Prince doth challenge in another Princes Dominions contrary to and above the Laws of the Land and what obedience it is that subjects may pay to such a forreign Prince without the privity and contrary to the command of his own Soveraign which cannot be done by a general Answer but by distinct assigning the bounds of the Popes Temporal and Spiritual Power in England and what the full intent of them is that the King may discern whether he hath enough of either to preserve himself and the Peace of the Kingdom 3. That till such time as the Roman-Catholick Subjects of England give as good security to the King for their Fidelity and peaceable behaviour as all his other subject do they have no cause to wonder that they may be made subject to such Laws and restraints as may disable them from being dangerous when they profess to owe obedience to a forreign Prince who doth as much profess not to be a friend to their Countrey and will not declare what that obedience is 4. That the Roman Catholick Subjects of England have a more immediate dependance on the Pope than is allowed in any Catholick Countryes and that those who under pretence of Religion refuse to declare that it is in no Earthly Power to absolve them from their Fidelity to the King do refuse to give as full satisfaction and security for their Allegiance as Catholick Subjects do give for their Fidelity to Catholick Kings there being no French Roman Catholick who dares refuse to do it 5. That there is so much the more reason to require this since the late instance of the Irish Rebellion wherein the Pope absolved the Kings Subjects from their Oaths and took upon himself to be their General in the Person of his Nuntio and assumed the exercise of the Regal Power both at Land and Sea and imprisoned those Catholicks and threatned to take away their Lives who had promoted the peace and desired to return to the Kings subjection and hath since given a severe check to those of the Irish Nobility and Clergie who had declared that the Pope had no Power to dispense with their Fidelity to his Majesty or to absolve them from any Oaths they should take to that purpose and imployed his Nuntio to discountenance and suppress that Declaration and to take care that it should proceed no further and that Cardianl Barbarine at that same time put them in mind that the Kingdom of England was still under Excommunication and since that the Pope hath made many Bishops in Ireland which his Predecessors had forborn to do from the death of Queen Elizabeth to A. D. 1640. And therefore there is no reason to believe that the Court of Rome doth recede from its former principles as to these things § 2. These several particulars carry so much weight along with them as may easily raise the expectation of any one to see what Mr. Cressy will reply to them And in truth he enters the Field like a Champion for he saith his Apologie is published permissu Superiorum and what he writes on this special subject he desires the Person of Honour to consider not as the inconsiderable opinion of one particular person only And he doth assure him that there is not any one Point of Controversie upon which they more earnestly desire to be summoned to give an account before equal Iudges than this Thus he enters the lists and walks his ground and brandishes his sword and makes legs to the Judges with more than ordinary assurance and fails in no point of a Champion but overcoming his Adversary Which he is so far from that after these Bravado's and flourishes he dares not stand before him but looks round about him to discern any way to escape But although it be beneath the Greatness of his Adversary to pursue him over all his Bogs and to draw him out of his Fastnesses yet I shall endeavour to bring him into the Lists again that his Adversary may not go away blushing at so mean a Triumph There are five things which Mr. Cressy offers at by way of Answer to the Discourse of the Person of Honour on this subject 1. That there is no reason to suspect the Catholick subjects of England to be more wanting in Fidelity to their Prince than of other Nations whose Catholick Ancestors were so far from acknowledging any Supremacy of the Pope in Temporals and much less any Authority in him to depose Princes that even in those times when Church-men had the greatest Power in this Kingdom Statutes were made with the joynt Votes of the Clergic upon occasion of some Usurpations of the Roman Court in which the Penalty was no less than a Praemunire against any one who without the Kings License should make any Appeals to Rome or submit to a Legats jurisdiction or upon the Popes Summons go out of the Kingdom or receive any Mandats or Brieffs from Rome or purchase Bulls for presentments to Churches and which is most considerable the ground of their rejecting Papal Usurpations is thus expressed For the Crown of England is free and hath been free from earthly subjection at all times being immediately subject to God in all things touching the Regalities of the same and not subject to the Pope to which he saith the Bishops assented and the Lords and Commons declared their Resolution to stand with the King in the cases aforesaid and in all other cases attempted against him his Crown and Regalitie in all points to live and to dye 2. That whatsoever they suffer here in England by vertue of the Poenal Laws it is purely for their Religion and the Catholick faith and therefore he parallels our Poenal Laws with those of the Medes and Persians against Daniel and of Nero Domitian and Dioclesian against the Apostles and their successors and yet Mr. Cressy confesses that the occasion of the Poenal Laws was the treasonable actions of some of their own Religion but he adds that they were scarce one score of persons and abhorred by all the rest for which actions of theirs he confesseth that care is taken of exacting Oaths both of Fidelity and Supremacy from Roman Catholicks as dangerous Subjects and dayes of Thanksgiving are kept for the discovery and prevention of such personal Treasons whereas saith he the whole Kingdoms deliverance from almost an universal Rebellion designing the extinction of Monarchy and Prelacy both and executing the murder of the lawful Soveraign is not esteemed a sufficient motive for such publick Thanksgivings neither it seems is there at all a necessity of requiring from any a Retraction of the Principles of Rebellion or a promise that it shall not be renewed By which we might think Mr. Cressy had been utterly a stranger in his own Countrey and had never heard of the thirtieth of Ianuary or the twenty ninth of May which are solemnly observed in our Church and the Offices joyned
another Remonstrance of the grievances of the Clergie and People of England which they sent to the Pope and Cardinals wherein they declare that it was impossible for them to bear the burdens laid upon them that the Kings necessities could not be supplyed nor the Kingdom preserved if such payments were made that the goods of all the Clergie of England would not make up the summ demanded but all the effect of this was only a promise that for the future the Kings leave should be desired which saith Matthew Paris came to as much as nothing By which we may judge of the miserable condition of this Nation under the intolerable Usurpations of the Court of Rome § 18. After so long tryal of the Court of Rome by Embassies Remonstrances and all fair wayes and no success at all by them at last they resolved upon making severe Laws the last Reason of Parliaments and to see what effect this would have upon the Clergie for the recovering the antient Rights of the Crown For we are to consider that the Controversie still was carryed on under the same pretence of the Ecclesiastical and Civil Power and it is a fooâ—ish thing to judge of the sense of the Ruling Clergie at that time by the Acts of Parliament and Statutes of Provisors and Praemunire For by this time the Pope had them in such firm dependence upon him and they were fed by such continual hopes from the Court of Rome that they were very hardly brought to consent to any restraints of the Papal Power and in the Parliament 13 Rich. 2. The Archbishops of Canterbury and York for them and the whole Clergie of their Provinces made their solemn Protestation in open Parliament that they in no wise meant or would assent to any Statute or Law made in restraint of the Popes Authority but utterly withstood the same the which their Protestations at their requests were enrolled as that Learned Antiquary Sr. Robert Cotton hath shewed out of the Records of the Tower By which we see the whole Body of the Clergie were for the most exorbitant Power of the Pope and would not consent to any Statutes made against it So that what Reformation was made in these matters was Parliamentary even in that time and I do not question but the Friends to the Papal interest made the very same objections then against those Poenal Statutes of Provisors and Praemunire that others since have done against the Laws made since the Reformation And all that were sincere for the Court of Rome did as much believe it to be meer Usurpation in the Parliament to make any Laws in these matters For was the King Head of the Church might he not as well administer Saâ—raments as make Laws in deregation of the Popes Authority and Iurisdiction What was this but to make a Parliamentary Religion to own the Popes Sovereign Power no farther than they thought fit If any thing were amiss they ought humbly to represent it to his Holiness and to wait his time for the Reforming abuses and not upon their own Heads and without so much as the consent of their Clergie to make Laws about the restraint of that Power which Christ hath set up in his Church How can this be done without judging what the Pope hath done to be amiss and who dares say that his Holiness can so much err as to aim at nothing but his own profits without any regard to the good of the Church What! are they not all members and will they dare take upon them to judge their Head What! Sons rise up against their Father and Secular men take upon them to condemn the things which Christs Vicar upon earth allows What! and after all the Sufferings and Martyrdom of S. Thomas of Canterbury that ever we should live to see a Parliament of England make Laws against that good Old Cause for which he dyed This is but to increase the number of Confessors and Martyrs as all those will be who suffer by these Laws For do they not plainly suffer for Conscience and Religion although the Parliament may call it Treason What an honour it is rather to suffer than to betray the Churches Liberty for which Christ dyed or to disobey the Head of the Church who commands those things which the Parliament forbids And must we not obey God rather than men After this manner we may reasonably suppose the Roman Clergie and their adherents at that time to have argued but it is well Mr. Cressy at least allows these Stasutes of Provisors and Praemunire and boasts of the Loyalty of those Ancestors that made them but I fear he hath not well considered the occasions and circumstances of them and what opposition the Papal Clergie made against them or else I should think he could not afterwards have declaimed so much against the injustice and cruelty of our Poenal Laws But even those antient Statutes were passed with so much difficulty and executed with so little care that they by no means proved a sufficient salve for the sore they were intended for as will appear by this true account of them § 19. In the time of Edward the first who was a Prince both wise and resolute the grievances of the Kingdom by his connivance at the Papal encroachments for a long time grew to that height that some effectual course was necessary to recover the antient Rights of the Crown which had now been so long buried that they were almost forgotten but an occasion happened which for the time throughly awaked him to a consideration of them Bonif. 8. out of a desire still to advance Ecclesiastical Liberty had made a Constitution strictly forbidding any Clergie-man paying any Taxes whatsoever to Princes without the Popes consent and both the payers and receivers were to fall under excommunication ipso facto not to be taken off without immediate Authority from the Court of Rome unless it were at the point of death Not long after this the King demands a supply in Parliament the Clergie unanimously refuse on account of the Popes Bull the King bids them advise better and return a satisfactory Answer at the time appointed Winchelsea then Archbishop of Canterbury in the name of the whole Clergie declares That they owed more obedience to the Pope than to the King he being their Spiritual and the King only a Temporal Soveraign but to give satisfaction to both they desire leave to send to the Pope At which saucy answer the King was so much provoked that he put the whole Clergie out of his Protection and seized upon their Lands for which an Act of Parliament was made to that purpose saith Thorn And although many of the Clergie submitted and bought their peace at dear rates yet Winchelsea stood it out ready saith Knighton to dye for the Church of Christ which if he had done there might have been a S. Robert as good a Martyr as S. Thomas of Canterbury For our Historians say
Christian Wife which he had of the Royal Family of the Franks named Bertha whom he received from her Parents on that condition that he would suffer her to enjoy her Religion and to have a Bishop to attend her whose name was Luidhardus What can be more plain from hence than that the first entertainment which Christianity met with in the Saxon Court was by the means of Queen Bertha and her Bishop Luidhardus This Queen Bertha was the only daughter of Châ—ripertus King of Paris one of the four sons of Clotharius among whom his Kingdom was divided by Ingoberga and her marriage is mentioned by Gregorius Turonensis to the Son of the King of Kent which marriage was in all probability solemnized before the death of Charipertus now Charipertus dyed A. D. 567. so that Christianity had been known about thirty years in King Ethelberts Court before ever Augustin set footing upon English ground And is it conceivable that when a Bishop had performed the exercises of the Christian Religion for thirty years in a Church for that purpose viz. S. Martins near Canterbury the English Saxons should know nothing of Christianity till Augustins arrival But this is not all for we have great reason to believe that the Conversion of the Saxons to Christianity is in a great measure owing to this Queen and her Bishop Luidhard or Letardus who had been Bishop of Senlis in France as Thorn tells us I know herein how much I shall provoke the whole Generation of Romish Missionaries but I value not the displeasure of those whom Truth and Reason will enrage William of Malmsbury himself a Benedictin Monk and one of the most judicious of our Monkish historians saith that by Ethelberts match to Queen Bertha the Saxons began by degrees to lay aside their barbarous customs and by conversation with the Frâ—nch became more civilized to which was added the holy and single life of Letardus the Bishop who came over with the Queen by which without speaking he did invite the King to the knowledge of Christ our Lord by which means it came to pass that the mind of the King being already softened did so readily yield to the preaching of Augustin By which it appears that the main of the business as to the Kings Conversion was effected before Augustins coming only for the greater solemnity of it a Mission from Rome was obtained and I am much deceived if Gregory himself doth not imply that it was at the request of the English Saxons themselves I know very well what an idle story the Monks tell of the occasion of the conversion of the English Nation viz. S. Gregories seeing some pretty English boys to be sold for slaves at Rome and having luckily hit upon two or three pious quibbles in allusion to the names of their Nation and Countrey and King he was at last in good earnest moved to seek the Conversion of the whole Nation A very likely story for so grave a Saint I do not quarrel with it on the account of the custom of selling English slaves but for the Monkishness i. e. the silliness of it I know Bede reports it but he brings it in after such a fashion as though he were afraid of the anger of his Brethren the Monks if he had left it out for he mentions it as a reverend tale with which the Monks used to entertain themselves that had come down to them by that infallible method of conveyance viz. Oral Tradition and quotes nothing else for it Whereas in the Preface to his History he tells his Readers that in the matters relating to Gregory he relyed on Nothelmus who had been at Rome and had searched the Register of the Roman Church but we see as to this story he saith he had nothing but an old Tradition for it But since Mr. Cressy is so zealous in Vindication of this story I desire the other part of it may not be left out which is told by Broâ—pton Abbot of Iorval viz. that S. Gregory and his companions were come three dayes journey towards England and then sitting down reading in a Meadow a Grashopper leapt upon his Book and made him leave off reading then S. Gregory thinking seriously upon this little creatures name for his wit lay much that way he presently found this mysterie in it Locusta saith he quasi loco sta which saith Brompton he spake by a Prophetick Spirit for messengers immediately came upon them from Rome and stopped their journey And surely he had been much to blame to undertake such a journey upon the instigation of one quibble if he had not been as ready to turn back upon the admonition of another But to set aside these Monkish fopperies the best Authority we can have in this case is of S. Gregory himself several of whose Letters are still extâ—nt in the Register of his Epistles relating to this affair In one sent to the Kings of France Theodoric and Theodebert he expresseth himself thus Atque ideo pervenit ad nos Anglorum gentem ad fidem Christianam Deo miserante desiâ—eranter velle converti sed sacerdotes vestros è vicino negligeâ—eâ— desideria eorum cessare suâ aahâ—rtatione succendere Ob hoc igitur Augustinum servâ—â—m Dei praesentium portitorem cujus zelus studium bene nobis est cognâ—tum cum aliis servis Dei praevidâ—mus illuc dirigendum Quibus etiam injunximus ut aliquos secum è vicino debeant presbyteros 〈◊〉 cum quibus eorum possint mentes agnoscere voluntatem admonitione sua quantam Deus donaverit adjuvare and to the same purpose he writes to Brunichildis their Mother Indicamus ad nos pervenisse Anglorum gentem Deo annâ—ente velle fieri Christianam c. Which are the most remarkable testimonies we could desire to our purpose for these Letters were sent by Augustin the Monk before ever he had been in England and therein the Pope expresseth the desire of the English Nation to embrace Christianity not barely of Ethelbert and his Court that this desire was made known at Rome that upon this the Pope sends Augustin and his Companions that the French who were their Neighbours had been too negligent in this Work and began to be more slack than formerly in it that however now since he had taken so much care to send these on purpose for that work he intreats them to send over so many Priests as might serve for their interpreters which is a plain discovery that there had been entercourse about the Christian Religion between the French and the Saxons before and that still they understood their language so well as to serve for interpreters to Augustin and his Brethren Mr. Cressy who pares and clips testimonies to make them serve his purpose renders those words Anglorum gentem desideranter velle converti velle fieri Christianam only thus that the English Nation were in a willing disposition to receive the
with that of the fifth of November and are purposely intended for that very thing which he denyes to be taken notice of by us in such a manner What must we say to such men who openly and to our faces deny that which the whole Nation knows to be true These stories might have passed abroad where they have been wont to lye for the Catholick Cause but to have the impudence to say such things here which every Boy can confute is not the way to advance the Reputation of their Church among us And what doth Mr. Cressy think the Renuntiation of the Covenant was intended for if not to prevent the mischief of the former Rebellion And is it possible for any man who knows the Laws of his Countrey concerning these matters to dare to say in the face of the Kingdom That it seems there is no necessity at all of requiring from any a Retraction of the principles of Rebellion or a promise it shall never be renewed If this be the way of defending the innocency of Roman Catholicks I had rather be accounted guilty than have my innocency thus defended 3. He saith We also confidently affirm so we have seen he hath done too much already that by vertue of the Spiritual Iurisdiction inherent in the Pope the Temporal Rights and Power of the King or even of the meanest of his Subjects are not at all abridged or prejudiced Which assertion he saith hath been alwayes maintained in France the Pope not contradicting it from whence it follows that it is agreeable to Catholick Religion After this I expected he should speak home to the purpose and say this is all the Power challenged by the Pope as to England or owned by any Roman Catholicks here which finding what he had affirmed about other matters I thought he would have made no scruple of but I see he durst not either for conscience or meer shame But how then doth he get over this difficulty Why English Catholicks saith he should be suspected not to be as tender of the just Rights and precious lives also of their Soveraign as the Catholick Subjects of any other Kingdom and why they should be thought to be willing to acknowledge any Temporal Power director indirect to be inherent in the Pope over the King or Kingdom to which not any Catholick Gentleman or Nobleman would submit I cannot imagine I am very much to seek for the sense of this and know not what the submitting relates to but I suppose something left out or struck out by his Superiours who did not take care to leave sense behind But is this indeed all the security Mr. Cressy offers that he cannot imagine it should be otherwise here than in France We find when he pleases he can imagine strange things and is this only out of the reach of his imagination What doth he think of the Kingdoms being under Excommunication at Rome as Cardinal Barbarine takes care to put the Irish Nobility in mind for some good end doubtless Is the Kingdom of France so What doth he imagine of Bulls from Rome prohibiting the taking the Oaths required Are there any such things in France What doth he think of the Popes Nuntio appearing in the Head of an Army and absolving the Kings subjects from their Allegiance I confess it was not much better in France in the time of the Holy League but what opinion had they of the Popes temporal Power then Cannot Mr. Cressy imagine that there are such people in England as Iesuits and it is not many years since their Reasons were therefore shewed to be Unreasonable in pleading an exemption from the Sanguinary Laws because they did hold the Popes power of deposing Princes and absolving Subjects from their Allegiance And do not the Iesuitical party still plead that their opinion is the common doctrine of their Church confirmed by General Councils and approved by multitudes of Divines of all sorts and that the contrary is only asserted here by a very inconsiderable party whereof some are excommunicated at Rome for their zeal in this matter And do not we know how much greater sway the Iesuitical party hath among the Nobility and Gentry than the despised Secular Priests I do not at all question but the Nobility and Gentry of England would do as much to preserve the just Rights and precious lives of their Soveraigns as of any Nation in the World and have as great a sense of their own Honour as well as Interest and of the Duty they owe to their Countrey But ought not the Laws to take so much the more care to keep their Consciences untainted in these things they being such Persons whose Loyalty cannot be corrupted but under a pretence of Conscience and their Consciences being so much in danger by being under the direction chiefly of those who are the sworn servants to the Papal Power 4. He offers by way of satisfaction concerning their Fidelity that they will subscribe the French Declaration lately made by the Sorbon or the Censure of the Faculty of Paris A. D. 1626. and that very few if any at all would refuse subscription to that Form prescribed by the State in case that unlucky word heretical were left out As though all those who had hitherto refused to take that Oath had done it only upon this nicety that the word heretical were to be taken not in the sense of the Givers but of the Takers of the Oath whereas Mr. Cressy himself saith that common Reason teaches that all Oaths Professions and Promises are to be understood in the sense of those who frame and require them and not of those upon whom they are imposed But if this were all the ground of refusing this Oath among any of them Mr. Cressy therein charges them with the want of common Reason whereas I shall make it appear in the progress of this Discourse that this was far from being the true and only reason of Roman Catholicks refusing the Oath of Allegiance 5. That since Ordination abroad doth not in the least render English Priests defective in their duties to the Civil Magistrate it will follow that whatsoever penalty is inflicted on them on such an account is not inflicted according to the Rule of Iustice and by consequence that whatsoever blood shall be shed the guilt of it before God will be imputed to the whole Kingdom since it is shed by vertue of the whole Kingdoms votes and consent given long since upon motives long since ceased And therefore he charges it deeply upon my conscience to endeavour to free the whole Kingdom from such a guilt This is the substance of what Mr. Cressy saith upon this very important subject as himself calls it and by vertue whereof he hopes the poenal Laws may be repealed and those of their Religion may enjoy the Liberty of their Religion and all the Rights of Free-born Subjects Which are things too important to be debated in
precarious Princes and in a much more proper sense than the Popes use that Title The Servants of Servants Supposing then the Legislative and Civil Power to be equal since the Reformation and before our work is to compare the other circumstances together and if it appear that the Plea of Conscience and Religion did equally hold then and notwithstanding that the penalties were as great upon the same or far less occasions I hope our Laws will at least appear as just and reasonable as those were § 4. To make this out I must give an account of the State of those times and the Reasons and Occasions which moved the Law-makers to enact those Poenal Statutes in which I shall shew these two things 1. That they began upon a controversie of Religion and that the Poenal Laws were made against those persons who pleaded Religion 2. That the Reasons and Occasions of the Poenal Laws since the Reformation were at least as great as those 1. That the antient Poenal Laws were made upon a Controversie of Religion And to give a clear account of the Rise and occasion of them I must begin from the Norman Conquest for then those Foundations were laid of all the following controversies which happened between the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power On the behalf of the Ecclesiastical Power was the plea of Conscience and Religion on the behalf of the Civil Power nothing but the just Rights of Princes and the necessary preservation of their own and the publick safety And this Controversie between the Two Powers was managed with so much zeal and such pretences of Conscience on the behalf of the Ecclesiastical Power that the Civil Power notwithstanding the courage of some Princes and the resolution of Parliaments had much ado to stand its ground or to be able to preserve it self from the encroachments and Usurpations of the other So that to see Princes give any Countenance to the same pretences would be almost as strange as to see them turn Common-wealths-men I know there were good Laws frequently made to strengthen the Civil Power but the very frequency of them shewed how ineffectual they were For what need many Laws to the same purpose if the first had any force at all and the multiplication of Laws for the same thing is a certain sign of defect in the Government To undeceive therefore all those who judge of the State of Affairs by the Book of Statutes I shall deduce the History of this great Controversie between the Ecclesiastical and Civil Power in England so far as to shew the necessity there was found of putting an issue to it by casting out the Popes pretended Power and Iurisdiction in this Nation The two first who began this Dispute were both men of great Spirits and resolute in their undertakings I mean william the Conqueror and Gregory the seventh who was the first Pope that durst speak out and he very freely declares his mind about the subjection of the Civil Power to the Ecclesiastical and the exemption of all Ecclesiastical Persons and Things from the Civil Power In his Epistle to Herimanus Bishop of Metz about the excommunication of Henry the fourth and absolving his Subjects from their Allegiance he thus expresses himself Shall not that power which was first found out by men who knew not God be subject to that which God himself hath appointed for his own honor in the World and the head of which is the Son of God Who knows not that Kings and Dukes had their beginnings from men who gained their Authority over their equals by blind ambition and intolerable presumption by rapines and murders by perfidiousness and all manner of wickedness Is not this a very pretty account of the Original of Civil Power by the Head of the Church But this is not all for he adds While Princes make Gods Priests to be subject to them to whom may we better compare them than to him who is the Head over all the Sons of Pride who tempted the Son of God with promising him all the Kingdoms of the World if he would fall down and worship him This is better and better it seems it is as bad as the sin of Lucifer for Princes not to be subject to the Pope and it is like the Devils tempting Christ to offer to make Priests subject to the Civil Power Who doubts saith he that Christs Priests are to be accounted the Fathers and Masters of Kings aud Princes and all the faithful Now saith he is it not a lamentable madness if the Son should offer to make the Father subject to him but one of his Successors did not think so that set up Henry the fifth against his own Father or the Scholar his Master or to think to bind him on earth by whom he expects to be loosed in Heaven These were the Demonstrations of that Age and the main supports of the Cause and in his Epistle to William King of England he tells him that God had appointed two kinds of Government for mankind the Apostolical and Regal that is much that the same Government should come only from the sins of men and yet be from the appointment of God but we are to consider he writ this to a King whom he hoped to perswade and therefore would not tell him the worst of his thoughts about the beginnings of Civil Power but saith he these two powers like the Sun and Moon have that inequality by the Christian Religion that the Royal Power next under God is to be under the care and management of the Apostolical And since the Apostolical See is to give an account to God of the miscarriages of Princes his wisdom ought to consider whether he ought not without farther delay take an Oath of Fealty to him For no less than that would content him but William was not so meek a Prince to be easily brought to this as Robert of Sicily Richard of Capua Bertram of Provence Rodulphus and several others were whose Oaths of Fealty to him are extant in the Collection or Register of his Epistles But William gives him a resolute answer which is extant among the Epistles of Lanfranc that for the Oath of Fealty he had not done it neither would he because he never promised it neither did he find that ever his predecessors had done it to Gregories predecessors The Pope storms at this and writes a chiding Letter to Lanfranc Arch-bishop of Canterbury who like a better subject to the Pope than to the King writes an humble excuse for himself to the Pope and tells him he had done his endeavour to perswade the King but could not prevail with him And Cardinal Baronius saith the Pope took it very ill at his hands considering the kindness he had received from the Papal See For Alexander the second favoured his cause against Harold and sent him a consecrated Banner and if we may believe Henricus de Silgrave the Pope gave him his title
to the Crown of England on condition that he should hold it in Fee from the Papal See but I find no such thing mentioned by Ingulphus or Gulielmus Pictaviensis who understood the Conquerors affairs as well as any being about him at that time neither would Gregory the seventh have omitted it but however Bertholdus Constantiensis or rather Bernaldus an Author of that time and the Popes Poenitentiary affirms confidently that William King of England made this whole Nation tributary to the Pope which there is no pretence for but only that he after some demurr caused the antient Eleemâ—synarie Peter-pence to be sent to Rome So careful had Princes need to be of the continuance of Gifts to Rome which in time are looked on as a Tribute and that Tribute an acknowledgement of Fealty and that Fealty proves a Subjection in Temporals But this was not the only dispute between these two Conquerors for Gregory the seventh at the same time that he sent Hubert his Legat to England about the Oath of Fealâ—y he sent Hugo to keep a Council in France against the investitures of Bishops by Lay-hands and afterwards in a Council at Rome solemnly condemned them and threatned deposition to all that received them and the vengeance of God upon those that gave them The bottom of which lay not in the pretence of Simony but because it was too great a token of their subjection to the Civil Power and Gregory the seventh was as Bertholdus saith a most zealous defender of Ecclesiastical Liberty i. e. the total exemption of Ecclesiastical persons from subjection to the Civil Power and Eadmerus saith that the Bishops made their homage to the King before they received investiture by the Staff and the Ring But notwithstanding all these Decrees and Threatnings William the Conquerour as that Author tells us would never part with the Rights of the Crown in this matter and he declares that he would not only keep the antient Saxon custom of investiture as Ingulphus and other Authors shew it to have been but all the antient customs of his Predecessors in Normandy relating to Ecclesiastical affairs So that all Ecclesiastical as well as Civil things saith Eadmerus were under his command These customs were 1. That none should be acknowledged Pope but whom the King pleased 2. That no Bulls should be received but such as were approved by the King 3. That nothing should be decreed in Provincial Councils but by his Approbation 4. That no Persons about the King should be excommunicated without his knowledge but besides Pope Gregory charged him with two more enormities viz. 5. Hindering all appeals to Rome of Bishops and Arch-bishops which was such a thing he saith that a Heathen would not have done it 6. Seizing upon the person of his Brother Odo being a Bishop and imprisoning him which he said was plainly against Scripture Qui vos tangit tangit pupillam oculi mei Nolite tangere Christos meos which no doubt were understood of the Archbishops and Bishops of the Patriarchal and Iewish Church But I do not find that King William did at all recede from the Rights of his Crown although the Pope according to his skill quoted Scripture against them and although the Bishop of Baieux was clapt up on the account of Treason as our Historians agree yet in Pope Gregories opinion he suffered for Religion and the preservation of Divine Laws and such men as Mr. Cressy might have compared such Laws with those of Nero and Domitian but I think they durst not have done it in the Conquerours time who at the Council of Illebon in Normandy declared his resolution to maintain the customs of his Predecessors relating to Ecclesiastical affairs § 5. After the death of Gregory the seventh there was no Pope acknowledged in England for eleven years because of the Schism between Urban and Clement and our King had declared for neither of them And william Rufus told Anselm who would fain have gone to Urban the second for his Pall that he had not yet acknowledged him for Pope and therefore he should not go And saith he if you own him without my Authority you break your faith to me and displease me as much as if you did endeavour to take away my Crown Anselm however stands upon it that himself had owned him for Pope and would do so whatever came of it and would not depart from his obedience for an hour A Parliament being called at Rockingham upon this occasion the Nobility and Bishops all advised him to submit to the King Anselm notwithstanding cryes Tues Petrus super hanc Petram c. Qui vos tangit tangit pupillam oculi as Gregory the seventh had done before him and to as much purpose but no such things saith he are said of Kings or Princes or Dukes or Earles and therefore he resolved to adhere to the Pope The King being acquainted with his answer sends some of the Nobles and Bishops to him to let him know that the whole Kingdom was against him and that hereby he endeavoured to take away one of the Flowers of his Crown from him by depriving him of one of the antient Rights of it and withal that he acted contrary to his Oath to the King Anselm if we may believe Eadmerus who lived in his time and was his constant companion stood upon his priviledge that an Archbishop of Canterbury could be judged by none but the Pope and so by that means was wholly exempt from the Royal Power and he bore all the affronts he met with patiently out of his firm devotion to the Papal See The Bishop of Durham whose advice the King asked in this matter told him that Anselm had the Word of God and Authority of S. Peter of his side The King said he would never endure one equal to himself in his Kingdom and therefore took off his protection from him and commands the Nobility and Bishops to disown him and banishes his Counsellors and gives him time for a final answer The mean while the King tryes by several arts to gain him viz. by sending to Urban secretly for the Pall and acknowledging him to be Pope and at last they brought it to this issue that he should receive the Pall at the Kings hands which he utterly refused to do and would take it no otherwise but off from the Altar of Canterbury After this he desires leave to go to the Pope the King denyes it he persists in his intreaty the King absolutely denyes it he resolves to go however because saith he it is better to obey God than men As though God had commanded him to disobey the King in this matter When the Bishops had disswaded him from it and told him they would keep their fidelity to the King Go saith he then to your Lord and I will hold to my God Did he mean the same
God which the Gloss upon the Canon Law speaks of our â—ord God the Pope and it is hard to conceive any other could be meant in this case The King sends some of the Bishops and Barons to him to put him in mind of his Oath to observe the Laws and Customs of the Realm he told him they were to be understood with the reservation of being according to God and that it was not so to keep him from going to the Pope and therefore he would not observe it and so takes his leave of the King to be gone and the King after his going seizes upon all his profits I desire to know of such as Mr. Cressy whether the King or Anselm were in the right in all this affair And if the King had used greater severity to him whether Anselm had suffered on the account of Religion Or Treason But he complains to the Pope that the Law of God and Authority of the Pope and Canons were overwhelmed by the Customs of the Realm and therefore he resigns his Archbishoprick to him and desires the Pope to put one into it which was contrary to the antient Rights of the King The Pope in a Council at Rome solemnly excommunicates all Lay-persons that gave Investitures of Churches and all that received them and all Ecclesiastical persons that paid Homage to Princes saying it was very unfit that they who made their God should put their hands into the obscene and cruel hands of Princes as Eadmerus relates it who was present in the Council § 6. After the death of Rufus Anselm returns for England the new King Henry the first demands the accustomed Homage from him he denyes it and gives the late Council at Rome for his reason adding further if the King would submit to the Decrees of that Council there would be peace between them otherwise he would be gone again The King was very unwilling to part with the Rights of his Predecessors in the Investiture and Homage of Bishops for saith Eadmerus it seemed to him as much as to lose half his Kingdom and yet was afraid to let Anselm go lest by his means the Pope should have set up his Brother Roberts Title against him the King being in this strait endeavours to gain time and sends Ambassadors to the Pope to try if he could procure his consent to let him enjoy his own Rights Pope Paschal the second in his long Epistle to Henry absolutely condemns them as inconsistent with God with justice or with salvation and adds that to the wit of his predecessors that it was a monstrous thing for a Son to beget a Father or a man to make a God but Urban gave that as a reason against it because Priests were men that did make a God now Priests saith he in Scripture are called Gods and are not Princes or Secular Powers The King not at all moved with this Bull requires from Anselm either to pay him homage and to consecrate those that had received investitures from him or immediately to be gone out of the Kingdom and withal declares that he would preserve the Rights of his Predecessors nor would endure any in his Kingdom that would not do him homage the Nobility and the rest of the Bishops joyn with the King and used all perswasions to keep him from submitting to the Pope The King hoping to compose this matter sends three Bishops to the Pope to let him know saith Eadmerus that if the King did not enjoy his Rights he would banish Anselm and renounce the Pope But Brompton hath the smart Letter the King sent upon this occasion wherein he tells him he would not fail of that respect and obedience which his predecessors had shewn to the Popes on condition that all the Honors Uses and Customs which his Father had in his predecessors times might be freely enjoyed by him and that by the help of God none of them should be lessened in his time and if saith he which God forbid I should be so base to let them go yet my Nobility nay the whole people would by no means suffer it The Pope told them he would not yield to the King in this matter to save his Life and writes word to the King that by the judgement of the Holy Ghost he had forbidden all investitures by Princes and encourages Anselm in his opposition to the King with some impertinent texts of Scripture For of all men the Popes notwithstanding their pretence to infallibility have been very unhappy in applying Scripture in their Bulls and it would be one of the strangest Commentaries that ever the World saw to set down the places of Scripture produced by them with their interpretations of them but that is not my present business The King called together the Great men of the Nation in Council at London and sends some of them to Anselm to know whether he would observe the customs of his predecessors or be gone The Bishops pretending private instructions contrary to the Popes Bulls Anselm desires time to know the Popes mind and still stands to the Popes Letters upon which the King told him he would bear these delays no longer Quid mihi de meis cum Papa what have I to do with the Pope about my own Subjects What Rights my Predecessors had are mine too whosoever would take them away from me is my enemy and every one that is my Friend knows it Anselm tells him that to save his life he would not contradict the Popes decrees unless he were absolved by him The King would not so much as hear of the Popes Bulls nor suffer others to do it which grieved Anselm much and away he goes again to receive comfort from the Pope The King sends an Ambassadour to the Pope who told him his Master would lose his Kingdom rather than the Investiture of Bishops the Pope very graciously replyed Before God I will lose my head rather than he shall quietly enjoy them But at last the Pope was content he should enjoy other customes excepting this of Investitures the King was not at all satisfied with this but sends word to Anselm he must not set foot on English ground unless he would promise to observe the former customs of the Realm which he still refused to do and after several endeavours to compose this difference the King was at last forced to yield up the ancient Right of Investiture and retain only homage which the Pope and Anselm were at present contented with but this Agreement held not long for notwithstanding the Pope did lay so much weight on this business of Investitures as besides what is mentioned already he said that Christ dyed in vain if Lay-investitures were allowed yet the King was certainly informed that this same Pope had yielded Investitures to tâ—e Emperour Henry 5. as Florentius Wigorniensis and Malmsbury report and therefore Anselm writes to the Pope that the King
would resume his too and it is evident he did so for Matth. Paris and Westminster say expresly that the King invested the next Archbishop of Canterbury with a staff and a ring after the ancient custom which was after the Lateran Council wherein the Pope again revoked the Emperours priviledge about investitures which he saith is contrary to the Holy Ghost and the Canonical Institution But where was the Holy Ghost then when he granted this priviledge After this the Pope complains of the King for retaining the other ancient Rights of hindering Appeals to Rome and not receiving Legats but at last Pope Calixtus yielded to the King the enjoyment of the Customs which his Father had in England and Normandy Was not this Pope very kind to the King who so patiently yielded to those customs which his Predecessors had condemned as contrary to Religion and making Christs death to no purpose The same Callisâ—us 2. in the Council of Lateran A. D. MCXXII put an end to the Controversie of investitures in the Roman Empire yielding to the Emperour the right of Investitures so it were performed without Simony and by a Scepter and not by a staff and a Ring because forsooth if it had been done by a ring it made it a kind of marriage and so made a spiritual Adultery between the Bishop and his Church as the former Popes very learnedly proved in their Epistles against Investitures § 7. This Controversie being at an end the Popes bethought themselves of a more subtle way of effecting their design which was by engaging the Bishops by oaths of Fidelity and obedience to themselves as well as taking away their homages and Fealty to Princes that so with less noise and more security they might compass the design of Ecclesiastical Liberty or rather slavery to the Pope Gregory 7. Urban 2. and Paschal 2. did all forbid Clargy-men to give any homage to Princes as Petrus de Marca proves from the Authentick acts of their several Councils instead of which they required an Oath of Fealty to themselves For it was not a bare oath of Canonical obedience which the Popes required but as much an oath of Fealty and Allegiance as ever Princes require from their other Subjects which will be made appear by comparing the oaths together The most ancient form of Allegiance I meet with is that prescribed in the Capitular of Charles the Great which is contained in very few words Promitto ego partibus Domini mei Caroli Regis filiorum ejus quia fidelis sum ero diebus vitae meae sine fraude vel malo ingenio as it is in the old Edition of the Constitutions but in the latter out of Sirmondus his Copy it is somewhat larger Promitto ego quod ab isto die in antea fidelis sum Domino Carolo piissimo Imperatori pura mente absque fraude malo ingenio de meâ parte ad suam partem ad honorem regni sui sicut per drictam debet esse homo Domino suo The ancient Form used in this Nation ran thus Tu jurabis quod ab ista die in antea eris fidelis legalis Domino nostro Regi suis haeredibus fidelitatem legalitatem ei portabis de vitâ de membro de terreno honore quod tu eorum malum aut damnum nec noveris nec audiveris quod non defendes pro posse tuo ita te Deus adjuvet Now let us compare these with the Oath made to the Pope I shall take that form which is published out of the Vatican MS. by Odoricus Raynaldus which was taken by Edmund Archbishop of Canterbury Ego Edmundus c. ab hac hora in antea fidelis obediens ero S. Petro S. R. E. D. Papae Gregerio suisque successoribus canonicè intrantibus Nonero in facto neque in consilio aut consensio ut vitam perdant aut membrum aut capiantur malâ captione Consilium vero quod mihi credituri sunt per se aut per nuntios suos sive per liter as ad corum damnum mesciente nemini pandam Papatum Romanum Regalia Sancti Petri aajutor eis ero ad retinendum defendendum salvo meo ordine contra omnem hominem c. This is enough to shew that if the other were properly Oaths of Allegiance to Princes this is so to the Pope and thereby they are bound to the very same obedience to the Pope as their Soveraign as anymen are to their own Princes For here is no exception at all of the Rights of Princes and the duty they owe to them not the least notice being taken of them as though they did owe them any allegiance which we plainly see was never intended should be paid by those who first imposed this Oath That Learned Gentleman Sir Roger Twisden supposes this oath to have been framed by Paschal 2. and it is certain that Rodulphus being made Archbishop of Canterbury in his time is the first we read among us that took an oath of Fidelity to the Pope with that of Canonical obedience after whose time we frequently meet with it but not before but in truth it is the very same oath only applying it to Church-men which Richard of Capua took by way of Fealty to Gregory 7. as may appear to any one that compares them together where there are the same expressions word for word by which we may see the strictest allegiance to the Pope is understood by it without the least reservation of any other Princes Rights And considering the doctrine and design of the first imposers of it it cannot be questioned but their intention was hereby to exempt the takers of it from all Allegiance to any other than the Pope But lest this design should be too easily suspected at first it went only along with the Pall to Archbishops then it came to Bishops shops and at last as the Gloss upon the Canon Law tells us to all that receive any dignity consecration or confirmation from the Pope and now the oath in the Pontifical is much larger than it was and by it the takers are bound to observe and defend the Papal reservations Provisions and mandates and to persecute to the utmost of their Power all Hereticks Schismaticks and Rebels to the Pope Much kindness then is to be expected from all who are sworn to persecution and much allegiance to Princes from those who own the Pope to be their Soveraign in as express terms as any Subjects can do their Princes and so Cassander takes notice that several passages in this Oath relate to meer civil obedience which we owe to Princes and not to the Pope and for what relates to the Papacy if by it be understood the Papal Tyranny as no doubt it is be utterly condemns it as an unlawful oath and I extreamly wonder at those who make
was in defence of these Which I shall the rather do since I find his Life very lately published in French with a high character of him and dedicated to the King of France but especially because I find that those among us of that Religion who disown Gregory the sevenths principles are willing to believe him a Martyr upon other grounds viz. that his quarrel with the King was upon the account of the antient Municipal Laws of England which had a respect to the immunities of Clergie-men I shall therefore prove 1. That the matters in Dispute between the King and Becket were the very same that Gregory the seventh and his successors contended about with Christian Princes 2. That the pleas made use of by Becket and his party were no other than those which Gregory the seventh and his successors used so that they had no relation at all to the Municipal Laws but to the controversie then on Foot between the Civil and Ecclesiastical Power In both which I hope to make some passages clearer than they have yet been having had the advantage of perusing several MSS. relating to this matter and especially that Volume of Epistles which Baronius accounts an unvaluable Treasure and as far as I can perceive the Cotton MS. is more compleat than the Vatican which Baronius made use of 1. For the matters in Dispute between them The whole controversie might be reduced to two heads 1. Whether Ecclesiastical Persons were unaccountable to the Civil Power for any misdemeanours committed by them 2. Whether the Pope had the Soveraign Power over Princes and all under them so that he might contradict the Kings Laws and Customs and command his Subjects against his consent to come to him and whether the Kings Subjects in such cases were not bound to obey the Pope let the King command what he please These in truth were the points in debate and the most weighty particulars in the Customs of Clarendon were but as so many branches of these In that Copy of them which is extant in the Cotton MS. and was drawn up by the Kings own Order the occasion of them is set down to have been the differences which had happened between the Clergie and the Kings Iustices and the Barons of the Kingdom about the Customs and Dignities of the Crown the most considerable of those which the Pope condemned were concerning 1. The Tryal of Titles of Advowsons and Presentations in the Kings Courts 2. The Tryal of Clergie-men before the Kings Iudges and the Churches not defending them after conviction or confession 3. That neither Archbishops Bishops or others should go out of the Kingdom without the Kings consent and giving security to the King that in going staying or returning they will do nothing to the prejudice either of the King or Kingdom 4. The profits of Ecclesiastical Courts upon absolutions for they demanded not barely personal security of all excommunicated persons to stand to the Churches judgements but Vadium ad remanens as the Law term was then which implyes real security or so much money laid down which was to come to the Court if they did not perform the conditions expressed For it was one of the things the Kings Ambassadour complained of to his Mother the Empress that the matters in controversie were not things of advantage to mens souls but to their own purses and that the Faults of Offenders were not punished in the Ecclesiastical Courts by the injoyning of Penance but by the giving of money And the Empress her self in her discourse with Nicholas de Monte the Archbishops Friend insisted on these pecuniary mulcts for sins as one of the great occasions of the troubles which made people suspect this pretence of Ecclesiastical Liberty to be only a cloak for their own profits But however the good Pope whether he understood this Vadium ad remanens or no at all adventures condemned it For what should the Court of Rome do without exchanging Money for Sins 5. That no Person who held of the King in capite or belonged to him should be excommunicated or have his Land interdicted without making the King acquainted with it or his Iustice in his absence 6. That in matters of Appeal they were to proceed from the Arch-deacon to the Bishop from the Bishop to the Arch-bishop and from thence to the King and not to proceed further without his express leave These were the main things in dispute and what do they all amount to but the very same Rights of the Crown which the Kings predecessors did insist upon and what could be the sense of Becket in opposing them but that Clergie-men were not accountable for their Faults to the Civil Power and in case of the Popes command whether upon appeal or otherwise Bishops and others were to go to his Court in spight of the King as Anselm and Theobald had done before It is agreed by Baronius himself that the quarrel brake out upon the Arch-bishops denying to deliver up the Clergie-man that was accused and convicted of Murder after Ecclesiastical Censure to the Secular Power which the King earnestly desired and Becket as peremptorily denyed And upon what principle could this be done but the highest pretence of Ecclesiastical Liberty that ever Gregory the seventh or any other asserted And it is plain by this that the King did not deny the Ecclesiastical jurisdiction nor hindered the proper Censures of the Church upon offenders but the Question was meerly this Whether Ecclesiastical persons having committed crimes against the publick peace were only to be punished with Ecclesiastical Censures and never to be delivered over to Civil Iustice Which was the main hinge of the Cause and which Becket stood to to the last And that this was the true State of the Controversie appears by the representation made of it to Alexander the third by the whole Clergie of the Province of Canterbury who confess that the peace of the Kingdom was very much disturbed by the insolence and crimes of some of the Clergie for upon the account of this exemption any Villains were safe if they could but get into any kind of Orders the King for the safety of his people pressed the Bishops after their Censures to give such guilty persons up to the Laws because bare degrading was by no means sufficient punishment for wilful murder which was all the Church censures reached to This all the Bishops at first opposed as derogatory to the Churches Liberty but afterwards Becket excepted the rest saw a necessity of yielding at present for as they confess themselves this liberty was extended even to a Lector or Acolythus and the Empress Matildis said that the Bishops gave orders very loosely without titles by which we may easily imagine what a miserable state the whole Kingdom might be in if these things were suffered So that we see the plea insisted upon at the beginning of the quarrell was that no persons in any Ecclesiastical
omnem Angliam a laico duodenni vel quindecim annorum contra Dom. Papam Alexandrum B. Thomam Archiepiscopum quod eorum non recipient literas neque obedient mandatis Et si quis inveâ—tus foret literas eorum deferens traderetur Potestatibus tanquam Coronae Regis capitalis inimicus Here we see an Oath of Supremacy made so long ago by Henry the second and those who out of zeal or whatsoever motive brought over Bulls of the Popes made lyable to the charge of Treason but the Archbishop by vertue of his Legatine Power took upon him to send persons privately into England and to absolve them from this Oath as is there expressed The same year the King being in Normandy sent over these Articles to be sworn and observed by the Nobles and People of England 1. If any one be found carrying Letters from the Pope or any Mandate from the Archbishop of Canterbury containing an Interdict of Religion in England let him be taken and without delay let justice pass upon him as upon a Traytor to the King and Kingdom 2. No Clergie-man or Monk or Lay-Brother may be suffered to cross the Seas or return into England unless he have a Pass from the Kings Iustice for his going out and of the King himself for his return if any one be found doing otherwise let him be taken and imprisoned 3. No man may appeal either to the Pope or Arch-bishop and no plea shall be held of the Mandates of the Pope or Archbishop nor any of them be received by any person in England if any one be taken doing otherwise let him be imprisoned 4. No man ought to carry any Mandat either of Clergie-man or Laick to either of them on the same penalty 5. If any Bishops Clergie-men Abbots or Laicks will observe the Popes interdict let them be forthwith banished the Realm and all their Kindred and let them carry no Chattels along with them 6. That all the Goods and Chattels of those who favour the Pope or Archbishop and all their possessions of whatsoever rank order sex or condition they be be seized into the Kings hand and confiscated 7. That all Clergie-men having revenews in England be summoned through every County that they return to their places within three months or their revenues to be seized into the Kings hands 8. That Peter-pence be no longer paid to the Pope but let them be gathered and kept in the Kings Treasury and laid out according to his command 9. That the Bishops of London and Norwich be in the Kings Mercy and be summoned by Sheriffs and Bailiffs to appear before the Kings Iustices to answer for their breach of the Statutes of Clarendon in interdicting the Land and excommunicating the person of Earl Hugh by vertue of the Popes Mandat and publishing this excommunication without Licence from the Kings Iustices I hope these particulars will give full satisfaction that the Controversie between King Henry the second and Becket was not about some antient Saxon Laws but the very same principles which Gregory the seventh first openly defended of the Popes temporal Power over Princes and the total exemption of Ecclesiastical Persons from Civil Iudicatures § 14. 2. This will yet more appear if we consider that the Pleas used by Becket and his party were the very same which were used by Gregory the seventh and his Successors The beginning of the quarrel we have seen was about the total exemption of Men in any kind of Ecclesiastical Orders from civil punishments which was the known and avowed principle of Gregory the seventh and his successors and it seems by Fitz Stephen that several of the Bishops were for yielding them up to the Secular Power after deprivation and said that both Law and Reason and Scripture were for it but Becket stood to it that it was against God and the Canons and by this means the Churches Liberty would be destroyed for which in imitation of their High-Priest they were bound to lay down their lives and bravely adds that it was not greater merit of old for the Bishops to found the Church of Christ with their blood than in their times to lay down their lives for this blessed liberty of the Church and if an Angel from Heaven should perswade him to comply with the King in this matter he should be accursed By which we see what apprehension Becket had of the nature of his cause from the beginning of it for this was before the King insisted on the reviving the Antient Customs at Clarendon Where it seems Beckets heart failed him which the Monks and Baronius parallel with S. Peters denying Christ but it seems the Cock that brought him to Repentance was his Cross-bearer who told him that the Civil Authority disturbed all that wickedness raged against Christ himself that the Synagogue of Satan had profaned the Lords Sanctuary that the Princes had sat and combined together against the Lords Christ that this tempest had shaken the pillars of the Church and while the Shepherd withdrew the sheep were under the power of the Wolf A very loyal representation of the King and all that adhered to his Rights After this he spoke plainly to him and told him he had lost both his conscience and his honour in conspiring with the Devils instruments in swearing to those cursed customs which tended to the overthrow of the Churches Liberty At which he sighed deeply and immediately suspends himself from all Offices of his Function till he should be absolved by the Pope which was soon granted him The Pope writes to the King very sharply for offering to usurp the things of Iesus Christ and to oppress the poor of Christ by his Laws and Customs and threatens him to be judged in the same manner at the day of judgement and tells him of Saul and Ozias and Rehoboam and parallels his sin with theirs and bids him have a care of their punishments And was all this zeal of the Pope only for the good old Saxon Laws When the Bishop of Exeter begged the Archbishop at Northampton to have regard to his own safety and theirs too he told him he did not savour the things of God he had spoken much more pertinently according to P. W. if he had told him he did not understand the Saxon Laws When the Earl of Leicester came to him to tell him he must come and hear his sentence he told him that as much as his soul was better than his body so much more was he bound to obey God and Him than an earthly King and for his part he declared he would not submit to the Kings judgement or theirs in as much as he was their Father and that he was only under God to be judged by the Pope and so appealed to him Which being an appeal to the Pope in a Civil cause about accounts between the King and him it does plainly shew that he did not think the King had any Authority over
than the Pope treated him as a Christian and Catholick King and as the Popes predecessours had done â—is And after the writing of that Letter and the reconciliation with his Son Radulphus de Diceto Dean of S. Pauls about that time hath an Authentick Epistle of Henry the second to the Pope wherein he acknowledges no more than the common observance which was usual with all Princes in that Age whereas Feudatary Princes write after another Form So that I cannot but think it to be a meer complement of Petrus Blesensis without the Kings knowledge or else a Clause inserted since his time by those who knew where to put in convenient passages for the advantage of the Roman See It is said by some that Henry the second A. D. 1176. did revive the Statutes of Clarendon which the Pope and Becket opposed so much in the Parliament called at Northampton It is true that Gervase of Canterbury doth say that the King did renew the Assise of Clarendon for whose execrable Statutes Becket suffered but he doth not say that he renewed those Statutes but others which are particularly enumerated by Hoveden upon the distributing tâ—e Kingdom into six Circuits and appointing the itinerant Judges who were made to swear that they would keep themselves and make others to observe the following Assises as the Statutes were then called but they all concerned matters of Law and Civil Iustice without any mention of the other famous Statutes about Ecclesiastical matters Whereas at the same time it is said that King Henry the second granted to the Popes Legat though against the advice of his great and Wise men that Clergy-men should not be summon'd before Secular Tribunals but only in case of the Kings Forest and of Lay-fees which is directly contrary to the Statute of Clarendon but some men love to heap things together without well considering how they agree with each other and so make the King in the same page to null and establish the same Statutes But it is observable that after all this contest about the exemption of Clergy-men and the Kings readiness to yield it they were made weary of it at last themselves for as Richard Beckets successour in the See of Canterbury saith in his Letter to the three Bishops that were then three of the Kings Iustices the killing of a Clergy-man was more remisly punished than the stealing of a Sheep and therefore the Archbishop perswades them to call in the Secular Arm against Ecclesiastical Malefactors And now in his opinion the Canons and Councils are all for it and Beckets arguments are slighted and no regard had to the Cause he suffered for when he found what mischief this impunity brought upon themselves But for this giving up their Liberties the Monks revenge themselves on the memory of this Archbishop as one that yielded up those blessed priviledges which Becket had purchased with his blood Notwithstanding the sufferings the King had undergone by his opposing the Ecclesiastical encroachments we may see what apprehension after all he had of the declension of his own power and the miserable condition the Church was in by those priviledges they had obtained by that notable discourse which Gervase of Canterbury relates the King had with the Bishops in the time of Baldwin Archbishop of Canterbury wherein with tears he tells them that he was a miserable man and no King or if a King he haâ— only the name and not the power of a King that the Kingdom of England was once a rich and glorious Kingdom but now a very small share of it was left to his Government And then gives a sad account of the strange degeneracy both of the Monks and Clergy and what saith he in the day of judgement shall we say to these things Besides Those of Rome see our Weakness and domineer over us they sell their Letters to us they do not seek justice but contentions they multiply appeals and draw suits to Rome and when they look only after Money they confound Truth and overthrow peace What shall we say to these things how shall we answer them at Gods dreadful Iudgement Go and advise together about some effectual course to prevent these enormities Was this spoken like a Feudatary of the Popes and not rather like a wiâ—e and pious Prince who not only saw the miseries that came upon the Kingdom and Church by these encroachments of Ecclesiastical Power but was yet willing to do his best to redress them if the great Clergy would have concurred with him in it who were a little moved for the present with the Kings Tears and pathetical speech but the impression did soon wear off from their minds and things grew worse and worse by the daily increase of the Papal Tyranny And when this great Prince was very near his end some of the Monks of Canterbury were sent over to him who had been extreamly â—roublesome to himself and the Kingdom as well as to the Archbishop by their continual Appeals to the Court of Rome and they told the King the Convent of Canterbury saluted him as their Lord I have been said the King and am and will be Your Lord Ye wicked Traytors Upon which one of the Monks very loyally cursed him and he dyed saith Gervase within seven dayes § 17. Having thus far shewed that the Controversie between the Ecclesiastical and Civil Power was accounted a Cause of Religion by the managers of the Ecclesiastical Power and that so far that the great Defender of it is to this day accounted a Saint and a Martyr for suffering in it I now come to shew that the ancient panal Laws were made against that very Cause which Becket suffered for After the death of Henry the second Beckets Cause triumphed much more than it had done before for in the time of Richard the first the great affairs of the Nation were managed by the Popes Legats during the Kings absence and after his return scarce any opposition was made to the Popes Bulls which came over very frequently unless it were against one about the Canons of Lambeth wherein the King and Archbishop were forced to submit no hindrance made to Appeals and even in Normandy the Ecclesiastical Power got the better after long contests In the latter end of Richard the first the Pope began to take upon him the disposal of the best Ecclesiastical preferments in England either by translation or Provision or Collation which Fitz Stephen saith that Henry 2. told those about him after the four Courtiâ—rs were gone for England to murder Becket was the design Becket intended to carry on viz. to take away all Right of Patronage from the King and all Lay-Persons and so bring the gift of all Church-preferments to the Pope or others under him Upon the agreement of King Iohn with the Popes Legat he renounced all right of Patronage and gave it to the Pope but it is no wonder in him
executed upon them had there not been daily new provocations such as 1. Sanders his confession in his Book De visibili Monarchia that the Pope had sent two Priests Morton and Web before the Northern Rebellion into the North to excite the Lords and Gentlemen to take up Arms declaring to them that the Pope had excommunicated the Queen and her Subjects were released from obedience to her and that Sanders doth justifie the said Rebellion and imputes the miscarriage of it to the over-late publishing the said Bull affirming that if it had been sooner published the Catholicks would undoubtedly so have risen as that they must have prevailed against the Queen and had certainly executed the said sentence at that time for her deposition from the Crown 2. Sanders his magnifying the Heads of that Rebellion after they had been arraigned condemned and executed by the ancient Laws of our Countrey for high Treason which course since that time was followed by Parsons and others 3. The full discovery of the plot of the Pope and King of Spain with the Rebels at home for the depriving the Queen of her Kingdom 4. Stukely's attempt in Ireland assisted by Sanders and others which was afterwards encouraged by the Pope himself when Sanders publickly appeared as a Ring-leader of the Popes Forces to perswade the Catholicks to joyn with the Rebels already in Arms. 5. Gregory 13. renewing the Bull of Pius 5. against Queen Elizabeth 6. Upon this the Iesuits coming into England who were the chief instruments of all the mischiefs against the Queen and of the miseries which they or any other Catholicks have upon these occasions sustained 7. Parsons his endeavour to set the Queens Crown on another Head as appeared by his Letter to a certain Earl 8. In all the Plots none were found to be more forward than the Priests and the Laity they say if the Priests had opposed themselves to their designs would have been over-ruled by them 9. All which considered they confess that no King or Prince in the World disgusting the See of Rome having either force or metal in him would have endured the Priests but rather have utterly rooted them out of their Territories as Traytors and Rebels both to him and his Countrey and therefore they rejoyce unfeignedly that God had blessed this Kingdom with so gracious and merciful a Soveraign who hath not dealt in this sort with them and that all Catholicks deserve no longer to live than they hereafter shall honour her from their â—earts obey her in all things so far as possibly they may and pray for her prosperous Reign and long life and to their powers defend her against all enemies whatsoever 7. They say notwithstanding all the former provocations from the time of the said Rebellion and Parliament there were few above twelve that in ten years had been executed for their consciences as we hold say they although our Adversaries say for Treason and of those twelve some perhaps can hardly be drawn within our account having been tainted with matters of Rebellion and for the rest although themselves knew them to be free from seditions her Majesty and the State could not know it and they had great Cause as Politick persons to suspect the worst 8. They confess that a Parliament being called A. 1576. no Laws were made at that time against them the antient Prisoners that had been more narrowly restrained A. 1570. were notwithstanding the Rebellion in Ireland again restored to their former liberty to continue with their Friends as they had done before and such who were not suspected to have been dealers or abetters in the said Treasonable actions were used with that humanity which could well be expected 9. The State having notice of the second excommunication and having found the bad effects of the former was concerned in Policy to prevent the like by the second And the jealousie was much increased by Sherwin's answer upon examination eight months before the apprehension of Campion For being asked whether the Queen was his lawful Soveraign notwithstanding any sentence of the Popes he refused to give any Answer Then followed a greater restraint of Catholicks than at any time before and in Jan. 1581. a Proclamation was made for calling home her Majesties Subjects beyond the Seas especially those trained up in the Seminaries pretending that they learned little there but disloyalty The same month a Parliament ensued wherein a Law was made agreeable to the Proclamation but with a more severe punishment annexed viz. the penalty of death for any Iesuit or Seminary Priest to repair into England c. 10. They confess that if all the Seminary Priests then in England or which should come after had been of the mind of Morton and Sanders or Parsons the said no Law no doubt had carryed with it a far greater shew of Iustice but that was say they the error of the State and yet themselves say the State could not know the difference between them and yet they add that it was not altogether for ought they knew improbable those times being so full of many dangerous designments and Iesuitical practices 11. This same year Campion and other Priests were apprehended whose answers upon their examinations agreeing in effect with Sherwins did greatly incense the State For this being one of the Questions propounded If the Pope pronounce her Majesty deprived and her Subjects discharged of their obedience and after either the Pope or some by his Authority invade the Realm which part would you take or ought a good subject to take To this they say some answered that when the case should happen they would then take counsel what were best for them to do others that when the case happened they would answer another that he was not resolved what to do and another that if such an invasion were made for any matter of his faith he thinketh he were bound to take part with the Pope Now say they what King in the World would not in the same circumstances justly repute such persons Traytors and deal with them accordingly 12. After this a new plot was laid between his Holiness the King of Spain and Duke of Guise for a sudden and desperate designment against her Majesty at which time they câ—nfess the Iesuitical humour had so possessed the hearts of sundry Catholicks as they rue and are ashamed at the remembrance of it And here they give a particular account of the Treasons of Throckmorton Arden Somervile Parry Northumberland Babington Stanley defended by Cardinal Allen who laid down this for a Maxim That in all Wars which may happen for Religion every Catholick is bound in conscience to imploy his Person and Forces by the Popes direction viz. how far and where either at home or abroad he may and must break with his Temporal Soveraign These things they say are necessary to be known to clear her Majesty from the imputations of more than barbarous cruelty towards them cast upon her by
the Iesuits when themselves were the Causes of all the Calamities any of them had indured since her Majesties Reign and they think all circumstances considered few Princes living of her judgement and so provoked would have dealt more mildly with such their subjects than she hath done with them 13. They confess the Spanish Invasion 1588. to be an everlasting Monument of Iesuitical Treason and Cruelty For it is apparent in a Treatise penned by the advice of Father Parsons altogether as they do verily think that the King of Spain was moved and drawn into that intended mischief by the long and daily solicitations of the Iesuits and other English Catholicks beyond the Seas affected and altogether given to Iesuitism and that Parsons as they imagine though the Book went under a greater name endeavoured with all his Rhetorick to perswade the Catholicks in England to joyn with the Spaniards but Caraâ—nal Aâ—en takes it upon himself and saith the Pâ—â—â— had made him Cardinal intending to send him his Legat for the sweeter managing this forsooth godly and great affair and there he affirms that there were divers Priests in the Kings Army ready to serve ever mans necessity and promises them the assistance of all the Saints and Angels and of our Blessed Saviour himself in the Soveraign Sacrament after a very invisible manner and they do not at all deny that the Pope did joyn and contribute towards this intended Invasion 14. That in these ten years from 1580. to 1590. the Prisoners at Wisbich lived together without any trouble Colledge-like without any wanâ— that of all sorts towards the number of fifty suffered death as they think most of them for conscience but as their Adversaries do still affirm for Treason that such Priests as upon examination were found any thing moderate were not so hardly dealt with insomuch as fifty five that might by the Laws have been put to death in one year 1585. and in a dangerous time were only banished and that although some hard courses were taken against them yet it was not by many degrees so extream as the Iesuits and that Crew have falsly reported and written of it 15. That there being just apprehensions of a new Invasion a Proclamation was set out 1591. against Semâ—nary Priests as being suspected to 〈◊〉 sent hither to pâ—â—pare a way for it and Parsons did not only acknowledge such a design but said the King of Spain had just cause to attempt again that enterprise but in the mean time they tryed a shorter course by the several Treasons of Heskett Collen both set on by Jesuits Lopez York Williams and Squire animated by Walpole the Iesuit 16. That Parsons at last set up the title of the Infanta of Spain and endeavoured to get subscriptions to it and promises to perswade the Catholicks of England to submit to it and that the Seminary Priests were to promote her Title against the Queen and her Lawful Successors From all which they confess that the Iesuitical designs abroad and the Rebellions and Traiterous attempts of some Catholicks at home have been the Causes of such calamities and troubles as have happened unto them great they confess in themselves but far less they think than any Prince living in her Majesties case and so provoked would have inflicted upon us And what more need to be said for the Vindication of the Poenal Laws from the charge of Injustice and cruelty than is here so ingenuously confessed by the Secular Priests men of the same Religion with those who complain of them men that suffered themselves in some measure men that throughly understood the true Reasons and casions of the several Laws that were then made and yet aâ—ter all this can Mr. Cressy have the impudence to parallel these Laws with those of Nero Domitian and Dioclesian and to say that they who suffered by them suffered only on the account of Religion If the primitive Christians had been guilty of so many horrible Treasons and Conspiracies if they had attempted to deprive Emperours of their Crowns and absolved Subjects from their Allegiance to them if they had joyned with their open and declared enemies and imployed persons time after time to assassinate them what would the whole World have said of their sufferings Would men of any common sense have said that they were Martyrs for Religion no but that they dyed justly and deservedly for their Treasons And for all that I can see all such as suffered in those dayes for their attempts on their Soveraign and Countrey are no more to be said to have suffered for Religion than the late Regicides who pleaded the Cause of God and Religion as well as they and if the one be Martyrs let the other be thought so too but if notwithstanding all their fair pretences of Religion and Conscience the Regicides shall not be thought to suffer for their Religion why then should those in Q. Elizabeth ' s or King Iames ' s time who suffered on the account of actual Treasons as those did who were engaged in the Gunpowder Treason as well as those who suffered in the Queens time And if the supposition of Conscience or Religion makes all men Martyrs the Regicides will put in their plea for Martyrdâ—m if it be not then there is no reason to say they suffered for Religion whom the Law condemned on the account of Treason If it be then allowed that the Laws must determin Treason then it will follow that those suffer for Treason who act directly against those Laws which determine it to be Treason § 22. But suppose the Law should make it Treason for men to serve God according to their Consciences as for Roman Priests to officiate or say Mass can such men be said to suffer for Treason if they be taken in the Fact and not rather for their Religion To this I answer that a great regard is to be had to the occasion of making such a Law for the right interpretation of it For if plain and evident Treasonable actions were the first occasion of making it as it is confessed in Q. Elizabeths time then all those Persons lyable to the suspicion of the State may be seized upon in what way soever they discover themselves and in this case the performing Offices of their Function is not the motive of the Law or Reason of the penalty but meerly the Means of Discovery of the Persons For by reason of Disguises and Aequivocations and mental Reservations being set on foot by the Iesuits to prevent discovery the Law had no certain way of finding them out but by the Offices of their Function in which the Magistrates are sure they will not dissemble so far as that a man who is no Priest will not take upon him to say Mass and therefore the Law looks upon the Office of Religion as only a certain Criterion of the Persons and not as the Reason of the punishment not as the thing that makes them guilty but as the way
there hath been so late so numerous so vehement nay I had almost said so Catholick an opposition to the Irish Remonstrance Not as Mr. Cressy would have it believed out of indignation at a particular person who had much greater Authority for what he did on the behalf of the rest by his Procuratorium than Mr. Cressy doth appear to have nor a quarrel at phrases but at the very substance of the doctrine contained in it Was it only about some phrases that the Popes Internuntio at Brussels de Vechiis condemned it when he said it contained in it propositions agreeing with those already reprobated by Paul the fifth and Innocent the tenth and this he expressed as the mind of the Pope Was it only about phrases when he said the Remonstrance would do more hurt than all the former persecutions of hereticks Was it only about phrases when Cardinal Barbarin charged the Remonstrants with corrupting faith under a pretence of Allegiance to the King and he adds too that the propositions were condemned before by the Apostolical See and that his Holiness was troubled to the very heart about it Methinks a few Phrases only should not have given his Holiness so much disturbance Was it only for some phrases that the Dominicans opposed it as contrary to the doctrine of Thomas Aquinas who roundly asserts the Popes power of deposing Heretical Princes and they pleaded they were sworn to maintain his Doctrine It seems then they can give no security to the State without perjury and I suppose there were some of these among Mr. Cressy's Roman Catholicks who were so ready to renounce this doctrine Was it only for a few phrases that the Lovain Divines condemned it as wholly unlawful and detestable and containing things contrary to Catholick Religion The true grounds of which were the taking away the Popes power over Princes and the great Diana of Ecclesiastical Liberty If Mr. Cressy accounts these but phrases the Court of Rome owes him but little thanks for it But this is so ridiculous a pretence that all the quarrells about the Irish Remonstrance were only about a few phrases that either he looks on the parties as extreamly quarrelsome or it must be some greater matter which he confesses was the occasion of so many commotions dissentions and scandalous invectives on both sides Since then there hath so long been and we have reason still to believe there is such a difference among them about these matters how can Mr. Cressy undertake so boldly as he doth on the behalf of English Catholicks for the subscribing the Censures of the Faculty of Paris But of all sorts of men I am apt to mistrust great Undertakers § 25. 2. But supposing they should subscribe the Sorbon Censures we may yet question whether hereby they would give full satisfaction in these matters Mr. Cressy is of opinion that this would be a more full and satisfactory testimony of their Fidelity than can be given by taking the Oath of Allegiance which makes me very much wonder why they should refuse the less satisfactory and choose that which is more But men had need to have fast hold that are to handle such slippery points as these are for when we think we have them safe they slip through our Fingers and escape Those who have not considered all their arts and evasions in these matters would think they offer as fair things as any men in the world but when it comes home to the point there is some sly distinction or mental reservation by which they get through all and are as much at liberty as ever That alone which in our Age and Kingdom can give satisfaction 1. Must reach our own case and not that of the King of France i. e. 1. Of a King not of the same profession of Religion with those who make the profession of Fidelity 2. Of a King or Kingdom already under censure of excommunion as Cardinal Barbarin declared 3. Of a King not barely considered as a King i. e. while he remains such and the Pope doth not declare him not to be a King but so as to declare it not to be in the Popes power to make him no King For men may subscribe the Censures of Sorbon understanding them of Kings of their own Religion not excommunicated by the Pope and while the Pope doth not declare them to be no Kings 2. What gives satisfaction in our case must exclude all manner of aequivocation and mental reservation For where that is not excluded there can be no security at all given it being impossible to bring aequivocations and reservations within any bounds nay those who hold it lawful to use them may deny it and do it in denying it therefore the matter of aequivocation must be stated how far and upon what terms and in what cases they allow it and yet there may be aequivocation in all this So that as aequivocation hath all the advantages of lying it hath the disadvantage too viz. that those who use it cannot safely be trusted though they do not use it because though it be possible they may not no man can be well assured that they do not But the Sorbon censures never mention aequivocation at all and therefore I do not wonder to see such as Mr. Cressy ready to bring in those instead of the Oath of Allegiance because although himself and some others may disown the doctrine of aequivocation yet if that be not expresly excluded they know the very Iesuits will swallow a Camel let them but have the dressing of him They know so many tricks of Legerdemain that I do not see why a very cunning Iesuit may not then think himself a fit match for the Devil himself for let him make never so many promises in Words he would have such a secret Reservation in his Mind as should make his Words to signifie nothing But it is not safe for them to play such tricks with so old a Sophister that first found out the way of aequivocation 3. What gives satisfaction in our case must exclude absolutely all power of Dispensing in the Pope for if that be reserved they are safe enough they know how to get out presently for they have one ready that can knock off all their shackles and set them as free as ever nay they have yet another fetch concerning the Popes power for he can null an Oath before-hand and make it stand for nothing as well as absolve them from it afterwards But how then can the Sorbon censures be so satisfactory in our case when they never so much as mention the Popes power of dispensing much less disclaim it so plainly as it ought to be done to give satisfaction So that we see it is not without reason Mr. Cressy would so willingly have the Oath of Allegiance changed for the Sorbon Censures and I do not at all wonder that fourteen Iesuits in France offered to subscribe the Sorbon censures 1626. which Mr.
declared by the Laws to be the True which is established by them Now if a party appears active and dangerous whose Principles are destructive to the Religion established by Law I appeal to any man of common sense whether it be sufficient ground for the Toleration of it that one objection is taken off when the other remains in its fuil force That which is then to be considered in this case is whether such a party which is dangerous without Toleration will grow less dangerous by it which I think needs no great consideration and it will require as little to shew the danger that will come to the Established Religion by a Toleration of Popery not only by the diligence industry and number of the Priests who will be glad to make new Converts to gain new Residences they being at present so much over-stocked besides their desires to approve themselves to the Court of Rome for preferments by their activity and telling brave stories beyond Seas of their exploits against hereticks as a late Miles Gloriosus among them hath done how many Legions of Hereticks they have blown away by the Power of Principles and Demonstrations but by the obligation that lyes upon them that receive preferments from Rome to persecute Hereticks Schismaticks and Rebels to the Pope to their uttermost which is expressed in the Oath they take to the Pope as appears by the Pontifical so that these men must either be perjured or persecute when it lyes in their Power And can any Nation in the World think it Wise or Safe to give Toleration to Wolfs among Sheep to those that have solemnly sworn to persecute to their power all that own the Established Religion and that look upon all such as in a damned condition that do not submit to their Church Till they abate of their monstrous uncharitableness till they renounce their Oaths to the Pope till they can give good security of their quiet behaviour in not seducing others what pretence can there be for their being allowed a free exercise of their Religion supposing they should take the Oath of Allegiance But as to their dignified Clergy I mean such of his Majesties Subjects whom the Pope hath taken upon him to make Bishops without his consent which was not suffered by some Princes even in times of Popery it ought farther to be considered what security any following Oath can give as to those that have taken a former Oath of Allegiance to the Pope as I have already proved it to be as much as King Iohn's was upon the Resignation of his Crown nay yet farther they are bound now by that Oath to defend all those Provisions and Reservations and Apostolical Mandates which were accounted the intolerable grievances of this Nation long before the Reformation But why may they not enjoy equal liberty with the Sectaries I am not pleading the Sectaries Cause neither would others plead it now but for a farther end nor would I extenuate the guilt of their Separation but they are blind that do not see the difference between the parties if not as to number yet as to interest forreign dependence and danger to the Church of England for surely a man is not in so much danger of being stung to death by Gnats as being poisoned by Vipers I mean in respect of the avowed principle of Persecuting all dissenters in the Roman Church which it were easie to manifest not only from our domestick story and the entertainment in Queen Maries dayes and from the History of the Inquisition abroad but from the Cabal at the Council of Trent between the Popes Legats and the Embassadours of Catholick Princes about the utter extirpation of the Protestant Religion and the defigns that were carried on in prosecution of this in most parts of Europe especially in Germany Flanders and France but I shall not meddle with the secret Intrigues but the open and avowed principles In France Claudius de Sainctes published a Book against Toleration A. D. 1561. wherein he pleads with all his strength for the utter extirpation of Protestants the like did Iacobus Pamelius in Flanders and both of them answer all the common and popular arguments now brought for Toleration the same did Scioppius in Germany and we all know what the dreadful consequences were in all those places But this is a subject too large to enter upon now For my part I am no Friend to Sanguinary Laws on the account of Religion and if the Wisdom of our Law-makers should think fit to change that popular way of publick suffering which the sufferers would have still believed to be for Religion into a more effectual course of suppressing the growth of a party so dangerous to our established Religion I should more rejoice it may be therein than those who are more concerned in it Provided that the pretence of making new Laws more accommodate to our present State be not carried on meerly with the design of leaving our Church without any security by Law at all against so violent and dangerous a party for it is a much easier matter to repeal old Laws than to make new ones And if the objection against the old Laws be that they are not executed it ought to be considered whether the same objection will not lye against others unless they be such Laws as will execute themselves and we have little Reason to believe that they who bid difiance to our present Laws and make sport with Proclamations will be perswaded by gentler means to obey others And is such an affront to Laws a sufficient Motive to Lenity And we have good ground to think that that they look upon all our Laws whatever they be as things of no force at all upon their Consciences as being null in themselves because they are contrary to the Popes Authority and the Constitutions of their Church And I believe if our modern Papists were pressed home the generality of those who are obnoxious to the Poenal Laws would not acknowledge those Ancient Rights of the Crown which were challenged by William the Conquerour William Rufus Henry the first Henry the second before his submission to the Pope and afterwards by Edward the first and Edward the third viz. No exercise of any forreign jurisdiction here without the Kings consent no liberty of going out of the Kingdom though upon the Popes Command without the Kings leave and while they allow this Power to the Pope to command his Majesties Subjects they make him Soveraign over them and make them more fearful of disclaiming his Power No Decrees of Popes or Bulls to be received without the Kings approbation No Bishops to be made by Papal Provisions out of the plenitude of his Power c. Those who will not reject these which were challenged by the Kings of England long before the Reformation as their ancient and undoubted Rights with what face can they plead for the Repeal of the Poenal Laws when the ancient Law of