killing his said Sovereign King Zachariah than what God aforehand had decreed should be done to the House of Jehu for his and their Hypocrisie and Wickedness Yet notwithstanding Shallum's executing God's Decree He was deservedly Condemned for a Traytor and at length Vengeance seized upon him By these and other Instances which might be alledged it is evident That Treason and Rebellion although Commenced upon never so Religious a pretence very seldom if ever went unpunished And therefore we Christians may pertinently urge in this case of Treason and Rebellion what Christ alledged in that of Offences Matth. 18.7 Woe to the World because of Offences for Offences will come but Woe to them by whom the Offence cometh So here Woe to the World because of Treasons and Rebellions for Treasons and Rebellions will happen as long as Youth are not duely Catechised and men are not better and more Loyally Principled But Woe to those Men by whom Seditions Treasons and Rebellions do come For the Divine Nemesis will undoubtedly pursue and over-take them either in this World or in that to come SECT IV. The Proposition proved by Reason and the Common Sentiments of Religion REason and Religion dictate it to be a thing absolutely sinfull and unlawfull for any Subjects whatever High or Low if they be Subjects in Parliament or out of Parliament to Depose their Lawfull Prince And that it is also unlawfull for any Subjects The Bill of Exclusion unlawfull by a Bill of Exclusion or by any other Means to put by the Lawfull Heir from the Crown for fear as was lately pretended He should alter Religion and so bring many Evils upon the Nation Now that it is utterly unlawfull and sinfull for any Subjects to doe thus Reason dictates Because to preclude a Lawfull Heir from the Crown for fear of future Evils which may happen in his Reign and Government is truly 1. Malitious To suppose a fault in the Right Heir before there is one and to Act upon such a Supposal savours of the height of Malice and Dis-ingenuity In truth so to doe in our apprehension is no better than to Hang a Man first and then to Try him afterward 2. Atheistical So to doe is to trust more to Man's Policy than to God's Wisedom more to Man's Care than to God's Providence for the prevention of suture Evils The Holy Scriptures assure us that the Heart of the King and of his Right Heir is in the hand of the Lord Prov. 21.1 and as the Rivers of Water he turneth it whither soever he will But this late Fanatical Doctrine of Deposing Kings and of Excluding the Right Heir from the Crown for want of Grace and for fear of future Evils that may possibly be done by Him speaks the contrary For this their Doctrine avouches for a Truth that the Heart of the King and of his Successour is not in the hand of the Lord Or if it be that then God will not turn it so as to doe any Good to the People And therefore the People especially in Parliament for the Good of the Common-wealth ought to Usurp God's Prerogative and take the Heart of the King and of his Lawfull Heir into their own hands and dispose of it as they the People shall judge best Now What is all this but in effect not onely to Depose and Dethrone an Earthly Prince and his Lawfull Heir but also to Depose and Dethrone Almighty God himself Nay What is it in plain English but for the People to take the Reins of Government out of God's hand into their own and to Rule the World according to their own exuberant fancies Nay What is it at the best but to doe an apparent Evil that a Contingent Good may come on it Which Principle is Antichristian and Condemned for such by Saint Paul who assures us That they who maintain such an irreligious Tenet scil Let us doe Evil Rom. 3.8 that Good may come Their Damnation is just And here it is to be farther noted That if it be as has been proved to be a sin for the Subjects upon any pretence whatever to Depose their King and to Exclude his Lawfull Heir from the Throne for fear of any Evil that may happen through his ill Government Now if this be a sin Then to be sure much more is it a sin for any Subjects to endeavour That a Law might be made to Disinherit the Lawfull Heir of the Crown upon the pretences aforesaid For 1. To make such a Law is truly to make a Law directly to oppose and contradict the unalterable Law of Inheritance which says that the Right Heir by Primogeniture shall Inherit and the other known Law of God That He who hateth Right shall Govern And therefore it was a notorious Sin Opposite to God's Law of Inheritance an Antichristian Act in the late Shaftsburian-Associators to move for a Bill of Exclusion of his present Royal Highness James Duke of YORK from Succeeding in the Throne notwith-standing his undoubted Right thereunto by Primogeniture upon a presumptive jealousie that He would not be a Friend to the true Episcopal-Protestant Religion of the Church of England as now by Law Established For by this Attempt they endeavoured to have set up a New Law of Man against the Ancient Law of God which Commands as we have heard already that the Right Heir shall Govern although he hate Righteousness and although he be a Belial an Idolater And the Law of God is so far from either Deposing a Lawfull King or Precluding the Right Heir as that it will not suffer any Subjects whatever to say Their King is Wicked or that their Princes are Vngodly 2. The Cause of Civil Wars and Sedition To make a Law for the Exclusion of the Lawfull Heir from the Crown is to establish Sedition and Faction by Law And it is not onely to cause but also to perpetuate an Intestine and Civil War by Law as our present most Wise and most Gratious King prudently and too truly urged in his late Declaration giving that for one Reason why neither in Honour nor in Conscience could He give his Royal Fiat unto that unnatural and irreligious Bill of Exclusion For if such a Bill should pass into a Law then there must inevitably follow a Bloudy Civil War Which can please none but them who delight in Bloud and love to sish in troubled waters And which will be worse The said War will in all likelihood continue untill the longest Sword shall have carried all before it And who knows but that Might may once again overcome Right as it did at Worcester Fight and in the late Cruel Rebellion Now Reason assures us That upon passing the Bill of Exclusion into a Law there most certainly will follow a Civil War and that because There will be in the Kingdom two Opposite irreconcilable Abettors for the Crown and their Adherers such as 1. The Right Heir by Primogeniture Excluded and his
Party 2. The Vsurper intruded and his Confederates And both sides will plead a just Title to the Crown The Lawfull Heir Excluded will urge and that most truly his Right thereunto by virtue of his Primogeniture according to the Law of God of Natural Reason and of Magna Charta And therefore to be sure He will Fight and that undauntedly for the Crown On the other hand the Vsurper will plead and that not without Reason his Title to the Crown by virtue of the New Law of the Nation to wit the New Statute of Exclusion which has setled the Royal Diadem upon his Head and therefore He will not easily part with it Wherefore no man need doubt but that the Vsurper will fight and that stoutly to keep what by Law he has got Thus any Man that has but half an eye may if he will plainly see That if the Bill of Exclusion should pass into a Law as the Anti-Yorkists so hotly desired that then War and Sedition will be established and continued by Law And now suppose this should ever happen to be which God forbid Then the Great Query and Case of Conscience will be scil Qu. What Party or Side ought the Pious and Dutifull Subject to take and follow Ans To deal plainly and faithfully in this Case where Conscience and Religion I mean Christianity are so deeply concerned We humbly conceive it to be the honest Subject's Duty in this case rather to Obey God and his Law and so to fight More Romano Couragiously for the Right and Lawfull Heir by Primogeniture unjustly Excluded This we ought to doe rather than to Obey Man and his New Law of Exclusion and so to engage for the Vsurper who Reigns and Governs not by Divine but onely by Humane Law and Appointment And we will Appeal to Conscience and Reason Whether it be not safer to follow God and his Law which cannot err than Man who may err and his Law of Exclusion which does grosly err in the very Sanction of it in that it manifestly opposes the above-mentioned Law of God which Commands That the Right Heir by Primogeniture should Reign and Govern although He hateth Right Object If it be as it is by all Anti-Yorkists and Common wealths Men objected That the Law of the Realm is above the King for that the Law made him King And therefore say they the Law has a power to Depose the King and to take away that Regal Authority which it gave him As that Great but to our thinking Factious Lawyer (a) Ipse autem Rex non debet esse sub homine sed sub Deo sub Lege quia Lex facit Regem Non est enim Rex ubi dominatur Volumas non Lex c. Bract. l. 1. c. 8. Bracton argues And as is so often quoted from him and seditiously urged by the Authour of Julian Apostate p. 83. And the very same Argument was pleaded by all the late Regicides particularly by that Grand Regicide Bradshaw the Lawyer who had the Impudence to sit as Judge upon the Bench and to pronounce that Diabolical Sentence of Condemnation upon his own Dread Sovereign King Charles the First of Blessed Memory and he palliated over his and their Horrid Treason with this colour of argument to wit That the Law was above the King Ans It is hoped that all the Gentlemen of the Long-Robe will go on as they already have worthily begun to repair the Honour of their Noble Order and that none of them will any more advise or plead for Treason nor ever again deceive and seduce the silly ignorant People with their specious and fallacious Arguments But that they who have been disloyal will suffer themselves and their Youth to be better Disciplined in the Doctrine of the Church of England The neglect of which has too apparently caused some of that Honourable and most necessary Function and their Clients so grosly to err in point of Obedience But as for the above mentioned Objection it is already pithily Answered by the King 's Learned Sergeants at Law in Hilary-Term 1683 in their truly Loyal Motto A DEO REX A REGE LEX God made the King the King made the Law And therefore very false and Antiscriptural are the forementioned Positions scil 1. That the Law made the King 2. That the Law is above the King For although the Law of God indeed is above all Kings and if they wilfully transgress the same they are all accountable unto God and unto God onely for the same Yet in this Kingdom of England no Statute-Law is or can be above the King And that because It was the King who first gave Life and Being to the Law of the Land The King by his Royal Assent made the Law Salvâ Regiâ Praerogativâ to be what it is to wit a Law But the Law of the Land did not make the King to be what he is to wit a King For the King was King before the Law And so he became the principal efficient Cause of the Law And therefore the King was before the Law inasmuch as the Cause is ever before the Effect And it is to be noted That although the Law may by Repeal or other ways be abolished and dye Yet in England the King never does nor can dye as long as there is alive any Lawfull Heir by Primogeniture though never so Remote Object But most if not all the Anti-Yorkists did and still do urge in favour of their Bill of Exclusion the Statute of 13 Qu Eliz. c. 1. When a Law was made to this purpose scil That it should be High-Treason for any to affirm the Right in Succession of the Crown to be in some other than the Queen Or to affirm that the Laws and Statutes do not bind the Right of the Crown and the Descent Limitation Inheritance and Governance thereof Whosoever shall during the Queens Life by book or work written or printed expresly affirm before the same be established by Parliament that any one particular person is or ought to be Heir and Successour to the Queen except the same be the natural issue of her body c. shall for the first offence be a whole year Imprisoned and forfeit half his Goods and for the second offence shall incur the penalty of Praemunire Polt Qu. El. 13. c. 1. This is the Act and these are the words of that Act which the Authour of Julian the Apostate and all the Factious Associatours have so stiffly pleaded in Justification of their Bill of Exclusion Ans But a little to undeceive the deluded People and to tell the Truth as far as we apprehend it First There was an Occasion if not a Necessity for such an Act in Queen Elizabeth's days but there is none in these of ours And the Reason for it is this scil Because in Her days many both Papists and Fanaticks disputed Queen Elizabeth's Right and Title to the Crown Nor was it certainly known who by Birth
of all men were most free from Courtship and Flattery they especially the Prophet Daniel did Honour and Worship even Heathen-Kings and frequently saluted them with this Pathetical Option VIV AT REX O King Live for ever Which is all one with God save the King In like manner St. Paul did Honour Noble Festus the Roman Governour and King Agrippa who were no Christians And the same Apostle exhorts Titus Bishop of Crete Tit. 3.1 to put All Men in mind of being subject to Principalities and Powers to obey Magistrates whether Christians or Heathens good or bad and to be ready to every good work And in Hebr. 13.17 the Jews are Commanded to obey all that had Rule over them Which Rulers over them in the State were the Roman Emperours and Deputies who were at that time inveterate Enemies to Christianity Our Blessed Saviour himself Commands all Men Christians especially to give unto Caesar what is Caesar's as well as to God what is God's And the Law of God and of Man tells us that Honour and Obedience is Caesar's due therefore it must be paid And St. Paul writing to the New-converted Romans at Rome charges them to be subject to Caesar and the Higher Powers And he gives this Reason for the necessity of their Obedience to wit Because there is no power but of God and that Rom. 13.1 2. Whosoever resisteth the Powers resisteth the Ordinance of God and he that risisteth shall receive to himself Damnation And the very same pious Doctrine of Loyalty does St. Peter teach 1 Pet. 2.13 Submit your selves to every Ordinance of Man for the Lord's sake whether it be to the King as Supreme or to Governours as unto them which are sent by him And v. 18. St. Peter adds as the Whole Duty of Man this Injunction Fear God Honour the King Thereby according to Beaufrons plainly intimating unto us this excellent Truth scil That if we will not peaceably submit to every Ordinance of the King * Beaufrons c. 8. p. 89. as to things Lawfull but become Mutinous and Rebellious then notwithstanding our high profession of Religion and of fearing God we neither Fear God nor Honour the King for as God is ever to be Feared so the King is ever to be Honoured Unto these Instances of Holy Writ pleading for Obedience to Kings and to the Supreme Magistrates we may add that Loyal Decree which the Reubenites and Gadites and the half Tribe of Manasseh made For they all were so zealous for Obedience unto Joshua their Supreme Magistrate as that they Decreed Josh 1.18 That whosoever Disobeyed Joshuah's Commands and would not hearken unto his words in all that he commanded he should be put to Death The Prophet Samuel terms Rebellion no better than Witchcraft 1 Sam. 15.23 So that according to him Whosoever Rebells has forsaken God and is gone over Volunteer to the Devil and is carrying on his works of Darkness Nor may we pass over in silence that smart check which the Heathen Sanballat gave though most undeservedly unto Loyal Nehemiah saying What is this thing that ye doe Nehem. 2.19 Will ye Rebell against the King Will ye Rebell that is to say in the Negative No surely ye will not offer to Rebell against the King For your Jewish Religion which ye say is the onely true Religion in the World teaches you otherwise and instructs you better to wit That although the King be in your opinion no other than an uncircumcised Heathen and as you believe an Idolater Yet for all this ye ought according to your own Religion not to Rebell against him From these Proofs in Canonical Scriptures we may rationally argue and conclude with the truly Loyal Archbishop Laud and others of the Church of England scil That all the Commands of a King Heyl. in Vit. Archb. Laud. p. 310. which are not upon the first Inference and Illation contrary to some clear passage of the Word of God or to some evident Sun-beam of the Law of Nature are precisely to be obeyed SECT III. The Proposition That All Lawfull Kings whether Morally good or bad ought to be obeyed proved by the Authority and Practice of honest Heathens HItherto we have heard the Divine Oracles amply declaring the Subjects Duty peaceably to Obey their Lawfull Kings and their Successours whether Papists or Protestants Heathens or Christians Good or Bad. The very same Truth and Duty we find urged and confirmed by the Authority and Practice of mere Heathens who were guided onely by the glimmering Light of their Natural Reason even such as they did not onely teach but also practise Loyalty and Obedience to their Lawfull Princes Hesiod discoursing on the Benefits of Kingly Government tells his Reader that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hesiod Theog c. unto the King the People do all most dutifully look waiting for his Word of Command They being fully assured that seeing their prosperity is his happiness He therefore will order all things right according to the Rules of Justice And when King Jupiter was Dethroned by the Rebellious Titanes then the Loyal Party mustered up their Forces and humbly tendering their Services to him their King They all unanimously entred into a solemn Vow that they would fight his Cause and never sheath their Swords untill 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. they had vanquished all his Enemies and had restored him to his Imperial Crown and Dignity Theocritus enlarging himself on the Praise and high Commendations of King Ptolemaeus says He was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the most happy of all men not onely in that He being King 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theocr. c. was the care and charge of the Supreme God But also he was happy in that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All his Subjects were Obedient and Conformable to his Government and were not factious and tumultuous nor given to Seditious Talk nor to Idleness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But every man kept his own Station and peaceably followed his own business And at last he religiously concludes his Panegyrick on the said King with this pathetical Epiphonema 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theocr. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 17. God save King Ptolemy Phocylides in his Admonitory Poem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cautions all men especially Subjects that are under an Oath of Obedience punctually to keep their Faith and Allegiance And that Because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. God hates a perjured person It is Remarkable That Fabius Maximus after he had been Consul five times became Obedient to his Son Suessa who was promoted to that high Office And when some jealousie arose that He had contemned the Authority of his said Son for that upon his first approach into his Son's Presence He did not bow the Knee nor did him that Honour and lowly Reverence which was due to his Consulary Dignity Fabius presently corrected the mistake assuring his Son the Consul that He did not forbear to give
THE PREROGATIVE OF Primogeniture SHEWING That the Right of SVCCESSION TO AN Hereditary Crown DEPENDS Not upon Grace Religion c. But Onely upon Birth-Right and Primogeniture AND That the Chief Cause of all or most Rebellions in Christendom is a Fanatical Belief That Temporal Dominion is founded in Grace By DAVID JENNER B. D. Prebendary of Sarum and Rector of Great Warley in Essex LONDON Printed for J. Hindmarsh Bookseller to His Royal Highness at the Black Bull in Cornhill 1685. TO THE Most Royal and High-Born PRINCE JAMES DUKE of YORK AND ALBANY EARL of VLSTER LORD High Admiral of ENGLAND IRELAND And all Foreign Plantations Constable of Dover-Castle Lord Warden of the Cinque-Ports Governour of Portsmouth c. Most Royal Sir YOUR Unparallel'd Magnanimity and other Your most Eminent Vertues and Excellencies are so well known to the Christian World as that Envy it self cannot obscure them And whatever English Man does or shall hereafter audaciously presume to deny You his hearty 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Euge is and ever will be unworthy any longer to be an Inhabitant of Great Britain Whose present Peace and Prosperity next unto Almighty God's Over-ruling Providence and unto Our most Gratious King 's Wise Conduct of Affairs is Owing unto Your Highness's Matchless Valour and Prudence The which You have most signally demonstrated in Vanquishing the King's and the Nation 's Enemies Abroad And in being highly instrumental in Suppressing them at Home So that if Fabius Maximus Deserved the Thanks of the whole Roman-Senate for his prudent Management of their Republick Concerns Then infinitely more has Your Royal Highness Merited not onely the Thanks of Our English Senate but over and above even Statues and Shrines of Gold Gratefully to be erected in perpetual Memory of Your most Glorious Atchievements But Ah ungratefull England That after Your most Illustrious Highness had Jeoparded Your Royal Person in many desperate and bloudy Battels at Sea and at Land onely for the Honour and Welfare of this Your Native Country whose Safety You oft times most Generously preferred before Your Own You should at last be so basely and so inhumanely requited As to have an Vnchristian and Unnatural Bill of Exclusion from Your Undoubted Birth-Right pass against You through the Prevalency of the Anti-Protestant and Factious Associatours in the late House of Commons who over-powering the Loyal Party in the said House Voted Sabbati 6. die Novembris 1680 and on Sabbati a day when surely those Fanatical Persons thought the Holy Jesus was again gone out of this World down into the Grave as to his Body and Descended into Hell as to his Soul doing Penance there for Mankind And so would not on a Saturday be present upon Earth to eye and behold their disloyal and disingenuous Actions and therefore They became Rampant and did what they pleased in spight of God and the King And being a Majority they Voted Nemine Contradicente Sabbati 26 die Martii 1681. Your Royal Highness's Exclusion from the Imperial Crown of England and Ireland c. Printed by the Order of Wi. Williams Speaker A Vote steep'd in so much Gall and Vinegar and attended with so much Disloyalty and Ingratitude As might justly have set All Your Noble and Heroick Passions on fire But God be praised In imitation of the Captain of our Salvation You have perfectly Conquered Your self Which personal Victory according to not onely the Stoical but also Christian Philosophy is more Memorable than All your other most Famous Conquests And Caesar like nay rather Jesu like You have forgot Nothing but to be Revengefull upon Your inveterate Enemies Which is Your Immortal Glory And one thing I most humbly suggest to Your Princely and most Christian Consideration as an undeniable Truth Scil. That Those Your Enemies who have or still do endeavour Your Royal Highness's Exclusion Contrary to the Divine and Natural Law of Your Birth-Right and Primogeniture neither were nor are Protestants nor any true Sons of the Church of England as now established by Law But they were and are onely a Company of Perjured Pseudo-Protestants Who under the specious pretence of being Vogued Protestants did and still do carry on their Diabolical Faction and Treasonable Association For in England onely He is a Protestant Beaufrons c. 1. who heartily believes and as heartily protests for and couragiously defends The King's Supremacy And who Christian-like Cordially declares for the Succession of the King 's Lawfull Heir according to Primogeniture whether He be Papist or Protestant whether Morally Good or Bad For This is the constant and professed Doctrine of the Apostolical-Protestant Church of England As I humbly conceive is sufficiently proved in the following Treatise The which does truly blush to approach Your Royal and most Illustrious Presence in its mean Dress and Country Garb. But forasmuch as it is the lively Draught of a most Loyal Heart towards His Majesty and of a most Faithfull and Devoted one towards Your Highness The Authour therefore most humbly begs Your Candid Acceptance of it Assuring Your Highness That He has no other Ambition in Publishing the same than where he lives to be instrumental in educating and instructing the People in the true Principles of Primitive Piety and Loyalty And whilst He lives be serviceable according to his Capacity unto God the King and the Church And to let the World know that He is Your Royal Highness 's Most Dutifull most Humble and Devoted Servant David Jenner THE CONTENTS CHAP. I. THE Necessity of Government Page 1. CHAP. II. Monarchy the best Form of Government p. 6. CHAP. III. That all Kings and their Lawfull Heirs ought by Right of Primogeniture to Reign and Govern Successively whether they be Morally Good or Bad whether Infidels or Christians Papists or Protestants p. 18. SECT I. The Proposition proved by Humane Authority of Heathens ibid. SECT II. The Proposition That Succession to the Throne ought to be by Primogeniture and not by Grace proved by Divine Authority p. 21. SECT III. The Proposition proved by the Vnalterable Law of Inheritance by Primogeniture p. 25. SECT IV. The Proposition proved by Reason and the Common Sentiments of Religion p. 37. The Bill of Exclusion of the Duke of York proved to be unlawfull and sinfull p. 38. Atheistical and Factious ibid. Opposite to the known Law of God p. 41. The Cause of perpetual Civil Wars and Sedition p. 42. The chief Pleas and Arguments for it Answered p. 43 44 c. CHAP. IV. That all Subjects ought Actively to obey their Lawfull Prince in all things which be not Positively against some known Law of God although their said Prince be an Heathen Idolater and Apostate or never so Morally vitious p. 56. SECT I. The Duty of Obedience to Superiours whetheh Morally Good or Bad proved by the Law of Nature an of Natural Reason p. 57. SECT II. The Duty of Obedience to Superiours whether Christians or Heathens Good or Bad proved by Authority of