VOL. XIV. 25
886 A VINDICATION OF THE ANIMADVERSIONS ON FIAT LUX.
testants; which is all you prove, and so do, " rnagno conatu nugas agere." Who knows it not? I wish there were any need to prove it. But, sir, this difference about the superiority of bishops to presbyters, or their equahty or identity, was agitated in the church many and many a hundred year before you or I were born, and will be so pro- bably when we are both dead and forgotten; so that wliat it makes in this dispute is very hard for a sober man to conjecture. 4. Who they are that pretend to exalt Christ, hy a mere asserting ministers not to be by his institution subject to bishops, which you call a "cheat," I know not, nor shall bo their a^lvocate. They exalt Christ who love him and keep his commandments, and no other.
Secondly, You may also as easily discern the frivolousness of your exclamation against Protestants for not giving up their differences in religion to the umpirage of Icings, upon the assignment of that supre- macy unto them which hath been declared. When we make the king such a head of the catholic church as you make the pope, we shall seek unto him as the fountain of our faith ; as you pretend to do unto the pope. For the present, we give that honour to none but Christ himself; and for Avhat we assign in profession unto the king, we answer it wholly in our practical submission. Protestants never thought nor said that any king was appointed by Christ to be supreme, infaXlihle jjroposer of all things to be believed and done in the worship of God ; no king ever assumed that power unto himself It is Jesus Christ alone who is the supreme and absolute lawgiver of his church, " the author and finisher of our faith;" and it is the honour of kings to serve him, in the promotion of his interest, by the exercise of that authority and duty which we have before declared. What, unto the dethroning and dishonour as much as in you lieth of Christ himself, and of kings also, you assign unto the pope, in making him the supreme head and fountain of your faith, hath been already considered. This is the sub- .stance of what you except against Protestants, either as to opinion or practice, in this matter of deference unto kingly authority in things ecclesiastical. What is the sense of your church, which you prefer unto your sentiments herein, I shall, after I have a little examined your present pretensions, manifest unto you (seeing you will have it so) from those who are full well able to inform us of it : —
" Fas mihi ponlificum sacrata rcsolvcrc jura;
atquc omnia ferre aub auras,
Siqua tegunt; tencor liomce nee legibus ullia." Virg. ^n. ii. 157.
For your own part, you have expressed yourself in this matter so loo«ily, generally, and ambiguously, that it is very hard for any man to collect from your words what it is that you assert or what you deny. T shall endeavour to draw OTit your sense by a few inquiries ; as, — 1. Do you think the king hath any authority vested in him, as king, in ec-
POWER OF KINGS IN MATTERS ECCLESIASTICAL. 887
clesiastical affairs and over ecclesiastical jiersons? You tell us, " That Catholics observe the king in all things, as well ecclesiastic as civil,'' p. 59 ; " That in the line of coii^oreal power and authority the king is immediately under God," p. 61 ; with other words to the same pur- pose, if they are to any purpose at all. I desire to know whether you grant in him an authority derived immediately from God m and over ecclesiastical affairs, as to convene synods or councils, to reform things amiss in the church, as to the outward administration of them? or do you think that he hath such power and authority to make, constitute, or appoint laws, with penal sanctions, in and about things ecclesias- tical? And, 2. Do you think that in the work which he hath to do for the church, be it what it will, he may use the liberty of his own judgment, directed by the light of the Scripture, or that he is precisely to follow the declarations and determinations of the pope? If he have not this authority, if he may not use this liberty, the good words you speak of Catholics, and give unto him, signify, indeed, nothing at all. If, then, he hath and may, you openly rise up against the bulls, briefs, and interdicts of your popes themselves, and the universal practice of your church for many ages. And, therefore, I desire you to inform me, 3. Whether you do not judge him absolutely to be subject and accountable to the pope for whatever he doth in ecclesiastical affairs in his o\\Ti kingdoms and dominions ? If you answer suitably to the principles, maxims, and practice of your church, you must say he is: and if so, I must tell you that whatever you ascribe unto him in things ecclesiastical, he acts not about them as king, but in some other capacity ; for to do a thing as a king, and to be accountable for what he doth therein to the pope, implies a contradiction. 4. Hath not the pope a power over his subjects, many of them at least, to convent, censure, judge, and punish them, and to exempt them in criminal cases from his jurisdiction? And is not this a fair su2'>remacy, that it is meet he should be contented withal, when you put it into the power of another to exempt as many of his subjects as he pleaseth and are willing from his regal authority? 5. When you say, "That, in matters of faith, kings for their own ease remit their subjects to their papal pastor," p. 57, whether do you not collude with us, or, indeed, do at all think as you speak? Do you think that kings have real power in and about those things wherein you depend on the pope, and only remit their subjects to him for their own ease? You cannot but know that this one concession would ruin the whole Papacy, as being expressly destructive of all the foundations on which it is built. Nor did ever any pope proceed on this ground in his interposurcs in the world about matters of faith, — that such things, indeed, belonged unto others, and were only by them re- mitted unto him for then* ease. 6. Whether you do not include kings