either keep me still from you or split me wth you LA. Wt shall we do wth you Sr Harry sith you decline scripture wch as it is the purest so t is the easiest way for your conversion VIC Shall I tell you he wil even go out of his way as Balam and his ass did I le show you the story as t is written in 22 chapter of numbers t is a very pretty one Ther you wil see how the ass confuted his rider and said unto him Am not I thine ass so prettily Read here from the 22 vers to the 36. If you go not in the right way Sr Harry as we would have you be sure you shall be checkt by a very ass When any such thing happens you may take it for a certaine sign that you ar out of your way KN. Scriptur is a good instrument to drawn men from paganisme to Christianity but no fit means to divert us from Catholik Religion to heresy That heavenly seed wch makes sons of God can never make children of perdition except it self be mischievously corrupted And therfore I decline it not at all but admit allow and embrace it as containeing that irrefragable doctrine wch eminent persons in the church of God penned wch industrious and religious persons in the same Catholik church coppied transcribed wth their owne hands above a thousand years together before printing was invented to keep that sacred letter alive and lastly wch by the Catholik body of the said Church hath beene authenticated and canonised and therfore it must needs be pure and holy being madâ— conserud and ratified by holy Church But its facility and easinesse that I do not so easily conceive or agree unto especially if you separate it from the Church whose book it is The mind and meaning of any writing no man can understand so well as the Authour no man can interpret aright contrary to the Authour no man where it is obscure and uncouth may peremptorily interpret wthout the Authour MIN. You will soon grant it to be easy if you consider that t is called a light to the understanding Wt thing is there more apparent than light And therfore t is said in the Ephesians if our Gospell be hid t is hid to them that are lost VIC Sweet heart you are mistaken that sayeing is not in the Ephesians but Corinthians 2. Ep. and the 4. c. LA. T is no matter Mr person so we find out your riddle tho it be by plowing wth your heyfer according to the saying of Samson Iud. 14. VIC I told you even now Madam that the ass will rebuk his rider when he goes astray KN. A light if it be set behind us or under a bushell or to an eye ill affected inlightens not and a prejudiced mind is a veyld understanding where light cannot enter I must say more he that goes out of the Church puts out his own eyes and he that never enterd in never had any but gropes in darknes Light is come into the world saith our Lord but men love darknes more than light Jo. 1. namely because they shut their eyes against it and no marvell that unto such the Gospell should be hid Catholikes all of them have indeed the whole Gospell by heart and comprehendit sufficiently for the life and spirit of it yet still the bark and letter of it hath obscurity enough wch is opend and manifested as far as is needfull upon occasion by the lips of priests wch preserve knowledg No man understands the mind of man but the spirit that is in man nor the meaning of scriptures can any comprehend but the spirit of that Catholik body whose the scriptures be For these be imediatly the word and doctrin of the Church and therfore called the Word of God because that Catholik body from whence it issued is animated by the spirit of Jesus Christ her naturall head who is God blessed for ever and the particular penmen therof being members of the sayd church were peculiarly illustrated by that spirit unto such an effect So then the word of God is a light and enlightens good Catholiks it enlightens not others that remain blinded in infidelity and separated from that holy mysticall body of Christ and yet t is a light still t is hid to them that are lost People that live in a family colledg or corporation by the daily sight and practis of things to be don therin do fully comprehend all that is to be said or acted there But others who be out of those societys shall never by bare reading of books written of such emploiments so long as themselves stay out attain to any satisfactory light therof but remain pusled in a wood of dark words and either mistake or not apprehend the reality and truth of things So our people wthin the Church see distinctly and clearly the truths of God in whose practis they are daily conversant so that words and writtings are not necessary unto such as be in a continuall exercise of their trade but sectaries paymins al infidels who be aliens and strangers to this Society out of the family altho they should look upon their book of statutes scripturs or laws yet will they still be pusling about words and never clearly understand the secrets of the profession One artist or tradesman knows more by heart and practise than the whole world besides that is out of that body or not conversant in the society can ever attain unto by reading A man may demonstrat by Philosophicall reason that light it self enlightens not but by reflexion no more do the word and scripturs except they reflect upon us from the bosom of the Catholik body wch actuats them in their operation If you would seriously ponder these few words you should quickly perceive unto whom the scriptures be obscure and unto whome they be easy and how they be easy to Catholiks for the practise life and meaning of them tho the letter may still keep its obscurity as children of a family may clearly understand all the whol affaires and businesses of the house tho if books should be written therof they might not so easily understand the letter of those books Yet these have great advantage in the understanding of such books abov those who are not coversant in the affairs being aliens and strangers to the family For t is easier by the knowledg perfect comprehension of things to understand words that be written of them than by reading of words to perceiv things we are altogether unexperienced in But to speak abstractively of the letter of Scriptur wthout reference unto persons as if the case were that neither you nor I ever knew any thing of the Christian religion but what we get out of the Bible or new Testament put now into our hands Could either of us or all of us together see clearly in this letter the whole state of the Catholick Church or without obscurity discern wt is to be
said and done wt is to be thought and beleevd wt is to be hoped and feard wt concerns God and his creaturs wt angels and men wt earth and heaven wt our creation and redemption wt the beginning and end of things First where is the order and method to find out these things You will find that the story and doctrinall part goes hand in hand together wch is not the ordinary way of teaching If I peruse the story of Gospell by it self I shall scarcely find it answerable to my expectation whiles I find mention onely of one howr of Christs birth and not a word more for twelv years together and then but one single action of his appearing in the publick Schools and not a word again of his whole life till almost twenty years after and then onely some works he did in publick for the space of about three years so his death wch is far less than I should expect or desire to know And the doctrine our Lord deliverd is no more of it set down than what he spake incidentally in fields and streets and publick places the three years space of his publik appearance and not a word of any thing he taught his Schollers or Disciples in particular on set purpose without reference to publick speeches which was without all doubt the main doctrin primarily intended both by the Maister his disciples and most copiously explicated Moreover those publick speeches of or Lord we have set down in Gospell they are deliverd us but under certain generall heads and brief notes wthout any order or connexion at all that can appear to any the subtillest wit that is Our Lords Sermon on the mount is the largest piece of doctrin we hav of his deliverd at one time and most heavenly and divine it is like its authour but he that reads the sift sixt and seaven Chapters of S. Mathew where t is set down shall desire connexion And indeed the holy Evangolists collecting their Gospels as brief memorialls did it wthout all doubt the best way And t is sufficient and far better than if all had been set down in that order and fulness of discours our Lord deliverd it For the few separated notions of Christian morality set down in Gospell wer enough to give testimony to the traditionall doctrine the Apostles had methodically received from their master for his Church Finally those speeches of our Lord recorded in Gospell be only some brief sentences and parables questions and replies to interrogatories wch be far short to a whol body of divinity tho abundantly enough for a Church in whos bowels the Messias would imprint his law and intire will It appears then both by the mingling of the story and dogm together by the few parcells of the history it self by the want of that method and connexion in the dogmaticall part wch our dull capacities require for learning and the omission of great many things we should need to be imformd in far more amply than we can find it set down in Scriptur concerning the use of Sacraments government of the Church and a thousand difficulties rising about the exercises of charity and faiths I say it appears by these and such like things that the Scripture of the New Testament was never pend on any purpose to teach us our religion but rather to confirm and ratify by incidentall passages therein such religion and doctrin as should be deliverd by the Church the prime and sole mistresse of faith after God and in place of him in all clearnes of methodical beleef and practise To you saith our Lord to his Apostles Luc. 8.10 it is given to known the mysteries of the Kingdom of heaven to others in parables that seeing they may see and not understand The Apostles and the Church derived from them were made acquainted wth the mysteries and secrets of Christian religion for their beleef and practise and the same Church clearly knows and understands them as the mysteries of her own profession and art wch she hath receivd and practisd from the beginning to this day But to others that be aliens and out of the Chuâ—ch it seems our Lord so orderd his speech that they should hear and yet not understand nor everfully perceiv his will till beleeving they were incorporated into his mysticall hody unto which alone all the mysteries of religion are delivered in perspicuity and clearnes This generall purpos and intention of penning the Gospell and other parts of the New Testament as short manuall notes for Christians within the Church or such as are to be congregated unto it from wch Churches hands they have both a larger explicit declaration of their faith and a full and ample practis thereof in her bosom must needs infer such an obscurity as shall obstruct all possibility out of the Church of God by this bare letter ever to arrive to a clear understanding of the waies of Christian Religion This is the first and great cause of that obscurity scripture carries with it unto such as come to seek their religion in a Book wch was never made to teach it nor written for such a propos The churches doctrin as it comes out of her lips that is the thing that converts nations and regenerats unto heavenly life and this written word is a good milk to nurs us up after we are regenerated wch made S. Peter to exhort Christians 1 Pet. as new born babes to desire that sincere milk of the word that they may grow by it 1. Pet. 2. But it is not the thing that givs us the first life Indeed the Scriptur does little or no good but as it is presented by the Church and received with her interpretation and practisd in her bosom wthout wch three things I wil be bold to say it is not the Word of God nor hath it any vertue at all The Ark of God so long as it was upheld by the Priests it comforted and sanctified them but touched or lookt into by others it destroyd them nor was it unto them an Ark of salvation but an offence and occasion of fall If we descend to particulars we shall espy reasons enough of obscurity such as will frustat all desire of any perspicuous discovery of faith to be made by any man wthout the churches help The very history doth afford disputs enough hardly to be answered by the learnedst of divines as they will easily grant that have examind them The Prophesies and mysteries of faith containd therein who is able to trace them And the morall or dogmaticall part tho it seem familiar yet hath it a profoundnesse beyond all human writting Indeed by this it is demonstrated to be the Word of God wch must needs be like himself unsearchable Out of the abundance ef the heart the mouth speaketh saith our Lord and where the heart is immense the word is also incomprehensible I doubt not but there be too many amongst our people in England who read the
and diligence of her councells their faithfulnes study and exactnesse in examining discussing refuting upstart opinions their uprightnes and wisdom in defining confirming the ancient Catholik doctrin against all innovations according to that general oracle of all Synods Nihil innovandum veterum traditionibus standum and lastly the severe penaltys inflicted by the church upon the authours of innovation if they did not humbly recant their errour so that all things considered aright t is as impossible for human innovations to incorporate wth the body of anicent Catholik faith as for wood or stone to concorporate wth the flesh of an animal You would M◠Dr. save me the labour of perswading this truth any further if you would pleas to call to mind how severall Reformers have taunted at the scrupulosity of papists in this kind yea and inveighed too against their severity telling us that popish councels are so scrupulously severe that they question meddle wth and censur things that ar of little or no concernment at all in Religion and oftims pure Philosophy that they condemne good books written by their owne people and those men of sincerity and conscience one can hardly tell why or wherfore that they so enslave excellent wits that they cannot invent or utter any thing that may rellish never so little of novelty that they judg the faithfull and cast them out of the church even for small supposed deviations that they set up inquisitions to prevent and suppresse liberty of conscience even wth un-Christian cruelty And they tell us severall storys of the Catholik churches scrupulosity in this kind of Heliodor put out of his byshoprick for writing his fained Romance of Virgilius displaced in like sort for teaching that ther were Antipodes an opinion in those daies new and unheard of of a Printer that together wth the losse of his place sufferd a heavy mulct for altering one letter wch had been falsly transcribed in that parable of the woman that lost a drachme and swept her house evertit domum the Printer for evertit made it everrit as it ought to be and forfeited say they his office for his pains It is possible that so much curiosity so much scrupulosity and tendernes should so tamely admit of an insupportable weight of popery wthout any disturbance at all nay wth the liking and universall consent of all men God Catholikes are as tender of their faith as of the apple of their eye so that if a friend or kinsman should once take up any noveltys therin we are scandalised at it rise up against him cannot but show our aversion and dislike even wher natur and custom had united us Nor can any one of our country-men broch an heresy but all sound Catholiks will hate him for it and rise up against him forreiners if it ever com to their ears will detest him much more how ever he may draw some disciples after him such light capritious people as will be led away wth every wind of doctrin and som such there have ever been who forgetfull of God and their own safty will leav the rock of the church wherupon they are built to follow the new fangldnes of a proud instable mind the whole Catholik body still resisting and condemning the insolence This is a quality as evident in good catholiks as that a man hath a nose in his face nor needs it proof How then can it be thought that whol Kingdoms and severall nations should submit to the judgment of one proud deviatour be he never so witty ov eloquent as for example all the Prelats of Spain Italy Germany France East and West-Judys Asia in a word all over the world to one haughty self conceited English Priest deviating from the ancient received faith of his ances tours wthout any resistance dislike or noise It is not a thing by a reasonable man so much as to be imagind Nor hath a prelate in one countrey any more power over the prelates of another than wit and eloquence can afford him wch reason and experience showes can never suffice for the bringing of all mankind into captivity to it self wthout resistance and clamour The chief Priest is the fittest to offer this kind of violence and yet how little he is able to prevail in an opinion contrary to the Churches universall tradition appears sufficiently in the fact of pope Iohn the twenty second who propounding to the consideration of some Christian universities the negativ of the soules fineal beatitud till the generall judgment effected no more but a commotion of the Christian world against himself And the thing is remembred and spoke of to this day Wherfor neither covin nor violence can be of any avail to the introducing of innovations by any person wtsoever contrary to the churches custon and tradition Deal sincerly wth me and take any one point of those many wch English Catheliks hold at this day masse pilgrimages vowes pennance absolution reall presence or wt you will and tell me in wch of the Kings dayes between William the conquerour and Harry the eight it was first taken up here or brought into the land look still further and see your self if the same was not beleevd and practisd by the Saxons even from their first conversion untill K. William the conquerours daies go forward and you shall find that the religion the Saxons receivd from Pope Gregory did both in that point and all others agree wth wt the Brittons had receivd two or three hundred years before This I am sure you shal find if you be not wāting to your self How then can you ever hope to perswade me that all or any of these be innovations wherof you can tell me neither the motiv nor the occasion nor the time they were introduced nor the person by whom nor any event that followed theron T is an argument of desperat wretchednes to cast away all practicall religion upon no other account than the bare affirmation that t is popish superstition and popish inventions No Sr the inventions of men in matters of religion cannot be so universall in men and Kingdoms of differing humours and at enmity oftimes wth one another they cannot be so imutable in so many alterations of states and governments as are and have been in the world they cannot be so permanent being both human and unlawfull for as divinity and essentiall truth are therfor eternall and unchangable becaus such so humanity and falshood must needs decay and moulder away contrariorum contraria est ratio It was a golden observation that of Gamaliel a great doctour of law among the Iewes If this counsell be of men it will come to naught if of God ye cannot frustrat it Act. 5. You see by the alterations that happen in human inventions that t is much for mens conceits or fansies to stand unch angd for one age or two all Reformations are by their continuall vicissitudes convinced to be human counsells and works of men
Scriptures as our boyes and girles do at schoole judging the sense comprehended as soone as the sillables be speld I speak not to such Greater divines to whome I speak must and will acknowledg that the Scriptures be often argumentative passing from one point to another wthout giving any doctrinall notice therof This will make the reader hable to continuall mistakes whiles he conceivs the writer to go still along upon the same subject whereas he is past over to a new or a contrary one As also in the Psalmes canticles Prophecies t is very familiar wth those holy men under one the same number person to act themselvs in one verse God or his church in the other imediately succeeding in one half line to decipher things present in the other conjunctivly connext things onely to come and not appliable to wt was then in hand tho the speech be united The good Eunuch in the Acts of the Apostles was it seems adviced hereof when reading the Prophesy of Isaias he asked Philip of whome doth the Prophet speak this verse he was led as a sheep to the slaughter of himself or of some other man Act. 8.34 Again in the whole course of scriptur a man may meet wth propositions here and there desperst wch being taken apart from the other discours and according to their own bare sound are quite opposite to other formal assertions in the same book nay to the very drift and intention of the Authour as will soon appear unto him that shall make an analysis of the whole book such be the semisentences depraved texts and ill applied autorities used by sectaries For example in that sublime and learned Epistle of S. Paul written to the Romans our people of England do cull out many places for the solesufficiencie of faith against the necessity merit of good works wch is as far from the dift and intention of the Apostle as hell is from heaven and unbeseeming such a Catholick doctour as S. Paul was to write to such a Catholik place as Rome The busines and occasion of the letter was an emulation risen in Rome betweene the converted Jewes and the converted Gentiles those who had been made Christians from Iewes disabling the Gentiles as being ever aliens from God wheras the Iewes converted were first Gods servants under Moses then under Christ and so pleasing God in the whole course of their linage by their good conversation according to the law they used the Gentils on the other side diminisht the Iewes for that themselves by the very light of reason doing wt they could was a law to themselvs and so far pleasd God that he therfore brought them equally wth the Iewes unto the light of Gospell wch the Iewes indeed deservd not sith they had murderd the Messias and Lord of glory This childish emulation arising haply upon some slight word at their meetings proceeded so far that it brake forth into open rancour one against another insomuch that their Priests and Pastours who were amongst them could not well allay it Wherfore S. Paul notice therof being given to him wrote that letter of his to them wherin he layes about him now at the Iewes then at the Gentils confuting their pride and folly and giving them both to understand that neither of them had aught to boast of sith God of his free mercy had equally cald them both to the saving faith of Gospell and made them Christians and therfore that they should all live together in humility peace and brotherly charity This is the scope and subject of that sacred and most Catholik Epistle so wretchedly abused by our pittifull Sectaries who understanding nothing of the Apostles purpose deprave him as they do other scripturs to their own ruin And t is an odde kind of riddle that Catholik divines who do onely understand the scriptures should affirm them to be hard and difficil to understand heretiks who understand them not at all should maintaine them to be easy Again we see that scriptur ever anon takes up figures allegories and parables wherin are inclosed truths of a differing strain to wt the letter relates This will caus an obscurity almost invincible For who can look through a veyl none surely but the church and church men singularly assisted and inspired so S. Paul lookt through the story of Sara and Agar and perceivd the two churches decipherd therin Gal. 4. And this custom is it seems so frequent in Scriptur that the same Apostle gives a caution against too much adhereing to the bark and letter of sacred scriptur averring peremptorily that the letter kills but the spirit or meaning couched under the letter that is life 2. Cor. 3. For that the bare letter of the history too much insisted upon will often lead if not to a contrary errour vet besides the intended truth Besides the same phrase or letter is used in scriptur somtimes one way somtimes another as sin not to stand upon further exemplification is taken commonly for an offens and yet somtimes again for an expiation therof 2. Cor. 5.21 wth is almost contrary Somthings in scriptur are spoken of God according to his essence wch wthout good heed may prejudice the right beleef of a trinity some things of Christ according to his humanity wch may dâ—sh the conceit of the diety in him som things of the church triumphant wch may falsly be applied to the militant somthings of the Messias his second coming wch may be a stumbling block to the truth of his first And contrary All these things have caused errours mistakes and heresies in the world And may still do the like if private judgment have free and uncontroulable dominion over the letter and text of scripture to interpret it at pleasur Lastly sacred scriptur being a masse or body of writing both made up by severall Authours and a miscellan of severall kinds of words histories and lawes under a figure histories and lawes wth out figure or dogmaticall Prophesies of severall stiles or phrases and all of them obscure and parabolicall prudentiall Proverbs close coucht together and so antimetrically sited that rare wits can search into their depth Psalms and canticles so highly elevated above ordinary conceit that for aught I see they may suffice to amuse the understandings of all ages parables not yet fully explicated and dogmaticall Epistles of the good Apostles wch if they be taken so far as may concern pure Christianity wthout their economicall morall and politicall precepts wch be easy and well enough known wthout them are enough to exercise the understandings of mankind Scriptures I say made up of all these severall ingredients argue first that they were never pend to teach us our faith but for a meer help of meditations for exhortation incitement of devotion and piety in people already beleeving Secondly that it would be a lost labour to go cull our beleef out of theÌ„ where no such purpose is intended no method used
for the worlds conversion carried any written Gospell at all wth them wch might be made by themselves much less is it to be thought that they staied to write out theirs having their own breasts so well fraught wth all that and far more than they found ther written especially considering that two of the Evangelists were but their pupills and disciples Nay before those Gospels were written out and completed especially that of S. John the Church of God was spread up and down the world and flourisht in all the duties of Christianity By wch it may appear that even the written Gospell is neither it self necessary to the being of the Church nor the reading or expounding of a text the essentiall work of Christianity As for the Epistles wch be the other part of the new Testament written by S. Paul and others These t is well enough known were pend a long while after the Church of God was perfectly formd and grown up in most parts of the known world in particular after those Churches of Rome Corinth Ephesus Galatia Thessalonica and the rest unto whom they are addrest were perfected in all the essentialls of Christian faith and they were occasiond merely accidentally upon the creeping in of some disorders and errours in those places contrary to the tradition of faith they had received as may soon appear to him that reads and understands the tenour of those spirituall Epistles So then the Church is antecedent to her Scriptur and altogether independant theron either for her being or profession helps of memory as all these writings be do presuppose both the memory and the things to be remembred before those helps were brought to light And so the reading of these Scriptures or hearing them expounded can no wise be the essentiall work of Christian religion or the totall exercise therof but somthing that is altogether independent of them more ancient than they be and that is more intrinsecally a worship homage adoration and service of the most high God than hearing or looking upon words and syllables can be I make no doubt but the whol Scriptur or writing of the new Testament both Epistles and Gospells was merely casuall and accidentall For I find it long ago foretold by the Prophets that the law and government of the Messias should in this differ from the Law of Moses that Moses Law was all committed to paper but the doctrin of Iesus should be writ in the heart and entrailes of his Church You may see one place in the Prophet Ieremy c. 31.33 wch the Apostle in his Epistle to the Hebrewes applies unto Christ our Lords dayes Heb. 10.16 and S. Paul doth not obscurely allude unto it in one of his letters he wrote to Corinth c. 3.3 Indeed to imprint in the churches breast a law from wch she should never deviat is in my judgment a greater argument of divinity than any written Gospell could afford The things wch Solon Numa Lycurgus Draco and other such like men contrived and dictated for the good of their common wealths did much commend their gravity vigilance and wisedome and elevated them above other men not above manhood Moses himself the most profound judicious Lawmaker the world ever had by the excellency of his written Laws hath merited the title of a divine and sacred legislatour but he is known to be a man by his hand-writing and the paper he wrote on He is a God that writes on the velin of the heart characters indelible unto eternity The Law of Christ onely is written not wth ink but wth the spirit of the living God not in tables of stone but in fleshly tables of the heart I do also verily think that the religion wch the Son of God deliverd to his church was neither commanded by him to be written nor yet ever intended either by the Euangelists or other of those primitiv writers to be totally set down under the notion of a rule of faith altho so much as ther is of it drawn principally for the use of devotion and charity be a rule of faith also What the occasion might be that moved the four Euangelists to write their compendious Gospells by the little learning I have I could never yet assuredly gather altho I remember I have read somthing thereof in a learned latin book made by a friend of mine called Systema fidei put forth some few years ago wherein be very many things of excellent learning worthy of the Authour but I have not now the book at hand Wt occasion moved S. Paul to write his Epistles unto Rome Corinth and other places is manifest enough and I shall afterward declare it when I shall come to discover the religion of the Apostles and Euangelists and make it appear that they were all papists and of the very self same religion Catholiks be of at this day All this put together that Christ himself neither wrote any thing nor comanded any thing to be written yea gave notice that he would use his speciall prerogative of legislatourship and write his law in hearts promising to animate the body of his Church wth his own spirit wch should lead them into all truth and that the church was disperst over the earth before any Christian writting was made wch was afterwards drawn to confirm and strengthen the faith and devotion it found already planted All this being true it follows apparently that hearing or reading or preaching upon a text is not the great capitall work of Christian Religion Indeed t is childishnes to think that God unto whom all prostration adoration all homage service and worship both of the outward inward man is more than due should be sufficiently served wth a little labour of the lips or ears when a man thinks good so to do Preaching is indeed necessarily antecedent to Christian faith yet it onely disposes unto furrher actions as may easily appear both by autority of Scriptures wch exclaime bitterly against such as hear and go no further and also by the very natur of hearing and all kind of exhortation wch ever tends to somthing besides it self For who ever heard onely to hear and no further who but our mad reformers ever preacht onely to be heard And how can speaking on one side and hearing on the other complete the whol duty of man to his God as if one were nothing but tongue and ear or had receivd nothing from him but those two organs Tell me Madam ingenuously Do not you think you have sufficiently done your duty to God if you go but forth once a Sunday to hear a Sermon and if you read a chapter or two in a week day this is nothing else in effect altho by your favour you do not think you self bound under sin to either but if you like the weather or the parson pleases or your clothes be neat and handsom then you will go forth to church if not you will stay at home if you find your self
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in fractione panis in his breaking of bread Luk. 24.35 For that religious work they knew was done by none but Christ himself or his Priests This discours upon the words of Scriptur I hav somwt inlarged beyond my custom not to teach Catholiks for altho the Greek should be rendred by them in templo they know well enough that every place where that most sacred rite is done is a temple and so t is indifferent to them to translate it either in templo or in sacro but to let others who be not Catholik understand that more is implied in such expressions than they do ordinarily think of and that the religion of the primitiv Christians was not preaching wherof here is no mention at all but prayers supplications sacrifice or fraction of bread Wch religious emploiment is in another place of the sam chapter yet more fully exprest They were saith he firmly persisting in the doctrin of the Apostles and in comunion and in fraction of bread and supplications v. 42. They firmly persisted both in the Apostles doctrin unanimously united in faith wthout schisme division or any singularity of opinions wch might separat them from the main body into particular conventicles and also in comunion one wth another both by fraternal charity Ecclesiasticall obedience and Christian Sacraments in Fraction of bread wch was the great Cardinall capitall work of their faith and the very quintessence of Christianity and in supplications in the plurall number both for living and dead both for pastour and people for every degree for every necessity This was a right Catholik body and the right exercise of their Catholik faith And such and no other is the faith religion of all Catholiks to this day those I meane who are traduced by frivolous people under the notion name of Papists wch is a barbarous word and neither Latin Greek or Hebrew nor yet good English and if it signify any thing it is as much as to say Fatherists because they persist unanimously and firmely in the doctrine of Apostolical pastours and fathers in comunion with them in fraction of bread and supplications day by day persevering in sacro and breaking the bread at their houses wch they take together in exultation and singlnes of heart praysing God and having grace towards al good people Pray God bless thē all To make themselvs worthy of this Holy comunion our Catholiks do frequently examin and clens their consciences as P. Paul advises to do wch clensing and examining of conscience none but Catholiks know wt it means This sacred Action and venerable service of God was by the first Christians named Missah a notion they had out of the old Testament where the Sacrifice of the Messias peculiar onely to his people and religion by way of constitution distinction from all others is so named and the Latin and western part of the church did ever keep the name as well agreeing to the Latin tongue But the Eastern and Greek churches called it ordinarily 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Liturgy wch was their own language and o word wherby that sacred action was exprest in the new Testament In the Acts of the Apostles t is frequently called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 breaking of bread The primitiv Christians gave it severall names the Eucharist the Synaxy the Dominicum and the like changing the word as souldiers do the watchword that uncircumcised paynims should not know wt they meant as our Catholiks now in England use some by-expressions therof for concealment And the antient doctours of the church wrote very cautiously of it especially in such books as they thought might haply fall into the hands of pagans as may be seen in severall places of Origen S. Austin and others I observed the last time I read over S. Austin de civitate Dei a very notable passage to this purpose tho I have not now the book to turn to it where speaking accidentally of the venerable bread of Christians he presently recalls himself saying they know wt I mean whose bread this is and in whose cause I write And a certain Roman prelat in antient times denied to send by writing an answer of som doubts propounded by ultra-marin Christians concerning some circunstances of the mass least the pagans intercepting his letters should therby discover the mystery of Christian Religion but he promist to send a messenger to the petitioners who should inform them by word of mouth So carfull they were not to cast this pearl before swine Yet as soon as Paganism was subdued their writings came abroad copiously and gave ample testimonies therof S. Ambrose was in the third age of the church and yet he began to be bold and writ not onely of the substance of the thing but betrayed the very name wherby it was generally known and called namely missa or mass But they all frequently spake of the Altar and Priests the Sacrifice and service of the most high God performd in Christian Religion and the like And the writers of the last twelv hundred years speak so amply and so plainly therof that the very citation of their evidences would fill a volume For this divine service were all our churches in England erected by Catholiks in the form of a cross the high Altar now called the Chancell being placed in the head of the church and the Tabernacle over it for the body of our Lord to repose on for Christian mens solace wth candles and lamps before it below it was the quire for the clargy to sing prayses night and day before their redeemer on both sides of the church lesser Altars for other priests to celebrate in at their devotion and the nave or body of the church kept clenly and vacant for the people to kneel in continue wth one accord in their supplication and prayer according as it is written My hous is the hous of prayer If churches had been onely buylt for preaching and hearing Sermons they would not have been made in the form of a cross as they be but of a theater or amphitheater rather wth scaffolds about for that purpose and such stalls or pews below as now all our churches are pesterd wth in Catholik times utterly unknown And if a man look into the places of devotion the Christians resorted unto in times of paganism before they had any churches erected wch were for the most part in dens and caves bottoms of mountains wherof many are still to be found in all Kingdoms of Europ he shall easily discern what their busines was there I once saw one of them in a hill neare Paris cald mount Dammartin wch descended as I remember three score steps into the hill at the bottom there is a place of the bignes of a chamber and an Altar stone at the head of it in part still remaining and a hole in the same rock over the Altar for the Priests chalice to stand in And generally wher ever such
pleasur by wth drawing tithes or tribut or otherwayes sess 8. against his 27. art Indeed the opinion is a way to all rebellion and disorder in church and state XVI Finally that no degree may scape the Waldenses and Luther inveighed bitterly against religious orders as the invention of the devill affirming that the founders of them were damnd for it if they repented not and that none could be saved in them wch desperate madness was censurd also in the said councell of Constance Sess 8. And strongly confuted by Chlitoveus Roffensis Albertus Thomas Waldensis a Carmelit and before them by S. Thomas and S. Chrysostome XVII To prevent all danger on any hand for any heresy or disorder the Waldenses spread abroad that no judg can condemn any man to punishment But they either forgat or simple souls never knew that S. Paul saith if ye do evill fear for the magistrat bears not the Sword in vain XVIII There were others who taught that no hereticks were to be punisht but left to Gods judgment 19. The Rhetorii saies Philaster affirmed that al hereticks thought aright XX. Nicolaus Eimericus reports of others in the time of Pape Gregory the eleaventh who affirmed that any one that commits a mortall sin is an heretick XXI S. Austin testifies of the hereticks called Ophitae that they worshipt the Serpent that beguiled Eve and the Caiani respected Judas for a Saint for that he was cause of our redemption These be some extravagant opinions of sectarys concerning severall persons in the church kings and subjects religious men clargy men priests students byshops the Senate of prelates popes Saints Christ and what not so sensles so wild so inconsistent so contradictory that the wisedom and integrity of the Church of God were not able to suffer much lesse approve them being contrary many of them to common honesty others to right reason all of them to Christian faith How shall the immaculate spous comply heaven and hell may sooner come together I think VIC T is a marvellous thing Sr Harry you can have all thes opinions in your head and hold none of them What difference is ther betwixt having and holding If I should ever think of them they would mingle wth my creed I can beleev any thing if it be not popery and take all that coms as I did my Husband to have and to hold for better and for wors as it is written MIN. Com you speak like one of the foolish women VIC How did you speak when you took me wth the very same words and said wth a blith and bucksom countenance I Iohn You have been a year or two at a pagan university where you learnt to worship Judas for a Saint you are so proud upon it deny if you dare that I understand the bible wch is the highest book in the world wherin then can you exceed mee T is true you are a parson but is it not written I have more understanding than my teachers Psa 119.99 You would fain com in wth your few texts against Sr Harry that you have been scribling out of a concordance being out of all patience that his Discours keeps you back Pray be content t is as pleasing to me to hear talk of these men as of my owne father and mother that begat mee expect your kue good sweet Husband Your hour is not yet come as t is written LA. T is agreed upon Sr Harry that you proceed in your discours Mr Doctour in the end will I beleev make use of it all to his owne advantage KN. I have declared som severall odd conceptions of men concerning sundry persons in the church Others there be concerning places as the temple or place of worship purgatory after life hell and heaven wch opinions maintained wth pertinacy caused the authours thereof to be cast out of the Catholik body of Gods church wherin they had been members I. Eustachius derided all Saints temples The Waldenses afterward would have all churches taken away as too much straitning the majesty of God whose temple is the wide world The Pseudapostoli added that a consecrated church is no more worth than a swine sty as also Zisca the German who wth his companions whom he called Taborites from mount Tabor where Christ was transfigured spoild and defaced all holy places they came neare The councell of Gangres defined against this madnesse c. 5. decret II. The same Waldenses would not endure that time should be spent in saying the canonicall hours in the church and their ape Wicleph gave his reasō for it becaus forsooth it is not fit that Christians should be tied to prayer at any time This reason if it wer worth any thing would destroy the Sabboth But all singing in the church they scofft at as nois made to Baal The Arrians before them disprooud singing in Catholik churches but their reason was becaus of so many Hymns and anthems made in the honour of Christ against their impious opinion Against al thes is the councel of Gangres c. 30. decret III. That all images are to be taken out of churches was stifly maintained both by the said Waldenses and their squire Wicleph For wch heresy long before their time Leo the third emperour in Constantinople was excomunicated by Pape Gregory the third yet notwthstanding the emperour Constantin the fift and emperour Leo the fourth his son adhered still to it but after his death Irene his wife ruling the empire in the name of the Infant Constantin the sixt obtained the second Nicen counsell to be called where by three hundred and fifty Byshops the heresy was condemnd though Constantin the sixt being of age would not submit to the councell wch was one of the mainest causes of the dislike and grudg between the Latin Greek emperours The errour was afterward condemnd in the councell of Frankford under pape Adrian the first IV. The adoration given in Catholik temples unto the cross and crucifix the above named Iohn Wicleph an english Priest who lived about the yeare 1380. would by all means have taken away But Thomas Waldensis his country man almost contemporary still confuted him and his blind Lugdunian guides who were also judgd condemnd by all the Prelats in Constance V. There also was censurd another errour of theirs that preaching in temples should be lawfull for any although prohibited by superiours VI. The said Wicleph denied tiths to be due to Priests serving at the Altar preaching and praysing God wch errour was also condemnd in the 18 place at Constance But this opinion he had from the Pseudapostoli whose ringleader was Gerardus Sagarellus of Parma who was burnt in the yeare 1260. VII Both the Waldenses and Wiclevits blasphemd all benedictions of water candls palms altars challices churches forgetting or not beleeving that every creature is sanctified by the Word of God and Prayer 1. Tim. 4. VIII No less peremptory was Wicleph Huss and Luther against excomunications from church and altar inflicted on