Selected quad for the lemma: duty_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A41817
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Two letters written to the author of a pamphlet entituled Solomon and Abiathar, or, The case of the deprived bishops and clergy discussed
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Grascome, Samuel, 1641-1708?
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1692
(1692)
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Wing G1579; ESTC R37402
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44,307
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44
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case he die or relinquinish yet suffer no injury to be to the next Heir but proclaim him to be without the help of any Ceremony or Formality immediately King in the very first moment of the vacancy as admitting no Interregnum I think this had been no ill cause But then farther suppose none of these consented and that the matter only was coram non judice and they were ejected by those who had nothing to do with them with your leave Sir I do not think my self bound to ratifie the iniqulty of such proceedings But since you have assumed the Authority to assign what Causes you please I will stick to those you have named i. e. The adhering to the Doctrines of the Church and the Laws of God And what then Sir Why then you say this will require a very clear proof But pray Sir Who are they that ought to bring this clear proof I have heard some say that it is an Axiome in Law That they who expect the benefit ought to make the proof Now you get all into your hands and would you give no reason for it The Meridian Sun is not more clear than that King James possessed His Crown by an undoubted Right and the ejected Clergy held their Sees and other Charges by an unquestionable Title whether you have respect to the Laws of the Church or the Land when therefore you dispossess them of such manifest acknowledged Right you ought to bring if possible more clear and demonstrable proofs for your proceedings otherwise all reasonable Men ought to condemn you for your bold and barbarous injustice so that this clear proof you call for ought to be on your side If a Thief rob me of my Goods it were very unreasonable to leave me no other remedy than the producing such reasons to him as should prevail with him to restore them again For perhaps he would not hear me or if he did it would be but to mock me for though my proofs were never so clear yet 't is ten thousand to one that he would never own them to be so yet much at this rate you deal with us and which is worse you make our Plea for us and suffer us not to speak but as you please But since it must be so I 'll follow you in the course you take though a very unreasonable task You seem to grant That our Church teacheth us to preserve an untainted Loyalty to our Lawfull Sovereigns which with us come in by Inheritance and that accordingly our Oath of Allegiance binds us to the King his Heirs and Lawfull Successors And you might have told us several other things which this Church teacheth us viz. Canonical Obedience to our Spiritual Fathers the indispensable Duty of Children to Parents whenever they command it or their condition requires it the not running with a multitude to do evil nor the encouraging other Men in their wickedness In short whatever the sacred word of God or the reverend Constitutions of his Church requires from us But to omit these things which are so apt to gather the Tares of Schismaticks and Rebels I shall examin what you say to your own Proposals An untainted Loyalty you approve while the Obligation lasts and we desire no more But then you think this Obligation may cease not only by Death or Resignation but also by Cession nor do I think it worth while to dispute this with you provided it be real not forced nor falsly imputed For so any Man that is driven out of his House or takes a journey from home may be interpreted to have quitted his Estate by Cession But when Cession is real which is very rare it can effect only the Party who makes it and ought to be no injury to the next Heir and in our particular case our Constitutions will not suffer it But after all the main assertion is such an impudent falshood as nothing but a person bewitch'd with Rebellion would offer For has that person made a Cession who though to perserve his life he fly from Fraud and irresistable Force yet all the while claims his Right calls on all persons to do him justice and useth all honest means that may be to recover his Right At this rate every Man would have made a Cession who suffers wrong though he bestir himself all he can to do himself Right But say you This was such a Cession as the States in Convention judged a virtual Abdication of the Sovereignty and of this you add they were the most Competent Authentick and Final Judges and this you tell us we are to submit to because the Kingdom hath ratified those proceedings in a second Parliament Now not to complain of unrighteous Judgment though there was never more cause the Answer I shall return is That they were neither Competent Authentick nor Final Judges Competent they could not be who for the prevailing part of them were either actually in the Conspiracy against him or joined with the Conspirators and refused so much as to read his Letters or hear any Message from him Nor could they be Authentick Judges who had no Law to authorize either them or their Proceedings nor did I ever hear that the natural Subjects of a Sovereign Monarch could be his Authentick Judges unless from President Bradshaw the Regicides and their Adherents And if upon this score you will have the proceedings valid against the Son you must also justisie the barbarous Murder of the Father And then they could not be sinal Judges because being neither Competent nor Authentick Judges they were no proper Judges at all Nor doth it all help the matter that you call these your Judges the Estates and farther to countenance the matter place them in Convention For how are they Estates but with respect to the King and Constitution Which if they overthrow pray what becomes of their Estateships It is the King made them such and they are so with Subordination to him nor is their Convention any thing without him they cannot convene without his Writ You might have remembred that your Oracle Dr. B tells you that single defect makes an essential Nullity if they do convene they can only act by and under the King's Authority and when they are come to a resolution and have concluded upon any thing still all sinks again into nothing unless it be ratified with the Royal Assent Thus without the King your Estates are insignificant but against him our Law condemns them as Rebels and those of all others are the most unfit persons to make the only Competent Authentick and Final Judges of the most Fundamental part of our Constitutions Did ever Men make them Judges of the Law who are condemned by the Law This is to pull the Judge from the Bench and set up the Offender from the Bar. Nor will it afford you any relief that these proceedings were ratified by a second Parliament which had never a first For as for your Transubstantiating Convention which would
about if they be not sensible already I doubt not but they will in a little time And now Sir if you will give me the same liberty to put together which you take I cannot learn from all this how our old Laws and Oaths binds us to your new Allegiance but that rather our Constitutions and Oaths binds us to King JAMES and not to William though the contrary hereto is your shameless conclusion from your wild Premises All along you make Dyscheres by whom you represent us to give up the cause as far as you go which disingenuous dealing we have too much cause to complain of but the better to detect it I must follow your steps and now comes such a tremendous Objection that I wonder your Joynts did not tremble and your Hand shake when you set Pen to Paper it is to this effect That when the violence is essentially unjust unnatural and contrary to the moral and eternal Laws of God and Righteousness no Human compacts can ratifie such wrong or justifie and confirm what is essentially injurious nor ought the Priests of the most High God to consecrate and confirm such Rapes by Oaths and Religious Sponsions If there be any such thing as this and such I fear we shall find there is if there be any such thing as God's Commandments we had need have a care what we do That Man's wit is ill bestowed on him who argues himself out of his own Soul But here you think to slip your Neck out of the Collar by telling us That the internal Immorality of all actions must be carefully distinguished from the civil Consequences of them Well be it so we will do this for you too as fairly and carefully as we can and what then Why then suppose say you p. 6. A Son by fraudulent Arts gets Judgment in Law and seizes his Father's Estate and Body by Execution and starves his Father in Prison this Man's Immorality is damnable Is it so I think this is a bone for some body to pick which may hold him tug tho' his Teeth were as long as his NOSE But Sir what if a Daughter should do thus Will not this Womans Immorality be damnable If not pray next time you write give us a reason of the difference But it seems if they should be both damned Yet the Judges Sheriffs and other Officers are innocent It may be so whilst they act as Officers of Law and according to the directions of Law but if your Judges Sheriffs or other Officers make themselves Parties and join with and assist such a wicked Son or Daughter to effect such an evil act or do applaud and approve it when they know it be done by such wicked and unlawfull Arts then their being Officers of Law will rather encrease than deminish their guilt And so for your Robbers and Pirates a Man may lawfully suffer by them tho' it were better if he could escape it but if you will plead that their Robberies and Piracies are lawfull if you say they require a just right to what they get by such wicked means or if you actually join with them and rob and share in their Booties you will be as very a Rogue as they and which is most like the Case I leave others to judge Much such another instance is your Lord of a Mannor let him look how he came to be so I may treat with him as Lord of the Mannor whom the Law declares to be so But if the Lord's Tenants conspire against their lawfull Landlord and dispossess him of his Mannor and invite a Stranger and say and swear he shall be Lord of the Mannor and accordingly pay Homage and Fealty to him you Sir may determine for their swearing and lying too if you please but I shall have nothing the better opinion of your Honesty for it But now let the Fifth Commandment look to it self for it was never so hardly beset There are a sort of Protestants who I think are resolved by making away the Fifth Commandment to be even with the Papists for suppressing the Second and indeed according as some Men act and write unless it be to furnish pretence and to shew our fine Cloaths and eat roast Meat on Sundays I see not what occasion they have for any Commandments and so they might make Religion a Law of Liberty or a Liberty from all Law and I do not perceive Sir that you much mend the matter you say That from the Fifth Commandment we cannot charge K. W. with Subjection to King JAMES c. p. 7. If by this you mean that we cannot thence prove him to have been his Subject I do not know that ever any Man attempted such a thing but does a Nephew and a Son-in-Law owe no Duty if he owe not that which is properly called Subjection Or may a Man because he is not his Subject spoil another of all he has And must all persons applaud and approve the Act and swear he is in the right The Case of an own Daughter is still more severe but for that you say That she is in Duty bound to follow her Husband's Fortune Order and Authority even against the Will of her Father and this with a more plenary consent if she judged her Husbands Cause to be just I do not think either her or your judgment worth a farthing unless the Cause be just in it self Sorry Arguments will serve to persuade Ambitious persons that they have right to a Crown though unconcerned persons at the same time plainly see the fallaciousness of them But Sir I am not satisfied with your bare word that a Woman is bound thus to follow her Husband through thick and thin I grant that she ought to be the Partner both of his Joys and Sorrows but let her have a care how she becomes Partner in his Sins nor doth the relation of a Wife take away the relation of a Child as you seem to intimate tho' you are ashamed plainly to say it they may indeed limit each other so that the Father may not command the Daughter any thing inconsistent with the Duty of a Wife nor the Husband the Wife any thing inconsistent with the Duty of a Child to a Parent but yet the great end of these relations is to strengthen and support not to destroy each other as you closely insinuate Besides your reason is a mistake in it self as to this Case for could you with all your tricks of Legerdemain remove both King James and the Prince of Wales out of the way then there would rise another relation and then he in these Dominions must follow her Fortunes not she his for according to our Constitutions she would be his Queen and here he must be her Subject It is true the Name of King would be allowed but the Power by our Constitutions would be lodged in her and he would be liable to offend against her Laws to Treason against her Person and to be tried by her Authority