Iesus Christ the second person of the Godhead is the sonne of God the Father Iohn 1.18 c. onely begotten Iohn 1.29 Heb. 1.2 equal to his Father 1. Chro. 17.13 Ioh. 1. 1. true God Iohn 1.2 c. foreappointed before the creation of all things 1. Pet. 1.20 Reuel 13.8 c. and presently after mans fall promised to be the Messias Gene. 3.15 c. published eftsoones vnto the holy Patriarches as vnto Abraham Gen. 12. 3. c. vnto Isaac Gen 26.4 vnto Iacob Gene. 28.14 and confirmed by promises Gen. 49.9 Esa. 11.1,10 prefigured by y e sacrifices of Moses Leu. 1.2 c. and by other types as namely by the offering of Isaac Gen. 22. by the lifting vp of the brasen serpent Num. 21. by Ionas Ionas 2. c. proclaimed by the testimony of the Prophets Esa. 7.14 and at length in the fulnesse of time truely exhibited true man Iohn 1.14 c. Gal. 4. that he died for our sinnes and was raised againe for our iustification Rom. 4.25 c. Ascending into heauen Acts 1.9 c. and making intercession for vs at the right hand of his Father without ceasing 1. Iohn 2.1 c. by his holy Spirit which is the thirde person of the Godhead coequall and consubstantial to the Father and the Sonne Acts. 5. 4. gathering the Church to himselfe by the Word and Sacraments Matth. 16.18 Rom. 10.14 c. and sanctifying it to eternal life Acts. 9.31 c. And that one day at the end of the world he will come from heauen Acts. 1.11 to iudge the quicke and the dead 1. Thessal 4.15 that he will render vnto the wicked according to their workeâ— and that he wil iudge them to eternal paines Matth. 13.42 25.4 but that he wil reward them with eternal life who beleeue in his Name Matth. 25.34 This Iesus Christ I say wee acknowledge to be our redeemer Matth. 1.21 our head 1. Corinth 12.27 and our Lord Ephe. 4.5 And that wee in our holy baptisme do giue and haue giuen our names vnto him Acts. 2.38 and that we are engraffed into him by baptisme 1. Corin. 12.13 And this we do plainely ingenuously freely and willingly confesse and witnesse And as for all others who inuent any other name in heauen giuen vnto men by which they may be saued we doe earnestly detest curse and condemne them Acts. 4.12 We holde his most holy Word to be the onely rule of our saluation And that alone all mans deuises being cast away and contemned we propound vnto our selues as an infallible rule and leuel of our faith Galat. 1.8 Esai 29.13 Ezech. 20. which we conteine vnder the name of the olde and newe Testament Hebr. 8. deliuered by the Prophets and Apostles Ephe. 2.20 by the singular and infinite goodnesse of God preserued euer vnto this day and to be preserued hereafter alwayes in the Church Matth. 28. last verse Psal. 71.18.1 Cor. 11.26 Therefore we render thankes vnto our most gratious and Almighty God from our soule and from our whole heart because that euen vnto vs being separated an huge distance from the rest of the body of his Church and inhabiting the farthest parts of the world hee would that this light graunted for the reuelation of the Gentiles and prepared before the face of all people and in olde time fauourably shewed to holy Simeon for in Christ are all the treasures of wisedome hidden which now doeth enlighten and cherish with the sauing beames thereof our whole nation that hee would I say this light should come vnto vs. This in briefe running ouer the very summe is our faith and our Religion which by the direction of the holy Spirit and of his Ministers in the vineyard of Christ we haue drawen and that out of the fountaines of Israel In the yeere of our Lord 1070. saw the Islanders conuerted vnto Christ c. IT is doubtful vnto vs whether in these words Kranzius would haue said that y e Islanders were first conuerted vnto Christ in the yeere of our Lord 1070 or whether he doth not deny that they were indeed before conuerted but saith that it was knowne first vnto Adalbert that yeere But whethersoeuer of these he affirmeth notwithstanding the yerely records and most auncient Chronicles of our nation testifying the contrary do make his credite to be suspected in this place vnto which records and Chronicles whether you had rather giue assent concerning our owne proper and domestical affaires done within the bounds of our Island or to Krantzius or any other being ignorant in the story of our countrey I appeale friendly reader vnto your owne discretion For my part I am enforced by many reasons to agree rather vnto our owne writers For our countreymen affirme those things onely that be knowen and in a maner domesticall he writeth matters forreine and vnknowen they haue compiled their histories without the diffaming disgracing or reprehending of any other nations onely that they might assigne vnto their owne acts and exploits the true time or age thereof he hath intermedled in his historie certaine things contrary to the trueth and that to the vpbraiding of our nation being most vnknowen vnto him as it shall immediatly appeare they describe the names yeres order succession of all the Bishops of Island he mentioneth onely one that farre otherwise then the trueth Furthermore that I may make good the credite of our Countreymen I wil impart with strangers a fewe things which I found in our most ancient records of the conuersion of Island vnto Christ and of the succession of Bishops in our Churches Which although they be of litle moment and not altogether worthy to be written yet must they of necessitie bee set downe for the defence of the trueth of our affaires against Krantzius and others Thus therefore standeth the certeintie thereof In the yeere of Christ 874. Island being indeed discouered before that time as is aboue mentioned was then first of all inhabited by certaine Noruagians Their chiefetaine was one Ingulphus from whose name the East cape of Island is called Ingulffs hoffdi These planters are reckoned vp by name in our recordes more then to the number of 400. together with those of their blood and kinred and great families besides neither onely is their number described but it is also plainely set downe what coasts what shores and what in-land places eche of them did occupie and inhabite and what names the first inhabitants did giue vnto Streights bayes harboroughs necklands creekes capes rockes cragges mountaines hilles valleys homockes springs floods riuers And to be short what names they gaue vnto their graunges or houses whereof many at this day are reteined and vsed Therefore the Norwayes with their company peopled all the habitable parts of Island now occupied by them for the space of 60. yeeres or thereabout but they remayned Ethnickes almost a 100. yeres except a very few which were baptised in Norwaie But scarce a 100. yeres from
Angle of the Sunne beames heateth and what encrease the Sunnes continuance doeth adde thereunto it might expresly be set downe what force of heat and cold is in all regions Thus you partly see by comparing a Climate to vs well knowen and familiarly acquainted by like height of the Sunne in both places that vnder the Equinoctiall in Iune is no excessiue heat but a temperate aire rather tending to cold For as they haue there for the most part a continuall moderate heat so yet sometime they are a little pinched with colde and vse the benefite of fire as well as we especially in the euening when they goe to bed for as they lye in hanging beds tied fast in the vpper part of the house so will they haue fires made on both sides their bed of which two fires the one they deuise superstitiously to driue away spirits and the other to keepe away from them the coldnesse of the nights Also in many places of Torrida Zona especially in the higher landes somewhat mountainous the people a litle shrincke at the cold and are often forced to prouide themselues clothing so that the Spaniards haue found in the West Indies many people clothed especially in Winter whereby appeareth that with their heat there is colde intermingled else would they neuer prouide this remedy of clothing which to them is rather a griefe and trouble then otherwise For when they goe to warres they will put off all their apparell thinking it to be combersome and will alwayes goe naked that they thereby might be more nimble in their sight Some there be that thinke the middle zone extreme hot because the people of the countrey can and doe liue without clothing wherein they childishly are deceiued for our Clime rather tendeth to extremitie of colde because wee cannot liue without clothing for this our double lining furring and wearing so many clothes is a remedy against extremitie and argueth not the goodnesse of the habitation but inconuenience and iniury of colde and that is rather the moderate temperate and delectable habitation where none of these troublesome things are required but that we may liue naked and bare as nature bringeth vs foorth Others againe imagine the middle zone to be extreme hot because the people of Africa especially the Ethiopians are so cole blacke and their haire like wooll curled short which blacknesse and curled haire they suppose to come onely by the parching heat of the Sunne which how it should be possible I cannot see for euen vnder the Equinoctiall in America and in the East Indies and in the Ilands Moluccae the people are not blacke but tauney and white with long haire vncurled as wee haue so that if the Ethiopians blacknesse came by the heat of the Sunne why should not those Americans and Indians also be as blacke as they seeing the Sunne is equally distant from them both they abiding in one Parallel for the concaue and conuere Superficies of the Orbe of the Sunne is concentrike and equidistant to the earth except any man should imagine somewhat of Aux Solis and Oppositum which indifferently may be applied aswel to the one place as to the other But the Sunne is thought to giue no otherwise heat but by way of Angle in reflection and not by his neerenesse to the earth for throughout all Africa yea in the middest of the middle Zone and in all other places vpon the tops of mountaines there lyeth continuall snow which is neerer to the Orbe of the Sunne then the people are in the valley by so much as the height of these mountaines amount vnto and yet the Sunne notwithstanding his neerenesse can not melt the snow for want of conuenient place of reflections Also the middle region of the aire where all the haile frost and snow is engendred is neerer vnto the Sunne then the earth is and yet there continueth perpetuall cold because there is nothing that the Sunne beames may reflect against whereby appeareth that the neerenesse of the body of the Sunne worketh nothing Therefore to returne againe to the blacke Moores I my selfe haue seene an Ethiopian as blacke as a cole brought into England who taking a faire English woman to wife begat a sonne in all respects as blacke as the father was although England were his natiue countrey and an English woman his mother whereby it seemeth this blacknes procceedeth rather of some natural infection of that man which was so strong that neither the nature of the Clime neither the good complexion of the mother concurring coulde any thing alter and therefore wee cannot impute it to the nature of the Clime And for a more fresh example our people of Meta Incognita of whom and for whom this discourse is taken in hande that were brought this last yeere into England were all generally of the same colour that many nations be lying in the middest of the middle Zone And this their colour was not onely in the face which was subiect to Sunne and aire but also in their bodies which were stil couered with garments as ours are yea the very sucking childe of twelue moneths age had his skinne of the very same colour that most haue vnder the Equinoctiall which thing cannot proceed by reason of the Clime for that they are at least ten degrees more towardes the North then wee in England are No the Sunne neuer commeth neere their Zenith by fourtie degrees for in effect they are within three or foure degrees of that which they call the frosen Zone and as I saide fourtie degrees from the burning Zone whereby it followeth that there is some other cause then the Climate or the Sonnes perpendicular reflexion that should cause the Ethiopians great blacknesse And the most probable cause to my iudgement is that this blackenesse proceedeth of some naturall infection of the first inhabitants of that Countrey and so all the whole progenie of them descended are still polluted with the same blot of infection Therefore it shall not bee farre from our purpose to examine the first originall of these blacke men and howe by a lineall discent they haue hitherto continued thus blacke It manifestly and plainely appeareth by holy Scripture that after the generall inundation and ouerflowing of the earth there remained no moe men aliue but Noe and his three sonnes Sem Cham and Iaphet who onely were left to possesse and inhabite the whole face of the earth therefore all the sundry discents that vntil this present day haue inhabited the whole earth must needes come of the off-spring either of Sem Cham or Iaphet as the onely sonnes of Noe who all three being white and their wiues also by course of nature should haue begotten and brought foorth white children But the enuie of our great and continuall enemie the wicked Spirite is such that as hee coulde not suffer our olde father Adam to liue in the felicitie and Angelike state wherein hee
that both their blessings and their curses they sell vnto the people The nouices of this order before they be admitted goe together two or three thousand in a company vp a certaine high mountaine to doe pennance there three score dayes voluntarily punishing themselues In this time the deuill sheweth himselfe vnto them in sundry shapes and they like young graduals admitted as it were fellowes into some certaine companie are set foorth with white â—assels hanging about their neckes and blacke Bonnets that scarcely couer any more then the crowne of their heads Thus attyred they range abroade in all Iapan to set out themselues and their cunning to sale each one beating his bason which he carieth alwayes about with him to giue notice of their comming in al townes where they passe There is also an other sort called Genguis that make profession to shewe by soothsaying where stollen things are and who were the theeues These dwell in the toppe of an high mountaine blacke in the face for the continuall heate of the sunne for the cold windes and raines they doe continually endure They marry but in their owne tribe and line the report goeth that they be horned beasts They climbe vp most high rockes and hilles and go ouer very great riuers by the onely arte of the deuill who to bring those wreâ—ches the more into errour biddeth them to goe vp a certaine high mountaine where they stande miserably gazing and earnestly looking for him as long as the deuill appointeth them At the length at nonetide or in the euening commeth that deuil whom they call Amida among them to shew himselfe vnto them this shew breedeth in the braines and hearts of men such a kinde of superstition that it can by no meanes be rooted out of them afterward The deuill was wont also in another mountaine to shew himselfe vnto the Iapanish Nation Who so was more desirous than other to go to heauen and to enioy Paradise thither went he to see that sight and hauing seene the deuill followed him so by the deuill perswaded into a denne vntill he came to a deepe pit Into this pit the deuill was wont to leape and to take with him his worshipper whom he there murdred This deceit was thus perceiued An old man blinded with this superstition was by his sonne disswaded from thence but all in vaine Wherefore his sonne followed him priuily into that denne with his bow arrows where the deuill gallantly appeared vnto him in the shape of a man Whilest the old man falleth downe to worshippe the deuill his sonne speedily shooting an arrow at the spirit so appearing strooke a Foxe in stead of a man so suddenly was that shape altered This olde man his sonne tracking the Foxe so running away came to that pit whereof I spake and in the bottome thereof he found many bones of dead men deceiued by the deuill after that sort in time past Thus deliuered he his father from present death and all other from so pestilent an opinion There is furthermore a place bearing name Coia very famous for y e multitude of Abbyes which the Bonzii haue therein The beginner and founder whereof is thought to be one Combendaxis a suttle craftie fellowe that got the name of holinesse by cunning speech although the lawes and ordinances he made were altogether deuillish he is said to haue found out the Iapanish letters vsed at this day In his latter yeeres this Sim suttle buried himselfe in a foure square graue foure cubites deepe seuerely forbidding it to be opened for that then he died not but rested his bodie wearied with continuall businesse vntill many thousand thousands of yeeres were passed after the which time a great learned man named Mirozu should come into Iapan and then would he rise vp out of his graue againe About his tombe many lampes are lighted sent thither out of diuerse prouinces for that the people are perswaded that whosoeuer is liberall and beneficiall towardes the beautifying of that monument shall not onely increase in wealth in this world but in the life to come be safe through Combendaxis helpe Such as giue themselues to worship him liue in those Monasteries or Abbyes with shauen heads as though they had forsaken all secular matters whereas in deede they wallow in all sortes of wickednesse and lust In these houses the which are many as I sayd in number doe remaine 6000 Bonzii or thereabout besides the multitude of lay men women be restrained from thence vpon paine of death Another company of Bonzii dwelleth at Fatonochaiti They teach a great multitude of children all tricks sleights of guile theft whom they do find to be of great towardnes those do they instruct in al the petigrues of princes and fashions of the nobilitie in chiualrie and eloquence and so send them abroad into other prouinces attired like yong princes to this ende that faining themselues to be nobly borne they may with great summes of money borowed vnder the colour and pretence of nobilitie returne againe Wherefore this place is so infamous in all Iapan that if any scholer of that order be happily taken abroad he incontinently dieth for it Neuerthelesse these cousiners leaue not daily to vse their woonted wickednesse and knauerie North from Iapan three hundred leagues out of Meaco lieth a great countrey of sauage men clothed in beasts skinnes rough bodied with huge beards and monstrous muchaches the which they hold vp with litle forkes as they drinke These people are great drinkers of wine fierce in warres and much feared of the Iapans being hurt in fight they wash their wounds with salt water other Surgerie haue they none In their breasts they are sayd to cary looking glasses their swordes they tie to their heads in such wise that the handle doe rest vpon their shoulders Seruice and ceremonies haue they none at all onely they are woont to worship heauen To Aquita a great towne in that Iaponish kingdom which we call Geuano they much resort for marchandise and the Aquitanes likewise doe trauell into their countrey howbeit not often for that there many of them are slaine by the inhabiters Much more concerning this matter I had to write but to auoyd tediousnesse I will come to speake of the Iapans madnesse againe who most desirous of vaine glory doe thinke then specially to get immortall fame when they procure themselues to be most sumptuously and solemnly buried their burials and obsequies in the citie Meaco are done after this maner About one houre before the dead body be brought foorth a great multitude of his friends apparelled in their best aray goe before vnto the fire with them goe their kinswomen and such as bee of their acquaintance clothed in white for that is the mourning colour there with a changeable coloured vaile on their heads Each woman hath with her also according to her abilitie all her familie trimmed vp in white mockado the better sort and wealthier women goe
was first created but tempting him sought and procured his ruine and fall so againe finding at this flood none but a father and three sonnes liuing hee so caused one of them to transgresse and disobey his fathers commaundement that after him all his posteritie shoulde bee accursed The fact of disobedience was this When Noe at the commandement of God had made the Arke and entred therein and the floud-gates of heauen were opened so that the whole face of the earth euery tree and mountaine was couered with abundance of water hee straitely commaunded his sonnes and their wiues that they should with reuerence and feare beholde the iustice and mighty power of God and that during the time of the floud while they remained in the Arke they should vse continencie and abstaine from carnall copulation with their wiues and many other precepts hee gaue vnto them and admonitions touching the iustice of God in reuenging sinne and his mercie in deliuering them who nothing deserued it Which good instructions and exhortations notwithstanding his wicked sonne C ham disobeyed and being perswaded that the first childe borne after the flood by right and Lawe of nature should inherite and possesse all the dominions of the earth hee contrary to his fathers commandement while they were yet in the Arke vsed company with his wife and craftily went about thereby to dis-inherite the off-spring of his other two brethren for the which wicked and detestable fact as an example for contempt of Almightie God and disobedience of parents God would a sonne should bee borne whose name was Chus who not onely it selfe but all his posteritie after him should bee so blacke and lothsome that it might remaine a spectacle of disobedience to all the worlde And of this blacke and cursed Chus came all these blacke Moores which are in Africa for after the water was vanished from off the face of the earth and that the lande was dry Sem those that part of the land to inhabite in which nowe is called Asia and Iaphet had that which now is called Europa wherein wee dwell and Africa remained for Cham and his blacke sonne Chus and was called Chamesis after the fathers name being perhaps a cursed dry sandry and vnfruitfull ground fit for such a generation to inhabite in Thus you see that the cause of the Ethiopians blacknesse is the curse and naturall infection of blood and not the distemperature of the Climate Which also may bee prooued by this example that these blacke men are found in all parts of Africa as well without the Tropickes as within euen vnto Capo de buona Speranza Southward where by reason of the Sphere should be the same temperature that is in Sicilia Morea and Candie where al be of very good complexions Wherefore I conclude that the blacknesse proceedeth not of the hotenesse of the Clime but as I saide of the infection of blood and therefore this their argument gathered of the Africans blacknesse is not able to destroy the temperature of the middle Zone Wee may therefore very well bee assertained that vnder the Equinoctiall is the most pleasant and delectable place of the worlde to dwell in where although the Sunne for two houres in a yeere be direct ouer their heades and therefore the heate at that time somewhat of force yet because it commeth so seldome and continueth so small a time when it commeth it is not to bee wayed but rather the moderate heate of other times in all the yeere to be remembred And if the heate at any time should in the short day waxe somewhat vrgent the coldnesse of the long night there would easily refresh it according at Honterus sayeth speaking of the temperature vnder the Equinoctial Quódque die solis violento incanduit aestu Humida nox reficit paribusque refrigerat boris If the heate of the Sunne in the day time doe burne or parch any thing◠the moysture of the night doeth coole and refresh the same againe the Sunne being as long absent in the night as so was present in the day Also our Aucthour of the Sphere Iohannes de Sacro Bosco◠in the Chapter of the Zodiacke deriueth the Etymologie of Zodiacus of the Greeke word Zoe which in Latine signifieth Vita life for out of Aristotle hee alleadgeth that Secundum accessum recessum solis in Zodiaco fiunt generationes corruptiones in rebus inferioribus according to the Sunnes going to and fro in the Zodiake the inferiour bodies take their causes of generation and corruption Then it followeth that where there is most going too and fro there is most generation and corruption which must needes be betweene the two Tropickes for there the Sunne goeth too and fro most and no where else but there Therefore betweene the two Tropikes that is in the middle Zone is greatest increase multiplication generation and corruption of things which also wee finde by experience for there is Sommer twice in the yeere and twice Winter so that they haue two Haruests in the yeere and continuall Spring Seeing then the middle Zone falleth out so temperate it resteth to declare where the hottest part of the world should bee for we finde some places more hote then others To answere this doubt reason perswadeth the hotest place in the world to bee vnder and about the two Tropickes for there more then in any other place doe both the causes of heate concurre that is the perpendicular falling of the Sunne beames at right angles and a greater continuance of the Sunne aboue the Horizon the Pole there being eleuated three or foure and twentie degrees And as before I concluded that though the Sunne were perpendicular to them vnder the Equinoctiall yet because the same continued but a small time their dayes being short and their nights long and the speedie departure of the Sunne from their Zenith because of the suddeine crossing of the Zodiake with the Equinoctiall and that by such continuall course and recourse of hote and colde the temperature grew moderate and very well able to bee endured so nowe to them vnder the two Tropickes the Sunne hauing once by his proper motion declined twentie degrees from the Equinoctial beginneth to draw neere their Zenith which may bee as before about the eleuenth day of May and then beginneth to sende his beames almost at right Angles about which time the Sunne entreth into the first degree of Gemini and with this almost right Angle the Sunne beames will continue vntill it bee past Cancer that is the space of two moneths euery day at noone almost perpendicular ouer their heades being then the time of Solstitium Aestiuale which so long continuance of the Sunne about their Zenith may cause an extreeme heate if any be in the world but of necessitie farre more heate then can bee vnder the Equinoctiall where the Sunne hath no such long abode in the Zenith but passeth away there-hence very quickly Also vnder the Tropickes