1829. The Dangers of England aud Ireland. 229 
< 10.—The Bishop of Rome may open and shut Heaven to men. 
«1].—It appertaineth to the Bishop of Rome to judge which oath 
ought to be kept, and which not. 
“ 12.—The see of Rome hath neither spot nor wrinkle in it, and can- 
not err.” 
Such was the state of universal slavery into which popery had sunk 
mankind, and from which we were delivered by what we. cannot con- 
sider as less than the merciful interposition of God. 
The first legislative act of the Reformation, was the denial of the papal 
supremacy (25 Henry 8, c. 1); this was demolished by Mary, of bloody 
memory. 
The true basis of English religious liberty was the act (1 Eliz. ec. 1), 
entitled, “ An Act to restore to the Crown the ancient jurisdiction over 
the estate, eclesiastical and spiritual, and abolishing all foreign powers.” 
By this Act, all public officers, ecclesiastical and temporal, must take 
the Oath of Supremacy ; which oath, amended by subsequent acts, 
and finally settled at the accession of George the First, is as follows :— 
« J, A. B. do swear that I do, from my heart, detest and abjure, as 
impious and heretical, that damnable doctrine and position, that princes 
excommunicated or deprived by the pope or any authority of the see of 
Rome, may be deposed or murdered by their subjects, or any other 
whatsoever ; and I do declare that no foreign prince, person, prelate or 
state, or potentate, hath or ought to have any jurisdiction, power, supe- 
riority, pre-eminence, or authority, ecclesiastical or spiritual, within 
this realm. So help me God.” 
This oath was required from members of parliament within four years 
of its original enactment. By the Act (5 Eliz.c.11), ‘ Every person 
who hereafter shall be elected or appointed a knight, citizen or burgess, 
or baron of any of the five ports, for any. parliament or parliaments 
hereafter to be holden, shall, before he shall enter into the parliament- 
. house, openly receive and pronounce the said oath before the Lord 
Steward or his deputy—and he which shall enter into the parliament 
house without taking the said oath, shall be deemed no knight, and 
shall suffer as if he had presumed to sit without any election.” By an 
act after the Restoration of Charles the Second, the oath was appointed 
_ to be taken by the temporal peers. 
By the Act (13 Eliz. c. 2) “ The bringing in of papal, bulls, &c. as 
exciting disturbance, was made high treason.” By the Act (27 Eliz. 
c. 2) against Jesuits and designing priests, it was declared (third section), 
* That it shall not be lawful for any jesuit, or ecclesiastical person 
whatever, being born within the dominions of England, who shall be 
ordained or professed by any authority or jurisdiction derived from the 
see of Rome, to come into or remain in any part of this realm, or of the 
dominions thereof, other than for such time and such occasions as are 
_ expressed in this Act, and that every such offence shall be adjudged 
high treason.” 
Those laws completed the original code of the Reformation in England. 
Their purpose was the debarring from all power of evil to the 
Constitution all men who were not exclusively British subjects. The 
oath of supremacy, and its following acts, is against a divided allegiance, 
_ for there is no doubt to be entertained that the papist offers his allegiance 
to two powers at the same time—the pope and the king—and that the 
papal is the paramount one. 
The reign of Elizabeth had been one continued but triumphant re- 
? 
