Flights of the Fathers but now he is of another mind every Submissive word every Respectful Form of Expression that he finds to have dropped at any time from the Mouths of the Members of a Synod when addressing to their Prince is Ground sufficient to rear a proof of his Prerogative upon But thus it is when Princes are to be complimented at the Expence of their Subjects Rights Compliments shall pass for Arguments As Dr. Wake has furnished himself with a Plea for the boundlâ—â—s Authority of Sovereigns in Church-matters from such Extraordinary Acts of Power as have been submitted to in good Princes so can he argue as well from the Unjust and Violent Encroachments of Ill ones Henry the Eighth was such if ever any Prince upon Earth was and Sir Walter Rawleigh therefore says of him that if all the Pictures and Patterns of a Merciless Prince were lost in the World they might all again be painted to the Life out of the Story of this King * Preâ— to hiâ— Hist. of the World And yet the Acts of this King the most Exorbitant and Oppressive Acts of Power which he exercised towards the Clergy are produced by Dr. Wake as good and lawful Precedents which all his Successors are allowed and incited to follow Particularly that Instance of his Correcting and Amending the Determinations of the Clergy in Synod even upon Doctrines of Faith is given us †See pp. 136 137 138 139. without any Intimation that such a practice exceeded the Bounds of the Kingly Power And in this he is followed by Mr. Nicholson ‖ Hist. Lib. â—ol 3. p. 196 197 And both these Gentlemen are so eager to assert this Power to the Crown that they have not given themselves leisure to inquire how far the Authorities they in this case cite are to be depended on Dr. Wake quotes my Lord of Sarum for it whose words are These Articles in 1536 being thus conceived and in several places corrected and tempered by the King 's Own Hand were subscribed by Cromwell and the Archbishop of Canterbury and Seventeen other Bishops Forty Abbots and Priors and Fifty Archdeacons and Proctors of the Lower House of Convocation * Hist. Ref. Vol. 1. p. 217. And in the Addenda to his first Volume †P. 364. his Lordship further says that He has had the Original with all the Subcriptions to it in his Hands I have had it too and can assure the Reader that there is not a single Correction by Henry the Eighth's hand or any others in that Original 'T is a Copy fairly Engrossed in Parchment ‖ See it Bibl. Cotton Cleop. â— 5. without any Interlineations or Additions whatever My Lord Herbert indeed who is Mr. Nicholson's and I suppose my Lord of Sarum's * I suppose so because my Lord of Sarum 's account of the Subscriptions is exactly the same as my Lord Herbert 's and with the same mistakes no Deans being mentioned by either nor any Consideration had of those of the Lower House who subscribed in double Capacities which makes the Subscriptions more numerous than they are represented to be Authority says that the Bishops and Divines who consulted upon these Articles were divided in their Opinions some following Luther and some the Old Doctrine whose Arguments on either side the King himself took pains to peruse and moderate adding Animadversions with his own Hand which are to be seen in our Records †Hist. H.S. p. 469. But these words I must be bold to say are mistaken both by my Lord Bishop and Mr. Nicholson if they infer from thence that the King made any Alterations in the Articles after they were drawn up since the Animadversions plainly were not on the Articles themselves but on the Arguments urged on either side of the Questions determined in ' em These Arguments or Opinions were it seems according to the known way of that time offered in Writing and subscribed by the Parties maintaining 'em And the King took upon him to temper and soften the Expressions on either side till he had brought both to a Compliance But this is a very different thing from his Correcting and Amending the Articles themselves even as different as assisting in the Debates of a Synod before the Conclusion is formed and altering the Conclusion it self after it has been unanimously agreed on This is truly the Case of those Amendments of Henry the Eighth which Dr. Wake is so full of However had it been such as he represents it yet no Argument of Right I say can be advanced on such Facts as these and it had become Dr. Wake therefore when he related 'em to have told us withal that they were unjustifiable Many of the Actions of that Supreme Head of the Church were such as cannot justly and will therefore I hope never be imitated by any of his Successors For instance he made his Bishops take out Patents to hold their Bishopricks at pleasure tho' I suppose my Lords the Bishops that now are do not think such a Power included in the Notion of the King's Supremacy William the Conquerour is another of the Pious Patterns he recommends who would suffer nothing he says to be determined in any Ecclesiastical Causes without Leave and Authority first had from him * P. 179. L.M.P. p. 34. for which he cites Eadmerus and might have told us from thence if he had pleased more particularly that he would not let any of his Noblemen or Ministers tho' guilty of Incest and the Blackest Crimes be proceeded against by Church-Censures and Penalties * Nulli Episcoporum permittebat ut aliquem de Baronibus suis seu Ministris sive Incestu sive Adulterio â—ive aliquo Capitali Crimine denotatum publicè nisi ejus praecepto implacitaret aut Excommunicaret aut ullâ Ecclesiastici rigoris poenâ constringeret Eadmer pag. 6. that he made his Bishops his Abbots and Great Men out of such as would be sure to do every thing he desired of 'em and such as the World should not much wonder at for doing it as knowing who they were from whence he took 'em and for what end he had raised 'em and that all this he did in order to make way for his Norman Laws and Usages which he resolved to establish here in England †Usus atque Leges quas Patres sui ipse in Normanniâ— habere solebant in Angliá servare volens de hujusmodi Personis Episcopos Abbates alios Principes per totam terram instituit de quibus indignum judicaretur si per omnia suis Legibus postpositá omni aliâ consideratione non obedirent si ullus corum pro quávis terrenâ potentiâ caput contra eum levare auderet scientibus cunctis Unde Qui ad Quid assumpti sunt Cuncta ergo Divina Humana ejus Nutum expectabant Ibid. This I say and more than this he might have given us from the very Page
Entertainment that follows P. 84. He proposes this Question Whether the Prince should be allow'd a Power to alter or improve what a Synod has defin'd to add to or take from it and thus he resolves it Sure I am that this Princes have done and so I think they have Authority to do For since the Legislative Power is lodg'd in their hands so that they may make what Laws or Constitutions they think fit for the Church as well as the State since a Synod in matters relating to Discipline is but a kind of Council to them in Ecclesiastical Affairs whose Advice having taken they may still act as they think fit seeing lastly a Canon drawn up by a Synod is but as it were Matter prepar'd for the Royal Stamp the last forming of which as well as enforcing whereof must be left to the Princes Iudgment I cannot see why the Supreme Magistrate who confessedly has a Power to confirm or reject their Decrees may not also make such other Use of them as he pleases and correct improve or otherwise alter their Resolutions according to his Own Liking before he gives his Authoty to them †P. 85. He is speaking here I confess of the Power of the Prince at large without pointing his words particularly on England but since he asserts this Power to every Prince and does not except Ours it is manifest he means him as much as if he had particularly mention'd him And this he himself is not shy of owning for before the End of this Chapter he in plain terms tells us that by Our Own Constitution the King of England has all that Power over Our Convocation that ever any Christian Prince had over his Synods †P. 98. And goes on afterwards ⸪ P. 136. to shew that H. the VIII did this very thing in 1536 correcting and amending with his Own Hand the Articles of Religion then drawn up before they were publish'd He does not indeed expresly Iustify this Act of H. the VIII but which is all one he mentions it without a word to shew that he disapprov'd it I will be bold to say that were this single Doctrine true the Late King might have gone a great way toward subverting our Religion without breaking in upon the Constitution or doing any thing Illegal He might have assembled the Clergy and commanded their Iudgment upon such and such Points and then alter'd their Resolutions to his Own Liking and so have set up Rank Popery under the Countenance of a Protestant Convocation Especially if he had call'd this other Principle of Dr. W's into his Aid Some of our Princes he says have not only prescrib'd to our Convocations what they should go about but have actually drawn up before hand what they thought Convenient to have established and have requir'd them to approve of it without submitting it to their Iudgments whether they approv'd of it or not ‖ P. 110. Which Fact also he gives us as a Right without insinuating the least Dislike of it And a very Convenient Right it is for Princes that meditate New Schemes of Church Government Twelve Years ago enforc'd by the Pen of a Parker or a Cartwright it might have done great Service it would have helpt on all the Pious Designs then upon the Anvil and if the Asserter of it had not been a Bishop to be sure it would have made him one Can such Doctrines ever be Serviceable I say not Grateful to This Government which would have ruin'd our Establish'd Religion under the Former But his Conclusions are not worse than his way of coming at them which is in this and in every case first by shewing what has been practis'd by the Emperors and other Absolute Princes and by asserting the same Power to belong to Our King as a King not by vertue of the particular Laws and Usages of this Realm but by the Right of Sovereignty in general †See Appeal p. 111.112 upon which he expresly owns himself to found the Authority of our Princes in Matters Ecclesiastical †See Appeal p. 111.112 and says therefore as we have heard that they have the same Power over Our Convocations that ever any Christian Prince had over his Synods And accordingly makes it the whole Business of his second Chapter that is of a Fourth part of his Book to set out the Powers exercis'd by Absolute Princes and particularly by the Roman Emperors over their Synods in order to warrant the Use of like Powers here at home I know not how this Doctrine may relish now but in the 7th * Mr. Nicholson See Hist. Libr. part 3. p. 177. according to his Exactness in Dates places this 3 io Iacobi whereas the Book it self was not set out till two Years afterwards as if he had seen any Edition of it he might from the Date of the Preface have known But he unluckily met with a false Print to this purpose in the Posthumous part of Spelman 's Glossary in Voce Tenura and he is always an Implicit Transcriber Year of King James the I. as high as Prerogative then ran it did not I am sure go down well with the Parliament for then Dr. Cowel's Interpreter was censur'd by the Two Houses as asserting several Points to the overthrow and destruction of Parliaments ond of the Fundamental Laws and Government of the Kingdom And One of the Articles charg'd upon him to this purpose by the Commons in their Complaint to the Lords was as Mr. Petyt †Miscell Parl. p. 66. says out of the Journal this that follows 4thly The Doctor draws his Arguments from the Imperial Laws of the Roman Emperors an argument which may be urg'd with as great reason and with as great Authority for the reduction of the State of the Clergy of England to the Polity and Laws in the Time of those Emperors as also to make the Laws and Customs of Rome and Constantinople to be binding and obligatory to the Citys of London and York The issue of which Complaint was that the Author for these his Outlandish Politicks was taken into Custody and his Book condemn'd to the Flames Nor could the Dedication of it to his then Grace of Canterbury save it who did not think himself concern'd to countenance whatever Doctrine any Indiscreet Writer should take the Liberty to ascribe to him He that thinks a Prince Absolute in Spirituals thinks him no doubt as Absolute in Temporals and will when a Proper time shall come not stick to say so Dr. W. has given some significant Hints that way in the words already produc'd from him for what else can he mean by the Legislative Powers being lodg'd in the Princes hands so that he may make what Laws he pleases for the Church as well as the State if we consider him to speak as he does of the Prince exclusively to the Three Estates of the Realm And when he adds therefore a few Lines afterwards that a Canon is
Memory of the Clergy and according to his deep Skill in English History has represented it * P. 248. Nor yet merely for Appearing and Making Suit in his Courts as a Greater Author †Bishop Burnet 's Hist. of Ref. Vol. I. p. 106. but in this Conjecture no less Unhappy than He seems to take it for then All the Clergy could not have been concluded under the Penalty for All had not Su'd there But that which made the whole Body at once Obnoxious was their obeying his Mandates †Rigida enim Provisionum Jura says Josceline upon this occasion non modò eos puniunt qui Romanas Legationes sine Regis Licentia suscipiunt sed qui iis parent Ant. Brit. Eccles. in Warhamo p. 325. and appearing in his Synods Legantine which the Clergy had often and lately (*) An. 1527. done The Cardinal had been a Favourite beyond Example the Sole and Uncontroul'd Minister of his Prince He was at that time Lord Chancellor by the King's Commission and had been made Legat with his Privity and at his Special Instance as Bishop Gardiner informs us (†) In a Letter to the Protectour Fox Vol. II. p. 2. col 1. What he did in one Capacity as well as in the other was presum'd to be done by the King 's Appointment and whoever had opposed him had certainly been crush'd by the Royal Power The Subject neither durst nor thought it necessary to enquire whether He had a License from the Great Seal who had himself the keeping it However their Obedience to his Unlicens'd Authority was Criminal even to the Loss of Liberty and Estate And could they in any case have vouch'd the King's Command for their Obeying it the Command would have been said to have been against Law and no Warrant Thus both the Clergy and Laity were unawares at the King's Mercy and the Clergy not admitted to pardon Gratis as the Laity afterwards were but forc'd to ransome themselves by a good Round Sum * 100000 l. for the Province of Canterbury and 18840 l. 10 d. for that of York which was laid as all other Convocation-Grants were proportionably on the whole Clergy as appears from the Assessments to be seen still in the Bishops Registers particularly in that of Hereford An. 1531. And I wonder therefore that my Lord of Sarum should say That he had not been able to discover whether the Inferior Clergy paid their Proportion of this Tax or not Vol. I. p. 115. and agen That the Prelates had a great Mind to draw 'em in to bare a share of the Burthen Ib. p. 114. He speaks of the Time after the Convocation which made the Grant was up For this was both Needless and Impracticable Needless because the Lower Clergy had already drawn themselves in by consenting to the Grant in Convocation and Impracticable because if they had not there was no way left of drawing 'em in afterwards for those times and by an Acknowledgment in Convocation that the King was Supreme Head together with the Submission and Petition recited in the Preamble of the Act we are discoursing of There the Clergy first knowledge and the Parliament add according to the Truth that the Convocation is always hath been and ought to be Assembled by the King 's Writ Which Acknowledgment however is not according to Truth unless understood of Parliamentary Convocations that is of those which were summoned as well by the Praemunientes as by the Archbishop's Mandate And to Those therefore it must be restrain'd And they had reason to Own and Avow this particularly because the Cardinal had taken upon him to Convene Legantine Synods by his own Authority frequently during his Ministry and particularly Once not long before his Fall and the Time of this Submission on Nov. 27. 1527. * As I gather from a Printed Sermon of Longland 's said to be Preached on that Day and Year Coram Celeberrimo Conventu tùm Archiepiscoporum cùm Episcoporum caeteraeque multitudinis in Occidentalis Coenobii Sanctuario juxta Londinum Though this Title I confess is somewhat Dubious And that Practice of his therefore might be oppos'd by this Declaration which prefaces the Submission In the Submission which follows the Clergy promise in Verbo Sacerdotii that they will never from henceforth presume to Attempt Alledge Claim or put in Ure Or Enact Promulge or Execute any New Canons Constitutions Ordinance Provincial or other or by whatsoever other name they shall be called in the Convocation unless the King 's most Royal Assent and License may to them be had to Make Promulge and Execute the same And that his Majesty do give his most Royal Assent and Authority in that behalf Now here are Two several Things distinctly promised in Two Different Branches of the same Sentence divided from Each other by the Particle Or They will not Attempt Alledge Claim or put in Ure that is one part of their promise Or Enact Promulge or Execute that is another The First of these respects Canons as already made whether by a Foreign or Domestick Authority the Second as to be made here at Home The Former part of their Assurance is given in their Private and Ministerial Capacity in relation to the Proceedings in the Spiritual Courts the Latter in their Publick and Legislative Capacity as they were Members of Convocation In their Private Capacity as they might be either Judges or Litigants they promise not to Attempt Alledge Claim or put in Ure i. e. not to be any ways Instrumental in acknowledging or promoting the force of any Canons made without the Royal Assent such as the whole Text of the Foreign Canon Law and all our Own Provincial and Legantine Constitutions were In their Publick Capacity they promise further not to Enact Promulge or Execute any such Canons for the Future unless they may have the same Royal License for it But here is no promise couch'd in any of these words that they will not debate about the matter or form the Draught of a Canon without such a License None of the Words Enact Promulge or Execute which alone relate to their Proceedings in Convocation including any such Promise and the only word which can be pretended to imply it the word Attempt being determinnd by its Situation to signify much the same thing as Alledge Claim or put in Ure and restraining the Persons promising only as they might Act in their Private or Ministerial Capacity that is out of Convocation To Attempt a Canon therefore must signify to put it upon tryal or prove the force of it and is a word of Art borrowed from the Civilians However we need not go so far for an account of it the very Act we are upon affording us an undeniable Instance of its being thus used as will appear if we consider the Petition of the Clergy which follows this Promise and the Enacting Words in the Body of the Statute which answer to that Petition The Petition
inform his Readers what Opposition it met with from the Clergy e'er it pass'd I have seen the Iournal of that Synod it is not so Large indeed as those Records of Convocation which Heylin saw Reformat justified Sect. 2. and wherein he says the whole Debate with all the Traverses and Emergent Difficulties which appear'd therein are specify'd at large However it is particular enough to shew with what Difficulty and by what steps the Clergy were drawn into a Complyance and how Threatning Messages were sent 'em by the King before they could be brought to it And I have already from another Manuscript promis'd the Reader the several Forms of Submission which they drew up one after another but could not get accepted There is no Reason therefore to complain of want of Light in this case for perhaps there is scarce any one thing done in any of H. the 8 th's Convocations of which we have a clearer and fuller account than of the Opposition which the Court-Form of Submission met with from the Clergy before they came up to it From the Inferior Clergy I mean for it does not appear that the Prelates were so very hard to be dealt with On the contrary it is said in the Acts that but one Bishop and not one Abbot or Prior disagreed to it but of the Lower Clergy 18 or 19 Voted against it to the very last and 7. or 8. referr'd that is Voted neither against it nor for it See Troub Try of Laâ—d p. 82. may be drawn to import by the Ambiguous Relation of the word Attempt as it now stands there yet the Parliament it is plain would take it and accordingly Enacted it in no other sense than I have given of it distinctly severing it in the Body of the Act from all those words that have any respect to the Making of a Canon and confining it to that Branch of the Sentence which suspends all the Old Canons already made Then comes the other Branch which prescribes the Method of making new ones and forbids the Clergy to Enact Promulge or Execute any without the King's Assent leaving them in the mean time to their Old Methods of Proposing and Deliberating and reducing their Power only to the same Level with that of Parliaments over which they had before great and sensible advantages in as much as they Enacted Canons by their own Authority without the Royal Concurrence and in Synods oftentimes which met without a Royal Summons This I question not is the true and genuine Exposition of the Act and this being the very Hinge on which the Second Article of the Dispute turns I thought my self oblig'd to consider it with a very particular care and to secure it if possible against all Exceptions I hope I have done so and that the Reader is by this time fully satisfy'd that no Restraint is laid by it upon any Convocational Act of the Clergy previous to the passing a Canon but that they have still as much Liberty to Treat Debate and Conclude so they do not Enact Promulge and Execute since this Statute as ever they had before it Sure I am that it has been thus understood all along by those who may be presum'd to be best acquainted with its meaning such as Poulton and Rastal were The one in his Abridgement puts this Title before the Act That the Clergy in their Convocations shall Enact no Constitutions without the King's Assent The other in his Repertory at the End of the Statutes makes this to be the Purport of it That the Clergy in their Convocations shall Enact nothing unless they have the King's Assent and License Neither of 'em were aware it seems that their Liberty of Debate was cut off by it My Lord Herbert took it just as they did for his short Summary of it is that in Convocations nothing shall be Promulg'd and Executed without the King's Leave * P. 399. Mr. Fox was of the same mind for thus he abridges it That the Clergy shall not hereafter presume to assemble in their Convocation without the King 's Writ or to Enact or Execute Constitutions without his Royal Assent †Vol. 2. p. 330. Bishop Godwyn does not differ in his account of it which is In praedicto porrò Parliamento decretum est de abrogandâ— Synodi Authoritate in Canonibus Ecclesiasticis condendis nisi quatenus Rex eos ratos habuisset * Annal. ad Ann. 1534. Francis Mason the Eminent Defender of our Orders represents it after the very same manner in a small Piece of his about the Authority of the Church in making Canons and Constitutions concerning things Indifferent There he says It is Enacted by the Authority of Parliament that the Convocation shall be assembled always by vertue of the King 's Writ and that their Canons shall not be put in Execution unless they be approv'd by the Royal Assent †P. 15. Nor had the Enemies of the Church any other Opinion in this matter than its Friends witness what the same Author in his Great Work mentions as the sense of the whole Body of the Puritans Ostendunt Puritani sub sinem sui Examinis Canones prorsus nullos vigere aut valere in Angliâ qui Regio Calculo ac Sigillo non sunt muniti * Fitz-Simon apud Masonum de Minist Angl. p. 21. And thus speaks one of them in a Treatise of Oaths exacted by Ordinaries c. and He no inconsiderable Writer It is Enacted he says and Provided that no Constitutions or Ordinances should be made or put in Execution within this Realm until c. †P. 54. Nay thus speaks Mr. Bagshaw himself in his famous Argument concerning the Canons where we may be sure he says nothing more to the advantage of the Clergy than he needs must and yet he represents the Act to be only that to the making of Canons there must be the King 's Royal Assent * P. 12. And when he is to produce the words of the Statute by which the Clergy have power to make Canons he says they are That they shall not Enact Promulge or Execute any Canons or Constitutions c. unless they may have the King 's most Royal Assent to Make Promulge and Execute the same †Ibid. But as to Attempting Alledging Claiming and putting in Ure he never dreamt that These were in the Act apply'd or were applicable to this purpose and therefore does not mention them Intruth he was a Lawyer and a Man of Skill in his Profession and so knew very well that in the Omission of these words as having no reference to the Clergy's Power of making Canons he only trac'd the steps of the King's Commissions to the Convocationâ— in 1603 and 1640. One of these is Printed at length in the * P. 285 290. Bibliotheca Regia and there All of the 25 H. 8. which relates to the Clergy's Power in Making Canons is inserted at large and which is
very remarkable those words Attempt Alledge Claim and put in Ure are not recited A sure sign that the Attorney-Generals of those times 〈◊〉 those Times had Attorney-Generals that had both Skill and Will enough to carry the King's Prerogative as high as it would bear did not think that they could colourably be made use of to this purpose or that the Clergy were debarr'd by this Act from attempting New Canons to be made hereafter but such Old ones only as had been long ago pass'd and publish'd Dr. Wake therefore is Disingenuous in the Highest Degree where †Append. Num. V. p. 371. he pretends to Print this very Commission and when he comes to the Act of Parliament which it recites does not transcribe the Act as it is there recited which is in part only but refers us to his Extract of it Num. IV. and assures us that it is recited in the Commission as in the Extract Verbatim tho' the most Material words in his Extract and such as would be most Conclusive upon the Clergy's Convocational Acts and Debates if they really belong'd to 'em are as I have shewn designedly omitted in that Recital Such poor shifts is he forc'd to to maintain a Bad Cause which however even by these Ill Arts cannot be maintain'd The Proof drawn from these Commissions is farther confirm'd by a Proclamation of K. Charles the First in Iune 1644 * See it Biblioth Reg. pag. 331. which forbids the Assembly of Divines to Meet and Act upon these and these Accounts only Because by the Laws of the Kingdom no Synod or Convocation of the Clergy ought to be called and assembled within this Realm but by Authority of the King 's Writ and no Constitution or Ordinance Provincial or Synodal or any other Canons may be Made Enacted Promulg'd or Executed it says not Attempted Alledg'd Claim'd or puâ— in Ure which were words known to belong to Canons already made Unless with the King 's Royal Assent and License first obtain'd upon pain of every one of the Clergy's doing contrary and being thereof convict to suffer Imprisonment and make Fine at the King's Will as by the Statute of the 25 H. 8. declaring and enacting the same it doth and may appear Let me add to all these the Authority of the Convocation it self which set out the Institution of a Christian Man a few years after they had submitted In the Dedication of that Book the Prelates address the King after this manner Without your Majesty's Power and License we acknowledg and confess that we have none Authority either to assemble together for any pretence or purpose or to publish any thing that might by us be agreed on or compil'd Which words evidently imply a power of agreeing upon and compiling tho' they deny that of publishing any Determination or Doctrine It were endless after this to argue from the silence of the Authors of those times for then I must vouch All of them Only the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum being a Book of Great Note which was drawn up by Commissioners appointed by the King and where no Occasion is neglected of setting out and magnifying the Royal Power it may be worth our while to observe that there is not however in all that Book as far as I can find one Expression that implies the Composers of it to have thought that the Clergy's Synodical Debates lay under any Restraint from the Crown which is a very strong Presumption that they did not think the Clergy to lye under any The Reader will forgive me for laying together this Great Heap of Authorities if he either considers of how great Importance it is to my Cause that the sense I have given of the Act should be fully clear'd or how necessary Dr. Wake has made such a Collection by affirming that this sense of it was never allowâ—d of or for ought he knows so much as heard of I repeat his very words till the Gentleman against whom he writes enlighten'd the world with it P. 289. The Accounts I have given do I hope both sufficiently expose the Rashness and Vanity of this Assertion and also sufficiently prove the Truth and Justness of that Exposition To return to it therefore The Statute as far as it relates to the Power of the Clergy in Convocation plainly implies no more than that Canons should not from thenceforth pass and become Obligatory without the King's Leave and Authority given in that behalf without his Leâ—ve which was requisite to their Passing and his Authority which was afterwards to ratifie and give 'em force And to understand the words of the Law otherwise is as has appear'd to understand them against all Propriety and the Rules of Construction and which is still more unreasonable to do this in Materiâ minùs favorabili and where Ordinary Liberty is abridg'd and lastly which is intolerable where so grievous a Penalty as that of a Praemunire is to follow The 25 of H. 8. then has not in the least alter'd the Law of Convocations in relation to any of the Powers or Priviledges of the Inferior Clergy They can still freely Consult and Debate Petition or Represent propose the Matter or Form of New Canons and consider about the Inforcing or Abrogating old ones in a word act in all Instances and to all Degrees as they could before the passing of that Statute Indeed my Lord Archbishop's hands are ty'd by it for he cannot now call a Convocation without the King 's Writ which before this Act he might and in Elder Times frequently did He cannot now Enact and Constitute any thing by his own Authority as in Imitation of the Papal Power in Councils and of the Royal Power in Parliaments it was usual for him to do He must before he passes any Act of the Two Houses have the King's Assent to it and after it is pass'd there must be the King's License also to Promulge and Execute it In these several Respects the Metropolitan's Authority is considerably lessen'd by this Act the Exercise of which is now chiefly seen in Moderating the Debates of the Synod and giving his Vote last upon any Question propos'd there as Dr. Cousins Dean of the Arches to his Grace that then was does in his Tables express it * Ejus est moderari Synodum ultimò Suffragium ferre Tab. 3. But the Powers and Priviledges of All the other Members of Convocation continue whole and entire to 'em notwithstanding this Statute and were so understood to continue for a long time after it pass'd the Methods of proceeding in Convocation continuing the same for near Threescore and ten years after the Act as they had been before it the Clergy going on still to propose deliberate and resolve as they had been us'd to do without Qualifying themselves for it by any Precedent License under the Broad Seal the King the Parliament and People of the Realm allowing 'em so to do without opposing this Method as Illegal
some Late Writers pretending to answer the Letter to a Convocation Man particularly by the Author of a Letter to a Member of Parliament and by Dr. Wake in his Book intitled The Authority of Christian Princes over their Ecclesiastical Synods asserted c. This Book being written by a Person of some Station in the Church and as is pretended under the Cover of a Great Authority deserves to be examined with a more than ordinary care which accordingly I have resolved to bestow upon it Dr. Wake indeed has a Peculiar Talent at enlarging on a Controversie the shortest Point when it comes under his Fruitful Pen immediately improves into a Volume I shall not so far follow his Example as to trace all he has said step by step and Page by Page and take every Opportunity that he has given me of laying open his misapplied Reading and mistaken Reasonings That would be an Endless Task which I have no leisure for neither does the Cause require it nor would the Reader bear it I shall endeavour therefore as much as I am able to shorten this Debate and in order to it shall first of all make some General Reflections upon his way of managing it wherein I shall shew how very little there is in his Tedious Work that really concerns the Point disputed and how much of it is written against no body and for no End in the World that I can see but the Pleasure of Emptying his Common-Place-Book I may very aptly apply to him what Bishop Andrews said of a much Greater Adversary Etsi nobis lis nulla de Regiâ in Ecclesiasticis Potestate tamen exorari non potest Tortus quin in Campum exeat istius Controversiae ubi quaestio nobis nulla de eâ re ostendat tamen nobis Testes minimè necessarios Explicare scilicet voluit Opes suas ostendere quae habebat in Adversariis suis. Habebat autem ad hanc rem nonnulla si incidisset alicubi Iam quia non incidit occasionem arripit non valdè idoneam ea quoquo modo proferendi Vult enim Lectorem videre quà m Cupressum pingat eleganter * Tortura Torti p. 169 I shall not I hope be thought impertinent in displaying these Impertinences of his which I shall do in as narrow a compass and under as few Heads of Observation as the variety of the matter will admit of And I. I observe that Dr. Wake has put himself to a great deal of needless pains to prove a Point which he might if he pleased have taken for granted that every Christian Prince and Ours in particular has an Ecclesiastical Supremacy and that the Clergy are not by a Divine Right intitled to transact Church-affairs in Synods as they please and as often as they please without any regard to the Civil Christian Power that they live under Many of those numerous Instances he has produced of Princes intermedling with Church-matters here at home or abroad are designed only to assert this Great Truth which however is a Point that he needed not to have laboured so heartily because no Church of England man ever denied it not the Man he writes against I am sure who says only and what he says I shall not fear to say after him that the Civil and Spiritual Powers are distinct in their End and Nature Lett. to a Conv. Man pp. 17 18. and therefore ought to be so in their Exercise too The One relates to the Peace Order Health and Prosperity of the Man in this Life as a Sociable Creature the other concerns his Eternal State and his Thoughts Words and Actions preparative thereto The first is common to all Societies whether Pagan or Christian the Latter can rightly be exercised among Christians only and among them not as inclosed within any Civil State or Community but as Members of a Spiritual Society of which Iesus Christ is the Head who has also given out Laws and appointed a standing Succession of Officers under himself for the Government of this Society And these Ministers of his did actually govern it by these Powers committed to them from him for near 300 years before any Government was Christian. From whence says he it follows that such Spiritual Iurisdiction cannot be in its nature necessarily dependent on the Temporal for then it could never have been lawfully exercised till Kings States and Potentates became Christian. And agen in another place This Power having been claimed and exercised by the Apostles and their Successors without any Regard nay in Opposition to the Heathen Temporal Authority is therefore we say not necessarily in its own nature dependent on such Authority †P. 19 20. Than which Reasoning nothing certainly can be more just nor could that Writer have expressed himself with more Caution and Guard upon so nice an Occasion Dr. Wake seems here to have apprehended him as if he had affirm'd that Princes have nothing to do in Church-matters the Management of which lyes without their Sphere and no ways depends on Their Authority But no Man living could have struck this sense out of his words that was not either very Blind or very willing for some small End or other to misunderstand him Cannot this mighty Controvertist distinguish between Denying the Exercise of Ecclesiastical Power to be necessarily dependent on the Temporal and affirming it to be necessarily independent upon it Does he not see a difference between saying that the Church may subsist without the State and that the State has nothing to do in the Government of the Church If he does not he ought to forbear tampering in Disputes of this kind till his Judgment is better and his Head clearer But if seeing this difference he yet resolved to take no notice of it either because he had made Collections some time of his Life about the Supremacy and was resolved to take this Opportunity of giving himself the Credit of them or because he saw it would be of use to him to have the Writer he appears against represented under as Invidious Colours and his Opinions loaded with as much weight as was possible if this were the Case it must be allowed him that there was some little Art tho' I think no very great share of Honesty in his Management 'T is true the Letter to a Convocation-man immediately after the last words I transcribed from it adds And if we should say further that this Society has an Inherent and Unalterable Right to the Exercise of this Power it would be no more than what every Sect or Party among us claims and practises c. But Dr. Wake could not with any colour lay hold of this Passage as asserting the Independency of the Church on the State for besides that it is only a way of arguing drawn from other Mens Principles it is a few Lines afterwards expresly retracted and qualifyed But this says he is what at the present we neither do nor need say Notwithstanding which Dr.
Decrees of those four first General Councils for which both the Church and the Law of England * Canon Aelfrici Can. 33. 1 Eliz. c. 1. have and have always had a particular Veneration But of All the Instances he has pitched upon to shew that Synods can debate of nothing but what the Prince particularly proposes to 'em commend me to those he urges P. 54 55. from the Practice of Carloman at the Synod of Leptines and of Arnulph at that of Trebur The first of these says he had call'd his Clergy together to advise him how the Law of God and the Religion of the Church which had been suffered to fall into such decay in the days of his Predecessors might be restored The second desires them to consider what they thought was needful to be done for the Reformation of Mens Manners for the Security of the Faith and for the Preservation of the Unity of the Church How could these Emperors possibly have expressed themselves in words that left their Synods more at large or gave greater Scope to their Debates than these do which yet Dr. Wake produces on purpose to shew that the Prince prescribed to them the Particular Points on which they were to proceed These are Ill Proofs indeed but pity it is that such Bad Notions should ever be supported by better Under the Prince's Power of suggesting any Subject of Debate to a Synod I comprehend also his Power of proposing the Draught of a Canon to them for that too he has sometimes done but without confining 'em to pass such Canons in the Form prescribed which I conceive he has never done nor has any Right to do tho' Dr. Wake gives us very Broad Hints that he thinks otherwise and to that End produces the Three Ecclesiastical Constitutions which Marcian delivered to the Fathers of the Fourth General Council at Chalcedon ready drawn up to be approved by them and they all he says gave their Unanimous Assent to 'em * P. 65. But he tells us not as he might that the Matter of these Canons was of such a mixt nature as made it proper for the Emperor to interpose in them nor does he inform us with what words of high Respect and Deference he offered 'em to the Synod There are says he Three Points which in Honour to your Reverences we have reserved for you judging it fit and decent that they should rather be by You in Synod Canonically defined than Enacted by our Temporal Laws †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 6. And in what manner the Synod passed 'em is worth our notice for it was neither in that Order nor exactly in those Terms in which they were proposed And one of them ‖ The Second they put into different words without any the least alteration of sense merely as it should seem to keep free of an Ill Precedent which by receiving the Emperor's Form they might have brought upon themselves So that this is a much better Proof that the Emperor could not prescribe the Form of a Canon to them than that he could Nor are his English Instances of this kind more to his purpose Some of our Princes he says have not only prescribed to their Convocations what they should go about but have actually drawn up before-hand what they thought convenient to be established and have required them to approve of it * P. 110. And for this he vouches King Iames's Letter to the Convocation in 1603 together with which he sent them the Articles of 1562 to be approved by ' em A notable Instance of the Prince's Power actually to draw up before-hand what they think convenient to be established by their Synods because King Iames sent a Message to one of 'em about Confirming the Thirty nine Articles which had been actually drawn up by another Convocation forty years before that Message was sent And that this Point may be sure to be well proved he adds a Second Instance of it every whit as concluding as the Former The same Prince he says to Another Convocation about four years after signified his Pleasure for Singing and Organ-service to be setled in Cathedral Churches without submitting it to their judgment whether they approved it or no †Ibid. He tells us not from whence he drâ—w either this or the former particular and so I am not able to say how he has disguised them But taking this last as he has represented it clear it is that the King in this case did not form or draw up any thing before-hand for the Convocation to Sign but only suggested the Matter of a Canon to them and of such a Canon as if necessary there was no doubt of their agreeing unanimously in since it was only to confirm a received Practice and therefore if he did not ask their Approbation it was because he was sure of it Dr. Wake is in this Observation all over Mistake For whereas he calls this Another Convocation from that in 1603 it was certainly the same That in 1603 being by Prorogations continued from Time to Time for seven years together as his own words are a few Pages afterwards * P. 142. Nor could the Import of this Message well be the Setling of Singing and Organ-service in Cathedral Churches for it was setled there long before †At the Reforming of the Church not only the King's Chappel and all Cathedrals but many Parochial Churches also had preserved their Organs to which they used to Sing the appointed Hymns i. e. the Te Deum the Benedictus the Magnificat the Nunc dimittis c. performed in an Artificial and Melodious manner Heylin Hist. of Presbyt p. 226. Only King Iames I suppose recommended to 'em the framing of a Canon in behalf of what was hitherto authorized by Practice alone and by the Queen's Injunctions ‖ Sparrow p. 80. But this the Synod thought needless the Thing being otherwise so well established already and therefore framed no Canon concerning it How Ridiculous then is it in Dr. Wake to say that the King signified his Pleasure to them in this matter without ever submitting it to their Iudgment whether they approved it or no when the Event shews that they disapproved and did not comply with the Motion for I never heard of any such Canon in behalf of Singing and Organ-service and which is more Bishop Sparrow never heard of it neither If this Message therefore make any thing for the King's Power of Proposing it makes as strongly for the Clergy's Priviledge of denying if they think fit which is the very thing Dr. Wake is endeavouring in this place to deprive them of VI. A Sixth Observation I have to offer on Dr. Wake 's way of managing this Controversie is that Those very Acts of Authority which were exercised by Princes in Ecclesiastical Matters to support and corroborate the Churches Power are by Him perversely made use of to undermine and destroy it He finds that the
others and there was no change made in a Tittle by Parliament So that they only Enacted by a Law what the Convocation had done * Pp. 74 75. And agen As it were a Great Scandal on the first General Councils to say that they had no Authority for what they did but what they derived from the Civil Power so is it no less unjust to say because the Parliaments impowered †Here I must beg leave to say that his Lordship's Expression is not Exact The Parliament did not impower but approve of them some Persons to draw Forms for the more pure Administration of the Sacraments and Enacted that these only should be lawfully used in this Realm which is the Civil Sanction that therefore these Persons had no other Authority for what they did Was it ever heard of that the Civil Sanction which only makes any Constitution to have the force of a Law gives it another Authority than a Civil one The Prelates and other Divines that compiled our Forms of Ordination did it by vertue of the Authority they had from Christ as Pastors of his Church which did impower them to teach the People the pure Word of God and to administer the Sacraments and perform all other Holy Functions according to the Scripture the Practice of the Primitive Church and the Rules of Expediency and Reason and this they ought to have done tho' the Civil Power had opposed it in which case their Duty had been to have submitted to whatever Severities and Persecutions they might have been put to for the Name of Christ or the Truth of his Gospel But on the other hand when it pleased God to turn the Hearts of those which had the Chief Power to set forward this good Work then they did as they ought with all thankfulness acknowledge so great a Blessing and accept and improve the Authority of the Civil Power for adding the Sanction of a Law to the Reformation in all the Parts and Branches of it So by the Authority they derived from Christ and the Warrant they had from Scripture and the Primitive Church these Prelates and Divines made those Alterations and Changes in the Ordinal and the King and the Parliament who are vested with the Supreme Legislative Power added their Authority to them to make them obligatory on the Subjects * Pp. 53 54. I have produced these Passages at length not so much for any Light they give to the Particular we are now concerned in the Authority of the English Ordinal as for the General Use they may be of in setling the Dispute between Dr. W. and the Church about the Distinction of the Two Powers Ecclesiastical and Civil and the Obligations we are under to the Decisions of the one antecedently to the Sanctions of the other I subscribe to his Lordship's state of it and think nothing can be said more justly and truly 1552. The Observation of Holy-Days ordered by Act of Parliament Ibid. pag. 191. This Act traced the Steps of the Rubrick in the Common-Prayer-Book relating to Holy-Days and ordered none to be kept Holy but what had before-hand been so ordered to be kept by the Clergy in Convocations only it added New Penalties 1553. A New Catechism by the King's Order required to be taught by Schoolmasters Ibid. p. 219. This Catechism was published with the Articles of 1552. and had I suppose the very same Convocational Authority which those had It was compiled indeed by Poynet but is said in the King's Patent annexed to have been afterwards perused and allowed by the Bishops and other Learned Men by which we are to understand either the Convocation it self or a Grand Committee appointed by it and upon which its Power was devolved That the whole Convocation have been by these or such like Terms about this time often expressed the Instances given in the Margent * The Six Articles in the Act 31 H. 8. c. 14. are said to be agreed to by the Archbishops Bishops and other Learned Men of the Clergy who a little before are styl'd a Synod or Convocation In the Articles of 1536. See 'em in Bishop Burn. Vol. 1. Coll. of Rec. p. 305. the Convocation is expressed by the Bishops and others the most Discreet and Learned Men of the Clergy The Articles of 1552. are in the Title said to be such de quibus in Synodo Londinensi inter Episcopos alios Eruditos viros convenerat And iâ— will scarce I think bear a Reasonable Doubt whether these Articles passed the Convocation Finally The Act about Holidays as 't is called is in the Canon it self See it in Sparrow p. 167. said to be decreed by the King with the Common Assent and Consent of the Clergy in Convocation assembled But in the King's Letter to Bonner about it the words are By the Assents and Consents of all you Bishops and others Notable Personages of the Clergy of this our Realm in full Convocation and Assembly had for that purpose will evince And that this Catechism was generally understood to have the Authority of Convocation is plain even from the Exception made to it by Dr. Weston †For that said he there is a Book of late set forth called the Catechism bearing the Name of this Honourable Synod and yet put forth without your Consents as I have learned c. â—ox Vol. 2. p. 19. in the first Synod of Queen Mary but plainer still from Philpot's Reply to that Exception which discovers also to us somewhat of the Manner by which the Convocation came to be Intitled not to this Catechism alone but to several other Pieces that seem to carry the Name of a Committee only upon them His words are that This House of Convocation had granted the Authority to make Ecclesiastical Laws unto certain Persons to be appointed by the King's Majesty and whatsoever Ecclesiastical Laws They or the most part of them did set forth according to a Statute in that behalf provided it might be well said to be done in the Synod of London although such as be of this House now had no notice thereof before the Promulgation And in this Point be thought the setter forth thereof nothing to have slandered the House since they had our Synodal Authority unto them committed to make such Spiritual Laws as They thought convenient and necessary * â—bid p. â—0 The Knowledge of the Time and Circumstances of appointing this Committee we have lost together with the Acts themselves however plain it is from this Assertion of Mr. Philpot made in open Convocation that such a Committee there was named by the Crown at the Instance of the whole Clergy and that this Catechism among other things passed them and had on that account as He judged the Authority of Convocation It is left to the Reader by whom in this caâ—e he will be guided the Churches Martyr or her Betrayer And here the Instance of the Catechismus ad Parochos is very pat
to our purpose and ought once again to be remembred The rest of Dr. W.'s Particulars are Immaterial and need not stop us only on the Last of 'em a Line or two may be not improperly spent King Charles the First Directions concerning Preaching with respect to the Arminian Points These Directions were for the silencing both Parties and for preventing all Innovations upon the Doctrine of the Church already Established and such Directions it is not only the Christian Magistrates Priviledge but his Duty to prescribe provided always that he do it not with any such under-hand Views and Aims as my Lord of Sarum represents K. Charles the First to have had in publishing His All Divines says he were by Proclamation required not to Preach upon Those Heads but those that favour'd the New Opinions were encouraged and the others were depressed * Exposition on the XXXIX Article p. 152. I presume this is no part of the Regal Supremacy nor a Pattern fit to be imitated in succeeding Reigns especially if the case ever should be as his Lordship further informs us it was Then And unhappy Disputes continues He falling in at that time concerning the Extent of the Royal Prerogative beyond Law the Arminians having declared themselves highly for that they were as much favoured at Court as they were censured in Parliament If this were then really the case we of This Age have reason to thank Heaven for reserving us for better Times when the Interests of Prince and People are the same and it can never therefore be a recommending Qualification of a Man that he is for extending the Royal Prerogative beyond Law nor intitle him to the favour of a Court to be censured in Parliament These are the Instances in which Dr. Wake has shewn himself very willing to blast the Honour of the Reformation in order to assert an unreasonable Prerogative to the Crown for which no good Prince will thank him I have considered 'em throughout and have proved I hope that the History he brings to justifie his Principles is every whit as unjustifiable as the Principles themselves and that they deserve therefore to keep Company with one another In some of these Instances Truth was so easie to be come at that he must be thought to have missed it willingly and to have judged it pardonable to pervert History a little in order to make his Complement with the better Grace A Principle familiar to the Writers in this Controversie as I could shew by some Domestick Instances but since that is not proper shall content my self with a foreign one De Marca a Man excellently well read in this Debate and of Abilities of Mind equal to his Reading and like Dr. W. in nothing but in his Design of letting the Royal Power in upon the Church as far as he was able while he was writing his Famous Piece Baluzii Vita Petri de Marca c. in principio operis de Concordiâ Sacerd Imp. pp. 13 14. was named to the See of Thoulouse but not quickly setled there for want of his Bulls To obtain them he wrote a Letter to the Pope full of Submission and Respect and in it took occasion to compare his own advancement to the See of Tholouse with that of Exuperius formerly Bishop of that place whom he made the same with Exuperius the Spanish President on purpose that the Parallel might run the better He himself having for some time presided in Catalonia tho' he knew very well they were two different Men. When this was objected to him as an over-sight or rather as a piece of Art not very well becoming his Holy Character he laughed at the Objection and pitied the poor People that made it who were so scrupulously silly as to tye Men up to strict Truth in such cases as these and not able to distinguish between History and a Complement So that with the Writers in this Argument it has been it seems a Fashion all along to disguise Truth and the bending of matters of fact to by-purposes is a tried and approved Remedy for the Dispatch of Bulls As a Key to all the false Stories vouched by Dr. W. I have added this true one and should it happen not to be very pertinent or entertaining I have no Excuse to make to him on that head 't is but returning him a Freedom which he has often before-hand taken with his Reader I am sensible these Reflections of mine are running out into too great a Length and shall therefore only name two or three more without enlarging much upon ' em VII Dr. Wake makes no distinction between Absolute and Limited Princes but produces the Acts of the one to prove and justifie the Exercise of a like Power in the other His first Chapter is taken up in telling us what was done in relation to Ecclesiastical Synods and Affairs by the Roman and German Emperors and by other Princes of narrower Territory but not less Despotick in their Government as if what They did or had a Right to do were immediately the Right of every other Christian Prince without any regard to the Restrictions which the Power of that Prince might be under by the Constitution of his Country But now should he have told us what Acts of Absolute Authority were exercised by those Emperors in State-matters and how their Edicts had the force of Laws would this Plea justifie an English Prince in attempting the like things at home or be a Bar any ways upon the Rights and Priviledges of Parliament Indeed our Author seems sensible that these Instances are not very Conclusive where he confesses that Princes may by their own Acts Limit themselves and that such Limitations may alter the Case mightily and make that Lawful in one Country which is not so in another * P. 95. Pity it is that this Truth had not come into his Thoughts sooner than the 95 th Page of his Work it might then have prevailed with him to withdraw that huge Heap of Foreign Precedents which now take up so much room in his Work and which would have been left to sleep peaceably in his Common-place-Book without seeing the Light upon so improper an occasion For should what he has the Courage in his next Chapter to assert be true that by our own Constitution the King of England has all that Power at this day over our Convocation that EVER ANY Christian Prince had over his Synod †P. 98. yet the Power he has in this respect he derives from the Particular Rules of our Constitution not from any beyond-Sea-Customs and Usages He claims it not I suppose as Heir to the Imperial Authority of Constantine or Charles the Great but by vertue of that Prerogative which as King of England he has by the Laws of England and should the Power therefore happen to be equal here at home to what it is abroad yet there lyes no Proof from the one of these to the other Dr.
Wake it seems has different notions of these things for he tells us that Whatever Priviledges he has shewn to belong to the Christian Magistrate they belong to him as such they are not derived from any Positive Laws and Constitutions but result from that Power which every such Prince has Originally in himself and are to be looked upon as part of those Rights which naturally belong to Sovereign Authority and that to prove any particular Prince entitled to these Rights it is sufficient to shew that he is a Sovereign Prince and therefore ought not to be denied any of those Prerogatives that belong to such a Prince unless it can be plainly made out that he has afterwards by his own Act Limited himself * Pp. 94 95. So that according to Dr. Wake 's Politicks All Kings in All Countries have an Equal Share of Power in their first Institution none of 'em being Originally Limited or subjected to any Restraints in the Arbitrary Exercise of their Authority but such as they have been pleased by after-acts and condescensions graciously to lay upon themselves Which Position how it can be reconciled with an Original Contract and with several Branches of the Late Declaration of Rights I do not see and how far it may appear to the Three States of this Realm to entrench on their share in the Government and on the Fundamental Rights and Liberties of the Free People of England Time must shew That all Bishops indeed are Equal is the known Maxim of St. Cyprian but which of the Fathers have said that All Kings are so too I am I confess as yet to learn For my part I should think it as easie a Task to prove that every Prince had originally the same Extent of Territory as that he had the same Degree of Power The Scales of Miles in several Countries are not more different than the Measures of Power and Priviledge that belong to the Prince and to the Subject But Dr. W. has breathed French Air for some time of his Life where such Arbitrary Schemes are in request and it appears that his Travels have not been lost upon him He has put 'em to that Use which a Modern Author * Moldsworth's Pref. to the State of Denmark observes to be too often made of 'em that they teach Men fit Methods of pleasing their Sovereigns at the Peoples Expence tho' at present I trust his Doctrine is a little out of season when we live under a Prince who will not be pleased with any thing that is Injurious to the Rights of the Least of his Subjects when duly informed of them Whereas then Dr. W. in great Friendship to the Liberties of his Church and of his Country asserts that by our Constitution the King of England has all that Power at this day over our Convocation that EVER ANY Christian Prince had over his Synod I would ask him one plain Question Whether the King and the Three States of the Realm together have not more Power in Church-matters and over Church-Synods than the King alone If so then cannot the King alone have All that Power which ever any Christian Prince had because some Christian Princes have had all the Power that was possible even as much as belongs to the King and the Three Estates in Conjunction There is one thing indeed which seems material to be observed and owned in this case 't is the Assertion of the Second Canon which declares our Kings to have the same Authority in Causes Ecclesiastical that the Christian Emperours in the Primitive Church had But this Canon must necessarily be understood of the King in Parliament for out of Parliament it is manifest that he is not so Absolute in Ecclesiastical Matters as those Emperors were In Parliament he can do every thing that is by the Law of God or of Reason lawful to be done out of Parliament he can do nothing but what the Particular Rules of our Constitution allow of And VIII This too is a Distinction which Dr. W. should have taken notice of had he intended to do Justice to his Argument For the Church here in England is under the Government both of the Absolute and Limited Sovereign under the Government of the Limited Sovereign within the Compass of his Prerogative under the Government of the Absolute Sovereign without any Restraints or Bounds except what the Revealed Will of God and the Eternal Rules of Right Reason prescribe The Pope usurped not only on the King the Limited but on the King and Parliament the Absolute Sovereign and what was taken from Him therefore was not all thrown into the Prerogative but restored severally to its respective Owners And of this Absolute Sovereign it is the Duty when Christian to act in a Christian manner to be directed in matters Spiritual by the Advice of Spiritual Persons and not lightly to vary from it By the same Rule the Limited Sovereign is to steer likewise within the Sphere of his Prerogative And he is also further obliged to preserve those Priviledges of the Church which belong to her by the Laws of the Realm Now Dr. Wake I say confounds these two Powers and the Subjections that are due to them speaking all along of the King as if He in Exclusion to the Three Estates had the Plenitude of Ecclesiastical Authority lodged in him and were the single Point in which the Obedience of the Church and of every Member of it centered This is a Fundamental Mistake that runs quite through his Book and is such an One as overturns our Constitution and confounds the Executive and Legislative parts of it and deserves a Reprehension therefore some other way than from the Pen of an Adversary Henry the Eighth 't is true in vertue of his Supreme Headship laid claim to a Vast and Boundless Power in Church-affairs had his Vicegerent in Convocation Enacted every thing there by his own Sole Authority issuing out his Injunctions as Laws at pleasure And these Powers whether of Right belonging to him or not were then submitted to by All who either wished ill to the Pope or well to the Reformation or wanted Courage otherwise to bear up against his Tyrannical Temper and Designs and were the more easily allowed of by Church-men because they saw him at the same time exercise as Extravagant an Authority in State-matters by the Consent of his Parliament However the Title of Supreme Head together with those Powers that were understood to belong to it was taken away in the â—â—â—st of Queen Mary and never afterwards reâ—ved but instead of it all Spiritual Iurisdictiâ—â— was declared to be annexed to the Imperial â—rown of this Realm 1 Eliz. c. 1. and the Queen enabled to â—xercise it by a Commissioner or Commissiâ—ners This Power continues no doubt in â—he Imperial Crown but can be exerted no â—therwise than in Parliament now since the â—igh Commission Court was taken away by â—he 17 Car. 1. It was attempted indeed to be
191. The Canons made in the Convocation of 1597. bear this Title Capitula sive Constitutiones Ecclesiasticae per Archiepiscopum Episcopos reliquum Clerum Cant. Provinciae in Synodo c. congregatos tractatae ac posteà per ipsam Regiam Majestatem approbatae confirmatae utrique Provinciae tam Cant. quam Ebor. ut diligentiùs observentur eà dem Regiâ Authoritate sub Magno Sigillo Angliae promulgatae †Sparrow p. 243. L. M. P. has been guilty of a piece of slight of hand in producing this Title for he has remov'd the Comma which should be after the word Tractatae backward to Provinciae omitting the Words between those Two that so tractatae may seem to belong to the Sentence which follows it and the Reader be by that means led into a belief that the Original Treating it self was as much from Royal Condescension and Grace as the Passing and Promulging afterwards I need not say how absurd this is and how contrary to the Rules of common Construction and common Sense It is true and Truth being the only thing I seek I shall not conceal it that in the Manuscript Collections of a Learned Man who liv'd before the Convocation-Registers were burnt I have seen a Memor in these following Terms Lib. Convocat ab anno 1584. usque c. 1597. Fol. 195. The Queens Letters Patents to confirm the Canons a Recital of the Writ of their Desire the Canons Confirmation and a Command to have them observ'd in both Provinces Which shews indeed that the Synod in 1597 desir'd and had leave for the Canons they pass'd and implys further that both their Request and the Answer to it were very probably in writing since it could not else have been recited in the Ratification of them But what this Leave was ask'd and given for whether only for the passing these Canons or even for the Previous Treating about them appears not from this Memorandum and must otherwise therefore be determin'd Our Publick Records will not ease us of this Doubt among which I am told this Instrument is not now to be found and the only way therefore we have left of clearing it is by a Recourse to the Title of the Canons which if it may be depended on evidently shews that their Desire was for Leave not to Treat but to Enact only And how Authentick and Significant the Titles of Canons are to this purpose our Adversarys in the next Instance will tell us for they produce †Appeal p. 24. L. M. P. p. 37. the Title of those in 1603. as a manifest Proof that that Synod had a Commission to treat We allow it had and it is the first Synod that ever had one from the 25 H. VIII down to that time L. M. P. indeed has found out one somewhat Elder for he tells us that a Proclamation on came out 5. March 1. Iac. 1. for the Authorizing of the Book of Common Prayer c. which recites that the King had issu'd out a Commission to the Archbishop and others according to the Form which the Laws of the Realm in the like Case prescribe to be us'd to make an Explanation of the Common Prayer c. So that in those days says he this Independent Freedom of Debate was not esteemed amongst the Libertys of the Church †P. 41. But had that Writer seen the Commission it self and not guess'd at the Contents of it from a Recital in a Proclamation he would have known that it was directed not to the Clergy in Convocation for they met not till some Months after the Date of it but to the High Commissioners in Causes Ecclesiastical authorizing the Alterations they had made in the Common-Prayer-Book by vertue of a Proviso in the Act of Uniformity 1 â— Eliz. How is this to his purpose or what possible use can he make of it It is indeed to my purpose to observe from hence how high the Prerogative then ran and what Unreasonable Powers were claim'd by it The Book of Common-Prayer was establisht by an Act of the 1 st of the Queen in which it was provided that if there should happen any Contempt or Irreverence to be used in the Ceremonys or Rites of the Church by the misusing of the Orders appointed in that Book the Queens Majesty might by the Advice of her Commissioners or of the Metropolitan ordain and publish such further Ceremonys or Rites as might be most for the advancement of God's Glory the Edifying of his Church and the due Reverence of Christ's Holy Mysteries and Sacraments * Cap. 2. In vertue of this Proviso King Iames in his first Year gives Directions to the Archbishop and the rest of the High-Commissioners to review the Common-Prayer-Book and they accordingly made several Material Alterations and Enlargements of it in the Office of Private Baptism and in several other Rubricks and Passages added five or six new Prayers and Thanksgivings and all that part of the Catechism which contains the Doctrine of the Sacraments Which last Additions would not I conceive have been in the least warranted by that Proviso had the Powers there specify'd extended to the Queens Hâ—irs and Successors but as they were lodg'd peresonally in the Queen there could I presume be no Colour for K. Iames's exercising them in vertue of it The Drawer up of the Commission was aware of this and supplys therefore what was wanting in this Provisional Clause by some General Words and by a Recourse to that Inexhaustible source of Power the King 's supreme Authority and Prerogative Royall which it seems was at that time conceiv'd to extend so far as to enable the Crown to make Alterations of Great Importance in a Book establish'd by Act of Parliament to authorize the Book thus alter'd and to forbid the Use of the Other I question whether such a Proceeding would now be thought Legal but then it went down quietly and in vertue of it the Common Prayer-Book so alter'd stood in force from the 1 st of K. Iames till the 14 C. II. when upon a new Review it was again confirm'd by Parliament I shall place this Commission in the Appendix †N. XVIII that the Reader may have an Instance what the Doctrine of that time was concerning the Extent of the Prerogative in Church Matters and from thence cease to wonder that a Formal Commission to treat c. should be first granted to the Convocation a few Months afterwards I say first granted for there is no Suspicion of any preceding License of this kind but in 1597. only and that rises no higher than a Suspicion there being stronger Probabilitys against it than for it And thus I hope I have effectually remov'd Dr. W's Argument about the sense of the Act taken from the Constant Practise of All Convocations ever since the framing it which he appeals to so frequently and with so much Calmness and Security that one less acquainted with him than I am
Chapterhouse appears to have been the Place of Reception for the Convocation Clergy * See Wals. Hist. Angl. ad ann 1421. and in the 4 H. V. the Rolls say Le Chanceleur per commandment du Roy assigna a les ditz Chivalers Citizeins Burgeoises une Maison appellee le Froitour dedeinz L'abbee de Westminster a tenir en yâ—elle leur Counseilles Assemblees and in the 6 H. VI. it is said to be the place where the Commons ordinarily sat ‖ The Roll goes further and says Eorum Domus Communis antiquitùs usitata in a Manuscript of Mr. Petyt printed by Bishop Burnet †Hist. Ref. Vol. 1. Coll. of Rec. p. 100. But though the Place of their Meeting puzzles him yet the Time it seems does not for as to That he informs us that the Clergy who met by vertue of the Convocation-Writ in Parliament time came together heretofore on some Other Day than that on which the Parliament began †P. 224. He knows not it seems that they have done so a late too and that the Custom for an Age and half was for them to assemble the Day after the Parliament This Usage began in the time of H. the VIII th and was then often practis'd but not regularly fix'd till toward the latter End of his Reign from which time to the late Revolution it held and from thence the Parliament and Convocation-Writs have Summon'd to the very same day which has joyn'd these two Bodys yet more closely than formerly in their Summons though their Assemblys at the same time are more than ever divided My Lord of Sarum therefore had not well consider'd this matter when he said that it was the Custom of all H. the VIII's Reign for the Convocation to meet two or three days after the Parliament †Vol. 1. p. 213. For besides that it sometimes met before it for instance in 1511 2. the Convocation came together Feb. 2. * Registr Hadr. de Castello the Parliament not till Feb. 4. †Dâ—gd Summ. 3 H. 8 th the very Instance upon which his Lordship produces this Observation destroys it for the Convocation of 1536. began Iune 9 th the Parliament Iune the 8 th And indeed near half the Convocations in that Princes time met as they did till the present Reign nicely the day after the Parliament as will appear by particularly comparing the Dates of both of them Parliament Met 1514 5 Feb. 5. Dugd. Sum. 1515 Nov. 12. Ibid. 1536 Iune 8. Ibid. 1540 Apr. 12. Bp. Burnet V. 1. p. 274. 1544 5 Ian. 30. Dugd. 1545 Nov. 23. Ibid. 1546 7 Ian. 14. Ibid. Convocation Met Feb. 6. Registr Warham Nov. 13. Registr Hadr. de Cast. Iune 9. Ibid. Apr. 13. Registr Cranmer Ian. 31. Ibid. Nov. 24. Ibid. Ian. 15. Ibid. And the same Distance of Time was often also observ'd both in Proroguing and Dissolving that Princes Convocations and Parliaments As to the Authority by which the Clergy were conven'd Dr. W. affords us as little light in That Point too as in any of the former He recites the Opinion of some who think that after the statute of Premunire in 1393. our Archbishops left off to summon Convocations by their Own Authority and call'd them only at the King's Command †Pp. 240 241. but in this account he says he is not altogether satisfied Had he any manner of Knowledge of these things he would not be at all satisfy'd with it For as in Fact it is certain that the Archbishop after this time summon'd Convocations frequently by his Own Authority so it is clear in point of Law that he had as much Right to do it after the Statute of Premunire as before it there being no Clause or Word in that Act that can be suppos'd to restrain His Power in this particular Indeed had the Archbishop whenever he call'd a Convocation without the King 's Writ done it by a Legatin Authority as Dr. W. represents him to have done * P. 241 199. there would have been some Ground to think that the Premunire Act might have laid a Restraint upon him But this is another of Dr. W's mistakes for the Archbishop needed no Help from his Legatin Character to convene the Clergy of his Province which he was sufficiently impower'd to do as Metropolitan by the Old Canons of the Church receiv'd and allow'd in this Kingdom And accordingly by this Metropolitical Power the Archbishops all along call'd Provincial Councils before any of them were the Popes Legates which from St. Austin down to Theobald say some * Ant. Brit. p. 127. to William de Corboyl say others †Gervasii Act Pont Cant. X Script col 1663. none of them were He indeed by vertue of his New Character summon'd the Archbishop of York and all the Clergy of that Province ⸪ Ibid. Continuator Florentii Wig. ad ann 1127. to his Councils and One of his Successors ‖ Hubert who is suppos'd by some to have got the Title of Legatus natus for ever annex'd to his See did Iure Legationis visit York Province †Hoveden ad ann 1195. And in order to these Extraprovincial Acts of Jurisdiction the Legatine Authority was indeed needful For tho' it had been solemnly determin'd in favour of Lanfrank by the Great Council of the Kingdom ⸫ Diceto de Archi. Cant. p. 685. that the See of York should be subject to that of Cant. and the Archbishop of the One obey the Conciliary summons of the other yet was not this Decision long observ'd the Archbishop of York soon finding means to get rid of it and to assert the Independency of his See But as to the Ordinary Acts of Metropolitical Power One of which was the calling of the Clergy of his Province together at Times prescrib'd by the Canons the Archbishop had no more want of a Legatine Character to qualify him for the Exercise of them than a Private Bishop had or now has for summoning a Diocesan Synod nor was it as the Law then stood any more an Encroachment upon the Royal Authority Dr. W. therefore is not very kind to the Memory of our Archbishops nor a Friend to the Antient Libertys of this Church when he asserts that all those Synods which the Metropolitan call'd without a Writ from the King were Legatine and upon that notion dates the Disuse of them at least as to their frequency from the Statute of Premunire which did no ways and could no ways affect them For after this Statute most of Arundel's Synods met by the Archbishop's Writ only as Dr. W. †P. 280. himself tells us from Harpsfield and might have told us yet more authentickly from that Archbishop's Register yet remaining This account of Harpsfield puts him upon fixing on a New Aera and now therefore he will have it that about the End of Arundel's time the King began wholly to assume this Power and this he
Conjunctim Divisim in their Procuratoria that so they might have some to vote for them in the One place and some in the Other Once more the Time when the Crown began to issue out Writs for the Convocation i. e. to command the Archbishops by Writ to assemble the Clergy of their Provinces is another point which Dr. W. would fain if he could determin and in order to it pitches upon a Writ of this kind in the 9 E. II. as the first that perhaps is extant * P. 101. or which is all One it seems as the first he has ever met with †P. 225. Which Learned Hint he takes care also to inculcate often †Pp. 100.103.225.228 that he may be sure to have Justice done him for the Discovery But in this he is a little too vain because neither is the Remark his Own for he met with it in the Grand Question p. 159. nor if it were would he have any reason to boast since it is by no means a true one for there are several Writs of this nature extant before the Date of this particularly of the 7 th and 5 th Years of E. II. and as far back as the 11 th of E. 1. which I have already in the course of these Papers had occasion to take notice of And even this Writ it self is misdated as to the Time to which it Summon'd for whereas Dr. W. says that it call'd the Convocation to meet Feb. 9. the Parliament sitting Oct. 16. foregoing †P. 103. the Truth was that the Writ was dated Oct. 16. and summon'd the Convocation to meet not on Feb. 9. but Ian. 27. i. e. in quindenâ Hilarii But I offend I fear in too nice a pursuit of his Errors and shall close these Remarks †P. 244. therefore as He does his with the Account of a Convocation the Circumstances of which have been much misunderstood not only by Dr. W. but by my Lord of Sarum too and even by our Elder Historians Henry the VIII th he says having call'd a Parliament to Westminster Anno 1529. he should say 1523. ‖ April 15 th 1523. the Parliament met April 20 th Warham's Prov. Synod Apr. 22 d. Wolseys 's Legatin Synod commanded Warham to Summon a Convocation of the Clergy to meet about the same time at St. Pauls Cardinal Wolsey who as Archbishop of York had no place in the Convocation and was desirous to bring every thing to his Own Management by his Legatin Power dissolves the Convocation held at the King's command by Warham and orders the same Synod to appear before himself as the Pope's Legat the next day at Westminster where having got a sufficient subsidy granted by them to the King he soon dismis'd the Assembly †P. 244. Thus Dr. W. tells the Story out of Antiqu. Britan My Lord of Sarum adds that this Dissolution was May 2. and points to the Writ of this date in Tonstall's Register issu'd out by the King to Tonstall for the Clergy of Cant. Prov. to meet at Westminster †Hist. Ref. Vol. 1. p. 20 But here to use his Lordships Own Words of my Lord Herbert †Vol. p. 95. he had not apply'd his Ordinary Diligence for the Writ he referrs us to is quite another thing than his Lordship apprehends it to be and the whole story of the Dissolution is a Mistake as appears beyond doubt from the Preamble of the Act of Subsidy printed by his Lordship himself among the Records * Vol. 1. p. 8 where we find these words Nos Praelati Clerus Cant. Prov. in hâc Sacrâ Synodo Provinciali sive Praelatorum Cleri ejusdem Convocatione in Ecclesià D. Pauli London 20 die Apr. A. D. 1523. inchoatâ ac usque ad in 10. Aug. proximè ex tunc sequentis de diebus in dies continuatà c. Had his Lordship considered these words he would have seen that this Synod was so far from being dissolv'd May 2 d. that it sat as a Provincial Synod above three Months afterwards and was continu'd from the first to the last Day of its Session by Ordinary Adjournments And had his Lordship further given himself the Trouble to peruse the Mandate to Tonstal which he cites from his Register he would have found that there is not a Syllable of a Dissolution or a Reassembly mention'd in it and would there have lit upon a true account of this mistaken Story For that Mandate recites that the Caâ—dinal had sent out his Legatin Summons concurrently with the Bishop of Cant's Provincial Citation for the Clergy of Both Provinces to meet at St. Peter's Apr. 22 d. two days after those of Cant. were Provincially to assemble that they did accordingly thus meet the York-Clergy by Adjournment from York where they met first March the 22 d * See Stat. 22 H. 8. c. 15. and those of Cant. by Adjournment from Pauls But the Clarks of Convocation for Cant. Prov. being to appear first before their Own Archbishop had brought up Powers to Treat with Him alone without any mention of the Legate for which reason the Cardinal issu'd out his Mandate of May the 2 d. to Tonstal for the Clergy of his Diocese and so of all others to meet and send up proper Forms to their Proctors as they did I suppose and then the Business of the subsidy was debated and the quantity of it agreed on before the Legat but the formal Grant of it made afterwards in Two Provincial Assemblys The Common Account therefore of this Legatin Synod is Fabulous taken up in Hatred to the Cardinal and too easily received by Iosceline himself without inspecting the Registers for the Truth of it Archbishop Parker upon the Review of his Work being not able to set this Story right by Memory alone for he was but Eighteen Years Old when it hapned Had indeed the Fact as it is commonly handed down to us been true Dr. W. would have had reason to say that it is not to be parallel'd in all its Circumstances in any part of our History But as it really stood there was nothing but the Writ for New Powers Extraordinary or singular in it Pool's Legatin Synods being afterwards Summon'd and held with the very same Formalitys particularly that in 1555 by the Acts of which it appears that the Synods of Cant. and York were first conven'd apart after the same manner that they were always us'd to be in Parliament time and then Both call'd to an Exempt place the Chapel Royal in Whitehall and there united into one National Assembly Besides had Cardinal Wolsey by his Power Legatin dissolv'd a Convocation call'd by the King 's Writ we should certainly have heard of it among the 44 Articles preferr'd against him in Parliament †See 'em Lord Herbert p. 293 but it not being touch'd on or so much as hinted there we might without further Authority conclude that nothing of the
but Bishops and Priests forasmuch as the Declaration of the Word of God pertaineth unto †Hist of the Ref. Vol. I. p. 174. them A Testimony that being given by those of the Higher Order in the Church in behalf of the Powers and Priviledges of the Lower must be allowed Considerable In the course therefore of our Provincial Synods the Inferior Clergy's Consent was expected and not that of the Suffragans only But still as we may observe the Archbishop alone is said to Decree and Ordain which is a stile of Authority peculiar to him Here and beyond what belonged Originally to his Character Indeed by the ancient Rules of the Church the Metropolitan's Consent was nenessary to make the Ordinance and He had the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But the Stile and Power of the Archbishop of this Province might in this respect run higher because he challenged to be looked upon as something more than a simple ‖ Quasi velitis says Peckam in a Letter to the Bishop of London Jura Cantuariensis Ecclesiae ad Simplices Metropolitani Limites Coarctare Whart App. ad Hist. de Ep. Lond. p. 270. Metropolitan and had the Title of a Legat Born and in virtue of that Character he might take upon him to Decree and Ordain as the Pope did in Foreign Councils and as the King here at home used to do iâ— our elder Statutes And as these at the end of every Session of Parliament were used to be Enacted by the King so the Provincial Constitutions were published on the last Day of the Synod by the Archbishop He also some time afterwards enjoyning the Bishop of London and by him as Dean of the Episcopal College the other Bishops to see them Promulged and Executed as Acts of Parliament were ordered to be Proclaimed by the Comes at first and since by his Vicar-General the Sheriff This was the manner of holding Councils and making Canons neither was it necessary to have the King 's or Pope's leave to hold the one nor was their Authority requisite for Decreeing the other The Clergy were only to take care that they did not exceed their Limits either in the Matter or Manner of their Decrees and that their Constitutions were such as would not be Revoked and Annulled by either of those Supreme Powers The Metropolitans were by the Canons and by the Roman Law * Nov. 123. c. 10. where it had force Oblig'd to call those Synods Yearly Neither was Leave to be ask'd for their Summoning such Assemblâ—es then any more than there is now for a Bishop's Convening his Clergy and Church-Officers to a Visitation Not because those Canons were above the Law of our Country but because they were received into it and made a part of the Constitutions and Usages of the Kingdom 'T is true the Archbishop called them sometimes at the King's Instance signified to him by a Royal Writ Yet even then not in Virtue of 〈◊〉 Writ but by his Own Authority By which also whether called at the King's Instance or not he always Dissolved them And of this we have a very remarkable proof in the last Convocation under Henry the IVth ‖ Hen. IV. Writ for the Calling it bears date Jan. 19. 1412. It met â—n the 6 th of March He Died on the 20 th but the Convocation sat on to the 10 th of May when it was Dissolved which though Meeting at his Writ was yet so little thought to be held in Virtue of it that it Sat for near Two Months under his Successor Henry the Vth without a Dissolution Till Archbishop Chichley's time Convocations were frequently held even while Parliaments were sitting without any other Writ from the King but what was contained in the Bishops Summons with the Clause Praemunientes After the 8. of H. VI. the Clergy if they met by the King's Letter had the benefit of the Act of Parliament of that Year and therefore I suppose usually deâ—ired it to gain the Parliamentary Protection not as Fuller idly Conjectures * Ch Hist. Book 5. p. 290. and Dr. Wake from him p. 230. to avoid a Praemunire When they met †Mr. Nicolson Eng. Hist. Lib. part 3. p. 196. says They were Inhibited in their very Writs of Summons from Decreeing any thing to the Prejudice of the King or his Realms And for this he refers us to Dugdale 's Summons in the Reigns of E. 1. and E. 2. where there is not a word to this purpose nor can there be for Dugdale has no Writs for Convocations but only for the Parliament When the next Edition of his Work comes out he will be pleased to tell us from whence he drew this curious Remark I have seen many Convocation Writs but never that I remember one with a Prohibition in the Belly of it Writs were often sent to them by the King Forbidding them to attempt any thing against his Crown and Dignity and these Prohibitions are allowed to have been Tacit Permissions of such Assemblies provided they kept within their Bounds ‖ Bishop Stillingfleet 's Duties and Rights of the Parochial Clergy p. 371. And so indeed they certainly were for otherwise it had been as easy for the King to forbid their Meeting and Sitting as their Acting in such and such Instances which yet he appears very rarely to have done and to have been yet more rarely Obeyed when he attempted it * The Oldest Instance insisted on is a Prohibition of Geofry Fitz-Peter Lord Iustitiary to Hubert Archbishop of Canterbury But how it was obeyed the Annals of Lanercost in Bib. Cott. Claud. D. 7. declare Hub. Arch. Cant. celebravit Concil contra Prohibitionem Gaufridi c. in quo Concilio Archiepiscopus Subscripta promulgavit Decreta Ann. 1200. The Oldest Writ produced is 9 Joh. Ann. 1208. See it in Pryn. 3. Tom. Eccl. Jurisd p. 10. Whether comply'd with or not I do not find But suppose it was for it Issued out upon a Complaint of the whole Parliament A Third Instance I find in the 41 H. 3. Rot. Cl. M. 6. dors when the Convocation was forbid meeting at London because the King had at that very time Summoned all the Members of it that owed him Service to Attend his Army in Wales See the Writ Pryn. Ibid. Vol. II. p. 890. But though this Prohibition was so reasonable yet it was not Obeyed On the contrary when Archbishop Boniface at the Opening it proposed this Question to them among others Item Cùm Dominus Rex Prohibuerit Praelatis Ecclesiae sub forisfacturâ omnium terrarum suarum quas de eo tenent ne venirent ad hujusmodi Convocationem Auctoritate Domini Archiepiscopi factam an liceat deceat expediat tractare in hujusmodi Convocatione de Negotiis Ecclesiae vel potiùs quod absit Prohibitioni Regiae parere c. Ann. Burt. p. 383. it was carried that they should proceed notwithstanding and so they did as appears by the Roll of Grievances then
sat afterwards and acted in Convocation An instance of such a Procuratorium for the Parliament I have seen as low as 1507. and another of an execution of the Premunientes by the Bishop yet lower in the Reign of Edward the Sixth though Returns had then Ceas'd or at least were not Enter'd Thus the Forms were kept up and by that means the King 's Right of Summoning the Clergy asserted and owned And so the State-ends of Summoning them were also answered they were left to do it in an Ecclesiastical way and to attend the Parliament and the Business of it not in One Body as they were called but in Two Provincial Assemblies This they did at first by the Connivance of the Crown rather than any express Allowance the Archbishop of his own accord sending out a Provincial Citation concurrently with the Bishops Writs of Summons which Method obtaining and these Meetings of the Province being tacitly accepted in lieu of the Clergy's resort to Parliament it grew necessary for the King to employ his Authority also in Convening them for otherwise it had been at the Archbishop's Discretion whether he would have any such Meetings or not and so the Crown might have lost the Clergy's Assistance in Parliament This gave birth to the custom of issuing out Two Convocation-Writs when a New Parliament was to be Chosen which though set on foot before yet settled not into a Rule till some Years after Edward the Third was in the Throne and then it was practised as duly and regularly and in much the same manner as it is at this day Take one Instance and that not the Earliest which might be given instead of many In the Parliament Roll of his Eighteenth Year we read That it had been agreed for the urgent Affairs of the Kingdom to hold a Parliament at Westminster on the Monday after the Octaves of Trinity and that the Archbishop should call a Convocation of the Prelates and others of the Clergy of his Province to the Church of St. Paul's London on the Morrow of Trinity for the Dispatch of the said Affairs To which Convocation none of the greater Prelates came on the said Morrow of Trinity or in the Eight days ensuing except the Archbishop or Two or Three other Bishops there named as the King was given to understand at which he much marvelled As also that the Great Men were not come to the Parliament upon the Day to which they were Summoned And he charged the Archbishop therefore to do what belonged to him in relation to those of the Clergy of his Province who came not to the said Convocation nor Obeyed his Mandate And the King would do what belonged to himself in relation to such as came not to Parliament nor Obeyed his Commands * Rot. Par. 18. E. 3. n. 1. If we supply this Record with the Writs extant on the Back of the Roll it will appear that the Clergy were Summoned here just as they are now by the Archbishop at the King's Order or Letter of Request as it was then deemed and †Even by the Crown it self for in the 25 E. 3. a Writ to the Archbishop of York in the Close Roll of that Year recites that the Archbishop of Canterbury had called his Clergy in Quindenâ Paschae ad Rogatum Nostrum stiled though it ran as now Rogando Mandamus and though the peremptory Time and Place of the Clergy's Assembling were prefixed by it and we see therefore that Punishment is Ordered in the Roll for their disobeying the Archbishop's Mandate but not a word of their not complying with the King's Summons But this was only the Language of Popery by which they kept up their pretences to Exemption and the Clergy were indulged in the Form so the Thing were but effectually done which was to have them Meet together with the Parliament and for the Dispatch of the same urgent Affairs of the Kingdom * Pur treter Parler ordeigner ce que soit miet affaire pur l' esploit des dit busoignes Are the Words of the Roll and one of these words is that from whence the Name of Parliament is derived for which the Parliament Met. And this was no new Practice but a Method now Settled and Customary of which various Precedent Instances might if they were needful be given but it is a short and sufficient Proof of it that the Words of the the King 's Writ to the Archbishop run More solito convocari faciatis We shall find also that the Archbishop of York had a Writ for That Province as the Archbishop of Canterbury had for This only he was to Convene his Clergy about a Fortnight Later than the other Province met †Province of Canterbury met on the Morrow of Trinity i. e. May 31. Easter falling that Year on April 4. That of York the Wednesday after St. Barnabas i. e. June 16. And in this the way then taken varied a little from Modern Practice which has made those Two Meetings perfectly Coincident But the ancient Usage was for the Clergy of Canterbury to Assemble first in order to set the President which it was expected that the other Province should almost implicitly follow and with reason since if the Two Provinces had continued to attend the Parliament in One Body as they did of Old the York Clergy would have had no Negative upon the Parliamentary Grants of the Clergy being a very unproportioned part of the Assembly When therefore they desired to Meet and grant Separately the Crown had reason to expect that what the greater Province did should be a Rule to the less or otherwise not to have consented to their Separation Very early in the Rolls therefore this Passage occurs That the Archbishop of Canterbury and other Nobles the King's Commissioners in his absence should require the Archbishop of York to contribute for the Defence of the North as They i. e. I suppose as the Archbishop of Canterbury and his Clergy had done 13 E. 3. n. 18. And even in Church Acts as well as State Aids what had passed the one was held to be a kind of Law to the other so that in 1463 we find the Convocation of York adopting at once all the Constitutions made by that of Canterbury and as yet not receiv'd †Memorand quòd Praelati Clerus in Convocatione 1463. Concedunt Unanimiter quòd Effectus Constitutionum Provincialium Cantuar. Prov. ante haec tempora tent habit Constitutionibus Prov. Ebor. nullo modo repugnant seu prejudicial non aliter nec alio modo admittantur Et quòd hujusmodi Constitutiones Prov. Cant. Effectus earundem ut praefertur inter Constitutiones Provinciae Ebor. prout indiget decet in serantur cum eisdem de caetero servandae incorporentur pro Jure observentur Registrum Bothe Arch. Ebor. f. 143. a Practice that I doubt not was often in elder times repeated and we know is still
Noise of Thunder from Above yet their Present Successors may not be e'er the less Dutiful tho' they are not quite so much frighted as having the happiness to live in a Time when the Priviledges and Rights of the English Subject are more clearly understood and much better secured Upon the whole then it appears That the Clergy Commoners have all along had an undoubted Right of being frequently assembled and particularly by the Law of England as often as a New Parliament is call'd That being assembled they had antiently a Right of framing Canons and doing several Synodical Acts not inconsistent with the Law of their Country without expecting the Prince's Leave for entring on such Debates or making such Decrees That the 25 H. 8. c. 19. has not in the least infringed this Right as far as the Lower Clergy are concerned in it That the Limitations there made to the Exercise of it chiefly concern the Archbishop of either Province who is now restrain'd as from calling a Convocation without the King 's Writ so from Passing or Ratifying any Canon without the Royal License and from Promulging the same by his Own Authority That the Inferior Clergy are no otherwise concerned than to take care that they give their Consent to no Canon fram'd by themselves or sent from the Upper House otherwise than with Submission to the Royal Pleasure if the King's License and Assent be not before obtained That they are left therefore intirely at their Liberty to Confer and Deliberate even about New Canons and also to Devise Frame and Offer them to the Upper House if with a Protestation annexed that they are neither intended nor desir'd to be enacted without the King's License Much more that there remains to 'em a Liberty of Petitioning either that Old Canons may be executed or New Ones made according to Law and to such Purposes as the Petitioners shall suggest or of representing their Humble Opinions concerning the Affairs of the Church and of Religion and if need be beseeching a Redress at least in General Terms This I take it is their Undoubted Priviledge and would be used by them on Great Occasions with the same Prudence and Temper that their Predecessors are known to have practised who when they met without Interruption were so cautious of giving no unnecessary Trouble either to Church or State that they were more complained of in some Reigns for sitting still than for stirring By this time the Reader sees that the Reason given for the Clergy's not Meeting because when met and formed into a Body they can do nothing is a strange one For supposing 'em to be tyed up never so strictly in their Decreâ—ing Capacity yet surely it does not follow that they can do nothing because they cannot Make or Attempt a Canon Is it nothing to speak the sense of the whole Clergy of the Kingdom in matters proper for them to intermeddle in is it nothing to Petition Advise Address Represent to give their Judgment where it may be desired or their Censure where it may be needful Is it nothing with a Dutiful and Discreet Zeal to suggest the fittest Methods of securing the Christian Faith of preventing the Revival of Old Heresies and Errors and the Growth of New Ones Is it nothing to do that which anciently when Bills began by Petition was the Great Priviledge of one Great Part of the Legislature the House of Commons I had thought that while they had this at least tho' they should have no more than this to do they had not nothing to do but rather a very Great and Necessary Work And whether such Applications are necessary should I suppose be left to the Convocation it self to determine tho' others afterwards may either second or reject these Applications who may in these Cases have the Power of Judging but not of Prejudging the Actions of a Lawful Assembly much less have they the Power of precondemning the very Being of such an Assembly because they foresee not what may be done in it In truth whatever may be pretended of the Convocations being able to do nothing yet their not being allowed to Meet is a shrewd sign that they can when met do something and that they of the Clergy who oppose their Meeting are themselves of that Opinion for were their Mouths really shut and their Hands ty'd to that Degree they are represented to be there could certainly be no Inconvenience in trusting such an Harmless Body of Men together nor would it be worth while to break through Antient and Received Practice in order to prevent their Assembling The Innovation made in these matters has begun within these Ten Years last past For tho' it has been usual to adjourn Convocations a few days after they had met and sat when there was little or no business to do yet it was never till this time known that a Convocation was adjourned before it sat that is indeed before it was a Convocation This New Practise which Dr. Wake in my Opinion by as New Law justifies we know the Date of and have reason therefore to obviate it while it is New and to take some care that it may not in a little time be able to plead a Quiet Prescription The Clergy betray their Priviledges if they lye still under the Publication of such Oppressive Schemes without as Open a Disavowal of them and without expressing their Detestation of the Meanness of the Publisher They deserve to be used as ill as their Open Adversaries or their False Friends would have them used if they can suffer their most Valuable Right to be thus torn from 'em in Print without the least struggle for it The Virgin in the Law of God was judg'd consenting to the Rape who did not cry out when Help was near and was order'd therefore to be stoned together with her Ravisher To prevent such an Imputation upon the Church and the sad Consequences of it her True Sons were they as Rash as they are represented to be would e'er this have shewed themselves against this New Advocate in a more Open Manner and in somewhat Greater Numbers than they have hitherto done and might perhaps for that End could they no otherwise be heard have interposed a Subscribed Protestation from their whole Body But if this way of gathering scattered Hands would seem disorderly and unsuitable to their Characters and prove dangerous it may be to the Persons engaging in it the more reason still have they to esteem and assert the Priviledge of being Legally assembled and put into such a condition as to be able duly and safely to make their just Complaints and represent their Grievances CHAP. IV. HAving largely shewed what the Two Great Convocation-Rights are which I proposed to Treat of and withal offered the several Chief Evidences and Proofs on which I build 'em my Method laid down leads me in the next place to consider the Exceptions of all sorts which have been made to this Claim by
congregati simul in nomine domini Sacerdotes ea inter se salutiferâ collatione requirunt quae secundum directionem Apostolicam Unitatem Spiritûs in Vinculo Pacis obtineant He restored the Catholick Faith and the Use of Councils both which were lost in that Country by a Long Succession of Arian Princes as both of 'em are usually lost together And to this End he ordered his Bishops to meet which could be no otherwise than Provincially for his whole Kingdom was then under one Metropolitan Is it any wonder that after so long an Intermission the first Provincial Synod that met should gratefully own that Princes favour by whom they were allowed and encouraged to assemble which yet they do in such a manner as to declare also that by the Canons of the Church they had a Right to meet and that their being debarred of that Right was a Violence upon ' em The Council of Lugo afterwards which sat in 569 or thereabouts not as Dr. Wake says * P. 23. in 607 mistaking grosly the Spanish Aera for the Year of our Lord professes it self to have met at the Command of Theodimirus but it was upon an Extraordinary Occasion the Erecting the See of Lugo into an Archbishoprick in which the Civil Power was nearly interested and to which it was requisite therefore that it should concur But after that was over the Two Metropolitans of Braga and Lugo Convened their Provincial Synods apart according to the Canons and without the King's Order as far as appears and needed his Command only to unite these Two Synods into One National Assembly As to the Seven Burgundian Synods whose Acts he says avow the Authority by which they met * P. 24. tho' he would insinuate yet he does not directly affirm any of them to have been Provincial and I shall not therefore stay to prove that they were not so That Five of them were not is certain and that the Two Others were if not more than Provincial yet at least Extraordinary it will be time enough to prove when he has told us which he gives up and which he insists on But Pag. 35. he professes to speak only of the Power of Princes over their Lesser Synods let us see by what Instances he chooses to make it good He tells us that when Wolfolendus Bishop of Bourges Summoned a Provincial Council according to the Canons yet having neglected to consult the King's Pleasure in it we find Sigebert for that reason alone forbad his Bishops to go to it This Story indeed would be something to his purpose were it rightly represented but nothing can be more insincere than his manner of telling it For the proof of this I appeal to the account which De Marca has given us of this matter L. VI. c. 19. Sect. 5. there he informs us that Bourges of which Wolfolendus was Archbishop was in Clovis's Realm Neustria not in Sigebert's Austrasia which was all out of the Province of Bourges That He nevertheless at the Desire of the Austrasian Bishops designed to come with his Suffragans out of his own Province into some City of Austrasia to have a Meeting there with the Bishops of that Kingdom and pretended to do this by vertue of some Antient Canons without so much as consulting Sigebert in it who for this reason resolved as he justly might to oppose him We see here that this Synod was not Provincial but the Meeting of an Archbishop and his Suffragans of one Kingdom with the Bishops of another and this appointed to be in the Territories of a Prince where that Archbishop had no Jurisdiction and without so much as acquainting him with it What wonder if Sigebert made use of his Royal Power to hinder such a Meeting or what Instance could Dr. Wake have pitched upon less to his purpose without it be that which follows When the Fifth Council of Paris he says had resolved it to be Expedient P. 36. that Provincial Synods should be held every year according to the Orders of the Church and the Canonical Custom establisht in it They made it their Request to Lovis the Emperor and Lotharius his Son that they would consent that at a fit season every year they might be assembled This Request was agen renewed some years after in another Synod Thus far he is of our side for what can be more to the advantage of Provincial Synods than this Decree of the Council of Paris and their Request in consequence of that Decree to the Civil Powers that they would suffer it to take effect according to the Canons It follows Yes notwithstanding these General Permissions before they did come together they were to have a particular Warrant for their so doing as is evident says he from the Acts of the Synod of Soissons Which Synod of Soissons one would think now was certainly Provincial and yet it was composed of the Bishops of no less than Five Provinces as De Marca assures us * L.VI. c. 26. §. 2. and the Names of several Metropolitans are now fairly legible in the Front of it which is that part of the Acts with which Dr. Wake is usually best acquainted I thank him here for mentioning this Decree of the Council of Paris for it gives me an occasion of supplying his account and of adding the Reasons by which the Authors of that Decree governed themselves in the passing it viz. Because if Provincial Councils were held Annually the Honour of the Ecclesiastical Order would be supported Ill Clergy-men would be discouraged many Offences which escape now with Impurity would be taken notice of and many Instances of Church-Discipline now superseded would by the blessing of God be restored †Quoniam si haec semel in Anno per unamquamqâ—e Provinciam celebrata fuerint Honor Ecclesiasticus Vires Ordinis sui obtinebit Impudentia quorundam Clericorum quae passim authoritate Canonicâ calcatâ Auribus Imperialibus molestiam ingerit ceâ—sabit Impunitas diversorum Plagitiorum locum delitescendi quem nunc habet non habâ—bit multa alia quae hactenùs secùs quà m Ecclesiastica Disciplina docet incessâ—runt ordinem suum Deo Auxiliante servabunt L. 1. c. 26. Which Reasons whether they will not serve as well to prove the Expedience of Convening frequently the Synods of Canterbury and York I leave the Reader who understands the state of this Church and Nation to determine These I think are all the Instances of Provincial Councils which he expresly produces as such throughout his first Chapter and I appeal now to the most Partial of his Friends whether any one of 'em does in the least countenance that Extravagant Principle which he sets up for That the Calling or not calling of Convocations i. e. Provincial Synods the allowing or not allowing them to meet and sit was a Thing always at the Free and Absolute Pleasure of the Prince even where the Nicene Canon was admitted as a
perpetual Law of the Church I do not wrong him in representing this as the Design of that large Historical Account of the Authority of Princes over their Councils which he has given us for besides that he must either have had this design or none nothing less than this being of any service to that side of the Debate which he espouses Besides this I say the very Terms in which he expresses himself shew this to be the true and only End he aims at Tho' Pag. 34 says he the Council of Nice first and after that several other Councils provided for the constant meeting of Provincial Synods every year and these being allowed of by the Emperors and other Princes who confirmed those Canons and approved of what they had defined may seem to have put these kind of Synods at least out of their power yet even in These we find 'em still continuing to exercise their Authority and not suffering even such Councils to be held without their Leave or against their Consent To confirm which he produces two o◠three Stories which I have shewn to be utterly wide of the mark and then concludes So intirely has the assembling of these Provincial Synods been looked upon to depend on the Will and Authority of the Christian Prince * P. 36. A Conclusion that has no Premisses nor any one clear and full Instance in all his Long Beadroll of Councils to support it The Doctor had kindly prepared us in his Preface to expect Digressions but withal promised us in his nice manner that they should be rather not directly to the purpose than altogether distant from it However I find not that he has kept his word with us or that they deserve to be thus gently dealt with In the first of 'em that meets me here I have shewn nine parts in ten of it i. e. whatever he has said about General Councils to be altogether distant from the purpose and that the other poor Scantling about Provincial Synods which seems to be yet is really not to the purpose and I conclude therefore that the whole is not only not directly to the purpose but altogether distant from it The Doctor must forgive me if I tell him that these Historical Unedifying Accounts of his put me in mind of the Honest Confession of William Caxton the Chronicler the words of which will become Dr. Wake 's mouth as well every whit as they did His and I cannot help thinking that I hear him in the close of his first Chapter thus addressing himself to his Reader Yf I cowde says he have founde mee storyes I wolde have sette in it moo but the substaunce that I can fynde and knowe I have shortly sette theim in this boke prayeinge all theym that see this symple werke of myne to pardon me of my symple writynge And indeed I for my part should have been very ready so to do had it been as Harmless as it is Simple and were it not likely as Simple as it is to be produced hereafter for a Testimony against the Churches Rights if it be not now opposed and disowned For which reason how Simple soever the performance is it deserves to be examined and I go on therefore to observe IV. That Dr. Wake distinguishes not between the Powers in Fact exercised by Princes and those of Right belonging to them by vertue of their Office Good Princes have been allowed often to extend their Authority in Spirituals very far and Ill Princes have often usurped an Authority beyond what they were intitled to Dr. Wake troubles not himself with these Considerations but what ever Powers he can find any Prince whether Good or Bad to have exercised over the Church Those he proposes as Patterns which all other Princes may safely copy and as the true Bounds and Measures of the Royal Supremacy When in the Story of our Convocations some Acts of theirs come cross him that he does not like then his Maxim is That they did take upon them to do this is no proof that they had a Right to do it * P. 296. But the most Extravagant Pretentions of Princes in the Ordering Church-matters are admitted by him without any such Guard or Distinction without considering Who it was that did this or that and in what Circumstances and for what Reasons they were submitted to in the doing it Charlemagne in Germany and Recaredus in Spain ordered Ecclesiastical Affairs with a very high hand and had certainly somewhat more than their Share came to in the management of them But this was tacitly yielded to by their Bishops who saw that to whatever Degree their Power was carried it would all be employed for the Establishment of the Church and Advancement of the Christian Religion What They did therefore must not because they did it be presently presumed to be the Common Right of every Christian Ruler but oftentimes an Instance only of a Discreet Complyance in the Clergy with such Intrenchments on the Liberties of the Church as might redound to the benefit of it Good Princes who had the Hearts of their People and were known to be intirely in their Interests have been permitted to carry their Prerogative in Civil Matters to an heigth that has been withstood and retrenched in more suspected Reigns Were the Measure of our English Constitution to be taken from those Excesses of Regal Power which have been winked at sometimes when well employed what would become of the Liberty of the Subject or the Freedom of Parliaments Dr. Wake finds perhaps in the Acts of some Councils Expressions of Great Duty and Respect used to Pious Princes by their Clergy These presently he lays hold of as Authentick Synodical Decisions The Council of Tours it seems did once upon a Time tell Charles the Emperor * See p. 92. that they left their Decrees to Him to do what he pleased with them and the Council of Arles begged him if he thought fit to amend and alter them †Ibid. This is Handle enough for Dr. Wake to annex such an Altering Power to the Kingly Character and to represent the Business of Synods to be only the preparing of matter for the Royal Stamp which may be improved corrected enlarged shorten'd at the Prince's Pleasure as in p. 84 and 85. of his Honest Performance he is pleased to express himself and therein to intitle the King de Iure to a more Extravagant Authority than ever the Pope himself I believe with all his Plenitude of Power de facto exercised or claimed But surely this is a Doctrine of too great Importance to be established on so slight a bottom and of such dangerous consequence to the Church that nothing less than the Universal Practice of the Church can sufficiently authorize it The Doctor may remember when he wrote against Prayers for the Dead in a late Reign his way of arguing was that Doctrines of that weight were not to be built on the Figurative Apostrophe's and Rhetorical
invigilarunt proferantur hujus Domâ—s Examinationem subeant Synodalia And something of the same nature seems to be intimated in the Statute I mentioned which Enacts that whatever should be Ordained and set forth by the Archbishops Bishops and Doctors now appointed or other Persons hereafter to be appointed by his Royal Majesty or else by the whole Clergy of England in and upon the matter of Christ's Religion and the Christian Faith †This relates to the Institution of a Christian Man then to be reviewed and Lawful Rites and Ceremonies ‖ This to the Rituals at the same time to be altered and Observations of the same shall be in all and every point limitation and circumstance thereof by all his Grace's Subjects c. fully believed obeyed observed and performed Here the words by the whole Clergy of England do most naturally refer to the Last Verb appointed and under that Construction imply that this and such like Committees were consented to by the Convocation as well as named by the King and so they certainly were And the reason of establishing 'em was because the matters to be discussed requiring as this very Act speaks ripe and mature deliberation were not rashly to be defined nor restrained to this present Session or any other Session of Parliament as they must have been if they had been considered only in Convocation which Then sat and rose always within a few days of the Parliament These Committees therefore were appointed to sit in the Intervals of Parliament and tho' they had a Power of concluding finally yet they seldom I suppose did more than prepare business to be laid before the Convocation when it sat Accordingly what was done by this Committee for reforming the Offices was reconsider'd by the Convocation it self two or three years afterwards as a Manuscript Note * Sess. 19. 21. Feb. 1542 43. Reverendissimus dixit Regem velle Libros quosdam Ecclesiasticos examinari corrigi Ubi Reverendissimus tradidiâ— hos Libros examinandos quibusdam Episcopis I have met with taken from the Journals of Convocation implies These Committees indeed are spoken of sometimes in our Statutes and elsewhere as appointed by the King without any mention of the Convocation-Clergy which was partly owing to the Doctrine of those times by which the King in virtue of his Supreme Headship was said to do decree and order every thing tho' the previous Steps and Resolves were from the Convocation and was withal not improper considering how much was left to the Royal Power in such matters for the Clergy often only Petitioned the King for a Committee and referred the Nomination of it to him of which a clear Instance has been given before in the Request for the Translation of the Bible Indeed when the Committee was composed of Members from both Provinces as it was in the Present case * The Act styles them The Archbishops and sundry Bishops of Both Provinces of Canterbury and York within this Realm and also a great Number of the best Learned Honestest and most Vertuous sort of Doctors of Divinity Men of Discretion and Iudgment and Good Disposition of this said Realm it could not sit and act by a bare Order of the Clergy but was necessarily to have the King's Commission before it could be a Legal Assembly and no wonder therefore if tho' both Convocations consented to it and perhaps sometimes named it yet the King only be said to impower them And here I must once for all observe that whatever was done by such Select Committees appointed or approved by Convocation tho' done out of Convocation must be reckoned done by it as carrying the stamp of its Authority For so the way has been in all manner of Assemblies both Ecclesiastical and Civil The Catechismus ad Parâ—chos among the Papists is accounted to have the Authority of the Council of Trent tho' that Council never passed or saw it because it was drawn up and published by Order of the Pope to whom that Council had referred it The like is to be said of the Oxford †Bp. Bâ—â—â— Vol. 1. p. 85. and Cambridge ‖ Ibid. p. 87. Resolutions concerning the Invalidity of King Henry's first Marriage which carried the Authority of those Universities because drawn up by Committees which were in full Convocation appointed by them Nor want we Precedents of a Delegation of the Power even of Parliaments to Committees in antient times For 1 Hen. 6. some Lords and Others of the King's Council were impowered to determine all such Bills and Petitions as were not answered in Parliament * Rot. Parl. n. 21. and so agen 6 Hen. 6. n. 45 46. and several Times before and after And Henry the Eighth had frequently the whole Power of Parliament Translated upon him We are not to wonder therefore if the Convocations of his Reign did something like this when they had so Great Patterns to follow and were so much more at his Mercy than Parliaments were 1542. The Examining of the English Translation of the Bible being begun by the Convocation is taken by the King out of their Hands and committed to the two Universities Ibid. p. 315. Were the Translating of Scripture a Work appropriated to Synods as sure it is not yet the Petition of the two Houses in 1534 to the King to take care of a New Translation of the Bible would have been Warrant enough for him to have put it into whose hands he pleased Especially since it is probable that this very Synod in 1542 complied at last with the King's Proposal I find indeed in some Minutes of their Acts that the Bishops at first disagreed to it †Sess. 9. Mart. 1541 42. but they were I suppose over-rulâ—d for Parker's account is only Aliquandiu quibus Biblia transferenda committerentur ambigebant ‖ P. 338. which shews that the dispute was soon over 1544. The King orders the Prayers for Processions and Litanies to be put into English and sends them to the Archbishop with an Order for the Publick Use of them Ibid. p. 331. This was done by a Royal Injunction * So it is stylâ—d in Bonner 's Reg. f. 48. then equal to an Act of Parliament and need not therefore by me here be accounted for However there is reason to believe that the Committee for Reforming the Offices or the Convocation it self might have an hand in it for about this time it is plain they composed the Little Book of Prayers called the Orarium †Orarium sive Libellus Precationum per Regiam Majestatem Clerum Latinè editus Ex Officina Rich. Grafton 1545. which was set out by the King the Year afterwards 1547. The King orders a Visitation over his whole Kingdom and thereupon suspends all Episcopal Iurisdiction while it lasted Vol. II. p. 26. The King Visited by vertue of his Supreme Headship recognized first in Convocation and established afterwards in Parliament
And while this Royal Visitation lasted all Inferior Jurisdictions ceased a course as they do even when an Archbishop visits ‖ Pendente Visitatione Atchiepiscopali tam Suffraganei quam Inferiores Praelati ordinariâ— suâ— Jurisdictione abstinent omniaque per Archiepiscopum ejusque Commissarios expediuntur Ant. Brit. p. 29. But what would Dr. Wake infer from this Instance that the King took to himself a Power which has been thought regularly to belong to the Convocation Why was ever any Man wild enough to say that the Convocation were the Visitors-General of all Ecclesiastical Bodies in England The Homilies composed Ibid. He should say reviewed and altered for they were composed many years before in the Convocation of 1542 as the Acts declare * Ian. 1541 42. Tractavit Reverendissimus de Homiliis conficiendis 16. Feb. 1542 43. Presentatae sunt Homiliae compositae per quosdam Praelatos de diversis materiis And by vertue of this Convocational Authority which they had Archbishop Cranmer sent 'em 1 E. 6. to Bishop Gardiner requiring him to publish 'em throughout his Diocese Thus Bishop Gardiner himself in his Letters to the Protector †Fox Vol. 2. p. 1. the first words of the first of which are After most humble Commendations to your Grace I have received this day Letters from my Lord of Canterbury touching certain Homilies which the Bishops in the Convocation holden Anno Dom. 1542. agreed to make for stay of such Errors as were then by Ignorant Persons sparkeled among the People The Second begins thus I have received other Letters from my Lord of Canterbury requiring the said Homilies by vertue of a Convocation holden five years past He does not allow indeed that the Homilies formally passed that Synod for he adds Wherein we communed of That which took none effect then and much less needeth to be put in Execution ne in my judgment cannot But Cranmer we see was of another opinion and thought these Homilies sufficiently authoriz'd by the Convocation of 1542 and that they wanted only to be confirmed and recommended by the King as they were in the Injunctions of that year But should there be any thing wanting to the Authority of these Homilies when first set out that want was made up when they were subsequently ratified by the Clergy in Convocation * See Art of 1552 1562. L. M. P. has increased Dr. Wake 's Collections by an Instance or two of this date which must not be neglected Parliaments he says without the Concurrence of Convocations have learnedly argued and determined the Questions about the Lawfulness of Priests Marriage and Communion in one kind †P. 16. As to the first of these the Stat. 2 3 E. 6. c. 21. does indeed determine this point but it is in consequence and almost in the very words of the Determination of the Clergy in Convocation made the year before which Arth. Harmar has Printed ‖ P. 170. and my Lord of Sarum has given a short account of ⸫ Vol. 2. p. 50. tho' with some mistakes in the Circumstances of it For whereas his Lordship makes but Thirty five to have affirmed the Question and but Fourâ—een to have denied it there were many more in either case Fifty three in the first and Twenty two in the latter * Synodalia The Name also of the Prolocutor who gathered these Votes is mistaken for it was Io. Taylor Dean of Lincoln not I. Tyler who had been Prolocutor Thirty two years before in the Convocation of 1515 where his Lordship takes notice of him †Vol. 1. p. 14. with Indignation for making a Partial Entry in the Journals of Parliament on behalf of the Clergy then contending with the Lay-power about their Ecclesiastical Priviledges which his Lordship says is no wonder the Clark of the Parliament being at the same Time Speaker to the Lower House of Convocation tho' had not his Lordship thus judged I should have been apt to have thought this Entry Impartial for the very same reason because the Man that made it belonged equally to both the contending Parties Unless it shall be said that Clergy-men are so blindly devoted to the Interests of their Order that no other Tyes or Views whatsoever can make 'em think indifferently where That is concerned But of this his Lordship 's own Works are an Effectual Disproof As to the other Point about the Communion in both kinds neither did the Parliament establish that without the Concurrence of Convocation for tho' the Clause concerning it was brought into the House of Lords by Bishop Cranmer I suppose Novemb. 24 * Bishop Burn. Vol. 2. p. 41. yet it lay upon the Table without being called for again till the Clergy Decemb. 2. had Voted it in Convocation after which the very next day †Synodalia it had a Second Reading 1548. A Committee of Select Bishops and Divines appointed to Examine and Referm the Offices of the Church Ibid. p. 61 71. To such a Select Committe I have shewn that the reforming the Offices was by Convocation intrusted in Henry the Eighth's time so that this was but continuing that business in the same method into which the Convocation had formerly put it And there is Great Reason to believe that it was thus continued by this Convocation it self and that the Petition of the Lower House to the Bishops ‖ Mentioned by me p. 181. out of the Acts of this Convocation for a Review of the Books prepared by the former Committee to this purpose ended in an Address of Both Houses to the King for a New one Thus it is plain Bishop Burnet * See Vol. 2. p. 50. understood this matter and Bishop Stillingfleet too who first produced that Petition in his Irenicum †See p. 386. where he terms it a Petition for calling an Assembly of Select Divines in order to the setling Church-affairs Not that this was the Direct Purport but only the Result of it and occasioned by it A New Office of Communion set forth by Them i. e. by the Select Committee Pag. 64. And it was therefore Authorized by that Convocation which we have reason to think consented to this Committee However sure we are that it was established soon afterwards by another Convocation which passed the whole Service-Book where this Communion-Office was with some Alterations inserted There is a Deep silence all along in my Lord of Sarum's History as to the Convocational Authority of this Service-Book which he seems to represent as the Work of a Committee ‖ See Vol. 2. p. 71 93. only confirmed afterwards by Parliament His Lordships's History has that Credit in the World that his very Omissions may in time pass for Proofs if they be not observed and supplied especially in the Present Case where it will be naturally enough concluded that the Church-Authority did not intervene if a Church-Historian of his Lordship's Rank takes no notice of it
For which reason and because I think the Point to be of Importance and withal related nearly to the Article we are upon I shall here produce some Passages from the Papers and Records of that time which fully clear it King Edward's Answer to the Devonshire-Mens Petition * Fox Vol. 2. p. 666. Assures 'em that for the Mass no small Study or Travel hath been spent by All the Learned Clergy therein †p. 667. b. And agen That whatsoever is contained in our Book either for Baptism Sacrament Mass Confirmation and Service in the Church is by our Parliament established by the whole Clergy agreed yea by the Bishops of the Realm devised by God's Word confirmed ‖ P. 668. a. The Council's Instructions to Dr. Hopton how to discourse the Lady Mary ⸫ Fox Vol. 2. p. 701. affirm the same thing somewhat more forcibly The first of these is Her Grace writeth that the Law made by Parliament is not worthy the Name of a Law meaning the Statute for the Communion c. You shall say thereto The Fault is great in any Subject to disallow a Law of the King a Law of the Realm by long Study free Disputation and uniform Determination of the whole Clergy consulted debated concluded But above all most Express and Full to this purpose is the Assertion in a Letter of Edw. 6. dated Iuly 23. Regni tertio and entred in the Register of Bonner * F. 219. a. it runs thus That one Uniform Order for Common-Prayers and Administration of the Sacraments hath beyn and is most Godly sette fourthe not onely by the Common Agreement and full Assent of the Nobility and Commons in the late Session of our late Parliament but also by the lyke Assent of the Bysshopps in the same Parliament and of all other 's the Learned Men of this our Realm in their Synods and Convocations Provincial I thought it worth my while to make good this Point because it has by some been much doubted and their Doubts have been countenanced by the Act 2 3 Edw. 6. c. 1. which establishes the Service-Book and wherein there is mention only of the Archbishop of Canterbury and certain of the most Learned and Discreet Bishops and other Learned Men of this Realm appointed to compile it but no Formal notice is taken of the Convocation that passed it And the Proof I have given in this single Instance will suggest to the Reader that it might be so in General and that several other Things done by this Select Committee were probably approved afterwards in Convocation tho' the Statutes and other Records of that time should seem to mention the Committee only The Convocation-Records which alone could have given us Full Light in this case are destroyed and the chief way we now have of supplying this Defect is by Parallel Instances and Probable Reasonings which Fair Men therefore will admit as good Evidence for want of better and not take advantage as Dr. Wake does from the Destruction of such Records to deny that there ever were any This is as if a Man should pretend to prove that none of the People of such or such a Parish were in the Reign of Edward the Sixth Christned because perhaps the Old Parish-Registers are lost This made way for the Act of 1548 p. 93. and 1551 p. 189. He means King Edward's two Acts of Uniformity which established the first and second Service-Book and way therefore was made for them not by this New Office of Communion but by the Service-Books themselves These I have shewn tho' the Work of a Committee yet had the Authority of Convocation inasmuch as the Convocation approved this Committee before-hand and confirmed what was done by it afterwards I have shewn it I mean of the One and the Reader therefore will easily believe that the same Steps and Measures were observed as to the Other 1549. An Order of Council forbidding Private Masses Ibid. p. 102 103. As contrary to the Statute of Uniformity and to the Determinations of the Clergy in Convocation and the Council therefore who sent this Order do afterwards in a Letter of theirs to the Lady Mary * Iune 4. 1551. call her Chaplains saying Mass a contempt not of Their but of the Ecclesiastical Orders of this Church of England †Fox Vol. 2. p. 709. The Forms of Ordination appointed by Act of Parliament ordered to be drawn up by a special Committee of Six Bishops and Six Divines to be nam'd by the King Ibid. p. 141 143. The true account of this is that the Council had already appointed this Committee at the Instance as we may from former Precedents reasonably collect of the Convocation it self then sitting and of the Members of Convocation therefore this Committee was composed according to my Lord of Sarum's account of it Some Bishops and Divines says he brought now together by a Session of Parliament were appointed to prepare a Book of Ordination * Vol. 2. p. 140. The Session was likely to end before these Forms could be prepared and the Parliament passed therefore a previous Confirmation of them as they had done in the case of the Necessary Erudition in 1540 †See Stat. 32 Hen. 8. cap. 25. Dr. Wake must have a very uncommon way of arguing if he can draw any thing to the Prejudice of the Churches Power from such Instances as these where such an Implicit Deference was paid to the Resolutions of the Clergy as to Enact 'em before the Parliament had seen 'em and indeed before they were made Dr. W. we see does in this and in every other step of this Article appeal to my L. of S.'s Book and would under the cover of his Lordship's Name put off all his Bad History and Worse Opinions It may not be amiss therefore to give him the Iudgment of this Right Reverend Prelate clearly expressed and avowed in another Piece ‖ Vind. of the Ord. of the Ch. of Engl. and with that to ballance all these Doubtful and Uncertain Authorities His Lordship speaking of the English Ordinal the Point we are upon and of the Alterations that were afterwards made in it has these words It was indeed confirmed by the Authority of Parliament and there was good reason to desire That to give it the force of a Law but the Authority of the Book and those Changes is wholly to be derived from the Convocation who only consulted about them and made them And the Parliament did take that care in the Enacting them that might shew they did only add the force of a Law to them for in passing them it was ordered that the Book of Common-Prayer and Ordination should only be read over and even that was carried upon some Debate for many as I have been told moved that the Book should be added to the Act as it was sent to the Parliament from the Convocation without ever reading it but that seemed Indecent and too Implicit to
the End of Lynwood From what Copy it was taken is not said But those Copies which Sir Will. Dugdale Transcrib'd into the Second Volume of our English Councils See p. 320. differ'd from it it is clear if at least Sir William 's Transcripts are Exact and to be depended on Whether Archbishop Peckam found that the King had resolv'd to bring these Proctors to Parliament by his Own Authority and therefore prevented him by this Constitution or whether he did it to have their Counsel and Assistance in opposing the Statute of Mortmain which he foresaw would be attempted in that Parliament and was accordingly carried or upon what other View he acted I pretend not to say But from thence forward I take it for granted that such Proctors were constantly return'd to all the Clergy's Parliamentary Meetings and that purely upon an Ecclesiastical Call at first tho' the King soon let himself into a share in Convening them For in his Ninth year His and the Archbishop's Authority were joyntly and interchangeably employ'd in it the Archbishop signifying the King's Pleasure in his Letters Mandatory to the Clergy and the King on the other side Executing the Archbishop's Mandate by his Own Ministers The Case if my Collections deceive me not was thus The Bishops and their Clergy were Summon'd to a Synod at London by an Injunction from the Archbishop in which they were commanded also to meet at another Time and Place appointed by the King and that they might be sure so to do Letters of Citation are directed not to the Bishop of London but to the King himself to be by him communicated to the several Bishops by Royal Messengers This odd President we have an account of in the Register of Pâ—ckam * The Citatory Letters are dated Kal. Apr. 1281 And the same Formality I suppose was used in Convening the Clergy of York Province who met about this time at York as appears from a Writ extant in Pryn †Eccl. Jurisd T. 3. P. 275. impowring the Bishop of Carlisle to collect the Tenth of his own Diocese granted at that Provincial Assembly Next year the Prerogative got ground a little for the King holding his Parliament at Northampton commanded the Archbishop by Writ to Summon his Clergy thither to meet Coram Nobis vel coram fidelibus nostris quos ad hoc duximus deputandos See App. Num. VII ad audiendum faciendum ea quae pro Republicâ Vobis eis super his ostendi faciemus c. But the Persons which the Archbishop is directed to Summon are only Bishops Abbats Priors and other Heads of Religious Houses together with the Proxies of Deans and Chapters without any mention of Archdeacons or of the Diocesan Clergy who it may be were by a Particular Writ to be apply'd to afterwards and requir'd to follow the Pattern which the Superior Clergy should set according to the way sometimes practis'd in former Reigns ‖ See an Instance A. D. 1207 80. Joh. in Pryn 's Parl. Writ Vol. 1. Pref. So that this Meeting was just such another as that in the third of his Reign where the Majores Cleri only were present And yet at the Synod call'd on the same occasion by the A.B. of York in His Province we find the Diocesan Clergy appear'd and which is very remarkable the Laity of York-Province under Barons Milites Liberi Homines Communitates omnes alii de singulis Comitatibus ultrà Trentam had also their Summons to the same Time and Place with the Clergy So I gather from the Writ sent joyntly to both which being of a curious and uncommon Form will deserve a place in the Appendix * Numb VIII where the Reader will find also another directed to the Clergy and Laity of the Bishoprick of Durham who tho' meeting with the rest of York Province yet had it seems distinct Messages and Messengers sent to them and made likewise their separate Returns See Regist. Joh. Romani ad Ann. 1286. fol. 99. Regist. Grenefield ad Ann. 1310. f. 180. and something of this Priviledge I think that See even yet retains Hitherto then the Clergy were so far from meeting Nationally with the Parliament that the Lower part of the Parliament seems to have divided sometimes to accommodate it self to the Provincial Meetings of the Clergy How the King was obey'd in this Instance as to the Province of Canterbury appears from Peckam's Register where we find his Mandate †See App. Num. IX to the Bishop of London reciting the King 's Writ and commanding all the Bishops of his Province and all the others mention'd in it to assemble dictis die loco ob Reverentiam Regiae Majestatis de expedientibus reipublicae tractaturi but with words also that intimated his sense of the Hardship which this New Precedent laid 'em under and which the Clergy I suppose so understood as if he would not be very severe upon them tho' they should not comply with it Accordingly their Meeting at Northampton was but thin and they brake up immediately referring themselves to a Fuller Convocation to be call'd in the usual Form by the Archbishop and refusing to answer the King's Demands till such an one were Summon'd as it was soon afterwards ‖ See App. Num. IX and that being a Regular Assembly both as to the Place * Nov. Templ Lond. at which and the Authority †The Archbishop's by which they met and the Persons ‖ Totus Clerus are said to be call'd i. e. beside those Summon'd to Northampton the Archdeacons also and Diocesan-Clergy composing it the King's Business did there receive an Easie Dispatch Had the King 's Writ which call'd the Clergy before his Commissioners at Northampton been obey'd readily the way had been open'd towards his bringing the whole Body of 'em afterwards to Parliament But having fail'd in this and such like attempts and finding that the Archbishop and his Clergy understood one another and were secretly agreed to defeat him he afterwards went more roundly to work and without asking help from the Church was resolv'd to use only his Own Authority and accordingly Summon'd all the Great Abbats and Priors to Parliament Personally as well those who did not hold of him by Barony as those who did and the Lower Clergy by a Premunitory Clause inserted in the Writ to every Bishop At what time precisely this Method was first set on foot I cannot be positive but sure I am that a year before the 23 Edw. 1. the common Aera of the Praemunientes it was practis'd Peckam was now dead and Winchelsey not yet return'd with his Pall from Rome and the See of York fill'd with an Obnoxious Person * Ioh. Romanus Fin'd lately Four thousand Marks by Parliament †Ryley's Placita p. 141. and on that and some other accounts ‖ See Ibid. p. 173. now at the King's Mercy This lucky Juncture the King seems to have
given to 'em from the Persons they represented These ran always in the same Terms with the Writs of Summons and varyed according to them so that when the One was ad tractandum ordinandum faciendum or ad faciendum consentiendum or ad consentiendum only so was the Other These Instruments they exhibited the first day of the Session or at least of their Appearance there and Memorandum's of them were enter'd together with the other Proxies by the Clerk of the Parliament This was the Method in which the Praemunientes was Executed upon the Inferior Clergy and obey'd by them a Method not practis'd once or twice upon an Exigence only as our Adversaries ignorantly talk but for two hundred years and upwards at least after the first framing it Several times it was inserted in the Latter Years of Edward the First as the Writs Printed by Pryn and Dugdale shew and sometimes when they take no notice of it * For instance the Writ for the Parliament in Quindena Purific 33 E. 1. is Printed in Dugdale p. 45. without the Praemunientes whereas both That and the Writ of Prorogation certainly had it as appears from a Certificatorium relating to the one and a Procuratorium to the other both enter'd in a Register of Henry the Prior of Canterbury And I have seen either the Certificatories or Letters of Proxy that were drawn up by some Capitular Body or other in relation to every one of these Meetings Three or four of these for the Convent of Bathe Pryn †Parl. Wr. Vol. 1. Pp. 116 117 118. has given us as Rarities and indeed they are All that I have seen Printed any where for That which he mentions out of Selden is a Deputation for an Abbat only However in the Old Chapter-Books they are very commonly to be met with and from thence therefore I shall take the Forms of some Few ‖ See Append Numb XI and the Dates of as many more as will be requisite to continue the Succession of them down to Henry the Eighth's Reign All Edward the First 's time I have said that this Clause had its due effect the Clergy by vertue of it resorting from Both Provinces to Parliament Of this the Evidence is very Full and Convincing in relation to his Last Parliament at Carlisle the Records of which Ryley has Printed at length in his Placita Parliamentaria and amongst them the Names of all those Proctors that appear'd for every Capitular Body and for the Clergy of Each Diocese of the Kingdom 'T is the only thing of the kind that is extant or perhaps preserv'd and the Book where it lyes is in the Hands of Few but the Professors of the Law for which reason I shall place a Specimen of it in the Appendix * See Num. XII Nor did any Change happen in this respect all Edward the Second's time Indeed the Weakness of that Prince who was given up to his Favourites and his Pleasures and the Ascendant which Archbishop Winchelsey had over him after his Return from Exile encourag'd the Clergy to slacken a little in their Obedience to this Clause at the Beginning of his Reign and once or twice under Archbishop Reynolds they attempted to free themselves wholly from the Authority of a Lay-Summons But they could not bring it to pass and after a short struggle therefore soon returnâ—d to their Duty and made their Representatives regularly according to the Tenor of it throughout all the Latter part of his Reign It will be at least a curious if not an useful piece of knowledge to give our selves some Account of the Steps taken by the Lower Clergy to get rid of the Praemunientes and of the little Varieties made use of in convening them at this Critical Time In the first and third years of this Prince when it went out it was comply'd with * Vide Procuratoria data 3. Apr. 1307. 25. Apr. 1309. in Registro Henrici Prioris but the Clergy afterwards fell off so that in his fifth year he found himself oblig'd to insert a Clause of a different nature into the two Archbishops Writs * See the Form in Dugd. Summoit Pp. 77 78. ordering them to bring the Clergy not of their several Dioceses only but Provinces to Parliament And here for ought I can find the Foundation was laid for that Practice of a Double Summons of the Clergy both by the Provincial and Bishop's Writ which grew afterwards the setled Course and does even to this day with some small Variety as to the Form obtain Two years afterwards a New Attempt was made by the Crown to bring Each Province apart before the King's Commissioners out of Parliament time but by Writs in a Parliamentary Form to the several Suffragan Bishops and by others to the two Archbishops †See Append Numb XIII ordering them to convene their Clergy Provincially at two different Times and Places therein mention Prout in proximo Parliamento nostro apud Westminster habito tam per Clerum quam per Communitatem regni nostri extitit concordatum †This refers to the Parliament in Quindenâ Paschae Dugd. p. 95. which was Summon'd with the Praemunientes and that Clause was as appears by these words obey'd The Direction of it was Venire faciatis coram dictis fidelibus nostris Suffraganeos vestros Decanos Priores Ecclesiarum Cathedralium Archidiaconos Abbates Exemptos non Exemptos Provinciae vestrae in propriis personis Capitula etiam per unum Clerum per duos Procuratores ad tractandum consentiendum unà Vobiscum c. And because the Exempt Abbats might be backward in obeying the Archbishop's Mandate They too had the same Writ sent 'em as the Suffragans had the Clause Praemunientes only excepted Had this Method succeeded it would have brought the Clergy more effectually and in fuller Numbers to Parliament than the Praemunitory Clause did When met therefore they took the Alarm and remonstrated against it as a Novelty never before practis'd in formâ quâ nunc scribitur They complain also of the Total Insertion of the King 's Writ into the Archbishop's Mandate as tending to a manifest Subversion of their Priviledges and desire a Revocation of it and that they may be resummon'd in a Regular Manner by the Archbishop without any Interposition of the Civil Authority which was granted The Remonstrance * See it Append Numb XIV is set down in an Old Cotton-Manuscript †Faustin A. 5. but with a false Date for it is there supposed to be made at a Convocation in 1322 to which it no ways belongs The Alteration this produc'd was that the next year of this Prince's reign but the same of our Lord the Archbishop had two several Writs directed to him when the Parliament was Summon'd the One as he was Bishop of the Diocese with the Usual Clause for the Lower Clergy the other ‖ See it
would be a very Curious Particular worth acquainting the World with But this is not the Only Instance * See another p. 31. of these Papers he has given of his knowing no other sense of the word Synodus but that of a Church-Assembly Many other ways the Clergy assembled in Synod had of employing themselves to the Adtage of the Church and the Commonwealth too many to be Enumerated and too well understood to be insisted on if Dr. Wake knows nothing of these things he is to be pitied for his Ignorance if he does and yet dissembles his knowledg of them he is to be detested for a much worse Quality But can this Gentleman be in Earnest when he says that the Convocation had little else at any time to do but to give Money does not He himself own in several places * Pp. 286 287 236 237. that the King frequently sent his Prohibitions thither commanding 'em not to enter or proceed upon Business that he did not approve of This implies I think that they were often otherwise employ'd than in Money-matters for Dr. Wake I believe will not pretend that it was Usual with our Princes to prohibit the Clergy from giving them Money Nay he tells us further out of Coke that the King did often appoint Commissioners by Writ to sit with the Clergy in Convocation and to have Conusance of such things as they meant to establish that nothing might be done in prejudice of their Authority †P. 111. And if so he could not but see that they were us'd to do some other Business beside Taxing themselves for here again I humbly conceive that neither were these Commissioners sent to restrain the Clergy's Liberality To convince the Reader yet further that the Clergy when met had other things beside Taxes to consider of I shall direct him to those very Instances brought by Dr. Wake to shew they had not I shall examin All his Proofs of this kind drawn from the Practice of Modern Synods and by Them shall leave the Reader to judge how fairly he has dealt with the Antient ones That I may not be thought says he * P. 142. to speak at all Adventures I will offer an Instance or two of it The Convocation that met the first of King Iames the First was by Prorogation continu'd from time to time for seven years together Yet except it were in his first year we do not hear of any great Business that was done by them more than that of granting Subsidies But I am well satisfy'd that he speaks at all adventures from this very Instance For * Book X. p. 28. Fuller seems to say that the Acts of this Convocation were lost even in his time and if so Dr. Wake must needs be a Bold Adventurer to pretend to say what was or was not done in it Besides had he spoken out and told us plainly what that Business was they did in their first year it would have given us some account why they might possibly have layn still a good while afterwards For that Business was no less than the setling the whole Discipline of the Church in a Body of an hundred and forty one Canons then drawn up which was one of the Greatest Works that ever any English Convocation had before them and having finish'd it therefore it would have been no wonder if they had discontinu'd their Debates for some time without entring on any thing that was Material If they had no Business to do we cannot expect that they should have made Business on purpose to do it But after all it so happens that we can certainly prove this Convocation to have sat and done Business and that of a very Important Nature for in 1606 Bishop Overall's Convocation-Book pass'd it a Work considerable in it self but made yet more considerable by the Event that attended the Publication of it And throughout all the rest of the Time that they were Employ'd or at least sitting and in a Readiness to do Business as it should happen appears from the Bishop of St. David's Speech in 1604 about the Use of the Cross * There is mention of this Speech in the Preface to Pool 's Sermon about Spiritual Worship He speaks of it as made in 1604 tho' otherwise I should have plac'd it at the Time when the Canons were passing The Speech it self and some Account of it is among the Manuscripts Bodl. Bibl. n. 8069 From which Paper we might certainly learn when it was spoken but I have not consulted it which shews that matter was then re-debated from the strict Attendance paid by the Members of the Lower House Three of which were Excommunicated by Archbishop Bancroft in 1605 on the account of their Absence and absolv'd from that Sentence the year afterwards †See Registr Banc. oft fol. 138 139 from the Messages sent by King Iames at several times to them with Two of which relating to the Articles of 1562 and Cathedral Service Dr. W. himself has kindly furnish'd us ‖ P. 110. and from the Applications made by the Clergy to the King One Instance of which their Petition against Prohibitions * Append Numb VI. I have already given the Reader So that no Instance could be more unfortunately pitch'd upon by Dr. Wake than this Let us see whether he is more lucky in that which follows His next Words are In King Charles the First 's time there were but Few Parliaments and therefore we are not to look for Convocations in that †P 142. In the first sixteen years of King Charles the First there were five New Parliaments chosen and as many Convocations and every One of those Convocations met and sat and we know who were the Prolocutors in each of them The first of these five * Anno 1625. See Fuller C. H. Book XI p. 108. was hindred from doing much Business by the Plague which then reign'd and the Last by a Select Committee for Alterations which sat in the Ierusalem-Chamber of the Deanery of Westminster and was set on foot to supplant the Use of Synods And yet even in these Two Motions were made †Some Instances of this kind Fuller takes notice of Ibid. p. 172. and Debates held tho' no Synodical Conclusions were form'd and in all the Five ‖ In the Convocation of 1628 Pryn says that Dr. Jackson was accus'd of Arminianism Append. to Anti-Arminianism at least so much Business was done as made their Title good to do more if they thought fit for I must here and every where put this Gentleman in mind that there is a great deal of Business for Convocations to do besides framing Constitutions However even That Business it self was done in One of these Assemblies the Convocation of 1640 where also their Jurisdiction was exercis'd in a very Notable Instance the Suspension of the Bishop of Gloucester * See Heylin Cypriâ—n Angl. Dr. Wake takes no notice of
ferè totâ Nobilitate regni Magistrorum Clericorum M. Par. p. 372. 1247. Fecit Dominus Rex Magnates suos nec non Angliae Archidiaconos per Scripta sua Regia Londinum evocari Ib. p. 719. agen Convenerant etiam tùnc ibidem ut praetactum est Archidiaconi Angliae nec non totius Cleri pars non minîma cum ipsis Magnatibus conquerentes communiter super intolerabilibus frequentibus Exactionibus domini Papae Tandem de Communi Consilio provisum est ut Gravamina terrae domino Papae seriatim monstrarentur ex parte Communitatis totius Cleri Populi regni Anglicani pp. 720 721. 1255. Post festum S t. Mich. tenuit Rex Parliamentum suum apud Westminster convocatis ibidem Episcopis Abbatibus Prioribus Comitibus Baronibus totius Regni Majoribus in quo petebat a Clero de Laïcis Foedis suis sibi Suffragium * Subsidium exhiberi disponens hoc priùs a Clero post eà à Populo Majori Minori extorquere Episcopi vero Abbates Priores Procuratores qui ibidem pro Universitate affuerunt nolentes huic exactioni adquiescere Gravamina summo Pontifici sub sigillis destinarunt Quorum Tenor Talis est De Archidiaconatu Lincolniae Articuli pro Communitate Procuratores Beneficiatorum Archidiaconatûs Lincoln pro totâ Communitate proponunt c. Ann. Burt. pp. 355 356. 1256. A Writ from the Bishop of Litchfield and Coventry to the Archdeacon of Stafford commanding him to collect the Papal Procurations ipsam Pecuniam tali die in Parliamento Londoniensi nobis assignantes Ibid. p. 372. Which supposes the Archdeacons Then to have attended the Parliament And accordingly the next time it was assembled we again find them there For a Debate arising this Resolution was taken Commune Concilium super hoc resedit quod Decani Praelati Regulares ac Archidiaconi tractabunt cum suis Capitulis Clericis it a quod ad mensem post Pascha redeant per Procuratores instructos ad plenè respondendum Ann. Burt. p. 374. The meaning of which was that the Deans Priors and Archdeacons appeared in Parliament not for themselves alone but for the whole Clergy of the Body or District over which they presided bringing up from them Procuratorial Letters †See a Bishop's Mandate to this purpose in the next Year 1257 which runs ut praedicti Dicanus Prior dictarum Cathedralium Ecclesiarum Cov. Litchf Abbates alii Priores cum Literis Procuratoriis nomine Congregationum suarum confectis ac dicti Archidiaconi cum Literis similibus factis ex parte Clericorum qui subsunt eïsdem dictis die loco peronaliter intersint Ann. Burt. p. 382. This Summons was purely Synodical P. 9. of this Book I have given two Instances wherein the same method was at this time practis'd in relation to the Parliament in which their Powers were sometimes specify'd and limited and this made a Recourse to their Principals necessary as often as any thing was propos'd that exceeded the Limits of those Powers This was by way of Indulgence to the Lesser Clergy in times when Summons to Parliaments were very frequent and consequently Attendance there very Expensive and Troublesome And the constitution of Reading therefore so often cited which first made distinct Proctors from the Rural Clarks of every Diocese a fixt and necessary part of the Clergys Parliamentary Assemblys did it not as a Priviledge but a Burthen for it commands them to be return'd etiamsi de Conturbatione vel Expensis oporteat fieri mentionem i. e. notwithstanding the Trouble and Charge it might be to them This they felt not while the Archdeacons were Commission'd to act for them who being bound Themselves to attend in Person by taking Procuratoria from the Inferior Clerks lessen'd Their Charge without increasing their Own But assoon as the Clergy sent up Distinct Proctors they were oblig'd to maintain them The Laiety I find were at this time indulg'd in like manner but in an Higher Degree for in the Parliament of Oxford Ann. 1258. this Memorable Provision was made which I shall for more than one reason here insert intirely Si fet a remembrer ke le Commun esâ—ise XII prodes homes ke vendrunt as Parlemenz which by the last Article were to be held three times every Year autre fez quant mester serra quant Rei u sun Cunseil les mandera pur treter de bosoingnes del Rei del Reaume Et ke le Commun tendra pur estable cer ke ces XII frunt ceo serra fet pur esparnier le Cust del Commun †Ann. Burt. p. 416. These Words at first sight might pass well enough for a Proof that the Commons of England properly so call'd were now represented in Parliament But upon comparing the several parts of the Relation it appears that these very Twelve who are here said to be elected par le Commun are in another place mention'd as chosen by the Barons And therefore the Community here spoken of must be the Community of the Baronage or Military Tenants who the Highest as well as the Lowest did it seems impower this Committee of Twelve to act for them in the three Annual Parliaments then appointed to be held And These together with the King's Council of Fifteen at the same time chosen had Authority to make Acts and Ordinances as appears evidently from the Provisions publish'd the next Year in the Parliament at Westminster of which it is said Ces sunt les Purveances les Establissimentz â—aitz a Westmoster al Parlement a la seint Michel par le Rei sun Conseil †Who the King's Council were appears p. 413 les XII par le Commun Conseil esluz after which these remarkable Words follow par devant le Communance de Engleterre ke dunke fu a Westmuster le an del regne Henry le fiz le Rei Iohan quarantieme terz * Ibid. p. 435. The Community of England therefore as distinguish'd from the Community of Barons or Great Tenants in Chief represented here by the Committee of XII were at and of this Assembly though the Enacting part of the Provisions then pass'd did not run in Their Name whose proper Province it was to Represent and to Petition Accordingly at their Instance these very Provisions were made as the same Annals inform us Significavit Communitas Bacheleriae Angliae Domino Edvardo filio regis Comiti Gloverniae aliis Iuratis de Concilio Regis apud Oxoniam quòd dominus Rex totaliter fecerat adimplevit omnia singula quae providerant Barones sibi imposuerant facienda quòd ipsi Barones nihil ad utilitatem reipublicae sicut promiserant fecerunt nisi Commodum Proprium Damnum Regis ubique quòd nisi inde fieret Emendatio alia ratio Pactum reformaret Upon which it follows Tandem videntes Barones magis
have done amiss in this Application yet nothing that they did afterwards needs an Excuse Their Refusal to comply with the King 's Excessive Demands was not only faultless but honourable and the Proceeding against them upon that refusal was altogether Illegal and Barbarous For we must not think that this sentence of Outlawry was built on any Legal Forfeiture they had incurr'd by adhering to the Pope against the Crown no it was founded purely on their denying to supply the King according to his Demands for three years before this when they delay'd to grant the Moiety ask'd he threatned †Audiens Rex indignatus est per suos satellites comminatus est se extrà Protectionem suam Clerum velle ponere nisi medietatem omnium bonorum concederent Knight c. 2502. So also Eversden before cited to do what he actually did now to put them out of his Protection and Then the Prohibitory Bull of Pope Boniface was not in being It would be some Mitigation indeed of the severity of this Process if it had been as Dr. W. would perswade us †P. 351. carried on in Parliament But that is highly improbable and inconsistent with the best accounts we have of those times The Barons it is plain were now very uneasy under the King's Exactions and it is not credible therefore that They should joyn with him in oppressing the Clergy nor had they for ought I can find any Opportunity of doing it For the Clergy were put out of the King's Protection Ian. 30 ‖ 310. Cal. Feb. tale fuit Regis Consilium quòd praeciperet praescriptam duriti em fieri contra Clerum Ann. Wigorn. apud Angl. Sacr. Vol. 1. p. 520. 129 6 which was long after the Parliament of St. Edmundsbury ⸪ Held Nov. 3. 1296. was up and before the Council of Sarum ⸫ Which met Feb. 24. 1296 7. was called Nay 12 days before this Council the Sentence was not only pronounc'd but executed even in the remote parts of England for the Writ of Seizure to the Sheriff of Worcestershire bears date Feb. 12 * Vid. eosdem Ann. Wigorn. ibid. And this agrees very well with the Observation made by the Writers of that time § Eversden Knighton Westminster Ann. Wigorn. that the King's Army was beat in Gascoign on the same day that the Clergy were outlawed here in England for the News of this Defeat it appears from Matthew of Westminster †P. 429. reach'd the King sometime before he met his Barons at Sarum Indeed Knighton ⸪ Col. 2491 and Walsingham ⸫ Ypod. Neustr. speak of a Parliament at Hillary 9â— where this Sentence may seem to have pals'd but there is great reason to suspect their Exactness in this particular The Eldest of them liv'd an 100 Years after the Time they here write of whereas there is no one Cotemporary Author ‖ Rex Angliae Edwardus in crastino animarum apud Sâ—um Edmundum Parliamentum suum tenuit vocati ibidem venerunt per Regias Literas Praelati totus Clerus Sed quoniam Clerus vocatus fuit ibidem ad mandatum regis non auctoritate Ecclesiasticâ noluit ibidem finaliter respondere Sed prorogata dies fuit quoad Clerum usque in Crastinum S. Hilarii A Laïcis tamen ibidem duodecimam partem bonorum-suscepit c. In festo verò S. Hil. Rex petebat à Clero tùnc Londoniae eâdem causa congregatis auctoritate Ecclesiasticâ Auxilium c. Excerpta è Chron. MS. Eccl. Cont. apud Angl. Sacr. Vol. 1 â—p 51. Generalis Convocatio Cleri facta est apud Londoniam in Octavis S. Hil. ad tractandum de pace Sanctae Eccl. c. Iohn de Eversden MS. The Sentence of Excommunication denounc'd by the Bishops and Clergy in Convocation A. D. 1298. see it Spelman Concil Vol. 2. p. 428. style this meeting Quaedam Convocatio Praelatorum Cleri London celebrata post Festum S. Hil. A. D. 1296. The Writ also for summoning it see it Registr Winchelsey fol. 205. the Returns to that Writ see One Registr Henr. Prioris fol. 70. and the Procuratoria drawn in relation to it ibid. mention a Meeting of the Clergy alone without any the least Intimation of a Parliament that I have seen either in Print or Manuscript and I have perus'd several that mentions such a Parliament or speaks of this meeting at St. Hilary any otherwise than as a Provincial Council of the Clergy agreed upon indeed in the preceding Parliament of St. Edmundsbury but not held concurrently with any Session of it Nor is there a Writ of this date either of Summons or Proâ—ogation in our Rolls or Registers So that the word Parliamentum in these two Historians must be taken loosly and in the same Latitude that it is made use of at this very time by Westminster †Barones Angliae Parleamentum suum per se-statuerunt ad ann 1297. and Eversden †Comites Barones tenuerunt Parliamentum suum apud Northampton de discordiâ ortâ inter Regem Ipsos ad ann eund when they apply it to the Barons Voluntary Meetings without and in Opposition to the King's Authority Accordingly we may observe that in the Praecept to the Sheriff for-seizing the Estates of the Clergy by me lately mention'd there are no words that imply the Sentence to have pass'd de Consilio Baronum or to have had the Consent of Parliament It says only Propter aliquas certas Câ—usas Tibi praecipimus qùod omnia Lâ—â—ca Fâ—eda totius Cleri in Ballivâ tuâ sine dilatione capiaâ—is in manum vestram c. †Annal. Wig. p. 520 and by the Tenor of it one would guess that it was a mere Arbitrary Command of the Prince not built on any Judicial Process whatever I have been very Liberal therefore in allowing that it might spring from a Iudgment in Court led to it by some Expressions that look that way in the Relations of Thorn and Knighton However the Judge who pronounc'd it will not be excus'd by this allowance for he pass'd an Unrighteous Sentence in a very Infamous Cause and meanly prostituted the Law to gratify the King's Resentments For which reason we may be sure that Sir Roger Brabazon * Dr. W. pretends to tell this Story with great Exactness and yet mistakes both the Name of the Person and his Office there being no such Iudge at that time as Robert Brabazon and the Person he means being neuer either second Iudge or Chief Iustice of the Common Pleas as Dr. W. will have him to have been if Dugale 's Chronica Juridicialia may be relied on The Dr. it seems found there Justitiarius ad Placita corum Rege and Justitiarius de Banco oppos'd to one another and wisely thought that the first of these signify'd the Common Pleas and the second the King's Bench just as they sounded was not the Man as my Lord Coke too
made between his Prerogative Royal and Supreme Authority in Causes Ecclesiastical and the particular Powers lodg'd in him by the 25 H. VIII In vertue of the first of these he is said to have granted the Clergy full free and lawful Liberty c. to confer treat debate c. upon Canons but to have given his Royal Assent to those Canons according to the form of a certain Statute or Act of Parliament made in that behalf in the 25th Year of the Reign of K. Henry the VIII †And so in the Commission it self see it in Dr. W's Append. n. V. though the 25. H. VIII be recited in the â—reamble of it yet where Leave is granted to Câ—nâ—er Treat c. such Grant is said to be by Vertue of our Prerogative Royal and Supreme Authority in Câ—â—seâ— Ecclesiastical without any reference to the Statute which Statute is no where vouch'd in that Ratification but with regard to such Royal Assent only It cannot be inferr'd therefore that either the Givers or Takers of this new License understood the Submission Act in a Sense different from what we contend for since it does not appear that the Grant of this License was really founded on that Statute However supposing it was yet are we to consider in the 3 Place that it is not a bare License to treat that is there granted but beyond this as the words run A full free and lawful Liberty License Power and Authority to conferr treat debate consider consult and agree of and upon such Canons Orders c. Now though a License to debate of Canons was not necessary according to the Act yet a License to agree upon them might be judg'd necessary the Clergys agreeing upon Canons especially in such an Authoritative Form and with such Sanctions and Penaltys as I have shewn them now first to have practis'd being liable to be constru'd to a sense equivalent to Enacting or Making them which without the Royal Assent and License they were by the Act expresly prohibited to do The License to Treat therefore is not to be taken separately but in conjunction with agreeing of and upon and must be suppos'd necessary no otherwise than as it qualify'd the Clergy so to treat of Canons as to agree also and come to a Conclusion upon them And thus therefore the Latin Title of these Canons which Dr. W. acknowledges to be truly Authentick and Legal †App. p. 25. runs Constitutiones sive Canones Ecclesiastici per Episcopum Londinensem Praesidem Synodi pro Cantuariensi Prov. ac reliquos Episcopos Clerum ejusdem Prov. ex Regiâ Authoritate Tractati Conclusi In ipsorum Synodo inchoatâ Londini c. Ab eâdem Regià Majestate deïnceps approbati ratihabiti ac confirmati ejusdemque Authoritate sub magno Sigillo Angliae promulgati per utramque Provinciam tam Cant. quam Ebor. diligentèr observandi They are said to be ex Regiâ Authoritate tractati conclusi joyntly not ex Regiâ Authoritate tractati conclusi in ipsorum Synodo c. as L. M. P. has fallaciously pointed these words on purpose that he may sever their Treating from their Concluding and make the Royal License seem to have been necessary for the one without any Consideration of the other But this is according to his usual Sincerity in these Matters one Instance of which I have already observ'd to the Reader The English Title of these Canons confirms what has been said and gives us further Light in the case it is thus worded Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiastical Treated upon by the Bishop of London President of the Convocation for the Prov. of Cant. and the rest of the Bishops and Clergy of the said Province And agreed upon with the Kings Majestys License in their Synode begun at London A. D. 1603 c. and now Publish'd for the due Observation of them by his Majesty's Authority under the Great Seal of England Here is no mention of the Kings License for any Act previous to their agreeing upon these Canons which is a good Evidence that the Framers of them thought there needed none and though by the form of their Commission a free Liberty was granted them to treat debate and agree yet that really they had occasion for such a Grant only as to the last of these Acts but not as to the Former For had the One been equally necessary with the other they would have taken equal care to express it Dr. W. indeed excepts against this English Inscription †App. p. 25. and says it is very imperfectly rendred from the Latin and apt to lead men into mistakes about these matters believing it seems that the Translation of these Canons into English was the work of some Private Hand unauthoriz'd by the Convocation whereas he should have known that the way was for the Convocation to prepare both her Articles †The Articles of our Church were at the same time prepar'd both in Latin and English so that both are equally Authentical Bishop of Sarum 's Exposition c. p. X. and Canons in Latin and English at the same time and that the one of these therefore is every whit as Authentick as the other And in the present case it may be question'd whether the English Canons be not rather somewhat more authentical than the Latin ones since it was That Copy of them which seems particularly to have passed the Great Seal and was with the King's Ratification at length annex'd then publish'd from the Press Royal. And as low an Opinion as Dr. W. has of Convocations I hope he will allow them able to translate their Own Latin and to understand their own meaning But should there in rendring the Latin Title any casual Mistake have happen'd it would have been set right afterward in the Canons of 1640 †See Sparow Col. p. 235. when it behov'd the Clergy to tread warily and to prevent all manner of Exceptions And yet There again the very same English Inscription returns nor did that House of Commons which was no ways unwilling to find fault with any thing in these Canons that could be laid hold of except against this Title but made use of it themselves in their Votes ‖ Rushworth part 3. p. 1365. of Dec. 1.5 16 1640 without questioning the Accuracy or Legality of it From all which I inferr that those very Convocations that took out these Commissions did not however think that they treated in vertue of them and much less that they could not have treated without them They needed such Powers only to draw up and pass their Synodal Decrees in form and though more was inserted into them even the Liberty of Debating as well as Concluding yet they accepted what was not necessary for the sake of what was taking care only in the Front of their Synodical Acts to assert a Liberty of Debate to themselves independently of any such Royal Grants or Commissions All they
wanted was a Commission to make or decree Canons the Attorney General who had the drawing it thought it seems that it would not harm them if a little more than they wanted was given them and knew to be sure that he should not hurt his Master's Prerogative by it and so that the Royal Grant and the Clergys Priviledge might look Ample and Full enough was pleas'd as has been usual in such cases to multiply Words without Occasion But it no more follows from the Clergys admitting such a License that they needed every Part and Parcel of it than it does that a Criminal who takes out a General Pardon is guilty of every Individual Crime that is there specify'd In the first seven Years of Q. Elizabeth every New Bishops Patent had this Clause in it Supplentes nihilominùs Supremâ Authoritate nostrâ— Regiâ ex Mero Motu Certâ Scientià nostris siquid aut in hiis quae juxta mandatum nostrum praedictum per Vos fient aut in Vobis aut Conditione Statu Facultate vestris ad praemissa perficienda desit aut decrit eorum quae per Statuta hujus regni aut per Leges Ecclesiasticas in hâc parte requiruntur aut necessaria sunt temporis ratione ac rerum necessitate sic postulante These words sound high and yet our Learned Mason pleads †de Minist Angl. p. 329. that it cannot from hence be collected that there were any such Defects as are here said to be Pardon'd and likens this Clause to that in the Pope's Bulls which absolves every Bishop â quibusvis Excommunicationis Suspensionis Interdicti aliisque Ecclesiasticis Censuris Paenis a Iure vel ab Homine quâ—vis Occasione vel Causâ latis †P. 330. without enquiring whether the Bishop had incurr'd any of these Censures or needed this Absolution It was given out as he there distinguishes Hypothetice non Absolute †P. 331. i. e. if they wanted it there they had it and if they did not want it yet ad abundantem cautelam they might be willing to accept it because others might Imagine both that they did want it and that it was this way to be supply'd and it might be proper therefore to ward against these Suppos'd Defects as well as more Real ones Which is all as Applicable to the Convocation that took out the License in the first of K. Iames. Does Dr. W. think that every impowring Clause or Phrase in a Commission implys that the Persons Commission'd could not have done such or such a thing without they had been so impower'd The following Instance may satisfy him to the contrary A Commission for the Repair of Pauls in 1631. gives full Power and Authority to the Persons nam'd in it to consult advise and consider of meet Orders Ordinances and Constitutions for the better preservation of that Church and for the preventing Annoyances and the same Orders Ordinances and Constitutions being reduc'd into Writing to present unto us to the intent that the same being perus'd by Us and consider'd of may receive our Royal Approbation and Allowance †Bibliotheca Regia p. 256. The Powers here granted are much the same and in much the same words with those in the Commission to the Convocation but no body can be silly enough to think that Private Persons might not of their own Accord have done all this have enter'd into such Considerations and made such Proposals to the King without a Commission Commissions are oft-times employ'd not for the security of such as do the Business but to secure its being done they give the Countenance of Authority to Things and promote the Dispatch of them For Example In the 21 H. III. A Writ issu'd to William de Perecat the Court-Barber which Mr. Pryn out of his Zeal against Long-hair has put into his Tomes of Ecclesiastical Iurisdiction †T. 2. p. 479. and may therefore become this place as well It ran as follows Pat. 21. H. III. m. g. dâ—râ— REX Willielmo de Perecat Salutem Sciatis quod concessimus plenam Potestatem Vobis dedimâ—s scindendi Capillos Clericorum nostrorum qui sunt de Hospitio nostro familia nostra longos crines habentium comas nutrientium ad Crocos capillorum suorum deponendos Et ideâ— Uobis mandamus quatenus ad hoc modo debito intendatis hujusmodi Potestatem nostram vobis concessam taliter exequentes circa predictos Capillos scindendos Crocos deponendos ne ad Capillos vestros scindendos forcipes apponere debeamus Teste meipso apud Clyne 2 d o. die Septembris Now though I doubt not but that William de Perecat went about his Business more nimbly and to better effect after this Message than before it yet I cannot forbear thinking that if these Clergymen and He had been agreed he might have exercised his Office upon them without having a Writ to shew for it This is a familiar Instance indeed but may be as Instructive as a more solemn one and if it serve withal to relieve a serious Scene and make the Reader smile a little I have my double end in it What has been said may be sufficient I hope to account for the License of 1603. and for any Word or Passage in it that may be suppos'd to affect the Clergys Liberty of Debate which they were in an Unterrupted Possession of when that Practise first began and have an Undoubted Right to still notwithstanding the continuance of it One Expression indeed there is in it which Dr. W. catches at and has not been yet consider'd He observes that the Liberty granted by that Commission is said to proceed out of the King 's Especial Grace Certain Knowledge and Mere Motion †P. 116. and does most invincibly from thence argue that it could not therefore be their Due or belong to them ex debito justitiae †P. 290. 283. I agree with him thus far that a Commission impowering them to Treat is not their Due because I take it to be their unquestion'd Right and Due to treat without one But his Reason why they are not entitled to it of Right I can by no means admit because Learned Lawyers tell me that those Phrases Especial Grace and Mere Motion are used sometimes for forms sake where the thing said to be thus granted is strictly of Right and cannot be with Justice deny'd For Instance the Writ de Excommunicato capiendo upon a Certification into Chancery follows we know in course and de Iure Ordinario and is therefore in diverse Precedents of it said to issue secundùm Consuetudinem Angliae i. e. according to the common Law of England and yet in one Instance Dr. Cousin †Apol. for Proc. Eccl. p. 8. informs me that it runs quòd hujusmodi breve nostrum de Gratià nostra procedat and a Note therefore in the Register upon these words in another Writ says that they
would have been tempted to think that he spake upon good Grounds and had well consider'd what he said Whereas in truth he was merely upon the Conjecture and having found that the Convocations of 1640. and 1603. acted by Commission concluded presently that all the Precedent ones must have done so too forgetting in the mean time that wise Maxim of his Own with which he very fitly introduces as wise a Chapter So great says he is that Uncertainty to which all Human Constitutions are expos'd that tho' I have before sufficiently shewn what the Nature of our Convocation at present is and what Authority our King 's have over it yet we can by no means from thence conclude that this was always the case †P. 147. Which deep Remark had it been in his View throughout his Book would have instructed him not to determin so peremptorily upon the Course of Antient Practise from some Modern Instances it would have sav'd him the shame of slipping into so many false and groundless Assertions on this Head and me the trouble of exposing them When he resolv'd for Reasons best known to himself to set up for a Champion in this Cause he should either have taken care fully to instruct himself in the matters he wrote of or at least where he was conscious of his want of Light he should have had the Discretion to express himself a little more warily The oldest Aera therefore of these Commissions which impower the Convocation to Treat c. is 1. I. 1. how that New Precedent came then to be set and what Restraints it may be conceiv'd to have laid on the Clergys Liberty of Debate I shall now briefly enquire It must be confess'd that K. Iames who had been somewhat less than a King in Scotland took upon him to be somewhat more than a King assoon as he came to the Crown of England spoke of his Prerogative in a very high tone look'd upon it as some Innate Power divinely annex'd to the Kingly Character and did not stick to call it so frequently in his Speeches and Messages †See his Speech to the Bishops and Ministers Spotswood p. 534. Letter to the Assembly of Perth ib. p. 537. and sometimes to talk even of a Sovereign and Absolute Authority which he enjoy'd as freely as any King or Monarch in the World †See his Declaration in 1605. Spotswood p. 488. Bishop Bancroft who had corresponded with him formerly in Scotland knew his Temper well and the Church having then Great Business to do and He himself some for the See of Cant. was then void contriv'd we may imagin how to humor it in the approaching Convocation wherein He was to Preside and to that end procur'd this Ample Commission as an Instance of the great Deference and Submission which the Church of England paid to the Royal Authority Indeed the Clergy had reason to shew all the Marks of Duty and Respect that were fiting to a Prince that had shewn himself so fast a friend to them as K. Iames in the Hampton-Court Conference which immediately preceded this Convocation had done Where he had declar'd openly for All the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church against the Scruples of those who were then called Puritans and had peremptorily commanded them to Conform This I say may be suppos'd to have wrought on the Clergys Gratitude and made them easier to accept such a Commission now than they would have been in any other Juncture especially since by it though they might seem to abridge their Liberty in One Respect yet they certainly enlarg'd it another For whereas in Former Convocations which were not thus Commission'd the Custom had been to draw up their Rules and Canons in an Unauthoritative Style and without denouncing Spiritual Penaltys on the Infringers of them according to the Pattern set by the Old Canons here the Clergy first began solemnly to Decree and Ordain and to annex the Sentence of Excommunication to the Breach of those Ordinances The Canons of Q. Elizabeth's time where they run most in the Style of Authority do yet rise no higher than to a Cautum est nequis †See Sparrow p. 245. as before in 1584. p. 193. Volumus etiam †Ibid p. 252. and Decernendum censemus * Ibid. p. 247. but in 1603 the very first Canon begins with Statuimus Ordinamus ‖ And so in those of 1640. We Ordain and Decree Can. 1. The Synod doth ordain and decree Can. 2. and the Sanction of several of them runs thus Excommunicetur ipso facto non nisi per Achiepiscopum restituendus idque postquam resipuerit ac impium hunc errorem publice revocarit The Previous License therefore qualifying them to Decree in form and to bring their Canons up to the antient Synodical Pattern they might for this reason be enclin'd to make use of it imagining how justly has since appear'd the Ground they got in one respect to be an Equivalent for what they lost in another Something too of this Caution might be owing to the Circumstances and Temper of the Times when there was no good understanding between Them and the Great Men of the Law the Two Jurisdictions clashing mightily and when those who underhand blew the Coals between Them and the Nonconformists were uneasy under the Clergys late Victory at Hampton-Court and would not have been sorry to see them make an ill use of it or to have had any Handle towards disputing the Legality of their after proceedings On this account a License under the Broad-Seal might be thought convenient to cover them not so much from the Law it self as from Popular Complaint and Misconstruction And if these Reasons may be suppos'd to be then of weight for the beginning this Practise they were yet stronger afterwards for the continuance of it in 1640. when the Passions and Prejudices of Men ran even higher against them than Now and every thing they did was more likely to be misinterpreted Thus far by way of Enquiry into the particular Grounds and Motives from whence this New Precedent may be suppos'd to have sprung let us now see how far the Clergys Liberty of Debate was really affected by it and we shall find this not to have been to such a Degree as is commonly imagin'd For in relation to this License there are Three things that deserve to be consider'd 1. That it was not granted the Clergy immediately upon their first coming together The Convocation had sat from March 20. to April 12. that is three full Weeks without a Commission and to be sure therefore had in that time Treated without one and did not therefore think themselves unqualify'd for all manner of Synodical Debates till they were so commission'd 2. It is very observable that in the King's Letters Patents of Confirmation †See them in the English Edition of the Canons in 1603. reciting this License there is a plain difference
thinks to be no Improble Conjecture of Fuller our Church-Historian ‖ P. 230. When the Authority of a Conjecture of Fuller's is appeal'd to one may be sure that both Authoritys and Reasons run low with him Let us ballance the Authority of a Conjecture of One Church Historian with the Records printed by another †Bishop Burnet at the End of his first Volumn Amongst which One of the first that meets us †P. 6. is a Mandate for a Convocation issu'd out by Archbishop Warsham in 1509 without the Recital or Mention of any Previous Writ from the King to that purpose This Instance I have particularly pitch'd upon because Dr. W. has strengthned this Guess of Fuller's by another of his Own concluding from the Assertion in the Submission-Act that the Convocation certainly met by the King 's Writ all H. the VIII's time and for some considerable time before * P. 231. whereas this Synod in the first Year of that Prince met as far as appears by no Provincial Summons but what was from the Archbishop only How the Clergy when met either in Convocation or Parliament consulted is another Curious Part of Knowledge which Dr. W. endeavors a little and but a little to supply us with Something he says of the Spiritualty sitting and acting separately from the Lay-part of the Parliament †P. 221. and something he seems to hint of the Inferior Clergys sitting apart from the Bishops after they had a Prolocutor of their own †P. 220. And this is all he knows of the matter I will add a few Particulars on this Head which a man of his Research methinks should have been no stranger to That the Clergy in Synod whether meeting with a Parliament or at different times from it sat ordinarily together for many Reigns after the Conquest is pretty well agreed on the Like Practise of Parliaments proves it and the Phrase of our Elder Historians who speak of the Clergy always as meeting in some One Particular Place without giving us the Names of several Rooms in which they sat apart or intimating that they usually subdivided The Canon †See it in Malmsbury ad ann 1075. made in Lanfrank's time to restrain all under Abbats from speaking in Synod without the Metropolitans Leave implys that the Greater and the Lesser Clergy then sat together so does the Account in M. Paris * Ad ann 1256. of a Synod in his time call'd by Rustandus where Magister Leonardus an Inferior Clergyman is term'd quasi Cleri Advocatus Prolocutor Universitatis †P. 920. l. 10. And in another place it is said of him In cujus Ore posita fuerunt Verba Episcoporum exponenda p. 918. l. 6. It seems he was deputed to deliver the sense of the whole Synod both of the Upper and Lower part of it who therefore we may presume now sat and debated together The Custom also of Bishops sending Inferior Clergymen to represent them though it held long after the Convocation divided yet to be sure had its rise when they were together and proves that originally they thus sat Indeed when the Archdeacons came with Procuratoria from the Inferior Clergy as they often did till E. the first 's time 't is not to be believ'd that they separated from the Greater Prelates but deliberated and voted with them as the Knights of Shires did at first with the Barons ‖ See a Record to this purpose in Dr. Brady 's Introduction Ap. p. 29 and p. 37. Not that the several Ranks of the Clergy did not even then act separately upon occasion The Instance of the Council of Winchester in Malmsbury * Ad ann 1142. Hist. Nov. is a plain proof of this at which he tells us the Legat consulted with the Bishops the Abbats and the Archdeacons severally and informs us withal that He himself was present in this Council †Cujus Concilii Actioni quia interfui integram Veritatem Rerum Posteris non negabo From whence also one would guess that more of the Inferior Clergy were there than are in the General Division of the Members expressed unless we shall say that Malmsbury came as the Proxy of his Absent Abbat so that his account is to be depended on When the Proctors of the Capitular and Diocesan Clergy came to be a certain and standing part of these Councils as they did in the 13 th Century they too sometimes consulted a a part and made as it were a distinct State by themselves Thus we are told of Two several Convocations in the Year 1296. by the Chronicle of Dunstable †MS. in Biblioth Cotton Tiberius A. 10. written at that very time Congregatio divisa erat in Quatuor Ordines sive Turmas Episcopi scilicet eorum Procuratores seorsùm Decani Cathedrales Archidiaconi seorsùm Abbates Priores alii Praelati seorsùm Procuratores Communitatis Cleri seorsiùm Into such Committees as these the Convocation I suppose subdivided all along down from these Times to the very Reformation as often as there was occasion for it though for the greater part of that Period they ordinarily sat and consulted together in Two Bodys as they do I mean should do at this day In Arundel's Register * Archiepiscopus consultis separatim Episcopis ad Oct. 8. 1399. Iterùm ad ann 1396. therefore we find the Bishops often treating separately from the Abbats and Priors and in one of Chichley's Synods ‖ A o. 1438. See Duck 's Life of Chichley it appears that the Proctors of the Inferior Regular Clergy granted subsidys and therefore we may presume consulted about them apart from the Diocesan Clergy And as low as 1529. in the Acts of the Synod of that Year this passage occurs ‖ Sess. 4. Exclusis omnibus praeter Suffraganeos Reverendissimus habuit Communicationem * In MS o. Convocationem cum eïs Intraverunt postèa Abbates Illis Exeuntibus intraverunt Fratres Mendicantes quatuor Ordinum cum quibus Reverendissimus habuit seriam communicationem Posteà ingressus est Prolocutor cum quibusdam de Clero At what time the Two Houses of Convocation divided is not easy to say but it was not I believe till after the Commons had separated from the Lords and therefore in all E. the II's Reign and in the beginning of E. III. the Petitions are made to the Archbishops and Bishops and run in the name of Religiosi Clerus †See an Instance in Dene 's Hist. Ross. Angl. Sacr. Vol. 1. p. 363. and here in the Appendix Numb XV. under which style all of the Convocation below Bishops are comprehended In the last Year of Edward the III. some Expressions in Sudbury's Register †In Conv. 4. Nov. Feb. 1376. seem to intimate that this Division had obtain'd if at least my Extract do not mislead me but a formal mention of the Inferior Domus Convocationis and