Selected quad for the lemma: nation_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
nation_n	england_n	law_n	statute_n	1,497	5	9.0809	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A86729	Digitus testium, or A dreadful alarm to the vvhole kingdom, especially the Lord Major, the aldermen, and the Common-Councel of the City of London. Or a short discourse of the excellency of Englands lawes and religion. Together, with the antiquity of both, and the famous Kings that England hath had to defend both the religion and the laws against the heathen Romish emperours, and against the Romish power, under Popes. With the several plots the Popes of Rome have used against the Kings of England, to throwe them down, and how of late he hath prevailed against the magistracy and ministery of England, his new designes, and manner of progress: together, with a serious view of the new oath or ingagement, with 22. queries upon the same. And also objections made against the non-subscribers thereof answered. Let the ingenuous reader take so much pains, as to read that incomparable peece of vindication of a treatise of monarchy by way of discovery of three main points thereof.	Hall, Henry, d. 1680, attributed name.; Hall, Edmund, 1619 or 20-1687, attributed name.	1651 (1651)	Wing H339A; Thomason E621_13; ESTC R206419	34,005	37

all the World and their damnation sleepeth not be not found amongst the number of Hypocrites Apostates Atheists and Papists persecuting the poor Church the sword is put into your hand for the preservation not for the persecution of a godly zealous Ministery The God of all wisdom direct you for the Churches good and his glory for which ends we dedicate these our Papers to you A short Discourse of the excellency of Englands Laws and Religion c. IT is not unknown to us the Free-born Protestants of England that our Nation claimeth the priority of all other Nations in the World for ancient and famous Laws and Peace and Religion The Laws and Customs of England saith Learned Fortescus are ancienter then the Laws of the Romans yea of the Venetians which are esteemed the ancientest in the World they are more famous then others because better then the Laws of other Nations and that in a threefold respect in the subject matter in the form and 3. in the disposing of them The ras substrata of the statute Laws of England is reason which indeed is the totum compositum of the common Law Common Law is a vast mine of right reason out of which all other Laws are digged and fitly squared to the good of the Kingdom he therefore is esteemed the best Lawyer that spoke the best reason and herein the People of England excel all other Nations in that they are only subjected by the Law to reason and the purest reason which to be is doubtless perfect freedom yea it may truly be affirmed that by the Law they are subjects only to divine reason for we have such a standing Law upon record that whatsoever Custom maxim or Statute shall be faind directly contrary to the Law of God that Custom Maxim Statute or Case shall be ipso facto void and so adjudged And as for the matter for the form the Laws of England are the absolute and undoubted best in the World for as there is universal obedience required and injoyned to every Law inacted for there is a general assent in the acting and constitution of that Law There are 3. estates which concur as joynt causes of the same effect in making of a Law These 3. Conjunctions do make the supreme Authority of the Nation the Apax or Culmen potestatis being set upon the Kings head all Writs and procession issuing out in his name with him are joyned the House of Lords and the House of Commons these 3. divisions are limitted by Law but compunction they have power to repeal or make a Law and none can say unto them why do you so but either of these apart are limitted by Law Limitations of royal power have been made and acknowledged by Magna Charta and several other acts and no obedience acknowledged any otherwise then according to Law and King Charles acknowledged that the measure of his power was the Law and he desired no more then what he was invested with by Law And so of the other two estates of Lords and Commons these three have negative voices alike have freedom in their several places a like freedom to make motions and freedom to reject what they dislike This is the absolutest best Government in the World as is clear from God and Nature God himself who is the Almighty Monark of all Spirits hath pleased to reveal himself to Man in a Trinity of persons and governs the universe by himself Angels and Men Celestical Bodies by Sun Moon and Stars the little World Man by understanding will and affections and the Kingdom of England by King Lords and Commons The King of himself cannot make a Law of himself if he do t is tyranny nor the Lords in a part by themselves nor the Commons by themselves against the other two if they do it is usurpation exceeding presumption perjury and Treason for they are sworn to the contrary by their Oaths of allegiance and supremacy to act nothing against the Crown and Dignity of their Soveraign Lord the King besides they are sworn to maintain the Priviledges of Parliament The King makes the first of these three Estates by a right which is not by election nor by Conquest simply but by inheritance for the Saxon Kings laying the plat-form of good Government here in England continued it succesfully until the Danes drove them into Corners subduing them for a time the which they soon recovered again and so recovered their ancient Customs and Laws again and continued them Edward the Confessor who was of the Saxon line having no Heir descending of his body intended to make Edgar Ethling Gran-child to Ironside his successor but Edward the Confessor dying Harrold-Earl Godwins Sonne being popular for his Victories usurped the Crown and dispossessed the right Heir deluding William of Normandy to whom he had promised by Oath the Government of the Kingdom after the death of Edward William Duke of Normandy hereupon pleads a right to the Crown of England by promise as he said from Edward the Confessor and hereupon brought an Army with him from Normandy and gave battel to Harold the Usurper at Hastings in Sussex where he overthrow'd him by whose overthrow there was way made for a Treaty betwixt Duke William and the Nobles and Citizens then at London Duke William pleaded his right by promise as having a grant of the Kingdom made to him by Edward the Confessor and confirmed by Harrold who forswore himself and usurped the Crown hereupon Duke William was received and acknowledged King by the Nobles and City of London after this Edgar Ethling who indeed was the right Heyr compounded with Duke William and for a royal allowance which Duke William granted him he reconciled himself to him and thus William came in as Successour to Edward the Saxon King and so it succeeded from the Normans to the Plantagenets Henry the 2. being the Sonne of Maud Henry the 1. his Daughter whom he married to Jeffery Plantagenet who begat Henry the 2. and so it passed from the Normans to the Plantaginets in whose unquestionable time eight Kings succeeded each other afterwards they divided Henry the 4 of the younger house usurped the Crown being of the house of Lancaster but Edward the 4. of the house of York coming in upon a better Title then those of Lancaster overthrew those that opposed his Title this Division continued and lived until Richard the 3. died who breathed the last of the Plantagenets The Tudors next succeeded the Plantagenets Henry the 7. matching with Elizabeth the eldest Daughter to Edward the 4. of the house of York united both houses of York and Lancaster laying the white Rose and the red together in the royal person of Henry the 7. the Scepter fell back into the Current of the old brittish blood together with the German Norman Burgandian Castalian and French atchievements with the intermarriages which 800 years had acquired incorporated and brought back into the old royal time

three Estates cannot be molested yet the instruments that he implies against Law may be tryed This Law is most agreeable to the Law of God and the Law of nature to the Law of God for Kings are the Representatives of God on earth and none can touch them we see this clear in two famous instances in Saul who could crimes have brought him under the censure of men had enough to dethrone him for he was a Tyrant a murtherer and a publick enemy to the Church and State yet David when he could have done justice upon him said God forbid for he is the Lords anointed the declared King of Israel And David that was guilty of murther and adultery both of them deserving death by the Law yet was not questioned by his Subjects because God only hath the power of punishing Kings and not man This is most agreeable to the Law of nature for if Kings should be subject to their Subjects then the order must needs be confounded and the Law of nature utterly rooted up which orders approves no further then the supreme Authority which if judged by any is not the supreme and so produceth confusion and infinition Therefore we conclude that the Laws of England are the best Laws in the World in every respect both for matter form and distribution And as for Laws so for pure Religion it is beyond all other Nations it received the Apostolick faith almost if not all out as soon as Rome that brags of its antiquity Gindas telleth us that England received the Gospel in the Apostles dayes Joseph at Armathea bringing it into the Kingdom and Origen and Turtullian tell us that it received the Gospel as soon as any Natian in Europe This we are sure that it hath retained it in its purity the longest of any Nation it had a great share in the Presevitians under the Heathen Emperours of Rome after that under the Arrian and Entichion Heresies and after that under Popus the bloudiest and cruellest enemy to the Church so that from the Apostles time till this day Christian Religion though sometimes obscured never was obliterate nor extinct in the Kingdom And as this Kingdom hath been famous for Laws and Religion above others so it hath been the famousest in the World for Religious and valiant Kings to protect it and eminent Ministers to divulge it Lucious the Son of Coilus who was King of England was the first Christian King Jesus Christ smiling upon this Nation above all others in blessing it with a righteous King which was a miracle in the World at that time Constantine the 8. King of England after Lucius who was the Son of beautiful Helea King Coil his Daughter of England whom she brought forth at York he becam Emperour of Rome conquering the Heathen Emperours with a Brittish Army and so converted Rome Heathen into Rome Christian the famousest Reformation that ever was wrought in the World so that England is famous for being the first Christian Kingdom and setting up Christian Empire English Kings having been the only great friends to true Religion in the time of Paganisme And as they were the greatest friends to Christs Church against Rome Pagan so they have been the greatest friends to the true Chucrch against Rome Antixfian for about the year 1070. when the Pope was in his full height of soverainty the Normons line succeeding the Saxons in England were the first Kings that contemned the Popes Authority William the Conqueror spit at him and Wilt Rufus who succeeded him openly spake against the Popes usurped power of binding and loosing withstanding and rejecting his intrapped fopperies declaring against the Pope the folly of invocating Saints he plucked proud Arch Bishop Anselmes nose under his Girdle in despight of the Pope and so did the royal Family of the Plantagenets The Tudors and the Stuarts got their several parts in greater degrees against the Pope as they succeeded each other So that the Normans may be said to resist the Pope the Plantagenets to grapple with the Pope the Tudors to unhorse the Pope and the Stuarts to stob the Pope King James being the first King that writ against him proved him to be Antichrist Against the Kings of England the Popes have born an old grudge and indeavoured to destroy those Kings or Queens which resisted their Authority at least 12. Treasons against Q. Elizabeth were discovered and prevented which so frustrated Pope Pius Quintus projects that it broke his heart for malice that he could not with his Bulls which with his own hands he sealed depose and dethrone the Protestant Queen for she took occasion from the Popes wickedness and the Papists treachery to extirpate Priests and Jesuites out of the Kingdom whereupon Pope Gregory 13. erected a Colledge on purpose for English Priests and Jesuites that fled from England to Rome and another at Doway which was much nearer England that they might there both frame their granadoes of Treason against the English Court and receive such persons as were succesless in their Treason and made escapes out of England Against King James besides that Treason of Warson and Clarke the prodigious Gunpowder-plot was contrived by the Papists to destroy the King the Prince the House of Lords and the House of Commons in the twinkling of an eye upon this ground because Pope Clement 8. by a Bull Commanded that the King should not be crowned without a toleration of Popery but God prevented that prodigious blowe Hereupon the King and the Parl framed the Oath of allegiance to be taken by every subject in the Kingdom 't is thus I. A. B do truly and sincerely acknowle●ge profess testifie and declare in my Conscience before God and the World that our Soveraign Lord K. James is lawful and rightful King of this Realm and of all other His Maj. Dominions and Countries and that the Pope neither of himself nor by any Authority of the Church or See of Rome or by any other means with any other hath any power of Authority to depose the King or dispose any of his Majesties Kingdoms or Dominions or to authorize any forraign Prince to invade or anoy him or his Countries or to discharge any of his subjects of the allegiance and obedience to His Majesty or to give license to any of them to bear Arms or offer any violence or hurt to His Maj. person State or Government or to any of His Maj. Subjects I do swear from my hear● that no withstanding any Declaration or excom. against the King his Heirs and Successours or any absolution of the said Subjects from their obedience I will bear faith and true Religion to His Maj. His Heirs and Successors and him and them will defend to the utmost of my power against all conspiracies and attempts whatsoever and I do detest and abhorre as impious and heretical the damnable Doctrine of the Pope that Princes may be excommunicated and deprived of their Kingdoms deposed and murthered by their