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St. Peter at Rome could not in the primitive church have been called a foreign bishop, either by a Grecian, Idumean, or Roman christian. I have fpoken more largely upon this doctrine, because it was the belief of the universities and monafteries, to whom this question was proposed; and therefore the anfwer to it will be the more fairly understood by the expofition of the doctrine of those, who gave it.

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The true conof the oath of

ftitutional fenfe

fupremacy.

In order to form a perfectly unbiaffed and true judgment of the opinion given by these divines upon this question of king Henry's, we must fully enter into the fpirit, influence, prejudices of the perfons, who gave As Roman catholics they were from principle tenaciously anxious to avoid any innovation in their doctrine or faith, particularly at a time when a spirit of innovation feemed to have pervaded moft countries in Europe. The clergy were even more than the laity in awe and dread of the arbitrary and defpotic difpofition of their fovereign, and from a mean felf-interested policy, which

few Roman catholics would refufe to fwear to it, in the true conftitutional fenfe of its actual existence, were it unequivocally expreffed, that the king is the supreme head of the civil establishment of the church of England.

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too frequently actuates mankind, they evidently attempted to gratify the dreadful ambition of king Henry, without making an exprefs renunciation of any article of their own religious belief. For if the quære propofed by the king related only to any right, power, authority, or jurifdiction, the exercise of which could produce a civil effect in this country, it is evident, that as fuch civil effect could not have been produced without the affent or permiffion of this community, fo the right to any power, that could produce it, could neither exift in the bifhop of Rome, nor in any other bishop of christendom, independently of the community, which was to fubmit to the civil effects of that power or jurifdiction.

If therefore thefe divines, under a refervation or falvo to their confciences, expreffed their opinion only of the fupremacy or headfhip of the civil establishment of religion in this country, it cannot be faid, that their anfwer deviated from any principle of the faith and doctrine, which they then profeffed; but they were called upon in candor fo clearly to exprefs the difference betwixt the real fpiritual jurifdiction of the church, and the jurifdiction and authority of the civil establishment of religion in this country,

that

that the expofition of the real state of the question to the nation would completely do away the infidious and captious purport of the question put by the king. For it cannot be denied, that as for nearly a thousand years the headship or fupremacy of the civil establishment of religion in this country had been vefted by the act of the nation principally in the bishop of Rome, in whom they alfo admitted the real fpiritual fupremacy of their church to fubfift, it was not easy for the community at large to diftinguish between these two capacities in the fame perfon; and thus I account for the purport and tendency of all the acts of parliament upon this fubject being, particularly in those times of heat and animofity, mifconceived and mifreprefented.

That the civil establishment of religion is merely acceffary to the religion itself, will not, I prefume, be denied; for were it effential to a religion, that religion could no where exist, where a civil establishment was wanting. This is emphatically exemplified in our own country at this hour; for the Roman catholic religion, which the divines, of whofe opinion I am now fpeaking profeffed, is ftill alfo profeffed and kept up by fome individuals in this country, without the counte

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nance or support of any civil fanction or establishment whatever. And if the present Roman catholics of England fhould pretend, that the religion, which they now profefs, differs in any one effential point from that religion, which their ancestors profeffed whilst the Roman catholic religion was countenanced and established by the law of this country, they will immediately give up their distinctive characteristic, and boasted glory of unity, univerfality, and irreformability. At this day they fubmit, as they formerly did, to the spiritual fupremacy of the bishop of Rome; but they cannot admit him to be the fupreme head of the civil establishment of religion in this country, because their religion has neither civil fanction nor establishment in it. They fubmit to the fpiritual power and jurifdiction of their own bishops, who are not now recognized by the state, as fully as they did, when they were in poffeffion of the temporalities, and other civil advantages of English bishopricks. They receive their facrament of matrimony from their own priefts as fully at prefent, as they formerly did, though no civil effect be produced by the administration of it. In a word, their bishops and priests are now endowed with the fame spiritual powers of preaching, teach

ing, and administering the word of God to their flocks, as they formerly were, when the constitution acknowledged them as a distinct part of the community, and invested them with political and other civil capacities and advantages.

In virtue of this fpiritual headship or fupremacy of the king over the civil eftablishment of religion, which the conftitution now gives him, he has authority to convene, prorogue, reftrain, regulate, and diffolve all ecclefiaftical fynods or conventions; he has the right of nomination to vacant bifhopricks, and certain other ecclefiaftical preferments, and is the dernier refort in all ecclefiaftical caufes, an appeal lying ultimately to him in chancery from the fentence of every ecclefiaftical judge."

It may be urged, that if the king be enabled to appoint to vacant bishopricks, he must neceffarily be legally authorized and impowered to confer a fpiritual power or divine miffion; for the fpiritual power of a Christian bishop can only be limited in its extent of jurifdiction by a power, that can controul him in his fpiritual capacity; but if the king can controul or limit the fpiritual

Black. Com. b. i. c. 7. fect. 5.

jurifdiction

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