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A56144 Canterburies doome, or, The first part of a compleat history of the commitment, charge, tryall, condemnation, execution of William Laud, late Arch-bishop of Canterbury containing the severall orders, articles, proceedings in Parliament against him, from his first accusation therein, till his tryall : together with the various evidences and proofs produced against him at the Lords Bar ... : wherein this Arch-prelates manifold trayterous artifices to usher in popery by degrees, are cleerly detected, and the ecclesiasticall history of our church-affaires, during his pontificall domination, faithfully presented to the publike view of the world / by William Prynne, of Lincolns Inne, Esquire ... Prynne, William, 1600-1669. 1646 (1646) Wing P3917; ESTC R19620 792,548 593

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of that Court caused Execution upon the satd Judgment to be stayed and being moved therein and made acquainted with the bad life and conversation of the said Person he said that he had spoken to the Judges for him and that he would never suffer a Iudgment to passe against any Clergy-man by nihil dicit 5. That the said Archbishop about eight yeares last past being then also a privy Councellor to his Majesty for the end and purpose aforesaid caused Sir Iohn Corbet of Stoak in the County of Salop Baronet then a Iustice of peace of the said County to be committed to the Prison of the Fleet where he continued Prisoner for the space of halfe a yeare or more for no other cause but for calling for the Petition of Right causing it to be read at the Sessions of the peace for that County upon a just and necessary occasion And during the time of his said imprisonment the said Archbishop without any colour of right by a writing under the Seale of his Archbishopricke granted a way parcell of the Glebe land of the Church of Adderly in the said County whereof the said Sir Iohn Corbet was then patron unto Robert Vscount Kilmurrey without the consent of the said Sir Iohn or then the incumbent of the said Church which said Viscount Kilmurrey built a Chappel upon the said parcell of Glebe land to the great prejudice of the said Sir Iohn Corbet which hath caused great suits and dissentions betweene them And whereas the said Sir Iohn Corbet had a judgment against Sir Iames Stonehouse Knight in an action of Waste in his Majesties Court of Common Pleas at Westminster which was afterwards affirmed in a writ of Error in the Kings Bench and Execution thereupon awarded yet the said Sir Iohn by meanes of the said Archbishop could not have the effect thereof but was committed to Prison by the said Archbishop and others at the Councell Table untill he had submitted himselfe unto the order of the said Table whereby he lost the benefit of the said Judgment and Execution 6. That whereas divers gifts and dispositions of divers summes of money were heretofore made by divers charitable and well disposed persons for the buying in of divers Impropriations for the maintenance of preaching the word of God in severall Churches the said Archbishop about eight yeares last past wilfully and maliciously caused the said gifts feoffements and conveyances made to the uses aforefaid to be overthrowne in his Majesties Court of Exchequer contrary to Law as things dangerous to the Church and State under the specious pretence of buying in Appropriations whereby that pious worke was suppressed and trodden downe to the great dishonour of God and scandall of Religion 7. That the said Archbishop at severall times within these ten yeares last past at Westminster and else where within this Realme contrary to the knowne Lawes of this Land hath endeavoured to advance Popery and Superstition within the Realme And for that end and purpose hath wittingly and willingly received harboured and relieved divers popish Priests and Iesuits namely one called Sancta Clara alias Damport a dangerous Person and Franciscan Fryer who having written a Popish and seditious Booke intituled Deus natura gratia wherein the thirty nine Articles of the Church of England established by Act of Parliament were much traduced and scandalized The said Archbishop had divers conferences with him while he was in writing the said Booke and did also provide maintenance and entertainment for one Mounsieur St. Giles a Popish Priest at Oxford knowing him to be a Popish Priest 8. That the said Archbishop about foure yeares last past ut Westminster aforesaid said that there must be a blow given to the Church such as hath not beene yet given before it could be brought to conformity declaring thereby his intention to bee to shake and alter the true Protestant Religion established in the Church of England 9. That in or about the month of May 1641. presently after the dissolution of the last Parliament the said Archbishop for the ends and purposes aforesaid caused a Synod or Convocation of the Clergie to be held for the severall Provinces of Canterbury and Yorke wherein were made and established by his meanes and procurement diverse Canons and Constitutions Ecclesiasticall contrary to the Lawes of this Realme the Rights and Priviledges of Parliament the Liberty and propriety of the Subject tending also to seditior and of dangerous consequence And amongst other things the said Archbishop caused a most dangerous and illegall Oath to be therein made and contrived the tenor whereof followeth in these words That I A. B. doe sweare that I do approve the Doctrine and Discipline or Government established in the Church of England as containing all things necessary to salvation And that I will not endeavour by my selfe or any other directly or indirectly to bring in any Popish Doctrine contrary to that which is so established Nor will I ever give my consent to alter the Government of this Church by Archbishops Bishops Deanes and Arch-Deacons c. as it stands now established and as by right it ought to stand Nor yet ever to subject it to the usurpations and superstitions of the Sea of Rome And all these things I doe plainly and sincerely acknowledge and sweare according to the plaine and common sense and understanding of the same words without any equivocation or mentall evasion or secret reservation whatsoever And this I do heartily willing and truely upon the saith of a Christian So helpe mee God in Jesus Christ Which Oath the said Archbishop himselfe did take and caused diverse other Ministers of the Church to take the same upon paine of suspension and deprivation of their livings and other severe penalties And did also cause Godfrey then Bishop of Gloucester to be committed to prison for refusing to subscribe to the said Canons and to take the said Oath and afterward the said Bishop submitting himselfe to take the said Oath he was set at liberty 10. That a little before the calling of the last Parliament Anro 1640. a Vote being then passed and a resolution taken at the Councell Table by the advice of the said Archbishop for assisting of the King in extraordinary wayes if the said Parliament should prove peevish and refuse to supply His Majestie the said Archbishop wickedly and malitiously advised His Majestie to dissolve the said Parliament and accordingly the same was dissolved And presently after the said Archbishop told his Majesty that now he was absolved from all rules of Government and left free to use extraordinary wayes for his supply For all which matters and things the said Commons assembled in Parliament in the name of themselves and of all the Commons of England doe impeach the said Archbishop of Canterbury of high Treason and other crimes and misdemeanours tending to the subversion of our Religion Lawes and Liberties and to the utter ruine of this Church and Common-Wealth And
after the Triall and above 2 Moneths after the Execution this work was delegated by the Commons unto me at which time most of the Papers Notes Books Evidences used at his tryall were laid aside and dispersed into severall mens hands whereby much time was spent before I could recollect and marshall them into Order to digest this History out of them Secondly since the assignment of this task unto my care I have been almost every day taken up with publike imployments for the State at the Committee of Accounts and elsewhere besides the dayly avocations of my particular calling my onely support since our unhappy Wars so as I have had few vacant hours to compile it but those I have borrowed from my naturall rest whiles others have bin sleeping Thirdly I have since this undertaking been necessitated to write publish sundry other Impressions uncapable of delay in defence of the Ecclesiasticall Iurisdiction of Parliaments Civill Magistrates and concerning Ecclesiasticall Censures and Church-Government against Independents Anabaptists others yea to Vindicate the Parliaments just Proceedings with mine own Innocency against the seditious Anti-parliamentary Libels of that notorious impudent Libeller and Lyat L. Col. Lilburn who still persevers in his trespasses to the dishonour and scandall of publike justice All which considered I suppose Your Honours and others will easily beleeve I wanted no diligence but leisure onely for the speedier accomplishment of this work wherein notwithstanding I have not been negligent witnesse my publication of the Breviate of the Archbishops life and of A necessary Introduction of his Tryall amounting to a large Volume sufficient to assoyle me from the least imputation of idlenesse or negligence in this very subject Fourthly Adde hereunto the voluminousnesse of this First Part of the Archbishops Tryal onely with the variety of the matter charges therein conteined the trouble I had in digesting the Labour in compiling writing reveiwing fitting it for and Correcting Revising it at the Presse with the coldnesse of this last winters Vacation when neither pen nor Presse could worke for sundry weekes together and compare this with the former reasons and the Printers slacknesse which hath delayed it very much and then I doubt not but your Honours and all others will rather wonder how I could possibly compleat this Voluminous Part so speedily then question or quarrell with me why it comes forth so slowly it being work enough to have swallowed up all my time since the Order had I had no other imployments to divert me To the second demand I must returne this Answer First that I published this History thus in parcells for want of time to compleat and print it all together in due season Secondly that the long expectation of this Tryall and mens calling for it every day induced me to satisfie their longing appetites with these First-fruits of it concerning Religion the thing most looked most inquired after both at home and abroad till the full crop be ripened for the harvest which will require some warmer moneths to concoct it ere it can attain to maturity Thirdly The great Charge of the Stationer in Printing this first Part the voluminousnesse and price whereof hath I fear out-swelled most Chapments purses in these Indegent times with the serious consideration of the incertainty of my life and future opportunity in these dayes of War and mortality to finish the remainder of this Worke which God willing I intend to compleat and publish with all convenient speed have induced me rather to gratifie your Honours and the World with these First fruits for the present then to hazard the depriving you of it or the whole History if deferred till all were compleated Having answered these demands I shall now crave liberty and your Noble Patience to raise some profitable Observations from the Subject matter of this History not unworthy your Honours saddest thoughts If you consider the meane obscure Parentage of this Arch-Prelate his grand Preferments the great mischiefes he did in Church State and his Execution after all it may suggest these profitable contemplations to your minds First That God by his power and all-disposing providence can raise up Persons of the lowest place or Parentage to the highest Pinacles of worldly Honour according to that in the 1 Sam. 2. 8. and Psal 118. 7 8. He raiseth up the Poor out of the dust and lifteth up the Beggar from the dunghill to set them among the Princes and make them inherite the Throne of glory 2. That God can make the most vile and despicable persons in the world grand Pests or Punishments to whole Kingdomes Nations when he pleaseth Dan. 11. 21 22. 1 Kings 11. 26. c. 12. 2. c. c. 13. 14. even as he made Frogs Lice Caterpillers the vilest creatures a very sore plague to King Pharaoh and the whole Kingdome of Egypt Exod. c. 7. 8. and 9. 3. That persons sodainly advanced from the lowest degree of men to the highest pitch of honour proove commonly the most insolent violent domineering imperious tyrannicall and mischievous of all such preferments being unable to weld or mannage the greatnesse of their fortune See Mat. 24. 48. to the end 2 Chro. 10. 8. to 16. Eccles 10. 1. 6 7. Psal 73. 6. to 13. Iob. 21. 7. to 20. Fourthly That grand preferments without great grace to mannage improve them to Gods glory and the common good are greater judgements than blessings and for the most part the immediate occasions of mens greatest ruin by their evill Councells or ill managing of their greatnesse to the publike prejudice Ps 73. 3. to 21. Iob 21. 7. c. Psal 37. 1. 2. Ester c. 3. to 8. Fifthly That mischievous Councellours and wicked Instruments in Church State though never so great in power or Favour with their Princes for a season seldome escape condigne exemplary punishment at the last and that no greatnesse whatsoever is able finally to protect mischevous Grandees from the hand of publike justice Ester 7. 1 Kings 2. 28. to 35. Let all great ones then seriously consider this and remember Canterbury lest they dye and fall like him If we again observe his Preferments Actions Proceedings and miserable end as a Clergy man we may raise these profitable observations from this History of his Tryall which all Prelates Clergy men may do well to consider is oft as they thinke of Canterbury First that when Clergy men cast aside or neglect their callings and turne meer Statesmen they commonly prove the very worst and most oppressive Persons of all others Matth. 5. 13. 2. Thess 2. 3. Secondly That one over potent Prelate backed with a Kings Royall power and favour is able to unsetleReligion where it is best established and embroyle ruine the most flourishing Churches Kingdomes in few yeares space 2 Thess 2. 4. 9 10 11 12. Revel 13. 2. to 18. Thirdly That there are no such desperate underminers persecutors suppressors of Gods true Religion Saints people as over potent wicked
have upon Matth. 3. 11. answered to the place objected and also to the scope and drift of the objection by distinguishing between the internall and invisible externall and visible church I now adde a word or two thereunto by a threefold distinction viz. first we distinguish between the catholike church and a particular church In the catholike church are onely good men but in a particular nationall church are both good and bad Secondly we di●●inguish between the systeme or whole body of the externall and visible church and some few particular members thereof because that doth not alwayes agree to the whole church which is usually ascribed to some particular externall members thereof i. e. the professors of the common faith of the church Thirdly we distinguish between the judgement of charity and faith for charity which is not suspetious but beleeves all things and hopes all things 1 cor 13. 45. doth often judge many hypocrties and externall professors to be the true members of Christ and the sheep of his ●●ock but faith informed by the Word of God knowe most certainly that no hypocrite or unbeleever or wicked person so long as they con-continue and remaine such doth belong unto the Essence or mysticall body of Christ And in the written copy fol. 317. on Matth. 22. 1. this clause was deleated by the Licencer Bellarmine lib. 3. de Eccles cap. 7. objects this place to prove that wicked men belong unto the Catholike church because the church here is compared to a marriage feast wherein not all the guests are elected or invested with the marriage robe of Christs righteousnesse but some of them clothed in their rotten ragges and polluted garments This and the like similitudes which are urged by Bellarmine in the place above quoted doe not shew the nature and essence●● essentiall properties of the catholike church which the adversary presupposeth but onely some certaine externall accidents thereof and therefore they are referred to the externall company of all those who by the preaching of the Gospell are in some sort called unto Christ and in some manner professe the faith of Christ now nothing hinders but that in such a company there may be reprobates who belong not at all unto the essence of the true and internall church of Christ and this and the other Parables which Bellarmine produceth makes nothing against us for he should have poored that there are as well reprobates as elect vessels in the catholike church and for the proofe thereof alleageth those places which speak not of the catholike and invisible church but of a particular and visible church wherein we confesse there are both good and bad yea for the most part more bad then good but these bad ones belong not unto the catholike church Alsteed de natura Eccles cap. 6. fol. 130. 21. Passages deleted against building Churches East and West and the superstitious adorning of them with Images and such like popish Furniture MAster Ward on Mat. page 342. It is controverted between us and the Papists concerning the formes of churches and Bellarmine affirmes that they should be built east and west that so when we pray therein our faces might be turned towards the east and for the proofe hereof he produceth this place Ab oriente venturus creditur ad judicium Ergo It is beleeved that Christ will come unto judgement from the east therefore we ought to pray towards the east First creditur it is beleeved saith he namely by those who can beleeve what they list though never so absurd Secondly suppose the antecedent were true yet the consequence halts for although Christ should come from the east to judgement yet it would not follow thence that therefore we should pray towards the east we must pray unto Christ who is every where in regard of his Deitie and according to the Papists in regard of his humanity also and therefore which way soever we pray we look towards him yea I imagine that Bellarmine would blush to affirme and be backward to undertake to prove that Christ's seat and throne of glory in Heaven is seated in the east end thereof and that the humanity never stirres or moves out of that seat and part of Heaven both which he must prove before his argument be of any worth or weight Thirdly the comparison in these words betwixt the comming of Christ and the lightning doth not respect the place but the cleare and sodaine apparition of both c. All this is expunged In Doctor Featlye's Sermons this passage is deleted page 225. What meane our adversaries then to spend so much in embellishing their churches and so little in beautifying their soules to lay out so much cost upon the materiall and so little upon the spirituall Temple of God Their rood-lofts they paint their pillars they engrave their timber they carve their Images they clothe their pictures they cover their stone Altars they guild their crosses they set about with jewels and precious stones they have golden Miters golden Vessels golden shrines golden bels golden snuffers all golden save the ordinary Priests who if Boniface of Mentz his observation be true for the most part are wooden or leaden Dicite Pontifices in sacro quid facit Aurum Saint Ambrose taxing too much superfluity in this kind saith expresly That those things please not God in or with gold which can be bought with no gold if we speak of the true adorning of the Church it is not with the beauty of pictures but with holinesse not with the lustre of pearles and precious stones but the shining of good works not with candles and tapers but with the light of the Word not with sweet perfumes but with the savour of life unto life neither will all the glorious furniture of Solomons Temple make any shew for their excesse in this kind of their outward deckings for that furniture was typicall then the service of God was restrained to that Temple and God himselfe gave them the modell thereof Is it not preposterous for Christians to goe about to enrich the Gospell with the beggarly rudiments of the law what folly is it after they put out the light of the Word or hide it as it were under a bushell in an unknowne tongue to stick up wax lights at the noon day to cloth pictures and to suffer the living members of Christ to goe naked to adorne the Images of Saints and to deface Gods Image in themselves to perfume their Churches and breath out a noy some savour of impure brothels in their lives c. 22. Passages expunged against evangelicall Councels tending unto Perfection Merit Superogation and against popish Vowes IN Master Wards Comentary upon Matthew written copy page 105. this discourse is purged out as heterodox He shall be called least in the Kingdome of Heaven The Papists generally urge this place for the establishing of their Evangelicall councels unto perfection But there are no such councels as these which
to infuse feares and jealousies of the increase of Popery into the peoples mindes and casting aspersions upon the Governours of the Church For Master Bernards prosecution it was upon the Complaint of Doctor Cumber Vice-Chancellour of Cambridge Fiftly for other Ministers that were questioned or fled from hence to New-England they were Non-conformists questioned upon just complaints and most of them fled hence out of a consciousnesse of guilt or of a panick feare before they were questioned or pursued To this was replyed first that we must not follow a multitude to doe evill and injustice done by a whole Court is a greater crime in every particular person who votes or concurres in it then if he had done an act of Injustice alone because more dangerous more inexcusable a greater perverting of Justice framing of mischiefe by a Law and making the very throne of Justice a throne of wickednesse Yea since the injustice of the whole Court flowes from the injustice of each particular Members vote and is the Act of each particular man who concurres in or consents to it he may no doubt be justly censured for it and others concurrence with him will be no excuse If twenty men joyne in a Treason Felony or Trespasse any one of them may by Law be severally arraigned and condemned for it as well as all of them together We have a notable President to prove this in the Judges censured and condemned in Parliament in King Richard the seconds time for delivering their opinions contrary to Law against the Members of Parliament and in the Judges questioned impeached this present Parliament for their false Judgement given in the case of Ship-money who might have pleaded as well as the Archbishop each for himselfe the judgement we gave in these cases was the Act and Judgement of the whole Bench therefore we ought not to be severally impeached for it but none of them were so inconsiderate as to make such a childish plea which himselfe refused to admit in the High-Commission in the case of the men of Gloucester censured for granting an Annuity to Master Workman their Minister under the City Seale an Act of the whole Corporation yet they were there Sentenced for it in their naturall capacities as single men And if this Plea should be admitted no corrupt Judges in any Court of Justice should be severally proceeded against for any illegall Judgement or proceedings of the Court which would be the very bane of publicke Justice and encourage ill Judges to doe what they list Secondly the objected Act of Parliament leaves the Judgments of both Courts as it found them neither better nor worse and the Judges that gave them in the same condition as before not in a better If the Judgment be unjust it leaves both them and the Judges as far forth liable to examination repeal censure as formerly as appeares by divers of them now questioned in Parliament for unjust Sentences therein given Thirdly the Proceedings Sentences against these persons were certainly most unjust being onely for Preaching necessary Truths and that which is but a Misdemeanour in others simply considerated as a single offence may prove high-treason in him being conjoynedwith and done in pursuit of his other Treasonable practises to subvert Religion Lawes Liberties introduce popery an arbitrary tyrannicall government which we have fully manifested Fourthly the passages for which they were censured were neither scismatical nor seditious nor scandalous but necessary for those secure times to mind the people of the dangerous covert encrease of popery Arminianisme and undermining of our Religion which all now visibly discerne but few then observed and to ruine godly Ministers for discharging their consciences duties in warning men of those dangers and speaking for the safety of that endangered Religion which we all professe was a most unjust and monstrous misdemeanour especially in an Arch-prelat who should have encouraged rewarded advanced them for this their faithfulnesse as for the aspersions pretended to be cast upon the Governours of the Church therein they were in truth meer generall censures without particularizing of such who justly deserved them And it is no calumny but a necessary duty for Ministers to tell negligent or unfaithfull Prelates of their duties and reprehend them for their supinesse when they are faulty as well as other men For Master Bernard and the rest they were prosecuted onely by this Archbishops own instigation for all the passages and proceedings against them were found in his study endorsed with his own hand he was the person to whom they made their humble addresses though without relief and the only inexorable enemy they met with their unjust censures therfore must rest principally on him who though he voted last in their condemnation yet appeared first in their prosecution and pre-directed their censures in private before they were given in open Court Fiftly all the forementioned godly Ministers were unjusty molested by him and few fled from hence but such who were actually prosecuted or threatned with ruine ere they left the Kingdom most of them being then conformable to all Rites and Ceremonies by Law established in our Church though not to his popish Innovations Ceremonies and Book of Sports against our Lawes and their consciences too This charge therefore still rests entirely upon him notwithstanding his evasions The fifteenth charge objected against me is my endeavours practises proceedings to suppresse preaching Lecturers Lectures on Lords-dayes and week-days and that first by a paper of Considerations which I tendred to the King Secondly by Instructions extracted out of them and sent as the Kings in his name and authority to both the Archishops and all Bishops of the Realm to be put in strict execution by colour whereof many Lectures Lecturers were suppressed in my owne Diocesse of London and in other Diocesses especially by Bishop Mountague Bishop Wren and Bishop Peice as appeares by their Articles and proceedings Thirdly orders for Combination Lectures Fourthly the Kings Letters that none should be ordained without a Title Fiftly the silencing of Master Leigh and others by my own direction and Letters signed by me Sixtly by suppressing the Feoffees for Impropriations alledged to be my act and project To this I answer first that these Considerations were originally drawne by Bishop Harsnet not me who onely transcribed them out of his Copy Secondly that these Instructions of the King were before I was made Archbishop and were sent unto me by my Predecessour in the Kings name to be put in execution in my Diocesse whereupon I was bound in duty to see them executed being good and necessary the intent of them being principally to bring all Lecturers to conformity to suppresse single Lecturers where there were Preaching Ministers to preserve peace between the Minister and people betwixt whom Lecturers in many places made great contentions alienating the peoples affections from their Ministers person Ministry and raising divers Schismes to the disturbance of the Churches