Selected quad for the lemma: book_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A69845
|
The Case of the forfeitures in Ireland fairly stated with the reasons that induced the Protestants there to purchase them.
|
|
1700
(1700)
|
Wing C912aA; Wing C1073; ESTC N61326
|
17,514
|
56
|
to raise a Cloud of Witnesses and alarum people with a great noise of Resumptions in former times tho there be nothing at all in them On the miscarriage of these anothor Act is made 10 Edw. IV. But 't is with such provisions and exceptions as by the K. shall be made who tells the Commons he will reward every of his Subjects for their merits We are told by this Author that a great number of exceptions are brought by the King but these don't seem of that nature as if 't were design'd they should defeat the intentions of the House of Commons This Gentleman in giving an account of these Resumptions had done well if he had told us how they happen'd this would sufficiently inform us what they were Every one knows how Edward the IV. came to the Thrown that he was Crown'd several years before the Death of Hen. VI. Our History tells us that to raise some with the ruin of others he distributed the Lands and Possessions of those that sided with King Henry amongst his own Favourites and Followers having the better to paliate his own proceedings firâ—t made Proclamation that whosoever of the contrary Faction would come in and submit should be received to Grace and restor'd to their Patrimonies Trust. Hist pag. 183. In the 10th Year of his Reign we find King Henry gets the ascendent again K. Edward IV. 1. Proclaimed an Usurper is forc'd to quit the Kingdom Then the Parliament was assembled at Westminster wherein King Edward and his Friends and Followers are Attainted of High-Treason and their Goods and Lands seised to King Henry's use Trust Hist pag. 194. This accounts for the Resumption made three Years after 13. Edward VI. last mention'd when King Edward got the better again 'T was an Act to re-invest Crown-Lands and Goods which King Edward IV. had in the beginning of his Reign which as I 've shewn were afterwards seiz'd by Parliament for King Henry's use and had by him been disposed of among his Friends So that this it seems was only an Act to resume from King Henry's Friends to vest them in the Crown and in effect to give them to King Edward's Favourites for giving the Royal assent he told the Commons That the Bill should not withstand that Right and Equity which obliged him to do to every of his Subjects according to their Merits Anno 1. Henry VII Another Act of Resumpiion passes by this the K. is to seize and assume into his hands whatever Henry VI. his Unkle had the 2 d. day of October in the 34 th Year of his Reign and it makes void all Grants made by King Edward IV. King Edward V. and Richard III. By Authority of Parliament or otherwise Here is an excellent precedent for Resumptions one that shews how a great deal of Money may be raised if we will but Copy after this Exemplar For this looks backward thro' three entire Reigns and seizeth what was given even by Act of Parliament Either this is a Regular Resumption or it is not If it be not why is it mentioned If it be this Gentleman shews where England may raise a vast Sum upon an extraordinary occasion 'T will be only resuming what has been forfeited in Ireland since 1641 or if that should be too little carrying the Act up to Queen Elizabeth's time which according to what he has delivered in his Doctrine of Resumptions and Conquest together may very well be done This Gentleman when he in order to influence the Parliament to resume deliver'd this among his many other excellent Precedents ought to have told us the true cause of this very extraordinary Act. 'T was in the 1 st of Henry VII who was Nephew to Henry VI. depos'd by Eward IV. in the 34th year of his Reign This Edward together with Edward V. his Son and Richard III. kept Henry VI. and his Heirs out of the Throne for many Years When therefore the Crown return'd into the Lancastrian Line and Hen. VII was Crown'd the Parliament call'd in the first year of his Reign made all the Grants of the former Usurpers void and vested in the King all that his Unkle possessed at the time he was Depos'd Is this any thing to the purpose in the present Case and is taking from Usurpers and their Favourites and vesting it in the King any invasion upon the King no Hen. VII in giving the Royal assent reserv'd a power to himself to make what exceptions he pleas'd and to reward the Merits of his Friends The last Resumption of Crown Lands made by the Kings of England was in this Kings Reign After this now mentioned our Author tells us there were some particular ones as anno 11. Henry VII An Act of Resumption of divers Castles Mannors Lands and Tenements which were formerly given by King Edw. III. and King Richard II. to Edmond de Langley Duke of York Though this would suit better with times which some expect hereafter but I hope never will see yet it ought not to be omitted here because it affords a Precedent for looking further backward and shews that when we are resuming we may rake deep into Antiquity and grasp at things that were given 120 years before This our Author is not for he is for confining his Resuming Act within the Grants of the present Reign this we can't ascribe to any extravagant respect he has for His Majesty nor can I tell whether we owe it to his Moderation for had he advised a large retrospect he had perhaps been too disobliging and defeated the designs of his Book If we would follow him 't is hard to know what measures to take when he proposes a Pattern for us to imitate in our retrospection he lays before us the Example of those Kings who resumed their own Grants without assistance of Parliament vid. pag. 428. In another he tells us that these are irregular and when he comes to give account of the regular he mentions such as either had no manner of effect at all or else took a very large compass and went very far back in their way breaking over Acts of Parliaments On the whole matter these Observations may be made First That all his noise about Resumptions has been of Grants of Lands and Revenues of the Crown Secondly That such Grants as these are not contrary to the Common or Statute Laws of this Kingdom Thirdly That they were never complained of but in the lowest and most deplorable Circumstances of the Crown and then not upon the account of their being illegal but upon the account of the indigency of the Prince and the necessities of his Family Fourthly That the first Regular Resumption as 't is call'd was in the reign of a Prince who had committed the most wasts upon the Crown and had lessen'd almost all the revenues of it And yet neither this nor those that follow'd had any manner of effect Fifthly That the Resumptions afterwards in the Reigns of Edw. IV. and H. VII
Purchasers have not as yet complained of the hardship of a Resuming Act. Have then the Grants of all the Princes since the Reformation created good Titles in Ireland and passed current and free from all Resumptions Yes 't is certain they have and that Author is challenged to shew the contrary This me-thinks shews a custom ancient enough to secure the Grants of His present Majesty to whom we owe more than to all the Kings before him 'T will be ask'd whether there were no such Resumptions before the Reformation if there were why considering the streights we are in shou'd not the same course be taken now to ease the Nation of Taxes In order to give this question a clear and satisfactory answer I shall observe that the Grants made by our Princes have been of two sorts First of Lands that have fallen to the Crown by Rebellion or Conquest Secondly of Lands or Hereditaments that were of the Demesnes or ancient Revenues of the Crown All Estates of the First sort are undoubtedly by our Laws in the gift of the King our constitution does not only allow him to dispose of these but supposes he will do it 'T is so far from being a Crime in any of his Ministers to countenance the Kings doing this that on the contrary should they advise him not to make Grants but to keep his Acquisitions in his own hands they ought to be censur'd for it Because it might prove a thing of ill consequence to our Country for if all the Revenues that fall to the Crown were kept there the King would in time become absolute Possessor and Lord of all and his People must be his Slaves As it is certain then that the King may and for a very good reason ought by our constitution to Grant away such Lands as these so it is as certain that not only since the Reformation but Norman Conquest likewise an Act never has passed to resume Grants of this kind As to the other sort of Grants I mean of the Lands or Hereditaments that were of the Demesnes or Ancient Revenue of the Crown it must be own'd that they in former times have made some noise in this Kingdom All that a late Author has said in a discourse too long for the Argument relates only to such sort of resumptions Therefore his precedents will not touch the Irish Grants though among other things his Book was plainly Calculated for them But since 't is possible many at this time may be induc'd to entertain too harsh and wrong sentiments concerning Grants of this kind since the prejudices of these Men if they should reckon that the Case of the one differs not from the other will reach to forfeitures and suggest to them that a resumption is highly reasonable I will give the plainest and shortest account I can of thosse resumptions I mean of Grants of the Crown Revenues and that taken from what the Author himself says and leave it to all True English Men who love this Government to Judge whether all his noise and clamour and ill-tim'd reflections might not in justice as well as good breeding be spared He tells us pag. 302 that anciently it seemed a fundamental that the Crown-Lands were not alienable To whom did it seem so anciently Not to the Kings themselves for they all along made Grants of the Revenues of the Crown and that so commonly that this Author will be hardly able to name two since the Reign of William I. that have not made Grants of some of the Revenues of the Crown and thus broken in to this fundamental Nor to the Parliament for they never have condemned such Grants never made an Act of Parliament to prohibit them This appears from the Act made 27. Hen. 8 c.11 to secure the Fees belonging to the Clerk of the signet or if the Author will have it so vid. pag. 298 To inforce by a positive Law the ancient steps in passing grants from the Crown Tho' in this he is mistaken in the Judgment of Lawyers mention'd by himself p. 30 who say that these methods are directive not coercive or as Hobart says Hob. Rep. Colt and Glover p. 146 That these kind of Statutes were made to put things in ordinary form and to ease the Sovereign of Labour but not to deprive him of Power But however that be this is certain that to make such Grants as these is what is permitted our Kings even by the Statute Law and the Law never prescribes a rule for doing that which it allows not to be done But does not this Author tell us that 11. Hen. 4. 'T was plainly and directly enacted That all manner of Hereditaments which from thence forward should fall into the Crown should not be alienable but remain to the King This he says is positive unrepeal'd as we know and still as much in force as Magna Charta pag. 303. Here this Gentleman has been guilty of great inadvertency in citing this as a Positive Act and strong as Magna Charta for prohibiting alienations of the Revenues of the Crown I hope he only forgot how he mentioned this Act in the foregoing part of this Book p. 145. I must desire the Reader to turn to the place he quotes the very same year of Henry the IV th and the same Parl. Roll. There he tells us The Commons pray the King That for ever hereafter no Grant might be made of any Hereditaments or other profits of the Crown except Offices and Bailiwicks till the King shall be quite out of Debt and unless there be remaining in his Coffers sufficient for the Provision of his Family The Act as 't is here deliver'd is differing from the Magna Charta the positive Law he mention'd before And yet here he has given the Original a very dextrous turn for the French in the Act is En Temps ensuivants which is no more than for the future but he has render'd it for ever hereafter and so would infer that That which 't is plain was no more than a Petition to the King not to Grant away the Hereditaments of the Crown till he had sufficient for the support of his Family was a positive Law which was to stand for ever like Magna Charta to Guard the Revenues of the Crown and restrain the King from making Grants This Gentleman is mistaken the Wisdom of this Nation never did and I 'm sure never will make such an everlarsting Law as he mentions They foresaw what the Power of the King in time would grow to if there should never be any alienation and that this fundamental would shake the foundation of the Government They know better things My Lord Coke tells us 2 d. Institut pag. 496 497 That the King's Prerogative is part of the Law of England and that this is shewn in his Letters Patents for Lands Tenements and other things Without this Prerogative I can't see how he can Govern and discharge that great duty incumbent upon him What