and would haue quoted these not in his name but in Ambroses But yet then you took your mark amisse also For he hath no bookes neither that simply cary these titles Indeed he hath writen fiue de fide ad Gratianum and one de fide orthodoxâ contra Arrianos and a booke he hath writen de his qui initiantur mysteriis and fiue de sacramentis but in no seuenth nor eleuenth Chapters of any of his bookes de fide or symbolo hath he any thing to serue your turne Neuer man therefore was so abused as you Master Albine were I thinke in taking so few quotations of credit I would therefore henceforth aduise you vnlesse you be euen resolued vtterly to leese your credit trust no more thus either other mens eies or fingers Well Basil and Arnobius are yet behinde let vs see if you hit any rightlier of your places out of them you cite Basils 15 and 75 Chapters de Spiritu Sancto and Arnobius vpon the 27 Psalme Neither of which you haue rightly quoted For there are but 30 Chapters in al Basils booke de Spiritu Sancto as Erasmus hath translated him caused him to bee published and Arnobius vpon the twenty seuen Psalme hath not at all mentioned any ceremony about baptisme Basil in his fifteene and twenty seuen Chapters of that booke and Arnobius vpon the seuenty fiue Psalme make mention of abrenuntiation of some other ceremonies before mentioned by the other fathers but yet neither these nor all the other laied togither that you haue named either in the places mentioned by you nor any where else mention al the ceremonies which you vse by far though you would by your lowd bragging make your reader beleeue they doe Thus you see vnlesse you had beene disposed vtterly for euer to shame your selfe you could not in so few quotations especially not set on your margent but in your lines as they are the better to preuent wrong applying of them haue beene taken with thus many grosse ouersightes May not any man worthilie thinke you hereby iudge that howsoeuer the names of the fathers are familiar with you that yet you are a verie stranger in their workes indeed Of twenty places you haue alleadged aright and to the purpose scarse fiue and of seuen fathers belike because you would not deale partiallie with them your happe hath beene one waie or other to erre in quoting of euerie one of them Surelie you are worthie to bee trusted vpon your bare word without any further examination of your quotations an other time you haue dealt so faythfully and vprightlie in these And to conclude this point withall as though you had most rightly quoted and that they most pregnantlie had iustified all your Ceremonies as you vse them you confidently tell your reader that if hee will reade these places hee shall finde that they did vse the verie Ceremonies that you doe vse and wee so much myslike Thus yet you coulde set a good face on the matter though you could doe little else But in good earnest is it your meaning by these places to make mē before that none are to be accoūted rightly baptised vnles vnto him all these your ceremonies which you talke of be vsed What say you then to Christs baptisme and the multitudes baptised by Iohn in Iorden and after by the Apostles sometimes in one day in water that was next to hād Sure I am that none of your ceremonies that you striue for here so much which we mislike was vsed then to anie of them and yet I am sure neuer were any with these ceremonies of yours better baptized then these were Nay to presse you a litle further if these ceremonies were so necessarie as you pretend how chāceth it that aboue 600. yeares after Christ that is long after any of the fathers you haue named to countenance them withal we read in Bedaes story so often mētion as we do of so great multitudes here in England by famous Bishops baptised in one daie in common riuers It is vnpossible that they should baptise so many in so short time as that story shewes they did and yet vse to euery one all the solemnity of ceremonies that you here thus pleade for It is cleare thē by that practise that for all this and whatsoeuer else any where either these or any other doctour before that time had writen hereof that then there was no such danger imagined to bee in omitting of these as your Tridentine coūcell now would make men beleeue there is But for a general answere to al that you or any of your side haue or can alleadge out of any father either for the iustifying your kinde of vsing these your ceremonies or any of the other three points that follow in this Chapter as long as you are not able to warrant your doings and opiniōs therin by the scriptures which we are sure you shall neuer be able to doe by the fathers leaue though they were as pregnant for you as you pretend which they are not neither that by the direction and aduise of the best of themselues we will may chuse for all their writings whither we will like any whit the better of them or no. For Hierom saieth that all things which mē seeke out and inuent at their owne pleasure without authority and testimony of the scripture as though they were the traditions of the Apostles the sword of God cutteth of Vpon the first of Aggei And Origen in his first homily vpon Hierom confesseth that their iudgements without witnes of the scripture were of no credit And Hierom againe vpon the 98. Psalme writeth that all which they spake they were to proue by the scriptures and vpon the 23. of Mat. he saieth plainely that which hath not authority from the scriptures as easily is despised as approued And Chrysostome vpon the 2. to Tim. Hom. 9. saieth if there be any thing either to learne or to be ignorant of we shall learne it in the scriptures And as for all other authority Hilary saieth in his 7. booke of the trinity that it is short darke troublesome And as for Augustine he of all the rest hath most plainely taught vs this in his 19. Epistle to Hierom and also in his 111. epistle to Fortunatian where he plainely shewes that hee gaue no further credit to any mans writings then he found them agreeable to the scriptures and therefore de baptismo contra Donatistas li. 2. cap. 3. he refuseth to be pressed either with the authority of Cyprian or any other man or councell further then by the canonicall scriptures their iudgements are approued and he teacheth Paulina in his 112. epistle not to follow his authority or to beleeue a thing because he hath said it but to beleue the canonicall scripture We saie therefore with him lib. 1. cap. 22. de peccatorum meritis remissione let vs yeeld cōsent vnto the holy scriptures which can neither deceaue nor be deceaued
remedy but that we must needs grant all this to be true he taketh occasion to triumph and to frame a bitter inuectiue against our Religion and liues so concluding his wordy preface with an exhortation to his Reader to forsake vs our Religiō to ioine againe with thē in theirs All which because it is nothing but the vaine malitious wordes of a foolish aduersary without proofe or shadowe of proofe which therefore I am sure the wise Reader will make no reckoning of I might very well let passe with this onely answere that whatsoeuer he hath here said braggingly either in the commendation of his Religion Church or to the disgrace of ours is vtterly false and that I haue plentifully proued it so to be in sundry places of this my answere Howbeit seing this is not only his brag but the brag also a nūber of times of Iohn de Albine in the booke following indeed is in effect the only thing by taking whereof granted most subtily they all their fellowes seeke to beguile their simple readers it shal not be amisse because here first we meete with it least otherwise the Reader should be too ready to suffer his hart to be sorestald with this false principle to the preiudice of the truth somewhat to say to make both the vanity falshood hereof to appeare to euery one First therefore it is worthy the marking that the mā though as hee plainly sheweth hee had here a full purpose at least in wordes to giue as great countenaunce as he could to his cause that yet he seekes to giue it credit but by the testimonie of fathers consent of Christian regions and prescription of time in the meane time omitting that which is to be preferd before all these namely the testimony of the vndoubted word of God reuealed set downe in the scriptures wherein he hath dealt but as the nature of his cause requires which hath no countenance from thence and as the fashion of other of his companiōs in this case is For hereupō it is that there is nothing more cōmon in their discourses then to labour by all meanes they can the disgrace of the written word of god and to establish the credite of a word vnwritten which they count to be the traditions or ordinary practise of the Church of Rome To this ende they bestowe so much paines as they doe at least to make shewe of proofe that the scriptures are so darke and obscure so insufficiēt for the direction of the Church in all matters and of so vveake authority of themselues without the authority and testimonie of the Church to countenance them that without the foresaid vnwritten word no man could either fully or certainly be setled and established in the truth So that herein this is their drift that they indeed being without all sounde warrant out of the canonicall scriptures for those thinges which wee count erroneous in thē they yet may make their followers beleeue that they haue as good ground as need be for them in that they can proue thē by the tradition of the Church which they call the word of god vnwritten and which they hold to be not onely aequal vnto the other that is written but also far more full and certaine for the determining the trueth of all controuersies And therefore Soto contra Brentium Canisius cap. 5. of his Catechisme and Lindan lib. 5. cap. 10. of his panoplie are not ashamed to confesse reckening almost all the pointes in controuersie betwixt them and vs that they haue their ground and warrant from tradition not written in the scriptures And hereupon it is that there is nothing more common with any of them then when wee presse them with this that the opinions for the which we striue with them haue no warrāt in the scripture yea that the scriptures rightly vnderstoode are flatte against them therein to flye to tradition which is the cause that this fellowe him selfe was so busie before to abuse Irenaeus for the countenance of that onely foundation of their Religion For this cause we may doe say of them that iustly by their owne confessiō as Tertullian saide of the hereticks in his time they cannot stand if they be driuen once to determine al their controuersies by the scriptures de Resurrectione Carnis cap. 3. Now as for vs Christian reader for all this lewde bragge of his we appeale to these scriptures of god and onely wee allowe of them as of a most perfect touchstone whereby to trye in all matters of Religion the pure golde from the counterfait crauing no further liking nor allowance in any thing then by them wee are able soundly to proue and confirme that which we say and teach And the ancient holy fathers and so the Christian regions in al ancient prescription of time which are the things that he here brags of as it appeares in all sound monuments of antiquity euer since these scriptures were written for the determining of controuersies in their times haue alwaies taken this course to cōfute confound all aduersaries to the truth As for their owne authority or the authority of any other before them no further credit they craue then as they are foūd to agree with these scriptures otherwise the more that haue couseted the lōger they held the worse This I haue made manifest by plētifull testimony of the ancient fathers thēselues cap. 3.5.23 And therfore whiles he sends vs thus to the fathers Christian regions consent prescription of time he sēds vs but about the bush for when we come to thē they will send vs backe againe to the scriptures But whiles they take this course in seeking rather countenance for their cause any where else then at or by the canonicall scriptures in the iust iudgement of god they plainly bewray themselues to euery simple mā to haue but a bad cause that they so shun the light and refuse the most certaine most indifferent triall of it which questionles is by these scriptures whose neither authority nor indifferecy without blasphemy may once be called in question Indeed I read that whē they were pressed with the authority of these scriptures the Marcionites pretēded for the defence of their heresy their paraclet or cōforters visiōs instructiōs that likewise the Mōtanists did fly to their prophecy the Valētinians to their dreams of their Aeons the Manichees to their fundamētal Epistle the Iewes to their Talmud the Turks to their Alcaron belike lest these should be foūd vnlike these their predecessors they will thus fly from the vndoubted authority of god speaking in the scriptures to the vncertaine and variable authority of man Yet if this were true that he saith that they haue the auncient holy fathers the common consent of all Christian regions pre scriptiō of time of their side it were sōewhat some likelihood it were that things were with thē as he saith I must needs cōfesse
must needs be good and lawfull and ours the plaine contrarie Howbeit if we examine this point throughly we shall find that they haue as weake helpe hence as from the other or from any thing else For whither they vnderstand by right succession succession without interruption in place person or office seuerally or iointly togither neither can their Bishops and Priests as they are now truelie saie they haue it nor yet if they could they being gone as they be from the soule and life of right Apostolicke succession namely the Catholicke and Apostolicke trueth are they euer the better And of the contrarie though it were neuer so true that we could not deduce vnto our present Bishops and Pastours downe from the Apostles or their times without interruptiō the line of succession in place person and office yet we being able to shew as wee are that we holde one and selfesame doctrine with them that would iustify our Church and ministers sufficientlie notwithstanding the want of the former This is quickly and easily sayed you will saie but these thinges cannot so readily bee proued I graunt to proue them will cost the more paines otherwise the proofe is readie and pregnant enough and that I doubt not but if with any indifferency that which I shall write to that ende bee marked shall ere it bee long appeare I say therefore first that the Roman Bishops and Priestes as they are now and haue beene a long time whatsoeuer they brag no not their verie Popes vnto whose right succession Stapleton and others trust most haue any right succession either to any Apostle or Apostolick man in place person or office For first they can neuer soundly proue the proofes out of the scripture are so strong to the contrary their proofes out of the stories so disagreeing and variable in all circumstances that Peter the Apostle whose successours their Popes claime to be and from whom al other Bishops and Priests amongst them haue their vocations and authority deriued was either euer at Rome or being there that hauing laied aside his Apostleship which was the greater and higher office he sate there as Bishop Secondly vnto this day they cannot agree of the order of succeeding one another betwixt Linus Cletus Clemēt Anaclet Vrspergensis in the life of Claudius hath notably at large set out both the difference of opinions in this matter and also the vncertainty of the trueth Thirdly none of any learning and reading can be so ignorant in the stories of the Bishops of Rome but he knowes that they haue not succeeded one another frō the Apostles to this day wtout interruptiō alwaies neither in place persō nor office For besids that sūdry times many Popes for some short time haue sate from Rome it is notoriously knowen that Clement the 5. about the yeare 1305. translated the Popes see from Rome into France to Auinion where it continued aboue 70. years And as for immediate orderly successiō of persons amongst them how is it possible truely certainly to define set downe that seing that see hath not onely stoode vacant daies weekes monethes and years somtimes 2. sometimes more but also there hath bene at once so often not only 2. but often 3. sometime more euery one striuing with his fauorers to be accoūted to be the right Pope And lastly by that which I haue said before of the nature of their offices of Popes Cardinalles Bishoppes Priestes their practise prouing daily my words therein to be most true how dare any mā that hath any feare of God once say or think that they in their offices haue any affinity with the Apostles or any Apostolicke man Light darknes are not more differing the one from the other then the offices of Apostles Euāgelists Prophets Pastours Doctours in the ancient primitiue Apostolick Church differeth from these offices of theirs Secondly whereas I sayed though yet they could which now you see they cannot truely say that they succeed the Apostles Apostolicke men in place person and office yet they were neuer the nearer my reasons thereof are these First I finde that wicked people wicked Priests in the scriptures often haue had this kinde of succession to pleade for themselues against the true Prophets and against Christ himselfe as you may see Ierem. 7. vers 4. cap. 8. vers 8. Iohn 8. v. 44. Vriah the Priest in King Ahaz time had this successiō frō Aaron and yet he to please that Idolatrous king set vp cōtrary to the commandement of the Lord an altar according to the patterne that the King had sent him of one that hee had seene at Damascus 2. King 16.10.11 The high Priests that withstoode alwaies Christ his doctrine and in the ende crucified him had this kinde of sucession yet none of these or their doings were any thing the more iustifiable for this Againe though Stapleton lib. 13. doctrinalium principiorū cōfesses that the Greekes haue beene scismatiques and heretiques this 500. yeares yet he all the sort of them of any reading know that not they only but also the Patriarches of Antioch and Alexandria and the Bishops of sundry other famous Churches in the world all which likewise they holde bee scismatiques and heretiques can doe make as great shew of this kinde of succession for the countenancing of their ministery and Churches as they themselues for they knowe that the Patriarch of Constantinople doeth deduce his locall and personall succession from Andrew the Apostle that the Patriarch of Antioch now sitting at Damascus doeth likewise his from Peter which he may doe more certainly then the Popes when they sate at Auinion could for it is euident Gal. 2. ver 11. euen by the scripture it selfe that Peter was at Antioch so is it not that he was at Rome In like maner they knowe that the Patriarch of Alexandria now holding his seate at Alcairum deriues his from the Euangelist Saint Marke And ignorant they are not that the Arrians preuailing as they did and in the ende hauing got the most seats of Bishops to be furnished with men of their dānable opinion that they for that time were able to holde this plea aswell as themselues and yet I am sure they will graūt that none of these were therfore or are therfore to be allowed iustified They will say I am sure for so I finde thē plainly to reply in their writings yea euen Iohn de Albine himselfe afterward Cap. 7. that though these all can and doe plead succession in place person and office that yet it cannot iustifie them because not onelie they haue helde some of them detestable heresies but presently also doe still Indeede I must needs confesse that I read that Macedonius Nestorius and Paulus Sergius abrupted the line of right successiō by their heresies at Constantinople that Paulus Samosatenus did the like at Antioch and that Dioscorus and Petrus Moggus did likewise at Alexanderia And
abrogated that order and haue thence forth left euery one whē he communicated iudicio conscientiae suae as Zozomen there plainely affirmes he did neither before that could one confessour haue serued for all the Christians in that great and famous City where I read in Iustinians time there were sixty ministers But this is the plaine trueth it was vsed and exhorted vnto as a good profitable order to be vsed so long and so far forth as they saw it needful and a furtherance to vertue and godlinesse And this is certaine the fathers by Albine here cited for auricular confession speake onely either for publicke confession of publikly knowen notorious sinnes before the receit of the sacrament or else onely to perswade men when they feele themselues sicke of sinne and grieued with the burden thereof in conscience then to confesse such their sinnes vnto some godly discreet minister that hath both skill and will to comfort their distressed soules In which case and maner wee allow and like aswell as they that men should so doe and it is a thing much vsed and practized amongst vs. There is lastly a confession of sinne of one brother or Christian to an other whom he hath offended to breed reconciliation againe betwixt the parties taught by Christ Matthew the fift and eighteenth Chapters Luke the seuenteenth and Iames the fifth allowed both by scriptures and fathers with one consent and this before the receit of the sacrament and at all other tymes wee teach and vse as very necessary Other confessions then these we neither finde taught nor practized in the old Testament nor new nor yet vrged by any of the ancient fathers you name either in the places by you remembred or else where and therefore you haue but beene abused and now seeke by the sound of their names to abuse others whiles you would make men beleeue because they speake of some of these kindes of confessing of sinnes or other in these places that therfore they speak for your Lenten shrift or auricular confession which was not so much as once thought of by any of them nor for many hundreth yeares after the latest of thē by any other writer of credit The question indeede betwixt you and vs then in this poynt is not whither sinnes be to bee confessed at all before wee receiue For yee see most willingly we confesse sundry wayes they may and ought but this is it whither such particuler and speciall confession of all our sinnes and the circumstances thereof that we can possibly by due premeditation had thereof remember in secret to a Priest be by Gods ordinance absolutely necessarie to remission of sinnes for all of both sexes once in the yeare at the least or no. Wee holde the negatiue and you the affirmatiue That sinnes haue beene and may agayne bee in secret confessed to such as be faithfull ministers and that the so doing some tyme is very good and profitable wee deny not you see but either to imagine such a necessity as you teach thereof or to bynde to such a full enumeration of all at anie tyme are the thinges wee saie which you can neuer proue either by Scripture or father For your owne Gratian brings sundry authorities before that Lateran coūcell when first this your opinion of the absolute necessity thereof to saluation was aggreed vpon as you may reade in him de paenitentiâ Distinct 1. some for the necessity and some to the contrary thereof and in the end Cap. Quamuis concludeth thus to which of these opinions one should rather sticke I leaue to the readers iudgement for both partes sayeth hee hath astipulatores sapientes religiosos viros that is fauourers men that are both wise and religious and Panormitan a great Doctour of yours disputeth the matter that your confession is not by Gods lawe but by mans And Chrysostome that succeeded Nectarius so liked his predecessours act of abrogating the order of secret confession to the confessour that he in his fourth sermon of Lazarus saieth Caue homini dixeris peccata ne tibi opprobret c. that is take heed that thou tell not thy sinnes to man lest hee vpbraide thee with them neither confesse them to thy fellowe seruaunt that hee may publish them but confesse them to God the Lorde and the like he writeth hom 31 vpon the 12 of the Hebrues and vpon the fiftieth Psalme as he counteth and else where often in his workes And as for your special and particular enumeration of all sinnes and their circumstances that possibly can be remembred Beatus Rhenanus a frend otherwise of yours in his notes vpon Tertullians booke of repentance reporteth how that euē for the vexation and torment of consciences that that bread one Geilerius a Carthusian monke wrote a booke which he entituled de morbo confessionis of the sicknesse of cōfession against the morosity scrupulosity brought in by Thomas and Scotus and other schoolemen of whose minde for that point Beatus Rhenanus sheweth himselfe to be And howsoeuer a number of your Priests by their fruites haue made it appeare that of all other they would be loth that young women should not come to auricular confession vnto them yet I can tell you Basil in his no question thinketh it not very decent that such should come alone but rather aduiseth that the yoūger by the graue elder women should make their state knowen that by thē they may receiue comfort or direction what to doe as they shall neede But yet because I would be loth to omit any thing either to cause you Master Albine to thinke that you haue saied or alleadged any thing of weight to iustifie this your kinde of confession withall or to cause the reader to suspect that these fathers whose names you haue brought vs for this purpose in these places say more directlie for you then they doe let vs particulerly examine your quotations alwaies remembring the state of the question as it is in this point betwixt vs. Your first man is Cyprian in his fift sermon de lapsis wherein his purpose was to perswade them that had either grieuously fallen from Christianity to idolatrie or that had but a secret purpose for the safety of themselues so to doe effectually to repent thereof in persuit of which his purpose in the ende hee commeth to that which it seemeth you ayme at to note it as an argument of greater fayth and better feare in such that will though they haue but thought so to fall yet sorrowfully and playnelie confesse the same before the Lordes Priestes and so making exoniologesin that is publicke confessiō of their consciēce shew forth the burdē of their minde seeking holesōe phisicke though for their small woundes in comparison and therefore a little after he there earnestly exhorteth euery such offender in purpose or performance to confesse their fault therein whiles they be here whiles their confession and repentance may be acceptable with the Lorde Which place serueth
beutified with most execrable and filthy pictures to set out that sinne withall And Petrus Aloysius notwithstanding that most moÌ„strous and impudent Sodomitry of his committed by force in the sight of his men as both Vergerius Sleidan report out of certaine Italian stories vpon the body of Cosmuscherius bishop of Fane a man then of 30. yeares olde at the least was deare and highly esteemed in the eies of his filthy adulterous and incestuous father Pope Paulus the third And for the other point touching Beza his wife certaine it is that she was an honest woman of good report when he maried her and since alwaies Christianity hath behaued her selfe as becommed an honest matronâ— for any thing that I euer could either heare or reade worthy of any credit to the contrary And who but they that haue made a shipwracke of all shame honesty would euer haue broched such a monstrous vntrueth as this that he ranne away with her shee being an other mans wife to Geneua her husband yet liuing Beza himselfe in that preface that I named last of his protesteth not onely the falshood of this but saieth further that if any mortall creature can iustlie touch him with the least and lightest suspition of adultery hee refuseth no seate of iudgement And if there were any ground of trueth â—n this is it likely that this matter would neuer haue bene prosecuted against him in no court of France or elswher he hauing so many enemies Nay we may be sure that if there had beene any trueth either in this or in any such thing now saied against him hee had heard of it at Poysy One Papist as Parsons a father Iesuite telling the tale saieth shee dwelt in Kalender streete and Frarin an other in his railing oration saieth shee dwelt in Harpe streete if Daniel were aliue and sate in iudgement these fellowes agreeing no better then the two wicked iudges did in their accusing of Susanna were like to haue and well worthy were they the iudgement that those two wicked iudges had But in the meane time with patience we must possesse our soules committing our cause to God who one day wil be auenged of such lying and flaunderous tongues and that neuer looking for other but that the Deuill as he hath beene a lier from the beginning and a false accuser of Gods seruants so he will continue and shewe himselfe in his instruments vnto the worlds ende Though you haue no other grouÌ„d but the report of an enemy which he gaue forth vpon the report of most malicious persons and otherwise diuers waies infamous for all this your diuelish slaunder of Beza which euidence you knew well enough is starke naught you yet proceede to your conclusion that he was such a man yea that thereby wee may see that the principall pillers of our Church are bawdes thieues and adulterers as confidently as if your euidence had beene most strong Wherein your fault is not onely that your argument holdeth not taken from no better grounds against the particuler man himselfe but that also you reason from the fault of one to all the chiefe pillars of our Church and so you put a great deale more in your conclusion then was in the premisses which in reasoning is an intollerable fault And if a man should reason in like maner Pope Iohn the 12. was an adulterer Iohn the 13. was slain coÌ„mitting it Iohn the 18. put to death both his eies put out by the means of Gregorie about it pope Clement the 6. caused to be poisoned as soÌ„e write Lodouick the Emperor Siluester the secoÌ„d was a notable coniurer Vrbanus drowned fiue of his dearest Cardinals though your owne Cronicles testifie these therfore al your Popes the verie heades of your church were such would you allow of such an argument I am sure you would not yet hath it an 100. times better ground and reason in it then yours As yet therefore for any thing you haue saied the beame is in your owne eies and so you are not fit persons to go about to get the moate out of ours before you haue cleansed your owne better The XLII Chapter YOV that can saie so well that one ought to liue according to the scripture and that you will by it reforme vs why doe yee not beginne with your selues to giue vs the a We doeâ— yet when we haue done what we can there wil be some amongst vs whom you may too iustly charge with these and other sins because alwaies there will be some hypocrites and time-seruers but seeing we doe by our religion coÌ„demne such vsages those that embrace our religioÌ„ in sincerity condemne these sins and absteine from them neither we nor our religion are to be charged with them better example FroÌ„ whence come so many kinde of vsuries excessiue interests as you doe vse You call our church abhominable and adulterous He that is among you without sinne let him cast the first stone You doe abhorre our idols as you tearme them talking of our images how commeth it to passe then that some of yours should come so neare vs that are Idolaters as to robbe our Churches and to carie awaie the images and reliques and to go and sell them in other places But now to make an ende of this discourse although it vvere so that your works were the best of the world yea whollie without spot or sin as some of b If any so affirm we renounce them they are none of vs. you doe affirme yet vvere not they sufficient to moue vs to change our Religion nor to forsake that that our forefathers haue taught vs for although it be so that our sauiour Christ was as iust and as innoceÌ„t as anie caÌ„ be hath beene or euer shall be yet neither his holie life nor the Scriptures that he did alleadge to proue his comming by the authoritie of the Prophets nor the testimonie of S. Iohn Baptist all these things togither were not sufficient to perswade the Iewes to forsake their old lawes and to receaue the Gospell without the testimonie of the great c Neither would they beleeue when hee had wrought his miracles no more would you if we should miracles that he did in their presence He doeth confesse this plainly where hee saieth if d Ioh. 15. And so he saith if I had not spoken vnto theÌ„ they should not haue had sin but now they haue no cloake for their sin v. 22. I had not done in their presence the works and miracles that neuer any had done they should haue no sinne This sentence is most notable and worthy to bee grauen in the hearts of all Catholiques to assure their conscieÌ„ces which are troubled with such diuersitie of opinioÌ„s For although it were so that you my masters were the honestest men of the worlde sent from God to teach and preach a true doctrine yet should we be excusable before God for not receauing of your commission euen
reason is there to the contrary but that according to the rules of decency the preface and the booke whereunto it is a preface shall be conformable one to the other And yet though this be the very methode and matter good Reader of all this his long tedious preface which I thus brieflie haue laide open before thee the poore silly man the authour thereof seemeth to haue conceiued such a liking of his owne doings therein especially towards the latter ende thereof that gloriously and triumphantly hee breaketh out into wonderful complaints amplifications and exclamations against vs. Alas poore man that hee was thought hee to meete with no reader but that would graunt him all these thinges at the first asking Or thought hee that hee had so cunningly and artificially knit those things together that no man could espy the childish losenes of them From his first generall farre set and yet vnnecessary discourse of the duety of all officers hee so suddenly falleth into the next of the properties of Christes sheepe that it was great maruaile that the man â—ooke no great harme by it But hauing recouered himselfe 〈◊〉 litie speaking belike before his wittes were well come to him â—ee neuer can hit after of any thing to the purpose For not onely all his matter and woordes besides a fewe naked assertions of his of the trueth of certaine points of his religion and falshoode of ours skipping in heere and there â—here is nothing but the circumstances of application altered one of vs might far more aptly and truely haue written against them But as those things sufficiently conuince the man and his preface of grosse folly and vanitie so if we consider but howe he hath wilfully sought to abuse his reader in cyting the ancient father Irenaeus and others to persuade his reader by his authoritie to obey their prelates and traditions we shall as plainely finde in the man palpable impiety For page second he cyteth his fourth booke and forty three chapter to proue vnto vs nowe that wee must obey their Church now speaking vnto vs by their prelates because then Irenaeus tolde the heretiques a thousand and foure hundred yeares agoe and more whom indeede the pastours of the Church that then was continued soundly in the purity of the Apostolique doctrine that they were to obey the pastours of the Church that had succession from the Apostles Which any maÌ„ may see bindeth not nor teacheth vs to do the like to theirs vnlesse they could proue theirs to be such as there Irenaeus speaketh of Likewise whatsoeuer else in this preface of his to like purpose he hath alleadged out of Irenaeus Augustine Chrysostome CypriaÌ„ Hierome or the scriptures theÌ„selues is abused for that which they spake of that pure true Church of Christ and her faithfull ministers that he would drawe his reader to think to be spoken euen of the Church of Rome as it is now and hath beene of late yeares and of her prelates which are in nothing almost like either the Church or ministers that they speake of But this is not all his fault in alleadging this testimonie of Irenaeus thus to confounde the prelates and Church with the true pastours of Christ and his pure Church a thousande fower hundreth yeares agoe whereunto theirs are no more like then darkenesse is to light but that also wilfully the easilier belike to beguyle the simple reader hee concealeth that that immemediatly followeth the former words Which is this Quisâ—câ—â— ostendimus cum episcopatus successione charisma veritatis certum secuÌ„dum placitum patris acceperunt that is which as we haue shewed with the succession of their Bishoppricke according to the will and pleasure of God haue receaued the certaine gifte of trueth and so hee hauing skipt ouer those wordes which hee thought as it should seeme in his conscience would and might be denied not to fit their prelats he goeth on with that that followed these wordes saying Reliquos vero qui absistunt à principal successione quocunquè loco colliguntur suspectos habere tanquam haereticos oportet which is in English but the rest which goe from the principall succession in what place soeuer they be gathered together wee ought to suspect as heretiques Wherein euidently it appeareth he left out the former words staÌ„ding in the author in the midst betwixt the former part of the sentence and the latter here alleadged by him to make the reader beleeue that Irenaeus minde was to teach men simply to obey such prelates without exception as haue ordinarie outward and locall succession downe from the Apostles and that that kinde of succession in place and office is the principall succession that he speaketh of which who so hath not ought by and by to bee suspected of heresy But indeede take al his words together and marke them especially those which craftily he had gelded the sentence of in his quoting of them and it is most cleare that Irenaeus here teacheth obedience onely to such Bishops as succeede the Apostles in the certaine gift of trueth that by principall succession he ment nothing else but succession to the Apostles in that gift of trueth and that therefore he would haue vs to suspect all those to be heretiques that lack succession vnto them in that howsoeuer and wheresoeuer they succeede them else Which is the very cause why according to this rule we think no better of their popish bishops priests then we do what successioÌ„ soeuer otherwise they bragge of for that sure we are that long ago they are gone from this principal succession in trueth This he knew euery one would perceiue if he had faithfully cyted Irenaeus wordes as they lye and therefore hee thought best to shew how he could followe the example of that olde fox Sathan who for his purpose in like maÌ„ner mangled the 91. Psalme Math. 4. It seemeth also that these words quocunque loco colliguÌ„tur in what place soeuer they be gathered together though he recite them in latine he would faine haue smothered for traÌ„slating the rest he omits these doubtles because without any exceptioÌ„ yea euen of Rome it selfe thereby Irenaeus would teach that they ought to be suspected to be heretiques that will not obey those pastours that succeed the Apostles in the gift of truth Which indeede the Bishops of Rome hauing had so little care to doe this great while if this rule of Irenaeus may bee followed they cannot possibly escape this suspition The credit therefore of theÌ„ waying more with the writer of this preface then his owne he thought it was better thus to leese his owne by thus shamefully abusing his reader in prouing this testimony after the popish manner then once to hazard the credit of his holy fathers the popes by right faithfull and honest dealing therewith Howbeit this kinde of dealing of his may giue iust occasion to all that are wise euer hereafter to looke better to the fingers of all such fellowes then vpon their bare
word to trust them any more in their quoting or citing of the fathers But lest we should thinke that this was but a slippe of his by chance that hee was not his craftes-master in this kinde of dealing he hath plaide vs the very like trick againe with this same father pa. 18. where he alleadgeth the fourth chapter of the said Irenaeus third booke to iustify their traditions not warranted by the written word For in the beginning of the saide chapter not fiue lines before the wordes cited by him hee speaking of the scriptures written by the Apostles Euāgelists he saith that they into that rich treasury most fully haue brought all things that belōg to truth so that euery one that will may frō thence take the drink of life And that which he speaketh in the words alleaged by him of following of tradition it is spoken only by way of supposition to shew what course had bene best for the Church whē any questiō should haue arisen if they had not left vs scriptures For his words are these if the Apostles had not left vs scriptures must we not haue followed the order of tradition which they gaue to them to whom they committed churches In which case which is not our case nowe seeing they haue left vs scripture we grant we should haue beene in the deciding of all controuersies that could haue arisen ouerruled by that which they deliuered by word of mouth to such and therefore that being the case no better or readier way for the ending of controuersies should there haue been then to haue recourse to the most ancient Churches wherin they were conuersant and so by their tradition to haue learned the certainty therein But thus by way of supposition Irenaeus speaking of their tradition in the case supposed by him certaine it is that by their tradition he vnderstādeth that soūd form of doctrin which they deliuered by their preaching teaching which thē would should haue been the same forasmuch as they spoke wrot by one spirit that now they haue left vs in writing And therefore euē then the Romish Church should haue been as far to seeke as she is now for hauing any warrant from thence for those things that she holdeth either contrary or besides the word written And that by tradition he meaneth here no other thing it is euident for in the first chapter of that booke he saith plainely Quod tum praeconiauerunt postea per Dei voluntatem nobis tradiderunt in scripturis columnam fundamētum fidei futurum that is that which first they preached after by the will of god they deliuered vnto vs in the scriptures to be the piller and ground of faith And in the third chapter of that book hauing before spoken of the Apostolicke tradition he after sheweth what he meant thereby namely this that god the maker of heauen and earth c as he is described in the olde testament the Apostles haue taught to be the father of our Lord Iesus Christ contrary to the phantasticall franticke dreame of Valentinian so plainely shewing that they that would euen by the scriptures themselues might learne what the Apostolick traditiō was Now what is this for the authorishing the vnwritē traditiōs of the Romish church which are not ōly al beside the scriptures but whereof the most are contrary thereūto But this gentle reader is the right trick of all the crue of these Romanists thus by the ambiguity of words out of the fathers to seek to colour their absurd opinions so er thou be a ware to deceaue thee if thou take not heede As for example to perswade a mā to like of their beggerly vnwritten traditiōs whatsoeuer any father speaketh of traditiō though it be neuer so plaine in the author himselfe that thereby he meaneth nothing lesse then such traditions as theirs yet that must be confidently brought in as fit most pregnant for their purpose Likwise whatsoeuer any father hath said of any sacramētall chāge of the outward elements for that therein their name vse estimation are chāged though the same father in a thousād other places shew that his iudgemēt is that there is no change at all there in substance yet that must be quoted as a flat place for Popish trāsubstantiation And euen so if they find in a father speaking of the Eucharist any mention of a sacrifice as though there were no kind of sacrifice but that which they dream to bee there that must be vrged as a strong place to proue their blasphemous sacrifice for the quick the dead And this iugling with the fathers and cosening of their poore simple readers vse they in al their cōtrouersies But at this time thou must pardō this preface writer this fault because herein he doth but study to bee like him before whose book he hath set this his preface For chapter the fifth he himselfe most grosly committeth this same fault in the detection whereof I haue more at large discouered this lewde dealing of theirs In the meane time let vs not forget that Irenaeus hath taught vs what that church is who those pastours be what those traditiōs are that we must obey be ruled by namely onely that Church that hath the scriptures for the piller groūd of her faith lib. 3. cap. 1. those pastours that succeede the Apostles in truth of doctrine li. 4. cap. 43. those traditiōs which haue good warrant from the scriptures themselues lib. 3. cap. 3. whereof it must needes follow that all the places reasons quoted by him either out of the scriptures or fathers to binde vs to yeeld obedience to their churches ordinances their prelates cōmandements to the points warranted onely by their traditions their Church hauing another foundation of her faith then the worde written namely alwaies their popes will as it hath the commādemēts of their prelates traditions being not only beside but also often most grosly contrary to that word of God writtē as I shal shew in sundry places er I haue done with Albine in Irenaeus iudgemēt ar but so many abusings and corruptings of their holy good meanings And yet thus hauing to no purpose bestowed a great deale of idle paines as one that had said inough to proue that the authority of all the learned fathers the cōmon consēt of all Christiā regions prescriptiō of time were al ful fast of his side he lustily braggeth p. 22. that if their be any weight in any or al these together that his side hath the true gospell the true sence thereof That their Religion is the very Christian Religion their order of ceremonies the right order and that their fasting and praying is according to the scriptures and that therefore their church is the lawfull and true spouse of Christ from which who so seperates himselfe is in state of damnation This thus only said thereupō by and by as though there were no
and due confirmation of the other But I cannot be perswaded that such was your owne simplicity as once to imagine that the fift of Mathew Ephes 4 Esaie 62. or any other proofe that you vse to that ende did serue at all to proue your entraunce to haue bene as you saied I am therefore flat of this minde and so must euery man of any wit and discretion be vnlesse you will giue vs leaue to thinke that you had neither of both in thus reasoning that this was your Romish and Popish cunning herein finding your selfe vnable to proue any of these foure points that your entrance is by the ordinary waie that your Bishops and Priests are right Bishops and Priests that you haue had from the Apostles right succession and that also now and alwaies you haue beene in possession of the Catholick trueth you thought it good confidently as though their were no controuersie to be made with you about any of these to aduouch that you had all these to iustifie your maner of comming to your offices And so perswading your selfe that you should meete with such franke and liberall Readers as would easily vpon this your bolde begging graunt you all these foure for an almes taking them for giueÌ„ as sure as though you had them already in your beggers budget euen for and at the very first asking you goe on as you doe supposing that your Reader is already wonne to this to imagine that all and euery place of scripture that speakes of right Bishops and pastours and of their lawful calling succeeding one another froÌ„ age to age in the trueth must needes be vnderstoode of yours But with this conceit phantesy of yours howsoeuer you may preuaile with men of your owne humour and complexion that haue their wits benummed bluÌ„dered with the drunken enchaunted cup of the garish whoar of Babylon whiles you take this course you set your selfe but forth vpon a scaffolde to bee laught at and derided as one that hath neither sounde Religion nor common reason left him of those that are indeede wise sober and godly Seeing therefore you haue saied so much and proued so little well enough might I euen with the detection in this sort of your vanity leaue you as sufficiently answered for any thing you haue saied concerning this point But because I haue not taken in â—and onely so to answere you as might be sufficient to take awaie â—â—e power and force from any thing you haue set downe in this â—our discourse to winne any more to bee of your iudgement then â—ee alreadie but also so as by the grace of God may bee likely to â—ake your owne frendes ashamed of your dealing in their cause 〈◊〉 will both in this throughout your booke for the further beneâ—it of the Reader take the paines to follow you froÌ„ steppe to steppe â—how crooked soeuer your pathes be so disclose lay open before â—im not onely the vanity of your proceeding but also the vntrueth â—nd grosse impietie of your words and sayings Wherefore whereas to iustify your maner of comming by your â—ffices you first saie you come thereunto by the ordinarie way the Reader is to consider that through the ambiguttie of your speech you seeke wilfullie to abuse him For you could not bee so simple but you knewe and remembred well enough that as there is a lawfull ordinarie waie ordeined and allowed by God and therefore accordinglie practised in his Church whereby his Church officers should enter into their callings whereby if you could haue proued yours to haue come to theirs you had indeede iustifyed their entrance thereupon so haue there beene in tract of time through the boldnes of men to alter Gods ordinance and therein to preferre the way deuised by themselues before that which the Lord himselfe had prescribed many waies both inuented and practised which though they haue by custome and long continuance of time growen to be too ordinarie yet for all that they haue beene and yet are too bad by anie of which though in respect of one or other of them you maie truelie saie yours haue entred by the ordinarie waie yet you haue saied nothing to proue their maner of entraÌ„ce to be holie good and of God But to speake plainelie and yet no more then I can proue out of your owne Cronicles your verie Bishops of Rome of whose lawfull and ordinarie calling you vse to brag most and of whose lawfull entrance and calling if they bee such heades of the Church as you pretend the lawfull calling and authoritie of all other inferiour Church officers is deriued and depends for manie hundreth yeares a number of them haue so got to their Prelacies that vnlesse you account those in your sence to haue come to their places by the ordinarie waie that in compassing of them haue broken all good order both of God and man I wonder with what face you durst thus indefinitely generally say of all your Bishops and pastours that they haue bene called to their estate by the ordinary way For furious braules monstrous and long contentious force of armes and cruell bloudshed haue beene the ordinary waies whereby a great multitude of them haue entered as namely and for exaÌ„ple these Symachus Boniface the second Pelagius the first Boniface the third ConoÌ„ Sergius the first Zozimus Paul the first Constantine the second Eugenius the first Hadrian the second Formosus Leo Benedict Gelasius the second Honorius the second Innocent the second Gregorie the tenth Nicholas the third Clement the fifth Vrban the sixth and sundry others Bribery also hath beene the ordinary way whereby many of them haue clymed into that chaire as namely Iohn 13. Boniface the 7. Gregory the sixth Siluester the third and most of late daies NicromaÌ„cy art magicke and plaine barganing with the deuill for it haue beene ordinary waies also whereby a shamefull sort of them haue compasseâ— that place For from Syluester the second vnto Gregory the seuenth including them there being an eighteene or nineteene Popes your owne Cardinal Benno shewes that the greater number of theÌ„ so came to their roomes and since wee reade that Alexander the sixth got it the same way It appeares also in the saied Benno that the greater nuÌ„ber of the Popes from Syluester the second to Gregory the seuenth were poisoned or at least by violent means dispatched by such as for theÌ„selues their frends thought good so to make the waie readier thereuÌ„to for themselues or some others whom they fancied And to the same ende other authours write that very many of them beside haue in like maner from time to time since beene sodenly vnpoped that others the sooner might bee popt into their roomes Yea Genebrard a late writer and a great frend to the Roman Religion and Bishops in his fourth booke and tenth age in his Cronology by the plaine euideÌ„ce of the truth is inforced to confesse that from the yeare 884. to the yeare
extraordinarily as he seeth need thereof is and may be such effectuall seede to beget childrē vnto God and so holesome foode to feede thē yea euen vntil they grow to a full age perfectiō in Christ Iesus that though their teachers cānot shew for the defence of their calling who alwaies successiuely in person and place haue gone before them yet euen this trueth of their doctrine doeth proue them and their people to be Apostolique Churches whereas though they could doe the other without this it were nothing And because my aduersary seemeth in this point otherwise to make great reckoning of the testimony of Irenaeus Tertullian and Augustine I will stande to their iudgement in this whither to succeede the Apostles in doctrine be not sufficient without the other locall and personall demonstrable succession and not this without that Irenaeus in his fourth booke and forty three Chapter teacheth vs onely to obey those Elders in the Church which from the Apostles with the succession of their Bishopricks haue receiued Charisma veritatis certum secundum placitum patris that is the certaine gift of trueth according to the pleasure of the father for as for all other whatsoeuer they pretend for he excepteth nothing he there immediatly sheweth that absistunt a principali successione that is they are gone from the principall succession and therefore must be suspected And Tertullian in the very same place de praescriptionibus haereticorum quoted by Albine after in his 9. Chapter immediatly after the words there cited by him wherein he calleth for personall succession hath added these Cōfingant tale aliquid haeretici c. but let heretiques deuise some such thing for after blasphemy what is not lawfull for them saieth hee but though they doe faine some such thing yet it shall nothing preuaile thē For their doctrine compared with the Apostolique doctrine by the diuersity cōtrariety thereof wil pronoūce that it hath neither Apostle nor Apostolique mā to be the authour therof For saith he as the Apostles taught not amōgst themselues contrary things so neither did Apostolique men teach contrary things to those that the Apostles taught After this sort therefore let them be prouoked by those Churches which though they cannot produce either Apostle or Apostolique man to bee the founder thereof in that they were long after planted as dayly there bee tamen in eâdem fide conspirantes non minùs Apostolicae deputantur pro consanguinitate doctrinae yet they agreeing with thē in one faith are no lesse to be reputed Apostolicke Churches then they that were planted by the Apostles What can be plainer then this to shewe that though our Churches could not satisfie his request in pleading the former succession that yet if they can shewe this that they agree with the Apostles in doctrine that they therefore are far rather Apostolicke then they that can produce the former without this And though Augustine in his 165. epistle and also in his fourth Chapter against the Manichees epistle which they call their foundation remembred by Albine cap. 6. doe there seeme to make great reckoning of personall succession yet when he had shewed of what force that and some other reasons were with him he preferres trueth indeede warranted by the scriptures before them all Wherefore what I haue saied concerning the vanitie of their brag of personall and locall succession either to iustifie theirs or to disgrace our Church or ministrie is sufficientlie proued But all this labour will Albine say I might haue spared for he spake not simplie of succession but expressely of right succession of Bishops pastours and to shew what he ment thereby he expresly added the continuance of one Catholicke faith deriued from the Apostles to our daies without the interruption of it vniuersally at anie time Moreouer I confesse that sundry times after so forcible was the trueth in this point with him that in wordes he confesseth that personall and locall succession without continuance in this trueth is not the thing that he vrgeth and yet for all this this that I haue saied of this point is not needlesse For besides that fewe of his opinion will bee brought to confesse thus much this both in others and in himselfe in sundrie Chapters following maie be obserued that when this confession is made by anie of thē it is wroong frō them much against their wils for their shew of proofes run wholy for the magnifying of personall successiō to be the marke whereby true Churches and the ministers thereof maie vndoubtedly be discerned Againe if in this he spake as hee thinkes why doeth he make so much adoe about the personall and visible succession of Bishops and pastours and neuer ioines this issue with vs to trie out soundly and throughly whither they or we haue this Catholicke and Apostolicke trueth For herein onely lieth all the controuersie betwixt them and vs and this determined the question betwixt vs were quite ended let them once therefore but proue indeed that they are in possession of this soūd trueth and that alwaies downe from the Apostles they haue continued therein if we ioyne not streight with them and repent vs hartely of our departure from them accursed be we Yea if we cannot proue by cōparing their doctrine with that which wee are most sure the Apostles taught to be both diuerse from that and contrary vnto it vnderstanding by their doctrine as wee doe that which is proper to them and wherein we are against them let vs for euer leese our credit and cause Now for the decyding and determining of this great maine cōtrouersie wee appeale to the canonical scriptures which we knowe are most fit and sufficiēt iudges herein whereunto vnles they will deserue the name of lucifugae that is of shunners of the light which for the like cause Tertullian gaue the heretiques of his time de resurrect carnis they will be contented to bring their doctrine as to the touchstone Indeede in Tertullian and Iraeneus time the heretiques as it appeares in their workes for the triall of their opinions fled from this touchstone and when they were vrged herewith they behaued themselues the likest these our aduersaries that euer I saw For Iraeneus in his third booke and second Chapter testifieth thus of them cùm ex Scripturis arguuntur in accusationem conuertuntur ipsarum quasi non rectè habeant neque sint ex authoritate quia variè sunt dictae quia non possit ex his inueniri veritas ab his qui nesciunt traditionem that is when they are reproued by the scriptures then they are turned streight into an accusation of them as though they were not right nor were of authority both because they are so set downe as that variably or diuersly they may be taken and because by them the trueth cannot be found out by those that are ignoraunt of tradition This notwithstanding it appeareth both there and elsewhere that he calleth them to this triall
neuer hauing proued either of these nor yet being able to doe it you should cōclude that your prescription against our doctrine which you call newe at your pleasure though indeede it be most ancient witnesse the olde testament and the newe much rather ought to take place then his in his time against heretiques that then taught diuerse basphemous heresies directly against the scriptures You say our Religion hath beene vnknowen this 1500. yeares or at least if any body sought to publish it he was condemned as a false pernitious heretique But you doe but say thus you proue it not nor euer shall For it was both heard and knowen many 100. yeares before yours was hatched and if euery one were so condemned that taught it then was Christ and his Apostles so condemned For vnlesse by scriptures we can proue ours to be the same that theirs was wee aske no fauour at your hands And as long as we can doe so the more we and our predecessours haue beene condemned by you the more we knowe we haue beene blessed of God Now whereas you say in this Chapter further that Irenaeus did withstand heretiques by the traditions of the Apostles adding your glosse that is to say by doctrine not writen but deliuered from hand to hand and so receiued from age to age frō the Apostles to that time therein through the ambiguity of the word Tradition craftsly you seeke to deceiue your simple reader and indeede you giue a glosse that corrupteeh the text For let that place of Irenaeus in his third booke and second Chapter be perused and that also which followeth in the third Chapter of the same booke though either you or the Printer mistaking it send vs to the fifth Chapter where the wordes are not which you cite and most euidently it shall bee proued that though Irenaeus haue there the words by you cited yet by the traditiōs of the Apostles which he speaketh of there he meaneth no doctrine nor points of doctrine as you doe vsually by that word contrary or besides that which was also taught in the word writen For the question was of God the father of our Lord Iesus Christ which Valētinian Marcion denied against whō he there sheweth that he fought first with the scriptures wherewith when they were vrged he saith they are turned streight into an accusation of the scriptures as though they were not right had not authority might diuersly be takē saying further that trueth could not be found of them by those that are ignorant of traditiō For the trueth was not deliuered by them but by liuely voice that therefore Paul saied we speake wisedome amongst them that are perfect not the wisedōe of this world And this wisdome to euery one of them saieth he is that which he himselfe hath deuised Of which heretiques their wordes yours when you are called to the touchstone of the scriptures are so like vndoubtedly you haue learned to plead against the scriptures for your vnwritten traditions Now when thus he had shewed how the heretiques in his time shunned triall by the scriptures and appealed to tradition he goeth on and sheweth that when he was contented to come to the traditiō of the Apostles kept obserued in the church downe from the Apostles to those times by succession of pastours then they resisted tradition also saying that they were wiser then either those pastours or the Apostles themselues and so indeede neither by the scriptures nor yet by making demonstration vnto them that the same doctrine taught in the scripture was also deliuered by liuely voice first by the Apostles and so receiued from age to age and continued in by those pastors of whose successiō he speaketh could stop their mouthes And thus any mā of meane capacity may perceiue that in these places Irenaeus his drift only is to shew the heretiques that the doctrine which he taught concerning God the father of our Lord Iesus Christ first was warranted by the Apostles writings and then also taught by them by liuely voice and so deliuered and continued from hand to hand amongst the faithfull pastours succeeding one another euen vnto that time And that he calleth this the tradition of the Apostles and not as you falsly expound him doctrine vnwriten beside or contrary to that which is writen as the Popish traditions you striue for bee if you had beene disposed you might haue learned in the 1. Chapter of the same booke where he saieth That which first they preached after by the wil of god tradiderunt nobis they deliuered vs in writing to be the foundation and piller of our faith And indeede it is an vsuall thing with the fathers of the primitiue Church often by the tradition of the Apostles to vnderstand the very same doctrine which is conteined in their writings Herein therefore so likewise in all other points in controuersy betwixt vs it is a cōmon tricke with you papists to vrge the fathers wordes quite contrary to their true meaning But because you first and namely bring in Irenaeus for your vnwriten traditions which is the window indeede that you would haue faine left open vnto you for then thereby you hope you may thrust in and vpon the Church what you list and so countenance thereby your Antichristian doctrine when all other shifts faile let vs see whither this cannot yet further be made manifest out of him He as Eusebius reporteth Hist Eccles lib. 4. cap. 14. saied that Polycarpe taught that one and sole trueth which he had learned of the Apostles quae Ecclesia tradit which the Church deliuereth forth Where of necessity by those things which the Church deliuereth by tradition that he there speaketh of you may not vnderstand any other but those which haue warrant from the word writen and in no case those things that are besides that or cōtrary thereunto for then hee would not haue called that which Polycarpe preached the one and sole trueth for questionles those things are true that are conteined in the scriptures And this clearely appeareth if you marke the wordes as they are in Irenaeus himselfe in his 5. booke 20. cap. that Eusebius hath relation vnto which are these Polycarpe did mention or teach those thinges which he had heard of the Apostles that is all things agreeable to the scriptures Againe the same Irenaeus in his 3. booke and 3. cap. which is one of the Chapters by you before alleadged saieth that vnder Clement the Church of Rome wrought to the Corinthians shewing them quam traditionem what tradition of late they had receiued of the Apostles that is to say that God the father almighty and so forth as is expressed in Moyses is the father of our Lord Iesus Christ And that he is so taught to bee of the Churches saieth hee they that will learne may by the Scriptures and so they may vnderstand the Apostolique tradition of the Church Where it is most cleare that he telleth vs himselfe
pretend you would yeelde vnto them in this point and so spare much labour that you bestowe to get credit to your traditions vnwriten Which if you would once be brought vnto we should quickly by the sole and sufficient authority of the scriptures haue a faire hand of you Which you espying whatsoeuer otherwise you would seeme to account of the fathers to bleare the eies of the simple in this they shall keepe their iudgement to themselues for you like it not So that this and such your like dealing with them caused one once to tell you that the fathers are vnto you as counters in the handes of him that casteth an account according to whose will and pleasure sometimes one and the selfesame counter standeth for an ob that stoode immediately before for a pound or more So with you when it pleaseth you an ancient fathers testimony is of great weight and when it pleaseth you againe 20. of their testimonies are nothing Howbeit I hope the indifferent reader by these testimonies doeth will perceiue that you wonderfully seeke to abuse Gods people when yet you would perswade them at anie time that the ancient fathers are fauourers and patrons of your vnwriten traditions And I trust this may serue to make it sufficiently appeare that in the iudgement of these ancient fathers your Andradius may be ashamed to write as he hath scripto suo aedito tempore Tridentini coÌ„cilii That the greatest part of Catholicke Religion is left vnto the traditions of the church not writen and that your Lyndan was extreame mad or very drunke when he wrote It is most extreame madnes to thinke that the whole and entire body of Euangelicall doctrine is to be searched out of the Apostolique letters writen with inke out of the litle booke of the new testament Panopl lib. 1. cap. 22. But thus to make vnwriten traditions sometime equall sometime superiour in authority to the canonical scripture that vpoÌ„ this ground that al trueth is not sufficieÌ„tly taught therein you haue learned of the Encratites Manichees and of the Montanists Valentinians and others as it appeares in them that wrote against them And yet O good God what a stir now of late this Andradius Lyndan other such your great champions haue made what cost they haue bestowed to drawe men from that estimation that these fathers had of the authority and sufficiencie of the canonicall scriptures in making large treatises and discourses to shew that the authority therof depends of the testimony and authority of the church that they are not sufficient no not halfe sufficient for the direction of the church either for Religion or conuersation and that they are obscure hard to be vnderstoode all vpon this occasion that will they nil they they are driuen to perceaue that their opinions wherein we differ from them cannot any longer bee defended by the scriptures for al their sophistrie cunning and that therefore they see they must maintaine the credit of theÌ„ by the authority of the church her vnwriten traditions which they may say to be what they lift or that else they must be driuen to throw vs the bucklers and to run out of the field But you doe fouly deceiue your selues if you thinke in this great light that men espy not that this is a shamefull shift and which argueth that your cause is euen giuing vp the ghost that you caÌ„ hold out no longer vnles it be by preferring the authority of the church the wife before Christ the husband by giuing her your commission to sit as iudge ouer her husbands word to adde there unto and take therefrom how what seemeth good vnto her And your fault herein is the more intollerable because by the church you vnderstand alwaies your popish Synagogue that now is For euen children may see that you are very farre driuen when there is no other remedy but you must thus open your mouthes and prepare your pens to disgrace his writen word which all meÌ„ know to be his word indeed without question for the gracing countenancing in this sort of that which though you call his worde you are neuer able to proue to be so And for this who seeth not that we may iustly say of you as Tertull Apolog. 5. saied of the heathen in his time Apud vos de humano arbitratu pensitatur diuinitas nisi homini Deus placuerit Deus non erit homo iaÌ„ Deo propitius esse debebit that is with you the godhead is esteemed of as man shall thinke good vnles God please man he shall not be God man now must be good to God Howsoeuer you are ashamed thus grosly with these prophane pagans to speake yet it is euident in that you still say write that the writen word of God is inferiour in authority to the church hath the canonical credit from thence that the sence thereof is must be whatsoeuer your Bishop of Rome for the time being doeth define determine so to be relying stil vpon vnwriten traditions bearing men in hand that they are as well the word of God as the canonical scriptures as you doe al meÌ„ whoÌ„ your enchantmeÌ„ts haue not bewitched made blind may see that in effect you are as grosse as they of whom these words were truely writen This once we knowe to be his word which wee finde set downe in the Canonicall scriptures we are sure this was writen by the direction of Gods Spirit for the information of the Church And we cannot be ignorant but that this Spirit of God foresawe what dangerous heretiques there would bee which if they were not preuented by leauing the word of God fully in writing vnder the pretence of vnwriten traditions would bring in damnable heresies And therefore seeing it is euident vnto vs that he in these writings begaÌ„ to leaue instruction vnto vs to settle vs in the certaine trueth we know he could go thorow with it because he is God the fountain authour of all wisedome trueth are sure that he was willing because he perfectly loued the church by Christs promise by the ministry of the Apostles was to leade it into al trueth we must needes thinke it flat blasphemy to think that the writeÌ„ word of God is any way vnsufficieÌ„t for the full direction of the Church in all matters And therefore howsoeuer you please your Sects in this deuise of yours in feighting thus for the traditions of the Church thinke not to the contrarie but any man of meane iudgement will discrie both your vâ—â—â—tie and impiety therein by making this reason in his owne minde vnto himselfe The spirit of God in the writers of the Scriptures sawe it good and necessary to leaue the worde of God for the full direction of the Church in all matters writen by that is done and writen it is cleare hee tooke it in hand and to take it in hand
then to lay to the charge of the Christians that they conspired amongst themselues against the state of the common weale and the ciuill and supreme magistrates thereof And therefore we can the more patiently abide this your dealing with vs in that herein we see we are no otherwise dealt withall by you then Gods people Christ his Apostles and other his faithfull seruants haue beene dealt withall in ancient time by your predecessours But the Lordes name be praised for it howsoeuer it hath pleased you in thus charging vs to intende the deposition and displacing of ciuill magistrates to conforme your selues to the ancient enemies of Gods people our doings in those places where our Religion hath beene longest settled doeth euidently in the eies of the world acquite vs hereof For in such places who seeeth not that the ciuill magistrates togither with it haue alwaies and yet doe honourably and quietly enioy their places and dignities Yea this wee dare bee bolde to say that the Christian Kings Princes and magistrates that haue giuen best entertainment vnto it finde by most manifest experience that both it and the professours therof haue better established them in their thrones and more aduanced them in their dignities then euer they were or could be by yours For now they are absolute Kings and Princes according to their right where as yours made thē to hold their kingdomes as the Popes vassals and so but at the curtesie and deuotion of a forrainer and of an intollerable proud and vnsatiable vsurping Prelate and now their treasure is kept at home to the strengthening greatly of their kingdomes and dominions which by your Romish Religiō gouernment was woont a 1000. waies most insatiably in infinit quantity yearly to the wonderfull weakning thereof to be conueied to Rome And whereas then by meanes of your auricular confession the secrets of euery Prince where that was vsed was often to the great peril of their states made knowen to many vndiscreet blabs by them their means to their forreine head the Pope and so he was thereby alwaies the better inabled for the furtherance of his owne deuises to preuent crosse theirs by the banishing of that Romish stratageme Princes coūsels secrets are kept at home in secret as they should to the great good of thē their cuntries And lastly by our Religion according to the examples of Dauid Salomō Asa Iehosaphat Ezechias Iosiah Constātine Theodosius they are in possession of their full authority to cōmāde for Religiō in matters ecclesiastical aswel their subiects of the clergy as the rest whereas by your Religion they were supreme gouerners vnder God for matters ciuil only had their cleargy so exēpted from them and their iurisdiction that howsoeuer they had their bodies in their kingdomes to enioy the promotions thereof they had neither their bodies nor soules in further subiection then would stand with the pleasure and profit of the forraine potentate the Pope By meanes whereof Anselme Stephē Lanckton Thomas Becket and sundry other proude prelates of this land haue so stucke to the Pope against their soueraigne kings at home here in England that in comparison of the Pope they haue set their King at naught to the wonderfull trouble and disquiet of the whole land as notoriously appeares in our Cronicles Which things considered I thinke you may long tell Princes that you and your religion is frendly to them and that we and ours is hurtful vnto them before any of them that be wise beleeue you Truely I cannot but wonder at your grosse hypocrisie in this Chapter in that you are so earnest and busie not onely to proue it vnlawful and mōstrous how bad soeuer they that be in authority be to refuse to yeelde duety submission vnto them but also to lay to our charge that we haue an intention to place and displace ciuill magistrates at our pleasure For I cannot perswade my selfe that your skill in diuinity was so small but you were resolued for all this that the obedience and subiection taught in these places here quoted by you or any where else in the scriptures is not so infinite and absolute as that thereby subiects are bound to doe whatsoeuer by higher powers be it good or bad they are commanded to doe For how could it be possible that a man of your place should forget the vsual limitation in the Lord or that you should not remember that God must be obeied before man Neither yet can I thinke that you were ignorant but that the very same thing which here you charge vs with as with a grieuous fault hath bene and yet is openly practised and taught publickly to be very lawfull in your Church of Rome Hereof I am sure D. Allen a great man of your side in his 5 Chapter of his defence of English catholicks reckōs vp in a great brauery and bragge sundry Kings and Emperours by force deposed by the Pope And indeed it appears most euidently in sundry Chronicles that at their pleasure a long time they haue most shamefully misused Christian Princes potentates of the world For though they were and are beholden to the Christian Roman Emperours for their first aduancement from the state of poore persecuted bishops to the state of patriarches in these westerne parts yet in processe of tyme when the seat of the empire was remooued to Constantinople these westerne parts were gouerned by an exarch at Rauenna they through the help of certaine Kings of the Lombards and others in tokē of thankefulnesse to the ancient Emperours of Rome quite extinguished their Empire and authority in these west parts And in the ende not contented with that which they had incroched by the ruine of the Empire through the helpe of the Goths Vandals Lombards others seeking thereby their further aduācement Pope Zachary about the yeare 743. found the meanes to cause Childericke then King of France to bee deposed and he set vp Pipine in his roome whom he his successour Stephen the 2. aduanced to the Empire and therefore this Pipine Charles the great and Lodouicke his sonne which three immediatly succeeded one another in the new Empire thus translated vnto them by the Pope to gratify the Pope for the same they brought the Lombards and others that before beganne to be somewhat to sausie with the Popes vnder and bestowed vpon his see as Blondus Volateran note very many rich and great Ilands cities countries shires townes and prouinces whereby he was mightely aduanced Yet for all these great benefits receaued by the line of Pipine when his successours began not to be pliable enough as they thought to their becke in making warre against the Princes of Italy which began to pinch them for their wrong-gotten goods Gregorie the fifth about the yeare 1002. practiseth with the Germans to bring the Empire to them from the line of France and so Otho was set vp Emperour But when these German Emperours began
againe I require the voice of the sheepheard read me this matter out of the Prophets read it out of the Psalms read it out of the law read it out of the Gospel read it out of the Apostles writings in his book de pastoribus c. 14. and so likewise conclude with him I owe my consent without gainsaying onely vnto the canonicall scriptures .. cap. 61. de naturâ gratiâ and according to these bookes of the scriptures we haue learned of him to iudge freely of all other writings lib. 2 cap. 29. contra Cresconium The fathers are full of such places whereby any man may see that by their very good leaue we are not to be pressed to beleeue or receaue any thing not taught in the scriptures vpon their bare authority and therefore these and such like places in them considered if you would haue had their names the places you cite in them to haue in sadnes bred any sound credit to any of these foure points you alleadge them for either should you haue warraÌ„ted them by good proofe out of the scriptures your selfe or haue shewed vs how they proued them consonant at the least to the same Howbeit because you shall not abuse the Reader to make him thinke that the fathers you name for these matters are further of your opinion then they be indeede as I haue not refused to examine your opinion and the places you send vs vnto for your ceremonies so will I for the Christian readers sake take the paines to deale with you for in al your other 3 opinions of confession praier to Saints for the dead with it your seueral quotations set down for the proofe of the same To go on therefore according to my course begun for confession before the receiuing of the sacrameÌ„t you saie first our sauiour Christ doeth teach vs that the ecclesiasticall ministers haue authority to binde and to forgiue sins and for proofe hereof you set in your margent Iohn 20. Mat. 16. I am sure here by confession that you speake of you meane your auricular confession wherof your Tridentine councel taketh such care that that in the 6 7 and 8 Canon thereof touching this matter it solemnely anathematizeth al those that hold auricular confession not to be necessary to saluation by the law of God saying that it is but the deuise of man Which they there haue defined to be a secret reckoning vp vnto the priest of al mortal sins at the least with al their circumstances whereof by due premeditation the party can haue any remembrance whereunto they bind all persons aboue certaine yeares of both sexes at least once in the yeare and that namely in lent before their receiuing at Easter Now this confession your schoolmen and doctours do teach must be made so fullie and exactly that no sin nor circumstance thereof must be coÌ„cealed for then therby al the labour is lost and the absolutioÌ„ frustrated from al the rest Which doctrine cannot chuse but a number of waies proue a needles and a desperate tormenting of coÌ„scieÌ„ces For first it laieth vpoÌ„ them an ineuitable necessity not onelie to doe that which God neuer required at their hands but also that which either is simply impossible vnto theÌ„ to doe for the multitude of their sins and circumstances thereof or else impossible for them to doe in such maner as that they can satisfie themselues that they haue omitted no piece of due premeditation to call all their sins the circuÌ„stances thereof that they should coÌ„fesse to their remeÌ„braÌ„ce which a nuÌ„ber of your owne side most deuoutly giueÌ„ to doe this in the best maner haue bene enforced to confesse Yet this confession before the sacrament though indeed it bee a thing that hath no ground or warrant at all in the Scriptures but was as both Iohannes Scotus libro 4. sententiarum Distict 17. art 3. and Anton part 3. histatit 19 doe confesse first imposed as necessary by the Lateran councel in InnoceÌ„t the thirds time about the year of the Lord one thousand 2 hundred and fifteene you here would seeme to couÌ„tenaÌ„ce by two places of scripture co begin withal But your betters haue thought otherwise of this your kinde of confession For your glosse de paenitentiâ Distinct 5. Cap. in principio confesses plainely that it came in rather by some tradition then either by authority of the olde testament or new which tradition he saieth yet ought to binde the West Church to vse it though not the Greekes East Church which haue it not And Beatus Rhenanus in his notes vpon Tertullians booke of repentance forasmuch as hee findeth not therein anie mention hereof not onely gathered that it was not in vse then but also hee sheweth that he thought it came in after grew of the mislike of the inconueniences of the continuance of publicke confessions made in the publicke assembly in the hearing of al the congregation vsed seuerally in the former times And Soto coÌ„tra BreÌ„tiuÌ„ reckoneth vp both your other two points following of praying to Saints and for the dead this also amongst the things grouÌ„ded but vpon the vnwriten word or tradition You had therefore delt both more wisely and more simply honestly if of these and such other great Rabbins of your side you had learned to fetch the ground of this your confession from any where els rather then from the scriptures But seeing you will seeme to haue found that ground for it there which they could not let vs a little consider how fâ—ly now the places you quote serue your turne You meane I am sure both by your words and quotations that Christs doing and saying to his Apostles set downe by Matthew John in the places you quote in these words to thee speaking namely in the first place to Peter I wil giue the keies of the kingdoÌ„e of heaueÌ„ whatsoeuer thou shalt binde in earth shal be bound in heauen whatsoeuer thou loosest in earth shal be loosed in heaueÌ„ And in the other he breathed vpoÌ„ theÌ„ and saied receiue yee the holy Ghost whose sins yee remit they are remitted whose sins yee retaine they are retained Wherby indeed it is euident that our Sauiour first promised to Peter in the name of al the rest after gaue to al his faithful Apostles first the gift of the holy Ghost and then power and authority to vse the â—eies of the kingdome of heauen to binde and loose and to remit retaine sinnes which power and authority they most faithfully and effectually vsed whiles faithfully they preached saluation to the peniteÌ„t beleeuer and denouÌ„ced damnation to the impenitent vnbeleeuers with all duety as they saw cause vsing the censures of the Church of admonition rebuking suspending and excommunicating though they were neuer acquainted with your auricular confession And likewise the same power is exercised by the Lords faithfull ministers in his church still not by the helpe of your
eare-shrist pardons but by their faithful preaching of the will of God sacraments ministring and vsing of the other censures in due time and place They haue a ministry of testification and declaration by the rule and light of the scriptures thorow the shining of Gods spirit in their hearts to assure them that rightly vnderstand them and beleeue them of that assuredly which God only doeth properly absolutely and principally But you seeme in thus alleadging of these places first so thinke that the power and authority the Christ here gaue his Apostles to binde and loose c. inuesteth them streight with power and authority to binde euery man to make vnto them your auricular confession whereas we neither read that any did so vnto them nor that they for all this euer exacted any such thing at any mans hands that they dealt withall and secondly you seeme to take the power giuen them and from thē deriued to other ministers here to be such that they properly and absolutely should haue power to pardon sinne c. which is absurd and blasphemous for you once but to imagine For so can none forgiue sinnes but God onely How can you say or thinke that a Priest properly or absolutely can absolue one of sinne seeing he may not so much as pronounce or declare a sinner to be pardoned of God vnles he be contrite penitent and faithfull indeede Now God onely and the party are priuy to this whither these thinges be sound and right in the heart or no for an hypocrite can make a shew to deceaue man withall in these you know vnles therfore we will thinke that we haue power to absolue him whom God yet condemneth our pronouncing of pardon or absolution to those that seeme such vnto vs must be but conditionall if they be such in deede as they make shew for and therefore neither is nor can it be proper or absolute Ambrose libro 3. de Spiritu Sancto ca. 19. by that of Iohn proues the godhead of the holy ghost for that he can and doeth forgiue sinnes which were no good argument if by that place Christ meant to giue ministers power and authority properly and absolutely to doe it vnles it be lawful to think that they are very Gods But marke I pray you your kinde of reasoning from these places Christ gaue to his Apostles power and authority giuing them the holy Ghost to bind and to forgiue sins ergo auricular confession before the sacrament thereby was enioynes this is your argument or else you saie nothing in all this for your selues against vs. For we deny not but most willingly confesse that by these places it is certaine that Christ gaue vnto his true ministers to whom he gaue the holy Ghost power and authority as ministers to doe this But what is this to authorize your priestes which are no ministers of his ordinance and to whom hee hath not giuen that spirit to doe this Or what is this if they had authority to doe it either to that which they take vpon them or to enforce a necessity of such auriculer confession as you practise and pleade for Herein it is with you as it is in other points of your religion you are deceaued and after seeke to abuse and deceaue others with the ambiguity and diuersity of acceptions of confession For that is a common tricke with you when you finde either in scripture or father that there is but the word mentioned that by any stretching maie reach to your meaning to alleadge that streight as flat full and pregnant for your purpose when as indeede if the circūstāces of the place he looked into it is as far from countenācing your opinion as may be So in this case you finding in scripture some mention of confessiō of sinnes and sundry examples of the same and likewise in the fathers you finding that they exhort and perswade men to confesse their sinnes you by and by imagined that your auricular confession must needes be that that they speake of or at least your learning not suffering you so to imagin you contrary to your owne knowledge and conscience as it seemeth could be contented to doe what you could to make your Reader so to thinke Wherefore to arme him hereafter against your subtlety or the cunning of any of your fellowes in this point and so to giue him a triacle to preserue him from the danger of your popish poison in this case let him know and vnderstand that there haue beene and be many kinds of confessing of sinnes spoken of both in scriptures and fathers and yet you neuer the nearer for yours For Augustine de verbis Euangelii hom 8. very pretily according to his maner saieth that confession is tither laudis or fraudis that is of praise or of fraude by the former vnderstanding that kinde of confession whereby we thankfullie acknowledging what God hath beene or is vnto vs we burst forth into lauding and praysing his holy name therefore whereunto the faithfull seruants of God are oftentimes exhorted in the scriptures as for example Psalme 33. in these words confesse vnto the Lord in harpe and in a psaltery of ten strings sing vnto him And Dan. 3. in these confesse vnto the Lord that he is good and that his mercy is for euer which kinde of confession in our Churches we alwaies publickly vse both before and in the receiuing of the Sacrament which wee teach to be a Sacrament euen to prouoke vs so to doe for our free and full saluation purchased for vs by the death of Christ And the other is the generall to all kyndes and sortes of confession of sinnes which he tearmeth frawde because by all sinne God or man or both are wronged of that which is due vnto them Otherwise some distinguish confession into confession of fayth and confession of maners of the first whereof sayeth Christ Matthew the tenth hee that confesseth mee before men I will confesse him before my father which is in heauen and of this Saint Paul speaketh saying with the heart man beleeueth to righteousnesse but with the mouth confession is made to saluation and this is farre more playnely in vse with vs also then with you For in all our publicke assemblies ordinarily as it is wel knowen according to the three auncient Creedes in english that all present may vnderstande vs wee make confession of our faith And as for the later which is confession of our maners there is no kinde of so confessing taught and commended vnto vs either in the olde Testament or new either to God or man priuate or publicke but wee vse it allowe it and exhort one an other vnto it in farre better sort and maner then you doe Yea to go one step further with you there is no kynde of so confessing our faultes by the consent and vniforme practise of the auncient fathers approued vnto vs but therein also both before the receite of the Sacrament and at other times as
them that with them we will not run out frō this church and faith to beleeue in a 1000. things that are not God as they doe And therefore these things considered by this note they are proued to be the Antichristian false prophets heretiques schismatiques that he speaketh of and not we His second sure marke signe and token of false prophets c. is saieth he that they being departed from the catholique church doe of thēselues of their owne authority without warrant being not sent set vp a new gospell a new faith and Religion and so by preaching a newe doctrine assemble and set vp a newe church and congregation And to proue this Heb. 5. Rom. 10. and Exod. 4. are quoted whence onely we may learne to this purpose that none may take vpon them an office in Gods house without lawfull calling and warrant from him Yet hereupon as though these were most pregnant places to proue that to be necessary to a lawefull calling which the learned protestant can neuer proue to bee in our calling he promiseth likewise to yeelde and to recant when wee shall bee able to proue our iust and due vocation ordinarily or extraordinarily to proceede of God and not onely of mē By his owne words in describing this note or marke two things must concurre to the making of it namely the preaching of a newe Religion or Gospell and the doing of it without a iust and due vocation from God and yet in the prouing it to be such a marke in the applying it to vs he forgetteth altogither the former maketh only shew of proofe for the later Belike his own cōscience tolde him that howsoeuer it was an easie matter to insinuate that our religion was new that yet he was not able so much as to make any shew that he could proue it so to be indeed And touching the other howsoeuer the places quoted by him serue to proue a lawful calling or sending by God to be necessary for and to all such as shal take any office vpon them in his Church yet they proue not at al that there is any thing needful to the prouing of our vocation to be such wanting in ours neither doeth he name any thing required in any of these places to be in ours which he could say we wanted which it is likely he would not haue omitted to haue done if he had seene that with any probability he might haue done it And therefore any man may see that euen in this signe as in the former his onely ground is a false supposition that those things must needs be graunted him all which both most iustly and confidently we alwaies deny For without any proofe or shadow of proofe he in one periode assumeth three things against vs most vntruely slanderously as at large in sundry places of my answere to Albine I haue made it manifest namely that we are gone out of the true catholicke Church that wee haue set vp a new faith and religion and that we haue assembled a new Church and congregation Yea christian reader if thou wouldest but vouchsafe by the table annexed vnto this answere of mine to turne to the places in the saied answere where these points be handled the antiquity of our church and religion the newnes of popery and the contrariety betwixt the Romish church that now is the scriptures fathers and councels in the true catholicke church of Christ the lawfulnes of our calling to the ministry and the vnlawfulnes of their priesthood and vocation thereunto vnto other prelacies amongst them and when thou hast found them to read ouer wtout partiality what I haue writen hereof I doubt not but thereby thou wouldest see not onely that he vniustly hath here charged vs with these three faults but the most iustly we may charge thē with thē al. And therfore therunto referring thee for further answere vnto this threefold charge of his in this place vpon that which there thou shalt finde I hope with mee thou wilt conclude that this beeing a marke and a most certaine signe of antichristian heretiques as he saieth that it standeth faire vpon thē and not vpon vs therfore he should recāt The third signe tokē that the offerer talketh of is that such ouer and aboue the properties touched in the two former doe preach and teach contentiously and seditiously against the doctrine before time taught of the common knowen Catholicke Church of Christ as namely saieth hee against the sacraments of Christs Church by a flat denial of many of thē against the real presence of Christs body in the holy eucharist against the blessed sacrifice of the masse propitiatory both for the liue and the dead against penance the worthy fruits thereof by fasting watching and praier al straightnes of life against vowes inuocation of Saints praier for soules departed and finally against the Church it selfe flatly denying that Christ hath here vpon earth any spouse or visible Church to be heard speak perceiued or seene The ground of which signe he maketh that saying Hebrues 13 be you not caried away with diuers and strange doctrines so tearmed of the Apostle as he expoundeth him because they agree not but are contrary to the receiued and common knowen doctrine of Christs holy catholicke Church whereupon he groweth to his conclusion that when the learned protestant shal be able to proue that they and not we are by our preaching of these strange doctrines the raisers vp of these strifes and contentions then he wil recant and not before Whereunto I answere that vnderstanding by the common knowen catholicke Church the true Church of Christ which is knowen and acknowledged so to be alwaies of him and his faithfull members then we graūt that this is a right marke of such as he would haue it to be a marke of and that worthely in the thirteenth of the Hebrues all men are warned to take heed that they be not caried away with diuers and strange doctrines from that which she hath vniuersally taught and receiued But so taking the common knowen catholicke Church of Christ and not otherwise I say it and haue proued it in my answere to Albine that the Church of Rome that now is hath too long and doeth still not onely cōtentiously and seditiously but also furiously tirannically bloudely and euery way antichristianly preach against the doctrine before time taught by her and commonly receaued and professed by hers touching the true vse of the law and the gospell the office of Christ faith in him the doctrine of faith and workes and of praier and the sacramentes and almost of all other principall pointes of the true Christian religion And thus I am sure hee must vnderstand the church of Christ if either he would haue this to be a certaine signe of heretiques or to be thought rightly to haue expounded the 13. to the Hebrewes And therefore vnderstanding by the common knowen catholique Church of Christ