Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	church_n	scripture_n	write_v	5,125	5	5.8373	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A10335	Th'overthrow of stage-playes, by the way of controversie betwixt D. Gager and D. Rainoldes wherein all the reasons that can be made for them are notably refuted; th'objections aunswered, and the case so cleared and resolved, as that the iudgement of any man, that is not froward and perverse, may easelie be satisfied. Wherein is manifestly proved, that it is not onely vnlawfull to bee an actor, but a beholder of those vanities. Wherevnto are added also and annexed in th'end certeine latine letters betwixt the sayed Maister Rainoldes, and D. Gentiles, reader of the civill law in Oxford, concerning the same matter.	Rainolds, John, 1549-1607.; Gentili, Alberico, 1552-1608.	1599 (1599)	STC 20616; ESTC S115568	189,176	200

rehearsed of so many Circi Theatra Amphitheatra builded by the greatest bravest Romans with huge charge and of games sett out therein referred by Aristotle to magnificence a goodlie vertue Your professed desire of approoving the Romans iudgement so farre foorth as serveth for the necessarie defense of your owne dooings causeth mee to dout that seeing in Theatra condemned by the Church you distingush abuse from vse you will in Circi also and Amphitheatra and therefore say that Cyprian reprooveth not the vse but the abuses onely of beast-playes yea of swoord-playes vnlesse there come some other shift into your minde for severance of your stage-playes from them And sure if one possessed with Machiavells humour and loue of blooddy sacrifices as helping by the sight thereof to make men valiant should wish for blooddy games of swoord-players in like respect he might by your example not onely chalenge them from the marke of infamie wherewith the Romans branded them for fuvenal Suetonius Tacitus and so foorth doe reproche noble men and Knights for swoord-playing not base folke but also defende them from the reproofe of Cyprian and all the rest of the Fathers For Cyprian inveigheth most eloquently and godly against the abuses of swoord-playing in his time So he doth also against the evills of warre of iudgement seates of iudges of advocates of gold and riches Shall wee therefore conclude there should be no warre no tribunals no iudges no advocates no gold no riches and likewise no swoord-playing in any sort No dout the Fathers as holy men of God haue written many Zealous and most godly things against the amphitheatricall sights of their times but distinguish the times the places the qualities of the sights and actors and the vse from the abuse and it is evident by that which Machiavell saith that swoord-playes of our age are not reproched by them A very true sentence that no dout the Fathers haue written many zealous and most godly thinges against those sights of both sorts and likewise true no dout that it is as evident by Machiavels discourse that if such swoord-playes should now be vsed in London as were then at Rome the Fathers checke them not as it is by yours that the Fathers doe not repoche the same stage-playes of Plautus Terence Seneca or woorse which comparison Rivales may well beare played here of late among vs. Wherefore it had bene better for your credit to conteine your selfe within generalities by saying that men mistake the Fathers as Machiavell contented him selfe to say in grosse that base and cowardly wretches have misse-interpreted our religion For then I could not haue blamed you about particulars your policie had prevented me as it hath in Chrysostome whose testimonie quoted by mee against your wastfull expenses on such toyes you make no aunswer to no more then to others whom I quoted not Now when you affirme that Cyprian and the rest writing against the theatricall sights of their times doe not write against such as in our time are vsed I must needes tell you that you shew lesse conscience and singlenes in your writing then to whom you ought and easily might excell in all religious duties Bodinus and Lipsius Of whom the one declaring what neede there is for Censors for theaters of our time alleageth sundry Fathers and namelie Cyprian against them yea that very epistle of Cyprian which you specifie and wring to the contrarie The other observing how the Fathers have inveighed against games as springes of lust and crueltie pointing in the terme of lust vnto theaters of crueltie vnto amphitheaters doeth argue that swoord-playes if they were vsed in our time might bee as well denied to bee reproched by the Fathers as stage-playes of our time are But with whatsoever cunning or boldnes you blinde the eyes of children and make them beleeve that these ancient Prophets write not against your fansie the praise given by you to our owne Prophets those reverend and famous persons now living causeth me to feare I was too faint when I said They will not approove your obstinate striving for it I should haue said They will not approove your bare opinion or this will is also too faint They doe not approove it For being excellent men in life they love modestie and yeeld vnto the knowen truth Beeing excellent in learning they know that your theatricall sights are of the same kinde that the Fathers have decreed in their Councells and written in their bookes against The thinges which the Fathers have decreed and written are not only zealous but also most godly as you say Most godly therefore consonant to the holy Scriptures on the ground whereof it is expressely noted by Epiphanius likewise that the churches doctrine and ordinances were framed And how can it bee thought then with any likelyhoode that those reverend persons doe approove your stage-playes which by all presumptions and your own verdict they know that the Church the Fathers the Councels the Scriptures have condemned In deede if they were Papists and such as would rather put on the shamelesse forehead of the hoore of Babylon then confesse them selves to have bene overseene a man might haue reason to think that their owne doeings they would still allow of For wheras the profane and wicked toyes of Passion-playes playes setting foorth Christs passion procured by Popish Priests who being corrupted from the simplicitie that is in Christ as they have transformed the celebrating of the Sacrament of the Lords supper into a Masse-game and all other partes of Ecclesiasticall service into theatricall sights so in steede of preaching the word they caused it to be played a thing put in practise by their flowres the Iesuits among the poore Indians but whereas these bables were reprooved by Vives the Purgatorie-censors commanded that reproofe of his to be defaced and the Divines of Lovan have razed it out accordingly Yea though some Italian Bishops in a Councell vnder their Archbishop Cardinall Borrhomaeus have ordered for their Province that the Passion shall not bee played hereafter any where yet for feare of breeding a scruple in mens mindes that their Church might erre they say it was a custome religiously brought in So loth are ambitious spirits to acknowledge their oversights and faults But seeing that our reverend Pastors and Doctors haue an other spirit as he saith of Caleb and professe a purer religion then Papists you must give mee leave to suspect rather that you charge them wrongfully then that men of excellent godlines and wisdome doo allow and thinke well of so manifold evills as in your playes I haue disclosed And thus a great deale later then my desire and hope was but as soone as sicknes and busines would permit haue you that performed which in your conclusion by woords you request me

Wherefore that of Terence wherewith you conclude saying that you thinke it was a fowle shame for noble men and Nero to play but to play noble men or Nero it is no shame for you as hee saith in the Comedie Duo quum idem faciunt saepe vt possis dicere Hoc liceti mpunè facere huic illi non licet Non quòd dissimilis res sit sed quòd is qui facit although you straiten the point whether for shame or for the figure when you speake of playing noble men and Nero your purpose being to iustifie the playing of the basest drunkards whooers too but if Terences saying would fitt the point in question the vse thereof must bee to proove that they might lawfully come on the stage you may not The truth is that it cannot bee applyed hereto because the law speaketh generally of stage-players as it doeth of bawdes of theeves with the like and common sense doeth teach vs that wee may not distinguish where the lawe distinguisheth not Else if I should say that by the same law our English theeves who robbe on Gaddes hill are infamous one of their abbetters might aunswer No not so for the Law speaketh of such as Lucius Tubulus men of wealth and state who robbed the whole worlde repairing vnto Rome not of poore good felowes that robbe a few Kentish men travailing to Graves-end and I thinke it was a fowle shame for rich men and Tubulus to robbe but to robbe riche men and Tubulus it is no shame for vs as he saith in the Comedie that oftentimes you may say when two men doe the same thing the one is not blameworthy for it the other is not as if there were difference in the thing it selfe but in the man that doeth it Which Comicall sentēce though it might be as well applied by Iustice Graybeard to the excuse of theft in poore men as by Terences Mitio it is to the excuse of whoordom in a young man yet were it vniustly applied therevnto because the law condemning theft in whomsoever without respect of persons bee they rich or poore doeth count it none of those things which fall within the compasse of Terences oftentimes So considering stage-players are spoken of in like sort as theeves by the law you see how Terences saying may be applied vnto them But if we might apply it vnto them iustly wee must inferre thereof that it was no shame for Nero his mates to come on the stage for you it is as S. Paul commandeth vs not to eate with any that is called a brother if he be a fornicatour which with an infidell committing the same filthines he doeth not forbid And thus while you endevour to vnwind your selfe out of the nett of ignominie and infamie cast vpon you by the civill lawe you are bound faster in it to the fulfilling of that proverbe which I wish you had marked in the Comedie rather if not in the Scripture It is hard to kicke against prickes In the second head to a reason drawn out of the law of God for the reproofe of stage-playes as now you handle it denying that you made it to proove that men may lawfully put on wemens raiment therein as I tooke it though howe iust cause I had to take it so I haue declared but vnto this reason grounded on the law of God in Deuteronomie Whatsoever man doeth put on womans raiment he is abominable to the Lord But men did put on wemens raiment in your playes you must acknowledge therefore that you were iustly blamed you reply in like sort as vnto the former of the civill law first that the prohibition of men to weare wemens rayment is not generall but toucheth certaine cases onely next that your players did not weare wemens raiment And because in treating of the prohibition I shewed out of the Scriptures that it doeth belong not to the ceremoniall law but to the morall and no parte of the morall law may bee transgressed no not for the saving of honour wealth or life my proofes hereof beeing so cleere strong and pregnant that you durst not deny the thing to bee prooved you moue a dout as your terme is out of wordes of mine in deede you reason thus against it I pray you giue mee leaue to propose my contrary dout The morall law as you truely say is the law of loue and charitie to the which wheresoever the ceremonial law is repugnant there it giveth place to the morall The morall law therefore is never contrarie to loue and charitie in commanding or forbidding any thing But the place of Deutero nomie being taken strictly absolutely and in the rigor of the letter may sometimes hinder the actions of loue and charitie both towards our selves and others as in those cases which both you and I propose Ergo in that strictnes it belongeth rather to the law ceremoniall though the equitie thereof pertaineth to the law morall and so it is perpetually and simply to bee observed Nowe I haue given you leaue to propose your contrary dout I pray you giue me leaue to propose my contrary question In the same booke of Deuteronomie it is written Thou shalt not kill Thou shalt not commit adulterie These precepts beeing taken strictly absolutely and in the rigor of the letter may sometimes hinder the actions of loue and charitie both towardes our selves and others as appeereth by the example of Ioseph and of David Ioseph who lost his libertie and put his life in hazard because he refused to commit adulterie with his Maisters wife David who cast his folowers and him selfe into sundry dangers and distresses because he would not kill Saul Herevpon I aske you whether you thinke that seeing the morall lawe bound Ioseph David to loue their neighbours themselves therefore they should haue made no scruple of adulterie and murder in these cases in which the forbearing thereof did hinder the actions of loue toward them selves and others but ought to haue iudged those precepts in that strictnes to belong rather to the law ceremonial though the equitie thereof pertaineth to the law moral and so it is perpetually and simply to be observed Which if you thinke not as God forbid you should and you will professe as I am perswaded that you detest such thoughts then doe you acknowledge that it came rather of a lust to crosse and contradict my speech then of any dout you had within your selfe that you say a precept which beeing strictly kept might breede some disadvantage to our selves or others must in this respect bee counted ceremoniall and not be kept strictly because the morall law is never contrarie to love and charitie in commanding or forbidding any thing And sure you might haue reason to take it not well if I should suppose you to be so ill catechized as that you knew not that the moral law commandeth vs to

I brought them in as testimonies you named with them for company a comparison too Though seeing you are greeved with my applying of it against your stage-dansing and that induced you to call it a cōparison me thinks you should have fastned that odious name rather on the proposition prooved by those testimonies For the proofes reach not you immediatlie they fight not nigh at hande the proposition doeth as being the maior of that argument wherof your stage-players make the minor And the proposition condemning all stage-dansing doth giue a deadlyer wound nether can it choose but light on your stage-dansing the proofes might seeme to be more easilie avoided or comming so farre off to raze the skinne onely Againe my applying of the proposition to you by the assumption would deserve more woorthily the name of a comparison and the assumption being particular or singular the proposition vniversall were not this applying of all against some a comparison without all measure The third iniurious part offered me in this point is that you alleage the iudgement of Homer and Syr Thomas Eliot as making for that dansing which I did reproove And bringing in the former of them by a figure saying To omit Homers iudgment thereof him self you call an excellent observer of decorum in all things and quote for his iudgement the eight booke of his Odyssea Now better had it ben●…●…or you to omit him without a figure in deede sith he describing there the life of King Alcinous and of his people the Phaeacians saieth that they tooke pleasure continually in feasting and musicke and daunsing and braverie of apparell and hott baths and chambering wherein a livelie paterne of a wanton riotous voluptuous Epicures life being sett foorth by Homer as Horace Athenaeus Eustathius may teach you if I should not haue blamed dansing in your playes because such an excellent observer of decorum saith the Phoeacians vsed it then must the belly bee your players God because such an excellent observer of decorū saith the Phoeacians served it Moreover seeing that the Musicke which the minstrell gave thē to their dansing was a song of Mars taken in adulterie with Venus Vulcans wife you commend in dansing the number of the footing wel expressing answering and as it were acting the measure and meaning of the Musike you see what good instructions you give men by extolling your excellent observer of decorum in all things Adde therevnto that he so good an observer of decorum maketh the Phoeacian actors danse with others of their owne sexe or single Which how much why it is more allowable then men and women to danse together I wish you to consider by weighing with examples mentioned in Scripture the iudgement of Divines thereon So shall you perceiue that Homer in the eight booke of his Odyssea hath no sufficient warrant for Melantho to danse together with Eurymachus the maides with the wooers no not though they were maides and Melantho in deede much lesse for boyes attired like Melantho maides to danse with men vpon a stage The later of your autours you alleage directlie and that learned Knight Syr Thomas Eliot say you among other things that he writeth in a booke of his in the prayse of dansing compareth the man treading the measures to Fortitude and the woman on his hande to Temperance You adde that you have seene the booke and you remember hee vseth this comparison in it But did you not remember the name of the booke too or was it for some speciall cause that you concealed it your woordes might giue a man occasion to thinke that he had written a booke in the praise of dansing which that he did I finde not I guesse you meane therefore his booke entituled the Governour Wherein he prayseth Dansing and vttereth somewhat like to that avouched by you and treateth of circumstances a point you touch also which being all observed dansing may be honestlie and honorably vsed But his speech of Fortitude and Temperance represented by men and maidens in a danse commeth nothing neere your maides and wooers measures whereto you would stretch it For among diverse maners and kindes of dansing vsed in ancient time he rehearseth one wherein as Lucian saith translated woord for woorde by him in a maner dansed young men and maidens the man going before and expressing such motions as he might afterward vse in warre the maiden following him modestly and shamefastlie so that it represented a pleasant coniunction of temperance fortitude Now those warlike motions were as Plato sheweth speaking of the like danse gestures which resembled partlie the avoiding all sortes of woundes and blowes by bending aside by going backe by leaping vp by bowing downe partlie the enforcing of enimies by shooting arrowes and casting dartes at them and giving them all sortes of wounds Wherfore this being it that represented Fortitude in the danse described by Syr Thomas Eliot farre was it frō his meaning to make your measures your sober measures warlike motions or compare a wooer treading them to Fortitude As farre as to compare a boy doeing the same in maidens likenes to Temperance Which if you had otherwise expressed his sense rightlie yet should you haue forborne to apply to yours for the observing of decorum a thing that you commend so in Homer and your selfe aime at sith those maides and wooers intended both by Homer and you to be wantons must vse lascivious danses and the man if you will needes haue such resemblances bee compared rather to Mollitude or Cowardnes the woman to Incontinencie Beside that the praise which that learned Knight geveth vnto dansing he giveth it not simply for he saith some danses doe corrupt the mindes of them that danse and provoke sinne but with limitation to weete being vsed and continued in such forme and with such observations and rules as hee specifieth Whereof the first to name one for example is that by the curtesie or reverent inclination made at beginning of dansing the dansers and beholders should marke and remember this to be signified that at the beginning of all our actes we should doe due honour to God which is the roote of prudence And in deede if dansers in treading of their measures had such regards and meditations then not Syr Thomas Eliot onely but the Fathers would praise dansing too For when godly Bishops assembled in the Councells of Laodicea and Ilarda decreed that Christians ought not to danse at mariages when S t Chrysostome blamed women for so doeing as being a staine vnto their sexe when S t Ambrose cited and averred that of Tullie that such as danse are drunke or madde when S t Austin said that it were better to spend the Sabbat day in digging delving then in dansing they meant not to restraine men from marking and remembring that at

vpp against mee you doe not onelie affirme that they are exceedinglie tainted in honour if playes which they allow of bee iustlie disallowed by mee but also that it were a great reproche to them though not so exceedingly great as is the other yet a great reproch at any time to haue bene acquainted with things of so vile and base qualitie For why Is the writing of Comedies or tragedies but what speake I of writing in mentioning whereof your art appeereth farther sith I condemned it not is the playing of them made by mee a thing of so vile and base qualitie as persequuting or blaspheming Yet Saint Paul thought it no great disgrace for him in former time to have bene a blaspemer and a persequuter when he was now become a faithfull minister of Christ no more then for the Romans to haue bene slaves of sinne when they did now obey the doctrine of the Gospell or for Abraham to haue bene in the land of Chaldaea served other Gods there when he came now to Chanaan and served there the Lord. Not to haue bene evill is a reproche but to bee Againe what reason have you to say that a much greater reproch it were to them still to allow of playes when you commend S t Cyprian as a man of singular godlines and zeale who did more then allow an other maner of matter then playes even rebaptizing of men baptized by heretikes For as he folowed his predecessors in this errour and therfore was the more excusable so had the reverend men whom you alleage their predecessors that trained them to the liking of playes Neither is it probable that they have bene advertised of their oversight by any such mans writing as Cyprian was by Stephanus And Cyprian continued in his errour still notwithstanding that advertisement howe knowe you that they haue not changed their opinion Or if they have not changed it they may ere they dye which none is able to say that Cyprian did for ought that Austin could finde a man most likely to haue found it had there bene ought that could haue shewed it Wherefore it savoureth stronglie of a bad qualitie that you would perswade them they must by my iudgement bee noted and disgraced with a fowle exceeding great reproche and infamie if they allow of playes still Much woorse doeth it savour that you beare them in hand although their mindes should alter and thinke hereof when they praye Remember not O Lord the sinnes of my youth it must bee neverthelesse a great reproche vnto them at anie time to have bene acquainted with the writing and playing of such matters But what qualitie nay what canker shall I say it savoureth of that vnto the Prophets whose iudgement and autoritie the spirits of these Prophets were likely to be mooved with I meane vnto the Fathers and Councels laid in balance by me against your testimonies you reply that if they be rightly vnderstoode their forces are not bent against you Whereas your owne penne telleth you that you know the contrary For the first and greatest Councell that I quoted is that generall Councell of Constantinople which grounding it selfe vpō the place of Deuteronomie noteth mens wearing of wemens raiment in playes as a heinous crime Now this to make against you euen being rightly vnderstoode your selfe did acknowledge whē I alleaged it afore in so much that you opposed therevnto the opinion of others interpreting that text otherwise then the Councell doeth The same did you likewise confesse of sundry Fathers vpon the same occasion namely of Saint Cyprian whom here notwithstāding you doe namelie mention as making not against you yea whom you moreover doe sett downe for a speciall paterne of the rest to inferre the generall that none of all the Fathers or Councells doe reproove your playes For Saint Cyprian say you inveigheth most eloquentlie and godly against the abuses of the tragike buskin in his time So hee doeth also against the evills of warre of iudgement seates of iudges of advocates of golde and riches Shall we therefore conclude there should bee no warre no tribunals no iudges no advocates no golde no riches and likewise no tragike buskin in any sort Wherevpon you adde No doubt the Fathers as holy men of God both in their Councelles and in their bookes have decreed and written many zealous most godly things against the theatricall sightes of their times but distinguish the times the places the qualities of the sights actors and the vse from the abuse and it is evident by that which is said before that we and our playes are not reproched by them Thus labour you to face it out that your playes are not reproched by the Fathers as dealing forsooth iust like Saint Cyprian against the abuses of playing tragedies not the vse when yet you had graunted that he condemneth the attyring of boyes in womens raiment and teaching them to play the women the self same thing he doth in the place you quote so that your tragedie-playing is reprooved by him in your owne conscience because of your Melantho and Nais played by boyes although it were true that hee inveigheth onely against the abuses thereof as you distinguish The trueth is that he distinguished not so neither for tragike buskin nor for comike stertvp but inveigheth against stage-playing it selfe in like sort as he doeth against the games and sights of fensers or sword-players and of beast-players so to terme them wherewith he matcheth this of stage-players So that the absurd conclusion which you frame of no warre no iudges no advocates no riches if no tragike buskin is framed amisse on errour and would have reason enough if it were framed rightlie as it should be thus that if no stage-playing ought to be allowed by Saint Cyprians iudgement then ought there no. vniust warres no perfidious advocates no corrupt iudges no. covetous encrochers on the poore to be allowed because he inveigheth as well against the iniquitie treacherie briberie and miserie of these as he doeth against stage-playing Or if you will needes have him to reproove the abuses onely of stage-playing not the thing then by like reason he reprooveth not the blooddy sport and game of beast-players or of sword-players but the abuses of it Which I hope you will not affirme to be his meaning no not for the former sith the Church condemned it as Epiphanius witnesseth it I say the thing not the abuses of it as if it had a right vse allowed by the Church At least you will not make it his meaning for the later which Emperours lesse severe then that holie Martyr even Constantine Theodosius Honorius and Iustinian tooke absolutely away by edictes and lawes as a thing faulty of it selfe Though when I consider your speech above