V.

both Charles and James historians in general are agreed; SECTION but, for the perfect understanding of the history of their times, it is highly necessary to inquire whether these unfortunate monarchs grasped at greater power than their predecessors had enjoyed, or confined their wishes to those, which they believed belonged of right to the throne, or were necessary for its security. In other words, the question is, whether the ultimate object of their various acts of tyranny was the unjustifiable increase of their power, or only the safety of their persons, and the stability of their thrones. The degree of guilt to be imputed to them may be very different in one, or other of these cases, in the former, the calamities of their house may be considered as a just punishment for atrocious crimes; in the latter, as the consequence of the improved, and enlightened state of the people, rather than the wanton, or wicked ambition of the monarch.

The divine right of Kings originally made no part of the law or constitution of England, and our most ancient writers derive the rights to the possession of the crown and its prerogatives from no higher authority than the law. Upon this foundation rested the rights of

*See Bracton, p. 5. 6. Fleta. p. 17. and Fortescue de laudibus, and his Difference between an absolute, and limited monarchy, The following curious case is in the year books. Henry IV. had granted to the rector of Edington and his confrères and their succesors, to be exempted from the payment of all taxes, and tallages, which should be

H

SECTION
V.

Introduced by

Henry VIII.

creed of the church.

the Sovereigns of England until the Reformation. They claimed to be entrusted with only limited powers, and were contented to be indebted for them to human institutions.

When Henry the Eighth threw off the yoke of the and made the Romish Church, there was no argument, by which he was so closely pressed, or which he found soli difficult to answer, as the assumption of a divine right in temporal, as well as spiritual affairs by the Pope over all Sovereign Princes. This usurpation had been submitted to by many Princes on the Continent, and, in former times, by some of his own predecessors. He adopted the only expedient, which could remove the difficulty,

1

granted by the commonalty, and of all tenths granted by the clergy, together with liberty to appropriate to themselves two parish churches. The legality of this grant was tried in the Exchequer, upon a tenth having been demanded from the rector, and his insisting upon this exemption. It was argued, on one side that the fifteenth was a profit belonging to the King's Court of Parliament, &c. and on the other, that it was not his inheritance, for he had no right to have it, before his people had granted it to him. Fray, Chief Baron, said that the grant was good, and this was a thing in the King at the time of the grant, for the Parliament is the Court of the King, and the highest Court he has, and the law is the most high inheri tance, which he has; for by the law he himself, and his subjects are ruled, and if there was no law, there would be no King, nor no inheritance. Hody, Chief Justice of the King's Bench, said "the same "law which wills that the King shall defend his people, wills that "the people shall grant to him of their goods, in aid of that defence, "which proves the inheritance." Though the question arose here upon the demand of a tenth, it was argued principally, as if a fifteenth

had been demanded.

V.

Reform.i. 132.

by usurping the power himself, and claiming not only SECTION to be supreme head of his newly erected church, but to be entitled to his crown by divine right, and therefore to have temporal jurisdiction over ecclesiastical persons, as well as laymen. Such is the language of the "In- Burn. Hist. of "stitution for the necessary erudition of a christian man," a book first agreed upon in convocation, and published about 1533, by the King's authority, and sometimes called the Bishop's book. But in another publication in support of the reformation, entitled the Obedience of a Christian Man, the principles to which the King was obliged to have resort, are more fully developed, and from it the following extract is made.

"Here by seest thou, that the Kýng is in this worlde p. 27. b. "without lawe, and may at hys luste do ryght or wronge, "and shall gyve accomptes, but to God onely. Another "conclusyon is this, that no pson neyther any degree, "may be exempte from this ordynaunce of God.

Neyther can the professyon of monkes and freres, or any thynge, that the Pope or Byshoppes can laye for "themselues, except them frō the swerde of ŷ Emperour "or Kynges, yf they breake y Lawes. For it is wrytten, "let every soule submytte hym selfe unto the auctorytee "of the hyer powers. Here is no man excepte but all "soules muste obeye. The hyer powers are the Tem

porall kynges and prynces, unto whom God hath gyven the swerde to punyshe who soeuer synneth.

K k

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"God hath not gyuen the swerdes, to punishe one and "to let another go fre and to synne unpunyshe. More "ouer, wh what face durste the spirytualtie, which ought "to be the lyght, and an example of good lyuynge unto "all other, desyre to synne unpunysshed, or to be "excepted from trybute, tolle, or custome, that they "wolde not bear payne with theyr bretherne, unto the "mayntenaunce of Kynges and officers ordayned of God "to punyshe synne? there is no power but of God (by power understande the auctoritee of Kynges and princes). The powers be ar ordayned of God. "Who so euer therfore resysteth, resisteth God: yea, thoughe he be Pope, Bysshoppe, monke, or frere. Theyresyste shal receyve unto thēselves dampnatyon. Why? for Gods worde is agaynste them, whiche wyll haue all men under the power of temporall "swerde."

66

66

Henry secured to himself this usurped authority by several acts of Parliament. The Act of Supremacy, the 26. Hen. 8. c. 1. recognized him as the only supreme head in earth of the Church of England; and the preamble of the 28. Hen. 8. c. 10, an act for extinguishing the authority of the Bishop of Rome, recites, "whereby "he" (i. e. the Pope) "did not only rob the King's Majesty, being only the supreme head of this his realm of England, immediately under God, of his honour, right, and "preeminence due unto him by the law of God, but spoiled.

66

V.

"this his realm," &c. Henry the Eighth did not rest SECTION satisfied with having his right sanctioned by the civil authority of his realm, but made it part of the creed of his national church, where it is still found in its articles, injunctions, canons, orders, and rubric.

abroad assert

of the right of

the people.

The Reformation occasioned a great revolution in Protestants the politics of Europe, and the discovery of the Art Printing, at nearly the same period, not only gave permanency to the changes introduced, but disseminated the principles upon which they were to be defended. Instances occurred of princes remaining catholics, whose subjects had embraced the new religion, and by every detestable mode of persecution exercising the power supposed to be delegated immediately from heaven, or to be conveyed to them through the Pope, the Vicegerent of God on earth, to the oppression, or destruction of those, whom it was their duty to have protected. Against this divine right of Kings, Protestant subjects were driven, by necessity, to oppose the right of the people, as the foundation of all temporal power; and in defence of this latter doctrine many able books were printed, and distributed, among others, one entitled Vindicia contra Tyrannos. The author assumed the feigned name of Stephanus Junius Brutus, but is supposed to have been the celebrated Mornay du Plessis, or Hubert Languet, It was translated into many languages, had a very general circulation upon the continent, and the