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A40805 Christian loyalty, or, A discourse wherein is asserted that just royal authority and eminency, which in this church and realm of England is yielded to the king especially concerning supremacy in causes ecclesiastical : together with the disclaiming all foreign jurisdiction, and the unlawfulness of subjects taking arms against the king / by William Falkner ... Falkner, William, d. 1682. 1679 (1679) Wing F329; ESTC R7144 265,459 584

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considered with other things which have affinity therewith from Mat. 18.17 and 1 Cor. 6. Chap. VI. Of the renouncing all Foreign Jurisdiction and Authority and particularly the supreme Power of the Bishop of Rome Sect. 1. The latter part of the Oath of Supremacy considered Sect. 2. The high claims of Papal Supremacy declared Sect. 3. Such claims can have no Foundation from the Fathers and have none in the direct expressions of Scripture which they alledge Sect. 4. Other Arguments for the pretended Papal Authority answered and refuted Chap. VII The Romish Bishop hath no right to any Patriarchal Authority over the Church of England Sect. 1. The whole Christian Church was never under the Patriarchal Sees Sect. 2. No Patriarch ever had any just right to Patriarchal Authority in this Island Sect. 3. The present Jurisdiction of those Churches which have been called Patriarchal ought not to be determined by the ancient bounds of their Patriarchates Chap. VIII Some pretences of other parties against the Supremacy of Princes in Causes Ecclesiastical refuted Sect. 1. Of Liberty of Conscience and Toleration Sect. 2. Of some other rigid and dangerous Principles against the Supremacy of Princes Chap. IX Corollaries concerning some duties of subjection The Second BOOK Of the unlawfulness of Subjects taking Armes against the King Chap. I. THE publick Forms of Declaration against the lawfulness of resisting the King by Armes considered Sect. 1. Of the Oath of Allegiance or Obedience and its disclaiming the Popes Power of deposing the King or licensing his Subjects to offer any violence to his Person State or Government Sect. 2. Of the unlawfulness of taking Armes upon any pretence whatsoever against the King Sect. 3. Of the traiterous Position of taking Armes by the Kings Authority against his Person or against those who are Commissionated by him Chap. II. The Laws of Nature and of General Equity and the right grounds of Humane Polity do condemn all Subjects taking Armes against the Soveraign Power Sect. 1. The preservation of Peace and common Rights will not allow Armes to be taken in a Kingdom against the Soveraign Sect. 2. The Rights and properties of Subjects may be secured without allowing them to take Armes against their Prince Sect. 3. The condition of Subjects would not be the better but the worse if it were lawful for them to take Armes against their Soveraign Sect. 4. The Plea that Self-defence is enjoined by the Law of Nature considered and of the end of Soveraign Power with a representation of the pretence that Soveraign Authority is in Rulers derived from the people and the inference thence deduced examined Sect. 5. The Divine Original of Soveraign Power asserted Chap. III. Of the unlawfulness of Subjects taking Armes against their King under the time of the Old Testament Sect. 1. The need and usefulness of considering this Case Sect. 2. The general unlawfulness of Subjects taking Armes against their Prince under the Old Testament evidenced Sect. 3. Objections from the behaviour of David answered Sect. 4. Divers Objections from the Maccabees Zealots Jehu and others answered Chap. IV. The Rules and Precepts delivered by Christ and his Apostles concerning resistance and the practice of the Primitive Christians declared Sect. 1. The Doctrine delivered by our Saviour himself Sect. 2. Of the Apostolical Doctrine against resistance with a reflexion on contrary practices Sect. 3. The practice and sense of the Primitive Church concerning resistance Chap. V. Of the Extent of the Duty and obligation of non-resistance Sect. 1. Resistance by force against the Soveraign Prince is not only sinful in particular private persons but also in the whole body of the people and in subordinate and inferiour Magistrates and Governours Sect. 2. Some Cases which have respect to the Prince himself reflected on and considered ERRATA PAge 64. line 8. read 2 Kin. 1.10 12. p. 71. l. 19. Marg. r. de Vit. Const l. 4. c. 40. p. 95. l. 2. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 100. l. 1. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 106. l. 3. Marg. r. n. 6. p. 107. l. 4. r. Frischmuthius p. 219. l. 14. r. Sword and p. 223. l. 25. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 265. l. 1. Marg. r. Comen p. 268. l. 25. r. Patriarchdoms Christian Loyalty The First BOOK Of Regal Supremacy especially in matters Ecclesiastical and the renouncing all Foreign Jurisdiction CHAP. I. The Kings Supremacy in Causes Ecclesiastical declared SECT I. The Royal Supremacy acknowledged and asserted in the Church and Realm of England 1. THE things established in the Church of England which all Ecclesiastical persons are required to declare their consent unto B. 1. C. 1. do concern matters of so high importance that both the being and the purity and perfection of a Church doth very much depend upon the consideration thereof to wit the order and way of its worship the due honour it gives to the King and Secular Authority the truth of its doctrine and the right and regular ordination of its Ministry That the publick worship of God in our Church is free from all just exception and agreeable to the rules of Christianity and the best and primitive patterns I have given some account in a former Treatise And in this discourse I shall treat of that Authority and Dignity which is justly yielded and ascribed to the supreme civil power 2. Loyal Principles useful to the world And if a general right understanding of this matter could every where be obtained together with a practice suitable thereunto it would greatly contribute to the advancement and honour of Christianity and the peace of the world The great miscarriages and irregular practices by not yielding to Soveraign Princes their due Authority hath strangely appeared in the enormous Usurpations of the Romish Church and the frequent distractions of the Empire and other Kingdoms which have been thence derived For the Roman Bishop who still claimeth even where he possesseth not Sect. 1 by his exorbitant encroachment upon the Royalty of Kings especially in matters Ecclesiastical and thereupon in Civil also did advance himself unto the highest step of his undue Papal exaltation And he thereby also more firmly fixed and rivetted his usurpation over other Christian Bishops and put himself into a capacity of propagating his corrupt doctrines without probable appearance of any considerable check or controul and with the less likelyhood of redress and reformation And from the like cause have proceeded divers exorbitancies in opinion and practice concerning the Church and its Government in another sort of men And the want of Conscientious observance of the duties of subjection hath too often manifested it self in the world by the sad effects of open tumult and rebellion all which hath highly tended to the scandal of Religion 3. It seemeth also considerable that almost all Sects and erring parties about matters of Religion and many of them to very ill purposes do nourish false conceptions and mistaken opinions concerning the civil power
Const c. 2 3. the sence of which is explained and confirmed in the Council of Chalcedon in a genuine Canon received into the Code of the Vniversal Church but disgusted by the Roman Church Which Canon doth assert the priviledge and authority of the Romish Church Conc. Chalc. c. 28. to have had its original from the Constitution of the Fathers out of respect to the Imperial City and therefore they upon the same account give to Constantinople which was the Seat of the Eastern Empire a right of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 equal priviledges and dignity of See with that of Rome and to be next to it in order Conc. in Trul. c. 36. The same also is established in the sixth general Council 4. But since there is an high pretence to a divine right according to the doctrine of Christ generally made by the Romanists for the Universal Supreme Spiritual Power of the Pope and by many of them for the temporal also these pretensions must be discussed and examined And though the latter be the more extravagant and exhorbitant yet they being both false and some of the same Foundations being made use of to support them both I shall consider them together Now it is highly improbable that he whose doctrine establisheth the temporal power as Gods ordinance and requires subjection from all persons to the same should wholly devest Kings of their Supremacy and appoint their authority to be altogether under the disposal of another to wit the Bishop of Rome But my design being to defend the Royal Supremacy and not only to oppose the Roman I shall assert that no Officers of the Christian Church ever were or are invested with any such superiority over Princes and if none then not they at Rome 5. Some testimonies of Scripture What Scriptures the Popes themselves have used for their universal supreme claim Extrav Com. l. 1. Tit. 8. c. 1. Unam Sanctam produced for the asserting a general Supremacy of the Pope both temporal and spiritual are so extremely fond and frivolous that I should account it a piece of vanity to take notice of them had they not been urged by the Popes themselves who challenge a title to infallibility Such is that of Boniface the Eighth proving that S. Peter and the Church had the power of the temporal Sword because our Saviour said to him Put up thy Sword into the sheath therein using these words thy Sword and that when the Disciples said to our Lord here are two Swords he answered it is enough Luk. 22.18 non nimis esse sed satis and also urging those words of the Apostle The spiritual man judgeth all things Surely such instances as these and divers of like nature give evidence enough that God never designed the whole Christian Church should be so sottish and void of all understanding as to be guided by the dictates of such men as infallible 6. Bonif. 8. ibid. Joh. 22. in Extrav c. Super gentes Some of the Popes have also made use of those words of Jeremy Jer. 1.10 I have set thee this day over the Nations and over the Kingdoms to root out and to pull down and to build and to plant But 1. What authority can these words give to the Pope when they respect not the time of Christianity nor speak of any ordinary authority in the Jewish Church Innoc. 3. in Decretal l. 1. Tit. 33. c. 6. in which Jeremy was no High Priest but they only express a prophetical Commission to him an inspired man to declare the pleasure of God from his mouth concerning the Kingdoms of the World as is manifest from v. 5 9. 2. How strangely different was the spirit and temper of Jeremy towards Kings from that of the Roman Bishop notwithstandiug this his Commission When he speaketh of the disposal of many Kingdoms into Nebuchadnezzars hands he useth not the Roman stile as coveying the title unto him himself but speaketh on this manner Thus saith the Lord I have made the earth and I have given all these lands into the hands of Nebuchadnezzar Jer. 27.4 5 6. And when he spake to Zedekiah he treated him not as his Vasal but his words are Jer. 27.20 O my Lord the King Let my supplication I pray thee be accepted before thee So far was that mournful Prophet from being the Vniversal Monarch of the World 7. Other arguments from Scripture examined But the arguments most insisted on by the Romish Writers are more plausible though insufficient and unconcluding For S. Peters singular supremacy they produce Mat. 16.18 Thou art Peter and on this rock I will build my Church Ans 1. That S. Hilary the Commentaries in S. Ambrose Gr Nyssen Cyrillus Alexandrinus S. Aug. and Chrysostome understand this rock of the faith of S. Peters Confession Barrad de Conc. Evang Tom. 2. l. 10. c. 23. Chamier Tom. 2. Pans l. 11. c. 3 4. is acknowledged by Barradius the Jesuit besides others observed in Chamier to the same purpose as the Liturgy of S. James Basil of Seleucia Theodoret and Epiphanius And divers Fathers are in the same place noted to understand this rock of Christ himself which sense is favoured much from Is 28.16 1 Pet. 2.4 7. Ans 2. As the Church of God is oft resembled to a building and called the house of God S. Peter according to the expression of divers Catholick Writers V. Dr Hammonds Annot on Mat. 10. b. may be herein owned to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which word ordinarily signifies a Rock or a Stone a prime stone of the foundation united to Christ the chief Corner-stone and so were also the rest of the Apostles Eph. 2.20 Rev. 21.14 But to assert him to be the rock distinct from the whole building and which beareth the whole together with the foundation it self would be to exclude him from being any member of Christs Church and to own him as supporting Christ himself who is called the foundation and the chief Corner-stone And though S. Peter had a kind of priority of order yet all the Apostles had the same office and were with him equally partakers both of honour and of power or in S. Cyprians Phrase Cyp. de Unit. Eccl. they were pari consortio praediti honoris potestatis This place therefore gives S. Peter a spiritual eminency in the Church but with the rest of the Apostles but it nothing at all concerneth any temporal power in him nor any exclusion of Princes from supreme Government 8. It is also pleaded that Christ Mat. 16.19 promised S. Peter the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven and said Whatsoever thou shalt bind on Earth shall be bound in Heaven c. Ans 1. The Keys being an Embleme of Authority this Text doth treat of a very high and great spiritual power of receiving men into the Church of Christ and the several ranks and orders thereof and unto the participation of Christian priviledges and of excluding
should be under their government and shall order the affairs of his Realm in complyance with them and subjection to them Now all such acts are utterly void and wholly unobligatory because 1. No just right of Supremacy or any part of Royalty can be gained by possession upon an unjust title against the right owner upon a sure title this being a parallel Case to a Thief being possessed of an honest mans goods Addit to Hen. 3. an 10. f. 70. An. 10 Ed. 1. p. 279. An. 12 Ed. 1. p. 318. An. 17 Ed. 1. p. 391. c. And therefore though some Kings of England as Hen. 3. and Edw. 1. did until they could without danger free themselves pay to the Pope an annuus census of a thousand marks as appears from the Records of the Tower published by Mr Pryn yet this is only an evidence of the oppressive injuries which this Crown sustained by the intolerable exactions of the Pope 2. No Soveraign King unless by voluntary relinquishing his whole authority to the next Heir can transfer his Royal Supremacy to any other person whomsoever partly because the divine constitution having placed Supremacy in the chief secular Governours God expecteth from them a due care of managing of this power for the good of his people and for the advancing his own service and glory nor can any act of theirs make the duty which God still requires from them to become void no more than a Father or Husband can discharge themselves from the duties of those Relations while the Relations themselves continue Partly also because the constitutions of the Realm oblige all the subjects thereof to maintain the Royalties of the Crown and to perform Faith and true Allegiance not only to the King in being but also to his Heirs and Successors And partly because it is a great and special priviledge of a free born people that they cannot according to the condition of slaves have the chief and principal Dominion over them translated from one to another according to the pleasure of any person whomsoever though it be their own natural Prince which is both his and their great security and advantage CHAP. VII The Romish Bishop hath no right to any Patriarchal Authority over the Church of England SECT I. The whole Christian Church was never under the Patriarchal Sees Sect. 1 1. THE title of Patriarch Of Patriarchal Authority was not in the beginning of the Church fixed as peculiar to the Bishops of those Churches which for many Ages have been so called This stile was not oft used in the first Centuries and when it grew into use was yielded to other famous Bishops by Socrates Socr. Hist l. 5. c. 8. who did not preside in any of those Churches which have been commonly accounted Patriarchal And this title also in an inferiour degree was of late by Duarenus allowed to the Bishop of Aquileia Canterbury and others Duaren de Benef. l. 1. c. 9. The Bishops of Rome themselves seem not to have much affected or used this stile but they were ordinarily owned to be Patriarchs not only in the Ecclesiastical account but in the Imperial law B. 1. C. 7. And as this is a title of special honour given to some Sees so it encluded an Ecclesiastical authority extended to divers Provinces and over several Metropolitans 2. Now though the Romish Bishops pretence to an Vniversal Soveraignty be very vain and unjust yet if he have but a patriarchal right as some have demanded for him over all the Western Churches this will entitle him to an authority in this Realm which is a member of them Hereby he would be chief spiritual judge to receive appeals in Causes Ecclesiastical from the Metropolitical Jurisdiction and to have the highest constant and fixed power of censure and absolution besides what concerneth the Consecration of Archbishops or Metropolitans by his act or consent and a chief authority with respect to Synods And though a true Patriarchal right be of the same nature with the Archiepiscopal which ought to acknowledge the supreme authority of the Crown yet if any such authority be placed in any Foreigner it would impair the just dignity of the Prince as I shall hereafter evidence But that no foreign Bishop or Patriarch ought to have any such authority in this Realm will appear manifest by the proving three assertions which I shall perform in this Chapter 3. Assert 1. The ancient Christian Churches were never all of them under the Patriarchal Bishops viz. of Rome Many free Churches not anciently under any Patriarch Constantinople Alexandria Antioch and Jerusalem But there were anciently divers free Churches or Dioceses which word was several times of old used for the larger limits of many Provinces independent on any superiour Patriarch For that all the Patriarchates and other ancient great Dioceses or Eparchyes were only within the limits of the Roman Empire is manifest because the extent and bounds of their particular Churches was ordered and fixed according to the division of the Imperial Provinces And therefore besides the greater Armenia which was a Christian Kingdom and no part of the Empire in the time of Constantine and both before and after him all the Christians who lived under the Barbarous Nations are reckoned as distinct from the Patriarchal and other head Dioceses or Churches by the second General Council Conc. Const c. 2. 4. And whereas until 450. years after Christ The Pontick Thracian and Asian Churches there were only three Patriarchal Sees erected at Rome Alexandria and Antioch not only the Churches in the remote parts of Asia and Africa and others without the Empire but those of the Pontick Thracian and Asian Dioceses or Eparchies which were in the heart of the Empire were in subjection to none of those Patriarchs but were all that time 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 governed by themselves as appears from the second general Council Conc. Const ib. But when the patriarchal limits and authority of the Church of Constantinople was established the Churches of those three regions now mentioned which as Theodoret acquaints us Theod. Hist l. 5. c. 28. contained twenty eight Provinces or Metropolitical Jurisdictions were made subject to the Bishop of Constantinople by the authority of the fourth general Council Conc. Chalc. c. 28. But besides these there were also other particular Churches free from all Patriarchal Jurisdiction of which I shall give some instances 5. The Province of Cyprus in the Eastern Church The Cyprian Church when the Patriarch of Antioch claimed a superiority over it and a right of ordaining therein had its liberty and freedom defended and secured against him by the third General Council Indeed this Canon of the Council of Ephesus did chiefly provide Conc. Eph. c. 8. that no Cyprian Bishops should receive their ordination from the Bishop of Antioch or from any other than the Bishops of their own Island Yet to put a stop to
or supreme governour if he will make use thereof as hath been declared by the chief persons of this Church Can. 1. 1640. And the ancient right and exercise of the authority of Kings in summoning provincial or national Councils De Conc. Sac. Imp. l. 6. c. 18 19 22 23 24 c. The Kings just authority in matters Ecclesiastical opposed is sufficiently observed and asserted by P. de Marca 6. But against these just rights of the Princes power there are various oppositions Such are the claims of the Romish Bishops universal Supremacy either in all affairs or at least in all things Spiritual and Ecclesiastical as also the pretence for the necessity of general liberty and exemption from all authority in matters of Conscience and Religion Ch. 6. 8. which things I shall so far as is needful in due place particularly consider 7. The Writers of the Romish Church do 1. V. l. 2. Decretal Tit. de Jud. c. At si clerici c. Clerici Tit. de foro comp c si diligenti Bellar. de Cler. c. 28. Generally assert and some other parties also encline the same way that the state of the Church and all Ecclesiastical affairs are exempt from the civil power and not under the inspection and government thereof and that the Clergy as such are not subjects to the secular Governour and that they are not accountable before him no not so much say divers of them as in criminal causes nor yet in civil Layman l. 4. Tr. 9. c. 2 4 5. seq 2. Not only the Canonists but many others also do found this Ecclesiastical immunity upon a proper divine right which is also asserted by some of the Romish Biships Innoc. 3. in Conc. Lateran Leo 10. in Bul. Reform in Conc. Later 5. Ses 9. Azor. Tom. 1. l. 5. c. 12. Laym ubi sup c. 8. Greg. de Valent. Tom. 4. disp 9. qu. 5. p. 4. Bannes in 2. secundae qu. 6● Art 1. Dub. 2. in such Councils as they call General And some of their Writers run so high as Layman Theol. Moral l. 1. Tr. 4. cap. 13. and divers others by him there cited as to assert that no civil or secular laws do lay any obligation directly upon the Clergy as having no authority over them But if I shall shew that all members of the Christian Church are nevertheless subjects or the Realm and that the nature of civil Soveraignty doth directly include a right to givern them and an obligation to take care of the affairs of the Church this will sufficiently refute these contrary positions 8. But these Writers are sensible that in the general practice of the Christian World almost in all ages thereof secular Governours have interposed in many cases Ecclesiastical And the great advantages from Christian Religion being established and Gentilisme opposed by the Laws and Constitutions of Constantine and other worthy Christian Emperours are so visible that they cannot be denied and therefore the Romanists do acknowledge that the Princes care of the Church affairs is of great use I. Zecch de principe l. 2. cap. 5. and that he is as Laelius Zecchius expresseth it Ecclesiae brachium Religionis propugnaculum the arm and defence of the Church and the fortress of Religion Greg. de Valentia ubi supra Laym l. 4. tr 9. c. 10. P. de Marca de Concord l. 1. cap. 12. in Prolegom p. 28. Yet that all this may be consistent with the former positions we have another device set on foot which acknowledgeth that this useful power of Soveraign Princes in things Ecclesiastical must be owned only as a priviledge granted them by the Bishop of Rome and that they must act therein as by his favour and as his deputies and by the right of protecting the Church which he committeth to them 9. Now though this pretence will fall with the former if it be manifested that the nature end and constitution of civil government as established by God is to be extended to matters Ecclesiastical yet concerning this pretence I shall here further note these things 1. That they must cast reflections upon the wise and good God who asserting the great usefulness of the civil Ruler interposing in matters Ecclesiastical will not grant that the wisdom and goodness of God should be as ready to allow the Church this advantage as the prudence of the Pope 2. That if this anthority in matters Ecclesiastical be against the rules of the divine law which God hath established for the honour and freedom of his Church the Bishop of Rome dealeth ill with the Church touching its freedoms by giving them away and makes very bold with God by daring to confront Gods laws with his priviledges and indulging any person to disobey them 3. That Christian Princes would be in a very unsafe condition whilest they act any thing about the affairs of the Church if they have no better foundation to bear them up than the pretence of the Popes power to dispense with the laws of God Surely had Justinian thought Novel 58. that his care of the Church had been so ventuous and hazardous an enterprise it would have cooled the heat of his zeal that he would never have professed his care for the Churches wilfare to be equal to that for his own life 4. That whilest any persons do think it meet that Princes should act under the Pope as his deputy in the affairs of Religion to whom they owe no subjection and from whom they receive no ruling authority it must certainly be much more reasonable that they should act under God and as his Deputies whose Vice-gerents they certainly are and from whom I shall now design to prove them to have authority in matters Ecclesiastical B. 1. C. 2. CHAP. II. The Royal Supremacy of Kings in matters Ecclesiastical under the Old Testament considered SECT I. Their supreme authority over things and persons sacred manifested 1. Kings in the Old Testament governed about things of the Church Art 37. THE inference which may be made from the authority of the Kings under the Old Testament is an argument to which our Church hath a great respect in asserting the Royal Supremacy in causes Ecclesiastical In her Articles she declareth this acknowledgment of Royal Supremacy to be a yielding that only prerogative unto our Kings which we see to have been given always to all godly Princes in holy Scripture Can. 2. by God himself And in her Canons she threatneth excommunication against them who shall affirm that the King hath not the same authority in causes Ecclesiastical Sect. 1 that the godly Kings had among the Jews Wherefore I shall for the inforcing this argument shew 1. That the Kings of Judah had and exercised a supreme power of Government in things belonging to the Church 2. That they did this by such a right as is common to all other Soveraign powers and not by any peculiar priviledge and
which undertook to dispose of the High Priesthood in Jewry against both the letter of the law and the design of it But no Governours whosoever they be whether of the Church or Strangers from it have any right to do such things no more than Jeroboam had to set up the worship of the ten Tribes of Israel contrary to the Law or than the Arian Emperours had to oppose the Deity of the Son of God against the Gospel But though it be very desireable that all parts of the Christian Church should be under Christian and pious Princes yet where other powers do take care Sect. 3 that the Christian Church and Ministers do observe the true Christian Rules Spalat Ostensio Error Fr. Suar. c. 3. n. 23. as the Archbishop of Spalato tells us was done in that part of his Province which was under the Turk this so far as it is regularly performed is an advantage to the Christian Religion and no blameable exercise of their authority 3. I think it a very plain and clear truth All Soveraign powers ought to profess and promote true Religion that Kings and Princes are invested with an authority to govern in matters of Religion not as originally arising from their Christianity but from their general right of Dominion and Soveraignty Nor will there be any difficulty in this assertion if we consider that this power of governing about Religion encludeth only a right of establishing by their authority what is truly unblameable orderly useful and necessary with respect to Religion and of enquiring into the practices of their subjects thereupon in order to approbation or punishment but gives no authority against truth or goodness 4. And though some persons by popular expressions declaim against this position De Minist angl l. 3. c. 4. yet the substance of it hath been yielded by men of various perswasions Mr Mason in his defence of the Ministry of England asserteth That they who are Heathens have the same office and authority of the higher power that the Christian Magistrate hath but want the right exercise of it in matters Ecclesiastical Our English Presbyterians have asserted that Heathen Magistrates may be nursing Fathers Jas div Reg. Eccl. c. 9. S. 1. may protect the Church and Religion and order many things in a ploitical way about Religion may not extirpate or persecute the Church may help her in reforming and may not hinder her Spalatens ubi sup And Spalatensis asserteth that the power of the Prince in the external things of the Church is so necessarily connected by divine natural and positive right with the Royal power ut infidelis etiam princeps tali si velit sciat legitime uti possit potestate that even an infidel Prince may use that power if he understand his duty and be willing to perform it And this assertion is approved even by Didoclavius or Mr Caldwood Altar Dam. c. 1. fin Didoclavius being the Anagram of Caldivodius one of the most eager of the Scotish Presbyterians And Rivet very rightly averreth In Decal ad quint. praec In infideli principe non est defectus potestatis sed voluntatis tantùm that an infidel Prince doth not want authority but will and inclination to advance the true Religion 5. Surely it is past doubt that where ever true Religion and Christianity is declared and manifested in the World it is the duty of all men to receive and embrace it because as they are Gods Creatures they ought to obey and honour him and submit to his Laws and believe his Revelations and thereupon every supreme Magistrate ought to advance the name of Christ and the true doctrine and Religion And if a Pagan Prince upon understanding the truth shall use his authority for its advancement this power is justly exercised in such Causes Ecclesiastical I presume no Christian will deny that Nebuchadnezzar did well in making a strict Law Dan. 3.29 that none should speak amiss against the God of Israel and Darius also in making a Decree that men tremble and fear before the God of Daniel Dan. 6.26 and Cyrus Darius and Artaxerxes in giving order for the rebuilding the temple at Jerusalem restoring its Vessels and furnishing it with Sacrifices and executing judgment on the opposers hereof with respect to which thing good Ezra blessed God who had put such a thing into the heart of Artaxerxes And that other Princes in like circumstances should follow the steps of Nebuchadnezzar Darius and the King of Niniveh who proclaimed a strict fast and commanded his people to cry mightily unto God Aug. Ep. 50. Tertul. Apol c. 5. is justly asserted by S. Aug. in his Epistle to Bonifacius 6. Nor are those Heathen Emperours to be censured who acted any thing on the behalf of Christian Religion as Tiberius threatned them who at their peril should accuse Christians for their Religion and other publick rescripts there were of Adrianus Eus Hist Eccl. l. 4.9 Antoninus ibid. c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aurelius Tertul. Ap. c. 5. and Galienus Eus Hist l. 7. c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which were in the favour of Christians And it is a known and famous case concerning Paulus Samosatenus who for Heresy was deposed by the Christian Bishops in the Council of Antioch and Domnus appointed to succeed him Eus Hist l. 7. c. 24. But Paulus refusing to leave his possession the Orthodox Christians appeal to Aurelianus a Pagan Emperour who referring the case to be heard by the Bishops of Italy and about Rome ordered the Church to be given to him for whom they should determine and by his authority was Paulus ejected and neither his interposing nor their appeal unto him hath been ever thought culpable nor yet Paulus his being dispossessed Constantine before his baptism exercised authority in things Ecclesiastical 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the secular power 7. But above all others the acting of Constantine the Great before the time of his Baptism seemeth very considerable to evidence what power hath been exercised in things Ecclesiastical with the general approbation of Christians by one not yet admitted into the Christian Church Of which I shall give some particular instances to which more may be added beginning with what hath relation to the peace and concord of the Church Africa in a short time gave birth to the Schism of Donatus and of Meletius and the Heresy of Arius The Donatists separated themselves from the Church upon some exceptions they made against the Ordination of Caecilianus and being condemned by the African Catholick Bishops they apply themselves to Constantine the Emperour Opt. cont Parm. l. 1. But he being not versed in things of that nature as Optatus tells us did not or as S. Austin several times saith Aug. Ep. 162. 166. durst not undertake the judging of the case himself but by his authority he appointed Melchiades then Bishop of Rome with three Bishops of Gallia to judge
Constantius De Episc Presbyt and other succeeding Emperours which may be seen in the Code of Theodosius 11. And for the Judicatures of Christian Bishops who therein tryed civil causes under the time of christian Emperours no man in reason can think but this must be done by favour and a delegated authority And it is manifest from the Imperial law that this was a priviledge granted unto them out of respect to the honour of Christianity God l. 1. Tit. 4. l. 7 8. Nov. 83. 123. it being therein enacted that whatsoever persons shall please by their own consent to have their Cases tryed and adjudged by the Bishop they shall have liberty so to doe 12. Obs 3. That the Canons were never intended to disclaim the Supremacy of Princes over the Clergy is manifest because in them is allowed the application to the secular authority against such bishops as will not submit to the determination of the Ecclesiastical This was done by a Carthaginian Synod Conc. Carth. gr c. 53. Conc. Trull c. 2. against Cresconius a Bishop of that Province as is manifest from the Greek Copy of the African Code which was the Copy confirmed in the sixth general Council And this particular Case is approved in the Comments of the Greek Scholiasts and is also referred unto in the Nomocanon of Photius Nomocan Tit. 9. c. 8. as giving direction when one Bishop may prosecute another before a secular ruler And it may be further observed that the Canons from the 37th to the 61st of that Greek Code were taken out of the third Council of Carthage this fifty third Canon to which this action is there annexed or according to Justellus his code the forty eighth is the thirty eighth Canon of that Council wherein a particular Canon for the priviledge of the Clergy was established And the Canons prohibited applications to the secular power against any of the Clergy almost in the same manner as they forbad the application to a general Council against a Bishop Conc. constant c. 6. which was condemned unless the other methods by the Bishops of the Province should prove ineffectual CHAP. VI. Of the renouncing all Foreign Jurisdiction and Authority and particularly the Supreme Power of the Bishop of Rome SECT I. The latter part of the Oath of Supremacy considered Sect. 1 1. THE Royal Supremacy will be further vindicated by resuting the pretences which are vainly made by others to the whole or any part of the just Soveraignty of Princes wherein I must chiefly consider the claims of Foreign Jurisdiction Foreign Jurisdiction disclaimed which are rejected and disowned in the Oath of Supremacy In which Oath it is declared that no Foreign Prince Prelate State or Potentate hath or ought to have any Jurisdiction Power Superiority Preeminence or Authority Ecclesiastical or Spiritual within this Realm and therefore all such Authority is disclaimed and renounced 2. But thereby it is not intended that no Foreign Bishop Priest or Deacon shall be owned in this Realm to have that preeminence of Order in the Catholick Church The just au●●●ty of Church Officers asserted unto which they have been duly received nor that their power of order for the performing Ecclesiastical Offices is invalid and null if they come into this Realm But this is no power of Government and Jurisdiction within this Kingdom by a Foreign Authority which is herein rejected Neither is it hereby meant that if the Ecclesiastical Governours of any Foreign Church do within their Jurisdiction duly admit any person into the Church or do clave non errante excommunicate or absolve any that the Christians in this Realm have no obligation upon them from the authority of such proceedings to embrace or avoid Ecclesiastical Society with such persons For thiswould be contrary to the Article of our Church which asserteth Article 33. that that person which is rightly cut off from the Vnity of the Church and Excommunicate ought to be taken of the whole multitude of the faithful as an Heathen and Publican until he be openly reconciled by penance and received into the Church by a Judge that hath authority thereunto Can. Apost 12. Conc. antioch c. 6. And the ancient Canons of the Church did determine that he who was excommunicated by his own Bishop might not be received by another 3. But the obligation which in this Case lyeth upon us and all the members of the Catholick Church is not from any Jurisdiction or Superiority which we acknowledge any such Foreign Officers of the Church to have over us because this obligation equally lies upon all Catholick Bishops Metropolitans and Patriarchs as well as upon ordinary and private Christians And it would bring in an unaccountable confusion to assert that every Bishop under the Patriarch of Alexandria should have a superiority over all the Bishops and Patriarchs of the Roman Constantinopolitan and other free Churches throughout the World not excepting the Alexandrian it self and at the same time to assert that every Bishop in any of these other Churches hath upon the same account superiority over him and all other Bishops and Churches But this duty is incumbent upon us from the nature of our Christianity and Christian Vnity For Christ having made his Church to be one Body who ever undertakes Christianity is thereby obliged to own Communion with this Church and all the regular Members thereof and to disown Communion with those who are rightly cut off therefrom and he having appointed Officers in his Church hath accordin gto their Offices given them authority to exercise the power of the Keys in his name in the Churches committed to them And hereupon Synesius Bishop of Ptolemais having excommunicated Andronicus and others Svness Epist 58. by vertue of his Sentence pronounced against them did require the Churches all over the Earth that they should not receive them into Communion 4. But this Oath tending according to the design of that Statute by which it was established to restore to the Crown its ancient Jurisdiction that authority which ischiefly rejected thereby is such as invaded or opposed the Royalty of the King and particularly that which claimeth any supreme cognisance of Ecclesiastical affairs as if they were not under the care of the temporal power or that pretendeth to any other authority above or against the just rights of the Crown And suh is the arrogance of the See of Rome which assumes to it self a claim of supreme authority in matters Ecclesiastical and even in temporal also which many of its followers defend as belonging thereto upon account of its spiritual authority Bellarm. de Rom. Pont. l. 5. c. 6. Thus Bellarmine declareth that if the management of temporal affairs appeareth prejudicial to spiritual ends potestas spiritualis potest debet coercere temporalem the spiritual power may and ought to restrain the temporal by all ways and means which shall seem needful to that purpose And Boetius Epo
foreign Jurisdiction by Oath 1 Eliz. 1. Article 37. is to restore that Jurisdiction to the Crown which had been usurped by the Pope and our Articles do assert that the Bishop of Rome hath no Jurisdiction in this Realm of England and the Injunctions of King Edward did also declare K. Edw. Inj. 1. that no manner of obedience and subjection within these Realms and Dominions is due to him And the truth of this I shall undertake to manifest after I have first given some account of the claim he makes SECT II. The high claims of Papal Supremacy declared Sect. 2 1. Against the supreme Government of Princes there is an high and imperious demand made of an Vniversal Monarchy for the Romish Bishop and of an exemption from the secular Government fot all Ecclesiastical things and persons And this is pleaded for and defended by divers of their Writers 2. Various assertions of Romish Writers concerning the Popes Supremacy Earcl de potest Papae c. 3. adversus Monarchomach l. 4. c. 4. l. 5. c. 8. Yet among those who embrace the Romish Communion there have been and are considerable persons who have maintained that the Pope as Pope and by divine right hath no temporal power and in temporal things hath no authority over Kings And yet even these men acknowledge the Bishop of Rome as Christs Vicar and the Universal and supreme Pastor to be endowed with a spiritual power and Empire over all Christian Kings and Monarchs But some of them do expresly grant to Princes an authority in causes Ecclesiastical so far as is necessary for the preservation of the temporal Republick 3. This opinion was not only embraced by Joh. Major Jacobus Almain and some others more anciently but is also at large declared and defended by Barclay de potestate Papae Blackwel in his Examination Barnes in his Catholico-Romanus Pacisicus and divers others But this assertion is not only distastful to the Romish Court but even Bellarmine accounted it to be rather an Heresy than an opinion De Rom. Pont. l. 5. c. 1. 4. Many others there are who deny the Pope to have any direct temporal power but yet grant him as much as he can desire nder the terms of indirectè in ordine ad spiritualia For since by this phrase is meant in order to the advancement or preservation of the See and interest of the Romish church and those of its Communion these persons grant as much indirectly as any other do directly even as if any person should aver that Alexander had no direct right to any other Kingdoms or Countries but in order to the advancement of his Crown or enlargement of his Government his claim was valid these give him as large a title as any other persons can do This method doth Eellarmine in his Controversies embrace with many others whom he mentions and he calls this the common opinion in explaining of which he gives the Pope this ample and extensive power that he hath in order to spiritual good Bell. ibid. the supreme authority of disposing of the temporal things of all Christians Yea he asserts that he can depose Kings and transfer Kingdoms not as an ordinary judge but as a supreme spiritual Prince and that he cannot ordinarily either establish temporal laws or make them void as Pope but that he can do this if the Kings themselves will not do it in ordine ad salutem animarum 5. Yet because he who talked at this rate spake with some reserves and seeming limitations of expression rather than of sense and chiefly because by considerable argument against the Popes direct temporal power he had indeed taken away the direct support for this indirect power we are informed by Barclay Barcl de Potest Pap. c. 13. p. 101. c. 40. p. 329. that Sixtus the fifth had a design and almost accomplished it by a publick censure to abolish all Bellarmines Controversies because in this particular he did not comply far enough with his ambition Acts and Monum Co. 8. n. 8. And it hath been observed both by Blackwell and Bishop Mountague that Carerius in his Book de Potestate Rom. Pontificis making it his drift to refute Bellanmine and his notion yet inscribes it adversus politicos nostri temporis haereticos 6. But there are many Canonists and others of whom Baronius was one who asserted the Pope to have a supreme universal temporal power by divine right over all the World tam jurisdictionis quam proprietatis M. Becan de Justit Jure c. 3. q. 7. Blackw Exam. n. 20. as Becanus expresseth their sense Many who maintain this opinion are mentioned by Bellarmine and others by Blackwell who observes that both Rodericus Sancius and Carerius do call this the common opinion of Divines 7. Vniversal temporal supremacy challenged by the Court of Rome But however any private persons of the Romish Communion may think in their studies or dispute in their Writings the publick claim of the Court of Rome hath been for an universal direct temporal power ●●atina in Greg. 7. Baron as is fully evident from these among other instances When Gregory the seventh undertook to transfer the Imperial Crown from Henry the fourth to Rodolphus he founds the right of his disposal thereof upon the gift of Christ to S. Peter and his pretended Successors at Rome saying Petra dedit Petro Petrus diadema Rodolpho 8. Extr. Coml l. 1. Tit. 8. c. 1. Unam Sanctam Mart. Polon an 1301. The Constitution of Boniface the Eighth asserted both the spiritual and Temporal power to belong to S. Peter and the Church with respect to which Martinus Polonus declared se dominum spiritualem temporalem in universo mundo asserebat And in his Oration in confirming Albertus to be King of the Romans lately published by Baluzius Baluz in Addit ad Marc. de Conc. l. 2. c. 3. he affirmed that as the Moon hath no light but what it receiveth from the Sun so there is no earthly power which hath any thing but what it deriveth from the Ecclesiastical power and all powers saith he are from Christ and from us as the Vicar of Christ And he there declareth that Christ hath given his Vicar that power that he hath the right of constituting an Emperour and of translating the Empire with much more to that purpose And his high contests with Philip the French King upon the like claim were very notorious which occasioned the earnest Declaration of the Estates of France against him 9. And in that large Rescript of Alexander the Sixth to Ferdinand and Isabella 7. Decretal l. 1. Tit. 9. C. ● King and Queen of Castile and Arragon and to their Heirs and Successors for ever he undertakes to give to them all the American land unpossessed of any other Christian Prince and all Islands and all parts of the Continent which either already are or hereafter shall
be discovered as things which were granted to him in S. Peter and in his power to dispose authoritate omnipotentis Dei ac vicariatus Jesu Christi upon account of the authority of God and the Vicarship of Christ with other such like words And when Bellarmine in his Books de Romano Pontifice had given such a sense of this grant as if it signified no more than to empower them to send Preachers thither and to protect converted Christians and to do such like Offices In lib. Recognit he afterwards found reason to retract what he had there said and acknowledged that when he wrote that he had not seen that rescript it self but only followed the opinion of Cajetan and some others 10. The Bull also of Pius Quintus against Queen Elizabeth declareth that Christ had constituted him a Prince over all Nations and over all Kingdoms And the Bull of Sixtus the Fifth against Henry the third of France asserteth him to have obtained a supreme power delivered to him by divine institution over all Kings and Princes of the whole Earth and over all people Nations and Countries But these usurpations upon Royal Authority were so distastful to a considerable part of the Romish Communion De Benef. l. 1. c. 4. that Duarenus with respect to his own age tells us that he thinks there is no sober and learned man who can approve thereof II. And the proud and stately behaviour and deportment of this Bishop The Popes behaviour towards Princes towards Emperours and Kings when they are admitted into his presence is suitable hereunto which by their own Ceremonialist we have thus described Saer Cerem l. 3. Sect. 1. c. 2. Romanus Pontifex nemini omnino mortalium reverentiam facit c. The Roman Bishop doth no reverence to any mortal man either by rising up openly or by bowing his head or by uncovering it but after the Roman Emperour or other great Kings have kissed his foot and his hand as he sitteth he doth a little rise towards them to receive them to kiss his mouth And again Omnes mortales c. Ibid. c. 3. All mortal men of whatsoever dignity and pre-eminence they be when they first come into the Popes presence must thrice at distant spaces bow their knee before him and must kiss his feet 12. I forbear to mention what our Histories manifest of the haughty insolent and imperious carriage of the Pope towards our English Kings especially King Henry the Second and King John But that proud and arrogant speech of Gratian the Popes Legate to Henry the Second Nos de tali curia sumus quae consuevit imperare Imperatoribus regibus we belong to that Court whose custom it is to command or rule over Emperours and Kings was so hugely pleasing to Baronius Baron an 1196. n. 11. that he thought fit to record it in great letters and in the margent to note Gratiani responsio digna legato that it was such an answer of Gratian as was fit for the Popes Legate to make And what Luciferian insolency appeared in that Speech of Innocent the Fourth concerning Henry the Third Nonne Rex Anglorum vasallus noster est Mat. Paris an 1253. ut plus dicam mancipium Is not the King of England our Vasal and that I may say more our slave And that this was no unusual stile at Rome appeareth from ancient Records in the Tower Pryns Addit to History of K. John f. 18. f. 28. which declare the Pope both in his Council at Rome and in his Letter to the Barons and Commonalty of England to have called King John his Vasal 13. And waving many other things I shall only add that immediately before the framing the Oath of Supremacy Queen elizabeth coming to the Crown signified her Inauguration to Paul the Fourth then Pope by Edward Carne who was then at Rome as an Ambassadour from Queen Mary Hist Conc. Trident. l. 5. p. 333 334. an 1558. the Pope proudly returns his answer That the Kingdom of England was a see of the Apostolical See and that it was intolerable boldness in her to assume the name of Queen or the Government of the Kingdom without his approbation and therefore he propounded to her to renounce her pretended right to this Realm and to leave it to his dispose From these things it may appear what great cause there was for this Crown to take care that all the subjects thereof who are in any chief places of trust and employment do disown such foreign claims which would undermine the very foundations of Regal Authority And the meer recital of such things as these are such palpable evidences of impudent arrogancy despising Dominions and opposing the humble meek and peaceable design of the Christian Religion and even the principles of humane reason and polity that this alone may be sufficient with all understanding and good men to raise in them an abhorrence of and indignation against such intolerable ambition SECT III. Such claims can have no foundation from the Fathers and have none in the direct expressions of Scripture which they alledge 1. Every rational man might well expect that so vast a claim both of Ecclesiastical and temporal power ought to be supported with some very considerable evidence which in this case can be no other but a manifest divine constitution For since the very being of the Church of God depends upon his founding it and the very being of its Officers upon Gods appointing them there can be no other ground for any Ecclesiastical Officer to claim upon a Christian account a supremacy of rule over the World unless he can produce the institution of God to this purpose 2. Some reflections on the sense of the ancient Church concerning this Supremacy And therefore it would be needless as it might also be tedious to examine those expressions of the Fathers wherein they spake with respect and honour to the See of Rome for such expressions if they had been never so plain could not found any original divine right And it would be no difficulty if it had been needful to evidence by examining them Sect. 3 that they were far from asserting that Supremacy which is challenged 3. But instead of this I shall observe that the greatest Authority of the Christian Church hath sufficiently disclaimed all such Supreme Vniversal Authority and Government of the Romish Church For that famous Canon of the Council of Nice Conc. Nic. Can. 6. doth plainly give the same power and authority to the Bishops of Alexandria and Antioch and the other Eparchies or chief Dioceses within their limits which it gives to the Bishop of Rome and makes them stand on even ground with one another which could not be done if the authority of the one was in subjection to the other and the authority of the other without subjection to any The second General Council also determined to the same purpose Conc.
from all these and governing the Church Cyp. Ep. 27. 73. Aug. in Joh. Tract 50. But this power as the ancient Church did acknowledge the other Apostles did also enjoy and were actually possessed of as appears Mat. 18.18 Jo. 20.21 22 23. Ans 2. How vastly different is this power from the temporal Dominion over the Kingdoms of the World of which there is not any world here spoken by our Lord And surely any man who considereth the doctrine and lives of the Apostles cannot imagine that every one or any one of them was intended and designed of God to be the Soveraign Potentate and grand Emperour of the World It is therefore a just complaint against the Romish party that ex clavibus cudunt enses Conf. Helvet c. 14. lanceas sceptra coronas out of the Keys they forge Swords and Spears Scepters and Crowns and usurp temporal Dominion equal with or superiour unto Kings notwithstanding that our Saviour expresly rejected from his Apostles such Dominion as the Kings of the Gentiles exercised Mat. 20.25 26. 9. But Pasce oves meas Feed my sheep Jo. 21.16 is a place chiefly insisted upon And if no more was hence inferred than a spiritual and Apostolical authority in S. Peter this is readily granted and asserted and the other Apostles enjoyed the like But Bellarmine will have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bellarm. de Rom. Pont. l. 1. c. 14 15 16. Layman Theolog. Moral l. 1. Tr. 4. c. 6. to be a Charter of Soveraignty and to enclude governing and commanding as a King doth And he and others also infer the extent of S. Peters power over all Apostles and Kings because they are Christs Sheep To which I Ans 1. Not S. Peter only but all Bishops and Elders are commanded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to feed or have a Pastoral care over the Flock Ambr. de dign Sacerd c. 2. Ignat. Ep. ad Philad ad Rom. Eus Hist Ecc. l. 8. c. 25. Act. 20.28 1 Pet. 5.2 And among all Ecclesiastical Writers beginning from Ignatius and downwards the Bishops and chief Officers of the Church have been acknowledged to be Pastors Now if this Office of Pastor doth not necessarily enclude a Soveraign or supreme Government then no such can be asserted to s. Peter or his pretended Successor from this Text if it doth then must this be ascribed to every Bishop which will necessarily overthrow the Popes Vniversal claim Ans 2. Government over the Sheep of Christ is also too narrow a compass for an Vniversal Monarchy 10. Ans 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 being a Metaphor from Shepherds is thence sometimes used for to take care and feed and at other times for to rule and govern and oft for both Now though the Officers of Christ have a pastor al authority over his Flock yet these words Joh. 21.15 16 17. were principally directed to S. Peter as supposing in him this authority and requiring his duty of care and feeding and not as conveying to him a peculiar authority and Dominion because this is enjoined upon him as an evidence of his love to Christ and because among the three Precepts to take care of the Sheep of Christ and his Lambs two of them are there expressed by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which must be understood only of feeding Ans 4. Civil Governours also are to be as Shepherds over their Flock with particular respect to rule and Government The Government of God is sometimes expressed by his being the Shepherd of Israel and a Prince whom Homer stiles the Pastor of the people 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is by Philo and other Writers oft mentioned by a like name Phil. de Agricult de Joseph quod omnis probus liber And a civil pastoral power over all their people is yielded to them Num. 27.17 Is 44.28 which is expressed in the Septuagint by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Sam. 5.2 Ch. 7.7 Ps 78.71 72. But every one must use their power according to their office Ecclesiastical Officers are to use the spiritual authority but temporal Soveraignty is reserved to Princes Ans 5. The pastoral office of the guides of the Church doth extend it self even to Kings with respect to the conduct of their Souls but yet this doth not exempt them from being under the Regal Soveraignty A Prince may be ruled by a Physician concerning his health or be led by a guide at Land or a Pilot at Sea and not lose his Soveraignty over these Subjects And the Kings of the House of David were the chief Rulers over the Realm though the Priests were to offer Sacrifice for Prince and People to direct them in Religion and to judge in case of Leprosy and such like SECT IV. Other arguments for the pretences of Papal Authority answered and refuted 1. Annal. Ecclesian 57. n. 28 29 30. The support which Baronius affords for the Popes Supremacy is that Christ himself is a Priest after the order of Melchisedek being both King and Priest according to the Apostle Heb. 7. and that from him the regal and sacerdotal authority are together conferred upon his Church first upon the Apostles and then upon their Successors which he further undertakes to prove because our Saviour declared to his Disciples Jo. 20. As my father sent me so send I you and did establish in his Church a Royal Priesthood 1 Pet. 2. Ibid. n. 31 32. And though the Cardinal will not allow that this authority in the Church doth make void the political power yet he doth assert that this Regal Ecclesiastical Authority must be superiour thereunto The Priesthood of Melchisedek 2. But concerning the Melchisedekian Priesthood Sect. 4 he did not consider these two things 1. That the making the supremacy of power to be conjunct with the Priesthood doth destroy the peculiarity of power challenged by the Bishop of Rome for thence it must be inferred that they who equally partake of Priesthood with the Bishop of Rome must have an equal supreme authority with him 2. That one thing which the Apostle did most especially insist on concerning the Priesthood of Melchisedek is that the Priest or High Priest of that Order must not derive or receive his Priesthood from any Predecessor nor leave it to any Successor but must abide a Priest for ever through that whole dispensation under which he is Priest Heb. 7.3 8 16 17 21 23 24 28. And therefore the Melchisedekian Priesthood is no more transferred from Christ to any other person in the Church then his proper mediatory office is Beyerl de Episc Rom. And they who say that this Priesthood of Christ cannot indeed be enjoyed by any as successor to him but only as his Vicar do not so avoid the force of this argument For it remains certain that no such pretended Vicar can partake of this Priesthood because in him it must be received from a Predecessor viz. in that Vicarship and Priesthood and be left to
a Successor which is so highly contrary to the nature of this Priesthood 3. Of the Apostolical Mission When Christ sent his Apostles as his father sent him 1. These words enclude a fulness of Ecclesiastical and spiritual authority or the power of the Keys which was given to all the Apostles 2. But they do not make the Apostles equal in dignity or dominion with Christ himself in being Saviour and head of the Church or Lord over and Judge of the quick and the dead 3. Even Christ himself when he was upon Earth being as man under the law was not only obliged to practise the duties of the first table and the other Commandments of the second table but even to the observance of the fifth Commandment al 's 4. And the Office of the Ministry And those persons who in general defence of Ecclesiastical Supremacy urge that they who are Officers of Christ and furnished with his authority ought not to be in subjection to secular rulers but superiour to them to whom Christs authority is superiour may consider 1. That Parents and Husbands have authority from God and from Christ and yet are under Kings and Princes 2. The superiority of any Officer of Christ must not be measured by the height of Soveraignty which Christ himself hath which would make the servant even every Deacon equal with his Lord and by the like pretence every petty Constable must have equal authority with the King but by the constitution of his office and the power thereby conveyed to him For neither God in governing the World nor Christ in governing the Church ever gave to any other an authority equal to what he possesseth 3. Christ came not to overturn the Government of God his father in the World which hath established the supreme temporal power yea his mediatory Kingdom and administration is in subjection to the Father and our Saviours Doctrine yieldeth that authority to Princes that it earnestly presseth a general and necessary subjection for Conscience sake to their Government 5. And as to what Baronius urgeth The Royal Priesthood from the Royal Priesthood mentioned by S. Peter 1 Pet. 2.9 it may be observed 1. That that expression hath not respect to a peculiar sacerdotal office in the Church but to the dignity of the Christian Church in general as is manifest from the place it self Salian an 2544. n. 347. Estius in loc and acknowledged by their own Writers 2. If this Text did express any peculiar power in Ecclesiastical Officers it must have particular respect to those Eastern Churches to whom that Epistle was written 1 Pet. 1.1 and 3. It is well observed by Bishop Andrews that even that Royal Priesthood v. 9. is commanded to be subject to every ordinance of man Ch. 4. S. 2. n. 3. and to the King as supreme v. 13. as I above observed 6. And while some say Of the Plea of expediency for the Churches good it is expedient for the Churches good that the Ecclesiastical Authority should be superiour to the temporal otherwise its welfare and good is not sufficiently provided for this Plea might appear more plausible 1. If there could be no ignorance heresy pride or ill designs in any who have the title of chief Officers in the Church which no man can believe who reads the Lives of the Popes written by their own Authors 2. If Kings and Princes must never be expected to be nursing Fathers to the Church and to take care of it 3. If the great design of Christianity was to take care that Christians must never follow their Saviour in bearing the Cross and that this Religion did not aim at the promoting true faith and holiness meekness and peace but at outward splendor dominion and power in the World according to that notion the Jews had of a Messias And this is not only a weak but a presumptuous way of reasoning to controul and affront the Gospel of Christ and to dare to tell him how he ought to have established his Kingdom to other purposes than he hath done 7. And after all this S. Peters Authority not peculiar to Rome there is nothing more unreasonable than for the Church of Rome to monopolize unto its self alone that authority which was committed to S. Peter and the other Apostles For it is not at all to be doubted but the Apostles committed a chief presidential and Governing authority in their several limits to other Churches besides the Roman Basil Ep. 55. Cyp. Epist 69. Firmil in Cyp. Ep. 75. The ancient Fathers frequently express the Bishops of the Christian Church in general to be the Apostles Successors S. Cyprian and Firmilian assert all Bishops to succeed the Apostles even ordinatione vicaria as placed in their stead and possessed of that power which was from them fixed in the Church Hier. ad Marcellam Aug. in Ps 44. Amongst us saith S. Hierome the Bishops do hold the place of the Apostles and for or instead of the Apostles are appointed Bishops saith S. Austin Tertullian declares that to his time Cathedrae Apostolorum the Cathedral Sees placed by the Apostles themselves did still continue their presidency in the Apostolical Churches of which he mentions many by name and Rome as one of them 8. And as there is no evidence that S. Peter who also presided at Antioch left all his authority peculiarly to Rome so there is sufficient evidence that S. Peter who was commanded to feed the Sheep of Christ did yield this authority to the Elders or Bishops of Pontus Galatia Cappadocia Asia and Bithynia that they should 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 feed the flock of God which was among them 1 Pet. 5.2 And hereby he either committed that pastoral authority which he received from Christ unto the Bishops of those free Churches of the Ephesine Thracian and Pontick Dioceses to whom he wrote and which afterward were placed under the Patriarch of Constantinople or at least he acknowledged this authority in them And therefore so far as concerneth a divine right these Eastern Churches in the Territories of Constantinople have fully as fair a Plea hereby for deriving a pastoral authority from S. Peter or having it particularly confirmed by him as they at Rome ever had 9. But with respect to England This Realm not feudatory Bellarm. in Apol. pro Resp ad Jac. Reg. c. 3. in Respons ad Bel. Ap. c. 3. divers Romish Writers alledge that it became feudatory to the See of Rome by King Johns resigning his Crown to Pandulphus the Popes Legate to which thing objected and misrepresented by Bellarmine divers things are returned in Answer by Bishop Andrews But waving such particular answers as might be given I shall chuse to observe in General that this Case is the same as if any seditious persons or Vsurpers should by fraud or force reduce the King to straits and difficulties and should then by like methods gain a promise from him that he
those evasions which some have endeavoured to make in this Case as if in other things besides Ordination they might be subject to the Bishop of Antioch he who duly weighteth this Canon will discern that it plainly enough condemns the attempt of the Bishop of Antioch as an invading 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 another distinct Eparchy or Province which was not heretofore and from the beginning under the authority of him or of those who did precede him Conc. in Trul. c. 39. And when the sixth General Council did confirm this Canon of Ephesus concerning the Liberties of the Cyprian Churches they do own the priviledges given to the Metropolitan of Cyprus in his Territories to be equal to those which the Bishop of Constantinople enjoyeth in his To which may be added that in the Synod of Antioch in the Reign of Constantius among the several Provinces belonging to that Patriarch which therein assembled there is no mention at all of Cyprus 6. Also the West African Churches The African Churches taking in all Numidia Mauritania and the other ample Territories of the Carthaginian Jurisdiction were never under any of the Patriarchs These limits were never claimed to any of the Eastern Patriarchates and are sufficiently excluded from thence by the Canons of Nice Nic. Conc. c. 6. Constantinople and Chalcedon which fix the bounds of those Churches Const c. 2. Chalc. c. 28. But when the Bishop of Rome claimed a power to receive appeals from those Churches in the case of an African Presbyter who was therein censured and pretended a Canon of the Council of Nice to give him that authority the African Fathers after they had diligently sought for the most perfect Copies of the Nicene Canons from Constantinople Alexandria and Antioch besides what they had before in Latine did detect the fraud and falshood of the claim of the Bishop of Rome and rejected his demand To this purpose the sum of their proceedings may be viewed not only in particular Writers but also in the Greek Copy of the African Code which was received in the sixth general Council partly in the beginning and partly in the conclusion thereof 7. But whereas it is pretended by several Romish Writers that these African Fathers did in the end of this contest yield this authority to the Bishop of Rome even this is very far from truth Indeed they were resolved to submit if there was any Canon of Nice which enjoined that submission but after this demand concerning appeals was made by Pope Zosimus and canvased in the time of his Successor Bonifacius the African Fathers write to Coelestin who succeeded him Ad finem Conc. Carth. Gr. both asserting their own liberty of Governing their own Church and requiring him not to receive any into Communion whom they had rejected from it And whereas in the beginning of this contest with Zosimus there was a Canon made in the Council of Milevis declaring Conc. Milev 2. Can. 22. that those who should make appeals beyond the Seas or to Rome should be uncapable of being received into Communion by any in Africa Cod. Afric c. 27. after this dispute was more fully debated and considered they were so far from retracting this Canon that they caused it to be put into the African or Carthaginian Code Conc. Carth. gr c. 31. which was compiled and confirmed about the end of this disquisition and therein this Canon remains as a standing rule 8. But because it hath been observed by Zonaras Zonar in Conc. Sard. c. 5. and by very many since that what the Bishop of Rome falsly urged as a Canon of Nice was to be found among the Canons of Sardica concerning that I shall note two things First Of the Canon of Sardica That he who considers that Zosimus would herein have falsified the Council of Nice that neither he nor they who managed this contest under him or after him did urge the authority of the Council of Sardica to those African Bishops and that those Bishops after all their enquiry did declare to the Bishop of Rome Epist ad Coelestin ubi sup that they had never read in any Synod of the Fathers that any such authority was granted to him may be apt to suspect that possibly there hath been no very fair dealing about this Council of Sardica or at least must conclude that they at Rome were sensible that Africa was not subject to the authority of that Council 9. Secondly That in this Council of Sardica Cham. Tom. 2. l. 13. c. 7. Marc. de Conc. l. 7. c. 3. n. 6. as Chamier observed and P. de Marca owneth here were no proper appeals to Rome asserted that the case under complaint might be there determined but only that the Bishop of Rome might order a revising of the sentence which had been pronounced against any Bishop upon his application to him And the state of the Church and the occasion of this Constitution was this Socr. l. 2. c. 5 6 7 16 18. Sozom. l. 3. c. 5 10 11. Arianisme greatly prevailing in the East the Arian Bishops there sentenced and deposed divers Catholick Bishops as particularly they had done to Athanasius in a Synod of Antioch who yet was received at Sardica Now that the faith of Nice might not by such methods be suppressed and the Communion of the Catholick Church be thereby confounded the Orthodox Bishops at Sardica who thought themselves not bound to disclaim Communion with all whom the Arian Heretical Bishops should reject allowed the Bishop who had been censured a liberty to have his Case re-examined And they committed this as a trust to the Bishop of Rome for the preserving the Catholick Communion that he should appoint Bishops about that Province sending others also to join with them to judge of that Case which trust the succeeding Bishops of Rome made ill use of for the inordinate advancement of that See But this Canon gave not the Bishop of Rome an Vniversal superiority in the right of his Church Sozom. l. 7. c. 9. Marca de Conc. l. 1. c. 3. n. 9. but dealt with him as the second General Council did with several eminent Bishops of the Eastern Churches who were appointed as Capita communionis that the rest of the Church might communicate with them with whom they held Communion Nor could the Western Bishops convey any authority over the Eastern Church which was here chiefly concerned 10 Now as these Cyprian and African Churches as well as those in these Islands had an Independent Ecclesiastical authority of the same nature with the Patriarchal but not honoured with that title so I might discourse further of other somewhat like instances both in the East and the West but I think that would be needless especially because the Patriarchal bounds and the limits of other free Churches ought not now to be fixed in all places upon the same terms on which they stood in the ancient Church as I shall
Rome gain any just right of Patriarchal Authority over this Realm This Realm not made subject to Rome by the Conversion of the Saxons after the coming of Austin into England and all that can be pretended to that purpose is either by pleading that the English were converted by Austin who was sent hither by Pope Gregory or that there was a great honour respect and subjection for many years yielded to the Bishop of Rome in this Island Both these pretences I shall examine 6. Now it is acknowledged that this Austin was instrumental for the converting very many of the Saxons to Christianity Yet here I observe three things 1. That they who Convert Foreign Nations do not thereby make those Nations and Churches to be perpetually subject to those Foreign Churches from whence they came For this would make Christianity to enclude a servitude in the profession of it and worldly Dominion in the preaching it Had this been a rule in the Primitive Times this Island and a greater part of the Christian Church all over the World must have yielded subjection to the Bishop of Jerusalem many Cities and Regions being first instructed in the Christian Doctrine and converted thereto by the dispersed Members of that Church and amongst others Antioch it self Act. 11.19 22 26. and even Rome also was partaker of their spiritual things Rom. 15.27 And yet these Christians being made subject to Christ and not to Jerusalem Hieron Ep. 61. n. 15. Conc. Nic. c. 7. the Bishop of Jerusalem for some hundred years was no Patriarch even till the Council of Chalcedon nor Metropolitan but was under the Bishop of Cesarea only he had a peculiar honour reserved to him by the Council of Nice Bed Hist l. 5. c. 20. And if this had been a rule for later times then Frisia Zealand and other Belgick Provinces must have been subject to the Church of England since under God they owed their Conversion to Wilfrid an English Bishop Cone Carth. gr c. 103 120 121. Indeed some Canons have given Bishops Authority to govern such places as they should convert but this tended only to give those persons the deserved honour of being the Bishops of those places which they had reduced from heresy or infidelity where any other had not a previous right thereto but not to make that Church or Kingdom subject to a remote Foreign Soveraignty All that could be hence inferred is that it was reasonable that Austin should be Bishop in England but not that Gregory should be Patriarch over it though he also deserved to be greatly honoured for being so instrumental to the Conversion of the English 7. I observe Secondly That when Austin came into this Island it was inhabited by four distinct sorts of Nations or people the Britans the Scots the Picts and the English with which without being curious about words I enclude also the Sexons and others who accompanied them out of Germany That the Britans were ancient Christians before the coming of Austin needeth no further proof Bed Hist l. 1. c. 13. Bed Hist l. 3. c. 4. Chronol Sax. And such were also the Scots over whom Palladius was an eminent Bishop almost two hundred years before Austin The Picts also in their Northern quarters towards forty years before the coming of Austin were Converted by Columba or Columbanus who came out of Ireland and the Southern Picts before that time by Ninias a British Bishop Now what pretence can be made that they who converted or presided in the three former Nations should neither have an authority over the whole Island nor a liberty left to govern themselves and yet the conversion of the last should swallow up the liberties of all the former three and convey a Patriarchal right over the whole Island yea though this last Nation or people were possessors of those limits which were within the ancient British Dioceses 8. I observe Thirdly That the Conversion of the English and Saxons was not performed only by Austin or his Successors or any other appointed by him or sent from Rome but a very considerable part of this work was effected by other persons who observed the rites of the British Church Bed Hist l. 3. c. 1 3. Amongst many things worthy observation the Kingdom of the Northumbrians after defection from Christianity which Paulinus taught them wee instructed therein and Converted Sporsw Hist l. 1. p. 14. by Aidanus a Scotchman who observed the ancient Rites of that Church and was made Bishop among the Northumbrians of whom it is related that in seven days he converted and baptized fifteen thousand The Mercians also and Middle Angles received their Conversion by Finanus a Scotchman Bed Hist l. 3. c. 21 25. who was Successor to Aidanus in his Bishoprick among the Northumibrians and is observed by Beda to have been a strict opposer of the introduced Romish Rites And this good work was carried on by others of the ancient British and Scotch Church 9. And Finanus above-mentioned did baptize Sighercht King of the East-Sexons and others of his Company who were converted to Christianity among the Northumbrians Bed ibid. c. 22. After which Cedda and another Presbyter of the Middle-Angles was sent for to instruct the Kingdom of the East-Saxons in the Christian Faith and by them they wee Converted after the defection of that Kingdom from their formerly professed Christianity And this Cedda was made Bishop of the East-Saxons by Finanus and two other Bishops with him and at that time observed the ancient British Rites but after the death of Sinanus when Colman Finanus his Successor deserted his bishoprick among the Northumbrians and went into Scotland Ibid. c. 26. rather than he would relinquish the ancient practises and usage of his Church Cedda was then brought over to comply with the Rites brought in by Austin All which will evidence that what was done by Austin could not bring England into a subjction to the Bishop of Rome unless he admit divers equals and rivals in his claim And a reflexion upon what hath been now observed will evidence that to found a constant Ecclesiastical superiority and subjection upon such pretences as these would bring in an unavoidable confusion sinto the Church and it would have overthrown in all the ancient Patriarchates in which no such rule was observed 10. Nor by the power the Pope once here exercised I shall now consider that subjection which was yielded to the Bishop of Rome in this Island And it is acknowledged that the Roman Bishop was for many years highly esteemed in this Realm and consulted with and many things after the Conquest were decided by his determination And also that he did receive great sums of money from hence not only from the Clergy in disms first-fruits and other payments but also Peter-pence were paid by the Laity also not as a tributary acknowledgment of the subjection of the Realm Spelm. Conc. Vol. 1. p.
that the Popes usurped power was not so quietly and freely submitted to in this Realm as thereby to give him any right to govern here SECT III. The present Jurisdiction of those Churches which have been called Patriarchal ought not to be determined by the ancient bounds of their Patriarchates 1. The bounds of Patriarchal Authority altered The third Assertion is That the Patriarchal rights especially those of Rome do not now stand on the same terms as they did in the ancient Church nor can the present Roman Bishop claim subjection in all those limits which of right were under the ancient and Catholick Bishops of Rome No man can reasonably think that the bounds of the Patriarchal Sees were unalterable unless they had been of a divine or Apostolical Authority But that they were never looked upon as such in the Catholick Church may besides other testimonies appear in that the General Councils undertook to erect Patriarchates and to divide the limits of others as they saw cause Sect. 3 Thus the dignity and honour of a Patriarch was given to the Bishop of Constantinople Conc. Const c. 3. in the second General Council and his Patriarchal limits and Jurisdiction were fixed in the fourth and in the same the Patriarchate of Antioch was divided and part thereof allotted to the Bishop of Jerusalem who then received Patriarchal limits and Jurisdiction Conc. Chalc. Act. 7. But I shall only consider four things which may so alter the state of Patriarchal Jurisdictions that every one of them besides what is abovesaid is a bar against all claim of authority in the Bishop of Rome to these Churches and Realms 2. First from the different territories 1. From the different bounds of free Kingdoms and Dominions of Soveraign Kings and Princes For the doctrine and design of Christianity did not intend to undermine and enervate but to establish and secure the right of Kings and no rule of the Christian Religion requires free Kingdoms to devest themselves of sufficient means to preserve their own security and peace and the necessary administration of justice Nor can the former acts of any Councils or Bishops wheresoever any such were give away the rights of Kings and Realms But a Foreign Bishop who is under no Allegiance to this Crown and hath no particular obligation to seek the good of this Kingdom Mischiefs from Foreign Jurisdiction may probably oft incline to designs either of his own ambition or the interests of other Princes against the true welfare of this Realm as hath sufficiently been done in the Court of Rome And if such an one hath power to cite before him any person whomsoever of this Realm either to his Patriarchal Seat or his Legate and hath the authority without all redress or appeal save to an Oecumenical Council which probably will never be had to inflict so severe a sentence as Excommunication truly is he would hereby have a considerable awe and curb upon many of the subjects of the Realm that they would be wary of opposing or provoking him And if Canonical obedience were due to him from all the Clergy and filial reverence from the laiety such a person being the Kings Enemy may have greater opportunity of indirect managing his ill projects than is consistent with the safety of the Realm or with the innocency and goodness of the Christian Religion to promote 3. The exercise of a foreign authority when managed by haughty and ambitious spirits hath been of such ill consequence to Kings and Emperours that King John was forced upon his knees to surrender his Crown to the Popes Legate Henry the Third Emperour of Germany Mart. Polon in Greg. Sept. p. 361. was compelled to stand at the Popes Gate barefoot several dayes n frost and snow to beg for absolution and Frederick the First to submit to Pope Alexander treading upon his neck And other instances there are of like nature of the despising Dominions and Dignities being the effects of Interdicts and Romish Excommunications Towards the whole Kingdom St. 25 Hen. 8.21 it becomes a method of exhausting its treasure by tedious and expensive prosecution of appeals and many other ways which were not without cause publickly complained of in this Kingdom Antiq. Brit. p. 178. insomuch that the yearly revenue of the Court of Rome out of this Kingdom was in the time of Henry the Third found to be greater than the revenue of the King And it is an high derogation from the Soveraignty of a King as well as a prejudice to the subjects where justice cannot be effectually administred and Cases of right determined by any authority within his own Dominions And with respect to the Clergy Pryn An. 24 25 Edw. 1. p. 689 c. the Foreign Jurisdiction sometimes brought them into great straits as did that Bull of Boniface the Eighth which put them to avoid his Excommunication upon contesting with the King and thereby brought them under the Kings displeasure and into very great grievances as appears from the Records of that time 4. And as upon these accounts it appears reasonable and necessary that the Dominions of Soveraign Princes should be free from any Foreign Ecclesiastical superiority so there are many things which may be observed to this purpose in the ancient state of the Church The Government of Dioceses Provinces and Patriarchates hath been acknowledged to have been ordered within the Empire and according to the distinct limits of the Provinces thereof Conc. Const c. 3. Chalc. c. 28. Conc. Chalc. c. 17. Trul. c 38. The Sees of Rome and Constantinople enjoyed the greatest Ecclesiastical priviledges because they were the Imperial Cities The Canons also of Oecumenical Councils enjoined that if any City receive new priviledges of honour by the Imperial authority the Ecclesiastical Constitutions for the honour of its See shall be regulated thereby And whereas the Slavonian Churches were first Converted to Christianity by them who were of the Eastern or Greek Church and embraced their Rites when Bohemia and some other branches of the Slavonian Nations were made members of the German Empire they thereupon became subject to the Government of the Western Church Thus also when the Bishop of Arles had an eminent authority in the ancient Gallia Com● Hist n 18. upon that City being divided from those Dominions and becoming subject to the Goths who then Commanded Italy and Spain he exercised no longer any Jurisdiction there but had his authority changed to be Delegate over the Spanish Territories but when this City was again reduced to the French Government he no longer exercised his authority in the Dominions of Spain 5. Yet it must be acknowledged that in practice the Dominions of several Soveraign Princes have been subject to a Foreign Patriarch which was not their duty But this was undertaken either upon presumption that because of the excellency and simplicity of the Christian Religion there could be no fear of prejudice from
where bad notions or inclinations get a through entrance they are apt to propagate and are not easily rooted out Thus S Hierome observes Hier. Prooem in lib. 2. Comment ad Galat. that Galatia which too readily embraced corrupt doctrines in the Apostles times notwithstanding S. Pauls Epistle to them continued to be a place prone to Heresy unto his time And the Church of corinth was so apt to fall into Divisions and Schisms that notwithstanding the Apostles severe rebukes of them for that sin they were soon after his Death Clem. Rom. Ep. ad Cor. strangely over-run with it again to the great disparagement of their Christian profession 7. Of the undutiful carriage of the Kirk of Scotland I gave a considerable and known instance in the former Book And that they at Rome do cast high disrespects and create great danger to Princes may be discerned both by the former Book and by the foregoing Section 8. Positions of Fanaticism and Jesuicism disloyal And besides these matters of Jact and practise it hath been manifest that many wild extravagant and disloyal Positions which are dangerous and destructive to Government and humane Society have been asserted by men of a Fanatick strain and temper of some of which I shall have occasion to take more particular notice in the progress of this discourse De Jur. Mag. in Subd qu. 6. Junius Brut. Vind. Qu. 2. Rutherf of Civil Policy Qu. 9 31 32 c. Some of them assert that the people in general may take the Power and Government into their own hands and deprive and punish their governours when they see cause others grant this power only to the persons who are the peoples representatives others fix the same in inferiour Officers with respect to the supreme governour And others have run on so far as to yield this pwoer to the meanest part of the people as was asserted by an Anonymous Scotchman about the time of the Galloway Rebellion that in the right of self defence the concourse of the Nobles or the Primores Regni is no way of absolute necessity 9. And amongst the Papists they who are of the Jesuitical strain do not only embrace those notions of the Popes deposing power to the great prejudice of Soveraign Princes Authority and safety but they also run into the highest strain of Fanaticism in violating the majesty of Kings and subjecting them and their authority to the people De Rege l. 1. c. 6. Thus Mariana when the Prince is accounted by the people to pervert his government alloweth to them the liberty of publick resistance by open War and also the use of Private violence commending the treasonable Murther of Hen. 3. of France by James Clement and allows very man to set himself against such a Prince whom he calls a Tyrant saying Ibid. c. 3. tanquam fera omnium telis peti debet He also such are the wicked and wretched principles of these Jesuits approveth the use in this Case of deceit and fraud yea and of poyson by poysoning his Seat or Cloaths But that we may think there is something of Conscience remaining in such a spirit as this he condemns Ibid. c. 7. and declares against the giving such a person poyson in his meat and drink for this doughty reason because it is saith he against humanity that he should be put upon contributing to his own Death by any act of his own which he would here do by taking this poyson in his food But sure this mans reason was as far from him as Conscience when he wrote these things in his not discerning that there was altogether as much done in contributing to his own death by putting on his poysoned Cloaths 10. ●ess de Just Iure l. 2. c. 9. ●ub 4. Becan de jure Just ad Qu. 64. D. Thom. qu. 4. And Lessius and M. Becanus two other Jesuits in this particular agree almost word for word with one another in asserting these Positions that a Prince who hath a just title becomes a Tyrant with respect to the administration of his Government when he designs in his Government and aims at his private advantage and not the publick good and burdens the common-wealth with unjust exactions sells the offices and places of Judges and makes Laws to his own advantage and not the publick That when this Tyranny is no longer fit to be born this Prince is first to be deposed or to be declared an enemy by the Common-wealth or the chief Estates of the Kingdom or by any other who hath authority and then he thereby ceaseth to be a Prince and it becomes lawful to attempt any thing against his person and life That so long as he remaineth a Prince that is till such acts be done as are now mentioned he may not be killed by private persons unless it be for their necessary self defence And Lessius saith in another place Dubit 8. for the further clearing his sense in this particular that for the necessary defending a mans own life or securing himself from being maimed it is lawful to kill him who sets upon him himself or procures another to do it And this saith he must be owned allowable against any superiours whatsoever even that a Vasal may in this Case kill his King unless it be likely that civil Wars may follow for discord about succession And in such an high strain of treason and Unchristian disloyalty is the Jesuits Casuistical Divinity But against the falshood and wickedness of these assertions it is needful to declare and defend the true and peaceable principles of Reason and Christianity and against the dangerous effects which such positions tend to promote it is necessary that publick laws provide due security for the person of the King to which purpose the general acknowledgment of the unlawfulness of taking up Armes against him The Laws of England condemnall Waragainst the King is of very good use 11. Our English Laws providing for the safety both of King and Subjects and the preservation of their just Rights do declare it universally unlawful to make or levy any War against the King And upon this account it must also be as much against reason and Christianity yea more both because of the greater duty to superiours and the concern of the general good to invade that Right and Royalty which the Law secures to the King as to deny to Subjects that property right and safety which the Law provides for them I confess the consideration of our Law in matters of doubtfulness difficulty or profound disquisition would be an unfit undertaking for my profession and especially for a man of no deeper study in the Law than my self But I am perswaded that if no men had made use of subtil Artifices and designed methods to obscure plain things there would have been no want of evidence even to any ordinary understanding in this particular to direct them to the honest practises
any designs laid by any of the Apostles for destroying the Elders of the Jews or turning Caesar out of his Dominions by these attempts And though this defence proceeded no further than to cut off an ear our Lord not only disliked it but his action in forthwith healing the ear by a miracle may seem to intimate that he thought fit to take upon himself to make restitution and to repair the injury done by the rash action of one of his followers C. 23. Qu. 8. in Capite Thus Gratian observed that when Peter took the material Sword to defend his Master from the injury of the Jews he then received this check 8. 4. To St. Peter and therefore to his Successours Fourthly if we consider the Person who here drew the Sword which St. John declares to be Simon Peter it may well be wondred that any sort of men should believe that Christ gave this Apostle and others by vertue of succession from him a power to authorize subjects to take Arms against their Princes in a case where they shall judge the Church and Religion concerned and to deprive them of their Crowns and Dominions when himself in person was not allowed though he was then an Apostle to make such resistance as hath been declared From this instance Gratian concludes Ibidem that no bishop nor any of the Clergy whosoever have any power either by their own authority or by the authority of the Pope of Rome to take Armes and then they can have as little authority to commissionate others to take them Nor can this be evaded by saying that St. Peter was not as yet possessed with the supreme soveraign Authority For as it no where appears that he ever received any such thing so if our Saviour had ever intended to convery to him the supreme power of the Temporal sword he would never have used particularly to him so general a threatning against the use of it And therefore some Romish Writers have put themselves upon undertaking another method and that is by a very bad attempt to defend or applaud this action of St. Peter which our Lord rebuked Bar. An. 34. n. 67. Baronius when he gives us the relation of it doth it without any manner of censure but not without an Encomium declaring quid generoso accensus amoris ardore fortiter gesserit In Concord Evang Tom. 4. l. 6. c. 17. And Barradius proposing the question whether St. Peter did amiss in this action resolves it as most probable that he did not verosimilius puto saith he non peccasse And Stella saith Stell in Luc. 22. St. Peter did not sin herein and he compares this action with the zeal of Phinebas whereby he obtained the High-Priesthood and so sith he did St. Peter 9. Severalreasons why St. Peter was rebuked And there are some who would evade the argument from these words of our Saviour by saying that our Lord did prohibit St. Peter's using the Sword for his defence only because he did now intend to law down his life according to his Fathers will But it must be observed that our Saviour lays down three several grounds upon which he checks this act of his Apostle and commands him to put up his Sword and we must not so assert the validity of any one of them as to deny or enervate the force of the others 1. From the sin and unwarrantableness of such actions where persons act out of their own sphere and what they have not authority to undertake and this is that I have now discoursed of in v. 52. 2. Because he himself knew how he could sufficiently procure his own defence by lawful means whereas this action was neither a necessary nor a proper undertaking for that purpose Had the Holy Jesus intended to have his person rescued out of the hands of the Jews he could have effected this by Legions of Angels who are under no obligation of subjection to men v. 53. But Gods Providence can never be so at a loss as to need the help of any unlawful means 3. Because the thing St. Peter aimed at to hinder his Master from suffering was no good design but savoured somewhat of the same spirit by which he had formerly rebuked his Lord when he spake of his being killed Mat. 16.22 For the Scriptures must be fulfilled v. 54. and the Cup saith our Saviour which my Father gives me to drink shall I not drink it Joh. 18.11 And every one of these are parts of Christs Doctrine and the first as much as the other and is that also which our blessed Lord thought fit to mention before the other 10. With respect to this Text Mauritius This Text anciently used to their purpose Eucher Lugdunens Epist ad Sylv. who commanded the Thebaean Legion which being all Christians yielded themselves to Martyrdom under Maximianus told them how much he feared lest they being in Armes should have resisted the Emperour under the colour of defnce when this was forbidden by Christ who by the command of his own mouth would have that Sword which his Apostle had drawn to be put up And St. Austin who sometimes extenuated St. Peters fault as proceeding from his love Aug. de Agon Christ c. 29 30. and not from any cruel disposition that he did a more peacare sed non saevitia in his Books against Faustus gives this account of the sense hereof The Lord did with sufficient threatning check the fact of Peter saying Put up the Sword Contr. Faust l. 22. c. 70. in Epist 48. for he that useth the Sword shall fall by the Sword but he useth the Sword who when no Superiour and lawful Power doth either command or allow useth Armes against the blood of another And from this Text also Gratian inferreth this general rule Grat. Decubi sup that every one who besides him or without his authority who useth the lawful power who beareth not the Sword in vain and to whom every Soul ought to be subject I say every one who without such authority takes the Sword shall perish by the Sword 11. Assemb Annot. in Luk. 22.51 And even the Annotations under the name of the Assemblies Annotations do interpret these words to condemn Subjects taking the Sword especially against their Superiours Neither Peter say they nor any other private person or persons might take up the Sword to defend the cause of Christ 1. Becaue the Jus gladii belongeth not to any private person but to publick authority Rom. 13.4 much less to Ministers 2. Because they who smite with the Sword shall perish with the Sword Gr. de Imp. c. 3. n. 6. And Grotius de Imperio asserteth that when Christ said He that taketh the Sword shall perish by the Sword he doth expresly condemn that defence which is made by violence against unjust force from publick authority contra vim injustissimam sed publico nomine illatam To which I shall subjoin the
IMPRIMATVR Liber cui Titulus Christian Loyalty c. Ex Aed Lamb. Julii 10. 1678. Geo. Thorp Rev. in Christo Patri Dom. Domino Guliel Archiep. Cant. à Sacris Domesticis Christian Loyalty OR A DISCOURSE Wherein is Asserted that just Royal Authority and Eminency which in this Church and Realm of England is yielded to the KING Especially concerning Supremacy in CAUSES ECCLESIASTICAL Together with The disclaiming all Foreign Jurisdiction And the unlawfulness of Subjects TAKING ARMS Against the KING By WILLIAM FALKNER Preacher at S. Nicholas in Lyn Regis LONDON Printed by J. M. for Walter Kettilby at the Bishops-Head in St Paul's Church-Yard MDCLXXIX To the MOST REVEREND FATHER in GOD WILLIAM By DIVINE PROVIDENCE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBVRY Primate of all ENGLAND and Metropolitan And one of His Majesties most Honourable Privy Council c. May it please your Grace I Have in the following Discourse undertaken a Vindication of those publick Loyal Declarations of this Church and Kingdom which are of great concernment not only in the Civil Government but also in the Christian Religion and I hope your Grace will therefore not account it improper that this should be presented unto your self For the chief things I have taken upon me to defend are such special Branches of the Doctrine of our Church that in this part and Age of the World they are in a manner peculiar to it and to them who with it have herein imbraced the true Reformed profession But both the Roman Church and divers other different Sects and parties among their other Errours and Heresies entertain such disloyal Positions as are of dangerous importance unto Government wherein besides some other things there is too near a Conjunction between them And these things are of so great consequence in Christianity that the main Foundations of Righteousness Peace and Obedience are thereby established all which necessary duties are much insisted on by our Saviours Doctrine And therein the regular and orderly behaviour of inferiour Relations is particularly enjoined for the gaining reputation to our Religion because a temper fitted for Christian subjection supposeth Pride Passion and Perverseness to be subdued and that in the fear of God an Humble Meek and peaceable Spirit is introduced which are things wherein our Saviour hath given us his Example And the principal matter of this Discourse concerning the Kings Supremacy in all Causes and the unlawfulness of Subjects taking Armes is of the greater concernment because the contrary ill Principles which many have imbibed have been very pernicious to several parts of the World for many hundred years past Which hurtful Positions have prevailed the more among men by their being covered over with plausible pretences as if those of the former sort were needful to assert the just interest and honour of the Christian Church and those of the latter sort to provide for the safety of the Common-wealth and of every Man 's own propriety All which would represent the secular Authority which was ordained by divine wisdom for the good of Mankind to be a thing exceeding hurtful and mischievous to the World Wherefore since men are much led by the consideration of their interests that what I propose may be the more successful and effectual I have shewed that Obedience and peaceable subjection to Governours without resistance is not only a duty which is enough to perswade all good men to practise it but that it is the common advantage of the World as the whole duty of Man is both to Rulers and to Subjects And that Royal Supremacy in Causes Ecclesiastical is not prejudicial to the Christian Church I have only expressed more covertly and succinctly because though this may be considered by some men there is another interest to wit that of the boundless ambition and avarice of the Romish Court and Church which chiefly instigates their opposition hereunto and I must confess that the truth I defend doth not gratify this interest But that tendeth best to promote the advantages of the Church in the World when the goodness of our Religion and its preserving all just rights of Superiours as well as others doth so recommend it to the World as may gain to it the good opinion of all men the favour of Princes and the blessing of God And though I am conscious to my self that by reason of the greatness and copiousness of the subject I have taken in hand there may be several defects in my performances notwithstanding my diligent endeavours yet I presume humbly to tender them to your Grace in confidence that your Candor and readiness to give a favourable acceptance to well designed and not unuseful undertakings and to make charitable allowances for their imperfections doth bear an equal proportion with other parts of your great worth by reason of which you possess your great dignity with a general satisfaction to good men and the Friends of Truth and Peace And that you may long and happily continue here to the benefit of the Church and may see the Church it self in Prosperity and true Piety flourishing all the dayes of your Life is the desire and Prayer of him Who Honoureth your Grace With humble and dutiful Reverence William Falkner TO THE READER THE Government and Constitution of this Realm requiring a solemn acknowledgment to be made by all who bear any office therein concerning the Regal Power and Dignity and the different parties using their several methods and pretences to oppose the matters of these publick Declarations I have endeavoured in the following Discourse to give a true and clear account of these things in order to the removing those mistakes or doubts which may either perplex any persons or tempt them to neglect their duty And I have oft thought that those things which are publickly professed in this Church and Realm by these particular acknowledgments which are made by so many persons are very useful to be discoursed of both because these things themselves were selected as being of great concernment by the grave and prudent consideration of publick Authority and the due complyance with them includeth the practising Obedience and following the things which make for Peace and also because the unjust oppositions made against these things are either managed by ill designs or at least have a tendency to promote ill effects in Church and State And the truth which in this Discourse I undertake to maintain doth also speak much the Integrity and Simplicity of the Christian Religion that it is not a Worldly contrivance or a way laid to intitle any Professors thereof to claim or to enable them to usurp upon or oppose the temporal Power and Authority as hath been shamefully done in the Church of Rome and not a little by other sorts of men a considerable part of the Popish Usurpations being founded in their unjust encroaching upon the Rights of Soveraignty And they who have observed the State of the World cannot be unsensible what Horrid and Mischievous
Conspiracies have been frequently contrived against the Safety and Welfare of Princes and their Kingdoms as the consequent of the wicked Positions which I have undertaken to refute But all these attempts which are Pernicious and Destructive to Humane Society will I hope sufficiently appear by the following Discourse to be perfectly opposite to the Christian Doctrine also and severely condemned by it Wherefore the things treated of in this Book are of such a nature that they are of great concernment for the good Order Peace and Settlement of the World the security of Kings and Kingdoms and the vindicating the Innocency of the Christian Religion Upon this Account I could wish my self to be more able to discourse of such a subject as this every way suitably to and worthy of it self But as I have herein used diligent care and consideration so I can freely say I have every where endeavoured impartially to discover and faithfully to express the truth and have never used any unworthy Artifices to evade or obscure it And therefore if the sober and judicious Reader shall in any thing of less moment as I hope he will not in matters of great moment discern any mistake I shall presume upon his Candor and Charity In the manner of handling things I have avoided nothing which I apprehended to be a difficulty or considerable matter of objection but in the return of Answers and the use of Arguments to confirm what I assert I have oft purposely omitted many things in themselves not inconsiderable for the shunning needless prolixity and have waved several things taken notice of by others for this cause sometimes because I was not willing to lay any stress upon such things as seemed to me not to be of sufficient strength On this account for instance in discoursing of the Supremacy of Princes over Ecclesiastical Officers I did not insist on our Saviour and S. Peter paying Tribute Mat. 17.24 27. For though many ancient Writers speak of this as paid to Caesar and some expressions in the Evangelist seem to favour this sense yet I suppose there is rather greater likelyhood that this had respect to the annual oblation unto God himself which the Jews paid for the service of the Temple to which St Hilary and some other Ancients refer it Yet in rendring unto Caesar the things that are Caesars I still reserve unto God the things that are Gods acknowledging the primary necessity of embracing the true Worship of God and the Doctrine and practice of Christianity and that all Christians ought to bear an high reverence to the establishment of the Kingdom of Christ under the Gospel and to that Authority and those Officers which he hath peculiarly established therein But there is a very great miscarriage among men that there are those who look upon many weighty things in Christianity as if they were merely secular Constitutions and were no further necessary to be observed than for the securing men from outward penalties These men do not observe and consider that there lyeth a far greater necessity of keeping and valuing the Communion of the Church of devoutly attending Gods publick worship and orderly performing its Offices with other things of like nature from the Precepts and Institutions of Christ and from the Divine Sanctions than from the countenance or establishment of any civil Law or secular Authority whatsoever The lively sense and consideration of this was that which so wonderfully promoted and preserved both Piety and Unity in the Primitive Church when it had no encouragement from the Temporal Power But there must be no opposition made between Fearing God and Honouring the King but a careful discharge of both and these Precepts which God hath joined together let no man separate And now I shall only entreat that Reader who is inclined to have different apprehensions from the main things I assert to be so just to his own reason and Conscience as impartially to consider and embrace the evidence of Truth which is the more necessary because truths of this nature are no mere matters of speculation but are such Rules to direct our practice which they who are unwilling to entertain act neither charitably to themselves nor accountably to God And he who is the Father of Spirits direct the hearts of all men into the wayes of Goodness Uprightness Truth and Peace Lyn Regis June 21. 1678. THE CONTENTS THE First BOOK Chap. I. THE Kings Supremacy in Causes Ecclesiastical declared Sect. 1. The Royal Supremacy acknowledged and asserted in the Church and Realm of England Sect. 2. The true meaning of Supremacy of Government enquired into with particular respect to Causes Ecclesiastical Sect. 3. The Declaration of this sense by publick Authority observed Sect. 4. The spiritual Authority of the Ecclesiastical Officers is of a distinct nature from the Secular power and is no way prejudicial to Royal Supremacy Sect. 5. A particular account of this Supremacy in some chief matters Ecclesiastical with some notice of the opposition which is made thereunto Chap. II. The Supremacy of Kings in matters Ecclesiastical under the Old Testament considered Sect. 1. Their supreme Authority over things and persons sacred manifested Sect. 2. The various Pleas against Christian Kings having the same Authority about Religion which was rightly exercised under the Old Testament refuted Chap. III. No Synedrial Power among the Jews was superiour or equal to the Regal Sect. 1. The Exorbitant Power claimed to the Jewish Sanhedrim reflected on with a refutation of its pretended superiority over the King himself Sect. 2. The determination of many weighty Cases claimed to the Sanhedrim as exempt from the Royal Power examined and refuted Sect. 3. Of the Antiquity of the Synedrial Power among the Jews with reflexions upon the pretences for a distinct supreme Ecclesiastical Senate Chap. IV. Royal Supremacy in Causes Ecclesiastical proved from reason and the Doctrine of Christ Sect. 1. The evidence hereof from the nature of Soveraign Power Sect. 2. The same established by the Christian Doctrine Sect. 3. What Authority such Princes have in matters Ecclesiastical who are not members of the Church Sect. 4. An enquiry into the time of the Baptism of Constantine the Great with respect to the fuller clearing this matter Chap. V. An Account of the sense of the ancient Christian Church concerning the Authority of Emperours and Princes in matters of Religion Sect. 1. Of the General Exercise of this Supremacy and its being allowed by the Fathers of the first General Council of Nice Sect. 2. This Supremacy owned in the second General Council at Constantinople and the third at Ephesus Sect. 3. The same acknowledged in the Council of Chalcedon and others Sect. 4. Some Objections concerning the Case of Arius and Arianism considered Sect. 5. Other Objections from the Fathers concerning the eminency of Ecclesiastical Officers and their Authority Sect. 6. The Canons of the Church concerning the exemption of the Causes of the Clergy from secular cognisance
They either beyond due bounds exalt it so high as not to reserve that respect which belongeth to God and Christian institutions which is done by some few or else depress it so low as to devest it directly of its authority in causes Ecclesiastical if not to erect and acknowledge some other power Papal or popular as rival or paramount thereunto And therefore it is a work worthy the care and industry of one who loveth truth and goodness to endeavour the healing such a Fountain of deadly evil which hath diffused it self into so many several streams and Channels And I heartily and humbly beseech the Almighty God and Governour of all the Earth that he will guide and assist my undertaking and dispose the hearts of all men to a right understanding of truth and a serious performance of their duty 4. Now for the preservation of the peace and Government of Kingdoms these two things are especially necessary 1. That there be an acknowledgment of the Rulers just authority in his Dominions against all false pretenders and those who would undermine it or incroach upon it 2. And are asserted in this Realm That there be due care for maintaining that fidelity in the subjects which is suitable hereunto And both these things are so far provided for in the Constitutions of our Church and Kingdom that the Royal Authority is therein fully acknowledged and asserted and all Ecclesiastical persons and together with them civil and military Officers besides divers other subjects of this Realm are required to yield to the King that authority and duty which consisteth chiefly in these two things 1. The asserting in the King the Supremacy of Government in all causes against the claim of any Foreign pretenders or any others and their engaging to maintain all those Royalties which belong to the Crown 2. That such a faithful Allegiance be performed to him as disclaimeth all right and power whether by pretended Papal Excommunication or otherwise to set free any of his subjects from their duty of Loyalty and obedience and particularly declareth it unlawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against him And of the matter of our publick acknowledgments which relate to these two heads I shall discourse concerning the former head in this Book and the latter in the second Book 5. The Supremacy of Government in the King of England over this Realm In our Statute Laws and all other his Dominions which is his just and undoubted right is plainly declared in our most solemn publick Constitutions both Civil and Ecclesiastical It was asserted in our Laws in the time of King Richard the Second 16 Ric. 2.5 that the Crown of England hath been so free at all times that it hath been in no earthly subjection but immediately subject to God in all things touching the Regalty of the same Crown and to none other And in the time of King Henry the Eighth 24 Hen. 8.12 it was declared in Parliament that this Realm of England is an Empire and so hath been accounted in the world governed by one supreme Head and King having the dignity and Royal Estate of the Imperial Crown of the same unto whom a body politick of spiritualty and temporalty be bounden and ought to bear next to God a natural and humble obedience And it is usual for the Lords and Commons jointly even in the framing Acts of Parliament to mention the King under the stile of Our Soveraign Lord the King which is obvious in our Statutes By out Laws also since the Reformation the usurpations which had incroached upon his Supremacy are discarded the ancient right of Jurisdiction restored to the Crown 1 Eliz. 1. and the Oath of Supremacy established wherein this Royal Authority is solemnly owned acknowledged and declared and which is taken by all the Clergy of England and many others 6. The Oath of Supremacy The Oath of Supremacy containeth in it three things 1. The asserting the Kings Highness to be the only supreme Governour of this Realm and all other his Dominions and Countries as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes as temporal 2. A disowning and renouncing all foreign Jurisdiction and authority within this Realm 3. An engaging true allegiance to the King and his Successors and a defence of the Jurisdictions and pre-eminencies of the Crown The lawfulness fitness and reasonableness of which things as they are expressed in that Oath I am the more enclined carefully to consider Weights and Measures Ch. 20. because a very learned man too readily and unadvisedly expressed his dissatisfaction concerning some clauses thereof But as the two first things contained therein will be the chief matter of my discourse so under the first nothing else need be much enquired after save the supremacy of the King in all spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes 7. For that the Kings Majesty is in general the chief Governour of this Realm is as evident as that this is the Kingdom of England and it is as needless a thing to say any thing in proof thereof as to go about to prove the Sun to be risen at Noon-day For there is an actual constant visible exercise of this Government in such an ample manner as to extend it self to all persons whomsoever in the Realm and this authority is very plainly acknowledged and confirmed throughout the whole body of our English laws and the Constitution of the Kingdom And the Title of our present Soveraign is manifestly undoubted by clear succession and descent not only from the Kings since the Conquest but from those before it For Margaret the Heiress of the Saxon Kings was about the time of the Conquest married to Malcom King of Scotland from whence our Soveraign is descended and thereby M. Paris an 1067. as M. Paris expressed it Regum Angliae nobilitas ad reges devoluta est Scotorum 8. And Ecclesiastical Constitutions This Royal Supremacy in causes Ecclesiastical is frequently asserted in the Constitutions of our Church It is owned and declared in the Book of Articles Art 37. And the Canons of our Church not only acknowledge this Supremacy Can. 1. but also enjoin Ministers frequently to teach the same Can. 36. And they moreover require subscription thereunto according to the purport of the Oath of Supremacy from all persons who come to be ordained or to be admitted to any living or employment in the Church Can. 2. and denounce Excommunication ipso facto against all impugners thereof in causes Ecclesiastical SECT II. The true meaning of Supremacy of Government enquired into with particular respect to causes Ecclesiastical Sect. 2 1. To prevent the inconveniency which ariseth from misunderstanding it is needful to consider what is meant by the phrase of supreme Governour Of Supreme Government which will easily be discerned if we first consider what is understood by Governing Now as Governing e●cludes a power of superiority over
the persons governed and an obligation upon them unto obedience so the chief and special works of secular Government are frequently expressed in the Holy Scripture by judging and doing judgment and justice 1 Kin. 10.9 Jer. 22.15 hence the ancient rulers of Israel were called their Judges by being as a Shepherd unto the people Num. 27.17 and also by giving praise to them that do well and executing wrath on them who do evil Rom. 13.3 4. 1 Pet. 2.14 Phil. de praem poen p. 918. de Vit. Mos l. 2. And Philo accounteth the authority of Government to be a power of commanding and prohibiting 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which encludeth an authoritative power over the persons of others and being the life of and giving execution to the law The sense of which and especially of the Scripture expressions is That the Governing power includeth an authority to take care of the Community and of what is just and right and to command and encourage well-doing and when occasion requires to take an account of the actions and causes of inferiours acquitting or punishing them according to their merit and opposing all injurious and evil doers And he who hath a right to do all this towards all other persons in his Dominions without being governed by subject to or accountable before any other superiour authority upon earth is a Supreme Governour 2. But it is neither necessary nor most suitable to supremacy of Government that the rules by which the Governour proceedeth should be altogether at his own will and pleasure But it is sufficient that these rules be such as he either judgeth to be good and therefore chuseth of himself or else freely accepteth and consenteth to them if they be formed to his hands or proposed by others For it is no abatement of the high Soveraignty of the Glorious God over the world that all his government and executing judgment is ordered according to the natural and eternal rules and measures of goodness and justice and not by any such arbitrary will which excludeth all respect thereto And man hath not a less but a greater government over himself when he guideth himself by the rules of reason nor is it therefore any diminution of the power of a Governour when the exercise thereof is and ought to be managed by rules of common equity Yea the Kings of Judah enjoyed a compleat Supremacy though they were to govern according to the law of Moses and so much more may Christian Kings do while they maintain a Religious respect to the positive laws of Christianity And there are some Kingdoms where without any disparagement to the Supremacy of their Prince they are governed by the fixed rules of the civil law and others where other laws established by their Predecessors are standing rules And if in the last place we consider that when great Emperours yielded to their conquered and tributary Principalities at their Petition and desire the priviledge of being governed by their own former laws as was done to Judaea by their Persian Josep Ant. l. 11. c. 4. c. 8. lib. 12. c. 2. c. 3. lib. 14. c. 17. Grecian Egyptian Syrian and Roman Governours under whose Dominion they were this was no giving the Supremacy of Government out of their own hands much less can it be a Plea against the Supremacy of Government in a free natural Prince where the consent of his Subjects in Parliament is always taken in for the forming and enacting any new law which he establisheth at their request and Petition 3. And as such a model of framing laws is very well consistent with the Supremacy of the Prince so it is a great priviledge to the subjects of such a Realm which they cannot but be sensible of and which will make their subjection more cheerful and free And it further encludeth this advantage to the Government it self that there is like to be greater care of obedience to those laws where the people are not only obliged thereto from the duty of submission and the fear of penalties but have also given their own consent and agreement to their being and constitution St. de Marlbridge St. de Bigamis St. quo Warranto passim To this purpose the things established by our laws are called things agreed and assented to and concordata and very often they are declared to be enacted by the Kings Majesty with the advice and assent of the Lords and Commons but always it is acknowledged that neither nor both Houses of Parliament have any legislative power without the King and whosoever shall assert the contrary is by a late statute declared to be under a Praemunire 13 Car. 2.1 4. And it is plainly evident Supremacy is a right of governing not of performing all particular offices that the supreme government in all things or causes is quite of a different nature from the right of performing the actions or offices of all persons who are under this government which for the most part are inconsistent with the dignity of Supremacy though some have been willing to confound these things and thereby hinder themselves and others from a right understanding of them De Rom. Pont. l. 1. c. 7. And Cardinal Bellarmine himself spent his strength and courage in fighting in the dark when he somewhat largely insists on this argument That secular Princes have not a supreme Government with respect to the Church because they cannot perform the offices of other Governours of the Church Bishops Priests and Deacons and argues they may not baptize and consecrate non sunt igitur Reges supremi Ecclesiae Magistratus But no man need be to seek for the true sense of supremacy as it is acknowledged in this Church and Realm who doth consider duly those very words both in the Oath of Supremacy and the Canonical subscription That the King is supreme Governour as well in all spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes as temporal Wherefore 5. Obs 1. In temporal things or causes there are some rights of power and authority Some authority besides the supreme by peculiar divine institution both in spiritual and temporal things which are wholly derived from the King as the Commanding an Army or Navy and the governing any place or County in his Dominion but there are others which depend upon divine institution which institution must be reverenced and the rules thereof attended unto by all sorts of men such is the authority and right of the Husband over his Wife in the state of marriage appointed of God And in Ecclesiastical matters there are some things in our ancient laws reserved as peculiar to the Ecclesiastical power not without good reason and yet much by the favour of the soveraign authority as the power of proving wills and testaments 21 Hen. 8.5.22 23 Car. 2. and granting administrations concerning which our late Statutes have made some additional provisions but there are other matters of Ecclesiastical authority
Supremacy according to this article of our Church At the end of his Answer to the Jesuits Challenge King James so approved his explication thereof that he returned him particular thanks for the same which is printed with his speech And the Bishop therein plainly asserted that God had established two distinct powers on earth the one of the Keys committed to the Church and the other of the Sword which is committed to the civil Magistrate and by which the King governeth And therewith he declareth that as the spiritual Rulers have not only respect to the first table but to the second so the Magistrates power hath not only respect to the second table but also to the first 5. From all this we have this plain sense That the King is supreme Governour that is under God say the Injunctions and with the civil sword say the Articles as well in all spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes as temporal that is he hath the Soveraignty and rule over all manner of persons born in these Dominions of what estate soever either Ecclesiastical or temporal say the Injunctions and to the same purpose the Articles Only here we must observe that the King 's being supreme Governour in all things and causes is one and the same thing with his having the chief Government over the persons of all his subjects with respect to their places actions and employments and therefore is well explained thereby For it must necessarily be the same thing to have the command or oversight of any Officer subject or servant about his business and to have a command or over-sight concerning the business in which he is to be employed and the same is to be said concerning the power of examining their cases or punishing neglects and offences 6. And from hence we may take an account Of supreme head of the Church of England Def. of Apol Part 6. Ch. 11. div 1. of the true sense of that title used by King Henr. 8. and King Edw. 6. of supreme head of the Church of England This stile was much misunderstood by divers Foreigners seemed not pleasing to Bishop Juel and some others of our own Church was well and wisely changed by our Governours and hath been out of date for above sixscore years past And though this title was first given to King Hen. 8. Tit. Of this civil Magistrate by a Convocation and Parliament of the Roman Communion it was used all King Edwards days and then owned even in the book of Articles And the true intended sense from the expressions above mentioned appeareth manifestly to be this to acknowledge the King to be head or chief Governour even in Ecclesiastical things of that number of Christians or that part of the Catholick Church who reside in these Realms and are subjects to his Crown even as Saul by being anointed King Wh. Treat 8. ch 1. div 4. Bishop Saund. Episcop not prejud to reg p. 130 131. Mas de Min. Anglic l. 3. c. 4. was made head of the tribes of Israel 1 Sam. 15.17 And according to this sense the use of this title was allowed and justified by very worthy men such as Bishop Whitgift Bishop Saunderson Mr Mason and others And to this end and purpose it is the just right of the King of England to own himself the supreme Governour of the Church of England which was a stile sometime used by our pious and gracious King Charles the First Declar. before 39. Articles in his publick Declaration about Ecclesiastical things but with due respect to the Ecclesiastical Officers 7. In the ancient Church it was not unusual for him who had the chief preeminence over a Province or a considerable part of the Christian Church to be owned as their head Can. Apost 34. whence in the ancient Collection or Code called the Canons of the Apostles the chief Bishop in every Nation was required to be esteemed by the rest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as their head And that Bishops may be called heads of their Churches is asserted by Gregorius de Valentia from that expression of Scripture lately mentioned concerning Saul Tom. 4. Disp 1. qu. 8. punct 4. which yet must more directly and immediately prove that title to be applicable to a Sovereign Prince And as the name of head is only taken for a chief and governing member the Author of the Annotations upon the Epistles under S. Hierom's name was not afraid of this expression In 1 Cor. 12. Sacerdos caput Ecclesiae the Priest is the head of the Church 8. And though that Statute whereby the title of supreme head of the Church of England was yielded to King Hen. 8. 26 Hen. 8.1 doth assert the Kings power to correct and amend by spiritual authority and Jurisdiction yet that this was intended only objectively concerning his government in spiritual and Ecclesiastical things and causes or his seeing these things be done by Ecclesiastical Officers and was only so claimed and used we have further plain evidence both concerning the time of King Hen. 8. and King Edw. 6. Under the Reign of King Hen. 8. by his particular command for the acquainting his subjects with such truths as they ought to profess was published a Book called The Institution of a Christian man which was subscribed by twenty one Bishops and divers others of the Clergy and the Professors of Civil and Canon law and in the dedication thereof to the King Of the Sacr. of Orders f. 39. by them all is given to him this title of Supreme head in Earth immediately under Christ of the Church of England In this Book besides very many other things to the same purpose it is asserted That Christ and his Apostles did institute and ordain in the new testament that besides the civil powers and governance of Kings and Princes which is called potestas gladii the power of the sword there should also be continually in the Church militant certain other Ministers or Officers which should have special power authority and commission under Christ to preach and teach the word of God to dispense and administer the Sacraments to loose and absolve to bind and to excommunicate to order and consecrate others in the same room order and office f. 40. And again This said power and administration in some places is called claves sive potestas clavium that is to say the Keys or the power of the Keys whereby is signified a certain limited office restrained unto the execution of a special function or ministration f. 41. And yet further we have therein this very clear passage That this office this power and authority was committed and given by Christ and his Apostles unto certain persons only that is to say unto Priests or Bishops whom they did elect call and admit thereto by their prayer and imposition of their hands 9. And concerning the office and power of Kings the Doctrine and positions then received were such as
these which are in that Book expressed f. 49. That God constituted and ordained the authority of Christen Kings and Princes to be the most high and supreme above all other powers and offices in the regiment and governance of his people f. 50. Vnto them of right and by Gods commandment it belongeth principally to defend the faith of Christ and his Religion and to abolish all abuses heresies and idolatries Notwithstanding we may not think that it doth appertain unto the office of Kings and Princes to preach and teach to administer the Sacraments to absolve to excommunicate and such other things belonging to the office and administration of Bishops and Priests but we must think and believe that God hath made Christian Kings to be as the chief heads and over-lookers over the said Priests and Bishops to cause them to administer their office and power committed unto them purely and sincerely and in case they shall be negligent in any part thereof to cause them to supply and repair the same again 10. And for the time of King Edward it is manifest from the Book of Ordination that the offices of Bishop Priest and Deacon the power of remitting and retaining sins and the Pastoral authority in the Church was accounted by ordination to be committed to those persons only who receive such ordination And in his time the royal authority and dignity is described K. Edw. Inj. 1. and asserted in his Injunctions in the very same words whereby it is declared in the injunctions of Queen Elizabeth and no otherwise Qu. Elizab. Injunct 1. and almost in the same phrases which are made use of in our Canons Can. 1. 1603. i. e. that the Kings power within his Realms and Dominions is the highest power under God to whom all men within the same Realms and Dominions by Gods law owe most loyalty and obedience afore and above all other powers and potentates upon earth 11. Now these things do clearly manifest that the spiritual authority of the Clergy was both in King Hen. and King Edwards reign owned to be really distinct from the secular authority and was not swallowed up into it And this I have the rather taken notice of because it gives us a clearer prospect into the plain sense of the interpretation of the Kings Supremacy Sect. 4 as it was declared in the Admonition annexed to the Queens Injunctions unto which the explication of the statute and Articles do refer And what is herein observed from the Institution of a Christian man is the more considerable because that Book was then designed by the King and Bishops as a guide to direct the Bishops and Preachers what they should teach the people committed to their spiritual charge as is very often expressed throughout the whole Book almost in every leaf of a great part thereof SECT IV. The spiritual authority of the Ecclesiastical Officers is of a distinct nature from the secular power and is no way prejudicial to Royal Supremacy 1. The wisdom and goodness of God is eminently conspicuous both in founding his Church and establishing an Ecclesiastical Society and authority and also in ordering a civil polity in the world And these two things were well observed by Justinian to be high instances of the great goodness and bounty of God towards men Maxima inter homines dona Dei sunt a superna collata clementia Novel 6. sacerdotium imperium And these two being both of them from God do not if rightly understood clash with but are useful and helpful to one another 2. Of old the same person oft King and Priest Whilst God was worshipped only in some particular Families of the holy Patriarchs he who was the chief Governour of those Societies was also in the place of a Priest to that Family whence Noah Abraham and Job offered Sacrifice And in those ancient times in some principalities the same person was King and Priest as Melchisedec was both King of Salem and Priest of the most high God and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which in the Hebrew is the ordinary word to express a Priest Phil. de vit Mos l. 3. p. 681. doth also signify a Prince And Moses himself before the Jewish Government was compleatly formed sustained the office both of a Prince and a Priest whence Philo in his description of a compleat Governour maketh the Priesthood to reside in him as then it was in Moses 3. And from the traditions of the ancient times the general custom of divers Pagan Nations might have its original who in several distant parts of the world conjoined in the same person the royal authority and the Priesthood This was done saith Clemens Alexandrinus by those who were the wisest of them Cl. Alex. Str. l. 7. p. 720. Diod. Sic. l. 3. c. 1. Aelian Var. Hist l. 14. c. 34. and is particularly averred by Diodorus Siculus concerning the ancient Ethiopians and of the Egyptians also by Aelianus as also by Plato in Politic. and by Synesius Ep. 121. And that Jethro Moses his Father in Law was both King and Priest is expressed by Ezekielus a Poet of Jewish Extraction in some Verses mentioned by Eusebius Eus Pr. Evang. l. c. 28. Cont. Ap. l. 1. That the same usage did sometimes take place among the Tyrians of old appears from Josephus and in the time of Aeneas his travels Virg. Aeneid 3. after the destruction of Troy at Delos there was saith Virgil Rex idem hominum Phoebíque sacerdos The Pagan Emperours at Rome had likewise the Office of Pontifex Maximus and used this title in several Edicts as part of their stile of dignity of which we have a plain instance in Eusebius Hist Eccl. l. 8. c. 29. concerning Galerius Maximinus and Constantius This was also ordinarily impressed upon their coins where sometimes the proper imperial title was stamped on the one side and that of Pontifex Maximus on the other as appears in that Medal exhibited to this purpose M. Freh Tr. de Numism censûs Xenoph. de Inst Cyr. l. 2 3 8. by Marquardus Freherus And that Cyrus the King of Persia did himself both Sacrifice and annex his Prayers therewith is observed by Xenophon And there are several learned men who assert that this title of Pontifex Maximus was retained Bar. An. 312. n. 94 95 97 c. and an 383. n. 6. Seld. de Syn. l. 1. c. 10. à p. 329. ad 344. as an ordinary part of the Imperial stile even by the first Christian Emperours until the time of Gratian who according to the testimony of Zosimus is said to have rejected it as unsuitable to Christianity And it is certain that this title was given to some of them and even to Gratian himself as well and as oft as to any other in some few publick inscriptions which are urged to this purpose by Baronius and Selden But as these inscriptions were probably ordered by others and not by these
that whatsoever difference is pretended between them and Christian Princes is of no force to exclude the latter from enjoying the like authority 2. The Ark. Concerning the first I shall design to omit many things but to observe so much as is needful under these several branches First concerning the Ark of the Covenant This was in a peculiar manner sacred and none might carry it but the Priests or Levites of the Family of Kohath and Vzzah died for touching it and the men of Bethshemesh for looking into it It contained the two tables of the Covenant which were the writing of God Buxt Lex Rab. in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 2395 2397 2398. Lempereur in Middoth c. 4. Sect. 5. was placed in the holy of holies the top of it was the mercy-seat and thereupon the Cloud which was the Symbol of divine presence the peculiar Shecinah so much magnified by the Jewish Writers and the Ark and this divine presence were two of the five eminent things wanting in the second temple and there was nothing more sacred than this R. Dav. Kimchi in Hagg. 1.8 in the peculiar Oeconomy of the Jewish dispensation Yet whereas the Ark was sometimes separated from the tabernacle and the temple it is evident that it was David the King who ordered and appointed the removing of the ark of God from Kiriathjearim to the House of Obededom and from thence to the tent which he had pitched for it in Zion 2 Sam. 6.1 2 10 12. 2 Chr. 1.4 and when he fled from Absalom by his command to Zadok and Abiathar the chief Priests the Ark of God which did accompany him was carried back again to Jerusalem 2 Sam. 15.25 29. And it was at the command of King Salomon that the Ark was brought from Zion and placed in the temple which he had built 2 Chr. 6.11 1 Kin. 8.1 4. And when amongst other corruptions in Religion the Ark was removed from the holy of holies it was again replaced there by the authority of King Josiah 2 Chr. 35.3 So that the Kings of Israel and Judah took care of this holy thing Salian M. 2544. n. 431. which as Salianus expresseth it was nobilissima pars sanctuarii quasi thronus Dei locus unde oracula fundebantur 3. The Temple The holy temple was the house of God and it with the Altar were in an especial manner dedicated unto God and yet the Kings authority had to do with it and the affairs thereof The Laws of God required that the presumptuous and wilful murderer should be taken from Gods altar that he might die not allowing as Philo noteth Phil. de l●g special that the temple which was Gods holy place should be a refuge for those unholy persons who are enemies unto God Whereupon by Salomons authority Joab was commanded from the bornes of the altar 1 Kin 2.30 and when he refused to come from thence this his carriage considered the command of Salomon to Benajah to slay him there seemeth warranted by the law above-mentioned and is vindicated even by Salianus and Cornelius à Lapide Salian an 3022. n. 21. A Lapide in 3 Reg. 2.31 The cleansing and purging the temple from all defilement was performed by the commandment of Hezekiah 2 Chr. 25.3 5 15. and the like was again done in the reformation undertaken by Josiah 2 Kin. 23.4 6 7. The repairs also of the temple and the manner of disposing of the treasures thereof to that purpose are taken care of by the order and command of Joash 2 Chr. 24.4 8 11 12 14. and by the commandment of Hezekiah were Chambers prepared within the limits of the temple building for the receiving of offerings and tithes and things dedicated 2 Chr. 31.11 13. 4. The Priests and Levites The Kings had a manifest Soveraignty over the Priests who were the chief officers of the temple service yea even with respect to their service in the worship of God After the Priesthood was established in the Family of Aaron Aaron himself though high Priest and elder Brother Abarbinel in Ex. 30. Phil. de praem poenis Seld. de Syn. l. 2. c. 2. n. 2 3. acknowledged Moses to be his Lord who had the secular soveraignty is in the Scripture stiled a King in Jesurun and is acknowledged by the Jewish Writers to have had a royal authority Ex. 32.22 Num. 12.11 And though Moses enjoyed a singular dignity in being a divine Legislator yet that this title was given and was due to Moses as chief civil Governour is manifest because Ahimelech also the High Priest giveth unto Saul the same title owning him to be his his Lord and himself to be his servant 1 Sam. 22.12 15. And David speaking to Zadok the Priest taketh to himself this title of being his Lord 1 Kin. 1.33 and gives him a command to anoint Salomon And it was very usual for the Kings by their authority to command the Priests even with respect to their temple service and to have such commands observed as appears in the reign of Salomon 2 Chr. 8.15 of Hezekiah 2 Chr. 29.21 24 27. and of Josiah 2 Chr. 35.10 16. The courses of the Priests attendance on their service was ordered by David 1 Chr. 24.3 by Salomon 2 Chr. 8.14 and by Hezekiah 2 Chr. 31.2 And by the authority of Hezekiah and his Princes the great Passover in the second month was observed 2 Chr. 30.2 3 4 5. which was acceptable to God v. 12 20. 5. Gr. de Valent Tom. 4. disp 9. qu. 5. punct 4. Layman The. Mor. Lib. 4. Tr. 9. c. 8. n. 2. Wherefore that argument which some Romanists make use of to prove that Princes have no authority over Ecclesiastical persons because God under the Old Testament took the Levites to be his and he gave them unto Aaron and his Sons Num. 3.9 12. and Num. 8.11 19. and therefore say they they were under subjection to no secular power nor to any other save only to Aaron and his Successors is a very weak inference sinc the High Priests themselves were manifestly under the Royal authority For this being Gods Ordinance and his people being under its government it can be no way incongruous that what is his should be under the inspection of that which hath his authority And that the Levites were under the Government of the Kings is obvious from the holy Scriptures 1 Chr. 15.4 11 12 ch 16.4 2 Chr. 29.30 and from many other places E 4 6. The 6. The Kings Soveraignty over the Prophets is also very evident The Prophets For though the Prophets when they delivered their message from God and in his name might require obedience even from Kings unto the God of Israel yet that themselves as subjects of the Realm were under the Kings authority is sufficiently testified by the instance of the Prophet Nathan besides what I shall superadd in the following Chapter For Nathan acknowledged himself the servant of
David 1 Kin. 1.26 and that David was his Lord v. 11 27. and David owned himself to be his Lord v. 33. and gave him command concerning the inaugurating of Salomon v. 32 33 34. which Nathan observed Schickard de Jur. Reg. Heb. c. 4. Theor 13. Carpzov in Schick ibid. v. 38. And the testimony of the Jewish Rabbins Maimonides and R. Bechai have been by others observed who from the example of Nathan 1 Kin. 1.23 declare that a Prophet is to stand before the King and to do reverence to him with his face to the Earth 7. Idolatry c. Concerning other general and necessary matters of Religion it is so plain from the History of the Scriptures that idolatry witchcraft and other such gross pollutions were punished and suppressed by the authority of the good Kings that it is needless to refer to particular places When Micah and the Danites had an House of Gods it is particularly observed that in those days there was no King in Israel Jud. 17.5 6. ch 18.1 which words do plainly intimate that if there had been then a King or setled Governour it should have been his care to prohibit and root out such transgressions against God and S. Aug. asserteth Aug. Epist ad Bonifac that other Kings ought to serve God as hezekiah did who destroyed the Groves and Temples of Idols And that Josiah the King was to destroy the Altar of Bethel was foretold 1 Kin. 13.2 8. Now though most of these things with many others of like nature have been frequently observed by other Writers yet I thought it necessary somewhat particularly to take notice of them in the management of this argument especially because of the opposition I must meet with and encounter in the following Chapter 9. But lest any should say Their governing herein was approved of God that all these things were indeed matters of fact but undertaken without right it must be further considered that the exercise of this royal authority in things Ecclesiastical was approved and commended by God himself and therefore was no unjust usurpation Thus for instance Asa's care of reforming Religion and establishing it tbroughout all Judah is declared to be that which was right in the eyes of the Lord 2 Chr. 14 2-5 and those pious acts of Hezekiah and Josiah for the suppressing false worship and establishing true Religion had an high and signal commendation from God himself 2 Kin. 18.3 4 5 6. and ch 23.1 2 -25. And where there were defects in the purity of the publick worship even this was charged as a blemish in the government of the Kings who then reigned as upon Asa Jehosaphat Joash Amaziah and others 1 Kin. 15.4 ch 22.43 2 Kin. 12.3 ch 14.4 And from hence it appears according to what hath been declared in our Church Can. 1.1640 that the care of Gods Church is so committed to Kings in the Scripture that they are commended when the Church keepeth the right way and taxed when it runs amiss and therefore her Government belongeth in chief unto Kings for otherwise one man would be commended for anothers care and taxed for anothers negligence which is not Gods way SECT II. The various Pleas against Christian Kings having the same authority about Religion which was rightly exercised under the Old Testament refuted Sect. 2 1. That the force of this argument might be avoided divers methods are made use of the chief of which I shall consider And those which in this Section I shall take notice of are reducible to two ranks Under the former I shall examine those pretences which are made to evidence that the Jewish Kings ordering things about Religion was an extraordinary case and by an extraordinary power and Commission and therefore must not be made a pattern for other times Under the second I shall consider such Pleas as would make a shew of proof that there is such a difference between the Gospel state and the Mosaical dispensation in this particular that thereupon Princes are not capable now of the like Soveraignty which they then enjoyed 2. With respect to the former head first Bellarmine will have David Bellarm. de Rom. Pont. l. 1. c. 7. Salomon and Josiah to have acted in matters of Religion as Prophets not as Kings and if this speak to the purpose the like must be supposed concerning all other Kings They governed as Kings not as Prophets in things Ecclesiastical who commanded about Religion And yet the Scriptures expresly call these orders the commandment of the King 2 Chr. 29.24 ch 30.6 ch 31.13 ch 35.10 16. and elsewhere and sometimes the commandment of the King and his Princes 2 Chr. 29.30 ch 30.12 Nor is there any pretence for affixing the prophetical office unto all the Kings of Judah who gave commands about Religion it being certain that neither Jehosaphat Hezekiah Josiah nor divers others of them were themselves Prophets but did as occasion required consult others as the Prophets of God De Concordia Sa. Imp. l. 2. c. 4. n. 5. And this is so far acknowledged by P. de Marca that thereupon he justly rejecteth this Plea as insufficient though he confesseth it to be usual 3. They had no extraordinary Commission herein V. Bishop Bilson of Christian subj Par. 2. p. 198. But others say the Kings of the Family of Israel might do what they did warrantably concerning Religion by a special command of God made known by a Prophet and this might make their undertaking herein necessary Now that Prophets did advise and direct in some of these cases is granted but still the authority which established such directions by a publick Sanction was the royal power But if any pretend that the Kings received their authority herein by an extraordinary commission from a Prophet he ought to give proof of this which he can never do but that there can be no place for any such conjecture will appear because 1. It is not likely that Gods Prophets should constantly require the Kings to intermeddle in any thing that was ordinarily unsuitable for their office to undertake and it is also injurious to the wisdom of God to think that he should make the care of Religion the duty of all the Kings of the stock of David only by an extraordinary message to every one of them 2. It is manifest that many things concerning Religion were well undertaken by the Kings of Judah without so much as the special direction of a Prophet Such were Davids first intentions to build a temple which God approved Hezekiahs order for the general Passover in the second month which is declared to be done by the consultation of the King and his Princes 2 Chr. 30.2 and Josiah's reformation was in a good measure effected before he advised with the Prophetess Huldah 4. Cun. de Rep. Hebr. l. 1. c. 14. Marca de Conc. l. 2. c. 4. n. 4 5. But there is another Plea made use of by Cunaeus
and another learned man who evidently followeth him They assert the right of Kings under the Old Testament to intermeddle in matters Ecclesiastical and that they had then such a supereminent authority that according to Maimonides even the High Priest was to stand in the Kings presence and that no other person no not the Priest might sit within the court of the temple save only the King Their authority not from any sacerdotal Vnction Ibid. c. 6. n. 6. And all this they found upon the vertue of the holy Vnction or his being anointed with the holy Oil hence P. de Marca asserteth that he acted Privilegio Regii Sacerdotii as having obtained by his Unction the priviledge of a royal Priesthood Cun. ibid. and hereupon Cunaeus thinketh that David might wear the Priestly Ephod and thereby consult the Vrim and Thummim But this also is a very weak pretence partly because the royal anointing was only designed to be the anointing such a person to be King as is expressed 1 Sam. 15.1 2 Sam. 3.39 1 Kin. 1.34 and in many other places and partly because such an anointed King had no right to perform the Priestly actions as is plain from the great guilt of Saul in sacrificing And much less could this give thim any Ecclesiastical or sacerdotal superiority over the High Priest himself since every successive High Priest was to be anointed with this holy oyl whilest most of the Kings even of the Family of David were probably not at all anointed as I shall observe in another place and whether that holy oyl of the Tabernacle Abarb. de Unctione in Exod. 30. Schick de Jur. Reg. c. 1. Theor 4. was made use of in the usual anointing of the King though it be asserted by the Jewish Writers as Shickard hath observed may yet possibly admit of a further enquity 5. And I must further observe Or any special law of Moses that there was not any particular law of God under the Old Testament as some would pretend which gave any special authority to their Kings in matters Ecclesiastical and therefore they proceeded only upon the general and common right which chief Governours of a Realm have even concerning those things since in his office he undertakes De Creatione Principis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the care and oversight of private publick and sacred things as Philo expresseth it Indeed the Israelites had particular laws which inflicted the punishment of death upon Idolatry Witchcraft blasphemy and other such like vices Ex. 22.18 20. Levit. 24.15 16. Deut. 17 2-5 but it could no otherwise belong to the King to execute these laws than as a judiciary authority in these cases Mr. Thorndike Right of the Church ch 1. p. 10. was included in his general royal power Had all matters of Religion been in their own nature reserved and exempted from the royal Government it would then have belonged to the Jurisdiction of Ecclesiastical persons only to have executed those laws especially since the punishment of death was sometimes inflicted by Prophets 1 Sam. 15.33 1 Kin. 18.40 2 Kinse 10 12. And that the death of a Malefactor was sometimes the issue of the sentence of the Priest is intimated in Deut. 17.12 and seemeth also observed by Clemens Romanus Epist ad Cor. p. 54. And with an eye to the declining state of the Jewish Government under the Maccabees and downwards when the chief execution of all laws Joseph cont Apion l. 2. was in the hands of the Priest Josephus frameth his description of the constitution of the Jewish Common-wealth as committing the chief secular power to the Priests and making them both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the judges of all cases and the punishers of all offenders But it is manifest that whilest the royal authority flourished the laws against Witchcraft Idolatry and such like vices were put in execution thereby 1 Sam. 28.9 2 Kin. 23.24 2 Chron. 34.4 5. 6. And there is no particular constitution in all the law of Moses which doth assert any singular supremacy more than what is generally included in the Regal authority of the Kings of the Children of Israel over their Priests and in the temple and about the worship of God Indeed Cunaeus doth offer an instance of a particular positive law of Moses Cun. ubi supra to this purpose Deut. 17.18 19 20. where God required that the King should write a copy of the law and that this should be with him and that he should read therein all the days of his life that he might fear the Lord to keep all the words of this law and these statutes to do them But there is nothing in this law which makes the care of Religion more the duty of the Hebrew Kings than of the Christian since these also are to acquaint themselves with the doctrines of Christianity to fear God and to do his will but neither of them might exercise that spiritual power which belongeth to the distinct Officers of the Church It may indeed be said that Kings cannot rightly fear and serve God unless they make use of their authority to promote Religious piety even in all sorts of their subjects and this was truly asserted by S. Austin Aug. Ep. 50. but then this can be of no peculiar concernment to the kings of the Old Testament but will equally extend it self to those who live under Christianity 7. I shall now shew that whatsoever is pretended from the peculiar state of the Gospel Reverence to Princes more fully required in the Gospel than in the Law to debar Christian Kings from that authority which certainly did belong to the royal Government under the Old Testament is of no force And this will easily be admitted by them who consider that the Precepts for honouring the King being subject to the higher Powers and submitting our selves to the King as supreme are more plainly expressed and universally enjoined under the New Testament than ever they were under the Old But that there is any direct prohibition in the Gospel against the soveraignty of the Royal power in matters of the Church is not so much as pretended and that the doctrine of Christianity doth assert this authority shall be hereafter shewed 8. A learned man of our own Kingdom who owneth the Soveraign power of Kings in matters of Religion Right of the Church Ch. 1. p. 8. Epilogue B. 1. ch 19. B. 3. Ch. 33. and alloweth the consequence hereof in general from the government of the Jewish Church doth seem to deny that the same right in matters of Religion may be claimed by the Christian Kings which was exercised by the Jewish Now that which is here demanded is that the general power of Ecclesiastical supremacy is under both dispensations the same in enjoining the observation of the divine laws in establishing matters of expediency for order sake and in punishing transgressors The
after he saith In this Kingdom there were Officers of the Realm rege superiores I say saith he in this Kingdom which was established and ordained not by Plato or Aristotle but by God himself the supreme founder of all Monarchy 4. And it is very manifest The pretended power of the Sanhedrin that the greater part of the Jewish Rabbinical Writers and from them divers Christians some of them so judicious that it is strange they should be so much imposed upon by Fables and Romances do assert that the Sanhedrim or Senate of seventy one persons had such a power over the Kings of Judah as to call them to account and punish them And they also assert that according to the original establishment of the Jewish laws and polity the chief causes of moment both of an Ecclesiastical and civil nature were exempt from the Kings jurisdiction and reserved to the Synedrial cognisance Grot. Schick ubi supra To this purpose Grotius declareth aliqua judicia arbitror regibus adempta I think there were some cases of judgment reserved from the King which remained in the Sanhedrim of seventy men i. e. besides the Nasi or president Schickard goes farther and sayes sine senatus magni assensu Rex in gravioribus causis nihil poterat decernere that the King could determine nothing in the more weighty matters without the assent of this great Senate And our Author de Synedriis De Synedr l. 3. c. 9. n. 1. among other things discourses de Judiciis adeo Synedrio magno propriis ut nec à Regibus aut impediri aut ad tribunal suum vocari jure potuerunt in which words he fetters and confines the Kings power but that of the Sanhedrim is set at large 5. Carpzov in Schick c. 2. p. 142. But it may be a sufficient prejudice against these positions that they have no better a foundation than a tradition delivered by some of the Jewish Rabbins This a fabulous tradition of the Rabbins against the evidence of whose testimony in this particular there lie these exceptions 1. That none of those persons who assert this Synedrial power were contemporary with the flourishing of royal authority before the captivity but all of them lived near or fully a thousand years and many of them above fifteen hundred years after that time and therefore can give no testimony upon their own knowledge and writing one from another with a zeal for all traditions any of their wise men have delivered the number of them who are produced can add nothing to their testimony But both divine and humane writers who are of an ancienter date do sufficiently contradict this position as I hope to make plain He therefore who can believe that the Apostolical form of Church Government was by Lay-elders because divers of late but neither Scripture nor ancient Writers do assert it and he who can perswade himself that our Saviour made the Bishop of Rome the Vniversal Monarch of the whole World and gave him a plenitude of all temporal and spiritual power because many Writers of that Communion do now assert this while what is inconsistent therewith was declared by Christ his Apostles and the ancient Christian Church such men have understandings of a fit fize and sutable disposition to receive these Rabbinical traditions concerning the Synedrial authority and Supremacy which are also things fit for their purpose 6. Gemar Sanhed Cocc c. 2. Sect. 10. Secondly It is evident that the Rabbins out of affection to their own Nation were forward to extol it even beyond the bounds of truth of which that prodigious instance may be given in the Talmud of the number of the Horses for Salomons own Stables which are there brought up to an hundred and sixty millions accounting a thousand thousand to a Million Now the great Sanhedrim was the chief Jewish consistory for a considerable time Sed. Olam zut in fin before the reign of Aristobulus and under the Roman Government and some continuance thereof remained towards five hundred years after the destruction of Jerusalem as their Chronicle informs us which was till about the time of some of those Rabbinical Writers And it is very probable that the pressures and sufferings which the Jews sustained under the Roman Emperours or Kings might prejudice them against Monarchical Government 7. Thirdly There are other Rabbinical and Talmudical Writers of good note who will by no means be perswaded to embrace this tradition which disparageth the Royal power Seld. de Syn. l. 2. c. 16. n. 4. p. 666. De Synedr l. 3. c. 9. n. 3. Grot. de J. B. P. l. 1. c. 3. n. 20. To this purpose the words of the Jerusalem Gemara and of R. Jeremias mentioned in Dabarim Rabba and others are cited by Mr Selden and the testimony of Barnachmoni by Grotius who assert that no mortal man hath any power of judging the King And that the highest authority is in the King who standeth in Gods place is asserted by R. Abarbanel Carpzov in Schick p. 165. Their pretended power over the person of the King refuted whose words are in Carpzov 8. But because a due examination of these pretences may be of good use I shall first particularly reflect upon that strange power which these Writers give to the Sanhedrim over the person of the King They deal with the royal authority as the Jews did with our Saviour who gave him the title of the King of the Jews but yet scourged him and treated him with great indignity For these Writers do assert that the King might be scourged by the Sanhedrim only by the great Sanhedrim at Jernsalem saith Schickard De Jur. Reg. c. 2. Theor. 7. and he acknowledgeth that even this appeared to him valde paradoxum a thing far from truth and very unlikely until his own apprehensions were moulded into a complyance with the Jewish Writers But Mr Selden addeth De Syn. l. 2. c. 9. n. 5. that according to the testimony of the Rabbins he might be scourged by the lesser Sanhedrim of twenty three which was the Government of every particular City And among the 168. Cases punished by scourging enumerated by Maimonides Ibid. c. 13. n. 8. and mentioned from him by Selden the three last are if the King multiply Wives if he multiply Horses and if he multiply silver and gold Now these things are so strange in themselves reducing the King to the same circumstances with every common and petty offender that how this can consist with the majesty and soveraignty of a Prince is utterly unconceiveable and he who can entertain such dreams and fancies must also perswade himself to believe against the plainest evidence that David and those who sat upon his throne were not Kings and chief rulers in the Kingdom of Israel and Judah but were all of them subjects under the common and ordinary government and authority of that Common-wealth 9. Schickard de Jur.
Reg. ubi sup And this absurd assertion hath put those Christian Writers who close with it upon unreasonable shifts for the defence thereof And for the reconciling this with the dignity of a King many of them make this their last refuge that this scourging amongst the Jews Grot. de Jur. Bel. pac ubi sup was without any note of infamy or disgrace and was voluntarily to be submitted to by their Kings as an act of penance and not of force But this answer stands chargeable with a twofold miscarriage 1. With a contradiction to the design of them who urge it and a giving up their cause for if there be nothing in it of disgrace it cannot be inflicted as a censure and the publick punishment of a fault and if it be undertaken only of voluntary choice and not of force then is it not the result of the sentence of a superiour Synedrial authority 2. This would also conclude that many considerable offenders who were to be punished with scourging as by the custom of the Jews according to the cases mentioned by Maimonides Maimon n. 134 135 156. he that curseth his neighbour in the name of Jehovah he that is guilty of perjury and he that commits whoredome and by the law of God the unfree woman who played the whore being betrothed Lev. 19.20 were free from all penalty and disgrace though the divine law Deut. 25.3 peculiarly mentions this punishment as infamous Wherefore these traditions are so absurd that Petitus justly affirmed Petit. Diatribe de Jure pr. c. 2. istam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 animo tantum conceperunt nulli principes eo jure regnarunt that no King of Judah with this manacled authority ever reigned any where else but in the fancies and pens of these Jewish Writers and their followers 10. Now a position so strange in it self and which puts men of learning upon such difficult service and hard shifts to bear it up had need bring with it very clear evidence if it expect to be entertained But in this case Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 9. n. 2. Mr Selden who is forward enough to embrace the notions of the Rabbins after he had represented what is usually said was so far in doubt of the truth that he saith hac in re nihil omnino definimus Schick ubi sup And Schickard who largely asserteth this synedrial power confesseth that he could not meet with any one instance of its having ever been reduced to practice And those who have ventured either at instances or arguments have greatly miscarried therein 11. Two instances by some have been produced only to shew that Kings have been cited before the Jewish Sanhedrim The one of Herod the King An. 31. n. 1● mentioned by Baronius but it is strange to see how pitifully he mistakes the case or else imposeth upon his Reader For it is plain from Josephus whence he hath this story that Herod was then no King of Judea nor was he cited by the Sanhedrim but by Hyrcanus Ant. Jud. l. 14. c. 17. who was then King by the Roman authority And it is much that the Cardinal should not consider that if Herod after he was King of Judea by the Roman right was under the Jurisdiction of the standing Jewish Synedrial authority the consequence must be that the Jews then were Governours over the Romans and their power but were in no subjection to them which besides the credit of History herein concerned he who acknowledgeth Christ crucified cannot admit 12. Another instance is mentioned of Jannaeus the King who is said to have been cited by the Sanhedrim upon account of a servant of his being charged with murder This instance in his second thoughts Schick append in Carpzov p. 152 153. Schickard preferreth to the former Now if this had been true concerning Jannaeus it would be of no great moment since he lived under the lapsed state of the Jews and had the name but not the authority and dignity of a King But this story is manifestly fictitious is stiled by Salmasius nugae fabulae Rabbinicae is not at all mentioned by Josephus Defens Reg. c. 2. p. 49. or any good Historian and also brings in the Angel Gabriel to bear a part in it by coming then into the Senate and destroying all the assessors thereof And this story is taken out of the Gemara where the whole Section is evidently vain and frivolous Gemar in Sanhed c. 2. Sect. 1. as amongst other things may appear from the way of its arguing in this matter which I shall presently take notice of Besides this I shall add that so much as hath any truth in this relation is very probably a kind of fabulous representation of the former instance of Herod under different names and circumstances For both of them are said to be cited upon occasion of some persons being put to death both the stories say that upon their appearance the whole Court whether properly the Sanhedrim or Hyrcanus his Judges called by Josephus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 spake not a word against them save only one bold man and that thereupon all the rest besides this man were after put to death And this man is called Sameas or Shammai in the one story and Simeon in the other which I conceive to be one and the same name in a different Dialect Grot. in Mat. 16.17 Drus Praet in Joh. 21.15 Hor. Hebr. in Joh. 11.1 in Luk. 16.20 even as Johannes Johanan and Jonah in likelyhood are the vulgar latin expressing Jonas by Johannes Joh. 21.15 And so are Lazarus and Eleazar and many others whence the Ethiopick Version instead of Lazarus constantly useth Eleazar Luk. 16. and Joh. 11. and that they are one and the same name hath been clearly evinced To which I add submitting these conjectures to the judgments of others that the name of Jannaeus or Jannas might possibly be made use of in this Talmudical relation from the signification of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both in the Hebrew and Chaldee for one injurious and oppressive 13. How extream vainly they argue in this particular will appear from that noted instance of the Talmud Sanh c. 2. Sect. 2. The Mishneh had declared that the King neither judgeth nor is judged which it manifestly expresseth concerning the Kings of the line of David nor doth it intend to deny them the authority of judging because the same Treatise affirms C. 7. Sect. 3. capital punishments by the sword to be inflicted by the King but that they did not usually in person sit in any Court or Consistory Gemara ubi sup But the Gemara here being a Comment which contradicteth the Text telleth us that this sentence The King doth not judge nor is judged doth not belong to the Kings of the House of David for they did both judge and were judged And the proof it produceth that they were judged is from Jer. 21.12
O house of David thus saith the Lord execute judgment in the morning declaring hereupon that they could not judge unless they could be summoned to receive judgment from others Which is such a ridiculous pretence of proof against the evidence of common sense which would serve as well to prove Parents to be subject to their Children Masters to their servants Schick de Jur. Reg. c. 2. Th. 7. Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 9. n. 2. and their great Sanhedrim to another Consistory as to the purpose they produce it And yet this testimony and tradition of the Gemara though very irrational is made use of very much by them who depress the royal authority among the Jews and advance the Synedrial SECT II. The determination of many weighty cases claimed to the Sanhedrim as exempt from the royal power examined and refuted 1. The fautors of this Synedrial soveraignty who would make the regal authority to truckle under it do under that polity exempt the decision of the most material cases of right from the Kings Judicature And they do also debar him of all authority to undertake arbitrary wars appoint inferiour officers and judges or to have any interest in enacting laws and constitutions Canin Disquis in Loc. N. Test c. 7. which Caninius doth roundly and plainly express telling us that the Sanhedrim bella decernebant resque omnes publicas administrabant And so there is neither civil nor military supreme authority Sect. 2 no more than Ecclesiastical reserved for the King 2. But I shall undertake to prove that the eminent power by many placed in the Sanhedrim by devesting the Jewish Kings thereof was certainly not seated in any such Synedrial power in the flourishing times of the Jewish Monarchy or before the Captivity of Babylon but was fixed in their Kings both as to cases of judiciary decision and of authoritative consultation and constitution And if either the traditions of the Jewish Writers mentioned in the former Section or those which I shall now discourse of had any good foundation I should readily then grant the consequence hence urged by P. de Marca to be true De Conc. Sac. Imp. l. 2. c. 5. n. ult Proleg p. 25. that they do not deserve well at the hands of Christian Princes who would measure their authority and dignity from the exercise of royal power under the times of the Old Testament 3. Several judiciary cases claimed as peculiar to the Synedrial power are enumerated by our Author de Synedriis De Syn. l. 3. c. 1. n. 1. Sanh c. 1. n. 5. out of which I shall single out those three chief Cases which are in the first place mentioned by the Talmud concerning a Tribe a false Prophet and the High Priest And these I the rather fix upon De Jur. B. P. l. 1. c. 3. because the learned Grotius made choice of these as special instances of cases peculiarly belonging to that Court and not subject to the King saith he quaedam cognitionum genera regi videntur non permissa ut de tribu pontifice propheta And according to the sense of Grotius Selden speaks of these three cases De Syn. I. 3. c. 9. n. 1. that they are adeo Synedrio magno propria peculiaria ut ne regi quidem ipsi permitterentur And the first of these concerneth things temporal of great moment and the other two cases Ecclesiastical 4. The judgment of a tribe This judgment concerning a tribe is by some declared to be when the greater part of a tribe or the whole becometh guilty of Apostasie or idolatry Coch. not ad Sanh c. 1. n. 21. Grot. de Imper. c. 11. n. 15. Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 4. n. 3 4. But Mr Selden though he acknowledgeth this to be the sense of divers Jewish Writers yet his opinion is that all other cases whatsoever concerning a tribe were only determinable by this great Sanhedrim which he thinks is not to be doubted And the consequence of this seemeth plain that if the whole or major part of any tribe became factious or guilty of rebellion as most of them were both after Absalom and after Sheba the King had then no authority to reduce them But that these things are empty dreams and wholly void of truth will be manifest from these following instances 5. When the two tribes and half desired an inheritance on the other side Jordan they spake of this to Moses Eleazar and the Princes of the Congregation Num. 32.2 but the power of determination was in Moses who commanded Eleazar and the Princes concerning them v. 28. and he gave them that land v. 33. Jos 14.3 and so also Josephus declareth Ant. Jud. l. 4. c. 7. The dividing the land of Canaan amongst the other tribes was of great concern to the whole tribes and was begun by Eleazar Joshua and the heads of the Children of Israel Jos 14.1 but by the authority of Joshua whom God appointed to divide it ch 13.6 7. and the main part of this division was made not by the Sanhedrim of seventy one but by three men out of every tribe Jos 18.4 5. who acted by Joshua's command v. 4 8. and he cast lots for their divisions and is said to have divided the land v. 10. and also in Josephus Antiq. l. 5. c. 1. When the two tribes and half were suspected of apostasie in building another Altar Phinehas and ten other Princes with him and not any great Sanhedrim had the hearing of it and did clear them Jos 22.13 14 30 31 32. In the time of Rehoboam when the tribes of Israel demanded greater liberty than they had had under Salomon 1 Kin. 12.1 3 4. here was no set Sanhedrim which must determine concerning them but the King himself was to resolve them either according to the counsel of the old men or the young as himself pleased v. 6. 14. And in Hezekiahs time when both the two tribes under the King of Judah and the ten tribes under the King of Israel were fallen to idolatry Hezekiah by his royal authority reformed Judah and in his piety perswaded Israel and in these cases was no appearance of a Synedrial power 6. Of a Prophet Cun. de Rep. Hebr. l. 1. c. 12. Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 6. n. 1. The judgment of a false prophet is frequently claimed as peculiar to the Synedrial power that is according to Selden the judging him who shall speak any thing in the name of a false God or shall speak falsly in the name of the true God But had the tryal of a true or false Prophet been peculiar to them it is not so probable that Asa would have been obeyed in committing the Seer to Prison this being then a case coram non judice and against their laws and superiour authority Nor is it likely that it would be made the matter of great commendation of Hezekiah that he put not Micab
the Prophet to death if the limit of his royal power could not extend it self to the case of a Prophet Jer. 26.18 19. See also Jer. 26.21 22 23. 7. Gr. de J. B. P. l. 1. c. 3. n. 20. in Jer. 26. in Jer. 28. in Mat. 5.22 Yet the learned Grotius and other Writers think they have found some evidence for the exemption of a Prophet from the royal power in the words of Zedekiah to the Princes concerning Jeremy Jer. 38.5 he is in your hands for the King is not he that can do any thing against you But herein he follows the steps of Brutus J. Brut. Vind. qu. 3. p. 96 97. Barclai adv Antimonarch l. 4. c. 12. whose great mistake was sufficiently detected by Barclay And these words have no other sense than that Zedekiah in his present straits must yield to this their desire as David was sometimes necessitated unto a complyance with the Children of Zerviah who he saith were too strong for him But we may wonder that so judicious a man should in this matter overlook many plain expressions in that very Chapter which beyond all contradiction evince the supreme authority of King Zedekiah in determining this very case of Jeremy v. 4. The Princes said to the King we be seech thee let this man be put to death And when Zedekiah had yielded him into their hands and they had cast him into the dungeon Ebedmelech makes his suit to the King for Jeremy and the King orders his being taken thence v. 8 9 10. And the King sware to Jeremy v. 16. I will not put thee to death nor will I give thee into the hands of these men that seek thy life Bertr de Rep. Jud. c. 11. Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 6. n. 4. c. 9. n. 1. And yet this one mistaken expression above mentioned against the scope of the whole Chapter was made use of also by Bertram Selden and many English Writers in our late sad times for the abridging of the royal power 8. The words of our Saviour are also urged Luk. 13.33 It cannot be that a Prophet perish out of Jerusalem The sense of which words is that Jerusalem was so far degenerated that he who came from God and in his name should no where meet with so much opposition enmity and violence as in that place where there ought to be the readiest acceptance But that our Saviour should design Drus Praet ad Luc. 13.33 Grot. de Imp. c. 11. n. 15. as many Writers would infer that no Prophet could be condemned to dy by any but the Jewish Sanhedrim would also have been contrary to the History of Johns being beheaded by Herod and to what Jesus had frequently foretold of himself that he should be crucified which was a kind of death never inflicted by the Jewish law but by the Roman 9. Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 8. n. 1. Of the High Priest The judgment of the high priest claimed as peculiar to the Sanhedrim is by some restrained to capital causes only Yet the judgment concerning any of the priesthood whether there was any 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or blemish Middoth c. 5. Sect. 3. Joma in Hor. Heb. in Mat. Chorogr c. 31. which rendred them unfit for their office was also claimed to the great Sanhedrim But had this case truly been as is pretended exempt from the regal power the sentence of Saul against Ahimelech and his Sons 1 Sam. 22 13-18 must have been accounted null and insignificant being pronounced by one who had no authority over him whereas at that time Ahimelech freely acknowledgeth his subjection to Saul as I above observed Nor can this Synedrial power consist with Salomons undertaking to depose Abiathar or his declaring it as a favour that he did not put him to death 1 Kin. 2.26 27. 10. And as to the admitting the priests to minister in their office this seemeth anciently to have belonged to the high Priests authority from 1 Sam. 2.36 but upon account of moral defilements and some other extraordinary cases there are instances of the Priests being rejected from their ministration by the authority of the Prince and secular governour And thus it was ordered by Josiah concerning them who had been Priests of the high places 2 Kin. 23.9 and by Nehemiah concerning them who could not make out their Genealogy and right of succession Neh. 7.65 From all this it is manifest that all these three cases have been misrepresented and that it is a bad description of the Kingdom of Judah which placeth all these things without the limits of the Royal authority 11. But there are also several other constitutions and determinations of authority which by these Writers are appropriated to the Synedrial power as the making of arbitrary wars the establishing and ordering inferiour judicatures and the constituting laws Of making War And to debar the King of all power in these matters and reserve them as peculiar to the Sanhedrin is in effect to affirm that neither the Royal Crown and Scepter nor the power of the Sword did belong unto the King 12. Sanh c. 1. Sect. 5. Coch. ibid. n. 23. Buxt Lex Ch. in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 12. n. 1 2. Schick de jur Reg. H. b. c. 5. Theor. 17. That the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 arbitrary war or War of choice whereby they understand all War besides what God commanded them against the seven Nations of Canaan might never be undertaken by the King but only by the authority of the Sanhedrin is generally asserted by these Jewish Writers and their followers Insomuch that Schickard producing Maimonides to the same purpose saith Rex arma finitimis illaturus necessariò prius deliberabat cum magno senatu citra cujus consensum miles non exibat Yet nothing can be more plain than that the war against the Ammonites for the defence of Jabesh-Gilead was particularly resolved upon by Saul upon his present hearing of the case 1 Sam. 11.5 6 7 12. to which Josephus agreeth Ant. Jud. l. 6. c. 5 6. And the Wars against the Children of Ammon in Davids time whereby they were destroyed were by the determination of David 2 Sam. 10.6 7. ch 11.1 And lest any should surmise that this great Court was in such Cases present with the King as the Soul is with the body from which though no man can see it all strength and life is derived I shall add that famous instance of Jehosaphat When he was with the King of Israel out of his Kingdom he upon a sudden resolved on and undertook in League with Ahab a voluntary War against Syria 1 Kin. 22.3 4. and for his proceeding therein desired no instructions from any Council in Judea nor from any other man under Heaven but only concerning the event he enquired of a Prophet of the Lord in Israel v. 5. 13. He who would have any further instances in this
matter may have recourse besides other cases to the voluntary Wars of Amaziah against Joash 2 Chr. 25.17 18 19 20. and of Josiah against Pharaoh Nechoh 2 Chr. 35.20 21 22. Where as those Wars are related to be undertaken by the choice of these two Kings of Judah so the Kings against whom they Warred sent Embassies for Peace not to any Sanhedrim but to them To this I add that if this notion had any thing of truth in it it might possibly be emproved far toward the justifying the rebellion of Absalom Seld. de Syn. l. 2. c. 16. n. 5. Seld. de Syn. l. 2. c. 15. n. 4. Schic de Jur. R. c. 1. Th. 2. against his own Father For if the power of War was in this Court it is altogether unlikely that David in his sudden flight from his Royal City should have them with him but it is much more likely if there was then any such Court it did remain with Absalom in Jerusalem where only that Court could regularly fit according to the Jewish Canons especially if that be admitted for truth Ch. Par. in Ps 140. v. 10. which is declared by the Chaldee Paraphrast that Ahitophel the chief Conspirator was the head of the Sanhedrim 14. Inferiour Courts Sanh ubi sup Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 1. n. 1. Quinq in Chal. Par. in Thren c. 5. v. 14. The right of appointing inferiour Courts of Judicature among the Tribes of Israel is claimed also as peculiar to this Sanhedrim And that the Judges of inferiour Courts must be made Rabbies and receive imposition of hands from this great Court is declared by Quinquarboreus But as we have undeniable evidence that in the military Government divers Captains and Generals were appointed by David and Benajah by Solomon so also David established 2700. Levites to be rulers over the two Tribes and half 1 Chr. 26.32 And as the holy Scriptures gives us an account of the Officers and Judges in his time over the other Tribes Antiq. Jud. l. 7. c. 11. Josephus informs us that six thousand of the Levites were made Judges by David And if Judges in the Land had not usually been established by the King there had been no colour for that plausible pretence of Absalom against his Father by telling the men of Israel their matters were good and right but there was no man deputed of the King to hear them 2 Sam. 15.3 Nor can any thing be more clear than that Jehosaphat set judges in the land throughout all the Cities of Judah City by City 2 Chr. 19.5 and also a chief court in Jerusalem v. 8 -11 but that this was no such Sanhedrim as the Rabbins mention I shall hereafter manifest And that the ancient Jewish Writers did acknowledge it a right of the King to appoint judges and judicatures will appear from Philo Phil. de Creat Princip who discoursing of a Prince with a special respect to the Jewish Government directs him to write the Book of the Law with his own hand and to read therein and also 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to chuse others who shall partake in the rule and Government that is as he expresseth it that the lesser causes he should 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 commit them to inferiour Rulers 15. Of making Laws Seld. de Syn. l. 3. c. 1. n. 1. Quinquarb ubi sup De Syned l. 2. c. 9. n. 7. Carpz in Schickard c. 1. Theor 2. p. 15. The authority of making any new Laws or Constitutions is also pretended to be peculiar to the Synedrial power And consequently their Kings must be denied to have any interest in the legislation since these Rabbinical Writers do generally affirm that the King might have no place in the Sanhedrim nor any share in its authority as hath been observed among others by Selden and Carpzovius But whereas the chief things reported to us concerning the Reign of the Kings of Judah consist either in their care of Religion or their military atchievements we have an instance of a standing military law or statute for dividing the Spoil which was established by David 1 Sam. 30.24 25. And I have in the former Chapter evidenced their establishing Orders in matters Ecclesiastical such were the division made by David of the Priests and Levites for their attendance on the service of God Ant. l. 7. c. 11. and others of like nature and Josephus tells us that this division was observed as long as the Temple and its worship stood Sect. 3 To which we may also adjoin the particular Laws or Constitutions made by Josiah and Nehemiah concerning some of the Priests abovementioned SECT III. Of the antiquity of the Synedrial power among the Jews with reflexions upon the pretences for a distinct supreme Ecclesiastical Senate 1. From what hath been discoursed it is sufficiently evident that whatsoever Courts of Judicature or Officers there were in Judah none of them under the Jewish Monarchy ever did vie for Soveraignty with it but were in subjection to it There was no such authority De Jur. Reg. c. 2. Th. 7. as is challenged by Schickard to the Sanhedrin who calleth it Synedrium magnum regiae majestatis compar or by Grotius Grot. in Mat. 5.22 who in the reign of the Kings owneth Senatûs authoritatem regiae velut parem in which expressions is asserted its equal or coordinate power with the Kings which Selden also allows Seld. de Syn. l. 2. c. 16. n. 4. p 667. Yet for giving further evidence to the truth of what I have above expressed I shall assert 2. That this chief Synedrial Government among the Jews The Original of the great Sanhedrin was since the Captivity was of a later extract than the time of the captivity and had its first original since the decay of the true Royal power There was indeed all along the Mosaical dispensation an High Priest whom the Law of Moses obliged the Judge or King in arduous and weighty matters and in such only to consult and by him to ask counsel of God And they had also Elders and men of wisdom and with some of these the Laws of equity and prudence would direct the King to advise And thus much may not improbably be the sense of those words of Josephus proposing this Rule for the King Joseph Ant. l. 4. c. 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not to act without the High Priest and the consent of the Senators Yet Salmasius thinketh that these words of Josephus Defens Regia c. 2. p. 47. are suitable only to those Princes who ruled about the end of the Jewish state and unless they be taken in the sense I have mentioned they are certainly no rule either founded on the law or agreeable to the government of the House of David And indeed Josephus who saw and felt the calamities which the Jews sustained under the Roman Kings was no friend to Monarchy and though he be far from the Rabbinical strain
Bertram ibid. this which is also improved by some in favour of the highest sort of Presbyterian Consistories and against the supremacy of the King in matters of the Church is necessary to be rejected concerning which it will be sufficient to note two things 7. First That this hath no foundation in the Jewish Writers according to whom it is not to be doubted but that in the declining time of their state they had only one Great Sanhedrin which took cognisance both of chief civil and Ecclesiastical causes And the asserting of two such properly distinct Synedrial Courts is justly exploded by Grotius Gr. de Imp. c. 11. n. 15. Seld. de Syn. l. 2. c. 4. n. 5. Hor. Hebr. in Mat. 26. v. 3. Selden Dr Lightfoot and others well acquainted with Jewish learning And what number soever they had of particular Consistories the Royal power hath been sufficiently proved supreme as well in causes Ecclesiastical as Civil 8. Secondly The pretended proofs from Scripture upon which they who embrace this conceit do build are very weak Some persons would find an evidence for a divine appointment of an Ecclesiastical Sanhedrin of 71. in Exod. 24.1 where God said unto Moses Jus divin Regim Eccl Part. 2. ch 12. Come up thou and Aaron and Nadab and Abihu and seventy of the Elders of Israel unto the Lord and worship ye afar off And yet here is nothing at all mentioned concerning any Consistory or power of Government nor is it usual to account seventy four persons to be but seventy one 9. Others as L'empereur and Rutherford L'emp in Annot. in Bertr in Comment in Middoth ubi supra Rutherf Div. Right of Ch. Gov. ch 23. p. 505. insist on Deut. 17.8 12. where a Court of Appeales in difficult cases is established and the Law declares If there arise a matter too hard for thee in judgment between blood and blood between plea and plea between stroke and stroke being matters of controversy between thy gates then thou shalt arise and go to the place which the Lord thy God shall choose And thou shalt come unto the Priests the Levites and which Particle some render or unto the Judge Now all the force of argument from this place for two distinct Consistories is that here is mention both of the Priests and of the Judge But this Text gives sufficient intimation that here is only one chief Court designed and that with particular respect to matters of civil cognisance which might consist of Ecclesiastical or secular persons or rather of both Ant. Jud. l. 4. c. 8. Josephus tells us there were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the same Assembly the High Priest the Prophet and the Company of Elders meeting together And the Law of Moses did also expresly require concerning one and the same case Deut. 19.16 17. If a false witness rise up against any man to testify against him that which is wrong Then both the men between whom the controversy is shall stand before the Lord before the Priests and the Judges which shall be in those days and the Judges shall make diligent inquisition And how the Priest might sometimes be particularly concerned in the enquiry about civil Cases and matters of trespass and injury may be observed from 1 Kin. 8.31 32. 10. Another place frequently alledged for this Ecclesiastical Sanhedrim distinct from the civil is the constitution of Jehosaphat 2 Chr. 19 8.-11 which is ordinarily called the restoring the Synedrial Government Grot. de Imp. c. 11. n. 15. Joseph Antiq. l. 9. c. 1. But Grotius doth with considerable probability deny that two Courts were here appointed and Josephus whom he cited seemeth to be of the same mind And I think it sufficient to add that since two distinct Courts do not appear enjoined by the Law of Moses and since David and Jehosaphat did differently model their Courts of Judicature in complyance with the end and design of the Law of Moses 1 Chr. 26 29-32 2 Chr. 19 8-11 it is not to be doubted but this modelling was performed by their own prudence and Royal authority But that here was no such Sanhedrim erected as is pretended is the more manifest because I have given plain evidence that both before and after Jehosophats time the power claimed at peculiar to them was exercised by the King Nor could the act of Jehosophat give any Court an original sanction as from the Law of Moses nor ought it to be imagined that he invested them with any power paramount to the Royal by which they were constituted 11. And now again I think it not unmeet to apologize for the length of this discourse concerning the Synedrial power which is much larger than I could have desired it to have been And yet considering how great the mistakes of very many Christian Writers are in this particular and to what ill purposes this errour hath been by some abused both for the subverting the Royal and Ecclesiastical Government I thought it useful to add this Chapter in this place and to say so much therein as would be sufficient with impartial men for the refuting over-grown mistakes And this I have done the rather P. de Marc. Proleg p. 23 24 25. because one of the most ingenuous Romanists lately though he mention other Pleas doth insist on this as a chief one against the admitting that Royal Supremacy asserted in the Church of England to be proved from the Authority of Princes under the Old Testament because he tells us the King then in all difficult Cases must depend on this great Sanhedrin And this he there insists upon with particular opposition to the Anglobritanni or the positions concerning the due authority of Princes which are asserted in the Church of England CHAP. IV. Arguments for Royal Supremacy in Causes Ecclesiastical from the nature of Soveraignty and the doctrine of Christianity with an enquiry how far Princes who are not of the Church may claim and use this authority SECT I. The evidence hereof from the nature of Soveraign power Sect. I 1. IN considering the nature of civil Government Princes as Gods Ministers must take care of his honour and Religion we may in the first place reflect upon the original thereof It is derived from and appointed by God who as Creator and Lord of all hath the highest right to rule and govern the whole World Hence the Apostle calleth Government an Ordinance of God and Rulers his Ministers Rom. 13.1 2 3. who are also stiled Children of the most high Ps 82.6 And that this is a divine institution was constantly acknowledged by the ancient Christians notwithstanding their persecution from the civil powers as is manifest from many expressions to that purpose B. I. C. 4 Tertul. Apol c. 36. ad Scap. c. 2. Eus Hist Eccl. l. 7. c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Tertullian Dionysius Alexandrinus and others of which thing I shall discourse more in another place Wherefore Rulers ought to
1. Con. Eph. c. 32. to engage the Royal power to take care of Religion because all civil powers are to intend the good of their inferiours according to the doctrine of S. Paul Rom. 13.4 And the instances of David Jehosaphat Hezekiah Josiah Constantine Theodosius and many other pious Kings and Emperours do manifest that they are capable of procuring very great good to their Subjects by their pious care about the matters of Religion And no doubt S. Austin might with good reason be confident Cont. Ep. Gaudent l. 2. c. 17. in Epist 50. that the Laws of Christian Princes about Religion had been the occasion of bringing many to Salvation by Jesus Christ 7. And the Royal Government is much of the same nature with the paternal enlarged in the extent thereof over several Families but not restrained in the nature of it and in the most excellent and useful part of its authority Gods Ordinance hereby placing others in that authority which Adam and Noah had Phil. de creat princip p. 727. over their multiplyed and enlarged Progeny Hence Princes are fitly stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the common Parents of Cities and Kingdoms their political and civil being having a dependance also upon them who were called Patres patriae 8. And the consideration of the paternal power will remove the objections which some men make use of against the authority of Princes in matters of Religion For if Religion must be so far left free as not to be commanded and enjoined by any humane civil power then would Abrahams commanding his Children and Houshold have been blameable he being in his Sphere a secular Ruler as well as a Prince is Or if it be pretended that grown men who are come to years of understanding and have undertaken the profession of true Religion ought to be so far left to their own choice as not to be under the Government of any civil power with respect to Religion this also is refuted by the instance of Abraham's commanding his Houshold which was so large V. Salian An. M. 2118. n. 13. an 2138. that many years before this time of the destruction of Sodom when God gave Abraham this commendation he could arm three hundred and eighteen Souldiers of his own Houshold Gen. 14.14 and all his numerous Family had been Circumcised And since Abraham continued under the blessing of God it is very probable that his Family was further enlarged before the time of this commendation of him 9. To all this I shall add that he who doth soberly consider what sad disturbances and commotions in divers Kingdoms have been the product of the corruptions and errors in the Christian Religion both upon the account of the Papal Vsurpations under the pretence of spiritual power and by reason of the disloyal positions and tumultuous practices of other Sects and their frequent Rebellions shall need no other argument to convince him that the Princes exercise of Government about the affairs of Religion is greatly necessary for the securing his own authority the peace of his Kingdoms and the property of his subjects SECT II. The same established by the Christian Doctrine 1. That the Gospel Doctrine never intended to destroy or diminish the right of secular powers is granted by some of chief note amongst the Romanists Christus saith P. de Marca cum Evangelium suum institueret De Concord in proleg p. 25. regum dignitatem non laesit And this is not only manifest from the tendency of those great Christian duties of humility meekness peace and righteousness but also from the many particular injunctions of subjection to Rulers and from our blessed Saviour his commanding to give unto Caesar the things that are Caesars Christianity establisheth Regal Supremacy And also in that the Christian Doctrine doth peculiarly enjoin fidelity and obedience in all all inferiour relations towards their superiours that by the practice of this duty Christianity may be adorned and recommended in the World even to those who did oppose or reject it Tit. 2.9 10. 1 Pet. 2.12 13 14 15. ch 3.1 2. 2. And with some prospect to Christianity the Kings of the Earth are called upon to serve the Lord Ps 2.10 11. and are foretold to be nursing Fathers Is 49.23 Sect. 2 And both this and their undertaking Christianity and being baptized into it doth require them in their places and by their interest and authority to take care of the honour of God of his Church and Religion And S. Austin well declares Conr. Cresc l. 3. c. 51. that Kings then serve God in their Kingdoms when they therein command what things are good and prohibit evil non solum quae pertinent ad humanam societatem verum etiam quae ad divinant Religionem as well concerning Religion as humane affairs 3. And lest any should think that the establishing the Kingdom of Christ according to the Gospel Doctrine should give any exemption to the subjects thereof from any part of that duty which was incumbent upon them towards other Kings and Governours S. Peter speaking to Christians under the Titles of a chosen Generation a Royal Priesthood and a holy Nation In Resp ad Bellarm. Apol. c. 3. doth yet as Bishop Andrews observed particularly enjoin upon these persons submission to the King as supreme and to the Governours sent by him 1 Pet. 2.9 13 14. And the business of the civil power is there declared to be so general as to be for the punishment of evil doers and the praise of them that do well and to the same purpose writeth S. Paul Rom. 13.3 4. So that he who would exclude matters Ecclesiastical or concerns of Religion from their government and care under the New Testament must undertake to assert that the performances of Religion contain nothing in them of well doing and that the neglecting contemning or opposing it is no part of evil doing which are such blasphemous assertions as no man can embrace unless he be sunk into Atheism and so really owneth no Religion at all Aug. Epist 160. And S. Aug. from Rom. 13.2 infers that he who contemns the Emperour commanding for truth brings judgment upon himself 4. 1 Tim. 2.12 And when the Apostle requireth that Prayers be made for Kings and all in authority that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty which includeth both Righteousness and Sobriety he thereby expresseth the right administration of Government to be advantageous to these ends Now as it is manifest that Rulers should not only not oppose Peace but establish it and not only not prostitute honesty and sobriety but defend and enjoin the practice of them so the Apostle mentioneth godliness as that which they should advance equally and in like manner with peace and honesty Nor can we suppose that the Christian Prayers were only designed that Kings and Rulers with respect to these particulars mentioned should do no hurt but since Gods
was baptized being against such great evidence deserves no more assent than the most fabulous stories concerning such religious reliques as do serve only to impose upon the credulous vulgar 7. But that argument which they seem to be most earnest in is that if Constantine was baptized at Nicomedia where Eusebius a chief Ringleader of the Arians was then Bishop this would cast an high aspersion upon that good Emperour who must say they then be concluded to dye in the Arian and not in the Catholick Communion Now it might be sufficient to say that by this same argument they might as well prove all the Nicene Council to be Arians as this good Emperour since they sate and no doubt received the Communion at Nice where Theognis was Bishop who was the constant Companion and Confederate with Eusebius in managing the Arian designs But I shall further add two things 1. That it might be possible that his baptism was not received from the hands of this Eusebius De Vit. Cons l. 4. c. 61 62. Eusebius Pamphilius declaring that there were divers Bishops at that time called to Nicomedia and Gelasius who was a famous Bishop of Palestine in that Century declaring that he was not baptized by an Arian but by one who embraced the Catholick faith as his words in Photius cited by Scaliger do plainly express Scalig. in Euseb Chron. p. 251. 2. That if it should be admitted that he was baptized by this Eusebius as is indeed expressed in the Chronicon of S. Hierome and in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 published by Scaliger with the Chronicon of Eusebius yet this will by no means charge him with Arianisme For 1. This Eusebius of Nicomedia had then subscribed the faith of Nice and though he and Theognis were once deposed by that Council yet upon their professed submission to the faith thereof they were again restored and received as S. Hierome acquaints us Hier. adv Lucif and the form of their submission is extant in Socr. Hist Eccl. l. 1. c. 10. and Sozom. l. 2. c. 15. And though this submission of his was as Theodoret tells us Theod. Hist Eccl. l. 1. c. 19. out of an ill design this is no way to be imputed to the Emperour 2. The faith of the Council of Nice was then publickly established and the Fathers at Ariminum above-mentioned do sufficiently intimate his being baptized into it 3. He then appeared a manifest friend to the Catholick Bishops who held to the Council of Nice in that at the time of his death at Nicomedia he designed to recal Athanasius from his banishment though Eusebius of Nicomedia perswaded the contrary Theod. ibid. c. 32. Athan. Apol 2. ex lit Const filii as Theodoret with whom Athanasius himself agrees doth acquaint us 4. Nicomedia was not the place he intended for his Baptism but Jordan but his sickness of which he died surprizing him here left him no liberty to choose any other place 8. I shall now only add that according to this evidence all the actions of Constantine expressed in the former Section were performed before his baptism But if any shall embrace the contrary opinion which I reject as false and groundless many of those actions will still be previous thereto And therefore this Princes authority and duty to take care of things Ecclesiastical was not the effect of his undertaking Christianity but was contained in the general authority of his imperial Soveraignty Yet I doubt not but this fiction of Constantines being baptized at Rome and the other of his Donation are two Twins being both of them the spurious and illegitimate off-spring of a luxuriant fancy impregnated by a Romancing Incubus And the large form of his Donation not that in Balsamon but in Binius Bin. Tom. 1. p. 296. expresseth the Baptism of Constantine by Silvester But this Donation is now justly rejected as a manifest forgery by their own learnedest Writers as Morinus and P. de Marca De Concord l. 3. c. 12. n. 3 5. the latter of which supposeth some of the Popes themselves about the eighth Century to be accessory to the framing and obtruding this imposture CHAP. V. B. I.C.5 An Account of the sense of the ancient Christian Church concerning the authority of Emperours and Princes in matters of Religion SECT 1. Of the general exercise of this Supremacy and of its being allowed by the Fathers of the first General Council of Nice 1. IT is acknowledged that the truths either of Christian doctrine or of natural reason do not principally depend upon the consent of men It is not to be decided by the voice of the World whether the only true God and he alone ought to be worshipped nor did it depend upon the vote of the Jewish Priesthood or Sanhedrim whether Jesus was the true Messias And upon this account the Gentile Deities were deservedly derided by Tertullian sertul Ap. cap. 5. who had no other title thereto than by the vote of the Senate nisi homini placuerit Deus non erit 2. But yet none can be expected Sect. 1 to give a better and more sure account of the doctrines and duties of Christianity than those who have been the professors and practisers of that Religion in the purer times thereof And therefore there is such a just respect and reverence due to the primitive Christian Church and the assistance of the divine grace which guided and influenced it that that which was generally received therein hath thereby a very great and considerable testimony of its being a truth especially where there are also other great arguments and evidences to evince the same And in such things it may well be allowed Dr. Hammond of Heresy Sect. 14. according to Dr Hammond among the pie credibilia that a truly general Council shall not err And even those persons who have no due regard either to antiquity or the authority of the Christian guides will manifest their great pride if they will reject and contradict the general sense of the Church unless it be upon very clear and manifest evidence to the contrary But such who pretend as the Romish Church doth a reverence and high veneration for Tradition are thereby the more concerned not to disclaim what hath been ordinarily and plainly delivered in the ancient Church 3. Now to give an account of the sense of the particular Fathers in this place would be a more long and tedious work than would be needful And indeed the minds of many of them may sufficiently be discerned by their plain expressions mentioned in several parts of this discourse Nor will I insist upon those commonly observed and very expressive sayings concerning Supremacy in general as that of Tertullian Imperatores in Dei solius potestate sunt Apol. c. 30. 33. cont Parm. l. 3. à quo sunt secundi post quem primi and majestatem Caesaris Deo soli subjicio and that of Optatus super Imperatorem
non esse nisi Deum qui fecit Imperatorem which very plainly assert that the Emperour was under none but only God himself But I shall apply my self to such things as will enclude the more general and publick acknowledgment of the Christian Church and shall then answer what may be objected in this particular 4. The actual exercise of Government in the ancient Christian Realms is somewhat considerable to this purpose That the Christian Emperours did exercise authority in matters Ecclesiastical is manifest from the Ecclesiastical Constitutions of the Roman Emperors Cod. l. 1. Tit. 1 2 3 4 5 c. which are yet to be seen in the Codex and the Novellae Justiniani Wherein among other things there are laws establishing the Catholick faith and the doctrine of the Holy Trinity Novel 6. 123. passim so as not to allow any to contend against it as also concerning the manner of Ordinations Excommunications and Absolutions and the duty of the Clergy even of Bishops Archbishops and Patriarchs And in these and other particulars the Nomocanon of Photius doth designedly shew Phot. Nomoc Tit. 1. c. how the Imperial law doth provide for various Cases concerning which the Canons of the Church also had taken care 5. The Laws of like nature are also yet extant of the Kings of France Kings anciently governed in things Ecclesiastical and other Realms abroad And in our own Kingdom the Ecclesiastical laws of Ina Alfred Edgar Canutus and Edward the Confessor may be seen in Sir H. Spelman Spelm. Conc. Vol. 1. The Laws made and executed by Christian Emperours against Arians Nestorians Manichees and others guilty of Heresy or Schism were very many and the proceedings by the Imperial law against the Donatists was in divers places defended by S. Austin And that all the godly Emperours of old Aug. Ep. 50.162 164 166. De correct Donatist passim even from the beginning of the Emperours professing Christianity did take such care of the Church that the affairs thereof and the matters of Religion were very much ordered by their authority Socr. Procem l. 5. Hist Eccl. is plainly declared by Socrates And this is a thing so manifest to all who look into the History and Records of those Times that it is as needless to go about to prove this as it would be to prove them to have been Christian Emperours 6. But that which will give the most evident Declaration of the sense of the Christian Church is the considering how this authority of Christian Princes hath been acknowledged and complyed with by Councils and by those especially which were the first general or Oecumenical Councils For whilest the opinion of some particular fathers may possibly be thought not sufficient to give a satisfactory account of the general sense of the Christian Church in those days and whereas the proof produced from the Imperial laws and the constant exercise of the Emperors authority in affairs of Religion may possibly fall under a suspicion of undue encroachment or may be pretended by some to be executed by an authority dependent upon and derived from some Ecclesiastical Officers no such exceptions can lie against the concurrent testimony and acknowledgment of the chief general Councils in the flourishing times of Christianity And I suppose that no man will deny that the assembling of Oecumenical Councils and the matters therein transacted were properly things Ecclesiastical 7. And here I shall begin with the first Council of Nice This Supremacy owned by the Council of Nice concerning whicn I shall need to say the less because many things mentioned in the third Section of the foregoing Chapter do sufficiently manifest the Supremacy exercised by Constantine the first Christian Emperour in whose Reign that Council sate That this general Council was called by the Command of Constantine the Emperour is expresly declared by Eusebius with whom Socrates Eus de Vit. Const l. 3. c. 6. Theodoret and other ancient Historians do agree But the later Romish Writers would perswade the World that it was assembled by the authority of the Romish Bishop Bin. in Not. in Cone Nicen Not. a. So Binius Authoritate Silvestri Romani Pontificis By the authority of Silvester Bishop of Rome this holy Synod was summoned and was gathered together by the consent help and Counsel of Constan tine the Emperour And Baronius likewise declares that no man may doubt Baron an 325. n. 13. but that the authority of Silvester was in this case interposed But in truth they produce nothing that can justly be accounted any evidence hereof 8. But that it may appear past all doubt by whose authority this Council was convened we have a twofold testimony beyond all exception Constantine himself who was able to give an account of his own actions in his Epistle to the Church of Alexandria Socr. Hist l. 1. c. 6. which is extant in Socrates declares that it was he who called this Council Ibid. And the Synodical Epistle which was written by the Council of Nice to Alexandria which may be seen in Socrates and Theodoret Theod. Hist l. r. c. 9. doth attest the same and therein the Fathers of Nice themselves who could not but know who summoned that Council declare that it was gathered together by the grace of God and by the Religious Emperour Constantine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who called us together out of divers Provinces and Cities 9. That the most eminent Bishops from the several quarters of the Empire did with much readiness repair to this Council according to the Emperors command is particularly attested by Eusebius Euseb ubi sup c. 6 7. and other Historians Yet it is not to be doubted that if they had received summons and command from a person whom they knew to be inferiour and not superiour to them as a Presbyter or Deacon they would never have yielded general obedience to him but would have rebuked and repressed his insolence and therefore this their obedience to the Emperour was an acknowledgment of his authority and supremacy And this is the more remarkable because these Nicene Bishops were persons of the highest worth and esteem of any in the Christian Church which appears from the general fame and deserved honour which this Council hath obtained in all succeeding ages unto this day 10. And the chief occasion of calling the Council was by reason of the evil opinions of Arius and the difference about the day for observing Easter which things the Emperour considering Socr. Hist l. 1. c. 6. gr though this the only effectual way for the redressing them and thereupon directed this Council particularly to consult about them which was accordingly done And whilest this Council was sitting the Emperour who was present with them used very great care and diligence Eus de Vit. Const l. 3. cap. 12 13. for the suppressing unnecessary occasions of discord and quarrel and for the
promoting the desired concord thereof 11. And when this Council was ended Constantine enjoined the observation of what was established thereby to take place in all even in the most remote Provinces of his Empire Eus ib. c. 18. He also gave his Imperial Sanction to the Decrees of this Council confirming them by his Imperial Seal Eus ibid. c. 22. which Eusebius expresseth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And both the Nicene Creed and its Canons are confirmed in the Civil Law in the Codex and Authentica SECT II. This Supremacy owned in the second General Council at Constantinople and the third at Ephesus 1. That the second general Council at Constantinople was summoned by the Emperour viz. Theodosius is declared both by Socrates and Sozomen Socr. l. 5. c. 8. Soz. l. 7. c. 7. The Council of Constantinople But Baronius though he had a little before cited the express testimony of Socrates against his assertion would have us believe that it was called by the authority of Damasus and produceth some small appearances of argument for the proof thereof Bar. an 381. n. 19 20. and tells us there is an ancient Manuscript in the Vatican and some other Libraries which declareth so much Bin. Not. in Conc. Const not f. And Binius making use of the same Plea is so earnest and fierce that he saith Nemo nisi pertinax haereticus asseveret hoc Concilium ab Imp. indictum fuisse Let no man unless he be an obstinate Heretick assert that this Council was summoned by the Emperour Sect. 2 2. Yet all this is a plain instance whereby we may clearly see how little credit is to be given to the specious pretence of Vatican Manuscripts or to the confident assertions of such Writers or their little forced Arguments For there is only one Epistle of this General Council Epist Synod ad Theod. in Bin. Bar. an 381. n. 37. produced both by Binius and Baronius in Latine and in this Epistle themselves declare again and again unto Theodosius the Emperour that they were convened by his authority They tell him in one of their expressions Mandato tuae pietatis Constantinopoli convenimus and in another Literis quibus nos convocasti Ecclesiam honore prosecutus es So that they assembled by the Letters and Mandate of the Emperour which they accounted an honour to the Church who were no obstinate Hereticks 3. And indeed though the calling of General Councils be now with some eagerness claimed by many of the Romish Writers as a prerogative of the Pope yet the late Archbishop of Paris hath acknowledged De Concord l. 6. c. 28. n. 12. that the first who pretended any right hereunto was Pope Nicholas about the year 865. And he hath sufficiently evidenced as others also have done that those Decretal Epistles which are said to be of a more early date Ibid. l. 3. c. 5. and express any such authority to be in the Pope are certainly spurious and supposititious 4. And in this second Council it is manifest that during part of their Session the Emperour Theodosius was present in the Council Theod. Hist Eccles l. 5. c. 9. as is affirmed in a Synodical Epistle from Constantinople to Damasus written by many of the same Fathers at another Council the year following which is to be seen in Theodoret. And the choice of the Bishop of Constantinople which was part of the business that Council was to undertake Sozom. Hist Eccl. l. 7. c. 8. was there determined by the Emperour himself who requiring the Bishops present to give him a Catalogue of such persons as they thought fit to nominate he reserved to himself the election of one out of this number and fixed upon the name of Nectarius who was the last in that Catalogue who thereupon was made Bishop of Constantinople 5. When this Council was ending in their Synodal Epistle to the Emperour Ep. Synodal ubi supra they give him an account of what they have done sent him a Copy thereof and pray him that by his Letters he would confirm the Decrees of that Council and that by his commands they may be of force ratum esse jubeas confirmesque concilii decretum and that he would strengthen the things which they had decreed and concluded by his sentence and seal Socr. l. 5. c. 8. Sozom. l. 7. c. 9. And after this in confirmation of the determinations of this Council the Emperour added his suffrage and consent to what they had done 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And he also established a law that all the Christian Churches should be committed to them only who confess the same divine nature of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost 6. That the third General Council of Ephesus The Council of Ephesus was summoned by the authority of the Emperour Theodosius the younger is attested both by Socrates and Evagrius Socr. l. 7. c. 33. Evagr. l. 1. c. 3. And though they who espouse the interest of the Romish Bishop do here likewise plead for its being convened by his authority there are so many Synodical Epistles of this Council taken notice of both by Binius and Baronius wherein they assert themselves to be assembled by the command of the Emperor that he that hath either honesty or a face may well be ashamed to assert the contrary And indeed touching the calling this Council and the exercising of the Imperial supremacy concerning it I shall not need to take notice of any thing further than what is related and asserted for truth by Baronius and Binius 7. They write themselves to be met together by the Emperours Authority Act. Conc. Eph. Tom. 4. c. 17. Edit Peit in their Epistle to the Clergy of Constantinople and in their Encyclick Epistle and in their Epistle to the Emperour And in their Epistle to Coelestine then Bishop of Rome they tell him not that they were convened by his authority but that they were met together according to the will of our Saviour and the Sanction of the most pious Emperours viz. Theodosius the Second and Valentinian at the day of Pentecost And they go on to tell him that this was the day which the Decree of the Emperour by which they were called together did fix for their first Session with several other expressions to the same sense Baron an 431. n. 10. And Coelestine himself in an Epistle to Theodosius which Baronius hath published telleth the Emperour that he did afford his presence by those Deputies he sent huic Synodo quam esse jussistis to this Synod which you have commanded to be held 8. And the Emperour first sent Candidianus a Count and afterward others to be present in this Synod not that he should give any vote in matters of faith but to take care of the peaceable and orderly proceeding of the Synod Baron ib. n. 45 46. And also to provide that no other business should be propounded till
tells us Quaestion Heroicar l. 2. c. 5. n. 105. that the Roman bishop virtute potestatis merè spiritualis by vertue of his mere spiritual power doth sometimes deprive had Kings of their Kingdoms But the falshood and injustice of this claim will be discovered by detecting the fraud and vanity of the Pleas made use of to support the Popish power of which in the following Sections 5. But a learned man hath given intimation of some suspicion Weights and Meas Ch. 20. Of a general Council that by these words of this Oath of Supremacy the authority of a general Council of the Western Churches may seem to be disclaimed And it must be granted that the determination of a truly regular general Council either of all the Western Churches or of the whole especially if it should establish a due reformation of the corrupt part of the Church and a right order and unity throughout Christendome would be obligatory upon us not only from the real goodness of the design but from the authority of the Council or the obligation that lies on the members or several parts of the Christian Church to be guided by the directions and rules established by the united consent and authority of the Pastors Yet 1. since such a Council neither is in being nor in any likelyhood thereof that which is not hath no Authority or Jurisdiction 2. This Church and Realm being a considerable branch of the Catholick Church the authority of such a Council or of the Christian Church therei is no more foreign to us who ought to bear a part therein than the soul is to a chief member of the body or than the laws of nature and rules of civility may be esteemed foreign things which have as considerable residence here as any where else 3. The Oath it self is so expressed as if it purposely designed not to exclude the authority of a General Council which properly is neither a Prince a Person a State or Potentate 4. As this Oath disowneth all foreign authority encroaching upon the Crown so if any Council how general soever should abridge or violate the Royal Authority all faithful subjects are so far bound by the authority of God to disclaim it 5. Though the determinations of a Council be never so excellent if any Princes by their laws reject or prohibit them as the Arian Princes dealt with the Council of Nice Christians in such places are bound to embrace them upon no other terms than they do their common Christianity that is in bearing the Cross and undergoing unavoidable penalties and thereby acknowledging the right and due extent of the authority of the civil power 6. The last part in the Oath of Supremacy The Oath of Supremacy engageth a defence of priviledges and authorities united to the Crown engageth Allegiance to the King his Heirs and Successors and also a defence of all Jurisdictions priviledges preeminencies and authorities granted and belonging to the King or united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm Now the only appearing difficulty here is concerning the last clause for if when the great encroachments of the Pope were discarded some thing might be overdone 27 H. 8. 28. 37 H. 8.4 1 Ed. 6.14 in annexing things to the Crown as in fixing in the Crown those great Revenues given to Religious uses when in many places there then was and yet is wanting a competent provision for the support of the Ministry it may be enquired how good men and good subjects may and ought to defend these things And it will be sufficient to observe that the defence here undertaken is that of a subject towards his Soveraign And all subjects of the Realm are as such obliged both with respect to the duties of obedience and peace in their capacities to oppose all persons who would injuriously violate what is enjoyed by the Crown and established by the law since such persons may justly be suspected of designs to subvert the Government and undermine the publick welfare and do act disorderly and against authority 7. And some thing which at first view may seem an abatement of the authority of the church is rather such a way of regulating the exercise of its power as under Religious Princes is for the Churches advantage Of this nature I conceive that constitution 25 H. 8.19 that no new Canons shal be enacted promulged or executed without the Royal assent and licence to enact promulge and execute the same For hereby the Clergy give such security to the King against all jealousy of renewed Ecclesiastical usurpations that thereupon the Church may under the Kings favour and with assurance of greater safety and protection practise upon its established constitutions which are so good that we have great cause to bless God for them And hereupon it may also be hoped that what shall be further needful may be superadded by the Royal Licence and become more effectual to its end by the confirmation of that authority 8. But because what I have now discoursed dependeth upon a fair How the words of publick acknowledgments must be interpreted but natural and genuine interpretation of these words of the Oath of Supremacy it may be further enquired how we may safely and prudently interpret the forms of publick acknowledgments where the bare Grammatical construction may be possibly capable of different senses Grot. de J. B. P. l. 2. c. 13. n. 3 5 c. 16. n. 12. l. 3. c. 1. n. 19. Sanders de oblig Juram Pral 2. n. 8. Now though a forced laxe sene by an evasion to avoid the design of the law or constitution be justly and must necessarily be rejected yet a rigid interpretation to strain the words and force them to an harsh and unlawful sense as is too oft done by discontented persons is also to be discarded where there is another construction or meaning of which the words by natural interpretation are capable which is agreeable to truth and justice and secures the intention of our Superiours For besides that Christian charity and equity will incline to this sense the politick rules of Government will require Governours to draw up publick acknowledgments in such phrases that they cannot by a fair construction naturally admit a lower sense than is designed For otherwise such forms of words would be useless and not attain their end and this consideration alone is sufficient to vindicate and acquit the form of words in this Oath of supremacy from such censures as have inconsiderately dropt from the Pen of a learned person 9. But those general words of this Oath of supremacy Qu. Eliz. Inj. 1. Can. 1. 1603. and the Canonical subscription and words of like general force in the Queens Injunctions and our Canons whereby all foreign Jurisdiction and obedience thereto is renounced have manifestly a more particular respect to the Bishop and Church of Rome For the design of that Statute which enjoins the disclaiming all
evidence in my third assertion And therefore I shall omit the considering the Church of Bulgaria and of the Asia Iberia which by Balsamon are owned to have been in his time 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bals in Conc. Const c. 2. Novel 131. the former according to the Constitution of Justinian and the latter by a Synod of Antioch appointing that that Church which was before under the Patriarch of Antioch should be free and head of it self 11. And concerning the Western Church it may be observed that whereas a prime patriarchal right is expressed by the Council of Chalcedon and the same may be collected from the Council of Ephesus in the place above-mentioned concerning the Cyprian Church to be this that the Metropolitans under him Conc. Chalc. c. 28. who have liberty to ordain the Bishops of their Provinces should be ordained by the Patriarch it is no difficulty to prove and is granted by P. de Marca Ubi sup l. 1. c. 7. that the chief part of the Western Church even all out of the Vrbicarian Diocese which took in only some part of Italy did never thus anciently depend on the Bishop of Rome for Ordination 12. And touching the Eastern Church the limits of the Patriarchate of Constantinople have been above observed The Territories of Alexandria were by the Council of Nice declared to be Egypt Conc. Nic. Can. 6. V. Praef. and Conc. Antioch Conc. Chalc. Actions 7. Libya and Pentapolis Antioch had once under it Coelosyria Phoenicia Palaestine Arabia Mesopotamia Cilicia and Isauria but when the Church of Jerusalem was made Patriarchal it was agreed in the Council of Chalcedon that all the three Palaestines should be reserved to its Jurisdiction 13. And such few expressions in some ancient Authors as speak of the Bishop of Rome presiding in the West or being the Patriarch of the West are not sufficient to prove the whole Western Church to have been subject to him Conc. Const c. 2. Conc. Chalc. Act. 1. Hieron Ep. 61. c. 15. but only some part thereof For the Bishop of Antioch is oft said both by Councils and other Writers to govern the East and yet the whole Eastern Church as distinguished from the Western never was under his Jurisdiction SECT II. No Patriarch ever had any just claim of Patriarchal Authority in this Island 1. The second Assertion which I shall make good is that the Churches of this Island had that ancient liberty and freedom that no Patriarch had any just claim of Patriarchal Authority over them The Eastern Patriarchs never pretended to any nor had the Romish Bishop any right to challenge it 2. For since this Island received Christianity Britain received Christianity before Rome some years before any Church was founded at Rome it could not then have any dependance upon the Church of Rome Besides what many other Writers express concerning Joseph of Arimathea preaching the Gospel here Bar. An. 35. n. 5. even Baronius from a Manuscript in the Vatican gives a relation of his coming into France and thence into England upon the dispersion after the death of S. Steven and this must be divers years before S. Peters coming to Rome Antiq. Brit. p. 1 2 3. Mason de Min. Angl. l. 2. c. 2. Usser de Prim. Ec. Br. And there want not Authors to assert that S. Simon S. Philip and other Apostles and Apostolical men did declare the doctrine of Christ in this Island as hath been observed by those who purposely give us an account of the original of Christianity here Sect. 2 But concerning the early Conversion of the Britans it will be sufficient to observe the testimony of Gildas who was himself a Britan Gild. de Excid Brit. who tells us that here the Precepts of Christ were made known tempore ut scimus summo Tiberii Caesaris in the latter end of the reign of Tiberius Caesar Baron An. 44. n. 25. Now the second year of Claudius when according to the general account S. Peter first preached Christianity at Rome must be about five years after the death of Tiberius Caligula wanting but little more than a month of four years Wherefore with respect to the first planting of the Church one Sister Church cannot claim superiority over another especially not over the Elder 3. Nor were there ever any Canons of the ancient Church which subjected these Realms to the See of Rome but the fixed rights of the free Churches were secured in the three first General Councils in those Canons I have above mentioned Conc. Nic. c. 6. Const c. 2. Eph. c. 8. And the Council of Ephesus is very zealous against the invaders of these priviledges as being a thing in which the liberties of all Churches are concerned and by which the intent of the sacerdotal function is perverted 4. That these Churches did preserve and retain their liberties Britannick liberty preserved till Austin the Monk Bed Eccl. Hist l. 2. c. 4. until the time that Austin the Monk came into England is manifest in that both in the Southern and Northern parts of this Island as also in Ireland they celebrated Easter and observed some other rites differently from the Rules and Canons of the other Western Churches and particularly of the Roman and therefore were not governed by them Indeed they celebrated Easter upon the Lords day as was noted by the Emperour Constantine Euseb de Vit. Const l. 3. c. 18. Bed Hist Eccl. Ang. l. 2. c. 2. l. 3. c. 4. at the time of the Council of Nice but they fixed on this day by a different rule from that of other Churches And when Austin required them to submit themselves to the Romish Church and to change these their different rites they would not hearken to him herein but both Britans and Scots long observed their former usages and some of their Clergy and Monks who lived within the English limits Bedae Hist Eccl. l. 5. c. 20. l. 3. c. 26. Bishop Spotsw Hist of Sc. l. 1. p. 18. H. Huntingd. Hist l. 3. and Colman Bishop of the Northumbrians rather left their places than they would forsake the customs of their own Church Yea they disowned Communion with him as invading the Liberties of their Churches and the Scotch Bishops would not so much as eat in the House where Austins Company was as is related in a Letter of Laurentius who succeeded Austin at Canterbury recorded in H. Huntingdon And the plain Declaration of the Abbot and Monks of Bangor who were the most eminent Society of the British Church consisting of thousands did fully disclaim and protest against all right of subjection to the Bishop of Rome as is expressed in their protestation made to Austin and exhibited in the British tongue by Sir Hen. Spelman Spelm. Conc. Vol. 1. p. 108 109. wherein they own no subjection to any above their own Archbishop as a superiour Ecclesiastical Officer 5. Nor did the Bishop of
doctrines but also all those who do appeal to any future Council Wherefore as much as it is the duty of any Church or Christian to own Gods authority and embrace his truth so much it must be their duty to reject the Romish authority which opposeth and withstandeth them 12. Fourthly From the sin of pursuing Schism with which the Romish Bishop and Church do stand chargeable 4. From Schism No Christian Bishop can have any authority against the Vnity of the Christian Church and against that authority whereby that Unity is established And therefore all Christians are obliged to avoid sinful divisions and Schisms though the names of Paul or Apollos or Cephas may be pretended to head them And it was the fault of S. Barnabas to comply with and be led by S. Peter himself in a groundless withdrawing from the Church of Antioch And it could not be the duty of any Catholick Christians who lived within the Dioceses of the Donatist Bishops to submit to them and thereby not hold the Catholick Communion Cyp. Ep. 52. ad Anton For as S. Cyprian said he who doth not keep the Vnity of the Spirit and the conjunction of peace and separateth himself from the bond of the Church and the Society of its Priests Episcopi nec potestatem potest habere nec honorem can neither have the honour nor the power of a Bishop And he who submits to or complyeth with the manager of a Schism in his prosecution thereof doth involve himself in the same crime 13. Gr. de Valent Tom. 3. disp 3. qu. 15. Punct 2. Bannes in 2. ●ae qu. 1. Art 10. p. 83 84. qu. 39. Art 1. Now that the Bishop of Rome himself may be a Schismatick in separating from the Unity of the Church is acknowledged by their own Writers And he is actually guilty of Schism in rejecting Communion with a great part and with the best and purest part of the Catholick Church and requiring them to be accounted Hereticks And his Schism hath such aggravations as these 1. In the ill design of upholding corrupt doctrines and practises of that Church without due reformation 2 From his high uncharitableness in not allowing salvation to other Christian Churches besides the Roman 3. From his great usurpation excommunicating all who do not yield obedience to him and the free Churches who reform themselves although their power of holding Synods includeth a right to reform themselves and all who appeal from him to a general Council who are subjected to excommunication Jac. de Graf Decis Aur. l. 4. c. 18. n. 55. as some who write upon the bull in coena domini tell us for accounting a general Council superior to the Pope 14. Wherefore the Bishop of Rome as things now stand hath no just right to a Patriarchal Power in any part whatsoever of the Christian Church having forfeited this by the corrupt doctrines and interests and by the Schism which are there managed And he is excluded from Foreign Soveraign Princes Dominions by the Supremacy of their Crown and by his undue claims inconsistent with their regalities But if he would become truly Catholick both as to Christian Vnity and doctrine and therein give due honour to secular authority he might then claim a Patriarchal right so far as the present civil power of Rome reacheth but no further unless by the leave and pleasure of other Princes and Churches And he might then expect and would receive an high honour all over the Christian World upon account of the ancient prime Patriarchal See CHAP. VIII B. 1. C. 8. Some pretences of other parties against the Supremacy of Princes in Causes Ecclesiastical refuted SECT I. Of Liberty of Conscience and Toleration AGainst the Authority of the Civil Power in matters of Religion there are some who undertake such a Patronage of Liberty of Conscience as thereby to infer a necessity of Toleration And what is urged upon this Topick hath either respect to Conscience it self or else the peace of the Christian World and so either pretendeth that it is the proper right of Conscience to be free from subjection to any men in matters Ecclesiastical and the affairs of Religion or else that the yielding this liberty to every man is a principle of peace The consequences from the Pleas for General liberty of Conscience and would tend greatly to the quiet of the World 2. the chief force of what is said upon the first pretence lyeth in this kind of reasoning which some account plausible to wit That every man hath a Conscience or capacity of discerning what is his duty in matters of Religion and that what he thus discerns to be his duty he ought to practise and no man ought to hinder or restrain him and the consequence of this is that concerning the affairs of Religion he ought to be under no Government whether Civil or Ecclesiastical But the vanity and fallaciousness of this way of arguing will sufficiently appear by improving the same to a further purpose to which it is altogether as well adapted concerning matters of common right For it may be said here that man is a Creature endued with principles of Conscience and capacities to discern what is just and honest and what he discerneth to be so he ought to pursue and should be permitted so to do and therefore according to the former method of argumentation he must in civil affairs be under no Government and no judge ought to question him Now the result of all this and what it would tend to prove is that man is such a Creature who ought not to be a subject or under Government and from hence it would follow that all the Precepts of subjection and obedience in the Gospel and the whole establishment which God hath made of Civil and Ecclesiastical power and authority are all of them opposite to the nature of man and to the rights and priviledges of his being And now would it not heartily grieve any pious and understanding man to see by what pitiful pretences men undertake to argue against the institution and authority of God 3. Men may not safely be left to the sole conduct of themselves and their Consciences But they who make use of such arguments about matters of Religion will be ready to say concerning things civil that though men have Consciences to guide them yet they may sometimes mistake the due measures of justice and right and sometimes an inordinate pursuing their own interest or gratifying some evil temper of mind may make men act contrary to what they know to be right and by such means other mens properties would be injured if there were not a civil judge to interpose and laws established for the securing these properties And all this is indeed truth but then these two things are also to be observed 1. That hereby it is granted that even in those things wherein men ought to be directed by the rules of Conscience they
the sole pretence of civil rights and secular interests that there may be a provision for this Case as well as for the former it will not be unmeet to accompany this Position of his with another which is much of like nature with it and equally peaceable And this is That all men ought to suffer each other without any disturbance or complaint to take and enjoy whatsoever goods persons and possessions they shall please to possess themselves of And if this principle with the former were entertained by all men as it never was nor can be there would then be no Wars nor contests in the World neither concerning matters of Religion nor any other rights And then we should have a quiet World but with little regard to Religion Righteousness Chastity and Vertue and without all Order Government and civil Societies the Earth being then over-grown with the height of Barbarism far surpassing the wildness of the Native Indians 9. No Peace can be from thence expected But against the former method here proposed for the procuring peace I shall observe further two things 1. That there are so many things necessary for the making this proposal practicable that even that may well make any man despair of its effect For first care must be taken that there be no such pious men in the World who will think that Gods honour ought to be maintained and the true Religion defended and secured by the authority of Governours and yet either the peaceable principle must be forsaken or else thereupon these men must enjoy the liberty of their opinion as well as others Secondly there must be security given that there shall be no such furious men in the World who will at any time vent notions in Religion which may tend to undermine authority and Government to make mens minds fierce and cruel or to evacuate obedience nor yet that there be any such eager and earnest men who will be forward to use what power they can gain for the establishing their own opinions Thirdly as this proposal can never become useful for peace until all men be brought to be of the opinion of the proposer which is as unlike as any thing can be so even then there must be some provision made that the practice of this proposal be not the ready way to hinder the effect thereof For the practice of this general liberty for all opinions in Religion doth according to common experience ordinarily beget instead of peace discords oppositions disturbances confusions and other ill effects which make all men of consideration see the hurt and danger of such licentious liberty and the necessity of Order and Government Fourthly And there must be no men so far Christians and conscientious as to acknowledge that there are any doctrines of Faith duties of Christian worship or institutions of Christ so necessary and sacred that the opposers or contemners of them ought to be checked and withstood And though he be so bold as to assert P. 68 69. that we ought not to teach that any errors in belief overthrow the hope of salvation and speaks of the hopeful estate of persons whatsoever doctrines they embrace P. 70 71. in the whole compass of Religions which large expressions must include those Jews who in our Saviours time asserted him to be a blasphemer and not the Christ yet thanks be to God there are many who will believe those words of our Lord to the Jews Job 8.24 If ye believe not that I am he ye shall die in your sins And from this and many other expressions in the Scripture of the great danger of unbelief will conclude that under the clear promulgation of the Gospel it is necessary to Salvation to believe that Jesus is the Christ and Saviour of the World and to profess and obey his doctrine 10. I observe 2. That the best way to promote the peace of the World Peace best promoted by uniform establishing true Religion and worship is by endeavouring that true Christianity in doctrine and practice be with one accord and with a spirit of Vnity embraced among men For first the nature of Christianity is such that so far as it really prevaileth it must be a strong bond of peace since it makes men tender of wronging any by word or deed and enjoins a necessity of making satisfaction for injuries a readiness to forgive enemies with a care of reverence fidelity and obedience to superiours and of gentleness humility patience and charity towards all men De duodeeim abus seculi cap. 7. On this account it was thought one of the great disorders amongst men that there should be Christianus contentiosus a Christian given to contention And though there are great miscarriages in this particular among many who profess this Religion but do not live according to it yet it is apparent that the spreading of Christianity in the World did greatly amend and reform it Eus de Dem. Evang l. 9. c. 17. De laud. Const p. 486 487. and as Eusebius long since noted did advantage the peace thereof and it will mightily promote this effect in all them who heartily practise it Secondly Vnity in Religion hath a natural force to excite friendliness whence even Jews Mahometans and all Sects are more kind to one another than to others and Philo accounteth concord in the worship of God Phil. de Charit p. 717. to be the greatest cement of love and Josephs Brethren thought it a considerable argument to engage his favour because they were the servants of the God of his Father Gen. 50.17 Thirdly The quiet of the World having chief dependance upon God it may be justly feared that where the care of true Religion is neglected the flourishing and peaceable state of Kingdoms should not long continue This was frequently observable in the times of the Judges and the Kings of Israel and Judah See Judg. 5.8.1 Kin. 11.4 Gild. de Exc. Brit. Mar. Par. an 1067. P. 5. 14 23. And remarkable decay of piety was observed to precede the two great Conquests of this Realm by Foreign Armies SECT II. Of some other rigid and dangerous principles against the supremacy of Princes 1. Of the rigid Presbyterians There are some of the rigid Presbyterians especially those of the Scotish way who though they allow the King some authority both in matters Ecclesiastical and over Ecclesiastical persons do yet in terminis reject the Kings being supreme Governour Sect. 2 Rutherf of Ch. Gov. Ch. 23. p. 508. Henderson's second Paper to the King in all causes Ecclesiastical and civil and withal do plainly misrepresent the sense thereof But that those of this way do in a dangerous manner oppose the just supremacy of Princes in things Ecclesiastical may be partly manifest from their general position That the institution of God hath so provided for all things pertaining to Religion that there is no room left for any appointments of order by the
authority of men the substance of which I have in another discourse taken notice of But this will be more apparently manifest from another position which I shall now reflect upon 2. It is asserted by them that if a Minister shall speak treason in his Pulpit by way of doctrine the Church only is to try whether it be treason indeed Ibid. Ch. 24. p. 551 552. The like Plea was used by A. Melvil a chief Modeller of the Scotish Presbytery in his own Case 1584. and he may decline the civil judg and appeal to a Synod This is not only affirmed by Mr Rutherford but this position was in an exceeding strange manner espoused by the General Assembly of the Kirk who contested with King James concerning it upon this occasion Mr D. Blake having in his Sermon at S. Andrews declared that the King had discovered the treachery of his heart That all Kings are the Devils Bearnes That the Queen of England Queen Elizabeth was an Atheist with many more dangerous assertions and being cited by the Kings authority to answer these things he alledged that he could not in this case be judged by the King till the Church had taken the first cognition thereof Spotsw Hist of Sc. l. 6. p. 330. And the Kirk-Commissioners enter a Declinator and Protestation against the Kings proceedings and would not consent that any punishment should be inflicted upon Mr Blake because there was no tryal before a proper judge and declared that if he should submit his doctrine to be tryed by the Council the liberty of the Church and the spiritual Government of the House of God Hist of Sc. l. 6. an 1596. would be quite subverted A full and particular account of this whole matter is expressed by Bishop Spotswood and this contest was so great and famous and the disturbances ensuing thereupon so notorious that they were thought fit to be signified to the States General of the united Provinces Adr. Damman in Praest Viror Epist p. 49. c. by their Agent then sent into Scotland in the entrance of 1597. But such positions and undertakings as these are calculated for a Meridian equal in Elevation with the Italian 3. One thing insisted on for this exemption of the Church and its Officers from the Civil Authority is that the Officers of the Church act by Authority from Christ and therefore are not to be in immediate subjection to Kings and Princes Chap. 6. Sect. 4. But this hath been particularly answered above 4. But they further argue Christs Royal Authority not invaded by Princes governing in causes Ecclesiasticale that it is the Royalty of Christ to Govern his Church in matters of Religion and if the Civil Rulers do intermeddle herein they thereby invade Christs Kingly Government To which I answer 1. That this way of arguing put into other language would amount to thus much That because Christ is the King of his Church or of all Christians yea and of all the earth therefore Christians and the whole World ought not to be subject to any other King or Ruler but to Christ And this would serve the design of the highest Fifth Monarchy men if it had any weight in it 2. It is a gross falshood that no act that Christ doth as King may be performed by any other King There are some great things in the Kingly power of Christ which are wholly incommunicable in the nature of them to any other human person whomsoever being founded on his Mediatory Office Such are his giving the Sanction to the Laws and Precepts of the Gospel to become the rule of the Christian Religion his Soveraign dispensing divine grace upon account of his own merits his pronouncing the final sentence of Absolution and Condemnation and his having by a peculiar right an Vniversal authority over all the World all power in heaven and earth being committed to him And all such things as these are as far disclaimed from Kings as from other men But there are other acts of Christs Government of his Church where some thing of like nature ought to be performed by others though in a different manner thus Christ ruleth Christians and so may all Christian Kings do Christ doth protect his Church and so ought all Soveraign Powers to do Christ by his Authority encourageth the pious and devout and discountenanceth the negligent and so ought all Rulers as well as all other good men to do by theirs 3. If governing others with respect to Religion were peculiar to Christ himself and his Royal Authority the authority of Ecclesiastical Officers would by this method become void also for Christ hath not conveyed the peculiarities of his Royal Authority to them But as they in their places have authority from Christ so the civil power is in subordination to him who is King of Kings and is confirmed by him 5. There have been also other very pernicious principles which undermine the whole foundation of the Royal Supremacy both in matters civil and Ecclesiastical In our late dreadful times of Civil War the whole management of things against the King and the undertaking to alter and order publick affairs without him was a manifest and practical disowning the Kings Supremacy Popular Supremacy disclaimed Some persons then who would be thought men of sense did assert that though the King was owned to be supreme Governour yet the supremest Soveraign power was in the people Others declared that the title of Supreme Governour was an honourary title given to the King to please him instead of fuller power And in the Issue July 17. 1649. by a pretended Act it was called Treason to say that the Commons assembled in Parliament were not the supreme authority of the Nation But there were also some who then affirmed the whole body of the people to be superiour to the Parliament and that they might call them to an account 6. But because I hope these positions are now forsaken and because much in the following Book is designed against the dangerous effect of them in taking Arms I shall content my self here to observe three things First that those who would disprove the Royal Supremacy because of some actions which have been undertaken by some of the people or by any in their name against their Kings or even to the deposing of them do first stand bound to prove all these actions to be regular and justifiable or else it is no better argument than they might make use of against the authority of God from the disobedience of men 7. Secondly The asserting supremacy of Government in the body of the people is a position big with nonsense and irreligion 'T is nonsense like a whole Army being General since Supremacy of Government in the whole body of the people can be over no body unless something could be supreme over it self whereas if there be no higher power than what is in the whole body of the people this must be a state of
Anarchy where there is no superiour or supreme It includes Irreligion because Religion establisheth the Government of a people to be the ordinance of God and whereas Government must be by the exercise of a superiour authority there can be no authority upon Earth superiour to the supreme 8. Thirdly Supremacy cannot be asserted in a Parliament without doing violence to plain evidence For as loyal English Parliaments have constantly acknowledged supremacy in the King so it is manifest that the Parliament regularly is under the Government of the King For he Summons and gives birth to it by his Writ continues it at his pleasure and hath the authority of adjourning proroguing or dissolving it as he sees cause CHAP. IX Corollaries from the foregoing discourse concerning some duties of subjection THE Royal Supremacy being asserted it will hence follow 1. Corol. 1. Of submission and solemn professing the Kings Right That Subjects ought to own and acknowledge this just authority and supremacy of their Soveraign and heartily to manifest an humble peaceable and faithful submission thereunto This is that which the Rules of the Christian Religion do enjoin and they who are averse from the performance hereof do as much as in them lies enervate this authority and render it unmeet to attain its ends for which God did appoint it even the peace and good of the World And for the more effectual promoting of this faithful subjection the sacred bond of an Oath of homage and fidelity B. 1. C 9. is approved by God himself Eccl. 8.2 and hath been made use of by the general wisdom of the World The ancient practice of such Oaths is manifest under the Jewish Government Jud. 11.10 2 Kin. 11.17 as also under the Chaldean Empire Ezek 17.19 and under the Persian and Roman Empires Joseph Ant. l. 11. c. 8. l. 17. c. 3. Herodian l. 2. Bar. an 169. n. 9. And that the primitive Christians even in the time of persecution did by their Oaths assure their allegiance to those Princes seemeth well observed by Baronius from Tertullian Apol. c. 32. where discoursing of that fidelity and honour which the Christians had for the Emperour upon that occasion saith Sed juramus 2. Of speaking reverently Corol. 2. Subjects ought also to speak of their Princes with reverence and expressions of honour For all authority whether of Father Master or other Ruler deriving suitable degrees of honour upon the person the greatest and chief civil honour doth of right belong to him who in his Dominions is possessor of the highest authority upon earth And the ordinary using outward expressions and titles of honour is in this Case the more needful and reasonable because this hath a considerable influence upon the disposing men to obedience and because Government it self becomes most useful where it is entertained with due reverence Wherefore the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 optimus or most excellent which was the usual stile of honour which both Jews and Romans gave to the president of Judea Act. 23.26 ch 24.3 was readily made use of to Festus by S. Paul Act. 26.25 And when Priests and Rulers were none of the best men the holy Scriptures stile the Priest the Angel or Messenger of the Lord of Hosts Mal. 2.7 and the Ruler the Minister of God Rom. 13.4 and of such they use that expression Ps 82.6 I said Ye are Gods 3. And the primitive Christians were forward by such means to promote and secure the due honour of superiours Eus Hist Eccl. l. 7. c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To which purpose Dionysius Bishop of Alex andria when he was a Confessor and exposed himself to be banished for the Christian profession did yield to Valerian and Galienus persecuting Emperours the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 most pious Athan. Ap. ad Const Testim Eccl. Alexand in Athanas Eus Hist Eccl. l. 10. c. 5. Both Athanasius himself and the Alexandrian Church which held to him called Constantius the Arian Most Religious 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And when Constantine wrote to some of the Prefects of the Empire he gave to them in two Rescripts mentioned by Eusebius the title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 your sanctity And that the ancient Churches did readily give to the Emperours their usual Imperial titles and did ordinarily treat them with such a stile as Sanctissimi Pientissimi Religiosissimi is not only manifest from particular Writers but is abundantly apparent from the Synodical Epistles of Provincial and even of Oecumenical Councils 4. Conc. Eph. Tom. 2. c. 10. To. 4. c. 17. And as the like expressions of honour were frequently and usually given to the Christian Bishops so when the Council of Ephesus were about to denounce the sentence of deposition against Nestorius Bishop of Constantinople for his Heresy and when they wrote to Celestine against John Bishop of Antioch as being an Enemy to the true Faith in complyance with Nestorius they gave them both the title of Most Religious And the like was done before the sentencing Dioscorus and other Bishops who complyed with Eutyches in the Council of Chalcedon Conc. Chalc. Act. 3. Evagr. Hist l. 2. c. 18. Wherefore such expressions as these were intended as titles of honour given to them upon account of their office and without respect to their personal vertues and in that sense are to be understood Mas de Min. Angl. l. 3. c. 5. n. 3. ibid. Baron Bin. 5. The use of such expressions of honourary titles is allowed and defended both by Romish and Protestant Writers And those persons who would appear backward in yielding to the supreme Governour his just stile of eminency and supremacy are wanting in giving him the honour which God enjoins and cannot easily be acquitted from the guilt of scandal in encouraging the bad temper of some and adding to the ignorance of others in that particular And they who are desirous to expose the persons actions or constitutions of their superiours may take warning by the actings of Ham towards his Father Noah which entailed a Curse upon his posterity 6. Corol. 3. it is also the duty of subjects Of praying for Kings heartily to pray for Gods blessing on the person and Government of their Soveraign because therein both Church and State and private interests also are so much concerned This was enjoined by S. Paul as a matter of principal concernment 1 Tim. 2.1 2. and was performed in the early times of Christianity Tert. Apol c. 30. Conc. Emer in Praef. And the Council of Merida did more particularly pray for their King Recessuinthus because he was Governour in all Causes Civil and Ecclesiastical quoniam de secularibus sancta illi manet cura Ecclesiastica per divinam gratiam recte disponit mente intentâ sit illi opitulatrix ineffabilis omnipotentis Dei gratia quae se quaerentibus manet propinqua But because it is an high piece of
Priest so there is a peculiar Wire-drawn nicety which some make use of to prove this deposing power from those words of our Saviour Joh. 21.16 Feed my Sheep Hence they argue that it belongs to the office of a Pastor to drive away Wolves and therefore the chief Pastor may depose such Princes who are hurtful to the Church And this same argument may also prove that all Pastors have the power of the Sword and of making resistance and of killing and destroying mens lives and exercising such Authority as the Kings of the Gentiles did But to this which will admit of many answers it may be sufficient to say 1. That it is a great vanity to found an argument upon the straining a metaphorical expression which only proves that they want better proofs As if all Christians from the same text might be concluded to be Fools because Sheep are silly Creatures and that it is not fit that Christian Kingdoms should defend themselves by Arms against an invading Enemy because it agrees not with the nature of Sheep to fight with Foxes or Wolves 2. And it is no part of the peculiar authority of a Shepherd to drive away of Wolf which any Man or Dog either may warrantably do as well as the Shepherd 10. Gr. de Val. ubi supra C. 15. qu. 7. c. nos sanctorum c. Juratos But it is pretended also that those who are Excommunicated because of Heresy or as some add for any other cause do thereby lose their Dominion and Authority over their Subjects And this is asserted and declared by Gregory the Seventh and Vrbane the Second Now though the having disproved the authority of the Bishop of Rome to extend to this Kingdom doth sufficiently manifest that he hath no more power to Excommunicate any Prince or Subject of England having no Jurisdiction here than a Bishop in England hath to Excommunicate any Prince or Subject in Italy yet I shall here take notice of some things further concerning Excommunication and also concerning Heresy Concerning Excommunication I shall observe II. Excommunication doth not forfeit temporal rights First That it is contrary to the nature of Excommunication though in the highest degree that any person and especially a Soveraign Prince should thereby lose those temporal rights which are not founded in their relation to the Church Indeed in Christian Kingdoms there are ordinarily some temporal penalties and abatement of legal priviledges inflicted upon the persons excommunicate but this is not the natural effect of that sentence but is added thereto by the civil Government and Soveraignty under which such persons do live And therefore no such thing can take place with respect to Soveraign Princes who have no temporal superiour to annex this as a penalty Excommunication is a separating an Offender from the Christian Society of the Church not a casting him out of the World it removes him as Tertullian expresseth it Tertul. Ap. c. 39. à communicatione orationis conventus omnis sancti Commercii from communicating in Prayer Christian Assemblies and all holy Commerce But that temporal rights are not thereby lost or forfeited is acknowledged by some considerable Writers of the Romish Church Blackw his Examination 1607. n. 39. as Richeome and Soto who are cited with approbation by Blackwell 12. This may be further manifest from the words of our Saviour wherein he expresseth the state and condition of a person Excommunicate Mat. 18.17 Let him be to thee as an Heathen man and a Publican Now supposing here that a Christian Prince were Excommunicated to be as an Heathen man is no more than to be as the Roman Governours were to whom S. Paul and S. Peter enjoin obedience and to be as Tiberius himself was towards whom our Saviour commands the performance of duty The Publicans who received the Roman Tribute were so hateful to the Jews that they would not eat with them Hor. Hebr. in Mat. 5. 46. they were accounted oppressive exactors as the Jewish Rabbins declare and the words of S. John Baptist intimate Luk. 3.12 13. And indeed they had so general a reputation of injustice even amongst the Romans that it was thought a remarkable commendation of the Father of Vespasian Suet. in Vesp n. 1. in the publick Inscription upon the Statues erected in honour of him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he was an honest Publican But yet with respect to the civil rights of tribute which they demanded our Saviour requires and commands to render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars Mat. 22.21 13. Princes may not be Excommunicated as others may Secondly I observe that Soveraign Princes are not liable to the Sentence of Excommunication in the same manner with Christian Subjects Though Princes must be under the care and conduct of Ecclesiastical Pastors and Guides yet the duties of that relation must be discharged with a reverent respect to the state of subjection And the different Case of a Prince and a subject with respect to Excommunication may be discerned by distinct reflecting on the causes the effects the end and the manner of proceeding in Excommunication If we consider the causes or occasions of Excommunication a Soveraign is capable of losing and forfeiting his relation to the Society of the Christian Church as well as other persons Right of the Church Ch. 4. p. 236. because as Mr Thorndike observeth he as well as others comes into the Communion of the Church upon the terms and conditions of Christianity and a failure in the condition must make the effect void Such was the Case of Julian who being an Apostate and no longer embracing Christianity had no more any right to be accounted a Christian The effect of Excommunication is such that it sometimes prohibits converse among private persons except in such relations as do not depend upon the Society of the Church and therefore remain intire notwithstanding the separation from that Society as of Parents and Children Husband and Wife Master and Servant And upon this account Davenant Determ 48. no subject can by vertue of Excommunication be prohibited converse with and discharge of all duty and respect to his Soveraign because this is that which he oweth him by the bond of Allegiance and the laws of nature humane Society and civil polity 14. And the end of all Ecclesiastical power being for the good of the Church and of Mankind it being an authority for edification and not for destruction in all the acts thereof due caution ought to be used in avoiding the unnecessary exasperating those who are in chief authority against the Officers of the Church which oft occasioneth lamentable discords and contentions V. Barcl de potest Papae c. 9. c. 26. And because the good of the Church consists chiefly in the advancement of Piety and Religious obedience of which one branch is the honouring and obeying superiours and Governours upon account of Christian piety all just care must be
taken that no acts of Ecclesiastical authority do render Soveraign Princes the more disrespected and disesteemed of their Subjects And upon this account also it is needful that all Ecclesiastical Officers do carefully avoid the suspicion of undermining the secular rights of Princes which hath been inordinately done in the Romish Church under the pretence of the power of the Keyes and of binding and loosing 15. And lastly and chiefly The manner of proceeding in the Sentence of Excommunication being ordinarily by a judicial process and a publick Judicial sentence and there being no Ecclesiastical Court or Person who hath any superiour power or authority over a Soveraign Prince to Command or Summon his appearing before them to answer to what shall be objected against him I cannot see how unless by his own consent he should become subject to such Judicial proceedings The Bishop of Rome did indeed presume to summon Kings before him but this was an high act of his Vsurpation Whereas according to the groundwork now laid a Soveraign Prince cannot by any coactive Ecclesiastical Power become subject to such a sentence and the open and outward proceedings therein But still Princes as well as any other persons must submit themselves to the power of the Keyes in undertaking the rules of repentance so far as they are needful for procuring the favour of God and obtaining the benefit of the Keyes by Absolution as was in a great part done in that memorable Case of Theodosius Theod. Hist l. 5. c. 17. Sozom. Hist Eccl. l. 7. c. 24. upon the sharp rebuke of S. Ambrose And though all Christians upon manifest evidence may in some Cases see cause to disown a Soveraign Prince as was done in Julian from being any longer a Member of the Christian Society yet in such Cases this Membership ceaseth and is forfeited by his own act and not properly by a Judicial sentence and formal Process Gr. de Val. Tom. 3. Disp 3. Qu. 15. Punct 3. And some of the Romish Writers go much this way in giving an account how the Bishop of Rome whom they suppose to be superiour to all men on Earth may be reason of Heresy or such Crimes be deprived of Christian Communion 16. Heresy doth not deprive men of all temporal rights Valent. T. 3. Disp 1. Qu. 10. P. 8. qu. 11. P. 3. qu. 12. p. 2. Concerning Heresy it might be sufficient in this Case to observe that those who in Communion with the Church of England embrace that true Christian Doctrine which was taught in the Primitive and Apostolical Church are as far from being concerned in the crime and guilt of Heresy as loyal Subjects are from being chargeable with Rebellion But that assertion which some Romish Writers embrace that Hereticks are ipso facto deprived of all temporal rights Layman The Mor. l. 2. Tr. 2. c. 16. and superiority etiam ante judicis sententiam say some is necessary to be rejected For this is a position that would ruine the Peace of the World when it would put every party upon seising the possessions of all whom they account Hereticks as having a just right so to do And this is certainly false because temporal Dominion is not originally founded in the entertaining the true Doctrine of Religion or the Faith of Christianity since S. Paul required subjection to the Pagan Rulers as being ordained of God Rom. 13.1 7. Had this been true the Scribes and Pharisees who were guilty of Heresy could not have sat in Moses Seat nor ought Constantius and Valens to have been acknowledged as they always were by the Christian Church for Soveraign Princes 17. That damnable doctrine and position Suar. in Reg. Brit. l. 6. c. 6. Vide Arnaldi Oration cont Jesuitas in Cur. Parlam Sixt. 5. in Orat. in Consist Rom. Comolet in Arnald Orat ubi sup which is abjured in the Oath of Allegiance as impious and heretical That Princes which be Excommunicated or deprived by the Pope may be deposed or murdered by their Subjects or any other whatsoever is owned and asserted even with respect to the murdering them by several Popish Doctors and by some of them as a thing most highly meritorious Among whom also the murdering of Princes is approved if they be only thought remiss and not zealous in carrying on the interest of the Romish Church and on this account the horrid murther of Hen. 3. and Hen. 4. of France hath been applauded and commended by divers of them But the wickedness of all such assertions and practises will be abhorred by all loyal and Christian Spirits and will I hope be plainly manifested from the following part of this discourse 18. And whereas this Doctrine and Position is abjured as Heretical Of Heretical Doctrines the phrase Heretical must be here taken in a proper and strict sense But when the Scriptures or ancient Fathers speak of Heresy or Heretical Doctrines strictly and properly they thereby understand such Positions which under the profession of Christianity do so far oppose and undermine the true Christian Doctrine as to bring those who maintain and practise these things to the wayes of destruction Thus those Doctrines were by S. Peter esteemed damnable Heresies which were proposed by false Teachers and were pernicious and destructive both to them and to those who followed them Ignat. ad Trallian 2 Pet. 2.1 2 3. Ignatius also describeth Heresy to be a strange Herb no Christian food which joineth the name of Christ with corrupt doctrines quae inquinatis implicat Jesum Christum in the Latin published by Bishop Vsher by which the Medicean Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is certainly amiss and concerning which both Vossius and P. Junius add their different conjectures may be corrected for that Copy out of which this Latin was translated seemeth to have read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. as they who give a deadly poyson with wine and honey which may please and yet kill And Tertullian accounted such assertions to be Heresy as undermine the Faith Tert. de Praescript c. 2 5. and lead to eternal death and where the Teachers of them though they profess the name of Christ do corrupt his Doctrine and are Adulteri Evangelizatores In like manner S. Austin owneth him to be an Heretick Aug. de Civ Dei l. 18. c. 51. who under the Christian name resisteth the Christian Doctrine and persisteth in maintaining dogmata pestifera mortifera pestilent and deadly opinions And when Aquinas treated of Heresy 22ae q. 11. a. 2. o. he declared that the import thereof is the corruption of the Christian Faith Nor would it be difficult to add a numerous Company of approved Writers to the same purpose 19. Doctrines allowing Subjects or others to depose or murther Princes are Heretical Now since the Popes depriving power hath been disproved this Position here abjured is not only false but according to this notion of Heresy it is
those who in that Case acted against the Emperour And the consideration of the Popes pretence was also included in that general Declaration in our own Church Can. 1. 1640. against Subjects bearing Arms against their King upon any pretence whatsoever And these Councils though disallowed at Rome were in this respect truly Catholick because they held to the Rules and Foundations of the true and Primitive Doctrine of the Catholick Church 23. But it is unreasonable to demand This Heretical Position entertained by the Pope and his Adherents that for the declaring this to be Heresy we should produce the determination of the present Church of Rome against this detestable Position since the Pope and the main part of the Romish church are the persons who stand chargeable with maintaining either the whole or at least a considerable part of this heretical position here abjured For in this Position That Princes which be Excommunicated or deprived by the Pope may he deposed or murthered by their Subjects or any other whatsoever the two main branches do concern the deposing and the murthering of Princes deprived or Excommunicated by the Pope Touching the former the deposing of them the very forms of the Papal sentence which I have above mentioned Supra n. 5 7. not only allow but require and command that such Princes be deposed and that their Subjects do renounce all fealty and Allegiance to them Aventin Ann. Boior l. 5. p. 460. Epist Leodiens advers Paschal 2. And by the Pope his Conclave and their Adherents it hath been accounted a crime deserving Excommunication and Death also for Subjects to defend their Soveraign whom the Pope had sentenced as was long since complained of by some of them who maintained their Allegiance to the Emperour Hen. 4. and were therefore by the Pope devoted to destruction 24. Yet it is certain that there have been and are divers persons and the chief part of some Countries of the Romish Communion who own not but oppose that part of this assertion which concerneth the deposing of Princes Le Merc. Franc. an 1609. But several Writings of this sort of men as of Barclay de potestate Papae and others of the like temper have undergone a publick censure at Rome and their opinions are herein looked on with so ill an eye that at Rome they are thought not to be altogether found in the Roman Faith 25. And touching the depriving such Princes of their lives Bell. Resp ad p. 66. Apolog. pro juram fidelit when Cardinal Bellarmine had asserted that it was not the Popes method to promote any thing against their lives he explains himself that he meant this with respect to private assassinates and not to what might happen in the raising open Wars But yet concerning the more secret attempts of Parricide against such Princes C. 23. q. 5. Excommunicatorum 1. Their Canons declare that they are not accounted Murderers who in a zeal to the Catholick Church do kill some who are Excommunicate 2. The horrid act of James Clement who murthered Henry the Third of France was applauded by Sixtus the Fifth in the Roman Consistory 3. Le Mercure Francois an 1609. f. 376. The arrest of the Parliament of Paris against John Chastell who attempted the murder of Henry the Fourth and wounded him was censured at Rome by a publick Edict Nov. 9. 1609. 4. When Parry undertook to kill Queen Elizabeth Eliz. Annal Christian Subjection Part. 3. p. 503 504. his intention was not only promoted by the Popes Nuncio's and other persons in Venice and France but desiring for his full satisfaction to understand the Popes approbation by a Letter from Cardinal di Como which was read at his Arraignment and owned by him he was assured that the Pope himself highly praised and favoured his undertaking as may appear from the Letter it self in Bishop Bilson dated Januar. 30. 1584. And to these other things of like nature and of later time might be added which will shew that at least at some times such things as these have been encouraged at Rome 26. Yet it may be observed that such Positions as this expressed in this Oath But it was declared to be damnable Heresy by S. Peter were in general accounted and declared damnable Heresies by one who is owned to have had both Apostolical and Episcopal Authority at Rome even by S. Peter himself When he had foretold the comeing in and spreading of damnable Heresies 2 Pet. 2.1 2. and declared the destruction that should come upon those who received them v. 1 3 4 9. he then tells us in some particulars who they are whom God will thus punish v. 10. chiefly them who walk after the flesh in the lusts of uncleanness and despise Government presumptuous are they self-willed they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities Now the walking in the lusts of uncleanness was the practical embracing the impure and heretical doctrines of Simon Magus the Gnosticks and others like them And since Government and Dignities do very properly express Civil as well as Ecclesiastical or any other power and the temper of those who are prone to despise Civil Government is fitly described by their being presumptuous and self-willed and S. Jude in the parallel place Jude 8 11. speaks of their perishing in the gainsaying of Core these words may reasonably be thought to have a great respect to Civil Authority And if we further consider that among those ancient Hereticks some under a pretence of liberty so far opposed Dominion that they despised their Masters and would not obey them the allowing of which S. Paul condemns as a great opposition to the doctrine of Christ 1 Tim. 6.1 2 3 4. and that there is some intimation of the same spirit towards Kings and other Governours 1 Pet. 2.13 14 16. and that at last this proceeded so far that they taught that the Government of the World had its original not from God but from the evil spirit which Position Irenaeus confutes this may well perswade and manifest Iren. adv Haeres l. 5. c. 24. Tertul. adv Valent c. 22. that the Apostle had in this palce an eye to these things And then this sense must be comprehended nder these words that those assertions which eminently include the despising disobeying and speaking evil of civil Government and Authority as the declaring it lawful to depose or murder a Soveraign doth are damnable Heresies 27. I only add that pertinaciousness which is included in the description of an Heretick having respect to the temper of the person who embraceth Heretical Doctrine is not needful though it be also in this Case sufficiently evident to prove a Position to be Heretical 28. Of absolveing from the Oath of Allegiance I shall not insist particularly on that clause in the Oath of Allegiance That neither the Pope nor any person whatsoever hath power to absolve from that Oath because this must stand and
fall with the deposing power For the absolving Subjects from the Oath of Allegiance must be presumed to be to this end that such persons should be no longer obliged to acknowledge the Authority or perform the duty which is therein expressed and contained and the best of their own Writers do found the Popes Authority of dischargeing Subjects from such Oaths and Duties upon the effect of his deposing or depriveing power And it must be granted that if the Pope cannot depose a Prince as is sufficiently evinced that he cannot then Princes have a right of governing notwithstanding all the Pope can do and his Subjects are then bound by the divine law to perform Allegiance though they should never have taken any special Oath to that purpose But if the Prince could be indeed deposed by the Pope and consequently hath no longer a right of governing I acknowledge that any other man as well as the Pope may pronounce the duties and obligation of subjection to cease Sect. 2 towards him who is no longer their Ruler and Governour SECT II. Of the Vnlawfulness of taking Arms upon any pretence whatsoever against the King 1. The more general acknowledgment for the preservation of the Kings safety is That it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King And that I do abhor that traiterous position of taking Arms b his Authority against his person or against those that are commissionated by him this profession is required by the Act. of Vniformity to be made by all the Clergy and the same thing in sense is enjoined upon all civil and military Officers And here I shall distinctly consider the several clauses which are all to be interpreted with respect to the end and design of them which is the preservation and just security of the Kings person and government and the due performance of the Subjects Loyalty Of the unlawfulness upon any pretence to take Armes against the King 2. The first clause that it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King is the chief and principal part of this acknowledgment which in the due latitude of its sense doth include what is more particularly expressed in the following words And the sense of this is nothing more than what the Church of England and the eminent members thereof hath constantly acknowledged Our Homilies teach Hom. of Obedience Part. 2. that it is not lawful for inferiours and subjects in any Case to stand against and resist the superiour power Can. 1. Concerning Regal Power And in the Canons 1640. it was declared that for subjects to bear Arms against their Kings offensive or defensive upon any pretence whatsoever is at the least to resist the powers which are ordained of God and though they do not invade but only resist S. Paul tells them plainly they shall receive to themselves damnation And to the same sense the Vniversity of Oxford hereafter mentioned 3. This clause of acknowledgment being framed and enjoined by an English Parliament not without respect to the disloyal and unchristian proceedings in this Nation and tendered to English Subjects and relating particularly to the King not indefinitely to any King can bear no other rational construction than to condemn the English Subjects taking Arms against their natural Soveraign the King of England And therefore though the like attempts against any other Kings who enjoy Soveraign Authority are equally blameable in their Subjects yet this Position doth not assert the utter unlawfulness of taking Arms amongst any other Nations against him who hath the title of King if he doth not therewith enjoy that right of supreme government which our Kings have and exercise And therefore in such a Constitution of government as the Lacedemonian was Plut. in Pausan in which Pausanias had the title of a King under the Ephori but with as much distance from Royal Power and Supremacy as was in the military Imperator or General among the Romans from the Dignity of an Emperour we are not concerned to determine any thing concerning their Rights Plin. Nat. Hist l. 6. c. 22. The like condition of the Kings of Tabrobana is mentioned by Pliny and others have given somewhat a like account concerning some other places But against a Soveraign Prince all open Hostility and secret treachery in his Subjects is Universally to be esteemed utterly unlawful 4. And it might be wished Violence hath too ost been offered to Princes that there had never been in England or elsewhere any such treacherous and disloyal actions or assertions from which the true Friends of the Church of England have been free as should render it exceeding needful to make use of the greatest care and caution for the preservation of the persons of Princes But alas the wretched practises against our late Dread Soveraign are equally manifest and horrid and the too forward proneness of vicious men to entertain rebellious designs both under Paganism Judaism Mahometanism and Christianity might afford matter enough for multiplyed Tragedies I shall forbear many instances which might be given both in our own and many other Kingdoms and shall only reflect on that temper and spirit which hath prevailed in Rome and Scotland 5. De Civ Dei l. 3. c. 15. In the first rise of the Roman Power it was observed by S. Austin that of their Kings which reigned before the Consuls there were only two Numa Pompilius and Ancus Martius who died of any Disease if so much may be affirmed of both them Suet. in Calig n. 58. Claudio n. 44. Ner. n. 49. Galb n. 19. Othon n. 11. Vitell. n. 17. And Suctonius who writeth the lives of the twelve first Caesars sheweth that besides Julius Caesar and Domitian no less than six of them who immediately succeeded one another even all from Tiberius to Vespasian had their Deaths procured either by secret treachery or open assaults and that there were suspicions concerning and frequent Conspiracies against others of them And of later times omitting many other instances and the Rebellions in other Countries which was the fruit of the doctrine propagated from Rome since Greg. 7. I shall only add Extrav Joh. Tit. 12. c. 1. that though Ancona be under the government of the Popes Officers and lies near the Gates of Rome the Inhabitants thereof are complained of in one of the Summaries of their Canon Law to this purpose soliti sunt rectores interficere it is usual with them to kill their Governours And it hath been observed that the Scots in the succession of somewhat above an hundred Princes have killed betwixt thirty and forty of them 6. And hence it may appear that that Genius and temper which hath too much prevailed in Rome and Scotland was such as disposed them to shew no very great respect unto Princes and this may possibly have had some influence upon the Conclave in the one and the Kirk in the other And indeed
of their duty in loyal obedience And indeed it would be an high reflexion on the Laws of our Realm if such things as these should be acknowledged to be matters of such a perplexed intricacy that honest and indifferent minds who stand obliged to the practice of peace and loyalty should not without consulting skillful Lawyers be able to understand the general rule of thier duty and to whom they ought to yield obedience and submission 12. Besides the words of this publick Declaration and acknowledgment against lawfulness of taking Armes which yet might be accounted sufficient in the Statutes in the time of King Edw. the third ●t Edw. 3.2 it is declared without allowance of any case or pretence to the contrary to be treason if any man do levy War against our Lord the King in his Realm or be adherent to the Kings enemies in his Realm giving them aid or comfort in the Realm or elsewhere 13 Car. 2.1 And since the restauration of his present Majesty it is also in general terms declared treason to levy War against the King within the Realm or without And to cut off all pretences either from the nature of the War as defensive only or from the authority of a Parliament or of the Lrods or commons we have in two several Statutes this Declaration 13 Car. 2.6 that both or either Houses of Parliament cannot nor lawfully may raise or levy any War offensive or defensive 14 Car. 2.3 against his Majesty his Heirs and lawful Successors In which Statutes also the sole supreme Command and Government of the Militia is declared by the Law of England ever to be the undoubted right of his Majesty and his Predecessors Kings and Queens of England 13. And from the Declaration and evidence of these Laws that Plea which hath been made from the Authority of Grotius becomes wholly void Grot. de J. B. P. l. 1. c. 4. n. 13. That learned man indeed did assert that if the supreme Government be part in the people or Senate and part in the King if the King invade what is not his right he may be opposed with just force because he hath not so far any Supremacy And this he thinks must take place though it be said that the power of War is in the King for that saith he is only to be understood of Foreign War when whosoever hath any pat in the supreme power cannot but have a right to defend that part But these words seem very strange and inconsiderate from so intelligent a person if they be intended as they seem to be concerning one simple and unmixt supremacy For to assert two capacities where each hath authority to make War with the other is not to found one only regular Government but to erect two distinct Governments each of which have a supreme power of judging and of execution Indeed in such a mixt and divided Government as is in the German Empire it is allowed by the Constitutions and Capitulations of the Empire that the several Principalities or rather the Princes and Governours thereof have a power of taking Armes if their rights be invaded by the Emperour but then these Princes in their own territories enjoy a right of peculiar Soveraignty But if the whole of this notion of Grotius be taken together it will according to his judgment conclude that the people of England Lords Commons or both jointly have no part in the supreme power because these publick Laws declare that they have no power of making so much as a defensive War against the King 14. And if we look into the Records of the former Ages we may thence discern that no Subjects whatsoever of this Realm had under any pretence an Authority to bear Armes against the King To which purpose it may be sufficient to consider the Conclusion of the Barons Wars in the latter end of the Reign of King Henry the Third Very many of the Peers and chief Barons of the Realm undertook to make War with the King under the Conduct of Simon de Montfort Earl of Leicester M. Par. An. 1264. whom M. Paris calls Baronum Capitaneum and after several Battels had been fought the Kings person was seized and taken at Lewis And not long after this Idem an 1265. the King Summons a Parliament at Winchester in which all those who acted under or with Simon de Montfort are disinherited Sir W. Raleigh Priv. of Parl. p. 31. which act of disinheriting is reported to have been confirmed in a following Parliament at Westminster But in order to the setling the State of the Realm upon more mild and gentle terms by agreement between the King and the Barons a Plenipotentiary Power was delegated and committed to twelve Peers that they might establish what they thought fit and convenient concerning them who thus stood disinherited 15. These twelve published their determination An. 51 H. 3. Dict. de Kenilw. c. 2. which had the force of a Law under the name of Dictum de Kenilworth In which it was concluded that they who had been engaged in Armes against the King unless the King had pardoned them should pay the revenue of their lands for five years And they who had no Lands were to give their own Oath and to find other Sureties for their peaceable behaviour and also make such satisfaction and undergo such pennance as the Church should appoint Ibid. c. 9. And that they who were Tenants should lose their right in their Farms C. 11. saving the right of their Lords And that they who by their perswasion did instigate any to fight against the King should forfeit the profit of their Lands for two years with many other provisions for particular Cases And they also determined that if any persons should refuse these terms which were proposed as a favourable mitigation of strict justice they should be de exhaeredatis C. 29. and have no power of recovering their Estates But some persons and particularly Simon de Montfort himself C. 21. was excluded from these terms of favour and left to the ordinary proceedings of justice in manus Regis Now those practises and enterprises which were so publickly censured condemned and punished by our Parliaments and proceedings of justice must needs be accounted by them unlawful actings 16. In the year following An. 52 Hen. 3. the Statute of Marlbridge mentions it St. Marlbridge c. 1. as a great and heavy mischief and evil that in the time of the late troubles in England many Peers and others refused to receive justice from the King and his Court as they ought to have done which is more expresly contained in the Original Latine than in the common English Translation justitiam indignati fuerint recipere per Dominum Regem curiam suam prout debuerunt consueverunt and did undertake to vindicate their own causes of themselves Now to declare that all Peers and all other persons ought to have
received justice only from the King and his Courts and not to revenge themselves or be Judges in their own Cases doth more especially condemn the entring into War it self which is an undertaking founded upon a direct contrary proceeding And thus far we have a sufficient censure in our English Laws upon that War against the King which those who have pleaded for the lawfulness of Subjects taking Arms do account the most plausible instance for their purpose which our Chronicles can furnish them with And it is needless to go about to prove that many other Conspiracies and Rebellions have been justly condemned and punished according to their demerit 17. And whereas unchristian and evil actions Some pretences shortly reflected on may oft be carried on under some fair colours and appearances all such pretences for taking Armes against the King are in this acknowledgment disclaimed the truth of which will be justified in the following Chapters And I shall here only shortly reflect upon some few of those pretences which are commonly made 18. Some have accounted the defence of Religion to be a sufficient Warrant for taking Armes But if the Christian Religion giveth a right to him who professeth it to defend himself and his profession against his Superiours by Armes then must not our Religion be a taking up the Cross but the Sword and it would then be perfectly unlike the Religion of the Primitive Christians and Martyrs and would be no longer a following of Christ our Lord and Saviour 19. Others have asserted the defaults and miscarriages of Superiours Jun. Brut. Vindic. Qu. 1. 3. to be a forfeiture of their Power and Dominion even as a tenure may be forfeited upon the non-performance of the conditions upon which it is held But though God may justly as a punishment of Offenders deprive them of what good they here possess he hath not made inferiours the Judges of their Superiours nor can any such forfeiture devolve on them And he who considers the great viciousness and cruelty of Saul of Tiberius and of Nero under whose Reigns the Holy Scripture presseth the duty of Allegiance will thence discern that the making such a pretence as this is contrary to true Religion and Christianity 20. By many the defending of the rights freedoms and liberties of the Subject hath been esteemed the most specious pretence of all the rest But whereas there are other better wayes to preserve these rights which are most violated by Wars and intestine Tumults and Broils it cannot easily be thought probable that he may be a judge and avenger of his own cause by force against his superiour who may not be so against his equal And since the tenderness of Davids Conscience was such that notwithstanding the many undeserved injuries he sustained he durst not stretch out his hand against the Lords anointed and Peters drawing his Sword to defend his Master was severely rebuked of which things more hereafter the management of this objection must proceed from a Spirit contrary to that of pious David and to the doctrine also of our Lord and Master SECT III. Of the traiterous Position of taking Arms by the Kings Authority against his person or against those who are commissionated by him 1. The other clause in the forementioned Declaration or acknowledgment is intended against another particular pretence of taking Armes and is this That I do abhor that traiterous Position of taking Armes by his the Kings authority Sect. 3 against his person or against those that are Commissionated by him The Position or assertion here rejected is thus expressed in the Oath to be taken by the Lord Lieutenants and Souldiers 14 Car. 2.3 That Arms may be taken by the Kings Authority viz. though the King never own them or give any Commission for them yea though they be against his own person or against those which are Commissionated by him And this Position Taking Arms by the Kings Authority against his person disclaimed exposing the sacred person of the King to the highest danger and being against the safety of his Life and Crown is justly declared to be traiterous and it standeth chargeable with these enormities 2. First It is so unreasonable as to be against the common sense of Mankind Would it not look strange and be accounted a prodigious thing to see a Company of Children or Servants beat and abuse the person of their Father or Master dispossess him by violence and possibly at last to confine and murder him and yet to expect that all men should believe they did this for the preservation of his Right and Government and in obedience to his Authority yea though he plainly declared and protested against these things as being heinously injurious and unnatural And it is no less unaccountable to pretend the Kings Authority Judic Univers Oxon de foedere p. 66. for taking Armes against his person This is as it hath been expressed a like contradiction in sense reason and polity as Transubstantiation is in Religion both which must suppose such a presence as is impossible to be there and is contrary to the plainest evidence This pretence of the Kings Authority against his person was hatched under the Romish Territories and made use of in the Holy League of France In the Guisian attempts against Henry the Third Hist of Civil Wars of France l. 5. an 1588. it hath been related as a matter of wonder to the common sense of men that they should besiege the Loure where the King was and yet this should pass under the disguise of obeying the King and defending the King and Country That the name of the King doth denote the royal person who governeth is the general apprehension of Mankind And it is vainly pretended that all the proceedings of justice being always in the Kings name and by his Authority when many of them are not particularly known to his person must require the forming such a legal Idea or Notion of the King as is distinct from his person but this supposeth the Soveraign Authority to be in his Royal person under whom and from whom other Ministers of Justice do execute their several Offices As when any man intrusts another to manage any part of his business and affairs in his name and by his Authority this doth not make the man who commits the trust to become an Idea or Notion distinct from himself or his person 3. Secondly This strained perverting of plain sense in this particular is not only against the security of the King but may upon the same foundation become fatal to the lives of the subjects Manual concerning some priviledges of Parl. p. 16 17 and p. 60. For whereas some who managed this conceit did assert in plain words that even the Statutes which condemned treason against the King had respect to the King in this Novel Idea as intending thereby the Laws and the Kings Courts of Justice it is easy to discern that any subjects who
shall stand in the way of such an ill-designing party of men or shall displease them may easily be charged with treason and thereby be cut off upon pretence of opposing the Laws and Government when the very discharge of honesty and integrity may be so accounted 4. Thirdly They who made use of this Position did give the World sufficient proof that it was only a designed pretence to serve a present turn For when in our late sad commotions they used the Plea of the Kings Authority in acting against his person before they had murthered his person they then laid aside also all pretence of reverent regard to the Kings Authority and by several Acts as they were called Acts May 19. 1649. and of Treason July 17. 1649. declare the supreme authority of England to be in the Commons not at all regarding this Ideal Authority of the King which if they had been true to their own notion must have been acknowledged still remaining And they then required the Engagement to be taken to be true and faithful not to the Kings Laws and Government according to their own Idea but to the Common-wealth of England without King c. Which is evidence enough that those men intended as much to act against and oppose the true Regal dignity and authority as the person of that excellent Prince and that this distinction was not only void of truth and justice in it self but of honesty and good meaning also in these contriving men who were the maintainers of it 5. The last part of this Clause of the acknowledgment Taking Arms against them who are Commissionated by the King unlawful hath respect to them who are commissionated by the King the sense of which must be measured from the intent and tendency thereof which is to secure the Kings safety and Government and to maintain the Subjects true allegiance and fidelity And therefore I doubt not to aver that the use of quirks and niceties Manual p. 102. in supposing some extraordinary Cases which are inconsistent with these duties and which we may well presume or hope may never be in act ought not to be considered in making this acknowledgment Wherefore to supppose that the person of any King of England should be violently surprized and seised by any seditious and ill-designing men which I trust will never come to pass and they should by force or fraud extort Commissions from him against his loyal Subjects and Friends this acknowledgment concerning the ordinary duty of Subjects doth not take in such extraordinary fictions of imaginary Cases which are not fit to be supposed but they who are the Kings regular Officers ought to resist such evil men who offer violence to his person for the good both of the King and Kingdom 6. And also that Case which some put of the King granting a Commission against the legal power which he hath committed to a Sheriff or against any other Commission which himself hath given and doth continue to other Officers is such an unreasonable and undutiful supposition of cross Commissions which no good subject ought to make or to consider in this acknowledgment Only in such an extraordinary Case where any persons whosoever in any Office or Commission shall become Authors or Abetters of Sedition or Robellion and oppose the Kings Authority and Government it is reasonable to be expected that the King will grant Commissions to suppress and reduce them And since no Office or Commission either can or is intended to warrant any man to act against his Loyalty and Allegiance such revolting Officers ought to be opposed by them who are impowered and commanded by their Prince so to do nor is it to be supposed that this acknowledgment doth at all assert the contrary But the true sense of this clause is that it is a traiterous design and therefore to be abhorred for the Kings Subjects without any command from their Prince to take Arms against those who act by vertue and in pursuance of his Commission regularly granted to them And that these words of this acknowledgment may be reasonably taken in this fair and just sense is evident from the result of what I have above discoursed B. 1. Ch. 6. Sect. 1. concerning the sense and interpretation of such publick Declarations 7. And it was reasonable for the avoiding evasions that this acknowledgment condemning the taking Armes against them who are Commissionated by the King should be declared in such general termes If only taking Armes against the Kings person should be disclaimed in a strict sense then the fighting the Kings Armies destroying his Subjects resisting his Government and those who are invested with his Authority which are the usual methods of the most open and daring Enemies would not be provided against But these are the highest oppositions against the King which the most disloyal Subjects can ordinarily make by taking up Armes who cannot probably act immediately against his person unless they can first vanquish those loyal subjects who are his strength and defence Fourth Sermon before King Edw. 6. Bishop Latimer tells us that when he was in the Tower a Lord who had been engaged in Rebellion told him If I had seen my Soveraign Lord in the Field against us I would have lighted from my Horse and taken my Sword by the point and yielded it into his hands To whom the Bishop replied It hath been the cast of all Traitors to pretend nothing against the Kings person subjects may not resist any Magistrate nor do any thing contrary to the Kings Law And the Imperial Law declares that all and every of them are Rebels or Traitors who in any wise publickly or secretly Extravag Henr. 7. Tit. 2. do the works of Rebellion against our honour or their fealty and do enterprise any thing against the welfare of our Empire contra nos seu officiales nostros in iis quae ad commissum eis officium pertinent rebellando by rebelling or taking Arms against us or our Officers in those things which belong to the office committed to them CHAP. II. The Laws of Nature and of general Equity and the right grounds of humane polity do condemn all subjects taking Armes against the Soveraign power SECT I. The preservation of peace and common rights will not allow Armes to be taken in a Kingdom against the Soveraign Prince and Governour Sect. 1 1. THose Laws do carry along with them the strongest obligation which are not only established by a positive constitution but are also inforced by the common and necessary Rules of justice truth righteousness and order Rules of common equity are against Subjects taking Arms. Bishop Ferne Episcop and Presbyter considered For here is a joint tye from the Bond of obedience to Superiours of Religion to God and of the general Principles of equity and reason Of this nature is the duty of non-resistance against Soveraign Rulers which our Laws establish And the doctrine of our Church doth
own those Rebels for the people of the Lord charge Moses and Aaron as being guilty of their blood and again gather themselves together against them v. 41 42. And as S. Austin conceives sutably to the tumultuous violence of their Spirits they came with a resolution of putting them to death Aug. de mirabil S. Scriptur l. 1. c. 30. saith he Totus populus contra Moysem Aaron ut sanguinis reos consurrexit eosque in eorundem ultionem occidere voluit And all these transactions are the more to be admired because they presently succeeded after that sad threatning and the Plague therewith that their Carcases should fall in the Wilderness and not enter into the Land of Canaan Num. 14.29 30 37. which judgment was denounced against them in part because they would forsake Moses and chuse them another Captain to return to Egypt Num. 14.4 Ant. Jud. l. 3. c. 13. and did then as Jo sephus expresseth it revile and conspire against Moses and Aaron And if under so excellent a Governour who had so highly obliged Israel and done so much good for them there were such dangerous consequences from the people or men of a popular strain exercising a power of judging concerning a Case fit to warrant a forcible resistance this must needs be a destructive principle if allowed under the best Government in the World This gave birth to so bad an undertaking as that of Corah which was an enterprise to heinous Sanhedrin c. 11. that besides the severe censures of the Scripture the Jewish Talmud reckons up the managers thereof amongst them who shall have no portion in the life to come 7. And in the time of David The other instance I shall give is in the Government of David He was peculiarly chosen of God to rule Israel and known so to be he was a man after Gods own heart and in his Government over Israel he fed or ruled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 them according to the integrity of his heart and guided them by the skilfulness of his hands Ps 78.72 He was also so potent and victorious over all his Enemies and by reason hereof Israel in his time was so renowned that Maimonides saith their Consistories would not receive Proselytes in his Reign because they supposed it was the fare of his power Maim in Inure Biah which induced them to pretend respect to the worship of the God of Israel Yet Absalom by a popular carriage and infinuating words soon perswaded the people they were greatly injured under the Government of David and that no justice could be had 2 Sam. 15.3 4. Josep Ant. l 7. c. 8. And Josephus declares he complained much of the Kings Officers that there were no good Counsellers about him And hereupon almost all the Kingdom of Israel join themselves with Absalom again2t David 2 Sam. 15.12 13 14. Ch. 16.18 Ch. 18.6 and their Elders with them Ch. 17.15 8. And though this wicked attempt of Absalom was defeated and no less than twenty thousand men slain therein in one day yet while the people in their discontent and passion took to themselves a liberty to take Armes as they thought fit it is remarkably observable that no sooner was this rebellion after Absalom over but upon some hot words between the men of Judah and the men of Israel concerning the manner of their performing their duty to the King 2 Sam. 20 2. every man of Israel went up from David and followed Sheba in a new Rebellion And though Davids Conquests had been very great over many Nations which some of the ancient Greek Historians gave an account of as was observed by Eusebius for Eupolemus neither the splendour of his Kingdom nor the sense of their duty Eus Praep. Evang. l. 9. c. 30. nor the bitter effects of their former Conspiracy nor the Kings Kindness in receiving them again into his favour could contain them under the bond of obedience and in the paths of Peace 9. Now all this will manifest how extremely unsetled any Government in the World must be and therein the authority of executing justice preserving peace and conserving all rights and properties if it be once admitted that Subjects when they shall judge it a Case of necessity for the preservation of the common good may take Armes against their Soveraign And therefore for the Securing peace and righteousness and the common rights and interests of all men it must be acknowledged that the supreme Governour hath such an authority that it is not lawful to take up Armes against him 10. The sense of Grotius concerning Subjects taking Arms. Besides these instances I shall add the judgment of the learned Grotius after his long and more mature consideration of things That worthy man in his Book de Jure Belli pacis and in another Discourse written in his younger time did make use of some unmeet expressions and notions and unsound arguments too much tending to infringe the Authority of Kings and to allow a power in the people in some Cases of making War against them But though he did not expresly retract and alter those things yet in his Writings which he published after a greater experience of the World he wrote at another rate and falls in directly with what I have not asserted Grot. in Mat. 26.52 Thus in his Commentaries upon S. Matthew he saith If it be once admitted that private persons being injuriously dealt with by the Magistrate may make forcible resistance all places would be full of tumults there would be no force or authority of Laws or Judicatures since there is no man who is not enclined to favour himself 11. And in his Votum pro pace Vot pro Pac. ad Art 16. after he had passionately complained of Armes being taken upon the pretext of Religion he goes on Ego vero non tantum subditos ab armis arceo c. But I do not only forbid Subjects from taking Armes but desire that Kings who have that power given to them would use it as feldom as may be Ibid. After this Grotius relateth at large and with approbation the proceedings of the University of Oxford about Paraeus upon the Romans with his allowance also of this their determination Subditos nullo modo vi armis Regi vel Principi suo resistere debere nec illis arma vel offensiva vel defensiva in cansa Religionis vel alia re quàcunque contra Regem vel Principem saum capessere debere That Subjects ought by no means to resist their King or Prince by force nor ought they to take either offensive or defensive Armes against their King or Prince Ibid. for the cause of Religion or for any other thing whatsoever And then asserting the generall rule of S. Paul even against the Cases excepted by Paraeus that whosoever resisteth the power receiveth to himself damnation he addeth If so many Exceptions of Paraeux i. e. underminings of S.
Pauls rule be admitted dico nullum imperium diutins in tuto fore quàm donec talia sentientibus vires defuerint I affirm that no Government can be any longer safe than whilst those who have such sentiments want strength And from hence it is manifest that Grotius in his elder time did disallow all Subjects taking Armes against their King and accounted it wholly inconsistent with the peace safety and Government of the World 12. The Royal Authority a legal right as well as the Subjects property And since it is part of the Kings Royalty according to the Laws of this Realm that none may take Armes against him Sect. 2 all Subjects who expect to enjoy their own legal rights are obliged to maintain this right of the King by that great rule of Righteousness and Religion as ye would that men should do unto you do ye also unto them likewise Luk. 6.31 And this also is included in the Oath of Supremacy wherein Subjects swear to maintain all Authorities granted or belonging to the Kings Highness his Heirs and Successors or united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of this Realm V. Sanders de obligat Consc Prael 10. And it is against all pretence of Reason that the rights of Superiours which are the greatest and on which all inferiour rights have dependance should be least regarded as if it were fit that the interest of a Child or Servant should be preserved and not those of a Father or a Master SECT II. Rights and properties of Subjects may be secured without allowing them to take Armes against their Prince 1. It must here be considered as an objection and seeming difficulty that since it is greatly necessary to the good of the World that the just properties of subjects be defended if it be once granted that they may in no Case take Armes against their Soveraign how can these properties be secured may they not then be exposed to irreparable injuries and the utmost pressures and if a Prince will exercise an unlimited power where is there help and redress Now in answer to this I premise that the principal care which must be taken for providing for the preservation of the rights of subjects is not on that part which concerns the defending them against their Prince but rather against the violence of other injurious persons which is done by the great Authority of Government and the due execution thereof For as in a Family the main thing designed in the Government thereof is not that Children may be secured from receiving any injury from their Father The Authority of Rulers is the defence of the people and their jecurity but rather that for their own quiet and good order at home and their honour and safety abroad they submit without gain-saying and resistance to his Government and thereby receive protection from the injurious dealings of others so Gods providence for preventing the greatest dangers of violence of men one towards another hath established the Authority of Rulers as a defence against them Rutherf of Civil Policy Qu. 9. And therefore such such persons who say a people cannot so readily destroy themselves viz. if they have no Governour or cast him off as one man may speak falsly and rashly against the wisdom of God and his Ordinance and against the common sense of the World as if Rulers were not Ministers of God for good to men and as if it would be better for the World to be without them whom all Nations have found necessary and consequently without peace order and justice 2. And as the Governours men live under The security for the Subjects rights are their defence from the violence and injuries which may be sustained from other men so there is great security for Subjects without their taking Armes that their rights and properties shall not be violated by their Prince which I shall manifest with a particular respect to our English Government Now amongst the ground of this security the Principles of Conscience which lay a great and moral obligation upon the greatest persons in the World not to be injurious to the meanest and the watchful providence of God who unless it be for the punishment of the grievous sins of a people doth not suffer them to be afflicted and oppressed are considerations which are not in this Case to be over-looked But there are two thins which I shall chiefly insist upon 3. From the Laws they have the security of good and wholsome Laws fixed with us by general accord of King Lords and Commons And that Laws were originally established that right and justice might thereby be impartially administred to every man Cic. de Offic l. 3. de leg l. 4. is reasonably declared by Cicero And it is a great priviledge in this Realm that both civil rights and matters of Religion are established by our Laws and that no Law can be made or repealed nor publick moneys raised but by consent of the Commons by their representatives And somewhat a like form for the Enacting Laws was resolved on a most Excellent method Cod. l. 1. Tit. 16. leg 8. by the Emperour Theodosius And since no design can be managed to defeat legal rights but the instruments therein must be private persons every one of these may be called to an account and suffer their deserved punishment by the justice of the Law And this is a like security to that which may be had against the meanest Subject in the Realm if he be the stronger man or get an advantage whereby he is able to do another a mischief And it is here worthy to be noted that whereas many plausible notions and pretences when they are reduced into practice fall short of accomplishing what was expected by their proposal in the Theory the benefit of the protection which Subjects enjoy from the Law is such that for divers Ages past in many hundred years the general rights and properties of the people of England legally established have thereby been excellently preserved And the like may be asserted concerning many other parts of the World and therefore they who will dispute against this provision must dispute also against the evidence of sense and of a long continued experience 4. But because jealous and suspicious minds may possibly suppose that at one time or other a Prince having the authority of administring justice and appointing Judges and Officers in his Kingdom may design to destroy his Subjects rights and property and thereby the fruitful inclosures of their civil interests may be laid wast and all respect to Laws utterly laid aside I shall take these suspicious jealousies into consideration And here we must all grant Naz. Orat. 19. that the state of this present World is such that at the best it is not above all instability uncertainty and danger And I shall in the next Section shew that there is much more cause of jealous fears of Subjects losing their legal rights by
granting than by denying them liberty to take Armes But I here desire the Reader impartially to consider that there are as great improbabilities of any such Case as is proposed ever happening under any Prince who hath a just right to the Crown as things of this World can admit and if any such should possibly happen the second consideration which I shall propose for the Subjects security will shew a way of help and redress therein 5. How little foundation there is for nourishing the jealousies expressed in this supposition may in part be discerned by looking backwards And in turning over the Annal and Chronicles of many Ages no such thing doth appear to have been undertaken by any English Monarch to enervate and make void the force of all laws and the rights founded upon them And the most that was ever done to this purpose was by them who under a pretence of liberty did take Arms against the King or forcibly prosecuted an opposition to his Government and Authority when great numbers were illegally deprived of their Lives or Estates sequestred decimated and suffered many other injuries 6. But if we look forward no such supposition can be admitted but it must require a Concurrence of all these strange things 1. That all the subordinate Rulers and Ministers of justice in the Realm must conspire against their Consciences the Law and their Oaths either out of choice or fear to pervert justice and to cast off all pious sense of God thereby and all care of their own Souls 2. That such a Prince must have no respect either to God or to his own interest and honour abroad or safety at home which under God consisteth in the flourishing estate and good affection of his Subjects For where Laws are in any high measure violated and prostituted by the Governours and general injuries thereby sustained by the Subjects since Mankind is not only led by respect to duty but also to advantage Aurel. Vict. in Nerone Suet. in Nerone n. 47. Tacit. Hist l. 1. such Subjects may be backward in defending that Prince against those who oppose him which was the Case in which Nero was generally forsaken by his Roman Subjects and put upon destroying himself to avoid that shameful death to which he was sentenced by the Senate Yea such a Prince hath great reason to stand in fear to his own Confidents and instruments for since they must be men of no Conscience and fidelity towards God it may well be expected according to the determination of Constantius the Elder Eus de Vit. Const l. 1. c. 11. that they will also prove unfaithful to their Prince if they can thereby propose a way to advance or better themselves And such instruments may see cause to nourish fears that where injustice violence and cruelty are frequently exercised they may upon slight occasions expect a time when their turn to suffer their part will be the next and this was the occasion of the Death of Commodus the Roman Emperour Herodian l. 1. who was first poysoned and then strangled by the contrivance of some who had been his great Favourites that they might secure their own live which they discovered were suddenly like to be taken away And from this it may appear that there was just reason for that observation of Xenophon Xenop de Regn. p. 911. that tyrannical Governours are under greater terrours and have more reason of fears at all times than men ordinarily have in War because they have not only reason to be afraid of their professed Enemies but of those whom they account their friends and defence And Hieronymus Osorius observeth not without reason Osor de Reg. Instit l. 8. that in such persons the stings and frequent lashes of their own Consciences and some inward though unwilling dread of God besides other fears and jealousies make their state sad and miserable Wherefore though Vsurpers having no right may account in their best and safest contrivance to lay their foundation in force and violence until they think themselves otherwise secure this is so greatly opposite to the interest of a rightful Prince that if he be a person of any reason in the World he must needs reject it 3. It must also be supposed that all those who act as instruments in such oppressions must be devoid not only of the sense of God and good Conscience but also of humane cautionsness For if such an imaginary Prince shall have his Conscience awakened to repentance or shall consult his own honour or else shall end his dayes as his breath is in his Nostrills all such persons are then accountable to the strict judgment of the Law and being Enemies to the publick good have little reason to expect favour 7. The security of Subjects from Gods governing the World The other ground of subjects security though they may not take Armes against their Soveraign is from God being the Judge and Governour of the World Shall it be thought a sufficient restraint to the exorbitancy of a Fathers power over his Children that if he becomes unnatural the earthly judge can both vindicate them and punish him though Children be not allowed when they think fit to beat and kill their Father and shall not the judgment and authority of God over Princes be thought valuable and considerable though he is more righteous and more able to help the oppressed than any Judge upon Earth And the judgments of God have been especially remarkable in the World against such Princes as have either designed the subverting the Laws of common righteousness or have set themselves in defiance against the true Religion and worship of God Socr. l. 3. c. 21. gr Theodor. l. 3. c. 20. Sozom. l. 6. c. 1 2. Naz. Orat. 4 21. The Ecclesiastical Historians and Fathers who write of the Death of Julian which was in the second year of his Reign in his Expedition against the Persians do all agree that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or divine vengeance ordered his Death and that he who did effect it whether Man Angel or Devil for by several Writers it hath been referred to all of these was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one subservient to the divine pleasure And some of these Writers say that himself dying did express so much Hieron ad Heliodor c. 8. and S. Hierome declareth Christum sensit in Media quem primum in Gallia denegârat 8. When the horrid impieties against the God of Israel and dreadful cruelties against the Jews of Antiochus Epiphanes a puissant Prince had increased to a strange height he was at last upon a defeat given to his enterprises struck even to death with inward terrour and the affrighting perplexities of his own Conscience And he then could not but acknowledge that his own injustice and cruelty and his profaning the Temple 1 Mac. 6.8 13. were the causes which brought upon him this sad trouble and forrow adding with respect thereunto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
subject either to kill him or to take away his goods potest civis ille vim vi repellendo eum interimere that subject in repelling force by force may kill him 2. Now this disorderly and unruly management of self defence would fill the World with tumults and subvert the foundations of its Peace and Government since by this means the power of the sword would be put into every private mans hand to use it against his Governours when he shall think it fit for his own interest But that the falshood as well as the danger of this pretence may be manifest I shall return an answer thereto in three heads 1. That it is notoriously false that men are obliged by the law of nature in all Cases to defend their own lives and outward interests by force And it is a sufficient prejudice against this that he who will maintain it must acknowledge that all those who died Martyrs for the Christian Religion did violate the Laws of nature in not resisting their Persecutors and that all malefactors ought to fight for their lives rather than to submit themselves to justice The prime laws of nature to rational beings are the rules of good Conscience 2. That the prime law which the nature and being of man who is a rational Creature and capable of happiness doth oblige him to observe is that he ought to take care of his own welfare and chief good and to endeavour after true perfection And because this is chiefly procured by well doing therefore to be pious and sober loyal and peaceable just and good whereby purity of heart and integrity and peace of Conscience is preserved and a good name here and a blessed state hereafter obtained these are the things which our nature and being and our Religion also oblige us principally to design and all outward interests of this life must be placed in subordination to them And sure no Christian will believe that our Saviour by his Religion did subvert the prime laws of our nature and being when he required his Disciples to take up the Cross to be ready to lose their lives for his sake and to forsake all and follow him 3. That self defence is then only lawful to be managed by force when this may be done by lawful means and without transgressing any necessary duty to God or Man It is therefore justly allowed so far as it necessary against private violence and assaults being then warrantable by the Rules of right reason and good Conscience which are the laws of our nature But to allow a right of self-defence to every man by taking Armes against his superiour is as much as to say that no man is bound to own the Ordinance of God in the World or to submit himself and his interest to be governed by any civil power 3. It is also urged Rutherf ubi sup Qu. 25. Jun. Brut. Qu. 3. p. 110. c. that in the Constitution of Government Princes are appointed for this end to wit the good of the people and therefore the peoples good is to be pursued though against the person or Government of the Prince and they most comply with the great end of Government who will take care of the community Armin. Disp publ Thes 25. n. 10. And therefore if a Prince do not promote the peoples good the end must be preferred before the means and the good of the Common-wealth is otherwise to be provided for Of the end of Government Anbs 1. That though the good of the people be a great end of Government yet it is not the sole end thereof But as when a Prince appointeth a chief Officer of a Corporation this is not only for the benefit of the members of that Society but it is also intended that they may be more useful to do the King service and that the Common-wealth may receive benefit thereby so in Soveraignty there is a claim of Gods authority in the World for his honour and therefore out of Conscience and duty to God there must be a subjection shewed to Rulers as his Ministers besides what the interest of the community will require 2. If Government were wholly intended with respect to the good of subjects I have proved in the former Sections that order peace and justice cannot be thereby established among men unless it be acknowledged that none may resist the Rulers Authority 3. To lay down such Rules that men are no longer obliged to observe any constitution intended for a further end than as the parties concerned shall judge it to conduce to that end is dangerous and unsound By this rule discontented persons might break the indissoluble bond of conjugal Relation where they account it not to answer the end by mutual helpfulness and comfort Gemer in Sanhedr Cap. 2. Par. 11. And when God forbad the King of Israel to multiply Wives lest his heart should turn away from God Deut. 17.17 the Jewish Writers account Salomon justly blameable for his multiplying Wives though he mightpresume there would be no danger of his forsaking God thereby 4. Of the original of Government being from the people Sov power of Parl. Part. 1. p. 35 36. Ruth Civ Pol. Qu. 4. p. 10. Qu. 19. p. 148. This asserted by many Papists But thee is another thing which hath been much insisted on and will require a larger Examination concerning the original of Soveraignty and the deductions which may be made from thence It was urged in our late unhappy times in England that the Soveraign power was more in the people than in the King or Prince who was originally created by them And in Scotland it was asserted then as a ground of taking Arms against the King that Royal power was radically in the people was communicated from them and that they may take it again if the conditions on which they gave it be violated and that the people being the fountain power are still superiour to the King 5. V. Bannes in 2. 2ae Qu. 40. Art 1. Dub. 2. And it is ordinary with the Writers of the Romish Church to make the people the original of the Princes Soveraign power and many of them make use of this Assertion as one way to shew the excellency of the Pope above Princes Thus Salmeron Salm. Tom. 12. Tract 63. Civil power saith he is indeed from God so far as he made the community free and gave them light and power to set up Governours and therefore secular power doth not so descend from Heaven but that it rather ascends from the community unto the King or other chief Magistrate Dominicus Soto asserts De Justit Jur. l. 4. Qu. 4. Art 2. Reges à suis Regnis potestatem recipiunt Kings receive their power from their Kingdoms Bell. de Laicis c. 6. Bellarmine asserteth indeed political powder and Government to be from God but that he gave it immediately to the whole multitude and they transfer it to
Grotius in his Book De Jure Belli pacis should assert that men at the first did join themselves together in Civil Society non Dei praecepto sed sponte not by any command of God but of their own choice and that hence civil power hath its original which Peter therefore calls an humane ordinance and that it is also called an Ordinance of God because God approved the wholesome institution of men And upon this Principle he thinks it may be questioned whether the people ever intended to excluded themselves from a power of taking Armes in all Cases And therefore without all distinction of Cases he there is not willing to condemn their resisting their Governour But I think it needful to do him so much right as to observe that this was not his constant and fixed sense and judgment For concerning the original of Authority he in another place declares this to be the doctrine of S. Paul Grot. in Rom. 13.1 that there are now no Empires but where God gives to them his authority even as a King gives Authority to his Presidents and he also affirms that in all Governments the Authority is received from God non minus quàm si reges illi per Prophei as uncti essent as much as if those Kings had been anointed by Prophets 10. And when S. Peter requires submission to every ordinance of man for the Lords sake Grot. in 1 Pet. 2.13 Grotius in his Annotations thinks him to intend ordinationem istam quae inter homines in terra agentes locum habet that ordinance which hath place amongst men which Exposition hath this advantage of the other that according to it a good account may be given of the Apostles argument or motive injoining submission for the Lords sake For this must infer that those men who govern in the World do not act only by an humane right since if Government were not by Gods authority and constitution obedience to it could not bear a respect to God himself And touching the unlawfulness of forcible resistance of Governours besides the plain and full expressions I have above produced from Grotius Sect. 1 he in another Treatise asserts that violent defence which is lawful against an equal is unlawful against a superiour Gr. de Imp. Sum. Pot. Cap. 3. n. 6. and he judgeth that the law of nature will not allow this no not for self-preservation But saith he this is more plainly demonstrated from the written law of God for when Christ said he that takes the Sword shall perish by the Sword he expresly disallows that defence which is made by force against the most unjust but publick violence diserte improbat eam defensionem quae vi fiat contra vim injustissimam sed publicam 11. Now it may be a just prejudice against this assertion Vnreasonable inferences from this unsound foundation V. Jun. Brut. Qu. 3. p. 91. De Jure Magistr c. 6. of Soveraignty being derived from the people that according to these various Proposals it may become dangerous to the settlement of the World But withal their way of arguing who pretend that the people who make the Prince have therefore a power reserved to themselves greater than his is a kind of contradiction to it self as if they who give up their power should by that means have the greater power and they who receive authority should thereby have the less This is such a fond argument as would prove all servants by contract to be superiour of their Masters because by their contract they made them their Masters or that those Countries who became subject and tributary to the Roman Empire or any other had a superiority over that Empire because their becoming subject to it was hat which made its Dominion so large and eminent And concerning that supposition that possibly the people might not intend to deprive themselves of all power of resistance with respect to this Kingdom V. Ch. 1. it is evident from the plain expressions of our Statute Laws above produced that the Subjects did intend to reject all power of resistance And yet they who enter into any relation by their own contract do stand obliged from the nature of that relation and the Laws that God hath established concerning it and not only from their own intention Thus the contracting to become a Wife or a Servant intending to be so to a kind and courteous man doth not hinder the continuance of the bond in these relations and the obligation to the duties thereof though this man contrary to their expectation may prove ill-natured and froward And what I have discoursed in the beginning of this Chapter will evidence that even they who will assert Soveraignty to be of a mere humane original must acknowledge that the rejecting of all forcible resistance against it is necessary to the peace and welfare of the World and therefore this must be intended by the wiser part of Mankind Sect. 5 SECT V. The Divine original of Soveraign Power asserted 1. Soveraignty and rule proved to be the constitution of God By rational evidence That Government and its Authority is originally the constitution of God may receive considerable proof from rational evidence supposing Creation and Providence to be acknowledged For since God is the Lord of the whole Earth he hath a right to govern it and it is in his power to appoint Rulers and Magistrates and to command subjection to them and whosoever besides God shall undertake to confer a power to rule the World as if it were originally derived from themselves do thereby put themselves upon the disposing of Gods right It was owned by the Ancient Poets as Homer and Hesiod Hom. Il. ae Hes Theogon in init Synes de Regno that Kings are from God In Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Hesiod saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Synesius observed that it was said by Plato 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Royalty was a good thing from God among men And in the Book of Wisdom Wisd 6.4 5. both the Authority of Kings is asserted to be from God and that themselves also are Gods Ministers 2. And it may well seem a strange thing that God who not only gave a being to all other parts of his Creation but framed them in an excellent and beautiful order and made the Sun to rule by Day and gave Man dominion over other lower parts of his Creation should leave Mankind only which is so excellent a being without taking any order for that useful and regular publick Society which is both suitable and beneficial to humane nature And it is yet far more unlikely that he who is the God of Order should for the peace and good of lesser Societies in private Families ordain the Authority of Parents over their Children and the Headship of the Husband over the Wife and yet should leave the more general and publick state of Mankind which is of greatest concernment in an
unsetled ungoverned confusion It would be also a reflexion upon the goodness of God to imagine that it was not his will that justice should be administred and viciousness punished among men that peace should not be preserved and goodness encouraged in the World and it would be a disparagement to his wisdom to conceive that he should appoint all these things to be done whilst he committeth no power or authority to any person or order of men to take care of them 3. By the testimony of the Scriptures But the express testimonies of the holy Scripture put this matter out of doubt There Governours as having Gods Authority are stiled Gods and Children of the most high Ps 82.6 And besides the Government of Israel which was evidently established by Gods appointment which was the reason why David so much reverenced Saul as being the Lords anointed we are told Pr. 8.15 16. By me Kings reign and Princes decree justice by me Princes rule and Nobles even all the Judges of the Earth And God declared by Jeremy Jer. 27.5 6. I have made the Earth and have given it to whom it seemed meet unto me and now have I given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the King of Babylon my servant Cyrus also was called the Lords Shepherd Is 44.28 Princes being oft stiled Shepherds because their Office and Government is thereby much resembled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Basil and the Hebrew word for a Shepherd is sometimes rendred in the Chaldee Paraphrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Prince or Governour he was also called the Lords anointed Is 45.1 And Daniel tells Nebuchadnezzar that God setteth up Kings Dan. 2.21 and that the God of Heaven had given him a Kingdom v. 37. S. Paul also declares that there is no power but of God and the powers that be are ordained of God Rom. 13.1 And he stileth the power the ordinance of God v. 2. and the Ruler the Minister of God v. 4. 4. By the sense of the ancient Church The ancient Christian Church even when they were under persecution by the Roman Emperours did yet constantly acknowledge their Authority to be from God Tert. ad S●●p c. 2. Apol. c. 30. Adv. Hares l. 5. c. 24. Tertullian declares that the Christian knows that the Emperour is constituted by his God And saith he from thence is the Emperour from whence is the man from thence is his power from whence is his spirit And the same sense is expressed by Irenaeus Eus Hist l. 7. c. 11. gr And Dionysius of Alexandria in Eusebius acknowledged that it was God who gave the Empire to Valerian and Galienus The same truth is asserted by S. Aug. de Civ Dei l 5. c. 21. by Epiphanius Haeres 40. and by divers other Christian Writers Bell. in Lib. Recogn de laicis insomuch that when Bellarmine sought for the testimonies of ancient Writers to prove Dominion to be of humane original he could meet with no Theological Writer of the Christian Church who favoured his opinion amongst the Fathers and therefore takes up with Aquinas And Paulus Orosius affirms Oros HIst l. 2. c. 1. Vell. in 4. Tom. Aug. ad 22 Qu. Dc Concord l. 2. c. 2. n. 1 2 3. that all Power and Government is of god is that which they who have not read the Scriptures do think and they who have read them do know And some of the Romish Church speak to this purpose as Vellosillus and especially P. de Marca 5. And now let any equal Reader consider whether the evidence of reason Scripture and the ancient Fathers will agree with that reproachful Position of Hildebrand or Greg. 7. Greg. 7. Epist l. 8. Ep. 21. against God and his Vice-gerents That Kings had their beginning from them who affected rule by the instigation of the Devil But they all tend to confirm what hath been asserted in our church Can. 1. 1640. That the most high and sacred order of Kings is of divine right being the ordinance of God himself founded in the prime laws of nature and clearly established by express Texts both of the Old and New Testaments 6. And the nature of the Rulers power And from the nature of this Authority will further speaks its Constitution to be from God He is to judge the people but God being the judge of all the earth all acts of judgment are declared to be not for men but for the Lord 2 Chr. 19.6 and therefore must be performed by an Authority derived from him And the punishment inflicted by Governours is an act of vengeance or revenging and therefore as vengeance or revenging 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is claimed by God himself as peculiarly belonging to him Rom. 12.19 vengeance is mine so the Ruler as the Minister of God is made an Executor of Vengeance or a Revenger 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 13.4 which must be by Gods Authority derived to him And since the Ruler who bears the Sword hath an Authority of Life and Death this could not be derived to him from the community since no man hath such a Dominion over his own Life as to have a power to take away his Life Lessius de Just Jur. l. 2. c. 4. dub 10. M. Becan de Jur. c. 4. q. 1. as hath been truly asserted by Schoolmen and others and therefore cannot transfer such a power to any other person And therefore this Authority of Governours must be received from God who is Lord of life and death 7. Objections answered Having proved the Authority of Governours to be of a divine extract I shall now shew that the various pretences for founding it in the consent of men are of very little weight From the Election of some Princes It is confessed that there are elective Kingdoms and Empires in the World and that where there hath been a vacancy of a Governour and none could claim a right of succession Princes have oft been chosen by the people In this Case several Roman Emperours were Elected by their Army and received by the Senate and thus were Gideon Jephtha and other Judges established in Israel But such a liberty of choice in the people in these circumstances carries no opposition to the Authority being from God For the entring into a conjugal Society is by a free choice even so far of choice that many persons if they please may live in celibate and single life whilest men cannot live without Government and yet Matrimony and the Husbands Authority is by divine appointment And Members of a Corporation do usually chuse their chief Magistrate but thought they determine upon the person it is not they but the Princes Charter and Grant that gives him his Authority 8. And they who tell us M. Salamon de princip that Soveraign Authority cannot be a proper divine institution because then its rights would be wholly unalterable and the same in all the Governments in the World do
rely upon a meer fallacy From the different rights of Regality For this Topick would with equal force and evidence prove the paternal right not to be founded in the laws of nature or the institution of God because the authority of the Father and the priviledges of Children are not the same in different parts of the World The Rules of inheriting by the right of devolution in some part of the Low-Countries Go●osred not ad Dig. l. 1. Tit. 6. n. 1. de jure Capp de vor Jephthae Instit l. 1. Tit. 9. and of Gavelkind and some other tenures in England do vary from the more general usage And in many places of the World the Father had Jus vitae neeis and Cappellus asserteth him to have had that power of life and death among the Jews The Institutions of Justinian expresly testify that that right of power which the Roman Fathers had over their Children was that which was proper to the Citizens of Rome and it is there added no other men have that power over their Children which we have Nor will it prove Matrimony to be no institution of God because the priviledges of the Wife are esteemed greater in England than in other Countries and are not the same at the Death of the Husband in the Province of York and the City of London with the other parts of the Kingdom But the truth is in those States or Relations which are fixed by divine institution there are some things so necessary and essential that they cannot be separated from them such are in the Conjugal Relation the Headship of the Husband the ordinary inseparableness of that Society till Death and the performance of Conjugal Duties and such are in the supreme Government the necessary care of justice and the common good and even of matters of Religion and the having a power fitted to these ends and which in pursuance of them may not by inferiours be forcibly resisted But in many other particular things the priviledges of inseriour relations and the dignities and rights of superiours may be greater or less according to what is concluded by their mutual consent 9. The Solemnity of Coronation From the Rites of Coronation when the people acknowledge their King and the King again gives the people assurance that he will preserve their Religion Rights and Laws and govern them according to those Laws is far from intending to express the Kings Authority to be derived from the people by a contract as some have weakly argued For the King is actually King by his right of inheritance and succession upon the Death of his Predecessor antecedently to this Solemnity as our Law-Books do generally acknowledge and Henry the Sixth Reigned divers years in England before he was Crowned Du May 's Estate of the Empire Di●l 2. vers fin Extrav Com. l. 5. Tit. 10. c. 4. And even in Elective Principalities the rights of Soveraignty are invested in the person elected thereto before the Coronation both in the Empire it self and other Dominions But the intent of this Solemnity is that as the Rites of Inauguration in other Magistrates tend to make such impressions in the people as may beget a reverence towards them so the Prince his appearing with splendour to his people doth both excite them to and give them opportunity for publick acknowledgments and expressions of affection and honour towards him and joyful acclamations To this purpose Henry the Third was twice Crowned once in the first year of his Reign Mat. Par. an 1216. where M. Paris treateth De prima Coronatione Regis Henrici and again in his twentieth year as is manifest in the preamble of the Statute of Merton Fullers Hist an 1194. and Richard the First was observed also to have been twice Crowned In like manner David notwithstanding his right by Divine appointment besides his being anointed by Samuel was twice anointed by the people Sed. Olam Rab. c. 13. Joseph Ant. Jud. l. 6. c. 6. And both the Jewish Chronicle and Josephus declare that Saul also was anointed a second time And the kind expressions of the Prince and the assurance that he gives his people that he will govern them by their laws and maintain their Religion and Rights is designed to banish and expel all jealous fears from them and to encrease their affection to him and make their obedience and submission the more ready and chearful by their having security from their Princes reputation honour and integrity that he will intend the preservation of the great things which conduce to their welfare 10. It hath also been objected From the Civil Law Digest l. 1. Tit. 4. n. 1. quod Principi that besides the like expressions in other Law-Books the Civil Law declares Lege Regia quae de ejus Principis imperio lata est populus ei in eum omne suum imperium potestatem confert which words declare that by that Law which was made concerning the Empire of the Prince the people yield to him all their authority and power It also asserteth that Nations were divided and Kingdoms established by the Jus gentium or the Law of Nations Ibid. Tit. 1. n. 5. Ex hoc jurc Ibid. Tit. 1. n. 4. Manumiss Justin Inst l. 1. Tit. 3. and also that liberty is the natural state and servitude is introduced by the Law of Nations Now though it might be said against the force of any such allegations which seem to oppose this truth that the right of God and of his constitution and authority is not to be determined by any humane writings especially if they speak against the Scripture and rational evidence Yet I further observe 1. That the first expression hath respect to the political sanction or establishment of the Civil Government of the Roman Empire and even with respect to the peculiar priviledges of the Emperour himself as having a legislative power in his own breast to which purpose that very law declares Quod Principi placuit legis habet vigorem utpote lege regia quae de ejus imperio c. Novel 73. Novel 85. passim And though these political sanctions be a proper consideration for humane Laws to take notice of yet this hinders not but that there may be a superiour divine constitution of Soveraignty and secular power which also is oft asserted in the Civil Law 2. The following expression doth speak of the like political sanction and doth further acknowledge and assert the bounds and limits of the several Kingdoms and Nations to be established by the Law of Nations jure gentium discretae gentes regna condita 3. That liberty which in the last clause above-cited is declared to be the natural state and the servitude which is there said to be introduced do not respect freedom from Government and Laws but from vasallage which is evident because in the Digests this servitude is said to be discharged by
of God and that they who resist them shall receive to themselves damnation Rom. 13.1 2. the sense of these truths was contained under the acknowledgment which David made in the Old Testament who can stretch forth his hand against the Lords anointed Hom. 1. de Dav. Saul and be guiltless For as S. Chrysostome noted when David declared Saul to be the Lords anointed he did acknowledge him to have Gods Authority and that to resist him was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to fight against God or in the Apostles words to resist the Ordinance of God Aug. Quaest ex Vet. Test c. 35. And S. Austin observing that David called Saul the Lords anointed after the Lord had departed from him he adds that David was not ignorant divinam esse traditionem in officio ordinis Regalis that the royal office was Gods Ordinance and appointment and therefore he both did honour Saul and ought so to do 6. Some possibly may here urge that the Laws and Rules of right and all the Precepts of Religion amongst the Israelites were there established antecedently to the being of the Royal Authority among them and that these things standing by Divine Authority no King had any power to repeal or break them and on this account they might have liberty from the nature of their Constitution to defend these rights by the Sword though Christians have not But even this also will not alter the Case For throughout all the World the common Rules of right and justice have a divine stamp and are of as great Antiquity as the World it self and the nature of man and there is scarce any Kingdom in the World which hath continued without interruption of its succession and establishment so long as the doctrine of Christianity hath been in the World Tert. Ap. c. 4. Cl. Alex. Strom. l. 4. Orig. cont Cel. l. 1. l. 5. l. 8. which peculiarly is from God And however no prescription can be pleaded against the right of God and the Soveraignty of Christ no more than it could be pleaded for the establishment of the Pagan Idolatry in which Case the ancient Christians constantly asserted their duty to God and his Religion to be above that which they owed to the contrary Laws and Constitutions of humane Authority 7. Wherefore it will be of considerable moment clearly to prove that Subjects in the Church of Israel according to the will of God under the Old Testament were not allowed in any such Cases as have been pretended to take Armes against their Soveraign And if this was then unlawful it is now much more so under the dispensation of the Gospel SECT II. The general unlawfulness of Subjects takeing Armes against their Prince under the Old Testament evidenced Sect. 2 1. Because the unlawfulness of Subjects taking Armes against their King Kings under the Old Testament might not be resisted under the Old Testament will receive the fullest evidence from the behaviour of David towards Saul and those principles of duty whereby he was guided I shall pass by many other things with much brevity When Samuel declared the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the manner or as very many Translations render it and the word most frequently signifies V. Vers Vulg. Syr. Arab. Par. Chald. Sept. Barclai adv Monarch l. 2. p. 64. the judgment or right of the King 1 Sam. 8.11 18. and Ch. 10.25 many judicious men with great reason have accounted it to contain this sense that such was the right dignity and authority of their King that though the people might bear and sustain such injuries as are there mentioned Carpzov in Schick Th. 1. p. 1. Th. 7. p. 160. Grot. ubi sup in 1 Sam. 8.11 de Imp. c. 3. n. 6. they had no lawful power of redressing themselves by force but only must apply themselves to God This Grotius in his Annotat. upon that place thus expresseth si peccarent reges graviter in Dei legem ad Deum ultio pertinebat non ad singulos ac ne ad populum quidem And de Imperio summarum potestatum circa sacra he saith Jus regis vocatur quia ita agenti nemini liceret vim ullam opponere And to the like sense Salmasius Defens Reg. c. 2. 2. Salomon perswading to that duty and reverence which Subjects owe to Princes Eccl. 8.2 3. declareth v. 4. where the word of a King is there is power and who may say unto him What dost thou and speaks of the King against whom there is no rising up Prov. 30.31 which words give a fair intimation that the dignity of the King of Israel was such that no opposition or resistance might be made against him by inferiours And when David declared Ps 51.4 Against thee only have I sinned Ambr. Apol Dav. c. 10. S. Ambrose gives this sense thereof That David being King was not subject to the penalties of any humane Laws but the whole punishment of his sin was in the hands of God alone This is owned by Vega Veg. in Ps 4. Poenit. Conc. 2. to be the sense also of S. Hierome Austin Chrysostome and Cassiodorus and he himself gives this as a kind of Paraphrase upon that expression nullum alium praeter te unum in terra superiorem recognosco I acknowledge none other besides thee alone my superiour upon earth And this interpretation was received in the Christian Church as early as the time of Clemens Alexandrinus and though other Expositions also have been given Strom. l. 4. p. 517. this shews what apprehensions these Christian Writers had of the nature of Davids Regal Authority And this hath so much evidence of truth that when Murder and Adultery in inferiour persons was punished by the Judges of Israel according to the Law of Moses Davids judgment must be according as God himself would pronounce and execute And though God so far pardoned David as to spare his life 2 Sam. 12.13 yet his Child must die v. 14. even by the hand of God v. 15 18 22. And God denounced against him that the Sword should not depart from his house v. 10. whereby Amnon Absalom and Adonijah were cut off And the Rebellion of Absalom as a judgment which God inflicted was part of the punishment of this sin v. 11. 3. When there were any corruptions in Religion publickly tolerated as the worshipping in high places and Groves the holy Scriptures lay the blame constantly upon the King and Prince whereas if the people and subjects had the power of defending their Religion and the purity thereof by the Sword the fault would have been equally chargeable upon them under the Government of their Kings For the same pious spirit which would engage a good Prince must also oblige a pious people to make use of their just power for the honour and service of God and if the Case had been lawful it would have been a kind of Martyrdom to hazard or lay down their
to day but I would not stretch forth mine hand against the Lords Anointed And behold as thy life was much set by this day in mine eyes so let my life be much set by in the eyes of the Lord and let him deliver me out of all tribulation 9. When the seventh Psalm was penned whose Title is concerning the words of Cush the Benjamite Chald. Par. Vers Vulg. Grot. Vatabl Munst in loc some ancient Versions expresly refer this to Saul the Son of Kish And many good Expositors do with much reason judge that when David was accused by Saul himself of lying in wait against him 1 Sam. 22.8 and by others of seeking his hurt Ch. 24.9 David in this Psalm under the Conduct of Gods Infallible Spirit declareth His Abhorrence of such things as being very wicked and deserving severe punishment in these words O Lord my God if I have done this if there be iniquity in my hands If I have rewarded evil to him that was at peace with me Yea I have delivered him that without cause was mine Enemy Let the Enemy persecute my Soul and take it c. v. 3 4 5. And even they who rather interpret the Title to relate to the words of Shimei must grant the like sense to be intended in these verses 10. And lest any should think He here acted not the Politician but observed the rules of Conscience Davids expressions and especially his killing the Amalekite to be the actions of a Politician for the better securing his own Government though this be sufficiently refuted in what I have said above I further add 1. That he had plainly declared the Sin and Guiltiness of disloyal Acts of violence at such times when mere Policy if considered as abstract from Duty might have prompted him to free himself from a potent deadly irreconcilable Enemy and thereby to gain the Possession of the Crown 2. That if David had shed the blood of the Amalekite without respect unto justice and only to strike an awe into others whilst he believed he did not deserve death this had been a designedly contrived wilful murder to gratifie his own lust and would have been a sin at least as deeply dyed as the Murder of Vriah which yet with its attendants is accounted the singular stain and blemish in the Life of David 1 Kin. 15.5 And therefore Davids Deportment in things towards Saul was Gr. Nys ubi sup c. 17. as Gr. Nyssen expresseth it because he judged it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an unlawful and unjust thing to have done otherwise and what he said and did was in the fear of God SECT III. Objections from the behaviour of David answered 1. It may be first objected Grot. de J. B. P. l. 1. c. 4. n. 7. Ruth of Civ Pol. Qu. 31. Qu. 10. that Davids Carriage reacheth not so far as to condemn all taking Arms against a Soveraign Prince but only such force where assaults are made or violence offered unto his Person and towards such a Person too who was particularly anointed by Gods especial Command Ans 1. The words of David do indeed directly condemn hostile Acts against the Person of the King But his proceeding upon this ground because Saul was the Lords anointed or one appointed by Gods Authority and invested with his Power David not only repressed violence against the person of Saul but reverenced his authority must also condemn acts of violence against his Power and Authority derived from God 2. Forcible opposing the Kings strength doth naturally tend to expose his Person also to violence for if his strength be subdued what defence remains for his Person against the fury of his Enemies or the rage of Assailants we may learn from the History of our Civil Wars and our late good Soveraign But David whose heart smote him for cutting off the lap of Saul's Garment whereby he might fall under some appearance of dishonour or disgrace would much more avoid what might bring him into real danger And it is very considerable that when David had the opportunity of coming upon Saul and his Army when God had cast them all into a deep sleep he not only spared Sauls Person but did not offer any violence to any single man in the whole Army 1 Sam. 26.7 8 12 16. 2. And 3. there could be nothing more contained under the Rite of anointing by Gods Command than to express in the first fixing a Governour or Government that this was appointed and approved by God Ant. Jud. l. 6. c. 7. To which purpose Josephus who was well acquainted with the sence of the Jewish Phrases doth give such Paraphrases of the Lords anointed as these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one who was by God advanced to the Kingdome and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one ordained of God and in the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to anoint is in 2 Sam. 3.39 rendred by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to constitute And it was not so much the use of any outward anointing by a Prophet or any other as the Authority ordained of God which was chiefly to be considered in them who were acknowledged to be the Lords Anointed Enxt. Lex Rab. in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Schickard de J. R. Heb. c. 1. Theor. 4. Abarb. in Ex. 30. de Unct. c. 8. For Cyrus was called the Lords Anointed though no such Unction was used among the Persians Isai 45.1 And in the Kingdom of Judah Maimonides and other Jewish Writers tell us that no King was anointed who was the Son of a King and came to the Crown by manifest and undoubted Succession and yet these Kings such as Jehosaphat Hezekiah and Josiah were nevertheless to be honoured Only Salomon Joash and Jehoahaz were anointed because of some different claims of succession or interruption of the true right but not by any special divine command But all other Power and Authority as well as that of Saul is ordained of God Rom. 13.1 2. 3. But the chief thing here objected is De jure Magis in subdit qu. 6. that there are appearances of evidence that David did take up Armes against Saul and undertook the defence of himself by force and three things are alledged in proof hereof Grot. ubi sup Quò nisi ad vim arcendam si inferretur The first thing produced is that David was Captain over four hundred men 1 Sam. 22.2 and then over six hundred Ch. 23.13 and a far greater number came to him to Ziklag who were called helpers of the War 〈◊〉 Chr. 12.1 And Mr Rutherford again and again saith Ruth of Civ Pol. Qu. 32. that these Armed men who came to Ziklag came to help David against Saul but the Scripture saith not so Ans 1. David having been a person of chief eminency both in Sauls Court Davids six hundred men not intended to make War against Saul and the Armies of Israel and being Son-in-law to the King and
The truth of what appears concerning Davids intention relating to Keilah is this that David purposed to have made some stay in that place which he had then rescued from their Besiegers the Philistines But understanding that Saul intended to destroy that place if they should harbour him and not seize on him and that they for their own security would hinder his further escape if he should continue there and would lay hold on him and deliver him up to Saul he timely prevented this danger by a speedy removal Ch. 23 7-12 SECT IV. Divers Objections from the Maccabees Zealots Jehu and others answered 1. Among other Objections I shall not need to take notice in this place of the pretences for a constant power among the Jews superiour to the Regal The Romanists indeed are sometimes forward to assert the Priest to have been above the King as Bellarmine affirms Bellarm. do Offic. Princ. c. 4. that after Moses semper praepositus erat Pontifex Principi And others besides those I have before mentioned speak the like of the Synedrial power insomuch that when Grotius did in his Book de Imperio assert some of the pretended Synedrial Authority to have been in truth fixed in the King saying hoc ipsum Synedrii jus regni tempore videtur fuisse penes Reges Blondel in his Scholia upon that place on the contrary asserts Sch. ad Grot. de Imp. S. p. c. 10. n. 17. that this Sanhedrim did judge the King imo de Regibus Synedrium judicavit And if either of these pretences were true it must also be granted that a superiour authority may lawfully make use of force towards an inferiour power when it be necessary so to do B. 1. Ch. 3. But these things are sufficiently refuted in the former Book to which I remit the Reader Sect. 4 and proceed to satisfy other Objections 2. Obj. 1. It is urged Of the wars of the Maccabees that in the Jewish Church Armes might lawfully be taken in the defence of their Religion against their Soveraign from the instance of the Wars of the Maccabees The Maccabees are generally commended and very probably by the Apostle Heb. 11.34 35 37. and by some of the Prophets When Antiochus Epiphanes polluted the Temple and did prostitute the Jewish Religion and Laws and commanded the Jews to offer Sacrifice after the manner of the Heathen Mattathias and his Sons being zealous for the Law took up armes against him 1 Mac. Ch. 1. and Ch. 2. which were chiefly managed after the Fathers Death by Judas Maccabaeus Brut. Vin●● Qu. 2. p. 61. Qu. 3. p. 199. Grot. de J. B. P. l. 1. c. 4. n. 7. Right of Church ch 5. p. 306. This instance is produced by Junius Brutus and Grotius as a lawful War against their lawful Soveraign And of this Case Mr Thornedike hath these words It is manifest that the Armes which the Maccabees took up against Antiochus Epiphanes their lawful Soveraign are approved by God not only as foretold by Daniel and Ezekiel and other Prophets but also because the Apostle manifestly commendeth their faith on the other side it is manifest that they justified their Armes upon the title of Religion Now it is obvious that as this Case stands thus represented it is the very same in which the Primitive Christians refused to make resistance and which Mr Thorndike will not allow under Christianity 3. Answ Antiochus Epiphanes against whom the Maccabees fought was no lawful Soveraign in Judea Grot. ibid. but an invader This assertion is indeed rejected by Grotius pretending that he had the right of succession from the Macedonian power saith he quòd quidem haec arma eo titulo defendunt quasi Antiochus non Rex sed invasor fuerit vanum puto But though there is some difference amongst Historians concerning the division of the Grecian Empire after the death of Alexander I see no reason to doubt of the account given by Josephus concerning Judea He tells us that then Egypt Jos Ant. l. 12. c. 1. Cont. Apion l. 1. and also Judea was under Ptolomaeus the Son of Lagus not Seleucus from whom Antiochus Epiphanes did descend who giving the Jews ample priviledges took of them an Oath of Fidelity to him and his Posterity and that they were then under Ptolomaeus he cites the Testimony also of Agatharcides Cnidius an ancient Historian who wrote the Acts of the Successors of Alexander Antiq. l. 12. c. 3. And Judea continued under the Egyptian Ptolomyes above an hundred years until Antiochus Magnus gained it by Conquest but enjoyed it a little time restoring it as part of the Portion of Cleopatra his Daughter whom he gave in Marriage to Ptolomaeus Epiphanes But this Ptolomy dying Antiochus Epiphanes in the Minority of his son Ptolomaeus Philometor overcame him and being invited by a Seditious party invadeth Judea taketh Jerusalem and exerciseth himself there in cruelty and impiety Josep l. 12. c. 6 7. Prol. de Bel. Jud. And under these circumstances Mattathias and his Son resisted him by War Josep Ant. l. 12. c. 8. de Bel. Jud. l. 1. c. 1 2. 4. Now a violent possession of what he had no just claim to was far from being a Title of right And therefore the Jews might very lawfully endeavour by Arms to recover their rights their Country and the liberty of Religious Worship from the forceable violence of an open Enemy and an invader who had cruelly oppressed them about three years Indeed he is sometime stiled the King being truly King of Syria but by no right King of Judea but other times in the Book of the Maccabees he and his Forces are stiled Enemies 1 Mac. 2.7 9. Ch. 13.51 and the like in Josephus who against Apion declareth that Antiochus came as an Enemy against them who were his Friends and Confederates Cont. Apion l. 2. nos socios amicos aggressus est saith the Latine Translation the ordinary Greek being there defective 5. The Wars of the Judges Of the same nature also were the Wars of Barak against Jabin King of Canaan of Gideon against the Midianites and of Othniel against Cushan Rishathaim King of Mesopotamia and also the acting of Sampson against the Philistines and of Ehud against Eglon. For none of these Princes against whom these Judges took Armes or towards whom they did acts of violence had any just right of Superiority and Soveraignty over Israel but they had injuriously invaded and oppressed them and it is very usual with Scholastick Writers to give the instance of Eglon D. Sot de Just jure l. 5. Qu. 1. Art 3. for one who was Tyrannus titulo or an Usurper having no just Title And besides this since God reserved the disposal of the Government of Israel peculiarly in his own hand Lessius de Just l. 2. c. 9. dub 4. and he raised up and sent all these Judges Jud. 3.9 15. Ch. 4.6 Ch. 6.14 Ch. 13.25 1
Sam. 12.11 and signified this to Barak by a Prophetess and to Gideon by an Angel by this means the Soveraign power so far as concerned the undertaking committed to them was placed in them 6. But it may be further objected The right of Zealots examined that it is declared by very good Authors and men well acquainted with the Jewish State and their Writers that in some cases especially against the practicers of Idolatry private persons out of a zeal for God and Religion might make use of the power of the Sword jure zelotarum following the example of Phinehas Grot. de J. B. P. L 2. c. 20. n. 9. Seld. de Jur. nat Gent. l. 4. c. 3 4 5. de Syned l. 2. c. 14. n. 3. Dr. Ham. Tract of Zealots Right of Ch. Ch. 5. And they who embrace this Notion do not confine this to private cases as if any of the Jews might lawfully kill an Idolater as other persons may do him who makes an actual assault against their King or is an aggressor to design their murder But Grotius Selden Dr Hammond and Mr Thorndike Seem to allow the undertaking of the Maccabees to be grounded upon this right of Zealots And then it must be granted that it might also be lawful for other private persons to take Armes in like cases And there are such instances as these produced to prove this right of Zealots in Phinehas killing Zimri and Cozbi Elijah slaying Baals Priests and calling fire from Heaven on the Captains of the Fifties our Saviours driving the money-Changers out of the Temple and such like besides the actings of the Maccabees Now it might be sufficient to say that if the right of Zealots should be allowed provided it extended it self only to private cases which is as much as any probability of proof can reach the duties of Subjection and the Authority of Government might still possibly remain inviolable But because I am further prone to think that the grounds and instances upon which this whole notion is built are mistaken I shall offer to the Readers consideration these three things with respect thereto 7. First that it must needs be a great disorder in Government and a foundation of much disturbance and evil if every earnest spirited man were allowed in the heat of his zeal to put himself into the place of a Magistrate and to execute judgment of death upon whomsoever he accounted an offender against God and his Religion I acknowledge that in the declining time of the Jewish Government many actions were undertaken only under the pretence of such a zeal which were in truth acts of fury and they were so far from being warrantable that they did abundantly manifest the dangerousness of admitting such pretences Grot. Ham. ubi sup in Act. 7.57 Both Grotius and Dr Hammond account the stoning of St. Steven and the conspiracy of more than forty Jews not to eat or drink till they had slain Paul to be done by the spirit of the Zealots which were things riotous and outragious which may not be justified nor may the like be tolerated under any Government Dr. Ham. in Mat. 10. c. And by the prevalency of this sort of men who were called Zealots there was very much cruelty exercised in Judea many of their Nobles and chief persons were slain Jos de Bel. Jud. l. 6. c. 1. and by Josephus they are accounted to have contributed much to occasion the destruction of Jerusalem But these practices were not regular or guided by any accountable rules but were greatly exorbitant And if private persons taking the Sword and killing those who depraved Religious Worship had been a thing lawful and commendable in the Jewish State upon this right of Zealots It may well be wondred that none of the Prophets did ever put the people upon vindicating their Religion by this Method under those had Kings of Israel or Judah in whose days the worshipping of Baal was openly practised 8. Secondly several worthy actions pretended to be undertaken by the right of Zealots were warranted according to the ordinary rules of Government by other sufficient Authority though a zeal for the Honour of God made the persons more forward and active Such I suppose was the action of Phinehas Numb 25.7 8. in pursuance of Moses his sentence of judgment v. 5. as also the War undertaken by Mattathias and his Sons and Mattathias his killing the Jew who in obedience to the command of Antiochus openly sacrificed according to the manner of the Heathen 1 Mac. 2.23 24 25. For by the same right whereby he might take Armes for his Country and Religion against Antiochus he might also act against those who took part with Antiochus against them 9. Thirdly In the Jewish Common-wealth which was peculiarly ordered by God some Prophets and men extraordinarily inspir'd not other zealous men at large were empowered by Gods Authority to do some extraordinary actions which otherwise had not been warrantable and it is be this special authority of God not by their own zeal only that such things were allowable To this Head may be reduced Samuels and Elijahs sacrificing though they were not Priests Samuels anointing Saul and David and the young Prophet who was sent by Elisha his anointing Jehu 2 Kin. 9.3 6. And of this nature were the actions of Elijah above-mentioned Samuel hewing Agag in pieces and our Saviours driving out of the Temple them who sold Sheep L'Empereur in Midd. c. 2. sect 3. in sciagraphia Templ Oxen and Doves and over-throwing the Tables of the Mony-changers Joh. 2.14.17 Mar. 11.15 For though these things were only done in the remote parts of the utmost Court and with respect to the Sacrifices and Offerings of the Temple they were a profanation of the Temple being managed by the undertakers in that place as a Trade And of this nature was Moses his killing the Egyptian as appears Act. 7.24 25. 10. The instance of Athaliah Of Athaliah being rejected from being Queen over Judah and slain by the direction of Jehoiadah is frequently urged by diverse Romish writers Bell. de Rom. p. l. 5. c. 8. to prove the Superiority of the Jewish High Priest over the Prince and it is also urged more generally by some others to shew that the People did warrantable deprive her of Princely power But Jehoiadah J. Brut. Qu. 2. Ruth Civ Pol. Qu. 28. p. 264. as a good Subject acted by the Authority of Joash the true and rightful King against her who was a plain Vsurper And that Jehoiadah was not the High Priest may appear somewhat probable because he is not mentioned in the Catalogue of the High Priests in the Chronicles Ant. Jud. l. 10. c. 11. Of Jehu conspiring against Joram 1 Chr. 6 11-15 nor in that of Josephus 11. Whereas Jehu took Arms against Joram and slew him 2 Kin. 9.24 and cut off Ahabs House for which God commended him 2 Kin. 10.30 this
was no taking Armes against a Soveraign King For God reserved to himself the right of disposing the Soveraignty of the Kingdom of Israel and by his particular direction were Saul and David and Jeroboam made Kings But none of Ahabs Family whose Son Joram was ever had any such designation by Gods appointment but Jehu before he took Armes was by the command of God anointed to be King and commanded to cut off the House of Ahab 1 Kin. 19.16 2 Kin. 9.6 7. So that Jehu his taking Armes was by a true Regal Authority against him who either never had a right to the Kingdom or at least was now totally deprived thereof by Gods special Declaration And this makes the Case of Jehu towards Joram to differ much from that of David towards Saul 12. Of the people saving Jonathans life It hath also been urged That when Saul resolved that Jonathan should dye the people rescued him as our Translation rendreth it 1 Sam. 14.45 But the Septuagint expresse it by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the people prayed or worshipped for Jonathan And the true state of this affair was this Saul desirous to prosecute his victory against the Philistines to the utmost Rutherf ibid. qu. 32. p. 348. adjureth the people of Israel that no man eat any food until the evening and threatneth death to him who shall do otherwise v. 24 39. Jonathan who wonderfully gained that victory being absent and not hearing this adjuration tasted a little Hony v. 27. Hereupon Sauls vow or Oath being not performed and God being offended therewith and search made after the transgression v. 37 38. Jonathan was taken whom Saul condemneth to dye for the expiation of this Transgression v. 43,44 Now here Jonathans life became due to God by a single vow and not that of Cherem and therefore his case did admit of Redemption according to the Law Lev. 27.2 And upon this account it is said of the People 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and they redeemed him which our Translation calls they rescued him i. e. substituted with a general consent and desire of the People an Offering for the vow which Josephus expresseth thus they did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Jose ph Ant. l. 6. c. 7. offered Offerings to God for the vow which Offerings for a Vow are usually called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Septuagint as in Lev. 7.16 Deut. 12.6 And by this means was Jonathan rescued or delivered from Death not by any Act of Hostile violence which the people offered to Saul but by an Act of Religion which they performed unto God B. 2. C. 4. And since it was God who required the performance of the Vow this Offering was the way to appease him and thereby secure Jonathan which the use of violence against Saul could never have done 13. Of Azariah withstanding Uzziah The instance of Azariah the Priest and eighty other Priests who being men of courage withstand Vzziah the King when he undertook to Offer Incense 2 Chr 163 17 18 19 20. is by some persons both Romanists and others insisted upon But their proceedings were not managed with weapons of War but with sharp reproofs and admonitions And whereas it is said in our Translation v. 20. they thrust him out the Heb ew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may properly be rendred they hastened him and no more can be proved from it and it is so expressed in this Text by the best Copies of the Septuagint 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by several other Translations and the same word is used for hastening but without any offering violence Est 6.14 Josephus also expresseth this action of the Priests to this purpose Ant. l. 9.11 that they requared or charged him to go out of the City being smitten with Leprosie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And this is nothing like making War 14. Some other things have been objected but of so little weight or appearance of evidence that it is needless to mention or refute them or to add any thing more for the vindicating that part of Soveraignty to the Kings under the Old Testament that it was not then lawful for subjects to take Armes against them CHAP. IV. The Rules and Precepts delivered by Christ and his Apostles concerning Resistance and the Practice of the primitive Christians declared SECT I. The Doctrine delivered by our Saviour himself 1. The Rights of Princes upheld by Christianity FRom the foregoing Chapters which have shewed that non-resistance of Subjects against their Soveraign is a duty according to the principles of common equity and which did take place in the political Constitutions under the time of the Old Testament we might make a reasonable inference that the same must abide and continue a duty under the times of Christianity For our Saviour intended to promote and establish righteousness goodness and peace and therefore would never give liberty to violate the great duties of Subjection by which violation the peace of the World would be much disturbed the duties of meekness banished and the practice of humility and obedience rejected which are so much aimed at in his Doctrine Sect. I. which commands his Followers to take up the Cross 2. That he took care of the preservation of the just Royalty and Right of Princes and did not intend to debase lessen or diminish that Soveraignty and Authority which they had a right before to enjoy is well observed by Grotius Gr. de J. B. P. l. 1. c. 4. n. 4. to be included in those words of his Mat. 22.21 Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesars and from other expressions of the Scripture which can have no less import And this Text will appear the more considerable if we take notice that it was Tiberius who was then Caesar when our Saviour delivered this Precept From our Saviours Precept in the time of Tiberius For Tiberius was a man whose cruelty even to his nearest Relations and his drunkenness rendred him infamous and his Lusts were so excessive that Suetonius saith Suet. in Tib. n. 44. vix ut referri audiríve nedum credit fas est it is scarce to be allowed that this should be related heard or believed He was so far from being a friend to the Jews that he would not allow them the exercise of their Religion at Rome Ibid. n. 36. Jos de Bel. Jud. l. 2. c. 14. gr Ant. Jud. l. 18. c. 4.5 inflicted on them great penalties and dispersed the youth of Judea into other less noble Provinces Under his Government to the great offence of the Jews the Images of Caesar were brought into Jerusalem by Pilate and the Treasures of the Temple in their Corban were taken out And in his time also was the Jewish Sanhedrim deprived of their Power of inflicting capital punishments Joh. 18.31 And his Government was so far from defending and maintaining the true Christian Religion that under it and by the sentence of his
Apostle commands subjection and against whom he condemns all resistance Now this is commonly acknowledged to have been written under the Reign of Nero who was a man of excessive intemperance and lust and prodigious cruelty even to that height as to cast off natural affection to his nearest relations In his time Suetonius tells us Suet. in Ner. n. 16. punishments were inflicted upon the Christians and according to Tacitus Tac. Annal l. 15. Tertul. Apol c. 6. in Scorpiac c. 15. poenis quaesitissimis by the most exquisite pains and he is noted by Tertullian to be the first of the Roman Emperours who undertook fiercely to persecute Christianity and under him S. Peter and S. Paul and divers other Christians were cruelly put to death And yet in this Case and under that Emperour whom the Roman Spirit would not endure without taking Armes against him and whom their Senate declared to be an Enemy Suet. in Ner. n. 49. Tacit. Hist l. 1. Aur. Vict. in Ner. and to be punished more majorum by an infamous Death S. Paul would not allow the Christians to resist and take Armes against this higher power And this was the Christian temper and Spirit that they kept themselves free from all those tumults and Seditions which other persons in the Empire were many times engaged in Tert. ad Scap. c. 2. And this is that which gave Tertullian occasion to say nunquam Albiniani vel Nigriani vel Cassiani inveniri potuerunt Christiani 5. And since the Church of Rome was founded in the beginning of the Government of Claudius and S. Paul was put to Death in the end of Nero's time who was the next Successor to Claudius in the Empire this Epistle to the Romans must be written in one of their Reigns Indeed Illyricus Illyr Chronol in Act. Apost Dr. Hammonds Annot on the Title of the Ep. to Rom. and Dr Hammond sometimes think it to have been written under Claudius And those expressions in this Epistle which intimate that S. Paul before the writing thereof had never been at Rome with this Christian Church may possibly seem to encline to the same sense Ch. 1 10.-13.-15 and Ch. 15.19 -22 23. But it was certainly written many years after the Conversion of the Romans Ch. 15.23 And if it should be supposed to have been sent to them under Claudius even he was not much a better man than Nero. For Claudius was a debauched and vicious person and barbarously cruel to which purpose amongst other expressions Suetonius saith of him Suet. in Claud. 33 34. that he was libidinis profusissimae and also saevum sanguinarium natura fuisse apparuit And even he was so great an Enemy to the right worship of the only true God that under the name of Jews he banished also Christians from Rome Act. 18.2 6. Rutherf of Civ Policy Qu. 33. The New Testament gives respect to the Emperour above the Senate But because there are some who say that these expressions of the Apostle have no particular mention of Nero or any Emperour and therefore may as well have respect to the Roman Senate To obviate this exception it may be observed that wheresoever in the New Testament there is any notice taken of or any respect given to the Roman power this is done with a principal and primary respect to the Emperour and subordinately to others as his Officers This is manifest in the Gospel the Acts and the Epistles The taxing or enrolling at the Birth of our Saviour was by the Decree of Augustus and the tribute money had Caesars Image and Inscription to whom Christ commanded the Jews to render what was his S. Pauls appeal was made unto Caesar and S. Peters commanding submission was directed to the King as supreme and to Governours as unto them who are sent by him So that the Spirit of God speaketh much in favour of Monarchical power though then Pagan but gives no encouragement to the notion of them who would embrace a popular Soveraignty 7. Now these words of S. Paul are so full that I shall not need to add any further evidences of Scripture in this particular But when S. Peter and S. Jude 2 Pet. 2.10 Jude 8. so highly condemn the despising Dominions and speaking evil of dignities as sins against which God will chiefly execute judgment it is evident à majori that their doctrine cannot give allowance to that forcible resistance whereby the greatest contempt of dignities is expressed and which runs higher than to speak evil especially when S. Jude speaks particularly against them who perish in the gain-saying of Core or in the practises of Sedition And S. Peter also proposeth the example of Christ as that which he himself intended should be an example to all Christians who when in well-doing he was reviled reviled not again when he suffered he threatned not but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously 1 Pet. 2.19.20 21 22 23. 8. Having now shewed Christianity doth not infringe Soveraignty that the Christian Doctrine doth fully provide for the safety and security of Princes it is matter of wonder that any men should have the considence to make Christianity a foundation for the highest resistance against Princes to depose them from their Crowns and forbid Subjects to yield them obedience and this Authority the Pope claims upon a Christian title Bellarm. in Resp ad Apol. pro Juram fidelit in init Bellarmine affirms it to be a thing agreed upon by their Lawyers and Divines that the Pope may by right depose heretical Princes and set free their Subjects from obedience to them for cum hac conditione reges terrae ad Ecclesiam admittuntur c. upon this condition the Kings of the Earth are admitted unto the Church that they shall subject their Scepters unto Christ and that they should protect and not destroy Religion which if they will not do he who is over the whole Church in the place of Christ vice Christi hath a right to separate them from the Communion of the faithful and to forbid their Subjects from giving them obedience Indeed all persons by their Baptism are engaged to yield up themselves to be Subjects to Christ But how can the baptism of Princes include a condition that they must yield their Scepters to be disposed of by any Officer of the Christian Church when they are baptized into that Doctrine which makes so great provision for the security of Kings and against all manner of resistance This would make Christianity to be prejudicial to the authority of Governours to assert which is contrary to the nature of its doctrine And the Holy Spirit seemeth to have taken special care to prevent this claim in any person of the Romish Church in that whosoever resisteth the power c. being particularly directed to that Church must deny all power to any person therein to oppose the authority of Rulers under the peril of damnation 9.
tthat time no part of the Roman empire but was a Nation bordering upon the Empire who then had a distinct King of their own but acknowledged a subjection to the Persians Evag. Hist Eccles l. 5. c. 7. and thereupon this Country was called Persarmenia But for divers years before and after this War they were not under the Roman power and Eusebius who relates this action Eus Hist l. 9. c. 7. gr declares they were friends and Confederates till by this undertaking of Maximinus they became his Enemies 16. I confess some years after the Reign of Constantine was ended This loyalt afterwards declined there were among the Christians some attempts and enterprises undertaken of another spirit and nature Socr. Hist Eccl. l. 2● c. 12. gr By reason of the great opposition between the Arians and the Orthodox Christians there were in Constantinople and in other places 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 frequent seditions and tumults as Socrates expresseth it and these took place from about the year 340. Ibid. c. 134 then among other things Hermogenes the Emperours commander whom he sent to Constantinople to dispossess Paulus from being Bishop there was opposed with force the House in which he was being fired upon him and himself slain in the year 342. Not long after this also Baron a● 350. n. 1 2 4. began the more open and contrived rebellion of Magnentius and though this was undertaken out of ambition and unchristian disloyalty yet he carried on his designs under a pretence for Religion He first engaged against Constans the Emperour who was slain by him for which abominable Parricide Athan. Apol ad Constant Baron an 353. n. 5. Athanasius inveighed greatly against him and then managed a War against Constantius And this according to Baronius was the first time that the Banner of the Cross appeared in the Field on both sides one against another and this was indeed a Rebellious Insurrection against a Soveraign Prince But the true primitive and genuine spirit of Christianity was wholly averse from and unacquainted with such proceedings and when the Christian temper did in divers persons degenerate in this particular such exorbitant and evil practises were always contrary to the judgment of the chief guides and Bishops of the Church CHAP. V. Of the extent of the duty and obligation of non-resistance SECT I. Resistance by force is not only sinful in particular private persons but also in the whole body of the people and in subordinate and inferiour Magistrates and Governours Sect. 1 1. THere have been some who grant the unlawfulness of taking Arms against a Soveraign Prince to be a geneal rule for ordinary circumstances but yet they pretend there are some great and extraordinary cases in which it must admit of exceptions And the proposal of these Cases as they are by them managed is like the Pharisaical Corban an Engine and method to make void the duties of the fifth Commandment concerning obedience and submission to superiours Wherefore in this Chapter I shall undertake the defence of that assertion of Barclay G. Barcl cont Monarchomach l. 3. c. 16. p. 212. who proposeth the Question Nullíne casus c. may there no Cases fall out in which the people by their authority may take Armes against their King B. 2. C. 5. and his answer is Certainly none so long as he is King or unless ipso jure Rex esse desinat 2. The whole Community have no Authority to take Armes against their Soveraign Now the first Question and pretence hath respect to the whole body of the people Whether if the whole or principal part thereof do account themselves injured and oppressed by their Soveraign and judge it needful for their own defence and security and the common good to take Armes and make use of force against him this authority of the Community be not a sufficient Warrant for such resistance This is asserted by the seditious Positions of Mariana Marian. de Reg Reg. Institut l. 1. c. 6. who not only gives a large allowance to Common-wealths and the generality of the people to devest their Kings of their Government and take away their lives but he also grants the same liberty and power to any members of the Common-wealth if learned and grave men be consulted and where there is Publica vox Populi the common voice of the people inclining that way And this notion also though not in the same exorbitant degree is embraced by Bellarmine and many of the Jesuits and other men of disloyal Antimonarchical Spirits But because what I have said in the former Chapters is both of sufficient force and clear enough for the refuting hereof I shall only superadd these brief considerations 3. First That the agreement of the whole body of the people or the chief and greater part thereof can give no sufficient authority to such an enterprise because the whole community are Subjects as well as the particular persons thereof And with especial respect to this Kingdom I above observed that our Laws declare it unlawful for the two Houses of Parliament though jointly to take Armes against the King The same hath been also acknowledged by men of understanding in Foreign Countryes As Bodinus Bodin de Repub. l. 2. c. 5. concerning England and other places where the Kings have jura majestatis concludeth singulis civibus nec universis fas est summi Principis vitam famam aut fortunas in discrimen vocare it is not lawful for the Subjects either singly or all of them together to bring into danger the life honour or possessions of the Prince Secondly this would open a gap to great confusions since the body of the people are apt to be imposed upon and to be led by their passions as the experience of these latter Ages as well as the Cases of Corah and Absalom do testify And the same appears from the whole Congregation of Israel being forward to cast off Moses and to make them another Captain Numb 14. 2 4. Thirdly This liberty may as reasonably be given to a few private persons as to the whole people because in such enterprises of the people they are counselled by and are generally influenced and led according to the motions of a few private persons Fourothly The Laws of God against any evil actions and consequently against resistance do not become void by any great numbers joining together in practising what is contrary unto them When the primitive Christians were the chief part of the Roman Empire they durst not take up Armes against the Emperour out of the fear of God as hath been shewed No sin is to be esteemed the less but the greater when a multitude shall be actors in it If any violence be offered to a Father or Master this is not the more allowable if all his Children or Servants join in the Confederacy And when great multitudes engage in open insurrections the consequents thereof may
be much more dreadful and calamitious to Mankind whereas the embodying of small numbers are the less to be feared because the more easy to be suppressed 4. The next pretence is that subordinate Governours being also Gods Officers may defend the properties of the Subjects and the exercise of true Religion Brut. Vind. qu. 2. p. 56. qu. 3. p. 93. edit 1589. De sur Mag. Qu. 6. even by taking Armes against their King This hath been asserted by such Writers as Junius Brutus the Anonymous discourse de jure Magistratuum in subditos others in England in our late intestine Broils Ruth Qu. 20. 36. J. Sleid. Com. l. 22. an 1550. and Rutherford of Civil Policy And Sleidan in his Commentaries reports that the same was declared in the Magdeburgh Confession And for the supporting of this assertion it is urged that all Governours even subordinate as well as supreme are in the use of their power to serve God and do justice and defend the innocent and do act by Gods Authority As also that if any person in Ecclesiastical power how high soever he be shall oppose the Christian Doctrine his subordinate Clergy lawfully may and ought to withstand him And that saying of Trajan In Vit. Trajan mentioned by Dion Cassius is usually noted to this purpose who delivering the Sword to an inferiour Commander bad him use this for him if he should govern well but against him if he governed or commanded ill 5. Subordina●t Governours may not resist the supreme But such Positions would undermine the peace of the World and lay Foundations for great disturbances and thereby the Commands of God would be broken with the greater force and violence if those who are invested with some part of the Kings Authority should account themselves thereby impowered to make use thereof against him And if this were admitted the state of Kingdoms must be in danger whensoever inferiour Governours shall be imposed upon by the subtilty of others or puffed up by ambition But this is as far from truth as from peace though Corah had 250 Princes who joynen with him and Absalom was assisted by the Elders of Israel besides Ahitoph●l the great Counsellour of State this did not justifie their Treasonable Conspiracies And though David was a great Officer at Court General of the Army of Israel and the anointed Successour to the Crown by Gods special appointment and no subordinate Ruler in other Dominions could have so much to plead for himself in this case as David had yet it was not lawful for him to stretch out his hand against Saul And in the account of the Thebean Legion above mentioned Mauritius was a great Officer and Commander of the Roman Army and then in Arms at the head of his Legion and yet according to the Primitive Christian principles professed a detestation of making resistance And therefore this pretence is justly rejected De J. B. P. l. 1. c. 4. n. 6. de Imper. c. 3. with some vehemency by Grotius as being against Scripture reason and the sense of Antiquity 6. Indeed all persons in Authority are bound to do justice but this must only be in their Sphere and according to the proportion of their power but they cannot be allowed to set themselves over their Superiours to usurp upon their Authority or to deny Subjection unto them And with respect to their Soveraign Officers both by Charter and Commission have their Authority depending upon him and are as much his Subjects as other men are and besides the common bonds of Subjection do all with us take the Oath of Supremacy and Allegiance Now as a Servant may not put himself into the place of a Ruler or Judge over his Master to force him to what he thinks equal no more may an inferiour ruler do to his Prince To this purpose it is observed by Sleidan Sleidan Comment l. 17. An. 1546. that the Elector of Saxony who was then the chief person against the Emperour in the German Wars under Charles the fifth did openly declare that if Charles the fifth was owned to be Caesar or a proper Soveraign with respect to those great Princes of the Empire it must then be granted cum eo belligerari non licere that it was not lawful to make War with him And whereas subordinate Rulers are to be submitted unto and rever●●●d in the regular use of their Authority ●●●et if they shall oppose the Superiour ●●●●r they are to be deserted and the acting against them in discharge of duty to the Soveraign is no disobedience Thus S. Austin Aug. de Verb. Dom. Serm. 6. ipsos humanarum rerum gradus advertite consider the orders steps and degrees of human affairs If the Curator command one thing and the Proconsul another must not the greater power be obeyed and so also where the Proconsul commands one thing and the Emperour the contrary And St. Peter in commanding submission to inferiour Governours makes use of these bounds of Subjection as unto them who are sent by him i. e. the King 7. Disparity between secular and Ecclesiastical Governours The objection from the comparing the case of Ecclesiastical and Civil Rulers is of no weight because of the great disparity that is between them The withstanding an Heretical Bishop who would impose corrupt Doctrines upon the Church if this be certain and manifest may lawfully be undertaken not only by the inferiour Clergy but by other Christians and herein they only do their own business of keeping the Faith holding to the truth and rejecting what is contrary thereto Cyp. Epist 68. And S. Cyprian when Basilides and Martialis Spanish bishops had closed with Pagan Idolatry accounted that ordinary Christians ought to separate themselves from such guides And though in our age too many causelessly reject communion with those Officers whom Christ hath set over them which is a sin of no low degree yet it must be acknowledged that there may be just causes for such withdrawing from Communion in obedience to the Christian Doctrine But it can never be lawful for private Christians to usurp to themselves Episcopal power which would be unaccountable and Sacrilegious Aug. ubi sup And if a Soveraign power should command any to embrace Heresie or reject the true Religion or to become unjust to others to refuse such evil practices is their duty they owe to God who is the Supreme Governour and so far they act in their own Sphere but if they take Arms they then take to themselves the power of the publick Sword which is the Soveraigns right and are thereby guilty of invading what is not their own Besides this there is no Ecclesiastical Officer whosoever but his Authority is inferiour to the Authority of the Vniversal Church of which he is a member and this principally takes in the Apostolical and Primitive Church and all Christians are bound to hold to the doctrine and unity of this Church against any
Laws of a Government condemn innocent persons who dye Martyrs they may not take Armes either out of great averseness to some good or lawful thing which they embrace or out of favour and kindness to their Enemies and yet where this is done according to the publick laws under which they live it is unquestionably no sufficient Plea to take Armes Of this nature were the Persecutions and all the sufferings of the Christians under the Pagan and Heretical Emperours when the Laws of the Empire were against Christianity and the true profession thereof And from the History of the Book of Esther it seemeth clear that when at Hamans Request Ahasuerus had granted that all the Jews should be destroyed they had no resolution of defending their lives by Armes till they had liberty to that purpose granted by Ahasuerus And the obtaining this libery was part of the benefit they received by the interecession of Esther and the advice of Mordecai Grot. in Esth 8.11 Esth 8.11 Ch. 9.2 And though Grotius thinks that they might have done this by the right of laws of nature yet the Constitution of the Persian Monarchy placing so large a power of life and death in their Kings of which the hanging Haman v. Dan. 6.24 Esth 7.8 10. and the casting Daniels Accusers into the Lions Den is sufficient evidence no resistance could have been made but against the authority of the Laws and Government under which they lived And there is so great an agreement between the condition of these Jews and of the Primitive Christians under their persecutions that if the laws of nature would have allowed these Jews to resist it must also have been lawful for the Christians to have done the same which is contrary to their general Profession and universal practice or else it must be said that the Christians were prohibited this by such a peculiar Christian-Law as is contrary to the Law of Nature which would be a great slander and calumny upon our Religion 16. Upon this account the Novatians were to be blamed Socr. Hist l. 2. c. 38. gr who when the Souldiers of Constantius the Arian Emperour were by his Command sent to force them to become Arians they took Armes in defence of their Profession of Religion especially because the secular laws of the Empire concerning Religion were directed by the particular Edicts of the Emperour who was then a fierce Arian And in such cases though men were able against the Laws and Government to defend their Bodies by resistance they might better defend their Souls and their Religion by suffering as Christians otherwise the spirit of a Jewish Zealot of whom there were great numbers in Jewry among the unbelieving Jews after our Saviours death must be preferred before that of a Christian Martyr Yet where the Laws of any Realm condemn any persons though underservedly they may flee or use any lawful means of escape but not take Armes for their own defence But with respect to such proceedings as these The advantage of the English Laws our English Government gives us this advantage above what divers ancient and modern nations had that the true Religion is established by our Laws and that no Law can be repealed or altered to the prejudice of English Subjects by the pleasure of any Prince alone and without the Consent of the Peers For a Soveraign Power against law and right to resolve to ruine great numbers of Subjects is so inhuman and unlikely that it ought not to be supposed against our ordinary duty and the representatives of the Commons of England 17. The only thing which in this case can farther be proposed is whether if a supreme Governour should according to his own pleasure and contrary to the established Laws and his Subject Property actually engage upon the destroying and ruining a considerable part of his People they might not defend themselves by taking Armes And it is to be heedfully considered that this Question is much notional and speculative and is of small concernment to practice because notwithstanding suspicions and jealousies which may be unreasonably fomented there hath never been in this Kingdome or in most others if not all any such enterprise by the true Soveraign Prince against peaceable and innocent Subjects during our Histories for many hundred years And it is hard to find any such instance of a lawful Prince undertaking to ruine a great part of his People against the plain declarations of the established Laws of the Realm 18. Had Antiochus Epiphanes been the true Soveraign of the Jews his attempting to destroy all those who would observe Circumcision and the Worship of the true God which the Political Laws in Judea established by God and unrepealeable by Antiochus did enjoin them to perform this had then been much to this purpose But he was none of their lawful King but an Enemy and yet died under the dismal lashes of a tormenting Conscience for these and such like wicked actions as I above shewed Jos An. l. 12. c. 6. Liv. Dec. 5. l. 5. And when he invaded Judea he was as a Lion bereaved of his Prey being forced to return from his designed attempts upon Egypt Justin l. 34. by the resolute denunciation of Popilius the Embassadour from Rome The Paris Massacre was also of somewhat a like kind with respect to the greatest numbers who were therein murdered For though I acknowledge the practice of some of them being in Armes about that time was not defensible and towards them this might possibly be intended as an Artifice and stratagem of War or else perhaps it had never been yet that so great numbers as about an hundred thousand should in cold blood be-cruelly assassinated and murdered and most of them manifestly innocent persons without ever being judicially accused Tryed Convicted or Condemned by the Law was such a piece of barbarous savage Cruelty as can scarce be paralleled as some have noted under Mahometanism 19. But if ever any such strange Case as is proposed should really happen in the World I confess it would have its great difficulties De. J.B. P. l. 1. c. 4. n. 7. Grotius thinks that in this utmost extremity the use of such defence as a last refuge ultimo necessitatis praesidio is not to be condemned provided the care of the common good be preserved And if this be true it must be upon this ground that such attempts of ruining do ipso facto enclude a disclaiming the governing those persons as subjects and consequently of being their Prince or King And then the expressions of our publick Declaration and acknowledgment would still be secured that it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Armes against the King Christian subjection and Vnchrist Rebel Part. 3. p. 519. edit 1585. But Bishop Bilson speaking of such Popish Cruelties as that I lately mentioned saith they are able to set grave men and good men at their wits end and make them justly