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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	church_n	receive_v	time_n	3,111	5	3.8577	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42797	A Glance on the Ecclesiastical Commission being a discourse concerning the power of making and altering ecclesiastical laws, and the settling religion, whether it belongs to our kings alone, and a convocation, or whether it must not be asserted rather no medling with law-making or law-mending, (whether ecclesiastical or temporal), but by authority of Parliament.		1690 (1690)	Wing G792; ESTC R25461	5,925	14

declare Her Pleasure That no Bill touching Reformation be exhibited and if any were She charged him on his Allegiance not to read them But in the 39. Eliz. the Queen consented that the Parliament should proceed in the Reformation of the Church However King James coming to the Crown he very soon orders a Conference at Hampton-Court and makes Alterations in the Common-Prayer without help of Parliament and carrying it on his own Authority calls a Convocation and confirms at once 140 Canons and Constitutions Ecclesiastical In his Second Year he causes his Judges to meet and give their Opinion and they notwithstanding the Onerousness hereof to the Subject do declare That the King without a Parliament might do thus that is Make and Impose Canons and Deprive in case of Non-Obedience Observe likewise that this was an extrajudicial Opinion there being no Cause depending before them Such slippery Tongues and Judgments have Lawyers when they are under the Temptation of Flattering Princes This you have in Crook's Reports After this Sentence no wonder that you find the Ecclesiasticks growing up to an Exorbitancy of Power during the Reign of this King And in the Reign of Charles the First Laud makes the same steps New Constitutions are advanced high ensnaring things devised The Et-cetera Oath Sports on the Lord's Days imposed The Nation can't endure it Stirs are raised a Parliament forced to be called and they prosecute a Redress of these Grievances so vehemently that King and Arch-Bishop and the whole Hierarchy with Him is brought to an end In Charles the Second's Reign following there is this one thing Remarkable That out of favour to the Papists he puts forth a Declaration for Liberty of Conscience to the Dissenters he goes not to promote it in the Houses if we have Liberty it must hang upon his own Will or not at all This the Parliament resents and as Illegal opposes it and constrains him to Revoke his Declaration Here was there a plain Conquest and indeed Triumph over the Dispencing Power of our Kings And yet James the Second taking the Throne resumes the same and persists in it with that Obstinacy as we all know hath occasioned our present Revolution The thing that gave the Crown and Clergy their Advantage was an Error generally received by the common Lawyers even by Sir Edward Cook himself that what Power in the days of Usurpation was de facto exercised in England by the Popes doth de jure belong to our Kings Whereas indeed it was not that Unaccountable Power the Pope assumed but the Ancient Power only exercised by the Kings of England that was restored and united to the Imperial Crown Or as I have de industria before distinguished it was not any Legislative Power without a Parliament but the Power of Jurisdiction only was annexed thereunto There are these Reasons for this do appear 1. From those Acts and all those Acts of Parliament in Edward the 6th and Elizabeth's Reign or any other since Henry the 8th which have given to our Kings or Queens any such Power as I have before mentioned For such Acts must have been needless if they had that Power and more than that by their Supremacy only 2. From those Instances that may be given and more particularly in the matter of Marriages wherein the Popes took power to Dispence and our Kings don't and can't without the Parliament as in the late known Lord Ross's Case 3. Ab incommodo If these Lawyers were in the right then must not only all the Arbitrary Proceedings of all our former Princes which have been still so much blamed and redressed by Parliaments but even the doings of our late King James the Second they being all and every one of them alike grounded upon this bottom be justified against the whole Nation and We condemned 4. Ab Authoritate From Authority greater than these Lawyers and that is the Opinion of the House of Commons who in that Year or a little before when the Judges gave King James such a Power in Ecclesiasticals as I have before recited did cause a Message to be delivered to him from them by their Speaker which I will set down in the words of the Journal Mr. Speaker in his Speech to the King declared That his Majesty was misinformed if any Man should deliver That the King of England hath any Absolute Power in himself either to alter Religion or to make any Law concerning the same otherwise than in Temporal Cases by consent of Parliament 1. Jac. 1. Fol. 567.569 The truth is That during the Reigns of Elizabeth James the First Charles the First when Nonconformists were outed of their Ministry and Livings by the Canons and not by legal Trials and the same Despotical Power was exercised by those Princes and the Bishops against the Puritans as was exercised by James the Second the Eyes of our Churchmen were generally shut But when those Proceedings were turned against the Church upon the very same Foundation by the late King I may righteously expect that the Eyes of such Men now as well as others especially of some of the Learned though they had the beam of Non-resistance in them before should be opened to see and acknowledg these Truths or Assertions of this Paper viz. That it was not a Power of making Ecclesiastical Laws but a Power only that belonged to our Kings before the Pope's Usurpation that was restored to Henry That our Ancient Kings had no Legislative Power out of Parliament That all Canons derive their Force from the King in his Legislative Capacity that is as Incorporated with his two Houses That they could not of themselves before the first of Elizabeth grant any Commissions for the exercise of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction which yet is less than Legislation That the branch of that Law of Elizabeth granting so much being Repealed by Charles the First there can never be any other such Courts legally Erected That Benefices are a Free-hold and that no Minister ought to be deprived of them but by his Peers or Trial of a Jury I will add That the Subjection which is required in the Sacred Scripture to the Higher Powers upon pain of Damnation is a subjection to the Powers that Are not to the Powers that are Not. Now the Powers that Are are the Powers according to the Constitution In this Case then let us hearken to Bishop Bilson and let Bishop Sanderson be attended in other Cases wherein he was more skilful than in Politicks If a Prince should go about to Subject his Kingdom to a Foreign Realm or change the Form of a Commonwealth from Impery to Tyranny that is from Regal to Despotical or neglect the Laws Established to execute his Pleasure In these and other Cases that might be named if the Nobles and Commons agree together to defend the ancient accustomed Liberty Regiment and Laws they are not to be accounted Rebels In page 520. of his Book about Subjection and Rebellion Upon the whole that is here related there may arise two Questions which are to be held distinct though apt to be confounded The first Question is If these things be so what then shall we think indeed of the Power of the Bishops Unto this that which some Lawyers say is Edward the Sixth makes a Law That the Bishops shall hold no Courts but in the King's Name Mary Repeals this Law or this part of it King James Repeals that of Mary It follows say they that Edward's Statute must be Revived and is of Force If not the Common Law starts up and that is declared therein to say the same Nevertheless that other Lawyers have something counter to this and some considerable thing too I am not so malignant to the Bishops as not to believe Let them that can and can make it good tell what The Second Question is And what shall we think of the King's Power as to this present Ecclesiastical Commission As for which I must confess my self so throughly satisfied with the Good intended that I will say no more than this only Whereas It was an Act of Parliament wherely Henry and Edward had and Elizabeth should have had the Power to appoint Commissions of this kind that is Ecclesiastical ones though with this difference that those Commissions were to Determine things this Commission only to Prepare things for the determination of a Convocation and the Parliament which Power yet of Preparation was to have been granted by an Act if the Bill for Comprehension had first passed as was intended by both Houses and so the same had been done Now as in former Reigns and then all had been well out of doubt I do humbly move both for the vindication of the Right of Parliaments and Preservation also of the Honour and Pains of the Commissionated Bishops and Doctors and the taking what they have so kindly done in good part That the Bill only for Comp●ehension be the more suddenly revived and that will make up the whole Matter When th● Act should have gone before the Commission because the Commission should have bin Authorized by the Act to put the Commission before the Act hath bin to put the Cart as we say before the Horse And consequently if the Bill be revived and passes and the Commissioners Authorized thereby to present what they have Prepared to the Convocation and the Convocation what they shall Determine thereupon to the Parliamens then will the Horse be re-duired before the Cart and we shall drive o● fair●y they being both set right The Truth is the main thing which I● Comprehension is the business to be attended and let but that which is already in the Bill be Established the several things by way of Improvement thereof with respect to the Book of Common Prayer the Book of Orders the Book of Canons the Government and Discipline of the Church which last do require a more profound Reformation may stay a due time to receive Perfection They must have time to be Debated to be Compounded and God knows when so great a Work can be done There is no need no reason that we wait for the Act of Comprehension till then unless we tarry and it be some Ill Mens Plot to have non at all FINIS