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	scotland_n	2,696	5	8.4241	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36089	A Discourse concerning the nature, power, and proper effects of the present conventions in both kingdoms called by the Prince of Orange in a letter to a friend.		1689 (1689)	Wing D1588; ESTC R3519	10,789	24

these in Publick Offices and upon Members of Parliament but upon all those who had Vote in Elections of Members to Parliament whereby many were excluded conceiving themselves obliged to endeavour some alterations in the Government either by Divine Right or by Oaths they were commanded to take both by King Charles the first and second being personally present in Parliament and with the consent of the Estates and though there had been no such hindrance it was an alteration of the Constitution whereby all Freeholders of the King of any considerable Land Estate had a Share in the Government by their Birth right in being capable to Elect and to be Elected Members of Parliament And when this King came to the Crown he did extend this Oath by an Act of his first Parliament to all Landed-men whatever the Tenor or Extent of their Lands were they being Protestants whereby Papists were excepted Might not this Meeting of the Estates consider and resolve whether these parts of that Act were beyond the ordinary Parliamentary Power and a Violation of the Constitution and so null without Repeal In all the Zeal against Popery no King or Parliament did by any Act exclude the Electors in Shires or Burroughs nor was there any such thing in England though their Test was only made for preservation of the Protestant Religion and excluding Papists from Publick Trust albeit in both Kingdoms Papists are excluded by Desuetude Seventhly In both Kingdoms Justice run in the Channel of the Ordinary Judicatures Established by Law that nothings can be done amiss for which there are not some persons accountable yet by an Act of the Parliament of Scotland held by this King when Commissioner for his Brother it is declared That all Government and Jurisdiction doth Originally reside in the King and that the Offices and Jurisdiction bestowed by him are not privative of his Jurisdiction and therefore in a dutiful and humble Recognizance of His Majesties Royal Right and Prerogative as to this Point it is declared That notwithstanding these Jurisdictions and Offices His Majesty may by himself or any Commissioned by him take Cognizance and Decision of any Cases or Causes he pleases Enervating the Power of the Ordinary Judicatures and giving ground to pick out Commissioners for every Cause as the Parties are favoured which breeds a general distrust in the Nation and was the ground of making the Officers of the Army Sheriffs and Justices who acted not only with but without and contrary to the Ordinary Judges and Justices though they had neither Skill nor Will to do Justice but did commit these Insolencies under that pretence which are mentioned in the Prince's Declaration for Scotland May not then the Meeting of the Estates in Scotland resolve whether this Act be a Violation of the Constitution and if so whether it be void in it self without a Repeal These of that Nation who are acquainted with the matter of Fact might shew many more Encroachments upon the Constitution and Laws of that Kingdom but I only mention some of these I read in publick printed Records If these and such Violations be found the next point is what that Meeting may do thereupon whether they may not declare themselves free of Subjection to the Violator or any of his Race begotten since these Violations Upon this Consideration that the Rectoral Contract betwixt him and the Body Politick of these Kingdoms represented in these Conventions doth by the Nature of a Mutual Contract necessarily imply that if the one Party violate his part of the Mutual Engagements the other Party hath two Remedies he may at his Option cither force the Failer to perform or declare himself for ever free of that Contract as to the Failer it is true that by the Law or Custom of some Common wealths if the Failer purge the Failure while his Party is in Suit he may be reinstated which is not by the Nature of a Mutual Contract and therefore 't is never pretended in the Mutual Contracts of Kings and States and though sometimes Subjects after such Violations have declared themselves willing to continue in subjection that was an Act of Favour not of Justice or Debt But after a Dispensing Power above Law is assumed and asserted nothing can be said or done which it cannot as easily surmount as it hath the Laws made and Oaths already taken even though the Dispensing Power itself should be disclaimed it can as easily dispence with that Disclamation as what was either Law or promised before If then these Meetings shall declare themselves and the Body Politick free Can they in Justice but declare the Crown to be devolved upon the Princess of Orange and in Justice Gratitude and Remuneration they cannot but declare that the Matrimonial Crown belongs to the Prince of Orange during all the days of his Life for it is inconsistent with Royalty to be for less time then Life and so to see a King of Britain relapse into a Prince of Orange again and how Incongruous and Ungrateful were it to force him who hath delivered Britain to leave it or staying there to become a Subject to his Wife for though a Queen in possession superinducing a Husband may justly be strictly dealt with as Philip of Spain by Treaty was excluded from any Act of the Government with Queen Mary tho' he had the Title of King which he was to leave after her Death even tho' his Child by her should succeed It imports nothing to this Case where the Princess was first a Wife and then a Queen Married to the nearest Male to the Crown and the Case being so contingent and unlikely 't is not to be thought the Princess of Denmark will grudge at it for if he had not come neither of the three were like to have enjoyed the Crown When Ferdinand of Arragon married the Queen of Castile he assum'd the Matrimonial Crown of Castile both in her Life and after her Death tho' he had Children by her The Courtesie both of Scotland and England gives the survivancy of the Estate of Wives Inheritance to their Husbands during their Life and tho' Custom hath restricted it to the Case of a Child born in the Marriage without requiring that Child to survive the Marriage which might have imported a rational Consideration to prefer the surviving Child in the Mother's Inheritance to her Husband yet that not being required there is no ground to extend it to Soveraigns These Conventions have yet a further Power and Use That seeing the ordinary Parliamentary Power can alter nothing in the Constitution without a further Warrant from the Body Politick these Meetings may give Warrant to establish a Liberty of Conscience in a just latitude as the Parliament shall judge reasonable and may also give Warrant for an Act to exclude a Popish Successor wherein the Sovereign Power shall also concur These Acts will be Irrepealable and Unalterable without the like Warrant of the Body Politick being convened with the consent of the King for the time which will give very much ease to the minds of good People and also give much security against Popery The House of Commons past several Votes to exclude a Popish Successor which came not to perfection and was not designed to exclude the apparent Heir of the Crown being Popish and born in which case it is dublious whether it could be done without consent of that apparent Heir But there can be no question that it may be done by the King and Parliament warranted by these Conventions tho' it exclude Collaterals Heirs not yet existent Albeit Queen Mary and Elizabeth were excluded to succeed to the Crown by their Father and a Parliament yet they both succeeded and neither they nor the Parliament found the necessity of a Repeal in respect these Acts were in themselves void as changing the course of Succession by an ordinary Parliamentary Power Likewise these Meetings may give Warrant to Unite the two Kingdoms which the ordinary Parliamentary Power could not reach to unless it were confirmed or consented to after the Act made by the Body Politick for the Uniting of the Kingdoms is certainly an alteration of both making two Politick Bodys one and making one Crown for two but can well be done if these Two Conventions give Warrant for it And there appears a general inclination as well as conveniency in both Nations more than ever before I shall not be much difficulted now to shew by what Authority these Conventions are called The Meetings of the ordinary Judicatures are determined by Law and Custom and any other way of Meeting is declared Illegal But there is no determination of the Calling or Meeting of these extraordinary Conventions and therefore whatever way they meet they are valid otherwise they are not possible and yet they are in many Cases undeniably necessary as if the Race of the Kings should fail or that a King should be a Child or become fatuous or furious or should absolutely desert or renounce the Kingdom In none of these Cases could there be a Parliament called till first there were a Protector or Regent named which only could be made by such Conventions but a Protector where there is a King of Age and Discretion is without Rule or Example and therefore these Conventions must either declared themselves Free or they must remain the King's Subjects and be obedient to all his Commands according to Law they cannot mids the matter Can any have so good an Interest to call these Conventions as the Prince of Orange who is the nearest Male and the Husband of the nearest Female to the Crown who hath put the Kingdoms in Capacity to hold such Meetings and declare their just Rights It is like some upon real Affection to the Prince and others upon that Pretence but upon intention to shake the Monarchy and to make way for a Common-wealth may make use of some Matters of Fact that have hapned in either Kingdom prejudicial to the Lineal Succession which cannot infer a Right against the frequent Declararations of Kings and Parliaments nor is like to be acceptable to the Prince not only from his Affection to so Excellent a Princess but from his Declaration in which he has set her Interest before his own I hope I shall not need to give you further trouble seeing the Event by the Conventions Resolutions will quickly appear and cannot admit of delay and therefore shall only add that I am Yours FINIS

the Common-wealth whether belonging to singer Persons or to Incorporations except in Denmark or Sueden and Laws were made and Taxes imposed by Emperours and Kings with the Advice and Consent of the Plurality of all these in one Assembly or of diverse States in separate Assemblies of the Prelates of the Church for Church-Lands and of the other Barons for the Temporal Lands and of Delegates representing Incorporations for the Lands belonging to them in common but afterwards the Barons being multiplied the minor Barons were all allowed to be represented by Commissioners Elected by them The Sovereign Power was at first stated in Kings and Princes who were very many every considerable City making a several Common-wealth whereof multitudes are mentioned in Scripture These Princes were Leaders of their Armies and Judges of their Controversies in their own Persons without Deputation till the Common-wealths swelled to that greatness That as Jethro advised Moses they found it necessary to have subordinate Deputies for smaller Matters and afterwards even for the greater without appeal to themselves who otherwise would be overwhelmed with Affairs Civil and Military yet so that the Malversation of these subordinate might be punished by the Soveraign Power or by such as were delegated for that purpose In the diffusive Kingdoms of the Assyrians Babylonians Persians and Medes their Kings could hardly be restrained because their Subjects could not Convein as in the lesser Common-wealths and many of them were not united by Popular Contracts and so were not one Body Politick The Excesses of Monarchs gave the rise to Aristocracy where the Soveraign Power was in the Plurality of more Persons and Democracy where the Power was in so great a number that they could not deliberate together that what was said ought to be heard by all Yea all these former came for the most part to be regulated by general Laws to be made with the Advice and Consent of others then these that were in the Soveraign Power In the Athenian Democracy the People could not deliberate but in those things that were advised by their Praeconsultores whose Advice but not their Consent was required The Romans in their Popular Estate could make no Laws unless they were con veined by a Senatorian Magistrate or Tribune of the People and in most things the Authority of the Senate behoved to proceed All the Kings in Christendom by a long tract of time made no general Laws but by consent of their Estates being conveined by themselves or their Deputies tho' some have pretended that they were only called to give their Advice But the constant stile of their Laws and their frequent Declarations evince that not only their Advice but their Consent was necessary I crave your Pardon that I have so long continued in Generals But you will find it was necessary for resolving your Doubts These Conventions then of the two Kingdoms are Representatives of the Body Politick of the respective Kingdoms such as might have been before these Bodies Politick entered in a Rectoral Contract with the first of the Kings of the Race that now Reigneth and they are no Judicial or Authoritive Judicatures and I suppose will claim no Power to make Laws to judge Persons or to impose Taxes Neither are they any of the Judicatures of the Common-wealth deriving Authority from a Soveraign Power but do proceed by the Judgment of Discretion not as they are Subjects or Parts of the Common-wealth but as they are the Parties Contracters with their Kings and their Race as to which Contract they were and must be considered as unsubordinate for they were not Subjects in that Contract nor their Kings Sovereigns but by and after that Contract and therefore they have the same native and inherent Right to deliberate and resolve how far they were obliged by that Contract and how far the present King hath observed or violated the same and therewith the Constitution of the Kingdoms and the Laws and Liberties of the Subject and what they may justly and warrantably declare thereupon in this extraordinary Conjuncture wherein the Body of the Nation hath arisen against the Actings of the King having voluntarily concurred with the Prince of Orange who upon the Invitation of many as the sence of the most came with an Army to encourage them to appear for themselves which they did before any Act of Hostility by him or his coming near to the Places where they rose in Arms and declared for him upon the Grounds of his Declaration So that even his Army tho' far the stronger would not assist the King in that Cause but the most of them joyned with the Prince So that the King being left to his liberty removed beyond Sea sheltering himself under the Wings of the most eminent Oppressor of Protestants I hope this will give you light to consider what is the nature of these Conventions The next Point is What Power these Conventions have and what they can warrantably do I have shewn you what I think they should not do now I shall tell you what I think they may do 1. They are the Representatives of a Body Politick which by the Popular Contract uniting therein may judge who are Members of the Meeting and by the Plurality of the Lords and of the Commons of England in their distinct Assemblies may over-rule the minor part of those who meet sufficient intimation being made to all or of the Estates of Scotland in their meeting joyntly Secondly They may resolve whether the Constitution of the Kingdom and the Rectoral Contract whence it arose be violated on the King's part and may agree upon the several violations I shall not insist on all but shall give some eminent examples as first They may declare whether the King hath violated the Constitution by assuming a Dispensing Power over the Laws of the Nation and that his Judges in his view if not by his instigation have by a solemn Sentence declared That he may dispense with Law even in the Case of Propriety accruing to a private Person from a Statute of Parliament And that those Judges who dis-assented were thereupon immediately removed yea the same hath been fully and publickly declared by his Publick Declaration in Scotland That He is an Absolute Monarch to whom Obedience is due in all things without reserve By these the Constitution of both Kingdoms is totally overturned for they are beyond question Legal Monarchies Regulated by Laws made by the Consent of the Representatives of the Kingdoms assembled in Parliament And if these Sentences and Declarations were effectual they would be Arbitrary Monarchies governable without the necessity of any general Law with or without the Consent of the Houses or States of Parliament which is a greater violation of the Constitution then if the Monarchy had been turned into an Aristocracy or Democracy for there is far less importance in the Persons that Govern than in the Power of Governing Thirdly There is nothing more contrary to the Government of England