manifest ceremonies of diuine seruice and therefore hath deliuered vnto vs some fewe in steed of many and the most easie to be done Iohn 4 29. Aug. de doct Chri. l. 3. c. 9. most honourable for signification and most cleare and pure to bee obserued The religion of the Papists is so loden with ceremonies presumptions deuises of men that their manner of worshipping of God in their Temple is become now altogether Iewish and carnall consisting in nothing else but altogether in outward and ceremoniall exercises in the doctrine whereof ther is neither faith nor spirit nor any working of the holie Ghost almost required Touching the matter of Gods worship wherein we differ from the Papists thus it stands wee teach and hold that onely God the Father God the Sonne and God the holie Ghost are to be worshipped with diuine honor and no creature besides grounding our selues vpon this principle and maxime in diuinitie that adoration is due onely to God and therefore that God onely is to be worshipped Lu 4. Deu 6. De vera religi cap. 54. And so S. Augustine saith It is very well recorded in the Scriptures that man was prohibited by an Angel to worship none but onely God vnder whom hee himselfe was a fellowe seruant And therefore hee saith Ecce vnum Deum colo Behold I worship and adore none but God alone And thence he deriueth the name of religion quòd ei vni religet animas nostras because it religeth our soules onely to him But the papists as before hath beene alleadged in their seruice ioyne with the worship of God the worship of Angels the worship of the Crucifix the worship of images the adoration of the Sacrament of the Altar as they call it whereunto they ascribe diuine honour and worship Hauing thus farre proued vnto you that God and Baal cannot both be serued together no more then God and Dagon can stand together it remaineth now in the third place that I intreate of the Prophet Elias his exhortion to the people wherein he exhorteth to constancie in religion and following God Part. 3 3. Part. Constancie preseuerance and continuance in the true knowledge of God are vertues required of all such as intend to lead a godly and a Christian life and finally resolue to finish the period of their liues in defence and maintenance of the true religion of Iesus Christ Math. 24.13 Reue. 3.11 He that continueth to the end shall be saued Behold saith God to the Angell of the Church of Philadelphia behold I come shortly behold that which thou hast that no man take away thy crowne And in the 2. of the Reuelation thus the sonne of God speaketh to the rest of them of Thiatyra which knew not the deepenesse of Sathan I will put vpon you none other burden but this holdfast that which you haue vntill I come Reue. 2.24.25 Heb. 10.23 And the Apostle to the Hebrewes giueth vs this aduise and counsell that we should keepe the profession of our hope without wauering so that being rooted and grounded in true knowledge and built vpon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Iesus Christ himselfe being the head and chiefe corner stone we should not henceforth be children any more wauering and carried about with euery blast of doctrine Ephe. 4.14 by the deceit of men and with craftinesse whereby they lye in waite to deceiue The diuell knowing full well what this hope of our saluation is ceaseth not continually to bend his force against the foundation and fortresse of our faith And surely if Sathan by his principall Ministers the Iesuites and Seminarie Priests can once shake the ground worke whereon we build our health and Saluation which is the affiance in Christ our God and credite to his word if he can but once perswade vs to retire from that hold and ground we stand vpon as vpon an vnmoueable rocke then hath he wonne his desire then enters he with banners displaied vpon vs tossing vs vp downe with euery blast of doctrine and beateth vs downe to the pit of damnation For the easier compassing of this his wicked designement some be perswaded by arguments and by reasons to forsake their faith and so by this meanes draweth them to sundrie heresies and errours others he forceth by torments and persecutions quite to giue ouer their hold others againe he winneth and allureth to himselfe with baites of pleasures to denie Christ and so Iulian perceiuing that torments could not preuaile to cause the Christians to reuenge their profession gaue them the greatest roomes and honours of his kingdome euen as Sathan when he could not by argument ouercome our Sauiour Christ offered him all the kingdomes of the world if he would fall downe before him and worship him The onely powerfull meanes to withstand all the forcible assaults of Sathan is whensoeuer he offereth vs to runne to the walles of faith betaking our selues each man to his defēce as in the certaine truth of gods eternall testament 2. Thess 2.15 1. Cor. 16.13 Stand fast saith the Apostle to the Thessalonians and keepe the traditions which ye haue beene taught And to the Corinthians to the same purpose he saith watch ye stand fast and quite your selues like men and be strong Let the feare of the Lord be vpon you Sticke fast vnto the Lord and cleaue vnto him with a perpetuall couenant which shall neuer be forgotten Three waies there are whereby we may grow to this resolution first by remembring the intolerable paines of hell if wee doe reuolt secondly by thinking of the vnspeakable ioyes of heauen if wee continue firme Thirdly looking vpon such who haue suffered before vs and to propose them vnto vs for examples of imitation And so to shew the like constancie in cleauing vnto God which they did We haue recorded in scripture the examples of Dauid of the three children of Eleazar and sundrie others who for the zeale they bare to the religion of their God were resolute to indure most cruell torments The Apostle to the Hebrewes mentioneth such who being strong in faith when they were tried by racking yet would not or cared not to be deliuered that they might receiue a better resurrection Heb 11.35 We haue againe in the Ecclesiasticall Histories the examples of eighteene hundred thousand Christians in the time of the tenne primitiue persecutions which were done to most cruell deaths onely because they would not forsake their Christian religion And to come neerer home to our owne daies we haue examples of our owne brethren in Queene Maries daies who for the zeale they bare to the house of God were content to yeeld their backes to the scourge their neckes to the tormentours their bodies to the furious flames of fire their soules with ioy into the hands of him that made them Concerning whom I doubt not but that euery true member of the Catholike Church may wish from her very heart that his soule might
Priest takes bread and coniureth it away by breathing vpon it Lastly Christ ordained his last Supper and instituted this Sacrament of his bodie and bloud to this ende that we should continually remember his death vntill his second comming and for that cause it is called Eucharistia And whereas Eusebius saith that Christ commaunded vs to offer vp a remembrance of his death in steed of a Sacrifice the popish church not contēting themselues with this sacrifice of praise and thanksgiuing wherein we celebrate the remembrance and as Nazianzene calleth it A figure of that great mysterie of the death of Christ they hold that their Masse which they call The daily Sacrifice of the Church is not a commemoratiue but a reall sacrifice not a figure and remembrance of that which is past but the thing it selfe that the sacrifice Christ offered vpon the Crosse and theirs in the Masse is all one that the same bodie of Christ which was borne of the Virgin Marie and which was offered vp vpon the Crosse for our Redemption is the very same euen idem numero with that which is offered vp by the Priest to God the Father in the Masse for the remission of sinnes By these materiall differences which here I haue set downe it is plainely manifest that the popish Masse doth in manie things varie swarue from the institution of Christ as most plainly is to be seene in the 11. cha of 1. Corint vers 23. where the Apostle at large doth describe the whole order and institution of the Lords Supper And thus it is euidently to be perceiued that the Masse as now it is vsed is nothing else but an heape of sinfull deuises and abuses inuented by Sathan and broached by Antichrist to deface frustrate the Lords supper where besides their fruitelesse praiers and superstitious ceremonies their priuate and halfe communion subuerteth the Lordes institution their sacrifice derogateth from his death and bloud-sheading their adoration of bread and wine conuinceth them of hainous Idolatrie But to proue that Protestancy and poperie cannot be reconciled First the Papists themselues bold the differences betweene vs to bee such that it is impossible for any Protestant to be saued Againe all the grounded diuines of the Protestants religion insist vpon the same differēce That sundry points of poperie doe quite raze the verie foundation of Christian religion Marke saith Bishop Iewell to D. Harding What yee were lately and what yee would now seeme to bee what way yee trode then and what way yee treade now the difference is no lesse then betweene light and darkenesse life and death heauen and hell so great a change saith hee would require some good time of deliberation Which asseueration of that worthy Bishop how agreeable it is to the truth and consonant to the practise of the ancient Catholike church and Doctors thereof who would neuer yeeld I will not say in an opinion but not so much as in a forme of speech or in the chāge of a letter sounding against the orthodoxall faith and whether there bee not in sundry fundamentall points of faith great and many differences betweene Rome and vs let it be duely considered by these instances following The first maine point of Catholike doctrine which the Papists goe directly against is the doctrine of free iustification by faith alone which doctrine D. Bishop in his Epistle dedicatory to the K. Maiestie setteth down as a maine heresie that Luther layed for the ground of his religion namely that a man is iustified by faith alone But I demaund of any sober Papist not too much wedded to the preiudice of his own opinion what other or what better foundation could any man lay then that which is already laid which is Iesus Christ which doctrine is the very life and soule of the Church For this was the Catholike faith of the church of Rome when S. Paule wrote his Epistle vnto them that a man is iustified gratis Rom. 3.24 for God a mercie for nothing and that by the grace of God without the workes of the law Quite contrarie to which doctrine of the Apostle the Papists hold iustification by workes of grace auouching that we are not iustified before God onely by the merites of Christ but also by our owne doings affirming that good workes are truely and properly meritorious and the causes of our saluation and that heauen is as truely the reward of good workes as hell is the stipend of euill workes that good workes doe fully satisfie the law of God and worthily deserue eternall life and that good workes wrought and done in the state of grace are so farre meritorious as that God should be vniust if he rendred not heauen for the same charging the iustice of God not in respect of his promise as the Apostle doth but in respect of merite and desert of workes Where we clearely perceiue and see that there is a great difference betweene the Church of Rome and vs euen in the principall Article of our faith touching the Saluation of our soules we beleeuing stedfastly that it is to be ascribed to the merites of Christ they expecting it for the merit of their workes Another substantiall point of the Catholike faith the Papists directly impugne in maintaining a daily reall sacrifice of the body of Christ in their Masse for the sins of the quicke and dead which they hold to be a very soueraigne true and propitiatorie sacrifice in all respects of power and vertue as auailable and as effectuall as was the sacrifice on the crosse for the remission of sinnes For the disproofe of which most wicked and blasphemous assertion there be sundrie arguments and proofes to be produced out of the word of God First if Christ could haue bene offered more then once then must he likewise after haue suffered Heb. 9.25.26 But now in the end of the world he hath appeared once to put away sinne by the sacrifice of himselfe Heb. 9.26 Therefore he cannot now any more be offered in the Masse Againe that thing is in vaine and to none effect where there is no necessitie it should be done but to offer vp any more sacrifice propitiatorie for the quicke and the dead there is no necessitie the reason whereof the Apostle giueth to be this because Christ hath offered one sacrifice and with that one sacrifice and offering vp of himselfe hath consecrated for euer them that are sanctified Heb. 10 12.14 This must then be the conclusion that there is no necessitie why we should offer vp Christ any more for remission of sinnes Thirdly the reason why the Priests of the old law did yearely repeate their sacrifices was this because those sacrifices yearely offered could neuer take away sinnes Heb. 10.11 But the sacrifice of Christ once offered hath sanctified the commers thereunto for wee are sanctified euen by the offering of the bodie of Iesus Christ once made Heb. 10.10 Therefore seeing that Christ by that one oblation of himselfe hath
die the death of those righteous persons and that his latter end might be like vnto theirs This is then the exhortation which Elias giueth to those wauing and wauering Israelites which could not resolue whether God or Baal was to be worshipped if God be the Lord follow him cleaue fast vnto him and serue him with all the desire of your hearts but God is the Lord yea the onely Lord therefore he onely is to be worshipped It is the Lord onely that formeth the light and createth the darkenesse it is he that hath made all things which hath spread out the heauens alone and stretched out the earth by himselfe it is he that can foretell things before they come to passe it is he alone that can say my counsell shall stand and whatsoeuer I will haue come to passe shall come to passe it is he that bringeth Princes to nothing and maketh the iudges of the earth as vanitie yea it is the euerlasting God that hath created the ends of the earth and bringeth out all their armies by numbers and calleth them all by their names And therefore he onely is the Lord. As for Baal if he be a God let him plead for himselfe against him that cast downe his Altar Iudi. 6.31 saith Ioas the father of Gideon after that his sonne had destroyed the Altar of Baal and cut downe the groue that was by it Baal can giue you nothing he can doe neither good nor euill and therefore he is no god though a man cry vnto him yet cannot he answere him nor deliuer him out of his tribulation and therefore he is no God The Papists are much grieued with vs because we will not acknowledge the Sacrament of the Altar to be our Lord and our God and thereupon cast this vniust aspersion vpon vs and falsely charge vs that We call the bodie of Christ an abominable idoll True it is indeed that we call that an abominable idoll Which they terme the body of Christ and vnder that pretence fall downe before it to worship it and call it Lord and God in doing whereof what other thing doe they but make a God of a peece of bread and vnder the name of the bodie of Christ set vp an Idoll in the Church of God But as for the bodie of Christ wee haue euermore confessed with Chrysostome that it is worthie of the highest honour 1. Cor Homil 14. as being inseparablie ioyned to his God-heade in one person sitting now at the right hand of God and wee adore it and worship it euen as the bodie of the sonne of God not onely for the turning of an hand as the Papists vse to do while the priest is able to hold vp the Sacrament and that with doubt of our selues whether wee doe well or no which thing is vtterly vncomfortable and dangerous and full of terrours to the conscience but we worship that blessed and glorious bodie as that blessed Martyr S. Stephen did being in heauen at the right hand of the power of God and therefore without doubt or danger and that at all times and for euer and we belieue and thus wee teach that Iesus Christ euen in the nature and substance of our flesh is the Lord in the glorie of God the Father Howbeit we say Christs bodie is one thing the Sacrament another The Sacramēt is an earthly thing Christs bodie an heauenly thing the Sacrament is corruptible Christs bodie is glorious the Sacrament is receiued into our bodies Christs body is only receiued into our soules and entreth not into our bodies S. Luke reporteth how that the Disciples of Christ being abashed at Christes suddaine presence among them Luk 24 38.39 and through feare supposing they had seene a spirite or Ghost our Sauiour spake vnto them in this manner Why are yee troubled and wherefore doe doubts arise in your hearts behold mine handes and my feete for it is I my selfe handle mee and see me for a spirite hath not flesh and bones as yee see me haue and so shewed them both his hands and his feete Euen so verily the Sacrament it selfe if it could speake would speake in this manner at the time of the eleuation to the standers by why doe such thoughts arise in your harts as to thinke that I am your Lord and God Why stand ye thus gazing thus knocking your breasts and bending your knees to me Handle me taste me and looke vpon me and see whether I haue not all the naturall properties of true bread that is whether I haue not the very forme shape sauour smell colour and weight of bread As for the bodie of Christ it cannot bee broken with hands or grated with teeth or conueied into the bellie as you see that I am The bread of life cannot be felt seene or tasted or discerned by any outward sence as you see that I am and therefore belieue them not which teach you otherwise for I am bread I am no God Quarta Pars. Hauing thus farre spoken of the exhortation of the Prophet Elias wherein hee exhorteth them to be constant in religion and constant in the confession of him which is the onely true God it remaineth now in the last place to shewe vnto you what the successe was which insued vpon the Prophets reproofe which at the first was thus that the people answered him not a word standing in doubt whether hee were the onely God or no. But a little afterwards when they saw how miraculouslie the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust and licked vp the water which was in the ditch 1. King 18.38 being moued with this strange and miraculous worke of God they were sodainly changed in their opinions and falling on their faces cryed out the Lord is God the Lord is God Where we may see that howsoeuer it may be that God permitteth his owne people for some certaine time to fall into manie dangerous errours yet such is his great mercie towards them that first or last he calleth them home againe and will not suffer them finallie to perish as here hee dealt with his owne people of Israell There is no one thing more commonly obiected by Papists against the religion of the Protestants then that as they say wee haue no miracles in our church If your Church be the true church if the doctrine you teach be the true Catholike faith of Christ where bee your miracles say they and where bee those signes and wonders among you which may proue vnto vs that your religion is of God To the which objection I answere with Chrysostome Opere imperfecto Hom 49. that there was a time wherein of olde it was knowne by miracles who were true Christians who were false and where a man might finde the true Church of God indeede but now saith hee the working of miracles is quite taken away and is rather found among them that are false Christians Which