and Revelation from God and are no more set down for our imitation than the robbing of the Ægyptians or any other particular and priviledged Commandement but in the general Precept which all Men must ordinarily follow not only our Actions but our Speeches also and our very thoughts are strictly charged with Duty and Obedience unto Princes whether they be good or evil the Law of God ordaineth That he which doth presumptiously against the Ruler of the Deut. 17. 12. people shall die And the Prophet David forbiddeth to touch the Lords Annointed Thou Psal 105. 15. shalt not saith the Lord rail upon the Judges neither speake evil against the Ruler of the Exod. 22. 28. People And the Apostles do demand further that even our thoughts and Souls be obedient Act. 23. 5. to higher Powers And least any should imagine that they meant of good Princes Rom. 13. 1. 13. only they spake generally of all and further to take away all doubt they make express Tit. 3. 1. mention of the evil For the Power and Authority of wicked Princes is the Ordinance 1. Pet. 2. 13 14 17. of God and therefore CHRIST told Pilate that the Power which he had was given 1 Tim. 2. 2. him from above and the Prophet Esay calleth Cyrus being a Prophane and Heathen Rom. 13. 2. Prince the Lords Annointed For God stirred up the Spirit even of wicked Princes to do John 19. 11. his will and as Jehosaphat said to his Rulers they Execute not the Judgment of Man Cap. 45. 1. but of the Lord In regard whereof David calleth them Gods because they have their 2 Chron. 36. 2. Rule and Authority immediately from God Which if they abuse they are not to be 2 Chron. 19. 6. adjudged by their Subjects for no Power within their Dominion is superior to theirs Psal 28. But God reserveth them to the forest Trial Horribly and sudainly saith the Wiseman Sap. 6. 5. will the Lord appear unto them and a hard Judgment shall they have The Law of God commandeth that the Child should be put to death for any contumely done unto the Parents But what if the Father be a Robber If a Murtherer If for all excess of Villanies odious and execrable both to God and Man Surely he deserveth the highest Degree of Punishment and yet must not the Son lift up his hand against him for no offence is so great as to be Punished by Parricide But our Countrey is dearer unto Quintil in declam Cic. offic lib. 1. us than our Parents and the Prince is Pater patriae the Father of our Countrey And therefore more sacred and dear unto us than our Parents by nature and must not be violated how imperious how impious so ever he be Doth he command or demand our Persons or our Purses we must not shun for the one nor shrink for the other For as Nehem. 9. 37. Nehemiah saith Kings have Dominion over the Bodies and over the Caettel of their Subjects at their pleasure Doth he enjoyn those actions which are contrary to the Laws of God We must neither wholly Obey nor violently Resist but with a constant Courage submit our selves to all manner of punishment and shew our subjection by enduring and not performing Yea the Church hath declared it to be an Heresie to hold that a Prince Alphons a cast in lib. de haeres in verb. Tiran Dom. Sot lib. 5. de just jur q. 1. artic 3. may be Slain or Deposed by his Subjects for any disorder or default either in Life or else in Government there will be faults so long as there are Men And as we endure with Patience a Barren Year if it happen and unseasonable Weather and such other defects of nature so must we tollerate the imperfections of Rulers and quietly expect either reformation or else a change But alas good King Richard what such Cruelty What such Impiety hath he ever committed Examine rightly those Imputations which are laid against him without any false Circumstance of aggravation and you shall find nothing objected either of any truth or of great Moment It may be that many errours and oversights have escaped him yet none so grievous to be termed Tyranny As proceeding rather from unexperienced Ignorance or corrupt Counsel than from any natural and willful Malice Oh how shall the World be pestered with Tyrants if Subjects may Rebel upon every pretence of Tyranny How many good Princes shall dayly be suppressed by those by whom they ought to be supported If they leavy a Subsidy or any other Taxation it shall be claimed oppression If they put any to death for Trayterous Attempts against their Persons it shall be exclaimed Cruelty If they do any thing against the Lust and liking of the People it shall be proclaimed Tyranny But let it be that without Authority in us or desert in him King Richard must be deposed Yet what right had the Duke of Lancaster to the Crown Or what reason have we without his right to give it to him If he make Title as Heir unto King Richard then must he yet stay until King Richards death For no Man can succeed as Heir to one that liveth But it is well know to all Men who are not either wilfully Blind or grosly Ignorant that there are some now alive Lineally descended from Lionel Duke of Clarence whose Off-spring was by Judgment of the High Court of Parliament holden the eight Year of the Raign of King Richard declared next Successor to the Crown in case King Richard should die without Issue Concerning the Title from Edmund Chrouchback I will pass it over seeing the Authors thereof are become ashamed of so absurd abuse both of their own knowledge and our Credulity and therefore all the claim is now made by right of Conquest by the Session and grant of King Richard and by the general consent of all the people It is a bad Wooll that can take no colour But what Conquest can a Subject pretend against his Soveraign where the War is insurrection and the Victory high and Heinous Treason As for the resignation which King Richard made being a pent Prisoner for the same cause it is an act exacted by force And therefore of no force and validity to bind him And seeing that by the Laws of this Land the King alone cannot alienate the Ancient Jewels and Ornaments partaining to the Crown surely he cannot give away the Crown it self and therewithal the Kingdome Neither have we any custome that the people at pleasure should elect their King But they are always bound unto him who by right of Blood is right Successour much less can they confirm and make good that Title which is before by violence usurped For nothing can then be freely done when liberty is once restrained by fear So did Scylla by terrour of his Legions obtain the Law of Vellia to be made whereby he was created
THE BISHOP of CARLILE's SPEECH IN PARLIAMENT Concerning Deposing of PRINCES Thought Seasonable to be Published to this Murmuring Age. Nutrum modo mas modo Vulgus LONDON Printed in the Year 1679. THE BISHOP of CARLILE's SPEECH IN PARLIAMENT Concerning Deposing of PRINCES THis question Right Honourable Lords concerneth a matter of great Consequence and Weight The determining whereof will assuredly procure either Safe Quiet or dangerous disturbance both to our particular Consciences and also to the common State Therefore before you resolve upon it I pray you call to your considerations these two things First whether King Richard be sufficiently deposed or no Secondly whether King Henry be with good Judgement or Justice chosen in his place For the first point we are first to examine whether a King being lawfully and fully instituted by any Just Title may upon impution either of Negligence or of Tyranny be deposed by his Subjects Secondly what King Richard hath omitted in the one or committed in the other for which he should deserve so heavy Judgment I will not spake what may be done in a Popular State or in a Consular in which although one beareth the Name and Honour of a Prince yet he hath not Supreme Power of Majesty but in the one the people have the highest Empire in the other the Nobility and chief Men of Estate in neither the Prince Of the first sort was the Common-Wealth of the Lacedaemonians who after the form of Government which Lycurgus framed oftentimes Tranquil in Caligula Tacitus in Proaemio Fined oftentimes Fettered their Kings and sometimes Condemned them to Death Such were also in Caesars time the petty Kings of every Citty in France who were many times Arraigned upon life and death and as Ambiorix Prince of the Leodienses consessed had no greater Power over the People than the People had over them Of the second condition were the Roman Emperours at first of whom some namely Nero and Maximinus were openly Condemned others were suddenly surprized by Judgment and Authority of the Senate and such are now the Emperors of Germany whom the other Princes by their Aristocratical Power do not only restrain but sometimes also remove from their Imperial State such are also the Kings of Denmark and Sweedland who are many times by the Nobility dejected either into Prison or into Exile Such likewise are the Dukes of Venice and of some other free States in Italy and the chiefest cause for which Lewes Earl of Flanders was lately expelled from his place was for drawing to himself cognisance in matters of Life and Death which high Power never pertained to his Dignity In these and such like Governments the Prince hath not regall Rights but is himself subject to that Power which is greater than his whether it be in the Nobility or in the Common People But if the Soveraign Majesty be in the Prince as it was in the three first Empires and in the Kingdom of Judea and Israel and is now in the Kingdoms of England France Spain Scotland Muscovia Turky Tartaria Persia Ethiopia and almost all the Kingdomes of Asia and Africke Although for his Vites he be unprofitable to the Subjects yea Hurtful yea Intollerable Yet can they lawfully neither harm his Person nor hazard his Power whether by Judgment or else by Force For neither one nor all Magistrates have any Authority over the Prince from whom all Authority is derived and whose only presence doth silence and suspend all inferiour Jurisdiction and Power As for Force what Subject can Attempt or Assist or Counsel or Conceal Violence against his Prince and not incurr the high and Henious Crime of Treason It is a common saying thought is free Free indeed from Punishment of secular Laws except by Word or Deed it break forth into action Yet the secret thoughts against the sacred Majesty of a Prince without attempt without endeavour have been adjudged worthy of death And some who in auricular Confession have discovered their Treacherous Devises against the Person of their Prince have afterwards been Executed for the same All Laws do exempt a Mad Man from Punishment Because their Actions are not governed by their will and purpose And the will of Man being set aside all his doings are indifferent neither can the Body offend without a Corrupt or Erroneous mind Yet if a Mad Man draw his Sword upon his King it hath been adjudged to deserve Death And left any Man should surmise that Princes for the maintenance of their own safety and Soveraignty are the only Authors of these Judgments Let us a little consider the Patterns and Precepts of Holy Scripture Nebuchadnezzar King of Assyria wasted all Palestine with Fire and Sword oppugned Hierusalem a long time and at the last expugned it Slew the King Burnt the Temple Took away the Holy Vessels and Treasure The rest he permitted to the Cruelty and Spoyl of his unmerciful Souldiers Who defiled all places with Rape and Slaughter and ruinated to the ground that flourishing Citie After the Glut of this bloody Butchery the people which remained he led Captive into Chaldaea And there erected his Golden Image and commanded that they which refused to Worship it should be cast into a fiery Furnace What Cruelty what Injustice what Impiety is comparable to this And yet God calleth Nebuchadnezzar his Servant and promiseth Heir and Wages for his Service And the Prophets Jeremiah and Baruch did Write unto the Jews to pray for the life of him and of Baltazar his Son that their days might be upon Earth as the days of Heaven And Ezechiel with bitter terms abhorreth the disloyalty of Zedechia because he revolted from Nebuchadnezzar whose Homager and Tributary he was What shall we say of Saul Did he not put all the Priests to Execution because one of them did revile Holy and harmless David Did he not violently Persecute that his most Faithful Servant and Dutiful Son in Law During which pursuit he sell twice into the Power of David who did not only spare but also protect the King and reproved the Pretorian Souldiers for their negligent Watch and was touched in Heart for cutting away the Lap of his Garment And afterwards caused the Messenger to be Slain who upon Request and for Pitty had lent his hand as he said to help forward the voluntary Death of that Sacred King As for the contrary Examples As that of * So did Domitian put to death Epaphroditus Neroes libertine because he helped Nero although in love to kill himself So did Serverus kill all the killers of Pertinax his Predecessour and likewise Vitellius did put to death all the Murtherers of Galba Theophilus Emperour of Greciae caused all those to be Slain who had made his Father Emperour by killing Leo Armanius And Alexander the great put to cruel Execution those that had Slain Darius his Mighty and Mortal Enemy Jehu who Slew Jehoram and Ahazia Kings of Israel and Juda They were done by express Oracle
Dictatour for fourscore Years And by like impression of fear Casar caused the Law Servia to be promulged by which he was made perpetual Dictatour But both these Laws were afterwards adjudged void As for the Deposing of King Edward the second it is no more to be urged than the Poisoning of King John or the Murdering of any other good and lawful Prince We must live according to Laws and not to Examples And yet the Kingdom was not then taken from the lawful Successour But if we look back to times lately past we shall find that these Titles were more strong in King Stephen than they are in the Duke of Lancaster For King Henry the first being at large liberty neither restrained in body nor constrained in mind had appointed him to succeed as it was upon good credit certainly affirmed The people assented to this designment and thereupon without fear and without force he was annointed King and obtained full possession of the Realm Yet Henry Son of the Earl of Anjowe having a neerer right by his Mother to the Crown notwithstanding his Father was a stranger and himself born beyond the Seas raised such Rough Wars upon K ing Stephen that there was no end of spoiling the Goods and spilling the Blood of the unhappy people besides the ruins and deformities of many Cities and Holds until his lawful inheritance was to him assured It terrifieth me to remember how many flourishing Empires and Kingdoms have been by means of such Contentions either torn in pieces with detestive division or subdued to forraign Princes under pretence of assistance and aid And I need not repeat how fore this Realm hath heretofore been shaken with these seueral Mischieves And yet neither the examples of other Countries nor the Miseries of our own are sufficient to make us to beware O English Men worse Bewitched than the Foolish Galathians our unstayed minds and reftless resolutions do nothing else but hunt after our own harms No people have more hatred abroad and none less quiet at home In other Countreys the Sword of Invasion hath been shaken against us In our own Land the fire of Insurrection hath been kindled among us And what are these innovasions but Whetstones to sharpen the one and Bellows to blow up the other Certainly I fear that the same will happen unto us which Æsop fableth to have been fallen unto the Froggs who being desirous to have a King a Beam was given unto them The first fall whereof did put them in some fear but when they saw it lie still in the Stream they insulted thereon with great contempt and desired a King of quicker courage Then was sent unto them a Storke which stalking among them with stately steps continually devoured them The mildness of King Richard hath bred in us this scorn Interpreting it to be cowardise and dulness of nature The next Heir is likewise rejected I will not say that with greater Courage we shall find greater Cruelty but if either of these shall hereafter be able to set up their side and bring the matter to Trial by arms I do assuredly say that which part soever shall carry the Fortune of the Field the people both ways must go to wrack And thus have I declared my mind concerning this question in more words than your Wisdom yet fewer then the weight of the Cause doth require And do boldly conclude that we have neither Power nor Pollicy either to depose King Richard or to elect Duke Henry in his place that King Richard remaineth still our Soveraign Prince and therefore it is not lawful for us to give Judgment upon him that the Duke whom you call King hath more offended against the King and the Realm than the King hath done either against him or us for being Banished the Realm for ten Years by the King and his Counsel amongst whom his own Father was chief and sworn not to return again without special Licence He hath not only violated his Oath but with impious Arms disturbed the quiet of the Land and dispossessed the King from his Royal Estate and now demandeth Judgment against his Person without Offence proved or Defence heard If this Injury and this Perjury doth nothing move us yet let both our private and common dangers somewhat withdraw us from these violent proceedings FINIS The Characteristie Description of this Stout and Renowned Champion of Fidelity and Loyalty the Reader may be pleased to take it Transcribed from the Learned Francis Godwin Bishop of Hereford In his Succession of the Bishops of England jisdem verbis as he there relates it THomas Merks a Monk of Westminster was likewise thrust into this Bishoprick by the Pope at the Kings Request and Consecrated 1397. Amongst many unworthily preferred in those days he undoubtedly was a Man well deserving that Honour for he was a Man Learned and Wise but principally to be commended First for his constant and unmoveable Fidelity unto his Patron and Preferrer King Richard the second then for his excellent courage in professing the same when he might safely yea and honestly also have concealed his Affection Some others there were of the Nobility that remembring their Duty and Allegiance when all the World beside forsook that unfortunate Prince followed him with their best assistance even till the time of his Captivity This Man nothing regarding the danger might insue not only refused to forsake him when he had forsaken himself but defended him and his cause the best he could when he might well perceive his endeavour might hurt himself much without any possibility of helping the other When the Furious and unstable Multitude not contented that King Richard had resigned his Crown to save the Head that ware it and their Darling Hen. 4. seated himself in his Royal Throne importuned the Parliament assembled to proceed yet further against him desiring no doubt that to make all sure his Life might be taken from him This Worthy and Memorable Prelate stepping forth doubted not to tell them that there was none amongst them meet to give Judgment upon so Noble a Prince as King Richard was whom they had taken for their Soveraign and Liege Lord for the space of 22 years and more And proceeding further I assure you quoth he I report his words as I find them in our Chronicles there is not so rank a Traytor nor so errand a Thief nor yet so cruel a Murtherer apprehended or detained in Prison for his offence but he shall be brought before the Justice to hear Judgment and will you proceed to the Judgment of an Annointed King hearing neither his Answer nor Excuse I say and will avouch that the Duke of Lancaster whom you call King hath more trespassed to King Richard and his Realm then King Richard hath done either to him or us For it is manifest and well known that the Duke was Banished the Realm by King Richard and his Council and by the Judgment of his own Father for the space of ten years for what cause your remember well enough This notwithstanding without Licence of King Richard he is returned again into the Realm and that is worse hath taken upon him the Name Title and Preheminence of King And therefore I say that you have done manifest wrong to proceed against King Richard in any sort without calling him openly to his Answer and Defence This Speech scarcely ended he was attached by the Earl Marshal and for a time committed to Ward in the Abby of St. Albanes Continuing yet his Loyal Affection to his distressed Master Soon after his inlargment he joyned with the Hollands and others in a Conspiracy against King Henry Which being bewrayed to the Destruction of all the rest he only was pardoned Peradventure in regard of his calling For it had never been seen hitherto that any Bishop was put to death by order of Law Peradventure in some kind of favour and admiration of his Faithful constancy for Vertue will be Honoured even of her Enemies Peradventure else to this end that by forcing him to live miserably they might lay a Punishment upon him more grievous then death which they well saw he despised The Pope who seldome denied the King any request that he might afford good cheap was easily entreated to translate forsooth this good Bishop from the See of Carlile that yielded him Honourable maintainance unto Samos in Greece whence he knew he should never receive one penny profit He was so happy as neither to take benefit of the gift of his Enemy nor to be hurt by the masked Malice of his Counterfeit Friends disdaining as it were to take his Life by his Gift who took away from his Master both Life and Kingdom he died shortly after his deliverance so deluding also the morkery of his Translation whereby things so falling out he was nothing damnified Quicquid in Historiâ discribitur vel ad imitandum indigitat vel ad evitandum instruit