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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A52764 A Letter from Oxford concerning Mr. Samuel Johnson's late book N. N. 1693 (1693) Wing N40; ESTC R4251 12,066 31

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Persons whatsoever who act by virtue of any Authority derived from the Prince must act at their Peril for that if such Authority Writ Commission or whatever it is be not warranted by Law the Persons who put it in execution are Trespassers and if they meet with Opposition and kill the Opponents are Murderers because they acted without any Authority at all for an illegal Commission is a void Commission and a void Commission is no Commission Whereas according to our Passive-Obedience-Gentlemen a void Commission which our Law says ought not to be obey'd does yet command our Obedience equally with a Commission warranted by Law because it proceeds forsooth from the Authority of the Soveraign They have not been able to deny being thus pressed that Passive Obedience has no Foundation in the ancient Laws of this Realm and have betaken themselves to a few Clauses in an Act or two of Parliament made since the Restauration of King Charles the Second The one is the Corporation-Oath whereby is renounced the Traiterous Position of taking up Arms by the King's Authority against his Person OR AGAINST THOSE THAT ARE COMMISSIONED BY HIM Besides that this Oath is now taken away by an Act of Parliament in the first Year of their present Majesties Reign they would do well to remember what passed in the House of Lords in the Year 1675 when great Endeavours were used to have this Oath imposed as a Test upon the whole Nation what was then alledged against it and that the Bill was thereupon thrown out of the House But the chief thing that I now think fit to mention is that in the very sense of the Parliament which passed it Persons Legally Commissioned were understood and no others for it met with main Opposition in the House of Commons and in particular Sir Edward Vaughan who was afterwards Lord Chief Iustice of the Court of Common-Pleas made a long Speech in which he shewed that by the Law the People of England not only might but in some Cases were bound to take up Arms against Persons Commissioned by the King and that Sheriffs of Counties were bound if it could be done no otherwise to raise the Posse Comitatus to oppose and suppress all such as should put any such illegal Commissions in Execution if they proceeded so far as to compel Obedience to them for then they became Rioters and subject to the several Acts of Parliament made for the suppressing of such Offenders To which Sir Heneage Finch then Sollicitor General and afterwards Earl of Nottingham and Lord Chancellor of England who was a great promoter of the Bill made no other Answer but this viz. That the word Legally needed not be inserted for that it must of necessity be understood to be implied because Persons not Legally Commissioned were not Commissioned at all Upon which the Bill passed And for the truth of this I appeal to the Memories of some who are yet alive and were Members of that Parliament and present in the House at this Debate The same Oath with very little Alteration in Words is in the Act for ordering the Forces in the several Counties of this Kingdom commonly called the Militia-Act The Alteration is this OR AGAINST THOSE THAT ARE COMMISSIONED BY HIM IN PURSUANCE OF SUCH MILITARY COMMISSIONS Those Military Commissions are Commissions of the Lieutenancy which we know to be settled and regulated by a Law and therefore to swear not to oppose them is no more than to swear not to fight against an Act of Parliament The rest are cursory Expressions in the Preambles of an Act or two which we know do not make a Law But I fear the Fountain of the Errors that our Clergy have run into upon this Subject is their framing to themselves an Idol of their own invention instead of a Legal English King This Cheat was discovered early in the 7 th Year of the Reign of K. Iames the First and complain'd of in an Apology of the House of Commons in those Days viz. That instead of enquiring into what Power Authority and Prerogatives the Kings of England enjoy by the Laws of this Nation our Men of speculative Heads had framed to themselves a general Notion of the word King as a Genus had given it a Definition and brought all Kings and other single supreme Magistrates as Individuals under that Definition By which Means the Laws and Constitutions of Nations were silenc'd and whatever Government had a single Person at the Head of it was equally subject to that single Person however their several Laws and Constitutions respectively might limit and restrain his Power This pernicious as well as senseless Hypothesis strikes at the Root of whatever the Church is possessed of in Temporals as well as at the Liberty and Property of Lay-Subjects for the Clergy have no Privileges Jurisdictions Endowments c. but what are conferred upon them and secured to them by Law which Law if they subject to the Personal Power of the Prince their Injoyment of them is precarious and they have nothing but his good Nature to depend upon Not to mention the Ingratitude they show in having received so ample Endowments from the Charity of our Ancestors who thought themselves Proprietors of their Estates out of which they provided so liberally for them and yet indeavouring to inslave their Masters and render their Liberty and Property precarious But St. Paul's Words to Timothy are verified in these Men viz. Desiring to be Teachers of the Law they understand neither what they say nor whereof they affirm We could wish that Mr. Iohnson had inlarged his Book with what he does but hint at and barely mention I mean the Doctrine of the Mirrour the Confessor's Laws the Curtana Sword and the Power of the Lord High Steward and other great Officers of the Kingdom but particularly that he had given us an Account of the Authority of the Lord High Steward concerning which Great Officer we find but some few Scraps here and there in any printed Book but they are such as give us good Cause to believe that he was farther intrusted and impowred to redress Misgovernment in the State than our Clergy are generally aware of and tho there be no such standing Officer at this Day yet there having been such an one it would do well if we were informed both wherein his Office did particularly consist and how it came to be disused The Stile of Mr. Iohnson's Preface offends some amongst us as too light and wanton for the Gravity of the Subject others as making too bold with his Superiours by personal Reflections To the former we who are his Friends give this Answer That it is a very hard Matter for an Author to keep his Gravity when he thinks he has nothing but Nonsense to encounter with To the second That his Sufferings having been so considerable and perhaps his Disappointment so too he may the better be allowed a Freedom of his Pen in treating those whom perhaps he may look upon either personally or in their Principles to have been instrumental in either Where we find so much Truth so much Integrity and such Strength of Reason as appears in every Page of his Discourse we can easily dispense with humane Infirmities if more had really intervened than what we hear are objected against him SIR I am Your humble Servant N. N. FINIS Cap. 6. Vers. 7.