Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	act_n	king_n	law_n	5,822	5	4.7877	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A52664	The nations address to the committee of grievances in Parliament for the taking off the corporation oath in behalf of all cities, towns-corporate, aldermen, bayliffs, burgesses, as also sheriffs, lord lieutenants, and deputy lieutenants of counties, ministers, and all others concerned for the repealing those acts, which impose the oath folowing.	England and Wales. Parliament. Committee of Grievances.	1689 (1689)	Wing N235A; ESTC R636	5,730	2

will ask here Whether the Sheriff act not herein by the King's Authority I think it cannot be denyed By the Kings Authority is all one as by the Laws and if he can Act so Justificially against any for all their Commission and the Law will bear him out How is this Position in this Case Traiterous and to be Abhorred It were hardly now to be imagined that it could be the intent of any Parliament in England to advance the Personal Will or Commission of the King above Law which is to make his power Despotical and not Royal Non est Rex says Bracton ubi Dominatur voluntas non Lex He is no King that Governs by his Will and not by Law. And how it should come to pass therefore that he should enjoin this Po●ition indefinitely without exception of this Case at least to be Sworn to as altogether Traiterous I can never methinks wonder enough What if any Souldiers should come with a Commission under the Seal to raise Money without an Act of Parliament and by vertue of such Commissions Seize our Goods Rifle our Houses and Ravish our Wives May not the People or our inferior Magistrates or the Sheriff for the County withstand such Violence May not the Constable alone from the Justice to keep the Peace raise the Neigbourhood and do it If he may or the Sheriff may it must be in the Name of the King or by Authority of the Law and then there is some Case or Cases where Arms or Force may be raised by the Authority of the King against such as are Comssionated by him though not against his Sacred Person Nay what if a Prince should go to ravish a Virgin and she catches up the next Weapon or Instrument that is at hand to defend her Chastity would such a Sacredness as that make this Act of hers to be sinful that is so Vertuous in it self Suppose again that Papists or Fanaticks should either by Power or Surprize at any time get a King in their Hand as the Duke of Guise once dealt with the French King and prevail with him for fear of his Life to grant Commissions under his Hand and Seal destructive to the Church and State must the Nation be Remediless in this Case and the King and Kingdom ruin'd by these Commissions Nay What security hath the Nation that a Lord Keeper may not prove Traitor to his King and Country and under the Broad-Seal grant Commissions to Disband his Majesties Life-Guard deliver up the Navy or Sea-Port Towns seize on the Tower and all places of Strength In what a Condition were the King and Kingdom brought if the Subjects Hands be bound up by an Oath not to resist or take Arms against the Executiers of such Commissions suppose but so long as till they understand his design seeing by that time the Nation be past recovery And who is there now that will not be offended at the Sense and turn'd at the Horror of these sad Consequences into which such Tests and Injunctions if not now seasonably Retrench'd may lead our Posterity As for the Form thereof the Words I abhor this Traiterous Position they are Harsh The word Abhor especially was a Word of interest and passion a cooler word as I disown or disallow might have served Some of the most Gravell of the Nonconformists were much scandaized at that Word A Man may say a thing is unlawful in his Conscience when he cannot say according to Truth I abhor it Well Sirs When these words Abhor and Traiterous are so harsh in the Composure and when such Cases as above-mentioned and others may be put as to the Position in the Matter of it I offer it in the next place to Consideration whether the Middle part of the Oath be according to Truth For the First Part we have a large Assertion roundly Sworn The Oath runs not only that it is not lawful to take Arms against the King and that it is not lawful on any pretence but on any Pretence or Cause whatsoever The Grammatical literal Construction of that Word seems to insinuate no less than that this Proposition must be held without Restraint or Limitation Among the most eminent Authors which have wrote of the Power of Princes and Establish'd it against Resistance in their Writings on this Subject I suppose they are few or none to be leveled above these Three Barclay Grotius Arnisaeus and we shall find that they have all their restrictions or Cases of Exception in the maintenance of this Tenet And how could any learned Justice formerly be very earnest in punishing a Refusor when if the matter was but scann'd th●●eason why he refused would be found only because he ha● Read more than some others that yielded their Submiss●on 〈◊〉 begin with Barclay that is William Barclay a Scot and Coun●elolr to the French King who writes against Buehanan Boucher and other Monarchomachists as he calls them This learne● Man endeavours to make his Prince to be above the who●● People that consequently no Arms can be taken against him Nevertheless when he comes to put some pressing Cases he thus limits him Quid ergo nulline casus insidere possunt quibus populo in Regem arma capere jure suo liceat Nulli certe quam diu Rex manet What then Can there no Cases happen wherein It is lawful for the People to take Arms against the King by right None certainly so long as he remains a King. There are Cases indeed he accounts in which a King doth exuere personum Regis or Dominatu se exuere put off the Person of a King and particularly l. 3. ch 16. he mentions two Si regnum alienet si Rem-publicam evertere conetur If he go to Alienate his Kingdom If he go to overthrow the Common-Wealth Let us come to a Grotius and first quote him in his Judgment of Barclay lest you may think else I mistake him Barclaius saies he Regis imperii licet Assertor fortissimus huc tamen descendit ut populo insigni ejus parti jus concedit se tuendi adversus immanem sevitiam Barclay though the most strong Assertor of Kingly Government does come to this that he Grants a right to the People or an Eminent part of them of defending themfelves against intolerable Oppression For himself therefore after he hath asserted this Tenet Summum imperium tenentibus jure resisti non posse That the Higher Powers may not lawfully be resisted from Scripture Antiquity Authority and Example to as much purpose perhaps as any he descends to put Seven Cases wherein he does Leorem monere warn his Reader Ne punet in hanc legem delinquere eos qui reverà non delinquunt Lest he mistake some for Delinquents in this matter that are none It will be too long and needless to mention those Cases For Arnisaeus he hath wrote three Learned Books of Politicks De jure Majestatus De Doctrina Politica De Authoritate Principum in Populum semper inviolabili seu Quod nulla ex causa subditis fas sit contra legitimum Principem arma sumere That the Authority of Princes over the People ought to be inviolable or That it is lawful for no cause to take up Arms against our lawful Prince Here then we have our Tenet but as to the stating it he is forc'd to distinguish There is Rex and there is Tyrannus a King and a Tyrant And there is Tyrannus in Titulo and Tyrannus in Exerictio A Tyrant in Title and a Tyrant in Practice And this he comes to in the issue that Tyraunus in Exercitio as Tyrant in Practice does Exeidere de jure si Hereditario fall from his Right though Heredita●y Truditur Resublica Principi in cum finem saies he ut illi profit in salutem omnium a quo si prorses disciverit etiam de potestate cadit quam non alio sine sibi commissam habebat The Common-wealth is delivered to the Prince that he should rule over it for the common Safety from which if he depart altogether he falls even from the Power it self which was committed to him only for this End. By such Testimonies as these I would convince the Compilers of such Declarations if they be alive and any others that are yet of the same Spirit with some Resentment and Shame that when a temperare Sense and Meaning of them is such as some good men have not stuck at yet are they so Composed in termiis as renders them not to be endured For the Form then yet of the Words I A. B. do Swear That it is not lawful c. Here is an Oath to the Matter of a Proposition questioned to the Determination of a point of Conscience and that diversly decided An Oath should he to a Matter of Fact and cannot be taken but to that whereof we are certain To require of Men therefore to Swear to the Verity of a Doctrine is not according to Judgment being a thing im●ossible because no man is infallible Now then Sirs When here is such an Erratum in the Composure as the want of the Words I believe or the like I Swear that I hold or believe that it is not lawful c. and so material an Exception as the Judgment of the most Learned comes to against the Substance in Terminis of the first part of the Oath which yet hath gone down ordinarily without Chewing I humbly offer it in the third place to be considered how this Oath can be taken in Truth o● in Judgment An Oath must be taken in Judgment Truth and in Righteousness The First part is not according to Judgment The Second not according to Truth The Third not according to Righteousness London Printed for R. Hayhurst in Little-Britain 1689.