THE OBLIGATION Resulting from the OATH of SUPREMACY To Assist and Defend the Pre-eminence or Prerogative OF THE Dispensative Power BELONGING To the KING his Heirs and Successors In the asserting of that Power various Historical Passages occurring in the Usurpation after the Year 1641. are occasionally mentioned And an Account is given at large of the Progress of the Power of Dispensing as to Acts of Parliament about Religion since the Reformation and of divers Judgments of Parliaments declaring their Approbation of the Exercise of such Power and particularly in what concerns the Punishment of Disability or Incapacity Princes are Supreme over Persons not over Things This is the Supreme Power of Princes which we teach that they be Gods Ministers in their own Dominions bearing the Sword and freely to permit and publickly to Defend that which God commandeth in Faith and good Manners c. Princes may Command the Bodies of all their Subjects in time both of War and Peace c. Out of all Question where Princes may by God's Law Command all Men must obey them c. The Prince may discharge the Servant but no Man can discharge the Subject The Word of God teacheth you to obey Princes the words of men cannot loose you BISHOP BILSON of the SUPREMACY LONDON Printed for Thomas Dring at the Harrow at Chancery-Lane End in Fleetstreet William Crook at the Green Dragon without Temple-Bar and William Rogers at the Sun over against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet-street 1687. To the Right Honorable JOHN Earl of MELFORT Viscount of Forth Lord Drummond of Rickartone c. His Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Kingdom of Scotland and one of His Majesty's most Honorable Privy Council in both Kingdoms of England and Scotland c. MY LORD AS the Historian hath told us of Ireland that long ago while the Arts and Sciences were generally banish'd from the Christian World they were enthroned in Ireland and that Men were sent thither from other Parts of Christendom to be improved in Learning so I have elsewhere observ'd that in some late Conjunctures and particularly during the turbid Interval of the Exclusion men might well be sent to Scotland to learn Loyalty And I having taken occasion in the first Part of this Discourse to shew my self a just honourer of that Country and as I may say somewhat like a Benefactor to it by sending thither the notices of some pass'd great Transactions that might possibly there give more light and life to the Moral Offices of Natural Allegiance or Obedience did hold my self obliged in Common Justice to address this Part of my Work to your Lordship For as your Station here qualifies you beyond other Subjects to receive what Tribute is offer'd to your Country so your handing it thither will necessarily make it there the more acceptable And when I consider with what an incomparable Tenderness for the Monarchy and its Rights so many of the Statutes of Scotland since the Year 1660. have been adorn'd I am apt to think that any matter of Presidents or Records by me recover'd out of the Sea of time where they lay so long useless and neglected and now happening to be serviceable to those Moral Offices before-mention'd would by the so many in that Kingdom devoted to consummate Obedience and Loyalty be more valued then if I could have imported into that Realm another such Treasure as that which lay so long buried in the Ocean near the Bahama Islands and that whoever Contributed to your Loyal Country any Substantial Notions that might enrich it in the discharge of the Duties of the born and sworn Allegiance would be esteem'd there as some way sharing in the honour of Arauna in giving like a King to a King. Long may your great Master live happy in the Enjoyment of the faithful Services of so vigilant a Minister as your Lordship who by the universality of your Knowledge accompany'd with universal Charity for all Mankind have appear'd to be born as I may say for the time of his most glorious Reign the time chosen by Heaven for Mercies Triumph on Earth Nothing vulgar was to be expected from a Person of your Lordship's extraordinary intellectual and moral Endowments and in whom the Loyalty and other Virtues of your many noble Ancestors have as it were lived extraduce And the World would be unjust to you if it acknowledged not its great Expectation answer'd by your greater Performances and particularly by your having been so eminently Ministerial in the Easing both the Cares of your Prince and of all his Subjects too by the Figure you have made in promoting the Ease of his People's Consciences and in further ennobling and endearing the Name of DRUMMOND by your Lordship's Prosecuting that by the Bravery of Action which the HISTORIAN of that your Name did by Words when he transmitted to Posterity the most Christian and Statesman-like Speech of Liberty of Conscience I know extant and as spoke by a Roman-Catholick Councellor in Scotland to King Iames the Fifth I most humbly kiss your Lordship's Hands and am My Lord Your Lordships most Obedient Servant P. P. THE OBLIGATION Resulting from the Oath of Supremacy To Assist and Defend the Pre-eminence or Prerogative OF THE Dispensative Power Belonging to the KING his Heirs and Successors c. PART I A. IN this Kingdom of England so naturally of old addicted to Religion and vehemence in it as to give a Bishop of Rome cause to complain he had more trouble given him by Applications from England about it then from all the World beside and afterward to make Geneva wonder at the Sabbatarians here exceeding the Iewish strictness and to cause Barclay in his Euphoâ—…mio to say of the English Nec quicqúam in numinis cultu modicum possunt and that our several Sects thought unos se Coelestium rerum participes exortes coeteros omnes esse did you ever observe hear or read of the style of Tenderness of Conscience so much used as in the year 41. and sometime afterward B. I have not From the Date of King Charles the First 's Declaration to all His loving Subjects about that time wherein he speaks of his Care for Exemption of Tender Consciences till the Date of King Charles the Second's Declaration from Breda wherein the Liberty of Tender Consciences is Provided for the clause of easing Tender Consciences ran through the Messages Addresses and Answers that passed between King and Parliament almost as much as the Clause of proponentibus legatis did run through the Councel of Trent A. But were not their Consciences extremely erroneous who thought themselves bound then to advance Religion by War B. Aâ—… and by a Civil War as you might have added against a Prince of the tenderest Conscience imaginable for that Character he had from an Arch-bishop in his Speech in the Parliament of 40 who said Our Sovereign is I will not say above other Princes but above all Christian men that ever I knew
Harvey who open'd such great Springs of real Learning as refresh'd that noble thirst so it seems before the Date of His late Majesty's Declaration of Indulgence in the 24th year of his Reign and of the Act about the Test in the 25th year of it and both which were likely to produce among the Learned so many Inquiries into the Legality of the Dispensative Power inherent in the Crown and even among the unlearned an Epidemical Disease of talking about the same it came to pass in the course of Providence that by as Learned Iudges as ever sate on the English Bench and as Learned Councel as ever appear'd at its Bar the Learning about the Dispensative Power was ventilated and discuss'd in a Series of several years in the Case of Thomas and Sorrell For the Cause began in the King's Bench 18. Car. 2. and was there argued by some of the Great Councel of the Kingdom and there again argued on both sides by other Councel in Michaelmas-Term in the 19th year of his Reign And in Hilary-Term in 25. and 26. Car. 2. this Cause for the weight and difficulty of it was adjourn'd out of the King's-Bench into the Exchequer Chamber and there argued by others of the Greatest Councel of the Kingdom and many Law-Books quoted And the Case was afterward argued by all the Iudges of England at six several Days in Easter Trinity Michaelmas and Hilary Terms viz. by two Iudges each day and the Iudges differ'd in several Points and even about the definition or meaning of Dispensation For so that learned Chief Iustice tells you and saith That some of his Brothers defined it to be liberatio à poenâ and others to be Provida relaxatio Juris which saith he is defining an ignotum per ignotius and liberare à poenâ is the effect of a Pardon not of a Dispensation c. Thus as I may say there was a Circumvallation by the Learning which concern'd Dispensing that encompass'd some time preceding that Declaration of Indulgence in the 24th year of his Reign and some time following both it and the Act of the Test. I shall some other time perhaps entertain you with the Learned Manuscript Report of the whole Case but shall now tell you that during that Series of years there was no angry motion in the Sea of the Populace occasion'd by any thing said in any of the Arguments that propp'd up the Dispensative Power no not by that mention'd in Keeble's Reports about Thomas and Sorrell's Case to have been said in the Exchequer Chamber by Ellis the King's Serjeant and whose Opinion was as Currant for Sterling-Law as any Man 's of the long Robe Viz. That the King may SUSPEND an Act of Parliament till next Session And now since it hath thus appear'd out of that Chief Iustice his Report that at least a sixth part of the Sworn Iudges of the Realm as he thought were unacquainted with the meaning of Dispensing I think it may pass for a Miracle if any great number of the mobile did understand it But without their troubling their heads with Law-Books if they would but mind their English Bibles and there consult the 12th of S. Mathew they would soon forbear calling the lawful Dispensing with the Laws establish'd a Contradiction Our learned Ames on the Priests in the Temple Prophaning the Sabbath and being blameless observes very well in his Cases of Conscience 1. 3. c. 17. That Praecepta Deiex suâ naturâ nunquam ita Concurrent at necesse sit alterum eorum propriè violare per peccatum Quum enim praeceptum aliquod minus negligendum est ut majus observetur minus illud cessat pro illo tempore obligare that is to say is dispens'd with ita ut qui ex tali occasione illud negligunt sint planè inculpabiles id est non peccent Matth. 12. 5 7. And as to that in the Chapter of David's entring into the House of God and eating the Shew-bread which was not lawful for him to eat c. the Lord Bishop of London in his Second Letter to his Clergy Printed A. 1680. in the Paragraph about The half Communion occasionally thus observes with great Judgment That a positive Command of God cannot be disobey'd without guilt unless on some one or more of these grounds either 1. That God dispenses with it as he did with Circumcision in the Wilderness Or 2. That some Evil greater then the Consequence of the Non-Performance of it will certainly follow as when David ate the Shew-bread and they that were with him which depends on that rule of our Saviour which tho apply'd to the Sabbath yet extends to all other positive Commands that man was not made for them but they for man Or lastly in case of incapacity as the Children of Israels not going up to Ierusalem in the time of Captivity And there are other words in a foregoing Chapter of S. Matthew that are still applicable to the Pharisaical ignorance of such as reproach DISPENSING as unlawful Go and learn what that means I will have mercy and not sacrifice But according to the Example of our Blessed Lord in Having Compassion on the multitude I think you have taken a just occasion for the pitying so many of your Countrymen who in the present Conjuncture presume to exercise themselves in great Matters or in things too high for them relating to Law and State and who without enquiring about the modus of Dispensing with the Laws establish'd wherein Lawyers differ cry down the thing it self wholly and absolutely as a Contradiction to the lex terrae and in which not being so all Lawyers agree My Lord Primate Bramhal in his Book of A fair Warning to take heed of the Scottish Discipline shewing in Chap. 6. that I have before referred to That it robs the King of his Dispensative Power doth wish any one averse to that Power no greater Censure then that the Penal Laws might be duly executed on him till he recant his error And how Penal a thing by the Laws of Nations it is to alienate the hearts of People from the Prince's Government all the great Writers of those Laws and of the Iura Majestatis have enough shewn Moreover how Criminal a thing of that Nature is in the Court of Conscience our two great Writers of it Ames and Sanderson have enough taught us The Moral offices of Subjects toward their Princes are well set forth in Ames his Cases of Conscience 1. 5. c. 25. and where he saith Debent ex singulari reverentiâ cavere ne temerarium judicium ferant de ipsorum administrationes Exod. 21. 28. Eccles. 10. 20. 2 Pet. 2. 10. Jud. 8. Fundamentum hujus cautionis est 1. Candor ille qui cum erga omnes debet adhiberi tum singulariter erga Superiores 2. Difficultas explorandi fontes causas negotiorum Publicorum 3. Moderatio illa quâ leves infirmitates offensiones tolerare debemus communi tranquillitati
Consciences and who might thereby think that according to the Rule of ejus est interpretari cujus est condere that the Oath of Supremacy enjoyn'd by Parliament 1 o Elizabethoe could not receive an Interpretation but from the Queen in Parliament and that that Consideration might therefore be supposed to be the cause of the Queens interpreting being approved or declared good by the Parliament in the Fifth year of her Reign B. I shall tell you that as to the sufficiency of the Queen's Power to interpret the Oath by her sole Authority it appears not that the Proviso in the Statute of 5 Eliz. did in the least arise from any such scruple and so De non apparentibus c. And here without troubling you with the Notions of the Royal assent creating the Soul of the Law and by the words of le Roy le veult after the Body of it hath been prepared by the three Estates and that the three Estates have nothing to do to interpret a Law that is once made and accordingly as Sir C. Hatton formerly Lord Chancellor of England in his Treatise of Acts of Parliament and their Exposition tells us That the Assembly of Parliament being ended functi sunt officio and speaking particularly of those of the Lower House saith their Authority is return'd to the Electors so clearly that if they were all together assembled again for interpretation by a voluntary meeting eorum non esset interpretari c. I shall once for all observe to you that our Monarchs when in the exercise of the Prerogative inherent in them and inseparable from them relating to Matters of Peace and War the Coining of Money or the Dispensing in Matters Civil or Ecclesiastical they condescend to have the same in particular â—…ases approved or strengthâ—…n'd by Parliament are no more deprived of their Sole Supremacy therein then the Body of the Sun is devested of its Heat and Light by diffusing the same through the Air. But I have before observ'd to you that the apparent Cause in the Proviso of 5 o Elizabethoe whereby the Queens Interpretation is Enacted is the better to transmit the obligatoriness of the Interpretation in point of Conscience beyond her Life and to the Reigns of her Heirs and Successors and to bind us who live now to acknowledge such Power due to our present King over the Persons of all his Subjects as was in her interpretation challenged to be due to Harry the Eighth and Edward the Sixth I shall not trouble you with my Judgment about Moot-points of Law relating to the Regal Power of interpreting Acts of Parliament and particularly such wherein Oaths are founded My Lord Coke Inst. 3. c. 74. tells us That an Oath cannot be ministred to any unless the same be allow'd by the Common Law or by some Act of Parliament neither can any Oath allow'd by the Common-Law or by Act of Parliament be alter'd but by Act of Parliament and saith in the Margin So resolv'd An. 26. El. in the Case of the Under-Sheriff And then saith the Oath of the King 's Privy Councel the Iustices the Sheriffs c. was thought fit to be alter'd and enlarged but that was done by Authority of Parliament For further proof whereof see the Statutes here quoted i. e. those referr'd to in his Margin and it shall evidently appear that no old Oath can be alter'd or new Oath rais'd without an Act of Parliament I have only here referr'd you to Matters of Fact in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth a Reign that the Royal Martyr in p. 3. of his Declaration to all his Loving Subjects of Aug. 12. 1642. refers to with so much honour by saying We declared our Resolution c. and desired that whatsoever mistaking had grown in the Government either of Church or State might be removed and all things reduced to the order of the time the memory whereof is justly precious to this Nation of Queen Elizabeth c. and do leave it to you to consider how Great the Power of Interpretation of Laws is in it self a Power almost infinitely greater then the discharging either the Obligations of some Penal Laws or their Penalties Pro hic nu c and as to some particular Persons as any one will grant who hath seen the extent of the Power of interpreting in the Canon Law where the Glossa ad Cap. Statuimus 4. Distinct. 4. gives us this Interpretation of Statuimus STATUIMUS i. e. ABROGAMUS And I can for this purpose tâ—…ll you that Bartolâ—…s in his Tractatus testimoniorum speaking of the Imperial Power concedendi veniam oetatis saith Carolus quarâ—…us sanctissimus nebilissimus Imperator inter 〈◊〉 multâ—… concessit ut ego meique descendentes quos legibús dâ—…los esse contigerit per un versum imperium oetatis venâ—…am concedere valeâ—…mus servataÌ„ formaÌ„ quoe legibus reperitur insâ—…rta and whereby you see that a Power of dispensing with incapaciâ—…y was by the Prince given as an inheritance But none can imagine that the Power of interpreting Laws can be so conferr'd So that therefore according to the Rule of Law Non debet cui plus licet quoÌ„d minus est non licere you neâ—…d not wâ—…nder at the Prince's dispensing with incapacity in particular cases whom you have seen interpreting Laws And you may consider that if the Queen did contrary to the measures of Law referr'd to in my Lord Coke by her sole Supream Ecclesiastical Authority seem to alter the interpretation of a Stature Oath for the better what she did found afterward its approbation in Parliament and in fine I leave it to you to consider how much the Power of dispensing with any Law may be thought Coincident with interpreting since as I shall some other time shew you at large that the dispensing with Laws is in effect the equitable interpreting that in such and such cases and circumstances they were not intended and ought not to bind but ought to be relax'd And now I must take the occasion offer'd me to give you a prospect of the Queens Dispensative Power both of the Interpretation of this Oath and of the acquittal from Disabilities that is not bounded by the Statutes of 5 o or 8 o Elizabethoe beforemention'd and wherein she again stood on the single basis of her own Supreme Authority Ecclesiastical without having recourse then to a Parliaments approbation Mr. Ney in his learned Observations on the Oath of Sâ—…premacy having spoke of the Queens Interpretation of the Oath in her Admonition and of the Parliamentary Proviso 5 o Eliz. doth thus go on There is something of Explication further meaning of the Oath in the Artiâ—…les of Religion concluded in the year 1562 and then recites the 37th Article as followeth viz. The Queens Majesty hath the Chief Power in this Realm of England and other her Dominions unto whom the Chief Government of 〈◊〉 Estates of this Realm whether they be Ecclesiastical or Civil in all Causes
Fra. Walsingham And what sense the House of Commons had in the beginning of the Reign of King Iames the First of the Disabling of several of the Nonconformist Divines being a Gravamen to the Realm appears by the Petition of that House to the King Anno 1610. as I find it in Mr. Nye's Beams of former Light p. 103. viz. Whereas divers painful and learned Pastors that have long time travell'd in the work of the Ministry with good Fruit and Blessing of their Labour have been removed from Ecclesiastical livings being their free-hold and from all means of maintenance to the great grief of sundry your Majesty's well-affected Subjects we therefore humbly beseech your Majesty would be graciously pleas'd that such deprived and silenced Ministers living quietly and peaceably may be restored c. But in short if you consider that the great Cause that excited the Loyal Zeal express'd in the Statute of the First of Queen Elizabeth and whereby so many Statutes of Harry the 8th against the Papal â—…pations were revived was that the King and Kingdom might not be disabled by Clergy-mens not being Subjects to the Crown through Papal Exemptions and that the Crown might Cum effectu be restored to its Government over them i. e. of the whole Realm and that our Monarchs should by means of such Exemption be no more disabled from being Governors only IN their Realm and not OF it and as when the Right of two Persons claiming to be Princes of Tuscany was before the Pope's Arbitrage he determin'd that one of them should be A Prince IN Tuscany and the other Oâ—… it you will find that this Supreme Power over all Persons as inherent in the King is the very Lapis Angularis on which your Abjuration of foreign Iurisdiction and on which the whole Promissory part of your Oath are built For when you have first declared in your Oath that the King is the only Supreme Governor of this Realm as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or Causes as Temporal and then what followeth upon that viz. That no foreign Prince Person Prelate State or Potentate hath or ought to have any Iurisdiction Power Superiority Preheminence or Authority Ecclesiastical or Spiritual within this Realm you say And THEREFORE I do â—…tterly renounce and forsake aâ—…l foreign Iurisdictions c. And do promise that from henceforth I shall bear Faith and true Allegiance to the King's Highness c. and to my Power shall assist and defend all Iurisdictions c. granted or belonging to the King's Highness c. or united and annex'd to the Imperial Crown of this Realm Thus then the Reason why you abjure foreign Jurisdiction for you ABIURE when you swear to quit and forsake as Mr. Nye in his Observations on that Oath tells us and why you promise to assist and defend all Iurisdictions granted or belonging to the King whose Subject you are is resolved into the Kings being the only Supreme Governor of this Realm as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or Causes as Temporal I am here further to tell you that when by your Oath you have renounced the Pope's Dispensative Power you have asserted and have obliged your self to defend the Jurisdiction of the King 's Dispensative Power in the room of it and the defence of which was the great design and drift of the entire Statute of 1 o. Eliz. and of your Oath therein and no collateral thing A. I have been and am pleas'd with that Prospect you have given me into the Region of the Dispensative Power used by the Crown in the Interpretation of my Oath a Region that was before to me like the terra Australis Borealis incognita but to deal frankly with you I am yet to seek out the meaning of this notion last â—…rted by you that the drift and design of the Statute of 1 o. Elizabethae and the Oath was to prop up the King 's Dispensative Power I doubt not but you are perfectly sensible that he who speaks to that tender thing call'd Conscience and about an Oath ought to be tender of any point he urgeth to it and not to wyre-draw any thing by forced Consequences that is to be offered to it as Obligatory B. I assure you I go by those very measures in giving you my Judgment of the design and drift of that Statute as I have done and that he must put the Statute on the wrack that will make it speak any other meaning Consider what the Prefatory part as the key of it mentions viz. That divers good Laws and Statutes that were made in Henry the Eighth's time as well for the utter extinguishment and putting away of all Usurped and Foreign Power c. as also for the restoring and uniting to the Imperial Crown of this Realm the ancient Iurisdictions c. to the same of Right belonging by reason whereof we your most humble and obedient Subjects from the 25th year of the Reign of your said dear Father were continually kept in good order and were disburden'd of divers great and intolerable Charges and Exactions before that time unlawfully taken and exacted by such Foreign Power and Authority as before that was usurped until such time as all the said good Laws and Statutes by one Act of Parliament made in the first and second years of the Reigns of the late King Philip and Queen Mary c. were repeai'â—… by reason whereof they then further mention how they were then brought under an Usurped Foreign Authority to their intolerable Charges and they thereupon desire the Repealing of that Act. Here we are given to see by their dating the aera of their being well govern'd and disburthen'd of divers great intolerable Charges and Exactions taken and exacted by Foreign Power from the 25th of Henry the 8th and had their eye on the Statute of the 25th of Henry the 8th c. 21. entituled No Imposition shall be paid to the Bishop of Rome which sets forth how the Subjects of this Realm were impoverish'd by intolerable Exactions of great Sums of Money taken out of this Realm by the Bishop of Rome as well in Pensions Censes Suits for Provisions and Expeditions of Bulls c. and also for Dispensations Licences Faculties Grants Relaxations Writs call'd Perinde valere Rehabilitations Abolitions and other infinite sorts of Bulls Breves and Instruments of sundry Natures c. wherein the Bishop of Rome hath been not only to be blamed for his Usurpation in the Premisses but also for his abusing and beguiling your Subjects pretending and persuading them that he hath Power to Dispense with all Humane Laws Uses and Customs of all Realms in all Causes which be call'd Spiritual which matter hath been usurped and practised by him and his Predecessors by many years in great deâ—…gation of your Imperial Crown and Authority Royal contrary to Right and Conscience For where this your Graces Realm recognizing no Superior under God but only your Grace hath been and
clear'd of those doubtful Expressions in them which cause their scruples c. whereby they may to the entire Satisfaction of His Majesty and the Nation fully testifie the Allegiance and Fidelity of faithful Subjects and true Patriots and no longer remain as they generally now do distrusted c. But there was another Book that year Publish'd by a Roman Catholick of which the title was A seasonable Discourse shewing how that the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy as our Laws interpret them contain nothing which any good Christian ought to boggle at and where the Saying of Tertullian is quoted Bonae res neminem scandalizant niâ—… malam mentem c. and where having taken notice of the Queen's Admonition and the Proviso of the Statute of 5 o Eliz. and the 37th Article and the Iudgments of the Bishops Bramhal and Carleton as Sir Iohn Winter had done and for the same purpose giveth his Judgment that the taking of those Oaths gives no Scandal and he in p. 38. averrs that Sir John Winter told him many years ago that he had the Iudgment of Sorbouists Secular Priests and Iesuites that he might take the Oath of Supremacy declaring the sense which the Law allows And I shall here by the way take notice that as to the Oath of Allegiance F. Cressy saith in his Epistle Apologetical p. 111. that few Roman Catholicks if any at all would refuse that Oath if that unlucky word heretical were blotted out c. or if they might change heretical into contrary to the Word of God which he saith he verily believes was the sense intended by King James But now after all this said I shall tell you that according to what is observ'd by the generality of Writers oâ—… Princes easing their Subjects by their Dispensative Power of interpreting their Laws viz. That they take occasion then to intermix with such interpretation somewhat else that may advance their Power there were Fears and Iealousies that some of these foremention'd interpretations tho lessening the spiritual Power of the Crown might enlarge its temporal and particularly such as in the Queen's Admonition mention'd the Duty Allegiance and Bond acknowledg'd to be due to Harry the Eighth and Edward the Sixth and as I partly before hinted such as in the Proviso in the Act of the 5th of the Queen that ratifying the Admonition hath in it the additional words of acknowledging in her Majesty her Heirs and Successors the Authority that was challenged and lately used by Harry the Eighth and Edward the Sixth and such as in the 37th Article explain'd the Queen's Power by that given by God himself to all GODLY Princes in Scripture and where notwithstanding the Word Godly being put in there to gild the Pill of the Absolute Power of the Iewish Kings and to make it be the more easily swallow'd the real meaning was the Power given to all the Iewish Kings for the right of their Power depended not on their Godliness and such as in the Canons of King Iames ipso facto Excommunicate all that do not give the King the same Authority in Causes Ecclesiastical not only that the Godly Kings had among the Iews but what the Christian Emperors had in the Primitive Church And there too notwithstanding the word Christian might be for the like reason put in as that of Godly was and to cause the owning of that absolute Imperial Power which pursuant to the Lex Regia was used by the Christian Emperors as well as their Heathen Predecessors in punishing Heterodoxy ad libitum the meaning of the Canon was not to devest Heathen Emperors of their right of judging about Matters of Religion and as to which Grotius in his Letter to the States Embassador having said neither would Paul have appeal'd to Nero had he judged that no right of Iudging in a Case of Religion belong'd to him addeth Wherefore as Trajan Civilly honest Nero wicked are equal in the Right of Government so Pious Constantine and Impious Nero are equal in the right of judging in aptitude and skill unequal The Canons therefore of Forty enjoyning the Explanation or Interpretation of the Regal Power there inserted to be one Sunday in every Quarter of the Year read by the Clergy to their Flocks did well provide for the cautioning them as against the setting up any independent Coactive Power either Papal or Popular so against Fears and Iealousies relating to their Properties in their Goods and Estates and by that Explanation they shew that Christ came not to Undermine or Disturb but to Confirm the Civil Government of Pagan Princes and that in the first times of Christ's Church Christians were ready to submit their very Lives to the very Laws and Commands of those Princes A. But doth that Explanation of the Regal Power assert any thing in Defence of the Dispensative part of it B. You see how without wyre-drawing any Consequences the very first Paragraph of the Explanation doth both strengthen the foundation of the assertory part of your Oath we have been so long discussing and strike out new lights in the Fabrick of the Oath You see it tells you downright that A Supreme Power is given to the Order of Kings by God himself in the Scriptures which is that Kings should rule and Command in their several Dominions all Persons of what rank or estate soever c. And the Explanation doth effectually enough provide by the second Paragraph that Kings should take care that none in their Dominions but the stubborn and evil doers may be restrain'd with the Temporal Sword for it saith The Care of God's Church is so committed to Kings in the Scripture that they are commended when the Church keeps the right way and taxed when it runs amiss and therefore her Government belongs in chief to Kings For otherwise one man would be Commended for another's Care and taxed but for another's Negligence which is not God's way And this is an Argument taken ab absurdo and the strongest that can be used in Law and not to be set aside but by the alledging something as more absurd against it and amounts to this that it is absurd that Kings who are commended when those who are not stubborn nor evil doers are not under any restraint by the Temporal Sword for the Church runs not the right way when that Sword is a terror to any but evil doers and tax'd on the contrary being done should not be judged to be authorized to exempt those from all restraint thereby And when the People are not liable to blame for Kings erring in their Judgment about the Persons to be so exempted from restraint nor to be commended or rewarded for their not erring therein can any thing be more absurd then for the independent Coactive Power of Kings it self to be restrain'd to the Punishing such as they shall judge Innocent But the two tenderest things in the World are Sovereign Power and Conscience and both of them were made with a
to perform the Conditions and that the King his Father should do the like Secondly That the Promises of Marriage should be presently made c. but that the Consummation of the Marriage should not at all be executed till the Month of May in the following year 1624. to the end that they might experimentâ—…lly see if the aforesaid Conditions required by his Holiness should be faithfully accomplish'd c. As to the first the Prince of Wales took an Oath to His Majesty to observe the foresaid Conditions and sign'd them with his Hand and he likewise swore and sign'd this by way of Over-plus to permit at all times that Any should freely propose to him the Arguments of the Catholick-Religion without giving any impediment and that he would never directly nor indirectly permit any to speak to the Infanta against the same But I shall here en passant observe to you out of the general Articles namely that in the 16th Article notwithstanding my Lord Coke's Opinion before-mention'd that a new Oath cannot be introduced nor an old one alter'd but by Act of Parliament there is a new Oath of fealty agreed to by the King to be tender'd both to Foreigners and Subjects of England who were to serve the Infanta and care taken that no Clause or word therein shall contradict the Roman Religion or Consciences of the Roman-Catholicks and that by the 24th Article for the Security that every thing that was agreed to should be fulfill'd the King and Prince were to be bound by Oath that all the Privy Councellors should sign the Agreement And I need not tell you that their being sworn to the private Articles was a new Oath A. Was nothing of the King's mind about the Suspending ALL the Penal Laws both the disabling ones and others against the Papists notify'd to his Privy Councel before the year 1623 B. Mr. Prynne there in p. 30. saith that for the hastening the Pope's Dispensation for the Match King James as the French Mercure Tom. 9. records it and as he had CREDIBLY been inform'd of from others assembling his Privy Councel together Febr. 25. 1622. made a long Oration to them which he recites at large the sum whereof was this That the Roman-Catholicks in England had sustain'd great and intolerable surcharges imposed on their Goods Bodies Consciences during Queen Elizabeth's Reign of which they hoped to be relieved in his c. That now he had maturely consider'd the Penury and Calamities of the Roman-Catholicks who were in the number of his faithful Subjects and was resolv'd to relieve them and therefore did from thenceforth take all his Roman-Catholick Subjects into his Protection permitting them the Liberty and entire Exercise of their Religion c. without any Inquisition Process or Molestation from that day forward and likewise will and ordain that they shall be restored to all their Estates Lands Fees and Seignories and re-establish'd in them Commanding all his Magistrates Iustices and other Officers whatsoever in this behalf to hold their hands and for what Cause soever it be not to attempt hereafter to grieve or molest the said Catholicks neither in publick nor private in the liberty of the exercise of their Religion upon pain of being reputed Guilty of High Treason and Disturbers of the Kingdoms peace and repose this being his will and definitive Sentence A. But still I cannot forbear wondring about what Considerations made our Divines and our Great Champions of the Church of England-Protestancy in the State as well as Church afterward thus inclinable to act their Parts about Toleration as Mr. Prynne hath mention'd B. They had cause enough to apprehend that the Hierarchy of England could not be supported without the Monarchy and that by reason of the various growth of the Potency of foreign Princes and States and of intestine Factions the Monarchy could not be then sufficiently secure without a foreign Alliance by inter-marriage and that where such Alliance was to be with the Familiâ—…s of Roman-Catholick Princes there could be no expectation of the Pope's relaxing his Laws by dispensing without our Princes doing something of that kind as to theirs I might here observe to you that we are told in The Regal Apology that the Oxford Antiquities mention'd to have been writ by Dr. Bate that A particular Toleration had a former President even in Queen Elizabeth in those Articles of Marriage which were consented to with the Duke of Anjou and if it were true that an Universal Toleration was agreed on by King James it was intuitu majoris boni The Palatinate was to be restored again and the Protestants of Germany to be re-enstated in their Possessions on that Condition But to punish being a kind of Punishment and it being irreligious to punish Men for Religion and the highest tide of Anger being naturally succeeded by the lowest ebbe of it and the thoughts of rigorous Severity in Princes toward their Subjects being like such in the Head toward the Members of the same Body and King Iames having found that the general abhorrence of the Gun-Powder-Treason had blown up the credit of those fiery Doctrines that produced it and he being then within Prospect of his end and being unwilling that the Sun of his Life should go down in his wrath and finding as appears by his long Proclamation of four sheets of Paper declaring his Pleasure concerning the Dissolving of the Parliament A. 16â—…1 that they were not the Papists who made his later breath so uneasie to him and he being of opinion that the reason of the severe Laws was much abated it may abate of our wonder that in that Conjuncture he put a Period to their Execution Mr. Prynne for this purpose in p. 14. of that Book Prints a Letter of the Lord Keeper Williams to the Iâ—…dges in the year following to acquaint them that His Majesty having resolv'd out of deep Reasons of State and in expectation of like Correspondence from foreign Princes to the Professors of our Religion to grant some Grace and Conveniency to the imprison'd Papists of this Kingdom had Commanded him to pass some Writs under the Broad Seal for that purpose and that he had accordingly done so and tells them that 't is His Majesty's Pleasure that they shall make no niceness or difficulty to extend that his Princely favour to all Papists imprison'd for any Church Recusancy whatsoever or refusing the Oath of Supremacy or hearing of Mass or any other point of Recusancy which doth touch or concern Religion only and not matters of State which shall appear to you to be totally Civil and Political A. You lately mentâ—…on'd to me that the Earl of Bristol hinted it that there was afterward somewhat of Compliance with the Pope in the Match with France of that nature as was in the Spanish Wâ—…at account doth Mr. Prynne give of that B. He tells you there p. 69. that the French Maâ—…ch was soon Concluded in the life of King James the Articles concerning