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A43638 The test or tryal of the goodness & value of spiritual-courts in two queries: I. Whether the statute of I Edw. 6.2. be in force (against them) at this day, obliging them to summon and cite the Kings subjects (not in their own names and styles, as now they do, but) in the name and stile of the Kings Majesty (as in the Kings Courts Temporal) and under the seal of the Kings arms? II. Whether any of the cannon-law, or how much of the cannon-law is (at this day) the law of England, in Courts Christian? Highly necessary to be perused by all those that have been, or may be cited to appear at Doctors Commons. By Edm. Hickeringill. Hickeringill, Edmund, 1631-1708. 1683 (1683) Wing H1829; ESTC R216804 57,574 47

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no very seasonable time for a Judge to declare a Statute to be null and void that never any Judge as yet did upon the Bench take upon him to do since 1 Jacobi reviv'd it by Repealing its Repealer 1 Mar. 2. And truly whilst Ecclesiastical-Courts did little else but prove Wills and now and then get a few crack't Groats from a poor fearful Church-Warden rather than contend with them and some such little business most men past them by through contempt As not daigning to trouble themselves with medling with them though in that little they did They opprest and still do oppress His Majesties Subjects most impudently by extorting excessive Fees in despight and defyance of the Statutes to the cont●●y Impudent Registers But there is this to be said for them by way of Apology That when they give some hundreds of Pounds for the Sell-Souls-place they must make their money of Sins and Souls which yet is contrary to their own Canons I profess I have many times long together been puzling my self by studying what those Ecclesiastical-Fellows in their Ecclesiastical-Courts are good for or what one good thing they do every Creature of God is good for something but now I think on 't they do not pretend to be purely of Gods making there 's nothing in holy Scripture that is alike to their Constitution nor by what has been here said will any man that I know venture to say they are purely of the King 's making Legally if they live in defyance of the Kings Laws and refuse to use the Kings Name Style and Seal in their Processes Ecclesiastical enjoyned by the Statute I have been in Popish Countreys and there I have seen a Crew in many things like them But God knows we Protestants do unanimously declare against Implicite Faith and yet the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction from the first Citation to the end namely to Excommunication and the Jayl is much carryed on by Implicite Faith For the Judges believe the Bishops Significavit and Arch-bishops Signifieavits whilst they good men signify a man Excommunicated and yet never heard one word of the merit of the cause but the Judges believes the Bishops Significavit and the Bishop believes the Registers Certificavit which unavoidable comes if you do not stop the Registers hand with money to his content Oh sad estate of Christianity Christianity God bless the King and Parliament when it sits I mean and by all Tokens it is probable that they 'l soon resolve these Riddles and also not admit palpable Symony and Hypocrisy to Provoke Gods Wrath and Judgments upon the Nation by making holy Ordinances and Ordinations vendible and Gospel-Keys of binding and loosing once another Gift of God a money-business or Political Engine to take away men's Franchises and Votes when there is no other way to deprive them thereof I cannot think that Christ entrusted Anathemas to his Disciples to play them so frankly at a bold Rate fast loose He that eats drinks unworthily that is to a Politick Carnal End eats and drinks his own Damnation and he that opens and shuts Heaven and Hell-Gates binding and loosing using the Holy-Keys unworthily that is for low politick Carnal-Ends uses them to his own Damnation God will not be mocked CHAP. VI. I Doubt not but all that Read this must say that in this Tract I have done their business already to all intents and purposes A Law may sleep a Statute may lie Dormant as did the Act of Vniformity whilst the King's Act of Indulgence according to his Royal Word and Promise from Breda facilitating his Return did last but though Laws may be husht and lull'd asleep awhile nay a long time yet if they be not quite dead woe be to him that tramples on them for the Laws of England are so sacred that it has been observ'd they have been too hard for any man at long run that durst oppose them withstand them or stand in their way the Laws are called the Subjects best Inheritance I remember part of Sir Harbottle Grimston's speech in Parliament Anno 1640. concerning Spiritual-Courts was to take notice of an Insolence of theirs much alike to what has been heard of in other cases namely under a Religious Pretext to meddle with mens Franchyses Charters and Priviledges as English-men for says that Loyal Gentleman and true Englishman speaking of the Lambeth Canons of 40. and the Synod then there ` That the Synod called together upon pretence of Religion took upon them `the boldness out of Parliament to grant Subsidies and meddle with men's Free Holds Oh! How dishonourable is it to any Religion to palliate so much venome as under a notion of a Gospel Ordinance of Excommunication or the like to design to make men uncapable of a Vote or Freedoms Franchises and Charters especially if they seem to be affraid of nothing so much as that some should conform and consequently be capable of as many Priviledges as the Debauchee or prophane Libertine Christianity do you call it more like Ely's Sons or Simon-Magus Oh God! may not such well dread thy Vengeance Christianity do you call it The wisest of all the ten Persecuting Emperours was Dioclesian whose Conscience so tormented his Breast for Persecuting the Christians that he threw the Diadem from his hated head and hid it in a Garden in the obscurest Py-corner of the World But the Horrour of Nero's Visage is by Suetonius rendred so tremendous to behold after he vented his Cruelty upon the Christians that it would make a mans Hair stand on end to view him extantibus vigentibusque oculis usque ad horrorem visentium with ghastly Looks and frightful Eyes strikeing Horrour in all that saw him such was the Fate of this Persecuting Atheist Religionem usque quaque Aspernator as Suetonius calls him a Contemner of every thing that lookt like Religion And such are the brood of Simon Magus that make use of Religion which is intended for the Salvation of mens Souls only to the destruction of their Bodies and Estates Simon quoth he no Simon Magus was not thus Impudent he did his business indeed namely the money business and to be ador'd and Reverenc't forsooth But he did it by juggle and sleight of hand but the Son 's of Eli and Symonists like Ghosts long enur'd to walk appeared at Noon-day did take purses before mens faces Swagger Curse Anathematize Damn bluster In good time they were charm'd down In Nomine Domini Amen If ever you were in Spain or Portugal as I have been tell me what Monkey or Baboon is more contemtible than a sneaking perjur'd Hypocritical Ecclesiastical Property of State What more Ridicule then a fawning Spiritual Sycophant in Antick-Dress cringing with his Pin-Buttocks and hallow-smiles upon a Whore Atheist or Renegade that do but scoff at his ghastly Habilements of uncouth Guize and Shape Portentous and Prodigious Risum teneat is Amic● could ye have held from Laughing at the Holy Mymick
and ride forty or fifty miles from their Houses their Trades and their Families upon the Summons of a Commissary in his own name which is none of the best names neither sometimes however some names abstracted from the quality of some that may happen to wear them may by accident become Scandalous and Odious Ravilliack Murther'd His Majesties great Grandfather Hen. 4. the French-King And in detestation or that villanous treacherous King-killing Fact the Loyalty Wisdom Justice and Piety of France enacted that the House wherein the Villian was born should be made a Dunghil never to be rebuilt but as ●ocursed ground layd waste his Father and Mother for ever banisht and all of the name of Ravilliack to change that King-killing name for some other and a better So sacred are the persons of Kings that they are not to be toucht in bloody earnest without an eternal stigmatize and brand set upon the Prophane A tempt to all Posterity Nay Jolm Scotus lost himself because he would not loose his Jest when the French King sitting on the one side of the Table and Du●● Scotus on the other the King askt him merrily what was the difference between a Scot and a So● Scotus bluntly answered The Table If it be dangerous to play at ●●yles with Princes 't is eternally mortal to play at Sharp's And therefore I wish with all my heart too that His Majesties Royal Ancestor the stout King Richard the second had not been basely cowardly and treacherously Murther'd with a Back-stroke by an Exton And if it had been in France I doubt not but the Loyalty Piety and Prudence of the French-men would have exterminated not all the men that were called Exton But in horrour and detestation of King-killing namely they would have so abbominated that King-killing name as they did Rabilliacks that they would have oblitterated it to all Posterity and have made all the Exton● in the Kingdom change that King-killing Name for a better that the loathed-name might like a hateful S●uff be put out and extinct to all Posterity But if in contempt of that Royal Statute of 1 Edw. 6. 2. and in defyance of the reason of that Statute The Kings Subjects should happen to be cited in any such untoward King-killing name and then be prosecuted till they have satisfied and paid the onsequence cannot but be the more ungrateful for that once deservedly odious name especially since the 1 Edw. 6. 2 commands all Processes Ecclesiastical to be all the reason in the World in the Kinge name the Ecclesiastical-Head as well as the Temporal-Head And if the Prelates and Ecclesiastical-men should not as industriously endeavour all manner of Legal wayes to advance and a●●w the Kings Prerogative Royal as much as Lay-men then they are very ungrateful and ill deserve the Bounty so Gracious a King has confer'd so liberally upon them If this Statute has been long I know not by what Arts and yet I do tooknow in part why it has be●n husht asleep and Scandal and Inconveniences may ensue by its awakened vertue and force the mo●re shame for them that have been the true causes and Authors of so grand a Scandal and Inconveniences lay the Scandal at the right door Scandals and Offences will co●e says our Saviour but wo be to them by whom they come Now is there any Scandal or Inconveniences so great but the King and Parliament can readily avoid them or compound them and remedy them CHAP. XII YEt can I not deny but that all Parliaments since the Reformation have been so Jealous of the Exor●itant Power of Church-men finding by woful Experience in the late High-Commission-Court granted by 1. Eliz. 1. what Ruefull Work was made that they fetcht it down with as much Celerity as they could and by the same Statute that repealed it have branded it to Posterity saving 17 Car. 1. 11 That it ●e●ded to the great wrong mark that and Oppression of the Kings Subjects c. And though some men never had greater Hopes of Regaining that unhappy Power or some-what alike it then by the long Parliament fais● called The Pentioner● Parliament for though there might be Judasses amongst them yet as to the Major part of them never were there Wiser nor Truer English-men All that they could gain by 13 Car. 2. 12. was onely to place their Ecclesiastical Courts in Statu quo just as they were in 1639. without the Addition of any new power or any new Confirmation of them but left their foundation as Tottering as they found it before the troubles commen●'t And truly they were with the frustration so dejected that no People were more scorned and neglected and Indicted for their Extortions and Oppressions And yet for many years the Registers with a little Cypher at his Elbow or over his head called a Surrogate scrap't up a poor untoward living sometimes catching what they could with as Little Noise as they could But now with Contrary Politicks how wisely let them look to it they have grown so busy with the Kings Subjects torturing their Souls Purses Liberties and Estates by their Citations in their own names Certificavits and Significavits in their own Names which ought by the 1 Edw. 6. 2. to have been under the Seal and in the Name of the Kings-Majesty and then upon such Significavits not sealed with the Kings Seal have got the Writ de Excommunicato Capiendo and then what Gratefull Works they made for the Jaylors and Bum-bayliffes is so notorious that no man can wonder that men are deservedly rowzed to Examine their Frame and Constitutions and pry whether all be right within when such ghastly ruines appear abroad that who can Imagine that the good God ever gave them Commission to make havock of mens Souls Liberties and Estates The Keys of Excommunication seldom opening any thing so soon as a Jayl-Door whence by the other Cross-Key of Absolution they were never delivered without Money money Nor is it for Church-men to Vapour long with Gospel-Ordinances when instead of using them for Spiritual-ends they abuse them to vile base and Sordid Designs to fill their Pockets and wreak their Malice This Rapine in the Sons of Eli prov'd the Ruine of his house for those alone that Honour God he will Honour but those that despise him shall be lightly esteemed And how truly this threathing has been verifyed upon the Ecclesiasticals let any man speak his Conscience say whether any sort of People in the Kingdom have been so contemned and lightly esteemed as they Not but that Contempt may happen to good men and the Scorner● be in the fault but when the light Esteem is grounded upon the Avarice Pride Idleness Extortion Malice and Oppression of Church-men it looks certainly like Digi●us Dei the just Judgment of Almighty God But if both King and some Houses of Parliament once did not like the Act for Uniformity what Wisdom is it for men to be so fierce for the Letter of the Law which
1. And if any one of these do but hold the Statute of 1 Edw. 6. 2. must stand Repealed But as drowning men lay hold of any Root or knubs though under water and does but help to drown'd them so men that are plung'd into a Necessity to hold the Conclusion they are very willing to gain it upon any Premisses how sophistical soever Nalson in his late Collection of affairs of State ●o 763. undertakes torecite this Consult of the Judges 4 Jacobi as he says he finds it in the Paper Office and tells us That the being of this Stat. 1 Edw. 6. 2. in force was Long stuck upon but AT LAST an Answer was found So that it seems there was much longing and abundance of seeking for an Answer that is to say for any plausible pretence to avoid this Statute and at last and with much ado something as good as nothing was found for he furnishes us but with two of the very same too weak Cords which Coke mentions For some thought they were hard put to it for Arguments against the force of that famous Statute when they fly for help to the two last Cords or Ligaments to bind down that Statute which they Trembled to think might be of terrible Consequence if it happen to be in force notwithstanding the Strength of the said Cords and Ligaments none of which seemed to have any the least Power Imaginable to do the feat if men were not very willing to believe it except the first Cord namely 1 Mar. 2. for that does expresly and by name repeal 1 Edw. 6. 2. And indeed if it had not expresly and by Name repealed it It could never have been repealed if what Lawyers say be true That no Statute can be Repeal'd but by another Statute and that expresly and by Name or be contrary to the former Statute For if Wyre-drawn Consequences and Inferences might Repeal a Statute the Subjects would never know when a Statute is in Force For let but a crafty Lawyer with an oyly glib tongue use his skill and he may with Strains of wit and stretches and Inferences and far-fetcht Consequences and oblique Reflections make such a Clash among the Statutes one against another that none should seem of force that a cunning Consequence driver had any picque against But our Kings and Parliaments have always been more tender of the Validity of their Laws then to leave them To●tering thus at the me●●● of every Inference-maker Especially when they draw 〈◊〉 Inferences and Consequences as could not possibly enter so much as into the minds and Cogitations of the Law-makers when they enacted and made a Statute And this is so clear a Truth and evident to every man that has but common sence that more needs not be said to it For it would be of most dreadful Consequence that the Statutes should be so flexible as to be made a Nose of Wax of to stand this way one day and that way another just as Mr. Consequence-maker is feed to set them The Dissenters for their money might find cunning Lawyers enough perhaps to defeat the Act of Uniformity and Repeal it if Far-fetcht Inferences and Consequences would do the feat But God forbid that the Laws of England should have nothing to stand firm upon but such slippery ground made such by an oyly Mouth If we cannot find 1 Edw. 6. 2. repeal'd but by Consequences and Oblique Inferences we shall make base Tinkerly work on 't and to patch up one hole of evil Consequences make two of Consequence twenty times more dreadful and pernicious Therefore the best Cord and that which seems most strongly to make void and of none effect the said Statute of 1 Edw. 6. 2. is indeed that which can never be deny'd namely that the same is expresly and by name repealed by 1 Mary 2. There let it stand or lie bound for ever except we can find its Ligaments and Shackles taken off and again set in its pristine Liberty Vigor and Splendor But as to those two latter Cords that they pretend bind it down for ever by Repealing it they are thought by wise men so trivial that they are not worthy any considera●●●●● and that they were surely sore put to 't for shifts that made them of such over 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 CHAP. IV. FOr how in the name of Prudence could it enter into the thoughts of wise Legislators to kill a dead Horse Could the Parliament intend by the 1 and 2 Phil. Mar. 8. to repeal 1 Edw. 6. which was repealed already and made void but the very year before namely by 1 Mar. 2. They could not forget it it was so lately done nor can they be accounted so silly as Actum agere and make Laws against Non Entityes The Learned Judge Hobert uses a like Argument to prove that the King shall have not only the Estates In Fee of Traytors Estates in Tail being not by the Statutes 31 Hen. 8. 33 Hen. 8. by name given to the King yet also Estates in Tayl why because there being but two sorts of Estates of Inheritance namely in Fee and in Tayl and the Estates in Fee of Traytors being forfeit and given to the King by the Common-Law Those Statutes shall not be presum'd Actum agere but shall reach the other Estates in Tail which the Common-Law did not reach And by like reason since 1 Edw. 6. 2. is not so much as mentioned or named in 1 2 Phil. Mar. 8. except by Inferences and Fetches deduced from the Stile and Latitude of those words All Statutes made against the See of Rome Repealed There is Life in a Mussle For the said Statute did not think sufficient for their Repeal by General Words but do therefore name particularly and Expresly what Statutes they mean to Repeal namely 25 Hen. 8. 9. 24 Hen. 8 12. with almost a score more amongst which my dear Statute of 1 Edw. 6 2 is not Named a 〈…〉 fore can never be repealed thereby nor could be intended to be 〈◊〉 thereby But some have said that there are in 1 2 Phil. Mar. 8. express words that do Repeal by Consequence the Statute of 1 Edw. 6. 2. namely these words ANd the Ecclesiastical Iurisdiction of the Arch bishops Bishops and Ordinarye to be in the same state for process of Sutes punishment of Crimes and Execution of Censures of the Church with knowledge of causes belonging to the same and as large in those points as the said Iurisdiction was in Anno 20 Hen. 8. To which it is readily answered That the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction was thereby made Valid and Powerful as it was in Condition and State as to Process of Sutes Censures c. In the 20 of Hen. 8. And yet the manner of their Processes as to the Name and Stile might well enough differ For no man can rationally say that the Process of Suits punishment of Crimes and execution of Censures of the Church are not in the same
other Popes as dull Sabinianus Boniface 3. that red Dragon as Cardinal Baronius calls him Prophane Formosus Ann. 891. wretched Pope Stephen 7. Ann. 895. of whom Baronius sayes He entred like a Wolf and died in a Halter like a Dog Debaucht Romanus Ann. 897. Seditious Theodore 2. Ann. 897. and next to him Vile Jo. 10. Ann. 897. three Popes in one year one after another or these three next succeeding Popes Benedict 4 Leo. 5. Terrae Filii as Platina calls them and this latter Ann. 903. after one months Possession of the Holy Chair ejected by Christophorus so obscure a fellow that no man could find out his Countrey or Sir-name only that the name he was known by before he was Pope was Christopher And these few amongst many more I recite that men need not wonder if great Scandals come in a Church if the Heads at Rome happen to be like the Wooden Heads aforesaid namely brainless Like Pope John 12. that Spit-fire full of his Anathema's excommunicating the whole Council of Lateran for Articling against him to the Emperor Otho the Great for drinking a Health to the Devil for ordaining Boyes Bishops at ten years old and Deacons in a Stable for invocating the Devil to help him at Dice to a lucky Cast for lying with Stephana his Fathers Concubine And for turning his Holynesses Palace to a common Stews or Brothel house But in his Answer to his Charge he curses them all to the Devil of Hell by Excommunication and they in Requital toss back his Bruta Fulmina and Anathema's by excommunicating the Pope saying You write by the Suggestion of as silly Councellors as your self Childish Threats but we despise your Excommunication and throw it back upon you Judas the Traytor bound nothing with his Halter but his own wretched Neck So ridiculous did they make that Ecclesiastical Tool or Sword of Excommunication growing dull by using it so often on every whissling occasion to Curse whom they hated in meer revenge 'till no wise man heeded them therefore at last they wheedled in the Magistrate to grant them the Writ de Excommunicato capiendo Blessed be God that there is a day of Judgment hereafter and of all Miracles I most wonder that any man in his wits can be an Atheist to doubt it for it is impossible but that the Sun Moon Stars Earth and all we see had a first Cause that made and preserves them and it is impossible but that that first Cause must be infinitely good and just and consequently impossible but that there must be a day of Judgment and Justice in another World For in this World the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong nor Favour men of Skill nor Bread to the Wise nor yet Riches to men of Vnderstanding but Honesty and Truth stands at the Bar sometimes when Hypocrisie Cruelty Atheism and Apostasie sits on the Bench therefore it is impossible but that there should be another day of Judgment when it shall be well with them that fear God which fear before him but it shall not be well with the Wicked neither shall he prolong his dayes which are as a shadow because he feareth not before God But if Bishops angry Bishops or angred Bishops would be content to Scold it out as St. Hierom at St. Ambrose calling him Corvus Cornicula Rook and Raven and his Commentaries on St. Luke Nugas Trifles though I like not the sport yet I confess of the two such Duels are most proper for Women or men of the Gown but I hate playing at Sharps especially with men that will not play upon the square and fairly with Equal Weapons and Equal Seconds but to fly to the Magistrates long Sword upon every Ecclesiastical Skirmish of Pen I will not I dare not say that it is foul Play but I 'le say 't is not an even Match The Learned Bishop of Canterbury Doctor Laud when Fisher published his Book of Popery did not run to the King and Council crying out Help O King nor did the Council trouble themselves with such Velitations or Pen-pickeerings but Laud answered a Scholar like a Scholar with his learned Pen to his lasting Honour not borrowing the Magistrates Pike to his Dishonour No man does well approve of the Bastinado though given him by never so smooth a Cudgel but the Cudgells do so ill become the hands that should bless us that any man would take the Lamb-basting from a Hangman with much more Patience and Alacrity than from a Prelate it being so incongruous to his holy Office to turn Executioner so much as by Proxie Nor do I know in all these Contests how it is possible to follow better advice than that happy and great States-man gave Queen Elizabeth in reference to the Papist and the Puritan neither of them did he well like yet lest the Queen should take him for a Puritan a sort of People to whom she never gave much Countenance nor much Discountenance much less cut them down with Sham-laves made against Papists sharpned on purpose because of the late Spanish Invasion the danger whereof was no sooner quite over but if she did not quite sheath that two edged Sword yet she never drew it against Papists no nor against Popish Priests except Treason against the State aggravated the virulency of that corrupt Religion the Statesman I mean was the Lord Treasurer Burleigh who in a Letter to that Queen Protesting first that he was not given over no nor so much as addicted to the Puritan Preciseness thus advises her Majesty Queen Elizabeth 'Till I think that you think otherwise I am bold to think that the Bishops in these dangerous times take a very ill and unadvised course so pious Bishops were in those dayes in driving them from their Cures and this I think for two Causes 1. Because it doth discredit the reputation and estimation of your power when the Princes shall perceive and know that even in your Protestant Subjects in whom consisteth mark that all your Force Strength and Power there is so great and heart-burning a Division and how much reputation swayeth in these and all other worldly Actions there is none so simple as to be ignorant and the Papists themselves though there be most manifest and apparent discord between the Franciscans and Dominicans the Jesuites and other Orders or Religious Persons especially the Benedictines yet will they shake off none of them mark that but some are wise and some are otherwise because in the main point of Popery and Protestantisme they all agree and hold together and so far and so may all Protestants also freely bragg and vaunt of their Unity The other reason is because in truth in their Opinions though they are over-squeamish and nice and more scrupulous than they need yet with their careful Catechizing and diligent Preaching they bring forth that fruit which your most Excellent Majesty is mark that to desire and wish