I. PART order of the Templars was instituted about the year 1120г. Scarcely any order can shew such a hopeful beginning at their first institution, or such a huge progress towards greatness in so short a revolution of time. He who shall read these extraordinary praises which are given them by St. Bernard (who is thought to have been the author of their rule), will take them rather to have been a society of angels than of mortal men. Yet, in the days of Clement the Fifth, [A.D. 1307 they were generally suppressed throughout the whole world -1311.] as it were in an instant, not for common faults, but horrid crimes, and prodigious villanies, by the joint consent of the occidental Church and sovereign princes". I inquire not whether their accusation was just or not; but from hence I do collect, that in the judgment of this occidental world a good institution may be deservedly abrogated for subsequent abuses. As we had not the same latitude of power, which they who censured them had, so we did not act without our own sphere, or the bounds of the English dominions. [Two points out of three SECTION THE SECOND. In the Vindication I urged three points, wherein the Romans do agree with us. First, "that sovereign princes not only may but in justice are obliged to repress the tyranny of ecclesiastical judges, urged in the and protect their subjects" from their violence, and "free" them from their oppressive yoke. To this he answereth by R. C.] nothing. Vindica tion, unanswered Secondly, that "princes may be enabled, either by grant or by prescription" (I added by "their sovereign authority over the whole body politic"), "to exercise all external ecclesiastical jurisdiction by themselves or by fit delegates," and "[At the Council of Vienna in 1311; Labb., Concil., tom. xi. Pt. ii. pp. 1538, sq. 1557, sq. See Mosheim, ibid. Cent. xiv. bk. iii. c. 5. § 9, 10.-Du Puy, Hist. de la Condemnation des Templiers; and for England, Shar. Turner, Hist. of Engl. in Mid. Ages, bk. ii. c. 3. in fine, and Wilkins' Concil., there quoted.] X [Just Vindie., c. vi. vol. i. pp. 169, 170.] III. to make ecclesiastical laws for the external regiment of the Discourse Church, to which their subjects owe obedience. This alone were sufficient to free us from schism. But to all this likewise he saith not one word good or bad. ful to with dience Thirdly, that it is lawful 'in several cases to substract It was lawobedience from the Pope". And among other proofs I cited draw obethe Council of Tours. To this only he answers, that they from Papal acknowledged it lawful "to withdraw obedience from this or authority corrupted. that Pope, in this or that case," but not "from Papal authority itself." Whereas I shewed him in the Vindication, that the same equity which doth allow substraction of obedience from this or that Pope for "personal faults," as "schism or simony," doth likewise allow substraction of obedience from him and his successors for "faulty principles," as "obtruding new creeds, pressing of unlawful oaths, palpable usurpation of undoubted rights,"-even until they be reformed. Papal authority" without the Pope is but an imaginary idea; whosoever substracts obedience from the 221 true Pope, substracts obedience from the "Papal authority;" perhaps, indeed, not simply or absolutely, but respectively; as he saith, "in this or that case." But what if the Pope will not suffer them to pay their obedience in part, so far as it is due, but have it entire according to his own demands, or none at all? Then it is not they who separate themselves from "Papal authority," but it is "Papal authority” which separates them from it. Either he understands "Papal authority" such as it ought to be de jure; and then we have substracted no obedience from it, for we owed it none, and are not unwilling for peace' sake to pay it more respect than we do owe: or else by "Papal authority" he understands a spiritual monarchy, such as it is now, with superiority above general Councils, and infallibility of judgment, and legislative authority, and patronage of all ecclesiastical preferments, &c.; and then the universal Church did never acknowledge any such "Papal authority;" and then to withdraw our obedience from it, is not to substract obedience from a lawful, but from an unlawful and tyrannical power. y [Ibid., pp. 170, 171.] [Ibid., pp. 173, 174.] Concil. Turon. [A.D. 1510, Respons. ad Artic. 3, 4, et 8. [ap. Labb., Concil., tom. xiii. p. 1482; quoted in C b [Surv., c. vi. sect. 2. p. 83.] [Just Vindic., c. vi. vol. i. p. 179.] PART Princes the of the in to their subjects by When sovereign princes do withdraw obedience "from this I. or that Pope, in this or that case," they make themselves last judges judges of the difference between them and the Court of juries done Rome; as, whether the Pope have invaded their privileges, or usurped more authority than is due unto him; or in conPopcs. temning his censures (which the Council of Tours doth expressly allow them to do), and judging whether the Pope's Key have erred or not. Yield thus much, and the question is at an end, that sovereign princes within their own dominions are the last judges of their own liberties, and of Papal oppressions and usurpations, and the validity or invalidity of the Pope's censures. Kingly authority from God, [but] not Papal. 1, 2. 15. There is one thing more in this discourse in this place which I may not omit,-that "Papal authority" is "instituted immediately by God," but "not regale." Cujus contrarium verum est.' He was once, or seemed to be, of another mind;- For of Almighty God His mere bounty and great grace they' (kings) receive and hold their diadems and princely sceptres! St. Paul saith expressly, speaking of Rom. xiii. civil powers, "The powers that be, are ordained of God;" and "whosoever resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God, and they that resist shall receive to themselves damProv. viii. nation." The Eternal Wisdom of the Father hath said, " By Me kings reign and princes decree justice." If they be "ordained by God," and "reign by God," then they are "instituted by God." Therefore they are justly styled the living images of God That saveth all things. He Who said, "By Me kings reign," never said, 'By Me Popes reign.' Kings may inherit by the law of man, or be elected by the suffrages of men; but the regal office and regal power is immediately from God. No man can give that which he himself hath not. The people have not power of life and death. That must come from God. By the law of nature fathers of families were princes; and when fathers of families did conjoin their power to make d [Concil. Turon. Respons. ad Artic. e [Surv., c. vi. sect. 2. f Bish. [of Chalced.], Epist. ad Reg. one father of a country, to translation of R. C.'s Epist. Historica ad Reg. Jacob., in fin. Flor. Hist. Eccl. Angl., p. 416; but nothing corresponding to the words. The editor cannot meet with the original English edition of the tract.] III. whom doth he owe his power but to God, from whom fathers Discourse of families had their power by the law of nature? As for the Pope, he derives his Episcopal power from Christ, his Patriarchal power from the Church, and monarchical power from himself. SECTION THE THIRD. grounds After this in the Vindication I descended to several new The considerations; as, namely, the power of princes to "reform of our new canons by the old canons" of the Fathers, the subjection separation. of Patriarchal power to imperial (which I shewed by a signal example of Pope Gregory, who obeyed the command of Mauritius the emperor though he did not take it to be "pleasing to Almighty God"), the erection of new Patriarchates by emperors, and the translation of Primacies by our kings . And so I proceeded to the grounds of their separation : first, the "intolerable rapine and extortions of the Roman Court" in England; secondly, their unjust usurpations of the undoubted rights of all orders of men, and particularly how they made our kings to be their "vassals" and the succession to the Crown arbitrary at their pleasures; thirdly, because our ancestors "found by experience that such foreign jurisdiction was destructive to the right ends of ecclesiastical discipline;" fourthly, "sundry other inconveniences,"—to have been "daily subject" to the imposition of new articles of Faith, to be "exposed to manifest peril of idolatry," to "have forsaken the communion of three parts of Christendom," to "have approved the Pope's rebellion against general Councils," and to have "their Bishops swear to maintain him 222 in his rebellious usurpations;" lastly, the privilege of the Britannic Churches, the Pope's disclaiming all his patriarchal authority, and their challenging of all this by Divine right, which made their sufferings "irremediable" from Rome". Lastly, I shewed, that our ancestors "from time to time" had made more addresses to Rome for remedy than either in duty or in prudence they ought to have done'. All this he h [Ibid., pp. 180-192.] [Just Vindic., c. vi. vol. i. pp. 175 -179.] i [Ibid., pp. 193-196.] I. PART passeth by in silence, as if it did not concern the cause at all. Only he repeats his former distinction between "the Pope, the Papacy, and the Roman Church," which hath been so often confuted already; and blameth Protestants "for revolting from the Roman Church for the faults of some" few "Popes1." As if all these things which are mentioned here, and set down at large in the Vindication, were but some infirmities, or some petty faults of some few Popes. I have shewed him clearly, that the most of our grounds are not the "faults of the Popes," but the faults of the Papacy itself. And as for "forsaking" the Church of Romem, he doth us wrong. I shewed him out of our Canons in this very place", that we have not forsaken it, but only left their communion in some points, wherein they had left their ancestors. We are ready to acknowledge it as a sister to the Britannic Church, a mother to the Saxon Church, but as a lady or mistress to no Church. 1. The Pope's new SECTION THE FOURTH. Afterwards he descendeth to two of the grounds of our Reformation, to shew that they were insufficient, "the new Creed" of Pius the Fourth, and "the withholding the Cup from the laity"." Two of two and twenty make but a mean induction. He may if he please see throughout this treatise, that we had other grounds besides these. Yet I confess that in his choice he hath swerved from the rules of prudence, and hath not sought to leap over the hedge where it was lowest. First (saith he), "the new Creed could not be the cause of articles or the separation, because the separation was made before the Creed"." of Faith a just cause of separation. He saith true, if it had been only the reduction of these new mysteries into the form of a Creed, that did offend But he knoweth right well, that these very points, which Pius the Fourth comprehended in a new Symbol or us. |