Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
authority_n	bishop_n	pope_n	send_v	2,160	5	5.9534	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33624	Argumentum anti-normannicum, or, An argument proving, from ancient histories and records, that William, Duke of Normandy, made no absolute conquest of England by the Sword, in the sense of our modern writers being an answer to these four questions, viz. I. Whether William the First made an absolute conquest of this nation at his first entrance?, II. Whether he cancelled and abolished all the confessor's laws?, III. Whether he divided all our estates and fortunes between himself and his nobles?, IV. Whether it be not a grand error to affirm, that there were no English-men in the Common Council of the whole Kingdom?	Atwood, William, d. 1705?; Johnson, Samuel, 1649-1703.; Coke, Edward, Sir, 1552-1634.; Petyt, William, 1636-1707.; Cooke, Edward, of the Middle Temple.	1682 (1682)	Wing C4907; ESTC R1971	61,200	184

in Latin R. 2. H. 4. H. 5. and H. 6. used to write their Letters in French and some of our Pleadings are in French and in the Common Pleas to our Time But Sir our Law is Lex non Scripta I mean our Common Law and our Statutes Records and Books which are written in French are no Argument that therefore the Original of our Laws is from France but they were in being before any of the French Language was in our Laws Fortescue writes That the English kept their Accounts in French yet doubtless they had Accounts here and Revenues before the French Language was in use here My Lord Cook saith That the Conqueror taught the English the Norman Terms of Hawking Hunting and Gaming c. yet no doubt but that these Recreations were in use with us before his Time And tho' Duke William or any other of our Kings before or after his Time did bring in the French Tongue amongst us yet that is no Argument that he or they did change or introduce our Laws which undoubtedly were here long before those Times and some of them when the French Tongue was so much in use here were translated written and pleaded and recorded in the French Tongue yet remained the same Law still And from the great use of the French Tongue here it was That the Reporters of our Law-Cases and Judgments which were in those Times did write their Reports in French which was the pure French in that Time tho' mixt with some words of Art Those Terms of Art were taken many of them from the Saxon Tongue and may be seen by them yet used and the Reporters of later Times and our Students at this day use to take their Notes in French following the Old Reports which they had studied and the Old French which as in other Languages by time came to be varied I shall not deny but that some Monks in elder Times and some Clerks and Officers might have a Cunning for their private Honour and Profit to keep up a Mystery to have as much as they could of our Laws to be in a kind of Mystery to the Uulgar to be the less understood by them But the Councellors at Law and Iudges can have no advantage by it but perhaps it would be found that the Law being in English and generally more understood yet not sufficiently would occasion the more Suits And possibly there might be something of the like nature as to the Court Hand yet if the more Common Hands were used in our Law-writings they would be the more subject to change as the English and other Languages are but not the Latin Surely the French Tongue used in our Reports and Law-Books deserves not to be so enviously decried as it is by Polydore Aliot Daniel Hottoman Cowell and other Censurers But Mr. Speaker if I have been tedious I humbly ask your pardon and have the more hopes to obtain it from so many worthy English Gentlemen when that which I have said was chiefly in vindication of their own Native Laws unto which I hold my self the more obliged by the Duty of my Profession and I account it an honour to me to be a Lawyer As to the Debate and Matter of the Act now before you I have delivered no Opinion against it nor do I think it reasonable that the generality of the People of England should by an Implicit Faith depend upon the knowledg of others in that which concerns them most of all It was the Romish Policy to keep them in Ignorance of Matters pertaining to their Souls Health let them not be in Ignorance of Matters pertaining to their Bodies Estates and all their worldly Comfort It is not unreasonable that the Law should be in the Language which may best be understood by those whose Lives and Fortunes are subject to it and are to be governed by it Moses read all the Laws openly before the People in their Mother Tongue God directed him to write it and to expound it to the People in their own Native Language that what concerned their Lives Liberties and Estates might be made known unto them in their most perspi●uous way The Laws of the Eastern Nations were in their proper Tongue The Laws at Constantinople were in Greek at Rome in Latin in France Spain Germany Sweden Denmark and other Nations their Laws are published in their Native Idiom For your own Country there is no Man that can read the Saxon Character but may find the Laws of their Ancestors yet extant in the English Tongue Duke William himself commanded the Laws to be proclaimed in English that none might pretend ignorance of them It was the Judgment of the Parliament 36. Edw. 3. That Pleadings should be in English and in the Reigns of those Kings when our Statutes were enrolled in French and English yet then the Sheriffs in their several Counties were to proclaim them in English I shall conclude with a Complaint of what I have met with abroad from some Military Persons nothing but Scoffs and Invectives against our Law and Threats to take it away but the Law is above the reach of those Weapons which at one time or another will return upon those that use them Solid Arguments strong Reasons and Authorities are more fit for Confutation of any Error and Satisfaction of different Judgments When the Emperor took a Bishop in compleat Armour in a Battle he sent the Armour to the Pope with these words Haeccine sunt vestes Filii tui So may I say to those Gentlemen abroad as to their Railings Taunts and Threats against the Law Haeccine sunt Argumenta horum Antinomianorum They will be found of no force but recoiling Arms. Nor is it ingenious or prudent sor ENGLISH-MEN to deprave their Birth-right the Laws of their own Country Thus Sir have I impartially given you my Sentiments of UUilliam the first his Conquest which hath been so terribly and frightfully represented and published to the UUorld by the Ignorance Interest and Artifice of some Modern UUriters Thus have I as an English Man endeavoured to do my Country Justice and to support the true Honour both of our worthy Saxon Ancestors and of our excellent and famous Laws against Conquest and Slavery as also to justify the Ancient Parliamentary Right as well of Lords as Commons But yet for your fuller and clearer satisfaction in this so weighty a Point I shall refer you if you please to the Learned and Iudicious Discourses writ in some measure more particularly upon this Subject never yet sufficiently answered to my Conviction though I have industriously compared and considered all the pretended Answers and them together without the least of byass or prepossession and I heartily could wish others would do the like and that for TRUTH 's sake The Discourses are these viz. Mr. Selden 's Iani Anglorum Facies Altera Mr. Sylas Taylor 's History of Gavelkind Mr. Petyt's Rights of the Commons of England asserted And Mr. Attwood's