Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
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A59242
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Reflexions upon the oathes of supremacy and allegiance by a Catholick gentleman, and obedient son of the church, and loyal subject of His Majesty.
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Sergeant, John, 1622-1707.
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1661
(1661)
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Wing S2588; ESTC R33866
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51,644
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98
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by that of Allegiance Though how can Equivocation be excluded when according to them one Equivocation may be renounced by another A most horrid example whereof England has lately seen in the R. Padre Antonio Vais 72. Neither do Protestants think that a Declaration formerly made by the Pope and forbidding Catholicks to take those Oaths with any Interpretation whatsoever needs to be a hindrance to the taking of it in the forementioned sence so publickly avouched but onely in any secret meanings invented or mentally reserved by particular persons For surely the Pope intends not to take a power from Law-givers to interpret their own lawes nor to forbid their Subjects to admit their interpretations if they be agreable to truth and that the words be capable of being so interpreted as these are pretended to be Certain it is that the Pope was never informed of this so legal an interpretation For if he had he would never have forbidden that to distressed English Catholicks which to his knowledg all good Subjects in France Germany Venice c. neither will nor dare refuse to acknowledge and profess Besides say they is England now become the only Kingdom in Christendom where all manner of Briefs must be immediately submitted to without a publick Legal acceptation and without examination of the Motives or suggestions by which they wâ—re procured It is far otherwise now in the most Catholick Countries and was formerly even in England when it was most Catholick the Lawes then made against receiving or executing Bulls from Rome without a publick admission under the penalty of incurring a Praemunire are still in force 73. If Catholicks rejoyning say that there is another regard for which they are unwilling even to receive information touching any qualifications of these Oaths viz. because the mere admitting a probability that they may lawfully and without prejudice to Catholick Faith be taken would argue that so many vertuous wise and holy Men as have suffered death c. for refusing them have suffred without any necessary cause Such were Bishop Fisher Sir Thomas More c. in King Henry the eights dayes and many good Priests since 74. Notwithstanding say Protestants such a consequence is not necessary For first it hath been shewed that King Henry the eighth intended to exclude the purely spiritual Jurisdiction of the Pope his power of determining matters of Faith according to former Lawes of the Church c. And therefore no wonder that good Catholicks then would not betray their consciences But it is well known that Sir Thomas More advised the King to limit some excesses of the Popes Jurisdiction And an eminent writer tells us that Bishop Fisher offered to take the Oath if it might have been permitted him to explicate his sence of it which could be no other then this that he should deny the Popes temporal Jurisdiction Secondly as for those that suffred in Q. Elizabeths time it is certain that all good Catholicks would never have esteemed it a Martyrdom to dye for refusing to the King a supreme Kingly Power and attributing that to the pope They had therefore a quite different notion of what the state of England required by this Oath But of late good occasion has been given for a more exact examination of it For to make a sincere and ingenuous confession it was a Committee of the late rebellious parliament that probably first of all discovered what use they made of the foresaid proviso in the Act 5. Eliz. to warrant them to take this Oath without submitting their Religion to the King And the same use they judged that all other Sects might make of the same and justify their so doing by law even Roman Catholicks themselves 75. All these things considered it is no wonder that English protestants not being fully informed of the state of Catholicks should wonder at Roman Catholicks for their so Universal agreement in refusing an Oath so interpreted without the least prejudice to their faith but with so unexpressible a prejudice both to their estates and exercise of their Religion 76. The Authour of these Reflexions does freely acknowledge that he has been inquisitive with more then ordinary diligence into the grounds upon which Protestants do make no scruple at all to take an oath which if it had no Expounders to qualifie the sence properly imported by the words he knows they could not take it with a good conscience Nay moreover he has given all the advantage that he could to the proofes produced by them to justify that no other sence ought to be given therto by any English Subject in so much as he may apprehend that he shall incurr a danger to be esteemed by Catholicks to have a design to encourage them also to take it since that sence is such as is very convenient to the principles of Catholick Religion 77. But he protests the contrary His end in writing all this is besides a satisfaction given to his mind that he cannot now without breach of Charity charge Protestants with such an unsincerity in their taking this Oath as Presbyterians c. are apparently guilty of to afford unto the World an illustrious proof of the most perfect sincerity and the greatest tendernesse of conscience expressed on this occasion by the generality of English Catholicks that I believe ever was given by any Church since Christs time 78. They live here in their own native Country with lesse priviledg then strangers they are excluded from having any influence on any thing that concerns the Common-weale of which they are freeborn Subjects When laws are made against them as guilty persons they are not permitted to separate their cause from a few that only deserved the penalties of those lawes they are by lawes obnoxious to greater sufferings then enemies they see their families impoverished their houses invaded by savage officers their lives forfeited as Traytours for entertaining those without whom they could not live otherwise then as Pagans deprived of performing any service and worship to God c. All these miseries they groan under without proofe of any demerit on their parts the crimes of a few miserable seduced and seducing wretches and their bloody Doctrine by none in the Kingdom more detested then by themselves are made their guilt And these calamities they could avoid by taking an oath the present new acknowleded sence whereof as to his Majesties right is just and lawful And yet they dare not take it Why Because they fear God above all But do not Protestants fear him too They are no Judges of the consciences of others This they assure themselves of that if those that now take the Oath had been to have framed it they would have shewed a greater proof of their fear of God then to have expressed the Kings Supremacy in termes fit for none but K. Hen. the VIII 79. But moreover great difference there is between the case of Protestants and Roman Catholicks in regard of this Oath For
fundamental Christian verity 2. That the preaching of that doctrine will be far more safe yea only safe in conscience because if it be probable that it is an Article of faith the teaching of the contrary may perhaps come to be Heretical which the teaching of it cannot be 104. In vain therefore do they expect so easie a condescendence from others and the more unreasonably because themselves dare not justifie this their Article of Faith in the Catholick Kingdom of France to be so much as a probable opinion no not in these times when they lately had a great Cardinal a Minister of State their confident and a Confessarius or manager of the Kings conscience their Court-instrument Who is so much too much a Courtier and as long as he lives in France too little a zelot for this their peculiar principle as that he dares not so much as motion to his penitentan acceptation of that Decree of Lateran interpreted in their sence but freely absolves him and admits him to the communion without so much as confessing among his faults his dis-beliefe of this Article yea professing the contrary Nay more they themselves whilst they are there do not believe it for if they did they would not surely omit to attempt the conversion of French Catholicks at least in articulo mortis to this their Fundamental point of Faith but this they dare not and care not to do nor do they refuse to take mony for praying for their souls as they did formerly in England to some that defended the Oath of Allegiance 105. What charme then have they to make such a topical uncatholick Aricle of Faith to serve only for the Meridian of England which of all the Countries in Christendome ought least to hear any mention of it They themselves in France are or at least appear Catholicks a la mode de France and dare not so much as in a whisper say that this is a topical Opinion much less an Article of Faith And yet the King there is of the Popes own Religion and consequently not obnoxious to the danger of it What stupidity then what blindness do they presume to find among us English Catholicks that they should fancy that we do not evidently see that it is their own secular interest only that makes the same point of Doctrine to be de fide in an Island and a pestilent errour in terra firma 106. In vain therefore do they hope that all Catholicks which have not made them the Depositaries of all their reason and common sence will admit a position infinitely prejudicial to their Religion to their King and to their own souls which they would renounce in regard of their own single Estates or persons For suppose a Bull of Excommunication should be procured from Rome against any Catholick Lord Gentleman or Farmer in England for some new Heresie of Jansenisme or for denying their Exemptions c. and that in consequence thereof the Pope by his temporal Authority should lay a sine upon their heads or deprive them of their Titles and Estates Would those Lords or Gentlemen quietly be content to be unlorded and become peasants or would they pay their fines and resign their Estates to such Apostles If not as most certainly they would not with what conscience would they suffer themselves to be perswaded that the Sacred person of their Soveraign only is obnoxious to slavery beggery and danger 107. Though that party therefore be so tender-conscienced that they dare not or so obnoxious to Superiours abroad that they must not according to the clause of this Oath of Allegiance swear that they do detest as impious that position of theirs That Princes excummunicated or deprived by the Pope may be deposed or murdred by their subjects Yet since English Catholicks yea even their own penitents will be both good Catholicks and therefore good subjects as all are in France Germany Venice Flanders c. Till an Authentick approved received decree of the Church be produced or procured to declare not in England only but all Christendom over that that position is de fide they will not be deprived of their Christian liberty to renounce it especially being assured that without renouncing of it the State will never acknowledg them for loyal Subjects It is well known that in France there was an Oath framed by the whole Body of the fiers Estate in which they are to be sound farr more comprehensive expressions then are in our Oath for therein is expresly affirmed That there is no power on Earth either spiritual or temporal that hath any right over his Majesties Kingdom to deprive the sacred persons of our Kings nor to to dispence with or absolve their Subjects from their loyalty and obedience whiâ—h they owe to them for any cause or pretence whatsoever 108. This will suffice concerning that position which those who will not be permitted to renounce but rather maintain it to Article of faith yet however will perhaps not refuse to profess themselves ready to swear 1. That the Kings of England excommunicated by the Pope may not be murthered by their Subjects and to detest the contrary as Heretical 2. Yea moreover that notwithstanding any sentence of deprivation ever hereafter upon what occasion soever to ensue they will bear faith and true Allegiance to his Majesty and his successours And what needs Princes desire any greater security say they what need they trouble themselves with their Subjects speculative opinions 109. But alas a miserable security a poor testimony or gage of fidelity is all this God knowes For first Murder being an unjust killing out of malice and with a deliberate purpose is a sin so horrible in it self that God himself cannot make it lawfull much lesse the Pope therefore in all reason instead of those words May not be murdred they ought to say may not be killed by their Subjects For otherwise notwithstanding that Oath the Pope may be acknowledged to be a competent Judge of life and death over our Kings to sentence them to the slaughter and that sentence may be put in execution without murther For who ever said that a Malefactour put to death by Law was murthered by the Judges sentence 110. But whether they say May not be murthered or May not be killed Princes will esteem themselves little advantaged by such an Oath unlesse the swearers say withal May not be deposed For whosoever has a supreme just right upon any pretence whatsoever to Depose Princes has thereby right to cause them to be killed in case they by armes oppose the Execution of that sentence And can it be imagined that any Prince judged an Heretick or otherwise guilty by the Pope and by him sentenced to be deposed will thereupon quietly descend out of his Throne and yield up his Scepter to one of a contrary Religion Or rather is it not most certain that they will not but on the contrary bring with them many thousands of their armed