"Trusty and right well-beloved,--We grete you well ... and also by the deliberate advice, consultation, consent, and agreement, _as well of the_ Bishops _and Clergie_ as by the Nobles and Commons Temporal of this our Realme _assembled in our High Courte of Parliament_, and by authoritie of the same, the abuses of the Bishop of Rome, ... but also the same our Nobles and _Commons_ bothe of _the Clergie_ and Temporaltie, by another several acte," &c.--Weever's _Fun. Mon._, p. 83., quoted by Atterbury. For multitudinous examples of the Convocation Clergy, "Prælati et clerus," being spoken of as not only of the parliament, but present _in_ it, I must refer CANON. EBOR. to Atterbury's work, pp. 61, 62, 63. And it is certain that, before the Commons can be proved to have been summoned to parliament at all, the inferior clergy sat there. In the parliament of Henry III. held at Westminster, 1228, there sat "the Archbishops, Bishops, Abbots, Priors, Templars, Hospitallers, Earls, Barons, {542} _Rectors of churches_, and they that held of the King in chief" (_Mat. Paris_, p. 361.), in which the order of precedence is worth observing. One more argument of CANON. EBOR.'s has to be met. He says (Vol. iv., p. 197.), "The Convocation of the Clergy never met either the sovereign or the parliament." The following quotations will destroy this position:-- "Though sometimes the King himself has vouchsafed to appear and sit in Convocation, when it was called for some extraordinary cause; as in Arundel's Register _Henry IV. is remembered to have done_ (in Conv. habitâ 23 Jul. 1408, causâ Uniones)."--_Atterbury_, p. 20. Also: "'Until the reign of Henry VII., there is a doubt whether the Convocation of the Clergy, then in separate existence from the Parliament since Edward I., had transacted purely ecclesiastical business not connected with the Government, or where the King was not present in person. (Henry IV., _Wilkins_, p. 310.) In the reign of Henry VIII., _who also sat in Convocation_, no Church Provincial Synod was held, and the House of Lords met and adjourned on the days on which Convocation transacted business in consideration to the bishops, who were barons of Parliament, and also members of the Upper House of Convocation. (_Wake._)'"--_Diocesan Synods_, by Rev. W. Pound, M.A.