judge wrong, and, whenever they do so, they cannot have any right to act in pursuance of such judgments; if they do so, they will be called to a severe account by God for such a misuse of their power. And therefore they ought to be very cautious both how they act and how they judge. In all doubtful cases in christian countries, the civil governors ought to pay a due regard to the advice, and, I will even say, to the authority of the clergy; for the clergy have some real authority in spiritual matters, which, as I have above observed, ought not to be lightly or disrespectfully opposed. But as the civil governors have a right to judge for themselves in all cases, so when they judge truly that the influence of the bishops and clergy is, or will be, used to the hurt of the civil government, they then have a right to oppose and restrain that influence by proper means, and in a sufficient degree.

To this it may be objected, that, as the civil governors will probably oftener err in their judgment than the clergy will, and so truth will be oftener hindered than promoted thereby, we therefore conceive that Christ cannot have vested the civil governors with this right of judging and censuring the clergy.

But to this I answer, that, even admitting this supposition, which is giving the utmost advantage to the objection, yet still it is justly presumable, that Christ hath vested the civil magistrates with this right; because their opposition to the truth cannot essentially hurt it. It may both subsist in all cases,

and even thrive under discouragements from them; whereas, on the other hand, if civil governors had not this right of judging and censuring their government, it could not subsist in some cases. But it is necessary that this should subsist and be secured in all cases: ergo, the civil magistrate hath this right, &c.

Now, upon these grounds, we may fully vindicate the deprivation of the bishops made in the first year of Queen Elizabeth, and other proceedings in the Reformation, from-whence our settlement ecclesiastical at this day is derived. That princess, at her accession to the throne, found the doctrines, forms of worship, &c. then publicly established, to be very erroneous and superstitious. Almost all the bishops who then were in the several sees, not only professed and practised according to these. forms, but they resolved to adhere to them, and refused to take that oath acknowledging the Queen's supremacy, which, I have shewn, was just in itself, and therefore might justly be required of them. They had plainly an aversion to the Queen, on account of her being of a different religion; and, for that reason, they refused to crown her. A majority of them being of this opinion, they would not, therefore, in an ecclesiastical way have deprived, or acted at all against any of their own number: and if, with these dispositions, they had continued possessed of their sees, they must have been able to do a great deal of mischief to the civil government, both in keeping up error and superstition among the people,

and in raising a disaffection in them towards the civil government, which might have proved very dangerous to its welfare. Therefore, the legislature had a full right to deprive them of their sees. We do not say that the civil government had a right to deprive them of their episcopal character; as they received that from a spiritual authority; and during their lives, no civil power could take it away and the less, because it was not necessary to the safety of the civil government that they should do so. But of the power and right of exercising their episcopal authority in such a diocese, with temporal effects, and of all the secular emoluments, revenues, and dignities thereto belonging, the civil governors, for the sake of the public welfare, had a full right to deprive them.

Upon the voidance of their sees, the deans and chapters belonging to each of them, having a license from the Queen to choose new bishops for their respective churches, chose certain persons by her appointed in letters missive for that purpose. It is true, they were not at liberty to do otherwise; because, if they had not complied with the royal nomination, they would have incurred a perpetual imprisonment, the forfeiture of their goods, &c. i. e. the penalties of a premunire. But their being under some constraint in this case was of no real disservice to the church; for, as long as the persons nominated by the Queen were, in all respects, fit for that sacred trust, and she had a right to nominate, it could be no harm that they were obliged to choose persons,

who, by being approved by the Queen, might be the more able to serve the church and religion.

It had, indeed, been the usual practice in this nation, so long ago as the Saxon times, for the kings or their curias to nominate to bishopricks, without any such form as election by the deans and chapters. Collier, indeed, in his preface to his Ecclesiastical History, vol. 1. p. v. affirms the contrary; and ibid. vol. i. p. 114, says, that Withred, king of Kent, in a council at Becanceld, A. D. 694, declares, "that the kings had no right to the appointment of bishops, but that it was to be made by their fellow bishops." But the authority of this council, though allowed by Dr. Atterbury, Rights of Convoc. and by Bishop Stillingfleet's Eccles. Cases, vol. ii. p. 89, is opposed by Dr. Wake, in his State of the Church, p. 140; and is not indeed, very clear, so that there cannot be much stress laid upon it. But as to the matter of fact, Ingulphus's testimony is unquestionable. And our common lawyers generally agree (see Gibson's Codex, p. 122.) that bishoprics in England,† being at first all of the

* See Stillingfleet's Ecclesiastical Cases, vol. ii. p. 91. Ingulphus, History, fol. 509, b. says, speaking of the times before the Roman conquest, that, "a multis retro annis nulla erat "electio prælatorum mere libera et canonica; sed omnes digni"tates, tam episcoporum quam abbatum, regis curia pro sua "complacentiâ conferebat."

† See Selden, Not. ad Eadmer. p. 1608-1610, worth reading. Twisden, Hist. Vindic. of the Church of England, p. 52 -64. ibid, 109. Coke upon Littleton, § 201, &c.

king's foundation, were donative; as they were like❤ wise in France, Spain, and Germany, in those ages, which continued without any considerable opposition, till the see of Rome having formed the project of its own excessive aggrandisement, by bringing all the clergy in Christendom to a more close dependance upon it, Pope Gregory VII. first opposed this practice with vigour; and his successors, after many struggles, at length, in great measure, carried their point in this, as well as in other kingdoms in Europe. Henry the First yielded up the point of Investitures (see Spelman, in Wilkins's Laws, Life of Henry I. p. 299, 304.) which grant was more solemnly confirmed by King John in the great charter. Then, for a while, elections were made by the deans and chapters, which was the method the church of Rome insisted upon, without any express or peremptory nomination from the crown; but this method did not continue long. Our kings found it so expedient to the welfare of their civil government, that they should have some influence in the elections of bishops, that they seldom suffered any one to be chosen contrary to their liking; or, if any dean and chapter presumed to choose contrary to their liking, they frequently punished them for so doing. (See Prynne, on the fourth Instit. p. 321.) Afterwards, the king got the nomination, and the Pope the approbation. (See Burnet's Hist. of Reformation, vol. i. p. 11).

* De Marca, part ii. p. 296, 297. Vertot, Nominat. aux Eveschés de France.