Selected quad for the lemma: land_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
land_n	line_n	page_n	read_v	2,533	5	12.1252	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A93888	An ansvver to a letter vvritten at Oxford, and superscribed to Dr. Samuel Turner, concerning the Church, and the revenues thereof. Wherein is shewed, how impossible it is for the King with a good conscience to yeeld to the change of church-government by bishops, or to the alienating the lands of the Church.	Steward, Richard, 1593?-1651.; J. T.; Turner, Samuel, D.D.	1647 (1647)	Wing S5516; Thomason E385_4; ESTC R201455	34,185	56

AN ANSVVER TO A LETTER VVritten at OXFORD And superscribed to Dr. SAMVEL TVRNER Concerning the CHURCH and the Revenues thereof Wherein is shewed how impossible it is for the King with a good conscience to yeeld to the change of Church-Government by Bishops or to the alienating the Lands of the Church Printed in the Yeere MDCXI VII Faults escaped correct thus Page 5. line 30. for Lawes read Lands p. 7. l. 30. r. preserving p. 9. l. 8. r. this in the Postscript p. 12. l. 20. r. visum p. 17. l. 15. r. and elsewhere part p. 18. l. 27. for then r. that p. 19. l. 11. for since r. sure p. 19. l. 15. r. aliquid p. 20. l. 20. for this r. the p. 21. l. ult. r. that error ibid. l. ult. r. that consent p. 24. l. 8. r. Creet ibid. l. 27. r. Apostolicall p. 31. l. 14. r. vindicta p. 35. l. 26. dele not p. 39. l. 1 r. must not p. 44. l. 5. for there r. other p. 47. l. ult. r. preserve p. 50. l. 3. r. the Commons p. 51. l. 22. for 〈◊〉 r. are p. 52. l. 19. dele that A Letter written to D. SAMUEL TURNER concerning the Church and the Revenues thereof Noble Doctor I Expected when you had seen the Kings last Messages your reason would have prompted you to have look'd this way which caused a delay in sending unto you untill the difficulty of the passage made me suspect whether this may come safe to you and by the preparations and designes here I feare I shall not have another oportunity take this therefore as a farwell-truth that the moderate party here are at their Ne plus ultra the presbyterians Independants will agree and the Scots and we shall not fall out and it must now be the wisdome of your selfe and such as have power and interest with the King to save him your selves and Country from ruine Your visible strength to hold out much lesse to prevaile is too well known here and your hopes from France and Ireland will soon vanish which if successefull by a victorious Army which I beleeve you shall never see would but make you and us slaves to a forraign Nation and extirpate that Religion both sides pretend to maintaine To be plaine I know no way left you but to accept such conditions of peace as may be had you are too much a souldier to thinke a retreate upon so many disadvantages dishonourable to a Generall or acceptance of hard conditions by a starved beleagured Garrison to the Governour In short of evils choose the least and I must tell you it is expected from you and the more wise and honest party with you that they should make use of their reason and advise the King to save what is left wherein it is believed you may prevaile considering what hath already passed in so many free offers to give satisfaction in the Militia Ireland paiment of the publique Debts choice of Judges Lord Admirall Officers of State and others with an Act of oblivion and free Pardon free exercise of Religion to Presbyterians and Independants their own way and a promise to endeavour in all particulars that none shall have cause to complaine for want of security things so farre beyond our former hopes that I cannot doubt but the same reason which moved the offer of these will obtaine to concession of such others as the Parliament shall require in order to peace which as neere as I can guesse will be either the removall and punishment of evill Counsellors and Ministers who have drawn the King into these troubles or the busines of the Church all other materiall things to my apprehension being already offered For the first of these I know not how you can with reason gain-say the bringing offenders to Justice and if the Parliament Prerogative streine justice in the tryall and punishment beyond example of better times it were wisdome for such as may therein be concerned to withdraw Dum furer in cursu for if it must come to suffering Melius unus quam unitas for the busines of the Church I wish it could be prevented there are who can witnesse the labour and hazards I have undergone for that end conceiving no government equall to a well ordered Episcopall for the well-being of this Church and State But when the necessity of times hath proposed this sad question for resolution whether consent to alter Episcopall government in the Church or let both Church and State ruine together my reason assents to the former I beleeve the doctrine of the place where you are would perswade the contrary and it hath been from thence transmitted hither as an orthodox truth that the altering that government being as they say jure divino is sinfull and the taking away the Church-lands sacriledge at least unlawfull which if I could believe would change my opinion for I cannot give way for the committing a sin for a good end what ever the Romanist or Jesuited Puritan pretend in defence of it but if I mistake not and if I doe I pray reforme me the opinion that the government by Bishops is jure divino hath but lately been countenanced in England and that but by some few of the more Lordly Clergy for we alwayes acknowledge the Protestants of Germany the Low Countryes and elsewhere part of the reformed Protestant Catholique Church though they had no Bishops and I am certaine the King would never have given way for the extirpation of Bishops in Scotland had he conceived them to be jure divino nor to the Presbyterians and Independants here to exercise their Religion their own way as by his late Messages when such a tolleration in the face of such a divine Law must needs be sinfull and for the latter opinion against taking away of Church Lands I am lesse satisfyed being so farre from conceiving it sacriledge that I do not conceive it unlawfull but may be done without breach of any Law which must be the rule for tryal of the lawfulnes or unlawfulnes of every action nay though there be never so many curses or imprecations added to the donation nor do I herein ground my opinion barely upon the frequent practise of former times not only by Acts of Parliament in the times of Queen Eliz and King James and King Charles if you have not forgotten the exchange of Durham house aswell as Henry the eighth but even by the Bishops themselves and Deanes and Chapters insomuch that if the wisdome of the State after Clergy men were permitted to marry had not prohibited their alienations and restrained their Leases to 21. yeares or 3. lives their Revenues at this day would not have been subject to envy But to deale clearely with you Doctor I do not yet understand how there can be any Sacriledge properly so called which is not a theft and more viz. a theft of something dedicated to holy use a Communion-Cup for instance or the like theft you know must

be of things moveable even by the Civil Law and how theft can be of Lands or sacriledge committed by aliening Church-Lands I pray aske your friend Holbourne and his fellow Lawyers for ours here deride us for the question As for the main quere touching the lawfulnes of aliening Church-lands I use the expression for the lands of Bishops Deanes and Chapters good Doctor give me your patience to heare my reasons And first I lay this as a foundation that there is no divine command that Ministers under the Gospell should have any lands the hire of a labourer at most a fitting maintenance is all to be challenged nor do we read that the Apostles had any Lands which I mention to avoid the groundlesse arguments upon the lands and portions allotted to the Tribe of Levi by Gods appointment to whom our Ministers have no succession and then it will follow that they enjoy their lands by the same Law of the State as others doe and must be subject to that Law which alone gives strength to their title which being granted I am sure it will not be denyed that by the Law of the Nation he that hath an estate in Lands in Fee-simple by an implyed power may lawfully alien though there be an expression in his Deed of purchase or donation to the contrary which being so makes the alienation of Bishops Lands even without any Act of Parliament to be lawfull being done by those who have an estate in Fee simple as the Bishop with the Deane and Chapter hath Then further I am sure it will be granted that by the Law of this Nation whosoever hath Lands or goods hath them with this inseparable implyed condition or limitation viz. That the Parliament may dispose of them or any part of them at pleasure Hence it is they sometimes dispose some part in Subsidies and other Taxes enable a Tenant for life to sell an estate in Fee-simple and not at all unlawfull because of that limitation or condition before mentioned and who ever will be owner must take them according to this Law Now hence comes the mistake by reason there is not such an expresse condition or limitation in the Deed of Donation which would silence all disputes whereas it is as cleare a truth that where any thing is necessarily by Law implied it is as much as if in plaine words expressed of which your Lawyers if Reason need a helpe from them can easily resolve Besides it were somewhat strange that the Donor of the Lawes should preserve them in the hands of the Bishops from the power of the Parliament which he could not doe in his owne and give them a greater and surer right then he had himselfe Nor doe I understand their meaning who terme God the Proprieter of the Bishops Lands and the Bishop the Usufructuary For I know not how in propriety of speech God is more entituled to their Lands then to his whole Creation and were Clergie-men but Usufructuaries how come they to change dispose or alter the property of any thing which an Usufructuary cannot doe and yet is by them done daily Aske them by what Divine Law S. Maries Church in Oxford may not be equally imployed for temporall uses as for holding the Vice-chancellours Court the University Convocation or their yearly acts And for the Curses those bug-beare words I could yet never learne that an unlawfull curse was any prejudice but to the Author of which sort those curses must needs be which restraine the Parliament or any other from exercising a lawfull and undenyable power which in instances would shew very ridiculous if any curse should prejudice anothers lawfull right I am sure such curses have no warrant from the Law of God or this Nation If this doth not satisfie the former doubts in your Bishops for I know you to be too great a Master of Reason to be unsatisfied aske them whether Church-lands may not lawfully the Law of the State not prohibiting be transferred from one Church to another upon emergent occasions which I think they will not deny If so who knowes that the Parliament will transferre them to Lay-hands they professe no such thing and I hope they will not but continue them for the maintenance of the Ministery which prevents all disputes upon the last question but if they shall hereafter do otherwise you know my opinion Onely mistake me not in this free discourse as if I did countenance or commend the Parliaments proceedings in their new Reformation but as a caution to you in the exigencies of times what is fittest to be done when I take it Mistresse Necessity in all things indifferent or not unlawfull must be obeyed in which cases the most constant men must be contented to change their resolutions with the alteration of time Your party have been resolute enough to preserve the rights of the Church and further peradventure then wise men would have done but at an ultra posse you and we must give over especially for an imaginary right And think seriously with your selfe whether after all other things granted it will be fit to run the hazard of the very being of this Church and State the King and his posterity and Monarchy it selfe onely upon the point of Church-government by Bishops or aliening the Church-lands or rather whether the Kings Councell in duty ought not to advise him the contrary who should be wise as well as pious yet herein may be both for I doe not thinke Conveniencie or Necessity will excuse Conscience in a thing in it selfe unlawfull what ever States-men maintain to the contrary your interest with the King is not small and your power with the Lords who are guided by reason very considerable you cannot doe better then make use of both at this time If they have a desire to preserve the Church it were wel their thoughts were fixed upon some course for setling a Superintendencie in the Presbyteriall Government which no way crosseth the Nationall Covenant and preserve the Revenues in the Church which I beleeve at Uxbridge Treaty would have been granted what ever it will be now I have given you my sense upon the whole businesse Si quid novisti rectius Candidus imperti si non his utere J. T. So farewell Doctor I give you commission to shew this to my Lord Dorset who by and something else can guesse my name and to as many more as owne Reason and Honesty An Answer to the foregoing Letter superscribed to D. Samuel Turner c. Sir YOu have put an odde taske upon me in commanding my judgement on a Letter lately sent to a Doctor in Oxford with a commission to shew it to the Lord of Dorset and to as many more as own reason and honesty for this is the Postscript and many the like passages in the Letter as that the more wise and honest party would make use of their reason and I know you too great a master of reason to be unsatisfyed makes me