Selected quad for the lemma: justice_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
justice_n	commission_n	peace_n	session_n	2,574	5	10.6777	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A67871	A just vindication of the questioned part of the reading of Edward Bagshaw, Esq; an apprentice of the common law. Had in the Middle Temple Hall the 24th day of February, being Munday, anno Dom. 1639. upon the statute of 25 E.3. called, Statutum pro clero, from all scandalous aspersions whatsoever. With a true narrative of the cause of silencing the reader by the then Archbishop of Canterbury: with the arguments at large of those points in his reading, for which he was questioned at the Council-Board.	Bagshaw, Edward, d. 1662.	1660 (1660)	Wing B396; ESTC R208288	31,311	44

6 R. 2 Rot. Parl. nu 5 that they had not to do with matters of the Peace The first Clergy-men that I find to be Justices of Peace by any Statutē are the Bishops of Ely and Durham for the I le of Ely and Durham and the Archbishop of Yorke for the Liberty of Hexam 27 H. 8 cap. 25. But then there is a provision by that Statute to make their Temporal Chancellers to be Justices for the excusing them as I conceive from their personal attendance at the Sessions Object But it will be objected They are made Justices of Peace by the Kings Commission and may be punished if they should refuse Answ. It is rara avis to heare of a Minister punished for refusing to be a Justice of Peace For by Law he may refuse By his Orders he may refuse as I conceive and by virtue of his Consecration For in the book of Ordination of Priests and Deacons confirmed by the Parliaments of 1 Ed. 6 and 1 Eliz. he is there charged by the Bishop To give himself wholly to his Spiritual Vocation and wholly to apply himself to that one thing and to draw all his cares and Studies that way and to that end And this not all but the Bishop doth require a promise of the Ordained Priest to that purpose for the Bishop asketh him If he will be diligent in Prayers and Reading Holy Scriptures c. laying aside the study of the World and the Flesh And the minister answers That he will endeavour himself so to do All which said together will amount to a good excuse of a Clergy-man from secular imployment As in truth it did of late to the Lord Keeper Coventry in the Case of one Mr. Samuel Johnson Clerk Son and heir of that Johnson that was the extraordinary kind Husband from whence was the Proverb of Drinking to Mr. Johnson This man was lately made High Sheriff of Rutland shire and pleading his Orders of a Clergy-man to the Lord Keeper he was forthwith discharged and another Sheriff chose in his place There is a Writ in the Register and in Fitz. Nat. brev. 175 b. named Breve quod Clerici non eligantur in officio Ballivi pro terris suis which lyeth in a stronger Case then this is As if a man holdeth divers Lands of a Lord of a Manor to be a Bailiff Bedel or Receiver if this man be once made a Clerk and afterward chosen unto such an office the Lord may Distrain in case the child should refuse yet this Writ will compel the Lord to let him alone and to dismiss him And the reason is given in the Writ it self Because the Law supposeth him to be so continually imployed in works of Piety and Hospitality that he is not at leisure to attend no secular affairs The same reason may be given for a Clerk made a Justice of Peace Object But it will be objected That my Statute is for the Clergy but I seem in this opinion to be against it Answ. I answer That in this I am for the honour and honesty of the Clergy For in those Provincial Constitutions which I mentioned before the Clergy are there enjoyned to abstain ab omnibus eis quae honestatem corum deformant And Linwood a principal Author of the Canon Law gives this instance of that deformity Deformatur haec honestas cum Clericus se immiscet in negotiis secularibus Linw. lib. 3. De vita Honestate Cler. fol. 87. So that by their Law it is a dishonest thing for Clergy-men to meddle in secular affairs The Readers Argument upon the Third Point being the Fourth Point of his Third Case upon the Third Division of his Statute WHether an Heretick may at this day be Convicted and Condemned for Heresie by his own Ordinary alone And I think he cannot It is a great Question and mainly concerns the life and liberty of the Subject and deserves a much larger debate then I can now afford it I being opposed herein by a learned Civilian sometimes Dean of the Arches in the first part of his Apology for Ecclesiastical proceedings fol. 81. who denies Fitz Herberts opinion Nat. brev. 269 D. to be Law who saith That a man cannot be convicted for Heresie but by the Archbishop and the whole Clergy of the Province in their general Council of Convocation But this Civilian with divers more of his mind doth hold That an Heretick both before the statute of 2 H. 4 c. 15 and now at this day may be both convicted and condemned to be burnt by his own proper Ordinary For the clearing this three Questions do naturally arise 1. What shall be said such an Heresie for which a man shall be condemned to the fire 2. Who shall be the Judge that shall Convict for Heresie 3. By what Law is it Common or Canon that an Heretick after conviction shall be burnt Quest 1. For the first it appears by the Canon Law Linw. cap. de Hereticis fol. 213. that there are no less then 88. sorts of Heresies which is the cause that the Canonists cannot agree about the definition of an Heretick I will name but two of their best definitions 1. The first is in the fourth book of the Institutes of the Canon Law cap. de Hereticis fol. 248. Hereticus est qui vanae gloriae principatus sui causa falsas opiniones gignit vel sequitur If this were Law how many Scholers would at this day be burnt for Hereticks 2. I come therefore to a second Definition given at home in our Provincial Constitutions cap. de Hereticis fol. 211. where Linwood having toil'd himself with about twenty Descriptions of an Heretick falls upon this as the best Omnin saith he censetur Hereticus qui non tenet id quod docet sequitur sancta Rom. Ecclesia Hence it was that by their Law a man was questioned for an Heretick for very small things viz. For eating flesh in Lent for standing out an Excommunication though it was perhaps for some extorted Fees of the Court Nay you shall find 1 H. 7. fol. 17. That a man was questioned for Heresie upon the Statute of 2 H. 4. c. 15. because he held an opinion That one might pay his Tythes where he pleased and not to his own Vicar when as by the Counsel of Lateran Tythes were only to be paid to Parsons and Vicars of the proper Parish and so he as an Heretick offended contra sanctiones Ecclesiae And I dare be bold to say That in that bloudy Roll of Martyrs which began from the first year of H. 4. to the làst year of Q. Mary there was not a man burnt for holding any thing contra Canonem Scripturae not an old Arrian which is the Socinian at this day nor an old Pelagian which is now the Arminian But for holding Opinions contra sanctiones Canonicas as saith the Writ De Haeretico comburendo founded upon that Statute of 2 H. 4. which was the

day For Misera est servitus ubi jus est vagum aut incognitum 4. What Fees were due to Pursevants Clerks Registers or other Officers imployed in such Ecclesiastical Commissions 5. Because those Ecclesiastical Commissions were by the King granted sometimes to meer Laymen as 31 H. 1 cap. 14 to Thomas Cromwel Earl of Essex c. Sometimes to Laymen and Clergy men as at this day Whether Common Lawyers did not then and might not now plead at those Ecclesiastical Commissions as they do now before the Judges Delegates But these are not so pertinent to my present point and therefore I will only speak of the first four Quest 1. Whether the High Commission can inflict this grievous punishment put in my Case or any part of it but for high and enormous offences and not for all offences And I think and do hold That the High Commission cannot punish but for high and enormous offences upon these words of the Statute of 1 Eliz. c. 1 Errors Heresies Schismes Abuses Contempts and Enormities and that for these Reasons Reas. 1. From the signification of the words High Commission and Enormous offences or Enormities It is called High Commission not that one Commission of the Kings is higher then an another for the King is the same in all his Commissions Neither is it called High Commission by reason of the greatness of the persons to whom it is directed for in the Commissions of Oyer and Terminer of the Peace and of the Sewers the persons are equally as high and as great But it is called High Commission as the late Bishop of London Dr. King Expounded it in Mr. Fermers Case Parson of Charwelton in our County because they had jurisdiction of high and great offences and not of petty and slight omissions as he was then questioned for The word Enormity or Enormous offence is well Expounded by the Statute of 2 E. 3. c. 2. to be a great and horrible Trespass as it is there called For the Commissions issued forth upon that Statute of Oyer and Terminer were to be revoked when the trespass was but pettie and slight and was not enormis seu horribilis transgressio And this appears plainly in the Register fol. 125. a. by the Writ there De Revocatione brevis de audiendo terminando and the Reason is given in the Writ Quia non est enormis laesio Reas. 2. The second Reason is taken from the Foundation of the High Commission grounded upon the Statute of 1 Eliz. It appears by the main scope and intent of that Act That the Commission founded upon that Act was to issue forth principally for the Visitation of the Ecclesiastical Estates and Persons of that time and for the correction reformation and ordering of the same Now the Ecclesiastical Estate of that time stood thus Queen Mary died Novemb. 17. 1558. Queen Elizabeth called her Parliament Jan. 23. following with a full purpose to restore and establish the reformed Religion happily begun by her Brother K. Edward the 6th and to abolish the Jurisdiction of the Pope all her Bishops at this time forsook her but only Anthony Kitchin Bishop of Landaff Cardinal Pool Archbishop of Canterbury died the same day Q. Mary died Heath Archbishop of York that should in that vacancy have set the Crown upon her Head refused to do it onely Owen Oglethorp Bishop of Carliel performed that Solemnity Hereupon that Parliament consisting of the Temporal Lords provided for the good and safety of the Queen and of true Religion by petitioning her for this Ecclesiastical Commission By which Commission which went out in the first year of her Reign being but Twenty Sheets of Paper but now above an Hundred Fourteen Bishops were deposed and many more of the Popish Clergy deprived And in this first Commission the chief persons named in it if not all were temporal men and the offences and enormities which that Statute principally intended and enquired of were the denying of the Queens Supremacy and the withstanding the Reformed Religion then established and other crimes in a second respect Reas. 3. The third Reason is taken ab Incommodo For if the High Commission should have Jurisdiction of all Causes whatsoever great and small then will the ordinary Jurisdiction of Bishops in their several Diocesses quickly vanish and be extinguished and the Subject grievously vexed in being fetched up one hundred or two hundred miles and more from his abode whereas he might have Justice in the Ordinaries Courts nearer home For the High Commission hath its Jurisdiction all over England and Ireland Scotland being not then united to the English Crown and therefore not extending to it which was never the intent and meaning of that Act of 1 Eliz. And for these Reasons many Prohibitions have been granted to the High Commission out of the Kings Courts of Westminster when they have meddled with inferiour offences As Mich. 44 45 Eliz. C. B. between Taylor and Massie for carrying Corn on Holy-days and giving irreverent speeches to the Minister and whistling and knocking at his door and saying He made Musick for his Daughters wedding A Prohibition was granted for these things as too light for the High Commission The like Prohibition was granted out of the Court of Common-Pleas Mich. 42 43 Eliz. Rot. 503. Trin. 44 Eliz. C. B. between Robert Pool Clerk and Thomas Guy a Prohibition was granted to the High Commission for holding Plea for the assaulting and laying violent hands on the said Pool being a Parson upon this Reason For that they were not offences proper for the High Commission but for the Bishop of the Diocess to meddle with And in all these Prohibitions and many more that I could vouch the words in the Record inducing the Prohibition are these Licet omnia singula premissa in articulis praedict. specificat non sunt laesiones enormes nec offensa adeo gravia unde praedict. Commissionarii dicti Domini Regis virtute actus praedict. de Anno primo dicto Dominae Reginae Eliz. cognitionem habere possint seu debeant As it appears in the Case between Vivers and Pellings in the Common-Pleas Sexto Iacobi Cok Entry's fol. 465. Quest 2. Whether for all those enormous offences of which they have Cognisance and Iurisdiction by the Letters Patents they can fine and imprison And I think they cannot My Reasons are these Reas. 1. The first Reason is this The Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction restored by the Statute of 1 Eliz. to the Crown was that which was then usurped by the Pope Now it is confessed to my hands by all the Civilians That the Pope did not at that time nor any time else exercise any Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction within this Kingdome by Fine and Imprisonment which are temporal acts belonging to the temporal Sword but only by the spiritual Censures of the Church belonging to the Keys which are six in number Suspension Sequestration Deprivation Degradation Interdiction and Excommunication And