(Vol. iv., pp. 115. 196.)
As CANONICUS EBORACENSIS considers that I have "not exactly hit the
mark" in inferring that "the Lords, the Clergy _in Convocation_, and the
Commons" are the "Three Estates of England" named in the Gunpowder
Treason Service, I would claim, being not yet altogether convinced by
CANON. EBOR.'S arguments that such is the case, a share of your space
for discussing a question which must certainly be interesting to all who
uphold "our Constitution in Church and State." My apology for prolixity
must be, that having but just received "NOTES AND QUERIES" I have not
had time to study brevity.
The passages, which contain the expressions referred to in the Service,
are as under:--
"We yield Thee our unfeigned thanks and praise for the wonderful
and mighty deliverance of our gracious Sovereign King James the
First, the Queen, the Prince, and all the royal branches, _with
the Nobility, Clergy, and Commons of England_, then assembled in
Parliament, by popish treachery appointed as sheep to the
slaughter, in a most barbarous and savage manner, beyond the
examples of former ages."--The First Collect at Morning Prayer.
"By discovering and confounding their horrible and wicked
enterprise, plotted and intended this day to have been executed
against the King _and the whole State of England_, for the
subversion of the government and religion established among
us."--The Litany.
"Acknowledging Thy power, wisdom, and goodness in preserving the
King, _and the Three Estates of the Realm of England_, assembled
in Parliament, from the destruction this day intended against
them."--The Communion Service.
"Who on this day didst miraculously preserve _our Church and
State_ from the secret contrivance and hellish malice of popish
conspirators."--After the Prayer for the Church Militant.
CANON. EBOR. asserts that these Three Estates (the word "estates" being
used of course in its second intention, as meaning the representatives,
and not the orders _en masse_) are "the Lords Spiritual," "the Lords
Temporal," and "the Commons," representing severally the clergy, the
nobility, and the commonality. As "the Lords Spiritual" are always
placed before "the Lords Temporal," he is obliged to rank _the clergy_
before _the nobility_ in spite of the order of precedency observed in
the Collect. This seems to show that the clergy are not represented by
the bishops. And in the Coronation Oath they are separately specified:
"And will you preserve unto _the bishops and clergy of the realm_,
and to the churches committed to them, all such rights and
privileges as by law do or shall appertain unto them or any of
them?"
This in an older oath ran thus:
"Et quil gardera le peas de seynt Eglise _et al clergie_ et al
people de bon accorde."
From these quotations it does not seem very faulty to infer, that the
clergy as represented by Convocation are the second Estate of the realm;
and are not, as represented by "the Lords Spiritual," the first, which
is the Estate of the nobility represented by the Peers.
Against this CANON. EBOR.'S arguments are two: first, "that the phrase
'assembled in Parliament' has no application to the Convocation;" and
next, that the "Convocation does not sit at Westminster."
With regard to the first, I have to say that it was somewhat late in our
history that the point was settled that Convocation was not a part of
Parliament. In Mr. Palin's recently published _History of the Church of
England_, ch. x. p. 242., I read, with respect to the dissolution of the
Convocation of 1701,--
"With the presentation of this document the Convocation dispersed,
both the King and the Prolocutor being now dead; and in the act
that empowered the Parliament to sit after the king's
death, no provision was made to continue the Convocation. The Earl
of Rochester moved, in the House of Lords, that it might be
considered, _whether the Convocation was not a part of the
Parliament, and whether it was not continued in consequence of the
act that continued the Parliament_. But that was soon let fall;
for the judges were all of opinion that it was dissolved by the
king's death."
In _A Reconciling Letter, &c._, a pamphlet published in 1702:
"Pray inform me to which notion I may subscribe; whether to the
Convocation being a Parliamentary body, and _part of Parliament_,
as Dr. A. has made it? Or to the Convocation having a
Parliamentary relation, and such an origin and alliance," &c.
On going back to an earlier date:--In Statutis 21 Richard II. c. 2., and
21 Richard II. c. 12. the preambles state that--
"These statutes were made by the assent _of the procurators of the
clergy, as well as_ of other constituent members _of parliament_."
And we know that the _Procuratores Cleri_ occasionally sat in parliament
in the Lower House, as the Judges do now in the Upper: in a treatise
quoted by Coke (_De modo tenendi Parliamentum_)--
"It appeareth that the proctors of the clergy should appear, 'cum
præsentia eorum sit necessaria' (which proveth they were voiceless
assistants only), and having no voices, and so many learned
bishops having voices, their presence is not now holden
necessary."--4 Inst. 5.
Perhaps they were not altogether voiceless, for we find that on Nov. 22,
1547, a petition was presented by the Lower House of Convocation to the
Upper, the second clause of which was--
"2dly. That the clergy of the lower house of Convocation may be
admitted _to sit in Parliament with the House of Commons_
according to antient usage."
In support of this, the clause _Præmunientes_ in the writ directing the
elections of Proctors was appealed to. This "Præmunitory Clause," which
at a later period of the history of Convocation was the cause of much
discussion, ran thus:--
"The Bishop was commanded to 'give notice to the (Prior or) Dean
and Chapter of his Cathedral Church, and to the Archdeacons and
all the clergy of his diocese, that the Prior, Deans, and
Archdeacons, in their own persons, the chapter by one, and the
clergy by two, proper proxies, sufficiently empowered by the said
chapter and clergy, _should by all means be present at the
Parliament with him_ to do and to consent to those things, which,
by the blessing of GOD, by their common advice happened to be
ordained in the matters aforesaid, and that the giving this notice
should by no means be omitted by him.'"
"The clergy _thus summoned to Parliament_ by the King and
Diocesan, met for the choice of their proxies; for this purpose
the Dean or Prior held his chapter, and the Archdeacon his synod.
The representatives being chosen in these assemblies _were sent up
to Parliament_, with procuratorial letters from the chapter and
clergy to give them an authority to act in their names, and on the
behalf of their electors."--Collier's _Eccles. Hist._, Part II.
book iv.