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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	day_n	king_n	time_n	2,754	5	3.4132	3	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41808	Considerations upon the second canon in the book entituled Constitutions and canons ecclesiastical, &c.	Grascome, Samuel, 1641-1708?	1693 (1693)	Wing G1569; ESTC R11703	35,734	45

is not long since that a wise and pious Prince was barbarously murdered amongst us by his own Subjects and though his Son by the Mercy of God made his escape yet there are many who thi●st for his Bloud which in the estimation of God is the same thing To this I will here add part of a Canon of another of our own Councils Vid. Lind. l. 5. sol 248. b. Auctoritate Dei Patris c. By the Authority of God the Father c. we excommunicate all those who injurious●y disturb the Peace and Tranquillity of our Lord the King and those who labour unjustly to detain the Rights of our Lord the King This is a Canon made amongst our selves and the Book is the great Director of our Ecclesiasti●●l Co●●ts at this Day and if the Rights of a King be not only detained but wholly swallow●d up by some at this time we must never believe matter of Fact more and as for the Cur●e let them take it to whom it belongs Indeed while the Authority of God was reverenced in the Censures of the Church Kings were very desirous that the Churches protected by them should contribute to the Security of the Royal Authority by a d●nunciation of Spiritual Judgments on such as should any ways be injurious to it Thus at the Request of K. Edward a Constitution was made to this purpose by John Stra●ford Arch-bishop of Canterbury as is to be seen Lind. fol. 254 b. But a very ●emarka●le Instance in this kind the Concilium Engilhelmense under Lewis the 4th affords us C●n. 1. De hinc ex Sessionis suae loco s● sub●●gens c. Then the Glorious King Lewis rising from his Seat made a most 〈◊〉 Complaint viz. That ●e was strip'd of his Royal Power by a certain Prince called Hugo whose just Grief and Complaint we Holy Fathers i. e. the Bishops there assembled cond●●ing being joined together in the Vnity of Spirit have made thereupon this Decree Let no Man henceforth in ●ade the Kingly Power nor deal treacherously therewith for we have decreed by putting in execution the Council of Toledo That H●go the Invader and Ravisher of the Kingdom of K. Lewi● shall be smitten with the Sword of Excommunication unless by an appointed Time he com● to the Council and repent of so soul a Fact and make satisfaction Had this Complaint been made to St. Asaph or Dr. Burnet They would have told poor Lewis that Hugo had conquered him that he had lost all his Right and so long as he lived must only be called the late King Lewis that for their parts they were bound to swear Allegi●n●● to Hugo and to assist him to the uttermost against Lewis But contrary-wise these Bishops own the Cause of the distressed Prince and decree the Usurper excommunicate if he restore not his ill-gotten Goods Now whom shall we believe For either this Council or some Bishops now living must be in the wrong The Case of Ludovi●us Plus has too much Assinity with ours for his own Children rose up against him and a parcel of St. Asaphs Burn●ts ●owlers and such other Godly and Loyal Prelates met together and made up that which is called Synodus Compendiensis and by the Learned Baluzius justly stiled Synodus Praedatoria these join with the Rebellious Children against the Father and formally strip him of his Authority in order to his being imprisoned by his Son Lotharius But against these Rabanus Maurus Arch-bishop of Mogunce then living a Man of greater Reputation and Authority than a thousand such false Loon● stoutly opposeth himself and with the Courage and Fidelity of a Christian Bishop condemns the Fact and writes a Tract on purpose De reverentia Filiorum erga Patres subdi●●rum erga Reges which I think may be worth any honest Man's reading Much such another Case was that of the Emperor Henry the 4th but the more abominable for this that that whole Scene of Wickedness was managed by Gregory the 7th otherwise called Pope Hildebrand but more deservedly Pope Firebrand who the better to colour over the matter excommunicates the Emperor and absolves his Subjects from their Allegiance but the Bishop of Leige being too Honest and Loyal to think himself so discharged of his Oath of Fealty continued faithful to the Emperor for which the Pope darts his Thunderbolts against both him and his Adherents notwithstanding which his Clergy continue firm to him justifie their Proceedings from the Obligation of their Oaths and the Commandments of God and look upon his Excommunication as meerly brutum ful-men and of no Force It would be too tedious to heap up what might be brought of this kind from Examples Canons and declared Judgment of Holy Fathers From all which it is plain that the pious consci●ntious Clergy ever thought themselves in Duty bound not only to adhere to their lawful Prince against all Usurpers and Rebels but to censure those that did otherwise which was sufficient to induce our Church to compose this Canon and justifie her in so doing and ought to strike a terro●● in all those who incurr the Censure of it which that they may be the more aware of I shall now proceed further to explain it in the other Particulars The next Thing we have to do is to enquire after the meaning of an Excommunication ipso facto where by the way take notice that this sort of Excommunication is never denounced but against Crimes of more than an ordinary Size either against such as are of themselves of so very ill Name that being once known there needs not the canvassing of a Judge to induce any Persons to condemn them or else of such pernicious and fatal Consequence that they ought not to be allowed the least encouragement or so much as any sorbearance by which you may easily perceive how heinous a Fault it is adjudged in the sense of the Ch. of England for any Person to m●im the Authority of his King or dismantle him of it she having denounced no less than an Excommunication ipso facto against it And indeed what Laws or what Authority shall be able to restrain those Men who shall dare to make an Attempt upon the Sovereign Authority which is the Guardian of the Laws and Security of the State Before Wickedness can grow rank enough for such a desperate Experiment it must have broke thro' and shook off the dread of all Laws and become not only regardless of the Duties of Civility and common Honesty but to be not so much as moved with the sense of the Publick Good and Safety Now what hopes can any Man cherish of such Men And how miserable must that Government be which is ravisht into such hands But to return to our Business Excommunication ipso facto is where the Discussion and definitive Sentence of the Judge is neither requisite or necessary as to the Offender but the Fact being committed the Excommunication immediately takes place and the Law in a great

whole Croud of all his Brethrens Arguments and thereby to their great grief bereaved them of all their Topicks wherewith they were used to blaspheme God in the Pulpits on their mock-thanksgiving-Mock-Thanksgiving-Days Nor doth his Performance seem any way displeasing even to the Government it self For though his Book was presented openly at the Parliament-Door yet it not only stands uncensured but is thought to have been the great occasion that the Salisbury Dictator's Book was doom'd to be burnt by the hands of the common Hangman But to make some amends for this triumphant Squander he hath set up a Plea of his own and indeed to do him justice he hath bid the fairest to set the present Government upon som● bottom if it could be possibly set on any For if he could make it appear that the late Proceedings were warranted by our Constitutions he would speak more to the purpose than all that hath been said hitherto but I doubt not but to make it appear that our Constitutions utterly overthrow his Plea Now this knocking Argument which will suffer nothing to stand before it is only Abdication still but then it is indeed a Passive Abdication wherein the Person abdicated is a Sufferer and is abdicated not by his own ●ct but by another who hath a certain Right in him and Superiority over him as a Father is said abdicare Filium He seems inclinable rather to call it Abrogation than Abdication a Word which seems harsh with respect to Persons though proper as to Laws and yet in the Verb is sometimes used in that Sense by later Historians but abdicare properly respects Persons However to his purpose he tells us That the People of England did actually abrogate or dethrone King James the Second for Misgovernment and promoted the Prince of Orange in his stead By the People I suppose he means not the dissusive Body but their Representatives for as the former seems impracticable so it is evident that the Feat was done by what they called a Convention and afterwards ratified by what they call a Parliament But herein he and his Masters cannot agree sor they put it upon an Active Abdication which Julian seems by no means willing to allow For they say expresly That King James abdicated the Government and that thereby the Throne became vacant So that all they pretend to is to supply a Vacancy whether there can be any such thing by our Constitutions in our Government I do not here dispute and provide a Remedy against a grand defect when there was no King in Israel and in that very place where he cites the Word abdicate in Tully it is taken in an Active Sense For after they had driven away their Kings the highest share of the Regal Power was conferred on the Consuls and when Mark Anthony offered a Crown to Caesar if he did not expresly yet he effectually renounced his Consulship For had Caesar accepted it he could no longer have been the Consul of a popular State but must thenceforth have acted by Authority srom Caesar or not at all So that this would have been no Forseiture but a real giving up his Power But contrary her●to Mr Johnson sairly makes King James tenacious enough of his Authority and tells us that the People abrogated and dethroned him a Power which the Convention knew not of nor did so much as pretend to they had done wisely if they had consulted this Learned Man to understand their own Power before they had gone about their work For though he contradicts them yet he makes them much greater than they were aware of and hath not only set the Subjects above the Sovereign but hath advanced the House of Commons into the place of the Almighty God of Heaven giving them Power to pull down and set up Kings as they shall 〈…〉 and convenient But I hope we are not so bound to follow Mr. Johnson with an 〈◊〉 Faith but that we may examine upon what Grounds he hath given Subjects such a Paramount Authority over their Sovereign And for this he urges in the first place a Message to King Richard the Second then at El●ham wherein his Parliament averrs that in the case there mentioned it is lawful for them ipsum Regem de regali solio abrogare propinquiorem aliquem de stirpe regia loco ejus in Regni solio sublimare And for this Power in the same Message they plead only an unknown Statute and the infamous Precedent and Larbarous usage of Edward the Second Had not Discontent and Anger blinded them they would have been ashamed of their Precedent and for their Statute neither they nor any other have transmitted it to us So that it seems they durst not trust any with the examination of it But if he please to make amends for that Defect I will recommend to Mr. Johnson's second Thoughts a known Statute in the Reign of the same King Richard the Second wherein it is judged High-Treason for any Person to compass the King's Death to d●pose him or make War against him within the Realm or to render up his Homage 21 Ric. 2. Where we shall find his Statute I know not but this is to be found in our Statute Book and in the same King's Reign against whom he sets up a contrary Plea If no Subject can render up his Homage which by the way I take to be much the same with Dr. Burnet's transferring his Allegiance wherein of late he hath had too many Followers nor raise War against his Prince nor depose him without being condemned by the Law for a Traitor I would fain know how he will reconcile his unknown Statute to this known one We are hard put to our Shifts when we are forced to run eight hundred Years backwards for a piece of a Sentence that may seem to look favourably on our Cause And what good at last will King Alfred's Stile do him Dei Gratia Benevolemia West-Saxonicae Gentis I confess he has a hard Task and bad Game to play who through the Artifices of designing Knaves labours under the ill Opinion and hard Thoughts of his Subjects and it was a singular Happiness to King Alfred that he had the Good Will and the very Hearts of his People But though King Alfred for his Piety Justice and Bravery might stand for an eternal Pattern to all Kings that come after him yet no Person that ever sat on the Saxon or English Throne ever acted with a freer or fuller Power than he did as will plainly appear to any that read his History Nor indeed was it possible for him to have done those great Things which he did had he been shackled with those Fetters which our Demigogues endeavour now to hang upon Kings with pretence indeed to curb their Extravagancies and restrain their exorbitant Power but with a real design to drive out all Kings and introduce a Democracy nick-named a Common-wealth the most unquiet troublesome and most arbitrary and tyrannical of all Governments