to shew the King and to assure him he was in earnest because things could not be done presently in form of Law he gave him secret advice to marry while the cause was depending The King having been two years without a Wife and not only holding himself free in his conscience but expecting to be shortly declared so and having now some kind of leave to chuse another cast his eye on Anne Bolen one whose Person and Birth might have deserved the best of his subjects and who being then a stranger in England could not have that part which Sanders gives her in displacing Queen Katharine nor could have preserved her any otherwise than by submitting to the King's lust the refusal whereof made her worthy of a nobler application But this Lady had been brought up in France among Protestants and was suspected to have some inclination that way which suspicion was enough not only to blacken her but to dash the King's suit much the sooner if not only for her sake It moved but slowly before for the Pope being engaged by the Emperour had sent instructions after his Legates requiring them to use all possible delays either to conceal his Bulls or to burn them and leave him free to do as he should see occasion Thus far he seems to have gone before he heard what choice the King had made But when that was discovered and whether for that cause or because he had made a new Alliance with the Emperour which tended to make the Popes Nephew Duke of Florence and the Queen being the Emperour's Aunt ought in reason to have some benefit of it whatsoever moved him to it the Pope after this would trust her cause no longer in England but having voided that Commission to his Legates called it home to his own Determination The King not knowing what to do next and taking time to consider in his Progress had Cranmer brought to him by some that chanced to hear him say what they thought was material in the Case He was a stranger to all that had passed hitherto which I mention because some would make him a chief man in it But from what he had heard and especially from their discourse he judged that the King had taken a wrong way in courting the Pope to retract his Predecessour's dispensation whereas in truth as most learned men thought the Matter it self was Indispensable And because it was not reasonable to expect that the Pope would judge it so for that had been to cut off a main limb of the Papacy he therefore wish'd that instead of dancing attendance at Rome the King would send to the Universities as being most able and unconcerned and get them to declare their Judgments in the case Hereupon the King sent learned men with his case and got the judgments of the Universities upon it To send to those in the Emperours dominions had been to no purpose But he had ours in England and those in France of his side and the two chief in Italy though not only the Emperour opposed but the Pope who had Bologna in his Territory And whereas it is said the King bought them which his Agents deny they say that the Emperour bought hands on the contrary and that he offered largely to get those who had given their judgments for the King to retract it but they would not take his Money though they might much more safely than the other The King being thus strengthened in his cause had reason to be the less in fear of the Pope and yet it appears he was not the more willing to break with him For after this he made fresh application to him by his Orators and Letters which were seconded with a Petition under the hands and seals of both the Archbishops and others the chief men of the three States of this Kingdom They represented their own and others judgments of the case they passionately besought him to do the King and them right in it they declared that if he did not they should think he had left them to themselves All this came out of time for the Pope was not then to be perswaded to break his Alliance while he was gathering the fruits of it This the King understood by his Answer And therefore knowing what he was to expect from abroad he was the more careful to secure himself at home Where to satisfie the minds of the people he declared what had passed to all his Subjects in Parliament he shewed them the Judgments of the Universities and the books of above one hundred Doctors against the lawfulness of his Marriage He also caused the same to be shewn to Queen Katharine by some Lords of his Council who would have perswaded her to withdraw her Appeal that she had made to the Pope and to refer her cause to the Judgment of others She refused it and thereupon was removed from the Court and had her choice given her of the Kings houses in the Country The Queen prosecuting her Appeal the Pope by Letters exhorted the King to receive her Which he refused as being unlawful for him to do and offered the Pope to send Doctors to dispute it before him He also got the King of France to mediate for him who did it as being assured of the Justice of his Cause But all this did not hinder the Pope from committing it to the Dean of the Rota who cited the King to appear before him This being done once and again the King entred his Protest against all proceedings in that Court. And the same day he privately married Anne Bolen in which if he was too hasty it was because he had not been quite seven years to consider Not long after this he had the Nullity of his former Marriage judg'd and declared in his own Kingdom which being done he owned her publickly as his Queen and gave her the solemnity of a Coronation This was no sooner heard of at Rome but the Pope who as long as the King was Plaintiff had used all possible delay and dissimulation now the Scales being turned without delay declared this Marriage a Nullity and gave Sentence of Excommunication against the King unless he put away Anne and restored Katharine before the end of September next The mean while the Pope made sure of the French King by a Treaty then afoot which produced an Interview between them at Marseilles and a Marriage between their two nearest Relations Our King in hope this new Allyance would have given good effect to the French King's Mediation in his behalf sent his Embassadours thither They waited there for a while but found nothing but delays And the Pope was now returning to Rome where he resolved to proceed in the Cause Therefore at an Audience before him they declared the King's Appeal
present occasion to show which I think I have sufficiently done that he had cause to Appeal from the Pope to a Council that he did Appeal in due form of Law and prosecuted it with great Moderation which was enough to acquit him from Schism as far as we are concerned in it That on the other hand the Pope rejected his Appeal to the affront of that Supreme Tribunal among Christians and not only proceeded against the Appellant in which case the Appellant might and ought to resist him but he also took a course that the case should never be otherwise For whereas the Pope assumes to himself the only power to call Councils and whereas there had been none in Ten years to say no more and therefore a Council ought to have been then according to the Canons yet the Pope would have no Council then nor afterwards till he had tried all other ways to destroy both the King and his Kingdom When at last after many years talk and deliberation a Council was called that at Trent which pretends to be a General Council it was such as the King could not think himself bound to acknowledge nay he was bound to oppose it as well for his own preservation as to maintain the Common Right of Christians according to the Principles then received in the Western Church By his Appeal he was not bound to submit to any other than he expressed in it that is a Lawful General Council Such the Councils of Constance and Basil were then generally acknowledged to have been And it was the cry of the Western Church as well in this as the foregoing Ages for such a Council as those were to reform abuses as well in the Head as in the Members But the Head was as it would be and therefore being to chuse would take no Physick to cure it self This was visible in the Popes extreme averseness to a Council till he saw that without it the Nations were likely to Reform themselves Then he began to think it needful to call one himself But at first he named no time or place Then he named first one Town and then another When men began to think he was in earnest for they had been often fooled with reports the King declared he would not own a Council called by the Popes single Authority It was the Judgment of the Church of England that he ought not to own it for so their Synod declared that neither the Bishop of Rome nor any one Prince whatsoever may by his own Authority call a General Council without the express consent of the residue of Christian Princes When afterwards it appeared that the Pope was intent upon it the King on the same grounds made his publick Protestation shewing that the Indiction of a Council belonged not to the Bishop of Rome but to the Emperour and Princes which should send or come thither The like Protestation he sent abroad into all forein Countries And he afterward made it good by not sending one Bishop to the Council when it met though one of his Subjects was there whom the Pope was pleased to make a Bishop with a Title in this Kingdom Having thus no obligation to own this for a General Council he was therefore obliged to oppose it as being the Mockery and Abuse of that Supreme Judicatory joyned with the defrauding all Christians of their right in it and particularly himself of the benefit of his Appeal to it Which things he ought to have considered had it been held in the most innocent manner But much more being held as it was with most apparent design to establish those abuses which all Christendome cried out to have reformed to deprive the diffusive Church of that which was the only remedy for them to bring it to pass that there should be no more General Council as now we see there is like to be none while the world stands particularly as to himself he had cause to oppose the Trent Council as far as he was able For it was originally designed to please the Emperour and thereby to oblige him to head the Party of Christian Princes whom the Pope was then uniting to make War against England And as that Council was framed in all its circumstances the King could consider it no otherwise than he did the Pope himself who was his open and implacable Enemy For as the Pope called it by his single Authority so he always presided in it by his Legates He had it filled with his Creatures Italians and others who were sure to carry every thing by their Number And yet for fear they should forget themselves every thing must be examined at Rome before it could pass through their hands And being past yet it was of no force till it had the Pope's Approbation By which means he made himself so far Lord of this Council that though perhaps he could not pass whatsoever he pleased yet nothing could pass that should displease him in it And least by taking all this care the Pope might seem to intend no more but only to secure himself without doing the King a farther injury there was one thing which made it appear that he had as great a mind to plague the King as to provide for his own preservation For among all his number of Cardinals he could find none fitter to preside in the Council and there to judge the King's cause if he were so unwise as to send it thither than one that was the King's Enemy more than the Pope himself if it were possible That was Cardinal Pool the King 's unnatural Subject and Kinsman who being brought up by him and sent to travel for his farther improvement and while he was abroad being intrusted by him in his cause forsook it and joined himself to the Imperial party In which though he might pretend that he followed his Conscience yet nothing could excuse him for practising against his King and his Country He was the man employed to write against the King's Divorce and out-did other Writers in this that he stirred up the Emperour to revenge his Aunts injury for fear he should forget it and not only so but went about from Prince to Prince and from Country to Country to stir them up to War against this Realm For which so unworthy and so officious a disloyalty he was declared Traitor at home by Act of Parliament and had a price set upon his Head not to mention other instances of the King 's extreme displeasure against him When this had so far endeared him to the Pope that being not content to have made him one of his Cardinals he must also have this man to preside in his Council the English had so much the more cause to be jealous and to stand upon their guard as well against his Council as himself A General Council they could not hold it to be for their Church was not allowed to
diligence in our intestine Divisions and in the growth of Atheism which we cannot but be sadly sensible are both much increased since the late Toleration In these and the like practises they plainly declare that rather then not bring in Popery they would drive out Christianity before them and not leave the name of Christ to the people that will not receive the Pope as his Vicar How those Churches where he is so received and bears rule as he would do among us are blessed in it we may partly guess by the means that he employs to get us under him For it is seldom known that they who are so greedy of power use it well when they have it But not to go by guess when we have a Map before us We may see the condition of his Subjects describ'd by some of themselves that writ in those times when men durst write of such things when there was no Inquisition for them nor no Index Expurgatorius for their Writings I believe a more cruel Bondage a more miserable Thraldom and Yoke then they describe never was among the barbarous Nations I believe also the Inquisition where it is introduc'd hath not made their condition easier since And that it is not introduc'd in some Countreys as namely in France and Flanders they may thank the poor Protestants for it Where such are the Pope will have a care not to make too much noise for fear of frighting away the Birds that he would take And yet in France where there is no Inquisition he found other ways not long since to make the Iansenists feel the weight of his hand and that severely for no other reason but because in certain School-points they presum'd to oppose another party that were more firm to his Interests If this be his way of keeping Unity for which they so much cry up his Government though men do not speak so well of the Russian which keeps Unity better I see no reason why we should not be content and endure our dissentions or rather find some other way to compose them than by putting our necks into a yoke which being once fastned it will be too late for us to complain afterward We must either draw as he would have us or else go to the Shambles For the Temporal State how it hath been turmoild with this Papal Usurpation would ask a large Book to describe as the matter deserves I shall only say this that ever since it began it hath hung like a Comet over Kingdoms and Nations and shed forth direful Influences on all that have been any way obnoxious to it But it came not to its height till Pope Hildebrand's days whom their heavenly Muster-Roll calleth St. Gregory VII A Saint no doubt worthy of Red Letters for he caused the shedding of more Christian Blood than Mahomet himself and as Mahomet did he taught his Sect to do the same and merit Heaven by it His Dictates are commonly known being publish'd both in his Books and in the Councils I appeal to any one that hath read them whether Antichrist at his coming if he be yet to come can speak greater things Sure I am nothing can be more contrary to the humble and meek spirit of Christ. Among these there is one Doctrine briefly expressed but more amply declared in his Bulls and in his actions pursuant to them It is concerning a power that he assumes to himself to depose Kings and to dispose of their Kingdoms Which Arrogant Claim such as none but the Devil ever made before him hath ever since been continued by his Successors and yet is as often as they see occasion both declared and manifested by the like Bulls and actions The woful effects of it throughout this Western part of Europe are notoriously known to all that read History having torn the Bowels of this part of Christendom like an Earthquake for these last six hundred years having shaken the Foundations of all Empires Kingdoms and States involving all of them at one time or other in bloody and cruel Wars accursed and unnatural Rebellions and all other consequent Calamities In Germany particularly where it first began to operate The two next Emperours were fain to fight no less than sixty Field-battels to keep their Crowns upon their Heads In France it hath wrought proportionably Other Countreys have suffered their share But none more than England in King Iohn's miserable days And that had been forgotten in 88. if the design had taken which God only could and did defeat when otherwise this Doctrine in all probability had destroyed the English Kingdom and Nation we had been gone and our name had scarce remained upon the face of the Earth The sad experience of the manifold mischiefs and dangers both to Church and State from this pretended Authority taught our Fore-fathers at sundry times to provide against it by Laws with such Penalties annex'd to them as they found needful to prevent the like mischiefs and dangers for the future It appears that the ancientest Laws of this kind were made by them that lived and died in the Roman Communion I mean the Laws of Provisors and Praemunire enacted some hundreds of years since by Roman Catholick Kings and their Parliaments who could have no design against any other of those things we call Popery for they held the same erronious Opinions which our now-Papists do though they held them not as Articles of Faith But they endeavoured by those Laws to secure themselves against the daily Encroachment of the Pope and his Faction in the Roman Church When those Banks were found insufficient to restrain the growing Torrent within its bounds they found it needful to stop the Channel to exclude the Papacy it self and turn it out of the Kingdom This was done by King Henry VIII upon such a Provocation as perhaps would have moved a much gentler Prince to do the same For he was made to dance Attendance upon the Court of Rome five or six years for Sentence in a Cause which he commenced not of himself but by advice of the Popes Legat and his Confessor A Cause which the Pope himself at first had encouraged in which he had the judgment of the whole Church of England and divers Foreign Universities of his side His exclusion of the Papal Authority was by Acts both of Parliament and of Convocation almost no man dissenting They both form'd the Oath of Supremacy and took it themselves and joyn'd with him in imposing it in direct opposition to this grand point And yet this King himself and all the Members of those Bodies were firm to all things else that we call Popery It was otherwise in the time of Queen Elizabeth of blessed Memory who at the entrance of her Reign not only repair'd her Father's Fence against the Papal Authority but also purged the Church of all those Errours and Corruptions which are yet retain'd and own'd by all them of the Roman Communion And yet she
laid no penalty on any of them but the loss of their Ecclesiastical Preferments and the payment of Twelve pence for every Sunday that they were absent from Church This is all that they suffer'd for many years till the Pope took upon him to turn her out of her Kingdom When he had publish'd his Bull to that purpose and sent it hither among her Subjects and some of them had taken Arms and tried all ways to put that Bull in execution then she enacted a Law to forbid any of her Subjects under pain of Premunire to bring Bulls or any other such Trumpery from Rome and made it Treason for any of them to be reconciled as they call it to the Roman Church Yet for six years more though some were taken in the offence none suffer'd the penalty of that Law When the Pope proceeded further in Hostility against her to give away her Crown to invade her Dominions and to practise against her life when she found that under pretence of Religion he drew over many of her Subjects and train'd them up as his spiritual Janizaries in Houses founded for that purpose when she found that at their return they fully answered the ends of their Education and rather listed Souldiers against her than made Proselytes to their Religion then she executed those former Laws and made more from time to time as they gave her occasion In which Laws though she found it necessary to forbid sundry Acts which were purely Religious and to make it penal to such as were taken at them because she had no other way to find out them that were dangerous to the state yet she made it sufficiently appear that the design of such Laws was only against dangerous persons by the great care she took to turn the edge of them from those that were otherwise She gave private Instructions to her Judges that before any was to suffer by the Sanguinary Laws they should examine him how he stood affected to the State whether he owned Hildebrands Doctrine whether he approved the Popes Sentence whether he would side with him against her Majesty If they found any one in those Circumstances of a Prisoner dead in Law so desperately bold that he durst own a Foreign power in defiance of her that had his life at her mercy she would not have her Judges spare him that she might be very sure would not have spared her nor her Kingdom Otherwise if they stood right as to the Civil Authority it was her will that none should suffer death And though they were such of the Clergy whom she knew to be the Popes Disciples and Pensioners and therefore thought it not safe to trust them in her Kingdom yet if they gave her a fair answer she sent them out of it quietly And thus she dismist some of them that proved afterward as errant Traytors as any whom she put to death But for many other of their Clergy and especially those who were Priests in Queen Mary's days knowing them to be of peaceable Principles she suffered them to live peaceably in her Kingdom Of the Laity likewise she put none to death that would disown the Popes temporal power She took only a pecuniary Mulct with which she thought fit to repair her self for the charge she was put to in defending her self against the Head of their Communion When that charge was apprehended to be over namely at King Iames his coming to the Crown they were discharged even of those pecuniary penalties The King knew of no Sentence that the Pope had issued forth against himself and finding no trouble from those of his Communion he was willing to give none Nor did he till he had tried them None suffer'd among them in any kind none had cause to be in fear of any suffering no distinction was made between them and other Subjects But this calm was soon interrupted by the breaking out of a Conspiracy which yet seemed only to waken the vigilance of the State For no great matter was done upon it till another broke forth that of the Powder-Treason which out-went all former examples And then when it was almost too late he understood by searching into this Conspiracy that though the Pope had not deprived him by name of the Kingdom yet he had barred his right to it by a sufficient Description having sent out two Breves before the Queens death in which he commanded all his Catholicks not to suffer any Protestant how near soever in Blood to succeed her in the Kingdom This Papal Precept it was to which the Authors themselves ascribed their Gunpowder-Treason And that the King might not always be in the like danger he saw no way but to punish them that heeded such Precepts Other Papists he excused and made himself as it were their Compurgator declaring to the World that he believ'd they were innocent and peaceable Only they were not to be excused for keeping ill Company For they joyned in all Religious Acts with those of Hildebrand's Sect therefore they ought not to think much if their purses paid for it But otherwise the King did what lay in him to distinguish them And therefore he provided the Oath of Alleigance by the taking or refusing whereof he might be able to know the one from the other That Oath was made at first in such Terms as might perhaps have raised scruple in those that held the Papacy to be of Divine Right though not in Temporals but only in Spiritual things Though most of that Communion held otherwise in France and few held so in England in King Henry VIII's days Yet lest that might stick with any innocent person the King that desired to hurt none that might be spared and well knowing all their Principles for he had studied their Authors therefore took upon him so to moderate the Oath that it could not pinch the Conscience of any Roman Catholick that was not first infected with Hildebrand's Principles And they were generally so well satisfied with the Oath in those Terms in which he had conceived it that it was forthwith taken by the Superior of the Secular Clergy and by many other both of the Clergy and Laity Few stuck at it but those of Hildebrand's Sect whom the King had a mind to single out of the Herd and to rid the Land of them that he might live quietly with the other Roman Catholicks But this pleased not at Rome where only those are the Darlings And it concerned the Pope to assert his own power in Temporals which being something the younger he is more fond of than that in Spirituals and yet the elder being the more popular he wilfully mistook and perswaded the people as if he had believed himself that the Oath was against his power in Spirituals But he mistook not in forbidding the Oath of Allegiance to be taken by any Catholick upon any Terms whatsoever His Prohibition was under pain of his Curse both which were confirm'd by one
taking it for proved that a general Council is superiour to the Pope it must necessarily follow that there lies an Appeal from the Pope to such a Council And that his hands are tied up by such an Appeal so that he cannot proceed at least to Censure the Appellant for this were not only a private Injury to the Person but an Invasion of the Rights of the Supreme Court of Judicature among Christians Therefore if the Pope should do so Uncanonical a thing he may be Canonically disobeyed and resisted Yea he ought to be so for it were a betraying the Churches right to do otherwise till there is such a Court or Council to which the Appeal was made And such a Council there would be at least once in ten years if the Pope did not hinder it For having taken upon-himself the power of Calling and Presiding in Councils it is his pleasure to have none And no doubt he hath reason for it though there is Law to the contrary as good Law for a Council every ten years as can be made by any Authority in the Western Church Such Appeals from the Pope to a General Council have been made by divers Persons and Societies in the Roman Communion as namely by Auxilius in the name of the Clergy of all Italy By Michael of Caesena in the name of the whole Franciscan Order By seven Cardinals who were at that time the major part of their Colledge By divers Emperours of Germany against divers Popes some of whom they deposed and made other Popes in their Councils By divers Kings of France some of whom have forbid all Communication with Rome till they had right done them in their Controversies That some of these had cause enough for what they did and that they had just Authority to do it will be granted by most of them of the Roman Church But they will not grant the like of our King Henry VIII whom they make Author of the Protestant Schism as they call it And yet setting aside Popular Opinions and Prejudices I do not see what there was really in his Case which might not be cleared from Schism by those Rules and Examples I speak only of his casting off the Popes Authority as being that which no doubt was a means to bring on the Reformation As for those other things with which he is charged they are extrinsick to our Cause and we are no way accountable for them Namely for his dissolving of Monasteries It was one whom Wolsey had bred to it that taught him the way and they whom he employed would have burnt us if we had lived in those days For his being Head of the Church whosoever is offended at it let him blame the Six-Article men who brought up that Title and who both Preached and Writ for it and not the Q. Elizabeth Protestants who cast it forth Much more for his Personal excesses whatsoever they were if they concern any Religion it must be theirs and not ours For as to his Conscience they tell us he always continued a Roman Catholic These things being set apart or charged where they ought to be there will remain on our account only this to be considered Whether that Prince were guilty of Schism in casting the Popes Authority out of this Kingdom Or whether he did no more in that matter than he might lawfully do according to the Principles of his own that is the Roman Communion If he had Right to Appeal from the Pope to a Council and was hindred by him from prosecuting that right and was thereby forced to disobey and oppose him in this Case it has been shewn that Disobedience and Resistance was Lawful Whether that were his Case will appear by searching into matter of Fact And to be rightly informed of this one must not take all for true that Sanders says though having the luck to be contemned at the first by them that should have confuted him he has carried the World before him ever since being not only transcribed by the Writers of his side but also followed by many others that seem not to know whence they have their Stories We that live in a more inquisitive Age have seen many things of which he is the Author acknowledged by his Friends to be very improbable and some things proved by others to have been altogether impossible Yet in those things which he says without evident partiality Protestants are not unwilling he should be heard and Roman Catholics may be content to hear others with him who though Protestants yet are not liable to the like imputation In the Caufe of that King's Appeal many things are to be considered elsewhere which are not proper for this occasion It suffices to know that in his Minority he was betrothed to Katharine of Spain his Brothers Widow That the Contract was made by his Father for reasons of State against the judgment and advice of Archbishop Warham who then told him that he thought it neither honourable nor well-pleasing to God That the People at that time murmured against it and soon after the Prince himself as Warham advised made a formal Protestation that he would never marry her And yet after his Fathers death he was perswaded to it and did marry her with the Popes Dispensation When he had lived with her near seventeen years and as Sanders says was weary of her whether he was or no is not material the Popes Legate Cardinal Wolsey pretended to have found a Nullity in the Marriage and in care for the King's Salvation as he said acquainted Bishop Longland the Kings Confessor with it They both declared this to the King whose ancient doubt being now revived he spent almost a whole year in Study and Consultation concerning it I enter not into the merit of the Cause being indifferent at this time whether the Marriage was Lawful or no. For it appears which is enough that he had reason to doubt and that he took the best way for satisfaction according to their Principles When he had satisfied his own Judgment as himself says though Sanders say otherwise And had the Judgments not only of those Men before-mentioned but of all the Clergy of England save two that his Marriage was Null And he had reason to believe that most Learned Men abroad were of the same Opinion there wanted only this more to have the Popes Declaration of the Nullity This at present could not be had for he was the Emperour's prisoner But as soon as he was at liberty being desired by the King who had obliged him above all men and whom as yet he had occasion to use it seemed at first that there would be no difficulty that way For the Pope granted all his requests gave the King what Commissioners he had named impower'd them to hear the matter in England gave them Bulls
from the Pope to the next lawful General Council Which Appeal the Pope rejected as being unlawful and against the constitution of one of his Predecessours He also declared that there should be a General Council but that the calling of it belonged not to the King but to himself And soon after the term that he had set for the restoring of Queen Katharine being now expired he caused his Sentence against the King to be openly set up at Dunkirk which was then in the Emperours Dominions This was only a declarative Sentence in the case of Attentates as they term it but this being passed there was no doubt but soon after he would proceed to a Definitive Sentence in the cause The King was now concerned to look about him and to provide for the worst that could happen Therefore first with the advice of his Council he acquainted his Subjects with his Appeal which he caused to be set up on every Church door throughout his Kingdom And that his people might understand the validity of it he commanded that they should be taught that a General Council is above the Pope and that by Gods Law the Pope has no more to do in England than any other Forein Bishop Next he sent to engage as many Forein Princes as he could into a stricter Allyance with him And yet lastly to shew that he sought not these ways but was driven to them he desired the Bishop of Paris who was then Embassadour in England to get his Prince to deal effectually with the Pope and to promise in his name that if the Pope would forbear to pass any definitive Sentence till the cause might be heard before indifferent Judges he would also forbear what he had otherwise purposed to do that is to withdraw his obedience from the See of Rome The Bishop gladly took the office of Mediation upon himself and though it was now the dead of Winter yet he went post to Rome to discharge it There in Consistory he delivered his Message to the Pope and so far prevailed that at his earnest request there was a present stop of proceedings on condition that the King should send a Ratification of his promise precisely by such a day In prefixing the day they seemed not to have considered the time of the year For though the Messenger whom the Bishop sent into England found a present dispatch there yet being hindered by weather he did not return within his day The Pope as if he had watcht for that advantage resolved immediately to proceed to a definitive Sentence There being a Consistory called for that purpose the Bishop once more came in and pressed for a longer time He begg'd no more but six days which as he said might be granted to a King that had waited on them with patience for six years It was put to the vote where through the eagerness of the Imperial Cardinals not only that small request was denied but such precipitation was used that as much was done at once in that Consistory as would have askt no less than thrice according to their usual forms Such hast they were in to cut off and to destroy him whom three Popes successively had entitled their Defender and Deliverer When they had done their will within less than fix days that is the second day after this rash and hasty Sentence the Post returned from the King with a Ratification of all that had been promised in his name And he brought this further offer from the King that he would submit to the Judgment of that Court on condition that the Imperial Cardinals who had made themselves Parties against him should be none of his Judges There was an Authority sent for Proctors to appear for him on that condition At which great submission of the King compared with their precipitation the wiser Cardinals were astonished and petitioned the Pope for an arrest of Judgment Which could not well be denied him in those Circumstances And yet it was as if it had not been granted for they that got the Sentence passed by majority of Votes had the same will and power to get it confirmed And confirmed it was with this advantage that the Execution of the Sentence was committed to the Emperour who would be sure to see it done thoroughly as well to enrich himself with the Spoyls as to take his revenge in the ruine of a Prince that had provoked him no way more than in his zeal for the deliverance of this Pope out of his hands In this series of things I cannot but observe the hand of God and adore that unsearchable wisdom by which he made way to bring in the Reformation of this Church There was no King in that Age so zealous for Popery as he had been that came now to throw it out of his Kingdom Whosoever considers him from first to last in this business cannot but see he had no intention to do this He did all things to avoid it that could be done by one who was perswaded of the Justice of his cause And those Princes and Prelates who were perswaded as he was did their parts to hinder things from coming to this extremity None desired it but the Spanish and Imperial Faction unless perhaps the Pope himself could desire to lessen the Papacy by cutting off a whole Kingdom from the Church but he seemed to mind nothing but the raising of his Family and in order to that let the Imperialists do what they would with him Perhaps he might think when his own turns were served to give the King satisfaction afterwards as it may seem by what one says that when the Sentence was past he suspended the Execution of it till the end of September next But he died before that time and so his Sentence continued in force The next Pope that came after him did not approve what he had done for to use his own words he had urged him to right the King in his Divorce and would have perswaded the Emperour to have born it patiently But as then he could not prevail on that side so now he came too late to be heard on the other For on the day of his Coronation at Rome the Parliament met here in England that made the Act of Supremacy The edge of which Law falling severely on the Friends of the Papacy even while the Pope was offering at a reconciliation he was thereby provoked to curse the King afresh by a Bull which yet was not published till some years after When the King having presumed to Un-saint Thomas Becket the Pope thereupon pronounced him no King which made the breach quite unreconcileable I have given so large account of this matter because it is brought into common discourse and as it is told serves to blacken many other beside the King who was only or chiefly concerned in it Otherwise it would serve for our
have any Right in it Though she had not lost her Right any otherwise than as being cut off by the Pope's uncanonical Censures against which she was relievable on her Appeal thither if that had truly been a General Council And the Bishops whom she should send to represent her in such a Council had as much to do there precedence only excepted as the Pope himself had according to the ancient Canons But now as matters were ordered at Trent if she had sent any thither and if they had been admittable otherwise yet they must not sit there without owning the Pope in his Legate They must not only be joyned into one Body with him but they must acknowledge him for their representative Head who yet to them was no other than a man dead in Law For they knew him to be condemned for a Traytor by that Authority to which they were Subjects as well as Trent as in England And though the Popes placing him there in that Character was the highest Affront that could be done to the Justice of their Nation yet they must submit nay contribute to that Affront by owning him in that Character or else they must have no place in that Council This Contumelious Condition being implicitly imposed on our Bishops was a virtual Exclusion of them from their Right of sitting there And it was so contrived that it lookt as ill upon the State as on the Church The King was not only concerned for both these but also for Himself on another account having his Cause to be heard there if it had been a General Council It was an Injury to him all this while that he had None so long after his Appeal to it But now to make him amends he had a Council pack'd by his Adversary and if that were not enough he had this Traiterous Subject in the Head of it Which last thing went beyond all former Trials of his Patience and perhaps had been enough to have angered the meekest of Princes If it be an ill thing to have ones Judge chosen by his Enemy it is worse to have his Enemy be his Judge He had both in this Council as the Pope had ordered it for him Therefore as he could not be Canonically obliged to stand by it so he did but use his own Right as before in Protesting so now in Declaring against it He did it on all Occasions and continued so doing till his Death His Son Edward VI who reigned next kept the Pope at his distance and had many things reformed in the Church of which I shall not speak particularly because all that he did of this kind was soon after undone by his Successour Queen Mary She for reasons that I mentioned before restored the Pope's Authority in this Kingdom And though his Council of Trent was all her time in adjournment so that she could not send her Bishops thither yet she had it acknowledged by them in a Synod where Cardinal Pool being first restord in bloud had the honour to preside as his Legate But as to the Schism between us and the Roman Church both these Princes were unconcerned in the Original cause of it which was as I have shewn the Popes Sentence concerning their Fathers Marriage For Edward VI. was born to him by another Wife whom he had married after Katharines death And Queen Mary being his Daughter by Katharine was not aggrieved by the Sentence but on the contrary held her self righted by it The only Person aggrieved was Queen Elizabeth the Daughter of Henry VIII by Anne Bolen whose Marriage the Pope had declared to be Null and pronounced any fruit that should come of it to be Illegitimate This Queen being the only fruit of that Marriage the Sentence was injurious to her if to any And whether she was wrong'd in it or no it ought to have been tried before a Lawful General Council to whose Judgement her Father had Appealed as has been already shewn And there being no such Council held in his life time the right of his Appeal descended to her at his death She was now the only party concerned in the Cause and her Right could not be given from her by any other She was as much concerned as ever her Father was to be heard by the Judge to whom He had Appealed and to be Righted against the Pope if it should appear that he had injured her and also against his Council of Trent which abetted him in it And she had as much Reason as ever her Father had to disobey and to resist both the Pope and his Council till they would suffer such a Council to meet as was the only proper Judge of her Cause Thus far all that has been said of her Father except only in things of Personal concernment is as Applicable to her And more needs not be said to shew that they were neither of them guilty of Schism in asserting their Cause as they did against the Adversaries of it For therein they did no more than what they lawfully might and ought to do according to the Principles of the Western Church But there was something in her Case which was not in her Fathers and which would have cleared her of Schism though he had been guilty of it For whereas when he rejected the Pope and his Council he was wholly of their mind in all the Articles of Faith then in being She did it not till the Council had sate and till they had already made sundry new Articles of Faith Whereof the first were defined some months before her Father died However he might like them as they presume he did who tell us that he died in their Faith yet it is certain that though at sometime she did not shew it she did always dislike them her Enemies being Judges And as soon as she came into Power she declared they were so far from being any part of her Faith that she took them for no other than False and Novel opinions If she mistook in so judging which shall be considered in its place then she was at least materially an Heretic And such he must prove her to have been that will make her a Schismatick For if she was in the right and those Doctrines were not of Faith then the Schism occasioned by them must not lie at her door It must be charged on the Council who defined them and on the Pope who added them to the Creed who made the belief and profession of these Doctrines a condition without which there is no living in his Communion She did what she ought to do in refusing to have it on those terms in adhering to the Faith once delivered to the Saints and in rejecting the Authority which would have it defiled with those Mixtures What has been said may suffice to clear Queen Elizabeth from the Imputation of Schism on any Personal account in not obeying the Pope or his Council It appears that she was free from Schism in