Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	bishop_n	king_n	year_n	1,399	5	4.7691	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44187	A letter of a gentleman to his friend, shewing that the bishops are not to be judges in Parliament in cases capital	Holles, Denzil Holles, Baron, 1599-1680.	1679 (1679)	Wing H2461; ESTC R204379	41,325	145

that he was ill spoken of and defamed to the close of all the Judgment given by the King by the mouth of the Chancellour for his banishment in regard he had not put himself upon his Peerage which yet the Chancellour said the King did not do as his Judge for that he was not in the place of Judgment And it was an odd thing and unusual that some Prelates and some Lords should be sent down to the House of Commons to receive the Articles of this Impeachment All this was such a Hodge-podge of a Trial as no man can tell what to make of it nor can it be of any signification to be a president and a rule of proceeding in matters of that nature in Parliament But admit it had been never so regular it is but one single president of Bishops and Prelates acting in a Judicial capacity in a Capital cause in Parliament against multitudes excluding them it was once so and never but once And can that be thought sufficient to alter and change the constant course and practice of Parliaments which hath been otherwise Had it been questioned then and upon a debate and mature consideration been so resolved at that time this had signified something but it was done and no exception taken which they call a passing Sub silentio and more it was never done but once But Sir Edward Coke goes further and saith that two or three presidents are nothing if forty be contrary and it is so here he tells you too when it is that they signifie nothing that is Quand les Presidents passe sans challenge del partie ou debate des Iustices When they be not challenged by the party concerned or not considered of and debated by the Iudges as neither of them was here done it is in Slades case in the 4. Reports It is a rule in Law A facto ad jus non valet argumentum but it may withal be said and truly A saepe facto ad jus contra semel factum valet argumentum Upon the whole matter one may boldly affirm that this President of 28 H. 6. is no ground for the Bishops to build their claim upon of having a right to sit and vote in Parliament in Capital Causes 31 H. 6. is the Earl of Devonshire's Case the Record runs thus Be hit remembred that where the 14. day of March the said 31 year of this present Parliament Thomas Earl of Devonshire upon an Indictment of High Treason by him supposed to be done against the Kings honourable estate and person afore Humfrey Duke of Bucks Steward of England for that time assigned and of the same Treason by his Peers the noble Lords of this Royaume of England being in this said present Parliament was acquitted of all things contained in the same Indictment Now I suppose no man will say That the Bishops were either his Peers or Lords of the Realm 38 H. 6. The Lord Stanley was accused by the Commons for being in confederacy with the Duke of York and they desire he may be committed to prison the Answer is The King will be advised which is all was done And this is the last president of any Impeachment or of any person questioned in Parliament in a Judicial way that is upon the Rolls in the Tower And I do not remember that I have read or heard of any Trial in Parliament in a Judicial way since that time till the E. of Straffords in our memory whose Trial was compleated in that way but he was attainted and condemned by the Legislative power During all the Trial from the beginning to the end the Bishops were never present at any part of it And it yet appears upon the Journal Book of the House of Peers though many passages be razed but this is not That upon the 9. of March 1640. upon a Report brought in by the Lord Privy Seal of something concerning that business and a debate arising upon it the Bishops withdrew it being In agitatione cause sanguinis It is true there was in that same Parliament the February before an Impeachment of High Treason brought up from the House of Commons against the Lord Keeper Finch but it never came to Trial for he fairly ran away and got beyond Sea whereupon by the Order of the Lords Temporal a Proclamation was issued forth for him to appear the 10. of March following the words of the Proclamation are Rex Uice-comiti c. Cum Communitas Regni nostri Anglie in presenti Parliament Iohannem Dominum Finch de Fordich nuper Custodem Magni Sigilli Anglie de Alta Proditione accusaverit impetierit Cumque per Dominos Temporales in eodem Parliamento de assensu advisamento nostris Ordinatum existit quod Proclamatio per totum regnum nostrum Anglie publice fiat qd idem Iohannes Dominus Finch in propria persona sua compareat se reddat coram nobis prefatis Dominis decimo die Martii proxime futuro ad respondendum standum recto coram nobis prefatis Dominis ex hoc parte Nos volentes c. The King to the Sheriff c. Whereas our Commons of this our Kingdom of England have in this Parliament accused and impeached John Lord Finch of Fordich late Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England of High Treason And whereas the Lords Temporal have in the same Parliament with our consent and advice Ordered a Proclamation to be published throughout our whole Kingdom of England that John Lord Finch do personally appear and yield up himself to us and the foresaid Lords upon the 10. of March next following to answer for his Treason and stand to the Iudgment of us and the foresaid Lords in that behalf We willing that the Order have its due effect do command and strictly enjoyn you that upon the receipt of these presents you do in all Cities Market Towns and such other places within your Bayliwick as to you shall seem expedient cause in our name to be publickly proclaimed That John Lord Finch do appear in person and render himself before us and the foresaid Lords in this present Parliament upon the 10. of March aforesaid to answer for the Treason aforesaid and stand to the Iudgment of us and the foresaid Lords in that behalf according to the tenor of the foresaid Order This was the Proclamation Ordered to be made onely by the Temporal Lords and no Bishops present yet was it no part of the Trial but meerly a course taken to have him in Court that he might be tried But because it looked towards a Trial the Bishops must have no hand in it And it is further observable in this president that the Kings learned Counsel was ordered to draw up this Proclamation according to the antient Parliamentary way which shews that it was the ancient Parliamentary way That only the Lords Temporal should be interested in such Proceedings and have the ordering of them and not at all the Bishops And I

that the Archbishop was then charged with Treason Gervasius Dorobernensis saith he was charged with two things one not doing Justice in his Ecclesiastical Court to one Iohn who was Iohn the Mareschal that complained of the Archbishops detaining some Land from him the other that being sent for by the King upon occasion of Mareschals complaint he came not The first he excused laying the fault upon Mareschal himself for abusing the Court bringing veterum cantuum codicillum and old Song-Book to swear upon and refusing to swear super Evangelium ut moris est upon the Evangelists as the Custom is whereby he said he did Curiam suam infamare Defame his Court. The other he answered proving by two sufficient Witnesses Per duos legales viros that it was sickness hindred him and not any contempt This is the account which Gervasius gives and saith not a word of any Treason neither doth Matthew Paris nor Roger Hoveden who both of them give a relation of that proceeding at Northampton against the Archbishop And to say the truth it would be a strange High Treason only not to come being sent for by the King though there had been no sickness in the case at most it could have been but a High Contempt and punishable by Fine and Imprisonment or the like and probable it is that Fitz-Stephen who was a Creature of the Archbishops might represent it so only to draw more Odium upon the King for his severity against the Bishop even to an injustice when in truth there was no such thing However we may look upon it as but a weak President for the Bishops to lay any weight upon to prove their right to sit and vote and judge in a Capital cause Causa sanguinis being at the best but out of a blind Manuscript of an Author justly suspected of great partiality against the tenour of all the ancient Writers that give an account of the same business But we must go a step further to clear this matter in question for it seems some of the Bishops do say that though they will have no part in the Condemnation and pronouncing Judgment upon a Criminal person as to loss of Life or Member yet they may and will vote and Judge in such things as are but Preliminary and Preparatory to that condemnation and yet think they have no hand in bloud though they have a hand in doing that which will infallibly cause the taking away of of a mans Life and shedding of his Blood so they would divide two things which in truth have so near a relation and dependency the one upon the other as they are only separated by a little time coming between one thing to be done first and that being done the other must necessarily follow and be done presently after And they doing the former may be well said to do the latter and if any Law prohibit them from having to do with the latter the same Law doth and must prohibit them medling with the former It is a rule in Logick Causa causae est causa causati If the Judgments of the Bishops determine one thing which is the necessary cause of any other thing their Judgment may be said and really it doth determine the other thing As take for example the particular case upon which this Question hath been moved the Earl of Danbyes Pardon of the validity or invalidity whereof they will be Judges It is hoped they will be just Judges and incline neither way but according to the merits of the Cause before them so what their Judgment will be till they have heard all themselves cannot tell Now if by their Judgment the Pardon be determined to be invalid and illegal and that carry with it a conviction of the Crime of which he stands impeached as some will have it to do saying that the taking of a Pardon implies a guilt and is in Law a confession of the Crime pardoned and so his condemnation must necessarily follow even for Treason the impeachment being so doth not their Judgment subject him to that condemnation How then can they say we will have no part in condemning him Is not this something like the Frier in Chaucer that would have of a Capon the Liver of a Pig the Head yet would that nothing for him should be dead So they forsooth will take upon them to Judge his Pardon to be no Pardon which brings on infallibly his condemnation and yet say with that Frier God forbid he should die for us That we should have any hand in his bloud But certainly this will not pass for currant either in Foro Iudicii or Foro Conscientiae to excuse them from being Actors in his Condemnation To evade this some say the Bishops may be present and hear what will be said Pro and Con concerning this Pardon and those only shall deliver their opinions and judgments of it who are satisfied of the Validity and Legality of it but those amongst them who are of another mind shall withdraw and give no vote and then it cannot be said that any of them have a hand in condemning him But how this will sute with the Office of a Judge let any man judge whose duty it is to condemn the Guilty as well as to acquit the Innocent and who ought to do the one or the other in every business that comes before him as he finds ground for it upon hearing the Allegations and Proofs And besides it is most Unparliamentary for in Parliament all who are at the debate of a business ought to give their vote to the Question one way or other according to their sense of it and as they in their consciences think it just But to break thorough all at once they will have it That it is only by the Canon Law that this restraint is upon them and that the forbearance of their Predecessors being Papists and so subject to that Law was only in that respect which Law being of no force at present and taken away by Act of Parliament they are now at Liberty though in modesty they think sit sometimes to withdraw but have a right to continue sitting if they please To which in answer I shall say that I will not deny but that the Canon Law might give the first rise and a beginning to such an usage and no Law could be of greater force to introduce and establish such a thing as being that to which only the Clergy of those times would be subject conceiving themselves to be above and not bound by any other But it is most clear that it came afterwards to receive a Civil Sanction and to have not only the stamp of the Authority of Parliament set upon it by the continual practice there and we know that Consuetudo Parliamenti est Lex Parliamenti The Custom of Parliament is the Law of Parliament But that two several times there have been particular and express Confirmations and Ratifications of it in Parliament which makes it