A REMONSTRANCE OF THE MOST GRATIOVS KING IAMES I. KING OF GREAT BRITTAINE FRANCE and IRELAND Defender of the Faith c. FOR THE RIGHT OF KINGS AND THE independance of their Crownes AGAINST AN ORATION OF the most Illustrious Card. of PERRON pronounced in the Chamber of the third Estate Ian. 15. 1615. Translated out of his Maiesties French Copie PRINTED BY CANTRELL LEGGE Printer to the Vniuersitie of Cambridge 1616. THE PREFACE I Haue no humour to play the Curious in a forraine Common-wealth or vnrequested to carrie any hand in my neighbours affaires It hath more congruitie with Royall dignity wherof God hath giuen me the honour to prescribe Lawes at home for my Subiects rather then to furnish forraine Kingdoms and people with counsels Howbeit my late entire affection to K. Henrie IV. of happy memorie my most honoured brother and my exceeding sorrow for the most detestable parricide acted vpon the sacred person of a King so complete in all heroicall and Princely vertues as also the remembrance of my owne dangers incurred by the practise of conspiracies flowing from the same source hath wrought me to sympathize with my friends in their grieuous occurrents no doubt so much more daungerous as they are lesse apprehended and felt of Kings themselues euen when the danger hangeth ouer their owne heads Vpon whome in case the power and vertue of my aduertisments be not able effectually to worke at least many millions of children and people yet vnborne shall beare me witnes that in these daungers of the highest nature and straine I haue not bin defectiue and that neither the subuersions of States nor the murthers of Kings which may vnhappily betide hereafter shal haue so free passage in the world for want of timely aduertisment before For touching my particular my rest is vp that one of the maynes for which God hath advanced me vpon the loftie stage of the supreme Throne is that my words vttered from so eminent a place for Gods honour most shamefully traduced and vilified in his owne Deputies and Lieutenants might with greater facilitie be conceiued Now touching France faire was the hope which I conceiued of the States assembled in Parliament at Paris That calling to minde the murthers of their Noble Kings and the warres of the League which followed the Popes fulminations as when a great storme of haile powreth down after a thunder-cracke and a world of writings addressed to iustifie the parricides the dethronings of Kings would haue ioyned heads hearts and hands together to hammer out some apt and wholsome remedie against so many fearefull attempts and practises To my hope was added no little ioy when I was giuen to vnderstand the third Estate had preferred an Article or Bill the tenor and substance whereof was concerning the meanes whereby the people might be vnwitched of this pernicious opinion That Popes may tosse the French King his Throne like a tennis ball and that killing of Kings is an act meritorious to the purchase of the crowne of Martyrdome But in fine the proiect was encountred with successe cleane contrary to expectation For this Article of the third Estate like a sigh of libertie breathing her last serued only so much the more to inthrall the Crowne and to make the bondage more grieuous and sensible then before Euen as those medicines which worke no ease to the patient doe leaue the disease in much worse tearmes so this remedie inuented and tendred by the third Estate did onely exasperate the present maladie of the State for so much as the operation and vertue of the wholesome remedie was ouermatched with peccant humours then stirred by the force of thwarting and crossing opposition Yea much better had it beene the matter had not beene stirred at all then after it was once on foote and in motion to giue the Truth leaue to lie gasping and sprawling vnder the violence of a forraine faction For the opinion by which the Crownes of Kings are made subiect vnto the Popes will and power was then avowed in a most Honourable Assemblie by the averment of a Prelate in great authoritie and of no lesse learning He did not plead the cause as a priuate person but as one by representation that stood for the whole bodie of the Clergie Was there applauded and seconded with approbation of the Nobilitie No resolution taken to the contrarie or in barre to his plea. After praises and thankes from the Pope followed the printing of his eloquent harangue or Oration made in full Parliament a set discourse maintaining Kings to be deposeable by the Pope if he speake the word The saide Oration was not onely printed with the Kings priuiledge but was likewise addressed to me by the author and Orator himselfe who presupposed the reading thereof would forsooth driue me to say Lord Cardinall in this high subiect your Honour hath satisfied me to the full All this poysed in the ballance of equall iudgement why may not I truly and freely affirme the said Estates assembled in Parliament haue set Royall Maiestie vpon a doubtfull chance or left it resting vpon vncertain tearmes and that now if the doctrine there maintained by the Clergie should beare any pawme it may lawfully be doubted who is King in France For I make no question he is but a titular King that raigneth onely at an others discretion and whose Princely head the Pope hath power to bare of his Regall Crowne In temporall matters how can one be Soveraigne that may be fleeced of all his temporalties by any superiour power But let men at a neere sight marke the pith and marrowe of the Article proposed by the third Estate and they shall soone perceiue the skilfull Architects thereof aymed onely to make their King a true and reall King to be recognised for Soueraigne within his own Realme and that killing their King might no longer passe the muster of works acceptable to God But by the vehement instance and strong current of the Clergie and Nobles this was borne down as a pernicious Article as a cause of schisme as a gate which openeth to all sorts of heresies yea there it was maintained tooth and nayle that in case the doctrine of this Article might go for currant doctrine it must follow that for many ages past in sequence the Church hath bin the kingdome of Antechrist and the synagogue of Satan The Pope vpon so good issue of the cause had reason I trow to addresse his letters of triumph vnto the Nobilitie and Clergie who had so farre approoued themselues faithfull to his Holines and to vaunt withall that he had nipped Christian Kings in the Crowne that he had giuen them checke with mate through the magnanimous resolution of this couragious Nobilitie by whose braue making head the third Estate had bin so valiantly forced to giue ground In a scornefull reproach he qualified the Deputies of the third Estate nebulones ex foece plebis a sort or a number of knaues the very dregges
matter of truth I draw this conclusion Howsoeuer no smal number of the French Clergie may perhaps beare the affection of louing Subiects to their King and may not suffer the Clericall character to deface the impression of naturall allegiance yet for so much as the Order of Clerics is dipped in a deeper die and beareth a worse tincture of daungerous practises then the other Orders the third Estate had beene greatly wanting to their excellent prouidence and wisdome if they should haue relinquished and transferred the care of designements and proiects for the life of their King and the safetie of his Crowne to the Clergie alone Moreouer the Clergie standeth bound to referre the iudgment of all matters in controuersie to the sentence of the Pope in this cause beeing a partie and one that pretendeth Crownes to depend vpon his Mitre What hope then might the third Estate conceiue that his Holinesse would passe against his own cause when his iudgment of the controuersie had been sundrie times before published and testified to the world And whereas the plot or modell of remedies proiected by the third Estate and the Kings Officers hath not prooued sortable in the euent was it because the said remedies were not good and lawfull No verily but because the Clergie refused to become contributors of their duty meanes to the grand seruice Likewise for that after the burning of bookes addressed to iustifie rebellious people traytors and parricides of Kings neuerthelesse the authors of the said bookes are winked at and backt with fauour Lastly for that some wretched parricides drinke off the cuppe of publike iustice whereas to the firebrands of sedition the sowers of this abominable doctrine no man saith so much as blacke is their eye It sufficiently appeareth as I suppose by the former passage that his Lordship exhorting the third Estate to refer the whole care of this Regall cause vnto the Clergie hath tacked his frame of weake ioynts and tenons to a very worthy but wrong foundation Howbeit he laboureth to fortifie his exhortation with a more weak feeble reason For to make good his proiect he affirmes that matters and maximes out of all doubt question may not be shuffled together with points in controuersy Now his rules indubitable are two The first It is not lawfull to murther Kings for any cause whatsoeuer This he confirmeth by the example of Saul as he saith deposed from his Throne whose life or limbs Dauid neuerthelesse durst not once hurt or wrong for his life Likewise he confirmes the same by a Decree of the Council held at Constance His other point indubitable The Kings of France are Soueraignes in all Temporall Soueraigntie within the French Kingdome and hold not by fealtie either of the Pope as hauing receiued or obliged their Crownes vpon such tenure and condition or of any other Prince in the whole world Which point neuerthelesse he takes not for certen and indubitable but onely according to humane and historicall certentie Now a third point he makes to be so full of controuersie and so farre within the circle of disputable questions as it may not be drawne into the ranke of classicall and authenticall points for feare of making a certen point doubtfull by shuffling and jumbling therewith some point in controuersie Now the question so disputable as he pretendeth is this A Christian Prince breakes his oath solemnly taken to God both to liue and to die in the Catholique Religion Say this Prince turnes Arrian or Mahometan fals to proclaime open warre and to wage battel with Iesus Christ Whether may such a Prince be declared to haue lost his Kingdome and who shall declare the Subiects of such a Prince to be quit of their oath of allegiance The L. Cardinall holds the affirmatiue and makes no bones to maintaine that all other parts of the Catholique Church yea the French Church euen from the first birth of her Theologicall Schooles to Calvins time and teaching haue professed that such a Prince may be lawfully remooued from his Throne by the Pope and by the Council and suppose the contrarie doctrine were the very Quintessence or spirit of truth yet might it not in case of faith be vrged and pressed otherwise then by way of problematicall disceptation That is the summe of his Lordsh ample discourse The refuting whereof I am constrained to put off and referre vnto an other place because he hath serued vs with the same dishes ouer ouer againe There we shall see the L. Cardinall maketh way to the dispatching of Kings after deposition that Saul was not deposed as he hath presumed that in the Council of Constance there is nothing to the purpose of murthering Soueraigne Princes that his Lordship supposing the French King may be depriued of his Crowne by a superiour power doth not hold his liege Lord to be Soueraigne in France that by the position of the French Church from age to age the Kings of France are not subiect vnto any censure of deposition by the Pope that his Holinesse hath no iust and lawful pretence to produce that any Christian King holds of him by fealtie or is obliged to doe the Pope homage for his Crowne Well then for the purpose he dwelleth onely vpon the third point pretended questionable and this he affirmeth If any shall condemne or wrappe vnder the solemne curse the abettors of the Popes power to vnking lawfull and Soueraigne Kings the same shall runne vpon fowre dangerous rocks of apparant incongruities and absurdities First he shall offer to force and intangle the consciences of many deuout persons For hee shall bind them to beleeue and sweare that doctrine the contrary whereof is beleeued of the whole Church and hath beene beleeued by their predecessors Secondly he shall ouerturne from top to bottome the sacred authoritie of holy Church and shall set open a gate vnto all sorts of heresie by allowing lay-persons a bold libertie to be iudges in causes of religion and faith For what is that degree of boldnesse but open vsurping of the Priesthood what is it but putting of prophane hands into the Arke what is it but laying of vnholy fingers vpon the holy Censor for perfumes Thirdly he shal make way to a schisme not possible to be put by and auoided by any humane prouidence For this doctrine beeing held and professed by all other Catholicks how can we declare it repugnant vnto Gods word how can we hold it impious how can we accompt it detestable but we shall renounce communion with the head and other members of the Church yea we shall confesse the Church in all ages to haue been the Synagogue of Satan and the spouse of the Deuill Lastly by working the establishment of this Article which worketh an establishment of Kings Crownes He shall not onely worke the intended remedy for the danger of Kings out of all the vertue and efficacie thereof by weakening of doctrine out of all controuersie in packing it vp
will and pleasure of his Holinesse The Prelats enformed hereof made answer that in this case they would neuer yeeld obedience to the Excommunication of the said Bishops because it was contrarie to the authority and aduise of the auncient Canons After these times Pope Nicholas 1. depriued King Lotharius of communion for in those times not a word of deposing to make him repudiate or quit Valdrada and to resume or take again Thetberga his former wife The articles framed by the French vpon this point are to be found in the writings of Hincmarus Archbishop of Reims and are of this purport that in the iudgement of men both learned and wise it is an ouerruled case that as the King whatsoeuer he shall doe ought not by his own Bishops to be excommunicated euen so no forraine Bishop hath power to sit for his Iudge because the King is to be subiect onely vnto God and his Imperiall authoritie who alone had the al-sufficient power to settle him in his Kingdome Moreouer the Clergie addressed letters of answer vnto the same Pope full of stinging and bitter tearms with speaches of great scorne and contempt as they are set downe by Auentine in his Annals of Bauaria not forbearing to call him theife wolfe and tyrant When Pope Hadrian tooke vpon him like a Lord to commaund Charles the Bald vpon paine of interdiction that hee should suffer the Kingdome of Lotharius to be fully and entirely conueied and conferred vpon Lewis his sonne the same Hinemarus a man of great authoritie and estimation in that age sent his letters containing sundrie remonstrances touching that subiect Among other matters thus he writeth The Ecclesiastics and Seculars of the Kingdom assembled at Reims haue affirmed and now do affirme by way of reproach vpbrading exprobation that neuer was the like mandate sent before from the See of Rome to any of our predecessors And a little after The cheife Bishops of the Apostolike See or any other Bishops of the greatest authoritie and holinesse neuer withdrew themselues from the presence from the reuerend salutation or from the conference of Emperours and Kings whether hereticks or schismiticks and Tyrants As Constantius the Arrian Julianus the Apostata and Maxmius the tyrant And yet a little after Wherefore if the Apostolicke Lord be minded to seeke peace let him seeke it so that hee stirre no brawles and breed no quarrels For we are no such babes to beleeue that wee can or euer shall attaine to Gods Kingdome vnlesse we receiue him for our King in earth whom God himselfe recommendeth to vs from heauen It is added by Hincmarus in the same place that by the said Bishops and Lords Temporall such threatning words were blowne forth as he is afraid once to speake and vtter As for the King himselfe what reckoning he made of the Popes mandates it appeareth by the Kings owne letters addressed to Pope Hadrianus as we may reade euery where in the Epistles of Hincmarus For there after King Charles hath taxed and challenged the Pope of pride and hit him in the teeth with a spirit of vsurpation he breaketh out into these words What hell hath cast vp this lawe so crosse and preposterous what infernall gulph hath disgorged this law out of the darkest and obscurest dennes a law quite contrarie and altogether repugnant vnto the beaten way shewed vs in the holy Scriptures c. Yea he flatly and peremptorily forbids the Pope except he meane or desire to be recompenced with dishonour and contempt to send any more the like mandates either to himselfe or to his Bishops Vnder the raigne of Hugo Capetus and Robert his sonne a Council now extant in all mens hands was held and celebrated at Reims by the Kings authority There Arnulphus Bishop of Orleans then Prolocutor and Speaker of the Council calls the Pope Antichrist and lets not also to paint him forth like a monster as well for the deformed and vgly vices of that vnholy See which then were in their exaltation as also because the Pope then won with presents and namely with certaine goodly horses then presented to his Holinesse tooke part against the King with Arnulphus Bishop of Reims then dispossed of his Pastorall charge When Philip 1. had repudiated his wife Bertha daughter to the Earle of Holland and in her place had also taken to wife Bertrade the wife of Fulco Earle of Aniou yet being aliue he was excommunicated and his Kingdom interdicted by Vrbanus then Pope though he was then bearded with an Antipope as the L. Cardinal here giueth vs to vnderstand But his Lordship hath skipt ouer two principall points recorded in the historie The first is that Philip was not deposed by the Pope whereupon it is to be inferred that in this passage there is nothing materiall to make for the Popes power against a Kings Throne and Scepter The other point is that by the censures of the Pope the course of obedience due to the King before was not interrupted nor the King disauowed refused or disclaimed but on the contrary that Iuo of Chartres taking Pope Vrbanus part was punished for his presumption dispoyled of his estate and kept in prison whereof hee makes complaint himselfe in his 19. and 20. Epistles The L. Cardinal besides in my vnderstanding for his Masters honour should haue made no words of interdicting the whole Kingdome For when the Pope to giue a King chastisement doth interdict his Kingdome he makes the people to beare the punishment of the Kings offence For during the time of interdiction the Church doores through the whole Kingdome are kept continually shut and lockt vp publike seruice is intermitted in all places bels euery where silent Sacraments not administred to the people bodies of the dead so prostituted and abandoned that none dares burie the said bodies in holy ground More it is beleeued that a man dying vnder the curse of the interdict without some speciall indulgence or priuiledge is for euer damned and adiudged to eternall punishments as one that dyeth out of the communion of the Church Put case then the interdict holdeth and continueth for many yeares together alas how many millions of poore soules are damned and goe to hell for an others offence For what can or what may the faltlesse and innocent people doe withall if the King will repudiate his wife and she yet liuing ioyne himselfe in matrimonie to an other The Lord Cardinall after Philip the 1. produceth Philippus Augustus who hauing renounced his wife Ingeberga daughter to the King of Denmarke and marrying with Agnes daughter to the Duke of Morauia was by Pope Innocent the third interdicted himselfe and his whole Kingdome But his Lordshippe was not pleased to insert withall what is auerred in the Chronicle of Saint Denis that Pope Celestinus 3. sent forth two Legats at once vpon this errand Who being come into to the assemblie and generall Council of all the French Prelats became like dumbe dogs that can not
barke so as they could not bring the seruice which they had vndertaken to any good passe because they stood in a bodily feare of their owne hydes Not long after the Cardinal of Capua was in the like taking For he durst not bring the Realme within the limits of the interdict before he was got out of the limits of the Kingdome The King herewith incensed thrust all the Prelates that had giuen consent vnto these proceedings out of their Sees confiscated their goods c. To the same effect is that which wee reade in Math. Paris After the Pope had giuen his Maiesty to vnderstand by the Cardinal of Anagnia that his Kingdome should be interdicted vnlesse hee would be reconciled to the King of England the King returned the Pope this answer that he was not in any sort afraid of the Popes sentence for as much as it could not bee grounded vpon any equity of the cause and added withall that it did no way appertain vnto the Church of Rome to sentence Kings especially the King of Fraunce And this was done saith Iohannes Tilius Register in Court of Parliament at Paris by the counsell of the French Barons Most notable is the example of Philip the Faire and hits the bird in the right eie In the yeere 1032. the Pope dispatched the Archbishop of Narbona with mandates into France commaunding the King to release the Bishop of Apamia then detained in prison for contumelious words tending to the Kings defamation and spoken to the Kings owne head In very deede this Pope had conceiued a secret grudge and no light displeasure against King Philip before namely because the King had taken vpon him the collation of benefices and other Ecclesiasticall dignities Vpon which occasion the Pope sent letters to the King of this tenour and style Feare God and keepe his commaundements We would haue thee knowe that in spirituall and temporall causes thou art subiect vnto our selfe that collating of benefices and prebends doth not in any sort appertaine to thy office and place that in case as keeper of the spiritualties thou haue the custodie of benefices and prebends in thy hand when they become void thou shalt by sequestration reserue the fruites of the same to the vse and benefit of the next incumbents and successors and in case thou hast heretofore collated any we ordaine the said collations to bee meerely void and so farre as herein thou hast proceeded to the fact we reuoke the said collations We hold them for hereticks whosoeuer are not of this beleefe A Legate comes to Paris and brings these brauing letters By some of the Kings faithful seruants they are violently snatched and pulled out of the Legates hands by the Earle of Artois they are cast into the fire The good King answers the Pope and payes him in as good coyne as he had sent Philip by the grace of God King of the French to Boniface calling and bearing himselfe the Soueraigne Bishop little greeting or none at all May thy exceeding sottishnesse vnderstand that in temporall causes we are not subiect vnto any mortall and earthly creature that collating of benefices and prebends by Regall right appertaineth to our office and place that appropriating their fruites when they become voide belongeth to our selfe alone during their vacancie that all collations by vs heretofore made or to be made hereafter shall stand in force that in the validitie and vertue of the said collations we will euer couragiously defend and maintaine all Incumbents and possessors of benefices and prebends so by vs collated We hold them all for sots and senselesse whosoeuer are not of this beleefe The Pope incensed herewith excommunicates the King but no man dares publish that censure or become bearer thereof The King notwithstanding the said proceedings of the Pope assembles his Prelates Barons and Knights at Paris askes the whole assembly of whome they hold their Fees with all other the Temporalties of the Church They make answer with one voice that in the said matters they disclaime the Pope and know none other Lord beside his Maiestie Meane while the Pope worketh with Germanie and the Lowe Countries to stirre them vp against France But Philip sendeth William of Nogaret into Italy William by the direction and aide of Sciarra Columnensis takes the Pope at Anagnia mounts him vpon a leane ill-fauoured iade carries him prisoner to Rome where ouercome with choller anguish and great indignation hee takes his last leaue of the Popedome and his life All this notwithstanding the King presently after from the successors of Boniface receiues very ample and gratious Bulls in which the memorie of all the former passages and actions is vtterly abolished Witnesse the Epistle of Clement 5. wherein this King is honoured with prayses for a pious and religious Prince and his Kingdom is restored to the former estate In that age the French Nobilitie carried other manner of spirits then the moderne and present Nobilitie doe I meane those by whome the L. Cardinal was applauded and assisted in his Oration Yea in those former times the Prelates of the Realme stood better affected towards their King then the L. Cardinal himselfe now standeth who could finde none other way to dally with and to shift off this pregnant example but by plaine glosing that heresie and Apostasie was no ground of that question or subiect of that controuersie Wherein hee not onely condemnes the Pope as one that proceeded against Philip without a iust cause and good ground but likewise giues the Pope the lie who in his goodly letters but a little aboue recited hath enrowled Philip in the list of heretiks He saith moreouer that indeed the knot of the question was touching the Popes pretence in challenging to himselfe the temporall Soueraingntie of France that is to say in qualifying himselfe King of France But indeed and indeede no such matter to be found His whole pretence was the collating of benefices and to pearch aboue the King to crowe ouer his Crowne in Temporall causes At which pretence his Holinesse yet aimeth still attributing and and challenging to himselfe plenary power to depose the King Now if the L. Cardinal shall yet proceede to cauill that Boniface 8. was taken by the French for an vsurper and no lawfull Pope but for one that crept into the Papacy by fraud and symonie hee must bee pleased to set downe positiuely who was Pope seeing that Boniface then sate not in the Papall chaire To conclude If hee that creepeth and stealeth into the Papacie by symonie by canuases or labouring of suffrages vnder hand or by bribery be not lawfull Pope I dare bee bold to professe there will hardly bee found two lawfull Popes in the three last ages Pope Benedict in the yeare 1408. being in choller with Charles 6. because Charles had bridled and curbed the gainefull exactions and extorsions of the Popes Court by which the Realme of France had been exhausted of their treasure sent
it maketh mention of disobedience to the Pope For I suppose he will not deny that whosoeuer shall stand out in heresie contrary to the Popes monitorie proceedings hee shall shewe but poore and simple obedience to the Pope Moreouer the case is cleare by the former examples that no Pope will suffer his power to cast downe Kings to bee restrained vnto the cause of heresie and infidelitie In the heate of the last warres raised by that holy-prophane League admonitory Buls were sent by Pope Gregory 14. from Rome Anno 1591. By these Bulls King Henry 4. as an heretike and relaps was declared incapable of the Crowne of France and his Kingdome was exposed to hauock and spoile The Court of Parliament beeing assembled at Tours the 5. of August decreed the said admonitorie Bulls to bee cancelled torne in peices and cast into a great fire by the hand of the publike executioner The Arrest it selfe or Decree is of this tenor The Court duely pondering and approouing the concluding and vnanswearable reasons of the Kings Atturney General hath declared and by these present doth declare the admonitorie Bulls giuen at Rome the 1. of March 1591. to be of no validitie abusiue seditious damnable full of impietie and impostures contrarie to the holie decrees rights franchises and liberties of the French Church doth ordaine the Copies of the said Bulls sealed with the seale of Marsilius Landrianus and signed Septilius Lamprius to be rent in peices by the publike executioner and by him to be burnt in a great fire to be made for such purpose before the great gates of the common Hall or Palace c. Then euen then the L. of Perron was firme for the better part and stood for his King against Gregorie the Pope notwithstanding the crime of heresie pretended against Henrie his Lord. All the former examples by vs alleadged are drawne out of the times after Schooles of Diuinitie were established in France For I thought good to bound my selfe within those dooles and limits of time which the L. Card. himselfe hath set Who goeth not sincerely to worke and in good earnest where he telleth vs there bee three instances as if we had no more obiected against Papall power to remooue Kings out of their chaires of State by name the example of Philip the Faire of Lewis XII and of Tanquerellus For in very truth all the former examples by vs produced are no lesse pregnant and euident howsoeuer the L. Cardinal hath beene pleased to conceale them all for feare of hurting his cause Nay France euen in the dayes of her sorest seruitude was neuer vnfurnished of great Diuines by whom this vsurped pow-of the Pope ouer the Temporalties and Crownes of Kings hath been vtterly misliked and condemned Robert Earle of Flanders was commanded by Pope Paschall 2. to persecute with fire and sword the Clergie of Leige who then adhered and stood to the cause of the Emperour Henry 4. whom the Pope had ignominiously deposed Robert by the Popes order and command was to handle the Clergie of Leige in like sort as before he had serued the Clergy of Cambray who by the said Earle had beene cruelly stript both of goods and life The Pope promised the said Earle and his army pardon of their sinnes for the said execution The Clergie of Leige addressed answer to the Pope at large They cried out vpon the Church of Rome and called her Babylon Told the Pope home that God hath commanded to giue vnto Cesar that which is Cesars that euery soule must be subiect vnto the superiour powers that no man is exempted out of this precept and that euery oath of allegiance is to be kept inuiolable yea that hereof they themselues are not ignorant in as much as they by a new schism and newe traditions making a separation and rent of the priesthood from the Kingdome doe promise to absolue of periurie such as haue perfidiously forsworne themselues against their King And whereas by way of despight and in opprobrious manner they were excommunicated by the Pope they gaue his Holines to vnderstand that Dauids heart had vttered a good matter but Paschals heart had spewed vp sordid and railing words like old baudes and spinsters or websters of linnen when they scold and brawle one with an other Finally they reiected his Papall excommunication as a sentence giuen without discretion This was the voice and free speech of that Clergie in the life time of their noble Emperour But after he was thrust out of the Empire by the rebellion of his owne sonne instigated and stirred vp thereunto by the Popes perswasion and practise and was brought vnto a miserable death it is no matter of wonder that for the safegard of their life the said Clergie were driuen to sue vnto the Pope for their pardon Hildebert Bishop of Caenomanum vpon the riuer of Sartre liuing vnder the raigne of King Philip the first affirmeth in his Epistles 40. and 75. that Kings are to be admonished and instructed rather then punished to be dealt with by counsell rather then by commaund by doctrine and instruction rather then by correction For no such sword belongeth to the Church because the sword of the Church is Ecclesiasticall discipline and nothing else Bernard writeth to Pope Eugenius after this manner Whosoeuer they be that are of this mind and opinion shal neuer be able to make proofe that any one of the Apostles did euer sit in qualitie of Iudge or Diuider of lands I reade where they haue stood to be iudged but neuer where they sate downe to giue iudgement Againe Your authoritie stretcheth vnto crimes not vnto possessions because you haue receiued the keies of the kingdome of heauen not in regard of possessions but of crimes to keepe all that pleade by couin or collusion and not lawfull possessors out of the heauenly kingdome A little after These base things of the earth are iudged by the Kings and Princes of this world wherefore doe you thrust your sickle into an others haruest wherefore doe you incraach and intrude vpon an others limits Elsewhere The Apostles are directly forbid to make themselues Lords and rulers Goe thou then and beeing a Lord vsurpe Apostleship or beeing an Apostle vsurpe Lordship If thou needes wilt haue both doubtlesse thou shalt haue neither Iohannes Maior Doctor of Paris The Soueraigne Bishop hath no temporall authoritie ouer Kings The reason Because it followes the contrarie being once granted that Kings are the Popes vassals Now let other men iudge whether hee that hath power to dipossesse Kings of all their Temporalties hath not likewise authoritie ouer their Temporalties The same Author The Pope hath no manner of title ouer the French or Spanish Kings in temporall matters Where it is further added That Pope Innocent 3. hath beene pleased to testifie that Kings of France in Temporall causes doe acknowledge no superiour For so the Pope excused himselfe to a certaine Lord of Montpellier
their Royall Thrones wherefore takes he more vpon him ouer Kings then ouer priuate persons wherefore shal the sacred heads of Kings be more churlishly vnciuilly and rigorously handled then the hoods of the meanest people Here the L. Cardinal in stead of a direct answer breakes out of the lists alleadging cleane from the purpose examples of heretikes punished not by the Pope but by the ciuill Magistrate of the Countrey But Bellarmine speakes to the point with a more free and open heart he is absolute and resolute in this opinion that his Holinesse hath plenarie power to dispose all Temporall estates and matters in the whole world I am confident saith Bellarmine and I speake it with assurance that our Lord Iesus Christ in the dayes of his mortalitie had power to dispose of all Temporall things yea to strippe Soueraign Kings and absolute Lords of their Kingdomes and Seignories and without all doubt hath granted and left euen the same power vnto his Vicar to make vse thereof whensoeuer he shall thinke it necessary for the saluation of soules And so his Lordship speaketh without exception of any thing at all For who doth not knowe that Iesus Christ had power to dispose no lesse of priuate mens possessions then of whole Realmes and Kingdomes at his pleasure if it had been his pleasure to display the ensignes of his power The same fulnesse of power is likewise in the Pope In good time belike his Holinesse is the sole heire of Christ in whole and in part The last Lateran Council fineth a Laic that speaketh blasphemie for the first offence if he be a gentleman at 25. ducats and at 50. for the second It presupposeth and taketh it for graunted that the Church may rifle and ransacke the purses of priuate men and cast lots for their goods The Councill of Trent diggeth as deepe for the same veine of gold and siluer It ordaines That Emperours Kings Dukes Princes and Lords of cities castles and territories holding of the Church in case they shall assigne any place within their limits or liberties for the duell between two Christians shal be depriued of the said citie castle or place where such duell shall be performed they holding the said place of the Church by any kind of tenure that all other Estates held in fee where the like offence shall be committed shall foorthwith fall and become forfeited to their immediate and next Lords that all goods possessions and estates as well of the combatants themselues as of their seconds shall be confiscate This Council doth necessarily presuppose it lieth in the hand and power of the Church to dispose of all the lands and estates held in fee throughout all Christendome because the Church forsooth can take from one and giue vnto an other all estates held in fee whatsoeuer as well such as hold of the Church as of secular Lords and to make ordinances for the confiscation of all priuate persons goods By this Canon the Kingdome of Naples hath need to looke well vnto it selfe For one duell it may fal into the Exchecker of the Romane Church because that Kingdome payeth a Reliefe to the Church as a Royaltie or Seignorie that holdeth in fee of the said Church And in France there is not one Lordship not one Mannor not one farme which the Pope by this means cannot shift ouer to a new Lord. His Lordship therefore had carried himselfe and the cause much better if in stead of seeking such idle shifts he had by a more large assertion maintained the Popes power to dispose of priuate mens possessions with no lesse right and authoritie then of Kingdomes For what colour of reason can be giuen for making the Pope Lord of the whole and not of the parts for making him Lord of the forrest in grosse and not of the trees in parcell for making him Lord of the whole house and not of the parlour or the dining chamber His Lordship alleadgeth yet an other reason but of no better weight Betweene the power of priuate owners ouer their goods and the power of Kings ouer their estates there is no little difference For the goods of priuate persons are ordained for their owners and Princes for the benefit of their Common-wealths Heare me now answer If this Cardinal-reason hath any force to inferre that a King may lawfully be depriued of his Kingdome for heresie but a priuate person cannot for the same crime bee turned out of his mansion house then it shall follow by the same reason that a Father for the same cause may be depriued of all power ouer his children but a priuate owner cannot be depriued of his goods in the like case because goods are ordained for the benefit and comfort of their owners but fathers are ordained for the good and benefit of their children But most certaine it is that Kings representing the image of God in earth and Gods place haue a better and closer seat in their chaires of Estate then any priuate persons haue in the saddle of their inheritances and patrimonies which are daily seene for sleight causes to flit and to fall into the hands of newe Lords Whereas a Prince beeing the Head cannot be loosed in the proper ioynt nor dismounted like a cannon when the carriage thereof is vnlockt without a sore shaking and a most grieuous dislocation of all the members yea without subuerting the whole bodie of the State whereby priuate persons without number are inwrapped together in the same ruine euen as the lower shrubs and other brush-wood are crushed in peices altogether by the fall of a great oake But suppose his Lordships reason were somewhat ponderous and solide withall yet a King which would not be forgotten is indowed not onely with the Kingdome but also with auncient desmenes and Crowne-lands for which none can be so simple to say the King was ordained and created King which neuerthelesse he looseth when he looseth his Crowne Admit againe this reason were of some pith to make mighty Kings more easily deposeable then priuate persons from their patrimonies yet all this makes nothing for the deriuing and fetching of deposition from the Popes Consistorie What hee neuer conferred by what right or power can hee claime to take away But see here no doubt a sharpe and subtile difference put by the L. Cardinall betweene a Kingdome and the goods of priuate persons Goods as his Lordship saith are without life they can be constrained by no force by no example by no inducement of their owners to loose eternall life Subiects by their Princes may Now I am of this contrary beleefe That an hereticall owner or master of a family hath greater power and means withall to seduce his owne seruants and children then a Prince hath to peruert his owne subiects and yet for the contagion of heresie and for corrupt religion children are not remooued from their parents nor seruants are taken away from their masters Histories abound with examples of most flourishing
of the base vulgar a packe of people presuming to personate well affected Subiects and men of deepe vnderstanding and to read their masters a learned lecture Now it is no wonder that in so good an office and loyall carriage towards their King the third Estate hath outgone the Clergie For the Clergie denie themselues to haue any ranke among the Subiects of the King they stand for a Soueraigne out of the kingdome to whome as to the Lord Paramount they owe suit and seruice they are bound to aduance that Monarchie to the bodie whereof they properly appertaine as parts or members as elswhere I haue written more at large But for the Nobilitie the Kings right arme to prostitute and set as it were to sale the dignitie of their King as if the arme should giue a thrust vnto the head I say for the Nobilitie to hold and maintaine euen in Parliament their King is liable to deposition by any forraine power or Potentate may it not passe among the strangest miracles and rarest wonders of the world For that once granted this consequence is good and necessarie That in case the King once lawfully deposed shal stand vpon the defensiue and hold out for his right he may then lawfully be murthered Let me then here freely professe my opinion and this it is That now the French Nobilitie may seeme to haue some reason to disrobe themselues of their titles and to transferre them by resignation vnto the third Estate For that bodie of the third Estate alone hath carried a right noble heart in as much as they could neither be tickled with promises nor terrified by threatnings from resolute standing to those fundamentall points reasons of State which most concerne the honor of their King and the securitie of his person Of all the Clergie the man that hath most abandoned or set his owne honour to sale the man to whome France is least obliged is the Lord Cardinall of Perron a man otherwise inferiour to few in matter of learning and in the grace of a sweete style This man in two seuerall Orations whereof the one was pronounced before the Nobilitie the other had audience before the third Estate hath set his best wits on worke to draw that doctrine into all hatred and infamie which teacheth Kings to be indeposeable by the Pope To this purpose he tearmes the same doctrine a breeder of schismes a gate that openeth to make way and to giue entrance vnto all heresies in briefe a doctrine to be held in so high a degree of detestation that rather then he and his fellow-Bishops will yeild to the signing thereof they will be contented like Martyrs to burne at a stake At which resolution or obstinacie rather in his opinion I am in a manner amased more then I can be mooued for the like brauado in many other for as much as he was many yeares together a follower of the late King euen when the King followed a contrarie Religion and was deposed by the Pope as also because not long before in a certaine Assemblie holden at the Iacobins in Paris he withstood the Popes Nuntio to his face when the said Nuntio laboured to make this doctrin touching the Popes temporall Soueraigntie passe for an Article of faith But in both Orations he singeth a contrarie song and from his owne mouth passeth sentence of condemnation against his former course and profession I suppose not without solide iudgement as one that herein hath well accommodated himselfe to the times For as in the raigne of the late King he durst not offer to broach this doctrine such was his fore-wit so now he is bold to proclaime and publish it in Parliament vnder the raigne of the said Kings sonne whose tender yeares and late succession to the Crowne do make him lie the more open to iniuries and the more facill to bee circumuented Such is nowe his after wisedome Of these two Orations that made in presence of the Nobility he hath for feare of incurring the Popes displeasure cautelously suppressed For therein hee hath beene somewhat prodigall in affirming this doctrine maintained by the Clergie to be but problematicall and in taking vpon him to auouch that Catholikes of my Kingdome are bound to yeeld me the honour of obedience Wheras on the other side he is not ignorant how this doctrine of deposing Princes and Kings the Pope holdeth for meerely necessarie and approoueth not by any meanes allegiance to be performed vnto me by the Catholikes of my Kingdome Yea if credit may be giuen vnto the abridgement of his other Oration published wherein he parallels the Popes power in receiuing honours in the name of the Church with the power of the Venetian Duke in receiuing honours in the name of that most renowned Republike no meruaile that when this Oration was dispatched to the presse hee commaunded the same to be gelded of this clause and other like for feare of giuing his Holinesse any offensiue distast His pleasure therefore was and content withall that his Oration imparted to the third Estate should bee put in print and of his courtesie hee vouchsafed to addresse vnto mee a copy of the same Which after I had perused I forthwith well perceiued what and how great discrepance there is betweene one man that perorateth from the ingenuous and sincere disposition of a sound heart and an other that flaunteth in flourishing speech with inward checkes of his owne conscience For euery where he contradicts himselfe and seemes to bee afraid least men should picke out his right meaning First he graunts this Question is not hitherto decided by the holy Scriptures or by the Decrees of the auncient Church or by the analogie of other Ecclesiasticall proceedings and neuerthelesse he confidently doth affirme that whosoeuer maintaine this doctrine to be wicked and abhominable that Popes haue no power to put Kings by their supreame Thrones they teach men to beleeue there hath not beene any Church for many ages past and that indeede the Church is the very Synagogue of Antechrist Secondly hee exhorts his hearers to hold this doctrine at least for problematicall and not necessarie and yet herein he calls them to all humble submission vnto the iudgement of the Pope and Clergie by whome the cause hath beene alreadie put out of all question as out of all hunger and cold Thirdly he doth auerre in case this Article be authorized it makes the Pope in good consequence to bee the Antechrist and yet he graunts that many of the French are tolerated by the Pope to dissent in this point from his Holinesse prouided their doctrine be not proposed as necessarie and materiall to faith As if the Pope in any sort gaue toleration to hold any doctrine contrarie to his owne and most of all that doctrine which by consequence inferres himselfe to be the Antechrist Fourthly he protesteth forwardnesse to vndergoe the flames of Martyrdome rather then to signe this doctrine which teacheth Kings Crowns to
their Soueraigntie But let vs come to see what aide the L. Cardinall hath amassed and piled together out of later histories prouided wee still beare in mind that our question is not of popular tumults nor of the rebellion of subiects making insurrections out of their owne discontented spirits and brain-sicke humors nor of lawfull Excommunications nor of Canonicall censures and reprehensions but onely of a iuridicall sentence of deposition pronounced by the Pope as armed with ordinary and lawfull power to depose against a Soueraigne Prince Now then The L. Cardinall sets on and giues the first charge with Anastasius the Emperour whome Euphemius Patriarke of Constantinople would neuer acknowledge for Emperour that is to say would neuer consent he should be created Emperour by the help of his voice or suffrage except he would first subscribe to the Chalcedon Creed notwithstanding the great Empresse and Senate sought by violent courses and practises to make him yeeld And when afterward the said Emperour contrary to his oath taken played the relaps by falling into his former heresie and became a persecutor he was first admonished and then excommunicated by Symmachus Bishop of Rome To this the L. Cardinall addes that when the said Emperour was minded to choppe the poison of his hereticall assertions into the publique formes of diuine seruice then the people of Constantinople made an vproare against Anastasius their Emperour and one of his Commanders by force of armes constrained him to call backe certaine Bishops whome he had sent into banishments before In this first example the L. Cardinall by his good leaue neither comes close to the question nor salutes it a farre off Euphemius was not Bishop of Rome Anastasius was not deposed by Euphemius the Patriarch onely made no way to the creating of Anastasius The suddaine commotion of the base multitude makes nothing the rebellion of a Greeke Commaunder makes lesse for the authorizing of the Pope to depose a Soueraigne Prince The Greek Emperour was excommunicated by Pope Symmachus who knowes whether that be true or forged For the Pope himselfe is the onely witnesse here produced by the Lord Cardinall vpon the point and who knowes not how false how suppositious the writings and Epistles of the auncient Popes are iustly esteemed But graunt it a truth yet Anastasius excommunicated by Pope Symmachus is not Anastasius deposed by Pope Symmachus And to make a full answer I say further that excommunication denounced by a forraine Bishop against a party not beeing within the limits of his iurisdiction or one of his owne flock was not any barre to the party from the communion of the Church but onely a kind of publication that he the said Bishop in his particular would hold no further communion with any such party For proofe whereof I produce the Canons of the Councils held at Carthage In one of the said Canons it is thus prouided and ordained If any Bishop shall wilfully absent himselfe from the vsual and accustomed Synodes let him not be admitted to the communion of other Churches but let him onely vse the benefit and libertie of his owne Church In an other of the same Canons thus If a Bishop shall insinuate himselfe to make a conueiance of his Monasterie and the ordering thereof vnto a Monke of any other Cloister let him be cut off let him bee separated from the communion with other Churches and content himselfe to liue in the communion of his owne flocke In the same sense Hilarius Bishop of Poictiers excommunicated Liberius Bishop of Rome for subscribing to the Arrian Confession In the same sense Iohn Bishop of Antioch excommunicated Caelestine of Rome and Cyrill of Alexandria Bishops for proceeding to sentence against Nestorius without staying his comming to answer in his owne cause In the same sense likewise Victor Bishop of Rome did cut off all the Bishops of the East not from the communion of their owne flocks but from communion with Victor and the Romane Church What resemblance what agreement what proportion betweene this course of excommunication and that way of vniust fulmination which the Popes of Rome haue vsurped against Kings but yet certaine long courses of time after that auncient course And this may stand for a full answer likewise to the example of Clotharius This auncient King of the French fearing the censures of Pope Agapetus erected the territorie of Yuetot vnto the title of a Kingdome by way of satisfaction for murdering of Gualter Lord of Yuetot For this example the L. Cardinall hath ransackt records of 900. yeeres antiquitie and vpward in which times it were no hard peice of worke to shewe that Popes would not haue any hand nor so much as a finger in the affaires and acts of the French Kings Gregorie of Tours that liued in the same age hath recorded many acts of excesse and violent iniuries done against Bishops by their Kings and namely against Praetextatus Bishop of Roan for any of which iniurious prankes then plaied the Bishop of Rome durst not reproue the said Kings with due remonstrance But see here the words of Gregory himselfe to King Chilperic If any of vs O King shall swarue from the path of iustice him thou hast power to punish But in case thou shalt at any time transgresse the lines of equitie who shall once touch thee with reproofe To thee we speake but are neuer heeded and regarded except it be thy pleasure and be thou not pleased who shal challenge thy greatnes but he that iustly challengeth to be iustice it selfe The good Bishop notwithstanding these humble remonstrances was but roughly entreated and packt into exile beeing banished into the Isle of Gernseye But I am not minded to make any deepe search or inquisition into the titles of the Lords of Yuetot whose honourable priuiledges and titles are the most honourable badges and cognizances of their ancestors and of some remarquable seruice done to the Crowne of France so farre I take them to differ from a satisfaction for sinne And for the purpose I onely affirme that were the credit of this historie beyond all exception yet makes it nothing to the present question wherein the power of deposing and not of excommunicating supreme Kings is debated And suppose the King by charter granted the said priuiledges for feare of excommunication how is it prooued thereby that Pope Agapetus had lawfull and ordinarie power to depriue him of his Crowne Nay doubtlesse it was rather a meanes to eleuate and aduance the dignitie of the Crowne of France and to style the French King a King of Kings as one that was able to giue the qualitie of King to all the rest of the Nobles and Gentrie of his Kingdome Doth not some part of the Spanish Kings greatnesse consist in creating of his Great In the next place followeth Gregorie I. who in the 10. Epistle of the 11. booke confirming the priuiledges of the Hospital at Augustodunum in Bourgongne prohibiteth all
Kings and Prelates whatsoeuer to infringe or diminish the said priuiledges in whole or in part His formall and expresse words be these If any King Prelate Iudge or any other secular person informed of this our constitution shall presume to go or do contrary thereunto let him be cast downe from his power and dignitie I answer the Lord Cardinal here wrongs himselfe very much in taking imprecations for Decrees Might not euen the meanest of the people vse the same tenour of words and say If any shall touch the life or the most sacred Maiestie of our Kings be he Emperour or be hee Pope let him be accursed let him fall from his eminent place of authoritie let him lose his dignity let him tumble into beggarie diseases and all kinds of calamities I forbeare to shewe how easie a matter it is for Monkes to forge titles after their owne humour and to their owne liking for the vpholding and maintaining of their priuiledges As for the purpose the same Gregorie citeth in the end of his Epistles an other priuiledge of the like stuffe and stamp to the former granted to the Abbey of S. Medard at Soissons It is fenced with a like clause to the other But of how great vntruth and of how little weight it is the very date that it beareth makes manifest proofe For it runnes Dated the yeare of our Lords Incarnation 593. the 11. Indiction whereas the 10. Indiction agreeth to the yeare 593. Besides it was not Gregories manner to date his Epistles according to the yeare of the Lord. Againe the said priuiledge was signed by the Bishops of Alexandria and Carthage who neuer knew as may wel be thought whether any such Abbey of S. Medard or citie of Soissons was euer built in the world Moreouer they signed in the thickest of a crowde as it were of Italian Bishops Lastly he that shall read in this Gregories Epistles with what spirit of reuerence and humilitie hee speaketh of Emperours will hardly beleeue that euer he armed himselfe with authoritie to giue or to take away Kingdomes He styles himselfe the Emperours vnworthie seruant presuming to speake vnto his Lord when hee knowes himselfe to bee but dust and a very worme Hee professeth subiection vnto the Emperours commaunds euen to the publishing of a certaine Law of the Emperours which in his iudgement somewhat iarred and iustled with Gods Lawe as elsewhere I haue spoken more at large The L. Cardinall next bringeth vpon the stage Iustinian 2. He beeing in some choller with Sergius Bishop of Rome because he would not fauour the erroneous Synode of Canstantinople would haue caused the Bishop to bee apprehended by his Constable Zacharias But by the Romane Militia that is the troupes which the Emperour then had in Italie Zacharias was repulsed and hindered from his designe euen with opprobrious reproachfull tearmes His Lordship must haue my shallownes excused if I reach not his intent by this allegation wherein I see not one word of deposing from the Empire or of any sentence pronounced by the Pope Here are now 712. yeares expired after the birth of Iesus Christ in all which long tract of time the L. Cardinal hath not light vpon any instance which might make for his purpose with neuer so little shew For the example of the Emperour Philippicus by the Cardinal alledged next in sequence belongeth to the yeare 713. And thus lies the historie This Emperour Philippicus Bardanes was a professed enemie to the worshipping of Images and commanded them to be broken in peices In that verie time the Romane Empire was ouerthrown in the West and sore shaken by the Saracens in the East Beside those miseries the Emperour was also incumbred with a ciuil and intestine warre The greatest part of Italie was then seized by the Lombards and the Emperour in Italie had nothing left saue onely the Exarchat of Rauenna and the Dutchie of Rome then halfe abandoned by reason of the Emperours want of forces Pope Constantine gripes this occasion whereon to ground his greatnesse and to shake off the yoke of the Emperour his Lord Vndertakes against Philippicus the cause of Images By a Council declares the Emperour heretique Prohibites his rescripts or coine to be receiued and to goe currant in Rome Forbids his Imperiall statue to bee set vp in the Temple according to auncient custome The tumult groweth to a height The Pope is principall promoter of the tumult In the heate of the tumult the Exarche of Rauenna looseth his life Here see now the mutinie of a subiect against his Prince to pull from him by force and violence a citie of his Empire But who seeth in all this any sentence of deposition from the Imperial dignity Nay the Pope then missed the cushion and was disappointed vtterly of his purpose The cittie of Rome stood firme and continued still in their obedience to the Emperour About some 12. yeeres after the Emperour Leo Isauricus whome the Lord of Perron calleth Iconoclast falles to fight it out at sharpe and to prosecute worshippers of Images with all extremitie Vpon this occasion Pope Gregorie 2. then treading in the steps of his predecessor when he perceiued the citie of Rome to be but weakly prouided of men or munition and the Emperour to haue his hands full in other places found such meanes to make the citie rise in rebellious armes against the Emperour that he made himselfe in short time master thereof Thus far the L. Card. wherunto my answer for satisfaction is that degrading an Emperour from his Imperiall dignitie and reducing a citie to reuolt against her Master that a man at last may carrie the peice himselfe and make himselfe Lord thereof are two seuerall actions of speciall difference If the free-hold of the citie had beene conueied to some other by the Pope depriuing the Emperour as proprietarie thereof this example might haue challenged some credit at least in shew but so to inuade the citie to his owne vse and so to seize on the right and authority of another what is it but open rebellion and notorious ambition For it is farre from Ecclesiasticall censure when the spirituall Pastor of soules forsooth pulles the cloake of a poore sinner from his backe by violence or cuts his purse and thereby appropriates an other mans goods to his priuate vse It is to be obserued withall that when the Emperours were not of sufficient strength and Popes had power to beard and to braue Emperours then these Papall practises were first set on foot This Emperour notwithstanding turned head and peckt againe his Lieutenant entred Rome and Gregorie 3. successor to this Gregorie 2. was glad to honour the same Emperour with style and title of his Lord witnes two seueral Epistles of the said Gregory 3. written to Boniface and subscribed in this forme Dated the tenth Calends of December In the raigne of our most pious and religious Lord Angustus Leo crowned of God the great
to turne subiect vnto Charlemayne Let me see but one Towne that Charlemayne recouered from the Greeke Emperours by his right and title to his Empire in the West No the Greeke Emperours had taken their farwell of the West Empire long before And therefore to nick this vpon the tallie of Pope Leo his Acts that hee tooke away the West from the Greeke Emperour it is euen as if one should say that in this age the Pope takes the Dukedome of Milan from the French Kings or the citie of Rome from the Emperours of Germany because their predecessors in former ages had beene right Lords and gouernours of them both It is one of the Popes ordinary and solemne practises to take away much after the manner of his giuing For as he giueth what he hath not in his right and power to giue or bestoweth vpon others what is alreadie their owne euen so he taketh away from Kings and Emperors the possessions which they haue not in present hold and possession After this manner he takes the West from the Greeke Emperours when they hold nothing in the West and lay no claime to any citie or towne of the West Empire And what shall we call this way of depriuation but spoyling a naked man of his garments and killing a man alreadie dead True it is the Imperiall Crowne was then set on Charlemaynes head by Leo the Pope did Leo therefore giue him the Empire No more then a Bishop that crownes a King at his Royall and solemne consecration doth giue him the Kingdome For shal the Pope himselfe take the Popedome from the Bishop of Ostia as of his gift because the crowning of the Pope is an office of long time peculiar to the Ostian Bishop It was the custome of Emperours to be crowned Kings of Italy by the hands of the Archbishop of Milan did he therefore giue the kingdome of Italy to the said Emperours And to returne vnto Charlemayne If the Pope had conueied the Empire to him by free and gratious donation the Pope doubtlesse in the solemnity of his coronation would neuer haue performed vnto his owne creature an Emperour of his owne making the duties of adoration as Ado that liued in the same age hath left it on record After the solemne praises ended saith Ado the cheife Bishop honoured him with adoration according to the custome of auncient Princes The same is likewise put downe by Auentine in the 4. booke of his Annals of Bauaria The like by the President Fauchet in his antiquities and by Mons. Petau Councellor in the Court of Parliament at Paris in his preface before the Chronicles of Eusebius Hierome and Sigebert It was therefore the people of Rome that called this Charles the Great vnto the Imperiall dignitie and cast on him the title of Empeerour So testifieth Sigebert vpon the yeere 801. All the Romanes with one generall voice and consent ring out acclamations of Imperiall praises to the Emperour they crowne him by the hands of Leo the Pope they giue him the style of Caesar and Augustus Marianus Scotus hath as much in effect Charles was then called Augustus by the Romanes And so Platina After the solemne seruice Leo declareth and proclameth Charles Emperour according to the publike decree and generall request of the people of Rome Aventine and Sigonius in his 4. booke of the Kingdome of Italie witnes the same Neuerthelesse to gratifie the L. Cardinall Suppose Pope Leo dispossessed the Greeke Emperours of the West Empire What was the cause what infamous act had they done what prophane and irreligious crime had they committed Nicephorus and Irene who raigned in the Greeke Empire in Charlemaynes time were not reputed by the Pope or taken for heretikes How then The L. Cardinall helpeth at a pinch and putteth vs in minde that Constantine and Leo predecessors to the said Emperours had beene poysoned with heresie and stained with persecution Here then behold an Orthodoxe Prince deposed For what cause for heresie forsooth not in himselfe but in some of his predecessors long before An admirable case For I am of a contrary minde that he was worthy of double honour in restoring and setting vp the truth againe which vnder his predecessors had indured oppression and suffered persecution Doubtlesse Pope Siluester was greatly ouerseene and plaied not well the Pope when he winked at Constantine the Great and cast him not downe from his Imperiall Throne for the strange infidelitie and paganisme of Diocletian of Maximian and Maxentius whome Constantine succeeded in the Empire From this example the L. of Perron passeth to Fulke Archbishop of Reims by whome Charles the Simple was threatned with Excommunication and refusing to continue any longer in the fidelity and allegiance of a subiect To what purpose is this example For who can be ignorant that all ages haue brought forth turbulent and stirring spirits men altogether forgetfull of respect and obseruance towards their Kings especially when the world finds them shallow and simple-witted like vnto this Prince But in this example where is there so much as one word of the Pope or the deposing of Kings Here the L. Cardinall chops in the example of Philip 1. King of France but mangled and strangely disguised as hereafter shall be shewed At last he leadeth vs to Gregory VII surnamed Hildebrand the scourge of Emperours the firebrand of warre the scorne of his age This Pope after he had in the spirit of pride and in the very height of all audaciousnesse thundred the sentence of excommunication and deposition against the Emperour Henry 4. after he had enterprised this act without all precedent example after hee had filled all Europe with blood this Pope I say sunke downe vnder the weight of his affaires and died as a fugitiue at Salerne ouerwhelmed with discontent and sorrowe of heart Here lying at the point of giuing vp the ghoast calling vnto him as it is in Sigebert a certaine Cardinall whome hee much fauoured He confesseth to God and Saint Peter and the whole Church that he had beene greatly defectiue in the Pastor all charge cōmitted to his care and that by the Deuills instigation he had kindled the fire of Gods wrath and hatred against mankind Then he sent his Confessor to the Emperour and to the whole Church to pray for his pardon because hee perceiued that his life was at an end Likewise Cardinal Benno that liued in the said Gregories time doth testifie That so soone as he was risen out of his Chaire to excommunicate the Emperour from his Cathedrall seate by the will of God the said Cathedrall seate new made of strong board or plancke did cracke and cleaue into many peices or parts to manifest how great and terrible schismes had beene sowed against the Church of Christ by an excommunication of so dangerous consequence pronounced by the man that had sit Iudge therein Now to bring and alleadge the example of such a
man who by attempting an act which neuer any man had the heart or face to attempt before hath condemned all his predecessors of cowardise or at least of ignorance what is it else but euen to send vs to the schoole of mighty robbers and to seeke to correct and reforme ancient vertues by late vices Which Otho Frisingensis calling into his owne priuate consideration he durst freely professe that he had not reade of any Emperour before this Henrie the 4. excommunicated or driuen out of his Imperiall Throne and Kingdome by the cheife Bishop of Rome But if this quarrell may bee tryed and fought out with weapons of examples I leaue any indifferent reader to iudge what examples ought in the cause to be of cheifest authoritie and weight whether late examples of Kings deposed by Popes for the most part neuer taking the intended effect or auncient examples of Popes actually and effectually thrust out of their thrones by Emperous and Kings The Emperour Constantius expelled Liberius Bishop of Rome out of the citie banished him as farre as Beroe and placed Foelix in his roome Indeed Constantius was an Arrian and therein vsed no lesse impious then vniust proceeding Neuertheles the auncient Fathers of the Church do not blame Constantius for his hard and sharpe dealing with a cheife Bishop ouer whom he had no lawfull power but onely as an enemie to the Orthodoxe faith and one that raged with extreame rigor of persecution against innocent beleeuers In the raigne of Valentinian the 1. and yeare of the Lord 367. the contention between Damasus and Vrsicinus competitors for the Bishoppricke filled the cittie of Rome with a bloody sedition in which were wickedly and cruelly murdered 137. persons To meete with such turbulent actions Honorius made a law extant in the Decretalls the words whereof be these If it shall happen henceforth by the temeritie of competitors that any two Bishops be elected to the See wee straitly charge and command that neither of both shall sit in the said See By vertue of this Law the same Honorius in the yere 420. expelled Bonifacius and Eulalius competitors and Antipopes out of Rome though not long after he reuoked Bonifacius and settled him in the Papall See Theodoric the Goth King of Italie sent Iohn Bishop of Rome Embassador to the Emperour Iustinian called him home againe and clapt him vp in the close prison where hee starued to death By the same King Peter Bishop of Altine was dispatched to Rome to heare the cause and examine the processe of Pope Symmachus then indited and accused of sundry crimes King Theodatus about the yeare 537. had the seruice of Pope Agapetus as his Embassadour to the Emperour Iustinian vpon a treatie of peace Agapetus dying in the time of that seruicc Syluerius is made Bishop by Theodatus Not long after Syluerius is driuen out by Belisarius the Emperour his Lieutenant and sent into banishment After Syluerius next succeedeth Vigilius who with currant coine purchased the Popedome of Belisarius The Emperour Iustinian sends for Vigilius to Constantinople and receiues him there with great honour Soone after the Emperour takes offence at his freenesse in speaking his mind commands him to be beaten with stripes in manner to death and with a roape about his necke to be drawne through the city like a theife as Platina relates the historie Nicephorus in his 26. booke and 17. chapter comes very neere the same relation The Emperour Constantius in the yere 654. caused Pope Martin to be bound with chains banished him into Chersonesus where he ended his life The Popes in that age writing to the Emperors vsed none but submissiue tearmes by way of most humble supplications made profession of bowing the knee before their sacred Maiesties and of executing their commaunds with entire obedience payed to the Emperours twenty pound weight of gold for their Inuestiture which tribute was afterward released and remitted by Constantine the Bearded to Pope Agatho in the yere 679. as I haue obserued in an other place Nay further euen when the power and riches of the Popes was growne to great height by the most profuse and immense munificence of Charlemayne and Lewis his sonne the Emperours of the West did not relinquish and giue ouer the making and vnmaking of Popes as they saw cause Pope ' Adrian 1. willingly submitted his necke to this yoke and made this Law to be passed in a Council that in Charlemain should rest all right and power for the Popes election and for the gouernement of the Papall See This Constitution is inserted in the Decretals Dist 63. Can. Hadrianus and was confirmed by the practise of many yeeres In the yeare of the L. 963. the Emperour Otho tooke away the Popedom from Iohn 13. and placed Leo 8. in his roome In like manner Iohn 14. Gregorie 5. and Siluester 2. were seated in the Papal Throne by the Othos The Emperour Henrie 2. in the yeere 1007. deposed three Popes namely Benedict 9. Siluester 3. and Gregorie 6. whom Platina doth not sticke to call three most detestable and vile monsters This custome continued this practise stood in force for diuers ages euen vntill the times of Gregorie 7. by whome the whole West was tossed and turmoiled with lamentable warres which plagued the world and the Empire by name with intolerable troubles and mischiefes For after the said Gregorian wars the Empire fell from bad to worse and so went on to decay till Emperours at last were driuen to begge and receiue the Imperiall Crowne of the Pope The Kingdome of France met not with so rude entreatie but was dealt withall by courses of a milder temper Gregorie 4. about the yere of the Lord 832. was the first Pope that perswaded himselfe to vse the censure of Excommunication against a King of France This Pope hauing a hand in the troublesome factions of the Realme was nothing backward to side with the sonnes of Lewis surnamed the Courteous by wicked conspiracy entring into a desperate course and complot against Lewis their owne Father as witnesseth Sigebert in these words Pope Gregorie comming into France ioyned himselfe to the sonnes against the Emperour their Father But Annals of the verie same times and he that furbushed Aimonius a religious of S. Benedicts order do testifie that all the Bishops of France fell vpon this resolution by no meanes to rest in the Popes pleasure or to giue any place vnto his designe and contrariwise In case the Pope should proceed to excommunication of their King he should returne out of Fraunce to Rome an excommunicate person himself The Chronicle of S. Denis hath words in this forme The Lord Apostolicall returned answer that he was not come into Fraunce for any other purpose but onely to excommunicate the King and his Bishops if they would be in any sort opposite vnto the sonnes of Lewis or disobedient vnto the
an excommunicatorie Bull into Fraunce against Charles the King and all his Princes The Vniuersitie of Paris made request or motion that his Bull might be mangled and Pope Benedict himselfe by some called Petrus de Luna might be declared heretike schismatike and perturber of the peace The said Bull was mangled and rent in pieces according to the petition of the Vniuersity by Decree of Court vpon the 10. of Iune 1408. Tenne dayes after the Court rising at eleuen in the morning two Bul-bearers of the said excōmuncaitorie censure vnderwent ignominious punishment vpon the Palace or great Hall stayres From thence were lead to the Lovure in such manner as they had beene brought from thence before drawen in two tumbrells cladde in coates of painted linnen wore paper-mytres on their heads were proclaimed with sound of trumpet and euery where disgraced with publike derision So little reckoning was made of the Popes thundering canons in those daies And what would they haue done if the said Buls had imported sentence of deposition against King Charles The French Church assembled at Tours in the yeere 1510. decreed that Lewis XII might with safe conscience contemne the abusiue Bulls and vniust censures of Pope Julius the II. and by armes might withstand the Popes vsurpations in case hee should proceed to excommunicate or depose the King More by a Council holden at Pisa this Lewis declared the Pope to be fallen from the Popedome and coyned crowns with a stamp of this inscription I wil destroy the name of Babylon To this the L. of Perron makes answer that all this was done by the French as acknowledging these iars to haue sprung not from the fountaine of Religion but from passion of state Wherin he condemneth Pope Iulius for giuing so great scope vnto his publike censures as to serue his ambition and not rather to aduance Religion Hee secretly teacheth vs besides that when the Pope vndertakes to depose the King of France then the French are to sit as Iudges concerning the lawfulnesse or vnlawfulnesse of the cause and in case they shall finde the cause to be vnlawfull then to disannull his iudgements and to scoffe at his thunderbolts Iohn d' Albret King of Nauarre whose Realme was giuen by the foresaid Pope to Ferdinand King of Arragon was also wrapped and entangled with strict bands of deposition Now if the French had been touched with no better feeling of affection to their King then the subiects of Nauarre were to the Nauarrois doubtlesse France had sought a newe Lord by vertue of the Popes as the L. Cardinal himselfe doth acknowledge and confesse vniust sentence But behold to make the said sentence against Iohn d' Albret seeme the lesse contrary to equity the L. Cardinal pretends the Popes donation was not indeede the principall cause howsoeuer Ferdinand himselfe made it his pretence But his Lor. giues this for the principall cause that Iohn d' Albret had quitted his alliance made with condition that in case the Kings of Nauarre should infringe the said alliance and breake the league then the Kingdome of Nauarre should returne to the Crowne of Arragon This condition between Kings neuer made and without all shew of probabilitie serueth to none other purpose from the Cardinals mouth but onely to insinuate and worke a perrswasion in his King that he hath no right nor lawfull pretension to the Crowne of Nauarre and whatsoeuer hee nowe holdeth in the said Kingdome of Nauarre is none of his owne but by vsurpation and vnlawfull possession Thus his Lordshippe French-borne makes himselfe an Aduocate for the Spanish King against his owne King and King of the French who shall bee faine as he ought if this Aduocats plea may take place to draw his title and style of King of Nauarre out of his Royall titles and to acknowledge that all the great endeauours of his predecessors to recouer the said Kingdome were dishonourable and vniust Is it possible that in the very heart and head Citie of France a spirit tongue so licentious can be brooked What shall so great blasphemy as it were of the Kings freehold be powred forth in so honourable an assembly without punishment or fyne what without any contradiction for the Kings right and on the Kings behalfe I may perhaps confesse the indignitie might bee the better borne and the pretence aledged might passe for a poore excuse if it serued his purpose neuer so little For how doth all this touch or come neere the question in which the Popes vsurpation in the deposing of Kings and the resolution of the French in resisting this tyrannicall practise is the proper issue of the cause both which points are neuer a whit more of the lesse consequence and importance howsoeuer Ferdinand in his owne iustification stood vpon the foresaid pretence Thus much is confessed and we aske no more Pope Iulius tooke the Kingdome from the one and gaue it vnto the other the French thereupon resisted the Pope and declared him to bee fallen from the Papacie This noble spirit and courage of the French in maintaining the dignitie and honour of their Kings Crownes bredde those auncient customes which in the sequence of many ages haue beene obserued and kept in vse This for one That no Legate of the Pope nor any of his rescripts nor mandates are admitted and receiued in France without licence from the King and vnlesse the Legate impart his faculties to the Kings Atturney Generall to be perused and verified in Court of Parliament where they are to be tyed by certaine modifications restrictions vnto such points as are not derogatorie from the Kings right from the liberties of the Church and from the ordinances of the Kingdome When Cardinal Balva contrary to this ancient forme entred France in the yeare 1484. and there without leaue of the King did execute the Office and speed certaine Acts of the Popes Legat the Court vpon motion made by the Kings Atturney Generall decreed a Commission to be informed against him by two Councellors of the said Court and inhibited his further proceeding to vse any faculty or power of the Popes Legate vpon paine of beeing proclaimed rebell In the yeare 1561. Iohannes Tanquerellus Batchelor in Diuinitie by order of the Court was condemned to make open confession that hee had indiscreetly and rashly without consideration defended this proposition The Pope is the Vicar of Christ a Monarke that hath power both spirituall and secular and he may depriue Princes which rebel against his cōmandements of their dignities Which proposition howsoeuer he protested that he had propounded the same onely to be argued and not iudicially to be determined in the affirmatiue Tanquerellus neuerthelesse was compelled openly to recant Here the L. Cardinal answers The historie of Tanquerellus is from the matter because his proposition treateth neither of heresie nor of infidelitie but I answer the said proposition treateth of both for as much as
who in stead of suing to the King had petitioned to the Pope for a dispensation for his bastard But perhaps as be speaketh it will be alledged out of the glosse that he acknowledgeth no superiour by fact and yet ought by right But I tell you the glosse is an Aurelian glosse which marres the text Amongst other arguments Maior brings this for one This opinion ministreth matter vnto Popes to take away an others Empire by force and violence which the Pope shall neuer bring to passe as we reade of Boniface 8. against Philip the Faire Saith besides That from hence proceede warres in time of which many outragious mischeifes are done and that Gerson calls them egregious flatterers by whom such opinion is maintained In the same place Maior denies that Childeric was deposed by Pope Zacharie The word He deposed saith Maior is not so to be vnderstood as it is taken at the first blush or sight but he deposed is thus expounded in the glosse Hee gaue his consent vnto those by whom he was deposed Iohn of Paris Were it graunted that Christ was armed with Temporall power yet he committed no such power to Peter A little after The power of Kings is the highest power vpon earth in Temporall causes it hath no superiour power aboue it selfe no more then the Pope hath in spirituall matters This author saith indeede the Pope hath power to excommunicate the King but he speaketh not of any power in the Pope to put down the King from his regall dignity and authority He onely saith When a Prince is once excommunicated he may accidentally or by occasion be deposed because his precedent excommunication incites the people to disarme him of all secular dignity power The same Iohn on the other side holdeth opinion that in the Emperour there is inuested a power to depose the Pope in case the Pope shall abuse his power Almainus Doctor of the Sorbonic schoole Jt is essentiall in the Laye-power to inflict ciuill punishment as death banishment and priuation or losse of goods But according to diuine institution the power Ecclesiasticall can lay no such punishment vpon delinquents nay more not lay in prison as to some Doctors it seemeth probable but stretcheth and reacheth onely to spirituall punishment as namely to excommunication all other punishments inflicted by the spirituall power are meerely by the Lawe positiue If then Ecclesiasticall power by Gods Lawe hath no authoritie to depriue any priuate man of his goods how dares the Pope and his flatterers build their power to depriue Kings of their scepters vpon the word of God The same author in an other place Be it graunted that Constantine had power to giue the Empire vnto the Pope yet is it not hereupon to be inferred that Popes haue authority ouer the Kingdome of France because that Kingdom was neuer subiect vnto Constantine For the King of Fraunce neuer had any superiour in Temporall matters A little after It is not in any place to be found that God hath giuen the Pope power to make and vnmake Temporall Kings He maintaineth elsewhere that Zacharie did not depose Childeric but onely consented to his deposing and so deposed him not as by authoritie In the same booke taking vp the words of Occam whome hee styles the Doctor The Emperour is the Popes Lord in things Temporall and the Pope calls him Lord as it is witnessed in the body of the Text. The Lord Cardinall hath dissembled and concealed these words of Doctor Almainus with many like places and hath been pleased to alledge Almainus reciting Occams authoritie in stead of quoting Almainus himselfe in those passages where hee speaketh as out of his owne opinion and in his owne words A notable peice of slie and cunning conueiance For what heresie may not be fathered and fastened vpon S. Augustine or S. Hierome if they should bee deemed to approoue all the passages which they alledge out of other authors And that is the reason wherfore the L. Cardinal doth not alledge his testimonies whole and perfect as they are couched in their proper texts but clipt and curtaild Thus he dealeth euen in the first passage or testimonie of Almainus he brings it in mangled and pared hee hides and conceales the words added by Almainus to contradict crosse the words going before For Almainus makes this addition and supply Howsoeuer some other Doctors doe stand for the negatiue and teach the Pope hath power onely to declare that Kings and Princes are to bee deposed And so much appeareth by this reason because this ample and Soueraigne power of the Pope might giue him occasion to bee puft vp with great pride and the same fulnesse of power might prooue extreamely hurtfull to the subiects c. The same Almainus brings in Occams opinion in expresse tearmes deciding the question and there ioynes his owne opinion with Occams The Doctors opinion saith Almainus doth simply carrie the most probabilitie that a Pope hath no power neither by excommunication nor by any other meanes to dedepose a Prince from his Imperiall and Royall dignitie And a little before hauing maintained the Greeke Empire was neuer transported by the Pope to the Germaines and that when the Pope crownes the Emperour he doth not giue him the Empire no more then the Archbishop of Reims when he crownes the King of France doth giue him the Kingdome he drawes this conclusion according to Occams opinion I denie that an Emperour is bound by oath to promise the Pope allegiance On the other side if the Pope hold any Temporall possessions hee is bound to sweare allegiance vnto the Emperour and to pay him tribute The said Occam alledged by Almainus doth further auerre that Iustinian was acknowledged by the Pope for his superiour in Temporall causes for as much as diuerse lawes which the Pope is bound to keep and obserue were enacted by Iustinian as by name the law of prescription for an hundred yeeres which law standeth yet in force against the Bishop of Rome And to the ende that all men may cleerely see how great distance there is betweene Occams opinion and the L. Cardinals who towards the ende of his Oration exhorts his hearers at no hand to dissent from the Pope take you here a viewe of Occams owne words as they are alleadged by Almainus The Doctor assoyles the arguments of Pope Jnnocent by which the Pope would prooue out of these words of Christ Whatsoeuer thou shalt bind c. that fulnes of power in Temporall matters belongeth to the Soueraigne Bishop For Innocent saith Whatsoeuer excepteth nothing But Occam assoyles Innocents authoritie as not onely false but also hereticall and saith withal that many things are spoken by Jnnocent which by his leaue sauour and smell of heresie c. The L. Cardinal with lesse fidelitie alledgeth two places out of Thomas his Summe The first in the Second of his Second Quest 10. Art 10. in
the bodie of the Article In which place let it be narrowly examined Thomas will easily be found to speake not of the subiection of beleeuing subiects vnder Infidel Kings as the Lord Cardinall pretendeth but of beleeuing seruants that liue vnder Masters whether Iewes or Infidels As when a Iew keepeth seruants which professe Iesus Christ or as when some of the faithfull kept in Caesars house who are not considered by Thomas as they were subiects of the Empire but as they were seruants of the family The other place is taken out of Quest 11. and 2. art in the body of the article where no such matter as the L. Cardinal alledgeth can be found With like fidelitie he taketh Gerson in hand who indeed in his booke of Ecclesiasticall power and 12. Consider doth affirme When the abuse of secular power redoundeth to manifest impugning of the faith and blaspheming of the Creator then shall it not bee amisse to haue recourse vnto the last branch of this 12. Consider where in such case as aforesaid a certain regitiue directiue regulatiue and ordinatiue authoritie is committed to the Ecclesiasticall power His very words which make no mention at all of deposing or of any compulsiue power ouer Soueraigne Princes For that forme of rule and gouernement whereof Gerson speaketh is exercised by Ecclesiasticall censures excommunications not by losse of goods of Kingdoms or of Empires This place then is wrested by the L. Cardinall to a contrary sense Neither should his Lordship haue omitted that Gerson in the question of Kings subiection in Temporall matters or of the dependance of their Crowns vpon the Popes power excepteth alwaies the King of France witnesse that which Gerson a little before the place alleadged by the Cardinal hath plainely affirmed Now since Peters time saith Gerson all Imperiall Regall and Secular power is not immediately to drawe vertue and strength from the Soueraigne Bishop as in this manner the most Christian King of France hath no Superiour nor acknowledgeth any such vpon the face of the earth Now here need no great sharpenes of wit for the searching out of this deepe mysterie that if the Pope hath power to giue or take away Crownes for any cause or any pretended occasion whatsoeuer the Crowne of France must needs depend vpon the Pope But for as much as we are now hitte in with Gerson we will examine the L. Cardinals allegations towards the ende of his Oration taken out of Gersons famous Oration made before Charles 6. for the Vniuersitie of Paris where he brings in Gerson to affirme That killing a Tyrant is a sacrifice acceptable to God But Gerson let it be diligently noted there speaketh not in his owne person hee there brings in sedition speaking the words Of which words vttered by sedition and other like speeches you shall now heare what iudgement Gerson himselfe hath giuen When sedition had spoken with such a furious voice I turned away my face as if I had beene smitten with death to shew that I was not able to endure her madnesse any longer And indeede when dissimulation on the one side and sedition on the other had suggested the deuises of two contrary extremes he brings forth Discretion as a Iudge keeping the meane betweene both extreames and vttering those words which the L. Cardinall alleadgeth against himselfe If the head saith Gerson or some other member of the ciuill body should grow to so desperate a passe that it would gulpe and swallowe downe the deadly poison of tyrannie euery member in his place with all power possible for him to raise by expedient meanes and such as might preuent a greater inconuenience should set himselfe against so madde a purpose and so deadly practise For if the head be grieued with some light paine it is not fit for the hand to smite the head no that were but a foolish and a madde part Nor is the hand forthwith to chop off or separate the head from the bodie but rather to cure the head with good speach and other meanes like a skilfull and wise Physitian Yea nothing would be more cruell or more voide of reason then to seeke to stoppe the strong and violent streame of tyranny by sedition These words me thinke doe make verie strongly and expressely against butchering euen of Tyrannicall Kings And whereas a little after the said passage he teacheth to expell Tyrannie he hath not a word of expelling the Tyrant but onely of breaking and shaking off the yoke of Tyranny Yet for all that hee would not haue the remedies for the repressing of Tyrannie to bee fetcht from the Pope who presumeth to degrade Kings but from Philosophers Lawyers Diuines and personages of good conuersation It appeareth now by all that hath been said before that whereas Gerson in the 7 Considerat against Flatterers doth affirme Whensoeuer the Prince doth manifestly pursue and prosecute his naturall subiects and shew himselfe obstinately bent with notorious iniustice to vexe them of set purpose and with full consent so farre as to the fact then this rule and law of Nature doth take place It is lawfull to resist and repell force by force and that sentence of Seneca There is no sacrifice more acceptable to God then a Tyrant offered in sacrifice the words Doth take place are so to be vnderstood as hee speaketh in an other passage to wit with or amongst seditious persons Or else the words doth take place doe onely signifie is put in practise And so Gerson there speaketh not as out of his owne iudgement His Lordshippe also should not haue balked and left out Sigebertus who with more reason might haue passed for French then Thomas and Occam whom he putteth vpon vs for French Sigebertus in his Chronicle vpon the yere 1088. speaking of the Emperours deposing by the Pope hath words of this tenor This heresie was not crept out of the shell in those dayes that his Priests who hath said to the King Apostata and maketh an hypocrite to rule for the sinnes of the people should teach the people they owe no subiection vnto wicked Kings nor any allegiance notwithstanding they haue taken the oath of allegiance Now after the L. Card. hath coursed in this manner through the histories of the last ages which in case they all made for his purpose doe lacke the weight of authority in stead of searching the will of God in the sacred Oracles of his word and standing vpon examples of the ancient Church at last leauing the troope of his owne allegations he betakes himselfe to the sharpening and rebating of the points of his aduersaries weapons For the purpose he brings in his aduersaries the champions of Kings Crownes and makes them to speake out of his owne mouth for his L. saith it will be obiected after this manner Jt may come to passe that Popes either carried with passion or misledde by sinister information may without iust cause fasten vpon Kings the imputation of heresie or apostasie
wherefore the man doth not require the Popes instructions But whether a King be deposed by that man the Pope or by that Pope the man is it not all one is he not deposed Others affirme the Pope may erre in a question of the fact but not in a question of the right An egregious gullery and imposture For if he may bee ignorant whether Iesus Christ died for our sinnes doubtles he may also be to seeke whether we should repose all our trust and assured confidence in the death of Christ Consider with me the Prophets of olde They were all inspired and taught of God to admonish and reprooue the Kings of Iudah and Israel they neither erred in matter of fact nor in point of right they were as farre from being blinded and fetcht ouer by deceitfull calumniations as from beeing seduced by the painted shew of corrupt and false doctrine As they neuer trode awry in matter of faith so they neuer whetted the edge of their tongue or style against the faultles Had it not beene a trimme deuice in their times to say that as Esay and as Daniel they might haue sunke into heresie but not as Prophets For doubtlesse in this case that Esay would haue taken counsell of the Prophet which was himselfe To bee short If Kings are onely so long to be taken for Kings vntill they shall be declared heretikes and shall be deposed by the Pope they continually stand in extreame danger to vndergoe a very heauy and vniust sentence Their safest way were to know nothing and to beleeue by proxie least if they should happen to talke of God or to thinke of religion they should be drawne for heretikes into the Popes Inquisition All the examples hitherto produced by the L. Cardinall on a rowe are of a latter date they lacke weight are drawne from the time of bondage and make the Popes themselues witnesses in their owne cause They descant not vpon the point of deposition but onely strike out and sound the notes of excommunication and interdiction which make nothing at all to the musicke of the question And therefore he telleth vs in kindnesse as I take it more oftentimes then once or twice that he speaketh onely of the fact as one that doth acknowledge himselfe to be out of the right Hee relates things done but neuer what should bee done which as the Iudicious know is to teach nothing The second Jnconuenience examined THE second Inconuenience like to growe as the Lord Cardinall seemeth to be halfe afraid if the Article of the third Estate might haue passed with approbation is couched in these words Lay-men shall by authoritie be strengthened with power to iudge in matters of Religion as also to determine the doctrine comprised in the said Article to haue requisite conformitie with Gods word yea they shall haue it in their hands to compell Ecclesiastics by necessitie to sweare preach and teach the opinion of the one side as also by Sermons and publike writings to impugne the other This inconuenience hee aggrauateth with swelling words and breaketh out into these vehement exclamations O reproach O scandall O gate set open to a world of heresies He therefore laboureth both by reasons by autorities of holy Scripture to make such vsurped power of Laics a fowle shamefull and odious practise In the whole his Lordship toyles himselfe in vaine and maketh suppositions of castles in the aire For in preferring this Article the third Estate haue born themselues not as iudges or vmpires but altogether as petitioners requesting the said Article might be receiued into the number of the Parliament bookes to bee presented vnto the King and his Counsell vnto whome in all humilitie they referred the iudgement of the said Article conceiuing all good hope the Clergie and Nobilitie would be pleased to ioyne for the furtherance of their humble petition They were not so ignorant of State-matters or so vnmindfull of their owne places and charges to beare themselues in hand that a petition put vp and preferred by the third Estate can carrie the force of a Lawe or Statute so long as the other two Orders withstand the same and so long as the King himselfe holds backe his Royall consent Besides the said Article was not propounded as a point of religious doctrine but for euer after to remaine and continue a fundamentall Lawe of the Commonwealth and State it selfe the due care whereof was put into their hands and committed to their trust If the King had ratified the said Article with Royall consent and had commanded the Clergie to put in execution the contents thereof it had beene their duty to see the Kings will and pleasure fulfilled as they are subiects bound to giue him aide in all things which may any way serue to procure the safetie of his life and the tranquility of his Kingdome Which if the Clergie had performed to the vttermost of their power they had not shewed obedience as vnderlings vnto the third Estate but vnto the King alone by whome such commaund had beene imposed vpon suggestion of his faithfull subiects made the more watchfull by the negligence of the Clergie whom they perceiue to be linked with stricter bands vnto the Pope then they are vnto their King Here then the Cardinall fights with meere shadowes and mooues a doubt whereof his aduersaries haue not so much as once thought in a dreame But yet according to his great dexteritie and nimblenesse of spirit by this deuice he cunningly takes vpon him to giue the King a lesson with more libertie making semblance to direct his masked Oration to the Deputies of the people when he shooteth in effect and pricketh at his King the Princes also and Lords of his Counsell whom the Cardinall compriseth vnder the name of Laics whose iudgment it is not vnlikely was apprehended much better by the Clergy then the iudgement of the third Estate Now these are the men whom he tearmeth intruders into other mens charges and such as open a gate for I wot not how many legions of heresies to rush into the Church For if it be proper to the Clergie and their Head to iudge in this cause of the Right of Kings then the King himselfe his Princes and Nobilitie are debarred and wiped of all iudgement in the same cause no lesse then the representatiue body of the people Well then the L Cardinall showres downe like haile sundry places and testimonies of Scripture where the people are commaunded to haue their Pastors in singular loue and to beare them all respects of due obseruance Be it so yet are the said passages of Scripture no barre to the people for their vigilant circumspection to preserue the life and Crown of their Prince against all the wicked enterprises of men stirred vp by the Clergie who haue their Head out of the Kingdom and hold themselues to be none of the Kings subiects a thing neuer spoken by the sacrificing Priests and Prelates mentioned in the passages alleadged
of King and continued in possession of his Kingdome euen to his dying day Yea the Scripture styles him King euen to the periodical and last day of his life by the testimonie of Dauid himselfe who both by Gods promise and by precedent vnction was then heire apparant as it were to the Crowne in a manner then ready to gird and adorne the temples of his head For if Samuel by Gods commaundement had then actually remooued Saul from his Throne doubtles the whole Church of Israel had committed a grosse error in taking and honouring Saul for their King after such deposition doubtlesse the Prophet Samuel himselfe making known the Lords ordinance vnto the people would haue enioyned them by strict prohibition to call him no longer the King of Israel doubtles Dauid would neuer haue held his hand from the throate of Saul for this respect and consideration because hee was the Lords annointed For if Saul had lost his Kingly authoritie from that instant when Samuel gaue him knowledge of his reiection then Dauid least otherwise the bodie of the Kingdome should want a Royal Head was to beginne his Raigne and to beare the Royall Scepter in the very same instant which were to charge the holy Scriptures with vntruth in as much as the sacred historie beginnes the computation of the yeers of Dauids raigne from the day of Sauls death True it is that in the 2. Sam. cap. 15. Saul was denounced by Gods owne sentence a man reiected and as it were excommunicated out of the Kingdome that he should not rule and raigne any longer as King ouer Israel neuerthelesse the said sentence was not put in execution before the day when God executing vpon Saul an exemplarie iudgement did strike him with death From whence it is manifest and cleare that when Dauid was annointed King by Samuel that action was onely a promise and a testimony of the choice which God had made of Dauid for succession immediately after Saul and not a present establishment inuestment or instalment of Dauid in the Kingdome Wee reade the like in 1. King cap. 19. where God commaundeth Elias the Prophet to annoint Hasael King of Syria For can any man be so blind and ignorant in the sacred History to beleeue the Prophets of Israel established or sacred the Kings of Syria For this cause when Dauid was actually established in the Kingdom he was anointed the second time In the next place he brings in the Popes champions vsing these words Rehoboam was deposed by Ahiah the Prophet from his Royall right ouer the tenne Tribes of Israel because his father Salomon had played the Apostata in falling from the Lawe of God This I say also is more then the truth of the sacred historie doth affoard For Ahiah neuer spake to Rehoboam for ought we reade nor brought vnto him any message from the Lord. As for the passage quoted by the L. Cardinall out of Reg. 3. chap. 11. it hath not reference to the time of Rehoboams raigne but rather indeed to Salomons time nor doth it carrie the face of a iudicatory sentence for the Kings deposing but rather of a Propheticall prediction For how could Rehoboam before he was made King be depriued of the Kingdome Last of all but worst of all to alleadge this passage for an example of a iust sentence in matter of deposing a King is to approoue the disloyall treachery of a seruant against his master and the rebellion of Ieroboam branded in Scripture with a marke of perpetuall infamy for his wickednesse and impietie He goes on with an other example of no more truth King Achab was deposed by Elias the Prophet because he imbraced false religion and worshipped false gods False too like the former King Achab lost his Crowne and his life both together The Scripture that speaketh not according to mans fancy but according to the truth doth extend and number the yeeres of Achabs raigne to the time of his death Predictions of a Kings ruine are no sentences of deposition Elias neuer gaue the subiects of Achab absolution from their oath of obedience neuer gaue them the least inckling of any such absolution neuer set vp or placed any other King in Achabs Throne That of the L. Cardinall a little after is no lesse vntrue That King Vzziah was driuen from the conuersation of the people by Azarias the Priest and thereby the administration of his Kingdome was left no longer in his power Not so For when God had smitten Vzziah with leprosie in his forehead he withdrew himselfe or went out into an house apart for feare of infecting such as were whole by his contagious disease The high Priest smote him not with any sentence of deposition or denounced him suspended from the administration of his Kingdome No the dayes of his raigne are numbred in Scripture to the day of his death And whereas the Priest according to the Lawe in the 13. of Leuit. iudged the King to be vncleane he gaue sentence against him not as against a criminall person and thereby within the compasse of deposition but as against a diseased body For the Lawe inflicteth punishments not vpon diseases but vpon crimes Hereupon whereas it is recorded by Iosephus in his Antiquities that Vzziah lead a priuate and in a manner a solitarie life the said author doth not meane that Vzziah was deposed but onely that he disburdened himselfe of care to mannage the publike affaires The example of Mattathias by whome the Iewes were stirred vp to rebell against Antiochus is no better worth For in that example we finde no sentence of deposition but onely an heartning and commotion of a people then grieuously afflicted and oppressed He that makes himselfe the ring-leader of conspiracie against a King doth not forthwith assume the person or take vp the office and charge of a Iudge in forme of lawe and iuridically to depriue a King of his Regall rights and Royall prerogatiues Mattathias was chiefe of that conspiracy not in qualitie of Priest but of cheiftaine or leader in warre and a man the best qualified of all the people Things acted by the suddaine violence of the base vulgar must not stand for lawes nor yet for proofes and arguments of ordinarie power such as the Pope challengeth to himselfe and appropriateth to his triple-Crowne These bee our solide answers wee disclaime the light armour which the L. Cardinall is pleased to furnish vs withall forsooth to recreate himselfe in rebating the points of such weapons as he hath vouchsafed to put into our hands Now it will be worth our labour to beate by his thrusts fetcht from the ordinary mission of the new Testament from leprosie stones and locks of wool A leach no doubt of admirable skil one that for subiecting the Crownes of Kings vnto the Pope is able to extract arguments out of stones yea out of the leprosie and the drie scab onely forsooth because heresie is a kind
of leprosie and an heretike hath some affinitie with a leper But may not his Quoniam be as fitly applyed to any contagious inueterate vice of the minde beside heresie His warning-peice therefore is discharged to purpose whereby he notifies that hee pretendeth to handle nothing with resolution For indeed vpon so weake arguments a resolution is but ill-fauouredly and weakely grounded His bulwarks thus beaten downe let vs now viewe the strength of our owne First hee makes vs to fortifie on this manner They that are for the negatiue doe alleadge the authoritie of S. Paul Let euery soule bee subiect vnto the higher powers For whosoeuer resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of God And likewise that of S. Peter Submit your selues whether it be vnto the King as vnto the superiour or vnto gouernours c. Vpon these passages and the like they inferre that obedience is due to Kings by the Lawe of God and not dispensable by any spirituall or temporall authoritie Thus he brings vs in with our first weapon But here the very cheife sinew and strength of our argument he doth wittingly balke and of purpose conceale To wit That all the Emperours of whom the said holy Apostles haue made any mention in their diuine Epistles were professed enemies to Christ Pagans Infidels fearefull and bloody Tyrants to whom notwithstanding euery soule and therefore the Bishop of Rome for one is commaunded to submit himselfe and to professe subiection Thus much Chrysostome hath expressely taught in his Hom. 23. vpon the Epistle to the Romanes The Apostle giues this commandement vnto all euen to Priests also and cloistered Monkes not onely to secular be thou an Apostle an Euangelist a Prophet c. Besides it is here worthy to be noted that howsoeuer the Apostles rule is generall and therefore bindeth all the faithfull in equal bands yet is it particularly directly and of purpose addressed to the Church of Rome by S. Paul as by one who in the spirit of an Apostle did foresee that rebellion against Princes was to rise and spring from the city of Rome Now in case the Head of that Church by warrant of any priuiledge contained in the most holy Register of Gods holy word is exempted from the binding power of this generall precept or rule did it not become his Lordship to shew by the booke that it is a booke case and to lay it forth before that honourable assembly who no doubt expected waited to heare when it might fal from his learned lips But in stead of any such authenticall and canonicall confirmation hee flyeth to a sleight shift and with a cauill is bold to affirme the foundation laid by those of our side doth no way touch the knot of the controuersie Let vs heare him speake Jt is not in controuersie whether obedience bee due to Kings by Gods Lawe so long as they are Kings or acknowledged for Kings but our point controuerted is whether by Gods Lawe it bee required that hee who hath beene once recognised and receiued for King by the bodie of Estates can at any time bee taken and reputed as no King that is to say can doe no manner of act whereby hee may loose his right and so cease to be saluted King This answer of the L. Cardinal is the rare deuise euasion and starting hole of the Iesuites In whose eares of delicate and tender touch King-killing soundeth very harsh but forsooth to vn-king a King first and then to giue him the stabbe that is a point of iust and true descant For to kill a King once vn-king'd by deposition is not killing of a King For the present I haue one of that Iesuiticall Order in prison who hath face enough to speak this language of Ashdod and to maintaine this doctrine of the Iesuites Colledges The L. Cardinal harps vpon the same string He can like subiection and obedience to the King whilest hee sitteth King but his Holinesse must haue all power and giue order withall to hoyst him out of his Royall seate I therefore now answer that in very deed the former passages of S. Paul and S. Peter should come nothing neere the question if the state of the question were such as he brings it made and forged in his owne shop But certes the state of the question is not whether a King may doe some act by reason whereof hee may fall from his right or may not any longer be acknowledged for King For all our contention is concerning the Popes power to vn-authorize Princes whereas in the question framed and fitted by the L. Card. not a word of the Pope For were it graunted and agreed on both sides that a King by election might fall from his Kingdome yet still the knot of the question would hold whether he can bee dispossessed of his Regall authority by any power in the Pope and whether the Pope hath such fulnesse of power to strip a King of those Royall robes rights and reuenues of the Crowne which were neuer giuen him by the Pope as also by what authority of holy Scripture the Pope is able to beare out himselfe in this power and to make it good But here the L. Cardinal stoutly saith in his owne defence by way of reioynder As one text hath Let euery soule be subiect vnto the higher powers in like manner an other text hath Obey your Prelates and be subiect vnto your Pastors for they watch ouer your soules as men that shall giue an accompt for your soules This reason is void of reason and makes against himselfe For may not Prelates be obeyed and honoured without Kings be deposed If Prelates preach the doctrine of the Gospell will they in the pulpit stirre vp subiects to rebell against Kings Moreouer whereas the vniuersal Church in these daies is diuided into so many discrepant parts that now Prelates neither do nor can draw all one way is it not exceeding hard keeping our obedience towards God to honour them all at once with due obedience Nay is not here offered vnto me a dart out of the L. Cardinals armorie to cast at himselfe For as God chargeth all men with obedience to Kings and yet from that commaundement of God the Lord Cardinal would not haue it inferred that Kings haue power to degrade Ecclesiasticall Prelates euen so God giueth charge to obey Prelates yet doth it not followe from hence that Prelates haue power to depose Kings These two degrees of obedience agree well together and are each of them bounded with peculiar and proper limits But for so much as in this point we haue on our side the whole auncient Church which albeit she liued and groned for many ages together vnder heathen Emperours heretikes and persecuters did neuer so much as whisper a word about rebelling and falling from their Soueraigne Lords and was neuer by any mortall creature freed from the oath of allegiance to the Emperour the Cardinal is not vnwilling to graunt that ancient
sinewes of his Papall Office to vnsheath and vnease his bolts of thunder against vngodly Princes and grieuous enemies to the Church wherefore liuing vnder Christian and gracious Emperours haue they not made knowne the reasons why they were hindred from drawing the pretended sword least long custome of not vsing the sword so many ages might make it so to rust in the scabbard that when there should bee occasion to vse the said sword it could not be drawne at all and least so long custome of not vsing the same should confirme prescription to their greater preiudice If weakenes bee a iust let how is it come to passe that Popes haue enterprised to depose Philip the Faire Lewis the XII and Elizabeth my predecessor of happy memorie to let passe others in whom experience hath well prooued how great inequalitie was between their strengths Yea for the most part from thence growe most grieuous troubles and warres which iustly recoyle and light vpon his owne head as happened to Gregory the VII and Boniface the VIII This no doubt is the reason wherefore the Pope neuer sets in for feare of such inconueniences to blast a King with lightning and thunder of deposition but when he perceiues the troubled waters of the Kingdome by some strong faction setled in his Estate or when the King is confined and bordered by some Prince more potent who thirsteth after the prey is euer gaping for some occasion to picke a quarrell The King standing in such estate is it not as easie for the Pope to pull him downe as it is for a man with one hand to thrust downe a tottering wall when the groundsil is rotten the studdes vnpind and nodding or bending towards the ground But if the King shall beare down and break the faction within the Realme if hee shall get withall the vpper hand of his enemies out of the Kingdome then the holy Father presents him with pardons neuer sued for neuer asked and in a fathers indulgence forsooth giues him leaue stil to hold the Kingdome that he was not able by all his force to wrest and wring out of his hand no more then the clubbe of Hercules out of his fist How many worthy Princes incensed by the Pope to conspire against Soueraigne Lords their Masters and by open rebellion to worke some change in their Estates haue miscarried in the action with losse of life or honour or both For example Rodulphus Duke of Sueuia was eg'd on by the Pope against Henrie IIII. of that name Emperour How many massacres how many desolations of cities and townes how many bloody battels ensued thereupon Let histories be searched let iust accompts be taken and beside sieges laid to cities it wil appeare by true computation that Henrie IIII. and Frederic the I. fought aboue threescore battels in defence of their owne right against enemies of the Empire stirred vp to armes by the Popes of Rome How much Christian blood was then split in these bloody battels it passeth mans witte penne or tongue to expresse And to giue a little touch vnto matters at home doth not his Holinesse vnderstand right well the weakenesse of Papists in my Kingdome Doth not his Holinesse neuerthelesse animate my Papists to rebellion and forbid my Papists to take the oath of allegiance Doth not his Holinesse by this means draw so much as in him lieth persecution vpon the backes of my Papists as vpon rebells and expose their life as it were vpon the open stall to be sold at a very easie price All these examples either ioynt or seuerall are manifest and euident proofes that feare to drawe mischiefe and persecution vpon the Church hath not barred the Popes from thundering against Emperours and Kings whensoeuer they conceiued any hope by their fulminations to aduance their greatnesse Last of all I referre the matter to the most possessed with preiudice euen the very aduersaries whether this doctrine by which people are trained vp in subiection vnto Infidel or hereticall Kings vntill the subiects be of sufficient strength to mate their Kings to expell their Kings and to depose them from their Kingdomes doth not incense the Turkish Emperours and other Infidel Princes to roote out all the Christians that drawe in their yoke as people that waite onely for a fit occasion to rebell and to take themselues ingaged for obedience to their Lords onely by constraint and seruile feare Let vs therefore now conclude with Ozius in that famous Epistle speaking to Constantius an Arrian hereticke As hee that by secret practise or open violence would bereaue thee of thy Empire should violate Gods ordinance so be thou touched with feare least by vsurping authoritie ouer Church matters thou tumble not headlong into some hainous crime Where this holy Bishop hath not vouchsafed to insert and mention the L. Cardinals exception to wit the right of the Church alwaies excepted and saued when she shall be of sufficient strength to shake off the yoke of Emperours Neither speaks the same holy Bishop of priuate persons alone or men of some particular condition and calling but he setteth downe a generall rule for all degrees neuer to impeach Imperial Maiestie vpon any pretext whatsoeuer As his Lordships first reason drawn from weakenesse is exceeding weake so is that which the L. Cardinall takes vp in the next place He telleth vs there is very great difference betweene Pagan Emperours and Christian Princes Pagan Emperours who neuer did homage to Christ who neuer were by their subiects receiued with condition to acknowledge perpetuall subiection vnto the Empire of Christ who neuer were bound by oath and mutuall contract betweene Prince and subiect Christian Princes who slide backe by Apostasie degenerate by Arrianisme or fall away by Mahometisme Touching the latter of these two as his Lordshippe saith If they shall as it were take an oath and make a vowe contrary to their first oath and vow made and taken when they were installed and contrary to the condition vnder which they receiued the Scepter of their Fathers if they withall shall turne persecutors of the Catholike religion touching these I say the L. Cardinal holds that without question they may be remooued from their Kingdomes He telleth vs not by whome but euery where he meaneth by the Pope Touching Kings deposed by the Pope vnder pretence of stupidity as Childeric or of matrimoniall causes as Philip I. or for collating of benefices as Philip the Faire not one word By that point he easily glideth and shuffles it vp in silence for feare of distasting the Pope on the one side or his auditors on the other Now in alledging this reason his Lordship makes all the world a witnesse that in deposing of Kings the Pope hath no eye of regard to the benefit and securitie of the Church For such Princes as neuer suckt other milke then that of Infidelitie and persecution of Religion are no lesse noisome and pernicious vermin to the Church then if they had
and those Princes likewise who are so well aduised to haue the most sacred names inscribed and printed in their coines doe take and acknowledge Iesus Christ for supreame King of Kings The said holy characters are no representation or profession that any Kings Crown dependeth vpon the Church or can be taken away by the Pope The L. Cardinal indeed so beareth vs in hand But he inuerts the words of Iesus Christ and wrings them out of the right ioynt For Christ without all ambiguity and circumlocution by the image and inscription of the money doth directly and expressely prooue Caesar to be free from subiection and intirely Soueraigne Now if such a supreme and Soueraigne Prince at any time shal bandie and combine against God and thereby shall become a rebellious and perfidious Prince doubtlesse for such disloyalty he shall deserue that God would take from him all hope of life eternall and yet hereby neither Pope nor people hath reason to be puft vp in their power to depriue him of his temporall Kingdome The L. Cardinal saith besides The champions of the Popes power to depose Kings doe expound that commandement of S. Paul whereby euery soule is made subiect vnto the superiour powers to be a prouisionall precept or caution accommodated to the times and to stand in force only vntill the Church was growne in strength vnto such a scantling that it might be in the power of the faithfull without shaking the pillars of Christian state to stand in the breach and cautelously to prouide that none but Christian Princes might be receiued according to the Law in Deut. Thou shalt make thee a King frō among thy brethren The reason whereupon they ground is this Because Paul saith It is a shame for Christians to bee iudged vnder vniust Infidels in matters or busines which they had one against an other For which inconuenience Iustinian after prouided by Lawe when he ordained that no Infidell nor heretike might be admitted to the administration of iustice in the Commonwealth In which words of the Cardinall the word Receiued is to be obserued especially and aboue the rest For by chopping in that word he doth nimbly and with a trick of legier-de-main transforme or change the very state of the question For the question or issue of the cause is not about receiuing establishing or choosing a Prince as in those Nations where the Kingdome goes by election but about doing homage to the Prince when God hath setled him in the Kingdome and hath cast it vpon a Prince by hereditary succession For that which is written Thou shalt make thee a King doth no way concerne and touch the people of France in these dayes because the making of their King hath not of long time been tyed to their election The passage therefore in Deuteron makes nothing to the purpose no more then doth Iustinians law For it is our free and voluntary confession that a Christian Prince is to haue speciall care of the Laws and to prouide that no vnbeleeuer be made Lord Cheife-Iustice of the Land that no Infidell be put in trust with administration of iustice to the people But here the issue doth not direct vs to speake of Delegates of subordinate Magistrates and such as are in Commission from the Prince but of the supreame Prince himselfe the Soueraigne Magistrate ordained by nature and confirmed by succession Our question is whether such a Prince can be vnthroned by the Pope by whom he was not placed in the Throne and whether the Pope can despoile such a Prince of that Royaltie which was neuer giuen him by the Pope vnder any pretended colour and imputation of heresie of stupiditie or infringing the priuiledges of Monasteries or transgressing the lawes and lines of holy matrimonie Now that Saint Pauls commandement which bindeth euery soule in the bands of subiection vnto the higher powers is no precept giuen by way of prouiso and onely to serue the times but a standing and a perpetuall rule it is hereby more then manifest S. Paul hath grounded this commandement vpon certaine reasons not only constant and permanent by their proper nature but likewise necessary for euery state condition and revolution of the times His reasons Because all powers are ordained of God because resisting of powers is resisting the ordinance of God because the Magistrate beares the sword to execute iustice because obedience and subiection to the Magistrate is necessary not onely for feare of his wrath or feare of punishment but also for conscience sake It is therefore a case grounded vpon conscience it is not a law deuised by humane wisedome it is not fashionable to the qualities of the times Apostolicall instructions for the right informing of manners are not changeable according to times and seasons To vse the L. Cardinals language and to followe his fancie in the matter is to make way for two pestiferous mischeifes First let it be free and lawfull for Christians to hold the commanding rules of God for prouisionall cautions and what followes Men are lead into the broad way of impietie and the whole Scripture is wiped of all authority Then againe for the other mischeife The glorious triumphs of most blessed Martyrs in their vnspeakeable torments and sufferings by the L. Cardinalls position shall be iudged vnworthy to weare the title and Crown of Martyrdom How so Because according to his new fiction they haue giuen place to the violence and fury of heathen Magistrates not in obedience to the necessary and certaine commaundement of God but rather to a prouisionall direction accommodated to the humours of the times And therefore the L. Cardinall hath vsed none other clay wherewith to dawbe ouer his deuise but plaine falsification of holy Scripture For he makes the Apostle say to the Corinthians It is a shame for Christians to be iudged vnder vnbeleeuing Magistrates whereas in that whole context of Paul there is no such matter For when the Apostle saith I speake it euen to your shame hee doth not say it is a shame for a beleeuer to be iudged vnder an Infidel but he makes thē ashamed of their vngodly course and vnchristian practise that in suing and impleading one an other they laid their actions of contention in the Courts of vnbeleeuing Iudges The shame was not in bearing that yoke which God had charged their necks withall but in deuouring and eating vp one an other with writs of habeas corpus and with other processes as also in vncouering the shame in laying open the shamefull parts and prankes played by Christians before Infidels to the great scandall of the Church Here I say the L. Cardinall is taken in a tricke of manifest falsification If therefore a King when hee falls to play the heretike deserueth to be deposed why shall not a Cardinall when hee falls to play the iuggler with holy Scripture deserue to be disrobed Meane while the indifferent Reader is to consider how greatly this doctrine is preiudiciall and how
attaine to the said assurance if things not denied bee mingled with points not graunted and not consented vnto by the Vniuersall Church By a thing not denied and not contested the L. Cardinall meanes prohibiting and condemning of King-killing by points contested hee meanes denying of the Popes power to depose Kings In this whole discourse I find neither pith of argument nor course of proofe but onely a cast of the L. Cardinalls office by way of counsell whereunto I make this answer If there be in this Article of the third Estate any point wherein all are not of one mind and the same iudgement in whome lieth all the blame from whence rises the doubt but from the Popes and Popish parasites by whome the certaintie of the said point hath been cunningly remooued and conueied away and must bee restored againe by publike authoritie Now the way to restore certaintie vnto a point which against reason is called into doubt and question is to make it vp in one masse or to tie it vp in the same bundle with other certaine points of the same nature Here I am forced to summon the consciences of men to make some stand or stay vpon this point and with me to enter into deepe consideration how great and vnvanquishable force is euer found in the truth For these two questions Whether Kings may lawfully bee made away by assassins waged and hired for the act and Whether the Pope hath lawful power to chase Kings out of their Thrones are by the L. Cardinals owne confession in so full aspect of coniunction that if either bee brought vnder any degree of doubt the other also is fetcht within the same compasse In which words he directly pointeth as with a finger to the very true source of the maine mischiefe and to the basilique and liuer veine infected with pestilentiall blood inflamed to the destruction of Basilicall Princes by detestable parricide For whosoeuer shall confidently beleeue that Popes are not armed with power to depose Kings will beleeue with no lesse confidence and assurance it is not lawfull by sudden assaults to flie at their throats For are not all desperate villaines perswaded when they are hired to murder Kings that in doing so damnable a feate they doe it for a peice of notable and extraordinarie seruice to the Pope This maxime therefore is to be held for a principle vnmooueable and indubitable that If subiects desire the life of their Kings to be secured they must not yeeld the Pope one inch of power to depriue their Kings of their Thrones and Crownes by deposing their Kings The Lord Cardinall testifieth no lesse himselfe in these words If those monsters of men and furies of hell by whom the life-blood of our two last Kings was let out had euer been acquainted with Lawes Ecclesiasticall they might haue read themselues adiudged by the Councill of Constance to expresse damnation For in these words the L. Cardinall preferreth a bill of inditement to cast his Holinesse who vpon the commencing of the Leaguers warres in stead of giuing order for the publishing of the said Ecclesiasticall Lawes for the restraining of all parricidicall practises and attempts fell to the terrour of his fulminations which not long after were seconded and ratified by the most audacious and bloody murder of King Henry III. In like manner the whole Clergy of France are wrapped vp by the L. Cardinals words and inuolued in the perill of the said inditement For in stead of preaching the said Ecclesiasticall Lawes by which all King-killing is inhibited the Priests taught vented and published nothing but rebellion and when the people in great deuotion came to powre their confessions into the Priests eares then the Priests with a kind of counterbuffe in the second place when their turne was come and with greater deuotion powred blood into the eares of the people out of which roote grewe the terrour of those cruell warres and the horrible parricide of that good King But let vs here take some neere sight of these Ecclesiasticall Lawes whereby subiects are inhibited to kill or desperately to dispatch their Kings out of the way The L. Cardinall for full payment of all scores vpon this reckoning layeth downe the credit of the Council at Constance which neuerthelesse affoardeth not one myte of true and currant payment The truth of the historie may be taken from this briefe relation Iohn Duke of Burgundie procured Lewis Duke of Orleans to be murthered in Paris To iustifie and make good this bloody act hee produced a certaine petimaster one called by the name of Iohn Petit This little Iohn caused nine propositions to be giuen forth or set vp to be discussed in the famous Vniuersitie of Paris The summe of all to this purpose It is lawfull iust and honourable for euery subiect or priuate person either by open force and violence or by deceit and secret lying in wait or by some witty stratagem or by any other way of fact to kill a Tyrant practising against his King and other higher powers yea the King ought in reason to giue him a pension or stipend that hath killed any person disloyall to his Prince The words of Petits first proposition be these It is lawfull for euery subiect without any commaund or commission from the higher powers by all the Lawes of nature of man and of God himselfe to kill or cause to be killed any Tyrant who either by a couetous and greedie desire or by fraud by diuination vpon casting of lots by double and treacherous dealing doth plot or practise against his Kings corporall health or the health of his higher powers In the third proposition It is lawfull for euery subiect honourable and meritorious to kill the said Tyrant or cause him to bee killed as a Traitor disloyall and trecherous to his King In the sixt proposition The King is to appoint a salarie and recompence for him that hath killed such a Tyrant or hath caused him to be killed These propositions of Iohannes Parvus were condemned by the Councill of Constance as impious and tending to the scandall of the Church Now then whereas the said Councill no doubt vnderstood the name or word Tyrant in the same sense wherein it was taken by Iohannes Parvus certaine it is the Councill was not of any such iudgment or mind to condemne one that should kil a King or Soueraigne Prince but one that by treason and without commandement should kill a subiect rebelling and practising against his King For Iohn Petit had vndertaken to iustifie the making away of the Duke of Orleans to bee a lawfull act and calls that Duke a Tyrant albeit he was no Soueraigne Prince as all the aboue recited words of Iohn Petit doe testifie that hee speaketh of such a Tyrant as beeing in state of subiection rebelleth against his free and absolute Prince So that whosoeuer shall narrowly search and looke into the minde and meaning of the said Councill shall easily perceiue that
after he speakes not in the teeth as before but with full and open mouth that he doth not dislike a King once deposed by the Pope should be pursued with open warre Whereupon it followes that in warre the King may be lawfully slaine No doubt a remarkeable degree of his Lordships clemencie A King shall be better entreated and more mildly dealt withall if he be slaine by the shot of an harquebuse or caleeuer in the field then if he be stabd by the stroke or thrust of a knife in his chamber or if at a siege of some city he be blown vp with a myne then by a myne made and a train of gunpowder laid vnder his Palace or Parliament house in time of peace His reason Forsooth because in sudden murders oftentimes the soule the bodie perish both together O singular bounty and rare clemencie prouokers instigators strong puffers and blowers of parricides in mercifull compassion of the soule become vnmercifull and shamefull murderers of the body This deuice may well claime and challenge kinred of Mariana the Iesuites inuention For he liketh not at any hand the poisoning of a Tyrant by his meate or drinke for feare least he taking the poison with his owne hand and swallowing or gulping it down in his meat or drinke so taken should be found felo de se as the common Lawyer speaketh or culpable of his owne death But Mariana likes better to haue a Tyrant poysoned by his chaire or by his apparell and robes after the example of the Mauritanian Kings that beeing so poysoned onely by sent or by contact he may not be found guilty of selfe-fellonie and the soule of the poore Tyrant in her flight out of the body may be innocent O hell-hounds O diabolicall wretches O infernall monsters Did they onely suspect and imagine that either in Kings there is any remainder of Kingly courage or in their subiects any sparke left of auncient libertie they durst as soon eate their nayles or teare their owne flesh from the bones as once broach the vessell of this Diabolicall deuice How long then how long shall Kings whom the Lord hath called his Anointed Kings the breathing images of God vpon earth Kings that with a wry or frowning looke are able to crush these earth-wormes in peices how long shall they suffer this viperous brood scot-free and without punishment to spit in their faces how long the Maiestie of God in their person and Royall Maiestie to bee so notoriously vilified so dishonourably trampled vnder foote The L. Cardinall bourds vs with a like manifest ieast and notably trifles first distinguishing between Tyrants by administration and Tyrants by vsurpation then shewing that he by no meanes doth approoue those prophane and heathenish Lawes whereby secret practises and conspiracies against a Tyrant by administration are permitted His reason Because after deposition there is a certaine habitude to Royall dignitie and as it were a kind of politicke character inherent in Kings by which they are discerned from persons meerely priuate or the common sort of people and the obstacle crosse-barre or sparre once remooued and taken out of the way the said Kings deposed are at length reinuested and endowed againe with lawfull vse of Royall dignitie and with lawfull administration of the Kingdome Is it possible that his Lordship can speake and vtter these words according to the inward perswasion of his heart I beleeue it not For admit a King cast out of his Kingdom were sure to escape with life yet beeing once reduced to a priuate state of life after hee hath wound or wrought himselfe out of deadly danger so farre he is from holding or retayning any remainder of dignity or politike impression that on the contrary he falleth into greater contempt and misery then if he had beene a very peasant by birth and had neuer held or gouerned the sterne of Royall estate What fowle is more beautifull then the peacocke Let her be plumed and bereft of her feathers what owle what iacke-daw more ridiculous more without all pleasant fashion The homely sowter the infamous catchpol the base tincker the rude artificer the pack-horse-porter then liuing in Rome with liberty when Valentinian was detaind captiue by Saporas the Persian King was more happy then that Romane Emperour And in case the Lord Cardinall himselfe should be so happy I should say so vnfortunate to be stript of all his dignities and Ecclesiastical promotions would it not redound to his Lordships wonderfull consolation that in his greatest extremitie in the lowest of his barenesse and nakednesse he still retaineth a certaine habituall right and character of a Cardinall whereby to recouer the losse of his former dignities and honours when hee beholds these prints and impressions of his foresaid honours would it not make him the more willing and glad to forsake the backe of his venerable mule to vse his Cardinals foot-cloath no longer but euer after like a Cardinall in print and character to walke on foote But let vs examine his Lordships consolation of Kings thrust out of their kingdomes by the Pope for heresie The obstacle as the L. Cardinall speaketh beeing taken away that is to say when the King shal be reformed this habituall right and character yet inherent in the person of a King restores him to the lawfull administration of his Kingdome I take this to be but a cold comfort For here his Lordship doth onely presuppose and not prooue that after a King is thrust out of his Throne when he shall repent and turne true Romane Catholike the other by whome he hath been cast out and by force disseised will recall him to the Royal seate and faithfully settle him againe in his auncient right as one that reioyceth for the recouery of such a lost sheep But I should rather feare the new King would presse and stand vpon other termes as a terme of yeeres for a triall whether the repentance of the King displaced be true and sound to the coare or counterfeit dissembled and painted holines for the words the sorrowfull and heauy lookes the sadde and formal gestures of men pretending repentance are not alwaies to be taken to be respected to be credited Again I should feare the afflicted King might be charged and borne downe too that albeit he hath renounced his former heresie he hath stumbled since at an other stone and runne the ship of his faith against some other rock of new hereticall prauitie Or I should yet feare he might be made to beleeue that heresie maketh a deeper impression and a character more indeleble in the person then is the other politike character of Regall Maiesty Alas good Kings in how hard in how miserable a state doe they stand Once deposed and euer barred of repentance As if the scapes and errors of Kings were all sinnes against the Holy Ghost or sinnes vnto death for which it is not lawfull to pray Falls a priuate person he may be set vp and new established Fals a
King is a King deposed his repentance is euer fruitles euer vnprofitable Hath a priuate person a trayne of seruants He can not be depriued of any one without his priuity and consent Hath a King millions of subiects He may be depriued by the Pope of a third part when his Holinesse will haue them turne Clerics or enter cloisters without asking the King leaue so of subiects they may be made nonsubiects But I question yet further A King falling into heresie is deposed by the Pope his sonne stands pure Catholike The Regall seate is empty Who shall succeed in the deposed Kings place Shall a stranger be preferred by the Pope That were to do the innocent sonne egregious and notorious wrong Shall the sonne himselfe That were a more iniurious part in the sonne against his father For if the sonne be touched with any feare of God or mooued with any reuerence towards his Father he will diligently and seriously take heed that he put not his Father by the Kingdome by whose meanes he himselfe is borne to a Kingdome Nor will he tread in the steps of Henry V. Emperour who by the Popes instigation expelled and chased his aged father out of the Imperiall dignity Much lesse will he hearken to the voice aduise of Doctor Suares the Iesuite who in his booke written against my selfe a book applauded and approoued of many Doctors after he hath like a Doctor of the chaire pronounced That a King deposed by the Pope cannot bee lawfully expelled or killed but onely by such as the Pope hath charged with such execution falleth to adde a little after If the Pope shall declare a King to be an heretike and fallen from the Kingdome without making further declaration touching execution that is to say without giuing expresse charge vnto any to make away the King then the lawfull successor beeing a Catholike hath power to do the feate and if he shall refuse or if there shall bee none such then it appertaineth to the comminaltie or body of the Kingdome A most detestable sentence For in hereditarie Kingdoms who is the Kings lawfull successor but his sonne The sonne then by this doctrine shall imbrew his hands in his owne fathers blood so soone as he shall be deposed by the Pope A matter so much the neerer and more deepely to be apprehended because the said most outragious booke flyeth like a furious mastiffe directly at my throat and withal instilleth such precepts into the tender disposition of my sonne as if hereafter he shall become a Romane Catholike so soone as the Pope shall giue me the lift out of my Throne shall bind him forthwith to make effusion of his owne fathers blood Such is the religion of these Reuerend Fathers the pillars of the Pontificiall Monarchie In comparison of whose religion and holinesse all the impietie that euer was among the Infidels and all the barbarous cruelty that euer was among the Canibals may passe henceforth in the Christian world for pure clemencie and humanity These things ought his Lordship to haue pondered rather then to babble of habitudes and politike characters which to the common people are like the Bergamasque or the wild-Irish forme of speech and passe their vnderstanding All these things are nothng in a manner if we compare them with the last clause which is the closer and as it were the vpshot of his Lordships discourse For therein he laboureth to perswade concerning this Article framed to bridle the Popes tyrannicall power ouer Kings if it should receiue gratious entertainment and general approbation That it would breed great danger and worke effects of pernicious consequence vnto Kings The reason because it would prooue an introduction to schisme and schisme would stirre vp ciuill warres contempt of Kings distempered inclinations and motions to intrappe their life and which is worst of all the fierce wrath of God inflicting all sorts of calamities An admirable paradoxe and able to strike men stone-blind that his Holinesse must haue power to depose Kings for the better security and safegard of their life that when their Crownes are made subiect vnto an others will and pleasure then they are come to the highest altitude and eleuation of honour that for the onely warrant of their life their supreame and absolute greatnes must be depressed that for the longer keeping of their Crownes an other must plucke the Crowne from their heads As if it should be said Would they not be stript naked by an other the best way is for themselues to vntrusse for themselues to put off all and to goe naked of their owne accord Will they keepe their Soueraigntie in safetie for euer The best way is to let an other haue their Soueraigne authority and supreame Estate in his power But I haue been euer of this mind that when my goods are at no mans command or disposing but mine owne then they are truely and certainly mine owne It may be this error is growne vpon me and other Princes for lacke of braines whereupon it may be feared or at least coniectured the Pope meanes to shaue our crownes and thrust vs into some cloister there to hold ranke in the brotherhood of good King Childeric For as much then as my dull capacity doth not serue me to reach or comprehend the pith of this admirable reason I haue thought good to seeke and to vse the instruction of old and learned experience which teacheth no such matter by name that ciuill warres and fearefull perturbations of State in any nation of the world haue at any time growne from this faithfull credulity of subiects that Popes in right haue no power to wrest and lift Kings out of their dignities and possessions On the other side by establishing the contrary maximes to yoke and hamper the people with Pontificiall tyrannie what rebellious troubles and stirres what extreame desolations hath England been forced to feare and feele in the raigne of my Predecessors Henry II. Iohn and Henry III These be the maximes and principles which vnder the Emperour Henry IV. and Frederic the I. made all Europe flowe with channels and streames of blood like a riuer with water while the Saracens by their incursions and victories ouerflowed and in a manner drowned the honour of the Christian name in the East These bee the maximes and principles which made way for the warres of the last League into France by which the very bowels of that most famous and flourishing Kingdome were set on such a combustion that France herselfe was brought within two fingers breadth of bondage to an other Nation and the death of her two last Kings most villanously and trayterously accomplished The Lord Cardinall then giuing these diabolicall maximes for meanes to secure the life and estate of Kings speaketh as if he would giue men counsell to dry themselues in the riuer when they come as wet as a water spaniel out of a pond or to warme themselues by the light of the Moone when they
prayses proclaimed a Tyrant as it were inebriated with blood of the Saints and a famous Enginer of torments for my Catholikes To this exhortation for the suffering of Martyrdome in imitation of my English traytors and parricides if we shall adde how craftily and subtilly he makes the Kings of England to hold of the Pope by fealty and their Kingdome in bondage to the Pope by Temporall recognizance it shall easily appeare that his holy-water of prayses wherewith I am so reuerently besprinkled is a composition extracted out of a dram of hony and a pound of gall first steeped in a strong decoction of bitter wormewood or of the wild gourd called Coloquintida For after he hath in the beginning of his Oration spoken of Kings that owe fealtie to the Pope and are not Soueraignes in the highest degree of Temporal supremacie within their Kingdomes to explaine his mind and meaning the better he marshals the Kings of England a little after in the same ranke His words be these When King Iohn of England not yet bound in any temporall recognizance to the Pope had expelled his Bishops c. His Lordship means that King Iohn became so bound to the Pope not long after And what may this meaning be but in plaine tearmes and broad speach to cal me vsurper and vnlawfull King For the feudatarie or he that holdeth a Mannor by fealty when he doth not his homage with all suit and seruice that he owes to the Lord Paramount doth fall from the propertie of his fee. This reproach of the L. Cardinals is seconded with an other of Bellarmines his brother Cardinall That Ireland was giuen to the Kings of England by the Pope The best is that his most reuerend Lordship hath not shewed who it was that gaue Ireland to the Pope And touching Iohn King of England thus in briefe stands the whole matter Between Henry 2. and the Pope had passed sundry bickerments about collating of Ecclesiasticall dignities Iohn the sonne after his fathers death reneweth vndertaketh and pursueth the same quarrell Driueth certaine English Bishops out of the Kingdome for defending the Popes insolent vsurpation vpon his Royall prerogatiue and Regall rights Sheweth such Princely courage and resolution in those times when all that stood and suffered for the Popes Temporall pretensions against Kings were enrowled Martyrs or Confessors The Pope takes the matter in fowle scorne and great indignation shuts the King by his excommunicatory Bulls out of the Church stirres vp his Barons for other causes the Kings heauy friends to rise in armes giues the Kingdome of England like a masterlesse man turned ouer to a new master to Philippus Augustus King of France binds Philip to make a conquest of England by the sword or else no bargaine or else no gift promises Philip in recompence of his trauell and Royall expences in that conquest full absolution and a general pardon at large for all his sinnes to be short cuts King Iohn out so much worke and makes him keep so many yrons in the fire for his worke that he had none other way none other meanes to pacifie the Popes high displeasure to correct or qualifie the malignitie of the Popes cholericke humour by whom he was then so intangled in the Popes toyles but by yeelding himselfe to become the Popes vassall and his Kingdome feudatary or to hold by fealty of the Papall See By this meanes his Crowne is made tributarie all his people liable to payment of taxes by the poll for a certaine yearly tribute and he is blessed with a pardon for all his sinnes Whether King Iohn was mooued to doe this dishonourable act vpon any deuotion or inflamed with any zeale of Religion or inforced by the vnresistable weapons of necessitie who can be so blind that he doth not well see and clearely perceiue For to purchase his owne freedom from this bondage to the Pope what could he be vnwilling to doe that was willing to bring his Kingdome vnder the yoke of Amirales Murmelinus a Mahumetan Prince then King of Granado and Barbaria The Pope after that sent a Legat into England The King now the Popes vassall and holding his Crowne of the Pope like a man that holds his land of an other by Knights seruice or by homage and fealty doth faire homage for his Crowne to the Popes Legat and layeth downe at his feete a great masle of the purest gold in coyne The reuerend Legat in token of his Masters Soueraigntie with more then vsuall pride fals to kicking and spurning the treasure no doubt with a paire of most holy feete Not onely so but likewise at solemne feasts is easily entreated to take the Kings chaire of Estate Here I would faine know the Lord Cardinals opinion whether these actions of the Pope were iust or vniust lawfull or vnlawfull according to right or against all right and reason If he will say against right it is then cleare that against right his Lordship hath made way to this example if according to right let him then make it knowne from whence or from whom this power was deriued and conuaied to the Pope whereby he makes himselfe Soueraigne Lord of Temporalties in that Kingdome where neither he nor any of his predecessors euer pretended any right or laid any claime to Temporall matters before Are such prankes to be played by the Pontificiall Bishop Is this an act of Holinesse to set a Kingdome on fire by the flaming brands of sedition to dismember and quarter a Kingdome with intestine warres onely to this end that a King once reduced to the lowest degree of miserie might be lifted by his Holinesse out of his Royall prerogatiue the very soule and life of his Royall Estate When beganne this Papall power In what age beganne the Pope to practise this power What! haue the auncient Canons for the Scripture in this question beareth no pawme haue the Canons of the auncient Church imposed any such satisfaction vpon a sinner that of ueraigne and free King he should become vassal to his ghostly Father that he should make himselfe together with all his people and subiects tributaries to a Bishop that shall rifle a whole Nation of their coyne that shall receiue homage of a King and make a King his vassall What! Shall not a sinner be quitted of his faults except his Pastor turne robber and one that goeth about to get a booty except he make his Pastor a feoffee in his whole Estate and suffer himselfe vnder a shadow of penance to freeze naked to be turned out of all his goods and possessions of inheritance But be it graunted admit his Holinesse robs one Prince of his rights and reuenewes to conferre the same vpon an other were it not an high degree of Tyrannie to finger an other mans estate and to giue that away to a third which the second hath no right no lawfull authoritie to giue Well if the Pope then shall become his own caruer in the rights of an other
if he shal make his owne coffers to swell with an others reuenewes if he shall decke and array his owne backe in the spoyles of a sinner with whom in absolution he maketh peace and taketh truce what can this be else but running into further degrees of wickednesse and mischiefe what can this be else but heaping of robbery vpon fraud and impiety vpon robbery For by such deceitfull crafty and cunning practises the nature of the Pontificiall Sea meerely spirituall is changed into the Kings-bench-Court meerely temporall the Bishops chaire is changed into a Monarchs Throne And not onely so but besides the sinners repentance is changed into a snare or pit-fall of cousening deceit and Saint Peters net is changed into a casting-net or a flew to fish for all the wealth of most flourishing Kingdomes Moreouer the King a hard case is driuen by such wyles and subtilties to worke impossibilities to act more then is lawfull or within the compasse of his power to practise For the King neither may in right nor can by power trans-nature his Crowne impaire the Maiestie of his Kingdome or leaue his Royall dignitie lesse free to his heire apparant or next successor then he receiued the same of his predecessor Much lesse by any dishonourable capitulations by any vnworthy contracts degrade his posteritie bring his people vnder the grieuous burden of tributes and taxes to a forraine Prince Least of all make them tributary to a Priest vnto whom it no way appertaineth to haue any hand in the ciuill affaires of Kings or to distaine vnhallow their Crownes And therefore when the Pope dispatched his Nuntio to Philippus Augustus requesting the King to avert Lewis his sonne from laying any claime to the Kingdom of England Philip answered the Legat as we haue it in Math. Paris No King no Prince can abienate or giue away his Kingdome but by consent of his Barons bound by Knights seruice to defend the said Kingdom and in case the Pope shall stand for the contrary error his Holinesse shall giue to Kingdomes a most pernicious example By the same Authorit is testified that King Iohn became odious to his subiects for such dishonorable and vnworthie inthralling of his Crowne and Kingdome Therefore the Popes right pretended to the Crowne of England which is nothing else but a ridiculous vsurpation hath long agoe vanished into smoake and required not so much as the drawing of one sword to snatch and pull it by violence out of his hands For the Popes power lying altogether in a certaine wild and wandring conceit or opinion of men and beeing onely an imaginary castle in the ayre built by pride and vnderpropped by superstition is very speedily dispersed vpon the first rising and appearing of the truth in her glorious brightnesse There is none so very a dolt or block-head to deny that in case this right of the Pope ouer England is grounded vpon Gods word then his Holinesse may challenge the like right ouer all other Kingdomes because all other Kingdomes Crownes and Scepters are subiect alike to Gods word For what priuiledge what charter what euidence can France fetch out of the Rolles or any other treasurie of her monuments or records to shew that she oweth lesse subiection to God then England Or was this yoke of bondage then brought vpon the English Nation was it a prerogatiue whereby they might more easily come to the libertie of the sonnes of God Or were the people of England perswaded that for all their substance wealth and life bestowed on the Pope his Holinesse by way of exchange returned them better weight and measure of spirituall graces It is ridiculous onely to conceiue these to yes in thought and yet with such ridiculous with such toyes in conceit his Lordship feedes and entertains his auditors From this point he falleth to an other bowt and fling at his heretikes with whom he played no faire play before There is not one Synode of ministers as he saith which would willingly subscribe to this Article whereunto we should be bound to sweare But herein his Lordship shooteth farre from the mark This Article is approued and preached by the Ministers of my Kingdome It is likewise preached by those of France and if neede be I assure my selfe will be signed by all the Ministers of the French Church The L. Cardinall proceedeth for hee meaneth not so soone to giue ouer these heretikes All their Consistories beleeue it as their Creede that if Catholike Princes at any time shall offer force vnto their conscience then they are dispensed withall for their oath of allegiance Hence are these modifications and restrictions tossed so much in their mouthes Prouided the King force vs not in our conscience Hence are these exceptions in the profession of their faith Prouided the Soueraigne power and authoritie of God be not in any sort violated or infringed I am not able to conceiue what engine can be framed of these materialls for the bearing of Kings out of their eminent seats by any lawfull authority or power in the Pope For say those of the Religion should be tainted with some like errour how can that be any shelter of excuse for those of the Romish Church to vndermine or to digge vp the Thrones of their Kings But in this allegation of the Lord Cardinal there is nothing at all which doth not iumpe iust and accord to a haire with the Article of the third Estate and with obedience due to the King For they doe not professe that in case the King shall commaund them to doe any act contrarie to their conscience they would flie at his throat would make any attempt against his life would refuse to pay their taxations or to defend him in the warres They make no profession of deposing the King or discharging the people from the oath of allegiance tendred to the King which is the very point or issue of the matter in controuersie and the maine mischeife against which the third Estate hath bin most worthily carefull to prouide a wholesome remedie by this Article There is a world of difference betweene the termes of disobedience and of deposition It is one thing to disobey the Kings commaund in matters prohibited by diuine lawes and yet in all other matters to performe full subiection vnto the King It is another thing of a farre higher degree or straine of disloyaltie to bare the King of his Royall robes throne and scepter and when he is thus farre disgraced to degrade him and to put him from his degree and place of a King If the holy Father should charge the L. Cardinal to doe some act repugnant in his owne knowledge to the Law of God I will religiously and according to the rule of charity presume that his Lordship in this case would stand out against his Holinesse and notwithstanding would still acknowledge him to be Pope His Lordship yet prosecutes and followes his former purpose Hence are those armes which they haue oftentimes
by the Lord Cardinall He likewise produceth two Christian Emperours Constantine and Valentinian by name the first refusing to meddle with iudgement in Episcopall causes the other forbearing to iudge of subtile Questions in Diuinity with protestation that Hee would neuer be so curious to diue into the streames or sound the bottome of so deepe matters But who doth not knowe that working and prouiding for the Kings indemnity and safetie is neither Episcopall cause nor matter of curious and subtile inquisition The same answer meets with all the rest of the places produced by the L. Cardinal out of the Fathers And that one for example out of Gregory Nazianzenus is not cited by the Cardinall with faire dealing For Gregorie doth not boord the Emperour himselfe but his Deputie or L. President on this manner For we also are in authoritie and place of a Ruler we haue command aswell as your selfe whereas the L. Cardinal with fowle play turnes the place in these termes We also are Emperours Which words can beare no such interpretation as well because he to whom the Bishop then spake was not of Imperiall dignitie as also because if the Bishop himselfe a Bishop of so small a citie as Nazianzum had qualified himselfe Emperour he should haue passed all the bounds of modestie and had shewed himselfe arrogant aboue measure For as touching subiection due to Christian Emperours hee freely acknowledgeth a little before that himselfe and his people are subiect vnto the superiour powers yea bound to pay them tribute The history of the same Gregories life doth testifie that he was drawne by the Arrians before the Consuls iudgement seate and from thence returned acquitted without either stripes or any other kind of contumelious entreatie and vse yet now at last vp starts a Prelate who dares make this good Father vaunt himselfe to bee an Emperour It is willingly granted that Emperours neuer challenged neuer arrogated to be Soueraigne Iudges in controuersies of doctrine and faith neuertheles it is clearer then the Sunnes light at high noone that for moderation at Synods for determinations and orders established in Councils and for the discipline of the Church they haue made a good and a full vse of their Imperiall authoritie The 1. Council held at Constantinople beares this title or inscription The dedication of the holy Synode to the most religious Emperour Theodosius the Great to whose will and pleasure they haue submitted these Canons by them addressed and established in Council And there they also beseech the Emperour to confirme and approoue the said Canons The like hath bin done by the Councill of Trullo by whome the Canons of the fift and sixt Councils were put forth and published This was not done because Emperours tooke vpon them to bee infallible Iudges of doctrine but onely that Emperours might see and iudge whether Bishops who feele the pricke of ambition as other men doe did propound nothing in their Conuocations and Consultations but most of all in their Determinations to vndermine the Emperours authoritie to disturbe the tranquilitie of the Commonwealth and to crosse the determinations of precedent Councils Now to take the cognizance of such matters out of the Kings hand or power what is it but euen to transforme the King into a standing image to wring and wrest him out of all care of himselfe and his Kingly charge yea to bring him downe to this basest condition to become onely an executioner and which I scorne to speake the vnhappie hangman of the Clergies will without any further cognizance not so much as of matters which most neerely touch himselfe and his Royall estate I graunt it is for Diuinitie Schooles to iudge how farre the power of the Keyes doth stretch I graunt againe that Clerics both may and ought also to display the colours and ensignes of their censures against Princes who violating their publike and solemne oath do raise and make open war against Iesus Christ I graunt yet againe that in this case they need not admit Laics to be of their counsell nor allowe them any scope or libertie of iudgement Yet all this makes no barre to Clerics for extending the power of their keies many times a whole degree further then they ought and when they are pleased to make vse of their said power to depriue the people of their goods or the Prince of his Crowne all this doth not hinder Prince or people from taking care for the preseruation of their owne rights and estates nor from requiring Clerics to shewe their cards and produce their Charts and to make demonstration by Scripture that such power as they assume and challenge is giuen them from God For to leaue the Pope absolute Iudge in the same cause wherein hee is a party and which is the strongest rampier and bulwarke yea the most glorious and eminent point of his domination to arme him with power to vnhorse Kings out of their feates what is it else but euen to draw them into a state of despaire for euery winning the day or preuailing in their honourable and rightfull cause It is moreouer graunted if a King shall commaund any thing directly contrary to Gods word and tending to the subuerting of the Church that Clerics in this case ought not onely to dispense with subiects for their obedience but also expressely to forbid their obedience For it is alwaies better to obey God then man Howbeit in all other matters whereby the glory and maiesty of God is not impeached or impaired it is the duty of Clerics to plie the people with wholesome exhortation to constant obedience and to auert by earnest disswasions the said people from tumultuous reuolt and seditious insurrection This practise vnder the Pagan Emperours was held and followed by the auncient Christians by whose godly zeale and patience in bearing the yoke the Church in times past grew and flourished in her happy and plentifull encrease farre greater then Poperie shall euer purchase and attaine vnto by all her cunning deuises and sleights as namely by degrading of Kings by interdicting of Kingdomes by apposted murders and by Diabolicall traines of Gunne-powder-mines The places of Scripture alledged in order by the Cardinall in fauour of those that stand for the Popes claime of power and authoritie to depose Kings are cited with no more sinceritie then the former They alleadge these are his words that Samuel deposed King Saul or declared him to bee deposed because hee had violated the lawes of the Iewes religion His Lordship auoucheth elsewhere that Saul was deposed because hee had sought prophanely to vsurpe the holy Priesthood Both false and contrary to the tenor of truth in the sacred historie For Saul was neuer deposed according to the sense of the word I meane depose in the present question to wit as deposing is taken for despoyling the King of his Royall dignity and reducing the King to the condition of a priuate person But Saul held the title
are starnaked and well neere frozen to death The Conclusion of the Lord of Perron examined AFTER the L. Cardinal hath stoutly shewed the strength of his arme and the deepe skill of his head in fortification at last he leaues his loftie scaffolds and falls to work neerer the ground with more easie tooles of humble prayers and gentle exhortations The summe of the whole is this He adiures his auditors neuer to forge remedies neuer so to prouide for the temporall safetie of Kings as thereby to worke their finall falling from eternall saluation neuer to make any rent or rupture in the vnity of the Church in this corrupt age infected with pestilent heresies which alreadie hauing made so great a breach in the walls of France will no doubt double their strength by the dissentions diuisions and schismes of Catholikes If this infectious plague shall still encrease and growe to a carbuncle it can by no meanes poyson religion without bringing Kings to their winding sheetes and wofull hearses The first rowlers of that stone of offence aymed at no other marke then to make an ignominious and lamentable rent in the Church He thinks the Deputies of the third Estate had neither head nor first hand in contriuing this Article but holds it rather a newe deuice and subtile inuention suggested by persons which beeing alreadie cut off by their owne practises from the body of the Romane Church haue likewise inueigled and insnared some that beare the name of Catholiks with some other Ecclesiastics and vnder a faire pretence and goodly cloake by name the seruice of the King haue surprised and played vpon their simplicitie These men as the Cardinal saith doe imitate Julian the Apostata who to bring the Christians to idolatrous worship of false gods commaunded the idols of Iupiter and Venus to be intermingled with Imperiall statues and other Images of Christian Emperours c. Then after certaine Rhetoricall flourishes his Lord ship fals to prosecute his former course and cries out of this Article A monster hauing the tayle of a fish as if it came cutting the narrow Seas out of England For in full effect it is downright the English oath sauing that indeede the oath of England runneth in a more mild forme and a more moderate straine And here he suddenly takes occasion to make some digression For out of the way and cleane from the matter he entreth into some purpose of my praise and commendation He courteously forsooth is pleased to grace me with knowledge of learning and with ciuill vertues Hee seemeth chiefly to reioyce in his owne behalfe and to giue me thanks that I haue done him the honour to enter the lists of Theologicall dispute against his Lordship Howbeit he twitches and carpes at me withall as at one that soweth seeds of dissention and schisme amongst Romane Catholiks And yet he would seeme to qualifie the matter and to make all whole againe by saying That in so doing I am perswaded I doe no more then my dutie requires But now as his Lordship followes the point it standeth neither with godlinesse nor with equity nor with reason that Acts made that Statutes Decrees and Ordinances ratified for the State and Gouernement of England should be thrust for binding Laws vpon the Kingdome of France nor that Catholikes and much lesse that Ecclesiastics to the ende they may liue in safetie and freely enioy their priuiledges or immunities in France should be forced to beleeue and by oath to seale the same points which English Catholikes to the ende they may purchase libertie onely to breath nay sorrowfully to sigh rather are constrained to allow and to aduowe besides And whereas in England there is no small number of Catholikes that lacke not constant and resolute minds to endure all sorts of punishment rather then to take that oath of allegiance will there not be found an other manner of number in France armed with no lesse constancie and Christian resolution There will most honourable Auditors there will without all doubt and we all that are of Episcopall dignity will sooner suffer Martyrdome in the cause Then out of the super-abundance and ouer-weight of his Lordships goodnesse he closely coucheth and conuayeth a certaine distastfull opposition between me and his King with prayses and thankes to God that his King is not delighted and takes no pleasure to make Martyrs All this Artificial and swelling discourse like vnto puffe-past if it be viewed at a neere distance will be found like a bladder full of wind without any soliditie of substantiall matter For the Deputies of the third Estate were neuer so voide of vnderstanding to beleeue that by prouiding for the life and safety of their King they should thrust him headlong into eternall damnation Their braines were neuer so much blasted so farre benummed to dreame the soule of their King cannot mount vp to heauen except he be dismounted from his Princely Throne vpon earth whensoeuer the Pope shall hold vp his finger And whereas he is bold to pronounce that heretikes of France doe make their benefit and aduantage of this diuision that speech is grounded vpon this proposition That professors of the Christian Religion reformed which is to say purged and cleansed of all Popish dregs are heretiks in fact and ought so to be reputed in right Which proposition his Lordship wil neuer soundly and sufficiently make good before his Holinesse hath compiled an other Gospell or hath forged an other Bible at his Pontificiall anvile The L. Cardinall vndertooke to reade me a lecture vpon that argument but euer since hath played Mum-budget and hath put himselfe to silence like one at a Non-plus in his enterprise There be three yeeres already gone and past since his Lordship beganne to shape some answer to a certaine writing dispatched by me in few daies With forming and reforming with filing and polishing with labouring and licking his answer ouer and ouer againe with reiterated extractions and calcinations it may be coniectured that all his Lordships labour and cost is long since evaporated and vanished in the aire Howbeit as well the friendly conference of a King for I will not call it a contention as also the dignitie excellencie and importance of the matter long since deserued and as long since required the publishing of some or other answer His Lordships long silence will neuer be imputed to lacke of capacity wherewith who knoweth not how abundantly he is furnished but rather to well aduised agnition of his owne working and building vpon a weake foundation But let vs returne vnto these heretikes that make so great gaine by the disagreement of Catholikes It is no part of their dutie to aime at sowing of dissentions but rather to intend and attend their faithfull performance of seruice to their King If some be pleased and others offended when so good and loyall duties are sincerely discharged it is for all good subiects to grieue and to be sory that when they speake for the