Works of Hooker, Book 8
OF THE LAWS OF Ecclesiastical Polity.
Book VIII.
Containing their Seventh Assertion, That to no Civil Prince or Governor, there may be given such power of Ecclesiastical Dominion, as by the Laws of this Land belongeth unto the Supreme Regent thereof.
WE come now to the last thing whereof there is Controversie moved namely, The Power of Supreme Iurisdiction, which for distinction sake we call, The Power of Ecclesiastical dominion. It was not thought fit in the Iews Commonwealth, that the exercise of Supremacy Ecclesiastical should be denied unto him, to whom the exercise of Chiefy Civil did appertain;Maccab. 1…. and therefore their Kings were invested with both. This power they gave into Simon, when they consented that he should be their Prince, not only to set men over their Works, and Countrey, and Weapons, but also to provide for the Holy things, and that he should be obeyed of every man, and that the Writings of the Country should be made in his name, and that it should not be lawful for any of the people, or Priests, to withstand his words, or to call any Congregation in the Country without him. And if haply it be surmised, that thus much was given to Simon, as being both Prince and High-Priest, which otherwise (being their Civil Governor) he could not lawfully have enjoyed; We must note, that all this is no more then the ancient Kings of that People had, being Kings, and not Priests. By this power, David, Asa, Iehoshaphat, Iosiaes, and the rest, made those Laws and Orders which sacred History speaketh of, concerning matters of meer Religion, the affairs of the Temple, and service of God, Finally, had it not been by the vertue of this power, how should it possibly have come to pass, that the piety or impiety of the Kings did always accordingly change the publique face of Religion, which things the Prophets by themselves never did, nor at any time could hinde from being done: Had the Priests alone been possest of all power in spiritual affairs, how should any thing concerning matter of Religion have been made but only by them; in had it head been, & not in the King, to change the face of religion at any time, the altering of religion, the making of Ecclesiastical Laws, with other the like actions belonging unto the power of Dominion, are still termed the deeds of the King; to shew, that in him was placed the supremacy of power in this kinde over all, and that unto their Priests the same was never committed, saving only at such times as the Priests were also Kings and Princess over them. According to the pattern of which example, the like power in causes Ecclesiastical is by the Laws of this Realm annexed unto the Crown; and there are which do imagine, that Kings being meer Lay-persons, do by this means exceed the lawful bounds of their callings; which thing to the end that they may perswade, they first make a necessary separation perpetual and personal between the Church and the Common-wealth. Secondly, they so tie all kind of power Ecclesiastical unto the Church, as if it were in every degree their only right, who are by proper spiritual functions termed Church-Governours, and might not unto Christian Princes in any wise appertain. To lurk under shifting ambignities, and equivocations of words in matter of principal weight, is childish. A Church and a Common-wealth, we grant, are things in nature one distinguished from the other: a Common-wealth is one way, and a Church an other way defined. In their opinions the Church and Common-wealth are corporations, not distinguished only in nature and definition, but in substance perpetually severed: so that they which are of the one, can neither appoint, nor execute, in whole nor in part, the duties which belong to them which are of the other, without open breach of the Law of God which hath divided them; and doth require, that so being divided, they should distinctly or severally work, as depending both upon God, and not hanging one upon the others approbation. For that which either hath to do, we say that the care of Religion being common to all societies Politique, such societies as do embrace the true Religion have the name of the Church given unto every one of them for distinction from the rest; so that every body Politique hath some Religion, but the Church that Religion which is only true. Truth of Religion is the proper difference whereby a Church is distinguished from other Politique societies of men; we here mean true Religion in gross, and not according to every particular: for they which in some particular points of Religion do sever from the truth, may nevertheless truly (if we compare them to men of an heathenish Religion) be said to hold and profess that Religion which is true, For which cause there being of old so many Politique societies stablished through the world, only the Common-wealth of Israel, which had the truth of Religion, was is that respect the Church of God: and the Church of Jesus Christ is every such Politique society of men, as doth in Religion hold that truth which is proper to Christianity. As a Politique society it doth maintain Religion, as a Church, that Religion which God hath revealed by Jesus Christ; with us, therefore, the name of a Church importeth onelyonly a society of men, first united into some publique form of Regiment, and secondly distinguished from other societies by the exercise of Religion, With them on the other side the name of the Church in this present question, importeth not only a maltitude of men so united, and so distinguihed, but also further, the same divided necessarily and perpetually from the body of the Common-wealth: so that even in such a Politique society as consisteth of none but Christians, yet the Church and Commonwealth are too Corporations, independently subsisting by it self.
We hold that seeing there is not any man of the Church of England but the same man is also a member of the Common-wealth; nor any, member of the Commonwealth, which is not also of the Church of England. Therefore as in a figure Triangle, the base doth differ from the sides thereof, and yet one and the self same line is both a base and also a side; aside simply, a base if it chance to be the bottom and under-lye the rest. So albeit, properties and actions of one do cause the name of a Common-wealth; qualities and functions of another sort, the name of the Church to be given to a multitude; yet one and the self-same multitude may in such sort be both. Nay, it is so with us, that no person appertaining to the one, can be denied also to be of the other: contrariwise, unless they against us should hold that the Church and the Common-wealth are two, both distinct and separate societies; of which two, one comprehendeth alwayes persons not belonging to the other, (that which they do) they could not conclude out of the difference between the Church and the Common-wealth, namely that the Bishops may not meddle with the affairs of the Common wealth, because they are Governours of an other Corporation, which is the Church, nor Kings, with making Lawes for the Church, because they have government not of this Corporation, but of another divided from it, the Common-wealth and the walls of separation between these two, must for ever be upheld: they hold the necessity of personal separation which clean excludeth the power of one mans dealing with both; we of natural, but that one and the same person may in both bear principal sway.
The causes of common received Errors in this Point seem to have been especially two: One, That they who embrace true Religion, living in such Common-wealths as are opposite thereunto; and in other publike affairs, retaining civil Communion with such as are constrained for the exercise of their Religion, to have a several Communion with those who are of the same Religion with them. This was the state of the Jewish Church both in Egypt and Babylon, the state of Christian Churches a long time after Christ. And in this case, because the proper affairs and actions of the Church, as it is the Church, hath no dependance on the Laws, or upon the Government of the civil State; and opinion hath thereby grown, that even so it should be always; This was it which deceived Allen in the writing of his Apology: The Apostles (saith he) did govern the Church in Rome, when Nero bare rule, even as at this day in all the Churches dominions: The Church hath a spiritual Regiments without dependance and so ought she to have amongst Heathens, or with Christians. Another occasion of which mis-conceit is, That things appertaining to Religion are both distinguished from other affairs: and have always had in the Church spiritual persons chosen to be exercised about them. By which distinction of Spiritual affairs,Arist. pol. l. 3. cap. 16. and persons therein employed from Temporal, the Error of personal separation always necessary between the Church and Common-wealth hath strengthened it self. For of every Politick Society, that being true which Aristotle saith, namely, That the scope thereof is not simply to live, nor the duty so much to provide for the life, as for means of living well: Maccab. 7And that even as the soul is the worthier part of man, so humane Societies are much more to care for that which tendeth properly to the souls estate, then for such temporal things which the life hath need of. Other proof there needeth none to shew, that as by all men the Kingdom of God is to be sought first, for so in all Commonwealths things spiritual ought above temporal be sought for; and of things spiritual, the chiefest is Religion. For this cause, persons and things imployed peculiarly about the affairs of Religion, are by an excellency termed Spiritual. The Heathens themselves had their spiritual Laws, and Causes, and Affairs, always severed from theirArist. pol. lib. … cap. 30. Liv. lib. 1. temporal; neither did this make two Independent estates among them, God by revealing true Religion sioth make them that receive it his Church. Unto the Iews he so revealed the truth of Religion, that he gave them in special Considerations, Laws, not only for the administration of things spiritual, but also temporal. The Lord himself appointing both the one and the other in that Common-wealth, did not thereby distract it into several independent Communities, but institute several Functions of one and the self-same Communitie: Some Reasons therefore must there be alledged why it should be otherwise in the Church of Christ.
I shall not need to spend any great store of words in answering that which is brought out of the Holy Scripture to shew that Secular and Ecclesiastical affairs and offices are distinguished:Three kinds of their proofs are stakes from the difference of affairs and offices. neither that which hath been borrowed from antiquity, using by phrase of speech to oppose the Common-weal to the Church of Christ; neither yet their Reasons which are wont to be brought forth as witnesses, that the Church and Common-weal were always distinct: for whether a Church or Common-weal do differ, in not the question we strive for; but our controversie is, concerning the kind of distinction, whereby they are severed the one from the other; whether as under heathen Kings of the Church did deal with her own affairs within her self, without depending at all upon any in Civil authority; and the Common-weal in hers, altogether without the privity of the Church: so it ought to continue still even in such Common-weals as have now publikely embraced the truth of Christian Religion; whether they ought evermore to be two societies in such sort, several and distinct: I ask therefore what society was that in Rome, whereunto the Apostle did give the name of the Church of Rome in his time? If they answer (as needs they must) that the Church of Rome in those dayes was that whole society of men, which in Rome professed the Name of Christ, and not that Religion which the Laws of the Common-weal did then authorize; we say as much, and therefore grant, that the Common-weal of Rome was one society, and the Church of Rome another, in such sort that there was between them no mutual dependance. But when whole Rome became Christian, when they all embraced the Gospel, and made Laws in defence thereof, if it be heid that the Church and Common-weal of Rome did then remain as before; there is no way how this could be possible, save only one, and that is, They must restrain the name of a Church in a Christian Common-weal to the Clergy, excluding all the rest of believers both Prince and People; For if all that believe be contained in the name of the Church, how should the Church remain by personal subsistence divided from the Common-weal, when the whole Common-weal doth believe? The Church and the Common-weal are in this case therefore personally one Society, which Society being termed a Common-weal as it liveth under whatsoever Form of Secular Law and Regiment, a Church as it liveth under the spiritual Law of Christ, forsomuch as these two Laws contain so many and different Offices, there must of necessity be appointed in it some to one charge, and some to another, yet without dividing the whole, and making it two several impaled Societies.
The difference therefore either of Affairs or Offices Ecclesiastical from Secular,1 Chron. 14.3,11. Hebr. 9.1. Allum. lib. 31 p.158. is no Argument that the Church and Common-weal are always separate and independent, the one on the other; which thing even Allain himself considering somewhat better, doth in this Point a little correct his former judgement before mentioned, and confesseth in his defence of English Catholicks, that the power Political hath her Princes,…. Taken from the speeches of the Fathers opposing the one to the other. Laws, Tribunals, the Spiritual, her Prelates, Canons, Councels, Judgments, and those (when the Temporal Princes were Pagans) wholly separate; but in Christian Common-weals, joyned though not confounded: Howbeit afterwards his former sting appeareth again; for in a Common-wealth he holdeth, that the Church ought not to depend at all upon the authority of any civil person whatsoever, as in England he saith it doth.
Euseb. de vita Constan. lib. 3. Aug. Epist. 167.It will be objected, that the Fathers do oftentimes mention the Common-weal and the Church of God, by way of opposition. Can the same thing be opposed to it self? If one and the same society be both Church and Common-wealth, what sense can there be in that Speech; That they suffer and flourish together? What sense is that which maketh one thing to be adjudged to the Church, and another to the Common-weal? Finally, in that which putteth a difference between the causes of the Province and the Church, doth it not hereby appear, that the Church and the Common-weal, are things evermore personally separate? No, it doth not hereby appear that there is not perpetually any such separation; we speak of them as two, we may sever the rights and the causes of the one well enough from the other, in regard of that difference which we grant is between them, albeit we make no personal difference. For the truth is, that the Church and the Common-wealth, are names which import things really different: but those things are accidents, and such accidents as may and always should lovingly dwell together in one subject. Wherefore the real difference between the accidents signified by these names, doth not prove different subjects for them always to reside in. For albeit the subjects wherein they be resident be sometimes different, as when the people of God have their residence among Infidels. yet the nature of them is not such, but that their subject may be one, and therefore it is but a changeable accident, in those accidents they are to divers: There can be no Errour in our conceit concerning this Point, if we remember still what accident that is, for which a society hath the name of a Common-wealth, and what accident that which doth cause it to be termed a Church: A Common-wealth we name it simply in regard of some regiment or policy under which men live; a Church for the truth of that Religion which they pofess. Now Names betokening accidents inabstracted, betoken no… only the Accidents themselves, but also together with them Subjects whereunto they cleave. As when we name a School-master and a Physitian, those names do not only betoken two accidents, Teaching and Curing, but also some person or persons in whom those accidents are. For there is no impediment but both may be in one man, as well as they are for the most part in divers. The Common-weal and the Church therefore being such names, they do not only betoken these Accidents of civil Government and Christian Religion, which we have mentioned, but also together with them such multitudes as are the subjects of those accidents; Again, their nature being such as they may well enough dwell together in one subject, it followeth that their names though always implying that difference of accidents that hath been set down, yet do not always imply different subjects also. When we oppose therefore the Church and the Common-wealth in Christian Society, we mean by the Common-wealth that Society with relation to all the publike affairs thereof, only the matter of true Religion excepted; by the Church, the same Society with only reference unto the matter of true Religion, without any affairs… Besides, when that Society, which is both a Church and a Common-wealth, doth flourish in those things which belong unto it as a Common-wealth, we then say, The Common-wealth doth flourish; when in both them, we then say, The Church and Common-wealth do flourish together.
The Prophet Esay to note corruptions in the Common-wealth complaineth,Isai. 1. 21. That where justice and judgement had lodged, now were murtherers; Princes were become companions of Thieves, every one loved gifts, and rewards; but the fatherless was not judged, neither did the widows cause come before them. To shew abuses in the Church, Malachy doth make his complaint, Ye offer unclean bread upon mine Altar.Mal 1. …. If ye offer the blind for sacrifice, it is not evill as ye think, if the lame and the sick, nothing is amiss. The treasure which David bestowed upon the Temple, did argue the love which he bore unto the Church: The pains which Nehemiah took for building the walls of the Citie, are tokens of his care for the Common-wealth.1 Chron 29.3… Nehem. 2. …7. Causes of the Common-wealth, or Province, are such as Gallio was content to be judge of. If it were a matter of wrong, or an evill deed (O ye Iews) I would according to reason maintain you. Causes of the Church, are such as Gallio there receiteth;Acts 18.14. if it be a question of your Law, look ye to it, I will be no judge thereof: In respect of this difference therefore the Church and the Common-wealth may in speech be compared or opposed aptly enough the one to the other; yet this is no Argument, that they are two Independent Societies.
Some other Reasons there are which seem a little more neerly to make for the3. Taken from the effect of punishment inflicted by the one or the other. purpose, as long as they are but heard, and not sifted: For what though a man being severed by Excommunication from the Church be not thereby deprived of freedom in the City, or being there discommoned, is not therefore forthwith excommunicated and excluded the Church? What though the Church be bound to receive them upon Repentance, whom the Common-weal may refuse again to admit? If it chance the same man to be shut out of both, division of the Church and Common-weal which they contend for, will very hardly hereupon follow: For we must note, that members of a Christian Common-weal have a triple state; a natural, a civil, and a spiritual: No mans natural estate is cut off otherwise then by that capital execution. After which, he that is none of the body of the Common-wealth, doth not I think remain fit in the body of that visible Church. And concerning mans civil estate, the same is subject partly to inferiour abatement of liberty, and partly to diminution in the highest degree, such as banishment is; sith it casteth out quite and clean from the body of the Common-weal, it must needs also consequently cast the banished party even out of the very Church he was of before; because that Church and the Common-weal he was of, were both one and the same Society; So that whatsoever doth utterly separate a mans person from the one, it separateth from the other also. As for such abatements of civil estate as take away only some priviledge, dignity or other benefit, which a man enjoyeth in the Common-weal they reach only to our dealing with publike affairs, from which what may lett, but that men may be excluded, and thereunto restored again, without diminishing or augmenting the number of persons, in whom either Church or Common-wealth consisteth. He that by way of punishment loseth his voice in a publike election of Magistrates, ceaseth not thereby to be a Citizen; A man dis-franchised may notwithstanding enjoy as a Subject the common benefit of Protection under Laws and Magistrates; so that these inferiour diminutions which touch men civilly, but neither do clean extinguish their estates, as they belong to the Common-wealth, nor impair a whit their condition as they are of the Church of God; These, I say, do clearly prove a difference of the one from the other, but such a difference as maketh nothing for their surmise of distracted Societies.
And concerning Excommunication, it curreth off indeed from the Church, and yet not from the Commonwealth; howbeit so, that the party Excommunicate is not thereby severed from one body which subsisteth in it self, and retained by another in like sort subsisting; but he which before had fellowship with that society whereof he was a member, as well touching things spiritual as civil, is now by force of Excommunication, although not severed from the body in Civil affairs, nevertheless for the time cut off from it as touching Communion in those things which belong to the same body as it is the Church: A man which having been both Excommunicated by the Church, and deprived of Civil dignity in the Common-wealth; is upon his repentance necessarily reunited into the one, but not of necessity into the other. What then? That which he is admitted unto, is a Communion in things Divine, whereof both parts are partakers; that from which he is withheld, is the benefit of some humane previledge, or right, which other Citizens happily enjoy. But are not these Saints and Citizens, one and the same people? are they not one and the same Society? Doth it hereby appear that the Church which received an Excommunicate, can have no dependency on any pers o which hath chief Authority and Power of these things in the Commonwealth whereunto the same party is not admitted. Wherefore to end this point, I conclude; First, that under the dominions of Infidels, the Church of Christ, and their Common-wealth, were two Societies independent. Secondly, that in those Common-wealths, where the Bishop of Rome beareth sway, one Society is both the Church and the Common-wealth: But the Bishop of Rome doth divide the body into two divers bodies, and doth not suffer the Church to depend upon the power of any civil Prince and Potenrate. Thirdly, that within this Realm of England, the case is neither as in the one, nor as in the other of the former two: but from the state of Pagans we differ, in that with us one Society is both the Church and Common-wealth, which with them it was not; as also from the state of those Nations which subjected themselves to the Bishop of Rome, in that our Church hath dependance from the Chief in our Common-wealth, which it hath not when he is suffered to rule. In a word, our state is according to the pattern of Gods own antient elect people, which people was not part of them the Common-wealth, and part of them the Church of God; but the self-same people whole and entire were both under one Chief Governour, on whose Supream Authority they did all depend. Now the drift of all that hath been alledged to prove perpetual separation and independency between the Church and the Commonwealth, is, that this being held necessary, it might consequently be thought fit, that in a Christian Kingdom, he whose power is greatest over the Common-wealth, may not lawfully have supremacy of power also over the Church, that is to say, so far as to order thereby and to dispose of spiritual affairs, so far as the highest uncommanded Commander in them. Whereupon it is grown a Question, whether Government Ecclesiastical, and power of Dominion in such degrees as the Laws of this Land do grant unto the Soveraign Governour thereof, may by the said supream Governour lawfully be enjoy'd and held: For resolution wherein, we are, First, to define what the power of dominion is. Secondly, then to shew by what right. Thirdly, after what sort. Fourthly, in what measure. Fiftly in what inconveniency. According to whose example Christian Kings may have it. And when these generals are opened, to examine afterwards how lawful that is which we in regard of Dominion do attribute unto our own: namely the title of headship over the Church, so far as the bounds of this Kingdom do reach. Secondly, the Prerogative of calling and dissolving great assemblies, about spiritual affairs publick. Thirdly, the right of assenting unto all those orders concerning Religion, which must after be in force as Law. Fourthly, the advancement of Principal Church-Governours to their rooms of Prelacy. Fifthly, judicial authority higher then others are capable of. And sixthly, exemption from being punishable with such kind of Censures as the platform of Reformation doth teach, that they ought to be subject unto.