Cardinal Prenestine to Pope Hadrian lest having confessed her Errour and Deviation in one point occasion might happily be from thence administred of examining of the rest and of resolving the same into a reference or Com-promise This is thereason why the Council of Trent instead of redressing Abuses hath indeed confirm'd them all being therein carried-on according to the Popes will and pleasure who was in that Convention both Judge and Party whereupon Monsieur de Lansack one of the French Ambassadours in that Council said very facetiously in a Letter to Monfieur de Lisle Embassadour at Rome that the Pope had sent the Holy-Ghost from Rome to Trent in a Cloakbag the Legats and Council acting or enacting nothing but what he appointed them and albeit several Bishops inclin'd to make some opposition in defence of the Authority of their Character yet this proved ineffectual they having in fine submitted their necks under the Papal-Yoke Though all this succeeded very luckily according to the hearts desire of the Popes of Rome yet notwithstanding from that time forwards they conceived such a disgust and aversion to Councils that they never cared more to propound the assembling of another fearing lest they might set about that happy Reformation which as hath been said was with such importunity desired and so absolutely necessary both in head and members All that they busied themselves about after that was what yet well became them the regulating of the Hoods Hosen and Shooes of Monks the number of whom instead of reducing they contrariwise augmented under the Badges of their Saints Francis Dominicus Ignatius Loyola and some other modern ones insomuch that the whole far from reforming misusages tended only to foment Scandal in such as were acquainted with true Piety those Reverend Fathers having well nigh resolv'd all the Christian Religion and Divine Worship into the practice of numerous Ceremonies and superstitious observances for therein consisteth all their business scrupulously annexing their professed Sanctity to ridiculous Mystical Vestments and foppish fantastical gesticulations and whereas God will be worshiped in Spirit and in Truth they pretend to satisfie him with instead of a true a superficial and instead of a Spiritual a bodily service which the Apostle informs us profiteth little Howbeit to be sure they cloak under their counterfeit humility and devotion an extream and indeed unsufferable pride and vanity as may sufficiently appear by the continual attempts made upon the Ordinaries namely Archbishops Bishops and Curates who undergoe all imaginable difficulties in stoping the currant of the Seraphicks and other Regulars more especially of such as have devoted themselves to the See of Rome and their General or Superiour by so strict a vow that when ever they believe their own Interests to be under debate they ought to acknowledge no other person in the world May the Lord commiserate his Church and put it into the hearts of Christian Kings and Princes to call as the above-named great Emperours Constantine Theodosius and Charles the Great have done before them a religious and free Council wherein all parties abandoning prejudices and animosities might in good earnest give themselves to an enquiry after the Truth in the Word of God which should be hearkened to as the only decisive Oracle whose right it is to determine all Controversies depending between the Church of Rome and those who protest against her Doctrine and that the more obscure passages of the holy Scripture might be expounded by others more clear so as that we might attain to the right understanding of the Scripture by the very Scripture it self according to the practice of the Levits when they instructed the People of God after their return from the Babylonish Captivity that the Ancient Fathers and Doctors of the Church and Writers of Ecclesiastical History by whose means we might be informed of the various revolutions and interchanges which have thereâ—n occurred might be likewise received as a subsidiary help for satisfaction to the more obstinate and opiniative and that Kings called of God unto this great work might in concurrence with a privy Council consisting of some of the more Learned and more sober of both parties prudentially weigh the validity of Reasons urged the sincerity of Procedure and the merit of the Cause We should quickly make it to appear that we have a veneration for Episcopal Government and that we are no enemies to order ornanment or decency nor yet to Ceremonies provided the whole be reduced to ancient usage and there be nothing therein derogatory to that Honour and Religious Worship which we owe to God only And as touching the Sacraments if the Word of God may be umpire as without all peradventure it ought to be we should soon likewise condescend upon their number And in conformity to that sacred directory observing our Saviour's practice and that which St. Paul by virtue of his Commandment hath enjoyned us to do in like manner we should take the Bread we should all drink of the Cup of blessing in commemoration of the inestimable Death of our dear Redeemer whose Flesh and Blood is meat and drink indeed whereby we are nourished unto an eternal life We should know without further debate that this Union is wrought by the mediation of his Spirit who uniteth and conjoyneth us to himself after an ineffable but a true and real manner Christ dwelling in our hearts by Faith which is the mouth of our souls by which we feed upon him whereunto the conversion of Bread into Flesh is not at all necessary but the Elevation of Faith unto Heaven its genuine and proper act for as our Lord hath taught us it is the Spirit that quickeneth the flesh profiteth nothing The words that I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life that is to say they are of a spiritual and vivifick vertue as well in the publication of the Gospel as in the participation of the holy Supper wherein the Bread and the Wine are Signes Gages and Memorials of that which is therein represented to us whose Name they bear as is usual in all Sacraments as also because they are not only significative but likewise exhibitive of the thing signified to the Faithful and worthy Communicant so as shall be shewed streight And certainly this same Real-Presence and Participation may be easily enough conceived without the necessary admission of a Local and gross one for if it must be acknowledged that the Sun whilst bounded within its sphear doth yet communicate warinth life and nourishment and that truly really substantially to Vegetables can any one doubt without Blasphemy that the glorious Body of our Lord and Saviour the true Sun of Righteousness who carrieth health and life in his Divine Rayes is furnished with less vertue than that Globe of fire and light which himself hath enlightned Or that his Humane Nature which he hath united personally to his Divinity cannot by its means mystically unite
A HISTORY OF ANTIENT CEREMONIES CONTAINING An Account â—f their Rise and Growth their first Entrance into the Church and their gradual Advancement to Superstition therein Written originally in French but now for general information and benefit faithfully translated into English The Second Impression Corrected the first being 1668. Mark 7. v. 7 8 9. In vain do they worship me teaching for Doctrines the Commandments of men for laying aside the Commandment of God ye hold the Tradition of men c. He said likewise unto them Full well do ye frustrate the Commandment of God that ye may keep your own Tradition London Printed in the Year 1669. THE TRANSLATOR to the READER THe Degeneracy of the Church Christian Reader from that Faith which was by the Apostles delivered to the Saints by Christ himself to the Apostles and by God the Father to Christ is matter of sad and serious but seasonable speculation The Primitive Church was by reason of her more immediate Conjunction with the Sun of Righteousness a burning and shining Light but alas How is the Noble Vine become a Degenerate Plant yielding instead of the Clusters of Canaan the wild Grapes of Gomorrah What Tares have there been sown in God's Enclosure What Chaff mixt with his Wheat What store of Wood Hay and Stubble in stead of Gold Silver and precious Stones in his Sanctuary How is Christs Body Mystical become an Ichabod This burning and shining Light becoming successively ever after the first Century and Age of the Church for the space of fourteen hundred years downwards either 1. decayed and remitted cool'd or clouded the Light of Truth eclipsed with its common Bushel Ignorance the heat of Zeal rebated into its ordinary Quench-coal sinful Neutrality and Luke-warmness Or 2. divided and that with no lesse cruelty towards Christs Mystical Body than was used towards the Baptist's natural one she frequently shining when she did not burn or else burning when she did not shine Light and Heat Truth and Zeal very rarely concurring both together at least in any eminent degree in her declining state so that either her Faith was dead being without works the fruits of Zeal or else her Zeal blind being without Knowledge one degree of Faith she Sampson-like losing both sight and life in the Temple of Idols Or 3. and lastly which is worst of all depraved Light and Truth with Error and Heresie Heaâ— and Zeal with the strange Fire of Idoâ—latry and Superstition Jewish-Pagan Rites and Ceremonies the truest Marks of the False Church of Rome many or most of which my self have been an Eye-witness and Spectator of abroad both the one and the other gradually introduced into the Church and vigorously propagated even to an Universal Corruption in matter both of Doctrine and Worship therein especially since the Rise and during the Reign of Antichrist who hath not failed to joyn the Serpent with the Dragon Policy with Cruelty for that end for which very reason our Retreat and Secession from that Adulterous Church should be to speak with St. Jerome a thousand times the dearer and more precious to us and may we in conformity to a higher Oracle never say a Confederacy to her more except upon God's own terms of Accommodation Let her return unto thee but return not thou unto her till that blessed day of power whereon the jealous God zealous for his Truth and Worship raised up and animated those famous Champion-Worthies Luther and Calvin with their fellow-Reformers Wisdom's Advocates as well as Children unto a rescuing of the Truth holden so long in unrighteousness and an earnest contest for the above-named Faith which was once delivered to the Saints dictated by God's own Spirit recorded in his Word and by a continued series succession of his Servants Professors under both Testaments ever since the War was first commenced between the two Seeds without interruption owned and maintained professed preserved propagated and through his good Providence Truth 's chief Guardian happily transmitted and conveyed to us at last God having never left himself without a Witness of his Truth in the Church more then of his Power in the World which they polished and refined and for the hand of the Lord was with them recovered to a considerable degree of primitive light and lustre resolving all into original Authority the Law and the Testimony Howbeit our Adversaries of the Romish Church do ignorantly or insolently charge the Reformed Religion with Enthusiastick Novelty as being of an hundred and fifty years date and of yester-day calculating its Rise by its Resurrection the Sun-rising by a Sun-shine as if its Reformers were its Authours and they Founders where they were only Repairers Whereas themselves do in the mean time like the Gibeonites under colour of the rags and tatters of their superstitious Ceremonies and the dry and mouldy Bread of their corrupt Doctrines pretend to be come from far as if the Antient of Dayes were the Parent of their novel and spurious Brat but we who have consulted the mouth of the Eternal God have not so learned Christ being informed and ascertained by the only Infallible One that how specious plausible to flesh and blood soever their Religion be it being ever as I have observed fuller of carnal and meritricious Allurement than of Argument yet from the beginning it was not so Now Reader being that this ensuing Treatise dedicated under its first Edition by its Anonymus but judicious and sober learned Author to King Charles the First of blessed Memory and under the last with Additions by another very good hand to King Charles the Second our present Soveraign comprehendeth a brief Historical Account of the whole more especially of the Rise and Growth of Church-Rites and Ceremonies their first Introduction into the Church and their gradual propagation and advancement to Superstition in it of the witnesses of Truth all along that dark and tedious Interval of about fourteen hundred years under the greatest Defection Superstition and Torrid Zone of Antichristian Persecution namely Fathers Councils Confessors Martyrs and other pious Zealots and Votaries valiant for the Truth all which died in the Faith and many of them for it the Names and successful Endeavours of the first Reformers those Trees of Righteousness whereby the Waters of the Sanctuary imbittered with Romish Wormwood Revel 8. 11. were sweetned and many other particulars specified in the useful and fruitful Preface prefixed to the Treatise from which I have onely lopt off what I judged to be more luxuriant and superfluous at the beginning of it to which I refer thee so that what is contained in the Writings of Fathers and other Church-Histories as those of Sozomen Eusebius Epiphanius the Magdenburgian Centuriators c. at large is here represented by way of short Compend and Breviary I therefore conceiving the Translation of the same into our Vernacular Tongue a thing more recreative than laborious to be well worthy of my more spare-hours and the perusal thereof
shall therein preside and exercise a Soveraign and Absolute Dominion demeaning himself as if he were God But let us see how the great and famous Lights of Antiquity have expressed themselves in reference hereunto behold how S. Chrysostom speaks in the Temple of God not that which is in Jerusalem but in the Temple of the Churches And Theodoret more particularly The Apostle calls the Temple of God the Churches wherein Antichrist shall possess himself of the first and chief place commanding that he be therein acknowledged for a God But S. Augustin instrusts us herein yet farther Shall his seat be saith he upon the ruines of the Temple of Solomon or rather shall it not be in the Church for the Apostle would never have called the Temple of God the Temple of a Devil and therfore some conceive Antichrist to be a Prince with a great company of attendants and judge that it were more proper to pronounce in the Latin as it is in the Greek into the Temple of God and not in the Temple of God in that he shal be seated as if himself were the Temple of God himself the Church What will this be other then to expel our Lord Jesus Christ his Chair and to deny that he is come in the flesh to be King and Head of the Church to vilify his Priesthood and to deride his sacred Doctrine with a no less then Diabolical Impudency This moreover should be a sign of his coming namely that ten Kings shall begin to reign at the same time having all one and the same Counsel and shall give their Power and Authority to the Apocalyptick Beast which is represented to us drunk with the blood of the Saints and with the blood of the Martyrs of Jesus and in all probability it is not without some special import that the Holy Ghost doth so plainly distinguish the Witnesses of the Truth into two Bands but that we are to understand by the one those whose blood was shed under the Pagan Emperours by the other those whose blood should be in like manner spilt and poured out under the Tyranical Reign of the grand Enemy of Jesus Christ. His Residence is also noted to be in the great City scituated upon seven Mountains which in St. John's time reigned over the Kings of the Earth which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt where also our Lord was crucified in the person of his members and spiritual Babylon which God exhorts his People to come out of lest being partakers of her sins they might likewise receive of her plagues We are informed also that that great Whore should be arrayed with Purple and Scarlet and deck'd with Gold and precious stones having upon her head a name written MYSTERY whereby is insinuated to us that there should be nothing in her but what is altogether secret and mysterious or at least pretended to be such The number of his name 666. is another Riddle in the Mystery of Iniquity which we leave to be read by any that list to undertake it whatever the interpretation of it be whether what Irenaeus others gather from the numeral value and signification of the Greek Characters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Latine or somewhat else Finally This Mother of Fornications is represented to us having in her hand a Golden Cup full of Abominations and filthiness of her Fornication for our further instruction namely that she should propound and obtrude such Doctrines as carried with them some outward decorum a gilded and specious outside and of such an enchanting quality and influence as that all the Kings and People in the Earth shall run after her to drink of this her envenomed Cup And that which obliegeth us to stand more strictly upon our guard is Jesus Christ's prediction that many should come in his Name and say Lo here is Christ or lo there is Christ but that we should not believe it that those Impostors should aspire to teach in his Name and make ostentation of their extraordinary gifts mock-miracles and Exorcisms in casting out of Devils by his Authority to whom notwithstanding he should infallibly say to their everlasting confusion in that great day whereon he is to judg the quick and the dead I never knew you depart from me ye workers of iniquity But behold an Advertisement well-worthy of our most serious consideration which the Spirit of God hath given us in these terms Now the Spirit speaketh expresly that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith giving themselves up to seducing Spirits and doctrines of Devils speaking lies in hypocrisie having their consciences cauterized forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from meats which God hath created for them which believe and know the Truth to be received with thanksgiving Henceforth a Believer should be greatly deficient to his duty should he not narrowly examine all those Circumstances and Marks of that grand Apostacy and Defection whereof God hath given so accurate and exact an enumeration and arm himself with matter both of Caution â—nd Confidence where-ever he shall chance to meet with them resolving to shun the company of all that bear those Marks in their foreheads or bear any cursed conformity thereunto Christians as many of you as embrace the Faith of a stranger if ye belong indeed to the Flock of the Lord Jesus hearken to the Voice of that good Shepherd and know that his Prophetick Spirit hath not declared those things unto us in vain take occasion from hence to glorifie God who hath made known unto us his Counsels in his Word wherein whatsoever is contained was written for our instruction that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope There be who conceal the truth of those Oracles of God fomenting in you malicious prejudices against such as do in strictness adhere thereunto They tell you that the Word of the living God is no more than a dead letter whereas it is no less than the very Power of God unto Salvation to every one that believeth that it is obscure notwithstanding what the Royal Prophet hath taught us namely that it is a lamp to our feet and a light unto our paths and that Man after God's own heart hath employed the greatest part of his Divine Hymns in magnifying of those Celestial Rayes and that Admirable Splendour which is universally refulgent in all its parts They presume moreover to taxit of Imperfection and Insufficiency notwithstanding those glorious surpassing Elogies given it by the great Apostle of the Gentiles S. Paul namely that it is inspired of God and is profitable for Doctrine for Reproof for Correction and for Instruction in Righteousness that the man of God may be perfect and thorowly furnished to every good workâ— They alledge that it is not the common peoples part to reade it albeit our Lord Jesus Christ hath said in express terms Search diligently the Scriptures
for in them ye think ye have eternal life and they are they that testifie of me whence the Jews of Berea are commended for giving of themselves to conference and reading of the Scriptures as Timothy likewise whom the Apostle gives this advantagious Testimony to that from a Child he had known the holy Scriptures They forestall you with a disrelishing prejudice and aversation to such as profess a sequacious obedience to the Word of Truth espousing the same for their only Canon and Rule both of Faith and manners as if they were the very filth and off-scouring of the world not considering that God hath chosen weak things yea things contemptible and despised to confound the things that are mighty They tell you that the Company of such Professours is but small and inconsiderable but yet be it known unto them they are those to whom Jesus Christ hath said Fear not little Flock for it is your Fathers good pleasure to give you the Kingdom and how little reckoning soever they make of them yet are they nevertheless the Children of that Woman of Wonder who is represented to us in the Revelation having the Sun for a garment the Stars for a Crown and the Moon for a footstool whereby is given us to understand that she is priviledged and exalted above the inconstancy and volubility of things here below against whom the Devil hath vomited out Floods of Water that is to say in a Prophetick stile hath stirr'd up the People and Nations of the Earth to wage War with her and to devour her but God hath given her Wings that she might flee into the place which himself hath prepared for her to be there fed during the thousand two hundred and threescore prophetick dayes wherein the Truth of God shall be declared by the Witnesses cloathed in Sackcloth by which dayes according to the usual signification of such terms in holy Writing is notified to us the time that the Persecution of the Church under the Reign of Antichrist should continue as by that forelorn Apparel the slight Entertainment which the Word of God and the Publishers thereof should meet withal in and from the World If then there be in you any good inclination take heed that ye stifle it not to your own misery and confusion abandon your Errors and come rank your selves amongst the Children of the Kingdom come and embody with them into the Communion of the King of Glory his Spouse whose beauty is internal borrowing nothing from earthly pomp or ornament Come but not by stealth as Joseph of Arimathea nor yet by night only as Nicodemus but rather after their example ashamed of such reproachful pufillanimity and cowardise Come even then when he is persecuted to the very Cross to remand and rescue his Body Mystical may your heart which before possibly resembled that Rock out of which our Lord's Tomb was hewen become a heart of flesh and a fitting-Repository for the same that from rest and repose as yet afforded it therein it might appear to the World that ye have so far interessed your selves in its defence as that none can henceforth doubt but that your selves are a part of that sacred Corporation Let the example of those two goodly personages animate you unto the like generous resolutions and see that ye prefer or over-rate not your wordly advantages which ye fear ye shall lose by the means for are ye Counsellours men rich and honourable such was Joseph of Arimathea or principal Doctors in your Community very Masters in your Israel such was Nicodemus yet did those count all things but loss and dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus all the hatred and contempt of those of their own Nation the scorn and mockery of Infidels the rage and fury both of the one and the other could not restrain them from glorifying of God nor associating themselves with his persecuted Church even then when she seem'd destitute of all succour and refuge Shall earthly advantages be dearer to you than Heavenly ones Know ye not that terrible threat of our Lord that he will spue the Luke-warm out of his sacred mouth and that the fearful and unbelievers c. shall be expell'd the holy Jerusalem and thrown headlong into the Lake burning with fire and brimstone For whosoever saith he shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinfull generation of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy Angels and Whosoever shall confess me before men him will I confess also before my Father which is in Heaven but whosoever shall deny me before men him will I also deny before my Father which is in Heaven It is not sufficient then that we believe with the heart unto Righteousness â—ut we must likewise confess with the mouth unto Salvation Think not that the example of David in retiring to the â—ouse of the Philistines for shelter from Persecution will bear you excused he having his own private reasons for justification of himself in that particular And as touching his counterfeiting himself a mad-man amongst them that was â—ure expence of reputation so that instead of any warrant from thence ye should take pattern by the extravagancies of Superstition and Errour to the miserable jeopardy and hazard of your eternal interest which one consideration oâ—ght to strike you with horrour and dread and deter you from the commission of such an heinous and prejudicial piece of cowardise Slight not then the wholsome Admonitions which are here given you henceforth reject spiritual Delilah who having once shaved off your hair quite emasculating and overpouring of you and by degrees reducing you into a miserable slavery hath also pluckt out the eyes of your understanding and in fine led you in triumph into the Temple of Superstition Cut all those Philistine-cords assunder with the sacred Sword of the Spirit the Word of God anoint your Eyes with that admirable Eye-salve and then shall ye be more happy than Sampson who lost his Life where many have lost their Inocency in the Temple of Idols ye shall depart out of that of Error with glory and triumph and be translated into the Liberty of the Children of God What an happy exchange will ye find it when in stead of Wood and Stone which they present you with together with I know not what numerous Reliques of Saints Cords of St. Francis Scapularies hallowed Grains and Tatters of Moncks and many things more of no better value ye shall feed upon the living Bread of the Word of God and suck of the sacred Breasts of his Consolations When ye shall seek no longer for the Living to the Dead as ye have done hitherto with those of whom God complains by the mouth of one of his Prophets but to the Law and to the Testimony to the Urim and to the
model and example of that of Rome whereupon the same Author tells us that there were many Bishops and Priests who would not in the least acknowledge him calling him the author of lyes a disturber of the Christian Peace and a corrupter of the Faith of Christians Anno 840. RAbanus Maurus Arch-bishop of Mayence and Disciple to Alcuinus whom he esteemed the most knowing person of all the Learned of those times in his Book of the Institution of Clerks speaking of the Sacrament of the Supper saith that when we are commanded to eat the flesh and to drink the blood of our Lord it is a figurative locution and that this mystery is spiritual And for this reason Thomas of Walden in an Epistle to Pope Martin V. who came to the Popedom in the year 1417 holds that he sens'd the holy Sacrament amiss and ranks him with Hereticks Anno 849. BErtram a Preacher of great fame as well by reason of his profound knowledge of the holy Scriptures as for his inculpableâ—life in a Treatise entituled Of the Body and Blood of our Lord which he addressed to the Emperour Charles the Bald upon that Emperours demanding of his Judgement touching the many Controversies moved about that Doctrine did in resolution to what was propounded to him plainly demonstrate by the Authority of Scripture of St. Augustine and the ancient Doctors that there is no such thing as Transubstantiation in the Supper but that the Bread and the Wine remain in their first substance under and by which the Body Blood of Jesus Christ are in an invisible and spiritual maner distributed and apprehended by faith alone That there is a spiritual body in this mystery that it is a mystical and spiritual comprehension of him and not that very Body which he assumed in the womb of the blessed Virgin He sticks not to say that the Body of Christ is therein for as much as the Spirit of Christ is there that is to say the power and efficacy of the Word of God which doth not only nourish but also purgeth and purifieth the soul. We find not that this great man was ever reprehended or reckoned an Heretick because of this Doctrine Anno 869. AT this time flourished John Erigine or Erwine otherwise a Scots-man skill'd in the Greek Arabick and Chaldaick Tongues a most famous and incomparable Divine all which by the relation of Antoninus himself Arch-Bishop of Florence Vincent of Beauvais Sabellicus Volateran and Platina was accompanied with singular holiness of life He was likewise so greatly endeared to Charles the Bald King of France and Emperour that he was by him detained in France where he received from him very honourable entertainment Occasion then offering it self for his declaring of his judgement touching the Doctrine of the Eucharist he expressed himself therein in a Book bearing the very same Title with that of Bertram wherein in like manner by the authority of the Divine Scriptures and of pious Fathers especially of St. Augustine he establisheth and confirms the truth of the same Faith which that learned Bertram had taught a little before In fine by reason of his great renown it came to pass that Alfred King of England having founded the Colledge now University of Oxford gave him an invitation to the Presidency thereof Anno 950. IT is recorded by William of Malmsbury that the belief both of the reality and of the conversion of Signes which were by degrees foisted into this Age of Ignorance and Barbarism was vigorously opposed and that divers Questions touching the same were agitated in England one party explaining it one way the other quite another Those who held the Affirmative part that they might the more dextrously proselyte their Adversaries obtruded Prodigies and Miracles averring that in the room of the Species they saw a comely little Infant which was thrust into the mouths of the Communicants instead of Bread that there was Blood found in the Chalice that a devout Ass worshiped the Hostie and abundance of such Miracles â—ut so gross ridiculous as that the bare mentioning of them may suffice to discover their impertinency and forgery Whereupon Gabriel Biel in his 51 Lesson oâ— the Canon of the Mass observed not aâ—iss that those apparitions of flesh blood wâ—â—rwith they entertained the people might happen through Diabolical delusion for deceiving of the simple God permitting it so to be Anno 292. THere was a Synod or Council of all the Churches in France held at Rhemes wherein Arnulphus Bishop of Orleans the learnedst and most eloquert person of those times was set apart for the conduct and managery of affairs It appears by the Acts of that Synod that this famous Bishop cognoscing upon matters therein agitated represents to that reverend Assembly that all the Poâ—es of this Age were branded with Notoriâ—us Crimes Murders and Tyrannies Monsters of men full of Infamy devoid of all Knowledg both Divine and Humane who else saith he think ye that man is who sitteth upon a high and lofty Throne glittring with Gold and Purple but the Antichrist infallibly sitting in the Temple of God whose Marbles c. are as fit to be consulted as himself He adds further that iâ— were much better to require the judgmenâ— of the Bishops of the Low-Countries and 〈◊〉 Germany than of that City which is at thâ—â— day exposed to sale and weighs Judgmeâ—â—s in the unjust ballance of filthy lucre c. That therefore Assemblies might be held without his privity since that the Canon of Nice acknowledged by the Church of Rome in all Councils and Decrees enjoyneth no such thing as that regard should be had to the authority of the Bishop of Rome that her Ministers are those of Antichrist who seems to be near at hand that the Mystery of Iniquity doth already work since that which should let to wit the Roman Power is already removed that that Man of Sin which opposeth and exalteth himself above the Name and Service of God begins to be revealed Religion exposed to ruine the Name of God trampled under foot with iâ—punity and Religious Worship vilified even by the chief Priests themselves this being all the care that Rome takes of others 〈◊〉 of her self Anno 1050. BErenger Archdeacon of Angiers did profoundly confute the real presence and other abuses ushered into the Doctrine of the Lord's Supper True it is that in the year 1059 having made his appearance before the Lateran Council whither he was cited out of fear of some cruel usage he signed a Confession contrary to his judgment mentioned below in its proper place but after his return into France he retracted the same and confirmed his Proselytes which were so numerous that William of Malmsbury in his 3d Book of the History of England doth attest that all France was full of his Doctrine which is confirmed by Matthew of Westminster who adds that not only the French but also greatest part of the Italians and English embraced