be in a Condition to bear their part in the Business he commands them to retire and chuse a Prolocutor Anno 1460. May 10. The Archbishop first directs the Choice of a Prolocutor and then confirms him after which he explains to them the Causes of the Convocation In these two last Instances the Clergy are not directed to Retire as they had usually been to debate apart about the Matters of Convocation laid before them by the Archbishop Because now they began as to their debating to be in a more separate State so that the bare Proposition of Business to be Prepar'd or Consider'd was notice enough that they were to Retire to their usual Place and set about it The old Registers have only the Acts of four Convocations more so that we have no light between the Years 1488 and 1529. nor any from thence to the Year 1562. besides certain Extracts out of the Registers of the Upper-House But the ancient Directory in Edward the sixth's time and Archbishop Parker's Form of holding a Convocation both of them written while the Registers of Covocation remain'd entire and both as above-cited setting down his Grace's declaration of the Causes of the Summons as a necessary part of their preparation for Business leave no Room to doubt whether in that Interval the same Usage continu'd which we have shown to be the Practiee of Convocation from the beginning of the most early Acts. Not but that even in these Extracts we find the Custom plainly enough tho' not express'd under all the Circumstances that appear in the Original Registers So Anno 1536. the Second in that Collection the Bishop of London's Return being exhibited Reverendissimus exposuit Causas hujusmodi Convocationis denide monuit omnes Praelatos quatenus conferrent se ad locum consuetum eligant unum virum in Referendarium Prolocutorem qui eorum nomine loqui possit Anno 1547. the next but one in which as well as in the first of that Book the Form of Opening is very much contracted by the Abridger and consists only of some short hints Archbishop Cranmer is there said in general to have acquainted them that the Convocation was then Summon'd quod Praelati Cleri inter se consulerent de vera Christi Religione probè instituenda tradenda popule that being the first Year of Edward the sixth Again Anno 1444. The Return being exhibited Episcopus London in the Vacancy of the Archbishoprick Summariè compendiosè Causam Synodi vocatae exposuit monuit Inferiorem Domum de eligendo sibi Prolocutorem Anno 1557. The Archbishop with the Consent of his Brethren having confirm'd the Prolocutor mox Causas hujus Synodi verbo-tenus proposuit which are there set down at large Anno 1558. Praeconizatione facta Inferiore Doino evocata exposuit Episcopus ibidem Causam Convocation is But more distinctly in the next which is an entire Register That I mean of Archbishop Parker in which the 39 Articles were made viz. Anno 1562. Reverendissimus Dominus Archiepiscopus Cant. brevens quandam Orationem Eloquentiae plenam habuit ad Patres Clerum per quam inter alia opportunitatem Reformandarum rerum in Ecclesia Anglicana jam oblatam esse aperuit ac propensos animos tam illustrissimae Dominae nostrae Regine quam allorum Magnatum hujus regni ad hujusmodi Reformationem habendam declaravit hortando praecipiendo mandando Praelatos Clerum Inferioris Domus in dicta domo capitulari coram co reliquis Patribus constitutos quatenus ad Conventus sui locum sese conferentes unum virum gravem c. eligant in eorum Prolocutorem Anno 1640. the next Convocation of which the Upper-House-Acts remain after the Prolocutor is confirm'd the Archbishop produces the King's License Et Reverendissimus Pater antedictus praefatum Prolocutorem alios de Domo inferiori Decanos Archidiaconos Capitula Cleri Procuratores ibidem praesentes voluit ut ipsi inter se convenirent mature excogitarent de Subsidiis Domino nostro Regi concedend Canonibus Constitutionibus Statum Ecclesiasticum Christi Religionem in Ecclesia Anglicana concernen concipiendis Et quicquid inde senserent sive excogitaverint in scriptis redigant coram ipso Reverendissimo Confratribus Episcopis exhibeant Anno 1661. The Prolocutor being confirm'd Committees of both Houses were order'd in the Upper-House to compose Services for the 29th of May and the 30th of January c. And when afterwards by the coming of the Royal License they thought themselves at liberty to Enter upon the Business which was the chief Cause of their Meeting the Archbishop directs the Members of the Lower-House to proceed in it in the self same words that Archbishop Laud had us'd in the Year 1640. The Inference from the Archbishop's declaring the Causes of Convocation I have been thus particular in my Deduction of Authorities to show the Right of the President to mark out a Scheme of Business to be transacted in Convocation Beause as by the Tenor of the Mandate his first step in Summoning we are led to the Foundation of his Grace's Power over the Members of the Lower-House so in this their Entrance upon Business we clearly see his Influence and Authority over their Proceedings That is we have the view of an Ecclesiastical Synod consisting of a Metropolitan Bishops and Presbyters all going on to Act within their proper Spheres and suitably to the Constitution of an Episcopal Church The Metropolitan having advis'd with his Suffragan-Bishops about the State and Condition of the Church of which He and They are constituted Governours recommends to the Synod the Consideration of such Improvements or Reformations as evidently tend to its Honour and Safety The Clergy are there in readiness to receive the Opinion and Directions of their Ecclesiastical Superiors and to offer their own Judgment as there shall be occasion with all Duty and Humility and in short to give their Assistance of every kind in a proper Subordination towards the ready and effectual Dispatch of all Business that shall be regularly propos'd for the Advancement of Religion The Archbishop and Bishops wee see deliberate Above And the Clergy debate the same Matters below to be ready with their Opinions and Resolutions when requir'd And thus they appear like one Body of Men met about the same common Business in which all in their several Stations are immediately concern'd Proceeding also with such a Paternal Affection on the one Hand and such Dutiful Obedience on the other as becomes their holy Function and is due to Measures for preserving the Order and Vnity of the Church But some late Principles and Practices have another Tendency For instance the Clergy's proceeding in Business of the greatest Moment and even coming to form'd Resolutions thereupon without ever acquainting their Ecclesiastical Superiors and much less offering them first in general as Points that in their Opinion deserve or
and place specifi'd in the Act above I know no way to determin the Strict and Legal meaning of Words in any Case but by the known and ordinary acceptation of them in general and the effect or operation they have and ever had in particular Cases that may fall under my Consideration In this therefore I refer my self to the Judgment of any impartial Man Suppose ' That by our Constitution the House of Commons in their Proceedings were bound to receive and follow the directions of the Peers ' That both these Houses sat and acted under one common President the L. Chancellour or Keeper ' That all the Adjournments were solemnly pronounc'd by him in his own Name and in Terms directly expressing the whole Parliament nay specifying the Lords and Commons ' That an Authentick Notice hereof were immediately transmitted to the House of Commons ' That in fact according to all the contemporary Journals it appear'd that the Adjournments Below had been to the same Day Hour and Place with those Above Under these Circumstances I say for in Convocation this is the Case could it be a Doubt with any unprejudic'd Man Whether that Constant Adjournment of the Commons from and to the same Time with the Lords could spring from any Cause but the sending down a Constant Notice of the Adjournment Above and a perpetual Perswasion among the Commons that they were Included in that Adjournment and absolutely determin'd by it The necâ—ssity of Insisting upon it that the L. Clergy are Included in the Continuation Above As therefore this concurrence of Sessions in the Upper and Lower House is an undeniable proof that Authentick Notice of the President 's Act has been ever conveyed to the Inferior Clergy so the form of that Continuation in the Schedule and Journals proves the whole Convocation to have been always Included in the Act. And whoever reflects upon the Consequenees of their not being Included will agree with me that 't is highly necessary his Grace should insist on it at this Juncture when the terms of the Schedule have been so publickly pretended to comprehend the Upper House only and the Intimation is reduc'd to a bare Notice of the Day and Hour to which their Lordships have Adjourn'd themselves without any Authority that shall bind or affect the Inferior Clergy Add to this The asking the express Consent of the House and The Intimating out of a written Paper of their own both of 'em without President and both Intended for a more open and publick Declaration that it is an Act of their own upon an Inherent Power in the House A separate Power of Continuing in the L. House opens a way to perpetual divisions of the Synod A Principle evidently introducing a Separation of the Synod both as to Bishops and Clergy and of the Clergy among themselves when Discontents happen to arise among the Presbyters or Designs against Episcopacy shall be set a foot For if they be not Included in the Continuation Above it is wholly at their own Pleasure whether they will attend at the next meeting of their Lordships The President can have no right in Law to oblige them to attend or to punish them for non attendance which upon that Supposition of their Adjourning themselves is no Disobedience to any Command of his Grace or Contempt of His Authority The present Presbyters of our Church may probably be content to observe their Lordships Days But I think Wise Men in the Settlement of all Constitutions are wont to look a little beyond the present time And should the Inferior Clergy of the next Age be dispos'd to take all Advantages which these Principles of their Predecessors supposing them to be now establisht would give I â—ee not what Fence the Church or Bishops will have against a Presbyterian Assembly The same Principle opens a ready way to Divisions among the Inferior Clergy themselves Suppose for the purpose that any number of the Lower-house Members should dislike the Proceedings and refuse to attend in pursuance of the separate Adjournment of the Majority neither the House nor the Prolocutor have a Right in Law Temporal or Ecclesiastical to oblige them to it Reflect on Exped p. 10. The Effect whereof as hath been observ'd elsewhere is a Session under the Name of a Synodical-Meeting protested against by the Archbishop Bishops and any number of the Inferior Clergy under the Majority and which is yet worse no Provision made by the Laws either of Church or State to re-unite even the Clergy themselves The Archbishop who Summons the Clergy hath also a Right to enforce their Attendance according to the Continuations that shall be made in the Upper-house which is a coherent Scheme of Government and will perpetually secure the Unity of the Synod The Presbyterian Assemblies also are at least thus far regular that the Assembly which Adjourns is suppos'd by them to have a Power of proceeding to Censures in case of non-attendance But the present Claim of separate Adjournments made by Episcopal Divines under the Perswasion of a Want of Power to enforce Attendance is in my Apprehension a very inconsistent Scheme and has a direct Tendency to perpetual Distractions and Divisions both between the Bishops and their Clergy and among the Clergy themselves A separate Power takes away all the Means of Re-uniting the Synod I will add That if this Principle I mean a Right in the Clergy to Adjourn tho' they have no Power to enforce Attendance were true it would not only break the Union of the Synod but take away all the means of re-uniting it The President has the Power of Censures but he cannot inflict them for Non-attendance upon Persons not enjoin'd upon his Authority to attend The Lower-house by this Principle are suppos'd to have the Right of enjoining their Members to attend but then they have no Authority in case of Non-attendance to censure and punish This Scheme therefore is a very unworthy Reflection upon the Wisdom of our Constitution It supposes a Power lodg'd in the Governours of our Church over the Inferior Members thereof for the Preservation of Peace and Union and yet that the Inferior Members are exempted from that Power It supposes also an easy way left open for factious Spirits to destroy the Union and by degrees the Being of our Episcopal Church without any Provision made to repair the Breach and restore that Union That is it makes our Constitution an incoherent and inessectual Scheme of Government below the Wisdom even of Human Policy and much more unbecoming the Dignity of an Apostolical Institution These Principles you observe make all Attendance whether on his Grace's Days or their own a mere voluntary Act of every particular Member of the Lower-house there being no Coercive Power to reach or censure them for Non-attendance The Majority in the last and present Convocations have not yet exerted the Right which their Principles would give of denying Attendance when the Upper-house met Intermediate Sessions a
before the Act of Submission 288 The notion of a Civil Summons an argument for the Papists against our Reformation 289 The intent of the Statute no more than to restrain the Archbishop from Exerting his Authority without the Royal-License 290 The word Authority in the Statute implies a Leave or Licence 291 The Archbishop's Summons Authoritative from the style of the Mandate and Return 292 The Case of the Convocation's being dissolv'd by the death of the Prince 295 A dissolution by the King's death no prejudice to the Archiepiscopal Authority as giving Subsistence to a Convocation 296 The Archiepiscopal Authority recogniz'd in the Dean of the Province's Certificatorium set down at large 297 V. Observations upon the Table of Fees and the Catalogue of Members presixt to the Registers of Convocation 301 Inferences from the Table of Fees 1. That the Officers of Convocation are under the immediate Jurisdiction of the Archbish 303 2. That the Admission of Proxies of the Lower-Clergy belongs to his Grace ibid. 3. That none could make Proxies but who were personally Cited ibid. Catalogues of Convocation-Members and Inferences from them 304 1. That the Entry of the Lower-Clergy in the Upper-house-Books shows the Convocation to be one Body under one common Head 304 2. That the Lower-house is Included in the Clause Convocatio Prael Cleri in Continuations ibid. 3. That the Members of both Houses in the Convocations of 1640 and 1661 were eminent Assertors of the RIGHTS and LIBERTIES of the CHURCH ibid. 4. That therefore our present Prelates in Convocation have been unjustly traduc'd for proceeding by the same Rules 306 THE CONSTITUTION AND PROCEEDINGS OF AN English Convocation c. INTRODUCTION The Occasion and Design of the following Discourse AMong the pretences that have been fram'd of late to gain the Clergy in Convocation some new Exemptions from their Metropolitan and Bishops no one has been insisted on so much as a Parliamentary Capacity suppos'd to belong to them And it was an artificial Management in those who set the design a-foot to make this the chief ground of their Claim not only because such Exemptions could have no Colour from their Ecclesiastical Capacity and the Constitution of the Primitive Synods but also because an Alliance to the Parliament in Constitution was the most likely way to lead the generality of Men to take the measures of their Proceediegs from thence Every one knows that the Parliament consists of two Houses and they have withal an Opportunity of observing out of the publick Votes the Separate Methods whereby the Commons Act and Govern themselves And little more of the nature of a Convocation being ordinarily understood than that It also consists of two Houses debating a-part this without recourse to the Primitive Times or opportunity to know our own Establisht methods of acting prepar'd Men's minds to favour the late Claims of some of the Clergy to such Privileges as the Commons enjoy In which Error they have been industriously confirm'd by the Endeavours of the same Persons to bring the Parliament and Convocation to such an alliance as was never thought of before the publication of some late Books The late Principle of Parliamentary Alliance That the Members of the Lower-House are the Clergy Commoners and Spiritual Commons that the whole Convocation subsists by the King's-Writ and not by the Archiepiscopal Mandate that the Clergy thereof are ATTENDANT on the Parliament as the Parliament has a Right to be ATTENDED by them is the ordinary Language of a late Book Atterb Rights c. which yet is pretended to be written in Defence of the Church's Liberties and censures the Principles of its Adversary as of a Slavish tendency From this Principle others of the same kind relating to their Constitution and Privileges have since sprung Answer to 1st Letter p. 2. Col. 2. That the Model of an English Convocation was doubtless taken from the Model of an English Parliament Ibid. p. 6. c. 1. That an English Synod was form'd upon the Plat-form of an English Parliament Nar. p. 6. That the Synodical Rights peculiar to the Lower-Clergy of the Church of England are owing to a Conformity to the Parliament Nar. p. 8. That the distinct Capacity of the Lower-house of Convocation was deriv'd from an imitation of the Lower-house of Parliament The ill consequence thereof to Episcopacy The two last Passages acknowledge in effect that some of the Privileges they are already in possession of were unknown to the more ancient Synods And as to the other Exemptions for which they contend if they had any countenance from those Early Times That I suppose would be thought a more decent Pleain a Case of Ecclesiastical Government than laying their model in the imitation of a Parliament For I take it to be new Doctrine that a late Author delivers with great assurance to take off the ill appearance of Contending and that with so much warmth for Ecclesiastical Rights upon a Secular Foundation Atterb Rights c. p. 138. I am sure and am ready whenever I am call'd upon particularly to prove that the more our Church shall resemble the State in her temper and manner of Government the nearer still will she approach to primitive Practice This is a Position that will require Proof when he is at leisure to go about it not being half so evident in my opinion as that the Rights and Privileges of the House of Commons if vested in the Lower-House of Convocation would give the Clergy a co-ordinate Power with their Bishops and so remove our Church still further from primitive Practice But all along on one side of this Controversie the Church seems to signifie no more than the Inferiour Clergy exclusive of the Metropolitan and Bishops as if the giving Presbyters new degrees of Exemption from their Ecclesiastical Superiors were the way that primitive Practice has trac'd out for the perfection of an Episcopal Church An Opposition to the Liberties of the Church has an odious sound and sounds no worse than it really is when the Bishops as well as Inferior Clergy acting regularly and peaceably within their proper Spheres are allow'd to be the constituent Members of that Church But the present claim of Parliamentary Rights is only in other Words a diminution of the Canonical Authority of the Archbishop and Bishops over their Clergy which being diminished as far as Parliamentary Exemptions would do it must evidently destroy the Subordination of Presbyters to their Bishops that is it must bring us by degrees to a state of Presbytery Now no Law has determin'd how far these which they call their Parliamentary Rights may be carried or which is the same thing how near the Claims upon that Foundation may bring us to Presbytery The late Narrative of the Lower-House p. 8. speaking of their distinct Capacity as deriv'd from an Imitation of the Lower-House of Parliament does indeed say that they are far from presuming to
set themselves upon a level with that honourable Body or to pretend to equal Privileges thence with respect to the Lords the Bishops But they no where tell us how far they will or may carry their Claims upon the foot of that Relation nor assign any reason why it does not as well entitle them to all the other Privileges of that august Assembly as to those they contend for at present And the Friends of Episcopacy will hardly be content that our Constitution be perpetually expos'd to Ruin whenever a majority of the Lower-House happens to be out of humour and in a disposition to withdraw their Obedience or invade the Rights of their Superiors under a general pretence of their Parliamentary Relation That they enjoy several Rights unknown to the Presbyters of the primitive Times is not deny'd nor ought to be forgotten by those who not content with that addition of Power and Privilege were making larger Encroachments upon their Ecclesiastical Superiors and which is worse upon a Foundation that will raise them to what further degrees of Independence the Clergy may at any time be drawn to attempt either out of a personal dislike of their Bishops or a secret enmity to the Character it self These Innovations begun in 1689. Reg. Sup. Domus These new Claims were set a-foot with what design or upon what grounds I cannot say in the Convocation of 1689. In the sixth Session whereof the Upper-House drew up an Address of Thanks to his Majesty for his Royal Licence and a Gracious Message which he had sent that day to the Convocation The Form being agreed on was according to Castom sent down to the Lower-House for their consent but they instead of giving their consent or signifying the Amendments they conceiv'd necessary return'd an Answer to this effect That they had resolved to Address in a Form of their own framing and presently after upon their Lordship's disapproving that Answer they declared their Resolution more openly That they intended to Address separately Intendebant Supplicem Libellum separatim praesentare An expression very agreeable to the Constitution of a House of Commons but never heard of before in Convocation And as the Practice was wholly New so was it resisted and over-rul'd by the Right Reverend the present Lord Bishop of London then President and his Brethren the Bishops In the Tenth Session Ibid. the Prolocutor having receiv'd certain Amendments from the President to be consider'd by the Lower-House immediately ask'd the Question Whether in case the Lower-House agreed to those their Lordships intended to make any more Which would not perhaps have been thought a very proper or decent Offer even from One House of Parliament to the other in a like Case And being so much more improper in Convocation especially as coming from the Lower to the Vpper-House would have justified their Lordships in a Resentment less mild and gentle than they were pleased to express Praeses c. declaravit quaestionem per cum propositam fuisse valde Irregularem talem cui nullo modo respondere queat aut tenetur Session 13th Ibid. The President proposes to the Prolocutor the naming a Committee of the Lower-House to meet a select number of the Upper in order to inspect the Acts of both Houses Upon this a double Irregularity ensu'd so I take the liberty to call them now because they will be proved such hereafter in their proper place the first in the Prolocutor who return'd an answer that I dare say no President ever met with before from a Prolocutor se non posse ad id consentire sine Consensu Coetus domûs Inferioris Convocationis prius habito The second in the House whose resolution was not to appoint any Committee for that purpose durante recessu Convocationis As if by the establish'd Rules of Convocation they had a negative upon the President in the appointment of Committees or had any further share in it than to receive his Directions and when the number and the Persons are left to their discretion to confirm the Prolocutor's Nomination In that Convocation also the new practice of sending the Resolutions and Opinions of their House by other hands than the Prolocutor's was first attempted but presently taken notice of as an Innovation and check'd by the President and Bishops I produce not these as testimonies of any Design in the Clergy of that time to transgress the Rules of Convocation or to gain new Privileges to their House The tendency of Parliamentary Claims to a co-ordinate Power Tho' it may be some of the Members then had this notion of Parliamentary Rights in their Eye and the manner of holding an English Convocation not being near so thorowly consider'd as since it has been the taking some of their Measures from the Proceedings in Parliament might under that imperfect knowledge of things be a pardonable Error But the observation I would make upon these Practices is That they were plainly enough an Imitation of the Methods in the house of Commons and being so shew how the very beginnings of such an Imitation tend to divide and separate the Synod and introduce a co-ordinate Power of Presbyters with their Bishops and that therefore the safety of our Episcopal Constitution at this juncture depends upon a timely and stedfast opposition to those Parliamentary Claims with the Establishment of all Proceedings in Convocation upon the only true bottom the current usage of former Convocations as contain'd in the remaining Registers of either House These have been diligently examin'd since the year 1689. and being so opposite to the Claims that were then made as will be shown at large from the Registers themselves it might have been hop'd that some of the more inquisitive Members would have come together the last Convocation in a disposition to recede from those groundless pretences But whether they had not thoroughly examin'd the Books or whether they suffer'd themselves to be misled by one whose Interest it was to draw a majority of the Clergy to act upon Principles that he had publickly advanc'd whatever I say was the Cause 't is certain in Fact that they were far enough from revoking the Innovations attempted in 1689. Some new Claims of the last Lower-House So far as upon the same Foundation to proceed to new Claims of Independence as little warranted from the Vsage of Convocation and tending equally if not more to set up the Co-ordinate Power we are complaining of and to destroy the fundamental Constitution of an English Synod Such are The Power they pretend over their own Members Their sitting and acting in a Synodical Way without their Metropolitan and Bishops Their proceeding to Resolutions upon matters of the highest importance without the previous knowledge and directions of the Vpper-House Their refusing to return their Answer in Writing and to appoint Committees when requir'd by the President c. with other steps towards such an Independence from their Bishops as the
Commons in Parliament are possess'd of with relation to the Lords And if this must be their standing Pattern and their Parliamentary Capacity a certain refuge whenever their Claims exceed the Custom of former Convocations how far they will go I cannot say nor will I judge with what Intention they pursue Measures so opposite to the State of the primitive Church but this I am sure of that the same Foundation upon which their late Claims are grounded will equally justisie them in many more that being once introduced would make the Frame of an English Convocation as inconsistent with Episcopacy as the profess'd Enemies thereof can desire It will be objected that the Persons who at present are in those Levelling Measures have not formerly been thought in the Presbyterian Interest and that now also they are more open and bitter than most other Men in their Invectives against them and remarkably loud in a Concern for the Church All this is readily acknowledg'd and 't is no new thing with frail Mankind such especially who are uneasie under Government to rail at those the most who are in the possession of what themselves most desire But Words are empty Testimonies in comparison of Actions and the hardest Names they can find for that Sect will be no Conviction to Them nor Vs either that these endeavours to lessen the Character of Bishops are not an evident Service to their Cause or that such Invasions by Presbyters upon the primitive Rights of Episcopacy are not an evident undermining of our Establishment The design of this Book to settle their Proceedings upon the Custom of Convocation But when I speak of the primitive Rules I would not be understood to propose the forms of the more ancient Synods as the measure of my future reasonings upon the Privileges either of Bishops or Clergy in an English Convocation but only to prevent its being thought that any of the Powers they now claim and the Bishops deny are so much as pretended to receive support from the Condition of Presbyters in the primitive Church So far from this that many of their real Privileges peculiar to the Clergy of this Nation and now grown into legal Rights are much younger than the first Accounts we have of a Convocation properly so call'd such are Their debating in a separate Body Their having a standing Prolocutor of their own The share they have in framing Canons and Constitutions Their Negative upon the Archbishop and Bishops in Synodical Acts of an Ecclesiastical Nature and even their right to be summon'd in the present Form or for Ecclesiastical Purposes For their Civil Property could not be dispos'd of but by their own consent and the necessity of having this gave them a Negative upon the Bishops in Subsidies which was then the chief business of Convocation the Canons and Constitutions of the Church being for many Ages after constantly made in Synods consisting only of the Archbishop and his Provincial Bishops But the Affairs of the Church as they came to be transacted in Convocation fell under the Rules and Methods that had been establish'd there upon Civil Accounts By which means the Inferiour Clergy came into the same share in the Ecclesiastical that they had enjoy'd in the Secular Business and as Custom has given them a legal Claim to several Privileges of that kind unknown to the Primitive Presbyters or even to the Presbyters of any other Episcopal Church at this Day so be their original what it will it is no part of my Design to call in question any of their Claims that the remaining Acts of Convocation will warrant Their want of Authorities from the primitive Times with the lateness of their coming to a share in the Canons and Constitutions of our own Church and the secular Original of the Title they now have to bear a part in framing and passing them will be a general Reason with all unprejudic'd Men why they should at least acquiesce in these and not endeavour to build higher upon that secular Foundation But in the present Controversie I freely pass by all these disadvantages and desire only that every Point may be determined by the Constitution and Customs of Convocation resolving neither to assert any Authority to the Upper-House nor deny any Privileges to the Lower but as the Proceedings of former Convocations establish the first and prove all Pretensions to the second groundless and illegal All proofs froâ—… 〈◊〉 Registers themselves Nor do I propose to have the Reader depend upon my Assertions or bare Representations of things but upon all Points that are either made a Question already or can possibly bear one the Evidences shall be produc'd at large that so every Reader may be his own Judge and none be able to contradict the Positions laid down but by first denying the Authority of the Registers My accounts may perhaps seem too minute and particular to some who are already skill'd in Convocation Affairs but it is not for their Use that I write this but for the sake of the Generality many of whom Eminent in other parts of Learning may without reproach be presum'd Strangers to a Subject that has so lately come under Consideration Which will also be a fair Apology for their having been mis-led into a favourable Opinion of some Measures not to be warranted by the Practice of Convocation if they shew themselves ready to retire upon a clear Conviction from proper Authorities In the producing of which my multiplying Testimonies of the same kind and to the same purpose may possibly be thought a fault but if it be they who have so openly deny'd Truths establish'd upon Evidences so plain and numerous are answerable for it The necessity of citing Authorities at large In Truth the Errors and Prejudices arising from the notion of a Parliamentary Body have been wrought into Men's Minds with so much Art and Diligence that nothing under Originals and a variety of Authorities from thence can hope to dispossess them nor will it upon any less Testimony be thought possible that Persons in Holy Orders should contend so earnestly for meeting and acting in a Civil Capacity about matters of an Ecclesiastical Nature if they had any Pretence in Law or Custom to meet and act under the Character or Appearance of a Sacred Synod Especially when Subsidies the great Business of a Secular Nature that ever belong'd to the Convocation are not now granted in it And since even after the business of it is become purely Ecclesiastical the Endeavours to make it a Civil Meeting have been so remarkable my design in the following Papers is to do Right to its Constitution by restoring it to all the Spiritual Liberties and Advantages it may justly claim by the Laws of the Land and its own perpetual Usage From which as convey'd to us by the Acts themselves The general Design of this Book I will shew in a plain and naked Relation of Matters of Fact That an
to appoint such a Committee and the Narrative speaks much more plainly Nar. p. 61. We conceive our selves intirely at Liberty to admit or decline their Appointments of Committes as we shall think fit This is a clear Declaration of their Principle and if I mistake not the foregoing Account of Committees is as clear a Proof that there was no Ground to make it either their Principle or their Practice The Narrative derives this Power of Refusing from being a distinct House Ibid. but as the third Chapter of this Book shews the Vanity of their Claims in general upon that Foundation so the Instances of Committees to meet the Bishops appointed by express Order of the Upper-House since as much as before their Separation are a full Answer in this Particular No Power of a Negative but only in final Resolutions Nar. p. 61. Another Reason they add is their having Power to dissent from the Proposals of the Upper-House But this is doubtfully expressed If their Meaning be That they have a Right to diagree finally from any Matters depending in Convocation so as to hinder them from passing into Synodical Acts I grant it But that being confin'd to the passing of Business does not help them in any Point antecedent thereto Nor can they ever shew either in this or any other Case that the English Clergy in Convocation have not at all times readily and religiously comply'd with the Directions of their Metropolitan and Bishops both as to the Matters recommended to their Consideration and the Methods and Circumstances of considering them The Right of the Bishops to take Cognizance of the Transactions of the Lower-House Ibid. In Vindication of themselves from this Charge of Irregularity they say further We conceive the only regular way of their Lordships knowing the Transactions of our House is by our own voluntary laying 'em before their Lordships As if their Lordships had only a Right to direct the Consideration of Business and not a Right also to prescribe the time of returning it and to call upon them to know their Resolutions or what Progress they have made 'T is a part also of the very Office of a Prolocutor to report to the Upper-House the Result of their Debates as he has frequently explain'd the Grounds and Reasons of their Resolutions and on the side of the Arch-Bishop to do for him what his Grace formerly did in Person that is to deliver to them his Commands and to moderate in their Debates and according to a former Observation to maintain such an Intercourse as may effectually preserve the Synod in an United State under one President the Metropolitan of the Province Their Actuary also is an Officer of his Grace and his Wages limited by an Archiepiscopal Decree and their Journals finally deposited in the Office of the See together with those of the Upper-House where Recourse may be had equally to both by all the Members of Convocation What therefore they mean by the Arch-Bishop's detaining from them the Journals of the Lower-House to which they had free Access upon all Occasions Nar. p. 62. and what by their saying The Journals belong to the Arch Bishop's Registry That they conceive these Journals of Right to belong to them I cannot imagin much less account for them either from Reason or Practice Nor can I conceive in what Office they would deposit them were they put into their own Possession The Language they use in this Case may be proper in Parliament but sounds strange in an English Synod of Bishops and Presbyters the latter whereof the Majority I mean of the Lower-House have in this Denyal of a Sight of their Registers even exceeded the Pattern they propose the Honourable House of Commons For as a mutual Freedom of Recourse to the Journals of each House is well known to be the Custom of Parliament so should any Jealousies arise between them and should the one press for such an Inspection of the Journals a Refusal from the other would make the Cause on that side suffer extreamly in the Opinion of the World The Lower House not to give Instructions in such Committees Nar. p. 61. One thing more they plead in their Justification That since their Lordships neither mention any particular Acts they would inspect nor assign any particular Reason for such Inspection we could see no Ground for such a Committee nor could we give Instructions for the Management of the Matter to be consider'd by it Their seeing no Ground for such a Committee resolves into their first Plea confuted before viz. Their Liberty to admit or decline their Lordships Appointment of Committees as they shall think fit and their Right by consequence to judge in what Case there is Ground for Compliance or Refusal But that which follows their giving Instructions for the Management of the Matter to be consider'd by it is a Stile familiar enough in Parliament but utterly unknown to the Records of Convocation For as the Upper-House according to the fore-cited Testimonies from Registers as well Ancient as Modern have a Right to order Committees of the Lower in Conjunction with those of their own prescribing withall the Number and the Time and Place of meeting and all this to consider Matters of their Lordships own proposing so the only End of their appointing such joint Committees is to have the Assistance of their Clergy in discussing or preparing those Matters And in that Case the Clergy's taking from the Metropolitan and Bishops their Instructions what to do and how to proceed is exactly agreeable both to the original Distinction between Bishops and Presbyters and to the share that each has ever had as a constituent part of an English Convocation But if we suppose according to their Scheme a Right in the Clergy to refuse their Assistance or in case they think fit to comply to send their Members under the Restraint of special Instructions and by that means prepar'd rather to stand upon Terms with their Lordships than to assist them whether a Meeting in these Circumstances would not show us a Co-ordinate Power of Presbyters with their Bishops let the World judge Instructions proper only when they appoint Committees of their own When they appoint Committees of their own and upon Business depending in their own House they are then at Liberty to give what Instructions they think fit because as the Matters to be debated so also the Methods and Ends of debating them are all within their own Power And in the present Case had they thought fit either before or after the Appointment by their Lordships to chuse a Committee to give them Information from the Acts of either House in any Point whatsoever that Choice and their Instructions thereupon had without doubt been very regular But when the Arch-bishop and Bishops in virtue of their original Right to require the Assistance of their Clergy do call for it in the way of a Committee to attend a certain
the Arch-bishop and Bishops debate about the same Matter Procuratores c. reintrarunt circa horam undecimam quibus per Dominum Archiepiscopum ad tunc mandabatur quòd citra proximum diem Convocationis exhibeant declarent Articulatim Gravamina sua in Scriptis redacta Accordingly Dec. 7. two of the Members nonnullas Inconvenientias Gravamina pro ex parte Cleri cujus gerebant Organa vocis exposuerunt quae in Scriptis redacta exhibuerunt Anno 1452. The Prolocutor having given the Upper-house an Account of what was done about the Subsidy is askt An quicquam voluisset pro parte Cleri in Ecclesiâ Anglicanâ Reformatione dignum proponere And he continuò quasi ex insperato quamplurima c. proposuit Et quia non erat facilè singula per ipsum ibidem exposita memoriae quae admodùm labilis est commendare idcircò admonuit eundem Prolocutorem dictus Reverendissimus Pater ut singula per eum in hac parte proposita redigeret in literas Concilio traderet pleniùs maturiùs super eisdem deliberaturo Anno 1452. Feb. 7. Praelocutor post explicationem declarationem nonnullorum Gravaminum Ecclesiae Anglicanae Clero ejusdem à Laicis illatorum super quibus petijt Reformationem debitam intimavit c. Anno 1460. May 13. Propositis ibidem coram dicto Reverendissimo Patre alijs in dictâ Domo Capitulari protunc ibidem existentibus quibusdam Articulis per Prolocutorem vivâ voce dictus Reverendissimus Pater decrevit hujusmodi Articulos sic vivâ voce declarat ' in Scriptis redigi Anno 1460. May 24. Reverendissimus c. auditis per eum pluribus Articulis coram ipso adtunc vivâ voce ministratis continuavit c. Anno 1541. Sess 8. Accessit Prolocutor cum quibusdam de Electis à Clero exposuerunt querelas suas Thus the usual Methods of entring upon the Grievances of the Clergy were either upon an express Command from the Arch-bishop and Bishops or by a general Representation thereof to their Lordships who being in that manner sollicited to redress them either by their own ordinary Power or by Intercession with the King or Application to the Parliament were the best Judges of the Methods most proper to be taken for that End and gave their Directions accordingly The Redress of Grievances The Grievances being reduc'd into Articles and read in the Upper-house by the Prolocutor were presented to the Arch-bishop and Bishops to be by them particularly consider'd and debated in order to their further Prosecution of such Measures as should appear most effectual to the Relief of their Clergy After mature Deliberation upon them with the Clergy or among themselves as seem'd most convenient the Articles were either suspended for some time as those in 1411. Dec. 7. Omnes isti suprascripti Articuli quorum Reformatio deliberationis dierum exegit Inducias de consilio assensu expressis Dominorum in Convocatione praesentium positâ— fuerunt adhuc in suspenso or being thought in all Respects just and reasonable they were approv'd and Measures taken by the President and Bishops in Convocation or by their Ordinary Authority if the Matters were such as came under their own Power in either of these Capacities Otherwise they convey'd them to the King in Person in his Council or in his Parliament according to the Nature of the Requests they offer'd The Reformanda frequently propos'd by the Arch bishop among the Causes of Convocation II. The Reformanda whether in Convocatione in Parliamento or per Regem were upon Matters that concern'd the Good of the Church and Religion in general and being therefore equally the Care and Concern as well of Bishops as Clergy were frequently mov'd and propos'd by the Arch-bishop at the Opening of the Convocation among the Causes of his Summons Anno 1400. Jan. 29. The Arch-bishop explains Causas negotia Celebrationis sui Concilij Provincialis Convocationis Cleri vulgariter nuncupat viz. pro defectibus ejusdem Provinciae tam in Clero quà m in Populo juxta Juris Exigentiam Canonicè Reformandis and then he descends to the Particulars Anno 1404. May 17. The first Day of Business the Arch-bishop continuing the Convocation to May 21. demandavit alijs Praelatis Clero tunc ibidem praesentibus quòd singulis diebus interim ad dictum locum Domum Capitularem convenirent laborarent circa Reformanda in Cantuariensi Provinciâ exinde Articulos conciperent in Scriptis redigendos ut cum Dei adjutorio adhibita corum Benevolentia in hac parte quaeque Reformanda hujusmodi possent reformari Anno 1416. Nov. 16. Expositâ per Reverendissimum Patrem Causa Convocationis eorum protunc factae celebratae communicató que inter eosdem viz. the Bishops and Clergy then present aliquamdiu de super varijs Reformandis in Provincia tandem Dominus Continuavit c. Anno 1419. Among the Causes of calling the Convocation particularly explain'd by the Archbishop the third is Pro defectibus in Clero regnantibus auctoritate illius Provincialis Concilij reformandis And then he directs the Lower-Clergy to retire to their House quòd ibidem de super materijs praedictis tractarent communicarent ad finem quòd babitd deliberatione de super praemissis ad Dei laudem auctoritate Concilij finaliter concludi posset concorditer ordinari Anno 1434. The Arch-bishop reckons up several Grievances of the Church Et tunc babita Communicatione super bujusmodi Gravaminibus ordinatum erat tunc ibidem ut hujusmodi Gravamina ac alia quaecunque in quibus dictus Clerus se sentijt gravari nec non si quae forent Crimina Excessus infra Clerum usitat quae necessariâ Reformatione indigerent in Scriptis redigerentur ut super his omnibus ex communi consilio consensu auxilio Remendium posset debitum adhiberi Anno 1439. The Arch-bishop declares the Causes of the Convocation viz. qualiter Jurisdictio Ecclesiastica per Brevia Regia praecipuè per Brevia illa de Praemunire facias plus solito extitit perturbata impedita atque enormiter laesa Qualiter Personae Ecclesiasticae tam Seculares quà m Regulares per falsa Indictamenta alias vias Exquisitas plus solito vexatae gravaâ—ae sunt his diebus And the next Sesson Dominus mandavit Praelatis Clero quartenùs super praemissis alijs materijs quibuscunque Reformatione recessaria indigentibus viz. Qualiter illud Breve de Praemunire facias ipsa falsa Indictamenta quae hodiernis diebus falsò nequiter malitiosè usitantur continuantur in aliquo mitigari aut pro perpetuo deleri finaliter extingui valeant Billas alia Advisamenta in hac parte necessaria ad praemissa Reformanda conciperent Anno 1444. After the mention of the foresaid Writ among the Causes of Convocation the Arch-bishop adds Qualiter in
the Sincerity of his Recantation In Cases of this kind the Person was frequently brought before the next Convocation especially such as had relaps'd after an Abjuration of their Errors according to the Language and corrupt Opinions of those Times The whole Process in the Interior Courts was return'd into the Arch-bishop's to be deposited there against the next Convocation and when that came the Person was produc'd and a Relation of the former Prosecutions publickly given either by the Arch-bishop or the Diocesan Constitution for bringing Hereticks before the Convocation This was the ordinary Practice long before that Establishment of it by a Constitution under Arch-bishop Chichle Anno 1416. part of which I will here transcribe because it shews the manner and end of bringing Persons examin'd already in the Bishops Courts before the whole Body of the Clergy in Convocation After a general Direction to the several Bishops Archdeacons c. to be diligent in the Discovery and Prosecution of Hereticks Et si quas personas convictas forsan Curiae Seculari non reliquant ipsos ad carceres perpetuos sive temporales prout rei qualitas exegerit ad minus usque ad prox Praelatorum Cleri Cantuariensis Provinciae Convocationem duratur realiter committant in eisdem secundum Juris exigentiam servari faciant ac de omnibus singulis supradictis quomodo viz. inquisierunt reperierunt ac in Processibus se habuerunt personas hujusmodi convictas diligentiaque aut negligentijs Archidiaconorum siue Commissariorum praedictorum alijsque omnibus singulis circumstantijs praemissis quomodolibet concernen ac praesertim de Abjurationibus si quos interim haerses abjurare contingat in prox Praelatorum Cleri Convocatione sub forma publica distincte aperte Nos Successores nostros certificare curent eosdem Processus Officiali Curiae nostrae Cant. effectualiter liberent penes eundem seu in Registrario Curiae nostrae Cant. remansur sic videlicet quòd quemlibet cujus interest pro executione ulteriori corundem Processuum ad eundem Officialem recur habere poterit cum effectu Such was the Method of those Times Hereticks brought before the Arch-bishop Bishops and Clergy but that which I am chiefly to consider is the Judicature in Convocation and this was usually the Arch-bishop Bishops and Clergy in a Body before whom the Party accus'd is generally said to be brought Coram Reverendissimo Confratribus suis Clero in Concilio congregatis adductus fuit or words to the same effect is the ordinary Language of the Registers in those Cases Sentence in all their Names And the Sentence running in the name of the Arch-bishop is pass'd auctoritate de consilio assensu c. Praelatorum Cleri The Instances of both kinds are too numerous to be particularly set down nor can they be over-lookt by any one who shall cast an Eye upon the Convocation-Acts of those times when such Prosecutions hapned 'T is true they are sometimes said to be produc'd Coram Domino Confratribus without mention of the Clergy or only praesente Clero and in praesentiâ Cleri in which Cases the Arch-bishop and Bishops might probably act as a pure Provincial Council for into such we know they sometimes resolv'd themselves upon the Opportunity of coming together in Convocation But in the ordinary Stile of the Registers the Appearance is made before them and the Sentence ordinarily pronounc'd by their Authority in Conjunction with that of the Bishops and therefore in those Days and upon those Occasions they were ordinarily at least a part of the Judicature in Convocation As to any Restraints in this Matter that may have been laid upon the Convocation by subsequent Statutes I don't pretend to give a Judgment of them but only assert the Clergy's Rights by ancient Usage to a share in the Judicature with the Arch-bishop and Bishops supposing Cases of that nature to come actually before them CHAP. XV. The Clergy's Right of a Negative or Final Dissent from the Upper-House The Original of the Clergy's Negative THE greatest Power enjoy'd by the English Clergy in a Provincial Synod beyond the Presbyters of other Nations is a Negative upon the Metropolitan and Bishops none of whose Resolutions either in part or in whole can be pass'd into Synodical-Acts without the previous Approbation of the Inferior Clergy 'T is very true what we observ'd before that it was a Civil Account which brought them by degrees into this Extraordinary Power in Ecclesiastical Affairs Their Civil Property could not be dispos'd of but by their own Consent and this being the great Business of Convocation at the beginning the Negative of the Clergy became an establisht Rule there and so that Rule took place in Canons Constitutions and other Ecclesiastical Affairs when these also which before had solely belong'd to a Synod of the Archbishop and Bishops came to be consider'd and fram'd in Convocation A Negative or final Dissent an establisht Right of the English Clergy However it is now an establisht Right of the Lower-house and a part of the Constitution of this National Church Nor is it my Design to dimiâ—…sh it by the Observation I am about to add That tho' the Clergy's Negative as to Subfidies was directly founded in that common Right of English Subjects Not to be Tax'd but by their own Consent yet under that Right the Clergy of those Days preserv'd such a Sense of Duty to their Ecclesiastical Superiors All Denials of the Clergy made with great Humility that all their Denials were made with great Humility and often accompany'd also with a Request to be excus'd for that time and also with their particular Reasons why they could not come up to the Desires of the Arch-bishop and his Brethren For the granting of Subsidies was always propos'd by the President upon which the Clergy were directed to retire and Debate and return their Answers to him and his Brethren Generally they concurr'd with great Readiness and when they dissented they usually shew'd the Causes thereof with the utmost Humility Anno 1356. 12 Kal. Jun. They excus'd themselves in a formal Address to the Arch-bishop and Bishops Vobis Reverendis in Christo Patribus Dominis Die gratia Archiepiscopo Cant. vestrisque Suffraganeis ad celebrandum Concilium Provinc juxta sacrorum instituta Canonum congregatis supplicat humiliter devotè Clerus Cant. Provinciae quatenus pio sibi compatientes affectu Rationes suas Motiva infrà Scripta clementer auscultare dignemini eis in examine circumspectae discretionis vestrae diligentius ponderatis Petitiones ejusdem Cleri admittere gratiose they offer several Reasons and then conclude thus Placeat benignitati vestrae absque ulteriori onere hac vice Ecclesiae imponendo ipsum Clerum qui dicto Domino Regi semper devotus extitit ipsum nunc in quantum potuit ne deterioris conditionis existat quà m Communitos Laicorum habere
great Irregularity and Mischief to our Church but they have held several INTERMEDIATE SESSIONS without their Metropolitan and Bishops a short State whereof I will give the Reader out of a late Letter to the Author of the Expedient propos'd Reflect on Exped p. 11. You say p. 15. c 2. that you have Precedents for meeting on Intermediate Days and threaten to exert that Power except the Upper-house will submit to your Method of Continuing But is it a fair part in you to leave your Reader to imagin that such Meetings as a House are warranted by a Number of unexceptionable Precedents when you know in your Conscience that no more than two can be fairly pretended and that the Invalidity of these two has been shown at large The first that of May 9. 1640. as you very well know hapn'd at a time when neither Bishops nor Clergy were sure of their being a legal Convocation and will equally justify the Clergy's Adjourning to a Day beyond the Appointment of the Upper-house which yet is a Practice disown'd by the Advocates for Intermediate Sessions When the second Adjournment of this kind hapn'd the Archbishop was in Custody and the Bishops justly Apprehensive of Danger amidst the popular prejudices of those times against their Order could not think it safe to come together nor had they met in Convocation some Weeks before These together with the want of Authority in the Minutes and some other Exceptions have been urg'd so largely already that I am asham'd to see one who could not but know all this insisting upon them without any attempt to remove the Objections and also referring to these two in such general terms as may lead the Reader into a Belief of many more There is another Objection and that a very material one equally concluding against these two Precedents viz. That no Business appears to have been done on either of the Days to which the Adjournments were made when yet the Preparation for business is the only pretence upon which the Claim of Intermediate Days is advanc'd If therefore Men were serious in their Enquiries about the Usage of former Times in order to make it a Rule to their present Practice they would consider how the Sessions of the Lower House have stood with regard to those of the Upper at times when business of moment was depending in Convocation Because then we may suppose the Clergy would have Exerted this Power if they had thought themselves possess'd of it The Clergy of former times did not think of Intermediate Sessions Now this Notice is not to be had but from concurrent Journals of the two Houses the first of which are in the Years 1586 and 1588. when we have no more than Extracts out of the Registers of the Upper House but all the Sessions that are express'd above 20 in Number concur exactly with those of the Lower House without any Appearance of Intermediate Meetings The next concurrent Books that remain are those in the two Convocations of 1640 the Minutes whereof express the Days of several of the Sessions and they all appear to answer the Continuations of the Upper House except the two we just now mention'd which are so fully and particularly accounted for elsewhere The Compilers of the late Narrative p. 37. speaking of the two Instances in 1640 add We may fairly prefume we might have found more in other Convocations if the Books of both Houses had been extant to have been compared Two Instances so exceptionable and under such singular Circumstances could be no fair ground for such a presumption But if Intermediate Meetings were any where to be expected no time so likely as in the Convocation which begun May the 8th 1661. the first after the Restoration For in that the whole Common Prayer was Revis'd several Prayers and Services added many Canons and Constitutions compil'd and other Matters of great Importance tranfacted In all this work the Clergy under Direction of the A. B. and Bps had their constant share as appears distinctly from the Original Register of the Upper House from May 8. 1661 to Sept. 19. 1666. which has been all along thought to be lost but by great Providence was lately retriev'd The Constant Style of Continuations in this Register is the same with that of 1640. Dominus c. de cum Consensu Confratrum suorum Continuavit Prorogavit hujusmodi Convocationem sive sacram Synodum Provincialem The Book contains above 140 Sessions and all that while the Sessions of the Lower House are distinctly set down in Mr. Mundy's Minutes I have made an exact Comparison of them and find not the least footstep of an Intermediate Meeting though both the Nature and the Length of the business before them would have prompted them at that time more than any other to hold Intermediate Sessions had they dreamt of such an Inherent Power of Adjourning as some of their Successors have lately taken up And yet in the last Convocation several of these Intermediate Sessions were held by the Majority of the Lower House with all the appearance of Synodical Meetings Suppose then that the Members of some Presbyterian Assembly taking the Advantage of one of those Sessions had enter'd their Claim of Alliance to that Majority of the Lower House as meeting sitting acting and departing upon the sole Authority of Presbyters without any Appearance of a Superiour Order I fear they would hardly have been driven from their Claim except the Lower House Members could have pleaded that they met there by the Authority or at least the Permission of their Metropolitan and Bishops and yet these their Ecclesiastical Superiors it is well known had publickly declar'd against such Intermediate Sessions and against all the business transacted in them as Vnsynodical Tho' therefore an Inherent Power of Continuing with a Right thereupon to hold Intermediate Sessions had some countenance from the Practice of former Convocations as we see they have none yet it could be no decent part in Episcopal Divines to contend with all this Zeal for Privileges so favourable to the measures of Presbytery And I hope before the Majority of the present Lower House resume these Claims and return to the like Practices they will consider how little warrant they have from antecedent Practice and how mischievous they are in the Consequences to our Episcopal Constitution Observations touching the RIGHT to determine Controverted Elections Instances of Controverted Elections occurring in the remaining Acts. An. 1586. p. 140. App. THE first instances we find of determining Elections in Convocation are those two set down at large in the Journal of 1586 Sess 3 4. which need not therefore be transcrib'd in this Place Anno 1586. The Elections of both the Proctors for the Diocese of Norwich hapned to be controverted and being also different Choices in the two Archdeaconries they were thereupon two different Cases One was heard and determin'd by the Archbishop in the Upper House the other by the Prolocutor
which the King gain'd and the Archbishop lost is express'd by the Statute in the word Always Which shall Always be assembled by Authority of the King 's Writ Before that Statute the Convocation had been sometimes call'd at the sole Motion and Pleasure of the Archbishop and sometimes upon the Royal Writ but since the Archbishop is confin'd to wait for the Direction of the Royal Writ The Intention therefore of directing the Royal Writ to the Archbishop is twofold 1. To signify the Pleasure of the Prince that at that particular time his Grace shall exert the Summoning-Authority inherent in his See as it has been ever exerted at the Command of the Kings of England 2. To be a legal Discharge from the Restraint of this Statute and a Security against the Penalties of Summoning without the Royal License The word Authority in the Statute only implys a le Leave or License For that the word Authority as it stands in the Act was intended for no more than a Leave or License to Summon is evident from the very Submission upon which the Act was immediately founded We will never from henceforth c. unless your Highness by your Royal Assent shall License us to assemble our Convocation And from the Dedication of the Clergy to the King prefixt to the Institution of a Christian Man Without your Majesty's Power and License we acknowledge and confess that we have not Authority to assemble together for any Pretence or Purpose c. And lastly from the Stile given to the Royal-Writ by Queen Elizabeth Cum Nos c. Archiepiscopo mandaverimus eidémque Licentiam Concesserimus quòd Convocari faceret singulos Episcopos c. As therefore the Bishops and Clergy in Convocation apprehensive of the Penalties of the Statute have taken care to use the very Expression of it with Reference to the Royal-Writ so that Expression being directly taken from the Statute is of course to be interpreted according to the Extent and Meaning thereof The Archbishop's Summons Authoritative from the Stile of the Mandate and Returns The Methods of Summoning antecedent and subsequent to that Statute are a clear Argument that the Archbishop's Authority therein remain'd entire That all his Summons before it tho' issu'd upon a Royal Writ and that expressly recited in the Mandate were yet Authoritative is not deny'd And if this Act of Submission had been intended to change the Archiepiscopal Summons into a Ministerial Office it would have given Directions for changing the Authoritative into a Ministerial Stile at least such a Change must of course have been made But no such Alteration appears either in the Mandate or the Dean of the Province's Certificate of the Execution The Writ comes to the Archbishop for it can be directed to none else in the same Stile and Manner as before the Statute it did and is now no otherwise inserted in the Archiepiscopal Mandate than was usual before the Reformation The Archbishop directing that Mandate to the Dean of the Province goes on Breve Regis c. recepimus in haec verba After a recital of the Writ he proceeds Quocirca i. e. having receiv'd this Royal Permission and Direction to exert the Summoning-Power inherent in the See Fraternitati vestrae COMMITTIMUS MANDAMUS VOLUMUS MANDAMUS INJUNGIMUS MANDAMUS All express Terms of Authority in his Grace's own Name and under the Archiepiscopal Seal Accordingly the Dean of the Province's Certificatorium or Return declares his Execution of every particular Branch thereof to have been in Virtue and by Authority of his Grace's Mandate Literas vestras Reverendissimas Citatorias Monitoriales jam dudum nobis sab sigillo vestro directas cum câ quâ decuit Reverentiâ humiliter recepimus Quarum literarum VIGORE pariter AUTORITATE AUTORITATE per receptionem Literarum vestrarum juxta VIM FORMAM EFFECTUM earundem secundum FORMAM TENOREM Literarum Vestrarum In like manner the Returns of all the other Suffragans are made immediately to his Grace and ultimately lodg'd where they ever were before the Submission-Act in the Registry of the Archiepiscopal See Whereas all Executions by the King's Authority are returnable of course into the Offices belonging to the Crown Right of the Archbishop p. 9. c. Hist of Con. p. 14. This Point of the Metropolitan's Authoritative-Summons has been more largely prov'd and explain'd elsewhere But the contrary Doctrine of its being Ministerial is attended with Consequences so very dishonourable to our Reform'd Church that I could not leave the Reader under any Danger of being missed into that Opinion by this general Expression of the Statute transcrib'd from thence into the Titles of our Acts and into some of the Instruments of Convocation For if that new Notion were true the Proceedings of Convocation would be so far from agreeing to the Principles of an Episcopal Church that they would not be the Proceedings of any Church at all The Ecclesiastical Power must then be swallow'd up in the Civil and the Methods of Proceeding would not be influenc'd by the ancient Synodical Rules or the Distinction of Bishops and Presbyters but founded entirely upon a Model fram'd and establisht by the State Enough I think has been said to expose and overthrow that Uncanonical Scheme but because it is come in my way I will take the Opportunity of adding an Observation or two 1. That at the Opening of Convocations as well since as before the Act of Submission the first step in certifying the due Execution of the Summons has been the Exhibiting and Reading the Dean of the Province's Certificatorium or Return directed to the Metropolitan alone in pursuance of whose Command and Authority every particular as we have seen is said to be duly executed Nor has any more Notice been taken of the Royal-Writ than as 't is recited in the Archiepiscopal Mandate just as it was before the Statute at the Opening of all Convocations which were Summon'd upon the Writ 2. The Contumacy pronounc'd thereupon is meerly for not attending according to the Tenor of his Grace's Mandates to the several Bishops with their Lordships Certificates to his Grace of the due Execution and the Censures for Absence being all purely Canonical shew them to be inflicted for an Act of Disobedience to the Authority of their Canonical Superior 3. Cardinal Pool held a Convocation in the Year 1557 the latter end of Queen Mary's Reign and the Title of it is Convocatio sive Sacra Synodus Convocata auctoritate Brevis Regis Philippi Mariae c. Now 't is not to be imagin'd that either the Queen or the Cardinal so remarkably tender of the Privilegdes and Immunities of the Church would have given way to a Convocation upon that Foot had it been the Opinion of those Times that the Authority of the Royal Writ destroy'd that Authoritative Summons which the Archbishops before the Reformation had always exercis'd The Case of the Convocation's being Dissolved by
it there is no such Resemblance as has been pretended between the Proceedings of Parliament and Convocation That on the contrary the chief part of the Prolocutor's Business is to convey to the Presbyters the Pleasure of their Metropolitan and Bishops and to represent to their Lordships the Answers Opinions and Petitions of the Lower-House and so for ever to prevent the Independence of the Clergy and preserve the Original Union of the Synod as to the matter method order tendency and progress of the Debates These with many more testimonies of an English Convocation's being in reality what all the Friends of our Church ought to wish it an Ecclesiastical Synod will naturally occur to every one who shall peruse these Acts with impartiality and an ordinary attention And Readers under that convâ—… from the practice of former Convocations may be allow'd to wonder upon what Model some late Proceedings and Principles were form'd and to reâ—… seriously upon the Design or at least the naturâ—… Trndency of them The Archbishops Parker Whâ—…gift Laud Juxon and Sheldon under whom the five Convocations were held are Names distinguisht in this Church by an eminent Zeal in maintaining its Constitution and the Rights of the Clergy And now the Proceedings of the last Convocation are made publick let every Man be his own judge whether our present Metropolitan and Bishops have not acted by the self same Rules and he will then see what Spirit has govern'd those Men who from thence have taken occasion to inveigh so freely against their Lordships as endeavouring to Overthrow the Rights of the Church and Clergy That part of the Controversie which relates to the Proceedings of Convocation when met began not before the Opening of the last in 1700. The Nation had been industriously prepossess'd with false Notions of the Constitution and Proceedings of an English Synod but the Alteration of Opinions about the Right of Continuing upon a plain State thereof from the Registers was evident enough and shows that the Generality both of Clergy and Laiety are dispos'd to make as impartial a judgment upon all other Heads when the Practice of former Times shall be clearly laid before them For the Information of such five Journals are here publisht Entire and the Form and Proceedings of an English Convocation particularly defcrib'd not only upon the Authority but in the very Words of all the remaining Acts. I pray God they may in any measure tend to the Removal of our unhappy Differences and the future preservation of Peace and Unity in the Synods of our Church A CATALOGUE Of the Remaining Acts and Registers OF CONVOCATION From whence the Following HISTORY is drawn The Years in which they were held The Days on which they were open'd The Registers wherein the Acts are enter'd 1356 May 16. Islip fol. 117. a. 1369 Jan. 21. Wyttlesey f. 17. b. 1371 Apr. 24. Wyttlesey f. 40. 1373 Dec. 1. Wyttlesey f. 63. 1376 Febr. 3. Sudbury f. 33. b. 1377 Nov. 8. Sudbury f 44. a. 1379 May 9. Sudbury f. 55. a. 1380 Dec. 1. Sudbury f. 72. a. 1383 Dec. 2. Courtney f. 78. a. 1384 May 20. Courtney f. 79. a. 1384 Dec. 1. Courtney f. 79. b. 1385 Nov. 6. Courtney f. 83. b. 1386 Nov. 5. Courtney f. 84. b. 1387 Febr. 26. Courtney f. 73. a. 1388 Oct. 12. Courtney f. 74. a. 1391 Apr. 17. Courtney f. 75. a. 1396 Febr. 19. Arundel f. 44 a. 1394 Febr. 5. Reg. 4. Epp. f. 195. b. 1399 Oct. 6. Arundel f. 51. a. 1400 Jan. 26 Arundel Vol. 2 f. 1. b. 1402 Oct. 21 Arundel Vol. 1. 54. a. 1404 Apr. 21. Arundel 57. a. 1404 Nov. 24. Arundel f. 62. b. 1406 May 10. Arundel 65. a. 1408 Jul. 23. Arundel f. 71. a. 1408 Jan. 14. Arundel Vol. 2. f. 7. b. 1409 Febr. 17. Arundel f. 15. a. 1411 Dec. 1. Arundel f. 22. a. 1412 Mar. 6. Arundel f. 4. b. 1415 Nov. 18. Chichley Vol. 2. fol. 1. a. 1416 Apr. 1. Chichley 3. a. 1416 Nov. 9. Chichley 6. a. 1417 Nov. 29. Chichley f. 10. a. 1419 Oct. 30. Chichley f. 17. a. 1421 May 5 Chichley f. 23. b. 1422 Jul. 6. Chichley f. 30. b. 1424 Oct. 12. Chichley f. 33. b. 1425 Apr. 23. Chichley f. 40. a. 1426 Apr. 15. Chichley f. 65. a. 1428 Jul. 5. Chichley f. 69. a. 1429 Oct. 19. Chichley f. 77. b. 1430 Febr. 19. Chichley f. 81 a. 1432 Sept. 15. Chichley f. 86. b. 1433 Nov. 7 Chichley f. 93. a. 1434 Oct. 7. Chichley f. 99. a. 1437 Apr. 29. Chichley f. 101. a. 1438 Apr. 28. Chichley f. 103. a. 1439 Nov. 21. Chichley f. 109. b. 1444 Oct. 19. Arundel Vol. 2. f. 28. a. 1452 Febr. 7. Kemp. f. 219. a. 1460 May 6. Bourchier f. 12. a. 1463 Jul. 6. Bourchier f. 18. a. 1480 Mar. 21. Bourchier f. 26. a. 1486 Febr. 13. Morton f. 33. a. 1488 Jan. 14. Morton f. 41. a. ¶ Thus far the Acts are distinctly enter'd in the Registers of the Archbishop but about this time they began to have separate Books for the affairs of Convocation 1529 Nov. 5. Large Extracts out of the Upper-housebooks except those of 1553. and 1554. which are taken from Journals of the Lower-house 1532 Nov. 5. 1536 Jun. 9. 1541 Jan. 30. 1547 Nov. 5. 1553 Oct. 6. 1554 Apr. 3. 1554 Nov. 13. 1555 Oct. 22. 1555 Dec. 10. 1557 Jan. 1. 1558 Jan. 24. 1562 Jan. 21. The Register of the Upper-house entire 1584 Nov. 24. Index of the Upper-house Register 1586 Oct. 16. Two Journals of the Lower-house in the Registry at Doctors-Commons 1588 Nov. 13. 1586 Oct. 16. Index of the Upper-house Registers in the hands of Dr. Atterbury 1588 Nov. 13. 1592 Febr. 20. 1601 Oct. 18. 1603 Mar. 20. 1605 Nov. 6. 1606 Nov. 19. 1614 Apr. 6. 1620  1623 Febr. 13. 1625 May 18. 1625 Febr. 7. 1627 Mar. 18. 1640 1ª Conv. Apr. 14. Entire Registers of the Upper-house and Minutes of the Lower in the Office at Doctors Commons 2ª Conv. Nov. 4. 1661 c. May 16. The original Register of the Upper-house and Minutes of the Lower at Doctors Commons 1689 Nov. 6. The original Register of the Upper-house at Doctors Commons THE CONTENTS Introduction THE Occasion and Design of this Book 1 The late Principles about a Parliamentary Alliance 2 The ill Consequence thereof to Episcopacy 3 The beginning of these Innovations in the Convocation of 1689. 5 The tendency of such Proceedings to a Co-ordinate Power of Presbyters 7 Some new Claims of the last Lower-house 8 The design of this Book To settle all Proceedings upon the Custom of Convocation 9 All Proofs from the words of the Registers 11 The necessity of citing Authorities at large ibid. The necessity of such a Work at this juncture to maintain the honour of our Reformed Church 12 CHAP. I. The Method of Summoning an English-Convocation 15 The Writ to the Archbishop ibid. The Warrant to the Lord Chancellor of another nature 17 The Returns immediately and ultimately to the
the Inferiour Clergy in Convocation 146 CHAP. XII The Share of right belonging to the Clergy in preparing and in presenting the Gravamina and Reformanda 147 The GRAVAMINA often consider'd and presented with the Subsidies 147 The Gravamina how address'd by the Clergy 151 The time when Grievances shall be propos'd at the discretion of the Vpper House ibid. Grievances first offer'd in a general Representation vivâ voce 152 The Clergy's Right to Redress and the manner thereof 154 The REFORMANDA frequently propos'd by the Archbishop among the Causes of Convocation 155 The Clergy's Right to propose Reformations 157 The Clergy's Right to bring in Schedules of Reformation 159 A short state of the Reformanda from the foregoing Accounts 161 The Care of the Reformanda in Parliamento usually left to the Archbishop and Bishops 162 Deputies appointed by Convocation to Assist in Soliciting ibid. CHAP. XIII The Clergy's Right to offer Petitions of other Kinds 164 The several sorts of Petitions particularly occurring in the Acts of Convocation not specified to restrain the Clergy from Petitions of other kinds 1. For making new Canons 164 2. For the revival of old ones 165 3. For the Abolition or Suspension of Laws ibid. 4. About Festivals 166 5. For the Archbishop's Intercession with the King ibid. 6. For the more strict Execution of Discipline 167 Petitions of several kinds An. 1555. 167 Clergy's Petitions of all kinds presented immediately to the Vpper-house 168 The usual Time of presenting such Petitions 169 CHAP. XIV The Part to which the Clergy have a Right in Judicial Cases in Convocation The Occasion of bringing Offenders ordinarily try'd in the Bishops Courts before the Convocation 169 Constitution for bringing Hereticks before the Convocation 170 Offenders usually said to be brought Coram Archiepiscopo Episcopis Clero as the Judicature 171 The Sentence ran in the Name of the Archbishop by authority of the Synod 171 This Account not oppos'd to any Restraints laid upon the whole Convocation by subsequent Statutes ibid. CHAP. XV. The Clergy's Right of a Negative or Final Dissent from the Vpper-house 172 The Original of the Clergy's Negative ibid. A Negative or Final Dissent a peculiar but yet establisht Right of the English Clergy 173 All Denials of the Clergy ever made with great Humility and Condescension ibid. This no prejudice to the Clergy's absolute Right to a final dissent 175 CHAP. XVI The manner of Passing business in Convocation 176 The manner of Consenting in the Lower-house ibid. The Circumstances of that Consent in some Instances reported to the Vpper-house 177 All Instruments read publickly and finally agreed to in the Upper-house 178 The Sanction of the Metropolitan ibid. Articles Canons c. pass'd otherwise viz. by Subscription 180 Why Articles Canons c. pass now by Subscription 182 CHAP. XVII Of Proroguing and Dissolving The Royal Writs for these purposes necessarily directed to the Archbishop 183 The Archbishop's Prorogations and Dissolutions upon these Writs Authoritative and Canonical 184 The Archbishop executes them by his own Metropolitical Power and in his own Name ibid. The Commissions to do the same things in Parliament express a Special Power and Authority from the King ibid. The Archbishop's Admonitions immediately before Prorogations or Dissolutions 185 The Schedules of Prorogation or Dissolution mention the Royal Writs but run in the name of the Archbishop 186 The English Reformation unjustly charg'd with destroying the Canonical Methods of transacting Ecclesiastical Affairs ibid. APPENDIX containing the Journals of five Convocations With Observations drawn from them concerning 1. The Right of CONTINUING or PROROGUING 2. The Right of determining controverted ELECTIONS 3. The Right of SUBSTITUTING a PROLOCUTOR 4. The AUTHORITY of the Summons to Convocation I. Of the Right of Continuing or Proroguing 223 The Schedule of Continuation constantly mention'd in the Vpper-house-Registers 224 The Antiquity of Schedules in Convocation ibid. The Inferior-Clergy Present at the Archbishop's Continuations 226 A Summary account of the Schedule 227 The deriving our Schedules from the Lateran-Council an improbable Scheme 228 The dispute depends not upon Proroguing by Schedule or otherwise 230 The heads upon which the dispute turns 231 The Schedule evidently comprehends both Bishops and Clergy ibid. The Clause Praelatorum Cleri a genuine part of the Schedule 232 The transmission of the Schedule only a circumstance in this dispute 233 Reasons to believe that the Schedule has been ever sent down 235 The Prolocutor is judge of the Time of Intimating when the President and Bishops don't interpose 234 The Form of Intimating to be taken from the most Exact Journals 235 The ordinary Phrase to be in reason the Establisht Form 236 Declaring by Intimation the ordinary Form ibid. The Prolocutor's Intimation has no reference to the Consent of the House 237 The Intimation given by Command of the President 239 A formal Intimation of the Prolocutor not necessary to Continue the Lower-house 240 The President 's Right to Continue the Clergy in the Upper-house 241 The Phrase Continuavit quoad hanc Domum no argument of a Separate Power in the Lower-house 243 Nor the Phrase in Parliament Dominus Cancell contin praesens Parliamentum 245 A Separate Power of Continuing in the Lower-house opens a way to perpetual Divisions of the Synod 248 Intermediate Sessions a great Irregularity and mischief to the Church 251 The Clergy of former times did not think of Intermediate Sessions 253 II. Observations touching the Right to determine Controverted Elections 256 Instances of such Elections occurring in the Acts. ibid. No question whether the Archbishop have a Right to determine Elections 261 The Lower-house have no Right to intermeddle in Returns 262 The Pretences to a concurrent Right in the Lower-house consider'd 263 The Prolocutor and not the House determin'd the Election in 1586. 265 The Instance of 1640. consider'd 266 III. An Additional account of the Substitution of a Prolocutor 268 The late Substitution in 1701. ibid. The account of it in a Paper markt Numb 1. 269 Orders made in Convocation against publishing the Debates while depending 269 Reasons why a Sub-Prolocutor ought to be confirm'd in the Vpper-house 273 Instances of Substitutions by Authority of the Vpper-house defended against the late Paper Numb 1. 272 The arguments for an Independent Power in the Lower-house answer'd 276 Instances where the Registers of the Vpper-house are Wanting of no force 277 The bare Silence of the Vpper-house-Books no Proof against Positive Evidences 279 The Precedent of 1640. particularly consider'd 280 The Paper Numb 1. speaks against the sense of the House in this matter 281 No difference between a Prolocutor and Referendary 282 The Duties belonging to the Office of a Prolocutor are all annext to that of Reporting as the Consequences of it 284 IV. Additional Observations touching the AUTHORITY of the Summons to Convocation 287 The Authority of Summoning apply'd both to the King and the Archbishop ibid. The Archiepiscopal Summons confess'd to be Authoritative
English Convocation however laid under some Restraints from the Civil Constitution is far from being so much transform'd into a Civil Meeting as has been pleaded of late That in the Summoning Opening and Acting it appears what it is an Ecclesiastical Synod of Bishops with their Presbyters and neither a Parliamentary Body on the one hand nor an Assembly of Presbyters on the other That however the Papists slander the English Reformation as if it had chang'd our Church into a Civil Constitution yet 't is evident against all the Endeavours of some among our selves to help the Church of Rome in that Objection that as to the Nature of our Synods at least it left 〈◊〉 in the same Ecclesiastical State as it found them To proceed regularly in this Design it must be all along observ'd what I hinted before that the Corruptions which have been endeavoured of late in an English Convocation are in general the Diminution of the Canonical Authority of the Metropolitan and Bishops and the Clergy's claiming such Exemptions from that Authority as makes the whole Body look more like an English Parliament than a Sacred Synod To this purpose it has been pleaded Nar. p. 6. That the Convocation was divided into two Houses in conformity to the Parliament Answ p 9. c. 2. That the Prolocuter is President of the Lower-House as the Archbishop is of the Vpper That the Acts and Declarations of both are only the Effect of the Order or Consent of each House respectively That the Prolocutor governs the Time of the Lower in as full a manner as his Grace does that of the Vpper i. e. with the Consent of the House Nar. p. 17. That their Debates are manag'd Independently from their Lordships Nar. p. 61. That they have a general Negative upon the Vpper-House That in virtue thereof they have a Right to deny the Appointment of Committees and even a sight of their Journals in which by the way they exceed their Pattern the Journals of the two Houses of Parliament being mutually open to the Members of each at all times and upon all occasions Nar. p 3. That without the Knowledge or Directions of their Lordships they can enter upon and proceed in business of the highest Importance and if any Point happen that in the judgment of the Vpper-House may be most conveniently Debated in Writing Nar. p. 50. they can insist upon a free Conference as the fittest Method and if that be deny'd are under no Obligation to be further accountable to their Lordships for any of their Practices or Proceedings Nar. p. 49. Add to these the Power they claim over their own Members upon which they can require their Attendance and according to the known practice of the last Convocation can discharge them from it by a Vote or Resolution of the House with that other Claim which has been so much insisted on their Right to adjourn to different Days from the Metropolitan and Bishops and to sit and act on these Days as a House In these Claims and Practices I say we have the view of an English Parliament but lose that of an Ecclesiastical Synod consisting of a Metropolitan Bishops and Presbyters By these Rules we see the Debates as to the matter manner and time are all separated at the pleasure of the Inferior Clergy and as the Archbishop and the Upper-house are made to resemble the Speaker of the House of Lords and the Lords Temporal so to compleat the Parallel the Prolocutor and the Lower-House that is as they term themselves the Spiritual Commons answer to the House of Commons and their Speaker However such Comparisons if they went no further than Names or the general Appearance of the two Bodies might be innocent enough but when upon these the Claims of new Privileges begin to be founded and such Privileges too as are an apparent diminution of the Metropolitical and Episcopal Authority separating the Synod and raising the Presbyters by degrees to a co-ordinate Power then the Parallel is no longer safe but the Governors of the Church and all that love our Episcopal Constitution are concern'd to enter upon proper Measures for the Preservation of it And these in our present Circumstances I conceive to be the opposing to those new attempts the Authority of former Convocations and describing from thence i. e. from the only true Rule the Practice and Proceeding proper to each House Which will not only shew that their Lordships have insisted upon no Power but what their Character and the Usage of Convocation fully justifie and that therefore the Clergy's Claims of Exemption from it are not to be warranted but will also discover to the World how they have been impos'd on by those who have grounded such Claims upon an imaginary Alliance between the Parliament and Convocation two Bodies that will appear to be widely different both in Constitution and Proceedings And since that difference as I said before consists chiefly in the Authority which belongs to the Metropolitan and Bishops over the Inferior Clergy and their Proceedings 't is my design to shew out of the Records themselves how that Authority stands and has always stood in the several Ages and Instances from the Summoning and Opening a Convocation to the Dissolution thereof with an Eye all along to the different Constitution and manner of corresponding in the two Houses of Parliament and particularly to the late Claims of Independence built upon a Parliamentary Relation CHAP. I. The Method of SUMMONING an English Convocation The Writ to the Archbishop I. WHen his Majesty by the Advice of his Council resolves to Summon his Parliament and with it a Convocation he signifies his Royal Pleasure by Writ to the Archbishop Rex c. Reverendissimo c. then the generaI Causes of his calling a Convocation are recited Vobis in fide dilectione quibus nobis tenemini rogando mandamus quatenus praemissis debito intuitu attentis ponderatis universos singulos Episcopos vestrae Provinciae ac Decanos Ecclesiarum Cathedralium necnon Archidiaconos Capitula Collegia totumque Clerum cujuslibet Dioecesis ejusdem Provinciae ad comparendum CORAM VOBIS in Ecclesia Cathedrali S. Pauli London die c. VEL ALIBI prout melius expedire videritis cum omni celeritate accommodâ MODO DEBITO Convocari faciatis A Writ to this effect and for some hundred Years in this very Form has been all along directed to the Archbishop whenever the King had resolved that a Convocation should be Summon'd Upon the reception whereof his Grace always proceeded to summon it in the fixt and Canonical Method that he ever us'd in calling of Convocations upon his own motion without that Writ For tho' the King as having a Right to the Assistance of the Clergy had also a Right to be obey'd by the Archbishop in calling them together for that end yet in the dispatch of that business he left them to proceed according to
the known Rules of a Provincial Synod viz. to be summon'd before their Metropolitan and to the Place he should think fit to appoint and in the manner that was usual in all other Convocations For the Archbishop had a Right to call a Convocation at pleasure till the Statute 25 H. 8. c. 19. absolutely restrained him from doing it unless empower'd by the King 's Writ Which effected this Alteration in the Summons that whereas before it was issu'd sometimes upon the Pleasure of the Prince signified to the Archbishop and sometimes upon the Archbishop's alone the Authority of the Summons in both resting equally in his Grace Now he is restrain'd from the Exercise of that Authority till he receive leave or direction from the Prince The Summons upon that intimation of the Royal Pleasure being still issued in his Grace's Name and under the Archiepiscopal Seal that is remaining as properly Authoritative as before * See this point proved more largely in Right of the Archbishop 9 c. II. For whereas in the late comparisons of a Convocation and Parliament the parallel lies between the Archbishop in the first and the Lord Chancellor in the second the share they have in the Summoning these two Bodies is very different The Warrant to the Lord Chancellor who acts Ministerially The Lord Chancellor or Keeper receives a Warrant from the King whereby his Majesty signifies his Resolution to call a Parliament In which case divers and sundry Writs are to be directed forth under our Great Seal of England c. Wherefore we Will and Command you forthwith upon the receipt hereof and by Warrant of the same to cause such and so many Writs to be made and sealed under our Great Seal for the accomplishment of the same as in like cases hath been heretofore used and accustom'd c. What the King in this case requires of the Lord Chancellor is in a way purely Ministerial his Lordship being commanded to act only in his Majesties Name and under his Seal i. e. solely by his Authority while the Archbishop is only Licens'd or Directed to Exert a Power and Authority which belongs to him as well in the common Right of a Metropolitan as by the antient Laws and Customs of this Realm In virtue whereof he directs his Mandate to the Bishop of London whose Office it is as his Grace's Dean of the Province to Execute that Mandate and whose part therefore in the calling a Convocation answers to that of the Lord Chancellor in the Summons of a Parliament Both of them Act Ministerially in the Name and by the Authority the one of his Civil and the other of his Ecclesiastical Superior The Writ for a Parliament issu'd in the King's Name by the Lord Chancellor summons the Lords Spiritual and Temporal Personally to attend his Majesty on a certain day at Westminster Vobis in side legiantia quibus nobis tenemini firmiter injungendo Mandamus quod consideratis Dicto die loco personaliter intersitis nobiscum And another also in his Majesty's Name to the Sheriff of each County commands him to take care that the Knights Citizens and Burgesses duly Elected pay their Attendance to the King at the same Place But the Archbishop in his Mandate executed by the Bishop of London first reciting the Royal Writ to shew that the Restraint of the Statute is taken off Summons the Bishops and Clergy of his Province to appear before himself in his Provincial Convocation at St. Pauls Quod iidem Episcopi Decani Archidiaconi caeteri Ecclesiarum Cathedralium Praelati c. compareant coram nobis aut nostro in hac parte locum tenente sive Commissario in Domo Capitulari Ecclesiae Cathedralis Divi Pauli London The Returns to Parliament to the King The Sheriff of each County is directed in the Royal Writ to make a due Return of his Election to the King in his Court of Chancery Et Electionem tuam in pleno Comitatu tuo factam distinctè apertè sub sigillo tuo sigillis eorum qui Electioni illi interfuerint nobis in Cancellariâ nostrâ ad diem locum in Brevi Contentum certifices indilatè In Convocation to the Archbishop By the Archbishop's Mandate the Bishop of each Diocese to whom the immediate Execution thereof belongs is directed to make the Return to his Grace or his Commissary Et praeterea vobis ut supra injungimus quòd omnibus singulis Coepiscopis Suffraganeis Provinciae nostrae Cant. injungatis injungi faciatis ut singuli eorum sigillatim de facto suo quatenus pertinet ad eosdem Nos seu locum-tenentem sive Commissarium unum vel plures dictis die horâ loco per literas eorum Patentes Nomina Cognomina omnium singulorum per eos respectivè Citatorum continentes distinctè certificent apertè These Returns are ultimately deposited in their proper Offices the Parliamentary in his Majesties Court of Chancery and those to Convocation in the Register of the See of Canterbury That is the due Execution of each being immediately certified to the Person from whom the Command comes and in whose Power it is to punish the default the Testimonies of that Execution rest and stop at the Authority The Summons not less Ecclesiastical for its being enjoined by the Prince from whence the Summons in both cases immediately flow'd Thus far to the Honour of our Reform'd Church nothing appears in the manner of an English Convocation but what is truly Ecclesiastical or in other Words suitable to the Constitution and Government of an Episcopal Church as well as the Degrees and Order of the Members whereof it consists Bating I mean that one Restraint which the Statute has laid upon the Archbishop from calling a Convocation at pleasure as the antient Metropolitans and our own here in England before that Statute had a right to do For as to the Archbishop's exercising his Summoning Authority at the Command of the King this is so far from changing our Convocations into Civil Meetings that 't is no more than an obedience which has been ever paid to Christian Princes by the Governours of National Churches planted and establish'd under their Influence and Protection Nor in our own did the Archbishop's calling his Clergy upon the King 's Writ or without it ever make the least Alteration in the stated Ecclesiastical Methods of Summoning All these God be thank'd are still pretty entire and I hope safe enough against the Endeavours of some restless Men who would perswade us that they are pleading the Cause of the Church in doing all they possibly can to make her a meer Creature of the State The Clergy not Summon'd in the same manner from the beginning This has ever been the Method of Summoning a Convocation but as to the Members summon'd the Cathedral and Diocesan Clergy were not from the beginning represented as now they are by Persons of
Praelatos non comparentes seu non Licentiatos suspendebat à celebratione divinorum et ingressu Ecclesiae The Praelati were the Lower-House Members the Dignitaries at least who under that Style are commanded to retire and chuse a Prolocutor in the Convocation that immediately preceeds Anno 1586. Dec. 2. in the Extracts out of the Registers of the Vpper-House it is said in short upon a Prorogation Non comparents Contumacious suspended And before the Dissolution Suspension of Absents or Departers without leave Anno 1601. in the same Extracts we meet with the like Hint immediately before the Dissolution Contumacious suspended Of which Act we have a full and particular account in the Lower-House Journal Sess 14. Mar. 24. That the Prolocutor according to Custom might be able to lay before his Grace a Schedule of the Absents in the Lower-House de mandato Domini Prolocutoris facta fuit publica Praeconizatio omnium Citatorum ad comparend in hac domo juxta consuetudinem alias usitatam juxta tenores Mandatorum Certificatoriorum alias respectivè coram ipso Reverendissimo Patre Domino Cant. Archiep. c. exhibitorum introductorum The Prolocutor and the whole House being immediately sent for Reverendissimus querelatus est de incurià negligentiâ contumacia citatorum c. non comparentium c. tunc porrecta sibi Schedula Suspensionis unà cum Schedula continente nomina cognomina contumaciter Absentium ab hac Sacra Synodo idem Reverendissimus eos omnes singulos in hujusmodi Schedula nominatos á Celebratione Divinorum omnimodo Exercitio Ecclesiasticae Jurisdictionis suspendit prout in ipsa Schedula penes Registrarium ipsius Reverendissimi quoad Superiorem Domum remanen continetur The Substance of the Arguments for the Archbishop's Power over the Members These therefore in short are the Grounds which give the Archbishop an undoubted Power over the Members of the Lower-House exclusive of the House it self It is an inherent Right of the See to require the Attendance of the Inferior Clergy in his Provincial Convocation And a right to require Attendance includes and supposes a Power of enforcing it when requir'd That Right has been ever exercised and this Coercive Power express'd in the Archiepiscopal Mandate or Summons The Returns of the Persons Summon'd are made immediately to him that he may know upon whom the obligation of attending lays and also rest ultimately with him as a testimony of his Right to such Attendance during the Convocation his Summons being not simply to appear before him but with the addition of such further Days as he shall see convenient cum continuatione dierum prout convenit According to the several Returns it has ever been the Custom at the opening of the Convocation to call over all the Members and to pronounce the Absents Contumacious In the Course of their Proceedings his Grace as Presiding in Person over the whole Body has either suspended the Punishment from time to time or inflicted it upon particular Persons as he saw Occasion Sometimes when Business of great moment was under Consideration giving general Admonitions not to depart before the Conclusion at other times Licensing particular Members to go away upon reasonable Causes alledg'd and approv'd and at the end either by way of Grace remitting the Penalties threatn'd or confirming them by a formal Execution The Claim of the Lower-House to a concurrent Power confuted All these belonging to the Archbishop and to him alone upon the Foundation of Law and Practice it has been wonder'd how his Power over the Inferior Clergy in point of Attendance could be made a question Especially when those of the Lower-House who claim a concurrent Right tho'some of the Departers acted the last Session as if it had been solely in that House The Lower-House have no Coercive Power over their Members don 't pretend any Coercive Power over their own Members And yet I take a right to grant leave to suppose a right of Refusing it and a right to refuse without an enforcing Power in case the Member depart to be somewhat singular both in Law and Reason Suppose one or more Members to be necessary to some Purposes depending in Convocation neither the Prolocutor nor the Lower-House can oblige him to come up or attend longer nor have they any way to bring him thither or to keep him there but by Application to the Archbishop in whom the Coercive Power rests and by his Grace's Admonition and Censure in case he will not readily comply So that what the Narrative means in saying that they have a Power of demanding the Attendance of their Members Nar. p. 49. I am yet to learn because as I understand the word all Power of Demanding necessarily supposes a Right in Law to prosecute upon refusal and they have not aim'd at the proof of such a right in themselves tho' they could not but see the necessity of clearing that point before their way could be made to the other Nar. p. 34. The Prolocutor reserves Punishment only in the Presidents Name I know they observe in another Place that the Prolocutor has a Power to reserve the Punishment meaning the Punishment of Contumacy pronounc'd against the Absents as well as the Archbishop in whose Schedule it is always immediately after the Sentence added poenâ sibi reservatâ And it is easie to imagin how the Person upon whose Sentence the Guilt is contracted reserves the Execution of that Sentence in his Power but how a Man can suspend the Infliction of the Punishment who had no part in pronouncing the Guilt which is the Prolocutor's case is not so easily comprehended They say indeed to avoid this Absurdity I suppose that they don't mean reserving in the first Instance the Punishment to himself Ibid. according to their Lordships Construction of reservata poena but reserving the Punishment for a Synodical Act which the words they conceive will bear as well But before they induce others to conceive so it will be necessary to show in what instance any one Member of their House was ever punisht for Absence by a Synodical Act or any other way than by a Sentence of Suspension solemnly pronounc'd by his Grace of whose Authority in Summoning a Convocation their Absence is a Contempt And the Punishment can certainly be reserv'd to no other Power than that which has always finally inflicted it Accordingly in the very first place where that Journal speaks of the Prolocutor's reserving the Punishment it expresly mentions it as done by the direction of his Grace Anno 1586. Sess 1. The Prolocutor and the whole House being call'd up Reverendissimus Pater Dominus Cant. Archiepiscopus ob paucitatem Comparentium c. intimavit Domino Prolocutori absentes ob eorum Contumacias Suspendend fore debere c. Upon this they go back and having call'd over the House Dominus pronunciavit eos eorum quemlibet Contumaces
c. reservata corum poenâ in diem Mercurii the day to which the Archbishop's Schedule had Contina'd the Convocation and suspended the Certificates Sess 2 3 4. The Contumacy not being yet pronounc'd by the Archbishop the Prolocutor after coming in every Instance from the Upper-House and his delivery of other Messages from thence to the Lower reserves the Punishment in the same sense that after the Continuation Intimated from the Schedule he in virtue thereof admonishes all the Members to be present at the day according to Archbishop Parker's description of the Office Forma Con. Ejusdem Prolocutoris est monere omnes ne discedant Civitate London absque licentia Reverendissimi quodque Statutis diebus tempestivé veniant ad Convocationem Which shows the meaning of an Expression in the form whereby Archbishop Bancroft suspends three Members of the Lower-House for departing without Leave Bancr Register Cum nos c. omnes singulos alios Decanos c. alios quoscunque in dictâ Convocatione comparentes ab eadem sine Licentia nostra in ea parte obtenta recedentes aut mandatis nostris licitis vel Prolocutoris dictae Convocationis minimè obtemperantes pronunciaverimus Contumaces c. Here the Mandatum Prolocutoris can signifie nothing but the Admonition to attend regularly at the Day appointed by the Archbishop given always by the Prolocutor in pursuance of the Intimation thereof from his Grace's Schedule MonuÃtque omnes c. ad interessend A Clause that the Actuary of the Lower-House in the last Convocation ought not to have added to the Adjournments to Intermediate Days as well as others because he knew that the Archbishop had declar'd against their meeting on those Days and 't is plain from hence that no Authority but that of his Grace can warrant such an Admonition The Prolocutor can give no Leave but as empower'd by the President But as to the Leave to depart and the Place of Application in these we see the forecited Passage directs us solely to the Archbishop whose Licence either immediate or by the Prolocutor the conveyer of his Grace's Pleasure to the House in all other particulars is absolutely necessary In 1586. Sess 10. after the Admonition to be present according to his Grace's Schedule the Journal as I observ'd before mentions five who ex Relatione Domini Prolocutoris isto die fuerunt licentiati quoad eorum personalem comparitionem And not to omit the smallest Objection this teaches us how to interpret that short hint which is in the List before the Minutes of 1640. over against the Name of one of the Proctors for Glocester-Diocese Venia Mri. Prolocutor ratione mortis filii In other Parts of that Catalogue V. Supr we find the Archbishop's Leave in such Cases directly express'd and in this the Lower-House will as little own as his Grace that the Prolocutor could give it by his own Authority For when in the Narrative they assert a Power of giving Leave concurrent with that of his Grace Narr Pag. 49. they do not make the Prolocutor but the House the Subject of that Power If either the Archbishop or the Lower-House give a Leave of Absence it is of Course to be interpreted so far only as the Claim of them that give it is concern'd So that the Member is not perfectly at Liberty without Leave from both How groundless this Notion is I have prov'd at large but it shows however that in their Sense the Venia Prolocutoris can be no more than a Declaration of Leave given by another And nothing but a Resolution to be Obstinate can make it suggested that this other must be the House which before the last Convocation does not once appear to have interpos'd directly or indirectly in that Matter and not the Archbishop who as he has been prov'd to have the Legal Right to give Leave and to have frequently done it in Person so the Prolocutor's is the Hand whereby he conveys all his Messages to the Lower-House and by whose Relation as we are sure from an exact Journal of their own Five of the Members were formerly Licens'd to depart The groundless Practices of the last Lower-House in giving Leave to be absent and admitting Proxies But be the Claim of such a Power in the House as groundless and unprecedented as it will 't is in Fact certain that it was openly and frequently exercis'd by the Majority of the last Lower Clergy Sess 7. Et tune Venerabiles Viri Subsequentes petierunt licentiam sese absentandi ab hac Domo cui consensum fuit ab hac domo Sess 13. Two Persons desir'd Leave to go into the Country Sess 20. Mr. Archdeacon desir'd Leave to go into the Country to hold his Visitation In the 24 Session another Member askt the same Favour as in the 27th not only Leave for Absence was desir'd but also that a Proxy might be admitted which the following Chapter will show to be equally out of the Power of the Lower-House CHAP. III. No Power in the Lower-House to admit or deny Proxies The Lower-House have no Power to admit or deny Proxies Narr p. 50. IT is upon the Supposition of a Power in the House to admit or deny Proxies that they build their Claim of a Right to give or deny Leave So the Narrative represents it But the Power of the Lower-House to admit or deny Proxies which has been always exercis'd and never disputed what else is it but a Power of giving or denying Leave to be absent It was wisely done to obtrude this Doctrin upon the Reader as a self-evident Truth because particular Proofs of it were not to be had either from Law or Practice We have already explain'd how at the Opening of the Convocation the Archbishop appoints a Commissioner to inspect and receive Proxies of all kinds and to Judge of the fitness of the Person substituted to examin the Causes of Absence and to admit or reject the several Excuses for non-attendance those I mean that are then offer'd in pursuance of the Clause in his Grace's Mandate which declares that none shall be excus'd nisi ex causâ necessariâ tunc ibidem allegandâ probandâ ac per nos approbandâ This Summons to appear on a certain Day cum continuatione dierum prout convenit is not satisfied by a Personal Attendance at the Opening but evidently extends to the whole Time of his Grace's Continuing and the Convocation's sitting thereupon There is therefore the same Obligation in Law not to depart in the middle without the Archbishop's Approbation of the Cause as not to be absent at the beginning without sending it up and laying it before his Grace or his Commissioner And on the other Hand if his Grace's Approbation of the Cause be of it self a legal and entire Discharge from attending at all why is it not a sufficient Warrant to depart before the Attendance be entirely pay'd Proxies lodg'd with
the Register of the Upper House Agreeable to the Law of Convocation the Practice has been as to apply to the President for leave to depart and Substitute a Proxy so to enter Proxies of that kind in the Register of the Vpper-House In that of 1640. the Catalogue whereof at the beginning is the chief Light we have of this kind frequent mention is made of Archdeacons appearing by Proxies with the Name of the Persons substituted by them Mr. Wade was then Register of the Upper-House and in the List before the Minutes of the Lower-House we find it often added over against the Names of Absent Members Wade habet Procuratorium and W. for Brevity's sake habet Procuratorium As the Memorandum enter'd at the Archdeacon of Derby's Name is remarkable to the present Purpose Comparuit per Prol. Mr. Prol. habuit Procuratorium exhibuit Mro W. But there are Entries of this kind yet more distinct in the Catalogue before Mr. Mundy's Minutes of 1661. where the Actuary of the Lower-House notes thus Archidiaconus Col. constituit Dom. Porey ejus Procuratorem reliquit Procuratorium penes Registrum Archidiaconus Wellen. constituit Magistrum Franklin S. T. P. in Procuratorem reliquit Procuratorium penes Registrum Archidiaconus Huntingdon comparuit constituit Do. Layfield ejus Procuratorem reliquit Procuratorium penes Registrum The entring of Proxies in the Lower-House-Book no Argument of their Right to admit them 'T is true several of the Proxies we meet with in the Upper-House-Book of 1640. are likewise taken notice of in the Catalogue before the Minutes of the Lower and the Reason is obvious because they were to be produc'd and exhibited there whenever the House were occasionally to divide upon any Point Others also are set down in the Minute-Book without any mention of them in the Register because his Grace's leave is frequently given in the Intervals of Sessions and may not therefore directly come to the notice of the Upper-House-Register but cannot escape the Knowledge of the Actuary in the Lower where the Proxy left behind is to be consider'd upon all Divisions But that the receiving of Proxies exhibited belongs Properly and Solely to the Register in the Upper-House appears from these three remarkable Circumstances 1. That by Archbishop Whitgift's Table he alone has a right to the Fee assign'd for Exhibiting such Proxies 2. That this Fee is constantly pay'd to him and none to the Actuary of the Lower-House 3. That when the Actuary either receives an Instrument of Proxy or the Fee of Exhibiting it the Instrument is always deliver'd and the Fee accounted for to the Register of the Upper-House Nor was it material in which Book the Entry was made so long as the Member had the President 's leave to depart and substitute the Notaries of each House being equally under the Jurisdiction of the Archbishop and Members of his Court As the Books themselves at the end of every Convocation are equally deposited in the Registry of his See The Actuary of the Lower-House an Officer of the Archbishop For that the Actuary of the Lower as well as the Register of the Upper is properly the President 's Officer cannot be deny'd when the very Original Table of Fees for the Vicar-General's Office establisht by Archbishop Whitgift appoints among the rest Feoda Actuario Domus inferioris Convocationis solvenda According to which Table the Fees of the Lower as well as the Upper-House are demanded and pay'd and a Copy of that Table so far as it concerns the Convocation is enter'd at the beginning of the Act-Books of each And so I find in 1640. that he in whose Book the Proxy was first enter'd commonly receiv'd the whole Fees and the other only enter'd a Memorandum that they were pay'd Sol. Wade 7 s. 8 d. or 7 s. 4 d. is the usual Note in the Minutes because they were the Fees of the same Court and the respective Proportions were assign'd by the same Authority Add to this what we meet with in their own Accurate Journal of 1586. Sess Ult. where the Notary having observ'd his Grace's Suspension of the Absents says prout in ipsa Schedula penes Registrarium ipfius Reverendissimi Patris quoad Superiorem domum remanen continetur which surely can imply no less than that the President had a like Officer also in inferiore Domo That therefore the Names of Proxies appear upon the Journal of the Lower-House shows no more than that 't is fit that Substitutions made by the President 's Authority should be recorded by an Officer of his own and then deposited in the Registry of his See But the bare bringing in and exhibiting of Proxies or even the Lodging the Instruments in the Actuarie's Hand is far from proving a Right in the House to admit them For that must include a Power of denying and as we have shown that the President has frequently licens'd Members of their House to go away upon Substitutions so it lays upon them to produce any such Instance attended with the least mark either of the Members asking their concurrent leave or of any Doubt or Scruple whether those Members should depart or their Proxies be admitted What they claim in this Case is a Negative upon the President but what can support that Claim besides such Testimonies of Denial or Scruple I cannot see There is I confess a Clause in the Lower-House Journal of 1586. Sess 3. that seems at first sight to imply a concurrent Power with the President in this Business of Proxies Et tunc Ego Notarius antedictus i. e. Tho. Barker Actuary of the Lower-House ex mandato Domini Prolocutoris monui omnes isto die comparentes ad exhibend introducend Procuratoria si quae habeant ad comparend pro Absentibus citatis ad comparend in hac sacra Synodo prox Sessione That the Prolocutor could give this Admonition by his own Authority is inconsistent with their Claim in behalf of the House the Power whereof would doubtless be contended for upon this Precedent were we not sure that what he did was by Order of the Archbishop At their first meeting after a Prorogation the President intimates to the Prolocutor the offence he took at the thinness of the House and his Resolution to proceed against the Absents Sess 3. we find this Note in the Extracts out of the Upper-House-Books Archbishop orders all Proxies of the Lower-House to be brought in And in the very same Session it is that the Prolocutor admonishes all ad exhibend introducend Procuratoria From these Accounts and these are all I can meet with in the Registers it appears that the President as in Law so in Practice also hath the sole Right to admit or deny Proxies and their giving leave for Absence being grounded upon the supposition of a concurrent Power in the Lower-House to admit Proxies these two Claims must of course fall together The late Irregularities in this Business of
The Method of Passing Canons and Constitutions before the Statute 25. H. 8. c. 19. was the same that has ever been practis'd in Synodical Meetings viz. by the Authority of the Synod and with the Sanction of the Metropolitan and these two gave them their full Force and Effect But now they are fram'd in order to be laid before the Prince as agreed on by the Arch-bishop Bishops and Clergy and none to be of any Force Effect or Validity in Law but only such and so many of them as he by his Letters Patents under the Great Seal of England shall allow approve and confirm This is the Language of the Royal Licence the Necessity whereof in order to make promulge and execute Canons c. is an Abridgment of the Ecclesiastical Power in these Respects and therefore the ancient Sanction which always signify'd a final Authority could not be continu'd in any Matters which were not to be promulg'd or executed without the Allowance Approbation and Confirmation of the King by his Letters Patents under the Great Seal of England But all Synodical-Acts to which the Royal Licence is not necessary receive their final Authority from the Sanction of the Metropolitan i. e. they still pass in the ancient Canonical way whatever some late Writers too much bent upon the Diminution of Ecclesiastical Power may suggest to the contrary CHAP. XVII Of Proroguing and Dissolving a Convocation AS the Arch-bishop upon receiving the Royal Writ for Calling a Convocation is bound by Law and agreeably to the Deference that has been ever paid to Christian Princes to exert his Summoning Authority so is he under the same Obligation to proceed to Prorogations and Dissolutions thereof in a Canonical way when the Pleasure of the Prince shall be signify'd by Royal Writs to those Purposes For how little Truth there is in the late Notion That the Arch-bishop in those Cases acts purely in a Ministerial way may appear by a Comparison of the Methods of Executing those Commands in Parliament and Convocation The manner of the A. bishop's Proroguing and Dissolving Authoritative For the the first the Prorogation of a Parliament the King by his Letters Patents constitutes such of the Nobility as he thinks fit his Commissioners for that end Dante 's vobis tenore praesentium plenam potestatem facultatem authoritatem c. ad praesens Parliamentum nostrum nomine nostro prorogand c. In the same Stile is the Commission for Dissolving as oft as his Majesty is not present in Person A Stile that is truly and evidently Ministerial But the Writs for doing the same things in Convocation can be directed to none but the Metropolitan himself and that without any Conveyance of Authority or Order to act in his Majesty's Name or any other Direction besides the Proroguing or Dissolving it according to the accustom'd Methods of Convocation Debito modo prorogetis and Dissolvetis seu dissolvi faciatis In pursuance of which Order the Archbishop Prorogues and Dissolves either in Person or by one or more Commissioners specially constituted by his Grace for those Purposes The Archbishop's Admonitions immediately before a Proragation or Dissolution Immediately before a Prorogation or Dissolution we find the Arch-bishop as he saw occasion publickly recommending to the Bishops and Clergy the due Execution of the Ecclesiastical Laws and the Reformation of any particular Abuses and Irregularities in the Church Anno 1428. Ulteriúsque rogavit hortatus est requisivit Reverendissimus Pater Dominus praedictus praefatos Confratres suos ut in inquisitione fienda contra Lollardos Haereticos hujusmodi diligentiam interim omnimodam quam poterant adhiberent cùâ—… revenerint quid contra eos fecerint ipsum pleniùs certificarent specialiter de illis quorum momina sibi detecta dictis Confratribus suis prout unumquemque in Dioc. suâ concernebant in Cedulis divisis conscripta circa tres Dies antea tradidit liberavit Anno 1601. Sess 18. The Extracts out of the Upper-house Books have this Note immediately before the Dissolution Arch-bishop exhorts the Bishops to be diligent in their Charge and careful to observe the Canons in the last Convocation Anno 1586. The Lower-house Book immediately before the Dissolution Revereâ—dissimus Pater Dominus Cant. querelatus est de pravâ immoderatâ luxuriâ ac minus verecundo gestu ac morum intemperie nonnullorum Clericorum Provinciae Cant. ad fora loca publica concurrentium Quare monuit Decanos Archidiaconos alios jam praesentes ad quos Correctio delinquentium hujusmodi pertinet ad severè procedend puniend obnoxios culpahiles si incorrigibiles perseveraverint ad implorand auxilium opem Episcopi Diocesani vel ipsius Reverendissimi Patris vel etiam ipsius Serenissimae Dominae nostrae Reginae ne actionum morum pravitas istorum obnubilet obscuret Dectrinam Evangelii quod verbis profitentur quo pluribus perniciosum siet pessimum eorum exemplum The Writs of Prorogation and Dissolution On the Day of Prorogation or Dissolution the Royal Writ is produc'd and publickly read But that being only a Direction to the Archbishop to Prorogue or Dissolve neither of these are effected by that Publication of the Writ On the contrary the very first Writ of Prorogation we meet with Anno 1532. May 15. was read in the Morning Reverendissimus ostendebat quoddam Breve Regium sibi directum pro Prorogatione hujusmodi Convocationis Quod Breve idem Reverendissimus publicè legebat and yet the Convocation sat till Noon and after Dinner met again So also Anno 1434. March 31. The Writ of Prorogation was brought in and read and afterwards the Resolutions of the Lower-Clergy touching the Pope's Supremacy were delivered and then the Arch-bishop is said to Continue to the Day specify'd in the Writ For so is the Practice of Convocation The Pleasure of the Prince is signify'd to the Archbishop by the Writ but his Grace pursues that Royal Order by a â—ormal Declaration out of a Schedule mentioning indeed the Royal Writ but running solely in the Arch-bishop's Name and by him pronounc'd in presence of the Bishops and Clergy The Authors therefore of some late Schemes have done a manifest Injustice to the Constitution of our Protestant Church in contending against Law and Practice that the Reformation put an end to the ancient Canonical Ways of transacting Ecclesiastical Matters and introduc'd a new Model inconsistent with the Primitive Distinctions between Presbyters and Bishops and unknown before either to this or any other Episcopal Church The foregoing Chapters I hope may vindicate our Reformation from the late Aspersions of that kind as well as the Ecclesiastical Government thereof from any such Repugnancy to the Primitive Rules and may withal make it more easily understood whether they who have carry'd on those new Measures or they who have oppos'd them are the truer Friends to the Rights Liberties and Honour of our
the matter into Consideration against the next meeting At the best therefore it was doubtful whether any one was legally Substituted to exercise the Office of a Prolocutor But which is more the Intimation of the Act of Continuing is a Referendary-Act a Report from their Lordships to the Lower House and they who contended the most Zealously for his taking the Chair declar'd it to be their intention that he should not act in any instance as a Referendary till he had been confirm'd by their Lordships To argue upon their own principles I only suppose this distinction between a Prolocutor and a Referendary but no such appears in the Registers which stile him not only Prolocutor Referendarius but Prolocutor sive Referendarius implying the names to be of the same Import in the language of Convocation But this will be explain'd more largely under another head At present I will pursue my Observations upon the general Right of Continuing from the five Journals which are here made publick The Phrase Continuavit quoad hanc Domum no Argument for a Separate Power in the L. House The only colour that can be drawn from these of a Separate Power of Continuation in the Lower House is the Phrase of some Continuations in 1586 Prolocutor continuavit quoad hanc domum But here no Act or Power is express'd besides that of the Prolocutor and they who are so earnest for an Inherent Power in the House are yet as zealous as we against all pretences to a Personal Authority in the Prolocutor The Question therefore is by whose Authority he must be suppos'd to Continue in those Cases by that of his Grace or of the Lower House He had certainly notice of the Continuations in the Upper House because these in the Lower are declar'd to the same time And the Advocates for this Inherent Right are at last brought to Acknowledge an Obligation to attend on his Grace's Day and by consequence the necessity of having an Authentick Notice thereof The Prolocutor is also known by his Office to be the Referendary or Reporter of all Messages from the Upper House and I think sufficiently prov'd in the 4th Chapter of this Book to moderate the Debates of the Lower in his Graces stead These are natural reasons why Continuations express'd in such general terms should be the pure Effects of the President 's Authority but as to the Vote Act or Consent of the Lower House there is no mark or footstep of it either in these or any other Separate Continuations The Phrase it self not to be met with elsewhere in all our Journals of Convocation was introduc'd by the Prolocutor's being put into the President 's Commission to Prorogue This oblig'd him to pronounce the Continuation in the Upper House at least to bear a part in it and coming from thence to give notice to the Lower the Actuary's use of the ordinary Style Intimavit would not have been so consistent with the meaning thereof in Convocation Language But while he considered him not only as Prolocutor but as Commissary to the President it was natural to change Intimavit a Ministerial word into terms that might better express the Authority he then had as Commissary to his Grace The Phrase in Parliament Dom. Canc. Contin praesens Parl. no argument for the Lower House See the Right of the A. Bishop p. 43 44. To this I will add a short but clear reply to another Suggestion why the Lower Clergy are not comprehended in the terms of the Archbishop's Continuations It is that in Parliament the Adjournments of the House of Peers are enter'd Dominus Cancellarius continuavit praesens Parliamentum and yet the Act of the Chancellour Adjourns the Lords only But the distinctions in this Case between the two Houses of Parliament and Convocation are too remarkable to leave room for such a Parallel 1. There is no original Subordination between the constituent Members of the two Houses of Parliament nor any Relation but what arises purely from the Usage and Constitution of the Kingdom But in the two Houses of Convocation as the Bishops make the Upper and Presbyters the Lower a Subordination is establisht in the Lower by Apostolical Institution and in Conformity thereto by the Constitution of this National Church And so every step made by Presbyters towards a co-ordinate or independent Power is a proportionable Deviation in the constitution of our Church from the pattern of the purest Ages For 2. The Adjournment of the House of Peers is pronounc'd by one who has no Authority over the Commons nor any concern even among the Lords besides that of Moderating except he be a Peer of the Realm and in Right of his Peerage have a Title to Vote c. But in Convocation the Continuation is pronounc'd by the Metropolitan of the whole Province and the President of the whole Convocation who advising with his Brethren the Bishops directs the business of Convocation and is at the head of Proceedings in both Houses nay which is more has a final Negative upon them and by his Concurrence gives the Sanction to their Acts in all matters to the framing and Promulging whereof the Royal License and Authority are not necessary in Law 3. That Act of the Lord Chancellor in the House of Peers is plainly Ministerial or the effect of an immediate direction from the House but his Grace's in Convocation is Authoritative Nos Continuamus in virtue of a Power belonging to him as President of the whole Body 4. The terms of the two Continuations or Adjournments are widely Different In the House of Lords it is the praesens Parliamentum which the Lord Chancellour Adjourns by word of Mouth and it is no extraodinary thing to find the Word Parliamentum signifying one House when the standing Clerk thereof is Stil'd Clericus Parliamentorum But the Archbishop in a formal Instrument Continues praesentem sacram Synodum sive Convocationem Praelatorum Cleri Cantuariensis Provinciae where the Parties thereby Continued the Bishops and Clergy are directly express'd nor is the Register of the Upper House tho' acting by a Deputy in the Lower also ever term'd Registrarius Convocationum or the word Convocatio much less Convocatio Praelatorum Cleri ever apply'd to one House Separately 5. Tho' those Expressions were us'd on any other occasions which they are not to signifie the Upper House only yet the known Effect they have always had in this Case of Continuation would necessarily extend them to the Lower as well as Upper House For whereas the Adjournment in the House of Lords is never notified to the Commons who equally govern their own times of meeting and sitting and so no Concurrence as to time appears in the Sessions of the two Houses of Parliament In Convocation the Lower House has express and authentick Notice of the Act in the Upper and so the Clergy according to all the concurrent Books of the two Houses have ever met again at the time
dissent from the express Judgment of a Writer who understands the Value of his own Opinions too well to be easy under Contradiction But leaving that Point to be disputed between this Author and the Majority of the House the Circumstance upon which I chiefly insist in this Matter is It was not the House but the Prolocutor who determin'd the Election 3. That those of the Lower Clergy contend not for this Power of determining Elections as lodg'd in the Prolocutor but in their House and not the least Mention is made of the House or any Member of it in determining this Election of 1586. but the Proceeding and Sentence run solely in the name of the Prolocutor The Question therefore is By whose Authority was that Sentence given It must be either from his Grace or from the House The Journal tho' very exact and particular makes not the least mention of the House's interposing which Silence is the stronger Argument that they had no Right to interpose the Matter in all appearance being committed to the Prolocutor alone because in the other Instances of 1640. when the Prolocutor and Lower Clergy were all equally concern'd the whole Proceeding was carry'd on in the name of the House Coram Dominis Praelatis Cleris comparuerunt Domini and Domini Praelati interrogârunt determinationem continuà runt consenserunt censuerunt rebus sic stantibus nihil statuendum c. And when they came to Sentence Domus ad eorum finale decretum processit and Post Suffragia Domûs in eâ parte fact declararunt ordinarunt Suffragiis in eâ parte promulgatis Dominus Prolocutor de cum consensu c. pronunciavit Considering how distinctly the Minutes of 1640. express the part which the House had in these Proceedings I leave it to the Opinion of every Reader whether the compleat Journal of 1586. would not have left us some Foot-steps at least of the Houses's Concern at that time either in the Course of the Proceeding or at least the final Sentence if the Cause had not been committed to the sole Examination and Decision of the Prolocutor And if the Power was solely in him it can be no Question whether he deriv'd from the House who were present and might as well have proceeded by their own immediate Authority if any such had been lodg'd in them or from the Archbishop who could not be there in Person whose Absence the Prolocutor supplies in all other Respects and who was also hearing a like Cause in the Upper-house at the same time The Instance of 1640. consider'd II. The other Instance of a Right in the Lower-house to take Cognizance of Elections concurrent with that of his Grace is in some respects more full to their purpose than the foregoing Testimony In the Year 1640. Nov. 11. the House appointed a Committee upon a controverted Election in Lincoln-Diocese which Committee met Nov. 12. and yet the Archbishop appears not to have interpos'd till Nov. 14. nay the Preface to the Order he then gave shews that to have been the first time of his interposing Reverendissimus eis significavit quòd ipse audivit esse quasdam discrepantias c. As far then as a single Instance can affect the Rights of a Judicial Court and alter the natural Course of legal Proceedings and establish a concurrent Jurisdiction so far is this Instance before us a Testimony of the Lower-house's Right to enquire into the Circumstances of doubtful Elections I say to Enquire It goes no farther than Enquiring for this Precedent goes no farther than an Enquiry about the Custom of the Diocese in their Election of Proctors and a Right founded upon a single Precedent can never be extended beyond that Precedent It proceeds not to a formal Examination of Witnesses upon Oath and much less to a final Judgement These and all the other marks of a Judicial Proceeding commence upon his Grace's Special Order to the Prolocutor and House ut examinarent determinarent juxta Juris Exigentiam Consuetudines cujuslibet Dioeceseos donec aliter ordinatum fuerit From which Order I think these three things are fairly infer'd 1. That if Archbishop Laud had thought the Lower-house to have an inherent Power of Examining and Determining Judicially he would not have interpos'd in that Matter after they were actually enter'd upon their Enquiries 2. That if the Clergy themselves had believ'd such a Power to be lodg'd in their House they would have declar'd against that Interposition as an Invasion of their own inherent Authority 3. That in Virtue of the Reservation donec aliter ordinatum fuerit it still remain'd in his Grace's Power to revoke that Order and either to put a stop to the Proceeding or to remove it as he should see cause to his own immediate Cognizance III. An Additional Account of the Substitution of a Prolocutor IN explaining the Election and Office of a Procutor Chap. IV. I took occasion to consider how far he had a Right to make a Substitution in cases of Sickness or Business For tho' the Speaker of the House of Commons as executing that Office upon a Royal Confirmation never pretended to depute another tho' also the Confirmation of the Archbishop and Bishops be no less necessary in order to execute the Office of a Prolocutor and tho' lastly it appear that Applications for leave to substitute in those Cases have been actually made to the Upper-house yet against all these it had been confidently affirm'd that the Deputations of this kind might be made without the Archbishop's Consent or Privity Power of the Lower-house p. 9. c. 1. and the manner of making them is farther urg'd to give the Prolocutor some such Figure in the Lower-house as the Archbishop is known to have in the Upper The late Substitution in 1701. That Writer had conceal'd all the Instances of Application for Leave made to the President and Bishops but he was afterwards put in mind of them by the Author of the Right of the Archbishop p. 66 67. Very lately a Substitution being made by the Prolocutor upon the Authority of a Precedent already consider'd in the Year 1640 V. Sup. p. 76. the Person so deputed was actually put into the Chair without the Approbation or Knowledge of the Archbishop and Bishops The Account of it in a Paper markt Numb 1. To justify the Proceedings of the Majority in this and some other Particulars a Paper came out markt Numb 1. in the way of a News-Letter and in Truth much of the same Authority both in the Relation of Facts and the Reasonings upon them with the flying Intelligence of other kinds Only there is this difference in the Case of our Ecclesiastical News-Writer and his Brother Intelligencers their imperfect Representations are usually the Effects of Ignorance and Haste but his savours too much of Partiality and Design God knows it is a sad Omen to our poor Church that any of her own Ministers can thus triumph in her Misfortunes and comply
directly upon themselves For it was in their own Power upon this Principle to become a House when they pleas'd and not the less so for his Grace's Delaying the Appointment of a Common Referendary But in truth since the Separation of the two Houses in their Debates the title of Prolocutor has comprehended all the Offices of the Place as the Confirmation of his Grace and the Bishops has been ever thought to Instate him in the Office and make the Lower Clergy a House to act in a due Subordination to those their Superiors And this new division of the Office is evidently fram'd to Support the notion of their being a Separate House and in a Condition to debate business of their own antecedent to this Act and the Authority of their Lordships Which being once allow'd would quickly establish them in a Co-ordinate State and open a way to any degrees of Independence they should hereafter please to insist on IV. Additional Observations touching the AUTHORITY of the SUMMONS to Convocation The Authority of Summoning appli'd both to the King and the Archbishop P. 189. The title of the Convocation of 1562. as of others since the Act of Submission runs thus Convocatio Praelatorum Cleri Cantuar. Provinciae inchoat in Domo Capitulari Ecclesiae Divi Pauli London Auctoritate Brevis Regij Reverendissimo c. in hac parte directi c. P. 1. App. The form of holding a Convocation drawn by Archbishop Parker for that of 1562. begins thus Sciendum est quòd omnes qui Auctoritate Reverendissimi Domini Archiepiscopi Cant. citantur ad comparendum coram eo in in Domo Capitulari Ecclesiae Cathedralis Divi Pauli London c. The Titles of our Convocations before and since the Reformation agree in the first Clause Convocatio Praelatorum Cleri Cantuarlensis Provinciae which shews that by our Protestant Constitution they are no less an Ecclesiastical and Provincial Synod of Bishops and their Clergy under one common head the Metropolitan of of the Province than in the times of Popery they were If therefore the Clergy as has been pleaded of late be not comprehended in that Phrase Convocationem Praelatorum Cleri in the form of Continuing they are by the same rule no Members of an English Convocation But whereas the Convocations before the Reformation are generally said in the Title to be Factae per Reverendissimum c. upon the Submission Act the Style seems to have been chang'd because the first title we have entire after that Act this I mean of 1562. makes the Convocation to be begun Auctoritate Brevis Regij Reverendissimo c. direct And yet we see that Archbishop Parker lookt upon the Convocation of that very Year to be Cited or Summon'd Auctoritate Reverendissimi c. Hereupon a question arises about the true meaning of the term Authoritas as us'd in these titles and on some other Occasions In what Sense the Bishops and Clergy are said to be Summon'd to Convocation by the King's Authority and in what by the Authority of the Archbishop The Archiepiscopal Summons Authoritative before the Act. It is agreed on all hands that before the Act of Submission an English Convocation was Summon'd by the Sole Authority of the Metropolitan Nor do we deny that Act to have been a confiderable Abridgment of the Liberties of the Church in the matter of holding Synods but only that it did not so far affect the Ecclesiastical Power as to change them into Civil Meetings i. e. Meetings Summon'd and acting in virtue of that Summons immediately upon a Civil Authority The Civil Summons an argument of the Papists against our Reformation This Civil Summons and the Authority of it has been warmly asserted by two sorts of Persons 1. By the Papists who ever since the Reformation have taken the Advantage of that Act of Submission to asperse our Protestant Synods as Civil Meetings and the Canons c. made in them as of a Secular Original 2. By some late Opposers of the Metropolitical and Episcopal Authority in Convocation One of whom forms this New and very Uncanonical Scheme of Summoning and Holding Synods upon that Expression in the Submission-Act The Authority by which the Convocation meets is now purely Royal Power of the Lower House p. 3. c. 1. The words of the Act are express in the case which shall always be assembled by Authority of the King 's Writ So that since this Statute the Archbishop's share in Convening them is not Authoritative but Ministerial And when therefore he frames his Mandate upon the King 's Writ he does it as the King's Instrument only and the proper Officer who is to execute the Royal Summons The Argument arising from hence is that his Grace has now no Authority to Convene the Body of the Clergy Again Ibid. p. 17. c. 1. 2. An English Metropolitan Presiding over a Synod c. call'd together not any way by his but purely by Royal Authority And in another place Ibid. p. 20. c. 2. The Convocation Subsists by the King 's Writ Let the most virulent Adversary of this Protestant Church frame if he can a description of its Synodical Meetings that shall be a deeper Reproach to our happy Reformation Against the first sort of Adversaries the Papists and Protestants one would think should be as easily answer'd a full Vindication of our Reform'd Church has been built upon the Genuine meaning of the Act of Submission interpreted according to the true intent thereof and the antecedent and subsequent Practice with other Circumstances all which we have been forc'd more particularly to Urge and enforce of late to defend the honour of our Constitution against the Second sort of Adversaries also As The intent of the Statute no more than to restrain the Archbishop from exerting his Authority without the Royal License That the Crown did not want the Assistance of any Act to have a Convocation at pleasure because the Right of enjoyning the Archbishop to Summon it in due form as our Princes saw Occasion was always thought a Power Inherent in the Crown and was all along practis'd in England both before and since the Reformation and is indeed a Right belonging to Christian Princes in general But till the Act of Submission the Archbishop also had a Power of Summoning Convocations according to the Exigencies of the Church without the permission or direction of the Royal Writ And King Henry VIII apprehending that the Archbishop Bishops and Clergy in Convocation might protest against or obstruct his Measures of Reformation got a sufficient Security against that danger by making himself in virtue of that Act the Sole Judge when a Convocation should be Summon'd As the King neither gain'd nor wanted more than this so nothing was taken from the Archbishop but the ancient Right of Exerting his Summoning Authority AT PLEASURE the Authority it self remaining Entire and as full and effectual as ever when that Restraint is taken off The Power
the Death of the Prince The same Convocation is said in the Extracts out of the Upper-house Books to be Soluta per mortem Reginae Mariae as we find afterwards Anno 1624. that the Convocation was dissolv'd by the Death of King James the First On the contrary before the Reformation Anno 1412. we find that Archbishop Arundel summon'd a Convocation in Obedience to the King 's Writ and yet it was continu'd for some time after the Death of Henry the Fourth Again Anno 1460. Archbishop Bourchier issu'd his Summons in a like Obedience to the Royal Writ but the same Convocation not expiring with the Death of Henry the Sixth continu'd in the Reign of Edward the Fourth The difference in this Matter before and since the Reformation naturally arises from the foregoing Construction of the Submission-Act Before that was made the Archbishop had a Right to hold Convocations independent of the Prince and was by consequence under no Obligation to discontinue them upon the Death or Demise of the Prince He was bound to obey the Royal Writ as oft as it was sent him by exerting the Summoning-Authority according to the Tenor thereof but he was not absolutely confin'd to wait for and receive such Writ in order to Summon or Hold nor was a Convocation holden by the Archbishop independent of the King an illegal Assembly by the Laws then in being But by the Statute of Submission interpreted in its most genuine Meaning an absolute Restraint is laid upon the Archbishop from holding his Convocation unless authoriz'd so to do by the Royal Writ By this means any such Meeting of the Bishops and Clergy holden by the Archbishop without such Writ is become an illegal Assembly Now the Force of the Writ directed to the Archbishop to take off the Restraint laid upon him by the Statute must cease and expire with the Prince in whose Name and under whose Seal it was issu'd And when that happens the Archbishop is by Law reduc'd to the same Inability to hold a Convocation as he was under before the Reception of such Writ A Dissolution by the King's Death no Prejudice to the Archiepiscopal Authority That therefore a Convocation dies in Law with the Prince resolves wholly into that Incapacity which is acknowledg'd both in this Section and elsewhere to be laid upon the Ecclesiastical Power by the Statute of Submission And so the most that such a Dissolution can infer is that the Archbishop is now uncapable in Law to hold a Convocation unless authoriz'd by the King 's Writ to hold it or in other words that without the Force and Warrant of such Writ he cannot now as before the Statute he could give Subsistence to a Convocation But to argue from hence That the Convocation subsists by the sole Authority of the Crown and that the Authority of the Archbishop is wholly lost and so his share in summoning and holding is purely Ministerial these Inferences are a direct Violence to the Statute such as one would naturally expect from some Advocate of an Erastian-Church or a declar'd Enemy to our Reformation but 't is strange to see a profess'd Member and which is more a Minister of our Reform'd Church wresting the Statute into a Sense so very injurious to her Liberty and her Honour The Statute as it lodges in the Civil Power the sole Right of judging when our Synods shall be held is an Abridgment of the Liberties of the Church and we must be content But let us bless God that the Power of the Church is not so affected either by this or any other Statute but that the Metropolitans of both Provinces have a Right after the Writ has given them the Liberty of exerting their Power first to Summon their Convocations in an Authoritative or Canonical way and then to hold them by the ancient Ecclesiastical Rules A Blessing for which they are very ungrateful who can so much delight in saying and even pleading that the Convocation subsists by the Royal Writ exclusive of the Archiepiscopal Authority when the Dean of the Province's Certificatorium or Return with the exhibiting whereof the Convocation properly opens declares and recognizes in every particular the immediate Authority by which they assemble The Archiepiscopal Authority directly recogniz'd in the Dean of the Province's Certificatorium I have before repeated some of the Terms in which that Instrument recognizes the Archiepiscopal Authority but for a more full Satisfaction to the Reader I will here subjoin it at large REverendissimo in Christo Patri ac Domino Domino Thomae Providentia Divina Cantuar Archiepiscopo totius Angliae Primati Metropolitano vestrove in hac parte Locum tenenti sive Commissario vel Commissariis Henricus permissione Divina London Episcopus omnimodam Reverentiam Obedientiam tanto Reverendissimo Patri debitam cum Honore Literas vestras Reverendissimas Citatorias Monitoriales jamdudum Nobis sub sigillo vestro direct cum ea qua decuit Reverentia humiliter recepimus exequend sub tenore verborum sequentium videl Thomas Providentia Divina c. See the Form of the Mandate p. 9 57. Quarum quidem Literarum vigore pariter authoritate Nos praefatus Henricus London Episcopus omnes singulos Confratres nostros Co-Episcopos Ecclesiae vestrae Christi Cant. constitutos peremptorie citari premoneri ac per eos Decanos Ecclesiarum Cathedralium Collegiatarum singula Capitula earundem Archidiaconosque alios Ecclesiarum Praelatos Exemptos non Exemptos Clerumque cujuslibet Dioec Provinciae vestrae Cantuar. antedictae peremptorie citari praemoneri respective fecimus Quòd iidem Episcopi Decani c. compareant coram Peternitate vestra Reverendissima aut vestro in hac parte Locum tenente sive Commissario vel Commissariis die loco in eisdem vestris Literis Reverendissimis plenius specificat designat cum Continuatione Prorogatione dierum extunc sequentium locorum si quatenus expediat Ad tractandum super arduis urgentibus negotiis c. ut prius in Mandato Ulteriusque Authoritate per Receptionem Literarum Destrarum Reverendissimarum Citotoriarum Monitorialium praedictarum fatemur Nos Henricum London Episcopum antedictum peremptorie fore esse citatum ad comparendum coram vestra Reverendissima Paternitate aut vestro in hac parte Locum tenente sive Commissario vel Commissariis hujusmodi die loco praecitatis de super Negotiis memoratis tractatur ' Et nos iisdem Literis vestris Reverendissimis hujusmodi juxta vim formam tenorem effectum carundem debite parebimus Intimavimus insuper denuntiavimus intimari denuntiari fecimus dictae Provinciae vestrae Cantuar. Co-episcopis c. quòd eos a personali comparitione in hujusmodi negotio Convocationis Congregationis dictis die loco ut praemittitur divina favente clementia excusatos Reverendissima vestra Paternitas non habere intendit ista vice nisi