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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	bishop_n	clergy_n	king_n	3,253	5	3.7031	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56215	The sword of Christian magistracy supported, or, A vindication of the Christian magistrates authority under the Gospell, to punish idolatry, apostacy, heresie, blasphemy, and obstinate schism, with corporall, and in some cases with capitall punishments ... by William Prinne of Lincolns Inne, Esquire.	Prynne, William, 1600-1669.	1653 (1653)	Wing P4099; ESTC R15969	222,705	186

c. And if he will deny it I am ready to prove it for the King as belongs to the King to do Chap. 4. Sect 11. p. 42. he defines that deadly sinnes are to be punished with death and mortall paine and that such punishments are warranted by the old Testament and to be inflicted to prevent eternall death After which Sect. 14. p. 252. Of the punishment of Treason he determines thus That Sodomy is to be punished with burying the party alive under ground Sorcery by burning in the fire The JVDGEMENT OF HERESY is fourfold The 1. is Excommunication the 2. Degradation the 3. Disinherison the 4. dee' ARSE en Cinders TO BE BVRNED TO ASHES By this punctuall Authority of Horne it is most cleare to me First that Hereticks and Apostates as well as Sodomites and Sorcerers even as they were Hereticks were inditable and triable at the Kings suite in the King Courts by the very common Law of England without any precedent conviction of Heresie by the Ordinary of the Diocesse or by a Nationall or Provinciall Synod and that the Judges of the common Law when any Heretick or Apostate was to be proceeded against criminally and capitally for his life were to judge what was Heresie and what not not the Bishops or Synod only as well as in the case of a r Prohibition or Habeas Corpus 2. That such Inditements were usuall and a set forme of them used and pursued in Edward the first his raigne and were then to be found in the Rolls of ancient Kings long before him therefore were then of long of ancient use and warranted by the ancient common Law of England before his raigne 3. That the Bishops and Clergy could punish heresie onely with Excommunication and Degradation not with death ● 4. That by the ancient Common Law of England in Edward the first his reign and in the reigne of ancient Kings before him Heresy as heresy and Sorcery only as Heresie and a branch thereof and under the name of heresy was inditable in the Kings Court at the Kings suite and punished with burning to death and so the writ De Haeretico Comburendo if necessary when grounded upon the Judges sentence warranted by the common Law and the judgement of burning given by it long before any Statute made against Heresy in the reigne of Richard the second or Henry the fourth 5. That Hereticks and Apostates who are such indeed may at this day be indicted for their heresy and Apostacy in the Kings Bench or at the Assises by the very common Law of England and upon sufficient proofes be there convicted condemned and adjudged to be burnt this power of the Judges at common Law to try and condemne Hereticks being not now restrained by any Statute nor taken away by the Statute of 1. Eliz. cap. 1. which repeales all former Statutes against Hereticks or Heresy which only concerned Bishops Ordinaries and their proccedings in case of Heresie grounded on them not the King or his Judges The next Authority I shall cite is that of Fleta written by a learned Lawyer imprisoned in the Fleet as Sir Edward Cooke informes us in Edward the third his raigne and taken for the most part out of Bracton lib. 1. cap. 3. Christiani Apostatae Sortilegii hujusmodi DEBENT COMBVRI Contrahentes verò cum Judaeis vel Judaeabus pecorantes Sodomitae in terra vivi confodiantur per testimonium legale vel publicè convicti A cleare Authority that Apostates which comprehends all such as fall into Heresy Judaisme or Paganisme after they have embraced the true Christian orthodox faith South-sayers and such like which comprehends Hereticks likewise OVGHT TO BE BURNT even by the common Law then in use and that Christian who turned Jewes and Sodomites were to be buried alive After this Wickliffe and his followers called Lollards infesting the Pope and Prelates with their Doctrines and invectives against their Antichristian Tenets and impostures they being greatly favored by some Nobles and eminent Knights about the end of the reigne of King Edward the 3. and beginning of Richard the second the Prelates bearing then great sway in the Kingdome not daring to trust the Judges with the Triall of these New Hereticks as they stiled them taking hold of the President in the Councell at Oxford in King Henry the seconds raigne forecited and of the practise of the Pope and Popish Prelates in forraign parts took upon them in their Synods Convocations and likewise in private Consistories to condemne these Lollards for hereticks and upon their sentence there passed without any Inditement or triall at the common Law procured a writ which they might easily do being then Lord Chancellors and Lord Privie Seales for the most part De Haeretico comburendo to be directed in the Kings name to the Sheriffes of Counties and Mayors of Towns to burn such for Hereticks whom they alone had thus condemned before there was any Statute chiefly upon this ground that hereticks by the judgment of the common Law upon Inditements and Convictions in the Kings Courts were to be burned This is evident not onely by the Bishops proceedings in their Consistories against John Wickliffe John Aston Philip Repington Nicholas Harford William Swinderby and Walter Brute but also by that forme of writ de Haeretico Comburendo mentioned in Fitzherberts Natura Brevium f. 269. c. which was made in Parliament by the King and Lords for the burning of William Sautre a godly Martyr condemned of heresie in the Convocation at the earnest sollicitation of Thomas Arundel Archbishop of Canterbury in the 2. year of King Henry the fourth and burned by vertue of this writ the first Martyr we read of burnt by vertue of such a writ granted meerly upon a sentence given by the Prelates themselves without an Inditement and Judgment at Common Law This writ for his burning made without the Commons is thus translated into English by Mr. Fox The King c. to the Mayor and Sheriffs of Loadon greeting y Whereas the reverend Father Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury Primate of England and Legate of the Apostolike Sea by the assent consent and counsell of other Bishops his Brothers Suffragans and also of all the whole Clergy within his Province gathered together in his provinciall Councell the DUE ORDER OF LAW BEING OBSERVED in all points in this behalfe hath denounced and declared by his definitive sentence William Sautre sometimes Chaplaine fallen again into damnable heresie the said William had abjured thereupon to be A MOST MANIFEST HERETICK and therefore hath decreed that he should be degraded and hath for the same cause degraded him from all prerogative and priviledge of the Clergy decreeing to leave him unto the secular power and hath really so left him ACCORDING TO THE LAWES AND CANONICALL SANCTIONS SET FORTH IN THIS BEHALFE We therefore BEING ZEALOVS IN RELIGION and REVEREND LOVERS OF THE CATHOLIKE FAITH and of Justice

so much as the least pitty The PIOVS RIGOR OF THIS SEVERITY not only PURGED the Kingdome of England of that Plague which had already crept into it BVT ALSO PREVENTED THAT IT SHOULD NO MORE CREEP INTO IT BY THE TERROR STRUCK INTO THE HERETIKES So our Nubrigensis whose words I have faithfully englished The forraign Sectaries thus severely punished were no other then professed Anabaptists and schismatickes pronounced hereticks for their obstinacy Their punishment was harsh yet deemed just and necessary in those times and it had this good issue which may induce us now to a fitting and just severity against obstinate Hereticks Schismaticks Blasphemers Anabaptists it suppressed the spreading of their pestilent Errors for the present in England and preserved it safe from their infection for the future Timely and discreet Flebotomie is ever the best cure against this Gangraene of obstinate Schisme and Heresie Only this I shall observe by the way that these Anabaptists for ought I find never pretended that the King and civill Magistrates had no power to punish them for matters of Religion as our Anabaptists and Sectaries now plead and write The sinnes of Heresy and Apostacy were so odious in this our Realm that by the very ancient common Law of England they deserved were punishable with death yea the soarest death of all others BURNING as being no lesse then High Treason against the King of heaven and Gravius est aeternam quam temporalem laedere majestatem That these were thus punishable by the very common Law of England before the Statute of 5. R. 2. Stat. 2. c. 5. surreptitiously procured without the Commons assent and repealed the next Parliament or the Statutes of 2. H. 4. c. 15. and 2. H. 5. c. 7. is apparent unto me by the Authority of our ancient Law Bookes I read in Bracton l. 3. c. 9. f. 123 124. who writ in King Henry the 3. his reigne That if a Clergy man be convicted of Apostacy he shall be for it depriued and afterwards per manum laicalem COMBVRATVR he shall be burnt by the hands of Laymen as it hapned in the Councell of Oxford under Stephen Archbishop of Canterbury to a certain Deacon who became an APOSTATE for a certain Jew who when he bad been degraded by the Bishops statim fuit JGNI TRADITUS per manum Lai●●lem he was presently delivered to the fire by Lay hands And c. 23. f. 144. b. The Jewes may circumcise their owne sonns but not a man of another religion for if they do it they shall be gelt by way of punishment I read that in the Councell held at Oxford An. 1222. in the 6. year of Henry the 3. under Stephen Archibishop of Canterbury an execrable Impostor was convented before him who suffered himselfe to be wounded in his hands feet and side that by the resemblance of these bloody impressions he might perswade the people he was their Saviour who being condemned by the Councell was immured between two walls as a Monster too impious and unworthy to dye by humane hands and another who pretended her selfe to be Mary the mother of Christ and a third who pretended her self to be Mary Magdalen were immured with him Matthew Paris Matthew Parker and others write that they were crucified And Mat. Paris relates that Grosthead Bishop of Lincolne lying on his deathbed An. 50. of Henry the 3. pronounced the Pope to be an Heretick and the Friars Nunnes and Preachers also to be Hereticks for not opposing but favoring him and concluded thereupon with R m. 1. verse last qui talia agunt consentiunt DIGNI SUNT MORTE Therefore in those daies Hereticks were deemed worthy to dye as well temporally as eternally which confirmes that in his time Hereticks deserved to be put to death John Britton Bishop of Hereford Doctor both of the civil and canon Law who writ a Book of the Lawes of England then in use about the 5. year of King Edward the first by the Kings command lib. 1. cap. 9. De Arsouns or persons that were to be burned by judgement of Law informs us That such who burned houses in times of peace and were therof convicted shall be burned so as they shall be punished by the selfesame thing wherein they offend And THE SAME JUDGEMENT have Sorcerers and Sorceresses and Sodomites and MISCREANTS or HERETICKS openly attainted who are to be enquired after And this was no new Law as appears by the preamble of the King to this Booke but les leys que len ad use en nostre Royalme AVANT SES HOVRES Therefore it is cleare by this Authority that the burning of Hereticks was in use before this Kings reigne though we find few or no presidents of it and inquirable by the Justices and other temporall Officers of the King as Britton writes in this chapter but not by the Bishops and Clergy further then to Excommunicate them Andrew Horne in his Myrrour of Justices written in the end of King Edward the first or at least in King Edward the second his reigne hath these severall passages concerning Heresy and its punishment as Chap. 1. Sect. 4. p. 21 22 23. where speaking of Crimes and their Division of the Crime of Treason he writes thus Crime of Majesty or Treason is an horrible sinne done to the King and this is either to the KING CAELESTIAL or Terrestriall Against the King of heaven in three manners by HERESY Sorcery Sodomy HERESY is an evill and false beliefe arising from Error in the right Christian faith In this sinne is Sorcery and Divination which are members of heresy and arise from an evill beliefe After which he enumerates the severall sorts of Sorceries and Divinations contrary to the Law of God and the Church and to the right faith for which they are to be apprehended and removed from among the people of God that so no good Christian may be taken with their act nor partner with their sinne Chap. 2. Sect. 22. p. 141 142. he writes thus Of the Crime of Treason or Majesty there is no especiall or large Enditement but OF HERESY and Sorcery Of which if any be indited and drawn into judgment this is the Inditement pronounceable for the King by any of his people in this manner according as it is found IN THE ROLLES OF ANCIENT KINGS I say Sebourge here is defamed by good people of the THE CRIME OF HERESY for this that from an ill art and beliefe forbidden and by charmes and enchantment he took from Brightient by name on such a day c. the flower of his beare by which he lost the vent c. Or thus Molling who is here is defamed by good men that on such a day c. he renounced his baptisme and caused himselfe to be circumcised and became a Jew or Saracen or offered or sacrificed unto Mahomet in despite of God and in damnation of his soule and this sinne he did FELONIOVSLY

praestigiosa illa superstitio deleta est vt sacerdotum ipsorum orthodoxorum Doctrinam sitientibus desiderijs amplexerentur After which this heresie sprouting up again in the year 449. Germanus and Severus coming hither out of France to suppresse it there was another Councell assembled wherein the Authors of this revived heresy were inquired after and being found were condemned and BANISHED the Island by the generall sentence of all Omniumque sententia pravitatis auctores qui erant EXPVLSI INSVLA sacerdotibus adducuntur ad medeterranea deferendi ut regio absolutione illi EMENDATIONE fruerentur factumque est ut in illis locis multo ex eo tempore fides INTE MERATA PERDVRARET This was the happy issue of these Hereticks banishment that religion from that time continued uncorrupted and this Island was thereby freed from the Pelagian heresie for many ages after Anno Dom. 630. Theodor Archbishop of Canterbury being a Graecian borne hearing that the Church of Constantinople was very much troubled with the haeresy of Eutiches to preserve the Churches of England free from that infection assembled a Councel at HEDTFELD of many Priests and learned men wherein they made a Confession of their Faith concerning the Trinity and Vnity and declared their assents to the generall Councels of Nice Constantinople the first and second Ephesus Calcedon and of Rome under Martin whereby he prevented the heresies condemned by them from springing up in this Isle A good effect of this Synodall Assembly Gulielmus Nubrigensis records that in the reign of King Henry the 2. about the year of our Lord 1161. certain erroneous persons commonly called Publicanes came into England These having their originall heretofore out of Gascoygne from an uncertain Author infused the poyson of their mis-beliefes into divers Countries for in the most ample Provinces of France Spain Italy and Germany so many were said to be infected with this pestilence that they seem'd to be multiplied more then the sand on the Sea-shore in multitude Finally whilest the Prelates of Churches and the Princes of Provinces proceeded more REMISLY against them the most wicked foxes creep forth out of their dens and by seducing the simple with a pretended show of piety demolish the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts TANTO GRAVIUS QVANTO LIBERIUS so much the more grievously by how much the more freely but when as the zeale of the faithfull is kindled against them with the fire of God they lye hid in their Dens and are lesse hurtfull but yet they cease not to hurt by scattering their hidden poyson They were rusticall and illiterate men and therefore dull to reason but having once drunke down that poyson they were so infected that they grew stiffe against all discipline whence it very rarely happens that any one of them when being discovered they are drawn out of their dens is converted to piety Verily England alwaies continued free from this and all other haereticall plagues when as so many heresies sprung up in other parts of the world And truly this Island whiles it was called Britaine from the Britons who inhabited it banished out of it Pelagius who became an Arch-heretick in the East and in proces of time admitted his error into it selfe for the destruction whereof the pious provision of the French Church directed St. Germane once and again hither But since the English Nation the Britons being expelled possessed this Island so as it was no more called Britannia but England the poyson of no hereticall plagues hath sprung out of it nor yet so much as entred into it so as to propagate and spread it selfe untill the time of King Henry the 2. Then also by Gods mercy the plague which had there crept in was so withstood that from thenceforth they feare to enter into it Now there were little more then thirty both men and women who dissembling their error came in hither as it were peaceably for to propagate ther plague one Gerard being their Captain upon whom they all looked as their Teacher and Prince for he alone was somewhat learned but the rest were without learning and ideots meer impolished and rustick men of the Teutonic Nation and language Abiding some little space in England they gathered to their congregation only one little girle circumvented with their poysonous whisperings bewitched as was said with certain enchantments But they could not long lye hid for some curiously discovering that they were of a strange sect they were thereupon apprehended and kept in the publike prison But the King not willing either to release them or condemne them without examination commanded a Councill of Bishops to be assembled at Oxford Whereupon they were solemnly convented concerning Religion He who seemed to be learned taking upon him the cause of all and speaking for all answered that they were Christians and embraced the Apostles Doctrines Being interrogated in order concerning the Articles of holy faith truly they answered rightly concerning the substance of the Supernall Physitian but spake perverse things concerning his remedies whereby he vouchsafes to heal humane infirmity to wit of the divine Sacraments detesting holy Baptisme the Eucharist and Mariage and derogating from THE CATHOLIKE UNITY in a nefarious bold manner which those divine helpes do make up Being admonished to repent and TO UNITE THEMSELVES TO THE BODY OF THE CHURCH they contemned all wholesome counsell Threats also that they might repent even for fear they derided abusing that saying of the Lord Blessed are they who suffer porsecution for righteousnesse sake for theirs is the Kingdome of Heaven Then the Bishops taking care that their haereticall poyson should spread no further pronouncing them publikely to be heretickes corporali disciplinae subdendos Catholico Principi tradidêrunt delivered them over to the Catholike Prince to be punished with corporall punishment Who commanded an hereticall character to be branded on their foreheads and being publikely whipped in the sight of the people to be expelled the City strictly charging that no man should presume either to lodge them in his house or give them any solace The sentence being pronounced they were led to the MOST JVST PUNISHMENT rejoycing not with a slow pace their Master going before and singing Blesed shall ye be when men shall hate you so much did the seducers then abuse the minds deceived by him Truly that girle they had deceived in England departing from them for fear of punishment confessing her error obtained reconciliation but that detestable Colledge with cauterized foreheads was subjected to JUST SEVERITY he who was the chiefe among them for the honor of his Masterslip suffring the infamy of A DOUBLE BRANDING to wit IN THE FOREHEAD ABOVT THE CHIN and their cloathes being cut off unto the girdle they WERE PUPLIKELY WHIPPED and cast out of the City with resounding stripes and miserably perished with the intolerablenesse of the cold for it was Winter no man showing them

Hereticks and Apostates to be burnt the rather because the Bishops power is abolished cortrary to the opinion of 27. P. 8. 14. delivered when those Lawes were in force and of Sir Edward Cooke in his third Institutes p. 40. That at this day no person can be indicted or impeached for Heresie before any temporall Iudge or other that hath temporall Iurisdiction as upon the perusall of the Statutes of 5. R. 2. c. 5. 2. H. 4. c. 15. 2. H. 5. c. 7. 25. H. 8. c. 14. 2. Phil. and Mary c. 6. appeareth For these Acts being repealed as he there grants the old common Law of England is thereby revived as to Hereticks and Apostates and so at this day any person may be indicted impeached condemned before the temporall Iudges of the Kings Courts for apparent reall Heresie contrary to the Word of God and 4. first Generall Councels in such sort as they were and might be before these Statutes 4ly That since the repeale of these Statutes no man upon a bare conviction of Heresie before the Ordinary or Commissary justly may or ought to be put to death or burnt by the Writ De Haeretico comburendo unlesse he were likewise first legally indicted and convicted by a Iury in the Kings Courts as all other capitall Malefactors Felons and Traytors are My reasons are F●●st because it is directly contrary to Magna Charta c. 29. the Petition of Right 5. E. 3. c. 9. 25. E 3. c. 4. and other forecited Statutes of Edward the 3d. and contrary to the right order of Iustice good equity and the Lawes of the Realme as is resolved in the Stat. of 25. H. 8 c. 14. 2ly Because the Sheriffe could not execute any man by vertue of this Writ or without it before the Statute of 2. H. 4. c. 5. nor after it without this Writ unlesse he were actually present at the sentence as is resolved 2. Mariae Brooke Heresie 1. Therefore this Statute and all others in pursuance of it being totally repealed this Writ and the proceedings on it upon a bare sentence of the Ordinary is as I humbly conceive meerely void in Law and contrary to Magna Charta And therefore it is considerable whether the resolution of the Iudges in Legates case forecited be not erronious though seconded by Sir Edward Cooke For though the Ordinary of every Diocesse both before and after these Acts might convict any person for Heresie and excommunicate or degrade him by the common Law yet the Sheriffe could not execute him by any such convictions either without or by vertue of a Writ De Haeretico comburendo but by power of those Acts now all repealed as is resolved by 25. H. 8. c. 1. 4 Yet that an Hereticke or Blasphemer convicted and condemned of Heresie or notorious Blasphemy by a whole Nationall Synod or Convocation may by Ordinance of both Houses of Parliament without any previous Indictment be lawfully executed by a Writ De Heretico comburendo even at this day seemes probable to me since it was usual before any Statute made by the connivance of the common Law 5ly That an Hereticke and Apostate legally indicted and convicted in the Kings Courts before the Iudges for Heresie or Apostacy and adjudged to be burnt may at this day by the common Law be executed without such a Writ by vertue of the judgement only by the Sheriffe who is an Officer to the Court as well as other Felons may be and are usually executed in other cases without a Writ And if the Parliament will be pleased by a Law to declare what are Heresies in particular and what Heretickes and Apostates in speciall shall be indicted and proceeded against at the common Law as they did heretofore in case of Treasons by the Stat. of 25. E. 3. c. 2. there will be as great benefit and no more danger of Tyranny or Persecution in permitting commanding the Iudges to proceed against Hereticks and Apostates who are Traytors unto God and Religion according to the ancient Rules of the common Law then there now is in their proceedings against Traytors to the King and Kingdome upon the Statute of 25. E. 3. c. 2. a very good president as I humbly conceive for framing a new capitall Law against Heresies and Blasphemies Now the reasons which confirme me in this opinion That all Heresies Blasphemies Schismes Apostacies Idolatries are triable and punishable in a criminall or Capitall manner only by an indictment and legall Tryall at the common Law but not upon any sentence given by the Clergy in Convocation or the Bishops in their Consistories are these First because the Priests under the Law were neither appointed to condemne nor execute such unlesse upon extraordinary occasions in default of the Majestrat but only the Majestrates and people as Deut. 13. with other precepts and precedents forecited manifest especially Iob. 31. 26. 27. 28. If I behold the Sunne when it shined or the Moone walking in brightnesse or my heart hath beene secretly enticed to worship them or my mouth hath kissed my hand this also were an iniquity TO BE PVNISHED BY THE IVDGE for I should have denyed the God that is above Secondly Because all such under the Gospell since Christs time were anciently punished with imprisonment confiscation of goods disinherison banishment death only by the civill Lawes Edicts of Godly Emperours Kings and civill Majestrates and by their sentences and Iudgements in pursuance of them as is apparant by the premised and subsequent Lawes and Histories No Prelats Councells Synods anciently having power to passe any such civill corporall or capitall sentence against them but the civill Iudges and Majestrate only Hence Lucas Tudensis about 350. yeares since writing of the Albigenses reputed for Hereticks records that a judice Regionis capti sunt Et ut digni erant flaminum ignibus traditi confessing it to be the civill Magistrates duty both to restraine and punish them concluding thus Regum Principum est hoc ministerium scilicet fidei rebelles occidere per se vel per ministros suos Quod nisi sollicite fecerint rationem reddent Domino de his quae eorum dissimulatione vel negligentia ab impijs perpetrantur Remunerabuntur autem si illorum ministeriocultus fidei conservetur Hence Iulius Firmicus writes thus to the Emperors Constans and Constantius vobis sacratissimi Imperatores ad vindicandam puniendam Idololatriam necessitas imperatur hoc vobis Dei summi lege praecipitur 3ly Because all the godly Councells Bishops Fathers in former ages yea Popes themselves have written to and importuned Godly Emperors Kings Magistrates to apprehend suppresse punish Hereticks Schismaticks Blasphemers and Apostates informing them it was their duty to do it to which all Orthodox Protestant Churches Writers at this day subscribe yea and the Papists too From whence Paeraeus Dr. Willet Bishop Davenant and generally all Protestant Divines thus argue against the Popish Prelates and Clergie who will not

boody to the true Professors of the Gospell thereupon the Statute of 1. Ed. 6. c. 12. repeald and utterly made void all Lawes and Statutes formerly made concerning Hereticks or opinions in Religion and so they continued repealed during all King Edward the sixt his Reigne But Queene Mary comming to the Crowne and restoring the Popes and Prelates exploded Jurisdictions thereupon The Statute of 1. 2. Phil. and Mary● 6. revived them all in whose Reign they were put in vigorus execution to the destruction of many Godly Christians as we may read at large in Mr. Fox his Acts and Monuments vol. 3. But shee deceasing and Queene Elizabeth●●cceding ●●cceding The Statute of 1. Eliz. c. 1. repealed all these Lawes againe rev●ed by Queene Mary and leaves Ord●… and the High Commissioners liberty to proceed against Heretickes only by Ecclesiasticall Censures with thes provisoes Provided alwayes and be it enacted as is aforesaid that no manner of Order Act or determination for any matter of Religion or cause Ecclesiasticall had or made by the Authority of this present Parliament shall be accepted deemed reputed or adjudged at any time hereafter to be any Errour Heresie Schisme or Schismaticall opinion any Order Decree Sentence Constitution or Law whatsoever the same be to the contrary notwithstanding Provided always be it enacted by the Authority aforesaid that such person or Persons to whom your Highnesse your Heires or Successors shall hereafter by Letters Patents under the Great Seale of England give Authority to have or execute any Jurisdiction Power or Authority Spirituall or Temporall or to visi Reforme Order or Correct any Errors Heresies Schismes Abuses or Enormities by vertue of this Act shall not in any wise have Authority or power to order determine or adjudge any matter or cause to be Heresie but only such as heretofore have beene determined ordered or adjudged to bee Heresie by the Authority of the Canonicall Scriptures or by the first 4. Generall Councells or any of them or by any other Generall Councells wherein the same was declared Heresie by the expresse and plaine words of the said Canonicall Scriptures or such as hereafter shall be Ordered judged or determined to be Heresie by the High Court of Parliament of this Realme with the assent of the Clergie in their Convocation any thing in this Act contained to the contrary notwithstanding So as this Act defines what shall be adjudged and punished as Heresie by the High Commissioners and may serve for a good Rule to the Judges and Parliament now to proceed by in judging what shall be reputed reall Haeresie and Blasphemy in future times But this clause of this Act is now repealed by an Act of this present Parliament which takes away the High Commission and so all Statutes concerning Heretickes or Heresie are now wholly repealed and the Ordinaries power to punish them totally abolished by the Ordinances abolishing Episcopacy Yet this is observable that both before and after the repeale of all Statutes concerning Haeresie by 1 Eliz. c. 1. some reall Heretickes and Anabaptists were condemned and burnt for Haeresie by vertue of the Common Law of England I read if Fox his Acts and Monuments that in King Henry the 8. his Reigne in the yeare of our Lord 1535. ten Datch men accounted for Anabaptists were put to death in sundry places of the Realme and that other tenne repented and were saved and two of the said Company pardoned by the King albeit the definitive sentence was read And well might they deserve this sentence if our learned Martyr John Philpot may be credited who writes in a godly Letter to a friend of his That Axentius one of the Arrian Sect with his Adherents was one of the first that denyed the Baptisme of Children and next after him Pelagius the Hereticke and some others that were in St. Bernards time and in our dayes the Anabaptists an inordinate kinde of men stirred up by the Devil to the destruction of the Gospel So he o An. 1538. Two Anabaptists were burned in Smithfield three then bore fagots and abjured the Realme but this was before these Acts repealed After their repeale in the 17. yeare of Queene Elizabeth Anno 1575. A congregation of Anabaptists being Dutch-men was discovered in a House without the Barres of Aldgate LONDON 27 of them were taken and sent to Prison 4. of them bearing Fagots recanted their Haereticall opinions at Pauls Crosse the 5th day of May The 21. of May one man and two women Anabaptists Dutch were in the Consistory at Pauls condemned to be burnt in Smithfield after great paines taken with them the Women were converted and the Man banished Nine Women of them and a Man were publikely Carted and whipped by the Sheriffs Officers on the first of Iune and then carried to the Water side from Newgate and shipped and banished never to returne more into England The 22. of Iuly two Dutchmen Anabaptists were burned in Smithfield who died with great horror roaring and yelling And by this meanes England was then preserved from their infection Anno 1579. being 21. Eliz. Mathew Hamant for execrable Haeresie and Blasphemy not fit to repeat against Christ and the Holy Ghost and denying their Deity and the use of Baptisme and Sacraments in the Church was on the 13. day of April condemned at Norwich by the Bishop of the Diocesse in his Consistory as an Haeretick and on the 20th of May burned publikly in the Castle of Norwich his Eares being first cut off in the Market place for horrible blasphemy against the Queene r Anno. 25. Eliz. on the 18. day of September one Iohn Lewes who named himselfe Abdeit an obstinate Haereticke denying the Godhead of Christ and holding divers other damnable Haeresies much like his Predecessor Hamant WAS BVRNED AT NORWICH Hil. 9. Jacobi one Legat was juditially convented convicted and condemned by the Bishop of the Diocesse for his Heresie and it was resolved by the Judges of the Kings Bench that a Writ De Haeretico comburendo lay upon the judgement and some say he was burnt accordingly 9. Jacobi 19. Novembris Anno Dom. 1611. one Edward Wrightman of Burton upon Trent was convented before Richard Neale Bishop of Coventry and Litchfield for denying the Trinity the Deity of Christ and of the Holy Ghost and affirming himselfe to be Christ and the Holy Ghost and the Scriptures spoken of them to be meant of himselfe all which he affirmed and justified in his Answers to his Articles and persisted in the same after many conferences whereupon on the 5th of December following he was condemned for an obstinate and incorrigible Haereticke and excommunicated with the great Excommunication and adjudged by the Bishop to be delivered over to the secular power to be capitally punished according to the Atrocity and haynousnes of his crimes and Blasphemies whose Articles and sentence I have in my custody Whether he were actually burnt or reprived as one frantique