Dignity or Honour without any Power The nature of it consists in Power which hath several branches concerning which he relates the Opinion and Judgment of the Philosopher of Historians of the writers of Politicks of Lawyers and in the end delivers his own mind and reduced them to certain Heads in this manner Iura majestatis sunt Majora Defensionis Gubernationis in Minora de aerario colligendo Legibus condendis Magistratibus constituendis The first division is taken from the inequality of these Prerogatives and Rights The second he seems to ground upon these words That our King may judge us and go out before us and fight our Battels 1 Sam. 8.20 Where to Judge seems to signifie to Govern by Law and Officers to go out before us and fight our Battels presupposeth in his Judgment the power of the Militia To these he adds other two concerning the ordering of Religion and Coining of Money Under these general Heads he reduceth many other particulars and so proceeds to handle 1. the greater 2. The less Prerogatives severally and that largely This with the salving of some doubts and confuting some Errours is the Scheme and substance of the whole Treatise divided into three several Books section 8 Leaving every one to his own method I will with submission to better Judgment make bold to deliver my own Majestas est Realis quae potest rempublicam Constituere abolere mutare reformare Personalis quae agit cum exteris De Bello Pace Per Foedera Legationes suis circa divina religionem ordinando humanae leges ferendo exequendo This though not exact may serve the turn and in some measure declare the several branches of this great Power which in it self is but one yet hath many acts and the same different in respect of several and different Objects and Subjects I only mention the chief Heads to which the rest may be reduced for the better and more distinct understanding of it I will more particularly explain my self 1. Therefore Majesty is Reall Personal Real is in the Community and is greater than Personal which is the power of a Common-wealth already constituted For as you have heard before this form of a Common-wealth is virtually in it before it be constituted and their consent is the very foundation of it And this consent whether mediate or immediate tacit or express is so necessary that though a people be conquered yet the Victor cannot govern them as men without their consent Nay more when God designed immediately first Saul then David yet the election and consent of the people did concur with and follow upon the Divine Designation As this Real Majesty is a Power to model a State so it s always inherent and can never be separated insomuch that when a form of Government is dissolved or there shall be a failer of Succession the Power of the Soveraign doth divolve unto them by the law of nature or rather it was always in the people As this Community hath the power of constitution so it hath of dissolution when there shall be a just and necessary cause Hence appears the mistake of Junius Brutus Buchanon Heno and others when they say Ejus est destituere Cujus est constituere if they meant it of the multitude and body of the Subjects as Subjects under a form of Government it can only be true of a Community where they have just and necessary cause Subjects as Subjects cannot do it because of their Subjection and Obligation whereas the Community as a Community is free from any Obligation to any particular Form either from the Laws of God Natural or Positive or from their own Consent or Oaths And though the People in this consideration are bound both by the Natural and Positive Laws of God to constitute a Government if they can yet they are not bound to this Form or that Another Act of this Majesty in the Community is when they see it necessary and just and they have not only Power but Opportunity to do it to alter the Form of the Government this Act as with us is above the Power of a Parliament which may have Personal yet cannot have this Real Majesty For a Parliament doth necessarily presuppose a Form of Government already agreed upon whereby they are made the Subject of Personal Soveraignity Therefore they cannot alter or take away the cause whereby they have their being nor can they meddle with the fundamental Laws of the Constitution which if it once cease they cease to be a Parliament If the Government be dissolved and the Community yet remains united the People may make use of such an Assembly as a Parliament to alter the former Government and constitute a new but this they cannot do as a Parliament but considered under another Notion as an immediate Representative of a Community not of a Common-wealth And thus considered the Assembly may constitute a Government which as a Parliament cannot do which always presupposing the Constitution as such can act only in and for the administration That Community is wise which doth and happy which can keep their Majesty so due unto them as to limit their personal Soveraigns so as not to suffer them to take it from them and assume it to themselves section 9 As there is a real so there is a personal Majesty so called because it 's fixed in some Persons who are trusted with the exercise of it and may and many times do forfeit to God and in some cases forfeit to the Community or the People for when it is said it may be forfeited to the People we must understand that the People is not Plebs the meanest and the lowest rank and but a part of the Community but the whole Community it self as a Community otherwise we may lay the Foundation of all kinds of Tumults Confusions Seditions and Rebellions The Person or Persons trusted with the Majesty and Power are bound to seek the good of the whole People and for that end they are trusted with it and no otherwise Hence the saying Suprema lex salus populi esto The Acts of this Power which it hath a right to exercise are many and that in respect of those without or those within the Common-wealth For agit cum exteris it dealeth and acteth with those without This is not the first but rather the last kind of acting It ariseth from the relation which it hath to other States with which it may have some society though it hath no dependance upon it The Rules of this Acting as it respects themselves and the States with whom they deal are the Laws of Nations Yet the particular Laws of every several State may determine the Rules according to which it will act with or against another State. Because one State may wrong or benefit or strengthen and help another hence it comes to pass that sometimes there is a cause of War. For when by Ambassadours or other
order of Government and observe it that their days may be long in the Land wherein God hath placed them and that it may go well with them section 2 But to return to the acquisition of Power the designation of Persons as it is from Man so it is from God who ruleth in the Kingdoms of the World and sets up one and puts down another so that this Power may be communicated from him and so acquired by Man that it may be taken away and lost again The Method of the Discourse following is this Majestas acquiritur juste modo extraordinario divina designatione ordinario inchoitur quae it continuatur succesione per electionem vel libera electionâ— vi armis indeterminatâ—m astrictam familiae ubi mares tantum jure quasi hereditario quast jure succedant foemina quoque jure quasi hereditario quast jure succedant injuste usurpata vel dolo malo pecuniae homicidio alio modo Amittitur modo ordinato naturaliter morte imperantis defectu successionis moraeliter voluntaria imperantis resignatione desertione violenta invasione vel ab intra extra inordinato injusta dissolatione mala administratione eujus summus gradâ—s Tyrannus 1. Acquiritur justo modo extraordinario ut divina designatione unctione Power may first be acquired and that several ways as justly or unjustly in an extraordinary or ordinary manner This extraordinary way and more immediate from God we find in Scripture For thus Moses Joshua many of the Judges Saul David Jeroboam Jehu were designed to their places of Government Some of those as Saul David Jehu were anointed by Gods appointment and the Scepter entailed upon David's Family in the Kingdom of Judah Yet two things are remarkable in the designation of Saul and David 1. That after the Divine Unction the People assemble and in a general Assembly by their Votes freely chose them and voluntarily submit and without Election they could not actually and effectually Reign This doth signify that there can be no orderly or lasting Government without consent tacit or express of the People For Men must be Governed as rational and free for such they are as Men. This was the manner of investing the Kings of England For at the Coronation amongst other things this is done The King being before them one doth ask the People Will you have this Man to be King or Reign over you This is more fully expressed in the Form of Coronation which at present I have not by me and doth signifie that they should have the voluntary consent of the People 2. That if we may believe Fortescue the Kings of England had not Regiam potestatem sed politicam a populo effluxam 3. That they did not derive that Power from the first Investiture as Hereditary but in another way The second thing to be noted is That those Kings thus designed of God were bound to govern according to the moral judicial ceremonial Laws of God. This implies that no Princes should govern by an arbitrary Power but according to Laws and them so wise so just as that they may be truly said to be rather the Laws of God than of Men. Acquiritur modo ordinario inchoative in constitutione per liberam electionem vim armorum ex causa justa section 3 God doth seldom use this extraordinary and more immediate designation for his usual way is by ordinary providence and that first in the beginning and Constitution of a Government the Foundation whereof may be laid in Peace or War. In Peace power is acquired by a free election of a Sovereign and singling out some person or persons to whom they will submit themselves Sometimes it is determined that all jointly should be Sovereign and every single person a subject This is the best most just and the wisest way and most agreeable to man as a rational Creature The parties whether one or more before their designation had no civil power at all but upon the designation when they are once agreed upon declared and submitted unto they must by divine institution of necessity have so much power as is necessary for the Government and general good of the People This Power which is now acquired is Majestas and is more from God than Man because it is a Power to do such things as God commands or such as are not contrary to his Will. In the first modelling of a State they may either compose one of their own invention or take example from some other Common-wealth and take the whole or some part and make it their own Thus the foundation of the Roman State was first laid by Romulus who in this work followed the Greeks in many things as Halicarnassaeus tells us Antiq. Rom. lib. 2. In this case whatsoever kind of State is constituted there must be some invested with Majesty personal which by the free Election and voluntary Submission of the parties who are free and have power to make this Election and Submission it is communicated and so acquired But if upon a Victory obtained by a just and necessary War a people is reduced under the power of the party conquering and they upon certain terms submit the power is acquired by the Sword and their voluntary Submission which they would not have made if they had not been Conquered And they who formerly were a free people and would have chosen another or continued under their own personal Sovereign if before the War they were under a form of Government do submit because neither they nor their Sovereign can protect them And if they be brought so low that they must either subject themselves or do worse or perish they willingly come under the protection of the Conqueror if he be willing to protect them and take them as his Subjects Majesty acquired in this manner for the most part is more despotical and absolute And that Princes are divested of Majesty and People of Liberty and fall under the power of Strangers it 's from the just Judgment of God punishing them for their Crimes And this is a most common title of most Sovereigns in the World. Yet it may be said that the inward motives of the Conquerors of the Earth are Ambition or Covetousness or Cruelty therefore this kind of Title is not good The answer is That in respect of any one or more of all these motives it 's unjust Yet if we consider this Title as given by God in making them Victorious and rewarding them for the execution of Justice which they seldom think upon and also the consent of the people and their submission When they can do no better it 's certainly just What strange Instincts from Heaven what Commands from God what suggestions from Angels or God's Messengers or Prophets Conquerors might have we know not Jehu was anointed and designed by God to cut off Ahab's Family and had a promise afterward Judah also and many Nations were perswaded and in
and expedient aecording to the general Rules of order decency unity and edification according to that distinction of Laws into declarative and constitutive section 8 After Laws are made and established they must be put in execution otherwise though they be both wisely and justly enacted and in themselves very excellent yet they are in vain and to no purpose This cannot be done without Officers therefore there must needs be a power of making Church-Rulers Under this Head we must comprehend Election Examination Ordination Suspension Degradation and whatsoever concerns the making reforming or disposing of Offices When Canons are made Officers with power of jurisdiction be constituted yet all is to no purpose except they proceed to hear and finally determine all Causes and Controversies within their Spiritual jurisdiction Therefore there must be Jus jurisdictionis cum ultima provocatione Hitherto appertain all Ecclesiastical Tribunals Judges judicial proceedings the discussion of all causes within their Cognisance sentences of Authoritative admonition Suspension Excommunication Absolution and Execution of all Besides all these because the Church whilest on Pilgrimage towards her Heavenly City hath need of these earthly and temporal goods neither can the publick Worship of God or her Officers be maintained nor her poor Saints relieved without them therefore every particular Church should be furnished with a Revenue and have a kind of publicum aerarium of her own which is not to be disposed of according to the will and pleasure of any private person or persons But there must be a power as to make Officers for other things so for this particular to receive keep and dispense the Church's Treasure this of themselves without publick consent they cannot do Therefore though the making of Deacons belong unto the second part of this Independant power yet jus dispensandi bona Ecclesiae publica is a distinct power of it self Christ and his Apostles had a common purse Joh. 13.29 so had the Church Act. 6.1 2 3 c. For this end they had their Collections at set times 1 Cor. 16.1 2. This Treasury belonged to the Church not to the State and did arise from the free gifts of such as were of ability and well disposed before there was any Tenure in Franke Almoigne as afterwards there was section 9 Before I conclude this Point concerning power lest instead of a well-composed body I make an indigested lump of heterogeneous stuff I will enquire how far it doth extend what be the limits wherewith it 's bounded what measure and degrees thereof a particular Church as such by Scripture-Charter may challenge For this purpose we may take notice of the subject of Power which is primary or secondary In the primary it 's primitive total supreme In the secondary it 's derivative partial and subordinate The power in both is the same essentially yet in the one as in the Fountain in the other as in several Channels This seems to be intimated by that submission required by the Apostle unto the King as supreme or unto Governours sent by him 1 Pet. 2.13 14. The King is Emperour who was the immediate subject of Supremacy Governours were Presidents and Vicarii Magistratus who are the instruments of the supreme as principal in government Coincident with this seems to be that distinction so frequent with Mr. Parker inter statum exercitium According to which he defines the government of the Church quoad statum to be Democratical because the power of the Keys is in the whole Church which with him is a Congregation as in the primary subject But quoad exercitium to be Aristocratical in the Rulers who derive their power from Christ by the Church This shall be examined hereafter This difference of the primary and secondary subject is to be observed lest we make every one who hath power and is trusted with the exercise thereof the prime and immediate receptacle of Church-power from Christ which is not to be done section 10 In the second place we must repeat a distinction taken up in the beginning of this Treatise which may briefly be contracted in this manner Ecclesiae Regimen est Internum Externum Vniversale Particulare formale Objectivum The Internal is Gods. The external Universal as such Christ doth justly challenge The external particular formally and properly Ecclesiastical is committed to particular Churches The external particular materially considered is the Christian Magistrate's due because the matters of the Church in this respect are an object of his Civil Power That distinction of Cameracensis potestas est ordinis aut Regiminis the same with that of Biel and many other Schoolmen hath some affinity with this For the power of Order with them is the power of a Minister as an Officer under Christ of the Universal Church and is exercised in foro poenitentiali or interiori The power of Government and Prelation which Defensor pacis saith the Bishops had per accidens is the same with this external Government of the Church as exercised in foro exteriori Mat. 18. 1 Cor. 5. Rev. 2.2 or judiciali as they term it All the power of a particular Church is confined to matters Ecclesiastical as such in that particular community and is exercised only in foro exteriori This must needs be so because the internal Government of the Church which by the Word and Spirit immediately rules the conscience so as to cast the impenitent both soul and body into Hell belongs to God as God. The external government of the Universal Church as Universal is purely Monarchical under Christ in which respect all particular Churches are meerly subjects and no ways independant no nor governing section 11 Yet in the third place if this be not so manifest and satisfactory the point may be illustrated if we parallel the Government of the Church with that of Israel As that was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the Theocratie of Israel God was pars imperans and the absolute Monarch and reserved to himself the jura Majestatis For he made their Laws appointed their chief Officers Generals Judges he anointed their Kings proclaimed their Wars concluded Peace and received last Appeals Yet in many petty causes and matters of State and that often he trusted their Elders Officers and Princes and committed to them exercise of power and actual government And their Kings were but a kind of Vicarii Magistratus under him So Christ hath retained to himself the government of the universal Church as such as also the Legislative power of particular Churches in all Essentials and Necessaries and hath enacted general Statutes for Accidentals and Circumstantials He hath the principal power of making Officers for he determines how many kinds of necessary Officers there should be limits their power prescribes their qualification sets down their duty and gives them their Commission Their judicial proceedings run in his name and their sentence is so far valid on earth as he shall
therefore termed Despoticum herile Imperium And such a Monarch seems to be that which by Aristotle is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 There be Princes invested with Majesty who challenge the Legislative power unto themselves will by a Proclamation or Edict command the goods of their Subjects and imprison their persons at will and pleasure These though they be limited by the fundamental Constitution and their Oaths are in the exercise of their power as absolute as the former This kind of Government may do well where the Subjects are turbulent insolent and unruly or of a base and servile spirit or rude and savage But where the people are ingenuous tractable and of a better disposition it 's very unreasonable for it will either cause Rebellions and Seditions or much debase their spirits This kind of Monarchy is apt to degenerate into a Tyranny of one person Yet if this kind of Sovereign be wise just and vertuous the people may live happily under his protection Yet such a power and so unlimited is not fit to be trusted in the hands of every one And if it be hereditary woe to the people that live under it Yet this power may be trusted in the hands of one yet so as that it may be allayed limited and justly and wisely poised and the Sovereign as a King. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Hebrew signifies a Governor in general 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek is a word of great latitude and so is Rex in Latin and also Sultan in the Arabick and Mauritanian Language Yet some are such imperious Dictators and Masters of words that the word King must needs signifie an absolute Monarch That it often signifies a Monarch and one that hath the title of Majesty there is no doubt But the bare word or title not distinctly inform us of the power or the manifold differences of Kings which must be known another way as by the constitution of those particular States where the chief and most eminent Governours have that title For there is a great difference and that in respect of power between the Kings of Spain and France and the Kings of Poland Swethland and Denmark Neither doth the King of England in this respect exactly agree with any of them But if the word cannot the definition surely of a King should determine his power Yet neither will the common usual definition do it For thus he is commonly defined A King is a Monarch who governeth free men justly according to the Laws to the good of the Common-wealth The Genus is that he is a Monarch And if such in strict senc◠as such he can have neither Superiour nor Peer in his Kingdom The specifical difference is taken from the Subject the rule the end of his Government For his proper act is Regere to govern The subjects of his Government are Freemen The Rule is just Laws The end the publick good Abstract the specifical difference and lay the word King and Monarch aside and it agrees to all Governours Civil whatsoever For Civil government being grounded upon the eternal moral Law Love thy Neighbour as thy self and more particularly upon the fifth Commandment no person or persons invested with Sovereign power can be defined any other way and neither their power nor the exercise thereof is good further than it agrees with this definition And the more their government swerves from this Rule the more of the Tyrant is in them and if the violation of it be more than their observation and that habitually too then they are really Tyrants in exercitio For denominatio fit a parte praedominante But I have wondred why Authors have made this the specifical difference of a King which certainly it cannot be Yet this definition leaves many things doubtful For it determines not what liberty is and whether it can be perfect without propriety Nor doth it tell us what these Laws are according to which he must govern whether the Laws of God only or the Laws also of men and if of men whether the Laws of constitution or administration if of administration whether they must be made by himself alone or by some others without him or with him For if the Laws be made by him alone he is an absolute Despotical Sovereign if by others either with him or without him he is not such For there may be a King at least in name above Law and a King by Law and such as cannot command or bind the meanest Subject nor judge him but according to Law. Such a King is not a pure Monarch which I now treat of Therefore a King that is a pure Monarch differs from a Despotical Sovereign in respect of his Subjects and the measure of his power and according to this definition in the exercise of it The Subjects of the one are free and have propriety of person and goods the Subjects of the other have neither The power of the one is more absolute and of larger extent or rather more intensive The exercise of the power of the one is bounded by just Laws the power of the other is not limitted or directed by Laws and so tends not so much to advance the weal of his Subjects as his own greatness and in this respect can be no lawful and good Governour if he act according to his absolute and arbitrary power which God never gave him And Despotical Sovereigns if wise and just will do as Trajan did that is act according to the Rule of Justice and of a limitted power though they be not bound by man to do so section 6 An absolute and pure Monarchy is a very dangerous form of Government and very inclinable and propense to Tyranny and such a Sovereign as is invested with such transcendent power degenerates and turns Tyrant Experience in all times and places makes this evident Monarchy indeed in some respects is the best Government Yet such is the imperfection and corruption of man that it proves not to be so If Monarchs were like God or Saints and Angels it might be better But in a succession whether elective or hereditary we find in tract of time few good many bad and very wicked In Israel the first King was not right the fourth too bad and after the Kingdom was divided into the Tribe of Israel and Judah in Judah we find few like David many very wicked in the Kingdom of Israel not one good Yet the Laws both Civil and Ecclesiastical were made to their hands and that by God himself Sovereign power is a weighty burthen and requires much strength and excellent abilities Moses himself cannot bear it alone he hath need of one hundred and Seventy Elders and the same endued with the spirit of government to be his assistants If a Sovereign be imprudent or weak of understanding not able to judge of good counsel or negligent or timorous or wilful or destitute of good Agents and Instruments for Administrations the Government begins to
of the name few know because they little understand the thing It 's not called so as many think because the Jura Majestatis are divided and given some to the Peers some to the people and some in some States to the Prince For this tends to confusion and doth not well suit with the Nature of Sovereign Power Therefore it 's the cause of many Quarrels and Dissentions But it 's called mixt because either three or at least two of the States are mixt together so as that the Sovereignty is jointly in them all and in the whole and of these there are two Sorts For some time there is no Prince in the Administration and then it 's in the Commons and the Peers not in Peers and in Commons severally but in both jointly Sometimes it 's in omnibus in Prince Peers Commons Yet these in the Administration may have their several parts and different manners of acting Therefore we must not judge of States according to the manner of Administration though the Administration will give great light and help us to understand the Constitution This kind of Government is called a Free State a popular State a Republick or the Republick and may be the best State of all others where Majestas is tota in toto yet there may be several kinds of this manner of Government which by the Philosopher as some think is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Polity Machiavel informs us That Experience of the Inconveniencies of pure States put men on work to find out this and for the most part it may be so If either of the two or any of the three States be predominant in the Administration the State is denominated from the prevailing part For where the Prince hath the Title of King and is predominant in the Exercise of the Power it 's called a Kingdom or Monarchy where the Peers it 's an Aristocraty where the Commons a Democraty and yet if it be a right mixture it can be none of these And in this particular many are deceived For where the whole Power is wholly in the whole there Populus that is King Peers and Commons are the proper subject of Majesty in the Constitution by and in which if any be predominant it cannot be a Free State. Such a Government the German Empire and the State of Venice seem to be Yet in this latter the great Council which some tell us consists of Peers is counted and judged to have the supream Power Yet if we may believe Machiavel the Families out of which they are chosen were at the first Constitution the whole People The Lacedaemonian State is thought by many to be mixt and some say the mixture was ex Democratia praedominante Aristocratia diminuta yet this is very improper and cannot be true The State of Rome seems in the time of the Kings to be a Monarchy After that an Aristocraty in the Senate and the Patricii But when Plebs did jubere Leges then it was a Democraty in the judgment of many Yet upon diligent search it will be found otherwise For though the King was the chief Pontiff and did call the Assemblies had the chief and sole command in War for they gave him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet Halicarnassaeus lets us know That this Form was taken from the Lacedaemonians where the Kings had not absolute Power they were not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but were limitted by their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or great Council and amongst the Romans by their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is their Senate They must not do what they will but what the Senate did determine Yet we shall often find this mixture very imperfect or very much altered in tract of time from what it was at first To say nothing of Platonick and Vtopian Commonwealths which are not practicable nor people capable of them the summ of all this Head is this That God hath given to Men in their several Communities a power to protect the Just and punish Offenders according to wise Laws and just Judgment and also a power to preserve themselves and justly maintain their own Right against all Enemies and Invaders Yet he hath left them at Liberty to dispose of it several ways and trust it in the hands of one or more who if they once take it upon them must exercise it and be just For he that ruleth over men must be just ruling in the fear of God 2 Sam. xxxiij 3 section 10 After 1. The generals premised 2. The several ways and manners of disposing Majesty in a certain subject handled I proceed to say something of the Constitution of the State of England which hath long been governed by Kings and Parliaments There was indeed a time even after the Saxons were setled in this Nation when there was no King but Forty Lords who at length chose a King which should have no Peer And there was a time when there were many Kings And after that we find one King and Parliaments and this before the Conquest For this model of ours began in the time of the Saxon Kings and was brought to perfection some say before some say in Edward the Confessor's time What the power of these Parliaments and of these Kings were is the great Question For that once known the Constitution will be evident There was a Power of Kings and also of Parliaments severally and a power of them jointly considered we find the real Majesty in the People and personal Majesty in King and Parliament jointly and a secondary personal Majesty sometimes greater sometimes less in the Kings in the intervals of Parliament But to observe a method and proceed more distinctly I will 1. Presuppose some things 2. I will say something of the Kings 3. Something of the Parliaments severally 4. Something of them both jointly 1. Therefore I will suppose the Government of England to have been by King and Parliament before the Conquest and to have continued so till our days And whosoever will not grant this must either be very ignorant or very partial 2. I will take for granted That there have been extraordinary cases wherein the Rules of the Constitution either have not or could not be observed 3. This is also true that sometimes when they might have been followed yet either the constitution of the Parliament or the carriage of the Kings was such as that they have violated the same 4. Wise and intelligent men will not deny but that in our days the Government was so altered and corrupted that the first constitution was hardly known and it was a difficult thing either to reform it or reduce it to the ancient form section 11 These things supposed in the second place I will examine 1. How the King acquires his power 2. What his power acquired is 3. How far it 's short of a plenary personal Majesty 1. The manner of acquiring this Power and Title is either by deriving it from the first investiture or
by inheritance or election For the first investiture I find none to insist upon it though the rule of investing if there be any should be sought in the fundamental Charter If the Crown be hereditary to the Kings and they have it as their own Fee they may dispose of it and of themselves appoint their Successor whom they please and King Henry 8. might without any Act of Parliament have designed by will which of his Children should succeed him And Queen Elizabeth might have nominated either the King of Scots or any other besides him for her Successor Some may demand what right she had to nominate or any other after her death to proclaim her Successor One answer to this demand may be That her wise Council did forsee that this was an effectual if not the only way to prevent greater mischiefs and effusion of blood which in all probability might have followed if this course had not been taken And in an extraordinary case some extraordinary thing tending to the publick good may lawfully be done Yet this is not to be made an ordinary rule and followed as an ordinary Example A third way of acquisition is by election and consent of the people Thus the first King as the Mirrour tells us in express words was elected So were the Saxon Kings till Edward the Confessor the last King of the Saxon Race So was William the second Henry the first Stephen John. The manner and form of the Coronation which contains in a few words much of the Constitution determines the Succession to be by Election Those words of Fortescue to the Prince Non habes potestatem regiam sed a populo effluxam imply so much The Conqueror himself who as a Bastard could not inherit the Crown confesseth that he possessed not the Crown Jure haereditario To this purpose the old book of Caen is alledged These things are above me and out of my element therefore to be judged of by the learned Antiquaries in Law. But suppose it be granted to be elective yet it 's elective in a certain line for such hath been the practice for a long time which is conceived to be more convenient Yet the Author of the due Rights of the Kingdom saith That if a King had such Children so qualified and so educated that they were above others in virtue wisdom and true worth or at least caeteris pares they were the most likely Candidates for the Crown section 12 But let the manner of acquiring this regal Power be either by and from the first investiture or by inheritance or by election the second point and the same of more importance is to know what this power once acquired and possessed is For the Roman Emperors acquired their power by election and yet it was absolute as is pretended and very great And here I do not intend to say any thing of his excellent Dignity his Scepter Sword Throne Crown Robe Titles the Honour due unto them for these are not so material as the Prerogatives of the King of England Prerogatives saith Sir Roger Owen are the Flowers which by time immemorial the Commons of this Realm have granted the Kings thereof If this be true he hath no Prerogatives but such as are granted him and that by the Commons of England But Judge Crook is no flatterer he speaks plainly and saith he knows no Prerogatives the King hath but this that he cannot do wrong This may be understood either as it agrees to all Sovereigns or as to the Kings of England in a more special manner It 's true that no Sovereign though absolute and Despotical can do wrong For Id quisque potest quod jure potest The meaning is they ought not to do wrong for to do wrong is contrary to the Laws of God whereby they hold their Crowns and also to the very end for which God instituted civil Government Yet there is a more special reason why the Kings of England can do no wrong because they are Kings by Law they cannot bind by their personal commands but by their Regal which are not Regal if not Legal Again he doth all things like an Infant in his minority by his Ministers of State to whom he can grant no Power or Commission to act but according to Law. Therefore if any wrong be done as much is it 's done by them and they not the King are chargeable with it and questionable for it Yet he hath power and great power and it 's not the less but rather the greater and more like unto Gods because it 's limitted by Law. He Summons Parliaments makes Officers conferrs Honours sends and receives Embassadors and gives them answer makes Leagues with other States and other things formerly mentioned when I spake of the second king of personal Majesty Yet if we may believe Bracton he hath all this from the Law. For Lex facit Regem and he is but trusted with the exercise of it for the protection of the people and the execution of the Laws in which respect it seems to follow that if the Law be above him they who make the Laws must needs be above him section 13 But in the third place though the King hath great power yet there is some power in the Kingdom which he hath not For he cannot abolish Parliaments he cannot refuse to call them either when the Laws or the ardua Regni require them he cannot exercise the Militia but according to the Laws neither can he make or repeal Laws without the Parliament he cannot command the Purse he cannot alienate the Crown or the Crown-Revenue nor dispose of the Crown as his own hereditary Fee divers other things there are above his power Yet the Kings of England have challenged and exercised far greater power than the Laws and Constitution gives them But that was matter of fact and cannot found a Right We read that King Richard the second was charged as with other things so with these two 1. That he said the Laws were in his head and his breast that is he had the Legislative power solely to himself 2. That he denied to approve the Laws made by the Parliament that is he challenged a negative Voice In both these Arnisaeus undertakes to maintain his cause as just and that he did but challenge his due Lib de authoritate principum in populum semper inviolabili Cap. 4. Yet all his whole answer is but petitio principii For presupposing the King of England to be an absolute Monarch which we know he is not he takes upon him to answer the whole charge which he might easily do if he take for granted that which he can never prove nor English Men especially Antiquaries in Law will never grant him that he wrote against Rebellion and Treason and maintained the just and lawful authority of Princes he did well but that he should write as a Pensioner to the King and so presumtuously judge of the Constitution of a Foreign
State whereof he was sufficiently ignorant we English Men cannot well brook So Bodin being informed by Dellus who I think was Sir Thomas Dale a prudent and experienced Statesman and far better acquainted with the Government of his own Country than he was that the Kings of England could not make or repeal a Law without but only by the Parliament he wondred and notwithstanding his Information he presumptuously determines the Kings of England to be absolute Monarchs So much he doated upon his imperfect notion of Majesty and absolute Power Mr. Cambden though a learned Antiquary yet not in the common Law speaks doubtfully in this point and doth not well though perhaps prudently express himself His words are Quod Rex habet supremam potestatem merum imperium apud nos Yet afterwards speaking of our Courts he gives to the Parliament the supreme and sacred power in making conferring repealing and interpreting the Laws and in all other things which concern the good of the State. If he meant that the King had it jointly with the two Houses it 's tolerable yet if so 1. His former expression was not good 2. Neither is that latter assertion of his when he saith the Parliament is summon'd ad arbitrium Regis when the King pleaseth section 14 But let 's go to the Parliament where we shall find the King again and when we come there we must consider 1. What it is 2. What power it hath 3. What power it hath not 1. To give a perfect definition of it is above my skill neither is it within the sphear of my profession ancient Parliament-men and especially learned Antiquaries in the common Law know it best Mr. Cambden gives a tolerable description of it It 's a Representative of all England invested with the highest power of Legislation and all other acts that concern the common good This is the substance of the matter though not given in his express terms And here I will not say any thing of their Election Incorporation manner of proceeding after it 's once constituted and begins as a formal Parliament to act Some have conceived it to be one of the most orderly Assemblies in the World which is an argument of the great wisdom of our Ancestors who first molded it and brought it to perfection yet it may be corrupted and ill constituted and then Corruptio optimi est pessima The Election in our times is not well ordered for if it were the very quintessence of the wisdom and virtues of all England might be extracted united and act in that Convention But men are ready through want of understanding to undo themselves by choosing insufficient and unworthy persons The first constitution certainly required a qualification in the persons to be Elected For we trust them much even with our Estates Liberty Lives and Religion for the outward profession It 's not fit to trust these in the hands of any sort of Men but such as shall be wise faithful just and sincerely affecting the publick good The Saxon name Wittena Gemote implies this for it signifies the meeting of wise men and is the abridgement of all the Folk-motes in England and of the wisdom of all England and now of all England Wales Scotland Ireland If they should be wise men wisdom includes all virtues If we consider this great body as distinct from the King it 's said to consist of two Houses which some call the upper and the lower This the Commons did not like did not acknowledge The two Houses or the House of Commons and the House of Peers may be tolerable and I do not know they ever excepted against the expressions Many ungrateful and unworthy persons to their own wrong and prejudice have much depressed the House of Commons and are not ashamed to say such is their ignorance that it is but of late standing Yet it 's the chief part and almost the whole Representative the Peers to them are but inconsiderable Whatsoever is concluded there doth most concern them and the heaviest burden lies on them And though by Commons some may understand only the Plebeian Rank yet there we find in that House men of as good Birth Estates and as eminent vertues as many of the Lords be What the House of Commons is may be more easily known but the nature of the House of Lords is somewhat hidden For in it we find Lords Spiritual as Abbots Bishops and these by Tenure we find in it also Lords Temporal as Dukes Marquesses Earls Viscounts Barons And all these under the name of Lords Peers Barons though Bárones Proceres Nobiles do sometimes signifie other persons For we read of the Barons of the Cinque-ports Barons of the Exchequer the eight Barons of Cheshire and the Barons of Burford in Shropshire We find Peers sometimes taken in another sence and to include the Commons And the truth is if the whole assembly be considered as one Representative they are all Peers and in all acts should be taken so to be These Peers become such three ways as I observed in my answer to Mr. Hobb's For they are aut Foedales aut rescriptitii aut diplomatici Barons by Tenure and ancient prescription since the time of William the Elder or by Writ or by Patent It is not for me to debate much less to determine the Controversies about these Lords as 1. Whether they be essential parts in a distinct House from the Commons of the Parliament or no seeing Acts and Ordinances and the same valid are said to be made without these Lords not any by the Lords without the Commons 2. What these Lords may do or for what end they are called For some say they sit there as Judges of the King together with the Commons For though the King in his Politick capacity cannot do wrong yet in his Personal he may This Horne and Bracton with other of the old Lawyers will tell us in whom we may read of the Torts and wrongs done by the King and of judging him as also the Queen and the Prince 3. Seeing by the Writ of Summons they are called to deliberate and consult Consilium impensuri not ad faciendum consentiendum as the Commons are whether they be there only as the King's Counsellors 4. Suppose them to be the King's Counsellors whether they be such without or with the Commons 5. Whether they have any share in the Legislative power or if they have whether in the same House or in a distinct House and Body with a negative to the Commons or not 6. When this transmitting of Bills to the House of Lords began which some say to be after the Barons Wars For it was not so from the beginning 7. Whether the Lords and not the Commons have power to administer an Oath We read in Sir H. Spelman's Glossary in the word Baro that no Barons were called to the Parliament but such as held of the King in Capite 2. That all
these were not called but the chief of them as Earls who possessed twenty Knights Fees and Barons which had to the value of thirteen Knights Fees and a third part of one 3. That because these were too many some of them were call'd to Parliament some omitted and only such as were called were counted Barons the rest not 4. This being taken ill the Barons caused King John adigere to covenant under the Broad Seal to summon severally by so many Writs the Arch-Bishops Abbots Earls and the greater Barons of the Kingdom 5. Yet Henry the Third so little regarded that compact that he called and kept a Parliament with an hundred and twenty Spiritual and only twenty five Temporal Lords though he had numbred two hundred and fifty Baronies in England 6. Edward the First omitted divers of those whom Henry the Third had summoned So that it will be a very difficult thing to rectifie or reduce unto the first institution this House as distinct from that of the Commons For it should be known 1. What kind of persons must constitute this other House 2. What their Priviledges be 3. What they must do which the House of Commons may not must not do section 15 By all this something of the nature of the Parliament may be known But then what is the power of this assembly either severally considered without the King or jointly with the King And that they may make Orders and Ordinances pro tempore will be granted and also which is far more if the King have no Negative voice the Legislative and Judicial power is in them and their ultimate Resolves and Dictates in all matters of Counsel must stand And if so then reason will conclude that if the King refuse to be personally or virtually present and to act with them they may do any thing for the good of the Kingdom without him which they may do jointly with him Yet because Laws and Judgment are ineffectual without execution therefore the King being trusted with the execution was required to give his consent that he might take care of the Execution For to that end was he trusted with the Sword of Justice and War that he might protect the people and see that Laws and Judgments be executed If we consider the Parliament as consisting of King Peers and Commons jointly it is the first subject of Personal Majesty and to it and it alone belongs all the Jura Majestatis personalis They have the power Legislative Judicial Executive to exercise it in the highest degree and may perform all acts of administration as distinct from the Constitution They are the highest assembly for Legislation the highest Counsel for advice the highest Court for Judicature section 16 This is the power of the Parliament which can do many and great things yet some things they cannot do for they are limitted not only by the Laws of God but also by the Laws of the Constitution Sir Roger Owen tells That the Parliament cannot do all things For 1. Many Acts are Voted for errors in matter of fact and for contrariety in words and sometimes they have idle and flattering proviso's 2. A Parliament hath not power to ordain that a Law shall not be abrogated for the space of twenty years for a latter Parliament may repeal their Acts. 3. That a Parliament cannot Enact that if there were no Heir to the Crown that the people should not be able to chuse a new King. 4. It cannot change the form of our Policy from a Monarchy to a Democraty 5. It cannot take away divers Prerogatives annexed to the Crown of England or that the King should not be able to dissolve the Parliament at will and pleasure yet in another place he tells us that he cannot dissolve the Parliament at will and pleasure and again he is not above the Parliament because he cannot be above himself and in Parliament he is Maxime Rex He further informs us that the common Law is the King's Inheritance and how the Parliament may wither away the Flowers of the Crown The true reason why the Parliament cannot do some of these things nor others not mentioned by him is because they have not real but personal Majesty They cannot alter the Government nor take away divers things belonging to the Crown because they did not give the Prerogatives of the Crown at the first the Commons of the Realm gave them as he confesseth The form of Government was first constituted by the Community of England not by the Parliament For the Community and people of England gave both King and Parliament their being and if they meddle with the Constitution to alter it they destroy themselves because they destroy that whereby they subsist The Community indeed may give a Parliament this power to take away the former Constitution and to frame and model another but then they cannot do this as a Parliament but as trusted by the people for such a business and work nay they may appoint another assembly of fewer or more to do such a work without them They may set up a Consilium sapientum which may determine what matters are fit to be proposed to the Parliament and in what order and also contrive a Juncto for all businesses which require expedition and secrecy which may act without them whether the Parliament it self can do such things or no may justly be doubted What may be done in extraordinary cases is one thing what may be done in an ordinary way another When he saith that the Parliament cannot change the form of Policy from a Monarchy he presupposeth our State of England to be a Monarchy yet if he distinguish not between the Constitution and the administration he may be guilty of an error For it 's not a Monarchy but only in respect of the Executive part in the Intervals of Parliaments Our Ancestors abhorred absolute and arbitrary Monarchs therefore before they did establish a King they made a bridle to keep him in and put it upon him This is plain from Bracton Fortescue the Coronation Oath and the Mirror section 17 From all this we may conjecture what the Constitution of England was It was no absolute Monarchy that 's plain enough Neither was it a State of pure disposition but mixt Neither were the Jura Majestatis divided some to the King some to the Lords some to the Commons it was of a far better mould The personal Majesty primary was in King Peers and Commons jointly in the whole assembly as one body this may appear several ways as 1. From this that it was a Representative of the whole Nation and as it was a general Representative of all England and no ways else was it invested with this personal Sovereignty It must represent the whole Community all the Members thereof of what rank or condition soever not only the Laity but the Clergy too these are words used in our Laws and good enough though disliked by
and do yet condemn them both in Words and Writings as guilty of most horrible Treason and Rebellion which others will undertake to prove the censurers themselves deeply guilty of Wise and learned Men no whit inferior to them do certainly know that as they could not maintain their cause by dint of Sword so neither can they make it good by dint of Argument One of their learned Casuists delivers this as a positive truth That to disobey a lawful Sovereign is such an act as that no circumstances can make it lawful no not the Glory of God nor the saving of many Souls nor preventing the Ruine of a Nation This is high Divers who read this in his Books conceive that in this he toucheth the Cause and Controversie between King and Parliament I cannot charge him with any such thing But let his Application be what it will I will consider his Proposition in it self and will suppose it to be grounded upon that divine Maxime We must not do evil that good may come For that which God hath made sin nothing can make lawful But then the Question is What he means by Sovereign what by disobedience to a lawful Sovereign If he mean by Sovereign one invested with supream Power and an absolute Monarch it 's clear enough the Kings of England were not such For 1. They had no Legislative Power which is the greatest without this Parliament 2. That his personal Commands bound no Man for he could command nothing but according to the just Laws and Customs quas vulgus elegerat 3. The late King himself in his Answer to the Nineteen Propositions confessed That the Parliament had a share in the Legislative Power It 's true they had the Title of Sovereign and Majesty but in another sence than many take it As for the second Term Disobedience it might be twofold 1. In respect of absolute Sovereigns 2. In respect of the Kings of England In respect of the former a lawful Sovereign may command unlawful things and contrary to the Laws of God and in this case their Commands may nay must be disobeyed 1. If they command things lawful in themselves yet they may command them so as to be unlawful A man is bound to love Father and Mother by the Law of God and to do so is not only lawful but necessary Yet if this love come in competition with the love of Christ it 's plainly unlawful Therefore I will be so charitable as to think he understood the proposition of disobedience to lawful Commands of lawful Sovereigns otherwise he saith nothing but his proposition is false 2. In respect of the Kings of England their Commands are personal or legal His legal Commands if agreeable to the Laws of God ought to be obeyed and his Subjects are bound to submit unto his legal Power for other Power as King he hath none But as for his personal Commands they bind no Subject as a Subject and if they be contrary to the Law in obeying them we may be guilty of Disobedience to the Law nay of Disobedience to the King as King nay guilty of Treason against the Kingdom and the Kings Crown and Dignity And methinks such learned Men should not be ignorant of these things section 20 As for the Parliament it was charged with taking upon them the Militia seising upon the Navy securing the Ports making of a new Broad Seal creating of Officers abolishing of Episcopacy and Liturgy established by Law by which they lost many of their Subjects calling in the Scots proposing a Covenant to the people upon high terms and many other things and all these without the King nay contrary to the King's Command who had so graciously condescended unto them in granting many things unto them prejudicial as he thought to his Prerogatives and the ancient Rights of his Predecessours especially the Acts of continuance and of the Triennial Parliament 1. For the Militia it was alledged The King promised it and the Lawyers and learned Counsel informed them That if the King in such a time should neglect it they might take it and exercise it themselves without him and it 's reported that the very same parties who had given this Advise to the Parliament after they were come unto the King did counsel him to set on foot the Commission of Array in opposition to the Parliament's Militia 2. For seizing the Navy Ports and creating of Officers in a Declaration of the Lords and Commons upon the Treaty at Oxford is shewed the necessity of doing so and the antiquity of that practice for they instance in many Parliaments which have done the like and more too It was no new thing And though his Majesty affirmed these things were his by Law yet it was not his but by way of trust for the defence not the destruction of the Kingdom 3. For the Broad Seal there was a necessity of making a new one seeing that the former was surreptitiously against Law and Right carried and conveyed away Neither had the King as separate and divided from the Parliament any right unto it 4. The abolishing of Episcopacy and Liturgy is conceived might be justly charged upon the Scots who when the King and so many great Ones had deserted the Parliament would not firmly adhere unto them but upon such terms Otherwise the reformation of Bishops and Book of Common-prayer was far more for the Protestant interest than Presbytery which was rather inconsistent with it 5. The calling of the Scots was said to be done in extremity and grounded upon the National League according to which they were bound of themselves to have assisted the Parliament as some thought and judged 6. The Covenant is said to be more from the Scot than the English and what the design of the first Contrivers in it might be was known to few who took it It proved to be of bad consequence whether in respect of the nature of the Covenant or some other cause may be doubted for the Parliament of Scotland thought it a sufficient ground for Duke Hambleton to invade England and the English House of Commons judged them Rebels and Traitors who should joyn with him or assist Such is the frailty inconstancy and pravity of men 7. As for the high demands of the Parliament it 's alledged No King ever did such things or gave occasion to make such demands and he did but grant that which was reasonable and necessary for the time and less than former Laws required so that except as separated from the Parliament he was an absolute Monarch his denial of their demands was not consistent with the Constitution of the Kingdom section 21 But after that the Royal party was totally subdued there falls out a subdivision amongst the Anti-Royalists For they who could agree against a third Party could not agree amongst themselves For they began to play Scotch and English first and then the Presbyterian who much though not in all things inclined to the
New Testament where it s used a hundred and eleven times at least and in all these places signifies an Assembly or Society Religious except in Acts 19.32 39 41. where it signifies both a tumultuous and also an orderly Assembly or Society or Convention as a civil Court of Judgment which signification is here applied by our Saviour to a Spiritual Judicatory for Spiritual Causes Though this be a special signification yet it signifies the number and Society of Believers and Disciples who profess their Faith in Christ exhibited and this is this Church-Christian and the People of God. Yet it signifies this People under several Notions as sometimes the Church of the Jews sometimes of the Gentiles sometimes the Universal Church sometimes particular Churches sometimes the Militant Church either as visible or mystical sometimes the Church Triumphant sometimes a Church before any form of Government be introduced sometimes under a form of Government so it 's taken and supposed by our Saviour here Grotius his Conceit that our Saviour in these words alludes to the manner of several Sects Professions as of Pharisees Sadduces Essenes who had their Rules of Discipline and their Assemblies and Convention for the practice of them may be probable Yet without any such Allusion the place is plain enough from the context and other Scriptures Erastus upon the place is intollerable and most wofully wrests it so doth Bishop Bilson in his Church-Government and is point-blank contrary to D. Andrews who in his Tortura Torti doth most accurately examine interpret and apply the words and most effectually from thence confute Bellarmine One may truly say of that Book as he himself said of Austin's Treatise De Civitate Dei it was opus palmarum For Civil Common Canon-Law Politicks History School Learning the Doctrine of the Casuists Divinity and other Arts whereof he makes use it is one of the most learned and accurate of any put forth in our times By his Exposition of this Text he utterly overthrows the immediate Jus Divinum of Episcopacy in matters of Discipline and Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction He plainly and expresly makes the whole Church the primary subject of the Power of the Keys in foro exteriori Therefore suppose the Bishops were Officers by a Divine Right as he endeavours to prove tho' weakly in his Letters to Du Moulin yet at best they can be but the Churches Delegates for the exercise of that Power And it is observable that divers of our Champions when they oppose Bellarmine's Monarchical Government of the Church peremptorily affirm the Power of the Keyes to be in the whole Church as the most effectual way to confute him yet when they wrote against the Presbyterian and the Antiprelatical party they change their Tone and Tune But to return unto the words of Institution 1. The word Church here signifies an Assembly 2. This Assembly is an Assembly for Religion 3. The Religion is Christian. 4. This Assembly is under a form of External Government 5. This Government presupposeth a Community and Laws and Officers Ecclesiastical These presupposed it 's a juridical Assembly or a Court. 6. Because Courts are Inferiour Superiour and Supream it signifies all especially Supream 7. It determines no kind of Government but that of a free State as shall more appear hereafter 8. Christ doth not say Dic Regi tell the Prince or State nor Dic Petro tell Peter or the Pope as though the Government should be Monarchical either Civil or Ecclesiastical nor Dic Presbytero tell the Elders nor Dic Apostolis Episcopis aut Archiopiscopis that the Government should be purely Aristocratical nor Dic Plebi that the Government should be purely Democratical nor Dic Synodo tell the Council general or particular But it saith tell the Church wherein there may be Bishops Presbyters some Eminent Persons neither Bishops nor Presbyters There may be Synods and all these either as Officers or Representatives of the Church and we may tell these and these may judge yet they hear and judge by a power derived and delegated from the Church and the Church by them as by her Instruments doth exercise her Power As the body sees by her eye and hears by the ear so it is in this particular but so that the similitude doth not run on four feet nor must be stretched too far This being the genuine Sense favours no Faction yet admits any kind of Order which observed may reach the main end For this we must know and take special notice of that Christ will never stand upon Formalities but requires the thing which he commands to be done in an orderly way Yet it 's necessary and his Institution doth tend unto it to reserve the chief Power in the whole Body otherwise if any party as Bishops or Presbyters or any other part of the Church be trusted with the power alone to themselves they will so engross it as that there will be no means nor ordinary jurisdiction to reform them Of this we have plain Experience in the Bishops of Rome who being trusted at first with too much Power did at length arrogate as their own and no ways derived from the Church and so refused to be judged For if the Church once make any party the primary subject of this power then they cannot use it to reduce them Therefore as it is a point of Wisdom in any State to reserve the chief power in the whole Community and single out the best and wisest to exercise it so as if the Trustees do abuse their power they may remove them or reform them so it should be done in the Church If any begin to challenge either the whole or the Supream power as Officers many of these nay the greater part of them may be unworthy or corrupted and then the Church is brought to straits and must needs suffer Some tell us that the King of England by the first Constitution was only the Supream and Universal Magistrate of the Kingdom trusted with a sufficient power to govern and administer the State according to the Laws and his chief work was to see the Laws executed Yet in tract of time they did challenge the power to themselves as their own and refused to be judged Yet in this Institution if Peter if Paul tho' Apostles do offend much more if Patriarchs Metropolitans Bishops Presbyters do trespass we must tell not Peter not Paul not an Apostle not a Bishop not any other but the Church No wit of Men or Angels could have imagined a better way nor given a better expression to settle that which is good and just and prevent all parties and factions and yet leave a sufficient latitude for several orderly ways to attain the chief end section 7 The Judge being known the Judicial Acts of this Judge must be enquired into in the fifth place and these are two the first is binding the second loosing For all Judgment passed upon any person is either against him and that is binding
Subject as a Subject The Question is therefore Whether he that is a Soveraign may not be in some case resisted by the people and if he may in what case a resistance is lawful and free from the guilt of Rebellion Our Case in England is extraordinary and not easily known by many of our own much less by strangers not acquainted with our Government The Resistance in the late Wars was not the first that was made against the Kings of England by the people of England though it differed from all the former The difference was between the King and Parliament whereof he was a part yet severing himself from the whole body And the Parliament was no Subject considered as a Parliament for then the King himself being an essential part thereof should be a Subject As he was divided willingly or wilfully from it he could be no King no Soveraign For if the power was in the King and Parliament joyntly it could not be in him alone Besides when there is no Parliament we know he is a King by Law and the Kingdom is Regnum pactionatum non absolutum If he make himself absolute by that very act he makes himself no King of England For the common and fundamental Law knows no such King. Yet this was all either he or his party could say to justifie themselves If he say the Militia was his the Parliament will say it 's theirs as well as his and except he be absolute it must needs be so For if the supream power be in King Peers and Commons joyntly the Militia which is an essential part of this power could not be his alone The Parliament conceived that when he left them he left his power with them if that could be made good by the Fundamental Constitution then all England was bound to subject to them for the time and obey their just Commands And if it were not so how could all such as took up Arms with the King against them be adjudged Traytors as they were If these things be so there could be no Rebellion upon the Parliaments side because according to the Rules the Parliament was no Subject the King then separated from the Parliament refusing to Act with them Acting and Warring against them was no Soveraign The Question in the time of those bloody and unnatural Dissentions was stated several ways as Whether it was Rebellion in Subjects Commissioned by the Parliament to resist evil Counsellours Agents Ministers of State and Delinquents sheltring themselves under the King as divided from the Parliament and acting against the Laws by his Commissions or Whether the Parliament of England lawfully Assembled where the King virtually is may by Arms defend the Religion established by the same Power together with the Laws and Liberties of the Nation against Delinquents detaining with them the Kings seduced person or Whether the Parliament might not grant a Commission to the Earl of Essex by a force to apprehend Delinquents about the King to bring them to a due Tryal and this even against the personal will of the King Or whether after the Parliament had passed a Judgment against the King they might not lawfully give Commission to General Fairfaxe to apprehend the Kings person and bring him to the Parliament or Supposing the King to be an Absolute Monarch whether any of these things could be done by any Commission from the Parliament as the Condition of the Kingdom stood at that time Thus and several ways was the Question then stated and debated But the Truth is that if the Fundamental Government be by King Peers and Commons joyntly and that neither the Parliament consisting of these three States nor the Parliament as distinct from the King nor the King as divided from the Parliament could alter this Constitution nor lawfully act any thing contrary unto it then so soon as the Commission of Array on one side and of the Militia on the other were issued out and were put in Execution the Subjects in strict sense were freed from their Allegiance And if they acted upon either side their actings were just or unjust as they were agreeable or disagreeable to the Fundamental Laws and the general and principal end of Government For even then their subjection to the Laws of God and Fundamental Constitution of the Kingdom did continue and they were even then most of all bound to endeavour with all their power the good and preservation of their Country bleeding and conflicting with the pangs of Death And in that cause no man was bound too scrupulously to observe the petty Rules of our ordinary administration which were proper for a time of Peace which could not help but hinder her recovery In such an extraordinary case many extraordinary things if not in themselves unjust might have been done to prevent her ruine And if the Parliament had gone at first far higher than they did they had prevented the ruin of the King the dis-inherison of His Children and very much effusion of blood which followed afterwards The business then was easie which afterwards became difficult and could not be effected but with the loss of many thousands and the hazard of themselves for their Cause at first was well resented and had many advantages but was much prejudicial by too much intermedling with Religion and making some alterations in the Church before the time section 9 The next Question is whether since the Commencement of the War there was any certain ordinary legal Power which could induce an Obligation or there was any such Power after the Wars was begun it continued after the War was ended till the secluding of the Members and upon that seclusion ceased The answer unto these two Questions seems not to be difficult For there neither was nor could be any such certain ordinary legal Power which could in the strict letter of the Law bind all English Subjects to subjection For during a Parliament this binding power is in King Peers and Commons joyntly in the Intervals of Parliament it s in the King acting according to the Laws of Administration But all this while nay to this day there is no such Parliament no such King. And both in the time of the Wars and after both King and Parliament acted not only above but contrary to many of our Laws which in the time of Peace are ordinarily observed Neither of them could give us any Precedent for many things done by them and those few Precedents alledged for some of their Actions were extraordinary and Acts of extraordinary times If the Counties and People of England had not been ignorant and divided the division of King and Parliament did give them far greater power than they or their Forefathers had for many years But it did not seem good to the Eternal Wise and Just Providence to make them so happy Punished we must be that was his sentence and punished we have been yet few of us receive correction or return to him that Smote us Some
is great danger to the Common-wealth therefore as every thing is armed with some power to defend it self so a sufficient strength is required in every political Body for to continue the safety thereof And this is a Sword not only of Justice but of War. This Sword of War especially cannot be well managed without a sufficient skill which cannot be had without instruction exercise and experience Hence the Art Military is not only useful but necessary in every well ordered State. One thing especially requisite in this profession is to have good Commanders men of valour and prudence able to lead and instruct others God himself would have Israel his own people a Warlike Nation Therefore after that he had given them possession of the Land of Canaan he left some certain Nations unsubdued only that the Generations of the Children of Israel might know how to teach them War at least such as knew nothing before of it Judg. 3.1 2. Those who lived in the times of Joshua were well experienced but the Generation following had no experience neither could they learn any without some Enemies constantly to exercise them Therefore though Wars be heavy Judgements yet it 's the will of God there should be warlike dissentions and that for many ends 1. To punish the wickedness of the World. 2. To let men know how sweet a blessing Peace is 3. To be a Nursery and School of breeding gallant men especially when he by them intends to do some great work In consideration of these things its good that any State in time of peace not only chuse Captains train Souldiers provide Arms but also send some into forraign Wars to learn experience Of this part of Institution as also of that of Learning you may read at large in Contzen Polit. lib. 4. lib. 10. Of the Laws of War Grotius may be consulted That some Wars are lawful especially such as are necessary and undertaken for our defence there 's no doubt and not only defensive but offensive arms may be justified out of the Holy Scriptures and from the Example of Abraham Joshua many of the Judges and David who were excellent Commanders under whom many gallant men served when God intended to ruin Judah he threatens to take away the mighty Man Esay 3.2 It 's a sad presage when the Gentry and Nobility of a Nation become vicious and effeminate and this was one cause of that heavy Judgment of God which many of them suffered in the late Wars Wherein England gained great skill and experience both by Sea and Land yet with the woful expence of much of her own blood And how happy had we been if so much valour had been manifested in the ruine of the Enemies of Christ and his Gospel Whosoever desires to understand more of this Subject as belonging to Politicks let him read Military Books If this be so necessary for the defence and safety of an earthly State how much more is the spiritual Militia necessary for the defence of our Souls section 18 There is another profession and the same useful for many things but in particular for to enrich the State it s that of Merchandise and Traffick These Merchants are of several sorts some deal in petty Commodities and sell by parcels some are for whole sale but the chiefest are such as are great Adventurers and Trade by Sea and Traffick with all Nations These are the great Monyed Men of the World who have great Princes and whole States their Debtors These furnish us with Rarities and Varieties of the Earth and enrich us with the Commodities of East and West South and North and the remotest parts of the World. These make new discoveries and might furnish us with many rare inventions Books and Arts but most intend rather private gain than publick good It were to be wished that our luxurious and wicked expences were turned another and better way to maintain Schollars in those Countries where they maintain Factours for the improvement of Learning and the propagation of Religion The King of Spain and the Jesuites are the only Politicians in this kind though it be a Question whether this profession be not derogatory to Nobility Yet King Solomon and Jehosaphat were Adventurers in Corporations and great Cities these Tradesmen and Merchants have their several Companies and their Orders and are called by some Systemes which cannot be well regulated without some Laws of the Soveraign power CHAP. XVI Of Subjects in an Ecclesiastical Politie section 1 OF subjection in general and subjection to a Civil Power I have spoken and because there is an Ecclesiastical power and subjection due unto it therefore order requires that I conclude the first part of Politicks with the explication of the nature of spiritual subjection and subjects This spiritual relation and duty arising from it presupposeth subjection 1. Absolute to God as Creatour and Preserver 2. To him as Redeemer 3. To Christ as Head and Universal Administratour of the Church and to him as having instituted an Ecclesiastical Discipline and promising to every particular Church using the Keys aright in their judical proceedings to be with them so as to make their judgment effectual and that what they bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven and what they loose on Earth shall be loosed in Heaven So that this subjection is due to the power of Christ in every particular visible Church For when a multitude of Christians associate and according to the Rules of Christ erect an independent Judicatory it s the duty of every one in that Association to submit unto it if he will be a Member of the same and enjoy the benefit of that external Government and by the very institution of Christ though there be no solemn Confederation they are bound so to do This subjection is different from that which is due from the people to their proper Pastours The power external of the Keys as you heard is 1. In the whole Church particular according to the extent as the primary subject of the same 2. In the Representative exercising this power 3. In the Officers The Representative is either general to which every particular person must submit or particular to which the particular Members of that Association and Division are bound to submit and none else Submission is due unto the Officers according to their intensive and extensive power and no further The Rule and Measure of this subjection are the special or general precepts of Christ and his Apostles and if a Church or its Representatives or Officers transgress these precepts they cannot justly challenge any submission as due unto them In this respect its necessary there should be Canons to regulate both the fundamental and also the derivative power and the same agreeable to the Gospel The want of these and the observation thereof may be an occasion if not a cause of separation whereof the Church it self may be guilty and will prove so to be This subjection ariseth from this
nascenti pagina Romae Ne vacet Egeriam consuluisse Numae Nôsset Sparta isthaec duro formata Lycurgo Secula mansisset quot stetit illa dies Nec tibi Parthenope gemino quater amplius anno Mutâsset dominos plebs malefida suos Nec sibi foedâsset fastos tam turpiter Anglus Mille per incertas mobilis usque vices Quam bene Lawsoni magni dignissimus haeres Nominis ille salo jura dat ipse solo Qui regnare doces qui parere libenter Imperium calami cedimus ecce tibi Te tantum genuit vicus brevis angulus orbis Langcliff nascenti conscia terra mihi Eborac invideant vel Athenae debeo plura Jam pro te patriae pro patriâque tibi J. Carr M. D. The Arguments of the several Chapters CHAP. I. THE Propriety of God acquired by Creation and continued by Preservation the ground of God's Supream Dominion and Power which is Vniversal over all Creatures more particular and special over Men and Angels who are capable of Laws Rewards Punishments not only Temporal but Eternal The exercise of this Power over men immediate or mediate Mediate in his Government by men over men is either Temporal and Civil or Spiritual and Ecclesiastical Of the Government Spiriritual before Christ's incarnation and after his Session at the right hand of God. Of the Church Christian Triumphant Militant Mystical Visible Vniversal Particular The particular parts of the Vniversal Church as visible the principal subject of the following Discourse Of our Differences and the Causes thereof of hope of better times and the Author's disposition and intention CHAP. II. Of a Community Civil What Politica is what a Common-wealth the subject of Politica What the parts of a Common-wealth what a Community in general which is the subject of a Common-wealth the name and nature of it Of a Community Civil the matter and the form thereof the Original of Civil Communities the members both natural and naturalized whether they be imperfectly or formally or eminently such The capacity of this Association to receive the form of a Civil Government Liberty Equality Propriety Adjuncts to this Community CHAP. III. Of an Ecclesiastical Community The Definition of it the explication of the Definition The distinction of the Members less or more perfectly such the manner of Incorporation Liberty Equality and aptitude to receive a form of Discipline Proprieties of this Society Where something concerning Children born of Christian Parents whether they be members of the Church or no. CHAP. IV. Of Power Civil The parts of Politica Constitution and Administration what Constitution is and what the parts of a Common-wealth both Civil and Ecclesiastical which are two 1. Soveraign 2. Subjects What Power in general what Power Civil what Supream Power or Majesty Civil the Branches thereof which are called Jura Majestatis the multitude of them reduced to order by several Writers and by the Author The Properties of Majesty which is real or personal What Soveraign real and personal may do The subject of Real Majesty in England the personal Majesty of the Parliament and of the King. CHAP. V. Of the Acquisition of Civil Power and the Amission thereof Civil Power not essential but accidental to any Person It 's acquired in an extrordinary or ordinary way In an ordinary way by consent or Conquest justly or unjustly as by Vsurpation Vsurpation no good Title The Person Vsurping Power at the first by subsequent consent may acquire a good Title Succession and the several ways of Succession Amission of Power by violence or voluntary consent or death Whether any can be made Soveraign by condition Whether Soveraign Power once acquired may be forfeited how and to whom the forfeiture may be made CHAP. VI. Of Power Ecclesiastical The Power is Spiritual not Civil Why it 's called the Power of the Keys as different from that of the Sword. Binding and loosing the same with shutting and opening and both belong chiefly to Legislation and Jurisdiction This Power is Supream and Independent in every particular Church constituted aright according to the Rules of the Gospel The Branches and several Acts of it as making of Canons the constitution of Officers Jurisdiction disposing of the Churches goods Of the extent and also the bounds of the Power Certain distinctions of Spiritual Government as Internal External Vniversal Particular Formal Material or Objective CHAP. VII Of acquiring or losing Ecclesiastical Power The just acquisition of this Power extraordinary in the highest measure as in Christ or in an inferiour degree as in the Apostles How ordinary Churches derive it from Christ by the Gospel-Charter in an ordinary way The Power of the Church and Church-Officers unequal The several ways of Vsurping and also of losing this Power CHAP. VIII Of the disposition of Power Civil from the several manners of which arise the several forms of Government General Observations premised The several ways of disposing Majesty or Supream Power in a State. Pure Forms Monarchies Despotical and Regal Pure Aristocracies and Democracies Mixt Governments when the Power is placed in the several States joyntly The Constitution of England Our Kings and their Title Peers Commons Parliaments and the limits of their Power The limits of the King 's personal Majesty Our late divisions and confusions Whether King or Parliament as separate could be justified by the fundamental constitution of England By what Rule the Controversie must be tried Whether Party at the first was more faithful to the English Protestant interest How the state of the Controversie altered The high and extraordinary actings of all Parties The good that God hath brought out of our Disorders and Confusions Whom God hath hitherto most punished What is to be done if we intend a Settlement of State and Church CHAP. IX Of the Disposition of Power Ecclesiastical and whether the Bishop of Rome be the first Subject of it under Christ. The many and great differences about the first subject of the Power of the Keys The Pope the Prince the Prelate the Presbyter the People challenge it as due unto them by a Divine Right Their several pretended Titles examined Whether that of the Bishop of Rome be good or valid His greatness state and pomp The opinions of some Authors concerning him The power he challengeth is Transcendent The reasons to prove his title taken from Politicks Ancient Writers the Scriptures The insufficiency of them though some may seem to prove the possession yet none make good the Title CHAP. X. Whether Civil Soveraigns have any right unto the power of the Keys Their power and advantage to assume and exercise this power Their power not spiritual but temporal The power of ordering Matters of Religion what it is and how it differs from the power of the Keyes Jus Religionis ordinandae rightly understood belongs to all higher Powers The Kings and Queens of England though acknowledged over all persons in all causes both Civil and Ecclesiastical supream Governours yet
had not the power of the Keys What meant by those words of the Oath of Supremacy Erastians worthy of no answer because they mistake the state of the Question and do not distinguish between the power of the Sword and the power of the Keyes CHAP. XI Whether Bishops be the primary subject of the power of the Keys The different Opinions concerning the Definition and Essence of a Bishop as also concerning the first Institution of Episcopacy St. Hierom's opinion in this point Spalatensis his Arguments to prove the divine Right of Bishops as invested with the Power of Ordination and Jurisdiction examined and answered Dr. Andrew's judgment in this point After the primitive and also the Hierarchical Bishop which differ much the English Episcopacy different from both the former in some things proper to its self is examined Though some Episcopacy be grounded upon a divine general Precept yet it 's not the primary subject of the power of the Keys neither is Episcopal Government proved to be necessary by any special Evangelical Precept of universal and perpetual Obligation CHAP. XII Whether Presbytery be the primary Subject of the power of the Keys The abolition of Episcopacy and Surrogation of Presbytery in several reformed Churches The nature institution and distinction of Ecclesiastical Presbyters The places of Scripture whereon the Divine Right of Law or Rulong Elders is grounded examined The Reasons why Presbyters cannot be the primary Subject of this Power The Arguments of the Authors of Jus Divinum Ecclesiastici Regiminis insufficient to prove it The English Presbytery as intended and modelled by the Parliament with the Advice of the Assembly of Divines inquired into the perfections and imperfections of the same as modelled by the Parliament without the King. Certain reasons which may be imagined why the Parliament would not trust the Ministers alone with this power CHAP. XIII Whether the power of the Keys be primarily in the People The Opinion of Morellius and the Brownists of Blondel of Parker and his mistake in Politicks applyed to the Church to make it a mixt Government The judgment of the Author concerning the Power of the Keys to be primarily under Christ in the whole Church exercised by the best and fittest for that work The explication of his meaning concerning the Power the Subject of the power and the manner how this power is disposed in this Subject The Confirmation of the Proposition that the power of the Keys is in the whole Church both by the institution and exercise of this power Where is premised a confutation of Mr. Parker's Opinion grounded upon two several places as he understands them The principal places of Scripture concerning Church-Government in foro exteriori explicated to find out where this power is by institution for Legislation Jurisdiction and making of Officers CHAP. XIV Concerning the extent of a particular Church The several extensions of the Church in excess according to the opinions of such as subject all Churches particular to that one Church of Rome of such as subject all to a general Council Whether Mr. Hudson is justly charged by Mr. Hooker and Mr. Ellis and divers others as guilty of Popery in asserting the Vnity of the universal Church The Congregational extent what Congregations are How they are gathered Whether the primary subject of an Independent power The Arguments of Mr. Parker and the Dissenting Brethren from Scripture and Politicks answered A National extent examined What means to be used for to compose our differences and to settle peace amongst us CHAP. XV. Of Subjection Civil What Subjection in general is the degrees of it What a subject in a Civil State is the definition explained What the duties of Subjects be What offences are contrary to this subjection what Rebellion and Treason the several degrees of Treason What Vsurpation is whether any subjection be due to usurped Powers When a power is dissolved How far the Oaths of Supremacy and Allegiance bound the English subject Whether the Civil War did dissolve the Government Whether the late Warlike Resistance made against the King's party and his Commissions was Rebellion or no Something of the Question Whether upon any cause it be lawful for the Subjects to resist or take up Arms against their lawful Soveraign as it 's handled by Arnisaeus Whether after the War said to be between King and Parliament was commenced there was any ordinary Legal power which could induce an Obligation to subjection Whether the Act of alteration or any other Form since proposed could introduce an Obligation Whether it be lawful to submit unto an extraordinary power when no Legal power according to the Fundamental Constitution can be had The distinction division and education of Subjects CHAP XVI Of Subjection Ecclesiastical What Ecclesiastical Subjection is The distinction of Ecclesiastical Subjects The qualification of a Church-member Something of separation from a Church The alterations divisions made and the Errors Blasphemies professed in the Church of England in these late times The manner of admission of Church-Members The ancient and also the modern division of Ecclesiastical Subjects and their subordination The Hierarchical Order The Education of Church-members LIB I. CHAP. I. Of Government in General and the Original thereof section 1 PRropriety is the ground of Power and Power of Government and as there are many degrees of Propriety so there are of Power Yet as there is but one Universal and absolute Propriety so there is but one supream and universal Power which the most glorious blessed and eternal God can only challenge as his due For he contrived all things by his wisdom decreed them by his will and produced them by his Power and to this Day worketh all things according to the counsel of his will Ephes. 1.11 In this respect he is worthy to receive Glory and Honour and Power because he hath created all things and for his pleasure they are and were created Rev. 4.11 By Creation he began by Conservation he continued to be actually the Proprietary of all things for he made them of nothing and gave them being and existence so that they wholly always depend upon him and are absolutely his Therefore he hath power to dispose of them as he pleaseth and to order them to those ends he created them This ordination of them which began immediately upon Creation continueth and shall continue to the end and is either General of all things or Special of some special more noble and more excellent Creatures Such are Men and Angels endued with understanding and Free-will and capable of Laws rewards and punshments both Temporal and Eternal The ordination of these is more properly and strictly called Government which is a part of divine Providence The Government of Angels no doubt is excellent and wonderful though we know little of it because not revealed section 2 That of men is more fully manifested to us as men in that Book of books we call the holy Scriptures the principal subject
whereof is the Government of man as ordered to his final and eternal Estate This Government is two-fold 1. That of strict Justice 2. That of sweet mercy in Christ For it pleased the Eternal Sovereign to bring Man fallen back again and raise him up to an Estate of eternal Glory this was his great design wherein he most gloriously manifested his divine perfections of Wisdom Justice Power and especially of free Mercy this man we find in a two-fold capacity the first is temporal confined to this mortal life the second is spiritual and in both he is subject to his Maker and Eternal King who doth not always exercise his Power himself immediately either in the constitution or administration of these earthly States but as he useth the ministry of Angels so he makes men his Deputies and Vicegerents these are called Higher Powers ordained of God who are trusted with and bear the Sword to protect the good and punish the bad according to certain Laws and Rules of Wisdom and Justice This power may reach the Persons and the goods of mortal man but not the Soul and Conscience which are exempted and reserved to the Tribunal of God who cannot only kill the Body but cast both Body and Soul into Hell and reward Men with Spiritual and Eternal Rewards which the Powers of the World cannot do Of this Government by the temporal Sword something shall be said in the following discourse but with some reference to that which is Spiritual that the generals wherein they do agree the particulars wherein they differ the subordination of the one unto the other may be the better known All men should be of this spiritual Society but are not many excluded through their own fault and just Judgment of God This separation was made betimes for we read of Cain cast out of God's presence and excommunicate of the Sons of God and the Sons of Men before the Flood of Jews and Gentiles after that the World was peopled by the Sons of Noah and the Family of Abraham Isaac and Jacob singled out of all other Nations and this before the Incarnation and the Glorification of the Messias And since then we may observe that there are Christians opposed to Pagans and Idolaters which do not acknowledge one only God to Mahometans who acknowledge the true God who made Heaven and Earth but not God Redeemer by Jesus Christ to Jews who confess God the Creator and Jesus Christ in general but as yet to come to Apostates who first professed the Truth but afterwards denying it are Excommunicated by a Sentence and Decree of Heaven Though these be many and of several and different sorts yet they are reducible to two Societies or Cities the one of God the other of the Devil as the learned Austin did well observe in his excellent Treatise of the City of God this Spiritual Society was governed by God as sole Monarch from the beginning without any Vicar or Deputy universal till such time as Christ having finished the great work of expectation was set at the right hand of God and made the Administrator general of the Church Christian for now that is the name of this Spiritual Society This Church and especially as Christian may be considered under several Notions and distinguished into that which now triumphs in Heaven and is secure of everlasting Bliss and that which is militant aiming at a final Victory and expecting a perpetual Peace 2. This militant Church may be conceived to be either as mystical consisting only of real Saints and such as by a lively Faith have Fellowship with Christ and are living members of his Body or visible of such as acknowledge and profess their Faith in God and in his Son Jesus Christ already exhibited and set at the Right hand of God and because the sincerity of this Profession is known certainly to God alone therefore in this visible Society we find Judas amongst the Apostles Simon Magus amongst Christians Pharisees and Saduces though a generation of Vipers amongst the Disciples of John Baptist yet these are but Chaff upon the Floor mingled with the Wheat and by the Fan in Christ's hand to be separated and burned with unquenchable fire section 3 This Visible Church militant may be considered either as Universal or Particular The Universal is the number of all Christians living on Earth who by their profession of Faith in Christ already come signifie that subjection to Christ and their relation one to another as Brethren In this respect the Government of the Church is Monarchical under one Head Jesus Christ who never appointed any one Vicar Universal or supream Independent Judicatory visible on Earth with plenitude of Power over all Christians of all Nations The Word Sacraments Ministry and the outward means of Conversion belonging to this Church as considered under this notion and every particular person therein is first admitted into this Society and made a Member thereof before he can be a Member of any particular Church Though one baptized in a particular Church under a form of externel Government may be solemnly received both as a member of the universal and also that particular Body at one and the same time yet in order of nature he must be conceived as a member of the universal before a Member of that particular For we are first Christians and subject to Christ before we can be subject to the Power of any particular Church For we are baptized into one Body Universal and in the Name of God the Father Son and Holy Ghost not into the Church of Rome Corinth Ephesus Jerusalem or into the Name of any of the Governours or Officers of these Churches particular visible Churches are parts of the universal and are first so many several Communities denominated usually from some place and after that by association and consent receive a form of Government visible and external This kind of spiritual visible policy and the Government thereof is the principal subject of the ensuing discourse wherein I aim at Peace and Truth desiring not to kindle but to quench or at least abate the flames of dissention which so long and so violently have raged amongst us section 4 The Government of these particular Churches at this present time is the subject of so many Disputes amongst us that some doubt whether there be any such thing or no some presuppose it but know not what it is some make it to be the same with Civil Government and put all the Power in the Civil Magistrates hands and only except the Word and Sacraments which they grant to Ministers some take those from the Ministers and make this administration common to others with them and because there is no certain order established amongst us therefore many are our divisions and fanatick Sects are multiplyed Some are subtil and politick agents and divide the Church that they may disturb the State these care not much what the Doctrine is so they can separate those
Subject gives essence to the State and constitutes it in being and existence 2. It s the first part for though as superiority and subjection and so Soveraign and Subjects are Relates and in that respect simultaneous yet the Soveraign is not only the first in dignity but in some sort by origination if not as a cause For as paternity in some respect is before filiation so it is in this particular For subjection doth rather follow upon Soveraignty than the contrary And therefore in molding a State they first determine upon a Soveraign whereupon instantly and at the same time follows without any thing intervening subjection 3. This party that is Soveraign is invested with Majesty Civil Where we have two things 1. Majesty an adjunct 2. The subjection invested with it And as Power is the very essence of a Superiour so Majesty is of a Soveraign section 4 Majestas est maxima in civitate potestas Majesty is the greatest power in a Community 1. It s potestas Power 2. Maxima in civitate Potestas est Jus Imperandi Power is a right to govern It 's Jus a Right and in it self is always just and is from some propriety and as the absolute propriety so the absolute power of all things is from God and there is no power but derived from him It 's not Physical but Moral and so nomen juris and may be considered as a faculty or habit which qualifies the Subject to do something which one that hath no power cannot do The proper act of it is to Govern and in Governing to Command so as to bind the party subject to obedience or punishment This Imperium or Command is an act of the Will and presupposeth some act of the Understanding and must needs be ineffectual and in vain without a sufficient coactive force And because the Understanding may be ignorant or erroneous the Will unjust the coactive force act accordingly therefore the understanding of a Superiour as such ought to be directed by Wisdom his commanding Will by Justice and his Executive force by both And that act of Power which is not thus directed is not properly an act of Power nor any such Command of the Jewish Rulers when it was devoid both of Wisdom and Justice and it was so much the more invalid because contrary to an express command of a Superiour Lord and Master even Jesus Christ. This Power is an Excellency and makes the party invested with it like unto God and the greater it is the greater the excellency of him that hath it Though it is in it self good and just as being from God or rather the power of God in the creature intellectual yet it may be exercised either too little or too much For one that is invested with it may do less or more than his power doth warrant him nay he may act contrary to the Rules of divine Wisdom and Justice And such is the imperfection of man that there is no perfect Government in the world but that God doth supply all defects and aberrations For the Judge of all the World will do right and in the final Judgment will compleat all Justice and reward every man according to his works so that nothing in any person Man or Angel but shall be judged section 5 This is Power in general and may be distinguished many ways as into the Power of God or Angels or of men Here we speak of the power of men which is the power of a Father or a Master or an Officer of peace or war by Sea or Land. Again It 's Civil Ecclesiastical and both supream or subordinate The subject now in hand is Majesty Civil which is the greatest power in a Civil Community the power of a Soveraign whereby he is able to bind the whole Community and every Member thereof It 's an act of the publick and universal Will directed by the universal Judgment made effectual by the universal and general coactive force and all this is done according to the Rules of Justice and Wisdom And that the best wisest and most just are most fit to govern To know it the better we must consider 1. The principal and several kinds of acts 2. The qualities of it the particular acts of this power in one Community are numberless yet all reducible to one And that is the wise and just Government and ordering of the Community yet this is divided and subdivided by the Authors of Politicks And the several Branches of this Power are called Jura Majestatis Praerogativa Regalia c. The distinction of these Rights are made according to the several acts of Majesty conversant about several different Objects and according to the diversification of the Objects is the diversity and difference of these Rights I might here relate both the number and the method of these Rights of Majesty as delivered by Angelicus Bodin Clapmarius Grotius Bisoldus Arnisaeus and others if it were either needful or useful The Civilians and sometimes though seldom the Casuists mention them Yet hardly two of them agree either in the method or the number or the particular names of them section 6 Yet not to neglect them all attend how handsomly and briefly Grotius reduceth them to a certain Order Qui regit civitatem eam regit per se circa universalia in legibus condendis abolendis singularia alios magistratus publica circa actiones Belli pacis res vectigalia dominium eminens Privata ad publicum ordinata quae sunt res inter privatas quas dirimi oportet propter pacem Curatores Yet this is far short of some others and indeed no ways accurate The Civilians some of them reduce them into Order according to the several acts of this power which are acts of Grace Justice Bisoldus doth distinguish of Majesty and informs us that it 's Real Personal Real in the People personally in the Prince He understands by the People the Community and under God that is the primary subject of it wherein it virtually resides and out of which by the constitution it is educed It hath power to form a State where there is none and if after a form once introduced the Order be not good they may alter it What the Rights of personal Majesty is he tells us but what those of real Soveraignty be he saith nothing Majesty so naturally belongs unto the Community that upon a failer of succession or a dissolution it divolves to them and that People is not wise which parts wholly with it and absolutely alienates it as the Romans are said Lege Regiâ to have done if necessity or some very weighty cause required it not section 7 We might in this particular expect much from Arnisaeus who hath composed a whole Treatise of this subject in which he informs 1. Of the name 2. Of the nature of Majesty For 1. The name may be given to such as have nothing of the thing and so be a meer Title 2. It may signifie
Agents the State wronged demands satisfaction or Justice and cannot be heard then there remains no way but to hazard a War and defer the cause to God to decide it by the Issue which he shall give Sometimes a State may be unjustly invaded in which case there is no remedy but a defensive War. 1. To judge and determine of this War whether offensive or defensive to have the chief Command to grant Commissions to Press Men provide for Arms and Money to denounce and proclaim the War by Heralds belongs unto the Soveraign who is trusted with this Militia not only against foreign States but against Seditious and Rebellious Subjects 2. After a War begun and continued a Peace may be concluded and this is another Act of Majesty Personal 3. Because one State may strengthen help and benefit another hence Leagues of Peace and Amity and also for mutual offence or defence or for Protection or for Commerce Yet none of these are valid by the very Law of Nations but as made concluded continued by the supream Powers Personal 4. The Soveraigns of several States cannot in their own Persons except very rarely meet together and act personally face to face one with another neither is it convenient or expedient so to do Therefore a way and means dictated by the light of Nature hath been invented to act by others who are their Deputies and Representatives and these are called Ambassadours To send these whether ordinary or extraordinary and to give them Power and Commissions with Instructions and Letters Credential that their Acts may be valid is the right of Majesty Personal To this Head may be referred the sending of Heralds and Agents or Envoyes section 10 This personal Majesty and Soveraignty acts within the Common-wealth and with the Subjects as Subjects With these it acts 1. In matters of Religion For Magistratus est custos utriusque tabulae where by Magistrate we must not understand Officers but supream Governours as the word is taken largely by many Authors especially such as profess Theology For it is the Duty as it is the Right of Civil Soveraigns to order matters of Religion and that in the first place so far as it tends unto or concerns the peace and happiness of a State which depends much upon the establishment profession and practice thereof As they must order it so they must not only constantly and sincerely profess practise it themselves but as Soveraigns protect and defend their Subjects in the profession and exercise of the same so far as their coactive-force and Sword may justly do it This should be their first and principal Work which they should do not onely for the good of the people but their own happiness success and establishment in the Throne They are not to associate as Priests or Presbyters nor arrogate the power of making Canons Ordination Excommunication Absolution and such like Acts which are purely spiritual yet they may make Civil Laws concerning those things and execute the same and also ratifie by Civil Acts the Ecclesiastical Canons and punish such as shall violate the same Yet this right doth presuppose the Religion which they establish and maintain to be true and instituted from Heaven It 's true that the consciences of men are subject only unto God and to him alone are they answerable for their secret thoughts and opinions which men can have no certain cognisance of Yet if they broach errours in Religion and blasphemies and seek by communicating them by word or writing to seduce pervert infect others they disturb the peace of the State offend God and bring Gods Judgements from Heaven upon themselves who are guilty of such sins and upon the Soveraign and the subject of that State where they live And in this case though the consciences cannot be forced yet their estates persons lives are liable to the sword and in that respect they may and ought to be punished by the sword of Justice This is so a Right of Civil Soveraigns that we never read of any State of civilized people without Lawes concerning Religion and the worship of a Deity I confess this branch of civil Power is not rightly placed nor is the method exact because it comes in under the Heads of Legislation and Jurisdiction the matter of both which are Religion mens persons estates and lives section 11 After matters of Religion which are more spiritual and divine follow such as are temporal and humane Concerning these we have two acts of Majestie 1. Legislation 2. Execution of Laws made hence these two Jura Majestatis 1. A right to make Laws 2. A right to execute them This Power of making Laws is the principal and most necessary and doth inseparably adhere unto the Soveraign once constituted It was Jethro's counsel to Moses which with Gods approbation he followed to teach the people Laws that all Subjects and Officers might know their work and duty and the Rule which must direct them in all actions of Officers and subjects as such this was Gods order For after that he became their Soveraign and the people of Israel his subjects he proceeds to make Lawes Moral Ceremonial Judicial yet the personal Soveraign hath no power to make fundamental Laws concerning the constitution but only for the administration This our Parliaments if rightly constituted and duly acting for the publick good I honour as much as any man may take notice of Yet I may not presume to teach them much less correct them This Power is given by the consent of the people in the constitution who upon their submission become their Soveraigns subjects and are bound thereupon either to obey his Lawes once made or suffer This is not meerly a Power to teach and direct them but to bind them To this Head are brought the Power of repealing interpreting altering Lawes with Dispensations Reservations naturalizing granting Priviledges conferring Honours founding Colledges and Corporations Legitimation restoring the blood tainted and all acts of Grace as giving immunities exemptions tolerations indulgences acts of oblivion section 12 After Legislation follows Execution which in this place is not the execution of the Judges Sentence for that follows as a distinct act of Jurisdiction This right of Majesty is of far greater latitude and reacheth all acts that tend to the execution of the Laws which are in vain if not put in execution And because this cannot be done without Officers and Judgment therefore this comprehends under it The right of making Officers administration of Justice The making of Officers as without which the Laws cannot be put in execution is the first of these two By Officers I understand all such as are used by the Soveraign for to put in practice the Law and perform any publick act These may be either ordinary or extraordinary temporary or standing for Peace or War for to deal with forriegn States Such are all Dictatours Viceroyes Regents Treasurers Counsellours Judges Sheriffs Constables Captains and Commanders by sea
or land in time of Peace or Warre To these may be referred Heralds Ambassadours publick Agents with the rest which shall be mentioned in the second Book of this Treatise And because he is no Officer which hath not some publick power and this he cannot have of and from himself therefore all Officers are made such by the Soveraign who by granting Commissions and other wayes derives their power unto them And as he gives them power so he may remove them and revoke their power or translate them or call them to account To chuse nominate propose them may be an act of the people or some of them yet to constitute them and give them their political being is an act of Majestie either mediate or immediate And because the personal Soveraign and his Officers cannot do their duty and discharge their places without sufficient maintenance therefore in this respect there is a right to command the purse For as they say he that bears the sword must have the purse And if there be not a sufficient standing Revenue and Treasury determined in the constitution the Soveraign must have a power to raise monies to defray the publick necessary charges Hence that Vniversale eminens dominium of Majesty in every State so much mentioned in the Authors of Politicks The reason of this is clear in the very light of nature that the people maintain their Governours because the benefit of the Government redounds unto them according to that of the Apostle For this cause pay you tribute also for they are Gods Ministers attending continually upon this very thing Render therefore to all their dues tribute to whom tribute is due custom to whom custom Rom. 13.6 7. It 's true that Soveraigns may have their private purse therefore some distinguish inter aerarium fiscum Aerarium is the publick Treasury which is maintained by Tribute Custom and other Impositions and this is to be raised and disposed of by the supream for the preservation of the publick Fiscus as some tell is the Soveraigns private purse whereof he may dispose at will and pleasure This publick propriety presupposeth every mans several propriety and no wayes prejudice it This right is reckoned by some amongst the lesser Prerogatives but there can be no minora Jura Majestatis in proper sense For because Majestas is Maxima potestas therefore all the essential parts and rights are so too section 13 The last is the Power of Jurisdiction whereby Justice is administred and it 's over all persons in all causes both Military Civil and Ecclesiastical so far as they fall under the Soveraigns cognisance Under this Head I comprehend not only the power of those acts of Judgement more strictly so called as Convention Discussion Decision of the cause upon evidence of the merit or demerit but the Execution To which last may be referred all penalties as well capital as not capital with Dispensations in Judgement suspension of Execution pardons To this of Jurisdiction also belongs all reservations of certain causes the receiving last appeals the final determinations and irrevocable sentences By vertue of this Power Commissions for judicial proceedings Courts the order of trial from first to last all calling of Assemblies general and provincial Civil and Ecclesiastical are determined From all this it 's evident that all Jurae Majestatis may be reduced to the Legislative Judicial and Executive Power if we understand Judicial and Executive in a larger sense than they are commonly taken And here it 's to be noted that Majesty Real is before and above all Majesty personal And by personal Majesty or personal Soveraign I do not mean only one single person as a Monarch but all Aristocratical and Polyarchical Soveraigns who are many Physically but considered as one person morally as joyntly invested with one Power Soveraign section 14 Thus far concerning the nature of Majesty after which follow some Epithets given to Majesty by Authors to signifie the properties thereof These are either included in the essence or flow from it For 1. It 's absolute and so Arbitrary Absolute soluta legibus It cannot be bound by any Lawes nor judged because the Soveraign is the Lawgiver himself and the Fountain of Jurisdiction He may bind himself by Oath to govern and judge according to the Lawes not to be governed or judged by the Lawes Yet no Soveraign personal is free from the Obligation of the natural and positive Lawes of God in force and how far he is inferiour to the real Soveraign who is subject to the same Lawes I will not here discuss 2. It 's universal not only in respect of all acts of Government but of all persons within that Territory For it must be coadequate to the whole body which it must act and animate it 's neither greater nor less No persons things or actions within can be exempted from this Power nor can it extend to any thing person action without but per Accidens 3. It s supream not in respect of God nor of the power of other States but in respect of the power of Fathers Masters Officers Corporations and Societies within every several State. For by vertue of Majesty it is that Soveraigns are equal in respect of themselves superiours in respect of their Subjects and inferiours unto God whose servants and subjects they are trusted with a particle of his power and accountable unto him 4. It 's Independent yet not in respect of God upon whom all Soveraigns do not only chiefly but wholly depend but in respect of all subordinate Powers within but coadequate to them without For all power civil within the Territory is derived from Majesty Fiduciary Princes therefore as such are not Soveraigns though they may have the title of Soveraignty yet a Soveraign may be fiduciary for some part of a Country within and part of the Dominions of another Soveraign Neither can the chief Magistrate of a Commonwealth trusted at certain times with the general exercise of the Power be such Protection and Vassalage are conceived by some not to destroy Independency neither doth confederation For though the League between several States as in Switzerland and the united Netherlands Provinces may be strict and Commissioners may be made and trusted with great power in things which concern the several States jointly such the states-General of the Low-Countries be yet this is thought to be no diminution of Majesty For it remains entire in the several Republicks 5. It s indivisible for though it hath several branches which may be distinguished yet they cannot be separated For if you take away but one much more if you take away more you make it imperfect and essentially defective and insufficient to Govern For as in Philosophy Essentia est indivisibilis so in Politicks Majestas est indivisibilis sic Majestatis Jura sunt inseparabilia As these Rights are indivisible in respect of themselves so they are in respect of the Subject For divide and separate some of
them even but one from the Soveraign he is an imperfect Soveraign take away all he ceaseth to be a Soveraign Again the Subject of Majesty and of all the rights and parts thereof must be only one either Physically or Morally If you divide the Subject you destroy them For if in this Common-wealth we give part of these to the King part to the Peers part to the Commons we make it a Babel and destructive of it self For suppose the King have the Militia to himself he may command the Purse make void the Laws revoke Judgments reject Parliaments and none can hinder him because neither Peers nor Commons have any right to the Sword whereby to defend themselves Therefore little heed is to be given to that Book or bitter Invective entitled Elenchus motuum nuperorum which informs from the Lawyers if we may believe him that these Soveraign Rights were thus divided 6. From this that it 's Indivisible follows it that it 's incommunicable For to whomsoever they are communicated they cease to be Subjects and the Soveraign to be a compleat Soveraign and this Communication tends to the dissolution of the Government 7. It 's perpetual that is fixed in a certain subject to continue in the same according to the fundamental Laws of Constitution Therefore the Temporary or occasional power though very great of a Dictatour or Regent or Protectour who are but trusted with it for a time in extraordinary cases and upon occasion cannot be Majesty when there is an Interregnum or suspension of the Government by reason of Sedition Faction Rebellion Civil War or some other cause it 's good and expedient for the safety of a State to set up some extraordinary Governour or Governours trusted for a time with transcendent Power till the State disturbed and not capable of any Union be setled which done that Power doth cease and Majesty is fixed in his proper primary and constant subject that the Government may run in the old Channel except they intend to make an alteration of the Constitution section 15 There is another kind of personal Majesty inferiour to and different from the former We find it in some Princes of Europe as in the Emperour of Germany the Kings of Denmark Sweden Poland and England For our Kings had not only the title of Majesty but some power with the title For in the intervals of Parliament he was Soveraign alone and all and every one yea the greatest were his subjects He called and summoned Parliaments made all Officers by sea and land sent and received Ambassadours conferred all Honours the subjects sware Allegiance to him His Dignity was eminent his State great and so many advantages he had that if he should have used them all he might easily have undone his subjects and so have undone himself Yet he had not the power of the purse He was sworn to corroborate the just Laws and Customs which the people had chosen In the Parliament he made a third party yet so that neither in acts of Lawes or Judgement could he do any thing without the Peers and Commons and as Sir Roger Owen in his Manuscript observes together with them he was greater than himself Yet as Kings have sometimes curbed Parliaments so Parliaments have Kings and disposed of the Militia the Navy the Ports the chief Offices Nay they have sometimes judged Kings accusing them of acting against the fundamental Constitution and challenging such Power as tended to the dissolution of the same and have deposed them But of this particular something may be said hereafter these kinds of Soveraigns have so much power whether more or less as the Constitution gives them yet it will be a difficult thing to keep them within their bounds CHAP. V. Of the manner how Civil Power is acquired WHat the Nature of Power in general and Majesty Civil is hath been declared The next thing to be considered is the Subject who from it is denominated a Soveraign and we must enquire first how this Power is acquired 2. How disposed in a certain Subject As for the acquisition it 's certain Man as Man or as a Member of a Community cannot have it from himself but it must be communicated to him from God who being the Universal Soveraign is the Fountain and Original of it and derives some part of it unto Man and a greater measure unto Mortal Soveraigns than other Men. Yet he doth not this immediately but mediately for the most part It 's extrinsecal and comes aliunde not only unto Men but Angels A Paternal Power which is more Natural is acquired by Generation though sometimes by Adoption This Generation from divine Benediction is the seminary of all Societies which as Societies and Communities may be so disposed and compleat as virtually to contain in them a Power of a Common-wealth and by a general consent constitute an actual Soveraign The Soveraign before he was made such was not invested with Majesty but it was extrinsecal unto him And here that distinction between the Power it self the Designation of the Persons Governing and the Form of Government is worthy taking notice of The Designation of the Persons and the Form of Government is from God leaving Man at Liberty but not so the Power which is more from him than the other two Though the parties justly possessed of power may be thought to have the propriety of it yet they have not any for let it be never so firmly conveyed upon them by designation and submission yet they are but trusted with it Princes tell us they hold their Crowns and Kingdoms per Deum Gladium If they mean that they derive their power from God so as that they neither receive nor hold it from the Bishops of Rome or the Emperour or any other Mortals it may be true yet they have their power so from God that they are invested with it by Humane Designation And as for their Sword it may by a Conquest make way for a Government but it cannot constitute it The fundamental Charter of all Civil Majesty is the fifth Commandment taken in a large sence and understood by other Scriptures which speak more expresly and distinctly of Civil Government In this Commandment including much more by Analogy than is expressed we may observe that there is a power of Superiority and Excellency as in Fathers so in the Princes and Rulers of the World and that from God who made them Men Fathers Princes 2. That all Government should be Paternal Not that the first-born of the most ancient Family in every Tribe Kinred Nation should be a Soveraign for that we seldom find but that they should as Fathers love their Subjects and seek their Good and tender them as Fathers do their Children 3. That by virtue of Gods Command so soon as they are actually Governours Honour and Subjection are due unto them 4. That all Vicinities as far as they are able ought first to associate and then establish an
some sort commanded by the Prophet Jeremy as sent from God to submit unto the King of Babylon and come under his protection section Majestas continuatur successione per electionem liberam indeterminatam astrictam familiae ubi mares solum foeminae quoque jure quasi haereditario succedant After a Title is once established by the Fundamental Charter and the first investiture care is taken how this Title may be continued that so not only the present but the future Sovereign and subject of personal Majesty may be determined and not only the State but the Sovereign thereof may become perpetual and immortal This can no ways be done but by Succession and this depends upon Election at least of the first Constitutors of the State which determines the successive Sovereigns to acquire their Title by Election or Birth or both If by Election only that many times is left free to the Electors to chuse out of what Family or Country they please Thus the Roman and also the German Emperors and the Kings of Poland acquire and receive their Power Sometimes the Election is confined to a Family or Line In this respect the Title is said to be Hereditary which is not to be understood as though the personal Sovereigns were absolute proprietaries of the Crown or had power of alienation but because they are like those who in civil Law are called Haeredes sui Heirs natural by Law and Birth who succeed into and by Birth acquire the right which their Predecessors justly had This Succession is sometimes tyed to the Males as in France sometimes is indifferent to Male or Female Children Thus it is in England where the Kings and Queens are said to have their Heirs which if we may believe the great Lawyer Sir Edward Coke upon Magna Charta are nothing but the Successors For Heirs saith he are Successors Yet surely he means Successors not only by Election but Blood. In this kind of Succession sometimes the present Sovereigns if they have Children may determine and declare which of them shall succeed them Thus David chose Solomon Sometimes it 's otherwise because by the Constitution it 's entailed upon the first-born or next of Blood. This seems to be the ancient right and custom of this Nation This may be the reason why King Henry VIII though he took upon him much of an absolute Prince would not presume of himself to define his Successor but desires an act to be made in Parliament for to enable him by Will to dispose of the Crown Yet such an act could not make void the Election used at the Coronation which hath something of the Constitution in it though it was made a meer formality section 5 Injuste usurpata dolo malo pecunia homicidio alio modo As Power may be justly so it may be unjustly acquired and this is usually called Usurpation which is the taking and keeping possession of that which is not our own or which we have no Right unto It 's true that in Civil Law it 's defined to be praepossessio juris controversi Yet in this manner of Usurpation that Right is seldom doubtful but for the most part clear enough The Power is always good because from God and the act thereof which is Government is good yet the manner of acquiring may be bad And it 's observable that many who have ill acquired have well used their Power It 's generally held That usurped Right and Power is no Right or Power because it 's not in his proper subject Therefore it 's conceived that Tyrannus in titulo such every Usurper is said to be cannot command and bind the people nor do any acts of Government which is valid and may justly be removed before the people acknowledge him or swear fealty to him And many think it unlawful to submit unto or act under an usurped Power Sometimes it may be so yet there are cases when we may nay we must submit and act too If Christians under the Heathen Emperors had stood upon such terms as some do in our days their condition had been far worse than it was For though they liked not Usurpation and the cursed means whereby many acquired their power yet this was their principle Non multum interest sub quorum imperio vivit homo cito moriturus si qui imperant ad impia vel iniqua nos non cogant Aust. de L.D. Blood Bribery Treason Rebellion unjust Invasions they abhorred as abominable and detested them as unfit means to ascend an Imperial Throne Yet it was not in their power to dispossess them once possessed and to establish better They knew God had reserved this unto himself Neither did they think that by submitting unto their power though unjustly gotten yet justly exercised that they were guilty of their sinful and unjust manner of Usurpation Concerning this unjust Acquisition of personal Majesty many things may be observed 1. There are few titles now especially such as are successive in a Line which did not at first begin in Usurpation 2. That the power it self with the just exercise thereof is a different thing from the manner of acquiring it 3. That one that hath the right in reversion may unjustly prepossess it and with us as the Lawyer tells us if the Heir apparent by murther or some other way remove the present just Soveraign yet so soon as he is possessed of the Crown he cannot be questioned and indemnity presently follows upon the possession Richard the Third is called an usurper and was so at the first yet his Laws and Judgments and other Acts of Government were and are judged valid after the Parliaments received him Henry VII cannot be acquitted from usurpation till the Parliament acknowledged him Neither his Victory nor Marriage with the right Heir could give him a good Title though this might conduce to his quiet possession He did never stand upon that Marriage as the foundation of his right unto the Crown for he knew well enough that if that had been his best and only Title that though it might make the Power good unto his Children yet while she was living he must hold the Crown in her Right not in his own and if she died before him it was lost 4. Many Princes have invented Oaths for to secure not only the form of Government but the Crown unto their own Posterity and Family And here it is to be considered whether these Oaths do not necessarily presuppose an higher Obligation of fidelity not only unto God but their own native Country to which they are bound to be faithful under any form of Government or personal Sovereign whatsoever If their present Allegiance cannot stand with the universal good it 's surely unlawful and unjust For the good of the whole is to be preferred before the good of a part and we are bound to love the whole body of the Community more than any Family or some particular persons Again it may prove sometimes impossible to
be actually faithful and perform our Oaths either to the persons to whom they are taken or their heirs and successors and then it will be unreasonable 5. We must distinguish between the humane positive Laws and Constitutions and the Laws and Rules of divine Providence for that may be usurpation in respect of the former which is a just possession in respect of the latter 6. As for removing an Usurper or refusing to submit unto him or act under him we must consider 1. How far God hath any hand in dispossessing one and giving possession to another least we be found to resist God. 2. What means we resolve upon to remove and reject the Usurper and whether the Remedy will not be worse than the Disease 3. What may be the bad and miserable consequences of this refusal of submission and acting yet some will say we will live peaceably and not meddle neither will we own the present Power nor act against it But do such think that any person or persons who have the Sword in their hands to which their Lives and Estates are subject will suffer men within the bowels of the State to be Neuters and yet give them protection 7. Such as justly acquire their power at the first may be the greatest Usurpers because they will challenge more power than either God will or man can give or more than by Constitution is due or the necessity of the State and publick good require 8. God may justly give to Nebuchadnezzar Alexander that power which they did unjustly seek and this for reasons best known unto himself as for executing his Judgments upon other Nations for their sins when he hath once given the possession continued is lawful 9. It 's an heavy Judgment upon a people when the title to personal Majesty is doubtful and liable to usurpation as it often falls out upon a dissolution civil War 's a failure of succession which is certain and clear or in other cases And happy is that People whose Nobles shall be of themselves and their Governours shall proceed out of the midst of them Jer. 30.21 And also when these Governours enter quietly according to the Laws of God and the just constitution of men Amittitur modo ordinato naturali section 6 morte imperantis defectu successionis morali voluntaria resignatione desertione violenta invasione As Power may be acquired and one that had it not may have it so it may be lost and he that was possessed of it may be dispossessed For it 's no inseparable adjunct to any person or persons And it's Gods will it should be so Therefore Crowns and Sceptres with Imperial Power cannot be so entailed or any ways made sure by any constitutions of man as not to be cut off from any Families or Persons They are like unto Estates which for want of Heirs or the extinction of Families or some other ways may pass to strangers It may be lost in a way which is orderly and not from any unjust cause And that first naturally upon the death of the Sovereign or a failure of Succession For all Sovereigns especially personal are mortal and as they live and reign so they die and lay aside their Majesty and leave it unto others This is a common and an usual way And let no man take up a Crown but with a purpose to lay it down when it shall please God to require it only the Crown of Heavenly Glory shall abide upon our heads for ever Death it self shall never be able to shake it off it sits too close Therefore it were wisdom for to aim at an Eternal Kingdom for that 's God's command as it is his promise to give it to them that seek it Ambition is base and far below the excellency of that noble Creature which was made and redeemed for eternity Yet there is old catching at these earthly Crowns which are a bait wherewith the most noble spirits are taken This was Satan's reserve and last temptation wherewith he thought to overcome our Saviour As persons so families may fail and the supreme Power may return unto a Community which then hath liberty either to alter the form of Government or if they retain the former model to design another Sovereign and the same eligible either at random with a latitude or in a certain Family section 7 This is a natural way of losing this Power though always directed by a divine special Providence There is another way and the same moral and voluntary as by Resignation Desertion For in some cases a Sovereign may resign his power to another even in his life-time Thus Charles the fifth resigned his hereditary Dominions unto Philip the first of Spain and others have done the like Some desert the Charge either to take a better or a greater as the Duke of Anjou deserted Poland to succeed his Brother in the Kingdom of France or out of discontent or upon some other cause And usually in a vacancy either upon the Issue failing or a desertion there follows a competition amongst pretenders For as they say no man that hath an Estate can want Heirs so in this case there will be pretenders and many times Competitors Thus it fell out in Portugal upon the death of Sebastian and Henry the Cardinal his Uncle For Anthony's Legitimation could do him little good his Sword was not long enough the King of Spain's was Therefore his Title though not the best was yet the strongest and most effectual As this Power may be lost or rather voluntarily laid aside so it may be violently invaded by a just War either of the People defending themselves and their Rights unjustly denied them or taken from them which according to the fundamental Constitution they may and ought to maintain even against a personal Sovereign though not as their Sovereign but as one that usurps greater Power than is due unto him and doing the People wrong For some tell us that is no Right which may not be defended The final issue of such a War may be the overthrow of the Sovereign and his Party and a Deposing of him or a rejection or death with the Exclusion of his Family Whether these things be done justly or no must be known by the Laws of God written or natural and the Law of the Constitution of that State where any such thing is done Some of our Barons Wars seem to be reducible to this case as likewise the late difference between King and Parliament and the civil War following thereupon Yet even in that difference if the Lords and Commons have partem imperii and participate the Power jointly with the King then they seem to have the advantage because according to their own profession the War being undertaken by them in their own just and necessary defence and ending in a clear Conquest of the King this not only preserved their own rights but if we may believe Grotius and the case be as he puts it or the same with
his the King plainly lost his right Yet if it was a War between Sovereign and Subject as such it was a Rebellion on the Subjects part and so the King could lose no right But the War was said to be as some express it between the King and Parliament Yet the Parliament declared they fought for King and Parliament And so the King as King was not the enemy yet it fell out that the person who was King was Conquered and confined and in the end put to death But in these difficult points it 's not easie either to have true and perfect information or if we had to meet with an impartial Judge Sovereignty may be taken away by a foreign Invasion upon a just War whether Defensive or Offensive For if the unjust party be conquered the right of Sovereignty is lost and this is an usual case Amittitur modo inordinato ut section 8 dissolutione mala administratione The dissolution of a State must needs destroy and take away all personal Majesty And except this dissolution be from a mutual consent of all parties Sovereign and Subject for to erect a better frame it must needs be inordinate or disorderly And if the personal Sovereign be the cause and begin this dissolution without just reason he must needs forfeit For whosoever holds any power from the Constitution and yet acts against it he must needs lose And if he once lose his power and through his own default his Subjects are freed from their Allegiance This was the reason why the Parliament passed so high a judgment upon the King. For upon his withdrawing from Parliament refusing to return and setting up his Standard both the Houses proceeded jointly together in adjudging it Treason against the State or Kingdom in deserting his Parliament betraying his Trust and People setting up his Standard and levying War against the Parliament and Kingdom that is against his own Peace Crown and Dignity Thus the Author of the rights of the Kingdom This he takes to be a peremptory sentence and that the latter General 's Commission for to take the King was a strong Capias ut legatum These things are out of and beyond my sphear Yet it 's certain that so far as the Kings proceedings were against the Fundamental Constitution so far they tended to a dissolution and a forfeit of the power Regal And when the Militia and the Array did so fearfully clash and dash the people in pieces there was a plain dissolution of the Government for the present And upon a Victory followed an Act of Alteration and not only the present Sovereign was dispossessed 1. By a Judgment then by Death but his Family disinherited and continues so to this day Whatsoever Men in this particular have done yet God hath judged justly And it deeply concerns that Family seriously to consider what the guilt is for which God hath so severely punished them There is another cause whereby and for which Soveraignty is often lost and that is male administratum For as Wisdom Justice Judgment are the establishment of the Throne and that by virtue of Gods institution and promise so is negligence imprudence injustice oppression and other such like sins a cause of dethroning and divesting the Governours and Princes of the World. For these offend God abuse the Power wherewith they are but trusted provoke the people Therefore God either stirs up their own people against them or makes use of foreign power to invade them and delivers them into their hands The highest degree of this ill Administration is called Tyranny and such wicked Governours are said to be Tyranni in exercitio For though their Title may be good yet their power is so abused as that they for the most part are worse and more wicked than Usurpers These in their administration violate both the written and natural Laws of God the Law of Nations the Law of the Constitution of that State where they govern and the Laws of Justice and Equity the violation of all which tend directly to the ruine of the Common-wealth Arnisaeus who together with Bodin is so much for absolute Princes doth confess that such a Tyrant doth Excidere jure suo etsi haereditario And there is great reason for it because his manner of administration is against the very fundamental Rules and the very end of all Government For God never did Man never can give any power to be unjust section 9 Before I conclude this Chapter the Reader must know that the scheme of Acquisition and Amission of Power is not exact For there may be more ways both of acquiring and keeping as also of losing power and to this Head may be reduced those arcana imperii dominationis handled more at large by Clapmarius and Angelius whereof some are prudential Rules for the acquisition and conservation of the form of Government and also for the continuance of power in the hands of the Persons or Families possessed of it Some of them are but Sophisms of State used too much by many Statesmen in these days who separate Religion and Policy to their own ruine For as the learned Fitz-hâ—rbert hath made it evident God will never prosper such courses Hitherto also might be referred the causes of corruption conversion and subversion of States Whereof something shall be said in the Chapter of Disposition 2. The right may be lost and the possession continue or the possession may be lost and the right may remain for a time 3. That a bare title is no power For as the sword in possession without Wisdom and Justice is insufficient so Wisdom and Justice with a Title without the Sword cannot actually govern because it cannot protect and punish 4. No man can acquire and receive any power except God give it nor keep it any longer than God is willing to continue it For he hath reserved it in his own hands to dispose of it to whom and how long and in what measure and manner he pleaseth yet he seldom doth communicate it immediately or in an extraordinary way He gives it for the most part mediately by man to man. Therefore that Sovereigns hold their Crowns from God and that they are supream next under God admits of some limitation and explication otherwise it may prove an error For I am sure few of them receive their Sovereignty immediately from God as Saul and David did The immediate foundation of it is some humane constitution and agreement made not immediately by God but Men. This to such as understand the fundamental Laws of States is clear enough 5. The greatest Power of any mortal man is but very little and he is but trusted with it for a while and such is his frailty that he cannot well manage that little which is committed to him Therefore all defects of humane Government are supplied by the universal and eternal King who punisheth all offences not punished by man and rights all wrongs not righted and rightly judged by the
Seventy two 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not only there but in other places which I forbear to mention And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to bind is sometimes to govern or exercise the acts of coercive power So Psal. 105.22 to bind his Princes compared with Psal. 2.3 where bands and cords are the Laws and Edicts of Christ. And the same word in the Chaldee is obligavit ad obedientiam aut poenam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dan. 6.7 8 9. is Translated by the Seventy two 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Decree obligatio interdictum It 's also remarkable that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to shut up signifieth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to deliver into the hand of enemies or to destruction Job 16.11 Psal. 78.48 Hence that phrase of delivering up to Satan 1 Cor. 5.5 1 Tim. 1.20 and also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to separate or exclude Lepers out of the holy Camp as Numb 12.14 15. and in other places which was a Typical adumbration of that act of Jurisdiction which we call Excommunication section 4 This Power of the Keys is spiritual because exercised within a Spiritual Community Do not ye judge them that are within saith the Apostle I have nothing to do to judge them without For what have I to do to judge them also that are without God hath reserved them to his own Tribunal But them that are without God judgeth Yet those without the pale of the Church are not exempted from the Civil Jurisdiction of the Christian Magistrate if within his Territories The Power of Hell and Death is not the power of the Sword. The power given to the Church was not given to the State. The power of the Kingdom of Heaven is not the power of the Kingdom of the Earth The power promised unto and conferred upon the Apostles was not estated upon the Civil Magistrate though Christian This power opens and shuts the Gates of Heaven binds and loosens sinners as lyable to eternal punishments which no Civil Sword can do Therefore it 's spiritual section 5 As it is Spiritual so it 's Supreme for a particular Church being a Commonwealth or Spiritual state must needs have a Spiritual Tribunal independent within it self except we will divest it of the very Essence and soul wherewith it 's animated Yet it cannot be such in respect of him whose Throne is Heaven whose Footstool is the Earth Or if by the Divine prospective of Faith we pierce into the Heaven of Heavens and approach that sparkling Throne where Christ sits at the right Hand of God possessed of an universal and eternal Kingdom every particular and all particular Churches must bow and wave the title of independent In a word in all imperial Rights which God and Christ have reserved and not derived by the fundamental Charter of the Scripture all particular Churches with all their Members nay all their Officers even Ministers are but subjects governed in no wise governing Supreme therefore it is both in respect of its own Members within and also of other Churches enjoying equal power within themselves and are not Queens and Mothers but Sisters in a parity of jurisdiction with it but no superiority of Command over it For the parity of them without is not destructive of her Soveraignty over her own within The universal Vicaridge and plenitude of Monarchical power arrogated by the Patriarch of Rome cannot justly depress or take away the Rights of any particular Church This Power was first challenged then usurped after that in a great measure possessed exercised and pleaded for The pretended right and title was invented after they had possession and with a fair colour did for a long time gull the world which at length awaked out of an universal slumber and found it to be a dream section 6 As this Power is 1. Spiritual 2. Supreme so 3. It 's divisible and may be branched into divers particular jura or rights which are four 1. Of making Canons 2. Of Constituting Officers 3. Of Jurisdiction and 4. Of receiving and dispensing of Church-goods Thus they may be methodized Jus Ecclesiasticum duplex 1. leges ferendi exequendi per Rectorum constitutionem jurisdictionis exercitium 2. bona Ecclesiastica dispensandi There may be other petty Jura yet easily reducible unto these And this division though grounded evidently upon Scripture and will by the ingenious be easily granted yet it may seem new to some upon whose understanding the old perhaps hath made too deep an impression For I find the old distinction of this power into two parts The 1. Of Order The 2. Of Jurisdiction to be retained by many unto this day Yet they do not unanimously define what this Clavis or potestas ordinis is Some will have it to be the same with Clavis Scientiae which the Schoolmen understood of that juridical knowledge which was antecedaneous and subordinate unto the Decree or definitive sentence Others say it is the power of Ordination and making of Ministers Others take it to be the power of a Minister ordained to preach the Word and administer the Sacraments In which respect it cannot belong to the external Government of independant Churches For a Minister as such is so a Deputy of Christ as that in the due execution of his Office he is above any particular Church and above the Angels And his power in this regard is rather moral than political As under this notion some give him jurisdiction in foro interiori which the Papists call forum poenitentiale But in foro exteriori he cannot challenge it as a Minister For then it could not be communicated to any other with him as to ruling Elders representing the people This the Bishops formerly assumed to themselves with a power to delegate the same to others section 7 These Keys or Powers in the root are but one and the same power supernatural which is a principle of supernatural acts the first branch whereof is the Legislative This ever was and doth still continue in the Church and is most necessary for to regulate and determine the acts both of Government and subjection For without a certain directive and binding Rule no State could ever long continue And God himself whose Power is absolutely supreme did limit himself by a certain Law before he began to require obedience from his Creatures and exercise his power ad extra For it 's his will and pleasure that neither men nor Angels should be subject unto him but according to a certain Rule This the Apostles Elders and Brethren put in practice Act. 15. And the jus Canonicum Novi Testamenti issued from this Power Unto this Head are reduced the forms of Confession for Doctrine Liturgies for Worship Catechisms for instruction in the Principles of Religion and Canons for Discipline in every well constituted Church In this Legislation Ecclesiastical they either do declare what God before hath determined or determine in things which God hath left indifferent what is profitable
of the same and Scotland vanquished In all our sad divisions which happened from first to last and are not wholly yet ended to this day Two things are worthy the serious consideration of wiser men than I am 1. What party for time past hath been most faithful to the English interest 2. What course is to be taken for to setle us more firmly for time to come For the first we must understand what the English interest is The interest of England is twofold Civil and Ecclesiastical for we are English men and Christians The Civil interest is salus populi Anglicani there is no doubt of that for the peace safety liberty happiness of our dear Country is the end whereat we are all bound both by the written and natural Laws of God to aim The interest Ecclesiastical is the Protestant Religion and the perservation of the substance thereof Prelacy Presbytery Independency much less Antipaedobaptism and other Sects are not essential but accidental to it This being the interest of England we cannot judge of the faithfulness either of the King 's or Parliaments party by the quality of the persons of either side For there were both good and bad on both sides who had their several grounds of adhering to this or that party and their several ends and neither their grounds nor ends good Nor can any man justifie all proceedings and actings of either side both had their errours Nor must we judge of them according to their protestation for both could not by such contrary means attain the same end as both sides protested to maintain the King the Parliament the liberty of the Subject the Laws and the Protestant Religion Neither in this particular must the Laws of the English Constitution and Administration be the rule for both acted not only above the Laws but contrary to the latter of them at least For no Laws could warrant the Parliament to act without the King or the King without the Parliament much less was it justifiable that there should be in one Kingdom two not only different but contrary commands supreme and from different heads and persons This was directly against the very nature of all Common-Wealths which have only one first mover and one indivisible supreme power to animate and act them section 19 The Rule therefore must be the Laws of God as above the Laws of Men and we must consider according to these divine Rules what was the state of the Controversie the justice and equity of the cause made evident and the just necessity of doing that which was done Neither must we look at the cause only as just in it self but also how it 's justly or unjustly maintained For men may use such means as shall never reach the just end intended but also such as may be destructive of the cause it self and raze the very foundation of it Besides all this before a perfect judgment can be made the secret counsels contrivances designs hidden actings of the chief Actors should be known yet these many times lie hid and are not known or if known yet to very few and some of these few cannot found the bottom Many things are charged upon the King as acting against the English interest as Civil as that he dissolves Parliaments without just and sufficient cause that he intermits Parliaments for sixteen years together that having signed the Petition of Right he acts contrary to it imposeth Ship-money calls a Parliament signs the Act of Continuance deserts it calls the Members from it calls another Parliament at Oxford challengeth a negative Voice to both the Houses raiseth a War against it though he was informed that this tended to the dissolution of the Government that whosoever should serve to assist him in such Wars are Traitors by the fundamental Laws of this Kingdom and have been so adjudged in two Acts of Parliament 11 Richard 2. and 1 Henry 4. And that such persons ought to suffer as Traitors These with other particulars charged upon him seem directly contrary unto the civil Interest of the Kingdom Again to Marry a Popish Lady upon Articles directly contrary to the Laws of England and the Protestant Religion established by Law to entertain Twenty eight Popish Priests with a Bishop to tolerate Mass in the Court to receive Three Agents from the Pope one after another Pisano Con Rosetti to maintain the Queen-mother to engage the generality of the People of England to retard the relieving of Ireland to admit divers of the Popish Irish Murtherers and Rebels into his Army to call our English Forces sent to relieve the poor distressed Protestants of Ireland out of that Nation and employ them against the Parliament of England to suffer some of the Heads of the Irish Rebels to be so near his Person to endeavour to bring in the Duke of Lorrain with his Forces into this Nation to contract with the Irish Rebels upon condition to enjoy their Religion to furnish him with Ten thousand Irish Rebels to strengthen his party in England with divers other acts like unto these is conceived to be not only inconsistent with but plainly destructive of the English Protestant Interest And if this be true it must needs be so Yet it might be said that the King endeavoured to maintain his own regal Power the Episcopacy and Liturgy established by Law and that he did not oppose the Parliament but a seditious party in the Parliament and other Sectaries whose principles were destructive both of all civil and also Ecclesiastical Government and without the judgment of able Lawyers and learned Divines he did not undertake the War either against Scotland or England or any other It 's true that of those who adhered to the King and liked not the Parliaments proceeding there were some consciencious persons who judged the King an absolute Monarch and did not like many things done by that party yet they thought it the Duty of Subjects to suffer and that it was no ways lawful to resist But the Casuists say That Ignorantia excusat a tanto non a toto their Ignorance might make their Crime less yet no ways free them from all Guilt It was not Invincible they might easily have known that the King of Enland was no absolute Monarch seeing he could not impose any Subsidy upon the Subject nor make or repeal a Law without the Parliament neither could he by his Letters or personal Command revoke the Judgment of any Court. And though they might be Civilians or read Foreign Writers which take our Kings for absolute Sovereigns yet no ancient Lawyers no Parliaments did declare them to be such Nay they might have known that they themselves obeying the King 's personal Commands disobeyed him as King and that serving him in the Wars they were guilty of High Treason against the Kingdom and against the King's Crown and Dignity Of these Royalists some have been high and cruel against their Brethren the Parliamenteers and have censured them
strains and far from being any ground either of Logical or Theological proofs 2. Such as were proper might agree to that Church for that time when it was honoured with persons of eminent piety and learning which were found in it as being the seat of the Empire And such things might be true of that Church then which do not agree unto it now 3. It 's found by the searching of the ancient Manuscripts that some things have been foisted into the Books of these ancient Authors in favour of that Church For they who could even before the fourth Century was ended corrupt the Copy if not the Latine Original of the Nicene Council and put in a Canon for to warrant receiving appeals from Africk which was not found in the Greek Original are not much to be trusted 4. Suppose many or all of those ancient commendations which were proper should be true yet they will not amount to that plenitude of power which in after times was exercised and to this day is challenged by the Bishops of that See. 5. None of those honourable testimonies are of Divine authority or firmly grounded upon the Scriptures And what the Scriptures give them that we will not deny them 3. As for their arguments from Scriptures I have wondred that any rational man should ever use them as they are by them applied to the Pope To argue That because Christ said to Peter to thee I give the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven and if thou lovest me feed my Sheep therefore the present Bishop of Rome is the Head and absolute Monarch of the Universal Church and invested with plenitude of power is very irrational There is such a vast distance between these Scriptures and the conclusion and so many mediums to be used before they can come at it and the same so uncertain that no man that will make use of his reason can assent unto the conclusion when all is said that can be said in behalf of this Universal Vicar from these Texts If we should maintain our cause against them by such arguments they would reject us with scorn and indignation Let his party plead and plead again for his Universal and transcendent power I am sure of one thing that if he loved Christ as Peter professed he did and had a mind sincerely bent to feed his Flock he would never challenge much less exercise such vast power That Christ left a power sufficient to the Church we verily believe but that he delegated so great a power or delegated it unto him we utterly deny and have great reason for it Yet because we will not submit unto his papal Majesty we must be condemned as Schismaticks and Hereticks deprived of all hope of Salvation as having no Communion with that Church whereof he is Head and lodged in Hell the lowest Hell. And all this is done upon the weakest grounds that ever rational man did use But we appeal to Heaven where Christ will be our Advocate and plead our cause and carry it too If it were needful I would single out the chiefest arguments used by them of Rome to maintain this Title and answer them distinctly But this is done already by many worthy and learned men Therefore I will take it for granted as that which hath been made good and evident that the Pope is not the first and proper subject of the power of the Keys CHAP. X. Whether the Civil State have any good Title to the Power of the Keys section 1 YET if the Pope cannot have and hold this power yet the Princes Soveraigns and civil States especially Christian will assume it and they have the strongest and the surest way of all others if they once get possession for to keep it and that 's the Sword. King Henry 8. did not only refuse to submit unto the Roman supremacy but took it to himself and became within his own Dominions over all persons in all causes as well Ecclesiastical as Civil supream Head and Governour So the Priest by the Prince was divested of a considerable part both of his power and also his Revenue But whether he could be the proper subject of this spiritual Power or make good his Title to it was much doubted and that by many As King he was but caput regni non Ecclesiae and as such he might have some Civil but no Ecclesiastical Power at all Yet though it was called Ecclesiastical yet it was not such Grammatice sed Rhetorice not properly but by a Trope a Metonymie of the adjunct for the Subject circa quod For the power of a State Temporal is only Civil if properly and formally considered yet the Civil Soveraign had always something to do in matters of Religion concerning which it may make Laws pass Judgment and execute the same yet the Laws the Judgments the Execution were Civil not strictly Ecclesiastical Therefore such as maintained the Regal Supremacy in Ecclesiasticals were so wise as to say that it was but materially and objectively in the Crown In which sense it was always due to Civil Powers as Civil as appears from Deut. 13. and many other places of Scripture as also from many Examples not only of the Kings of Judah but of Ninivy Babylon and Persia. That many of these Heathen Princes and also of the Kings of Israel did abuse this power for the establishment or exercise of a false Religion and Idolatry is no argument to prove they had it not but that they did not use it aright 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 circa sacra did always belong and that by divine institution to the Civil Higher Powers section 2 For the better understanding of this point several things are to be observed 1. That as there is no people so barbarous but profess and practise some Religion so there is no State or orderly Government but acknowledgeth some Deity or Divine Power upon which they conceive their publick Peace Safety Prosperity and good Success doth depend as we may by the very Scriptures and also by other Histories be informed For every Nation had their publick gods besides their Family-tutelar Deities It 's true though by the light of Nature considering the Glorious works of Heaven and Earth they might have known the true God yet they changed the Glory of God into a Lye or false God and conceived that to be a God which was no such thing 2. The supream Governours of these States had a special care to order the matters of that Religion which they publickly received They made Laws appointed Priests for the Service and Worship of their Gods. This is also evident from Scripture and from other Histories too This ordering of Religion as publick was always held a right of the publick Power 3. Yet they had no power to establish or observe any Religion or Worship but that which God had instituted according to the Laws of Nature or divine Revelation if they did they abused their Power For that very power as from
God was nothing but jus ad recte agendum a right to do right in matters of Religion If they did otherwise they abused their power they lost it not And if an Heathen Prince or State should become Christian they acquire no new Right but are further engaged to exercise their power in abolishing Idolatry and establishing the true Worship of the true God. This may be signified by the Titles of Nursing-Fathers of the Church Defenders of the Faith Most Christian Most Catholick King. All which as they signified their Right so they also pointed at their Duty which was to protect the true Church and maintain the True Christian Catholick Faith. 4. Though Regal and Sacerdotal power were always distinct and different in themselves yet they were often disposed and united in one Person Thus Melchisedeck was both King and Priest Thus Romulus was Prince and the chief Pontiffe For he is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Halicar Antiqu. Rom. lib. 2. The succeeding Kings took the same place After the Regal power was abolished it was an high Office. When Rome became Imperial the Emperours took the Title of Supream Pontiffe and some of them after they became Christian retained it Yet still as the Powers so the Acts were distinct For Melchisedeck as King ruled his People in Righteousness and Peace as Priest officiated received Tithes and blessed Abraham As they were sometimes united so they were divided For God entailed the Sacerdotal power upon the house of Aaron and afterwards the Regal power upon the family of David Neither did Christ or his Apostles think it fit to make the Ministers Magistrates or the Magistrates Ministers Yet in this Union or Division you must know that this Sacerdotal and Ministerial power was not this Civil power of Religion which always belonged to the Civil Governours even then when these two powers were divided 5. If Civil powers stablish Religion and that by Law call Synods order them ratifie their Canons divest spiritual and Ecclesiastical persons of their temporal priviledges or restore them yet they do all this by their civil power by which they cannot excommunicate absolve suspend much less officiate and preach and administer Sacraments In this respect if the civil power make a civil Law against Idolatry Blasphemy Heresie or other scandal they may by the same power justly punish the offenders by the sword and the Church censure them by the power of the Keyes 6. This jus Religionis ordinandae this power of ordering matters of Religion is not the power of the Church but of the State not of the Keyes but of the sword The Church hath nothing to do with the sword nor the State with the Keyes Christ did not say tell the State and whatsoever ye bind on earth shall be bound in Heaven c. Neither did he say of the Church that she beareth not the sword in vain Therefore he must needs be very ignorant or very partial that shall conceive that the State is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the power of the Keyes section 3 These things premised give occasion to consider how the Oath of Supremacy is to be understood especially in these words wherein the Kings or Queens of England were acknowledged over all persons in causes as well Ecclesiastical as Civil all supream head and because that word Head was so offensive it was changed into Governour For the clearing hereof it 's to be observed 1. That by these words it was intended to exclude all foreign Power both Civil and Ecclesiastical especially that which the Bishops of Rome did challenge and also exercise within the Dominions of the Crown of England 2. That the Kings and Queens of Enland had no power supream in making Laws and passing judgements without the Parliament Therefore by supream Governour was meant supream Administratour for the execution of the Laws in the intervals of Parliament In this respect the Canons and injunctions made by the Clergy though confirmed by royal assent without the Parliament have been judged of no force 3. That by Ecclesiastical causes are meant such causes as are materially Ecclesiastical yet properly civil as before For matters of Religion in respect of the outward profession and practice and the Parties professing and practising are subject to the civil power For by the outward part the State may be disturbed put in danger of Gods judgements and the persons are punishable by the sword even for those crimes Yet neither can the sword reach the soul nor rectifie the conscience except per accidens That by Ecclesiastical is not meant spiritual in proper sense is clear because the Kings of England never took upon them to excommunicate or absolve neither had those Chancellours that were only Civilians and not Divines power to perform such acts Yet they received their power from the Bishops and it was counted Ecclesiastical 4. In respect of these Titles those Courts which were called Spiritual and Ecclesiastical derived their power from the Crown And the Bishops did correct and punish disquiet disobedient criminous persons within their Diocess according to such authority as they had by Gods word and as to them was committed by the authority of this Realm These are the words of the Book of Ordination in the consecration of Bishops The words seem to imply that they had a mixt or at least a twofold power one by the word as trusted with the power of the Keyes the other from the Magistrate or Crown and that was civil Such a mixt power they had indeed in the high Commission Yet though this may be implyed yet it may be they understood that their power by the word of God and from the Crown were the same The act of restoring the ancient jurisdiction to the Crown 1 Eliz. 1. doth make this further evident For it 's an act of restoring the ancient jurisdiction in Ecclesiasticals especially to the Crown for that 's the Title Where it must be observed that the power was such as the Parliament did give 2. That they did not give it anew but restore it 3. They could not had no power to give it if it belonged to the Crown by the Constitution but to declare it to be due upon which Declaration the Queen might resume that which the Pope had usurped and exercised 4. It 's remarkable that not the Queen but the Parliament by that act did restore it as the act of the Oath of supremacy was made by a Parliament which by that act could not give the King any power at all which was not formerly due In respect of Testaments temporal jurisdiction Dignities Priviledges Titles as due unto the Church by humane Constitution and donation all Ecclesiastical causes concerning these were determinable by a civil power How tithes are a lay-fee or divine right hath been declared formerly Hence it doth appear that the Oath of Supremacy was not so easily understood as it was easily taken by many and the Oxford Convocation I believe but that they
had already sworn could have found as many reasons against it as against the Covenant especially if it had been new as the Covenant was Many wise men at the first did scruple it and some suffered death for refusal Amongst the rest Sir Thomas Moor a learned and a very prudent man could not digest it and though he might have an high conceit of the Papal Supremacy yet that might not be the only reason of his refusal but this because he knew the Crown had no Ecclesiastical power properly so called Though this was not thought to be the true but only the pretended cause of his death For in his Vtopia he seems to dislike the Indisputable Prerogative which was a Noli me tangere and to touch it so roughly as he did might cost dear as it did Yet I have taken the Oath of Supremacy in that sense as our Divines did understand it and I was and am willing to give to Caesar the things that are Caesar's section 4 That which hath been said in this point in brief is this That though the Civil Powers have a right to order matters of Religion in respect of the outward part and so far as the Sword may reach it according to Divine Law yet they have no power of the Keys which Christ committed to the Church For if we consider all the power exercised in matter of Religion by David Solomon and the pious Kings of Judah by the Christian Emperours and Princes by the Kings of France and England it was but civil Neither is the power of our Parliaments any other For though they make Acts concerning the publick Doctrine and Discipline yet these are but civil They are not Representatives of the Church but of the State whether the Convocation was an essential part of the Parliament or a full representative of the Church I will not here debate I find some great Lawyers which deny both And if their denial be true then England had no general Representative of the Church in latter times As for Erastians and such as do give all Ecclesiastical power of Discipline to the State and deny all power to the Ministers but that of dispensing Word and Sacraments it 's plain they never understood the state of the Question and though a Minister as a Minister have no power but that of Word and Sacraments yet from thence it will not follow that the Church hath not a power spiritual distinct from that of the State in matters of Religion CHAP. XI Whether Episcopacy be the primary subject of the Power of the Keys section 1 THE Prelate presumes that the power of the Keys is his and he thinks his title very good and so good that though he could not prove the institution yet prescription will bear him out For he hath had possession for a long time and Universality and Antiquity seem to favour him very much Yet I hope his title may be examined and if upon examination it prove good he hath no cause to be offended except with this that I of all others should meddle with it But before any thing can be said to purpose we must first know the nature and institution of a Bishop which is the subject of the Question Secondly Put the Reader in mind that the Question is not in this place whether a Bishop be an Officer of the Church either by some special or some general Divine Precept but whether he be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the primary subject of the power of the Keys For he may be an Officer and yet no such subject Concerning a Bishop the subject of the Question two things are worthy our consideration 1. What he is 2. How instituted at the first The Definition and Institution seem rather to belong unto the second part of Ecclesiastical Politicks where I shall entreat of Ecclesiastical Officers and the constitution of them Yet I will here say something of both in order to the Question though I be the briefer afterward section 2 What a Bishop is may be difficult to know except we do distinguish before we do define For we find several sorts of Bishops in the Church Christian. There is a Primitive a Prelatical or Hierarchical and an English Bishop distinct and different in some things from both the former for whom I reserve a place in the end of this Chapter The Primitive Bishop is twofold 1. A Presbyter 2. A President or Superintendent 1. A Presbyter in the New Testament is a Bishop For the Elders of Ephesus were made by the Holy Ghost Bishops or Superintendents over God's flock Acts 20.28 And the qualification of a Bishop 1 Tim. 3.1 2 3 c. is the qualification of an Elder Tit. 1.5 6 7 c. For whatsoever some of late have said to the contrary yet Presbyter and Bishop were only two different words signifying the same Officer And this is confessed by divers of the Ancients who tell us that the word Bishop was appropriated to one who was more than a Presbyter in after-times 2. A Bishop signified one that was above a Presbyter in some respects as a Moderatour of a Classis or President of a Synod But such a Presbyter might be only pro tempore for the time of the Session and after the Assembly dissolved he might return to be a bare Presbyter again For to be a Moderatour or President was no constant place The word in this sense we find seldom used if at all 2. A President was a kind of Superintendent with a care and inspection not only over the people but the Presbyters too within a certain precinct and this was a constant place and the party called a Bishop and by Ambrose and Austine with divers others called primus Presbyterorum and these were such as had no power but with the Presbytery joyntly and that without a negative voice And the Presbytery might be a Representative not only of the Presbyters strictly taken but of the people too For we may read in Cyprian and other Authours that these Bishops in more weighty matters of publick concernment did nothing without the counsel and consent not only of the Presbyters but the people This I call a primitive Bishop not only because he is ancient but also because the place or office is agreeable to the rules of Reason of Government and the general Rules of the Apostles concerning Order Decency Edification There is also an Hierarchical Bishop who may be only a Bishop or an Archbishop and Metropolitan or a Patriarch and these challenge the power of Ordination and Jurisdiction and in Jurisdiction include and engross the power of making Canons This kind of Episcopacy is ancient as the former This last Bishop is he upon whom Spalatensis and many others do fix and though they grant that he should do nothing without the Counsel of the Presbytery yet they give him full power without the Presbytery which they joyn with him only for advice The English Bishop is in
commended or reproved and charged with divers sins and threatned with such punishments as must fall upon all After all these proofs from Scripture recourse is had to Antiquity and Universality as sufficient grounds of a prescription which is a good kind of title But 1. In divine things especially such as are of ordinary and universal obligation Antiquity and Universality without a Divine Institution will not serve the turn 2. The Hierarchy prescribes as much and as high as Episcopacy invested with power of Ordination and Jurisdiction as proper to it self yet it s confessed to be only of humane institution 3. What is it how is it defined What Divine Institution can be made evident of that which they say is so universal and ancient 4. Who are the witnesses by whose testimony this Antiquity and Universality is proved They are besides some of later times but few and all within the Roman Empire many of them Bishops themselves and some of them bitter Enemies one against another They are not one of an hundred amongst the Bishops not one of a thousand amongst others Yet the Church in the Apostles times was enlarged to the ends of the Earth And as then so now there were in every Century thousands that did never write or if they did they wrote not of Episcopacy and many of them might be as great Schollars as those whose books are extant 5. There was a special reason why there might be Bishops and the same Hierarchical in the principal parts of the Roman Teritory as shall be touched hereafter 6. Suppose these Bishops to have the power of Ordination and Jurisdiction yea the whole power of the Keyes which includes the Legislative in making Canons can any man prove that they had it always in all places and if so that they had it severally in their several precincts and not joyntly with their fellow Bishops as Representatives in Counsels and also with Presbyters and others too It s well enough known that other besides Bishops had their suffrage in Synods Arles President of the Council of Basil proves stoutly that Presbyters have their Votes and without them he could not have carried the cause against Panormitan and his faction section 8 After the primitive and the Hierarchical Episcopacy comes in the English which hath something singular He that will understand the nature of it more fully must read Dr. Zouch Dr. Mucket Dr. Cosens the Civilian his Tables with him who calls himself Didoclavius upon him By all whom we may understand 1. It was not the primitive Episcopacy 2. It was clearly Hierarchical for we had Bishops and two Arch-Bishops of York and Canterbury the one the Metropolitan of England the other of all England The Bishops took their Oath of obedience to the Arch-Bishops as appeareth by the book of ordination They did arrogate the power of ordination to themselves though Presbyters did in the ordination impose hands with them and some of them confessed they had it only with the Presbyter joyntly Yet we know how that by others is eluded 3. Not to say any thing of their Titles Dignity Revenue Baronies annexed to their Sea their place in the house of the Peers in Parliament and their priviledges they had cast off in effect not only the people but Presbytery For though the Presbytery had their Clerks both in the Convocation of York and also at London if the Parliament sat there yet they took upon them in the end to nominate these Clerks and deprive the Ministers of their right of Election As for the Deanes and Chapters which should have been eminent Persons and chosen by the Presbytery in every Diocess to represent them they were degenerate from their original Institution and the Bishops who should have done nothing but joyntly with them did all things without them They in effect though unjustly engrossed the whole power of Administration 4. Yet this is observable that 1. They could make no Canons but joyntly in one Assembly 2. That joyntly amongst themselves without the Presbytery they had not this power 3. That no Canons were valid without the Royal Assent 4. Neither by the Constitution was the Royal Assent sufficient without the Parliament 5. That they derived much of their Ecclesiastical power from the Crown For by the Oath of Supremacy is declared that the King of England is over all persons even in Ecclesiastical causes Supream Governour In which respect all their secular Power Revenue Dignity and also their nomination and confirmation with their investiture is from him He calls Synods confirms their Canons grants Commissions to exercise Jurisdiction purely Ecclesiastical In the first year of King Edward the sixth by a Statute they were bound to use the Kings name not their own even in their Citations and as before they must correct and punish offenders according to such Authority as they had by the Word of God and as to them should be committed by the ordinance of this Realm So that if the Popish Bishops derive their power from the Pope and the English from the King neither of them could be jure divino And by this the title of most Bishops in Europe is meerly humane and that in two respects 1. Because its Hierarchial 2. Derived either from an higher Ecclesiastical or an higher secular power section 9 Thus far I have enquired though briefly and according to my poor ability into the definition and institution of a Bishop the subject of the Question which is this Whether a Bishop or Bishops be the primary subject of the Keyes The meaning whereof is 1. Whether they be the primary and adequate sole subject of the whole power of the Keyes whereof the principal though not all the branches are making Canons and receiving last appeals without any provocation from them For they may be subjects and not primary they may be subjects of some part and not of the whole power 2. Whether they be such subjects of this power in foro exteriori For in foro interiori the Presbyters have as much as they 3. Whether they be such subjects of such power in foro exteriori quatenus Episcopi reduplicative 4. Whether as such they be such a subject by Divine Institution For solution hereof it s to be considered 1. That except there be an Universal consent and the same clearly grounded upon Scripture both what a Bishop is and 2. That made evident that his Title is of Divine Institution the affirmative cannot be proved 2. That though a Bishop could be clearly proved to have the power of Ordination and Jurisdiction yet it will not follow from thence that he is the primary subject of that power For the negative many things may be said 1. Neither the papal nor the English Bishop so far as the one derives his power from the Pope and the other from the Crown can be the primary subject of this power the secondary they may be 2. For such as derive not their power from
it only at the second hand as he himself confesseth I will not examine his many arguments because there is none of them ad idem and to the purpose or point in hand and they all and every one as he misapplies them presuppose an errour For they all should be limited to the Fundamental Power in Constitution but here Power of Constitution and of Administration are confounded as also the power of the Church with the power of Officers section 2 After the examination of all these Titles I proceed to deliver mine own judgment and to make good the Title of my Mother the Church For I believe this to be the truth in this point That the primary subject of the Power of the Keyes is the whole Church For order sake I will. 1. Explain the proposition 2. Confirm the same In the Explication I will inform the Reader 1. What I mean by the power of Keyes 2. What by the whole Church 3. How and in what manner I understand the whole Church to be the primary subject of this power 1. This power is not the power of Civil Soveraigns nor of Officers as Officers Civil or Ecclesiastical in foro exteriori or of Ministers as Ministers nor the Universal Power of Christ nor the Extraordinary power of Apostles or any other Extraordinary Officers but it is an Ordinary power of making Canons of constituting Officers of Jurisdiction and other Acts which are necessary for the outward Government of an Ecclesiastical Community committed unto and conveyed upon the Church by Christ. 2. By the whole Church is not to be understood the Universal Church militant and triumphant nor the whole Church mystical nor the whole Church militant and visible of all times nor of the visible Church of all Nations existent in one time but a whole particular Church visible in some certain place and Vicinity that shall be fit to manage the power of the Keyes independently as the Church of Jerusalem of Antioch of Corinth of Ephesus of Smyrna c. Those who determine the Series or order of appeals to ascend from a Congregation to a Classis from a Classis to a Provincial Synod from a Provincial to a National of one Nation to a National of several Nations or from that unto an Oecomenical or General Council extend the whole Church far further than I do As for the Papal party they presuppose all particular Churches to make but one visible Church not only for Doctrine and Worship but for outward Discipline too and the Church of Rome must be the Mother and Queen of all other Churches in the World yet they differ about the primary subject of the power of the Keyes Some determine the Pope as Peters Successour to be the visible Head and Universal Monarch of this Church Others as the Councils of Constance and Basil Cameracensis Gerson and the faculty of Paris give this power to the whole Church to be exercised in general Councils Mr. Ellis doth charge some of our own who affirmed this power to be in the Universal Church with Popery and Mr. Hooker conceives he hath demonstrated Learned and Judicious Mr. Hudson to be guilty of the same but he is mistaken as since is made evident These two cannot possibly be reconciled whilest they proceed upon contrary principles Mr. Hooker of New-England understands by a visible Church such a Church as is under a form of external Discipline and subject unto one independent Judicatory but neither Mr. Hudson nor others of his mind understand any such thing There is an Universal visible Militant Church on Earth this Church is truly Totum integrale and also an Organical body the Head and Monarch is Christ all Ministers Officers all Believers Subjects the Word and Sacrament priviledges and every Christian either by Birth or Baptism according to Divine Institution is first in order of nature a Member of this Universal or Organical Body before he be a Member of any particular Church or Congregation and is so to be considered And many if not all the places of Scripture alledged by Mr. Hudson are truly understood to speak of this Universal Church though some of them seem to be affirmed only of the Church mystical as such yet so that in divers respects they may agree to both This cannot be Popery neither doth it presuppose any point of Popery or other errour The grand errour of the Papist in this particular is to affirm that one Church particular is above all Churches in the World not only in dignity but in power so that all particular Churches must be subject unto her and her Bishop invested with universal Jurisdiction To subject the Universal Church Militant in one body to Christ can have no affinity with this And to subject every particular Church to the Universal exercising her power in a Representative is no such errour nor so dangerous as that of the Soveraignty of Rome And though there be no such thing because the distance is so great that the Association is impossible yet the Pope and his party did abhor to think of it That Question about visible and invisible is but a toy to this The Church therefore which is the subject of the Question is a Church a particular Church a whole particular Church Yet there is a particular Church primary and secundary primary is the Church considered as a community and a secondary Church by way of Representation The primary is the proper subject of real power the Representative of personal Whether this Church be Congregational or of larger extent shall be examined hereafter 3. Thus you have heard 1. What the power is 2. What the subject is Now 3. We must consider in what manner this power is in this primary subject It s not in it Monarchically nor Aristocratically nor Democratically or any pure way of Disposition but in the whole after the manner of a free State or Polity For there Universi praesunt singulis singuli subduntur universis so it s here All joyntly and the whole doth rule every several person though Officer though Minister though Bishop if there be any such is subject to the whole and to all joyntly And in this Model the power is derived from the whole to the parts not from the parts to the whole though this Community should consist of ten thousand Congregations This power is exercised in the highest degree by a Representative general in an inferiour degree by Officers or inferiour Assemblies Upon this principle though in another manner the Councils of Basil and Constance did proceed against the Pope as being but a part though an eminent part as the times were then of the Church Yet this proposition is not so to be understood as though this Church were the first Fountain and Original of this power for she is not she derives and receives it from Christ as Christ from God. But she is the primary subject in respect of her parts and members section 3 For the confirmation of this
is not bound to obey because he subjected himself according to the Laws of Wisdome and Justice Yet in such cases he being a subject as a Subject must be willing to suffer and not resist the power for though the power be just and we are bound to submit yet we are not bound to obey the unjust Laws of a just power The Apostles would not obey the unjust commands of their Rulers yet they did not resist their power but rather suffered though unjustly persecuted By this subjection the Subject is bound to maintain their higher Powers for the publick good and safety For this cause therefore saith the Apostle pay you Tribute also for they are Gods Ministers attending continually upon this thing Rom. 13.6 By this Subjection he is further bound to hazard not only his Estate but his Life and Person for the Soveraign and the State in a time of publick danger And all this must be done not for fear but Conscience sake For subjection is a duty required by the Moral Law of God and must be performed out of love and in obedience unto God and cannot be performed by any so fully as by a sincere Christian. And though we must pray for all men yet especially must we pray for them 1 Tim. 2.1 And in praying for them we pray for our selves and for our own peace Honour also is due from Subjects to their Soveraigns by reason of their eminent Dignity which ariseth from their power Contrary to these are dishonouring reviling or vilifying the Higher Power disobedience to their just Laws denying of Tribute and other dues refusing to hazzard Person or Estate for the Publick safety revolting and infidelity keeping Intelligence with Enemies open Rebellion and Resistance of their Power secret Treasons and Conspiracies against their Person or other ways directly or indirectly And the greatest Treason and Rebellion and Infidelity is that against the State it self and real Majesty the next is that against personal Majesty in the general Representative of the whole Community the next to that is that against the person or persons upon whose safety the Peace and Happiness of the People much depends And that which is against Government in general is far greater than that which is only against this or that form in particular Treason against Laws is more hainous than Treason against persons and Treason against the Fundamental Laws than Treason against Laws for Administration This Treason against the Fundamentals was charged upon the Earl of Strafford and the personal Commands of the King could no ways excuse him Yet it was not thought fit that the Judgment past upon him should be made a Precedent for Inferiour Courts because none but a Parliament could judge of and declare the Constitution and what was against it and what not section 4 And here I might take occasion to speak of Subjection unto Usurped Power and acting under it of the continuance of this Obligation unto Subjection and the dissolution of it of the Obligation of the Oaths of Supremacy and Allegiance the Protestation the Covenant and Engagement in respect of such as have taken them Of the Civil Wars of late how far they tended unto the Dissolution of the Government and how far they did actually dissolve it Whether the warlike resistance made by the Parliament against the King's Commissions and his party was Rebellion and whether there was any legal certain Power that could justly challenge Subjection or induce an obligation to it since the commencement of the War or whether the Power continued in the Parliament till the Members thereof were secluded whether the Act of Alteration was a sufficient ground of Obligation or whether any of the Alterations made since can be sufficient for that purpose But the distinct discussion hereof would require a great Volume which I intend not Neither if I should presume to deliver my judgment in these particulars is there any probable hope of giving satisfaction seeing so many men of Eminent Parts and Learning do so much differ in them I can and I shall pray that God would open our Eyes to see the Truth and unite our Hearts in Love one towards another 1. For Usurpation few do distinguish between the Usurpation and manner of Acquisition and the power itself For Power is Gods and is always just though it may be both acquired and exercised unjustly There are also several kinds oâ— Usurpation whereof some may be apparently unjust and some doubtful And there is scarcely any power now in the Kingdoms and States of this World but were Usurped either by the present Possessors or some of their Predecessors Neither can the tract of time make them lawful without some rational consent either tacit or express and something of Divine Providence besides For supream power personal cannot be usurped and possessed by any man without the Will of God not only permitting but acting and giving it too not that he approves mans sin or can do any thing unjust but for Reasons just and good known many times only to himself and not to us For God hath made use of Usurpers for to execute his judgements and to do as much Justice as many lawful Successors or Possessors and may bless them temporally for their good service and yet punish them for their Ambition and unjust manner of seeking Power By this he no ways doth warrant or encourage or give the least liberty to any one to usurpe power unlawfully We must in this point put a great difference between those Usurpations which are contrary to the Moral Laws of God and such as are only disagreeing with humane Institutions which many times may be unjust Suppose we desire to have an Usurper or Usurpers removed yet we must consider whether removal may not do a far greater mischief than our submission can possibly do When we do submit we must not so much look upon the unjust manner of acquiring the power as at the power itself which is from God and we must consider the necessity which Divine Providence hath brought us into seeing he gives us no power or opportunity to right our selves in respect of humane Titles or free our selves from such as we conceive Usurpers under whom he many times enjoys Protection Peace Justice and the Gospel It 's no Wisdom to be so ready and rash as to call every one Usurper which did not obtain his power according to the Fancies and Idea's of our own Brain and to deny all power when as they know that if there should not be power and in the hands of some and the same exercised too all would come to ruin and they themselves could not escape It may be observed that the greatest Usurpers themselves are readiest to charge those with Usurpation which have justly dispossessed them Yet for all this we must not justifie Usurpation that is truly and really Usurpation neither must we swallow Gudgeons comply with every party and sail with every wind as some are ready to do Yet
on the other hand we must not be too scrupulous and pretend Conscience and yet make our Fancy or some humane Constitutions our Rule and adhere unto them as though they were Divine Institutions For some whilst they refuse either to submit or act under a power in their conceit usurped they become guilty of more hainous Sin and when they presume they are faithful to some personal Majesty they prove unfaithful to Real and their own dear Country preferring the Interest of some Person or Family or persons before the good of the whole body of the people to whom they owe more than to any other And whosoever will not be faithful unto his own Country cannot be faithful to any form of Government or personal Governours Yet whosoever will handle this point accurately must first define what Usurpation in general is 2. How many kinds and differences of Usurpation there be and 3. What the particular Usurpation is against which he argues and 4. State the particular Case with all the Circumstances section 5 The continuance and dissolution of a Legal Power is also to be observed As for real Majesty it always continues whilest the Community remains a Community and subjection to this is due till it be destroyed Subjection to personal Majesty in a Representative cannot in just things be denied till a latter Representative make their power void The personal Majesty of a King with us requires subjection whilst he lives and governeth according to Law but upon his Death or upon Tyranny likewise or acting to the dissolution of the Fundamental Constitution he ceaseth to be a Soveraign and the Obligation as to him ceaseth A Parliament turning into a Faction acting above their Sphere wronging King or People cannot justly require nor rationally expect for Subjection And though private persons cannot yet the people by a latter and well ordered Parliament may both judge them and call the Exorbitant Members to account When a personal Soveraign cannot protect his Subjects because their Lives Persons and Estates are in the power of another he cannot rationally require subjection but for the time at least he should be willing to free them from Allegiance and to let them make the best terms they can for themselves But voluntary Revolt or Rebellion cannot free them from this Obligation to their lawful Soveraign In a word so many ways as Majesty and Soveraignty may be lost so many ways this Obligation may be dissolved Yet in all these Dissolutions Subjects must remember that their Obligation to God and their Country doth continue when not only Personal Soveraigns but also the Forms of Government are altered There are just Causes and Reasons of the Dissolution of this Obligation and there are also unjust pretences and grounds of denying Subjection If any one of an innovating humour or desire of alteration or discontent with their present Governours or conceits of false Titles or an intention to advance some of their own party or a belief that any forraign Prince or Priest can absolve them from their Allegiance or that their Soveraigns are wicked or do not administer justly or are Tyrants when they are not or in any such like case shall seek to cast off the Yoke and think themselves free they must needs be guilty and cannot be excused Those are the greatest Offenders who are Enemies to Government it self under pretence of liberty or impunity in their Crimes vailed under the notion of self-preservation or a reformation of some things amiss section 6 The Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy could alter nothing in the Constitution and both did presuppose our Allegiance due to England according to the fundamental Laws and could neither take it away nor add any thing unto it The Parliament by them might declare what was the Duty of every Subject The occasion of them both are well known the end was to exclude all forraign Power in matter of Religion and civil Right in both which the Pope had usurped formerly and might do so for future times especially seeing many Subjects did incline so much unto the Sea of Rome They seemed to bind the Subjects taking them not only to the present Kings or Queens but their Heirs and Successors For the King might have Heirs and Successors and he might have no Heirs and yet have Successors For Queen Elizabeth had no Heir or Heirs but a Successor she had Yet because the Crown is not entailed by common Law and the fundamental Rule as some tell us therefore none is a Successor till he be designed and actually invested and acknowledged and till then the Oaths were not administred to be taken by any particular subject The Oath taken to the former Prince if once removed by Death or some other way though it expressed Heirs and Successors was not thought sufficient it must be taken anew unto the present Successor by Name Yet if the Crown had been entailed or the King 's proper Fee by Inheritance this seems to be needless One reason of these words inserted seems to be this that seeing Succession and Election was usually in a Line it was intended by them to exclude Pretenders and all Power of the Pope or any other to dispose of the Crown when the former Possessor was removed or deceased yet they did not so tye us to be faithful unto the Power of England to be exercised by King Peers and Commons as that it were unlawful to be true and faithful unto the Community of England though under another form The Obligation to our Country was far higher and fidelity to it was due by the Laws of God and Nature so that we must seek the good thereof though the Government was altered Fidelity unto the Community is first due Fidelity to it under some form of Government was the second Fidelity unto it as under that form by King Peers and Commons was the third Fidelity unto the person of the King is the last and presupposeth the former whosoever understands and takes them otherwise perverts the true meaning and makes them unlawful The Protestation and Covenant were made in a time of danger and distraction and did include or presuppose the former Obligations yet the Protestation superadded something concerning the Protestant Doctrine of the Church of England to be maintain'd and the Covenant something of Discipline as to be performed and both extended to the preservation of the peace and union of the three Kingdoms Neither of them did allow any unlawful means to compass these ends Neither of them could take away our Obligation to our Country and destroy our English Primary Interest but it remains entire and since all the alterations made afterwards we are as much as ever bound to seek and promote the same and whosoever will refuse to do so upon pretence of these Oathes the Protestation and the Covenant he is Traytor to the common good of the Nation For as there is a positive so there is a negative Infidelity For though such did not use
any means positive to destroy it yet they neglect it and if every one should do as they do sit still and look on and do nothing it would certainly come to ruin and fall into the hands of those who are their Mortal Enemies section 7 The late Civil Wars in England did not only tend unto the Dissolution of the Government but actually for that time dissolve it For if the first Supream Power personally was in King Peers and Commons joyntly then it follows that when the King forsook the Parliament and refused to act joyntly with them it was dissolved much more when he set up his Standard and granted the Commission of Array and fought against them For then there were two contrary Powers and Supream Commands and the Subjects in strict sense were not bound to obey either And the Parliament did declare that whensoever the King should make War upon them it was a breach of the trust reposed in him by his People contrary to his Oath and tended to the Dissolution of the Government If the Government was dissolved it will follow that the Subjects were freed from their Allegiance yet the Allegiance due to the Community of England did continue and every one was bound to adhere to the just party according to the Laws of God though in doing so they could not observe the Laws of men And whosoever did oppose that just party did render themselves for ever uncapable of the benefit of the English protection and were ipso facto Enemies to their own Country their own peace and safety Yet the Parliament did not declare that upon a War made upon them the Government was actually dissolved because though that War tended to the dissolution thereof yet they conceiv'd that the form did remain still in King Peers and Commons and a considerable party of the Lords and Commons remained in the place whither they were summon'd by the King and by vertue of the Act of Continuance continued a Parliament and that the King's power was virtually in the two Houses Yet in this they passed above the Letter of the Law and followed the Rules of Equity and Reason and perhaps they had some hopes of rectifying the King and had no intention to alter the form if they could preserve it and keep it up But all their Wisdom and Endeavours could not prevent the Judgment that God intended to execute section 8 Whether the warlike resistance made by the Parliament against the King against his Commissions against his party was a Rebellion The King did declare it to be Rebellion and proclaimed the Parliament-party Rebels and Traytors yet he did not declare the Parliament to be Rebellious For so to have done had been offensive to his own party and he had a considerable party perhaps in both the Houses and if he did acknowledge it to be a Parliament in condemning them he must have condemned himself because he was an essential Member of the same Neither did the Parliament profess they fought against but for the King. Yet if they fought against such as were commissioned by the King they fought against the King and if the King declared the Parliaments party to be Rebels and Traytors he must needs judge the Parliament guilty because as he in his War was the principal Agent so they on their side were too This gave occasion of curious distinctions For men did distinguish between Charles Stewart and the King betwen his regal and his personal Capacity and on the other side between the Parliament and a party in the Parliament though the whole Parliament did Commission and Arm. Thus they found a difference between the King and himself and the Parliament and itself These distinctions were not altogether false yet though Charles Stewart and the King and so the Parliament and a party in the Parliament might be distinguished yet they could not be separated And woe unto the people that is brought into such straights and perplexities For if they kill Charles Stewart they kill the King and if the King destroy that party in the Parliament he destroys the Parliament But to return unto the Question it 's one thing to be Rebellion another to be judged Rebellion For that may be judged Rebellion which is not such and the same thing may be justified by one and condemned by another Arnisaeus handles this matter at large and makes the Question in general to be this Whether upon any Cause whatsoever it is lawful for the Subjects to resist or take up Arms against their lawful Soveraign When he hath stated the Question he determines upon the Negative and proves it In stating the Question he seems to define a Subject to be one who hath given his Allegiance to his lawful Prince But what he means per fidem datam is not made so clear Then he distinguisheth of Princes For 1. There are Regna pactionata where Princes are made upon condition 2. There are Regna absoluta where the Princes are absolute 3. There are Tyrants and that of two sorts 1. In Title as Usurpers 2. In Exercise These distinctions being made he grants That Princes upon condition may be resisted for their ill Administration 2. That Tyrants in Title before the Subjects bind themselves unto them may be opposed 3. That Tyrants in Exercise may be deposed and that by their Tyranny excidunt jure suo etsi haereditario divests themselves of their power though hereditary 4. That absolute Soveraigns who have potestatem non delegatam sed transfusam cannot be resisted lawfully though they be vicious and their Administrations impious and unjust if it reach not Tyranny which is directly against the Laws and Rules of Government and tends to the destruction of the Common-wealth But in all this Discourse he doth not produce any Authentical Record Fundamental Charter for these absolute Soveraigns which have omnem omnimodam potestatem à populo transfusam As for that Roman transfusion of power upon the Emperours it 's an uncertain thing Lex Regia doth no where appear it 's doubted of many as it is denied by many And suppose that people should be so unwise what 's that to others He seems to contradict his own Definition of a subject which I formerly explained he mistakes most grosly the Constitution of some States wherein he instanceth Whosoever will determine this Controversie or debate it to purpose he must 1. Define Subjection and declare the several degrees of it according to the several Constitutions of Common-wealt 2. If he instance in a particular State he must certainly know the Fundamental Laws thereof and truly express them 3. He must put the case aright and state the Question hic nunc rebus sic stantibus This resistance if Rebellion must be an act of a Subject as a Subject and that cannot be but against his Soveraign as his lawful Soveraign according to the Laws of God and just Laws of Men. And no man is able to justifie the Resistance of a
think an ordinary power continued on foot till the Members were secluded yet there was no such thing for the two Houses could not according to ordinary Rules exercise the Ordinary power of the King though they might use his name and did so contrary unto his consent If they should alledge that his power was forfeited and did divolve upon them that would be hard to prove We know well enough if it be not in him where it is it could no ways be in them but for the exercise and in them for that end it was an extraordinary way Some would say that if the King was dead either naturally or in Law a Parliament must instantly dissolve and be no Parliament because there was wanting an essential part The act of continuance could not help them in this case for it presupposed all the three essential parts Neither could any particular Parliament enact that there should be a Parliament without all the three essential members If they should make any such Act by a following Parliament it may be repealed and the parties in the name of the People of England called to account for altering the Fundamental Government For we must not favour on particular Parliament so as to wrong all England or suffer any ill example to be given Yet if ever any Parliament did deserve not only to be pardoned if they did some things amiss but to be rewarded for their service surely this Parliament did for never any suffered more even from him who summoned them and from them who chose the particular Members Never any was brought into the like straits I mean that this respect was to be had to the upright party But if there was no ordinary power what must the people do in such a case and distracted condition In this I will give mine opinion in that which follows section 10 Whether could the Act of alteration which required the ingagement or any of the alterations which followed introduce an Obligation to Subjection The answer is they could not in any ordinary way do any such thing For if the constitution was dissolved and the personal Majesty forfeited it must devolve unto the people and no Parliament nor part of a Parliament or any other person but the people could either alter the former Government nor Model a new one For according to the general principles of Government the right of Constitution Alteration Abolition Reformation is the right of real Majesty if it be not their right then the people may be bound to Subjection without their consent A Parliament may declare it but some make it a Question whether their Declaration be binding If they who required the engagement did intend to exclude a King who should separate from them or refuse to act with them or challenge an Absolute power 2. To abolish the House of Lords as distinct from that of the Commons with a Negative Voyce in Legislation and of such Lords as were Lords by Writ or Patent only 3. To declare that upon a dissolution the power was devolved to the people it was the more tolerable Yet who gave them power to do this or declare this When I mention the people of England as the primary subject of Power and the heir of real Majesty I mean the rational judicial party for no consent of people that is not rational and agreeable to the Laws of God is of any force And I exclude not only such as are barely Members virtually but all Rebels Traytors and malignant persons For in the midst of these Bloody distractions and perplexity of minds there was a Sanior pars a rational judicious party that unfeignedly desired the Peace Welfare and happiness of England And when many Members of a Community are insufficient of themselves to judge what is just and good many of them perverted the power remains in parte saniore aut in parte hujus partis valentiore and in those who upon right information shall consent with them For many who are not able of themselves to judge yet when they are rightly informed are willing to consent But to return unto the former Question seeing there was no ordinary power which could introduce any strict Obligation what must the People do in such a Case What 's their duty The Answer is That though there was no Ordinary yet there was an Extraordinary Power ever since the Wars were ended to this day which they were bound to obey For 1. Seeing the Community of England did remain and in the same better party Real Majesty did continue 2. The Fundamental Government could not be dissolved by one King and one Parliament though they both had agreed to do it For though as to them it was actually dissolved yet the right might remain virtually in the Community I mean a right to continue it if they pleased 3. As the Case now is and was since the Wars were ended this Fundamental Government could not be so restored as to Act. 4. All parties did agree that there should be a Government and a Power for Protection and Administration of Justice but the difference was what the Model should be and most of all who should Exercise this Power Some did challenge and seek it for themselves some for their Friends whom they conceived to favour their party and interest For many of the Royalists were for the late Kings Eldest Son not so much for the Publick good as for the private interest and many other parties were guilty of the very same crime 5. Government it self for the substance is more material than this or that form and the Exercise of Power than the Exercise by such or such particular Persons For if there be not a Governing Power and some to Exercise it and the rest to submit there can be no protection from Enemies no Justice no Order but a meer Anarchy upon which a ruin instantly and unavoidably will follow For prevention whereof much may be done which in a time of safety would be utterly unlawful The people may submit to any whom they shall conceive shall be able to protect them and willing to preserve the Laws for Administration of Justice They need not stand upon doubtful Titles nor Quiddities in Law but may do what they can do so that it be not unjust by the moral Laws of God. 6. Seeing some particular Government was necessary and all rational men did agree in this therefore there was an obligation to subjection and every particular person was bound to submit unto the present power under which they enjoyed the benefit of the Laws and protection both from publick Enemies and private Injustice This is not so to be understood as though every one or any ought to rest in this extraordinary condition but to desire and endeavour to restore the first constitution freed from corruption or some part or degrees of it and proceed by little and little as God in divine providence shall prepare the people for it and enable us to introduce
from an inferiour to a provincial Synod and from the Provincial to the Patriarchal which was the highest Court except the Christian Emperours call a General Council And that was said to be a General Council which extended beyond the bounds of one Patriarchate especially if it included all 9. After these Patriarchates began to be such eminent places many ambitiously sought them and there was great contention amongst themselves who should be greatest and have the precedency Neither could General Councils by their determinations prevent them for time to come 10. The Patriarch of Rome though but at the first one of the three and afterwards of the five and according to some of the seven if you take in Justiniana Prima with Carthage did challenge the precedency and preeminency of them all And though the Council of Chalcedon gave the Constantinopolitan See equal priviledges with his yet he would not stand to their determination but afterward challenged greater power then was due began to receive Appeals from Transmarine parts beyond the bounds of his Diocess and to colour his Usurpation alledged a Canon of the Nicene Council which was not found in the Greek Original He will be President in all General Councils no Canons must be valid without his Approbation His Ambition aspires higher when the title of Universal Bishop had been denied the Patriarch of Constantinople by Gregory the Great Boniface his Successour assumes it And by degrees they who follow him usurpe the Power and at length the civil Supremacy is arrogated and the Roman Pontiffe must dispose of Kingdoms and Empires and will depose and advance whom he pleaseth And is not he the Man of Sin and the Son of Perdition who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God shewing himself that he is God 2 Thes. 2.3 4. From all which words he that goes under the name of M. Camillas defines Antichrist in this manner Antichristus est Pontifex maximus Elatione vicariatu assimulatione Christo oppositus lib. 1. c. 3. de Antichristo As the Roman State subdued and subjected unto themselves the former Empires and Monarchies of the World and this in themselves after that became Vassals and Servants unto one Absolute Imperial Monarch and by him Rome-Heathen raigned over the Kings of the Earth Revel 17.18 So in tract of time Rome-Christian usurped Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical over all Churches and her Patriarch swallowing up all the power of the former Patriarchs became Universal Monarch and Visible Head of the Universal Church The occasions true causes of this Usurpation and the means whereby he by degrees aspired to this transcendent power are well enough known Some will tell us that Episcopacy or rather Prelacy was the occasion at least of the Hierarchy and the Hierarchy of the Papacy For if there had not been a Bishop invested with power in himself and a provincial Jurisdiction given to one Metropolitan and many Metropolitans subjected to one Patriarch the Bishop of Rome could have had no advantage nor colour for his Usurpation This makes many prudent men jealous of Episcopacy especially as many understand a Bishop to be one invested with the power of Ordination and Jurisdiction and that by divine Law without the Presbytery Division and Subordination which are essential to Government could be no proper cause of the Papal Supremacy But the trusting of power Ecclesiastical in one man extending and enlarging the bounds of one particular Church and independent Judicatory too far and subordinating the People and Presbyters to the Monarchical Jurisdiction of one Bishop the several Bishops to one Metropolitan the several Metropolitans to one Patriarch and several Patriarchs to one Roman Pontiffe did much promote and effectually conduce to the advancement of one man to the Universal Vicarage At the first institution of the Hierarchy neither the people nor Presbytery were excluded the Patriarchates were of a reasonable extent the Patriarchs independent one upon another and the end intended was Unity and the prevention of Schism and the subordination seemed to be made out of mature deliberation Yet humane Wisdom though never so profound if it swerve from the Rules of divine Institution proves Folly in the end Let not all this discourage any Ecclesiastical Community or disswade them from division co-ordination subordination if so be they keep the power in themselves as in the primary Subject and reserve it to the whole and not communicate it to a part and keep themselves within a reasonable compass From all this we may conclude that a Secession from Rome and the rejection of his Ecclesiastical Supremacy if so be we retain the true Doctrine and pure Worship of God is no Schism especially in England For 1. there were many Provinces out of the great Patriarchate and no ways subject to any of them but they had their own proper Primates and Superindendents Amonst these England was one and by the Canon of Nice had her own Jurisdiction and was under no Patriarch but a Primate of her own 2. The Bishop of Rome was at first confined to that City and after he was made Patriarch he had but the ten Suburbicarian Provinces and the rest of the Provinces of Italy had Milan for their Metropolis 3. That after the Conversion of the Saxons that that Bishop should exercise any power in England was a meer Usurpation And to cast off an usurped power and the same Tyrannical could be no Schism at all There is a Book printed at Oxford in the year 1641 wherein we find several parcels of several Authors bound up in one The first Author is Dr. Andrews the second Bucer the third Dr. Reynolds the fourth Bishop Usher the fifth Mr. Brerewood the sixth Mr. Dury the seventh Mr. Francis Mason The design of the whole is to maintain Episcopacy and in part to prove the Hierarchy 1. Some of the formentioned Authors do grant with Hierome that the Church was first governed by the common advice of Presbyters though this position in strict sence is not true as hath been formerly proved 2. Some grant that at the first Institution of Bishops a Bishop was nothing else but a President or Moderator in Presbyterial Meetings 3. That afterwards these were constant and standing with a power of Suderintendency not only over the people but the Presbyters within a City and the Territory thereof 4. That when a Church was extended to a Province in the Metropolis thereof they placed a chief Bishop called a Metropolitan who had the precedency of all the other City Bishops 5. That these Bishops could do no common act binding the whole circuit without the Presbytery 6. That there were such Bishops and Metropolitans in the Apostles times thus Dr. Usher doth affirm and he quotes Ignatius to this purpose 7. That there was an imparity both in the State and Church of Israel under the Old Testament and so likewise
and the parts the Soveraign and the Subject According to this method though mine ability be not much I have spoken of a Community both Civil and Ecclesiastical and of a Common-wealth 1. Civil then 2. Ecclesiastical In both the first part is the Soveraign where I enquire 1. Into his power civil and then into the spiritual power of the Keys in the Church 2. I proceed to declare how the Civil Soveraign acquires or loseth his power and how the Church derives her power or is deprived of it 3. The next thing is the several ways of disposing the power civil in a certain subject whence arise the several forms of Government civil and the disposal of the power of the Keys the primary subject whereof is not the Pope or Prince or Prelate or Presbyter or People as distinct from Presbyters but the whole particular Church which hath it in the manner of a free State. Here something is said of the extent of the Church After all this comes in pars subdita both Civil and Ecclesiastical where I speak of the nature of subjection and of the distinction division and education of the Subjects both of the State and Church All this is done with some special reference both to the State and Church of England desiring Peace and Reformation If any require a reason why I do not handle Ecclesiastical Government and Civil distinctly by themselves without this mixture the reasons are especially two 1. That it might be known that the general Rules of Government are the same both in Church and State for both have the same common principles which by the light of Reason Observation and Experience may be easily known but especially by the Scriptures from which an intelligent Reader may easily collect them Therefore it 's in vain to write of Church-Government without the knowledge of the Rules of Government in general and the same orderly digested The ignorance of these is the cause why so many write at random of Discipline and neither satisfie others nor bring the Controversies concerning the same unto an issue 2. By this joynt handling of them the difference between Church and State Civil and Ecclesiastical Government the power of the Sword and Keys is more clearly as being laid together apparent For this is the nature of Dissentanies Quod juxta posita clarius elucescunt This is against Erastus and such as cannot distinguish between the power of ordering Religion for the external part which belongs unto the civil Soveraigns of all States and the power of the Keys which is proper to the Church as a Church Yet if these two Reasons will not satisfie and some Reader may desire and wish they had been handled dictinctly he may read them as dictinct and several even in this Book I my self had some debate within my self what way I should handle them yet upon these reasons I resolved to do as I have done section 12 A Common-wealth once constituted is not immortal but is subject to corruptions conversion and subversion The Authors of Politicks following the Philosopher make these accidents the last part of their Political Systems and some speak of them more briefly some at large and declare the causes and prescribe the Remedies both for prevention and recovery Corruption is from the bad constitution or male-administration and both Soveraign and Subject may be and many times are guilty The conversion and woful changes and also the subversion and ruine is from God as the supream Governour and just Judge of Mankind who punisheth not only single and private Persons and Families but whole Nations and Common-wealths Of these things the Scripture humane Stories and our own experience do fully inform us But of them if it may be useful I shall speak more particularly and fully in the second Book the subject whereof in general is Administration in particular Laws and Canons Officers of the State and of the Church and Jurisdiction both Civil and Ecclesiastical The reasons why I desire to publish this first and severally from the latter part are partly because though the first draught of that latter part was finished above half a Year ago yet I intend to enlarge upon the particulars partly because I desire to know what entertainment this first part may meet withal for if it be good I shall be the more encouraged to go forward but chiefly because the most material Heads and Controversies are handled in this which is far more difficult The latter will be more easie yet profitable and useful especially if some of greater ability would undertake it The God of Truth and Peace give us Humility Patience Charity and the Knowledge of his Truth that holding the Truth in Love we may grow up unto him in all things which is the Head even Christ to whom be Honour Glory and Thanks for ever Amen FINIS * vid. Comin de bell Neap. lib. 5. Scope of the Work. Means to prevent Errors Sect. 1. The reason of differences in Church-Affairs What a Common-wealth in general is Foundation of the Work. Constitution Community in general De C. D. lib. 19. Cap. 21. Cap. 22. What Community Civil is Original of community Members of a Community Ecclesiast Community A good ground of Childrens right to Baptisme What hinders Reformation A Community formed is a Commonwealth De C. D. Lib. 19. cap. 13. Neighbour a notion of Society Majesty in the People really c. Real Majesty greater than Personal The mistake of Junius Brutus Buchanon Heno A Parliament cannot alter a form of Government A happy Community Majesty Personal Acts of Personal Majesty 1. Without Within Soveraigns must order Matters of Religion Civil matters Properties of Majesty Fundamental Charter of Civil Majesty Power how got Justly got extraordinary How Kings must govern Ordinarily By Election Best Government By Conquest Vsurpation Subjects may defend their Rights What destroys Personal Majesty Bracton Kings duty Binds not posterity Majesty when forfeited When Subjection ceases a Isa. 22.2 Vers. 21. b Rev. 1.18 1 Cor. 3.7 d Mat. 16.29 e Joh. 20.22 23. f 1 Cor. 5.12 g Ibid. h Ibid. 13. 11 Quaest. in vesperiis Dib 4. dist 8. Quaest. 2. What a King is What the King cannot do Parliament best Assembly Parliament Members qualified Wittena Gemote What the House of Commons is The End of calling the House of Lords What Barons called to Parliament Power of Parliament without the King. Why Kings Consent required First subject of Personal Majesty What the Parliament cannot do Who gave Crown Prerogatives and Parliament-being Kings of England no absolute Monarchs Cause of England 's Miseries What observable in our sad Divisions How to judge of our Divisions What charged on the King. Disobedience to King unlawful Parliament accused acquitted The cause changed Treaty at the Isle of Wight The 〈◊〉 works 〈◊〉 God among us Sect. 22. What may be the best way of settlement Qualification of Parliament members What to be looked into by a Parliament first * Non assumit Rex vel jus clavium vel censurae sed quae exterioris politiae Tort. Torti pag. 318. Rex qua Rex habet primatum Ecclesiasticum objective qua Christianus effective qua Rex actu primo qua Christianus secundo Mason de Minist Angl. l. 3. pag. 312. Primitive Bishop His Power Hierarchical B. B. His Power Hierarch Jure Humano * De Repub Eccles. lib. 2. c. 3. sect 7 8 9. Sect. 7. * Act. 8.14 * Ludovicus Arabelensis Lewis Arch-Bishop of Arles President in the Council of Basil. English Bishops What Dean and Chapters were English Bishops not Jure Divino * Lib. 3. c. 3 4. Tit. de praescript adversus haereticos Job 37.12 Prov. c. 12.5 * Gal. 1.1 * De. polit Ecclesiastica l. 3. c. 7. p. 26. * Tort Tor. p. 41. * Vignierus de excommunicatine venatorum The Church the Subject of the Keyes As in the Fundamental Office of Christ. Church-government what Who guilty of Schism Who Schismaticks Parish no Congregation Christian What Church the primary subject of the Keys The supposed end of the Congregational notion The subject of the whole Treatise * Isa. 49.23 Chap. 60.16 22. * Chap. 55.34 * 1 Cor. 11.34 * In his Book of the Church c. 8. p. 63. Best means to reform and unite a Church Divided What 's the chief interest of a Nation as Christian. Soveraign real Personal Measure of subjection rightly bounded The rational part of a people the heir of real Majesty The Sacrament what Education What makes a Church-Member Who a Visible Saint Division Subordination of that Church when Subordination of Bishops prudential Episcopal Hierarchy not of Divine Authority Bishops over Presbyters uncertain The Pope the Man of Sin c. Prelacy the occasion of Hierarchy and that of Papacy England under no foreign Primate What a Bishop was at first No Divine Testimony for Bishops Bishops of good use not of necessity A special Work of the Levite