other sorts of men because of their Religion and their abilities above all other men to defend it On the other side the Puritanes who envied their power and some great ones about the Court who having tasted the sweet of Sacriledge in the times of the two last Kings thirsted after the remainder of their Revenues complyed either with other for their several respective ends against the Bishops Which being so it had been the foolishest thing in the world for the Bishops to have used that power or interest they had with the Queen upon whose favour or displeasure their whole livelyhood depended for the procuring of her consent to any Act to be done in favour of them that malice it self could with any colourable construction interpret either to savour of Popery or to trench upon the Royal Supremacy That Queen having both by her sufferings before and actions after she came to the Crown sufficiently witnessed to the world her averseness from Popery and being withall a Princess of a great Spirit and particularly jealous in the point of Prerogative XXIX Whence I think we may with good reason conclude that the ancient custome of the Bishops in making Summons c. in their own names after it was by the Act of Repeal 1. Mar. restored was continued by Queen Elizabeth and her successours ever since without interruption or reviving of the Statute of King Edward neither out of any inadvertency in the State nor through any importune or indirect labouring of the Bishops as by the Objectors is weakly presumed but advisedly and upon important considerations viz. that the devising of such a new way as is set forth and appointed in the said Statute was not only a needless thing and Laws should not be either made or altered but where it is needful so to do but subject also to manifest both inconvenience and Scandal XXX That it was altogether needless to change the old Custome may appear by this that all the imaginable necessity or utility of such a change could be onely this To secure the King by using his Name in their Processes c. as a real acknowledgement that their Iurisdiction is derived from him and no other that the Bishops had no intention in the exercise of their Episcopal power to usurp upon his Ecclesiastical Supremacy Which Supremacy of the King and Superiority of his Jurisdiction Authority over that which the Bishops exercised being already by so many other wayes and means sufficiently secured it could argue nothing but an impertinent jealousie to endeavour to strengthen that security by an addition of so poor and inconsiderable regard XXXI The Kings of England are secured against all danger that may accrue to their Regal power from Episcopal Iurisdiction as it hath been anciently and of later times exercised in this Realm First by the extent of their Power over the persons and livelihoods of the Bishops and over the whole State Ecclesiastical as in the ancient right of the Crown which how great it was may appear by these three particulars XXXII First the Collation and Donation of Bishopricks together with the nomination of the persons to be made Bishops in case they did by their Writ of Conge d'eslier permit the formality of Election to others did alwayes belong to the Kings of this Realm both before and since the Conquest as in right of their Crown Our learned Lawyers assure us that all the Bishopricks of this Realm are of the Kings foundation that they were originally donative and not elective and that the full right of Investiture was in the King who signified his pleasure therein per traditionem baculi annuli by the delivery of a ring and a Crosier-staff to the person by him elected and nominated for that office The Popes indeed often assayed to make them elective either by the Dean and Canons of the Cathedral or by the Monkes of some principal Abbey adjoyning but the Kings still withstood it and maintained their right as far as they could or durst Insomuch as King Henry the First being earnestly sollicited by the Pope to grant the election of Bishops to the Clergy constanter allegavit saith the story and verbis minacibus he stoutly and with threats refused so to do saying he would not for the loss of his Kingdome lose the right of those Investitures It is true that King Iohn a Prince neither fortunate nor couragious being overpowred by the Popes did by Charter in the Seventeenth year of his Raign grant that the Bishopricks of England should be eligible But this notwithstanding in the Raign of King Edward the Third it was in open Parliament declared and enacted that to the King and his heirs did belong the collation of Archbishopricks c. and all other dignities that are of his Advowson and that the elections granted by the Kings his progenitors were under a certain form and condition viz. that they should ask leave of the King to elect and that after the election made they should obtain the Kings consent thereunto and not otherwise XXXIII Secondly the King hath power if he shall see cause to suspend any Bishop from the execution of his Office for so long time as he shall think good yea and to deprive him utterly of the dignity and office of a Bishop if he deserve it Which power was de facto exercised both by Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth in the beginning of their several Raigns upon such Bishops as would not conform to their Religion XXXIV Thirdly the Kings of England have a great power over the Bishops in respect of their Temporalties which they hold immediately of the King per Baroniam and which every Bishop Elect is to sue out of the Kings hands wherein they remained after the decease of the former Bishop during the Vacancy and thence to take his only restitution into the same making Oath and fealty to the King for the same upon his Consecration Yea and after such restitution of Temporalties and Consecration the King hath power to seize the same again into his own hands if he see just cause so to do Which the Kings of England in former times did so frequently practice upon any light displeasure conceived against the Bishops that it was presented as a grievance by the Arch-bishop of Canterbury and the other Prelates by way of request to King Edw. 3. in Parliament and thereupon a Statute was made the same Parliament that thenceforth no Bishops Temporalties should be seized by the King without good cause I finde cited by Sir Edward Coke out of the Parliament Rolls 18. H. 3. a Record wherein the King straightly chargeth the Bishops not to intermeddle in any thing to the prejudice of his Crown threatning them with seisure of their Temporalties if they should so do The words are Mandatum est omnibus Episcopis quae conventuri sunt apud Gloucestr ' the King having before summoned them by writ to a Parliament to be holden at Gloucester
the Objectors and then endeavour by a clear and satisfactory answer to discover the weakness and vanity of them both III. The former objection Whereas in the Oath of Supremacy the supreme power Ecclesistical is acknowledged to be in the King alone and by the Statute of 1. Eliz. All jurisdictions and preeminencies Spiritual and Ecclesiastical within the Realm of England are restored to the Crown as the ancient right thereof and forever united and annexed thereunto the Bishops claiming their power and jurisdiction to belong unto them as of divine right seemeth to be a manifest violation of the said Oath and Statute and a real diminution of the Regal power in and by the said Oath and Statute acknowledged and confirmed For whatsoever power is of divine right is immediatly derived from God and dependeth not upon any earthly King or Potentate whatsoever as superiour thereunto These two tearms to be from Heaven and to be of Men being used in the Scriptures as terms opposite and inconsistent and such as cannot be both truly affirmed of the same thing IV. The latter objection Setting aside the dispute of jus divinum and whatsoever might be said either for or against the same the very exercising of Episcopal jurisdiction in such a manner as it was with us the Bishops issuing out their Summens giving Censures and acting every other thing in the Ecclesiastical Courts in their own and not in the Kings name seemeth to derogate very much from the Regal power in the point of Ecclesiastical Soveraignty For whereas the Judges in the Kings Bench Common Plees and other Common-Law-Courts do issue out their Writts and make all their Iudgments Orders Decrees c. in the Kings name thereby acknowledging both their Power to be depending upon and derived from the Kings authority and themselves in the exercise of that Power to be but his Ministers sent and authorzied by him and so give him the just honour of his Supremacy temporal The Bishops on the other side exercise a spiritual power or jurisdiction in their own names and as it were by their own authority without any the least acknowledgment of the effluxe or emanation of that power or jurisdiction from the King Which custome as it had undoubtedly its first rise and after-growth from the exorbitant greatness of the Bishops of Rome who have usurped an unjust authority as well over Kings and Princes as over their Fellow-Bishops laboured all they could to lessen the authority of Kings especially in matters Ecclesiastical so is the continuance thereof no otherwise to be esteemed then as a rag or relique of that Anti-Christian tyranny which was retained as some other things also of evil consequence were in those imperfect beginnings of Reformation when the Popes power was first abrogated under King Henry the Eighth But it was afterwards in a more mature and perfect reformation taken in to consideration in the Raign of King Edward the Sixth and remedy provided there-against by an Act of Parliament made in the first year of his Raign Wherein it was enacted that all Summons Citations and other Processes Ecclesiastical should be made in the Kings name and with the style of the King as it is in Writts original and judicial at the Common Laws and that the Teste thereof only should be in the name of the Bishop V. It is true indeed that this Statute of King Edward was within a few years after repealed and so the old usage and form again restored primo Mariae and hath ever since so continued during the Raigns of the said Queen of Queen Elizabeth of K. Iames and of his Majesty that now is until this present Parliament without any alteration or interruption But the repealing of the Statute of primo Edw. 6. and the reception of the former usage insuing thereupon ought not to be alleaged by the Bishops or to sway with any Protestant inasmuch as that repeal was made by Queen Mary who was a professed Papist and who together with that form of proceeding in the Ecclesiastical Courts restored also the whole Popish Religion whereof that was a branch Neither ought the un-interrupted continuance of the said form under Queen Elizabeth and the succeeding Kings whether it happened through inadvertency in the State or through the incessant artifices and practises of the more active Bishops some or other whereof had alwayes a prevalent power with those Princes in their several Raigns to hinder but that as the said manner of proceeding was in the said first year of Edward 6. by the King and the three Estates in Parliament adjudged to favour the usurped power of the Bishops of Rome and to trench upon the Kings just and acknowledged authority in matters Ecclesiastical as by the preamble of the said Act doth sufficiently appear so it ought to be still no otherwise esteemed then as a branch of the Papal usurpation highly derogatory to the honour of the King and the rights of his Crown This is as I conceive the sum of all that hath been and the utmost of what I suppose can be said in this matter THE II. SECTION In answer to the former Objection I. WHereunto I make answer as followeth To the former Objection I say first that it is evidently of no force at all against those Divines who for the maintenance of Episcopacy lay their claim under another notion and not under that of Ius Divinum Which expression for that it is by reason of the ambiguity thereof subject to be mistaken and that captious men are so willing to mistake it for their own advantage might peradventure without loss of Truth or prejudice to the Cause bâ— with as much prudence laid aside aâ— used as in this so in sundry other disputes and controversies of these Times II. If it shall be replyed that then belike the Proctors for Episcopacy are not yet well agreed among themselves by what title they hold and that is a shrewd prejudice against them that they have no good title For it is ever supposed he that hath a good title knoweth what it is and we are to presume the power to be usurped when he that useth it cannot well tell how he came by it I say therefore secondly that the difference between the Advocates for Episcopacy is rather in the different manner of expressing the same thing then in their different judgement upon the substance of the matter The one sort making choise of an expression which he knoweth he is able to make good against all gainsayers if they will but understand him aright the other out of wariness or condescension forbearing an expression no necessity requiring the use of it which he seeth to have been subject to so much mis-construction III. For the truth is all this ado about Ius divinum is in the last result no more then a meer verbal nicety that term being not alwayes taken in one and the same latitude of signification Sometimes it importeth a divine precept which is indeed
by the 37 th Art of the Church of England required to be subscribed by all that take Orders in the Church or Degrees in the Universities and by constant declared judgement and practice of the two late Kings of blessed memory King Iames and King Charles the I st They who thus expresly disclaimed the medling with Spiritual Censures and the power of the keyes cannot be rationally supposed to have thought their own presence either personal or virtual any way requisite in the Courts where such Censures were to be pronounced and that power to be administred and exercised and therefore doubtless could not deem it fit or proper that in the juridical proceedings of such Courts their names should be used XII The second point in the charge objected is that this custome used by the Bishops in acting all things in the Ecclesiastical Courts in their own names grew at first from the exorbitant power of the Popes who laboured what they could to advance their own greatness by exempting the Clergy from all subjection to Temporal Princes and setting up an Ecclesiastical power of Jurisdiction independent upon the Secular and that the Parliament had that sence of it in the Raign of King Edward the Sixth as the words of the Statute made I. Edward VI. for the altering of the said Custome do plainly intimate XIII In which part of the Charge there is at the most but thus much of Truth 1. That the Bishops of Rome did not omit with all sedulity to pursue the grand design of that See which was to bring all Christian Princes into subjection to it self 2. That all the labouring for the Exemption of the Clergy from the Secular Powers was in order to that design 3. That the Bishops manner of using their own names in all acts of their Iurisdiction looked upon alone and by it self without any consideration of the true reasons thereof doth carry by so much the more shew of serving the Papal Interest then if they should do all in the King's Name by how much the acknowledging the Kings Supremacy-Ecclesiastical is less apparent therein then in the other 4. That the want of such an express acknowledgement of the King's Supremacy together with the jealousies the State had in those times over any thing that might seem to further or favour the usurped Power of the Pope in the least degree might very probably in this particular as well as it did in some other things occasion such men as bear the greatest sway in managing the publick affairs in the beginning of that godly but young King 's Raign out of a just detestation of the Papacy to endeavour overhastily the abolishing of whatsoever was with any colour suggested unto them to savour of Popery without such due examination of the grounds of those Suggestions as was requisite in a matter of so great importance XIIII This is all we can perhaps more then we need yield unto in this point of the Charge But then there are some other things which we cannot easily assent unto as viz. 1. That this custome had undoubtedly its original and growth from the Popes usurped power Which as we think it impossible for them to prove so it seemeth to us the less probable because by comparing of this course used in the Ecclesiastical Courts with the practise of sundry other Courts some of like some of different nature thereunto we have already shewed the true reasons and grounds of the difference between some Courts and othersome in this particular 2. That it is a rag or relique of Antichristian tyranny Which we believe to be altogether untrue Not only for the reasons before specified and for that the same is done in sundry other Courts holden within this Realm without any note of Antichristianisme or Popery fastened thereupon but also because it hath been constantly continued in this Kingdome the short Raign of King Edward the Sixth only excepted with the allowance of all the Protestants Kings and Queens of this Realm ever since the Reformation Who although they be ever and anon taxed by the Puritane-faction unjustly and insolently enough for want of a Through-Reformation and leaving so much Popish trash unpurged in the point of worship and Ceremonies yet have not usually been blamed by that party for being wanting to themselves in vindicating to the uttermost their Regal authority and Supremacy Ecclesiastical from the usurped power of the Bishops of Rome in any thing wherein they conceived it to be many wise or degree concerned As also because this manner of proceeding in the Courts Ecclesiastical hath been constantly and without scruple of Conscience or suspition of Popery used and practised by all our godly and Orthodoxe Bishops even those who have been the most zealous maintainers of our Religion against the Papists and such as have particularly written against the Antichristian tyranny of the Pope or in defence of the Kings Supremacy in matters Ecclesiastical as Iewel Bilson Abbots Buckridge Carleton and many others XV. But against all this that hath been said how agreeable soever it may seem to truth and reason may be opposed the judgement of the whole Realm in Parliament the Bishops themselves also then sitting and voting as well as other the Lords and Commons in the first year of the Raign of King Edward the Sixth who thought fit by their Act to alter the aforesaid form and that upon the two aforesaid grounds viz. that it was contrary to the form and order of the Common Law-Courts and according to the form and manner used in the time of the usurped power of the Bishop of Rome Which being the last and weightiest point in the Charge is the more considerable in that besides its own strength it giveth also farther strength and confirmation to the other two XVI But for answer unto this argument drawn from the judgement of the Parliament as it is declared in the Statute of â— Edw. 6. I would demand of the Objectors where they place the chief strength of the Argument whether in the authority of the persons viz. the great Assembly of State convened in Parliament so judging or in validity of those reasons which led them so to judge If in this later their judgment can weigh no more then the reasons do whereon it is built the frailty whereof we have already examined and discovered If in the Authority of the Judges we lay in the ballance against it the judgment of the Kingdome in all the Parliaments after the decease of King Edward for above fourscore years together the first whereof repeated that Statute and none of those that followed for ought appeareth to us ever went about to revive it XVII If it shall be said first That the enacting of that Statute by King Edward was done in order to the farther abolishing of Popery and the perfecting of the Reformation begun by his Father I answer that as it was a very pious care and of singular example in so young a Prince to intend
Fellows and Equals All this great noise and clamour against the pride of the Bishops upon this score proceedeth as I said meerly from the ignorance of the true original cause and ground of that innocent and ancient usage and therefore cannot signify much to any reasonable and considering man when that ground is discovered which is this viz. that every Bishop is in construction of our Laws a Corporation For although the Bishop of himselfe and in his private and personal capacity be but a single person as other men are and accordingly in his letters concerning his own particular affairs and in all other his actings upon his own occasions and as a private person writeth of himselfe in the singular number as other private men do yet for as much as in his publike and politick capacity and as a Bishop in the Church of England he standeth in the eye of the Law as a Corporation the King not only alloweth him acting in that capacity to write of himselfe in the plural number but in all writs directed to him as Bishop as in Presentations and the like bespeaketh him in the plural number Vestrae Diocesis vobis praesentamus c. The Bishop then being a Corporation and that by the Kings authority as all other Corporations whether Simple or Aggregate whether by Charter or Prescription are it is meet he should hold his Courts and proceed therein in the same manner and form where there is no apparent reason to the contrary as other Corporations do And therefore as it would be a high presumption for the Chancellour and Scholars of one of the Universities being a Corporation to whom the King by his Charter hath granted a Court or for the Major and Aldermen of a City for the same reason to issue Writs or do other acts in their Courts in the Kings name not having any authority from the King or his grant or from the Laws and Customs of England so to do so doubtless it would for the same reason be esteemed a presumption no less intolerable for the Bishops to use the Kings name in their processes and judicial acts not having any sufficient legal warrant or authority for so doing IX Which if it were duly considered would induce any reasonable man to beleive and confesse that this manner of proceeding in their own names used by the Bishops in their Courts is so far from trenching upon the Regal power and authority which is the crime charged upon it by the Objectors that the contrary usage unless it were enjoyned by some Law of the Land as it was in the Raign of King Edward the Sixth might far more justly be charged therewithal For the true reason of using the Kings name in any Court is not thereby to acknowledge the emanation of the power or jurisdiction of that Court from or the subordination of that power unto the Kings power or authority as the Objectors seeme to suppose but rather to shew the same Court to be one of the Kings own immediate Courts wherein the King himselfe is supposed in the construction of the Law either by his personal or virtual power to be present And the not using of the Kings name in other Courts doth not infer as if the Iudges of the said Courts did not act by the Kings authority for who can imagine that they who hold a Court by virtue of the Kings grant only should pretend to act by any other then his authority but only that they are no immediate representatives of the Kings person in such their jurisdiction nor have consequently any allowance from him to use his name in the exercise or execution thereof X. Secondly there is another observable difference in this point between the Kings Common-law-Courts such as are most of those afore-mentioned and those Courts that proceed according to the way of the Civil Law If the King appoint a Constable or Earle-Marshal or Admiral of England for as much as all tryals in the Marshals Court commonly called the Court of Honour and in the Admiralty are according to the Civil Law all Processes therefore Sentences and Acts in those Courts go in the names of the Constable Earle-Marshal or Admiral and not in the Kings name Which manner of proceeding constantly used in those Courts sith no man hitherto hath been found to interpret as any diminution at all or dis-acknowledgement of the Kings Soveraignty over the said Courts it were not possible the same manner of proceeding in the Ecclesiastical Courts should be so confidently charged with so heinous a crime did not the intervention of some wicked lust or other prevail with men of corrupt minds to become partial judges of evil thoughts Especially considering that XI Thirdly there is yet a more special and peculiar reason to be given in the behalf of the Bishops for not using the Kings name in their Processes c. in the Ecclesiastical Courts then can be given for the Iudges of any other the above-mentioned Courts either of the Common or Civil Laws in the said respect arising as hath been already in part touched from the different nature of their several respective Iurisdictions Which is that the summons and other proceedings and acts in the Ecclesiastical Courts are for the most part in order to the Ecclesiastical censures and sentences of Excommunication c. The passing of which sentences and other of like kind being a part of the power of the Keyes which our Lord Iesus Christ thought fit to leave in the hands of his Apostles and their Successors and not in the hands of Lay-men the Kings of England never challenged to belong unto themselves but left the exercise of that Power entirely to the Bishops as the lawful Successors of the Apostles and inheritours of their Power The regulating and ordering of that power in sundry circumstances concerning the outward exercise thereof in foro externo the godly Kings of England have thought to belong unto them as in the right of their Crown and have accordingly made Laws concerning the same even as they have done also concerning other matters appertaining to Religion and the worship of God But the substance of that power and the function thereof as they saw it to be altogether improper to their office and calling so they never pretended or laid claim thereunto But on the contrary when by occasion of the title of Supream Head c. assumed by King Henry the Eighth they were charged by the Papists for challenging to themselves such power and authority spiritual they constantly and openly disavowed it to the whole world renouncing all claim to any such power or authority As is manifest not onely from the allowed writings of many godly Bishops eminent for their learning in their several respective times in vindication of the Church of England from that calumny of the Papists as Archbishop Whitgift Bishop Bilson Bishop Andrews Bishop Carleton and others but also by the Injunctions of Queen Elizabeth and the admonition prefixed thereunto
by the State as a Law indeed foolish and pernicious how specious and plausible soever it seemed at the first appearance because saith he it would but encourage busie active spirits to be alwayes innovating some thing or other in the State which might finally tend to the subversion of all ancient Lawes and Customes and consequently of the whole Government it self Now that the Reformation in King Edwards dayes as to this particular in that Statute concerned was subject at least to this frailty we may very probably gather a posteriori from this that after it was once repealed they that had to do in the Reformation ever since thought it sit rather to let it lye under that repeal then to revive it XXIII There can be no doubt but that to an objection made from the force of a Statute it is a sufficient answer if it be true to say that the said Statute hath been repealed and so continueth Yet the adversaries of Episcopacy are so pertinaciously bent to hold their Conclusion in despite of all Premisses that they seem to be nothing satisfied there withal but dividing the answer turn the former part of it viz. that of the Repeal to their own advantage For say they that Repeal being made by Queen Mary who was a professed Papist and a Persecuter of the Protestant Religion was certainly an Act of hers done in favour of Popery and so is a strong confirmation that the form of proceeding formerly used by the Bishops in the Ecclesiastical Courts prohibited by the Statute of King Edward but restored by that her Repeal was a popish practice and more besitting Papists then Protestants to use XXIV To return a full answer hereunto first it shall be willingly granted that Queen Mary being a zealous Papist did cause that Statute made in the first of her Brothers Raign to be repealed out of pure zeal to the Romish Religion and in favour of the Pope and of his Iurisdiction Both bee use she conceived which was true that her late Brother being a Protestant had by that Statute prohibited the Bishops to do sundry things in their own names of purpose thereby to lessen the Popes authority within his Realms as also because their using of the Kings name in their Processes and Acts carried with it as we formerly granted a more express and evident acknowledgment of the Kings Supremacy Ecclesiastical then the contrary custome doth XXV But then secondly this being granted it will by no means follow either first that the repeal of that Statute is not to be valued by any Protestant or that secondly the custome of the Bishops prohibited by the Statute and restored by the Act of Repeal was Popish or thirdly that our former answer was unsufficient not the first because we are not to look upon the Statute and upon the Act of Repeal as they were made the one by a Protestant the other by a Papist for that were to judge 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and with respect of persons but to consider whether the reasons whereupon the Statute was grounded were in veritate rei such as that it ought not to have been repealed either by Papist or Protestant Which reasons how they have been valued appeareth upon the post-fact in this that a Papist Princess by the principles of her Religion could do no less then repeal that Statute and a Protestant Princess without prejudice to the principles of her Religion might continue that Repeal XXVI Not the second because that very Statute of I. Edward the Sixth by which it is ordained that all Summons Citations and other Processes Ecclesiastical be made in the name and with the style of the King doth it self sufficiently absolve the contrary custome formerly used by the Bishops acting in their own names from being either Popish or otherwise derogatory to the Kings Supremacy Inasmuch as by Proviso's in the said Statute the Bishops are still permitted in some cases to use their own names without any mention at all to be made of the King as namely the Archbishop of Canterbury to grant Faculties and Dispensations and every other Bishop to make Collations Presentations Institutions and Inductions of Benefices Letters of Orders and Dimissories c. under their own names and seals as by the words of the said Statute doth plainly appear Which sure would not have been permitted in any case had the thing it self been by them conceived to have been simply and de toto genere either Popish or prejudicial to the Regal Power XXVII Not the Third because they disjoynt our former answer that they might make their advantage of the one piece of it severed from the other For the strength of the answer it being copulative was not to lye in either part alone but in both together taken joyntly and indeed more principally in the later part which they slightly put off then in the former whereat they take advantage We do not say that the objecting of that Statute is of little moment against us because it was repealed by Queen Mary though that repeal alone is sufficient to make it void and invalid as to all effects in Law but because being then repealed it was never after revived in the Raigns either of Queen Elizabeth King Iames or his Majesty that now is which sheweth that the Act of Repeal as to the point now in dispute was by them approved of and intended to continue in force And it will thence follow further and most clearly that in the judgement of all these wise and religious Princes there was a great difference between the Papal and the Episcopal Iurisdiction as they had been either of them exercised within these Realms and that the Papal was prejudicial to the Regal Power and Supremacy but the Episcopal was not XXVIII Neither doth that suffice which is put in by way of Reply hereunto to alledge that the continuance of the old custome after the repeal made happened either through inadvertency of the State or by reason of the great power some or other of the Bishops ever had with those Princes For it cannot be doubted but that the State having before them a Precedent of so late and fresh memory as the Statute of 1. Edw. 6. would at some time or other within the space of fourscore years especially there being no want in those dayes of enough greedy Great-ones and factious Disciplinarians to remind them of it have taken a time to frame and pass a Bill for the reviving of that Statute if they had deemed the custome therein forbidden Popish or derogatory either to the Kings honour or power or had not rather found sufficient reason to perswade them that the said Statute was inconvenient or at leastwise useless And as for the Bishops they that understand the condition of those first times well know that under God and his good providence they stood in a manner by the immediate and sole favour of Queen Elizabeth The Papists on the one side hated them above all
upon it by some necessity of the times or induced for just reasons of expediency so to do XL. But then Secondly as that Reason relateth to the present business in particular the Scandal thereby given is yet greater For we are to know that when King Henry the Eighth abolished the Papal Power resuming in his own hand the ancient rights of the Crown which the Bishops of Rome had unjustly usurped he took upon himselfe also that title which he then found used by the Bishops of Rome but which none of his Progenitors the Kings of this Realm had ever used of being the Supream head of the Church within his Dominions This title continued during the Reign of his son King Edward the Sixth by whom the Statute aforesaid was made and is mentioned in that very Statute Now albeit by that title or appellation was not intended any other thing then that Supremacy Ecclesiastical which the Kings of this Land have and of right ought to have in the governance of their Realms over all persons and in all causes Ecclesiastical as well as other and which is in the Oath of Supremacy ackowledged to belong unto them yet the Papists took Scandal at the novelty thereof and glad of such an occasion made their advantage of it to bring a reproach upon our Religion as if the Protestants of England were of opinion that all Spiritual Power did belong unto the King and that the Bishops and Ministers of England had their whole power of Preaching administring the Sacraments Ordaining Excommunicating c. solely and originally from the King as the members of the body live by the influence which the Head hath into them Upon their clamours that title of Supream head and governour was taken into farther consideration in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Raign And although that style in the true meaning thereof was innocent and defensible enough yet for the avoiding of Scandal and Cavil it was judged more expedient that the word Head should thenceforth be laid aside and the style run only Supream Governour as we see it is in the Oath of Supremacy and otherwhere ever since without mentioning the word Head according to the intimations given in the Queens Injunctions and elswhere in that behalfe And it seemeth to me very probable that for the same reason especially besides those other reasons already given it was thought fitter by Her then and by her successours hitherto that the Bishops in all their Ecclesiastical Courts and proceedings should act in their own names as formerly they had done then that the Statute of King Edward should be revived for doing it in the Kings name For the sending out processes c. in order to Excommunication and other Church-censures in the Kings name would have served marvellously to give colour and consequently strength in the apprehension at least of weaker judgements to that calumny wherewith the Papists usually asperse our Religion as if the Kings of England took themselves to be proper and competent Iudges of Censures meerly spiritual in their own persons and the Prelates accordingly did acknowledge them so to be Thus have I shewen to the satisfaction I hope of the ingenuous and unprejudiced Reader that Episcopacy is no such dangerous creature either in the Opinion or Practice as some would make the world believe it is but that the Kings Crown may stand fast enough upon his head and flourish in its full verdure without plucking away or displacing the least flower in it notwithstanding Episcopacy should be allowed to be of Divine Right in the highest sence and the Bishops still permitted to make their Processes in their own names and not in the Kings By this time I doubt not all that are not willfully blind for who so blind as he that will not see do see and understand by sad experience that it had been far better both with King and Kingdome then now it is or without Gods extraordinary mercy is like to be in haste if the enemies of Episcopacy had meant no worse to the King and his Crown then the Bishops and those that favoured them did A POST-SCRIPT to the Reader WHereas in my Answer to the former of the two Objections in the foregoing Treatise I have not any where made any clear discovery what my own particular judgement is concerning the Jus divinum of EPISCOPACY in the stricter sense either in the Affirmative or Negative and for want of so doing may perhaps be censured by some to have walked but haltingly or at least wise with more caution and mincing then became me to do in a business of that nature I do hereby declare 1. That to avoid the starting of more Questions then needs must I then thought it fitter and am of the same opinion still to decline that Question then to determine it either way such determination being clearly of no moment at all to my purpose and for the solving of that Objection 2. That nevertheless leaving other men to the liberty of their own judgements my opinion is that EPISCOPAL GOVERNMENT is not to be derived meerly from Apostolical Practise or Institution but that it is originally founded in the Person and Office of the Messias our blessed Lord JESUS CHRIST Who being sent by his Heavenly Father to be the great Apostle HEB. III. 1. Bishop and Pastor 1 PET. II. 25. of his Church and anointed to that Office immediately after his Baptisme by JOHN with power and the Holy Ghost ACT. X. 37-8 descending then upon him in a bodily shape LUK. III. 22. did afterwards before his Ascension into Heaven send and impower his holy Apostles giving them the Holy Ghost likewise as his Father had given him in like manner as his Father had before sent him JOH XX. 21. to execute the same Apostolical Episcopal and Pastoral Office for the ordering and governing of his Church until his coming again and so the same Office to continue in them and their Successours unto the end of the world MAT. XXVIII 18 20. This I take to be so clear from these and other like Texts of Scripture that if they shall be diligently compared together both between themselves and with the following practise of all the Churches of Christ as well in the Apostles times as in the Purest and Primitive times nearest thereunto there will be left little cause why any man should doubt thereof 3. That in my Answer to the later Objection I made no use at all nor indeed could do of the Opinion of the Reverend Judges in that point nor of his Majesties Proclamation grounded thereupon For although the Proclamation had been extant Ten years before this task was imposed upon me yet I had never seen nor so much as heard of the same in all the time before nor yet in all the time since till about ten dayes ago I was advertised thereof when these Papers were then going to the Press Which since they give so much strength to the main Cause and so fully avoid the Objection I have followed the advise of some friends and caused them to be printed here withal FINIS See Stat. 25. H. 8. 20 1. Edw. 6. 2. Cok. 1. Instit. 2. Sect. 648. Stat. for the Clergy 14. â— 3. cap. 3.