prince, person, prelate, state, or potentate, hath or ought to have any jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-eminence, or authority, ecclesiastical or spiritual, within his majesty's said realms, dominions and countries.

Art. 37. "The queen's majesty hath the chief power in By the Thirtythis realm of England, and other her dominions; unto nine Articles. whom the chief government of all estates of this realm, whether they be ecclesiastical or civil, in all causes doth appertain; and is not, nor ought to be, subject to any foreign jurisdiction. But when we attribute to the queen's majesty the chief government, we give not thereby to our princes the ministering either of God's word or of the sacraments; but that only prerogative which we see to have been given always to all godly princes in Holy Scripture by God himself; that is, that they should rule all estates and degrees committed to their charge by God, whether they be ecclesiastical or temporal, and restrain with the civil sword the stubborn and evil doers. The Bishop of Rome hath no jurisdiction in this realm of England."

By 1 Eliz. c. 1, s. 7, it is enacted "that no foreign Penalty of prince, person, prelate, state, or potentate spiritual or denying the temporal, shall use, enjoy or exercise any manner of supremacy. power, jurisdiction, superiority, authority, preheminence or privilege, spiritual or ecclesiastical, within this realm, or any other her majesty's dominions or countries; but the same shall be abolished thereout for ever: any statute, ordinance, custom, constitutions, or any other matter or cause whatsoever to the contrary notwithstanding."

Sect. 8. "And such jurisdictions, privileges, superiorities and preheminences spiritual and ecclesiastical, as by any spiritual or ecclesiastical power or authority have heretofore been, or may lawfully be exercised or used for the visitation of the ecclesiastical state and persons, and for reformation, order and correction of the same, and of all manner of errors, heresies, schisms, abuses, offences, contempts and enormities, shall for ever be united and annexed to the imperial crown of this realm."

Sect. 14. "And if any person shall by writing, printing, teaching, preaching, express words, deed or act, advisedly, maliciously and directly affirm, hold, stand with, set forth, maintain or defend the authority, preheminence, power or jurisdiction, spiritual or ecclesiastical, of any foreign prince, prelate, person, state or potentate whatsoever, heretofore claimed, used or usurped within this realm, or any other her majesty's dominions or countries; or shall advisedly, maliciously and directly put in ure or

Statutory definition of

the supremacy.

execute any thing, for the extolling, advancement, setting forth, maintenance or defence, of any such pretended or usurped jurisdiction, power, preheminence and authority, or any part thereof; he, his abettors, aiders, procurers and counsellors, shall for the first offence forfeit all his goods, and if he hath not goods to the value of 201., he shall also be imprisoned for a year, and the benefices of every spiritual person offending shall also be void; for the second offence shall incur a præmunire; and for the third shall be guilty of high treason."

Sect. 15. "But no person shall be molested for any offence committed only by preaching, teaching, or words, unless he be indicted within one half-year after the offence committed."

Sect. 21. "And no person shall be indicted or arraigned but by the oath of two or more witnesses: which witnesses, or so many of them as shall be living, and within the realm at the time of the arraignment, shall be brought face to face before the party arraigned if he require the same."

At the great epochs also of the Revolution, and of the unions of Scotland and Ireland, the supremacy of the crown was limited and defined. The suspending power claimed by James II. was pronounced illegal (n), and a coronation oath enacted which is to be administered by one of the archbishops or bishops to the sovereign, who must swear to govern the people according to the statutes in parliament agreed on, and the laws and customs of the kingdom, to maintain the religion established by law, and preserve the rights and privileges of the bishops and clergy (0).

66

This supremacy was further defined by the oath of allegiance and supremacy as set forth in 21 & 22 Vict. c. 48, s. 1. 'I, A. B., do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to her majesty queen Victoria, and will defend her to the utmost of my power against all conspiracies and attempts whatever which shall be made against her person, crown or dignity, and I will do my utmost endeavour to disclose and make known to her majesty, her heirs and successors, all treasons and traitorous conspiracies which may be formed against her or them; and I do faithfully promise to maintain, support and defend, to the utmost of my power, the succession of the crown, which succession, by an act intituled An Act for the further limitation of the crown, and better securing the

(n) 1 W. & M., sess. 2, c. 2.
(0) 1 W. & M. c. 6; 6 Ann. c. 8.

rights and liberties of the subject,' is and stands limited to the princess Sophia, electress of Hanover and the heirs of her body being protestants, hereby utterly renouncing and abjuring any obedience or allegiance unto any other person claiming or pretending a right to the crown of this realm; and I do declare that no foreign prince, person, prelate, state or potentate hath or ought to have any jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-eminence or authority, ecclesiastical or spiritual, within this realm: and I make this declaration upon the true faith of a christian. So help me God." This oath, however, has been again altered by 31 & 32 Vict. c. 72; and now the oath of allegiance is as follows: " I, do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to her majesty queen Victoria, her heirs and "successors, according to law. So help me God."

66

66

What this is.

Law by which the church is governed.

CHAPTER III.

JUS ECCLESIASTICUM.

THE rules and laws which relate to the ministrations and government, rights and obligations of a church established in a state are properly denominated jus ecclesiasticum ; under which head are included, not only the canons and ordinances made by ecclesiastical authority, but also the civil laws and the customs, general and local, which affect the church, and which cannot with strict propriety be included under the usual title jus canonicum.

This observation applies with particular force to the law of the English Church; for in England the law of the church and the state are, with few exceptions, the

same.

Jus ecclesiasticum admits of various divisions: considered as to its origin, it is either divine or human, modern or recent. As canonists say, antiquum, novum novissimum. Considered as to its object, it is either public or private.

(1.) Jus publicum ecclesiasticum determines the authority of the universal church and those who govern it. (2.) Jus privatum ecclesiasticum is concerned with the rights and duties of individual members of the church. Jus publicum also admits of a subdivision into internal and external:-the former being concerned with the constitution of the church relatively to the members of it; the latter being concerned with the relations of the church to the state and to other religious bodies not directly connected with herself.

The rights and duties arising from these latter relations will be discussed in a later chapter: the former relations, viz., those arising from the union of the church with the state, will be considered in connection with the exposition of the law which governs each institution or function of the church.

CHAPTER IV.

THE SOURCES OF THE LAW OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.

AN examination of the laws by which the Church of England is governed leads to two certain conclusions:

1. That she has adhered in all matters of importance to General the general principles of the law of the Eastern and principles of Western Church.

2. That she has at all times before and since the Reformation claimed the right of an independent church in an independent kingdom, to be governed by the laws which she has deemed it expedient to adopt.

In the case of Martin v. Mackonochie (a) the Dean of the Arches said as follows:-"In the history of no kingdom is the independence of the national church written with a firmer character than in that of England, in the statutes of the realm, in the decisions of judicial tribunals, and the debates of parliament.

"The constitutions of Clarendon, in Henry the second's reign (A.D. 1164), though directly aimed at the repression of the inordinate claims and privileges of the national church, were, no doubt, indirectly calculated,' as Hume observes, to establish the independency of England on the papacy;' and, therefore, when the king sought Pope Alexander's ratification of them, that pontiff annulled and rejected all but six out of the sixteen memorable articles.

"The resistance of Beckett, and, still more, the general feeling excited by the wicked and impolitic murder of that prelate, procured the practical abrogation of the articles objected to, by the enactments of Edw. I. and III., of Rich. II., of Hen. IV. and V., and of Edw. IV.

"But in the severe penalties attached to the statutes of provisors and præmunire may be read the steady determination of the English people to maintain an independent national church, and to resist the ultramontane doctrines which had taken root in some other countries.

"The Statute of Provisors (25 Edw. III., st. 6 (b), A.D. 1350) recites that the Holy Church of England' was founded in the estate of prelacy within the realm of England' by the king and nobles of England, and forbids

(a) 2 L. R., Adm. & Eccl. p. 116.

(b) 25 Edw. 3, st. 4, in "The Statutes Revised."

the law of
the Church
of England.

1