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A33926
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The legality of the court held by His Majesties ecclesiastical commissioners defended their proceedings no argument against the taking off penal laws & tests.
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Care, Henry, 1646-1688.
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1688
(1688)
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Wing C527; ESTC R23058
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12,362
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42
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Let this be Printed WHITE-HALL Febr. 25 th 1687. Sunderland P. THE Legality of the Court HELD BY His Majesties Ecclesiastical Commissioners DEFENDED Their Proceedings No ARGUMENT Against the Taking Off Penal Laws Tests LONDON Printed and are to be Sold by Richard Janeway in Queens-Head-Alley in Pater-Noster-Row MDCLXXXVIII THE Legality of the Court Held by His Majesties Ecclesiastical Commissioners DEFENDED THE Manifest Design of our Church-men's Out-cries against His MAJESTIES Ecclesiastical Commission being to insinuate into the Mobile That the KING notwithstanding the solemn Promises he has made to the Church of England intends nothing less than Her Ruin I cannot forbear adding some Considerations to what the Vindicator of the Proceedings of His MAJESTY's Ecclesiastick Commissioners hath said on this Subject And thus much I the rather do because I find that the Last thing they aim at is the setting the Nation against the Taking off Penal Laws and Tests But that I may the more Successfully go through this Province it will be necessary that I examine what has been opposed to the Legality of the Court. His MAJESTY has Promised to Protect the Church of England as by Law established and hitherto has done Nothing that interseres with this most Gracious Promise for it must be acknowledged that a Correcting the Disobedient Members of a Church is not a Destroying but rather an using proper methods to preserve and secure it The Church of England is a Body-Politick compact and compounded of many and almost infinite several and yet well-agreeing Members of which the KING is Head instituted and furnished with plenary and entire Power Prerogative and Jurisdiction to render Justice and Right to every part of this Body of what Estate Degree and Calling soever he be The Exercise of this Power and Prerogative according to the Ecclesiastick Laws of this Realm is the Great Engine used for the Defence and Security of this Church The Distribution of Justice whether by encouraging those that do well or punishing the Offenders is the true way to support a Body-Politick Thus much I presume all men of Sence will yield from whence it is easily inferr'd That on my Clearing the Legality of the Commission for nothing has been that I do know objected against the Defence of its Proceedings it must be moreover granted that His Majesty has done the Church of England no harm My present Work then is to consider What has been urged against the Legality of this Court The Author of a Letter to the Vindicator will have the Question to be Whether or no by the Laws of this Nation as they now stand the KING 's Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction may be delegated to Commissioners Or Whe-Ecclesiastical Commissioners derived their Authority from His Majesty by vertue of the First Elizabeth only and not upon the score of any Prerogative in the Crown preceding to that Act whereby our Kings might appoint Commissioners in such Cases ad libitum is the single Question upon which the Validity or Invalidity of the present Commission will turn To this the Author answers That it is not an Expression that might drop from my Lord Coke's Pen that will determine so weighty a point as this especially it being a question that depends upon some knowledge of Antiquity which my Lord Coke was very little acquainted with Besides he adds That my Lord Coke never tells us that our King 's by vertue of their ancient Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction could appoint any Commissioners After this the Author goes on to let us know what the ancient Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical was boldly affirming that no Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction was anciently delegated to Commissioners For saith he Commissioners are not such Arbitrary things as some mistaken Men do fondly imagine And how plausibly soever it be said That what Power a Man has in himself he may delegate unto another Yet this difference must be admitted betwixt Persons Commissionated by the KING in Matters of Government and Persons authorized by private men to act for them and in their stead viz. That private men may by Law do those things in Person which they impower others to do for them But the KING Commissionates Persons to do what Himself cannot by Law do in Person This is the Substance of what our Author opposes to what the Vindicator had said of the Legality of this Court. And in my Reply no more is needful than to shew 1. That in the Sence of the Church's great Archbishop the KING may do by Law those things in Person which He impowers Commissioners to do for Him. 2. That before the 1 Eliz. the Kings of England by the Common Law might grant out Commissions 3. That notwithstanding any thing contained in the 16 Car. 1. or 13 Car. 2. be KING may do so still 4. That His Majesty may exercise this Prerogative in Matters Ecclesiastical in a more ample manner than yet He has done and therefore seeing he doth not it 's manifest That His Majesty designs no Hurt to the Church of England To the First I will only insist on what is affirm'd by Archbishop Bancroft the Malleus Puritanorum the great Champion of our English Church who was President of the Convocation called in the First year of K. James 1. and stifly insisted on the imposing the three Articles and on a Depriving all that disobeyed This Great man the Church of England's Darling expresses himself most fully in these Words Lib. 12. Mich. 5 Jac. Prohibitions de l'Roy as Sir Edward Coke reports Upon Sunday the 10th of November the KING upon Complaint made to him by Bancroft Archbishop of Canterbury concerning Prohibitions was informed That when question was made of what Matters the Ecclesiastical Judges have cognizance either upon the Exposition of the Statutes concerning Tythes or any other thing Ecclesiastical or upon the Statute of 1 Eliz. concerning the High Commission or in any other case in which there is not express Authority in Law the KING Himself may Decide it in His Royal Person and that the Judges are but the Delegates of the KING and that the KING may take what Causes he please to determine from the Determination of the Judges and may determine them Himself And the Archbishop said It was clear in Divinity that such Authority belongs to the KING by the Word of GOD. Nothing can be more expresly opposite to what the Author of the Letter affirms He saith that The KING cannot by Law do that in Person which He impowers others to do But the Archbishop is positive That the KING can do it in Person yea that thus much is ratified by the Holy Scriptures and therefore is out of the power of humane Laws to alter If then there be any Truth in this Church-man's Divinity there is no force in what the Author offers for Law. But Secondly The thing I chiefly insist on is this That before the First of Elizabeth the Kings of England might grant out Commissions In Caudries Case Coke Rep. Lib. 5.
But yet His Majesty with the greatest steadiness pursues His Royal Purposes of Grace to the whole Kingdom to all Parties in it even to the Church of England that She continue in the Enjoyment of all that is dear unto Her so far as it 's consistent with the true peace and quiet of the other great parts of the Nation Let things be restored to the Ancient Constitution let all English-men as such enjoy the Priviledges that belong unto 'em Let them all sit down with peace under their own Vines and be equally concern'd in the Services the Government calls for and Encouragements it gives and His Majesty is satisfied The enclosing the Government and narrowing it so that none but Men of one Religious Perswasion can have a share in it hath as woful experience teaches us proved fatal to this Nation It hath spoiled our Trade depopulated the Kingdom and exhausted the Nation 's Treasure carrying it unto a neighbouring People Let us then be content that His Majesty brake down the Enclosures and set the Government on a larger bottom that all True English-men may have a share in it Let Liberty and Property and every man's Religion be secured and we shall soon be the happiest People under Heaven I say Let every man's Religion be secured as much from Violence as the most Sacred part of our Civil Liberties for this is the thing His MAJESTY Desires and Where then is our danger His MAJESTY offers to do what never any of His Royal Predecessors ever did before him towards the establishing his Peoples Peace And shall we be so unsensible as not to Bless GOD and accept of the Offer Here is no Trusting in the Case His MAJESTY discovers so much Sincerity and Integrity in what he saith that he will leave no room for Trust It is but to accept of a Magna Charta in which our Religion is secured from all danger which can never be so long as Penal Laws and those Tests whose matter is meerly Religious be kept up and we are immediately possest of all we can reasonably desire Let the same Instrument that takes away Penal Laws and Tests secure our Religion and by the very Breath that the one is destroyed the other will be established That a Sufficient Security may be found out is not doubted by the most wise and thoughtful What that is is the part of a Parliament to consider but if we have as good or better Security for our Religion to be content to part with Penal Laws and Tests is both the Duty and Interest of every true English-man That His Majesty will give us as good Security as can be reasonably desired is the Import of His Late Gracious Declaration which he has on divers occasions oft publickly repeated and it hath been fully proved That His Majesty's Ecclesiastical Commissioners have done nothing that is inconsistent with It. Whence it clearly follows That there is nothing of Argument in our Hot-Churchmens Clamours about this Courts Proceedings against the Taking off Penal Laws and Tests In a word from what has been already urg'd it 's most apparent I. That the Court held by His Majesties Ecclesiastical Commissioners is according to the Sentiments of Church of England-Lawyers and Divines a Legal Court. II That the Prerogative recognized by the Church-of England to be inherent in the CROWN is much larger than what His Majesty has yet exercised For 1. The KING with His Commissioners Ecclesiastical may make New Laws about Ceremonies and instead of Three impose Thirty more The Power being lodg'd in the KING He is the most proper Judge of their Decency and Number and for the same Reason that Three are imposed if His Majesty judges it meet Thirty more may be added to the present Imposition 2. The KING with His Commissioners Ecclesiastical may enjoyn a strict Subscription unto New Articles and in the present juncture require the Clergy to give in Assent and Consent unto them on Pain of Deprivation And if His Majesty should oblige our hot Church-Doctors to Subscribe Assent and Consent unto Liberty of Conscience What a condition would these Violent Men be plung'd into They must either renounce their persecuting Principles or part with what is as dear unto them viz. their Benefices 3. His Majesty may proceed against the Bishop of London to a Deprivation for when ever any one falls under Suspension it has been the Custome of the Church of England stifly to insist on a Submission and where that could not be obtained they never stopt one point this side a Deprivation Now it 's plain that it was the Bishop's Duty to obey the Mandate of his Supreme Ordinary and suspend Dr. Sharp and seeing he refused to Discharge his Duty he was by their own Laws justly suspended and it 's as certain that His Majesty exercises the greatest Clemency in waiting so long for his submission 4. If His Majesty should deal with some of the Magdalen-Fellows after that manner the Church-of England-Judges advis'd King James the First to proceed against the Old Puritanes He might handle 'em more severely than yet his Commissioners have done For their endeavouring to fill the Minds of His Majesties Subjects with Discontents and Jealousies is an Offence Fineable at discretion and very short of Felony or Treason in the Punishment By all which it 's manifest that His Majesty has not stretched his Prerogative to the utmost length he might and yet keep within the Church-of England Circle and it 's also as clear that by reason of this Power His Majesty has all the Conformable Clergy under His Girdle to which we may add that on the account of the many Penal Laws against Protestant Dissenters They also are as much under the Power of their PRINCE for which reason we may be assured that if His Majesty design'd any thing more than the Peace and Quiet of all His People if he had further resolv'd to have set up Popery in Dominion to the Ruining His Protestant Subjects the only time of doing it would be before the Penal Laws and Tests are taken off and a Magna Charta for Liberty of Conscience is Established For Now the KING can either Muzzle all the Clergy or Tyâ—up the hands of Protestant-Dissenters and get a Parliament that shall set up Popery It 's not to be doubted but that 't is more easy Now than it can be after a Magna Charta for Liberty of Conscience is obtained for Then the persecuting principle will be Damned the Church of England will have fresh security for her standing and the Protestant-Dissenter be deliver'd from the Awe and Dread of Penal Laws And every Man whose desire is more for Peace than Broyles and Confusions be they Protestant or Roman Catholick they will be for a continuing the Magna Charta To deliver freely my Conscience in this case it is this His Majesty designs to make us happy by setting us all at ease under His Government and the utmost he desires is That the Roman Catholicks with His other Subjects may enjoy the Free Exercise of their Religion and have an equal share with others in the priviledges of Englishmen and that thus much may be compassed the King would have Matters so setled that it may never be in the power of any one Party to hurt the Religion of the other and that all Parties may be secured from Fears and Jealousies His Majesty calls for the help of a Parliament that in a Parliamentary-way Men of every Religion may have the greatest security the Wit of Man can invent for Liberty of Conscience All those Pamphlets therefore that are daily spread abroad chiefly by those who had the greatest hand in the late Persecution do hinder the Nations Peace so far as they obstruct this His Majesties most Gracious Design and are to be consider'd as such by all good Men who when they weigh things will I doubt not see cause to do their utmost that We may have such a Parliament as will concurr with His Majesty in making us Happy FINIS