in the second Age after Christ there was not the Faith in Rome that now is For that there was no mention or knowledge then either of any universal Authority of the Church or Bishop of Rome or of the name or use of Masses or Sacrifice propitiatory or of Transubstantiation or of Images used in Churches and the like 5. To which vain Arguments of both these poor Men I might answer sufficiently by telling them if they will learn that albeit it were true in some sence that these Doctrins which here they alledge and some other in Controversie between us were not found in the Second Age when Pope Eleutherius lived so expresly set forth as in other Ages afterward when better Occasion was offered and the Times did more permit the same yet is this no good Argument to prove that they were not believed then also in the Catholic Church For if this Consequence should be admitted then as well might it be admitted also against many other principal Points and Articles of our Faith which are acknowledged and believed by Protestants also at this day tho not expresly handled discussed or determined in those first two hundred Years after Christ as for Example the Name and Doctrin of the Blessed Trinity the two distinct Natures and one Person in Christ his two distinct wills the Virginity of our Blessed Lady both before and after her Child-birth the Proceeding of the Holy Ghost as well from the Son as from the Father c. 6. All which Points and some others are not found to be handled so clearly and distinctly by Authors of the first two hundred Years as afterward partly for that they were occupied in other matters against Gentiles and Hereticks that touched not these Points and partly for that General Councils could not yet be gathered together to discuss and declare them distinctly tho no good Christians will or may doubt but that they were believed in the Church before from Christ downward and that the General Councils that determined them afterward for Articles of true Belief against Heretics that had called them in question did not so determine them as if they had made them Articles which were not before for this the Church could not do as is held by all Catholics but only that they being Articles of True and Catholic Belief before the Church did now declare them to be such Wherefore this being so I might answer and I see not how they could reply that John Fox and his Scholar may as well deny and call in question all or any of these foresaid Articles as the other which they recite For that they were as little or perhaps less specified in the first two hundred Years than these which they object 7. But I will deal more liberally with our Minister and Knight and will seek to satisfie them with Reason who do brabble and argue against us without Reason I shall endeavour to do the same by two ways hoping to make their Folly appear to every indifferent Man by them both The first shall be via negativa the negative way by putting them to some proof And the second shall be affirmative shewing them what Proofs may be brought for our side Nothing doubting but that each shall be sufficient to satisfie the equal Reader Let the first kind of Argument then by the way of negative be this 8. We deny that the Faith now held in Rome and namely the Articles here mentioned of the Pope Mass Transubstantiation and use of Images were not believed in Pope Eleutherius's days as now for the substance of the Doctrin And let them prove it if they can and if they say that it is hard to prove a negative we are content that they prove only an affirmative whereby the said negative may be inferred to wit that any one of these Doctrins did begin to enter into the Church after Eleutherius And to this Proof they are bound in all equity and reason as we shall shew by our sequent Discourse For if it be true that the Articles and Points of Doctrin here mentioned by Fox and Sir Francis wherein they differ from us be indeed not things heard of or believed at Rome in the time of Pope Eleutherius which yet they denie not but that in other Ages after they were generally received then followeth it that Fox and his Fellows must shew the Time Place Men and Occasion of their beginning to wit when where and by what Men and upon what Causes and with what Authority or Induction or Violence or by what Deceit or with what Contradiction of others these Doctrins entred first and were continued in the Church All which Points we can shew of every other Error or Heresie that hath risen and was held for such from Christ's Time to ours 9. And if either Fox or his Cub or any of that Kennel can or will shew this and joyn issue with us upon this one Point we do accept thereof and the matter may be quickly dispatch'd But if this cannot be done then must we follow the Rule of St. Augustin held by him for infallible in such Affairs to wit That when any Doctrin is found generally received in the known visible Churh at any Time or in any Age whereof there is no certain Author Time or Beginning found then is it sure that all such Doctrin hath come down from Christ and his Apostles 10. This doth that holy Doctor and great Pillar of Gods Church Saint Augustin affirm and reiterate in every place of his Works against Heretics of his Time which argued as our Men do by denying only and putting Catholics to Proof As for Example against the Donatists denying the custom of baptizing Infants for that it was not in Scripture nor recorded by Fathers of the first Ages Saint Augustin answereth thus Illa consuetudo quam tunc homines sursum versum aspicientes non videbant à posterioribus institutam rectè ab Apostolis tradita creditur That Custom of Baptizing Infants which Men before us in the Church looking upward to Antiquity did not find to have been ordained by them that came after the first Ages is rightly believed to have been delivered by the Apostles 11. And again in another place speaking of Ecclesiastical Customs he saith Quod universa tenet Ecclesia nec Conciliis institutum sed semper retentum est non nisi anthoritate Apostolica traditum rectissimè creditur That which the universal Church doth hold and was not instituted by any Council but hath been still retained in the Church this we may most justly believe to have come from no other Authority than from the Apostles And the like Speeches unto this hath St. Augustin in divers other places both of this Book against the Donatists as l. 2. c. 7. and l. 5. c. 23. as also lib. de Vnitat Ecclesiae c. 19. Epistola 118 c. And as for that he speaketh of Institution by Councils he
pious Princes and Lords Egfrid King of the Northumbers Anno 10. upon the fifteenth day before the Calends of October the eighth Indiction and Etheldred reigning over the Mercians the sixth year of his Reign and Adulphus being King of the East-Angles the seventeenth year of his Reign and Lodtharius being King of Kent in the seventh year of his Reign and Theodorus by the Grace of God Archbishop of the Isle of Britanny and of the City of Canterbury being President of the Synod together with the rest of the Bishops of the same Island venerable men sitting with him in Council and the holy Sacred Gospel being laid before them in a place called in the Saxon Tongue Hedtfield after treaty had they expounded the right Catholic Faith in this manner 24. Sicut Dominus noster Jesus c. As our Lord Jesus taking our flesh upon him did deliver unto his Disciples that saw him in person and heard his speeches and as the Symbolum or Creed of the holy Fathers have delivered unto us and as generally all whole and universal Synods and all the company of holy Fathers and Doctors of the holy Catholic Church have taught us so do We following their steps both Piously and Catholicly according to their Doctrin inspired to them from Heaven profess and believe and constantly confess according to the said holy Fathers Belief That the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost are properly and truly a consubstantial Trinity in Unity and Unity in Trinity c. We receive also the holy and universal five Synods that have been held before our time by the blessed Christian Fathers our Ancestors to wit those 318 holy Bishops in the first Council of Nice against Arius and his wicked Doctrin and of the 150 other Bishops in the first Council of Constantinople against the Heresie of Macedonius and of the 200 Godly Bishops of the Council of Ephesus against Nestorius and his Errors and of the 230 Bishops in the Council of Calcedon against Eutyches and his Doctrin and of the other 165 Fathers gathered together in the second General Council of Constantinople against divers Heretics and Heresies c. We do receive all these Councils and we do glorifie our Lord Jesus Christ as they glorified him adding nothing nor taking any thing away We do anathematize and accurse also both by heart and mouth all those whom these Fathers did anathematize and accurse and we do receive them whom they received c. 25. Behold here the manner and form of Catholic Councils of old time who laid down first the Gospel in the midst and then after due examination of Scriptures considered that Antiquity of Fathers and Councils had determined in God's Church before them even from Christ and his Apostles downward and therein insisted agreeing all in one and rejecting and accursing all new contrary or different Doctrins and Doctors and by his means and by the assistance of the Holy Ghost promised by Christ unto his Church hath she continued now for 1600 years one and the self-same whereas Sectaries lacking this Humility Wisdom and Subordination but especially God's Grace are divided and consumed among themselves 26. But I will pass no further in this point this which I have said being sufficient to shew that there were more Learned men in England in these times of our primitive Church than fantastical Fox would have men believe which is greatly confirmed by that which Malmsbury writeth and Fox also confesseth the same That a General Council being gathered soon after this which we have mentioned in Constantinople both of the East and West Church against the Monothelites that deny'd two distinct Wills of Christ our Archbishop Theodorus with some other Learned men of our English Clergy was called for by Pope Agatho to be one of his Legats in the said Council where there were 331 Bishops gathered together by order of the said Agatho Bishop of Rome against the Patriarchs of Antioch Alexandria and Constantinople which thing sheweth the great Power and Authority of the Bishop of Rome even in Greece it self at that day the Emperour Constantine IV. being present himself 27. And to this Council as is said was the foresaid Theodorus Archbishop of Canterbury with divers other Bishops called by name by Pope Agatho as we may see in his Letter to the said Council cited by Malmsbury in these words Sperabamus de Britannia Theodorum c. We did hope to have had from Britanny Theodore my Brother and Fellow-Bishop and Archbishop of that great Island and a Philosopher together with others which hitherto do remain there and then to have joined them to our Humility and for this cause we have hitherto deferred the Council Vides quanti eum fecerit saith Malmsbury ut ejus expectatione Universale Concilium differret You see of what account this Archbishop was with Pope Agatho that he would defer a General Council for his expectation Thus writeth he whereby every indifferent man will easily see that this time of our primitive English Church which Fox by contempt so often calleth Ignorant and Monkish was not devoid of rare Learned men and so hath continued until our days frustrà circumlatrantibus haereticis to use St. Augustin's words Heretics in vain barking on every side against it With whom John Fox thought good to bear a barking part also and not being able to find out any one hole or corner for his Church in those Ages except only among the Heretics before named he thought good at least to rail and spit at them as he passeth by and so will he do more and more the lower he goeth until at length he fall to plain Apostasie and forsaking them openly will join with the known condemned Heretics and Enemies of this Church which Church hitherto notwithstanding he will seem in some sort to follow tho' lazily and dragging behind and as it were weary of her Company and looking about him which way he may give the slip and betake himself to his heels as will better appear by that which ensueth CHAP. V. The fourth station or division of Times from King Egbert unto William the Conqueror containing the space of some 260 years and how John Fox his Church passed in these days and whether there were any Pope Joan or no. YOu have heard before how John Fox in his second Book promising to handle but 300 years touched in the Acts of 500 in less than a dozen Leaves shewing the small store of matter he had for his Church in those Ages Now his next Book is entituled thus The third Book containing the next 300 years from the Reign of Egbert unto the time of William the Conqueror So is his Title And yet if you count the years from the beginning of King Egbert his Reign Anno Domini 802 according to Stow or 800 according to others unto the entrance of the Conqueror Anno 1066 you shall find but only 264 years and
from King Egbert his death but 234. So as Fox is in no one thing exact or punctual And these 264 years may be counted the fourth station or parcel of Time from Christ downward which now we are briefly to examin and run over as we have done the former Stations and Limitations appointed 2. First then concerning the general Roman Church it continued in these Ages as in the former by continual Succession of her Bishops and Governors altering nothing in Belief and Doctrin from her Ancestors And briefly to repeat the sum of all there ruled in the See of Rome in these two Ages and an half as supreme known and acknowledged Pastors of this great visible Church some sixty Popes from Leo III. that crowned Charles the Great and thereby restor'd the Western Empire unto the time of Alexander II. under whom Duke William of Normandy conquered England And in the Western Empire there reigned some eighteen Emperours in this space from Charles the Great to Henry IV. and in the Eastern Empire some twenty five from Nicephorus I. to Constantine X. All which Popes Emperours and Princes were of one Religion Faith and Belief in those days And albeit soon after the See of Constantinople and Greek Church by occasion of Emulation against the Roman Empire did begin to withdraw their due Obedience from the Roman Church and thereby fell by little and little into divers errors of Doctrin also and finally were delivered over as all the World seeth into the Subjection and Servitude of the Turks yet in these Ages there was Union and due Subordination between both Churches Which may appear by that one only General Council being held at Constantinople even against Phocius that was Patriarch of the said City being gathered by order of Pope Adrian II. and Basilius the Grecian Emperour concurring therein This Council was of 300 Bishops and confirmed by the said Pope Adrian being the eighth General Council in order and the fourth of those that were held in Constantinople Whereby it cometh also to be noted That all the General Councils held hitherto in the Christian Church for the space of 900 years being eight in number as hath been said from the first Council of Nice unto this and from this to the first General Council of Lateran holden in the year of Christ 1115 under Pope Innocentius III. were all held in Greece but yet by order of the Bishops of Rome sending thither their Legats and confirming the same afterwards by themselves without which confirmation they were never held for Lawful in the Christian World which is no small Argument of the Greatness and Authority of the Church of Rome from time to time 3. It shall not be needful to speak of the particular Heresies of these two or three Ages which in effect were none of any name but only two the Iconoclasts or Image-breakers and the Berengarians or Sacramentaries both of them agreeing in their particular Heresies with the Calvinists of our Times tho' in many other things different as it is wont to be The first of them was begun before these Times by Leo III. Emperour of Constantinople sirnamed Isaurus about the year of Christ 750 as before hath been noted and renewed again by Claudius Taurinensis The second was begun 300 years after by Berengarius about the year of Christ 1050 and abjured by him again as hereafter shall be shewed The chief Doctors and Fathers that defended true Religion in these Ages were Turpinus Eginhardus Haymo Rabanus Frecolphus Hincmarus Jo. Diaconus Remigius Theophylactus and others in the ninth Age and then in the other Odo Ado Rhegino Luitprandus Rhatbodus Abbo Floriacensis and others and the other half of the eleventh Age Bruchardus Petrus Damianus Lanfrancus and many others 4. And this was the state of the Universal Christian Church in these Ages whereunto in all respects was conform the particular Church of England as the Daughter to her Mother which may be demonstrated partly by the continual Descent of Archbishops in England which were to the number of Sixteen from Celnothus that lived with King Egbert unto Stigand that possessed the See of Canterbury when William the Conqueror came in tho' afterward he caused him to be deposed by a Commission from Rome in the year of Christ 1070 as John Stow and others do note 5. I do pretermit the Succession of other Bishoprics in England for Brevities sake the Kings also of England that possessed that Crown from Egbert to William the Conqueror were some Twenty in number if we count Canutus the Dane and his two Children among the rest All which Kings of what Nation or State soever agreed fully in Faith and Belief with the said Archbishops and Bishops of our Land and They again with the whole Universal Roman Church as appeareth by their Acts and Monuments and John Fox also confesseth 6. Which being so it is hard to say or imagin where John Fox in these Ages will pick out a different Christian Church tho' it be never so poor and creeping for Him and His either in England or out of England during this time And much more hard it is to think how he can devise any visible Continuation of the said obscure and trodden-down Church as he promised to do even from the Apostles Time to our Age. His only refuge must be as before we have often noted to run to the condemned Heretics of these times if he find any for his purpose Which yet he dareth not openly to do as you have seen throughout all the former Ages But afterward when he cometh near home to wit after Pope Innocentius III. and John Wickliff he taketh more heart affirming Our Church to have utterly perished and a new visible Off-spring of his Church to have started up to wit all the Sectaries and Heretics cast out and condemned of our Church as you shall see more particularly when we come to that place 7. For the present Ages that we are now in he doth not so much as lay hands upon the Iconoclasts or Berengarians nor doth seem to count them for his Brethren tho' in the principal Points of their Heresies they agree with Him as is notorious And John Fox to have some visible Members of his Church in these Ages ought to have shaken hands with them but the poor Fellow was asham'd to build his Church openly of so ancient Heretics tho' afterward when he beginneth to build indeed and to gather Stones together he calleth for the Berengarians again which now he casteth away as after you shall see 8. But now perhaps you will ask me If John Fox do set down no Succession in these Ages as neither in the former of His Church or Ours what doth the simple Fellow in all this third Book of his Whereto I answer first That albeit he promiseth in the Title That this third Book shall contain the Acts and Monuments of 300 years together with the whole
Goodness of Almighty God who in these very first days of his Gospel procured for so remote an Island so excellent Spiritual Fathers Founders and Patrons both of contemplative and active Life in Christian Religion the first Four which I have named being all Preachers and this Fifth having come out of Jury unto Marsilia in France with St. Mary Magdalen and her Company and seen her extraordinary Austerity of Contemplative Life and Zeal of Solitude and doing Penance therein he began that kind of Life also in Britanny as our Writers do testifie and namely Cambden among others doth observe Solitariam vitam amplexi sunt c. ut severo vitae genere ad Crucem preferendam se exercerent Joseph and his Company did take upon them a solitary life that with more tranquility they might attend to holy Learning and with a severe kind of conversation exercise themselves to the bearing of Christ's Cross 26. And albeit John Fox out of whom Sir Francis hath stoln all that he saith in this matter and most of the rest that be Historical tho' suppressing his Name doth cavil upon this man's going into England making him first a Preacher and not an Eremite and then saying That he came not from Rome but out of Jury and France and consequently that the Church of Britanny is not the Daughter of the Church of Rome nor had not her first Birth or Institution from thence and yet St. Cyprian glorieth in that his Church of Carthage in Africa and all the other Churches under her in Mauritania and Numidia had received their first Institution of Christian Faith from Rome as from their Mother All the World may see that this is but a foolish and absurd Cavil of Fox for that albeit St. Joseph came not immediately from Rome nor was a Roman by Birth as none of the Apostles were yet he taught in England the Roman Faith that is to say the same Faith that St. Peter and St. Paul and Aristobulus that came immediately from Rome had taught before him or did teach jointly with him in Britanny Of which Roman Faith St. Paul had written to the Romans themselves before the going of St Joseph into Britanny Fides vestra annuntiatur in universo mundo Your Faith is preached and divulged throughout the whole World signifying That the Christian Faith planted in Rome by St. Peter was derived already for a Platform into all other parts of the World round about For which cause Tertullian writing in Africa said That the Authority of his Church came from Rome Vnde nobis quoque authorit as praesto est saith he And St. Cyprian as before hath been noted called the Roman Church Matricem caeterarum omnium the Mother and Original Church of all other Churches And St. Innocentius also whose Holiness St. Augustin so much admired doth affirm That all Churches generally of the West-parts of the World were founded by St. Peter and his Disciples And St. Angustin himself had no better way to defend his Church of Hippo and other of those Countries to be truly Catholic against the Donatists than to say that they were Daughters and Children of the Church of Rome though some of them were very near as far off in distance of place as England at this day 27. Well then by this we see that the shift invented to deliver us from all Obligation to the See of Rome for our two Conversions under Eleutherius and Gregory I. by saying that some had preached Christian Religion first in Britanny before these two public Conversions fell out is a foolish shift and diminisheth not our said Obligation but increaseth rather the same For if this first Preaching and first Faith taught in England by our first Preachers was the Roman Faith and deriv'd principally from the City and Church of Rome by the Preaching of St. Peter and St. Paul Aristobulus and others as hath been declared and if the very first Beams or Sparkles thereof before any Preachers perhaps were sent came by the access of some Roman Christians upon the Wars and other occasions which before hath been declared then all this rather multiplieth our Bonds to Rome than diminisheth the same And so instead of two Conversions from Rome whereof I spake in my Ward-word now we find three And consequently a triple Obligation is come upon us for a double 28. And this shall suffice to the first Answer of Sir Francis or rather simple shift by which he would avoid our Obligation to Rome persuading us that our first Preachers came not from thence but from Asia and the East Church Of which Argument though I have said more here than I meant to have done yet for that Sir Francis and all other Heretics of our time for hatred to Rome do seek certain Reasons or rather foolish Conjectures to prove the same I shall be forced to say somewhat more thereof in the Chapter following CHAP. II. An Answer to certain Cavillations Lies and Falsifications of Sir Francis and his Masters Fox and the Magdeburgians about the first Preaching of Christian Religion in Britanny ALbeit the fond heretical wrangling before rehearsed against Rome deserveth not so large a Confutation as I have already bestowed thereon especially in so clear a matter as are the manifold benefits which our Island hath received from the See of Rome yet for that it seems to be a general Conspiracy of all Heretics of our time as well Lutherans as Zwinglians Calvinists and Puritans to take from Rome if they could all the merit of bringing Christian Faith into our Country I am forced in this place to stand longer upon the matter than otherwise I would for that there followeth also another Consequence hereof of no small moment which St. Irenaeus Tertullian St. Cyprian St. Augustin and others are wont to urge greatly against Heretics to wit That if our Church be the Daughter and Disciple of the Church of Rome then ought it to run unto her in all doubts and difficulties of matters of Faith. Wherefore we shall briefly discuss the truth of this Affair 2. Besides the Proofs set down in the former Chapter how the chief of our first Preachers came from Rome immediately as St. Peter St. Paul and St. Aristobulus and that the other as St. Symon of Chananae and St. Joseph of Arimathea if they did not come from Rome yet preached the Roman Faith conform to the Preachings of St. Peter and St. Paul there remain two other Conjectures also very probable to the same effect to prove that St. Joseph was specially directed into Britanny by the same Apostles The first is for that King Inas above 900 years past when he laid the Foundation of Glastonbury-Abby in memory of St. Joseph and his Fellows that had lived a solitary Life there he caused these Verses to be written in the Church as Cambden and others testifie Anglia plande lubens mittit tibi Roma salutem Fulgor Apostolicus
missus est Augustinus à beato Gregorio c. In the mean space was sent into Britanny Augustin by Blessed Gregory to preach to English-men the Word of God who were yet blind in Pagan Superstition c. Though among the Britans that Christianity was yet in force which being received from the time of Eleutherius the Pope had never failed until that day c. Among whom there was an Abbot of Bangor named Dinoot that had above 2000 Monks under his charge who answered to Augustin when he requir'd Subjection of the British Bishops and that they would joyn with him to convert the English Nation That the Britans owed no Subjection unto him nor would bestow the labour of Preaching upon their Enemies seeing the Britans had an Archbishop of their own and that the Saxons took from them their Country for which cause they hated them extremely nor did not esteem their Religion nor would communicate with them more than with Dogs 14. Lo here all that is to be found in Geffry of Monmouth to this purpose which is nothing else as you see but a passionate and choleric Answer of the Britans as of men afflicted and exasperated Here is no one word of their not acknowledging the Popes Supremacy as the Magdeburgians write but only that they acknowledged not the Superiority of Augustin over the Britans seeing he was only sent to the English and that the Authority of their own Archbishop was not taken away by his coming for any thing they yet knew but remained as before Which question of Jurisdiction between two Archbishops falleth out daily even where the Pope's Authority is acknowledged and so we see that it is a manifest Lie which the Magdeburgians affirm so resolutely That the Britans would not acknowledge any Primacy of the Bishop of Rome over them For they speak as you see of Augustin's Authority and not of the Bishop of Rome from whom we read not that he had yet shewed to them any Authority to place him over their Archbishop and consequently it is a vain and malicious Inference which the Magdeburgians here do make out of this Answer of the Britans if it had been true that forasmuch as they admitted not St. Augustin's Authority they acknowledged not the Primacy of Rome and that this again was a clear sign that Religion was not planted in Britanny by the Romans 15. For how clear is this I pray you or how hangeth this together might not this Error of not acknowledging the Power of the Roman See if it had been among them have crept in after the first planting of Christian Faith Will these Germans or Sir Francis or Fox their Scholars deny that Ravennae in Italy for Example was converted by St. Apollinaris sent thither from St. Peter for that afterwards the Bishops of that place for many years waxing proud and presumptuous upon the presence and Court of the Exarchs and Vice-Roys of the Emperours residing amongst them did refuse to yield to the Bishops of Rome Or for that England at this day by Error of Protestant Religion refuseth to acknowledge any Subjection in Spiritual Affairs to Rome will our men deny that the English Nation was ever converted to Christian Faith from Rome Who seeth not the impertinency of this kind of Argument And yet with such-like kind of Arguments and Inferences these absurd People do deceive the World. 16. But the last point of these Germans Assertion about Pope Innocentius I. is a most egregious Impudency to say of so holy a Father so highly commended by St. Augustin and other Fathers that lived with him and after him That he spake of Vain-glory and desire of Temporal Power when he wrote above 1200 years agone That all the West-Churches and the British amongst the rest were founded by St. Peter or his Disciples and Successors And let any indifferent or prudent Reader in the World consider of what weight these words of the Germans may be when having said That albeit Innocentius I. wrote so yet we judge that to have been spoken of Vain-glory c. A proud Censure of so great a man by three or four poor Companions that wrote Books for their Bread and begg'd the same commonly of every Prince to whom they dedicated their several Centuries That so contemptible People I say should presume to touch the Honor and Truth of so great and worthy a Saint and Father as was holy Innocentius so called commonly by St. Augustin St Hierom St. Basil Orosius and others and whom all the rest of the World together with these men admired and respected in his Life for such Sancti Innocentii saith St. Hierom to the Virgin Demetriades qui Apostolicae Cathedrae beat ae memoriae Anastasii successor filius est tene as fidem nec pergrinam quamvis prudens callidáque videaris doctrinam recipias Hold the Faith of holy Innocentius which is the Successor and Son in the Seat of St. Peter's Chair of Anastasius of blessed Memory that went before him and do not admit any new or foreign Doctrin though thou maist seem perhaps wise and subtle to thy self 17. Thus wrote St. Hierom which is another manner of Judgment of Innocentius both for his Holiness of Life and Authority of Place to direct men in Religion than the Magdeburgians give who would make him Vain-glorious But thus they use all ancient Fathers that are against them And so much for this Chapter CHAP. III. The former Controversie is more particularly handled how the Grecian Custom of celebrating Easter-day after the Fashion of the Jews came first into the British and Scottish Church and how untruly and wickedly John Fox and John Bale do behave themselves about this matter BUT now let us return if you please to speak a word or two more of the entrance of the foresaid Custom of celebrating Easter with the Jews into Britanny to wit how and about what time or upon what occasion it is probable that it entred Wherein first it seemeth most certain that it could not be brought in by the first Preachers of Christian Religion to John Fox and Sir Francis and the Magdeburgians would have men believe And this is proved as well by the Reasons and Authorities alleged before to shew that the first Preachers in Britanny either came from Rome or preached Roman Doctrin as also by the Reasons following First for that if Damianus and other Preachers sent into Britanny by Pope Reason I Eleutherius to instruct King Lucius and the rest in Christian Faith about the year 180 had found any such Custom there contrary to the Roman Use from whence they were sent they would have removed the same or at least wise have made some mention thereof forsomuch as at that time the contrary Custom of celebrating Easter upon the Sunday was public in the Use of the Roman Church and Pope Pius I. had made a Decree for confirming the same against the Asian Use about 40 years
next Age following Pope Victor seeing the same inconveniences greatly to increase wrote a Letter to Polycrates Bishop of Ephesus to gather a Synod against it about the year of Christ 249 as Eusebius testifieth And when he perceived that both He and divers Asian Bishops did stand more stifly in defence thereof than he expected yea that they began not only to shew obstinacy therein against the former Decree of Pope Pius and the See of Rome but to draw near also to the very formality of Heresie before mentioned to wit that it was necessary to observe the Fourteenth Day nay further that it was ex Evangelii praescripto secundum Regulam Normam Fidei by the Prescription of the Gospel and according to the Rule and Norm of Faith as the said Polycrates in his Epistle to Pope Victor writeth When Victor I say saw this he resolved after Counsel taken by Conference with divers Synods both of the West and East Churches to Excommunicate those Asian Bishops that resisted if they would not agree Which Determination albeit Irenaeus and some others at that time did mislike and dehort Pope Victor from it as a thing perillous and scandalous and subject to many troubles as Eusebius reporteth yet did never any of them say that he could not do it but rather when he had done it indeed they did accommodate themselves thereunto both in West and East ratifying and confirming the same by divers particular Synods as Nicephorus recounteth to wit in Jerusalem Caesarea Tyrus Ptolomais Corinth Lions of France where St. Irenaeus himself was Bishop and other places c. 29. And finally the Council of Nice confirmed the same as the Fathers thereof do testifie by their particular Letters to the Clergy of Alexandria whose words are these as Theodoretus relateth them Scitote controversiam de Paschate susceptam prudenter sedatam esse Ita ut omnes fratres qui Orientem incolunt jam Romanos nos omnes vos sint consentientibus animis in eodem celebrando deinceps sequuturi You must understand that the Controversie about celebrating Easter taken in hand by us is prudently pacified so as all our Brethren that inhabit the East-parts will follow for the time to come the Romans or the Roman Church Us and the Authority of the Council and all You of the Aegyptian Church with full consent of mind in celebrating the same Feast Note here That the Council doth put the Authority of the Church of Rome in the first place even before Themselves and then Themselves and the Authority of the Council in the second place and those of Alexandria in the third which is another reckoning than our Heretics are wont to make of the Roman Church 30. Constantine also the Emperour writing his Letters to all Bishops of the Christian World that had not been present at the Council of Nice nor could come yieldeth account unto them with great Christian Modesty and Zeal of the chief Matters handled in that Council Where coming to speak of the Decree of celebrating Easter he saith thus Cùm de sanctissimo Festo Paschatis disceptaretur communi omnium sententia videbatur rectum esse ut omnes ubique uno eodemque die illud celebrarent When the Question was proposed about celebrating the holy Feast of Easter it seemed good by the common consent of all that were present in this Council that all Christians should celebrate the same in one and the self-same day which day he sheweth to be Sunday and refuteth at large the Custom of celebrating the same with the Jews upon the fourteenth day of the Moon tho' it were a Feria concluding thus Quae cum ita se habent c. Which things being so do you willingly embrace this Decree of the Council as a great Gift of God and a Commandment sent from Heaven forasmuch as whatsoever is decreed by holy Council of Bishops that must be ascribed to God's holy Will. Wherefore do you declare and denounce unto all our dear Brethren living among you the Decrees of this Council and namely the Decree of celebrating this holy Feast c. 31. Thus wrote our good British Emperour Constantine with a far different Spirit from those Christian Inhabitants of Britanny who afterwards defended the contrary Custom without respect of holy Decree of the Nicene Council but far more opposite and contrary is the wicked Spirit of John Bale John Fox and other such latter Brutish rather than British Sectaries that even in our days after that the Roman Catholic Use hath been received for thirteen hundred years since the said Council they are content for hatred of the Name of Rome to bring it into Controversie again and to allow rather the Jewish Use and to praise them that defend it in our Countrey as you have heard rejecting and defacing others that stood for the Catholic Party tho' never otherwise so famous and illustrious for their Learning and Vertue as Beda Agilbert Wilfrid and others the chiefest Pillars of our Primitive English Church were But this is their shameless Spirit to dishonor wherein possibly they can their Forefathers 32. And thus much of this matter about the first Conversion or Preaching of Christian Faith in Britanny under the Apostles Now will we pass to the more public Conversion of our Land under King Lucius which as in my Ward-word I called the First in respect of our two public Conversions from Paganism so do I here name it the Second in regard of the former Preaching in the Apostles Time. About which Conversion tho' in effect our Modern Heretics dare not deny the same yet shall you hear no less wrangling of them about this than the former for the great grief they receive in that it should be said or thought to come from Rome CHAP. IV. Of the Second Conversion of Britanny under King Lucius by Pope Eleutherius and Teachers sent from him about the year of Christ 180 and of the notorious absurd Cavillations of Heretics about the same also ALL that hitherto hath been spoken is about the first Preaching of Christian Religion in Britanny by particular men within the first Age or hundred years after Christ which our Roman Enemies only upon Envy and Animosity without any one Testimony of Antiquity will needs take from Rome and the Roman Church and give it to the Grecians of Asia and to the East parts as you have heard Now do follow two other more famous and public Conversions of the said Island under the two renowned Popes of Rome and by their special Industry which are acknowledged and registred by the whole Christian World and do so much press the Spleen and move the Gall of our Rome-biters as they leave no corner of their Wits unsifted to discredit or reject the same 2. The first Conversion was as the Warder saith under Pope Eleutherius towards the end of the second Age after Christ when King Lucius of Britanny hearing of the
divers other perillous Opinions about this matter as for Example That he tyeth the Office of true Pastorship to ordinary Succession and that he denieth that Bishops can be judged c. And Origen also in this Age hath no mean blots about the Power and Office of the Church c. 13. Hitherto are the words of the Magdeburgians against the chief Writers of these two first Ages after the Apostles concerning the point of Principality and Supremacy of the Church and Bishop of Rome so clearly confessed by the said Fathers as the Magdeburgians do grant and on the other side so boldly denied by the Fox and the Knight his Follower and Proselyte as a thing not so much as heard or dreamed of in these first Ages whereof you have heard their several and resolute asseverations before Let them but grant me saith Fox and then I say quoth the Knight there is no such matter c. And by this one point only of the five Articles before objected by them and denied flatly to have been known or believed in Eleutherius's time you may see how they behave themselves and what may be said on our part and how great a Volume this Book would grow unto if I should prosecute all the other four Articles also by them mentioned before and should pass through the first three or four or five hundred years after Christ for so much our Adversaries sometimes upon a good mood of bragging will seem to allow us to shew not out of the Books and Writings of the ancient Fathers themselves for that this were over long but what these Magdeburgians do note and gather against themselves out of their Works for the Antiquity of that Doctrin which they impugn rejecting afterward all again with this only frivolous and fond Cavil That these Opinions of the Fathers were but naevi stipulae palia Doctorum stains stubble and straw of Doctors opiniones incommodae c. and incommodious Opinions 14. Wherein it is well noted by a Learned Man of our time That these Fellows do proceed as if one being suspected or accused of Theft Heresie or any other grievous Crime should willingly present himself before the Magistrate or Senate of the City and there first of all for his clearing should bring in for Witnesses against himself the best learned most grave ancient and best reputed honest men of all that City to testifie that he is indeed such a one to wit a false Thief an Heretic or the like but yet having so done would endeavor to refute all these again by one bare rejection saying that they spake rashly and incommodiously and that they were overseen and knew not what they testified or were in a dream when they spake or testified against him and finally that all were deceived and he alone to be believed against them all And would this shift think you countervail so grave Witnesses against him or would any indifferent Judge leave to condemn him for this evasion or would any man think him much better than mad that would take such a course of Defence And yet this is the very course of these Magdeburgians who citing first the gravest and most ancient Fathers of Christendom against themselves do reject the same again with this only jest and contumely that they spake incommodiously ignorantly and were Stubble-Doctors 15. Well then for so much as concerneth the first Article mentioned by Fox and Sir Francis as a thing not heard of in Eleutherius's time to wit the Vniversality and Primacy of the Church and Bishop of Rome you see that with going to the Authors themselves of that Age the Magdeburgians do make it clear against themselves And for the second point concerning the use of Mass and Propitiatory Sacrifice we have cited sufficiently before in the first Chapter of this Treatise out of the same Magdeburgians who condemn divers of the most ancient Fathers for testifying this matter and we may do the like in all the other Articles specified by Fox and his Knight but that it would be over tedious And therefore I do remit the curious Reader to the Volumes of the Magdeburgians themselves if he have so much time to lose as the reading thereof doth require Only in this place I am to note unto him for his better Instruction three or four kinds of shifts and frauds used ordinarily by these Protestant Germans in setting down these and other like matters out of the Fathers which I shall do in the next ensuing Chapter CHAP. VII The same Argument is continued and it is shewed out of the Magdeburgians how they accuse and abuse the Fathers of the Second and Third Age for holding with Us against Them. DIvers are the shifts and frauds and manifold the abuses which Protestant Writers and namely the Magdeburgians do offer to the ancient Fathers in examining their Sentences about Controversies in Religion Whereof one principal may be accounted that of four or five places or more that may be alledged out of them for Us and our Doctrin in the question proposed they will not cite two left the multitude of Authorities if they alledge all that in the Fathers are found should give our Cause too much credit Secondly of four or five parts of the Fathers words contained in the places by them alledged these good Fellows do cut off ordinarily three lest if they did set them down at length with their Antecedents and Consequents their Opinions might appear more probable and plausible than these men would have them And of this you have had an Example in the first Authority alledged by me even now out of Irenaeus about the Principality of the Church of Rome which being set down somewhat at length as it is in the Author maketh the matter clear but shuffled up in four or five words after a most curtail'd manner as the Magdeburgians do alledge them do scarce make any sense at all which is the thing the Alledgers do desire thereby to discredit the Author 2. Their third fraud is that having alledged the first Authorities for Us and against themselves they devise divers pretty and witty slights to discredit them again as sometimes saying that in other places the said Father expoundeth or contradicteth himself sometimes that he speaketh rashly or incommodiously or without Scripture and other such contemptuous rejections As for Example talking of St. Cyprian that famous Bishop Doctor and Martyr and the Christian Phoenix of his Age as St. Augustin judgeth of him these men do handle him in this sort 3. Cyprianus sine Scriptura loquitur Cyprian speaketh without Scripture Cyprianus superstitiosè fingit Cyprian doth feign superstitiously Cyprianus malè judicat Cyprian judgeth naughtily and the like Nay they endeavor to discredit the whole multitude of Doctors and Fathers in every Age As for Example in the beginning of the first Age next after the Apostles they write thus Tamesit haec aetas Apostolis admodum vicina fuit c. Albeit this
erroribus This man did Caelestinus Bishop of Rome send to the Scots and Irish-men especially those that lived in Britanny after Palladius the Grecian to defend them from the Errors of the Pelagians 16. Behold the Care and Authority of the Bishop of Rome in those days But what followeth in Bale This man saith he did preach the Gospel unto the Irish-men with incredible fervour of spirit for forty years together and did convert them to the sincere Faith of Christ He was most excellent both in Learning and Holiness and among other Miracles that he did he continued in Praying and Fasting forty days and forty nights founded many Churches healed many sick deliver'd many possessed of Devils and raised to life sixty that were dead c. 17. Behold the effects of Preachers sent forth by the Bishops of Rome recounted by the Heretics themselves Let Fox or Bale shew us any such Example of Miracles wrought by Preachers sent by them and their Sect. And that this man also was made Bishop by Caelestinus the Pope and sent hither after Palladius is testified by St. Prosper that lived in that time and after him by St. Bede Marianus Scotus Sigibert and others who say also that he died in the year of Christ 491 being of the age of 122 years and his Memory is held in the Roman Calendar upon the 17th day of March c. And now our Fox and Bale being taken in these Examples to speak against themselves we might pass over the rest with silence assuring the Reader that all is like unto this Yet some points more we shall note 18. The fourth before named Bacchiarius tho' he be not mentioned by John Bale yet other Authors do report that he was brought up in Rome and in good credit with Pope Leo I. to whom he dedicated a Book written in defence of his Pilgrimage to Rome He had been the Scholar of St. Patricius and by this you may guess of what Religion he was 19. Congellus is the sixth Preacher of true Religion cited in Fox's Catalogue for of Dubritius which is the fifth we spoke before whom Bale saith to have flourished about the year of Christ 530 and that he was the first Abbot of the Monastery of Bangor But what more think you Ab isto Monachismus à Pelagio introductus c. From this man saith he the Religion of Monks brought in by Pelagius the Heretic was not only spread over Britanny under shew of true Religion but was dilated also into other Countreys c. Behold how Fox and Bale agree Fox saith He was a true Preacher of the Word of God and Bale saith He was a Father of Pelagian Monks And note here by the way that Fox professing to shew the continual Succession of the Britan Church leapeth from Patricius to Dubritius of whom we spake before and between whom there was above 100 years distance if we believe Bale and other Authors And then followeth Kentegernus and Helmotus before David Menevensis who should have come after him in respect of time tho' of Helmotus Bale maketh no mention but of Kentegernus he saith That he flourished in the year 560 and lived in all 185 years which if it be so he must needs be alive long after the entrance of St. Augustin He saith He was a Monk and had three hundred Scholars in one Colledge which he sent to preaching here and there c. And then he addeth further Melote utebatur c. He used a Garment made of Goats skins with a streight Hood having a white Stole about his Neck after the fashion of the Primitive Church He converted many to the Faith of Christ recall'd many Apostatas drove out Pelagians built Churches ministred to the sick and healed their sickness and lived in very great Abstinence c. Thus he describeth him and whether this description doth agree to a Protestant Minister or to a Catholic Abbot let the Reader consider 20. There do follow in Fox's Catalogue David Daniel Sampson Elnodugus Asaphus and Gildas But of St. David the first of this number we have spoken before in this Chapter And as for Gildas which is the last of this Rank Bale saith He was a Monk of Bangor And further it may easily appear by the speeches themselves which before we have alledged out of him in the former Chapter of what Religion he was Of Daniel Sampson and Elnodugus tho' John Bale speak little or nothing yet Capgrave Leland and others shew that they were of the same Religion with the rest Daniel being the first Bishop of Bangor and Sampson next after St. David was Bishop of that place 21. Of Asaph Bale saith He was Scholar to the foresaid famous Abbot Kentegern and was made Bishop of Elgoa in Wales which of his name was called Asaph ever since He flourished in the year 590 and saw the coming in of Augustin and his Fellows from Rome and was the first of the Britans saith Bale qui à Gregorii Romani Discipulis in Angliam adventantibus Auctoritatem Unctionem accepit that took his Authority and Vnction or Consecration from the Disciples of Gregory Bishop of Rome that came into England So writeth Bale and by this sheweth that St. Asaph held nothing against the Roman Religion seeing he accepted his Authority and Consecration from the Bishop of Rome Besides this this Bishop St. Asaph hath his Memory celebrated in the Roman Martyrology upon the first day of May which he should not if he had been different in any one point from the Roman Religion 22. And so being come down now to St. Augustin's time it is to no purpose to go any farther or name the rest that do ensue in Fox to wit those five Herlanus Elbodus Dinothus Samuel and Nivius for that they lived after St. Augustin's entrance whereas Fox's promise was to cite only British Teachears that were before him and different from the Roman Religion whereof he hath named hitherto none Besides that of three of these five Bale writeth not and as for Dinothus Abbot of Bangor he was the chiefest of those who opposed themselves against Augustin and set other men against him also in Synodo Wiccionum and was severely punished afterward for the same by the Providence of God as St. Bede noteth to wit by the Sword of Ethelfredus a Heathen King of Northumberland long after the Death of St. Augustin when the said Dinothus and 1200 Monks were slain at Chester by the Souldiers of the said Ethelfride Augustino jam multo ante tempore saith St. Bede ad Coelestia Regna sublato St. Augustin being taken to Heaven long before tho' Bale be not ashamed to say that it was done by his suggestion praising the foresaid Dinothus and his Confederates for that they would not preach Baptism and celebrate Easter-day according to the Custom of Rome and Universal Catholic Church 23. So as now we see that these men care not
of the Kings and Queens inclination as he presumeth and of the great Authority of Cranmer Cromwell and some other that he calleth his Gospellers or Patrons rather of his Gospel And yet if you behold the external Face of the English Church at this day all these named and others held the Catholic Faith Use and Rites and both King and Queen Cranmer and Cromwell went as Devoutly to Mass as ever before and so remained they in outward shew I mean the former three even to their Deaths And Cromwell when he was to die protested on the Scaffold that he was a good Catholic Man and never doubted of any of the Church Sacraments then used and the like would Cranmer have done no doubt if he had been brought to the Scaffold in King Henries days as he was to the Fire afterwards in Queen Maries which had been a happy case for him 9. There ensued the year 1534 which was the year indeed of open breach with Rome for that an Excommunication being set forth by Pope Clement VII against King Henry VIII upon notice given of his Marriage and the said Excommunication set up in Dunkirk and other Towns in Flanders which did import the consent also and concurrence of Charles the Emperour and then certain Prophesies being blown about at home as coming from Elizabeth Barton sirnamed the holy Maid of Kent about the King's Deprivation he was much more exasperated than before and so calling a Parliament caused the Pope's Authority to be wholly extinguished and transferred to himself and made divers Bishops in order to preach at Paul's Cross against the Pope's Supremacy over the Catholic Church But what may we think that these Bishops did in so small a time change their belief in matters of Faith The King also being angry with divers Friars as namely with F. Elstow beforenamed that contradicted Cutwyne the Preacher when he inveighed against the Pope's Authority did this year upon the 11th of August ordain That all the observant Friars of St. Francis's Order should be thrust out of their Convents beginning with Greenwich where the said contradiction was made and to seem somewhat to favour the Augustin-Friars of whose Order Luther had been he commanded them for the present to be put in their places yet did he at the very same time cause John Frith to be burn'd in Smithfield for denying the Blessed Sacrament and this by his own particular order which Frith and his Master Tyndal were the greatest Enemies that Friars had 10. He burned also this year Henry Poyle William Tracy and other Protestants as Fox testifieth in his Calendar So as we may see that the King's Faith was as before and tho' he were content to suffer some new-fangl'd Spirits to ruffle at this time as namely Friar Barnes in London where he preach'd most seditiously and Hugh Latimer in Bristol where as Stow saith he stirred a notorious Tumult causing the Mayor to suffer Lay men to preach and to prohibit and imprison Priests and other like Disorders yet what the King thought inwardly of them he declared afterwards by his acts when he burned Barns and cast Latimer into the Tower and kept him there with evident danger of his life so long as himself lived which disposition of King Henry Tyndal smelling at the same season wrote from Flanders to his Scholar John Frith Prisoner in the Tower of London in these words And now methinketh I smell a counsel to be taken c. But you must understand that it is not of a pure heart and the love of Truth but to avenge themselves and to eat the Whores flesh and to suck the marrow of her bones c. So wrote that honest man signifying that King Henry was resolved to make an outward shew in favouring the Gospellers not for love or liking he had of them but to revenge himself of the Pope and to enjoy the Goods of Monasteries and other spiritual Livings which he in his blasphemous heretical vein calleth the Whores flesh and marrow of her bones 11. Well then this was the beginning of their Gospel in England by their own Confession and Interpretation and so whatsoever was done from this year forward against Catholics or Catholic Religion unto the 31st year of his Reign which was of Christ 1540 to wit for five whole years was upon these grounds and to the former ends of Revenge and Interest if we believe Protestants themselves in which point notwithstanding for that divers Godly Learned and Zealous men could not be content to follow the King's affections as others did and namely Bishop Fisher of Rochester Sir Thomas More late Chancellor of England and divers most Reverend and Venerable Abbots Priors and Doctors and other their like they were content to give their Blood in defence of Catholic Unity against this Schism as the Abbots of Glastenbury of Whaley of Reading Dr. Forest Queen Catharine's Confessor Dr. Powel and the like 12. Some others and amongst them one most near to the King himself both in Blood and Affection namely Cardinal Pool opposed himself by public Writing from Padua as we may see by those three learned Books left by him in Latin De Unitate Ecclesiae Others also of the same Blood-Royal as the Marquess of Exceter and Countess of Salisbury the said Cardinal's Mother shewed their dislike which afterwards was the cause of their ruin and many Shires also of the Realm at this time not being so patient as to bear these Innovations took Arms and fell into great Commotions as in Lincolnshire Yorkshire Somersetshire and some other Provinces making all their Quarrels for matters of Religion 13. So as by this we see that Catholic Religion remained still in England both in Prince and People but that the Prince for a time thought good for other ends to tolerate and wink at disorders therein until the aforesaid year of 1540 when calling all his Realm together both Spiritual and Temporal to examin well this matter of Religion they decreed that famous Statute both in Parliament and Consistory Ecclesiastical called the Statute of six Articles or as John Fox nameth it the whip with six strings or lashes in which Decree are condemned for detestable Heresies all the most substantial points of Protestants Doctrin especially of Zwinglians and Calvinists and most severe punishment of Death appointed unto the Defenders and Maintainers thereof whereby the Catholic Judgment and Censure of the whole Realm in that behalf was seen and the King himself made further declaration thereof presently for his own part by putting away his German Wife Anne of Cleve by which the Gospellers had thought to have drawn him further into League and Religion with the Protestant German Princes and by punishing Cromwell the Head and Fountain of most of these Innovations by the loss of his Head. He burned also immediately after this Statute in Smithfield upon the promulgation thereof three famous Heretics Barns Jerom and Gerard
of his Church observe what he writeth presently upon the enumeration of these foresaid Pillars of his Church 6. Wherefore if any be so beguiled in his Opinion saith he as to think that the Doctrin of the Church of Rome as now it standeth is of such Antiquity and that the same was never impugned before the time of Luther and Zuinglius now of late let him read these Histories and peruse the Acts of Parliament passed in this Realm of ancient time as Anno 5 Regis Richardi 2. 1380 c. Did you ever hear a man in his Wits reason in this sort How doth this Catalogue I pray you of condemned Heretics for these last 400 years impugn the Antiquity of the Roman Church or Doctrin before that time And again Who doth deny but that the same Roman Church and Doctrin was impugned by old Heretics long before Luther and Zuinglius yea and before Wickliff Waldenses Albigenses and Berengarius were born as by our former deduction hath appeared that she was impugned by Heretics of every Age And moreover To what purpose doth Fox will us to read these Histories and the Acts of Parliament passed against Wickliffians in the time of King Richard II To what purpose I say doth this simple Fellow talk and write this against himself seeing that by these Histories and Statutes we learn nothing as before we have noted but only that his elder Brethren the Lollards and Wickliffians were condemned for Heretics by public Authority of our Realm above 200 years agone Which we grant unto him without further proof 7. Wherefore to leave this childish babling that is without sense consequence or reason and to return to some more serious Argument We shall handle here two Points for better discussion of this Succession of Sectaries alleged by John Fox First What are the Conditions necessarily required to a good Ecclesiastical Succession for demonstrating a Church And then What manner of men these were indeed which Fox doth here assign for Representation of his Church And all shall be done with as much brevity as may be 8. The first Condition is That this Succession of men that make the Church be Universal both in Place and Time that is to say to use St. Augustin's words Non quae hoc loco est sed quae hoc loco per totum Orbem terrarum nec illa quae hoc tempore sed ab ipso Abel usque in finem c. That it be not in this or that particular place only but in this place and throughout the whole World and that it be not only in this or that time but that it be from Abel to the end of the World. By which words of St. Augustin we see that the visible Succession of the true Church must be Universal first in Place and that it must be a visible Company professing Christ under one Faith and Doctrin not in this or that particular Country Province or Place only but over all the World where Christians are And so we see it verified in the Succession of the Roman Church in our former deductions 9. Secondly It must be Universal in Time for that it must not begin from John Wickliff only Bertramus or Berengarius as John Fox doth appoint the Visibility of his Church but it must come down from the Apostles and endure visibly to the end of the World yea from Abel himself as St. Augustin saith for that even from Him Christ instituted a visible Church and continued the same by Succession under all three Laws both of Naturè of Moyses and of Grace as St. Augustin in his Book de Civitate Dei doth declare at large and in our days Dr. Sanders most Learnedly in his Excellent Work de Visibili Monarchia doth prove the same 10. So as this Collection of Sectaries alleged here by John Fox being neither Universal in place nor agreeing in Faith with the Universal known Church of Christendom but with particular Assemblies one in one place and another in another nor yet having Universality of Time as not coming down from the Apostles Age but only for some 400 years as Fox himself confesseth these men I say cannot make a true Church tho' they have some sparks of true Doctrin among them as Fox braggeth seeing it is true which St. Augustin affirmeth Quicunque credunt quòd Christus Jesus in Carne venerit quòd fit Filius Dei c. Et tamen ab ejus Corpore quod est Ecclesia ita dissentiunt ut eorum communio non sit cum toto quacunque diffunditur sed in aliqua parte separata inveniatur manifestum est eos non esse in Catholica Ecclesia Whosoever doth believe that Christ Jesus came in Flesh and that he is the Son of God c. And that they do so dissent from his Body that is the Church as they do not communicate with the whole spread over all parts but only with some separate part it is manifest that these men are not of the Catholic Church And thus much of the first Condition 11. The second Point to be considered is When the ancient Fathers do stand upon visible Succession of Men as a Note of the true Church they meant it especially by Bishops that come down by continual Succession from the Apostles time to ours Ecclesia saith St. Augustin ab Apostolorum temporibus per Episcoporum Successiones certissimas usque ad nostrum deinceps tempora perseverat The true Church doth persevere from the Apostles time unto ours and after us again to the Worlds end by most certain Succession of Bishops c. St. Irenaeus also Tertullian Optatus and St. Augustin before-alleged do each of them as you have heard deduce the visible Succession of the Church from the Apostles to their days by the visible Succession of the Roman Bishops 12. And finally the Sentence of the said holy Father St. Augustin is notoriously known in many parts of his Works concerning the importance of this Succession Tenet me saith he in Ecclesia Catholica ab ipsa Sede Petri ad praesentem Episcopatum Successio Sacerdotum The Succession of Priests he meaneth Bishops from the Seat of St. Peter unto the present Bishop of Rome holdeth me in the Catholic Church And again against his old Master Faustus the Manichee Vides in hac re quid Ecclesiae Catholicae valeat Authoritas quae ab ipsis fundatissimis Sedibus Apostolorum usque ad hodiernum diem succedentium sibimet Episcoporum serie tot populorum consensione firmatur Dost thou not see of what force the Authority of the Catholic Church is which being established by the most firm foundations of the Apostolic See doth endure unto this day by the Race of Bishops succeeding one another and by the consent of so many Nations under their Government 13. Behold here four things especially required by St. Augustin in Succession of men that must demonstrate a true Church First
conform to this do speak also other ancient Fathers as well Greek as Latin and one thing is specially to be noted That both the Greek and Latin Church did agree therein in the said Council there being present two Patriarchs of the Greek Church to wit those of Constantinople and Hierusalem and others both Archbishops Bishops and Prelates So as of both Churches the Archbishops were 70 the Bishops 412 Abbots and Priors 800 and Prelates in all 1215 together with the Legats Doctors and Embassadors of both Empires West and East as also of the Kings of France Spain England Hierusalem and others So as this point of Doctrin about Transubstantiation was not hanled in corners but publicly and the Council doth not deliver the same as any New Doctrin but only as an Explication of That which ever had been held before 19. And the same is answered to the other-like Heretical Cavils about other points here objected by Fox and Sir Francis of an Vniversal Pope the use of the Mass and Propitiatory Sacrifice the setting up of dead Mens Images and the like For if they understand by the first the Primacy and Supreme Authority Ecclesiastical of the See of Rome and her Bishops and by the second the Christian external Sacrifice of the Body and Blood of our Savior instituted by himself as the Complement of all other Sacrifices that went before and by the third Sacred Memories and Images of Christ and his Saints that are not dead but living and reigning everlastingly in Heaven then are all these Doctrins howsoever disguised by Heretics with different words to make them more odious most true and Catholic Doctrins and received in the Church from the beginning and continued from the Apostles downward 20. And albeit these People to continue cavilling do alledge divers times that the first of these Articles about the Popes Supremacy did begin first under Pope Gregory the Great and Phocas the Emperor about the year of Christ 600 and that the last about the Vse of Images was decreed in the second General Council of Nice about the year 700 and that the other of the Use of Mass began by little and little they cannot tell when yet is this all most ridiculous and themselves dare not stand to any certain time by them assigned for that presently we appoint another time before that wherein these things were also acknowledged which they cannot do in the Heresies by us objected to them for that we shew indeed the very true time wherein they began and had their off-spring together with the proper Authors Places Occasions and other-like particularities recorded not by our selves but by other authentical Writers before us so as reasonably there can be no doubt thereof And herein stands the true difference between us We really and substantially shew the Beginning and Authors of their Heresies for that they are Heresies indeed but They cannot shew the Beginning or Author of any of our Articles of Belief since Christ and his Apostles for that they are no Heresies but Catholic Doctrins and have ever endured from Christ downward tho' in some Ages more than other they have been expounded or declared by Fathers and Councils according to the necessities of the time and this is one proper Office of the Holy Ghost appointed for Guider of the Church to explain matters as doubts do arise 21. Wherefore this is the first way of trial whether the foresaid Articles of the Roman Religion taught at this day about Transubstantiation Mass and the like be the same that Pope Eleutherius held and sent into Britanny or not And I do call all this kind of Argument Negative both in respect of our Adversaries that deny them to have been then in use and of Us that deny them to have been brought in afterward And they ought to prove the second seeing they cannot deny but that they were once generally in use and received over Christendom Whereof we do make the former most infallible Inference with St. Augustin That forasmuch as they were once in use and generally received and no particular beginning can be shewed of them or of their entrance Ergo They came from the Apostles themselves 22. To this Inference the Sectaries and Heretics of our time have one only shift more which is That albeit these Doctrins have for many Ages been received generally in the Church of Christendom yet that they crept into the same by little and little and finding no resistance began at last to be universally believed But this creeping Instance can have no place here by any probability For to say nothing of the Providence of God in protecting his Church from such creeping Errors nor yet of the Promises of Christ before-mentioned to the same effect Reason it self doth demonstrate also that this possibly could not be For if the Doctors and Fathers of the Church did note and discover from time to time every least Heresie or Error that did peep up in their days and this not only in Heretics but in divers principal Fathers also that held any particular Opinions as is manifest in St. Cyprian Lactantius Arnobius Cassianus and others If this diligence I say were used by them in all other occasions how could it happen that so many so manifest and so important Doctrins as are in controversie between Us and Protestants should be let pass without Note or Contradiction if they had been either New or Erroneous How should it come to pass I say that no one of these ancient Fathers should ever impugn any of these Doctrins if they were New Opinions and brought into the Church contrary to the Doctrin that was before as these men do say Yea how should it fall out that no one Record in the World should be left by our Ancestors that at such a time by such or such occasions began the Doctrin of Purgatory of Praying to Saints of the Real Presence of the Vse of Images of Mass and Sacrifice of seven Sacraments and the like that were not held in the Church before 23. And that this is impossible may be shewed by this experimental Deduction which now I will set down Let us imagin that none of these Doctrins were in the first Age under the Apostles and namely that then there were but two Sacraments no Purgatory at all or any External Sacrifice held We ask them concerning the second Age wherein Justinus Polycarpus Irenaeus Clemens Alexandrinus and Tertullian were chief Teachers whether these Doctrins were in this Age or no If they deny it tho' we might prove the contrary out of their Works yet not to pass from this first kind of Argument we ask the like of the third Age under Origen Cyprian Dionysius Alexandrinus Pamphilus Arnobius and the rest And if they deny of this Age also that these Doctrins were not held by them we go to the fourth Age under Athanasius Hilarius Optatus Basil Nazianzen Ambrose Hierom Chrysostom Epiphanius Cyrillus In whose Writings
what they say or avouch so they say somewhat against Rome and those that any way favoured the same wherein passion doth so greatly blind them as they cannot discern when they alledge matters plainly against themselves as you have seen in the former enumeration of British Teachers Pastors and Prelates whom they would have us think to have been of a different Religion from that of Rome whereas their own words testimonies condition and state of life do testifie the contrary And so I leave these men to their folly and impudency in this behalf CHAP. XI The Deduction of the aforesaid Catholic Roman Religion planted in England by St. Augustin from his time to our days And that from King Ethelbert who first received the same unto King Henry VIII there was never any public interruption of the said Religion in our Land. HAving shewed before how that the Roman Catholic Faith was first preached in our Island under the Apostles and then again in the next Age under Pope Eleutherius and thirdly four Ages after that again under Pope Gregory and that all this was but one and the self-same Religion continued renewed and revived in divers times under divers States and People of the Realm there may seem to remain only now two other points considerable in this affair The first Whether this Religion brought in by St. Augustin to England were held at that day for the only true Religion of Christendom and so accepted by all the World The other Whether that Religion then planted hath come down and been continued in England ever since by continual Succession until the first public alteration made thereof in our days For if this be so then is the demonstration easie to be made even from the Apostles Times to Ours 2. And for the first tho' we have handled the same somewhat before yet briefly we will add now That there can be no doubt at all in this matter with men of Reason and Judgment but that St. Augustin and his Fellows brought in with them the whole Body of Religion as well touching Articles of Belief as Ceremonies and Ecclesiastical Customs which were at that time in use at Rome whence they came and in other Catholic Countreys by which they passed namely Italy France and Flanders from which Countreys Pope Gregory himself exhorteth them by his Letters to take such good Ecclesiastical Uses as they should see most agreeable to Piety Edification and Devotion which is a sign that all those Countreys agreed fully in Faith and Belief with Rome at that day and were perfectly Catholic tho' in some external Ceremonies belonging to Devotion there might be difference And forasmuch as the French Bishops St. German St. Lupus and St. Severus 150 years as hath been said before the entrance of St. Augustin planted in Britanny the French Catholic Faith against the Pelagians and these men coming from Rome found no fault therewith most certain it is that all was one And finally if we do consider the Works Writings and Actions of Pope Gregory related by us before partly out of St. Isidore living at that time in Spain partly out of his own Epistles yet extant written to the chiefest Bishops of the Christian World and their Answers to him again together with their agreement in Faith and Religion If we do consider also the Heresies condemned in his days by Him and his Authority as the Eutychians Monothelites and others which our Protestants also do condemn for Heresies at this day By all this I say and by infinite other Arguments and Demonstrations that may be made it is most evident that either Christ had no Visible Church or Catholic Religion in those days which were most foolish and wicked to imagin or that the Religion of St. Gregory and his Church of Rome and others of others of the same Communion was in that Age the only true Catholic Church and consequently had in it the only true Catholic Faith and Religion of Christ whereby Christians might be saved which also is proved most evidently by infinit Miracles wrought in England and in divers other Countreys upon manifold occasions during this time of our Primitive Church as shall appear more in particular in the deduction of our second point which is the continuance of this same Religion from St. Augustin to Thomas Cranmer the first and last Archbishops of Canterbury following by Succession the one the other for the space of above 900 years the first dying a Saint the last ending in Apostacy as after shall be shewed 3. Wherefore to come to the second point about the deduction of Catholic Religion in our Nation from St. Augustin downward first of all St. Bede talking of the planting thereof and of our first Primitive Church whose progress and increase he describeth for the space of almost 140 years after the entrance of St. Augustin hath these words Gregorius Pontifex Divino admonitus instinctu servum Dei Augustinum alios plures cum eo Monachos timentes Dominum misit praedicare verbum Dei genti Anglorum c. Gregory the Pope being admonished by heavenly Instinct did send God's Servant Augustin and others Monks with him that feared God to preach his Word to the English Nation in the 14th year of Mauritius the Emperour which was of Christ 596 and the 4th after that St. Gregory was made Pope 4 These holy men landed in the Isle of Thanet belonging to the Kingdom of Kent for that the whole Dominion of the Saxons in those days which was all the Land except Scotland and the other part now called Wales whither the reliques of Britans were retir'd was divided into seven several States and Dominions which they called Kingdoms The first whereof to speak of them according as they received the Faith was the Kingdom of Kent whose King Ethelbert being the fourth in number from Hengistus that began the same about the year of Christ 450 afterward first of all other received the Christian Faith at the preaching of St. Augustin about the year of Christ 600 that is to say an hundred and fifty years after they had reigned as Pagans there 5. The second Kingdom was of the East-Saxons and contained the Shires now called Essex Middlesex and Hartfordshire The first founder of which Kingdom was Erchenwine about the year of our Lord 527 as Stow and some others do hold tho' Malmesbury doth write otherwise but both do agree that under King Seebert or as Bede calleth him Sabered those Provinces were converted to Christian Religion by the preaching of St. Mellitus Fellow to St. Augustin and first Bishop of their chief City of London whither he was sent by St. Augustin from Centerbury in the year of Christ 604. 6 The third Kingdom was of the East-Angles which contained the Shires of Norfolk Suffolk Cambridge and the Isle of Ely. Which Kingdom was begun about the year of Christ 492 by one Vffa but converted after to
Anselmus and so successively one after another none of them ever being noted to be contrary to his Predecessor in Religion until Thomas Cranmer in King Henry the Eighth's time Who applyed himself to the Religion which the State and Prince liked best to allow of in that time And after the Kings Death agreed to break his last Will and Testament in changing that Religion into Zuinglianism most detested by his Majesty And after again Conspired to put down and destroy all the Kings Children and to set up the Duke of Suffolks Daughter And finally was put to Death both for Heresie and Treason in Queen Maries time as after more particularly shall be shewed And this was the first change of Religion in any Arch-bishop of Canterbury from the beginning unto his days 28. So as from King Ethelbert the first Christned English King unto King Henry the Eighth being the Eighteenth from William the Conqueror and more than Eighty from the said Ethelbert one and the self same Faith endured in England and the self same Church florished under so many different both Kings and Nations as before hath been shewed And the like we have declared to have been for the first 600 years under the Britans to wit that they never were known to have changed their Religion Which being so the deduction and demonstration is so clear as any reasonable Man can either make or require for proof that one and the self same Religion endured from the beginning to the ending among them 29. Unto which kind of proof the Ancient Holy Father and Martyr St. Irenaeus giveth great Authority by a like Argument For that having made the like Enumeration of the Bishops of Rome as we do now of our Arch-bishops of Canterbury against the Heretics of his days and that from St. Peter downward to Pope Eleutherius that lived with him he inferreth this conclusion Est plenissima haec ostensio unam eandem vivificatricem fidem esse quae in Ecclesiis ab Apostolis conservata tradita in unitate c. This is a most full proof that one and the self same lively Faith hath been conserved in the Church from the Apostles days unto our time delivered from one to another in unity c. And if that were a most full proof and demonstration in St. Irenaeus judgment against the Heretics of his time The same is now much more to us having seen the Succession of so many Ages since and noted the manner of like proof and Argument in all other Fathers after him As namely of St. Augustin Numerate sacerdotes velab ipsa Petri Sede in ordine illo Patrum quis cui successit videte Number the Priests that have succeeded the one to the other even from the Seat of Peter himself And then further In hoc ordine Successionis nullus Donatista Episcopus invenitur No one Donatist Bishop is to be found in this rank of Succession And yet more 30. Et si in illum ordinem Episcoporum quisquam traditor per illa tempora subrepsisset nihil praejudicaret Ecclesiae And if any Traytor in those days should have crept into that order and rank of Roman Bishops for of them he speaketh it should not have prejudicated the Church of God. 31. Which saying of St. Austin may serve us not only to Answer whatsoever Heretics do or may object true or false against the Lives of any latter Roman Bishops but for defence also of the Rank and Succession of our Archbishops of Canterbury notwithstanding the Apostasie of Thomas Cranmer or any other his like that for these latter years may have crept in as St. Austin saith or been thrust in and by violence occupied that See and Seat unworthily either in respect of his life or Religion or both seeing that the former Succession as well of Men as of Doctrin from St. Austin to Cranmer is manifest and evident for the space of 900 years without interruption as also that they were united all this time in Faith and Doctrin with the Universal Church of Christendom as Members and Branches of their Head and Body and that the first breach and interruption made thereof in that See by Cranmer and continued after him by some of his followers was noted presently and contradicted yea censured and condemned also by Sentence of the whole Church and thereupon rejected and abhorred by the principal of his own people both Clergy and Laity at that time 32. And the same contradiction endureth to this day and will do ever in those that conserve their Ancient Faith and Religion and do adhere to the lawful Succession of his Predecessors against him and his partners until it please Almighty God to put the said order and lawful Succession in joynt again and restore that chief and head conduct of our Country to his former integrity whereby the Water of true Catholic Religion was wont to be derived to the people of our Land and will be again when Gods wrath for our sins shall be pacified and his mercy induce him to permit as often otherwise he hath done that all return to the accustomed Ancient course of Catholic Faith and Religion again seeing in very deed there is none but that for so much as Sects and new Religions are but inventions and entertainments of time whilst God punisheth some sins in his Servants and after all returneth where it was before 33. And this have we spoken by the way and by occasion of Cranmer that was the first Arch-bishop of Canterbury that ever brake from the Roman Faith but notwithstanding his Apostasie Catholic Religion was not extinguished in England by that but remained there still all King Henries time as also during the Reigns of his three Children King and Queens Edward Mary and Elizabeth unto these our days as in the next Chapter following more largly and particularly we are to demonstrate CHAP. XII How Catholic Religion hath continued and persevered in England during the times and Reigns of King Henry the Eighth and his three Children King Edward Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth notwithstanding all the troubles changes alterations and tribulations that have fallen out and that the same Religion is like to continue to the Worlds end if our sins hinder not THE deduction which we have hitherto made of Catholic Religion from our first Conversion under St. Gregory and King Ethelbert of Kent unto the Reign of King Henry the Eighth with whom concurred in the See of Rome Leo the Tenth and Clemens the Seventh and other Popes Successors of St. Gregory hath been for the most part in time of Peace and without any public discontinuance at all but now are we to prosecute the same matter from the alteration made by King Henry downward unto our days and therein to shew that albeit in the external Face and Form of Religion there have been divers Mutations as Tempestuous Winds and Storms for the present yet hath the Catholic
each Sect pretended Scriptures for themselves yet the vertue and substance of Scriptures consisting in their true meaning and interpretation thereof it was intolerable pride and insolency in them to arrogate to themselves the said true Interpretation and Exposition before the whole Church of God that went before them And hereof ensued the justness of their punishment which in Catholics can have no place as before hath been shewed Yet one Example of each sort of these men shall we here alledge thereby better to declare the Case 21. King Henry during his Reign caused sundry sorts of men to be put to death about matter of Religion as is notorious and first certain Anabaptists and new Arians namely in the 27th and 30th years of his Reign In the former of these two Condemnations were nineteen Men and six Women as Stow and others do relate and in the second were three Men and one Woman condemned These Anabaptists denied amongst other points that Children ought to be baptized before they come to years of discretion and can actually believe for defence of which Doctrin they stood resolutely upon many clear places of Scripture as to them then seemed to wit Qui crediderit baptizatus fuerit salvus erit Marc. 16. He that shall believe and be baptized shall be saved Lo say they it is necessary to believe as well as to be baptized which Infants being not able to do ought not to receive Baptism in their Infancy or if they do they must be rebaptized again when they come to years of discretion Thus reasoned they And besides this Text they and their chief Masters do alledge almost thirty places of Scripture more which seem most plain and evident to them as by their Books that are extant appeareth 22. The like places they do alledge also for that other absurd Position of theirs That no Magistrate may punish by death as for example those words of God Exod. 20. Non occides Thou shalt not kill and again the saying of our Savior Omnes qui acceperint gladium gladio peribunt Matth. 26. All that use the sword shall perish by the sword Thus said the Anabaptists from which by no means could they be drawn but went willingly to the fire for testimony of their Opinions The Arians also denying the Equality of God the Son with the Father alledged no less plain places as they would have them to seem namely that of Christ himself in St. John's Gospel ch 14. Pater meus major me est My Father is greater than I and many other which were too long here to recite And this of them who burned together obstinately in one fire in England 23. But what shall we say of the Lutherans Do not they alledge plain places also both against Us and Calvinists as themselves think For against Calvinists in defence of the Real Presence in the Sacrament they urge the plain words of Christ as we do Hoc est corpus meum This is my Body And against us for their gross Opinion that the substance of Bread and Wine remaineth together with the Body of Christ they alledge many places of Scripture where it is called Bread which places the Zuinglians accepting do turn the same against the Lutherans affirming that for so much as it is so oftentimes called Bread in the Scripture it is not the true Body of Christ at all And this passed between Fryer Barns and the two Apostata Priests Gerard and Jerom burned with him The first a fervent Lutheran the other two earnest Zuinglians all three consumed by Fire at one Stake in Smithfield by King Henries appointment in the Thirty-second year of his Reign 24. But now was there a third or fourth sort of Sectaries in K. Henries days who were neither Anabaptists Arians nor yet perfect Lutherans or Zwinglians but would have the Controversie of the Blessed Sacrament and Real Presence to be an indifferent thing to be believed or not believed as every Man should think best So held William Tyndall as also his Scholar John Frith whom John Fox doth compare to St. Paul and Timothy Frith being Burned in Smithfield by the Kings express Commandment in the Twenty-sixth year of his Reign and Tyndall not long after in Flanders by the said Kings procurement as more largely we shall declare in the Third Part of this Treatise when we come to examine John Fox his Calendar of Martyrs Now it shall be sufficient for proof of that we say to alledge Fox himself who setting down the Articles of Frith for which he was Burned assigneth this for the first First saith he the matter of the Sacrament is no necessary Article of Faith under pain of Damnation c. But may be believed or not believed as every Man shall think best And for proof thereof alledgeth divers Arguments out of Scripture that the Fathers forsooth of the Old Testament were saved by the same Faith that we are and yet were not bound to believe the Real Presence c. And Fox seemeth to like well both of this Argument and of the Heresie 25. Now then here be four or five sorts of Sectaries Condemned by King Henry and all defended themselves by shew of Scriptures but for that each of them doth reserve the interpretation of Scripture to themselves and thereby teacheth new Doctrin contrary to that which was received generally in the known Church before them to whose judgment and interpretation they will not yield themselves Hereof it followed that the indictment of Heresie lyeth truly and justly against them and that they were worthily Condemned and Burned for this Pride self-will and obstinacy But on the contrary side against the Catholics that died for the Ecclesiastical Supremacy of the Pope none of these Accusations can justly be laid for that they do neither stand upon their own judgment nor have invented any thing of new nor do adhere to their own Interpretations or Exposition of Scriptures but being accused do make their Plea and Defence far otherwise to wit that they found this Doctrin of the Popes Supremacy in use and practice before they were born as a thing received from Age to Age by the known Catholic Church time out of mind that they see all Christian Kingdoms and Princes to have embraced the same and General Councils to have allowed thereof That the Texts and Examples of Scripture alledged for the proof of this Article and all others whereon they stand are not inventions of their own but so expounded by Ancient Fathers and uniform consent of the Catholic Church that all our Christian English Kings from our first Conversion unto King Henry the Eighth acknowledged this Spiritual Authority of the Bishop of Rome and King Henry himself defended the same most earnestly with his own Pen not many years before against Luther and Lutherans That it is not a thing devised but delivered as Tertullian said of the Catholic Faith and therefore if any point thereof were to
be altered it must be done by the same Authority by which it was delivered to them to wit by the whole Church Councils and General Pastors thereof 26. This was the Defence and Pleading of Catholics under King Henry the Eighth to excuse themselves from Treason objected against them for holding the Popes Supremacy wherein you see divers notorious differences between the Defence of the Sectaries and them for that amongst the Sectaries every one held what himself thought best of things invented by themselves every one cited Scriptures and interpreted them as he listed without Authority President or Example of former Ages and consequently they are justly called Heretics that is to say choosers For that they chose to themselves what to believe in every Sect and reduced the last and final resolution of all things to their own Wills and Wits which in matters of belief is the highest Crime that against God and his Church can be committed 27. But on the other side the state and condition of the Catholics and their cause is quite opposite to this for that they stick to Authority Obedience Integrity Example of their Ancestors they bring nothing of their own they invent or innovate nothing They stand only upon that which they have found Established to them not by this or that Man or by this or that Author of any Sect or by this or that particular Congregation fellowship or Faction or by this or that Town City Province Kingdom or Country but generally by the whole universal Church and Pastors thereof and therefore properly and truly are called Catholics which is to say Vniversal and general 28. And this shall suffice to shew the difference between the Catholic Martyrs and Heretical Malefactors put to death in King Henries time whereof yet we shall Treat more largely in the third part of this Treatise where we are to handle the particular Stories of Fox his Calendar-Martyrs and to compare and paralell them with ours shewing that yet never Dogs and Cats nor yet Sampsons Foxes did ever so disagree in natures and conditions as these good Martyrs did in Faction and contrariety of opinions amongst themselves and consequently could not be Martyrs or witnesses of any one Faith whatsoever 29. And with this also will we end the Discourse of King Henries Life having sufficiently shewed as to me it seemeth that the Catholic Religion held her footing and continuance also under ther Reign of this King no less perhaps than before yea she shewed her self much more to the World by the Persecution which then she suffered than before in the time of peace for that the Famous and Illustrious Martyrdoms of such excellent Men as were Bishop Fisher Sir Thomas More Dr. Forest and many other such Worthies that suffered Martyrdom in those days did more Illustrate her and made extern Nations to talk more of the Zeal and Constancy of English Catholics than ever they would have done if that Persecution had not fallen out and the like success hath happened since both under King Edward the Sixth and her Majesty that now is as briefly we shall here declare 30. And as for King Edwards Reign as it was but short and the first passage from Catholic Religion to open Profession of Heresie So was it not so sharp for effusion of Blood as under King Henry For that the King being very young and those that Governed in his Name not thorowly settled in their States and Affairs troubled also with much Division and Emulation among themselves could not attend to prosecute matters so exactly against Catholics as some of their desires and Appetites were yet began they very well as we may see by the most unjust Persecutions and Deprivations of two principal Bishops Gardiner of Winchester and Bonner of London by such violent Calumnious manner as was proper for Heretics to use The particulars whereof John Fox doth set down at large whereby a Man may take a taste what they meant to have done if they had had time For that Cranmer and Ridley that had been Bishops in King Henries time and followed his Religion and humor while he lived being now also resolved to enjoy the Preferment and Sensuality of this time so far as any way they might attain unto getting Authority into their hands by the Protector and others that were in most Power began to lay lustily about them and to pull down all them both of the Clergy and others whom they thought to be able or likely to stand in their way or resist their inventions 31. And hereupon divers were laid hands on and Imprisoned divers fled over Seas sundry most Captious and Calumnious Questions and Demands were devised to entangle Men As Namely Whether a King of one year old were not as truly a King as at Forty or Fifty which if you did grant concerning the Title and Right of his Crown which is true then presently they inferred that King Edward being but Nine years old wanting yet discretion might also be lawful Head of the Church and determine Controversies of Religion yea change the Faith and Religion which his Father and all his Ancestors Kings and Princes of England all Parliaments Synods and Councils before his days had left unto him for the space of a Thousand years and more And albeit he had not sufficient judgment to understand what Religion meant yet was he made judge thereof by vertue of his Birth and Succession to the Crown And this Point was wonderfully urged by the Protector Seymor to all Preachers Prelats and Bishops of that time that they should inculcate the same to the people in their Sermons to the end that himself taking all the said Child Kings Authority upon him might be Head and Judge in his place Whereunto that he might seem the more fit and able for his excellent learning John Bale the Apostata Friar that lived under him was not ashamed to Publish in Print and place him for a Learned Author amongst his Illustrious British Writters for that some Proclamations perhaps passed by his hands tho' otherwise he was known to be so unlearned as he could scarce Write or Read. 32. But yet as I said this Doctrin or rather Paradox of the Child Kings supereminent ability high Authority and Supreme Ecclesiastical Power to determin alter change and dispose of matters of Religion at his pleasure tho' he were but of one year old was sounded in Pulpits every where at this time whereof Sir John Cheke the Kings School-master amongst others Wrote a several Treatise besides the large Message sent in the Kings Name but of his Writing to the Catholic people of Devonshire as after shall be shewed The same also was objected grievously against Bishop Gardiner and Bishop Bonner by Name that they had not in their Sermons appointed unto them by the Protector so sufficiently urged this Point of the Kings Ecclesiastical Power in his Nonage as was required And this especially for that the people in
Realm of ancient times and therein consider the course of times where he may find and read Anno 5 Reg. Rich. 2. in the year of our Lord 1380 of a great number that there be called evil persons going about from Town to Town in Frize Gowns preaching unto the People c. Which Preachers tho' the words of the Statute do term them to be dissembling persons preaching divers Sermons containing Heresies and notorious Errors to the emblemishment of Christian Faith c. yet notwithstanding may every true Christian Reader conceive of those Preachers to have taught no other Doctrin than now they hear their own Preachers in Pulpits preach c. 22. Mark here three Points good Reader First That if all this were true that the Wickliffians had preached no other Doctrin than the Protestants do now yet nothing followeth of this but that Protestants Doctrin was condemned for Heresie not only by the Church-Laws but also by divers Acts of English Parliaments above 200 years past Which thing what help or credit it can bring to Fox his Religion which standeth chiefly in England by Authority of far latter Acts of Parliament I do not see for that hereof only may be inferred two Conclusions if his premises be true The first That Protestants were condemned for Heretics by Acts of Parliament 200 years agone The second If those ancient Acts of Parliament were of little force in matters of Religion then latter Acts that have established a different Religion may also be called in question and that with much more reason and probability 23. Secondly I say That this Assertion of Fox is most apparently false to wit that the Wickliffian Preachers taught no other Doctrin than the Protestant Preachers now teach if the Articles before alleged out of himself be truly written by him For neither do the Protestant Preachers in England at this day teach the Real Presence in the blessed Sacrament of the Altar or the Doctrin of Purgatory as you have heard Sir John Oldcastle a chief Wickliffian profess a little before nor yet do Protestants hold those Articles of John Wickliff himself which in this Chapter we have mentioned as held neither by Them nor Us. And much less do they hold any other Catholic Opinions which the Wickliffians did together with their Heresies So as this is a notorious untruth and cannot be denied or dissembled 24. Thirdly We may consider of the particular Point which before I noted That John Fox is not ashamed to cite a whole Parliament against himself and then in a word to reject the same as of no credit in the World in respect of Him and his Denial or Rejection The Parliament saith he calleth these Frize gown-Preachers the Wickliffians dissembling persons but you must think notwithstanding they were very honest men The Parliament saith That they preached Heresies and notorious Errors but John Fox saith it was true Christian Doctrin Whom shall we here believe either the whole Parliament who lived with them and examined both their Doctrin and doings or John Fox that cometh more than 200 years after them and will needs make himself their Brother whether they will or no and judge also of the Parliament But let us hear him yet further 25. Furthermore saith he you shall find likewise in Statuto anno 2 Hen. 4. cap. 15. in the year of our Lord 1402 another like Company of godly Preachers and faithful Defenders of true Doctrin whom albeit the words of the Statute there through corruption of time do falsly term to be false and perverse Preachers under dissembled Holiness teaching in those days openly and privily new Doctrin and heretical Opinions c. Yet notwithstanding whoever readeth Histories and the orderly descent of times shall understand these to be no false Teachers but faithful Witnesses of the Truth c. 26. Lo here the testimony of another Parliament of our Country held 22 years after the former which John Fox rejecteth with the same facility that he did the other For whereas the Parliament that had examined the matter protesteth That they had found them false perverse and dissembling People teaching new Doctrin and heretical Opinions Fox averreth the contrary That they were good Preachers and faithful Defenders of true Doctrin and holy Witnesses of God's Truth And for proof hereof he saith That whosoever readeth Histories and conferreth the Order and Descent of times shall understand thus much to be true But how and by what means a man shall gather this understanding he telleth us not And by the Historical Discourses and Conference of times which we have hitherto made in this Book we understand the contrary finding indeed by Descent and Order of times that these Opinions of Wickliff Husse and Lollards and the like were new heretical Opinions indeed and taken and judged so by Christendom at their up rising and appearance in the World. Wherefore this is plain impudence in Fox to say that by reading Histories and noting descent of Times these men are by him justified from being Sectaries 27. It followeth in Fox Of the like number also saith he of like true faithful favourers and followers of God's holy Word we find in the year of our Lord 1422 specified in a Letter sent from Henry Chichesley Archbishop of Canterbury to Pope Martin V. of many infected here in England as he said by the Heresies of Wickliff and Husse c. who tho' they be termed for Heretics and Schismatics yet served they the living Lord within the Ark of his true spiritual and visible Church And where is then the frivolous brag of the Papists which make so much of their painted Sheaths c 28. Do you see in what jollity of mind John Fox is put by finding out this Succession of his new visible Church for above 200 years downward Do you hear how he vaunteth of Antiquity and long Continuance albeit indeed he nameth not continuance nor can he for that I think he will not grant that the Wickliffian Church doth endure unto this day or that if a number of those Wickliffian holy Teachers and faithful Witnesses of the Truth so much praised here by him should come into England at this day or Scotland or into Germany or Geneva or among any other Sect or sort of Protestants whatsoever and should preach that Doctrin which they preached then to wit against the Church of Rome in many Points but yet defending that number of Sacraments which they did the Real Presence Sacrifice of the Mass together with those extravagant Articles also before mentioned to wit That it is against the Scriptures that Bishops or true Ministers should have any Temporal Lands and Livings and that Tythes are not due and that both Princes and Prelates do lose their Offices Authorities and Dignities whensoever they fall into mortal sin c. If these men I say that were so true Preachers and principal Guiders of the Ark of John Fox his true visible and spiritual Church
of Religion he wrote again to have the Civil and Imperial Laws sent over to him whereby to govern his Kingdom according to Christian Religion 19. All this I say doth Fox set down afterward very particularly shewing that after King Lucius and his Realm had received the Baptism of Christ were made Christians and had turned twenty-eight Heathen Flamens and three Archflamens that were before of Gentiles into so many Christian Bishops and Archbishops All this being done and well settled the foresaid King Lucius saith he sent again to the said Eleutherius for the Roman Laws thereby likewise to be governed as in Religion now they were framed accordingly Vnto whom Eleutherius again writeth after the tenor of these words following Ye require of us the Roman Laws c. 20. Whereby it is evident that this Letter of Eleutherius if it be true and not feigned by Fox was written to King Lucius some number of years after his Conversion seeing he could not setttle his Realm as here Fox describeth but in some good space of time Holinshead Hooker and Harrison Disciples also of this Fox in this do take upon them to determine the Time tho' I know not by what Authority saying That it was three years after King Lucius his Conversion and Baptism The Faith of Christ say they being thus planted in the Island Anno 177 it came to pass the third year of the Gospel received that Lucius did send again to Eleutherius the Bishop requiring that he might have some brief Epitome of the Order of Discipline then used in the Church c. 21. Thus hold they and that upon this second Embassage followed the foresaid Letter of Eleutherius to King Lucius Which if it be true then let them give Sentence of their good Father what an egregious Hypocrit and Deceiver he was to argue out of this Letter That forasmuch as it appeareth by the same that King Lucius was a Christian when this Letter was written Ergo King Lucius was not converted by Eleutherius but by some other before him tho' perhaps he might help somewhat to his Confirmation in Religion c. 22. But now to the substance of the Letter it self or rather of the piece or parcel that it hath pleased Fox and these his Scholars to impart with us You must note first That these good Scholars seeing their Master to have left us this English Epistle of Eleutherius so imperfect and curtail'd as it seemeth to have neither end or just beginning do say that the rest was lost which yet Fox telleth us not Secondly they seeing the Title to make much against them left it out as before hath been said Thirdly touching the very Corps it self of the Epistle set down by him they put it down so different both in Words Sentences Authorities and Texts of Scripture from that which Fox hath as it sheweth either the thing to be wholly feigned by Them or their Master or that they have a great Liberty and Priviledge to alter the same at their pleasures 23. And this would be sufficient for this matter but further perchance you might demand Why this Epistle of Eleutherius is alledged and urged so earnestly by them seeing it seemeth to make so little for them Whereunto I answer That the chiefest Causes seem to be two or three The first That Fox might frame thereupon his former foolish Argument That forasmuch as by this Epistle it appeareth that King Lucius was a Christian when this Epistle was written by Eleutherius it may seem that Eleutherius converted him not nor any other sent from Rome the falshood and childishness of which Argument hath been sufficiently laid open before 24. The second Cause is to found two points of Doctrin thereon The one That Scriptures only are sufficient to govern any Kingdom without other Ecclesiastical Civil or Temporal Laws which yet themselves do not practise where they have Dominion as experience teacheth us The other point is That every King is God's Vicar that is to say absolute and supreme Head in all Causes as well Spiritual as Temporal within his Realm and to this end is brought in the Testimony of this Letter of Eleutherius not only by Fox Holinshead Hooker Harrison Hastings and other of that Crew taking one from another that Argument but even their great Champion Jewell as Holinshead relateth in the first Volume of his Stories 25. The Reverend Father John Jewell saith he sometime Bishop of Salisbury writeth in his Reply unto Harding 's Answer That the said Eleutherius for general Order to be taken in the Realm and Churches here wrote his advice to Lucius in manner and form following Ye have received in the Kingdom of Britanny by God's Mercy both the Law and Faith of Christ ye have both the New and the Old Testament out of the same through God's Grace by the advice of your Realm make a Law and by the same through God's sufferance rule your Kingdom of Britanny for in that Kingdom you are God's Vicar c. 26. These are the words alledged by Master Jewel out of this Epistle which differ not much from that which is in Fox and Holinshead But both of them do add a third Clause out of the said Epistle which is this A King hath his name of Ruling and not of having a Realm You shall be a King while you rule well but if you do otherwise the name of a King shall not remain with you but you shall utterly lose and forgo it which God forbid And then maketh Holinshead this Annotation in these words Hitherto out of the Epistle that Eleutherius sent unto Lucius wherein many pretty Observations are to be collected if time and place would serve to stand upon them 27. So he saith but what Annotations these are he declareth not tho' it be easie to guess by others which he maketh in other places For that in the very next page before he maketh us a very grave Discourse How that Lucius sent to Rome the second time for a Copy of such politic Orders as were then used in the Regiment of the Church but that Eleutherius for divers reasons thought it best not to lay any more upon the Necks of the New Converts of Britanny than Christ and his Apostles had already set down to all men in the Scriptures And is not this a wise Discourse as tho' no Temporal Laws were to be made in a Christian Commonwealth but only those that are set down in Scriptures Who seeth not the madness of these Conclusions or Illations Nay who doth not consider how greatly this matter is against themselves That King Lucius dwelling so far off from Rome as he did yea being otherwise an Enemy to the Roman Nation as these men confess that he was did notwithstanding so highly respect even in those ancient days the See and Bishop of Rome that he submitted himself thereto and demanded from thence direction not
only in matters of Religion and Ecclesiastical Laws but in Temporal and Civil also and Eleutherius knowing his own Authority over him and his doubted not to appoint them what was to be done And albeit Mr. Jewell doth call it an Advice as you have heard yet the Title of the Epistle implieth more saying that it was ad correctionem Regis Procerum Regni as above we have declared And this for the first point contained in this Epistle 28. And for the second wherein Eleutherius saith that King Lucius was God's Vicar or Vicegerent as Holinshead translateth it within his own Realm what Catholic ever deny'd this or that any lawful Temporal Prince is not God's Vicar and Substitute in governing his People under him Sure we are St. Paul speaking even of a Heathen Prince or Magistrate saith Dei enim minister tibi est in bonum for he is God's Substitute to thee for thy good And in another place teaching Servants how they should obey their Heathen Lords and Masters he saith Servi obedite Dominis carnalibus cum timore tremore sicut Christo Servants obey your Carnal or Temporal Lords as to Christ himself And again in the same place Sicut Domino non Hominibus As unto our Lord Jesus and not as unto Men. And doth not here the Apostle confess expresly that Temporal Lords and Princes yea tho' they were Pagans are Christ's Vicars and Substitutes in their Government of Temporal Affairs But yet I do not think that either Fox or Holinshead will say that they were Christ's Vicars also in Spiritual Affairs or Heads of the Church within their Realms as by this Epistle of Eleutherius they would make King Lucius seem to be 29. And so finally Whether this Epistle of Eleutherius be true or feigned it maketh little for them but much rather against them And there be divers things in it which do make it probable that it is a feigned matter First for the time set down in the Title shewing it to be written after Eleutherius was dead Secondly for that neither Fox nor Holinshead would deliver it unto us in Latin as it was written Thirdly for that the Copy set down by Holinshead hath many Texts of Scriptures full little to the purpose and fondly apply'd and unworthy the great Learning of Pope Eleutherius which John Fox perceiving like a wily Fox indeed left them quite out of his Copy professing notwithstanding to put down the Epistle wholly as he found it 30. Fourthly the last point of Doctrin therein taught That Kings are no longer Kings than they rule well and do lose and utterly forgo the same when they do otherwise is a Doctrin not fit for Eleutherius but agreeing rather with that of Husse and Wickliff mentioned before in the Second Encounter as condemned by the General Council of Constance And this shall be enough about this first Heretical Cavillation concerning the Conversion of Britanny under Pope Eleutherius which our English Sectaries for hate to Rome will needs call in doubt But not being able to stand in this quarrel they flie to another of more moment which shall be handled in the ensuing Chapter CHAP. V. Of another Heretical Shift about the former Conversion of Britanny under Pope Eleutherius and King Lucius as tho' the Faith of Rome that was then did not remain now which is reproved by two evident Demonstrations the first Negative the other Affirmative WHen all the former Foxly Shifts and Devices will not serve to shake off the praise of our Britans Conversion from Rome by means of Eleutherius our Fox diggeth to himself another starting-hole whereunto when he is pressed to run and his good Cub Sir Francis followeth him diligently at the heels The Fox his words are these But grant we here that it be as they would have it and indeed the most part of our English Stories do confess it neither will I greatly stick with them therein yet what have they got thereby when they have cast all their gain In few words to conclude this matter if so be that the Christian Faith and Religion was first derived from Rome by Eleutherius let them but grant to us the same Faith and Religion that was taught in Rome and from thence derived hither by Eleutherius and we will desire no more For then was there not any Vniversal Pope neither any Name or Vse of the Mass nor any Sacrifice Propitiatory nor any Transubstantiation neither any Images of Saints departed set up in the Churches c. 2. Thus saith the Fox granting by Testimony of most Writers that which before he laboured so much to impugn Now let us hear the Cub how well he hath learned to bark after his Sire Tho' it be granted saith he that Eleutherius sending hither Preachers from Rome in King Lucius his time did first convert this Land to the Christian Faith I say there is not now the same Faith in Rome that was then There were then no Masses said no Transubstantiation known no setting up of Images in Churches no Vniversal Pope c. 3. Here you see the self-same Speech with the self-same Spirit betwixt the Cub and the Fox the Scholar and the Master but that the Scholar altereth somewhat the order to cover thereby his borrowing from the other Nay we may note another thing also which is usual in such people the Scholar is more earnest and eager than his Master of whom he took it and more over-lashing so as what the one speaketh but doubtfully the other affirmeth most resolutely what the one saith the other sweareth Let them grant us saith Fox the same Faith which was then at Rome and we desire no more This was somewhat modest tho' False and Hypocritical for he meaneth it not whatsoever you grant him or prove against him But what saith his Scholar I I say quoth he there is not now the same Faith in Rome that was then This is more resolute and peremptory as you see For who saith it I pray you I say it quoth he as tho he would challenge the field of him that will dare to deny it or prove the contrary But who are you Sir that we should yield unto you this Pythagorical Authority of ipse dixit granting all things upon your own Assertion without further proofs if you be the Man that so often before have been made a mouse and your Credit so many times shaken by shewing your false dealing then may it be now an Argument rather to the contrary to wit Sir Francis saith this or that without alledging any Proof Ergo it is probable that the matter is either feigned or falsified and this consequence you shall see much confirmed both in him and his Father Fox by this that here we are to examin 4. For first both of them do affirm as you have heard and that with great Asseveration that in the Time of Eleutherius the Pope that is to say