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Show [54] [‘55] the Plantations and this Colony in particular." of our Ancef'tors, in leaving the Kingdom of England, was to be freed from aSubjefiion to its fpiritual Laws and Courts, and to worlhip God '1 he :iuthority of the Legiflature, lays the fame Author who la quoted by your Excellency, " does not extend to tar as the Fundamentals of the Conttttut on." " They ought to confider the Fundamental Laws as facred, if the Nation has .not in very exprefs Ferms,given them the Power to change them. For the Conllitution of the State ought to be fixed : And time that was firil eliabliihed by the i=~ation, which afterwards trufi.ed certain Perfons with the Legiflative Power, the fundamental Laws are excepted From their Commiflion." Now the Fundamentals of the Confiitution of this Province are flipulated in the Charter; the Reafoniug therefore in this Cafe holds equally good. Much leis then ought any A85 or Doings of the General Allembly, however numerous, to neither of which your Excel- lency has pointed us, which barely relate to Acts roE:_Parliament made to refpeé‘t the Plantations in general, or this Colony in particular," to be taken as an Acknowledgment of this People, or even of the Aflémbly, which inadvertently palled tliofe Aéts, that we are {object to the Supreme Authority of. Parliament. And with {lill lefs Reafon are the Decilions in the Executive Courts to deter- according to the Diflates of their Confciences. Your Excellency in your Hiflory obferves, that their Defign was " to obtain for themfelves and their Poflerity the Liberty of worfhipping God in fuch Manner as appeared to them mofi agreeable to the facred Scriptures." And the General Court themfelves declared in 1651, that " Peeing jufl Cattle to fear the Perfecution of the then ' Btlhop, and High Commillion for not conforming tothe Ceremonies of thofe under their Power, they thought it their fafefi Courfe, to get to this Outfide of the World; out of their View and beyond tbeir Rear/3." But if it had been their Serrfe, that they'were flill to be fubjeét to the Supreme Authority of Pariiament,tbey mull have known that their Deiign might and probably would ,be fruflrated ; that the Parliament, ef cially confideriug the Temper of more: Times, might make what ecclefiaftical Laws they pleal2 ed, exprefsly to refer to them, and place them in the fame Circumllances with Refpefi to religious Matters, to be relieved from which was the Part of the Rule of Law," which in‘ Faé‘t is not» Delign of their Removal. And we would add. that if your Excellency's Confiruétion cf the Claufe in our prefeut Charter is juft, another it mull be imputed to lnattertion or Error in Claul'e therein, which provides for Liberty of mine thisPoint. If they have adopted that "as Judgment, and cannotjuflly be urged as an Alteration or Relirifiion of the Legillative Authority of the Provmce. Confciencc for all Chriflians except Papifis, may be rendered void by an Aét of Parliament made to refer to us, requiring a Conformity to the Rites and Mode of Werlhip in the Church of Before we leave this Part of your Excellency,S Speech, we would obferve, that the great DFGE‘I _ C England, or any other. The: |
