Selected quad for the lemma: lord_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
lord_n	earl_n	james_n	thomas_n	17,338	5	7.8637	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A38840	The Evil eye plucked out, or, A discourse proving that church revenues cannot be alienated by any secular persons or powers without a manifest violation of the known fundamental laws of this kingdom, and of publick justice, and a common-honesty		1679 (1679)	Wing E3555; ESTC R6758	19,644	92

and experience to perfect it be not sacred yet in the sense of our Laws they are Clerks too that are exceedingly well read and Learned as Clergy-men are or should be From which use of the name Clerk by I know not what cause there are no Pen and Ink-horne men now relating to the Law termed Clerks but those that use Pen and Ink in Courts as Clerks of Parliament Roles Clerks of Chancery c. But blessed be God that the Laws of this Kingdome are not so little cultivated or understood especially by Gentlemen of any note or account in this latter age but that the interests of the Church and religion are sufficiently conceived and that by the constitution of this state the Lands both of the Clergy and themselves are so founded that one cannot be attacqued or invaded without a manifest wrong to the very settlements and freedoms of the other And therefore little doubt that so many hundreds or thousands should ever combine to do any acts of wrong and unrighteousness to them and therein besides the violation of their trust and consciences weaken and enfeeble themselves and their posterities for ever Nor have these Church-preferments been entailed to the off-spring of the Peasantry and common people which for the most part have not ability to give Education unto their Children to qualify them for such Offices but have generally been the reward and support of some branches of the most ancient and frequently of the most Honourable families of the whole Kingdom insomuch as those that have been born to sit with Princes have not disdained by a sedulous and studious life to fit themselves for those dignities Nor did the Policy of any former ages esteem them ever the less qualified to serve their Princes when they were so well prepared to serve God and his Church This little Catalogue that I have subjoyned will let you see that the dignities of the Church have been the Seats for several of the greatest families of this Nation which for the more speed I have set down promiscuously without any orderly marshalling Thus Agelnothus Bishop of Cant. was Son of Earl Agelmare Athelmarus Bishop of Winton was Son to Hugh Earl of March and Queen Isabel Henry de Bloys Bishop of Cant. was Brother to King Stephen Hugh de Pudsey Bishop of Durrham was Earl of Northumberland Boniface of Savoy Bishop of Cant. was Vncle to Queen Eleanor wife of Hen. 3. Richard Talbot Bishop of London was Allyed to the Talbots after Earles of Shrewsberry Henry Beaufort Bishop of Lincolne was Son of John of Gaunt Will. Courtney Bishop of Cant. was Son of Hugh Courtney E. of Devon Giles de Bruse Bishop of Hereford was Son of Will Lord de Bruse George Nevil Bishop of Exon was Brother to Richard Nevil Duke of Warwick Thomas Peircy Bishop of Norwich was Allyed to the Piercies E. of Northum Lionel Woodvil Bishop of Sarum was Son to Earl Rivers of Sarum Thomas Vipont Bishop of Carlile was Allyed to Viponts then Earls of Westmoreland Marmarduke Lumley Bishop of Carlile was Allyed to the house of Lumley's Walther Bishop of Durrham was Earl of Northumberland Julius de Medices Bishop of Worcester was Allyed to the house of Medices in Italy Nicholas de Longespee Bishop of Sarum was Son to Will Earl of Salisbury Will Dudley Bishop of Durrham was Son of Jo. Lord Dudley Walter de Cantilupo Bishop of Worcester was Of a great house in Normandy Lewes Beaumont Bishop of Durrham was Of the Bloud Royall of France Thomas Arundel Bishop of Cant. was Son to Rob. Earl of Arundell and Warren James Berkley Bishop Exon was Son to the Lord Berkley Rich. Scroope Bishop Cov. and Litchf was Brother to Will Scroope Earl of Wiltshire Thomas Bourchier Bishop Cant. was Son to Hen. Bourchier Earl of Essex Roger de Clinton Bishop Cov. and Lichf was Of the same family with Geofery de Clinton Jo. Stafford Bishop Cant. was Son to the Earl of Stafford Will. de Vere Bishop Heref. was Brother to the Earl of Oxon. Richard Beauchamp B. Hereford was Allyed to Beauchamp then Duke of Warwick Jo. Grandison B. Exon was Of the house of Grandisons Dukes of Burgundy Edmund Audley B. Heref. was Allyed to Audley E. of Glocester Hen. Burwesh B. Line was Nephew to the Baron of Leeds Jo. Zouch B. Llandaff was Brother to the Lord Zouch Hen. Beaufort B. Linc. was Allyed to the Beauforts E. of Dorset Fulco Basset B. Lond was Lord Basset James Stanly B. Ely was Brother to the Earl of Darby Simon Montacute B. of Ely was Allyed to the Montacutes then Earls of Salisbury I might extreamly enlarge this if there were either time room or need so to do And as for the Gentry and the Lawyers and Merchants which according to the constitution of this Kingdome are to be had in no small regard very few of all the Bishops of this Kingdome have been from any lower families than such or if here and there one have risen from small beginnings it hath been extraordinary merit parts and industry that have been the means of their promotions And such unthought-off advancement is common to the Laity as well as the Clergy amongst whom many of the now highest rank may attribute their rise purely to the grace and favour of Princes who as one saith have so much of God in them whose deputies they are that they oftentimes raise the poor out of the dust that they may set than with Princes even with the Princes of their people And although these preferments and dignities in the Church have in this latter age fallen more generally to the hands of such that have been the Branches of Knightly and Gentile Families and not to those that are the Sprouts of Peers there is no reason that the Peers should envy this honour and advantage unto those Worthy Families and neither accept of those imployments themselves nor be content that others enjoy them there is no cause that while they esteem those advantages too small for the least Peers they should conclude them too liberal or splendid for the best Commons Especially when by a chargeable Education and a painful and industrious Life they have acquired learning and parts to be able to undergo them to the glory of God and the honour of their houses It were most unreasonable and disingenious for the Nobility after themselves are entered into the Court of Honour to pull up a Draught-Bridg and shut to the Gates that none else may enter There are but these two ways for the Commons by merit to aspire unto honours by the Gown and by the Sword And if this way should ever be bayed up the rest of the pathes of the Gown would become so wondrous rough and uneven that there would hardly any ready way for them to come unto dignities remain but what they could dig out with the Sword For as for riches It is much more uncertainly attained by all industry than Wisdom and Learning and if

whether the Parliament had enacted it or no for in the year of our Lord 1532. Hen. 8.24 Anno Regni 24. He suppressed the Collegiate body of the Holy Trinity in London and gave their Plate and Lands to his new Favourite and Keeper Sir Thomas Audley and did not tarry for the Act of Parliament which came not forth till the year of our Lord 1535. 27 H n 8. Anno Regni 27. Nor durst the Parliament do less than humour him for fear of their heads he had so awed them in not sparing the bloud of their Predecessors And those who had the greatest integrity and courage he quickly cut off out of the way of his designs But do you judge now would it not have been thought a blessed and a just act of himself and the Commons had they thus cut off the Revenues of the Barons or if himself and the Lords had thus devested the Commons of their Estates or if himself and the Clergy in their Convocation had thus enacted the disseizing of the Laity But good God! What will not a powerful Leacher do when Revenge and Gain spur him on one side and he is sure to meet with nothing but helpless tears and words to oppose him It is certain there hath not been in the whole World so great a dishonour and so vile a scandal to the Protestant Religion as the impious practices of this dissolute Prince And yet after all this that he might gather together the fragments of this shipwrack't honour which he had so rashly prostituted in the sight of all Christendome he began at length to stick some little Feathers of the Geese that he had plucked and made some small shew of Love to the Church whom he had Ravished by raising towards his latter end here and there a little Bishoprick which by their indowments may be discerned to have proceeded from a very moderate zeal and by the slenderness of their Revenues in respect of the rest of the Kingdom as the Bishoprick of Oxon. 31.32.33 Hen. 8. valued in the Kings books at 354 l. 16 s. 4 d. ob founded Hen. 8.33 Peterborough valued per annum in the Kings books 414 l. 19 s. 11 d. founded Hen. 8.31 Glocester valued per annum 315 l. 17 s. 8 d. Hen. 8. 31. The Bishoprick of Bristol valued per annum 338 l. 8 s. 4 l. Hen. 8.31 c. 9. And although he fingered the Revenue of the Bishoprick of Norwich yet he substituted other Lands and to excuse the exchange alledged that they were of more value than those he took as is expressed in the Statute Hen. 8.32.47 32 Hen. 8.47 This was a poor pittance in proportion to that he took and yet was engaged by his Promise and Princely Word to advance the glory of God without which the Commons notwithstanding that dastardly fear they were possessed with would never have past that Act for the Dissolution 27 Hen. 8. So that we have a here fair example how much such persons design the glory of God or any countenance to Religion Nor doth that argument which some have brought from any emergent Necessity of Affairs for any robbery or depilation of the Church signifie any more to justifie such a proceeding than the former brought from a number of impious facts For first Evil is not to be done that Good may come of it and such it must be confessed to be to take away mens Properties and to spoil the Innocent Nor is every thing that is called a necessity such indeed or if it were Justin Iastitut tit digest 162. Quae propter necessitatem recepta sunt non debent in argumentum trahi Nor is it equal for any sort of men to spoil and disseise another sort on the pretence of pure necessity when it is indeed to the security and ease of themselves for this were to make those that are Parties Judges which no Law ever allowed nor themselves would be content to suffer Or supposing that necessity should supersede all right supposing it should be lawful Caiaphas Maxime Joh. 11.50 to kill one Man to save a Nation or to undo one sort of men to save the rest and withal that such a necessity should fall on this Kingdom I would fain know by what Law of God or Man the Clergy only should be the devovoted people and that their maintenance should be sacrificed more than the Estates of others Josephs example in Egypt will hardly allow this who for the preservation of the Lives of the Egyptians when he took the Estates of other men to the Kings advantage Medled not with the Lands of the Priests Gen. 47.26 but left their Revenue as free as Pharaohs much less did he sell it to maintain or ease others If necessity must fall let it fall on all men alike Where all lift together the greatest load will become portable And truly Maxime of the Common Law In pari necessitate potior est conditio possidentis In like necessity the condition of the possessor is most advantageous The Law tells us Bracton Lib. 2. fol. 12. that the Church is in the condition of aminor Ecclesia fungitur vice minoris And it is a strange piece of degenerous inhumanity to spoil a minor Justin Iastitut tit digest 110. §. 2. Pupillus pati posse non intelligitur That Pupils should be exposed no Government ever allowed or indured 'T is true there are some causes for which Clergy-men as well as others may be disseised as in case of Treason and the like Mag. Char. cap. 29. But no man must be disseised before he is convict Nor when he is convict can he loose more then he had which in Ecclesiastical preferments is only for the life of the Clerk after his death they do cedere successori go to the successor And in the vacancy no wast is suffered by the Law 14 Edw. 3. pro Clero cap. 4 5. in Manors Parks Ponds or Warrens c. no fines are to be levied of Tenants nor any under woods to be felled nor any other thing done which may tend to the disherison of the Church 14 Edw. 3. c. 4. 5. pro clero Nor will any consent of the possessors if they should be so perfidious make an alienation ever the more legal for though they are usufructuaries their interests extend but to their own times Ulpian lib. 46. Nemo plus juris ad alium transferre potest quam ipse haberet No man can transfer to others a greater right than himself had And if such Estates should ever discontinue from that use and end whereunto by the grants and wills of the Donors they were orignally designed they ought both in Equity and Law to return to them again or to their Heirs This is certain that it is the most reasonable thing in the World that every man should do what he thinks fit with his own and this is as certain that to pervert or frustrate the