of the same and Scotland vanquished In all our sad divisions which happened from first to last and are not wholly yet ended to this day Two things are worthy the serious consideration of wiser men than I am 1. What party for time past hath been most faithful to the English interest 2. What course is to be taken for to setle us more firmly for time to come For the first we must understand what the English interest is The interest of England is twofold Civil and Ecclesiastical for we are English men and Christians The Civil interest is salus populi Anglicani there is no doubt of that for the peace safety liberty happiness of our dear Country is the end whereat we are all bound both by the written and natural Laws of God to aim The interest Ecclesiastical is the Protestant Religion and the perservation of the substance thereof Prelacy Presbytery Independency much less Antipaedobaptism and other Sects are not essential but accidental to it This being the interest of England we cannot judge of the faithfulness either of the King 's or Parliaments party by the quality of the persons of either side For there were both good and bad on both sides who had their several grounds of adhering to this or that party and their several ends and neither their grounds nor ends good Nor can any man justifie all proceedings and actings of either side both had their errours Nor must we judge of them according to their protestation for both could not by such contrary means attain the same end as both sides protested to maintain the King the Parliament the liberty of the Subject the Laws and the Protestant Religion Neither in this particular must the Laws of the English Constitution and Administration be the rule for both acted not only above the Laws but contrary to the latter of them at least For no Laws could warrant the Parliament to act without the King or the King without the Parliament much less was it justifiable that there should be in one Kingdom two not only different but contrary commands supreme and from different heads and persons This was directly against the very nature of all Common-Wealths which have only one first mover and one indivisible supreme power to animate and act them section 19 The Rule therefore must be the Laws of God as above the Laws of Men and we must consider according to these divine Rules what was the state of the Controversie the justice and equity of the cause made evident and the just necessity of doing that which was done Neither must we look at the cause only as just in it self but also how it 's justly or unjustly maintained For men may use such means as shall never reach the just end intended but also such as may be destructive of the cause it self and raze the very foundation of it Besides all this before a perfect judgment can be made the secret counsels contrivances designs hidden actings of the chief Actors should be known yet these many times lie hid and are not known or if known yet to very few and some of these few cannot found the bottom Many things are charged upon the King as acting against the English interest as Civil as that he dissolves Parliaments without just and sufficient cause that he intermits Parliaments for sixteen years together that having signed the Petition of Right he acts contrary to it imposeth Ship-money calls a Parliament signs the Act of Continuance deserts it calls the Members from it calls another Parliament at Oxford challengeth a negative Voice to both the Houses raiseth a War against it though he was informed that this tended to the dissolution of the Government that whosoever should serve to assist him in such Wars are Traitors by the fundamental Laws of this Kingdom and have been so adjudged in two Acts of Parliament 11 Richard 2. and 1 Henry 4. And that such persons ought to suffer as Traitors These with other particulars charged upon him seem directly contrary unto the civil Interest of the Kingdom Again to Marry a Popish Lady upon Articles directly contrary to the Laws of England and the Protestant Religion established by Law to entertain Twenty eight Popish Priests with a Bishop to tolerate Mass in the Court to receive Three Agents from the Pope one after another Pisano Con Rosetti to maintain the Queen-mother to engage the generality of the People of England to retard the relieving of Ireland to admit divers of the Popish Irish Murtherers and Rebels into his Army to call our English Forces sent to relieve the poor distressed Protestants of Ireland out of that Nation and employ them against the Parliament of England to suffer some of the Heads of the Irish Rebels to be so near his Person to endeavour to bring in the Duke of Lorrain with his Forces into this Nation to contract with the Irish Rebels upon condition to enjoy their Religion to furnish him with Ten thousand Irish Rebels to strengthen his party in England with divers other acts like unto these is conceived to be not only inconsistent with but plainly destructive of the English Protestant Interest And if this be true it must needs be so Yet it might be said that the King endeavoured to maintain his own regal Power the Episcopacy and Liturgy established by Law and that he did not oppose the Parliament but a seditious party in the Parliament and other Sectaries whose principles were destructive both of all civil and also Ecclesiastical Government and without the judgment of able Lawyers and learned Divines he did not undertake the War either against Scotland or England or any other It 's true that of those who adhered to the King and liked not the Parliaments proceeding there were some consciencious persons who judged the King an absolute Monarch and did not like many things done by that party yet they thought it the Duty of Subjects to suffer and that it was no ways lawful to resist But the Casuists say That Ignorantia excusat a tanto non a toto their Ignorance might make their Crime less yet no ways free them from all Guilt It was not Invincible they might easily have known that the King of Enland was no absolute Monarch seeing he could not impose any Subsidy upon the Subject nor make or repeal a Law without the Parliament neither could he by his Letters or personal Command revoke the Judgment of any Court. And though they might be Civilians or read Foreign Writers which take our Kings for absolute Sovereigns yet no ancient Lawyers no Parliaments did declare them to be such Nay they might have known that they themselves obeying the King 's personal Commands disobeyed him as King and that serving him in the Wars they were guilty of High Treason against the Kingdom and against the King's Crown and Dignity Of these Royalists some have been high and cruel against their Brethren the Parliamenteers and have censured them
Subject as a Subject The Question is therefore Whether he that is a Soveraign may not be in some case resisted by the people and if he may in what case a resistance is lawful and free from the guilt of Rebellion Our Case in England is extraordinary and not easily known by many of our own much less by strangers not acquainted with our Government The Resistance in the late Wars was not the first that was made against the Kings of England by the people of England though it differed from all the former The difference was between the King and Parliament whereof he was a part yet severing himself from the whole body And the Parliament was no Subject considered as a Parliament for then the King himself being an essential part thereof should be a Subject As he was divided willingly or wilfully from it he could be no King no Soveraign For if the power was in the King and Parliament joyntly it could not be in him alone Besides when there is no Parliament we know he is a King by Law and the Kingdom is Regnum pactionatum non absolutum If he make himself absolute by that very act he makes himself no King of England For the common and fundamental Law knows no such King. Yet this was all either he or his party could say to justifie themselves If he say the Militia was his the Parliament will say it 's theirs as well as his and except he be absolute it must needs be so For if the supream power be in King Peers and Commons joyntly the Militia which is an essential part of this power could not be his alone The Parliament conceived that when he left them he left his power with them if that could be made good by the Fundamental Constitution then all England was bound to subject to them for the time and obey their just Commands And if it were not so how could all such as took up Arms with the King against them be adjudged Traytors as they were If these things be so there could be no Rebellion upon the Parliaments side because according to the Rules the Parliament was no Subject the King then separated from the Parliament refusing to Act with them Acting and Warring against them was no Soveraign The Question in the time of those bloody and unnatural Dissentions was stated several ways as Whether it was Rebellion in Subjects Commissioned by the Parliament to resist evil Counsellours Agents Ministers of State and Delinquents sheltring themselves under the King as divided from the Parliament and acting against the Laws by his Commissions or Whether the Parliament of England lawfully Assembled where the King virtually is may by Arms defend the Religion established by the same Power together with the Laws and Liberties of the Nation against Delinquents detaining with them the Kings seduced person or Whether the Parliament might not grant a Commission to the Earl of Essex by a force to apprehend Delinquents about the King to bring them to a due Tryal and this even against the personal will of the King Or whether after the Parliament had passed a Judgment against the King they might not lawfully give Commission to General Fairfaxe to apprehend the Kings person and bring him to the Parliament or Supposing the King to be an Absolute Monarch whether any of these things could be done by any Commission from the Parliament as the Condition of the Kingdom stood at that time Thus and several ways was the Question then stated and debated But the Truth is that if the Fundamental Government be by King Peers and Commons joyntly and that neither the Parliament consisting of these three States nor the Parliament as distinct from the King nor the King as divided from the Parliament could alter this Constitution nor lawfully act any thing contrary unto it then so soon as the Commission of Array on one side and of the Militia on the other were issued out and were put in Execution the Subjects in strict sense were freed from their Allegiance And if they acted upon either side their actings were just or unjust as they were agreeable or disagreeable to the Fundamental Laws and the general and principal end of Government For even then their subjection to the Laws of God and Fundamental Constitution of the Kingdom did continue and they were even then most of all bound to endeavour with all their power the good and preservation of their Country bleeding and conflicting with the pangs of Death And in that cause no man was bound too scrupulously to observe the petty Rules of our ordinary administration which were proper for a time of Peace which could not help but hinder her recovery In such an extraordinary case many extraordinary things if not in themselves unjust might have been done to prevent her ruine And if the Parliament had gone at first far higher than they did they had prevented the ruin of the King the dis-inherison of His Children and very much effusion of blood which followed afterwards The business then was easie which afterwards became difficult and could not be effected but with the loss of many thousands and the hazard of themselves for their Cause at first was well resented and had many advantages but was much prejudicial by too much intermedling with Religion and making some alterations in the Church before the time section 9 The next Question is whether since the Commencement of the War there was any certain ordinary legal Power which could induce an Obligation or there was any such Power after the Wars was begun it continued after the War was ended till the secluding of the Members and upon that seclusion ceased The answer unto these two Questions seems not to be difficult For there neither was nor could be any such certain ordinary legal Power which could in the strict letter of the Law bind all English Subjects to subjection For during a Parliament this binding power is in King Peers and Commons joyntly in the Intervals of Parliament it s in the King acting according to the Laws of Administration But all this while nay to this day there is no such Parliament no such King. And both in the time of the Wars and after both King and Parliament acted not only above but contrary to many of our Laws which in the time of Peace are ordinarily observed Neither of them could give us any Precedent for many things done by them and those few Precedents alledged for some of their Actions were extraordinary and Acts of extraordinary times If the Counties and People of England had not been ignorant and divided the division of King and Parliament did give them far greater power than they or their Forefathers had for many years But it did not seem good to the Eternal Wise and Just Providence to make them so happy Punished we must be that was his sentence and punished we have been yet few of us receive correction or return to him that Smote us Some
Rulers of the World. And he makes use of Angels Men Armies all Creatures to execute his righteous Judgments 6. Majesty hangs very loosely upon such as do possess it they have no strong hold of it It 's easily separable from man and man from it and it 's more easily lost than acquired and acquired many times more easily than kept Therefore it is that a Scepter is so easily turned to a spade and a spade unto a Scepter 7. Here is the proper place to examine 1. Whether Majesty can be conferred upon any person or persons upon condition 2. Whether once conferred and received it can be forfeited Not to be conditionally given and received not to be liable to forfeiture are not Jura Majestatis as Mr. Hobbs improperly calls them but if they any ways agree to Majesty as it will be hard to prove they do they are rather adjuncts than any thing else For the first Whether they be given upon condition or no cannot be well determined except we distinguish of this Power as given by God and as given by Man. 2. Between Majesty real and personal 3. Between personal of the first and of the second degree 4. Between the Sovereign materially and formally considered 1. God never gave any Power or Majesty Real or Personal but upon condition 1. That the receiver use it well 2. That he may take it away at will and pleasure 2. Real Majesty cannot by Man be given upon condition to a Community as free and such in proper sense 3. A Community may give personal Majesty upon condition and by the Laws of God cannot give it otherwise And the Condition is that they use it well and for the good of the people according to the eternal Laws of divine Wisdom and Justice for that very end for which God ordained all higher Powers and civil Government And no good Sovereign will desire it upon any other terms Hence the Oaths solemnly administred to the Sovereigns of the World which the people impose upon them not as Subjects but as members of a Free Community and this imposing referrs to the first Constitution and the fundamental Law of Government This is clear enough in the first institution of a King in England as the Myrrour tells us The Conqueror received the Crown upon the same terms And some good Lawyers inform us that before the King had taken his Oath to the people he could not require an Oath of Allegiance from them Therefore Sir Edward Coke must be warily understood when he makes the Coronation but a formality For though the setting of the Crown upon their Heads which is but a sign of Dignity and Honour be but a Ceremony yet the matter of his Oath is essential to the making of him King and if that being the substance of the fundamental Contract be not presupposed as first consented unto he cannot be a King. Bracton who advanceth our Kings as high as any antient Lawyer saith Ipse autem Rex non debet esse sub homine sed sub Deo Lege quia lex facit Regem Attribuat igitur Rex Legi quod lex attribuit ei videlicet dominationem potestatem Non enim est Rex ubi dominatur voluntas non lex l. 1. c. 8. And here he seems to understand not only the Law of constitution but administration That he means the latter is plain when he saith Non debet esse major eo in Regno suo in exhibitione juris He formerly asserted that Rex non habet param in Regno suo which is true in respect of every single person otherwise we know the King may be judged With this agrees that of the Myrrour That it was the great abusion of all to say the King was above the Laws to which he ought to be subject And we know who makes these Laws Arnisaeus who is so zealous for absolute Monarchs confesseth with the Philosopher that ubi leges dominantur the King cannot be absolute He observeth three kinds of Oaths which Princes take The 1. Is to maintain Religion The 2. To do their Duty The 3. Whereby they subject themselves to the Laws Such are the Oaths to be taken by the Kings of Poland Swethland Denmark and England whose Coronation-Oath includes all the three Yet this very man having no better Author than Holinshed is bold to affirm that our Kings were absolute hereditary Monarchs Bodin and Bisoldus seem to be of the same mind And if they be such then saith Arnisaeus they are Kings before they take their Oaths and hereditary too But who told him so How will he prove it We know for certain it 's otherwise and our Antiquaries in Law will say that he is very ignorant and yet very bold if not an impudent flatterer That Bodin with him and others should make the King of France absolute there may be some colour if we look upon their practice for they act very highly as absolute Princes Yet if Hottoman a better Lawyer and a far greater Antiquary than either Bodin or Arnisaeus be true the Kings of France are made Kings and receive their Crowns from the first investiture and that upon conditions Neither is there any Government which hath a rational and just constitution which may be known by ancient Records or unwritten constant Customs but will manifest that the Sovereigns thereof receive their Crowns and keep them upon certain conditions different from the written and natural Laws of God. And it 's remarkable that no Constitution can be good or allowable which is not agreeable to those Laws It 's true that if a people design one or more Persons to be their Sovereign and promise absolutely to acknowledge them by that designation and promise they are bound to grant him or them all the power whereby he or they may be absolute Sovereigns and if they will keep their promise they must not they cannot put any conditions upon him or them which may tend to the diminution of the Power already given And they may give it so as that he may as absolutely transmit it and derive it to his Posterity Yet if any shall do thus and set up such an absolute Sovereign that very Person or his Successor may be considered materially as such or such men or formally as such Sovereigns Materially considered especially as such as not yet invested they may be bound to such conditions as upon the non-performance of them they may forfeit But consider them as actually and absolutely invested there can be no such Obligation neither can any Conditions or Oaths be imposed upon them except they be willing to accept of them Yet if any people constitute such a Soveraignty it 's to be examined how justly and wisely they have done and whether they have not enslaved both themselves and their posterity and laid the foundation of their own misery and ruine And if this Constitution be neither just nor wise I cannot see how it should bind posterity And I
conduce to that end Or else we are wilfully divided and no way will serve the turn but our own The first is the cause of our difference in Judgement the second of our disaffection and without an unity of the whole or at least of the major part the business will hardly be effected For we are not in any immediate capacity of a general Unity till time hath wasted and consumed some of our divisions and also the bitter enmity and rancour which continues in the Spirits of many to this day Therefore our settlement must begin in generals and necessaries and proceed by degrees 2. The Foundation to be laid is first to find out the ancient Constitution before it was corrupted too much and understand the great Wisdom of our Ancestors gained by long experience in the constitution of this our State. This may be done by some experienced Statesmen and Antiquaries in Law and that as well if not better out of Parliament than in Parliament For a Parliament it self must have some Foundation and certain Rule of their very being before they can act steadily and regularly and not spend their time of every sevâ—â—al Parliament in molding their Government a new It 's a vain and presumptuous imagination to think that we have attained to a greater measure of Wisdom than our Ancestors attained unto And let us not undo what is already done if it be consistent with the best model 3. Let no man think that the publick interest either Ecclesiastical or Civil of England is the interest of any one person or Family or any few persons or Families much less of any Sect Party Faction It cannot be denied but whilst the Succession of our Kings was limited to a Family the succession was more certain For so the next successour was more easily known and competition which in this case is so dangerous was more easily avoided Yet even this could not prevent the difference between the Houses of York and Lancaster And when the issue of Henry 8 failed we had been in greater danger if the King of Scots had not been a Protestant and one who was conceived would prove firm to the English Protestant Interest But when this limited succession shall prove as it may do inconsistent with the publick interest it s not so much to be regarded For why should the honour or priviledge of one Family prejudice the universal safety of a Nation We know that vast Empires and Kingdoms have by an unlimited Election continued long And that which might help much in this Case is that policy of the German Empire in the Interregnum to have an administrator General 4. In modelling the Government we must have a special eye unto the Constitution that it be such as that it may not only be consistent with but effectually conduce to the promoting of peace and righteousness in the administration of the State and also to the advancement of the Christian Religion in the Church And I conceive our ancient Government for these ends was excellent and did also preserve and regulate the liberty of the people and also wisely limit the supream Magistrate 5. The Parliament being a general Representative of the whole Nation and now of three and trusted with our liberty estates lives and in some measure with the Religion we profess should consist and be made up of eminent and wise men Therefore the Election of them for the manner should be more regular and orderly in respect of the Electors and better limited and more strictly tied to a right Qualification of the Persons elected which should neither be unworthy nor unfit It may indeed fall so out that in these irregular and sometimes tumultuous Elections some wise and eminent persons may be chosen and the same may prove predominant and leading Members in that great Assembly but this is but a chance and no certainty nor use of right reason in it 6 When a Parliament is once assembled and begins to act if there be any thing that concerns the preservation and continuance either of the being of the State or of the Substance of the Protestant Religion that must be first dispatched and the next the punishment of crying Sins which are the Ruines of States 7 As for Religion so far as it concerns the State it 's fit that there be some general Rule both of our Profession and Worship but the Rule of profession must be brief and grounded upon plain Scriptures and so near to ancient Confessions as that no rational Christian who acknowledged the Scriptures to be the Word of God could or would scruple The Rule of Worship also must be plain and Clear. Let nothing be imposed upon all which any rational Christian as such may not recive without scruple As for Discipline as I have begun so I will go on in the next Chapter But these things have been and will be considered by far wiser men therefore I will not enlarge section 23 I might have said something more of the manner of disposing Soveraign power and with Besoldus have observed that as there may be two persons who make but one Monarch so there may be one King of two or more distinct and several Kingdoms This latter disposal was debated much in Calvin's case by the Sage Judges of the land in which debate some of them especially Chancellour Egerton did little less than make the King an absolute Monarch and the two Kingdoms in effect one but the Parliament was of another mind And the matter was far above their Courts and Cognizance the union could not be determined but by the Parliaments of both Kingdoms neither could this be done by them if the union made any alteration in the Constitution of either Kingdom In respect of mine intention this Chapter is very large in respect of the matter very brief and my desire is that others would more seriously and impartially enquire into this subject so far as it concerns our own Constitution which no doubt may be found out and if it prove defective may be perfected if men were peaceable and sought the publick good CHAP. IX Of the disposition of Ecclesiastical Power and first whether it be due unto the Bishop of Rome section 1 THe most difficult point in Politicks is that of the Jura Majestatis and the right disposal of them in a fit subject and concerning the nature of Civil power the manner of acquiring and disposing of it I have already spoken and also of Ecclesiastical power and the acquisition thereof now it remains I say something of the manner of disposing the power of the Keys in the right subject This is a matter of great dispute in these our times Therefore when I expected to find all clear because a Jus divinum grounded on the Scriptures was pretended on all hands I found it otherwise As when one of our Worthies had disemboked the Megellanick straits and was entred into that sea they call Pacificum he found the word Pacifick
strains and far from being any ground either of Logical or Theological proofs 2. Such as were proper might agree to that Church for that time when it was honoured with persons of eminent piety and learning which were found in it as being the seat of the Empire And such things might be true of that Church then which do not agree unto it now 3. It 's found by the searching of the ancient Manuscripts that some things have been foisted into the Books of these ancient Authors in favour of that Church For they who could even before the fourth Century was ended corrupt the Copy if not the Latine Original of the Nicene Council and put in a Canon for to warrant receiving appeals from Africk which was not found in the Greek Original are not much to be trusted 4. Suppose many or all of those ancient commendations which were proper should be true yet they will not amount to that plenitude of power which in after times was exercised and to this day is challenged by the Bishops of that See. 5. None of those honourable testimonies are of Divine authority or firmly grounded upon the Scriptures And what the Scriptures give them that we will not deny them 3. As for their arguments from Scriptures I have wondred that any rational man should ever use them as they are by them applied to the Pope To argue That because Christ said to Peter to thee I give the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven and if thou lovest me feed my Sheep therefore the present Bishop of Rome is the Head and absolute Monarch of the Universal Church and invested with plenitude of power is very irrational There is such a vast distance between these Scriptures and the conclusion and so many mediums to be used before they can come at it and the same so uncertain that no man that will make use of his reason can assent unto the conclusion when all is said that can be said in behalf of this Universal Vicar from these Texts If we should maintain our cause against them by such arguments they would reject us with scorn and indignation Let his party plead and plead again for his Universal and transcendent power I am sure of one thing that if he loved Christ as Peter professed he did and had a mind sincerely bent to feed his Flock he would never challenge much less exercise such vast power That Christ left a power sufficient to the Church we verily believe but that he delegated so great a power or delegated it unto him we utterly deny and have great reason for it Yet because we will not submit unto his papal Majesty we must be condemned as Schismaticks and Hereticks deprived of all hope of Salvation as having no Communion with that Church whereof he is Head and lodged in Hell the lowest Hell. And all this is done upon the weakest grounds that ever rational man did use But we appeal to Heaven where Christ will be our Advocate and plead our cause and carry it too If it were needful I would single out the chiefest arguments used by them of Rome to maintain this Title and answer them distinctly But this is done already by many worthy and learned men Therefore I will take it for granted as that which hath been made good and evident that the Pope is not the first and proper subject of the power of the Keys CHAP. X. Whether the Civil State have any good Title to the Power of the Keys section 1 YET if the Pope cannot have and hold this power yet the Princes Soveraigns and civil States especially Christian will assume it and they have the strongest and the surest way of all others if they once get possession for to keep it and that 's the Sword. King Henry 8. did not only refuse to submit unto the Roman supremacy but took it to himself and became within his own Dominions over all persons in all causes as well Ecclesiastical as Civil supream Head and Governour So the Priest by the Prince was divested of a considerable part both of his power and also his Revenue But whether he could be the proper subject of this spiritual Power or make good his Title to it was much doubted and that by many As King he was but caput regni non Ecclesiae and as such he might have some Civil but no Ecclesiastical Power at all Yet though it was called Ecclesiastical yet it was not such Grammatice sed Rhetorice not properly but by a Trope a Metonymie of the adjunct for the Subject circa quod For the power of a State Temporal is only Civil if properly and formally considered yet the Civil Soveraign had always something to do in matters of Religion concerning which it may make Laws pass Judgment and execute the same yet the Laws the Judgments the Execution were Civil not strictly Ecclesiastical Therefore such as maintained the Regal Supremacy in Ecclesiasticals were so wise as to say that it was but materially and objectively in the Crown In which sense it was always due to Civil Powers as Civil as appears from Deut. 13. and many other places of Scripture as also from many Examples not only of the Kings of Judah but of Ninivy Babylon and Persia. That many of these Heathen Princes and also of the Kings of Israel did abuse this power for the establishment or exercise of a false Religion and Idolatry is no argument to prove they had it not but that they did not use it aright 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 circa sacra did always belong and that by divine institution to the Civil Higher Powers section 2 For the better understanding of this point several things are to be observed 1. That as there is no people so barbarous but profess and practise some Religion so there is no State or orderly Government but acknowledgeth some Deity or Divine Power upon which they conceive their publick Peace Safety Prosperity and good Success doth depend as we may by the very Scriptures and also by other Histories be informed For every Nation had their publick gods besides their Family-tutelar Deities It 's true though by the light of Nature considering the Glorious works of Heaven and Earth they might have known the true God yet they changed the Glory of God into a Lye or false God and conceived that to be a God which was no such thing 2. The supream Governours of these States had a special care to order the matters of that Religion which they publickly received They made Laws appointed Priests for the Service and Worship of their Gods. This is also evident from Scripture and from other Histories too This ordering of Religion as publick was always held a right of the publick Power 3. Yet they had no power to establish or observe any Religion or Worship but that which God had instituted according to the Laws of Nature or divine Revelation if they did they abused their Power For that very power as from
had already sworn could have found as many reasons against it as against the Covenant especially if it had been new as the Covenant was Many wise men at the first did scruple it and some suffered death for refusal Amongst the rest Sir Thomas Moor a learned and a very prudent man could not digest it and though he might have an high conceit of the Papal Supremacy yet that might not be the only reason of his refusal but this because he knew the Crown had no Ecclesiastical power properly so called Though this was not thought to be the true but only the pretended cause of his death For in his Vtopia he seems to dislike the Indisputable Prerogative which was a Noli me tangere and to touch it so roughly as he did might cost dear as it did Yet I have taken the Oath of Supremacy in that sense as our Divines did understand it and I was and am willing to give to Caesar the things that are Caesar's section 4 That which hath been said in this point in brief is this That though the Civil Powers have a right to order matters of Religion in respect of the outward part and so far as the Sword may reach it according to Divine Law yet they have no power of the Keys which Christ committed to the Church For if we consider all the power exercised in matter of Religion by David Solomon and the pious Kings of Judah by the Christian Emperours and Princes by the Kings of France and England it was but civil Neither is the power of our Parliaments any other For though they make Acts concerning the publick Doctrine and Discipline yet these are but civil They are not Representatives of the Church but of the State whether the Convocation was an essential part of the Parliament or a full representative of the Church I will not here debate I find some great Lawyers which deny both And if their denial be true then England had no general Representative of the Church in latter times As for Erastians and such as do give all Ecclesiastical power of Discipline to the State and deny all power to the Ministers but that of dispensing Word and Sacraments it 's plain they never understood the state of the Question and though a Minister as a Minister have no power but that of Word and Sacraments yet from thence it will not follow that the Church hath not a power spiritual distinct from that of the State in matters of Religion CHAP. XI Whether Episcopacy be the primary subject of the Power of the Keys section 1 THE Prelate presumes that the power of the Keys is his and he thinks his title very good and so good that though he could not prove the institution yet prescription will bear him out For he hath had possession for a long time and Universality and Antiquity seem to favour him very much Yet I hope his title may be examined and if upon examination it prove good he hath no cause to be offended except with this that I of all others should meddle with it But before any thing can be said to purpose we must first know the nature and institution of a Bishop which is the subject of the Question Secondly Put the Reader in mind that the Question is not in this place whether a Bishop be an Officer of the Church either by some special or some general Divine Precept but whether he be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the primary subject of the power of the Keys For he may be an Officer and yet no such subject Concerning a Bishop the subject of the Question two things are worthy our consideration 1. What he is 2. How instituted at the first The Definition and Institution seem rather to belong unto the second part of Ecclesiastical Politicks where I shall entreat of Ecclesiastical Officers and the constitution of them Yet I will here say something of both in order to the Question though I be the briefer afterward section 2 What a Bishop is may be difficult to know except we do distinguish before we do define For we find several sorts of Bishops in the Church Christian. There is a Primitive a Prelatical or Hierarchical and an English Bishop distinct and different in some things from both the former for whom I reserve a place in the end of this Chapter The Primitive Bishop is twofold 1. A Presbyter 2. A President or Superintendent 1. A Presbyter in the New Testament is a Bishop For the Elders of Ephesus were made by the Holy Ghost Bishops or Superintendents over God's flock Acts 20.28 And the qualification of a Bishop 1 Tim. 3.1 2 3 c. is the qualification of an Elder Tit. 1.5 6 7 c. For whatsoever some of late have said to the contrary yet Presbyter and Bishop were only two different words signifying the same Officer And this is confessed by divers of the Ancients who tell us that the word Bishop was appropriated to one who was more than a Presbyter in after-times 2. A Bishop signified one that was above a Presbyter in some respects as a Moderatour of a Classis or President of a Synod But such a Presbyter might be only pro tempore for the time of the Session and after the Assembly dissolved he might return to be a bare Presbyter again For to be a Moderatour or President was no constant place The word in this sense we find seldom used if at all 2. A President was a kind of Superintendent with a care and inspection not only over the people but the Presbyters too within a certain precinct and this was a constant place and the party called a Bishop and by Ambrose and Austine with divers others called primus Presbyterorum and these were such as had no power but with the Presbytery joyntly and that without a negative voice And the Presbytery might be a Representative not only of the Presbyters strictly taken but of the people too For we may read in Cyprian and other Authours that these Bishops in more weighty matters of publick concernment did nothing without the counsel and consent not only of the Presbyters but the people This I call a primitive Bishop not only because he is ancient but also because the place or office is agreeable to the rules of Reason of Government and the general Rules of the Apostles concerning Order Decency Edification There is also an Hierarchical Bishop who may be only a Bishop or an Archbishop and Metropolitan or a Patriarch and these challenge the power of Ordination and Jurisdiction and in Jurisdiction include and engross the power of making Canons This kind of Episcopacy is ancient as the former This last Bishop is he upon whom Spalatensis and many others do fix and though they grant that he should do nothing without the Counsel of the Presbytery yet they give him full power without the Presbytery which they joyn with him only for advice The English Bishop is in