In respect whereof thou oughtest also if thou be in any doubt not only to take upon thee the labor of reading this or any such Treatise that may help thee therein but also to travel both by Sea and Land Countries and Kingdoms if we believe S. Austin that both said and practised the same to seek out the Truth and Certainty of Catholic Religion whereby only and by no other ways and means under Heaven may a man be saved or escape Everlasting Damnation as holy Athanasius protesteth in his Creed Wherefore this ought to be unto us as the same Father saith that rich Jewel found in the Field for buying whereof we should not stick to sell or lose all other temporal Goods or Riches that we have seeing Christ our Savior doth so much commend them that did so and thereby inciteth us also to do the like 9. And the same Doctor S. Austin together with S. Chrysostom and other Fathers do reprehend greatly the sluggishness of divers men in their days that seeing Sects and Heresies to arise and diversities of Religion in almost every Country did not bestir themselves to try out the Truth but were content either to accept of every Novelty thrust upon them or to remain doubtful or indifferent which in some sort is a worse state than the other For as the Prophecy and Prediction of our Savior is clear that such times of Heresie and Contradiction should come when one Sect would say here is Christ and another there is Christ One Heretic would cry here is the Church here is the true Doctrin here is Reformation and another deny it So the Apostle expoundeth the hidden Providence of Almighty God in this permission of his to wit ut qui probati sunt manifesti fiant that those who are men of proof should be made manifest among us And how then in a time of proof and of so special trial when so great a Crown is to be gained are men so negligent slothful and fearful in shewing and declaring themselves S. Chrysostom yields this reason which is severe Quia neque promissio beatitudinis ejus saith he desideratur neque judicium comminationis timetur c. It is for that neither God's promise of Eternal Felicity in the next Life is desired by these slothful people nor his threat of Judgment feared And yet saith the same Father si Vestimenta empturus gyras unum negotiatorem alterum c. if you were to buy a Garment you go about from one Seller or Merchant to another to see and examin where the best is to be found And how much more ought this to be done to try out true Religion 10. If a pretension were made saith one to take away your Temporal Lands and Livings or that any new doubts should be put in the Title of your Inheritance or that it should be call'd in question by any Promoters or busie people whether you were true Owners of such and such Lands and Livings or no you would quickly start and bestir your selves looking out Records and Writings for confirmation of your Right and Title and would seek Lawyers to plead and defend the same and you would make account of ancient Witnesses for proof thereof All which you neglecting in this case of trial about Catholic Religion against Heretics which is more clear in it self if men would attend unto it than any other proof of Possession Right Interest Title or Inheritance whatsoever this negligence I say doth clearly declare that men have more care and cogitation of Temporalities than of Eternity of Earth than of Heaven and of this miserable short and vanishing Life than of God's Everlasting Kingdom and their Immortal reigning with him 11. And thus much be spoken by the way concerning the judgment sense and feeling of ancient holy Fathers about the care and sollicitude that every true Christian ought to have for informing himself soundly and substantially but especially in time of Heresies what the truth and certainty of Cath. Religion is lest being negligent therein and yielding overmuch to the cogitation of worldly affairs he be deceived before he be aware and carried away to Perdition by the present surge and sway of Innovations under the colour and name of New Reformations persuading himself that he goeth right and hath no need of further advice or information therein 12. For preventing of which most perilous course held alas by too many of our Country at this day who persuade themselves that either matters of Religion appertain not greatly unto them or that they go well as they are or that they may remain indifferent or attend to worldly affairs and let the other alone or at leastwise do imagin by the multitude of contradictions which they see and hear every where that it is a hard matter to discern which Party hath the Truth or where that Certainty lieth For help I say in all these Points but especially the last I have thought best to publish this Treatise which I trust shall be a sufficient Light for discerning Truth to them that will vouchsafe to peruse the same for that it doth briefly clearly and in whole sum or view lay before them the Verity of Catholic Religion the Off-spring Increase and Continuance thereof together with the Fraud and Falshood of all Sects whatsoever but especially those of our time 13. And it is here to be noted that as in Suits and Controversies about Temporal Lands and Livings belonging to any Estate or Lordship a man may take two ways of proof and trial against Quarrellers that craftily and falsly would intrude or make pretension thereunto The first by alleging particular Evidences for every part and parcel thereof severally as for this Close this Meadow this Park that Pasture those Woods that Glebe-land and the like which way as you see is more prolix and troublesom There is therefore a second more short and general whereby a man proving One point proveth All as if we would take upon us to shew that the chief Mansion-house of the said Lordship in Controversie whereunto all the rest belong is Ours and hath been ever held by our Ancestors and that we are true Successors Heirs and Inheritors to them This Issue I say were more short and sure and this is that in which I do now join plea with our Adversaries especially with J. Fox in name of all his Brother-Protestants to wit that whereas other men hitherto have taken upon them to defend and prove particular Points of Controversies severally As for example the Real Presence Purgatory Prayer to Saints Seven Sacraments and the like which are but Branches of our whole Cause my purpose is to prove all together by joyning the foresaid Issue about the chief Mansion-house and true Owners thereof that is to say the true Catholic Church and lawful Family thereunto belonging descending from Christ himself for that we proving this only we prove the whole no man being able to deny but
conform to this do speak also other ancient Fathers as well Greek as Latin and one thing is specially to be noted That both the Greek and Latin Church did agree therein in the said Council there being present two Patriarchs of the Greek Church to wit those of Constantinople and Hierusalem and others both Archbishops Bishops and Prelates So as of both Churches the Archbishops were 70 the Bishops 412 Abbots and Priors 800 and Prelates in all 1215 together with the Legats Doctors and Embassadors of both Empires West and East as also of the Kings of France Spain England Hierusalem and others So as this point of Doctrin about Transubstantiation was not hanled in corners but publicly and the Council doth not deliver the same as any New Doctrin but only as an Explication of That which ever had been held before 19. And the same is answered to the other-like Heretical Cavils about other points here objected by Fox and Sir Francis of an Vniversal Pope the use of the Mass and Propitiatory Sacrifice the setting up of dead Mens Images and the like For if they understand by the first the Primacy and Supreme Authority Ecclesiastical of the See of Rome and her Bishops and by the second the Christian external Sacrifice of the Body and Blood of our Savior instituted by himself as the Complement of all other Sacrifices that went before and by the third Sacred Memories and Images of Christ and his Saints that are not dead but living and reigning everlastingly in Heaven then are all these Doctrins howsoever disguised by Heretics with different words to make them more odious most true and Catholic Doctrins and received in the Church from the beginning and continued from the Apostles downward 20. And albeit these People to continue cavilling do alledge divers times that the first of these Articles about the Popes Supremacy did begin first under Pope Gregory the Great and Phocas the Emperor about the year of Christ 600 and that the last about the Vse of Images was decreed in the second General Council of Nice about the year 700 and that the other of the Use of Mass began by little and little they cannot tell when yet is this all most ridiculous and themselves dare not stand to any certain time by them assigned for that presently we appoint another time before that wherein these things were also acknowledged which they cannot do in the Heresies by us objected to them for that we shew indeed the very true time wherein they began and had their off-spring together with the proper Authors Places Occasions and other-like particularities recorded not by our selves but by other authentical Writers before us so as reasonably there can be no doubt thereof And herein stands the true difference between us We really and substantially shew the Beginning and Authors of their Heresies for that they are Heresies indeed but They cannot shew the Beginning or Author of any of our Articles of Belief since Christ and his Apostles for that they are no Heresies but Catholic Doctrins and have ever endured from Christ downward tho' in some Ages more than other they have been expounded or declared by Fathers and Councils according to the necessities of the time and this is one proper Office of the Holy Ghost appointed for Guider of the Church to explain matters as doubts do arise 21. Wherefore this is the first way of trial whether the foresaid Articles of the Roman Religion taught at this day about Transubstantiation Mass and the like be the same that Pope Eleutherius held and sent into Britanny or not And I do call all this kind of Argument Negative both in respect of our Adversaries that deny them to have been then in use and of Us that deny them to have been brought in afterward And they ought to prove the second seeing they cannot deny but that they were once generally in use and received over Christendom Whereof we do make the former most infallible Inference with St. Augustin That forasmuch as they were once in use and generally received and no particular beginning can be shewed of them or of their entrance Ergo They came from the Apostles themselves 22. To this Inference the Sectaries and Heretics of our time have one only shift more which is That albeit these Doctrins have for many Ages been received generally in the Church of Christendom yet that they crept into the same by little and little and finding no resistance began at last to be universally believed But this creeping Instance can have no place here by any probability For to say nothing of the Providence of God in protecting his Church from such creeping Errors nor yet of the Promises of Christ before-mentioned to the same effect Reason it self doth demonstrate also that this possibly could not be For if the Doctors and Fathers of the Church did note and discover from time to time every least Heresie or Error that did peep up in their days and this not only in Heretics but in divers principal Fathers also that held any particular Opinions as is manifest in St. Cyprian Lactantius Arnobius Cassianus and others If this diligence I say were used by them in all other occasions how could it happen that so many so manifest and so important Doctrins as are in controversie between Us and Protestants should be let pass without Note or Contradiction if they had been either New or Erroneous How should it come to pass I say that no one of these ancient Fathers should ever impugn any of these Doctrins if they were New Opinions and brought into the Church contrary to the Doctrin that was before as these men do say Yea how should it fall out that no one Record in the World should be left by our Ancestors that at such a time by such or such occasions began the Doctrin of Purgatory of Praying to Saints of the Real Presence of the Vse of Images of Mass and Sacrifice of seven Sacraments and the like that were not held in the Church before 23. And that this is impossible may be shewed by this experimental Deduction which now I will set down Let us imagin that none of these Doctrins were in the first Age under the Apostles and namely that then there were but two Sacraments no Purgatory at all or any External Sacrifice held We ask them concerning the second Age wherein Justinus Polycarpus Irenaeus Clemens Alexandrinus and Tertullian were chief Teachers whether these Doctrins were in this Age or no If they deny it tho' we might prove the contrary out of their Works yet not to pass from this first kind of Argument we ask the like of the third Age under Origen Cyprian Dionysius Alexandrinus Pamphilus Arnobius and the rest And if they deny of this Age also that these Doctrins were not held by them we go to the fourth Age under Athanasius Hilarius Optatus Basil Nazianzen Ambrose Hierom Chrysostom Epiphanius Cyrillus In whose Writings
established over the World than in any other former Ages And to come unto the particulars there sate in the See of Rome as High-Bishops of the Universal Church from Pope Alexander II. that sent a Banner blessed unto William the Conqueror at his entrance into England and was the 162 Pope from St. Peter to our time unto Pope Gregory XI under whom Wickliff began his Doctrin 45 Popes and in the Roman Empire from Henry IV. unto Charles IV. succeeded 19 Emperours and in the Crown of England 10 or 11 Kings from the Conqueror to Edward III. under which Kings there succeeded by Election in the Metropolitan See of Canterbury from Stigand and Lanfrank unto Thomas Arundel 20 Archbishops All which both Popes and Emperours of the Universal Church as also the Kings and Archbishops of our Island agree uniformly in Faith and Religion without any difference at all and so it continued in our Island For albeit towards the end of this time John Wickliff with his Followers and some other Sectaries especially the Lollards rose up in our Country and caused many troubles both in England and other places yet neither the State of England nor any of our Princes and much less any Bishops or Archbishops ever suffered themselves to be infected therewith So as for the manifest continuation both of Men and Doctrin in these Ages we have no less visible Succession both of Bishops Doctors and Faith than before we have shewed in the former Ages the Succession of Bishops being evident in every Country and Church by their particular Stories and Records as also of Teachers and Doctrin as now we shall shew 18. The principal Learned Men also and Doctors of this time from the Conquest to Wickliff are known As for Example Burchardus Petrus Damianus Lanfrank Anselmus Oecumenius Marianus Scotus Ivo Carnotensis Lambertus Schafnaburgensis Rupertus Abbas Enthymius St. Bernard Peter Lombard Gratianus Albertus Magnus St. Thomas of Aquin Nicephorus Calixtus and many other downward In which time there are accounted some ten or eleven Synods and Councils to have been held in divers Countries for suppressing of Heresies and Sects that did from time to time peep up and reforming of abuses in former times and two of them to have been General to wit that of Lateran and of Constance wherein Wickliff was condemned 19. The most notorious Sects also of this time which against these Doctors Councils and Synods did strive were the Bogomilians the Petrobusians the Arnardistes the Waldenses or poor men of Lyons the Albigenses of Tholosa the Cathari or Puritans the Flagellantes or Whippers the Begardians the Beguisnes and Fraticelli or little Brethren the Lollards and Wickliffists and the rest that ensued Against all which the Church proceeded in all this time by Censures of Councils and Bishops as in all other times before against such men and must do to the Worlds end 20. And now this being so tell me good Reader whether it be not true which St. Augustin saith That it is as easie in all Ages to see where the true visible Church goeth as to see the Sun at noon day when it shineth clearest And where will John Fox go now to seek himself a private hidden Church among Christians except he patch it up of those Heretics by me named and other like as he doth And therein dealeth as if one having shewed the Descent and Continuance of the most Noble and most Ancient House of England by their Arms and Actions would condemn them all presently to have degenerated and bring in a Company of Beggars or Brothers that have run out of that House or were beaten from thence affirming These only to be of the ancient Race of that Family Or as if a man would say of the City of London that for these thousand years and more all those Men or Women that have been punished by the same City for Malefactors were the true Citizens indeed and the others that punished them only Intruders 21. In which Examples notwithstanding tho' they be ridiculous yet is there much more reason or probability than in the other for that any temporal House or Family whatsoever may degenerate and be wholly perverted and any City whatsoever may err alter or be turned upside-down by disorder but the Catholic Church cannot except we deny both the Promise Power and Godhead of Christ himself as our Heretics in effect do tho' not in words whilst they make to themselves a new scarce-visible Church of elect people to wit of their own Election and thereby are forced to say that the great visible Church begun by Christ and continued for many Ages together did at length about the time appointed by Fox tho' they cannot agree at what time wholly forsake Christ and fall to Apostacy becoming the Synagogue of Sathan an Enemy to Christ instead of his Family Kingdom and dearly-beloved Spouse which is so foul and foolish yea ignominious and monstrous an absurdity that it doth not only contradict the whole course of Scriptures which did prophesie and foretell the visible durance and continuance of this Church until the Worlds end but that it should also be the Pillar and Firmament of Truth and so assisted by Christ and his holy Spirit that it should never err nor bring into error and much less fade away or perish 22. The most Learned Father St. Augustin doth handle this matter every-where against the Donatists who like our Protestants would needs have the Universal visible Church in their time to have erred and fallen from Christ and they only as elect Vessels make the true Church tho' scarce visible to the eyes of the World as Fox saith of his Church gathered up of lurking Heretics here and there as after you shall see declared Against which absurdity St. Augustin disputed most learnedly solving first the Arguments which they allege of some evil Men or Popes that may have been in the Church if all were true as they say Nullius hominis quamvis sceleratum immane peccatum c. That no man's sin being never so heinous can prejudicate the promises of God for the visible continuance of the Church to the Worlds end neither can any Impiety of any men whatsoever within the Church bring to pass that the Faith of God which was contained in the promises made to the ancient Fathers concerning the Church of Christ to come and to be spread over the World and now fulfilled in our days should be made void c. 23. And again Albeit this Church be sometimes obscured and shadowed by multitude of scandals yea even then doth she shine and is eminent in her most firm Members c. And yet further Sed illa Ecclesia quae fuit omnium gentium non est periit hoc dicunt qui in illa non sunt O impudentem vocem Illa non est quia in illa tu non es But perhaps you will say saith he to the Donatists that that
wrong Cause 32. How large a Treatise Fox maketh of St. Thomas Becket and his contention with King Henry II. and how shamefully he doth bely and revile him every-where hath been shewed sufficiently before in my Answer to Sir Francis Hastings as also of the Fable of the poysoning of K. John. And as for the Histories the Waldenses Albigenses whom he meaneth to lay for the first Foundations of his visible Church upon Earth he handleth matters so falsly and partially contrary to the testimony of all Antiquity as a man may easily see that the whole contexture of his Story is nothing else but a perpetual woven thread of wilful and malicious Falshoods and for that I shall have occasion to speak again of these Heretics in the next Chapter wherein we have to handle the Succession of John Fox his visible Protestant Church from Wickliff downward I shall say no more thereof here but remit me to that which ensueth CHAP. IX Of the time from John Wickliff unto the beginning of the Reign of King Henry VIII containing about 140 years And how the Roman Church and John Fox his Church passed in these days BY that which hath been said before from Age to Age of the apparent and manifest Descent Progress and Continuation of the Catholic Roman Church and of her State and Condition as well in England as in other parts of the Christian World at the rising of John Wickliff an English-man about the year of Christ 1371 it is not hard to make the like deduction of the same Church from that time unto the year of Christ 1560 when her Majesty that now is had a little before begun her Reign and established the form of Religion that now is held in England For as for the Popes and chief Ecclesiastical Governors of the Roman Church in this time they are publicly known their Names Number and Succession one to another from Innocentius VI. Vrbanus V. and Gregory XI who first condemned Wickliff's Doctrin unto Pope Pius V. that entred the Roman See at the beginning of her Majesties Reign being in number about Thirty and all of one Faith and Religion the one with the other 2. The Emperours also both of the West and East Empire so long as it lasted are known to have been of the self-same Religion excepting some Disobedience and Schismatical Opinions in some of the Greek Emperours against the Church of Rome for which it may be thought that God of his Justice gave them over at length together with their Empire into Infidels hands about the year of Christ 1450 Constantinus the Twelfth of that Name sirnamed Paleologus being the last of that Race 3. The manner also of proceeding in Ecclesiastical matters by this Church in this time was like unto the former to wit by conserving and continuing the Faith of their Ancestors and precedent times defending the same with like diligence against Innovations of Heretics partly by the Writings of Catholic Learned Men Doctors and Preachers which in these Ages were as Gregorius Ariminensis Laurentius Justinianus Thomas de Kempis Bartholomeus Vrbinas Thomas Waldensis Joannes Gerson Alphonsus Tostatus Sanctus Vincentius Sanctus Antoninus Sanctus Bernardinus Senensis Nicolaus Cusanus Jo. Tritemius Jo. Naucleras Albertus Pius Eckius Empserus Clicthoveus and many other Learned Catholic Writers By whose diligence the Heretics in these Ages were every-where refuted But especially were they repressed by the Authority of Synods and Councils as well Provincial and National as General also to which effect were their latter General Councils the first of Florence under Pope Eugenius IV. against the Heretics and Schismatics of those times about the year of Christ 1432 the second of Lateran under Julius II. and Leo X. about the year of Christ 1513 and the third of Trent against Lutherans Zwinglians Calvinists Anabaptists and other such fresher Heretics of our days under Pope Paulus IV. Pius IV. and Pius V. which Council was begun about the year 1445. 4. And albeit in this time as in former Ages there wanted not troublesom Spirits and new-fangling Heads to impugn and exercise this Church as the Wickliffians Hussites Pickards Adamites Thaborites Orebites and other such Sectaries going before Lutherans Zwinglians Calvinists Anabaptists Trinitarians and other like new Dogmatists of our days yet were they always discovered resisted vanquished and condemned by the same ordinary Process of Ecclesiastical Censures and Judgment excommunicated anathematiz'd and delivered over to Sathan by the Authority of this Church as all other Heretics were in former Ages and consequently are like to have the self-same final end howsoever they ruffle or resist for a time 5. And this being now the demonstration of our Catholic Church most clear and evident to all them that have Eyes of Understanding to see and Grace to consider the Truth let us pass over to the view of John Fox's Church which having been hitherto invisible from Christ downward and only imaginary or Mathematical as you have seen for that he hath scarce named any to have been of that Church yet now from this time forward he will begin to exhibit unto us a real visible Church on his part that is to say a Succession or rather Representation of divers Professors of his Religion or of some Points thereof at leastwise wherein they differ from the Roman For he doth not think it needful for those of his Church to agree in all Articles nor doth he bind himself to the Rule of St. Augustin Ecclesia universaliter perfecta est in nullo claudicat The true Church is universally perfect and doth halt in no one point of Belief But he thinketh it sufficient for his men to agree in some things against the Roman Church and to have some sparkles of Truth in it as before he affirmed albeit therewithal they should have some blemishes and errors also as a little after we will declare 6. The Catalogue of these Protestant Professors whereof Fox would make up his Church we shall handle in the Chapter following Now we are only to tell you that from this time of Wickliff downwards he meaneth to lay down the visible Succession of his Church and to that effect he storeth up all those that held the Articles of the foresaid Wickliff or Husse for Gospellers of his Church whatsoever they held otherwise against him or different among themselves And if any of them or others were punished for their Opinions by our Church then doth he register them for Martyrs or Confessors of the same Church which yet he never durst do before this time albeit there were divers other Sectaries in former Ages that symboliz'd with him in divers Articles as hath been shewed 7. Yea in this matter we may see John Fox also play the Fox and fetch many windings and turnings to deceive his Reader for that at the very entrance of his prolix and tedious Treatise of John Wickliff whom he proposeth as a chosen man raised
up by God for lightening the World and impugning the Church of Rome he leaveth to himself a starting-hole for all necessities when he shall be pressed telling us That albeit in John Wickliff 's Opinions and Assertions some blemishes perhaps may be noted yet such blemishes they be which rather declare him to be a man that might err than which directly did fight against Christ our Savior c. 8. Consider I pray you what a Defence this is Perhaps saith he some blemishes may be noted as tho' the matter were in doubt whether he had any blemishes in his Doctrin or no. Which yet after the Fox is forced to confess and to disclaim them openly And further he addeth full wisely That if he have blemishes or errors in Doctrin they are such as do rather prove that he was a man and might err than that he did directly fight against Christ Mark the manner of his Defence His errors do prove only That he was a man and might err And so I say also of the worst Heretics that their errors and blemishes in Doctrin do prove that they were men and erring men yea wicked men also in that they obstinately defended their own errors And so I say of Wickliff in like manner But mark what followeth Rather than that he did fight directly against Christ Which is as much as to say that it importeth not much tho' he impugned Christ indirectly if directly he did not fight against him And may not any Heretics that ever lived be defended in this sort No Heretics do openly and directly impugn Christ but rather pretend to honor him above others bearing ever the Names not only of Christians but also of the best and most reformed Christians and consequently they never fought directly against Christ but indirectly pretending one thing and doing another 9. After John Fox hath greatly justified Wickliff by divers Leaves of Paper together he cometh to set down 23 of his first Articles condemned by the Church of England at that day and that as Fox confesseth by special chosen Judges gathered together to wit eight Bishops fifteen Religious Learned Men of divers Orders fourteen Doctors and six Batchelors of Divinity all which Fox doth name and contemn And yet these Articles tho' in divers points they concur with Luther Zwinglius and Calvin's Doctrin in these days yet in others they do greatly disagree and Fox I think will not defend them As for Example The fourth Article is That if a Bishop or Priest should give Holy Orders or consecrate the Sacrament of the Altar or minister Baptism whiles he is in mortal sin in were nothing available 10. Will Fox yield to this Article think you For if he do we may call in doubt whether ever he were well baptiz'd and consequently whether he were a Christian seeing it may be doubted whether the Priest that baptiz'd him were in mortal sin or no when he did it And again the ninth Article is That it is against Scripture for any Ecclesiastical Ministers to have any temporal possessions at all This Article if Fox will grant yet his Fellow-Ministers and his Lords the Bishops I presume will hardly yield thereunto but will pretend Scriptures to the contrary against Wickliff Let us see the rest The tenth Article is That no Prelate ought to excommunicate any person except he know him first to be excommunicated by God. The fifteenth is That so long as a man is in deadly sin he is neither Bishop nor Prelate The sixteenth is That Temporal Lords may according to their own wills and discretion take away the Temporal Goods from any Church men whensoever they offend The seventeenth is That Tythes are meer Alms and may be detained by the Parishioners and bestowed where they will at their pleasure 11. These were some of Wickliff's first Articles condemn'd at Oxford about the year of Christ 1380 but after he published many worse And I would here know of John Fox Whether He and his Fellow-Ministers will allow of these Articles or no And if not but that they will have them accounted for his blemishes or errors as Fox calleth them then may we also with better reason account for blemishes and errors his other Propositions wherein he agreeth with the Protestants against Us as I doubt not but that John Fox will account those also wherein he agreeth with Us against Him which are many and far more than the former wherein he joyneth with Him against Us as may be gathered by these few Articles alleged here by Fox himself whereby tho' mingled with much other erroneous Doctrin as you see it is evident that Wickliff held divers Points also of Catholic Religion as Holy Orders Consecration Excommunication distinction of Venial and Mortal Sins and other like For which cause I marvel why John Fox would allege these Articles but only to confound himself and to shew that his holy Patriarch Wickliff is so full of blemishes as scarce any unspotted thing can be found in his Doctrin 12. But this is the beggery of this new Church that it cannot be made up but by such Dunghil-clouts gathered together from under the feet of their Adversaries For albeit Wickliff Husse and other like Sectaries did hold many more Articles with Us against the Protestants than with Them against us yet such is the Integrity Purity Severity yea Majesty of our Church that forasmuch as they agreed not in all and every point of Belief we according to the Creed of Athanasius reject them and as spotted and blemished Rags do cast them out to the Dunghil whom poor Fox gathereth up again with great diligence putting them into his Calendar for Saints and chief Pillers of his new Church and so consequently maketh his Church of our Shoe clouts which how honorable thing it may be esteemed let every man judge For if these Heretics did agree with him in all Points of his Doctrin tho' by joyning with them he should shew himself an Heretic yet they not agreeing but in some Points only and impugning him in the rest it sheweth a marvelous base mind and lack of common sense to make them Pillars of his Church as he doth 13. But there is yet another point worse than this which is that he doth not only allow of the Religion of these men but defendeth also and justifieth their Life and Actions in what case soever and tho' never so orderly and lawfully condemned by the Church or State of those days yea tho' they were convinced to have conspired the King's Murther and Ruin to the State or had broken forth into open War and Hostility against the same As did Sir John Oldcastle by his Wife called Lord Cobham Sir Roger Acton and many other their Followers in the first year of King Henry V. which Story you may read in John Stow truly related out of Thomas Walsingham and other ancient Writers 14. He setteth down also without blushing I mean Fox as well
Religion from those downward to John Wickliffe were commonly infected with some points of these two general Sects the Waldenses or Albigenses it shall not be needful to stand upon the examination of every one of them seeing that their Opinions are known to be such as they could not possibly be of one Church with Fox and his Company Yet must we note this by the way also that Fox doth commit infinite confusion falshood and cosinage in all this his enumeration accounting some for Disciples of the Albigenses that lived 100. years before them As Marsilius Patavinus who lived under Pope Paschasius II. about the year 1110. which is more than an 100 years before Pope Innocentius III. as both Alvarus and Alphonsus de Castro do testifie and never held any points of the former Heresies but only some Propositions agiainst the Degrees and living of Ecclesiastical Persons And the like falshood is to be understood of Gulielmus de Sancto Amore who living about the year 1250. was a Catholic man in all points and only had some quarrellings with Religious Orders As in like sort Armachanus Archbishop of Armach in Ireland also had For which cause only Fox maketh him of his Church though in matters of Religion he held no one Article of the Protestant Faith with him different from the Catholic And consequently Fox doth extremely abuse them by conjoining them here with divers Heretics burned for the foresaid blasphemous Opinions 32. The like may be said of William Occam and Gregorius Arminensis two Catholic Scholmen and every day alleged for such in our Schools Robert Grossead also our Learned Bishop of Lincoln is in the same predicament as in like manner Dante 's and Petrarcha Italian Poets that never held any jot of Protestant Religion in the world And yet are brought in here by John Fox as men of his Church and Belief with the greatest falshood and foolery in the world And this forsooth for that in some place of their Works they reprehend the Manners of Rome or Lives of some Popes in those days Which is as good an Argument as if a man would prove that St. Paul was not of the Faith or Religion of the Corinthians for that he reprehended them sharply for Fornication used among them 33. Wherefore to leave the Rabble that followeth of this people as namely thirty six Citizens of Moguntia burned An. Dom. 1390. and another company of like people to wit one hundred and forty put in the Fire throughout the Province of Narbone and twenty four more put to death in Paris in the Year 1210. and other particular Saints of his Church recounted and Canonized by Fox To leave these I say and to come down to our Lolhards and Wickliffians and their followers in England we have treated of their Doctrin sufficiently in the precedent Chapter shewing how far different it was from that of Fox and his Fellows But now for their Actions we are to consider that the Lolhards began from the year of Christ 1320. or thereabout and Wickliff from the year 1370. and therewith raised infinite Troubles Garboils and Tumults in our Country As may appear by the lamentable Story set down by Thomas Walsingham of the whole people put in commotion in King Richard II. his time against the Nobility and Clergy by these kind of people under their Seditious Captains Jack Straw Wat Tiler and the rest And so again under some other Kings whilst this Heresie lasted And namely against the two valiant and most Catholic Princes King Henry IV. and King Henry V. his Son. In the first year of whose Reign to wit King Henry V. John Stow writeth thus 34. The favorers of Wickliffs Doctrin did nail up Schedules upon the Church Doors of London conteining that there were an hundred thousand ready to rise against all such as could not away with their Sect c. And hereon followed the open Rebellion of Sir John Oldcastle and Sir Roger Acton and others in S. Giles Field by Holborn which before we have touched And yet was the providence of God such as this Sect could never prevail in England neither then or after so Catholic were our Princes until some Points thereof being renewed by Luther and Zwinglius the later was admitted in K. Edward's days I mean the Sect of Zwinglius as all men know Being the first Sect that ever was admitted publickly in England either by Britans or Englishmen from Christ to that day For as for King Henry VIII though in the matter of the Popes Supremacy he admitted the Opinion of Luther yet in other things as before we have shewed at large he held in all Articles the Catholic Roman Faith with singular hatred against both Lollards Wickliffians and Lutherans but much more against Zwinglians and other such Sacramentary Sectaries As by his Laws made for their punishment and repression doth sufficiently appear 35. And albeit his Majesty having yielded once in that one Point of Ecclesiastical Supremacy and subordination which held before all the rest in joint it was no marvel though Sects and Sectaries did grow upon him so fast as with all his severe Laws he could hardly repress them in his own days yet much more were the Judgments of God seen after his death in that presently all was turned upside down in the Minority of his Son notwithstanding his Laws Testament and Ordinances to the contrary And that by those whom he most trusted on that behalf and who in his days had shewed themselves most earnest against Zwinglians and their Doctrin of the Sacrament as a thing most abhorred by the old King their Master I mean Cranmer Ridley Seymor and Dudley the chief changers of all in King Edwards days 36. But this is the common event where Princes be not careful at the beginning as Walsingham doth well note about the rising of Wickliff's Heresie in in the end of King Edward III.'s time when that old King was now impotent and wholly governed by Women leaving the care of his Kingdom in the Hands of his Son the Duke of Lancaster and others that followed him who having partly emulation and jars with the Bishops of Canterbury Winchester London and some other principal men of the Clergy and partly desiring to invade Church Livings which Wickliff preached to be lawful they were content to wink at him yea and to use him and his Doctrin openly against the said Bishops and Clergy as also against Monks and Abbots in the beginning of of K. Richard II.'s time as appeareth both in the said Walsingham and Stow who relate the calling of Wickliff to London for this effect where he was publicly and scandalously born out by the said Duke and Sir Henry Piercy and others of that Faction against the said Bishops Monks and Abbots which here we shall set down in Stows own words taken by him out of Walsingham and other Writers which do contain the very sum of
Pope 6. But what did he from his breach forward Did he spare the new Gospellers any thing more for his breach with the Pope Truly it cannot be denied but that for some years he wink'd at their doings somewhat more than before considering the new difficulties wherein he had cast himself by his new disunion and breach as before we have noted in the end of the former Part. But as soon as he had put his Domestical Affairs in some quiet and security he returned again to his former course and custom of restraining these new unruly Spirits by calling them to account for their Innovations and proceeding juridically against them according to Church Canons and according to his former judgment in matters of Religion Which as I might shew by divers ways of proof as well of Acts of Parliament as Proclamations Injunctions and other Declarations of his Will and Opinion in this behalf so will we allege only two or three Examples in the first kind besides those which we have set down in the former Part. 7. In the 31st year of his Reign which was seven or eight years after his breach with the Pope there was made an Act for abolishing of diversity of Opinions about Christian Faith which beginneth thus Whereas the King 's most Excellent Majesty is by God's Law Supreme Head immediately under him of the whole Church of England c. intending the conservation of the same Church in a true sincere and uniform Doctrin of Christ's Religion c. Thus beginneth his Preface And then he determineth together with the Parliament That whosoever shall deny the Real Presence in the Sacrament of the Altar or affirm that the Communion is necessary under both Kinds or that Priests may by God's Law take Wives after Priesthood or that Vows of Chastity are not to be observed or that private Masses are not to be said or that Sacramental and Auricular Confession is not necessary c. All these he condemneth as Heretics and for such to be Apprehended Arraigned Condemned and Burned as at large is to be seen in the Statute 8. And the very next year after perceiving that notwithstanding his former Statute against Protestant Opinions the same did grow and were spread abroad in England he ordained another Statute which beginneth thus Whereas the King 's Róyal Majesty of his blessed and gracious disposition c. well weighing that out of sundry outward parts and places there have sprung been sown set forth divers heretical erroneous dangerous Opinions Doctrins in the Religion of Christ whereby his Grace's Leige-people may be induced to unfaithfulness misbelief miscreancy and contempt of God to the utter confusion and damnation of Souls c. For this cause his Majesty according to the very Gospel and Law of God meaneth to have matters determined and declared c. Thus he writeth in the Statute remitting himself to his further Declaration which is wholly against Protestants whose Faith and Religion you see here called by the King unfaithfulness misbelief miscreancy contempt of God heretical erroneous and dangerous Doctrin tending to utter confusion and damnation of Souls c. And this proved by the pure Word of God and the very Gospel it self as his Majesty affirmeth 9. And will you have more clear testimony of his settled judgment against Protestants than this But yet hear further For that the same King divers years afters after this again towards the end of his days having had good experience of the falshood of Protestants in corrupting the very Scriptures themselves by their crafty Translations Notes and Commentaries he was forc'd to forbid under grievous punishments the reading of the foresaid Scriptures in English which before he had permitted as appeareth by a peculiar Statute made for that purpose and for inhibiting Protestants Books Sermons and Preachings in the 34th and 35th years of his Reign this Statute being entituled An Act for the Advancement of true Religion saying therein as followeth Whereas the King 's most Royal Majesty Sumpreme Head of the Church of England and also of Ireland perceiveth that notwithstanding such holy Doctrins and Docucuments as his Majesty hath hitherto caused to be set forth besides the great liberty granted unto them in having the New and Old Testament among them which notwithstanding many seditious arrogant and ignorant Parsons pretending to be Learred have the perfect and true knowledg understanding and judgment of sacred Scriptures c. intending to subvert the very true and perfect Exposition thereof after their perverse fantasies have taken upon them not only to preach teach declare c. but also by printed Books Ballads Plays Rhythmes Songs and other fantasies subtilly to beguile his Majesty's Leige-subjects c. 10. Behold King Henry's description of Protestants their Wit Nature Condition and Doctrin But now followeth the Remedy Wherefore to ordain and establish a certain form of pure and sincere Teaching agreeable to God's Word and true Doctrin of the Catholic and Apostolical Church c. Be it enacted That all manner of Books of the Old and New Testament in English being of the crafty false and untrue Translation of William Tyndall and all other Books or Writings in the English Tongue teaching or composing any matter of Christian Religion contrary to that Doctrin which since the year of our Lord 1540 is hath or shall be set forth by his Majesty is clearly and utterly abolished c. Thus ordained King Henry of the Protestants Books and Doctrin and this Censure he gave of William Tyndall's Truth and Honesty in translating the Scriptures whom John Fox calleth not only the true Servant and Martyr of God but the Apostle also of England in this our latter Age. 11. Wherefore I do not see how Fox can with any reason make King Henry to be a Gospeller of his Religion or so earnest a Defender of the same or why he should paint him with the Bible in his hand holden up by Cranmer and Cromwell as before hath been said and seen in his Painting seeing he contemned ever their Doctrin and burned the Professors thereof as notorious Heretics unto his dying-day Which is evident by many Examples but most clear and notorious by that of John Lambert a famous Zuinglian with whom in solemn public Audience he disputed in presence of all his Clergy and Nobility of the Realm and caused Cranmer to do the like and in the end made Cromwell as his Vicar-General to give the Sentence of Death against him and burn him in Smithfield and this not two years before Cromwell's own Condemnation for like Heresie by the King 's own pursuit as may appear by the Act of his Condemnation yet extant And the same no doubt would he have done with Cranmer which was the other Upholder of his Arm to maintain the new Gospel according to Fox his Picture if he had known or suspected him not only for an Upholder of
in the second Age after Christ there was not the Faith in Rome that now is For that there was no mention or knowledge then either of any universal Authority of the Church or Bishop of Rome or of the name or use of Masses or Sacrifice propitiatory or of Transubstantiation or of Images used in Churches and the like 5. To which vain Arguments of both these poor Men I might answer sufficiently by telling them if they will learn that albeit it were true in some sence that these Doctrins which here they alledge and some other in Controversie between us were not found in the Second Age when Pope Eleutherius lived so expresly set forth as in other Ages afterward when better Occasion was offered and the Times did more permit the same yet is this no good Argument to prove that they were not believed then also in the Catholic Church For if this Consequence should be admitted then as well might it be admitted also against many other principal Points and Articles of our Faith which are acknowledged and believed by Protestants also at this day tho not expresly handled discussed or determined in those first two hundred Years after Christ as for Example the Name and Doctrin of the Blessed Trinity the two distinct Natures and one Person in Christ his two distinct wills the Virginity of our Blessed Lady both before and after her Child-birth the Proceeding of the Holy Ghost as well from the Son as from the Father c. 6. All which Points and some others are not found to be handled so clearly and distinctly by Authors of the first two hundred Years as afterward partly for that they were occupied in other matters against Gentiles and Hereticks that touched not these Points and partly for that General Councils could not yet be gathered together to discuss and declare them distinctly tho no good Christians will or may doubt but that they were believed in the Church before from Christ downward and that the General Councils that determined them afterward for Articles of true Belief against Heretics that had called them in question did not so determine them as if they had made them Articles which were not before for this the Church could not do as is held by all Catholics but only that they being Articles of True and Catholic Belief before the Church did now declare them to be such Wherefore this being so I might answer and I see not how they could reply that John Fox and his Scholar may as well deny and call in question all or any of these foresaid Articles as the other which they recite For that they were as little or perhaps less specified in the first two hundred Years than these which they object 7. But I will deal more liberally with our Minister and Knight and will seek to satisfie them with Reason who do brabble and argue against us without Reason I shall endeavour to do the same by two ways hoping to make their Folly appear to every indifferent Man by them both The first shall be via negativa the negative way by putting them to some proof And the second shall be affirmative shewing them what Proofs may be brought for our side Nothing doubting but that each shall be sufficient to satisfie the equal Reader Let the first kind of Argument then by the way of negative be this 8. We deny that the Faith now held in Rome and namely the Articles here mentioned of the Pope Mass Transubstantiation and use of Images were not believed in Pope Eleutherius's days as now for the substance of the Doctrin And let them prove it if they can and if they say that it is hard to prove a negative we are content that they prove only an affirmative whereby the said negative may be inferred to wit that any one of these Doctrins did begin to enter into the Church after Eleutherius And to this Proof they are bound in all equity and reason as we shall shew by our sequent Discourse For if it be true that the Articles and Points of Doctrin here mentioned by Fox and Sir Francis wherein they differ from us be indeed not things heard of or believed at Rome in the time of Pope Eleutherius which yet they denie not but that in other Ages after they were generally received then followeth it that Fox and his Fellows must shew the Time Place Men and Occasion of their beginning to wit when where and by what Men and upon what Causes and with what Authority or Induction or Violence or by what Deceit or with what Contradiction of others these Doctrins entred first and were continued in the Church All which Points we can shew of every other Error or Heresie that hath risen and was held for such from Christ's Time to ours 9. And if either Fox or his Cub or any of that Kennel can or will shew this and joyn issue with us upon this one Point we do accept thereof and the matter may be quickly dispatch'd But if this cannot be done then must we follow the Rule of St. Augustin held by him for infallible in such Affairs to wit That when any Doctrin is found generally received in the known visible Churh at any Time or in any Age whereof there is no certain Author Time or Beginning found then is it sure that all such Doctrin hath come down from Christ and his Apostles 10. This doth that holy Doctor and great Pillar of Gods Church Saint Augustin affirm and reiterate in every place of his Works against Heretics of his Time which argued as our Men do by denying only and putting Catholics to Proof As for Example against the Donatists denying the custom of baptizing Infants for that it was not in Scripture nor recorded by Fathers of the first Ages Saint Augustin answereth thus Illa consuetudo quam tunc homines sursum versum aspicientes non videbant à posterioribus institutam rectè ab Apostolis tradita creditur That Custom of Baptizing Infants which Men before us in the Church looking upward to Antiquity did not find to have been ordained by them that came after the first Ages is rightly believed to have been delivered by the Apostles 11. And again in another place speaking of Ecclesiastical Customs he saith Quod universa tenet Ecclesia nec Conciliis institutum sed semper retentum est non nisi anthoritate Apostolica traditum rectissimè creditur That which the universal Church doth hold and was not instituted by any Council but hath been still retained in the Church this we may most justly believe to have come from no other Authority than from the Apostles And the like Speeches unto this hath St. Augustin in divers other places both of this Book against the Donatists as l. 2. c. 7. and l. 5. c. 23. as also lib. de Vnitat Ecclesiae c. 19. Epistola 118 c. And as for that he speaketh of Institution by Councils he
meaneth of Customs and Ceremonies and not of Articles of Belief Which no Council can appoint but only declare and expound as before we have shewed 12. This Position then of St. Augustin is most true and consonant to the Doctrin of all other Fathers in that behalf that when any thing is found generally received in the Church and no Author Institutor or Beginning can be found thereof this without all doubt cometh down from the Apostles And of this position may be alledged two infallible grounds The one of Faith the other of evident Reasons For in Faith who can think so basely of Christs Power or Will in performing his Promises made unto his Church to conserve her in all Truth unto the Worlds end as that he should permit her notwithstanding to admit or teach generally any one false Article of Doctrin and much less so many as these men object against us For whereas he promised his Holy Spirit to be with her unto the Worlds end and that she should be the Pillar and Firmament of Truth to direct others and finally that hell gates should never prevail against her How should all this be performed if she fell into those Errors of which Protestants accuse her or what greater Victory could the gates of Hell have against her than that from an Apostolical Church of whom Christ spake she should become an Apostatical Church as these Men do call her which is the greatest Blasphemy against Christ and his Divinity that possibly can be imagined seeing it doth evacuate his whole Incarnation Life Death Doctrin Resurrection and other Benefits of his coming which were all imployed to this end to make unto himself a Church and Kingdom in this world that should direct Men in all Truth to their Salvation And this being taken away and the other granted that the Church her self may fall into Error and false Doctrin then is there no certainty in any thing And consequently it cannot be that any erroneous Doctrin should be taught or received generally by the Church And this is the first ground of St Augustin's Assertion 13. But besides this there is another founded in Reason and Experience which cannot be denied And for that it is a consideration of great Importance and may serve the Reader to many purposes of moment for discerning of Doubts and Controversies I shall desire him to be attent in perusing the same We do find by Experience and that not only in Ecclesiastical but Temporal Affairs also That when Orders Laws and Customs are once settled in any Common-wealth it is hard to alter or take them away or to bring in things opposite or different to them without some Resistance Dispute Contradiction or at least some Memory thereof how why and by whom it was done As for Example if a Man would go about to bring in any Innovation in the particular Laws of London and much more in the general Laws of all the Land no doubt but he should find some Resistance therein some that would dispute about the matter alledging Reasons to the contrary others would resist and oppose themselves and when all did fail at leastwise some Record Story or Memory would be left of this Change. 14. But much more if this matter did concern Religion which is most esteemed above other Points As for Example if a Man would begin to teach any Points of Doctrin at this Day in England contrary or different from that which is there received and established by public Authority he would presently be noted and contradicted by some no doubt as we see the Puritans Brownists Family of Love and other such newer Teachers have been and the History thereof is notorious and will remain to Posterity 15. And this is the very reason also why all Heretics and Heresies from the beginning did no sooner peep up in the visible Catholic Church but that they were noted impugned confuted and finally cast out from that body to the Devils dung-hill And the Records thereof do remain who were the Authors and Beginners who the Favourers and setters forward at what time upon what occasion under what Popes and Kings and other such-like Circumstances And this will endure to the end of the World. 16. This then being so we now come to the state of our Question and to joyn with the Protestants upon this Issue That seeing the Doctrins before mentioned of the Popes Authority Sacrifice of the Mass Transubstantiation Vse of Images and the like were found to be generally received and believed in the Visible and Universal Catholic Church of Christendom when Martin Luther first began to break from the same yea and many Ages before by their own confession they must shew us when the said Doctrins were brought in afterwards to the Church not being there nor believed therein before to wit by what Man or Men with what Authority Constraint or Persuasion with what repugnance of them that misliked the same and other like Circumstances before mentioned which if they be not able to do most certain it is that whatsoever they prattle against these Doctrins saying they were not in Eleutherius's time it is nothing but Cavils and Heretical Shifts 17. And now that they cannot shew any such particularities for the entrance or admittance of these Doctrins into the Church is most evident For whatsoever time they assign for their beginning we can still shew that before that time they were in use if they mean of the Things themselves and not only of Words or Phrases As for example when they object That in the Council of Lateran under Pope Innocentius III. in the year of Christ 1215. the word Transubstantiation was first used we answer That albeit that word was then added for better explication of the matter as these words Homousion Consubstantial Trinity and the like were by the first General Council of Nice yet the substance of the Article was held before from the beginning under other equivalent words of Change and Immutation of Natures Transformation of Elements and the like As for Example that of St. Ambrose speaking of the words of Christ in the Consecration Non valebit sermo Christi ut species mutet elementorum Shall not the words of Christ be of power to change the Natures of Elements And again Sermo Christi qui potuit de nihilo facere quod non erat non potest ea quae sunt in id mutare quod non erant The Speech of Christ that was able to create of nothing that which was not before shall it not be able to change things that are already into that which they were not before He meaneth the Bread and Wine into the Body and Blood of Christ as himself doth expound 18. So as here we see the change of the Natures of Elements and of the Substance of one Body into another averred by St. Ambrose long time before the Council of Lateran which is the same that we mean by Transubstantiation And
every where there is mention of all these Doctrins as afterward in our second Argument we shall shew out of the Protestants themselves and namely the Magdeburgians that profess to note all 24. Now then I ask our Adversaries touching this creeping Instance how could these Doctrins so creep into the Catholic Visible Church in this fourth Age for example and be received so generally over all Nations Countreys and Kingdoms by these principal Lights Captains Watchmen and Guiders of the same as no Note Detection Resistance or Memory should be left of any Doubt Dispute or Opposition made against them Is this likely Is this possible Read all the Fathers Works over and find if you can but one place wherein one Father did ever hitherto note another for holding Purgatory Praying to Saints believing the Real Presence or the like as they did Cyprian tho' otherwise a most Learned and Holy Man for teaching Re-baptization of Heretics and some other Fathers for other particular Opinions different from the Catholic Doctrin of that Age. Whereof we may infer That they would have done the like also in these other points if they had been held for new or erroneous in those days And hereof also may be inferred another Sequel or Observation of very great moment against our Heretics That when soever any Doctrin is found in any of the ancient Fathers which is not contradicted nor noted by any of the rest as singular that Doctrin is to be presumed to be no particular Opinion of his but rather the general of all the Church in his days for that otherwise it would most certainly have been noted and impugned by others Whereby it followeth that one Doctor 's Opinion or Saying in matters of Controversie not contradicted or noted by others may sometimes give a sufficient Testimony of the whole Churches Sentence and Doctrin in those days which is a point very greatly to be considered 25. But yet further to all this may be added another Consideration of no small weight which is the difficulty of bringing in certain Doctrins if any man would have attempted it as for Example the Doctrin of Seven Sacraments If there had been but Two only before in the Apostles time it had been an extreme great Novelty to have added Five more which never would have been admitted without much strife and resistance seeing all Catholics do hold that Christ only could institute Sacraments for that He only could assure the Promise of Grace made thereunto as excellently doth declare the Council of Trent and long before that again the Master of Sentences and St. Thomas in the name of all Catholics did leave that Doctrin registred and there can be no doubt thereof 26. Wherefore this Truth being admitted That the whole Church hath no Authority to institute any Sacrament or to alter any thing about the substantial parts thereof to wit the Matter Form or Number as the same Council of Trent in another place declareth how was it possible that five whole Sacraments should be added or brought into Catholic Doctrin and received and believed throughout Christendom without any resistance or opposition at all if there had been but two only instituted by Christ and exercised by the Apostles in the first Age How I say could five more be brought in afterward By whom at what time in what Countrey c. For if any one had begun to do it others would have resisted it being a matter of so high moment And if one Countrey Province or Church had admitted them another would have refused or at leastwise there would have been some Doubt or Disputation and some general Meeting and Synod or Council gathered about that matter and some parts would have admitted one Number and some another as we see that the Sectaries of our time have done since the matter hath been called in question by them some allowing five some four some three some two But no memory of any of these differences being to be found among Catholics most certain it is that this Number came down from Christ and his Apostles themselves 27. The like or greater difficulty would also have been about the use of Sacramental Confession if it had not been appointed by Christ and put in ure presently and so continued from time to time For that it being a thing in it self most repugnant to man's sensual Nature to be bound to open his particular sins to another with that Humility and Subjection which Catholic Doctrin doth prescribe in the use of that Sacrament clear it is that if it had not been in ure even from the Apostles time and that as a matter of absolute necessity it could never have been received afterward nor yet brought in by any Human Power Art or Device For who I pray you should or could bring in such a thing of so great repugnance and difficulty upon the whole Christian Church Will they say any Pope Let them name either Him or Them together with the Time and other Particularities which they never will be able to do 28. Besides this I ask them further What Pope would ever have attempted this if it had not been by Obligation before him seeing that Popes themselves the more Great and Eminent they be above others the more natural repugnance must they needs find in themselves to go and kneel down at the feet of an inferior Priest and confess unto him their most secret sins And the like may be said of Temporal Princes and Emperours who if any Pope or Power Ecclesiastical would have laid such a burthen upon them not used nor of obligation before how would they have yielded unto it which of them would not have answered that seeing their Fathers and Ancestors were saved without this subjection and irksom obligation of revealing their particular sins they would hope to be so also And finally some great Difficulty Doubt or Contention would have been about this matter before it could have been so brought in and established all over the Christian World as we see by experience it was and at leastwise some memory would have remained thereof in Histories which we find not and consequently we may conclude that there was never any such thing And this is sufficient for our first Argument Now let us pass to the second CHAP. VI. It is proved by the second kind of Affirmative or Positive Arguments That the Points of Catholic Doctrin before denied by Fox and Sir Francis were in use in Pope Eleutherius his Time and in other Ages immediately following and this by Testimony of Protestant Writers themselves ALbeit the Reasons and Considerations before alledged whereby our Adversaries are willed to shew the beginning of such Articles and Points of our Catholic Doctrin as they deny to have come down from the Apostles Time were sufficient to put them to silence being not able to perform any part thereof and consequently also may open the eyes of any studious Reader to see
the Infirmity of Their Cause and the Strength and Truth of Ours yet will we for greater satisfaction of all sorts pass over to the other part also of Positive and Affirmative Proofs which are so abundant in this behalf as if I would set them down all this only point would require a particular Treatise wherefore I mean to abreviate the matter as much as I may 2. For which respect whereas there are two means to set down these Proofs one out of the Authors themselves that lived in the same Age with Eleutherius and the next after and the other to cite the same out of Protestant Writers I have made choice of the second way in this place both for that it is shorter and seemeth also more sure and effectual For if I should cite the places as for Example in the second Age St. Irenaeus lib. 5. advers haeres for the Supremacy of the Bishop of Rome and the same lib. 4. cap. 77. and with him Justinus Martyr q. 103. together with Theophilus Athenagoras Clemens Alexandrinus for Freewill and the same Clemens lib. 5. stromatum and divers others of that Age for the Merit of Good Works for the manner of doing Penance and the like and if I should alledge the said Irenaeus lib. 4. cap. 32. for the Sacrifice of the Mass and Justinus Martyr Apolog. 2. and Clemens Alexandrinus lib. 7. Stromatum about the Rites and Ceremonies of the said Mass and the same Justinus q. 136. and the same Irenaeus lib. 1. c. 18. for the Ceremonies of Baptism and Chrism used in those days If I say I should alledge these and other Authors of that time for positive Proofs of Catholic Articles against Protestants in Eleutherius's days the matter would first grow to be very long for that I must alledge the places at length seeing that otherwise the quarrelling Adversary would say that I left out the Antecedents and Consequents as themselves are wont to do when they mean not to have any Text rightly understood Secondly they would quarrel with us when they see themselves prest about the Authors Books whether they be truly theirs or no and thirdly about the Translation Words and Sense All which would bring a long Dispute 3. But now finding that certain Authors of their own Religion if they be of their Religion I mean the Magdeburgians called otherwise Centuriatores have taken upon them to set down the whole Story of the Church and have herewithal treated as well of the Doctrin as also the Doctors of every Age I have thought best to take my Proofs out of them being Confessions as it were against themselves and their Mates the Calvinists tho' not very friendly Mates in many matters of Doctrin as you shall hear and their Story being the very Ground and Fountain of all John Fox his Volume of Acts and Monuments except only those things which concern England in particular wherein whether he or they behave themselves with less Honesty or Conscience is hard to say but in this Treatise you shall have divers tasts of them both And this being spoken as it were by the way of Preface we shall now take in hand the matter proposed 4. These men being four Saxons whom before we have named gathered together in the City of Magdeburg to wit Flaccus Illyricus Joannes Vigandus Matthaeus Judex and Basilius Faber and in Religion strict or rigid Lutherans took upon them as hath been said to write the whole Ecclesiastical History from Christ to their Time by Centuries or Ages allowing 100 years to every Age whereof they are called Centuriatores And in every Age they handle these and like Chapters Of the Church and increase thereof or Doctrin therein taught Of Heresies and Heretics Of Doctors and Writers and the like But amongst other points especially to be noted to our purpose that presently after the Apostles in the second Century they make this Chapter repeating the same in every Age after Inclinatio Doctrinae complectens peculiares incommodas opiniones stipulas errores Doctorum quae palam quidem hoc est scriptis tradita sunt That is The declining of true Christian Doctrin containing the peculiar and incommodious Opinions of Doctors their Errors Straw or Stubble which were left publicly by them that is to say in their Writings 5. This is the Title of this Chapter in every Age and those last words seem to be added thereby to insinuate to the Reader that the said Doctors inwardly did hold perhaps many more Errors and Straw-opinions in these mens judgments than they left openly in writing And by this arrogant Title you may see these four good Fellows mean to judge and censure all from the beginning of Christian Religion unto their days and among others they will censure John Fox also and his Fellows as you may see in the Preface of one of their Centuries dedicated unto the Queen of England the third year of her Reign 1560 where having told her Majesty a long Tale of the Gospel and pure Word of God naming the same above half a hundred times if I have counted right in this one Epistle and shewing how Princes must have no other Rule of Government than the said Word but yet understood as these men will interpret it they tell her also that they now do bring her Antiquity to look upon yet complaining that few in ancient Times did write luculenter cum judicio perspicuously and with judgment And then again Sacrosanctae antiquitatis titulo plurimos quasi fascinari ut citra omnem attentionem rectumque judicium quantumvis tetris erroribus applaudant That very many are as it were so be witched with the holy Title of Antiquity that without all attention and upright judgment they do give willingly consent to never so foul Errors if they be set down by Antiquity 6. Lo here what an entrance this is of them that profess Antiquity to discredit by their Preface all Antiquity of Christian Religion and of the eldest and primitive Church whose Acts and Gests they promise to set down but the very point indeed is that they themselves will be Judges of all as the fashion of proud Heretics is and admit only so much as maketh for their particular Sect and discredit or reject the rest And in this point our English Calvinists are like to find as little favour at their hands as we that are Catholicks and less too for that by the whole course of Antiquity they do shew these men to be clearly Heretics and their Opinions about the Sacraments Invisibility of the Church and other like to be Heretical whereas our Doctrins which they find in ancient Fathers differing from them they call either incommodious Opinions Blots Stubble or Errors of Doctors as before you have heard and not lightly Heresies As in this their Preface to the Queen they admonish her Majesty more carefully to beware of Their Doctrin than of Ours in these words
Age wus nearest to the Apostles yet the Doctrin of Christ and his Apostles began to be not a little darkened therein and many monstrous and incommodious Opinions are every-where found to be spread by the Doctors thereof Perhaps some cause hereof might be for that the Gift of the Holy Ghost in these Doctors did begin to decay for the ingratitude of the World towards the Truth 4. Lo here what a Preface this is to make contemptible to the Reader all the Fathers of the very first Age after the Apostles But what then do you think they will say of the next following You shall hear by their own words in the Preface of that Age which are these Quò longiùs ab Apostolorum aetate recessum est eò plus stipularum Doctrinae puritati accessit The farther that we go off from the Apostles Age the more Stubble we shall find to have been added to the Purity of the Christian Doctrin Thus they say of these two Ages and by this last Sentence you may imagin what they will say of all the Ages following 5. And this is now spoken by them by way of prevention to discredit generally the Fathers of these first Ages when they say any thing against them But when they come to particulars they have notable Quips for them whereof for Example-sake we shall let you hear some few whereby you may as well learn their sharp Wits as heretical Spirits About the matter of Man's Free-will whether it were wholly lost by Original Sin as Protestants say or wounded only as Catholics hold and strengthened again by God's Grace to do good in him that will they write thus of the Doctors of the second Age Nullus ferè Doctrinae locus est qui tam citò obscurari coepit atque hic de libero arbitrio No one place or part of Christian Doctrin began so soon to be darkened as this of Free-will And then they go on thus with the chiefest Doctors of that Age Irenaeus disputes not distinctly and wresteth the Speeches of Christ and of St. Paul in favour of Free-will saying That there is Free-will also in Faith and Belief Sed haec satis crasse dicuntur aliena sunt à scripturis But these things are spoken grosly by Irenaeus and are far from the sense of Scriptures But whether these Good-fellow Saxons may be accounted less gross in Wit or Grace than Irenaeus is easie to guess 6. From St. Irenaeus they pass to Clemens Alexandrinus another Pillar of that Age saying Eodem modo Clemens Alexandrinus liberum arbitrium ubique asserit ut appareat in ejusmodi tenebris non tantum fuisse omnes ejus saeculi Authores verum etiam in posterioribus eas subinde crevisse auctas esse Clemens Alexandrinus doth in like manner every-where affirm Free-will whereby it appeareth that not only all the Doctors of this second Age were in the same darkness but that the same did grow and was encreased in the Ages following Behold here their general Sentence both of this Age and the other ensuing To what end then should we alledge more particulars in this matter seeing their resolution to discredit all In the third Age they do shamefully slander Tertullian Origen Cyprian and Methodius for the same Doctrin of Free-will saying They do abuse the Scriptures intolerably for maintenance thereof 7. For the fourth Age having given this general Sentence Patres omnes ferè hujus aetatis de libero arbitrio confusè loquuntur All the Fathers almost of this Age do speak confusedly of Free-will c. They add also contra manifesta Scripturae sanctae Testimonia contrary to the manifest Testimonies of Holy Scripture And then they take in hand to course seven chief Fathers and Doctors in particular Lactantius Athanasias Basilius Nazianzenus Epiphanius and Hieronymus saying That they were all deceived all in darkness all misled about this Doctrin of mans Free-will So as it is no marvel if Sir Francis's sharp sight discover so many thick Clouds and Darkness in the Catholic Church of our days seeing his Masters the Magdeburgians discover so many in the Primitive Church as by this you may see 8. About the point of Justification they begin the next Age after the Apostles thus Doctrina de Justificatione negligentiùs obscuriùs ab his Doctoribus tradita est The Doctrin of Justification was delivered by the Doctors of this second Age after Christ more negligently and obscurely than it ought to have been And the same they say of the third Age also Hunc summum Articulum de Justificatione obscuratum esse justitiam enim coram Deo operibus tribuerunt that this chief Article of Justification hath been obscured in this Age for that the Doctors thereof did attribute Justice before God unto Works and not to only Faith c. And then again in the fourth Age they reprehend greatly Lactantius Nilus Chromatus Ephrem and St. Hierom for the same Doctrin The other lower Centuries I have not lying by me but it is easie to guess what these men will say of later Ages Authors seeing they do exagitate so greatly the more ancient 9. About the Sacrament of Penance which is another Controversie betwixt us they write in the beginning of the second Age thus Quòd jam tum coeperit haec pars Doctrinae de poenitentia labefactari ex Tertulliano Cypriano Haeresi Novatiana infra patebit That this part of Christian Doctrin about Penance even then in the first Age after the Apostles began to be weakened shall appear afterward by Tertullian Cyprian and the Novatian Heresie Thus they write boldly and confidently as you see And then in the Age following Plerique hujus saeculi Doctores Doctrinam de poenitentia mirè depravant The most of the Doctors of this Age do wonderfully deprave the Doctrin of Penance And what is the reason think you They tell us presently Ad ipsum tantum opus poenitentis seu contritionem eam deducunt de fide in Christum nihil dicunt They reduce Penance only to the works of the Penitent that is to say unto Contrition and do speak nothing at all of Faith in Christ But who doth not see this to be a notorious slander For how is it possible to have Contrition without Faith Consider then how little it is to be wonder'd at if these Companions and others of their Crew do slander and calumniate Us that live in these days when they shame not to do it against so many Holy and Learned ancient Fathers of the Primitive Church But let us go forward 10. About the Perfection and Merit of Good Works these Censurers affirm also That the true Doctrin of Christ in this behalf was obscur'd in the second Age immediatly after the Apostles And they do wonderfully by name fall out with Clemens Alexandrinus for that he saith Gratia salvamur sed non absque bonis operibus We
Britanny And forasmuch as this Church of St Martins was found fit to say Mass and Baptize in according to the use of Rome and for that the Britan Christians were never found to have reprehended or misliked this manner of serving God used by St. Augustin and his Fellows it is an evident Argument that the same was and had been in use also among them from all Antiquity neither was it a novelty brought in by St. Augustin 3. Moreover about the same time of the Romans going out of Britanny or soon after to wit about the year of Christ 440 it appeareth by Bede that the two French Bishops St. German and St. Lupus the first time and St. German and St. Severus the second time came into Britanny to resist the Pelagian Heresie and to reestablish the Catholic Faith that was among them before And so they did as well by working many Miracles as by their Preachings which Bede recounteth at large throughout many Chapters But now that these three holy Bishops the first of Antisiodore in France the second of Troy in Campany the third of Trevers in Germany were all of the Roman Religion and held in all Points of Controversie against the Protestants of our Time both in Doctrin and Practise is evident not only by that the Roman Church doth hold them all three for Canoniz'd Saints and celebrateth their Memories the First upon the 31 of July the Second upon the 29 of the same Month the Third upon the 15 of October which would never be permitted if they had been different in any one Point of Faith but also the same is clear as well by their own Writings that are extant and by their Lives written by others as also by divers things recounted by St. Bede in his Story of their Doings in England as namely where he writeth of St. German how he cured the Tribunes Daughter of Blindness by his Prayer and by applying the Relics of certain Saints unto her Eyes in the sight of all the People Deinde saith he Germanus plenus Spiritu sancto c. Then St. German full of the Holy Ghost did invoke the Name of the Blessed Trinity and presently took from his side a certain Box of Saints Relics that he was wont to carry about his neck and with his hands did put them upon the maids eyes which out of hand received perfect sight therewith Whereat the Parents of the maid rejoyced exceedingly and all the People did tremble at the sight of the miracle c. 4. Thus writeth St. Bede of that Act. And further that the said Bishop went to the Sepulcher of St. Alban which even at that time appeareth to have been kept with great Devotion prayed to the Saint largely and there left in his Sepulcher part of the Relics of all the Apostles and of divers other Saints which he had brought with him out of France and carried away with him in exchange thereof much of the earth that was died with the Blood of St. Alban Which he would not have done if he had been a Protestant And then yet further talking of another famous Miracle and Victory achieved by the said St. German against Heretics with sounding out the word Alleluia St. Bede saith Aderant Quadragesimae venerabiles dies quos religisiores reddebat praesentia sacerdotum c. The venerable days of Lent were come which the presence of these Priests of God made more religious c. 5. Behold here now almost 200 years before St. Augustin came into England the use of Relics of Saints of praying to Martyrs and honoring their Sepulchers the use of Alleluia the Religious Observation of Lent and such other Points recorded to be in practise among the Christian Britans Is this Protestant-like think you or can these men be presumed to have been of our new Religion But let us proceed to talk of some Britan Teachers and Pastors themselves 6. Geffrey of Monmouth in his British Story much esteemed and alledged by our Adversaries writeth that at a certain Feast of Pentecost at Chester about the year of Christ 522. as Bale holdeth King Arthur being present there was a great meeting of Princes Lords and Bishops for his Coronation and that of the three Archbishops of Britanny at that time which were London York and Chester Dubritius Archbishop of Chester did the Office of the Church that day of whom he saith Hic Britannia Primas Apostolicae Sedis Legatus tantâ religione clarebat ut quemcunque languore gravatum orationibus sanaret This Man being Primate of Britanny and Legate of the See Apostolic was so famous for his Religion and Sanctity as he did heal any sick Man by his Prayers 7. Lo here the Popes Legate among the Britans did also Miracles before the coming of St. Augustin And then further talking of the Church Solemnity that day he saith Postremo peract â processione tot organa tot cantus fiunt utrisque templis c. Lastly the Procession being ended there were so many Organs did sound and so great variety of Music heard in both Churches as was wonderful c. Behold Procession and Organs in Britanny before St. Augustin's coming This Man afterwards left of his own will the said Archbishoprick and became an Ermit as both Jeffrey and John Bale do testifie which Protestant Bishops are not wont to do 8. And further Bale writeth of him that he died the 18 day before the Calends of December Anno Domini 522. and that his Body afterward in the year of our Lord 1120 the Sixth of May was translated under Vrban Bishop of Rome to the Church of Landaff in Southwales All which could never have been done nor permitted by the Bishop of Rome if there had been any Suspicion that he had held any Point of Doctrin different from the Church and Faith of Rome at that time which maketh also the matter evident that the Heretical Custom of celebrating Easter according to the Jews which in St. Gregory's time was found in Britanny was a latter custom not held by all but by some few only 9. In this Man's place was made Archbishop the famous Man David Menevensis King Arthurs Unkle as Jeffrey and Bale do testifie who passed the said Archbishoprick from Chester to St. Davids and so it is called at this day of his Name This David saith Bale was a goodly Man of Stature about four cubits high learned and eloquent and after ten whole years Study in the Scripture expounded the same as a Trumpet carrying always the Text of the Gospel with him He extinguished the Relics of the Pelagian Heresies in Britanny preached incessantly cured many sick and built twelve Monasteries and was held for a very great Saint in his days and canonized afterward by Calixtus II. Bishop of Rome c. Per Calixtum secundum saith he Papisticorum deorum ascribitur in Catalogum He was put in the Catalogue of the Papistical Gods by
Calixtus the Second Whereby appeareth that the Britans were not only Papists in those days before the coming of St. Augustin but had Papist Gods and Saints also there Yet this Man might live according to Bale to have seen the times of St. Augustin's entrance for that he saith he flourished in the year 440. and lived in all 146 years tho' Gerrad Cambrensis Polydor and others do make him somewhat more ancient 10. And for that we have talked here of John Bale and that the testimonies taken from Enemies themselves are of greatest weight against themselves we shall in this place touch certain Points briefly of the chief Preachers and Pastors among the Britans in those days to wit for the next two hundred years before the coming of St. Augustin into England Which Preachers are mentioned and much praised both by Fox and Bale as true Teachers in those days whereof Fox writeth thus In this Age to wit after the Peace restored to the Church by Constantine followed here in the land of Britanny Fastidius Ninianus Patricius Bacchiarius Dubritius Congellus Kentegernus Helmotus David Daniel Sampson Elnodugus Assaphus Gildas Henlanus Elbodus Dinothus Samuel Nivius and a great sort more which governed the Britan Church by Christian Doctrin a long season albeit the civil Governours for the time were dissolute and careless as Gildas very sharply doth lay to their Charge and so at length were subdued by the Saxons And all this while about the space of 400 years to wit from the time of King Lucius Religion remained in Britanny uncorrupt and the word of Christ truly preached until about the coming of St. Augustin and his Companions from Rome c. 11. Here now you see the chief Teachers of the British Church Nineteen in number for the space of 400 years as Fox avoweth set down in order and highly praised by him but neither his Order or Argument is worth a rush For as for his Order he beginneth with Fastidius that lived not two hundred years before St. Augustin's coming tho he name four hundred And then he putteth some before that lived long after the rest and sometimes skippeth over 100 years together from one to another as you shall see by the Examen And for his Argument how many lies and errors it containeth shall easily appear by the Sequel of this Discourse For first concerning two of the chief in this Catalogue contained to wit Dubritius and David Archbishops of the Britans you have seen before that they were Roman Catholics and canonized many Ages after their Death by Roman Bishops which they would never have done if they had differed from them in any Point of Religion But now let us see of the rest for I see not what reason there is why Fox should so commend these two 12. The first four are Fastidius Ninianus Patricius and Bacchiarius all which are found to have been Catholic Men and held the common Faith of Rome in those days nor any of them ever favoured any of these new Doctrins brought in by our new Gospellers Trithemius maketh mention of Fastidius whose Sirname was Priscus Bishop of the Britans a Man of rare Life and great Learning in the Scriptures and a singular Preacher and lived in the time of Honorius and Theodosius the Emperors about the year of Christ 420. The same do write of him both Honorius Gennadius and Bergomas And John Bale concurreth with the rest adding that he was Archbishop of London and that amongst other his Works he wrote one De Viduitate servanda of keeping Widowhood without marryig again By which only work you may know that he was not of John Bale's Religion What we have written also of the Religion of St. German and his fellow Bishops that came into England may easily declare what Religion this Man was of who being then Archbishop of London must needs be presumed to have had a great part in their calling in as also to have joyned with them against the Pelagians which he would not have done if they had not been all of one Religion And thus much of him 13. Of St. Ninianus who converted the Picts to Christian Religion St. Bede maketh most honorable mention in the Third Book of his Ecclesiastical History and the Roman Martyrologe doth cite him for a Saint upon the Sixteenth day of September Which would never have been permitted if he had been in any one thing different from the Roman Faith. Nay John Bale writeth of him thus Ninianus Bernitius ex Regio Britannorum sanguine procreatus Italiam adhuc adolescens petiit Romae apud divini verbi ministros mysteria veritatis edoctus ad plenum celer in patriam remigrabat c. miraculis ac sanctitate clarissimus obiit anno 432. St. Ninian Bernitius being descended of the Blood of the King 's of Britanny went in his youth into Italy and being fully taught the Mysteries of Gods Word in Rome he returned swiftly to his Country again where he flourished exceedingly in Miracles and Sanctity of Life and after died in the year of Christ 432. Mark here that Princes Children became Priests in those days and went to Rome to learn Divinity and that this Man having done so and brought back into Britanny the Christian Doctrin of Rome wrought Miracles thereby Ergo he was no Protestant so that here Bale testifieth against himself 14. There followeth of Patricius in John Fox but indeed he should have put Palladius before Patricius For so doth Bale and he hath Reason for that he was a famous Teacher in Britanny and sent from Rome by Pope Caelestinus before Patricius as Bale doth note saying first of Palladius Hic à Caelestino Romanorum Pontifice Antistes mittebatur c. This Man was sent Bishop from Caelestinus Pope of Rome to drive out of Britanny the Pelagian Heresie which at that time had infected the greater part thereof and to reduce the Scots to true Piety c. He flourished about the year of Christ 431. c. So saith he And the same is confirmed by that which Prosper a far better Author than Bale writeth in his Chronicle where he saith that Palladius was sent by Caelestinus Pope in the year 432 into Britanny but especially to the Scots as testifieth also St. Bede in his Story So as in this time also the Popes of Rome had Supreme Care in Spiritual Affairs both among the Britans and Scots seeing he appointed them Bishops from Rome 15. And this is confirmed also by the other Example of Patricius who as John Bale saith was sirnamed Mangonius and was born in Britanny of the Family of Senators and thereby called Patricius but yet of kindred by his Mother to St. Martin Bishop of Tours study'd Divinity in Rome and thence sent by Caelestinus the Pope to preach to the Irish-men Istum saith he ad Scotos Hibernos post Palladium Graecum misit ut eos à Pelagianorum tueretur
their Authority what Succession bring they down by imposition of hands from the Apostles time may not every Sect of Heretics make themselves Christ's Church by this device Wherefore of this second point there need to be said no more 20. There remaineth then a third point to be considered by the Reader before we come to set down the Succession of John Fox's Church who having considered with himself that both Luther and Calvin did hold it to be invisible and on the other side that divers chief Lutherans had changed their Opinions therein and held it to be visible especially Flaccus Illyricus and the rest of the Magdeburgians who were to write a whole Story of their own visible Church in their Centuries and Fox to follow them step by step therein in his English Acts and Monuments the poor man was brought to a very great perplexity forasmuch as on the one side to leave Luther but especially Calvin seemed very hard unto him and on the other side not to stick to the Magdeburgians that are his Masters in his Story seemed hard also But especially and above all was he troubled as it seemeth with the reason and necessity of the matter it self for if the Church of Christ be invisible how can Fox or the Magdeburgians write so great and large stories thereof To which effect Illyricus writing upon the Genealogy set down by St. Matthew's Gospel of the true Church from the beginning saith thus Ostendit ista series Ecclesiam Religionem veram habere certas historias suae originis progressus This Genealogy proveth that the true Church and Religion have assured Histories of their beginning and progress 21. Thus said Illyricus for that he and his Fellows were then in hand as hath been said with their Ecclesiastical Histories named Centuries which they could not well have written holding the Church to be invisible neither yet John Fox could begin so great a Volume with that Opinion Wherefore after much breaking his brains about this matter as it seemeth he cometh forth with a new Opinion never heard of perhaps before affirming that the true Church of Christ is both visible and invisible to wit visible to some and invisible to others visible to them that are in her and invisible to them that are out of her You shall hear his words 22. Altho' saith he the right Church of God be not so invisible in the World that none can see it yet neither is it so visible again that every worldly eye may perceive it for like as is the nature of Truth so is the proper condition of the true Church that commonly none seeth it but such only as be members and partakers thereof and therefore they which require that God's holy Church should be evident and visible to the whole World seem to define the great Synagogue of the World rather than the true spiritual Church of God. 23. Thus saith he wherein you see that he maketh the true Church visible but only to such as are in her and Members thereof A device I think never heard of before and fit for the Brains of John Fox which were known to be out of tune for many years before he died for if he do not trifle and equivocate meaning one-where internal Visibility by Faith and another-where external Visibility to the Eye but doth mean indeed as he should do and as the Controversie is meant of external visibility to man's eye then is it most ridiculous that none can see the true Church in this World but he that is a Member of her for she is to be seen as well to her Enemies and Adversaries as to her Friends and Children the One to impugn and fight against her the Other to acknowledge and obey her And I would for examples sake demand of John Fox Whether Herod and Nero that persecuted the true visible Church of Christ were of that Church or no For if they were not then by his sentence they could not see her and consequently not persecute her 24. His comparison also between Truth and the true Church doth not hold for that Truth is a spiritual thing to be seen only by the eye of our Understanding but the true Church consisting of visible Men and Women may be seen by man's eye tho' the truth thereof to wit whether this or that visible Congregation be the true Church of Christ is a matter of Understanding and Belief confirmed unto us by such Arguments as before we have recited and others So as albeit the aforesaid Persecutors Herod and Nero for Example did not see the Truth of that Church which they persecuted in respect of their Doctrin for then perhaps they would not have done it yet did they both see and know that this was Christ's visible Church to wit a Congregation professing his Name and Doctrin yea they might know further that it was his true Church seeing it was begun visibly and evidently by him and his Apostles in their days and so continued on without interruption and if they had further known and believed as we do that he had promised to maintain and defend this Church unto the worlds end then must they either have doubted of his Fidelity or Power to perform it or must have believed also that this Church could not fail whereof Protestants doubting must needs doubt also of the one or the other to wit of the Fidelity and of the Ability of our Savior to perform his promise And this is the force of Succession even with Enemies and Infidels 25. But now let us pass to the principal matter intended in this Chapter which is the Succession or Deduction of the Protestants Church promised by John Fox in his Acts and Monuments Wherein saith he is set forth at large the whole race and course of the Church from the Primitive to these latter times of ours c. Thus he promiseth in the Title but how he doth perform it in his whole Book we shall see afterward in this Declaration Tho' in part we may perceive his drift by that he protesteth to the Church of England before his entrance into his Story in these words I have taken in hand saith he this History that as other Story-Writers heretofore have employ'd their travail to magnifie the Church of Rome so in this History might appear the Image of both Churches but especially of the poor oppressed and persecuted Church of Christ which tho' it hath been so long trodden under foot by Enemies neglected in the World not regarded in Histories and almost scarce visible and known to worldly eyes yet hath it been the true Church only of God wherein he hath mightily wrought hitherto in preserving the same in all extreme distresses continually stirring up from time to time faithful Ministers by whom always hath been kept some sparks of this true Doctrin and Religion And forsomuch as the true Church of God goeth not lightly alone but is accompanied with some
other Church or Chappel of the Devil to deface and malign the same necessary it is that the difference between them both be seen and the descent of the right Church to be described from the Apostles time c. 26. Here we see all John Fox his drift laid down First he meaneth to contradict all former Writers that have magnified the Church of Rome and the Greatness and Glory thereof which he calleth the Devil's Chappel And in this he must contradict all the ancient Fathers and Writers for divers hundred years after Christ as Irenaeus Tertullian Augustin Optatus and other Writers that bring down the descent of the true Church of Christ by the Succession of the Bishops and Church of Rome as before you have heard And secondly Fox meaneth to set out another Christian Church trodden under foot before neglected in the World not regarded in Histories and almost scarce visible or known and yet was and is forsooth the only true Church of Christ keeping some spark of his true Doctrin and Religion he doth not say that all was true which she held nor that all Christ's Doctrin was taught in her but only some sparks or scraps of true Doctrin And further he promiseth that he will describe the descent of this Church from the Apostles time 27. This is John Fox his promise and we accept thereof And tho' it be scarce worth the performance to shew us a hidden obscure and trodden down Church in every Age that keepeth some sparks of true Doctrin and Religion for that every Sect and Heresie not denying Christ and his Doctrin wholly doth so yet shall we accept and exact the same being never so miserable and beggarly as we go over the whole course of Times and Ages from Christ downward following therein the distribution it self that John Fox hath appointed to be observed in his Story to wit from Christ to Constantine 300 years from Constantine to S. Gregory as much from S. Gregory and S. Augustin our Apostles to the Conquest 400 and odd years from the Conquest to Wickliff other 300 years from Wickliff to Luther about 240 from Luther's time to ours somewhat less than a hundred In all which variety of Times we shall examin briefly Whether John Fox his Church were on foot or no What Continuance or Succession it may be said to have had Where when and by what men it was begun continued and acknowledged What Doctrin it held and whence and with what Vnion or Conformity with it self or with the Catholic Roman Church Which Catholic Church being shewed and declared in the first Part of this Book to have been founded by the Apostles and conserved visibly from that time hither by Succession of Bishops and Prelates Governors and Professors thereof will easily also bring in the Notice and Certificate of John Fox his opposite Church whereof now we begin to treat CHAP. II. The particular Examination of the Descent or Succession of John Fox his Church in England or elsewhere for the first Three Hundred years after CHRIST to wit unto the time of Constantine the Emperour And whether any such Church was extant then in the World or no and in Whom HE that will consider the proportion of John Fox his Book of Acts and Monuments in the latter Edition he shall find it the greatest perhaps in Volume that ever was put forth in our English Tongue and the falsest in substance without perhaps that ever was published in any Tongue The Volume consisteth of above a thousand Leaves of the largest Paper that lightly hath been seen and every Leaf containeth four great Columns and yet if you consider how many Leaves of those thousand he hath spent in Deduction of the whole Church either His or Ours and the whole Ecclesiastical Story thereof for the first thousand years after Christ they are by his own account but threescore and four to wit scarce the thirtieth part of that he bestoweth in the last five hundred years 2. And further if this his thousand years Story containing threescore and four leaves be sifted and examined what it containeth not four of them do appertain to that which he should handle which is the visible Deduction of his Church as we shall endeavor briefly to shew dividing the whole thousand and threescore years from Christ to William the Conqueror into four distinct Times or Stations appointed out by John Fox himself in his Book to wit the first from Christ to Constantine containing 300 years the second from Constantine to K. Ethelbert's Conversion by St. Augustin containing other 300 years the third from King Ethelbert and other six Kings of England reigning jointly with him unto King Egbert the first Monarch of the English Nation which space is somewhat more than other 200 years and the fourth from King Egbert to William the Conqueror containing the same or some few more years 3. Let us now follow I say John Fox throughout all these Ages and different stations of times and see out of what Holes or Dens he will draw his little hidden trodden down Church different from the Roman Visible Church and yet endued notwithstanding from time to time with some little sparks of Truth which he promiseth to bring down from the Apostles to our time In the first 300 years then from Christ to Constantine whereas all other Ecclesiastical Writers and St. Luke amongst the rest in his Acts of the Apostles ch 2 3 4 c. do set down the visible beginning of Christ's Church by his Apostles and Disciples their strengthening and confirmation by the coming of the Holy Ghost their preaching and converting of others their great and many Miracles and thereby the establishing and wonderful increase of the said Church throughout the World and continuance of the same downward by Succession of Bishops but namely and specially of the Bishops of Rome as before hath been declared and is to be seen in the Writings of Dionysius Areopagita Josephus Justinus Egesippus Clemens Irenaeus Tertullian Origenes Julius Africanus Cyprian Eusebius and others of these Ages John Fox followeth no such order at all nor ever so much as mentioneth any descent of Bishops of His Church or Ours but only to spend time and fill up Paper taketh upon him to translate out of Eusebius and other Authors the Martyrdoms of such as suffered for Christian Religion in the ten general Persecutions of these first 300 years setting the same forth also in painted Pictures for no other purpose as it seemeth but only to entertain his Reader with some strange and delightful Spectacle and afterward so to joyn his Protestant burned Martyrs with those of the Primitive Church as the Painting being somewhat alike the simple Reader might thereby be induced to think that there was no great difference either in their Persons or Cause of suffering 4. But I would ask John Fox To what purpose of his was the bringing in of all these Martyrs of the Primitive
discipline of your Confederation that your Bishops must sacrifice in Gold and dispense Blood in Silver Cups and that in your Night-Vigils you have Waxen Torches in Golden Candlesticks c. And thus much of St. Laurence whose Persecutor speaketh like a perfect Protestant which is an Argument that himself was none 9. Now as for the other glorious Martyr and Bishop St. Cyprian who suffered under the same Emperour and in the same year that Pope Sixtus and St. Laurence did as appears by Pontius his Deacon that lived with him we have shewed before that the Magdeburgians do reprehend him sharply I mean St. Cyprian for this very point about offering Sacrifice for that he saith Sacerdotem vice Christi fungi Deo Patri sacrificium offerre lib. 2. ep 3. That the Priest doth perform the Office of Christ and offereth Sacrifice to God the Father So as now we have here three Massing or Sacrificing Priests which is the highest Crime objected to Priests now in England and a Massing Deacon that helpeth to Mass and all four most glorious Martyrs within these first 300 years to wit St. Andrew the Apostle by his own Confession St. Sixtus Bishop of Rome by the testimony of St. Laurence St. Cyprian Bishop of Carthage by the accusation of the Magdeburgians and St. Laurence the Deacon by testimony of Prudentius St. Ambrose and others And it were over-long to pass any further in this examination for that the Examples would be infinite this be-being sufficient to shew how little it maketh for John Fox his purpose to have brought in this so large and particular a story of all the Martyrs of the first ten Persecutions they being so opposite to his late Protestant Martyrs as they are 10. Well then this is sufficient for these Martyrs But what shall we say to the whole intent and drift of John Fox which should have been as you know to lay before us the continual descent throughout these first three Ages of his poor oppressed and persecuted and yet the only true Church of Christ almost scarce visible or known to worldly eyes c This I say he should have shewed and laid open to us for that we find no other Christian Church known in the World in these first 300 years but only One which tho' it were much persecuted yet was it neither obscure nor hidden from the eyes either of good or bad but most visible and apparent to all the World. And in the end of these 300 years to wit under Constantine the Emperour and Silvester the Pope of Rome the same came to be so magnificent and glorious as all the World remained astonished thereat which appeareth partly by that which Eusebius and all other Ecclesiastical Writers do recount in the Life of the said Constantine especially Eusebius that wrote four whole Books of the said Constantine's Life and Actions who was a most excellent Christian Emperour And amongst other points of his most pious Devotion it is recorded that he builded four goodly Churches within the City of Rome carrying Earth to the first Foundation of them with his own hands and adorning them with holy Images endowing the same with rich Possessions Furniture and Ecclesiastical Ornaments and consecrated precious Vessels for Divine Service dedicating the one of them which was his own Palace of Lateran unto our Savior and St. John Baptist the other to St. Peter the third to St. Paul and the fourth to St. Laurence all which do remain unto this day and the very manner of building thereof with their Altars Fonts Pictures and other such-like Antiquities do well shew without Books what manner of Religion was then in use 11. This was the known visible Church then of Christians in those days as glorious and renowned as can be imagined Of which Church one wrote at that time to Constantine himself thus Quis locus in terra est c What place is there in the whole Earth which hath not received the Faith of Christ either where the Sun riseth or where it falleth where the North-Pole is elevated or where the South all is filled with the Majesty of this God. The same writeth Optatus Concedite Deo c. Yield this unto Christ who is God that his Garden spread it self over all the World Can you deny unto him now but that Christians do possess both East West North and South as also the Provinces of innumerable Islands And the same hath St. Basil in his 72d and 75th Epistle and the like St. Hilary lib. 6. de Trinitate This then was the greatness of this Universal Catholic Church at that day and of this Church were counted the head Bishops for all these 300 years the Popes and Bishops of Rome as appeareth by the deductions made by Irenaeus Tertullian and others before mentioned and in this Church was held to be all Catholic Truth and none out of it Which being so I would gladly know what poor obscure trodden-down Church neglected in the World not regarded in Histories and almost scarce visible or known which yet he saith to be the only true Church of God can John Fox find us out in these first 300 years especially seeing he saith also that it must be different from the Church of Rome as from the Devil's Chappel and that it must come down from the Apostles time and always hold some sparkles of true Doctrin 12. For Example or Proof whereof notwithstanding he mentioneth no one Man Woman or Child that was of that Church in all these 300 years and consequently he driveth us to imagin or seek out who they are that made up this obscure Church of his different and opposite to the Roman And I can find none except the known Heretics of these first three Ages to whom the description of his Church may easily agree for first none will deny but that albeit they were many in number as Simon Magus and his Followers the Nicolaits Cerynthians Ebionites Menandrians Saturnians in the first Age Basilidians Gnosticks Cerdonists Marcionists Valentinians Encratites Montanists and others in the second Age as also Helchesits Novatians Sabellians Manichees and many more in the third Age and that in divers Countries and Provinces they had their Followers their Churches their Assemblies under the name of Reformed Christians Elect People and men of more perfection than the rest yet in respect of the glorious Catholic Church that shined throughout the World they were just as John Fox describeth his People here to wit a poor oppressed and persecuted Church c. Oppressed by force of Truth and persecuted by the famous Writings of Catholic Doctors against them as after the Apostles themselves St. Ignatius Justinus Martyr St. Dionyse of Corinth St. Polycarp Irenaeus Clem. Alexandrinus Tertullian Origen Cyprian Ammonius Pamphilus Arnobius and others They were persecuted also by the Excommunications and spiritual Censures of all Catholic Bishops throughout the World but especially by the
Popes of Rome from St. Peter to Pope Silvester which were Thirty-three in number all Martyrs and every one of them condemned the Heretics of his time 13. This accursed new Church also of Heretics had the other quality ascribed in like manner by John Fox to his Church to wit that they were neglected in the Christian World and not regarded in Stories but only to recount them to their shame and damnation Finally the last commendation also was not wanting to them that they were almost scarce visible or known in respect of the flourishing Catholic Church And lastly these congregations and swarms of Heretics tho' never so much divided among themselves continued indeed from the Apostles by a kind of broken Succession of times the one rising and the other falling And they had the last point also specified by John Fox of keeping some sparks of true Doctrin in Religion for that as St. Augustin writeth Nulla falsa Doctrina est quae aliqua Vera non intermisceat There is no Doctrin so false which doth not interlace some true things And this is proper to Heresies for that otherwise if they had no points of true Doctrin they should be rather Apostates than properly Heretics for that Apostates are those that deny all Christ's Doctrin but Heretics do grant some parts and deny others 14. About which point of old Heretics and their Affinity with the Protestants of this Age it is worth the noting That whatsoever some of our late English Writers especially the Minister O. E. or Matthew Sutcliff do prattle to the contrary yet shall you never find any one Article of those that are in controversie and held by us at this day against the Protestants to have been held singularly by any one old Heretic in that sense as we do hold the same and much less condemn'd for Heresie in him or them by the Church in these days or by any one Father thereof And on the other side you shall find divers Doctrins held by them and condemn'd in them by the Church for Heresies I mean the Heretics of the first 300 years which the Protestants do hold at this day properly and in the same sense that those Heretics did And We do condemn the same for Heresies in Them as the Primitive Church did in the Other As for Example that of the Pseudo-Apostoli Heretics called false Apostles who did think only Faith to be sufficient to Salvation without Works against which Heresie St. Augustin saith were written the Epistles of St. James St. Jude St. Peter and St. John. 15. That other point also which St. Ignatius reporteth of certain Heretics in his time Qui non confitebantur Eucharistiam esse Carnem Salvatoris nostri Jesu Christi quae pro peccatis nostris passa est Who did not confess that the Eucharist was the Flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ that suffered for us That other Doctrin in like manner that Theodoretus writeth of the Novatians His qui ab ipsis tinguntur sacrum Chrisma non praebent quocirca eos qui ex hac haeresi Corpori Ecclesiae conjunguntur benedicti Patres ungi jusserunt To those that are baptized by them the Novatians they do not give holy Chrism for which cause whosoever returning from that Heresie are to be joyned to the Body of the Catholic Church the holy Fathers commanded that they should be anointed with the said Chrism 16. Cornelius also Bishop of Rome complaineth that the said Novatus and Novatians did not receive the Sacrament of Confirmation For speaking of Novatus he saith Qui sigillo Domini ab Episcopo non signatus fuit quomodo quaeso Sanctum Spiritum adeptus est He that was not signed with the Seal of our Lord by the Bishop how could he think you obtain the Holy Ghost The same Heretics also deny'd the power of absolving from sin in Priests as also Confession and Satisfaction according as the same holy Bishop and Pope Cornelius objecteth unto him by the testimony of St. Cyprian And finally to go no further within these first 300 years St. Hierom objecteth for an Heresie to the Manichees the denying of Man's Free-will saying Manichaeorum Dogma est hominum damnare naturam liberum auferre arbitrium It is the Doctrin of the Manichees to condemn Man's Nature and to take away Free-will So saith St. Hierom and St. Chrysostom and St. Augustin do also testifie the same of the Manichees expresly And tho' perhaps the Manichees held that Doctrin upon other grounds than Protestants do yet in the Heresie it self they do plainly symbolize and agree 17. These are matters then most evident and clear nor can they be deny'd but that these Opinions are held by Protestants at this day in the very same words sense and meaning as they were by the forenamed old Heretics wherein also they were anathematiz'd and condemn'd by the known Catholic Church of these ancient Ages 18. But now when on the contrary side some Sectaries of our time to cure or cover this wound of theirs will needs like Apes object to us again That we hold some old condemned Errors and Heresies also or rather some shadow or similitude thereof you shall ever find one of these two frauds or falshoods in their Objection to wit that either they object unto us that which we indeed hold not at all or at least not in the sense which they object it or that the thing in truth is no Error in it self nor ever was held or condemned for such in the sense and meaning in which we hold it tho' it may have some little external similitude with that which was an Error As for Example O. E. objecteth unto us That we do symbolize and participate with two old Heresies the one of the Angelici qui Angelos adorabant that did adore Angels as St. Augustin saith the other of the Collyridians so called of the Greek word Collyra signifying a little triangular Cake or Bun that those Heretics being Women did offer in Sacrifice to our Blessed Lady But in both these Examples we utterly deny that we agree in Doctrin or Practice with those Heretics seeing that we neither adore nor worship with Divine Honor Angels or other Saints nor do offer Sacrifice to the Mother of God but only to God himself alone tho' in the Honor and Memory also of his Mother and other Saints glorified by him which Doctrin of ours is extant in all our Books So as here is manifestly found the first fraud of our Adversaries which is to object to us that which we hold not indeed 19. And the other falshood also cannot be deny'd whereby they affirm the Doctrin which we truly hold and practise in this behalf about honoring of Saints to have been at any time held for Error or condemn'd by the ancient Catholic Church or Teachers thereof for such Truth it is that the Magdeburgians are not asham'd to note this
for an Error in Origen Invocandos Angelos Origenes putavit homil 1. in Ezech. Origen thought Angels to be invoked And then again Hanc formulam invocandi Angelos proponit Veni Angele suscipe conversum ab Errore pristino c. And he setteth down this form of praying to Angels Come Angel receive him that is converted from his former Errors c. 20. But I would have the Magdeburgians or any of their Partners shew me when or where this Sentence of Origen was ever noted or condemned by Antiquity for Error or Heresie as some other Doctrins of his were Certain it is they cannot which is a singular Argument against them for that those Watchmen of the Church that noted and condemned those other Errors of his would have noted also this if it had been taken for an Error in those days And further I say to the Magdeburgians Let them tell us whether other holy Fathers yea the chiefest of God's Church after Origen did not hold the very same Doctrin Sure I am that the Magdeburgians themselves in the very next Century after do condemn by Name St. Ephrem and St. Hilary for this Doctrin of Invocation of Angels in the same sense that Origen did hold it And then again in the same third Century they do reprehend by Name for Invocation of other Saints which is the same Controversie the gravest Doctors of the Church to wit St. Athanasius St. Basil St. Gregory Nazianzen St. Ambrose St. Epiphanius Ephrem and Prudentius citing their plain words and condemning their Doctrin in this behalf So as if this were an Heresie all these Fathers were Heretics which were a blasphemous cogitation to think and much more to speak or utter And thus much of the first Objection about honoring Angels and other Saints wherein Protestants do only calumniate our doings as you see 21. As for the Collyridians he that will read St. Epiphanius who writeth of that mad fond fantastical Error of certain Women in Thracia for so he termeth them that would needs make our Blessed Lady a Goddess and offer Sacrifice unto her he shall find this Father to handle two things at large First That notwithstanding our Blessed Lady for the Privilege of bearing the Savior of the World be highly to be honored yet not ultra decorum as his words be that is not more than is decent or beyond the limits of a Creature seeing she is not God tho' the Mother of God And consequently these Thracian Women did foolishly and wickedly in devising this public Sacrifice unto her 22. Secondly That albeit this their Sacrifice had been offered by them to God himself yet was it unlawfully done by Women for that neither in the Old or New Testament saith he was it appointed that Women should do the Function of Sacrifice but Men only and those Priests And this Argument St. Epiphanius prosecuteth very largely proving that in the New Testament and Christian Church the Apostles only and other Priests succeeding by Imposition of hands had Authority to sacrifice but no Woman no not the Mother of Christ her self who should have had that Privilege above all other Women if any of her Sex might have been admitted And after our Blessed Lady he addeth these that followeth Fuerunt saith he quatuor filiae Philippo Evangelistae prophetantes sed non sacrificantes c Philip the Evangelist had four Daughters that prophesied but not that sacrificed And again Et ministrarum quidem Diaconissarum appellatarum Ordo est in Ecclesia sed non ad sacrificandum c. Diaconissis indiguit Ecclesiasticus Ordo nusquam autem eas Presbyter as aut Sacrificulas constituit c. Vnde igitur hic rursus Mulierum fastus insania muliebris There is saith he in the Christian Church an Order of them that are called Diaconesses but not to sacrifice The Ecclesiastical Order had need of these Diaconesses at the beginning but yet never ordained them as Priests or Sacrificers And whence then is now come again this pride of Women or womanish madness as to take upon them to sacrifice in the Church 23. By all which Discourse you may easily see what was the true Heresie condemned in these Collyridians to wit Colere Sanctos ultra modum decorum as the words of holy Epiphanius are that is to worship Saints beyond measure and decency and above the nature and condition of Creatures which is forbidden by God's Church but not to honor Them as Servants of His and Him in Them. You will see also what Opinion and Use of Christian Sacrifice there was in Epiphanius's days and how it was deny'd to Women and practis'd by Priests only which yet the Sectaries of this Age cannot abide to hear of And here now will we make an end of these first 300 years after Christ wherein as you see John Fox hath put down no Succession of his Church at all either in Men or Doctrin For as for men to wit Bishops Pastors and Teachers succeeding one to another from the Apostles downward they were all of the Roman visible Church and so were all other that bear the name of Christians except the Heretics before named and of the said Roman and Catholic Church the chief Leaders were from St. Peter unto Silvester Thirty-three Popes as before hath been mentioned all Martyrs and Witnesses of the same Faith. And in other principal Patriarchal Seats wherein the Apostles had held the first Chairs as Antioch Hierusalem Alexandria and the like there had succeeded other holy Bishops as also in infinit other places throughout the World so as in the Emperor Constantine's time who liv'd in the end of these first 300 years and was the first Christian Emperor that publickly professed Christian Religion the said Christian Church was so glorious that in the first General Council of Nice there were 318 principal Bishops joyned together the most of them of Asia only Whereby we see how Illustrious and Eminent the said Catholic Church and Religion was at that time 24. By which we do most evidently infer That either John Fox his obscure and trodden-down Church scarce visible as he saith to the World was not at all in those days or else it lurk'd only in some of the forenamed Heretics For if he say that the great perspicuous Roman Church was his at that time then how doth he define his Church to be obscure and scarce visible to the World And moreover we have shewed before that the Bishops Doctors Teachers Martyrs and chief Members or Guiders of this great illustrious Church were opposite to Him and his Church both in Faith and Doctrin and this by the confession of his own Doctors and Writers the Magdeburgians and others that reprehend and condemn the Fathers of the second and third Ages for holding divers principal Points of Doctrin now also in controversie against Them and for Us. And we have shewed also that this great Universal and
Catholic Church had all Truth in it that was revealed by Christ and not some sparks only as Fox requireth in his Church and that it had continual Succession of multitudes of true Teachers without interruption and not one starting up in one Age and another in another wherewith Fox seemeth to be contented for the continuation of his Church 25. And finally if Fox coming at length to be asham'd of his former definition of an obscure and trodden-down Church and of the sparkled Doctrin of Truth therein taught should leave the same and offer to lay hands on the Great Illustrious and Visible Church of the first 300 years saying that this was His which yet you have seen by many Arguments demonstrated that it cannot be I shall be content to admit so ridiculous a pretence for a time with condition that he will stand to it and go forward with this Church in the sequent Ages and not to disclaim from Her to his hidden Church again Which if he yield unto then have we now a Visible and Eminent True Church on foot by confession of both Parties which we must follow to the Worlds end for that she cannot perish again as before we have declared For which cause I am to prosecute the same from Age to Age in this Treatise from this time downwards to our days in the Chapters that do ensue where we shall see who sticketh to her and who flieth from her who followeth her constantly or who giveth the slip for that she being now once so Potent Notorious and Illustrious as both Parts do confess if he will stand to it in earnest that she is his Church also it is not possible that she should be lost shrink or fade away again but that all the World must see it How Where When and by Whom so great an Accident should fall out neither can Fox and his People being now once in Her and of Her by his own pretence be found out of her afterward but only by Apostacy or Heresie and running away This then let us examin in the Ages following CHAP. III. The prosecution of the same matter to wit of the Descent of the Catholic and Protestant Church for other Three Hundred years that is from Pope Sylvester and Constantine to Pope Gregory and Mauritius the Emperour And where John Fox his Church lay hid in this time AND thus having run over the first three Ages after Christ we must now pass to the second station which is for other 300 years beginning from Constantine the Emperour downward unto the time of St. Gregory under whom St. Augustin came into England in which space of time the Catholic Christian Church spread over all the World as before you have heard did grow and confirm it self powerfully especially after Persecution did cease as by all Stories appeareth having had thirty-two Popes between Sylvester and Gregory whereof thirty were holden for great Saints and three or four were Martyrs 2. The Fathers and Doctors also of these three Ages were most excellent men both Grecians and Latins and it seemeth that what wanted in these three Ages from the former three in the Glory of Martyrdom it was supply'd by the Excellency of Learning As for Example in the fourth Age after Christ which is the first of the second three did flourish Eusebius Lactantius Rheticius Juvencus Athanasius Hilarius Optatus Climacus Basil Nazianzenus Ambrose Prudentius Hierom Chrysostom Epiphanius Cyril and divers others In rhe fifth Age St. Augustin Possidonius Sulpitius Orosius Cassianus Prosper Vincentius Lyrinensis Falgentius and many more And in the sixth Age Cassiodorus Emisenus Procopius Fortunatus Venantius Evagrius Gregorius Turonensis and Gregory the Great All which filled the World with their excellent Books both Greek and Latin besides many General National and Provincial Councils whereof five were Universal the first of Nice the second of Constantinople the third of Ephesus the fourth of Chalcedon wherein there were 630 Bishops and the fifth was of Constantinople the second time but of Provincial and National Councils there are receiv'd to the number of almost seventy to have been held in this time 3. By all which concourse of Testimonies the Force and Unity of Catholic Faith is shewed to wit that these Fathers Doctors Popes and Councils agreeing together all throughout the World in one and the self-same Faith and Religion and continuing the same from Age to Age with so great Authority of Respect and Majesty as not only all Ecclesiastical Persons of what Nations soever and other Christian People but all Temporal Princes Kings and Emperours in like manner except such as were noted with any particular Heresie as some Emperours of the East did wholly submit themselves with one consent Whereby this visible Illustrious Roman Church was made so Great and Universal notorious and known embracing all Christendom as it is wholly impossible for John Fox to find out any creeping hidden Church bearing the name of Christian in these three Ages and yet different from this visible and splendent Church of Rome which he calleth the Devil's Chappel And much more hard will it be for him to find out this in these latter three hundred years than in the former for that the external Glory of this Church was increased much more in these three Ages than in the first three before treated of which passed all in Persecution 4. The Heresies also and Sects of this time being above Fifty in number were beaten down more strongly by the foresaid Fathers Bishops and Councils than before by reason they had more time and leisure from Persecution to attend unto them than had those of the former three Ages The principal Heresies of this fourth Age were Meletians Donatists Arians Novatians Macedonians Luciferians Aërians Eunomians Apollinarians Aetians Priscillianists Jovinians Vigilantians Collyridians Helvidians Antimarians and other the like And in the fifth Age were Pelagians Nestorians Eutychians and other such Rabble And in the sixth Age Severians Monothelites Chrystolytes Agnoites Sadduces Theopaschites and the like Out of which Synagogues and Congregations of wrangling Spirits which succeeded one another in divers Times Places and Countries and opposed themselves maliciously out of their obscure corners against the shining Light of the foresaid Catholic Church if John Fox will frame his poor and beggarly Church which yet he holdeth for the only true Church of God oppressed and trodden down as he saith and almost scarce visible to worldly eyes he may do it with great probability for that these Fellows were neglected and trodden down indeed by the other opposite Roman Church and yet did they as John Fox requireth for the Succession of his Church continue and rise up from time to time tho' by no orderly Succession of Bishops or Doctrin as hath been said yea they had that other quality also proper to John Fox his Church that they always kept some sparks of true Doctrin and Religion together with their Heresies So as in this
respect of obscurity and contemptibility John Fox may easily joyn his Church with them as also in having some sparkles of true Doctrin but not the whole body of true Doctrin among them 5. He may joyn also in divers particular Doctrins which these men held as peculiar Heresies to themselves and were condemn'd by the Church for such in those days and are held also in these days by John Fox his Church in the very self-same words sense and meaning as they were held by those Heretics As namely he may joyn with the Donatists who said that thy were the only true Church and called the Succession of Bishops in the Church of Rome as Sectaries do at this day the Chair of Pestilence and moreover that the whole Church besides themselves had erred c. which is the common Song of our modern Protestants And further if you will see how near of Kin these Donatists and our Protestants be both in Manners Conditions Doctrin and Belief read St. Augustin Optatus and other Writers that objected against them these things following to wit That they had cast the blessed Sacrament of the Altar to Dogs overthrew Altars broke Chalices and sold them cast a Bottle of holy Chrism out of the Church-window shaved Priests heads to take away their Unction turned Nuns out of their Monasteries to the World polluted all Church stuff and the like And whether John Fox and his Fellows do not joyn also in these Points let the Reader judge 6. They may joyn in like manner with the Eunomians for their only Faith who affirmed as St. Augustin saith quòd nihil cuiquam obesset guorumlibet perpetratio ac perseverantia peccatorum si hujus quae ab illis docebatur Fidei particeps esset That the committing and perseverance in never so great sins could not hurt him that was partaker of their Faith. They may also joyn with the Novatians of that time in denying the Churches power in forgiving sins They may joyn with the Aerians who taught as St. Angustin saith non oportere orare vel Oblationem offerre pro mortuis that we ought not to pray or offer Oblations for them that be dead and further That solemn Feasts are not to be appointed by the Church but every one to fast when he would lest he should seem to be under the Law c. 7. Thus testifieth St. Augustin of him and of Jovinian that followed him both the said Father and St. Hierom that wrote against him do accuse him to have held That all sins were equal before God that fasting from certain meats was not profitable that chast Marriage was equal in honor and merit to professed Virginity in Nuns and that he had been cause that some Nuns had married in Rome and finally that the reward in Heaven was equal to all men And is not this good currant Protestant Doctrin and Practice at this day But let us go forward They may joyn also with the Helvidians or Antidicomarians in impugning our Blessed Lady and equalling Marriage with Virginity And much more with Vigilantius in impugning the continent sole Life of Clergy-men Worship of Martyrs at their Tombs use of Candles and Torches in the Church by day-time Invocation of Saints Vows of Poverty and the like 8. I will go no further for that this is sufficient to see what Communion John Fox his Church did hold in these three Ages either with the common known Catholic Church of Christ or with these lurking Assemblies of Heretics pursued and persecuted by the said Church and for that John Fox is guilty to himself in this behalf he hath proceeded accordingly in his Acts and Monuments For whereas he promiseth a several Book of these second 300 years under this Title The second Book containing the next 300 years after Christ c. he not finding any sufficient matter for his purpose to patch up this second Book withal as he did the former with recounting the Martyrs of those days what shift deviseth he think you to blear his Readers eyes with all and to seem to say somewhat in the continuation of his Story You shall hear briefly and by this one trick you may learn to know the man and his meaning for the time to come 9. First he writeth but five leaves in all for the continuation of the Story of these second 300 years A short Volume you will say for so great and copious an Argument And yet further you must know that of these five leaves he passeth two in telling tales and matters that fell under Pope Eleutherius and King Lucius more than a hundred years before and consequently it should have been told in his former Book by order of Time and Story and then the other three leaves he spendeth in setting down the entrance of the Saxons into England about the year of Christ 449 and the Succession of their Pagan Kings unto St. Augustin's coming So as of all the foresaid glorious Christian Church for 300 years together to wit from Pope Sylvester and Constantine unto Pope Gregory and Mauritius the Emperour wherein she flourished more than in any other three Ages we find only five Leaves designed but scarce three Lines performed Whereby you may perceive how little part John Fox persuadeth himself to have in these three Ages for his hidden Church You may consider also what an honest Bargainer he is and how well he performeth his promise made in the first page of his whole Work wherein he saith That he will set forth at large the whole Race and Course of the Church from the Primitive Age to these latter times of ours c. whereof you see he hath performed nothing at all hitherto either largely or briefly I mean of this Race or Course of any Church General or Particular Domestical or Foreign Good or Bad True or False His or Ours for of the first 300 years he wrote only the ten Persecutions as you have seen and of the second 300 years he writeth nothing at all 10. Which if you consider well is a strange confession of his own weakness and poverty seeing that these three Ages to wit the fourth fifth and sixth are the most abundant of matter that are to be found in the Church of Christ from the beginning and so might he see by the Centuries of his Masters the Magdeburgians who do enlarge themselves much more in these three Ages than in the former enforced thereunto by the multitude of matter tho' all against themselves as before hath been noted and here will also appear which John Fox well perceiving thought best by slight of silence to avoid that inconvenience of treating a History so apparently against himself Which slight notwithstanding or rather flight every man of mean understanding doth easily see considering that according to the Argument of his Book and particular promise made before he should have declared to us That the Religion of Britanny in these 300
accuse St. Ambrose for using these words Missam facere Offerre Offerre Sacrificium c. To say Mass to offer to offer up Sacrifice c. They reprehend Gregory Nyssen for teaching of Transmutation or Transubstantiation Dei verbo Sanctificatum panem in Dei verbi corpus credimus immutari We do believe that the Bread which is Sanctified by the word of God is by the same word of God changed into the Body of the Son of God. 20. It would be overlong to Treat of all the Points in Controversie for which the Magdeburgians do reprehend and Condemn the Fathers of this Age which so highly they commended a little before For about Justification by Faith only they Condemn by Name Lactantius Nilus Chromacius Ephrem and St. Hierom. And why for that he saith non sufficit murum habere fidei nisi ipsa fides bonis operibus confirmetur It is not enough to have the wall of Faith except Faith be confirmed with good works Which yet you have heard approved by the Sentence of Sir Francis Hastings before 21. They condemn the same Lactantius together with St. Gregory Nyssen St. Hillary St. Nazianzen St. Ambrose St. Ephrem and Theophilus Alexandrinus for Attributing to much to good works but especially to those that are voluntary Inter omnia opera say they Electitiis plurimum haec aetas tribuit Sic enim ait Theophilus hi qui jejunia id est Angelicam conversationem in terris imitantur per continentiam brevi parvo labore magna sibi aeterna conciliant praemia But among all other works say the Magdeburgians this Age doth Attribute most unto voluntary works or such as are chosen by a Mans self for so saith Theophilus Arch-Bishop of Alexandria those that do follow Fasting that is to say an Angelical Conversation upon Earth do gain unto themselves by this short and small labor of abstinence great and eternal rewards 22. About Satisfaction they reprehend greatly and put it for an Error in great Hilarius for that he writeth upon these words of the 118 Psalm My eyes have brought forth fountains of waters c. Haec poenitentiae vox est lachrymis orare lachrymis ingemiscere This is the voice of true Penance to pray with tears and sigh with tears And again Haec venia peccati est fontem fletus stere largo lachrymarum imbre mad fieri This is the forgiveness of sin to weep a whole fountain of tears and to wash our selves with a large shower of weeping c. This did greatly discontent our Good-fellow Germans but St. Hilarius was of another Opinion 23. What should I recite here other Controversies seeing it would but tire the Reader For about Invocation and Prayer to Saints they condemn by name St. Athanasius lib. de Incarnatione for praying to our Lady St. Basil oratione in quadraginta Martyres for praying to the said Forty Martyrs St. Gregory Nazianzen oratione in Basilium for praying to St. Basil after he was dead also for praying to St. Cyprian after he was martyred Orat. in Cyprianum they condemn also St. Ambrose lib. de viduis for praying to St. Peter and St. Andrew and our Lady they condemn Prudentius for praying to St. Laurence and in another place to St. Vincentius and Cassianus Martyrs Hym. in Laur. Vincent Cassian They condemn Epiphanius for saying that Prayers of the Living do help the Dead Haeres 75. They condemn St. Ephrem for saying that the Saints in Paradise did pray for them that are alive lib. 1. de compunctione cordis cap. 13. 24. As for unwritten Tradition they condemn all the Fathers of this Age one by one reciting their Sentences and rejecting them They condemn by name Lactantius Prudentius and Hieronymus for holding Purgatory they condemn St. Epiphanius for affirming that the Church admitteth no man to marry after he is Priest Et haec certe sancta Dei Ecclesia cum sinceritate observat And truly the holy Church of God saith Epiphanius doth observe this Custom with all sincerity And thus much be spoken only about one Chapter to wit of Doctrin having over-skipped many other things for brevity-sake in the same Chapter 25. But if I would pass to other Chapters especially that of Rites and Ceremonies which is their sixth in order there would be no end For first in the very first Paragraph about Rites or Ceremonies belonging to Churches Service and public Meeting which is but one of almost twenty Paragraphs contained in this Chapter they set down these Rites following which do easily shew that Our Religion and not Theirs was in practice in this fourth Age. As for example the Building of Churches in Honor of Saints by Constantine and others at the beginning of this Age and dedicating them to the same Saints out of Eusebius and other Authors pag. 407. nu 50. Dedications also and Consecrations of the same Temples or Churches and the Days of the said Consecration kept Holy and Festival with great solemnity out of Athanasius and others ibid. Service at midnight used in the Churches at that time out of St. Basil and others ibid. Altars builded in Churches for Christian Sacrifice by the testimony of Socrates Zozomenus Theodoretus and others ibid. The Interpretation also what an Altar meaneth set down by Optatus Quid est Altare nisi sedes Corporis Sanguinis Christi What is an Altar but the seat of the Body and Blood of Christ Images also set up and painted in Churches in this Age out of Zozomenus Eusebius Optatus and others pag. 409. Caereas Candelas Lampades Torches Wax-Candles and burning Lamps set up in the Church by Constantine himself out of Eusebius lib. 4. de vita Constant pag. 410. Of Vigils and Watches kept in Church-Feasts out of Basil Theodoret and others ibid. The use of Litanies in those days they shew out of Basil Theodoret and others ibid. 26. I leave many more Rites and Catholic Ceremonies set down by them in this first Paragraph which is of public Meetings Churches c. But if I would pass from this unto many other Heads handled by them as about the use of Baptism and administration of other Sacraments and Sacrifice about Feasts Fasts Marriage Burying Honoring Martyrs Tombs Pilgrimages consecrating of Monks and Nuns and other such points which these Magdeburgians do handle here at large out of the Fathers of this Age and practice of that Church to the number of nineteen or twenty all against themselves it were sufficient to make a several Book apart As for Example about Baptism they teach us That those who are to be baptized must first be confessed of their sins that they must say abrenuntio tibi Sathana omnibus operibus tuis that they must be prepared by Exorcisms and after Baptism be anointed with holy Chrism that they must fast a certain number of days before their Baptism that they must thrice be
West by the foresaid Pope Leo III. And during this Race of time the said Universal Church flourished greatly by Learned Men and Holy Bishops whereof the principal were St. Isidorus Archbishop of Sevil Sophronius Leontius Theodorus Archbishop of Canterbury Venerable Bede Johannes Damascenus Paulus Diaconus Alcuinus our Countrey-man Vsuardus and others 4. This time had many Learned Councils also whereof two were General the one being the third of Constantinople the other the second of Nice Whereby were beaten down all the Heretics of those days the principal whereof were the Jacobites the Armenians Monothelites Neophonites Lampetians Agnychites Iconomachians or Image-breakers and other the like Besides all this there was added to the Greatness of this Church the new Conversion of many Countries from Paganism to Christian Religion Amongst which may principally be recounted our English Saxons as also by their means divers Provinces afterward of High and Low Germany And this for the continuance and going forward of the Christian Catholic Church in general planted by Christ and brought down by Succession from the Apostles time 5. But if you will talk of our new English Church planted in this mean space and inserted or united to that General Catholic Church as a Branch or Member to the whole Body and as a new Daughter subordinate to her Mother we shall see her progress to be conform thereunto to wit that she multiplied mightily in these 200 years both in Number Doctrin and great Piety of Life which John Fox himself is forced to confess in that he having told us of the Conversion of seven English Saxon Kingdoms within the compass of this time he setteth down divers Tables in the end of all whereof one is of seventeen Archbishops of Canterbury from Augustin to Celnothus that lived with King Egbert and another Table of thirty Cathedral Churches Abbies and Nunneries builded and abundantly endowed by Christian English Kings Queens and Bishops of that time and a third Table of nine several Kings besides many more of chief Nobility both Men and Women who leaving the World and their Temporal States entred into a Religious Life the more strictly to serve Almighty God. All which John Fox is forc'd to recount against himself and findeth no one in all this time of 200 years and much less any company on whom he dareth lay hands to build up his hidden Church in England withal 6. And it is to be noted by the Reader and by us to be repeated again for better memories sake that which before we admonished to wit that Fox findeth these 200 years of our first English primitive Church so barren of matter for his purpose as in the whole story thereof he spendeth only eight Leaves of Paper and these rather in deriding and scoffing the same and principal Pillars thereof than writing any Ecclesiastical History For which cause you shall find these Notes and Titles commonly written over the heads of his Leaves and Pages Augustin's arrival in Kent Gregory the basest Pope but the best Proud Augustin Lying Miracles Shaven Crowns Beda his Birth and the like Of which Learned Holy Man's Story I mean St. Bede he maketh so little account as in the same place reciting a Letter out of him written by a holy Man Ceolfride Abbot of Sherwyn in Northumberland to Naitonus King of the Picts he saith thus The Copy of which Letter as it is in Bede I have annexed not for any great reason therein contained but only to delight the Reader with some pastime in seeing the fond Ignorance of that Monkish Age c. Whereby we may see the drift of this pleasant Fox in these his Acts and Monuments which is to discredit that whole Time and all our Primitive Church 7. But yet to the end that the saying of Christ may be fulfilled in him Ex ore tuo te judico Serve nequam I do judge thee out of thy own mouth thou wicked Servant I shall here set down two National Synods gathered in England in these two Ages by two famous Archbishops of Canterbury the one Theodorus in the year of Christ 680 and related by Beda and the other St. Cuthbert in the year 747 related by William of Malmsbury after Bede's death and both of them set down by Fox And by viewing the Decrees of these two Synods you will see whether those Ages were so fond in Ignorance as Fox maketh them Out of the first Synod held at Thetford Fox gathereth ten Decrees in these words 8. I. That Easter-day should be uniformly kept and observed throughout the whole Realm upon a certain day viz. prima 14 Luna Mensis primi II. That no Bishop should intermeddle within the Diocese of another III. That Monasteries consecrated unto God should be exempt and free from the Jurisdiction of Bishops IV. That the Monks should not stray from one place that is from one Monastery to another without the license of their Abbot also to keep the same Obedience which they promised at their first entring V. That no Clergy-man should forsake his own Bishop and be received in any other place without Letters Commendatory of his own Bishop VI. That Foreign Bishops and Clergy-men coming into the Realm should be content only with the benefit of such Hospitality as should be offered them neither should they intermeddle any further within the Precinct of any Bishop without his special permission VII That Synods Provincial should be kept within the Realm at least once a year VIII That no Bishop should prefer himself before another but must observe the time and order of his Consecration IX That the number of Bishops should be augmented as the number of People increased X. That no Marriage should be admitted but that which was lawful no Incest to be suffered neither any man to put away his Wife for any cause except only for Fornication after the Rule of the Gospel And these be the principal Chapters of that Synod c. 9. Out of the second Synod held at Clonisho Fox gathereth thirty-one Decrees as followeth I. That Bishops should be more diligent in seeing to their Office and in admonishing the people of their faults II. That they should live in a peaceable mind together notwithstanding they were in place dissevered asunder III. That every Bishop once a year should go about all the Parishes of his Diocese IV. That the said Bishops every one in his Diocese should admonish their Abbots and Monks to live regularly and that Prelates should not oppress their Inferiors but love them V. That they should teach the Monasteries which the secular men had invaded and could not then betaken from them to live regularly VI. That none should be admitted to Orders before his Life should be examined VII That in Monasteries the reading of Holy Scripture should be more frequented VIII That Priests should be no disposers of secular business IX That they should take no money for baptizing
pious Princes and Lords Egfrid King of the Northumbers Anno 10. upon the fifteenth day before the Calends of October the eighth Indiction and Etheldred reigning over the Mercians the sixth year of his Reign and Adulphus being King of the East-Angles the seventeenth year of his Reign and Lodtharius being King of Kent in the seventh year of his Reign and Theodorus by the Grace of God Archbishop of the Isle of Britanny and of the City of Canterbury being President of the Synod together with the rest of the Bishops of the same Island venerable men sitting with him in Council and the holy Sacred Gospel being laid before them in a place called in the Saxon Tongue Hedtfield after treaty had they expounded the right Catholic Faith in this manner 24. Sicut Dominus noster Jesus c. As our Lord Jesus taking our flesh upon him did deliver unto his Disciples that saw him in person and heard his speeches and as the Symbolum or Creed of the holy Fathers have delivered unto us and as generally all whole and universal Synods and all the company of holy Fathers and Doctors of the holy Catholic Church have taught us so do We following their steps both Piously and Catholicly according to their Doctrin inspired to them from Heaven profess and believe and constantly confess according to the said holy Fathers Belief That the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost are properly and truly a consubstantial Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity c. We receive also the holy and universal five Synods that have been held before our time by the blessed Christian Fathers our Ancestors to wit those 318 holy Bishops in the first Council of Nice against Arius and his wicked Doctrin and of the 150 other Bishops in the first Council of Constantinople against the Heresie of Macedonius and of the 200 Godly Bishops of the Council of Ephesus against Nestorius and his Errors and of the 230 Bishops in the Council of Calcedon against Eutyches and his Doctrin and of the other 165 Fathers gathered together in the second General Council of Constantinople against divers Heretics and Heresies c. We do receive all these Councils and we do glorifie our Lord Jesus Christ as they glorified him adding nothing nor taking any thing away We do anathematize and accurse also both by heart and mouth all those whom these Fathers did anathematize and accurse and we do receive them whom they received c. 25. Behold here the manner and form of Catholic Councils of old time who laid down first the Gospel in the midst and then after due examination of Scriptures considered that Antiquity of Fathers and Councils had determined in God's Church before them even from Christ and his Apostles downward and therein insisted agreeing all in one and rejecting and accursing all new contrary or different Doctrins and Doctors and by his means and by the assistance of the Holy Ghost promised by Christ unto his Church hath she continued now for 1600 years one and the self-same whereas Sectaries lacking this Humility Wisdom and Subordination but especially God's Grace are divided and consumed among themselves 26. But I will pass no further in this point this which I have said being sufficient to shew that there were more Learned men in England in these times of our primitive Church than fantastical Fox would have men believe which is greatly confirmed by that which Malmsbury writeth and Fox also confesseth the same That a General Council being gathered soon after this which we have mentioned in Constantinople both of the East and West Church against the Monothelites that deny'd two distinct Wills of Christ our Archbishop Theodorus with some other Learned men of our English Clergy was called for by Pope Agatho to be one of his Legats in the said Council where there were 331 Bishops gathered together by order of the said Agatho Bishop of Rome against the Patriarchs of Antioch Alexandria and Constantinople which thing sheweth the great Power and Authority of the Bishop of Rome even in Greece it self at that day the Emperour Constantine IV. being present himself 27. And to this Council as is said was the foresaid Theodorus Archbishop of Canterbury with divers other Bishops called by name by Pope Agatho as we may see in his Letter to the said Council cited by Malmsbury in these words Sperabamus de Britannia Theodorum c. We did hope to have had from Britanny Theodore my Brother and Fellow-Bishop and Archbishop of that great Island and a Philosopher together with others which hitherto do remain there and then to have joined them to our Humility and for this cause we have hitherto deferred the Council Vides quanti eum fecerit saith Malmsbury ut ejus expectatione Universale Concilium differret You see of what account this Archbishop was with Pope Agatho that he would defer a General Council for his expectation Thus writeth he whereby every indifferent man will easily see that this time of our primitive English Church which Fox by contempt so often calleth Ignorant and Monkish was not devoid of rare Learned men and so hath continued until our days frustrà circumlatrantibus haereticis to use St. Augustin's words Heretics in vain barking on every side against it With whom John Fox thought good to bear a barking part also and not being able to find out any one hole or corner for his Church in those Ages except only among the Heretics before named he thought good at least to rail and spit at them as he passeth by and so will he do more and more the lower he goeth until at length he fall to plain Apostasie and forsaking them openly will join with the known condemned Heretics and Enemies of this Church which Church hitherto notwithstanding he will seem in some sort to follow tho' lazily and dragging behind and as it were weary of her Company and looking about him which way he may give the slip and betake himself to his heels as will better appear by that which ensueth CHAP. V. The fourth station or division of Times from King Egbert unto William the Conqueror containing the space of some 260 years and how John Fox his Church passed in these days and whether there were any Pope Joan or no. YOu have heard before how John Fox in his second Book promising to handle but 300 years touched in the Acts of 500 in less than a dozen Leaves shewing the small store of matter he had for his Church in those Ages Now his next Book is entituled thus The third Book containing the next 300 years from the Reign of Egbert unto the time of William the Conqueror So is his Title And yet if you count the years from the beginning of King Egbert his Reign Anno Domini 802 according to Stow or 800 according to others unto the entrance of the Conqueror Anno 1066 you shall find but only 264 years and
from King Egbert his death but 234. So as Fox is in no one thing exact or punctual And these 264 years may be counted the fourth station or parcel of Time from Christ downward which now we are briefly to examin and run over as we have done the former Stations and Limitations appointed 2. First then concerning the general Roman Church it continued in these Ages as in the former by continual Succession of her Bishops and Governors altering nothing in Belief and Doctrin from her Ancestors And briefly to repeat the sum of all there ruled in the See of Rome in these two Ages and an half as supreme known and acknowledged Pastors of this great visible Church some sixty Popes from Leo III. that crowned Charles the Great and thereby restor'd the Western Empire unto the time of Alexander II. under whom Duke William of Normandy conquered England And in the Western Empire there reigned some eighteen Emperours in this space from Charles the Great to Henry IV. and in the Eastern Empire some twenty five from Nicephorus I. to Constantine X. All which Popes Emperours and Princes were of one Religion Faith and Belief in those days And albeit soon after the See of Constantinople and Greek Church by occasion of Emulation against the Roman Empire did begin to withdraw their due Obedience from the Roman Church and thereby fell by little and little into divers errors of Doctrin also and finally were delivered over as all the World seeth into the Subjection and Servitude of the Turks yet in these Ages there was Union and due Subordination between both Churches Which may appear by that one only General Council being held at Constantinople even against Phocius that was Patriarch of the said City being gathered by order of Pope Adrian II. and Basilius the Grecian Emperour concurring therein This Council was of 300 Bishops and confirmed by the said Pope Adrian being the eighth General Council in order and the fourth of those that were held in Constantinople Whereby it cometh also to be noted That all the General Councils held hitherto in the Christian Church for the space of 900 years being eight in number as hath been said from the first Council of Nice unto this and from this to the first General Council of Lateran holden in the year of Christ 1115 under Pope Innocentius III. were all held in Greece but yet by order of the Bishops of Rome sending thither their Legats and confirming the same afterwards by themselves without which confirmation they were never held for Lawful in the Christian World which is no small Argument of the Greatness and Authority of the Church of Rome from time to time 3. It shall not be needful to speak of the particular Heresies of these two or three Ages which in effect were none of any name but only two the Iconoclasts or Image-breakers and the Berengarians or Sacramentaries both of them agreeing in their particular Heresies with the Calvinists of our Times tho' in many other things different as it is wont to be The first of them was begun before these Times by Leo III. Emperour of Constantinople sirnamed Isaurus about the year of Christ 750 as before hath been noted and renewed again by Claudius Taurinensis The second was begun 300 years after by Berengarius about the year of Christ 1050 and abjured by him again as hereafter shall be shewed The chief Doctors and Fathers that defended true Religion in these Ages were Turpinus Eginhardus Haymo Rabanus Frecolphus Hincmarus Jo. Diaconus Remigius Theophylactus and others in the ninth Age and then in the other Odo Ado Rhegino Luitprandus Rhatbodus Abbo Floriacensis and others and the other half of the eleventh Age Bruchardus Petrus Damianus Lanfrancus and many others 4. And this was the state of the Universal Christian Church in these Ages whereunto in all respects was conform the particular Church of England as the Daughter to her Mother which may be demonstrated partly by the continual Descent of Archbishops in England which were to the number of Sixteen from Celnothus that lived with King Egbert unto Stigand that possessed the See of Canterbury when William the Conqueror came in tho' afterward he caused him to be deposed by a Commission from Rome in the year of Christ 1070 as John Stow and others do note 5. I do pretermit the Succession of other Bishoprics in England for Brevities sake the Kings also of England that possessed that Crown from Egbert to William the Conqueror were some Twenty in number if we count Canutus the Dane and his two Children among the rest All which Kings of what Nation or State soever agreed fully in Faith and Belief with the said Archbishops and Bishops of our Land and They again with the whole Universal Roman Church as appeareth by their Acts and Monuments and John Fox also confesseth 6. Which being so it is hard to say or imagin where John Fox in these Ages will pick out a different Christian Church tho' it be never so poor and creeping for Him and His either in England or out of England during this time And much more hard it is to think how he can devise any visible Continuation of the said obscure and trodden-down Church as he promised to do even from the Apostles Time to our Age. His only refuge must be as before we have often noted to run to the condemned Heretics of these times if he find any for his purpose Which yet he dareth not openly to do as you have seen throughout all the former Ages But afterward when he cometh near home to wit after Pope Innocentius III. and John Wickliff he taketh more heart affirming Our Church to have utterly perished and a new visible Off-spring of his Church to have started up to wit all the Sectaries and Heretics cast out and condemned of our Church as you shall see more particularly when we come to that place 7. For the present Ages that we are now in he doth not so much as lay hands upon the Iconoclasts or Berengarians nor doth seem to count them for his Brethren tho' in the principal Points of their Heresies they agree with Him as is notorious And John Fox to have some visible Members of his Church in these Ages ought to have shaken hands with them but the poor Fellow was asham'd to build his Church openly of so ancient Heretics tho' afterward when he beginneth to build indeed and to gather Stones together he calleth for the Berengarians again which now he casteth away as after you shall see 8. But now perhaps you will ask me If John Fox do set down no Succession in these Ages as neither in the former of His Church or Ours what doth the simple Fellow in all this third Book of his Whereto I answer first That albeit he promiseth in the Title That this third Book shall contain the Acts and Monuments of 300 years together with the whole
in those days should revive and preach again in these days would his Brethren the Protestants in England or out of England receive them think you And if it be certain that they would not how were they true Preachers then and not now or how can these and they be true Brethren of one Faith Religion or Church Doth not every simple Man or Woman see this Folly and absurd Contradiction 29. But to return to the matter in hand about rejecting Parliaments and other public Testimonies we see that John Fox with the same facility both reciteth and rejecteth the Letter of the Archbishop of Canterbury written to the Pope about those Wickliffians of his time twenty years after the former Parliament was held but yet in conformity of that which the said Parliament under King Henry IV. and the other before under King Richard II. did testifie as well of the said Sectaries Hypocrisie and Dissimulation as of their wicked Errors and Heresies All which Fox contemning saith to the contrary That they served faithfully the living Lord within the Ark of his true spiritual and visible Church c. 30. And it is to be noted that scarce ever throughout this whole Volume of Acts and Monuments from Christ downward for the space of 1400 years doth Fox talk of any visible Church on his side but only now when he cometh to these Wickliffians and other like Sectaries And yet to speak warily also he adjoyneth unto it the word spiritual to have some starting-hole to run out when he shall be pressed about the true nature of visible Succession which we mean to do in the next Chapter following But in the mean space it is a matter worth good laughter to hear him say That Papists do brag of their painted Sheath concerning their Churches Antiquity and Succession and that he hath sufficiently proved before by the continual descent of his Church after the Doctrin that now is reformed that it hath stood and been continued from the beginning for so are his words yea and that visibly as now he addeth Whereat I know no man can choose but laugh that hath read this our Treatise wherein we have shewed all the contrary to wit the visible Descent of the Roman Church by orderly Succession from the Apostles time and that John Fox hath not so much as named any different Succession or Descent of his Church distinct from the other until the time of Innocentius III. 1200 years after Christ And what manner of deduction or collection of Heretics and Sectaries he bringeth down from thence and how well they agree and hang together either in Time Place Function or Faith we shall examin a little after 31. But now before we end this Chapter we are to advertise the Reader that besides the Sects before named of the Petrobusians Henricians Waldensians or poor men of Lyons the Albigensians and Wickliffians there was another Sect in England called Lollards more famous than the rest in respect of Lollards Tower some what renowned in London for the Imprisonments of those Sectaries in that place But when and how this Sect of Heretics began is not so clear for that some as Prateolus and others seem to affirm that it took its Origin in England as a Brood of the Wickliffists for that they were more famous there than in other places And therefore he saith Lollardi ex Anglia ex Wickliffistarum Secta originem duxerunt The Lollards had their beginning from England and from the Sect of the Wickliffians And he addeth That it was about the year 1360 which cannot stand for that we have shewed before how Wickliff began to publish his Doctrin after this to wit about the year 1370. Wherefore the Abbot Tritemius a German Chronicler declareth the matter more particularly and truly saying That there was a certain Heretic in Germany called Gualter Lolhard who about the year of Christ 1315 taking certain Doctrin from the Albigenses and Waldenses that went before him and adding as the fashion is of Sectaries divers new Opinions of his own made a particular Sect who were called Lolhards Whereby it appeareth that this Sect began in Germany above fifty years before the Sect of Wickliff in England and hereby ensued that Wickliffians taking afterwards divers Opinions from the said Lolhards were commonly also called Lolhards And John Fox himself reciting the Sentence of Condemnation of Bishop Tresnant of Hereford against one William Swynderby an Apostata Priest for Wickliffian Heresies in the year of Christ 1391 the 24th of June he setteth down these words of the said Bishop We being excited through the Information of many credible and faithful Christians of our Diocese to root out pestiferous Plants as Sheep diseased with an incurable Sickness going about to infect the whole and sound Flock that is to say certain Preachers or more truly execrable Offenders of the new Sect vulgarly called Lolhards c. 32. Lo here Wickliffians at this time for such a one was this Swynderby were commonly called Lolhards twenty years and more after Wickliff had begun his Doctrin So as rather Wickliffians are to be said to have come forth of Lolhards than Lolhards of Wickliffians 33. And albeit these two Sects beginning as you have heard the one in Germany and the other in England with the distance of some fifty years of their Off-spring had many Opinions common to them both especially against the Roman Church against Invocation of Saints Fastings Prayers and the Sacraments of Penance Matrimony Extreme Unction and the like yet had they their peculiar Opinions also whereby they were made a several Sect. As for Example the Lolhards impugned not only the foresaid three Sacraments of Penance Matrimony and Extreme Unction as some Wickliffians did but Baptism and the Eucharist in like manner They held also for their peculiar Opinions as Tritemius saith That Lucifer and his Angels were injuriously thrust out of Heaven by Michael and his Angels and consequently to be restored again at the Day of Judgment and that Michael and his Angels are to be damned for the foresaid Injury and to be delivered over to everlasting Punishment from the Day of Judgment forward That our Lady could not bear Christ and remain a Virgin for that so he should have been an Angel and not a Man. That God having given the Earth to the use of Man according to the saying of the Psalm Terram autem dedit filiis hominum God hath given the Earth to the children of men he doth consequently punish such Wickedness as is done upon Earth but if any thing be done under ground it is not punishable And therefore in Caves and Cellars under ground they were accustomed to exercise all manner of Abomination And of this he relateth a certain Story happened in Germany which was That one Gisla a young woman of their Sect coming to be burned for Heresie she was asked whether she were a Virgin or no whereunto
Tythes and if any man will needs give he may give to whom he will excluding thereby their Curates Another Article also was of the said Brute That a Priest receiving by bargain any thing of Yearly Annuity is thereby a Schismatic and Excommunicate Which if it be true then are his Ministers in a hard case at this day in England who do bargain for their Service and Wages due thereunto 40. And so goeth Fox on from Point to Point to ratifie John Wickliff's Doctrin or at least the Professors thereof not considering simple Fellow how much they differ from him or make against him so they be contrary to the Pope of Rome or condemned by him For further proof of which Folly and blind Ignorance we shall pass now to treat in a several Chapter what manner of Continuance and Succession of his Church he deviseth thro'out the Rabble of these opposite Sects from the time of Pope Innocentius III. to the Reign of King Henry VIII whereby I doubt not but the Reader will remain sufficiently instructed of these Mens madness that of so contrary and repugnant Spirits will needs frame to themselves the Unity of a true Christian Church CHAP. X. The most absurd and ridiculous Succession of Sectaries appointed by John Fox for the Continuance of his Church from Pope Innocentius III. downward where also by this occasion is declared the true Nature and Conditions of lawful Ecclesiastical Succession HAving now followed John Fox throughout all this Treatise from Christ's time to ours to see what visible course and race he would set down as well of His Church as Ours according to his promise made in the beginning of his Acts and Monuments we have found him hitherto to have talked only in a manner of Our Church that is to say of the Universal Roman Church perspicuously come down by succession of Years and Ages from the Apostles to Us neither did John Fox for twelve hundred years together so much as name unto us any other Congregation of Men or Women small or great good or bad that in this time bare the Name of a Christian Church besides the other nor did he pretend any Succession fearing perhaps those words of Tertullian before recited Confingant tale aliquid Haeretici c. Let Heretics presume to feign or devise any such Succession of Bishops Teachers and Pastors for Their Church as we have alleged for Ours if they dare 2. But now from Pope Innocentius's time downwards John Fox presuming that all the other Church was fallen from God a great presumption indeed as before hath been shewed he bringeth us forth in place thereof another Company of Men which he saith in those days made the true Church for that they were condemned by the other Church which he holdeth for the false And these were a certain Rabblement of Sectaries different in Opinions and Professions not only from Us but also from John Fox and his Crew and most of all among themselves being of divers Countries Sects Times Ages Offices and Functions and cohering together in no other form at all of Succession but that one rose or sprung up after the other For which cause Fox himself in his Acts and Monuments doth not handle their Affairs as of any Congregation that ever met together or saw perhaps one another or had Conference Order Subordination or Succession among themselves but only tieth them together in a certain List or Catalogue as Sampson's Foxes were by the Tails Which List or Catalogue he setteth down in his foresaid Protestation to the Church of England telling us first That during the time of the last 400 years from Pope Innocentius downwards the true Church of Christ durst not openly appear in the face of the World being oppressed by Tyranny but yet that it remained from time to time visibly in certain chosen Members that not only bare secret good affection to sincere Doctrin but stood also in the defence of Truth against the Church of Rome 3. This is his Assertion which he proveth by a large List or Catalogue as I have said of sundry that were in this time censured and condemned in some part of Doctrin by the said Roman Church In which Catalogue saith he first to pretermit Bertramus and Berengarius which were before Pope Innocentius III. a Learned multitude of sufficient Witnesses here might be produced whose Names neither are obscure nor Doctrin unknown as Joachim Abbot of Calabria Almaricus a Learned Bishop that was judged an Heretic for holding against Images besides the Martyrs of Alsatia of whom we read an hundred to be burned by Pope Innocentius in one day Add likewise saith he to these the Waldenses and Albigenses Marsilius Patavinus Gulielmus de Sancto Amore Symon Tornacensis Arnoldus de nova Villa Joannes Semica besides divers others Preachers in Suevia standing against the Pope Anno 1240 c. 4. Thus beginneth Fox his Catalogue and then goeth he forward with Joannes Anglicus a Master of Paris Petrus Joannis a Minorite burned after his death Robert Grossehead Bishop of Lincoln called Malleus Romanorum c. And further he addeth Joannes de Ganduno Eudo Duke of Burgundy that counselled the French King to receive the Popes Extravagants Dante 's an Italian Poet that wrote against Popes Monks and Friars together with Petrarcha and them Conradus Hagaz imprisoned for preaching against the Mass Anno 1339 c. And to these again he coupleth Franciscus de Arcaterra and others burned for new Opinions Gregorius Ariminensis Armachanus Occham and others as tho' these had been all of the same Opinions And finally he falleth upon the Lollards Wickliffians Hussites and their Followers in England and Bohemia succeeding one after another now in this Country now in that now upon one occasion and now upon another until the Reign of King Henry III. when Martin Luther began his Profession who did agree and symbolize in divers Points with the said former Sects of Waldenses and Albigenses Lollards Wickliffians and Hussites and differed in others as before hath been declared And after the Lutherans did follow again others partly agreeing and partly disagreeing as Zuinglius Calvinus Beza Oecolampadius and others unto our days and every one affirming his Opinions to be the New Gospel 5. And this is the visible Succession forsooth which John Fox hath devised to set down for the proof of his new Church and the Antiquity thereof for 400 years past And it is like as if a man in England to disgrace the City of London should seek out the Records of all those that have been hanged at Tyburn for Theft or Murthers for 400 years and having found them out should produce them for Witnesses of the truth and for honest men and good Citizens condemning both the Judges and Jurors and whole Country that gave Sentence and Verdict against them And yet if you will see how John Fox playeth the Fool indeed and braggeth of this Succession
of his Church observe what he writeth presently upon the enumeration of these foresaid Pillars of his Church 6. Wherefore if any be so beguiled in his Opinion saith he as to think that the Doctrin of the Church of Rome as now it standeth is of such Antiquity and that the same was never impugned before the time of Luther and Zuinglius now of late let him read these Histories and peruse the Acts of Parliament passed in this Realm of ancient time as Anno 5 Regis Richardi 2. 1380 c. Did you ever hear a man in his Wits reason in this sort How doth this Catalogue I pray you of condemned Heretics for these last 400 years impugn the Antiquity of the Roman Church or Doctrin before that time And again Who doth deny but that the same Roman Church and Doctrin was impugned by old Heretics long before Luther and Zuinglius yea and before Wickliff Waldenses Albigenses and Berengarius were born as by our former deduction hath appeared that she was impugned by Heretics of every Age And moreover To what purpose doth Fox will us to read these Histories and the Acts of Parliament passed against Wickliffians in the time of King Richard II To what purpose I say doth this simple Fellow talk and write this against himself seeing that by these Histories and Statutes we learn nothing as before we have noted but only that his elder Brethren the Lollards and Wickliffians were condemned for Heretics by public Authority of our Realm above 200 years agone Which we grant unto him without further proof 7. Wherefore to leave this childish babling that is without sense consequence or reason and to return to some more serious Argument We shall handle here two Points for better discussion of this Succession of Sectaries alleged by John Fox First What are the Conditions necessarily required to a good Ecclesiastical Succession for demonstrating a Church And then What manner of men these were indeed which Fox doth here assign for Representation of his Church And all shall be done with as much brevity as may be 8. The first Condition is That this Succession of men that make the Church be Universal both in Place and Time that is to say to use St. Augustin's words Non quae hoc loco est sed quae hoc loco per totum Orbem terrarum nec illa quae hoc tempore sed ab ipso Abel usque in finem c. That it be not in this or that particular place only but in this place and throughout the whole World and that it be not only in this or that time but that it be from Abel to the end of the World. By which words of St. Augustin we see that the visible Succession of the true Church must be Universal first in Place and that it must be a visible Company professing Christ under one Faith and Doctrin not in this or that particular Country Province or Place only but over all the World where Christians are And so we see it verified in the Succession of the Roman Church in our former deductions 9. Secondly It must be Universal in Time for that it must not begin from John Wickliff only Bertramus or Berengarius as John Fox doth appoint the Visibility of his Church but it must come down from the Apostles and endure visibly to the end of the World yea from Abel himself as St. Augustin saith for that even from Him Christ instituted a visible Church and continued the same by Succession under all three Laws both of Naturè of Moyses and of Grace as St. Augustin in his Book de Civitate Dei doth declare at large and in our days Dr. Sanders most Learnedly in his Excellent Work de Visibili Monarchia doth prove the same 10. So as this Collection of Sectaries alleged here by John Fox being neither Universal in place nor agreeing in Faith with the Universal known Church of Christendom but with particular Assemblies one in one place and another in another nor yet having Universality of Time as not coming down from the Apostles Age but only for some 400 years as Fox himself confesseth these men I say cannot make a true Church tho' they have some sparks of true Doctrin among them as Fox braggeth seeing it is true which St. Augustin affirmeth Quicunque credunt quòd Christus Jesus in Carne venerit quòd fit Filius Dei c. Et tamen ab ejus Corpore quod est Ecclesia ita dissentiunt ut eorum communio non sit cum toto quacunque diffunditur sed in aliqua parte separata inveniatur manifestum est eos non esse in Catholica Ecclesia Whosoever doth believe that Christ Jesus came in Flesh and that he is the Son of God c. And that they do so dissent from his Body that is the Church as they do not communicate with the whole spread over all parts but only with some separate part it is manifest that these men are not of the Catholic Church And thus much of the first Condition 11. The second Point to be considered is When the ancient Fathers do stand upon visible Succession of Men as a Note of the true Church they meant it especially by Bishops that come down by continual Succession from the Apostles time to ours Ecclesia saith St. Augustin ab Apostolorum temporibus per Episcoporum Successiones certissimas usque ad nostrum deinceps tempora perseverat The true Church doth persevere from the Apostles time unto ours and after us again to the Worlds end by most certain Succession of Bishops c. St. Irenaeus also Tertullian Optatus and St. Augustin before-alleged do each of them as you have heard deduce the visible Succession of the Church from the Apostles to their days by the visible Succession of the Roman Bishops 12. And finally the Sentence of the said holy Father St. Augustin is notoriously known in many parts of his Works concerning the importance of this Succession Tenet me saith he in Ecclesia Catholica ab ipsa Sede Petri ad praesentem Episcopatum Successio Sacerdotum The Succession of Priests he meaneth Bishops from the Seat of St. Peter unto the present Bishop of Rome holdeth me in the Catholic Church And again against his old Master Faustus the Manichee Vides in hac re quid Ecclesiae Catholicae valeat Authoritas quae ab ipsis fundatissimis Sedibus Apostolorum usque ad hodiernum diem succedentium sibimet Episcoporum serie tot populorum consensione firmatur Dost thou not see of what force the Authority of the Catholic Church is which being established by the most firm foundations of the Apostolic See doth endure unto this day by the Race of Bishops succeeding one another and by the consent of so many Nations under their Government 13. Behold here four things especially required by St. Augustin in Succession of men that must demonstrate a true Church First
to this or that Man or Woman For so he cometh in presently with his Examples of Queen Anne and Cromwell So long saith he as Queen Anne lived the Gospel had indifferent success but after that she by sinister instigation of some about the King was made away the course of the Gospel began again to decline But that the Lord then stirred up the Lord Cromwell opportunely to help in that behalf who did much avail for the increase of God's true Religion and much more had brought it to perfection if the pestilent Adversaries maligning the prosperous Glory of the Gospel had not by contrary practising undermined him and supplanted his vertuous proceedings 22. Behold here a wise Discourse of John Fox Whereby if nothing else were you might perceive how justly and truly that Spirit of Majesty that spake to him in his Bed upon a Sunday in the morning if you remember called him Thou Fool For that no man but a very Fool indeed would have brought forth these Examples to have proved his purpose being both impertinent and clearly false in themselves 23. And first they are impertinent or rather against himself for that they shew that his Gospel had no other beginning in England but upon Affection of Men and Women False also are the Examples if we consider the Times themselves for that the foresaid new Book of devised Articles mentioned by Hall and Hollinshead as the first public Alteration in points of Religion discovered in King Henry was made and set forth after the death of Queen Anne Bullen to wit upon the 8th of June 1536 whereas the Queen died upon the 19th of May before And Fox himself having related the said Articles and Book as set forth after the death of Queen Anne he saith thus This Book treated especially but of three Sacraments Baptism Penance and the Supper of the Lord for which the Lincolnshire men took Arms c. And then he addeth this Note in the Margin Alteration of Religion a little beginneth And after again presently this other Note Commotion in Lincolnshire Whereby is evident out of his own words that the first beginning of any alteration in points of Religion towards his Gospel was after the death of Queen Anne Bullen and consequently it is a ridiculous foolery which he writeth before That so long as Queen Anne lived the Gospel had indifferent success c. 24. The other Example also of Cromwell is no less apparently false for that besides the particulars which you have heard before of his assisting to punish and burn Protestants and his Sentence of death given against Lambert with the Protestation he made at his own death of his being Catholic and never doubting of any one Point of Catholic Religion Besides all this I say it is notorious that when the severe Statute of Six Articles was made against all sorts of Protestants in the 31st year of King Henry's Reign which was in the Month of April 1540 as appeareth both by the Book of Statutes it self and Hall Holinshead and other Chroniclers Cromwell was then in his highest Authority and Favor with the King as is evident for that in the time of the very same Parliament besides all his other great Offices before received as of Baron Chancellor Knight of the Garter Master of the Jewels Vicar-General in Spiritual Affairs and other like Titles he was created also Earl of Essex and High-Chamberlain of England which Holinshead setteth down in these words The 18th of April at Westminster was Lord Thomas Cromwell created Earl of Essex and ordained Great Chamberlain of England which Office the Earls of Oxford were wont ever to enjoy Also Gregory his Son was made Lord Cromwell c. Thus writeth he And if in Cromwell's most flourishing time this Act of Six Articles came out for punishment of Protestants the most severe that can be imagined how fond and childish a babling was that before used by Fox when he telleth us that as long as the good Lord Cromwell was in credit or bare Rule with the King their Gospel went prosperously c 25. Well then by all this we may see how poor and troden down a state John Fox's Church and Religion held under King Henry notwithstanding all his brags and flattering of him in his Pictures Which yet that you may not think we mean only of the temporal or external condition or contemptibility of his Church for of that perhaps he would brag seeing he defines his Church by the words obscure and troden down I would have you here consider briefly but two things only for the end of this Chapter which directly do appertain to the true spiritual misery of Fox's Church and Religion in those days under King Henry if a Confusion of fantastical Opinions Errors and Heresies may be called a Religion 26. The first is That in King Henry's days at leastwise for a great part thereof the Protestants Sects were not yet fully distinguished into their Classes or Orders but were a great confused heap of new Opinions all going under the name of Gospellers or Protestants as well Lutherans Oecolampadians Zuinglians and other Sacramentaries as Waldensians Wickliffians Anabaptists Libertines and other such-like So as in this first Heap and Mass of Gospellers were contained all the several Sects that since have been distinguished as the four Elements and particular parts thereof were contained according to the Poets Fiction in that great confused Chaos of the World before it was distinguished or to speak more properly they were as the Bears Whelps when first they are born and new fallen from their Mothers Womb to wit certain disform gross confused things which by often licking of their Parents are polished at last and brought to some fashion of handsom Creatures such as you know Bears Whelps to be 27. And even so was it in those days with Protestants Religion For that every man that would hold a new Opinion of what Sect soever or would speak against the Catholic Church or Doctrin then used was admitted presently for a Brother of the new Gospel and for a sincere Servant of God and holy Gospeller as John Fox every-where calleth them without distinction whether he were a Lutheran Zuinglian Anabaptist Waldensian Wickliffist Lolhard or whatsoever else but since that time this Chaos hath been somewhat more distinguished and polished and every sort of Sectaries divided into their Classes Which Luther himself began first to do noting nine distinct Sects to have risen in few years after him out of his Doctrin and these only of Sacramentaries Whereunto his chief Scholar Melancthon a little before his death in his Judgment written to the Palsgrave or Prince Elector of Rhene added six more to be among the Lutherans themselves But others that have gathered them more exactly and distinctly as Staphilus a most Learned Man and Counsellor to the Emperour Bishop Lyndan Dr. Gabriel Prateolus and others do divide them into a far great number
Contentions but had not the Gift of the old Apostolical Preachers to preach the self-same Faith and Doctrin every where but so many men so many Opinions were set abroach every man following his own fancy only they agreed in impugning the Catholic Church Rites Doctrin and Service but among themselves they could not agree 11. Which thing being signified to the Protector both before his departure and while he was in the Scottish Journey it grieved him exceedingly and wrote back to Cranmer Ridley and the rest that they should seek some means of Agreement and Conformity and that they should make hast to end the Common-Service-Book or Book of Common Prayer Doctrin and Rites which they had begun to treat of before his departure out of London But this was not so easie to do for that new Factions and Divisions were grown now among them especially upon the arrival of the foresaid new Preachers as well English as strangers from beyond the Seas For albeit the strangers could not much help in making this English Communion-Book or rather new Mass-Book yet did they hurt and hinder the same much by the variety of Opinions which they brought with them in matter of Doctrin some of them coming from Saxony and others from Switzerland where there were different new Sects and Doctrins held and taught And forasmuch as in this Book not only the Rites and Ceremonies of Service and Administration of Sacraments but the Doctrin also of their Number and Nature and other Articles of Belief were to be expressed or at leastwise insinuated hereof arose a great War for that Bucer would have one thing Peter Martyr another Ochinus a third and then stepped in John Bale and Milo Coverdale freshly come with their new Doctrin and wanton Women from beyond Seas and would have room amongst the rest 12. But above all others did trouble the Market at this time two heady married Priests come also from beyond the Seas to wit John Hooper and John Rogers the one from Wittenberg with a German Wife the other from Argentine with a Burgundian Sister as Fox testifieth who dissenting wholly from the Course begun by Cranmer and Ridley and bearing special emulation against them as accounting themselves more Learned and zealous and more reformed than they as in their Lives we shall shew when we come to their places in the Calendar they being potent in Speech and Faction and had in estimation of the people in respect of their former Banishment they made this Agreement at the first beginning much more difficult Especially for that one Hugh Latimer more turbulent than any of them all and of more regard with the common people for that he had been Bishop in King Henry's days joyned with Hooper and Rogers against Cranmer and Ridley for that they were not inclined to restore him his Bishoprick of Worcester whereof he had been deprived by King Henry VIII 13. Whereupon the Protector when he returned to London from the Scottish Voyage in the end of the Summer he was greatly troubled to see these Divisions But especially for that he found nothing ready as he had hope for the new Communion-Book but only that the old Religion was impugned and the new not yet framed and infinite strife was raised both about the one and the other Yet a Parliament being called together upon the Fourth of November Anno Domini 1547 and the First of King Edward they thought to give an attempt to see what might be done to have some Alteration established But it would hardly be notwithstanding all Art Power and Persuasion was used by the Protector and his people to obtain the same For that in this Parliament they gat only two things of moment to be determined about Religion The first was that all former penal Statutes made against any Heretic or Sectary whatsoever from King Edward the Third downward to wit for the space almost of 200 years should be revoked But namely the Statutes made against Lollards Wickliffians Hussits Anabaptists and the rest in the 1. Year of King Richard the Second and in the 2. Year of King Henry the Fifth and in the 25.31.33.34 and 35. Years of King Henry the Eighth against what Heresies Heretics or Sectaries soever All these Laws and Statutes I say were recalled annulled and taken away together with their punishments prohibitions or other restraints whatsoever So as now every Man might think say preach or teach what he thought best And this judgeth Fox to be a goodly sweet Liberty of the Gospel where no Man is bound nor forced to any thing And this determined a Child of Nine years old against the Decrees of all his prudent Ancestors for 200 years upward 14. But yet in all this free liberty of Sectaries to say write and teach what they list the punishment of Death was reserved unto Catholics that should speak in defence of the Doctrin of the Pope's Supremacy or in derogation of the Supreme Ecclesiastical Headship of this young King. And this was the first and principal beginning of the Gospel in King Edward's time to give every Man liberty to do and believe what he would so he were not a Catholic Which is much like the opening of Prisons and common Jayls in the beginning of a Rebellion when all Malefactors are made free from fear of Laws so they will joyn in Faction with the Rebellious And upon the opening of this Gate no marvail tho' all Sectaries rushed in and among others divers Arians Anabaptists Trinitarians and like Heretics began to preach presently their Doctrins with such publicity as Cranmer and his Fellows for repressing thereof were enforced to sit in publick Judgment and condemn divers of them to Death albeit I do not see by what Law having now revoked and annulled all former Statutes made against Heretics for their punishment as hath been said And namely he condemned Joan of Kent alias Joan Knell that had been a Handmaid of Anne Askew burned before in the last year of King Henry VIII for denying the Real Presence And Joan had profited so much under Anne's Doctrin as now she denied Christ to have taken Flesh of the Blessed Virgin who was so resolute with her Scriptures against Cranmer and his Assistants sitting upon her and her Fellows in our Lady 's Cappel of S. Paul's Church in London upon the 27th of April when he gave Sentence of Death against her that she reproached him greatly for his inconstancy in Religion telling him that he condemned not long before Anne Askew for a piece of Bread and now condemned her for a piece of Flesh And that as he was come now to believe the first which then he had condemned so would he come in time to believe the second c. 15. And for that O. E. in his Defence of Sir Francis Hastings would not seem to think this matter to be true I do assure the Reader in all sincerity that I have it by relation and asseveration
must prepare me c. And having thus spoken he kneeled down saying to them that were about him I beseech you all to bear me witness that I die in the true Catholic Faith. And then said he the Psalms of Miserere and De Profundis his Pater Noster c. 47. This is Stow's Narration whereby you see first the dishonesty and falshood of the other Chroniclers that leave it quite out and the cozenage of John Fox that only saith it in two or three Lines and lieth most shamefully affirming That he having Promise made unto him that tho' his Head were upon the Block he should have his Pardon if he would recant he consented thereunto Which yet you see the Duke protesteth the contrary upon his Death that it was not for Flattery or hope of Life or upon any Man's Instruction but only upon Conscience first to save his own Soul and then for desire to deliver his natural Country from the Infection of Heresie and Calamities thereon ensuing 48. And thus much of those Men and their Fruits who first planted this Gosael But now as for the Means whereby these things were wrought you have heard them before that they were all commonly by pulling down thrusting out dissolving of Discipline giving immunity from punishments to all sorts of Heretics and of Marriage to loose Priests and Apostate Friers and other like licentious Liberties far different from the purity severity and strictness of Life used by the first Planters of Christ's Gospel And as for the form and fashion of this new Religion set up under this Child-King it was as you have heard both their own Men and ours testifie compounded and patched up of all diversity of Sects and Religions as it pleased the Composers many things they took and retained of ours as well in Doctrin as in Rites and Ceremonies Some things of the Lutherans some others of the Zuinglians some of the Relicks of King Henry's mutation as that of the Supreme Head of the Church a singular Point of Doctrin proper to England above all other Nations But most of this Composition was of their own Inventions which yet neither the Protestants that remained in secret under Queen Mary did wholly allow as appeareth by that which I have cited before of John Rogers's Prophecy nor the other that began again under her Majesty that now is did wholly readmit the form and fashion but made a new one of their own as by their Communion-Book is evident nor do the purer sort of Calvinists in these days any way like or approve the one or the other as before we have shewed 49. Whereupon I may conclude as well this Chapter as also this whole Second Part that neither under King Henry the VIII nor King Edward the VI. nor Queen Mary had John Fox any distinct Church extant or known to the World especially if his Church be the Puritan Congregation as he will seem to signifie in many places of his Acts and Monuments But whether he have any such Church now visible under her Majesty at this day in England and in what state and condition it standeth I will not stand to enquire or discuss but do leave it to my Lords of Lambert and London whom most it concerneth being sufficient for me to have shewed throughout all former Christian Ages that John Fox hath had no Church of any Antiquity and consequently if he he have any now it must be a very young Church and of so tender Age as he may marry her to what Sect or Sectary he listeth for her Youth and that with hope of Brood and Issue And so much of all this matter CHAP. XIII The Conclusion of both these former Parts together with a particular Discourse of the notorious different Proceeding of Catholics and Protestants in searching out the truth of Matters in Controversie BY all that hitherto hath been written and discoursed good Christian Reader about the former Subject of discerning true Christian Religion and the way whereby to know and find the same I do not doubt but that of thy prudence thou hast observed a far different course holden by us that are Catholics and our Adversaries in this behalf we seeking to make matters plain evident easie perspicuous and demonstrable so far as may be even to the Eye it self whereas our Adversaries and namely John Fox according to that which by reading this Treatise you have seen doth altogether the contrary intangling himself and his Reader with such Obscurities Difficulties and Contradictions both about Times Matter and Men as he findeth not where to begin nor where to end nor yet how to go forward or backward in that he had taken in hand which I suppose to have been abundantly shewed by that which hitherto hath been written For whereas we for our parts begin clearly with the very first Corps or Body of Religion Instituted by Christ himself and the first Professors thereof that made a Church or Christian Congregation and do never after leave the same but do deduce it visibly and without interruption from that time to this and thereby do shew the beginning and continuance of one and the same Religion from their days to ours John Fox on the other side knoweth not well either where to begin where to insist or where to end as sufficiently you have seen tried For albeit in the Tile of his Book he tells us that he will bring down his Church from the Apostles time to ours and then after in his Protestation to the Christian Reader he doâ—h tell us farther that his true Church is different from the great visible Roman Church yet in the prosecution of his Work he setteth forth and describeth only the Roman Church as before we have declared and doth not so much as name any distinct visible Church of his own or other except only of such Heretics as himself also condemneth for such different from the said Roman Church for the space of almost 1200 years and then falleth he into such a strange extravagant humor of building a new Church for himself and his out of all sorts and Sects of later Heretics as being not able in all Points for very shame to allow their Opinions which in many Points are most absurd and contradictory both to him and us as also among themselves he findeth himself extremely intangled nor cannot tell which way to wind tho' he be a Fox nor which way to turn his Head but is forced to double hither and thither to go forth and back say and unsay and to cast a hundred shadows of wrangling glosses upon the whole matter thereby to obscure the same to the Eyes and Ears of his Reader 2. And finally it seemeth to me that the difference between us and him and his to wit between Catholics and Protestants in this behalf is not much unlike to that of two Cloth-sellers of London the one a Royal Merchant which layeth open his Wares clearly giveth into your
Christian Men have to procure their Salvation tho' all do not use the same to their best benefit and thereby do miscarry For to come to some particulars we say That in this Church and no where else is the truth of Faith and certainty thereof and this by the perpetual assistance of the Holy Ghost promised thereunto by the Founder God himself In this Church is the infallible Judgment both about the Books of Scripture and their Interpretation as all other Doubts and Controversies according to that you have heard before out of S. Augustin In this Church alone and no where else is there true Priesthood by lawful Succession Unction and Imposition of Hands and consequently Remission also of Sins by the Authority they have from Christ to that effect In this Church is the true number use and force of holy Sacraments and Grace given by them In this Church is Unity of Faith and Doctrin Communion of Saints and of Merits and Prayers which no where else is to be found And finally in this Church alone is there warrant and security from Error assurance from overthrow failing or fading which security is established by the promise of Christ himself as our God Creator and Redeemer and to endure unto the worlds end 10. All these utilities and most singular benefits do we believe to be in this Catholic Church above all other Congregations in the world In respect whereof we hold this Church to be our ship our rock our castle our fortress our mistress our mother our skilful pilot throughout all storms of heresies our pillar and firmament of truth against falshood our house of refuge against tribulation our protection our direction our help aid and security in all points and if any man perish in her it is by his own default but out of her none can but perish And this is our estimation of this Affair 11. But now how different an account Protestants do make both of this or their own Church is easily seen by their own words and doings For as they contemn and impugn our Church which we hold for the only true so do they seldom speak of their own For when shall you hear a Minister or Protestant Writer allege the Authority of his Church against us or against his own Fellows when they fall out as often they do or if he should how lightly is it esteemed even by themselves You may read the eager Contentions of the Protestant Churches of Saxony which are Lutherans against those of Heidelberg and other Towns of the Palsgrave's Country that are of a different Sect and of these again against other Consorts of other Provinces both of Switzerland and other parts of Germany yea between the soft and severe Lutherans themselves as between the Calvinian Churches of England and Scotland and in England it self between the Protestants Puritans and Brownists at this day who are nothing else but soft and severe Calvinists In all which sharp Contentions if any part do but name the Authority of their several Church which is very seldom the other presently falleth into laughter holding the Authority thereof so ridiculous as it is not worth the naming so as the Argument taken from the Authority of the Church which with us is of so high esteem as we say with S. Augustin That we would not believe the Gospel if the Authority of the Church did not move us thereunto with these Fellows is most base and contemptible 12. Moreover when they talk of their own Churches tho' every Sect and Sectary for Honors sake would be content to have them accounted Catholic as Lactantius before testified of the Heretics of his time yet do they speak it so coldly and do use the word Catholic so sparingly as they will shew that in their Consciences they do not believe it and a man might answer them as S. Augustin answered Gaudentius the Donatist whose Sect being a particular company of Heretics in Africa presumed by little and little first in jest and then in earnest to call themselves Catholics and their Church the Catholic Church as Protestants do at this day and being reprehended for it by S. Augustin and others would needs prove the same by the Definition of Catholic taken out of S. Cyprian S. Augustin I say after a long refutation thereof out of S. Cyprian's words to the contrary concludeth thus Quid igitur vos ipsos c. Why then do you go about both to deceive your selves and other Men with impudent Lies against S. Cyprian If your Church be the Catholic Church by the testimony of this Martyr shew us that your Church doth stretch her beams and boughs throughout the whole Christian World as ours doth for this S. Cyprian called Catholic c. So as by S. Augustin's Argument if the Protestants cannot shew that their Church hath her beams and boughs spread throughout all the Christian World and that her Faith is the general Faith received amongst all Christians and not only of particular Provinces then cannot they call her or esteem her for Catholic as indeed they do not but for fashion sake and from the teeth outward as hath been shewed 13 For when they come to set her out in her best colours they make her but a very obscure base and contemptible thing first in outward shew calling her the poor oppressed and persecuted Church as Fox's words are troden under foot neglected in the World not regarded in Histories and almost scarce visible c. So as where all the ancient Fathers do triumph and vaunt against both Heretics and Heathens as we do at this day against Protestants that the Catholic Church is more eminent and splendent than the Sun it self and more famously known than any other Temporal Kingdom or Monarchy that ever was in the World Fox of his Church confesseth that she is scarce visible neglected in the World not regarded in Histories c. 14. And then again he playeth fast and loose making her visible and invisible Altho' saith he the right Church be not so invisible in the world as none can see it yet neither is it so visible again that every worldly Eye may perceive it So saith he But how contrary to this was S. Chrysostom who would not yield that the right Catholic Church could be so much as obscured by any force or means whatsoever and thereof vaunting against Infidels saith It may be perhaps that some Heathen here will despise my arrogancy about the Majesty of our Church but let him have patience to expect until I come forth with my Proofs and then shall he learn the force of truth and how it is easier for the Sun it self to be wholly extinguished than for the Church to be so much as darkned or obscured Thus said S. Chrysostom And mark good Reader the difference of Spirits S. Chrysostom vaunteth of the outward splendor and majesty of his Church and John Fox contrariwise doth
brag of the obscurity and contemptibility of their Church And so again whereas we hold and highly esteem that our Church hath all truth of Christ's Doctrin and Religion in it Fox writeth of his Church as before we have recorded That by God's mighty Providence there hath always been kept in her some sparks of Christ's true Doctrin and Religion 15. Again whereas we glory that in our Church there is power to absolve from sins security from error and the like Fox denieth these privileges to be in his Church objecting unto us for an error against the first in a certain Treatise of his before his Acts and Monuments That we in our Church have Confession and Absolution at the Priests hands c. And against the second he bringeth in a large Conference of Ridley and Latimer agreeing together that the greater part of the Universal Catholic Church may err but yet fearfully as you shall see more largely in the Third Part of this Treatise when we shall come to treat of these Foxian Saints and their Festival Days Acts and Monuments The same Patriarchs also do censure S. Augustin's Speech before by me alleged for an excessive vehemency for so are their words where he saith That he would not believe the Gospel if the Authority of the Catholic Church did not move him thereunto signifying thereby as before hath been noted that he could not know Scriptures to be Scriptures nor the Gospel to be Gospel neither their sense and meaning to be such as they were taken for but by the Authority of the Universal Catholic Church that had conserved them from time to time and delivered them to him and to the rest of the World for such to be believed 16. Wherefore to conclude this matter seeing that John Fox doth allow so well this Doctrin of his Patriarchs Ridley and Latimer and thereby doth take from the true Church and consequently in his meaning from his own all this excellent Authority which S. Augustin and other Fathers do ascribe to the Catholic Church to wit the Sovereignty of approving or rejecting true or false Scriptures of discerning between Books and Books and judging of their true interpretations and seeing further he taketh away from his Church both Confession and Absolution of sins and all efficacy of Sacraments leaving them only to bare Signs that do signifie and not work seeing he taketh away from her all infallibility of Doctrin confessing that she may err and contenteth himself that she retain ever some sparkles only of true Doctrin and Religion as before hath been shewed out of his own words and considering moreover that he maketh her so poor a thing as now you have seen and furnisheth her with such rags to wit with such variety of Sectaries as is ridiculous to name they disagreeing among themselves and the one most opposite to the other in Doctrin and Belief she being such a Church I say so poor and miserable so obscure and ragged so doubtful and uncertain no marvail tho' they make little account of her or give small credit unto her which in very deed is no greater than is given to the worst man or most dishonest woman living which is to believe her so far as she can prove by others what she saith to be true to wit by Scriptures without which witness none of her own children or houshold will credit or believe her which is a remarkable Point for that with the same condition they will believe the Devil himself and must do if he allege Scriptures in the true sense and meaning 17. And this is the estimation which Protestants do hold of their new Church Now let us pass to speak a word only about the second Point which concerneth the assigning out or description of this Church Clear it is and cannot be denied that Catholics do assign such a Church as may be seen and known by all men begun visibly by Christ himself in Jury when he gathered his Apostles and Disciples together and continued afterward with infinite increase of Nations and People Countries and Kingdoms that in tract of time adjoyned themselves thereunto and that this most manifest notorious and known Church hath endured ever since under the name of the Christian Catholic Church for the space of sixteen hundred years as we have shewed before both largely and particularly in the former Treatise which is plain dealing clear and manifest whereas on the other side the Protestants of our days following herein the steps of old Heretics their Ancestors do seek to assign such a Church as no man can tell where to find it for that it is rather imaginary mathematical or metaphysical than sensible to man's eyes consisting as they teach of just and predestinate men only whom where or how to find you see how uncertain and difficult a thing it is in this mortal life 18. Wherefore as the ancient Fathers condemned wholly the Heretics of their times for this fond and pernicious device and wrote eagerly against the same as S. Cyprian against the Novatians S. Epiphanius and S. Augustin against the Donatists and Pelagians for that under this cover and colour they would make themselves to be the only true Church to wit every Sect their own Sectaries and Congregation saying that they only are predestinate just holy and God's chosen people and consequently also his only true Church so do we at this day stand in the very same controversie with Protestants that seek the same evasion and refuge 19. And he that hath but so much leisure as to read over the Conference of the Third day had between S. Augustin and other Catholic Bishops on the one side and the Bishops of the Donatists on the other side at Carthage by the Emperor's persmission and appointment even upon this very Question of assigning the Church he shall see the matter most clearly handled and that the Catholics of this time do urge nothing in this Point but that S. Augustin and his fellow Catholic Bishops did urge in that Conference against the Donatists and that the Protestants of our time do take no other course of shifting and defending themselves therein than the Donatists did in those days for that after infinite delays and tergiversations used before they could be brought to this Conference which S. Augustin setteth down in the collation of the first and second day when at length in the third days meeting they came to joyn upon the Controversie in hand they began first about the word Catholic it self which the Catholics urg'd against the Donatists as we do now against the Sectaries of this Age and the Donatists sought to avoid the same by the very same sleights which ours do as appeareth by S. Augustin's words 20. Donatistae saith S. August responderunt Catholicum nomen non ex universitate gentium sed ex plenitudine Sacramentorum institutum petiverunt ut pro barent Catholici c. The Donatists did
41. l. 2. c. 28. Aug. tract 27. in Joan. Serm. de Sanctis St. Laurence speaketh like a flat Papist Prudent in hymn de Sancto Laurentio Pont. Diac. in vi◠Cyprian See also the 28 Epistle of S. Cyp. himself Supra p. 1. c. 6. * Cent. 3. c. 4. Old Martyrs massing Priests The glorious state of the Cath. Church under Constantine Euseb l. 4. de vit Constant Four Churches in Rome built by Constantine * Julius Firmicus l. ad Imp. de abol Idol Optat. l. 2. cont Parmen * Supra c. 4 5. The obscure mathematical Church of John Fox The chief Heretics of the first 300 years How old Heretics were persecuted How old Heretics agree to John Fox's Church Aug. l. 2. quaest Evang. c. 40. A point much to be noted Aug. l. de fide oper c. 14. de unico bap c. 10. Apud Thoed dial 3. Theod. l. 3. haeret fabulat c. 35. Old Heresies held formally again by Protestants Cornel. Papa apud Euseb l. 6. hist c. 35. Cyp. l. 4. ep 2. Hier. in prooem dialog contra Pelag. Chrys hom 43. in Joan. Aug. l. cont Manich. ep 28. Old Heresies fraudulently objected to Catholics The 1 fraud Aug. haeres 39. D. Thom. 2.2 q. 85. art 2. The 2 fraud Cent. 3. c. 4. § de Angelis About honorring and Invocation of Angels Cent. 3. c. 4. Epiph. l. 3. to 2. haeres 78 79. About the Heresie of the Collyridians Mark this discourse of Epiphanius about sacrificing in the New Law. Epiph. ib. Ibid. haeres 79. Christians Sacrifice The visible succession of the Church in the first 300 years The sum of that which hath been said hitherto * Part. 1. c. 5 6. The conclusion of this Chapter with an offer to Fox Part. 1. c. 8. The Fathers Doctors and Councils of the second 300 years after Christ John Fox findeth not a hole for his poor Church in those 300 years The Heretics of the second 300 years after Christ In his protestation to the English Church p. 9. Communication of Doctrin between Protestants and Heretics of the second 300 years after Christ Aug. lib. de haeres haer 69. Optat. l. 2. idem l. 6. Aug. haer 54. Pacian ep 1. 3. ad Simpron Aug. haer 53. Aug. haeres 82. Hier. lib. cont Jovinian Hier. lib. cont Vigilantium The poor shift of John Fox Fox pag. 95. John Fox's shift to fill up this second Book An. 180. Fox in the Title of his Acts and Monuments In his Protestation to the English Church pag. 10. What Fox should have treated in his second Book second 300 years after Christ Sup. part 1. cap. 5. Why Fox writeth nothing of the Church of Britanny in these three Ages Exc. 2. c. 5. sup p. 1. c. 6. The substance and method of the Magdeburgians Centuries Cent. c. 4. p. 159. The praise of the Doctors Fathers of the fourth Age by the Magdeburg About Free-will Cent. 4. p. 211. Ib. pag. 287 291. Cent. 4. p. 231. Cent. 4. c. 4. Cent. 4. p. 294. Ephr. l. 2. de compunctione cordis c. 3. The blessed Sacrament Cent. 4. pag. 242. Ambr. lib. 4. de Sacr. c. 4. Hil. l. 8. de Trinitate Nazianzen orat 1. in Juliam Ambr. lib. 5. ep 33. Nissen Orat. Catechistica Cent. 4. pag. 292. Hier. in cap. 3. ad Galat. Enc. 2. cap. 16. Cent. 4. pag. 293. Theoph. Alex. lib. 3. de Paschate Cent. 4. p. 242. Hil. in Ps 118. The Fathers condemn'd for divers Doctrins held against Protestants Cent. 4. p. 299. Epiph. tom 2. lib. 2. Cent. 4. p. 303. Cent. 4. cap. 6. p. 407. num 50 54. Euseb Athan. S. Basil Socr. l. 5. c. 22. Theod. l. 5. c. 18. Opt. l. 6. Zoz l 6. c. 6. Eus l. 4. de vit Constant Opt. l. 1. cont Parmen Basil Basil ep 63. Zozim l. 4. c. 16. Cent. 4. p. 118 119 120. p. 431 432.433 The ancient observation of Fasts Fox p. 95. How Fox filleth up his second Book with matter not to his purpose The third station of Times from K. Ethelbert an 600 to K. Egbert an 800. Why Jo. Fox shifted over these 200 years so slightly The contemptuous writing of John Fox in this station of 200 years Popes Emperors of these 200 years The chief Doctors from an 600 to 800. Council General Heretics of this time Conversion of England The growth and progress of the English primitive Church in this time Fox's scoffing story of the English primitive Church p. 107 113 c. Bed. l. 1. hist c. 21. Fox p. 113. Mat. 18. Bed. l. 4. hist c. 5. Malm. de gest Pont. Angl. l. 10. Fox p. 112. col 2. n. 63. Decrees of an English Synod an Dom. 680. out of Fox Fox p. 115 col 1. n. 84. The Decrees of a second Synod out of Fox an Dom. 747. Deceitful turnings windings of Fox Bed. l. 4. c. 5. Bed. ibid. Wilful Errors of John Fox Bed. l. 4. c. 5. Cambd. in desc Britan. Com. Hartf p. 302. Fox p. 112. Sup. c. 2 3 4. Bed. l. 4. hist c. 5. The wicked falsifying of S. Bede by Fox Fox is taken in his malicious dealing about the Decree of Observation of Easter Sup. c. 3. Fox 112. About marrying a second Wife the first being alive Bed. l. 4. c. 5. pag. 227. Guileful Omissions of John Fox Bed. l. 4. c. 5. A Synod holden at Herudfrod an 673. Bed. l. 4. c. 17. Leo PP epist 10. ad Flavian Theod. dial 2. Evagr. l. 2. c. 4. A second Council of Archbishop Theodorus The manner of decreeing in old Synods and National Councils according to their Ancestors (a) Anno 315. (b) Anno 380. (c) Anno 428. (d) Anno 457. (e) Anno 532. Fox p. 113. An. Dom. 682. The Council of Constantinople in Trullo Plat. in vit Agath PP Paul. Diac. l. 1. hist Malm. l. 1. de gest Pont. Angl. p. 112. Aug. l. de utilitate credendi c. 17. The fourth station from an Dom. 800 to 1066. Fox p. 121. The eighth General Council An. Dom. 870. The Heresies of these Ages The Fathers and Doctors of these Times The Archbishops of Canterbury in these Ages Kings of England in this Time. Fox in protest ad Eccl. Angl. pag. 10. What Fox handleth in these 300 years Martyrolog Rom. 5. Junii Willeb in ejus vita Vicelius in hagiolog Epitome operum Bed an 754. Adams Bremens hist Ecc. c. 4. St. Boniface an English-man an Apostle of Germany an 750. (a) St. Willebrord an 730. B. of Vtright Bed. l. 3. hist c. 27. l. 5. c. 23. Tritem de viris illust l. 3. c. 137. (b) St. Willebaldus an 760. B. of Ayste Democrit l. 2. de missa in catalog Episc de Ayste Marcell in vit S. Suneberti c. 6 14. (c) S. Willehad B. of Breme an 780. (d) Adam Bremens c. 9 11 12. St. Willericus B. of Breme an 790. Brem in hist c. 12. Erpold Lindenb in hist Archiep. Brem
to divert these Prophesies from the true Antichrist and apply them to certain Bishops of Rome do beat their heads how to devise out some new Expositions of these numbers never heard or thought of before And namely John Fox more fondly than the rest will have the number of 42 Months to import 294 years that is every Month to signifie seven years or as fantastically he calleth it a Sabbath of Years For proof whereof having neither Authority nor any one Example of Scripture he confirmeth it by a Revelation of his own as after you shall hear 10. His device therefore is That the 1000 years wherein Sathan is said in the Ayocalypse to be ty'd up must begin as you see after the said 294 years of Heathen Persecution were ended So that the loosing out of Sathan against the Church again must fall in the year of Christ 1294 when Bonifacius VIII was chosen Pope or as the Monks Prophesie was upon the year 1260 when Antichrist was born Which is both contrary to that he said before that he was loosed about the year 900 as also that the Popes Gregory VII and Innocentius III. by Sathan's help no doubt overthrew the Church about the year of Christ 1080 or 1215 For if that Sathan was bound and not loosed until the year of Christ 1294 how could he overthrow the Church before 11. Wherefore all these new Interpretations of the words of the Apocalypse are but fantastical devices of wrangling Heretics seeing the ancient Fathers do interpret all these things far otherwise And first they put the binding up of Sathan for 1000 years there mentioned before the other number of 42 Months given to Antichrist to work his will and do say that the said loosing of Sathan began from the very Death and Passion of Christ when the power of Sathan was bound according to the saying of Christ himself in St. John's Gospel drawing near to his Passion Now the Prince of this World shall be cast forth And secondly they do interpret these 1000 Years not to signifie any certain time but generally to signifie all the whole course of time between the death of Christ and the coming of Antichrist three years and a half before the Day of Judgment according to the ordinary phrase of Scripture As for Example Quod mandavit Deus in mille generationes God hath commanded his Precept to be kept for a thousand Generations that is to say to the Worlds end and not for any certain time And again in Job If a Just man should contend with God he cannot answer him one for a thousand 12. This then is the ancient Interpretation of holy Doctors quite contrary to these new fancies of John Fox whose Expositions are both contrary to himself as in part you have seen and opposite to the words and sense of Scripture it self For whereas first these 42 Months importing by his Account 294 years were given to Sathan to work his will against the Saints of God the Scripture saith they were given to the Beast that is to say to Antichrist by the Dragon and not to the Dragon himself And secondly whereas he would needs have the 42 Months to signifie 294 years the Scriptures do expound them by 1260 days which make just three years and a half as hath been said 13. Thirdly Fox shall never find any place or example in Scripture where the word Month either in Greek or Latin doth signifie seven Days Weeks or Years as in Daniel the Greek word Hebdomada doth and may by its proper signification And yet is John Fox so fond and resolute in his device as all other proofs and probabilities failing him he will needs confirm it by a Revelation from God which he recounteth in these words following 14. Because the matter saith he being of no small importance greatly appertaineth unto the public utility of the Church and lest any should misdoubt me herein to follow any private Interpretations of my own I thought good to communicate to the Reader that which hath been imparted unto me in the opening of these Mystical Numbers in the foresaid Book of Revelation contained by occasion as followeth c. 15. As I was in hand with these Histories c. being vexed and turmoiled in spirit about the reckoning of these Numbers and Years it so happened upon a Sunday in the morning lying in my Bed and musing about these Numbers suddenly it was answered to my mind as with a majesty thus saying inwardly within me Thou Fool count these Months by Sabboths as the Weeks of Daniel are counted by Sabboths The Lord I take to witness thus it was Whereupon thus being admonished I began to reckon the 42 Months by Sabboths first of the Months and that would not serve and then by Sabboths of Years and then I began to feel some probable understanding Yet not satisfied herewith eftsoons I repaired to certain Merchants of my acquaintance of whom one is departed a true and faithful Servant of the Lord the other two yet alive and Witnesses hereof to whom the number of these foresaid Months being propounded and examined by Sabboths of Years the whole Sum was found to surmount to 294 years containing the full and just time of the foresaid Persecutions neither more nor less c. 16. And thus you have the Revelation made to John Fox which he saith that he relateth unto us for that we shall not misdoubt the truth thereof nor think that he followeth any private Interpretation of his own but that it came from God immediately And this is the first Dream of John Fox in his Bed. And the second ridiculous point is that he went to three Merchants to confer this Revelation and that they approved the same The third point is open Folly where he saith that this number of 294 containeth the full and just time of the first Persecution of Christians under Pagan Emperours neither more nor less which before hath been confuted and is evident in it self seeing that from Christ to the Victory of Constantine against Maxentius there are assigned by Eusebius 318 years and yet did not this Persecution of Christians cease then neither but continued under Licinius and other Tyrants for divers years after See then how just these Numbers fall out neither more nor less All which being considered I find no one thing so true or credible in all this Revelation as those words of the Spirit unto him saying Thou Fool for that this maketh him a Fool indeed by Revelation And so much of him and of this whole matter of binding and loosing Sathan and Reign of Antichrist Now let us return to the continuation of our Conference with John Fox about his Church 17. The deduction of the Catholic Roman Church from William the Conqueror downward unto John Wickliff's time is no less easie and clear but rather more than the former deduction from Christ to the Conquest for that the Church was now more spread and