of those words Except yee eat the flesh of the son of mā c. killeth therefore he teacheth vs there spiritually to vnderstand them Who vpon these wordes of Christ gathereth that no wicked man can eate the flesh of christ vpon Mat. c. 15. as for the other part he granteth the wicked may eat that when it hath beene eatē in the end it is auoided into the place of easement Hom 15. vpon Mat. Athanasius noteth the christ made mention of his ascension Iohn 6. to wtdraw thē from corporall fleshly vnderstāding of his words vpon these words whosoeuer speaketh a word against the son c. But Chrys goeth plainly to work saith in his 11. Hom vpon Mat. that the very body of christ himselfe is not in the holy vessels but the mistery sacrament thereof is therin conteined And therefore in his 46. Hom. vpon Iohn sheweth vs the christ saying the flesh profiteth nothing Iohn 6. therby warned vs to take heede of carnall and fleshly vnderstanding of his words which is to vnderstand them saieth he simply and in his 4. Homil vpon the 4. to the Corinth he telleth vs that the body of Christ is the carion where the Eagles will bee he nameth eagles saieth he to shew that who so will approch to his body must mount aloft haue no dealing with the earth nor be drawē downward but must euermore fly vp c. For this is a table of Eagles saieth he that fly on high not of Iaies that creepe beneath Christ tooke bread which cōforteth mās hart that he might represēt therby his body bloud saith Hier. vpō the 26. of Mat. As thou hast in baptism receued the similitude of death so likewise dost thou in this sacramēt drīk the similitude of christs bloud saieth Ambrose in his 4 booke 4 c. of the sacraments Ciprian de vnctione chrismatis writeth thus Christ in his last supper gaue vnto his Apostles bread wine which he called his body bloud but on the Crosse hee gaue his very body to be wounded with the hands of the souldiers that the Apostles might declare vnto the world how in what maner the bread may be the flesh bloud of Christ And the maner straight way he declareth thus that those things which do signifie those things which be signified by thē may be both called by one name Fulgētius in his booke to King Thrasimund hath these words This cup or chalice is the new Testamēt that is to say doth signifie the new Testament Theodoret in his first Dialogue most plainely writeth that Christ honoured the signes and representatiōs which are seene with the name of his body and bloud not changing their natures but adding grace to nature and yet more plainely in the 2. Dialogue he writeth thus the mystical signes after sanctification go not from their nature for they tary in their former substance figure and forme Yea euen Gelasius a Pope about the yeare 500. against Eutiches is as plaine saying in the Eucharist the substāce and nature of bread and wine cease not For the image and similitude of the body and bloud is celebrated in those mysteries And Bertram in his treatise of this matter writen in the time of Carolus Caluus laboureth by many proofes testimonies to shew that bread and wine remaine still and that we are here to followe Christ in a figure and mistery And Bede vpon Luke 22. saith because bread doeth comfort mans heart and wine doeth make good bloud in his body therefore the bread is mystically compared to Christs body and the wine to Christs bloud The like saying hath Haymo in his 5. booke De sermonum proprietate Emissenus de consecrat Dist 2. cap. Quia corpus compareth the conuersion in the Sacrament to the conuersion in a man regenerated which we all know is in quality and not in substance There are two Epistles yet extant in the Saxon tongue made by one Alfricke in King Etheldreds time about the yeare of the Lord 996 being then as some write Bishop of Canterbury wherein he teacheth the bread and wine to be no otherwise the body and bloud of Christ then manna and the water of the rocke was Christ who also translated 80 sermons out of latin into the Saxon tongue whereof 24. were appointed to be read for homilies and in that which was to be read on Easter day there is much direct matter against Transubstantiation and your reall presence And since these times you know well inough wee haue had many from time to time yea mo thē you well like of that haue beene as flat and direct against your kinde of reall presence as we are now This Master Foxes booke of Actes and Monuments hath made euident to all the world And it is famously knowen that before your Lateran Councel vnder Innocent the 3. in the yeare 1215. it was not decreed to bee as you now hold It appeareth also by the last session of the councell of Florence which is not much aboue 140. yeares ago that the Greeke Church vntill then stoode against your doctrine of transubstantiation which is the ground of your reall presence And Tonstall though otherwise a great man on your side yet in his booke of this sacrament saieth perhaps it had beene better to leaue euery man that would be curious concerning this matter of the maner how Christ is present to his owne coniecture as by his confession before the councel of Lateran it was left at libertie And Iohn Duns a frend of yours vpon the 4. booke of the sentences saieth that the wordes might haue beene expounded more plainely then by Transubstantiation if it had pleased the Church Gabriel Biell another great doctour vpon the canon of the masse in his 40. reading plainely confesseth that it is not expressed in the canon of the Bible how the body of Christ is there whither by Trāsubstantiatiō or Consubstantiation Euen so your great Bishop Iohn Fisher writing against Luthers booke of the captiuity of Babylō is enforced to confesse that he findeth not in Mathew nor any where els in the scripture any thing to proue that there is thereby the reall presence of Christ in your masse nor that whensoeuer a Priest shall go about that matter hee maketh the bread wine the body and bloud of Christ and so concludeth that he thinketh that euery man vnderstandeth that the certaintie of that matter dependeth not so much of the Gospell as it doeth vpon the vse tradition and custome of the Church These testimonies forasmuch as directly they are against your literall exposition of Christs words your new deuise of transubstantiation the onely piller and buttresse of your real presence and against your grosse and carnal eating of him with the bodily mouthes of all receiuers good and bad they may not bee denied to bee forcible against your reall presence For the cause thereof denied and taken away the effect must cease and if the
wordes well you shall finde that hee counted the waie to heauen straight as well in respect of religion as life and that there is nothing more vsuall with Dauid then indifferently without any such nice distinction to vse these wordes waies and pathes both in respecte of the one and the other you might easily perceiue if you were anie thing conuersant in his Psalmes looke vpon Christs time whereunto he had an especiall eie when hee vsed these wordes and you shall finde that true religion was a thing more geyson and rare then in the worlde and had fewer followers then an holy and a vertuous life For eueÌ„ many of the Pharisees and Philosophers made great shew of that that therefore to leade vs rather to thinke that in respect of Religion then maners he had vttered those wordes immediately thereupon he addeth beware of false Prophets And as for Dauid if your argument be grounded vpon that that he placeth the word waies in the first place and pathes in the later if you marke him well you shall oftentimes finde him to inuert that order in the Psalmes And Psalme 109. because you should plainly see that he referreth waies as wel to maners as to ReligioÌ„ he saieth take from me the way of lying and teach me the way of thy statutes And considering that you cannot be ignorant that Idolatry and Paganisme in Christs time was more common then Christs Religion therefore had 10000. that tooke it for true religion in comparison of one that tooke Christs so I wonder that you euer durst thus expound Christs wordes For by your expositioÌ„ he tolde them that it was better for them to embrace paganisme then his Religion for that was the common beaten way and his was but a small bie-path Againe in Liberius his time when it was an hard matter to finde one true Catholique for an 100. Arrians insomuch that Constantine saied vnto Liberius that he alone fauoured Athanasius Theodor. Eccles Hist lib. 2. cap. 16. by your rule Liberius did well in that seeing Arrianisme to be the common waie and his ancient Religion that then was but as a bie-path wherein few walked that he yeelded his subscriptioÌ„ to Arrianisme Indeede it should seem that this Pope Liberius was of your minde so long you care not I am sure as that you may haue a Pope on your side Wel yet if you had but remembred that the Turkish religioÌ„ is at this day hath beene a long time coÌ„mon to moe then your owne religioÌ„ is or euer was it might haue staied you froÌ„ teaching meÌ„ to measure religion by the coÌ„monnes of it or multitude of followers least you should haue so persuaded them to Turcisme But it may be you had rather haue it so seeing in coÌ„parisoÌ„ therof ours is but a narrow path wherein few doe walke then that they should follow vs. If your skil in interpreting of the scriptures in prescribing rules for the direction of men be no better then you haue shewed in this you may very well be a Doctour and great master in your blinde and ignorant kingdome of Popery but in the kingdome of Christ there is little hope that there will euer any great reckoning be made of you The XLI Chapter NOw to turne to the partition that we haue vpon the 34. and 37. of Ezechiel and vpon the tenth of Iohn it is plaine that we are the flockes of weake and sickelie sheepe and your disciples are the sheepe that runne this waie and that waie astraie those that are our a Howsoeuer that title is due vnto them they take it not vnto theÌ„ ill Prelats take vpon them the title of Mercenarii pastoris but vnto your ministers the titles of deuouring wolues may be applied b Onely of such as haue made shipwracke of conscience without anie scrupulositie of coÌ„science for you watch to none other intent but to make the sheepe runne out of the folde and to deuour them because that our pastours haue not taken care to keepe them And although they be not excusable aswell for their silence as for their naughty liues I see not your Patriarchs zealous manifesters amende much themselues the faults that they finde in vs for besides the true and certaine experience that wee haue had by the triall that we haue seene to our cost in this Realme within these fiue or six yeares c Penned then by such that had taught their peÌ„s to write lies I haue read full many a golden Legend of your sacred martyrs and holie Bishops which doe not altogither redound to the honour of your pretended reformed Church And among others Theodore de Beza Caluins successour in the Pontificate seat of the holy city of Geneua of whom such things are preached abroad that if the one halfe of them be true d Neither wil â—e nor any of vs so compare our selues he is scant so good a man as S. Iohn Baptist And because I would not haue you to mislike theÌ„ for their religioÌ„ I wil not alleage to verify this any Catholick author but soÌ„e of Luthers successors your first fouÌ„der who taught you to write so learnedly I would say railingly against the church of Rome Tilemanus Heshusius a minister of the LutheraÌ„s in the * Jn his booke of the true body of Christ in the sacrif writen in Latin book that I haue alreadie noted doeth openlie accuse the saied Beza of great infamy that he did not onlie content e Heat of conteÌ„tion made the man too credulous and so beleeued your malitious parasites that most impudently and falsly haue forged these things of him the fancie of his mind with leading a luxurious a liceÌ„tious life to staine his vow with a bilt of adulterous loue but that that is worse hee himselfe hath set forth in writing all his lasciuious acts the which saieth hee f His lasciuious songs and Epigrams he made and published whiles he was yours whereof he hath publickly in printe testified his repentance mislike since he was ours he hath song in sacrilegerime to the Instrument to manifest his sinne to the whole sight of the worlde And in that verie booke hee doeth say that Beza who as I haue tolde you is a Bishop of the holie Cittie of Geneua is an infamous monster whose naughtie life any man may reade set forth by him selfe in his owne Epigrams and notwithstanding saieth he to heare him speake you would thinke hee vvere Saint Iohn Baptist for he can talke of nothing but of his holie life This same very minister in the booke where he writeth these things he doeth laie to g The more shame for him for it is a monstrous and notorious slander Bezaes charge that he tooke with him to Geneua another mans wife without the knowledge of her husband whose name was Candida h Will an argument from one to al follow with papists and yet this one not proued such an one neither
AN ANSWERE TO MASTER IOHN DE ALBINES NOTABLE DISCOVRSE AGAINST heresies as his frendes call his booke compiled by THOMAS SPARK pastor of Blechley in the County of Buck. And I heard a voice from heauen saying Come out of her my people that yee be not partakers of her sinnes and that yee receaue not of her plagues Revelat. 18. vers 4. Put your selues in aray against Babylon rounde about all yee that bende the bowe shoote at her spare no arrowes for shee hath sinned against the Lord. Ierem. 50. vers 14. ACADEMIA OXONIENSIS SAPIENTIAE ET FELICITATIS Printed at Oxforde by IOSEPH BARNES Printer to the Vniversitie 1591. TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE ARTHVRE LORD GREY OF WILTON Knight of the most honourable order of the Garter his especiall good Lord and Patrone Thomas Sparke Wisheth all good perseuerance in Christian courage and constancy in the profession and furtherance of Gods sincere truth with all other ornaments of true nobility to Gods glorie our comfort and his owne heart good contentation nowe and euer ALthough Right Honourable when I had first perused this treatise of Iohn de Albines I foūd it thorow out a most bitter inuectiue a malitious declamation written onely of purpose to deface disgrace amongst the simple both our religion the ministers professors thereof yet finding withal as I did as anie indifferent man that reads it shal that neither for matter nor manner of writing there is any newe thing of any importance in it which hath not beene before euer this discourse of his sawe the light oftē that far more substantially vrged by some other of that side therefore which hath not also heretofore been as oftē fully effectually answered by some or other of ours I not only iudged this to be the reason when it hauing now been amōgst vs in english these 16. or 17. yeares none hitherto had vouchsafed it any further particular answere but also though vrged as your Honour knoweth to frame vnto it a speciall direct answere I could yet hardly be brought to thinke it necessary so basely I esteemed of it to aford it any other answere then either a fewe marginal notes that whē I first red it I bestowed vpō it or frō point to point as it were in a table to haue shewed the reader where and by whom he might read the same thing long ago often obiected on the one side answered by the other which might haue bene in one sheet of paper very well dispatched Howbeit in the end calling to minde what your Lordship tolde me concerning the opinion that our poore seduced cuntrimen seeme secretly to haue amōgst thēselues of it as you learned by one of their owne speeches had thereof vnto your selfe in acquainting you first with the booke and marking how not onely by publishing it in english but also by entitling it both in the forhead ouer euery leafe a notable discourse against heresies they themselues haue plainely shewed that they haue it in no base account finding it also since to be the iudgement of a certaine learned man of auncient and long experience euen of our owne side now this last yeare published in print that the hauing of this very booke so long in secret amongst them vnanswered hath bene one great cause of the apostasy of so many yong mē as of late yeares in this our cuntry haue reuolted from the truth to popery at the last I resolued with my selfe though I know that whē I had done what I could herein that I should be foūd to haue said litle or nothing not said writtē aswel before by some one or other of our side that yet your Lordships request made vnto me to answere it as fully and directly as I coulde when you first shewed me the booke how you came by it was is such as that both of duty to your selfe particularly for sundry causes to the church of Christ generally for that by this means many may see togither an answere to that which otherwise in great part either they might chance neuer to hit of in any other wryter of ours or else be driuen to search more those further then it was likely they would or could I was bound to satisfy in as good sort as any way conueniently I could Hauing therefore encouradgement by these reasons to take it in hand hauing now by Gods grace finished it in maner as you see I present the same vnto your Honour as an vndoubted token of my dutifull affection towards you beseeching you not onely to take the paynes as your leasure serueth you to peruse it ouer your selfe but also desyring you to bee vnto it such a patrone as that it comming abroade thus by your prouocation it may haue your best protection and countenaunce to passe vp and downe openly and boldly both in the veiw of frendes and foes vnto it There was prefixed before Jhon de Albines book vvhich your honour deliuered me a long preface to the reader made as it should seeme by the publisher thereof in english and there was annexed vnto it in the later ende an offer of a catholicke as hee is there termed to a learned protestant consisting of two and twenty demaunds and six signes of false prophets heretiques and schismatiques the preface I haue aunswered and the answere thereunto I haue placed next vnto my aunswere vnto Albines booke it selfe somewhat also I haue annexed that answere of mine to his booke finished in the latter ende to shewe the vanitie and childishnesse of those things which the author hath vttered in the application of those six signes to vs but to that which hee hath written concerning those two and twenty demaunds I haue said nothing And indeed because otherwise the booke was growen farre greater then I imagined at the first it woulde I haue not at all inserted that offer nor anie part thereof The reason of my not medling at all with those two and twenty demaunds and not troubling this my booke at all with anie part of that offer is that Doctor Fulke long agoe hath aunswered those demaundes and that also nowe of late Master Crowley hath at large aunswered both them and that which is added concerning those signes Doctor Fulkes answere thereunto maie bee had vnder the title of an aunswere of a Christian protestant to the proude Chalenge of a popish Catholicke and it is prefixed commonly before his booke written in confutation of Allens of Purgatorie Indeede concerning the six signes hee saieth nothing not because of any greater matter in them then in the rest but because at the first they were not published with the other The demaunds though hee haue aunswered shortly according to his manner yet so sharpely and effectuallie hee hath doone it that if the Chalenger were a man of his worde hee continued not long after a popish Catholicke Master Crowleys aunswere to the whole offer worde for worde as it was annexed
to John de Albines booke is extant vnder the tytle of a deliberate aunswere to a rash offer c. and it vvas printed by Iohn Charlewoode in London 1588. They both haue vvith their aunswere set downe the words of the offerer The trauels of these two men haue eased both me this booke of mine of medling any further then I haue sayed with that Chalenger and the rather because since hee had his first aunswere we neuer yet heard that hee had either skill or will to replie I might well ynough considering the largenesse and sufficiency of Master Crowleys answere thereunto haue omitted that vvhich I further haue sayed to aunswere his six signes not touched by Doctor Fulke but that vvhat I haue vvritten thereabout vvas written before I sawe Master Crowleys answere and that I thought it not amisse to let it stande that so betvvixt vs three the vvhole thus might bee tvvyse aunswered Though it were Master Crowley vvho as I noted before in the first leafe of his booke making aunswere to this offer that gaue that iudgement that Iohn de Albines booke had beene the cause of so much apostasy of late here amongst vs yet he as he there shows would not bestowe tyme in aunswering of it because supposing by the title it was written by a Frenchman therefore either in french or latine he thought that either Beza or some other french protestant had done it already sufficiently This when I redde first it caused me to be the slacker both in finishing and publishing this answere of mine Yet in the ende forasmuch as this was now amongst vs in English and therefore in his opinion had hurt so much and so many English persons and I could neuer learne of any certainty that in any other language it had beene directly answered by any I thought it needefull and the best way whether any such answere in any other tongue had beene made vnto it elsewhere or not to preuent as much as maie bee anie further such danger amongst vs by it to accompany such poyson with his fit counterpoyson that is such an English popish discourse with an English christian answere And the rather because howsoeuer by the title there is shew that the author was a Frenchman yet indeede I can hardly be perswaded that he was so For his publisher in English taking leasure as he hath to trouble his reader with a long tedious and friuolous preface hath not therein so much as secretly once insinuated vnto vs in what language the author wrote it yea he hath not once meÌ„tioned any traÌ„slation of it either by himselfe or any other the consideration whereof together with sundry phrases and matters conteined in the booke makes me rather thinke that some of our owne fugitiues English Iesuits or seminary priests indeede haue made it then any such Archdeacon of Tolosa in France as is pretended But howsoeuer it be in this respect it is not much materiall and therefore I haue not beene herein curious for these my reasons notwithstanding in all this my answere vnto him I frame my speech as to the author whose name it beares And howsoeuer I may doubt of his person and cuntrey of this I am certaine whosoeuer he were French or English the sonne of that bondwoman Ismael was neuer cunninger in persecuting the son of the freewoman Isaac with scoffes mocks then the author thereof was by the same meanes to doe what might be done to vex and grieue vs. Whosoeuer he was the right popish vaine spirit of writing he had For in so short a peece of worke I am perswaded by that you haue viewed him ouer together with this answer of mine your Lordship will be of opinioÌ„ that neuer any of that factioÌ„ weÌ„t beyond him in shameful begging alwaies the things most in questioÌ„ in subtle slipping froÌ„ the matters vndertakeÌ„ to proue into other more easy for him not in question in false quoting abusing the testimonies which he alleadges or in barrennes of matter or methode in such copy of swelling bragging and triumphing words Sure I am for my owne part though I know these be the common ornaments of popish writers that I neuer redde any whose book coÌ„sisted so wholy of these as this of his But to leaue him as hee is whosoeuer he was and to returne vnto your Lordship once againe I dedicate and offer this my poore labour vnto your honourable view protection which I doe not because the truth of god which I haue therein taught and defended standeth neede of the patronage of man For god the author thereof can and will defende and protect that though al the great meÌ„ in the world should band themselues against it but for diuers and sundry other reasons iustly me mouing thereunto One is which I haue touched already that of right the dedication hereof appertayneth to you because I had neuer taken it in hand but by your Lordships motion perswasion An other is that you since my comming to the place where I am for these eleuen years last past haue alwaies been yet are a most louing fatherly patrone to my ministry mee and mine by which right though that former reason had not beene your honour may worthily chalenge not onely in this but also in all other such poore fruites of mine growing from me thus nourished and cherished vnder your Lordshippes patronage greater interest then this which I offer you nowe herein But if neither of these two reasons had been yet you being the man you are that is by the grace goodnesse of God as far as you are knowen which is very farre amongst the godly and truly religious a man by birth honourable for martiall prowesse more and for giftes of sounde learning religion and vertue most of of all to be honoured and esteemed euen that would haue drawen me though otherwise I had been a meare stranger vnto you by this means to haue sought to haue testified my duetifull and hartie good affection towardes you For pietie ioyned with Christian nobilitie hath been the auncieÌ„t cause why the godly learned in auncient times haue dedicated their works to such as they haue iudged truly qualified therewith doubtlesse therby both the better to encourage them to whom they dedicated their labours to proceede and goe on in the good course they had begun and thereby to prouoke others to imiâ—ate their good exaÌ„ple that the like honourable opinion may by such also bee conceaued of them likewise when occasion should serue to their comfort testified publickely of them in the church of God What else mooued Ambrose to dedicate his bookes of fayth and the spirite to Gratian the Emperour What else caused Lactantius to dedicate his diuine instituâ—â—ons to Constantine or what else enduced the holy â—uangelist S. Luke to dedicate his historie of the â—ctes of the Apostles to noble Theophilus It was â—oubtlesse great honour vnto these men in their â—imes in the churches of Christ
they haue deceiued the simple people vvithall vnderstande welbeloued in the Lord vvhosoeuer thou art first for transubstantiation the very archpiller of their Synagoge that if they bee very busie to seeke out who first gaue inkling of such a matter they shall finde indeede the originall thereof not to come from Marke the Euangelist or anie of his fellowshippe but from one Marke a notable Magitian and filthie heretique of the broode of Valentinian that liued as it seemeth by the stories in the raigne of Antoninus Pius about one hundred and fifteene yeares after Christ For Epiphanius in his thirty foure heresie noteth and when hee hath done plentifully confirmeth it out of the first booke of Irenaeus and his ninth chapter against the heresies of ValeÌ„tiniaÌ„ others that this same heretique by his enchaÌ„tmeÌ„t hauiÌ„g first caused a cup of white wine to beare the colour of blood made his followers beleeue that by his inuocation over it it was so traÌ„substantiated into blood that seing that he had giveÌ„ thaÌ„ks ouer it long praied it might be thought of them that gratiaÌ„ quae est super vniuersa sanguinem suum instillâsse in illud poculum that is that grace that is aboue all things had poured his bloud into that cup by which meanes wheÌ„ he had made them in admiration of him desirous to drink thereof he giues it them with great deuotion solemnity of words so wonderfully bewitched many Indeed this fellow may very wel be allowed for the first auÌ„cient fouÌ„der of this point of doctrin for there being not any one point of popery wherein Antichrist hath more manifestly shewed him selfe coÌ„trary to Christ then in this as in truth there is not because for the establishing vse of this he is both spoiled of the true nature of a maÌ„ office of the only sufficieÌ„t priest of the new testament to offer himselfe once for all for the redemption of his church who can be fitter then this auncient enchauÌ„ter Marcus to be the first author and patrone hereof especially seing Irenaeus speaking of him in the eight chapter of the foresaid booke as it should seeme secretly directed by the spirit of prophesy saith thas he was verè praecursor Antichristi that is truely Antichrists fore-runner Yet how notably soeuer this Marcus caused many simple persons in his time to beleeue his transubstaÌ„tiation of wine into the bloud of Grace yet he was so baited detected confounded for his lewd and cosening dealing therein and in other points by Irenaeus Epiphanius and others that howsoeuer in the meane time Antichrist his successour was busie vnder Leo the 9. in a councell at Vercellis and after in the councell of Lateran vnder Nicholas the 2. about the yeare of the lord 1060. in bringing Berengarius to recantatioÌ„ to reuiue againe this doctrine of transubstantiation yet as their own friends confesse namely Tonstall in his booke of the sacrament of Christs body and bloud it could not nor was not decreed for a certaine and vniuersall doctrine before Innocent the thirds time in another councell at Lateran about the yeare of Christ 1215. before which couÌ„cel the Greeke Church had separated themselues from the Latine and therefore it being a point of Doctrine not receaued as Catholike before that diuision neuer since could it be receaued in the Greeke Church for any Catholike truth How can it then haue countenance of all Christian Regions and times Bertram Berengarius the Waldenses in sundry places by writing speaking opposed themselues against it as witnesseth Bertrams book of the sacrameÌ„t the condemnation of Berengarius opinion about it at Vercellis and the articles of the Waldenses Yea a little before and in this Pope Innocents time a certaine people about Iohn de Albines Tolossa called Albigenses and that in great mighty multitudes as the French Cronicles shew denied reall presence of Christ vnder or with the outward elements in this sacrament in somuch as great warres were raised to subdue them But of this matter also I haue spoken so much chapter eleuenth 17. that here I neede thereof say no more Now touching Images or Idols and the worshipping thereof I must needes confesse that for their dealing about them they may very well pretend both antiquity and vniuersality For it appeares in all stories and in the scriptures themselues that that way not onely all other nations but also euen the people of the Iewes themselues haue beene alwaies wonderfully giuen to pollute and defile themselues but withall it appeares that god in his word writteÌ„ against no abhominatioÌ„ hath cried out either more often or more vehemently then against this But amongst Christians the first that we reade of that worshipped the image of Iesus or any other was Marcellina a filthy companion of the phantasticall heretique Carpocrates but both in Epiphanius heresi 27. and in Augustine ad Quod vult deum we finde this both noted condemned amongst other detestable errours of the Carpocratians This Carpocrates liued in the beginning of the empire of Antoninus Pius Anicet then being Bishoppe of Rome about the yeare of the lord 109. And in Origens time who died as Spanhemensis saith in the yeare of Christ 261. hee in his seuenth book to Celsus noteth that then the Christians neither suffered images nor pillers to be worshipped Likewise in Arnobius aduersus gentes who florished about the 300. yeare after Christ it appeares that the geÌ„tils obiected that as a matter of disgrace against the ChristiaÌ„s that they neither had nor worshipped any such But so far of was it that the christiaÌ„s theÌ„ thought it any disgrace vnto theÌ„ that OrigeÌ„ in the place before quoted saith that the Iewes ChristiaÌ„s hearing the law Exo. 20. not only refuse images of god choosing rather to die then to make or worship any such adding this as a reasoÌ„ that god is inuisible without body And likewise Clemens Alexandrinus who florished 100. yeares before Origen in his exhortation to the heathen confesses willingly this their obiection to be true that Christians had no images that might be discerned by sence but onely by vnderstanding because to vse that deceitfull art saieth he was forbid theÌ„ Yea and that Christians and their teÌ„ples might continue still free froÌ„ them in Constantines time in a councel held in Spaine at Eliberis can 36. it was decreed thus It hath pleased vs to determine that no pictures should be suffered in churches least that which is worshipped or adored should be painted in walles Isid tom 1. coÌ„ci And therfore Epiphaniê° 55. yeares after this councell about the yeare of Christ 390. as it appeares in his Epistle to Iohn of IerusaleÌ„ finding in the entrance of the church at Anablatha in that Iohns dioces the image of a maÌ„ pictured on a cloth there haÌ„ging puld it downe tare it asuÌ„der writing to the foresaid Iohn about it though as he confessed it seemed vnto him that it was made for
the picture of Iesus or sōe of the Saints yet he cōdemneth it as contrary both to the scriptures and Christian Religion therefore perswades him not to suffer any such thing any more for it became him to banish such superstition which was vnseemely for the Church of Christ Yea Lactantius lib. 2 cap. 19. of his diuine institutions saieth flatly that their can be no Religion where there is an image he liued florished in the yeare 320. And S Augustine who liued after al these before named for he died not before the yeare 430. de consensu Euangelistarum lib. 1. cap 2. writeth that they euen deserue to erre which seeke Christ and his Apostles not in bookes but in painted wals Yea Gregory the great as they cal him Bishop of Rome though thē the painting of stories for an ornamēt of the church was thought tolerable yet he lib. 7. Epist 109. lib. 9. Epist 9. to Serenus slatly cōdemneth the adoring worshipping of images And whereas by occasiō of this tolerating of historicall painting of them through the superstition corruption of mans nature within short time by litle litle the worshipping of thē grew to be too much vsed liked of many especially in these Westerne parts of the Bishops of Rome thēselues by the yeare of Christ 700. the Emperour Leo the third in a coūcell held at Constantinople consisting of 330. Bishops there with the consent of that coūcell decreed that they should be quite remoued out of churches burnt seuerely he punishes those which notwithstanding would perseuere in the worshipping of them And the same course tooke his successour Constantine by another great coūcell held their ratifying the former two Emperours more succeeding him notwithstāding al this while the Bishops of Rome with stood thē what they might decreed as fast for the retaining worshipping of thē as they could as it appeares in Sigebert Blōdus others Howbeit though also in the time of Irene the nonage of her sonne Constātine in the east through the suggestiō of Therasius Bishop of Constantinople they got there a councell helde at Nicea consisting of three hūdreth fifty Bishops where to currie fauour againe with the Bishops of Rome who vpō the former occasiō as it appears in Sigebert others had bene a shrewd traiterous meanes to cause these westerne parts to reuolt frō the empire they decreed according to their humour for the honour of images Yet Africk Asia the greater could neuer be brought to receiue those canōs there made yea that more is though by that time the Pope had made Charles the great very much beholding to him in being the means to trāslate the empire of the west vnto him so were those canōs in this point misliked cōtradicted here in thes western parts that a coūcel in his time by his meās as the Emperour being called at Francford whereunto came many Bishops of Italy Frāce Germāy other cūtries yet there euē for this point was that coūcel of Nice reiected cōdēned as a wicked councell witnes both Regino lib. 2. anno 794. also one Hinckmare not lōg after those times Archbishop of Rhemes writing against another of his name thē Bishop of Iandune or Lauedune as some cal it ca. 20. where he for further proofe of this to be true writeth that the Bishops their assembled caused a booke of purpose to be writen sent to Rome cōteining at large a cōfutatiō of al the reasons vsed for images at Nicea which in his yoūg yeares he saw which the keeper of the Popes library Augustine Steuchus cōfesses to lie there writē in anciēt caracters de donatione Constantini lib. 2. cap. 59. nu 60. And Roger Houodē who liued 400. years ago in his cōtinuatiō of Bedeas story in the year 792. shewing how Charles sēt the canōs of that coūcel of Nice hither wherin as he saith it was decreed that images ought to bee adored which the church of God vtterly detesteth reports that one Albirus here wrote an epistle against that determinatiō maruelously grounded vpō the scriptures which he caried into France as he saith in the name of our Bishops by occasion whereof the rather it should seeme shortly after Charles thought meete to call the foresaid coūcell at Francford All these things notwithstanding neuer were images pillers and crosses more idolatrously decreed to be worshipped their nor euer were idols more grosly adored of heretiques or the very pagans and heathen then they haue bene yet be of superstitious Papists For they crouch kneele vnto them present offerings before them they run a pilgrimage vnto them and teach that they are to be worshipped with that honour that is due vnto them whose images and monuments they be though in an other manner not for their owne sakes but for theirs whose remembrances they be But indeed if in worshipping of them they did not principally respect the Images themselues why should there not be as great deuotion as many pilgrimages as great offerings presented yeelded to the image of Christ Mary or of any other aswell in one place as in an other Well howsoeuer they will do wickedly herein and when they haue done seeke to colour the matter such in truth all the worlde sees herein hath beene their dealing that Euthymius in his panoply had neuer more cause to name the Armenians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Idolaters to the crosse for their grosse and superstitious worshipping of it then we haue generally to count and call the Romanists flat idolaters for their behauiour towards it and other images also Thus then hoping by this that I haue said cōcerning this point that not onely thou maiest see goodreader when and how this point of popery first came in but how and by whom it hath beene oppugned but consequently also that the Romish church is herein destitute both of scripture fathers consent of Christian regions and al that she bragges of let vs see if wee can shew the like concerning the other point of forced single life vpō the clergy which she holds to be so necessary and holy an ordinance as that by no meanes without deadly sin it may be transgressed Euen in this as in the former if we search the monumentes of antiquity well we shal finde that they haue very auncient heretiques to be their first fathers leaders For the Tacianists commonly cald Encratites of their abstinence from mariage certaine other thinges who began about the yeare one hundred forty two were great condemners of mariage as appeares in Aug. ad Quodvult Deum in Epiphanius writing of them Heresi 46. After them spronge vp the Manichees who in like manner were enemies to mariage but not so vniuersally as the former for they permitted it to others and restraine onely their clergy from it whō they calde their elect as August witnesseth of them Epist 74. but indeed as many as
Catholique faith Catholique Bishops succeeding one another When as indeede and trueth it is as impossible for you to proue that you haue any iust right to anie of these as it was for those heretiques But howsoeuer you make some beleeue you haue all these yet I say vnto you with Saint August De vnitate Ecclesiae against the Epistle of Petilian chap. 10. That euen Catholique Bishops are not to bee consented vnto if that anie where they be deceiued in thinking anie thing contrarie to the Canonicall Scriptures And therefore when all commeth to all and when otherwise you haue runne your selues out of breath in conclusion will you will you by these Canonicall Scriptures must it bee determined whither you haue anie right to anie of these or no. For if you appeale from them as indeede you doe to the Church and fathers they will sende you backe againe for the triall whither that which they speake bee true or no onelie to the Scriptures as it maie appeare vnto you not onelie by this one place which I haue cyted out of Augustine alreadie but also by a number such like places both to bee founde in him else where and also in others For you maie reade in the first booke and seuenth Chapter of Theodoret that when Constantine sawe great controuersies in the Church in the Nicene councell and perceaued that euerie seuerall companie bragged of the trueth and so also of the Church and fathers to bee on their side to ende all those controuersies he saied Ex diuinitus inspiratis oraculis quaeramus solutionem eorum quae proponuntur that is out of the oracles that are come by diuine inspiration thereby meaning the Canonicall Scriptures let vs seeke the determination of those thinges that are propounded and so they did And as Constantine the Emperour was of this minde so it appeareth that Athanasius was of the same For to Serap hee saieth Solum exsacris literis condiscas meaning that the holie Ghost is God sufficiunt enim documenta quae in illis reperias Thou maiest learne it onelie out of the holie Scriptures for the documents or lessons which thou maiest finde in them are sufficient And Origen vpon the 16. to the Romanes in his tenth booke agreeing herein with these saieth that onely by the holie Scriptures the difference of trueth from errour in the examination thereof is to bee discerned And yet more plainely the same Origen in his first Homilie vpon Ieremie writeth of necessitie wee must call for the testimonie of the Scriptures for our senses and declarations without them as witnesses haue no credit Well therefore saied Augustine de naturâ gratiâ cap. 61. Onelie to the holy Scriptures doe I owe my consent without refusall And therefore franckely hee telleth Hierome in his nineteenth Epistle that hee had learned to yeelde that honour onely to the Canonicall Scriptures to thinke that the authours thereof therein neuer erred Where he plainly sheweth vs by his example how we should reade his writings or the writings of any other father namely beleeuing that which they wrote no further then we see it by scripture confirmed or by probable argument not dissenting from the trueth And the like he teacheth yet more plainelie in his 111. 112. Epistles to Fortunatus and Paulinus in the proeme of the third booke of the Trinity Wherefore with the same Augustine I confidently say and write whither of Christ or of his Church or of any thing that appertaineth to our faith and life I will not say wee that are not to bee compared with him that saied though wee but as hee addeth though an Angell from Heauen shall preach any thing besides that yee haue receaued marke hee saieth not contrarie but besides in the legall and Euangelicall scriptures let him be accursed in his third booke against Petilian cap. 6. Yea your owne Vincentius in the very place quoted by you denyeth not but taketh it for graunted that the scriptures of themselues alone are sufficient for all things yea and more then sufficient Whereupon it is euident that Vincentius by the rule line and true sence of the Catholique Church that there he speaketh of vnderstandeth onely such a sence or line as agreeth best with the scriptures themselues and the right rules of the interpreting of them wherof more afterwards In the meane time howsoeuer Vincentius his meaning was Augustine an ancienter father more famous somewhat then he speaking of the rule of faith that alwaies in interpreting of the scriptures men must haue an eie vnto and be ruled by saith that it is euen that which is taught in plainer places of the scripture de doctrinâ Christia lib 3. cap. 2. de trini lib. 1. cap. 2. 4. Yea in the same Augustine de doct Christ lib. 2. cap. 6. distrinc 37. c. Relatum we may reade noted out of ClemeÌ„t that the church is not to receaue any fence for the true seÌ„ce of the scriptures which caÌ„not be proued so to be out of the scriptures theÌ„selues And therefore all interpretation of scripture newe or ancient deliuered by the fathers in former time or receiued of their children of this later age must and ought according to this rule and line bee iudged catholique or not The IIII. Chapter Cant. 1. WHose discourse doeth make me remeÌ„ber the complaint that the soule doeth make vnto her Spouse Iesus Christ beeing both represented by Salomon and his legitimate spouse I pray thee saith she O my deare frend tell mee in what place thou doest lie and rest at noâ—â— daies for I would be very glad and desirous to follow the flockes of thy felowes The which is as much to say as if she meant thus I see many shepheardes in these mountaines which haue great abundance of sheepe I see those of the Roman Church I see Donatistes I see Nouatians or to speake of our time I see one flocke follow Luther another follow a The Caluenists Zuinglians and Sacramentaries are commonly amongst you taken for one yet here that the variety of opinions may seeme the greater you reckon them vp as three distinct sorts Zuinglius another follow Caluin another the Anabaptists another the SacrameÌ„taries so forth diuers others of whoÌ„ wheÌ„ I demauÌ„d particulerly Whose is this flocke they do al answer me It is of Christ euery 〈◊〉 saieth this is the catholicke Church euery one doeth say that he is his fellow that is to say as touching the guiding of his flocke Now it is not possible that they doe al teach the trueth considering how they varie among theÌ„selues therefore I doe desire thee to tell me where thou doest rest thy selfe at noone daies That is as much to say teach me which is the true Catholicke Church which doeth celebrate the true misterie of the Crosse which is the place where thou wast nailed at noone daies beeing nailed both handes and feete Heare now the answere of Iesus Christ If thou doest not know the place
suffering their Croniclers to mention them or else in causing them to deface them with strange name and false slaunders maketh it very hard yea if impossible no marueile you hauing the euidences whereby we should doe it for the most part a long time in your owne keeping to vse at your owne pleasure for vs to name from time to time the places and persons that haue alwaies succeeded one another for the continuance of our faith and Church But to returne againe to the consideration of this place of the Canticles further I saie as I saied before that you erre in alleadging this or any other place of the Scripture to proue that the Church of Christ may safely account those flockes in possession of the trueth and therefore to bee followed and those sheepheardes true sheepheardes and therefore meete alwaies to bee consented vnto that lineally downe from Christ can deduce their personall succession For so as I haue shewed in the first Chapter and it is not denyed of your selues sundry heretiques in their times haue done and can doe still If therefore you say you meane still that flocke and those sheepheardes that together with their visible personall succession haue alwaies beene in possession of the true ancient faith I answere first you begge still the thing in question in supposing that to haue beene alwaies ioyned with your flockes and sheepheards which we say and are able to proue they fell from many hundreth yeares ago Secondly I tell you once againe and now this time for all that you shall neuer bee able to proue but that both that personall succession may bee separated from trueth and also trueth from it and that therefore it is neither a certaine meanes to knowe the trueth nor the Church of Christ by Thirdly for your collection out of this place for the iustifying of your Church before ours because as you say from time to time for this thousand and fiue hundreth yeares you can shew the descent and continuance of yours and we cannot of ours for one hundreth yeares no not beyonde the yeare one thousand fiue hundreth and seuenteene we affirme that both in the one and in the other herein you write vntruely For first if your Church as it is now either in respect of the doctrine or gouernement thereof bee compared with the ancient Roman Church in the Apostles times or for many hundreth yeares after there is such diuersitie betwixt the one and the other as that the one beeing founde the chast spouse of Christ the other must needes bee proued to bee the very whoar of Babylon The simplicity of the ministerie that then was is turned amongst you into a pompous Lordly and more then Princely prelacy And then the Church was fedde with the pure worde of God conteyned in the Scriptures and so ledde thereby perfectly to vnderstand the will of God and with you as carefullie as may bee that is kept from her and in steede thereof shee is fedde with the dreames inuentions and traditions of men Then she was taught to account the name of Christ the onelie name whereby commeth saluation Act. 4. and therefore that in him all thinges were prepared Math. 22. and now with you besides him Saintes Angels your owne merites and the merites of others satisfaction in this life by your selues and after by others with a number of baser things must ioyne with him in the office of intercession betwixt vs and God and in the most glorious worke of our saluation as though hee either could not or would not go perfectly through with the worke of our saluation in himselfe and by himselfe but had so begunne it as that the accomplishing and perfecting thereof were left to these vaine and foolish by-meanes Then her faithfull doctours and teachers taught her that Christ in saying Hoc est corpus meum this is my body meant that it was a signe figure of his body as you may reade in Augustine against Adimantus the Maniche cap. 12. and in Tertull. against Marcion cap. 4. and in infinite places elsewhere in the ancient fathers and now contrary to nature yea to the verie nature of a sacrament contrary to the analogie of faith and good manners yours teach that those wordes being vttered by your Priestes thereupon followeth such a transubstantiation of the bread into his bodie that whosoeuer receiueth the outward parte of that sacrament receiueth in by his mouth the naturall bodie of Christ If thus I were disposed to go a long as farre as I might and to leade the reader to a full view of the difference betwixt the Romish Church that nowe is and that which hath beene I should euen therewith make a great booke But further of these differences I haue noted as you may reade Chapter 19. 20. and else where in this booke And Doctor Fulke against Stapletons Fortresse hath noted out of Bede and other authours of good credit 50. differences betwixt the church of the English Saxons in the time of Augustine the monke who was 600. yeares after Christ at the least and the Popish church that now is and infinite be the differences then betwixt the Church before in her puerer times and the Popish Synagogue now And therefore whatsoeuer you bragge neither you nor all your fellowes shall euer be able to proue indeede that your personall succession hath beene ioyned with the continuance of one and selfesame doctrine of Christ vnto these daies And to come to the other point therein I saie you write vntruely also For so far of is it that we graunt Luther to haue beene the first that preached the Gospell that wee now embrace and that wee cannot shewe by whom and where it was preached and receaued before that there is nothing more common with vs in answering this your obiection of newnes then to tell you that so farre of is it that it is newe indeede that it is the very ancient Religion and Gospell taught both in the olde testament and newe and therefore though it grieue you wee tell you that the ancient Patriarches and Prophets Christ and his Apostles taught the verie same and no other and all the ancient doctours and fathers as farre forth as they were able to iustify that which they taught by the Scriptures were sheepheardes of our church and teachers of our Religion Indeede we confesse that as Hilkiah the Priest in Iosiahs time 2. King 22. found the booke of God and was so a meanes to bring those thinges to light that by the wicked proceedings of Manasses Amon and others had for a certaine season lien hid So Luther in these late daies was a singuler instrument of God to reuiue and bring to light diuerse pointes of Christian faith which your Antichristian Synagogue had long laboured to smother and hide from the eies of the Church And yet hereupon it no more followeth that he was the first that preached our Religion then vpon the former it followed that Hilkiah was then first the
meanes to preach the lawe of God And I tell you truely that I cannot maruaile yet sufficientlie that anie man of anie reason iudgement and learning as you would seeme to bee should be so farre past all shame as confidently to set downe in print that wee cannot deny but that Luther 1517. began first our Church and Religion that we can name none 100. or 200. yeares before that taught it when you cannot be ignorant vnlesse your ignorance be verie grosse that we name vnto you verie manie and that in all ages to haue beene of the same Religion and Church that wee are now of For first there is nothing more vsuall with vs then to tell you that all the ancient Patriarches Prophets Euangelists and Apostles witnesse the canonicall Scriptures liued and died in our Church and Religion The same opinion wee tell you wee haue of all the Christian martyrs whose number is infinite that were slaine in the first 300. yeares after Christ vnder the 10. bloudy persecutions that were in that time For during that time our Religion was onelie professed and embraced in the Church and verie little or nothing was there of those opinions for the which especiallie wee account your Religion Antichristian vnlesse it were of heretiques and such as had learned it of them in those daies once thought of And after for three hundreth yeares more at least in all the most substantiall pointes of Christian Religion and the greatest questions betwixt vs and you all the ancient doctours and the Christians that liued in their times as wee haue diuerse times sayed so haue wee often so proued it that you shall neuer bee able therein to disproue vs were fully ours And though after these times when Boniface the third had once obteined of that traiterous murderer Phocas the Antichristian title of Oecumenicall or vniuersall Bishop the mysterie of iniquity did euery day work more plainelie then other hasted to his height yet as I haue shewed in my answere to your publishers preface and in the sixteenth Chapter of this my answere to your selfe where you bragge againe as you doe here of 1500. yeares antiquity and continuance there were after these times from time to time that both spied the growth and proceeding thereof and set themselues against it For Bertram Iohannes Scotus were with vs against your grosse real presēce aboue 700. years ago Trithemius maketh mētion of a booke writen 400. yeares ago which is supposed was writen by one Arnulphus for as Sabellicus and Platina testifie much about that time was hee put to death of the Romish cleargie in which booke the authour grieuously complaineth of the enormities amongst the saied Cleargie and findeth many faultes in the Romish Church Gisburne also in his storie writeth that in the yeare 1158. Dulcinus Nauarensis and Gerrhardus preached earnestly that the Pope was Antichrist and that they had thirtie followers whom they brought into England who were persecuted then here for preaching that and other such like doctrine against the Romish Church Much about this time but somewhat rather before a company of Christians who by your Prelates were nickenamed Albigenses did florish and there were great multitudes of them euen about Tholossa whereof you Master Albine are called Archdeacō who did vehemently resist your Pope and his proceedings setting vp vnto themselues a Bishop whom they called Bartholomew oppugning the grosse pointes of your Religion euen as wee doe witnesse Nicolas Triuet and others in their Stories Hildegarde though shee were a Nunne yet in the yeare 1146. prophesied the ruine of your kingdome at Rome and bitterly inueighed against the wickednesse of your Cleargie and Friers So did Geffery Chaucer about the same time namely in his Dialogue called Iacke Vpland very saltly taunt and deride the vanity of your frierly superstition In the yeare 1164. was Petrus Valdus a citizen of Lions whose followers after had giuen them diuerse names to disgrace them withall For your frendes call them Waldenses Albigenses pauperes de Lugduno Picardos Boslauienses Thaboritas and Leonistas changing their titles and names according to the diuersities of places and times they liued in howsoeuer their Religion was all one And these haue beene of ancient time and of great continuance in very many places namely in Prouince Sarmatia Lyuonia Bohemia Morauia Polonia Silesia Belgia and in Calabria and of you wheresoeuer or whensoeuer they were they haue beene cruelly persecuted for heretiques and yet if their opinions bee iudged of not as you the more to disgrace them haue charged them but as they in their owne confessions of their faith and Apologies haue set them downe they in many thinges helde the verie same that wee doe and condemned the same for errours in you that wee now doe They are of 400. yeares continuance at least For Aeneas Syluius a man of your owne for he was Pope ere he died writeth handling the stories of Boeme that they had continued vnto his time from the yeare 1160. And Gulielmus Paruus writeth that their doctrine was examined in Oxforde and found sound concerning God and the merites of Christ for your doctrine concerning the iorning of our owne merites with Christes to make vp full satisfaction and redemption is of farre later inuention and their life saieth hee was commendable but in the doctrine of the Sacrament they were found to differ from the Church of Rome Yea Reinerus a writer 300. yeares ago who as he himselfe saith was often at the examination of them in his booke of inquisitions writing of them calling them Leonists confesseth that some saied they had continued from Syluesters time and that some saied they had beene euen from the time of the Apostles he further reports that they had great shew of holy life in liuing iustly before men and that they beleeued all things well of God and all the articles contained in the creede onely he chargeth them that they hated blasphemed the Romish Church And this he further writes that there was no land wherein that sect did not creepe speaking but of thē that were thē but in one cuntrey yet this he testifieth that they had there ten schooles in one parish called Camach that there were forty congregations or Churches of them euery one hauing their leaders or teachers and that their power in his time was such that none as hee saieth durst then openlie resist them There are yet to bee seene as good authours report the consultations and records of the proceedings of foure great Bishops in France against them writen three hundreth yeares ago namely of Narbonensis Arelatensis Aquensis and Albanensis yea 355. yeares ago I read there was a Councell kept in Tholossa especially against them And yet though both of ancient times and later daies the Synagogue of Rome hath sought to roote them out by all possible cruelty they and their successours continue vnto this day in great numbers in Bohemia and in other places But because you very
oft in this your booke and the rest of your side continually beare the simple reader and vnlearned Christian in hand that before Luther there were none of our religion that haue so condemned your Church and religion as we doe I wil vouchsafe for the better inabling of euery one that shall read this my answere to see your vanity and impiety though this which I haue noted already be sufficient to lay open your folly to proceed yet somewhat further in this matter Wherefore to go on in the course of times though your popish Church hath bene in her ruffe and at the heighest that euer she was this latter 400 yeares yet we are able to shew that there haue bene many euen in this time from time to time and that in sundry places that haue ioyned with vs against you that therefore there is no such newnesse or strangenes in our religion a d doings as you would make the ignorant beleeue For in the dayes of Gregory the 9 in the yeare 1230 the Greeke Church and other Easterne Churches did quite forsake communion with yours who euer since ioyne with vs in a number of thinges against you as namely in withstanding the supremacy of your Romish Bishop as appeareth not onely by one Epistle that Germanus Petriarch of Constantinople wrote vnto the pope in the yeare 1237 but also by a large booke writen about the yeare 1384 by Nilus Archbishop of Thessalonica wherein he doeth not onely confute his Supremacy euen as we doe but also he enueigheth against al those that hold communion with the Popish or latin Church And as it appeareth in ancient record in the Church of Herford wherein 29 of the Articles wherein they differ from the Church of Rome are set downe they ioine not only with vs in this point in seperating thēselues frō the Romish Church in denying the popes supremacie which is the very foundation of your Church and religion but also in denying purgatory and masses for the dead in holding it lawfull for their ministers to enioy the benefit of matrimony in not vsing any priuate masse in not denying the cup to any that receaue in not ministring the communion in priuate houses in not vsing extreme vnction and in sundry other points And by diuers Epistles writen from thence of late extant in print both in greeke and latin to Chitreus and other Germans it euidently appeareth that they ioyne with vs against the Romish Church in many other great and weighty points of our religiō and that great hope there is that they might easily be brought to ioyne with vs in the rest Besides these Easterne churches euē here in these westerne parts euident it is that there haue beene many great learned and famous persons with innumerable followers at all tymes from age to age in these latter 400 yeares when the tyranny of your popes to represse them hath bene the greatest and strongest that euer it was which yet haue openly with vs stood forth against them and their religion For Fredericke the second as diuers other Emperours had beene before him as namely Constantine the 5. Leo his sonne and Constantine the 6 in the East and Henry the 4 and 5 in the West was a notable Antagonist of the 3 popes in his time contending against them to maintaine the authority of Christian princes against their vsurped Supremacy ouer them about the yeare 1260 as notoriously the Cronicles of those times writen by your owne men Platina Sabelicus and others declare And 20 years before that Krātzius testifieth in his history that there were many that preached openly in Sueuia that the Pope was an heretique his clergy Symoniakes and generally they all seducers of the people Ten yeares after that florished Arnoldus De nouâ villâ a Spaniard who taught that Sathā had thē seduced the world that the faith thē taught was but such as deuils had meaning belike a bare historicall faith that the pope led men to hell that he and his clergy did falsifie the doctrine of Christ that masses were naught not to be saied for the dead c. and therefore your popish Church condemned him for an heretique Much what about the same time was Gulielmus De Sancto amore a master and chiefe ruler then in Paris who went as farre as Arnoldus applying the same Scriptures which concerne Antichrist as we doe to the pope and his clergy and therefore hee also was condemned for an heretique and his bookes burnt by your popish rout And in the yeare 1260 Laurentius Anglicus a master of Paris also tooke this Williams part against the pope wrote a booke in his defence In the yeare 1290 Petrus Iohānes a Minorite directly preached the pope to be Antichrist and Rome great Babylon and therefore he was burnt after he was dead 30 yeares and more before this Robert Grosthead a famous learned man and Bishop of Lincolne for hee died in the yeare one thousand two hunderd fifty three was a great withstander of the popes tyranny and three dayes before his death hauing conference with his clergy he laboureth to make them see by sundry demonstrations that the pope was Antichrist and his doings Antichristian King Philip of France about the yeare one thousand three hundred was a great withstander of the Supremacy which now the Pope challengeth and a resister in his dominions of sundry of his enormities and William Nagareta and the prelates of France then ioyned with their king against the pope Grosthead this king Philip and his clergy as afterward king Edward the 3. king of England in the yeare 1346 despised the popes curse appealed frō him to God There is in an ancient Chronicle of S. Albons a notable Epistle of one Cassiodorus to the Church of England wherein are layed forth a number of lamentable abuses in the Roman Church in the yeare one thousand three hundred twenty eight In the Extrauagants we reade that Marsillius Patauinus Iohannes de Ganduno Michael Chesenas Petrus de Carborea and Iohannes de Poliaco all great learned men were condemned by the Pope for preaching against his Supremacy and other errours of that Church of his about the yeare 1326. There were thē also many learned mē more that disputed wrote against his Supremacy which took part with Ludouicke the Emperour against him as William Occam Luitpoldus Andreas Landanensis Vlricus Hangenor the Emperors treasurer and others Dante 's liuing in the yeare one thousand three hundred wrote against the Pope the orders of religious men and the Doctours of the Decrees saying that these were three great enemies to the trueth he flatly hath left in writing in his cāticle of Purgatory that the Pope of a pastor was become a woulfe that he was the whoar of Babylon In the yeare 1350. Gregory Ariminensis Andreas de Castro and Burdianus taught as we doe against your doctrine of freewill and merites Taulerus then a preacher in Argentine preached openly against your doctrine
since Augustine the monkes comming into England as I haue saied and for 300 yeares after him your glorious succession must faile there are so many apparent differences for so long space at least betwixt the opinions that your pastors and doctors hold now and them that were held then Take heede therefore whiles you measure thus to vs and so seeke to disgrace them whose names we cite that the same be not measured to you againe so the necke of your visible Succession be broken to the perill of the life of your Church which draweth her breath thereby Now to come to your disgracing of our Church with the difference of opinion betwixt Luther and Zuinglius and your laying to our charge all the heresies that haue sprung vp since Luther began first to preach against you therein do you vs manifold wrong For who knoweth not that it is no strange or new thing to finde the deare seruants of God and the true members of Christs Church sometimes and in some things differing and hoatly dissenting in opinion Doe we not read Mat. 16. that one thing seemed good to Peter and the contrary seemed and was indeed good in Christs iudgement Did not Peter take one course and Paul another at Antioch Galat. 2. insomuch that Paul there rebuked Peter openly and sharpely And finde we not Act. 15. Paul and Barnabas growen to that heat of contention about the receiuing againe or refusing of Iohn Marke that they parted companies And if we leaue the Scriptures and go downe to later times and view the state of the Church euen in the purest times thereof we shall finde it no strange thing to see diuersities of opinions and therefore also hoat contentions betwixt those whom yet we will and must account the true members of the Church Betwixt Polycrates Victor the East and West Churches Irenaeus and certaine other Bishops of France and some Popes the contention about the obseruation of Easter was such Euse 5.21.22.23.24 that one side excommunicated another that diuers Synods were held to appease it and yet it cōtinued 300 yeares more And who knoweth not that there was contention betwixt Cypriā other Bishops of Africke Cornelius Stephanus Bishops of Rome for that they euē thē at Rome encroched too much as the other thought to intermeddle within the iurisdictiōs of the Bishops of Africke in receiuing condēned excōmunicated fugitiues that ran to Rome frō thence Neither was the controuersie small betwixt them about the rebaptizing of those that had beene before onely baptized by heretiques For proofe of both which points I refer you to the third and fourth Epistles of Cyprians first booke of Epistles and to the first Epistle of his second booke and to the third and fourth Chapters of Eusebius seuēth booke Basil also and the Church of Caesarea as it is well knowen were at hoat contention about Ecclesiasticall songes and ceremonies Theophilus of Alexandria and Chrysostome of Constantinople had betweene them a violent and troublesome contention and great part taking there was of both sides and that along time Cyrillus of Alexandria wrote against Theodoret in a controuersie of Catholicke religion Betwixt Miletius a Bishop of Aegypt and one Peter of Alexandria and their followers of both sides there arose and continued a long whyle to the great trouble of the Church a lamentable contention All Ecclesiasticall stories for the most part haue with griefe made report of these yea downe from Christ to the age wherein euery one of them wrote it too plainly appeares in them that there was neuer yet any one century of yeares but it hath had new contentions and those many not onely betwixt heretiques and catholickes but also euen amongst those that otherwise of both sides were to bee reputed sounde Christians Hierom and Augustine as all men will confesse were in their times worthy so to be accounted and yet it appeareth in their works that there was great diuersity of opinions and that in many things of great moment betwixt them Epiphanius Bishop of Cyprus and Chrysostome of whom I spake before were both famous Christians and yet the stories of their tymes shew that they were bitter enemies It is notoriously knowen that amongst the Bishops assembled against the Arrians at the councell of Nice Constantine by the bookes offered vnto him one against an other found that they then had amongst themselues many contentions and varieties of opinions and infinite it were to reckon vp all the examples that might easily be found to this end Indeede I reade for these and such like differences the Iewes and Heathen people mocked at the Christians and hereby sought mightily to deface them and their religion seuenth Stromat Clement Alexandrini But I neuer read that either then or since euer any sounde Christian though for this cause they tooke occasion to mourne yet that they or any of them tooke occasion to condemne either the one side or the other or both as not to be therefore at all of the Church of Christ For notwithstanding these differences they saw that they ioyned togither otherwise as brethren in holding togither the fundamentall pointes And that they whom you call Lutherans Zuinglians doe so the booke of late set forth of the Harmony of the confessions of all the Churches that hereabouts professe the Gospell doeth make it most manifest and euident And therfore for any force that this reason carieth with it this their differēce which is in effect only about the maner of the presēce of Christ in the Sacramēt they both may be mēbers of the true anciēt Catholick Church as wel as these other whō I haue named Another wronge that herein they offer vs is this that beeing themselues at variance amongst themselues and hauing had many and great contentions and yet hauing still some about as great a matter of religion as this that yet forgetting the beame in their owne eies like hypocrites they are so busie with the moate in ours For who so readeth the histories of their Popes writen by their owne frendes besides a number of hoat and contentious schismes troubling all Christendome for many yeares togither yea sometimes fourty years continuing betwixt their Popes Antipopes he shall finde it so common a thing for the succeeding Pope to contrary the proceedings of his predecessour as though the chiefe glorie of their papacy lay in that and therefore poore Gratian tooke a combersome worke in hand to make a concorde of such discording Canons Their religion considered it is one of the greatest controuersies that can be whither the pope or a generall councell haue the superiour authority and so must be the carier of the Churches tongue to decide and determine controuersies and yet euen in this controuersie they are so at concorde that the councell of Constance and Basil determined one way and the councels of Florence and Ferraria the other way and yet both sides hath his stout champions The Scotistes and Thomistes many an
according to the successioÌ„ of those Bishops vnto whoÌ„ only the Apostles coÌ„mitted the custody of the Church throughout the world the which saith he is come to vs. This saied Irenaeus doeth write in his third booke and second Chapter that he and his fellowes did withstand the Valentinians and the Marcionistes which were great heretiques by the traditions of the Apostles d A cursed glosse for it corrupteth the text for the tradition that he speaketh of had good warrant in the writeÌ„ word that is to say the doctrine not writen but receaued from age to age of the Apostles and so continued till their time He saith likewise vnto the Traditions which are of the Apostles and that by successioÌ„ of pastours haue beene vsed in the Church we doe persuade and prouoke those that speake against Traditions Hee writes as much more in the third Chapter of the saied booke Forasmuch saith he as it were to tedious to set forth in one booke the Successours of al the Churches and to tel theÌ„ one by one we doâ—â—â—â—â— throw those that for vaine glory doe seek to gather disciples togither touching them contrary to that that doeth appertaine vnto the traditions of the Apostles the which we doe shew to theÌ„ by the saied Traditions and by the faith that hath beene taught and is come to vs by succession of the Bishops of the great and ancient Church of Rome the which was founded by the two glorious Martirs and Apostles Saint Peter Saint Paul These are his words in his third booke aduersus haereses a The third you should say the fifth Chapter And at the beginning of the saied Chapter he saieth thus All these that will vnderstand the trueth may presently regard the traditions of the Apostles which are manifest throughout the world and wee cannot count the number of those that haue bene instituted and ordeined Bishops in the Church and their Successours till our daies which haue neither knowen nor taught any thing like vnto the fables and tales that these doe preach vnto vs. b If you say so you say it without cause and vntruely Not without cause we may now a daies say the like of the Lutherans Caluinistes other sects of our time After this he doeth set forth all the Popes of Rome c If the Popes euer since had beene like these you and wee should not haue needed to striue as we doe from Saint Peter vnto Eleutherius which was Pope in his time And he did affirme that that number did suffice to proue that the doctrine of Marcian and Valentinian was false very hurtfull because that it was vnknown or at the least not receiued or approued by the Church being vnder the gouernance of any of thâ—se Popes Then with greater reason ought prescription to take place against d True but such you shall neuer proue ours to bee a new doctrine which hath beene vnknowen this 1500. yeares or at the least if any body sought to publish it he was condemned as a false perâ—itious hereticke The V. Chapter YOu must remember that Vincentius liued 1000 yeares ago by your own coÌ„fessioÌ„ that therfore he speaketh of their time and of the Catholique Church and ancient faith that then was Whereof if you vnderstand him we say as he saied and are more willing to ioine and holde communion with that Church of Christ that he speaketh of then you but then his saying maketh directly against you For neither your Church nor faith was in his dayes We grauÌ„t you also that Irenaeus did vrge succession of persons to stop the mouthes of the heretiques as you shew in this Chapter out of him but withal then you must not forget that he liued not long after the Apostles times when as yet they whose Succession he alleadged continued in the sincerity of the Apostolique doctrine from which long ago your Roman Church as it is now hath fallen by antichristian apostacy For that hee calleth the principall succession and those bishops onely he teacheth are to be obeyed who togither with the succession of their Bishoprickes haue receiued the gift of trueth as I noted vnto you out of his fourth booke 43 Chapter in my answere to your first Chapter But Irenaeus no where prescribeth that his example of vrging hereticks to see their folly by Succession for a perpetuall rule to followe neither therein doeth he prophecy that for 1000 yeares after further those successiue lines of Bishops or any other would continue so in possession of the trueth of doctrine as that safely alwaies they might be ioyned vnto For he was not ignorant what was prophecied concerning the comming of Antichrist 2 Thess 2. and Reuel 17. and that Paul tolde to the Pastors of Ephesus Act. 20. that after his departure there would arise vp euen amongst themselues grieuous wolues not sparing the flock which must needs import that howsoeuer in his time he thought sometimes of succession of bishops that continued in the trueth that yet it was farre from his meaning to prophecy that so it would be alwaies You reason therefore in this point as one that to proue the stewes at Rome now to be pure virgins should alleadge for proofe thereof that they were so when they were yong children For euen like difference and ods there is betwixt the Church of Rome now and her bishops and pastours and that that was in the daies times that you and the authours that you alleage speake of For whereas vnto these times the Church of Rome her bishops pastours stoode and continued in the trueth since not only many of the bishops of Rome themselues whom you hold are freest furthest of of al other from erring as I haue shewed already most plainly fell into heresie but also al your Romish doctrine which we now count cal papistical was diuised found out since those times and is also not only beside but contrary to the doctrine then taught receiued by the ancient Church of Rome her pastours as ere I haue done with you I hope at least in great part sufficieÌ„tly to proue It should seeme therfore that either you in thus reasoning are very childish your selfe or els you thinke you haue to deale but with babes and fooles in that because Irenaeus that florished within two hundred yeares after Christ when the Church was yet pure and vndefiled in comparison of the tymes that followed could and did vrge Succession of persons ioined with succession of trueth therefore you may that liue 1500. yeares after Christ and more You must first proue that succession of trueth is vnseparable from personall succession that euer since and now also the Bishops pastours whose personall succession you bragge of haue continued in the trueth as well as they did whose names he reciteth Whereof neither shall either you or any of you be able to proue as long as the world standeth Fye therefore for shame that you
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
thing that we holde teach and preach as much as you You doe therfore but abuse your reader in going about to make him beleeue that we reiect your Bishops onely for their lewde liues whereas the thing especially that we condemne both you and them for is your Antichristian doctrine It is well that when you haue saied what you can for your line of Popes yet the consideration of the oft interruptiōs of their succession by schismes and otherwise you are glad in the ende to giue vs this note that when you talke of succession of Bishops and pastours you meane not onely them but all other Bishops and pastours of your Church in whom the succession hath beene continued whensoeuer it was interrupted in the other For hereby in effect you doe acknowledge that you meane not nor thinke it wisedome to leane too much to the successiō of them least they let your building fall Wherein I preferre you yet before Stapleton in that herein the trueth of the manifold interruptions of their succession seemeth to haue preuailed more with you then with him For he writing against Doctor Fulke of this matter of succession though hee saieth hee will not holde succession in the same places and sees to haue continued generally yet in this particuler line of Popes onely hee thinketh that safely he may You are also to be commended for acknowledging dissentions to haue beene betwixt your Popes and Antipopes themselues and in leauing them without defēce for their lewd liues ambition and negligence euen to answere for themselues For indeede as it cannot be denied but that these thinges most monstrously haue beene found in very many of them so you could not haue had any honesty in smothing of their faults Yet you go some thing to far in saying that their dissentiōs were not preiudiciall to the vnity of faith held before For how could it be that one part of the world ioyning with the Pope the rest with his Antipope or Antipopes it being an article now of your Catholique faith Boniface 8. de maioritate obed Cap. 1. vnder paine of damnation to be beleeued that al soules must submit themselues to your Pope as to the Supreame head of the Church but that these for many yeares togither banning cursing each others faction thereby the vnity of faith was not onlie troubled but maruellously broken The IX Chapter NOw seeing that we haue yeelded you a full accompt of our vocation to the ministery if we may be so bold I thinke it is no great presumption to demande the like of yours a Caluin neuer thus reasoned therefore you play the papist with him that is you bely him For euen as Caluin hath heretofore called vpon vs to haue vs proue that we are the Children of God or otherwise he would absolutelie affirme that God cannot be called the authour of our vocation to the ministery We say likewise that if you doe not shew the like of yours you shal giue vs leaue although it be against your willes to saie that yours commeth not from God but from the procurement of his aduersarie Tertullian b Wee know hee spoke against such heretiques as you Papists bee who as you know aboue 1200 yeares agone speaking against such as you are in his booke de praescrip haeret doeth write these words Edant origines Ecclesiarum suarum euoluent ordinem Episcoporum suorum per successiones abinitio decurrētem Hoc enim modo Ecclesiae Apostolicae cursus suos deferunt sicut Romanorum Clementem Episcopum à Petro ordinatum id proinde vtique coeteri exhibeant quos ab Apostolis in Episcopalibus constitutos Apostolico semine radices habeant c Here either is ignorance or wilfull corruptiō of this authours meaning dris◠You see well by these wordes how that Tertullian doeth continue with the succession of the Pastours the which he doeth affirme to be necessarie saying that you and such as you are ought not to be receiued to the ministerie of the Church nor to teach the people contrary to the ecclesiatical order except that you shew the antiquitie of your table And it is necessary saieth he that you reckon your Pastours and Bishops by order how they haue succeeded one after another for this is the waie that the Churches doe maintaine their right The saied Tertulliā doth ground his similitude vpon the custome of the Ciuil gouernance For when that these that are Princes or Lords doe suruaie their lands the subiects are bound to shew what landes they holde of them setting it all forth by accompt shewing by what tenure they hold their copie and whether it be demean◠or free holde comming by inheritance or bought they ought likewise to name him that had it before and by their owne title to ouerthrowe all other persons that maie make claime vnto it a Not yet nor euer will you be able According to this patterne and order we haue giuen you accompt of our inheritāce although we were not bound to it setting before your eies the similitude of Salomon by whom our Sauiour Iesus Christ is represented That same Salomon doeth giue the sheepe that runnes astraie counsaile to set his Tabernacle by the Tabernacle of the Shepheards to follow their flocke vntill he come to the place where Christ was nailed on the Crosse at noon daies The which counsell as the most certaine according to Tertullian his opinion we doe follow thinking it sufficient to keepe vs firmely in the right and ancient Catholicke faith For we that are the sheep of Christ doe follow as touching our religion the steppes that our fathers led before vs and as it were going vp vpon the ladder of Iacob Gen. 28. b Whatsoeuer you meane you can neuer deduce your religion so high for it hath beene a patching together long euen till of very late daies we mount by degree and degree I meane from yeare to yeare from age to age vntill that we come to S. Saturim S. Denice S. Marcial S Gratian which were those that did first teach the Catholicke faith in Tholose in Paris and to those of Guyenna and Lorayne and so consequently to all the rest of the Saintes that first did teach the Catholicke faith through all Christendome whom wee doe call in iudgement before God to defende that faith which they haue giuen vs from hand to hand they maie cal vpon the Apostles which sent them the Apostles maie direct themselues to Christ who by the mouth of his most louing Apostle doeth command vs to continue in that that was taught vs at the beginning 1. Iohn 2. And so wee shall continue and rest with the Father the Sonne and the holie Ghost And if any bodie doeth come to teach vs anie other doctrine then that which hath bene taught vs at the beginning I doe not saie c No take heede of that for the booke of the Scriptures is your bane writen in booke but
shewing by al lineal succession how you came to it from Christ his Apostles but thereby also you haue quite ouerthrown our claime This is easily saied wel bragged of you but it is more then either you can or meane to proue O yes saie you we can as it were going vp vpon the ladder of Iacob mount from step to step vntil in the top we come to those that first taught the Catholique faith in Tholossa Paris and Guienna as to S. Saturim Denice Martiall and Gratian and to the rest of the Saints It may be these were Saints you speake of and yet you haue not shewed vs that yea it may be also you can frō age to age euen frō that time to ours now name vs the persons that haue succeeded one another from those men you speake of but you shal neuer be able to proue that all these persons which haue succeeded haue continued in the sound Apostolique faith and so haue deriued it down frō the first to you that be the last which vnles you proue this climing vpō this ladder you talke of wil doe you smal pleasure But you are so confidently perswaded that the religion that you are in possession of now is the very same that was taught the Church of Christ in the beginning that you denounce him anathema be hee man or angell that preacheth against it Yet this is no proofe that it is the very same For you may be deceiued and if God would giue you grace to read and rightly to vnderstand the Scriptures sure I am that euen in thus saying you would finde that you haue as far as your authority reacheth cursed and excommunicated your own selues your whole Church So far of are we though it please you stil to cal our religion a new Gospel from being afraid to ioine with you in anathematizing them that preach any other Gospell then Christ and his Apostles preached at the first that withal our hearts we say Amen thereunto And therefore for all your supposed newnes of our religion we wish with all our hearts according to Iohns counsell 1. Epist 2. that that might abide which wee haue heard from the beginning We thinke Tertullian saieth most truely that cōmeth from the Lord is true that is first deliuered that is strange and false which is brought in after De praescrip aduersus haereticos Wherfore we say also most willingly with him in an other place in his 4 booke against Marcion Id est verius quod est prius c. That is truer that is former that is former that is from the beginning and that is from the beginning which is from the Apostles But then we conclude with him De praescriptione aduersus haereticos Vndè autem extranei inimici Apostolis haeretici nisi ex diuersitate doctrinae c. How are strangers and enemies to the Apostles knowen but by the diuersitie of doctrine which euery one of his owne minde hath brough forth and receiued against the Apostles therefore let deprauation of Scriptures and their exposition be accounted to bee where the diuersitie of doctrine is founde hitherto Tertullian and wee with him and therefore doe not charge vs any more with newnesse nor make your bragges anie more to deceiue the simple of antiquity vnlesse by the Scriptures wherein the simpliest knowe the Apostolique doctrine is contained indeede you can proue your doctrin to agree with theirs and ours to disagree For you may not thinke that you can cause them that haue any witte or discretion at al left them to beleeue that your doctrine is the same that was taught at the first by the Apostles because you can say so or because you can tel them their father grandfather and great grandfather tooke it so as long as they see you are loath to come to the triall with the learned whither it be so or no by Gods writen word Euen herein thundering out your Anathema though you would seeme therein stout and resolute in your religion yet if your words be wel marked it may euidently be perceiued that like a dastard you shunne the trial of your doctrine by the writen word For you say If any body come to teach vs any other doctrine then that which hath beene taught vs at the beginning I do not say writen in booke no take heed o◠that but printed in our harts let him be Anathema c. wherby you bewray your minde namely to be this that when it shal come in trial what that religiō is that was preached at the beginning you would not haue the Canonical books of the old and new Testament to determine the matter but that which was then writen in mens hearts whereby you meane your vnwriten traditions But I pray you how shal we know what was writen in mens hearts by the ministry of the Apostles better or more safely then by that which they wrote Especially seing as Irenaeus hath tolde vs that which they preached at the first after by the wil of God they committed vnto writing to be the foūdation piller of our faith in his 3 booke Chap. 1. As for your vnwriten word to speake most moderately you knowe the credit thereof is suspected and certaine it is it must agree with the word writen for God is one and selfesame both in writing and speaking or els worthily may it not be suspected onely but flatly also reiected as a false and counterfait word which but that you know it doeth not you would without any such correction or explanation of your meaning haue saied simply that you would haue him held Anathema that preacheth any other doctrine thē that which is writen in the books of the scripture But your owne conscience telling you that yours was another doctrin then had warrāt fro thēce before the curse should drop out of your pen you thought it wisdome least in your own knowledge you should haue cursed you selues to tel vs that you directed your sentence not against those that teach another doctrine then those bookes wil warrāt for of such you allow well enough or else you should disallowe your selues but against those that teach another doctrine from that which was writen in our harts so leauing to your selues liberty to make the poore people beleeue that that was whatsoeuer you would deuise O this is too too grosse paltry dealing in matters that so much concerne the souls of mē as this doth especially in this so great light that shineth now euery where amongst vs. As for your liues the liues of your pastors and great bishops though they be such as worthily you may be ashamed of yet if they had continued in the profession of the trueth therein we would haue held for al the other communion with them But seing their liues haue bene such a long time as there were neuer worse in Sodom nor any where els witnes your own stories Benno Cardin Platina Sabellicus Abbas Vsperg and others
by BertraÌ„ and others before named and their followers as we haue made it most euident in many bookes writeÌ„ to that purpose namely of late in a great booke called Orthodoxus coÌ„seÌ„sus the true catholick coÌ„sent of the holy Scriptures ancient Church of the trueth of the words of the Lords supper and of al the coÌ„trouersie thereabout printed at Tygure 1578 which booke al the swarme of you wil neuer be souÌ„dly able to answere coÌ„fute as long as you liue And therfore al the rest of this Chapter is needles wherein you suppose that betwixt Christ and his Apostles and vs there is none that we caÌ„ produce of our iudgemeÌ„t or otherwise against you But you take vpoÌ„ you to proue that we cut of theÌ„ al that haue bene betweene theÌ„ vs because Caluin hath writeÌ„ haÌ„dling this matter of the sacrament that he did find that they of old time had chaÌ„ged the fashioÌ„ of the administratioÌ„ therof otherwise theÌ„ Christs institutioÌ„ would beare c. wheruâ—oÌ„ your coÌ„clusion followeth not for diuers causes For an argumeÌ„t froÌ„ one to al holdeth not as Caluin hath done so ergo it is all out opion we al do so For though we accouÌ„t of him as of a rare singuler minister of the Lord yet wee doe not binde our selues to doe and say whatsoeuer he did and saied For we know him to haue beene a man subiect to error and infirmity for al his gifts neither wil you be coÌ„tented that such an argument should hold alwaies drawn froÌ„ any one of your greatest most famous learned writers to presse al the rest And a second reason of the weaknes of your argumeÌ„t is that there is more in your coÌ„clusion then is in the antecedent giuen you by him For you would conclude for those are your words to the proofe whereof you cite Caluin that we condeÌ„ne cut of al the ChristiaÌ„s that haue bene are betwixt Christ his Apostles and vs wheras Caluin speaketh not of al but of some of olde time The 3 reason Caluin himselfe giueth you in the eueÌ„ in the words set downe by you he sheweth plainly that though in theÌ„ that he spake of he noted some aberration froÌ„ the simplicity of Christs institution yet he did not therfore cut theÌ„ of froÌ„ the Church nor coÌ„deÌ„ne theÌ„ What are you such a cutter that you straight cut of al those froÌ„ coÌ„munioÌ„ with you in whoÌ„ you caÌ„ iustly finde any fault or errour in opinion or practise of life Surely then you must cut of most of your best frends That which we can foundly proue to be a fault in brethren either ancient or of later time we may safely note tel them of and labour to reforme yet as long as they ioine togither with vs in one God faith and Baptisme otherwise we can and ought to holde peace Christian communion with them or els where caÌ„ there at any time be any true concord or peace kept in the church For some differences of opinions vsages there haue alwaies yet beene and wil be betwixt one particuler Church and another and betwixt some members of the true church or other You needed not therfore I warrant you one whit haue beene afraide that Caluin his fellowes were so scrupulous that they would not ioine in fellow ship with some such as he speaketh of there and yet the letteth not but that he should couÌ„sel his readers to prefer Christs own simple institution before the vsage of them or any other differing from it The XI Chapter YOu doâ— verie wel that S. Paul doth coÌ„pare many times the mistical body of the church vnto a natural body seing that Iesus Christ is the head vnto whoÌ„ the body is ioined by ioints bones sinews If one should then demande of you how the feete are ioined to the head you will answere me by the legs which are next vnto the feete And if I aske you how the legs are ioyned to the head you will answer by the ioints and by the 〈◊〉 of the backe and so consequently from member to member I doe beleeue that we are all of one accord * 1 Cor. 10. that the ende of the world is at hand and so consequently that we are the lower most part of the body so that 〈◊〉 the feete or the legs Then my masters you that haue made so fâ—ne aâ— Anotomie of the Masse at my request make another of the ministrie of your congregation a You were a very pleasant man be like that could thus play your selfe a fit of mirth and when you had done daunce after your owne pipe it seemes you thought that the sport then would be so pleasant that no beholder could forbare laughter If you should see such another as Apelles that would paint a man and that he had drawen his head and without painting the rest of his bodie he had set his feete vnder his eares what would you saâ—â— to such a Table Spectatum admissi risum teneatis amici Would you not thinke that he was a simple painter or else a great Iester Euen so doe you deserue that one should laugh at your ministerie b This is vntrue and a grosse slaÌ„der for we hold and teach that euer since Christ to our daies there haue bene both shepheards and sheepe ioyning with vs in the vnity of faith therfore you laugh at your owne shadow and vaine fansie For you will ioine your Church if it may bee so called vnto the church of the Apostles without setting forth anie members betweene them You take but scant measure when you will cut of all the Bishops Pastours and doctours that haue beene from the Apostles time till our daies they being the members that followe the head of the church This maie well be called a new Religion or to saie the truth it is a meere presumption to flie without winges or to climbe without a ladder And I saie to you againe that this is not the waie to followe the counsell of the great Sheepheard that I mentioned before who doeth saie vnto vs that if we will not misse the waie of the Catholicks we ought to follow the flocke of those sheepe that haue gone before vs that is to saie that we should reckon c But thâ—s in truth yours caÌ„not do therefore yours is not the Catholicke Church by your owne reason by succession the Pastours that haue succeeded in continuance of one kinde of doctrine the which as we haue shewed the Catholicke church doeth and hath euer done The XI Chapter As though you had most substaÌ„tially proued by Caluins words that we cut of all Christians betwixt the Apostles and vs in this Chapter you vrge the metaphor of a body whereunto vsually the church of Christ is compared whereupon you gather that as there is an orderly connexion and situation of members in a body so there must be in the church and that therefore our church must
needes be a monstrous mishapen thing in ioyning the Christians of these later daies with the Apostles without any betwixt and fosâ—â—ating as it were the feete of the body hard to the eares without any other members betwixt the one and the other And thus hauing framed this mery conceit in your owne heade you call vpon your frendes to laugh at it with you and so you proceede in telling vs that whiles we take this course we fly without wings and climbe without a ladder and despise the counsell of Salomon which after your maner you interpret that we should reckon by succession the pastours that haue succeeded in continuance of one kinde of doctrine the which you say you haue shewed you haue done To what purpose now is all this seeing in trueth neither we doe thus cut of all Christians betwixt them and vs neither haue you shewed any such succession of pastours downe from them to you continuing in your doctrine Truely to no other purpose can they serue but to expresse your owne ridiculous vanity Howbeit because you called in the former Chapter for the names of those that haue caught vs to deny your real presence in the sacrament and vpon a conceit in your owne fansie that you haue posed vs you haue growen to bee thus full of these swelling wordes of vanity and because I feare neither you nor many of your disciples will vouchsafe to peruse those books that I sent you vnto for answere in that point yet haue hope that for your sake some of you may chauÌ„ce vouchsafe to reade this I will not sticke with you particulerly to satisfie your request a little further First therefore vnderstand that we haue learned to deny your kinde of reall presence of Christ himselfe the institutour of this Sacrament because he hath flatly and vehemently affirmed without exception Iohn 6.54 that whosoeuer eateth his flesh drinketh his bloud hath eternall life Whereas by the meanes of your doctrine it followeth because all that receiue this sacrament haue not faith but manie lacke it that it shall bee eaten of manie that shal be neuer the better by it but the worse We haue also further learned it of him in that in the same Chapter speaking of the eating of his body drinking of his bloud he drew his hearers from a grosse conceit of eating drinking him by their bodily mouthes by vsing of the word beleeueth in stead of eateth and drinketh ver 40.47 and cap. 7.38 by mentioning vnto them his ascention Iohn 6.62 lattly by saying vnto theÌ„ It is the Spirit that quickeneth the flesh profiteth nothing the words that I speake vnto you are spirit life ver 63. This finally we haue learned of him saying If any shall say vnto you Lo here is Christ there is Christ beleeue it not Math. 24.23 by his continuing at the table when he first instituted and ministred it vnto his Apostles without alteration either of his place or forme Mat. 26. Mar. 12. Luke 22.1 Cor. 11. The Apostles euaÌ„gelists haue also taught vs to deny it in that they teach vs that he visibly asceÌ„ded into heauen that he shall so also come againe wheÌ„ he coÌ„meth froÌ„ thence c. Act. 1.11 especially seeing his comming to iudgement is called his secoÌ„d comming Heb 9.28 and vntil the restitutioÌ„ of all things it is saied by Peter the heaueÌ„s must coÌ„taine him Act. 3.21 The EuaÌ„gelists in laying downe vnto vs the story of his natiuity life death so prouing vnto vs that he was is a true and perfect maÌ„ encourage vs also least we should with the Marcionites other heretiques denie the trueth of his maÌ„hood coÌ„tantly to â—â—â—y your reall preseÌ„ce for the maintenance whereof you are driueÌ„ to fansy a nuÌ„ber of things quite contrary to the nature trueth of his maÌ„hood And lastly in that reciting the words of the institution they tel vs that Christ commanded that to be done in remeÌ„brance of him Luke 22.19 1. Cor. 11.24 there Paul saith v. 26. As often as ye shall eate this bread drink this cup ye shew the lords death till he coÌ„e which words plainly argu that though the sacrameÌ„t be both rightly ministresâ— receiued yet it inferreth not any such real preseÌ„ce as you ther imagâ—â— Now betwixt them vs we finde infinite places in writers of all ages that teach vs still to denie your reall presence but amongst many marke these for example TertulliaÌ„ in his 4. booke against MarcioÌ„ interpreteth these words Hoc est corpus meum thus that is to say This is a figure of my body Augustine against AdamaÌ„tus the Manichee c. 12. writeth that christ doubted not to say This is my body wheÌ„ he gaue a signe of his body vpoÌ„ the 3. Ps he saieth that Christ admitted Iudas to a baÌ„quet where he coÌ„meÌ„ded a figure of his body to his disciples vpoÌ„ the 98. Ps he saith yee shal not eat this body that yee see neither shall yee drinke that bloud which they shall shed that crucify me I haue coÌ„mended vnto you a certaine sacrament it being spiritually vnderstoode will giue you life In his 3. booke therfore of Christian doctrine he writeth thus This saying of Christ Except yee eate the flesh of the son of maÌ„ c. seemeth to coÌ„mand an heinous thing a wicked therefore it is a figure coÌ„maÌ„ding vs to be partakers of Christs passioÌ„ keeping in our minds to our great profit coÌ„fort that his flesh was crucified wouÌ„ded for vs. c. 16. he saith It is a miserable slauery of the soule to take the signes for the things signified in the same booke c. 5. And therefore in his 23. epistle he telleth vs that the similitude betwixt the signe the thing signified is the cause why the one beareth the name of the other in sacrameÌ„ts in his 57. questioÌ„ vpoÌ„ Leuitic he giueth vs this rule The thing that signifieth is woÌ„t to bear the name of the thing which it signifieth as Paul said The rock was Christ not it signified Christ but eueÌ„ as it had bene indeed which neuertheles was not Christ by substaÌ„ce but by signification So that his vsual doctrine is to teach vs in this sacrament to seeke christ in heaueÌ„ by faith thereby to make him present which otherwise is absent as you may read in his 50. tract vpon Iohn els where very often And with Augustine the rest of the fathers consent in this matter therefore nothing is more coÌ„moÌ„ with them then to call the outward part in this sacrament a signe figure similitude resemblance or representatioÌ„ as it appeareth in these places Chrysostom in his 83. Homil vpon Mat. Hierom in his 2. booke against IouiniaÌ„ Ambr. in his 4. booke of the sacraments c. 5. Basil in his lyturgy Ephr in his 4. booke against the impugners of Christs manhood by humane reason And Origen vpoÌ„ Leuit hom 7. teacheth vs that the letter
to returne to your perswasion of vs to be meeke and humble c. tell me in good earnest did Christ at any time obey any of them you speake of in any thing that was ill and was there not a necessity in regard of our redēption to suffer those things which he suffered and as he suffered them at their hands what maketh this then either to binde vs to obey the wicked vngodly proceedings of your Popes and Prelates wherein onely we refuse to listen vnto them or needelesly to suffer those thinges at your hand which lawfully we may auoide And I trust you are perswaded that Christ himselfe that willed others to learne of him to be hūble and meeke that he neuer forgat that lesson himselfe And yet if you reade Mat. 23. and Iohn the 8. you shall finde that he comprising the high Priestes themselues within the compasse of his speech aswell as other his inferiour malitious enemies calleth them hypocrits children of the Deuill c. And the Prophets though they were not to learne of you how to behaue them selues to higher powers yet they did vse often very sharpe and bitter speeches against the Princes and other rulers of their times an example whereof you haue Esay 1.10 in these wordes Heare the word of the Lord O Princes of Sodom hearken to the law of our God O people of Gomorrah But Paul you will say Act. 23. hauing called a wicked high Priest that contrary to law tyrannously had commanded him to be smitten painted wall being admonished thereof corrects himselfe remēbring that it is writē thou shalt not raile or speake ill of the Prince Ex. 22. saying I knew not that he was the high Priest Indeede one of the high Priests clawbacks who are alwaies ready to iustify their master how vniustly soeuer he deale and to controle Gods seruāts for saying neuer so litle amisse of thē though therunto they be neuer so iustly prouoked gaue him a check therefore wherevpon it seemeth that Paul vpon the reason aforesaied excused himselfe but indeede he did it in such sort as that in trueth he giue him a greater blow though somewhat more couertly then he had done before in plainly shewing that that dealing of his considered he knew him not to be the high Priest But if this notwithstanding you thinke still that Paul would not giue any harde speech to such a Prelate and iustifie it when he had done consider a little what reckoning you make of Saint Peter and then call to remembrance what is writen Gal. 2. and you shall finde it cleare that not onely he rebuked Peter openly at Antioch but that also he iustifies that his owne doing therein saying that he did so because he went not with the right foote to the Gospell And learne by these places not to be so dainty ouer your Popes and Prelates hereafter but that if they doe lewdly think it may well stand with that meekenes humility that Christ hath taught vs that they be plainly as they deserue tolde of their doings by vs. It is one thing to rafle of them that be in lawful authority and to backbite and depraue them and another thing it is by way of instruction admonitiō and reprehensiō by plaine iust and true tearms to let them see their faults so it be done in time and place conuenient in maner beseeming such an action This later might the Iewes doe to Nabuchadnezzar notwithstanding Ieremies words and the Christians vnder the heathen Emperours to them and yet both keep within duety and loialty but the former is that which is vnlawful to bee vsed against any how bad soeuer he be that is in place of lawfull magistracy or office Finally whereas you yet thinke scorne that your Pope should bee worse then Nabuchadnezzar and that therefore the Iewes might haue had far more iust exceptions against him to free them frō their obedience and submission to him then we haue to free vs from subiection to your Popes in trueth therein you are very much deceiued For first his authority as a King ouer them was a power in it selfe lawful though abused by him and yours as I haue shewed is flatly vnlawfull and the Iewes were commanded subiection vnto him and we are commanded as I haue saied Reuel 18. to forsake all communion with your Popish Antichristian kingdome Your Popes for lewdnes of life for manifold Idolatries and blasphemies in Religion and for want of right title to the dignity and office which they claime doubtlesse will thorowly match him by how much their knowledge in respect of the meanes they haue which he lackt should be more then his by so much these things in them make them more intolerable then the same could make him And therefore these thinges considered the obedience and submission which the Iews were enioyned to yeeld to Nabuchadnezzar inferreth not the like to be due to your Popes and other your Romish Prelates The XVII Chapter ANy mā may easily perceiue by this discourse that you haue no great reason in saying that that you saie and much lesse to doe that that you preach I meane to begin the reformation of the church by the waie of force the which is a thing contrarie to all lawes diuine and humane which defende * Cod. vt nemo in suâ causâ jud that a This is your dealing flat for your Pope is the party many waies most iustly charged by vs yet he wil be the supreme iudge in his owne cause one should bee Iudge in his owne cause and you will not onelie be a Iudge but a partie resembling in this him that gaue the blowe to Christ vnto whom the answere was made * b Job 15. b Wel hit again 15. for 18. If we haue done ill c This alwaies we are ready to doe proue it before the Iudge seeing that you are our accusers If you saie that God hath giuen you power to knowe to iudge and to exempt that is to saie to driue vs out of our possession and to cause the people to forsake that Religion which they haue maintained d It is a shame to repeate this bragge so often and neuer to go about in all your booke once to proue it which you know is the maine question these 1500. yeares vpwards shew vs your commission with as sure a warrant as so great a matter doeth require seeing that you saie that ye are sent extraordinarilie as Moses was to redeem the childrē of Israell out of the captiuity of Egypt that is to say according vnto your interpretatiō the children of God the true faithful out of the false Religion of the Papists of that which the Pope Antichrist worse thē Pharao is the head master Thus ye vse to expoūd moralizate the figures of the olde Testament in fauour of the Catholicke Church yet is it so that when God spake vnto you about so zealous a thing as this yee
accounted amongst vs a soūd preacher of the gospell hath either sayed that thus hee ought to be receaued to preach the gospell or hath attempted so to doe For it is generally held and receiued of al the Churches that professe the gospell and so lykewise is their vniforme practise that none be suffered to take vpō them to preach the gospel vnlesse it be knowen and sufficiently appeare that by the ordinary calling of some according to the order of the Church where hee is ordered he be sufficiently authorished so to doe And wel knowen it is that there is no Church that professes the Gospel indeed but the order thereof is that none meddle in the ministry therein without commissiō as it pleaseth you to speake either from some conueniēt number of pastours or from some bishop or from both by the order of that church appointed to looke to and to take care of that busines As for the Anabaptists a captaine whereof you named in the former Chapter we know that in their fantastical spirit they both hold and practise as here you charge vs but therin and therfore we dislike condemne them as much as you And you know we renounce communion with them we coūt them heretickes therfore sundry of vs purposely haue writ large and vehement bookes against them you doe vs therfore great wrong to charge vs with that which is their fault which you cānot proue to be ours But you wil say I am sure for in your former Chap. you seeme to deriue Mūcer the Anabaptist his petigree frō Luther that we may worthely so be charged for they are such as spring of and from vs. But herein againe you offer vs as great wrong as the seruants of the good seeds man that sowed only good seed in his field should haue done him if they had saied that the tares that came vp therewith in the same field had beene there sowed by him because when Christ his Apostles and faithfull ministers had first preached the gospel there were foūd in the same age springing vp with the same amongst the professours therof Ebionites Cerinthians Nicolaitans Simonists and sundry other fantastical heretickes as Hymeneus Philetus Hermogines and Phygetus was it any reason therefore that Christ or any of his faithfull ministers or that the gospel it selfe should be charged with their fond cōceits And yet as absurd sencelesse as this kinde of dealing were it is both here with you oft in this your booke vsuall is it with all of your spirit this now for want of better matter against vs by this means with the simple people to labour the discredit and disgrace both of vs our churches and religion But you content not your selfe with falsely charging vs to say that we ought to be receiued to preach the gospel extraordinarily but also you lay to our charge that we seeke still to defend an ill cause and an extraordinary commission This you onely say as your maner is but neither proofe nor shadow of proofe you bring neither indeede can you For our cause is the very trueth and our commission is but that ordinary commission of teaching and confirming the same vnto men that Christ hath left by his owne ordināce to all his faithfull ministers vnto the worlds ende And for proofe hereof we appeale indeede to the holy scriptures which in this case euen for the reason by you alleadged wee are not ashamed to confesse to be the sound touchstone of trueth and to be preferred in credit before miracles Yet you some thing amplifie and adde vnto our speech in that you say we affirme that the scriptures as they are alleadged by vs alone ought to bee of more credit then all the miracles wrought by the Apostles Well this our reason to iustifie our cause and commission you say is a notable way to deceaue the simple and vnlearned I wonder that you were not ashamed and affraied so to write For you cannot be ignorant that to confute errour to proue trueth to exhort to vertue and to dehort from vice Christ and his Apostles and so from time to time the ancient fathers what aduersaries soeuer they had to deale withal vsed alwaies to flie to this touchstone and for the most certaine concluding of their purpose did alleadge scripture but your shift will be that these alleadged the scripture rightly which you speake not of and we alleadge the scripture corruptly and in a wrong sense therefore you would haue your words in all this your discourse against our alleadging of scripture to bee taken as writen not simply against alleadging of scripture but against alleadging it as we doe Then I answer that that you should haue proued that we alleadge the scripture in a wrong sense but this you haue not once gone about only you proue that bare alleadging of scripture cannot nor may not so countenance our cause as we pretēd for that sundry heretickes haue countenanced their heresies by alleadging scripture and that often very plentifully About this you spend sundry Chapters and withall to shew your selfe to be able if you list to be a cunning in wresting of the scriptures as any of the heretickes you mention all which is to no purpose vnles withall you had proued which you shall neuer be able to doe that we alleadging them doe alleadge them so likewise For we are not so simple or ignorāt that we know not that the scripture hath beene and may be misalleadged as you write and therefore we neuer go about to perswade the people that they must and ought to beleeue vs for our bare alleadging of scripture but for that by the sound rules of interpreting of them we proue forcibly and inuincibly vnto their consciences that we alleadge them according to their true and natiue meaning We call vpon them with Christ to search the scriptures themselues Iohn 5 39. and with Paul we exhort them so to trauaile therein as that they may haue the worde of God dwell euen in themselues plentifully in all wisedome Coloss 3.16 that so according to the commended example of the noble men of Baerea Act. 17.11 and the doctrine of S. Iohn they may trie the spirits of them that would seeme to teach them a right before they beleeue them 1. Iohn 4.15 we confesse gladly with Peter 2. Epist cap. 1. 20. 21. that no prophesie nor part of the scripture is of any priuate interpretation and all such interpretations we count and iudge priuate and humane whosoeuer gyues or allowes them that are not indeede soundly agreeing with the minde of the authour of the scripture the holy Ghost And therefore we hold and teach for asmuch as the naturall man vnderstandeth not the thinges of the spirit of God 1. Cor. 1.15 that no man in alleadging and citing of the scripture◠is to trust to his owne wisedome or learning but according to the counsell of S. Iames finding himselfe in this case to lacke wisedome we exhort all men
which is but a mā often times an ignorant wicked man to vnderstand the scriptures and haue indeede no true acquaintance with the spirit of God nor any true desire after knowledge but rather after ignorāce because that is the best foūdation of your Religiō And therefore as the fashiō is you measuring another 〈…〉 by your owne happily iudge them to be as hard to all others as to your selues and thereupon by the hardnes thereof discourage them from reading them as much as you cā I am sure whatsoeuer you or any of your fellowes prate hereof that therein is conteined the will and testament of our heauenly father and that this pertaineth to simple and vnlearned artificers as well as to the great learned men of this world For therein and thereby I know that God is no accepter of persons and therefore so far of is it that any hardnes of tearmes or phrases therein conteined to expresse vnto thē or bequeath vnto them their heauenly fathers behestes and bequestes should driue them from the reading and studying of thē that so much the more paines and diligence they ought to vse to atteyne to the right sence thereof For we see in our earthly fathers will the harder the tearines and phrases be wherein he hath giuen vs any thing or willeth vs to doe any thing nature reason hath taught vs not therefore to take and bestow lesse paines cost but a great deale more to seeke to vnderstand the same how much more ought it to be so in this case And I am perswaded that oure heauenly father hath so tempered hardnes with plainenes plainenes with hardnes in the scriptures that the plainenes might allure and encourage euery simple man to reade study them with hope to vnderstand them that the other might admonish him to be no negligent but a careful wise peruser of them so both together make euery one a willing and studious reader of them Which it should seeme both Fulgentius in his sermon of the confessours Gregory in his epist to Leander had obserued in noting that God had so ordred the scriptures as the therein he had prouided for the strong man meate for the weakling milke and that there both the Elephāt might swimme and the lambe safely wade These things notwithstāding whatsoeuer else might be saied further to this purpose I perceiue that you in this your lōg discourse of the hereticks abusing and wresting the scriptures cared not how litle otherwise that which you wrote was to the purpose so the thereby you might gaine thus much as by such experiments to withdraw the mindes of men from the loue study of the scriptures For I know they greatly comber you stād in your way and therefore by your wils you cared not if the people neuer hearde of them wherof you haue giuen an inuincible demonstration in that you haue kept them hidden and shut vp from them as long as you 〈◊〉 vnder the close bushell of an vnknowen tongue And your goodwill towardes thou hath otherwise beene sufficiently bewrayed by the vnreuerent and disgracing speeches vttered by your chiefe great Champions against them as it is well knowen too too often For first for their authority though now some of your side would seeme in that point to speake more modestly not long ago Piggins a great man in his time with you in the first booke and second Chapter of his Hierarchie hath flatly writen that all authority of scripture now necessarily dependeth vpon the authority of the Church For otherwise we could not beleeue them but because we beleeue the Church that giues testimony vnto them adding further that Marke and Luke were not of themselues sufficient witnesses of the gospell and that the gospels were not writen that they might be aboue our faith and Religion but rather to be subiect thereunto And Ecchius another great doctour of yours of the same time in his Enchiridion writing of the authority of the church saieth that the scriptures were not of authenticke authority but through the authority of the Church and therefore he boldly affirmeth that to say that greater is the authority of the scriptures then of the Church is hereticall and the contrary is Catholicke And whereas it was obiected by Brentius in the confession of Wittingberge that one of your crue meaning thereby one Herman had not beene ashamed to say that the scriptures should haue had no greater estimation or credit then AEsops fables but for the testimony of the church Hosius a Bishop and Cardinall of yours writing against the saied Brentius in his third booke being of the authority of the scripture defends it as well inough spoken for saieth he vnles the church had taught vs which is scripture Canonicall it could haue had small authority with vs. Likewise teacheth Melchior Canus in his second book seuēth Chapter of his places of diuinity that it appears not to vs that the scriptures are of God but by the testimony of the Church insomuch that she must determine saieth he what bookes be Canonicall and her authority is a certaine rule whereby either to receiue or to reiect bookes into or out of the Canon Of the same iudgemēt is Canisius in his Catechisme ca. 30. sect 16. and Stapleton in his first Chapter of his ninth booke of the principles of doctrine with a great rabble moe of your writers of greatest account since Luther And this position so liked Ecchius that in the place before cited he writes of the margent Achilles against this position to insinuate that this is a speciall tried captaine of yours And yet when all comes to all your meaning all this while is by the Church to vnderstand onely the Pope forasmuch as none but hee hath the tongue of the Church in weelding For Catherin in Epistolam ad Galatas cap. 2. holdeth that it is the Popes proper priuiledge to canonize or to reiect from the Canon scriptures which is also Canus fift proposition in effect in the Chapter before named This being your meaning Leo the tenth being one of your Popes what Canonicall authority haue you left the scripture if it be true that is writen of him that he talking with Bembus then a Cardinall cōtemptuously saied speaking of the Gospell that that fable of Christ had beene very profitable vnto them And as for the vncertainty of the sēce insufficiēcy of thē who knoweth not what cost vsually alwaies vpon euery light occasion you are ready to bestow in amplifying the hardnes of them in either preferring therefore or equalling the vnwritē word with you call the liuely practise of the church before thē both for plainnes sufficiency Whē you are in this vaine both the fathers of Colen shall be iustified and Piggius also by your Andradius Orthodox Epl. li. 2. p. 104. though they cōpared the scriptures to a nose of waxe he to a leaden lesbian rule and to their further
shew your selfe to bee not onely one that dare write any thing how grosse a lie soeuer it be but as malitious in your iudgement as euer was any First you set downe not onely that the Anabaptists condemne thē that die in Luther Caluins religion to hell which is likely inough because they were franticke heretiques haue denied the foundation but also the Lutherans and Caluinists will doe giue that iudgement one of another and yet I am sure you are not able truely to say that euer any of Caluins iudgement saied or wrote so Secondly though your owne iudgement be short yet so it is set downe that you shew that you beleeue that all the three sorts go thither And such care compassion your catholique heart had of it whē you had done that you iest at it accounting your selues fooles if you should stay their passage thither For if we were al gone for company you thinke you should be at quiet you say hel would be so full that the deuil would long for no more companie Is this your popish diuinity to make sport at the damnation of men And hold you this for a principle that it is folly to stay men from running togither to hel Indeed it may be For I haue read that it is a rule amongst you that if your Pope lead headlong with him multitudes by heapes to hell yet no man may be so hardie as to say vnto him why doest thou so Distinct 40. Cap. Si Papa But howsoeuer you account this diuinity certaine I am you wil finde it that in no two things more the deuils shew themselues deuils then in these In laughing and reioicing in the damnation of the soules of men and in letting them go freely for company to hell without stoppage as many as will Truely truely God must take from you this profane and deuilish spirit of yours and giue you grace to repent of it or els you may be sure how many soeuer die and go to hel before you hell wil long for you and you shal finde place and roome inough there I warrant you The XXXII Chapter THere is a certaine minister of the Lutherans called a What will not a passionate aduersary say to disgrace them that he writes against If like testimonies of men of your Religion writing yet in some points one against another wil be admitted it is an easy matter thus to discredit your whole faction Heshusius the which within these three yeares hath made a booke against Caluin Peter Boquin Theodore de Beza Gulielmus Elcimalcius he saieth amongst other things that Carolstadius Zuenfeldius Caluin Beza doe shew well the vncertainty of their faith by the diuersities of opinions that there is amongst thē the which fault saieth he doeth proceede of this that they haue forsaken the true sence of the scripture to follow the opinions of their owne heades b And yet in truth lyeth therein himselfe And in that very booke the saied authour doeth giue the lie to Caluin because that in that hee wrote against the aboue named Westphal hee saieth that Martin Luther and his adherents did acknowledge him as their brother the which thing he maintaines to be false c Greater more disagreement◠there are amōgst you papists and therefore these conclusions presse you rather then vs. Thus seeing yee agree togither like dogs and cattes that all these sects haue confirmed their false doctrine with the shedding of their owne bloud it is best to conclude as we haue saied before that it is not the paine nor the tormēt that doeth make the righteous martyr except we should saie that diuerse contrary messengers are sent from one master the which is notoriously false for that good king frō whom the trueth doeth come indeede hath so good a memory that he doeth neuer send contrary messengers but rather his faithfull seruāts doe all with one voice and one accord honour him as the father of our sauiour Iesus Christ The XXXII Chapter HEre againe as in the former Chapter you labour to discredit Caluin Beza and others onely with the testimony of Heshusius an vtter enemy of theirs about the quarrel of the cōtrouersie of the Sacrament whom heat of contention and a desire therefore to disgrace his aduersaries rather then iust cause led thus to write For what reason had he there to ioyne Zuenfeldius with Caluin and Beza with whom they helde no more communion and fellowshippe then hee himselfe and Corolstadius who was a doctour in Wittenberge in Luthers time and an associate to him in disputatiō against Ecchius he might with more reason haue ioyned with Luther himselfe and his partners then with these And howsoeuer the intemperate heate of contention emboldened Heshusius to giue Caluin the lie most certaine yet it is that Melancthon a great frende of Luthers whom Heshusius cannot deny was an adherent of Luther accounted of Caluin as of a good brother For in an Epistle which he wrote to him he calleth him Charissim◠fratrem most deare brother it is the 187. Epistle in the booke of Caluins Epistles And I am perswaded that what Caluin wrote he was able to iustify in this behalfe how rudely soeuer angry Heshusius gaue him the lie This obiection of our disagreement hath beene oft enough vrged and answered alreadie It seemeth that you haue great penurie of arguments against vs when this must come in thus often especially seeing as I haue shewed greater contentions haue beene amongst your selues In which cases would you haue thought a mā should haue dealt wel with you if the bitter speeches of the one side had alwaies beene taken as sufficient argumentes to disgrace the other Or would you haue liked that thereupon a man should inferre as you doe that you agreed no better then dogges and cattes and that therefore you so differing amongst your selues came not both from one master God who vseth not to sende contrary messengers this had beene an harde conclusion against a number of you in the time of your schismes betwixt your Popes and Antipopes and in the times of the contentiōs of your Friers with your other Prelates and also amongst themselues whereof I haue put you in remembrance before Chapter twenty eight And yet if you will needes meate this measure vnto vs vpon occasion of this one controuersie about the maner of Christs reall presence you must bee contented that vpon moe and greater contentions amongst you wee sende you home as good measure againe As for your conclusion that it is not the paine but the cause that maketh a true martyr wee graunted it you at the first but where to make way to bring it in here againe you insinuate not onely that the Donatists Adamites Seruetus and the Anabaptistes of whom you haue spoken in your former Chapter haue died to confirme their false Religion which we graunt you but that these also that you spake of last Lutherans and Zuenfeldians haue
hauing the grace that was inspired in him by the holie ghost at his baptisme so long he doeth not sinne vnto eternall death d Yea the Apostle to the great comfort of them that are once truely regenerat teacheth in these places that such by the power of that grace shall be so preserued that they shall neuer sin as the vnregeneraâ— do with their whole man vnto death for the generatioÌ„ of God that is to saie the grace receiued by this holy sacrament doeth so defend him that the Deuill cannot persecute him to death being not able to preuaile against him and as long as this good seede which is the word of God doeth dwell in him he cannot sinne and if he did sinne the seed would no loÌ„ger remain in him The holie ghost saith * Sap. 1. the wisemaÌ„ shall refuse the hypocrite and dissembler and shall depart from the vaine and crafty cogitations and therefore the grace of God and sinne can not dwell togither nor we ought not thinke S. Iohns wordes strange in that he saieth that he that is borne of God doeth not sinne for it is as much to say as that one can not serue two masters and that he that serueth God can not serue the Deuill For. S. Paul saieth * 1. Cor. 10. You cannot assist at the table of God and of the Deuill altogether for what communication is there betweene iustice and iniquity or betweene Iesus Christ and Belial And hee that doeth loue this world declareth himselfe an enemie vnto God And a little before he had saied he that doeth commit sinne is the sonne of the Deuill the which doeth not affirme that a sinner cannot be the sonne of God if he repent and doe penance but in the meane while a If this assertion be true â—â—en as often as the regenerate either actually sinneth or hath but a minde to sinne he is not the childe of God I would gladly know theÌ„ h w often the authour hath coÌ„tinued a moreâ—h the child of God togither or any man else he that is in actuall sinne or hath a minde to doe euill is as then not the sonne of God but the sonne of the Deuill The good tree doeth not beare ill fruite for although the fruit doe rot or perish vpon the tree that corruption doeth not proceede of the tree but of the wormes birdes or of some other kinde of vermine and therefore when they say that by the fruit we shall knowe the tree and by the workes the faith this ought to be vnderstood when the fruite doeth ripe in season and that it hath the naturall humour and property of the tree And in a man that he haue the influeÌ„ce of the true faith not otherwise for euen as the rotten fruit hanging vpon the tree doeth digresse nothing from the good stocke euen so the ill workes of vs that are Christians ought not to staine our holy and Catholique religion b Thus we also answere the obiection that you make against our religion froÌ„ the lewd liues that you see in some which seeme to be of our profession It is a good defence for you you thinke why should you not graunt â— then so to be to vs For the corruption of our ill fruites coÌ„meth of our selues and not of our religion the which doeth defende vs from doing that we doe I meane to sweare to blaspheme to commit adulterie to doe anie man wrong or to offend God anie waie He that doeth desire then by the fruit to know whither the tree of our Religion bee good hee ought not to bende his eies to looke vpon the rotten fruit as if that were sufficient to disproue the goodnesse of the tree but let him looke vpon the good fruites c You shall finde that you farre oueâ—shot your se fe in your reckoning when you compare indeed their religion exp essed in their writiâ—gs with yours such are all the Doctours aswell of the Greeke as Latin church so manie good Emperours and vertuous Kinges Princes Dukes and Earles which haue raigned in France Spaine Germany and England and ouer all the worlde and haue died in the faith leauing their workes to beare witnes of their good fruites d Many Kings Quâ—enes Nobles and others of our religion haue done these things also The which haue builded so manie faire hospitals to helpe releeue the poore so many goodly Colledges to entertaine fatherles children at their bookes so manie foundations and workes for the common wealth and that haue builded so manie sumptuous e The first pulling of them dowâ—e here in England came euen from your Cardinals and great bishops vnder the pretence therwith to found colledges and so hauing giuen the king an example wheâ— he was disposed to follow it they easily consented indeed the abhominaâ—ions therin committed was their ouerthrow Abbeies and houses of Religion the which you with your godlie zeale haue not onely robbed and spoiled but that that is more odious you haue pulled them cleane downe to deface the memorie of our ancesters to acquite all these which are notable monuments you brag of the good deedes that your good Christians doe which are much like vnto the gaines of those that vse to cog at dise for although they win much it is neuer seene or like the Iewes which to colour their horrible crueltie in putting our sauiour vniustly to death they weÌ„t bought with the monie that they gaue to Iudas a field to bury the dead k As deepe and grounded papists were lickorish of Abbey lands as any other and as greedily and securely they enioy them still amongst vs. Cardinall Woolsey and the Bishop of Rochester your great Martyr first began that course here And so you hauing robbed spoiled froÌ„ the religious houses and Abbeies more then you are able to restore you thinke to acquite it al with giuing a little to the poore No no these deuises are but vaine if by the fruit the tree be knowen as Christ saieth let them that haue anie iudgement looke vpon the fruit of our trees then iudge whither they be good or no. The XXXIIII Chapter PArtly in the former Chapter but more plainly in this you shew that you vnderstand by the trees that Christ spake of good Religion and bad But if you view the place you will at least I am sure you should rather thereby vnderstaÌ„d the persons of men effectually called as I haue saied or not called at all or at least yet vneffectually called that sound religion is one of the principall fruits that he meant should grow vpoÌ„ the former to discerne him from the later For his scope was not there to teach vs how to discerne religions but how to discerne the children of God from the children of sathan And thus it will proue that the sence of this prouerbe will not proue hard at all to vs to digest but to you who what shew soeuer you caÌ„ make with
they left in writtng by the ordinance of God to confute such heretiques as you are The XXXVII Chapter AT last it seemeth by your paines taken in this Chapter you be thought your selfe that forasmuch as hitherto onelie in bare and naked wordes you had vaunted and bragged your Religion to be the ancient Religion that it was needefull for you euē for shame before you made a full end of your booke to yeeld vs some reasons and grounds or at least some shew colour of your so lewd and bold boasting And therefore here now at last to that ende you haue mustered the bare names of a few ancient fathers very prouidently leauing your Readers to the examining of your quotations amōgst whom not one of an hundreth you knew either for lacke of skill or will leasure or bookes could and would turne to the places in the authours themselues You thought belike your credit to bee such that they must needes beleeue that you cite thē truely and faithfully and that because you so roundly haue huddled them togither that therefore also out of all question they spake and wrotefully for you in the points you alleadge them for What smal cause there is either for you to looke thus to bee trusted or for any to yeelde you such credit herein wee shall see anone when wee come to the examining of your quotations In the meane time what ment you by this thus onely when all commeth to al to countenance these 4 points your Ceremonies in baptisme confession before the sacrament praiers to the Saints departed and praier for the dead Are these the greatest matters of your religion in question Or doeth it especially depend vpon these 4 and the coūtenancing of these Or was your prouision ready for no more that but once in all your booke you seeming to set downe the authorities whereupon you ground your religion you would take the paines to go no further then to these 4 points Indeed in your next Chapter you excuse your selfe and say that you would haue gone likewise on to confirme the rest but for being tedious to your reader Truely he is much beholden to you for your discreet kindnes towards him that haue not spared to be tedious vnto him in al the rest of your book in troubling of him with such a number of proud brags of the antiquity and catholikenes of al your religion as you haue and with many needles and friuolous long discourses besides and now when you came to the point indeed which of all other was most materiall and wherein both for his satisfaction and your owne credit it stood you vpon most to enlarge your selfe then thus to shift him of with as good as nothing bearing him yet in hand that but for his ease you both could and would haue saied inough This is a common tricke amongst you thus to cozen and abuse your simple readers to weary them with things needles and then to slip ouer with some such shift as this matters most needful Wel concerning that which either you haue saied here for these 4 points or that which after you pretend if you had list you could haue easily saied for the rest this I would haue the reader diligently to note and marke that but for two places vainely alleaged to proue your confession that you neither haue alleaged any testimony of scripture at all for the proofe of these nor yet that you so much as say after you could or would for the rest Which argueth that euen in your owne conscience the best ground and countenance that your popish religion hath either in these points or in the rest is but from earth and not from heauen from men and not from the holy ghost For if you had beene able with any good colour to haue coūtenāced either these points or any of the rest out of Gods owne booke and writen word the reader may think that neither your zeale to your religion nor yet your boasting spirit which hitherto hath shewed it selfe ouerflowing in you either would or could haue suffered you thus much to the preiudice your whole cause cleane to haue forgotten so much as once to go about it But to say the trueth seeing it is confessed by your betters not onely that this but the most of all the rest of the points of your Religiō which we striue with you for are grounded but vpon tradition as I haue shewed out of Soto against Brentius Canisius fift Chapter of his Catechisme and Lyndans 100. Chapter of the fifth booke of his panoply before you are the honester man and the more a great deale to be liked for your thus secretly confessing the same with them Now yet by this the Reader may plainely vnderstand what hath indeede beene the reason why in all your booke hitherto you haue laboured so much as you haue to grace and countenance tradition and the exposition of the doctours and withall haue spent so much time in diswading the appealing to the Scriptures for the ending of the controuersies betwixt vs. You were wise enough it seemeth to see where your strength lay and from whēce would rise your bane and therefore who can blame you for leaning as you doe altogither to the one and shunning the other But then in reason yet you should call your Religion no more diuinity but humanity no more Theologie but patrologie and plainely confesse indeede from whence you haue all your figge leaues rags and clouts to couer your shame and nakednes Truely these you haue whatsoeuer in this respect you pretend not from the right and sound Apostolique tradition which alwaies was either expressed in Scripture or at least cōsonant vnto it nor from the ancient holy fathers rightly vnderstood and when they taught as it was of themselues acknowledged to be their duties with sound warrant from the scriptures as I haue sundry times shewed already but onely from forged or corrupt tradition and from the fathers either misunderstood or erring as men So that vnwriten verities or rather forgeries sentences of fathers mistaken or their verie errours whereof they would haue beene ashamed if they had had the meanes to helpe them to see them that you haue are the groundes pillers and bewties of your church and Religion And this we are alwaies ready to iustifie against you before the whole world by sound and inuincible proofe out of the vn doubted word of God interpreted according to the same rules of interpreting it that the holy and ancient fathers themselues haue followed in confuting all heretiques in their times by and which they haue likewise commended to others alwaies to be obserued and out of the vndoubted writings of the ancientest and best fathers them selues Wee are therefore verie well content to liue and die in that Church and Religion which we are sure we are able thus to iustifie and we enuy not you but rather heartely lament and pittie you that yours hath no better grounde then it hath But to
aside of all our sorrowes and the banishing of all tēptations because they die not but liue for euer which seeme to die and therefore saieth he we keepe the memories of the Saints and of our parents and frendes which die in the faith as reioycing for their rest so begging for our selues consūmation in the faith and to this ende to celebrate the memory of such so departed we call the poore togither and satisfy thē with victualls in token of our ioy thankfulnes for their quietnes rest He that getteth not forgiuenes of his sinnes here shal not be there and therefore saieth Dauid forgiue mee that I may bee refreshed before I go hence and be no more seene saieth Ambrofe de hono mortis cap. 2. And Cyprian against Demetrian saieth most flatly when one is gone hence there is no place for repētance no effect of satisfaction de mortalitate againe he saieth what maner of one God findeth thee when he calleth thee euen such an one also will hee iudge thee Chrysostome is as flat as Ambrose in these points For vpon the 4. of the Hebrewe hom 4. he saieth that if we come to the throne of grace now we shall haue grace mercy now is the time of gifts after of iudgemēt and in his sermon de Eucharistiâ in Eucaen there is saieth he after this life ended no negotiatiō this is the time of suffering or striuing that of crowns this of labour that of ease this of sorow that of reward therefore in the 7. Hom vpon the 2. of the Hebrewes shewing a reason of the solemnities vsed at burials he saieth that the reasō thereof is that we may glorify God giue him thāks that hath crowned taken to himselfe our brother departed freed him from his labours seruitude are not our Psalmes hymnes for this our singing omnia ista gaudētiū sunt al these saith he are the doings of men that reioyce de beato Philogonio most cōfidētly he writeth Ego fide iubeo c. that is I doe pawne my credit if any depart from his sinnes with his whole heart truly and vnfeinedly promise vnto God that he will returne no more vnto them that God will require nothing more of him to satisfaction But to come to Augustin he in his 80. epistle to Hesichius saith in what state soeuer thy last day findeth thee in the same will the last day of the worlde come vpon thee for what maner of one euery man dieth such an one then he shal be iudged and vpō the 25. Psa he plainely wisheth that only the price of the Lords bloud might be sufficient to him for his perfect freedome and deliuerance Herein we are sure they had the scriptures full of their sides For first they assure vs that the bloud of Iesus Christ doth clense vs from all sinne 1. Iohn 1. and that hee so bare our sinnes in his owne body vpon the tree that by his stripes we are healed 1. Pe. 2. Secondly they teach vs that blessed are they that dye in the Lord for euen thenceforth immediatly they rest from their labours and their works follow them Apo. 14. And thirdly likewise directly they affirme that an ill man once dead there is no more hope for him Pro. 11. and that therefore wee must haue oyle in our lāps in a readines when the bridegroome calleth vs or else we shal be shut out for euer what stur soeuer we make to prouide oyle after Mat. 25. And lastly in these vpon these grounds all men are vrged whiles the day lasteth while the acceptable time or day of saluatiō endureth whiles the Lord is nigh and may be found whiles they haue time to worke to embrace the gospel to seeke the Lord and to doe good vnto al men as it is well enough knowen And therefore if these fathers as mē at any time or any other ether by their example or writing haue in any point neuer so litle in any kind of sort crossed thēselues the holy canonicall scriptures in any of these points either in praying for the dead or in laying any groūd or occasiō therof we may boldly leaue thē chuse rather to cleaue vnto thē in these These things thus premised let vs now proceed to the particuler examining of Iohn de Albines quotatiōs for their kind of praier for the dead His first mā is Tert. for higher he cānot go to fetch any shew of colour for this matter vnles he would run to Apocrypha writings to philosophers poets to heretiques or to the notoriously knowen coūterfeit writings of Clemēt such like And out of this Tertulliā he alleageth two places the first out of his book de Monogamiâ the other out of his book de coronâ militis both which were writē by him after he becāe a Montanist as Beatus Rhenanus in his argumēts of those two books is ēforced to cōfes for in the later he mētioneth the new prophecy therby vnderstāding Mōtanus fācies in the other he most plainly cōdēneth secōd mariage quite cōtrary to the doctrin of S. Paul as Hierom hath truely noted vpon Titus and therefore both there he condemneth that booke as an hereticall booke and also in his catalogue of ecclesiasticall wryters as a booke writen against the Church Albine therfore hath aptlier then he was aware of sought out an heretique in his hereticall wrytings to bee the first man to speake for the patronising of this popish heresie of his But perhaps he wil say that he learned not of heretiques to speake for prayer for the dead Whereunto I reply that if euer he wrote any thing therin to serue your turne he learned it of no better schoolemasters then of such or of philosophers their ordinarie teachers For as hee himselfe writeth de praescript aduersus haereticos as the original of al trueth was doctrine receaued by the Apostles frō Christ so the spring of al errour hath beene frō the diuel by philosophers And touching this particuler in his booke de animâ he writeth that the philosophers that helde the immortality of the soule as Pythagoras Empedocles and Plato assigned for soules departed heauen hell and a thirde purifying place and in that booke he sheweth that Montanus his master helde that the Patriarches before Christs comming were in hell that Abrahams bosome was in hell or in the lower parts that onely perfect men and martyrs went to heauen streight and that all small offences must be punished after this life to the vttermost farthing his paraclet so expounding that of Mat. ca. de inf vlt and in that booke also he telleth of a woman lying to bee buried that at the praiers of the Priest ouer her lifted vp her hands c. whereby it seemeth that the heretique Montanus his paraclet might be very fit schoolmasters to teach him a great part of your doctrine in this point Further that you may see not only by his own
testimony that he might haue such school masters as I haue saied to teach him herein somwhat to fauor you to speake of your side Irenaeus in his first book 24. chapter testifieth of the heretique Carpocrates that he was a great admirer of philosophy insomuch that to the images he made of Christ and of some of his Apostles he ioyned the images of Pythagoras Plato and Aristotle of whom hee learned to imagine that there was a purifying place after this life and so to proue purgatory out of that place of Matthew as you hearde before Montanus Paraclet did And the heretiques Heracleones as Augustine wryteth of them vsed ouer their deade oyle balme water and inuocation in the Hebrewe tongue Hereunto ioyne you Virgils 6 book of his Aeneidos lying visions you haue the right scholemasters that haue taught you al that fauour you in this point But concerning the places in Tertullian which you quote we need not thus answere you for they are not so pregnant for you as you imagined For the words you ground on in the first place are these spoken by him to the wife to teach her how in this point to behaue her selfe towards her dead husband pro animâ eius oret refrigerium interim adpostulet ei in primâ resurrectione consortium offerat annuis diebus dormitionis eius that is let her pray for his soule and in the meane time desire refreshing for him and felowshippe in the first resurrection and let her offer alwaies when the yeare day commeth for his sleeping which are the words as Beatus Rhenanus confesseth that he hath so set downe acknowledging that he found it far otherwise in all examples before Againe not onely this obscurity of Tertullians wordes and the vncertainety what they were disableth this place from being of any force for you to ground vpon but also vnles you must haue it granted that euery womans husband to whom he gaue this counsel was in purgatorie wherof there is no ground at all in his wordes in that booke but rather the contrary whereby it should seeme that he spake of such as were gone before in peace to the Lord his words if they were these proue not your praying to relieue soules there And the offering that he lastly speaketh of was either the offering of thankes to God for his quiet rest and sleeping or an offering or giuing of almes to the poore in token of ioy for the same and to prouoke them to be thākeful therfore also as you heard me before note the fashion was when the tracts of Iob fathered vpon Origen were writen out of the third tract of the same and not as you woulde haue it taken an offering of your propitiatory sacrifice in your masse for his sinnes For hee saieth for his falling a sleepe and not for his sinnes and hee willeth the woman to offer and not that she should get the Priest to doe it And in answering of this place your other is also answered for there onely he saieth oblationes pro defunctis pro natalitiis annuâ die facimus that is wee offer oblations for the dead for their birth daies euery yeares day For in that he expresly saieth pro natalitiis for their birth daies it is euident that he cannot nor may not be vnderstood of any other oblation but of thankefulnesse and reioicing But this offering for their birth daies Beatus Rhenanus vpon this place in his notes saieth was heathenish and afterwards was condemned and abolished by the Nicene councell and others And yet for any thing that these words of Tertullian enforce in this place he speaketh of no other oblations for the dead but for their birth daies so that long ago the date and credit of this testimony and fashion was abrogated And lastly it is not to be forgotten that he himselfe within few lines after these words speaking of this fashion of sundry others that there also he had spoken of plainely confesseth that these thinges had no grounde in the scriptures but onely by tradition That which other of your fellowes alleadge to this purpose out of Tertullian in his exhortation to charity may receiue the same answere with these for it is euident that booke also was writen in his Montanisme for there hee is against second marriage as in the first and so against Paul Romans 7. 1. Cor. 7. and with Montanus and the words are no more pregnant to ground praier to relieue soules in purgatory then the former were Now next is Cyprian who was a bishop in that City wherein sōetimes Tertullian had liued in him for your praier for the dead you would haue vs read his Epistle ad plebem Furnensem in his first booke I am sure you meane the ninth Epistle of that booke writen as it appeareth there ad plebem Furnilanorum though either you could not or would not to put your reader to a little more paines to seeke it out tell vs so much But hauing found it and read it howsoeuer you were perswaded of it we finde little or nothing there that can doe you any good for onely there of a decree made in some Africane Synode before his time he groundeth his perswasion to that people forasmuch as one Victor had contrary to that decree made one Heminius Faustinus minister executour of his wil and testament therefore to stay others from daring any more so to violate that decree to the calling away the ministers from attendance of their ministry that they should execute that decree against that their brother Victor departed which was that for this cause there should be no offering for him nor sacrifice for his falling a sleepe For saieth he he is not worthy to be named in the praier of the Priest that wil so cal away the ministers or Priests from the altar therefore seeing this is Victors fault let there be no oblatiō with you for his sleeping nor in his name any deprecatiō frequēted in the Church Doe you thinke in good earnest Master Albine that if Cyprian had thought that his brother Victors soule had bene in such paines in purgatory as you teach are there and that these were the ordinarie meanes to ease soules there that for so small a matter as this the breaking of this positiue law which with you is vsually broken if in your sence these things were to be vnderstoode of oblation sacrifice and praier for the ease of the party so departed from vnder the punishment vpon him for his sinnes that Cyprian either might lawfully could without too too much cruelty or would so without all mercy and charity perswade to depriue a brother departed of these things You cannot be so without reason as once to thinke so The execution of this Canon against Victor was but onely a note of some disgrace ignominy laied vpon him the better to make others after to regarde that Canon and not any denying of his soule any thing so necessary
hence men ouergrowen and oppressed with thornes Sure such as these go straight to hell or else none In the other two places it cannot be denied he both mentions praier for the dead and in some sorte alloweth thereof and holdeth thereby good to come to the dead the places are in his Enchiridion to Laurence cap. 110. and in his booke de curâ agendâ pro mortuis But both in these same places and else very often in his workes as namelie in the 1 4. and 18. Chapters of the later booke in his 23. sermon de verbis Apostoli in his 21 booke of the Citty of God cap. 13. and 24. and to Dulcitius quaest 2 it appeareth that herein and hereabout in his time there was great question some as the common people stretching the vse of praiers for the dead euen to the discharging of the worst sort and some altogither disalowing any kinde of good to come thereby whereupon somewhat too much caried with a desire to appease the commō people he chose the meane betwixt 2 extremities which he thought in this case the safest and so that he seemeth to teach that they were profitable for a mean sort neither perfectly good nor extreame bad And that in this question of the determining the auailablenes of praiers for the dead he was both greatly caried by the sway of the opinions of the multitude and greatly perplexed to finde out of what sins men might be eased therby he himselfe most plainly sheweth de ciuitate Dei l. 21. c. 24. 27. in the first hereof disputing such questions thereabout as he did in the other confessing that though he had searched much for that matter yet he could not be satisfied therein and who so readeth his booke de curâ agendâ pro mortuis hee shall finde it wonderful full of doubts and questions about this matter and before I haue shewed how variable vnconstant he was for the purging fire after this life what a weake and tottering foundation or ground then is Saint Augustines authoritie in this case to build vpon But if hee had beene neuer so confident constant and resolute herein seeing hee confesseth as he doeth that he hath no warrant for it in the scriptures but the Machabees that he laieth the custōe of praying offring for the dead as the verie foundation of his opinion in this point by his owne leaue and rules we may lawfullie without offering him any wrong dissent from him herein as I haue shewed sundry times before For in his 112 Epistle most plainely and honestly he saieth Follow not so my authority that therefore thou shouldest thinke thy selfe of necessity bound to beleeue it because I haue saied it and de vnitate ecclesiae Cap. 10. we must not saieth he agree to catholicke bishops if peraduēture they be deceiued or hold any thing contrary to the scriptures the reason is that as he saieth contra faustum l. 11. cap. 5. such mens writings are to bee read not with necessity of beleeuing but with liberty of iudging For onely to the scriptures without gainesaying saieth he I owe my consent Epist 19. ad Hieronimum This leaue and liberty you take in refusing either him or any other of the fathers in a number of points where you like them not and why should not we then haue leaue to doe likewise in this being able as we are to proue that herein he went further then either he had any warrant for out of the canonical scriptures or out of any vnforged and vncounterfeited president for three hundreth yeares at the least of any ancient father But when you haue made the most of his speeches and writings you can you can neuer without doing of him most grosse iniury make him to allow of your kinde of sacrificing and offering the body and bloud of Christ vnto God the father as a propitiatory sacrifice for the dead For de fide ad Petrum Diaconum Cap. 10. most confidentlie he hath taught bidding vs to hold it most stedfastly and nothing doubt therof but that Christ offered that sacrifice to his father himselfe and that the holy Catholique Church ceaseth not to offer the sacrifice of bread and wine in faith charity which must needs be a sacrifice of thankesgiuing and commemoration of the other onelie propitiatorie sacrifice not an offering of it againe as you imagin◠for quicke or dead Thus at last we haue viewed and scanned all your euidence Master Albine and for any thing we can yet finde vnlesse gaine and commodity that commeth rowling in vpon you by the practice of this point of praying for the reliefe of soules in purgatorie were a more forcible argument to continue your liking thereof then anie thing saied and taught with anie constancie by anie of these doctours in any of these places or any where else to countenance it withall we might easilie be perswaded that you would quietlie giue ouer stāding any longer in such egre defence of it as you do But indeede this argument hath proued so sweete and strong of your side that vntill we be able to weaken this as we haue done the rest that is to stop the passage of the cōming in of gaine and commodity vnto you this way we shall neuer put you to silence in this howsoeuer we preuaile with you in all other points This is the argument of arguments the first and last middlemost all that in trueth you haue for this of any weight And this we cannot deny to such as you be must needs seeme a most notable argumēt For to make you in loue with it and euen for the sake thereof alone to hold on your plea in this cause purgatory hath so pickt other mens purses filled yours so dispossessed others possessed you and praying for soules there hath so brought in paiments to you pilled and poled the heires frends of the dead that if you wil speake for any thing surely you will speake neuer giue ouer speaking for this Iohānes Angelus a mā of some credit of your side saieth that the soules that are in purgatory are of the Popes iurisdictiō that he if he would could at once euē empty purgatory therfore as it should seeme by his owne right your Pope Clemēt the 6. in his time by his buls cōmaunded the Angels to deliuer thēce so many soules as he thought good But I pray you this being thus why neither did he nor any before him being so holy merciful fathers to their subiects cliēts as you pretēd they are take such compassion of the poore soules there as of charity and compassion to ridde them all thence at once The reason was that this your onely argument of gaine still to grow thereby might continue frō time to time in force For doubtles it is not to be supposed that such a noble rase of holy most holy fathers would haue stayed all this while from doing such a wonderfull worke of
wee onely are saued or they al condemned For I haue shewed how a nuÌ„ber yea infinite numbers of them might be saued this notwithstanding As for your iudgement that they neuer erred so much as our disciples it is not material For you are no competent iudge in this matter And the reason of your iudgement that we condemne the faith that the Catholique Church hath held this 1500. yeares and maintaine the olde rotten condemned heresies is a thing which by begging after this sort at our hands though therein you be neuer so impudent and shamelesse a begger as that way in this your book your greatest skill hath appeared you shall neuer get And therefore set your hearts at rest your words though they be neuer so lowde stout shall neuer make vs yeelde you this for an almes You must therefore proue your words true and so make vnto vs euident demonstration thereof which you shall neuer be able to doe before we may yeeld vnto you that you haue any right at all to this The XXXIX Chapter IF that by a good and a right title your disciples cal themselues the children of God this maketh me beleeue that the saying of our Sauiour is fulfilled in them the which is * Luc. 16. The childreÌ„ of this world are wiser in their generation then the children of light To proue this true wee see this dailie experience for a wise worldly man when he doeth put out his money to gaine he vvill not trust the promise so soone of one or two or three as hee vvill doe the bondes of a vvhole Towne or Cittie that should warrant or assure his gaine But you nor your disciples haue not done thus but rather the contrarie It had beene better for you to haue first put your faith and trust in God beleeuing that he hath giuen his holie spirit and declared the meaning as touching the Scriptures vnto the Catholique Church a We build not our faith religion or hope of saluatioÌ„ of these meÌ„s credits but vpoÌ„ the credit of the vndoubted worde of God set down in the scriptures which is for credit to be preferred before the credit of all men speaking beside or contrary vnto them and not to hazard the hope of your saluation putting it into the hands of Luther Zuinglius Oecolampadius and three or foure other such pelting merchantes vvhich haue newlie set vp shoppes at Wittemberge Geneua Losane vvhich one of these daies we shal see bankeroutes as their predecessours haue beene before them the vvhich after that they had deceiued the poore simple Catholiques b Beware of dogs Phil. 3. ergo take heed of this Romish barker the best is hee is but one that barketh to bite hurt he hath small or no power and gained some of their soules for the deuill they haue at the last sold al their honestie and credit so that at this daie except that it be those that reade the ancient histories no bodie else doeth remember that euer they liued in the world You are come now last of all to make vp their merchandise but your credit can hardlie be good before God c Will you neuer haue done with this bare vaine brag Shew this but once to bee true and then we yeelde and then brag and spare not for you shall haue against you all the ancient Catholicke Church which hath continued visible since the comming of Christ vnto this day all the Doctours of all the vniuersities all the Empires Kingdomes and priuate state thoroughout al the worlde which haue receiued and honoured this doctrine that you call Papisticall And if you saie that you will not trust meÌ„ but the verie word of the Lord we agree to the like that we ought al to beleeue the Scripture but we varie about the interpretation for you interpret it after one sort and we after another you expound it after a new sort and the Catholicke Church doeth follovv d When it commeth to the trial it will be found that our interpretation rather then yours hath continuance froÌ„ all the sound ancient Doctours and the vndoubted Apostolicall â—raditions the olde exposition of the ancient Doctours traditions which you haue forsaken or to saie the trueth your Ministers haue led the sheepe astraie froÌ„ the old flocke at the departing froÌ„ the which they haue beene al scattered abroad some following Luther some Caluin some the Anabaptists so forth for the which the Popes kings others that haue had the gouernment of the Church shall answere at the last daie of iudgement for as much as while e Ergo you haue had sleepy Popes they slept you haue come sowedweeds among the good corne Then seeing you are the sheepe that rome astraie what excuse can they make before God that wilfully follow your steps We confesse that we are the poore sheepe of God that haue continued with our old flocke stedfast whole as touching our religion but very weake and sickely f Amend them for shame as touching our maners that is to say g But your wounds sores sicknes is grown so desperat that you will account none such but them that wil tel you you are sound and in health where you are most sicke full of sins vices attending some sage phisitions to heale vs good pastors to keepe vs casting out the chaffe froÌ„ the corne I meane cutting off those abuses that are offensiue not to such scrupulous consciences as you haue but vnto him that doeth threaten theÌ„ for the carelesse liues of their sheepe so to continue in that h Proue this once some of you or else for shame neuer say it almost in euery leafe for lack of matter as you doe ancient faith that by succession of pastours we haue receiued from the Apostles The XXXIX Chapter In this Chapter there is nothing but your old great words stout begging the maine questioÌ„ that your Church is the true ancient Catholicke Church that al the ChristiaÌ„s great small since Christ haue bene flat on your side that you are the only men that follow the sound sence of the scriptures deliuered vnto you by the ancient doctors and true pastors of the Church that we are but two or three in coÌ„parison of you sprung vp yesterday such as you prophesie wil shortly grow banckerout both of credit and honesty This bladder ful of nothing but winde is sufficiently I hope prickt and let out already by that which I haue saied in sundry places before Howsoeuer I hope the reader is not so simple as that seeing in you neuer so great store of these swelling wordes as long as he knoweth your aduersaries denie them as stoutly of the other side and he seeth you bring nothing but bare wordes without proofe he wil any whit be mooued therewith And yet as not able a discourse as this booke of yours is accounted the greatest stuffing that it hath is onelie
9. p. 322. Auricular confession coÌ„futed at large c 37. p. 322. c B. BAptisme and the ceremonies at large spoken of 308. c. Baptisme that is outward sometimes separate from regeneration 280. c. Baptisme bindeth not alwaies the baptised to be of his religion that baptised him p. 395. 410. Bad alwaies intermingled with good 404. Beza defended against Albines slanders 400 Bondage vnder poperie as great as Israels vnder Pharao 170. c. Bohemians doings coÌ„sidered and defended 291. c. C. CAluins argument against the popish priesthoode that it is not of God vnanswered by Albine p. 5. Ceremonies popish how and when many of them came in and how withstood C. p. 15. 16. Colliers faith what it is 222 Christ will bee a whole and sole Sauiour or else no Sauiour at all 419. Christs Church perpetuall but not alwaies visible in the popish sence 37. c. 122. 413. c. Church why called catholicke and so the popish church is not catholicke p. 360. Contentions and varieties of opinions amongst Christians no news they ought not to preiudice the trueth 68. 69. 250. Contentious popish many and great 70. 71. 97. 252. c. Corpus Christi day when and by whom it came in 161. Caiphas had not the spirit of prophesie as Albine would seem he had 94. 95 Crueltie of papists in seeking to preuaile to stand by force 155. c. 291. c. Cathechising in popery how bad it hath bene 179. c. Councels haue erred and that euen papists confesse 230. c. Communion vnder one kind is but a new deuise 159. Christ was to proue his calling by miracles and yet not we 188. c. 403. D. DEdicating of bookes to great persons hath good and ancient presidents A. p. 11. and 12. Departure from the Roman Church that now is lawfull 149. 394. 417. c. 409. c. E. EDucation bindeth not the party to bee alwaies of their religion that brought him vp 181. to be read but not so as to discourage the simple from the study of them 205. 208 c. Scriptures alleadged in their true sence the ground that protestants staÌ„d vpoÌ„ 205 c. Scriptures though neuer so much abused by heretiques yet by them they must be confuted 226. Scriptures must expound scriptures 47. 210. 224. Scriptures they which alleadge best they are to be followed 245 c. Scriptures must trie who hath the spirit of God 222 c. Scriptures are to bee studied and read of all men 209 c. Scriptures shamefully spoken of by papists the better to shun triall by them 82 c. 212 c. Scriptures fondely allâ—adged and applied by Papists 35 c. 218. Scriptures in some sence may well be vnderstoode according to the tradition of the Church 87. 393. Scriptures whither rightlier alleadged by protestants or papists examined 215. 216. c Scriptures are so alleaged by protestaÌ„ts that they therfore are to be beleeued and neither papist nor heretique 215 c. Scriptures are both iudge and witnes 262. Scriptures are the only souÌ„d touchstoÌ„e both of trueth church al. 33 c. 46 c. 244 406. Scriptures by Papists thought neuer to bee soundly interpreted but according to the present practise of the Roman Church 214. 219. Sinne is more strictely condemned by protestants then by papists 285. 404. SuccessioÌ„ papists haue neither Personall 25 c. SuccessioÌ„ papists haue neither Locall 25 c. SuccessioÌ„ papists haue neither not reall 21 c. 27 Succession Popish we reiect not so much for their bad liues as doctrine 92. 301. Succession neither locall nor personall anie certaine note of trueth 27 c. Succession in the trueth the onely succession indeede to be stood simply vpon 31 c. Supper of the Lord wonderfully peruerted of the Papists 31. 416. Supremacy of the Pope new how by whoÌ„ it came vp and by whom still resisted p. 11. c 161. c. T. Traditions beside the word writen countenanced by abusing of Irenaeus and others p. 1 2. 76 c. Traditions vnwriteÌ„ the ground of popery C. p. 5. p. 82. Traditions beside and contrary to the word writen reiected by the fathers C. 2. p. 46 78. c. 224. c. Traditions spoken for and allowed by the fathers alwaies warranted by the scriptures C. p. 2 3. Traditions vnwriten heretiques commonly flie vnto eueÌ„ as the papists doe p. 5 6 33. Transubstantiation wheÌ„ it came in and how confuted D. 7 8. p. 109. Tree that is good bringeth forth good fruit and in what sence that is to be taken 274 278. c. Trueth is to be preferred before custome all things else C. p. 7. 86. 100. 406. Trueth is not tied to bishops mouthes and chaires 28. 29. 94. 95. 151. c. Trueth is most ancient and that is it that came from the Apostles 102. Turkes and Iewes take occasion the more to be hardened for the popish doctrine of Images and transubstantiation 217. V. VIsible demonstrable succession is neither certaiâ—e note of Church not trueth 28 â—7 c. 51. Vnity and Christian peace may and ought to be kept in the Church though the rites be diuers 312. c. Vnity vnlesse it bee in verity men are not to continue in 417. c. Vnity in euery thing followeth not vpon right praying for the spirit 247. c. Vnity papists haue not though they bragge thereof neuer so much 70. 71. 97. 246. 252. Vnâ—uersalitie indeed the Romish Church hath not 388 c. Vocation ordinary hath not alwaies beene found in them that haue beene meanes of the conuersion of nations that haue profitably preached 30. 123. c. Vocation may be good and lawfull though the called haue faults 131. Vocation of what sort popish prelates haue 14 c. Vowes in popery foolish and superstitious 306. c. W. VVAnts and faultes of the Church to reforme men are not bound onely to vse praier 141. Way that is narrow both for life and religion is to bee preferred before the broad way 395. c. Workes that are good indeed rather founde with protestants theÌ„ with papists 280. c. 286. 404. FINIS Faults escaped in printing through the absence of the authour the hardnes and smalnes of the hand wherein the copy was offered to the presse and the vnacquaintance of the ouerseers with the same A. p. 1 l. 26 â— why for when 4. 16. before for vnto B. 1. 7 the for that l. 33. the for their 15. 16 for second 11. l. 20 when for whom l. 35 for the their C. 1. 12 pruning for prouing 7. 12 them for them l. 25 put in I say next therefore 12. 23 for first sixt 15. 11 put out of desposed the first s D. 2. 9 Paula for pacta and in Armonians e for o and in Moralia is for l. 6. 9. put in next them they doe 7. 1 that for the 9. 34