fuch authoritie ouer themfelues, if he had no right thereunto at all."

I cite these quotations, not for the fake of the reasoning or argument contained in them, but merely to prove, that the authority of the fee of Rome, in all spiritual matters, was in fact freely fubmitted to by the community of this realm, before the reformation. For nobody will fufpect King Henry VIII. of fubmitting tamely, and with full reflection, to any ufurped or affumed authority whatsoever.

We are now to examine what this primacy What the fuwas, which was fuppofed to be transferred from premacy is. the pope to the king, in order to determine what the fupremacy of the king over the church of England is at this hour. Sir Edward Coke, partly from official pomp and rigour, and partly from natural pedantry and pride, has undertaken to reft the title of his fovereign to this prerogative of fpiritual fupremacy upon fuch grounds, as never can ftand the test of a cool difpaffionate enquiry. *«The kingdom of England being an abfolute empire and monarchy, confisting of one head, which is the king, and of a body politicke divided into two general parts, the clergy and the laity; both of them, next unRep. iv. fol. 9.

prerogative in

der God, must be subject and obedient to the fame head in all caufes; for that otherwise he fhould be no perfect monarch, or head of the whole body." If Sir Edward Coke had either understood, or wifhed well to our conftitution, he would never have complained, that the kings of England were not fufficiently abfolute monarchs for all the purposes of our constitution, without the fuperaddition of spiThis addition of ritual jurifdiction. How much more truly and more philofophically is this accumulation of ceffes under the prerogative reprefented by the learned bishop of Worcester, as the efficient cause of that excefs of prerogative in the Tudors, which had nearly fwelled into arbitrary and abfolute defpotifm. "I brought these general confiderations only to fhew the reverend opinion, which of courfe would be entertained' of this mixt person, the fupreme bead of the church, compounded of a king and a pope; and how natural a foundation it was

the king, the

caufe of its ex

Tudors.

* I have never met with any writer, who has pretended to deny, that every English clergyman is a fubject of our king, and fubject to all the laws of the realm. If the clergy have in any age claimed indulgences, exemptions, or difpenfations, they claimed them no otherwife, than from the legislative power, which alone could grant them.

+ Dr. Hurd's Moral and Political Dialogues, vol. ii. p. 284, and feq.

for

for the fuperftructure of defpotic power in all its branches. But I now haften to the particulars, which demonftrate, that this use was actually made of that title.

commiffion.

"And, first, let me obferve, that it gave Court of high birth to that great and formidable court of the high commiffion, which brought so mighty an acceffion of power to the crown, that, as experience afterwards fhewed, no fecurity could be had for the people's liberties, till it was totally abolished. The neceffity of the times was a good plea for the first inftitution of fo dangerous a tribunal. The reftlefs endeavours of papists and puritans against the ecclefiaftical establishment gave a colour for the continuance of it. But as all matters, that regarded religion or confcience were subjected to its fole cognizance and infpection, it was presently seen how wide an entrance it gave to the most tyrannical ufurpations.

chamber.

"It was further natural, that the king's Court of star power in civil causes fhould keep pace with his authority in spiritual; and fortunately for the advancement of his prerogative, there was already erected within the kingdom another court of the like dangerous nature, of ancient date, and venerable estimation, under the name of the court of ftar chamber, which brought every thing under the direction of

High notions

of prerogative

the crown, that could not fo properly be deter mined in the high commiffion. These were the two arms of abfolute dominion, which, at different times, and under different pretences, were stretched forth to the oppreffion of every man, that prefumed to oppofe himself to the royal will or pleasure. The star chamber had been kept, in former times, within fome tolerable bounds; but the high and arbitrary proceedings of the other court, which were found convenient for the further purpose of reformation, and were therefore conftantly exercised, and as constantly connived at by the parliament, gave an easy pretence for advancing the star chamber's jurifdiction fo far, that in the end its tyranny was equally intolerable, as that of the high commiffion.

"Thus the king's authority, in all cafes in our kings. fpiritual and temporal, was fully established, and in the highest fenfe, of which the words are capable. Our kings themfelves fo understood it; and when, afterwards, their parliaments fhewed a difpofition to interfere in any thing relating either to church or state, they were presently reprimanded, and sternly required not to meddle with what concerned their prerogative royal, and their high points of government."

This reverend and learned prelate is cer

tainly warranted in attributing these effects to this translation of fpiritual power from the

pope to the king; but no individual is war

ranted to revile or traduce the community, much less to rife up against it, because at any particular time, they thought proper to increase the proportion of prerogative or power, which the conftitution had formerly annexed to the executive branch of the legiflature. Bleffed is the nation at this day in a monarch, to whom this extenfion of prerogative is but an increase of his people's happinefs. The conftitution formerly did, and still does, admit of this general divifion of the people into clergy and laity; and the ecclefiastical or spiritual rights and liberties of the former feem anciently to have been more generally understood and admitted, than the civil or temporal rights and liberties of the latter. Thus, in the first legislative act of the community, that has been handed down to us in writing, which is called Magna Charta, the great charter of our liberties, and which was paffed in the 19th year of Hen. III. about the year of our Lord 1225, we find the first care and fecurity is had of the church, viz. that the church of England fhall be free, and fhall have all her whole rights and liberties inviolable. Had thefe been either dubious or uncertain,