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OPINIONS OF OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITIES.

sums of money, that they easily condescended to the requests of the commissioners; and Crook, the king's agent, writes that he found the greatest part of the divines of all Italy mercenary;' and tells that he doubts but all Christian universities, if they should be well handled, would earnestly conclude with his Majesty;' adding, that if he had been sufficiently furnished with money, though he had procured, besides the seals which he then sent, 110 subscriptions, yet it had been of nothing in comparison with what he might, and easily would have done."

Now what have we here? This writer had quoted Jeremy Taylor, to prove that there was at that period "a general consent that the judicial degrees do not, by any law of God, bind Christians to their observation." It is presumed there is a general consent to that proposition still. But what are the "judicial degrees?" Supposing it were as Cavendish_asserts, it would only prove that they were reluctant to declare that Pope Julius had done wrong in granting a dispensation to Henry, and Pope Clement was doing wrong in refusing to retract it. That the divines of Italy were mercenary, and for a consideration might be got to give an opinion contrary to the act of a dead Pope, and the intentions of a living one, it did not need the testimony of a court sycophant, anxious to get as much money into his hands as possible, to testify. But what are we to think of the writers who, on scraps like this, set their face against the whole stream of European history, civil and ecclesiastical, for 1500 years; and affirm, as this American writer proceeds immediately to do," No doubt that the influence of the tyrant Henry VIII. gave a bias to the opinions of Christendom, which, even at this day, has not ceased to prevail?”*

We have already shown that the Canonists did maintain that such marriages were forbidden by Scripture. The reason assigned by Hume for the hesitation of Oxford and Cambridge was, not that they were less, but more Popish than the continental universities. They were "alarmed at the progress of Lutheranism, and dreading a defection from the Holy See, scrupled to give their sanction to measures whose consequences they feared would prove fatal to the ancient religion." In short, they were less honest than the continental universities, and scrupled to give an opinion which would place in a difficulty Pope Clement, who, for personal, selfish considerations, hesitated to give an opinion contrary to Pope Julius, who had granted the dispensation.

The Council of Trent did decide that the church had the dispensing power, but whether that was expressed by Pope or Council, or both, is not determined. Canon iii. De Matrimonia is, "Si quis dixerit, eos tantum consanguinitatis et affinitatis gradus qui in Levitico exprimantur, posse impedire matrimonium contrahendum, et dirimere contractum: nec posse ecclesiam in nonnullis illorum dispensare, aut constituere, ut plures impediant et dirimant, anathema sit." "If any one shall say that only those degrees which are expressed in Leviticus can hinder marriage to be contracted, and dissolve it when contracted, and that the church cannot dispense in some of them, or decree that many may hinder and dissolve, let him be accursed." Here, as Chemnitz in his "Examen," who gives an admirable reply to this anathema, says, "What then, is the controversy on this question between the Papists and us? I answer, that in these prohibitions of divine and natural law the Romish Church assumes to itself the authority and power of dispensing; that is, that of its own

* See "Lawfulness of Marriage,” p. 563.

POPE'S DISPENSING POWER-COUNCIL OF TRENT.

35

authority and power it can relax and dissolve divine prohibitions; and thus the Tridentine canon denounces anathema, if any one should say that the church cannot dispense in some of those degrees which are divinely prohibited."* And yet men, who write with great confidence, like this American writer and his copyists, do not hesitate to say, "But the Roman Catholics did not say that they found all their marriage laws in the Bible." Certainly they did not. But what follows is not the whole truth, viz., "Those which were understood to be forbidden in the Bible were held, by at least the sounder doctors in the Church of Rome, to be without the dispensing power of the Pope, so that he could not grant leave to contract them; but over all those which were forbidden only by the church, he was understood to have a dispensing power." The above canon proves that the dispensing power is held by the Council of Trent to reside somewhere in the church, even in cases forbidden by Scripture; and therefore the fact of the Pope's dispensation in the case of Henry VIII. is no proof that he held the prohibition of the marriages in question to stand on a lower ground than others prohibited in Scripture. Popes did not always follow the opinion of the "sounder doctors;" and it is a historical fact that the Council of Trent was ruled altogether from Rome.†

The writers on the other side, then, both mistake the question and pervert the whole facts of history. Any one who wishes to be further informed on the subject of the marriage of Henry, may consult Fuller's "Church History of Britain." We have seen that the question turned on the point, whether Pope Julius had a right to dispense with the law of God when he granted Henry VIII. a dispensation to marry the widow of his brother Arthur. If he had not, then, it was argued, ought Pope Clement, his successor, to annul his dispensation. Some unprincipled Popish controversialists maintained that Julius had the right. The question was submitted to the universities of Europe, and ten of them declared that it was above the Pope's power to dispense with the positive law of God. The question was not as to the law, but as to the Pope's power to dispense with it. Fuller says, "Of all the universities declaring for the Pope's inability to dispense with God's positive command, most bold and daring (because largest, fullest, clearest), was that of Bononia, the chief city in Romandiola, a province of Peter's patrimony, and that city the Pope's retiring place. Nor can I omit the conclusion of their declaration: We confidently do hold and witness, that such marriage is horrible, accursed, and to be cried out upon, and utterly abominable, not only for a Christian man, but for an infidel, unfaithful, or heathen, and that it is prohibited, under grievous pains and punishments, by the law of God, of nature, and of man; and that the Pope, though he may do much, unto whom Christ gave the keys of the kingdom of heaven, hath no power to give a dispensation to any man to contract such marriage. In witness whereof we confirm this our judgment, both under the seal of our University, as also with the seal of our College of Doctors of Divinity, and have subscribed it in the cathedral church of Bonony, the tenth day of June, in the year of our Lord 1530.'" The stories of bribes and of Crook's management, Fuller sets aside in his usual quaint fashion, and adds, "The best is, the cleanly hands of the court of Rome

"Examen Decretorum Concilii Tridentini," Pars Secunda, p. 1236.

Father Paul, in his History of the Council of Trent, tells us, so much was this the case, that the wags about the Council said, in reference to their calling the decrees the decisions of the Holy Spirit, that the Holy Ghost was brought from Rome in a cloak-bag.

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FULLER'S OPINION OF SOME BISHOPS.

had never, no doubt, any bribes sticking to their fair fingers. But though that English angels (a coin) flew over to foreign universities, yet there lieth a real distinction betwixt a bribe and a boon freely bestowed, not to bow and bias their opinions, but to gratify their pains and remunerate their industry, in studying of the point." The truth is, all Popish authorities had more interest in sustaining the right of the Pope to dispense with the law, and so enable another Pope to manage Henry for his own interests, than Henry had in procuring a denial of the right. At all events, the judgment of the Universities is unquestionably the judgment of the Canon Law, as it had been of the whole professedly Christian Church from the beginning, viz., that such marriages were unlawful. I know not whether it argues the greater ignorance and confusion in regard to any historical fact, or the greater dishonesty, deliberately to argue any question on the truth of the contrary

assertion.

Fuller, after discussing the question by the usual arguments, says,-"Thus far the sum of the sense of Protestants and others. No fewer than an hundred authors were writing at this time against this marriage, all which were produced by the king in the next Parliament. Yet very many Papists professed their judgments in print on the contrary side, both English and outlandish divines; and (to give them their due) brought very plausible arguments." He enumerates these advocates of various countries for the Pope's power to dispense with the law of God, and introduces the enumeration in the following terms:-" Of all these, John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, led the front, whom some Catholics call Saint John, because beheaded like the Baptist, though on contrary accounts-John Baptist for saying, it is not lawful, Mark vi. 18; John Fisher for saying, it is lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife."

These statements have received more attention than their intrinsic value, in the sight of any one competently informed on the subject, can claim, only because it is useful to let it be seen how little dependence is to be placed on the rash averments of the men who are straining every nerve to delude the public mind; and with whom any kind of assertion that makes for their view, is an authority and an argument. The reader will now be able to judge of such a piece of history as the following, contained in one of the tracts in the "Collectanea Majora" of the Libertarians :-"Henry did indeed make his own determinations' with the universities. 6 At Oxford the Masters of Arts were threatened; but standing firm, they were expelled and punished. At Cambridge the recusants were bribed without effect; but at last were persuaded to leave the house without voting. The foreign universities were brought over by bribes. This is expressly stated by Cavendish (Cavend. Mems., p. 99), and expressly alleged by the English parliament (1 Mary, sess. 2, v. 1)." The uninitiated will now understand the mystic signs, "Cavend. Mems.," and can determine the point without the authority of a servile Crook, agent of the tyrant Henry, or of the crouching slaves of the bloody Mary.

No man, we presume, questions what is the opinion of the Church of England on this subject, though it be not contained in any one of the Thirty-nine Articles. The doctrine of the Westminster Confession of

*The 99th canon (A.D. 1603) is as follows:-"No person shall marry within the degrees prohibited by the laws of God, and expressed in a table set forth by authority, in the years of our Lord God, 1563. And all marriages so made and contracted shall be judged incestuous and unlawful, and consequently shall be dissolved as void from the beginning;

WESTMINSTER DIVINES-THEIR FAITHFULNESS AND ABILITY. 37

Faith we have already quoted, and little more need be said on that score. But as it is fashionable with a certain class of writers to speak of it with contempt, it may be proper to remind those who are little versant in such questions, of the nature and character of this Assembly. It was called by the Lords and Commons of Great Britain. It consisted, first and last, including the Scotch Commissioners, of more than 200 members-peers, commoners, lawyers, and divines-all of the highest name and learning both in theology and law, and bound by solemn oath to decide nothing but according to holy Scripture in matters of faith. One hundred and upwards of these divines attended regularly. It lasted about four years. Any man who will read Principal Robert Baillie's quaint account of this Assembly, see their extreme care, and long and anxious discussions of every point; and glance his eye over the list of names, and then at his own library, unless it be very defective in English theology, will have no very comfortable reflection in then observing the sneers of some modern pamphleteers, and may be somewhat surprised when such a man as Mr Binney of London sneers at Scotch notions as derived from what he calls "their Confession," though it happened to be England's before it was "theirs." It is much to be doubted if the times of Charles the Second, when this Confession was cast off, reflect very great glory on England. The celebrated John Owen, who copied this Confession almost verbatim for the Congregational Churches, will be held a more competent witness to its value than even Mr Binney. The Westminster divines were, of all others, in the most favourable position for examining the question. They had not only thrown off the yoke of Popery, but lived after the excitement of the Reformation had ceased, and when every question of criticism, morals, and moral and ecclesiastical jurisprudence, had been put into the crucible. They were men of vast learning, and specially selected for the duty. They deliberated and discussed, in committees and Assembly, every point seriatim, and clause by clause. They sat long, and had all the means of a great nation at command for their work. They were solemnly sworn to discharge their duty faithfully. When one looks at the names, and then the tomes, of a Twiss, a Gouge, a Godwin, a Gattaker, an Arrowsmith, a Lightfoot, a Calamy, a Caryl, a Marshall, a Manton (who writes the preface to the Confession of Faith), a Gillespie, and a host of others, and remembers that they had such men as the great Selden to cope with on points on which they differed, and met him successfully, though on the question in hand they had no difference of opinion-one is at a loss how to treat the flippancy of those who presume to despise them. I have noticed this point the more specially, from the wretched attempts made, in our day, to disparage this noble document, by many whose antecedents rebuke their degeneracy.

Section VII.-Opinions of American Protestants.

The doctrine of the Reformed Churches of Britain passed with the Puritans into America, and was, till very recently, the doctrine of its civil law, as well as of the various sections of the Christian Church. In the Presbyterian Church a case came before the Synod, in the year 1717, in which

the parties so married shall, by course of time, be separated, and the aforesaid table shall be in every church publicly set up and fixed at the charge of the parish." The table referred to is that known as Parker's Table, which contains these "Wife's Sister, Hus. band's Brother; Brother's Wife, Sister's Husband."

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OPINIONS OF AMERICAN PROTESTANTS.

such marriages were pronounced, nemine contradicente, incestuous and unlawful, and it was declared that so long as the parties lived together they must be debarred from sealing ordinances. Nothing more seems to have occurred on this subject till more than forty years thereafter. From 1758 on to 1842 there were several cases, in some of which decisions were given on different grounds, more or less stringent. The following summary of the more recent, is given by one who writes in favour of such marriages. After detailing various cases, he says,

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May 24th, 1825.-The committee appointed by the last Assembly on the subject involved in the appeal did not report. Resolved, That they be continued. May 19th, 1826.-The committee appointed by the former Assembly on the subject involved in the appeal did not report. Resolved,That this committee be discharged, and that the subject be committed to Dr Neil, Dr Heron, Mr Fisher, Dr Chester, and Dr Anwell, with instructions that they report during the sessions of the present Assembly. Just ten days after, that committee reported that, in their opinion, no relief can be given to the said M'Rimon without an alteration in the Constitution, ch. xxiv. sec. iv., the last clause of which declares that the man may not marry of his wife's kindred nearer in blood than of her (his ?) own.' But, inasmuch as a diversity of opinion and practice obtains on this very important subject, they submitted the following resolution, namely:

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6

Resolved, That the Presbyteries be, and they hereby are, directed to take this matter into serious consideration, and send up, in writing, to the next General Assembly, an answer to the question, Whether the abovequoted clause of our Constitution shall be erased? The report was adopted.

"At the meeting in May 1827, fifty Presbyteries reported against the erasure, eighteen in favour of it, and twenty sent no report. It seems to be the fair presumption that those twenty Presbyteries were in doubt, and, therefore, did not report either for or against the erasure.*

"Her last case of the kind, that of Archibald M'Queen, came before the Assembly of 1842, by appeal from the Presbytery of Fayetteville, who had suspended him from the exercise of his office and the communion of the church because he had married the sister of his deceased wife. The Assembly, by a large majority, refused to sustain the appeal. Sixty-eight voted not sustain, eight to sustain in part, five were non liquit, and one was excused from voting. Thirty-four had obtained leave of absence that morning, and twelve the previous day.

"The cases of Presbyteries which have been stated (13 in all) came before the supreme judicatories in the course of one hundred and twentyfive years, ending in the year 1842. These cases consist of one marriage between the relicts of brothers and sisters, two marriages to the widows of brothers, one of them a half-brother, four marriages to the nieces of former wives, and six to their sisters."†

Even in this resumé by a partial hand, it is very clear that the American Presbyterian General Assembly, even up to 1842, held such marriages either anti-scriptural or unscriptural, and unlawful, sinful, and inexpedient. What were their special shades of difference, it concerns us little, as an authority to us, to know. It is clear, however, that they, in common with all the churches of the Reformation, originally held the marriages in ques

* It is more probable that they never considered the 'subject.

Marshall on Lawfulness of Marriage, &c.