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of the same place or his commissaries convicted by sentence, and the same wicked sect, preachings, doctrines, and opinions, schools, and informations, do refuse duly to abjure, or by the diocesan of the same place or his commissaries, after abjuration made by the same person, be pronounced relapsed, so that according to the holy canons he ought to be left to the secular court, whereupon credence shall be given to the diocesan of the same place, or to his commissaries in his behalf, then the sheriff of the county of the same place, and mayor and sheriff, or sheriff, or mayor and bailiff of the city, town and borough of the same county next to the same diocesan or said commissaries, shall be personally present in the preferring of such sentences, when they by the same diocesan or his commissaries shall be required; and they the same persons and every of them, after such sentence promulgate, shall receive and them before the people in an high place do to be burnt."

Sir John Ollcastle's Bill, 1410.

Stat. II, 125, Gee & Hardy, 133.

"To the most excellent lord the king and all the nobles in this present parliment assembled, your faithful commons do humbly show that our sovereign lord the king may have the temporal possessions and lands which by the bishops, abbots, and priors are spent and wasted in the realm, which would suffice to find the king with 15 earls, 1,500 knights, 6,200 squires, and 100 almshouses for the relief of poor people, more than there were then in England. That every earl should have of yearly rent 3,000 marks; every knight 100 marks and four plowlands; every esquire 40 marks and 2 plowlands; and every alms-house 100 marks, and be overlooked by two secular priests to each house. And over and above all these, the king might put yearly into his coffers 20,000 pounds. Provided also that every township should maintain their own poor, that could not labor, on condition that if any was overburdened with them, then the said townships to be relieved by the almshouses aforesaid. And for to bear the charges of all these things, "the commons affirmed in their bill, that the temporalities then in the possession of spiritual men amounted to 322,000 marks yearly rent. The commons also alleged, "That over and above the said sum of 322,000 marks, several houses of religion in England possessed as many temporalities as might suffice to find 15,000 priests, every priest to be allowed, for his stipend, seven marks a year.”

Walsingham II, 282; Hook IV, 489.

Act of Annates, 1532, 23 Hen. VIII, c. 20.

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Forasmuch as it is well perceived, by long approved experience, that great and inestimable sums of money have been daily conveyed out of this realm, to the impoverishment of the same; and especially such sums of money as the pope's holiness, his predecessors, and the court of Rome, by long time have heretofore taken of all and singular those spiritual persons which have been named, elected, presented, or postulated to be archbishops or bishops within this realm of England under the title of annates, otherwise called first fruits; which annates or first fruits have been taken of every archbishopric, or bishopric, within this realm, by restraint of the pope's bulls, for confirmations, elections, admissions, postulations, provisions, collations, dispositions, institutions, installations, investitures, orders, holy benedictions, polls, or other things requisite and necessary to the attaining of those their promotions; and have been compelled to pay, before they could attain the same, great sums of money, before they might receive any part of the fruits of the said archbishopric, or bishopric, whereunto they were named, elected, presented, or postulated; by occasion whereof, not only the treasure of this realm hath been greatly conveyed out of the same, but also it hath happened many times, by occasion of death, unto such archbishops, and bishops, so newly promoted, within two or three years after his or their consecration, that his or their friends, by whom he or they have been holpen to advance and make payment of the said annates, or first fruits, have been thereby utterly undone and impoverished; and for because the said annates haven risen, grown, and increased, by an uncharitable custom, grounded upon no just or good title, and the payments thereof obtained by restraint of bulls, until the same annates, or first fruits, have been paid, or surety made for the same; which declareth the said payments to be exacted, and taken by constraint, against all equity and justice:

The noblemen therefore of the realm, and the wise, sage, politic commons of the same, assembled in this present parliament, considering that the court of Rome ceaseth not to tax, take, and exact the said great sums of money, under the title of annates, or first fruits, as is aforesaid, to the great damage of the said prelates, and this realm; which annates, or first fruits, were first suffered to be taken within the same realm, for the only defence of christian people against the infidels, and now they be claimed and demanded as mere duty, only for lucre, against all right and conscience: insomuch that it is evi

dently known, that there hath passed out of this realm unto the court of Rome, since the second year of the reign of the most noble prince of famous memory, King Henry the seventh, unto this present time, under the name of annates, or first fruits, paid for the expedition of bulls of archbishoprics, and bishoprics, the sum of 800,000 ducats, amounting in sterling money, at the least, to eight score thousand pounds, besides other great and intolerable sums which have yearly been conveyed to the said court of Rome, by many other ways and means, to the great impoverishment of this realm; and albeit, that our said sovereign the king, and all his natural subjects, as well spiritual as temporal, being as obedient, devout, catholic and humble children of God, and holy church, as any people be within any realm christened; yet the said exactions of annates, or first fruits, be so intolerable and importable to this realm, that it is considered and declared, by the whole body of this realm now represented by all the estates assembled in this present parliament, that the king's highness before almighty God, is bound, as by the duty of a good christian prince, for the conservation and preservation of the good estate and commonwealth of this his realm, to do all that in him is to obviate, repress and redress the said abuses and exactions of annates, or first fruits; and because that divers prelates of this realm, being now in extreme age, and in other debilities of their bodies, so that of likelihood, bodily death in short time shall or may succeed unto them; by reason whereof great sums of money shall shortly after their deaths be conveyed unto the court of Rome, for the unreasonable and uncharitable causes above said to the universal damage, prejudice, and impoverishment of this realm, if speedy remedy be not in due time provided:

(It is therefore enacted that all such payments other than are declared in this act, shall cease, and no person shall pay them, upon pain to forfeit goods to the king; and if therefore any person is delayed or denied his bulls at the court of Rome, he shall be consecrated by his archbishop, being first named by the king, but shall still pay at the court of Rome 5 1. for every hundred that the promomotion is valued at.)

And forasmuch as the king's highness, and this his high court of parliament, neither have nor do intend to use in this, or any other like cause, any manner of extremity or violence, before gentle courtesy or friendship, ways and means first approved and attempted, and without a very great urgent cause and occasion given to the

contrary, but principally coveting to disburthen this realm of the said great exactions, and intolerable charges of annates and first fruits, have therefore thought convenient to commit the final order and determination of the premises, in all things, unto the king's highness, so that if it may seem to his high wisdom, and most prudent discretion, meet to move the pope's holiness, and the court of Rome, amicably, charitably, and reasonably, to compound, or to extinct and make frustrate the payments of the said annates, or first fruits, or else by some friendly, loving, and tolerable composition to moderate the same in such wise as may be by this realm easily borne and sustained; that then those ways and compositions taken, concluded and agreed, between the pope's holiness and the king's highness, shall stand in strength, force and effect of law, inviolably to be observed.

Stat. of the Realm III, 385; Gee & Hardy, 178.

The Restraint of Appeals, 1533, 24 Hen., VIII, c. 12.

"Whereby divers sundry old authentic histories and chronicles it is manifestly declared and expressed that this realm of England is an empire, and so hath been accepted in the world, governed by one sovereign head and king, having the dignity and royal estate of the imperial crown of the same, unto whom a body politic compact of all sorts and degrees of people, divided in terms and by names of Spirituality and Temporality, be bound and owe to bear next to God a natural and humble obedience; he being also instituted and furnished by the goodness and sufferance of Almighty God with plenary, whole, and entire power, preeminence, authority, prerogative, and jurisdiction to render and yield justice and final determination to all manner of folk residents or subjects within this his realm, in all causes, matters, debates and contentions happening to occur, arise, or begin within the limits thereof, without restraint or provocation to any foreign princes or potentates of the world. The body spiritual whereof having power when any cause of the law divine happened to come in question or of spiritual learning, then it was declared, interpreted and shewed by that part of the said body politic called the spirituality now being usually called the English church, which always hath been reputed and also found of that sort that both for knowledge, integrity and sufficiency of number it hath been always thought and is also at this hour sufficient and meet of itself, without the intermeddling of any exterior person or persons,

to declare and determine all such doubts and to administer all such offices and duties as to their rooms spiritual doth appertain; for the due administration whereof and to keep them from corruption and sinister affection, the king's most noble progenitors, and the antecessors of the nobles of this realm, have sufficiently endowed the said church both with honor and possessions:

And the laws temporal for trial of property of lands and goods and for the conservation of the people of this realm in unity and peace without ravin or spoil, was and yet is administered, adjudged and executed by sundry judges and administers of the other part of the said body politic called the temporality, and both their authorities and jurisdictions do conjoin together in the due administration of justice the one to help the other; And whereas the king's most noble progenitors and the nobility and commons of this said realm at divers and sundry parliaments as well in the time of King Edward the first, Edward the third, Richard the second, Henry the fourth, and other noble kings of this realm, made sundry ordinances, laws, statutes and provisions for the entire and sure conservation of the prerogatives, liberties and preeminences of the said imperial crown of this realm, and of the jurisdictions spiritual and temporal of the same, to keep it from the annoyance as well of the see of Rome as from the authority of other foreign potentates attempting the diminution or violation thereof as often and from time to time as any such annoyance or attempt might be known or espied:

And notwithstanding the said good statutes and ordinances made in the time of the king's most noble progenitors in preservation of the authority and prerogative of the said imperial crown as is aforesaid, yet nevertheless since the making of the said good statutes and ordinances divers and sundry inconveniences and dangers not provided for plainly by the said former acts, statutes and ordinances have risen and sprung by reason of appeals sued out of this realm to the See of Rome, in causes testamentary, causes of matrimony and divorces, right of tithes, oblations and obventions, not only to the great inquietation, vexation, trouble, costs and charges of the king's highness and many of his subjects and residents in this his realm, but also to the great delay and let to the true and speedy determination of the said causes, for so much as the parties appealing to the said court of Rome most commonly do the same for the delay of justice. And forasmuch as the great distance