For which Joseph Stevan ‖ Ioseph Stevan Epist ad Gregor XIII de osculo pedum Papae Iure meritoque in Religionis Ecclesiae infensissimum hostem Fredericum Barbarossam non ut in salem insatuatum quem jubet Christus pedibus proterere sed potius ut horrendam belluam calcibus insultavit who writ at Rome to Gregory the XIII of kissing the Popes feet checks Duarenus saying that Pope Alexander the III. trod the Emperour Frederick under foot not onely as salt which hath lost its savour but as an horrible wild beast And Otho Frisingensis both relates it and commends it * Otho Frising lib. 5. cap. 14. Quod sactum summis liberum est sacerdotibus cum Principum tyrannidem aut violatam fidem aut Ecclesiae imminutam dignitatem vident and saith That the Popes have the power to do so much when they see the tyranny of Princes or that faith is violated or the dignity of the Church imbezelled So though the History were not as it is most undoubtedly true the approving and exalting of the fact in the Court of Rome makes that Court as guilty as if it had been done But it was done and as bad was done by other Popes Pope Celestin the III. gave Constantia a Nunne in marriage to the Emperour Henry the VI. and gave him for her dowry the Kingdome of both the Sicilies upon Platina Uspergensis condition he should expell Tancred who was possess'd of the Kingdome Hence a bloody War between Henry the VI. and Tancred It is ordinary to the Pope to give that which is none of his When the Pope giveth a Kingdome from a Prince that enjoyeth it he commands together the people to resist him making a sport to spill their blood and damn their souls Baronius commends very much that Popes behaviour Annal. Roger. an 1191. Sedebat Dominus Papa in Cathedra Pontificali tenens coronam auream inter pedes suos Imperator inclinato capite recepit coronam imperator similiter de pedibus Domini Papae Dominus autem Papa statim percussit cum pede suo coronam Imperatoris dejecit eam in terram significans quod ipse potestatem ejiciendi eum ab Imperio habet si ille demeruerit in the Crowning of the Emperour Henry the VI. and his Wife thus related in the Annalls of Rogerius The Pope was sitting in his pontifical chair holding an Imperial golden Crown between his feet and the Emperour bowing his head received the Crown and the Empress likewise by the feet of the Pope And the Pope presently hit the Emperours Crown and kick'd it down to the ground thereby signifying that he had power to cast him down from the Empire if he deserved it Baronius having related this amplifieth it with this morality ‖ Baron Tom. 12. Anno 1191. sect 10. Ut fixum menti Caesaris haereret nempe dare custodire conservare auserre si causa exigeret imperium esse in voluntate Romani Pontificis ejusmodi voluit commenere eum exemplo That it might remain fixed in the Emperours mind that it lieth in the Popes pleasure to give keep preserve and take away the Empire if there be cause for it he would admonish him with such an example Could the Devil have set up pride to a higher pin to put the Emperours Crown at his feet as a foot-stool for him to tread upon put the Crown on the Emperours head with his feet as an office too low for his hands and then with his foot kick'd it down as having a quarrell against the Imperiall Crown and together a contempt for it This and the treading upon the Emperours neck were significant ceremonies with a witness And what more effectual course could have been taken to raise rebellion in all the States of Christendome then thus to blast the respect of Majesty For thereby all Nations were taught that their Princes were not Sovereigns but the Popes Vassalls and Liegemen That themselves were not their Kings Subjects but the Popes who could kick down their Crowns when he listed and that when that supreme Head shall command it the Feet that is the inferiour Members of the State must make Foot-balls of the Crowns of Emperours and Kings After Celestin the III. came Innocent the III. as proud but more active then he England hath reason to remember this Pope For he excommunicated King John deposed him absolved his Subjects from their allegiance to him and cast an Interdict upon England which lasted six years All which time no Divine Service was said in the Kingdome but in some priviledged places no Sacrament was administred and no corps buried in Consecrated Ground The Kingdome of England he gave to Philip August of France if he could take it and that by a formal order thus related by Matthew Paris The Pope by the counsell Matth. Paris in vita Reg. Johan Papa ex consilio Cardinalium Episcoporum aliorum vivorum prudentium sententialiter definivit ut Rex a solio deponeretur Ad hujus quoque sententiae executionem scripsit Dominus Papa potentissimo Regi Francorum Philippo quatenus in remissionem peccatorum suorum hunc laborem assumeret of the Cardinalls Bishops and other prudent men gave a definitive sentence that the King should be put down from his Throne For the execution of that Sentence the Pope writ to the most potent King of the French Philip that for the remission of his sins he should take that labour upon him A new way for that King to get the remission of his sins to invade his neighbours estate As in the age of our Fathers Pope Sixtus the V. gave nine years of true indulgence to all the French that would bear Arms against their King Henry the III. Thus the remission of sins purchased by the blood of the Son of God and presented by his Gospell to all that repent and believe is by the Pope given as a reward of Invasion and Rebellion Matthew Paris writes that The Pope having gotten the Kingdome of England to himself to his thinking sent to Philip August to enjoyn him to be reconciled with King John else he would put France to Interdict Philip answered that he feared not his sentence and that it belonged not to the Church of Rome to pronounce a sentence against the King of France It is a long and a sad story how King John was persecuted by Pope Innocent the III. his Barons made to rise against him his Neighbours to fall upon him his Clergy to revile him and his people to despise him till that unlucky King was brought to such an extremity that to buy his peace he gave his Kingdome to the Pope and yet could not get his peace that way The Gold which he laid at the Legats feet in sign of subjection the Legat trod under his feet in scorn yet took it in his hand after so great was his clemency What a cruel tyranny did the
former subjection From Holland the Adversary saileth into Scotland and objects to us the Maxims of Knox and Buchanan and the disorders of that time Of which I have said enough in the Chapter before Of the Work of Reformation in England and the publick actions of that age upon that interest he speaks very scornfully saying that the Sect of Wicleff lay pag. 71. strangled in the cradle till King Edward the VI. his dayes when some ends of it were taken up again and set out with more ostentation then ever in that Princes minority and what rare effects of obedience were by that means produced in Queen Maries time who brought them up again to the test may be easily read in our Chronicles Wherein it is plain that in the poor five years of her Reign there was de facto more open and violent opposition and rebellion made by her own subjects then Queen Elizabeth had in forty five years or any Prince before or since the Wicleffian doctrine till the same smothered fire broke out at last in good King Charles his time to his utter ruin and the shaking of the very foundation of his Monarchy Is this spoken like a most observant Son and in every honest mans esteem a pious reverend and learned Priest of the Church of England as this Author is tearmed in the Publishers Epistle to the Reader Certainly a Son and a Priest of the Church of England would never have derived from Wickleff but from the Holy Scripture the Religion of the Church his Mother nor ascribed to her Religion the cause of the late horrid rebellion We see what a Son and Priest of the Church he is the tree is known by his fruit What better figs can be gathered from such a thorn What better grapes from such a bramble And what is that doctrine of Wickliffe which he imputes to the Protestants to the English especially Impios nullum dominium habere That the ungodly pag. 70. can have no right of dominion Was that the doctrine set out with ostentation in Edward the VI. his dayes Or was any of the Protestants found tainted with that doctrine when Queen Mary burnt them which this man calls bringing them to the test Sure it was not upon that ground that some oppositions were made against that Queen It is a wonder that she met with no more considering how her Father had declared by Act of Parliament her Mothers Marriage unlawful and her self incapable of the Crown and had miserably incumbred the Title and Succession of his Children That there was more open and violent opposition against her in her five years reigne from her own Subjects then Queen Elizabeth had in forty five years it is because they that went to question her Title went to work plainly above boord but no secret Jesuitical conspiracies to stabbe or poyson her as against Queen Elizabeth The means she made to reduce her dissenting subjects in Religion when they made no opposition against her was to make bon-fires of them Three hundred of those burnt-offerings she sacrificed unto God A farre greater number in her poor five years then that of the Popish Martyrs of disobedience since the death of that Queen now above a hundred years For no Papist was executed for his Religion all for disobeying the Laws of the Land and many of them for High Treason It is known that Queen Mary got the Crowne by the assistance of the Protestants of Suffolk and what recompence she gave them for it And whereas no fewer then eight rebellions did rise in Henry the VIII his dayes I find not that the Protestants had a hand in any of them All were raised by Papists and upon the score of Popery The principal colour of our Adversaries malice is his detestation of the late rebellion of England and the execrable Murther committed in the sacred Person of our gracious Sovereigne Upon this he makes several Panegyricks which are very ill sorted with his Apology for Mariana and justifying of the Iesuites doctrine Especially seeing that those actions were copied out upon their principles Felicia tempora quae te Moribus admorunt Belike the curious pens of the wise States-men and learned Scholars of England had need to be supplied by the boyish theames of a petty Novice of Doway to learn the duty of Subjects and to abhorre the guiltinesse of rebellion The venome that lieth under that oratory of invectives is that all the mischief is imputed to the Protestants of Integrity a term which he useth like a stirrup-leather longer or shorter according to his occasions yet alwayes treacherously to cast the faults of some particular person or some heretical Sect upon the generality of the Protestants But let him know that the King the Church and the State are Protestants of Integrity and that the parricides and troublers of our Israel will never give him thanks for calling them Protestants Also that we acknowledge them not for such unlesse it be upon a new score because they protest against the Kings power and the duty of their obedience When Jesuits or their Scholars as this Gentleman is charge our Fanaticks with High Treason they do but act that which they had prepared to do if the Powder-Plot had taken For they had a Declaration ready to indite the Protestants of that Treason For these men would story the just clamor against them for their doctrine of rebellion and parricide by laying the same charge with loud words upon others We have great reason to call upon the Justice of God and Men to condemne the unsincerity of this clamour With what face or conscience can the Jesuits passe a hard Sentence upon the late Rebels and King-killers seeing that these furious Zealots have neither taught nor done any thing in that horrible defection but what they had learned of the Jesuits For what do they blame them for Is it for teaching that the Sovereigne Power lieth in the Commons and that they may alter the Government of a State Did they not learn Bellarm. de Laicis lib. 3. cap. 6. Potestas immediate est tanquam in subjecto in tota multitudine si causa legitima adsit potest multitudo mutare regnum in Aristocratiam aut Democratiam è contrarie that of Bellarmine The Power saith he is in the whole multitude as in its subject and if there be a lawful cause for it the multitude may alter the Royal State into an Aristocracy or Democracy and so on the contrary Is it for saying that the people makes the King and may unmake him and retains still the habit of power Did they not learn of the same Bellarmine that In the Kingdomes of Bellarm. de Concil lib. 2. cap. 19. In regnis hominum potestas Regis est à populo quia populus facit Regem Ibid. cap. 19. sect ad alteram In Rebusp temporalibus si Rex degeneret in tyrannum licet caput sit Regni tamen à populo potest
God whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal and restraiz with the Civil Sword the stubborn and evil doers The Bishop of Rome hath no Jurisdiction in this Realm of England The Lawes of the Realm may punish Christian men with death for heinous and grievous crimes It is lawful for Christian men at the Commandment of the Magistrate to wear weapons and serve in the Wars The XXXV Article appoints Homilies against Rebellion to be read in Churches The summary of these Homilies and the whole drift of them is contained First part page 2. of the first Homily against wilful disobedience and rebellion in these words In reading of the holy Scriptures we shall finde in very many and almost infinite places as well of the Old Testament as of the New That Kings and Princes as well the evil as the good do reigne by Gods Ordinance and that subjects are bound to obey them And that Doctrine of the Church of England which is that of the Word of God is fully demonstrated in these godly Homilies published and enjoyned to be read in Churches by Royal Authority CHAP. IV. Proving by the Bulls and Decrees of Popes That the Doctrine of the Roman Court in the point of Obedience to Sovereignes is a Doctrine of Rebellion HItherto we have stood upon the Defensive and have with no great labour wiped off the false and foul aspersions of Rebellion cast upon the Doctrine of the Protestant Churches Let us try whether we can use the Sword as well as the Buckler And we will use no other then the Popes own Sword For as David said of Goliah's sword There is none like that give it me In this Combate the enemies sword is the right weapon none like it The Adversary to disgrace our Doctrine hath objected to us some passages of our Authors most of them false or wrested and some actions of persons of the Protestant party But though he had proved all these to be true he had done no harm to our Doctrine which is not built upon private opinions or upon private or publick actions He should have taken our Confessions in hand and Indicted them of rebellious Tenets if he could have found any Or finding none he should have given glory to God and confessed the Truth of God with us But if I bring him the Bulls of his Popes and their Decrees can he scape as we do when he urgeth us with maxims of Buchanan or Goodman Can he say The Pope speaks Treason and prescribes Rebellion as we say of these men and my faith is not tyed to his authority Can he as freely go off from the Popes judgement as we do from the best of our party when their Tenet is represented to us aberring from the rule of Gods Word and dissenting from the Articles of Religion consented unto by the Provincial Convocations of the Church We will then object to him and his party that which they cannot disown unless they disown their Faith and Religion since their Faith and Religion depend upon the Popes Decrees and that so strongly and with such a spirit of delusion that the most pestilent opinions pass with them for Evangelical Truths and the most abominable actions for patterns of Holiness if they be once marked with that stamp according to Bellarmines sentence which no Romanist hath yet disallowed for any thing I know If the Pope did Bellarm. lib. 4. de Pontifice ca. 5. Si Papa erraret in praecipiendo vitia vel prohibendo virtutes teneretur Ecclesia credere vitia esse bona virtutes malas nisi vellet contra conscientiam loqui Idem cap. 31. in Barklaium In bono sensu dedit Christus Petro potestatem faciendi de peccato non peccatum de non peccato peccatum erre in commanding vices or prohibiting vertues the Church should be obliged to believe that vices are good and vertues evil unless she would speak against Conscience And to the same purpose he affirmeth That in good sense Christ hath given to St. Peter the power to make sin to be no sin and that which is no sin to be sin And he takes it for granted That the power which Christ hath given to St. Peter he hath ipso facto given it to the Pope his Successor If then we prove that sedition rebellion and murther of Kings is justified promoted yea and commanded by that Head of their Faith the Papists must either approve it as good and holy or cease to be Papists and learn to have the Faith of the Lord Jesus Christ the Lord of glory without respect of persons Since the Roman Church stands much upon her Antiquity we will begin by the ancientest example of approving the murther of Kings that can be charged Ann. Chr. 611. upon the Roman See It is that of Gregory the I. who hearing that Phocas had slain the Emperour Mauritius his Liege Lord having first killed his children before his face and that he had invaded the Empire writ a gratulatory Epistle to that monster where these words are found We are glad that the benignity Greg. 1. lib. 11. Epist 36. Benignitatem pietatis vestrae ad Imperiale fastigium pervenisse gaudemus Laetentur Coeli exultet Terra de benignis actibus vestris universae Reip. populus hilarescat of your Piety hath attained to the Imperial Dignity Let the heavens rojoyce and let the Earth be glad and let the people of the whole Commonwealth be joyful for your gracious deeds The next example shall be that of Gregory the II. who rebelled against his Sovereigne the Emperour Ann. Chr. 726. Leo Isaurus and made Rome and the Roman Dutchy do the same And while the Emperour was sore afflicted with the wars of the Saracens in the East he made himself Lord of that part of his Masters Dominions in Italy for which Sigonius giveth an admirable Sigonius Hist de Regno Italiae lib. 3. Ita Roma Romanusque Ducatus à Graecis ad Romanum Pontificem propter nesandam eorum haeresim impietatemque pervenit reason That Rome and the Roman Dutchy were lost by the Grecians and got by the Pope of Rome by reason of their wicked heresie A strange kind of penance from a Pastor to turn the sinner out of his house and possess himself of it That wicked heresie of Leo Isaurus was That he prohibited the adoration of Images and pulled them down every where For that Heresie and Impiety the holy Father Gregory the II. imposed this penance upon the Emperour He made him lose his Estate and himself seized upon it This is the beginning of the Popes Temporal Principality This is the Title whereby he holds Rome and the Territory of it to this day even plain Rebellion and Tyrannical Invasion of his Sovereigns Estate and Dominion The next Successor of Gregory the II. was Gregory the III. of whom Platina writeth thus This Pope as soon as he attained to the Papal Platina in Greg.
following Popes exercise over his Son Henry the III. in his long and unfortunate Reign insulting over his weakness and superstition How licentiously did these Wolves tear and raven in England while the publick cry of the oppressed Matth. Paris in vitae Hen. III. people represented unto the King that his Kingdome was become like a Vine whose fence is pulled down and rooted out by the wild Bear These Histories which make the usurpations of the Roman Court to be abhorred yet are set forth by the Jesuite Petra Sancta as examples for all Princes And Petra Sancta Not. in Epist ad Balzac he would have all Kings to imitate King John and Henry the III. of England in their subjection to the Pope He could not have chosen more frequent examples to dehort them from it considering the gulf of miseries which they sunk into by their stooping under the Popes tyranny But they have more reason to follow the example of the next King brave Edward the I. who recovered his own and his Kingdomes liberty by expelling all the Roman Exactours out of England and by his contempt of Rome reigned peaceably and glorious For the Pope who in the Reigns of his Father and Grandfather was thundering continually and cudgelling both King and people never spake a word against this stout King Pope Innocent the III. played with his Spiritual Sword in Germany as well as in England for he excommunicated the Emperour Otho the IV. Platina in Innocent III. Otho iram Pontificis in se concitavit à quo anathemate notatur Imperii titulis privatur and deprived him of the titles of the Empire as Platina speaks warily for Popes cannot take away Kingdomes but onely deny to acknowledge the titles The Emperour Fredericke the II. was worse used by the Popes though much deserving of the Roman See to which he had given the County of Fundi For he was excommunicated and deposed by Pope Honorius the III. and again by Gregory the IX for that Monster Platina of pride and greedinesse when the Emperour was gone on his errand into Palaestina anathematized him raised him enemies in Germany by his preaching Friars Matth. Paris in Vita Hen. III. Reg. Angl. Vspergensis Trithemius and taking advantage of his absence sent an army into Appulia and seised upon the Emperours Lands Twice he shewed himself reconciled with the Emperour and twice again broke with him and excommunicated him but with ill successe to himself For by all these Excommunications and Depositions the Emperour thrived who after a long patience fell upon the Pope made his Interdicts laid upon the Empire to be hissed out and so distressed the Pope by his armies that he died for wrath and sorrow The same Emperour was also excommunicated and Platina Matth. Paris persecuted by Pope Innocent the IV. And when after the Emperours death the armes of his Son prospered in Italy he gave the Kingdome of Sicily to Richard brother to Henry the III. of England Richard not acquainted with the Popes giving of Kingdomes asketh that the Forts and the Treasure and Hostages be given to him Herein wiser if he had stayed there then others who accept that which the Pope cannot deliver I will passe by many Popes that came after who sent their Excommunications no further then the Kingdome of Naples and Sicily and filled Italy with factions that they might fish in troubled waters Let us fix our contemplation a little upon that high pattern of Pontifical vertues Boniface the VIII upon whom Platina bestoweth this Character That Boniface Platina in Bonifacio Bonifacius ille qui Imperatoribus Regibus Principibus Nationibus Populis terrorem potius quam religionem injicere conabatur Quique dare regna auferre pellere homines ac reducere pro arbitrio conabatur aurum undique conquisitum plus quam dici potest sitiens who studied to give terrour rather then religion unto Emperours Kings Princes and Nations and laboured to give and take away Kingdomes drive men away and bring them again according to his pleasure One that was thirsty of goods scraped up from all places more then can be exprest The passages between him and the French King Philip the Fair are known yet perhaps not to all This is the History in short This Pope having a grudge against him about the Collation of Benefices and desiring to pick a quarrel sent to him the Bishop of Pamiers Stella Histoire de France to command him to undertake an expedition to the Holy Land and to threaten him if he refused The Bishop did that errand so malapertly that the King offended committed him to prison The Pope angry demanded the Bishop again and had him and sent this Letter to the King Fear God and keep his Commandements We will have thee to know that thou art our Subject both for the Spiritual and the Temporal That no Collation of Benefices and Prebends belongs to thee And if thou hast the custody of any of them that are vacant we will have thee to reserve the fruits for their Successors And if thou hast granted any Benefices We declare all such Collations null and as far as they are executed de facto We revoke them Those that believe otherwise we hold them for Hereticks These goodly Letters being brought to Paris by a Legate were pluckt from him by the Kings Council and Judges and cast into the fire by the Earle of Artois And to them the King returned this Answer Philip by the Grace of God King of the French to Boniface calling himself Sovereign Pontife but little greeting or rather none at all Let thy most egregious folly know that in temporal things we are subject to no man That the Collation of Churches and Prebends belongs unto us by Royal Right and converting the same to our use during the vacancy That the Collation by us made and to be made shall be valid and that in vertue of the same we will couragiously defend the possessors Those that hold otherwise We hold to be idiots and bereaved of their sense The Pope inraged excommunicates the King but none durst be the publisher or bearer of that Bull. The King assembleth at paris his Knights Barons and Prelates and asketh them of whom they hold their Lordships and the temporal of their Ecclesiastical preferments All answer that they hold them of the King not of the Pope whom they charge with heresie and many crimes The Pope assembleth a General Council as Platina calleth it though it was gathered out of few Platina Countries and by a Decree of that Council depriveth Philip of his Kingdome and giveth it to the Emperour Albert and laboureth to arme Germany and Netherlands against France But that vigorous King sent Nogaret into Italy who by the help of Sciarra Columna whose Family Boniface had cruelly opprest got two hundred horse and surprised the Pope at Anagnia whom they mounted upon a poor jade and brought him prisoner
with his whole power against Queen Elizabeth and had raised a great Army for that expedition But when Stukely came to Sebastian he found him possess'd with a new project to help a Moor King of Fez against another King who kept him out of possession and to get the Kingdome from them both To that War he invited Stukely promising that presently after that work done which he represented to him most easie they should go together to the War against England and Ireland So they sailed over into Africa where Sebastian and his whole Army were destroyed and with him Stukely and the Popes Italian Souldiers were cut in pieces A deliverance of England ever to be remembred with praise and admiration So let thine enemies perish O Lord. This Pope had a great hand in that unparallelled villany wrought by the marriage of Henry King of Navarra with the Sister of Charles the IX of France A marriage which Pius the V. would never consent unto by reason of their difference in Religion But when his Successor Gregory the XIII was told by the Cardinall of Lorrain that this marriage was intended as a trap to destroy Henry and his Protestant party he presently gave his dispensation for the celebrating of it and encouraged the design The horrible massacre which attended the jollity of that marriage was received at Thuanus Rome with triumphant expressions of publick joy And Cardinal Vrsin was sent Legat into France to praise the Kings piety and wisdom in that great action and to bestow blessings and spiritual graces upon the King and the Actors of that fearful Tragedy The Court of Rome might well praise what themselves had procured if not contrived and truly the plot hath an Italian garb and looks not like a production of the French soil Not long after this Pope sent to Henry the III. of France and to his people Indulgences for millions of years which were to be obtained by making processions to four Churches in Paris and by being zealous and diligent in the extirpation of heresies that is in his style to extermine the Protestants The male line of the Kings of Portugal being extinct this Pope laid a claim to the Kingdome as depending from the holy See and would have the Nation to have taken Arms for him against the heirs from the females But his claim was hissed out with great scorn In the year 1580. this Pope sent an Italian called San Iosepho with some Italian Troops into Ireland to joyn with the Irish Rebells When they were demanded by a message from the Lord Deputy who they were and what they came for they answered Some that they were sent by the most holy Father the Pope and some from the Catholick King of Spain to whom the Pope had given Ireland because Queen Elizabeth had justly forfeited her Title to Ireland by her heresie A doctrine which at the same time was preach'd in England and Ireland by Jesuites and other Seminary Priests with great boldness and vehemency till the Queen and her Councell perceiving what danger the State was running into by these mens activeness and impunity Campian and some others sent by the Pope on that errand were apprehended And being examined they obstinately defended the Popes authority over the Queen and maintained that she was no Queen as being lawfully deposed by the Pope upon which they were condemned and executed That Crown of Martyrdom the Pope procured to his Confessors And the greater the number is of those Martyrs that the Papists muster the more they exaggerate the Popes cruelty to his truest Vassalls For could the Pope expect that persons sent to perswade the people to dispossess and kill their Sovereign should have other dealing from the hand of Justice The principal Article of the late Papal Creed is that which Pius the V. sets forth in his Bull against the Queen that God hath made the Bishop of Rome Prince over all people and all Kingdoms But the English Papists are taught that besides that general right over all Kingdomes the Pope hath a peculiar right over England and Ireland as his proper Dominions This is Bellarmins doctrine which he hath made bold to maintain unto King James himself The King Bellarm. lib. cui Titulus Tortus pag. 19. Rex Anglorum duplici jure subjectus est Papae uno communi omnibus Christianis ratione Apostolicae potestatis quae in omnes extenditur juxta illud Ps 44. Constitues eos Principes super omnem terram Altero proprio ratione recti dominii of England saith he is subject to the Pope by double right The one by reason of his Apostolick power which extends over all men according to that Charter Ps 44. Thou shalt establish them Princes over all the earth The other proper by a right dominion Then he pleadeth that England and Ireland are the Churches dominions the Pope the direct Lord and the King his Vassal This then being become an Article of Religion in which the English Papists are instructed and this in consequence that if the Pope disallow the King he is no more King of England but an Usurper and must be used accordingly Let any man judge who hath some equity and freedome of judgement left whether a prudent Prince and Council of State ought to suffer such an instruction to be given to the people Truly the more Religion is pretended for that doctrine and the practice of Rebellion obtruded as a commandement of the Church the more it concernes the loyal Magistrate to oppose it vigorously Pope Sixtus the V. to favour the enterprise of Philip the II. upon England renewed the Excommunication of Queen Elizabeth pronounced by Pius the V. deprived her verbo tenus of her Kingdome absolved her subjects from all Allegiance to her and published a Croisada against her as against the Turk giving plenary Indulgence to all that would make warre against her But the Popes Curses provoked Gods blessings upon the Queen who might say as David when Shimei cursed him The Lord will requite me good for his cursing this day All the storms raised against England were blown over without harme The great preparations of Spain served onely to disable it and secure England And the many attempts against the Queens life upon that Bull contributed to her safety by manifesting to the World the wickednesse of Rome and the pernicious effects of the Roman principles For which I might produce the Examinations and Confessions of many that suffered for attempting to murther the Queen but I will bring but one for all William Parry acknowledged that he had promis'd at Rome to kill the Queen about which he was most troubled in his conscience till he lighted upon Dr. Allens book which taught that Princes excommunicate for heresie were to be deprived of Kingdome and life Which book saith he did vehemently excite me to prosecute my attempt This Popes Excommunications had more effect in France for after that he had excommunicated King Henry the
III. and absolved his subjects from all Allegiance to him in consequence of that Bull many of the French rebelled against their King and he wasslain upon that account by a Dominican Friar Which when this Pope heard he commended the action highly in a full Consistory at Rome and forbad that any funeral rites should be celebrated for him Which funeral rites usually celebrated at Rome for departed Princes consisting most in prayer for their souls it appeareth that his Holinesse was not contented that he had slain that King by his Bull but would also damne his soul Gregory the XIV excommunicated by his Bulls Henry the IV. of France forbidding all Peers Nobles Cities and Commons to yield him obedience and declaring him incapable of the Crown as an Heretick and relapse But that Bull was by the Court of Parliament then sitting at Tours condemned to be torn and burnt by the Hang-man Clement the VIII did the same over again and excommunicated Henry The Bull was condemned as the other to be burnt by the hand of the Hang-man But the effect of these Bulls appeared by the attempts against the Kings life which soon after followed first by a woman next by Peter Barriere and again by John Chastel all denying him to be King because he was not absolved by the Pope Neither did the effects of these Bulls cease after that the King was absolved by his Holinesse For by them the King got his death Ravilliac who killed him could alledge them when he was examined and say that the King was an Heretick in his heart and deserved to be slain as an enemy of the Church Paul the V. was as turbulent as his predecessors as he shewed it in his insolent and impertinent quarrel with the Venetians because they had stopt by Edict the giving of Lands to the Church whereby the State lost many tributes and services He threatned them of Excommunication if they did not recal that Law And upon their maintaining of it he excommunicated them and put their State in Interdict But it took no effect for none of their Clergy would or durst obey it the Jesuites onely excepted who therefore were expelled out of their dominions They condemned the Popes Bull by Edict and forbad the bringing of it into their Territory upon pain of hanging Neither did they give any satisfaction to the Pope when the businesse came to an Arbitrement but forced him to make amends to himself and to come to their terms In the beginning of this Popes reigne was detected that Treason not to be matcht in any age for cruelty and depth of villany the Gunpowder-plot to have destroyed in one blow the King the Parliament the Judges of the Land and all the flowre and strength of the Kingdome of England This horrid Treason was the effect of the several Bulls of the Pope before the Reigne of our gracious King James of glorious memory who coming into his Kingdome of England found it lying under a Papal Interdict and himself excluded from the Crown by a Bull sent into England a little before the death of Queen Elizabeth whereby all that are not Roman Catholicks are declared incapable of and excluded from the Succession of which his Majesty complains in his Apology And that Bull was produced in the Indictment of the Jesuite Garnet as the principal motive of the Gunpowder Treason This gave occasion to the Oath of Supremacy set forth by the King and his Parliament then sitting for the security of his Majesties Life and Dignity wherein it is required of all to whom it is administred to acknowledge his Majesty to be the lawful King of the Realmes of England Scotland and Ireland and that the Pope hath no right to depose him of his Kingdoms or dispense his Subjects from their obedience to him Also that they abhorre as impious and heretical this doctrine That Princes excommunicated by the Pope may justly be deposed or slain by their owne Subjects This Oath being presented to the Roman Catholicks some of them made no difficulty to take it among others Blackwell the Arch-priest Whereupon the Pope sent Apostolical Letters into England declaring that Dated Sept. 22. 1606. this Oath could not be taken with a safe conscience and exhorting the English to suffer all kinds of torments and death it self rather then to offend Gods Majesty by such an Oath To imitate the constancy of other English Martyrs To have their loins girt about with vertue to put on the Brest-plate of righteousnesse and take the Buckler of Faith He tells them that God who hath begun in them that good work will perfect it and will not suffer them to be Orphans c. And he injoyneth them to observe diligently the precepts contained in the Letters which Clement the VIII his predecessor had written a little before to Mr. George Arch-priest of England By which Letters all Princes of a Religion contrary to the Roman are excluded from the Crown of England These Letters whereby the English were exhorted to be Martyrs of the Popes Sovereignty in England and to make it an Article of their faith which they must signe with their blood that the Pope hath power to depose Princes and expose them to be expelled and slain by their own subjects did not receive that entertainment which he expected among the English of his Religion For some rejected them as supposititious forged by the Hereticks to draw persecution upon them and kindle their Kings wrath against them he being already justly provoked to revenge by the late conspiracy The Pope hearing of this sends other and more express letters Dated Aug. 23. 1607. into England to expostulate with the Roman Catholicks saying That he wondred at their doubting of the truth of the Apostolick letters to dispense themselves upon that pretence from obeying his commandments And therefore he declareth That those Letters were written by himself not only motu proprio ex certa scientia by his own motion and certain knowledge but also after a long and grave deliberation enjoyning them again to obey those Letters because such is his pleasure To these letters which set up rebellion with a high hand as an Article of the Roman Faith were joyned letters of Cardinal Bellarmine to Blackwell the Archpriest wherein he chides him bitterly for taking the Oath which under colour of modifications had no other end but to transport the Popes authority to a Successor of Henry the VIII And by the examples of his Predecessors he exhorteth him to defend the Popes primacy whom he calleth The Head of the Faith Of this Oath thus prohibited by the Pope and cryed down by Bellarmine the Jesuite Becanus saith That both of them the Pope and Bellarmine Beean de dissidio Anglic. Vterque negat salva conscientia praestari posse hoc juramentum quia abnegarent fi-Catholicam deny that it may be taken with a safe Conscience because by taking it the Catholick Faith is denyed Is it then an
York Squire Hesket Lopez Babington with his associates and how many more All were assisted and prompted by Jesuites as the judicial examinations will justifie And now we speak of Babington and his associates I find two brothers Bellamy's both apprehended for hiding them after they were openly proclaimed traitors in their house neer Harrowhill where they were kept ten dayes and clothed in rustical habits There they were all taken and thence carried to prison where one of the Bellamies strangled himself the other was executed with the conspirators his name Hierome Bellamy From which of the two brothers our Adversary Thomas Bellamy is descended and whether from either or neither himself best knows But it seems by his behaviour that the crime of hiding and disguising traitors runs in the blood For what is his covering of the parricidial doctrine of Jesuites with falfe constructions but hiding and disguising traitors whose doctrine is declared treasonable by sundry Acts of Parliament Let him take warning by the crime and the ill successe of these men of his name and apply to himself that Sentence of Tully which he misapplyeth to the Protestants of Integrity Mirror te Antoni quorum facta imitere corum exitus non pertimescere Since you imitate the actions of men of your name Sir Bellamy I wonder you are not frighted with thinking of their ends The Devil and the Jesuites having been so often disappointed of their attempts against England in the end contrived the foulest plot that ingenious cruelty did in any age imagine the Gunpowder-Treason which shall be to the Worlds end the wonder of succeeding ages and the shame of ours This was the godly product of the English Seminaries abroad and the Roman education It is easie to judge that the plotters of it had been bred long in another Climate then the middle aire of England for it looks like one of the feats of Caesar Borgia Non nostri generis monstrum nec sanguinis Of that attempt to cut off King and Kingdome with one blow none could be capable but such as had many years breathed the same aire where he reigned who wished that the Romans had but one neck that he might cut it off with one stroke But a Jesuite is capable of devising and the Romish zeal of executing any mischief though never so prodigious to promote the Papal interest And they have law for it even the Roman Decree the Oracle of the Pope himself We do not account them for Causa 23. qu. 5. Can. Excommunicatorum Non enim eos homicidas arbitramur quos adversus excommunicatos zelo Catholicae Matris Ecclesiae ardentes aliquos eorum trucidasse configerit murtherers saith his Holinesse who burning with the zeal of our Catholick Mother the Church against exmunicate persons shall happen to kill some of them Now England was lying under many excommnnications when the Gunpowder-Treason was plotted and lyeth under them still for they never were repealed Truly so far we must excuse Campian Garnet Hall Hamond and other Jesuites who have plotted or incouraged rebellions and treasons in England They have done no more then they were commanded or allowed by the Pope And here I must be a suitor to all the conscionable Roman Catholieks who abhorre these wicked wayes to acknowledge ingenuously that the Actors were grounded upon the fundamental Laws of the Court of Rome And that the Pope the Head of their Faith is he that commands by his Canons and Bulls the slaughter of those that displease him the breach of faith the deposing of Kings and the rebellion of the people as I have sufficiently demonstrated before If after that they adhere to the other points of the Roman Religion upon this main ground of the Roman Faith That the Pope cannot erre they blinde themselves wilfully and building their faith upon an unsafe ground they may come short of the end of their faith the salvation of their souls This power of deposing Kings and exposing them to the attempts of their enemies so peremptorily assumed by the Pope and so boldly executed by his zealous agents ought to be grounded upon some proof out of holy Writ In all the passages which I have alledged out of Jesuites books I finde but two of those proofs The one of Bellarmine who proveth Bellarm. lib. cui Titulus Tortus p. 19. Rex Anglorum subjectus est Papae jus omnibus Christiadis communi ratione Apostolicae potestatis juxta illud Ps 4. 4. Constitues eos Principes super omnem terram that the King of England is subject unto the Pope by a right common to all Christians by reason of the Apostolick power according to this Text Psal 44. Thou shalt make them Princes over all the earth In that Psalm which with us is the 45. this promise is made to the Kings Spouse which is the Church the Spouse of Christ our King Instead of thy Fathers house shall be thy children whom thou mayest make Princes over all the earth Answerably to that we learn Rev. 1. 6. That God hath made us Kings and Priests unto God our Father That blessing then to be understood and fulfilled in Gods good time belongs to all the true children of the Church The ingrossing of it to the Pope alone to the exclusion of all Christians is a bold and indeed a ridiculous inclosing of Commons without any warrant Suarez brings a proof of the like validity After that horrid assertion alledged before that after that a Prince is excommunicated he may be dispossess'd or slain by any persons whatsoever He prevents the objection out of Rom. 13. 1. Let every soul Suarez adversus sect Anglic lib. 6. c. 6. sect 24. 〈◊〉 Paulus his verbis Omnis anima potestatibus sublimioribus subdi a sit Rom. 13 nunquam addidit etiam potestatibus excommunicatis vel deprvatis a Papa omnes subditisint be subject to the higher Powers and saith that the Apostle never added Let all be subject also to the Powers excommunicated and deprived by the Pope A recreative proof which would make but a poor enthymema The Apostle addeth not that we must be subject also to the higher Powers deprived by the Turk Ergo if the Great Turk pronounce a sentence of deprivation against a Christian Prince the Subjects of that Prince are free from their allegiance and may dispossess and kill him when they think good But what These proofs are as concluding as those that the Popes themselves bring to prove their power Nicholaus 1. Epist ad Michael Imp. Constant Petro specialiter ostensum est ut ea mactaret manducaret Illi soli jussum est ur rete plenum piscibus ad littus traheret as when Pope Nicholas the I. proveth the Papal power because it was said to Saint Peter Kill and eat and because to him alone was granted that power to draw a Net full of Fishes to Land Likewise Bonifacius the VIII proveth his primacy Bonifac. VIII
all his false turns But both my Readers and I have better businesses then to heap up dung or search all the Impostures of a Novice of the Iesuites For the end he brings some rules of Law concerning the nature of the English Monarchy which if he had studied well he had never taken upon him to defend the doctrine of the Iesuites which is inconsistent with them For they allow not that which he affirmeth That the Monarchy of England can do no homage having no superiour and that the Crown of England is independent and his jura Regalia are holden of no Lord but the Lord of heaven Bellarmine saith the clean contrary and makes the Pope Sovereigne of England by double right as we heard before Yet this Scholar of the Iesuites may give Bellarmines sense to that assertion that the Crown of England is independent for holding with his Masters that the Crown of England belongeth to the Pope he will say also that it is independent and oweth homage to none but God meaning that the Pope the right Sovereigne oweth homage for it to none but God The man being evidently a Scholar of the Jesuites cannot but be instructed in the doctrine of equivocations about which Tolet Tolet lib. 4. Instruct Sacerd. cap. 21. Aliquando uti licet aequivocatione decipere audientem ut cum Iudex petit juramentum ab aliquo ut dicat crimen vel proprium vel alienum si omnino est occultum jurare cogatur utatur aequivocatione puta Nescio intelligendo intra se ut dicam tibi vel simile Et lib. 5. c. 38. lib. 4. c. 21 22. gives large instructions in his book of the Instruction of Priests saying expresly That it is lawful sometimes to use equivocations and to deceive the hearer And Sanchez tells us in what case it is lawful to equivocate There is a just cause saith he to Sanch. oper Mor. l. 3. c. 6. num 19. Causa jure utendi his amphibologiis est quoties id necessarium aut utile est ad salutem corporis honorem tes familiares tuendas use these equivocations whensoever it is necessary or useful for the preservation of body honour or estate Since then the sect and Religion of the Jesuites which subjecteth the Crown of England unto the Pope cannot subsist in England without palliating that criminal doctrine with equivocation They finde it necessary for the preservation of body honour and estate to profess that the Monarchy of England can do no homage having no superiour and that the Crown of England is independent but to whom that independant Crown belongs that they will reserve in their thoughts Or if they say they will be true to the King they will by the King understand the Pope or the King of Spain to whom the Pope gave the Kingdome of England fourscore years ago and never recalled that gift since Wherefore if this Gentleman appear in Print again or any of his confreres for him about this point of obedience we must desire him to speak more home before he can justifie himself to be a true Philanax Anglicus and a good English subject of his Majesty To that end let him declare that he acknowledgeth the following Articles as true and just and is ready to subscribe unto them I. The Kings Most Excellent Majesty Charles the II. hath no superiour on Earth de jure in the Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland and other His Majesties Dominions II. All Roman Catholicks born in these His Majesties Dominions are his subjects de jure and of none else although they have taken the Orders of the Church of Rome or have a General of some Religion to whom they have sworn obedience III. The Doctrine of Cardinal Bellarmine is false that the King of England is subject to the Pope by double right besides his pretended subjection in matters spiritual IV. The Pope hath no power to deprive Kings of their Kingdoms or any way to dispose of their Crowns or their Lives V. The Pope cannot absolve the subjects of His Majesty King Charles the II. or of any of His Successors from the Oath of their Allegiance Neither are they now absolved from it by any precedent Decree from the Popes VI. A King declared heretick or excommunicate by the Pope is not thereby disabled from exercising his Kingly jurisdiction VII The excommunicating or depriving of a King by the Pope doth not exempt that Kings natural subjects from the duty of their Allegiance VIII King John had no power to give his Kingdome to the Pope without the consent of his Peers and Commons Neither is that Contract of any validity IX A Priest having learned in Confession a Conspiracy against the Kings life ought to discover it to the King or his Councel X. The Peers and Commons of England and other His Majesties Dominions have no power to judge their King much less to depose him or put him to death or to choose another King or to alter the Government of the State He that will refuse to subscribe these Articles and openly profess his consent unto them cannot justifie his love and fidelity to the King and is altogether unfit to charge the Protestants with rebellious tenets Vacuum culpa esse decet qui in alium paratus est dicere He that is in an error cannot justifie himself but by forsaking it That yeilding is glorious and to be overcome by the truth is a great victory Without such a justification lessons of loyalty given by a Iesuite are unsuitable and of as little effect as a Lecture of Chastity preach'd by an allowed Curtizan of Rome JOH VIII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 CAROLE qui Latias artes fulmina bruta Et Capitolini contemnis Vejovis iras Macte manumissus coelesti lumine Princeps Lumine Romuleas tibi dispellente tenebras Assertamque sacro capiti firmante coronam Dum trepidi Reges sancti luminis orbi Serva Quirinali submittunt colla tyranno Tu liber specta stantes ad fraena Monarchas Stratorum officio succollantesque cathedrae Augustos lixas mox flexo poplite curvos Turpia purpureo libantes oscula socco Erige tu curvos rectus fratresque doceto Quos Regum Pater agnoscit Natosque Deosque Quà m male prostituat divum Rex sanctus honorem Tarpeiam lambens crepidam solosque pudendum Excussisse jugum libertatique litasse Gnaviter amplexos coelestia lumina Reges FINIS ERRATA PAge 8. line 17. Galileo p. 9. l. 5. put out which p. 11. in the margent l. 10. tenerentur p. 19. l. 12. matter p. 24. l. 14. Popes p. 26. l. 10. by the preaching l. 12. oppressing l. opposing p. 30. l. ult Francis the II p. 31. l. 7. Iesuites p. 33. l. 20. Henry the IV. l. 22. because p. 3â— l. â—4 the ordinary l. 13. any of five Kings p. 49. l. 28. unequitable l. equitable p. 53. l. 13. stonie the just p 87. l. 13. frequent l. pregnant p. 113. l. 24. Pope p. 115. in the margent 1. 6. non sine manibus p. 124. l. put out persons put letters p. 128. l. 25. Mutius p. 137. l. 26. depose
of the world as Rebels by their very Religion and the Bane of all Governments The whole Work is purum putum mendacium right mettle of untruth in the main substance The Title is false for it picks a quarrel with the Presbyterians only whereas the Book declareth open war to all the Protestants under heaven The pretence false for the Author pretends to undertake that task out of love to the King whereas he works the Kings ruine by calumnies against his true Subjects and by maintaining the Jesuites the sworn enemies of his Crown and State The face he puts on is false many wayes for he pretends in his Epistle and Prefaces to publish the Book of a dead man whereas the uniformity or rather deformity of the affected broken Style and Billings-gate language in the Epistle Prefaces and body of the Book shews all that false coin to have been stampt in the same base Mint The Author is produced as a Priest of the Church of England whereas he speaks as a Priest of the Church of Rome The Publisher calls himself Bellamy whereas he is a false Friend and a true Enemy and most like it is that no such man as he names himself is to be found For such Vizards are borrowed by these children of darkness A wrong Name A contrary Profession A dead man that speaks out of his Grave three Vizards one over another lyes upon lyes in the Porch a right Entry into a Shop of Lyes But how much falshood is in the Epistle Was Bellamy or the pretended dead Author well acquainted with that venerable Prelate to whom the Book is dedicated Did Bellamy ever present the Book to his Lordship Did he chuse him for his Patron and stroak him with deserved praises to honour him or to betray him and make him odious as a Patron of Popery and Protector of Jesuites And lastly the accusations laid against the several Protestants even these that are true if any be are they not falsely imputed to the generality of the party And are not most of the alledged passages out of their writings maimed detorted or plainly forged O God of Truth who lovest Truth in the inward parts and lookest with piercing judicial eyes into the bottome of crafty projects through all the coverings of hypocrisie Is thy Truth to be defended with Falshood What followship hath the simplicity of thy Gospel with this heap of multiplyed Impostures And how can the zeal of Religion put a man that hath some sense of Ingenuity upon such false and crooked wayes Well I see my self engaged to fight with wilde Beasts as St Paul did at Ephesus Let God arise and let his enemies be scattered Let them also that hate him flee before him I did not see the Book but after the second Edition eight moneths after its first appearing And though I had seen it before I would have made no haste to appear upon the lists against this Adversary but expected of the Secular Power a more substantial and indeed the right Confutation But what the smalness of the Libel and the Libeller kept them hitherto from the Censure of Authority For those that stand in high places can hardly discern such strawes below But we that stand below may look neerer and see poyson in a straw and ought to represent unto our Superiours the mischievousness of this small yet dangerous thing Dangerous I say not for the strength of reason nor for the bitterness neither for the very extremity of malice in that Book makes it weak in reason as it is the natural effect of pride and choler to enervate the judgement and take reason off the hooks But that which makes the Book dangerous is the unparallell'd boldness and presumptuousness of the attempt Could we believe but that we see it that in England where the Law gives no Toleration to the Romish Religion a Papist durst appear in Print with his and his Printers name to the Book to tax not only the Protestant Reformers but the very Reformation of Rebellion and High Treason Put among Luthers crimes That he preached against the Tyrannie and Superiority Pag. 73. 74. of the Bishop of Rome and perswaded the people not to render him any Obedience Call the Reformation the New Gospel Excuse Mariana and justifie the Jesuites against those that charge them with the Doctrine of King-killing Cry down Protestants as persons not to be trusted with any part of the Government of the State or suffered to live in any Commonwealth Bestow upon them the most contumelious termes that he could devise Traytors Diabolical Cockatrices Infernal Spirits are the mildest words that he giveth them It is a silly colour to his malice to name them alwayes In his pa 109. his vizard falls down and he saith openly These rebel doctrines are backt by the generality of those that call themselves Protestants pag. 71. Protestants of Integrity as if he meant a different sort from other Protestants whereas under that name he persecuteth all the Reformed Christians of Europe following them from Countrey to Countrey And although he durst not so openly rail against the English Reformers yet can he not abstain to tax them of Rebellion under Queen Mary saying most falsely That there was more Rebellions in her poor five years then in the forty four of Queen Elizabeth thereby to shew that the Roman Catholicks are the far more loyal subjects But that which goes beyond all examples of the most superlative impudence that most virulent Libel against the Protestants of Integrity which is the Religion profess'd in England he makes bold to recommend to the Protection of that Eminent and Vertuous Prelate now our most Reverend Lord Archbishop of Canterbury then the second Ecclesiastical Person of all the Province and President of the Convocation I pray Sir Philopapa for Philanax Anglicus is too good a Title for you do you know who you speak to Do you think what you say Do you remember where you are In qua tandem Civitate Catilina arbitraris te vivere Do you think you are at Rome or Madrid where you may bring as you do all Protessants to the Inquisition Or do you hope that our loyal Clergie will mistake you for one of their side because you rail against Knox and Buchanan and make some profession of Obedience and declame against the late rebellion And when they know you once for the man you are do you presume that you can make them forget what Sovereigne you are sworn unto and what power the Pope claims over all Kingdoms and what particular Title he pretends to England and Ireland Certainly Sir Philopapa for the Pope is the King you love and whose Interest you promote among our Kings Subjects I hope you shall finde that your loud cryes at my Lords Grace of Canterbury's door for the putting down of all Protestants of Integrity will prove as improper and unseasonable as if you proclaimed at the Court gates the Ordinance of the Rebels
Parliament for putting down Monarchy and that you shall be helped with some personal interest to increase your hatred against the Protestants of Integrity for such shall you finde the Kings Majesty his Council his Parliament the pious Fathers of the Church and the wise Judges of the Land Could you not content your self to enjoy quietly your Sovereigns Clemency and forbearance but you must defame in Print all that are not of your gang which are no less then the King and the State From their Justice nothing can secure you but your obscurity But while you take an order that your person may lye undiscovered I will make bold to discover some of your Impostures All I cannot neither is it material for all that I need to do to provide an antidote against your poison is to do two things The one to wipe off the aspersions of Rebellion which you cast upon the holy Doctrine of the Protestant Churches The other to bring to the Bar the true Rebels which will be no recrimination but asserting the Pope in his ancient known possession of being the grand Patron and Architect of Rebellion of subjects against their Sovereignes and the especial directer of high Treason against the Kings of England Before I look to the body of his Book somthing must be said of his Epistle and Prefaces His Epistle is addressed to no less then the Right Reverend Father in God Gilbert Lord Bishop of London and Dean of His Majesties Chappel Royal since deservedly promoted to the highest Dignity of the Church of England A great Honour to his Book How far the great Patron which he chuseth is honoured with that Dedication and the due praises which he payeth unto him is obvious to any ordinary understanding Praise at the best is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but a light gift to a wise man And since praise Seneca Sit tibi tam turpe laudari a turpibus quam si lauderis ob turpia hath its price from the praiser that eminent Prelate is little obliged to this Gentlemans praises who justifies in his Book what he is and what he aimes at It is praising him with a vengeance to take him for a Protector of his mischievous attempt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He hath more obliged our late most Reverend Archbishop Juxon now a glorious Saint in heaven whom he hath not spared to blame though he doth not name him but he points at him with his finger And then tells My Lord of London From all these vanities your Lordships known Innocency and Piety hath alwayes defended you scientifically inferring that Innocency and Piety is inconsistent with the Character which he had given of that great Prelate Could this Epistles be so senseless as to expect thanks from a Bishop of London for raising his commendation upon the disgrace of his Metropolitan What needed he to go so far out of his subject to bring in that malicious exception For the blame of the one adds nothing to the praise of the other Does he not shew his hatred against Protestant Prelates which he could not but express even when he took one of them for his Patron And no wonder that a Jesuite should maligne an Archbishop of Canterbury seeing the Jesuites had no greater enemies then those that sate in that See That which he findes amiss in that rarely accomplished Prelate is commended in him by wise men his laudable curiosity fit for a great Naturalist as he was to keep several sorts of Animals about his house as Aristotle did before him Their Nature and Inclinations he would observe with a judicious eye and speak of them pertinently and delightfully Of these Natural Lectures he was pleased to make me hearer several times and to imploy me to finde him Books of that subject So serious were his Recreations when he would unbend among those whom he honoured with his Discourses and Table after his great Imployments about the Government of Church and State As that great person 's known Piety and Innocency cannot be blasted by such a weak enemy as this Jesuite so it needs not be defended by such a weak Champion as I am His admired Vertue shines in an Orb elevated far above the reach of the barking of envie and if he needed the approbation of any under God he had a Royal Testimony when his late Majesty our glorious Saint and Martyr had so much confidence in his Piety and Innocency and together in his Wisdome and Courage that of all his Divines he chose him for his second when he was to encounter the terrors of a violent and ignominious death And by the excellent use which he made of his godly counsel in the retirement of his last devotions he ended his combates in a victorious death over all his enemies spiritual and temporal and yeilded his great soul unto God with joy and comfort For one thing this Jesuite and his confreres had great reason to hate that godly Prelate That after His Majesty had spoken many divine words upon the Scaffold he put him in minde to make a profession of his Religion which he did and professed before God and the world that he dyed a Protestant according to the Religion established by Law in the Church of England A profession which gave great discontent to the Papists and the Fanaticks for both wish'd that he had dyed a Papist indeed It is known with what calmness of spirit prudence and magnanimity that vertuous Prelate went through the tryals which he was put to after the Kings death for he was as wise as a serpent though as harmless as a dove And among his many Vertues he was a great Master of two which seldome meet together a singular and Moses-like meekness and an invincible constancy They that have known him moderating in the Vniversity and have seen him since acting in the greatest businesses of the Kingdome admire the readiness and solidity of his judgement fitted alike for speculation and action and in both excellent His dexterity and patience overcoming the most difficult affairs His sincerity in declaring himself without Complements and his fidelity in keeping his promises without wavering were very remote from the imputation of vanity which this enemy would fasten upon the reputation of that truly great and good man I cannot leave I cannot part from the mention of him without that reverend and affectionate expression of the Jews when they speak of their vertuous friends departed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let his memory be blessed for so his soul is in heaven for all the good he hath done in earth to so many and to me for one for to his Graces goodness next to God I owe the greatest part of my well-being To return to our Adversary Many things in his Epistle and Preface shew him to be an Adversary indeed to the whole Protestant party and a sworn slave to the Court of Rome But as he takes no pains to prove any thing but that all Protestants are Rebels
suturi licitum habeant sine Rebellionis aut Infidelitatis crimine resistendi ac contradicendi nobis Successoribus nostris Romanorum Regibus vel Imperatoribus in perpetuam libertatem Caesarea anno 1356. Whereby if the Emperour or the King of the Romans violate any of the Rights of the Subject established by that Capitulation It is declared to be lawfull for the Electors Princes Prelates Nobles and Commons either jointly or severally to resist them without crime of Rebellion or Infidelity Three hundred and fifty years before that a German Pope Gregory V. had brought in the Institution of the Electors as the Centuriators of Magdeburg report But Aventinus and Onuphrius more credibly make it of later date after the death of Frederick II. whom Pope Innocent IV. had persecuted to death and the Empire being much weakned by the loss of that great Emperour to weaken him more yet either Innocent IV. or his Successor Alexander III. procured seven perpetual Electors whose Interest should be to keep alwaies the Emperours low to keep themselves high Since that time the Emperours Authority in many parts of Germany is little more then a title and a respect without power for the Electors may both elect and depose him They and the other Princes of the Empire govern their Signories and pay nothing to him but homage And the Cities called Imperial are they that have the greatest exemptions from the Imperial Lawes Wherefore the exclamations of the Adversaries about the resistance of the Elector of Saxony with other Princes of the Empire and some Imperial Cities against the Emperour and about the words of German Divines or Jurists to that purpose are very ignorantly or maliciously urged as rebellious for neither the words nor the actions of those Germans ought to be weighed in the balance of the duty of other subjects to their absolute Sovereignes Luther who was always very rigid for the subjection of every soul to the higher powers and had written a book expresly of that subject had much ado to be perswaded to consent to a confederacy of defensive arms against the Emperour who being set on by the Court of Rome oppressed the liberties of Germany and to suppress the growing Reformation took more cognizance of cases belonging to the jurisdiction of the Princes and cities of the Empire then he was allowed by the authentical capitulations till the learned in the Law satisfied him about the Statutes of his Countrey and his reason and conscience shewed him that the Apostle commanding Christians to submit themselves to every ordinance of man for the Lords sake requireth of them an obedience proportioned to the constitutions of the States of which they are members Of that consultation Sleidan giveth this account Before they made the confederacy Sleidan Hist lib. 8. ad an 1531. Priusquam soedus iniretur in consilium adhibiti sunt non Iurisconsulti modo sed Theologi quoque Lutherus enim semper docuerat Magistratui non esse resistendum exstabat ejus ea de re libellus Cum autem in hac deliberatione periti juris docerent legibus esse permissum resistere nonnunquam nunc in eum casum de quo leges inter alia mentionem faciunt rem esse deductam ostenderent Lutherus ingenue profitetur se nescivisse hoc licere Et quia leges Politicas Evangelium non impugnat aut aboleat uti semper docuerit Deinde quoniam hoc tempore tam dubio tamque formidoloso multa possint accidere sic ut non modo jus ipsum sed conscientiae quoque vis atque necessitas arma nobis porrigat defensionis causa foedus iniri posse dicit five Caesar ipse sive quis alius forte bellum ejus nomine saciat they called to counsel not onely Jurists but Divines also For Luther had taught alwayes that the Magistrate must not be resisted and a book of his concerning that subject was extant But when in that consultation the learned in law shewed that it was permitted by the laws to resist sometimes and demonstrated that at that time their business was come to that very case of which the laws make mention among other things Luther did ingeniously profess that he knew not that it was lawfull And because the Gospel doth not impugne or abolish the Politick laws as he had alwayes taught Also because the time being so perillous and full of terrour many things might happen which would put the armes in our hands not onely by the prescript of the law but by the force of conscience and necessity he declared his opinion that a defensive League might justly be made whether the Emperour himself or any other in his name should make war against us While they were thus met at Smalcald the Emperour sent letters to them not to condemn or dissolve their meeting as a King of England or France would have done for he knew that by the laws they might meet to look to their common interest without him yea and against him But to charge the Protestants to send help against the Turk who was advancing with a great army towards Germany The Protestants answered that because the Emperour would grant them no peace at home nor suspension of the decree of confiscation against their estates for their Religion and that they were in daily expectation of proscription and hostile dealing from him they could not cut off their own sinews and lay themselves open to his hostility to help him against a foreign enemy But if he would make all fiscal proceedings for the matter of Religion to surcease till the time of the promised Councel and grant them peace and safety at home they would not onely assist him against the Turk with all their power but serve him in all the publick interests to which their duty bound them And this is that confederâ—… 〈…〉 which the Adversary cryeth down as the â—pâ—… 〈…〉 â—…rn of Rebellion from that time to our days how 〈…〉 the equitable Reader judge If it be objected that this abridging of the Emperours power was wrongfully got from him I will grant it It was jus quod coepit ab injuria a right that began by wrong yet confirmed by the Emperours with authentical Charters and strengthened by long prescription The Emperour may thank the Popefor it who having an ancient jealousie of the Imperial rights in Italy and not able to suffer any King of the Romans but themselves have powerfully laboured for many ages to break the Emperours power every where And it was by their practises that the constitution of the Electors and the Golden Bull was made and those great immunities given to the Princes of the Empire and Imperial Cities whereby the Emperour is remained a manacled Prince so unable in most parts of the Empire to stretch his hands upon the meanest persons that trouble him that he could never so much as secure Luther a poor Monk though urged to it by the most powerfull and irresistible sollicitations
have made the Right of Kings known which was opprest before Such a judgement is of great weight coming from a wise King who was truly informed of the businesses of his neighbours Certainly si perito in arte sua credendum est If a skilful Artist must be believed when he speaketh within the compasse of his Art none can decide better what rebellion is and what is not then a great Monarch jealous of the Royal Authority skilled in the duty of Subjects and one that had a long struggling with rebellious spirits This Sentence was pronounced by his Majesty in the year 1615 when France had peace at home and abroad Two years after they had the like testimony of their fidelity from their own King by a Letter of his Majesty written to their Deputies assembled in a Synod at Vitre in these terms Nous avons receu bien volontiers les nouuelles assurances protestations que vous nous auez faites de vostre fidelite obeissance En laquelle persistans comme vous devez que vous auez sait par le passè vous pouuez aussi estre assurez que nous aurons toussours soin de vous maintenir conserver en tous les avantages qui vous ont esté accordez These Letters were printed and published with other Declarations We have received with good satisfaction the new assurances and protestations which you have made unto us of your fidelity and obedience In the which if you persist as you ought and as you have done before you may also be assured that we shall alwayes have a care to maintain and preserve you in all the advantages which have been granted unto you These Letrers bear the Date of May 29. 1617. from Paris Cardinal d'Ossat speaking to Cardinal Aldobrandin Nephew to Clement the VIII about the execrable murther attempted by Iohn Chastel against Henry the IV. of France told him that if Sil y avoit lieu a de tels assassinats ce seroit aux Heretiques a les purchasser executer qu'il a quittez abandonnez qui avoyent a se craindre de luy toutesois ils n'ont rien attenté contre luy ni contre aucun de cinq de nos Roys ses predecesseurs quelque boucherie que leurs Majestez ayent fait desdits Huguenots Card. d'Ossat Epist 8. a Mr. de Velleroy Ian. 25. 1595. pag. 77. such attempts were allowable they were more proper to execute for the Hereticks so he is pleased to call the Protestants whom the King hath left and forsaken and who have reason to stand in fear of him and yet they never attempted any such thing neither against him nor against any of the Kings his predecessors what slaughter soever they have made of the said Hugenots But the greatest testimony of their fidelity is that famous Edict of Nantes which was expressely made to reward them with priviledges for their constant adhering to their King in the long calamities of France Seeing then that the French Protestants were acknowledged good Subjects by their Sovereigne and have deserved by their signal loyalty and long services to the Crowne those few priviledges which they hardly enjoy it is evident how unjust the extraordinary expostulation is That the Roman Catholicks have not the publick allowed exercise of Religion in England as the Protestants have in France There is great reason for that differing dealing The French Protestants have deserved that liberty and more by their constant fidelity and valour having maintained their King with their purses and defended him with their swords so many years against the Jesuitical party who had made a League with strangers to keep him from the Crown and take away his life It is known that the Grandfather of the King now reigning was set upon the Throne by the swords of his Protestant Subjects Let the Jesuitical party of England shew the like service to their Sovereigne whereby they deserve the like recompence What care did they take of the preservation of their Sovereigns lives Queen Elizabeth and King Iames How did they defend their Crowns against the claim and invasion of strangers Did they further or hinder the return of our gracious King now reigning If some few Roman Catholicks have fought for our glorious King and Martyr Charles the I. their whole party fares the better by it now and finds the King a grateful Prince remembring good deeds and forgetting injuries Then the difference of their doctrine in point of Government ought to make a great difference in the allowance of the publick exercise of their Religion The Jesuited Catholicks acknowledge another Sovereigne over their King both for the Spiritual and the Temporal a forreigne power which can dispense them of their Allegiance to him The Protestants acknowledge no Sovereigne above their King and give no jealousie by their doctrine to the Roman Catholick Princes and States under which they live as the Jesuites have done even to Roman Catholicks by whom they have been expelled out of their Dominions as Teachers of a doctrine tending to rebellion Of the troubles that followed who so will give an impartial judgement must look upon the condition of the French Protestants since King Henry IV. bought his peace with the party of the League by the change of his Religion That King seeing himself obliged to provide for the safety of his Protestant subjects by whose armes and long service he had been preserved in his adversities and finally placed upon the Royal Seat gave them some places of strength in several Provinces of the Kingdome for certain years and by an Edict called the Edict of Nantes the free enjoying of their estates and the open exercise of their Religion with some limitation of places Of the priviledges granted them by that Edict there were many infractions especially since the death of Henry the IV. who both by his authority and together by his ancient interest in the Protestant party kept all quiet and preserved them from those wrongs to which the weakest are alwaies obnoxious The term being expired of the grant of those places King Lewis the XIII renewed it for four or five years after which he would have them out of their hands That they were to be restored upon the Kings demand was the opinion of grave Protestants the severest exactors of the obedience of subjects to the Sovereign of my Reverend Father especially who being eminent and respected in the party was a principal means to keep the Protestant Churches on this side Loire in peace and in duty to their King for which his Majesty sent him a considerable summe of money which he refused to take saying that he could be loyal to his King without being bought But the necessity of their keeping those places seemed to be justified by the reason of the first grant which was to preserve them from the violence of their bitter enemies for said they if so many places of safety could not keep us
deponi eligi alius Et Recogn lib. de Laicis sect Addo experientiam laudat Navarrum qui non dubitat affirmare nunquam populum ita potestatem suam in Regem transferre quin illam sibi in habitu retineat ut in certis quibusdam casibus etiam actu recipere possit men the Kings power is from the people because the people makes the King And in temporal Common-wealths if the King degenerate into a Tyrant though he be the Head of the Kingdome he may be deposed by the people and another elected And doth he not praise Navarrus for saying that the people never so transferre their power to the King but they retain it in the habit so that in some cases they may resume it Is it for saying that the Common-wealth may take defensive armes against the King and expel him The Jesuite Suarez taught them that doctrine Suarez Defens Fid lib. 6. c. 19. sect 17. Resp ex sola rei natura spectatam prout fuit apud Gentiles nunc est inter Ethnicos habet potestatem se desendendi à Tyranno Rege sect 15. Si Rex legitimus tyrannice gubernat regno nullum aliud sit remedium nisi Regem expellere deponere poterit Resp tota publico communi consensu civitatem procerum Regem deponere The Common-wealth saith he considered in her meer nature and as it was among the Gentiles and as it is now among the Pagans hath the power to defend her self against a Tyrant If a lawful King governe tyrannically and that there be no other remedy for the Kingdome but to expel and depose the King the whole Common-wealth by the publick and common consent of the Cities and the Peers may depose the King Or do the Jesuites inveigh against them for making a formal and aggressive Warre against the King They have no reason for it seeing that the Jesuite Mariana hath set them down the whole course which they have followed The readiest Mariana lib. 6. de Rege cap. 6. pag. 59. 60. Expedita maximé tuta via est si publici conventus facultas detur communi consensu quid statuendum sit deliberare fixum ratumque habere quod communi sententia steterit Monendus in primis Princeps erit atque ad sanitatem revocandus c. Qui si medicinam respuat neque spes ulla sanitatis relinquatur sententia pronuntiata licebit Reip ejus imperium detrectare primum quoniam bellum necessario concitabitur ejus defendendi consilia explicare expedire arma pecunias in belli sumptus imperare populis si res feret neque aliter se Resp tueri possit eodem defensionis jure ac vero potiori authoritate propria Principem publice hostem declaratum ferro perimere and the safest way saith he if the people may meet in a publick Assembly is to deliberate by common consent what is to be done and then to keep inviolably that which is agreed on by common consent The Prince must first be admonish't and exhorted to mend But if he refuse the remedy and there be no hope of his mending the sentence being once pronounced against him it will be lawful for the Common-wealth to refuse to obey him And because a Warre must necessarily follow the counsels how to maintain it must be set down armes must be quickly provided and taxes laid upon the people to bear the expences of the Warre And if it be requisite and the Common-wealth cannot otherwise maintain it self it shall be lawful both by the right of defence and more by the Authority proper to the people to declare publikely the King to be the common enemy and then kill him with the sword Do the Jesuites look with horrour upon that Court of Justice erected to try the King Let them remember that they had Mariana's warrant for it That the Common-wealth from which the Royal Power hath its original may when the case requires Mariana Ibid. Certe à Rep. unde ortum habet regia potestas rebus exigentibus Regem in jus vocari posse si sanitatem respuat Principatu spoliari Neque ita in Principem jura potestatis transtulit ut non sibi majorem reservarit potestatem it bring the King to judgement and if he refuse to mend deprive him of his Sovereignty For the Common-wealth hath not so transferred the right of power unto the Prince but it hath reserved a greater power to it self And why doth our Adversary an earnest defender of the Jesuites exclaim so much against the abominable parricide acted upon our Sacred Sovereigne seeing that the people which made Warre against him held him to be a Tyrant and Lessius lib. 2. de Iustitia Iure cap. 9. dubio 4. scribit Verum Principem qui tyrannus est ratione administrationis non posse à privatis interimi quamdiu manet Princeps primum à Repub. vel comitiis Regni vel alio habente authoritatem esse deponendum hostem declarandum ut in ipsius personam liceat quicquam attentare it is the currant opinion of the Jesuites that a tyrant may be killed by any private man A true Prince saith Lessius who is a tyrant by reason of his administration cannot be killed by a private person as long as he remaineth a Prince but he must first be deposed and declared enemy by the Common-wealth or the Parliament of the Kingdome or some other having Authority that it may be lawful to attempt any Suarez contra Regem Mag. Brit. lib. 6. cap. 4. sect 14. Post sententiam lutam domnino privatur regno ita ut non possit justo titulo illud possidere ergo ex tunc poterit tanquam tyrannus tractari consequenter à quocunquè privato poterit intersici thing against his person And Suarez saith to the same purpose that after the Sentence given against a King he is altogether deprived of his Kingdome so that he can no more possesse it with a just title Wherefore from thenceforth he may be used like a tyrant and killed by any private person Neither ought the Jesuites to find fault with the publick thanksgiving for murthering the King and making of the thirtieth of Ianuary a Thanksgiving Day seeing that the Jesuites of Paris shewed the way for that to the Rebels in England for in the time of the French League they made Solemne Thanksgivings for the murthering of their King as Pope Sixtus the V. did since at Rome with a vehement oration in which he applieth a Prophesie of the Incarnation of the Sonne of God unto that Kings Murther So much the late Rebels of England have learned of you Fathers Jesuites and no reason have you to chide your Scholars for following your doctrine and example how far you are yet before them I will shew before I have done with you For they do not make the crown of their Kings obnoxious to be kickt down by the
Pope and have learned no further of your maximes then will serve them to kill the King and keep rhe crown for themselves And by their gross dealing with their King beheading him upon a Scaffold whereby they have spun a halter for their own necks they have shewed themselves not skilled in the mysteries of King-killing set forth by your Mariana who to put a King to death with less danger to the Actours Mariana lib. 1. cap. 7. Hoc temperamento uti in hac quidem disputatione licebit si non ipse qui perimitur venenum haurire cogitur quo intimis medullis concepto pereat sed exterius ab alio adhibeatur nihil adjuvante co qui perin endus est Nimirum cum tanta vis est veneni in sella eo autveste delibuta ut vim interficiendi habeat Qua artè à Mauris Regibus invenio saepe alios Principes mislis donis veste pretiosa linteis armis ephippiis suisse oppressos then to stab him will have him taken away by poison Yet so mercifull he is to such a King that least he should be accessary to his own death by taking the poison himself in his meat or drink he will have a strong and subtile poison put in a garment or saddle which may spread its mortiferous quality into his body And for that he propounds the example of Moore Kings who have killed their enemies with poisoned presents These Jesuitical curiosities about a murther are too fine for our Northern Fanaticks but for going so far with you as they have done you have reason to cherish them When the businesses of the late bad times are once ripe for an history and time the bringer of truth hath discovered the mysteries of iniquity and the depths of Satan which have wrought so much crime and mischief it will be found that the late rebellion was raised and fostered by the arts of the Court of Rome That Jesuites professed themselves Independent as not depending on the Church of England and Fifth-Monarchy-men that they might pull down the English Monarchy and that in the Committees for the destruction of the King and the Church they had their spies and their agents The Roman Priest and Confessour is known who when he saw the fatal stroke given to our Holy King and Martyr flourished with his sword and said Now the greatest enemy that we had in the world is gone When the newes of that horrible execution came to Roan a Protestant Gentleman of good credit was present in a great company of Jesuited persons where after great expressions of joy the gravest of the company to whom all gave ear spake much after this sort The King of England at his Marriage had promis'd Which is most false us the re-establishing of the Catholick Religion in England and when he delayed to fulfill his promise we summoned him from time to time to performe it We came so far as to tell him that if he would not do it we should be forced to take those courses which would bring him to his destruction We have given him lawful warning and when no warning would serve we have kept our word to him since he would not keep his word to us That grave Rabbies sentence agreeth with this certain intelligence which shall be justified whensoever Authority will require it That the year before the Kings death a select number of English Jesuits were sent from their whole party in England first to Paris to consult with the Faculty of Sorbon then altogether Jesuited to whom they put this question in writing That seeing the State of England was in a likely posture to change Government whether it was lawful for the Catholicks to work that change for the advancing and securing of the Catholick Cause in England by making away the King whom there was no hope to turn from his heresie Which was answered affirmatively After which the same persons went to Rome where the same question being propounded and debated it was concluded by the Pope and his Council that it was both lawful and expedient for the Catholicks to promote that alteration of State What followed that Consultation and Sentence all the World knoweth and how the Jesuites went to work God knoweth and Time the bringer forth of truth will let us know But when the horrible parricide committed in the Kings Sacred Person was so universally cried down as the greatest villany that had been committed in many ages the Pope commanded all the papers about that question to be gathered and burnt In obedience to which order a Roman Catholick in Paris was demanded a Copy which he had of those papers but the Gentleman who had had time to consider and detest the wickednesse of that project refused to give it and shewed it to a Protestant friend of his and related to him the whole carriage of this negotiation with great abhorrency of the practices of the Jesuites In pursuance of that Order from Rome for the pulling down both the Monarch and the Monarchy of England many Jesuites came over who took several shapes to go about their worke but most of them took party in the Army About thirty of them were met by a Protestant Gentleman between Roan and Diepe to whom they said taking him for one of their party that they were going into England and would take Armes in the Independant Army and endeavour to be Agitators A Protestant Lady living in Paris in the time of our late calamities was perswaded by a Jesuit going in scarlet to turn Roman Catholick When the dismal newes of the Kings Murther came to Paris this Lady as all other good English Subjects was most deeply afflicted with it And when this Scarlet Divine came to see her and found her melting in tears about that heavy and common disaster he told her with a smiling countenance that she had no reason to lament but rather to rejoyce seeing that the Catholicks were rid of their greatest enemy and that the Catholick Cause was much furthered by his death Upon which the Lady in great anger put the man down the stairs saying If that be your Religion I have done with you for ever And God hath given her the grace to make her word good hitherto Many intelligent Travellers can tell of the great joy among the English Convents and Seminaries about the Kings death as having overcome their enemy and done their main work for their settlement in England of which they made themselves so sure that the Benedictins were in great care that the Jesuites should not get their land and the English Nunnes were contending who should be Abbesses in England An understanding Gentleman visiting the English Friars of Dunkirke put them upon the discourse of the Kings death and to pump out their sense about it said that the Jesuites had laboured very much to compasse that great work To which they answered that the Jesuites would engrosse to themselves the glory of all great and good works
appointed by him to bear a lawful and holy Office Article XL. Affirmamus ergo parendum esse legibus statutis solvenda tributa reliqua onera perferenda subjectionis deniqne jugum voluntarie tolerandum etiamsi infidelis fuerint Magistratus dummodo Dei summum imperium integrum illibatum maneat Article XL. WEe maintain then that we ought to obey lawes and statutes pay tributes and bear other burdens of subjection and undergo the yoke with a good will although the Magistrates should be Infidels so that Gods Sovereigne Authority remain entire and inviolate The Belgick Confession CVncti homines cujuscumque sint vel dignitatis vel conditionis vel status legitimis Magistratibus subjiei debent illisque vectigalia ac pendere eis in omnibus obsequi ac obedire quae verbo Dei non repugnant preces etiam pro eis fundere ut eos Deus in omnibus ipsorum actionibus dirigere dignetur nos vero vitam tranquillam quietam sub ipsis cum omni pietate honestate ducere possimus ALl men of what dignity quality or state soever they be must subject themselves unto the lawful Magistrates pay unto them imposts and tributes and please and obey them in all things that are not repugnant unto the Word of God Also pray for them that God be pleased to direct them in all their actions and that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life under them in all piety and honesty The Helvetick Confessions SIcut Deus salutem populi sui operari vult per Magistratum quem mundo veluti patrem dedit ita subditi omnes hoc Dei beneficium in Magistratu agnoscere jubentur Honorent ergo revereantur Magistratum tanquam Dei Ministrum Ament eum faveant ei orent pro illo tanquam pro patre Obediant item omnibus ejus justis aequis mandatis Denique pendant vectigalia atque tributa quae alia hujus generis debita sunt fideliter atque libenter Et fi salus publica patriae justitia requirat Magistratus ex necessitate bellum suscipiat deponant etiam vitam fundant sanguinem pro salute publicâ Magistratusque quidem in Dei nomine libenter fortiter alacriter Qui enim Magistratui se opponit iram gravem Dei in se provocat AS God will work the safety of his people by the Magistrate whom he hath given to the World as a Father so all subjects are commanded to acknowledge that benefit in the Magistrate Let them honour and reverence the Magistrate as the Minister of God Let them love and assist him and pray for him as their Father Let them obey him in all his just and equitable commands And let them pay all imposts and tributes and all other dues of that kind faithfully and willingly And if the publick safety of the Countrey and Justice require it and that the Magistrate undertake a Warre by necessity let them also lay down their lives and spill their blood for the good of the publick and of the Magistrate and that in the Name of God willingly valiantly and cheerfully For he that opposeth himself to the Magistrate provoketh the heavy wrath of God upon himself The Bohemian Confession UNiversi singuli in omnibus quae Deo tantum non sunt contraria eminenti potestati subjectionem praestent primum Regiae Majestati postea omnibus Magistratibus qui cum potestate sunt in quibuscunque muneribus sint collocati sive ipsi per se boni viri sint sive mali itemque omnibus Administris Legatis horum ut eos revereantur colant quaecunque eis jure debentur ea omnia ut praestent etiam honorem eis tributum vectigal similia alia ad quae pendenda obligantur ut praestent pendant LEt all every one yield subjection in all things that are no wayes contrary to God unto the higher power first to the Kings Majestie and next to all Magistrates and those that are in Authority in what Offices soever they be placed whether the men be good or bad as also to all their Officers and Deputies And let them deferre unto them all honour and performe all things which are due unto them by right let them pay unto them also the homage imposts tribute and the like which they are obliged to pay and performe The Saxonick Confession MAgistratui Politico subditi debent obedientiam sicut Paulus docet Rom. 13. Non solum propter iram id est metu poenae corporalis qua afficiuntur contumaces ab ipsis Magistratibus sed etiam propter conscientiam id est contumacia est peccatum offendens Deum avellens conscientiam a Deo SUbjects owe obedience to the Politick Magistrate as St. Paul teacheth Rom. 13 not onely for wrath that is for fear of the corporal punishment which the Magistrates inflict upon the disobedient but also for conscience sake that is disobedience is a sinne offending God and separating the conscience from God The Suevick Confession NOstri Ecclesiastae obedientiae quae exhibetur Magistratibus inter primi ordinis bona opera locum dederunt docentes hoc unumquemque studiosius sese accommodare publicis legibus quo sincerior fuerit Christianus fideque ditior Juxta docent fungi Magistratu munus esse sacratissimum quod quidem homini contingere possit Vnde factum sit quod qui gerunt publicam potestatem Dii in Scripturis vocentur OUr Divines have placed the obedience which is done to the Magistrates among the good works of the first rank teaching that the more a Christian is sincere and rich in faith the more careful ought he to be to subject himself unto the publick Laws They likewise teach that to be a Magistrate is the most Sacred Office that a man may have Whence also it cometh that they that bear a publick Authoriry are called Gods in the Scriptures After all these the English Confession shall speak last to give the Sentence as the Apostle St. James spake the last in the Synod of the Apostles at Ierusalem because he was the Bishop Article XXXVII Of the Civil Magistrate THe Kings Majesty hath the chief power in this Realme of England and other his Dominions unto whom the chief Government of all Estates of this Realme whether they be Ecclesiastical or Civil in all Causes doth appertain And it is not nor ought to be subject to any forreigne Jurisdiction Where we attribute to the Kings Majesty the chief Government by which Titles we understand the minds of some slanderous persons are offended we give not to our Princes the Ministring either of Gods Word or of the Sacraments the which thing the Injunctions also set forth by Elizabeth Our Queen do most plainly testifie but that onely Prerogative which we see to have been given alwayes to all Godly Princes in Holy Scripture by God himself that is that they should rule all Estates and Degrees committed to their Charge by
shed in Christendome by the meanes of that plague of mankind Pope Julius the II. that it is thought that he was the death of two hundred thousand Christians in seven years time In a Synod of the Gallican Church at Tours it was Nicol. Cilles in Vita Ludov. XIII Thuan. lib. 1. declared that the Pope hath no power to make warre against a Christian Prince and if he do so that the Prince hath power to invade the Popes Territories This the King signifieth to Julius and cites him to answer to a General Council which both the Emperour and he had called to be held at Lyons The Council was held there but soon removed to Pisa where the Council cited Julius to appear and he not appearing was condemned as an Incendiary unworthy to sit at the Helme of the Church and declared deprived of the Papal Dignity There also Lewis coined golden Crownes with this Motto Perdam nomen Babylonis I will destroy the name of Babylon For it is observable that all that have quarrelled with the See of Rome these thirteen hundred years have called it Babylon and Saint Hierom ad Marcellam Hierome was he that began We cannot charge the Successor of Iulins Leo the X. to have stirred Wars abroad he loved too much his ease at home for that But I could not pass by him for indeed his memory is precious to all Protestants for giving occasion to the Reformation by his Indulgences And he is worthy to be recorded for his sentence spoken to his Secretary Cardinall Bembo Quantum nobis Crispinus nostrisque ea de Christo fabula profuerit satis est omnibus saeculis notum an anxiome of too high a nature to be Englished After him came next but one Clement the VII the Fomenter of the quarrell between the Emperour and the French joyning sometimes to the one sometimes to the other and playing false with both whereby he gave occasion to the taking and sacking of Rome The thundering of this Pope and of his Successor Iovius Paul the III. against Henry the VIII did him no harm but to themselves and to the Roman See very much Of the following Popes till Pius the V. the Protestants have much to say as of men that sought their own pleasure and wrought their ruine Hence so much blood split in horrible Massacres But these are besides my subject which is to make the Popes to appear Authors of rebellion But now in a good time we are come to Pius the V. that Pope whom the English Protestants have most reason to remember For without admonition or citation Cambdens Hist of Qu. Elizabeth premised he pronounced a sentence of anathema against that blessed and glorious Queen Elizabeth to raise rebellion in the Kingdome against her Authority and Life and caused the same to be published and set up upon the Pallace Gate of the Bishop of London the Title was this A sentence declaratory of our holy Lord Micolaus Sanderus de schismate Anglicano lib. 3. Pope Pius against Elizabeth Queen of England and the Hereticks adhering unto her Wherein her Subjects are declared absolved from the Oath of Allegiance and every thing due unto her whatsoever and those which from thenceforth obey her are innodated with the anathema In that Bull Pope Pius having first styled himself Servant of Servants declareth that God hath made the Bishop of Rome Prince over all people and all Kingdoms to pluck up destroy scatter consume plant and build Then he calleth Elizabeth the pretended Queen of England the servant of wickedness And having declared her crimes which are to have taken upon her self that supremacy which his Holiness pretended to and to have establish'd the true Catholick Orthodox Religion in her Kingdomes he doth thunder out this seditious Decree against her and all her loyall Subjects We do out of the fulness of our Apostolick power declare the aforesaid Elizabeth being an Heretick and a favourer of Hereticks and her adherents in the matters aforesaid to have incurred the sentence of anathema and to be cut off from the unity of the body of Christ And moreover we do declare her to be deprived of her pretended Title to the Kingdom aforesaid and of all Dominion Dignity and Priviledge whatsoever And also the Nobility Subjects and People of the said Kingdome and all other which have in any sort sworn unto her to be for ever absolved from any such Oath and all manner of duty of Dominion Allegiance and Obedience as we also do by authority of these presents absolve them and do deprive the same Elizabeth of her pretended Title to the Kingdome and all other things abovesaid And we do command and interdict all and every the Noblemen Subjects People and others aforesaid that they presume not to obey her or her Monitions Mandates and Laws And those which shall do to the contrary we do innodate with the like sentence of anathema This Bull was the fire and the roaring of the Canon and the bullet came forth immediately which was the rebellion in the North for which Chapino Vitelli was sent into England from the Duke of Alva under pretence of compounding some controversies about commerce And Nicholas Morton was sent from the Pope to knit the rebellion Which he did denouncing from his Master that Queen Elizabeth was an Heretick and thereby had forfeited to the Pope all her dominion and power At the same time a rebellion broke out in Ireland kindled or blown by a Spaniard Iuan Mendoza And when the Rebells of England were defeated they found refuge among the Papist Rebells of Scotland who set up again the English rebellion All these in vain by the gracious assistance of God to poor England as if his compassion had been stirred up by his jealousie after that the Pope had declared himself so insolently Prince over all People and all Kingdoms to pluck up destroy scatter consume plant and build And God would shew that to himself not to the Pope belongeth the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory for ever Neither did Pius the V. fight onely by Bulls but at the same time that the Bull was published he laid down a hundred thousand Crowns to raise the rebellion and promised fifty thousand more yea and to bear the whole charge of the War That money was distributed by one Ridolpho And how active that Pope was to stirre Spain France and Netherlands against the Queen and to put her Kingdome in combustion is related by Hieronymo Catena an Authour of great credit at Rome in his life of Pius the V. Gregory the XIII succeeded Pius the V. in all his plots against England He gave to Thomas Stukely an English Rebell a Commission to help the Rebells of Ireland and get that Kingdome for the Bastard-Son of his Holiness Iames Boncompagnon and gave him the command of eight hundred Italians to joyn with King Sebastian of Portugal who had engaged his word to the Pope to serve him
Article of the Catholick Roman faith that Princes excommunicated by the Pope are ipso facto deposed and their subjects absolved from all obedience and fidelity to them It is directly though not believed but by few You have that fundamental Law authentically pronounced by Gregory the VII and it is made a Canon of the Roman Church By Apostolical Causa 15. Qu. 5. cap. Nos Sanctorum Eos qui excommunicatis fidelitate aut Sacramento constricti sunt Apostolica authoritate a juramento absolvivimus ne sibi fidem observent omnibus modis prohibemus authority we absolve from their oath all them that are bound by fidelity or oath to excommunicate persons and by means we forbid them to keep faith unto such persons I would ask the Roman Catholicks Seriously do you believe this And are you ready to seal that faith with your obedience or sufferings upon occasions If you believe and will maintain it you are not good subjects but dangerous persons in the State If you deny faith and obedience to that Papal Decree you are not good Roman Catholicks for if you were you would acknowledge the Pope the Head of the Faith with Bellarmine and that the Pope cannot erre in his Canons and that it is in the Popes power to make Articles of faith according to the determination of the Council of Trent Now the Pope hath made this an Article of your faith the denying of it an heresie and the resisting of it a crime punish'd in the persons of Kings by the deprivation of Kingdom and life Open your eyes Christian souls that are so much blinded as to pin your faith upon the Popes Decrees And reading in your own Authors the histories of the Popes behaviour which I have here represented acknowledg that those Decrees for many hundred years have been the powerful stirrers of rebellion in Christendome and the ambition of Popes the first Intelligence that sets the great Orb of sedition on going After that the Popes have thus commanded and wrought rebellion by express Decrees and filled the Christian world with fire and blood these five or six hundred years have the Jesuites the face when we object this against the Head of their Faith to object unto us in exchange some passages out of books either false or disowned by us if true And the defensive Arms of a few persons living under the Cross and driven by themselves upon the brink of despair The evil which men of our Religion have said or done we condemn freely and openly Let the Romanists condemn also so many Decrees of the Popes which have been the Incentives of war and brands of rebellion But that they cannot as long as they remain Papists sworn to approve all that the Pope saith or doth The difference between the faults of the Pope and those of Protestants about the point of obedience is this That disobedience with us is a crime but with him it is a Law We punish rebels but the Pope rewards them We say to rebels after St Paul That they that So did Sixtus the V. of which before resist the higher powers shall receive to themselves damnation But the Pope promiseth eternal life to make subjects rebel against their King We abhor the murtherers of Kings but the Pope sets them on by his excommunications and after the murther committed makes panegyricks on their praise Can the Romanists produce among us a Priest that hath made himself a Temporal Prince by robbing his Master of his land who hath kickt down the Emperors crown trodden upon his neck with his foot deposed him from his Kingdom made his son rise in Arms against him absolved his subjects from their obedience and given his Dominions to another One that makes himself the absolute disposer of Kingdoms and Master of the Universe Such a Priest is no where to be found but at Rome After this true account of so many Emperours and Kings deposed and killed and so much rebellion slaughter and desolation wrought in Christendom by the Papal excommunications and factions let the conscionable Reader who is not altogether ignorant in modern History judge what truth there is in our Adversaries assertion That in this last Century of years there have been pag. 93. more Princes deposed and murthered for their Religion by those Protestants of Integrity then have been in all the others since Christ's time by the Popes excommunications or the attempts and means of Roman Catholicks He should have set down a list of those Princes deposed and murthered by Protestants and for their Religion For my part I have heard of none Indeed Charles the I. our holy King and Martyr suffered for his Religion and the Adversary may take that one for many because he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worth alone many Princes But they that murthered him were not Protestants they disavow that name And it was for the Protestant Religion that he suffered But since he speaks of the means and attempts made by Roman Catholicks against Princes he shall hear a little more of them CHAP. V. The Adversaries Defence of the Jesuites examined Their Doctrine and Attempts against the Crown and life of Kings THe Adversary who is commended in the Epistle to the Reader as a most observant Son of the Church of England takes upon him the defence of the Jesuite Mariana so infamous for his doctrine of killing of Kings and saith three things about that The one is That he handleth that matter only problematically page 94. But the Court of Parliament of Paris composed of grave heads did not understand it so when they condemned his book to the fire Neither doth he speak of the murther of Henry the III. of France problematically when he exalteth the murtherer in these words Making a shew of delivering Mariana lib. 1. de Rege Regis Iustitutione cap. 6. Specie litteras in manus tradendi cultro quem herbis noxiis medicatum manu tegebat supra vesicam altum vulnus inflixit Insignem animi confidentiam Facinus memorabile Caeso Rege ingens sibi nomen fecit letters to the King he gave him a deep wound above the bladder with a poysoned knife which he hid in his hand O admirable confidence of minde O memorable action by killing the King he got to himself a great name And in the same place he taxeth the Kings servants who presently killed that murtherer of cruelty and barbarousness The second answer for Mariana is That the question was not for killing of Kings but for killing of Tyrants page 94. This man shews himself a right scholar of the Jesuites for this is their distinction But if a King deposed by the Pope keeps his Kingdome in spight of him they account him no more a King but a Tyrant And whereas there are two sorts of Tyrants some by usurpation which they call Tyrannos in Titulo Tyrants in the Title some Tyrants by administration the Jesuites hold That a lawful King