measures of it Every one sees what Distractions such a Power might occasion and therefore we can't pay too great a Veneration to our Laws which have wisely provided against them That have intrusted this Power with the Prince whose Interest it is as much to preserve the Church as the State And I hope we have no Reason to believe but that he makes it as truly and sincerely his concern to vindicate the Cause of Religion as any amongst us If there are such Dangers threaten the Church that nothing but a Convocation can prevent no doubt but he will think it a great Obligation upon him to call one But yet it is not at all times necessary Mens Heats will not always suffer it And if it should chance to fire their Tempers instead of cooling them it would be then very Prejudicial We confess indeed with Grotius and Others That Synods are often times very useful to the Order and Government of the Church yet we also join with them that there may be such a time when they are far from being convenient much less necessary But our greatest wonder is at the Boldness of some Men who maintain That even when the Powers take on them the Protection of the Church whether they will or no Synods may lawfully and rightly be Assembled Of another Mind says Vossius were all those who have hitherto defended the Cause of the Protestants against the Papists and he cites several Authorities for it As for the Assertors of a Divine Right of Synods 't is something difficult to know their meaning they seem too much to distrust their Cause to speak plain enough to be understood If they mean no more by that Expression than that Christ hath so constituted his Church as to leave a Power of Goverment with the Bishops of it for the better ordering its Affairs who accordingly may either by Consent meet themselves or by their Authority call together their Clergy and agree on such things as are necessary for the ordering of it This is what in States not Christian will never be deny'd by us But if they pretend to a Power from God of Meeting and Acting independently on the Sovereign Authority tho' Christian and of Making and Establishing Ecclesiastical Laws and Constitutions without his Consent this is what we utterly deny And I would desire to know of the Author of The Vindication of the depriv'd Bishops by what Authority either from the Scripture or the Practice of the Church he will oppose this or with what Justice he can so severely reflect on the Memory of the first Reformers for being of the same Opinion But to return supposing we should allow this jus divinum which they contend for yet after all it must be left to human Prudence to determine when 't is proper for Convocations to meet and then who is it that must judge of the proper Seasons for it Who of the Clergy have a divine Commission to judge of the Reasons and fix the time for it Or suppose the Clergy should differ in their Judgments who is the supream Arbiter that must decide when it is most convenient and accordingly shall have the Power of summoning all the rest Superiority in Bishops over each other is an act of human Authority since Christ did not appoint a Head and therefore any one of those can't have a Power by Divine Right of summoning all the rest Where then must the Power be placed For they who urge such an Institution against us ought to assign where they would have the divine Power of summoning the Convocation to be lodged After all 't is Reason that must direct in these Cases when a Convocation ought to be Assembled of what Number of the Clergy it ought to consist where their Power is to be fixed and limited and to whom the chief Authority ought to belong of Calling and Dissolving them and of giving their Resolutions the Force and Sanction of a Law This the Wisdom of the Nation has entrusted with the Sovereign Power and the Church of England has ever since the Reformation own'd and acknowledg'd it to be its peculiar Province As for the Author of the Municipium Ecclesiasticum poor Man he is rather to be Pitied then Censured as to the arguing part of his Book he writes so much backwards and forwards for and against himself and withal so very obscurely that the most charitable Opinion of him is That he knew nothing of what he writ He is so strangly bewildred in his own Notions and so fond of Ill-nature that he is neither to be understood or convinced All he has urged in defence of the Divine Right of Convocations will as much prove a Divine Right of Constables and Church-wardens or any other Officers that may be useful for punishing Immorality or for supporting or advancing the Interest of the Church And for all the Argument I can find in his Book he might as well have called it a Criticism upon Honer's Iliads as an Answer to Dr. Wake This Author is one great Instance why I think a Convocation necessary that Malice and Uncharitableness may have their just Reward that he may be convinced that he who writes at all adventures upon every thing he least understands must not think to carry a Cause only by abusing and defaming his Adversary which is all that I can find he pretends to in all his Prints And lastly that he may be satisfied that his Ill-breeding which he values himself so much upon is but one way Meritorious I should not have digressed into this way of Writing was it not to inform this Author that there is a difference between Railing and Argument That the one is rude and indecent even when mixt with the other but without it 't is insufferable Thus have I run thro' all the parts of this Dispute about a Convocation which I thought necessary to be considered and discussed I have endeavoured to reduce the Controversie into as narrow a compass and to set it in as clear and true a Light as I could And as I have given my Thoughts freely so I have not been misled by any Prejudice or a desire of pleasing any Party My first Designs were to get a clear view of the Controversie and since there had been of late some heats about it I thought it not improper to expose my Enquires to publick Examination I consulted the best and most rational Authors that I could find had writ upon the Subject tho' I thought it unnecessary to fill out a Volume with Quotations But I shall add what the Learned Vossinus as well as Grotius says upon this occasion namely That besides the Divines all the Writers of Polity that are worth the Reading have declared the supreme Authority of Princes over Ecclesiastical Persons and Causes to be one of the principal parts of the Imperial Right Dr. Wake as well as all the other Writers upon this Subject is wholly unknown to me But I can't but think upon an impartial Enquiry into the Controversie that he has given us a very just and learned Account of it and that he agrees with the most judicious and eminent Men that have treated the Subject before him What a peice of daring Confidence must it then be to tax those as mercenary designing Writers that only espouse a Cause which some of the greatest and most learned Men in the World have before defended But I shall urge nothing more but only That I have delivered what I judged to be Right without either Hopes or Fears FINIS * Epis. 23. Dr. Wake Act. Parl. An. 25. Hen. VIII Upon the submission of the Clergy and restraint of Appeals De Imperio sum Potest circa Sacra c. 7. See Bp. Taylor 's Duct Dub. L. 3. C. 3. Eccl. Polity l. 8. p. 462. That Clause of the 1st Eli. which gave the King Power to make such high Commissioners in Ecclesiastical Causes is now repealed Municip Eccles. Preface Defence of the Vind. of the depriv'd Bishops p. 104. See Rast. Stat. 22. H. VIII Ecclesiastical Polity p. 469. Preface p. 44. Ed. Lond. 1682. Vid. Stat. 16. R. 2. against purchasing Bulls from Rome G. Voss. Ep. 23. See Canon 1640. Can. 1. See Bishop Andrews's Sermon before the King at H. C. Canons 1640 Can. 1. See Bishop Andrews Sermon at Hampton Court See Bishop Taylor 's Duct Dub. L. 3. C. 3. Vid. Grot. de Imp. sum Pot. cir Sacra C. 3. Eccl. Pol. p. 444. C. 7. de Synodis See the Defence of the Vind. of the Deprived Bishops Municip Eccl. p. 439. See Bishop Bramhal against the Scotch Discipline p. 109. Eccl. Pol. 467. p. 440 441 c. Defence of the Vind. of the deprived Bishops p. 108. Eccl. Pol. p. 464. See the History of the Troubles and Tryal of Arch-Bp Laud p. 309. lb. p. 309. De Impersum Potest Circa Sacra Chap. 10. By Doctor Hody See Dean Nowel against Dorman See the Doctrine of the Church of England concerning the Independency of the Clergy on the Lay-Power by the Vindicator of the deprived Bishops Vid. Bp. Burnet's Hist. of the Reform Vol. 2 p. 399. See Dean Nowel who was Prolocut of the Convocat when the Articl were made in his Books against Dorman Hist. of the Reform Vol. 2. p. 400. See Bp. Taylor 's Duct Dubitant l. 3. c. 4. Ep. 23. Cap. 4. Vid. Selden de Synedriis See Vossius Ep. 23. Duct Dubitant l. 3. c. 4. Cap. 7. De Synodis Cap. 7. De Synodis Vid. Eccle Politie p. 461. P. 467. Acts 15. Chap. 7. De Synodis Voss. Epist 23. Cap. 1. De Imperio See Bishop Andrew's Sermon at Hampton-Court See Bishop Andrew's Sermon at Hampt Court Cap. 7. Vid. Bp. Bramhal against the Scotch Discipline Vossius Epist 23. Vid. Bp. Taylor Ductor Dubitamium Archbp. Bramhal against the Scots Discipline c. Vos Ep. 23. De Imperio sum Potest circa Sacra
SOME THOUGHTS ON A Convocation And the Notion of its DIVINE RIGHT WITH SOME Occasional Reflections ON The Defence of the Vindication of the Deprived Bishops LONDON Printed for Tim. Childe at the White-Hart the West-end of St. Paul's-Charch-yard 1699. THE PREFACE I Shall only thus far endeavour to prepossess the Reader in Favour of the following Papers as to assure him That the Author is not Conscious to himself of having advanced any Notion that is repugnant to the Sense of Scripture or Antiquity To the Articles of our own Church or the Opinions of its greatest Divines who have treated this Subject The Authority of the King over our Convocations has indeed been of late disputed by some and a Learned Treatise that was writ in Defence of it has had the Misfortune of meeting with a great many Enemies that are very free in thier Censures upon it what their Reasons are themselves best know For they are so kind as not to let them appear in Publick But these Papers are only designed to give as true a State and Notion of the Controversie as the Authors Enquiries could lead him into and not for a Vindication of others Opinions And if they should chance to fall in with any of those delivered in that forementioned Treatise it was no other than a sober and impartial View of the Subject that occasioned it And I can't but think that they who assent to the Articles of our Church can hardly deny joyning in the same Notions It is very common with the Managers of Disputes of late to fix Characters of Ignominy upon those who dissent from them And some who have engaged in this Controversie for want of other Arguments have thought I suppose to carry the Cause by insulting over their Adversaries as Latitudinarians and Erastians And therefore least they should fix the same Titles upon the Author of these Thoughts he desires they would first answer these two Queries Whether he who advances no other Doctrin than what has always been maintained by the Church of England and is intirely agreeable to its 39 Articles can justly be charged by any Member of that Church as a Latitudinarian in point of Doctrin And whether he who subscribes to the Government of the same Church as by Law Established and maintains no other Notions but what our Convocations have agreed to and are at this Day the standing Rules delivered to us in her Ecclesiastical Canons and Constitutions can by any Member of the Church of England be reasonably charged as an Erastian in point of Church-government And if he that guides himself by these Methods is in the wrong the Church must answer for his Errors and not he for being obliged to defend her And therefore the Church must be taxt with our false Principles if they are such or it ought to be shewn wherein we have differed from her It may probably be one Objection against these Papers that a Book of Grotius's is sometimes cited in them which lies under the Censure of Erastian Principles It is foreign to my present Business to engage in its Defence Ger. Vossius gives it the Character of a most Excellent Book and offers to defend it against all Opposers But it is enough to my purpose that there is nothing cited from him that is disagreeable to the Doctrines of our Church And it was not his Authority but the strength of his Argument that occasion'd his being introduced in the Debate But I hope the other Authorities that are here made use of can have no such Objections against them Tho' if these Papers are condemned they can hardly escape notwithstanding the Characters they have always bore in the World ought to secure them from such Treatment since if this Author is an Error 't is they who have led him into it SOME THOUGHTS ON A Convocation c. THE stating the Rights and Authority of the Clergy must be confest to be a very nice and tender Point and in Attempts of this Nature it is almost impossible not to offend Let a Man deliver his Opinions with never so much Sincerity and Caution yet after all he must expect to find that some Party or other will be displeased The asserting the Privileges of the Clergy but even as far as those Bounds which Religion and the Laws of the Land have set them and the Nature of their Function requires is almost a downright Affront to a sort of Men who think the whole Order useless and their Office only an Imposition upon the Rights and Liberties of the rest of Mankind And the not carrying their Authority to a higher pitch than the Constitution of the State does or can admit of or than the Law of God has allowed or even to such Immunities as some Mens mistaken Zeal would challenge to belong to them is represented as an Indignity to Religion and an open Violation of the Rights and Honours of that Profession I shall not concern my self in determining whose Censure 't is most safe to fall under But this seems very apparent That the pretending to too unlimited a Power is as great a Prejudice and of as dangerous Consequence to the Clergy as the parting with some of their just Rights and Privileges Either of these Extreams may be fatal and therefore the more Caution is required to avoid them It is certainly a great Weakness in any Clergy to raise themselves Enemies in the State by laying Claim to an Authority which is none of theirs The intolerable Usurpation of the See of Rome on the Rights of Princes and the Revolutions occasioned by it in a great many parts of Europe afford us Instances enough of this Nature Let us in God's Name maintain the Honours and Privileges of the Holy Function as far as of right we may but let us not extend them to such a Power and Superiority as neither the Laws of God will justifie nor those of the Land admit of and which the first Ages of the Church after the State was Christian never exercised The whole Controversie about a Convocation may be I think reduced to this Either that the time and manner of its sitting acting or debating is to be determined by the Laws of the Land and the Prudence of the supream Authority or that the Clergy have a Power by Divine Right independent on the State to assemble themselves decree and enact Ecclesiastical Laws without the Consent of the secular Authority If the latter of these Notions be true 't is plain That all human Laws to the contrary can be of no force A Divine Institution being unalterable by any other Power And if any other Power has decreed any thing in Opposition to it 't is a Sin to submit to its Commands But in Cases of this Nature where such a Right is pretended it ought to be made very clear and indisputable from the express Declaration of Scripture or at least from the Practice of the first Christians where any Parallel Instances can
in this kind they should not be able when need is to do as Vertuous Kings have done As Iosia and Hezekiah in the Old Testament did when they Assembled the Priests and Levites to renew the House of the Lord and to Celebrate the Passover The like before them did David and Solomon for removing the Ark and Dedicating the Temple Such Authority as the Iewish Kings Exercised over Ecclesiastical Affairs and Persons the like we claim to belong to our Kings and those that deny them the same Authority are to be Excommunicated according to the Doctrine of the Church of England But since there is an Argument now again insisted upon from the New Testament to prove the Right which belongs to the Clergy to Assemble and make Ecclesiastical Laws without the leave of the Supream Authority which in Mr. Hooker's Time was brought for an Objection against such a Supremacy in the King I shall take the freedom to set it down in his Words with his Answer to it It will be says that Excellent Author perhaps alledged That a part of the Unity of Christian Religion is to hold the Power of making Ecclesiastical Laws a thing appropriated unto the Clergy in their Synods and whatsoever is by their only Voices agreed upon it needeth no farther Appropriation to give unto it the strength of a Law as may plainly appear by the Canons of that first most venerable Assembly Where those things the Apostles and Iames had concluded were afterwards published and imposed upon the Churches of the Gentiles abroad as Laws the Records threof remaining still in the Book of God for a Testimony that the Power of making Ecclesiastical Laws belongeth to the Successors of the Apostles the Bishops and Prelates of the Church of God To this we Answer That the Council of Ierusalem is no Argument for the Power of the Clergy to make Laws For first There has not been since any Council of like Authority to that in Ierusalem Secondly The Cause why that was of such Authority came by a special Accident Thirdly The Reason why other Councils being not like unto that in Nature the Clergy in them should have no Power to make Laws by themselves alone is in Truth so forcible that except some Commandment of God to the contrary can be shewed it ought notwithstanding the aforesaid Example to prevail The Decrees of the Council of Ierusalem were not as the Canons of other Ecclesiastical-Assemblies Humane but very Divine Ordinances For which Cause the Churches were far and wide commanded every where to see them kept no otherwise than if Christ himself had personally on Earth been the Author of them The Cause why that Council was of so great Authority and Credit above all others which have been since is expressed in those Words of principal Observation Vnto the Holy Ghost and to us it hath seemed good Which form of Speech though other Councils have likewise used yet neither could they themselves-mean nor may we so understand them as if both were in equal sort assisted with the Power of the Holy Ghost Wherefore in as much as the Council of Ierusalem did consist of Men so enlightned it had Authority greater than were meet for any other Council besides to challenge wherein such kind of Persons are as now the State of the Church doth stand Kings being not then that which now they are and the Clergy not now that which then they were Till it be proved that some special Law of Christ hath for ever annexed unto the Clergy alone the Power to make Ecclesiastical Laws we are to hold it a thing most Consonant with Equity and Reason that no Ecclesiastical Laws be made in a Christian Common-wealth without consent as well of the Laity as of the Clergy but least of all without consent of the highest Power The Opinion of the Learned Grotius being more short and decisive in our present Case upon that forementioned place of the Acts I shall also give an account of it The Original of Synods says he is usually taken from that History in the 15th Chap. of the Acts. But whether that Assembly may be properly termed a Synod as we now understand that Word may very well be questioned There arose a Controversie between Paul and Barnabas and certain Iews of Antioch concerning the Obligations of the Mosaick Law Paul and Barnabas are sent with some of Antioch to know the Opinion of the Pastors but were they those of all Asia Syria Cilicia and Judea Assembled together in one place that were to give their Iudgment No certainly but of the Apostles and Elders of Jerusalem the Company of the Apostles was a College not a Synod and the Elders of one City could not certainly be called a Synod One Church therefore alone is consulted or more truly and properly speaking the Apostles only are consulted and they alone give Iudgment to whose Authority the Elders and Brethren of Jerusalem yield their Consent and Approbation Thus I think there can't be the least shadow of an Argument brought from Scripture for a Divine Institution of Synods But to return once more to Mr. Hooker Were it so adds that judicious Author that the Clergy alone might give Laws unto all the rest is it not easie to see how injurious this might prove to Men of other Conditions Peace and Justice are maintained by preserving unto every Order their Right and by keeping all Estates as it were in even ballance which thing is no way better done than if the King their Common Parent whose Care is presumed to extend most indifferently over all do bear the chiefest sway in making Laws which all must be ordered by wherefore of them which attribute most to the Clergy I would demand what Evidence there is whereby it may clearly be shewed that in ancient Kingdoms Christian any Canon devised alone by the Clergy in their Synods whether Provincial National or General hath by meer force of their agreement taken place as a Law making all Men constrainable to be Obedient thereunto without any other approbation from the King before or afterwards required in that behalf This was the Sense of that Great-Man and the very same Opinion and Notions they are and no other as far I can judge which are maintained by them who at present defend the King's Authority in calling Convocations and in other Ecclesiastical Affairs And I can't yet apprehend how those who so warmly and furiously oppose them can reconcile their Notions with the Doctrines which have been always received in the Church of England But it may probably be urged That though the Clergy's Right to Assemble themselves and make Laws for the Government of the Church by their own Power could not be proved by Revelation yet in Reason it ought to be allowed to them because the security of Religion depends upon it For if the Clergy alone may not make any new Orders which may seem wanting nor pass a general Censure upon any false