vndique Ire li. 3. ca. 3 conseruata est ea quae est ab Apostolis traditio In which Church saith S. Irenée that is by repayring to it the faithfull that be all about haue alwayes preserued theÌ„ selues in the tradition that coÌ„meth from the Apostles And where you say for another instance Ar. 2.3 Pur. 337. It is manifest by al Histories that the Nations of the Alanes Gothes Vandales were first conuerted by the Arrians in so saying you declare that you neuer read the Ecclesiasticall Histories presuming notwithstanding to write against these Articles which are in maner nothing els but certayne obseruations therof Reade Socrates li. 2. ca. 32. and not onely li. 4. ca. 27. and Sozomenus li. 6. ca. 37. but specially Theodoret li. 4. ca. 32. who as a Catholike Bishop of purpose to take from the Arrians that vayne bragge of theirs sheweth that the Gothes were first Catholikes and not as you say first conuerted by the Arrians but onely by false informations and to much trusting of their Bishop Vlphilas béeing another Balaam ledde out of the way You talke also of the Nations that were coÌ„uerted by the Donatists Nouatians Pur. 337. But we shall know your Histories authors hereafter Againe you say And it is also manifest by Histories Ar. 3. that the Grecians whoÌ„ the Papists count no part of their church but Schismatikes conuerted the Moscouites first of all Did the Grecians conuert them since their Schisme O great Historian The truth is there was great emulation then in the Grecians against the Latins but not schisme nor heresie as yet nor long after and therefore of our Church they were then Howbeit it is not the true faith nor our religion as you say truely which the Moscouites haue but such as they them selues did list to receiue with many qualifications and modifications of their owne such was the fruite of the Grecians emulation and such is the necessitie that S. Peter cast the nette But if Histories fayle you yet one demonstration ex per se notis you haue to proue that not we but you conuerted all true Christian Nations Ar. 2. And what is that If the Papist can proue that we hold not the same faith and trueth vnto which the Apostles conuerted the Nations we refuse to be called the Church or Congregation of Christ The Papist proueth to omitte a 1000. others of his proufes that you be Heretikes and therefore hold not the same faith c. by the testimonie of that which your selfe confesse to be the true Church of Christ here cap. 2. and cap. 3. Againe We are members witnesse your Separation here Dem. 3. Ar. 2.3 of that Church which conuerted all Landes in the earth that are conuerted to the true Religion of Christ and we affirme that the Apostles taught none other faith in steed of true Christianitie but that which we hold as we are readie to proue by the word of God Witnesse here cap. 8. Where all your absurd Deprauations of Gods word are answered and not that onely but also shewed by the expresse word of God among other thinges that the Sacrament of Confirmation went euery whither together with the Apostles Gospell as the chiefest point of Christianitie Ar. 3. pag. 145. But no maruaile of your audacitie to say we are readie to proue it considering that you are bold to conclude of this saying thus I haue shewed that our church holding the true Doctrine of the Apostles is that which conuerted all Nations to true Religion Then belike all those Nations were and are of your Religion and you will be content to be tryed by them as by Afrike for example whose Religion we know by Tertullian S. Cyprian S. Optatus S. Augustine c. Or if you haue better Monumentes of any other Nations Religion name it and let vs try it betwene vs. But whosoeuer séeth here cap. 3. how you are faine to charge the true Church the Primatiue Church with erring may easily coniecture what you dare doe Motiue 17. 11. Britannie Well we be English men and therefore in a seuerall Demaund I name our Countrie England or Britannie vnto you Specially because the Prophetes as you know speake much of the conuersion of Ilands expresly and namely of such Ilands as were farthest of As also because there are extaÌ„t such monumeÌ„ts of our Ilands conuersion and religion in Tertullian Origen S. Hierome S. Chrysostome S. Gregory the Pope with many other like and specially in the History of our owne countreyman S Bede But here Fulke telleth such English men that list not to be deceiued Pur. 346. but to see into what faith all Nations were conuerted that were turned by the Apostles that they were better to consider the word of God the Historie of the Acts of the Apostles and biddeth vs of so many Nations there recorded to name one Pur. 166.332 vnto which Purgatory or praying and sacrificing for the dead was taught You are profoundly seene in the Scriptures I perceiue by this Why was the Actes of the Apostles written to shew into what faith all Nations were conuerted that were turned by the Apostles Nay is there so much as any mention of the twelue Apostles preaching to any nation of the Gentiles No syr that booke was written to shew onely the beginning of the Church according to the Prophets to wit at Hierusalem and among the Iewes and the taking of it froÌ„ them for their deserts and geuing of it to the Gentils euen froÌ„ Hierusalem the head of the Iewes to Rome the head of the Gentiles And there S. Luke endeth it not caring to tel so much as the fulfilling of that which our Lord had foretold Act. 27. to S. Paule in whose person this traÌ„slation was wrought and not in S. Peters nor any others of the Twelue for causes to long to be here rendred Caesari te oportet assistere Thou must stand before the Emperour Because his purpose was no more but to shew the new Hierusalem of the Christians and so to leaue them to it to know what are the particulars that the Apostles taught And so withall you haue one of those Nations named in the Actes and that no common one â—o wit the Romanes which receiued of the Apostles not only the Article that you require but also all the rest which at this time it hath neither you béeing able by Scripture or otherwise to proue the contrarie so muche as in any one and we prouing it both a particulars and in the totall summe partly by Scriptures partly by other vnauoydable demonstrations Well for all this trigiuersation by which you sée what you haue wonne you will yet be content to be tryed by our Britannie Ar. 49. For you confesse that the Church of the Brytans or Welchmen before Augustine came in to conuert the Englishmen Anno 597. continued in the faith of Christ euen from the Apostles time Pur. 332. so that
also for hereafter Euen as Fulke also him selfe saith Ar. 78. Pur. 298. In despight of the diuel and all her enemies she is to this day preserued and shall be to the worlds ende and none other but she Moti 48. 51 Apostasie Last of al I shew that it is not so much an Heresie as a plaine Apostasie from Christ that the Protestants haue brought in vnder the name of the Gospel Wherof also I haue said ynough ca. 8. pag. 118. So that if it were euer damnable to giue eare to any Heretikes it is damnable to giue eare to these Which it were good for all men to thinke earnestly vpon before it be to late ¶ The eleuenth Chapter What grosse Contradictions Fulke is driuen to vtter against him selfe while he struggleth against Gods Church and the Doctrine thereof BEsides all that hath bene yet said another most iust motiue not to follow the Protestants may be this to any reasonable man because they know not themselues what to holde nor what to say and therefore doe vtter straunge contradictions in their bookes by reason that they will say any thing rather then yéelde plainely to the trueth A notable ensample hereof we haue in Fulke specially about the question of the Church in his booke of the Articles as I will here note very briefely leauing to the discrete Readers consideratiō what I might enlarge vpon euery particular First as touching the Church of Rome on the one side thus he saith Ar. 96. You are neuer able to answere the argumentes that Peter was neuer at Rome And then where is the Apostolike Sea succession c Then on the contrarie side The Church of Rome was founded by the Apostles b Pur. 373.361.374 it was an Apostolike Church 2 c Pur. 373.374 Those auncient Fathers whom D. Allen doth name the last of them is Vincentius Lirinensis An. 420. did appeale to the iudgement of the Church of Rome against all heresies and c Pur. 373.374 among the Apostolike Churches specially named the Church of Rome because it continued in the doctrine of the Apostles Yet contra where d Apud Au. de gra Chr. cont Pelag. c. 43 Pelagius within that compasse commended S. Ambrose for the Romaine faith and most pure sence in the Scriptures Fulke saith therevpon e Pu. 405. And by the way note here the Hereticall bragge of the Romaine faith 3 Speaking of the same Fathers and Church of Rome f Pur. 374. It had by Succession reteined euē vntill their dayes that faith which it did first receiue of the Apostles Contra g Ar. 85. She the Church of Rome hath had no orderly Succession of Bishops except so many Schismes as they write of be orderly Successions By the time of those Fathers there had bene foure Schismes 4 h Pur. 373.374 It continued at that time in the doctrine of the Apostles h Pur. 373.374 it reteined by Succession that faith which it did first receiue of the Apostles Contra He charged it with sundrie errors here Cap. 3. .4 namely P. Liberius with Arrianisme P. Innocentius for housling of Infantes eight Popes for the Supremacie 5 i Pur. 374. Ar. 79. It was a true Church an Apostolike Church i Pur. 374. Ar. 79. a faithfull Church true i Pur. 374. Ar. 79. and Apostolike Faith and Religion haue dwelled in her Contra k Ar. 85.16 106.10.27 The Church of Rome neuer preached the word of trueth She neuer had sence she first arose the ministring of Sacramentes according to Christes institution The true Catholike Church hath ouerthrowen Heresies of all sortes But the Popish Church was neuer able to encounter with Heretikes k Ar. 85.16 106.10.27 Rome may be a nurse of Antichristians but neuer did good vnto Christians k Ar. 85.16 106.10.27 I am able to proue that the Primitiue Church affirmed a Supra pag. 29. your Church to be the Church of Antichrist He meaneth the l Supra ca. 9. pag. 155. places of S. Irenée S. Hierome S. Augustine calling Rome Babylon which he vnderstandeth as though they had so called the Church of Rome in their time also as the Protestants doe now at this time 6 m Ar. 102.38 Pur. 287. The Popish Church is a puddle of all false doctrine and heresie whereof the whore beareth a cuppe full out of which all Nations haue drunke m Ar. 102.38 Pur. 287. Euen from the Apostles time the diuell neuer left to set in his foote for his sonne Antichristes dominion vntill he had placed him in the Temple of God prepared the wide world for his walke and then came m Ar. 102.38 Pur. 287. The Generall defection Contra Ar. 38.16.33.34 Supr p. 117. All Nations neuer consented to the doctrine of the Papistes For as it hath bene often said the Greeke Church and all other Orientall Churches of Asia and Africa neuer receiued the Popish Religion in many chiefe pointes and specially in acknowledging the Popes authoritie they will not vnto this day acknowledge her doctrine to be Catholike nor her authoritie to be lawfull And yet we shall now heare that the preuailing of the Popes religion and his Antichristian exaltation consisteth specially in that point Ar. 36. 7 The religion of the Papistes came in and preuayled in the yere of our Lord 607. in which the Pope first obteined his Antichristian exaltation to wit Bonifacius the 3. of Phocas the Emperour that the Bishop of Rome should be called and counted the head of all the Church Contra in the same place Because you speake of the first entring of Popish religion which dependeth chiefly vpon the Popes authoritie it first began to aduaunce it selfe in Victor about the yere of our Lord 200. And likewise in diuers others before S. Bonifacius the third as he confesseth here cap. 3. and withall that the Church of Rome all that while was the Church of Christ and not of Antichrist Ar. 102. Pur. 287.238 8 The Popish Church is a puddle of all false doctrine and heresie Euen in the Apostles time and from that time in all times whensoeuer and wheresoeuer was any peece of myste or darke corner though all the reste were light there were the steppes of your walke It may be a shame for you Papistes to leaue and condemne for heresie all that is true in the Fathers writings and agreable to the Scripture Ar. 43. Contra where he distinguisheth the Religion of the Papistes from the great heresies and open aduersaries that sought to beate downe the chief foundations of Christian faith as the Valentinians Marcionistes Manichees Arrians Sabellians and such like monsters Ar. 43.36.38 Supra c. 10. pag. 223. 9 We say not that the Religion of the Papists came in sodenly but that it entred by small degrees at the first and therefore was lesse espyed by the true Pastors beeing earnestly occupied against great
fulfilled that which was reuealed to S. Iohn in the twelfth of the Apocalipse The woman clothed with the sunne which you your selfe confesse to be the Church was so persecuted by the Dragon that she fledde into the wildernesse there to remayne * Idem etiam Ar. xxvij narrovvly persecuted of the Romish Antichrist for a long season a long season So farre printed by you in the letter of the Scripture A world to sée your bolde blindnes You do so apply this prophecie onely because of the Popes Primacie which yet is a truth of the Gospell practised also notoriously in all ages as well afore Bonifacius the third as after him which two poyntes the Reader may sée euidently in the Seuenth booke of M. D. Saunders Monarchie yea by your selfe also confessed before the said Bonifacius and the Church the true Church notwithstanding your wordes I reported in the 3. Chapter Supra pag. yea moreouer your owne selfe do say Articulorum pagina 38 that All nations neuer consented to the doctrine of the Papistes for the Greeke Church and other orientall Churches neuer receiued the Popish Religion in many chiefe pointes and especially in acknowledging the Popes authoritie cleane contrarie to that which both the Scripture and also your selfe do hold of Antichrist and of his vniuersall exaltation as I shall lay your wordes together in the 11. Chapter amongest your other grosse contradictions And therefore you can not for the Popes authoritie so expound this prophecie As for that Summe of money you tell vs not what author you followe therein neither is the thing material vnlesse you wil condemne your owne side also of Antichristianisme for their infinite contributions to mainteine these Rebellions euery where whiche you call your Gospell But O Syr I pray you I thought séeing your goodly promises in the last Chapter that to finde out the meaning of a text of Scripture you would haue brought vs nothing but Scripture and so cleare Scripture that by no suttletie it might be auoyded Howe is it then that nowe you bring nothing but your owne conceites Yea furthermore how is it that to make a shewe of a texte which you saw not to be with you but playne against you you corrupt the text For by your opinion Antichrist raigned in the world and the Church continued in the wildernes Ar. 36.79 The time of the Churches being in the vvildernesse the space of 807. yeres from the yere .607 the time of Bonifacius the third to the yere 1414. béeing the time of the Constance Councell and of Iohn Hus your supposed great Grandfather All this while you say Christ hath preserued her now to bring her out of her secret place in the wildernesse into the open sight of the world agayne And therefore you make the text to say here before that being persecuted by the Dragon she fled into the wildernes Falsification most detestable there to remayne a long season But the text hath the cleane contrary a very short season to wit but thrée yeres and a halfe These are the words truely reported as Catholikes are wout to do And the woman fugiebat Apoc. 12. fled into the wildernes where she had a place prepared of God that they may there feede her 1260. dayes And the same againe a litle after And to the woman were geuen two wings of a great Eagle Vt volaret that she might flye whether this be flying in body as you say or in mind as I say into the wildernes vnto her place where she is fedde one time and two times and halfe a time from the face of the Serpent Where is now your long season your 807. yeres VVhether Antichrist should come An. 607. Apoc. 12. Your folly will agayne be manifest if I report the truth of the Dragons persecution because you make it to haue bene in the time of Bonifacius An. 607. But what saith the Scripture First that great Dragon is the olde Serpent called the Diuel and Satan the Seducer of the whole world But Christ in consideration of his passion then at hande and the conuersion of the world immediatly ensuing therevpon saide of him Now is the iudgement of the world Ioan. 12. Mat. 12. now shall the prince of this worlde be expelled And the same in the Apocalypse in these moste euident wordes Apoc. 12. And he tooke the Dragon and he bounde him the space of a thousande yeres and he cast him into the bottomlesse pitte and he shutte and sealed vpon him that he should no more deceiue the Nations or the Gentiles vntill the thousande yeres were consummate So expresly to confounde you vtterly with your impious Gospell of Caluenisme who set the loosing of the Dragon the comming of Antichrist his persecution and the Churches desolation which all do go together at the yere 607. The time of Antichristes raigning It followeth as expresly And after this he must be loosed modico tempore for a litle season And the same agayne And when the thousande yeres be consummate Satan shall be loosed out of his prison and he shall goe foorth and shall seduce the Nations which are vpon the foure corners of the earth Gog and Magog and shall gather them vnto battayle whose number is as the sande of the sea And they ascended vpon the latitude of the earth and compassed rounde the campe of the Holy ones and the Citie beloued But all in vayne and to their owne destruction for Fire descended from God out of heauen and deuoured them and the diuell who seduced them was caste into the lake of fire and brimstone where also the Beast that is Antichrist and his notable falseprophet shal be tormented day and night for euer and euer That which the Apocalypse here calleth Consummation The consummation of the thousand yeres the Gospell that no man be deceiued calleth it Consummationē seculi The consummation of the world Mat. 24. Mar. 13. and meaneth thereby that Modicum tempus litle season aforesaid For so the Apostles asking our Sauiour What signe shall there be of thy comming and the consummation of the world He answereth and telleth them of sundry things which must be Sed nondum est finis but the consummation notwithstanding is not yet What then Mary This Gospell of the kingdome shall be preached in the vniuersall world for witnesse to all Nations Et tunc veniet consummatio and then shal come the consummation And in the short season of the consummation what shal be Tribulatio magna and Seductio magna So great a persecution and so great a Seducing that the Elect also would not be saued but that for their sakes Breuiabuntur dies illi Those dayes shall be shorter then any man would thinke it possible séeing the Persecutors greatnes onely thrée yeres and a halfe Statim autem post tribulationem dierum illorum And straight after the persecution of those short dayes there shall be maruailous alterations in the heauens
Catholikes as none can be more and some of their suffering in Englande for the Catholike faith in prison in yrons and that after the most terrible and most cruell manner doth most gloriously declare ¶ The ninth Chapter To defend that the Doctors as they be confessed to be ours in very many pointes so they be ours in all pointes and the Protestantes in no point All the Doctors sayings that he aleageth are examined answered The first parte Of his Doctours generally j His chalenging words THat out of the old Doctours Church is no saluation that they make with vs in many things against the Protestants I declared in the thrée first Chapters by Fulkes owne confession Now to declare further that they be wholly ours with the * Aug. sic inuocat Cyprianum de Bapt. con Don. lib. 5. ca. 17. li. 7. cap. 1. Pur. 432. Pur. 383. helpe of their prayers I will defende that in nothing they make for the Protestants against vs because he saith vnto D. Allen speaking of the auncient Doctors and Councels Among whom as we will not denie but you haue some patrons of some of your errors so will we affirme that you haue more enemies in the greatest Againe The Papistes offer to stand to their iudgement in all thinges and yet in most thinges yea in the chiefest pointes of religion they are contrarie to the Doctors and old Councels Againe Brag of them as much as thou wilt Pur. 406. thou shalt neuer be able to proue that of 20. errours which thou defendest Rusticus es Corridon they did hold one If they haue spoken otherwise then trueth in any matter they must be * In the zeale of the Scribes against Christ. told of it as well as other men But thou must not think that for one error common with them thou must hold an hundred cōtrarie to them He saith in most things and Pur. 238. in an hundred for one Yea more then that in another place It may be a shame to you Papists saith he to leaue condemne for heresy all that is true in those mens writings and agreable to the Scripture and to make such vaunt for a few superstitious ceremonies Pur. 407. and vncincere opinions And againe Nay M. Allen though those Doctors buyld some hay or stouble vpon the only foundation Christ their case is ten thousande times better then yours which buyld nothing but dirt and dung tempered with hay and stuble vpon no foundation at all and seeke by all meanes to digge vp the onely true foundation of our faith Iesus Christ making him nothing better then a common person except his bare name Ar. 60. And once againe more particularly The other writers of later yeres he spoke before of Iustinus Martyr and Ireneus we are not afraide to confesse that they haue some corruption wherby you may seeme to haue colour of defence for inuocation of Saintes prayer for the dead and diuers superstitious and superfluous Ceremonies But for the chiefe poyntes of Christian religion and the foundation of our faith that is for the honor of God the offices of Christ Redemption iustification satisfaction the fruites of Christ his passion Grace faith workes authoritie of Gods word authoritie of the Pope Real presence Transubstantiation Communion in both kinds Images c. the most approued writers Tertullian Cyprian Origen Epiphanius Hilarius Chrysostomus Ieronymus Ambrosius Augustinus c. are vtterly against you and therefore can not be of your Church Lo this he saith of our differing from the Doctors First touching the number of the poyntes to wit in most things in many hundreds yea in all that is true in their writings and secondly touching the weight of the poyntes to wit in the greatest and chiefest euen about God and Christ him selfe with those other that he named ij A generall answere to his chalenge declaring that we neede not to answere his Doctors particularly Wherein I thinke Reader whatsoeuer thou art thou doest of thy selfe abhorre the mouth which so filthily runneth ouer and therfore desirest not that I take the payns which I haue promised to ioyne with him in this Chapter vpon the Doctors As also other good causes there are why I might spare that labour Pur. 383 432. First because speaking of the old Doctors and old Councels and the most auncient primatiue Church he saith Pur. 383.432 For which cause that is because the Papistes do offer to stand to their iudgement in al things and not for Confirmation of truth we alleage the authoritie of men we stand for authoritie only to the iudgement of the holy Scriptures In which saying as he agréeth well with himselfe aboue in the seuenth Chapter where he did set at nought all but onely Scripture so I hauing in the laste Chapter answeared all his Scriptures haue by this his owne iudgement fully satisfied him although I meddle not at all with his Doctors vnlesse he require me to spende time onely to mainteine their honor whiche make the forsaid offer being otherwise as he here saith nothing to the matter which is the Confirmation of trueth Againe because he himselfe for me doth answere all his owne Doctors if it be rightly considered See cap. 5. in the end in that he confesseth them to haue helde with vs the very same pointes for the which we must be condemned no remedie as differing from the Doctors in the greatest pointes For why doth he saye that wée are against the honor of God and against the Offices of Christ but because wée hold Inuocation of Saintes and worshipping of their Relikes But the Doctors held the same he confesseth both here Sup. cap. 3. part 2. Sup. cap. 7. par 1. in Traditions and more amply in the 3. chapter Why doth he say that we are against the authoritie of Gods word but because we hold with Traditions But the Doctors held with the same he confesseth in the 7. Chapter And so forth in the residue of those great pointes as may easily be deduced in like maner or at the least so proued that he shal be faine to cōfesse as much In somuch that of one of those points he saith thus expresly I confesse with M. Allen Pur. 156. that the old writers not onely knew but also haue expressed the valew of our redemption by Christ in such wordes as it is not possible that the Popish Satisfaction can stande with them And yet on the other side sée what followeth immediatly Against the valew of which Redemption saith he if they haue vttered any thing by the word of Satisfaction or any thing els we may lawfully reiecte their authoritie not only though they be Doctors of the Church but also if they were Angels frō heauen So that nowe we no more néede to defend against him that we are not contrarie to the Doctors in such great poyntes then that the Doctors are not contrarie to them selues in the same as also that
Heresie but it was so contradicted howsoeuer the Fathers were at the same time otherwise occupied And we shew that these supposed Heresies were not as you blaspheme taken into the Church by emulation of Paganes or Heretikes as here cap. 6. pag. 36. to pag. 56. In how many places doth S. Augustine say that Origens heresie of the Damneds saluation after a while was ioyned with a certaine humane pietie And yet who knoweth not how the Origenistes for all that were most ernestly and continually resisted And the like may be shewed in all the like that as well the Heresies which had a shew of pietie and charitie were faithfully resisted as the others no Heresie at all lacking some shew for the time And howsoeuer now you make a small matter of prayer for the dead Cap. 11. coÌ„tradict â—1 in the next Chapter after your vsuall maner of contradicting your selfe you will make it equall to the greatest most blasphemous against Christ and against God and occasion of most licentious wickednes in all that belieue it c. Besides that the Fathers in déede withstood your friend Aerius who would haue entred with the contrarie and likewise all those other knowen friends of yours the old Heretikes Had they for all their being occupied against those horrible Heresies leasure to withstand trueth and had they not leasure to withstand corruptions of trueth You thinke your folowers very béetles if you hope to blind them with such grosse conueiance But you haue also Scripture forsooth to couer your iuggling Ar. â—8 2. Thes 2. For when the Scripture telleth vs that the Mysterie of iniquitie preparing for the General defection Reuelation of Antichrist wrought euen in S. Paules time it is folly to aske whether sodenly and in one yere and consequently with much preaching against it Ar. 43 all Religion was corrupted Against your blaphemous vnderstanding of this texte as if it said that the Church of Christ wrought the mysterie or preparation of Antichrist I haue replied cap. 8. pag. 121. But now whosoeuer wrought it doth your text say that ther was then no preaching against it No such word Besides what a mad imagination is this of yours that if all Religion had bene corrupted in one yeare then the Pastors would haue cryed out against it but being wrought by litle and litle they either could not espie it or were content to winke at it For who séeth not in the Ecclesiasticall Histories and other monumentes of Antiquitie that they gaue warning vigilantly and faithfully as well against those Heretikes that would haue corrupted but one or a few Articles as against those others that sought to corrupt many or all So haue they done all the time of the mysterie against all the Heresies that from the beginning haue wrought it 1. Ioan. 2. couertly therein seruing Antichrist them selues also therefore termed Antichristes So they do now also being the time of the defection or Apostasie though not Generall S. Paule doth not so call it of which Antichristian Mysterie you Protestants are the workers as I haue declared cap. 8. pag. 124. to .133 And after all the mysterie when his Reuelation coÌ„meth shall that at least passe vncontrolled You according to the blasphemies of your Apostasie do make that Antichrist is long agoe reuealed to the which I haue in the same place answered moste irrefragably by the Scriptures them selues that you abuse But now whensoeuer his Reuelation be doth any text say that there is then no preaching agaynst him Ar. 36. 2. Thes 2. Mat. 24. Apoc. 12. For so you say When the comming of Antichrist was in all power of lying signes and wonders in so muche that if it were possible the very Elect should be deceiued and a generall departing from the fayth was foreshewed and the Church to be driuen into the wildernesse What maruell were it if none of our Church could preach against it as it first entred As though the Scripture were not playne that not onely as he shall enter when the time of his Reuelation commeth but also euen during the whole time of his raigne there shall be open and stoute preaching against him ouer all the worlde with moste mightie working of true Miracles agaynst his lying wonders and moste constant resisting of him to bloud and to death though his tormentes and tormentors be neuer so horrible and Satanicall As I haue partly noted in the same 8. chapter pag. 124. to 130. All this you haue said to defend that our Religion might be false and of a later entraunce Ar. 36. although it were not gaynesaid at the first entring of it As for that which you say of preaching and writing agaynst the Popes authoritie when it first began it is answered aboue cap. 9. pag. 157. Now on the other side that your Religion is not false though it were withstood by the true Pastors in Aerius Iouinianus c. this you say Pur. 413. They that defended that Heretikes should not be baptized were withstood by Cyprian and all the Bishops of Affrica who were in the vnitie of the Church yet were they not heretikes nor their opinion heresie Much forsooth to the purpose Were withstood you should haue added at their first arising and preaching But then you had marred your example your selfe For their opinion did not then first arise but came by lineall tradition from the Apostles And the contrary opinion of Agrippinus and his successor S. Cyprian did then first arise and was withstoode by Pope Stephanus c. who (a) Aug. de bap cont Don. li. 5. ca. 23. wrote and commaunded (b) Vincen. Lirin ca. 9. apud Cyp. epist 74. nihil nouandum nisi quod traditum est to make no innouation but keepe the Tradition And therfore it was an heresie and they that helde it obstinately as afterward the Donatistes and Luciferians were Heretikes and the (c) Eus li. 7. ca. 2.3.4 Niceph l. 6. ca. 7. Hier. coÌ„tra Lucif Bed l. octo quest q. 5. Aug. coÌ„tra Cresc li. 3. ca. 1.2.3 de Bap. li. 2. ca. 4. Ep. 48. Catholiks recanted it both in Africa in Phrygia though S. Cyprian him selfe peraduenture was martyred in the meane time But yet you haue in store one example about this rule to dorre vs withall and to shew that (d) Ar. 93. the Romish Church can well inough abide the true Religion of Christ to be damnably abused by wicked men not only without open or priuie reprehension but also with allowing Which is no worse theÌ„ you hold here of the true auncient Church which you cal your owne But your example out of Matthaeus Paris is cleane agaynst your selfe For it sheweth manifestly that neither those Friars preachers which attributed too much to Religion or life Monasticall nor those Parisian Doctors which detracted too muche from it lacked their reprehenders among the Catholikes as they were all vntill some of the Doctors afterwards proued obstinat heretiks And that
yet he is warned withall if he be a great sinner not to thinke but that he oweth muche more then he is inioyned and therefore that he muste eyther paye it otherwise in his life or procure pardon for it by greater authoritie or els most certainely it will be exacted after his death These I say are all the chaunges to belong any way to the controuersies of this time though you note some others not so belonging Which therefore I might omitte welynough For it is inough for vs that we can say with S. Augustine Aug. epist 165. In hoc ordine successionis nullus Donatista Episcopus inuenitur In this orderly succession no Donatist nor Protestant Bishoppe is founde As for other matters if Iulianus Apostata chaunged into Paganisme what were that to our purpose Woulde that do any thing to proue a chaunge agaynst vs namely that the Emperour whiche nowe is Rodolph the second is chaunged from the Religion of Constantinus the great So therefore if any Pope had chaunged the Romaines into Arrians or into Monothelites that were no vauntage for you Howe muche lesse considering you shewe neither so muche as that You tell vs Pur. 376. that Sabinianus condemned the Decrees of hys predecessour Gregorie and Stephanus the Decrees of Formosus c. Why then doe not you make Sabinianus rather the first Antichrist but skippe him and make the next to him the first to witte S. Boniface the third Both he and some other Popes are said I graunt though you alleage no author to haue disanulled certaine Actes of their next predecessors but not one to haue condemned any decrées made of doctrine Againe you tell vs Ar. 27.85.92 Pur. 344. Act. 23. that many of them were tyrantes traitors whoremongers Sodomites murtherers poysoners sorcerers necromancers warriers and one whore also So you blaspheme the Princes of your people But you shew not that any of these if they were such did for all that chaunge Religion at Rome S. Augustine long agoe told vs where he reckeneth vp the Bishops of this Chaire that it were nothing against the Church Aug. epist 165.166 Si quisquam Traditor per illa tempora subrepsisset if any Traitor had crept into it al the while because our Heauenly Master hath said vnto vs of euil Prelates Doe what they say but doe not what they doe for they say and doe not Mat. 23. warning vs thereby and assuring vs That for them the Chaire of healthfull doctrine should not of vs be forsaken in which the euill also are compelled to say that which is good For it is not their owne that they say but it is Gods who in the chaire of vnitie hath set the doctrine of veritie Wherefore also if any heretike créepe into it we are secure because we are warranted that he shall not teache his heresie out of it much lesse shall he chaunge them whom he teacheth For none teach heresies but you and such others that separate your selues from the vnitie of that Chaire Ar. 91. Pur. 376. Therefore supposing that Honorius was a Monothelite both in opinion and in some secrete writing yet did he not chaunge nor goe about to chaunge the Romanes into Monothelites Yea both he and the Church of Rome in his time and after his time did faithfully resist and mightily ouerthrowe that heresie as you may sée in D. Saūders a San. Mo. li. 7. pa. 418 Monarchie Where you shall finde also the case of b Ib. p. 518. Ar. 91. Pur. 443. Iohn .22 truely reported he was so farre from chaunging the Romanes faith that he vtterly denyed the error which his contentious enemies laid vnto him Which was not as you and Caluine doe belie the storie against the Immortalitie of the Soule and resurrection of the body but whether any Soules doe sée God before the Generall Resurrection Also of S. c Sand. ib. pa. 324. ad 336. Liberius of whom I also will report the truth in the next Demaund howbeit your selfe likewise confessed Cap. 2. Pag. 3. the Romanes long after his time to haue continued without all chaunge Finally that fable of d Sand. ib. pa. 436. Onuph addit ad Plat. in vita Ioan 8. Cop. Dial. 1.5.8 the woman Pope cléerely confuted and more copiously by Onuphrius and others Mine owne chaunce it was in England long agoe hearing a Protestant who was counted a great Historian stand vpon it to say vnto him that it was maruell why among so many Historiographers not one made mention of her before Martinus Polonus who was .400 yeares after her time He therevpon brought out the same Martinus in a faire written hand turned to the place and behold shée was not in the text but in the Margine in an other hand Nowe quoth I when I saw that I perceiue that also this Author fayleth you He was confounded to sée it and saide he would at leasure looke his Bookes better Therefore in harping continually vpon these most vnconsonant stringes you do no more but declare your selues to be such as the Apostle prophesied of They will turne their yeares away from trueth 2. Tim. 4. they will not abide it as that S. Peter was euer at Rome c. but vnto fables they will turne themselues most willingly be they neuer so false improbable and absurd 46. Our Auncetors saued and theirs damned Motiue 36. To make it yet more plaine what a madnesse it is to forsake our Churche and turne to the Protestantes I note in the next Demaund Saluation to be so certainly in our companie and Religion that the Protestantes themselues dare not say our people to haue béene damned for so many hundred yeares as they liued and dyed in our side Whereas we say boldly with the holy Fathers here Cap. 3. that whosoeuer is a Protestant not onely in all but so much as in any one point as were Aerius Iouinianus Vigilantius c. is therefore a damnable Heretike But they dare not so say neither of our Masters who knowing the preaching of those fellowes condemned them and therefore could not be excused by ignoraunce No not so much as of the very Authors of our Monkes and Friers as S. Bernard Saint Frauncis S. Dominike of whom what Peter Martyr saide I reported Cap. 5. Pag. 33. the whole Chapter is also of Fulkes owne wordes to the same effect specially Pag. 30. where he dare not pronounce of manifest Papistes but that they might be saued for building vpon the foundation in his sence though no Protestant builde vpon the foundation in S. Paules sense as there I shew Therefore his Diuinitie maketh with me in this Demaund rather then against me although he denyeth some particulare Saintes of ours Ar. 23.24.25.85 and also the Canonization of Saintes An easie matter it is for Heretikes when they can not proue the Catholike religion to be heresie agaynst God to make it by their Parliament Treason against the king and then when they put
heresies not preached against winked at because it had a shew of pietie and charitie and at length allowed of Augustine and others who followed the common errors of their time Specially when a Generall defection and departing from the faith was foreshewed what maruell were it if none coulde preach against it as it first entred Ar. 92.36.37 Contra The Churche of Christ in such places as she is suffreth no man damnably abusing her Religion without open reprehension Ar. 11. 10 The true Catholike Church hath alwayes resisted all false opinions contrarie to the word of God as her duetie was and fought against them and obteined the victorie and triumphed ouer them Pur. 419. Ar. 35.36 Contra In those auncient times they of the true Catholike Church did not alwayes weigh what was most agreable to the worde of God but if Heretikes had any thing that seemed to haue a shewe of pietie or charitie they would drawe it into vse So they tooke into the Church of Christ many abuses and corruptions vntill at the length An. 607. the religion of the Papistes preuayled And c since that time that diuelish heresie hath alwayes increased in error vntill the yere 1414. 11 That blasphemous heresie of Purgatorie To the Reader Pu. 26.166.184.177.269.362.363.419.186 which is moste blasphemous against Christ against the bloud of Christ against his merites and satisfaction for our sinnes and against Gods vnspeakable mercies and occasion of most licentious wickednes in all thē that beleue it nothing conuenient for the disciples members of Christ No suffrages were made for the dead by the Apostles or their lawfull successors Contra here cap. 3. he confesseth that the Fathers held it and yet notwithstanding that they were members of the true Church ca. 2. and held the foundation Iesus Christ cap. 5. and all the substance of true doctrine z Pur. 393.405 And also that they did inuocate Saintes denying in other y Supr pa. 139.140 places that such be true Christians The like q Su. p. 141. of Fasting 12 x Pur. 51.26.166.177.184 The opinion of Purgatorie satisfaction of sinnes after this life is the very doctrine of licentiousnesse to mainteine wicked men in their presumptuousnes For what hast will they make to amendment newnes of life when they haue hope of release after their death Contra As S. Augustine saith Pur. 448. it is but for smal faultes or as M. Allen saith for great faultes that by penaunce are made small And is God suche a mercifull father to punishe small faultes so extremely in his children whom he pardoneth of all their great and haynous sinnes O blasphemous helhoundes Sée how vehement he is in contradicting him selfe to iustifie that saying of D. Allens I am well assured there dare no man Pur. 150. though he were destitute of Gods grace yet not for shame of him selfe affirme that the doctrine of Purgatorie is hurtfull to vertuous life Considering that people with vs are told that to escape hell it selfe they must do much more then the Protestants require and more againe to escape Purgatorie according to S. Augustines threatning here cap. 9. pag. 212. 13 How long soeuer the true Church were hidden Ar. 73. Supra ca. 1. whether it were a 1000. yeres or 2000. yeres this is certayne that out of this Church none could be saued Contra here ca. 5. he counteth it ynough if the faith of their saluation were in the onely foundation Iesus Christ and that in such a sense as agréeth to men in déede out of the Church Ar. 61 74. Pur. 238. 14 They which hold the foundation that is Christ to wit the Article of Iustification by the onely mercie of God and of the onely Sonne of God are doubtlesse members of the true Church of Christ Contra here cap. 10. pag. where he saieth that the Anabaptistes are abominable heretikes and that they are not Protestants who yet do hold that article iump as the Protestants do Ar. 36.38 Ar. 71.78.79.80 15 A generall departing from the faith was foreshewed and it was fulfilled An. 607. Contra The Church was neuer lost neither when the departing was Generall but hidden in the wildernesse that is from the eyes of the world She is to this day preserued and shal be to the worldes end Christ hath neuer wanted his Spouse in earth he hath neuer ben a head without a body Ar. 2.96.26.27 16 The Primitiue Church of the Apostles hath continued vnto this day by succession not of persons and places but of doctrine faith and trueth These very wordes conteine a manifest contradiction For how can a Church or doctrine faith and truth cōtinue but in persons and places in so much that he saith also We doubt not but God hath alway stirred vp some faithful teachers that haue instructed his Church in the necessarie pointes of Christian doctrine Ar. 15.79 17 The true Church of Christ hath alwayes stoode stedfast inseperable from Christ her head though the blind worlde when they see her will not acknowledge her to be his Spouse but persecute her as if she were an adulteresse Contra in the same place The true Church vnder the Emperours Constantinus Constans and Valens was greatly infected with the heresie of Arius And in another place Ar. 79. The visible Church may become an adultresse and be deuorced from Christ And so is that faithfull Church of Rome become an harlot Ar. 79. 18 The true Church consisting of Gods elect and the liuely members of the body of Christ shal neuer commit such adultery c. But the visible Church may separate her selfe from Christ As though there were another Church besides the visible Church and so two Churches Ar. 65. Contra Wheresoeuer the Catholike Church be in partes it is one body of Christ And therfore in dede there is neuer no Church but the visible Church the other is but an imagination of the Protestants to delude the world withall As though Luther and the rest that appeared with him had afore their appearing bene secrete Protestants whereas in deede they were open Papistes 19 Anno 607. the Church fled into the wildernes that is Ar. 16.27.79.36 out of the sight and knowledge of the world there to remaine a long season where all this while God hath preserued her vntill suche time as he thought good now in our daies to bring her out of her secrete place in the wildernes into the open sight of the world againe Contra Ar. 77. Diuers times it was bold to chalenge preaching and ministring of the Sacraments yea and so boldly that it cost many of the chalengers their liues As Berengarius Bruno Marsilius de Padua Ioannes de Gaudano Ioannes Wickleue Walden Ioannes Hus Ieronymus de Praga c. Where besides his manifest contradiction I note two things against him one that it cost not all these yea very few of these
neyther hath priuilege nor authoritie and yet out it commeth by permission at the least to make forsooth a face and showe of somewhat for a time and if after it chaunce to be of some Catholike dasht out of countenaunce then the shame to be no mans but onely Fulkes All which considered I doubted a while whether it were good to returne him an answer or no least peraduenture I should but lease my labour rather to expect yet somewhat longer whether any do answer my Motiues or Demaunds as by aduise out of England I haue nowe more then this tweluemonth wayted therevpon Yet my resolution hath bene séeing that abundans cautio non nocet to put out my hande a litle and take of his vizard that being playnly discouered euery man may beholde and abhorre his foule fauour and beare me witnesse that he had bene better to kéepe in not onely those nine yeres and two yeres but also for euer following rather the ensamples of those other two brethren mentioned in his preface to the Reader of whom the one purposed to haue answered the booke of Purgatory himself but afterward vndertooke rather the printing of Fulkes answere the other learnedly began the answering of it but was he knoweth not how letted from the accomplishing of the same So hath Satan hitherto hindred the setting abrode of this answere sayth he of his owne but God hath now at length brought it forth I doubt not he addeth but to his glory and the confusion of satan in his members the Papistes As I also doubt not but God in déede hath brought it forth to his glory and to the confusion of heresie so that satan had done more politikely to haue hindred still if he could the setting abrode of it such stuffe it conteineth Better stuffe we should haue had if better had they had Well séeing that M.D. Allen is otherwise and better occupied I who haue already succéeded him in his Articles and do owe vnto him at one worde all duetie both for the publike and namely for my priuate will here with the helpe of God laye so much of Fulks wares open out of both his bookes that although my meaning is directly against his first booke yet my treatise shall appeare to be a iust reply to both his bookes First therefore I will shew briefly how he confesseth that out of the true Church is no saluation See the contentes more at large in the ende of this booke to this ende that when as in my processe it shall be manifest that he and his felowes are out of the true Church and that we haue the true Church both they may clearely sée in what case they stand and their felowes may looke in time vnto their reconciliation Secondly I will shewe somewhat more at large for what space he graunteth the true Church to haue continued in sight and knowledge of the world and what persons and companies to haue bene of it to the ende that neither he nor no man else being able to proue that we agrée not with those times and persons in substance of religion or haue gone out of the vnitie of their communion it may euidently be séene that we likewise at this time be of the same true Church and he with his fellowes to be without the true Church because they be out of our Church Thirdly for as much as on the other side he could not denie but that he and his agrée not with the saide true Church I will shew how he is fayne to holde that the true Church may erre and that he chargeth it then with the same errours with the which he chargeth vs now to the end that thou mayst sée that for all those surmised errours he hath not any iust cause to denie vs the true Church which he giueth to them that with vs were in the same errours Nay I will further declare in the fourth place that he chargeth them with diuers errors wherewith he neither can nor doth charge vs that it may much more appeare that we haue the true Church nowe if they so much worse then we had the true Church then Fiftly I wil report the reason for which by his saying they had the true Church then notwithstanding their errors to the end that where thou shalt sée it to be such a reason as agréeth to vs nowe as well thou mayst perceyue that he must no lesse graunt vs the true Church now After this I will note briefly his zeal towards Caluin and others that in déede are or at least be vnfaignedly thought of him to be of his Church at this time how that he can not in any wise beare any thing to be spoken agaynst them whereas yet he not onely can beare but also him selfe speaketh so much agaynst the olde auncient Church and the members thereof And in consideration hereof my Catholike zeale must do no lesse as béeing in déede with all other Catholikes of this time a member of the very same auncient Church in olde time but answere for the said Church shewing in euery particuler how vnworthily and vniustly he chargeth it with erring Which I will in like maner do for the Church also of later times defending it likewise against all his like accusations of it Seuenthly I will declare howe that séeing manifestly the true Church Councels Fathers and all other euidences of Christian Religion to make cléerely against him and his he is faine and nothing abasht at the matter to take exception against all by the bare name and colour of Onely Scripture and therein behaueth him selfe so boldly as if the holy Scripture were as manifestly with him as all the other are manifestly against him Where also because like an other Phormio homo confidens he prouoketh vs to a disputation of Scripture I will make him a reasonable offer Eightly I will most cléerely shew how that not withstanding all these great crakes and bolde facinges of his he hath not for all that in these two bookes alleaged so much as one text of Scripture that maketh any whit against vs. And to that purpose I will aunswer all his allegations first concerning Onely Scripture to be credited next concerning the Church whether it can erre and whether we haue it or they then concerning Purgatory and last of all concerning all other matters that any where he mentioneth by the way Ninthly I will likewise shew whereas he maketh himselfe so sure of Scripture that he holdeth the testimonies of Councels and Fathers to be no confirmation of trueth and alleageth them sometimes notwithstanding although because of his so holding I might neglect those allegations yet I will shewe I say that of all which he alleageth no one neither expoundeth any Scripture nor beareth any other testimonie with him against vs. Which wil be a plaine demonstration of that which I proposed here aboue in the second Chapter to wit that wée haue still the true Church because we still so throughly and entirely agrée
with them who by his owne confession had in their time the true Church Tenthly because all D. Allens Articles are in effect contained in my Motiues and Demaundes I will examine what he answereth not to my probations for to them or any one of them he lightly answereth not as I say afore but euen to the bare titles of them And for as much as his answeres will soone appeare to be no answers I will examine whether at the leastwise he obiecteth any thing to the purpose to the end that when thou shalt sée that all is so litle or rather nothing at all thou maist perceaue that God for his Churches glory blinded them to send such a booke abroade Which thou shalt againe more plainely perceaue in the eleuenth Chapter where I will lay forth his marueilous grosse and palpable contradictions yea and in great numbers also And againe as plainely in the twelft Chapter where I will display certaine straunge and detestable positions of his and also his ignoraunce in the Scriptures and other learning Theologicall To the which I might but for prolixitie ioyne many ensamples perteining to a falsarie putting him in minde withall of his horrible blasphemies as him selfe also must confesse them to be because he can not auoide it but that the Church against whom he hath poured them is the true Church In the conclusion I will amongst some other things aduertise the Reader what more may be desired for the full iustifying of the booke of Purgatorie though this much be ynough and superabundaunt but for iustification of the Articles that no more can be desired But now let vs come to the perfourming of these our promisses Ar. and Pur. in the margins signifie the page of Fulkes bookes against the Articles and against Purgatorie ¶ A REPLY TO FVLKE In defence of M. D. Allens scroll of Articles and booke of Purgatorie ¶ The first Chapter That he confesseth out of the true Church to be no saluation THis I shew briefly and most plainly by his owne words as where he saith The house of refuge or defence may be applied to the Church Ar. pag. 108. out of which is no saluation and in whose bosome it becommeth euery man to rest which shall looke for the refuge and defence of God Ar. 83. And in an other place There is no man of what age or yeres soeuer he be that can be saued except he be a mēber of the Catholike Church Agayne This we affirme that out of the Church there is no saluation Agayne We vtterly denie that beside the true Church Ar. 62. Ar. 76. there was an vntrue church that practised those offices of baptizing and other spirituall actions to the saluation of any man And agayne No man aliue Ar. 73. that knoweth what the true Church meaneth will say that any man can be saued out of the true Church For he that is not a member of the body of Christ can by no meane receiue any benefit of Christ to his saluation Therfore this is certaine that out of this Church none could be saued This then béeing so confessed as in our Church it is also openly practised first in baptisme to take men in then in reconciliation if they went or were cast afterwarde out to receiue them in againe I will stande no longer vpon it but procéede further ¶ The second Chapter That he confesseth the knowen Church of the first 600. yeres after Christ and the knowen members thereof THis likewise will be euident by his owne wordes if the Catholike eare can beare his blasphemies withall first if we consider what he writeth of the Romans and their Bishops both since Bonifacius the third and also afore him Ar 35. Being asked What yere the religion of the Papists came in and preuayled Thus he answereth We may well say that the religion of the Papistes came in and preuayled that yeare in which the Pope first obteined his antichristian exaltation which was in the yere of our Lord 607 when Boniface the third for a great summe of money obteined of Phocas the trayterous murtherer and adultrous Emperour that the Bishop of Rome should be called and counted the head of all the Church And what after that Since that time saith he that diuelish heresie hath alwayes increased in error vntill the yeare of our Lorde 1414. Wherevpon in other places he saith agayne Ar. 27. Pur. 344 From Boniface the third all blasphemous heretikes and antichristes And agayne Or any succeeded Boniface the third which beside their abhominable life were all heretikes and antichristes And where he speaketh of the olde Doctors by and by he addeth as in an antithesis Pur. 405 Nay rather count vpon the Popes to be pillers of your Church Doctours of your learning and Fathers of your fayth that haue bene within these seuen or eyght hundred yeres By this that he saith of the time after Boniface the third you perceyue his confession as touching the time afore him Yet to make it more playne he shall expressely make him selfe his owne confession Pur. 194. Gregory was the last of all the Romishe Bishops in whom was any sparke of goodnes because Boniface his successor See pag. and all the rest by Gregories owne iudgement and prophecie were all Antichristes And moste manifestly in an other place Pur. 372 where D. Allen vrgeth the succession of the Romane Bishops by example of Ireneus Cyprian Tertullian Optatus Hierome Augustine and Vincentius Lirinensis who confounded therewith all heretikes and saith It is a straunge thing that the Fathers hauing then store of Apostolike Successions did euer choose out for the warrant of their fayth from amongst the rest the Romane Seate and nowe when there is no Apostolike Churche lefte in the whole worlde but it that they will not haue vs referre our fayth to it which was euer of all other moste free from falshood To this Fulke in his aunswere saith That these men specially named the Churche of Rome it was because the Churche of Rome at that time as it was founded by the Apostles so it continued in the doctrine of the Apostles And a litle after As for that which M. Allen counteth so straunge it is for lacke of skill and right iudgement For the same cause that moued those auncient Fathers to appeale to the iudgement of the Churche of Rome moueth vs nowe to condemne the Churche of Rome of heresie Wherefore did they reuerence the Churche of Rome Aske Tertullian he answereth True doctrine in the true Churche hovv long because it had by Succession reteyned euen vntill his dayes that fayth which it did first receyue of the Apostles Therefore it was a true Churche therefore it was an Apostolike Churche This answere he learned of his master Caluine who in his Institutions first putteth downe our allegation saying Cal. Ins li. 4. ca. 2 nu 2.3 Magnifice illi quidem suam nobis Ecclesiam commendant Allegant enim
eam apud se initio sana doctrina sanguine Martyrum bene fundatam perpetua Episcoporum Successione conseruatam fuisse ne intercideret Commemorant quanti hanc Successionē fecerint Irenaeus Tertullianus Origenes Augustinus alij that is They in deede set foorth vnto vs their Churche very gloriously for they alleage that beeing in the beginning well founded amongest them with sounde doctrine and with the bloud of Martyres it was by the continuall Succession of Bishoppes preserued from decaying They report out of Irenaeus Tertullian Origene Augustine and others howe highly they esteemed this Succession And then he putteth herevnto his owne aunswere saying Cum extra controuersiam esset nihil a principio vsque ad illam aetatem mutatum fuisse in doctrina c. that is Considering that it was a playne case that from the beginning euen vntill that time nothing was chaunged in doctrine the holy Doctors tooke in argument that which was sufficient for the ouerthrowing of all newe errors to witte That they oppugned the doctrine which euen from the verye Apostles them selues had bene inuiolably and with one consent reteined This graunt both of the master and of his Scholar as more by a great deale then in this Chapter we néeded The true Churche not onely to haue continued so long it selfe but also to haue kepte inuiolably and generally with one accorde the true faith and true doctrine which of the Apostles thē selues she had receiued The like he confesseth of our owne Countrey also Ar. 49. where he saith The Church of the Brytaines before Augustine whom Saint Gregory sent from Rome to conuert the English in our said countrey of Britannie came in with Romish seruice had they not trow you Authentical Seruice which continued in the faith of Christ euen from the Apostles time To which confession let it be added out of S. Bedes Storie that the a Bed hist li. 2. ca. 4.2 li. 3. ca. 25. greatest point wherein the Christian Brytons and our Apostle S. Augustine differed was about the kéeping of Easter day and that also not so great as in olde time betwéene S. Victor of Rome and the Christians of Asia as this man ignorantly b Pur. 371. here ca. 10. pag. somwhere affirmeth that is to say not whether it should be alwayes kept with the Iewes vpon the verye day of the full Moone according to the heresie of the c Aug. heresi 29. Tessaresdecatite or Quartadecimani for that obseruation d Eus in vita Const li. 3. ca. 28. Britannie as the Emperour d Eus in vita Const li. 3. ca. 28. Constantinus witnesseth detested no lesse then other prouinces at the time of the Nicene Councell but onely vpon what e Beda supra sonday it should be kept So then this being their greatest difference and yet therein also the right obseruation being that which was brought from Rome as no man will denie you sée what graunt this man must make as to Britannie so likewise to Rome at that time to witte not onely the true Churche but withall the same faith which the Apostles taught though in this Chapter as I haue alreadie said we looke no more but for the true Church Which same true Church he graunteth againe many other wayes vnto the Romanes and their Bishops in that he geueth it to sundry notable personages and companies that were in vnitie and in one Church with the said Romaines as to the auncient Doctors and Councels to the Martyrs Monkes and other Christians not onely that frequented those Cryptes or holye vautes vnder the heathen and persecuting Emperours but also that gathered themselues afterward in those magnificall newe Temples vnder the Christian Catholike Emperours and finally to those Catholike Emperours themselues euen to Mauritius who liued with S. Gregory Ar. 60. Of the Doctors his confession is this The most approued writers Tertullian Cyprian Origen Epiphanius Hilarius Chrysostamus Ieronymus Ambrosius Augustinus c. were doubtles members of the true Church of Christ Againe Ar. 71. The Church of the Arians was not the Catholike Church but Athanasius and a a Such is his skill in the storie of that time few other that were banished and persecuted were the true Catholike Church Againe b Ar. 59. Iustinus Martyr and Irenaeus two of the most auncient authenticall writers that the Church next vnto the Apostles had And againe c Pur. 434. The old doctors had their measure of Gods spirit Cyprian and Cornelius were both endued with Gods spirit and both martyrs Againe Pur. 405. The Doctors of Gods Church Augustine Ambrose Chrysostome Basill c. Againe It is a good argument Ar. 27. that the Popish Church is not the Church of Christ because it was neuer hidden since it first sprang vp in so much that you can name all the notable persons in all ages in their gouernment and ministerie and especially the succession of d A proper distribution the Popes in all ages to be ours and yet the Apostles Doctors to be his Sapientes confitentur non abscondunt patres suos quoth Eliphaz against Iob. cap. xv Popes you can rehearse in order vpon your fingers But our Church which hath not had so many registers chroniclers and remembrancers hath perhaps fewer but yet honester men to name we can name Peter Paul c. Iustinus Irenaeus Cyprianus Athanasius Hilarius Ambrosius Augustinus Gyldas c Then as touching auncient Councels thus he saith f Ar. 97. The foure best generall councels were gathered by our Churche Againe g Pur. 430. Pur. 296. If any Councell decree according to the Scriptures as the Councell of the Apostles did Act. 15 and the Councell of Nice with diuers other we receaue them with all humilitie as the oracles of God To this place of Doctors and Councels pertaineth that also which he confesseth of the Church that resisted and ouercame the olde heresies as where D. Allen had said It is not you that shall outface Gods Church she hath by the spirit of God beaten downe your proudders the Arrians the Macedonians the Anabaptistes as the Donatistes c. and all your predecessors He answereth 297. You boast that your Church hath beaten downe our proudders the Arrians Macedonians Anabaptistes It was the Church of Christ that ouerthrewe those Heretikes And in an other place likewise Ar. 10. I demaund saith D. Allen what Church hath mightely gone through borne downe fully vanquished all heresies in times past aswell against the blessed Trinitie as other articles of our Religion I answere saith Fulke the true Catholike Church hath alwayes resisted all false opinions contrarie to the worde of God as her dutie was and fought against them with the sworde of the spirite which is the word of God and by the aide of God obtained the victory and triumphed ouer them So did the fathers of the primitiue Church from time to time confute heresies by the
necessarie to saluation that a Christian man should so beleeue the Catholike Church because the Church may erre Agayne in the same place But to beleeue al and euery thing that the Catholike Church by common consent doth mainteine is no Article of our fayth and therfore not necessarie to saluation The second part That the true Church did also erre and that in the same poyntes as we now do erre in j. Where he chargeth them with many poynts together Now further that the true Church did also in dede erre first in the same poyntes wherein our Church now erreth as they charge it thus he saith Ar. 35. Si patrem f. Beelzebub vocauerun◠quanto magis domesticos eius◠Matt. x. Many abuses and corruptions were entred into the Churche of Christe immediatly after the Apostles time which the diuel planted as a preparatiue for his eldest sonne Antichrist By Antichrist he meaneth God forgiue him his blasphemie the vicar of Christ him selfe and so consequently by that preparatiue he meaneth such poynts of the Popes religion as are found agaynst the Protestantes in antiquitie Where to minister him some light by the way if it may please God to open his eyes let him consider that he must confesse no lesse Infra c. 11. cont 8. yea much more that the Arian Sabellian Nestorian and infinit other old Heresies detested now of both our parts were a preparatiue for Antichrist and therfore séeing that Bonifacius the third and the other Popes after him haue not receiued those confessed heresies that it followeth necessarily therof that the Popes are not Antichrist But that I stray not further from my matter but rather reserue euery thing to his proper place he cōmeth else where to particularities and saith Pu. 419. And this was a great corruption of those auncient times that they did not always weigh what was most agreable to the worde of God but if the Gentiles or Heretikes had any thing that seemed to haue a shew of pietie or charitie they would draw it into vse What any thing without exception Go too then and name somewhat for ensample So they tooke the signe of the crosse from the Valentinians What more Oblations for the days of death and byrth of the Gentiles Foorth a Gods name Prescript times of fasting and vnmeasurable extolling of Sole life in the ministers of the Church from the Manichees Tacianistes and Montanistes And yet what more Prayer for the dead of the Montanistes Forth agayne Purgatory fire of the Origenistes Say on still Yea Ieronym was almost fallen into the heresie of Tertullian in condemning seconde mariage Once more to ease that stomacke Yea euen the name of sacrifice which was commonly vsed for the celebration of the Lords supper they tooke vp of the Gentiles All these eyght poyntes he so noteth in the Fathers of Gods Church together in one place Againe in an other place after the sayings of Iustinus Martyr and Ireneus alleaged Ar. 60. The other writers of later yeres saith he we are not afrayd to confesse that they haue some corruption wherby you may seeme to haue colour of defence for Inuocation of Saintes prayers for the dead and diuers superstitious superfluous Ceremonies And that to the same they were no lesse addicted then we are he confesseth plainly where he graunteth that they accounted the contrarie for no better then heresie Ar. 44.45 46. You may perchaunce saith he note the names of them that preaching the truth of our doctrine against your receiued errors were accounted of the world for Heretikes And a litle after I wil not dissemble that which you thinke the greatest matter Well then confesse the truth Aerius taught that prayer for the dead was vnprofitable as witnesseth both Epiphanius and Augustinus which they count for an error Also he taught that fasting dayes are not to be obserued if he espied the superstition of fasting dayes and reproued it that was no error at all And who els Iouinian affirmed that virginitie was no better then mariage which if it be well vnderstood is no error at all And if he taught further that suche as could not conteine though they had vowed virginitie should neuerthelesse be maried Moreouer if he taught that fasting abstinence from certaine meates and other bodily exercise of them selues profite litle it was no error he saith and yet S. Ieronyme was a most bitter enemie vnto Iouinian Any more Last of all Vigilantius wrote agaynst Inuocation of Saintes superstition of Reliques and other Ceremonies Him Ieronym reproueth or rather rayleth on him Modestly for his reasons are nothing worth that he hath against him Therefore howsoeuer Ieronym esteemed him in his rage if he had none other opinions contrary to the trueth we doubt not to acknowledge Vigilantius as many godly and learned Bishops of his time did for a true preacher and reprehender of that superstition whervnto Ieronym was to much addict He said afore that he would not dissemble and yet you sée his ifs and Hierome alone against many godly and learned Bishoppes Therefore to make it yet more playne howe in clearing these Heretikes he chargeth the Fathers I must report what he hath likewise in other places ij As touching Vigilantius and inuocation of Saintes by it selfe As where D. Allen said Pur. 306 310. So their citing out of S. Ambrose for the improuing of the inuocation of holy Saintes is no more but an abuse of the simples ignorance knowing well that he and all other of that time did practise prayers both often to all holy Martyrs and sometimes peculiarly to such whom for patronage they did especially choose of deuotion amongest the rest To this he answereth Honorably Touching Ambrose which was sodenly made a Bishop before he was a perfect Christian if some steppes of Hethenish Inuocation or Rhetoricall apostrophees and prosopopees appeare to be in him and some other about his time yet was not that generally receiued of all the Church in his time Also where the question is asked Ar. 39. Whether men began sodenly to require the helpe of Saintes in heauen He answereth Whether sodenly or by litle and litle man were brought to suche superstition that they required helpe of Saintes it maketh litle matter yet it is to be thought that it grewe vp as other errors by litle and litle And S. Augustine in his booke De cura pro mortuis agenda wearieth him selfe and in the ende can define nothing in certayne Howe the Saintes in heauen should heare the prayers of men on earth Pur. 315.316.317 Although he can not define Howe yet neuerthelesse sayth D. Allen he nothing doubteth but intercession maye profitably be made to them and that also for the deceased Wherevnto Fulke sayth agayne Augustine in hys booke De cura pro mortuis agenda is full of doubtes that he knoweth not hym selfe what to determine but that he wyll holde the common opinions receaued in his time And
doe erre by their authoritie and the authoritie of their Successors after them to this time no greater authoritie in the meane time clearely ruling ouer the case to the contrarie parte but rather the more it is scanned the more continully it appeareth that their part is still to bée followed and the contrarie parte still to be condemned and accursed ¶ The fourth Chapter That he chargeth the saide Primitiue true Church with sundrie errors wherewith he neither doth nor will nor can charge vs. HEre I haue to present him with an other reason why he shoulde graunt vnto vs the true Churche rather then to the olde Fathers for so muche as he will confesse vs to bée frée from diuers errors that he chargeth them withall most of them also being so great and so grosse that none of the errors that he imputeth to vs can be thought comparable by the iudgement of any man that is any whitte indifferent and not altogether blinded with an huge beame of partialitie And let the Reader lay this to the last Chapter before and conferre all diligently together That he confesseth I say that there may bée a Companie which erreth not onely some principall members but also the whole bodye of it and which erreth obstinately and moreouer whiche erreth the grossest errors that can bée and them in no small number and yet the same companie maye bée the true Churche and in déede also hath bene the true Churche so that no péece of this nor all this together will serue him him I saye to proue our companie not to bée the true Churche And then afterwarde let it bée considered what better or what other stuffe he hath to proue the same and if he haue any suche eyther better or other then this refuse a Gods name to bée of our Churche and séeke after hym thy saluation where else thou canst finde it Well then to come to those other errors that were as he sayth the Primitiue Churches and are not ours and to beginne at the toppe Ar. 35. D. Allen requireth the Protestantes to declare when the true Church decayed To this I answere saith Fulke First Euen in the Apostles time there arose manye heresies whiche did not a little trouble the Churche Secondlye But immediately after the Apostles time while the Fathers of the Churche were earnestly occupied in resisting of horrible heresies by the crafte of Satan some errors and abuses crepte into the true Churche of Christ which at the first because they were small and men occupyed in greater matters were eyther not espyed or not regarded And howe declareth he this Iustinus Martyr was in this error that the Angells lusted after women and therefore were turned into diuells What more Irenaeus affirmeth that our Sauiour Christ lyued here .50 yeares And what more Also both he and Papias the Disciple of S. Iohn helde this error that Christ shoulde raigne a thousande yeares after the Resurrection here in fleshe And what of all this Whereby it is manifest seeyng these auncient Fathers and pillers of the Church were thus stained with errors that the Church in their time could not be free from the same Againe It seemeth also that the Churche in Iustinus his time was in some error about Second mariages and diuorcementes After all whiche he concludeth in the end And so it is euident that the true Church decayed immediatly after the Apostles time Where the diligent Reader marketh that he vseth decaying and erring indifferently one for the other As for that which he sayeth there of abuses and corruptions entered into the Church of Christ as a preparatiue to the Religion of the Papistes it belonged to the last Chapter and therefore I noted it there Supra pag. And so much of the Apostles time and also of the time immediatly after the Apostles Let vs procéede and come downe lower Cyprians time was such a time saith he as Cyprian and all the Byshops of Africa decreed in Councell Pur. 287. that those which were Baptized by heretikes shoulde be Baptized againe And therefore it was no such time but that he and all his fellowes might and did erre in some opinions contrarie to the trueth of Gods worde And lower agayne Vnder the Emperours Ar. 15. Constantius Constans and Valence the true Churche was greatly infected with the heresie of Arius what time also Liberius Byshop of Rome was infected with the same heresie Straight after that time did Sainct Hierome florishe whom amongest others in the seconde Chapter he confessed to bée a member of the true Churche And him he chargeth not onely Supra pag. as I alleaged in the last Chapter that he was almost fallen into the heresie of Tertullian in condemning Second mariages Pur. 419. Ar. 46. But also thus in an other place Consider what perilous assertions these be that the Lambe is euery where and that the Martyrs are euerye where this is to destroye the humanitie of Christ and to geue diuinitie vnto the Martyrs I doubte not but Sainct Ieronym if he had quietly considered these absurdities He lacked but such a monitor woulde haue reuoked them as erroneous and hereticall but whyle he rather followed affection then iudgement you may see howe he was deceaued At the same time was the thirde Councell of Carthage and Sainct Augustine one of the Byshops thereof Ar. 89. It he chargeth thus The Councell of Carthage the third Cap. 23. determined that all prayers at the Altar should be directed onely to the Father and not to the Sonne or the holy Ghost Whether this be an error to define That it is vnlawfull to pray to God the Sonne and God the holy Ghost let euery man iudge And to put more weight to this his accusation he addeth But you will except that this was a prouinciall Synode and not a Generall Councell But I answere you it hath the authoritie of a generall Councell because it was confirmed in the sixte generall Councell holden at Constantinople in Trullo But of all others most insolently he insulteth and triumpheth against the auncient Church for ministring the blessed Sacramēt to Infants Ar. 87. I will proue vnto you saith he that the Church of Rome hath falsly interpreted diuers sentences of Scripture and therfore by that which she hath done it can not be doubted but that she may do it One then for example S. Augustine was in this error that he thought Infants must receiue the sacrament of the body and bloud of Christ vnder payne of damnation and was deceiued by false interpretation of this Scripture Except ye eate the flesh of the Sonne of man drinke his bloud c. Ioh. 6. This error and false interpretation he affimeth to be common to all the Westerne Church and to Pope Innocent him selfe Contra duas Epist Pelag. ad Bonifacium li. 2. cap. 4. contra Iulianum li. 1. cap. 2. Againe in an other place where D. Allen admonished his Reader saying Pose M.
scient quia ego dilexi te and they shall knowe that I haue loued thee Which all if you also did knowe you would not say thus in one place to vs Euen in the Apostles time when the superstition of Angels beganne to be receiued there was one steppe of your way Pur. 287. which you holde euen to this day Colos 2. iiij Of abstinence from fleshmeat and from mariage Nowe to another error common to the Fathers and to vs Supra ca. 3. pa. 2. diui 2. You sayde in the same thirde Chapter and confessed that they counted Aerius an heretike for teaching against our prescript Fastingdayes and so Iouinianus likewyse for denying the merite of abstinence from fleshe and from mariage and for licensing therevpon Votaries and Priestes to marrie You on the other syde charged the Fathers and saide Pur. 419. that they tooke prescript tymes of Fasting and vnmeasurable so you terme it extolling of Sole life in the Cleargie frō the Manichees Tacianistes Montanistes But you bring no proofe thereof Ar. 45. Onely this you haue in another place Augustine by authoritie of Philaster chargeth the same Aerius with abstinence from fleshe If this bee an heresie then bee all Papistes heretikes which count abstinence from fleshe an holy fast Still you take Richard for Robert These thrée heresies condemned fleshe mariage as pertaining to the yll God and not to the good God according to the heresie of the Valentinians before them So writeth S. Augustine of the Tocianistes or Eucratites Nuptias damnant c. They condemne mariages August ad quoduult haer 25.40 53. and esteeme of them all a like as of fornications and other pollutions neither admitte they to their number any that vseth mariage be it man or be it womā Non vescuntur carnibus easque omnes abominantur They eate no flesh but count all flesh abominable He hath there of Apostolici or Apotactite likewise saying Eucratitis isti similes sunt c. These are like to the Eucratites They receiue not into their Societie them that vse mariage and haue proprietie Such as the Catholike Churche hath both Monkes and of the Cleargie very many Sed ideo isti haeretici sunt c. But therefore these are heretikes because separating them selues from the Churche they thinke that there is no hope for them which vse these thinges that they do not vse Nowe saieth he of the Aerians afterwarde Some saye that these doe not admitte into their Societie but onely such as conteyne them from mariage and haue renounced all proprietie being therein like to the Eucratites or Apotactites Yet from flesh meate Epiphanius saieth not that they absteine But Philaster layeth to them also this abstinence What abstinence and howe from fleshmeate but such as in those Eucratites he had saide afore Sure it is that this Aerius of his maister called Eustathius Gang. con Can. 1.19 Soc. li. 2. cap. 33. had this heresie to whom therfore Concilium Gangrense sayeth Anathema and to all that holde the like to witte that a Christian vsing mariage and eating fleshe in Regnum Dei introire non possit can not enter into the kingdome of God Et spem non habeat Nor hath ought to hope for Though withall he taught Ieiunia praescripta auersanda that the prescript fastes shoulde be detested Dominicisque diebus ieiunandum and to fast on Sondayes iiij Of Ceremonies and Liturgies Ar. 91. Next after this you charge the auncient Church with approuing Ceremonies that were as you thinke vnprofitable and hurtfull because S. Augustine complained them of presumptions and because many of them are nowe abrogated I might here and in many other places exclaime against you as you did often against D. Allen vpon light causes for not quoting your testimonies and that you haue not read them in the authors but taken them out of some blinde or wilfull collector But to spare words all that I can and let the things only to cry agaynst you Doth not S. Augustine in the very same Epistle and the very same Chapter whence your place is taken of certayne that were more earnest for their owne priuate obseruations Au. ep 119. ad Ianuar. cap. 19. then for Gods commaundements as that against dronkennesse say constantly Tamen Ecclesia dei quae sunt contra fidem vel bonam vitam non approbat Yet the Church of God approueth not any thing that is against the faith or against good life And there also playnly distinguished those presumptions from such things as are eyther conteyned in the authorities of holy Scriptures or found in the statutes of Bishops Councels or fortified by custome of the whole Church Saying also in the Epistle next afore to the same man Au. ep 118 ad Ianuar cap. 5. that if the whole Church vse any thing it is a poynt of most insolent madnes only to call in question whether that thing should be so vsed Neither if some such vsages be afterward abrogated doth it folow therof Pur. 265.393.400 Tertul. de Cor. mil. Hier. adue◠Lucif Act. 15. that therfore they were before vnprofitable or hurtfull or not of the Apostles tradition though Tertullian affirme it S. Hierome also euen in Tertullians words or els that the Church is blasphemous which abrogateth them as you conclude For there might be good cause both of that afore and of this after as you sée euen in that decrée of the Apostles which is recorded also in the Scripture Of not eating bloud nor fleshe that hath not the bloud let out of it Likewise in that custome of the Apostles and of the Churches of God 1. Cor. 11. for men publikely to praye and prophecie or preache bareheaded Which of Bishops in olde time and nowe also of Doctors yea in many countries of all preachers is not obserued What ordinarie authoritie the Church had in the Apostles time the same it hath still and also the same spirite to vnderstande what are the immutable grounds of Religion and what traditions howe and vpon what causes maye be chaunged Of euery particuler to giue a reason requireth a speciall worke by it selfe but generally the quicker witted maye consider that in a Nation when the fulnes thereof is baptized and the articles of faith throughly rooted there may iustly must néedefully be a great mutation in the Ceremonies specially of Baptismus adultorum and Missa Catechumanorum And so to plant the Euangelicall article of the Resurrection the Apostles vpon Sondayes and in Quinquagesima did forbid Solemne faste and Solemne genuflexions and the Church afterwarde muche more straictly what time the Manichées other heretikes put al their strength to plucke vp againe the Apostles plant But nowe all such heresies being by such diligence of the Church quite confounded and that marueilous article so fastned in all Christian hearts as it is wonderfull specially knowing what resistance and rebellion it hath suffred Now I say the Church might
afore doubted of by some Referring them to the .10 Chapter a Cap. 10. de 45.46 such errors as he layeth to the later Popes personally because they concerne not the whole Churche as neither the pretensed Arrianisme of Liberius in old time b Cap. 10. dem 38. such errors also as he layeth to vs now in respect of our shauen beardes rounded heades with other like taken as he saith of certaine old heretikes because he him selfe also counteth these but small matters Therefore I say reseruing these to their proper place we haue here no more but foure or fiue to speake of j. Touching the bodies of Angels One he reporteth thus Ar. 90. The second Councell of Nice determined that Angels and soules of men had bodies were visible circumscriptible and therfore might be paynted And this it affirmeth to be the iudgement of the Catholike Church Con. Nice 2. Actio 5. I answere you mispeport the matter for it is not the Councels determination no nor saying also but the saying onely of Ioannes Bishop of Thessalonica rehearsed in the Councell amongst many other authors with this admonition giuen after it to the Councell by Tharasius Bishop of Constantinople that they consider hereby the madnes of them that ouerthrew the Images of our Lord and of his vndefiled mother séeing this holy father doth shew that Angels also may be paynted And touching Ioannes him selfe his error is not so great as your ignorance maketh it saying If this be not to induce an error to make men beleeue that Angels and spirites haue bodies visible and circumscriptible there was neuer any error since the world began Soft man you go to farre other maner of errors you may remember haue bene since the world began which might not be defended as he defendeth his saying to the Gentill with whom he there talketh of Angels ipsa Catholica Ecclesia sic sentit The Catholike Church so thinketh quibus animas nostras adiungo To whoÌ„ I ioyne also our soules that they are pardie intellectuall Heb. 1 of psa but not altogether vnbodily and inuisible as you Gentiles do say but of a thin and ayrie or fierie body as it is written His Angels he maketh spirites and his ministers burning fyre And by the Catholike Church what he meaneth he straight declareth saying So thought And so Pâ— must put 〈◊〉 rather to errors of primitiuâ— Church many of the holy fathers we know as Basilius Athanasius Methodius and they that holde with them qui stant ab illis signifying that some other Catholikes helde otherwise Aug. â— cap. 5 And not only S. Augustine numbreth it amongst the things That without sinne a man may be ignorant of and therfore néede not cum discrimine with perill to be affirmed or denied or defined but also to this day no such determination or declaration of the question is made as the a Thâ— in q. d moni best also do graunt to condemne the assertion as hereticall though b Coâ— sub Iâ— cap. 1 â— sufficient to count it nowe temerarious and erroneous ij Touching the Popes superioritie ouer the Councell But the next error of our Church is I trow vnanswerable being such a one also as not only sheweth vs to erre but moreouer depriueth vs of al certentie of truth Mary that in déede must be séene vnto as you tell vs saying that we haue nede to lay our heades together about it Ar. 63.85 And this it is Your Canonistes and Diuines he saith be not agréed about the chiefest articles of your Religion that is 1 Whether the Pope be aboue the Councell or the Councel aboue the Pope 2 Whether the Pope may erre and not the Councell or whether the Councell may erre and not the Pope And what then These two The Popes determination and the Councels determination being the rules of truth in your religion and not agreed vpon how can any truth be certayne in your Church Agayne by and by after You Papistes some holding of the Pope and some of the Councell as rules of truth can haue no ground nor certentie of truth Therefore if you woulde haue me or any man to be of your beliefe first determine how I shall know when I am in a right beliefe And that be all which troubleth you me thinketh I should be able to satisfie you or any other reasonable man as you are if I say that you may know and that by the consent of both these parties that you are in a right beliefe when you holde those determinations that without controuersy are ioyntly the determinations both of the Pope and of the Councell together as the determinations of the Councell of Trent and of all other Councels without controuersie confirmed by the Pope Other Councels that are certayne not to be confirmed by him or also not certayne to be confirmed by him no man wil binde you to beléeue them or at the least not before it be certayne and so are you easily answered though it be supposed the matter to be so vncertayne amongst vs as you make it But now how much more if it be not so For how do you proue this disagréement The Councell of Ferraria and Florence determined That the Pope was aboue the Councell and that the Councell might erre And Eugenius quartus that gathered the Councell of Ferraria and Florence was of the same iudgement All this I graunt Now what haue you for the other side The Councels of Constance and Basill determined That the Councell was aboue the Pope and that the Pope may erre Let this also be graunted And Martinus quintus the Pope chosen by the Councell of Constance was of the same iudgement Nay syr whoe there that you proue not nor neuer shall proue but onely that a Sess vâ—… Con. CoÌ„ … Martinus quintus at the petition of the Polonian Ambassador confirmed those determinations alone of the Councell of Constance which were agaynst the errors of Wiclefe Hus and Hierome of Prage And that b Sess 4 Con. Ba … Nicolaus quintus to auoyde much confusion ratified the collations of Benefices and such like thinges done in the Councell of Basill And that c Sess 16 Con. Ba … Eugenius quartus did no more but declare that from the beginning to a certaine time the same of Basill was Legitimum Concilium a lawfull Councell and lawfully continuated But otherwise as concerning the determinations and decrées of it neither Eugenius nor he that d Ar. 91 you name to wit Nicolaus confirmed it yea Leo decimus afterwarde in his e Sess 〈…〉 Lateran Councell most expresly reiected it comparing it to the seconde Ephesine Synode commonly called Lestrice whiche was repealed afterwardes by commaundement of Pope Leo the first in the Councell of Chalcedon Go now and say still in your vayne spirite of childish insultation Gentle master N. reconcile me these togeather This triu … vvanteth â—â—thing but 〈◊〉 victorie because
as before And agayne Neither do we require you to beleeue any one companie of men Ar. 62. more then another but to beleeue the truth before falshood which you must search in the word of truth It was belike for this much other such Apocriphall stuffe that your booke was kept in so long and in the end also faine to come forth without priuiledge Yea he is so peremptorie in his exception Fuâ—e vvil not beleeue the Apostles nor the Angels vvithout Scripture the most absurdly he attributeth to the Apostles themselues without scripture no more then to Iackstraw and consequently with scripture as much to Iackstraw as to the Apostles For thus he saith speaking of D. Allen He speaketh it because he beleeueth it Pur. 24.4 2. Cor. 4. He would faine counterfeit his speach like the Apostle but the ground of his beliefe is not as the Apostles was the word of God but the practise of meÌ„ which though they were neuer so good yet they were suche as might deceiue and be deceiued Againe Pur. 449. Gal. 1. where he abuseth that which S. Paule speaketh to the Galathians of preaching their receiuing of it turneth it as spoken of onely Scripture It vexeth you at the very hart saith he that we require the authoritie of the holy Scriptures to confirme your doctrine hauing a plaine coÌ„maundement out of the word of God that if any man teache otherwise then the word of God alloweth he is to be accursed As though S. Paul there commaunded to accurse him self and al the Apostles the vniuersall Church of Christ if they confirmed not all their doctrine with expresse Scriptures in such maner as you here require No Syr nothing so Onely he accurseth them which should preach contrarie to that he had preached the Galathians had receiued which was as you see traditioÌ„ by mouth in which maner he taught them other Churches all Christian Religion therein as one principall point the Canon of the scriptures both old new if at the leastwise any Bookes of the newe as then were written which could not be many before the Epistle to the Galathians being as by conference of times it may well be proued the first of all S. Paules Epistles And so much of the Churches authoritie in her Iudgements and Practise namely of her diuine Seruice Whervnto I ioyne as the principalles in the authoritie first the Councells and secondly the Popes For to theÌ„ likewise he maketh his exceptioÌ„ Pur. 430. Councels Dem. 27. saying Wherfore if any CouÌ„cell decree according to the Scriptures as the CouÌ„cel of the Apostles did Act. 15. the CouÌ„cel of Nice with diuers other we receiue them with all humilitie as the oracles of God But if any Councell decree contrarie to the authoritie of the Scriptures as many did without all presumption or pride we may iustly reiect them Pur. 194. See Apostolike Dem. 28. Then of the other Yet is not all that Gregorie writ of equall authoritie with the word of God without authoritie whereof we beleeue not an Angel from heauen as I haue often shewed much lesse a Bishop of Rome And not onely against eche Pope seuerally but also against their whole line and entire Succession he excepteth in like maner saying Succession Dem. 43. Aâ— 28. Although we could rehearse in order as many Successions in our Church as the Papistes boast of in theirs yet were that nothing to proue it to be the Church of Christ which must be tried onely by the Scriptures And a little after We require at the Papistes handes that they shew them selues to hold the Church not by Succession of Bishops or rehearsing of their names but onely by the Scriptures For although wee did rehearse innumerable names of Bishops in orderly Succession on our side wee would not require men to beleeue vs but onely because wee proue the doctrine of our Churche by the authoritie of the Scriptures In déede we must acknowledge Fulke vvhat a frankeling that you deale very frankely with vs to renounce so fréely such a goodly euidence because you can not make so much as any shew thereof For otherwise when you haue any collour of any thing at all what mountybanke pedler is so facing so boasting so vaunting as you and your fellowes iiij Against the Fathers Fathers Dem. 26. Now after all this I will open his like excepting against the Fathers both in generall and also expressing diuerse of their names although it hath bene opened in part alreadie by other occasions And touching the first true it is that he often braggeth much of the Fathers which liued in the first a Ar. 39. Pu. 30.177 435.370.371 two hundred or b Pur. 186.247.304.331.357.364.382 one hundred yeares chalenging vs to proue our doctrine out of them and not out of the later Fathers after them euen with as much reason as he commonly chalengeth vs to proue all out of the scriptures vtterly without all ground but méere voluntarily * Fulkes tvvo Onelies the one as the other which ensample therefore is much to be noted But here notwithstanding I shall declare howe he excepteth smothly and simply against all the Fathers against all in general and expresly also saying were they neuer so auncient Wherin how well he agréeth with him selfe I deferre to the eleuenth Chapter And in effect he hath already so done in calling so often afore for Onely Scripture But yet to shew it more manifestly and as it were the very face it selfe thus he saith Pur. 205. Whatsoeuer he was or howe long soeuer it be since he wrote because it hath not authoritie in the word of God I weigh it as the wordes of a man whose credit in diuine matters is nothing without the word of God Againe Pur. 202. When all authoritie out of Gods word faileth you wherby you should proue that the soules departed receiue benefite by the merites of the liuing you flye to the authoritie of men But mans authoritie is to weake to carie away so weightie a matter Away with mens writings shew me but one Scripture to proue it Againe If for these and an hundred suche Pur. 22. you can shew no better warrant then the tearmes of your fathers the practise of your elders or the authoritie of mortall men the curse of God by Esay must nedes be turned ouer vnto you Againe Pur. 58. Your reasons either be manifest wrestings of the holy Scripture or else are buylded vpon the authoritie of mortall men Againe Pur. 386. We neede no shift M. Allen for the authoritie of the Doctors whom we neuer allow for Canonicall Scriptures and therefore we may boldly say Whatsoeuer we find in theÌ„ agreable to the Scriptures he meaneth expressed in the Scriptures we receiue it with their prayse and whatsoeuer is disagreable to the Scriptures we refuse with their leaue Againe Pur. 363. Now touching the credite and
there is no true Christian man that is voyde of Gods spirite for he that hath not the spirite of Christ is none of his Rom. 8. yet may euery true Christian erre and be deceaued in some thinges This your sophisme consisteth in speaking confusely of Gods spirite as though the gifte of it were alwayes but one whereas it is one in the whole Church and another in euery particular true Christian man For neither do we argue simply of Gods spirite but of Gods spirite so as it is the spirite of trueth and of all trueth Ioan. 14. My Father sayth our Comforter at the instante of his departure will giue you another Comforter to remayne with you for euer the Spirite of trueth And after in the same Sermon I haue yet many thinges to saye vnto you but you can not now carry them but when the Spirite of trueth commeth he will teache you all trueth This place we saye must néedes be vnderstoode of the whole Churche 1. Tim. 3. and of a gifte conuenient to make her as she is saide to be the Piller of trueth because it is euident that euery one member of the Churche by him selfe may erre and in that case néedeth no more but the Spirite of obedience to heare her whiche hath suche a Spirite or gifte that she can not erre And this is ynough to make that no damnation be by erring to them that are in Iesus Christ that is which haue his spirite Rom. 8. so that sayth he they walke not after the fleshe but after the spirite and namely in this case after this spirite of obedience as I haue said Thus muche by occasion though my purpose is not here neither to alleage places nor to defende the alleaged but onely to answere the enemies allegations Now that the Church may be diuorced his allegation is this The visible Church Ar 79. by Idolatrie and superstition may seperate her selfe from Christ and be refused of him as God speaketh by Esay to the Church of Ierusalem Cap. 1. How is the faythfull Citie become an harlot It was full of iudgement and iustice lodged therein but now they are murtherers Thy siluer is become drosse and thy wine is mixed with water Thy princes are rebellious and companions of théeues c. Euen so may he say to the Church of Rome May he forsooth but whether doth he say so vnto it or doth the Prophet say that he may you are too too ignorant in the Scriptures if you know not the difference herein betwene the Synagoge of the Iewes the Church of Christ to wit that the Synagoge with her Ierusalem might be should be diuorced but that the Church of Christ with her Ierusalem which is Rome if you haue any sight in the Actes of the Apostles should neuer nor neuer might nor may be diuorced but contrariwise should beginne in the faythfull Iewes being a very small number in respect and so call in all nations euen Plenitudinem gentium Rom. 11. Mat. 13. The fulnes of al nations fishing for that purpose in the wide Sea of this world continually without any intermission in so much that immediatly after that all Nations or Gentiles be entred in Omnis Israel saluus fiet All the Iewes euen their fulnes also shall be Christned in the end of the world To this place pertaineth this strange imagination of his and his fellowes that euen the Church of Christ it selfe should prepare the way to Antichrist inuenting forsooth or receyuing of others inuention all the superstitions all the errors all the heresies that haue bene or may be euen vnto playne defection Apostasie Whereas the cleane contrarie is most euident and notorious that the Church should and hath as the piller of trueth from time to time accursed and commaunded vs to accurse all the heresies that haue bene yea and with due animaduersion noted vnto vs al errors whatsoeuer of her owne Doctors also who them selues sometime and in some things some of them haue erred as men Therfore against this most certayne cleare truth what alleageth these Heretikes for their most fonde and most absurde imagination aforesaid Diuinitie vvithout Scripture It is the totall summe of all their newe Diuinitie yet no warrant at all haue they for it out of Scripture Ar. 35. Many abuses and corruptions saith Fulke were entred into the Church of Christ immediatly after the Apostles time which the diuel planted as a preparatiue for his eldest sonne Antichrist But let vs heare your Scripture for it Ar. 38. The Scripture telleth vs sayth he that the mysterie of iniquitie preparing for the * Generall is your vvâ—rd noâ— S. Paules Generall defection Reuelation of Antichrist wrought euen in S. Paules time 2. Thes 2. But doth the Scripture tell you that it wrought in the Church of Christ No word so It wrought in the Persecutors of the Church of Christ and in the sundry Seducers that arose agaynst the doctrine of Christes Church as now it worketh in your Heresie béeing as it shall appeare anone the very next and vltima or at the least penultima Mysticall working before the Reuelation it selfe Next of all what haue you for this that the Church of Christ is always a contemptible companie D. Allens Demaund was Ar. 8â— Let the aduersarie shew that Christes onely kingdome should become so contemptible You alleage certayne places for answere and conclude vpon them saying So that the Church in the sight of the world hath alwayes bene most base and contemptible though in the sight of God and his Saintes 1. Cor. 1. Gal. 6. Rom. 1. most glorious and honorable Alwayes you say but your places import not alwayes Some of them conteine that her Crosse and her Crucifixus are condemned of the world that is of the Infidels But that may be and yet the Church not be in their sight a contemptible companie Euen as we Christians contemne the Turkes Mahometane Religion and the old Romaines Pagane religion for one of their goddes was a goose yet no man I trow will say they were or these are now a base and contemptible coÌ„panie An other of your places is this You shall be hated of all men for my names sake Mat. 10. As though it must néedes be alwayes a base contemptible companie which is hated of all sorts of men or euen then also when it is so hated Doth it séeme vnto you that it was of contempt that the Romane tyrantes so persecuted the Romane Bishops and their Christian flocke so vehemently all the first 300. yeres Cyp. epist 52. n. 3. Haue you not read what S. Cyprian writeth of Decius the Emperour Multo patientius tolerabilius audiebat leuari aduersus se aemulum principem quà m constitui Romae Dei Sacerdotem To heare that an Emperour was set vp against him that sought his Crowne he was much more patient then that in Fabianus place whom he had martyred another should
be ordeined at Rome as the Priest of God And therefore Infestus Sacerdotibus Dei fanda atque infanda comminabatur The Tyrant being mad at the Priests of God for that fact threatned as the Diuell Which he speaketh in excéeding prayse of Cornelius qui sedit intrepidus Romae c. Because he sate boldly at Rome in the priestly Chaire euen at that time Whereby you sée in what dread the tyrantes stoode of the Church though they so hated and so persecuted it Who euer more hated the same Priest and the Church with him then you your selues who at euery worde do blaspheme and call him Antichrist and yet I thinke you will not say that they are haue bene these thousand yeres a base and a contemptible companie Another place you alleage blindly against your selfe saying And S. Paul biddeth vs looke on our calling 1. Cor. 1. not many wise men according to the flesh not many mighty men not many noble men but God hath chosen the foolish things of this world to confound the wise and the weake of this world to confound the strōg So was the beginning of the Church What ergo always Doth not your text say that the wise also thē selues the strong at length were confounded that is to say conuerted Do you not sée how it foloweth against you If the Church were then a base and contemptible company as you say because it had not many wise mightie noble ergo afterward it was otherwise when it had gotten in also the Princes Kings Emperours of the world and as Esay speaketh Esai 60. The multitude of the Sea the fortitude of the Gentiles Was it then also a contemptible company yea or shall it according to the Scriptures euer after be no verily not so much as in the time or reuelation of Antichrist wherof I shall say more anone In so much that in another place your selfe also alleaging to the cleane contrarie Ar. 73. do say And Esay declareth when the people should be almost all destroyed yet a remnant should be saued which though it semed to be small yet it should ouerflow and fill all the world with righteousnes Esay 10. But this I must reserue to the Chapter of your grosse contradictions Last of all as concerning the Inuisiblenes of the Church you alleage so as Pur. 450. I thinke no sober man would One while that the vniuersall Church is not seene at all of men So we beleue you say because it is in heauen Gal. 4. Why do you say The vniuersall Church Is not also euery good member of it in heauen as the Apostle saith Our conuersation is in heauen Philip 3. And yet you beléeue not I trow that the Apostle was not séene at all of men Another while you say Ar. 80. It sufficeth that the Church be knowē to Christ the head As he saith My shepe heare my voyce I know them Iohn 10. Adding for all that text immediatly And to them that be of the members of the same body If your text import that it sufficeth to be knowen to the head why do you iumble in the members afterward Chrestes knowing of his shéepe is his louing of them as contrariwise to the goates he will say Mat. 25. I know you not Wherevpon if it folow not necessarily forsooth that the Church may be inuisible I report me to you Another while you alleage that although not alwais yet at one certaine time it should become inuisible to wit at the cōming of Antichrist And what Scriptures haue you for that thus you say It was prophecied that the Church should flye into the wildernes Ar. 27. that is be driuen out of the sight knowledge of the wicked So you expound that text of your owne head Againe Ar. 77. If the Church should stand always in the sight of the world then the defection which S. Paule speaketh of could not haue come neither should the Church flye into the wildernes as was declared to S. Iohn Substantial arguments That defection is your heresie as I shal straightway declare yet notwithstāding the Pope the church standeth at this time in the sight of the world The Church in the time of Antichrist both visible and vniuersall as it hath alwayes done Yea in the time that is to come when your great lord Antichrist shal appeare in person euen then also the Church shal stand stil in the sight of the world as it did in al the former persecutiōs in the first 300. yeres For there shal be preaching al the time of the persecution euen 1260. days Apoc. 11. as the persecution shal last 42. moneths which both cōmeth to three yeres a halfe the preaching shal be as general as the persecutiō to thē that sit vpon the earth Apo. 14. and vpon euery nation tribe language people exhorting thē mightily that they feare not the Beast nor adore him but that they feare the Lord giue honor to him because the honor of his iudgemēt is come As when it is said againe that the persecutors beeing in number as the sand of the sea Apoc. 2◠shall flow ouer the wide world super latitudinem terrae and so compasse the campe of the faithfull and the beloued Citie is it not therby playnly signified that the Church shal at the same time together with her enemies be vniuersall and super latitudinem terrae And therefore her flying then into the wildernes cannot be vnderstood as you expound it that she shal be driuen out of the sight and knowledge of the wicked but the meaning of it is this that she shall then abandon more then euer before all worldly pleasures being content to be turned out of all she hath and neuerthelesse sustayned by Gods prouision and fedde both in body and soule during all the time of that straite necessitie Apoc. 12. to wit 1260. dayes ij Namely of their Church and of ours by conference of places that are about Antichrist And so hauing answered all that you alleage about the Church indefinitely I am now come to that you alleage of your Church and of our Church by name Which is nothing in effect but only your owne fonde and voluntary applying of the two textes laste rehearsed whither the spirite of your error moued you That neither Antichrist nor the Apostasie agreeth to Bonifacius the third Of the Churches fleing into the vvildernes For so you said in the second Chapter that the Religion of the Papistes came in and preuayled An. Dom. 607. when Boniface the third for a great summe of money first obteined of Phocas the Emperour his Antichristian exaltation that the Bishop of Rome should be called and counted the head of all the Churche And now we shall heare what Scripture warranteth you so to say Ar 16. When Antichrist the Pope in the West seduced the worlde with most detestable heresie then was
a stone falling from an high although it be most properly said tendit in centrum terrae yet is it well said also tendit in superficiem terrae as in order to the center wherevpon in saying it tendeth to the superficies we do in déede say it tendeth to the center I know some Catholikes in answering to this obiection do say that the Apostle meaneth such inuocation as tendeth immediatly to the last end that is to god so do graunt accordingly that it is beleuing in God alone wherof he speaketh which is a sufficiēt answer to the obiection But I cōsidering that he speketh of Christ as mediator therfore as mā haue said what I think most agreable to the text As for your iangling there without allegations that if Saints be inuocated then God alone knoweth not the hearts of al men Pur. 451. and God only is not to be worshipped and serued and Christ is not our only Mediator and aduocate Where you say this to vs now whom you denie to be the true Church and to S. Ambrose with others of old whō you confesse to haue bene the true Church notwithstāding so you must say it likewise to S. Iohn for inuocating the holy Angels Apoc. 1. and to God himself for making an Angell to be worshipped Apo. 3. as more at large I told you in the 6. chapter to the Angell also that in his golden censer offereth our prayers making suche a perfume of them before God Supra pag. 42. by meanes of his incense mingled with them Apo. 8. To the 24. Seniors also which semblably haue phialas adoramentorum quae sunt orationes Sanctorū swéete odours that is to say our praiers in boules for the purpose singing accordingly praises to Christ in the person of all tribes tongues people nations Apoc. 5. Finally to all which in the holy Scripturs recommend others to God or desire to be recōmended of others If you wil not quarrel with these likewise you must let fall your suite against the former and confesse that it is nothing against one mediator to god thogh we are haue neuer so many mediators so that al make suite to God by him Nothing also against god alone to be worshipped so that we worship none but for him Nothing finally against God alone to know our hearts so that all others know them by him For otherwise your argumēt procedeth aswel against Chirst the man that neither he is to be worshipped 1. Tim. 2. nor knoweth the hartes of men For as he hath it by the gift of God so his Saintes likewise by gifte haue it in their degrée So much of praier now to fasting Fasting About which you haue again two textes Thus you say to D. Allen You are they that attend to spirites of error doctrines of diuels forbidding to marry Pur. 391.20 22. Ar. 20.93 and absteining or cōmanding to absteine frō meates which God hath created to be receiued with thanks giuing 1. Tim. 4. There is the brande marke of Romish religion that all the water in Tiberis nor in the Ocean sea shal not be able to wash out Well lustily crowed But soft a little you shall sée me straight draw inough and inough againe euen out of your owne puddle to wash al sufficiently In the third chapter I haue recorded your own words Supra pag. 10. how Aerius taught that Fasting-daies are not to be obserued And how Iouinian taught that fasting and abstinence from certayne meates profite litle or nothing at all Ar. 45.46 And that for this cause S. Epiphanius and S. Augustine counted Aerius for an Heretike as S. Augustine counteth Iouinian likewise for no better for that he said Au. Her 82 de Ec. dog ca. 68. Nec aliquid prodesse That fastes and abstinence from certaine meates do not profite any thing or as we haue in another place for that he did beléeue nil meriti accrescere That it is no increase of merite to them that for loue to chastise their bodies do absteine from wine or flesh Of that iudgment were these Fathers and yet they were if you remember your owne confession since the second Chapter of the true Church and in high fauour with God And therfore this is not such a marke in Romish religion but that it may be currant inough How much more considering that you confesse further Pur. 75. 1. Cor. 9. and say In deede S. Paule cōmaundeth and by his example commendeth christian chastisemēt of mens bodies by abstinence and fasting and that for daunger of eternall damnation Is not here then gret néed of all Tiberis yea and of all the Occean sea Well then whom what doth S. Paule meane there The Manichées the Tacianistes other such Heretikes of whō I noted more in the sixt Chapter which said that certayne meates were the creatures of the diuell Mark the words and conferre them together To absteine from the meates which God hath created And why is that an error and a doctrine of the diuels because euery creature of God is good and nothing is to be reiected And therfore S. Augustine answering the Manichées as I do now the Protestants noted in like maner vpon the very words Aug. cōtra Faust li. 30 ca. 6. that there is much difference betwene them that abstein from meates for a sacred signification as they in the old Testament or for chastising of the body as now the Catholikes and them that absteine from meates which God hath created dicendo quod eos deus non creauit saying that God did not create them Therefore the former is the doctrine of the Prophetes and of the Apostles the later of the lying diuels Your other text is for Iouinian agaynst the merite of fasting If Iouinian taught Ar. 46. that fasting abstinence from certayne meates and other bodily exercise of them selues profite litle his doctrine agreeth with S. Paule 1. Tim. 4. but if he taught as he is charged that such things profite nothing at all we agree not with him in that opinion You would fayne wipe your hands of Iouinians heresie but it will not be the brandmarke is imprinted to déepe it wil not out For his heresie was as you heard euen now that Fasting abstinence is not more meritorious then eating with thanks giuing So S. Augustine meaneth Merites when he chargeth him to haue taught Nec aliquid prodesse That they profite nothing as by another place I haue told you more playnly And as in the same place in the very next article of his heresy he chargeth him that Meritis adaequabat To the merites of chast and faythfull matrimonies he made equall and not more meritorious as the Catholikes did and do the virginitie of Nunnes and the continence of the mansexe in holy persons that choose the single life S. Paules wordes to Timothée are these Exercise thy selfe vnto Religion or godlines For bodily exercise is profitable
places Nowe what maketh all this for Fulke vnlesse he thinke he hath any vauntage in his owne false translation of Acta turning it Decrees Yea doth it not make against him most inuincibly as all the rest also that S. Augustine hath written against the Donatistes for his Church ours that is for the Church beginning at Hierusalem and thence spreding ouer all Nations to the very last time euen in the same maner altogether as it had done to S. Augustines time iij About certaine Traditions Vpon this question of Onely Scripture I haue stood long because Onely Scripture Onely faith are with the Protestantes all in all howbeit they haue neither Scripture nor Faith Now to dispatche other questions very briefly agaynst certayne Traditions Fulke alleageth saying Beatus Rhenanus a Papist and a great Antiquarie affirmeth that by the Canons of the Nicene Councell and other Councels which he hath seene in Libraries those oblations pro Natalitijs with other superstitions that Tertullian fathereth vpon Tradition of the Apostles were abrogated As touching oblations pro Natalitijs I haue answered in the sixt Chapter Cap. 6. par 1. v. But as for abrogation of any other Traditions Rhenanus hath neuer a word iiij About the mariage of Votaries For the mariage of such as haue vowed virginitie Ar. 45. Pur. 22.23 you alleage one place of Epiphanius thrise another of S. Hieromes twise and all about a matter that we hold euen as they did Thus you saye Epiphanius Hpiph li. 2 Haer. 61. although he count it an offence to marrie after their vowe therein he is with vs you know yet he saith speaking of such as secretly liue in fornication sub specie solitudinis aut continentiae vnder the colour of vowed singlenes or continencie It is better to marrie then to burne that first is not in Epiphanius Melius est itaque vnum peccatum habere non plura It is better to haue one sinne rather then many It is better for him that is fallen from his course wherein he beganne to runne for the Crowne of Virginitie openly to take a wyfe according to the lawe a virginitate multo tempore poenitentiam agere and a long time to repent to do penaunce for breaking that vowe of his virginitie and so hauing done his full penaunce to be brought agayne into the Churche out of the which he was caste as an excommunicate person for breaking his vow as one that hath done amisse as one that is fallen and broken and hauing neede to be bound rather then to be wounded dayly with priuie dartes of that wickednesse whiche the diuell putteth into him So knoweth the Church to preach Haec sunt sanationis medicamenta These are the medicines of healing Whereof you gather and say that Epiphanius calleth marriage of suche men an holsome medicine contrarie to that you confesse your selfe that he calleth it a sinne for so doth the Apostles Tradition saith he vnlesse perhaps you thinke Sinne to be an holsome medicine No syr the holsome medicins are his long penance and his reconcilement to the Church againe But at the least say you Epiphanius alloweth marriage in them whereas the Popish Church did separate them from their wiues in queene Maries time After a solemne vow which is made but only two ways by taking holy orders by professing some common approued rule of Religion to marrie is * Chry. ep 6 ad Theod. MonachuÌ„ lapsum Basil lib. de virginitate no mariage and therevpon it is that no Doctor can be alleaged which alloweth it for mariage if Priests or such professed Monkes and Nunnes do marrie But the sole vow of virginitie and of widowhood is none of those two and therfore but a simple vow and therefore to marrie after it although it be a great mortall sinne yet the mariage holdeth So saith Epiphanius and so say we as some widowes in England hauing taken the mantle and the ring and marrying afterwards can beare vs witnesse whose mariage we haue allowed of though they may not vse it so fréely without iust dispensation as other maried Folke and as their husbandes may because of their vow and cured them by penance reconciliation altogether as Epiphanius here witnesseth of the Church in his time Hie. ad Demetriad tom 1. So is it likewise of the simple vow of virginitie that S. Hierome speaketh saying The name of certayne virgins which behaue them selues not well doth slaunder the holy purpose of virgins and the glory of the heauenly and angelike familie To whoÌ„ must be playnly said vt aut nubant that either they marrie if they can not conteine or els conteine suing to God to giue them strength if they will not marrie We say the same to the same and generally to all others which of two sinnes wil nedes commit one counsayling them rather to commit the lesser then the greater As for example to say that they will come to your schismatical and Heretical seruice when the Commissioners require no more rather then to come vnto it in déede not omitting to tell them withal that they should neither so much as say they wil come because that also is a sinne and a mortall sinne as Epiphanius told those virgins that their mariage also is sinne v. About the Real presence and Transubstantiation About the blessed viuificall Sacrament of the Altar you alleage one Doctor against the Real presence and thrée others agaynst Transubstantiation Pur. 326. It was not the beleefe of S. Augustine nor of any other in that time you say that the Sacrament is the naturall body and bloud of Christ As though it were the mysticall body of Christ which is his Church Vnlesse you finde more then these two his naturall body and his mysticall body Or as though it were not his naturall body which was the morow after his Supper to dye for vs and his naturall bloud which was to be shedde for vs. When will you euer admit any text for plaine and euident Scripture standing so obstinately against these most cléere woords of Christ This is my Body that is geuen and broken for you Luc. 22.1 Cor 11. This is my bloud Mat. 26. Mar. 14. that is shedde for you and for many Luc. 22. Mat. 26. Mar. 14. And what a grosse blindnes is this considering the infinit difference betwene bread and Christ to thinke that being in S. Augustines time taken for bread it could afterward in all Christendome be taken for Christ himselfe and that without all contradiction wheras also at this time you the Sacramentaries could not chaunge the doctrine of it from Christ to bread but heauen and earth cryeth out against you for it not the Catholikes alone but also the Lutherans But S. Augustine forsooth saith Pur. 3â—8 Non hoc corpus quod videtis manducaturi estis c. I will recite the whole circumstance that the world may sée your dealing Aug. in Ps 98. I finde
within one hundred yeares after the Apostles doth witnesse that it was vsed before his time and that it came to his time by Tradition of the Apostles The same doth S. Chrysostome S. Augustine S. Epiphanius and many mo witnesse by your owne cōfession here cap. 3. pag. 2.3.4 Are not these authenticall writers nor credible authors nowe with you who here cap. 2. pag. 11. to 22. were with you the most approued writers and the Doctors of Gods Churche I thinke Gods Church may beléeue her Doctors better then you her rebels Howbeit also any reasonable man will thinke it enough for vs to bring it vp to Tertullians time and put you to proue that then it began if you will not graunt that it came from the Apostles Ar. 43. Of another particular you say Transubstantiation no small Article of your Religion was not decreed vntill the yeare of God of our Lorde you would saye 1215. But you will not I trow inferre therevpon that then it beganne For by the same reason an Arrian maye say that Homousion no small Article of our Religion beganne in the first Nicene Councell because it was not decréed vntill then Both wordes were then decréed but the things meant by them came euen from the Apostles Lanfrācus lib. contra Bereng and was decréed also the one of them 200. yeres afore that time to witte when the Heresie of Berengarius superesse in Altari post consecrationem substantiam panis vini the substance of the bread and wine to remayne after Consecration and not only agaynst the Reall presence was condemned in diuers Councels and he glad to recant it as by the writers of the same time we know The other Argument is directly agaynst you as this was directly for vs. The 2. Arg. Your first Authors can be named after the beginning of the Church rising with their new opinions Ergo their opinions were Heresies and they were Heretikes and you be Heretikes namely maynteining the same obstinatly Here agayne you denie both the consequence and the antecedent but how friuolously I haue at large reported cap. 7. pag. 80. where you put in your poore and colde exception of Onely Scripture hauing nothing els to stay agaynst the Auncient Fathers who both made that consequence and also noted your beginners but that they muste proue all by Scripture or els neither doth their argument holde neither was Aerius c. your first Author As also in another place you say to D. Allen therevpon Your rule is false For you leaue out the chiefest condition Pur. 413. which js that the opinion it selfe be contrarie to the trueth first preached by the Apostles or els it is no Heresie though it maye be truely fathered vpon any man sooner or later Full wisely D. Allens rule is this Any opinion that maye be truely fathered vpon any man that was long after the trueth was firste preached by the Apostles if it be vpon a poynt of Faith and contentiously maynteined it is an Heresie that is to say contrarie to the trueth first preached by the Apostles And you can by no exception by no reason disproue it Now your rule is this Any opinion that maye be truely fathered vpon any man long after the Apostles if it be vpon a poynt of Faith c and contrarie to the trueth first preached by the Apostles it is an Heresie that is to say contrarie c. Are not you then a proper rule giuer Any opinion that is contrarie to the trueth first preached by the Apostles is contrarie to the trueth first preached by the Apostles No doubt but D. Allen should do wisely to correct his rule which is not his but the Fathers rule by suche learned aduise 5. Contradicted Motiue 20. Article 11. Another rule of D. Allens is according to my next Demaūd (a) Pur. 412. Whosoeuer was wondred at and withstand and in his first arising and preaching by such as were in the vnitie of the Church as Aerius by S. Epiphanius S. Augustine c. and now Luther and Caluine by the Romanes c. he was according to the matter an Heretike or a Schismatike if he were obstinate I aske them therefore who so withstoode vs at any time or what heresie was not so withstood according to Gods promise to his Church Vpon thy walles Esa 62. O Hierusalem I haue set watchmen all day and al night euen for euer non tacebunt they shal not be scilent Whervpon S. Augustine saith confidently by the warrant also of the Parable Aug. ep 119 cap. 19. Mat. 13. Ecclesia dei inter multā paleam c. The Church of God beset with much chaffe and with much cockle although she tolerate many things not béeing able to redresse them yet such things as be agaynst faith or good life she neither alloweth nor is scilent nor practiseth And Fulke him selfe saith as much The Church of Christ in suche places as she is ioyne herevnto ca. 2. Ar. 92. where he confesseth the knowen Church of the first 600. yeres suffereth no man damnably abusing her Religion without open reprehension Now against this and so against him selfe to what hath he to say One while he bringeth causes why and how our Religion entred into the true Church with scilence 1 For because it came not in sodenly Ar. 43.39.35 Pur. 256. but entred by small degrees at the first and therefore was lesse espied by the true Pastors where he addeth especially being earnestly occupied against great Heresies and open aduersaries that sought to beate downe the chiefe foundations of Christian faith as the Valentinians Marcionistes Manichees Arrians Pur. 419. Sabellians and such like monsters 2 Another meane or cause was this that in those auncient times if the Gentiles or Heretikes had any thing that seemed to haue a shew of pietie or charitie they would draw it into vse with such correction as they thought was sufficient And this was a great corruption Where he addeth So they tooke of them c. eight or nyne things of ours he there nameth his words are here cap. 3. pag. 9. Amongst the which prayer for the dead is one 3. the causes and maner of the entring wherof he rendreth in like sort more at large cap. eodem pag. 14. to 20. as because it had a pretence of Charitie Ar. 39. Pur. 386.78 it deceiued simple men the sooner And the ignorant peoples error first winked at because it had a shew of pietie was allowed at length of Augustine and others who folowed the common errors of their time To omit that D. Allen foresaw and preuented these goodly causes Pur. 384. c. I say it is a fond part to tel why and how a thing was done which thing was neuer done For so the Scripture before alleaged promiseth and S. Augustine affirmeth that there should not be nor was any such silence in the true Pastors In so much that you can not name any confessed
then to the Arrians to be an Homousian If you Sacramentaries or Caluinistes delight not in the name of Protestants the Lutherans do and stand as earnestly against you vppon their senioritie for that name as we do stand agaynst you both vpon our senioritie for the name of Christians of Catholikes But your confessing of the name on the one side and yet saying on the other side that your true Christians delight not in it Ar. 65. Infra ca. 11. cont 50. Ar. 65. as also that they desire to be called Christians without choosing any other name I reserue to the place of your cōtradictions But of vs you say as much They can not be content with the name of Christians but choose vnto them selues new names after the calling of their Sect-masters as Franciscanes Dominicanes Benedictins Gilbertins Augustinians Scotistes Thomistes Albertistes c. This is answered in my Demaunds Motiues as all the rest also in effect Yet I say againe to it A Sect importeth a diuision Now what diuision is betwene those Catholikes and vs the other Catholiks that haue none of those names Be we not all of one faith and of one communion So easily is your accusation wyped away and not onely from vs I say who haue none of those names but also from our brethren who haue them They be not of that sort as the name of Christians and therefore by Logike you know not priuatiuely opposite therevnto But suche are these Arrians Pelagians Lutherans Caluinistes Protestantes Because being before of Christ of his vnitie of his communion all called Christians they for some matter either of faith or other diuiding themselues frō the same follow the communion or felowship of Arius of Pelagius of Luther of Caluin of those Protesters Why then are those our brethren so named if S. Augustine S. Benet S. Frauncis S. Dominike if S. Thomas and Scotus were not Sect-masters I answere the first sort because they professe to liue after the rules of those principall Abbots the other sort because they hold certaine Scholasticall questions which either can not be matters of faith or els as yet be not because they be not yet defined by the Church according to the opinions of those principall Schole Doctors 9. Conuersion of Heathen Nations Motiue 25. Article 1. My nienth Demaund doth note who are after the Apostles the Conuerters of all Nations from Paganisme whom the Scripture calleth the witnesses of Christ to the extremes of the earth Act. 1. to wit we and not the Protestants According to Tertullians most singular obseruation speaking of Heretikes and saying As touching the ministerie of the word Tertul. de Praesc what should I speake considering that this is their endeuour non Ethnicos conuertendi sed nostros euertendi Not to conuert the Heathen but to subuert our people This glory they do more seeke after Si stantibus ruinam non si iacentibus eleuationem operentur To work ruine to such as are standing and not raysing to such as are lying And so Fulke may glory I do not denie as he doth also where he saith Ar. 33. Ar. 95. The Land of Bohemia was conuerted by Iohn Hus and Hieromyn of Prage Againe in another place And at this day the most part of Europe is conuerted from Idolatry Heresie and Antichristianitie such he counteth the Catholike faith vnto the same true faith that we mainteine as in England Scotland Ireland Fraunce Germanie Denmark Suetia Bohemia Polonia by publike authoritie in Spaine and Italie a great number vnder persecution and tyrannie That is your glory in déede that you haue subuerted many in many Christian nations We can not so glory nor you can not shew that we haue done the like in any Nation although you say with a brasen face Ar. 3. It is certayne that the Popish Church hath peruerted and corrupted al parts of the Latine or Westerne Church with Idolatry and false religion But that you haue conuerted any Nation from Paganisme you do not nor you can not boast But the truth is although you say that we haue not cōuerted the Nations to Christes faith Pur. 460. but peruerted all nations from the faith of Christ that our Church that is to say the Cōmunion of S. Peters Sée Apostolike or the church beginning visibly at Hierusalem and visibly growing on to this day is she that conuerteth al Pagane Nations to be Christians not only at this present so many nations of both the Indies and in Afrike item so many others that this last thousand yeres haue bene conuerted thrée wherof you name Liuonia Prussia Lithuania Ar. 3.85 with this lying censure that we conuerted them by force of armes rather then by preaching and teaching but also all them that were conuerted either in the 500. yeres afore that or also in the Apostles time it selfe Against this cleare trueth what mist haue you to cast Forsooth not we but certaine Heretikes Schismatikes conuerted some nations to the profession of Christes name Ar. 2.3 though to false religion Do you graunt that it was to false religion yet bring that for an instance It is an euident argument that you had no instance in the nations that we cōfesse to haue bene conuerted to the true faith of Christ Was not this scope inough for you reason inough for vs when we say as in my Demaund you may sée that it was our Church by which all Nations were conuerted or corrected to the true faith of Christ And yet also for your said instancies where you quote your Authors they shall be answered In the meane time I quote to you Eus li. 2. ca. 1. reporting the conuersion of Ethiopia to haue bene of the right stampe according to Psal 67. and Act. 8. which two places he there doth cite Ar. 2.3 because you to shew that the true Church of Christ did not conuert all do say For in Aethiopia there are yet people conuerted by the False Apostles whiche taught circumcision obseruation of the Law in which heresie they continue vnto this day Who should tell that better then the Ethiopians themselues whom we sée to haue their house at Rome and to be Catholikes And your selfe do saye in another place Pur. 357. that their Liturgie doth sauour playnly the vsage of the Greke Church Their Emperour did his obediēce to Paulus III and also an Ethiopian Abbot which Abbot in his Epistle dedicatorie before the rites of their Baptisme Liturgie doth expresly inueigh against them that did falsly report of them as not Catholikes and obedient subiects to the Sée Apostolike much reioysing therein and desiering that they might be so taken Howbeit I denie not but there might be some corruption though not of heresie peraduenture but for lacke of frée conuersing béeing intercluded by the Turkes and Saracenes and often oppressed by Tyrants and Infidels of their owne with the Romane Church In qua semper ab ijs qui sunt
his doctrine But cleane contrarie we finde so playnly for the Pope and for euery poynt of his doctrine that you are faine to put the reuelation of Antichrist and the disparition of the Church here cap. 2. at the very time of our conuersion For which cause also you refuse as we saw before to be tryed by Bedes historie Pur. 333. telling our countreymen that they were better to consider the Acts of the Apostles and saying in another place that you waye not worth a slye that which D. Allen telleth out of Beda For who séeth not there our Religion most playnly and namely for (a) Beda hi. li. 1. ca. 24. Greg. li. 12. epist 15. the Popes authoritie and (b) Beda li. 1. ca. 25.27.29 Masse the very poynts that your Saxon Homilies do impugne But what saye we then to those godly monuments Who can not say and sée that if they were such as you make them they should not all this while be kept vnprinted neither should that which was printed so soone and so diligently haue bene called in againe for why either they conteine not suche matter as you report or they be but of some of these late Wiclesistes making such as by your owne saying are yet common to be seene Disproue my coniecture if it be wrong Ar. 34. and then you shall sée whether I can reply 10. 12. Myracles and Visions Unto these two Demaunds I couple two others of Myracles Motiue 5.6.7 and of Uisions noting that the very Scriptures do by them commend vnto vs Christ him selfe his Apostles with their successors the conuerters of all Nations and their doctrine and saying accordingly that the Miracles and visions of our Church are infinite Pur. 166.331.333 Greg. Dial. li. 4. ca. 24. Et Epist l. 7 ep 30. li. 9. ep 58. mora l. 27. c. 6. in Iob. 36. Damas ser de defūctis Beda hist li. 1. c. 31. l. 3. c. 13. li. 4. c. 21. li. 5. c. 13. alleaged also by the Doctors against the Iewes also Paynims to conuert them to Christ Wheras the Protestants haue not all this while bene able so much as to heale a lame horse though Luther and Caluine as we reade in their liues namely set out in French attempted wonders Now what saith Fulke to this The examples out of Gregorie Damascene Bede you may spare for your frendes there is none of vs that maketh great account of them Againe I force litle what Augustine our Apostle of whose Miracles and holines S. Gregorie also whose Monke he was doth testify as also of his learning Hebrew psalters written with his owne hand which you count a high poynt c. wrought to confirme his errors neither do I waye worth a flye that long tale you tell out of Beda of him that had his cheynes fallen of in Masse time that credulous and superstitious age had many such fayned Myracles Againe You leape but 600. yeres from Christ to Gregories Dialogues from which time I wil not deny but you may haue great store of such stuffe as you haue miracles now in Flaūders of the honest woman of the old Bayly in London Happy it were for you and you were so honest Neither when she was in Heresie was she vnhonest for ought that I haue hard and the Miracle euen as I tell it in my Motiues is most gloriously knowen at Bruxelles You should haue better played the Doctor of Diuinitie if you could haue informed the simple how to know fained Miracles from vnfained and why Miracles vnfained may not be after S. Gregories time aswell as before You will tell them as here cap. 2. that straight after his time was the Reuelation of Antichrist Pur. 336.338 and that these were and are his lying signes and wonders 2. Thes 2. such as errours had alwaies great plentie to establish them withall This is the very bones and marrow of your new Gospell and yet all worm-eaten and rotten For first what Scripture telleth you that after the Reuelation of Antichrist supposing it at that time whiche you wold haue there shal be none but fained Miracles Apoc. 11. telleth me the cleane contrary Secondly why cannot you for the defence of Christ his true Miracles against the Infidels discouer the fainednes of Antichrist his wonders whereas we discouer the lying of all fond Miracles which sundry errours though not in such great plentie haue pretended Thirdly what Scripture telleth you that the time of Antichrists reuelation was so long agoe It telleth me the cleane contrary as I haue most euidently declared cap. 8. pag. 125. Discouering therewithall your grosse falsation of the Scripture to racke it to your blasphemous purpose A wise Reuelation that was yet so many hundred yeres hidden and the partie reueled taken yet for Christ his owne Uicare Consider their absurdnesse No no syr you that be mysticall Antichristes may of fooles be mistaken and thought to be the Ministers of Christ Iesus but your Lord in proper person shall shew himselfe openly ynough and expressely against the onely Christ our Lord and Sauiour Iesus not so much as desiring to be thought of his side Fourthly what say you then at the least to our infinite Miracles afore S. Gregories time as those whiche S. Augustine De Ciuitate Dei li. 22. ca. 8. reherseth to the Paganes wrought by the Relikes of the first Martyr S. Steuen after many particulars euen six Resuscitations of the dead saying generally Si enim Miracula sanitatum vt alia taceam modò velim scribere quae per hunc Martyrem id est gloriosissimum Stephanum facta sunt in colonia Calamensi in Nostra plurimi conficiendi sunt libri For if I would write but the Myracles of healings to omitte the others which by this Martyr that is by the moste glorious S. Stephen haue bene wrought but in two Cities Calama and Hippo where his familiar friende Possidonius and him selfe were Bishoppes very many bookes were to be made What Scripture haue you agaynst these Myracles Either you must remoue the comming of Antichrist so muche higher which a litle thing would make you to do or els you must bring your blind followers some text that testifieth his lying Myracles to go also so long before his comming and the workers of them for him to be the very Martyrs and ministers and true Church of Christ him selfe For els how will you nowe defend that our Church hath no true Myracles Ar. 85. but the power of Antichrist in lying signes and wonders As for your censure of Myracles and Uisions that what soeuer is consonant to the word of God is to be receiued Pur. 163.333 that which is not agreable therewith is to be detested although an Angell from heauen were the bringer of it as though these were agaynst the trueth of God vttered in the holy Scriptures All this hangeth but vpon the twyned thréede of your owne poore worde though you say neuer
so much that it is briefly and playnely so set foorth in the worde of God as I haue shewed in the eyght chapter answering all the textes that you peruert for Onely Scripture namely that text of an Angel from heauen pag. 110. And the place also of Saint Augustine chapter 9. pag. 181. Pur. 333. In so much that where you say therevpon He will not allowe Myracles and Visions for sufficient proofes without the authoritie of the Scriptures you do shamefully abuse your Reader for he saith expresly that whatsoeuer such things are done in the Catholike Church as he there also mentioneth many generally and some particularly therefore they are to be allowed because they are done in the Catholike Church And you graunt that these of S. Augustines reporting were done in the Catholike Church Ergo by S. Augustine euen in that place you must allow them and so condemne your owne Religion Motiue 26. 13.15 Honour of Crosses and of Saintes 14.16 Vertue of Crosses and of Saintes 17. Exorcismes 18. Destroying of Idolatrie In the next fiue Demaundes I report certaine argumentes made of the old Doctors in their bookes against the Paynims to proue that Christ is God and not their Idolles by certaine pointes of our Religion as the Soueraigne Honor both of his Crosse and of his Saintes and the miraculouse power not onely of them two but also of his Church in her ordinarie exorcismes requiring the Protestantes to helpe here the Paynims if they be eyther able or not ashamed and also in the next Demaund bidding them open their eyes at length and beholde that our Religion hath bene and is the bane of Idolatrie yea and those very pointes of our Religion which their peruerse blindnes counteth and calleth Idolatry it selfe To all this Fulke had nothing but like a Cuckow You haue not saith he destroyed Idolatry Pur. 460. but set vp Idolatrie Not waying what I tell him according to the prophets that we haue so throughly conuerted al Nations from Idolatrie that we haue made them forget also the names of their Idolles Motiue 41. Article 10. 19 Kinges My 19. Demaund is of the Christian Emperours and Kinges of whose conuersion together the Scripture speaketh expresly and of the conuersion of Nations The chiefe of them Fulke nameth here cap. 2. and confesseth with vs and for vs that they were of the true Church in the first 600. yeares yea and chalengeth them to haue bene of his Religion no lesse then we doe But what proufes doth he bring thereof Not one Neither doth he answere so much as any one of our proufes no not that which D. Allen alleageth Pur. 429. how Constantinus honored the Sentence of the Priestes Councell at Nice tanquam a deo prolatam as pronounced of God Pur. 313. Ruff. li. 1. ca. 5. yea he is faine to confesse that in the burial of Constantinus him selfe the very first Christian Emperour Eus in vita Const li. 4 c. 58.59.60.66.71 there was prayer for his soule according to the errour of the time being the time of the first Nicen Counsell In Eusebius is much more Sacrifice also for his soule with the intercession of the Apostles in whose honor it was offered at their Relikes in their Temple Pur. 312. and all by the procurement of ConstaÌ„tinus him self Again That the Emperour Theodosius Iunior prayed for his fathers and mothers soules Arcadius and Eudoria But the storie saith not quoth he that he prayed to S. Chrysostome for them as M. Allen thinketh The storie is Theodorets and his words are these Hist Trip. li. 10. c. 26. ex Theo. l. 5. c. 35.36 Pur. 222.226 Amb. super obitum Theod. And he setting his face and eyes vpon the shrine of that holy man made supplications for his parentes and prayed him vt veniam illis tribueret that he would pardon them the iniuries which of ignorance they had done him in working his death Againe as touching Honorius of the west brother to the said Arcadius of the East wher S. Ambrose saith Eius principis Theodosij Senioris et proximè conclamauimus Obitum et nunc quadragesimum diem celebramus assistente sacris Altaribus Honorio Principe We finished of late vpon the seuenth day this Princes Obite Theodotius Senior their father and now we celebrate his fourtyth day our Prince Honorius standing by the sacred Altares To this Fulke had nothing but partly to reprehend the thing as superstitious both in the Bishop and in the Emperour partely to inueigh blindly against D. Allens translation For Ambrose speaketh not he saith of his fortyth dayes minde but of the solemnitie of his funerall kept 40. dayes togeather As though the fortyth day is not one of the fortie and yet also how playnly he expresseth the singulare solemnitie of the fortyth day as of the Obite before saying And now we celebrate his fortyth day whereas others vse to kepe the Thirde day and the Thirtith which was and is the vse of the Romane Church But the Church of Millaine kept the seuenth day and the fortyth Al this considered who seeth not that aswel the Catholike Emperours within the first 600. yeres be against him as the others of later tymes and therefore that it is but a cast of his facing deceiuing arte that he saith Ar. 33.51 Before the generall Defection and Reuelation of Antichrist it is an easye matter to name you the Emperours and Princes of our Church as Constantine the great See the impudent Heretike them vvhâ—m he condemned before Iouinianus Valentinianus Theodosius Arcadius Honorius Martianus Iustinianus Mauritius diuers other But when the Kings of the earth had coÌ„mitted fornicatioÌ„ with the great Whore of BabyloÌ„ as the holy ghost foresheweth Apo. 17. 18. it is no preiudice to our cause if we cannot shew any of them that haue maintained our Religion Your malicious and ignoraÌ„t setting of the Defection Antichrists reuealing at the yere 607 I haue coÌ„futed cap. 8. pag. 126. by the Scriptures most manifestly But that you poynt the same time for the Kinges of the earth to haue fornicated with her your ignorance and malice surmounteth it selfe as it is euideÌ„t by that which I say there pag. 126. that Babylon is this world froÌ„ the beginning to the ending thereof and called a Whore for that it hath such alluremeÌ„ts wherevpon the same S. Iohn exhorteth vs in his Epistle 1. Ioan 2. and saith Loue not the world nor the thinges that are in the world The world is transitorie and also the coÌ„cupiscence of it And therefore in his Apocalipse he maketh her to sit vpon all the earthly worldly Kinges that euer tooke or shall take her parte against Gods Church But your blindnes could finde no earthly Kinges in the world but within these last 900. yeares yea none to be the Kinges of the Earth but those that be the Kinges of the Church and their fornicatioÌ„ to consist In humbly
adoring her Esa 49.60 licking the very dust of her feete which they are cōmaunded by the Prophet to do vnder paine of Damnation Ar. 17. Discipline And thereupon D. Allen told you that to be the true Church Which exerciseth Discipline vpon offenders in all degrees And that al true the Christian Kings haue and doe obey her accordingly which is an vnuincible argument for vs against you in this Demaund And yet you haue Kings on your side also since the Reuelation of Antichrist Ar. 33.34.32 The Grecian Emperours that were Image-breakers Charles the great who wrote a booke against Images and called Bertrame to declare his mind vpon the Real presence and transubstantiation and those Princes that defended their maried Priests But least we should obiect that it was but in one or two poynts that these did fauour you Edward the third defended Wickleue Also Zisca Procopius defended the Bohemians and George king of Bohemia was depriued of his kingdome by the Pope for defending the Protestants An. 1466. Which is wel towards an hundred yeres before the name of Protestants by your own confession here Dem. 8. and much more before the religion of the Protestants was coyned For though you say Wickleue I wene you will not deny but he was of our Church and Religion yet you may sée in my 40. Dem. that in déede he was not neither also the Bohemians or Hussits But that Edward the third was a Wickleuist who euer heard though I denie not but that Catholike Princes are often times passing negligent in their office and othe to extirpate Heresies vntill by God and his Churches admonition on the one side and by the wast on thother side that Heretikes in time doe make both spiritually and temporally of all Common wealthes they be spurred therevnto The like absurd ignoraunce in stories or rather malice you and your brethren declare in saying that fonde booke against Images to be Charles the greates who was cleane contrarie Cop. Dial. 4. c. 18.19 Sander de Imag. li. 2. ca. 5. an enimie of the Image-breakers as is at large learnedly declared in M. Copes Dialogues Neither is it Carolus Magnus but Carolus rex brother to Lotharius the Emperor An. 840. by Trithemius to whō Bertrame wrote De corpore sanguine Domini Neither was that as the learned thinke for good causes this Hereticall booke which Oecolampadius set foorth vnder Bertrames name And is not this a substantiall reason He declared that he liked not the Real presence and Transubstantiation in that he called Bertrame to declare his mind of that matter How much better may I reason that both the Emperour or King and all Christendome held the Real presence and transubstantiation because this Bertrame durst not but so timerously about the bush after the maner of all heretikes in the beginning go against it as we sée in that booke No no syr As I said before of Nations so I say of Princes If any were euerted he might in some thing fall on your side But those Princes in al countries that were cōuerted from Paganisme also their Successors that continued in their steppes were in no poynt yours but ours in all things 20 In all Persecutions Motiue 15. Article 7. My 20. Dem. is of the persecutions both before the Emperours became Christians also afterwards whē some of thē were peruerted againe with Apostasie or Heresie saying that the Religion which we reade of in those times béeing the Religion of all Martyrs and by Fulkes confession here cap. 2. pag. 4. Pur. 258.312 Ar. 23.24.25 of the true Church is in al poynts ours and in no one poynt the Protestants And to this he hath nothing but only this that all true saints held the foundation Iesus Christ which we do in his sense he doth not in the true sense as I shewed cap. 5. and therefore forsooth it is proued that they all were of his Church notwithstanding he is fayne to say that some of them buylded straw and stubble vpon the foundation they were ours so playnly in many things as he confesseth cap. 3. yea and in all things as I shew cap. 9. In so much as they haue scraped most of their names out of the Callender wherof I shall speake more Dem. 46. Motiue 33. Article 14. 21. Churches In the 21. Demaund I chalenge for ours the auncient Christian churches with their furniture both afore and after the conuersion of the Romane Emperours also in our country namely as in all others And Fulke no lesse chalengeth them to his side here cap. 2. pag. 6. But before we come to the particulers let vs see his answere to D. Allens argument What if it were graunted that all Churches that now remayne Ar. 53. Pur. 339.340 that he addeth whereas D. Allen speaketh generally were buylded by Papists and for Popish vses what haue you wonne thereby As much as néedeth I thinke Why not For the same chalenge might the Idolaters haue made to the Apostles Shew vs a Temple in all the world that was not buylded by Idolaters and to mainteine Idolatrie Were that the same chalenge I pray you The Apostles renounced both those Temples and that Religion you renounce Popish religion but do you also renounce al Churches that now remayne If you do then you renounce also the Churches of the first 600. yeres for innumerable of them as at Rome c. now also remaine But because you may not leaue to vs the Churches of that time also for feare of afterclaps you thinke good to come to the matter and to say But for all your bragges we are able to shew that such Churches as were buylded by true Christians were not buylded to such end as yours are Constātinus Magnus was a true Christian with you also and of him I told you erewhile in the 19. Dem. out of Eusebius that he builded Apostolorum templum A temple of the twelue Apostles in his citie of Constantinople appoynting his owne body to lye in the midle of their 12. shrines Vt defunctus queque precationum quae ibidem essent ad Apostolorum gloriam offerendae particeps efficeretur That also after his death he might be partaker of the prayers whiche there should be offered to the Apostles glory And at his burial accordingly Much people with the Priests preces pro anima Imperatoris Deo fundebant made prayers to God for his soule And likewise to this day we sée saith Eusebius that he enioyeth there the diuine Ceremonies and the Mysticall Sacrifice the societie of the holy prayers This was his end among others and the same was the end of al our Church founders a Pur. 338. to 347. saith D. Allen. Not so saith Fulke for b Pur. 339. Ar. 52.57 Fulk is no babe you may see our Stories testifie that at the first conuersion of this Land to Christianitie the Temples of the Pagane Britons and of the Idolatrous
Saxons were conuerted into Churches of the Christians Therfore these Churches forsoth had Pagane founders and not beleeuers of Purgatorie as likewise Pantheon in Rome As though that they which conuerted them to the Christian vse were not rather their founders as now also king Henry the eight is called of you a founder of many places that he did not buyld but only alter So then here is one ende of their Churches all one and of our Churches to wit to pray for the dead But they were all buylded in the honor of God of Christ Ar. 53. to 55. and the most of yours in the honor of creatures of Saints Mary well ymet The aforesaid Church of Constantinus was it not called The twelue Apostles Church And doth not S. Augustine De Ciuit Dei talke of Basilicae Martyrum Apostolorum Au. de Ciu. li. 1 ca. 1.4 The Apostles and the Martyrs Churches or Palaces calling thē also Christi Basilicas The Churches of Christ which you make to be opposite one to the other besides infinite like examples And therfore your places out of S. Basill and Didymus S. Augustine Bas ep 141 Did. de sp sanct Au. ep 174 Ench. c. 56. Cont. Maxim Ar. l. 1. Titul 11. De ver rae ca. 55. that a Temple is onely for God make no more against our Churches now then against theirs at that time But the places where S. Augustine answereth the matter for you to alleage them against it is most vayne impudencie He a Au. de ci li. 8. c. 27. li. 22. ca. 10. telleth you the Paganes for him selfe and for vs together But we do not to our Martyrs build Temples as to Gods but Memories as to dead men their soules yet liuing with God Nec ibi erigimus Altaria in quibus sacrificemus Martyribus sed vni Deo c. Neither in those memories do we erect Altars etiam super sanctum corpus Martyris Not so much as them that are made ouer the holy bodies of Martyrs vpon them to sacrifice to the Martyrs But to the one both ours and the Martyrs God do we offer the Sacrifice Although at that Sacrifice they as the men of God be in their place and order named and we honor the Memories of them as of holy men of God Ar. 55. Sozo li. 2. ca. 2. This is the meaning and none other of S. Peters Church S. Laurence Church of S. Peters Altar S. Laurence Altar And euen so of Angels Churches also Sozomenus telling of a Church in Constantinople called Michaelium S. Michaels in memorie of an Apparition of that Archangell there Pur. 344.345 But in the third end you pay vs home for the great grauntes that Constantine made to Syluester Byshop of Rome he made to marryed Byshops of Rome And that were so then crie on a Gods name Viuat Iouinianus Blessing vpon Iouinian and Anathema to S. Augustine who called him a monster yea and vppon all the Churche of Rome where not so much as one Priest would marrie for all his perswasions but so faithfully resisted him that out of hand they extincted his heresie here Cap. 8. pag. 149. Séeing this your impudent most false assertion of Rome who will maruell to heare you say as boldly of England Many of these Churches and Colledges yea the most notable Cathedrall Churches in Englande were buylded for Preachers of the Gospell and their wiues to * Then is the Q. Iniunction to blame dwell in and they were first inhabited of marryed Priestes Is it possible Our stories are plentifull in that poynt if you be skilfull in antiquitie you cannot be ignoraunt of this which is testified of Ranulphus Castrensis Matthaeus Westmonasteriensis the storie of Peterburghe and many other You talke sometymes of a Whetstone as bygge as a Mountayne You haue wonne it you must néedes haue it This our Stories tell that manye of our Priestes had néede sometymes of reformation and that also with violence suche was their obstinacie in that durte as also in other Countryes too often But that any Churches were builded for suche swine or first inhabited by such is a chicken of your owne hatching Ar. 55.56.57 After this wée haue to consider what you say of Chauncells and the Roode lofte of Altars of Chalices and Uestmentes The Churche of Tyrus Eusebius lib. 10. cap. 4. had Cancellos the Chauncell in the myddest and the Altar beyng but one Fulk driuen to confesse altars in the Church in the myddest of the Chauncell So also as the Priestes and Deacons stoode rounde about it Agayne Many Churches haue Crosse Iles. Belike you are sodainely become our Proctor For Chauncelles Altars and Crosses were not I trow in your fellowes late buyldinges which you mention Pur. 342. at Orleans Antwarpe and other places And therefore as sodainly you chaunge agayne and say that the Chauncelles are but additions buylded since the Churches of lykelyhood by the persons that disdayned to haue their place in the myddest of the people as the olde manner was Euen as likely as that it was of disdayne that Saint Ambrose by his Archdeacon commaunded the Emperour Theodosius senior Theo. li. 5. ca. 17. Sozom. li. 7. ca. 24. out of the Chauncell telling him that it was for the Cleargie onely solis sacerdotibus If you knowe that maruellous Storie you may better remember your selfe because you saye In the Orientall Churche as their Ceremonies are diuers from yours so no doubt the fashion of their Temples differeth from yours You may there perceaue that both in the East and West Churche the diuersitie was not in the Ceremonies nor Temples but in the Byshops for many were flatterers or vnskilfull euery one was not an Ambrose Howbeit some little differences are in the Temples also of one Citie but without iarre yea all very sightly becomming our Church Psal 44. as varietie in the Quéenes goodly garment But your Religion may not beare any Chauncels at all neyther in the myddest nor at the East ende It may not beare the length into the East which was and is the common and Apostolike fourme but will haue all rather to bée rounde accordyng to the example of those fewe which before were lyghtly Temples and Synagogues of the Paganes and Iewes as Sainct Maria Rotunda in Rome which was Pantheon and those two at London and Cambridge which you doo mention It may not bear the out Isles to make it in forme of a Crosse lying along vppon the ground No it may not beare any Crosse or Roode at all to be in the Church although Constātinus had a Eus in vi Cōst li. 2. c. 12. l. 4. c. 56 Soz. li. 1. c. 8. Tabernaculum Crucis a Tabernacle or moueable Church of the Crosse carryed about with him in the warres and also in Hierusalem b Eus or de laud. Cōst pag. 367. dedidicated an holy Temple Salutari Signo Crucis to the healthfull signe of the Crosse
maketh mention also of a Eus li. 7. ca. 19. the Hymnes of Nepos Theodoretus and Zosomenus of e Theo. lib. 4. ca. 24. Zoso l. 3. ca. 15. the Hymnes of S. Esrem in the feastes of Martyrs and S. Augustine very often of f Aug. retr li. 1. ca. 21. Confes l. 9. ca. 6.7.12 the Hymnes of S. Ambrose The Councell of Laod. doth no more but forbid priuatos vulgares Psalmos priuate and vulgar Psalmes made by simple men to be said in the Church as the g Con. Mil. ca. 12. Con. Cart. 3. ca. 23. Mileuitane Councell also commaundeth that no other prayers or collectes or Masses or prefaces or commendations or handlayings be said in the Church nisi quae a prudentioribus tractatae But such as haue bene examined by some more skilfull or allowed in the Synode least it chaunce something to be made against the faith or by ignoraunce or by negligence Likewise touching lessons the Councel of Laod doth no more but forbyd the Apocryphall Scriptures libros non Canonicos to be read sed solos Canonicos veteris noui Testimenti but the onely Canonicall bookes of the olde and new Testament Con. Cart. 3. ca. 47. Ar. 20. as also the .3 Councell of Carthage decreeth that beside the Canonicall Scriptures nothing be read in the Church vnder name of the diuine Scriptures for which cause both Councelles doth there declare which bookes be Canonicall and the Carthage Councell addeth also that the Martyrs Passions may be read when their anniuersarie dayes be celebrated These examples declare manifestly that you detest in our seruice euen those things which were in the seruice of the Primitiue Churche and all without cause and that it is an horrible blasphemie where you say If you demaund whence your Ceremonies VVhy then do you kepe them novv festiuall dayes feastes and varieties of Seruice did proceede I aunswere plainly out of the bottomlesse pit of Hell For touching dayes also which may be the last example of Fasting and Feasting you confesse cap. 3. pag. 13. and cap. 6. pag. 43. that Aerius and Iouinianus were condemned in the Primitiue Church for Heretikes because they denyed the dayes and merites of Fasting and the Scriptures that you obiect against the Fathers vs for it I haue aunswered cap. 8. pag. 140. to .143 Ar. 20. Likewise you confesse that Festiuall dayes were vsed in the Primitiue Church adding to shewe of what Church you be that they might haue bene omitted without any hurt of Christian Religion wel But they were not kept in honour of the Saints as they are of the Papistes for that is great Idolatrie as also to build Churches in the honor of Saintes but only for the memory of the martyres and other Saintes that their good life might be followed Whether for that onely let S. Augustine be witnesse where he saith The Christian people doth celebrate together the martyres memories with religious solemnitie Aug. cōtra Faust l. 20. ca. 21. Et ad exitandam imitationē et vt meritis eorum consocietur atque orationibus adiuuetur Both to stirre vp imitatiō and to be ioyned in felowship to their merites and holpen with their prayers Was not this to kéepe their memories in their honor also As againe it is manifest not onely by certayne places alleaged before but also in the very words that you alleage de ver Relig. cap. 55. Ar. 20.54 The saints must be honored for imitation not adored for religion Honoramus eos charitate non seruitute We honour the blessed Angels with charitie not with seruice Doth he not here expresly auouch their honoring As for your note that Seruitus is the same that Dulia is contrary to the Papists which will worship them with seruice called Dulia or Seruitus it is but your vnacquayntance in S. Augustines writings Reade De Ciuit. Dei li. 10. ca. 1. Seruitus Latria Latriam quippe nostri vbicunque sanctarum Scripturarum positum est interpretati sunt Seruitutē For whersoeuer in the holy Scriptures in Gréeke is put Latria our Latines haue translated it Seruitus And so you may sée that he vseth Seruitus for Latria not for Dulia as also he vseth Religio for thresceia béeing synonymum to Latreia But saith he speaking of cultus Deitati debitus the worship due to the Godhead Propter quem vno verbo significandū quoniam satis mihi idoneum non occurrit Latinum Greco c. Because to signifie it in one word I finde no Latin word apt ynough neither Religio nor Seruitus although in that booke De vera Relig. he so vsed them being yet but a Lay man I do where it is necessarie vtter my mind by the Greeke word Latria Lo I haue alleaged here no more but as an answere And yet I haue made it manifest that notwithstanding all his obiections yea also by his owne confession the Seruice of the Primitiue Church was ours and not the Protestants defending it also easily against his vaine cauils Ar. 38.40.49 Neither shal he euer be able to shew that any Church Latin or Gréeke Brytish or other had authenticall seruice but it was ours as D. Allen told him before Now as for the Language in which the Seruice is Seruice in Latine that maketh no difference in the Seruice it selfe For praying for the dead is all one whether it be in Latine or in English Yet because he holdeth that it ought to be in the vulgar tongues let vs sée what be his groundes thereof Ar. 49.40 We can easily shew it out of the Scripture so he saith but no word that he alleageth any where But bylike he meaneth the place to the Corinthians by which his fellowes do commonly reiect the Latin Seruice as if it were that miraculous gifte which the Apostle there calleth 1. Cor. 14. Loqui linguis to speake with tongues Which also he doth not reiect but moderate for the varietie of certayne much like to * Pur. 7. some Protestantes that thinke all learning to be the tongues Now if any learned man séeing it is not the seruice that S. Paule there speaketh of thinke yet that one may argue thence at the least a simili Let him consider first that so the maner of the simple Catholikes who praye to them selues priuately in the Latine tongue which they vnderstande not is not condemned but iustified For He that speaketh in a tongue speaketh not to men but yet to God And he that speaketh in a tongue doth also edifie him selfe in spirite that is in affect For if I pray in a tongue my spirite or affection prayeth though my vnderstanding be without fruite And therefore If thou blesse or giue thankes in spirite thou doest it well But if there be no Interpreter let him be silent in the Churche and speake to him selfe and to God The difference is onely this that those Corinthians receiued immediately of the holy Ghost such prayers
in such a tongue And these Catholikes now receiue the like prayers of the same holy Ghost but by the Church Secondly that the Church in her publike praiers doth not speake in a tongue because the Latine tongue is not in Englande a straunge tongue so as it were if one should say Masse at Rome in the English tongue And so the question is not now the same as was betwéene the Apostle and the Corinthians but whereas the Church would do all things for edification as S. Paule commaundeth the question is whether this be obteined in the Publike prayers of the whole worlde rather by the Latine tongue that is to saye by the Common tongue or els by the seuerall vulgare tongues that is to say by the Priuate tongues To which question the Catholikes drawing all to common or vnitie haue one answer Heretikes and Schismatikes drawing from the Common and scattering into many Priuates haue an other At Corinth the case was otherwise both because the tongues were vtterly straunge and also because the prayers were not Set and Solemne in writing and custome but momentaneous suggested of the Holy ghost to some one for the time so that of them they were not vnderstood there was no profite at all in their publication And therefore they should not publish them but speake to them selues and to God Reade the learned Latin booke of F. Ledesima the Iesuite vpon this matter He sheweth at large and substantially that it is neither necessarie no nor expedient the Publike Seruice to be in all vulgare tongues howbeit the Popes holines may by the Councell of Trent do therin with any Nation as he seeth cause And Fulke can not nor doth not denie but that in the Primitiue Church all the Natiōs of the Latine Church had the seruice in Latine neither can he or doth he denie but many of the same Natiōs had vulgare tongues of their owne which were not Latine as the Punike tongue the Dutch tongue the Brytish tōgue c. What doth he then He holdeth that all the people and yet once he dare not but adde For the most parte which is ynough against him of the said Nations besydes their vulgare tongues spake and vnderstood Latine And how doth he proue this absurd position By the Germaine or French Councelles of Towres Turon 3. c. 17. Magunt c. 25.45.43 Rhem. c. 15. Magunce and Rhemes in the time of Carolus Magnus Whereas one of his places is so plaine against him that it saith as we do now also yf any man cannot learne so strange and hard was the Latine tongue vnto them his Créede and Pater noster in Latine Vel in sua lingua hoc discat Let him learne it at the least in his owne tongue One other taketh order for Homilies to be translated out of Latine into the Rusticall * The French is yet in some place called the Romane Romane or Dutche tongue playnly quo facilius cuncti possint intelligere quae dicuntur that al may more easily vnderstand that which is said Wherof he gathereth that all the Dutch men vnderstood also the pure Latin tongue though hardly and not perfectly He might gather aswell that all English men vnderstand the Latine tongue and the pure Latine tongue if the Bishops should say as they may Let Latine Homilies be translated into the Englishe tongue playnely that all maye more easily vnderstande what is saide Another doth forbid the Priest to say Masse alone because some body must answer to Dominus vobiscum and Sursum corda c. as also at this time and therefore he gathereth properly forsooth that the people commonly vnderstood the Latine Seruice Ar. 41.49 Cap. 9. Last of all he alleageth the great Councell of Laterane An. 1215. as though it commaunded the Bishops to translate the Seruice into English and other vulgar tongues whereas it doth no more but commaunde them because at that time the Latines were Lords of Constātinople Antioch Hierusalem c. to prouide ministers according to the rites and languages in which the Seruice presently was as it is euident by the words of the Councell And otherwise I aske him why it prouideth but only for those Cities and Diocesses in which people of diuers languages be mingled together and not for all in generall Besides that in no place any such translating of the seruice was put in execution Amongst those 1300. Prelats was there not one but he was either so negligent or so desirous of the peoples blindnes And that neither among those of thē which procured the making of that Canon This is the stuffe that they haue against Gods Church or rather this is the execation and infatuation of them that haue forsaken Gods Church Motiue 34. 23. Apish imitation The next Demaund sheweth them to be but the Apes of the Catholike Church in so much as they retayne of her Seruice and other orders leauing it to the consideration of the learned in the Scriptures and other writings that false Religion was always the Ape of true Religion as in the rest that they haue reiected they shew them selues to be Apostataes according to that I noted here cap. 8. pag. 144. Wherein the Puritanes are offended with their brethren the Protestants onely because they will not procéede so farre in this Apostasie as they and their master Antichrist who commeth to méete them as it were halfe way would haue them Pur. 379. And that is it which Fulke saith to D. Allen The ciuill Magistrates haue thought good in some outward ceremonie or vsage to beare with the infirmitie of the weaker sorte of your side Fulke is no Puritant in hope to winne them Where he saith further All your doctrine is abolished and nothing left but a fewe ragges of your robes to looke vpon And therefore I accorde with you that in déede they be infirme or rather down dead already that will be wonne from Gods Church to such companions by so babish meanes Whether that were the ciuil Magistrates meaning or no I séeke not but his meaning who mystically worketh in you was and is as I haue said Apostasie And therefore againe where you say I will vrge the Papists to tell me Pur. 295. what we say or do in the celebration of the Communion which Christ cōmaunded vs not to say and do or what Christ did or cōmaunded vs to do which we do not therein I say that you be answered already that whatsoeuer is therein against the holy Masse of which we vrge you in like sort is against Christes commaundement who said expresly to his Apostles and their Successors being the orderers of the same He that despiseth you despiseth me Luc. 10. Insomuch that S. Augustine talking of such matters condemneth you here cap. 6. pag. 45. of most insolent madnesse onely for calling in question the Masse or any part therof that is vniuersally receiued Of which matter and of your said Apostasie this Demaund following giueth further
occasion 24. Priesthood and Sacrifice Mot. 21.38 Article 13. Heb. 7. In the 24. Demaund being of the Priesthood and Sacrifice I touch your Apostasie at the very roote For S. Paule saith The Priesthood being translated from Aaron and them of his order to Melchisedec or Christ and them of his order it is necessary that translation of the Law also be made That your Heresie of Caluinisme is not a méere Heresie that is a corruptioÌ„ of Christianitie in one or two pointes but a mutation of the whole new Law almost of Christ it commeth of this I say that you haue made a mutation of the new Priesthood And that you haue chauÌ„ged the new Priesthood or Priesthood of the New Testament I shew because you haue chaunged our Catholike Priesthood For this Priesthood wherin we serue came to vs from no other but from Christ and his Apostles The Priesthood that they delyuered our forefathers and we haue to this day kept the same vnchaunged To be perspicuous I come to particulares First the very Apostolike names Episcopus and Presbyter Note that is Bishop and priest we neuer went about to change them you haue labored to change them into these Superintendent and Elder Wherevpon it followeth that you haue chaunged the Apostolike order as it followeth the Apostles to haue chaunged the Aaronicall order because they chauÌ„ged the former names Pontifex Sacerdos for which we haue no English I touched this here afore in the .6 Dem. pag. 231. and you haue no where answered it but I finde where you haue holpen it For wheras the Fathers keeping those new names Isa 66. s 21. yet according to the Prophesie of Esay vsed euermore also the former names considering that the newe order no lesse then the old is a true species of that genus SacerdotiuÌ„ wheras we accordingly do in translating put the English word Priest not only for Presbyter Pur. 283. but also for Sacerdos you sir translating a passage of S. Cyprians do put the Priestes twise where he putteth Sacerdotes but where he putteth Presbyterum you shun the word Priest which is the very same and put your newe inuented word an Elder Secondly you helpe another argument of ours where you say I would desire none other place in all the scripture Ar. 29. Pur. 297. to ouerthrow the Popish Hierarchie which is the gretest glory of their Church then this place of Paule Eph. 4. He speaketh of Apostles Euangelistes Prophetes Pastors Teachers But where are Popish Byshops Priestes Deacons Subdeacons Exorcistes Cantors or Lectors Acolytes Ostiares By this you declare that you haue chauÌ„ged the order Hierarchie or Priesthood of the Primitiue church wherein as it is infinitly Eus li. 6. ca. 34. witnessed you cannot denie but the same degrées were which here you call Popish And doth not S. Paule him selfe in other places make expresse mention of Bishops Priestes Deacons And so you might aswell by your wise reason out of Ephe. 4. ouerthrow S. Paules Hierarchies Who also in the names of Deacons 1. Tim. 3. includeth subdeacons and the other inferiors as in the name of Priestes Tit. 1. he includeth likewise Deacons themselues And the like is common in the auncient Fathers who yet because Deacons or Ministers is a distinct order Sup. p. 251. do like better to call all vnder Priestes by the name of Leuites Pur. 383. because that was the generall terme in the old Law of all the varieties of them that were not Sacerdotes to call all to-together Clerum the Cleargie or in Clericos or in Clericali ministerio constitutos â—yp ep 66 or ad ordinatione clericaleÌ„ promotos Al which termes S. CypriaÌ„ hath in one Epistle with the names of Episcopus and Presbyter Sacerdos coÌ„mon to them both And it is but your ignorance to thinke that S. Paule should haue named them Eph. 4. considering that he speaketh there onely of the ministerie of the word only of preachers vt iam non circumferamur c. that we be not now caried about with euery wind of doctrine whereas these other are belonging to the ministerie of the Altar Which are two distinct offices as you may sée Act. 13. where some preachers had not orders as yet 1. Tim. 5. where some good Priestes do not labour in the word and doctrine Thirdly the Apostles Bishops Priestes were made by other Bishops and Priestes as also with vs it continueth to this day But yours be onely of Lay mens making as of Kings and other Ciuill Magistrates I passe ouer the difference of liuing Single Marrying as a thing extrinsical touched before in the .21 Dem. Pag. 250. Fourthly your selues confesse our orders to be good ynough in that hauing béen ordered by vs you séeke not to be reordered as Cranmer Parker Grindall Sandes Horne c. whereas we as you knowe account your Orders for no orders Ar. 50.51 To this you say You are highly deceiued if you thinke we esteeme your offices of Bishops Priests Deacons any better then the state of Lay men For we receiue none of theÌ„ to minister in our church except they forsweare your religion so their admission is a newe calling to the ministerie How true it is that you receiue none otherwise I passe that ouer But sir A nevv vvay to giue Orders we also make your ministers to abiure yet after that they be but lay men still And I would ask you if two Catholikes abiure with you one a lay man the other a Priest are they both Priests ipso facto O your diuinitie O your scripture As for the Sacraments of Baptisme Matrimonie we doe not iterate them after you though we supply the Ceremonies because a Bishop or a Priest is not the necessarie sole minister of them as he is of the Sacramentes of orders of our Lordes Body Which is a sounder cause then yours of reteining the forme of woordes and for as much as the Sacramentes take not their effect of the minister but of God For herevppon you allowe you say our Baptisme If that be ynough what néedeth Abiuring Yea belyke with you it is the Sacrament of our Lordes Body if a lay man or wooman also reteyne the wordes for as much as the Sacraments take their effect of God What is this but to deny the Priesthood and so to runne hedlong to Apostasie As that also where to defend Pilkinton not to be a mocke Bishop Pur. 343.428 Ar. 72. you bring no more but his excellent learning and diligent preaching Inueying against our Catholike Bishops as vnlearned or vnpreaching and therefore no Bishops Whereas in déede we that knew both sydes by experience can truly testifie that in Catholike Countries where your Desolation could not yet remoue the Orders of seculare and religious Preachers ther is more preaching to say nothing of the stuffe in so many Churches for so many in one yeare
that the vniuersall Churches authoritie was alwayes counted so irrefragable that she would be and was beléeued vppon her onely word in all matters before she yéelded or we could conceiue the reasons of her doctrine And that S. Augustine wrote a booke vpon this against the Manichées which he called De vtilitate credendi Of the vtilitie of beléeuing first before you vnderstand Aug. retra li. 1. ca. 14. Because his friend Honoratus béeing a Manichée did irride in the discipline of the Catholike faith quod iuberentur homines credere that men were commaunded to beleue and not taught by certentie of the groundes certissima ratione what was true Which to our Doctor Fulke is so strange that of D. Allen saying he taketh it to be the naturall order of a Christian schole Pur. 4.5 he requireth to shew where he learned that methode affirmeth S. Paule Rom. 10. to teach a cōtrary order and calleth it a blind faith which must be thrust vpon mens consciences to be accepted before they see what ground it hath Whereas S. Paule doth not say that men must vnderstand the groundes of euery matter before they beléeue for that were contrary to his owne doing who did not alwayes to all at the first speake wisedome 1. Cor. 2. but that they must heare first the Churches preaching to know which be the articles before they can beléeue them And that is it which we say that hearing what the Church teacheth they may be bold to beleue it forthwith although they heare not or can not attaine to the groundes euen as they which heard Christ him selfe and his Apostles after him might boldly beléeue them As he also did worke those Myracles in the beginning to commend his own authoritie credite and thereby to draw vnto him a multitude which multitude should alwayes after him moue the worlde to beleeue as Myracles did at the first Au. de vtil cred ca. 13. S. Augustine in that booke deduceth this at large and concludeth Rectè igitur Catholicae disciplinae maiestate institutum est vt accedentibus ad Religionem fides persuadeatur ante omnia It is rightly therefore apoynted by the maiestie of the Catholike Churches Schole that they which come to Religion be first and formost moued or perswaded by certayne generall motiues to beleeue Wherefore I say that the Protestantes can not possibly be the Church because they do renounce the claime of suche authoritie I say also that neyther they nor no other secte in the world is so happy sure of their faith as we be hauing a Schoole and Masters that we may boldly beléeue in all thinges because Christ hath geuen them the Spirite of truth Ioan. 14. and to vs also accordingly sayth D. Allen the spirite of obedience But therunto Fulke answereth as more at large here cap. 7. pag. 90. That also the Protestantes wil be ruled by their Superiours What simply Ar. 58. so farre as their Superiours are ruled by Gods word Any other submission they allowe not O humble submission of yours who will ouerrule your Superiours as it were by Gods word and O worthy authoritie of theirs who by your owne cōfession may swarue from the truth of Gods word But howsoeuer the Protestantes are affected to their Superiours the Greeke Church with the Moschouites and Russianes in doubtes wil be ruled by their Patriarche of Constantinople and so will the rest of the Orientall Churches by their chiefe Patriarches Bishops though they be not of our felowship and Catholike communion So you say But if you knewe the storie of the Florentine Councell wherein their Patriarches agréed with the Catholike Latines in all thinges and yet could not for all that reduce their Countries from Schisme you would not so say Ar. 83.84 And as towching your grammaticatiō vpon the article of our Créed I beleeue the H. Catholike Church I haue shewed plainly cap 8. pag. 138 out of antiquitie that the meaning of it is according to this presēt demaund I beleue in the H. Catholike Church And therefore you erre where you say To beleeue all and euery thing that the Catholike Church by commō consent doth maintayne is no article of our faith And is not this a goodly interpretation which you bring We say confesse against all Heretikes and Schismatikes I beleeue that there is a Catholike Church or that God hath an Vniuersall Congregation For what Heretike and Scismatike may not say the same And what Catholike may not also cōfesse that there is a Lutherane Church The meaning of the Créede is as I haue sayd I beléeue that to be the true Church whose name is Catholike as in the Articles afore going I beléeue that Christ which is named Iesus and that God who is the Creator and I beléeue all which the same Church doth bid me to beléeue as being the mouth of the Holy Ghost and by her being the communion or company of the Holy so that none be Holy which do not cōmunicate with her I beléeue that we haue remission of our sinnes in the Sacramentes and shall haue Resurrection of our bodies in glorie and for euer afterwardes in Soule and Bodye together lyfe euerlasting All which is the worke of our Sanctification and appropriated in the Créede to the Holy Ghost as our redemption to the Sonne and Creation to the Father In calling this a foolish and false interpretation you do but vtter your ignorance in the auncient Doctors They are the boyes that you count worthy to haue many stripes for their construing it otherwise then thus I beleeue that there is a Catholike Church Suppose the Apostles had said Credo S. Romanam Ecclesiam how would you haue construed it not I beleue that there is a Romane church for so much you may confesse being yet a Protestant but I beleeue the Romane Church And what should that meane but as I haue here sayd out of the Fathers As also against all Apocriphalles to say Credo Sanctas Scripturas Canonicas I beleeue the H. Canonicall Scriptures Item against Manicheus Montanus Luther and all other false-named Apostles or Euangelists of Christ to say Credo S S. Duodecim Apostolos Credo S S. quatuor Euangelistas I beleeue the H. Twelue Apostles I beleeue the H. Fower Euangelistes 35 Vnitie Motiue 27. Arti 15.17 Well of this irrefragable authoritie of Gods Church ouer vs and of our humble submission againe and affection vnto it procedeth I say in my next Demaund our inseperable vnitie Aug. cōtra Epi. Fund ca. 4. Ioan. 17. whiche S. Augustine in his Motiues to the Manichies calleth Confentionem Populorum atque Gentium Consenting of Peoples and Nations in one Which Christ in his prayer for it accompteth a most iust motiue for the world to beleeue in him But Fulke notwithstanding because his Protestantes haue it not Ar. 93. nor can not possibly atteyne vnto it telleth vs that also the Mahometistes and Turkes haue their
then they be the Churches nowe answering whatsoeuer obiections you haue brought against them Ar. 5. Againe you say As for the Popish Church she is so blind that she can not discerne betwene the Canonicall bookes of the Scriprere from the Apocryphall writings as appeareth by receiuing the bookes of the Machabees Ecclesiasticus c. to be of equall authoritie with the bookes of the Law Psalmes c. The Popish Church that Canonized those bookes was the Primitiue although ye call them Heretikes which did it as I haue shewed playnly Pur. 214. and by your owne confession cap. 9. pag. 165. and that you are fayne to saye that also the Primitiue Church therein did erre S. Augustine therefore as he saith to the Manichie denying the Actes of the Apostles Cui libro necesse est me credere si credo Euangelio quoniam vtramque Scripturam similiter mihi Catholica commendat authoritas I must needes beleue this booke if I beleue the Gospell because the Catholike authoritie commendeth vnto me both those Scriptures alike so he saith vnto you denying the Machabées Ecclesiasticus Iudith c. I must néedes beléeue them if I beléeue the Gospell because they also be in the Canon of the same Church as he telleth you playnly here cap. 9. pag. 165. And therefore they are but words when you said erewhile We allow and beleeue the Primitiue Churches testimonie of the word of God And againe Ar. 10.9 We haue most steadfast assurance of Gods Spirite for the authoritie of Gods booke with the testimonie of the true Church in all ages and so we know it to be true You beleue the Gospell for the Churches testimonie euen as much as the Manichies did because you reiect her authoritie Canon in other bookes as they did in the Actes And therefore againe you do but condemne your selfe when you say Ar. 4.5 The Church of Christ commended the bookes of holy Scriptures to be beleeued of all true Christians And againe The Church of Christ hath of the holy Ghost a iudgement to discerne the word of God of infallible veritie from the writing of men which might erre In so saying you both iustifie vs who as we confesse that Church so we beleue her Canon and condemne your selues who confesse it to be the true Church and yet deny her Canon yea and generally her authoritie here in the 34. Dem. holding stiffely that she may erre and did erre in many things and therfore making Only Scripture your ground for all things Wherin how contrarie you be to your selfe any man may sée and I must note it in the next Chapter In the meane time I note Cap. 11. cōtradict 33.34.35 Ar. 8. that you shew your selues not to be the Church that cōmaunded S. Augustine to beleue the Gospell in that you say fréely We do not chalenge credite to our selues in any poynt so presumptuously as the Papistes that men must beleue it because we affirme it but because we proue it to be true by the worde of God By what place of Scripture did either the Primitiue Catholike Church proue to S. Augustine or could you proue to the Manichée the Actes of the Apostles to be of Canonicall authoritie The true Church of all times is of like authoritie and therfore that which was not presumption then is not presumption now But what will not your terme of Only Scripture serue you vnto when by it you argue say Ar. 6. Our Congregation hath euer had both right and possession of the Scriptures as appeareth by this that our Church Congregation beleueth nothing but that she learneth in them And that be not a notable plea to proue a right and a possession yea and a continual possession I report me to your Lawyers What a forehead and face haue you to say A substantiall lye that your companie had euermore possession of the Bible Is it not euident that Luther and all that are come of him tooke their Bibles of the Papistes Leaue your impudent facing it is not your new vpstart Congregation it is our Catholike Romane Church which hath continually kept her possession of this Treasure which she receiued of the Apostles She it is that reiecteth no one booke therof she it is that with Gods spirite hath kept them from corruption of all Heretikes Ar. 5. If also the Arrians Donatists Nouatians Eutichians and other Heretiks receiued all the bookes of Scripture What doth that proue but only that those Heretiks should rather be the true church then you and that we might not vse against them this piece of our argument as we doe against you but this rather that they had those Scriptures of vs and caryed them out with them whē they went out from vs. So did also the Greeke Church Ar. 6. and other Esterne Churches of Asia and therefore If vnto this day they haue kept them neuer so safely they are not for all that the true Church Euery Article of D. Allens is not to proue absolutely that we be the church but some only that you be not the Church When our Church was oppugned by other enemies she knew what she had then also to do So she had hath her proper Motiues against the Iewes and therefore it is a wise Demaund of yours when you say Why are not the Iewes the Catholike Church which haue kept the old Testament in Hebrue more faithfully then euer the Papistes We doe not now encounter with the Iewes but presupposing the Religion and Church that Christ and his Apostles did institute to be true we geue plaine notes how a man may know that the Protestāts haue it not as because they deny some Canonical bookes of Scripture the Churches authoritie which is the foundation of the Canon And therefore that no wise man should be moued when he heareth them to claime it and that by pretēce of Scripture and false carde of Onely Scripture from vs who doe so faithfully beléeue and haue so vncorruptibly keapt all the bookes of the same As for the Iewes old Testament I towched your blindnes therein cap. 7. pag. 103. sufficiently and also your desperate impudencie pag. 103. in charginge the Church with reiecting of the Scriptures 37. Stoarehouse of all Trueth Motiue 29. As in our Church at this day a man may find all the holy bookes which the Church in old time layed vp in her Canon thereof so likewise all other Truthes I say in my next Demaunde which in any of her Councels or otherwise she ruled ouer canonized at any time against any Heresie of her rebells or against any error of her owne obedient children that the Protestantes all other Heretikes haue no truth among them but they had it of our Church which Church therefore I say is now and euer and she onely the Stoarehouse both of Canonicall Scripture Iren. cōtra Heraeses li. 3 ca. 4. and of all trueth beside And therefore againe
yet to couer it as you hope Ar. 96. Pur. 423. For there were manye more Heresies at the firste preaching of the Gospell in and immediatelye after the Apostles time then at the laste restoring of the publike preaching thereof vnto the worlde in our dayes when the Gentiles continued constant and the Iewes without schisme in their errours This is iumpe as I saye in my 35. Demaund That you be not able to alleage anye excuse for your diuision into so many Sectes which the Arrians Donatistes and other olde Heresies might not as well alleage for excuse of their diuisions Aug. de agone Christi ca. 29. and so when S. Augustine noteth that as Donatus went about to diuide Christ euen so he him selfe is of his owne Donatistes diuided euery day into sundry pieces to tell him as you do vs that also in the Apostles time the professours of Christianitie were rent and torne into an hundred Sectes and Heresies You want but that whiche is soone had we know figures and prophetes of another olde Testament and miracles of healing the diseased of all sortes of raysing the dead and such other petite matters to make demonstration that Donatus then or Luther now is another Christ and then we must be forced to graunte that you are as the Apostles and they as you And yet for all that I thinke we should not be forced to graunt that you haue the trueth but rather it would folow per impossibile that the Apostles had not the truth But it is well that the Apostles were not the cause of those Sectes and Diuisions no more then we now their heires be cause of your Sectes and Diuisions Your owne Diuiding of Christ whiche is the Apostles and ours by Senioritie in right possession is the meritorious cause of them as S. Augustine told the Donatistes And the efficient cause is your denying of all Catholike Principles and holding of Onely Scripture and that but so much as you liste of your owne heades and to be interpreted by euery ones priuate fantasie which you call the Spirite Finally your Articles do fitte them all very well in so much that their Sectiones lightly be not made by going from any Article of yours but from some more Articles of ours as the Anabaptistes from baptizing of Infantes from lawfull swearing c. If the case had bene thus with the Apostles the world had neuer beléeued them Ar. 27. 40 They neuer afore now Next after this I note that the Protestantes were neuer in the world before our time Fulk saith With the Apostles Euangelistes and Prophetes we consent whollie in all pointes of Doctrine No not in one point at all vnles it be such a one as with vs also you consent in as I haue shewed cap. 8. and much lesse wholly in all pointes He saith further With Iustinus Irenaeus Cyprianus Athanasius Hilarius Ambrosius Augustinus c. Gildas we consent though not wholly in all pointes of Doctrine yet in the cheefe and most substantiall articles of faith Neither with them in any one pointe in maner aforesaid as I haue shewed cap. 9. Howbeit in this your owne saying you confesse my purpose For Vigilantius Iouinianus c. did muche more agrée with them in the cheefe and most substantiall Articles which you meane and yet were not of their Church could not be nor would not be If you say that you were then in those Heretikes Vigilantius and Iouinianus for I trow you will not say that you were in Aerius the Arrian nor in the Manichées nor Pelagians though they were your parteners in some pointes as we saw erewhile in the 38. Dem. that is a plaine confession that you were not in the Church of the Fathers Yet also that you were not in those Heretikes is plaine by this because they held no more of yours then the Fathers noted them for who would haue noted them also for denying prayer for the dead as they noted Aerius for it if they had denyed it as he did If you say that you were in that Church which went out of sight an 607. as you say here cap. 2. it is a chimera onely of your owne imagination you can not shewe any companie of Christians that departed from that Pope Bonifacius the thyrd and his adherents much lesse that they were Protestantes You come lower to Bertramus Marsilius de Padua Ar. 27.30.33.34.75.77.95.97 Pur. 420.341.344.345 Ioannes de Gauduno al. de Gaudano you call him Bruno Andeganensis Wickleue Iohn Hus and Hierome of Praga with their Bohemians c. as Berengarius Apostolici Waldo with his French Waldenses and Pauperes de Lugduno and Albigenses the Grecian Image breakers the maried Canons somtime in England and Emperours that defended their maried Priestes Of these you say as you did of the Fathers We consent with them in the chiefe and most substantiall articles of faith sauing that in one place where you passe some of them ouer with silence least we should obiect that they held with you but in some one or two pointes Wal. tom 3. ca. 7.8.9 Melan. epi. ad Fred. Micon there you say But Wickleue I wene you will not denie but he was of our Church and Religion Against this ignoraunt wene of yours the Catholike may reade Thomas Waldensis that excellent writer our Countreyman the Protestant may reade Philip Melancthon who report sundrie articles of Wickleues which you your selfe will detest namely humaine merites as Pelagius helde them in so much that Waldensis doth exhort Catholikes to say at euery worde the grace of God as nowe we sée vsed in our language because Wickleue did teache his to haue alwayes in their mouthes merita propria their owne merites And Melancthon saieth Prorsus non intellexit nec tenuit fidei iustitiam Verely he did not vnderstande nor holde the iustification of faith He nameth fiue other pointes of like weight and besides them all Deprehendi in eo multa alia errata ex quibus iudicium de eius spiritu fieri potest Looking in Wicklefe I found in him many other errors whereby one may iudge of his spirite Of Hus the like is written by Luther him self Luther apud Roffen ar 30. Non recte faciunt qui me Hussitam vocant Non enim mecum ille sentit They do not well that call me an Hussite For he is not of my iudgement as there he exemplifieth in the Popes Supremacie c. And how say you to the seditious article as Melancthon calleth it of both Wickleue and Hus Con. Constan Sess 8. art 15.17 touching ciuill dominion that it is lost immediately if the King doe fall into mortall sinne Hauing shewed this in them whom you thought your selfe most sure of I néede not to goe particularly through the rest which otherwise and if it were not too long I myght easilye doe to your confusion For what a poore and fowle shifte is this of yours Whether Apostolici in Bernardes time were sclaundered
meant of the Apostles and their successors the ministers of the Church he teacheth them aboue al other men to looke diligently to their life conuersation for as they excell in place dignitie so the eyes of all men are set vpon them As a citie builded vpon an hill must needes be seene of all that come neare it so they beeing placed in so high an office and dignitie shall be noted and marked aboue all other men One part of the Church is alwayes visible to the eyes of all men and can not be hidden and yet the whole Church and so also that part is not alwayes visible but may be hidden and was hidden for a 1000. yeres So he saith 31 b Ar. 35. Pur. 458. The true Church decayed immediatly after the Apostles time And so the error of praying for the dead was continued frō a corrupt state of the Church of Christ vnto a plaine departing away into the Church of Antichrist Contra The Primitiue pure Church for the space of an hundreth yeares after Christ Againe Ar. 16. Pur. 458. An. 607. The Church fled into the wildernes there to remaine a long season where she hath not decayed but bene alwayes preserued vntill God should bring her againe to open light now in our dayes c Pur. 364. The true Church shall neuer decay but alway raigne with Christ The false Synagoge shall dayly more and more decay vntill it be vtterly destroyed with Antichrist the head therof If this be not contradiction it is much worse to wit that Luther and his Apostles haue giuen vs a visible Church which shall not decay Whereas Christ and his Apostles gaue vs a visible Church which did decay yea and plainly departe away into Apostasie 32 At euery word he calleth the Pope Antichrist and the head of the malignant Church Contra in some places he maketh two distincte heades and their distincte companies Ar. 16.95 As when Mahomet in the East and Antichrist the Pope in the west seduced the world then the Church fled into the wildernes Againe The Popish Church is not in euery parte of the world for Mahomets sect is in the greatest parte 33 That the true Church may erre and hath erred notwithstanding any priuilege it hath by Gods Spirite we hard him say cap. 3. Nowe to the contrarie Ar. 82.81.93.99.62.77.100.108.62 Neither hath the Spirite of God failed to leade her into all trueth Ar. 82.81.93.99.62.77.100.108.62 There be some prerogatiues of Gods Spirite that are necessarie for the saluation of Gods elect as the gift of vnderstanding the gift of faith c And these the Spouse of Christ hath neuer wanted Ar. 82.81.93.99.62.77.100.108.62 True Faith c. might be signes of the true Church The Spouse of Christ heareth the voice of Christ and is ruled thereby The Church of God is the piller stay of truth Ar. 82.81.93.99.62.77.100.108.62 so called because that wheresoeuer the Church is either visible or inuisible ther is the truth Ar. 82.81.93.99.62.77.100.108.62 S. Paul by this title doth admonish Pastors and preachers how great a burden and charge they susteine that the truth of the Gospell can not be cōtinued in the world but by their ministery in the Church of God which is the piller and stay of truth This their duety true preachers considering are diligent in their calling to preach the trueth Ar. 82.81.93.99.62.77.100.108.62 As our Church is the piller and stay of trueth so is she also the house of trueth which knoweth nothing but him that is the trueth it selfe Iesus Christ his most holy Scripture in which this trueth is signed and testified Ar. 82.81.93.99.62.77.100.108.62 We require you to beleeue the true Cathòlike Church onely and immediatly againe to the contrarie We require you not to beleue any one companie of men more then another 34 The error of Purgatorie and praying for the dead is continued from a corrupt state of the Church of Christ Pur. 458. vnto a playn departing away into the Church of Antichrist Contra The true and onely Church of God is so guyded by Gods spirite Ar. 88. and directed by his word that she can not induce any damnable error to continue No nor suffereth any man damnably abusing her religion without open reprehension and yet Purgatorie c. came in with silence 35 Ar. 5.4.9 The Church of Christ hath of the holy Ghost a iudgement to discerne true writings from counterfectes and the word of God of infallible veritie from the writing of men which might erre Ar. 5.4.9 She hath commended the bookes of holy Scripture to be beleeued of all true Christians Ar. 5.4.9 We persuade vs of the authoritie of Gods booke because we haue most stedfast assurance of Gods spirite for the authoritie of it with the testimonie of the true Church in all ages Contra Pur. 219. All other writings are in better case then the Scriptures are with you For other writings may be coūted the works of their authors without your censure the holy Scripture may not be counted the word of God except you liste so to allow it Other writings are of credite according to the authoritie of the writers The holy Scriptures with you haue not credite according to the authoritie of God the author of them but according to your determination Ar. 65. Ar. 82. 36 Those that by true Christians haue bene called and counted for Heretikes haue proued so in deede Contra This Demaund hath a false principle that the Church ought to be a Christian mans onely it is not in D. Allens principle staye in all troubles and tempestes Ar. 65. 37 And therefore the Papistes being called and counted Heretikes of true Christians that is of the Protestantes without doubt are Heretikes in deede Contra He is a foolish Sophister Ar. 66. that reasoneth from names to things as you do most vainely and childishly Ar. 86. Pur. 367. 38 There is neuer Heresie but there is as great doubt of the Church as of the matter in question Contra Augustines argument of the publike prayers of the Church tooke no holde of the Pelagians by force of trueth that is in it but by their owne confession and graunt of that prayer to be godly and them to be of the Church that so prayed But now the controuersie is not onely of the substance of doctrine but of the Church it selfe also The Donatistes chalenged the Church to them selues Ar. 60.61 39 But for the chiefe poyntes of Christian Religion and the foundation of our faith that is Real presence c. the most approued writers are vtterly agaynst you and therefore can not be of your Church Contra But the Lutheranes and Zuinglians as it pleaseth you to call them are of one true Church although they differ in one opinion concerning the Sacrament the one affirming a Real presence the other denying it Out
whatsoeuer wee doe Also To geue to them that are newly Baptised a temper of mylke and hony and from the day of their Baptisme forbid dayly washing all the weeke after v. As touching Purgatorie and Praying for the dead But for Purgatorie and Praying for the dead because his whole booke is of that matter he is most profuse in charging that auncient true Church both fathers and people thereof and therfore I must stand the longer hereabout specially because the Reader shall sée therein as in a notable example to what shamefull confessions against them selues they are driuen whensoeuer they take in hand to answere throughly to any learned Catholike that hath throughly written of any controuersie And first I will shewe what he saith of particular Doctors and their particular times secondly of the whole Churche in some of those times thirdly of the glorious originall that they referre it vnto and lastly of the shamefull original or head that he referreth it vnto and them also for it j. What he saith of particular Doctors and their particular times for it And for the first to beginne alowe and so goe vpwarde Pur. 158. Bernard saith he is a very late writer and therefore his authoritie with vs is of small accompt in such cases as he followeth the common error of his time I take this in the way without our compasse yet not without good cause that conferring the times both within and without those first .600 yeares thou maist beholde how he chargeth both a like Well then to come nowe into our compasse Pur. 166. of S. Gregorie thus he saith When the proofe commeth you leape but 600. yeares from Christ to Gregories Dialogues from which time I will not denie but you may haue great store of such stuffe And not afore that time likewise Theodoret was an .100 yeares before S. Gregory Pur. 123. and what of him and his time Oecumenius and Theodoretus saith he were writers about that time when corruption of doctrine had greatly preuayled Againe before that time from the yeare .430 vp to .360 much about one time these did florish Augustine See M. Rishtons table Ambrose Hierome Paulinus Efrem Chrisostome Basil and Epiphanius And what of them and their time I haue alreadie rehearsed what he saith of S. Augustine vpon his booke De cura Pur. 315.317 that he woulde hold the common opinions receaued in his time and that he was willing to mainteine the superstition that was not throughly confirmed in his time 349. As againe If he had diligently examined the Common error of his time of prayer for the dead he would not so blindly haue defended it as he doth in that booke De cura pro mortuis agenda and else where And againe In celebration of the Sacrament 326. the superstitious error of that time allowed prayers for the dead generally and speciall remembrance of some in the prayers as of Monica Patritius the parents of S. Augustine 78. Againe But Augustine speaketh of the amending fire in the place alleaged by M. Allen. He doth so in deede but Augustine had no ground of that fire but in the common error of his time 161. And againe Concerning Augustine that error of Purgatorie was somewhat risely budded vp in his time Then of Paulinus 322. Purgatorie in those dayes was but euen a breeding and yet not throughly shaped out of prayers for the dead and such other superstitious ceremonies as were vsed about the departed How handsomly he agréeth here with him selfe I dissemble till * Contr. 46.47 the 11. Chapter Nowe of Ambrose and others Ambrose in deede alloweth prayer for the dead as it was a Common error in his time Pur. 320 262. Againe But of memories of the dead and prayers for the dead also we wil not striue but that they were vsed before the times of Beda Ephraim Ambrose Moreouer Chrysostome and Ieronym allowed prayers for the dead 194. 370. Then of Epiphanius Because the olde Liturgies vsed to make memorie of all sortes of men that were dead in Christ he expoundeth it according to the error of his time that this memorie was a prayer for the sinners for the iust as Patriarkes Prophets c a signification that they were inferior to Christ a simple cause why they should be remembred but this shift he is driuen vnto So S. Augustins exposition of the like practise 279.280 August euc 110. ad dul q. 4. saying When the sacrifices either of the Altar or of any kind of Almes be offered for all men departed and baptized for the very good they are Gratiarum actiones thanks giuing for them that be not very euill they are Propitiationes procurements of mercy for the very euil although they be no succor to them being dead yet they are certayne comforts to the liuing He condemneth it likewise in these words These matters stand al vpon a false supposition that any prayers are auailable for the dead which when it can not be proued it is in vaine to shew who taketh profite by them who not And so much of that time yea and of more then that time where he said before the times of Efrem and Ambrose Let vs now ascend to Constantinus Magnus his time who was the first full Christian Emperour and beganne his raigne soone after the yeare .300 Pur. 313. In the buriall of Constantinus sayth he there is mention of prayer for his soule according to the error of the time which was * Inough for any Christian man the time euen of the first Nicen Councell also and he buried in the Gréeke Church at Constantinople Long afore that againe about the yeare .200 florished Tertullian and Origines of that time so he saith after a certaine saying of Origens alleaged By this place it is manifest Pu. 249. that Origen whom notwithstanding here a little after we shall haue for the founder of Purgatorie and the East Churche in his time acknowledged no Purgatorie paines Againe This one testimonie of Origen shall testifie what the iudgement of the Greeke Church was concerning Purgatorie and prayers for the dead from the Apostles time vnto his dayes Pag. To Origens place I must answere in the ninth Chapter but nowe doe you say on I wotte well superstition in the Latine Church was somwhat forwardes in as much as there was the seat of Antichrist appointed to be set vp Where by the waye may be noted his For the .xii. Chapter ignorance being the foundation of his malice that he knoweth not all the old heresies to haue sprong of the Gréekes wherevpon also were holden in the Gréeke Church those first foure generall Councels against them and not of the Latines but contrawise the Romaine Church specially to be commended of the fathers Vinc. Lir. cap. ix Ruf. in expo Symb num iii. For maintaining alwayes most earnestly susceptae semel Religionis integritatem the puritie of
Religion whiche it first receaued neque heresis vlla illic sumpsit exordium and that no heresie did spring there But to our matter that forwardnes in the Latine Churche he confesseth I thinke in respect of Tertullian whose manifest testimonies he coulde not otherwise shift him of and therefore of him somewhere he saith thus I denie that any of the auncient Fathers in Christ his time or Scholars to his Apostles Pu. 435. or within one or two hundreth yeares after Christ except one that had it of Montanus the heretike as he had more thinges besides in any one worde mainteined your cause for Purgatorie or Prayers for the deade Mary Montanus of whom Tertullian receaued his heresie had in all pointes the opinion of the Papistes Againe I will not denie but you haue much drosse and dragges of the later sorte of Doctors Pur. 247. and the later the fuller of drosse But bring me any worde out of any that did write within one .100 yeares after Christ that alloweth prayer or almes for the dead Where as we sée by the later sort of Doctors he sheweth him self to meane such as were without one .100 yeares after Christ But of that one .100 yeares also together with Tertullian and the Fathers afore him vp vnto Christ we shall haue occasion to say more anone in our third Article Hauing therefore thus shewed in this first Article howe he chargeth the true confessed Fathers of the true confessed Church with this error as which he summeth vp together in an other place Pur. 458. and saith The error was continued from a corrupt state of the Church of Christ vnto a plaine departing away into the Church of Antichrist Let vs now sée how he chargeth the same whole true Churche for some time with the same and that the more briefely because we haue nowe so often hard him say of so many times that it was the common error of that time and that time ij What he saieth of the whole Church in some of those times Pur. 382. Thus he saith in one place If we be asked how we can shifte our selues against the generall practise of Gods Churche for all popish assertions and namely this of praying for the dead We answere that we denye the practise to be generall because wee finde it Is nothing generall but that vvhich you find in them not in the most auncient writers that liued within an hundreth yeares and more after the time of Christ But what say you to the later practise which for places then was generall though for times you count it particular And to the particular practise of later times we answere that it is not sufficient to controll the auncient doctrine and primer practise Againe in an other place 370. The same order that was before Epiphanius and error that was in Epiphanius time doe all the later Liturgies followe and therefore saye I all the later Byshoppes and Priestes and people because they vsed those Liturgies making memorie and prayers for all them that are departed in the faith What saye you then to that practise so generall In the memorie of all departed they followe the olde order in praying for all they followe the later error which had chaunged the sacrifice of thankes geuing into the sacrifice of prayer But more of the olde Liturgies nowe in the thirde Article which must be of the originall that the Fathers referred this their practise vnto iij. To what origin he confesseth the Doctors to referre it to wit vnto Scripture and Tradition of the Apostles And here first for perspicuitie I remember to the Reader what S. Augustine saith of fasting August â—pist 86. Casul In the Scriptures of the new Testament Video praeceptum esse Ieiunium I see that fasting is commaunded But what dayes we must keepe fast Non inuenio in illis literis euidenter praeceptum I finde not in those scriptures euidently commaunded And yet the fast of fortie dayes before Easter and some others both he many moe of the Fathers doe say to be Au. in pâ— 110. eâ— 119. cap Hieâ— epâ— Marcel Montaâ— commended vnto vs in the Scripture of the new Testament but specially that it coÌ„meth expresly vnto vs of the Au. in pâ— 110. eâ— 119. cap Hieâ— epâ— Marcel Montaâ— Apostles tradition without Scripture The like they say of prayer for the dead that it is expresly found in the holy Scripture But the certaine times that it is solemnely practised as vpon the burial day the third seuenth thirteth fourteth yeares day and also in a certaine speciall prayer of the holy Masse are they say eyther all or some of them of the Apostles plaine TraditioÌ„ though also commaunded to vs out of Scripture So say the Fathers and for their so saying let vs now sée what this maÌ„ saith of them And to omit because it requireth a longer treatie that he maketh in effect no lesse then heretiks of S. Augustine with others Infr ca. â— Pur. 214 for auouching sacrifice for the dead out of the booke of Maccabées as out of Canonical scripture Gregorie Bernard Bede whoÌ„ D. Allen alleageth vpon the place of Mathew 12 are of opinion Pur. 19. â— Gre. 4.19 Ber. Ser. in Cant Bed in Mar. 3. saith Fulke that sinnes not remitted in this world may be remitted in the world to come But howe happeneth it that Chrysostome and Ieronym which both interpreted that place coulde gather no such matter although they otherwise allowed Prayer for the deade the reason must needes be because the error of Purgatorie growing so much the stronger as it were nearer to the full reuelation of Antichrist Gregorie and Bede sought not the true meaning of Christ in this Scripture but the confirmation of their plausible error Then S. Chrysostome bylike will please him Pur. 251.247 Chris ho. â—4 in 1. cor 15. Such pitie may bring you into the pit of hell Pur. 237. but heare I pray you out of an other place I denie not but that Chrysostome doth alleage this example of Iob sacrificing for his children Cap. 1. for prayers to profite the dead What shall we say Those good men in that declining state of the Church to superstition being destitute of the cleare testimonies of Scripture to maintaine those plausible errors are driuen to such simple shiftes to vphold them as it is great pittie to see Againe But where learned Chrysostome that prayers and almes had any comfort in them for the dead surely he alleageth Scripture but he applieth it madly and yet he often applieth it to the same purpose Pur. 226. Amb. de obit Theod. Alas good man Likewise Ambrose commendeth Honorius the young Emperour for solemnising the funerals of Theodosius his father by the space of .40 dayes after the example of Ioseph Genesis .50 such superstition crept into the Churche first by emulation of the Paganes and after seeking for colourable confirmation in the examples of the
when the matter was brought before the Pope he tooke such blessed order with it as was very méete for his Apostolike See to wit that the Friars new scandalous booke secreto combureretur should be priuily burned for shaming their order say you And what fault was that I pray you Know you not how S. Augustine vsed Pelagius and his disciples in the beginning of their new doctrine when he first wrote against them Tacenda adhuc arbitratus Aug. Retr li. 2. ca. 33. c. I thought good not to expresse as yet their names hoping that so they might more easily be amended Imo Pelagij ipsius nomen non sine aliqua laude posui quia vita eius a multis praedicabatur Yea in my next writing expressing the name of Pelagius himselfe I did it not without some prayse because his life was commended of many Thus did S. Augustin vse one Monke and him the author of a most pestilent Heresie as he proued afterwards And your Christian spirite would haue all the order all Monkes the innocent also shamed for the fault of a few Such would haue bene your care to amend those few and such your prouidence to saue the wheate whereof these fewe might haue made as gret waste if they had not bine wisely handled as Friar Luther now hath made for lacke of a siluer spurre and a Cardinals hatte and as Erasmus also might haue made had he not bene made of by Catholike Bishops farre aboue his merites Yet one shift more you may séeme to haue where you say for your argument ab authoritate negatiuè of the whole Scriptures authoritie negatiuely Pur. 449. And this conclusion M. Allen him selfe made of mans authoritie cap. 13. Purgatorie and prayers for the dead were not preached against at their first entry Ergo they are true or rather there was no such entrie of them as you imagine but they came lineally and quietly from the Apostles But of all mens authoritie it is false you say Howsoeuer the argument of all mens authoritie negatiuely be good or bad who but you would call this such a one All heresies according to the Scriptures Fathers and Histories haue bene preached against at their first entry This was neuer preached against Ergo this is no heresie nor neuer since the Apostles time did enter ¶ Names In the thrée next Demaundes I haue thrée easie and familiar notes by our bare names to know which side is right Ar. 66. and which is wrong To that generally Fulke saith He is a foolish sophister that reasoneth from names to the things In what Logike he hath that axiome I know not But this I know and you shal heare it * In the 7. Dem. See cap. 11. his 37. cōtr Aug. in Ps cōt partem Donat. Ar. 68. anone that also him selfe so reasoneth I know moreouer that S. Augustine so reasoneth Dicitis mecū vos esse saith the Church to the Donatists sed falsum videtis esse Ego Catholica dicor vos de Donati parte You say that you be with me But you see it is false For I am named Catholica and you Of Donates part S. Augustine I trow he will not call a foolish sophister nor him selfe a foolish sophister Againe he saith generally If the onely name of an honest man of a learned man of a good Christian is enough to proue the thing many a knaue asse hypocrite may proue himself an honest man a learned man a good Christian As though we said the argument to be good frō euery name to the thing No syr we say it no more but of thrée sort of names of which the Fathers said it before vs and experience teacheth it and you can not disproue it by giuing any instance For there are in it further reasons then onely arguing from names to things 6. Catholikes Motiue 1. Article 20. First then we say that sith the Apostles did bid vs beléeue that church which is named The Catholike Church euermore to this day they haue ben true Catholikes in déede which were in times of Heresies and Schismes commonly called Catholikes and easily knowen thereby For this we alleage among others S. Augustine wherof you take notice which may be written it is so rare a thing in this your booke against the Articles and go about to answere him with his owne words but very fondly as I haue shewed cap. 9. pag. 182. The rest that you haue is oppositions after your custome As where you oppose to this name your stale exception which here cap. 7. Ar. 69. you oppose to all things of Onely Scripture saying Wherfore howhoeuer you boast of the honorable name of Catholike except you proue that your opinions agree with the Scripture they are not Catholike in dede by Chrysostomes iudgement Againe By this you may see that Chrysostome thought it not sufficient to haue the name of Catholike Your folly in this allegation I detected cap. 9. pag. 172. neither is it Chrysostomes neither doth he speake of the name Catholike nor of the Apostles writings but of the Apostolike Sees writings Ar. 66. Another opposition You your selues will not account the Grecians now since their separation for true Christians And yet as many nations haue since then called them Catholikes as you are able to shew on your side Though they are not so called by you for no more are you so called by them Be bolde to say ynough how litle soeuer you be able to proue To saye the Grecians be called Catholikes is like as to say the Latines be called Catholikes which were forsooth a proper saying considering that not only we but you also be Latines But this I say that as among the Latine or Westerne Christians he that in common talke or writings heareth Catholikes named vnderstandeth vs therin not you so likewise if he heare the Catholike Gretians or the Catholikes of the East whether he be Latine or Gretian he vnderstandeth them that be with the Pope beléeue the holy-Ghost to procéede of the sonne also not the Schismaticall Heretical Gretians And therfore in this example is nothing to the contrarie but that they be true Catholikes which are knowen by the name of Catholikes And so much you say of the name and rule it selfe Now which of vs two haue that name whether we or you Ar. 66. The Heretike Gretians do not call vs Catholikes you say No more do you that be Heretike Latines But yet both you and they mistake not the person when common talke and bookes so calleth vs. Therfore I say we be true Catholikes On the other side you say Ar. 68. And we haue as many Nations and more then you haue that by publike authoritie call vs Catholikes and you Heretikes Who be so called any where by publike authoritie is not the question but who be commonly called knowen by that name Howbeit also of any such publike authoritie no man knoweth but your selfe But this