when it is made apparent that these mistakes are made serviceable to the Popish Plot and the means which the Popish party prosecute to compass and bring about the ruine of our Church But that nothing may be wanting that lies in my poor power for pulling their Foot out of the Snare I shall more distinctly consider them First I shall desire them to consider what our Government is and where the true knowledge of it is to be found And where can it be found but in our Statute-Books the Commentaries of our Law the Histories of our Government and of the Kingdom Search them if you be at leisure if you are not consult those that have read them and whose business and employment it is to understand them and you cannot fail to be informed That the King hath no power to make Laws that both Houses of Parliament must joyn with the King in making a Law It can with no more reason be concluded that the King hath the Legislative Power because his Assent makes the Bills in Parliament Laws than it can because the third Unit added to two makes a Triad that the other two do not go to the making of that number When a matter 's moved from the King in Parliament to pass into a Law the Commons consent last The Letters Patents of Ed. 3. for making the Eldest Son of a King in Succession Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwal Sir E. Cook 8. R. was confirmed as they must have been otherwise they would have been void by the House of Commons And yet we will not say that the House of Commons can make a Prince of Wales or Duke of Cornwal And yet upon no better reason than this some men will talk as if they believed themselves that the Legislative power is in the King when no King of England yet ever pretended to it but by their process of Law have punished such officious and mischievous Knaves They also will tell you that the Laws are the measures of our Allegiance and the Kings Prerogative and declare the terms of Obedience and Government That a Legislative authority is necessary to every Government and therefore we ought not to want it and therefore Parliaments in which our Government hath placed the making of Laws cannot be long discontinued nor their Conventions rendred illusory and in vain which is all one as to want them That to Govern by Laws implieth that great fundamental Law that new Laws shall be made upon new emergencies and for avoiding unsufferable mischiefs to the State By the Statutes of 4 Ed. 3. c. 14. 36 Ed. 3. c. 10. it is provided that Parliaments be holden once every year The Statute of this King required a Parliament every three years which being an affirmatory Law doth not derogate from those of Ed the 3. But if the King doth not call a Parliament once in a year he neglects these Laws and if he delays calling a Parliament three years he neglects the other Law of his own time too And for that he is by the Law intrusted with the calling of Parliaments he is at liberty to call them within the times appointed And that Laws ought to be made for Redress of mischiefs that may ensue appears by the Statute of provisors 25 E. 3 cap. 23. In which we have these words Whereupon the Commons have prayed our said Soveraign Lord the King that sith the right of the Crown of England and the Law of the said Realm is such that upon the mischiefs Dammage which happeneth to this Realm be ought and is bound of the Accord of his said People in his Parliament thereof to make Remedy and Law in avoiding the mischief and damage which thereof cometh which that King agreed to by his Royal Assent thereto given I dare be bold to say that never any Bill in Parliament was lost and wanted the Royal Assent that was promoted by the general desires of the people If Popery therefore which is the greatest mischief that ever threatned this Kingdom can be kept out by a Law we ought to have such a Law and nothing can hinder such a Law to be past for that purpose but want of an universal desire to have it I desire these Gentlemen to consider how they will answer it to our Saviour at the last day if they suffer his true Religion and the professors of it to be destroyed and persecuted when nothing but their desires of a thing lawful to be had and of right due was requisite to prevent it Their sufferings will be just and righteous from God if their sin occasioneth it and very uncomfortable to themselves The extent of the Legislative Authority is nowhere to be understood but by our Acts of Parliament in which it hath been exercised and used and by such Acts that declare the extent of its power By the 13 Eliz. cap. 1. it is made Treason during that Queens Life and forfeiture of Goods and Chattels afterwards To hold maintain affirm that the Queen by the Authority of the Parliament of England is not able to make Laws and Statutes of sufficient force and validity to limit and bind the Crown of this Realm and the descent limitation inheritance and Government thereof And this authority was exercised by Entailing the Crown in Parliament in the times of Richard the 2d Henry the 4th Henry the 6th Edward the 4th Richard the 3d Henry the 7th thrice in the time of Henry 8th and upon the Marriage of Queen Mary to King Philip of Spain both the Crowns of England and Spain were Entailed whereby it was provided that of the several Children to be begotten upon the Queen one was to have the Crown of England another Spain another the Low-Countries The Articles of Marriage to this purpose were confirmed by Act of Parliament Those that are truly Loyal to our present Soveraign have reason to recognize with high satisfaction that such a power of altering and limiting the descent of the Crown is duly lodged in the King and States of the Realm For under the Authority of an Act of Parliament of the Kingdom of Scotland we derive our selves to the happiness of his Government and He his Title to the Crown of Scotland which drew to him the Imperial Crown of England For Robert Stewart first King of Scotland of that Family lived in concubinate with Elizabeth Mure and by her had three Sons John Robert and Alexander afterwards he Married Eufame Daughter to the Earl of Ross and after was Crowned King of Scotland He had by her Walter Earl of Athol and David Earl of Straherne When Eufame his wife died he Married Elizabeth Mure. After that by one Act of Parliament he made his natural Children first Noble that is to say John Earl of Carrick Robert Earl of Menteith and Alexander Earl of Buchquhane And shortly after by another Parliament he limited the Crown in Tail Successively to John Robert and Alexander his Children by Elizabeth Mure
res bonae damnari quia sunt qui iis abutuntur sed verso in morem abusu intermitti res ipsas non est infrequens The young men of the Church of England have their Heads filled with the Imagination of a numerous Sect of Presbyterians amongst us and have form'd a frightful Idea and Character of this Imaginary Sect as sworn Enemies to the Episcopal Government Whereas our old Puritans and late Dissenters I speak of the gross of them for they are not answerable for the Fools and Rogues sent amongst them or at least spirited by the Roman Priests no more than any other Party or Division of men are for the Rogues that pass under their numbers or respective denominations have not disliked the Episcopal Government though by their senseless and unaccountable scruples they have depriv'd themselves of the benefit of the Communion of our Church and thereby give so much scandal to the Government and make the Popish Plot considerable which can no longer subsist than they are pleased to continue obstinate in their conceited follies They beg to be re-admitted to have the terms of our Communion made easie by relaxation of a Ceremony or two and a few matters of Scruple To be received again under the Governance and Guidance of our Church and are ready to acknowledge the benefit of the Episcopal Order in the Church of Christ Let this be askt by any man who doubts the truth thereof of any man that is considerable amongst our unhappy Dissenters Dr. Durel in his Book called Vindiciae Ecclesiae Anglicanae tells what a high opinion the Reformed Churches abroad have of our English Episcopacy and that the Bishops were deposed by them because they would not assist but oppos'd the Reformation not of dislike to their Order Mr. Calvin in his Opusc de Necessitate Reformandae Ecclesiae hath declared himself to be of the same mind Talem saith he there nobis Hierarchiam exhibeant in quâ sic emineant Episcopi ut Christo subesse non recusent ut ab illo tanquam vinco capite pendeant ad ipsum referantur in quâ sic inter se fraternam Societatem colant ut non alio modo quam ejus veritati sint colligati Tum vero nullo non anathemate dignos fatear si quis erunt quos non eam revereantur summâque obedientiâ observent His very good liking and great approbation of the Order appears plainly by the earnestness and vehemency of his stile whereby he expresseth himself in the matter Beza de Minist Evangel Gradibus Cap. 23. affirms Essentiale fuit quod ex Dei ordinatione perpetua necesse fuit est erit ut Presbyterio quispiam loco dignitate primus Actioni Gubernandae praesit cum eo quod ipsi divinitus attributum est jure Peter de Moulin Part. 2. Thes 33. Episcopos Angliae inquit post conversionem ad fidem Ejuratum Papismum asserrimus fuisse fideles Dei Servos ne debuisse deserere munus vel Titulum Episcopi Monsieur Drelincourt in his Letters from Geneva upon the happy Restoration of our King 1660 saith Quandoquidem Germania Helvetia suos habent inspectores superintendentes Dania vero ac Suecia suos Episcopos non video cur quis offendi debeat quod Angliae sui etiam sint Episcopi Quod si eadem Regminis forma apud hujus Regni Ecclesias non obtineat id ideo fit quod non convenit cum rerum nostrarum statu cui nihil aptius excogitari potest quam pastorum aequalitas verum si Deus apud quem omnia possibilia in cujus manu sunt Corda Regum ac populorum Monarchae nostro omnibus illius subditis aut saltem maximae eorum parti eam gratiam indulgerent ut reformationem Evangelicam amplecterentur meo quidem judicio impossibile esset inter tantum pastorum numerum aequalitatem retinere compelleret que necessitas ad instituendos quosdam qui aliqua praeeminentiâ gauderent prae caeterîs quique eorum moribus invigilarent The great men of the French Protestant Church though under the state of a severe Persecution who follow the Institutions of Mr. Calvin do at this time applaud the Constitution of our Church and speak of it in terms of high esteem and honour as may be seen in the Letters of Monsieur Moyne Monsieur de l'Angle and Monsieur Claude written to my Lord of London Published by the Dean of Pauls in his Book called the Vnreasonableness of Separation Dr. Durel after he hath in the aforementioned Book shewed that Geneva was a Free City of the Empire of most ancient time That the Soveraign Authority was in the Senate of that City That the Bishop was Chosen by the Canons and Citizens and Swore Allegiance to the Government before he entred the City and that the Consuls of the City did take his Oath That Petrus de Baulme their last Bishop Anno Dom. 1533. being detected of a design to betray the City to the Duke of Savoy fled from the City and at that time the City was and for two years after continued Roman Catholick so that what wrong if any was done to the Bishop was done by the Papists That two years after the Bishop fled from the punishment of his Crimes the Authority of the Senate attempted the Reformation of Religion After this I say Dr. Durel thus concludes Confidenter dicam Genevenses cum Religionem emendarunt Episcopalis regiminis ab Ecclesiâ Eliminatiomem reformationis partem necessariam haud duxisse Besides all amongst us that have the name of Presbyterian called upon them at the pleasure of the Popish Faction subscribe to the Nine and Thirty Articles in what they declare of the Doctrine of the Church of England about Obedience to our King and Governours and are therefore in profession as Loyal as any of those that boast themselves True Sons of the Church of England Indeed Scotland hath been disgrac'd by a vile sort of Presbyterians the onely true Presbyterian Sectaries in the world in any considerable body or union These men have deservedly put that name under eternal infamy by their turbulent and contumacious carriage against the Kingly Authority But to speak the truth this is not imputable so much to Presbytery as to the barbarous Manners and rough Genius of that Nation Though it hath afforded some men in all Ages of great Excellency in all sorts of the most commendable Qualities That Nation was infamous for Disloyalty and a barbarous Treatment of their Kings before Buchanan and Knox were born The Scots boast of One hundred and fifty Kings in Succession in that Kingdom how many Names they have feigned to make out the boast of the Auncientry of their Kingdom we do not know but certain it is they really Imprisoned Deposed and Murdered Fifty of their Kings at least before the time of Mary Queen of Scots whose prosecution was promoted and assisted by the English Bishops A fine Kingdom
become Zealots He is a Prince that can deliberate and consider and will conclude that it is better for him to betake himself to a Monastery now before he hath filled the Land with Blood and Slaughter and all the mischiefs that the hellish Plot designs upon us than to take Sanctuary in one hereafter loaded with the melancholy considerations of a lost design and intolerable guilt if he himself should chance to survive and not perish ingloriously in the enterprize never to be gathered to his Fathers and shut out of the Sepulchres of Kings He is a great lover of his Brother as he ought in gratitude to be who lets him live and in his good opinion too after he had departed from his Allegiance and become a Member of another Hostile Polity and Regimen and after in consequence thereof the King's Life is brought in conspicuous danger Besides that it was natural and necessary that attempts upon the Life of the King should ensue upon his publick declaration of himself to be a Papist And we cannot without thinking too meanly of him think him without a foresight thereof there remains therefore no way for him to avoid the guilt of his Brother's Murder we tremble at the probability of it than by renouncing the Crown The King cannot in probability die before him except he falls to the Interest of that Religion which his Highness doth profess So that the Duke will relinquish nothing by the consenting to the Bill but the hopes to succeed upon his Brother's Murder but he would not the one so virtuous we will think him to obtain the other Admit him to be King he must be a King without Subjects for he must be a Slave to one part of the people to destroy the other these may not be the other will not be his Subjects To be an open Enemy is more Princely than to submit to the sordid methods of Falshood and Treachery than to betray us and deceive us in the confidence we justly should have in him if he should succeed to the Crown by a legal appointment He hath already departed from the Government which is Treason in a common person but we will give it in him an honester name and call him onely an Enemy to our State and Religion and his departure to be an overt declaration of Hostility let him therefore be consistent with himself purchase the Government by Conquest by the assistance of the Arms of France his Popish Adherents and home-bred Traitors But let him not assume the Crown by Title and Succession under obligations to govern by Law and to preserve us in our Religion which is our Legal Right and more precious to us than any thing else the Law entitles us unto Let him not add falshood to his mistaken and cruel zeal and do all the mischiefs the Plot designs while he pretends to Govern Let him openly assault us Miscreants subdue us Infidels that already stand Cursed and Excommunicated whom he hath Warrant enough from his Religion to destroy with an utter destruction He is an excellent Son of King Charles the First of blessed Memory who died a Martyr for the Government of Church and State and lost his Life as well as his Government when he could not preserve it any longer by his Sword And do you think that James his Son who carries the Royal Name of his Grandfather though the first of England yet the Sixth of that Name in Scotland will suffer the Government to be altered and to be a King and no King It is more just for him to chuse an Exclusion from the Succession than to suffer the Government to be changed we must therefore suppose him to be willing rather to consent to the Bill and renounce the Succession conformably to the recent example of his never-to-be-forgotten Father than to consent to or be bound by any Act of Parliament that shall alter the Government They are not his Friends nor agreeable to him that would spoil the Government more valuable in his esteem as well as his Father's than a personal Reign That would make him a King in mockery That conspire against the Government it self which he will not he ought not to sustain and endure as long as there is any Iron and Steel in the hands or Blood in the Veins of Loyal Roman Catholicks He is an equal Prince and will not take it so much to Heart that he sees the People of his Nativity not stupid Sots but that they can be sensible of the dangers that he urgeth them with and provide apt remedies against the evils which threaten us But if these Reasons will not obtain his express Consent to that Law for his Exclusion they will be allowed Inducements sufficient enough to pass it and conclude his Assent for the nature of a Law is to be first reasonable and to make those willing that should be consenting to it as reasonable and fit but are not and to render them obedient and submitted For this is one of the greatest benefits of Government that they that cannot or will not chuse what is best for themselves the Laws will chuse for them with regard to the Publick Good For the better clearing the matter of the Constitutions of this Realm in relation to the Succession I thought it necessary to add the substance of an Act of Parliament yet in force made 13 Elizabethae 13 Elizebthae Cap. 1. An Act whereby certain Offences are made Treason FOrasmuch as it is of some doubted whether the Laws and Statutes of this Realm remaining at this present in force are vallable and sufficient enough for the surety and preservation of the Queens most Royal Person in whom consisteth all the happiness and comfort of the whole State and Subjects of the Realm Which thing all Faithful Loving and Dutiful Subjects ought and will with all careful study and zeal cnosider foresee and provide for By the neglecting and passing over whereof with winking Eyes thâ—…e might happen to grow the subversion and ruine of the quiet and most Happy State and present Government of this Realm which God defend Therefore c. to Declare c. during her Maiesties life that the Right of the Crown was in any other Person should be Treason And such Person that should during her Maiesties Life Vsurp the Crown or the Royal Stile Title or Dignity of the Crown or Realm of England c. they and every of them so offending shall be utterly disabled during their natural Lives onely to have or enjoy the Crown or Realm of England or the Style Title or Dignity thereof at any time in Succession Inheritance or otherwise after the Decease of our said Sovereign Lady the Queen as if such Person were dead any Law Custom Pretence or matter whatsoever to the contrary notwithstanding After which these words follow And be it further Enacted That if any Person shall in any wise hold and affirm or maintain That the Common Laws of this Realm not altered
and Heir to the Duke of York Edward the Fifth succeeded by vertue of the same Act of Entail Richard the Third having got the Crown he was confirmed King by Act of Parliament which likewise Entail'd the Crown which was done upon two reasons pretended First for that by reason of a precontract of Edward the Fourth Edward the Fifth his eldest Son and all his other Children were declared Bastards Secondly for that the Son of the Duke of Clarence second Brother to Edward the Fourth had no right because the Duke was attainted of Treason by a Parliament of Edward the Fourth The Act of Parliament for Bastardizing the Children of Edward the Fourth was in force until repealed in the time of Henry the Seventh after his Marriage with Elizabeth the Daughter of Edward the Fourth Henry the Seventh comes in by no legal Title First because Edw. 4th his Daughter was then living Secondly his own Mother was then living In his first Parliament the Crown was Entail'd upon him and the Heirs of his body And observable it is that after the death of Elizabeth his Queen Daughter and Heir to Ed. 4th there is no notice taken of any right which was pretended to by Hen. 8. during his Fathir's life as being Son and Heir of his Mother who had the legal Right to the Crown by an ordinary right of Succession Henry the Eighth Succeeded who did as all his Laws speak derive his Title to the Crown by the Fathers side and not by the Mothers In his Reign the Crown was Entail'd thrice by Act of Parliament Confirm'd by the general Oaths both of the Spiritualty and the Lasty and it was made High Treason to refuse such Oaths and several Attainders were in his time by particular Acts of parliament of several persons who opposed such limitations of the Crown and the authority of the Laws that made them But the great Law of the three was made in the 35th year of his Reign Cap. 1. whereby power was given him to give and dispose by his Letters Patents or by Will the Imperial Crown of the Realm to remain and come after his death for want of lawful Heirs of Prince Edward the Lady Mary and the Lady Elizabeth to such person or persons in remainder or reversion as should please his Highness In which Act there was a Clause that made it high Treason to speak or write against that Act or to go about to annul or repeal it Besides there is another Proviso in that Act That if the Lady Mary should not keep such conditions which the King should declare by his Letters Patents or last Will the Imperial Crown should come to the Lady Elizabeth And if the Lady Elizabeth should not observe the same then the Crown was to go to such person as the King by his Letters Patents or last Will should limit and appoint By virtue of which limitation in the Act of Parliament afore-mentioned Edward the Sixth succeeded to the Crown and after him Queen Mary in whose Reign in an Act of Parliament for Conformation of the Articles of Marriage between her and Philip of Spain the Crown was again Entail'd but she dying without Issue the Lady Elizabeth became Queen who had been declared a Bastard as well as her Sister Mary in the life of their Father and therefore succeeded to the Crown by force of the Entail made in the 35 H. 8. Cap. 1. Pursuant to these Presidents in fact in the 13. year of the Reign of Q. Eliz. an Act of Parliament was made declaratory of the power of Parliament in the limitation of the Succession which made it highly penal to deny the Authority of an Act of Parliament for the limitation of the Crown Several persons in her time were proceeded against upon that Act and had the Judgement of Traytor and as Traitors executed for being contrary to that Law This Queen dying King James succeeded who was as the Statute of Recognition made in Parliament the first year of his Reign declares lineally rightfully descended of the most excellent Lady Margaret eldest Daughter of the most renowned Henry the 7th and the high and Noble Princess Queen Elizabeth his Wife eldest Daughter of King Edward the 4th the said Lady Margaret being eldest Sister of King Henry the 8th Father of the High and mighty Princes of famous memory Elizabeth late Queen of England It is further observable that upon the Marriage of Queen Mary to King Philip of Spain both the Crowns of Emgland and Spain were entailed whereby it was provided that of the several Children to be begotten upon the Queen one was to have the Crown of England another Spain another the Low Countries The Articles of Marriage to this purpose were confirmed by Act of Parliament and the Pope's Bull. And by that Act of Parliament for confirming the Articles of Marriage Philip was created King and did exercise Soveraign Authority and particularly in making Laws together with the Queen the Stile of the Soveraign Assent to Bills in Parliament in their time being Le Roy la Roigne les veulent And likewise for that it was agreed by the States of both Kingdomes and the Low Countries it is therefore probable that it was the Universal opinion of the great men of that Age That Kings and Soveraign Princes by and with the consent of their States had a power to alter and bind the Succession of the Crown FINIS