by certain Noblemen and others of our Kingdom of Ireland suggesting Disorders and Abuses as well in the Proceedings of the late begun Parliament as in the Martial and Civil Government of the Kingdom We did receive with extraordinary Grace and Favour And by another Proclamation in the 12th year of his Reign Procl 12 Jac. he declares That it was the Right of his Subjects to make their immediate Addresses to him by Petition and in the 19th year of his Reign he invites his Subjects to it And in the 20th year of his Reign Procl Dat. 10 July 19. Jac. Procl Dat. 14. Feb. 20. Jac. he tells his People that his own and the Ears of his Privy Council did still continue open to the just Complaints of his People and that they were not confined to Times and Meetings in Parliament nor restrained to particular Grievances not doubting but that his loving Subjects would apply themselves to his Majesty for Relief to the utter abolishing of all those private whisperings and causless Rumors which without giving his Majesty any Opportunity of Reformation by particular knowledge of any Fault serve to no other purpose but to occasion and blow abroad Discontentment It appears Lords Journ Anno 1640. that the House of Lords both Spiritual and Temporal Nemine contradicente Voted Thanks to those Lords who Petitioned the King at York to call a Parliament And the King by his Declaration Printed in the same year Declar. 1644. declares his Royal Will and Pleasure That all his Loving Subjects who have any just cause to present or complain of any Grievances or Oppressions may freely Address themselves by their humble Petitions to his Sacred Majesty who will graciously hear their Complaints Since his Majesty's happy Restauration Temp. Car. 2. the Inhabitants of the County of Bucks made a Petition That their County might not be over-run by the Kings Deer and the same was done by the County of Surry on the same Occasion 'T is time for me to conclude your trouble I suppose you do no longer doubt but that you may joyn in Petition for a Parliament since you see it has been often done heretofore nor need you fear how many of your honest Countreymen joyn with you since you hear of Petitions by the whole Body of the Realm and since you see both by the Opinions of our Lawyers by the Doctrine of our Church and by the Declarations of our Kings That it is our undoubted Right to Petition Nothing can be more absurd than to say That the number of the Supplicants makes an innocent Petition an Offence on the contrary if in a thing of this Publick concernment a few only should address themselves to the King it would be a thing in it self ridiculous the great end of such Addresses being to acquaint him with the general desires of his People which can never be done unless multitudes joyn How can the Complaints of the diffusive Body of the Realm reach his Majesty's Ears in the absence of a Parliament but in the actual concurrence of every individual Person in Petition for the personal application of multitudes is indeed unlawful and dangerous Give me leave since the Gazette runs so much in your mind Stat. 13. Car. 2. c. 5. to tell you as I may modestly enough do since the Statute directs me what answer the Judges would now give if such another Case were put to them as was put to the Judges 2 Jacobi Suppose the Nonconformists at this day as the Puritans then did should sollicite the getting of the hands of Multitudes to a Petition to the King for suspending the Execution of the Penal Laws against themselves the present Judges would not tell you that this was an Offence next to Treason or Felony nor that the Offenders were to be brought to the Council-board to be punished but they would tell you plainly and distinctly That if the hands of more Persons than twenty were solicited or procured to such a Petition and the Offenders were convicted upon the Evidence of two or more credible Witnesses upon a Prosecution in the Kings-bench or at the Assizes or Quarter Sessions within six Months they would incur a Penalty not exceeding a 100 l. and three Months Imprisonment because their Petition was to change a matter establisht by Law But I am sure you are a better Logician than not to see the difference which the Statute makes between such a Petition which is to alter a thing establisht by Law and an innocent and humble Petition That a Parliament may meet according to Law in a time when the greatest Dangers hang over the King the Church and the State The Right Honourable the Earl of Shaftsbury 's Speech in the House of Lords March 25. 1679. My Lords YOU are appointing of the Consideration of the State of England to be taken up in a Committee of the whole House some day next Week I do not know how well what I have to say may be received for I never study either to make my Court well or to be Popular I always speak what I am commanded by the Dictates of the Spirit within me There are some other Considerations that concern England so nearly that without them you will come far short of Safety and Quiet at Home We have a little Sister and she hath no Breasts what shall we do for our Sister in the day when she shall be spoken for If she be a Wall we will build on her a Palace of Silver if she be a Door we will inclose her with Boards of Cedar We have several little Sisters without Breasts the French Protestant Churches the two Kingdoms of Ireland and Scotland The Foreign Protestants are a Wall the only Wall and Defence to England upon it you may build Palaces of Silver glorious Palaces The Protection of the Protestants abroad is the greatest Power and Security the Crown of England can attain to and which can only help us to give Check to the growing Greatness of France Scotland and Ireland are two Doors either to let in Good or Mischief upon us they are much weakened by the Artifice of our cunning Enemies and we ought to inclose them with Boards of Cedar Popery and Slavery like two Sisters go hand in hand sometimes one goes first sometimes the other in a doors but the other is always following close at hand In England Popery was to have brought in Slavery in Scotland Slavery went before and Popery was to follow I do not think your Lordships or the Parliament have Jurisdiction there It is a Noble and Ancient Kingdom they have an illustrious Nobility a Gallant Gentry a Learned Clergy and an Understanding Worthy People but yet we cannot think of England as we ought without reflecting on the Condition therein They are under the same Prince and the Influence of the same Favourites and Councils when they are hardly dealt with can we that are the Richer expect better usage for 't is
do live wicked lives the Lord in mercy convert you and shew you your danger for I as little thought to come to this as any man that hears me this day and I bless God I have no more deserved it from the hands of men than the Child that sucks at his Mothers breast I bless my God for it I do say I have been a sinner against my God and he hath learned me Grace ever since I have been a Prisoner I bless my God for a Prison I bless my God for Afflictions I bless my God that ever I was restrain'd for I never knew my self till he had taken me out of the World Therefore you that have your liberties time and precious opportunities be up and be doing for God and for your Souls every one of you To his Son Where is my dear Child Mr. Sheriff I made one request to you you gave me an imperfect Answer you said you were of the best Reformed Church in the world the Church of England according to the best Reformation in the world I desire you for the satisfaction of the world to declare what Church that is whether Presbyterian or Independant or the Church of England or what Colledge Good Mr. Sheriff for your satisfaction for 20 years and above I was under the Presbyterian Ministry till his Majesties Restauration then I was conformable to the Church of England when that was restored and so continued till such time as I saw Persecution upon the Dissenting People and undue things done in their Meeting-places then I went among them to know what kind of people those were and I take God to witness since that time I have used their Meetings viz. the presbyterians others very seldom and the Church of England I did hear Dr. Tillotson not above three weeks before I was taken I heard the Church of England as frequently as I heard the Dissenters and never had any prejudice God is my witness against either but always heartily desired that they might unite and be Lovers and Friends and I had no prejudice against any man and truly I am afraid that it is not for the Nations good that there should be such Heart-burnings between them That some of the Church of England will preach that the Presbyterians are worse than the Papists God doth know that what I say I speak freely from my heart I have found many among them truly serving God and so I have of all the rest that have come into my company Men without any manner of Design but to serve God serve his Majesty and keep their Liberties and Properties men that I am certain are not of vicious lives I found no Dammers or those kind of People amongst them or at least few of them To his Son Kissing him several times with great passion Dear Child Farewell the Lord have mercy upon thee Good people let me have your Prayers to God Almighty to receive my Soul And then he Prayed and as soon as he had done spake as followeth The Lord have mercy upon my Enemies and I beseech you good People whoever you are and the whole World that I have offended to forgive me whomever I have offended in word or deed I ask every man's pardon and I forgive the World with all my soul all the Injuries I have received and I beseech God Almighty forgive those poor Wretches who have cast away their souls or at least endangered them to ruine this body of mine I beseech God that they may have a sight of their Sins and that they may find mercy at his hands Let my blood speak the justice of my Cause I have done And God have mercy upon you all To Mr. Crosthwait Pray Sir my Service to Dr. Hall and Dr. Reynall and thank them for all their kindnesses to me I thank you Sir for your kindness The Lord bless you all Mr. Sheriff God be with you God be with you all good People The Executioner Ketch desired his pardon and he said I do forgive you The Lord have mercy on my Soul The SPEECH of the Late Lord RUSSEL to the SHERIFFS Together with the PAPER deliver'd by him to them at the place of Execution on July 21. 1683. Mr. SHERIFF I Expected the Noise would be such that I could not be very well heard I was never fond of much speaking much less now Therefore I have set down in this Paper all that I think fit to leave behind me God knows how far I was always from Designs against the King's Person or of altering the Government and I still pray for the Preservation of both and of the Protestant Religion I am told that Captain Walcot has said some things concerning my knowledge of the Plot I know not whether the Report is true or not I hope it is not For to my knowledg I never saw him or spake with him in my whole Life and in the Words of a dying Man I profess I know of no Plot either against the King's Life or the Government But I have now done with this World and am going to a better I forgive all the World and I thank God I die in Charity with all Men and I wish all sincere Protestants may love one another and not make way for Popery by their Animosities The PAPER deliver'd to the SHERIFFS I Thank God I find my self so composed and prepared for death and my Thoughts so fixed on another World that I hope in God I am now quite weaned from setting my heart on this Yet I cannot forbear now in setting down in Writing a fuller Account of my Condition to be left behind me than I 'll venture to say at the place of Execution in the noise and clutter that is like to be there I bless God heartily for those many Blessings which he in his infinite Mercy has bestowed upon me through the whole course of my Life That I was born of worthy good Parents and had the Advantages of a Religious Education which I have often thank'd God very heartily for and look'd upon as an invaluable Blessing For even when I minded it least it still hung about me and gave me checks and has now for many years so influenced and possessed me that I feel the happy Effects of it in this my extremity in which I have been so wonderfully I thank God supported that neither my imprisonment nor the fear of Death have been able to discompose me to any degree but on the contrary I have found the Assurances of the Love and Mercy of God in and through my blessed Redeemer in whom only I trust and I do not question but that I am going to partake of that fulness of Joy which is in his presence the hopes thereof does so wonderfully delight me that I reckon this as the happiest time of my Life tho' others may look upon it as the saddest I have lived and now die of the Reformed Religion a true and sincere Protestant and in the Communion of the Church
shift Instruments and to betake themselves to the Nonconformists whose assistance the better to engage they have not only suspended all the Penal Laws to which the Dissenters were liable but have endeavoured to fill ' them with jealousy and apprehension of danger from the Test Acts tho at the same time they know that Nonconformists never either did or could receive prejudice by them Only they are sensible that if they could work up that easie people into such a belief they should thereby not only obtain their concurrence and abettment for the rescinding of those Laws that are at present the only great remaining Fence about our Religion and upon the abrogation whereof nothing could hinder the Papists from getting into a condition to extirpate it but make them a formed and united Body with themselves against the Prince and Princess of Orange who have with so much Wisdom Courage and Integrity declared that they are against the having them repealed And as the Dissenters cannot have so far renounced all regard both to honesty and to a good name as to be fond of being herded with the Papists or thank our Author for it so they must be become void of all sense and understanding if they suffer themselves to be either wheedled or frighted into an opinion of their being subject to receive any dammage by the Tests it being so expresly contrary both to the Terms of those Laws and to their own experience Nor can they be so far abandoned of God nor prove so treacherous to the Nation Posterity and the whole Protestant Interest thro' Europe as to cooperate to the Repeal of them by destroying that great Fence about the Reformed Religion in England and to put the Papists into capacity both of subverting it there and every where else And setting aside a few mercenary fellows among them there is no ground to fear after we have had so many proofs of their zeal for the Protestant Religion and English Liberties in the worst of times and under the greatest Temptations that they should at this season when all others behave themselves with so much Integrity and Courage be accessory to so villanous a thing The ill success which the Court hath met with in the several Towns and City's since the late Regulation of the Corporations sufficiently shews that the Dissenters who were put into Magistracy in hopes by them to have compassed the packing of a Parliament are no less careful of preserving the Test Laws than they of the Church of England Communion were who were displaced to make way for them And to discover the grossness of the abuse which our Author without regard to Truth or Ingenuity endeavours to put upon them as if they were judged by their Highnesses to be incapable of Trusts and Employments or any ways concluded to stand under those restraints by the Test which the Roman Catholicks do there is not one word in Mijn Heer Fagel's Letter whereby they are said to be subject unto them or by which there is any ground administred of fancying they are put into the same rank with the Papists and whereby to fear that they may hereafter come to be treated accordingly But in stead of this they are expresly told that Their Highnesses do both allow and desire the abrogation of all the Penal Laws against Dissenters and the having them freed from the severity of them and that they do not only consent but heartily approve of their having an entire liberty granted them for the full exercise of their Religion without any trouble or hindrance or being left exposed to the least molestation or inconvenience upon that account And to testifie how far the Nonconformists are from being in the least menaced by those Laws it is again Declared that the only reason why their Highnesses refuse to consent to the having them repealed is because that they have no other tendency save to Secure the Reformed Religion from the Designs of the Papists by containing provisions in the vertue of which those only may be kept out of Office who can not testifie that they are of the Reformed and not of the Roman Catholick Religion Which as it is the highest evidence imaginable of their own stedfastness and integrity in the Reformed Religion and of the compassion and love which they equally bear to all who profess it and how careful they will at all times be to have it maintained and supported so it is the putting such a merit upon all Protestants that it should engage their prayers for their happy extation to the Throne and make them ambitious as well as willing and ready to hazard their lives and Fortunes for the securing the Succession unto them if any should be so wicked as to go about to preclude them But I must pay a further attendance upon our Author and accompany him to the fifth particular which I promised to consider namely that according to his own foolish and incoherent way of writing while he pretends to commend and justify the proceeding of His Majesty of Great Brittain he publisheth the villany of the Papal Church and proclaims the dishonour and injustice of diverse Eminent Monarchs and Princes of the Romish Communion His Panegyricks upon the King of England are so many just Satyr's upon the Church of Rome the Monarch of France and the Duke of Savoy c. For if it be becoming a Christian to be of a contrary judgment to those who are for persecuting such as differ from the publick and established Religion and if it be a sentiment worthy of a Royal mind that none ought to be oppressed for their Consciences in Divine Matters what characters of irreligion ignominy wickedness are due unto them who judge it to be meritorious to destroy sincere Christians for no other pretended Crime save that they cannot believe as the Pope and the Church of Rome do Surely our Author must either be extreamly ignorant of the Doctrine of his own Church and of the bloody and barbarous practices pursuant thereunto both at this day and for many ages past or else he must be the most unsincere miscreant that ever writ or at best be guilty of the inconsistency and folly as to continue in the Communion of a Church whose Articles of Faith he condemns as Antichristian and whose practices according to the Terms made necessary for Salvation he abhorreth both as unworthy of Royal Minds and contrary to Christian Piety But tho nothing can render a false man honest or a foolish Man wise yet seeing something may be done towards the curing a person's ignorance if he be teachable or at least to shew his obstinacy and that the fault is in his will not in his Understanding if he will not learn and be convinced I shall therefore both acquaint him a little with the Doctrine of that Church and briefly put him in remembrance how these of the Romish Fellowship have therefore persecuted Christians and still continue so to do only for differing
who had lived and died a cordial and zealous Protestant and whosoever had muttered any thing to the contrary would have been branded for a Villain and an execrable person But with what a scent and odor must it recommend his Memory to them to consider his having not onely lived and died in the Communion of the Church of Rome in contradiction to all his publick Speeches solemn Declarations and highest Asseverations to his People in Parliament but his participating from time to time of the Sacrament as Administred in the Church of England while in the interim he had Abjured our Religion stood reconciled to the Church of Rome and had obliged himself by most sacred Vows and was endeavouring by all the Frauds and Arts imaginable to subvert the established Doctrin and Worship and set up Heresy and Idolatry in their room And it must needs give them an abhorrent Idea and Character of Popery and a loathsom representation of those trusted with the Conduct and Guidance of the Consciences of Men in the Roman Communion that they should not onely dispense with and indulge such Crimes and Villanies but proclaim them Sanctified and Meritorious from the end which they are calculated for and levelled at And for his dear Brother and renowned Successor who possessed the Throne after him I suppose his most partial Admirers who took him for a Prince not onely merciful in his Temper and imbued with all gracious Inclinations to our Laws and the Rights of the Subject but for one Orthodox in his Religion and who would prove a zealous Defender of the Doctrine Worship and Discipline of the Church established by Law are before this time both undeceived and filled with Resentments for his having abused their Credulity deceived their Expectations and reproached all their Gloryings and Boastings of him For as it would have been the greatest Affront they could have put upon the King to question his being of the Roman Communion or to detract from his Zeal for the introduction of Popery notwithstanding his own antecedent Protestations as well as the many Statutes in force for the preservation of the Reformed Religion so I must take the liberty to tell them that his Apostacy is not of so late Date as the World is made commonly to believe For though it was many Years concealed and the contrary pretended and dissembled yet it is most certain that he Abjured the Protestant Religion soon after the Exilement of the Royal Family and was reconciled to the Romish Church at St. Germains in France Nor were several of the then suffering Bishops and Clergy ignorant of this though they had neither the Integrity nor Courage to give the Nation and Church warning of it And within these five Years there was in the custody of a very worthy and honest Gentleman a Letter written to the late Bishop of D. by a Doctor of Divinity then attending upon the Royal Brothers wherein the Apostacy of the then Duke of York to the See of Rome is particularly related and an Account given how much the Dutchess of Tremoville though without being her self observed had heard the Queen Mother glorying of it bewailed it as a dishonour unto the Royal Family and as that which might prove of pernicious consequence to the Protestant Interest But though the old Queen privately rejoyced and triumphed in it yet she knew too well what disadvantage it might be both to her Son and to the Papal Cause in Great Brittain to have it at that Season communicated and divulged Thereupon it remained a Secret for many Years and by virtue of a Dispensation he sometimes joined in all Ordinances with those of the Protestant Communion But for all the Art Hypocrisy and Sacrilege by which it was endeavoured to be concealed it might have been easily discerned as manifesting it self in the whole Course of his Actions And at last his own Zeal the Importunity of the Priests and the Cunning of the late King prevailing over Reasons of State he withdrew from all Acts of Fellowship with the Church of England But neither that nor his refusing the Test enjoyned by Law for distinguishing Papists from Protestants though thereupon he was forced both to resign his Office of Lord High Admiral c. nor his declining the Oath which the Laws of Scotland for the securing a Protestant Governour enjoyn to be taken by the High Commissioner nor yet so many Parliaments having endeavoured to get him Excluded from Succession to the Crown upon the account of having revolted to the See of Rome and thereby become dangerous to the Established Religion could make impression upon a wilfully deluded and obstinate sort of Protestants but in defiance of all means of Conviction they would perswade themselves that he was still a Zealot for our Religion and a grand Patriot of the Church of England Nor could any thing undeceive them till upon his Brother's Death he had openly declared himself a Roman Catholick and afterwards in the fumes and raptures of his Victory over the late Duke of Monmouth had discovered and proclaimed his Intentions of overthrowing both our Religion and Laws Yea so closely had some sealed up their Eyes against all beams of Light and hardned themselves against all Evidences from Reason and Fact that had it pleased the Almighty God to have prospered the Duke of Monmouth's Arms in the Summer 85. the present King would have gone off the Stage with the Reputation among them of a Prince tender of the Laws of the Kingdom and who notwithstanding his own being a Papist would have preserved the Reformed Religion and have maintained the Church of England in all her Grandure and Rights And though his whole Life had been but one continued Conspiracy against our Civil Liberties and Priviledges he had left the Throne with the Character and under the Esteem of a Gentleman that in the whole course of his Government would have regulated himself by the Rules of the Constitution and the Statutes of the Realm Now among all the Methods fallen upon by the Royal Brothers for the undermining and subverting our Religion and Laws there is none that they have pursued with more Ardor and wherein they have been more successful to the compassing of their Designs than in their dividing Protestants and alienating their Affections and embittering their Minds from and against one another And had not this lain under their prospect and the means of effecting it appeared easie they might have been Papists themselves while in the mean time they had been dispensed with to protest and swear their being of the Reformed Religion and they might have envied our Liberties and bewailed their Restriction from Arbitrary and Despotical Power but they never durst have entertained a Thought of subverting the Established Religion or of altering the Civil Government nor would they ever have had the boldness to have attempted the introducing and erecting Popery and Tyranny in their room And whosoever should have put them upon reducing the Nation
of the Traytors it was comfortably hoped before thirty Months should have past over after the detection thereof some effectual Remedies might have been applied to prevent the further Attempts of the Papists upon us and better to have secured the Protestants in their Religion Lives and Properties But by sad experience we have found that notwithstanding the vigorous Endeavours of three of our Parliaments to provide proper and wholsome Laws to answer both ends Yet so prevalent has this Interest been under so potent a Head the D. of Y. as to stifle in the birth all those hopeful Parliament-Endeavours by those many surprizing and astonishing Prorogations and Dissolutions which they have procured whereby our Fears and Dangers have manifestly increased and their Spirits heightned and incouraged to renew and multiply fresh Plottings and Designs upon us But that our approaching Parliament may be more successful for our Relief before it be too late by being permitted to sit to Redress our Grievances and to perfect those Good Bills which have been prepared by the former Parliaments to this purpose these following Common-Law Maxims respecting King and Parliament and the Common and Statute-Laws themselves to prevent such unnatural Disappointments and Mischiefs providing for the fitting of Parliaments till Grievances be redress'd and publick Safety secured and provided for are tendered to consideration Some known Maxims taken out of the Law-Books 1. Respecting the King That the Kings of England can do nothing as Kings but what of right they ought to do That the King can do no wrong nor can he dye That the King's Prerogative and the Subjects Liberty are determined by Law That the King hath no Power but what the Law gives him That the King is so called from Ruling well Rex à bene Regendo viz. according to Law Because be is a King whilst be Rules well but a Tyrant when he Oppresses That Kings of England never appear more in their glory splendor and Majestick Sovereignty than in Parliaments That the Prerogative of the King cannot do wrong nor be a Warrant to do wrong to any Plowd Comment fol. 246. 2. Respecting the Parliament That Parliaments constitute and are laid in the Essence of the Government That a Parliament is that to the Common-Wealth which the Soul is to the Body which is only able 〈…〉 and understand the symptoms of all Diseafes which threaten the Body-politick That a Parliament is the Bulwark of our Liberty the boundary which keeps us from the Inundation of Tyrannical Power Arbitrary and unbounded Will-Government That Parliaments do make new and abrogate old Laws Reform Grievances in the Commonwealth settle the Succession grant Subsidies And in sum may be called the great Physician of the Kingdom From whence it appears and is self-evident if Parliaments are so absolutely necessary in this our Constitution That they must then have their certain stationary times of Session and continuance for providing Laws essentially necessary for the being as well as the well-being of the People and redressing all publick Grievances either by the want of Laws or of the undue Execution of them in being or otherwise And suitable hereunto are those Provisions made by the Wisdom of our Ancestors as recorded by them both in the Common and Statute-Law First Coke lib. 7. Rep. p. 12 13. What we find hereof in the Common-Law The Common-Law saith my Lord Coke is that which is founded in the immutable Law and light of Nature agreeable to the Law of God requiring Order Government Subjection and Protection c. Containing ancient Vsages warranted by Holy Scripture and because it is generally given to all it is therefore called Common Lib. 9. Preface And further saith That in the book called The Mirror of Justice appeareth the whole frame of the ancient Common-Laws of this Realm from the time of K. Arthur 5 6. till near the Conquest which treats also of the Officers as well as the diversity and dictinction of the Courts of Justice which are Officinae Legis and particularly of the High Court of Parliament by the name of Council-General or Parliament so called from Parler-la-ment speaking judicially his mind And amongst others gives us the following Law of King Alfred who reigned about 880. Le Roy Alfred Ordeigna pur usage perpetuel que a deux foits per lan ou plus sovene pur mistier in temps de peace so Assembler a Londres Mirror of Justice Ch. 1. Sect. 3. pur Parliamenter surle guidement del people de dieu corneâ—t gents soy garderent de pechers viverent in quiet receiverent droit per certain usages saints Judgments King Alfred ordaineth for a usage perpetual That twice a year or oftner if need be in time of peace they shall assemble themselves at London to treat in Parliament of the Government of the People of God how they should keep themselves from Offences should live in quiet and should receive right by certain Laws and holy Judgments And thus saith my Lord Coke you have a Statute of K. Alfred Lord Coke's Comment upon it as well concerning the holding of this Court of Parliament twice every year at the City of London as to manifest the threefold end of this great and honourable Assembly of Estates As First That the Subject might be kept from offending that is that Offences might be prevented both by good and provident Laws and by the due Execution thereof Secondly That men might live safely and in quiet Thirdly That all men might receive Justice by certain Laws and holy Judgments that is to the end that Justice might be the better administred that Questions and Defects in Laws might be by the High Court of Parliament planed reduced to certainty and adjudged And further tells us That this Court being the most Supream Court of this Realm is a part of the frame of the Common-Laws and in some cases doth proceed Legally according to the ordinary course of the Common-Law as it appeareth 39 E. 3. f. Coke Inst ch 29. fol. 5. To be short of this Court it is truly said Si vetestatem specter est antiquissima si dignitatem est honoratissima si jurisdictionem est capacissima If you regard Antiquity it is the most Ancient if Dignity the most Honourable if Jurisdiction the most Sovereign And where question hath been made whether this Court continued during the Heptarchy let the Records themselves make answer of which he gives divers Instances in the times of King Ine Offa Ethelbert After the Heptarchy King Edward Son of Alfred King Ethelston Edgar Ethelred Edmond Canutus All which he saith and many more are extant and publickly known proving by divers Arguments that there were Parliaments unto which the Knights and Burgesses were summoned both before in and after the Reign of the Conqueror till Hen. 3d's time and for your further satisfaction herein see 4 E. 3.25 49 Ed. 3.22 23. 11 H. 4.2 Littl. lib. 2. cap. 20. Whereby we may understand 1.
People in divers Parliaments holden heretofore Willing to ordain Remedy for the great Damages and Mischiefs which have happened and dayly do happen by the said Cause c. By the assent of all the great Men and Commonalty of his said Realm hath Ordained and Established c. In which preamble of the Statute we may observe 1. The intollerable grievance and burden which was occasion'd by the illegal Incroachments of the See of Rome 2. The many Complaints the People had made who in those dark times under Popery were sensible of groaning under those Burdens 3. The Endeavours used in vain by former Parliaments to Redress the same and to bring their Laws in being to have their Force and Effect 4. The acknowledgment of the King and Parliament that the Obligation hereto was upon the King 1. From the Right of the Crown which obliged every King to pass good Laws 2. The Statute in force 3. The King's Oath to keep the Old and pass New Laws for his Peoples safeguard which they should tender to him 4. From the sence of the People expressed in their Complaints and 5. From the Mischief and Damage which would otherwise ensue And therefore by the desire and accord of his People He passes this famous Law The Preamble whereof is here recited Another Statute to the same purpose you find 2 R. 2. No. 28. Also the Commons in Parliament pray That forasmuch as Petitions and Bills presented in Parliament by divers of the Commons could not heretofore have their Respective Answers That therefore both their Petitions and Bills in this present Parliament as also others which shall be presented in any future Parliament may have a good and gracious Answer and Remedy ordained thereupon before the departing of every Parliament And that to this purpose a due Statute be ensealed or Enacted at this present Parliament to be and remain in Force for all times to come To which the King replied The King's Answer THE King is pleased that all such Petitions deliver'd in Parliament of things or matters which cannot otherwise be determined A Good and Reasonable Answer shall be made and given before the departure of Parliament In which excellent Law we may observe 1. A Complaint of former remisness their Bills having aforetime been pass'd by their Grievances Unredressed by unseasonably Dissolving of Parliaments before their Laws could pass 2. That a Law might pass in that very Parliament to rectifie that Abuse for the future And 3. That it should not pass for a temporary Law but for perpetuity being of such absolute Necessity that before the Parliaments be dismissed Bills of common Right might pass And the King agreed hereto Suitable hereto we have my Lord Chief Justice Coke that great Oracle of the Law in his Instit 4. B. p. 11. asserting Petitions being truly preferr'd though very many have been Answered by the Law and Custom of Parliament before the end of Parliament This appears saith he by the Ancient Treatise De Modo tenendi Parliamentum in these Words faithfully Translated The Parliament ought not to be ended while any Petition dependeth undiscussed or at the least to which a determinate Answer is not made Rot. Par. 17. E. 3. No. 60. 25 E. 3. No. 60. 50 E. 3. No. 212. 2 R. 2.134 2 R. 2. No. 38. 1 H. 4.132 2 H. 4325.113 And that one of the principal ends of calling Parliaments is for redressing of Grievances that daily happen 36 E. 3. c. 10. 18 E. 3. c. 14. 50 E. 3. No. 17. Lyons Case Rot. Par. 1 H. 5. No. 17. 13 H. 4. No. 9. And that as concerning the departing of Parliaments It ought to be in such a manner faith Modus Tenendi viz. To be demanded yea and publiekly Proclaimed in the Parliament and within the Palace of the Parliament whether there be any that hath delivered a Petition to the Parliament and hath not received Answer thereto if there be none such it is to be supposed that every one is Satisfied or else Answered unto at the least so far forth as by the Law be may be And which custom was observed in after Ages as you have heard before Concerning the Antiquity and Authority of this Ancient Treatise called Modus tenendi Parliamentum saith my Lord Coke whereof we make often use in our Institutes Certain it is that this Modus was Rehearsed and Declared before the Conqueror at the time of his Conquest and by him approved for England and accordingly he according to Modus held a Parliament for England as appears 21 E. 3. so 60. Whereby you clearly perceive that these wholsome Laws are not only in full agreement with the Common Law and declarative thereof but in full accord with the Oath and Office of the Prince who has that great trust by the Law lodged with him for the good and benefit not hurt and mischief of the People viz. First These Laws are very suitable to the Duty and Office of a Ruler and the end for which he was instituted by God himself who commands him to do Judgment and Justice to all especially to the Oppressed and not to deny them any request for their relief protection or welfare 2 Sam. 22.3 1 Chron. 13.1 to 5.2 Chron. 9.8.19.5 c Est 1.13 Our Law-Books enjoyning the same as Bracton Lib. 1. c. 2. Lib. 3. c. 9. fol. 107 c. Fortiscue ch 9. fo 15. c. 7. fol 5.11 Coke 7. Book Reports Calvin's Case f. 11. Secondly They are also in full Harmony with the King's Coronation Oath solemnly made to all his Subjects viz. To grant fulfill and defend all rightful Laws which the Commons of the Realm shall choose and to strengthen and maintain them after his Power Thirdly These Laws are also in full agreement and oneness with Magna Charta it self that Ancient Fundamental Law which hath been Confirmed by at least Forty Parliaments viz. We shall deny We shall defer to no Man Justice and Right much less to the whole Parliament and Kingdom in denying or deferring to pass such necessary Bills which the Peoples needs call for Object But to all this which hath been said it may be objected That several of our Princes have otherwise practised by Dissolving or as laterly used by Prorogucing Parliaments at their pleasures before Grievances were Redressed and Publick Bills of Common Safety Passed and that as a Privilege belonging to the Royal Prerogative Answ To which it is Answered That granting they have so done First It is most manifest that deth not therefore create a right to them so to do according to that known Maxim a facto ad jus non valet Consequentia especially when such Actions are against so many express and positive Laws such Principles of Common Right and Justice and so many particular Tyes and Obligations upon themsâ—â—es to the contrary Secondly But if it had been so yet neither can Prerogative be pleaded to justify such Practices because the King has no Prerogative but what the Law gives
was used c. returned by the Sheriffs c. without any denomination to the Sheriffs See Coke's Instit 3d part fol. 33. c. according to the Law of England and if any Indictment be made hereafter in any point to the contrary the same be also void and holden for none for ever See also the Statute of Westm 2d cap. 38. and Articul super Cortas cap. 9. So careful have our Parliaments been that the power of Grand Inquests might be placed in the hands of good and worthy men that if one man of a Grand Inquest though they be Twenty three or more should not be Liber Legalis Homo or such as the Law requires and duly returned without denomination to the Sheriff all the Indictments found by such a Grand Jury and the proceedings upon them are void and null So it was adjudged in Searlet's Case I know too well that the Wisdom and Care of our Ancestors in this Institution of Grand Juries hath not been of late considered as it ought nor the Laws concerning them duly observed nor have the Gentlemen and other men of Estates in the several Counties discerned how insensibly their Legal Power and Jurisdiction in their Grand and Petit Juries is decayed and much of the means to preserve their own Lives and Interests taken out of their hands 'T is a wonder that they were not more awakened with the Attempt of the late L. Ch. K. who would have usurped a Lordly Dictatorian power over the Grand Jury of Somersetshire and commanded them to find a Bill of Indictment for Murther for which they saw no Evidence and upon their refusal he not only threatned the Jury but assumed to himself an Arbitrary Power to fine them Here was a bold Battery made upon the ancient Fence of our Reputations and Lives If that Justice's Will had passed for Law all the Gentlemen of the Grand Juries must have been theâ— basest Vassals to the Judges and have been penally obliged Jurare in Verba Magistri to have sworn to the Directions or Dictates of the Judges But thanks be to God the late long Parliament though filled with Pensioners could not bear such a bold Invasion of the English Liberty but upon the Complaint of one Sir Hugh Windham Foreman of the said Jury and a Member of that Parliament the Commons brought the then Chief Justice to their Bar to acknowledge his fault whereupon the Prosecution ceased The Trust and Power of Grand Juries is and ought to be accounted amongst the greatest and of most concern next to the Legislative The Justice of the whole Kingdom in Criminal Cases almost wholly depending upon their Ability and Integrity in the due execution of their Office Besides the Concernments of all Commoners the Honour Reputation Estates and Lives of all the Nobility of England are so far submitted to their Censure that they may bring them into question for Treason or Felony at their Discretion Their Verdict must be entred upon Record against the greatest Lords and process must legally go out against them thereupon to imprison them if they can be taken or to outlaw them as the Statutes direct and if any Peer of the Realm though innocent should justly fear a Conspiracy against his Life and think fit to withdraw the direction of the Statutes in proceeding to the Outlawry being rightly pursued he could never reverse the Outlawry as the Law now stands save by Pardon or Act of Parliament Hence it appears that in case a Grand Jury should be drawn to indict a Noble Peer unjustly either by means of their own weakness or partiality or a blind submission to the Direction or Opinion of Judges One such failure of a Jury may occasion the Ruine of any of the best or greatest Families in England I mention this extent of the Grand Juries Power over all the Nobility only to shew their joint Interest and Concern with the Commons of England in this ancient Institution The Grand Juries are trusted to be the princpal means of preserving the Peace of the whole Kingdom by the terror of executing the Penal Laws against Offenders by their Wisdom Diligence and Faithfulness in making due Inquiries after all Breaches of the Peace and bringing every one to answer for his Crime at the peril of his Life Limb and Estate that every man who lives within the Law may sleep securely in his own House 'T is committed to their Charge and Trust to take care of bringing Capital Offenders to pay their Lives to Justice and lesser Criminals to other punishments according to their several demerits The Courts or Judges or Commissioners of Oyer and Terminer and of Goal-Delivery are to receive only from the Grand Inquest all Capital Matters whatsoever to be put in issue tried and judged before them by the Petit Juries The whole stream of Justice in such Cases either runs freely or is stopped and disturbed as the Grand Inquests do their Duties either faithfully and prudently or neglect or ornit them And as one part of their Duty is to indict Offenders so another part is to protect the Innocent in their Reputations Lives and Interests from false Accusers and malicious Conspirators They are to search out the Truth of such Informations as come before them and to reject the Indictment if it be not sufficiently proved and farther if they have reasonable suspicion of Malice or wicked Designs against any Man's Life or Estate by such as offer a Bill of Indictment the Laws of God and of the Kingdom bind them to use all possible means to discover the Villany and if it appear to them whereof they are the Legal Judges to be a Conspiracy or malicious Combination against the Accused they are bound by the highest Obligations upon Men and Christians not only to reject such a Bill of Indictment but to indict forthwith all the Conspirators with their Abettors and Associates Doubtless there hath been Pride and Covetousness Malice and desire of Revenge in all Ages from whence have sprung false Accusations and Conspiracies but no Age before us ever hatched such Villanies as our Popish Faction have contrived against our Religion Lives and Liberties No History affords an Example of such Forgeries Perjuries Subornations and Combinations of infamous Wretches as have been lately discovered amongst them to defame Loyal Innocent Protestants and to shed their guiltless Blood in the Form and Course of Justice and to make the King 's most faithful Subjects appear to be the vilest Traitors unto him In this our miserable State Grand Juries are our only security inasmuch as our Lives cannot be drawn into jeopardy by all the malicious Crafts of the Devil unless such a number of our honest Countrymen shall be satisfied in the truth of the Accusations For prevention of such Plotters of wickedness as now abound was that Statute made in the 42 of E. 3.3 See the Stat. 42 E. 3.3 in these words To eschew the mischiefs and damage done to divers
Administration of Justice Belongeth to the Office of a King But the fullest account of it in few words is in Chancellor Fortescue Chap. XIII which Passage is quoted in Calvin's Case Coke VII Rep. Fol 5. Ad Tutelam namque Legis Subditorum ac eorum Corporum bonorum Rex hujusmodi erectus est ad hanc potestatem a populo effluxam ipse habet quo ei non licet potestate alia suo populo Dominari For such a King That is of every Political Kingdom as this is is made and ordained for the Defence or Guardianship of the Law of his Subjects and of their Bodies and Goods whereunto he receiveth power of his People so that he cannot Govern his People by any other power Corollary 1. A Bargain 's a Bargain 2. A Popish Guardian of Protestant Laws is such an Incongruity and he is as Unfit for that Office as Antichrist is to be Christ's Vicar CHAP. II. Of Prerogatives by Divine Right I. GOvernment is not matter of Revelation if it were then those Nations that wanted Scripture must have been without Government whereas Scripture it self says That Government is The Ordinance of Man and of Humane Extraction And King Charles the First says of this Government in particular That it was Moulded by the Wisdom and Experience of the People Answ to XIX Prop. II. All just Governments are highly Beneficial to Mankind and are of God the Author of all Good they are his Ordinances and Institutions Rom. 13.1 2. III. Plowing and Sowing and the whole business of preparing Bread-Corn is absolutely necessary to the subsistence of Mankind This also cometh forth from the Lord of Hosts who is wonderful in Counsel and excellent in Working Isa 28. from 23. to 29th Verse IV. Wisdom saith Counsel is mine and sound Wisdom I am Vnderstanding I have strength By me Kings Reign and Princes decree Justice By me Princes Rule and Nobles even all the Judges of the Earth Prov. 8.14 V. The Prophet speaking of the Plowman saith His God doth instruct him to discretion and doth teach him Isa 28.26 VI. Scripture neither gives nor takes away Mens Civil Rights but leaves them as it found them and as our Saviour said of himself is no Divider of Inheritances VII Civil Authority is a Civil Right VIII The Law of England gives the King his Title to the Crown For where is it said in Scripture That such a Person or Family by Name shall enjoy it And the same Law of England which has made him King has made him King according to the English Laws and not otherwise IX The King of England has no more Right to set up a French Government than the French King has to be King of England which is none at all X. Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesars neither makes a Caesar nor tells who Caesar is nor what belongs to him but only requires Men to be just in giving him those supposed Rights which the Laws have determined to be his XI The Scripture supposes Property when it forbids Stealing it supposes Mens Lands to be already Butted and Bounded when it forbids removing the antient Land-marks And as it is impossible for any Man to prove what Estate he has by Scripture or to find a Terrier of his Lands there so it is a vain thing to look for Statutes of Prerogative in Scripture XII If Mishpat Hamelech the manner of the King 1 Sam. 8.11 be a Statute of Prerogative and prove all those particulars to be the Right of the King then Mishpat Haccohanim the Priest's custom of Sacrilegeous Rapine Chap. 2.13 proves that to be the Right of the Priests the same wood being used in both places XIII It is the Resolution of all the Judges of England that even the known and undoubted Prerogatives of the Jewish Kings do not belong to our Kings and that it is an absurd and impudent thing to affirm they do Coke 11. Rep. p. 63. Mich. 5. Jac. Give us a King to Judge us 1 Sam. 8.5 6 20. Note upon Sunday the Tenth of November in this same Term the King upon Complaint made to him by Bancroft Archbishop of Canterbury concerning Prohibitions was informed that when Question was made of what matters the Ecclesiastical Judges have Cognizance either upon the Exposition of the Statutes concerning Tythes or any other Thing Ecclesiastical or upon the Statute 1 Eliz. concerning the High Commission or in any other Case in which there is not express Authority by Law the King himself may decide it in his Royal person and that the Judges are but the Delegates of the King and that the King may take what Causes he shall please to determine from the Determination of the Judges and may determine them himself And the Archbishop said That this was clear in Divinity That such Authority belongs to the King by the Word of God in Scripture To which it was answered by me in the presence and with the clear consent of all the Justices of England and Barons of the Exchequer That the King in his own person cannot adjudge any Case either Criminal as Treason Felony c. but this ought to be determined and adjusted in some Court of Justice according to the Law and Custom of England And always Judgments are given Ideo consideratum est per Curiam so that the Court gives the Judgment And it was greatly marvelled That the Archbishop durst inform the King that such absolute power and authority as is aforesaid belonged to the King by the Word of God CHAP. III. Of OBEDIENCE I. NO Man has any more Civil Authority than what the Law of the Land has vested in him Nor is he one of St. Paul's Higher Powers any farther or to any other purposes than the Law has impowr'd him II. An Usurped Illegal and Arbitrary power is so far from being the Ordinance of God that it is not the Ordinance of Man III. Whoever opposes an Usurped Illegal and Arbitrary Power does not oppose the Ordinance of God but the Violation of that Ordinance IV. The 13. of the Romans commands Subjection to our Temporal Governours Verse 4. because their Office and Imployment is for the publick welfare For he is the Minister of God to Thee for Good V. The 13. of the Hebrews commands Obedience to spiritual Rulers Verse 17. Because they watch for your Souls VI. But the 13. of the Hebrews did not oblige the Martyrs and Confessors in Queen Mary's Time to obey such blessed Bishops as Bonner and the Beast of Rome who were the perfect Reverse of St. Paul's Spiritual Rulers and whose practice was murthering of Souls and Bodies according to the true Character of Popery which was given it by the Bishops who compiled the Thanksgiving for the Fifth of November but Archbishop Laud was wiser than they and in his time blotted it out The Prayer formerly run thus To that end strengthen the Hands of our Gracious King the Nobles and Magistrates of the
that detain Church-Lands especially since the Papists themselves â—ehâ—mently accuse King Henry the eighth for sacrilegiously robbing of Religious Houses and seising of their Lands a great pâ—â—t of which Lands are to this very day possess'd by Papists Now though there may be some Plea for the Popes Authority in the interim of a general Council and in such things wherein they have made no determination yet in this matter there is no colour for any pretences since the Council of Trent was actually assembled within sew years after these Alienations and expresly condemned the possessors of Abby Lands and after all this was all consirm'd and ratified by the Pope himself in his Bulla Super conf gen Concil Trid. A. D. 1564. And tho' we have here the Judgment of the infallible See as to this matter in the Consirmation of the Trent Council yet because there be some that magnifie the Popes extravagant and unlimited power over the Church and pretend that he confirm'd the Abby-Lands in England to the Lay-possessors of them I shall shew Secondly That the Pope neither hath nor pretends to any such Power nor did ever make use of it in this matter under debate only I shall premise that whereas some part of the Canon Law seems to allow of such particular alienations as are made by the Clerks and Members of the Church with the consent of the Bishop yet such free consent was never obtained in England and as to what was done by force fraud and violence is of so little moment as to giving a legal Title that even the alienations that were made by Charles Martell who is among the Papists themselves as infamous for Sacriledge as King Henry the Eighth yet even his Acts are said to be done by a Council of Bishops as is acknowledg'd by Dr. Johnston in his assurance of Abby Lands p. 27. I shall proceed to shew First That the Pope hath no such power as to confirm these Alienations and this is expresly determined by the infallible Pope Damasus in the Canon-Law Caus 12.9.2 c. 20. The Pope cannot alienate Lands belonging to the Church in any manner or for any necessity whatsoever both the buyer and the seller lie under an Anathema till they be restored so that any Church-man may oppese any such Alienations and again require the Lands and Profits so Alienated So that here we have a full and express Determination of the infallible See And tho in Answer to this it is urg'd by Dr. Johnston that this Canon is with small difference published by Binius in the Councils and so as to confine it to the suburbicacy Diocess of Rome yet that this Answer is wholly trivial will appear First Because if the Bishop of Rome hath no Authority to confirm such alienations in his own peculiar Diocess where he hath most power much less can he do it in the Provinces where his power is less Secondly That in all Ecclesiastical Courts of the Church of Rome it is not Binius's Edition of the Councils but Gratian's Collection of Canons that is of Authority in which Book these words are as here quoted Thirdly Since this Book of the Popes Decree hath been frequently reprinted by the Authority and Command of several Popes and constantly used in their Courts this is not to be look'd upon as a Decree of Pope Damasus only but of all the succeeding Popes and in the opinion of F. Ellis Sermon before the King Decem. 5. 1686. p. 21. what is inserted in the Canon Law is become the whole Judgment of the whole-Church Fourthly It 's absolutely forbid by Pope Gregory the Thirteenth in his Bull presixed before the Canon-Law A. D. 1580. for any one to add or invert any thing in that Book So that according to this express Determination in the Popes own Law the Bishops of Rome have no power to confirm any such Alienations as have been made in England and agreeable to all this Pope Julius the Fourth the very person that is pretended to have confirm'd these Alienations declar'd to our English Ambassadors that were sent upon that Errand That if he had Power to grant it he would do it most readily but his Authority was not so large F. Paul's H. of Council of Trent Lond. A. D. 1629. And therefore all Confirmations from the Bishop of Rome are already prejudg'd to be invallid and of no force at all Secondly No Bishop of Rome did ever confirm them The Breve of Pope Julius the Third which gave Cardinal Pool the largest powers towards the effecting this had this express limitation Salvo tamen in his quibus propttr renem magnitudinem gravitatem haec Sancta sedes merito tibi videtur consulenda nostro prefatae sedis beneplacito confirmatione i. e. Saving to us in these matters in which by reason of their weight and greatness this Holy See may justly seem to you that of right it ought to be consulted the good pleasure and confirmation of us and of the holy See which is the true English to that Latin and that this whole Kingdom did then so understand these words is evident from the Ambassadors that were sent to Rome the next Spring Viz. Viscount Moitecute Bishop of Ely and Sir Edward Carn These being one to represent every state of the Kingdom to obtain of him a Confirmation of all those Graces which Cardinal Pool had granted Burnet's H. Ref p. 2. f. 300. So that in the esteem of the whole Nation what the Cardinal had done was not valid without the Confirmation of the Pope himself Now this Pope Julius and the next Marcellus both died before there is any pretence of any Confirmation from Rome but this was at length done by Pope Paul the Fourth is pretended and for proof of it three things are alledged First The Journals of the House of Commons where are these words After which was read a Bill from the Popes Holiness confirming the doing of my Lord Cardinal touching the assurance of Abby Lands c. Secondly a Bull of the same Pope to Sir Will Peters Thirdly The Decrees of Cardinal Peol and his Life by Dudithius To all which I answer First That it s confess'd on all hands that there is no such Bull or Confirmation by Pope Paul the Fourth to be any where found in the whole World not any Copy or Transcript of it not in all the Bullaria nor our own Rolls and Records tho' it be a matter of so great moment to the Roman Catholicks of England and what cannot be produced may easily be denied Nor can it be imagined that a Journal of Lay-persons that were parties concerned or a private Bull to Sir Will Peters or some hints in the Decrees and Life of the Cardinal will be of any moment in a Court at Rome whensoever a matter of that vast consequence as all the Abby Lands in England shall come to be disputed especially if it be observed that this very Journal of the House of Commonâ— is
The Pope published a Bull in print against the restoring of Abby-Lands which Dr. Burnet affirms also Ap. Fol. 403. It is notoriously false they both asserting the contrary Dr. Burnet's Words in that very place are these The Pope in plain terms refused to ratifie what the Cardinal had done and soon after set out a severe Bull cursing and condemning all that held any Church Lands Seventhly and lastly The succeeding Popes have been clearly of this opinion Pope Pius the Fourth who immediately succeeded this Paul confirm'd the Counoil of Trent and therein damned all the detainers of Church-Lands and tho he was much importuned to confirm some Alienations made by the King of France to pay the debts of the Crown yet he absolutely refused it F. Pauls H. C. Trent 713. Pope Innocent the Tenth first protested against the Alienations of Church Lands in Germany that were made at the great Treaty of Munster and Osnaburg A. D. 1648. and when that would not do by his Bull Nov. 26. in the very same Year damns all those that should dare to retain the Church-Lands and declares the Treaty void Infirmnentum pacis c. Innocentii 10 me declaratio nullitatis Artic. c. and all their late Popes in the Bulla caenae do very solemnly Damn and Excommunicate all who usurp any Jurisdiction Fruits Revenues and Emoluments belonging to any Ecclesiastical person upon account of any Churches Monasteries or other Ecclesiastical Benefices or who upon any occasion or cause Sequester the said Revenues without the Express leave of the Bishop of Rome or others having lawful power to do it c. And tho upon Geod-Friday there is published a general Absolution yet out of that are expresly excluded all those who possess any Church Lands or Goods who are still left under the sentence of Excommunication Toleti Instr Sacerd. and his Explicatio casuum in Bulla caenae Dni reserva From which consideration it 's evident that it never was the design of the Pope to confirm the English Church Lands to the Lay-possessors but that he always urg'd the necessity of restoring of them to religious uses in order to which the papists prevailed to have the statute of Mortmain repealed for 20 Years In Queen Elizabeth's Reign the factious party that was manag'd wholy by Romish â—missaries demanded to have Abbtes and such Religious Houses restored for their Vse and A. D. 1585. in their petition to the Faâ—hament they set it down as a 〈◊〉 Doctrine that things once dedicated to Sacred Vses ought so to remain by the Word of God for ever and ought not to be converted to any private Vse Bishop Bancrofts Sermon at p. c. A. D. 1588. p. 25. And that the Church of Rome is still gaping after these Lands is evident from many of their late Books as the Religion of M. Luther lately printed at Oxford p. 15. The Monks wrote Anathema upon the Registers and Donations belonging to Monasteries the weight and essect of which curses are both felt and dreaded to this day To this End the Monastiâ—â—â— Anglicanum is so diligently preserved in the Vatican and other Libraries in the popish Countries and especially this appears from the obstinate refusal of this present Pope to confirm these Alienations tho it be a matter so much controverted and which would be of that vast Use towards promoting their Religion in this Kingdom If therefore the Bishops of Rome did never confirm these Alienations of Church-Lands but earnestly and strictly required their Restitution if they have declared in their Authentick Canons that they have no power to do it and both they and the last general Council pronounce an heavy Curse and Anathema against all such as detain them Then let every one that possesseth these Lands and yet own either of these Foreign Jurisdictions consider that here is nothing left to excuse him from Sacriledge and therefore with his Estate he must derive a curse to his posterity There is scarcely any Papist but that is forward to accuse King Henry the 8th of Sacriledge and yet never reflects upon himself who quietly possesseth the Fruits of it without Restitution either let them not accuse him or else restore themselves Now whatever opinions the papists may have of these things in the time of health yet I must desire to remember what the Jesuits proposed to Cardinal Pool in Doctor Pary's Days Viz. That if he would encourage them in England they did not doubt but that by dealing with the Consciences of those who were dying they should soon recover the greatest part of the Goods of the Church Dr. Burnet's Hist Vol. 2. p. 328. Not to mention that whensoever the Regulars shall grow numerous in England and by consequence burthensome to the few Nobility and Gentry of that perswasion they will find it necessary for them to consent to a Restitution of their Lands that they may share the burthen among others For so vast are the Burthens and Payments that that Religion brings with it that it will be found at length an advantagious Bargain to part with all the Church Lands to indemnifie the rest And I am confident that the Gentry of England that are Papists have found greater Burthens and Payments since their Religion hath been allow'd than ever they did for the many years it was forbid and this charge must daily encrease so long as their Clergy daily grows more numerous and their few Converts are most of them of the meanest Rank and such as want to be provided for And that 's no easie matter to force Converts may appear from that Excellent Observation of the great Emperour Charles the Fifth who told Queen Mary That by endeavouring to compel others to his own Relegion he had tired and spent himself in vain and purchas'd nothing by it but his own dishonour Card. Pool in Heylin's Hist Ref. p. 217. And to conclude this Discourse had the Act of Pope Julius the Third by his Legate Cardinal Pool in confirming of the Alienation of Church Lands in England been as valid as is by some pretended yet what shall secure us from an Act of Resumption That very Pope after that pretended Grant to Cardinal Pool published a Bull in which he Excommunicated all that kept Abby-Lands or Church Lands Burnet's Hist Vol. 2. p. 3â—9 by which all former Grants had there been any were cancell'd His Successor Pope Paul the Fourth retrieved all the Goods and Ecclesiastical Revenues that had been alienated from the Church since the time of Julius the Second and the chief Reasons that are given why the Popes may not still proceed to an Act of Resumption of these Lands in England amount only to this That they may stay for a fair opportunity when it may be done without disturbing the peace of the Kingdom From all which it 's evident that the detaining of Abby-Lands and other Church-Lands from the Monks and Friars is altogether inconsistent with the Doctrine and Principles of the Romish Religion The King's
of the Peace and Vnity of this Realm 3. And that such Person or Persons so to be Named Assigned Authorised and Appointed by Your Highness Your Heirs or Successors after the said Letters Patents to him or them made and delivered as is aforesaid shall have full Power and Authority by Vertue of this Act and of the said Letters Patents under Your Highness Your Heirs and Successors to exercise use and execute all the premisses according to the Tenor and Effect of the said Letters Patents any matter or cause to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding So that I take it that all manner of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction was in the Crown by the Common Law of England and declared to be so by the said Act of 1 Eliz. 1. and by that Act a Power given to the Crown to assign Commissioners to exercise this Jurisdiction which was accordingly done by Queen Elizabeth and a High Commission Court was by her erected which sate and held Plea of all Causes Spiritual and Ecclesiastical during the Reign of Queen Elizabeth King James the First and King Charles the First till the 17th Year of his Reign Which leads me to consider the Statute of 17 Car. 1. ca. 11. which Act recites the Title of 1 Eliz. ca. 1. and Sect. 18. of the same Act and recites further Section 2. That whereas by colour of some Words in the aforesaid Branch of the said Act whereby Commissioners are authorised to execute their Commission according to the Tenor and Effect of the Kings Letters Patents and by Letters Patents grounded thereupon the said Commissioners have to the great and insufferable Wrong and Oppression of the Kings Subjects used to Fine and Imprison them and to exercise other Authority not belonging to Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction restored by that Act and divers other great Mischiefs and Inconveniences have also ensued to the Kings Subjects by occasion of the said Branch and Commissions issued thereupon and the Executions thereof Therefore for the repressing and preventing of the aforesaid Abuses Mischiefs and Inconveniences in time to come by Sect. 3. the said Clause in the said Act 1 Eliz. 1. is Repealed with a Non obstante to the said Act in these Words Be it Enacted by the Kings most excellent Majesty and the Lords and Commons in this present Parliament Assembled and by the Authority of the same That the aforesaid Branch Clause Article or Sentence contained in the said Act and every Word Matter and thing contained in that Branch Clause Article or Sentence shall from henceforth be Repealed Annulled Revoked Annihilated and utterly made Void for ever any thing in the said Act to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding And in Sect. 5. of the same Act it is Enacted That from and after the first of August in the said Act mentioned all such Commissions shall be void in these Words And be it further Enacted That from and after the said first Day of August no new Court shall be erected ordained or appointed within this Realm of England or Dominion of Wales which shall or may have the like Power Jurisdiction or Authority as the said High Commission Court now hath or pretendeth to have but that all and every such Letters Patents Commissions and Grants made or to be made by his Majesty his Heirs and Successors and all Powers and Authorities granted or pretended or mentioned to be granted thereby And all Acts Sentences and Decrees to be made by virtue or Colour thereof shall be utterly void and of none effect By which Act then the Power of Exercising Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction by Commissioners under the Broad-Seal is so taken away that it provides no such Power shall ever for the future be Delegated by the Crown to any Person or Persons whatsoever Let us then in the last place consider Whether the Act of 13 Car. 2. ca. 12 hath restored this Power or not And for this I take it that it is not restored by the said Act or any Clause in it and to make this evident I shall first set down the whole Act and then consider it in the several Branches of it that relate to this Matter The Act is Entituled An Act for Explanation of a Clause contained in an Act of Parliament made in the 17th Year of the Late King Charles Entituled An Act for Repeal of a Branch of Statute in Primo Elizabethae câ—ncerning Commissioners for Causes Ecclesiastical The Act it self runs thus Whereas in an Act of Parliament made in the Seventeenth Year of the Late King Charles Intituled An Act for Repeal of a Branch of a Stature primo Elizabethae concerning Commissioners for Causes Ecclesiastical It is amongst other things Enacted that no Arch-bishop Bisâ—â—p or Vicar-General nor any Chancellor nor Commissary of any Arch-Bishop Bishop or Vicar-General nor any Ordinary whatsoever nor any other Spiritual or Ecclesiastical Judge Officer or Minister of Justice nor any other Person or Persons whatsoever exercising Spiritual or Ecclesiastical Power Authority or Jurisdiction by any Grant Lisence or Commission of the Kings Majesty His Heirs or Successors or by any Power or Authority derived from the King his Heirs or Successors or otherwise shall from and after the First Day of August which then should be in the Year of our Lord God 1641. Award Impose or Inflict any Pain Penalty Fine Amercement Imprisonment or other Corporal Punishment upon any of the Kings Subjects for any Contempt Misdemeanor Crime Offence Matter or Thing whatsoever belonging to Spiritual or Ecclesiastical Cognizance or Jurisdiction 2. Whereupon some Doubt hath been made that all ordinary Power of Coertion and proceeding in Causes Ecclesiastital were taken away whereby the ordinary Course of Justice in Causes Ecclesiastical hath been obstructed 3. Be it therefore Declared and Enacted by the Kings most Excellent Majesty by and with the Advice and Consent of the Lords and Commons in this present Parliament Assembled and by the Authority thereof That neither the said Act nor any thing therein contained doth or shall take away any ordinary Power or Authority from any of the said Arch-Bishops Bishops or any other Person or Persons named as aforesaid but that they and every of them exercising Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction may proceed determine Sentence execute and exercise all manner of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction and all Censures and Coertions appertaining and belonging to the same before any making of the Act before recited in all Causes and Matters belonging to Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction according to the Kings Majesties Ecclesiastical Laws used and practised in this Realm in as ample Manner and Form as they did and might lawfully have done before making of the said Act. Sect. 2. And be it further Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That the afore recited Act of Decimo Septimo Car. and all the Matters and Clauses therein contained excepting what concerns the High Commission Court or the new Erection of some such like Court by Commission shall be and is thereby repealed to dlintents and purposes whatsoever
bear the Character which is vulgarly ascribed to him and if the greatest indication of the wisdom and integrity of Princes be the prudence and sincerity of their Ministers but that we may thence come under a necessity of entertaining meaner thoughts than we otherwise would both of the Moral and Intellectual Capacity of him to whom this Gentleman is indebred both for his Titles and the Function he is exalted unto Whereas on the other hand besides many signal Evidences which have filled all Europe with admiration of the admirable Wisdom inflexible Integrity eminent Vertues Religious tho' calm and discreet Zeal and steddy and impartial Justice of his Highness the Prince of Orange our Ideas of him as a person under whose Government Conduct and Shadow all good men may promise themselves happiness are not a little heightned by the consideration of the excellent Qualities of Monsieur Fagel whose advancement as Pensionary of Holland to the first Ministry in that State is owing to the Princes Grace and Recommendation Which Eminent Trust as he hath all along discharged with Honour to his Highness Reputation to himself and to the Satisfaction of those who are interested in the Affairs of that Republick so by nothing hath he more merited an universal esteem and praise from all Protestants and acquitted himself more worthily towards God and their Serene Highnesses than by that Letter wherein he was honoured to declare their thoughts and in which he hath with so much wisdom moderation and convincing light expressed both their Highnesses Sentiments and his own as well concerning the English Laws the Papists may and the Dissenters ought to be favoured with the Repeal of as concerning those which no wise Non-conformist desires to have rescinded and which to humour the Papists with the Abrogation of were no less than to expose the Nation to ruine and to lay the Reformed Religion open to be totally subverted Now this Excellent Letter and which hath produced all the good Effects that honest men long'd for but knew not before how to compass our Anonymous Answerer is pleased with an Indignation and angry Resentment and in hopes to exasperate his Majesty of Great Britain against their Serene Highnesses to stile a kind of Manifest in reference to most important Affairs which even Mr. Stewart who in obedience to the injunctions of his Soveraign had with so much importunity sollicited their Highnesses Opinion about the Repeal of the Penal and Test Laws he says could not have expected And of whom to testifie his exact and intimate knowledge and to recompence him for the unfortunate service he had been employed in and to encourage his readiness to future drudgery he is pleased by a creation of his own as being the Substitute of the Fountain of Honour to confer the Title of Dr. upon But certainly had this Anonymous Writer the sense and prudence of an ordinary man he would not under the present conjuncture of Affairs talk of Manifests nor put people in mind of them at a season when most persons of all ranks and qualities are so much disgusted and when they at Whitehall are so lavish in their provocations towards some who if they were not strangely fortified against all tincture of Resentment are known to be capable of doing them irreparable prejudice and who by such a Manifest as there is cause enough to emit might not only disturb their proceedings but with the greatest facility blow up at once both all their hopes and projections I would fain know of this modest and discreet Gentleman whether if their Highnesses had ordered a Letter to be written declarative of their Opinion for the Abrogation of the Tests by what name he would have judged it worthy to be called and whether if he had bestowed upon it the Title of a Manifest he would have thereby intended to fasten upon it an imputation of presumption and reproach All good men have reason mightily to bewail their Highnesses condition seeing according to this rate of proceeding towards them it is in the power of the Papal Ecclesiasticks in England when they please to prevail upon the King to reduce them to the uneasie circumstances either of offending against their Consciences or of displeasing him For there is no more requisite towards the bringing them into this unhappy Dilemma but that Father Peters or any other of the Tribe who have an Ascendency over his Majesty do persuade him to desire their Highnesses Thoughts in reference to such particulars wherein it is neither consistent with their Religious Principles nor agreeable with their Honour to comply with his Majesties Judgment and Inclinations For if in prudence they decline the returning of an Answer they are sure not only to be censured as guilty of neglect incivility and rudeness but they do thereby administer an advantage to their Enemies of diffusing reports to their prejudice thro' the Nation as if they approved all those Court-methods which for no other reason save upon the meer motives of respect and wisdom they avoided openly to disallow And if on the other hand they suffer themselves to be overcome by importunities and thereupon give an Answer agreeable to the Dictates of their own minds but which is found to interfere with the prepossessions wherewith his Majesty is imbued then their Lot is to have it called by the unkind and ignominious Title of a Manifest One would think that Letter ought to have been mentioned by a softer name if we do but consider its being written not only with the utmost modesty that becomes the Relation Their Highnesses stand in to the King and which is any ways agreeable to their own quality but that it is enforced with all the Reasons that may serve to demonstrate that their Opinion is the result of conviction and judgment and not the effect of humour nor a sentiment they are meerly determined unto by their interest But we see no Term is too hard to be bestowed upon a Paper that hath so much prejudiced the Priests in their designs and laid so great an obstruction in the way of those methods which they had proposed to themselves for the robbing England of the Protestant Religion And whereas our Author tells us that tho' Mr. Stewart did not account himself obliged to answer Monsieur Fagel's Letter yet one who extreamly esteems and honoureth Mr. Stewart thinks the Publick too much concerned not to have the weakness of the reasonings in it detected and to have it made appear that the inferences deduced from them are no ways convincing I can easily believe that Mr. Stewart did not judge himself obliged to answer the Pensionary's Letter and all men do account it a piece of wisdom in him to forbear endeavouring it For tho' he be much better qualified for such an undertaking than our Author yet he could not but be sensible that it was not to be attempted with any hope of success And if our Author had been endow'd with any measure of discretion he would
there being sincere Christians and true Englishmen among those of all Judgments and Societies of Protestants and among none more than those of the Communion of the Church of England It were the height of Wickedness as well as the most prodigious Folly to imagine that the Conformists have abandoned all Fidelity to God and cast off all care of themselves and their Country upon a mistaken Judgment of being Loyal and Obedient to the King The contrary is plain enough they knew as well as any that the giving to Caesar the Things that are Caesar's lay them under no Obligation of surrendring unto him the Things that are God's nor of sacrificing unto the Will of the Sovereign the Priviledges reserved unto the People by the Fundamental Rules of the Constitution and by the Statutes of the Realm And they understand as well as others that the Laws of the Land are the only measures of the Prince's Authority and of the Subjects Fealty and where they give him no Right to Command they lay them under no tye to Obey And though here and there a Dissenter has written against Popery with good Success yet they have been mostly Conformable Divines who have triumphed over it in elaborate Discourses and who have beaten the Romish Scriblers off the Stage Nor can it be thought that they who have so accurately related and vindicated the History and asserted and defended the Doctrine of the Reformation should either tamely relinquish or be wanting in all due and legal Ways to uphold and maintain it And though some few of the Nonconformists have with sufficient strength and applause used their Pens against Arbitrariness in detecting the Designs of the Royal Brothers yet they who have generally and with greatest Honour appeared for our Laws and Legal Government against the Invasions and Usurpations of the Court have been Theologues and Gentlemen of the Church of England Nor in case of further Attempts for altering the Constitution and enslaving the Nation will they shew themselves unworthy the having descended from Ancestors whose Motto in the high Places of the Field was nolumus Leges Angliae mutari They who have so often justified the Arms of the Vnited Netherlands against their Rightful Princes the Kings of Spain and so unanswerably vindicated their casting off Obedience to those Monarchs when they had invaded their Priviledges and attempted to establish the Inquisition over them cannot be ignorant what their own Right and Duty is in behalf of the Protestant Religion and English Liberties for the Security whereof we have not only so many Laws but the Coronation Oaths and Stipulations of our Kings And those Gentlemen of the Church of England who appeared so vigorously in three Parliaments for excluding the Duke of York from the Succession to the Crown by reason of a Jealousy of what through being a Papist he would attempt against our Religion and Priviledges in case he were suffered to ascend the Throne cannot be now to seek what becomes them towards him having seen and felt what before they only apprehended and feared For if the Law that entaileth the Succession upon the next of Kin and obligeth the Subjects to admit and receive him not only may but ought to be dispensed with in case the Heir thro' having imbib'd Principles which threaten the Safety and are inconsistent with the Happiness of the People hath made himself incapable to inherit we know by a short Ratiocination how far we stand bound to a Prince on the Throne who by Transgressing against the Laws of the Constitution hath abdicated himself from the Government and stands virtually Deposed For whosoever shall offer to Rule Arbitrarily does immediately cease to be King de jure seeing by the Fundamental Common and Statute Laws of the Realm we know none for Supream Magistrate and Governor but a limited Prince and one who stands circumscribed and bounded in his Power and Prerogative And should the Dissenters entertain a belief that the Conformists are less concerned and zealous than themselves for the Protestant Religion and Laws of the Kingdom they would not only Sin and offend against the Rules of Charity but against the Measures of Justice and daily Evidences from Matters of Fact For neither they nor we owe our Conversion to God and our practical Holiness to the Opinions about Discipline Forms of Worship and Ceremonies wherein we differ but the Doctrines of Faith and Christian Obedience wherein we agree 'T is not their being for a Liturgy a Surpliss or a Bishop that hath heretofore influenced them to subserve the Court in Designs tending to Absoluteness but they were seduced unto it upon Motives whereof they are now ashamed and the ridiculousness and folly of which they have at last discever'd Nor is the multitude of profligate and scandalous persons with which the Church of England is crowded any just impeachment of the Purity of her Doctrine in the Vitals and Essentials of Religion or of the Vertue and Piety of many of her Members For as it is her being the only Society established by Law that attracts those Vermin to her Bosom so it is her being restrained by Law from debarring them that keeps them there to her reproach and to the grief of many of her Ecclesiasticks Neither is it the fault of the Church of England that the Agents and Factors for Popery and Arbitrary Power have chosen to pass under the name of her Sons but it proceeds partly from their Malice as hoping by that means to disgrace her with all true English-men as well as with Dissenters and partly from their Craft in order thereby the better to conceal their Design and to shrowd themselves from the Censure and Punishment which had it not been for that Mask they would have been exposed unto and have undergone And I dare affirm that besides the Obligations from Religion which the Conformists are equally under with Dissenters for hindring the introduction of Popery there are several Inducements from interest which sway them to prevent its establishment wherein the Dissenters are but little concerned For though Popery would be alike afflictive to the Consciences of Protestants of all Persuasions yet they are Gentlemen and Ministers of the Church of England whole Livings Revenues and Estates have been threatned in case it had come to be established Nor would the most Loyal and obsequious Levites provided they resolve to continue Protestants be willing that their Personages and Incumbencies to which they have have no less Right by Law than the King hath to the Excise and Customs should be taken from them and bestowed upon Romish Priests by an Act of Despotical Power and of unlimited Prerogative And for the Gentlemen as I think few of them would hold themselves obliged to part with their purses to High-way-Padders though such should have a pattent from the King to rob whomsoever they met upon the Road so there will not be many inclined to suffer their Mannours and Abbey-Lands to which they have so
I shall not take upon me to determine and will only say that as I heartily wish he had not in those Letters afforded them any probable Pretence for proceeding against him so there are Excesses of Loyalty in them to attone for the utmost Indiscretions his words are capable of being wrested unto nor can any thing but Papal Malice and Romish Chicanerie construe and pervert them so far contrary to his Intentions as to make Crimes and much less to make Treasons of them Now as nothing can be of more portentous Omen to British and Irish Protestants than to have a Popish Bigot exalted to Rule over them so through a Concurrence of ill Nature and a deficiency in Intellectuals met in him with this furious Zeal and Bigottry they are the more to expect whatsoever his Power inables him to inflict that is Severe and Dreadful 'T is possible that a Ruler may be possessed with a Fondness and Valuation of Popery as the only Religion wherein Salvation is to be obtained and therefore in his private Judgment and Opinion sentence all to eternal Flames who cannot herd with him in the same Society and yet he may through a great measure of Humanity and from an extraordinary Proportion of Compassion and Meekness woven into his Nature hate the imbrueing his Hands in their Blood or treating those with any Harshness whose supposed Misbelief is their only Crime and that finding them in all other Respects Vertuous Peaceable and Industrious He may leave them to the decretive Sentence of the Sovereign and infallible Judge without disturbing or meddling with them himself Nor is it impossible but that there may be a Prince so far Bigotted in Popery as to have Inclination and Propensity to force all under his Authority to be of his Religion or else to destroy and extirpate them yet through being of that largeness of Understanding and Political Wisdom as to be able to penetrate into the Hazards of attempting it and to foresee the Consequences that may ensue upon it in reference to the Peace and Safety of his Government as well as the Wealth and Power of his Dominions he may come to check and stifle his furious Inclinations and chuse rather to leave his Subjects at quiet than to impoverish weaken and dis-people his Country either by destroying them or by driving them to abandon his Territories in order to find a Shelter and Sanctuary in other places But where as in the King of England a small Measure of Understanding accompanied with a large share of a Morose Fierce and Ill Nature and these attended with Insolency and Pride as they usually are in weak and froward People come to have a Bigottry in such a Religion as Popery superadded to them whose Doctrines and Principles instigate and oblige to Cruelty towards all of other Perswasions there Protestants do find nothing that may incourage to hope for Security and Protection under a Prince of that Temper and Complexion but all that does affect and impress their Minds bids them prepare for Persecution and to look for the utmost Rigors and Severities that Pride Malice brutal Zeal back'd and supported with Force and Power can execute and inflict And how much such a Prince's Religion proves too weak to restrain him from Uncleannesses and other Immoralities by so much the more is he to be dreaded in that he thinks to compound for and expiate Crimes of that Nature by his Cruelty to Hereticks and his offering them up in Sacrifices of Attonement to the Tripple Crown Nor are the Priests either displeased with or careful to disswade Princes from Offences of that kind though they know them to be great Provocations to God and of mischievous Example to Subjects seeing they are Masters of the Art of improving them to the Service of Holy Church and the Advantage of the Catholick Faith For instead of imposing upon those Royal Transgressors the little and Slavish Penances of Pilgrimages Whippings and going Bare-foot they require them to make Satisfactions for those and the like Crimes by the pious and meritorious Acts of Murthering Protestants and of extirpating the Northern Heresie And as one of the French Whores of State is reported to have been a Person that hath principally instigated to all the Cruelties against the Reformed in France so no doubt but as she did it under the Influence and Conduct of her Confessors to compensate for her Adulteries so she advised and perswaded Louis to it upon Motives of the same nature Nor do they who have the guidance of Consciences at White-hall want matter of the same kind to improve and work upon and as there are of the licentious Females that will be glad of attoning for their filthy Pollutions by Acts so agreeable to the Articles of their Religion so there are some who as they have Influence enough upon the King to Counsel Him to the like Methods so they will find Him sufficiently disposed to compound for his Loathsom and Promiscuous Scatterings at a rate so suitable to his Temper as well as to the Doctrines of the Papal Faith If any be deluded into a good Opinion of His Majesty and brought to flatter themselves with Expectations of their being protected in the Profession of the Protestant Religion they may be easily undeceived and prevailed upon to change their Sentiments if they will but consider his Behaviour towards Protestants in the Post wherein he formerly stood and what his carriage was to them while he was fixed in a meaner and more subordinate Station than now he is Though there have been many whose Behaviour in their private Condition would have rendred them thought worthy to Rule if their Actions after their Advancement to governing Power had not confuted the Opinion entertained concerning them yet here have been very few that have approved themselves Just and Merciful after their attaining to Sovereignty whose Carriage in an inferior Station had been to the Damage and general Hurt of Mankind as far as their narrow Power and Interest would extend It ought therefore to lay us under a Conviction what we are to expect from His Majesty on the Throne when we find the whole Thread and Series of his Conduct while a Subject to have been a continued Design against our Religion and an uninterrupted Plot for the Subversion of our Laws and Liberties 'T is sufficiently known how active he always was to keep up and inflame the Differences among Protestants and how he was both a great Promoter of all the severe Laws made against Dissenters and a continual Instigator to the rigorous Execution of them So that his affirming it to have been ever his Judgment that none ought to be oppressed and persecuted for Matters of Religion nor to be hindered in Worshipping God according to their several Perswasions serves only to inform us either with what little Honesty Honor and Conscience He acted in concurring to the making of the foresaid Laws or what small Faith and Credit is now to be
the many Laws and Rights which a Jurisdiction is challenged over and exerted in reference unto in the Papers stiled by the forementioned Names All confess a Royal Prerogative settled on the Crown and appertaining to the Royal Office nor can the Supreme Magistrate be executed and discharged to the Advantage and Safety of the Community without a Power affixed unto it of superceding the Execution of some Laws at certain Junctures nor without having an Authority over the Rights of particular Men in some incident cases but then the received Customs of the respective Nations and the universal Good Preservation and Safety of the People in general are the Measures by which this Prerogative in the Crown is to be regulated and beyond which to apply or exert it is an Usurpation and Tyranny in the Ruler All the Power belonging to the Kings and Queens of England and Scotland ariseth from an Agreement and Concession of the People wherein it is stipulated what Rights Liberties and Privileges they reserved unto themselves and what Authority and Jurisdiction they delegated and made over unto the Sovereign in order to his being in a Condition to protect and defend them and that they may the better live in Peace Freedom and Safety which are the Ends for which they have chosen Kings to be over them and for the compassing whereof they originally submitted unto and pitched upon such a Form of Civil Administration Nor are the Opinions of particular Men of what Rank or Order soever they be to be admitted as an Exposition of the Extent of this Prerogative seeing they through their Dependencies upon the King and their Obnoxiousness to be influenced by selfish and personal Ends may enlarge it beyond what is for the Benefit of the Community but the immemorial course of Administration with the Sense of the whole Society signified by their Representatives in Parliament upon emerging Occasions are to be taken for the Sense Paraphrase and Declaration of the Limits of this Royal and Prerogative Power and for any to determine the Bounds of it from the Testimonies of Mercenary Lawyers or Sycophant Clergy-men in Cases wherein the Parliament have by their Votes and Resolutions settled its Boundaries is a Crime that deserves the severest Animadversion and which it is to be hoped a true English Parliament will not let pass unpunished Now a Power arising from Royal Prerogative to suspend and disable a great number of Laws at once and they of such a Nature and Tendency as the great Security of the People consists in their being maintained and which the whole Community represented in Parliaments have often disallowed and made void Princes meddling with so as to interrupt their Execution and Course is so far from being a Right inherent in the Crown that the very pretending unto it is a changing of the Government and an overthrowing of the Constitution De Laudib Leg. Angl. c. 9. Fortescue says That Rex Angliae populum Gubernat non merâ potestate Regiâ sed politicâ quia populus iis legibus gubernatur quas ipse fert the King of England doth not so properly Govern by a Power that is Regal as by a Power that is Political in that he is bound to Rule by the Laws which the People themselves chuse and enact And both Bracton and Fleta tell us Bract. l. 2. c. 16. Flet. l. 2. c. 17. That Rex Angliae habet superiores viz. legem per quam factus est Rex ac Comites Barones qui debent ei fraenum ponere the King of England hath for Superiors both the Law by which he is constituted King and which is the measure of his Governing Power and the Parliament which is to restrain him if he do amiss And thereupon we have not only that other Saying of Bracton Lib. 3. cap. 9. That Nihil aliud potest Rex nisi id solum quod jure potest The King can do nothing but what he can do by Law But we have that Famous Passage in our Parliament Rolls Rot. Parl. 7. Hen. 4. Num. 59 Non est ulla Regis prerogativa quae ex justitia aequitate quicquam derogat That there is no Prerogative belongs to the King by which he can decline from acting according to Law and Justice So careful were our Ancestors both in England and Scotland to preserve their Laws from being invaded and superceded by their Kings that they have not only by divers Parliamentary Votes and Resolutions and by several Statutes declared all Dispensations by the King from Laws and enjoyned Oaths to be null and void and not admittable by the Judges or other Executors of Law and Justice but they have often Impeached Arraigned and Condemned those to one Penalty or another that have been found to have counselled and advised Kings to an Usurpation of Power over the Laws and to a Violation of established and enacted Rules It would draw this Discourse to a length beyond what is intended should I mention the several Laws against Papists as well as against Dissenters that are suspended stop'd disabled and dispensed with in the two fore-mentioned Royal Papers and it would be an extending it much more should I make the several Reflections that the matter is capable of and which a Person of a very ordinary Understanding cannot be greatly to seek for I shall therefore only take notice of two or three Efforts which occur there of this Royal Prerogative and Absolute Power which as they are very bold and ample Exertions of them for the first time so should the next Exercises of them be proportionable there will be nothing left us of the Protestant Religion or of English Liberties and we must be contented to be Papists and Slaves or else to stand adjudged to Tyburn and Smithfield One is the Suspending the Laws which enjoyn the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and the prohibiting that these Oaths be at any time hereafter required to be taken by which single Exercise of Royal Prerogative and Absolute Power the two Kingdoms are not only again subjected to a Foreign furisdiction the Miseries whereof they groaned under for several Ages but as the King is hereby deprived of the greatest Security he had from his Subjects both to himself and the Government so the Crown is rob'd of one of its chiefest Jewels namely an Authority over all the Subjects which was thought so essential to Sovereignty and Royal Dignity that it was annexed to the Imperial Crown of England and adjudged inherent in the Monarch before the Reformed Religion came to be received and established And it concerns their Royal Highnesses of Orange to whom the Right of succeeding to the Crown of Great Britain unquestionably belongs to consider whether his Majesty may not by the same Authority whereby he alienates and gives away so considerable and inherent a Branch of the Royal Jurisdiction transfer the Succession it self and dispose the Inheritance of the Crown to whom he pleaseth Nor will they
till after the expiration of twenty Years In the same manner when he had resolved to Repeal the Edict of Nantes and had given injunction for the Draught by which it was to be done he at the same season gave the Protestants all assurances of Protection and of the said Edicts being kept Inviolable To which may be added that shameful and detestable Chicanery in passing his Sacred and Royal Word that no violence should be offered any for their Religion tho at that very moment the Dragoons were upon their March with orders of exercising all manner of Cruelties und Barbarities upon them So that his Majesty of Great Britain hath a Pattern lately sent him and that by the Illustrious Monarch whom he so much admires and whom he makes it his Ambition and Glory to imitate Nor are we without proofs already how insignificant the King's Promises are except to delude and what little confidence ought to be put in them The disabling and suspending the 13th Statute of his late Parliament in Scotland wherein the Test was Confirmed and his departing from all his Promises Registred in his Letter as well as from those contained in the Speech made by the Lord Commissioner pursuant to the Instructions which he had undoubtedly receiv'd together with his having forgotten and receded from all his Promises made to the Church of England both when Duke of York and since he came to the Crown are undeniable evidences that his Royal Word is no more Sacred nor Binding than that of some other Monarchs and that whosoever of the Protestants shall be so foolish as to rely upon it will find themselves as certainly disappointed and deceived as they of the Reformed Religion elsewhere have been And while they of the Established way find so small security by the Laws which the King is bound by his Coronation Oath to observe the Dissenters cannot expect very much from a naked Promise which as it hath not a solemn Oath to enforce it so 't is both Illegal in the making and contrary to the principles of his Religion to keep Nor is it unworthy of observation that he hath not only departed from his Promises made to the Church of England but that we are told in a late Popish Pamphlet Intituled A New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty Published as it self says by Authority that they were all conditional to wit by vertue of some Mental Reservation in his Majesty's Breast and that the Conformable Clergy having failed in performing the Conditions upon which they were made the King is absolved and discharged from all Obligation of observing them The Church of England says he must give his Majesty leave not to nourish a Snake in his Bosom but rather to withdraw his Royal Protection which was promised upon the account of her constant fidelity Which as it is a plain threatning of all the Legal Clergy and a denunciation of the unjust and hard measure they are to look for so it shakes the Foundation upon which all credit unto and reliance upon his Majesty's Word can be any ways placed For tho Threatnings may have tacit Reserves because the right of executing them resides in the Threatner yet Promises are incapable of all latent conditions because every Promise vests a Right in the Promisee and that in the virtue of the words in which it is made But it is the less to be wondred at if his Majesty fly to Equivocations and Mental Reserves being both under the conduct of that Order and a Member of the Society that first taught and practised this treacherous piece of Chicanery However it may inform the Dissenters that if they be not able to answer the End for which they are depended upon or be not willing in the manner and degree that is expected or if it be not for the Interest of the Catholick Cause to have them indulged in all these cases and many more the King may be pronounced acquitted and discharged from all the Promises he hath given them as having been merely stipulatory and conditional And as he will be sure then finem facere ferendae alienae personae to lay aside the disguise that he hath now put on so if they would reflect either upon his temper or upon his Religion they might now know haud gratuitam in tanta superbia comitatem that a person of his pride would not stoop to such Flattery as his Letter to Mr. Alsop expresseth but in order to some design But what need other proof of the fallaciousness of the two Royal Papers and that no Protestants can reasonably depend upon the Royal Word there laid to pledge for the continuation of their Liberty but to look into these too Papers themselves where we shall meet expressions that may both detract from our belief of his Majesty's sincerity and awaken us to a just jealousie that the Liberty and Toleration granted by them are intended to be of no long standing and duration For while he is pleased to tell us that the granting his Subjects the free use of their Religion for the time to come is an addition to the perfect Enjoyment of their Property which has never been invaded by His Majesty since his coming to the Crown He doth in effect say that His Fidelity Truth and Integrity in what he grants in reference to Religion is to be measured and judged by the Verity that is in what He rells us as to the never having Invaded our Property And that I may Borrow an Expression from Mr. Alsop and to no less Person than to the King himself namely That tho we pretend to no refined Intellectuals nor presume to Philosophise upon Mysteries of Government yet we make some pretence to the Sense of Feeling and whatever our Dullness be can discern between what is exacted of us according to Law and what we are rob'd of by an Exerclse of Arbitrary Power For not to insist upon the violent Seisure of Mens Goods by Officers as well as Soldiers in all parts of England which looks like an Invasion upon the Properties of the Subject nor to dwell upon his keeping an Army on foot in time of Peace against the Authority as well as without the Countenance of Law which our Ancestors would have stiled an Invasion upon the whole Property of the Kingdom I would fain know by what Name we are to call his Levying the Customs and the Additional Excise before they were granted unto him by the Parliament all the legal Establishment of them upon the Nation having been only during the late King's Life till the Settlement of them upon the Crown was again renewed by Statute It were also worth his Majesties telling us what Titles are due to the Suspending the Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge a Beneficio and the turning the President of Magdalen's in Oxford out of his Headship and the Suspending Dr. Fairfax from his Fellowship if there be not an Invasion upon our Property seeing every part of this is against all
Protestant and a Free man and therefore the Case being thus I shall think my self false to my Country if I sit still at this time I am of Opinion that when the Nation is Deliver'd it must be by Force or by Miracle It would be too great a presumption to expect the latter and therefore our Deliverance must be by Force and I hope this is the Time for it a Price is now put into our Hands and if it miscarry for want of Assistance our Blood is upon our own Heads and he that is passive at this Time may very well expect that God will mock when the Fear of Affliction comes upon him which he thought to avoid by being indifferent If the King prevails farewel Liberty of Conscience which has hitherto been allowed not for the sake of the Protestants but in order to settle Popery You may see what to expect if he get the better and he hath lately given you of this Town a taste of the Method whereby he will maintain his Army And you may see of what sort of People he intends his Army to consist and if you have not a mind to serve such Masters then stand not by and see your Country-men perish when they are endeavouring to defend you I promise this on my Word and Honour to every Tenant that goes along with me That if he fall I will make his Lease 〈◊〉 good to his Family as it was when he went from home The thing then which â—â—se â—esire and your Country does expect from you is this That every Man that hath a toâ—rable Horse or can procure one will meet me on Boden-Downs to morrow where I Rendezvouz But if any of you is rendred unable by reason of Age or any other just Excuse then that he would mount a fitter person and put five Pounds in his Pocket Those that have not nor cannot procure Horse let them stay at home and assist with their Purses and send it to me with a particular of every Mans Contribution I impose on no Man but let him lay his Hand on his Heart and consider what he is willing to give to recover his Religion and Liberty and to such I promise and to all that go along with 〈…〉 if we prevail I will be as industrious to have him recompensed for his Charge and â—â—azard as I will be to seek it for my self This Advice I give to all that stay behind That when you hear the Papists have committed any Out-rage or any Rising that you will get together for it is better to meet your danger than expect it I have no more to say but that I am willing to lose my Life in the Cause if God see it good for I was never unwilling to die for my Religion and Country An Engagement of the Noblemen Knights and Gentlemen at Exeter to Assist the Prince of Orange in the Defence of the Protestant Religion Laws and Liberties of the People of England Scotland and Ireland WE do engage to Almighty God and to his Highness the Prince of Orange and with one another to stick firm to this Cause and to one another in the Defence of it and never to depart from it until our Religion Laws and Liberties are so far secured to us in a Free-Parliament that we shall be no more in danger of falling under Popery and Slavery And whereas we are engaged in the Common Cause under the Protection of the Prince of Orange by which means his Person may be exposed to Danger and to the desperate and cursed Designs of Papists and other bloody Men we do therefore solemnly engage to God and to one another That if any such Attempts be made upon him we will pursue not only those that made them but all their Adherents and all we find in Arms against us with the utmost Severity of just Revenge in their Ruin and Destruction and that the executing any such Attempt which God of his Infinite Mercy forbid shall not deprive us from pursuing this Cause which we do now undertake but that it shall encourage us to carry it on with all the Vigour that so Barbarous Approach shall deserve The Declaration of the Nobility Gentry and Commonalty at the Rendezvouz at Nottingham Nov. 22. 1688. WE the Nobility Gentry and Commonalty of these Northern Counties assembled together at Nottingham for the Defence of the Laws Religion and Properties according to those free-born Liberties and Priviledges descended to us from our Ancestors as the undoubted Birth-right of the Subjects of this Kingdom of England not doubting but the Infringers and Invaders of our Rights will represent us to the rest of the Nation in the most malicious dress they can put upon us do here unanimously think it our Duty to declare to the rest of our Protestant Fellow-Subjects the Grounds of our present Undertaking We are by innumerable Grievances made sensible that the very Fundamentals of our Religion Liberties and Properties are about to be rooted out by our late Jesuitical Privy Council as hath been of late too apparent 1. By the King's dispensing with all the Establish'd Laws at his pleasure 2. By displacing all Officers out of all Offices of Trust and Advantage and placing others in their room that are known Papists deservedly made incapable by the Establish'd Laws of our Land 3. By destroying the Charters of most Corporations in the Land 4. By discouraging all Persons that are not Papists preferring such as turn to Popery 5. By displacing all honest and conscientious Judges unless they would â—â—ntrary to their Consciences declare that to be Law which was meerly arbitrary 〈…〉 By branding all Men with the name of Rebels that but offered to justifie the Law 〈…〉 a legal course against the arbitrary proceedings of the King or any of his corrupt Ministers 7. By burthening the Nation with an Army to maintain the Violation of the Rights of the Subjects 8. By discountenancing the Establish'd Reformed Religion 9. By forbidding the Subjects the benefit of Petitioning and constâ—â—ing them Libellers so rendring the Laws a Nose of Wax to serve their Arbitrary 〈…〉 And many more such-like too long here to enumerate We being thus made sadly sensible oâ— he Arbitrary and Tyrannical Government that is by the Influence of Jesuitical Counsels coming upon us do unanimously declare That not being willing to deliver our Posterity over to such a Condition of Popery and Slavery as the aforesaid Oppressions inevitably threaten we will to the utmost of our power oppose the same by joining with the Prince of Orange whom we hope God Almighty hath sent to rescue us from the Oppressions aforesaid will use our utmost Endeavours for the recovery of our almost ruin'd Laws Liberties and Religion And herein we hope all good Protestant Subjects will with their Lives and Fortunes be assistant to us and not be bugbear'd with the opprobrious Terms of Rebels by which they would fright us to become perfect Slaves to their Tyrannical Insolences and Usurpations
Consent of Parliament is against Law That the Subjects which are Protestants may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Condition and as allowed by Law That Election of Members of Parliament ought to be Free That the Freedom of Speech and Debates or Proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any Court or place out of Parliament That excessive Bail ought not to be required nor excessive Fines imposed nor cruel and unusual Punishments inflicted That Jurors ought to be duly empannell'd and return'd and Jurors which pass upon Men in Tryals for High-Treason ought to be Freeholders That all grants and promises of Fines and Forfeitures of particular Persons before Conviction are Illegal and Void And that for Redress of all Grievances and for the amending strengthening and preserving of the Laws Parliaments ought to be held frequently And they do claim demand and insist upon all and singular the Premises as their undoubted Rights and Liberties and that no Declarations Judgments Doings or Proceedings to the prejudice of the People in any of the said Premises ought in any wise to be drawn hereafter into Consequence or Example To which Demand of their Rights they are particularly encouraged by the Declaration of His Highness the Prince of Orange as being the only Means for obtaining a full redress and remedy therein Having therefore an intire Confidence that his said Highness the Prince of Orange will perfect the Deliverance so far advanced by Him and will still preserve them from the Violation of their Rights which they have here asserted and from all other Attempts upon their Religion Rights and Liberties The said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons Assembled at Westminster do resolve That William and Mary Prince and Princess of Orange be and be declared King and Queen of England France and Ireland and the Dominions thereunto belonging to hold the Crown and Royal Dignity of the said Kingdoms and Dominions to them the said Prince and Princess during their Lives and the Life of the Survivor of them And that the sole and full Exercise of the Regal Power be only in and executed by the said Prince of Orange in the Names of the said Prince and Princess during their joynt lives and after their Deceases the said Crown and Royal Dignity of the said Kingdoms and Dominions to be to the Heirs of the Body of the said Princess and for default of such Issue to the Princess Ann of Denmark and the Heirs of Her Body and for default of such Issue to the Heirs of the Body of the said Prince of Orange And the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons do pray the said Prince and Princess of Orange to accept the same accordingly And that the Oaths hereafter mentioned be taken by all Persons of whom the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy might be required by Law instead of them and that the said Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy be Abrogated I A. B. do sincerely promise and swear That I will be Faithful and bear true Allegiance to their Majesties King WILLIAM and Queen MARY So help me God I A. B. do swear That I do from my Heart Abhor Detest and Abjure as Impious and Heretical this Damnable Doctrin and Position That Princes Excommunicated or Deprived by the Pope or any Authority of the See of Rome may be Deposed or Murthered by their Subjects or any other whatsoever And I do declare That no Foreign Prince Person Prelate State or Potentate hath or ought to have any Jurisdiction Power Superiority Preeminence or Authority Ecclesiastical or Spiritual within this Realm So help me God Jo. Browne Cleric ' Parl. Die Veneris 15 Feb. 1688. His Majesties Gracious Answer to the Declaration of both Houses My Lords and Gentlemen THIS is certainly the greatest proof of the Trust you have in Vs that can be given which is the thing that maketh us value it the more and we thankfully Accept what you have Offered And as I had no other Intention in coming hither than to preserve your Religion Laws and Liberties so you may be sure That I shall endeavour to support them and shall be willing to concur in any thing that shall be for the Good of the Kingdom and to do all that is in my Power to advance the Welfare and Glory of the Nation Jo. Browne Cleric ' Parliamentorum Die Veneris 〈◊〉 Februarii 1688. ORdered by the Lords Spiritual and Temporal Assembled at Westminster That His Majesties Gracious Answer to the Declaration of both Houses and the Declaration be forthwith Printed and Published And that His Majesties Gracious Answer this Day be added to the Engrossed Declaration in Parchment to be Enrolled in Parliament and Chancery A PROCLAMATION WHereas it hath pleased Almighty God in his Great Mercy to this Kingdom to Vouchsafe us a Miraculous Deliverance from Popery and Arbitrary Power and that our Preservation is due next under God to the Resolution and Conduct of His Highness the Prince of ORANGE whom God hath Chosen to be the Glorious Instrument of such an Inestimable Happiness to us and our Posterity And being highly sensible and fully persuaded of the Great and Eminent Vertues of Her Highness the Princess of ORANGE whose Zeal for the Protestant Religion will no doubt bring a Blessing along with Her upon this Nation And whereas the Lords and Commons now Assembled at Westminster have made a Declaration and Presented the same to the said Prince and Princess of ORANGE and therein desired them to Accept the Crown who have Accepted the same Accordingly We therefore the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons together with the Lord Mayor and Citizens of London and others of the Commons of this Realm do with a full Consent Publish and Proclaim according to the said Declaration WILLIAM and MARY Prince and Princess of ORANGE to be KING and QUEEN of England France and Ireland with all the Dominions and Cerritories thereunto belonging Who are accordingly so to be Owned Deemed Accepted and taken by all the People of the aforesaid Realms and Dominions who are from henceforward bound to Acknowledge and Pay unto them all Faith and true Allegiance Beseeching God by whom Kings Reign to Bless King WILLIAM and Queen MARY with Long and Happy Years to Reign over Vs. God Save King WILLIAM and Queen MARY Jo. Brown Cleric ' Parliamentorum The Declaration of the Estates of Scotland concerning the Misgovernment of King James the Seventh and filling up the Throne with King William and Queen Mary THAT King James the 7th had acted irregularly 1. By His Erecting publick Schools and Societies of the Jesuits and not only allowing Mass to be publickly said but also inverting Protestant Chapels and Churches to Publick Mass-houses contrary to the express Laws against saying and hearing of Mass 2. By allowing Popish Books to be Printed and Dispersed by a Gift to a Popish Printer designing him Printer to his Majesties Houshold College and Chapel contrary to the Laws
be miserably diminish'd sooner than we are aware But there remains yet another part of our Message which we have to impart to you on the behalf of your People They find in an antient Statute and it has been done in fact not long ago That if the King through any Evil Counsel or foolish Contumacy or out of Scorn or some singular petulant Will of his own or by any other irregular Means shall alienate himself from his People and shall refuse to be govern'd and guided by the Laws of the Realm and the Statutes and laudable Ordinances thereof together with the wholsom Advice of the Lords and great Men of his Realm but persisting head-strong in his own hare-brain'd Counsels shall petulantly prosecute his own singular humour That then it shall be lawful for them with the common assent and consent of the People of the Realm to depose that same King from his Regal Throne and to set up some other of the Royal Blood in his room H. Knight Coll. 2681. No Man can imagine that the Lords and Commons in Parliament would have sent the King such a Message and have quoted to him an old Statute for deposing Kings that would not govern according to Law if the People of England had then apprehended that an Obedience without reserve was due to the King or if there had not been such a Statute in being And though the Record of that Excellent Law be lost as the Records of almost all our Antient Laws are yet is the Testimony of so credible an Historian who lived when these things were transacted sufficient to inform us that such a Law was then known and in being and consequently that the Terms of English Allegiance according to the Constitution of our Government are different from what some Modern Authors would persuade us they are This Difference betwixt the said King and his Parliament ended amicably betwixt them in the punishment of many Evil Counsellors by whom the King had been influenced to commit many Irregularities in Government But the Discontents of the People grew higher by his After-management of Affairs and ended in the Deposition of that King and setting up of another who was not the next Heir in Lineal Succession The Articles against King Richard the Second may be read at large in H. Knighton Collect. 2746 2747 c. and are yet extant upon Record An Abridgment of them is in Cotton's Records pag. 386 387 388. out of whom I observe these few there being in all Thirty three The First was His wasting and bestowing the Lands of the Crown upon unworthy Persons and overcharging the Commons with Exactions And that whereas certain Lords Spiritual and Temporal were assign'd in Parliament to intend the Government of the Kingdom the King by a Conventicle of his own Accomplices endeavoured to impeach them of High-Treason Another was For that the King by undue means procured divers Justices to speak against the Law to the destruction of the Duke of Glocester and the Earls of Arundel and Warwick at Shrewsbury Another For that the King against his own Promise and Pardon at a solemn Procession apprehended the Duke of Glocester and sent him to Calice there to be choaked and murthered beheading the Earl of Arundel and banishing the Earl of Warwick and the Lord Cobham Another For that the King's Retinue and a Rout gathered by him out of Cheshire committed divers Murders Rapes and other Felonies and refused to pay for their Victuals Another For that the Crown of England being freed from the Pope and all other Foreign Power the King notwithstanding procured the Pope's Excommunication on such as should break the Ordinances of the last Parliament in derogation of the Crown Statutes and Laws of the Realm Another That he made Men Sheriffs who were not named to him by the Great Officers the Justices and others of his Council and who were unfit contrary to the Laws of the Realm and in manifest breach of his Oath Another For that he did not repay to his Subjects the Debts that he had borrowed of them Another For that the King refused to execute the Laws saying That the Laws were in his Mouth and Breast and that himself alone could make and alter the Laws Another For causing Sheriffs to continue in Office above a Year contrary to the tenor of a Statute-Law thereby incurring notorious Perjury Another For that the said King procured Knights of the Shires to be returned to serve his own Will Another For that many Justices for their good Counsel given to the King were with evil Countenance and Threats rewarded Another For that the King passing into Ireland had carried with him without the Consent of the Estates of the Realm the Treasure Reliques and other Jewels of the Realm which were used safely to be kept in the King 's own Coffers from all hazard And for that the said King cancelled and razed sundry Records Another For that the said King appear'd by his Letters to the Pope to Foreign Princes and to his Subjects so variable so dissembling and so unfaithful and inconstant that no Man could trust him that knew him insomuch that he was a Scandal both to himself and the Kingdom Another That the King would commonly say amongst the Nobles that all Subjects Lives Lands and Goods were in his hands without any forfeiture which is altogether contrary to the Laws and Vsages of the Realm Another For that he suffered his Subjects to be condemned by Martial-Law contrary to his Oath and the Laws of the Realm Another For that whereas the Subjects of England are sufficiently bound to the King by their Allegiance yet the said King compell'd them to take new Oaths These Articles with some others not altogether of so general a concern being considered and the King himself confessing his Defects the same seemed sufficient to the whole Estates for the King's Deposition and he was depos'd accordingly The Substance and Drift of all is That our Kings were antiently liable to and might lawfully be deposed for Oppression and Tyranny for Insufficiency to govern c. in and by the great Council of the Nation without any breach of the old Oath of Fealty because to say nothing of the nature of our Constitution express and positive Laws warranted such Proceedings And therefore the Frame of our Government being the same still and the Terms of our Allegiance being the same now that they were then without any new Obligations superinduced by the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy a King of England may legally at this day for sufficient cause be deposed by the Lords and Commons assembled in a Great Council of the Kingdom without any breach of the present Oaths of Supremacy or Allegiance Quod erat demonstrandum MANTISSA WHen Stephen was King of England whom the People had chosen rather than submit to Mawd tho the Great Men of the Realm had sworn Fealty to her in her Father's life-time Henry Duke of Anjou Son of the said Mawd afterwards King Henry the Second invaded the Kingdom An. Dom. 1153 which was towards the latter-end of King Stephen's Reign and Theobald Archbishop of Canterbury endeavoured to mediate a Peace betwixt them speaking frequently with the King in private and sending many Messages to the Duke and Henry Bishop of Winchester took pains likewise to make them Friends Factum est autem ut mense Novembris in fine mensis EX PRAECEPTO REGIS ET DUCIS Collect. pag. 1374 1375. convenirent apud Wintoniam Praesules Principes Regni ut ipsi jam initae paci praeberent assensum unanimiter juramenti Sacramento confirmarent i.e. It came to pass that in the Month of November towards the latter end of the Month at the summons of the King and of the Duke the Prelats and Great Men of the Kingdom were assembled at Winchester that they also might assent to the Peace that was concluded and unanimously swear to observe it In that Parliament the Duke was declared King Stephen's adopted Son and Heir of the Kingdom and the King to retain the Government during his Life I observe only upon this Authority That there being a Controversy betwixt the King and the Duke which could no otherwise be determined and settled but in a Parliament the Summons of this Parliament were issued in the Names of both Parties concerned Quisquis habet aures ad audiendum audiat FINIS