. Iijiory of thePuritans, examin'd. 2©3 cation. Several warm Speeches were made againft the Compilers ; Lord Digby, who was yet with the Coun- try Party, flood up, andPaid, " Does not every Par- liament-Man's Heart rife, tofee the Prelates ufur- .` ping to themfelves thegrandPre-eminence of Parlia- " ments, the granting Subfdies under the Name of " Benevolence, under no lefs Penalty to them that re- ` fufe it, than the lofs of Heaven and Earth ? &c." Collier fays ; ` Notwithftanding thefe tragical Expreffions, the Clergy had always the Privilege of taxing their own Body. Neither fromMagna Charta, to the 37th Henry VIII. is there any Parliamentary Confirmation of Subfidies given by the Clergy ; for what reafon this Cullom was afterwards altered, is not eafy to account for : nay, there is an Inftance in Queen Elizabeth's time, 1585, when the Convocation granted a Sub- , fidy or Benevolence, and levied the Money by fynodical Authority. In the Inftrument figned and fealed by the Ele6tors for Convocation, they engage themfelves toabide by the Proceedings of their Clerks and Proctors t fe ratum, gratum, & acceptum habere, quicquiddisci procuratores fui dix- erint, fecerint, vet conflituerint.' Neal, p. 37o. In the Saxon Mmes, all Ecclefia- flical Laws and Conflitutions were confirm'd by the Peers, and by the Reprefentatives of the People. I fhould be glad to knowwhat Authority he has for this Affertion. The late Mr. ohnfon of Cran- brook, in the Diocefe of Canterbury, a Perfon ad- mirably well verfed in Ecclefaaflical Laws, has informed us, That ` during the Time of our Saxon, and even Danifh Kings, the Bill-lops were * Collier, p. 795. -l- Appendix to Billaop 4tterbury's Rights of an EngdiJh Con- vocation. f Mr. 7ohnfon's general Preface to his Colle&ion of Ecciefi- a:{tical Laws, p. 35. 3 ' in
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