until Recourse may be had thereunto as the said Lord Lieutenant shall appoint as aforesaid other than as to such and so many of them as to the chief Governour or Governours for the time being by and with the advice and consent of the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunrie Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them shall be thought fit to be altered and then and in such case or in case of death fraud or misbehaviour or other alteration of any such person or persons then such other person or persons to be employed therein as shall be thought fit by the chief Governour or Governours for the time being by and with the advice and consent of the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them And where it shall appear that any person or persons who shall be found faithful to His Majesty hath Right to any of the offices or places about the said Customs whereunto he or they may not be admitted until settlement in Parliament as aforesaid that a reasonable compensation shall be afforded to such person or persons for the same XXXI Item As for and concerning His Majesties Rents payable at Easter next and from thenceforth to grow due until a settlement in Parliament It is concluded ordered and agreed upon by and between the said Parties and His Majesty is graciously pleased That the said Rents be not written for or levied until a full settlement in Parliament and in due time upon application to be made to the said Lord Lieutenant or other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom by the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunrie Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them for remittal of those Rents the said Lord Lieutenant or other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being shall intimate their desires and the Reasons thereof to His Majesty who upon consideration of the present condition of this Kingdom will declare his gracious pleasure therein as shall be just and honourable and satisfactory to the reasonable desires of His Subjects XXXII Item It is concluded accorded and agreed by and between the said Parties and His Majesty is further graciously pleased That the Commissioners of Oyer and Terminer and the Gaol-delivery to be named as aforesaid shall have power to hear and determine all Murthers Manslaughters Rapes Stealths Burning of Houses and Corn in Reek or Stack Robberies Burglaries forceable Entries detainers of Possessions and other Offences committed or done and to be committed and done since the first day of May last past until the first day of the next Parliament these present Articles or any thing therein contained to the contrary notwithstanding Provided that the authority of the said Commissioners shall not extend to question any person or persons for doing or committing any act whatsoever before the conclusion of this Treaty by vertue or colour of any Warrant or direction from those in Publick Authority among the Confederate Roman-Catholicks nor unto any act which shall be done after the perfecting and concluding of these Articles by vertue or pretence of any Authority which is now by these Articles agreed on Provided also that the said Commission shall not continue longer than the first day of the next Parliament XXXIII Item It is concluded ordered and agreed by and between the said Parties and His Majesty is further graciously pleased That for the determining such differences which may arise between His Majesties Subjects within this Kingdom and the prevention of inconvenience and disquiet which through want of due remedy in several cases may happen there shall be Judicatures established in this Kingdom and that the persons to be authorized in them shall have power to do all such things as shall be proper and necessary for them to do and that the said Lord Lieutenant by and with the advice and consent of the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them shall name the persons so to be authorized and do all other things incident unto and necessary for the setling of the said intended Judicature XXXIV Item At the instance humble suit and earnest desire of the General Assembly of the Confederate Roman-Catholicks It is concluded accorded and agreed upon That the Roman-Catholick Clergy of this Kingdom behaving themselves conformable to these Articles of Peace shall not be molested in the possessions which at present they have of and in the bodies scites and precincts of such Abbeys and Monasteries belonging to any Roman-Catholick within the said Kingdom until settlement by Parliament And that the said Clergy shall not be molested in the enjoying of such Pensions as hitherto since the Wars they enjoyed for their respective livelihood from the said Roman-Catholicks And the scites and precincts hereby intended are declared to be the body of the Abby one Garden and Orchard to each Abby if any there be and what else is contained within the Walls Mures or ancient Fences or Ditch that doth supply the Wall thereof and no more XXXV Item It is concluded accorded and agreed by and between the said Parties That as to all other the demands of the said Roman-Catholicks for or concerning all or any the matters proposed by them not granted or assented unto in and by the aforesaid Articles the said Roman-Catholicks be referred to His Majesties gracious Favour and further Concessions In witness whereof the said Lord Lieutenant for and on the behalf of His most Excellent Majesty to the one part of these Articles remaining with the said Roman-Catholicks hath put his Hand and Seal and Sir Richard Blake Knight in the Chair of the General Assembly of the said Roman-Catholicks by Order Command and unanimous Consent of the said Catholicks in full Assembly to the other part thereof remaining with the said Lord Lieutenant hath put his Hand and the Publick Seal hitherto used by the said
Roman-Catholicks the 17th day of January 1648 and in the 24th year of the Reign of Our Sovereign Lord CHARLES by the Grace of God King of Great Britain France and Ireland c. ORMONDE The DECLARATION intituled thus A Declaration Of the Archbishops and other Prelates and Dignitaries of the Secular and Regular Clergy of the Kingdom of Ireland AGAINST The continuance of His MAJESTIES Authority in the person of the Marquess of ORMOND Lord Lieutenant of Ireland for the misgovernment of the Subject the ill Conduct of His MAJESTIES Army and the violation of the Articles of Peace Dated at Jamestown in the Convent of the Fryers Minors August 12. 1650. THE Catholick People of Ireland in the year 1641. forced to take up Arms for the defence of Holy Religion their Lives and Liberties the Parliament of England having taken a resolution to extinguish the Catholick Faith and pluck up the Nation root and branch a powerful Army being prepared and designed to execute their black rage and cruel intention made a Peace and published the same the 17th of January 1648 with James Lord Marquess of Ormond Commissioner to that effect from His Majesty or from His Royal Queen and Son Prince of Wales now CHARLES II. hereby manifesting their Loyal thoughts to Royal Authority This Peace or Pacification being consented to by the Confederate Catholicks when His Majesty was in restraint and neither He nor His Queen or Prince of Wales in condition to send any supply or relief to them when also the said Confederate Catholicks could have agreed with the Parliament of England upon as good or better conditions for Religion and the Lives Liberties and Estates of the People than were obtained by the above Pacification and thereby freed themselves from the danger of any Invasion or War to be made upon them by the Power of England where notwithstanding the Pacification with His Majesty they were to dispute and fight with their and his Enemies in the Three Kingdoms Let the World judge if this be not an undeniable Argument of Loyalty This Peace being so concluded the Catholick Confederates ran sincerely and chearfully under His MAJESTIES Authority in the person of the said Marquess of Ormond Lord Lieutenant of Ireland plentifully providing vast sums of Monies well nigh half a Million of English pounds besides several Magazines of Corn with a fair Train of Artillery great quantity of Powder Match Ammunition with other Materials for War After his Excellency the said Lord Lieutenant frustrating the expectation the Nation had of his Fidelity Gallantry and Ability became the Author of almost losing the whole Kingdom to God King and Natives which he began by violating the Peace in many parts thereof as may be clearly evidenced and made good to the World I. FIrst The foresaid Catholicks having furnished his Excellency with the aforesaid Sum of Money which was sufficient to make up the Army of Fifteen thousand Foot and Two thousand five hundred Horse agreed upon by the Peace for the preservation of the Catholick Religion our Sovereigns interest and the Nation his Excellency gave Patents of Colonels and other Commanders over and above the party under the Lord Baron of Inchiquin to Protestants and upon them consumed the substance of the Kingdom who most of them afterwards betrayed or deserted us II. That the Holds and Ports of Munster as Cork Youghal Kingsale c. were put in the hands of faithless men of the Lord of Inchiquin's Party that betrayed these places to the Enemy to the utter endangering of the KING's interest in the whole Kingdom This good service they did His MAJESTY after soaking up the sweet and substance of His Catholick Subjects of Munster where it is remarkable That upon making the Peace his Excellency would no way allow His Loyal Catholick Subjects of Cork Youghal Kingsale and other Garrisons to return to their own Homes or Houses III. Catholick Commanders instanced by the Commissioners of Trust according to the Pacification and hereupon by his Excellencies Commission receiving their Commands in the Army as Colonel Patrick Purcel Major General of the Army and Colonel Peirce Fitz-Gerald alias Mr. Thomas Commissary of the Horse were removed without the consent of the said Commissioners and by no demerit of the Gentlemen and the said places that of Major General given to Daniel O Neil Esq a Protestant and that of Commissary of the Horse to Sir William Vaughan Knight and after the said Sir William â—s death to Sir Thomas Armstrong Knight both Protestants IV. A Judicature and legal way of administring Justice promised by the Articles of Peace was not performed but all process and proceedings done by Paper Petitions and thereby private Clerks and other corrupt Ministers inrich't the Subject ruined and no Justice done V. The Navigation the great support of Ireland quite beaten down his Excellency disheartning the Adventurers Undertakers and Owners as Captain Antonio and others favouring Hollanders and other Aliens by reversing of Judgments legally given and definitively concluded before his Commissioners Authority By which depressing of Maritime affairs and not providing for an orderly and good Tribunal of Admiralty we have hardly a Bottom left to transmit a Letter to His Majesty or any other Prince VI. The Church of Cloine in our possession at the time of making the Peace violently taken from us by the Lord of Inchiquin contrary to the Articles of Peace no Justice nor redress was made upon Application or Complaint VII That Oblations Book monies Interments and other Obventions in the Counties of Cork Waterford and Kerry were taken from the Catholick Priests and Pastors by the Ministers without any redress or restitution VIII That the Catholick Subjects of Munster lived in slavery under the Presidency of the Lord of Inchiquin these being their Judges that before were their Enemies and none of the Catholick Nobility or Gentry admitted to be of the Tribunal IX The Conduct of the Army was improvident and unfortunate Nothing hapned in Christianity more shameful than the disaster at Rathmines near Dublin where his Excellency as it seemed to ancient Travellers and men of experience who viewed all kept rather a Mart of Wares a Tribunal of Pleadings or a great Inne of Play Drinking and Pleasure than a well ordered Camp of Souldiers Droghedagh unrelieved was lost by storm with much bloodshed and the loss of the flower of Leinster Wexford lost much by the unskilfulness of a Governour a young man vain and unadvised Ross given up and that by his Excellencies order without any dispute by Colonel Luke Taffe having within near upon 2500 Souldiers desirous to fight After that the Enemy make a Bridge over the River of Ross a wonder to all men and understood by no man without any let or interruption our Forces being within Seven or eight Miles to the place where 200 Musqueteers at Rossberkine being timely ordered had interrupted this stupendious Bridge and made the Enemy weary of the Town Carrig being betrayed by the
all that should feed help or adhere to Us are set down in their Declaration * See before page 65. in the former Appendix of Instruments where you have this Declaration at length both Preamble and Fifteen Articles thereof entirely and consequently without interposition of any other matter After which also you have there pag. 70. the Excommunication before mentioned of the 12th of August intituled A Declaration of the Archbishops Bishops and other Prelates and Dignitaries of the Regular and Secular Clergy of the Kingdom of Ireland against the continuance of His Majesties authority in the Marquess of Ormond Lord Lieutenant of Ireland for the misgovernment of the Subject and the ill conduct of His Majesties Army and the violation of the Articles of Peace at Jamestown in the Convent of the Friers Minors the 12th of August 1650. That in this Title they assume unto themselves a power to declare against the continuance of His Majesties authority where he hath placed it needs no further proof than the reading of it But whence they derive their pretence to this power We find not any where expressed nor by whom they are constituted Judges of the misgovernment of the People the ill conduct of His Majesties Army or of the violation of the Articles of Peace For the misgovernment of the People and ill conduct of His Majesties Army We acknowledge no earthly competent Judge of Us but His Majesty and the established Laws And for the violation of the Articles of Peace by the consent even of all those Bishops unless there be gotten amongst them some that opposed the Peace and joined with those that assisted the English Rebels as long as they could give them hire the trust of looking to the observance of the Articles of Peace was reposed by the General Assembly with whom the Peace was concluded in Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Dr. Gerald Fennel Esquires as appears by the said Articles Whereby we suppose it is clear That as the Bishops have arrogated to themselves an unwarranted power to declare against the continuance of His Majesties authority where he hath placed it and to be Our Judges in the government of the People and conduct of the Army wherein VVe doubt whether their skill be answerable to their desire to try it so have they as unwarrantably taken upon them to judge what is or is not a violation of the Articles of Peace and in all they have endeavoured to invade and usurp both upon King and People bereaving the one of Royalty and the other of Freedom Now supposing they were the Monarchs they would be let the grounds of their Excommunication set forth in all that VVe have seen be duly examined and it will be found that their sentence is most unjust So that as their Tribunal is usurped their Judgment is erroneous VVe begin with the Preamble of the Declaration in these words Preamble of the Declaration THE Catholick People of Ireland in the year 1641. forced to take up Arms for the defence of Holy Religion their Lives and Liberties the Parliament of England having taken a resolution to extinguish the Catholick Faith and pluck up the Nation root and branch a powerful Army being prepared and designed to execute their black rage and cruel intention made a Peace and published the same 17th Jan. 1648 with James Lord Marquess of Ormond Commissioner to that effect from His Majesty or from His Royal Queen and Son Prince of Wales now Charles the Second thereby manifesting their Loyal thoughts to Royal Authority This Peace or Pacification being consented to by the Confederate Catholicks when His Majesty was in restraint and neither He or His Queen or the Prince of Wales in condition to send any supplies or relief to them when also the said Confederate Catholicks could have agreed with the Parliament of England upon as good or better conditions for Religion and the Lives Liberties and Estates of the People than were by the above Pacification obtained and thereby free themselves from the danger of any Invasion or War to be made upon them by the power of England where notwithstanding the Pacification with His Majesty they were to dispute and fight with their and His Enemies in the Three Kingdoms Let the world â—udge if this be not an undeniable argument of Loyalty The Peace being so concluded the Catholick Confederates came sincerely and chearfully under His Majesties authority in the person of the said Marquess of Ormond Lord Lieutenant of Ireland plentifully providing vast Sums of monies well nigh half a Million of English pounds besides several Magazines of Corn with a fair Train of Artillery great quantity of Powder Match Ammunition with other materials for War After His Excellency the Lord Lieutenant frustrating the expectation the Nation had of his Fidelity Gallantry and Ability became the Author of almost losing the whole Kingdom to God King and Nation Which he began by violating the Peace in many parts thereof as may be clearly evidenced and made good to the world ANSWER Concerning their motives of taking up Arms in the year 1641 We shall say nothing But since they begin so high with their Narrative as the year 1641 it will not be amiss to mind them That betwixt that and the year 1648 there was by Authority from His Majesty and Our Ministration several Cessations and at length a Peace concluded with the Confederate Roman-Catholicks in the year 1646 which Peace was shamefully and perfidiously violated by the instigation and contrivement of most part of these Archbishops Bishops Prelates and others of the Secular and Regular Clergy and that not in slight and strained particulars such as We are now charged with by them but by coming with Two powerful Armies before the City of Dublin upon no provocation from Us unless they esteemed the continuance of a Cessation for about Three years with them and the bringing them a Peace to their own doors such a provocation as deserved their bending their united power against Us leaving other parts that neither had nor would have Peace or Cessation with them unmolested and at liberty to waste their quarters whil'st they devoured Ours and sought Our ruine This as a particular blotting their name and memory with the everlasting infamy of Perfidy Ingratitude and undeniable Disloyalty they have reason to leap over in their Preamble least they should awaken the Curses of those multitudes of People who being seduced into so horrid a violation of Publick Faith by their impious allurements and hellish Excommunications are thereby become desolate Widows helpless Orphans and miserable Exiles from the place of their birth and sustenance True it is That His late Majesty and His now Majesty then Prince of Wales overcoming
will not agree with the Parliament for not having it We are of opinion the best remedy the King 's Authority being taken away as was said of meeting this inconvenience of the Peoples closing with the Parliament is returning to the Confederacy as was intended by the Nation in case of breach of the Peace of His Majesties part This will keep an union amongst us if men will not be precipitantly guilty of breach of their Oath of Association which Oath by two solemn Orders of two several Assemblies is to continue binding if any breach of the Articles should happen of His Majesties part The King 's Authority and the Lord Lieutenants Commission being recalled by the Declaration abovesaid we are of opinion the Lord Lieutenant hath no such Authority to leave If we must expose Lives and Fortunes to the hazard of fighting for making good that Peace seeing the danger and prejudice is alike to defend that or get a better Peace why should we bound our selves within the limits of those Articles so disavowed Answer To this VVe answer That if they were alwayes of opinion all their endeavours should be employed to keep the King's Authority over them their Declaration and Excommunication is a strange way of manifesting that opinion which Declaration and Excommunication bears date before His Majesties Declaration wherein they say He throweth away the Nation as Rebels So that whatever His Majesty hath done in withdrawing His Authority it is apparent their endeavour to drive it away was first in time In their advice of returning to the Confederacy appears the scope of their dilemma's and arguments against the continuance of the King's Authority over them which that they may be sure to be rid of they say VVe have not Authority to leave Their Reasons why in Conscience they cannot consent to the revocation of their Declaration and Excommunication follow Vpon consideration of the whole matter we may not consent with safety of Conscience to the Provisoes of revoking our Declaration and Excommunication demanded by his Excellency or granting any assurance to him or the Commissioners of Trust for not attempting the like in the future and that for many Reasons especially for First Reason That the King's Authority is not in the Lord Lieutenant nor power in us to confer a new Authority on him being also destructive to the Nation to continue it in him and preservative if in another And that was our sense when we declared against the King's Authority in his person Answer The King's Authority was to Us when the Declaration and Excommunication was framed by them they acknowledge And that it is still in Us notwithstanding His Majesties said Declaration VVe are able to make good if We could find it of advantage to His service or the safety of His good Subjects But that they confess It is not in them to confer a new Authority upon us is one of the few Truths they have set down Yet why they may not pretend to give as well as take away Authority and why they may not to Us as well as to others We know not They further say It is destructive to the Nation if continued in Vs and preservative if in another and this they say was their sense when they declared against the King's Authority in Our person We would gladly know what We have done to change their sense since the time that by their many professions formerly recited they seemed to be of another opinion If it be for doing little or nothing We believe We have made it appear they are principally guilty of Our being out of action That it will be preservative to the Nation to have Authority to govern it in another We shall be glad to be convinced in the event Second Reason We much fear we should lose the few Churches remaining under his Government as we lost under him all the Churches of the Cities of Waterford and Kilkenny and the Towns of Wexford Rosse Clonmel Cashel Fethard Kilmallock c. In this agreeing with the Maccabees Maximus vero primus pro sactitate timâ—r exat templi Answer The loss of the places mentioned here is answered elsewhere We shall only add That as Cashel was lately deserted by some of those these men esteem obedient Children of Holy Church so the same men could neither be persuaded nor forced into Kilkenny when they had orders for it and by that means both places were lost Third Reason His Excellency having declared at Cork That he will maintain during his life the Protestant Religion according to the example of the best Reformed Churches which may be the same in substance with the Oath of Covenant for ought we know we may not expect from him defence of the Catholick Religion Answer Whatever We declared at Cork in this particular was before the conclusion of the Treaty of Peace and was published in Print and then well known to many of these Bishops So that they ought then to have been aware how they had concluded a Peace with one that had made such a Declaration rather than now after almost Two years to make it a ground of breaking the Peace What Our opinion is of the Covenant or the best Reformed Churches We hold not Our Self obliged to declare Resolved We were to defend the Peace concluded by Us in all the parts of it Which We have faithfully endeavoured to do and should still have endeavoured it if We had not been interrupted affronted and wholly disabled therein by the contrivement of those very Bishops their Brethren and Instruments Fourth Reason The scandal over all the world to make choice of one of a different Religion especially in Rome where His Holiness in His Agreement or Articles with the Queen of England had a Catholick Governour granted though not performed And we do fear the scourges of War and Plague that have fallen so heavy upon us are some evidences of Gods anger against us for putting Gods Causes and Churches under such a hand whereas that Trust might have been managed in a Catholick hand under the King's authority Answer Now at length they are come plainly to shew the true ground of their Exception to Us which they have endeavoured all the while to disguise under the personal scandals they have endeavoured to cast upon us They are afraid of scandal at Rome for making choice as they call it as if they might choose their Governours of one of a different Religion If this be allowed them why they may not next pretend to the same fear of scandal for having a King of a different Religion and to the power of choosing one of their own Religion We know not Touching any agreement made between the Queen of England and His Holiness for a Governour for this Kingdom We have never heard of any such and We are most confident That in the agreement and consequently in the want of performance Her Majesty is falsely aspersed by the framers of this Paper Fifth Reason That we shall
otherwise at all noxious to humane Society and then also and there to Enact those penal Laws where at the same time the Lawmakers could not but have continually before their eyes all those beforemention'd Positions and Practises which they could not but judge to be indeed of the greatest Danger Insolence Pride Injustice Usurpation Tyranny and Cruelty imaginable even those very Positions and Practises which they knew to threaten themselves above others most particularly and which they saw themselves Ten thousand times more concern'd to persecute than any pure Religious Rites or Articles nay which they also knew to be such as even according to the judgment of the greater and sounder part of the Roman-Catholicks themselves abroad in other parts of the World did of their own nature require all the severity of Laws and all the anger of Men to prosecute them I am sure the Third Estate of the Roman Catholicks of France anno 1514 1â— did think so when they desired it should be made a fundamental Law of FRANCE to be kept and known by all men That the King being acknowledged Head in his Dominions holding his Crown and his Authority only from God there is no power on earth whatever Spiritual or Temporal that hath any right over his Kingdom either to depose our Kings or dispense with or absolve their Subjects from the fidelity and obedience which they owe to their Soveraign for any cause or pretence whatsoever That all his Subjects of what quality or condition soever shall keep this Law as holy true and agreeable to God's Word without any distinction equivocation or limitation whatsoever which shall be sworn and signed by all the Deputies of Estates and henceforward by all who have any Benefice or Office in the Kingdom before they enter upon such Benefice or Office and that all Tutors Masters Regents Doctors and Preachers shall teach and publish that the contrary Opinion viz. That it is lawful to kill and depose our Kings to rebel and rise up against them and shake off our Obedience to them upon any occasion whatever is impious detestable quite contrary to Truth and the establishment of the State of France which immediately depends upon God only That all Books teaching these false and wicked Opinions shall be held as seditious and damnable All Strangers who write and publish them shall be look'd upon as sworn enemies to the Crown and that all Subjects of His Majesty of what quality and condition soever who favour them shall be accounted as Rebels Violators of the Fundamental Laws of the Kingdom and Traytors against the King c. And I am sure also That all the Parliaments and Universities of the same Kingdom did likewise think and believe so when at several times they proceeded with so much severity in their censures against so many inconsiderate Writers that maintain'd the Papal vain pretences of Authority to depose Kings and exempt their Subjects from the obedience due to them But to say nothing at present of the many several Arrests of the French Parliaments on this subject and speak only of their University Censures how smart these were in general the Universities of Paris (z) 1626 4. April and Caen (a) 7. May. and Rheims (b) 18. May. and Tholouze (c) 23. May. and Poitiers (d) 26. June and Valence (e) 14. July and Burdeaux (f) 16. July and Bourges (g) 25. November sufficiently tell us in their special Censures anno 1626. against the Jesuit Sanctarellus in particular i. e. against the Doctrine of such a power in the Pope asserted by him the said Sanctarellus in his Treatise of Heresie Schism Apostasie c. The first of them viz. the University of Paris finding in the said Book this Assertion That the Pope may with temporal punishments chastise Kings and Princes depose and deprive them of their Estates and Kingdoms for the crime of Heresie c. condemn'd it in formal words as new false erroneous contrary to the Law of God rendring odious the Papal Dignity opening a gap to Schism derogative to the Soveraign Authority of Kings which depends on God alone retarding the conversion of Infidels and Heretical Princes disturbing the publick peace tending to the ruine of Kingdoms and Republicks diverting Subjects from the obedience due to their Soveraigns and precipitating them into faction rebellion sedition and even to commit Particides on the sacred Persons of their Princes And the other seven Universities were not much behind for they also every one condemn'd it as false erroneous contrary to the Word of God pernicious seditious and detestable XI That if any shall object those penal Statutes which may perhaps be thought by some to have all their quarrel and bend all their force and level all the rigor of their Sanctions against some harmless Doctrines and practises whether in themselves otherwise true or false good or bad I say against the meer spiritual meer sacramental rites of our Religious worship of God and our Belief of meer supernatural operations following as for example against our Doctrines of the Consecration and Transubstantiation and our practice withall of the adoration of the Host which this present Parliament at Westminster in their late Act against Popish Recusants may be thought by some to make the principal mark whereat all the arrows of disfavour must now be shot the answer is both consequential and clear viz. That the Law-makers perswading themselves 1. that the Roman Catholicks in general of these Kingdoms both Ecclesiasticks and Laicks had alwayes hitherto since the schism either out of ignorance and blind zeal or a mistaken interest or irrational fear refused or at least declined to disown by any sufficient publick instrument the foresaid Anti-catholick Positions and Practises which maintain the Popes pretences of all Supreme both Spiritual and Temporal Dominion Jurisdiction Authority Power Monarchy and Tyranny c 2. That their Missionaries i e. their Priests not only day and night labour to make new Proselytes but also to infuse into as many of them and of their other Penitents as they think fit all their own Principles of Equivocation and mental Reservation in swearing any Oath even of Allegiance or Supremacy to the King and forswearing any thing or doctrine whatsoever except only those Articles which by the indispensable condition of their communion they may not dissemble upon Oath 3. That the Tenet of Transubstantiation is one of those Articles therefore to discover by this however otherwise in it self a very harmless Criterium the mischief which they conceive to go along with it thorough the folly of Roman Catholicks in these Dominions they make it the test of discriminating the Loyally principled Protestant from the disloyal and dissembling Papist Which otherwise they would not have done if the Romanists themselves in general who are Subjects to our Gracious King had by any sufficient Test distinguished amongst themselves and thereby convinced the Parliament and all other Protestant people
Dignities and Offices whereby they constituted the said Father Walsh their Agent and Procurator to His Majesty and great Ministers to kiss His Majesties hands in their behalf and name c. Giving him moreover all the power authority and jurisdiction they could to act for them and the rest of the Clergy and Catholicks of Ireland and to do all things he should find expedient in order to obtain what favours His Majesty should think fit by connivence or otherwise for the exercise of their Religion and to save them from persecution on that account To which Instrument of Procuration many others afterwards did subscribe and put their Seals as soon as they saw it in particular the Bishop of Dromore and the Bishop of Ardagh with their own hands and the Bishop of Ferns by his proxy and special Commission from Spain to that end That the rest of the chief Superiours of the Clergy in other parts of Ireland did not the reason was given that the times then when it was done and sent to London were such as no Messenger would undertake to go about with the Instrument and to meet together it was impossible and all thought it sufficient for all that the Primate and those other Bishops and Vicars General had already done it especially whereas it was known that the Primate himself drew that Instrument Which I thought fit to insert here word by word as it is in the original writing To the end some persons who are yet unsatisfied in this matter may see what warrant the said Procurator had from the Clergy themselves to act for them and urge them far more yet then he hath to do themselves right In Dei nomine Amen Sciant vniversi per praesentes quod nos qui huic instrumento Procuratorio subscripfimus eligendum duximus sicut per praesentes eligimus nominamus facimus et constituimus Reverendum admodum et venerabilem virum Fratrem Patrem Petrum Valesium Ordinis Sti Francisci Recollectum S. Theologiae Lectorem c. nostrum Procuratorem Agentem et negotiorum Actorem et Gestorem ut nostro omnium nomine et vice osculetur Sacras manus Serenissimi Domini Regis nostri Caroli II. congratuleturque ejus felici et faustae inaugurationi et ingressui in sua Regna Monarchiam et Imperium Eidemque Serenissimo Domino Regi vota et preces nostras humiliter offerat et praesentet et coram sua Sacra Majestate Judicibus Commissionariis Delegatis et Ministris quibuscumque ab eodem Serenissimo nostro Rege ad id deputatis aut deputandis proponat agat sollicitet et promoveat causam Catholicorum et libertatis sive tollerantiae exercitii Religionis Catholicae in hoc regno Hiberniae Vt saltem procuret nobis eas conditiones favores et gratias quae in Articulis Pacis et Reconciliationis an 1648. compositae ratae et confirmatae inter Excellentissimum Dominum Marchionem Ormoniae et Confederatos Catholicos pactae et promissae nobis fuerunt omniaque alia proponat agat et concludat nostro omnium nomine quae in ordine ad dictam sollicitationem et Agentiam necessaria aut conducibilia fuerint Proinde damus eidem venerabili et Rdo. admodum Patri omnem potestatem Authoritatem et Iurisdictionem in quantum possumus aut debemus ut ad debitum effectum perducat pacem tranquillitatem et quietem Religionis Catholicae in hoc Regno Rogantes ut eidem credentia et fides abundé in omnibus habeâtur In quorum fidem has signaturis et sigillis nostris muniri fecimus Primo Jan. 1660. In the name of God Amen Be it known to all men by these presents that we who have subscribed this Procuratory Instrument have thought fit to elect as we do by these presents elect name make and constitute the very Reverend man Father Peter Walsh Recollect of the Order of St. Francis and Reader of holy Theology c. our Procurator Agent Actor and Doer of our affairs that in all our names and place he may kiss the Sacred hands of our most Serene Lord and King Charles the Second and congratulate his happy and fortunate inauguration and ingress into his Kingdoms Monarchy and Empire and that he may humbly offer and present unto the same most Serene Lord and King our vows and prayers and that before his Sacred Majesty Judges Commissioners and Delegats and other Ministers soever deputed already or hereafter to be deputed by the same our most Serene King he may propound act sollicit and promote the cause of Catholicks and of the liberty or tolerancy of exercise of Catholick Religion in this Kingdom of Ireland That at least he may procure to us those conditions favours and graces which in the Articles of Peace and Reconciliation in the year 1648. compounded ratified and confirmed betwixt the most excellent Lord Marquess of Ormond and the Catholick Confederats were conditioned for and promised to us And that he may propound act and conclude in all our names all other things which in order to the said sollicitation and Agency shall be necessary or conducing Therefore we give the same venerable and very Reverend Father all power authority and jurisdiction as much as we can or ought that he may bring to a good issue the peace tranquillity and quiet of Catholick Religion in this Kingdom praying that credence and beleef may be given him abundantly in all things In witness whereof we have strengthned these with our subscriptions and Seals 1. of Ian. 1660. Edmundus Archiepiscopus Ardmachanus totius Hiberniae Primas Fra. Antonius Episcopus Medensis Fra. Oliverus Episcopus Dromorensis Patricius Episcopus Ardaghadensis 1665. Cornelius Gaffneus Vic. Gen. Ardachaden Oliverus Dese Vic. Gen. Medensis Ego Jacobus Cusacus S. Theologiae D. fretus authoritate et commissione speciali Rmi D. Nicholai Episcopi Fernensis huic instrumento Procuratorio ejusdem Illmi ac Rmi D. Episcopi nomine subscribo die 8. Sep. 1662. Iacobus Dempsy Vic. Apostolicus Dublinensis c. Fra Ioannes Scurlog Ord. Praedicatorum Fra. Barnabas Barnewallus Ord. Capucinerum Fra Paulus Brownus Carmelita Discalocatus When the said Peter Walsh had in the same month of Ian. 1660. according to the English stile for it was 61. according to the Roman received this Instrument at London by the hands of the Reverend Father Antony Gearnon of St. Francis's Order and shewed it immediately to my Lord Lieutenant although as he expected he was soundly checked by His Grace for daring to receive such an Instrument from such men that is men as to the generality and chief of them formerly and lately too so charactered as they were for being in their inclinations and carriage very much disaffected to His Majesties interests and very obnoxious to the laws yet he ceased not ever after upon all good opportunities to act for them and all the rest of the Irish Clergie of their communion indifferently and without any distinction and endeavour to worke their peace
vincti sumus Where you see a General Council and a Council truely General with their armes or hands wide spread bowing down humbling themselves touching as their phrase is the knees of the Emperour and beseeching him to set free to them out of prison the Patriarchal Praesident of their whole Council And you may see them in some passages going before complaine indeed but with all modesty to the Emperour that his Majesty was deceaved by sinister information But that he oppress'd or infring'd Ecclesiastical Immunity they neither complaine of there nor elsewhere so farr were they from any thoughts of proceeding to excommunications Interdicts or monitories or minatories of either and consequently so farr from the practise of some later Ages The same Theodosius and by the Ministers of his Pretorian Presect exiled Nestorius Patriarch of Constantinople who was by the said great Ephesme Council condemned of heresie as may be read in the Acts of that Council And truly Cyril of Alexandria epist 6. writing to Iuvenal Bishop of Ierusalem advises that the extermination of Nestorius should be desired and expected from this Emperour only and from his subordinate civil Magistrates Necessarium autem erit sayes he ut Christi amanti ac religiosissimo Regi universis Magistratibus scribamus consulamusque ne pietati in Christum hominem praeponant sed largiatur orbi rectae fidei firmitudinem ac greges Domini à malo pastore liberent nisi universorum consiliis obtemperaverit Pursuant to which desire this very Theodosius afflicted most grievously several other Bishops for being only suspected of Nestorianism Amongst whom let Theodoret Bishop of Cyrus albeit in himself otherwise a very true and sure Catholick tell how the Emperour punish'd him upon suspicion only let us observe whether he complain that a Laick should take cognizance of judge and sentence and confine a Bishop or whether only be complain of the injustice of the proceeding against him as having no crime at all whereof he was convicted or which he had confessed or that was objected to him at least upon any kind of even but a probable ground Cum enim sayes he himself Theodoretus epist 81. apud Paron tom 6. an 440. num 11. ad Nomum consulem semel iterum scripserim litteras nondum accepi Imperatoris decreto Cyrenssum regionis terminos praeterire prohibeor Nulla vero alia causa hujus damnationis videtur praeterquam quod Synodos Episcoporum congrego licet neque accusatio ostenderetur neque actor appareret neque reus convictus decretum tamen editum fuit c. And then adducing the example of Festus with Paul Act. 25. he adds Et haec quidem dicebat homo qui Christo non credebat sed idolorum erroribus serviebat Ego vero neque interrogatus An Synodes congregem nec ne quorum causa congregem quid mali afferam vel rebus Ecclesiae vel publicis ac si in maximis deliquissem ab aliis arceor civitatibus Quin immo aliis quidem omnibus omnis aperta est civitas non solum Arrii Evnâ—mii sectateribus sed Marcionistis illis qui Valentini Montani morbo laborant nec non Ethnicis Iudaeis Ego vero qui pro dogmatibus Evangelicis pugno ab omni excluder civitate Moreover it was Theodosius commanded Irenaeus Bishop of Tyrus to be not only deposed from his Episcopal See but also degraded of Sacerdotal Order as was actually done in obedience to his command Acta Concil Ephes edit Pelt tom 5. c. 29. And further yet it was this Emperour Theodosius that notwithstanding the foresaid great General Synod of Ephesus deposed the before mentioned Iohn from his Patriarchal See of Antioch as appears in the Acts by his own imperial authority interceded and hindered the execution of that sentence nay commanded it should not be executed and who also by his own self same and onely imperial authority though for a very just end or least otherwise great troubles should arise licenced the said Iohn to return to his former See of Antioch And finally it was this Emperour Theodosius that called both Iohn and Cyril to himself to Nicomedia and forced them to agree among themselves and Iohn also to agree with the Catholick Church wherever by renouncing Nostorius Martianus a no less Catholick Emperour even he who together with Pulcheria the good Empress convoked the fourth General Council or that great one indeed of Chalâ—dâ—n this very Martianus I say was he that by his own Imperial authority removed from the Patriarch of Antioch the cause of â—â—as and brought it to his own cognizance and this too at the Instance of the Priests of the Diocess of Edessa Subjects to and accusers of the said Ibas their own Bishop and because they alleadged that the Patriarch of Antioch to whom the cognizance of their accusation against Ibas immediatly belong'd in the Church was suspected of partiality and committed it to other Bishops to be judg'd by them joyning also to these other Bishops for an assistent Damasium Tribunum Nâ—tarium a meer lay officer Concil Chalced. Act. 9. But that which herein or in this cause of Ibas and in this Imperial cognizance and commission of it is more notable yet is that the complaint of the said Priests his accusers was purely Ecclesiastical as wholly concerning an excommunication which he had pronounced against them But I have elsewhere noted that the Prince hath an external superintendence over and power of the external regiment of even meer Church affairs especially in two cases viz. 1. when manifest injustice is committed or innocency oppressed or whether it be so or no in rei veritate when complaints are made to the Prince that matters are so carried in the Church or by the spiritual or Ecclesiastical Governours of it 2. when he sees that by the carriage however this be of Churchmen or of the spiritual superiours of other Churchmen or laymen the publick peace or tranquillity of either Church or State politick is any way disturbed or hazarded or that any other publick spiritual or even temporal good which implyes no sin is hindered Pursuant to which it was also that Leo Magnus Primus the first and great Pope of that name writ to an other Leo the Emperour and writ in his 81. epist to coerce the Clerks of the Constantinopolitan Church as favourers of hereticks In quibus sayes this holy Pope deturbandis si frater meus Anatolius cum nimis benigne parcit segnior invenitur dignamini prâ—fide vestra etiam istam Ecclesiae praestare medicinam ut tales non solùm ab craine Clericatus sed etiam ab urbis habitatione pellantur Where this Pope desires the Emperour to exercise his own Imperial power not delegats any Ecclesiastical to him though he desires the Emperour not onely to banish those Clerks from the City but also to have them degraded from their order And pursuant to the same
opinion or rather certain and true judgment of such a power in the Emperour as properly and essentially belonging to his Imperial office it was that the orthodox Bishops of Syria writ also to the same Emperour Leo for punishing by his own Imperial power according to the laws of the civil Commonwealth Timotheus Elucus Bishop or Patriarch of Alexandria as by the same laws and against both the same laws and Princes too being guilty of various crimes but in particular of adultery and murder De delictis autem say they post Câ—ncil Chalced. praesumptionibus quas nefandê commisit Reipublicae legibus corum praesulibus judicio competenti subdetur Where you see a meer secular judgment called or said to be a competent judgment of criminal Bishops And indeed that the banishment of the said Timotheus which soon after followed by the decree of this Emperour Liberat. Brevi c. 13. proceeded onely from his own proper Imperial power not from any Church power or from any commission or delegation from the Church we may gather sufficiently out of the 100. epist of the above S. Leo the Pope wherein he writes thus to Gennadius Dilectio tua eniti elaborare debit ne redeundi integram capiat libertatem de quo jam Edictis suis Princeps Christianissimus judicavit Finally pursuant to the same knowledg of the Imperial power and authority from God for judging and sentencing the criminal causes and inflicting corporal punishments in such criminal causes and on such Clergymen as were found guilty Pope Simplicius epist 9. 11. beseecheth the Emperour Zeno Vt quod per nos sayes he Ecclesia seriò postulat imô quod ipsi specialiùs supplicamus Petrum Alexandrinae Ecclesiae pervasorem ad exteriora transferri piissima praeceptione jubeatis But to leave this judgment of Popes or other Bishops of the power and authority Royal in the case which Judgment as such of the power is not the proper and primary subject of this section or at least of this part of it and to return to matter of fact onely and this of the Princes themselves acting by particular Instances The next Prince I offer to the Readers consideration is Theodoricus King of Italy For this Prince albeit an Arrian as to his beleef of the Trinity of persons or Divinity of Jesus Christ yet in all other points of Christian religion and in his veneration and observance of the Church and Churchmen and of their priviledges and exemptions in general and this without any distinction of Arrians or not Arrians he was precise wary and strict enough nor is there any reprehension or complaint of him in History as not being so And yet he is recorded to have admitted of and discussed the accusations drawn and presented to him by the very Catholicks themselves both Layety and Clergye against Pope Symmachus Of which matter Anastasius Bibliothecarius writes thus in Symmacho Post annos vero quattuor aliqui ex clero zelo ducti aliqui ex Senatu maximè Festus Prâ—binus insimulaverunt Symmachum subornarunt falsos testes quos miserunt Ravennam ad Regem Theodoricum accusantes beatum Symmachum occultè revocarunt Laurentium post libellum Romae factum fecerunt Schysma divisus est iterum Clerus nam alij communicaverunt Symmacho alij Laurentio Tunc Festus Probinus Senatores miserunt relationem Regi caeperunt agere ut visitatorem daret Rex Sedi Apostolieae quod canones prohibent And albeit upon debate this King at last remitted this cause of Symmachus to a Council of Bishops and that by the same King's licence several Councils of Bishops convened at Rome to sift it throughly which Councils I have amongst others and upon an other occasion quoted in the marginal note of my introduction to this first Treatise pag. 1. yet no man can deny that he admitted the accusations and thereupon and as judg of them and of the whole cause exercised several judiciary acts as having a legal power or Christian authority to do so Nor did Symmachus except or resist nor did any for him or in his behalf or in behalf of the Church or of Ecclesiastical Immunity reprehend Theodorick for doing so Nay we have seen before in this Treatise Sec ... this very Symmachus himself openly professing that he himself would yield to God in the Emperour's person to wit by obeying him in humane things as we saw him desiring on the other side that the Emperour should likewise revere God in the person of the Pontiff doubtless for what concern'd spiritual or divine matters The Catholick Emperour Justinus proceeded yet more imperially in the criminal cause of Dorotheus Bishop of Thessalonica For this Bishop being accused of sedition and of several murders too and particularly of the murder of Iohn who was one of the Legats of the See Apostolick and the rest of the Apostolick Legats being his accusers before the Emperour and being so also by express command from Hormisda the Pope whose Legats they were and he too that was murdered and this Pope himself pressing hard that the said Bishop Dorotheus the supposed murderer of his Legat should either be deposed by the Emperour from his Bishoprick and sent to banishment farr from his place or See and Church or certainly be sent to Rome with all fit prosecution of his cause Iustin indeed proceeded to a judicial tryal and sentence of the criminal Bishop but with so much regard of his own imperial power in the case that he neither did the one nor the other which Hormisda so earnestly pressed for Of all which the Suggestions amongst and after the epistles of Hormisda and these epistles themselves particularly the Suggestion which is after the 56. epist and the second Suggestion after the 64. epist and the 57. epistle in it self may be read Promittit say the Legats writing to the Pope Sancta Clementia for so they stile the Emperour vindicare citare Dorotheum quia nos contestati sumus pietatem ejus c. And Hormisda himself the Pope epist 57. writing to the said Legats Nam eumdem Dorotheum sayes he Constantinopolim jussu Principis didicimus evocatum adversus quem Domino filio nostro Clementissimo Principi debetis insistere ne ad eamdem civitatem denuo revertâ—tur sed Episcopatus quem numquam bene gessit honore deposito ab eodem loco ac Ecclesia longius relegetur vel certè huc ad urbem sub prosecutione congrua dirigatur But wherefore doth not this Pope command his Legats to insist upon the delivering of such a criminal a criminal Bishop into their own proper custody hands and power to proceed against him to judg and punish him as they shall find cause being they alone and not the Emperour were his competent Judges in the case if we believe our Bellarminians and Baronius wherefore do not these Legats wherefore doth not this Pope himself being denied what he desired fulminat excommunications against Iustine
are so many strong confirmations of that which is and which I gave already as in effect my first Answer in general to the fourth the grand and last of all the remaining objections as it is made in general For if I be not very much deceived they strongly confirm not onely the rational probability but the moral certainty of what I have answered so that is that Thomas of Canterbury was not of a contrary judgment or opinion to my doctrine concerning the exemption of Clergiemen from inferiour lay tribunals and their subjection to the supream civil coercive power notwithstanding any true or pretended exemption but that he held as I do that all true Ecclesiastical exemption of either Churchmen or Churches and of the lands or goods of the Church is meerly and onely proceeding from the civil power of the municipal laws of the land not from any other law divine or human and held that by no such even municipal law Churchmen either have been or might be universally in criminal causes exempt from the supream civil coercive power of the supream Magistrat while otherwise they acknowledg themselves or indeed remained subjects And yet for exemplifying this I do not insist on that out of Parker concerning the Asyla because though he sayes 't was made a law yet I do not find it clear in him it was so by authority of Parliament but of a Synod in pursuance of the Popes Bull though for any thing I know it might have been so also by Parliament or otherwise by custom without any relation either to that Synod or that Bull. My Second answer to this grand fourth last objection is more particular cause it is to it as it is framed into a Syllogisme against me and is to each of the particular premisses a part Therefore to the Major which in effect is in these tearms whatever doctrine condemns of opposes the justice of St. Thomas of Canterbury's quarrel with Henry the Second c is false I answer that for my own part and for any thing may be deduced thence I admit it or this Major and admit it simply and absolutely without any distinction and even admit it so not onely as to the immediat cause for which he suffered but as to the intermediat or grand and long quarrel concerning the 16. customs and also as to the very original or that other complex of those antecedent five differences and as to a sixt original too if you please to add a fixt whereof hereafter and which might have been the very first spring or occasion of all that followed if we believe Parker For I confess it is my own judgment whatever judgment some contemporary Catholick Authors though otherwise both true Historians and good Ecclesiastical regular Monastical persons were of to the contrary on the whole matter and for what I can judg of matter of fact in relation to those dayes of St. Thomas and to the laws were as yet then legally unrepealed in England and to that King Henry the Second I confess I say that takeing all these relations together it is my own judgment plainly that Thomas of Canterbury had justice of his side in all these several following instances 1. In changing the pomp and vanity and pleasures and delicacies of his former life while he was high Chancellour of England and how splendidly pleasantly and delicatly he lived before in that office and in his other high employments of warr and peace and embassies abroad may be seen in Parker though Parker tax him not even for that time with any injustice sinfulness or viciousness but with a courtly and wordly pleasant and pompous life to the height and to humour the King and Court and in changing all I say into a life devoted wholly to God above all humane esteem and yet also unto the austerities of a most rigid Monk and Hermit as to his own body Which if Parker guess aright was the first cause or rise of the Kings alienation ever after from him before any other difference happen'd Quod he means the Archiepiscopal Pallium simul atque Thomas accepisset sayes Parker in the life of Thomas of Canterbury tam dissimili atque immutato genere vitae a priori illa curiali fuit ut Monachalem superstitionem so Parker cals it sub vestitu Clericalitexerit Nam ut scribit Trivetus and he quotes also in his Margin Roff. Hystor Arch. Nich. Trivetus Will Canter all of them ancient Catholick Historians post susceptum Pastoris officium supra humanam aestimationem factus est Deo devotus Consecratus enim cilicium clam induit femoralibus usus est usque ad poplites alicinis sub vestis Clericalis honestate habitum colens monachalem Et Wil. Cant. Paucis consciis sub lorica fidei militabat gaudens quia in triplici veste triplicem personam gereret exteriori clericum exhiberet interiori monachum occultaret intima Eremitae molestias sustineret Ex quo quidem existimare facile est quamvis Monachorum sibi studia hac dissimulatione this of dissimulation is Parkers own addition and not what he read in his Authors adjunxerit quantum tamen Regis Praesulum atque Procerum animos abalienaverit si quis ea quae de communi omnium voto de Monachis ab Episcopali dignitate deinceps repellendis in Rodolphi vita antea scripsimus animadverterit Atque haec prima esse poterat offensionis dissensionis Regiae causa quod cum antea politius urbaniusque vixisset jam odiosam illam Monachalem institutionem susceperit sive sponte sua sive quod illam obsoletam Papalis excommunicationis sententiam in Elphegi vita antea descriptum timuerit 2. In discharging himself of the Chancellours place especially being that he had no command from the King to the contrary 3. In recovering to his Church of Canterbury and by due course of law those lands which some of his Predecessors had against law alienated to lay persons and secular uses 4. In using his best endeavours that the fruits or temporal revenews of vacant Churches should not be swallowed by the Kings Exchequer 5. In declaring his judgment frankly and compassionatly for the ease of the people according to law in that case wherein the Kings Officers against law extorted from them Hyde money or accridg money and extorted it as a duty whereas it was or should be but a free benevolence at the pleasure of the people and this too but in certain cases whereof none was then 6. In not delivering the two criminal Clerks to secular justice 7. In not swearing first at the Kings demand to receive and observe the 16. customes and when he had through too much importunity and fearfull apprehensions of others and at the entreaty and perswasion and tears also of the Bishops of Salisbury and Norwich and of the Earls of Lester and Cornwal and of those two Templars Richardus de Hastings and Tâ—stes de St. Homero all
Reason which should govern or direct their particular Actions as well in order to themselves as to others and should foresee what might be objected False against Truth because so manifestly against both the Divine revealed Truths of Christian Religion and against those evidences also of natural Reason given by me before against the fourth ground of the same Louain Divines Injurious against Justice because against the most considerable right can be of all Princes States and People and even of the Clergy too if considered aright And in the highest degree may be Scandalous against Charity because in the highest degree may be harming the name and same of their Christian Catholick Neighbours and of so vast a multitude of them and because also not only of endangering in the highest degree inasmuch as in them lay even the very Temporal safety of so great a number of all the poor Catholicks in the British Monarchy and the peace of the King of Englands Dominions but further yet of raising against and casting and continuing on the Roman Religion it self in general or wheresoever professed the greatest hatred and blackness and hideousness and horrour may be and because too consequently of continuing still the chief cause of the grand Schism in Europe by keeping still that Block of stumbling and Rock of Scandal in the way of all Sects whatsoever which above any other hinders them from thinking of a Return to their Mother Church whereby to save their Souls in the Unity and Truth of the Catholick Church Than which I am sure nothing can be either more highly or more properly and strictly scandalous As for the Minor of the Syllogism being the last part of it which sayes that the second or short Censure of Louain judges our Remonstrance to be unlawful detestable sacrilegious c. is so manifest that it cannot be disputed since you read it so in that very Censure it self the former part only which sayes also and where it sayes That our Remonstrance contains only in effect word and sense an Acknowledgment only of a meer Supreme Temporal power in the Supreme Politick Magistrate and a promise of Obedience and Fidelity in meer Temporal things to the same Power and Magistrate remains to be made here no less manifest and to be made so manifest by analysing resolving and taking in pieces the whole frame of the Act of Recognition and all the Appendages of it whereof the dispute is or may be whether it contains any things besides such Temporal power in the Magistrate and such Obedience and Faith in Temporal things in the Subjects or by considering every clause of it one after another apart and the relations of one to another and to the whole and of the whole to each For there can be no other way to demonstrate this former part of the Minor And this is an easie way ad oculum and will save the Reader some labour of turning to the 7 8 and 9 pages where the whole Remonstrance is wherein that Act of Recognition and those other Appendages of it are inserted Yet before I come to an issue on this point the Reader is to be Advertised First That in that publick Instrument which hath these six or seven years past occasioned so many Differences or Disputes or rather renewed them having for Title The humble Remonstrance Acknowledgment Protestation and Petition of the Roman Catholick Clergy of Ireland it which in this distinction of words and proper strict sense of them as distinct is and ought to be understood by the word Remonstrance as in this Title so distinguish'd is not that which is at all controverted For that which is so understood is only the Representation of their then present sad and deplorable condition or of such grievances persecution suspition calumnies and odium under which for their Religion they lay then amongst their Protestant Fellow Subjects in Ireland Secondly That that which is and ought to be understood by the word Acknowledgment properly and strickly taken as in this Title signifying somewhat distinct from the meaning of the former word Remonstrance is no other than that which in the same Title is imported also by the word Protestation with this only difference That the whole Act of Recognition with all its Clauses and Appendages may be and is properly and truly an acknowledgment and confession both of the Supreme civil or Temporal power and of that obedience as above And that the very same whole Act of Recognition or Acknowledgment is in the Title called a Protestation partly because the Remonstrants or Subscribers do about the end of the same Act of Recognition formally or in formal express words Protest against all Doctrine and Authority to the contrary of that which they acknowledge confess c. in that very Act of Recognition and partly too because that having done in the former part of that publick Instrument with the Representation of their Grievances in general then and immediately before they begin their said Recognition they speak thus We know what odium all the Catholick Clergy lies under by reason of the Calumnies with which our Tenents in Religion and our dependance upon the Popes Authority are aspersed and we humbly beg Your Majesties pardon to vindicate both by the ensuing Protestation which we make in the sight of Heaven and in the presence of Your Majesty sincerely and truly without equivocation or mental reservation and partly also because by the word Protestation any publick Testimony whether it be by an Oath or not may be truly and properly understood And therefore I confess ingenuously that within the whole Act of Recognition separately taken from the rest of that Instrument there is no Protestation at all understanding by the word Protestation that kind of Testimony which is by oath For indeed there is no oath at all either formal or virtual in the whole Act so taken separately or in any Clause or Appendage of it so taken And yet I confess too that is or may well be understood to be either a formal or at least a virtual oath which is in the passage immediately antecedent or going before that Act. But this oath imports no more then that the Remonstrants or Subscribers do so antecedently swear or protest in the sight of Heaven that they do sincerely and truly without equivocation or mental reservation acknowledge confess disclaim renounce declare promise profess protest hold abhor and detest whatever they acknowledge confess c. in their following Declaration or said Act of Recognition And therefore by no meâ—â— imports that they swear their Acknowledgment Confession Renunciation c. are made conformably to the objective truth of Things or Laws in themselves For Example They swear not nor protest at all in the sight of Heaven That our Sovereign King Charles the Second is Lawful and Rightful King Supreme Lord c. or I mean that He is so according to the verity of Things and Laws in themselves but only that they
amongst the People and amongst all Catholicks both at home in Ireland and abroad in Forreign Countries for Sufferers in the Cause of God and Catholick Religion c all those and these Considerations I say at least jointly taken made the opposers come to such an height of Insolencies and Injuries against the Subscribers that such as were otherwise willing to subscribe kept back their hands as having not withall resolution or resignation enough to expose themselves to all the obloquies and calumnies of those fiery both ignorant and malicious opposing Zelots And from the last of all the five viz. my LORD LIEUTENANT's departure some of these unreasonable men did as unreasonably derive joy and gladness But gaudium Hypocritae instar puncti as Job sayes LXXXI FOR two other much contrary and no less unexpected Accidents happen'd in July following the same Year 1664. which in some measure altered their Joy and humbled their Pride 1. A Proclamation issued on the xi of July the same Year 1664. against some of the Ringleaders of those factiously dissenting and opposing persons commanding them upon other Accounts to appear at the Council Table 2. And soon after some others of them were upon some other Information or Suspition seized upon in the County of Cavan brought Prisoners to Dublin and committed to the Marshalsea But for the greater satisfaction of curious Readers I give here at length that Proclamation By the LORD DEPUTY and COUNCIL A PROCLAMATION Requiring Denis Magee Anthony Doghertie and others to appear personally at the Council Board OSSORY WHEREAS Information hath been given unto Vs by divers Gentlemen and others of the Popish Religion That several pretended Chapters have been and are to be soon called in several parts of this Kingdom and Meetings appointed by Persons disaffected to His MAJESTIES Government and to the Publick peace and quiet who take opportunities from those Assemblies to diffuse and spread abroad amongst the people of that Religion Seditious Doctrines to the great dissatisfaction of all those who are Peaceably and Loyally inclined And particularly that one Denis Magee doth by colour of a late Commission derived from the Bishop of Rome call himself and now acts as Commissary Visitor of the Order of the Franciscans in this Kingdom and by such illegal Authority doth summon Assemblies to be held suddenly for pernicious ends contrary to the known Laws of the Land and to the Peace and Quiet of the People And that John O Hairt who goes under the title of the Prior Provincial of the Dominicans Anthony Doghertie under the title of Minister Provincial of the Franciscans Jeoffry Gibbon as Prior Provincial of the Augustinians Joseph Sall under the title of Guardian of the Franciscans in Cashel Anthony Darcy Fryer Andrew Sall under the title of Superior of the mission of the Iesuits in this Kingdom and others under colour also of Authority derived from the Bishop of Rome go in Circuits and visit the several Provinces to the great Trouble and grief of the Well-affected even of their own Religion which practises and proceedings of the said persons are Offences of a high nature and are an exercising of Forreign Iurisdiction within this Kingdom and do render the Offenders and their Orders Assistants Comforters Abettors Procurers Maintainers Fautors Concealers and Counsellers lyable to the Dangers Penalties Pains and Forfeitures ordained and provided by the Laws and Statutes of this Kingdom and may tend if not seasonably prevented to the seducing of His Majesties good Subjects and to the disturbance of that peace and tranquillity which by the blessing of God upon His Majesties gracious Government this Kingdom now enjoyes in the belief whereof We are further confirmed by the proceedings of certain Fryers who have been lately Apprehended and now remain Prisoners at Dublin namely Thomas Mackiernan John Brady Anthony Gowan and others the like obstinate Seducers of His Majesties Subjects And therefore as it was an Act of Loyalty to His Majesty in those persons of the Popish Religion to give Vs the said Information so it was an Act of Prudence in them for their own safety and preservation that they who are Loyal to His Majesty a Duty due from them and from all his Subjects by the Laws of God and Nature might not be involved in the guilts of others who fail in that Duty nor incur the punishments by the Laws of the Land justly due to such Offenders And whereas We are desirous in Our tenderness of all His Majesties Subjects of that Religion who are dutifully and peaceably minded that they may be preserved from that Contagion and those Dangers which by the Contrivances and Seducements of the said Denis Magee John O Hairt Anthony Doghertie Jeoffry Gibbon Joseph Sall Anthony Darcy Andrew Sall and others of turbulent spirits are endeavoured Therefore as a Caution to them and all others We judge it fit to give them this Publick forewarning that so they may avoid the Dangers which by the Laws of the Land they may otherwise incut and do hereby in His Majesties Name strictly Charge and Command all persons of what condition soever That they or any of them do not presume to assist abet countenance or conceal any of the said persons in those unlawful doings and that they or any of them do not appear or come together upon any Summons Citation or Notice whatsoever from the said Denis Magee John O Hairt Anthony Doghertie Jeoffry Gibbon Joseph Sall Anthony Darcy Andrew Sall or from any of them or from any other exercising Forreign Iurisdiction in this Kingdom derived from the See of Rome or make any Collections or Contributions in money or otherwise for them or any of them or obey or observe any Rules or Orders or Directions issued or to be issued by them or by any of them as they will answer the contrary at their perils And these are likewise in His Majesties Name strictly to Charge and Command the said Denis Magee John O Hairt Anthony Doghertie Jeoffry Gibbon Joseph Sall Anthony Darcy and Andrew Sall upon their Duty of Allegiance to His Majesty to forbear any further proceedings by virtue of the said Forreign Authority upon their utmost perils And also to appear personally before Vs the Lord Deputy or other chief Governor or Governors of this Kingdom for the time being and Council at or before the 27th day of this present July to answer such matters as are to be objected against them in His Majesties behalf and not to depart without Our special Licence And in case they or any of them shall fail to appear as aforesaid then all Officers Civil and Military and all persons whatsoever whom it may concern are hereby Authorized and Required after the said 27th day of this present July to make diligent search and inquiry for the said Denis Magee John O Hairt Anthony Doghertie Jeoffry Gibbon Joseph Sall Anthony Darcy and Andrew Sall and wheresoever they or any of them that shall not appear as aforesaid shall be found
possis rationabilem causam praetendas quia patienter sustinebimus si non feceris quod prava nobis fuerit insinuatione suggestum If sayes he at any time we write to your Brotherhood what may seem to exasperate your mind you ought not to be troubled Weighing seriously the quality of the business whereof we write either fulfill reverently our Command or by your Letters pretend a reasonable cause for which you may not observe it For we shall patiently bear if you do not that which shall be suggested by evil information And therefore I have further particularly and consequentially noted in the 53. page of that little Book That nothing is more known then that even after or when the Papal Bulls appear to be authentick and that it moreover appears they have not been grounded on any sinister Information as to matter of Fact from others yet according to the Pope's own Law and natural reason too if they proceed from ignorance of the Divine Law or of that of Nations or of the Canons of the Universal Church or from hatred malice or other evil passion or any unjust end or when they are notably prejudicial to Justice or the rights of a third passion they may be suspended as to any execution of or obedience to be given to them until his Holiness be informed by those that find themselves aggrieved by such Letters or Decrees or Bulls and until there may be a legal fair and equitable discussion of the cause and where it may conveniently or ought to be discussed And that it will be sufficient for such as are so concern'd or find themselves so aggrieved to alledge or even to pretend only for their excuse to his Holiness some rational cause that is such as were it true might and ought to be reputed rational to save them from any disobedience or irreverence This much and many other things also to this purpose I have said in my More Ample Account against that pretended Brief of Paul the V or use made thereof against our Formulary But much more as well of that Brief or condemnation by Paul V as of the other by Innocent X pretended by de Vecchiis I have said in a Letter to this Internuncio himself which you may read in the next Section saving one following this And therefore I will not here detain you any longer on this Subject but refer to that following Section and Letter Only what I did not give in that Letter I mean the specifical Articles or three negative Propositions in specie said to have been condemn'd by Innocent X I will for the Readers satisfaction give here together with their Names who in England subscribed these negative Propositions or Articles Because otherwise it may be hard to find or know what they were As for the Oath of Allegiance said to be condemn'd by Paul the V I need not give that being any man can find it in the Statute Books and many others at hand And because that matter of those negative Articles is of importance to be truly and fully known and that I can say nothing of my own knowledge thereof but what I read and hear from others I will give here without Comment two Papers of that matter delivered to me lately by some of those who have been either Actors or conversant with some of the chief yet alive who acted in it and subscribed the very Original of those Articles in the year 1647 or 1648. One of those Papers is in Writing never yet Printed as I am told and hath first a Preamble containing the motives of the Subscription next the affirmative Propositions themselves whose negatives were subscribed then the Subscriptions of Seven Roman-Catholick Lords of England and Seven and Twenty Esquires and Gentlnmen of the same Religion and Countrey after these Subscriptions it hath another short Preamble to the other Subscriptions of Clergymen Secular and Regular which follow and so in the last place the Names of these Clergymen Eight in all The other Paper is in Print and besides those Articles doth contain a long and good Letter from Paris written by Dr. Holden to England upon that matter The written Paper is of this tenor THE Roman-Catholicks of this Nation taking into consideration the Twelve Proposals of His Excellency Sir Thomas Fairfax lately publish't this present year 1647. and how prejudicial and destructive it might be to them at this time tacitely to permit an Opinion by some conceived of an inconsistency in their Religion with the Civil Government of this Kingdom by reason of some Doctrines and Positions scandalously laid upon them which might thereby draw on persons that cannot Conform themselves to the Religion here established an incapacity to receive and be partakers of a general benefit intended for the ease of Tender Consciences have thought it convenient to endeavour the just vindication of their integrities therein And to remove the scandal out of all the minds and opinions of moderate and charitable persons do declare the Negative to these Propositions following I. That the Pope or Church hath power to absolve any person or persons whatsoever from his or their obedience to the Civil Government established in this Nation II. That it is lawful by the Popes or Churches command or dispensation to kill destroy or otherwise injure any person or persons whatsoever because he or they are accused or condemned censured or excommunicated for Error Schism or Heresie III. That it is lawful in it self or by the Popes dispensation to break either word or oath with any persons abovesaid under pretence of their being Hereticks And in farther Testimony that we disallow the said precedent Propositions as being no part of our Faith or ever taught us by our Pastors we have ratifi'd the same under our hands Winchester Brudenell Petre. Teinham Powiis W. Montagu E. Brudenell Walter Blunt Henry Bedingfield Francis Howard Tho Gascoigne Francis Mannock John Arundell Fran Slaughter Fran Petre. Will Arundell Will Havington Edw Smith Robert Hennage Joh. Webb James Yates Thomas Gage Edmond Thorold Nicholas Crispe John Chapperline Antâ— Monson Rich Cotton Edmond Plowden Jo Tasburghe Geo Pulton Geo Fortesen John Chamberline Hen Bedingfield Upon the ground given in the Twelfth Proposal printed Aug. 1. 1647. by Authority from his Excellence Sir Tho Fairfax That the penal Statutes in force against Roman-Catholicks shall be Repealed and farther that they shall enjoy the liberty of their Consciences by grant from the Parliament if it may be Enacted That it shall not be lawful for any person or persons being subject unto the Crown of England to profess or acknowledge for truth or persuade others to believe these following Propositions That the Pope c. These Premises considered we under-written set our hands that every one of these three Propositions may be lawfully answered unto in the Negative Geo Gage Tho Dade Dominican Henry More Jesuite William Penry Fryar Bonaventure Bridges Phil Champet Tho Carre Geo Ward The printed Paper is of this
doth not swerve from the square of Sacred Canons from the consent of great Divines and Canonists from the practice of most Catholick Nations and amongst the rest of England before the Schism without controulment of the Clergy nay we are undoubtedly possessed the Law of Nature which is above all Canons doth approve and command it so strictly as we cannot otherwise answer the Trust reposed in us when by our negligence herein the Lives and Fortunes of the Confederate Catholicks would be exposed to most inevitable and evident danger Given at Kilkenny Castle the Third day of June 1648. and in the Four and twentieth year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord CHARLES by the Grace of God King of Great Britain France and Ireland Mountgarret Athunry Donboyne Lucas Dillon Rob Linch Rich Barnewall Rich Everard Rich Bellings Patr Gough John Walsh Gerrald Fennell Patrick Brian Robert Deuereax George Commin GOD SAVE THE KING 6. That next Winter following the General Assembly of all the Three Estates of the Confederates being conven'd from all parts of the Kingdom at Kilkenny in order to conclude the Second Peace or it called the Peace of 1648. with His Majesties Lord Lieutenant and great Commissioner the then Marquess now Duke of Ormond as they did indeed before that year ended conclude it they took into their special care to second the foresaid publick Declaration of the Supreme Council and that by another as publick of their own fix'd up publickly to the great Gate as the manner was of their Assembly-house and to several other places in Town under the hand of their Speaker Sir Richard Blake In which Assembly Declaration and Act the Estates amongst other things took notice first of the designs of the rebellious Clergymen especially Regulars who even contrary to the Oath of Association took part with the Nuncio Owen O Neill and others proscrib'd by publick and lawful Authority to hold meetings and celebrate even Provincial Chapters in the woody mountainous boggy or other unaccessible places possess'd by Owen O Neill and that too partly nay principally of purpose to proceed against those other good and loyal Churchmen who for His Majesties service obeyed the Supreme Authority of the Confederates yea to displace and deprive them of their respective local Superiourships Guardianships or other offices and to name Malignants in their stead And therefore in the next place they strictly commanded all such rebellious Out-lawed Ecclesiasticks of what dignity or title or office soever at their utmost peril not to hold any kind of Meeting or Chapter upon any account whatsoever And Thirdly also they no less strictly enjoin'd all and every the loyal Ecclesiasticks and on their Allegiance to the King and likewise at their utmost peril commanded them not to assemble with nor receive or obey any Summons Orders Precepts Sentences Institutions Destitutions Statutes c. of or from all or any of the adverse party but to continue their respective offices and other matters as formerly until His Holiness or other general Superiours beyond Seas should upon or after full information send persons duly qualified and empower'd to rectifie all abuses and punish in their way according to their demerits those fire-brands of rebellion and civil War 7. That accordingly all Ecclesiasticks adhering to and obeying the said Supreme Authority behaved themselves but more especially those of the Franciscan Order being they were above others concern'd forasmuch as Father Thomas Makiernan their Minister Provincial and his Diffinitory all and every of them declared Enemies to and by the said Supreme Authority had within Owen O Neill's Quarters presumed to hold a Chapter or Congregation intermedia as they call it and therein authoritatively as much as in them lay displaced all the loyal Guardians throughout the whole Province and order'd Malignants to succeed them 8. That by such means used and care taken that year 1648. the loyal Ecclesiasticks of Ireland then came to be and continue still so numerous until they got the upper hand in all parts even amongst the common people and quite run down their Adversaries and so for what belongâ—d to them enabled the very same foresaid Supreme Council and General Assembly to reduce that Irish Nation once more unto their due obedience to His Majesty by treating and concluding as they did within a few Months after the second Peace or that of 1648. with His Majesties foresaid great Commissioner 9. That after this Peace concluded and the Government thereby placed in and executed by the said Commissioner the Duke of Ormond as under the King Lord Lieutenant those same loyal Ecclesiasticks having in all respects the same countenance and protection from his Excellency which was before given them by the Confederate Council and Assembly witness in particular among an hundred other examples which I could alledge Father Redmund Caron come and sent from Flanders as upon the Letters and Complaints of the foresaid Council and Assembly delegated by the Highest power general then of the Franciscan Order the most Reverend Peter Marchant of purpose to reform the abuses of his Order in Ireland and either to reduce or depose the rebellious Provincial and Diffinitory they I mean the above loyal Ecclesiasticks encreased daily more and more both in number strength and credit until the two Sieges of Londonderry and Dublin had been raised and the fate of Rathmines happen'd and Cromwel with a great Army landed and the strong Sea-towns of Munster betrayed and Droghedagh and Wexford stormed and Rosse taken and the repulse at Carrig and the treachery at Waterford and Owen O Neill with his Forces being rejected by the Parliament of England condition'd but too late with and submitted to the Lord Lieutenant and Owen O Neil dying at the very time the Bishop of Clogher Ewer mâ—â— Mahoâ— made General of the same Northern Army Then it was that the Nuntio party of the Ecclesiasticks being on the late submission mix'd with the Royalists reassum'd new courage and gain'd ground by sowing new divisions and playing over again their former Game Then that after the Appeal to Innocent the Tenth sent to and prosecuted at Rome by Father John Roe Provincial of the Irish Carmelites the same Nuntio partty first began to speak big and Triumph also in that Court the said Father Roe without any satisfaction or positive answer being forced to leave off his prosecution and depart if not steal away privily viz. when the news of Rathmineâ— and the consequences thereof had been with so much gladness and excess of joy come to and proclaimed in Rome Then it was that all means and devices had been ordered there to make use of the present occasion of the Royals Powers declining in Ireland for either the reduction or destruction of the Anti-Nuntiotist Irish Ecclesiasticks as being the time expected when these could have but little or no support from a tottering Government a Government undermin'd hourly by its own seeming friends and therefore even professed Subjects and at the same
Petition to his Grace wherein after they had in general terms expressed not only their ingenuous and sorrowful acknowledgment of too too much having been acted contrary to Law and Reason by the generality of the Irish Clergy of the Roman Communion since Octob. 23. 1641. nor only their humble acknowledgement of the obnoxiousness of the Clergy therefore to the Laws but also their hearty Repentance for and detestation of all such no more unhappy and fatal than wicked and criminal actings of either the whole or greater or lesser part or even of any individual persons or person whatsoever living or dead of that Clergy And after they had further in the most humble and moving expressions could be implored His Majesties gracious and general pardon to all and singular the surviving Irish Ecclesiasticks any way guilty during the late Civil Wars they should in the perclose of all both declare and humbly offer their readiness to give whatever arguments of their future obedience and faithfulness to His Majesty which not intrenching on Catholick Religion should be desired of them What arguments I used then to perswade the Bishop of the necessity of such a Petition shall be seen hereafter Sect. XI Where I tell how I repeated and urged the same thing again to the Congregation it self when sate At present 't is sufficient to see and know that as I gave no other ground to that contrivance that ridiculous though withal malicious surmise of the Bishop so I can and do call God sincerely to witness that both my words and my intention in giving that occasion were pure and good and only tending to the general good i. e. to a general pardon for that whole Clergy without any either distinction or exception of or any reflection at all upon any Faction or as much as any one particular Person of all Ireland How much more think you without design to get the Fathers of the Assembly accuse themselves every one under their own proper hands And yet men that otherwise of themselves and for other ends of their own were ready to catch at any occasion which might be a colour to hinder the intended Assembly did hug this lying story that I doubt very much whether even after I my self had disabused them and upbraided too the Bishop to his face with his ungrounded distorted that I may not say malignant interpretation of my both innocent words and meaning and that he had nothing to reply but that he had thought my end was such and having given this short answer flung away in anger they had not pretending that lying story as a just cause withdrawn out of town before or at least by Monday morning the day prefix'd for sitting if Providence had not otherwise disposed and prepared the arrival of the Packet that very Saturday early in the evening and the news thereby of his Royal Highnesses the Duke of York's great Victory in the first Sea-fight against the Hollanders and the great joy thereupon amongst all the Loyal Party and all the Streets in Town immediatly full of Bonefires to testifie both the certainty of that news and greatness of their joy This if I be not much mistaken was the most powerful aagument to deter the most factious of the members from running away before Monday as was intended But that they had not laid by not even then all thoughts at least of breaking and dissolving the Assembly in the very beginning thereof or before it could come to any issue on the matters expected from them will appear hereafter In the mean while and before I close this present Section the Reader may be pleased to take notice that I omitted nothing I could do by visiting and reasoning with those leading men to rectifie them especially the two Bishops viz. Ardach and Kalfinuran For I must confess I was singularly concern'd in these two not being then certain of any other Bishop to come in person and because also I had formerly given but too often for several years my opinion to the Lord Lieutenant of their honest Principles and good Affections to the Royal Cause nay and of their Judgments and hands too in France to the very Remonstrance when it first came out in the year 1662. S. N. and was sent them to France before either of them left that Countrey I remembred how often I had sollicited the Duke in the year 1661. for his savour to these very two Bishops in particular above any other and his special permission of or at least connivance at their return home if they were minded to return And remembred well I to that end often repeated these two Arguments to his Grace viz. 1. That each of them had sided with the Supream Council against the Nuncio in the difference of the Cessation and Censures 2. That neither of them had subscribed the Acts or been present at the Congregations of Jamestown and Galway made and held against the Peace of 1648. and the Royal Authority in his person then And my third Argument for them was the Bishop of Ardach's Letter from Seez to his Brother Sir Nicholas Plunket see pag. 13. of the First Part and the Bishop of Kilfinuran's getting subscriptions at St. Malos whereof see also pag. ibid p. 12. Now it was no little grief to me to see my self wholly deceived in my former good opinion and partly also in my Relation of them I had truly some weeks before Kilfinuran's Landing entertained some little jealousie of him for several reasons but particularly for his being so lately and long Incognito at Paris and with the Popes Nuncio there and yet signifying not a word to me by Letter or Messenger And when I knew that Ardagh had received the Letters of Rome and Bruxels from Ferral and kept and made use of them without giving me one word of notice or advice so much contrary to his former custome I could not choose but entertain at least the like jealousie of him also But after I had a little more sounded them and considered how when they were pleased to dine with me some few days before the Congregation sate Kilfinuran not only declared to my self that he came in cuerpo out of France not having brought any kind of thing with him that he had left behind him a Thousand pounds worth of Books Church-stuff and Plate of his own and that he was to return immediatly and hold to his 300. Pistols a year which he enjoyed in France but upon some other occasion of discourse plainly also to my self That he had never opposed the Nuncio nor done any thing in the former differences without sufficient permission from Him and how Ardagh likewise even to my self declared that his only reason for not sitting in or going to Jamestown-Congregation that of the Bishops in the year 1650. was their presumptuous uncanonical coming into and holding a Synod however Nationally within his Diocess without his own Licence first demanded for that Jamestown is within the Diocess of Ardagh
no yet doubtless even the Lord Nuncio and Delegates will not deny but the causes expressed in the Appeal are probable or likely or such as if they can be proved to be true will be thought sufficient There is no man of judgment hath ever yet seen or will see the Appeal that can or will deny this And if so how could it be rejected in foro exteriori as unjust whereas it hath the conditions prescribed by the Doctors Canons and Glosses for a just Appeal the one to have been made in due time and the other to have expressed in it motives which may seem in facie Ecclesiae to be probable likely or such as being proved would be thought lawful For that of bona fides mentioned by some of the Divines is not required by them but only for securing the interiour Conscience of the Appellant and not for any thing might concern the exteriour Tribunal wherein judgment is not given of the interiour opinion or bona fides of the Appellant but of that which appears exteriourly as of the causes expressed in the Appeal c. which if secundum allegata probata they be found true the Judge ad quem to whom only it belongs will give sentence for the Appeal whether in the mean time the interiour opinion of the Appellant was a bona fides or no. For of the interiour God alone is Judge not the Church And this is the reason why the Canons and Glosses speaking of the reasonableness and justice of the causes which being expressed makes the Appeal just require only such motives as seem probable or true though in themselves they be not true or such as being proved to wit before the Judge ad quem would make the Appeal lawful and say nothing of the bona fides conceiving this to be impertinent and not belonging to the external Court of judgment which they do chiefly regard Yet because the bona fides of the Appellants may be sufficiently conjectured out of the probability likelihood or evidence of the motives expressed in the Appeal who can doubt that knows the state of Ireland and looks on our condition with an indifferent eye but the Council and Confederates had not only probable motives but even reasons in themselves and before the World most evidently just which necessitated them to make their address to His Holiness and throw themselves into His protection though for point of Conscience this was needless from the violent proceedings of the Lord Nuncio and his either Delegates or Sub-delegates as being for private ends opposite to the advancement of Religion and of the common Cause destructive of the Kingdom and illegally thwarting the Supreme Civil power of the Confederates by drawing the people in as much as in them lie to Sedition and Rebellion All which motives and many more your Honours expressed at large in your Appeal and their truth may be manifestly inferred out of our sad condition the great necessity the Countrey stood in of a Cessation and the no less utility might be derived from it for the Catholick Cause as your Honours of the Council declared in your said Appeal and we have shewed in our answer to the first Querie Unto which motives may yet be added according to the power for adding your Lordships reserved to your selves in your Appeal what is consequent out of them and out of other particulars expressed in the Appeal videlicet That your Honours and the rest of the Confederates were commanded on pain of Excommunication and Interdict not to adhere unto a Cessation concluded upon actually and from which neither you nor they could fall without omission of most vertuous acts Fidelity in performance of Promises Religion in sacred Oaths and Disobedience to Authority nor without commission of sinful acts unfaithfulness in Contracts Perjury in Oaths and disobedience to Authority From which likewise you could not fall without extremely endamaging and hazarding the Commonwealth by reason of the strength and multitude of enemies which that Cessation rejected would on all sides come upon us besides the judgments of God would hang over us for our perfidiousness (k) See both in Sacred and Prophane Histories the dreadful punishments that attended alwayes the breach of Publick Faith and Perfidiousness See in the 2d of Kings 2â— how Heaven pursued with vengeance the King and whole Kingdom of Israel for having broken Faith with the Gibeonites though no less than a Hundred years since the Covenant made with them Josh 9. yea and though in that Covenant the Gibeonites used subtlety and were by profession Infidels Were not the chosen people and Nation of God for this breach of Faith scourged with an universal Famine even in the dayes of holy King David propter Saul domum ejus sanguinum quia occidit Gabeonitas And notwithstanding so many Thousands starved to death by this Famine was the Divine wrath appeased until Seven of his Sons who brake the League were resigned over by King David to the pleasure of the offended Gibeonites and were Crucified alive by them upon a Mount before the face of God Et dedit eos in manus Gabaâ—nitorum qui cruc fierunt eos in monto coram Domino repropitiatus est Deus torrae post hac See in the 36 of Paralipâ—m the deplorable fate of the unfortunate King Sedecias and of his Kingdom for having contrary to promise made renounced his Allegiance broken League with and taken Arms against Nabuchadnezzaâ— the Monarch of Babylon A â—ege quoquo Nabuchadâ—â—sâ—â— recesserat qui adjuraverat eum per Deum Was not his Kingdom therefore utterly destroyed the holy City râ—zed the Temple of God burn'd the miserable King deprived of those eyes wherewith before he beheld the Covenant broken finally his Countrey planted with Aliens and both himself and the remainder of his people translated to Babylon for to lead the life of Slaves in a long Captivity of 70 years Yet Sedecias was drawn to this breach of Peace through causes no less specious than Nebuchadnezzar's Idolatry in Religion and Tyranny in his Government of the elect Nation of God See in Gregory Sceidius and in Knolls's Turkish History the formidable event of a Cessation or Ten years Truce broken formerly concluded 'twixt Vladislaus the Christian Catholick King of Hungary and Amwâ—ath the Turkish Monarch but broken by the Christian King soon after 't was published by the persuasions and overmuch importunity of part of the Clergy specially of Julian the Florentine Cardinal then Legate Apostolick in the Kingdom of Hungary who needs would dispense in the Oath interchangeably taken by Christians and Turks for observing the Cessation Alas how late came repentance when the poor Hurgâ—rians beheld their valiant and good Vladislaus slain before their faces in the Battel of Varra their Nobility slaughtered â—â—lian himself with oâ—her Authors of this misfortune all naked covered only with blood and yielding the ghost their Army ever before this faithless dealing victorious totally destroyed and
offences of what nature kind or quality soever in such manner as if such Treasons or offences had never been committed perpetrated or done That the said Act do extend to the Heirs Children Kindred Executors Administrators Wives Widows Dowagers and Assigns of such of the said Subjects and their Adherents who dyed on before or since the Three and twentieth of October 1641. That the said Act do relate to the first day of the next Parliament That the said Act do extend to all Bodies Politick and Corporate and their respective Successors and unto all Cities Burroughs Counties Baronies Hundreds Towns Villages Tythings and every of them within this Kingdom for and concerning all and every of the said offences or any other offence or offences in them or any of them committed or done by His Majesties said Subjects or their Adherents or any of them before in or since the Three and Twentieth of October 1641. Provided this Act shall not extend to be construed to pardon any offence or offences for which any person or persons have been convicted or attainted of Record at any time before the Twenty third day of October in the year of our Lord One thousand six hundred forty and one That this Act shall extend to Piracies and all other offences committed upon the Sea by His Majesties said Subjects or their Adherents or any of them That in this Act of Oblivion words of Release Acquittal and Discharge be inserted That no person or persons Bodies Politick or Corporate Counties Cities Burroughs Baronies Hundreds Towns Villages Tythings or any of them within this Kingdom included within the said Act be troubled impeached sued inquieted or molested for or by reason of any offence matter or thing whatsoever comprized within the said Act And the said Act shall extend to all Rents Goods and Chattles taken detained or grown due to the Subjects of the one party from the other since the Three and twentieth of October One thousand six hundred forty and one to the date of these Articles of Peace and also to all Customs Rents Arrears of Rents Prizes Recognizances Bonds Fines Forfeitures Penalties and to all other Profits Perquisites and Dues which were due or did or should accrue to His Majesty on before or since the Three and twentieth of October One thousand six hundred forty and one until the perfection of these Articles And likewise to all Measne-rates Fines of what nature soever Recognizances Judgments Executions thereupon and penalties whatsoever and to all other profits due to His Majesty since the said Three and twentieth of October and before until the perfection of these Articles for by reason or which lay within the survey or cognizance of the Court of Wards And also to all respites issues of homage and Fines for the same Provided this shall not extend to discharge or remit any of the Kingâ—s debts or subsidies due before the said Three and twentieth of October 1641. which were then or before levied or taken by the Sheriffs Commissioners Receivers or Collectors and not then or before accompted for or since disposed to the Publick use of the said Roman-Catholick Subjects but that such persons may be brought to accompt for the same after full settlement in Parliament and not before unless by and with the advice and consent of the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them the said Lord Lieutenant shall otherwise think fit Provided that such barbarous and inhumane Crimes as shall be particularized and agreed upon by the said Lord Lieutenant and the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunric Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them as to the Actors and Procurers thereof be left to be tryed and adjudged by such indifferent Commissioners as shall be agreed upon by the said Lord Lieutenant and the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunrie Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them And that the power of the said Commissioners shall continue only for Two years next ensuing after the date of their Commission which Commission is to issue within six months after the date of these Articles Provided also that the Commissioners to be agreed on for tryal of the said particular Crimes to be excepted shall hear order and determine all cases of Trust where relief may or ought in equity to be afforded against all manner of persons according to the equity and circumstances of every such cases and His Majesties chief Governour or Governours and other Governours and Magistrates for the time being and all His Majesties Courts of Justice and other His Majesties Officers of what condition or quality soever be bound and required to take notice of and pursue the said Act of Oblivion without pleading or suit to be made for the same And that no Clerk or other Officers do make out or write out any manner of Writs Processes Summons or other precept for concerning or by reason of any matter cause or thing whatsoever released forgiven discharged or to be forgiven by the said Act under pain of Twenty pounds sterl And that no Sheriff or other Officer do execute any such Writ Process Summons or Precept and that no Record Writing or memory do remain of any offence or offences released or forgiven or mentioned to be forgiven by this Act and that all other Causes usually inserted in Acts of General pardon or oblivion enlarging His Majesties grace and mercy not herein particularized be inserted and comprized in the said Act when the Bill shall be drawn up with the exceptions already expressed and none other Provided alwayes that the said Act of Oblivion shall not extend to any Treason Felony or other offence or offences which shall be committed or done from or after the date of these Articles until the first day of the before mentioned next Parliament to be held in this Kingdom Provided also that any Act or Acts which shall be done by vertue pretence or in pursuance of these Articles of Peace agreed upon or any Act or Acts which shall be done by vertue colour or pretence of the Power or Authority used or exercised by and amongst the Confederate Roman-Catholicks after the date of the
raised on the Commissioners defective Titles in the Earl of Strafford's Government This to be by Act of Parliament and that in the mean time the said Rents shall not be written for by any Process or increase of Rents or the payment thereof in any sort procured XXVI Item It is further concluded accorded and agreed upon by and between the said Parties and His Majesty is further graciously pleased That by Act to be passed in the next Parliament all the arrears of interest money which did accrue or grow due by way of debt morgage or otherwise and yet not satisfied since the Three and twentieth of October 1641. until the perfection of those Articles shall be fully forgiven and be released And that for and during the space of Three years next ensuing no more shall be taken for use or interest of money than five pounds per Cent. And in cases of equality arising through disability occasioned by the distempers of these times the considerations of equity to be alike unto both Parties But as for Morgages contracted between His Majesties Roman-Catholick Subjects and others of that Party where entry hath been made by the Morgagers against Law and the condition of their Morgages and detained wrongfully by them without giving any satisfaction to the Morgagees or where any such Morgagers have made profit of the Lands Morgaged above Countrey charges yet answer no Rent or other consideration to the Morgagees the Parties grieved respectively to be left for relief to a course of equity therein XXVII Item It is further concluded accorded and agreed upon and His Majesty is further graciously pleased That immediately upon perfection of these Articles the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires shall be authorized by the said Lord Lieutenant to proceed in hear determine and execute in and throughout this Kingdom the ensuing particulars and all the matters thereupon depending and that such authority and other the authorities hereafter mentioned shall remain of force without revocation alteration or diminution until Acts of Parliament be passed according to the purport and intent of these Articles and that in case of death miscarriage disability to serve by reason of sickness or otherwise of any the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires His Majesties Lord Lieutenant or other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being shall name and authorize another in the place of such as shall be so dead shall miscarry himself or be so disabled and that the same shall be such persons as shall be allowed of by the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunrie Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them living And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunrie Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them shall have power to applot raise and levy means with indifferency and equality by way of Excise or otherwise upon all His Majesties Subjects within the said Kingdom their Persons Estates and Goods towards the maintenance of such Army or Armies as shall be thought fit to continue and be in pay for His Majesties service the defence of the Kingdom and other the necessary publick charges thereof and towards the maintenance of the Forts Castles Garrisons and Towns of both or either Party other than such of the said Forts Garrisons and Castles as from time to time until there shall be a settlement in Parliament shall be thought fit by His Majesties chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being by and with the advice and consent of the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them not to be maintained at the charge of the Publick Provided that His Majesties Lord Lieutenant or other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being be first made acquainted with such Taxes Levies and Excises as shall be made and the manner of the levying thereof and that he approve the same And to the end that such of the Protestant Party as shall submit to the Peace may in the several Counties where any of their Estate lyeth have equality and indifferency in the Assessments and Levies that shall concern their Estates in the said several Counties It is concluded accorded and agreed upon and His Majesty is graciously pleased That in the directions which shall issue to any such County for the applotting subdividing and levying of the said Publick Assessments some of the said Protestant Party shall be joined with others of the Roman-Catholick Party to that purpose and for effecting that service And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them shall have power to Levy the Arrears of all Excise and all other Publick Taxes imposed by the Confederate Roman-Catholicks and yet unpaid and to call all Receivers and other Accomptants of all former Taxes and all Publick dues to a just and strict accompt either by themselves or by such as they or any seven or more of them shall name or appoint And that the said Lord Lieutenant or any other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being shall from time to time issue Commissions to such person and persons as shall be named and appointed by the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander
mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them for letting setting and improving the Estates of all such person and persons as shall adhere to any Party opposing His Majesties authority and not submitting to the Peace and that the profits of such Estates shall be converted by the said Lord Lieutenant or other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being to the maintenance of the Kings Army and other necessary charges until settlement by Parliament And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them shall have power to applot raise and levy means with indifferency and equality for the buying of Arms and Ammunition and for the entertaining of Frigots in such proportion as shall be thought fit by His Majesties Lord Lieutenant or other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being by and with the advice and consent of the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them the said Arms and Ammunition to be laid up in such Magazines and under the charge of such persons as shall be agreed on by the said Lord Lieutenant and the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them to be disposed of and the said Frigots to be employed for His Majesties service and the publick use and benefit of the Kingdom of Ireland And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them shall have power to applot raise and levy means with indifferency and equality by way of Excise or otherwise in the several Cities Corporate Towns Counties and parties of Counties now within the Quarters and only upon the Estates of the said Confederate Roman-Catholicks all such Sum and Sums of money as shall appear to the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them to be really due for and in the discharge of the Publick engagements of the said Confederate Catholicks incurred or grown due before the conclusion of these Articles And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them shall be authorized to appoint Receivers Collectors and all other Officers for such monies as shall be assessed taxed or applotted in pursuance of the Authorities mentioned in this Article and for the Arrears of all former Applotments Taxes and other Publick dues yet unpaid And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them in case of refractoriness or delinquency may distrain and imprison and cause such Delinquents to be distrained and imprisoned And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them make perfect Books of all such monies as shall be applotted raised and levied out of which Books they are to make several and respective Abstracts to be delivered under their hands or the hands of any seven or more of them to the several and respective Collectors which shall be appointed to levy and receive the same and that a Duplicate of the said Books under the hands of the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or more of them be delivered unto His Majesties Lord Lieutenant or other chief Governour or Governours of this Kingdom for the time being whereby a present accompt may be given And that the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of Costelloe Lord President of Connaught Donnogh Lord Viscount Muskery Francis Lord Baron of Athunry Alexander mac Donnel Esq Sir Lucas Dillon Knight Sir Nicholas Plunket Knight Sir Richard Barnewall Baronet Geoffery Browne Donnogh O Callaghane Tirlagh O Neil Miles Reilly and Gerald Fennel Esquires or any seven or them shall have power to call the Council and Congregation and the respective Supreme Councils and Commissioners General appointed hither to from time to time by the said Confederate Roman-Catholicks to manage their publick affairs and all other persons answerable to an accompt for all their Receipts and Disbursments since the beginning of their respective employments under the Confederate Roman Catholicks XXVIII Item It is concluded accorded and agreed by and between the said Parties and His Majesty is graciously pleased That for the preservation of the Peace and tranquility of the Kingdom the said Lord Lieutenant and the said Thomas Lord Viscount Dillon of
and us IV. They proposed that an Vnion cannot be had or preserved for preservation of the Nation without keeping the King's Authority among us for that many of those considerable will instantly make their conditions with the Enemy the Kings Authority being taken away and that there is no hopes of leaving that Authority with us but by revoking the Excommunication and the Declaration for it will not be left by the Lord Lieutenant or undergone by Clanricard but on those terms Whether there is ground for the sense of the Commissioners delivered in and upon these heads We leave to themselves to make good and to the event that shall follow the refusal of the Prelates to hearken or assent to the Proposals of the said Commissioners But finding that in the Reasons given by the said Prelates for their refusal and in the Advices they give for the union and preservation of the Nation they have repeated some of those things wherewith VVe were formerly unjustly charged by them and have framed new objections against Us VVe shall take a particular view of each of them and as far forth as VVe conceive Our Self concerned shall give Answers to them though VVe had reason to hope That if the offer VVe made should not meet with the success VVe desired that yet so affectionate a manifestation of Our love to the Nation transporting Us to an overture of reconciliation with those that had so much injured Us would not have given ground for repeating of old and casting new Aspersions upon Us. Answers of the Committee to the Proposals of the Commissioners before recited First Article The abovementioned Letter was read containing his Excellencies undertaking for asserting the Peace and his demands of two Provisoes to that end Where we observe his Excellency informed His Majesty of certain disobediences and affronts put upon the Kings Authority and consequently suggested matter to His Majesty of making His Declaration against the Peace Answer VVe have in Our Answer * * Pag. 115. to the 11th Article of their Declaration answered to this Introduction and Our Letter out of which they make this Collection is but newly recited * * Pag. to which VVe refer them Second Article We have perused the King 's Declaration disavowing of the late Peace And are of opinion for ought to Vs appearing That the King hath thereby withdrawn His Commission and Authority from the Lord Lieutenant This is clearly proved out of a branch of the said Declaration taking away and nulling all Commissions granted by him In that Declaration the King will have no friends but the friends of the Covenant Hence it is evidently inferred That His Majesties Authority is taken away from the Lord Lieutenant unless he be a friend to the Covenant as we conceive he is not But if he be he is not our friend nor to be trusted by us in having authority over us In the same Declaration the Irish Nation as bloody Rebels are cast from the protection of the Kings Laws and Royal Favours It may not therefore be presumed That He would have His Authority kept over such a Nation to govern them We do join with you in that you represent to wit there is no safety to be expected from Covenanters or Independents for the Catholick Religion or this Nation If that of the Peace be proved the onely safety we are for it However we conceive the benefit thereof is due to us having made no breach of our part Answer Here they readily declare their opinion concerning His Majesties having recalled Our Commission and take pains to prove it by an unavoidable dilemma or that at least We are not their Friend nor to be Trusted by them and by another strong Argument they endeavour to prove His Majesty would not have His Authority at all kept over this Nation VVhen by this means they have as they think shewed it impossible That the Peace can be continued which they know it cannot without the continuance of the Kings Authority then they say if the Peace be proved the onely safety they are for it and that however they conceive the benefit thereof is due to them having made no breach on their part If they would make it their business to seek for Arguments to keep the Kings Authority over them they might perhaps find many and these as convincing as those they have found to dispute it out of the Kingdom as The Conclusion and Ratification of the Peace here by vertue of His Authority precedent to the Declaration seeming to annul it the certainty that He was in a free condition when he gave the said Authority and ratified the Peace concluded by it and The question that may be made whether he was so when he declared against it and lastly That by the Articles of Peace He is obliged to continue His Authority here from which obligation no Declaration at least importuned from Him by His Subjects of Scotland can free Him or take from this Nation who have no dependence on Scotland the benefit of the Agreement made by His Majesty with them Upon these grounds it was That until His Majesty had been fully informed in all that had passed here and declared his free sense upon it We offered to justifie the lawfulness of concluding the Peace and the continuing validity of it to those that had not forfeited their interest in it if We might have had the concurrence of these Bishops and obedience in the places by the strength and means whereof it might have been justified And surely this was an offer not meriting the scorn and bitterness wherewith it was rejected If they that contrived this Paper have made no breach of the Peace on their part We have lost much labour in the forepassed discourse But We believe We have proved they have made many and those the highest it was possible to make And sure they must be very partial on their own side if they think the benefit of a thing they reject is due to them Third Article Something of our sense concerning what way may tend best to the Nations preservation we will say beneath and do offer our clear intentions before God to join with you and all men in what will be found the best and safest way to such preservation Answer This is onely a profession which requires no Answer from Us. Fourth Article We are of opinion and did ever think all our endeavours should be employed to keep the Kings Authority over us But when His Majesty throweth away the Nation from His protection as Rebels withdrawing His own Authority we cannot understand this mystery of preserving the same with us and over us or how it may be done Whereas you say That many of those considerable will instantly make their conditions with the Enemy if the King 's Authority be taken away by himself as by His Declaration it is and not driven away by the Subject in such case when the People may not hold it likely they