The third and last question I proposed to consider relative to the Convocation was as to the civil governor’s de facto and de jure power over it; a large subject indeed, requiring a depth of thought and an accuracy of historical knowledge which cannot be expected in such papers as I am presenting to the reader. Asking then his indulgence for all defects in my mode of handling it, I will, in return, give him more in one respect than I engaged to do—viz., some account of the State’s power over the English Church generally, not merely over the Convocation. To this undertaking I now address myself, and shall so bring my papers to an end.
1.
The King’s power over the Church is popularly conveyed in the title “Head of the Church,” which has become a familiar phrase. It is a title, however, unknown (as I believe) to the Law at present, having been assumed by Henry, but abandoned by Elizabeth. This would not be worth noticing, except that it is usual, with many persons, to assume it is of authority, and to proceed to deduce conclusions from it; for instance, “the King is head of the Church, and therefore he may alter the liturgy;” whereas it is but a generalized term, the sign and symbol of certain defined and specific prerogatives which belong to him, such as the power of appointing bishops. It is not correct to say, “The King appoints the bishops because he is head of the Church;” rather, he is head of the Church because he appoints the bishops, etc. The simplest answer to such confused statements is to draw attention to the parallel supremacy of the King in civil matters. He is head of the State; yet no one dreams that he may therefore interfere with the constitutional rights of its separate members and functionaries.
With this caution, however, the title of Head will express the relation of the King to the Church, better, perhaps, than any other. The recognized constitutional title, and that which comes nearest to it, is “Supreme Governor;” but this, as we shall directly see, neither includes of necessity his appointment of the bishops, in which he commonly is said to act as the representative of the laity, nor his extensive church patronage, which is held on the same tenure with other patrons, though it is so great as to be virtually a constituent portion of his power. The very vagueness of the term Head is its recommendation.
I confine myself here, however, to the consideration of the supremacy, which is a supremacy of jurisdiction. The King is supposed to call the Church into being, that is, to develop that member of it existing in his own dominions, which is only in posse till he makes it actual; and, therefore, he claims to have authority over all its movements. In the 26 Henry VIII., the King is said to have “power to visit, repress, reform, order, etc., all such errors, heresies, abuses, etc., which by any manner of spiritual authority or jurisdiction ought to be visited;” and, in 37 Henry VIII., that ecclesiastical persons, such as archbishops, have “no manner of jurisdiction ecclesiastical, but by, under, and from him, to whom, by Holy Scripture, all authority and power is wholly given to hear and determine all manner of causes ecclesiastical, and to correct vice and sin whatsoever.”
This power is claimed in more accurate language in the instrument under which Cranmer exercised his episcopate in Edward’s time, as given in Burnet’s History. (Part ii., book 1, Records.) In this document, the King declares that “omnis juris dicendi auctoritas atque etiam jurisdictio omnimodo, tum illa quæ ecclesiastica dicitur, quam sæcularis, â regiâ potestate, velut a supremo capite ac omnium magistratuum infra regnum nostrum fonte et scaturigine, primitus emanaverit.”
2.
This being a general account of the Supremacy, let us consider it under the two heads of executive and juridical.
1. Executive; and here I shall confine myself to the King’s acts from Henry’s time to the accession of the Hanoverians, not, however, professing to do more than approximate to a complete list of them.
(1) Henry’s first act of pure Supremacy was in 1536. In all that went before he had had the concurrence of the Convocations; but, at this time, Cromwell published injunctions about Religion in his name, Cranmer (as it is believed) being the writer of them. These enforced upon all incumbents the reading in church of a declaration against the Pope, and in behalf of the King’s Supremacy, confirmed the Articles lately set forth by the Convocation, forbade the superstitious use of relics, etc., and gave sundry directions relative to education, charities, temporalities, etc. Shortly before this, Henry had given orders for the translation of the Bible, but this was at the petition of the Convocation. A more remarkable proceeding of the same year, though still with the sanction of the Convocation, was his interfering in the drawing up and correction of the Articles of Religion, published at that time.