Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A29601
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Britanniæ speculum, or, A short view of the ancient and modern state of Great Britain, and the adjacent isles, and of all other the dominions and territories, now in the actual possession of His present Sacred Majesty King Charles II the first part, treating of Britain in general.
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1683
(1683)
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Wing B4819; ESTC R9195
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107,131
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325
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other inferior Officers as so many Crystal Pipes he conveyeth to his People We will saith Edward the I st in his Book of Laws written at his appointment by John Briton Bishop of Hereford that our own Jurisdiction be above all Jurisdictions in our Realm so that in all manner of Felonies Trespasses Contracts and all other Actions Personal or Real We have Power to render or cause to be rendred such Judgments as do appertain without other Process whereever we know the right Truth as Judges All Jurisdiction say the Scotch Laws stands and consists in the Kings person by reason of his Royal Authority and Crown and is competent to no Subject but flows and proceeds from the King having Supreme Jurisdiction and is given and committed by him to his Subjects as he pleases The King then is the sole Supreme Judge all other Judges being his Deputies to whom whatsoever Power is by him committed yet is the last Appeal alwayes to be made to himself who may therefore as his Predecessors formerly have done sit in any Court and take Cognizance of any Cause but in Treasons Felonies c. the King being Plaintif sits not personally in Judgment but doth perform it by his Delegates From the King of Great Britain who being the only Supreme Head is furnished with Plenary Power and Jurisdiction to render Justice to every Member within his Dominions there lies no Appeal in Ecclesiastical Causes to the Bishop of Rome whose Authority ever since the Reformation has been here wholly abrogated nor in Civil Matters to the Emperor who for above twelve hundred years has not had the least Shadow of Pretence to any Jurisdiction within this Island nor in either to the people who both in themselves and by their Representatives in Parliament as well Conjunctim as Divisim are his Subjects and ow Obedience to his Commands To Legislation and Judicature which are solely and supremely in the King is necessary the Power of the Sword without which all other Power is nothing for forcing Obedience to the Laws and Judgments given both in Criminal and Civil Causes This having in virtue of their Soveraignty been alwayes indisputably enjoyed by the Monarchs of this Nation till the time of the late Rebellion was since his Majesties Restauration by a Parliament as truly zealous for the happiness of their King and Country as ever this Nation saw in proper and express Terms declared to be the Right of the King only without either of his Houses of Parliament the contrary Position thereunto asserted by the rebellious Members of the Parliament of 1640. having been the chief Means of overturning our Government and bringing Confusion and Misery upon this flourishing Kingdom Divinity So great was the Veneration shewn to the ancient Christian Emperors by their Subjects that they gave them tho imperfectly only and Analogically the Titles of Your Everlastingness Your Divinity and the like belonging essentially and perfectly to GOD alone Who to shew the great Power by him given to Soveraign Princes and to beget in the Hearts of their People an higher Esteem and more reverend Awfulness of them which failing all Confusion Impiety and Calamity break in upon a Nation is himself pleased as is manifest in Holy Writ to bestow upon them the Title of Gods as being his Vicegerents and representing his Majesty and Power upon Earth Nay so excessive was the Respect of the good Christians of those times that they were wont to swear by the Majesty of their Emperor as Joseph sometimes did by the Life of Pharaoh And this Custom seems to be justified by Vegetus a learned Writer of that Age being practiced only to create in the Subjects a greater Reverence for these Earthly Deities In like manner the Laws and Constitutions of this Monarchy attribute to the King whom they regard as GOD upon Earth divers Excellencies which belong properly to none but GOD. Thus as GOD is perfect so the Law will have no Imperfection found in the King No Negligence no Folly no Infamy or Corruption of Blood all former Attainders tho even made by Act of Parliament being ipso facto purged by the Accession of the Crown To the King is attributed Infallibility and Justice in the Abstract The King cannot erre The King can do no wrong To the King is likewise ascribed a Kind of Immortality The King never dies as being a Corporation in himself that lives for ever For all Interregna being unknown in these Kingdoms the same Moment that one King dies the next Heir is fully and absolutely King without any Coronation Ceremony or Act to be done The King is also in some sort said to be Omnipresent He is in a manner every where in all his Courts of Justice in all his Palaces Therefore it is that all his Subjects stand bare in the Presence Chamber wheresoever the Chair of State is placed tho the King be many Miles distance from thence He hath also a kind of Universal Influence over all his Dominions His Fatherly Care is extended to preserve feed instruct and defend the whole Commonweal His War His Peace His Courts of Justice and all His Acts of Soveraignty tend only to preserve and distribute to every person within his Territories their particular Rights and Priviledges By his Power of creating to the highest Dignity and annihilating the same at pleasure and much more by his Prerogative of pardoning those whom the Law has condemned he is invested with a kind of Omnipotency whereby he can restore to life those that are dead in Law And this Power of pardoning condemned Criminals is of such Benefit to the Lives and Estates of the People that without it many would be exposed to die unjustly The King alone in his own Dominions can say with GOD whose Representative he is Vengeance is Mine For all Punishments proceed from him in some of his Courts of Justice it not being lawful for any Subject to avenge himself The King alone is Judge in his own Cause tho he delivers his Judgment by the Mouth of his Judges But in nothing doth the King more resemble the eternal Deity than in the Plenitude of his Power to do what he pleases without being opposed resisted or questioned by his Subjects Nemo quidem saith Bracton de factis ejus praesumat disputare multo minus contra factum ejus ire Let none presume to search into his deeds much less to oppose them Nor is this a Priviledge belonging only to the King of Great Britain but a Prerogative inherent in every Soveraign Prince by vertue of his Soveraignty Where the word of a King is there is Power and who may say unto him what dost thou saith the Spirit of God by the mouth of the Royal Prophet Salomon For Kingly Power being by the Law of God hath no inferior Law to limit it The Emperor saith Saint Augustine is not Subject to Laws who hath Power to make other Laws Accordingly it is delivered by the great Lawyer
had of Proclamations appears by these Words of a Statute made in the one and thirtieth year of King Henry the VIIIth Forasmuch as the King by the Advice of his Councel hath set forth Proclamations which obstinate Persons have contemned not considering what a King by his Royal Power may do Considering that sudden Causes and Occasions fortune many times which do require speedy Remedies and thaâ— by abiding for a Parliament in the mean time might happen great prejudice to ensue to the Realm And weighing also that his Majesty which by the Kingly and Regal Power given him by GOD may do many things in such Cases should not be driven to extend the Liberties and Supremity of his Regal Power and Dignity by wilfulness of froward Subjects It is therefore thought fit that the King with the Advice of his Honorable Councel should set forth Proclamations for the good of the People and Defence of his Royal Dignity as necessity shall require The King only can give Patents in case of Losses by Fire or otherwise to receive the charitable Benevolences of the People without which none may ask it publickly The King by his Prerogative is Vltimus Haeres Regni and the Receptacle of all Estates when no Heir appears For this cause all Estates for want of Heirs or by Forfeiture escheat to the King All Spiritual Benefices for want of Presentation by the Bishop are lapsed at last to the King All Money Gold Silver Plate or Bullion found and the Owners thereof not known belong to the King and so do all Wayfs Strays Wrecks not granted away by him or any of his Predecessors All Wast Ground or Land recovered from the Sea all Land of Aliens dying before Naturalization all things the property whereof is not known and all Gold or Silver Mines in whose Ground soever they are found belong to the King In the Church the Kings Prerogative is very great He only hath the Patronage of all Bishopricks None can be elected Bishop but whom he hath first nominated None can be consecrated or take possession of the Revenues of any Bishoprick without his special Writ or Assent He is the Nursing-Father of the Church and hath Power to call a National or Provincial Synod and with the Advice and Consent thereof to make Canons Orders Ordinances and Constitutions relating to the Government and Polity of the Church wherein as it was affirmed by Christopher Wray Speaker of the House of Commons in the thirteenth year of Queen Elizabeth the Princes Power is absolute The King has Power upon Causes only known to himself to dispence by Non Obstantes with General Laws made in Parliament and with the Penalties for transgressing them where such Penalty is appropriated to himself alone to mitigate the Rigor of the Laws where Equity and Conscience require Moderation to alter or suspend any particular Law that he judges hurtfull to the Commonwealth to pardon a Man legally condemned to grant special Priviledges to particular Persons Colledges and Corporations and if any Doubt arises concerning such Priviledges he only has Right to interpret them To him and the Judges constituted by him does it belong to interpret all Statutes and to determin and pass Sentence in Cases not defined by Law These are some Branches of that Jus Coronae of that Regal Prerogative of the name whereof however some persons are afraid yet may they assure themselves that the Case of Subjects would be desperately miserable without it since the Kings just Rights are the best Preserver of the Peoples Liberties being an impregnable Bulwark against all popular Invasions and illegal Powers Nor have there ever been found any greater Oppressors of the People than those who under pretence of asserting their Liberties have endeavored to lessen the Royal Authority Thus in the great Contest between Henry the IIId King of England and the Barons about the pretended Liberties of themselves and the People the King being forced at length to yield the Lords instead of that glorious Freedom which they promised the Nation ingrossed all Power into their own Hands under the Name of the twenty four Conservators of the Kingdom behaving themselves like so many Tyrants acting all in their own Names and in Juntoes of their own wholly neglecting or else over-ruling Parliaments But then not agreeing among themselves four of them viz. the Earls of Leicester Glocester Hereford and Spencer defeated the other twenty and drew the entire Management of Affairs into their own hands Yet it continued so not long Leicester getting all into his own Power who being slain in Battle the King recovered his Authority and the People their true Liberty Many of these Prerogatives those especially that concern Justice and Peace are so essential to Royalty that they cannot be separated from it but by the destruction of the Monarchy it self Not without reason therefore did the Estates of England assembled in Parliament in the Reign of King Edward the IIId declare that they could not tho the King himself should desire it assent to any thing which tended to the Disherison of the King and his Crown whereunto they were sworn The King therefore as he is by his Office Debitor Justitiae obliged to administer Justice to his People so is he in Conscience bound to maintain the Rights of the Crown in possession and to endeavour the recovery of those whereof it has been dispossest And how dismal the Effects have been whenever any King neglecting the religious observance of this part of his Duty has been prevailed upon to give way to the lessening of his Royal Prerogative we have a sad Example in his Majesties Father of Blessed Memory who parting tho but only Pro illa vice with his absolute Power of dissolving Parliaments and giving it to the two Houses they never ceased farther incroaching upon his Prerogatives till he himself was barbarously murthered the Government wholly subverted and all the Liberties of the People trampled under foot To him therefore that shall seriously consider the many fatal Mischiefs and Inconveniences which necessarily follow the Diminution of the Kings Prerogative it will seem no Paradox to affirm that it is the Subjects great Interest to be far more sollicitous that the King maintain and uphold his own Prerogative and Preeminence than their Rights and Liberties which as they had no other Original but the Grace and Bounty of the Prince so must they of necessity perish when he is no longer able to protect them It is not thefore to be wondred that a right Apprehension of such pernicious Consequences made his Sacred Majesty refuse his Royal Assent to a Bill presented him for the raising of the Militia tho it was if passed into an Act to have continued in force but six Weeks Because the Tendency of the Bill being to put out of his Possession the Posse Regni or absolute command over the Forces of the Realm he could not answer unto GOD by whom alone he is intrusted with his Regal Power