CHAP. V. (Book 5)
That it subjects the supreme Magistrate to their censures, &c.
FOurthly, they have not onely exempted themselves in their duties of * 1.1 their own function from the tribunal of the Sovereign Magistrate, or Supreme Senate, but they have subjected him, and them (yea even in the discharge of the Sovereign trust) to their own Consistories, even to the highest censure of Excommunication, which is like the cutting of a member from the body Natural, or the out-lawing of a * 1.2 Subject in the body politick. Excommunication, that very engine, whereby the Popes of old advanced themselves above Emperours. To discipline m•…•…st all the Estates within this Rcalm be subject: as well R•…•…∣lers, * 1.3 as they that are ruled. And elswhere, all mea, as well Magi∣strates as Inferiours, ought to be subject to the judgement of General As∣semblies. And yet again, no man that is in the Church, o•…•…ght to be ex∣empted * 1.4 from Ecclesiastical censires. What horrid and pernicious mis∣chiefs do use to attend the Excommunication of Sovereign Magi∣strates, I leave to every mans memory or imagination. Such cour•…•…es make great Kings become cyphers, and turn the tenure of a crown co∣pie-hold, ad voluntatem Dominorum. Such Doctrines might better be∣come some of the Roman Alexanders or Bonifaces or Grego•…•…ius or Plus Quintus than such great Professours of Humility, such great disclaimers of Authority, who have inveighed so bitterly against the Bishops for