the Primitive Church As for Franciscus a S. clara being the book is writ in latine and printed in the parts beyond sea how can you charge the Bishops with it for that it hath beene printed in London and presented to the King by a Prelate you dare not certainely affirme but speake it onely upon heere-say p. 117. Or were it so yet being written in the latine it is meete for Schollers and such as understand that language not as your pamphlets are proposed unto the common people either to misinforme them or to inflame them As for the booke intituled the Female glorie you finde not in it that I see by your collections any thing positively or dogmatically delivered contrarie unto any point of doctrine established and received in the Church of England Some swelling language there is in it and some Apostrophes I perceive by you to the virgin Marie which if you take for Invocations you mistake his meaning who tells us plainly as you cite him p. 125. that the more wee ascribe unto her setting Invocation apart the more gracious wee appeare in our Saviours sight No Innovation hitherto in point of Doctrine From bookes set out by private men proceed we to the opinions of some certaine Quidams which you are displeased with and were it so as you report it yet the opinions of some private men prove not in my poore Logick an Innovation in the Doctrine by the Church delivered though contrary unto the Doctrine so delivered To make an Innovation in point of Doctrine there must be an unanimous and general concurrence of minds and men to set on foote the new and desert the old not the particular fancie of one private man And yet I think you will not find me out that particular man that hath defended any thing contrary to the Doctrine of the Church of England and passed uncensured Yes that you can you say for certaine For a great Prelate in the High Commission Court said openly at the censure of Dr. Bastwick that wee and the Church of Rome differ not in fundamentalibus but circa fundamentalia as also that the same had beene affirmed by one Choune p. 122. Suppose this true and how comes this to be an Innovation in the Doctrine of the Church of England Hath the Church any where determined that wee and those of Rome doe differ in the Fundamentalls if not why doe you make this saying an Innovation in the Churches Doctrine The Church indeed hath told us in the Nineteenth Article that the Church of Rome hath erred not only in their living and manner of Ceremonies but also in matters of Faith it hath not told us that that Church hath erred in Fundamentalls The learned Junius could have told you that the Church of Rome is a true Church quoad essentiam according to the essence of a Church lib. de Eccl. cap. 7. and Dr. Whitakers that there were many things in the Church of Rome Baptisme the Ministery and the Scriptures quae ad veram ecclesiam pertinent which properly appertaine to a true Church An argument that neither of them thought that Church had erred in Fundamentalls And certainly if that confession of Saint Peter Thou art Christ the Sonne of the living God Matth. 16. be that Rocke on which the Church of Christ is founded as all our Protestant Divines affirme it is the Church of Rome doth hold as fast on that foundation as you or any Zealot of your acquaintance and hath done more against the Hereticks of this Age in maintenance of the Divinitie of our Lord and Saviour then you or any one of your Divines be hee who he will But for the Church of Rome that it is a true Church and that wee doe not differ from them in fundamentalls you may see further in a little booke called the Reconciler doe not you remember it and the occasion of it too writ by the Bishop of Exeter now being and therein the opinion of some Bishops to the selfe same purpose and of some others also learned men whose judgement you preferre in other things more then any Bishops Had you but throughly studied the Reconciler as you should have done you had not made this quarrell perhaps none at all As for the other opinions of more private men that have offended you you goe on and say that Justifiâ—ation by works was maintained in Cambridge at the Commencement not long agoe and that Shelfords booke will prove Justification by Charitie as also that the said Shelford in that book maintaineth that the Pope is not Antichrist contrary as you say to the resolved Doctrines of our Church in our Homilies and else-where p. 122. and 123. In answere to the first of which I hope you doe not think in earnest that whatsoever point is ventilated and discussed in the Publike Schooles is presently conceived to be a Doctrine of the Church or that there hath beene nothing handled in those disputations but what is agreeable thereto Many things there both are and may be handled and propounded problematically and argued Pro and Con as the custom is as well for the discovery of the trueth as the true issue of the question betweene the parties And if you please to cast your eye upon those questions which have beene heretofore disputed at those solemne times how many will you find amongst them and those of your owne speciall friends in which the Church hath not determined or not determined so as they have then and there been stated and yet no clamour raised about it Nor doe you truely relate the businesse neither Thesis not being so proposed as you informe us Viz. That wee are Justified by Workes but onely that good Workes are effectually necessary to Salvation so that the principall part of our justification was by the Doctor then and there ascribed to faith workes only comming in as effectuall meanes to our salvation For Shelfords Booke what ever is in that maintained should as little trouble you if he ascribe a speciall eminencie unto Charitie in some certaine things it is no more then what was taught him by Saint Paul who doth preferre it as you cannot chuse but know before Faith and Hope Nor doth hee attribute our justification thereunto in any other sense then what was taught him by Saint James And here I purposed to have left you with these opinions of particular and private men but that you tell us by the way that by the Doctrine of our Church in the Homilies and elsewhere it is resolved that the Pope is Antichrist Your else-where I am sure is no where and that which you alledge from the booke of Homilies is as good as nothing The Second Homilie for Whitsunday concludeth with a Prayer that by the mighty power of the holy Ghost the comfortable Doctrine of Christ may be truely preached truely received and truly followed in all places to the beating down of sinne death the Pope the Devill and all the Kingdom of Antichrist Can you
their Persons H. B. displeased that the Bishops doe challenge their Episcopall authoritie from our Saviour The challenge of Episcopall power from Christ and his Apostles neither new nor strange as H. B. pretednds Of the Episcopall succession in the Church of England Episcopall succession how esteemed and valued amongst the Antients The derivation of Episcopall discent from the Church of Rome no prejudice vnto the Hierarchy or Church as H. B. makes it The Bishops antiently called Reverend Fathers The scandalous and scornfull attributes given by H. B. to the Bishops in the generall and to some of the chiefe of them in particular A briefe replie to all his cavills against the chiefe of those particulars H. B. makes his addresse to all sorts of people to joyne together with the King to destroy the Bishops and is content to run an hazard of his own life so it may be done The ruine of the Bishops made by H. B. the only present meanes to remove the Plague A generall answere to these slanderous and Seditious passages LEt us now looke upon your dealing with my LL. the Bishops how you handle them their place their persons their proceedings who being the principall object of your malice must not expect more civill usage then the King their Master especially considering in cold blood how they have provoked you by calling you forth upon the stage However use them as you please you have one good shelter For if your stile seeme sharper then usuall wee are to blame if wee impute it not to your zeal and fidelity for God and the King being you are to encounter those who be adversaries to both Begin then zealous sir wee stand ready for you First then you quarrell with the calling and stomack it exceedingly that some of them should say in the High Commission being put unto it by your Brother Bastwick that they had their Episcopal authority from Christ and if they could not prove it they would cast away their Rochets And so say you they might their Capps too for any such proofe they can bring for it p. 68. What more It 's plaine that they usurpe professe and practise such a jurisdiction as is not annexed to the Imperiall Crowne of England but with the Pope and Prelates of Italy they claime from Christ Ibid. Well then what hurt of this Thus you see our Prelates have no other claime for their Hierarchy then the Popes of Rome have and doe make which all our Divines since the Reformation till yesterday have disclaimed and our Prelates cannot otherwise assume but by making themselves they very limbes of the Pope and so our Church a member of that Synagogue of Rome And this you say because it is affirmed by Dr. Pocklington that we are able lineally to set downe the succession of our Bishops from Saint Peter to Saint Gregory and from to our first Archbishop Saint Austin our English Apostle downwards to his Grace that now sits in the chaire c. p. 69. Thus also in the Newes from â—pswich you are much offended with the Prelates that they will needs be Lord Bishops jure divino by the holy Ghosts own institution and shame not to stile themselves the Godly Holy Fathers of our Church and Pillars of our faith when as their fruites and actions manifest them to be nought else but Step-fathers and Catter-pillers the very pests and plagues of both And not long after you bestow a gentle touch on Dr. Pocklington calling the Prelates as your use is the true-bred sonnes of the Roman Antichrist from whom D. Pocklington boasts they are lineally descended But whatsoever be the claime from Christ or his Apostles or the Church of Rome you have found out a fitter Author of the holy Hierarchie even the spirit that beares rule in the aire the devill Who doth not only haunt the Pallaces of Prelates perhaps he went sometimes upon your occasions but hath infused such a poison into the chaire of this Hierarchie as that man who sits in it had need to be strongly fortified with Preservatives and Antidotes of true Reall Grace not nominall and titular that is able to overcom the infection of it p. 106. This is the summe of what you say or repeat rather with a nil dictum quod and this is hardly worth the saying by so great a Rabbin the answere being made before the objection yet since you say it something must bee sayd about it and so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Your first exception is that the Episcopall authoritie is claimed from Christ and that some of the Bishops said in the High Commission that if they could not prove it they would cast away their Rochets This is no more then what had formerly beene said in the conference at Hampton Court when on occasion of Saint Hieromes saying that a Bishop was not divinae ordinationis the Bishop of London Dr. Bancroft interposed that unlesse hee could prove his ordination lawfull out of the Scriptures he would not be a Bishop foure houres You see then this is no new saying devised but yesterday and contrary to what hath beene the judgement of all our Divines since the reformation as you please to tell us The learned workes of Bishop Bilson entituled The Perpetuall government of Christs Church and those of Dr. Adrian Saravia against your Patriarke Theodore Beza de diversis ministerii gradibus with many others of those times shew manifestly that you are an impudent Impostor and care not what you say so you make a noise And yet I cry you mercy I may mistake you not knowing exactly what you meane by your Our Divines For if by your Divines you meane the Genevian Doctors Calvin and Beza Viret and Farellus Bucan Vrsinus and those others of forreine Churches whom you esteeme the onely Orthodox professours you may affirme it very safely that the derivation of Episcopall authority from our Saviour Christ is utterly disclaimed by your Divines Calvin had never else invented the Presbytery nor with such violence obtruded it on all the reformed Churches neither had Beza divided Episcopatum into Divinum humanum and Satanicum as you know he doth But if by our Divines you meane those worthies of the Church who have stood up in maintenance of the holy Hierarchie against the clamours and contentions of the Puritan faction or such as are conformable unto the Articles and orders of the Church of England you do most shamelessely traduce them as your custome is and make them Patrons of that Tenet which they most opposed For tell me of a truth who is it which of our Divines that holds Episcopall authority to be derived from any other fountaine then that of Christ and his Apostles and that conceive their ordination is not de jure divino grounded and founded on the Scriptures and thence deduced by necessary evident and undeniable illation if any such there be hee is one of yours Travers and Cartwright and the rest of your Predecessours men never
advancement of Gods glorie the edifying of his Church and the due reverence of Christs holy mysteries and Sacraments This you restraine unto the person of the Queene affirming p. 66. that it is not to be extended to her successours in the Crowne How truely this is said hath beene showne elsewhere And were it so in point of Law yet a good Church man as you are could not choose but know that in the Articles of the Church it is acknowledged and agreed on that the Church hath power to decree Rites or ceremonies Art 20. and more then so that every particular or nationall Church hath authoritie to ordaine change and abolish ceremonies or Rites of the Church ordained onely by mans authority so that all things be done to edifying Art 34. These Articles you have subscribed to more then once or twice and therefore cannot choose but know that other ceremonies may be used in the Church then those which are expressed in the Common prayer booke Nor were these Articles confirmed onely in the Convocation the power and authority of the which you regard but little but were confirmed and subscription to the same exacted by Act of Parliament as your unlearned Counsaile can at large informe you It s true some such as you have quarrel'd with the 20. Article as if that clause of giving power unto the Church to decree rites or ceremonies and authority in controversies of faith were not coequall with the Article but thrust in of late and for that cause by some undue and sinister practise the booke of Articles was lately printed in the Latine tongue and that clause left out But in the antient Copies published in the yeare 1563. the Article is intire and whole according as it is in all those bookes of Articles to which you severally subscribed Nor saith that Article any more as to the matter of ordaining ceremonies then what is afterwards affirmed in the 34. Article as before was said nor more then what hath positively beene affirmed by your owne Divines as you please to stile them Calvin whose judgment in this point you neither may nor can decline hath said as much upon these words of the Apostle Let all things be done decently and in order Non potest haberi quod Paulus hic exigit nisi additis constitutionibus tanquam vinculis quibusdam ordo ipse et decorum servetur That which St. Paul requires cannot be done saith he without rules and Canons by which as by some certaine bondes both order and decorum may be kept together Paraus yet more plainely and unto the purpose Facit ecclesiae potestatem de decoro et ordine ecclesiastico libere disponendi et leges ferendi So that you see the Church hath power to decree rites and ceremonies in things that appertaine to order decency and uniformity in Gods publicke service and which is more a power of making lawes and Canons to inforce conformity unto the same in the opinion of your owne Doctors And if it please his Majesty with the advice of his Commissioners or Metropolitane to ordaine new ceremonies or if the Church thinke fit to adde further rites to those which are received already I know no remedy either in Law or conscience but that you must submit unto them Which said we will proceede to those other Innovations which you have falsly charged upon the Prelates The fourth change is you tell us in the civill government which they labour to reduce and transferre to ecclesiasticall while they seeke to trample on the lawes of the land and step between the King and his people the Prelates power overswaying the subjects right in the free use and benefit of the Lawes pag. 129. You make the like out-cry to my LL. the Iudges saying Doe not your wisdomes see a new generation of Innovators risen up in this Land who usurping and practising a Papall and Antichristian power and jurisdiction exempted from the Kings Lawes c. doe thereby begin to overtop the Royall throne and trample the Lawes liberties and just rights of the Kings Subjects under their feete p. 29. Quid dignum tanto What is the ground of all this noise Nought els it seemes but that the high Commissioners thinke that Court of too high a nature to be affronted by such fellowes as your Learned Counsailes of which you tell us p. 129. and that my LL. the Iudges out of their honourable love to Iustice are not so easily moved to send their writs of prohibition to that Court as some of their Predecessours were before them And is there not good reason thinke you For if as Dr. Cosin pleades the case his Majesties supreame Royall authority and power ecclesiasticall granted by Commission to others be as highly vested in his Crowne as is his Temporall then will it be probably gathered both of them being in their severall kindes supreme and the exercise of them committed over to others under the great Seale that the one of them is not to be abridged restrained or controuled by the other And you may also know if you please to know it how that it was affirmed once by K. Iames of blessed memorie in his speech at Whitehall before both houses of Parliament An. 1609. That the high Commission was of so high a nature that from thence there was no appellation to any other Court Both Courts being thus supreme in their severall kindes and neither of them being to be abridged restrained and controuled by the other as long as the Iudges in the high Commission keepe themselves within their bounds to causes of ecclesiasticall cognizance what reason have you of complaint in case you cannot get a Prohibition as before you did Most likely that my LL. the Iudges are growne more difficult in that kinde as for diverse other reasons so most especially because they see the Iudges in that other Court so carful as not to meddle in any thing which may entrench upon the Courts of common Law or the subjects liberty Call you me this an overtopping of the Royall throne a trampling of the Lawes liberties and just rights of his Majesties subjects under their feete Cannot so insolent a wretch as you be denied a Prohibition from the Courts of Law or may not Mr. Prynne be threatned for his sawey and irreverent carriage by the high Commission but presently you must raise an outcry ac si Anniball ad portas as if the libertie of the subjects was indangered in the free use and benefit of the Lawes as you please to phrase it yet this amongst the rest you have made a cause of your seditious libelling against Church and State as if the one were like to devoure the other and all were in a way to ruine but for such Zelots as your selfe the carefull watchmen of the times But good Sir be assured there is no such danger For as the reducing of the civill government so ecclesiasticall which you so much feare there must be other meanes to doe
all by Parliament and yet the Parliament did nothing in it All that was done by Parliament was that the day of that deliverance was appointed for a kinde of holy day wherein the pâ—ople were to meete together to set forth Gods glory and it was there enacted also that upon every such day that very statute of the institution should be read publickly to the Congregation Of any forme of prayer set forth or afterwards to be set forth ne gry I am sure in all that statute The booke was after made and published by the Kings authority without the trouble of a Parliament However being set out and published though not by Parlament you cannot but be grieved at the alterations Well what are they First you complaine that whereas in the former booke there was this passage Roote out that Babilonish and Antichristian sect which say of Hierusalem c. in the Edition A. 1635. it is set downe thus Roote out that Babilonish and antichristian Sect of them which say of Hierusalem c. Here 's of them added more then was And this you thinke doth make a great and fearefull difference For whereas in the Originall it was plainely meant that all Iesuites Seminary Priests and their confederates are that Babilonish and Antichristian sect which say of Hierusalem c. this latter booke either restraines it to some few that are of that mind or else mentally transferres it on those Puritans that cry downe with Babilon that is Poperie which these men call Hierusalem and the true Catholick Religion p. 130 131. It seemes you have a guilty conscience you would not start so much at this else Quid prodest non habere conscium habenti conscientiam sayd the Father rightly That Babylonish Sect which say and that Babylonish Sect of them which say make 's so little difference that were you not guilty to your selfe of many ill wishes against Hierusalem you would not have so stomacked at the alteration And being that it is confessed by you their Oracle that the Puritans doe cry downe with our Hierusalem by them called Poperie they come within the compasse of the prayer take which forme you list either that Babilonish Sect or that Babilonish Sect of them Nor is it strange that so it should bee For howsoever the Iesuites Priests and their confederates were at first intended yet if the Puritans follow them in their designes of blowing up the Church and State and bringing all into a lawlesse and licentious Anarchie the prayer will reach them too there 's no question of it The Statute 1. Eliz. c. 2. Confirmatorie of the Common prayer booke hath ordained severall penalties for such as shall deprave the said booke of Common prayer or obstinately refuse to use it or use any other forme of prayer then that there appointed as also a particular mulct of 12d toties quoties upon every man that doth absent himselfe from Church on Sundaies and holy dayes This was intended at the first against Recusants there being then no Puritans in rerum natura And may not therefore all the penalties therein contained be justly laid upon the Puritans if they offend in any of the kinds before remembred The like may also be affirmed of the High Commission established hereby at the first for the correction and reduction of the Papists being then the onely opposite partie to the Church and yet you know the High Commissioners may take a Puritan to taske if they finde him faulty That which you next complaine of is that whereas in the old booke the prayer went thus Cut off these workers of iniquity whose Religion is rebellion whose faith is faction it is now altered into this who turne Religion into rebellion and Faith into faction Hereupon you inferre that these Innovators would not have the Popish Religion to bee termed rebellion and their Faith faction as the antient Copie plainely shewes it to be but turne it off from the Religion to some persons which turne Religion into rebellion and Faith into faction so as by this turning they plainely imply that the Religion of Papists is the true Religion and no rebellion their Faith the true faith no faction p. 131. You make another use of it in your Apologie and tell us that it tendeth to justifie and extenuate notorious treasons traytors and to usher in Poperie Superstition and Idolatry p. 3. Here is a change indeede you say right in that but that which you inferre thereon is both false and scâ—ndalous For taking it for granted that they by whose authority the said clause was altered thought it not fit to call the Religion of the Church of Rome rebellion or the Faith therein professed faction must it needs follow thereupon that by so doing they imply that that religion is the true religion and that faith the true faith There 's a non sequitur with a witnesse There is a kinde of religion amongst the Turkes Because I cannot say that their religion is rebellion doe I imply so plainely as you say they doe that therefore their religion is the true religion And there 's a faith too questionlesse among the severall Sects of Christians in the Easterne Muscovite and African Churches Because I thinke not fit to say of any of them that their faith is faction must I conclude astringently therefore the faith profest by each particular Sect is the true faith You might well tax me should I say the one and I may laugh at you for concluding the other Adeo argumenta ex falso petita inepto habent exitus as Lactantius hath it Your use is yet more scandalous then your inference false For how doth this tend to justifie and extenuate notorious treasons and Traytors The treasons and the traytors stand as before they did unlesse the staine be laid more deepe upon them then before it was Before the imputation seemed to rest on the faith it selfe which being a generall accusation concerned no more the guilty then it did the innocent But here it resteth where it ought upon the persons of the Traytors who are not hereby justified or their crime extenuated but they themselves condemned and the treason aggravated in an higher manner That which comes after of ushering in Poperie Superstition and Idolatry is but your ordinary flourish one of your generall calumnies and needes not a particular answer O but say you and undertake to make it good the very religion is rebellion and the faith is faction and therefore there was somewhat in the chang which deserved that censure That their religion is rebellion you prove two wayes First because the Iesuites and Seminary priests refuse to take the oath of Supremacie which is injoyned to all Papists 3. Iac. c. 4. You must needes shew your law you have such store of it For speake man was the oath of Supreamacie enacted 3. Iacobi Then am I out againe for my bookes tell me it was 1 Elizabethae In your Apologie you place the oath of
alleigance 1. Elizabethae and here to make your ignorance the more remarkeable you place the oath of Supremacie 3. Iac. Cujus contrarium verum est The oath of alleigeance t is you meane And sure you will not say all Seminarie Priests and Lay-papists refuse the oath of alleigeance considering that of each sort some have written very learnedly in defence thereof therefore according to your way of disputation the religion of all Papists is not rebellion and consequently their faith not faction The second proofe you offer is that by Doctor Iohn White and Dr. Cracanthorp it is affirmed that the Church of Rome teacheth disloyaltie and rebellion against kings that Popish Authors doe exalt the Popes power over kings that some of theÌ„ have sayd that Christian kings are dogges which must be ready at the Shepheards hand or else the Shepheard must remove them from their office p. 134.135 This argument is full as faulty as the other was and will conclude as much against your selfe and the Puritan faction as any Papist of them all The Citizens of Geneva expelled their Bp. as the Calvinians in Emden did their Earle being their immediate Lords and Princes Calvin hath taught us that the three estates Paraeus that the inferiour Magistrate Buchanan that the people may correct and controule the Prince and in some cases too depose him And you Mass Burton have condemned that absolute obedience unto Kings and Princes which is due to them from their subjects and that unlimited power which is ascribed unto them because theirs of right Therefore we may from hence conclude or else your argument is worth nothing that out of doubt the Puritan religion is rebellion and their faith faction As for your generall challenge p. 191. viz. What one Protestant can they bring that ever committed treason against his king or lifted up an hand against his sacred person I leave it to the Papists to make answere to it to whom your chalenge is proposed But I could tell you in your eare which I would to God were otherwise of more than one or two twice told and twice told to that Protestants of that sort which you most labour to defend and make to bee the onely right ones Had you distinguished as you ought betweene the doctrines of that Church and the particular either words or actions of particular men you had not made so rash a venture and lost more by it than you got So then the religion of the Church of Rome not being in it selfe rebellion though somewhat which hath there beene taught may possibly have beene applyed to rebellious purposes there is a little feare that their faith is faction and so the alteration not so grievous as you faine would have it What further reason there was in it you shall see anon The third booke altered as you say is that set sorth by the king for the publicke fast in the first yeare of his reigne and which his Majestie by his proclamation commanded to be reprinted and published and so reade in the Church every Wednesday What finde you altered there In the first Collect as you tell us is left out this remarkeable pious sentence intirely viz. Thou hast delivered us from superstition and idolatry wherein we were utterly drowned and hast brought us into the most cleere comfortable light of thy blessed word c. And then you ad Loe here these men would not have Popery called Superstition and Idolatry nor would they have the Word of God so commended as that cleare and comfortable light which teacheth us all duties both to God and man p. 142. This is the last of all these changes which tend as you informe us to bring in Popery and therefore I will tell you here what I conceive to be the reason of those alterations which you so complaine of You cannot chuse but know because I think you have it in your Pamphlet against D Cosens that in the Letanie of King Edward 6. there was this clause viz. From the tyrannie of the Bishop of Rome and all his detestable enormities from all false doctrine c. Good Lord deliver us This was conceived to be as indeede it was a very great scandall and offence to all those in the Realme of England which were affected to the Church of Rome and therefore in the Liturgie of Queene Elizabeth it was quite left out Had you beene then alive you might perhaps have quarrelled it and taxed those learned men that did it of Popery Innovation I know not what and then conclude it that they would have the people think that there was neither tyrannie in the Pope nor any detestable enormitie in the Church of Rome But as that then was done with a good intent and no man quarrelled for it that I can heare of why should you thinke worse of the changes now or quarrell that authoritie which gave order for it before you knew by whose authority it was so done conceive you not that those who in this Kingdome are affected to the Church of Rome are not as apt to take offence now as they were before or that there is not now as much consideration to bee had of those which are that way affected as was in any part of the said Queenes time the matter being of no greater moment than this is how great soever you pretend it Most of our faults before have beene of Commission but these that follow most of them are omissionâ— onely First you except against the leaving out of the whole prayer It had beene best for us c. And this was done with an Alas because therein was commended the profitable use of continuall preaching the Word of God p. 142. The Newes from Ipswich calls it the most effectuall prayer of all because it magnifies continuall often preaching c. and call's our powerfull Preachers Gods servants Say you me so Then let us looke upon the Prayer where I perswade my selfe there is no such matter All that reflects that way is this It had beene also well if at thy dreadfull threates out of thy holy word continually pronounced unto us by thy servants our Preachers we had of feare as corrigible servants turned from our wickednesse This all and in all this where doe you finde one word that magnifies continuall preaching or that takes any notice of your powerfull Preachers quorum pars ego magna as you boast your self Cannot the dreadfull threats of Gods holy word be any other way pronounced and pronounced continually by Gods servant then by the way of Sermons only or if by sermons onely by no other Preachers than those whom you stile powerful preachers by a name distinct I trow the reading of Gods Word in the congregatioÌ„ presents unto the people more dreadfull threats then what you lay before them in a sermon and will sinke as deepe Therefore assuredly there was some other reason for it then that you dreame of â—nd thinke you that it
Latimers Sermons Bishop Iewels Bishop Andrewes and diverse others Your afternoone Sermons on the Sondaies if performed by Lecturers are but a part of that new fashion which before wee spake off and having no foundation in the Church at all it cannot be an Innovation to lay them by And if the Curate of the place or whosoever hath the Cure of Soules bestow his time in Catechizing as he is appointed that in effect is but to change one kinde of Preaching for another So that if he that hath the Cure doth carefully discharge his office and performe his duty you have no reason to complaine for want of having Sermons in the after noone I know it is the custome of you and yours to take up Sermons more by tale then weight and so you have your number you thinke all is right But as in feeding of the body one temperate meale digested presently and concocted throughly adde's more unto the strength of nature then all that plentifull variety of delicates which gluttony hath yet invented So doe they profit best in all heavenly wisdome 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not who heare many Sermons but which heare good ones For limiting the Catechizing unto halfe an houre that 's ordered by the Canon also and it is ordered by the Canon that Children shall bee taught no other Catechisme then that set forth in the booke of Common prayer Not that the Curate is to examine them by question and answere onely without expounding any of the principles of religion which is that you quarrell but to examine and instruct them as the Canon hath it Yet so that under the pretence hereof nor you nor any such as you may assume that libertie as to turne simple Catechizing for the instruction of the youth and ignorant persons of the Parish into a Catechisme Lecture of some two houres long not differing from your mornings sermons but in name alone If in great Cities and the Viniversities Sermons are limited to the same time of the day or as your owne phrase is to one houre onely assuredly it is neither new nor strange The Sermon appointed for the morning being a part of the second service is to be read or spoken in all Churches at the time appointed by the Church Nothing in this de novo that I can heare of In Oxford it was alwayes so since I first knew it the Sermon for the Vniversity and Towne being expressely at the same time Nor neede you bee offended at it if by that meanes the people in those places cannot heare above one sermon in a day it being not many but good sermons not much but profitable hearing which you should labour to commend unto them but that you would bee some body for your often preaching Our Saviour tels us of some men that thought they should bee heard by much speaking and you are one of them that teach the people that they shall be saved by much hearing Your two last innovations I shall joyne together the one being in the rule of Faith which is now made you say to be the dictates of the Church to wit the Prelates p. 151. the other in the rule of manners which must not bee any more the word of Christ but the example of the Prelates lives and dictates of their writings onely p. 156. In this you have most shamefully abused your selfe and all them that heard you The rule of faith is still the same even the holy Scriptures nor can you name a man who hath changed this rule or made the dictates of the Church to wit the Prelats the rule of faith The application of this rule that is the exposition of the Script you must acknowledge to be in the Churches power or els you are no son to the Church of Eng. For in the Articles of the Church to which you have subscribed more thē once or twice it is said expresly that the Church hath authority in cōtroversies of faith that it is vwitnes a keeper of holy writ As also that it hath authority to expound the scriptur cōditioned that it so expound one place that it be not repugnant to another And for the judgmēt of prelats I know not how you can excuse your selfe before God almighty for not submitting therunto having called God to witnes that you would so do For when you took the order of holy Priesthood it was demanded of you in the Congregation whether you would reverently obey your Ordinary and other chiefe Ministers unto whom the government and charge is committed over you following with a glad mind and will their godly admonitions and submitting your self to their godly judgements and you made answer that you would the Lord being your helper Either then you must first cōvince their judgements of some plaine ungodlines or else your not submitting to them must be a plaine colluding both with God and man Reeve whom you jeere at so both in your Pasquil p. 152. and in your dialogue between A. B. saith no more then this and if you say not this you have not lied unto men only but unto God Nor is this any other doctrine then what was held for currant in Ignatius his time 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Let the Priests saith he submit themselves unto the Bishop Deacons unto the Priests the people to the Priests and Deacons And then hee addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 My soule for theirs that faithfully observe this order So he And had you kept this order you had not so engaged your self in these factious brabbles wherewith you have disturbed both your selfe and others Touching the rule of manners that any hath affirmed or written that it must bee according to the Prelates lives and dictates you produce no proofe Onely you say and say it onely that they doe countenance allow and by Episcopall authority dispense with an heathenish kinde of life especially in most sacred times as the Lords day This is no proofe I hope but an ipse dixit or a petitio Principii take it at the best although it bee an argument you are used most to And I must answer you to this in the words of Tullie Quid minus est non dico Oratoris sed hominis quam id objicere Adversario quod si ille verbo negarit ulterius progredi non passis Till you bring better proofes for your innovations your selfe must be reputed for the Innovator and all the mischiefe which you have imagined against other men will fall upon your owne pate and deservedly too Hitherto you have acted the false Accuser and have done it excellently well none better In the next place you come to play the Disputant and that you do us wretchedly none worse For first you say that it is pleaded by our changers as you please to call them that they bring in no changes but revive those things which antient Canons have allowed and prescribed as standing up at the Gloria Patri and at the reading of