sate at the Helm of the most Dignified Churches and steered the Conclusions of Divine Truth were more rigid upon this Theme than they that hold the same Sees in these Days They were so literal in the sense of those words Job 6.53 Except ye eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink his Blood you have no Life in you that an Infant Baptized was presently admitted to the Sumption of the Sacred Elements That believing People in danger to be separated from their Pastors in time of Persecution were suffered to reserve the Consecrated Bread and to eat it reverently at Home These Customs are utterly melted away into disuse and the latter overthrown by a Curse in the first Council of Toledo At this Day your Canons enjoyn no more But that every faithful Man and Woman partake of Christs Body once a Year at Easter And how gentle are your Casuists in their Copious Relaxations upon the Obligation to this Canon You shall hear but one speak Navarr Enchirid. Cap. 21. Every Notorious Cause excuseth those that receive not once a Year And it is allowed to be a Notorious Cause if danger to lose Life or Hmour or Fortunes doth distein a Christian Therefore a Woman that hath a Child at her Breast is dispens'd with for the Sucklings sake And a Widow in some places who keeps the fashion to mourn a twelve-month at Home before she appears in publick Nay Caution is made to absolve them that are raggedly or meanly apparell'd and would be ashamed to have the Eyes of some cast upon them in their homely Garments You cannot go lower unless you could throw less than one Ace upon a Dye Excuses you see are cheap because that Sacrament is not rated so dear as if it were taken or not taken upon the price of Salvation 225. And now that your Lordship may undergo no longer Penance to hear me upon this Subject I will dispatch with the Consideration of your Sacrament of Penance For whose use and necessity the Priests contend more than the People And if we of the Reformed Clergy had not set before our Eyes the Naked Simplicity of the Gospel rather than our own Interests and Emolument we would never have ridden that stiff-headed Beast the Multitude without this Bridle The Power of the Keys do you call it And so ye may For the Locks of all Secrets fly open before it and every Mans Coffers are at the Command of the Confesson Confession of all Sin especially the most to be blush'd at though lodged in the darkest Cellar of the Heart is a heavy Burden Yet any wise Man will resolve not to be shame-faced but to endure that which he must bear by a rigid and peremptory Law If there be no remedy as the Confessors say but either reveal your Sin even to all their Minutes and Circumstances and obtein Sacerdotal Absolution or never look Christ in the Face I cannot then blame your Brethren to say Give us Ghostly Fathers or else we die But hold there I will spread your own Doctrine impartially before you Your severest Writers say That Confession of wasting and mortal Sins is to be made to a Priest upon the Commandment of Christ Such a Law they have fixed partly by Consequences partly by their Exposition of the Text. Now it is fit to hear what may be said upon this Law when the Case is removed into a Court of Equity I move then in the behalf of a Sinner Is he bound as soon as he hath committed a mortal Sin with all competent Celerity to confess that he may be absolv'd Not so says the Chancery of Divinity Let him prostrate himself before the Knees of the Poenitentiary once a Year and rehearse his Crimes Is that resolved Scripture Is Confession once a Year of Divine Right No says old Navarr there is no Divine express Word that chargeth the Penitent when and how often to come to that Sacrament but by Human Authority all Offenders are obliged thereunto once a Year I move once more at the Bar of Favour Is that Canon as inflexible as the Laws of the Medes and Persians Or will it admit of Relaxation Why not says Azorius Lib. 7. Moral Cap. 40. Quod quisque fidelium semel quotannis confiteatur Ecclesia Imperavit Et Autoritate Pontificiâ potest quis eximi à lege annuae Confessionis One Exception by all Votes is admitted That a Person born dumb shall not have his Sins reteined for want of Confession Cajet Sacerd. Lib. 3. Cap. 6. And are not their Mouths stopt as if they were dumb-born in whose Vicinage nay in whose Country none of Holy Orders out of that Tribe ought to be found by the Laws to take their Confession Or will it come to one effect if they put down such faults as they call to mind they have committed in writing And so send this blotting Paper to them that have the Tutelage over them in such Cases This Trick wants not those that applaud it Especially among the Jesuits who I think would teach Pigeons to carry such Messages to and fro since they would have all the Work in their own Hands and cannot be in all places But your sounder Divines condemn that Device Either because the Circumstances of Sins which alter Cases exceedingly cannot be Interrogated so well in conveyance of Letters Or least the Offendor while his Letter is under the Messengers dispatch should relapse into his former Sin and abuse the Grace of Absolution Or principally because that which is under a Mans Hand is permanent and if it miscarry it may be produc'd afterwards to his sorrow and vexation by the Secular Power Therefore this Rule must be the Coronis of all this Dispute That he that hath not a Competent External Judge to confess his Sins unto may quiet his Conscience when he confesseth them to none but GOD. 226. What say you now my Lord Doth Salvation necessarily depend upon your Septemfluous Sacraments Or do they depend all upon the Administration of the Priests O Sir King David was cosen'd for believing his Son Amnon who pretended he could eat nothing unless his Sister Tamar dress'd it But somewhat about Sacramental Confessions hangs yet in my Teeth and I shall not speak it but spit it out It is so reasonable that I bespeak you not to be offended He that takes it ill it is at his own adventure Salus populi suprema Lex esto We must first look to common safety And they that think to build upon the Ruines of it will find a false Foundation I hope Court us not suffer Confessors to creep into Corners among us For they profess they will not discover Treason plotted against the King and Kingdom if it be disclosed under that Privy Seal Nay it hath appeared by Examinations by Witnesses by Letter under their own Hands by all sorts of Proofs that they did not reveal it when they knew the fatal Hour was at Hand to blow up our Sovereign the
were living But though they are all under Earth Faith forbid that their Names should be abused to a wrong Report To keep History uncorrupt from such baseness 't is daintily observ'd out of the Poets by Salmasius Clymac p. 819. Apud orcum defunctae animae jurare dicuntur ne quid suos quos in vitâ reliquerint contra fas adjuvent The Souls departed take an Oath not to help their surviving Friends against Justice But no such Protestation needs in this Cause There is a Petition to be produced written with the Hand of Dr. Walker a Gentleman living and well known wherein His Majesty is minded that he had cancell'd this Complaint and had given his Royal Hand to confirm it What could be more sure Yet it turn'd to nothing the Wound was never suffer'd to heal by the daily Whispering of Bishop Laud diligent in the King's Ear. You may read of one in Suetonius's Caligula Cui ad insaniam Caius favebat So the King suffer'd this Prelate in excess of Power to turn and return Causes as he would and was obnoxious by the bewitching of his Tongue to facility of Perswasions to grant and retract as he possest him Which was seen too late in this excellent Passage of His Majesty in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I wish I had not suffer'd mine own Judgment to be overborn in some things more by others Importunities than their Arguments As Erasmus wrote honestly to a mighty Monarch Harry the Eighth Ep. p. 74. Eximia quaedam inter mortales res est Monarcha sed homo tamen And with much liberty our Poet Johnson in his Forrest p. 815. I am at feud With that is ill tho' with a Throne endu'd The Faults of the Blessed Charles were small yet some he had who having assured Lincoln he should never be question'd again about the matter brought against him by Lamb and Sibthorp yet remitted it to the Star-chamber The Defendant conceived it would spend like a Snail or the untimely Fruit of a Woman but when he found himself deceiv'd and that the Cause was glowing hot in Prosecution he sought the King's Clemency Quaedam enim meliùs fugiuntur quà m superantur it is in Erasm Ep. p. 18. He thought it better to fly the Trial than to get the Cause and he put up this which follows into the Hands of His Majesty The Humble Petition and Submission of John Bishop of Lincoln c. THAT although he is innocent from any Crime committed against your Majesty in thought word or deed yet abhorring as he finds by Presidents all other Bishops of this Realm have done Placitare cum Domino rege to have any Suit with his Sovereign Lord Master and Patron he casts himself in all humility at Your Majesties Feet and implores your Royal Mercy and Clemency Non intrare in judicium cum servo tuo coveting to ascribe his Deliverance to Your Majesties Clemency And whereas your most Excellent Majesty having in the fourth year of your happy Reign received the Opinion of the four Lords Committees concerning these very self-same Charges did in your Majesties Gallery at Whitehall admit this Defendant brought in by the Right Honourable the Lord Treasurer one of the said Committees to kiss your Majesties Hand and did use unto him this Defendant in the presence and hearing of the said Right Honourable Lord these gracious words That your Majesty was pleased to forgive all that was past and would esteem of this Defendant according as he should deserve by his Service for the time to come He most humbly beseecheth your most Excellent Majesty that according to that so gracious Remission and Absolution no further Prosecution at your Majesties Suit may be used against him concerning the said Charges all which he doth the rather hope for from your Majesty because he is a Bishop that hath endeavoured not to live scandalously in his Calling and hath formerly had the Favour from Almighty God with his own Hands to close your Majesties Father's Eyes and to have written and drawn up that Commission and Contract for your Majesties Marriage whereupon ensued to this Kingdom a most unvaluable Blessing and heartily prayeth that God who hath delivered your Majesty from your late Sickness may bless you in all Health Happiness and Prosperity So far the Petition I will not teach the Reader what Sallads to pick out of it but only the Herb of Grace that the Bishop kist the King's Hand upon the assurance of his Peace that the Offence which was taken was buried and should never rise up in Judgment more Nihil periculi Soloni à Pisistrato Diog. Laert. Now who ever liked Julian the Cardinal that made Ladislaus K. of Polonia break his League with the Turk And who will defend B. L. that made his Soveraign break his word with his Subject It was he and none else that put in an unseasonable Bar to hinder Lincoln the fulness of the Benefit I know none that had the nearest part in B. L's Favour that can deny it And let them turn it about as they will is it possible they should excuse it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is Theodoret's Ep. 2. Children see no uncomeliness in their Parents But although they will see no ill in the Person they must in the Fact For what a Trespass is this in Justice to punish that which was forgiven Let the King do Righteous Judgment like God in whose Throne he sits before whom this holds inviolable Peccata dimissa nunquam redeunt No not original Sin when remitted in Baptism it shall not be imputed to them any more that are damned for actual Crimes whereof they did not repent So Grotius cites it out of Prosper in Matth. c. 18. v. 34. Extinctam semel obligationem non reviviscere sed propter postrema crimina affici The most that seems to be against this Rule but falls in with it is this That when former Sins are forgiven and new ones are superadded the latter shall be punish'd the more for the ungratefulness of the Sinner Non quod jam remissa puniantur sed quod sequens peccatum minùs graviter punâ—retur si priora remissa non fuissent says Maldonat My Sentence is at the last of all with Syracides c. 29.3 Keep thy word and deal faithfully revoke not your Kindness pluck not up the Seeds of a Benefit which you had sown with your own Hand It is worse to turn Mercy than Justice into Wormwood 111. Destiny is unavoidable A Bill is filed in the Star-Chamber and prosecuted for the King for Revealing his Councils The Defendant made him ready for his Answer and plyed the King with Petitions together in Parody like Virgil's Aeneas Et se collegit in arma Poplite subsidens At first he tried Bishop Laud if he would be so generous as to heal the Wound that he had made and anointed him with the Weapon-Salve of remembrance of Friendship past and protestation of the like for ever he courted him to
Bishops Dispensations only but Mandates also And those Bishops have been fined at the Kings Bench and elsewhere that absented themselves from Councils in Parliament without the King 's special leave and licence first obtained Thirdly When they are forbidden interesse to be present the meaning is not in the very Canons themselves that they should go out of the room but only that they should not be present to add Authority Help and Advice to any Sentence pronounced against a particular or individual Person in cause of Blood or mutilation If he be present auctorizando consilium opem vel operam dando then he contracts an irregularity and no otherwise saith our Linwood out of Innocentius And the Canon reacheth no further than to him that shall pronounce Sentence of Death or Mutilation upon a particular Person For Prelates that are of Counsel with the King in Parliament or otherwise being demanded the Law in such and such a Case without naming any individuum may answer generaliter loquendo That Treason is to be punisht with Death and a Counterseiter of the King's Coin Hostien lib. 2. eap de fals monet allowed by John Montague de Collatione Parliamentorum In Tracta Doctor Vol. 10. p. 121. Fourthly These Canons are not in force in England to bind the King's Subjects for several Reasons First Because they are against his Majesty's Prerogative as you may see it clearly in the Articles of Clarendon and the Writ of Summons and therefore abolished 25 H. 8. c. 8. It is his Majesty's Prerogative declar'd at Clarendon that all such Ecclesiastical Peers as hold of him by Barony should assist in the King's Judicatures until the very actual pronouncing of a Sentence of Blood And this holds from Henry the First down to the latter end of Queen Elizabeth who imployed Archbishop Whitgist as a Commissioner upon the Life of the Earl of Essex to keep him in Custody and to examine him after that Commotion in London And to say that this Canon is confirm'd by Common Law is a merry Tale there being nothing in the Common Law that tends that way Secondly It hath been voted in the House of Commons in this very Session of Parliament That no Canons since the Conquest either introduced from Rome by Legatine Power or made in our Synods had in any Age nor yet have at this present any power to bind the Subjects of this Realm unless they be confirmed by Act of Parliament Now these Canons which inhibit the Presence of Church-men in Cause that concerns Life and Member were never confirm'd by any but seem to be impeach't by divers and sundry Acts of Parliament Thirdly The whole House of Peers have this very Session despised and set aside this Canon Law which some of the young Lords cry up again in the same Session and in the very same Cause to take away the Votes of the Bishops in the Case of the Earl of Strafford For by the same Canon Law that forbids Clergy-men to Sentence they of that Coat are more strictly inhibited to give no Testimony in Causes of Blood Nee ettam potest esse test is vel tabellio in causâ Sanguinis Linw. part 2. sol 146. For no Man co-operates more in a Sentence of Death than the Witnesses upon whose Attestation the Sentence is chiefly past Lopez pract crim c. 98. distl 21. and yet have the Lords admitted as Witnesses produced by the House of Commons against the Earl of Strafford the Archbishops of Canterbury and Armagh with the Bishop of London which Lords command now all Bishops to withdraw in the agitation of the self same Case Bishops it seems may be Witnesses to kill ont-right but may not sit in the Discussion of the Cause to help in case of Innocency a distressed Nobleman Whereas the very Gothish Bishops who first invented this Exclusion of Prelates from such Judicatures allow them to Vote as long as there is any hope left of clearing the Party or gaining of Pardon 4. Conc. Tol. Can. 31. And by the beginning of that Canon observe the use in Spain in that Age Anno 633. as touching this Doctrine Saepe principes contra quoslibet majestatis obnoxios Sacerdotibus negotia sua committunt Binnius 4. Tom. Can. Edit ult p. 592. Lastly In the Case of Archbishop Abbot all the great Civilians and Judges of the Land as Dr. Steward Sir H. Martin the Lord Chief Justice Hobart and Judge Doderidge which two last were very well versed in the Canon Law delivered positively when my self at first opposed them That all Irregularities introduced by Canons upon Ecclesiastical Persons concerning matters of Blood were taken away by the Reformation of the Church of England and were repugnant to the Statute 25 II. 8. as restraining the King 's most just Prerogative to imploy his own Subjects in such Functions and Offices as his Predecessors had done and to allow them those Priviledges and Recreations as by the Laws and Customs of this Realm they had formerly enjoy'd notwithstanding the Decree de Clerico venatore or the Constitution nae Clerici Saeculare c. or any other in that kind 150. The only Objection which appears upon any Learning or Record against the Clergies Voting in this Kingdom in Causes of Blood are two or three Protestations entred by the Bishops among the Records of the upper House of Parliament and some few Passages in the Law-Books relating thereunto The Protestation the Lords now principally stand upon is that of William Courtney Archbishop of Canterbury 11 Rich. 2. inserted in the Book of Priviledges which Mr. Selden collected for the Lords of the upper House In the Margin whereof that passage out of R. Hovenden about which we spake before about Clergy-mens agitation of Judgments of Blood is unluckily inserted and for want of due consideration and some suspicion of partial carriage in the Bishops in the case of the Earl of Strafford hath been eagerly pressed upon the Bishops by some of the Lords in such an unusual and unaccustomed manner that if I my self offering to speak to this Objection had not voluntarily withdrawn the rest of the Bishops and I had been without hearing voted out of the House in the agitation of a Splinter of that Cause of the Earl of Strafford's which came not near any matter of Blood An act never done before in that honourable House and ready to be executed suddenly without the least consideration of the merit of the Cause The only words insisted upon in the Protestation of Courtney's are these Because in this present Parliament certain matters are agitated whereat it is not lawsul for us according to the Prescript of holy Canons to be present And by and by after they say These matters are such in the which Nec possumus nec debemus interesse This is the Protestation most stood upon That of Archbishop Arundel 21 Rich. 2. is not so full and ample as this of Courtney's For the Bishops going forth left their Proxies with the
Houses to accept thereof Obj. 3. They desire the King to command the Clerk of the House of Peers to enter this their Petition and Protestation among his Records which derogates from the Rights of Parliament As though the King could be his Command make a Record of Parliament 〈◊〉 It is to be conceived that the Bishops never intended that this Petition as may appear by the Directory thereof should be preferred to the King in any other place but in the Upper House of Parliament And it will appear among the Records of that most Honourable House 11 Rich. II. num 9. that the King in that House hath commanded the like Protestation of the Bishops to be enrolled which made the Bishops use that Phrase Howbeit beside the King's Command the Assent of the Peers and Commons have still concurred and the Bishops never conceived it otherwise which made them presume that no matter of their Protestation could possibly amount to any higher Crime than that of Error or Mistake considering that it was still to be admitted or rejected by the King with the Assent of the Peers and Commons Here the Answer ends in this brief compass Let all the Council in the Land plead against it and shew where it is not sound and satisfactory Yet the Bishops desire no other reparation for their false Imprisonment but Liberty and Safety to Vote in that House to which they were called by the King 's Writ Sidonius speaks in pity of Eutropia lib. 6. ep 2. Victoriam computat si post dammum non litiget And these innocent men would not hold it for Justice done unto them if after so much Wrong sustained the Contention might be ended 170. Every subsequent Action of that Parliament did castrate their Hope Day utter'd unto Day how they meant to dissolve that Primitive and Apostolick Order piece by piece And what shall we have next The very Kingdom of Christ set up in the Church if you will believe them As Pisistratus would perswade the Athenians that he changed not their Laws but reduced them to those that were in Solon's time by which Trick he made them his Slaves Laert. in Vit. Sol. Is it possible that men could have the face to pretend more ancient Rulers in Christ's Church than Bishops The method of Sacrilege was first to pluck the Spiritual Lords out of the House and to disable all the Clergy from intermedling in Secular Affairs The Bill is read and easily pass'd now the Bishops were not in place to hear it and dispute it The Plaintiff pleads the Cause at Westminster what can the Defendant say to it in the Tower Proceed my good Lords he that runs alone by himself must needs be foremost This was worse than if a young Heir were sent to travel by his Guardian and the Guardian pulls down his House fells his Woods leaseth out his Lands when he is not in the way to look to it But where were those Earls and Barons that sided with the Bishops before Shrunk absent or silent They that are wise Leave falling Buildings fly to them that rise Or as Plautus in Stych as neat in his Comick Phrase as Johnson Si labant res lassae itidem amici collabascunt But the King's part is yet to come The Parliament makes ready a Bill the King only makes it a Law So he did this and it was the last I think that ever he signed Why he did it is a thing not well known and wants more manifestation Necessity was in it say they that would look no further Nulla necessitas excusat quae potest non esse necessitas Tertul. Exh. ad Cast c. 7. The most said That nothing was more plausible than this to get the Peoples Favour Or that the Houses had sate long like to continue longer and must have Wages for their Work because they are no Hirelings they will chuse and take and this Boon they will have or the King shall have no Help from them It would ill become a Royal Spirit to plead he was compelled by Fear else His Majesty might have revoked this Act upon that Challenge As Sir Nic. Throgmorton surpassing most of his Age for Wit and Experience assured Mary Queen of Scots shut up in the hold of Loquelevin Cessionem in carcere extortam qui justus est metus planè irritam esse Cambd. Eliz. ann 1569. Yet Fear had not so much stroke in this as the Perswasions of one whom His Majesty loved above all the World The King foresaw he was not like to get any thing from this Parliament but a Civil War he would not begin it but on their part he heard their Hammers already at the Forge Et clandestinis turgentia fraudibus arma Manil. lib. 1. He being most tender to provide for the Safety of his Queen went with her to Dover to convey her into France not that she desired to turn her Back to Danger or refused to partake of all Hazards with her Lord and Husband for she was resolute in that as Theogena the Wife of Agathocles Justin lib. 20. Nubendo ei non prosperae tantùm fed omnis fortunae iniisse societatem But because His Majesty knew himself that he should be more couragious if his dear Consort were out of the reach of his Enemies Being at Dover the Queen would not part with the King to Ship-board till he signed this Bill being brought to believe by all protestation of Faith from Sir John Culpepper who attended there for that Dispatch that the Lords and Commons would press His Majesty to no more Bills of that unpleasing nature So the King snatch'd greedily at a Flower of a fair Offer and though he trusted few of the men at Westminster yet in outward shew he would seem to trust them all the more because the Queen had such Confidence in them How Culpepper instilled this into the Queen and how she prevailed York is my Author and could not deceive me for he told me in the Tower That the King had sacrificed the Clergy to this Parliament by the Artifices contrived at Dover a day before the News were brought to London Then they fell to Bells and Bonfires and prophaned the Name of God that He had heard them whose Glory was not in their Thoughts from the beginning to the end A Day-labourer lifts up his Ax towards Heaven but strikes his Mattock into the Earth And all the Evil that the Earth breeds was in their Mind when they seemed to look up to God That which is of God must have its Foundation in Humility its binding fast in Obedience its rising in Justice and its continuance in Peace So begins the Misery and Fall of the Bishops Synesius hath lent us words fit to express jump in the same Case Ep. 70. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is the Bishops were expulsed meerly by Slander nothing being demonstrated to lay any Crimes against them And verily God was gracious to them What should they have done as it