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A46453 King James his letter and directions to the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury concerning preaching and preachers with the Bishop of Canterburies letter to the Bishop of Lincolne, Lord Keeper, desiring him to put in practise the Kings desires that none should preach but in a religious forme : and not that every young man should take to himselfe an exorbitant liberty to preach what he listeth to the offence of His Majesty and the disturbance and disquiet of the church and common-wealth. England and Wales. Sovereign (1603-1625 : James I); Abbot, George, 1562-1633. 1642 (1642) Wing J139; ESTC R16287 4,604 11

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KING JAMES HIS LETTER AND DIRECTIONS TO THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY Concerning Preaching and Preachers With the Bishop of Canterburies Letter to the Bishop of Lincolne Lord Keeper desiring him to put in practise the Kings desires that none should preach but in a Religious forme And not that every young man should take to himselfe an exorbitant Liberty to preach what he listeth to the offence of his Majesty and the disturbance and disquiet of the Church and Common-wealth Printed for Thomas Walkeley 1642. KING IAMES HIS LETTER And Directions to the Lord Arch-Bishop of Canterbury concerning Preaching and Preachers MOst reverend Father in God right trusty and right entirely beloved Councellour wee greet you well for as much as the abuses and extravagancies of Preachers in the Pulpit have beene at all times redressed in this Realme by some act of Councell or State with the advise and resolution of Grave and learned Prelates insomuch as the very licensing of Preachers had a beginning by an order of Starchamber the 8. day of Iuly in the 19 yeare of the Raigne of King Henry the eight our Noble Predecessour And whereas at this present divers young Students by reading of late Writers and ungrounded Divines doe broach many times unprofitable unsound seditious and dangerous Doctrines to the scandall of this Church and disquieting of the State and present Government Wee upon the humble representation unto us of these inconveniences by sundry Grave and reverend Prelates of this Church as also of our Princely care and zeale for the extirpation of Schisme and discension growing from these Seeds and for the setling of a Religious and peaceable Government both of the Church and State doe by these our speciall Letters streightly charge and command you to use all possible care and diligence that these limitations and cautions herewith sent unto you concerning Preachers bee duely and strictly from henceforth observed and put in practise by the severall Bishops of their severall Diocesses within your Iurisdiction And to this end our pleasure is that you send them forth Coppies of these directions to bee by them speedily sent and communicated to every Parson Vicar Curate and Lecturer in every Cathedrall and Parish Church within their severall Diocesses and that you earnestly require them to employ their uttermost endeavours in the performance of this so important a businesse letting them know that wee have a speciall eye to their proceedings and expect a strict accompt both of you and every of them And these our Letters shall bee your sufficient warrant in this behalfe Given under our Signet at our Castle of Windsor the 4. day of August in the 20. yeare of our Raigne of England France and Ireland and of Scotland the six and fiftieth 1622. His Majesties Orders and Directions concerning Preaching and Preachers 1 THat no Preacher under the degree and calling of a Bishop or Deane of a Cathedrall or Collegiate Church and they upon the Kings dayes onely and set Festivals doe take occasion by the expounding of any Text of Scripture whatsoever to fall into any set course or Common place otherwise then by opening the coherence and division of his Text which shall not bee comprehended and warranted in essence substance effect or naturall inference within some one of the Articles of Religion set forth 1562. Or in some one of the Homilies set forth by authority in the Church of England not onely for a helpe of none preaching but withall for a Paterne as it were for the preaching Ministers and for their further instruction for the performance thereof that they forthwith read over and peruse diligently the said Booke of Articles and the two Bookes of Homilies 2 THat no Person Vicar Curate or Lecturer shall preach any Sermon or collation hereafter upon Sun-dayes and Holy-dayes in the after noones in any Cathedrall or Parish Church throughout the Kingdome But upon some part of the Catechisme or some Text taken out of the Creed and Commandements or the Lords prayer Funerall Sermons onely excepted and that those Preachers bee most incouraged and approved off who spend their afternones exercise in the examination of Children in their Catechismes and in the expounding of the severall points and heads of the Catechisme which is the most ancient and laudable custome of teaching in the Church of England 3 THat no Preacher of what title soever under the Degree of a Bishop or Deane at the least doe from hence forth presume to preach in any popular auditory the deepe points of Predestination Election Reprobation or of the universality efficacity restibility or irrestibility of Gods grace but rather leave those theames to bee handled by learned men and that modestly and moderately by use and application rather then by way of positive Doctrine as being fitter for Schooles and Vniversities then for simple auditories 4 THat no Preacher of what title or denomination soever shall presume from henceforth in any auditory within this Kingdome to declare limit or bound out by way of positive Doctrine in any Lecture or Sermon the Power Prerogative Iurisdiction Authority or Duty of Soveraigne Princes or therein meddle with these matters of State and the reference betweene Princes and the People then as they are instructed in the Homily of obedience and in the rest of the Homilies and articles of Religion set forth as before is mentioned by publique authority but rather confine themselves wholly to these two heads of faith and good life which are all the Subject of the ancient Sermons and Homilies 5 THat no Preacher of what title or denomination soever shall causelesly and without any invitation from the Text fall into any bitter invective and undecent rayling speeches against the Papists or Puritans but wisely and gravely when they are occasioned thereunto by the Text of Scripture free both the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church of England from the aspersions of either adversary especially where the auditory is suspected to bee tainted with the one or the other infection 6 LAstly that the Archbishop and Bishops of the Kingdome whom his Majesty hath good cause to blame for their former remisnesse bee more wary and chose in licensing of Preachers and revoke all grants made to any Chancellour Officiall or Commissary to passe licences in this kind and that all the Lectures throughout the Kingdome a new body severed from the ancient Clergy of England as being neither Parson Vicar nor Curate bee licensed hence forward in the Court of Faculties onely upon recommendation of the party from the Bishop of the Diocesse under his Hand and Seale with a fiat from the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury and a Confirmation under the great Seale of England and that such as transgresse any one of these directions bee suspended by the Bishop of the Diocesse or in his default by the Lord Archbishop of the Province Ab officio beneficio for a yeare and a day untill his Majesty by the advise of the next convocation prescribe
some further punishment The Arch-Bishop of Canterburies Letter to the Arch-bishop of Yorke MY very good Lord I doubt not but before this time you have received from mee the Directions of his most excellent Majesty concerning Preaching and Preachers which are so graciously set downe that no godly or discreet man can otherwise then acknowledge that they doe much tend to edification if hee doe not take them up upon report but doe punctually consider the tenure of the words as they lye and doe not give an ill construction to that which may receive a faire interpretation Notwithstanding because some few Churchmen and many of the people have sinisterly conceived as wee here find that those instructions doe tend to the restraint of the exercise of preaching and doe in some sort abate the number of Sermons and so consequently by degrees doe make a breach to ignorance and superstition His Majesty in his Princely wisedome hath thought fit that I should advertise your Lordship of the grave and weighty reasons which induced his Highnesse to prescribe that which is done You are therefore to know that his Majesty being much troubled and grieved at the heart to heare every day of so many defections from our Religion both to Popery and Anabaptisme or other points of Seperation in some parts of this Kingdome and considering with much admiration what might bee the cause thereof especially in the Raigne of such a King who doth so constantly professe himselfe an open Adversary to the Superstition of the one and madnesse of the other his Princely wisedome could fall upon no one greater probability then the lightnesse affectednesse and unprofitablenesse of that kind of preaching which hath beene of late yeares too much taken up in Court Vniversity City and Countrey The usuall scope of very many Preachers is noted to bee soringe up in points of Divinty too deepe for the cap●city of the people or a mustring up of much reading or a displaying of their owne wit or an ignorant medling with civill matters as well in the private of severall Parishes and Corporations as in the publike of the Kingdome or a venting of their owne distast or a smoothing up of those idle fancies which in this blessed time of so long a peace doe boile in the braines of an unadvised people or lastly a rude or undecent rayling not against the Doctrines which when the Text shall occasion the same is not onely improved but much commended by his Royall Majesty but against the Persons of Papists and Puritans Now the people bred up with this kind of teaching and never instructed in the Catechisme and fundamentall grounds of Religion are for all this Ayry nourishment no better then abrajae tabulae new table bookes ready to bee filled up either with the Manuals and Catechismes of the Popish Priests or the Papers and Pamphlets of Anabaptists Brownists and Puritans His Majesty therefore calling to mind the saying of Tertullian Id verum quod primum and remembring with what Doctrine the Church of England in her first and most happy Reformation did drive out the one and keepe out the other from poisoning and infecting the people of this Kingdome doth find that the whole scope of this Doctrine is contained in the articles of Religion the two bookes of Homilies the lesser and the greater Catechisme which his Majesty doth recommend againe in these Directions as the Theames and proper Subjects of all sound and edifying preaching And so farre are these Directions from abating that his Majesty doth expect at our hands that it should increase the number of Sermons by renuing upon every Sunday in the afternone in all Parish Churches throughout the Kingdome that Primitive and most profitable exposition of the Catechisme where with the people yea very Children may bee timely seasoned and instructed in all the heads of Christian Religion the which kind of teaching to our amendment bee it spoken is more diligently observed in all the reformed Churches of Europe then of late it hath beene here in England I find his Majesty much moved with this neglect and resolved if wee that are his Bishops doe not see a Reformation hereof which I trust wee shall to recommend it to care of the Civill Magistrate So farre is his Highnesse from giving the least discouragement to sollide preaching or discreet or religious Preachers To all this I am to adde that it is his Majesties Princely pleasure that both the former Directions and those reasons of the same bee fairely written in every Registers office to the end that every Preacher of what denomination soever may if hee bee so pleased take out Coppies of either of them with his owne hand gratis paying nothing in the name of fee and expedition But if hee doe use the paines of the Register or his Clarkes then to pay some moderate fee to bee pronounced in open Court by the Chancellours and Commissaries of the place taking the direction and approbation of my Lords the Bishops Lastly that from hence forward a course may bee taken that every Parson Vicar Curate or Lecturer doe make exhibite of these his Majesties Directions and the reasons for the same at the ensuing visitation of the Bishops and Arch-Deacons paying to the Register by way of fee but two pence at the time of the exhibite and so wishing but withall in his Majesties name requiring your Lordship to have a speciall and extraordinary care of the premisses I leave you to the Almighty From Croyden Sept. 4. 1622. Your Lordships very loving Brother G. CANT. The Lord Arch-Bishops Letter to the Lord Keeper BY this you see his Majesties Princely care That none should preach CHRIST crucified obedience to the Higher Powers and Honest and Christian conversation of life but in a Religious forme and not that every young man shall take unto himselfe an exorbitant liberty to teach what he listeth to the offence of his Majesty and the disturbance and disquiet of the Church and Common-wealth I can give your Lordship no better directions for the pursuance hereof then are prescribed to you in his Majesties Letter and the Schedule herewith sent unto you whereof I pray your Lordship to bee very carefull since it is the Princely pleasure of his Highnesse to require an accompt both of you and mee for the same And so not doubting but by your Register or otherwise you will cause these instructions to bee communicated to your Clergy I leave you to the Almighty and remaine Your loving Brother G. CANT. FINI●