CERTAIN CONSIDERATIONS Of present Concernment TOUCHING THIS REFORMED Church of ENGLAND WITH A particular Examination of AN CHAMPNY Doctor of the Sorbon his exceptions against the Lawful Calling and Ordination of the Protestant Bishops and Pastors of this Church By H FERNE D.D. LONDON Printed by J.G. for R. ROYSTON at the Angel in Ivie-lane 1653. THE PREFACE HOw the several points handled in this Treatise concern this Reformed Church will be declared below when first we have taken notice of the causeless Aspersions and Reproaches which the Romanists cease not to cast upon is and against which these Considerations are purposely intended and opposed They think they have now a fitter oportunity by reason of the confusions of these Times to deal that way by Reproaches then as formerly by Arguments And it is no new thing for the enemies of Gods Truth to scoff at the afflicted condition of the professors of it The Ammonite is challenged for it Ezek. 25.3 Thou saidst Aha against my Sanctuary when it was profaned and so is Tyrus Ezek. 26.2 Thou saidst against Jerusalem Aha she is broken and laid wast I shall be replenished and so the Romanists looking now upon our disturbances say with those in the Psal 35.21 Aha we have seen it with our eyes and so would we have it Endeavouring by mocks and scoffs against the English Church to prevaile with ungrounded Protestants and all unwary ones that will be jeered out of their Religion One of their Pamphlets set out by a late Romish Convert the Reader must give me leave by the way to instance in for it gives us proof and example of what I said both wayes It shewes us a giddy unwary Protestant foolishly carryed away by the reproachful allegations of our Adversaries and having been a while among them presently instructed in this their way of scoffing at that Church and Religion he had forsaken Some of his wit he spends in a few Cursory animadversions as he calls them upon my former Treatise Those I let pass as inconsiderable and not fit to trouble the Reader with But the designe of his book was against that Learned and Solid piece of the University of Oxford set out by Act of Convocation 1647. against admitting of the Covenant He tells us there He is W. R. sometimes of Exeter Colledge but now a Convert of Rome and is not ashamed to profess that we may know his weaknes he had his impulsive cause of conjunction with Rome from that Act of the University pleading Tradition and the necessity of it as for Episcopacy so for other chief points of Faith But alas poor man he did not understand either what those Learned men said or what our Church allowes in the point of Tradition For however he pretend to Wit in reproving our Reformation and Religion yet in arguing when be ventures on it he behaves himself as a manforsaken of his Reason By his Titles prefixed to his book one may read what strein he meant to follow hold throughout his whole discourse for being not content to have at first entitled it An Examination of the Oxford Act he gives it two scoffing Titles more The Obit of Praelatick Protestancie and again The last dying words of Episcopacy faintly delivered in the Convocation at Oxford So he of the Modest and Sober Defence of those Learned Men against the then prevailing force And so might any Heathen Julian or Prophyry have derived the Apologies of the Ancients in the behalf of Christianity then under persecution and might have called them The last dying Words of Christian Religion So might the Arrians have termed the Defenses which Athanasius and others made The last dying Words of the Catholick cause and because Saint Hierom expresseth it dolefully with a Miratus ingemuit Orbis the whole Christian world wondred and sighed to see her selfe made Arrian Such a Reasoner as this might conclude the true Christian Faith was then groaning her last Now albeit there is nothing in this Pamphlet considerable either against our Church or against Episcopacy reteined in it yet did it give me occasion of further thoughts concerning them both and in order to the lawful Calling and Ordination of our Protestant Bishops to examine what Champny who professedly wrote against them hath alleged In the next place that I may give the Reader a better account of what was intended in the former and now pursued in this following Treatise He may please to take notice how the Romanists charge us with Schism in departing from their Communion upon our Reformation and reproach us with the Confusions of these Times as wrought under the like pretence of Reformation and defensible by the like principles upon which we stood in the work of our Reforming and to which we must hold in the defense of it To demonstrate the falshood of both Either that We who are now of a divided Communion from Rome are therefore guilty of Schism or that They who made the rupture in the Scottish first and then in the English Church can say justly for themselves against the former Doctrine and Government of those Churches what we can for our selves against the Church of Rome it was part of the work and purpose of the former book And it was demonstrable upon these grounds 1. There was a necessity of Reformation and we had just Cause for it by reason of the over-grown Papall power and the intolerable abuses in Doctrine and Worship 2. It was Warrantably done not only for the Cause of it but also for the Autority by which it was done whether we consider the Vote of the Clergy and the Iudgment of a Nationall Synod or the assent and command of the supreme and Sovereign power In which regard we see the Vanity of all that the Romanists allege from the Ancients concluding Schism Affirmatively or Negatively by Communion with the Church of Rome for however that Argument might be good when that Church stood right and held the Catholick Faith undefiled yet was it no more then they might and did conclude by Communion with other famous Churches confessedly Catholick No such conclusion can now be made upon holding or not holding Communion with the Romish Church since it gave such Cause of Reformation as abovesaid We see also the Vanity of their Reproaches that we leave every man to his privat Iudgment and Reason that we open a gap to all Sectaries to work confusion when they get force in any Church For however we leave men the use of their Reason and Iudgment in order to their own believing yet in order to Reformation we require not only just cause in regard of intolerable Error or Superstition but also due Autority for the carrying it on in the way of the Church These particulars were spoken to more or less in the first part of the former book Now for the further clearing of this point of the English Reformation and defending it so against the reproaches of Papists that no Sectaries
points of concernment or prejudicial to the Faith for that of the Millenary as it was not Universal so not of such moment and that of the Infant-Communion though more Universal and of longer continuance was but a tolerable Mistake The Church of Rome indeed in her Councel of Trent hath pronounced Anathema to them that shall say such communicating of Infants is Necessary which the ancient Church of Rome under Innocent the first did no question say and accordingly practise Therefore the instances of those Errors were not as I said directed against the whole Church but onely made use of against the Church of Rome and the Errors there prevailing which they will not acknowledge can take hold on that Church First to shew that the use of Private judgment which they scoff at is necessary in discovering and for reforming of Errors prevailing these two instanced in being so discovered and thereupon left off Secondly to shew that the Church of Rome did Err in this of Infant Communion Saint Augustin telling us directly L. 1. Cont. Julian c. 1. Definivit Innocentius Nisi manducaverint Innocentius defined unless they Infants eat the flesh c. Nay saith Saint Augustine Definivit Dominus the Lord himself defined it when he said Except ye eat and drink the ye have no life in you S. Joh. 6.35 Whereby it is plain that the practise of Iufant Communion being raised from that place Except ye eat S. John 6. was held needful and so it was held and practised in the Church of Rome however the Trent Councel condemning this Error slubbers it over saying it was practised quibusdam in locis in some places as if not in the Roman Church and that the Ancients doing so held no necessity of it Thirdly to shew that no point of Faith or Worship wherein they and we differ did so generally prevail in the Church and with so little contradiction made to it as those Errors did for some Ages It is true that Justin Martyr in his Dial. cum Tryiph insinuates that many piously affected did not entertain the Millenary belief yet he tells us 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That all who were in all points Orthodox or of right Judgment held it and I said no more pag. 58. of the former book Also of all that wrote for 300. yeers even down to Lactantius inclusively most of them avouch it not one of them as I can finde contradicting or writing against it Whereas we can say to the Errors prevailing in the Roman Church that there were alwayes many piously affected who entertained them not and that they are upon Record and their contradiction to those prevailing Errors more apparent then was any made to the Millenary for the first 300. yeers or to Infant-Communion for moe Ages This is clear by the many Authors yet extant which albeit partial for the most part in the cause of the Church of Rome yet tell us of the opposition made to the prevailing conceit of a transubstantiating of the Elements in the Eucharist from Bertram down to Berengarius and after him how many opposed that and other Errors prevailing in the Church of Rome to the time of the Albigenses and fromt hence downward to the last Age. All this I say is upon Record in many Writers of former times Lastly to shew by the prevailing of those two Errors of the Millennium and Infant-Communion without any contradiction recorded how Cardinal Perrons two Rules for knowing who and what was Catholick according to antiquity were vaine and inconsistent with truth of which Sect. 31. of the sormer book To these purposes was use made of those two prevailing Errors against the Church of Rome Henry Ferne. Contents of the Chapters Chap. I. OF Submission of Judgment and external peaceable Subjection due to the Church National or Vniversal from the respective Members thereof pag. 1. Chap. II. Of the Reformation begun under Hen. 8. advanced under King Edward perfected under Queen Elizabeth and of the Warrantableness thereof pag. 62. Chap. III. Of the lawful calling of our English Protestant Bishops against Doctor Champny Sorbonist and of the first Prejudice from other reformed Churches that have not Ordination by Bishops pag. 89. Chap. IV. Of the second Prejudice against the Ordination from the Protestant Opinion of the Pope being Antichrist and the Church of Rome Heretical pag. 131. Chap. V. Of the third Prejudice from the Protestant Opinion of the Romish Orders that they are Sacrilegious and do not give an indelible Character pag. 156. Chap. VI. Of Archhishop Cranmers Ordination and the pretended defects of it Bigamy and Heresie pag. 177. Chap. VII Of Bishops Ordained in King Edwards time and the essentiall Defect pretended to be in the Form of their Ordination and of other presumptions against it pag. 210. Chap. VIII Of Archbishop Parkers Ordination and the pretended Defects of it from the New Form and the Incapacity of his Ordainers pag. 246. Chap. IX Of the other Bishops Ordained in the begining of Queen Elizabeths reigne and pretence of special defect in it by reason of Intrusion Where also of the Deprivation of the former Bishops and of the Oath of Supremacy as the chief cause of it pag. 264. Chap. X. The Exception against our Bishops that they were not Priests Of the Evangelical Priesthood or Ministery committed to us men and of the Romish Presumption in assuming more pag. 319. Errata PAg. 15. l. 6. for that is r. there is p. 35. l. 25. for Natures r. Natural p. 37. l. 2. for producit r. perducit p. 68. l. 10. for speak r. spake p. 111. l. 9. for fo r. of p. 126. l. 24. for perplexity r. prolixity p. 143. l. 25. of given dele of p. 144. l. 21. laid r. is laid p. 146. l. 16. asserted r. are asserted p. 147. l. 14. for an r. and. p. 191. l. 20. for wrought r. wrote p. 195. l. ult applyed r. is applyed p. 200. l. 1. for was r. were p. 203. l. 16. for Mat. 15. r. Mat. 5. p. 205. l. 23. for that r. then by p. 208. l. 27. for his r. this p. 216. l. 27. for impertirently r. impertinent p. 239. l. 11. for letten r. let p. 251. l. 20. for should r. would and l. ult for is r. as is p. 256. l. 1. for admit r. omit p. 264. l. 2. for autority r. austerity p. 266. l. 12. for perished r. persisted p. 274 l. 11. for alteration r. altercation p 302. l. 19. for Subject r. Submit p. 325. l. 2. for his r. it Additionals PAge 62. l. ult After King Edward add That several Bishops were committed into several Prisons pag. 237. line 26. after 7. Chapter add Now to the former part of the charge I answer that by the clause any Statute Law or Canon notwithstanding No Law Divine is dispensed with nor yet any Canon of the whole Church for Champny acknowledged above in his second proposition Nu. 5. that the Matter and Form of Ordination is not expressed
or forbear for Conscience sake 2. That such forbearance of any practice be an Act of simple and bare Omission without clamour and contempt of Autority without tumult or resistance with a readines to suffer rather then is there peaceable subjection when private judgment keeps within these bounds For such conscionable forbearance of many practices in the Church of Rome of high concernment and very evident they have good cause that are within her Communion Such practice is the exercise of Religious Worship many wayes applyed in that Church to the Creature such also are some superstitious Rites and Ceremonies having a kind of Sacramental vertue and real holiness affixed to them 18. In Matters of Ceremony or Discipline But as for Rites and Ceremonies in themselves indifferent and by the Church enjoyned only with respect to Order and Discipline there is no cause of inconformity or forbearance yet in these hath there been great opposition from privat Judgments that could not keep within their bounds and those places of Rom. 14. He that doubteth is damned if he eat and what is not of Faith is sin have been abused to maintain a dissenting from the Judgment of the Church and a forbearance of the Practice We say therefore those places are misapplyed to matters determined by publick Autority against which it is not doubting or want of Faith i.e. perswasion of the Lawfulness or indifferency of the thing so determined that can take place or bear out disobedience but evident demonstration of the thing out of Gods Word to the contrary and the Reason is plain the command of Gods Word for Obedience and Submission to them that are over us is evident and therefore against them we must have evidence from Gods Word to shew they are mistaken in their Judgment or determination of that particular Now when a Church professes the thing determined by her to be indifferent in it self or of a middle Nature neither commanded by God nor forbidden and that she neither affixes any Sacramental or Spiritual vertue or hollness to it nor enjoyns it as Worship but only out of respect to Order and Discipline no man can have any evident demonstration but only a doubting or mixt perswasion of the unlawfulness of such a thing and although a Man of doubting of a thing in it self indifferent but not determined or enjoyned by Authority may by reason of his doubting have cause to forbeare it yet not in this case of the supposed determination and injunction of Autority for he that will then urge He that doubteth is damned must remember that he that disobeyeth is damned too that former place of doubting having many exceptions of which this predetermination of Autority is one but this disobeying of Autority hath only one viz. when there is sufficient evidence of L. vine Autority against the thing determined by humane and so it becomes an Obeying of God rather then Man 19. Of Priests Celebacie enjoyned by the Church and how But it may be expected because I referred the injunction of Priests single life to matter of Discipline that I should speak particularly to the conformity of Judgment and Practice to it I referr'd it to Discipline because antiently enjoyned not in a disparagement to Marriage which the Apostle concludes Honourable in all men but in Order to their better discharge of their Duty and Priestlie or Ministerial function and I do not now dispute the difference of that antient injunction from the now Roman exaction of single life nor question with what fulness of Autority it was enjoyned or how far or how long binding which I shall have more fit occasion to touch a little Num. 25.26 below and more largly against Champny in the sixth Chapter but only speak to the point of Submission and conformity to such judgment or determination of the Church supposing it fully concluded and binding Therefore I cannot but say while it was so binding every Clergy-man had cause to Judge the Governors of the Church saw reason to enjoyn it was bound to endeavour conformity in Practice i.e. to use such means by Temperance Fasting Prayer as conduce to preserve that continency of Single life but if after due use he found himself not answerable to that state but in the condition to which S. Paul prescribes the use of that remedy which God had ordained Marriage against Burning he was bound notwithstanding the Church-Ordinance to take to it and this as it hath direct Warrant from Gods Word so is it not a direct opposition to the Church Ordinance which was but conditional as in the prohibition of Marriage to Fellows of Colleges under the pain of loss of their Fellowships Only in this point of Priests Marriage the condition is of greater concernment the loss of Clergy or quitting the Ministerial function which if happened to him that hath dealt conscionably as above in the business the Church must answer for it 20. Thus have I endeavoured as neer as I can to discover and fixe the bounds of Submission of Privat Judgment and Practice according to the several condition of the matter wherein it is shewn and according to the divers extent and manner of performing or shewing it either to a direct conformity and compliance with the publick or if dissenting yet to a yeilding of all possible peaceable Subjection and that if need be to a suffering under Autority If Privat Judgment keep it self within the former bounds of Submission there can be no harm to the Church 21. I should now speak the respect Passages out of 8. Augustine touching Autority and Reason which every National or particular Church ought to bear to the Universal in this point of Submission but before we go farther it wil be worth our pains to take a short view of some passages of S. Aug. appliable to the business in hand concerning Autority and Reason I calld them Autority and Evidence or demonstration of Truth in his Books de verâ Relig. and de Vtil tate credend It is his purpose there to shew how Autority goes before Reason in our believing or receiving the Christian Faith which by the Romanists is sometimes misapplyed to the purpose of that Church requiring belief to rest upon her Autority We may therefore take notice that the writing of those books was occasioned by the Manichees who reproached the Catholiques for requiring belief of their Scholars or Auditors before they shewed them reason and boasted Se terribili Autoritate separatâ c. that laying aside all supercilious Autority they would by simple and plain reason bring Men to God cap. 1. de util cred Had this Romish Infallible Autority which exacts belief simply and finally been then pretended to in the Church they might well have call'd it terrible Autority and S. Augustine could not but have spoken to it Whereas it is his only work in both books to shew that Men are first moved by Autority to a belief of things before they see
the Reason of the things themselves Now the belief upon this Autority is but previous and preparatory as I call'd it in order to that which S. Augustine calls Reason or evident knowledg of the truth For he tels us this Autority viz. of the Church proposing the Catholick Faith stands upon Miracles confirming that Faith and Multitude of believers that have embraced it and this indeed is the first motive to induce a Man to seek and believe he may have the true Faith and Religion in such a Church such a company of Relievers Again he pleads for belief due to the Autority of Pastors and Teachers of the Church whom he cals Antistites Dei whom God hath set in his Church as Governours and Teachers cap. 10. de Vtil Cred. and this is but according to the Rule common to the teaching of other Sciences Oportet discentem credere He that is taught must give credit to him that teacher him Lastly we find him every where speaking the end of that Autority and teaching in the Church it is praecolere procurare animum or idoneum facere percipiendae veritati to mould and fit the mind for perceiving and embracing the Truth and preparare illuminaturo Deo to prepare it for the enlightning of Gods Spirit which he calls sometimes the punging of the mind viz. from Natures ignorance self-conceit love of Worldly pleasures that it may be fit to behold the clear Truth and this is it which he calls Reason and gives it the chiefest Authority Summa est ipsius veritatis jam cognitae perspicuae Autoritas cap. 14. de verâ Relig. this was calld Evidence above or Demonstration of Truth and cap. 25. of the same book Purgatioris animae rationi quae ad veritatem pervenit nullo modo preponitur humana Autoritas Humane Autority must give way to Reason and Evident truth which a Soul purified by Faith knows and believes Thus much in reference to that which had been spoken above of preparatory conditional belief due to and beginning from Autority but finally resting in the Evidence and Demonstration of Truth Like as the belief of the Samaritans given first to the Testimony of the Woman that had been with Christ brought them out unto him but stayed at last upon Aâ—divimus ipsi we have heard him our selves S. John 4.42 22. Pride makes men pass the bounds of peaceable subjection Now in reference to that which was spoken of Submission of privat Judgment keeping within bounds of peaceable subjection hear what S. Augustine subjoyns immediately upon the former words cap. 25. de Verâ Rel. ad hanc nulla humana suPerbia producit To this viz. the reason and belief of a purified minde pride brings no man quae si non esset nec Haeretici nec Schismatici essent but for this Pride and self-conceit the cause why privat Judgments do not keep within bounds there would be no Hereticks or Schismaticks for it comes not to this but when nimiâ levitate as he speaks sometimes through too much lightness of judgment they are driven tanquam palea vento Superbiae as chaff by the puff of their own pride from the Lords floor or Visible Church 23. Vnjust excommunication and want of the Communion of the Church upon it But what if Privat Men for a peaceable dissenting in judgment or practice from the Visible Church of which they were Members in points of high concernment for Belief or Worship be censured and driven from the communion of it They are not for all that driven from the Communion of the Catholick Church but their condition is not unlike the case of those good men which S. Augustine speaks of cap. 6. de verâ Rel. Divine Providence saith he suffers sometimes Viros bonos per turbulentas sed tiones carnalium hominum expelli de Congregatione Christianâ Good men to be cast out of the Communion of the Visible Church through the turbulent Seditions of carnal Men How such if private men must behave themselves declaring also how they ought to behave themselves in that condition patiently constantly by charity to those to whose Violence they gave way and perseverance in the Faith of the Catholike Church sine Conventiculorum segregratione without making Conventicles apart testimonio suo juvantes eam fidem quam in Ecclesiâ and by their witness and profession helping that Faith which they know is still taught in the Church These saith he thus serving God in secret Pater viaens in occulto coronat their Father which sees in secret crowns and rewards Observe he speaks here of privat Men and so do we hitherto but he supposes them cast out of the Church in which the Catholick Faith is truly professed with due Christian Worship and therefore saith Examples of such expelled good men are rare Whereas we supose such to be cast out from the Visible Communion upon the cause of Faith and Worship and those turbulent persons to be the chief Rulers casting them out upon that account and therefore with more advantage may conclude it is well with such in the sight of God that sees in secret Indeed the condition of the Catholick Church being such as it was in S. Augustine his dayes it could not but be rare to find such examples but if he had seen these latter Ages and the corruption of Faith and Worship upheld by pride and Tyranny of the chief Rulers especially within the Communion of the Romish Church he might have seen examples great store of good men and pious for peaceable dissenting or desiring Reformation cast out and persecuted 24. Now in the last place Submission of National Churches to the Vniversal of the respect which National Churches have and ought to have to the Universal as to this point of submission we need not say much 1. Several National Churches being parts as it were and Members making one whole Church called the Catholic in some proportion ought to bear like respect to the Definitions and practises of the Catholick Church as Inferior or privat persons to the particular National Church of which they are Members in some proportion I say as also it was said Sect. 9. of the former book but with advantage to a National Church in this point of Judgment above what is allowed proportionable to privat persons for they have only Judgment of discretion in order to their own believing whereas a National Church hath publick Judgment both in receiving the Decrees of the Universall Church or in making some her self and in proposing them to others whom she is to guide and answer for and so can make publick reformation when there is cause for it and constitute a Visible Church in depending in point of Government of any other Visible Church or rather can continue a Visible Church as it was before but with this difference from what it was before that now it stands reformed or purged from many errors and freed from the Tyranny of forrein
Archbishop Parkers Ordination where his first exception is against the Form as new and so acknowledged by Mason saying that Matthew Parker had the happiness to be the first of so many Bishops since Austin that received consecration without Popes Bull Pall c. p. 478. 479. But this because it belonged to the form of Ordination I referred it thither and answered to it above in the former Chapter 1. Presumptions against the Ordainers Next he excepts against the Ordainers that they were not such as was pretended And here we must again trouble the Patience of the Reader with the importunity of their presumptions and conjectures alleged against public Records which though it little serve to the end they intended the disproving of the Ordination of our Bishops yet will it make to this good purpose the proving of the restless importunity of these Men in their calumniando fortiter ut aliquid adhaereat their custome in raising and nourishing any manner of Reports to discredit their Adversary That I may not be thought to slander them in so weighty a business hear what they say The Popish Art of belying Evident Truth that knew it very wel Those secular Priests of whom above Chap. 5.8 in their book there mentioned complain much of this unconscionable dealing in the Jesuites and their followers acknowledging the Queens Majesty had very just cause to think more hardly of them all for it The pretended brethren say they of that Society and such as follow their steps do in their Writings so calumniat the Actions and Doings of the State be they never so judicially and publickly proceeded in never so apparently proved true and known of many to be most certain and after of Father Parsons that he was a great Master in this Art I find also Jo Copley sometime Priest among them but returning to the Church of England in King James his time to acknowledg this to be usual among their Priests and that it was one Motive to him of forsaking them This he spoke upon occasion of lying reports raised by their Priests and spread among their Proselytes to make them believe the whole carriage of that fearful plot was but a Trick of State Of Gunpowder Treason to make the Catholicks odious Lastly John Goe Master of Arts returning from them upon the downfal of the Black Friers in acknowledgment as he saith in his Preface of Gods mercy by which he escaped with life discovers the several and close practices damnable dissimulations and Artifices of their Priests about London naming the persons and place to ensnare and delude unwary Protestants or hold on their credulous disciples and this is one Their confident denying or misreporting and discrediting of evident Truth At the end of his book he gives in a Catalogue of neer 200. Priests in and about London their Names and the Characters and Lodgings of most of them in which Number this Doctor Champny was one and then trading for Rome Now let us see how well he plaies this part against the evident Truth of public Records So passionately that he will not abate us the fond story of the Naggs head in Cheapside but strives all he can to make it probable as we shall see presently 2. His first conjecture or presumption against Matthew Parkers Ordination is because according to Masons Records saith he the Ordainers here are set down with their bare Names whereas in all other consecrations the Ordainers are named with the Titles of their Bishopricks Now what reason can there be of this difference but that his Ordainers were not indeed Bishops consecrated but Elect only But Champny might have seen them set down in the Queens Letters Patents with the Titles of those Bishops Seâ—s they before held and also of those they now were elected to and the Registers of those Sees shew their enstalment as Godwin hath set them down His second Consecration of Bishop Barlo That Barlo one of the Ordainers was never as it appears consecrated himself for Mason could not give us the Record of his Consecration as of the rest Answer Mason though he found not his Consecration yet he found him a Consecrator of Arthur Buckley Bishop of Bangor in King Hen. 8. his time which evidently shews he was himself consecrated or could not els been admitted to assist in that Action Champny excepts that is alike as if a man should thus reason Such a man hath a woman and children therefore he is a Lawful Husband and Father That is not alike but thus Such a man in all public Actions Deeds Instruments was by Law permitted to do towards that Woman and those Children unquestionably as a Lawful Husband and Father she accordingly enjoying her Dowry and they their inheritance so demised by him therefore he was a Lawful Husband and Father so it follows evidently that Barlo being without question admitted to that public Action was a Lawful consecrated Bishop Whereas Champnies Negative Argument against him runs thus weakly according to the former instance such a Mans Marriage cannot be found in the Register of the Parish Church therefore he is no Lawful Husband But Godwin a diligent searcher of the Registers of Bishops finds him consecrated Bishop of Asaph Feb. 22. 1535. and the next year translated to S. Davids where he sate ten years in King Henry's reign besides the time of King Edward Now what reason can be imaginable why he should continue Bishop doing all the Offices and duties of a Bishop so long without consecration or that he should be suffered so to do Furthermore that he may say something rather then nothing he observes pag. 494. that Landaff who was consecrated some years after Barlo is pretended to be set before him in the Queens Letters Patent for the Consecration of Mat. Parker and why saith he but that Landaff was consecrated indeed and Barlo only Elect Also at the solemnizing of the Funerals of Henry the second of France related by Stow he finds Parker Barlo Scory assisting as Bishops and Parker in the first place who then was but Elect which ought not to have been so if the other two had been Bishops consecrated They are goodly doubts fit for a Doctor of the Sorbon to dispute but to solve them if they fall not in pieces of themselves we leave to Heralds or the Master of the Ceremonies to do it at their Leasure 3. The shameless story of the Nags-head Tavern And now we are come to that shameless tale which hath more of impudency in it then the former Instances had of weakness That our first Bishops in the Queens time were made at the Naggs-head Tavern in Cheapside That Scory alone Landaff failing Ordained Parker Grindal c. and after this manner They kneeled down before him and he laying the Bible upon their heads severally said Receive the power of Preaching Gods Word sincerely and so they all rose up Bishops pag. 497. and this he saith he received from Father
are Sacraments But Champny and the Romanists do lye when they say Immolatur He is offered up in their sense i. e. really properly and when they say the Priest hath power so to offer him up But we do not lye if we say as the Fathers did Christ is offered in the Eucharist or that the Eucharist is his Death and Passion or that the Bread and Wine is his Body and Blood or that he is truly present in the Sacrament Yea in such attributions of the thing signified to the Sacrament Questions made by Sacramental attributions to be answered affirmatively rather then negatively we ought to answer affirmatively and that because of the similitude and neer union between the Sacrament and the thing signified but especially because of the effect to which God hath ordained the Sacrament that it should be so really to us in the true application of the Sacrifices of the Cross to us in our real Communion and participation of his body and blood in our real conjunction unto Christ Many other places there are of the same Father to the like purpose as lib. 20. contra Faustum cap. 21. speaking of the respect which the Sacrifice before and the Eucharist after had to the Sacrifice of the Cross in those saith he promittebatur it was promised in his Passion the flesh and blood of Christs Sacrifice per ipsam veritatem reddebatur was truly and really exhibited but after his ascension per sacramentune memoriae celebratur it is celebrated by the Sacrament of Remembrance And as he is cited by Gratian de Consecr Dist. 2. Vocatur immolatio that offering that is made by the hands of the Priest is called the Sacrifice the Passion and Crucifixion of Christ non rei veritate sed significante mysterio not that it is so in truth and very deed but in a mystery signifying and representing it Lastly let Eusebius speak who in his first book de Demonstr Evang. cap. 10. accurately sets down and clears this whole business of the Eucharist There he shews why Christians do not offer Beasts in Sacrifice as the Patriarchs did before the Law because all such are taken away in Christs Sacrifice which they did prefigure also because Christians have Spirituall Sacrifices now to offer unto God but foretold in the Psalms and the Prophets and thereupon he tels us the relation of the Eucharist to the Sacrifice on the Cross Christ saith he offered a wonderful Sacrifice for our Salvation to his Father and instituted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the memory thereof to be offered by us to God for or in stead of a Sacrifice Again Hujus Sacrificii memoriam in mensâ per Symbola corporis sanguinis ipsius The remembrance of this his Sacrifice at the Holy Table by the Symbols of his body and blood we have received according to the institution of the New Testament and thereupon Incruentas rationales Victimas we offer to God unbloudy and reasonable Sacrifices by the most eminent High Priest whereas the Romanists will have us offer up the High Priest himself And what are those unbloody Sacrifices The unbloody Evangelical Sacrifices which we offer up at the Lords Table as he calls it or at the Altar as the Fathers commonly speak He there numbers them punctually Sacrificamus memoriam magni illius Sacrificii celebrantes c. We Sacrifice by celebrating the Memory of that great Sacrifice on the Cross by giving thanks to God for our Redemption by offering up holy prayers and Religious Hymns Lastly by dedicating our selves wholly to him in Word body and Soule So that Ancient and learned Father 8. Vain exception or Reply of the Romanists All that the Romanists have to reply unto the Evidence of these and other Fathers speaking properly of that respect and relation the Eucharist hath to the Sacrifice on the Cross comes to this that the placing of a remembrance or representation of the Sacrifice of the Cross in the Eucharist doth not hinder it to be a true and proper Sacrifice also no more saith Champny pag. 699. then the respect which the Sacrifices of the Law had to Christs Sacrifice hindered them to be true and real Sacrifices But all this is very impertinent for if the Fathers had barely said there was a remembrance in the Eucharist of Christs Sacrifice it had not excluded a real Sacrifice but when in explaining themselves why they call the Eucharist a Sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ and why they say Christ is there offered up they give it for the reason of their so speaking because that Sacrifice once offered by our Saviour is there remembred shewn and represented it is most plain they did not think that which is done in the Eucharist to be a real Sacrificing of Christ Their Instance also of the Legal Sacrifices is as impertinent for they were real Sacrifices in regard of the Beasts really slain and offered Now if the Romanists will have the Bread and Wine which represent the Body and Blood which was really offered to be the real Sacrifice in the Eucharist then indeed the remembrance or representation of Christs Sacrifice there doth not hinder but there may be also an external oblation and so many Fathers accounted the Bread and Wine to be as they were brought and offered to that Holy use and service But the Romanists will not say the Bread and Wine is the Sacrifice they contend for but that it is the very Body and Blood which is offered up Which Body and Blood being the same that was offered up upon the Cross their Real Sacrifice cannot have help by their instance of the Legal Sacrifices of the Bodies and blood of Beasts but stands excluded by the Fathers saying Christ is offered up in the Eucharist by a Mysticall signification by a remembrance by representation as above said It is very remarkable what Peter Lombard saith to this purpose The Question he puts is the same we have in hand and his Resolution the same we give to it Si quod gerit Sacerdos c. Whether that which the Priest doth be properly called a Sacrifice or offering up and whether Christ is daily offered up or was but once To the first he answers It is called a Sacrifice quia memoria est representatio veri Sacrificii in arâ crucis because it is the remembrance and representation of that true Sacrifice on the Cross To the second Christ once died on the Cross ibique immolatus est in Semetipso and there was offered up in himself or offered up himself indeed but he is daily offered up in the Sacrament quia in Sacramento fit recordatio illins quod factum est Semel because in the Sacrament there is made a remembrance of that which was done once upon the Cross Bellarmines answer here is a miserable shift That the Master of the Sentences by this doth not deny a real Sacrifice in the Sacrament Another vain exception but a real Occision