66 "bounds of their natural allegiance, but thought diversity of religion, a safe pretext for all kinds of "treasons, and rebellions, against their sovereign. "Which godly, and wise intent, God did bless "accordingly; for very many of my subjects, that were popishly affected, as well priests, as laics, "did freely take the same oath; whereby they both gave me occasion to think the better of their fide"lity, and thereby freed themselves of that heavy "slander, that, although they were fellow professors, "of one religion of the powder-traitors, yet were "they not joined with them in treasonable courses "against their sovereign; whereby all quietly"minded papists were put out of despair, and I 66 66 gave a good proof, that I intended no persecution "against them, for conscience, or cause; but only "desired to be secured of them, for civil obedience, "which, for conscience cause, they were bound to perform." In several other parts of his writings on the oath, the king expresses the same sentiments. He declares, that, ❝ he never did, nor would, presume to "make an article of faith :"-that, "the oath was "ordained only for making a true distinction be 66 tween papists of quiet disposition, and, in all other "things, good subjects; and such other papists, as, "in their hearts, maintained the like bloody maxims, "that the powder-traitors did;"-that "it was "his care, that the oath should contain nothing, "but matter of civil and temporal obedience, due by subjects to their sovereign power." As a proof "As of this care, he mentions the following remarkable fact; The lower house of parliament," to use his own words," at the first framing of the oath, "made it to contain, that the pope had no power "to excommunicate me; which I caused them to "reform,-only making it to conclude, that no "excommunication of the pope, could warrant my ແ subjects to practice against my person and state; denying the deposition of kings to be in the pope's “lawful power; as, indeed, I take any such tem"poral violence to be far without the limits of such a spiritual censure, as excommunication is. So "careful was I, that nothing should be contained "in this oath, except the profession of natural allegiance, and civil and temporal obedience, with a promise to resist to all contrary civil violence." A more exact description of the different natures of spiritual, and temporal, power cannot be produced. 2. On perusing these, and many other passages of the same spirit, which are to be found in the writings of the royal author, it seems impossible to contend, that the monarch's views were not both kind, and salutary. Other views are, however, attributed to his advisers. It is said, that "the "wording of the oath was drawn up, in such ambiguous terms, that a tender conscience,- (the "best disposed towards paying civil allegiance),— "could not digest it ;"-that "the wording of it "was chiefly committed to archbishop Bancroft, who, with the assistance of Christopher Perkins, a renegado jesuit, so calculated the whole to the designs of the ministry, that they met with their "desired effect; which was, first, to divide the "catholics about the lawfulness of the oath; se 66 condly, to expose them to daily persecutions, in "case of refusal; and in consequence of this, to misrepresent them, as disaffected persons, and of "unsound principles, in regard of government." Such is the statement given of this circumstance, by Dodd *. On this subject, Dodd's authority is certainly entitled to great respect; and his statement receives some confirmation from a passage in the Athenæ Oxonienses t, where, on the authority of a manuscript review of the court of king James, by Good-`· man, bishop of Gloucester, Mr. Wood mentions, that "sir Christopher Perkins,"-(for the jesuit had been created a knight)," had a hand in con"triving, and drawing up, the oath of allegiance, "while he was intimate with doctor Bancroft ‡." It "receives a further confirmation, from a passage in "cardinal Bentivoglio's Relationi delle Provincie ||, in which, as he is translated in the Answer to the Memoirs of Panzani §, his eminence,--alluding to the oath of allegiance,-says, that, "in contriving "this new machine against the catholic religion, the "authors had principally two things in view. One • Church History, vol. ii. part v. art. iv. + Vol. i. p. 22. That Bancroft was concerned in framing the oath, and intended it should occasion a disunion among the catholics, is confirmed by a passage in Osborne's Secret History of the Court of James I. (Ballantyne's edition. p. 61.) 66 66 66 .66 was, to furnish the king an opportunity of pro❝ceeding with an increase of rigour against the persons and property of catholics; it being easily foreseen, that many of them would refuse the oath, in which heretical terms were used to deny all authority of the roman pontiffs, under what"soever interpretation and form, in temporal affairs "of princes.-The other, was to give new occasion "to the discontents among the catholic clergy; it being held for certain, that several of them, either through dread of punishment or tepidity in religion, would be induced to swallow an oath; "and to advise others to follow their example." (In a future page, we shall transcribe a further part of this passage.) It is probable, that some at least of his majesty's ministers were not so favourably disposed towards the catholics, as their royal master. But, that James's own views, in their regard, were most benign, the writer has not discovered any just reason to doubt. 66 In support of the allegation respecting the sinister views of the framers of the oath, intentional obscurity and objectional language were imputed to some of its clauses; and the words "impious," heretical," and "damnable,” used in describing the deposing doctrine, were severely condemned*. 66 The great objection to it, however, was its absolute denial of the pope's deposing power. "This," says the Rev. Roger Widdrington, the learned and * See Ecclesiastical Democracy Detected, by the Rev. John Milner, 1793, 8vo. 66 able benedictine advocate of the oath*, was the "rock of scandal, the stone of offence, on which "the bulk of the learned and the unlearned of those "times, generally stumbled."-Even the illustrious Bellarmine, for that epithet is justly due to his virtues, his learning, and his talents†, maintains, that the assertion,-that the pope, as pope, and "by divine right, has no temporal power, and can"not, in any manner, command secular persons, or deprive them of their kingdoms and sovereignty, though they deserve to be deprived of them,-is "not so much an opinion as a heresy." This was the burthen of many a page, which the cardinal and his collaborators published, in support of the briefs, which, as will be seen immediately, Paul the fifth issued against the oath. This, therefore, to repeat Widdrington's words, was, the petra scandali, the lapis offensionis. Had the parties agreed on this point, there would have been no final disagreement between them. In a future page, the complete re 66 * Disputatio Theologica de Juramento Fidelitatis, oh. iii. § 1. † De Romano Pontifice, lib. iii. c. 1. On the denial itself of the pope's deposing power, not on the language, in which that denial was expressed, father Juvençi (Historia Soc. Jesu, lib. xiii. §4) grounds his objection to the oath: "Singulos in certa verba jurare jussit, "quibus eam summo pontifici auctoritatem abrogabat, quam "inesse illi confitentur quicunque ipsum Christi vicarium, "et summum ecclesiæ pastorem agnoscunt: quam christianus ❝orbis, in concilio Lateranensi congregatus, ipsi concessam professus est." A very different construction of this de |
