As for the later of calling him to account although your good wéening of the Pope persuadeth you that he would not thinke his state to be abased if the Cardinals should aske him why he dooth this or that yet they who knew him better a great deale then you and loued him so well that they woulde not belie him doo witnesse not onely by word but by writing that he will not bée dealt withall by his inferiours as Peter was by the Apostles I meane not your Canonists in whose glose it goeth for a famous rule that none may say vnto the Pope Syr why do you so But I meane the learnedst and best of your Diuines who setting the Church aboue the Pope in authoritie mislike that the Pope will not be subiect to the Councell Of whom to name one for many Iohn Ferus a Frier of S. Francis order but godlier then the common sort intreating in his Commentaries written on the Actes of the example of Peter how hée was required to render a reason of that which hee had done maketh this note vpon it Peter the Apostle and chiefe of the Apostles is constrained to giue an account to the Church neither dooth he disdaine it because he knew him selfe to be not a Lorde but a minister of the Church The Church is the Spouse of christ and ladie of the house Peter a seruant and minister Wherefore the Church may not onely exact an account of her ministers but also depose thē reiect them altogither if they be not fit So did they of old time very often in Councels But wicked Bishops now will not be reproued no not of the Church nor be ordered by it as though they were Lordes not ministers Therefore they are confounded of all and eche in seuerall by the iust iudgement of God Doo you know what Bishops they be who refuse to bee subiect to the Church Who say they are aboue the Councell Who may iudge all and none may iudge them This Preacher a Preacher of your own not ours dooth call them wicked Bishops The Lord of his mercy make his wordes a prophecy that those wicked Bishops may be confounded of all and eche in seuerall by the iust iudgement of God Hart. You bring me wordes of Ferus which were not his perhaps but thrust into his commentaries before they came vnto the print by some malitious heretike For Sixtus Senensis saith that there are witnesses of very good credit who auouch that the commentaries of Ferus vpon Matthew were corrupted by heretikes after his death before they were printed Rainoldes Sixtus saith in déede of his Commentaries vpon Matthew that they were corrupted chiefly in that place where Ferus speaketh of the keyes that Christ did promise Peter For there is set downe as a speciall note that Christ saith to Peter I will giue thee the keyes of the kingdome of heauen hee saith not the keyes of the kingdome of earth These wordes pertaine nothing to an earthly power which yet some endeuour by them to establish affirming that Peter receiued fulnes of power not only in spirituall things but also temporall And after declaration how this is plainely reproued by S. Bernard writing to Pope Eugenius it is added farther Peter receiued the keyes that is to say power not an earthly power that he might giue and take away dominions and kingdomes neither such a power that it should be lawfull for him to doo what hee list as many men dreame but he receaued the power of binding and loosing opening shutting remitting and retaining sinnes neither this at his pleasure but as a minister and seruant doing the wil of his Lord. And these are the words which sauour so strongly of an hereticall spirite that Sixtus saith it is auouched by credible witnesses the cōmentaries of Ferus on Matthew wer corrupted after his death by heretikes chiefly in this place before they wer printed Wherin both the witnesses Sixtus in my iudgement haue shewed thē selues wise For it is better to beare men in hand that heretikes corrupted the commentaries of Ferus chiefely in this place then it should be thought that the strongest hold of all your religion the Popes supreme power to giue and take away kingdomes is shaken by a man so learned so famous so Catholike as Ferus But Sixtus saith not of his Commentaries on the Acts that they were corrupted also by heretikes Yet some heretikes hand may séeme to haue béene in them chiefely in this place where he doth reproue the arrogancie of the Popes and nameth them wicked Bishops Wherefore it would do well that the ouersight of Sixtus herein were mended by some other Sixtus who might say as much of Ferus on the Actes as Sixtus saith of him on Matthew Perhaps you haue not witnesses that wil auouch this as some auouched that The least matter of a thousand For two or three such as Surius Pontacus and Genebrardus men that haue sold them selues to make lies in the defense of Popery will be readie on the credite of a Lindan or Bolsecke not only to say it but to Chronicle it too Here is al the difficultie that these bookes are printed thus amongst your selues who set them foorth first and we receiue them at your hands A great faulte I know not whether of printers or censours and allowers of bookes to the print who suffer such scandalous places to bée printed Yea to be printed so still specially when Sixtus Senensis hath said and credible witnesses haue auouched that heretikes did corrupt them No no M. Hart it is too stale a iest to say that heretikes haue corrupted the commentaries of Ferus For the abomination of the Popes supremacie oppressing both the magistracie of the common wealth and ministerie of the Church is grown to such outrage that if we whom you call heretikes should hold our peace the stones would cry against it Hart. What néedes all this of Ferus Or Sixtus Or Canonistes Or I know not who You called me to the scriptures whē I brought the Fathers and now from the scriptures you bring me to writers of our owne age Rainoldes Not from the scriptures to them but to the scriptures by them As Christ when the Phariseis sclaundered his workes alleaged the example of their own children therby to make them sée the truth And as he said to them therefore your children shall be your iudges so I say to you therefore your brethren shall be your iudges Hart. I graunt that the Pope doth not in all respectes submit him selfe as Peter to giue account of his dooings both to the Apostles and to inferior Christians But Ferus should haue considered and so must you that the times are not like It were not conuenient for him to do so now Rainoldes So I thought the case is altered You meane by the times the mē who liue
this is the mould of your owne reason wherein you cast the church to haue one visible head proportionable to the body A fansy more proportionable to the limmes of Popery then to Saint Paules doctrine touching the body of Christ. For his drift and purpose therein is to shew that as a mans body is made of sundry members which are not all as excellent one as an other the hand as the head the foote as the hand yet they are ioined togither to care one for an other all to maintaine the bodie so the bodie of Christ that is to say the church consisteth of sundry Christians as members some of greater gifts and callings then some the Apostles then that teachers the teachers then the helpers yet al ioyned together to loue and serue one an other and kéepe the church in vnitie wherby it is manifest first that in naming the head he considereth it not as a head properly but onely as a principall member For so he applieth it naming all Christians members and calling them the bodie of Christ he putteth Christ to be the head Next that by the name of head so considered hée meaneth no one man but all the Apostles as them who were indued with the chéefest gifts and placed in the highest function UUherefore if that word be strained to the vttermost as far as by the text it may the proofe that it yeldeth will argue a preeminence of the Apostles in generall ouer the inferiour members of the church but no power of Peter ouer the rest of the Apostles much lesse of the Pope ouer his fellow-bishops Hart. Yet this it doth proue that the name of head is not so giuen vnto Christ but that it may be giuen vnto a mortall man also Not as a head properly you say but as a principall member And what said I els For I graunted that Christ is properly the head of the church the Pope improperly Yet you reproued me for it Rainoldes I reproued you not because you gaue the title of head vnto the Pope for hee should be a pastour of the church of Rome and pastours for their giftes aboue the members of their churches ought to be like heads though many of them be tailes as the prophet calleth them but because you named him head of the whole church and that in such sort as it is due to none but Christ. For though you graunted Christ to be the quickening head that is to say the fountaine whence there floweth life into the rest of the bodie yet you gaue the Pope this soueraintie of headship that he should direct by his rule and power the outward functions of the bodie Wherein as of the one side you debase the worthinesse of his gifts who giueth vs Pastors and Teachers in that you doe appoint them to guide onely the outward functions of his bodie whereas he hath giuen them to the ful perfiting of his Saintes so of the other side you detract somewhat from the soueraintie of Christ when you giue his seruants dominion to guide his church by rule and power whereas they are ordeined to the worke of the ministery Wherfore howsoeuer you alay the title which you giue the Pope and say you call him head not properly but improperly a ministeriall head yet you doe imply that in this improperly which can agrée to none but him that properly is a head a head that doeth quicken guide and moue the bodie Euen as in your Canon lawe it is said of Peter The Lord did commit the charge of preaching the truth vnto him principally to the intent that from him as it were from a certaine head he might powre abroad his gifts as it were into all the bodie Hart. These wordes that you reproue in the Canon lawe are the wordes of a man of singular wit and iudgement famous both for holinesse and learning Saint Leo an auncient father who did flourish aboue a thousand yeares ago Rainoldes They aâ—e the wordes I grant of an auncient a wittie a learned holie man but a man and that is more a Bishop of Rome Now men euen the holiest while they liue in the flesh haue some contagion of the flesh and learning may puffe vp as it did the Corinthians and the best wittes are soonest tainted with ambition yea Iames and Iohn the sonnes of thunder desired superioritie and Rome a great Citie did nourish great statelinesse and that euen in the Bishops of that Citie before Leo. So they louing preeminence as Diotrephes did tooke all occasions to get it and sought some colours to mainteine it Wherefore as one in Tully said to Hortensius when he immoderately praysed eloquence that hee would haue lift her vp into heauen that himselfe might haue gone vp with her as hauing greatest right vnto her so many Bishops of Rome and Leo not the least of them did lift vp Saint Peter with prayses to the skye that themselues might rise vp with him as being forsooth his heires The Epistles and Sermons of Leo haue manifest markes of this affection as to giue a taste of them The Lord did take Peter into the feloship of the indiuisible vnitie and Wee acknowledge the most singular care of the most blessed Peter for vs all in this that God hath loosed the deceites of all slaunderers and My writings be strengthened by the merite and authoritie of my Lorde most blessed Peter the Apostle and Peter hauing confirmed the iudgement of his See in decision of faith hath not suffered any thing amisse to be seene about any of your persons who haue labored with vs for the Catholike faith and We beseech you and aduise you to keepe the thinges decreed of vs through the inspiration of God the Apostle most blessed Peter If any thing be well done or decreed of vs if any thing bee obtained of Gods mercy by daily praiers it is to be ascribed to S. Peters workes and merites whose power doth liue and authoritie excell in his owne See and He was so plentifully watred of the fountaine of all graces that whereas he receiued many things alone yet nothing passeth ouer to any man but by him To be short Leo by his exaÌ„ple his successors after him are so full of such spéeches that in the common phrase of themselues and their Secretaries all thinges pertaining to the Popes were growne to be S. Peters their prerogatiue S. Peters right their dignitie Saint Peters honour their statelinesse S. Peters reuerence subiection to them subiection to S. Peter A message from them an embassage from S. Peter Things done in their presence done in S. Peters presence Landes and possessions giuen them giuen to S. Peter And when they would haue kingdomes Princes must get them for S. Peter Their territories and Lordships S.
may séee by Eli. Rainoldes But this was verie rare extraordinarie Now the Law which God prescribed in Deuteronomie by his seruant Moses did touch the common state and ordinarie gouernment of the people of Israel For both it is generall without limitation of persons or times as to be kept still for the ending of their controuersies not onely in the dayes of Eli and it is written that when king Iosaphat restored the state decayed in Ierusalem hee set of the Leuites and the Priestes and of the chiefe of the families of Israell for the iudgements of the Lorde and for controuersies Which to haue béene done in respect of that law it appeareth by the wordes that he spake vnto them Whatsoeuer controuersie shall come vnto you from your brethren who dwell in their cities betweene blood and blood betweene law and precept statutes and iudgements doo ye admonish them that they offend not against the Lord. Wherefore séeing that the law in Deuteronomie was made to establish a highest court of iudgement in which all harder causes ecclesiasticall and ciuil should be determined without appeale farther the reason and the practise of the law do shew that in respect of the two kinds of causes there were ordained two sortes of men to heare them ecclesiasticall and ciuill the ciuill meant by the iudge the ecclesiasticall by the Priest Who because they were distinct as in office so in person too ordinarily it followeth thereof that the Priest was not meant by the iudge Hart. Yet the Glosse expounding that place of Deuteronomie doth say that by the iudge is meant the high Priest euen as I say Rainoldes But Lyra and Caietan as worthie men as they who compiled the Glosse if you will heare men doo say that by the iudge is meant the ciuill magistrate euen as I say Which sense of the place is so plaine certaine that Carolus Sigonius the Popes owne historian in a booke which lately he set foorth at Bononia with approbation of the Bishoppe and holy Inquisition and dedicated to Pope Gregory the thirtéenth affirmeth that the king is meant by the iudge in that place of Deuteronomie It may be M. Hart that sith you were beyond-sea they haue bethought them selues and seeing that your Glosse doth goe against the text they will no longer stand vnto it Indéede if the supremacie belong to the iudge the Prince hath greater right thereto then the Pope For it is certaine as I haue declared by circumstances of the scripture that the Priest was not meant by the iudge Hart. It skilleth not to my purpose whether he were or no. It sufficeth me that he who refuseth to obey the Priest must die by the law Which is enough to proue the soueraintie of one Priest Rainoldes Not so For the name of Priest in this law doth signifie the Priestes Which is cléere by reason that the punishment of the transgressor hath a relation to the law and the law doth will men to go to the Priests the Priestes it saith as of many not as of one the hie Priest Wherefore in giuing sentence of death against him who disobeieth the Priest it meaneth the Priestes according to a kind of spéech wherin the whole is noted by the part As afterward likewise entreating of the duetie and right of the Priestes it noteth them in generall by name of the Priest Hart. But here vpon mention of the Priest it foloweth who doth serue the Lord thy God By the which title the hie Priest may séeme to haue béene namely noted and seuered from the rest Rainoldes He might so were it not that the same title is also giuen afterward to Priestes generally yea where this matter is touched againe of purpose the Lord thy God hath chosen the Priestes the sonnes of Leui to serue him and to blesse in the name of the Lorde and by their word shall euery controuersie and euery plague be tried Hart. Yet you will graunt I trust that amongst the Priestes there was one chiefe yea euen in this matter of highest iudgement in doubtfull causes Which in the same place of Scripture that you brought to expound this is shewed by king Iosaphat saying vnto them to whom that iudgement was committed Amarias the Priest shall be the chiefe ouer you in matters of the Lord. Rainoldes This I will graunt you But you must graunt me also that looke what is giuen to him amongst the Priestes in matters of the Lord that is in ecclesiastical the same amongst the iudges is giuen to Zebadias in matters of the king that is in ciuil causes For Iosaphat doth say as well the one as the other So that to come now to the later point of your lame similitude if Christians must haue a soueraine Bishop ouer all because the Iewes had one chiefe Priest then Christians must haue a soueraine Prince ouer all because the Iewes had one chiefe iudge And as all harder causes at least of religion must be referred to the Pope so all of ciuill matters must be referred to the Emperour And as amongst the Iewes the Priest and iudge were resident in the place which the Lord had chosen so the Pope and the Emperour must both abide in Rome Which Pope Paule the third did feare that Emperour Charles the fifth would haue done But he sent for the French men to kéepe him out If Gregorie that now is Pope be better minded and will resigne his ciuill State vnto the Emperour with the Palace of Vaticane and Castell of Saint Angelo then may the reason which you ground vpon the law in Deuteronomie serue you with greater shew Howbeit euen in that case it would rather further the Emperour then the Pope because it mentioneth the iudge as one the Priestes as many Hart. It is not necessary for the gouernment of the common-wealth among Princes that any one of them be Prince ouer all But as the king of Iuda was in his owne kingdome so euery Prince is highest in his own dominion Rainoldes Neither it is necessarie for the administration of the Church amongst Bishops that any one of them be Bishop ouer all But as the hie Priest was chiefe ouer the Iewes so is euery Bishop ouer his owne charge Hart. Nay the case of the Church and common-wealth herein are vnlike and different Because that common-weales may be vpholden although they be gouerned not onely by diuerse kings and ciuill magistrates but also by diuerse ordinances and lawes But the Church as it hath one faith in all Christians so ought it to haue the same lawes and ordinances of religion in all countries Rainoldes This difference and vnlikenes betwéene the Church and common-wealth is lesser then you imagine if it bee marked well For iustice and right in giuing euery one his due should haue the same place in the common-wealth which faith and religion claimeth in the Church Now as in religion there are some things of substance
the worde which your exposition forceth to pointes of faith Christ himselfe applyeth it to precepts of maners kepe the commandements So pithie is the timber of which you frame your fansies Though if we should take it all as verie sounde and graunt that Christ meant obseruing and dooing of beléefe and life your purpose is not proued thereby For whether pointes of faith or precepts of maners he willeth Scribes and Pharises to bée obeyed no farther then in what they teach out of the chaire of Moses Hart. The wordes of our Sauiour are a great deale larger You straitē them I know not how All things whatsoeuer they shall say vnto you obserue ye and doo ye marke he saith all thinges And he that saith all thinges doth except nothing You except many Rainoldes The Lord did command the people of Israell to repaire in causes of difficultie and doubt to the Priestes and to the iudge and aske and they shall shew thee the sentence of iudgement and thou shalt obserue to doo according vnto all that they shall teach thee These wordes thou shalt obserue to doo according vnto all that they shall teach thee the Iewes are accustomed to alleage commonly when they defend their fond traditions receiued of their Fathers And Selomoh a Rabbin whom they make great account off doth glose them with this note Thou must not decline from that which they shall tell thee no not though they say that the right hand is the left and the left hand is the right A mightie spirit of errour that hath bewitched these men But you and your Church doo runne apace after them Perhaps you thinke you may be as bolde for your Popes as Rabbi Selomoh for their Priestes Hart. No sir. For I graunt that Rabbi Selomoh speaketh foolishly Which is plaine by the place it selfe whereon he gloseth For the scripture saith there thou shalt doo all that they shall teach thee according to the law or to his law as we reade it Wherefore to doo all that the Priestes taught is not meant of thinges vngodlie or false but onely true and consonant to the law of God Rainoldes Euen so the scripture sarth here The Scribes and the Pharises doo sit in the chaire of Moses all thinges therefore whatsoeuer they say you must obserue obserue ye and doo ye Wherein the word therefore restraineth all thinges to that which they teach in the chaire of Moses that is as I haue shewed out of the law of God So that by your leaue the dreame of the Iewes is as wise as yours in this point of all And as you say to vs so may they to you he that saith all thinges doth except nothing You except many Hart. Nay I except nothing of all which the Scribes and the Pharises teach For Christ as I saide requireth all those thinges to be obserued which they teach because they teach not other thinges but such as are to be obserued Rainoldes But if they taught any thing against the law of God I trust you will except that and graunt that all was not to be obserued which they taught Hart. If they taught any thing against the law I graunt But I deny that they taught any thing against it yea or could teach Rainoldes And why doo you deny it Hart. Because Christ saith of them they sit vpō the chaire of Moses Whereby to take your owne exposition he meant they teach as Moses did Now if they taught as Moses then taught they not against the law neither could they For if they could teach against the law of God then might that bee false which was meant by Christ that they teach as Moses Rainoldes That reason holdeth not For many speake the truth who can lye if néede be and many speake the truth in some thinges who in all thinges doo not Christ respecteth that which the Scribes and Pharises did ordinarily they read the law in the Synagogues they willed the people to obserue it yea in outward thinges as ceremonies tithes purifyings and sabbats they did exact it most straitly But as Paul said vnto the hye Priest thou sittest to iudge me according to the law and doost thou command me to be smitten against the law so did they some times teach against the law when they should teach according to it And hereof is proofe made by Christ him selfe who therefore willed his disciples to beware of the leauen that is the doctrine of the Pharises Hart. Then belike they sate not vpon the chaire of Moses at some times when they taught Rainoldes True but cleane beside it vpon a stoole of their owne For Moses wrote of Christ and Christ is the end of his law But they refused Christ and taught the people so to doo They watched him of purpose that they might finde matter of accusation against him They pronounced of him that he cast out diuels by the Prince of diuels They condemned him as guiltie of death They saide that they had found him a man peruerting the nation forbidding to pay tribute to Caesar. They sclaunderously accused the iust they did blaspheme the God of glory they put to death the Lord of life They neither entred them selues into the kingdome of heauen nor suffered others to enter in Hart. I graunt that in the person of Christ they did erre but they did not erre in expounding the law For when they were demaunded where Christ should bee borne they said at Bethleem in Iudaea and they said well But because the virgin Marie and Ioseph dwelt at Nazareth in Galile before he was borne and there he liued with them after in so much that he was called Iesus of Nazareth they thought he had beene borne there not at Bethleem and so they were deceiued and did not know him to be Christ. Rainoldes Yet this is the substance of the word of life not that there shal be a Christ which the Iewes beleeue till this day but that Iesus of Nazareth whom they crucified was that Christ. The Scribes and the Pharises said he was not Ought the Iewes herein to beleeue as they said If you thinke that they ought no maruaile if you hold that we must doo as Popes say If you thinke they ought not then the Scribes and Pharises did erre in some thinge that they taught As for that you answere they erred in Christes person not in expounding the law it is a méere cauill For we speake in generall of the chaire of Moses that is of his doctrine They erred in expounding the doctrine of Moses when they denyed to Christ the thinges which Moses wrote of him Howbeit that it is false too that they erred not in expounding the law For whereas the law is holy and spirituall requiring perfit righteousnes not onely in the outward actions of the bodie but also in the in ward affections of the minde the Scribes and the
same fauour if I would admit it VVhich I grounding my selfe vpon the most certayne foundation of the Church so strengthened by God that it shall stand for euer did gladly yeeld to and as became me accepted of it with all dutie VVherevpon his Honour sent for M. Rainoldes to conferre with me taking order also that I should be furnished with whatsoeuer bookes I did neede thereto But after we had spent certayne weekes together in conference by word of mouth and I continued still in my former mind he desired to haue the summe thereof in writing that he might see the groundes on which I stood And to this intent we set downe together breefe notes of the points that we dealt in I shewing my reasons with the places of the autours whose iudgement and learning I rather trusted too then to my owne skill and M. Rainoldes answering them in such sort as he thought good Howbeit those notes being so short as pointing to thinges rather then vnfolding them that they could not well bee vnderstood by any but our selues onely vnlesse they were drawne more largely and at full my selfe being troubled then with more necessary cogitations of death as altogether vncertaine when I might be called to yeeld vp mine account before God and man requested M. Rainoldes to take paines to penne them according to our notes thereof Promising him that I would peruse it when he had doon it and allow of it if it were to my mind or otherwise correct if I misliked ought in it This paines he vndertooke and sending me the partes thereof from time to time as he finished them I noted such thinges as I would haue added or altered therein and he performed it accordingly But when I perceiued that it was prepared to be set foorth in print I sought meanes to stay it all that I could for some considerations which seemed to me very great and important Marry since that againe vnderstaÌ„ding it to be his Honours pleasure that it should go forward wherevnto he granted me also by speciall warrant the vse of such bookes as I should call for to helpe my selfe withall I set afresh vpon it by letters written vnto M. Rainoldes receiued from him I had mine owne speeches reasons perfitted as I would VVherefore I acknowledge that he hath set downe herein a true report of those things which past in conference betweene vs according to the grounds and places of the autours which I had quoted referred my self too As for that which he affirmeth in one place that I haue told him that my opinion is the Pope may not depose Princes in deede I told him so much And in truth I thinke that although the spiritual power be more excelleÌ„t worthie theÌ„ the temporall yet they are both of God neither doth the one depend of the other VVherevpon I gather as a certaine conclusion that the opinion of them who holde the Pope to be a temporall Lord ouer Kings Princes is vnreasonable and vnprobable altogether For he hath not to meddle with theÌ„ or theirs ciuilly much lesse to depose them or giue away their kingdomes that is no part of his commission He hath in my iudgment the Fatherhoode of the Church not a Princehood of the world Christ himself taking no such title vpon him nor giuing it to Peter or any other of his disciples And that is it which I meant to defend in him and no other soueraintie Humbly desiring pardon of her Maiestie my gratious soueraine Lady for my plaine dealing in that which so Christ helpe me I take to be Gods cause and the Churches only As I do also most willingly submit my selfe to the curteous correction of all men who through greater skill and perfitter iudgement see more then I doe in the depth of these matters whereof I haue conferred Farewell gentle Reader and now that I haue shewed thee my dealing herein let me obtaine this little request at thy handes that thou be not too hasty in giuing thy iudgemeÌ„t before thou hast weighed all things sincerely and vprightly From the Tower the seuenth of Iuly Iohn Rainoldes to the Students of the English Seminaries at Rome and Rhemes BRethren my harts desire prayer vnto God for Israel is that they may bee saued For that which S. Paule wrote to the Romans touching the Israelites his brethren and kinsmen according to the flesh as being of one nation with him that must I protest to you brethren your selues my kinsemen according to the flesh in like sort and countriemen of England Of whom I haue the greater compassion and pitie because I am perswaded that you sinne of ignorance rather then of wilfulnesse and haue a deuotion to serue God aright though not the right way wherein he will be serued That I may iustly say the same vnto you which S. Paule of theÌ„ For I beare you record that you haue the zeale of God but not according to knowledge The zeale which the Israelites had was of the law The knowledge which they waÌ„ted was the true meaning of it For they expounded it after the traditions and doctrines of their Fathers and knowing not Christ to be the ende thereof they sought their owne righteousnesse against the righteousnesse of God The zeale which you haue is of the Gospel The knowledge which you want is the true meaning of it too For you are instructed to vnderstand it after the maner of your Fathers Whereby your seducer beareth you in hand that the Pope is supreme head of the Church the trade of Popish Priesthoode the way to saue soules the sacrifice of Popish Masse the souerain sacrifice in a word that Papistrie is the Catholike faith and the faith and seruice of the Church of England is cursed and damnable specially the oth of the Queenes supremacie And your mindes are taken so with these opinions that you are content to venture as farre in the defense of them as the Donatists did who loued their errours better then their liues Great zeale but not according to knowledge my brethren For the Gospell teacheth not that which you imagin your Fathers were abused by Phariseis Rabbines your Pope hath vsâ—rped ouer all Christian states your Priesthoode is impious your Masse abominatioÌ„ your Popish faith heresie our doctrine of the Queenes supremacie oth thereto our ministerie of the word of sacraments of prayers agreeth with the Gospell and therefore is holy Which thinges sith this Conference that one of your Seminarie-Priests and I haue had doth open proue peruse it â— beseech you with equitie and iudgement and studie to ioine knowledge to your zeale that you may be saued Perhaps your Superiors the guides who seduce you will not giue you leaue to reade it and peruse it But there are two reasoÌ„s which should moue them to coÌ„descend thereto the one of the worke the other of the autours The worke is a conference
Louan to himselfe and to raze out his notes of theÌ„ all sauing of Abdias a forgerie coÌ„demned by the Pope Papists the Roman Inquisitors many yeares ago with D. Hessels Censure wholly Sigonius in his storie of the Weststerne Empire hath written so of Constantine that he hath not onely not proued the charter of Constantines donation a fable that hee gaue the Western Empire to the Pope but hath disproued it Cardinall Sirletus sent him worde from Rome that Balsamon Caleca Gennadius hungrie Greekes haue mentioned that charter A miserable euidence against all ancient writers But such as it was Sigonius must enroll it and vse it gently as he doth Though ouerthrowing afterward the foundation of it yet fearfully poore man and making his excuse that he thought it his dutie to shew what Eusebius and many more had writen albeit not agreeably to the Church of Rome So the dealing of Cardinall Sirletus with Sigonius of many with Molanus of the Diuines of Louan with Ludouicus Viues may teach you my brethren to what sort of seruice or seruitude rather you are trained vp by the Popes officers who if you vtter a worde beside the artes and toung of the Romans will gag you by and by and cut your toungs if they be long Yet this is a freedome in respect of that slauerie which your Masters fat you too Alas yee knowe not seely soules nor yet doo vnderstand The thraldome of the Romish crew yoke of Popish band For it is a small thing that they should restraine you from reprouing falsehood or force you to furder it in points of lesser waight a hard thing for ingenuous mindes but small for them vnlesse they leade you also with heresie and treason to band your selues against the Lord and his anointed in the Popes quarrell that he may bee exalted as God of Gods vpon the earth The anointed of the Lord are the higher powers ordained to execute iustice and iudgement ouer the good and euill The Lord hath giuen charge of these his anointed that all eueÌ„ euery soule should be subiect to them yea though they be infidels as they were when this charge was giuen Your Masters doo teach you that if they indeuor to withdraw their subiects to infidelitie or heresie then ought they not to raigne and the Pope as iudge thereof must depose them It were a point of scandalous doctrine and erroneous to say that the persons ouer whom the power of the sword is giuen them are lay men onely not the clergie Much more to adde thereto that the things and matters wherein they haue to gouerne are onely temporall not spirituall Buâ—â—o say that the Pope may depriue them of their kingdomes nor onely take from them some of their subiects in all causes all their subiects in some causes but all their subiects and causes both it is so vngodly that Sigebert a moonke who liued fiue hundred yeares since when Hildebrand the Pope did first vsurpe that power against the Emperour Henry Sigebert an historian alleaged by your champions for a speciall witnesse that the Church of Rome had neuer any heresie nor changed ought in faith Sigebert condemneth it in the Pope as noueltie and though halfe afraid to cal it so heresie This is the golden image which your Nabuchodonosor hath raised vp to bee worshipped Beware of him my brethren who hath raised it vp and commaundeth you to fall downe before it Though he haue ensnared you with his meate and drinke yet learne of your felow and friend M. Hart to disobey him in this point If you haue not the courage to doo it where you are as Ananias Misael Azarias did returne out of Babylon into your natiue country serue the Lord with feare not in the hye places but in his holy temple But if you will neither returne vnto vs will persist there to be the Popes slaues heretikes traitors I call heauen and earth to witnesse this day that I haue warned you to turneÌ„ from your wickednes I haue discharged my dutie your bloud vpon your owne heads LVK. 23.34 Father forgiue them for they know not what they doo ¶ THE CONTENTS OF THE Chapters diuided by numbers into sundrie partes for the sundrie pointes entreated of therein The first Chapter THe occasion of the conference the circumstances and pointes to be debated on 2 The ground of the first point touching the head of the Church Wherein how that title belongeth to Christ how it is giuen to the Pope and so what is meant by the Popes supremacie Pag. 33. The second Chapter The promise of the supremacy pretended to bee made by Christ vnto Peter 1 in the wordes Thou art Peter and vpon this rocke will I build my Church 2 and To thee will I giue the keyes of the kingdome of heauen Of expounding the scriptures how the right sense of them may be knowne and who shall iudge thereof 3 What is meant by the keyes the power of binding and loosing promised by Christ to Peter and in Peter to all the Apostles Pag. 55. The third Chapter The performance which Christ is supposed to haue made of the supremacie promised 1 in saying to Peter Feede my lambes feede my sheepe 2 and Strengthen thy brethren With the circumstances of the pointes thereof Doest thou loue me and I haue prayed for thee Peter What and how they make for Peter how for all Pag. 121. The fourth Chapter The practise of the supremacie which Peter is entitled to imagined to be proued 1 by the election of Matthias to the Apostleship 2 by the Presidentship of the Councell held at Ierusalem 3 and by Paules iourney taken to see Peter and his abode with him Wherein as in other of the actes of the Apostles the equalitie of them all not the supremacie of one is shewed Pag. 151. The fifth Chapter The Fathers 1 are no touch-stone for triall of the truth in controuersies ofreligion but the scripture onely 2 Their writings are corrupted and counterfeits do beare their names 3 The sayinges alleaged out of their right writings proue not the pretended supremacie of Peter Pag. 184. The sixth Chapter The two maine groundes on which the supremacie vsurped by the Pope doth lye The former that there should bee one Bishop ouer all in earth 1 because Christ sayd There shall be one flock and one Pastour 2 And among the Iewes there was one iudge and hie Priest The later that the Pope is that one Bishop 3 because Peter was Bishop of Rome as some say 4 and the Pope succeedeth Peter Both examined and shewed to faile in the proofe of the Popes supremacie Pag. 230. The seuenth Chapter The scriptures falsly sayd to bee alleaged by the Fathers for the supremacie of the Pope as successour to Peter 1 Feede my sheepe strengthen thy brethren and that thy faith faile not belong
Peter not only my Lord but as Thomas did our Sauiour My Lord my God It is a desperate cause that wil admit no colour The Stewes of Rome haue found patrones and that which is worse then Stewes The heathens called Domitian Our Lord God the Emperor A Canoniste saith of the Pope Our Lord God the Pope Blasphemous spéeches both yet a quareller might alleadge in defense of them I haue sayde ye are Gods But the very heathens by the light of nature mislyked the one as insolent neither haue I read any Papiste no nor Iesuite that durst defend the other It was a common practise amongst the young students of our Uniuersities in the time of the Dunses and is yet amongst too many whom spottes of Dunsery haue stayned that if in disputation they were brought to an inconuenience were it neuer so absurd they would haue a distinction though voyde of braine and sense yet a distinction to mainteyne it If a man wil be peruerse it is no mastery to doe it But as a wise and learned man doth say of them that they are base wits which are so affected whereas ingenuous mindes natures wel geuen wil rather seeke howe true that is which they holde then how they may defend it making greater price of veritie then victorie so I may say yea much more in matters of religion of faith of life eternall a Christian witte and godly minde will search and weigh rather what should be saide truely then what may be said probably or colourably at the lest And I wish if it had béene the good will of God master Campian had had the grace in the Tower-conference to haue aimed at this marke rather in sinceritie to haue sought the truth then with shiftes and cauilles the mayntenance of his cause and credit But though he were froward and did shut his eyes against the beams of the light yet doe you not so for Gods sake master Hart in this conference of ours Be content to open your minde to hys grace who standeth at the dore knocketh and hearken to his voice while it is to day Beware of their example who could not beleeue or if they did beleeue durst not confes Christ because they loued the praise of men more then the praise of God and hunted after honor one of another not seking for that honor which commeth from the Lord alone Deny your selfe and your frends and all fleshly respectes geue the glory to the Highest Hart. I neither séeke for shiftes to darken the trueth nor loue the praise of men more then the praise of God It were a madnesse for a man to aduenture his life as we doe you see for the maintenance of error or of his own credit As for M. Campian I thinke of him as of my selfe I heard the disputations wherein he answered them who came to reason with him and I perceyued nothing in any of his answeres but synceritie and trueth Rainoldes My selfe was not present at the disputations but I haue read them written and that least you suspect the wryter as partiall by a fauourer of yours who was present as he saith at the whole action And I doe affyrme it in singlenesse of heart as before the Lord neither doe I doubt but al who haue the wisdome to discerne spirites wil see the same if they peruse them he sought in such sort to maintaine the credite of his cause or person as though he had set nothing more before his eyes then to perswade his proselytes that nothing could bee brought against him but he would shew it made for him I would not say so much vnlesse I knew it by his fruites For to passe ouer his often glosing against the text and facing out of places which pressed him most forcibly thinges alleadged out of the Councels of the Fathers of others which by the iudgementes of your own doctors haue that sense wherin we cyte them he by shifts and cauilles would turne their neckes cleane about and wreste them vnto his side which argued more witte then trueth and sophistrie then sinceritie But to leaue him to the Lords iudgemēt and come vnto your selfe you neither séeke for shiftes you say to darken the trueth nor loue the praise of men more then the praise of God I pray God your déedes be not as plaine to prooue you do it as the reason which you adde to proue you do it not is weake For what although it were a madnesse to doe it Many things are done which madde men scarce would doe and yet they that doe them doe think themselues well in their wittes as the Donatistes did who aduentured their liues in most desperate maner for the defence of their error and maintenance of theyr credite yea they offred themselues to the sword the fire the water séeking for death as for a treasure that they might die they thought Martyrs But whether you doe set the praise of men at that price I leaue it to your owne conscience That you seeke for shiftes the thing it self doth crie For your very answere in the defense of Leo touching vnitie of will not vnitie of substance on these words of his that Christ receiued Peter into the felowship of the indiuisible vnity is a shifte to shield him from a iust reproofe Let his owne Discourse speake and it wil graunt it For hauing saide before that Christ did place Peter as it were a certaine head to poure his giftes from him as it were into all the body to this poynt he knitteth these words by way of proofe So that if the proofe haue any kin with the thing proued the words must néedes import some preeminence in Peter aboue all the rest of the Disciples of Christ. But vnitie of wil wherein Christ doth pray that his Disciples may be one as he is one with his Father is common vnto all not peculiar to Peter as Christ himselfe doth shewe That plaister then of yours hath no vertue in it to salue the sore of Leo. Neither can you cure it indéed with any other For the vnitie which the Scriptures doe note in God and vs is of three sortes the first of persons in one nature the second of natures in one person the third of sundrie natures and persons in one qualitie In the first is One God In the second is One Christ In the third is One church The Lord receiued not Peter into the first vnitie wherein the father the sonne the holy Ghost are one God Not into the second wherein he himselfe consisting of two natures God and man is one Christ. Into the third wherein the Churche is one with Christ her head and the Churches members are one amōgst them selues he did receaue Peter but in societie with his brethren not without them in singularitie The multitude of the belieuers were of one hart
expounde the Latin according to the Hebrue but to alaye the Hebrue according to the Latine Wherefore in that I saide that if we should goe from your authenticall Latin to the originall textes it would be misliked of I doo you no iniurie Yet I mislike it not in your plea for Peter that you take aduantage not of the originall but of a translation nay I like it well Though I like not that which you adde to proue it that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greeke toong dooth signifie a rocke as Cephas in the Syriake and so the wordes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 haue one meaning For they haue one meaning not because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth signifie a rocke as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth signifie a stone as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sometimes signifieth a stone your owne learned linguists as you call them note and examples thereof are rife But that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 any where signifieth a rocke neither doo they shew nor haue other skilfuâ—l of that toong obserued You say that it is so in the Athenian language but you bring no Athenian nor any Grecian else to witnesse it And the French toong which foloweth the Gréeke as in many other words so in this hath the same word you know for a stone and for the name of Peter Wherein there is a print of the true originall meaning of that name in the Gréeke toong But Christ did call him Cephas in the Syriake toong and Cephas you say doth signifie a rocke as Fabricius sheweth But Fabricius sheweth further that Cephas doth signifie a stone also And though he or rather the Iewe whom he citeth reporteth their saying who expounde the name as taken from that worde in signification of a rocke yet hauing mentioned the other of a stone he saith therevpon that so his name is Peter in the Romane toong and in the Italian a stone is called pereda Whereunto I might adde that an other learned writer of the Iewes and auncienter then he doeth likewise say as opening the sense of Peters name that he is called stone But that Christ did meane a stone not a rocke in naming him Cephas your stoutest champion D. Sanders may serue in stéed of many witnesses For he wanting no will to go as far as the boldest and hauing many yeares aduised of the matter durst say no more for Cephas but that it signifieth a stone at the most a great stone euen petra it selfe he doeth expound in this maner Super hanc petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam Thou shalt bee the first stone next me of that church which I will build on earth In the which iudgement he doeth deserue the greater credite at your handes because he was contented to hazard his life with the Pope against his Prince in that holy quarell and hauing spent his chiefest studie in the point he had before times expounded it a rocke the which exposition so fit for the Papacy he would haue neuer left had not the truth enforced him to retire from it A thing so much the likelier because when hee laboured first to infect men with the Popes supremacie by the name of rocke and therfore both in the title and course of all his booke did sound the rocke of the church euen then he did expound Cephas and Peter doubtfully a rocke or a stone and yelding the reason why Christ did name him so he mentioned a stone onely because what place a stone hath in holding vp the house which is built vpon it the same should Peter haue in vpholding the frame of Christes militant church Wherefore you must let go your holde of the rocke whereon D. Stapleton doth beast your house is built and be content to lay a stone in stéed of it Let our Sauiour Christ alone be the rocke If you dash your selfe against him therein he will breake you in péeces Hart. It is a disputable point You sée that learned men are of sundrie iudgements in expounding of it some thinking it betokeneth a stone some a rocke Wherefore you can not force me to take the one and leaue the other Rainoldes Not by mens wordes but by the word of God I can For Christ in the Syriake toong did name him Cephas and Cephas in the Gréeke is expounded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in English signifieth a stone And sure you had done better if as the Gréeke text hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Syriake translation Cephas Cephas so you had made it in English stone and stone For Peter and peter doth not expresse the force of the Syriake word Rocke and rocke is strong but the text doth not beare it Stone and stone is fit had you not thought it too slender Now sith you doo presse the Syriake translation to shew thereby the meaning of the Latin as you say you must giue me leaue to tell you that the wordes should be rather Englished after the Syriake thus Thou art stone and vpon this stone will I build my church Hart. Rocke or stone if I should giue you leaue to choose whither of them you list what gaine you thereby Rainoldes The truth which I deale for shall gaine thus much by it that although you construe those words that Christ would build his church vpon Peter for your most aduantage euen as Sanders doth yet is it not proued thereby that Christ did promise him a supreme-headship ouer the Aposâ—les For the church of Christ which is the company of Gods elect and chosen isresembled in Scripture to a materiall temple such as was the temple which Salomon built So as that was called a house the house of prayer in like sort the church is called a house too but a spirituall house to distinguish it from that which house because it must be made of all the godly as it were of stones grounded on Christ by faith though the doctrine of the Apostles therefore Christ is called the chiefe corner stone in respect of the Iewes and Gentiles as of walls which are ioyned in him the foundation in respect of the whole house yea the foundation of foundation as the Prophet termeth him the twelue Apostles laid next vpon Christ are called twelue foundations the faithfull laide on them or rather after them on him are called stones not dead ones such as the temple had but liuing the working and framing of them to this purpose is called building and edifying which is done by preaching of the word of truth coupling them togither betwéene them selues and with Christ that they may grow to bee a holie temple in the Lord for God to dwell in by his spirite Wherefore if the wordes of Christ be
so taken that he meant the laying of Peter as a principall stone next to him selfe and others vpon him wheÌ„ he sayd Thou art stone and vpon this stone will I build my church this sheweth that Peter was in the first ranke as I may say of stones I meane he was in order with the first who beléeued and amongst those first he had a marke of honour in that he was named stone aboue his brethren But it sheweth not that he should be head of the rest of the Apostles For as he so they are called foundations and Christ did build his church as well on them as on him Hart. Then you grant that Christ did promise to build his church vpon Peter Rainoldes I doo so Hart. Not vpon his doctrine onely but his person Rainoldes After a sort What then Hart. What then What say you then to Doctors of your owne side namely to Sadeel and Mornay whom you praised so greatly and brought them me to reade They write that the church was builded not vpon the person of Peter but vpon his doctrine preaching Christ vnto vs. You graunt the contrarie Rainoldes What say you to the auncient Doctors whom they follow chiefly to S. Austin He writeth that the rocke which our Sauior promised to build his church vpon is Christ and not Peter You hold the coÌ„trary Thou art Peter saith he and vpon this rock which thou hast confessed vpon this rock which thou hast knowne saying Thou art Christ the sonne of the liuing God will I build my church I will build thee vpon mee not me vpon thee For men entending to build on men said I hold of Paul I of Apollos I of Cephas that is Peter and others who would not be builded vpon Peter but vpon the rocke said I hold of Christ. For the rocke was Christ vpon the which foundation Peter him selfe was builded sith no man can lay an other foundation beside that which is laide which is Iesus Christ. What say you to the rest namely to Gregorie Nysâ—en to Cyril to Chrysostome to Ambrose to Hilarie They write that this rocke is the consession of Peter They say not it is Peters person Hart. That exposition of S. Austin denying Peter to be the rocke was lapsus humanus as D. Stapleton calleth it caused by the diuersitie of the Gréeke and Latin toong which either he was ignorant of or marked not Howbeit neuerthelesse it hath a true meaning though not the full proper sense of this place Besides that him selfe doth other-where expound it as vnderstood of Peter according to the famous verses of S. Ambrose in which he calleth Peter the rocke of the Church The rest of the Fathers who apply the rocke to Peters confession imply his person in it For to say that the Church is built on the confession and beliefe of Peter is all one in déed and to say it is built on Peter confessing and beleeuing in Christ. Wherefore in as much as they affirme the former they prooue withall the later by it Rainoldes S. Austin and the Fathers are beholding to you whose wordes though not answering well to your fansies are handled so gentlie If you were as fauourable to Sadeel and Mornay that which they write of Peter would haue a true meaning Though if they with greater zeale vnto his doctrine then vnto his person that is to Christ then to Peter had giuen a litle lesse to him then is due the faulte were not so much to bée â—aide on their restraint as on your excesse who say a great deale more of him then you ought For example Father Robert the Prince of the Iesuites in his Diuinitie lectures read publikelie at Rome about seuen yeares agoe handling this same point of the foundation of the Church did ground him selfe on a sentence of the Prophet Esay to proue it to be Peter and Peters see the see of Rome Whereof to make his proofe strong by the wordes which God doth speake of Christ Behold I lay in Sion a tried pretious corner stone a sure foundation he affirmed that Esay did therein prophecie not of Christ but of Peter a stumbling stone to heretikes a rock of offense but to Catholikes a tried a pretious a corner stone S. Peter the Apostle expoundeth those wordes not of himselfe but of Christ. Father Robert the Iesuit sayth that they agrée not to Christ but to him So to aduaunce the Popes dignitie by Peter he maketh Peter himselfe nay the holy Ghost a lier Such blasphemous outrages of your chéefe professors giuing more to Peter then staÌ„deth with the truth and honor of the Sonne of God might prouoke the godly spirites of his seruantes to bend to the contrarie as husbandmen when they would straighten a young plant that groweth crooked one way do bow it to the other But in the discourse of Sadeel and Mornay that the Church is built vpon the confession of Peter not his person there is no straining of ought beyond the truth for the meaning of it by your owne iudgement For they approue and folow the exposition of S. Austin and that you affirme hath a true meaning As for the maner of S. Austins spéech I graunt it séemeth somewhat tough to expound those wordes of Christ as if he sayd Thou art Peter and vpon me not Thou art Peter and vpon thee will I build my Church But if the circumstances of his spéeche bée weighed you shal find not only the meaning of it true but the maner good For as it is writen that God commaunded the Iues to offer burnt offerings sacrifices vnto him yet God sayth in Ieremie that he spake not to them neither commaunded them touching burnt offerings and sacrifices not as though he had not commanded the things but because he did not commaund them in that sort and respect as they vsed them so though it be true that Christes wordes to Peter doe import this sense Vpon thee will I build my Church yet because hée spake them in respect of Peters profession and faith vpon Thou art Christ the Sonne of the liuing God not in respect of Peters person which they built on who sayd I hold of Paul I of Apollos I of Cephas S. Austin might expound them well as he doth that Christ sayd to Peter I wil build my church not vpon thee but vpon me In the which conclusion the rest of the Fathers who expound it of Peters confession doe ioyne with S. Austin Neither can your shuffling of Peters coÌ„fession with Peter confessing inueigle their consent For they doo expound and vnderstand it plainelie some of him whom Peter confessed that is Christ the Sonne of the liuing God some of Peters faith wherwith he confessed him as by which the faithfull are builded on Christ. And this is their meaning in saying that which your men doo vainelie triumph at the church is built on Peter
that which was common to all the Apostles by the meaning of Christ you chalenge as proper vnto Peter onely For as the confession of Peter touching Christ shewed their common faith by the mouth of one so the answere of Christ directed vnto one conteined that blessing that should be common to them all And this is declared by the holy scripture which to the Ephesians mēbers of the church saith that they are built vpō the foundatiō of the Apostles Prophets Not of Peter onely but of the Apostles who lay the same foundation all that Peter did and thereupon are called all of them foundations And the church relying vpon their doctrine that is the Christian faith the onely and sure foundatiō of the church as the truth hath forced your owne mouthes to witnesse may bee iustly saide to be built on them euen as well on all of them as on Peter Wherfore by the proportion that you grate vpon of a foundation to a house and a head to a bodie as Christ is head onely so is he the onely foundation of the Church as the name of foundation is giuen to the Apostles so the twelue foundations doth proue them twelue heads You must séeke therefore some other foundation of Peters headship ouer them For neither the name of stone that Christ gaue him nor the wordes of building his church vpon that stone proue that he promised him to make him head of all the Apostles Hart. Not in your iudgement but in mine they doo And so dooth the other part of the promise also which Christ made vnto him To thee will I giue the keyes of the kingdome of heuen For by the name of keyes is signified the fulnes of ecclesiasticall power But to giue the fulnes of ecclesiasticall power is to make him head Therefore Christ did promise to make him head of the church Rainoldes These keyes will not open more in the house then did the foundation lay in the building For if you meane by fulnes of ecclesiasticall power the lawfull power of the Apostleship then the which no greater was euer giuen to anie ministers of the church Christ gaue it both to Peter and to euerie Apostle If you meane such power as the Pope claimeth by fulnes of power a soueraine power not onely spirituall but also temporall Christ gaue it neither to Peter nor to anie Apostle So that in the former sense al were heads in the latter none and thus your headship proued by neither But what soeuer you meane by fulnes of power this is cleere and certaine that our Sauiour promised no more power to Peter then he meant and performed to all the Apostles And therefore what soeuer he promised to him he promised in him to them For as amongst them when they were all asked Whom say ye that I am Peter answered alone Thou art Christ the Sonne of the liuing God so Christ said to him alone I will giue thee the keyes of the kingdome of heauen as though he had alone receaued power to bind and loose whereas he made that answere one in stead of them all and receiued this power one togither with them all Wherefore sith no more was promised then giuen and equall power was giuen to all the Apostles this promise proueth not your headship You must bring vs foorth some better euidence or else your title will be naught Hart. The euidence is good For it saith in plaine and expresse termes that Christ would giue the keyes to Peter Then the which what could be more manifestly spoken Rainoldes In shew to the simple Chiefely when they sée the matter set forth as that is at Rome where Christ is painted out not as promising Peter that he would giue him keyes but as giuing them to him at that present and giuing them to him alone not to all the Apostles with the wordes of Christ paraphrased feately thereto by some poet Be thou the Prince of pastors to thee alone is giuen The power to shut the dore of heauen and eke to set it open Pastorum princeps esto tibi ius datur vni Claudere celestes reserare fores Hart. Nay the very words as they lie in scripture are plainer in shew for vs then for you which also may be noted in other pointes of controuersie betwéene you and vs. As about the reall presence this is my bodie For Christ did not say this is a signe of my bodie And againe the bread that I will giue is my flesh He said not it is but the signe of my flesh Rainoldes Neither do we say that Christ did so meane in this of flesh and bread For we teach that the true bread the bread of God which came downe from heauen and giueth life vnto the world is Christ euen the flesh the very flesh of Christ that is Christ incarnate The greater wrong they do vs who lay to our charge that we expound it not of the thing but of a signe themselues indéede guiltie thereof expounding it of a sacrament of Christ where it is meant of Christ him selfe the word that was made flesh But what if in the other place and sundry mo the wordes of the scripture bee plainer in shew for you then for vs It is not the shew but the sense of the wordes that doth import the truth and must decide controuersies For wordes were ordained to open the meaning and minde of him that speaketh them The meaning of the word of God is alwaies true because God who speaketh it is true and cannot lie The shew of it is false sometimes and deceitfull as men are whose iudgement this shew dependeth of and that may séeme to them to be meant by it which is not meant by God Wherfore it is not the shew but the sense the substance not the semblance of the wordes of scriptures that you must proue doth make for you in points of controuersie if you will proue ought Hart. Why do you graunt then that the wordes of scripture make more for vs in shew though not in substance then they doo for you It were not good for you that this should be knowne Rainoldes What Not that the wordes of scripture sometimes make more for you then vs in shewe though not in substance Yes truely M. Hart and for the Anabaptistes too that Christians had all things common And for Pope Clemens too that wiues must be common because in all things wiues are implyed also And I am so farre from being afraid that this should be knowne that euen in the very example which you mētion as making for you most I grant that the words of Christ this is my body are plainer in shew though not for your monster of transubstantiation yet for your reall presence then for our sacramentall But so that I graunt the same in like maner of other sacramentall and
mysticall spéeches wherein the scriptures giue the name of the thing to that which it betokneth as of the passeouer to the lambe and of the rocke to Christ. For I hope you wil not conclude of this shew that really Christ was a rocke or a lambe the passeouer really Hart. These spéeches are not like to that of Christes bodie in the Sacrament of the Eucharist For it is manifest that when the lambe was called the passeouer and Christ the rocke it was meant not really but figuratiuely that the rocke signified Christ the lambe the passeouer But it is not manifest in that of Christes bodie Rainoldes Whither it be manifest or no is not the question but whither the spéeches be like in shew of wordes the rocke was Christ this is my bodie Or to come néerer to your owne example and proofe of that point Christ saith of himselfe that he is true bread and my flesh is meate indeede and my blood is drinke indeede True and indeede these termes are more pregnant for a reall presence then that of Christes bodie Yet if you say that Christ is bread really and his flesh meate and his blood drinke you may as well say that he is really a vine and his disciples branches really and other such reall either blasphemies or follies Hart. Nay we doo confesse that many things in scripture are spoken and meant figuratiuely but neither all nor this concerning the Sacrament nor any thing els whereof the literall and proper sense hath not somewhat contrarie to God to religion and to Christian life As D. Allen saith that S. Austin teacheth Out of whom he citeth withall a woorthie sentence touching such as you are If the minde be preuented with an opinion of some errour whatsoeuer the scripture dooth affirme otherwise men thinke it to be spoken figuratiuely Rainoldes That sentence is good as S. Austin vttereth it But D. Allen vseth it ill against vs. The woorse because S. Austin sheweth straight vpon it in the same booke of the same point that to eate the flesh of Christ and drinke his blood was spoken not properly for so it were a wicked deede but figuratiuely flat against that error of the reall presence which hée is pretended to proue by D. Allen. But howsoeuer D. Allen deale in that the point which you graunt with him sufficeth me for proofe of that I saide For if many things in scripture are spoken and meant figuratiuely it followeth that the sense of scripture is against the shew of wordes in sundrie places and therfore that the shew of words sundrie times is against the truth Which sith you cannot sée in this Sacrament because of your preiudice of the reall presence I will bring an example of the sacrament of baptisme wherein you must needes sée it There were some of old who as we sprinckle children with water in baptizing of them so they vsed to print and stampe certaine marks vpon them with fire For the which vsage they alleaged the scripture I meane the wordes thereof that touching Iohn Baptist who saying of himselfe I baptize you with water addeth of our Sauiour He will baptize you with the holie Ghost and fire Now I put the matter to your owne iudgement whether they did better who baptized with fire or we who without it Hart. Who doubteth but we For they were deceiued who tooke the name of fire properly in that place where it is vsed figuratiuely to signifie the graces of the holie Ghost who lighteneth and purgeth the hartes of the faithfull They who did baptize in that sort were heretikes as Alphonsus sheweth Rainoldes Yet the shew of words dooth make more for thē Iohn baptized with water Christ baptizeth with fire Neither haue you here so much as that euasion which yet if you had were nothing to the purpose that it is manifest to be meant not properly but figuratiuely For there haue béene sundry churches and nations these many hundred yeares that vsed it and doo still induced all thereto by the shew of wordes as manifest to be meant not figuratiuely but properly in their iudgement And your reall presence hath not gone so far in the one Sacrament with this is my bodie as their firie markes haue gone in the other with the holie Ghost and fire Wherefore to returne to the point in questiō although it may séeme by the shew of words that our Sauiour promised the keyes of the kingdome of heauen to Peter onely yet sith he meant them to all the Apostles as I haue declared your claime will be a bare shew if all your proofe be shew of wordes And therefore as I said so I say againe that you must bring vs foorth some better euidence or els your title will be naught Hart. And I tell you againe that the euidence is good and hath not onely shew of words but sense too if it be rightly taken But we retaine not you to be our lawier to expound it Rainoldes I am not in hast to be retained of you But what mislike you in my expounding of it Hart. That which shall kéepe me from yelding thereunto For your exposition is a priuate exposition which we allow not of We allow onely of the churches exposition Rainoldes Then I perceiue the church shall be your lawier And what is I pray you the churches exposition Hart. That which all the Fathers make with one consent Rainoldes Which all the Fathers make We had néede to haue bodies like the bodies of Oakes and memories as strong as stéele to endure to reade and be sure to remember of euery exposition so much as may ascertaine vs that all the Fathers make it Hath any man liuing read them all Nay haue all the men liuing read them Nay can they shewe them Can they get them I had almost said can they name them Hart. Womeane of the Fathers which are extant commonly and may be had and read If many of them make it and the rest either gainsay it not or say nought of it we count it to bée made of all with one consent Rainoldes That count is euill cast For as in the writings of Fathers which we haue some one expoundeth places of Scripture oftentimes otherwise then all the rest a thing notorious and confessed so it is likely that in those which we haue not some places were otherwise expounded thē they be in those which we haue Yet I will not deny but you had reason so to count For else your lawier had béene dumbe and could not haue spoken a word for his client But if this be your rule of the churches exposition then I could haue made mine exposition the churches with a wet finger if I would haue stuffed it with the names of Fathers For my words of Peter that he alone made answere for all the Apostles receiued the keyes togither with them all are the wordes of S. Austin though I did
the lesser it appeareth by the controuersie betwéene Austin and Ierom concerning the reproofe of Peter whether Paule rebuked him in earnest as blameworthie or dissembled with him and made a duetifull lie which Ierom termed an honest policie For your selues graunt that Austin who thought that Paule reproued him in earnest did iudge therin more soundly truely then Ierom did who thought that he dissembled Yet Ierom alleaged more Fathers on his side and made so great account of them that he desired Austin to suffer him to erre with such men if he thought him to erre Whereupon S. Austin replyed that peraduenture hee might finde as manie Fathers on his side if he had read much But I saith he haue Paule the Apostle himselfe in stead of these all and aboue these all To him do I flie to him I appeale from all the Doctors his interpreters who are of other mindes Of him do I aske whereas he writeth to the Galatians that hee sawe Peter not going with a ryght foote to the truth of the Gospell and that hee withstood him to his face for it bicause by that dissembling hee constrayned the Gentiles to doo lyke the Iewes whether he wrote true or did lye perhaps with I know not what politike falshood And I do heare him a litle before making a very religious protestation in the beginning of the same discourse The thynges whych I write vnto you beholde I witnes before God I lye not Let them who are of other mindes pardon me I beleeue rather so great an Apostle swearing in his owne and for his owne words then anie man be he neuer so learned talking of the words of an other A wise and frée iudgement worthie of S. Austin Whereby you may perceiue that your rule of folowing the greater number of the Fathers in expounding the scriptures is but a leaden rule not fitte which should be vsed to square out stones by for building of the Lords temple Hart. This of Austin sheweth that we may vary sometimes from the greater number of the Fathers and refuse their iudgement But that as Torrensis hath obserued well must bee with two cautions One that the thing wherein we varie from them be a knowne truth The other that we do it with reuerence and modestie Rainoldes UUith reuerence and modestie God forbid else As Elihu reproued Iob as Paule reproued Peter But for the other caution how shall we know a thing to be a knowne truth Hart. Oneâ—way to know it and that a good way is the common testimonie of the faithfull people if they with one consent beleeue it to be true Rainoldes This bringeth vs small helpe to the expounding of scriptures For things may be true and yet a place of scripture not applied truely and rightly to proue them As it is plaine in places that haue béene applied by Christians against the Iewes But let it be a good way UUhat if the faithfull people doo dissent As in the question which we haue in hand about the Popes supremacy the people of the east church dissented from the west many hundred yeares together UUhat shall we doo then Hart. Then an other way a better way to finde it is the common testimonie of the faithfull Pastors if they doo decrée it in a generall councell As for the Popes supremacy they did in the Councell of Lateran Rainoldes The Bishops of the east church say that the Councell of Lateran was not generall which the Pope him selfe doth acknowledge also as it is noted on your law But here the former difficulties méete vs againe and bréede the same perplexitie For there are but few places of Scripture which generall Councels haue expounded neither is it likely the Pope will assemble them to expound the rest Againe although you say that generall Councels can not erre in their conclusions yet you say they may erre in applying of Scriptures to prooue their conclusions Lastly generall Councels may dissent too as heretofore they haue in a weightie point offaith touching Christ. The which incommodities being all incident into this which presently we debate of as our conference will shew you sée that you haue not yet resolued me One question I must aske you more In this case when Councels say nothing of Scriptures or misapply them in proofes or dissent in conclusions what are we to doo Hart. If Councels dissent we must follow those which are confirmed by the Head And to answere all your questions in a word whether with the Councels or without the Councels that which the Head determineth is a knowne truth that which the Head condemneth is a knowne errour Rainoldes You meane by the Head not our Sauior Christ but the Pope I trow Hart. I the visible head Rainoldes Doo you not sée then by your owne answeres that whatsoeuer shew you make of Fathers and Councels the Pope is the man that must strike the stroke So that to bring it to the point in controuersie whereas our question is whether that the Pope be supreme head of the church you say He is so UUhen we sift the matter and séeke the reasons why this is the summe of all Because him selfe saith so I thought that the church should haue béene your lawier to expounde your euidences but now I perceiue that you meant the Pope Hée is the churches husband belike and in matters of law dealeth for her I cannot blame you though you be content to make him your iudge too For if he giue sentence in this cause against you I will neuer trust him Hart. You doo gather more of mine answers then I meant I pray make your owne collections and not mine Rainoldes I doo gather nothing but that which you haue scattered For you began to try this point touching the Pope by the wordes of Scripture The wordes we agrée decide by the sense the sense must be tried you say by the Fathers the Fathers by the truth the truth by the people the people by the Councels the Councels by the Pope If one of vs should make but a semblance of such an answere you would sport your selues with it and call it a Circulation and cry against our impudency whoope at it like stage players But you may daunse such roundes and yet perswade men that you go right forward with great sobrietie and grauitie Hart. Howsoeuer you dally with your circulations rounds as you call them I say no more but this that if a truth cannot be knowne otherwise then the last meane to resolue vs of it is the Popes authoritie But there néeded not so much adoo hereof if I proue that Christ did giue that supremacie whereof we talked to S. Peter Rainoldes You can neuer proue that Christ did giue it him but by the word of Christ which is the holie scripture And the scripture standeth in substance of the sense not in
haue Nor yet am I ashamed of that kinde of triall and iudgement by the godly who haue not learned toonges and artes but Christ onely And I comprised it in that which I said that Christ is the iudge and they which vnder him haue it committed to them euen the church of Christ. For himselfe hath giuen by speciall commission two sortes of iudgement to his church the one priuate the other publike priuate to all the faithfull and spirituall as God calleth them who are willed to iudge of that which is taught and to trie spirits whither they be of God publike to the assembly of pastors and elders for of that which Prophets teach let Prophets iudge and the spirites of Prophetes are subiect to the Prophets In both of the which the church must yet remember that God hath committed nothing but the ministerie of giuing iudgement vnto her The soueraintie of iudgement dooth rest on Gods word For Christ is our onely Doctor Law-giuer according to whose written will the church must iudge And so to returne vnto the wordes of Christ from which we digressed the sense I gaue of them will I proue by scripture according to the rule of faith the proofe of the sense I submit to the priuate and publike iudgement of the church The wordes of Christ to Peter conteined a promise of the keyes I will giue thee the keyes of the kingdome of heauen The occasion of the wordes was a question of Christ asked of the Apostles answered by Peter whom say yee that I am Thou art Christ the Sonne of the liuing God The sense which I gathered by laying these together was that as Peter answered one for all so the keyes were meant to him one with all To proue the former point that Peter answered one for all the scripture is most plaine in the sixt of Iohn where before this time Peter had confessed in their common name We beleeue and know that thou art Christ the Sonne of the liuing God To proue the later that the keyes were meant to him one with all the scripture is as plaine in the twentieth of Iohn where Christ performing that which he had promised to Peter doth say to him with the rest As my Father sent me so doo I send you Whose sinnes soeuer ye remit they are remitted to them whose sinnes soeuer ye reteine they are reteined Wherefore sith the keyes were promised by Christ on the profession of their fayth which was common to them all and the promise was performed when he sent them all with power to binde and loose to remit and reteine sinnes it followeth that the keyes belonged no more to Peter then to all the Apostles And therefore the promise of the keyes to him importeth no headship of his ouer them Hart. That which was promised by Christ vnto Peter was not performed to the Apostles For he gaue not them the keyes of his kingdome but the power of remitting and reteyning sinnes Rainoldes These things differ in wordes but they are one in sense as Ioseph said to Pharao Both Pharaos dreames are one For as God to teach Pharao what he would do in Egipt by seuen yeares of plentie seuen yeares of famine did vse two sundrie dreames of kine and eares of corne the surer to resolue him of his purpose in it so Christ to teach vs what he doth for mankind in ordeining the ministerie of the word Sacraments vseth two similituds the one of keyes the other of binding loosing that we may know the better the fruit force of it Touching the keyes he speaketh of heauen as of a house wherinto there is no entrance for men vnlesse the doore be opened Now we all Adams ofspring are shut out of heauen as Adam our progenitour was out of Paradise through our offenses and sinnes For no vncleane thing shall enter into it But God of his loue and fauour towards vs hath giuen vs his sonne his onely begotten sonne that whosoeuer beleeueth in him should not perish but haue eternall life which is the inheritaunce reserued in heauen for vs. We cannot beleeue vnlesse wée heare his word We heare not his word vnlesse it be preached Wherefore when God the Father sent his sonne Christ and Christ sent his Apostles as his Father sent him to preach his word to men that they who repented and beleeued in Christ should haue their sinnes forgiuen them the faithlesse vnrepentant should not be forgiuen then he gaue authoritie as it were to open heauen to the faithfull and to shut it against the wicked Which office to shut and open because in mens houses it is exercised by keies and the stewarde of the house is saide to haue the key of it to open it and to shut it therefore Christ the principall steward of Gods house is saide to haue the key of Dauid and he gaue his Apostles the keies as you would say of the kingdome of heauen when hee made them his stewardes to shut out to let in The other similitude of binding and loosing is to like effect For we are all by nature the children of sinne and therefore of death Now sinnes are in a maner the same to the soule that cordes to the body and the endlesse paines of death that is the wages of sinne are like to chaines wherewith the wicked are bound in hell as in a prison From these cordes of sinne and chaines of death eternall men are loosed by Christ when their sinnes be remitted their sinnes are remitted if they beleeue in him If they beleeue not their sinnes are reteined whose sinnes are reteined they doo continue bound For he that beleeueth not shall be condemned he that beléeueth shall be saued None shall be condemned but they whose sinnes are reteined to binde them with the chaines of darkenesse none saued but they whose sinnes are remitted and the cordes vnloosed by which they were holden UUherefore sith the Gospell is preached to this ende a sauour of life to life vnto beléeuers vnto the vnbeléeuers a sauour of death to death as we reade of Christ that the Lord sent him to preach deliuerance to the captiues and opening of prison to them that are bound in like sort his ministers whom he sent to preach it are said to binde and loose to reteine and remit sinnes So that both these kinds of spéech import the same that is signified by keyes For to binde and to reteine sinnes is to shut to loose and to remit sinnes is to open the kingdome of heauen Your owne church dooth take the keyes in this meaning euen the Councell of Trent For whereas Christ gaue to his Apostles and their successours the power of binding and loosing that is of remitting and reteining sinnes as your selues expound it this power you call the power of the keies as
authoritie to Peter in some sort Yet this is a notable difference betweene them and well worth the marking that S. Paule was the Apostle and teacher of the Gentiles but Peter the Apostle both of Gentiles and of Iewes Which because we loue not to speake without Doctors you may read in S. Ambrose in his CoÌ„mentaries on this place He that wrought by Peter in the Apostleship of circumcision wrought by me also towardes the Gentiles He nameth Peter alone saith he and compareth him vnto himselfe because he had receiued the primacie to build the Church that himselfe likewise is chosen to haue the primacie of building the Churches of the Gentiles Yet so that Peter preached to the Gentiles also These are S. Ambrose his wordes Rainoldes Haue you read these words your selfe in S. Ambrose or do you take them vp on credit Hart. What if my selfe haue read them Rainoldes Then shall I thinke worse of you then I haue done For I haue thought you to erre of simplicitie But I smell somewhat else here Hart. In déede I reade them not my selfe in S. Ambrose but in D. Stapleton who citeth them as I do Rainoldes Then you may learne the precept of a wittie Poet Be sober and distrustfull these are the ioyntes of wisedome For this which you haue taken of D. Stapletons credit is clipped fowly clipped If he should deale so with the Princes coine I know what iudgement he should haue The wordes of Ambrose are Ita tamen vt Petrus gentibus praedicaret si causa fuisset Paulus Iudaeis yet so that Peter preached to the Gentiles also if it were needfull and Paule to the Iewes D. Stapleton citeth them Ita tamen vt Peâ—rus gentibus praedicaret Haec ille Yet so that Peter preached to the Gentiles also Thus saith Ambrose See you not how hansomely he hath clipped-of the last words of Ambrose Paulus Iudaeis and Paule to the Iewes to proue that Paule might not preach vnto the Iewes as Peter might vnto the Gentiles Yet this is D. Stapleton whose Treatise of the Church some of our English Studentes and young seduced gentlemen thinke to be a treasure of great truth and wisedome But God wil make the falsehood and folly thereof euident to all men at his good time For this present point that Paule was an Apostle and teacher of the Iewes and the Gentiles both as well as Peter was and therfore not inferior to him in this respect the Scripture is so cléere that no mist of Stapletons though it were as thicke as the darkenes of Egipt can take away the light of it The wordes of Christ proue it spoken touching Paule vnto Ananias He is a chosen vessell to me to beare my name before the Gentiles and kinges and the children of Israel The commission by Ananias sent vnto Paule The God of our Fathers hath appointed thee that thou shouldest know his will and see that Iust one and heare the voice of his mouth For thou shalt bee his witnesse vnto all men of the thinges which thou hast seene and heard Paules obedience to his calling and performance of his duetie He preached Christ in the Synagogues he confounded the Iewes he spake and disputed with the Graecians Iewes by religion although not by parentage to be short when he was sent by speciall commission of the holy Ghost for the worke whereunto God had called him and Barnabas they preached the worde of God in the Synagogues of the Iewes through diuers cities and countries vntill that when the Iewes did stubbernely resist the truth which they preached they said boldly to them It was necessarie that the word of God should haue bene first spoken vnto you but seeing you put it from you and iudge your selues vnworthie of euerlasting life lo we turne to the Gentiles Wherefore as Peter preached the Gospell both to Iewes and Gentiles so did also Paule As God did choose Peter that the Gentiles by his mouth should heare the word of the Gospell so did he choose Paule Hart. Why dooth Paule then call himselfe the Apostle and teacher of the Gentiles and that in sundry places Rainoldes Because that when he and Peter perceiued that God did blesse the labours of the one of them amongst the Iewes chiefly of the other amongst the Gentiles they agreed togither and gaue the right handes of fellowship each to other that Paule should preach vnto the Gentiles Peter to the Iewes not so but that either if occasion serued might and did preach to either as Ambrose noted well and it is written of Paul namely but that they should specially teach the one the Iewes the other the Gentiles as their epistles shew they did Thus if you regard that which they did chiefly Peter was an Apostle and teacher of the Iewes Paule of the Gentiles If that which they might doo and did by occasion they were the Apostles and teachers both of both and so no difference betwéene them Hart. We graunt that there was no difference betwéene them in the office of the Apostleship for therein was Paule equall vnto Peter Rainoldes He that granteth this would sée if he had eyes that he must grant the other which he hath denied For if equall in the office of the Apostleship then equall in the charge of preaching to all nations And if in the charge of preaching to all nations then both to Iewes and Gentiles Hart. It is true to both But so that S. Peter was chiefe Apostle to them both and the supreme head to rule as well S. Paule as the rest of the Apostles Rainoldes I haue proued that Peter had no such headship ouer them You barely say the contrary and repeat it still This is a fault in reasoning condemned of the Logicians by the name of begging that which is in controuersie I pray vse it not but either proue that you say or hold your peace and cease to say it Hart. I will proue it by the circumstances of the words of Christ saying vnto Peter Doost thou loue me more then these Feede my lambes Doost thou loue me Feede my sheepe Doost thou loue me Feede my sheepe Wherein sundry principall pointes are to be noted First he requireth of him an open profession and testimonie of his loue to this intent that he may put him in trust with his flocke Secondly he requireth not onely that he loue him but also that he loue him more then the rest that to him as louing him more then the rest he may giue power aboue the rest Thirdly he asketh him thrise if he loue him and the former times with the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the last with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which noteth feruent loue With the which worde also Peter had answered him still Fourthly he saith vnto him thrise also feede And to passe ouer the sheepe and the lambes whereof
that in place of greatest force as when he saith This is my commandement that ye loue one an other as I haue loued you greater loue then this hath no man when a man bestoweth his life for his friendes Whereas S. Iohn therefore vttered Christes demand by the one worde and Peters answere by the other it séemeth that he vsed the wordes indifferently as hauing both the same meaning Which is proued also by the consent and iudgement of the Syriake translation that hath the same worde for them both Howbeit if the wordes haue a difference of sense it agreeth better with the modestie of Peter to haue saide lesse then more of his loue chiefly sith hee had fallen by saying too much of it and had by triall felt his frailtie But if he did answere as you imagine him Dost thou loue me Peter Lord I loue thee feruently yet this feruent loue inferreth no supremacy ouer the rest of the Apostles For what he reporteth of his owne loue the same doth Christ witnesse of theirs or rather more if we would pricke it vp as you doo euen that his Father loueth them because that they loued him In both the which branches that same worde is vsed which by your fansie doth signifie feruent loue when it may serue the Popes vantage Hart. We doo not relye so much on that word as on the other two 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but chiefly on the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For although to feed which is meant by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth import much yet to feede and rule which 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth hath a greater force as those places shew where that worde is vsed Thou shalt rule them with a rodde of yron and he shall rule my people Israel Wherefore Christ committed a soueraine power to Peter in that he said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not onely to feede but to rule and gouerne too Rainoldes Then it was not Peters duetie to rule the lambes but the shéepe onely For Christ doth say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speaking of the shéepe and of the lambes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hart. So I said Yet that word which he vseth of the lambes he vseth of the shéepe also Whereby this is shewed as I touched briefly out of o D. Stapleton that lambes must be onely meated and fedde of Peter through the common foode of doctrine to be looked for from him as supreme father of the houshold and from his Sée and they must be ruled of their next and proper Pastors whom immediatly they are vnder but sheepe that is to say the greater and perfiter Bishops themselues and Pastors are committed to him not onely to be fedde with the common doctrine but also to be ruled of him more immediatly as of the supreme Pastor of Pastors Rainoldes So your Doctor noteth I grant and you touched it But you were best recall it or els this fine fansie of that Gréeke word as it is farre fetched so will be deare bought For it must cost the Pope halfe of his supremacy Hart. Why doo you say so Rainoldes Why Are not Princes comprised in the name of lambes by your iudgement as Bishops and Pastors in the name of sheepe Hart. They are and what then Rainoldes The Pope then hath nothing to doo with the ruling and gouerning of Princes much lesse with deposing them For Peter had commission you say to feede onely and not to rule the lambes Hart. But they must be ruled of their next Pastors and so by consequent of the Pope because their Pastors must be ruled of him as Pastor of Pastors Rainoldes Nay but the Pastors are not to be ruled by the Pope neither if this fansie hold For in your Latin authenticall translation the clawse which doth answere to the Gréeke word hath not sheep but lambes Whervpō your Rhemists also note the same as spokē of lambs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 feed rule So that howsoeuer he lay hold on others by that Gréeke word compared with your Latin text yet his rule gouernment of Bishops Pastors is shakē of therby And this is as much as half of his supremacy nay all by a consequent For his claime lieth first ouer Bishops and then by means of Bishops ouer the whole church Thus while you deuise by quirkes of your owne to vnderprop the Pope you lay him on the ground do him more harme by crasing of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then good by fortifying of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For although it signifie to feede in such sort as shepheards do their sheepe and so consequently to rule them and guide them in all respects as shepheards doo for the preseruing of them yet that charge of ruling belonged not to Peter alone peculiarly but was and is common vnto all shepheards Our English toong answereth not to the felicitie of the gréeke and latin in making euident proofe hereof For in the gréeke wordes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in the Latin pastor pasco the matter would be plainer But yet in our English a shepheard and to feede in that sort with ruling are yoked so togither by lincke as I may terme it of reason and sense though it appeare not in lincke and likenesse of words that as many as are called to the function of shepheards and Pastors of the church they all are bound by duetie to féede and rule so The proofe whereof we haue in Peter and Paule who mouing the Pastors whom they cal Elders to attend their charge the one beseecheth them to feede the flock of God which dependeth on them the other telleth them that the holy Ghost hath made them ouerseers to feede the church of God both vsing the same worde 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as betokening the common charge of shepheards Yea Christ him selfe speaking to the Angel that is the shepherd of the church of Thyatira doth promise that hee who ouercommeth and keepeth his workes vnto the ende shall haue power giuen vnto him ouer nations and he shall rule them with a rodde of yron So that euen there where you note that word importeth greatest power of beating downe the wicked Christ applieth it to all his faithfull seruants and not to Peter onely Wherefore if it were so that hee had ment more by saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thē by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in his charge to Peter yet he meant no more then that which belongeth to euery shepheards charge for the shéepe which God ordeineth him to féede But in truth if your itche of wresting holy scriptures to priuate fansies were healed you woulde rather thinke that S. Iohn did vtter one sense with sundry wordes as in the Lordes demaunde of Peter Doost thou loue mee so in his commandement to Peter Feede my sheepe
dastardes which you set against them My former wordes of the Apostles as being equall in power agrée well with these of Peter and Paule For I say not that Paule was aboue Peter but that he might haue bene aboue him in power for all the honour which he gaue him And this is sufficient to ouerthrowe your reason But if my example of the Pope and Emperour did cause you to mistake me you may take an other and fitter for the purpose the Colledge Apostolike as the Pope dooth call them I meane the Cardinalles of Rome Who though they be in states orders and liuings one aboue an other yet in all things and with all curtesies they all giue hie reuerence one vnto an other And when any of them doth come into the chappell of the Popes holinesse to say his deuotions he turneth towardes the Cardinalles of his owne order and goeth not directly to his own place vnlesse he be the lowest but beginning at the lowest as though he wold abide there he is desired entreated of euery one to go higher vntil hee come directly to his own place vnlesse he be the lowest himselfe demurely once again desireth him who is next vnto him that he will go before him at leÌ„gth he sitteth down in his place This is a foule trouble to make so much adoo at the comming in of euerie Cardinall to prayers chiefly when prayers are begun Yet to shew how modestly they thinke of themselues and how they honour one an other euery one that commeth after others dooth it whither the Pope be there or no. Out of doubt Cardinalles men of such wisedome would not commit this folly if euery one whom they honour must be aboue them in power But you deale iniuriously with me to say that you framed your reason out of the scriptures and Fathers and I bring the booke of Ceremonies to kill it For neither did you ground vpon the wordes of scripture but onely on a circumstance obserued by the Fathers that Paule went to Peter of reuerence to honour him and I slew the reason which you made thereof with the sword of scriptures I vsed the booke of Ceremonies but as an Irish Lackey to cut off a dead mans head I would not haue vouchsafed as much as to name him but to cast the doong of your solemnities in your faces and to shewe the fondnesse of a Popish reason by practise of a Papall mockery Though I sée not why you should preferre so the scriptures and Fathers before the booke of Ceremonies For the booke of Ceremonies speaketh more good of the Pope in one leafe then both the other doo throughout all their volumes And it is solemnely printed at Rome with Peters picture in the front and the keies in his handes and Feede my sheepe written about him as a booke of great account where many of the Fathers doo lye in the dust of the Vatican Library and cannot come into the light Notwithstanding if you be willing to yéeld your selfe prisoner to the Fathers as Gentlemen thinke the booke of Ceremonies to be a raskall souldiour whom you disdaine to yéeld vnto behold your owne witnesses who make not Paule inferiour to Peter otherwise then in the time of his Apostleship the one made first the other last S. Ierome who putteth an equalitie betweene them though Paule did honour him as an Apostle before him S. Chrysostome who pronounceth that Paule to say no more of him was Peters peere in dignitie S. Ambrose who giueth a primacy to them both and saith that Paule was euen such an other as Peter S. Austin who declareth their authoritie to haue beene equall and that for Paules honor what he wanteth in time is supplied by Christes glory in that he made him an Apostle not as the rest vpon the earth but when he raigned now in maiestie And these things are written by the same Fathers whose wordes touching the honour that Paule gaue to Peter your Doctor setteth in a beadrole as though in their iudgement Paule acknowledged Peter his supreme head thereby Wherein you may perceiue both his deceitfull dealing that alleageth their wordes as setting one aboue the other who in expresse words doo make one equall to the other and your expositions how iumpe they méete with the Fathers who gathered an equalitie of Peter and Paul by the epistle to the Galatians whence you conclude Peters supremacy ouer Paule Hart. How the Fathers all agrée with one consent of Peters supremacy it shall be shewed hereafter As for the circumstance which I obserued out of them touching the fact of Paule yâ— when he went to see Peter he went of reuerence to honour him I doo not account so greatly thereof as of the fact it selfe nor vrge I the Fathers so much obseruing that as the report of this made by the Scriptures For they set it forth with so liuely wordes as if it were of purpose to paint out Peters primacie Then after thre yeares I went to Ierusalem saith Paule to see Peter and taried with him fifteene daies Marke his words I pray and sée what weight they cary with them He went to Ierusalem so farre so long a iourney and he went notwithstanding his great affaires ecclesiastical and he went to see Peter not in the vulgar maner but as S. Chrysostom noteth that the Gréeke word importeth to behold him as men behold a thing or person of name excellencie and maiestie Neither did he go onely to see him but he abode with him also to fill him selfe with a perfit viewe of his behauiour And he abode with him no common time but fifteen daies fiftene daies a great matter and more then many would thinke who doo not search the depth of scriptures In such estimation was Peter with Paule and will you yet deny his primacy Rainoldes King Agesilaus when one praysed an Orator that he could amplifie thinges and make them of small to séeme great I saith hée would neuer count him a good shoomaker who would put a great shoo vpon a small foote You play the Orator M. Hart with your amplifications and that in such sort as you passe the shoomaker of Agesilaus For you do not only put a great shoo vpon a small foote but you stretch the leather with your â—éeth too And yet when you haue wéeried your selfe with stretching it you will haue stretched it in vaine For though your shoo be too great for the primacy of Peter yet will it be too small for the supremacy of the Pope Hart. We speake not of the Pope now but of Peter Why stray you from the point Rainoldes I thought they had béene things both of one nature and differing in name only But I will speake of Peter And that you may sée that the shoo which you made is too great for his foote I will shew it by a plaine demonstration to the
he preached it almost twentie yeares and was he now afraid least hee had preached falsely Hart. S. Ierom saith not so but that he had not had securitie of preaching it vnlesse it had bene approued by the rest with whom he did confer of it Rainoldes S. Ierom saith not so but that he had not had securitie Then S. Ierom saith so in that he saith not so and you vnsay in one word that which you say in an other For what is it else not to haue securitie of preaching the Gospell then to be afraid either of his doctrine that it is not true or of his fact that it is not lawfull Hart. Why doth the scripture then report of S. Paule that he conferred with them least he should runne or had runne in vaine Rainoldes Because many Christians whom Paule had preached the Gospell too began to be seduced by false Apostles of the Iewes who taught them that except they kept the law of Moses they could not be saued And to winne credit to their hereticall doctrine that the hearers might receiue it the sooner for the authoritie of the teachers they said it was the doctrine of Peter and the rest the chiefe of the Apostles the pillars of the Church As for Paule who taught the contrarie thereof they disgraced him as one that was crept into the Apostleship after theÌ„ and hauing learned the gospell of them which he preached yet dissented froÌ„ them in the preaching of it Which spéeches of seducers if they had beléeued whom Paule either should or had alreadie preached the Gospell vnto then should they haue fallen away with mindes corrupted from the simplicitie that is in Christ and Paule haue lost his labor and runne in vaine as hee speaketh that is to say without profit without the fruit of that hee ran for As Christ complaineth in the Prophet I haue labored in vaine I haue spent my strength in vaine and for nothing because he was not receiued of the Iewes to whom he preched the word of life Wherefore Paule desirous as a carefull husbandman to reape where he had sowne did seeke to roote out the wéedes of false Apostles that did or might hinder the growth of the corne In which consideration hauing shewed first touching his authoritie that he had it not of men nor by man but by God next touching his doctrine that he learned it of Christ not of the Apostles touching his dissension from them he sheweth last that he went and conferred with the chiefe of them euen Iames Peter and Iohn who were accounted to be pillars that they might witnesse their consent and make his preaching to be fruitfull and stoppe the mouthes of false Apostles All this S. Ierom saw and taught in his commentaries on Paule to the Galatians where he aduised better of Paules intent and drift and sifted all the pointes and circumstances of the text The wordes which you stand on were vttered lesse aduisedly by him in an epistle written to S. Austin against whom to iustifie his opinion though false that Peters fault at Antioche was no fault in deede nor Paule reproued him in earnest he saith for the credit of one aboue the other Paule had not had securitie of preaching the Gospell vnlesse that Peter had approued it Wherefore I may iustly speake in his excuse at the least to soften the hardnes of his spéech the same which Basil said in excuse of Gregorie that his wordes were vttered not by way of doctrine but of contention rather to maintaine his quarell against Austin then to deliuer his iudgemeÌ„t of the matter as writing of affection more what he fansied then of discretion what he thought Whereof there appeareth as it were a print euen in his owne wordes For he doth mention Peter by name of whom he did contend with Austin and none of the rest whereas the Scripture nameth no more him then others but first saith in generall of Paule that he conferred with them that were the chiefe and after in particular of Iames Peter and Iohn that they were counted to be pillars Thus neither did Paule conferre with Peter onely but with Iames and Iohn and therefore it proueth no supremâ—cie of Peter more then of Iames and Iohn and although he had yet were it a token by Ieromes own iudgement that Paule was Peters equall not Peter his superior For there is equalitie betweene them saith Ierom who conferre togither I would to God M. Hart if you will needes follow S. Ieroms authoritie yet you would folow him in the best thinges and what you say with error in heate of contention you would amend by truth in iudgement of doctrine But that which is written of giftes and rewards they blind the eies of the wise and peruert the wordes of the iust is no truer in iudges and arbiters of ciuill causes then in you and yours who meddle with the decision of spirituall matters The giftes which partly the pollicie of the Pope hath enterteined you with in his Seminaries and affaires partly the state of the Papacie doth yéelde to such as speake things pleasing him they do blind your eies and peruert your wordes that you thinke darkenes to be light and light darkenes and call euill good and good euill They make you not to see in Paule to the Galatians his direct purpose of ouerthrowing that which you would haue him build They moue you to depraue the circumstaÌ„ces of his words as though he proued him selfe inferior to Peter in that by which he proueth him selfe not inferior They stirre you to transforme his summission into subiection and to abuse the spirite of his apostolike modestie to the raysing vp of the Papall pride and pompe of the supremacie Paule went to see Peter with a desire of knowing him which the Greeke word importeth as they vse saith Chrysostome to speake who go to see great and famous cities You can not sée that Chrysostome saith on the same place that Paule was Peters equall in dignitie to say no more but you take this note of his puffe it vp with the word of Maiesty thereby to make the simple reader to conceaue that Peter was as stately as he to whom that terme is vsed Paule went to Ierusalem from the citie of Damascus not much aboue a hundred miles You say he went so farre so long a iourney as though it had bene no lesse then hence to go to the court of Rome which Bishops do to the Pope not of their owne accord as Paule but enforced thereto by solemne oth not twise in seuentéene yeares as Paule but euery yeare once by them selues or by their messengers vnlesse the Pope dispense with them But of all the rest that passeth that you say hee went to Ierusalem to sée Peter notwithstanding his great affaires ecclesiasticall Here was art by the way to shew that Bishops may neglect
in the times I trow In déede they are not like For Peter was then a preacher of the Gospell as Pastors are now and the Pope now is a Prince of the world as Nero was then The fifth Chapter The Fathers 1 are no touch-stone for tryal of the truth in controuersies of religion but the Scripture onely 2 Their writings are corrupted and counterfeits do beare their names 3 The sayings alleaged out of their right writinges proue not the pretended supremacie of Peter HART What soeuer difference there is betwéen the Pope Peter in state and power of worldly gouernment yet Peter had the same authoritie and primacie ouer the Apostles which the Pope claimeth ouer all Bishops And this because you will not yéeld vnto the Scriptures I will proue by the Fathers whose testimonies of it are most cléere and euident Rainoldes Whether I or you refuse to yéeld vnto the scriptures let the godly iudge As for the Fathers I like your dealing well in part For I wished that first you would go through with the Scriptures and then when you had found nothing in them come to the Fathers afterward But I wish further if I might obteine it that you had the Scriptures in such price and honour as the word of God that no word of men should be matched with them to build your faith vpon For God hath giuen his word to be a lanterne to our feete and a light to our path that we may sée the way to heauen and walke in it And the holy Ghost saith that the Scriptures are able to make vs wise vnto saluation wise by instructing vs in the faith of Christ vnto saluation by leading vs to life through that faith Wherfore sith we conferre about a point of wisedome perteining vnto faith and life you should do very well to rest on the Scriptures as the onely touch-stone for tryall of the truth therin Hart. Now at length I heare that which I looked for I thought for all your duetifull words of the Fathers that you would come ouer to the Scriptures onely before you made an end Rainoldes Why Is my behauiour towarde men vndutifull because I am duetifull vnto God aboue them Hart. There is a worthy treatise of an auncient writer Vincentius Lirinensis against the profane innouations of all heresies a passing fine booke which it is wished that al such should read as wil know the truth You haue read it perhaps and what thinke you of it Is it not a golden booke Rainoldes The booke is good enough if it haue a wise reader Hart. Say you so Yet some there be of your side who are afraid of the name of Vincentius Lirinensis Rainoldes They are worse afraid then hurt for any thing that I know But what of Vincentius Hart. He saith it is so common a practise of heretikes to alleage the scripture that they neuer bring almost ought of their own but they seeke to shadow it with words of scripture too And hauing shewed this by sundry examples he addeth that therein they folow the practise of the Deuill their maister Who tooke our Sauiour Christ and set him on a pinnacle of the temple and said vnto him If thou be the sonne of God cast thy selfe down For it is written that he will giue his Angels charge ouer thee that they shall kepe thee in all thy waies with their hands they shall lift thee vp least perhaps thou dash thy foote against a stone If thou saith he be the sonne of God cast thy selfe down Why For it is written We must with great heede obserue and remember the doctrine of this place that when we see words of the Prophets or Apostles brought foorth by any men against the Catholike faith we way be assured by this great example of the authoritie of the Gospel that the Deuil doth speake by them Thus saith that auncient Father Vincētius Lirinensis Whose words do manifestly disproue your opinion that the truth of pointes in faith should be tryed by the scripture onely Rainoldes The ciuill law saith that it is vnciuill for a man not hauing weighed the whole law to giue aduise or iudgement some one parcell of it being alone proposed Your dealing with the wordes of Vincentius Lirinensis is guiltie of this vnciuilitie For he to instruct vs how we may continue sound in the faith against the guiles of heretikes and suttletie of Satan who doth transforme him selfe into an Angell of light teacheth that our Sauiour hath to this entent both forewarned vs of the danger and foreshewed vs a remedy Forewarned vs of the daunger in the precept that he gaue Beware of false prophets which come to you in sheepes clothing but inwardly are rauening wolues For what saith he is sheepes clothing but the sincere and soft words of the Scripture which are alleaged by false prophets as well as by the true What are the rauening wolues but the cruell meanings and senses of heretikes which vnder sheepes clothing do rent the flocke of Christ Foreshewed vs a remedy in the lesson that he adioined Ye shal know them by their fruites That is to say when they be gin not onely to alleadge those wordes but to expound them and citing them as true prophets do not interprete them as true prophets then are the wolues seene by their teeth and rauening then are their bloudy natures known for all their fleeces then are the faithfull teachers discerned from seducers the true Apostles from the false the Angell of light from the Angell of darknes the ministers of righteousnes from the ministers of Satan Which thinges set downe and prosequuted more amply and fully he draweth in fine vnto this conclusion the summe of all his treatise that although the scriptures alone be sufficient for all pointes of faith yet is it not sufficient to haue a shew of the wordes but we must also haue the substance of the sense that is the true and naturall meaning of the scriptures Now if this discourse of his be weighed whole and not a parcell of it seuered from the rest what can you proue thereby more then I will graunt Nay more then I haue graunted and proued alreadie when I shewed that the right sense of the scripture expounded by the scripture is the sword of Gods spirit wherewith all heresies must be vanquished The Deuill you say alleaged the wordes of the scripture against Christ. He did so Yet he alleaged thē not wholy entirely as Vincētius hath them but as the Euangelistes rehearse them maimedly Wherein if Vincentius obseruing the attempt that the Deuill alleaged the wordes of the scripture had withall obserued the suttletie of the tempter how he alleaged them hée might haue better noted the deceites of heretikes abusing scripture then he did and so haue better fensed the right-beléeuing Christians with power of scripture then he hath For he reporteth it so as if the Deuill had
alleaged that whole place of the scripture He will giue his Angels charge ouer thee that they shall keepe thee in all thy wayes with their handes they shall lift thee vp and so forth Whereas the deuill alleaging the rest of charge giuen to keepe him and vphold him left out of the middle wordes of keeping him in all his wayes because they made directly against that to which he did tempt Christ as I haue declared Wherefore if Vincentius had thought that the scripture is no sufficient stay for vs against heretikes because it is alleaged as well by false teachers as it is by true by the Deuill as by Christ he must haue rather craued pardon for not espying the policie of Satan then liking for impairing the credit of the word of God But although he saw not all in particular neuerthelesse in generall hee ioyneth with the truth For hee saith that heretikes followe the Deuill as oft as they bring foorth sentences of scripture by which beeing expounded amisse they goe about to maintaine theyr errours So that the scripture which heretikes bring foorth against the Catholike faith is the scripture taken in a wrong sense and misse-expounded by his iudgement But I meane the scripture expounded aright when I say that pointes of faith should be tried by the scripture onely The wordes of Vincentius therefore which you cited doo rather proue that which I defend then disproue it Neither make they more against vs then you vnles you begge all that which is in controuersie that Popery is the Catholike faith For then you may conclude that wee bring the scripture against the Catholike faith when we bring it against Popery An easie way to conquest if begging can procure you that But I minde not to giue it right to it you haue not You must winne it if you will weare it Hart. Whither that the faith of the Church of Rome which you call Popery be the Catholike faith or no because it is the later part of our conference concerning one faith I will not confound it with this of one head But what doo you meane to say that the wordes of Vincentius which I cited disproue not your assertion nor make against you more then vs when hée saith that heretikes doo alleage the scripture as also did the Deuill and you alleage it too and thinke it a sufficient fense of your opinions Rainoldes So doo you alleage it too doo you not And what is there against vs in those wordes more then against you would you not laugh at me if I should reason thus Heretikes alleage scripture so doo the Papists too therefore they are heretikes The Deuill alleaged scripture so dooth the Pope too therefore he is the Deuils scholer Hart. But we doo not alleage onely the scripture nor will be tried by it alone The heretikes appeale to nothing but to scripture and the Deuill alleaged the scripture only against Christ. Rainoldes This is more then you â—â—nde in the wordes of Vincentius it is your owne fansie He saith that heretikes do alleage the scripture that nothing else but it he saith not Neither could he haue said so without a lye For they alleage many reasons beside the scripture euen whatsoeuer helpeth to countenance their errors sometime the Church sometime Tradition sometime Councels sometime Fathers sometime Miracles sometime Visions sometime Succession of Bishops sometime such other Motiues as your Bristow calleth them Yea they haue greater aduantage for their errours against the catholike faith by these then by scripture For these may be truely alleaged against it as they haue bene often the scripture can neuer but falsely and wrongfully As for that the Deuill alleaged the scripture onely against Christ you thinke his example discrediteth the triall of truth in points of faith by the scripture onely And so it may séeme to a weake eye But to such as marke it with a sharper sight it dooth confirme it rather For that suttle serpent knowing what baites are fittest to take theÌ„ whom as a roaring lion he seeketh to deuoure is want to set vpon men with those perswasions which he is most lykely to seduce them by To one he promiseth knowledge of good and euill as to Eue an other he hardneth with lying wonders as Pharao the prophet he telleth of an Angels speech the king he deceiueth by the consent of false prophets to the Iewes he pretendeth the temple of the Lorde to the Heathens hée sheweth vniuersalitie and antiquitie in a word he leaueth no meanes vnattempted whereby he may intangle the soules of mankinde and wrappe them in the snares of death Wherfore as in his instruments he vseth other Motiues to preuaile with others so him selfe of likelihood would haue vsed them specially to Christ and not the scripture onely had he not knowne that onely scripture if any thing would preuaile with him Stapleton intending to perswade vs that Peter and by reason of Peter the Pope is supreme head of the Church saith that he will proue it by onely demonstration out of the scriptures in effect and that by onely scriptures it may bee proued fully enough and abundantly Is not this a token that we whom he séeketh to winne by his perswasions will not be woon thereto but onely by the scriptures So the Deuils practise in alleaging scripture onely to Christ is a great presumption that Christ accounted nothing a ground of faith and duetie but onely the scripture Whereof a surer argument is the whole behauiour of Christ against the Deuill whom in euery one of his three tentations he put to flight still with scripture It is written And although the Deuil to driue him from that hold alleaged scripture also yet Christ replied not with Fathers or Doctors or Rabbines of the Synagogue but with the word of his heaueÌ„ly Father and against the maimed wrested wordes of scripture he set the scripture alleaged rightly Wherefore let your Captaines instruct their souldiours as they list to get vs into the plaine fieldes of their Motiues out of our weake and false castle of onely scripture as a Licentiat termeth it the action of Christ is the instruction of Christians the Prince of darknes could not get him out of that neither shall the Princes band get out vs. Nay that this castle how weake and false soeuer false-harted weakelinges count it hath ordinaunce enough to shake your Motiues into fitters and can alone subdue all aduersarie powers I néede not the practise of Christ and word of God against you to proue it Your owne golden authour Vincentius Lirinensis saith it For himselfe affirmeth that scripture is sufficient alone against heretikes so that it be taken in the right sense But scripture is not scripture vnlesse it be taken in the right sense in the which alone it came from
he agreeth not precisely word for worde with the Cambron-copie Now the Cambron-copie what is it or whence came it that Cyprian should be made the father of such slippes vpon the credit of it alone What if some did note them in the margent of fansie as students vse to doo What if some receiued them into the text of errour What if some of zeale vnto the church of Rome did adde them And why did not Pamelius leaue out the other words of the equalitie of the Apostles in honor and power because the Cambron copie wanteth them as well as adde these of Peters primacie and chaire because the Cambron-copie hath them Did not his conscience tell him that the copie was vnsound or at the least insufficient to force the change of a place of so great importance against the credite of so many both writen bookes and printed If other Licentiates as learned as Pamelius shall vpon one copie as good as the Cambron presume in all the Fathers as he hath in CypriaÌ„ to adde the like gloses for the rest of your opinions as these are for the chaire and primacie of Peter it will be hie time for vs to take héede how wee permitte the tryall of controuersies in religion to the consent of the Fathers Wherfore although these matters seeme neuer so small yet there may lie as much on them as concerneth the safety of our soules Neither doo I picke them as quarrels for pretense but I alleage them as reasons for proofe that by the position of your owne author we must deale with you not by their consent but by the scripture onely For he on whom you grouÌ„ded Vincentius Lirinensis alloweth onely scripture to conuince those errors which haue encreased long wide because the length of time hath geuen them occasion to steale away the trueth and the poyson spreading farther they endeuour to corrupt the writings of the Fathers Your error of the Papacie hath spread farre and growen long you haue endeuoured to corrupt the writinges of the Fathers the forgeries are plaine in Cyprian in Cyrill and in the Councell of Chalcedon the presumptions are great that you haue beene as bold with other as with these For if Thomas of Aquine made no conscience of it what may be thought of such as were more ambitious And if Manutius dealt so with Cyprian in whom hee sought most credit what did his ten yeares labors in setting foorth the rest And if Papistes durste this in the light of printing what may we feare they did in the darcknesse of writing bookes And if the Roman print be folowed at Anwerp the Anwerp at Paris the Paris other-where perhaps and the newer the worser and the worst accounted best by such as D. Stapleton and testimonies alleaged thence as authenticall how much likelyer is it that when they wrote copies in Monasteries and Abbeys they folowed one another with lesser shame and greater loosenes and so did proceede from good to euill from euill to worse and authors of that age did most approue those copies which made for their aduauntage most and brought authorities out of them To conclude therefore euen by his iudgement to whom you appealed Vincentius Lirinensis in that golden booke against the profane innouations of all heresies the touchstone by the which our controuersie must be tryed is the word of God and not the word of men not the consent of Fathers but the holy scripture and the scripture only And this I may protest I speake not of feare as though the Fathers all held with you against vs but of conscience that I may yeelde due glory to God due reuerence to his word For let such forgeries as I haue spoken of be set apart and what haue all the Fathers nay what hath any of them to prooue the pretended supremacie of Peter Hart. The very same Fathers whose wordes I alleaged before and them acknowledged to be their owne not counterfeits geue Peter the supremacie which you call pretended For S. Ierom saith of him Peter was of so great authoritie that Paul wrote Then after three yeares and so forth and S. Austin affirmeth that the primacie of the Apostles is conspicuous and preeminent with excellent grace in Peter and Chrysostome calleth him the mouth of the Apostles the chiefe and toppe of the company and he is named by Theodoret the prince of the Apostles the prince which title also is geuen him by all antiquitie Wherto I may adde that Epiphanius termeth him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as you would say the highest of the Apostles and S. Austin yet farther their head their President the first of them which preeminence he prooueth also out of S. Cyprian who saith that the Lord did choose Peter first S. Ierom teacheth that Peter was chosen one among the twelue to the inteÌ„t that a head being appointed occasion of scisme might bee taken away The bookes of the Fathers are full of such sayings but they are all to this effect And therfore these fewe may serue to shew their iudgement Rainoldes These sayings and the like which are alleaged out of the Fathers doo touch three prerogatiues which they giue to Peter the first of authoritie the second of primacie the third of principalitie But none of them all doth proue the supremacy which you pretend to Peter and meane to the Pope For by thaâ— supremacie is signified the sâ—lnes of ecclesiasticall or rather Papall power euen a power soueraine of gouerning the Church throughout the whole world in all points matters of doctrine and discipline as you declared Is it not Hart. It is so What then Rainoldes But none of the sayings alleaged out of the Fathers doe geue this soueraine power to Peter Therfore they proue not his pretended supremacie Hart. They geue it him all Rainoldes I wil shew the contrary And to speake in order of the three prerogatiues which by them are geuen him the first out of Ierom that Peter was of great authoritie is nothing to your purpose For it is apparaunt that sith the supremacie dooth note a soueraine power the question is of power and not of authoritie Hart. As who say that power and authoritie did differ so much one from the other Rainoldes Much. For power importeth a right of rule and gouernment which the superiors haue ouer their inferiors for the good ordering of mankind as Princes ouer subiectes Pastors ouer flocks Masters ouer seruants Husbands ouer wiues By authoritie is meant estimation and credite a good opinion of men for that which wée account worthy to bée estéemed For they of whom we think so well in respect of their vertue or wisdome or state or other qualities that we will folow them as authors in our dooings our iudgements factes or words are said to be of credite and authoritie with vs. And this an inferior may haue with his superior As
the Spirit of truth and whether any of them were who can say We haue no assurance then of mysticall senses which may be mens fansies Onely the literall sense which is meant vndoubtedly by the holy Ghost is of force to proue the assured truth and therefore doth binde in matters of beliefe And this is so cléere that your owne Doctors acknowledge it and teach it euen he whom you alleaged For he saith It is agreed betweene you and vs that forcible aguments ought to be drawne onely from the literall sense and that is surely knowne to be the sense and meaning of the holy Ghost As for mystical senses it is not alwaies sure whether the holy Ghost meant them vnlesse they be expounded in the scriptures as that in Iohn you shall not breake a bone of him Which excepted it is a folly to go about to proue the pointes of faith forcibly by mysticall senses Wherefore if it be not expounded in the scriptures that the wordes of Christ touching one Pastor are meant as of him selfe by the literall sense so by the mystical of the Pope you sée that Father Robert saith it is a folly to go about to proue the Popes supremacie by them if you will proue it forcibly Now what I say of one Pastour the same I say of high Priest By whom the law of Moses doth signify the hye priest literally the epistle to the Hebrewes doth shew that mystically he betokened Christ. But that the Pope was meant by him in any sense eyther literall or mysticall I finde not in the scriptures Hart. But I find in the scriptures that Christians must stil haue a hye Priest amongst thē on earth to be their chief iudge Rainoldes Were finde you that Hart. In the seuentéenth chapter of the booke of Deuteronomie euen in these wordes If there rise a matter too hard for thee in iudgement betweene blood and blood betweene cause cause betweene plague and plague in the matters of controuersie within thy gates then shalt thou arise and goe vp to the place which the Lorde thy God shall choose and thou shalt come to the Leuiticall priestes and to the iudge that shall be in those dayes and aske and they shall shew thee the sentence of iudgement And thou shalt do according to that thing which they shall shewe thee from that place that the Lord shall choose and thou shalt obserue to do according to all that they shall enforme thee According to the law which they shall teach thee and according to the iudgement which they shall tell thee shalt thou doo Thou shalt not decline from the thing which they shall shew thee neither to the right hand nor to the left And he that shall presumptuously refuse to obey the commandement of the Priest who serueth then the Lord thy God by the decree of the iudge shall that man dye and thou shalt take away euil out of Israell Here the hye Priest is made the chiefe iudge to heare and determine hard and doubtfull causes amongst the people of God And who amongst Christians is such a Priest and iudge but the Pope onely Rainoldes Now the first chapter of the booke of Genesis would serue you as well to proue the Popes supremacie if it were considered For it is written there In the beginning God created the heauen and the earth Hart. What meane you so to say Rainoldes Nay aske that of him who doth expound it so saying that whosoeuer resisteth his supremacy resisteth Gods ordinance vnlesse he faine as Manichee did that there are two beginninges which is false hereticall because as Moses witnesseth not in the beginninges but in the beginning God created heauen and earth See in the beginning not in the beginninges and therefore not many are hye Priestes of the Church but the Pope onely Hart. The place which I alleaged doth plainely speake of the high Priest and so it doth serue my purpose more fitly then this which doth not touch him Howbeit as learned men when they haue proued a point by stronger arguments are wont to set it foorth with floorishes of lighter reasons rather to polishe it as it were then to worke it and frame it so the Pope hauing brought better euidence for proofe of his supremacie doth trimme it vp with this of Genesis as you would say by an allusion Rainoldes An illusion you should say But the places both as well this of Genesis as that of Deuteronomie are taken in a mysticall sense of your owne so that to winne a matter which must be wunne by sound proofe they are both of like force because that neyther is of any For the literall sense of that in Deuteronomie doth concerne the Iewes to whom the Lorde spake it by his seruant Moses Now how dangerous it is to buyld as vpon scripture thinges which are not grounded vpon the literal sense thereof we may learne by the mysticall sense of that place which a Pope giueth and no common Pope but Innocentius the third the Father of the Lateran-councel in which your popish Shrift and Transsubstantiation were enacted first He in a decretal which is enrolled in the canon law as a rule of the gouernemēt of the Church for euer doth bring foorth that same place of Deuteronomie to proue that the Pope may exercise tēporal iurisdiction not onely in his owne dominion but in other countries too on certaine causes And because Deuteronomi◠is the second lawe by interpretation it is proued saith he by the force of the worde that what is there decreed ought to be obserued in the newe Testament Upon the which principle he doth expound it thus that the place which the Lord hath chosen is Rome the Leuiticall Priestes are his brethren the Cardinals the iudge is himselfe the vicar of Christ the iudgements are of three sortes the firs◠betweene blood and blood is meant of criminall ciuil causes the last betweene plague and plague of ecclesiastical and criminall the midle betweene cause cause pertaineth vnto both ecclesiasticall ciuill In the which when any thing shal be hard or doubtfull recourse must be had to the iudgement of the See Apostolike that is of Rome whose determination if any man presumptuously refuse to obey he is adiudged to dye that is to be cut off as a dead man from the communion of the faithfull by excommunication Lo this is a mysticall sense of that place which you alleaged out of Deuteronomie It runneth verie roundly with the Popes supremacie But Christian States I hope will hold the literall sense against it For if they allow this doctrine of Pope Innocentius as catholike the Pope must be supreme head of all Christians both in ecclesiasticall causes and ciuill The mysterie of iniquitie did worke verie fast when the chiefest mysteries of the Romish faith were built vpon such mystical senses Hart. I
and some of ceremonie so there are some pointes essentiall in iustice and some accidentall The essentiall pointes of iustice are the same in lawes of all common-wealthes For what is a law but a diuine ordinance commanding thinges honest and forbidding the contrarie The accidentall pointes doo and may vary according to circumstances of places times and persons So lawes of religion must be the same for substance in all Christian Churches in ceremonies they may differ as in the primitiue Church they did Wherefore the same faith and lawes of religion do no more inforce all churches to obey one Bishop then the same right and ordinances of iustice do require one Prince to rule all common-wealthes But what soeuer your fansie make you thinke of this point the place in Deuteronomie adiudging them to death who disobey the Priest can not helpe your fansie though it had béene meant of no other Priest but of the high Priest onely For Christ wheÌ„ he sent his Apostles to preach the Gospell said vnto them Whosoeuer shall not receaue you nor heare your wordes when yee depart out of that house or that city shake of the dust of your feete Truely I say vnto you it shall be easier for them of the land of Sodome and Gomorrha in the day of iudgement then for that citie Which wordes being spoken to all the Apostles not to Peter onely and therefore belonging to all their successors as well as to Peters doo shew that euery Bishop hath as great authoritie giuen him by Christ as the Priest had by that law in Deuteronomie In so much that Cyprian doth alleage it often by a better reason of proportioÌ„ then yours to proue the authoritie of Bishops each in seuerall ouer the flockes committed to them Hart. And what if a matter of religion be harder then Bishops each in seuerall be able to decide it What if they disagree and will not yéeld one to another Doth not wisedome shew that there must be a chiefe iudge to ende the controuersie to keepe the truth of faith and peace of the Church that it be not pestered with heresies and schismes Rainoldes The wisedome of God hath committed that chieftie of iudgement so to call it not to the soueraine power of one but to the common care of many For when there was a controuersie in the Church of Antioche about the obseruation of the law of Moses some Iewes teaching contrarie to that which Paule and Barnabas taught they ordeined that Paule and Barnabas and certaine other of them should go vp to Ierusalem to the Apostles and Elders about that question And so by their common agreement and decrée the controuersie was ended the truth of faith kept and peace maintained in the Church After which example the Bishops that succéeded them made the like assemblies on the like occasions and by common conference tooke order for such matters both of doctrine and discipline as concerned in common the state of their Churches So did the Apostles and Apostolike men prouide against schismes heresies Their wisedome reached not vnto your policie of one chiefe iudge Hart. The profit of Councels and Synods of Bishops is very great we graunt For many eyes see more then one But it wil be greater if they be all counsellors vnto one gouernor then if they gouerne eche his owne and all in common For reason doth teach vs that the regiment of one which wee call a monarchie is better and worthier then the regiment of many as the Philosophers shew who write of Common-weales Rainoldes Reason is a notable helpe of mans weakenes if it be obedient to faith as a handmaide not rule it as a maistresse And humane artes wherein the Philosophers haue séene many sparkles of the truth of God by the light of reason are profitable instruments to set forth the truth so farre as they haue peace not warre with Gods worde But if the Philosophers haue erred as naturall men who neither doo conceiue the things of the spirit of God nor can know them if reason haue her eyes as it were dazeled because the light shineth in darkenesse and the darkenesse did not comprehend it then is it to be feared least as the Serpent seduced Eue through his suttletie so he beguile you by reason and you forget that lesson of the holy Ghost beware least there be any man that spoyle you through philosophie Which I say not so much in respect of this point of the Church gouernment as of your whole doctrine a mightie ground whereof in your Schoolemen is philosophie and your Iesuites challenge doth offer to proue it by naturall and morall reason For here if I would iustifie the cause by Philosophers it is â—asily shewed that the Churches state is a most perfite monarchie wherein Christ is king his lawes are the scriptures his officers are the Bishops not ordained to bée assistantes vnto one deputie but to be deputies all them selues euen Pastors of his flock guides rulers of his Church Howbeit if it differ from the kingly states of worldly coÌ„mon-weales which philosophie writeth off as it doth in part Philosophers must not maruel sith Christ hath declared his kingdoÌ„e is not of this world Indéede the Apostles thought of such a kingdome but Christ saide it should not be so amongst them as with the Princes of the Gentiles Which sentence of Christ your Popes not vnderstanding and wéening the Apostles to be forbidden nothing but an heathnish tyrannie and liking well a monarchie because Philosophers prayse it they haue raised a visible monarchie of their owne in steede of Christes monarchie and haue chaunged his kingdome which is not of this world into a worldly kingdome the kingdome of the Romanes as a Iesuit calleth it Neither contenting them selues with such a kingdome as Princes of the Gentiles had they make them selues Princes ouer all the kingdomes and nations of the earth Which is a greater monarchie then Philosophers like off as I coulde proue out of them if the Popes cause were to be handled in their schooles But because I list not to trifle out the time with idle discourses about pointes of State as your Rabbines doo to proue that a monarchie is the best regiment therefore against such reasons I laye that exception which Tertullian did of olde against heretikes What hath Athens to do with Ierusalem the schoole of philosophy with the Church of Christ The duetie of Christians is to search and weigh in matters of faith not what reason but what religion not what the Philosophers but what the Prophets Apostles not what mans fansie but what the Spirit of God doth say And so the former parts of your maine argument for the Popes supremacie are too weake to proue it The last is weaker then they both For that there should be one chiefe and highest Pastor of the Church in earth it hath some
my worke-fellowes vnto the kingdome of God which haue bene a comfort to me at my first answering no man assisted me but all forsooke me I pray God it bee not laid vnto their charge Of the which reasons though some are but probable yet some are sure proofes that Peters continuance at Rome was not such as is reported by Eusebius And this is so manifest that to say nothing of auncienter writers who to make the scriptures agrée somewhat better with his fiue and twentie yeares abode at Rome brought him thither later and gaue him longer time of life Onuphrius Panuinius a Frier of your owne most deuout to the Pope most skilfull in antiquities and stories of the Church acknowledgeth and confirmeth it For in the discourses of his Annotations on Platina printed at Venice afterward at Coolein it is most cleere saith he and surely known by the Actes of the Apostles and Pauls epistle to the Galatians that for nine yeares after Christes death vntill the second yeare of the raigne of Claudius Peter neuer went out of Iewry Wherfore if he came to Rome at that time as it is agreed amongst all autours that he did it followeth of necessitie that hee did not sit seuen yeares at Antioche before he came thither but that his sitting at Antioche was some other time Which thing I haue resolued on thus by the testimonie of most auncient writers He did come to Rome the second yere of Claudius From which time there are to the time of his death about fiue and twentie yeares Wherin although the auncient writers do say that he sate at Rome yet doth it not folow thereof that he abode still in the citie For in the fourth yeare after his comming thither he returned to Ierusalem and there was present at the Councell of the Apostles Thence he went to Antioche and there continued seuen yeares vntil that Nero was Emperour In the beginning of whose raigne he came againe to Rome where hee repaired the Romane church which was decaying And after that when hee had traueiled almost throughout al Europe he returned to Rome in the last yeare of the raigne of Nero and there was put to death This is the confessioÌ„ of your owne Onuphrius made perhaps against the heare as I may terme it but the light of truth and scripture forced him to it Wherby you may perceiue that when Eusebius wrote that Peter sate first seuen yeares at Antioch and fiue and twentie at Rome after that befell to him which Thucydides saith of the old stories of the Grecians men receyue reportes of thinges done before them from hand to hand one from another without examining trying them Some through a desire as it is likely of honouring the Sees of Antioche Rome hearing that S. Peter had preached in them both deuised that he sate seuen yeares in the one and fiue and twentie in the other Eusebius fell vpon it and wrote it in his Chronicle without farther tryall But if he had tryed it by the touchstone of scripture hée would haue cast it off as counterfeite Which I thinke the rather because in his storie he mentioneth the coming of Peter to Rome as out of Iurie not from Antioche for his first coming thether in the time of Claudius and for his coming thither againe in Neros time he sheweth out of Origen that it was towarde his end wheÌ„ he had preached the gospell to the Iewes in Pontus Galatia Cappadocia Asia and Bithynia Wherefore sith Eusebius doth in his storie dissent from his Chronicle and in his Chronicle dissent from the scripture you must not blame me if I require a surer proofe then his worde that Peter was Bishoppe of the Citie of Rome Hart. To talke about the yeares of Peters coming to Rome or his continuance there I am not disposed I leaue it to them who list to search antiquities But that he was in Rome it is a thing vndoubted the scripture doth witnesse it For in the first epistle of his the fifth chapter the Church saith he saluteth you that is in Babylon coelect and Marke my sonne Where your Protestants shew them selues as in all places that doo make against them to be most vnhonest and partiall handlers of Gods worde The auncient Fathers namely S. Ierom Eusebius Oecumenius and many moe agrée that Rome is meant by the worde Babylon here also as in the Apocalypse saying plainely that S. Peter wrote this epistle at Rome which is called Babylon for the resemblance it had to Babylon that great citie in Chaldaea where the Iewes were captiues for magnificence monarchie resort and confusion of all peoples and tongues and for that it was before Christ and long after the seate of all Ethnike superstition and idolatry the slâ—ughter-house of the Apostles other Christian men the heathâ— Emperours then kéeping their chief residence there This being most plaine consonant to that which foloweth of S. Marke whom all the ecclesiasticall histories agree to haue béene Peters scholer at Rome that he there wrote his gospell yet you fearing hereby the sequele of Peters or the Popes supremacie at Rome deny that euer he was there or that this epistle was writen there or that Babylon doth here signifie Rome But you say that Peter wrote this epistle at Babylon in Chaldaea though you neuer read either in scriptures or other holy or prophane history that hee was euer in that citie But sée your shamelesse partialitie Here Babylon say you is not taken for Rome because it would folow that Peter was at Rome and so forth But in the Apocalypse where all euill is spoken of Babylon there you will haue it signifie nothing else but Rome and the Romane church also not as the Fathers interprete it the temporall state of the heathen Empire there So do you folow in euery word no other thing but the aduantage of your own heresie Which is most notorious by this that you hold that Peter was neueâ— at Rome Wherein you passe your selues in impudencie For it is against all the ecclesiasticall histories all the Fathers Gréeke and Latin Theodoret Prosper S. Leo S. Austin Orosius S. Chrysostome S. Epiphanius Prudentius Optatus S. Ambrose S. Ierom Lactantius Eusebius S. Athanasius S. Cyprian Tertullian Origen Irenaeus Hegesippus Caius and Papias the Apostles owne scholers and Dionysius the Bishop of Corinth Ignatius the holy councell of Chalcedon and many others Yea Peter him selfe according to the iudgement of the Fathers as I haue shewed confesseth that he was at Rome calling it Babylon Rainoldes Here is a gréeuous crime wherewith you charge our Protestants of shamelesse partialitie But whether shew them selues more partiall and vnhonest handlers of Gods word our Protestants or your Papistes you are too partiall
and doctrine Wherefore sith the Pharises were so well estéemed did swarme in Iurie it is not to be thought but that other tribes had some of that profession chiefely the tribe of Iuda Hart. If Iuda if Beniamin if other tribes had of them much more by all likelihood had the tribe of Leui. And them might our Sauiour specially meane not generally all in saying The Pharises doo sit vpon the chaire of Moses As if I should say that the Catholikes sit vpon the chaire of Christ you must not thinke I meane of Catholikes who be scholers but of Catholikes who be teachers of Catholike Priestes and Bishops Rainoldes Your answere hath reason For as S. Paule was a Pharise-scholer so was Gamaliel a Pharise-teacher And that there were Pharises of the Priestes Leuites the scripture sheweth saying that the Iewes sent Priestes and Leuites from Ierusalem to talke with Iohn Baptist and they who were sent were of the Pharises Wherefore that the Pharises did succeede Aaron the likelihood is great That the Scribes greater For they expounded taught the law of God whence they were also called now Doctors of the law now Lawiers by duetie and office Whereupon when Herode desired to know where Christ should be borne he gathered togither all the chiefe Priests and Scribes of the people to learne it of them It is most likely then that they succéeded Aaron too as did their predecessor Ezra the Scribe prompt in the law of Moses Yet your Doctor Genebrard saith that the Scribes were lightly of the tribe of Simeon and they with the Pharises are said to haue sate in the chaire of Moses as who had thrust them selues into it being emptie while the Priestes abusing the riches of the Church did forsake their duetie Hart. If Genebrard or any other of our Doctors haue a conceit of his owne what is that to me I folow the receiued sâ—ntence of the Church that the Scribes and Pharises came into the chaire of Moses by succession and not by intrusion But why do you agréeing with me in this point reproue it in my argument Rainoldes I reproued it not The point which I reproued was that you expounded the wordes of Christ so They sate in the chaire of Moses that is they did succeede Aaron Which exposition is erroneous and verie dangerous to the truth though the danger of it not so apparant in it selfe as in the consequent For it is the mother of a greater error Hart. And how would you haue it expounded I pray Rainoldes According to the word and meaning of Christ. The Scribes and the Pharises sit in the chaire of Moses that is they teach the law of Moses For as Moses him selfe receiued it of God to teach it the children of Israel and he did so in like sort the Priestes and Leuites after him were vsed to reade it in the assemblies of the people and to expound it To this end their synagogues were built in euery citie and euerie Sabbat day they met there as it is written Moses of olde time hath in euerie citie them that preach him being read in the Synagogues euerie Sabbat day Now they who did teach were wont to teach sitting which appeereth by our Sauiours example in the temple in the synagogues in other places Wherfore the Scribes and Pharises of whom there were some in euerie towne of Galile and Iurie and Ierusalem to discharge this duetie are said to haue sate in the seat of Moses or chaire as we terme it because they did teach the same which Moses did euen the law of God deliuered to Moses Hart. The matter is not great whether you expound it thus or as we doo Rainoldes Yes For it foloweth of your exposition that the Scribes and Pharises said well in all things which they said because they did succeede Aaron and so that succession which is the marke you shoote at hath certaintie of doctrine and faith knit vnto it Whereas the right lesson which you should gather thence is that the Scribes and Pharises said well in all thinges which they said out of the word of God and so that Gods word is simplie true and certaine but men ordeined to teach it must be heard no farther thâ—n they agree with it And this might D. Stapleton haue learned of the same Fathers whom he cited but that he rather readeth them to mainetaine a faction then to learne the truth For Austin doth interpret the chaire not of succession but of wholsome doctrine in the which they sit who speake the good things of God we are willed to heare God speaking by them when we are willed to do the things which they say For in sitting on Moses chaire they teach the law of God therefore by them God doth teach But if they would teach their owne things saith Austin heare them not obey them not So doth Chrysostome expound it Doo all things which the Scribes and Pharises say you must doo for they preach not their owne things but the things which God commaunded by Moses So doth Origen apply it to them who teach the faith aright with a speciall clause that Christians if they see a preacher liue ill and haue not to charge him with teaching ill doctrine they must frame their liues according to his words not deedes If they haue not to charge him with teaching ill doctrine as if he should say that who soeuer teach ill doctrine they sit not in the chaire of Moses Let them succéede Aaron neuer so directly yet if their doctrine be ill they sit not in the chaire of Moses Whereby you may sée the wretched state of that argument of which you made so great vaunt For the first proposition that the Scribes and Pharises were to be obeied in all thinges which they said because they sate in the chaire of Moses that is they did succeede Aaron is fouly corrupted in the point of succession The second that the Popes do sit in Christes chaire that is they are successors of the Apostles is tainted with the sameâ—canker that the first The conclusion therefore that men must obey the Popes in all thinges which they say and the consequent thereof that they cannot erre in any thing they say are children like their parents as sound as the propositions of which they are begotten The filthines of all the which if yet you sée not behold an other light to sée it by The Scribes amongst the Iewes were as the Canonists are with you the Pharises as the Schoolemen your Genebrard doth match them so Or if you like not his iudgement therein because Schoolemen and Canonists say not true in all thinges yet this you must graunt that Priestes are with you as Scribes and Pharises were with them For Chrysostome saith they be the verie wordes which you did passe ouer for breuities sake we must not say now In
the chaire of Moses but in the chaire of Christ doo the Priests sit for they haue receiued his doctrine Which point vnlesse your former argument were naught will proue that Priestes cannot erre no more then Popes For they who sit in Christes chaire haue greater prerogatiue then they who sate in the chaire of Moses Priestes then Scribes and Pharises The Scribes and the Pharises were to be obeied in all things which they said The Priestes must bee therefore much more obeied in all things But if they should erre then ought they not to be obeied Therefore they cannot erre in any thing they say Acknowledge you the forme of your owne argument Doth not the conclusion folow as necessarily here as there And thinke you M. Hart that Priestes cannot erre Thinke you that your selfe are of this perfection that wée ought to obey both you and your companions in all thinges which you say Or if you thinke not so fondly of them so proudly of your selfe as I hope you do not then leaue Doctor Stapletons exposition which inferreth it which he patcheth vp with the wordes of Austin Chrysostome and Origen whereas not one of them meant it Yéelde rather if you be wedded to Doctors of your owne side vnto their authoritie then whom the Church of Rome hath none of greater knowledge and perfiter iudgement for right interpreting of the scriptures I meane Iohn Ferus Arias Montanus Of whom the one saith that Christ taught his disciples to obserue and doo whatsoeuer the Scribes and the Pharises commanded by the prescript of the law that is out of the chaire of Moses the other that he chargeth vs to obey euil prelates yet withall he addeth how farre we must obey them Do ye saith he all things which they shall say vnto you but he had told them first they sit vpon the chaire of Moses For Christ did not meane that they should obserue all the decrees of Pharises but so farre forth as they agreed with the law According whereunto when he had shewed before also that they taught contrarie to the law in some pointes after certaine things touched betweene he added Beware of the leauen of the Pharises In like sort he said to the Apostles and their successours Hee that heareth you heareth me and he that despiseth you despiseth me and it shall be easier for the land of Sodom in the day of iudgement then for them who shall not receiue you and heare your wordes But Matthew had set downe before that Christ chose twelue whom he called Apostles and charged them to preach the gospell Whereby it appeereth that the Apostles must be heard but so farre forth as they be Apostles that is as they doo Christes worke and preach and teach the thinges which Christ commanded But if they teach other thinges and contrarie to Christ then are they not Apostles now but seducers and therefore not to be heard O the great light of truth which forceth euen the aduersaries not onely to perceiue it but also to reueale it often So will it force you too if you haue so much grace as Ferus and Montanus had Hart. So much grace as to say that if the Apostles teach thinges contrarie to Christ they are no Apostles now but seducers Doo you allow that spéech of Ferus And might the Apostles be seducers Rainoldes Peter an Apostle might say vnto Christ when he heard him speake of suffering at Ierusalem Maister pitie thy selfe this shall not be vnto thee And Christ would not therefore haue called him Satan had he not thought him a seducer Hart. But Christ did giue them afterwarde the holy ghost in greater abundance from heauen when he sent them to preach vnto all the world Rainoldes But Christ had told them before that it should be easier for Sodom and Gomorrha then for the citie that shold not heare their wordes Yet Christ himselfe refused to heare the wordes of Peter Wherefore the exposition of Ferus is good that Christ meant those wordes which he had willed them to preach that is the gospell Beside that Ferus speaketh not onely of Apostles but also of their successours Now though the Apostles were priuileged afterwarde by the speciall graces of the holy ghost to teach the truth in all thinges yet Bishops who succeeded them haue not that priuilege You must renounce therfore that erroneous expositioÌ„ which knitteth an assured truth of faith and doctrine to the succession of the Apostles and bindeth vs in all thinges to obey them who succeede into the seate of the Apostles and saith that he who sitteth in the chaire of the Apostles doth speake not his owne thinges but the thinges of God For our Sauiour meant that the Scribes Pharises ought to be obeied in al things which they taught out of the law of God not that they câ—uld not erre in faith and doctrine because they did succeede Aaron Hart. I cannot conceiue but that he meant to cléere their doctrine from errour For his wordes of doing that which they say because they sit in the chaire of Moses are rather a warraÌ„t for them in all thinges which they teach then a restraint for others how farre they must obey them Rainoldes His wordes belong properly to the instruction of hearers that they despise not the doctrine of God for the fautes of teachers So are they both a warrant and a restraint by consequent A warrant for teachers to be obeied in all things which they shall say out of the law A restraint for hearers not to doo those thinges whiâ—h the teachers say if they shall teach against the law As letters of credence geuen by Princes vnto their embassadours doo warrant them for their commission restraine them if they goe beyond it Hart. But the commission here is generall for all thinges that concerne teachers For Christ expresly sâ—ith obserue ye and doo ye Now we obserue pointes of faith we doo precepts of maners Wherefore whatsoeuer the Scribes and Pharises taught either of faith or maners they were to be obeyed in it Rainoldes That were a pretie proofe for your traditions of both sortes if it had ground in the text But to obserue and doo are both referred by Christ to the same thinges as he sheweth by comprising them first in the one worde then in the other All thinges whatsoeuer they say you must obserue obserue ye and doo ye but after their workes doo not for they say and doo not So it séemeth that to fasten his lesson of obeying the commandements of God which the Scribes and Pharises taught out of Moses he doubleth as it were his stroke by saying both obserue ye and doo ye Wherein he might expresse and call to their remembrance that which he doth commend of Moses who doubleth oft the same wordes in vrging of the same doctrine To be short
say withall that this encrease of wealth in the Church of Rome began after S. Gregories time yet are they notably disproued by S. Gregorie himselfe in whose reigne as it may probably be thought the Churches possessions were more then they be now at this present And this appeereth by sundry of his epistles where he maketh expresse mention of S. Peters patrimonie in Africke in Naples in Campania in Dalmatia in Fraunce in Italie in Sicilia in Sardinia and in many other countries Now then whereas for this which is the greatest part so good proofes may be made there is no doubt but for sundry other very great and large giftes of diuers Princes many Nobles men and women which were bestowed vpon that Sée the Bishops thereof can shew very good euidence when nede shall require Marry if any of all the Bishops that euer were in that seat flowing thus in wealth abused the same to any euill purpose or els their authoritie when they were become so mightie in any of the pointes which are mentioned by you I am so farre off from iustifying them therein that rather I râ—w to sée it and I condemne them therefore But thereof wee shall haue occâ—sion to treate more particularly in the chapters folowing Onely this is it which I go about to proue and defend in them that because of Christes promise of building his Church vpon that rocke and prayer also that their faith should not faile they neuer erred in iudgement or definitiue sentence And thus much I am sure the very same autours whose names here you bring in against me do mainteine no lesse then I doo howsoeuer they carpe and finde fault with the Popes naughtie maners Wherefore to drawe to an ende whether all that hath béene said hithertoo or shall be said hereafter touching the practise of the Popes supremacie doo proue his supreme authoritie or not I referre the iudgement thereof M. Rainoldes to your selfe and to euery indifferent reader Certes I haue endeuored somewhat to doo it though nothing so wel I graunt as such a cause requireth But as I said you shall sée it proued yet furthermore by the practise thereof which the Bishop of Rome hath alwaies vsed bearing himselfe as supreme pastour of our soules next vnder Christ which thing was neuer denyed him but graunted of all men without resistance Let their spéeches and déedes bee a iustifying of him and let their behauiour generally towardes him bée an instruction for vs to folow them in their well dooing Iohn Hart. Rainoldes If you loue me the better M. Hart for my plaine dealing in so weightie a matter as you say you must I would to God you would deale as plainely with me that I might in like sort loue you the better too But neither doo you yéelde to that which I haue proued by euidence of truâ—h and although you cannot disproue my proofes of it yet you seeke to shift them off by fraude and falsehood For whereas I shewed that the Pope pretending discharge of his office in gouernment of the Church hath gotten his temporall dominion from Emperours by treâ—son and rebellion and practised vnlawâ—ull power in thinges spirituall to the oppressing of Christendome and therefore erred in office yea in the supremacie which he hath vsurped ouer both the states spirituall and temporall you for the first point of his dominion temporall doo go about to cléere him by sophismes and lyes for the next of his tyrannie in spiritual things you smooth it as a lawfull autoritie abused for the last of his erring in office you abbridge it to iudgement and definitiue sentence and wrappe his supremacie vp in generall wordes as allowed by all men when in the particular pointes of the supremacie you can not iustifie it by any Festus the Roman thought Paul to bee madde the madnes was in Festus him selfe noâ— in Paul You thinke that I erre of a wrong perswasion the errour is your owne not mine M. Hart. The fautes of your dealing for the maintaining of your errour I will set before you if perhaps the Lorde will open your eyes and vntye your tongue that you may at length perceiue and confesse the Popes supremacie to be vnlawfull To begin therefore with the first point wherein you séeke to cléere him from hauing vsurped his temporall dominion you say that if we weigh thinges with indifferencie and in equall balance I shall wel perceiue that both Emperours and other Princes adioyning vnto him haue rather vsurped of his then hee of theirs Which if you tooke not thinges at hucksters handes without all weighing of them you would neuer say For that which I haue laide in one scale of the balance is the manifest truth of recordes euidences approued by the witnesse of writers verie credible who note the times the persons the meanes and all circumstances how the Pope vsurped And that which you lay in the other scale to ouerweigh mine is partlie impertinent and nothing to the purpose partlie vntrue and impudentlie forged The weightiest parcel of it is that which cometh formost namely that a good autour doth write that S. Peters patrimonie is greatly diminished through the Popes negligent looking vnto it What is that good autour M. Hart who writeth so Why doo you not name him Is it because you feare that I should finde he maketh nought for you if I knew him or that you would put me to the paines of séeking him I pray vse hereafter at least so much plainenesse to name me the autours on which your proofes are grounded sith I not onely name them but quote their places also whereon I ground mine that you may the better sift them and iudge of them The autour who writeth that which you alleage is Nicolas Clemangis a Doctour of Paris that liued about a ninescore yeares since in déed a good autour Who lamenting the wretched and corrupt state of the Church in his time declareth the Pope to haue béene the fiâ—ebrand of her calamities and disorders in that not contented with the fruites and profits of the Bishopricke of Rome and S. Peters patrimonie though very great and royal he laide his greedy handes on other mens flockes replenished with milke and wooll and vsurped the right of bestowing Bishoprickes and liuings ecclesiasticall throughout all Christendom and disanulled the lawfull elections of pastors by his reseruations prouisions and aduowsons and oppresâ—ed churches with first fruites of one yeare of two yeares of three yeares yea sometimes of â—oure yeares with tithes with exactions with procurations with spoiles of Prelates and infinite other burdens and ordeined collectors to seaze vpon these taxes and tributes throughout al prouinces with horrible abusing of suspensions interditements and excommunications if any man refused to pay them vsed such marchandize with suites in his Court and rules of his Chauncerie that the house of God was made a denne of theeues and raised his Cardinals as
as Canus D. Stapleton shew but not in the conclusion that is the principal point which they entend to teach Rainoldes Now you may sée how vainely you stâ—iue for the Pope For this which is your last hold when all is doone I oueâ—threw at first by the example of Honorius The conclusion and principal point of whose decrees set forth to teach the Church was the Monothelites heresie Whereby he did not strengthen his brethren in the faith but confirmed their wicked errors against the faith as the Councel pronounced of him Hart. Why doo all the Fathers then apply this priuilege of not failing and of confirming other in faith to the Roman Church and Peters successors in the same Rainoldes They doo not But your Rhemists who report that of them do shamefully misreport them For Austin Chrysostom Prosper and Theophylact doo vnderstand by faith a liuely Christian faith and say that Christ prayed that Peter might continue therein vnto the end Which grace neither they nor any Father saith that all the Popes haue Nay your selfe your Doctors yea Rhemists do confesse the contrarie Hart. Yet the rocke no doubt whereon Christ did promise that he would build his Church and the gates of hell should not preuaile against it is applyed by the Fathers to Peters successors in the church of Rome S. Austin is a witnesse thereof against the Donatistes whom he biddeth number the Priestes that is the Popes euen from the seate of Peter and marke their succession affirming it to be the rocke against which the proude gates of hell preuaile not And S. Ierom writing to Damasus the Pope auoucheth as much I am ioyned saith he in communion to your holinesse that is to Peters chaire I know that the Church is builded vpon that rocke Rainoldes The poore shippe of Christ hath made almost shipwracke vpon this rocke of yours I haue alreadie proued that the word petra which you translate a rocke doth signifie in Christes spéech a stone not a rocke Howbeit rocke or stone it makâ—th no difference to the sayings of the Fathers which you alleage concerning it For whether they meant a stone as it is properly or a rocke as it may be they did at least S. Austin through doutfulnesse of the worde they meant not to build the Papacie therby Wherfore if you thinke that the name of stone either hath not so great aduantage for your purpose or doth not yéelde so fully the meaning of the Fathers I am content with out preiudice to that which I haue spokeÌ„ touching the right sense thereof in Christes spéech to vse your rocke in steede of it Hart. So you must doo if you will deale with my argument For the maiestie of the Church of Rome is much aduanced by the name of the rocke and in my iudgement the Fathers meant no lesse when they applyed the words of Christ to that Sée Rainoldes The Fathers vsed those wordes to aduance the maiestie of the Church of Rome but neither to aduance the church of Rome alone neither to import the Popes supremacie by that maiestie And this may be gathered plainely by S. Cyprian who although he giue a speciall tiâ—le of honour preeminence to the Church of Rome yet doth he apply that of the rock to the Church in general For he affirmeth that our Lord tooke order for the office of a Bishop and the state of his Church by saying vnto Peter Thou art Peter and on this rocke will I build my Church and the gates of hell shall not preuaile against it and to thee will I giue the keyes of the kingdome of heauen and whatsoeuer thou shalt binde on earth shall be bound in heauen and whatsoeuer thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heauen Thence by course of times and successions there floweth the ordeining of Bishops and the state of the Church that vpon the Bishops the Church should be set and euery action of the Church should be gouerned and guided by the same rulers In the which wordes S. Cyprian you see accounteth all Bishops the rocke of the Church That as by the church built vpon the rocke the whole Church is meant and not the Church of Rome or of Carthage onely so neither the Bishop of Rome nor of Carthage may be represented alone by the rocke and yet as well the Bishop of Carthage as of Rome Hart. Howsoeuer it seemed in S. Cyprians iudgement to belong to all Bishops and so after a sort to the Bishop of Carthage as he applyeth it yet other of the Fathers apply it in speciall to the Bishop of Rome giue it particularly to that Church Sée Rainoldes They doo but in such sort that they might haue done it to any faithfull Church euen to the Church of Carthage as S. Cyprian did For that which is verified of a thing in generall is verified in the speciall As for example the Catholike Church in generall is named the house of God and the spouse of Christ. The Apostle applyeth those titles in special the one to the Hebrewes the other to the Corinthians if they continue faithfull And so what Christ hath said of his whole Church that the gates of hell shall not preuaile against it that is true in euery part of his Church And if he named Peter a rocke in respect of the faith that hee professed on the which he said he would build his Church then al on whom professing the same faith of Christ his Church in part is builded may in a proportion be called rockes also Wherefore sith the Fathers did speake of the Church of Rome when it was holy and of the Roman Bishops when they professed the faith of Peter no maruaile if they said the Church was built on that rocke and the gates of hell did not preuaile against it Howbeit I deny not but that in their spéeches of the Church of Rome they giue more vnto it then they could haue giuen to euery faithfull Church For whereas of the sundry Churches of Christ some were planted by the Apostles them selues as Ierusalem Antioche Corinth Rome some receiued the faith from them which the Apostles planted they had the former sort in greater reputation and called them Apostolike Churches amongst which they counted the Church of Rome a chiefe one as planted by the chiefe Apostles Peter and Paule And because it was famous that Peter had preached the Gospel there whom as the first Apostle it séemeth that the Romans did more reioyce in then in Paule thence it commeth that in speaking of the Church of Rome they mention oftentimes the seat and chaire of Peter For they who did teach were wont to teach fitting as I shewed before by the example of Christ and his wordes of the Scribes and Pharises
Whereupon as the scripture speaketh of S. Paul that he sate at Corinth a yeare sixe monethes teaching the word of of God amongst them meaning that he continued there and preached to them in like sort the Fathers â—o signifie that Peter abode and taught in Rome are accustomed to say that he sate at Rome So doth Austin mention the succession of Bishops from the seat of Peter So doth Ierom honor the Bishop of that See with the nâ—me of Peters chaire But what is this to the supremacie For it is spoken by the Fathers also that Peter did sit and hâ—d hâ—s châ—ire at Antioche yea at Antioche as some say he had in deede a high chaire wherin he was exalted And of his chaire at Antioche you haue an olde holy day of his chaire at Rome a new one trimmed of late Wherefore if the high chaire of Peter at Antioche with an olde feaste could not make the Bishop of Antioche supreme head how can the Bishop of Rome be made supreme head by Peters chaire perhaps a lower chaire at Rome with a newe feast If the new feast be that which maketh vp the matter the Pope was no foole in making that feast He may doo well to make mâ—e Hart. You make your selfe sport with our feastes of S. Peters chaire as though I had said that because the Fathers doo name the Sée of Rome the seat and chaire of Peter therefore the Bishop of Rome must haue the supremacie Whereas I alleaged them to shew that the Bishops and the succession of Bishops in that See is the rocke on which S. Ièrom saith he knoweth the Church to be built against which S. Austin saith that the proud gates of hell preuaile not Rainoldes But you doo conclude the Popes supremacie hereof or els you stray from the question Hart. Why may I not conclude it Rainoldes If you list but the feast of S. Peters chaire would proue it more galantly For if the testimonies which you alleage of Ierom and Austin be examined they say nothing for it S. Ierom abiding in his young yeares among the Arian heretikes in the coastes of Syria was required by their Bishop to allow and approue a profession of faith touching the Trinitie wherein he suspected there lay some priuy poyson hidden Wherefore least he should yéelde thereunto rashly he sought to be directed by the aduise and counsell of Damasus Bishop of Rome as whom both hee acknowledged to bee his owne Biâ—hop and knew to be a Bishop that helde the catholike faith which praise by that title of the rocke he giueth him In Afrike they were troubled with other heretikes named Donatistes a sect which despised the communion of Saintes and rent them selues a sunder from the assemblies of Christians because there were some euil men amongst them as they said whose felowship defiled them S. Austin wrote a Psalme for the Catholiks against these wherein hauing proued first out of the scriptures that we must not leaue the communion of the Church for that there are some euill men in it sith Christ hath declared that there should be so as tares with corne in the field as chaffe with wheate in the floore as badde with good in the nett he confirmeth this doctrine by the consent iudgement of the Church of Rome whose Bishops euen from Peter had imbraced it still and constantly maintained it the gates of hel in vaine assaulting them So the wordes of Austin and Ierom doo import a sinceritie of faith in the Church of Rome the Roman Bishops against the Arians and Donatistes but neither of their wordes import the supremacie which is a soueraintie of power Hart. If they had not meant as well a soueraintie of power as sinceritie of faith why should they mention that Church and not others Were there no Bishops sincere through al the world but the Bishops of Rome onely Rainoldes Yes a great many and they mention them too For Ierom though he asketh the aduise of Damasus a young man of an old a Roman of the Bishop of Rome whose religion was sound whose authoritie was great and the greater with Ierom because he knew him well as hauing lerned him selfe the faith of Christ in Rome where he was baptized yet doth he name S. Ambrose the Bishop then of Milan as sound in faith also and the Bishops of Aegypt yea of the west in generall Now in the west saith he the sunne of righteousnes ariseth and the inheritance of the Fathers is kept vncorrupted amongst you alone In like sort doth Austin note against the Donatistes whose canker had fretted but a péece of Afrike that Bishops of the coastes and countries beyond sea and Churches through the whole world were pure from their heresie Howbeit as Ierom preferred the aduise of Damasus before others to confirme himselfe so did Austin choose the Church of Rome aboue the rest to confirme his brethren For he penned his Psalme wherin this is writen of purpose to the capacitie of the very meanest simplest of the people that they might vnderstaÌ„d and remember the state of the controuersie with the Donatistes Wherefore he commendeth the truth by the authoritie of the Church of Rome which of all the Churches that the Apostles planted was both néerest to them and best estéemed of amongst them But how farre S. Austin was from your fansie of the Popes supremacie when he alleaged the Church of Rome to this intent let that bee a token that writing for the learned who were of greater reach he alleageth the Churches of Ierusalem of Corinth of Antioche Ephesus Smyrna Pergamus of Asia Bithynia Galatia Cappadocia in a worde of all the rest as well as of Rome And this may be semblably noted in S. Ierom. Who when the Arians charged him with heresie did iustifie his faith by his communion with the Churches of the west and of Aegypt of Damasus Bishop of Rome and Peter Bishop of Alexandria According to the law of the Emperour Theodosius wherein it is decréed that all they should be named and esteemed Catholikes who beleeued of the Trinitie as Damasus and Peter did the rest to be accounted and punished as heretikes A great prayse I graunt of the faith of Damasus that so good an Emperour did set him for a sampler whom Christians should folow but a prayse common 〈◊〉 him with Peter Bishop of Alexandria and common to them both with sundrie Bishops of the East Nectarius Pelagius Diodorus Amphilochius Helladius Otreinâ—s Gregorie Nyâ—â—en and mo Of whom the same Emperour did 〈◊〉 make an other law that none should haue the châ—rge of â—ishoprickes committed to them but such as weâ—â— of their faith Whereby you may perceyue that the prayse giuen to Damasus by Ierom proueth a sound faith common to the Bishop of Rome with many other not a soueraine power peculiar to him alone aboue all Hart. Then
to winne you to the truth doo bring you the confessions of your own men who witnesse a truth Hart. A truth Why will you graunt vs that the Popes supremacie came in by tradition if we will graunt you that it can not be proued by scripture Rainoldes By tradition I if you meane tradition as S. Peter doth where he teacheth Christians that they are redeemed from their vaine conuersation of the tradition of their Fathers Hart. You are disposed to play with your owne fansies You know my meaning well enough Will you graunt that it came in by tradition of the Apostles Rainoldes I should play in déede with your owne fansies if I should graunt you that Hart. But they whom you alleaged doo say that it did so as your selfe haue shewed Rainoldes But I will proue that they spake no truer in that then you haue doone in the other Hart. But what an iniurie is this to presse mee with their former wordes of the scripture whereas your selfe beleeue not the later of tradition Rainoldes What thinke you of S. Paule Did hee beleeue those thinges which the heathnish Poets do write of Goddes and Goddesses Bacchus Diana Minerua Mercurie Hart. He did not What then Rainoldes Yet he alleaged them to perswade the Athenians that in God we liue and moue and haue our being What an iniury was that to presse the Athenians with Poets words of God whereas himselfe beléeued not their wordes of Gods and Goddesses Hart. The Poets might say well and did in the former though in the later they missed Rainoldes Now wil you deale as frendly with me as with S. Paule His case and mine are coosins Hart. Nay you in the selfe same sentence of our men cull out a péece of it and yet an other péece of it you allow not Rainoldes Euen so did S. Paule For that which he auouched out of their owne Poets the meaning of it is in sundry the very wordes in Aratus they spake it of Iupiter who was a wicked man but thought of them to be God S. Paule allowing not their error in the person culled out their sentence concerning the thing and proued a truth by it Hart. Well if you may diuide the sentence of Canus and other sort then I haue done Rainoldes That I wish For the truth is like vnto camomill the more you presse it down the faster it groweth and spreadeth fairer and smelleth sweeter Hart. So much of scripture then Now to tradition by which the Popes supremacie may be cléerely proued Rainoldes By tradition Why Do you acknowlege then that it cannot be proued by scripture Hart. I tell you no once againe How often must I say it Rainoldes Once saying will serue if you do not vnsay your saying But here in my iudgement you séeme to vnsay it For you disclaime the title pretended by scripture when you claime by tradition Hart. Why so Might not the same thing both be writen in scripture and deliuered by word of mouth Rainoldes It might was no dout as the traditions shew which S. Paule doth mention which signify the doctrine that hee deliuered out of the scriptures But you meane a doctrine not writen in the scriptures when you speake of tradition For you doo imagin that the gospell of Christ is partly contained in writen bookes that is the scriptures partly in vnwriten things that is traditions as the Iewish Rabbines do say that God by Moses deliuered not only the law that is writen but also an vnwriten law which they call Cabala Hart. Sée as the Iewish Rabbines You haue inured your mouth to such venemous spéeches· Rainoldes Beware or els through my side you will wound your freend For Bishop Peresius your chiefest patrone of traditions doth proue them solemnly by this point of the Iewish Rabbins and the Cabala Neither is the proofe vnfit if it be weighed For as they pretend this ground for the Cabala that it openeth the hidden meaning of the scriptures so do you for traditions And as they in processe of time brought in doctrine contrarie to the scriptures vnder pretense of traditions so do you with your Cabala And as Cabalists among the Iewes do call them scripture-men by way of reproch who cast off traditions and cleaue to scriptures only so doo traditionists among you reproch vs with the same terme Yea Lindan and Prateolus doo note it for a speciall heresie But to leaue this venemous spéech it is manifest that you renounce the scripture for proofe of any title which you lay claime to by tradition For scripture is writen tradition vnwriten Wherefore if by tradition you minde to proue the Popes supremacie you must acknowlege first that it cannot be proued by scripture If you bee not willing to ackonwlege that I must debarre you from tradition Hart. Then I will proue it by the Fathers Rainoldes Nay that you shall not neither vnlesse you will forgo the scripture Hart. And why so I pray Rainoldes Because they say forsooth that it is held by tradition So that their euidences make against you if scripture be your plea for it Hart. That is very false For by the words Thou art Peter and vpon this rocke in the sixtéenth of Matthew the first Popes of Rome most holy martyrs haue proued it Anacletus Alexander the first Pius the first Victor Zepherinus Marcellus Eusebius Melchiades Iulius Damasus and likewise others by other places as D. Stapleton alleageth farther Wherefore that the Fathers tooke it as you say to be held by tradition it is a flat lye Rainoldes Say you so Then Canus and Father Robert do lye flatly but that is no maruell who grounding it both on tradition the one doth cite for witnesses thereof the first Popes of Rome most holy martyrs Anacletus Sixtus the first Eleutherius Victor Sixtus the second Zepherinus Marcellus Melchiades Marcus Iulius the other not contenting himselfe with particulars doth alleage in grosse fâ—â—st the generall Councels next the Popes and last the Fathers Hart. Yet more of Canus and Father Robert I take not their defense vpon me and why againe doo you tell me of them Rainoldes That you may sée how the Lord doth sheath the swordes of Madianites in their own sides to the confusion of them who pitch their campe against Israel For the same Popes which are alleaged by Canus to prooue that their supremacie is an vnwritten truth the verie same Popes are alleaged by Stapleton to prooue that it is writen euen Anacletus Victor Zepherinus Marcellus Melchiades and Iulius Yea and that is more the very same epistles of theirs are alleaged by Stapleton which by Canus If rightly by Canus how may we trust Stapleton If rightly by Stapleton how may wee trust Canus If rightly by them both what trimme Popes are they who with one
are not aliue Hart. Aliue What is that to the tryall of our issue Rainoldes Much. For if they liued and did appeere before the iury first they should be sworne to say the truth and al the truth and nothing but the truth Whereby they might bee moued both to speake more waâ—ily and to enforme the iury more throughly then they haue doon Next it would be easier to examine them of their age their estate the circumstances of their persons of their spéeches the meaning the occasion and cause thereof Which all are helpes to finde out the truth of thinges in controuersie Thirdly if it appeered by examination that either for their persons or for their speeches they are vnworthie of credit then it should bee lawfull to except against them A libertie which law doth graunt against witnesses if there be cause of iust exception Yet you perhaps as your men are wont would make outcrye if I should vse it against them who are dead and absent Wherefore vnlesse the iury doo supply that by wisedome and equitie which wanteth in the course of tryall by reason that the witnesses whom you will bring are not aliue they may be deceyued by names and shewes of witnesses and thereby giue a verdict which shall proue no verdict For verdict is a speech of veritie Hart. An honest mans worde is as good as his oth For as he will not forsweare so neither lye The Fathers must not therefore be the lesse beleeued because they are not sworne Rainoldes Yet an honest man when he is sworne wil speake more fully and maturely then when he is vnsworne And hée may say that sometime on coniecture which on his oth he would not say Hart. But that may be perceyued by the Fathers writings when they doo pronounce of a thing as certaine when as vncertaine they coniecture it And so may other circumstances which you require be knowne too as well as if them selues were present Rainoldes Not so well For their writings doo not answere to many questions which if they were present I woulde aske of them But I am content with that which may be knowne so Let the iury weigh it and iudge thereafter of their credit Hart. What Shall meaner men who be aliue now iudge of the credit of the Fathers who were so long in time so farre in giftes before them Rainoldes Euagrius a meane man wrote vnto S. Ierom desiring his opinion concerning Melchisedec whether he were the holy Ghost S. Ierom answering him when hee had shewed the iudgements of the auncient writers Origen Didymus Hippolytus Irenaeus Eusebius Caesariensis and Emisesenus Apollinarius Eustathius and the best learned Iewes of whom some thought Melchisedec an angel some a man you haue saith he what I haue heard what I haue read touching Melchisedec To bring forth the witnesses it was my part let it be yours to iudge of the credit of the witnesses It séemed reason to S. Ierom that Euagrius should iudge of of the witnesses whom he brought What is there more in the Fathers then was in those witnesses What was there more in Euagrius then is in many who liue now Hart. But you perhaps will cauil either at the persons or at the spéeches of the Fathers and thinke that euery toy is a sufficient reason why men should not beléeue them Rainoldes Whether the exceptions that I shall take against any be cauils and toyes let the iury iudge Nay I durst say almost let mine aduersarie iudge For what thinke you youâ— self if one alleage for scripture that which is not scripture may not that autoritie be iustly refused As if for example a man should write that Christ said to his disciples that which I say to one of you I say to all Hart. In deed M. Iewell alleaged that for scripture to proue that the wordes of Christ vnto Peter feede my sheepe feede my lambes were spoken n ot to him onely but to the rest of the Apostles Wherein he was iustly reproued by D. Harding For Christ did not say what I say to one that I say to all but what I say to you meaning the Apostles that I say to all Christians watch So good is our cause that M. Iewell could not make shew of truth against it but by foule corruption and falsifiing of the scriptures Rainoldes I pray be good to M. Iewell for M. Optatus and Fulgentius sake who both haue missealleaged the same words of Christ yea one of them in like sort as Bishop Iewell did For to proue that the words of the Lord to Esay Cry and cease not were spoken not to Esay onely but to all preachers he vseth this reason that Christ doth say to his disciples what I say to one of you I say to all Wherin as the doctrine of a preachers duty is true though the proofe be false so is in Bishop Iewell the doctrine of the Apostles duety And Bishop Iewels proofe from one Apostle vnto all is better grounded on the wordes then the other from Esay the Prophet to all preachers Moreouer the faulte remaineth vncorrected in â—ulgentius and Optatus Bishop Iewell hath corrected it Wherefore if you condemne him of fouly corrupting and falsifying the scripture because he missealleaged that sentence of Christ what iudgement will you giue of Fulgentius and Optatus Hart. Nay it is likely that they ouersaw it by a slippe of memorie Rainoldes The same would you iudge of M. Iewel if some what did not blinde your eye But by this your iudgement I see that where the Fathers mistake the wordes of scripture they may be refused What if they mistake not the wordes but the sense may we refuse them also there As Iustin the Martyr Irenaeus Papias Tertullian Victorinus Lactantius Apollinarius Seuerus and Nepos in that they thought that Christians after the resurrection should raigne a thousand yeares with Christ vpon the earth in a golden Ierusalem and there should mary wiues beget children eate drinke liue in corporall delites Which errour though repugnant flatly to the scriptures yet they fell into partly by confounding the first and second resurrection partly by taking that carnally which was mystically meant in the Reuelation Hart. That was the heresie of the Millenaries as they are called Howbeit in the Fathers though it were an errour yet it was no heresie Rainoldes I doo not say it was an heresie I say that they mistooke the meaning of the scripture which you can not denie Yea some times when they neither mistooke the words nor the meaning yet they taught amisse out of it As that God created the world in six dayes they vnderstood it rightly But to conclude thereof that the world should last but sixe thousand yeares because one day is with the Lord as a thousand yeares a thousand yeares as one day this was an ouersight For if that were true
which they did gather of those wordes then might we know the times whereof our Sauiour saith that it is not for man to knowe them And vpon this reason S. Austin doth reproue that fansie of sixe thousand yeares as rash and presumptuous Hart. So doo we also For Lindan and Prateolus doo note it in Luthers and Melanchthons Chronicles as a Iewish heresie Rainoldes Good reason when Luther and Melanchthon write it But when Irenaeus Hilarie Lactantius and other Fathers write it what doo they note it then Hart. Suppose it were an ouersight But what néedes all this As who say you douted that we would maintaine the Fathers in those things in which they are conuicted of error by the scriptures Rainoldes I haue cause to dout it For though there be no man lightly so profane as to professe that he will doo so yet such is the blindnes o◠mens deuotion to Saintes there haue béene heretofore who haue so done and are still There is a famous fable touching the assumption of the blessed virgin that when the time of her death approched the Apostles then dispersed throughout the world to preach the gospell were taken vp in cloudes and brought miraculously to Ierusalem to be present at her funerall This tale in olde time was writen in a booke which bare the name of Melito an auncient learned Bishop of Asia though he wrote it not be like But whosoeuer wrote it he wrote a lye saith Bede because his words gaine say the wordes of S. Luke in the actes of the Apostles Which Bede hauing shewed in sundrie pointes of his tale he saith that he reherseth these thinges because he knoweth that some beleeue that booke with vnaduised rashnesse against S. Lukes autoritie So you sée there haue béene who haue beléeued a Father yea perhaps a rascall not a Father against the scriptures And that there are such still I sée by our countrymen your diuines of Rhemes who vouch the same fable vpon greater credit of Fathers then the other but with no greater truth Hart. Doo you call the assumption of our Ladie a fable What impietie is this against the mother of our Lord that excellent vessell of grace whom all generations ought to call blessed But you can not abide her prayses and honours Nay you haue abolished not onely her greatest feast of her assumption but of her conception and natiuitie too So as it may bee thought the diuell beareth a special malice to this woman whose seede brake his head Rainoldes It may be thought that the diuell when he did striue with Michael about the bodie of Moses whom the Lord buried the Iewes knew not where did striue that his bodie might bee reuealed to the Iewes to the entent that they might worship it and commit idolatrie But it is out of doubt that when he moued the people of Lystra to sacrifice vnto Paul and Barnabas and to call them Gods he meant to deface the glory of God by the too much honouring and praysing of his Saintes We can abide the prayses of Barnabas and Paule but not to haue them called Gods We can abide their honours but not to sacrifice vnto them Wee know that the diuell doth beare a speciall malice both to the woman and to the womans seed But whether he doth wreake it more vpon the séede by your sacrificing of prayses and prayers to the woman or by our not sacrificing let them define who know his policies The Christians of old time were charged with impietie because they had no Gods but one This is our impietie For whatsoeuer honour and prayse may bee giuen to the Saintes of God as holy creatures but creatures we doo gladly giue it We thinke of them all and namely of the blessed virgin reuerently honourably We desire our selues and wish others to folow her godly faith and vertuous life We estéeme her as an excellent vessell of grace We call her as the scripture teacheth vs blessed yea the most blessed of all women But you would haue her to be named and thought not onely blessed her selfe but also a giuer of blessednesse to others not a vessell but a fountaine or as you entitle her a mother of grace and mercy And in your solemne prayers you doo her that honour which is onely due to our creator and redeemer For you call on her to defend you from the enimie and receiue you in the houre of death Thus although in semblance of wordes you deny it yet in déede you make her equall to Christ as him our Lord so her our Ladie as him our God so her our Goddesse as him our King so her our Queene as him our mediator so her our mediatresse as him in all thinges tempted like vs sinne excepted so her deuoide of all sinne as him the onely name whereby we must be saued so her our life our ioy our hope a very mother of orphans an aide to the oppressed a medicine to the diseased and to be short all to all Which impious worship of a Sainte because you haue aduanced by keping holy dayes vnto her the feastes of her conception natiuitie assumption therefore are they abolished by the reformed Churches iustly For the vse of holy dayes is not to worship Saintes but to worship God the sanctifier of Saintes As the Lorde ordeined them that men might meete together to serue him and heare his worde Hart. Why keepe you then still the feastes of the Apostles Euangelists other Saintes and not abolish them also As some of your reformed or rather your deformed Churches haue doon Rainoldes Our deformed Churches are glorious in his sight who requireth men to worship him in spirite truth though you besotted with the hoorish beauty of your synagogues doo scorne at their simplenesse as the proude spirite of Mical did at Dauid when he was vile before the Lord. The Churches of Scotland Flanders France and others allow not holy dayes of Saintes because no day may be kept holy but to the honour of God Of the same iudgement is the Church of England for the vse of holy dayes Wherefore although by kéeping the names of Saintes dayes we may séeme to kéepe them to the honour of Saintes yet in déede we kéepe them holy to God onely to prayse his name for those benefits which he hath bestowed on vs by the ministerie of his Saintes And so haue the Churches of Flanders and Fraunce expounded well our meaning in that they haue noted that some Churches submit them selues to their weakenesse with whome they are conuersant so farre foorth that they keepe the holy dayes of Saintes though in an other sorte nay in a cleane contrarie then the Papists doo Hart. But if you kéepe the feastes of other Saintes in that sorte why not
the Ministers doth shew And herein their dealing is so much the worse because they set it out with the name of Erasmus as if he meant by sacrificing the saying of Masse which is farre from him For although by reason he thought that the word doth properly signifie not simply to minister but to minister in holy thinges as they who serue in the Priesthood therfore he did translate it that the Prophets Doctours in the Church at Antioche were sacrificing to the Lord yet he saith that hereby is meant that they imployed their giftes to Gods glory and the saluation of the Church the Prophets in propheciing the Doctours in teaching the doctrine of the Gospell So he vnderstandeth nothing els by sacrificing then others doo by ministring or rather then the scripture doth as it is obserued out of the circumstances of the text by the best of your own interpreters Who séeing that the men were Prophets and Doctours which are said to haue béene ministring to the Lord thereupon do gather that they serued him in executing their owne ministerie that is to say the ministerie of prophecying and teaching In which sort the Gréeke fathers doo expound it also what meaneth the word ministring say they it meaneth preaching Wherefore if the name of Liturgie were taken hereof by the Gréeke fathers as your Rhemists adde it is a good hearing but so much the lesse will it proue your Masâ—e For if they vnderstood preaching by ministring when the worde is spoken of Prophets and Doctours it is the more likely that when they applyed it to the ministerie of the Pastours â— seruice of the Church they meant the publike prayers and other holy functions which we doo call Diuine seruice As in truth they did For that which we call euening prayer they called the euening Liturgie as you would say the seruice doon to God at euening and in the verie Liturgie that is called Chrysostomes because he made some part of it belike not all for himselfe therein is prayed too but in that very Liturgie the word is applied to the Churches seruice in the same maner as it is to the seruice which Angels doo to God And I hope you will not affirme that the Angels doo say Masse in heauen Wherefore howsoeuer Erasmus did translate it after the phrase of his time wherein the Churches seruice was commonly called Missa the ministerie mentioned in the Actes of the Apostles doth not proue that sacrifice of which you would inferre your Priesthood As for the place of Esay in which it is writen you shall be called the Priests of God the Ministers of our God shal it be said vnto you the course of the text doth seeme to meane by Priestes all the seruants of God whom Peter calleth an holy Priesthood to offer vp spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Iesus Christ. For the words are spoken as in Christes person to all the faithfull and repentant who should be trees of righteousnes to build vp the Church and thereupon are promised that their enimies shall serue them and they shall serue God But in an other place of Esay I graunt the name of Priest is giuen to Pastors and Elders where speaking of the calling and conuersion of the Gentiles And of them saith he will I take for Priests for Leuites saith the Lord. Hart. S. Ierom doth expound the former place of them also But all is one to my purpose For séeing that Pastours and Elders as you terme them are called Priests in scripture and the name of Priest implyeth you confesse autoritie to sacrifice it foloweth that Pastours and Elders are Priestes autorized to sacrifice Now the Priest that hath autoritie to sacrifice is he whom you do call a Masse-priest Wherefore both Masse and Priests are proued by the scripture Rainoldes Why Thinke you that euerie Christian man and woman is a Masse-priest because the name of Priests is giuen them by scripture in respect of spirituall sacrifices which they must offer vnto God Hart. No. Because the sacrifices that they must offer are spirituall and are called sacrifices by a borowed kinde of spéech and not properly But the sacrifice which is offered to God in the Masse is an external visible true and proper sacrifice as it is declared by the Councell of Trent So that the Priestes ordeined to offer this sacrifice are properly called Priestes wheras other Christians are called so improperly according to the nature of the sacrifices which they offer Rainoldes Then the name of Priestes alleaged out of Esay doth not proue your Masse-priestes For he doth call the Ministers of the gospell Priestes in respect of the spirituall sacrifices which they must offer And that appéereth by the words going next before in which the Lord declaring euen by S. Ieroms iudgement too that he would call the Iewes to the same honour that by the name of Priests is signified and they saith he shall bring the Gentiles for an offering to the Lord as the children of Israel offer in a cleane vessell in the house of the Lord. So to bring the Gentiles as an offering to the Lord is that for which they who do bring such offerings are named Priestes and Leuites But the offering vp of the Gentiles vnto him is a spirituall sacrifice made by the Ministers of Christ as Paule sheweth when they conuert the Gentiles through the preaching of the gospell The sacrifice therefore in respect whereof the Ministers of the gospell are called Priestes by Esay is a spirituall sacrifice And as euerie faithfull person is a Priest because we must offer each his owne bodie a liuing sacrifice holy acceptable vnto God so that name is giuen to Ministers of the gospell because they are called to offer vp the bodies of other men in like sort Wherefore if priuate Christians are not Masse-priestes because their sacrifices are spirituall then sith the Ministers must offer vp the like sacrifices it foloweth by your answere that nether they are Masse-priestes Hart. The Ministers of the gospell must offer vp the like sacrifices I deny it not And in that respect it is true that nether they nor priuate Christians are proued to bee Masse-priestes But there is an other an externall sacrifice that Ministers must offer also euen that which our Lord in the prophet Malachie doth call a cleane oblation and saith that in euerie place it is sacrificed and offered to his name because his name is great among the Gentiles And that is the sacrifice in respect whereof the Ministers of the gospell are called Priestes properly and are indéede Masse-priests For the cleane oblation is the sacrifice of the Masse wherein the body and blood of Christ is offered vp vnto God his father as the Councell sheweth an oblation that cannot be defiled by the vnworthines or wickednes of them who offer it Rainoldes What And be
this that Malachie meaneth doth succéede the sacrifices of the Iewes and is offered in their stéede but praier fasting and the workes of charitie doo not succéede any but are ioined and coopled to euerie kinde of sacrifices Fifthly our workes chiefely in the iudgement of heretikes are defiled howsoeuer they séeme beautifull but this Prophetical offering is cleane of it selfe and so cleane of it selfe in comparison of the olde sacrifices that it cannot be polluted anie way by vs or by the woorst Priests For here in our testament they cannot choose all the best to them selues and offer to the Lord for sacrifice the féeble the lame and the sicke as before in the old because there is now one sacrifice so appointed that it cannot be chaunged so cleane that no worke of ours can distaine it Finally the Fathers and all that euer haue expounded this place of purpose catholikely haue expounded it of the sacrifice of the Masse yea then when they speake of the sacrifice of praier yea or of spirituall sacrifice Wherein the heretikes deceiue and are deceiued For the Fathers call our sacrifice some times an offering of prayer and a spirituall sacrifice because it is made with blessing and with prayer mysticall because the victime that is here hath not a grosse carnall and bloody consecration or sacrification as had the victimes of the Iewes Sée Tertullian in the third booke against Marcion in the end Iustin in Trypho Irenaeus in the fourth booke the two and thirtieth chapter Ierom on the eighth of Zacharie Austin in the first booke against the aduersarie of the law and the eightenth chapter albeit in the second booke against the letters of Petilian he doth expound it of the sacrifice of prayse Cyprian also in the first booke the sixtenth chapter against the Iewes Cyrill in the booke of worshipping in spirit and truth Eusebius in the first booke of preparation of the gospell Damascen in the fourth booke of the Catholike faith and the fourtenth chapter Theodoret vpon the first chapter of Malachie Thus farre D. Allen. By whom you may perceiue that we bring the right opinion of the Fathers with many other reasons out of the circumstances of the text it selfe to proue that the cleane offering in the Prophet Malachie doth signifie the sacrifice of the blessed Masse Rainoldes Nay I may perceiue that D. Allen bringeth the names of the Fathers though Damascen a childe in respect of the rest farre in yeares beneth them farther in iudgement but their names he bringeth he bringeth not their right opiniō For if their opiniō be searched examined it maketh nothing for him And therfore he doth onely name them quote them Which point of his wisdome your Rhemists folow much Many other reasons he bringeth I graunt besides the names of Fathers but it had béene better for him not to bring them For Tertullian Iustin Irenaeus Ierom Austin Cyprian Cyrill Eusebius Damascen and Theodoret would make a faire shew with their names alone if the other reasons and they were set a sunder Now being matched in a band together and agréeing no better then Ephraim with Manasses and Manasses with Ephraim who did eate vp one another they marre the matter with their discorde That as the Emperour Adrian saide when he was dying The multitude of physicians hath cast away the Emperour so may you complaine the multitude of reasons hath cast away the proofe which your Masse did hope to procure by Malachie Hart. Not so But their multitude helpeth one an other For many thinges which singled by them selues are weake are strong if they be ioyned and a three fold coard is not easily broken Rainoldes This is a roape of sande rather then a coard it will not hang together For whereas D. Allen doth thus alleage Malachie after your olde translation in euery place there is sacrificed and offered a cleane offering to my name saith the Lord of hostes the Hebrew text and after the Hebrew the Gréeke of the seuentie interpreters which the Fathers folow doo set it downe thus in euery place there is incense offered to my name and a cleane offering Now the worde incense is vsed in the scripture simply for prayers in the fifth chapter of the Reuelation where the golden vials of the foure and twentie Elders are full of odours or incenses to keepe the worde which are the prayers of the Saintes And so doo the Fathers expound the same in Malachie Wherefore the first reason which you rehersed of D. Allens that the worde to sacrifice being vsed by it selfe without a terme abridging it is taken in the scripture alwayes properly for the act of outward sacrifice is false both in it selfe and by the iudgement of the Fathers For that worde of his is incense in the Fathers according to the scripture But incense in the scripture is taken for prayers figuratiuely By the iudgement therefore and exposition of the Fathers that worde doth not inferre the sacrifice of the Masse but our spirituall sacrifices Hart. In déede S. Iohn expoundeth in the Apocalypse those odours to be the prayers of the Saintes But thereby it is plain as we note vpon it that the Saintes in heauen offer vp the prayers of faithfull and holy persons in earth called here Saintes and in the scripture often vnto Christ. And among so many diuine and vnserchable mysteries set down without exposition it pleased God yet that the Apostle him selfe should open this one point vnto vs that these odours be the laudes and prayers of the faithfull ascending and offered vp to God as incense by the Saintes in heauen That so you may haue no excuse of your errour that the Saintes haue no knowledge of our affaires or desires Rainoldes You are too too flitting on euery occasion from the present point in question to others And yet if we should enter into that controuersie about the worship of Saintes that honour which you giue them would finde no succour here For neither doth it follow that we must pray to them though they did offer vp our prayers neither is it certaine that the Saintes in heauen onely are represented in the foure and twentie Elders neither if they be can you proue that the prayers of Saintes which they offer are other mens prayers they may bee their owne And for my part I doo rather thinke that the foure and twentie Elders represent all the Saintes and faithfull both in heauen and earth who offer vp their owne prayers as incense to God For after that S. Iohn had saide that the odours are the prayers of the Saintes he addeth that they sang a new song saying Thou art worthie to take the booke and to open the seales thereof because thou wast killed and hast redeemed vs to God by thy blood out of euery kinred and tongue and people and nation and hast made vs Kinges and Priests vnto our God and
sacrifice spoken of in Malachie is one and therefore betokeneth not spirituall sacrifices the which are as many as there are Christian good workes Hart. Why Because the text of the Prophet Malachie saith that there is offered a cleane oblation or offering as you call it And offering is spoken of one not of many For els he should haue saide offerings not offering Rainoldes So. And doo you thinke that he who said to God sacrifice offering thou art not delited with or as you translate it host and oblation thou wouldest not did meane the Masse by that host Hart. The Masse No. He meant the hostes and oblations of the old law For they are the wordes of the Prophet Dauid spoken of the legall and carnall sacrifices of the Iewes Rainoldes The Iewes Nay the text of the Prophet Dauid saith that God mislyked host and oblation it saith not hostes and oblations Wherefore sith he speaketh of one not of many and the carnall sacrifices of the Iewes were many but the sacrifice of the Masse is one as you say it séemeth he should meane that A point some what dangerous for the host which your Priests lift vp to be adored More dangerous for them who liue by lifting it vp Hart. Our adoration of the host is good in spite of all heretikes and not reproued by the Prophet For although he saith host and oblation thou wouldest not yet is it plaine he meaneth the sacrifices of the Iewes by a figure of spéech in which a part is vsed for the whole and one for many as host and oblation for hostes and oblations Rainoldes Then Allens second reason is not worth a shoobuckle to proue that the sacrifice of the Masse is meant by the oblation in Malachie For the word oblation or offering which he vseth in his owne language is vsed likewise still as of one not as of many through all the olde testament Wherefore if the sacrifices of the Iewes were many which neuerthelesse are called not offerings but offering the same worde applyed to the sacrifices of Christians can not inforce them to be one Howbeit were they one to graunt you that by a supposall yet might that one sacrifice be a spirituall sacrifice and so your Masse no whit the neerer For as the Prophet Esay saith that the Gentiles shal be an offering to the Lord vsing the same worde that the Prophet Malachie so the Apostle Paul exhorteth them with Esay to present their bodies a liuing sacrifice holy acceptable vnto God speaking of their sundry sacrifices as one as also in a mysterie we that are many are one body But without supposall the course of the text doth import rather that the Prophet saying there is offered an offering doth meane not one but many by that figure which you touched as by an other figure he saith it is offered meaning it shall be offered For the Lord declaring his detestation of the sacrifices of the Iewish Priests saith that he will not accept an offering at their hand but the Gentiles shall offer to him a cleane offering which he meaneth of the contrarie that he will accept And this he sheweth farther where touching it againe he saith it shall be offered vnto him in righteousnesse and shal be acceptable to him Now the offering that is acceptable to God from the Gentiles in the new testament is all sortes of spirituall sacrifices and good workes By the offering therefore mentioned in Malachie there are many sacrifices meant not one onely Which yet your olde translation maketh more euident opening the meaning of the Hebrew word by terming it sacrifices They shall offer sacrifices to the Lord in righteousenesse Wherefore sith our offering that should please God in the time of the gospell is sacrifices by the iudgement of your old translation which you in no case may refuse and sacrifices can not be meant of the Masse for that is one sacrifice but of spirituall sacrifices it may for they are many as Allens second reason saith you see we must conclude on his owne principles that the cleane offering which Malachie writeth of doth signifie the spirituall sacrifices of Christians and not the sacrifice of the Masse The third and fourth reasons haue greater shew but lesser weight For though it be true that spirituall sacrifices of praying to God and doing good to men are common to the Iewes with vs and therefore may seeme not to be the offering spoken of in Malachie which beside that it is proper to the Gospell and the Gentiles it should succeed also the sacrifices of the Iewes and be offered in their steede yet if we marke the difference that the scriptures put betweene the Iewish worship of God in the law and the Christian in the gospel that séeming wil melt as snow before the sunne For in the law of Moses the Iewes to the intent that both their redemption by the death of Christ dutie of thankfulnesse which they did owe to God for it might stil be set before them as in a figure shadow were willed to offer beastes without spot blemish in sacrifice with ceremonies thereto annexed and to offer them in the place that God should choose which was the citie of Ierusalem and the sanctuarie that is to say the temple built therein Now Christ in the gospell when that was fulfilled which the temple of Ierusalem and sacrifices did represent shewed that the time of reformation was come and remoued that worship both in respect of the place and of the maner of it For as it was prophecied that he should destroy the citie and the sanctuary and cause the sacrifice and offering to cease so him selfe taught that now the Father would not be worshipped in Ierusalem nor as the Iewes did worship him but he would be worshipped in spirit and truth The Christian worship therefore that did succéede the Iewish doth differ from it in two pointes one that it worshippeth God not in Ierusalem but in all places an other that it worshippeth him in spirit and truth in spirit without the carnall ceremonies rites in truth without the shadowes of the law of Moses The which sort of worship séeing hee requireth of the true worshippers that is of all the Saintes his seruants and in the new testament the Gentiles by the Gospell are called to be Saintes the worship that is proper to the Gospell and the Gentiles is the true spirituall worship of God the reasonable seruing of him by godlines and good workes in righteousnes and true holines euen the offering vp of spirituall sacrifices acceptable to God by Iesus Christ. And thus you may sée the weakenes of those cauils which are brought to proue that our spirituall sacrifices cannot be the offering whereof God in Malachie saith it shall be offered
forhead Hart. But Polycrates signified a miter by that plate after a figure of spéech wherein a part is vsed to signifie the whole Rainoldes Nay if you come to figures it is more likely that Polycrates in saying S. Iohn was a Priest that did beare the plate meant by an allusion to the lawe of Moses that he entred as it were into the sanctuarie with prerogatiue and had the very mysteries of God reueled to him Whereto S. Ierom séemeth somewhat to incline who translating the same of Polycrates touching Iohn saith that hee was a high Priest bearing the plate of gold vpon his head For if he had vsed to beare a plate of gold in déede vpon his forhead sure when Peter saide siluer and gold haue I none to the creple who desired an almes of Peter and him that plate would not haue saued his forhead from blushing Neither is it nothing that Polycrates mentioned the plate and not a miter sith other of the Iewish Priests did weare miters none but th◠high Priest the plate Howbeit if the worde were meant as you would haue it and S. Iohn had worne a miter like to Aaron yet his example proueth not that all Apostles much lesse that all Bishops wore it Nay the speciall note thereof in S. Iohn doth rather proue the contrarie as when we reade that Iohn Baptist had his garment of camels heare and a girdle of skin we gather that all preachers wore not such apparell Hart. But infulae that is a Priestly attire of the head which Tertullian speaketh of was common to them all and the miter séemeth to bee the same with vs that infulae with him Rainoldes I graunt that the attire which Tertullian speaketh of doth touch your miter néerer but it doth not proue it For infulae were miters which the heathnish Priests as namely the Priestes of Ceres and Apollo did weare in their solemnities Of the which ceremonie Tertullian deriuing a prouerbiall phrase after the maner of his style doth say touching Christians who refuse to be counted Priests that they lay downe the miters In déede it is likely the miters of your Bishops came from that heathnish rite although they draw some what from the Iewish custome as Wolfgangus Lazius your friend hath well obserued But it is neither true nor fit for you to hold that it was a miter worne by Christian Priests which Tertullian meant Not fit for you to hold least all Priests be proued to haue as good right to the miter as your Bishops which doctrine they will neuer account of as catholike Not true because your Bishoply miters were not vsed in many hundred yeres after Tertullian Hart. No Is it not writen in the donation of Constantine that when he offered Pope Siluester a golden crown beset with gemmes the Pope refused it and onely tooke a white miter Rainoldes What tell you me againe of that foolish forgery Which yet doth make the first originall of the miter younger then Tertullian But the true recordes and monuments of antiquitie doo shew that it was not bredde a greate while after For Amalarius Fortunatus and Rabanus Maurus and Walafridus Strabo who liued aboue eight hundred yeares after Christ and wrote of the vestiments which Bishops wore in their dayes make no mention of it And Alcuinus the Maister of Charles the great who liued and wrote not long before them treating of Priestly vestiments and therein of the miter of the Iewish Priests we haue not saith he such a vestiment in the Church of Rome or in our countries Yea Iuo Carnotensis who liued thrée hundred yeares after Alcuinus doth shew that in his daies it was not yet come in and with expresse mention of the plate of golde he saith that no Priests of the new Testament doo weare it Wherefore the first and highest of your Massing-vestiments is nether confirmed by the plate in Eusebius nor by the miters in Tertullian The next is the stole whereof you haue no better proofe in S. Ambrose For that which he mentioneth was either a towell as it may séeme or a napkin wherein his brother Satyrus caused the sacrament to be wrapped vp and laid it to his necke At least séeing Satyrus was nether Priest nor perfit Christian what shew haue you of likelihood that it was a Massing-vestiment Hart. S. Ambrose calleth it orarium And orarium is vsed in the Councell of Toledo for the same that stola that is a stole as we call it Rainoldes But if S. Ambrose meant a stole by orarium because the Councell meant so then stol◠in the later writers of those matters must be a womans garment because it is so in Isidore who liued néerer to them then did S. Ambrose to the Councell And as for that Councell and the other of Braga no marueile if the stole be mentioned in them For they were kept at that time when rites did steale in upon religion verie fast Though nether was it then halfe setled in the Masse yet as by a later Councell of Braga may be gathered Howbeit if it had béene your proofe faileth still For you may not say that because a Spanish Councel speaketh of it therfore the Church had it by tradition of the Apostles Unlesse you will say also that your shauen crownes ought to be great circles about the whole head by the tradition of the Apostles and not such little circles on the toppe of the head onely as now a daies are made because a Spanish Councell condemneth the shauing of those little circles as a rite of heretikes and alloweth none but great ones So farre of the stole There foloweth the albe For which the Deacons albe so named in the Councell of Carthage maketh nothing For though the name of albe be deriued from alba by which word the Councell doth note a white garment as it were a surplisse forbidding the Deacōs to weare it all the seruice time yet the thing differeth from your Massing-albe which is peculiar to Priests as the Canonists also declare on the same worde of the Councell of Carthage Which difference remoueth your proofe out of Chrysostome touching 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too For what soeuer kind of garment that were it was common to the Deacons not proper to the Priests and therefore not your Massing-albe Hitherto the holy robe in Eusebius that reached downe to the feete should be referred by their iudgement who compare the garments of Aaron with yours But Stapleton who found that holy robe in Eusebius might haue found withall an other meaning of it by the wordes folowing For he whose oration Eusebius doth report telleth Bishops that they are clad with the holy robe that reached downe to the feete and with the heauenly crowne of glorie and with the vnction of God and
doo willingly though they doo it weakely For as he accepted the sacrifices of the Iewes when they offered the best and soundest that they had so when the Gentiles were brought him for an offering in like sort as the Israelites doo offer an offering in a cleane vessell the offering vp of them was acceptable to him And thus might the spirituall sacrifices of Christians be meant by the cleane offering whereof the Lord saith in the Prophet Malachie that it shall be offered to him in euerie place According to the scripture that instructeth vs to pray in euerie place lifting vp pure hands without wrath and douting For though nether our prayers be so intier and feruent nor our hands so pure and vnspotted of the world nor our mindes so setled in loue of our neighbour nor our faith so constant and stedfast towards God but that they be stained with remnants of vncleannes and haue lesse perfitnes then they should yet are they all cleane in respect of the sacrifices of those Iewish hypocrites which God in the Prophet reiecteth as vncleane and so where he refuseth to accept theirs he promiseth to accept ours and sheweth that they please him well Wherefore the Masse findeth no footing in Malachie by D. Allens fifth reason Now the sixth and last which he concludeth with as it were to set the Masse in full possession of the cleane offering mentioned by Malachie doth dispossesse it cleane and casteth out the reasons which he brought to strengthen it For the Fathers expound it of our spirituall sacrifices of prayers of thankes giuing of holinesse of godly works of repentant heartes of clensed mindes and bodies sanctified of the giftes offered in Christian Church-assemblies and of the whole worship wherewith we honour him in spirit and truth Wherein to say that they meane the sacrifice of the Masse by the sacrifice of prayer and the spirituall sacrifice as he â—aith they doo and that they call it so because the victime that is here hath not a grosse carnall and bloody consecration or sacrification as had the victimes of the Iewes it is grosse and carnall For the victime as you terme it which they meane and speake of is either our selues purified by faith oâ— our fruites accepted as pure from persons purified not Christ killed and sacrificed vnto God his Father which is your Massing-uictime pure of it selfe and purifying others as you fansie Yea sith it is granted by D. Allens owne words that Austin expounding it of the sacrifice of praise meaneth not the sacrifice of the Masse thereby let that place of Austin he weighed with the rest of his and other Fathers and it shall be found that Malachie toucheth not the Masse in their iudgement by D. Allens owne graunt The sixe reasons therefore which he setteth forth as strong and very good for the proofe thereof proue it no better out of the Prophets in the old testament then doo his bare wordes out of the Apostles in the new In déede there is no letter through all the scriptures for it And thus much perhaps him selfe hath espied since hee wrote his treatise of the sacrifice of the Masse For in his Apologie of the English Seminaries where he would of likelihood make the strongest proofe of it that he could for the defense of Masse-priests and the Masse-priests Nourseries he citeth not the scriptures but the Fathers onely Which vnlesse hée thought that the scriptures faile him I sée not why hee should Chiefly sith he knoweth that they whose good liking of Masse-priests the Masse he séeketh specially to winne by his Apologie doo giue greater credit to fiue words of God then to ten thousand words of men Hart. Nay you are deceued much in D. Allen if you think his iudgement changed any whit from that it was in this point But in his Apologie he citeth the Fathers onely not the scriptures because you haue colours of spiritual sacrifices to shift the scriptures off but you cannot the Fathers so For they all were Masse-priestes themselues and said Masse Rainoldes What one of them M. Hart If you speake indeede to the point of the Masse and daly not as D. Allen who maketh Masse-priestes of the Apostles because they did consecrate the body and bloud of Christ and offer it For if to consecrate and offer as they did be to say Masse then wee say Masse in our Communion and our Ministers are Masse-priests Which I thinke you meane not Hart. I meane that all the Fathers said Masse as we doo and were as we be Masse-priests Which he meaneth also and proueth by the most of them For so was S. Ambrose testifying of him selfe that he offred sacrifice and said Masse euen in that plaine terme Rainoldes In that plaine terme Why S. Ambose spake not English I trust Hart. No. But he saith in Latin Missam facere Rainoldes That is not to say Masse but to doo masse or rather to dimisse Missam fecit in Suetonius would proue the Masse as wel as that Which I dare not say that perhaps him selfe espied since he wrote it least againe you tell me that I am much deceiued in him But in his Apologie turned into Latin S. Ambroses missam facere is changed into missam dixisse And so the words are fitter to proue he said Masse Hart. Dixisse or facere the matter standeth not in that but in the word missa From which sith the name of Masse dooth come in English it foloweth that S. Ambrose did celebrate Masse that is say Masse as wée terme it Rainoldes Must I tell you again that idiot commeth from idiota And wil you say that all the simple idiotae who heare Masse are idiotes Hart. That is a iest you may not so put off my reason For the name openeth the nature of the thing as Aristotle sheweth Wherefore sith the name of Masse is in S. Ambrose how can you deny but that hee did celebrate the thing that is the Masse it selfe as we doo whom you call Masse-priests Rainoldes And thinke you in earnest that S. Paul did celebrate the communion of the body and blood of Christ as we doo who are called Ministers Hart. As you doo who saith so Rainoldes You if your reason be of any value For the name openeth the nature of the thing as Aristotle sheweth Wherfore sith the name of communion is in S. Paul how can you deny but that he did celebrate the thing euen the communion it selfe as we doo who are called Ministers Hart. Yes For though you keepe the name with S. Paul yet you keepe not the thing As sorcerers are called magi like the Sages of the East yet is their wisdome wicked not like that of the Sages Rainoldes That is false M. Hart as you referre it to our Communion For as we
standeth not so much in making Church-officers as in iudging Church-causes And therein the second sort of Popes auouched as much as the last For Innocentius the first answering the letters of the Councell of Mileuis who had writen to him about the errour of the Pelagians doth prayse them for referring the matter vnto him and I thinke saith he that as oft as a matter of faith is called in question all our brethren and felow-bishops ought not but to referre it vnto Peter that is the autour of their name and honour as now your charitie hath doon Rainoldes Thâ—se wordes of Innocentius may proue M. Hart that he claimed a preeminence of knowledge for your Peter not a soueraintie of power a preeminence of knowledge to resolue the Church-questions not a soueraintie of power to decide the Church-causes For matters of faith are to be defined by the rule of faith that is by the scriptures and the right opening of the scriptures lyeth not in power but in knowledge Which you may learne by Gratian in the Canon law saying that the Fathers are preferred before the Popes in expounding of scriptures because they passe them in knowledge the Popes before the Fathers in deciding of causes because they passe them in power Hart. That distinction of causes and questions of the Church is but a shift of sophstrie to cast a mist vpon the truth For though the Church-causes as Gratian speaketh of them do concerne persons the innocent to be acquitted or offenders to be condemned yet questions of faith which you call Church-questions are Church-causes too in a generall sense As one of the third sort of Popes saith that greater causes of the Church chiefly such as touch the articles of faith are to be referred to the See of Peter And this was the meaning of Innocentius the first For in his letters to the Councell of Carthage writen to like effect on the same occasion he saith that the Fathers decreed by the sentence not of man but of God that whatsoeuer was doon in prouinces far of they thought that it ought not to be concluded before it came to the notice of the See of Rome Rainoldes It is true that questions of matters touching faith are causes of the Church but they are not such causes as quicken the Papacie The causes touching persons which Zosimus Boniface and Caelestine did deale for when they would haue it lawfull for Bishops Elders to appeale to Rome are those which Popes must liue by And the same Councels of Carthage and Mileuis whom Innocentius wrote too did know and shew this difference when they desired the Popes consent in that of faith but forbadde the causes of Bishops and Elders to come vnto him by appeales Wherefore that distinction of the Church-causes and the Church-questions is not a shift of sophistrie to cast a mist vpon the truth but a point of truth to cléere the mist of your sophistry For your Iesuit citeth those textes of Innocentius to proue the Popes supremacie Whereas he claimeth iudgement to resolue the douts or that is lesse autoritie to approue the doctrine not a soueraine power to heare and determin the causes of the Church Hart. Nay his wordes are generall to the Councell of Carthage that whatsoeuer was doon in prouinces farre off it should come to the notice of the See of Rome before it were concluded Rainoldes But if you doo racke that word whatsoeuer so farre beyond his drift you make him more gréedy then the last sort of Popes who claime the greater causes of the Church onely Wherefore as when S. Paul saith all thinges are lawfull for me he meaneth not all thingâ—s absolutely and simply but all indifferent thinges according to the point which he treateth of so must you apply the wordes of Innocentius not to whatsoeuer touching Church-causes but to matters of faith called into question which the Popes being learned then and Catholike the Christian Churches vsed to referre to them that the truth approued by their consent and iudgement might for their autoritie finde the greater credit fréer passage against heretikes Hart. What say you then to Leo the great or rather to S. Gregorie who had the Church-causes euen such as touched persons referred to their Sée and willed them to be so as their epistles shew Rainoldes In déede Leo and Gregorie are somewhat large that way Though Leo as the diocese of the Roman Patriarke was lesser in his time then afterwarde in Gregories so had fewer of them Gregorie had more yet he had not all Hart. Not all but all the greater And that is as much as the last sort of Popes claime Rainoldes But they claime all the greater through the whole world which Gregorie neither had nor claimed Hart. No Is it not manifest by all his Epistles that hée dealt with the causes of Bishops in Italie Spaine Fraunce Afrike Corsica Sardinia Sicilia Dalmatia and many countries mo Rainoldes Yet he dealt neither with all the greater causes nor through the whole world And this very shew of the names of couÌ„tries by which your Irish champion doth thinke the Popes supremacie to be cléerely proued is a demonstration in truth to disproue it For rehersing only those which you haue named with England Ireland Corcyra and Graecia and saying that Gregorie did practise the supremacie ouer their Bishops and Churches though neither prouing so much but admit he proued it yet in bringing only the names and proofes of these he sheweth that Gregorie did not practise it ouer the Bishops and Churches of Thracia Mysia Scythia Galatia Bithynia Cappadocia Armenia Pamphylia Lydia Pisidia Lycaonia Phrygia Lycia Caria Hellespontus Aegypt Iury Phoenicia Syria Cilicia Cyprus Arabia Mesopotania Isauria with the rest of the countries subiect to the Patriarkes of Constantinople Alexandria Antioche and Ierusalem Hart. Though S. Gregorie speake not of these particularly yet he sheweth in generall his supremacie ouer them For whereas the Patriarke saith he doth confesse himselfe to be subiect to the See Apostolike if any fault bee founde in Bishops I know not what Bishop is not subiect to it Behold not onely Bishops but the Patriarkes also subiect to the Pope by S. Gregories iudgement yea by their owne confession Rainoldes Nay it was not a Patriarke but a Primate who confessed that And a Primate is but a Bishop of the first and cheefest See in a Prouince that is a Metropolitan Hart. It was Primas Byzancenus that is to say the Patriarke of Constantinople as it is expounded in the glose on Gratian For Constantinople was called Byzantium first Rainoldes Gratian and his glose were deceiued both For primas Byzacenus or Byzancenus if you reade it so is Primate of Byzacium called Byzantium too which was a prouince of Afrike and therfore had a Primate as Councels of that countrie shew Whom and not the Patriarke
was not thrée yeares Bishop Or if because Cyprian doth write it to the Pope you haue such a preiudice that it is the Popes peculiar you may know that he writeth the same to an other expresly of himself TheÌ„ce haue schismes heresies sproong doe spring that the Bishop which is one and ruleth the church is despised by the proud presumption of certain men Wherefore though your Rhemists and other of the Popes friends doe plie the box with that saying of one Priest one iudge for the time in Christs steed yet in very truth it maketh as much for the Bishop of Rochester as for the Bishop of Rome The more is Stapletons blame who knowing and confessing the same not onely otherwhere but in this very worke of his principles too yet in the ende thereof abridgeth it to the Pope Maruell that in his preface to Gregorie he past it He might haue alleaged it better then he hath The head of all Churches Which title is giuen in Victor to the Church of Rome not to the Bishop and toucheth lesse the Papacie there then in S. Gregorie in whom it doth not proue it as I haue declared Marry that which followeth is of greater shew out of Ambroses commentarie on S. Paul to Timothee where Damasus the Bishop of Rome in his time is called ruler of the Church But first whatsoeuer he were who wrote that it was not S. Ambrose the famous Bishop of Milan on whom are falsly fathered the coÌ„mentaries on S. Paul as your Diuines of Louan do obserue and testifie Next the wordes themselues which are in that autour on mention of the house of God the ruler whereof at this day is Damasus are not in my iudgement the autours owne wordes but a glose crept in amongst them For whereas S. Paule writing vnto Timothee declared why he did so to wéete that thou mayst know how thou oughtest to behaue thy selfe in the house of God which is the Church of the liuing God the commentarie thereon doth expouÌ„d it thus I write vnto thee that thou maiest know how to gouern the Church which is the house of God that whereas all the world is Gods yet the Church is called his house the ruler whereof at this day is Damasus For the world is naught troubled with sundrie errours Therefore the house of God and truth must of neceâ—sitie be saide to be there where he is feared according to his will In the which wordes if that of Damasus were omitted the lâ—ter clawse contayning a reason of the former would cleaue therevnto more suantly and fitly Which maketh me to thinke that it was not pitched in thetext by the autour but found a â—hinke and so came in as an other glose of Damasus successour hath done into Optatus And I think it the rather because some are perswaded by manifolde conference as your Louanists note that the booke of questions of the old and new testament entitled to S. Austin this to S. Ambrose are the same autours For he who wrote that booke was not aliue of lykelihoode when Damasus was Pope Howbeit if he were too and of a kinde â—ffection to Rome where he liued thought good to mention him the wordes which he vseth in Latin cuius hodie rector est Damasus might meane that Damasus was a ruler of the Church not as you english it the ruler Which to haue bene so it appéereth farther by the word at this day spoken with a relation to the dayes of Timothee that as hée did gouerne the Church in Paules time so at that present was Damasus ruler of it Wherefore sith Timothee was placed at Ephesus to set that Church in order not to rule the whole Damasus might be called a ruler of the Church in that he was Bishop of the Church of Rome as S. Ambrose termeth him though he were not the ruler of the vniuersal S. Austin is the last oâ— them whose testimonies you cited And the preeminence of a higher roome whereof he made mention to Boniface the first importeth a prerogatiue of honour ouer others not soueraintie of power A prerogatiue of honour according to the canon of the first Councell of Constantinople which gaue that prerogatiue to the See of Rome because that citie raigned Not soueraintie of power as it is euident by the Councell of Afrike where he denied that to the same Boniface to whom hée graunted this preeminence It was therefore only the dignitie of place which S. Austin meant by the higher roome As else where hauing named Cyprian Olympius and other auncient writers he sayth that Innocentius was after them in time before them in place because they were Bishops of inferiour cities and he of the Roman Hart. Nay but S. Austin sayth in plain termes that the principalitie of the Apostolike See had floorished in that Church still Rainoldes But S. Austin addeth in as plain termes that Bishops may reserue their cases to the iudgement of their fellow-bishops chiefly of the Apostolike Church and that a generall Councell is aboue the Pope in iudging of those causes too Which is a cléere proofe that by the principalitie of the Apostolike See he meant the Church of Rome to be chéefe of other Churches as I sayd in honour not in power For in power al others at least the Apostolike that is in which the faith of Christ had bene taught by the Apostles themselues are made equall with it But amongst all in which the Apostles themselues had taught the faith the Roman for honour credit had the chiefty And thus haue I discharged my selfe of my promise which was that I would yeeld vnto the Popes supremacie if you prooued it by the sayings and iudgement of the Fathers alleaged and applied rightly For none of all theÌ„ which you haue alleaged neither of any other church nor of the Roman it self doth auouch it Whereby the shamelesse vanitie of Bristow may be séene who being not contented to say of all the Fathers that they were Papists addeth that in familiar talke among our selues we are not afeard plainely to confesse it The Lord who is witnesse of our thoughtes and spéeches knoweth that we are lewdly sclaundered herein And for mine owne part I am so farre off from confessing plainely that they were all Papists that I haue plainly declared and confirmed not one of them to haue bene For the very being and essence of a Papist consisteth in opinion of the Popes supremacie But the Popes supremacie was not allowed by any of the Fathers Not one then of al the Fathers was a Papist Wherefore if you haue the Fathers in such reuerent regard and estimatioÌ„ as you pretend M. Hart let if not the Scriptures yet the Fathers moue you to forsake Papistrie and giue to euery pastor and church their owne right whereof Christ hath possessed
the Emperour did talke at Rome with Marcellinus and brought him to idolatrie Whereas Diocletian was then at Nicomedia about a thousand myles off Besides that Diocletians warre agaynst the Persians was ended certaine yeares before the time of that Councell Yet the Councell sayth that Diocletian being in that warre heard of it There is an other Councell of the same stampe holden vnder Pope Siluester at Rome about the time that Constantine was clensed of his leprosâ—e that is to say neuer Amongst the canons whereof those which begin with Nemo enim there is one Nemo enim to that effect that yours of Sinuessa But what the true Bishops of the primitiue church thought of iudging him they shewed by their iudgement of his fellow at Antioche Paulus Samosatenus whom the Bishops and Elders of his own prouince did excommunicate and depose agaynst your Councels lye that No man euer iudged his bishop Wherefore to returne to the primitiue Churches ordinances and rules from these deuises Papall of Councels neuer holden the first generall Councell assembled at Nice did keepe the Pope vnder in his former state For they ordeined that Bishops should be made by Bishops of their own prouince requiring no consent of his therevnto neither did they giue the hearing and determining of causes vnto him but vnto the Bishops of the prouince too commaunding the ancient canon to be kept that none should receiue them to the communion who were excommunicated and condemned by others Hart. True if they were iustly condemned and excommunicate But if their owne Bishop had dealt vniustly with them vpon some displeasure and remoued them from the communion wrongfully which you cannot denie but that he might do then reason requireth that they should haue remedie Now the remedie thereof is by appeale to the Pope Rainoldes This remedie was deuised by new Physicians that lacked worke it increaseth diseases The Nicen Physicians foreséeing the danger prouided an other and better remedy for them Hart. Better what is that Rainoldes The cause to be heard in a Synode of Bishops so to be decided by their common iudgement For let it be examined say they whether the Bishop haue excommunicated them vpon a way wardnesse or grudge or too much rigour Whereof that there may bee due examination we haue thought good that in euery prouince two synods should be kept yerely to the intent that in common all Bishops of the prouince being gathered together such thinges may be examined And so whosoeuer shall be found in fault and to haue bene dealt with iustly by the Bishop lett them bee holden of all for excommunicate till it shall seeme good to the Synode of Bishops to giue more gentle sentence of them Hart. I grant the Councell of Nice doth bring matters first from the Bishop to the Synode But if the Synode also doe giue vniust sentence then is the Pope left for the last refuge Rainoldes The Councell meant not so but that the last refuge should be the Synode still For they doe not say till it shall seeme good to the Bishop of Rome but to the Synode of Bishops to geue more gentle sentence of them Yea euen the particular honour and preeminence of his which they mention is a plaine token that they dreamed not of such a generall power For it followeth straight in the next canon Let old customes be kept they that are in Egypt and Lybia and Pentapolis that the Bishop of Alexandria haue the preeminence of all these because such is the custome of the Bishop of Rome too Likewise also in Antioche and in other prouinces let the Churches enioy their dignities and prerogatiues Which wordes of the Councell grounding on the custome of the Bishop of Rome that as he had preeminence of all the Bishops about him so Alexandria and Antioche should haue of all about theÌ„ and likewise other churches as the Metropolitan ech in their owne prouinces doe shew that the Pope neither had preeminence of all through the world before the Nicen Councell nor ought to haue greater preeminence by their iudgement then he before time had Hart. Nay the Councell did not limit the preeminence and power of the Church of Rome by those wordes but they followed rather it as a paterne in aduancing others For the Nicen Councell sayth Nicolas the first durst not make any decree of that Church as knowing that nothing could be giuen her aboue her desert yea that she had al things by the grant of Christ. And if the Councels canons bee diligently marked you shall find doubtlesse that they gaue no increase to the church of Rome but rather tooke example of the forme therof for that which they would geue to the church of Alexandria Rainoldes Pope Nicolas endeuoring to proue his supremacie by recordes of Councels some impudently forged as the Councell of Sinuessa some lewdly misexpounded as the Councell of Chalcedon not knowing what to say well of the Councel of Nice doth shape this answere to it for lack of a better But as a dronken man that hath a giddie head enteÌ„ding to go one way sometimes doth reele an other so fareth it with him For in saying that they tooke example of the forme of the Churche of Rome for that which they would giue to the Church of Alexandria he granteth that as the Bishop of Alexandria had but the preeminence of all thereabout no more had the Bishop of Rome And séeing that example is allowed therein and made a paterne of the rest it followeth that the Councell thereby did decrée that the Bishop of Rome should kéepe within those limits Which to be the purport of that Nicen canon not onely singular autors Rufinus and Cusanus but a generall Councell also hath declared In déede the very sticking of your own men in it like byrdes in the lyme may shew that in the sight of sense and common reason it maketh directly against the Popes supremacie For Gratian hauing set it downe as he found it Let the old custome hold in Egypt Libya and Pentapolis that the bishop of Alexandria haue rule of all these because the Bishop of Rome too hath the like custome the glose on him expoundeth it lyke that is like in some things because they both depose Bishops or say the Bishop of Rome that is of CoÌ„staÌ„tinople Of which expositions the former being dangerous that any may depose Bishops beside the Pope a glose vpon that glose alloweth the later of Constantinople sayth it is the better in the iudgement of Hue. But Hue was deceaued For though Constantinople were called new Rome within a few yeares after yet nether was it called Rome nor Constantinople at the time that the canon wherof we speake was made Carranza therfore helpeth it with an old edition shewed him by a Cardinal which in stéede of these words the Bishop of Rome had
is it fully written by S. Iohn Let vs heare him selfe speake These things saith he are writen that ye may beleeue that Iesus is the Christ the sonne of God and that in beleeuing yee may haue life through his name In which wordes the summe and end of the gospell is set downe by Iohn the summe that we may beleeue that Iesus is the Christ the Christ that is the soueraine Priest Prophet and King the Sauiour of men the end that we beleeuing in Christ the sonne of God may through him haue life euen that which alone is called life rightly to wit eternall life Which things being so as the Euangelist him selfe teacheth it must néedes be granted that those things which are writen in the gospell are sufficient for vs both to the way of life and to life As much then as sufficeth to faith and saluation so much is writen in the gospell For if the things which are writen had not béene sufficient to faith and saluation there were mo thing◠which might haue bene writen so many as the world could not haue conteined But these were omitted by the spirit of God because the other were enough for his purpose For he giueth this reason why mo were not writen these things are writen that yee may beleeue and in beleeuing may haue life There is contained therefore in S. Iohns gospell so much as is sufficient to faith and saluation Then if S. Iohns gospell alone haue sufficient how plentifully hath Christ prouided for his Church as a most bountifull Lord for his houshold to which he hath giuen so many Apostles and Euangelists witnesses and expounders of the same doctrine Wherefore the scripture doth not onely teach the Church but also amply and plentifully teach it all things behoofull to saluation For although the substance of the Christian faith be single and the same wherewith as with meate the seruants of God are fedde to life eternall yet as the ages of the seruants differ and in ages different their cases differ too so was it méete there should be sundry sortes and waies to diuide that meate and as it were to season it for ech one his part as it might best agrée with him Whereof that we might haue a true liuely paterne set foorth by Christs owne spirit in the word of life for the féeding of the faithfull therefore hée gaue sundry woorkemen so to terme them and writers of his faith that although they deliuered all the same foode yet they did not dresse it all in one sort And so it cometh to passe that in those writers of the faith of Christ both the vnitie of doctrine in the diuersitie of deliuering yeldeth a swéete tast in the spirituall mouth of the godly minde and the manifold vse ministreth holesome nourishment to euery mans stomake the euident plainnesse in the groundes of faith maketh that euen they who are of deintiest mouthes can not refuse it for the toughnes and the hidden wisedome in the secretes of scripture both trieth the strongest and satisfieth them who are sharpest set and to say that in a word which no wordes can expresse enough the infinite treasures bring infinite fruits to the faithfull to procure them a blessednes that is exceeding great and infinite Wherefore it is a thing so cléere and so sure that those secretaries of the holy Ghost ioyned togither doo open to the Church in the holy scriptures all things behoofefull to saluation that he who knoweth it not may be iustly counted ignorant hée who acknowledgeth it not lewde hée who dissembleth it vnthankfull hée who denieth it more then wicked For what can there be in cléerenesse more euident or in peise more weightie or in strength more sound or in truth more certaine then that generall principle which S. Paul deliuereth not as Moses of the law not as Iohn of the gospell but of the whole scripture and holy writt to Timothee The whole scripture is giuen by inspiration of God and is profitable to teach to improue to correct to instruct in righteousnes that the man of God may bee furnished throughly furnished to euery good worke Thus if you demaund of what autoritie scripture is it came from God by inspiration if you regard what vse it hath it teacheth improueth correcteth instructeth if you would sée to what end it is that the man of God may be furnished Our dutie in Christ Iesus is faith woorking by loue Faith embraceth sound doctrine loue requireth a godly life Soundnes of doctrine is held if true things be taught and false refuted Godlines of life is kept if we fly from euill and folow good But the holy scripture teacheth the truth improueth errour correcteth iniquitie instructeth to righteousnes as it appéereth by the Apostles wordes Therefore it setteth foorth a mans whole dutie in Christ Iesus that is as I suppose so much as sufficeth to saluation For it is not onely profitable to these things as some doo mince the matter but sufficient too in so much that it is able to make a man wise to saluation through faith and to furnish him Yea to furnish what maner of man the man of God that is the Lordes interpreter the Minister of the worde the teacher of the Church the Pastour of the flocke euen Timothee himselfe much more the flock of the faithfull in whom so great furniture of wisdome is not necessary Howbeit the Apostle neither so contented with saying that the man of God may be furnished addeth to beat the absolute perfection of the scripture into our mindes and memories with as many reasons as he vseth wordes that the man of God may be furnished throughly furnished to euerie good worke Whereupon it foloweth that there is nothing at all that can be wished for either to soundnes and sinceritie of faith or to integritie and godlines of life that is to mans perfection and the way of saluation which the scripture geuen by inspiration of God doth not teach the faithfull seruantes of Christ. It is the iudgement therefore of the holy Ghost whose sentence I defend as I am bound by duetie that the holy scripture teacheth the Church all things necessarie to saluation Here if some perhaps desire the testimonies of the Fathers though to what purpose sith ye haue heard the Father of Fathers notwithstanding if any would heare the scholers iudgement when he hath heard the masters he shall heare the iudgement not of this or that man of whom he might dout but of the whole Church and of all the Saints For they with one agréement and generall consent haue termed the bookes of scripture Canonicall of the word Canon which signifieth a rule because they containe a worthy rule and squire of religion faith and godlines according whereunto the building of the house of God must be fitted Which opinion touching the Canon of the scripture allowed by Andradius himselfe the chiefest patrone of the Popish faith hath béene
there is any faute in the diall I meane in the Church for that can not be as Pighius proueth pretily but because perhaps either Christ him selfe hath tooke an other course and is altered I know not by what changeablenes of God or els the whole scripture is slipt from the point in the which it stood But let vs right woorshipfull who know that the dials and clockes doo mysse often but the course of the sunne is certaine and constant let vs make more account of the sunne then of a diall of heauen then of Plinie of the Zodiake circle then of the field of Flora of God then of men of Christ then of Pighius of the holy scripture then of the church For God forbid there should be any amongst vs so beastly a monster in the shape of man as to set vp Antichrist in the temple of God aboue God and to attribute more to any either man or multitude of men then to the Lord of maiestie But so doo they no dout who haue the Church in greater regard then the scripture For the voice of the scripture is the voice of God the voice of the Church is the voice of men Then if it be impious to set vp men aboue God doubtlesse to set vp the Church aboue the scripture it is Antichristian Nor yet doo I deny that the Churches voice is sometimes the voice of God For in appeasing the offenses and reprouing the sinnes of brethren if thy brother saith Christ refuse to heare the church let him be to thee as a heathen man and a Publican But the holy spirit that is the spirit of truth doth speake both alone and alwaies in the scripture An humaine spirit that is a spirit of errour hath a part sometimes in the spéech of the Church Both which pointes I haue proued by the word of God the euidence of the thing and the confessions of our aduersaries Why doo we not then acknowledge that the royall prerogatiue of this priuilege to bee altogither exempt from all errour is due to scripture onely and confesse as Austin doth against the Donatistes that it is peculiar and proper to the holy canonicall scripture that all things which are writen therein be true and right but the letters and writings of Bishops as of Cyprian yea the very Councels not prouinciall onely but also full and generall haue often times somewhat that may be amended I for my part doo gladly both allow this sentence of Austin and iudge it woorthy to be allowed as agréeable to the trueth And therefore I conclude the point which I proposed that the holy scripture is of greater credit and autoritie then the church Thus you haue my iudgement right learned Inceptors touching the Conclusions which are to be disputed of opened in more wordes perhaps then your wisedome in fewer then the weight of the things required But I haue waded so farre in the opening of them as I thought the Proctors might wel giue me leaue by the straitnes of time As for that which néedeth to be discussed farther I will assay to open it as well as I can if occasion serue when the aduersarie arguments shall bée proposed in disputation CONCLVSIONS HANDLED IN DIVINITIE SCHOOLE THE III. OF NOVEMBER 1579. 1 The holy Catholike Church which we beleeue is the whole company of Gods elect and chosen HE who the sea the earth the skyes made by his worde of nought Who by eternall power doth guide and rule all things he wrought Did choose from out the sonnes of men before the world was pight Such as with blessed angels aye should ioy his blisfull sight The Iewes are not the onely men that make this holy band But they are souldiers chosen out of euery toung and land Where on the south the mightie prince of Abissines doth raigne Where on the north the coasts do lye that looke to Charles waine Where Phaebus with his glistring beames doth raise the dawning light And sinking in the westerne seas doth bring the darksome night The fleâ—h can not by natures light such hidden truthes pursue But Christian faith by light of grace this Catholike Church doth vew 2 The Church of Rome is not the Catholike Church nor a sound member of the catholike Church THey do not well who shut the world within the Roman boundes Christs Church is spred through al the earth without restraint of mounds Rome was I grant a faithfull branch of this renowned vine Rome was a myrrour that in grace in zeale in loue did shine Rome was commended farre and wide for faith in Christ his name For Peters doctrine taught and kept Rome was of worthy fame But where Rome was now ruines are The Capitoll is sâ—ooried The grouÌ„d is bathde in Christians blood whoÌ„ Romish woolues haue wooried Her Churches are with idoles stained her guides with maners vile Whom lustfull traines and wicked hearts and beds vnchast defile O thrise vnhappie Babylon that Sions spoyle doost woorke Under the noble name and hue of Sion wouldest thou lurke 3 The reformed churches in England Scotland France Germany and other kingdomes common wealthes haue seuered them selues lawfully from the church of Rome A Place of haunt for deuils and sprits is Babylon waxt saith Iohn Art thou desirous to be saued from Babylon be gon The names and trickes of Babylon Rome on it selfe doth take Then if ye séeke eternall life sée that ye Rome forsake This haue the noble Germanes done bidding the Pope a dieu England hath followed Germany Romes thraldome to eschew Beholde the Lord hath called on the Flemish French and Dane And Scotland hath escaped eke the Papall deadly bane O that the remnant of the world by faith to Christ were knit And Princes to the Prince of all their scepters would submit Build vp O Lord O father deare the church and Sions for t That vnto thée from Babylon thy people may resort AMongst many singular benefits of God bestowed vpon our Vniuersitie fathers and brethren which may be very fruitfull to the aduancing of Gods glory and saluation of the Church if they be well husbanded there is scarse any more excellent in my iudgement then that it is ordered that the truth giuen by inspiration of God and registred in the Scripture should be not expounded onely by publike lectures but also proued by disputations A woorthy and profitable ordinance no doubt and most méete for schooles which serue to traine vp Christians that is for schooles of God For what can there be more pretious then the truth which teacheth vs the knowledge of God the way to life And what more conuenient to strengthen the truth then to haue it proued by discussing the reasons brought of both partes For as golde being digged out of the veines of the earth is seuered from earthy substance mixt therewith by the mettall-workemen knocking it together and as husbandmen are wont to sift wheat from the chaffe by winowing that it may be fit to nourish the body
or the hauing of it corrupted In the which respect Christ who giueth charge that his sheepe be fedde chargeth that they be taught to obserue those thinges which he commanded his Apostles And Peter hauing shewed that the faithfull are begotten a new by Gods word exhorteth them to desire the milke of the word the sincere milke not corrupt with any trumperie that they may grow thereby And they who are warned to heare the Pharises sitting in the chaire of Moses are warned to beware of the leauen of the Pharises Wherefore a church that will be whole and sound must neither be famished with want of Gods worde nor haue it corrupted But the church of Rome doth bring in both corruption and want of the worde nor onely bring them in but also maintaine them obstinatly as wholesome The church of Rome therefore is not whole and sound nay she séemeth rather to be madde frantike For she bringeth in corruption of the worde to beginne with that by mingling and adulterating the word of God with mans word not one way but sundrie First in that she giueth autoritie canonicall that is diuine autoritie to the bookes called apocrypha which are humane Against the truth of the holy scripture which is gainsaid flatly by certaine pointes in the apocrypha against the cléere euidence of thinges therein recorded which by their repugnancie one vnto another doo shew that men were autours of them against the consent iudgement of the church of the old church wholy and of the best part of the new Secondly in that she receyueth traditions of men with equall reuerence and religious affection as she doth the scripture As though the holy scripture the most exact perfect squire of Gods will and rule of righteousnesse and wisedome sufficed not for faith and maners or the spirit of God could gainsay him selfe which must be imported by this of traditions some whereof do fight one against another some against the scripture In sooth this point is handled with a dutifull care and regarde of scripture which hath no greater reuerence at Rome then traditions and that all traditions are not obserued there it is playne by the Fathers whom them selues alleage Thirdly in that she willeth the Latin translation of the Bible commonly called S. Ieroms to be receiued throughout as sacred and canonicall and not to be refused on any pretense Whereas yet to let go the iudgement of S. Ierom other ancient Fathers the Papists them selues such as are most expert in the toungs amongst them acknowledge that translation to haue missed sometimes the meaning of the holy Ghost and not the words onely Euen Pagninus namely in the old testament Budaeus in the new Andradius and Arias Montanus in them both Fourthly in that about expounding of the scripture she condemneth all senses and meanings thereof which are against the sense that her selfe holdeth or against the Fathers consenting all in one Whereby it falleth out that the sense and meaning of the holy Ghost shall be refused often but meanings and senses deuised by men though crossing one an other yet if they be currant for the time and practised as a Cardinall saith shall go for authenticall the baggage which the Schoole men haue sâ—iled Diuinitie with out of the Philosophers puddles and their owne shall be accounted holy the things which some Fathers haue handled more soundly shal be set aside as humane inuentions though they agrée with Gods word but other in the which they were ouerséene through weaknes of naturall affection or reason shall be approued as Gods worde though they procéede from mans fansie Fifthly in that she coopleth with the commandements of God the commandements of the church that is to say of men and that is more she coopleth therewith these commandements not as things indifferent but as necessarie to saluation So what soeuer filth deuotion as it is named indéede superstition hath brought or shall bring in that must be déemed to be pure religion and in vaine shall the Lord be worshipped of vs as of the Iewes in olde time with the commandements of men and good intentes as they call them which are abominable to God shall be preferred before obedience voluntarie religion condemned by the scriptures shall be taken vp as a most holy seruice of the Lord. Last of all in that she appointeth images to be had in churches for the instruction of the people as bookes so one supposeth which idiotes may reade in O miserable idiotes the instructing of whom is committed to a stocke which instructeth to vanities whose teacher is an image that is a teacher of lyes if we beléeue the Prophets And is it any maruell if they be naughtie scholers whose masters are dumbe idols the doctours of errours The church of Rome therefore hath brought in such corruption of the word of God what by the apocrypha what by traditions what by faultes of the translation what by the sense of her holding what by commandements of the church what by the teachers of idiotes that she séemeth to haue mingled the sustenance of life not with filth but with poyson and the wine of God not with water but with venoome and the bread of Christ not with leauen but with rats-bane or rather if I might speake so mens-bane As for want of Gods word which is the other cause of sicknesse how wretchedly she hath pined her children therewith our auncestours felt by long experience and aged men may remember and histories of the church doo witnesse and they who are vnder the Popish yoke know For though she permitted sometimes in some places perhaps a small parcell of the word of God if I may call that Gods word which sauoured more of mens deuises then of God to be touched in the presence and assembly of the people by common cryers preachers such as they were yet she hath not onely not permitted to Christians but also hath hindered with no lesse impietie then inhumanitie yea and hindereth still that abundance and plentie which they ought to haue as it is writen Let the worde of Christ dwell in you plenteously with all wisedome For whereas this plenty is gotten obteined by two speciall meanes to weete by hearing by reading the one commanded all in Church-assemblies publikely the other allowed priuatly to euery man at home both vsed and approued by the rules of the holy Ghost and the practise of holy companies and the iudgement of holy churches our Romanists pretending that horrible confusion will ensue thereof and the church of Christ shall be like to Babylon not to Ierusalem as Cardinall Hosius saith if the holy scriptures be read in mother toongs doo kéepe them sealed vp in a straunge toong and sound them out so in their Church-assemblies that
the Lord from gilt of transgression By the which doctrine how much so euer they adde to their own merites or take away from their own sinnes while they go about to be iustified by woorkes yet gaine they nothing els but that with a wonderfull tormenting of conscience they mistrust still and stand in dout of their saluation Which thing themselues deny not nay they teach that they ought to dout and mistrust because they know not whether they haue merites enough So that we may iustly say that their doctrine is not a doctrine of faith and beléefe but of mistrust and dout rather And what maruell is it that they who pluck away so much from the grace and righteousnes of God doo abate no lesse of the glory of God whose woorship and honour they communicate and impart I say not with Saints with elect Angels with the blessed Virgin whom they make equall to Christ in being frée from all sinnes but which is more shamefull with reliques with images with scurfe of all scurfe and things most vile and contemptible against the Lords commaundement God onely shalt thou serue They make a distinction I graunt that to these things they geue a lesser honour called Dulia but the greater honour called Latria they geue to God onely Which is vaine and false For they geue the greater honor euen Latrîa not onely to the sacrament of the body of Christ the consecrated bread wherein they wil excuse themselues because they hold it to be their Lord and God but also to the crosse of Christ the wodden crosse nay to the image thereof as Thomas of Aquine their Angelical Doctor teacheth and confirmeth by the practise of the church and Cardinall Caietan liketh it nor doth Andradius deny it but defend it stoutly Wherefore sith the doctrine of the faith of Christ doth set forth vnto vs our wretchednes and Gods goodnes our naughtines and Gods mercy that we through the knowledge of God and of our selues thinking of him religiously and of our selues modestly may conceiue assured trust that saluation is geuen vs in Christ by the grace of God through the righteousnes of God to the glory of God can there be any felowship communion betwéene this doctrine the doctrine of the faith of Rome which planteth superstition in stéede of religion pride in stéede of modestly douting in stéede of trusting a Pharisaicall vanitie in stéede of Christian pietie that is at one word vnfaithfulnes in stéede of faith Now what shall I say touching the sacraments how those holy rites deliuered vs by Christ to seale the grace of God vnto vs haue béene increased in number impayred in vertue depraued with errours polluted with ceremonies defiled with mens inuentions and spoyled of their fruite by reason they were ministred in a strange toung With the which anoyances to let passe in silence how greatly and gréeuously the Romanistes haue hurt baptisme whereof the substance yet and as it were the life hath beene preserued whole and sound through Gods mercy they haue corrupted the supper of the Lord so fowly with so great and many errours and abuses that there is almost no token of his supper to be found in it For they haue made of a sacrament a sacrifice not a sacrifice of thankes geuing but propitiatorie nor propitiatorie as representing Christ but truely and properly propitiatorie to be offred by a Masse-priest as by a new Priest after the order of Melchisedec and offered not onely for the quick but for the dead too nor for the quick and dead onely to saue them but also to ridde their pigges from diseases and to serue their turne for whatsoeuer other chares They offer vp anew that one and onely sacrifice which being once offered hath sanctified vs for euer and make the death of Christ to be of no effect They take away the humane nature of Christ by the reall presence They take away the holy signe that is the sacrament by transubstantiation They take away the right vse of the communion by their priuate Masses They take away the ordinance of our Lord and Sauiour they take away the singular comfort of the faithfull they take away a most swéet pledge of saluation by their maimed communion vnder one kinde They take away almost religion it selfe at least they prophane it with a cursed custome of superstition more then heathnish in that they cary a cake the body of Christ they call it about in processions to be worshipped as God and before the Pope they mount it on a horse with lanterns and a bell in a maner as the Persians did cary fyer their God before the king of Persians As for publike prayers ordeined to this end that the people of God banding them selues together as Tertullian speaketh might doo their suite seruice to God with ioyned force the Romanistes not contented to robbe God of his honour by praying to creatures yea to dumme creatures which is more abominable oyle stones crosses images saying to a stocke thou art my father and to a stone thou hast brought me foorth like m the idolaters in Ieremie they robbe the people of God both of a dutie and of an aide by praying in a strange tongue wherein neither can they pray together with them nor be stirred vp thereby to true deuotion For it is a small faute in these men to pray for the dead that they may be ridde out of the paines of Purgatory to babble in praying with vaine repetitions as if God were serued By reckening vp their mutteringes vpon a paire of beades Though these thinges are also beside the worde of God and therefore not of faith therefore of sinne Yet in these men they are small fautes at least they haue some coolour eyther of olde custome or of mans reason or of zeale without knowledge But to pray to God in wordes not vnderstoode like popiniayes or parrats it is so absurd a matter in reason so wicked in religion so contrary to the expresse cōmandement of the Lord iudgement of the Apostle and practise of the church I say not of the church of the Iewes or of the Syrians or of the Greekes or of the Latins but the church generally euen of all churches from the beginning of the world till the darke ages in which the Barbarians of late did ouerflow them that such as doo vse it may bee thought to doate such as defende it seeme to haue a lust to bee madd with reason It remaineth for me to intreate of discipline whereof this is the order set downe in the scripture that the church should be gouerned by the ministers of God according to the lawes of God to the saluatiō of Gods people And what one of these pointes is kept in the church of Rome In
the which the ministers of God are remoued from gouernance by the Pope who being not a voluntarie Senator as Tully iesteth at Asinius himselfe chosen by him selfe but a voluntary tyrant doth take vpon him selfe the rule of the whole church Who to get the soueraintie that he aspireth to doth cast off the foly of Paul and of Peter and neither will him selfe nor suffereth his to be subiect vnto higher powers Who autoriseth him selfe to giue and take away the dominions and kingdomes of the whole world as if that all Princes held their right of him Who chalengeth the two swordes as he termeth them the spirituall and temporall and that by the gospell because it was saide for sooth by the Apostles Beholde herâ— are two swordes Who hauing committed the temporall sword in part to ciuill magistrates and reserued it in part to him selfe hath put vp the spirituall sworde of all Pastors into his owne sheath Who of church-ministers hath made him selfe Cardinals felowes of kinges gardians of Princes Protectors of nations a Senate meete for such a â—arquin Who exacteth an oth of Emperours of Bishops of Christian common wealthes Uniuersities and Churches to be obedient vnto him Who admitteth I say not Cornelius the Centurion which Peter yet would neuer haue doon but the Lordes of Centurions euen Kinges and Keisars Emperours and Empresses to kisse his blessed feete Finally who being in Princely attire and accompanied with Princely traine serued not by common but by noble men wearing not a single but a triplâ— Crowne called by his Parasites our Lord God the Pope by discréete Doctors most good in grace most great in power as full of riotous pompe and pride as euer were the Persian kings z His clothes bedeckt with precious stones â—his gorgeous miter dight With iewels rare with glistring gold with Pyropus bright O very Troian truls not Troians hath taken the state ecclesiasticall of Christ appointed in noble order as an army set in aray and hath transformed it as it were with an enchauntment of the whoore of Babylon into a visisible monarchie and kingdome of the Romans And that the old saying might be fulfilled new Lordes new lawes such lippes such lettise as one said of an asse that was eating thistles this new Prince the Pope hath brought in new lawes to gouerne his kingdome in stéede of Gods lawes which Christ would haue to rule his Church and in stéede of the Canon of the holy scriptures he hath ordeined his Canon law Touching the vnrighteousnes of the which law least any man should think me perhaps to finde fault with that I haue no skill in as the shoomaker did whom Apelles warned not to presume beyond his shooe I had leiffer you should heare the iudgement of a learned Doctour and professour of the law then mine Francis Duaren a man of great skill in both the lawes ciuill and canon and named amongst lawiers the chiefest lawier of our time hath writen a learned treatise touching the holy functions and liuings of the Church as it were an abridgement of the canon law allowed by the iudgement of the Parlament of Parisâ— and set foorth with the priuiledge of the French king that no man can iustâ—y 〈◊〉 either the autor or the worke as hereticall In 〈…〉 then of the said treatise declaring that the body of the Canon law consisteth of two parts to weete Decrees and 〈◊〉 Decrees which were gathered together by Gratian 〈◊〉 epistles writen by sundry Popes he saith that in the â—irâ—t volume of Decretales conteining fiue bookes set out in the name of Gregory the ninth there are many things that doo much degenerate and grow out of kinde from that old discipline comprised in the former booke of Decrees And hence arose that saying which is common and famous amongst our countriemen he meaneth the Frenchmen Things haue gone ill with men since tales were added to Decrees that is since the time that in steed of the Decrees the Decretales did beare sway For the Church-causes had lost their olde simplicitie when Decrees were patched out with those tales as the world is wont to growe worse and worse So destenies do prouide That all thinges fall vnto decay and backe efisoones they slide As for the other volume the sixth booke of Decretales which Boâ—iface the eighth added it hath not bene receiued in the kingdome of France because the constitutions and ordinances thereof are thought to haue bene purposely made the most part of them in hatred and despite of Philip the French king and for the game of the court of Rome No not the Clementines neither nor Extrauagants the last part of the Decretales are voyde of like faultes nay the later lawes of the Popes be commonly worse then the former And this is the body of the Canon-law these are the Popes statutes by the which though very vnméete for the church in Duarens iudgement yet is the church of Rome gouerned and it is so gouerned that the Decrees which are the better part haue lesse autoritie the Decretales which are woorse haue greater force in Church-causes and are more authenticall Yea the matter came to that passe that Gratian the principall autor of the Canon law would haue had the Decretall epistles of the Popes to be accounted holy and reckened in the number of the Canonicall scriptures For the better compassing and credite whereof he did most shamefully corrupt a saying of S. Austins But it would not â—ay In so much that the Papists Alfonsus and Andradius are them selues ashamed of that his either wilfull fault or ouersight The Decretales therefore remaine not in the number of the Canonicall scriptures which hope the Giants fayled of through the diuision of their toungs yet equall in autoritie to the canonicall scriptures yea aboue them in deciding Church-causes at Rome For that which S. Bernard complained off to Pope Eugenius long since he might complaine off to any Pope in our time if he were aliue the lawes keepe a great sturre dayly in your Palace but the lawes of Iustinian not the lawes of the Lord. Whether iustly or no looke you to that For doutlesse the law of the Lord is vndefiled and conuerteth soules But these are not so much lawes as law-quarels and strifes subuerting iudgement Besides that the maner of dealing which is vsed in debating causes is too too abominable and such as is maruellous vnseemely for the church nay it were not seemely for the common place where ciuill matters are handled He meaneth that maner which the Popes Court of Chauncerie at Rome had bred long before though it were not growen yet to that bignesse to which it shot vp afterwarde euen that maner of dealing which is practised in the brabbles and cauils of aduocates
to vs. But the Doctor saw that Babylon would fall if the distinction stoode Wherefore if he had no stronger shot then this to discharge against it I will beare with him as in the rest of his tauntes also Loosers must haue their wordes An other point he carpeth at is mine exposition of holy catholike church Which I hauing proued by the Papistes themselues that it must needes signifie the company of the chosen alone not mixt with wicked ones because by their catechisme it is the body of Christ all the body of Christ is quickned by his spirit which the wicked are not he replieth that the church is said in the scripture to be the body of Christ quickned by his spirite because some partes of it are so not all the body An aunswere somewhat straunge considering that the scripture which I had alleaged saith that al the body of Christ is quickned so As for that he noteth of the word Catholike that I and Philip Mornay expound it not in one sorte Philip Mornayes excellent giftes and fruitfull labors I reuerence and loue And both of vs hauing aymed at the trueth whether hath come neerer it let the Prophets iudge But if among Prophets in the church of Christ somewhat be reueiled to one that is not to an other this iustifieth not them who say they are Iewes are not but are the Synagogue of Satan Yet this is the soundest reason that he hath against my Conclusion that the holy Catholike church which we beleue is the whole company of Gods elect and chosen For touching that he addeth that he hath disproued it by shewing that the church is distinguished from hereticall assemblies by the name of Catholike he hath disproued it as soundly therby as if he should say that the Catholike epistles in the new Testament were not so called as generall writen to no certaine persons because that other writings are named catholike also to distinguish them from hereticall The third point he taketh vpon him to confute is an argument that I made to proue my third Conclusion All the wordes of scripture be the wordes of trueth some wordes of the Church be the wordes of errour But he that telleth the trueth alwayes is more to be credited theÌ„ he that lyeth sometimes Therefore the holy scripture is to be credited more theÌ„ is the Church And to this argumeÌ„t saith he I answere briefly that no words of the Church are the words of error that is that no erroneus thing is euer taught defined or approued by the Church in her Bishops Pastors teaching vniformly in the decrees of Councels chiefly of generall Councels in that which the Fathers teach with one consent in her head the Pope defining deliuering any thing publikely finally in the rule of faith which all the Church holdeth though â—euerally some Bishops may priuately erre in teaching and one or moe Fathers may write some vntrue thing or be in some erâ—or and somewhat euen in CouÌ„cels without the decree it self may be said or reasoned inconueniently and to conclude the Pope may be ouerseene priuately in somewhat But this must be certes imputed to the frailtie of men not to the Church her selfe Which speech of D. Stapletons if it be an aunswere vnto my argument then can I tell him a very briefe way to aunswere my Conclusions all with one word How By graunting them all to be true For though it were so that nether Bishops teaching vniformely might erre nor Fathers consenting nor Councels in decrees nor the Pope in publike and definitiue sentence which I both there else where haue shewed to be otherwise but if it were so yet seeing that Bishops and Fathers and Councels and the Pope himselfe may erre as he confesseth in this or that point and this or that maner he graunteth that which I said that some wordes of the Church are the wordes of errour But those wordes must certes saith he be imputed to the frailtie of men not to the Church her selfe Now certes M Doctor is a mery maÌ„ who can shift an argument off with such a iest As though the Church her selfe consisted not of men and therefore must needes offend so through frailtie the men offending so The fourth and last point wherewith he findeth fault is that amongst the reasons why the Church of Rome is no sound member of the Catholike Church I bring this that touching expounding of the Scripture she condemneth all senses and meanings thereof which are against the sense that her selfe holdeth or against the Fathers coÌ„senting all in one Whereof in that he gathereth that I allow not the expositions of the Fathers yea that I affirme that it is a marke and token of a false Church to admitte the ioint-consent of the Fathers in expounding of the scripture he dooth me great wrong For though by folowing too much breuitie in Latin I fell into obscuritie and said not so plainly that which I would and should as in the English now I haue yet that which I said dooth cleere me of his sclaunder as D. Fulke hath shewed whom I can better thanke for his defending of me then deserue the praise that he hath geuen me therein Nay I was so far from noting that as faulty in the Church of Rome that the faulte which I noted was her vile abusing the name of the Fathers against their iudgemeÌ„t in that point For I declared straight in the words ensuing that first shee autoriseth thereby her owne practise as the right sense and meaning of the Scripture though contrarie to it selfe next she alloweth the puddles of the Schoolemen wil haue theÌ„ taken for waters of life lastly when some Fathers gainsay her she reiecteth them because they all consent not and admitteth them who doo make for her as hauing hit the mark Of the which branches the last importeth not that I refuse the Fathers consenting all in one The former two import that I condemne the frensie of the Church of Rome mainteining her Dunses and deedes against the Fathers But the serpentes assembled in the Councell of Trent haue set downe that I spake of touching the expounding of the scripture so suttilly that a simple man would thinke they allow such senses and meanings of the Scripture onely as the Fathers geue all with one consent Whereas in very trueth they do nothing lesse they disallow them rather For whether by the Fathers consenting all in one they meane the Fathers all simply none excepted that consent is a Phoenix and neuer will be found or whether they meane a good number of them as M. Hart expoundeth it they dissent froÌ„ senses agreed on by that number For example the scripture saith There shal be one flock one Pastour The Fathers Austin Chrysostome Cyrill Ierome Gregorie expounde this of Christ. The church of Romes