A IVST VINDICATION OF THE Church of England FROM The unjust Aspersion of Criminal SCHISME WHEREIN The nature of Criminal Schisme the divers sorts of Schismaticks the liberties and priviledges of National Churches the rights of Sovereign Magistrates the tyranny extortion and Schisme of the Roman Court with the grievances Complaints and opposition of all Princes and States of the Roman Communion of old and at this very day are manifested to the view of the World By the Right Reverend Father in God Iohn Bramhall Dr. in Divinity and Lord Bishop of Derry Pacian in ep ad Sempron My name is Christian my sirname is Catholique By the one I am known from Infidels by the other from Hereticks and Schismaticks LONDON Printed for Iohn Crook at the sign of the Ship in S. Paul's Church-Yard 1654 THE Contents of the particular CHAPTERS CHAP. I. THe Scope and summe of this Treatise Pag. 1. CHAP. II. The stating of the question what is Schisme who are Schismaticks and what is signified by the Church of England in this question p. 6. CHAP. III. That the Separation from the Court of Rome was not made by Protestants but Roman Catholicks themselves p. 31 CHAP. IV. That the King and Kingdome of England in their Separation from Rome did make no new Law but vindicate the ancient Law of the Land pag. 54. CHAP. V. That the Britannick Churches were ever Exempted from all forreign Iurisdiction And so ought to continue pag. 87 CHAP. VI. That the King and Church of England hâ—d both sufficient authority and sufficient grounds to withdraw their obedience from Rome p. 1â—6 CHAP. VII That all Kingdomes and Republicks of the Roman Communion Germany France Spain Portugal Sicilly Brabant Venice do the same thing in effect when they have occasion p. 160 CHAP. VIII That the Pope and Court of Rome are many waies guilty of Schisme and the true cause of the Dissensions of Christendome Pag. 229 CHAP. IX An Answer to the Objections of the Romanists p. 245 CHAP. X. The Conclusion of the Treatise p. 275. Courteous Reader BY reason of the Authour's Absence and difficulty of the written Copy severall Errata's have past the Presse which you are desired to amend and among the rest these following Page 7. in Margine Act. leg Art p. 13. line 17. Lyne leg kind p. 13. in marg Manrit leg Maurit p. 14 l 1 Schimse leg Schisme p. 15 l. 15 Creed leg Creeds p. 18 l. ult legemachies leg logomachies p. 21 l. 8. qui leg quis p. 22 l. 4. teach for touch p. 35 l. 8. these for those p. 39. l. 31. dele little p. 42 in margine modo for nodâ— p. 65 in margine 78 for 787 p. 67 Hesâ—is for Hosius in marg p. 74 l. 1 sepultura for sepulchra p. 79 l. 4 Asseâ—tie for Asserio p. 85 l. 30 the for his Legates p. 102 l. 25 as for or p. 113 in marg lais for Caiet p. 119 l. 2 novum for nonum p. 121 l. 11 no for had p. 140 for 138 p. 141 for 139 p. 144 for 142 p. 145 for 143 p. 914 for 149 p. 129 l. 23 chink for klink and l. 25 despensations for dispensations p. 130 l. 10 Simoniae for Simonia and l. 20 21 aliam and nummam for alium and nummum p. 131 l. 1 conscivit for consuevit p. 132 l. 16 singulta for singultu and lin 20 speculiem for speculum p. 133 l. 28 papale for papali l. 29 rigarâ— for rigore line 30 praecipient for praecipiente p. 138 l. 6. for then the oath read then that the oath p. 142 l. 5 sweare for sware And in the margent Hoops for Harps p. 153 l. 15 provisos for provisors And in the marg theops for the copy p. 164 l. 10 deest not p. 165 l. 30 thar for that p. 186 l 32 which leg wherewith p. 199 l. 14 Redimendum leg Redimendam p. 214 l. 4 leg Placaert l. 27 but for but p. 217 in marg Imprss. leg Impress A JUST VINDICATION OF THE Church of England CHAP. I. The Scope and summe of this Treatise 1. NOthing hath been hitherto or can hereafter be objected to the Church of England which to strangers unacquainted with the state of our affaires or to such of our Natives as have onely looked upon the case superficially hath more Colour of truth at first sight then that of Schisme that we have withdrawn our obedience from the Vicar of Christ or at least from our lawful Patriarch and separated our selves from the Communion of the Catholick Church A grievous accusation I confesse if it were true for we acknowledge that there is no salvation to be expected ordinarily without the pale of the Church 2. But when all things are Judiciously weighed in the Ballance of right reason when it shall appear that we never had any such forrein Patriarch for the first six hundred years and upwards And that it was a grosse Violation of the Canons of the Catholick Church to attempt after that time to obtrude any forrein Jurisdiction upon us That before the Bishops of Rome ever exercised any Jurisdiction in Brittain they had quitted their lawful Patriarchate wherewith they were invested by the authority of the Church for an unlawful Monarchy pretended to belong unto them by the institution of Christ That whatsoever the Popes of Rome gained upon us in after-ages without our own free consent was meer tyranny and usurpation That our Kings with their Synods and Parliaments had power to revoke retract and abrogate whatsoever they found by experience to become burthensome and insupportable to their Subjects That they did use in all ages with the consent of the Church and Kingdom of England to limit and restrain the Exercise of Papal power and to provide remedies against the daily incroachments of the Roman Court so a Henry the Eighth at the reformation of the English Church did but tread in the steps of his most renowned Ancestours who flourished whilest Popery was in its Zenith And pursued but that way which they had chalked out unto him a way warranted by the practise of the most Christian Emperours of old and frequented at this day by the greatest or rather by all the Princes of the Roman Communion so often as they find occasion When it shall be made evident that the Bishops of Rome never injoyed any quiet or settled possession of that power which was after deservedly cast out of England so as to beget a lawful prescription And lastly that we have not at all separated our selves from the Communion of the Catholick Church nor of any part thereof Roman or other qua tales as they are such but only in their innovations wherein they have separated themselves first from their Common Mother and from the fellowship of their own Sisters I say when all this shall be cleared and the Schisme is brought home and laid at the right door then we may safely conclude that by how much we should turn more Roman
Dominions Witnesse the lawes of Ercombert Ina Withred Alfrede Edward Athelstan Edmond Edgar Athelred Canutus and Edward the Confessor among whose lawes one makes it the office of a King to govern the Church as the Vicar of God Another implyes a power in the King and his Judges to take cognisance of wrong done in Ecclesiastical Courts It was to this Holy King Edward the Confessor that Pope Nicholas the second by his bull for him and his Successours granted this ensuing priviledge to the Kings of England for ever Namely the Advocation and protection of all the Churches of England and power in his stead to make just Ecclesiastical constitutions with the advise of their Bishops and Abbats This grant is as full or fuller then that which Vrban the second made to Roger Earl of Sicily from whence the Kings of Spain at this day do not onely Challenge but enjoy in a manner all Ecclesiastical power in Sicily If the Pope had ever had any such right as he pretends this onely Bull were sufficient to justifie our Kings But they injoyed this very power from the beginning as an essential flower of their Crownes without any thanks to the Pope To make just Ecclesiasticall constitutions in the Popes stead saith the Bull. To govern the Church as the Vicar of God saith the law of the Land The Bishops of Rome have ever been very kind in granting those things which were none of their own and in making deputations and delegations to them who stood in no need of their help being lawfully invested before hand by another title in that power and dignity which the Popes pretended out of their goodnesse to confer upon them but in truth did it onely for the reputation of their See and for maintaining the opinion of their own Grandeur Whether the deputation were accepted or not they did not much trouble themselves So they dealt with 〈◊〉 president in the Councell of Nice So they dealt with the Patriarch of Iustiniana Prima so they served Good King Edward and many others This Legislative power in Ecclesiastical causes over Ecclesiasticall persons the Norman Kings after the conquest did also exercise from time to time with the advice and consent of their Lords spiritual and temporal Hence all those Statutes concerning Benefices Tythes Advowsons Lands given in Mortmain prohibitions consultations praemunires quare Impedits priviledge of Clergy extortions of Ecclesiasticall courts or officers and regulating their due fees wages of Priests Mortuaries Sanctuaries Appropriations and in summe all things which did belong to the externall subsistence regiment and regulating of the Church and this in the raigns of our best Kings long and long before the reformation Othobone the Popes Legate under Vrban the fifth would have indowed Vicars upon appropriated Rectories but could not But our Kings by two Statutes or Acts of Parliament did easily effect it With us the Pope could not make a Spiritual corporation but the King The Pope could not exempt from the Jurisdiction of the ordinary but the King who by his charter could convert Seculars into Regulars The Pope could not grant the Priviledge of the Cistercians and other orders to be free from the payment of Tyths but the King The Pope could not appropriate Churches but the King we find eight Churches appropriated to the Abby of Crowland by the Saxon Kings three Churches appropriated to the Abby of Battell by the Conquerour and twenty by Henry the first to â—â—e Church of Sarisbury The King in his great Councel could make void the certificates of Ordinaries in cases of Ecclesiasticall cognisance and command them to absolve those persons who were judged by his authority to be unjustly excommunicated The Pope could not translate an Arch Bishoprick or a Bishoprick but the King The disposition of Ecclesiastical preferments upon lapse accrued not to the Pope but to the King a plain evidence that he was the Lord Paramount And the King onely could incurre no lapse Nullum tempus occurrit Regi because the law supposed that he was busied about the weightie affaires of the Kingdom The revenewes of a Bishoprick in the vacancy belonged not unto the Pope but to the King which he caused to be restored sometimes from the time of the first vacancy sometimes from the time of the filling of the Church with a new Incumbent according to his good pleasure The Canons of the Pope could not change the Ecclesiastical Lawes of England but the King whose lawes they were He had power in his great Councel to receive the canons if they were judged convenient or to reject them and abrogate them if they were judged inconvenient When some Bishops proposed in Parliament the reception of the Ecclesiastical Canon for the Legitimation of Children born before marriage without such a reception the Canon was of no force in England All the Peers of the Realm stood up and cryed out with one voice Nolumus leges Angliae mutari We will not have the lawes of England to be changed The King and Parliament made a Legislative exposition of the Canon of the Councel of Lyons concerning Bigamy which they would not have done unlesse they had conceived themselves to have power according to the fundamental constitutions of the kingdom either to receive it or reject it Ejus est legem interpretari cujus est condere He that hath authority to expound a law Legislatively hath power to make it The King and Parliament declared Pope Vrban to be the right Pope in a time of Schisme that is in relation to England their own Kingdom not by determining the titles of the Popes but by applying the matter to the one and substracting it from the other All these are so many evidences that when Popery was at the highest the Bishops of Rome had no such absolute Ecclesiasticall Soveraignty in the Church and Realm of England And that what power they exercised at any time more then this was by connivence or permission or violent usurpation And that our Primates had no forraign Superiour Legally established over them but onely the King as he was the Supream head of the whole body politick To see that every one did his duty and injoyed his due right Who would not suffer one of his Barons to be excommunicated from Rome without his privity and consent No Legate de latere was allowed by the law in England but the Archbishop of Canturbury And if any was admitted of courtesy he was to take his oath to do nothing derogatory to the King and his Crown If any man did denounce the Popes excommunication without the assent of the King by the law he forfeited all his goods Neither might any man appeale to Rome without the Kings License In the year 1420 the Pope translated the Bishop of Lincolne to York But the Dean and Chapter absolutely refused to admit him and justified their refusal by the Laws of the Land And
by the favour of the country carried the cause So as the Pope was forced to Recall him to Lincolne Having mentioned the statutes of Mortmain I cannot but do my native country and the Church of England that right to clear it from an heavy accusaâ—ion framed against it upon mistaken grounds That the English protestants had made a Law to maintain and patronize Sacriledge that no man how penitent soever could restore any thing to the Church which had been formerly taken from it God forbid First the statutes of Mortmain were not made by Protestants but in the daies of Henry the third Edward the first and Richard the second between the last of which and Henry the eighth there raigned six Kings successively That is one great mistake Secondly the Statutes of Mortmain did not at all concern the restitution of any thing that had been taken away There was no use for that in those daies The onely scope of those Lawes was to restrain the first donation of Lands to the Church without royal assent That is another mistake Thirdly these very Lawes of Mortmain are not so incredible nor so hard to be believed nor so altogether destitute of presidents and examples as that authour doth imagine so as posterity should scarcely believe that ever any such Law had been made He might have remembred the Proclamation of Moses when the people had already offered abundantly for the adorning of the Sanctuary Let neither man nor woman make any more work for the offering of the Sanctuary So the people were restrained from bringing He might have called to mind a like law of Theodosius a godly Emperour and propitious to the Church to moderate the peoples bounty and the Clergies covetousness Which Law Saint Ambrose and Saint Hierome do so much complain of not against the Emperour who made the Law but against the Clergy who deserved to have such a Law made against them He might have found the like Law made by Nicephorus Phocas and afterwards revived by Emanuel Comenus He might have remembred that the troubles between the Pope and the Venetians did spring partly from such a Law Briefly with a little search he might have found like Lawes in Germany Poland France Spain Italy Sicily And if he will trust Padre Paâ—lo in the Papacy it self The Prince cannot wrong his Subject that is an owner or possessour of Lands or haereditaments in a well ordered State Then why should it be in the power of a Subject that is an owner to wrong his Prince and his Country But by such alienations of Lands to the Church in an excessive and unproportionable measure the Prince loseth his right that is both his tribute and his military service and fines upon change of Tenants The Common-Wealth loseth its supportation and due protection Therefore they were called the Lawes of Mortmain because Lands so aliâ—nated to the Church were put into a dead hand from whence they never returned And so in time the whole Signioury should be the Churches as it is elegantly expressed by the Venetian Oratour to Paul the fifth Nè fortunis omnibus exuantur ne quicquid sub coelo Veneto homines arant ferunt aedificant omnia veluti quodam oceano Ecclesiae absorbeantur â—ihilque sibi reliqui fiat unde Rempublicam patriam tecta templa aras focos sepultura majorum defendere possint Lest the Citizens should be turned out of their estates lest all which men plow sow build under the Vâ—netian heaven should be swallowed up into the Ocean of the Church And nothing be left where with to defend the Common-Wealth their Country their houses their temples their altars their fires and the sepulchers of their Ancestors To prevent this great inconvenience the Lawes of Mortmain were devised prudently to ballance the spiritualty and the temporalty that the one do not swallow up the other to which all wise Legislators have ever had ought to have a special regard In France no man can build a new Church without the Kings License verified in Parliament A new Monastery builded in Genua without License is to be confiscated In Spain without License Royal no new Religions can enter into the Kingdome The Fathers of Saint Francis de Paula began to build a Church in Madrid upon their own heads but they were stopped So aequitable so necessary hath this Law of Mortmain been thought to all Nations But to leave this digression and to come up closer to the direct point without any consequences In the Reign of King Henry the second some controversies being likely to arise between the Crown and Thomas Bâ—cket Archbishop of Canterbury The King called a general Assembly of his Archbishops Bishops Abbats Priors and Peers of the Realm at Clarendon where there was made an acknowledgment or memorial cujusdam partis consuetudinum libertatum Antecessorum suorum Regis videlicet Henrici avi sui aliorum quaeobservari debebant in Regno ab omnibus teneri of a certain part of the Customes and Liberties of his predecessors that is to say his Grand-father Henry the first son of the Conquerour and other Kings A parte but ex ungue Leonem from the view of this part we may conclude of what nature the rest were of the customes The customes of England are the Common Law of the Land of his predecessors that is to say the Saxon Danish and Norman Kings successively And therefore no marveil if they ought to be observed of all This part of their ancient customes or liberties they reduced into sixteen Chapters or Articles To which all the Archbishops Bishops and other Ecclesiasticks with all the Peeres and Nobles of the Realm did not onely give their acknowledgment and consent but also their oathes for the due observation of them It would be tedious and impertinent to relate them all I will onely cull out some of them One was that all appeales in England must proceed regularly from the Arch-Deacon to the Bishop from the Bishop to the Archbishop and if the Archbishop failed to do justice the last complaint must be to the King to give order for redresse that is by fit Delegates But there might be no further or other Appeales without the consent of the King whereby the Nunciatureâ— and Legantine Court and the Court of Rome it self are all at the Kings mercy Wherein did the Popes great strength lie in those dayes when his hands were fast tied both at home and abroad Another Custome was that no Ecclesiasticall person might depart out of the Kingdome without the Kings License no not though he were summoned by the Bishop of Rome And if the King permitted them to go yet if he required it they must give caution or security to act nothing hurtful or prejudicial to the King or Kingdome in their going thither abiding there aâ—d returning home You see our Ancestors were jealous of Rome in those daies Whether it was their providence or their experience
Religion to the See of Rome and to the rights of Holy Church notwithstanding the municipal Lawes and immemorial customes of the Empire and notwithstanding any Oathes taken for the observation thereof Yet the Emperour and the Princes of Germany stand to their contracts assert the municipal lawes and customes of the Empire And assume unto themselves to be the onely Judges of their own priviledges and necessities Thirdly Henry the eighth challenged to himself the patronage of Bishopricks and investitures of Bishops within his own Dominions The Emperours did more Adrian the fourth taxed Frederick the first for requiring homage and fealty of Bishops Et manus eorum sacratas manibâ—s tuis innectis and that he held their consecrated hands in his hands The Emperour denyed it not but justified it Ab his qui regalia nostra tenent cur homagium regalia Sacramenta non exigamus why may we not require homage and Oathes of Allegiance from them who hold their Lands of our Imperial Crown The Ecclesiastical Lords in their letter to Innocent the third do acknowledge that the fees which they held from the Empire they had received at the hands of Otho the fourth and had done him homage and sworn fealty to him And this before his Imperiall Coronation at Rome Henry the fifth goes yet further and accuseth Pope Paschal that without any hearing he sought to take away from the Empire the investitures of Bishops which the Emperours his predecessours had enjoyed from the time of Charlemain by the space of 400 yeares and upwards A fair prescription But this is not all The Emperours did long injoy the patronage of the Papacy it self and the disposition of the Roman Bishoprick Adrian the first with the whole Clergy and people of Rome quitted all their claim right and interest to Charles the Great as well in the elections of the Popes as investitures of Bishops And Leo the eighth did the like to Otho the first which is a truth in history so apparent that no man can deny it with his credit nor question it with reason Fourthly the Kings of England suffered no appeales to Rome out of their Kingdoms nor Roman Legates to enter into their Dominions without their License No more did the Emperours though they acknowledge the Roman Bishop to be their Patriarch which we do not Hadrian the fourth complained of Frederick the first That he shut both the Churches and the Cities of his Kingdom against the Popes Legates à latere And more fully in his letter to the German Bishops that he had made an edict that no man out of his Kingdome should have recourse to the Apostolique See To the former part of the charge the Emperour answers Cardinalibus vestris clausae sunt Ecclesiae non patent civitates quia non videmus eoâ— praedicatores sed praedatores non pacis corroboratores sed pecuniae raptores non orbis reparatores sed auri insatiabiles corrasores Our Churches and Cities are shut to your Cardinals because we do not see them Preachers but robbers not confirmers of peace but extorting catchers of money not repairers of the world but insatiable scrapers together of gold Thus much he writ to the Pope himself To the second part of the charge he answers That he had not shut up the entrance into Italy or the passage out of Italy by edict nor would shut it up to travellers or such as had necessary occasions and the testimony of their Bishops for their voyage to the Sea of Rome but he intended to remedy those abuses by which all the Churches of his Kingdome were burthened and impoverished That the whole body of the Empire were of the same mind it appeares by the Advises of Ments And by the hundred grievances of the German Nation which the Princes and Peeres of the Empire protested that they neither could nor would indure any longer Fifthly the Kings of England declared the Popes Bulls to be void They had good reason for they were not under his Jurisdiction nor within the sphere of his activity The Emperours did not so generally but yet they took upon them to be Judges whether the Popes key did erre or not Pius the second by his Bull condemned all appeales from the Pope to a General Councel as erroneous detestable void and pestilent and subjected all those who should use them after two moneths to execration ipso facto of what condition soever they were Emperours Kings or Bishops Yet long after this Charles the fifth appealed from Clement the seventh to a Generall Councel Ad sacri Generalis Concilii totius Christianitatis cognitionem et judicium remittenda censuimus Illiqque nos et omnia quae cum S. vestra habere possumus aut deinceps habituri sumus omnino subjicimus Wherein he did but insist in the steps of his predecessours Lewis the fourth did the same to Iohn the 22th And in the Dyet of Frankford decreed them all that should assent to the Popes Bull to be guilty of treason and to have forfeited all their fees which they held of the Empire because the sentence of a Pope contrary to God or to holy Scripture or to that due obedience which a Subject owes to his Prince is of no moment or validity And such the Princes and Peeres of the Empire did unanimously declare the Popes Bull to be contra Deum justitiam juris ordinem contrary to God contrary to holy Scripture and contrary to due order of Law Sixthly Henry the eighth deprived the Pope of his Annates tenths and first fruits in England of his pall-money and other extorted revenues What did the Emperour and the Germans lesse then he In the advises of Ments it is concluded that the Pope shall receive nothing either before or after for confirmations elections admissions collations provisions presentations holy order palles benedictions c. upon pain that the transgressour thereof either in exacting or giving or promising should incurre the punishment due to a Simoniacal person And though these were but Advises yet the King of the Romans and Electors did covenant mutually to assist and defend one another in the maintenance of them against all men And yet further procured them to be confirmed and inlarged in the Councel of Basile by the addition of investitures bulls annates first fruits c. This was too sweet a morsel for the Pope to lose willingly when the Archbishop of Ments paid for his pall worth about sixe pence thirty thousand Florens By the Concordates or accord made between the Emperour and Princes of Germany and Nicholas the fifth the Annates are in part remitted or taken away The Estates of the Empire assembled at Nurenberge represented to Adrian the sixth that Annates were given for maintenance of the war against the Turks and how comely a thing it were that they should be restored to the same use The Princes
all ages affronted and curbed the Roman Court and reduced them to a right temper and constitution as often as they deviated from the Canons of the Fathers and incroached upon the liberties of the Gallicane Church Whereby the Popes jurisdiction in France came to be meerly discretionary at the pleasure of the King Hincmare had been condemned by three French Synods for a turbulent person and deposed Pope Adrian the second takes Cognisance of the cause at Rome and requires Carolus Calvus the King of France to send Hincmare thither with his accusers to receive justice The Kings apologetick answer will shew how he relished it Valde mirati sumus ubi hoc dictator Epistolae scriptum invenerit esse Apostolica authoritate praecipiendum ut Rex corrector iniquorum districtor reorum atque secundum leges Ecclesiasticas atque mundanas ultor criminum reum legaliter ac regulariter pro excessibus suis damnatum sua fretum potentia Roman dirigat We wondered much where he who dictated the Popes Letter hath found it written as commanded byâ— Apostolical authority that a King who is the Corrector of the unjust the punisher of guilty persons and according to all Lawes Ecclesiastical and Civill the revenger of crimes should send a guilty person legally and regularly condemned for his excesses to Rome He tells him that the Kings of France were reputed terrarum Domini not Episcoporum Vice-Domini or Villici Lords paramount within their Dominions not Licutenants or Bayliffes of Bishops Quis igitur hanc inversam legem infernus evomuit quis tartarus de suis abditis tenebrosis cuniculis eructavit What hell hath disgorged this disorderly law what bottomlesse depth hath belched it up out of its hidden and obscure holes The Kings of France have convented the Popes before them So Charles the Great dealt with Leo the third and Lotharius with Leo the fourth The Kings of France have appealed from Popes to Councels So Philip the 4th with the advise of all the orders of France and the whole Gallicane Church appealed from Boniface the eighth and commanded his appeal to be published in the great Church at Paris So Henry the great appealed from Gregory the 14th and caused his appeal to be affixed to the gates of Saint Peters Church in Rome So the School of Sorbone appealed from Boniface the eight Benedict the eleventh Pius the second and Leo the tenth The Kings of France have protested against the Popes decrees and sleighted them yea in the very face of the Councel of Trent Witnesse that protestation of the Ambassadour of France made in the Councel in the name of the King his Master We refuse to be subject to the commands and disposition of Pius the fourth we reject refuse and contemn all the judgements censures and decrees of the said Pius And although most holy Fathers your Religion Life and Learning was ever and ever shall be of great esteem with us Yet seeing indeed you do nothing but all things are done at Rome rather then at Trent And the things that are here published are rather the decrees of Pius the fourth then of the Councel of Trent we denounce and protest here before you all that whatsoever things are decreed and published in this Assembly by the meer will and pleasure of Pius neither the most Christian King will ever approve nor the French Church ever acknowledge to be decrees of a General Councel Besides this the King our Master commandeth all his Archbishops and Bishops and Abbats to leave this Assembly and presently to depart hence then to return again when there shall be hope of better and more orderly proceedings This was high and smart for the King and the Gallicane Church so publickly to reject refuse and contemn all Papal decrees and to challenge such an interest in and power over the French Archbishops and Bishops as not onely to license them but to command them to depart and leave the Councel whither they were summoned by the Pope The French Kings have made Lawes and constitutions from time to time to repress the insolencies and exorbitances of the Papal Court so often as they began to prejudice the liberties of the Gallicane Church with the unanimous consent of their Princes Nobles Clergy Lawyers and Commons As against their bestowing of Ecclesiastical dignities and benefices in France and their grosse Simony and extortions in that way against the payment of Annates and tenths to Rome and generally for all the liberties of the Church of France Against reservations and Apostolical graces and all other exactions of the Court of Rome Charlâ—s the seventh made the pragmatical Sanction to confirm all the Acts of the Councels of Constance and Basâ—l against the tyranny and usurpation of the Pope It is true that Lewis the eleventh by the flattering perswasion of Aeneas Sylvius then Pius the second did revoke this Sanction But the Kings Proctour and the Rectour of the University of Paris did oppose themselves formally to the Registring and Authorizing of this revocation Whereupon the King desired the advise of his Parliament in writing which they gave to this effect That the revocation of that Sanction tended to the confusioâ— of the whole Ecclesiastical order the depopulation of France the exhausting and impoverishment of the Kingdom and the total ruine of the French Church Hereupon the King changed his mind and made diverse declarations and edicts conformable to and in pursuance of the pragmatical Sanction After this the three Estates assembled at Towers made it their first and instant request to Charles the 8th that he would preserve inviolable the pragmatical Sanction which they reputed as the Palladium of France And in the National Councel assembled by Lewis the 12th in the same City it was again confirmed But the Pope stormed and thundered and excommunicated and interdicted Lewis the 12th Francis the first and the whole Realm and exposed it as a prey to the first that could take it And gave plenary Indulgence to every one that should kill a Frenchman King Francis fainted under such fulminations and came to a composition or accommodation with Leo the tenth which was called conventa or the concordate On the one side the Popes friends think he wronged himself and his title to a spiritual Sovereignty very much by descending to such an accommodation And exclude France out of the number of those Countries which they term pays d' obedience As if the French were not loyal obedient Subjects but Rebels to the Court of Rome On the other side the Prelates the Universities the Parliaments of France were as ill contented that the King should yeeld one inch and opposed the accord Insomuch as the University of Paris appealed from it to a future Councel and expedited Letters Patents sealed with the Universities Seal containing at large their grievances and the reasons of the appeal which after were published to the world in print I cannot here omit
the severity of our Lawes or the rigour of our Princes since the reformation a motive to his revolt from our Church Surely the Inquisition was quite out of his mind but I meddle not with forrein affaires He might have considered that more Protestants suffered death in the short Raign of Queen Mary Men Women and Children then Roman Catholicks in all the longer Raignes of all our Princes since the Reformation put together The former by fire and faggot a cruel lingring torment ut sentirent se mori that they might feel themselves to die by degrees The other by the gibbet with some opprobious circumstances to render their sufferings more exemplary to others The former meerly and immediately for Religion because they would not be Roman Catholicks without any the least praetext of the violation of any political Law The latter not meerly and immediately for Religion because they were Roman Catholicks for many known Roman Catholicks in England have lived and dyed in greater plenty and power and reputation in every princes raign since the Reformation then an English Protestant could live among the Irish Roman Catholicks since their insurrection If a subject was taken at Masse it self in England which was very rare it was but a pecuniary mulct No stranger was ever questioned about his religion I may not here omit King Iames his affirmation That no man in his Raign or in the Raign of his predecessor Queen Elizabeth did suffer death for conscience sake or Religion But they suffered for the violation of civil Lawes as either for not acknowledging the political Supremacy of the King in Ecclesiastical causes over Ecclesiastical persons which is all that we assert which the Roman Catholicks themselves in Henry the Eighth's daies did maintain as much or perhaps more then we We want not the consent of their own Schooles or the concurrent practise of Kings and Parliaments of their own communion As Sancta Clara doth confesse Valde multi doctores c. very many Doctours do hold that for the publick benefit of the Commonwealth Princes have Iurisdiction in many causes otherwise being of Ecclesiastical cognisance by positive Divine Law and by the Law of Nature And though himself seem rather to adhere to others who ascribe unto them meerly a Civil power yet he acknowledgeth with the stream of Schoolmen that by their Soveraign Office by accident and indirectly for the defence of the Common-wealth and the preservation of publick Justice and peace they have great power over Ecclesiastical persons in Ecclesiastical causes in many cases As they may command Bishops to dispose their spiritual affaires to the peace of the Common-wealth They may remove the froward from their offices They may defend the oppressed Clergy from the unjust oppressions of Ecclesiastical Iudges c. which he confesseth to be as much as our Article setteth forth What the practise of other Kings and Princes is herein we shall see more fully when I come to handle my fifth Proposition Or else for returning into the Kingdome so qualified with forbidden orders as the Lawes of the Land do not allow The State of Venice doth not the Kingdom of France hath not abhorred from the like Lawes Or lastly for attempting to seduce some of the Kings Subjects from the Religion established in the Land In all these cases besides religion there is something of Election He that loves Danger doth often perish in it The truth is this An hard Knott must have an heavy Mall Dangerous and bloody positions and practises produce severe lawes No Kingdom is destitute of necessary remedies for its own conservation If all were of my mind as I believe many are I could wish that all Seditious Opinions and over rigorous statutes with the memory of them were buried together in perpetual oblivion I hold him scarce a good Christian that would not cast on one spade full of earth towards their interrement Pardon this digression if it be one Cruelty is a Symptome of Schisme Secondly I answer that though the Romanists could be contented to brand their own friends for the principall Schismaticks yet they shall never be able to prove us accessaries or fasten the same Crime upon us who found the separation made to our hands who never had any thing to do with Rome who never ought them any Service but the reciprocall duty of love who never did any act to oblige us to them or to disoblige us from them indeed it were something if they could produce a patent from Heaven of the Popes Vicariate Generall under Christ over all Christians But that we know they can never do Or but so much as an old Canon of a generall Councel that did subject us to their Jurisdiction So as the same were neither lawfully revoked nor their power forfeited by abuse nor quitted by themselves untill then they may withdraw their charge of Schisme Nay yet more though they could justifie their pretended title yet we acting nothing but preserving all things in the same condition we found them are not censurable as formal Schismaticks whilest we erre invincibly or but probably and are implicitely prepared in our minds to obey all our just Superiours so far as by law we are bound whensoever we shall be able to understand their right There have been many Schismes in the Roman Church it self Sometimes two Popes sometimes three Popes at a time One Kingdome sâ—bmitted to one this to another that to a third every one believing him to whom he submitted to be the right Pope and every one ready to have submitted to the right Pope if they had known who he was Tell me were all those that submitted to Antipopes presently Schismaticks That were too hard a censure The Antipopes themselves were the Schismaticks and the Cardinals that Elected them and all these who supported them for avaritious or ambitious or uncharitable ends We may apply to this purpose that which St. Austin said concerning Haereticks Qui sententiam suam quamvis falsam atque perversam nulla pertinaci animosâ—â—ate defendit praesertim quam non audacia praesumptionis suae pepererit sed à seductis et in errorem lapsis parentibus accepit quaerit autem cauta solicitudine veritatem câ—rrigi paratus cum invenerit nâ—quaquam est inter haereticos deputandus He that defends not his false opinion with Pertinacious animosity having not invented it himself but learned it from his â—rring parents If he inquire carefully after the truth and be ready to embrace it and to correct his errors when he finds them he is not to be reputed an Heretick If this be true in the case of Heresie it holds much more strongly in the case of Schism especially that Schism which is grounded only upon Humane constitutions He that disobeys a Lawful Superiour through invincible ignorance whom he deserted not himself but found him cast off by his parents if he be careful to understand his duty and ready to submit so far
as in justice he is bound he is not to be reputed a Schismatick If men might not be saved by a general and implicite repentance they were in a woful condition for who can tell how oft he offendeth Cleanse thou me from my secret faults And if by general and implicite repentance why not by general and implicite faith why not by general and implicite obedience So as they do their uttermost indeavours to learn their duties and are ready to conform themselves when they know them God looks upon his creatures with all their prejudices and expects no more of them then according to the talents which he hath given them If I had books for that purpose I might have cited many Lawes and many Authors to prove that the final separation from Rome was made long before the reformation of the Church of England But it is a truth so evident and so undeniable by all these who understand our affaires that I seem to my self to have done overmuch in it already I do expect that it should be urged by some that there was a double separation of the Church of England from Rome The former from the court of Rome The second from the Church of Rome The former in point of discipline The latter in point of Doctrine The former made in the daies of Henry the Eighth The other in the daies of Edward the sixth That if the Protestants were not guilty of the former yet certainly they were guilty of the later To this I give two answers first that the second separation in point of Doctrine doth not concern this question Whether the Church of England be Schismatical but another whether the Church of England be Haereticall or at least Heterodox for every error doth not presently make an haeresy which cannot be determined without discussing the particular differences between the Church of Rome and the Church of England It is an undeniable principle to which both parties do yeeld firm assent that they who made the first separation from the primitive pure Church and brought in corruptions in faith Leiturgy or use of the Sacraments are the guilty party Yea though the separation were not local but onely moral by introducing errours and innovations and making no other secession This is the issue of our controversie If they have innovated first then we are innocent and have done no more then our duties It is not the separation but the cause that makes a Schismatique Secondly I answer that as Roman Catholicks not Protestants were the authors of the Separation of England from the Court of Rome so the Court of Rome it self not Protestants made the Separation of England from the communion of the Church of Rome by their unjust and tyrannical censures excommunications and interdictions which they thundred out against the Realm for denying their spiritual Soveraignty by divine right before any reformation made by Protestants It was not Protestants that left the communion of the Church of Rome but the Court of Rome that thrust all the English Nation both Protestants and Roman Catholicks together out of their doores and chased them away from them when Pope Paul the third excommunicated and interdicted England in the daies of Henry the eighth before ever any reformation was attempted by the Protestants In that condition the Protestants found the Church and Kingdom of England in the daies of Edward the sixth So there was no need of any new separation from the communion of the Church of Rome The Court of Rome had done â—hat to their hands So to conclude my first Proposition Whatsoever some not knowing or not weighing the state of our affaires And the Acts and Records of those times have rashly or ignorantly pronounced to the contrary it is evident that the Protestants had no hand either in the separation of the English Church from the Court of Rome or in their separation from the Church of Rome The former being made by professed Roman Catholicks the later by the Court of Rome it self both before the reformation following in the dayes of Edward the sixth both at a time when the poor Protestants suffered death daily for their conscience upon the six bloody Articles CHAP. IV. That the King and Kingdom of England in the separation from Rome diâ— make no new Law but vindicate their ancient Liberties THe second Conclusion upon examination will prove as evident as the former that Henry the eighth and those Roman Catholicks with him who made the great separation from the Court of Rome did no new thing but what their predecessors in all ages had done before them treading in the steps of their Christian Ancestors And first it cannot be denyed but that any person or Society that hath an eminent reputation of learning or prudence or piety or authority or power hath ever had and ever will have a great influence upon his or their neighbours without any legal Jurisdiction over them or subjection due from them Secondly it is confessed that in the primitive times great was the dignity and authority of the Apostolical Churches as Rome Antiâ—ch Ephesus Hierusalem Alexandria which were founded by the Apostles themselves And that those ancient Christians in all their differences did look upon the Bishops of those Sees as honourable Arbitrators and faithful Depositaries of the genuine Apostolical traditions especially wherein they accorded one with another Hence is that of Tertullian Constat omnem doctrinam quae cum illis Ecclesiis Apostolicis matricibus et originalibus conspi at c. Whatsoever doctrine agrees with those Apostolical original mother Churches is to be reputed true And in this sense and no other Saint Cyprian a great admirer and imitater both of the matter and words of Tertullian whom he honoured with the title of his Master doth call the Church of Rome a Matrix and a root But if the tradition varied as about the observation of Easter between Victor Bishop of Rome and Polycrates Bishop of Ephesâ—s the one prescribing from St. Peter and S. Paul the other from S. Iohn The respective Churches did conform themselves to their Superiours or if they were free as the Britannique Churches were to their own judgment or to the example of their neighbour Churches or kept them to the tradition delivered unto them by their first converters As in this very controversie about Easter and some baptismal rites the Brittish and Scottish Bishops alwaies adhered to the Eastern Church A strong presumption that thence they received the faith and were not subordinate to the Patriarchal See of Rome But yet all this honourable respect proceeded from a free prudential compliance without any perpetual or necessary subjection Afterwards some Churches lost some gained the place and dignity of Apostolical Churches either by custome so Ephesus lost it or by the Canons of the Fathers so Constantinople did get it or lastly by Imperial priviledges so Iustiniana and Carthage obtained it Thirdly it
is not to be doubted of but that after the year six hundred after that Pope Boniface had quitted his Patriarchal dignity by assuming a more lofty title of universal Bishop The succeeding Popes by the connivence leave or consent of our Kings did sometimes more sometimes lesse upon pretence of their universal Jurisdiction by degrees thrust in their sickle into the Ecclesiastical affaires of England Whosoever shall ponder duly with what a depth of prudence the Roman Court hath mesnaged all occasions and occurrences to the advantage and advancement of that See and consequently to the improvement of their own authority whosoever shall weigh seriously with what art and cunning the Papacy as it now is was tacked into the Church contrary to wind and weather and how their beginning of unity was scrued up to an omnipotence and universality of power whosoever shall duly consider what advantage they made to that See and therein to themselves by the onely countenancing of Phocas his base and bloody murther or of Charles Mà rtel his more glorious and successeful revolt will not wonder to observe how they did watch their times when we had Princes of weak Judgments or necessitous or superstitious or of unjust or Litigious titles to wind themselves into Britain Nay rather he will admire that they did not radicate themselves more deeply and more firmly therein which without doubt they had effected but for their exorbitant rapines whilest they thought that like Foxes they might prey most boldly farthest from their own Kennel Anglia verè hortus noster deliciarum puteus inexhaustus est ubi multa abundant multa de multis extorqueri possunt That England indeed was his garden of delight a Well that could not be drawn dry And where many things did abound out of much much might be extorted But first this intrusion was manifest usurpation and tyranny This was the Gangrene of the Church which no subsequent possession or submission could warrant no tract of time or prescription sufficiently confirm Quod ab initio fuit invalidum tractu temporis non convalescit That which is not onely unjust but invalid in its beginning can never be made valid by the empty pretense of a following custome or prescription Neither do I find in truth that any of the petite Saxon Kings or their Subjects though some of them indebted to S. Gregory for their first conversion and all of them much weakned by their Sevenfold division for at first of Seven Kings there was but onely one who was a Christian namely the King of Kent Neither was it any of his progeny who did afterwards unite the Heptarchy into a Monarchy much lesse that any of the succeeding Kings of England or of great Brittain united did ever make any Solemne formal or obliging acknowledgment of their submission to the Bishop of Rome But on the contrary when Austin first arrived in England he staied in Isle of Thanet untill he knew the Kings pleasure and offered not to preach in Kent until he had the Kings License for him and his followers to preach throughout his Dominions So not onely their Jurisdiction but even the exercise of their pastorall function within that Realm was by the Kings leave and Authority The donation and resignation of King Iohn whereby he went about to make a free Kingdom servile and feudatary to the Pope did concern the Crown more then the Miter and was soon hissed out of the world to the perpetual shame and infamy of such mercenary Pastors yet to obtain this Ludibrious act the power of the Keyes was abused and the Kingdom of England stood interdicted by the space of six years and three Months The Popes in later times had some power in England of courtesy not of Duty but never that omnipotence which they gaped after Sometimes they sent their Nuncios or Legates into England So they did of old into other Patriarchates Sometimes they admitted appeales from England to Rome So they did of old from Africk Sometimes they excommunicated the English Subjects So did Pope Victor long since excommunicate all the Asiaticks But neither Asia nor Africk for all that did acknowledge the Popes Jurisdiction On the other side sometimes their Legates were not permitted to enter into the Realm or after their arrival thrust out of the Realm unless they woâ—ld give caution by oath for their good demesnour Sometimes their Bulls and excommunications were slighted or damned and they who procured them soundly punished for their labours Sometimes all appeales to Rome were prohibited under most severe penalties and their decrees rejected All this while our Kings and Bishops called Councells the one under civil punishments the other under Ecclesiastical made Ecclesiastical lawes and constitutions in their Synods and Parliaments yea expresse constitutions against the Court of Rome it self with as much tartnesse and vehemency as King Henry the Eighth And with this onely difference that they indeavoured to draw the people out of the Popes clawes at home and he thought it more expedient to throw the Pope over the Brittish Sea once for altogether The old and lawful Patriarchal power of the Roman Bishops within their own destricts had been renounced long before by themselves Their new universal Monarchy erected by themselves was not capable of prescription or if it had yet such a dubious unquiet possession as the Popes did hold in England at the mercy and discretion of the right owners was not sufficient to make a legal prescription or to justifie their pretended title or to render them bonae fidei possessores lawful and conscionable possessours This is that which I am now to demonstrate in this second ground The most famous I had almost said the onely appellant from England to Rome that we read of before the Conquest was Wilfride Arch-Bishop of York who notwithstanding that he gained sentence upon sentence at Rome in his favour And notwithstanding that the Pope did send expresse Nuncios into England on purpose to see his sentence executed yet he could not obtain his restitution or the benefit of his sentence for six years during the Raignes of King Egbert and Alfrede his son Yea King Alfrede told the Popes Nuncios expresly That he honoured them as his Parents for their grave lives and honourable aspects but he could not give any assent to their Legation Because it was against reason that a person twice condemned by the whole Councel of 〈◊〉 English should be restored upon the Popes Letter If they had believed the Pope to be their competent Judge either as universal Monarch or so much as Patriarch of Brittaine or any more then an honourable Arbitrator which all the Patriarchs were even without the bounds of their proper Jurisdictions how comes it to passe that two Kings successively and the great Councels of the Kingdome and the other Arch-Bishop Theodore with all the prime Ecclesiasticks and the flower of the English Clergy did so long and so
resolutely oppose so many Sentences and Messages from Rome and condemn him twice whom the Pope had absolved Consider that Wilfride was an Arch-Bishop not an inferiour Clerk And if an appeal from England to Rome had been proper or lawful in any case it had been so in his case But it was otherwise determined by those who were most concerned Malmesbury supposeth either by inspiration or upon his own head that the King and the â— Arch-Bishop Theodore were smitten with remorse before their deaths for the injury done to Wilfride and the slighting of the Popes Sentence Letter and Legates But the contrary is moâ—â— apparently true for first it was not King Alfrede alone but the great Councel of the Kingdom also nor Theodore alone but the main body of the Clergy that opposed the Popes Letter and the restitution of Wilfride in that manner as it was decreed at Rome Secondly after Alfrede and Theodoret were both dead we find the Popes sentence and Wilfrides restitution still opposed by the surviving Bishops in the Raign of Alfredes son To clear the matter past contradiction let us consider the ground of this long and bitter contention Wilfride the Archbishop was become a great pluralist and had ingrossed into his hands too many Ecclesiastical dignities The King and the Church of England thought fit to deprive him of some of them and to confer them upon others Wilfride appealed from their sentence unto Rome The Pope gave sentence after sentence in favour of Wilfride But for all his sentences he was not he could not be restored untill he had quitted two of his Monasteries which were in question Hongesthill deane and Ripon which of all others he loved most dearly and where he was afterwards interred This was not a conquest but a plain waving of his sentences from Rome and a yeelding of the question for those had been the chief causes of the controversie So the King and the Church after Alfredes death still made good his conclusion That it was against reason that a person twice condemned by the whole Councel of the English should be restored upon the Popes Bull. And as he did not so neither did they give any assent to the Popes Legation So unfortunate were appeales to Rome in those daies And as unfrequent as unfortunate for from that time untill Anselmes daies after the Norman Conquest in the Raign of Henry the first we do hardly meet with another appeal Then Pope Paschalis the second had devised a new Oath for Arch-Bishops when they received their Pall An oath much wondered at in all places as a strange innovation Significasti reges Regni majâ—res admiratione permotos c. You signified unto me that Kings and Nobles were moved with admiration that the Pâ—ll was offered unto you by our Ministers upon condition that you should take an oath which they brought you written from us c. This oath was that which animated Anselme to contest so hotly with the King The main controversie was about this very question of Appeales to Rome The King pleaded the fundamental Lawes and Customes of the Land consuetudo Regni mâ—i est à Patrâ— meo instituta ut nullius praeter licentiam Regis appelletur Papa Qui consuetudines regni tollit potestatem quoque coronam Regis violat c. It is a custome of my Kingdome instituted by my Father that no Pope may be appealed unto without â—the Kings License He that takes away the Customes of the Kingdome doth violence to the power and Crown of the King It is to be noted that the Lawes established by his Father that was William the Conquerour were no other then the Lawes of Edward the Confessor that is to say the old Saxon Lawes So he might justly say both that it was an ancient immemorial custome of the Kingdom and also that it was instituted or established by his Father So Hoveden tells us that at last he yeelded to the request of his Barons c. that was by his authority to confirm the Lawes of King Edward But the best was that though Anselme the Archbishop was obliged by oath to the Pope yet the Bishops were not so soon brought into the same bondage And therefore the former Authour tells us that In his exequendis omnes Episcopi Angliae Primati suo suffragium negarunt In the execution of these things all the Bishops of England did deny their suffrage to their Primate So unanimous were they in this point Which unanimity of the whole Realm both Clergy and Laity doth appear yet more evidently by the Statute of Clarendon made in the Raign of the grand-child of this King when all the Prelates and Peeres of the Realm did confirm the former ancient Brittish English custome not onely by their consents but by their oathes whereof we shall have occasion to speak more hereafter And upon this custome was that Law grounded which our Histories do make mention of Si quis inventus fuerit literas vel mandatum ferens Domini Papae c. capiatur et de eo sicut de Regis traditore regni sine dilatione fiat justitia If any one be found bringing in the Popes Letter or Mandate let him be apprehended and let justice passe upon him without delay as a traitor to the King and Kingdom And generally every man is interdicted or forbidden to appâ—al to the Pope And the Legations from Rome were almost as rare as appeals to Rome during the raigns of all the Brittish and Saxon Kings untill the Norman conquest As Gregory Bishop of Ostium the Popes own Legate did confess That he was the first Roman Priest that was sâ—nâ— into those parts of Bâ—iâ—tain from the time of S. Austin And those Legates were no others then ordinary messengers or Embassadors sent from one Neighbour to another Such a thing as a Legantine Court or a Nuncios Court was not known in the Brittish world in those ages and long after It is not enough to shew that one Roman Bishop did once send over one or two Doctors to help to propagate or confirm the faith or to lend their helping hands to Religion fainting This may well set forth their devotion and our obligation But further as to the present question it signifies just nothing Favours cease to be favours when they are done on purpose to deprive men of their ancient liberties The Brittish Bishops and English also have done as much for other Nations over whom they did never challenge any Jurisdiction The French Church sent over Germanus Lupus to help to root up the relicks of Pelagianisme in Brittain yet did never pretend thereby to any authority over the Brittaines Add to this that during all the time from St. Gregory to the conquest it was usual for the Brittish Saxon and Danish Kings with their Clergy or great Councel to make Ecclesiastical lawes and to regulate the external discipline of the Church within their
that â—aught them this lesson certainly their prudence to prevent dangers was very commendable A third custome was that the revenues of all Ecclesiastical dignities belonging to the Kings demeisne during the vacancy were to be received by the King as freely as the rents of his own demeisnes Tell me who was then the Patron and Political Head of the Church A fourth Custome was that when an Arch-Bishoprick Bishoprick Abbacy or Priory did fall void the election was to be made by such of the principal dignitaries or members of that respective Church which was to be filled as the King should call together for that purpose with the Kings consent in the Kings own Chappell And there the person elected was to do his homage and fealty to the King as to his Liege Lord. That later form of Dei Apostolicae sedis gratia had taken no root in England in those daies The rest are of the same nature as that Controversies concerning Advowsons ought to be determined in the Kings Court Benefices belonging to the Kings patronage could not be appropriated without his grant When a Clergy man was accused of any Delinquency the Kings Court ought to determine what part of his accusation was of Civil and what part of Ecclesiastical cognisance And the Kings Justice might send to the Ecclesiastical Court to see it ordered accordingly None of the Kings Servants or Tenants that held of him in capite might be excommunicated nor their Lands interdicted before the King was made acquainted When it was questioned whether a Tenement were of Ecclesiastick or Lay fee the Kings Justice was to determine it by the oathes of twelve men All Ecclesiasticall persons who held any possessions from the King in capite were to do suit and service for the same as other Barons did and to joyn with the Kings Barons in the Kings Judgments untill it came to sentence of death or diminution of member To this memorial all the Nobility and Clergy of the English Nation did swear firmly in the word of truth to keep all the customes therein contained and observe them faithfully to the King and his heires for ever Among the rest Thomas Becket the Archbishop of Canterbury himself was carried along with the crowd to take this Oath Though shortly after he fell from it and admitted the Popes absolution By the Statute of Carlile made in the daies of Edward the first it was declared That the holy Church of England was founded in the estate of Prelacy within the Realm of England by the Kings and Peeres thereof And that the several incroachments of the Bishop of Rome specified in that Act did tend to the annullation of the state of the Church the disinheriting of the King and the Peeres and the destruction of the Lawes and rights of the Realm contra formam collationis contrary to the disposition and will of the first founders Observe in the estate of Prelacy not of Papacy within the Realm not without it By the Kings not by the Popes of whose exorbitant and destructive usurpations as our Ancestors were most sensible so they wanted neither will nor power to remedy them To corroborate this Law by former presidents and thereby to shew that our Kings were ever accounted the right Patrons of the English Church King Edelwalk made Wilfride Bishop of the South Saxons now Chichester King Alfrede made Assertie Bishop of Sherburn And Oenewulphus Bishop of Winchester Edward the Confessor made Robert Archbishop whom before from a Monk he had made Bishop of London Thus the Saxon Kings in all ages bestowed Bishopricks without any contradiction The Norman Kings followed their example No sooner was Stigand dead but William the Conquerour elected Lanfrank Abbat of Saint Stephens in Caen to be Archbishop William Rufus upon his death-bed elected Anselme to be Archbishop of Canterbury And untill the daies of Henry the first the Popes never pretended any right nor laid any claim to the Patronage of the English Churches The Articles of the Clergy do prescribe that elections be free so as the Kings conge d'eslire or License to elect be first obtained and afterwards the election be made good â—y the Royal assent and confirmation And the Statute of provisors Our Soveraign Lord the King and his heires shall have and enjoy for the time the collations to the Archbishopricks and other dignities elective which be of his Advowry such as his progenitors had before free election was granted Sith the first elections were granted by the Kings progenitors upon a certain form and condition as namely to demand License of the King to choose and after choise made to have his Royal assent Which condition not being kept the thing ought by reason to return to its first nature Further by the same Statute of provisors it is declaratively enacted That it is the right of the Crown of England and the Law of the Realm that upon such mischiefs and dammages happening to the Realm by the incroachments and oppressions of the Court of Rome mentioned in the body of that Law The King ought and is bound by his oath with the accord of his people in Paâ—liament to make remedy and Law for the removing of such mischiefs We find at least seven or eight such Statutes made in the Raigns of several Kings against Papal provisions reservations and collations and the mischiefs that flowed from thence Let us listen to another Law The Crown of England hath been so free at all times that it hath been iâ— no earthly subjection but immediately subjected to God in all things touching its regality and to no other and ought not to be submitted to the Pope Observe these expressions free at all times free in all things in no earthly subjection immediately subjected to God not to be submitted to the Pope And all this in Ecclesiastical affaires for of that nature were all the grievances complained of in that Law as appears by the view of the Statute it self Then if the Kings of England and the representative body of the English Church do reform themselves according to the word of God and the purest Patterns of the primitive times they owe no account to any as of duty but to God alone By the same statute it is enacted That they who shall procure or prosecute any popish Bulls and excommunications in certain cases shall incurre the forfeiture of their estates or be banished or put out of the Kings protection By other statutes it is enacted That whosoever should draw any of the Kings Subjects out of the Realm to Rome in plea about any cause whereof the cognisance belongeth to the Kings Court or should sue in any forrain court to defeat any judgment given in the Kings court That is by appealing to Rome they should incur the same penalties The body of the Kingdom would not suffer Edward the first to be cited before the Pope Henry the sixth by the Councel of Humphry
spare for Britain In the whole term of three hundred years there were few above two hundred Bishops Ordained at Rome Italy alone may brag well near of as many Bishops at one time as many succeeding Popes did ordain in all their ages Let them not tell us of the scarcity of Christians in those dayes The writings of Tertullian and Saint Cyprian and the Councels held within the time limited do evince the contrary No the first badge of their Patriarchal authority in Britain was sending of the Pall as the onely badge during the times of the Britons and Saxons And the first Pall that came into Britain was after six hundred years But this doth yet appear much more clearly from the answer of Dionothus the Reverend and learned Abbot of Bangor which according to the manner of those times was an University or Seminary of Learning and piety among the Britons and he the well deserving Rector of it made in his own name and in the name of the Britons when they pressed him to submit to the Romaen Bishop as his Patriarch that he knew no obedience due to him whom they called the Pope but the obedience of love And that under God they were to be governed by the Bishop of Caerleon Observe first what strangers the Britons were to the Papacy That man whom you call the Pope Secondly that they acknowledged no subjection or subordination no obedience whatsoever due from them to Rome but onely the reciprocal duty of love that was just the same that Rome did owe to them Thirdly that under God that is immediatly without any Forrein Prelate or Patriarch intervening they were to be governed by the Bishop of Caerleon as their onely Primate and Patriarch Which priviledge continued to the succeeding Bishops of that See for many ages afterwards saving that the Archiepiscopal Chair was removed from Caerleon to St. Davids in the Raign of King Arthur And lastly observe the time when this answer was made after the first six hundred years were expired So it is a full demonstrative convincing proof for the whole term prefixed But lest any man should cavil and say that Dionothus was but one man and that the body of the British Clergy might be of another mind that which followes strikes the question dead That Austin Saint Gregories Legate proposing three things to the Britons First that they should submit to the Roman Bishop Secondly that they should conforme to the customes of the Roman Province about the observation of Easter and the administration of Baptisme And Lastly that they should joyn with him in Preaching to the Saxons all the British Clergy assembled themselves together Bishops and Priests in two several Synods one after another to deliberate hereupon and after mature consideration they rejected all his propositions Synodically and refused flatly and unanimously to have any thing to do with him upon those terms Insomuch as St. Austin was necessitated to return over the Seas to obtain his own consecration and after his return to consecrate the Saxon Bishops alone without the assistance of any other Bishops They refused indeed to their own cost twelve hundred innocent Monks of Bangor shortly after lost their lives for it Rome was ever builded in blood Howsoever these words quamvis Augustino prius mortuo have since been forged and inserted into venerable Bede to palliate the matter which are wanting in the Saxon Copy The concurring Testimonies of all our Historiographers witnessing the absolute and unanimous refusal of the Britons to submit to Rome and the matter of fact it self do confirm this for an undoubted truth beyond all exception So clear a truth it is that the British Churches for the first three hundred years neither ought nor paid any subjection to Rome Whence might well proceed that answer of Elutherius to King Lucius if that Epistle be not counterfeit when he desired him to send over a Copy of the Roman Lawes That he should chuse a Law Ecclesiastical out of holy writ by the Councel of his Kingdom that is principally of his Bishops for saith he you are the Vicar of Christ in your Kingdom The same in effect which is conteined in the Lawes of Edward the Confessor Hence it is that both our Histories and our Lawes do stile our Archbishops Priâ—ates which in the Language of the Primitive times signifies as much as Patriarchs And sometimes call them expresly by the very name of Patriarchs it self Hence Vrban the second intertained and welcomed Anselm our Archbishop of Canterbury into the Councel of Barre tanquam alterius orbis Papam as the Pope of another world Or as others relate the passage as the Apostle of another world and a Patriarch worthy to be reverenced CHAP. VI. That the King and Church of England had both sufficient authority and sufficient grounds to withdraw their obedience from Rome and did it with due moderation SO from the persons who made the separation from the Lawes and Statutes of our Realm which warranted the separation and from the ancient Liberties and priviledges of the Britannick Churches I proceed to my fourth ground drawn from the Imperial prerogatives of our Soveraign Princes That though we should wave all the other advantages yet they had power to alter in the external discipline and regiment of the Church whatsoever was of humane institution for the benefit and advantage of the body politick Doctor Holden proposeth the case right by way of Objection But peradventure the Protestants will say that the King or supream Senate of every Kingdome or Common-Wealth have power to make Lawes and statutes by which either directly or at least indirectly as well the Clergy as the Laity of that Kingdom or Common-Wealth are bound to reject all forrain Iurisdiction superiority and dependance And that his Legislative power is essentially annexed to every Kingdom and Commonwealth seeing that otherwise they cannot prevent those dangers which may spring and issue from that fountain to their destruction and ruine The Protestants do say indeed without all peradventure upon that very ground which is alledged in the objection Neither do the Protestants want the suffrage of Roman Catholicks therein Because humane nature saith one cannot be destitute of necessary remedies to its own preservation And another To whom a Kingdome is granted of necessity all things are esteemed to be granted without which a Kingdome cannot be governed And a Kingdom cannot be governed unlesse the King enjoy this power even over Clerks c. Necessary remedies are no remedies unlesse they be just but worse then the disease And being just the Subject is obliged to active obedience But let us see what the Doctour pleads in answer to his own objection First he passeth by the native power of civil Soveraign Empire which ought not to have been omitted for therein consists the main force of the argument But as to the Ecclesiastical part he saith he could
imperandi innocentem subditum ordo serviendi The Prince may be unjust in his commands and yet the Subject innocent in his obedience Take the case at the worst it must be doubtful at the least the Popes Soveraignty and the Jurisdiction of the Roman Court being rejected by three parts of the Christian world and so unanimously shaken off by three Kingdoms And in such a case who is fittest to be Judge the Pope the People or the King Not the Pope he is the person accused And frustra expectatur cujuslibet authoritas contra seipsum It is in vain to expect that one should imploy his authority against himself Not the people would a Judge take it well that a Gaoler should detain the Prisoner from execution untill he were satisfied of the justice of his sentence Or a Pilot that he may not move his Rudder according to the alterable face of the heavens but at the discretion of the ordinary Marriners No whensoever any question hath been moved between any kingdom or Republick of what Communion soever and the Court of Rome concerning the liberties and priviledges of the one or the extortions and incroachments of the other they have evermore assumed the last Judicature to themselves as of right it doth belong unto them The Romanists themselves do acknowledge that Soveraign Princes by the Law of God and nature not only may but are in justice obliged to oppose the tyranny of Ecclesiastical Judges and to protect and free their subjects from their violence and oppression Parsons himself wondreth that any man should deny this power to Kings in their own kingdomes But we are fully satisfied and assured that that universal power which the Pope claimes by Divine right over all Christians and particularly over the Britannique Churches without their consents And much more that Jurisdiction which de facto he did or at least would have exercised there and lesse then which he would not go to the destruction of their natural and Christian liberties and priviledges was and is a tyrannical and oppressive yoak If all Christians were as well satisfied of the truth of this our assumption as we are this controversie were at an end And thus far all Roman Catholicks not interessed nor prepossessed with prejudice do accord fully with us that by whomsoever Papal power was given whether by Christ or his Apostles or the Fathers of the Church in succeeding ages it was given for edification not for destruction And that the Roman Court in later dayes hath sought to impose grievous oppressive and intolerable burthens upon their subjects which it is lawful for them to shake off without regarding their censure as we shall see in the next proposition But because all are not so well satisfied about the just extent of Papal authority and power we must search a little higher Secondly we do both agree that Soveraign Princes may by enabled and authorized either by concession or by prescription for time immemoriall perhaps it were more properly said by vertue of their Soveraign authority over the whole body politique whereof the Clergy are a part â—o exercise all external acts of Ecclesiastical coercive Jurisdiction by themselves or at least by fit delegates praecipiendo suis subditis Sacerdotibus ut excommunicent rebelles contumaces And this is asserted in the case of Abbesses which being women are lesse capable of any spiritual Jurisdiction The truth is that as all Ecclesiastical Courts and all Ecclesiastical coercive jurisdiction did flow at first either from the Bounty and goodnesse of Soveraign Princes to the Church or from their connivence or from the voluntary consent and free submission of Christians Volenti non fit injuria consent takes away errour I except alwayes that jurisdiction which is purely spiritual and an essential part of the power of the Keies whereof Emperours and Kings are not capable So whensoever the Weal-publick and the common safety of their people doth require it for advancement of publick peace and tranquillity and for the greater ease and convenience of the subject in general according to the Vicissitude and conversion of humane affairs and the change of Monarchies they may upon well grounded experience in a National Synod or Councel more advisedly retract what their predecessours had advisedly granted or permitted And alter the face and rules of the external discipline of the Church in all such things as are but of humane right when they become hurtful or impeditive of a greater good in which cases their subjects may with good conscience and are bound in duty to conforme themselves to their Lawes Otherwise Kingdoms and Societies should want necessary remedies for their own preservation which is granted by both parties to be an absurdity Weigh all the parts of Ecclesiastical discipline and consider what one there is which Christian Emperours of old did not either exercise by themselves or by their delegates or did not regulate by their Lawes or both concerning the priviledges and revenues of holy Church the calling of Councels the presiding in Councels the dissolving of Councels the confirming of Councels concerning holy Orders concerning the patronage of and nomination to Ecclesiastical benefices and dignities concerning the Jurisdiction the suspension deposition and ordering of Bishops and Priests and Monks and generally all Persons in holy orders concerning Appeales concerning Religion and the Rites and Ceremonies thereof concerning the Creeds or common Symbols of faith concerning Heresie Schisme Judaisme the suppression of Sects against Swearing Cursing Blaspheming Prophanenesse and Idolatry concerning Sacraments Sanctuaries Simony Marriages Divorces and generally all things which are of Ecclesiastical cognisance wherein he that desires satisfaction and particularly to see how the coercive power of Ecclesiastical Courts and Judges did flow from the gracious concessions of Christian Princes may if he be not too much possessed with prejudice resolve himself by reading the first Book of the Code the Authentiques or Novels of Iustinian the Emperour and the Capitulars of Charles the great and his successours Kings of France We have been requested said Iustinian by Menna the Archbishop of this City beloved of God and universal Patriarch to grant this priviledge to the most reverend Clerkes c. in pecuniary causes referring them first to the Bishop and if he could not compose or determine the difference then to the secular Judge And in criminal causes if the crime were civil to the civil Magistrate if Ecclesiastical to the Bishop By the Councel of our Bishops and Nobles said Charles the great we have Ordained Bishops throughout the Cities that is we have commanded and authorized it to be done And do decree to assemble a Synod every year that in our presence the Canonical decrees and Lawes of the Church may be restored I beseech you what did our King Henry and the Church of England more at the reformation It is true Soveraign Princes are not said properly to make Canons because they do not prescribe them
that by which it was acquired I say in this our case there can be no doubt at all And yet it can much lesse be doubted whether a Soveraign Prince with a National Synod may remedy the incroachments and usurpations of the Roman Court within his own dominions or exclude new Creeds and new Articles of faith lately devised and obtruded contrary to the determination of the General Councel of Ephesus of which let us hear what is Doctor Holdens opinion Notum est inter Catholicos omnes tanquans axioma certissimum c. It is known that all Catholicks do hold this as a most certain axiome that nothing ought or may be maintained for a Christian revealed truth but that which was received by our Ancestors and delivered from one generation to another by continued succession from the times of the Apostles This is all that we have done and done it with due submission to the highest Judge of Ecclesiastical controversies upon earth that is a general Councel If the Court of Rome will be humorous like little children who because they cannot have some toy that they have a mind to do cast away all that their parents have given them we cannot help it Over and above all the former grounds which the Romanists themselves do in some sort acknowledge I propose this further that Patriarchal power in external things is subject and subordinate to Imperial When Mauritius the Emperour had made a Law that no Souldier should turn Monk untill his warfare were accomplished St. Gregory Bishop of Rome disliked the Law and represented his sense of it to the Emperour but withall according to his duty published it Ego quidem missioni subjectus eandem legem per diversas terrarum partes transmitto quia lex ipsa omnipotenti deo minime concordat Ecce per suggestionis meae paginam dominis nunciavi utrobique ergo quae debui exolvi qui Imperatori obedientiam praebui pro deo quid sensi minime tacui I being subject to your command have transmitted your Law to be published through diverse parts of the world And because the Law itself is not pleasing to Almighty God I have represented my opinion thereof to my Lords wherefore I have performed my duty on both sides in yeelding obedience to the Emperour and not concealing what I thought for God A most rare and Christian president of that great Patriarch and fit for our observation and imitation in these dayes He acknowledged the Emperour to be his Lord and himself to be subject to his commands And though no humane invention can warrant an act that is Morally evil in it self yet if it be onely impeditive of a greater good as that blessed Saint did take this Law to be the command of a Soveraign doth weigh down the scale and obligeth a Patriarch to obedience in a matter that concerns Religion How much more doth the command of the English Monarch and the English Church disoblige an English subject from a forrein Patriarch whose Original right is but humane at the most and in the case in question between Rome and England none at all But to come up yet closer to the question The general Councels of Constantinople and Chalcedon with the presence concurrence and confirmation of Theodosius the great Martian the Emperours notwithstanding the opposition of the Roman Bishop by his Legates did advance the Bishop of Constantinople from being a poore Suffragan under the Metropolitan of Heraclea to be the second Patriarch and equal in dignity power and all manner of priviledges to the first and assigned unto him for his Patriarchate Pontus and Asia the lesse and Thracia and some other countries part of which territories they substracted from the obedience of the Roman Bishop at least over which the Roman Bishops challenged Jurisdiction and part from other Patriarchs And the reason of this alteration was the same for which Caesarea of old was a long time preferred before Hierusalem and Alexandria before Antioch and Rome before all others to conform the Ecclesiasticall regiment to the Politicall because Constantinople was made of a mean City the seat of the Eastern Empire and had as many Diocesses and Provinces subject unto it as old Rome it self But lest it may be conceived that this was not done at all by Imperial power but by the authority of the Oecumenical Synods we may observe further that Iustiniâ—n the Emperour by his sole Soveraign Legislative power did new-found the Patriarchate of Iustiniana prima and assign a province unto it and indow it with most ample priviledges freeing it from all appeals and all acknowledgment of superiority giving the Bishop thereof equal power with that which the Bishop of Rome had in his Patriarchate The same priviledges and prerogatives were given by the same Emperour by the same Legislative authority to the Bishop of Carthage notwithstanding that the Bishops of Rome did alwayes pretend that Carthage was under their Jurisdiction I deny not that Vigilius and Gregory succeeding Popes did make deputations to the Bishop of Iustiniana to supply their places But this was but an old Roman fineness The Bishops of Iustiniana needed none of their Commissions Iustinian the Father and founder of the Imperial Law knew well enough how far his Legislative power did extend And though the Act was notorious the whole world and inserted into the body of the Law yet the Fathers of that age did not complain of any innovation or usurpation or breach of their priviledges or violation of their rights King Henry the Eight had the same Imperial power and was as much a Soveraign in his own Kingdomes as Iustinian the Emperour in his larger Dominions as William Rufus Son and successor of the Conqerour said most truly that the Kings of England have all those liberties in their own Kingdomes which the Emperours had in the Empire and had as much authority to exempt his own subjects from the Jurisdiction of one Patriarch and transferre them to another especially with the advise consent and concurrence of a National Synod So King Arthur his predecessor removed the Primacy from Caâ—rleon to Saint Davids and another of them to Canterbury for the advantage of their subjects according to the exigence of the times If the Pope had been the King of Englands Subject as former Popes were the Emperours he might have served him as they did some of his predecessours called a Councel regulated him and reduced him to order and reason or if he proved incorrigible have deposed him But the Pope being a stranger all that he could justly do was what he did rather then to see his royall prerogative daily trampled upon his Lawes destroyed his Subjects oppressed rather then to have new Articles of faith daily obtruded upon the English Church rather then to incur the peril of willful Idolatry against conscience and therefore formal to Cashier the Roman Court with all their pardons and
the time of his health and upon his death-bed for which he was stiled Romanorum malleus The hammer of the Romans whereby he so much irritated the Pope that he would have deposed him and accursed him in his life time if he had not been disswaded by his Cardinals in respect of the learning and holinesse and deserved reputation of the Bishop And after his death would have had his Corps disinterred and buried in a dunghill but that the Bishop appeared to him the night before and gave him or seemed to give him such a shrewd remembrance partly with words and partly with his crosier staffe that the Pope was much terrified and half dead so that he could neither eat nor drink the day following The Pope excommunicated Sewalus the Archbishop of York with Bell Book and Candle But non curavit voluntati papale relicto Iuris rigare muliebriter obedire Quapropter quantâ— magis praecipient Papa maledicebatur tanto plus a populo benedicebatur tacite tamen propter metum Romanorum He cared not to submit womanishly to the Popes will leaving the streight rule of the Law wherefore the more he was accused by the Popes command the more he was blessed of the People but secretly for fear of the Romans In his last sicknesse he summoned the Pope before the Tribunall of the high and incorruptible Judge and called Heaven and Earth to be his witnesses how unjustly the Pope had oppressed him Dixit Dominus Petro c. The Lord said unto St. Peter feed my sheep not clip them not flea them not unbowell them not devoure them They who desire to know what opinion the English had of the greedinesse and extortion of the Court of Rome may find them drawn out to the life by Chaucer in sundry places Such thriving Alchymists were never heard of in our daies nor in the daies of our fore-Fathers that with such ease and dexterity could change an ounce of lead into a pound of gold So they had great reason to say of England that it was a Well that could not be drawn dry And England had as much reason to whip these Buyers and Sellers out of the Temple This complaint is neither new nor particular as we shall see further in due place The second ground of our Ancestors separation of themselves from the Court of Rome were their most unjust usurpations and daily incroachments and intrenchments and extream violations of all sorts of rights civill and Ecclesiastical sacred and prophane They indeavoured to rob the King of the fairest flowers of his Crown As of his right to convocare Synods and to confirm Synods within his own dominions of his Legislative and judiciary power in Ecclesiasticall causes of his Politicall Jurisdiction over Ecclesiastical persons of his Ecclesiasticall Feuds and Investitures of Bishops of his just Patronages of Churches founded by his Ancestors and of the last appeals of his subjects And as if all this had been too little taking advantage of King Iohns troubles they attempted to make the royall Scâ—pter of England Feudotary and tributary to the Crosier staffe of Rome at the annuall rent of a thousand marks Neither is this the case of England alone seeing they make the like pretensions in matter of fact almost to all Europe To say nothing now of that Dominion which some of them have challenged indirectly others directly over Soveraign Princes Nos imperia regna principatus et quicquid habere mortales possunt auâ—erre et dare posse We have power to take away and to give Empires Kingdoms Principalities and whatsoever mortal men can have because I confesse that it is not generally received by the Roman Church Mr. Blackwell made Archpriest of England by Clement the eighth cites Cardinall Allen with much honour to his memorie but much scandalized at his doctrine that none can be admitted King of England without the Popes leave His words are these Without the approbation of the See Apostolique none can be lawfull King or Queen of England by reason of the ancient accord made between Alexander the third the year 1171. and Henry the second then King when he was absolved for the death of St. Thomas of Canterbury That no man might lawfully take that Crown nor be accounted as King till he were confirmed by the Soveraign Pastor of our souls which for the time should be This accord afterwards being renewed about the year 1210. by King Iohn who confirmed the same by oath to Pandulphus the Popes Legate at the speciall request and procurement of the Lords and Commons as a thing most necessary for preservation of the Realm from unjust usurpation of Tyrants and avoiding other inconveniences which they had proved and might easily fall again into by the disorder of some wicked King To which he adds with the like disapprobation a like testimony of Stanislaus Christa novic a Polonian author who infers upon the former ground that the Pope may depose the King of England as being but a tributary King his words are these Illud impie Legislatores per jusjurandum extorquent a Catholicis c. The law-makers do impiously by an oath extort this from Catholicks to deny that the King may be deposed by the Pope and his Kingdomes and Countries by him disposed of For if by an Honourable and pious grant the Kingdome hav become tributary to the Pope why may he not dispose of it Why may he not depose the Prince being refractory and disobedient Thus a bold stranger altogether ignorant of our histories and of our lawes shoots his bolt at all adventures upon the credit of a shamefull fiction but from whom did they learn this lesson even from the Pope himself Bishop Grosthead had been a little bold with the Pope for his extorting courses calling him Antichrist and murtherer of Souls and comparing the Court of Rome to Behemoth that putteth his mouth to the river Jordan thinking to drink it up and stiling the oppression of the English Nation an Aegiptian Bondage He had good reason for the Court of Rome in those daies was grown past shame rubore deposito and consequently past grace The Pope irritated with this usage breaks out into this passionate expression Nonne Rex Anglorum noster est Vasallus et ut plus dicam mancipium Is not the King of England our Vassal or rather our Slave Or rather are these fit guests to be entertained in a Kingdom that make no more of our Soveraign Princes then their Vassals and Slaves who can neither be admitted to the Crown without their leave nor hold it but by their grace This relation of Cardinal Allen brings to my remembrance the question of Neoptolemus to Vlisses when he should have taught him the Art of lying how it was possible for one to tell a lie without blushing The Arch-Priest is much more ingenuous affirming that the assertions touching both the said Kings for matter of fact
were untrue That Henry the second never made any such accord with Alexander the third for ought that he could ever read in any Chronicle of Credit Then the oath which Henry the second did take for himself not for his heires was this that he would not depart from him or his successours so long as they should intreat him as a Catholick King That the fact of King John is of more probability but of as little truth which he confirmes by the testimony of Sir Thomas Moore a Lord Chancellour of England a man of Extraordinary learning of great parts of so good affections to the Roman See that he is supposed to have died for the Popes Supremacy and is commended by Cardinall Bellarmine to Mr. Blackwell as a Martyr and a guide of many others to Martyrdom cum ingenti Anglica nationis gloria certainly one who had as much means to know the truth both by view of records and otherwise as any man living Thus writeth he If he the author of the beggars supplication say as indeed some writers say that King John made England and Ireland tributary to the Pope and the See Apostolique by the grant of a thousand Markes we dare surely say again that it is untrue and that all Rome neither can shew such a grant nor ever could And if they could it were nothing worth For never could any king of England give away the Realm to the Pope or make the Land tributary though he would As to that of Henry the second without doubt the Archpriest had all the reason in the world for him Cardinall Allen did not write by inspiration and could expect no more credit then he brought authority There is a vast difference between these two that no man shall be accounted King of England untill he be confirmed by the Pope And this other that the King in his own person would not desert the Pope so long as he intreated him like a Catholick King The former is most dishonourable to the Nation and Diametrally opposite to the fundamental Lawes of the Land The later we might take our selves without offence to God or our own consciences But to make our Kings their vassals aud their slaves to impoverish their Realm and to commit all those exorbitant misdemeanours against them which we have related in part and shall yet describe more fully was neither to intreat them like Catholick Kings nor like Christian Kings nor yet like political Kings And for his Saint Thomas of Canterbury we do not believe that the Popes Canonisation or to have his name inserted into the Calender in red letters makes a Saint We do abhominate that murther as Lawlesse and Barbarous to sprinkle not onely the pavements of the Church but the very altar with the blood of a Prelate And we condemn all those who had an hand in it But we do not believe that the cause of his suffering was sufficient to make him a Martyr namely to help forraignâ—rs to pull the fairest flowers from his Princes Diadem by violence and to perjure himself and violate his oath given for the observation of the Articles of Clarendon All his own Suffragan Bishops were against him in the cause and justified the Kings proceedings as appeareth by two of their letters one to himself the other to Pope Alexander the third The Barons of the Kingdom reputed him as a Traitor quo progrederis Proditor Expecta et audi judicium tuum Whither goest thou Traitor stay and hear thy judgment This is certain The first time that ever any Pope did challenge the right of investitures in England was in the dayes of Henry the first and Paschal the second was the first Pope that ever exacted an oath from any forraign Bishop above Eleven hundred years after Christ. Before that time they evermore swore fealty to their Prince de Homagiis de Feudis de sacramentis Episcoporum Laicis antea exhibitis There was great consultation about the homage and Fealty and oaths of Bishops in former ages sworn to Lay-men These new articles of faith are too young to make Martyrs Concerning the secoÌ„d instance of King Iohn though I attribute much to the authority of Sir Thomas More in that case who would never have been so confident unlesse he had supposed that he had searched the matter to the bottom yet his zeal to the Papacy and his unwillingnesse to see such an unworthy act proceed from that See might perhaps mislead him for I confesse sundry authours do relate the case otherwise That there was a Prophesie or Prediction made by one Peter an Hermite that the next day to Ascension sunday there should be no King in England That Pope Innocent the third being angry with King Iohn excommunicated him interdicted the Kingdom deprived him of his Crown absolved his subjects from their allegiance animated his Barons and Bishops against him gave away his Realm to Philip King of France sent Pandolphus as his Legate into England to see all this executed The King of France provides an Army accordingly But the crafty Pope underhand gives his Legate secret instructions to speak privatly with King Iohn And if he could make a better bargain for him and draw him to submit to the sentence of the Pope he should act nothing against him but in his favour They do meete King Iohn submits The Pope orders him to resign his Crown and Kingdomes to the See of Rome so they say he did and received them the next day of the Popes grace as a feudatary at the yearly rent of a thousand Marks for the Kingdoms of England and Ireland And did homage and swear fealty to Pope Innocent But whereas the Cardinal adds upon his own head that this was done at the special request and procurement of the Lords and Commons it is an Egregious forgery and well deserves a whetstone for all the three Orders of the kingdom Bishops Barons and Commons did protest against it in Parliament notwithstanding any private contract that might be made by King Iohn And that they would defend themselves by arms from the temporal Jurisdiction of the Pope But the other answer of Sr. Thomas More is most certain and beyond all exception that if either Henry the second or King Iohn had done any such thing it was not worth a rush nor signified any thing but the greedinesse and prophanenesse of these pretended vicars of Christ who prostituted and abused their Office and the power of the Keies to serve their base and avaritious ends and lets the world see how well they deserved to be thrust out of doores What That no man might be crowned or accounted King of England untill he were confirmed by the Pope By the Law of England Rex non moritur the King never dies And doth all acts of Soveraignty before his Coronation as well as after They robbed the Nobility of their patronages Those Churches which their Ancestours had founded and
any the least particle of divine right if there had been any such Nor could they justly be accused of violating that humane right which had been quitted long before nor be blamed rightly for denying obedience to him from whose Jurisdiction they were exempted by the Canon of an Oecumenical Councel and who had himself implicitely renounced that Ecclesiastical right which he held from the Church Perhaps some may conceive a defect in the manner of proceeding of the King and Church of England that they did not first make a Remonstrance of their grievances and seek redresse of the Pope himself So the Councel of Towers thought it fit Visum est tamen Concilio ante omnia mittendos Legatos ad D. Papam Julium c. It seemeth good to the Councel that in the first place messengers be sent from the French Church to the Pope who may admonish him with brotherly love and according to the Evangelical form of correction to desist from his attempts and to imbrace peace and concord with the Princes But if he will not hear the messengers let him be demanded to convocate a free Councel according to the decrees of the holy Councel of Basile And this being done and his answer received further provision shall be made according to right To this I answer first That it had been reasonable and just indeed that we had made our first addresse to the Pope if we acknowledged the Roman Bishop to be our lawful Patriarch But the same respect is not due to an usurper Secondly we have seen by frequent experience how vain and fruitlesse such addresses have proved from time to to time According to the former advise of the Councel of Towers the King of France sent Ambassadors to Rome but the Pope refused to hear them or to convocate any Councel and before his death Anathematized Maximilian King of the Romans the Kings of France and of Navarre and divers other Princes Cardinals and Bishops deprived the Kings and Princes of their respective Realms and Principalities the Bishops of their dignities and benefices and gave their Kingdoms and Principalities to the first that could take them from which sentence they appealed to a future Councel The most ancient arbitrary imposition of the Popes upon the British Churches was the Pall an honourable and at first innocent ensign of an Archbishop otherwise of no great moment first introduced in the reigns of the Saxon Kings after the six hundreth year of Christ But in process of time it became vendible and a great summe was exacted for it whereof Canutus long since complained at Rome and had remedy promised as he well deserved of that See But how well it was observed the experience of after-ages doth manifest when both the price was augmented and withall an oath of allegiance to the Pope imposed Electo in Archiepiscopum sedes Apostolica pallium non tradet â—isi prius praesteâ— fidelitatis et obedientiae juramentum The See Apostolique will not deliver the Pall to an elect Archbishop unlesse he first swear fidelity and obedience to the Pope what was become of their old oath of allegiance to their King In the year 1245. the King the Lords spiritual and temporal and the whole Common-Wealth of England joyned together unanimously in a complaint and exhibited their grievances to Rome that the Pope extorted more then his Peter-pence out of the Kingdom contrary to law that the Patrons of Churches were defrauded of their rights strangers preferred souls endangered their bullion exported the Kingdome impoverished provisions made pensions exacted That the English were drawn out of the Realm by the authority of the Pope contrary to the customes of the Kingdom They complained of the coming among them of the Popes infamous messenger non obstante by which oaths customes writings grants statutes rights priviledges were not only weakened but exinanited They complained of collections without the Kings leave that hospitality was not kept the poor not sustained the Word not preached Churches not adorned the cure of souls neglected divine offices not performed and Churches ruined by the abuses of the Papal Court I cannot omit one clause in the letter of the Lords to the Pope Nisi de gravaminibus domino Regi et regno illatis Rex et râ—gnum citiùs liberentur oportebit nos ponere murum pro domâ— Domini et libertate regni Quod quidem ob Apostolicae sedis reverentiam hucusque facere distuliâ—us Vnlesse the King and Kingdom be quickly freed from these grievances we must make a wall of defence or partition for the house of the Lord and the liberty of the Kingdom which we have hitherto forborn to do out of our reverend respect of the Apostolique See They seem to allude to that wall which Severus made to save the Kingdom from the incursions of the Scots and Picts Surely that was not more necessary then than that wall of partition which Henry the eighth made afterwards to save the Realm from the affronts and extortions and injuries of the Roman Court. Neither did they make their addresses to the Pope alone but to the Councel of Lyons by the Procters of the whole Nobility and Commonalty of England for redresse of the violent oppressions intolerable grievances and impudent exactions which were practised in England by meanes of that hateful clause non obstante too often inserted in the Popes letters They represented that there were so many Italians for the most part ignorant and unlearned that understood not one English word nor did ever tread upon English ground beneficed among them that their yearly revenue exceeded the revenue of the Crown Neither did they complain onely but threaten and swear that they would not permit such abuses for the future But what ease did the poore English find by complaining to the Pope either in Councel or out of Councel Martine the Popes Commissioner for he could not send a Legate without the Kings consent extorts excommunicates interdicts the Pope himself is angry because like sturdy children they durst cry and whimper when they were beaten and perswades the King of France to invade England and either to depose the King or subject him to the Court of Rome which lost the Pope the heart of the English The King told them that their King began to kick against him and play the Frederick And they threatened that if he persisted they should be forced to do that which would make his heart ake After this Edward the third made his addresses likewise to Rome for remedy of grievances in the year 1343. How did he speed No better then his Great grandfather Henry the third The Pope was offended and termed his modest expostulation rebellion But that wise and magnanimous Prince was not daunted with words to requite their invectives he made the statutes of Provisoes and praemunire directly against the incroachments and usurpations of the Court of Rome Whereby he so abated their power
respect of their errours and especially their tyrannical exactions and usurpations but unwillingly and with reluctation in respect of their persons and much more in respect of our common Saviour As if we were to depart from our fathers or our brothers house or rather from some contagious sicknesse wherewith it was infected Not forgetting to pray God daily to restore them to their former purity that they and we may once again enjoy the comfort and contentment of one anothers Christian Society We pray for their conversion publickly in our Letany in general And expressely and solemnly upon Good Friday though we know that they do as solemnly curse us the day before If this be to be Schismaticks it were no ill wish for Christendome that there were many more such Schismaticks Thirdly we do not arrogate to our selves either a new Church or a new Religion or new holy orders for then we must produce new miracles new revelations and new cloven tongues for our justification Our Religion is the same it was our Church the same it was our holy orders the same they were in substance differing onely from what they were formerly as a garden weeded from a garden unweeded or a body purged from it self before it was purged And therefore as we presume not to make new Articles of faith much lesse to obtrude such innovations upon others so we are not willing to receive them from others or to mingle Scholastical opinions with fundamental truths Which hath given occasion to some to call our Religion a negative religion Not considering that our positive articles are those general truths about which there is no controversie Our negation is onely of humane controverted additions Lastly we are ready in the preparation of our mindes to believe and practise whatsoever the Catholick Church even of this present age doth universally and unanimously believe and practice Quod apud multos unum invenitur non est errâ—tum sed traditum And though it be neither lawful nor possible for us to hold actual communion with all sorts of Christians in all things wherein they vary both from the truth and one from another yet even in those things we hold a communion with them in our desires longing for their conversion and re-union with us in truth CHAP. VII That all Princes and Republiques of the Roman Communion do in effect the same thing when they have occasion or at least do plead for it SO we are come to our fifth Conclusion That whatsoever the King and Church of England did in the separation of themselves from the Court of Rome it is no more then all Sovereign Princes and Churches none of whatsoever communion excepted do practise or pretend as often as they have occasion And first for all Protestant Kings Princes and Republicks it admits no deniall or dispute Secondly for the Grecian and all other Eastern Churches it can be no more doubted of then of the Protestants since they never acknowledged any obedience to be due from them to the Bishop of Rome but onely an honourable respect as to the prime Patriarch and beginning of unity Whose farewell or separation is said to have been as smart as ours and upon the same grounds in these words We acknowledge thy power we cannot satisfie thy covetousnesse live by your selves But my aim extends higher to verifie this of the Roman Catholick Princes and Republicks themselves as the Emperour the most Christian and Catholick Kings the Republick of Venice and others To begin with the Emperours I do not mean those ancient Christian Primitive Emperours who lived and flourished before the daies of Gregory the Great Such a Court of Rome as we made our secession from was not then in being nor the Colledge of Parish Priests at Rome turned then into a Conclave of Cardinals as Ecclesiastical Princes of the Oecumenical Church So long there was no need of any separation from them or protestation against them But I intend the later Emperours since Gregorie's time after the Popes sought to usurp an universal Sovereignty over the Catholick Church and more particularly the Occidental that is to say the French and German Emperours Yet the Reader may be pleased to take notice that the case of our Kings is much different from theirs in two respects First they believed the Roman Bishop to be their lawful Patriarch whether justly or not is not the subject of this present discourse But we do utterly deny his Patriarchal authority over us And to demonstrate our exemption do produce for matter of right that famous Canon of the General Councel of Ephesus made in the case of the Cyprian Bishops and for matter of fact the unanimous Votes of two British Synods and the concurrent testimonies of all our Historiographers Some have been formerly cited We might adde to them the ancient British history called by the Author thereof Brutus wherein he relates this answer of the British to Augustine Se Caerleonensi Archiepiscopo obedire voluisse Augustino autem Romano Legato omninâ— noluisse nec Anglis inimicis paulò antè Paganis à quibus suis sedibus pulsi erant subesse se qui semper Christianifuerunt voluisse That they would obey the Archbishop of Caerleon that was their British Primate or Patriarch but they would not obey Austine the Bishop of Romes Legate Neither would the Britanes who had evermore been Christians from the beginning be under the English who were their enemies and but newly converted from Paganisâ—e by whom they had been driven out of their ancient habitations The same history is related by sundry other very ancient Authours A second difference between our English Kings and the later German Emperours is this that our Kings by the fundamental constitutions of the Kingdome are hereditary Kings and never die So there is an uninterrupted succession without any vacancy But the Emperours are elective and consequently not invested in the actual possession of their Sovereignty without some publick solemnities Whereof some are essential as the votes of the Electours some others ceremonial as the last Coronation of the Emperour by the Bishop of Rome which was really and is yet titularly his Imperial City But the Popes who had learned to make their own advantage of every thing sacred or civil took occasion from hence to make the world believe that the Imperial Crown was their gift and the Emperours their Liegemen So Adrian the fourth doubted not to write to Frederick Barbarossa the Emperour Insigne corona beneficium tibi contulimus which was so offensively taken that as the German Bishops in their letter to the same Pope do affirm the whole Empire was moved at it the eaâ—es of his Imperial Majestie could not hear it with patience nor the Princes endure it nor they themselves either durst of could approve it Whereupon the Pope was forced to expound himself that by beneficium he meant nothing but bonum factum a good deed and by contulimus
added further That they were but granted for a certain term which was effluxed The hundred Grievances rest not here but say moreover that they were but deposited at Rome to be preserved faithfully for that use And lastly Charles the fifth in his Rescript tells the Pope That other Kings do not suffer the spoyles of the Churches and Annates to be transported out of their Kingdoms to Rome so universally and so abundantly Seventhly to draw to a conclusion Henry the eighth imposed an oath of fidelity or allegiance upon his Subjects Ecclesiastical as well as temporal So did Frederick the first Emperour of that name I swear that from henceforth I will be faithful to my Liege Lord Frederick the Emperour of the Romans against all men the Pope is included or rather intended principally as by Law I am bound And I will help him to retain his Imperiall Crown and all his honour in Italy c. Henry the eighth took away Popish pardons and indulgences and dispensations The German Nation likewise groaned under the burthen of them Among their hundred grievances that of dispensations was the first And that of Papal Indulgences the third either for sins past or to come modo tinneat dextrâ it is their own phrase They call these artifices meer impostures by which the very marrow of Germaâ—y was sucked up their ancient liberty was enervated and the merit of Christs passion became sleighted Lastly Henry the eighth abolished the usurped jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome within his Dominions The Emperours did not so whether they thought it not fit to leave an old Patriarch Or because they did not sufficiently consider the right bounds of Imperial power especially being seconded with the authority of an Occidental Councel or because they did not so clearly distinguish between a beginning of unity and an universality of Jurisdiction or because they had other remedies wherewith to help themselves I cannot determine But this we have seen That the Emperours have deposed Popes and have appealed from Popes to General Councels And have maintained their Imperial prerogatives against Popes and made themselves the last Judges of the liberties and necessities of the whole body Politique Frederick the third in the Dyet of Nurenburg sequestred all the moneys that should be raised in three years from Indulgences and absolutions whether Papal or Conciliary towards the raising of twenty thousand men for defence of the Empire against the Turk The resolution of the Elect Arch-Bishop of Trevers against Gregory the 7th was this Ne plus per hunc Sancta quae modo extremum traâ—it spiritum periclitâ—tur Ecclesia ex me dicâ— quod nullam ei posthac obedientiam servabo c. Lest the holy Church which is now brought to the last gasp incurre more danger by his means I speak of my self that hereafter I will perform no obedience to him that is Pope Hildebrand Neither was this his resolution alone All the German Bishops were of the same mind Because thy entrance into the Papacy was begun with so great perjuries And the Church of God is brought into such a grievous storm through the abuse of thy innovations and thy life and conversation is soiled with so manifold infamy As we promised thee no obedience so we let thee know that for the future we will perform none unto thee Et quia nemo nostrum ut publice declamas tibi hactenus â—uit Episcopus ita nulli nostrum â— modo eris Apostolicus And as thou hast reputed none of us for Bishops hitherto So hereafter none of us will esteem thee for the Successour of Saint Peter Which sentence was confirmed by the Emperour Ego Henricus Rex cum omnibus Episcopis meis tibi dico Deseâ—nde descende The first Councel of Pisa did not onely substract their obedience from Peter de Luna calling himself Benedict the 13th and Angelus de Gorario calling himself Gregory the 12th But they decreed that it was lawful for all Christians and accordingly did command them to substract their obedience from them Of which Councel the Councel of Constance was a continuation The second Councel of Pisa suspended Iulius the second from the Papacy and commanded all Christians to withdraw their obedience from him The former had the consent of the Emperour The later his assistance and protection as appeareth both by the solemn promise of the Emperours Ambassadours made in Councel and the acknowledgment of the Councel it self I will conclude this first part of my parallell concerning the Empire with two answers of German Bishops The first of the German and French to Anastasius the second wherein they tell him plainly that they did not understand that new compassion which the Italian Physicians used to cure the infirmities of France They â—axe them for seeking to restrain the absolution of souls to Rome They require that Italian Bishop that is without sin to cast the first stone at them They advise them not to use their pretended authority against their Bishops lest the blow should recoile upon themselves for that theirs had not learned to fear above that which was needfull they tell them that surely they in Italy think that the Galles had lost all these three Verbum ferrum ingenium their tongues their wits and their weapons And so they conclude Etiamsi inclinata esset arca testamenti nostri nostrorum Episcoporum esset non illorum inclinatam relevare Although the arke of their Covenant was falling yet it belonged to their own Bishops and not to them to lift it up again The other answer was of the Archbishops of Colone and Triers with the Synod of Coloegne to Nicholas the first Wherein after many bitter expressions they have these words His de causis nos cum fratribus nostris collegis neque edictis tuis stamus neque vocem tuam agnoscimus nequo tuas bullas tonitruaque tua timemus For these reasons we with our brethren and collegues do neither give place to thy edicts nor acknowledge thy voyce nor fear thy thundring bulles I expect that some will be ready to object that these substractions were but personal from the present Pope not from the See of Rome which is true in part But the same equity and rule of justice which warrants a separation from the person of the Pope for personal faults doth also justifie a more durable separation from the See of Rome that is from him and his Successours for faulty rules and principles either in doctrine or discipline untill they be reformed From Germany our passe is open into France where the case is as clear as the Sun how their Kings though acknowledged by the Popes themselves to be most Christian the eldest Sons of the Church and otherwise the great Patrons and Protectours of the Romane See with their Princes of the blood their Peers their Parliaments their Ambassodours their Schools and Universities have all of them in
the free and just speech of a French Bishop When Henry the fourth had in a manner ended the civill Wars of France by changing from the Protestant to the Roman Catholique Communion Yet the Pope who favoured the contrary party upon pretence of his dissimulation and great dangers that might ensue thereupon for a long time deferred his reconciliation untill the French Prelates by their own authority did first admit him into the bosome of the Church At which time one of them used this discourse Was France all on fire and had they not Rivers enough at home but they must run as far as Rome to Tybur to fetch water to quench it Since that in Cardinal Richlieu's daies it is well known what books were freely printed and publickly sold upon pont neuf of the lawfulnesse of erecting a new or rather restoring an old proper Patriarchate in France as one of the liberties of the Gallicane Church It was well for the Roman Court that they became more propitious to the French affaires Take one instance more which happened very lately The Pope refused to admit any new Bishops in Portugal upon the nomination of the present King because he would not thereby seem to acknowledge or approve his title to the Crown in prejudice of the King of Spain whereby the Episcopal order in Portugal and the other Dominions belonging to that Crown was well near extinguished and scarcely so many Bishops were left alive or could not be drawn together as to make a Canonical Ordination The three Orders of Portugal did represent to the Pope that in the Kingdomes of Portugal and the Algarbians wherein ought to have been three Metropolitans and ten Suffragans there was but one left and he by the Popes dispensation non-Residenâ— And in all the Asâ—atique Provinces but one other and he both sickly and decrepit And in all the African and American Provinces and the Islands not one surviving But the Pope continued inexorable whereupon theyâ— present their request to their neighbours and friends the French Prelates beseeching them to mediate for them with his Holinesse And if he continue still obstinately deaf to their just petition to supply his defect themselves and to Ordain them Bishops in case of necessity The French did the Office of Neighbours and Christians The Synode of the French Clergy did write to the Pope on their behalf in April 1651. But that way not succeeding they sent one of their Bishops as an expresse Envoié to his Holinesse to let him know that if he still refused they cannot nor will be wanting to themselves to their neighbours but would supply his defect what the issue of it is since I have not yet heard But to leave matter of fact and to come to the fundamental Lawes and Customes of France Every one hath heard of the liberties of the French Church but every one understands not what those liberties are as being better known by their practice at home then by Books abroad I will onely select some of them out of their own authentique authorities And when the Reader hath considered well of them let him judge what authority the Pope hath in France more then discretionary at the good pleasure of the King or more then he might have had in other places if he could have contented himself with reason Protestants are not so undiscreet or uncharitable as to violate the peace of Christendom for a primacy or headship of order without superiority of power or for the name of his Holinesse Or for a Pall if the price were not too high Or for a few innocent formalities 1. The Pope cannot command or ordain any thing directly or indirectly concerning any temporal affairs within the dominions of the King of France 2. The spiritual authority and power of the Pope is not absolute in France but limited and restrained by the Canons and Rules of the ancient Councâ—ls of the Church received in that Kingdom Where observe first that the Pope can do nothing in France as a Sovereign Spiritual Prince with his non obstantes either against the Canons or besides the Canons Secondly that the Canons are no Canons in France except they be received This â—ame priviledge was anciently radicated in the fundamental Lawes of England This priviledge the Popes indeavoured to pluck up by the roots And the contentions about this priviledge were one principal occasion of the separation 3. No command whatsoever of the Pope can free the French Clergy from their obligation to obey the commands of their Sovereign 4. The most Christian King hath had power at all times according to the occurrence and exigence of affairs to assemble or cause to be assembled Synods Provincial or National and therein to treat not onely of such things as concern the conservation of the Civil estate but also of such things as concern Ecclesiastical order and discipline in his own dominions And therein to make Rules Chapters Lawes Ordinances and pragmatique sanctions in his own name by his own authority Many of which have been received among the decrees of the Catholick Church and some of them approved by general Councels 5. The Pope cannot send a Legate à latere into France with power to reform judge collate dispense or do such other things accustomed to be specified in the authoritative Bull of his Legation except it be upon the desire or with the approbation of the most Christian King Neither can the said Legate execute his charge untill he hath promised the King in writing under his oath upon his holy orders not to make use of his Legantine power in the Kings Dominions longer then it shall please the King And that so soon as he shall be admonished of the Kings pleasure to forbid it he will give it over And that whilest he doth use it it shall be exercised conformably to the Kings will without attempting any thing to the prejudice of the decrees of Generall Councels or the liberties and priviledges of the Gallicane Church and the Universities of France 6. The Commissions and Bulls of the Popes Legates are to be seen examined and approved by the Court of Parliament And to be registred and published with such Cautions and modifications as that Court shall judge expedient for the good of the Kingdome and to be executed according to the said cautions and not otherwise 7. The Prelates of the French Church although commanded by the Pope for what cause soever it be may not depart out of the Kingdom without the Kings Commandment of License 8. The Pope can neither by himself nor by his Delegates judge of any thing which concerneth the state preheminence or priviledges of the Crown of France nor of any thing pertaining to it Nor can there be any question or processe about the state or pretensions of the King but in his own Courts 9. Papal Bulls Citations Sentences Excommunications and the like are not to be executed in France without the Kings
Command or permission And after permission onely by authority of the King and not by authority of the Pope to shun confusion and mixture of Jurisdictions 10. Neither the King nor his Realm nor his Officers can be excommunicated or interdicted by the Pope nor his Subjects absolved from their Oath of Allegiance 11. The Pope cannot impose Pensions in France upon any benefices having cure of soules nor upon any others but according to the Canons according to the expresse condition of the resignation or ad redimendum vexationem 12 All Bulls and Missives which come from Rome to France are to be seen and visited to try if there be nothing in them prejudicial in any manner to the estate and liberties of the Church of France or to the Royal authority 13 It is lawful to appeal from the Pope to a future Councel 14 Ecclesiastical persons may be convented judged and sentenced before a secular Judge for the first grievous or enormious crime or for lesser offences after a relapse which renders them incorrigible in the eye of the Law 15. All the Prelates of France are obliged to swear feaâ—ty to the King and to receive from him their investituâ—es for their fees and manours 16. The Courts of Parliament in case of appeales as from abuse have right and power to declare null void and to revoke the Popes Bulls and Excommunications and to forbid the execution of them when they are found contrary to sacred decrees the liberties of the French Church or the prerogative Royal. 17. Generall Councels are above the Pope and may depose him and put another in his place and take cognisance of appeals from the Pope 18. All Bishops have their power immediately from Christ not from the Pope and are equally successours of Saint Peter and the other Apostles and Vicars of Christ. 19. Provisions reservations expectative graces c. have no place in France 20. The Pope cannot exempt any Church Monastery or Ecclesiastical body from the Jurisdiction of their Ordinary nor erect Bishopricks into Archbishopricks nor unite them nor divide them without the Kings Licence 21. All those are not hereticks excommunicated or damned who differ in some things from the doctrine of the Pope who appeal from his decrees and hinder the execution of the ordinances of him or his Legates These are part of the liberties of the Gallicane Church The ancient British Church needed no such particular priviledges since they never knew any forreign Jurisdiction The English British Church which succeeded them in time in place and partly in their members and holy orders ought to have injoyed the same freedom and exemption But in the daies of the Saxon Danish and Norman Kings the Popes did by degrees insinuate themselves into the mesnagery of Ecclesiastical affaires in England Yet for many ages the English Church injoyed all these Gallicane priviledges without any remarkable interruption from the Roman Court. As in truth they do of right by the Law of nature belong to all Sovereign Princes in their own Dominions Otherwise Kingdomes should be destitute of necessary remedies for their own conservation And in later ages when the Popes having thrust in their heads did strive to draw in their whole bodies after the whole Kingdome opposed them and made Lawes against their several grosse intrusions as we have formerly seen in this discourse And never quitted these English as well as Gallicane liberties untill the Reformation But perhaps we may find more loyalty and obedience to the Court of Rome in the Catholick King Not at all Whatsoever power King Henry or any of his Successours did ever assume to themselves in England as the Political Heads of the Church the same and much more doth the Catholique King not onely pretend unto but exercise and put in practice in his Kingdome of Sicily both by himself by his Delegates whom he substitutes with the same authority to judge and punish all Ecclesiastical crimes to excommunicate and absolve all Ecclesiastical persons Lay-men Monks Clerks Abbats Bishops Archbishops yea and even the Cardinals themselves which inhabit in Sicily He suffers no appeals to Rome He admits no Nuncio's from Rome Atque demum respâ—ctâ— Ecclesiasticae Iurisdictionis neque ipsam Apostolicam sedem recognoscere hâ—bâ—re superiorem nisi in casu praevenâ—ionis And to conclude he acknowledgeth not any superiority of the Sâ—e of Rome it sâ—lf but onely in case of prevention What saith Baronius to this He complains bitterly that praetensa Apostolica authoritate contra Apostolicam ipsam sedem grande piaculum perpetratur c. Vpon pretence of Apostolique authority a grievous offence is committed against the Apostolick See the power whereof is weaknâ—d in the Kingdome of Sicily the authority thereof abrogated the Iurisdiction wronged the Ecclesiastical Lawes violated and the rights of the Church dissipated And a little after he declaimes yet higher Quid in ad ista dixeris lector What wilt thou say to this Reader but that under the name of Monarchy besides that one Monarch which all the faithful have ever acknâ—wledged as the onely visible Head in the Church Another head it risen up and brought into the Kingdome of Sicily for a Monster and a prodigy c. But for this liberty which he took the King of Spain fairly and quietly without taking any notice of his Cardinalitian dignity caused his books to be burned publickly It will be objected That the King of Spain challengeth this power in Sicily not by his Regal authority as a Sovereign Prince but by the Bull of Vrbanus the second who constituted Roger Earl of Sicily and his heires his Legates à latere in that Kingdome whereby all succeeding Princes do challenge to be Legati nati with power to substitute others and qualifie them with the same authority But first if the Papacy be by Divine right what power hath any particular Pope to transfer so great a part of his office and authority from his Successours for ever unto a Lay-man and his heires by way of inheritance If every Pope should do as much for another Kingdom as Vrbanus did for Sicily the Court of Rome would quickly want imployment Secondly if the Bull of Vrbanus the second was so available to the succeeding Kings of Sicily which yet is disputed whether it be authentick or not whether it be full or defective and mutilated why should not the Bull of Nicholas the second his predecessour granted to our Edward the Confessour and his Successours be as advantagious to the succeeding Kings of England why not much rather seeing that they are thereby constituted or declared not Legates but Governours of the English Church in the Popes place or rather in Christs place seeing that without all doubt Sicily was a part of the Popes ancient Patriarchate but Britaigne was not And lastly seeing the situation of Sicily so much nearer to Rome renders the Sicilians more capable of receiving Justice from thence then the English
Thirdly the King of Spain when he pleaseth and when he sees his own time doth not onely pretend unto but assume in his other Dominions that self-same power or essential right of Sovereignty which I plead for in this treatise It is not unknown to the world how indulgent a Father Vrban the eighth was sometimes to the King and Kingdom of France and how passionately he affected the interest of that Crown And by consequence that his eares were deaf to the requests and remonstrances of the King of Spain The Catholique King resents this partiality very highly and threatens the Pope if he persist to provide a remedy for the grievances of his Subjects by his own power Accordingly to make good his word he called a general Assembly of all the Estates of the Kingdome of Castile to consider of the exorbitancies of the Court of Rome in relation to his Majesties Subjects and to consult of the proper remedies thereof They did meet and draw up a memoriall consisting of ten Articles containing the chiefest abuses and innovations and extortions of the Court of Rome in the Kingdom of Castile His Majestie sends it to the Pope by Friar Domingo Pimentell as his Ambassadour The Pope returned a smart answer by Senior Maraldo his Secretary The King replied as sharply All which was afterwards printed by the special command of his Catholick Majesty The summe of their complaint was first concerning the Popes imposing of pensions upon dignities and other benefices Ecclesiastical even those which had cure of soules in favour of strangers in an excessive proportion to the third part of the full value That although benefices were decayed in many places of Spain two third parts of the true value Yet the Court of Rome kept up the Pensions at the full height That it was contrived so that the Pensions did begin long before the beneficiaries entred upon their profits insomuch as they were indebted sometimes two years pensions before they themselves could taste of the fruits of their benefices And then the charge of censures and other proceedings in the Court of Rome fell so heavy upon them that they could never recover themselves And further that whereas all trade is driven in current silver onely the Court of Rome which neither toiles nor sweats nor hazards any thing will be paid onely in Duckates of Gold not after the current rates but according to the old value That to seek for a remedy of these abuses at Rome was such an insupportable charge by reason of three instances and three sentences necessary to be obtained that it was in vain to attempt any such thing This they cried out upon as a most grievous yoak They complained likewise of the Popes granting of Coad jutorships with future succession whereby Ecclesiastical preferments were made hereditary persons of parts and worth were excluded from all hopes and a large gap was opened to most grosse Simony They complained of the Popes admitting of resignations with reservation of the greatest part of the profits of the benefice insomuch that he left not above an hundred Duckats yearly to the Incumbent out of a great benefice They complained most bitterly of the extortions of the Roman Court in the case of dispensations That whereas no dispensation ought to be granted without just cause now there was no cause at all inquired after in the Court of Rome but onely the price That a great price supplied the want of a good cause That the gate was shut to no man that brought money That their dispensations had no limits but the Popes will That for a matrimonial dispensation under the second degree they took of great persons 8000. or 12000. or 14000 Duckats They complained that the Pope being but the Churches Steward and dispenser did take upon him as Lord and Master to dispose of all the rights of all Ecclesiastical persons That he withheld from Bishops being the true owners the sole disposing of all Ecclesiastical preferments for eight monthes in the year That he ought not to provide for his own profit and the necessities of his Court with so great prejudice to the right of Ordinaries and Confusion of the Ecclesiastical order whilest he suffers not Bishops to enjoy their own Patronages and Jurisdictions They cite St. Bernard where he tells Pope Eugenius that the Roman Church whereof he was made Governour by God was the Mother of other Churches but not the Lady or Mistris And that he himself was not the Lord or Master of other Bishops but one of them They complained that the Pope did challenge and usurpe to himself as his own at their deaths all Clergymens estates that were gained or raised out of the revenue of the Church That a rich Clergyman could no sooner fall sick but the Popes Collectors were gaping about him for his goods And guards set presently about his house That by this means Bishops have been deserted upon their deathbeds And famished for want of meat to eat That they have not had before they were dead a Cup left to drink in nor so much as a Candlestick of all their goods It is their own expression That by this means Creditors were defrauded processes in Law were multiplied and great estates wasted to nothing They complained that the Popes did usurp as their own all the revenues of Bishopricks during their vacancies sometimes for divers years together all which time the Churches were unrepaired the poor unrelieved not so much as one almes given And the wealth of Spain exported into a forreign Land which was richer then it self They wish the Pope to take it as an argument of their respect to the See of Rome that they do not go about forthwith to reform these abuses by their own authâ—â—ity in imitation of other Provinces So it was not the unwarrantablenesse of the act in it self but meerly their respect that did withhold them They complained of the great inconveniences and abuses in the exercise of the Nuncio's office That it is reckoned as a curse in holy Scripture to be governed by persons of a different language That for ten Crowns a man might purchase any thing of them That the fees of their office were so great that they alone were a sufficient punishment for a grievous crime They added that self-interest was the root of all these evils That such abuses as these gave occasion to all the Reformations and Schismes of the Church They added That these things did much trouble the mind of his Catholique Majestie And ought to be seriously pondered by all Sovereign Princes qui intra Ecclesiam potestatis adeptae Culmina tenent ut per eandem potestatem disciplinam Ecclesiasticam muniant Behold our Political Supremacy They proceeded that often the heavenly Kingdome is advantaged by the earthly That Church-men acting against faith and right discipline may be reformed by the rigour of Princes Let the Princes of this world know say they that they
owe an account to God of the Church which they have received from him into their protection For whether peace and right Ecclesiastical discipline be increased or decayed by Christian Princes God will require an account from them who hath trusted his Church unto their power They tell his Holinesse it was a work worthy of him to turn all such Courtiers out of his Court who did much hurt by their persons and no good by their examples Adding this distich Vivere qui sanctè cupitis discedite Roma Omnia cum liceant non licet esse bonum And for remedy of these abuses they proposed that the Popes Nuncio's should not meddle with the exercise of Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction but be meerly in the nature of Ambassadours That all Ecclesiastical causes should be determined at home according to the Canons That the Pope should delegate the dispensation of matters of grace to some â—it Commissioners within the Kingdome That Ecclesiastical Courts or Rota's should be â—rected within the Realm wherein all causes should be finally determined without recourse to Rome except in such cases as are allowed by the ancient Canons of the Church Lastly they represented that his Majestie was justly pressed by the continual clamours and reiterated instances of his Subjects to whose assistence and protection he was obliged to contribute whatsoever he was able as their Natural Lord and King to procure their weal with all his might by all just means according to the dictates of natural reason And to remedy the grievances which they â—uffered in their persons and in their goods by occasion of such like abuses not practised in other Kingdomes Especially this propositâ—on being so conformable to the Apostolical precepts and to the sacred Canons of Councels They tell the Pope that their first addresse is to him to whom as universal Pastour the Reformation thereof doth most properly belong that there might be no need to proceed to other remedies prescribed by the Doctours of the Church And in the margent they cite more then twenty several Authours to shew what the Magistrate might do in case the Pope should refuse or neglect to reform these abuses So you see they confessed plainly that there were other lawful remedies And intimated sufficiently that they must proceed to the use of them in case the Pope refused or neglected to do his duty That was for the Sovereign Prince with his Bishops and Estates to ease his Subjects and reform the abuses of the Roman Court within his own Dominions And this by direction of the Law of nature Upon our former ground that no Kingdom is destitute of necessary remedies for its own preservation But they chose rather to tell the Pope this unwelcome Message in the names and words of a whole cloud of Roman Catholick Doctours then in their own In fine the Pope continued obstinate And the King proceeded from words to deeds And by his Sovereign power stopped all proceedings in the Nuncio's Court. And for the space of eight weeks did take away all intercourse and correspondence with Rome This was the first act of Henry the eighth which Sanders calls the beginning of the Schisme untill the Pope being taught by the costly experience of his predecessours fearing justly what the consequents of these things might be in a little time was conâ—ented to bow and condescend to the Kings desires To shew yet further that the Kings of Spain when they judge it expedient do make themselves no strangers to Ecclesiasticall affaires we read that Charles the fifth renewed an edict of his predecessours at Madril That Bulls and Missives sent from Rome should be visited to see that they contained nothing in them prejudicial to the 〈◊〉 or Church of Spain which was strictly observed within the Spanish Dominions I might adde upon the credit of the Portugueses how Alexander Castracan was disgraced and expelled out of Spain for publishing the Popes Bulls and that the Papal censures were declared void And how the Popes Delegates or Apostolical Judges have been banished out of that Kingdom for maintaining the priviledges of the Roman Court. And when the King of Spain objected to the Pope the Pensions which he and his Court received yearly out of Spain from Ecclesiastical benefices and dignities The Popes Secretary replied that all the Papal Pensions put together did scarcely amount to so much as one onely pension imposed by the King upon the Archbishoprick of Siville Neither did the King deny the thing but justifie it as done in favour of an Infante of Castile And did further acknowledge that it was not unusual for the Kings of Spain to impose pensions upon Ecclesiastical preferments to the fourth part of the value except in the Kingdom of Galiâ—a This was more then ever any King of England attempted either before or after the reformation Before we leave the Dominions of this great Prince let us cast our eyes a little upon Brabant and Flanders who hath not heard of a Book composed by Iansenius Bishop of Ypres called Augustinus And of those great animosities and contentions that have risen about it in most Roman Catholick Countreys I meddle not with the merit of the cause whether Iansenius followed Saint Austine or Saint Austine his Ancients or whether he be reconciliable to himself in this question I do willingly omit all circumstances but onely those which conduce to my present purpose So it was that Vrbane the eighth by his Bull censured the said Book as maintaining divers temerarious and dangerous positions under the name of St. Austine forbidding all Catholicks to print it sell it or keep it for the future This Bull was sent to the Archbishop of Mechline and the Bishop of Gant to see it published and obeyed in their Provinces But they both refused And for refusing were cited to appear at Rome And not appearing by themselves or their Proctours were suspended and interdicted by the Pope and the copy of the sentence affixed to the door of the great Church in Brussels Although in truth they durst not publish the sentence of condemnation without the Kings Licence And were expresly forbidden by the Councel of Brabant to appear at Rome under great penalties as appeareth manifestly by the Proclamation or Placaâ—t of the Councel themselves dated at Brussels May 1â— 1653. Wherein they do further declare that it was Kennelick ende noâ—oix c. Well knowâ— and notoriously true that the Subjects of those Provinces of what state or condition soever could not be cited nor convented out of the land neither in person nor by their proctour selveroock niet voor het hoff van Roomen no not by the Court of Rome it self And further that the provisions spiritual censures excommunications suspensions and interdictions of that Court might not be published or put in execution without the Kings approbaâ—ioâ— after the Councels deliberation And yet further they do ordain that the said defamatory writing So they call the Copy of
the Popes sentence should be torn in pieces in the great Hall of the Court at Brussels by the door-keeper condemning and abolishing the memory thereof for ever Thus all Christendom do joyn unanimously in this truth that not the Court of Rome buâ— their own Sovereigns in their Councels are the last Judges of their National liberties and priviledges I passe from Spain to Portugal where the King and Kingdom either are at this present time or very lately were very much unsatisfied with the Pope And all about their ancient customes and essential rights of the Crown As the nomination of their own Bishops without which condition they tell the Pope plainly that they neither can nor ought to receive them That if others then the Sovereign Prince have the naming of them then suspected persons may be intruded and the Realm can have no security That it is the opinion of all good men and the judgement of most learned men that herein the Pope doth most grievously derogate from the right of the Crown That it is done in favour of the King of Castile lest he should either revolt from his obedience to the Pope or make war against him And that if provision be made contrary to justice for the private interests of the Roman Court Christs right is betrayed They advise the Pope to let the world know that he hath care of souls and leaves temporal things to Princes That if he persist to change the custome of the Church to the prejudice of Portugal Portugal may and ought to preserve its right And that if he love Castile more then Portugal Portugal is not obliged to obey him more then Castile There are other differences likewise as namely about the imprisoning of some Prelates for Treason to which they make this plea that the Law doth warrant it That Ecclesiastical immunities are not opposite to natural defence That it is he that hurts his Countrey who hurts his own immunity A third difference was about the Kings intermedling in the controversies of religious persons To which they answer that the protection of the Prince is not a violation but a defence of the rights of the Church That it is the duty of Catholick Princes to see regular discipline be observed The fourth difference is about taxes imposed upon Ecclesiastical persons and the taking up the revenues of Bishopricks in the vacancy to which they give this satisfaction that all orders of men are obliged in justice to contribute to the common defence of the Kingdom and their own necessary protection And that the revenues of the vacant Bishopricks could not be better deposited and conserved then when they are imployed by the Prince for the publick benefit cum onere restituendi In summe they wish the Pope over and over again to consider seriously the danger of these courses now when Heresie shewes it self with such confidence throughout Europe That the minds of men are inclined to suspected opinions That St. Peters ship which hath often been in danger in a Calme Sea ought not to be opposed to the violent course of just complainers who think themselves forsaken That the Chuâ—ch of Rome hath lost many kingdoms which have withdrawn their obedience and reverential respect from it for much lesser reasons That they had learned with grief by their last repulse that their submissions and iterated supplications had prejudiced their right That the Kings Ambassadour the Clergies messenger the Agent from the three orders of the Kingdom had found nothing at Rome from two Popes but neglects affronts and repulses And lastly for a farewell that Portugal and all the Provinces that belong unto it in Europe Asia Africa and America is more then one single sheep Which is as much as if they should tell him in plain down right terms that if he lose it by his own fault he loseth one of the fairest flowers in his Garland What the issue of this will be God onely knowes and time must discover I will conclude this point with the answer of the University of Lisbone to certain questions or demands moved unto them by the States or Orders of Portugal The first question was whether in case there were no recourse to the Pope the King of Portugal might permit the consecration of Bishops without the Pope in his Kingdom To which their answer was affirmative that he might do it because Episcopacy was of divine right but the reservation of the Popes approbation was of humane right which doth not bind in extreme nor in very great necessity The second question whether there was extreme necessity of consecrating new Bishops in Portugal Their answer was affirmative that there was because there was but one Bishop left in Portugal and six and twenty wanting in the rest of the Kings dominions The third question was whether Portugal had then recourse to the Pope for his approbation The answer was Negative that they had not first because the Castilians had attempted to slay their Ambassadourâ— before the eyes of Vrban the 8th and Innocent the 10th So there was no safe recourse And secondly because their Ambassadour could uot prevail with the Pope in nine years by all their solicitations So there was no hope to obtain The fourth question was whether the permission of this were scandalous The answer was Negative that it was not first because it was a greater scandal to want Bishops Secondly because the King had used all due means to obtain the Popes approbation Thirdly because it was done out of extreme necessity The fifth and last question was how Bishops were to be provided They answered that it was to be done according to Law by the election of the respective Chapters and by the presentation of the King as it was of old in Spain and Portugal and was still observed in Germany and elsewhere From Spain and Portugal it is now high time to passe over into Italy where we meet with the Republick of Venice obliged in some sort to the Papacy for that honour and grandeur and profit and advantage which the Italian Nation doth reape from it Yet have not they wanted their discontents and differences and disputes with the Court of Rome The Republick of Venice had made several Lawes As first that no Ecclesiastical person should make any claime or pretence to any bona Emphyteutica as the Lawyers call them that is waste lands that had been planted and improved by the great Charge and industry and good Culture of the Fee-farmers which were possessed by the Laity Secondly that no person whatsoever within their dominions should found any Church Monastery Hospital or other religious house without the special licence of the State upon pain of imprisonmeut and banishment and confiscation of the soile and buildings Thirdly that none of their subjects should alienate any Lands to the Church or in favour of any Ecclesiastical persons secular or Regular without the
Aristocratical dignity So Non tellus cymbam tellurem cymba reliquit It was not we that deserted our pretended Patriarch but our pretended Patriarch deserted his Patriarchal office So long as the Popes contented themselves with Patriarchal rights they soared no higher then to be the executours of the Canons When Acacius complained that he was condemned by the sole authority of the Roman Bishop without a Synodal sentence Gelssius the Pope then pleaded for himself that Acacius was not the beginner of a new errour but the follower of an old And therefore it was not necessary that a new Synodal sentence should be given against him but that the old should be executed Therefore saith he I have onely put an old sentence in execution not promulged a nâ—w And as they had quitted their title so likewise they had forfeited it both by their Rebellion and by their exorbitant abuses First by their notorious rebellion against General Councels The authority of an inferiour ceaseth when he renounceth his loyalty to his superiour from whom he derives his power A General Councel is the Supreme Ecclesiastical power to which Patriarchal power was alwayes subordinate and subject General Councels with the consent of Sovereign Princes have exempted Cities and Provinces from Patriarchal Jurisdiction with the consent of Sovereign Princes they have erected new Patriarchates as at Hierusalem and Constantinople And made the Patriarch of Constantinople equal in all priviledges to the Patriarch of old Rome Against this Supreme Ecclesiastical power the Popes have not onely rebelled themselves but have compelled all Bishops under their Jurisdiction to take an oath to maintain their rebellious usurpations When a President of a Province shall rebell against his Sovereign Prince and seek to usurpe the whole Empire to himself and impose new oathes of allegiancc upon his fellow-subjects it is not Treason but Loyalty in them to thrust him by the head and shoulders out of the gates of their City When a Steward not imposed upon the family by the Master but chosen in trust by his fellow-servants during their Masters absence shall so far violate his trust that he will by force make himself the Master of the family and usuâ—pe a dominion not onely over his fellowes but over his Masters Wife and Children and oblige his fellow servants to acknowledge an independent Sovereign power in him it is not want of duty but fidelity to substract their obedience from him This is our case with the Roman Bishops They have sought to usurpe a dominion over the Catholick Church the spouse of Christ and all their fellow-servants Then ought not all good Christians to adhere to the Catholick Church and desert a schismatical Patriarch They have rebelled against the representative Church a general Councel should we involve our selves in their rebellion and perjury by swearing to maintain and make good their usurpations I confesse inferiours are not competent Judges of their Superiours But in this case of a subordinate Superiour and in a matter of Heresie or Schisme already defined by the Church the sentence of the Judge is not necessary the sentence of the Law and the notoreity of the fact are sufficient It is not we that judge him but the Councels of Constance and Basile Neither could our Ancestours hope to have a General Councel suddenly whilest so great a part of Christendom was under the Turk nor a free Occidental Councel whilest the usurper had all Ecclesiasticall power in his hands What remained then but to reform themselves According to the sage advice of Gerson I see that the Reformation of the Church will never be effected by a Councel without the presidence of a well affected wise and constant guide Let the Members therefore provide for themselves thâ—oughout the Kingdomes and Provinces when they shall be able and know hâ—w to compasse this work Moreover as they have forfeited their power by their Rebellion so they have most justly also by their rapine extortions and terrible and exorbitant abuses the most shamefull abuses that ever were committed by persons trusted To passe by the hundred grievances of Germany the complaints and protestations and pragmatical Sanctions of France the memorials of Castile the sobbes of Portugal and to confine my discourse to the sufferings of our own Nation which have been more particularly related already in this Treatise when I set down the grounds of our Reformation They robbed the King of his investitures of Bishops which Henry the first protested to the Pope himself by his Proctour that he would not lose for his Kingdome and added threatenings to his protestations Yet to gratifie Anselme who though otherwise most deserving was the first violater of the ancient customes of our Kingdome in that kind he waved his right But soon after resumed it made Rodolph Bishop of London Archbishop of Canterbury and invested him by a crosier and a ring The like he did to many others They robbed the King of his patronages by their collations and provisions and expectative graces Two or three or ten benefices were not accounted sufficient for a Roman Courtier in those daies but an hundred or two hundred or more They robbed him of the last appeales of his Subjects contrary to the ancient Lawes of England They fomented the rebellion of his own Subjects at home sometimes of his Barons sometimes of his Bishops playing fast and loose on both sides for advantage They dis-inherited him of his Crown They gave away his Kingdome for a prey to a forreign Prince They incited strangers to make war against him And they themselves by meer collusion and tricks had well near thrust him out of his Throne They robbed the Clergy in a manner of their whole Jurisdiction by their exemptions and reservations and visitations and suspensions and appeales and Legantine Courts and Nunciatures thrusting their sickles into every mans harvest They robbed them of their estates and livelihoods by their provisions and pensions by their coadjutorships and first-fruits and tenths by the vast charge of their investitures and palles and I know not how many other sorts of exactions and arbitrary impositions The most ancient of these was the pall whereof our King Canutus complained long since at Rome and had remedy promised They robbed the Nobility and Commonalty many waies as hath been formerly related If all these were not a sufficient cause of forfeiture certainly abuse did never forfeit office And though they had sometimes had a just Patriarchal power and had neither forfeited it by rebellion nor abuse Yet the King and the whole body of the Kingdome by their Legislative power substracting their obedience from them and erecting a new Patriarchate within their own Dominions it is a sufficient warrant for all English-men to suspend their obedience to the one and apply themselves to the other for the welfare and tranquillity of the whole body politick as hath before been declared Thirdly
I answer that obedience to a just Patriarch is of no larger extent then the Canons of the Fathers do injoyn it And since the division of Britaigne from the Empire no Canons are or ever were of force with us further then they were received and by their incorporation became Britannique Lawes Which as they cannot noâ— ever could be imposed upon the King and Kingdome by a forreign Patriarch by constraint so when they are found by experience prejudiciall to the publick good they may as freely by the same King and Kingdome be rejected But I shall wind up this string a little higher Suppose that the whole body of the Canon Law were in force in England which it never was yet neither the Papall power which we have cashiered nor any part of it was ever given to any Patriarch by the ancient Canons and by consequence the separation is not Schismatical nor any withdrawing of Canonical obedience What power a Metropolitan had over the Bishops of his own Province by the Canon Law the same and no other had a Patriarch over the Metropolitans and Bishops of sundry Provinces within his own Patriarchate But a Metropolitan anciently could do nothing out of his own Diocesse without the concurrence of the Major part of the Bishops of his Province Nor the Patriarch in like manner without the advice and consent of his Metropolitans and Bishops Wherein then consisted Patriarchal authority In ordaining their Metropolitans for with inferiour Bishops they might not meddle or confirming them or imposing of hands in giving the Pall in convocating Patriarchal Synods and presiding in them in pronouncing sentence according to the plurality of voices That was when Metropolitical Synods did not suffice to determine some emergent difficulties or differences And lastly in some few honorary priviledges as the acclamation of the Bishops to them at the latter end of a General Councel and the like which signifie not much In all this there is nothing that we dislike or would seek to have abrogated Never any Patriarch was guilty of those exactions extortions incroachments upon the civil rights of Princes and their Subjects or upon the Ecclesiastical rights of Bishops or of those provisions and pensions and exemptions and reservations and dispensations and inhibitions and pardons and indulgences and usurped Sovereignty which our Reformers banished out of England And therefore their separation was not any waies from Patriarchal authority I confesse that by reason of the great difficulty and charge of convocating so many Bishops and keeping them so long together untill all causes were heard and determined And by reason of those inconveniencies which did fall upon their Churches in their absence Provincial Councels were first reduced from twice to once in the year and afterwards to once in three years And in processe of time the hearing of appeales and such like causes and the execution of the Canons in that behalf were referred to Metropolitans untill the Papacy swallowed up all the authority of Patriarchs and Metropolitans and Bishops Serpens serpentem nisi ederet non fieret draco Peradventure it may be urged in the fourth place That Gregory the Great who by his Ministers was the first converter of the English Nation about the six hundreth year of our Lord did thereby acquire to himself and his Successours a Patriarchal authority and power over England for the future We do with all due thankfulnesse to God and honourable respect to his memory acknowledge that that blessed Saint was the chief instrument under God to hold forth the first light of saving truth to the English Nation who did formerly sit in darknesse and in the shadow of death whereby he did more truly merit the name of Great then by possessing the chair of Saint Peter And therefore whilest the sometimes flourishing now poor persecuted Church of England shall have any being Semper honos nomenque suum laudesque manâ—bunt But whether this benefit did intitle Saint Gregory and his Successours to the Patriarchate of all or any part of the British Islands deserves a further consideration First consider that at that time and untill this day half of Britaigne it self and two third parts of the Britannique Islands did remain in the possession of the Britons or Scottish and Irish who still continued Christians and had their Bishops and Protarchs or Patriarchs of their own from whom we do derive in part our Christianity and holy orders and priviledges Without all controversie the conversion of the Saxons by Saint Gregory could not prejudice the just liberties of them or their Successours Secondly consider that the half of Britaigne which was conquered and possessed by the Saxons was not soly and altogether peopled by Saxons A world of British Christians did remain and inhabit among the Conquerours For we do not find either that the Saxons did go about to extirpate the British Nation or compell them to turn Renegadoes from their Religion or so much as demolish their Churches But contented themselves to chase away persons of eminency and parts and power whom they had reason to suspect and fear And made use of vulgar persons and spirits for their own advantage This is certain that Britaigne being an Island whither there is no accesse by land all those who were transported or could have been transported by Sea on such a suddain could not of themselves alone in probability of reason have planted or peopled the sixth part of so much land as was really possessed by the Saxons And therefore we need not wonder if Queen Bertha a Gallâ—ise and a Christian did find a Congregation of Christians at Canterbury to joyn with her in her Religion and a Church called Saint Martins builded to her hand And stood in need of Lethargus a Bishop to order the affaires of Christian Religion before ever Saint Austine set foot upon English ground Neither did the British want their Churches in other places also as appears by that Commission which the King did give to Austine among other things to repair the Churches that were decayed These poor subdued persons had as much right to their ancient priviledges as the rest of the unconquered Britons Thirdly consider That all that part of Britaigne which was both conquered and inhabited by the Saxons was not one intire Monarchy but divided into seven distinct Kingdoms which were not so suddenly converted to the Christian faith all at once but in long tract of time long after Saint Gregory slept with his fathers upon several occasions by several persons It was Kent and some few adjacent Counties that was converted by Austine It is true that Ethelbâ—rt King of Kent after his own conversion did indeavour to have planted the Christian faith both in the Kingdomes of Northumberland and the East Angles with fair hopes of good successe for a season But alas it wanted root Within a short time both Kings and Kingdoms apostated from Christ and forsook their Religion The Kingdoms of the West Saxons
and of the South Saxons under Kingils their King who did unite the heptarchy into a Monarchy were converted by the preaching of Berinus an Italian by the perswasions of Oswald King of Northumberland Oswâ—ld King of Northumberland was baptized in Scotland and Religion luckily planted in that Kingdome by Aidan a Scottish Bishop Penda King of Mercia was converted and christened by Finanus Successour of Aidan by the means of a marriage with a Christian Princesse of the Royal Family of Northumberland Sigibert King of the East Angles in whose daies and by whose means Religion took root among the East Saxons was converted and christned in France All these Saxons which were converted by Britons or Scots may as justly plead for their old immunities as the Britons themselves We acknowledge Saint Gregory to have been the first that did break the ice And yet we see how small a proportion of the inhabitants of the British Islands do owe their conversion to Rome in probability not a tenth part Fourthly consider that the conversion of a Nation to the Christian faith is a good ground in equity all other circumstances concurring why they should rather submit themselves or a General Councel assign them to that See that converted them then to any other Patriarchate As was justly pleaded in the case between the Bishops of Rome and Constantinople about the right of Jurisdiction over the Bulgarians But the conversion of a Nation is no ground at all to invest their converter presently with Patriarchal authority over them or any Ecclesiastical superiority especially where too great a distance of place doth render such Jurisdiction uselesse and burthensome And most especially where it cannot be done without prejudice to a former owner thrust out of his just right meerly by the power of the sword as the British Primates were Or to the subjecting of a free Nation to a forreign Prelate without or beyond their own consent In probability of reason the Britons ought their first conversion to the Eastern Church as appeareth by their accord with them in baptismal rites and the observation of Easter Yet never were subject to any Eastern Patriarch Sundry of our British and English Bishops have converted forreign Nations yet never pretended to any Jurisdiction over them Fifthly and lastly consider That whatsoever title or right S. Gregory did acquire or might have acquired by his piety and deserts towards the English Nation it was personal and could not descend from him to such Successours who both forfeited it many waies and quickly within four or five years after his death quitted their Patriarchate and set an higher title to a spirituall Monarchy on foot whilest the most part of England remained yet Pagan when Pope Boniface did obtain of Phoeas the usurper an usurping Pope from an usurping Emperour to be universal Bishop Their Canon-shot is past that which remains is but a small volly of Muskets They adde that we have schismatically separated our selves from the Communion of our Ancestours whom we believe to be damned That we have separated our selves from our Ecclesiastical predecessours by breaking in sunder the line of Apostolical succession whilest our Presbyters did take upon them to Ordain Bishops and to propagate to their Successours more then they received from their predecessours That our Presbyters are but equivocall Presbyters wanting both the right matter and form of Presbyterial ordination To extinguish the order is more schismatical then to decline their authority And lastly that we derive our Episcopal Jurisdiction from the Crown First for our natural Fathers the answer is easie We do not condemn them nor separate our selves from them Charity requires us both to think well and speak well of them But prudence commands us likewise to look well to our selves We believe our fathers might partake of some errours of the Roman Church we do not believe that they were guilty of any heretical pravity but held alwaies the truth implicitely in the preparation of their minds and were alwaies ready to receive it when God should be pleased to reveal it Upon these grounds we are so far from damning them that we are confident they were saved by a generall repentance He that searcheth carefully into his own heart to find out his errours and repenteth truly of all his known sins and beggeth pardon for his unknown errours proceeding out of invincible or but probable ignorance in Gods acceptation repenteth of all Otherwise the very best of Christians were in a miserable condition For who can tell how oft he offendeth The second accusation of Priests consecrating Bishops is grounded upon a senselesse fabulous fiction made by a man of a leaden heart and a brazen forehead of I know not what assembly of some of our Reformers at the sign of the Nags-head in Cheapside or rather devised by their malicious enemies at the sign of the Whetstone in Popes-head-Alley Against which lying groundlesse drowsie dream we produce in the very point the authentick records of our Church of things not acted in a corner but publickly and solemnly recorded by publick Notaries preserved in publick Registers whither every one that desired to see them might have accesse And published to the world in Print whilest there were thousands of eye-witnesses living that could have contradicted them if they had been feigned There is no more certainty of the Coronation of Henry the eighth or Edward the sixth then there is of that Ordination which alone they have been pleased to question done not by one as Austine consecrated the first Saxon Prelates but by five consecrated Bishops Let them name the person or persons And if they were Bishops of the Church of England we will shew them the day the place the persons when and where and by whom and before what publick Notaries or sworn Officers they were ordained And this not by uncertain rumours but by the Acts and instruments themselves Let the Reader chuse whether he will give credit to a sworn Officer or a professed adversary to eye-witnesses or to malicious reporters upon hearsay to that which is done publickly in the face of the Church or to that which is said to be done privately in the corner of a Tavern These authentick evidences being upon occasion produced out of our Ecclesiasticall Courts and deliberately perused and viewed by Father Oldcorn the Jesuit he both professed himself clearly convinced of that whereof he had so long doubted that was the legitimate succession of Bishops and Priests in our Church and wished heartily towards the reparation of the breach of Christendome that all the world were so abundantly satisfied as he himself was Blaming us as partly guilty of the grosse mistake of many for not having publickly and timely made known to the world the notorious falshood of that empty but far spread aspersion against our succession As for our parts we believe Episcopacy to be at least in Apostolical institution approved by Christ himself in
and broiles between the Emperours with other Christian Princes and States and the Popes We have seen that from the excesses abuses innovations and extortions of that Court have sprung all the Schismes of the Eastern and Western Church and of the Occidentall Church within it self We have heard the confession of Pope Adrian that for some yeares by-past many things to be abominated had been in that holy See abuses in spiritual matters excesses in commands and all things out of order We have heard his promise to endeavour the Reformation of his own Court from whence peâ—adventure all the evil did spring that as corruption did flow from thence to the inferiour parts so might health and Reformation To which he accounted himself so much more obliged by how much he did see the whole world greedily desire a Reformation We have viewed the representation which nine selected Cardinals and Prelates did make upon their oathes to Paul the third That this lying flattering priâ—ciple that the Pope is the Lord of all benefices and therefore could not be Simoâ—iacall was the fountain from whence as from the Trojan horse so many abuses and so griâ—vou diseases had 〈…〉 into the Church and brought it to a desperate condition to the dâ—rision of Christian Religion and blaspâ—eming of the Name of Christ and that the cure must begin there from whencâ— the disease did spâ—ing We may remember the memorial of the King of Spain and the whole Kingdome of Castile That the abuses of the Court of Româ— gave occasion to all the Reformations and Schismeâ— of the Church And the complaint of the King and Kingdom of Portugal That for these reasons many Kingdomes had withdrawn their obedience and reverential respect from tâ—e Church of Rome These were no Protestants The first step to health is to know the true cause of our disease It hath been long debated whether the Protestant and Roman Churches be reconciliable or not Far be it from me to make my self a Judge of that Controversie Thus much I have observed that they who understand the sewest controversies make the most and the greatest If questions were truly stated by moderate persons both the number and the height would be much abated Many differences are grounded upon mistakes of one anothers sense Many are meer logomachies or contentions about words Many are meerly Scholastical above the capacity and apprehension of ordinary brains And many doubtlesse are real both in credendis and agendis both in doctrine and discipline But whether the distance be so great or how far any of these are necessary to salvation or do intrench upon the fundamentals of Religion requires a serious judicious and impartial consideration There is great difference between the reconciliation of the persons and the reconciliation of the opinions Men may vary in their judgments And yet preserve Christian unity and charity in their affections one towards another so as the errours be not destructive to fundamental Articles I determine nothing but onely crave leave to propose a question to all moderate Christians who love the peace of the Church and long for the re-union thereof In the first place if the Bishop of Rome were reduced from his universality of Sovereign Jurisdiction jure Divino to his principium unitatis and his Court regulated by the Canons of the Fathers which was the sense of the Councels of Constance and Basile and is desired by many Roman Catholicks as well as we Secondly if the Creed or necessary points of faith were reduced to what they were in the time of the four first Oecumenical Councels according to the decree of the third General Councel Conc. Eph Part. 2. Act. 6. c. 7. Who dare say that the faith of the primitive Fathers was insufficient Admitting no additional Articles bur onely necessary explications And those to be made by the authority of a General Councel or one so general as can be convocated And lastly supposing that some things from whence offences either given or taken which whether right or wrong do not weigh half so much as the unity of Christians were put out of divine offices which would not â—e refused if animosities were taken away and charity restored I say in case these three things were accorded which seem very reâ—sonable demands whether Christians might not live in an holy communion and joyn in the same publick worship of God free from all Schismatical separation of themselves one from another notwithstanding diversities of opinions which prevail even among the members of the same particular Chrches both with them and us FINIS Nothing more probably objected to the Church of England then Schisme But nothing more unjustly The method observed in this Discourse Every passionate heat not Schisme Acts 15. 〈◊〉 39. Ecclesiastical quarrels of long continuance not alwaies Schisme Hen Holden Append. de Schis Act. 1. pag 484. Infidelity unmasked Sect. 176. pag. 591. Idem pag. 516. The Separaters may be free from Schisme and the other party guilty Act. 19. 9. 1 Tim. 6. 5. Infid unmasked Ch. 7. Sect. 112. pag. 534. To withdraw obedience is not alwaies criminous Schisme Idem pag. 481. Theod. l. 4. c. 14. Cyril ep 18. ad Coelestinum Tâ—m 1. Conc. lib. Rom. Pâ—â—t in Anast. Libel ad mancit apud Bar. to 8. an 590. nu 39. 8. Syn. c. 10. What is single Schisme 1 Cor. 1. 10. 1 Cor. 3. 3 Wherein internal Communion doth consist Wherein External Communion doth consist External Communion may be suspended And withdrawn There is not the like necessity of communicating in all Externals Christian Communion â—mplies not unity in all opinions Reg. mor. tit pâ—aec decal lib. de A. P. Cons. 14. â—e unit eccl cons. 10. Lib. 2. de Rom. pont c. 29. Bar tom 10. an 878. Append. de Schismat Art 4. p. 516. The soâ—â—â— of Schisme What the Catholick Church signifies Collat. Carth. Col. 3. Each member of the Catholick Church is Catholick inclusively Schisme is changeable And for the most part complicated with heretical pravity Four waies to become heretical Who are Catholiques Aug. l. 2. cont casâ— Who are Schismaâ—cks What is understood by the Church of England Roman Catholicks first authors of the separation from Rome Act. and Mon p. 965. Râ—gist epist. Vni Oxon. ep 210. Sac. Syn. an 1530. et an 1532. 24 Hen. 8. c. 12. Romanists first gave the King the title of Head of the Church Resp. ad quaest 74. Râ—sp ad qu. 75. Conc. Mil. 2. Henry the 8th no friend to the Protestants Hist. Conc. Trid. 23. H. 8. 24. H. 8. 25. H. 8. 26. H. 8. 28. H. 8. The Authors opâ—nion of Monasteries Supplication of beggars Henry the 8th no friend to Protestants 31. Hen. 8. Much lesse those who joyned with him in the separation from Rome Act. Mon. an 1510. Conc. Tonst et Longlands Hist. aliquot mart et edit an 1550. Apol. sac Reg. pro jur fidel p. 125. England unanimous in casting out the Pope de verâ—â— obed Câ—ted