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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A44191	Lord Hollis, his remains being a second letter to a friend, concerning the judicature of the bishops in Parliament, in the vindication of what he wrote in his first : and in answer to ... The rights of the bishops to judge in capital cases in Parliament, cleared, &c. : it contains likewise part of his intended answer to a second tractate, entituled, The grand question touching the bishops right to vote in Parliament, stated and argued : to which are added Considerations, in answer to the learned author of The grand question, &c., by another hand : and reflections upon some passages in Mr. Hunt's Argument upon that subject, &c., by a third.; Second letter to a friend concerning the judicature of the bishops in Parliament	Holles, Denzil Holles, Baron, 1599-1680.; Holles, Denzil Holles, Baron, 1599-1680. Letter of a gentleman to his friend.; Atwood, William, d. 1705? Reflections upon Antidotum Britannicum.	1682 (1682)	Wing H2466; ESTC R17318	217,539	444

and other Lords who were suspected to be of the Confederacy with the said Henry Hotspur alias Percy This was the work of Friday the 18th of February on Saturday the 19th the Commons give Thanks to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal for the rightful Judgment they had given as Peers of Parliament 5 H. 4 from N. 12 to N. 17. This is the whole Case as to Father and Son Now whether the Bishops were present at all these Proceedings and how far is the Question The Grand Questionist contends they were present at the Proceedings both against the Father and the Son at that against the Son from the word full Parliament which he seemeth to infer must include the Bishops and at that against the Father from the Thanks made by the House of Commons the next day after the acquittal of the Earl First as to the Son It appears plainly by the Historians of those times that he was slain in the fourth Year of the King in the life-time of the Father who soon after broke out into Rebellion so that at the time of Henry's Death he was only a Commoner and consequently not to receive any Judgment in the Lord's House alone nor could he be made a Traitor otherwise than by Act of Parliament so that the word full Parliament must either refer to some particular Act of Parliament made in his Case in which the Bishops might be present and the Commons concur or else the Proceedings were wholly irregular and contrary to their own Agreement in 4 E. 3. Now from an illegal Act no Right can be concluded As to the Earl himself we find him suddenly after in open Rebellion defeated and escaped into Scotland with Lord Bardolf and convicted of Treason by the Temporal Lords for not appearing upon Summons and all this within two Years after Now can it be reasonable to think that the Bishops were present at the acquittal of this very Lord in 5 H. 4. who were not present in 7 H. 4. which was but two Years after nor were present at a like Case in 2 H. 4. N. 30. against the Earl of Holland and others which was not three Years before Neither can any weight be laid upon the Thanks of the House of Commons which was only matter of Complement and performed at another time when the House was assembled upon other matters but seeing them there might extend their Thanks to them also who though they could not contribute did nothing to hinder the Clemency of the Temporal Lords towards the Earl besides at the same time it was accorded by the King and Lords upon the Desire of the Commons that certain ill Officers about the King should be discharged in which the Bishops might be Instrumental and very well deserve the Thanks of the Commons at which Desire of the Commons they might assist and be absent at the rest The Precedent of Iohn Lord Talbot will not avail him he exhibited an Accusation against the Earl of Ormond for certain Treasons by him committed this Accusation was in the Marshalsea before the Earl of Bedford Constable of England The King to put an end to this matter doth by Act of Parliament make an Abolition and Discharge of the said Accusation and Discovery The words are That the King by the Advice and Assent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons made an Abolition of the said Detection Whoever denied the Bishops Consent in a Legislative way and had it been otherwise the Commons could not have been I think regularly concerned 2. H. 6. N. 9. The Precedent of the Duke of Suffolk in 28 H. 6. I thought to have passed over being a Case as irregular in the Proceedings as unjust in those that put to death that unfortunate Man Much Art was used by the Court to have preserved him from the Envy of the People A Parliament assembled at Westminster after dismissed into London then prorogued to Leicester that dissolved and another called at Westminister in which the Duke appeared which exasperated the Commons against him But upon the whole Record it appears that no Issue was joyned for after Articles exhibited by the Commons and his denial of them March 14 at the least of the eight first and giving some Answers to others on the 17 th he was sent for again and the Chancellour acquainted him that he had not put himself upon his Peerage and now asketh him how he would be tried who instead of pleading put himself upon the King's Order who caused him to be banished for five Years By all this it appears here were no judicial Proceedings which could not be before Issue joyned so that although the Bishops were present at the reading of the Articles yet this can be no Precedent to entitle them to be present in judicial Proceedings in Capital Causes for here were none at all in this Case and till Issue joyned the Bishops are not bound to withdraw Neither ought it to seem strange that the Viscount Beaumont should make Protestation in the name of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal against these Proceedings which they finding to be extra-judicial in very many Particulars they did not know I mean the Bishops as well as some of the Lords what Construction might be made to their Prejudice for sometimes they met in one place sometimes in another and not always in the Parliament-House to consult of this Business Besides many things pass sub silentio which being questioned would not have been allowed these Observations being added to what hath been said by the Author of the Letter seems to me a full Answer to this Precedent in which the Protestatio is only Protestatio facti not Iuris I have thus put an end to the Examination of this third Chapter and fully considered all his Arguments and Precedents and come now to a view of his fourth and last Chapter CHAP. IV. IN this Chapter our Author hath employed all his Art to assert the Peerage of the Bishops and that they make a third Estate in Parliament in what sense they are called Peers as also that the entire Clergy met in Convocation make a third Estate I have largely shewed before and shall not now repeat I admit they are sometimes called Lords Spiritual tho not so before Rich. II. but Prelates or the like Peers of the Realm Peers in Parliament If by that Appellation you would make them Equals to the Nobilitas Major I think they never were yet have they many Privtledges in respect of their Seats and Episcopal Dignity in the Lords House and by reason of their most honourable Profession have all of them Precedence to Barons I admit also that the Clergy is really a third Estate and that the Bishops in respect that they are the Head of the Clergy may sometimes in ordinary Discourse be called so but are in truth never so exclusively to the rest of the Clergy they all making but one Body or third Estate fully represented

the Truth but that he confounds the Potential with the Indicative Mood The Words are where Life or Member may be concerned which he reads are concerned and so seems to refer them to the Sentence which ought to be referred to the whole Proceedings In the last place let us hear the Sense his grave Author Fitz-Stephens puts upon this last Clause After the Appeal of the Arch-bishop Becket to Rome the King expostulates the matter with him asketh him why he would break his Oath so lately sworn at Clarendon Amongst which Hec una est ut Episcopi omnibus ejus assint judiciis preterquam judicio sanguinis That is That the Bishops should be present at all Tryals except when the Tryal concerned Blood where you see he renders Duousque by preterquam as indeed ●…sque quo quousque usque dum praeterquam have the same Sense all restrictive Now Fitz-Stephen was undoubtedly at the Parliament at Clarendon which was not above seven months before the Meeting at Northampton Fitz. ca. 10. col 12. Our Author proceeds and tells you there is a great deal of difference between Duousque perveniatur ad judicium mutilationis Membrorum vel Mortis and quousque perveniatur in judicio c. I confess I understand not this Criticism which however is not warranted by the Authority of any Copy neither can it be made capable of any good Sense except one not different to what I have given for if it were quousque perveniatur ad judicium c. I ask to what doth perveniatur refer I think most properly to Curia Regis That is to say 't is their Duty to be present at all Proceedings in Parliament until such a Case may fall out where Life or Member may be concerned For we must not be permitted to fancy a Sense of Words and then contrary to all Rule wrest them to our own Biass and against the Opinion of such as writ before us neither are we to expect from these old Monkish Writers such polite Latin as Tully writ but take their meaning as others who liv'd nearer the time have done before us So that I have done with this Clause when I have first told the Reader that I have translated debent interesse 'T is their Duty to be present because they would often take Liberty to go away or protest or be troublesom upon several Pretences sometime the Canons allowed them not when the Law did sometime the Liberty of the Church was concerned as appears by the Statute de asportatis religiosorum where they absented themselves Co. 2. Inst. pag. 585. All these Subterfuges were obviated by this Statute although perhaps not by them well observed which required their Attendance in Parliament in all Causes where they were not prohibited by the received Laws of the Nation Now our Author acknowledgeth that the Council of Toledo was brought into England by Lanfrank in William the First his time which Council is put out in the second Tome of the English Councils by Sir Will. Dugdale and Mr. Spelman as the Work of Sir Henry his Father That Council forbids their Presence in Cases of Blood which being as he admits received here as low as the Conquest made it a Custom in Henry the First his Time and an ancient Custom in Hen. the Second and now being allowed at the Parliament at Clarendon to which they all swore makes that Custom or Canon as much a part of the Law of England as any affirmative Statute can and so not to be repealed except by as equal Authority as that by which it first became a Law and was now affirmed as such By what hath been hitherto said I think it will appear competently plain to any unbiassed Reader that the word in judicio doth not refer as he supposes to that particular Tryal then in Court as if it had respect to one Period in the Tryal and left them at liberty to be present at all other parts of it but was restrictive to all Tryals whatsoever which might have their Conclusion in Blood and his Allusion in the same Page is as little solid As suppose saith he Charles the Fifth had required the Protestant Princes to attend him to Mass as other Princes did only when the Mass-Bell tinckled they might withdraw would not any reasonable man believe by this that they were obliged to their Attendance till then So here the King commands their Attendance till it comes to such a Point therefore before it comes to such a point their Presence is plainly required by this Constitution This Allusion or Supposition doth no way answer our Case except he had shewed us that there were different sorts of Masses in some whereof the tinckling-Bell sounded in others not and then Charles the Fifth had required their Attendance at all Masses until such a Mass might sall out in which the tinckling-Bell was to sound here their Absence would have been allowed during every part of such a Mass. Our Case is the same some Tryals there are in Parliament which may concern Life or Member others which cannot Now the Statute saith 't is their Duty to be present in all Tryals until such a Tryal happen in which Life or Member may be concerned I hope here this Restriction will have Reference to the whole Tryal and not any particular Period of it I had not said this the matter being sufficienttly cleared before but out of Apprehension that some unwary Reader might be misled by this Author's Subtilty and believe there was weight where indeed there was none But however the Words of Petrus Blesensis will give great light to the whole matter This Petrus Blesensis was Arch-Deacon of B●…th and the place cited is amongst his O●…ula in the Edition I have in Quarto and precedent to that other in Folio 'T is in his Tractate de institutione Episcopali pag. 542. or rather Y y 2 for the Pages are in my Copy falsly numbred dedicated to the then Bishop of Worcester The Design of the whole Tractate is to shew the duty of a Bishop and by the whole Scope seems to be addressed to all Bishops and not to the English only He lived in the time of Hen. 2. for his 136. Epistle is to Pope Alexander the Third from K. Henry about the Rebellion of his Son The Words are not in my Edition as the Author recites them Principes Sacerdotum seniores Populi But Quidam Principes Sacerdotum Seniores Populi Not the chief Priest and Elders but certain of the Chief Priests and Elders of the People By which it seems to me this could not be understood of an English Parliament because all the Bishops had equal right to be present in Parliament and this is restrained to certain of them Secondly I think Seniores Populi never comprehends Abbots Priors with Lords and Commons together I know Baronagium Clearus Populus are sometime so taken but I believe Seniores populi never

for he cannot but know out late King chose rather to loose his Life than resign his Power that he never had quiet Possession but a Prince always strugling against him nor had he the acceptance of the People or any thing but force to buoy him up which after his Death fail'd in his next Descendent By what I have said it may appear to any equal Judge that the Laws made 1 Henry 4. were good notwithstanding his pretended Usurpation And as to the thing it self that the Bishops Absence in cases of Blood doth not make a Judgment given void appears plainly by the Case of the Earl of Salisbury in 2 H. 5. who petitions that a Judgment given against the Father might be reversed and assigns for Error that the Bishops who were Peers of the Realm were not present and upon full hearing and debate it was adjudged no Error Now I appeal to this Author whither he can think that my Lord and his Counsel were so stupid as not to urge what they could think of for the advantage of the Earl and the Clergy for whatsoever other faults might be laid to the charge of his Parent the cause appears to be turn'd upon that hinge by all this we may well conclude that the Lords in that Parliament did not hold the Bishops such Peers as ought to be allowed Judges concerning the Life and Death of Noble-men This Judgment our Author hath not thought fit to take notice of which might be equivalent to error temporis for it was either ignorantia or neglectus rei But he tells you Edward the fourth repealed all again in which he is mistaken for Edward the fourth repealed nothing but what concerned the Title between York and Lancaster with some Charters to others I come now to his third head or point Whether supposing that the Bishops absented as he contends only upon the account of the Canon-Law in the times of Popery whether those Laws do continue in force now since the Reformation he thinks they do not In this I shall be very short and against his Reasons which are rather Surmises than other I shall return direct Authorities of Judges and Lawyers in point First he saith the Canon-Law was grounded upon a superstitious fancy that to be present in Cases of Blood brought upon them Irregularity and hath there a large Digression upon the Unreasonableness of the Canon-Law in many particulars I shall easily yield that many of the Rules brought upon the Church by the Papacy are full of Hypocrisie and self-ends but do not think that our Bishops did first forbear from bloody Tryals about Lanfranks time as if this Canon had been unknown in England till then almost 700 years after the first Council of Toledo for Sir Henry Spelman reckons that Canon to be Anno Christi 400. and William the first came in Anno 1066. And in this first Council this Canon is cited but it is more reasonably referred to the eleventh Council of Toledo and the sixth Canon which expresly forbids their medling in Blood 't will yet be about 500 years before Williams Time It is therefore more probable that their forbearance in those Cases proceeded not from any thing brought in by Laufrank but was received here long before from their obedience to the Apostolick Canons which did not only forbid their medling in Blood but in all secular Employments and were carefully observed till Constantine's time who flourished in the year of Christ 323. 'T is likely enough that the Liberty then taken by the Clergy was restrained in Spain by that Council And if our Author please to observe it till they came to be corrupted by Covetousness and Ambition their chiefest Employment was to make Peace between their Neighbours as Chancellors and Arbitrators rather than as Lawyers and Judges In earnest whoever shall consider the intricacy of the Laws of England as they are called the Common-Law will rather believe when they sate as Chief Justices if ever they did so their Seats were among others better versed in the Common Laws than themselves and they sate rather to direct what was equal according to the rules of Mercy than according to the rigorous balance of Justice This certainly was their Office when they sate with the Earl in the County-Court Mr. Lambert in his Laws of Edgar cap. 5. hath these words Celeberrimus autem ex omni satrapiâ conventus bis quotannis agitor cui quidem illius diocesis Episcopus Aldermannus intersunto quorum alter jura divina alter jura humana populum edoceto Here you see the Bishops Office was only to teach the People the Divine Law as the Earl or Alderman did those of the Land His next Suggestion is rather a Conjecture than a Proof to wit that this Canon was never received contrary to himself before or that if it were received it was in diminution of the King's Prerogative and so repealed by the Statute of 25 H. 8. cap. 19. He might as well have said That all the Ecclesiastical Laws as of Tithes Marriages probate of Wills and other Faculties now exercised in the Ecclesiastical Courts are against the King's Prerogative and therefore void What Success an Attempt of that Nature lately had he may easily call to mind But let me bring into his Remembrance what the Statute made in the same Parliament 25 H. 8. cap. 21. hath in the Preamble of it Whereas his Majesties Realm recognizeth no Superiour under God but only his Majesty hath been and is free from Subjection to any mans Laws but only such as have been devised made and ordained within this Realm for the Weal of the same or to such others as by the Sufferance of the King and his Progenitors the People of this Realm have taken at their free Liberty by their own Consent to be used among them and have bound themselves by long Custom to the observance of the same not as to the observance of the Laws of any foreign Prince Potentate or Prelate but as the ancient and accustomed Laws of the same by the said Sufference Consents and Customs and none otherwise We see here the Sense of the whole Parliament That such Laws as had been used and accustomed should be look'd upon as the Laws of the Kingdom and not of any foreign Prince or Prelate Now let him tell me what Laws were common to us with any foreign Prelate except the Ecclesiastical and Canon-Law which having been here used are acknowledged a part of the Laws of the Land by Usage and Sufferance of the People So that we have now a whole Parliament that they did not look upon these as against the Kings Prerogative and so null as this Author would have it but fully confirmed as part of the English Law Agreeable with this is my Lord Coke in Cawdrey's Case lib. 5. 32. b. It is says he Resolved and enacted by authority of Parliament that all Canons Constitutions Ordinances and Synodals

of Parliament and learned Monks or other old Authors be taxed with heedless Impertinencies nay even want of understanding what they wrote Eadmerus who was a very corrrect Writer and lived in the time of which he wrote tells us that at one General Convention in the Reign of Hen. I. there were tota Nobilitas cum Populi numerositate at another tho it was held only for Ecclesistical Affairs there were Nobilitas Populusque minor The Election of King Stephen as a grave Prior of those Times tells us was a primoribus Regni cum favore Cleri Populi Clericorum Laicorum universitate In that King's Reign there was adunatum Concilium Cleri Populi a General Council of the Clergy and Laity together which now one would say were a Parliament and Convocation united the Members of this Council follow Episcoporum atque Abbatum Monachorum Clericorum Pl●…bisque iufinita multitudo the Authority for this is a Legier Book of the Abby of Ely wrote as it should seem in the time of Hen. I. These kind of Books were generally kept with great Exactness and were in the nature of Records From the like Authority we have it that Archiepiscopi Episcopi Comites atque alij omnes were consenting to the Election of King Iohn But to mention a few undoubted Records to this purpose In the 15 th of King Iohn there were Precepts to all the Sheriffs of England to summon in every County Milites who were to come with Arms Barones without Arms and four Knights for every Shire quatuor discretos Milites de comitatu to a General Council at Oxford In the 38 th of Hen. III. besides the Tenants in Chief two legales discreti Milites were required to come for every County vice omutom singulorum to be chosen by the Milites alij de Comitatu And several Records before the 49th of H. 3. describing the Members of Parliaments mention besides the Clergy Comites Barones Milites liberi Homines some libere Tenentes others omnes de Regno Now can there be the least colour to believe that all these were no more than the Prelates and great Barons or only the greater and less Nobility holding in Chief whatever Dr. Brady or others may obtrude upon the World That the Commune Concilium Baronum may sometimes be used in the same sense with Commune Consilium Regni affords no help to Mr. Hunt because where the expressions are too lax and general Barones shall be taken in it's utmost extent and consequently shall comprehend ordinary Free-holders who were Nobiles Barones minores long before the 49th of Hen. 3. But the Question is Whether when Records or Histories make a Distinction between Barones and others coming after the Distinction can be thought to be without any manner of Difference and so vain and idle as that the Porulus minor or Populi numerositas after Nobilitas is a Term comprehensive of the Nobility before mentioned or when there were Primores Regni cum Clero Populo the chief of the Kingdom with all the Clergy and People the word People was but comprehensive of the Primores so that the Primores were there together with themselves But surely I need not run over all these Instances and many more produceable to convince even Dr. Brady Mr. Hunt and Mr. W. of the absurdity of interpreting Records after their manner But Mr. W. thinks to help out his Record by an Historian and cites the Additaments to Matthew Paris mentioning the Letter wrote to the Pope in the Case of Adomar de Valens which begins thus Communitas Procerum Magnatum aliorumque Regni Angliae and was subscribed by some Earls and great Men and Peter de Monteforti vice totius Communitatis this Mr. W. says was in the name of the whole Baronage not the House of Commons or Commonalty of England there being mention of the universitas Baronagij but not universitas Regni Popularis I take it to be manifest that all the Question which can arise upon these words is not as Mr. W. puts it whether Symon Montfort subscribed in the names of the Barons only or of the Commons only But whether some of the great Barons having set their hands themselves Montfort being the last Man that subscribed did not do it in the name of the rest of the Great Barons not subscribing and of the Commons too as part of the Baronage or Communitas of Earls Barons and others And I think nothing is more clear then that the Commons were part of the Community here intended Matthew Paris tells us that 't was ex parte Regni totius Angliae universitate and this he says was scriptum a Farnagio and that the Commons were part of the Kingdom at Parliaments and went under the Denomination of the Faronage at that very time is evident beyond Contradiction from Record for whereas the Title of the Writ expressing some Matters agreed upon between the King and his People in that very Parliament is pro Rege Faronagio An●…liae the body of the Writ runs Rex omnibus c. cum pro negotiis nostris arduis Regnum nostrum tangentibus proceres Fideles Regni nostri ad nos London in Quindena Pasche prox praeterit faceremus convocari c. And another Record explains and reduces to a certainty the Proceres Fideles and the Faronage and calls them Hanshomes the high Men the Prelates and great Barons Prodes homes the Magnates and Grands of the Counties and the Commune de Reaum the Commons of the Cities and Boroughs and with this his own Instance out of Matthew Paris exactly agrees for there were the Comites and Proceres the great Barons the Magnates or Grands of the Counties and alij who must needs be the Commons of the Cities and Boroughs as they were distinguished from the Grands of the Counties even as late as the 27th E. 3. This may serve for a full and clear Answer to Dr. Brady's Exposition of the forementioned Letter whom both Mr. Hunt and Mr. W. may thank for misleading them in this Point and this sufficiently shews the Vanity and Falshood of the Doctor 's Assertion that the Commons as at this day known are not to be found amongst the Community of England in old Historians except he will place Matthew Paris amongst the Moderns This I think may suffice in answer to any thing wherein Mr. W. his Authority may be used against me I cannot be so short in my Observations upon Mr. Hunt because he aims many Blows at me in the dark and may be thought in many places to have wounded my Arguments or the Reputation of my Endeavours which he represents as impertinent or like a Contest de lanâ Caprinâ In opposition to my Notion of the Curia Regis he produces another

Post-script which affirms That nothing can be the Concerns of Men united in any Polity but may be govern'd and ordered by the Laws of their Legislature for their good At least this shews how in matters of Notion and naked Rights great Wits may not only differ from others but from themselves But let us give the Argument raised from Conquest its full weight and see whether Mr. Hunt maintains our present Establishment upon clearer Grounds than they do who search Antiquity about the Point The absolute Power and Government of the Nation was by the right of Conquest setled in William the First and his Heirs this being so could not be parted with For it must be either voluntarily or by Compulsion For the first Sir Robert Filmer will tell you No Man can bind himself in a matter depending of his own Will there can be no Obligation which taketh State from the meer Will of him that bindeth himself If by Compulsion then they will tell you for the same Causes that a private Man may be relieved from his unjust and unreasonable Promise as that it was so grievous or for he was by Deceit or Fraud circumvented or induced thereunto by Terrour or Force or just Fear or by some great hurt even for the same causes the Prince or Princes may be restor'd in that which toucheth the diminishing of his or their Majesty If it be said That this would as well hold in relation to the Peoples parting with that Right which was once in them they will tell you that no Government can be exercised but Monarchy That no other Government is owned by God Almighty in the New or Old Testament but Monarchy That while God's People were without a King in Israel there was Confusion and Anarchy If Adam was no Monarch at least God himself was and 't was a Theocracy And therefore admit Paternal Power was not Monarchical yet a Man might as well seize upon a People without a Government as upon a piece of Land unoccupied And when once he became Conqueror he was let into a Divine Right of ordering arbitrarily all things within that district and could not depart from it And though every Monarch was not absolute for the Jewish Kings were not yet every Monarch by Conquest must needs be so being received without any Conditions or Limitations Now Mr. Hunt himself going chiefly to shew that Paternal Power was not as such absolute does not answer this Hypothesis and the Examination of it depends upon such searches into the bottom of things and the shewing them naked in their Metaphysical Existences that very few Men can judg of the Controversy at least not so many as may of the meaning of Writers and Records carefully compared together and in many places freed from all possible Ambiguity but still the more ambiguous they are the more evidently will they overthrow all those Pretences upon which these Notions are built For if the Records and Histories give such doubtful Responses as Mr. Hunt imagines then indeed we must look only to the present Government Whereas if Dr. Brady and his Friends could shew those ancient Authorities to be plainly on their side they would have many that would improve their Notion of the House of Commons their beginning by Rebellion into an Argument that they ought to be cast off as Usurpers upon the Divine Right of the Conqueror Or at least yeild but that one Point of the Conquest they will tell you agreeably to Mr. Hunt's Assertion that a Government by Conquest is unalterable by any lawful Power And as that is wholly different from a Government by consent whatever implies or admits of the consent of Subjects to the passing any Law is contrary to the Fundamentals of the Government and is like a Superstructure of Hay and Stubble whi●…h ought to be consumed Others will tell you that the most free Concessions of a Conquering Prince or one claiming under that Title and not departing with his Dominion can no more oblige himself or his Successors in any thing that may restrain his Soveraign Will and Pleasure than a Man can depart with the freedom of his Will And the most seeming Restraints can be no more than temporary Provisions or ordinary Methods of Ruling which the Prince as he found occasion might remove notwithstanding the strictest Clauses of Perpetuity they being of like Interpretation with such Passages as related to the continuance of the Jewish Law or Oeconomy which was to have no place in the New Heavens and new Earth But if they should yeild that all Grants and Charters c. are binding to the Prince who made them yet Sir Robert Filmer tells us expresly The Laws Ordinances Letters Patents Priviledges and Grants of Princes have no Force but during their Life if they be not ratified by the express Consent or at least by the sufferance of the Prince following who had knowledg thereof These Notions have more Favourers perhaps than there are Men of Judgment or Honesty enough to shew the weakness of them Nor has Mr. Hunt that I know of directly encountred them with his two-edg'd Weapon But if the supposed Fact which they are built upon be prov'd to be no more than Supposition all the most specious Superstructures are but Castles in the Air which vanish like Smoak ¶ Inter Communia brevia de Termino Michaelis Anno 34. Edw●… EX pacte eorundem hominum Regi est ostensum quod cum Uilla praedicta Civitas Burgus seu Dominicum Regis non erictat ut homin●… Uill●… predicte tanquam Cives Burgenses seu Tenentes de Domino Regis in al●…quibus auxilus 〈◊〉 seu contributionil us Regi seu progenitoril us suis concessis taxari consueberunt seu talliari sed tantum cum Communitate Co●… War Taxatores tamen Collectores XXX XX in 〈◊〉 praedicto homines praedictos tanquam Burgenses tarari XXX de bonis rebus suis ad opus Regis levare nituntur in ipsorum hominum ●…ampnum nori medicum gravamen depa●…perationem manifem Et quià Rex non vult quod iidem homines indebi è pregraventur in lâc parte ●…andat 〈◊〉 quod scruta●… Rotulis Memorandis de consimilil us ●…enibus factis in Uill●… prae●…â tam tempore Regis quam proge●…orum suorum praedictorum si eis constare poterit evidenter quod praedicta Willa de Covent●… non si●… Civitas Burgus aut Manerium de antiquo Dominico Corone Regis ut praedictum est quod dicti homines simul cum aliis extra Civitates Burgos Maneria praedicta manentes ad hu●…usmodi prestationem Regi faciendam ●…ari debeant semper ha●…enus ta●…ri con●…ueverunt tunc ipsos homines ad prestationem Regi ratione praedictae concessionis de XXX Regi ratione faciendum per praedictos Tatatores Collectores distringi non permittant aliter quam totis temporibus retroactis in hujusmodi