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APPENDIX.

No. I.

Part of Pope Clement VII.'s Letter to King Henry VIII. NAM ex iis quas pro Vobis facere doctorum hominum atque Universitatum Opiniones scribitis, paucæ admodum venerunt in manus nostras, Nobis non legitimè, nec Regis Nomine, ab Oratoribus præsentatæ ; illæque nudæ tantùm illorum hominum Opiniones, nullis adscriptis Rationibus cur ita sentiant, nullâque Sacrorum Canonum et Scripturæ, quæ tantum spectare debemus, Authoritate subnixa.Collier's Collec. of Records, No. XV.

No. II.

WE are indebted to my Lord Herbert for the following dissuasive harangue. It was spoke, he assures us, by one of his Majesty's most Honourable Privy Council; but what was this Privy Counsellor's name the reader must not expect to be told by us, because it seems to be one of those secrets which, we suppose, it was not in his Lordship's power to communicate to any body. So our noble historian contents himself with informing us, that it was made by one who much favoured the Papal Authority; which, indeed, may be easily conjectured from the nature of his style and argumentation. But whoever was the author of the speech we are going to recount, or whatever was his name, (which is not very material to know) at least he is said to have addressed himself to the King at the Councilboard as follows:

«Sir,

"Your Highness is now come to a point which needs a strong and firm resolution; it being not only the most important in itself that can be presented to this honourable board, but likewise of that consequence, that it will comprehend your kingdom and posterity. It is, 'Whether, in this business of your divorce and second marriage, as well as in all other ecclesiastical affairs in your dominions, you will make use of your own or the Pope's authority? For my own part, as an Englishman, and your Highness's

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subject, 1 must wish all power in your Highness. But when I consider the ancient practice of this kingdom, I cannot but think any innovation dangerous. For, if in every temporal estate it be necessary to come to some supreme authority, whence all inferior magistracy should be derived, it seems more necessary in religion; both as the body thereof seems more susceptible of a head than any else, and as that head again must direct many others. We should therefore, above all things, labour to keep an unity in the parts thereof, as being the sacred bond which knits and holds together, not its own alone, but all other government. But how much, Sir, shall we recede from the dignity thereof, if we (at once) retrench this its chief and most eminent part? And who ever liked that body long, whose head was taken away? Certainly, Sir, an authority received for many ages ought not rashly to be rejected. For is not the Pope Communis Pater (the common Father) in the christian world, and arbiter of their differences? Does he not support the majesty of religion, and vindicate it from neglect? Does not the holding his authority from God keep men in awe, not of temporal alone, but of eternal punishments, and therein extend his power beyond death itself? And will it be secure, to lay aside, those potent means of reducing people to their duty, and trust only to the sword of justice, and secular arms? Besides, who shall mitigate the rigour of the laws, in those cases which may admit of exception, if the Pope be taken away? Who shall presume to give orders, or administer the sacraments of the Church? Who shall be the depository of the oaths and leagues of princes? or fulminate against the perjured infractors of them? For my part (as affairs now stand) I find not how either general peace amongst princes, or any equal moderation in human affairs, can be well conserved without him. For as his court is a kind of chancery to all the other courts of justice in the christian world, so, if you take it away, you subvert that equity and conscience, which should be the rule and interpreter of all laws and constitutions whatsoever. I will conclude, that I wish your Highness (as my King and Sovereign) all true greatness and happiness, but think it not fit (in this case) that your subjects should either examine by what right ecclesiastical government is innovated, or inquire how far they are bound thereby; since, beside that it might cause division, and hazard the overthrow both of the one and the other authority, it would give that offence and scandal abroad, that foreign princes would both reprove

and disallow all our proceedings in this kind, and, upon occasion, be disposed easily to join against us."Lord Herbert's Life of King Henry the Eighth, p. 390.

No. III.

Extract of a Discourse concerning the Royal Supreme Power Ecclesiastical, which Mr. Collier tells us he found in the Paper Office; adding, at the same time, this remark, that "'Tis drawn up with advantage by a learned · hand, most probably in the reign of King Charles the Second, and is intitled:

"A Discourse concerning his Majesty's Supreme Power Ecclesiastical, established by the Laws of this Kingdom, at this present time in full force and Vigour.”

AMONGST the jurisdictions, [invested in the King by virtue of our laws] it is evident that Excommunications, Suspensions, and Deprivations ab Officio, and all manner of dispensations belonging to the Church, are to be understood annexed to the King. Not that it is affirmed that the King did ever exercise himself the power of the keys, but that this right was annexed to the Imperial Crown: that no clergyman being a member of the Church of England and Ireland should exercise it in his dominions in any case, or any person, without the licence and approbation of him the Supreme Head of the Church; nor any forbear to exercise it, where he the Head commanded it. As before the reformation, the inferior clergy might not exercise any church censure contrary to the commands of their lawful superiors; which jurisdiction of their former spiritual superiors was now instated in the King: not as one subordinate to any ecclesiastical jurisdiction herein, but as one by God primarily invested with the disposal thereof, from whom the ecclesiastical governors within his dominions derive their authority, 2 E. 6. c. 1. And accordingly we find, in Stat. 5 and 6, 2 E. 6. c. 1. that by virtue of that act the Archbishops and Bishops should punish, by censures of the Church, all persons who shall offend. Which clause, by virtue of this act, implies, that the Bishops might not excommunicate, and use the censures of the Church, without the King and Parliament's licence, and ought to excommunicate in all matters wherein the King and Parliament commands it. Whereby it is most clearly to be understood, that the Jurisdiction Spiritual,

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ascribed to the King or Queen in the acts aforementioned, involves the Jurisdiction of Excommunication, as well as others, if not exercised by himself and his vicegerents, and other commissioners, lay-persons; (which practice notwithstanding, in King Henry VIIIth's days, seems to be recorded, and further confirmed, by allowing them to be married persons, in the act 37 H. 8. c. 17.) yet so established in the King, as to appoint when and for what matters the clergy within this realm shall execute or not exeeute it.

"As the power of Ecclesiastical Censures is instated in the King, so is that also of giving all manner of licences, dispensations, faculties, grants, &c. For all laws and constitutions merely ecclesiastical, and all causes not being contrary to the scriptures and the laws of God, it is not only taken from the Pope, but from the Clergy of this Church, and committed to the King, after the manner enacted 25 H. 8. c. 21. where the Archbishop is constituted the King's instrument in giving the said licences, &c.

"Now as for the exercise of this supreme jurisdiction, it was enacted, both in King Henry the Eighth's reign, and Queen Elizabeth's, 1 Eliz. c. 1. and 8 Eliz. c. 1. that the King shall have full power and authority to name and authorize, by commission under his broad seal, such person or persons as his Majesty shall think meet, so they be born subjects of England, [Note, that King Henry was limited to choose half of them clergymen, which the present King is not] to execute and exercise, under his Majesty, all manner of jurisdictions, &c. to visit, reform, and redress all such errors, heresies, schisms, &c. which by any manner of spiritual or ecclesiastical power may lawfully be reformed, &c.

"By virtue of this supremacy ecclesiastical, the King's Majesty is made the ultimate judge of heresy, and the determiner of what is agreeable or repugnant to God's law. And all his subjects are obliged to receive, observe, and submit unto the godly instructions and determinations set forth by his Majesty.

"By virtue of this supremacy, the clergy are bound to admit and consecrate what person soever the King shall present to any bishoprick, upon penalty of incurring præmu nire; and the consecration is to be performed by such and so many as the King shall appoint; which persons are to do this work, not by virtue of any ecclesiastical jurisdiction in them, but as the King's delegates, who by his Letters Patents commands them to consecrate the elect Bishop; and in them, if there be any canonical defect or impediment, the King, by his Royal Supreme Spiritual Jurisdiction, dis

penses with it. Both of which things are evident by the patent for the consecration of Archbishop Parker in Queen Elizabeth, by the instrument of the said Archbishop's confirmation, and by the practice ever since.

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"Many more instances might be given of the exercise of the Royal Supreme Ecclesiastical Authority and Jurisdiction. But it may suffice to add this only: That whatso ever the Bishop of Rome could lawfully do in the time preceding the Stat. 25 H. 8. either in relaxation of the penalty, or suspension of the inferior ecclesiastical jurisdiction, all that is now legally instated in the King, as is evident from these two maxims, universally acknowledged by lawyers, and in the statutes since that time: First, that all manner of Spiritual Jurisdiction, formerly lawfully exercised in England and Ireland, does now belong to the King. Secondly, that all Spiritual Jurisdiction exercised by any subject in the said kingdoms, is held and exercised from, by, and under the King.' See the whole of this curious discourse in Mr. Collier's Eccl. Hist. Vol. II. B. ii. p. 89. It is somewhat too long to be transcribed at large; but what we have extracted from it may suffice, we presume, to give the reader an idea of that Supreme Power Ecclesiastical, which is invested in the King by the laws of this land.

No. IV.

An Act for the Repeal of two several Acts made in the Time of King Edward the Sixth, touching the Dissolution of the Bishoprick of Durham.

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W HEREAS there hath been, time out of mind of any man to the contrary, a See of a Bishop of Durham, commonly called The Bishoprick of Durham, which hath been one of the most ancient and worthiest Bishopricks in dignity and spiritual promotion within the realm of England, and the same place always supplied and furnished with a man of great learning and virtue; which was both to the honour of God, and the exercise of his true religion, and a great surety to that part of the realm: nevertheless, the said Bishoprick was, without any just cause or consideration, by authority of Parliament, dissolved, extinguished, and exterminated: and further, by the authority of the said Parliament, it was ordained and enacted, that the said Bi

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