the Priest of the living God that remembreth with Saint Chrysostome that by his office he standeth and ministreth in the most holy place of all others under the Cope of heaven and mixeth himselfe in his service with those Ministring spirits the blessed Angels that with bended neckes give humble attendance of their Lord and ours circum circa Saecrosanctum Altare Me thinkes that livery which Tertullian bestowes upon his Psychicus will suite this yeoman of the Dresser well enough Deus tibi venter est pulmo Templum aqualiculus Altare sacerdos coquus Sanctus spiritus nidor condimentâ— charismata ructus prophetia Apud te Agape in cacabis fervet fides in culina calet spes in ferculis jacet If the Prince of the ayre had caused such a thought like lightning to strike through his phansie yet he could not have forced him to nurce it to cloth it with ayre to lend it wings to flye abroad in this sort to fly-blow and cause to putrifie other mens cogitations Zealous and fervent Prayer would have quencht this and all such fiery darts of the Devill And herein is all our hope that we shall take no more hurt by it and that the Author when hee leâ—s what prophanenesse he may kindle in innocent mens hearts by casting such dangerous sparkes as these will be sorry for it And so I leave him in Tertullians words Ne stili potius negotium quam officium conscientiae meae curare videar But for his Dresser Can the Author or any man of common parts in understanding imagine that when the most holy and blessed Patriarch and rest of the Bishops in the fifth Councell of Constantinople that when the Princes and Citizens of that Imperiall City performed lowly reverence and adoration to the holy Altar that when S. Chrysostome sayes that the drawing by the Curtaines that the holy Altar may be seene did put them in minde of the opening of Heaven that when holy Gorgonia in S. Nazianzene when Penitents in Tertullian when barbarous souldiers in S. Ambrose when S. Ambrose himselfe sayes that he could be contented immolari pro Altaribus if his fall might make them stand to come home to our countrey when the Author sees the Kings most sacred Majesty and the honourable Lords of the most noble Order of the Garter performe most low and humble reverence to the most holy Altar the Throne in earth of that great Lord from whom their honour proceedeth that these or any of these had that unworthy conceit come into their minds to take the holy Altar for a loathsome Dresser or that any of these would have taken it well that any Buffon should have vented so scurrilous and prophane ascoffe against the sacred Altar which all these thinke worthy of all reverence and when they have done all they can yet still thinke they have done too little And so I leave him to his meditations and follow him to another reason wherein though he argue weakely and like himselfe against Altars in Christian Churches yet he reasoneth so like a Divine that a Christian may heare him with patience which his late rude scurrility and unsavoury language was enough to banish Another reason the Author hath met with for the utter casting downe of Altars stand where they will Church or Chancell viz. that Christ himselfe instituted this Sacrament upon a Table and not upon an Altar as Archbishop Cranmer observes and others I will say somewhat concerning our Saviours first institution of this holy Sacrament and then leave M. Beza to answer what he brings out of M. Fox touching Archbishop Cranmer and others Touching our Saviours institution I conceive none that reade the story reads it and takes it as a rule to guide the Church to the worlds end in all circumstances and ceremonies to be precisely observed in administring and delivering the blessed Eucharist For then the Sacrament must not be administred on any day but on Maundy thursday nor in a Church but in a Chamber and delivered only to twelve at a time and those twelve not Women but Men and those men not Lay persons but Priests and those Priests receiving the same not standing or kneeling or sitting but lying and leaning one on anothers brest or bosome and receiving the same not in a morning but at night and not fasting but after meat and that meat taken at a supper and that Supper not the first Supper but when that Supper is ended and the Table taken away and they all risen up and after all this the deliverer must gird himselfe with a Towell and wash the receivers feet and this done they must all couch them downe againe and so receive the Sacrament These and diverse Ceremonies are to be observed if our Saviours manner of institution be our precise patterne Now if no man will binde the Church to observe these and the like Ceremonies why will the Author binde us to a Table rather than to an Altar and why will he forbid the Vicar to call it an Altar considering that the Author tels him that Altars stand still in some orthodoxall Churches and may remaine in ours still for ought he knowes to the contrary What abomination is the name like to receive in our Church more than in Lutheran Churches which he honoureth as orthodox And why will he forbid the Vicar to call it an Altar since himselfe confesseth also that we have an Altar in regard of participation and communion Have we it and may we not call it as it is Those that have Superintendents may call them Superintendents and those that have Lay-Elders may call them Lay-Elders and shall not those that have Altars obtaine his favour to call them Altars Our Saviours institution at a Table doth not binde us to have such a Table as we have but such an one as he had much lesse doth it binde us to the name of a Table If our Saviour had said doe not you call it an Altar or the Church had ordered and said doe not you call it an Altar he might have had some warrant for his Injunction Doe not you call it an Altar But our Saviours Table doth not restraine the Church from an Altar An Altar we have or the Lords Table set Altarwise which is all one and an Altar we may call it his peremptory imperatives notwithstanding The truth is this the purpose of our Saviour Christ in his first institution of this holy Sacrament was not to make his example our patterne in the circumstances of a Table Times Communicants or the like But when he departed he gave his holy Spirit to his Apostles and to the holy Catholike Church which is the pillar and ground of truth and to the Church are we to resort to heare the Church to be guided by the the Church in all matters of comelinesse and order Other things will I set in order when I come sayes S. Paul and in setting things in order he crost the order
per coecitatem malam sententiam praeterquam oportet colligunt we put all those to confusion that through vaine glory or ignorance broach new doctrines in the Church For none of all these Heretickes can derive their succession from the Apostles nor shew how their doctrines were received by Tradition from them For before Valentinus there were no Valentinians and he came to Rome under Hyginus and increased his faction under Pius and continued unto Anicetus Cerdon also that was before Marcion came in under Hyginus who was the eighth Bishop and Marcion prevailed under Anicetus which was the tenth So those that are called Gnosticks from Menander Simons Disciple All these sell into Apostacy after the Church had continued a long time Thus Tertullian confoundeth Valentinus Apelles and other Hereticks edant origines ecclesiarum suarum evolvant ordinem sacerdotum ita per successionem ab initio decurrentem ut primus ille episcopus aliquem ex Apostolis vel Apostolicis viris qui tamen cum Apostolis perseveraverit habuerit authorem antecessorem Let Heretickes shew that they had an Apostle for the Author of their doctrine or some Apostolicke man whom they doe succeed as Polycarpus was placed by Saint Iohn in the Church of Smyrna and Clemens by Peter in the Church of Rome Confingant tale quid Haeretici I would faine see Hâ—reticks to set their heads to devise such a pedigree This hee was sure they could not for Valentinus and Marcion saith he came in under Antoninus the Emperour and were cast out of the Church by Eleutherius In this sort doth Saint Cyprian confound Novatian Novatianus in Ecclesiâ nâ—n est nec Episcopus computari potest Novatian is neither Bishop nor member of the Church qui Evangelica Apostolica traditione contempta nemini succedens à seipso ordinatus est because hee cannot prove his succession according to Apostolicall tradition To conclude thus doth Saint Augustine confound the Donatists and Sectaries of his time Numerate Sacerdotes vel ab ipsa sede Petri in illo ordine Patrum quis cui successit videte They that say there were no materiall Churches built till 200. yeares after Christ are more injurious to the Church and unjust to themselves and to all true members of the Catholicke Church than perhaps every one is aware For if in all this time there were no materiall Churches then there could bee no materiall Chaire wherein their Bishops were enthronized and if no Chaire then no reall inthronization then no personall succession from the Apostles whereby the right faith was derived from God the Father to his Sonne whom he hath sent into the world out of his owne bosome nor from the Sonne to his Apostles nor from the Apostles to succeeding Bishops For as Tertullian reaoneth very excellently if we will have the truth to be adjudged of our side it must appeare by this if we walk in that rule quam Ecclesiae ab Apostolis Apostoli à Christo Christus à Deo tradidit which we have received of the Apostles they of Christ Christ of God Those that deprive us of the benefit of this Apostolicall tradition plucke one speciall staffe out of our hands whereby wee stay our selves from falling from the true Catholicke Church and beat all Hereticks out of our Communion Miserable were we if he that now sitteth Arch-Bishop of Canterbury could not derive his succession from St. Augustine St. Augustine from St. Gregory St. Gregorie from St. Peter For hee that remembreth whom hee succeeds will doubtlesse endevour and pray to be heire to their vertues as well as possessor of their places What a comfort is this to his Grace and to all those that receive consecration from him and to all those that they shall ordaine when they remember that this Grace can say Ego sum haeres Apostolorum Sicut caverunt Testamento sicut Fidei commiserunt sicut adjuraverunt ita teneo I am the Apostles heire the Faith which they have by Will bequeathed to the Church that I hold Mea est possessio Olim possideo prior possideo habeo origines firmas ab ipsos authoribus quorum fuit res Here I and my Predecessors have kept possession here are my evidences which I have to shew that I have received the right Faith from the true Owners Vos verò but as for you Marcion and Apelles exhaeredaverunt semper ubdicaverunt the Apostles Christ God Himselfe hath dis-inherited you and cast you out On the other side what a confusion is this to all Hereticks or Schismaticks when the Fathers of our Church and all true children of the Church shall be able to tell them that they have no right of inheritance or portion in their Mother Quando unde venistis Quid in meo agitis non mei tell us when and from whence you come and what you make your selves to doe in the Church that are no sons of the Church We can with Saint Irenaeus point you to the time of your comming in You Cartwright and your brood came in as most Sabbatarians did under Arch-Bishop Whitguift and you Ames and Brightman with your Laodiceans came in under Arch-Bishop Bancroft and you Vicars and our Cotton with his fugitives came in or rather went out under Arch-Bishop Abbot Thus Saint Irenaeus Saint Cyprian Saint Augustine and other holy Fathers have detected the Donatists Marcionists and other Sectaryes of their times and so put them to utter confusion And so by their example are we taught to doe and our duty is to blesse God that wee are able so to doe Cotton therefore or whosoever else is the Author of this Letter shewed himselfe a sly and subtile Merchant when he would make use of the authority of a learned and godly Bishop of our Church against his mind utterly to overthrow the Truth of our Church by making simple people believe there were no Churches nor Altars till 200. yeares after Christ. For if this were so and that he could tell us when our Church came in then there would no be cause but to honour him and his party for a true Church as well as this of ours And it would bee no reproch to him and his adherents to have their comming in detected and thereby themselves discovered to bee no other but such whose comming in may be discovered CAP. X. Dedication and Consecration of Churches used by godly Bishops and taxed by the Centurists for the Mystery of Iniquitie What penance was performed by Hypocrites and Apostata's before their admittance into the Church Of Confession Exomologefis Dayes of Penance and Absolution Citizens Penance I Will passe from the placing of the Bishops Chaire to the dedication of his Church where it was set The dedication of Churches within two hundred yeares after Christ sheweth clearely that there were Churches within that time There is mention of Dedication of Churches under Euaristus Anno 112. and under Hyginus Anno 154. under Calixtus of
pernicious purpose must in reason be in the heart of this Scribe otherwise it was utterly impertinent to scare the poore Vicar with such terrible and astounding words And better had it beene to have kept such mortall bolts as these in store and not to discharge them so soone before discretion had brought him within eye-reach of the right marke Had this man beene so wise as the Vicar was to president himselfe by what he sees done in the Kings or Bishops Houses or Chappels he would have kept these shafts in his Qâ—iver and bestowed them as he sees M. Casaubon and our learned Bishops by the Kings direction doe upon grosse and impious abuses cleerely discovered as well in Altars as in Sacrifices and not therewith to strike through Oblations sacrifices and Altars themselves together with the holy and reverend use and users thereof from whom he hath his Priesthood Orders Faith and Religion too if he have any at all In shooting after this blinde heedlesse fashion not the judgement only and learning but the discretion and piety of the Archer to his Mother the Church and to all reverend antiquity stands in greater hazzard of the shot than the unremarkable actions of a simple Vicar They are not Altars which still stand in the Churches of sound Protestants and may remaine in some of ours or to make use of their Covers and Ornaments Tables may bee placed in their roomes of the same length and fashion the Altars were of as this Author tels us with which practise he also concurreth in opinion they are not Altars I say or Sacrifices or Oblations that true Christians and good Protestants have in execration but the grosse and vile abuses of these Against abuses onely good Christians protested and from thence received they their names This the most learned Bishop in his Apologie for King Iames of happy memory putteth the Cardinall in minde of Salva protestatione hac haud ulla est fides Nostra nisi quae Vestra est vel esse debet vetus 〈◊〉 illa Catholica The Protestant holds the same Catholicke faith which is or ought to bee the same in Rome and over all the Christian world The Protestant hath the abuses and Novelties only which are crept into the Romane Church in detestation not the things themselves no not the name of the very Masse it selfe For as the same Reverend Bishop telleth the Cardinall in the Kings name In missa si missa fiunt quae sum 〈◊〉 antiatione vestra ibi submissa â—unt bono fi loco res essent non valde de nomine litigaret Rex The King would like well enough of the Masse if her Priests would â—hrive her of Transubstantiation the name should beget no reall difference Those therefore were not well advised nor throughly informed of the doctrine of our Church and of pious antiquity that by their violent and unlearned clamours incited the people unto that horrible out-rage committed in breaking downe of Altars and caused them to boggle and spie umbrages and scandals at the things themselves where none at all could have beene found if these Arietes gregis had partaken as much of the mild temper of the sheep as they did of the Rams horne But where simplicity and ignorance is armed nothing can be expected but a violent confusion and the like disorder This disorder committed de facto as the Author speakes the supreme Magistrate thought meet to punish not by a kind of law but by a law yet in force to punish the same de jure in case it should be committed The law was made by Queen Mary and is this If any shall unlawfully contemptuously or maliciously of their owne power or authority pull downe deface spoile or break downe any Altar or Altars c. such person or persons are to be punished as in the law is expressed Queene Mary who made this law did repeale the law made by King Edward for the authorizing of the Book of Common Prayer Queene Elizabeth who did establish King Edwards law for authorizing the Book of Common Prayer did repeale Queene Maries repeale thereof but that part of the Statute which concerneth the punishing of such disorderly people that of their own authority riotously pull down Altars c. the said Queene Elizabeth of famous memory repealeth not but it is still in force that the Magistrate whom it concernes may proceed against delinquents that violate the Lords Table standing Altar-wise or break or deface the pictures of Christ or of Saints in Church-windowes or crosses or the like upon that Statute if any should so offend which God foâ—bid if Sergeant Rastales hand and starre point and lead me not into an errour CAP. XXI Altars crept not into the Church Altars Consecrated with more ceremony and regarded with more reverence than any part of the Church appeareth out of Bishop Iewell On the Altar stood the Crosse of CHRIST in the Primitive Church and in Saint Chrysostomes time and remained there in Queene Elizabeths Raigne sometime steps unto the Altar drawne with Curtaines Archbishops and Bishops and all sorts of people doe reverence towards the Altar Barbarous Souldiers kisse them Penitents prostrate before them Saint Ambrose willing to be made a Sacrifice for them THe drift of the Author in this Epistle is the disgrace of Altars To this purpose he hath framed these words to serve his turne two wayes 1. By the manner of their comming in and that was creeping 2. By the meanes of their creeping in and that was by Complying with the Iewes For as much as the most ancient and holy Fathers of the Primitive Church and the most learned and pious Fathers of our own Church have Christian Altars and Sacrifices in due honourable and reverend estimation there is no cause at all why a man not bigge with selfe love nor made to kindle a faction quae jam plus satis calescit should picke a quarrell first with them then with their name then with their comming in by phrasing it so contemptuously in that terme of creeping whereby is implyed their comming into the Church in some base secret undue and unobservable manner I dare be bold to say that no man of judgement and learning though hee look over Antiquity as the Devill lookt over Lincolne will say and meane to justifie what hee saies by sound proofes out of good antiquity that Altars crept into the Church It were not amisse if this Pen-man would looke the face of his actions in the envious mans tares these he shall finde crept up among the Wheat no man knowing how when the honest Husband-man and his servants thought no hurt but were at rest and asleepe The case is not so with Altars the Husband-men themselves that labour faithfully in the Lords Vineyard the Governours of Christs Church and the true and only successors of the Apostles brought them in by the speciall direction of Gods holy Spirit I shall not need to spend much time in proofe hereof
The least thought of what hath beene said lights up a Candle to shew the truth hereof which no blast of Puritane mouthes set against it is able to blow out though Boreas had made his bellowes in their Cheekes Sure wee are by that which hath beene said that Churches were built and made with the very Cradle of Christianity and when they were made they were consecrated For a man may as lawfully and Christianly administer the blessed Sacrament in a Barne or Towne-Hall as in any place that is not Consecrated to such holy uses And when the Church was Consecrated was not the Altar the chiefest place which with most ceremony and devotion was hallowed when it was hallowed was it not kept more carefully from prophanation than any other part of the Church Levita eligatur sayes Saint Ambrose qui Sacrarium custodiat not the Vestry onely but the Altar belonged to his care Was there not a feast annually kept in a joyfull remembrance of the dedication of every Church and did not the Consecration of the Altar carry the name of that feast doth not St. Augustine say my brethren you know right well that to day consecrationem Altaris celebramus was not the Altar set and fixed in the most eminent place of al the Church The Readers Tribunall stood in the body of the Church in loco editiori in a place exalted above the rest there But was not the Altar set in Sacrario or Sancto Sanctâ—rum in the highest place of all whereunto the Priest ascended by certaine steppes and degrees and when they did so ascend were there not Psalmes of degrees sung called for that cause Graeduals were not tythes of greatest sanctity given to the Altar was it not the only place whither none but Priests might be allowed to come to officiate was not the holy Eucharist there and no where else Consecrated Durst the Priests themselves ascend thither without doing lowly reverence three severall times Was not this holy Altar and the mysteries thereof at some time kept rayled from the eyes of most men doth not KING Edward the 6th call it Sacro-sanctum Altare in his writ to the Bishop doth not Saint Nyssex say Altare hoc Sanctum c. this holy Altar at which we stand is in his owne nature no more but a stone such as our houses are made of but being Consecrated and Dedicated benedictionem accepit and is become meâ—sa Sancta Altare immaculatum quod non ampliâ—s ab omnibus sed à solis sacerdotibus iisque venerantibus contrectatur Veneration towards the Altar was then required and practised Doth not the most holy and blessed Archbishop as the fifth Councell calls him performe his low obeysance toward the holy Altar and exhort all others to doe the like doth hee noâ— say adoremus primum Sacro-sanctum Altare did not the reverence of holy Altars prevaile so farre with the furious Souldiers and barbarous Goths that in all humility they willingly fall down and kisse the holy Altar doth not Tertullian say that in his time Altars were had in that reverence that their Penitents used adgeniculare to fall downe upon their knees doth not St. Chrysostome say dum vides sublata vela tum cogita câ—elum ipsum sursum resâ—rari Angelosque descendere when the Curtaines are drawne by our hearts which even then we are bidden to lift up unto the Lord conceive heaven it selfe to be open to us when Iesus Christ is given to the faithfull Communicant who wee may be sure commeth not alone but with the blessed Spirit attended with his blessed Angels whom hee hath made ministring spirits for their good who shall bee heires of salvation Doth not the same Father say semper in Altari manere solet Christi Crux the Crosse of Christ alwayes used to stand upon the Altar doth not Beatus Rhenanus say out of Tertullian and Lactantius that in those times Christians had no other Images in their Churches praeterquam crucis signum super Aram adorientem versum ut mentem oculosque in coâ—lum ubi Pater est omnium erigerent espansis manibus but only the Crosse of Christ which stood upon the Altar And is it not also said that the Altar which stood in former Princes times continued in Queen Elizabeths Chappell with the Crosse upon it Doth not Bishop Iewell in the place cited by the Author confirme the greatest part of all that hath beene said And are these arguments that Altars crept into the Church If the Governours of the Church had come in to see the furniture of the Church as the good man of the house did to see his guests and had espied there an Altar amongst sundry other Consecrate things would they not at one time or other have questioned some or other for it and have said Friend how came this hither Neither the Altar nor his furniture are such guests or wedding garments as I look to find here and therefore doe you take it and cast it unto utter darknesse There it was bred and so crept in hither and there let it bee buried But the case yee see is quite otherwise they honour reverence and adore towards it for his sake whose Sacrament is Consecrated thereon And this is the first man that I can find that â—aith Altars crept into the Church And if he bee not I hope hee will discover himselfe and â—ell us by whom hee doth president himselfe I am sure not by Kings or Bishops Chappels or Cathedrall Churches or by any true Christian member of them But if Altars crept into the Church I would but know how he and I came in I will begin with my selfe I had my Ordination from Bishop Dove he had his Consecration from Archbishop Whitguift and the Archbishop his from the undoubted successors of Saint Peter and of our Saviour Christ Here is no creeping in all this And I perswade my selfe he crept not into his if he had orders in the Church of England If the Porter or Sexton had led him aside in the night into the Belfrey and had put what belongs to his custody into his hand and so he had stole up to the Chancell this had beene Creeping But Priests in our Church have their Ordination usually at the 4. tempora they prepare or ought to prepare themselves with Fasting and Prayer three dayes before and at the Ordination they kneel upon their knees before the holy Altar The Bishop and they pray before the holy Altar then is given imposition of hands before the holy Altar then the Bishop taketh the holy Gospels from the holy Altar and delivereth the same into the hands of him that is ordained who maketh solemne protestation before Almighty God meekely kneeling still upon his knees before the holy Altar and in the presence of the Bishop and the whole Congregation that hee will read these holy bookes c. Here is no creeping but this holy action is