Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A33926
|
The legality of the court held by His Majesties ecclesiastical commissioners defended their proceedings no argument against the taking off penal laws & tests.
|
Care, Henry, 1646-1688.
|
1688
(1688)
|
Wing C527; ESTC R23058
|
12,362
|
42
|
present Commissioners for what they have done against the Bishop of London and Magdalen Colledge they do condemn themselves for exercising the greatest Severities against the Puritans contrary as now they themselves will have it unto all Law For from what has been already said it is apparent That the same Power His Majesty's Predeceffors exercis'd belongs unto His Majesty and that gives Strength to each Horn of the Dilemma In a word then our Church-men must confess they have been guilty of a very great errour in turning the Royal Thunder against the Old Puritans in Q. Elizabeths and K. James the First 's days Or that they acted very Righteously in what they have done against them If the Former why do they not publish so much to the World Why do they not confess that their Forefathers have sinned and gone astray and that the Puritans were most Unjustly persecuted by their beloved Mother If the Latter if the Church of England in those days did but what was Just seeing many Hundred of the Puritans were spoiled of their Benefices by the Royal Power the KING may as Righteously proceed on the same bottom Fourthly The Fourth thing to be done is this viz. That His MAJESTY may exercise His Prerogative in Matters Ecclesiastical in a more ample manner than yet He has done The Author of the Letter affirms That the Power of making Canons for the Government of the Church was no otherwise in the CROWN than the Power of making Temporal Laws But the mistake in this place is as great as some others he is faln into about Appeals and Investitures the first of which notwithstanding what he saith to the contrary is to the KING without a Parliament and decided by his Delegates or Commissioners of Review the Last by the KING solely who by the delivery of the Staff and Ring did usually invest as our Histories abundantly confirm In like manner touching Laws about Rites and Ceremonies it lies in the KING's Power without a Parliament to make ' em So saith Dr. Zouch and Dr. Cosin and there is an Act of Parliament Rex possit novas Leges condere circa ceremonias ritus cum confilio Metropolitani vel Commissariorum in Causis Ecclesiasticis Zouch Descrip Jur. Eccles Par. 1. Sect. 3. Cos T. 6. expresly recognizing this Power to be in the KING the Words of which are If there shall happen any Contempt or Irreverence to be used in the Ceremonies or Rites of the Church the Queen's Majesty with the Advice of Her Commissioners in Causes Ecclesiastical or Metropolitan may Ordain and Institute such further Ceremonies or Rites as may be most for the Advancement of GOD's Glory the Edifying of His Church and due Reverence of Christ's Holy Mysteries and Sacraments 1 Eliz. c. 2. And as the KING with His Ecclesiastical Commissioners may make New Laws about Ceremonies so without a Parliament He may make Orders or Constitutions for the Government of the Clergy and deprive the Disobedient Thus much is affirm'd by those Protestant Divines who have Written in Defence of the KING's Supremacy particularly by Dr. Harris in Answer to Becanus the Jesuit where he is express in assuring us That the Right and Power by Regal Authority to make Church-Laws as that GOD should not be Blasphemed that GOD should be pacified in a Fast and Honoured in a Festival-day and all such as we read to have been made in the Code Authenticks and Capitulars by Constantine Theodosius Justinian and Carolus Magnus belongs to our Kings Moreover to Delegate such as should judge of the Laws so made Touching Persons To administer Justice to all of all sorts To deprive the High-Priest if he do deserve of his Priesthood These by Divine Right are the Rights of Regal Primacy viz. whereby the KING may 1. Be called the Supreme Head of the Church 2. Call Councils and preside in them 3. Make Laws Ecclesiastical 4. Constitute and Depose the High-Priest 5. Bind His Subjects by Oath to Keep the Laws by Him made To conclude Hereby may the Adversaries see that Regal Primacy is founded on the Scriptures and propagated from the First Religious Kings under the Old to the First Religious Emperors and Kings and so to Our Sovereign Lord K. JAMES under the New Testament and in that long distance of time nothing impaired or diminished So far Dr. Harris But before many Noble-men Archbishops and Bishops and the Justices and Barons of the Exchequer it was agreed That the KING without a Parliament may make Constitutions for the Government of the Clergy and that such a Deprivation Ex Officio without a Libel is good Besides it must be further observ'd That as it was held both by the Church-of England-Divines and Lawyers Noyes Reports Fol. 100. to be in the Power of the KING to make Constitutions for the Government of the Clergy and Deprive the Disobedient In like manner our KINGS acted accordingly and impos'd a Subscription to the Three following Articles I. That the KING's Majesty under GOD is the Only Supreme Governour of this Realm and of all other His Highnesses Dominions and Countries as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes as Temporal and that no Forreign Prince Person Prelate State or Potentate have or ought to have any Jurisdiction Power Superiority Preheminence or Authority Ecclesiastical or Spiritual within His Majesties said Realms Dominions and Countries II. That the Book of Common-Prayer and of Ordering of Bishops Priests and Deacons containeth in it nothing contrary to the Word of GOD and that it may Lawfully be used and That He Himself will use the Form in the said Book prescribed in publick Prayer and none others III. That He alloweth the Book of Articles of Religion agreed upon by the Archbishops and Bishops of both Provinces and the whole Clergy in the Convocation holden in London in the Year of our Lord God 1562. And that He acknowledgeth all and every the Articles therein contained being in number Nine and Thirty besides the Ratification to be agreeable to the Word of GOD. To these three Articles all Persons received into the Ministry were bound to Subscribe in these Words I N. N. do willingly and ex animo Subscribe to these Three Articles above-mention'd and to all things that are contained in them This Subscription was imposed by the Regal Authority without a Parliament and many Hundreds who could not Subscribe were to the Ruin of them and their Families actually deprived And although this Subscription was exacted during the whole Reign of James I. and Charles I. yet until the Restauration of Charles the 2d it had never a Parliamentary Establishment Seeing then it 's past doubt That His MAJESTY's Supremacy is as ample as that of any of His Royal Predecessors what Q. Elizabeth and K. James the First have done that His present MAJESTY may now do and without a Parliament Command a Subscription to other New Articles and Deprive the Disobedient To instance in one
Let this be Printed WHITE-HALL Febr. 25 th 1687. Sunderland P. THE Legality of the Court HELD BY His Majesties Ecclesiastical Commissioners DEFENDED Their Proceedings No ARGUMENT Against the Taking Off Penal Laws Tests LONDON Printed and are to be Sold by Richard Janeway in Queens-Head-Alley in Pater-Noster-Row MDCLXXXVIII THE Legality of the Court Held by His Majesties Ecclesiastical Commissioners DEFENDED THE Manifest Design of our Church-men's Out-cries against His MAJESTIES Ecclesiastical Commission being to insinuate into the Mobile That the KING notwithstanding the solemn Promises he has made to the Church of England intends nothing less than Her Ruin I cannot forbear adding some Considerations to what the Vindicator of the Proceedings of His MAJESTY's Ecclesiastick Commissioners hath said on this Subject And thus much I the rather do because I find that the Last thing they aim at is the setting the Nation against the Taking off Penal Laws and Tests But that I may the more Successfully go through this Province it will be necessary that I examine what has been opposed to the Legality of the Court. His MAJESTY has Promised to Protect the Church of England as by Law established and hitherto has done Nothing that interseres with this most Gracious Promise for it must be acknowledged that a Correcting the Disobedient Members of a Church is not a Destroying but rather an using proper methods to preserve and secure it The Church of England is a Body-Politick compact and compounded of many and almost infinite several and yet well-agreeing Members of which the KING is Head instituted and furnished with plenary and entire Power Prerogative and Jurisdiction to render Justice and Right to every part of this Body of what Estate Degree and Calling soever he be The Exercise of this Power and Prerogative according to the Ecclesiastick Laws of this Realm is the Great Engine used for the Defence and Security of this Church The Distribution of Justice whether by encouraging those that do well or punishing the Offenders is the true way to support a Body-Politick Thus much I presume all men of Sence will yield from whence it is easily inferr'd That on my Clearing the Legality of the Commission for nothing has been that I do know objected against the Defence of its Proceedings it must be moreover granted that His Majesty has done the Church of England no harm My present Work then is to consider What has been urged against the Legality of this Court The Author of a Letter to the Vindicator will have the Question to be Whether or no by the Laws of this Nation as they now stand the KING 's Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction may be delegated to Commissioners Or Whe-Ecclesiastical Commissioners derived their Authority from His Majesty by vertue of the First Elizabeth only and not upon the score of any Prerogative in the Crown preceding to that Act whereby our Kings might appoint Commissioners in such Cases ad libitum is the single Question upon which the Validity or Invalidity of the present Commission will turn To this the Author answers That it is not an Expression that might drop from my Lord Coke's Pen that will determine so weighty a point as this especially it being a question that depends upon some knowledge of Antiquity which my Lord Coke was very little acquainted with Besides he adds That my Lord Coke never tells us that our King 's by vertue of their ancient Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction could appoint any Commissioners After this the Author goes on to let us know what the ancient Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical was boldly affirming that no Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction was anciently delegated to Commissioners For saith he Commissioners are not such Arbitrary things as some mistaken Men do fondly imagine And how plausibly soever it be said That what Power a Man has in himself he may delegate unto another Yet this difference must be admitted betwixt Persons Commissionated by the KING in Matters of Government and Persons authorized by private men to act for them and in their stead viz. That private men may by Law do those things in Person which they impower others to do for them But the KING Commissionates Persons to do what Himself cannot by Law do in Person This is the Substance of what our Author opposes to what the Vindicator had said of the Legality of this Court. And in my Reply no more is needful than to shew 1. That in the Sence of the Church's great Archbishop the KING may do by Law those things in Person which He impowers Commissioners to do for Him. 2. That before the 1 Eliz. the Kings of England by the Common Law might grant out Commissions 3. That notwithstanding any thing contained in the 16 Car. 1. or 13 Car. 2. be KING may do so still 4. That His Majesty may exercise this Prerogative in Matters Ecclesiastical in a more ample manner than yet He has done and therefore seeing he doth not it 's manifest That His Majesty designs no Hurt to the Church of England To the First I will only insist on what is affirm'd by Archbishop Bancroft the Malleus Puritanorum the great Champion of our English Church who was President of the Convocation called in the First year of K. James 1. and stifly insisted on the imposing the three Articles and on a Depriving all that disobeyed This Great man the Church of England's Darling expresses himself most fully in these Words Lib. 12. Mich. 5 Jac. Prohibitions de l'Roy as Sir Edward Coke reports Upon Sunday the 10th of November the KING upon Complaint made to him by Bancroft Archbishop of Canterbury concerning Prohibitions was informed That when question was made of what Matters the Ecclesiastical Judges have cognizance either upon the Exposition of the Statutes concerning Tythes or any other thing Ecclesiastical or upon the Statute of 1 Eliz. concerning the High Commission or in any other case in which there is not express Authority in Law the KING Himself may Decide it in His Royal Person and that the Judges are but the Delegates of the KING and that the KING may take what Causes he please to determine from the Determination of the Judges and may determine them Himself And the Archbishop said It was clear in Divinity that such Authority belongs to the KING by the Word of GOD. Nothing can be more expresly opposite to what the Author of the Letter affirms He saith that The KING cannot by Law do that in Person which He impowers others to do But the Archbishop is positive That the KING can do it in Person yea that thus much is ratified by the Holy Scriptures and therefore is out of the power of humane Laws to alter If then there be any Truth in this Church-man's Divinity there is no force in what the Author offers for Law. But Secondly The thing I chiefly insist on is this That before the First of Elizabeth the Kings of England might grant out Commissions In Caudries Case Coke Rep. Lib. 5.