Selected quad for the lemma: england_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
england_n	king_n	lord_n	richard_n	8,069	5	8.7668	4	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A30253	A case concerning the buying of bishops lands with, the lawfulness thereof and the difference between the contractors for sale of those lands, and the corporation of VVells, ordered, Anno. 1650, to be reported to the then Parliament / with the necessity thereof, since fallen upon Dr. Burges.	Burges, Cornelius, 1589?-1665.	1659 (1659)	Wing B5670; ESTC R11486	85,757	85

one of the Burgesses of the same City or Burrough to be our true and lawful Atturnies for us and in our names to treat contract and agree with the Honorable Committee of Contractors for the sale of all Bishops lands within the Kingdom of England and Dominion of VVales for the purchasing of the Inheritance of the Royalty of the Liberty of the City or Burrough of VVells as also of the hundred of Wells and VVells-Forum and the two Fairs of Priddy and Binegar within the said Hundred Hereby ratifying confirming and allowing all and whatsoever our said Atturnies or any two of them shall do for us in the premises In witness whereof we have set our Seal of Maioralty of the said City the fourth day of December in the 23 yeer of the Reign of our Soveraign Lord Charls by the Grace of God of England Scotland France and Ireland Kings Defender of the Faith c. And in the yeer of our Lord 1647. Thomas Salmon Maior Barthol Cox Tho. Jones VVilliam Baron VVill. VVest Richard Casbeard VVill. Smith Robert Hill Robert Thomas John Web. Hugh Merefield William Hiat Robert Hurman Robert Hole William Atwel Joseph Gallington Joseph Plummer Josias Cook This Letter of Attorny which inabled any two of the therein named Attornies to Contract being received one of them adventured single upon the work and Contracted as followeth Die Mercurii 15 Decem. 1647. AGreed with the Contractors for the Purchase of the Royalties of Wells and Wells forum in the County of Somerset Welby Contract mentioned in the Particular thereof delivered in under the hand of the Register and also for the Bayliff-wick of the Town and Forum of Wells aforesaid with all and singular the Fairs Markets Clerkship of the Market and Profits thereof and all other things to the said Bayliff-wick pertaining And also for the Office of Stewardship for the Town of Wells aforesaid and all Profits and Advantages thereunto belonging mentioned also in the said Particular at the rate of Twenty Years Purchase for the present improved yearly values of all the said premises amounting in toto to the sum of nineteen pounds and ten shillings in Possession And for an improvement of value upon the said Bayliff-wick after the determination of three Lives in being at the rate of four yeers Purchase for the said increase of value being five pounds thirteen shillings and four pence in Reversion I say agreed accordingly on the behalf of the Corporation of Wells Per me John Casbeard This Contract so refers to the first Particular that without sight of that no man can say punctually what was purchased but rather what not was purchased till that particular be produced And whereas the Contract mentions the Bayliff-wick to be but 5 l. 13 s. 4 d. improvement after three Lives in being it agreeth not with the Survey which saith it is 40 l. per annum This Contract lay as the Contractors thought sleeping from the 15 of December till the 15 of March following In which time the Agents of Wells slept not for they being told by somebody that if they could but get the first Particular out of the Registers hands and draw up and return another in the room they might get much more into their Purchase and Conveyance then they had indeed Contracted for Which some imployed in this Purchase accordingly did And in room of the first Particular the Particular here following without any new Contract or warrant from the Contractors was thrust in and brought to the Contractors March 15. to signe The Contractors being by Ordinance of Parliament to look no further then to the Registers hand affixed to the Particular for their Warrant to signe the Contract made thereupon they then used not to have the whole read again but onely the sums for the Purchase to be paid how much in Possession and how much in Reversion and how many yeers Purchase for both Which done they signed it and gave their Warrant to the Trustees for passing a Conveyance accordingly The last Particular which the Contractors signed in March 1647. ran thus Parcel of the Possessions of the late Bishoprick of Bath and Wells Com. Somers The last partilar for the Corporation THe Royaltie of the City or Burrough of Wells and of the forraine Fee Bayliff-wick or Hundred of Wells commonly called Wells and Wells Forum with the Rights Members and Appurtenances thereof in the County of Somerset together with the said Hundred And also the Courts and Courts of Record or Court and Courts of Pleas Hundred Courts Views of Frank-Pledge and whatsoever to view of Frank-Pledge appertaineth Court Leets Courts Baron and other Courts to be holden from three weeks to three weeks or otherwise holden or to be holden from time to time within the City or Burrough of Wells and the Liberties thereof or within the Hundred of Wells and Wells Forum aforesaid Together with the Guild Hall and the ground and soil thereof wherein the said Courts are usually holden And the prison or prison House thereunto adjoyning And all Fines Issues and amercements requisites and profits as well at the said Courts and every of them as at the Sessions of the Peace holden from time to time at the City or Burrough of Wells aforesaid And also all Fines for License of Alienation and post-Fines and all other Fines Forfeitures Issues and Amercements at the Assizes or elsewhere before whatsoever Judge or Justices either in the High Court of Chancery the Court of Kings Bench or Common Pleas or of Exchequer due and payable or happening from time to time to be due and payable by any person or persons within the County of Somerset aforesaid And also the Bayliwick and Office of Bayliff of Wells and of the Hundred of Wells and Wells-Forum aforesaid And of the said Liberty of the said Bishop of Bath and Wells within the said County of Somerset And also full Power and Authority to keep the aforesaid Courts and every of them and the accustomed Writs and Process of the aforesaid Courts and Courts of Record to be from time to time issued and awarded To bear Test in the name of the Maior of the said City or Burrough for the time being successively And to be kept by the Maior or Recorder or by the Steward of the said Maior Masters and Burgesses of the said City or Burrough and their successors for the time being and such other Officers of the said Maior Masters and Burgesses and their successors for ever to be from time to time attendant upon the said Courts and to serve and execute the Writs and Processes of the said Courts and other matters and things in the said Courts as were usually attendant in and upon the said Courts in the time of the late Bishops there And also power to distrain for all sums of mony due and payable for or by reason of the said premises And all other remedies and means for the having receiving levying or enjoying the premises or any

all their wickedness their adulteries rapes murders and other villanies which they committed against others of the Laity till they saw it most seasonable to carve large gobbets out of their Estates vvhen they had them sure vvithin their Nets Then they would to this end fall foul upon them terrifying them with unsufferable torments first in Purgatory and afterwards in Hell it self unless they speedily gave such large portions of their best Lands as these Harpies pleased to expiate their sins and to prevent those miseries Which if they did they were presently absolved and proclaimed meritorious especially if they could be drawn to give so much as might redeem the souls of their deceased Ancestors too out of Purgatory tortures By this they merited Heaven but without this they must expect Hell for their portion Strong Arguments to weak and silly Souls abused by blind Guides All which Donations they were made to believe were given unto God and to some Saint whereupon they needed not to doubt of their own pardons and the release of their Ancestors out of Purgatory fire which kept the Kitchins of those soul-killing Prelates so warm All those Charters must for the better grace of the business begin with the Name of God as if all were given to him and that he accepted thereof meaning to themselves to cramb their purses and panches to the use of the Devil Therefore when he or his imps had any mischief to act they usually made In Dei nomine Amen In the name of God Amen the Preface to it Whence that old Proverb In nomine Domini incipit omne malum When they had a minde to fleece any man God himself must be made a party to countenance their avarice even when God was not truly and indeed in all their thoughts n Psal 10.4 and their eyes and their thoughts were not but for their covetousness o Jer. 22.17 Nor would the Donors have parted vvith such ample Territories but as being made to believe by those Merchants to whom they gave them or by their Agents and Factors that thereby they satisfyed God for their sins and expiated the guilt of some hideous and hainous wickedness which they had before committed or as hiring the Priests and Monks that were to enjoy those Lands to redeem the Souls of their Ancestors out of Purgatoty or to curse their Enemies with Bell Book and Candle as the manner then was the more to please or rather fool the ignorant Founders whom by such means they cheated of such large donations as any indifferent man vers'd in the Histories of those times cannot but know And lest this should be thought a slander take but these few instances for proof thereof First in the very Body of the Popes Canon-Law which is enough to silence for ever all such as plead for such Popish Donations it is declared as a Maxime not to be denyed Ille qui donat pro redemptione Animae suae non pro commodo Sacerdotis offerre probatur p Decret par 2. caus 12. q. 3. C. Pontifices He that gives ought to the Church doth it for the Redemption of his Soul not for the gain of the Priest And this Shooing-Horn was held out the more easily to draw on other mens Revenues upon their Feet who gave out this for a Law that all such Gifts redeemed the Souls of the Donors and of all others that they pleased to mention in their Donations which was indeed to give to the Devil not unto God because it makes man his own Saviour and denieth the satisfaction made by Christ which is a Doctrine of Devils How the Bishops Lands at Wells were first given In this manner did Kenulph King of the West Saxons about the year of Christ 766. endow the Church of St. Andrew in Wells then a Monastery with a large Patrimony in Lands in and about Wells Mendip and other places adjacent some of which Dr. Burges hath now bought For in his Charter q Godw. of Bps pag. 358. Monast Anglic. he declareth that he did it pro expiatione delictorum suorum nec non quod verbo dolendum est pro vexatione inimicorum suorum Cornubiae gentis For the expiation of his sins and which he was sorry for for the vexation of the Cornish People That is to hire the Monks of Wells to curse the Cornish Men which he could not subdue by his Sword And verily he had need to do somewhat for expiating his sins as the Doctrine of those times wherein the sufficiency of Christs satisfaction for true Penitents was concealed ran For he was so much given to Adultery that even after that great gift he could not leave that sin but rather grew more bold to continue it as appears by his going in that Errand to one of his Concubines which he kept at Merton r Sim Danel cited by Speed Isaakson or Marton in Devon where he was discovered surrounded by Enemies in all probability the Cornish who knew his haunt and there slain So Divine was the gift of the Mannor of Wells And so highly did God accept and own it as His Propriety that the Curse which the King intended to fall upon his Enemies fell upon his own head by those very Enemies whom he had hired the Monks of Wells to curse And that this was the High-Way wherein the Popish Clergy of England long before as well as since the Conquest constantly travailed Take one Testimony more of that famous Gildas the Elder surnamed Sapiens who being a Britain Presbyter within the Sixth Century or hundred of yeers after Christ thus chargeth the Popish Clergy of his time who had suck'd their Principles from Augustine the Monk sent from Rome on purpose to advance the State and Pomp of the Clergy under colour of planting the Christian Faith in England For thus he Å¿ Eccles Ordin Corrept Bibl. Patr to 5. par 3. Britania habet Sacerdotes sed nonnullos insipientes quamplurimos Ministros sed multos impudentes Clericos sed quosdam raptores subdoles Pastores ut dicuntur sed occisioni animarum lupos parates quippe non commodo plebis providentis sed proprii plenitudinem ventris quaerentes Ecclesiae domos habentes sed eas turpis lucri gratia adeuntes c. Britain saith he hath Priests but some of them very Dolts very many Ministers but many of them impudent ones Clergy-men but very Thieves and Cheaters Pastors as they are termed but in truth Wolves standing ready to slay and flay the Souls of the Sheep for that they seek not the good of the People but the crambing of their own Bellies they have Church-Houses but never repair to them unless for their own filthy Lucre. Again that he might let all men see that he involved the Bishops of those times yea even the Pope himself within this Charge he addeth Sedem Petri Apostoli immundis pedibus Vsurpantes sed merito cupiditatis in Judae Traditoris Pestilentiae Cathedram

desidentes With unclean feet they Usurp the Seat of the Apostle Peter but through Covetousness they rather sit indeed in Judas his Chair of Pestilence This with much more that highly esteemed Author writes of the Clergy of his time which future ages did not make better For since the Conquest the Prelates and Monks have been more high-flown grasped more Lands upon the same account with the former into their Possession then their Predecessors in so much as the Clergie Monks and Nuns of England being not a fortieth nay not a hundredth part of the Kingdom had by these wiles and devices gotten as some intelligent men have computed a third part of all the prime Lands in the Nation into their clutches at what time King Henry the Eighth began to seize the lesser Monasteries and all upon the same ground of meriting Salvation for themselves and their Relations dead or unborn Thus Henry the Third in the ninth of his Reign himself being then but eighteen years of age was hook'd into that Great Charter Magna Chartae so much cryed up by the Prelatical Clergy to which he thus prefaceth Henry by the Grace of God King of England c. to all Archbishops Bishops c. Know ye that We unto the Honour of God and for the Salvation of the Souls of Our Progenitors and Successors Kings of England c. have given and granted c. to which all the Bishops and Abbots as well as others were of Counsel and Witnesses by which it appears that this Charter was granted to merit Salvation so as however the honour of God be mentioned yet the dishonour of God and Christ lay at the bottom of that Grant in reference to the Foundation laid in his heart by the Prelates The same is after declared in the Statute De Provisorib Beneficior in the 25 of Edw. 3. where it is expresly said That the Church of England was founded in the State of Prelacy within the Realm of England by his Grandfather which was Edw. 1. and his Progenitors and by the Earles Barons and other Nobles of the said Realm and their Ancestors to inform them and the People of the Law of God * This was ever pretended but never performed unless by some few very rarely as the stories of those Times plainly testifie See Mat. Paris ad ann 1253. Fox his Martyrol of the same times and to make Hospitality Alms and other Works of Charity in the places where the Churches were founded for the SOULS of the Founders their heires and all Christians c. In which Act the Bishops as well as others joyned thereby proclaiming to the world the superstitious Foundations of getting so many Lands to the Church Yea so zealously bent were the Prelates of those times to augment the Churches Patrimony that a Constitution t Lindw l. 5. tit de poenit remiss ca. Cum anima was made in a Provincial Synod under Richard Withershed alias Weather-head in the Reign of Hen. 3. not to suffer any Physitian to administer any Physick to any Patient whatsoever be he in never so great Extremity and Danger till the Patient were first shrived by a Priest under pain of Suspension ab ingressu Ecclesiae The pretence was to physick his Soul first but the meaning was to get a collop to some Chantery or Monastery to pray for his Soul in Purgatory upon which the Priest absolved him and not before And this was that which occasioned so many Chanteries justly vacated and seized by Edw. 6. being given to him by Parliament 1 Edw. 6.14 Nor were the Kings and Parliaments especially after King John so hood-wink'd and cow'd as not to take notice of and provide against those excessive gifts of Lands to the Church as they call'd it which so greatly rob'd the Commonwealth For the same Hen. 3. who first granted the Great Charter Cap. 36. wherein he confirmed the Rights and Liberties of Holy Church as that Idolized Crew was then termed did in the same Chapter enact a That it should not be lawful from thenceforth to any to give his Lands to any Religious House and to take the same again to hold of the same House * Because Lands so held were free from all Tythes Taxes and Eschetes Therefore many did so convey Lands to cozen the King and other chief Lords Nor shall it be lawful to any House of Religion to take the Lands of any and to lease the same to him of whom he received it And that if any from thenceforth gave his Lands to any Religious Houses and thereupon be convict the gift should be utterly void and the Land accrew to the Lord of the Fee Here then was a Liberty of resuming Lands dedicated to the Church and an imploying of them to such secular uses as the Lord of the Fee should appoint without incurring the guilt of Sacriledge Next after Henry the Third succeeded his Son Edward the First who confirmed Magna Charta in the 25 of his Reign and with it the Clause or Chapter last mentioned but before he did that even in the seventh of his Reign he made a strict Law against Mort-main by advice of the Prelates as well as others to make all gifts and Purchases of Lands without special License from the King to be null and void and the Lands forfeited to the chief Lord if he took the advantage within a year and half or else to the King in case the chief Lord neglected the seizure within the said time therein limited and appointed for his seizing thereof for his own use Which Law however it were mitigated at the importunity of the Clergy by Edward the Third who in such Cases enacted the taking of Fines in stead of Forfeitures Yet afterwards in 15 Rich. 2. that first Statute of 7 Edw. 1. was not onely set on foot again but extended to all Guilds Fraternities and Corporations yea to all Donations of Lands for Church-yards or for any other Church Use And that if contrary thereunto any should presume to give or to receive any Lands upon a Church account or otherwise without the Kings special License they should either procure his License or sell away those Lands by the then next Michaelmas By all which it is manifest that neither the Kings nor Parliaments nor Bishops themselves in Parliament ever took all Lands given to Churches to be Sacred and Gods Propriety Jure Divino or so much as lawful for the Church to hold them without License from the King or other chief Lord of the Fee of whom such Lands were before holden Witness the many Statutes against Mort-Main or against the falling of Lands into a dead hand that is the Church whereby neither King nor Kingdom could receive any thing out of them for Defence of the Realm nor the chief Lords enjoy the benefit of chief Rents Services Fines of Alienation or Eschetes which being an apparent wrong to all occasioned those Statutes Not that it is