lives in attempting an imagined liberty due to them by Luthers reformed Dutch Ghospel Whereby our Polititian may learne how ordinarily speaking Gods providence doth chastise wicked men by the same instruments they employ against the Church and Clergy in compassing their politick ends Luther was the occasion of the destruction of the Franconian Nobility which had made him an instrument to destroy the Clergy and dissuaded him from retiring into Bohemia promising they would protect him We may see also how dangerous it is not onely to Religion but to the interest of Princes that liberty which Protestants have of reading the Scripture without any obligation of conscience to submit their judgements in the interpretation thereof to any of their owne Churches When a Religion is made to comply with as many contrary humours and interests as Luthers was we must expect no other fruit of it but sedition and rebellion it is the apple of discord and the occasion of all mischiefs in Christian Commonwealths 6 From Germany this plague of Lutheranisme went into Swethland Swethland perverted Ioan Magnus in Pontif Psal lib. 6. by meanes of one Olaus Peters a Deacon and Luthers Scholler who in the yeare 1523. returning from Wittemberg to his own Countrey became acquainted with Laurence Andrewes Archdeacon of Stronghen an ambitious man the Bishop of that See dying Laurence Andrewes pretended and failed of the Bishoprick which was given to another farre inferiour to him in his owne opinion Olaus Peters tooke this occasion to make him a Lutheran and declare to him that all Christians were Priests by Baptisme and that there was no difference between a Priest and a Bishop but the revenues Whereupon they both declared their errour to Gustavus King of Swethland which he approved of as advantagious to that poore Crowne Therefore he declared to all his Subjects as a learned Scholler of Luthers teaching that Priesthood and Episcopacy were but formalities and privileges depending upon the Prince his will and favour and that it was his pleasure to take all their authority and lands into his owne hands he did not onely deprive the Bishops of their dignities and revenues but imprisoned them all because they opposed the change of Religion and their owne destruction Whereby we may perceive that poverty and coveteousnesse in a King and ambition in a Subject was the ground of Swethlands Reformation 7 In the yeare 1537. Iohn Bugenhagius who had beene a religious Priest put Christierne the Third King of Oenmarke in minde of what advantages his Neighbour Gustavus had made of Luther Doctrine and he upon the same grounds followed so meane an example deposing and imprisoning all the Bishops of his Kingdome who were but seven and made Iohn Bugenhagius Pope of his Northerne climat because he gave him authority to name seven Superintendents that succeded in the Bishops Seas but not in their ordination or revenues which were forfeited to the Crowne and was the greatest fault that the King found in catholick-Catholick-Religion It s great pitty that so many millions of soules doe perish through the coveteousnesse of those two Northerne Princes but the people may curse their Ancestors as much as their Kings who did not attempt the innovation of Religion before they felt the pulse of their Subjects consciences and perceived their soules to be as full of vice as their Countrey is of pitch and tarre and as disposed for heresy and hell as their woods are for fire Luther the Incendiary of all these Countries lived untill the yeare 1546. and died at Isleb where he was borne the 18. of February betweene two and three in the morning after that he had feasted himselfe and beene very merry that same night in the house of his death he pronounced these words to his Disciples Pray for our Lord God and his Ghospel that it may have good sucesse because the Council of Trent and the abominable Pope are great enemies Whether this blasphemy proceeded from Atheisme or drunknesse let Protestants determine my opinion is that Luther was both Atheist and Drunkard though Lutherans call him the Saint and Prophet of Germany Iustus Ionas de morte Lutheri notwithstanding that they acknowledge his last prayer to be the aforesaid blasphemy But now let us goe to the branches of his pretended Reformation SECT II. Of Anabaptisme 1 IN the yeare 1523. Nicholas Stork one of Luthers Schollers saw no reason why he might not invent a new Religion as well as his Master and at length resolved to goe to Switzerland where by counterfeiting revelations communicated to him by Saint Michael the Archangel he gained much credit amongst the simple people and persuaded them what he pleased confirming his mad fancies with texts of Scripture fondly applyed and by the Sermons of one Thomas Muntzer from both these Apostles the Sect of Anabaptists had its beginning their principall errour is grounded upon the words of our Saviour misinterpreted Whosoever will believe and be baptised shall be saved Therefore say they children ought not to be baptised before they come to yeares of discretion and capacity of beliefe or at least they ought to be rebaptised whereas it is cleare by the Scripture and not onely by the practise of the Church in all ages that children ought to be baptised seeing they are reasonable Creatures because Christ commanded his Disciples to baptise all Creatures but the continuall tradition is that whereby this errour hath beene and must be confuted which is the best explication of doubtfull texts of Scripture as Oecolampadius who formerly rejected Tradition as Roman superstition was forced to confesse Lindan in Dubit Prateol Methon Hist Anabap. lib. 5. when he disputed with the Anabaptists at this very time in Switzerland from whence they were banished by proclamation for their Doctrine against the obedience due to civill Magistrats and many other mad fancies whereby they practised bloody practises upon others and even upon themselves they were divided into many Countreys and Sects and in few yeares had more then 44. different Religions as Sebastian Francus doth testify in his history and is very credible because they are a people much given to believe dreames and to take fancies for revelations None is more dangerous then that assurance they pretend to have of themselves alone being Saints and the elect of God excluding all other men not onely from heaven but even from all right to lands or inheritances here upon earth according to the Doctrine of their booke which they intitle Restitution composed at Munster when their Prophets and Kings did domineere in that City Iohn Mathews gave himselfe out sometimes for Moyses sometimes metimes for Enoch and celebrated a Synod at Amsterdam breathed the spirit upon his twelve Apostles and sent them to preach his Ghospel to the world whereof some repented their madnesse others were punished and himselfe was killed at Munster his royall Seate 2 But after him succeeded for Prophet and King of the Anabaptists in the same City Iohn
its greatest height and most part of the English Protestant Doctors being of no Religion at all it was time for Gods vengeance to fall upon their Church which in King Charles his reigne was but a fancy of Christianity indifferent for all heresies and in that sense onely Catholick or universall it was an â—lla podrida of all errours a politick corporation of University men that pretended a neutrality of Religion by applying absurdly their distinction of fundamentall and not fundamentall articles of Faith Finally it was a phantasma or Ghost of Reformation that a distance seemed nothing but when men drew neare and examined its principles it was found to be nothing but weake policy and obstinate heresy almost degenerated into manifest Atheisme SECT IX Of the Kirk of Scotland 1 OF all Princes none ought to be more lamented for the heresy they have fallen into then the Kings of Scotland others perverted their Subjects by policy persecution and ill example but the Subjects of Scotland persecuted their Soveraignes for Catholick Religion and made their young King sweare to maintaine heresy before he had discretion to know what they imposed upon him and his posterity King Iames the V. of Scotland was so zealous a Catholick that in the yeare 1527. he commanded a kinsman of his owne Pathrick Hamilton by name to be burnt in Saint Andrews for his obstinacy and heresy And in the yeare 1533. called a Parliament Leslaus lib. 9. wherein he declared his resolution to live and dye in the Roman Catholick Faith and obedience to the Sea Apostolick as all his Ancestours had done since Christianity was professed in that Kingdome The three States or Scotland swore the same Acts of Parliament were made against all novelties in Religion and to prevent them it was commanded that none of the ignorant and vulgar sort should read the Scripture falsely translated into English but that all should be contented to heare the Word of God from the mouth of their Doctors and Pastors according to the institution of Christ and the continuall practise of his Church 2 In the yeare 1539. a Canon regular two Dominicans one Franciscan and some seculars were burnt for obstinate Hereticks some recanted their errours others were banished But George Buchanan a Franciscan Apostata Buchan lib. 14. escaped out of prison as himselfe relates though he conceales the cause of his imprisonment which was not onely for heresy but for Iudaisme and celebrating the Jewish ceremony of eating a Paschall Lambe with great devotion in Lent This is that mercenary knave who being bribed by Iames Steward the bastard writ so basely and falsely of that incomparable Queene Mary Steward and recounts so many fables and palpable lyes in the history of his owne Nation that the very truths are not believed Beza epist Theol. 78. Beza the Heretick calls him an excellent and most worthy man and Genebrardus graceth him with the title of an Atheisticall Poet and a drunken Buffon Basil Dorc. lib. 2. King Iames had so good an opinion of him that in his instructions to Prince Henry he forbid him the perusall of Buchanan and Knoxes writings 3 Henry the VIII of England jealous to see his Nephew Iames the V. so addicted to France that after the death of Magdalen eldest daughter to Francis King of France his first wife he tooke for his second the Duke of Guises sister desired the said Iames King of Scots to give him a meeting at York The Nobility and Clergy of Scotland opposed this conference as dangerous both to the State and Religion bringing to their Kings memory how Iames the I. his Ancestour had beene kept prisoner in England upon such an other occasion as also how Henry the VIII who had beene perfidious to God and the Church was not to be trusted Hereupon Henry declares warre against Scotland and Iames the V. raises an Army to oppose and prevent Henry by making England the Seate of the warre But because he named a Favorite of his owne to command the Army under himselfe that was not gratefull to the Nobility and people they would not obey nor concurre with their Soveraigne according to their duty This put the King into a feaver whereof he dyed the 13. of December 1542. in the 32. yeare of his age a most gallant and active Prince whole greatest fault and ruine was not to distinguish betweene the duty and the humour of his Subjects a wise Prince must so contrive things that the one be seconded by the other for if they encounter it s twenty to one but the humour of a multitude will prevaile against the duty they owe to their Soveraigne who must humour his people if he will be obeyed and goe their pace if he will be served his owne way but let him endeavour to make it appeare that he hath away of his owne and that he is not at the command of others who are hated or not regarded by those that must doe his businesse when Subjects imagine that they are not governed by their Prince but by his Favorites they often breake out into open rebellion especially if the Favorites seeme to be too imperious and uncivill It were to be wished that the people did accommodate themselves to the humour or their Prince and his Councellours and not impossible if the Prince will choose persons of honour and integrity to assist him that confound not their Masters interest with their owne ambition and passions Whether the King of Scots his Favorite was guilty of any such crime I knowe not but his case hath demonstrated to posterity that nothing can be more fatall to a Prince then to strive against the humour of his Subjects for a Favorite whose fidelities they suspect or contemne his person and abilities And if Kings will thinke it concerns their honour not to part with hated or contemned Favorits because thereby they seeme to condemne their owne choice and judgements let them consider whether it be more for their purpose to be deprived of their Kingdomes or to acknowledge that they are men and may be mistaken in choosing Councellors and Privados Yet if the Councellors grew odious since they sate at the helme the case is altered and the Prince his choice or judgement cannot be censured for removing from the management of affaires persons whose incapacity was not knowne to him before he applyed them to the government of the Commonwealth 4 But in case the unfitnesse of a Favorite for governing great affaires should be so evident that the ill successe must be attributed rather to his want of wisdome and conduct then to fortune if the Prince be obstinate in his resolution of not parting with him he must runne the hazard of being censured not onely void of judgement in his choice but also incorrigible in his errours his first choice may be excused by affection to the person or want of experience his persisting in that choice notwithstanding the continuall miscarriage of businesses must be
established their perfidious Reformation brought up King Iames in their errours the first Protestant King or Prince that by heresy stained the royall bloud and name of the Stewards There is not a family in the world that ought to hate heresy and love Catholick Religion more then his posterity none was so much persecuted by our pretended Reformers and in particular by the English Church as theirs and no Subjects were more faithfull to their Soveraigne then the Catholicks of Scotland were to their Queene Mary Steward But the education of few and tender yeares doth destroy the obligation of many ages and blot out of Princes mindes the memory of their most famous Ancestors CHAP. VI. That no Policy could heretofore or can for the future give any supernaturall appearance to the reformed Churches whereby any rationall persons may be mistaken in their way to heaven by confounding them with the true Catholick Church 1 WHat a great hand Policy had in destroying Religion and setting up Reformation hath beene demonstrated in the former Chapter and Sections I doubt not but the most vulgar apprehensions that did see the change might easily perceive the difference which was betweene the old and new Religion I am also confident all sober men of the last age did looke upon Luther Calvin Cranmer Knox and all their Reformados just as we doe upon Iames Naylor and his Quakers though now many silly soules doe reverence their memories because distance of time makes things looke as unlike themselves as distance of place A brute beast at a distance may be taken for a rationall creature and a beastly reformation may by the helpe of time and policy gaine the credit of a rationall Religion amongst misinformed and weake understandings but it can never looke like supernaturall Faith to any rationall person that will examine the grounds and fundation of it notwithstanding that wicked Clergy and Polititians have endeavoured to dabe it over with the private spirit and their owne interpretation of Scripture 2 There is the same proportion betweene Catholick Religion and Reformation as is betweene ancient Gentry and upstarts Kings out of policy or favour may bestowe titles of honour but all the policy upon earth cannot make a man an ancient Gentleman if he be not one by descent A Nobleman that derives his pedigree from Citizens cannot compare in quality with men whose Ancestors have beene time out of memory knowne Gentlemen It s just so in Religions Men may give to their Reformations very glorious titles as Mount Sion Assembly of Saints Beauteous discipline and what they please but all will not doe The ancient name of Catholick comes by descent and continuall succession not by policy to the Roman Church and not to any other pretending Reformation These new Religions may well become upstarts and new families raised by heresy but methinks the ancient Nobility and Gentry looke odly in this new fashioned faith and seeme to staine their bloud by renouncing and persecuting that Religion which their noble Progenitors for so many ages did constantly professe and gloriously maintaine both at home and abroad 3 Catholick Religion doth not onely sympathise with ancient Gentry in descent and succession but also in their Coates of armes The armes of the Catholick Religion are the supernaturall signes of the true Church visible to the world Put case that a Cheate or Mountebanck disguised like a Gentleman should intrude himselfe into the company of persons of quality in Whitehall and brag much of his Gentry but when he is desired to prove it he should ingenuously confesse that he hath no other evidence for his extraction but certaine interiour motions and impulses to heroike actions questionlesse this Mountebank would be laught at by the whole company This is the case of all reformed Churches that pretend to be the true one or part thereof without any further proofe or evidence for their Religion and interpretation of Scripture then their owne word for a private spirit as invisible in it selfe as in any effect that lookes like supernaturall It s true that many noble families whose Ancestors have beene lions as their Coates of armes testify even to this day have by degrees degenerated into lambes yet they prove by tradition and records that they descend from warlike lions Though the Roman Catholick Church had no miracles nor persons of eminent sanctity of life at the present to shew for their Religion that onely of their Ancestors in former ages would be proofe enough that they professe the right Faith because they have evidence of tradition and records that it is the same with the Faith of those who worked miracles and were Saints but reformed Churches want all such evidences and though records may be forged by Master Mason and others of the English Church neither they nor any private spirit can by all their politick devises counterfeit tradition which must goe further up into antiquity then they can reach by all humane industry But the Lord be praised for it the Roman Catholick Church hath now and had in every age evident miracles and eminent sanctity of life much resembling that of the Apostles and our primitive Fathers whereby our spirit and faith is confirmed to be truly Catholick These armes and signes of Gods Church cannot be counterfeited by Reformers because they are supernaturall and above the spheare of hypocrisy and policy A Puritan may shew the white of his eyes by lifting them up to the Lord and looke very demurely and devoutly a Nags-head Minister may walke in roba longa and weare his suplise black scarfe and square cap but none of them can attaine to an eminent degree of supernaturall sanctity or worke a miracle untill they forsake the Reformation and become Roman Catholicks 4 The pretended evidence of Scripture in favour of Reformation is not lesse ridiculous then the private spirit Let us track our Mountebank Gentleman and follow him to the Courts of Westminster after his being repulsed and laught at in Whitehall for proving his Nobility onely by interiour impulses Suppose he should in the open Court lay claime to some ancient Gentlemans inheritance descended from father to sonne for many ages and should produce no other evidence or proofe for this pretended right but his adversaries owne patent in vertue whereof the ancient Gentlemans Ancestors and himselfe possessed the estate but because some words in the patent may be interpreted by the Mountebanks ambition and coveteousnesse in a different sense then ever they were before that time understood by the learned Judges of the Land our Mountebank must needs be the right heire and dispossesse the Gentleman of his ancient inheritance by misinterpreting the words of the patent absurdly and contrary to their knowne sense and to sentences and practise of the Court since ever Law was of force in England This is the case of all Protestants who pretend that there are cleare texts of Scripture against Catholick Tenets and practises The sense of Scripture which
obedience is equally destroyed by Atheisme and Protestancy Though the signes of a supreme Deity be as evident and visible to the eyes of Atheists as this world and all its creatures yet they deny obedience to that supreme Deity and though supernaturall signes as miracles and sanctity of life be as evident to the eyes of Protestants in the Roman Church and no other as any thing can be yet they deny obedience to the said Church both agree in destroying that principle upon which the obligation of beliefe and obedience is grounded Policy and civill government can as little stand without this principle as a house can without out a foundation Atheists and Protestants doe agree in undermining not onely Religion but also the authority of Princes and Commonwealths and therefore both doctrines ought to be equally prohibited and suppressed 4 In one respect Protestancy is more dangerous to civill government then Atheisme An Atheist expects not any invisible power providence to support him because he believeth none a Protestant persuades himselfe that God will second his zeale for the Ghospel and consequently is more resolute and daring if God to punish the sinnes of others permits a Protestant to have good successe in his first attempts he thinks that successe is a new engagement to proceed further looking upon himselfe as an instrument of providence to carry on the imaginary worke or the Lord. The Atheist thinks of no such providence or engagement but attributeth his successe to his owne industry and is not so fierce constant and dangerous an enemy to the civill government as a Protestant Though all this had not beene evident by reason as necessarily following out of Protestant principles yet its manifest by experience and history as we have seene in this Treatise Chap. 7. but because in the next I am to treate of the tyranny and rebellions of Protestancy I will end this with onely assuring my Reader that Polititians were never more unhappy or more grosely mistaken then in the beginning and promoting a pretended Reformation that doth not onely lead men to Atheisme but makes them incapable of being governed after they have shaken of the yoke of obedience to divine Authority appearing more sufficiently and evidently in the Roman Catholick Church then any Kings authority doth appeare in his Lieutenant or subordinate Officers But now let us proceed and descend to particulars by shewing CHAP. VIII That Protestancy inclines the Prince to Tyranny and the Subjects to Rebellion 1 PRinces may be Tyrants though the Religion they professe be good but that Religion cannot be good which inclines Princes to tyranny A Tyrant is he who rules either without or against Law making his owne will and pleasure the modell of his government To rule against the knowne and practised sense of the Law is to rule against Law because the essence of a Law consists in the sense not in the letter The fundamentall Lawes of a Christian Commonwealth are the holy Scriptures to rule against the knowne and practised sense of these Lawes is the greatest tyranny because it is to rule without and against Law it is to rule without Law because Gods sense is left out and the Reformers fancy or the Prince his pleasure is thrust into its place and Scripture is not Gods Law without Gods sense It is also to rule against Law because the Protestant sense of Scripture is contrary to the knowne and practised sense of Gods Word whereby the Church hath beene governed since the time of the Apostles This proves nothing lesse then I supposed in the title of the Chapter it demonstrates clearly that when Protestant Princes are not Tyrants we may thanke themselves and not their Religion which is directly opposite to the Law of God and inconsistent with the duty Princes owe to divine Majesty whence also it followed that it is an inclination to Tyranny against the Lawes and liberties of the Land because he that governeth without and against the Law or God is in a faire way and at least inclined to governe without and against the Lawes of men 2 I heare some Doctors of the English Protestant Church seeme to be much scandalized at Master Hobbes his Leriathan because he attributes so much to a Soveraigne and saith that Christian Subjects may in the exteriour profession of their Faith accommodate themselves with the Prince whether Turke or Jew I cannot answer for Master Hobbes his Christianity but this much I will say in his behalfe that I have not seene Protestancy better expressed nor more consequently deduced out of its principles then in this Authors Leviathan he is a good Protestant and an ill Christian How can any Protestant sinde fault with Master Hobbes See the 39. articles of the Protestant Religion confirmed by K. Charles an 1642. for making the Prince Head of the Church and sole Interpreter of Scripture Why should 12. or 7. men in King Edward the VI. time or a few Ministers in Queene Elizabeth and King Iames his reigne assume to themselves a power of framing a new Religion and coyning a new sense of Scripture contrary to antiquity and the knowne practise of all Christian Churches and in particular that of England Why should they I say assume this unlimited power to themselves and deny it to their Soveraigne 3. Ed. 6.12 5. Ed. 6.1 and his Counsell If they examine well they will finde Master Hobbes doth no more And if they acknowledge this great power in spirituall affaires to be inherent to the Soveraignes person as they doe 8. Eliz. 1. even by their Acts of Parliament how can they deny him in the temporall as absolute and unlimited a power as Master Hobbes is forced to grant by the foundation and principles of Protestant Religion Doe not the Doctors of the English Church averre that from the Popes Primacy and Headship of the Church must evidently follow an Antichristian Tyranny inconsistent with the prerogative dominion and security of Kings and the liberty of Subjects why doe they not inferre die same consequence from the Soveraignes supremacy I am sure they attribute greater power to their Kings Queenes and petty Doctors then Catholicks doe to the Pope or generall Councells who according to our Tenets cannot pare of any thing from the matter and forme of Sacraments nor alter the ancient sense of Scripture contrary to tradition and the practise of the Catholicks Church but Protestancy acknowledgeth all this power to be inseparable from the Kings and Queenes of England and yet doth confesse that both King and Protestant Church may erre against Christian Faith in their Reformations no Subject notwithstanding must speake a word against those errours he must accommodate himselfe to them in all his exteriour actions though he be convinced in judgement that they are against Catholick Religion I would faine knowe in what doth this doctrine of theirs differre from Master Hobbes Both agree in the substance both grant that men may dissemble their Faith and deny
it is more easy for an Archbishop of Canterbury or any other in the Realme to make ill use of his supreme spirituall jurisdiction in England then it is for the Pope at so great a distance and with so little acquaintance Experience doth demonstrate that the Popes spirituall jurisdiction over all Christendome is not so dangerous as Protestant Lawes and petty Preachers doe pretend Histories doe testify that Popes have restored twenty Kings for one that they are said to depose neither did they ever pretend to depose any King untill his owne Subjects were weary of his tyrannicall government or all the world scandalized at his wicked heresies and in those very cases the Popes never tooke the Kingdome to themselves an evident argument that Religion not interest moved them to take so rigourous wayes whether warrantable or not let others dispute I cannot Yet this much I can assure Protestant Princes that Popes have exhorted their Subjects to obedience and patience when they were most persecuted In case any of his Ministers should be misinformed indiscrete or exceed his commission that fault cannot be attributed to his Master nor to the Religion of Catholick Subjects but rather to the ignorance of Catholick Tenets and of Canonicall Doctrine which commands Subjects to obey though their Soveraignes be not of their owne Religion 3 Kings and Princes by denying obedience to the Pope teach their Subjects to rebell against themselves and doe dispense with oath of alleageance The ground of fidelity and obedience due to hereditary Soveraignes is a constant tradition that he who actually resignes is lawfull successour to one whose right and jurisdiction was undoubtedly acknowledged and indeed there cannot be a more rationall and secure ground of obedience then tradition and a continuall succession of lawfull witnesses from one age to another Writings may be counterfeited Tradition cannot because its impossible to stop so many mouthes as deliver it to posterity or to contradict the testimony of whole Provinces and Nations This is the reason why Hereticks cannot gainesay the tradition of the Popes supremacy though they deny the supremacy it selfe and the truth of that Doctrine yet they are not so madly impudent as to deny what is evident to all Christendome to wit that there was a constant tradition when Luther revolted from the Church that the Bishop of Rome is Christs Vicar upon earth They onely pretend that this tradition is not a sufficient ground to oblige men to believe what it delivered or to acknowledge the Popes supremacy If it be not how can the tradition of one onely Nation be a sufficient ground to oblige Subjects to believe that their Soveraigne is lawfull King of France or Spaine or that they are bound in conscience to obey him There is not any King or Prince in Europe that hath so universall and constant a tradition for his temporall soveraignty as the Bishop of Rome hath to be Saint Peters lawfull successour and of Saint Peters being head of the Church under Christ by divine institution Pasce oves meas Feed my sheepe Joan. 21. and many other texts of Scripture have never beene otherwise understood in the Church by any but by declared Hereticks whose contradicting the tradition and ancient sense of Gods Word can as little prejudice the Popes right and supremacy as a declared Rebell can prejudice his Soveraigns right by calling in question his discent or royall authority When Saint Peters chaire is shaken by Protestant Princes their owne thrones must fall because it is not onely the fundation of the Catholick Church but the support of Christian Monarchy 4 Here I cannot omit to advertise my Reader what poore shifts some of the most learned Protestants are brought to they renew that so often and solidly refuted errour of making the Pope Patriarch onely of the West by misapplying the words of the Nicen Councell Baron an 325. Sirmondus Guther Card. Perron my râ—sp ad Object Reg. Brit. lib. 1 c. 32. 33. and concealing the true translation of the Canon as every man may see in the Authors cited in the margen The title of Patriarch of the West doth no more exclude the Popes supreme dignity of head of the Church under Christ then the title of Earle of Flanders doth exclude that of King of Spaine If the Bishops of Rome were not universall Patriarchs but Patriarchs onely of the West why did Saint Victor Pope in the second age of Christianity excommunicate all the Churches of Asia Euseb 5. hist 24. cap. 25. Spond 198. upon the difference of celebrating Easter for not accommodating themselves to the Roman Sea And though Saint Iretaeus did not approve of so great severity yet neither he nor any other called in question his authority They are also pleased to make the Pope Speaker in the generall Councells but not President they allowe him the place of first Bishop and call him exordium unitatis with Saint Cyprian but by no meanes will they grant him the title of infallible and supreme Pastor These are but weake and pittifull shifts whereunto Protestants are driven by the evidence of Councells Fathers Tradition and Catholick arguments contrary to the Tenets and Doctrine of their brethren of the late Church of England If the Pope be exordium unitatis he must be infallible in deciding the controversy proposed otherwise he will be exordium divisionis because no learned persons will submit their judgements in matters of Faith to a Judge that may be mistaken they will be as farre from his sentence and thoughts as from any other and the unity of Faith whereof Saint Cyprian speakes consists more in an unity of thoughts of judgements then of speech or exteriour acquiescence Such a dumb unity of Faith hath its beginning from Policy not Religion 5 They excuse themselves from the guilt and crime of Schisme as ridiculously as they impugne the Popes supremacy They accuse us Catholicks for the fault themselves committed because forsooth they left not our communion untill we thrust them out of doores It may be as well said that the Judge and not the thiefe is the malefactour because the Judge pronounced sentence against the thiefe The Roman Catholick Church had no more part in the Schisme of England then to declare Henry the VIII and Queene Elizabeth Schismaticks and Hereticks They committed the crime and the Pope pronounced the sentence Therefore the Roman Church or Court is guilty of Schisme is an excellent Protestant consequence But such fopperies we must expect from obstinate Hereticks that with a perverse will oppose no lesse their owne understandings then Catholick verities The Pope say they imposed new articles of Faith upon their tender consciences he made a new Creed and declared it was necessary to believe the same Therefore he was cause of the Schisme The same argument that the Arrians made against the Councell of Nice and Saint Athanasius his Creed doe these Hereticks now object against the Councell of Trent and Pope
the penall Lawes were enacted but it was a crime to be an Heretick or Apostata before the ancient Emperours and Kings made penall Lawes against heresy The Law supposed and did not make the crime as penall Statutes doe in England making a crime of Christian Religion 2. Hereticks are never condemned by the Inquisition without the testimony of many lawfull witnesses both living and dead all the ancient Fathers Councells and the whole Catholick Church of former ages testify that their errours are new and contrary to the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles no Rebell was ever more evidently convicted of rebellion against his Prince then Hereticks are by the Inquisition of heresy against God and the Apostolicall Church We Catholicks cannot obtaine so faire play at their hands we are condemned by a new Law because we are not Hereticks and our Judges are convicted of the crime they lay to our charge Surely this is to turne upside downe Justice and Judicature 3. The Inquisition medleth not with those who never were Catholicks but the penall Lawes comprehend them who never were of their Church or communion 4. The Inquisition condemns no Hereticks to death but onely declares their heresy to the end the faithfull may avoid their conversation its true the secular power executeth the secular against them notwitstanding that the Inquisition doth protest against that rigour and desireth that Hereticks may not be punished with death or effusion of bloud this protestation and petition is now and hath alwayes beene the continuall practise of the Roman Church but the penall Lawes of Protestants are written with bloudy caracters all their Courts are stained with the innocent and noble bloud of many learned and loyall Subjects onely because they would not take an oath against their conscience and abjure the Faith of their Christian Ancestours 5. Though the Inquisition were as unjust and rigorous as some of the ignorant Protestants pretend it could be no blemish to the Catholick Religion because it is not an universall practise but limited to Spaine and Italy at the instance of secular Princes who looke upon it as a necessary meanes to keepe their Subjects of those Nations in the feare of God and in awe of their Soveraignes But the penall Lawes of England are spread as farre as their Protestant Church and communion 6. The Inquisition doth seriously wish and endeavour the conversion amendment of Hereticks employing learned Divines to convince them of their errours and instruct them in the way of salvation but the penall Lawes and the oathes of supremacy alleageance and abjuration are like so many nets cast out by Protestants to fish estates in troubled consciences a farre different method from that of the Apostles who were fishers of men and not of estates Protestants fish for estates though not alwayes with successe In King Iames his reigne a Scot begged of his Majesty an English Catholicks estate to whom he procured that the oath of supremacy might be tendered never imagining that the Gentleman would take it or goe to Church and damne his soule to save his estate the Gentleman offered the Scot a faire composition but nothing would satisfy this beggar if he had not made the Catholick also a beggar who at length resolved to shew himselfe in the Church whereupon the Scot made him a most devout and learned exhortation dissuading him from all Protestant assemblies often repeating and explaining the words of our Saviour What doth it availe a man if he games all the world by the losse of his sale Yet the English man remained obstinate and resolved rather to give his soule to the Devill then his estate to a Scot. I believe there are many such beggarly Preachers now adayes in England if they consider well the text of the Scots Sermon they may apply it better to themselves then to Roman Catholicks 6 The last pretext for persecuting of English Catholicks is the massacre and murther of Protestants in Ireland in the beginning of the late troubles and this must be a preamble to all Proclamations and Oathes of abjuration What hath an English Catholick to doe with an lrish massacre I am sure he doth not thirst by nature after the bloud of his owne Nation and his Religion doth neither incline him to murther or rebellion That is a privilege of Protestancy we have a setled sense of Scripture which none can alter without breach of Catholick Faith and we are not Judges of our owne Controversies but must submit to a third and indifferent person But as for the murthers and massacres of Ireland so much and so often exaggerated in Protestant Pamphlets and Pulpits I onely say that Protestancy had a greater hand in them then Catholick Religion because our Tenets arc contrary to cruelty and bloudshead and though Catholicks may be as guilty of murther as other men the Religion cannot Is it not notorious that the Protestants in Ireland signed a bloudy Petition offered to the Parliament of England that all Irish who would not goe to Church might be extirpated or banished This was done before the Irish Catholicks did stirre But suppose that in Vlster some of the rascality or kernes being exasperated by so many and continuall injuries done to them by Protestants had murthered some persons must that reflect upon the English Catholicks and all the Irish Nation It is most certaine and evident that the murthers and massacres done in Ireland by Protestants exceeded without comparison those committed by Catholicks as well in respect of their brutishnesse as numerousnesse Witnesse their marches about Dublin where the Inhabitants were all of English extraction and spoke no other language but the ancient Saxon. There are very few of that populous Countrey called Fingale left alive all perished by fire and sword being a most innocent people and having nothing I rishlike in them but Catholick Religion In the march of the Protestant Army to the County of Wicklo man woman and child was killed a Gentle woman big with child was hanged at an arch of a bridge and the poore Catholick that guided the Army for reward of his service at parting being commanded to blow into a pistol was shot therewith into the mouth though there had beene no murther committed on the Protestants in that County In another march into the same shire one Master Comain an aged Gentleman who never bore armes was roasted alive by one Captaine Gines yea they murthered all that came in their way from within two miles of Dublin In a march into the County of Kildare in or about February 1641. some of the Officers going into Mrs Eustate of Cradogstons house a sister to Sir William Talbot of eighty yeares of age who being unable to shunne entertained them with meate and drinke after dinner her selfe and another old Gentlewoman and a girle of eight yeares of age were murthered by the said Protestant Officers Walter Evers Esquire aged and sickly and of a long time before the warre bed-ridden being carried by
progresse SECT I. Of Lutheranisme 2 Martin Luther was a Saxon borne in a Lordship of Count Mansfeld Sur. in Commentar alij I will not affirme that his father was an Incubus though others seeme to doubt little of it I believe their best proofe was his intimacy with the devil which himselfe doth acknowledge in his writings The 22. yeare of his age he was frighted into the Order of Saint Augustin by a thunderbolt that killed his Camerade both being in the fields for recreation He taught Philosophy to his owne Friers and Divinity in the University of Wittemberg which Frederike Elector of Saxony Luthers greatest Protector had founded Pope Leo the Tenth in the yeare 1517. granted Indulgences to all that would voluntarily contribute money against the Turke who threatned all Christendome committed the charge of it to Albert Elector of Mentz that had no good correspondency with him of Saxonny this coldnesse betweene the two Electors was that which made Frederike so hot in maintaining Luther and his Doctrine against Indulgences which first he preached and afterwards printed because he was not chosen to preach for them having a good talent and it being the custome in Germany to make use of Augustin Friars to publish Indulgences But the next yeare after Luther writ to the Pope excusing his Doctrine and submitting himselfe to his judgement yet when he was certainly informed that his Holinesse would condemne it he appealed from the Pope to the next Generall Councell◠which is the ordinary shift of Hereticks and Polititians seeing at length that the Universities of Paris Lovaine Cullen and others had commanded his writings to be burnt and that his errours did not take much with the people because he had not as yet broached any inelining to lust and liberty he resolved to retire into Bohemia amongst the Hussits this resolution was stopt by the Elector or Saxony and some of the prime Nobility of Franconia who doubted not to make good use of Luther against the Clergy whose lands and goods they coveted promising him their protection Whereupon he to gratifie his benefactors and strengthen himselfe by a popular faction printed a booke and dedicated the same to the German Nobility exhorting them and all good people to joyne with himselfe in reforming the Catholick Church so much neglected and notoriously corrupted in Doctrine by the present and ancient Clergy Cochlaeus de act Luth. Vlen berg in vita Lutheri Florim de orig haeres Prateol de haeres alij 3 And that they might not seeme to intermedle in matter which did not belong to their jurisdiction and function he assured them in his booke that every Christian was a Priest because in the new Testament there was no distinction betweene Baptisme and Priesthood from whence he concluded all that which they aymed at to wit that seculars had as much right to Church-livings by their Baptisme as Bishops or Priests by their Ordination And to the end that the Emperour and Christian Princes might be engaged in his quarell against the Pope and Bishops he inculcated to them that they were subject to none even in spirituall matters but to God that the Popes supremacy was an usurpation and that Episcopacy was against Gods Law incompatible with true Religion in confirmation whereof he printed this Bull the Preface was Attendite Episcopi c. Attend ye ô Bishops nay rather marks of the devil Doctor Martin Luther readeth to ye a Bull which will not be gratefull Doctor Luthers Bull and Reformation Whosoever doe contribute their endeavours with body goods and fame to destroy Bishopricks and abolish the government of Bishops they are children of God and true Christians observing the commandements and resisting the Devils ordinations or if they cannot doe this at least they must condemne and shunne that government On the other side whosoever doe defend Bishops government or voluntarily obey them they are the Devils proper Ministers and resist Gods Law and Ordinations dinations Besides this Bull he writ a booke intitled Adversus falso nominatum Ecclesiasitcorum statum Papae Episcoporum Against the false Ecclesiasticall state of Pope and Bishops 4 Now that he had fitted as he imagined the humour of Kings and Princes and awakened their passions of coveteousnesse and ambition against the Church-livings and dignity of the Clergy he thought it necessary for the carrying on of his designe to comply with the genius and liberty of the vulgar people and make his Religion plausible amongst the ignorant multitude by assuring them that Faith alone without good workes was sufficient to save men putting the word alone in the very text and not in the margen of Scripture Not content with this he resolved to drawe many of the vicious and ignorant Clergy to his side by writing a booke De vita conjugali Of a married life wherein he condemneth vowes of chastity exhorteth Priests and Religious to marriage and married men to make use of the serving mayde in case the wife be humorsome if either party commit adultery the innocent may immediatly choose another husband or wife and if there be no hopes of children by the husband his brother or next kinsman may supply the defect The ground of all this Doctrine was Crescite multiplicamini Gen. 1. Encrease and multiply So that by this text fondly applied and by corrupting another and adding the word alone to Faith honest Martin Luther framed his new Protestant Religion and cited Scripture for his Reformation according to the custome of Hereticks 5 And that men might be the more inclined to embrace and more obstinate in adhering to these heresies Luther with the helpe of Philip Melanchton published the new Testament in high Dutch rejecting altering and adding whatsoever he thought fit for his purpose by which device he engaged the ignorant as much to their errours as to their owne proper judgements making themselves judges of Scripture and Controversies and at length or their Lords for taking themselves to be learned and well versed in Gods written Word they raised an Army for defence of the Euangelicall liberty of Luthers Ghospel which they conceived was not granted them by their Masters and therefore the Clownes drew their Remonstrance Cothlae de act Luth. Sur in Comment Erasm in Hyperasp and demands in twelve articles which Luther approved of and caused to be proclaimed in Saxony exhorting the Lords to grant all which the Clownes desired and laying to their charge the fault of all inconveniences which were like to ensue if they did oppose his Ghospel and the Clownes designes but seeing that this failed and that the Lords had the better he writ against the Clownes upbraiding them for their rebellion and exhorted their Masters to punish their disobedience the conclusion was that he embroyled all Germany and that in Franconia alone above two hundred Noblemens Castles and Monasteries were destroyed and in few moneths more then a hundred and fourty thousand peasants lost their
a meane betweene both assertions and that was to be present by faith or by a pledge a poore one God knowes if it be onely a morsell of bread and a cup of wine It s better take Christ at his word then rely upon Calvins pledge Neither himselfe nor any of his Disciples could hitherto speake sense when they declared their sense and Doctrine in this particular and no mervaile seeing there can be no sense in a meane betweene two contradictions for either Christ is realy present in the Sacrament or he is not realy present whether the reality of his presence be after a spirituall or corporall manner is not the question a spirituall presence is as reall as a corporall To say that Christs body and bloud is not realy in the Sacrament by themselves but onely by our faith is as much as to say that they are not there though we believe they are which is not Catholick and true faith because we are mistaken However this nonsense served Calvins turne because it was a new Chimaera and much applauded by his first foure Disciples Anthony Duguius Philip Veronius Albert Babinot and Iohn Vernovius to whom he infused his spirit and sent them to preach his Doctrine in divers parts of France and distribute his fantasticall communion But when it came to his cares that some who denyed the reall presence were cruelly tormented and put to death in Paris he thought fit to retire to his old Master Rusus and partake with him of the Queene of Navars protection resolved not to suffer that Martyrdome to which he had so devoutly and earnestly exhorted others 3 After some time he parted with Rufus and repaired to Basile where he published his Institutions in French that at least the language might incline ignorant people to believe that the worke was his owne In the beginning of his booke he put a fiery sword with this Motto Non veni pacem mittere sed gladium I come not with peace but with the sword Never was the designe or effect of any booke better expressed there is not a Countrey where it was received that felt not the sad effects of warre fire and sword being as inconsistent with peace and obedience to the Prince or Magistrate Calvin in 5. Daniel as with Catholick Religion It teacheth Subjects not onely to rebell but also to spit in the faces of their Soveraignes in case they oppose Calvins Doctrine or discipline 4 In they care 1535. in the moneth of August the Citty of Geneva revolted from the Catholick Church their lawfull Prince and Bishop banishing him and his Clergy The Ringleader of all this mischiefe was one William Farellus a Frenchman by birth a Jew by descent and an Heretick by profession The instrument whereby he effected this worke was Amicus Perrinus a man of great power in Geneva and Captaine of the Militia so bitter an enemy to Priests and the Masse that he commanded the Altar stone of the Cathedrall Church to be carried out of Towne and laid in that infamous place where malefactors were accustomed to be executed that it might be stained with base bloud of theeves and murtherers but God permitted that Perrinus himselfe should be the first diabolicall sacrifice offered upon the Altar stone which he had prepared for others upon which he was beheaded at Calvins instance because he opposed his discipline and ambition though the pretext was a pretended conspiracy intended by Perrinus as Calvin said against all the French fugitives that retired to Geneva to enjoy the liberty of their errours and learne Calvins new Doctrine who had beene some time before called thither by some friends that lived in the Citty But being proud and forcing his discipline upon the people both he and Farellus were banished from Geneva in the yeare 1538. Calvin retired to Stratzburg where first he taught a Schoole and afterwards tooke upon him the care of a Church which the Magistrate granted to the French Hereticks Here he tooke to wife an Anabaptists widdowe and though I have nothing to say against his marriage because I doe not read that ever he received holy Orders notwithstanding that he had two benefices conferred upon him when he was yong yet much is writ by others of his dishonest life the Lord of Fallarie his wife was forced to goe live at Lausanna to be rid of Calvins importunity and adulterous attempts the Lady of Mong is was not so honest she left her husband at Lausanna and lived incontinently with Calvin at Geneva 5 During his banishment his friends were very earnest with the Magistrate for his returne which was not onely permitted but decreed and he invited solemnly by the Senate not doubting by his meanes and credit amongst new Sectaries to strengthen much their petty Commonwealth of Geneva Hooker in his Preface of Eccles Policy But Calvin knowing how much they imagined it was their interest to have him refused to come if both Magistrate and Pastors would not be solemnly sworne to observe that forme of discipline which he would establish The civill regiment of that Towme was popular and the spirituall government at that time was at the discretion of their Pastors it was not for his purpose to be at the mercy of either Layty or Clergy neither could his ambition and pride brooke any such subjection Wherefore after they had taken the oath which he exacted seeing it was impossible to make himselfe Bishop the very name being odious and the reality much more in Geneva having annexed to it an absolute dominion over that State he framed his discipline to the humour of the people in outward shew making it plausible by composing his Ecclesiasticall Court or Consistory of lay Elders double in number to the Ministers whereby all would be at his owne disposall because the Elders though more in number were changed every yeare and would not dare to oppose the Ministers that continued in office and these were all his owne Creatures so that all served for nothing in the Consistory but to countenance and put in execution Calvins decreer He sate in his Ecclesiasticall Court more absolute then any Pope having no rule to be guided by but his owne fancy and any text of Scripture which he pleased to accommodate to it the private spirit being sufficient ground for the most impertinent and absurd application 6 It is the opinion of many that Calvin was a more politike heretike then Luther and that he shewed it in his Religion and discipline It is certaine that Luther was more learned and more resolute then Calvin who if the truth were knowne did but steale from Luther even his private spirit to which Luther and all Protestants recurre when they are pressed with evidence contradicting their errours His doctrine of denying the reall presence and his making worship of Images idolatry he tooke from Zwinglius and his Camerades so that all considered we finde that Calvin had but very little or nothing of his owne in his
Religion but his discipline The reason why Calvin rejected all ceremonies in his Church was Luthers ill successe in admitting and framing some This mad fellow tooke upon himselfe the authority which he denyed to the Catholick Church composing a Masse and ceremonies of his owne but soone repented his folly when he perused Iodocus Clictoveus his booke confuting his fond presumption to which Luther could never answer This made Calvin so great an enemy of Ecclesiasticall ceremonies 7 Though he hated ceremonies he coveted miracles because they are necessary to make a new sense of Scripture and a new private spirit prudently credible his bare word was not a sufficient testimony of the truth without some supernaturall and visible signe to confirme it Calvin therefore persuaded one Brullen a Frenchman of his owne Sect in Geneva to feigne himselfe dead and when he would bid him rise in confirmation of his Religion spirit and discipline to obey and tell the spectators newes of the other world The agreement was made Brullen was to have so much money his wife gave her consent because she was poore and they communicated the matter to her it being impossible to conceale it from her knowledge To be briefe the supposed death of Brullen was published Bolsee c. 11. Lang c. 13. and none lamented it more then Calvin considering the distresse of his wife and family Out of meere compassion he repaires to the house declaring the affliction of his spirit to all who met him but withall giving them hopes of a miracle whereby the sanctity of his owne life doctrine and discipline might be made evident As soone as he fixed his eyes upon the supposed dead Corps he lifted them up to the Lord and desired his faithfull brethren to joyne with him in prayer that God might command Brullen his soule returne to his body and Calvin naming him bid him rise and declare to all present Gods sense of his doctrine and discipline The wife seeing her husband did not rise and that really he had signes of death in his face drew nearer and by experience found that Brullen was dead indeed Whereupon she cryed aloud and declared to all the people the story accusing Calvin of being not onely an Impostor but a murtherer both he and his friends sneakt away and never afterwards attempted to worke miracles which now he hated as much as ceremonies Such another miracle doe we read of Cyrola the Arrian Greg. Tur. 2. hist 3. who by touching the eyes of one who feigned himselfe blinde was realy made blinde by that hereticall hand but Eugenius the Catholick Bishop of Carthage restored him his sight againe by making the signe of the crosse upon his eyes These Hereticks were rather Cheates then Politicians weake policy doth betray it selfe at length and when it is applyed to the discredit of the true Religion and establishment of heresie God is so much concerned in the discovery of these petty plots and tricks that its impossible they should have any effect The Lutherans did so laugh at Calvin for this successe that neither himselfe nor his Disciples could abide to heare the word miracle pronounced 8 The Calvinists had no other way to stop their adversaries mouthes but by casting in their teeth the onely miracle which Luther attempted to worke A poore woman was brought to Wirtemberg to be dispossessed by him Staphylus in prodro apol 2. Genebr Chronol lib. 4. in Paul Sur. in Comment Martin refused to intermedle in the matter being fearfull of the successe But perceiving that his backwardnesse made others for ward in censuring and contemning both in his person and doctrine he resolved to venter and try what his exorcismes lately composed by himselfe would be able to doe The man was led to the Vestiary of the Parish Church thither repaired Luther accompanied with his disciple Staphylus who writ this story and begunne in a grave and severe tone to command and threaten the Devill who laught at Martins folly and impudence seeming to say How now friend Are we not better acquainted then so Doest thou imagine to conquer me with the armes I put into thy hands The Devill might lay claime to Luthers exorcismes Luther de Missa angulari Sacerdotum consecrat as well as to his doctrine in other points which himselfe acknowledgeth to have learnt of the Devill and to have eaten a bushell of salt in his company We may judge what a ridiculous object it is to see a Pâ—otestant Minister exorcise or pretend to performe any Ecclesiasticall function or ceremony when Martin Luther the Apostle of Protestancy looked so absurdly and despicably in the Devills eyes that instead of being exorcised he did exorcise Martin and did so fright him that he attempted to leape out at the window the doore being made fast by the Devills art untill at length Staphilus who had more courage broke open the dore with a hatchet but was almost stifled fot his paines with a most abominable sent occasioned by Luthers feare Hereticks may counterfeit miracles but never worke any in confirmation of that doctrine wherein they differ from the Roman Catholick Church in confirmation of our Tenets against Hereticks we have continuall miracles and we read of Jewes that escaped dangers and Devills by making the signe of the Crosse and though Protestants should doe the same in confirmation of the Trinity or any other Tenet of Catholicks that would favour Protestancy no more then Iudaisme As for the Kings of Englands gift in curing the Kings evill if any such thing there be every seventh sonne hath the same as many say or other as extraordinary privileges and if it be a supernaturall miracle they owe that grace to Saint Edward the Confessor a knowne Roman Catholick to whom and not to their owne merits or Protestant Religion they must attribute all their cures Calvin dyed in the yeare 1564. the 27. of May in Geneva invoking the Devill Laing Franc. Balduinus Claudius Sancterius Guiliel Lindanus Hosius Florim Prateol Rescius alij de morte Calvini blaspheming God cursing himselfe his studies writings doctrine and discipline as Hierom Bolsee his owne Scholler and many more his domesticks and friends testify though Beza who never told truth affirmes that he delivered his soule in peace I am sure his Sect which is more violent then politick hath occasioned so many warres and rebellions that Calvinist Princes doe not desire to make their Subjects of their owne Religion SECT V. Of the Reformation in Holland and the other united Provinces 1 IN the yeare 1565. the Hereticks of France sollicited their brethren in the Low Countries to a rebellion and Reformation for these two sisters goe alwayes together The Prince of Orange tooke this opportunity and advised the malcontents to send Agents to King Philip the II. humbly desiring his Majesty would be pleased to recall his Fathers severe Lawes against novelties in Religion and that Cardinal Granvile and the Spanish garrisons might be removed
world if in the other he must for all eternity be but a coale to keepe in and inflame hell fire 8 In the yeare 1564. Queene Mary Steward after her returne from France married the Lord Henry Steward a Prince of the bloud royall both of Scotland and England and though Murray the Queenes base brother advised her to marry this same Prince he joyned in rebellion with the Hereticks and other seditious men against her Majesty for marrying but they were soone quasht and the heads of the faction retired into England where with Queene Elizabeth they brewed a new rebellion and to give it a better colour and successe then the former had it was thought expedient to sowe sedition and jealousies betweene the Queene and her husband who having but 22. yeares of age and being high minded had not from her Majesty that unlimited power which he desired This restriction of the yong Prince his authority was thought to proceed from the advice of David Rizius the Queenes Secretary a grave and understanding man and a severe observer of hereticall designes The Lord Henry Steward being persuaded by the Hereticks that this old man was the onely obstacle of not having all the government in his owne hands resolved to dispatch him out of the way and to that end leads a company of armed Hereticks into the Queenes chamber she being at supper and great with child of King Iames at her feete whither he repaired for protection was the poore Secretary murthered and the Queene so barbarously dealt withall that it was strange she did not dye in the place or miscarry which was all that the Hereticks aymed at But her husband reflecting upon his passion and folly being also advertised by some of the company that the Hereticks made him but an instrument of his owne ruine he entered to the Queenes chamber with pretext of causing her to signe a paper in favour of the murtherers and there acknowledging his fault both got away privatly to the Castle of Dumbar raised forces dissipated the Army of their Enemies some whereof were executed but Murray the bastard that plotted all the mischiefe was pardoned at the instance of Queen Elizabeth who was resolved by this Hereticks meanes to destroy his Sister the innocent Queene of Scots as afterwards happened 9 Prince Henry Steward considering that Queene Elizabeths kindnesse to the bastard Murray was grounded upon her hatred to his Queen and himselfe was resolved to prevent his owne death by permitting Justice have its right against a man who employed all his thoughts in rebellious designes he communicated his resolution with the Queene but she being of a more mercifull and mild disposition then the times and troubles required disswaded her husband from putting him to death though even after his last pardon there was proofe enough of treason He perceiving that the Prince looked upon him as a Traitor dealt with his confederats about murthering the Prince and promised to Iames Heburne Earle of Bothuel that he should be married to the Queene if he would kill her husband the rest of his hereticall Cabale put their hands to this engagement whereupon Bothuel murthered Henry Steward in his bed not farre from Edinburg at a Countrey house whether he had gone for his recreation and afterwards tooke the Queene prisoner as she was returning from visiting her child King Iames who was nursed at Sterling Bothuel forced his prisoner to be his wife assuring her no other hopes were left for her selfe other sonne to survive Prince Henry but his protection who was of great power amongst the hereticks as then he imagined but the contrary was soone discovered for the very same hereticks that set him upon killing the Prince and marrying the Queene raised an Army to ruine him and professed to the Queene they had no other dâ—signe in raising forces but to revenge the death of her husband whereof they knew Bothuel to be the Author and humbly desired her Majesty would be pleased to deliver him up to Justice and receive them into her grace protesting to live and dye in her obedience Bothuel was delivered to their hands whom they let escape but the poore Queene contrary to their oath and engagement was not onely made prisoner but reviled and afronted in the highest degree laying to her charge that she had murthered her husband and to make her odious and infamous to the whole Kingdome and Christian world they carried before her all the way to Edinburg the picture of her husband dead with many wounds and her little sonne painted by his fathers corps praying to God for justice against his mother This is the faith and fruit of heresy and policy When Polititians heads direct Hereticks hands we may expect nothing but such tragicall stories as this is Queene Elizabeth by destroying this poore Lady aymed at the establishment of her owne usurpation and security Murray by her death had hopes to governe Scotland Knox Buchanan and the rest of the hereticall crue looked upon the setling of Calvins Reformation and Discipline and to that end advised that the innocent Queene should be put to death of the same opinion was her good brother the bastard Murray but that glory was reserved for our Virgin Queene of England whose malice could not be satiated with afronts afflictions and many yeares imprisonment untill at length upon a publike stage the most vertuous and renowned Queene of Scots lost her head against the Law of Nature and Nations by the command of a Iezabel that cruell head heart and darling of the venerable Protestant Church of England 10 Before it was resolved by the Assembly of Hereticks whether the Queene should dye it was decreed the government of the Kingdome should be resigned to her sonne and in his minority being then but 13. moneths old to Murray and his Camerades Hereupon the Infant was declared King and in stead of the Masse honest Iohn Knox made a sermon against that holy Sacrifice and all Catholick Tenets and ceremonies recommending much to the people the observance of his Calvinian Discipline Morton and Humes swore in the young Kings name to set up the new Religion and pull downe the old which was already brought so lowe that the Queene could scarce finde one Catholick Priest to baptize her sonne the same did celebrate her husbands funerall whom she commanded to be buried in her fathers Tombe wherewith these two Catholick Princes King Iames the V. and Prince Henry Steward lyeth also enterred the Catholick Religion that for so many ages had florished in Scotland Duke Hamilton and his brother Iohn Archbishop of Saint Andrews the Earles of Huntley and Argile with many others of the Nobility protested against the oath that was taken in the Kings name of destroying that Faith which his Majesty and themselves had inherited from their noble Progenitors yet the Queene of Scots being made prisoner by Queene Elizabeth and most of the Catholick Nobility being killed in her quarrell Murray Knox and other Hereticks
we Roman Catholicks follow either for Transubstantiation communion of the layty under one kinde worship of images c. was never contradicted by any that were not knowne and judged Hereticks by the Catholick Church of those times wherein our Tenets were questioned this our sense of Scripture hath miracles to confirme it and other supernaturall signes theirs is backt onely by hereticall obstinacy and impudence pretending evidence of Scripture in obscurity and light in darknesse If all Roman Catholicks had beene in times past and were at this present idiots or naturall fooles Protestants might perswade them that they doe not see what is cleare and evident in Scripture in behalfe of Protestancy but untill Reformers prove that we are all idiots or resolved to be damned by contradicting Gods cleare Word they cannot ground their Reformation upon the clearnesse of Scripture nor reject that sense of it which Catholicks were in possession of before their Sects were heard of in the world 5 That Scripture is not cleare for Protestants is evident because Catholicks who understand it as well as they differ from them in the interpretation And in case it be obscure to both its cleare that the tradition and practise of the ancient Catholick Church is a better Interpreter of Gods meaning then any Protestant pleasure policy or fancy It s as unreasonable therefore to dispossesse Catholicks of their ancient Tenets and sense of Scripture upon the score of a Protestant interpretation as it is to dispossesse a Gentleman of his ancient inheritance at the suite of a coveteous and impudent Mountebank that can produce no other evidence for his pretence then his fond interpretation of the very writings in vertue whereof the Gentleman and his Ancestors have beene confirmed in the peaceable possession of their estate by the sentence of all Courts in former ages and never opposed but by such as were convinced and condemned of manifest knavery Here I need not mention how many times Protestant Judges condemne their Religion in their owne Courts by just sentences whensoever they judge according to the Lawes of the Land interpreted by the ancient and continuall practise of the Courts and contrary to the fancy of ignorant and absurd pleaders they give sentence against Protestancy for the Roman Catholick Religion though in a different subject whereby it is evident how little beholding Protestancy is to that Policy which is not able to defend reformed Churches in the very Protestant Courts That Religion is farre from supernaturall appearance which hath not the least colour of naturall equity But now let us see how little beholding Policy is to Protestancy and prove CHAP. VII That Policy hath destroyed it selfe by courting Protestancy as being neare allyed to Atheisme the greatest enemy of civill government 1 POlicy without Religion is a body without a soule The motions of a politike body must have their beginning from Religion because without it the Princes and Magistrates are too weak for the managing of so great a machine as a Commonwealth The power of the people must be employed against themselves and the multitude must be subdued and kept in subjection by their owne forces all the difficulty and policy consists in persuading men to a thing so much against their naturall inclinations Some greater power must be inculcated and because that is not visible the very Pagans thought it necessary to create a beliefe in their Subjects of invisible Deities to which both Prince and Subjects professed obedience being convinced in their judgements that all policy is weake without power either reall or imagined to back it and that the best States-man is he who can persuade the people that he is more powerfull then themselves This is the reason why Polititians though Atheists persecute Atheisme because if the multitude thinke that there is no such thing as God or another life they will soone discover their owne strength and apply it against Princes and Magistrates without feare of being overpowerd by the invisible hand of God in whom they doe not believe but fancy to be impossible 2 Atheists and Protestants being sworne brothers and judging of others by themselves are of opinion that the Roman Catholick Religion is but a politick invention to set up the Pope and enrich the Roman Clergy by Purgatory Indulgences Masse and pilgrimages to Images If the Roman Catholick Laity were as apt to be cheated as Protestants thinke the Roman Clergy apt and inclined to cheate their opinion would be more plausible but whosoever will reflect upon the manifest miracles and supernaturall signes whereby these and all Catholick Tenets have beene in former ages and even in this present confirmed and moreover will consider how maturely many Roman Catholicks of the Layty most prudent and politick men have examined the grounds of our Religion and how impossible it is that so many former ages different interests and opposite Nations and families should all concurre and conspire to maintaine for Head of the Catholick Church a man they never knew nor expect any benefit by whosoever I say will reflect upon these things will clearly see and be convinced that no humane policy can reach so farre nor secrecy be so well kept that amongst so many millions of persons the cheate and mystery should not breake out and never hitherto be discovered to Protestants that are no lesse curious to knowe it then vaine in imagining so ridiculous a foppery But in case they are resolved to be as obstinate in this mad fancy as in their other heresies they must grant that we have better successe in our politick ends then themselves and if they will needs call us knaves they cannot thinke we are fooles whereas they may to their owne first Reformers without injury attribute both denominations because they shewed so little wit in framing their new Religions that they made them as inconsistent with government as inseparable from Atheisme destroying the very interest they intended to promote by reformation 5 Atheists and Protestants doe agree in rebellion against God and in being refractory against supreme authority but with this difference that the Atheist declares against God himselfe the Protestant against his Church which is Gods Liutenant upon earth He that rebells against the Kings Liutenant will soone declare against himselfe and this is the reason we see so many Protestants become Atheists and of no Religion As rebellions growe to a height by degrees first they point at evill Counsellours then at the Favorite at length at the Kings person so Atheisme possesseth mens mindes first by vice then by Protestancy and at last by no Religion The ground of all Religion and of obedience both to God and men is the appearance of a lawfull authority and soveraignty adhearing to the person that pretends it If the signes of his superiority and jurisdiction be evident he may challenge an evident right to our obedience and beliefe we are obliged to honour him according to his appearance This ground of Religion and
Christianity either altogether or by halfe Hobbes saith Subjects may renounce all Christian Religion by words so they believe in their heart our Doctors of the English Church say Subjects may deny such points of Christian Religion as have beene renounced by their Soveraignes And when the Soveraigne will if ever that should happen deny all Christianity and believe no more then Turkes or Jewes it evidently followeth out of their principles though hitherto they durst not say it that the Subject may doe the same by an exteriour acquiescence untill the contrary be decreed in an imaginary generall Councell of their owne making and morally impossible to come together as hath beene said in the 7. Chapt. sect 8. for what reason can they have to accommodate themselves to their Prince and Church in denying some articles of Christian Religion and not all They have none I am sure to be angry with Master Hobbes who sayes nothing but what they also must say if they will sticke and be consequent to Protestant principles and particularly to the doctrine of the Church of England 3 That Protestancy doth incline the Subject to rebellion against his law full Prince is more evident then I wish it were by so many woefull experiences Their Reformation begunne in all places with rebellion and is like so to continue notwithstanding the vigilant care of wise Princes and Counsellours The reason is manifest because it s morally impossible that the conveniency of the Court should alwayes agree with the interest of the people and many times the Lawes of the Land being made to favour both are not so cleare in the behalfe of either The contrary being railed who must decide it Not the people saith the Prince because they are Subjects Not the Prince say the people because he is a part and Subject to Gods Law Both appeale to Scripture the sole Judge of Protestants controversies If the Scripture could speake and pronounce the sentence without an Interpreter all might end in peace and quiet but amongst Protestants every Subject speakes for Scripture and consequently for himselfe If every man be naturally inclined to favour himselfe and looke with a partiall eye upon his owne interest it s more then probable that Scripture interpreted by the Subjects will second their owne inclination and conveniency against that of Prince and Court neither is it lesse evident that the Prince and his adherents will not submit their judgements and wills to the finall and scripturall sentence of every Subject so that the sword and rebellion must end the controversy in that Religion where all men are supreme Judges and Interpreters of Scripture 4 And though the Prince may endeavour to incorporate the legistative power and the interpretation of the Lawes of the Land into his owne prerogative the Protestant Subjects will oppose it not onely as unreasonable but also as Antichristian pride and tyranny inconsistent with their Euangelicall liberty They will inferre this consequence If God hath made us Interpreters of his divine Law how can a Creature exclude us from interpreting the Lawes of the Land wherein we are so much concerned and which ought to be subordinate to Scripture Truly seeing no Protestant Prince or Church doth pretend to be infallible in declaring the true sense of Gods Word they can hardly condemne the Subjects private interpretation as contrary to Gods meaning all their Synodicall Decrees and legall Declarations against the Subjects fancy or pretended inspiration in favour of the Prince will be lookt upon by them who oppose his designes as suggestions of obsequious Courtiours and flattering Clergy and the people will stick to their owne interpretation of Scripture backing it with the words of the Apostles Act. 5. God ought to be more obeyed then men And if the Prince should declare that their text is but a pretext of rebellion they will retort his argument and say that his texts are but pretexts of tyranny and proclaime him a Rebell against God for the meanest of Protestant Subjects with a Bible in his hand is as absolute as his King with a Scepter nay more because he lookes upon the Scepter as subordinate to his Bible Thus you see how the liberty of interpreting Scripture is no lesse the ground of rebellion then of Protestant Faith and how politick Princes by undermining the ancient Catholick sense of Scripture with new fancies and interpretations have plotted their owne ruine and their posterities destruction And that this may appeare yet more evidently I will endeavour to prove Chap. IX That the Popes spirituall jurisdiction is nothing dangerous to Soveraignes but rather that the ground of fidelity and obedience due to them is utterly destroyed by denying the Popes supremacy and that it is a greater foppery in Protestants then in Catholicks to deny his infallibility 1 PRotestant Princes looke upon their Subjects with as jealous an eye as Spaniards or Italians doe looke to their wives The word forreigne jurisdiction though onely spirituall sounds to them as harshly and troubles them no lesse then the most injurious terme doth a suspicious husband This jealousy of Protestant Princes is no lesse fomented by the stupidity of some of their Writers then by the ambition of others Some as Master Hobbes for one looketh so dully upon man Leviathan part 3. ch 39. and government that he maketh no distinction betweene Spiritualists and Temporalists betweene the Church and State betweene the sword of Iustice and the shield of Faith betweene Christian and Man and is of opinion that out of such distinctions must needs follow faction and civill warre in the Commonwealth But other Protestant Writers admit these distinctions because they hope by them to reape some benefit or benefice Doctor Bramhall in his replication pag. 163. Nay of late some have printed that the King notwithstanding his supremacy is subject to the Archbishop of Canterbury in spirituall affaires and under the jurisdiction of his ordinary Ecclesiasticall Pastors but by no meanes under that of the Pope thinking it to be more for their Soveraignes honour to obey his Subjects then Saint Peters successor 2 That God should commit the charge of soules or any spirituall jurisdiction to temporall Princes is as incredible as it is evident that he did foresee what an ill accompt they would give of their Subjects Religion if they had the management of their owne consciences If they be so jealous of the Pope that notwithstanding he being a stranger and so farre of yet they feare he may reduce all temporall matters to his spirituall jurisdiction how doe they thinke it possible that God should not he jealous of trusting them with the soules of their owne Subjects seeing they may reduce all spirituall matters to temporall and abuse their power with much more ease and successe then the Pope can misapply his spirituall jurisdiction I am sure they ought to be more jealous of any of their owne Subjects supremacy then of the Popes spirituall jurisdiction and authority because
left meanes in it to end controversies of Religion with peace and unity of Catholick Faith 9 There cannot be a greater foppery then to thinke that God instituted his Church without possibility of obtaining the end or its institution The end of the Catholick Church is our salvation by one and the same supernaturall and undoubted Faith communicated by preaching and hearing Rom. 10. this one and undoubted Faith in this manner is impossible If there be not at least one infallible Pastour when there are no generall Councells who may by his definition declare what is Catholick Faith what heresy whensoever the Church is troubled with diversity of opinions it s as evident therefore that the Popes infallibility is not superfluous as it is cleare that God did not deprive his Church of meanes without which its impossible to compasse the end he aymed at in its institution If Profestants themselves judge it a most absurd and destructive Tenet in any Commonwealth See the late Kings answer to the Remonstrance of the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament 26. May 1642. in answer to the businesse of Hull that a murtherer or felon cannot be apprehended condemned or punished by any other authority then that of Parliament even when it actually sits how much more absurd and destructive must they grant it would be in the Church that a murtherer of soules and an Heretick cannot be declared and condemned by any other authority or infallibility then that of a generall Councell not actually sitting nor likely to be assembled in a long time Doe they imagine that God would institute a Church more absurdly then themselves would order a Commonwealth As in all well ordered Commonwealths there must be meanes to suppresse sedition at any time before it comes to be rebellion so in the Church of God there must be meanes to condemne dangerous opinions and growing heresies before they come to spread and infect Christian soules If there be no infallible and visible Judge of controversies besides a generall Councell none will alter his opinion untill the generall Councell be gathered and then it will be too late to apply the remedy An exteriour acquiescence doth not change mēs opinions nor free their minds and thoughts from heretical errours none thinkes himselfe obliged to forsake his owne opinion for that of other men If theirs be noe more then probable Therefore some infallible authority there must bee at all times in the Church whereby men may bee obliged to condemne even their owne opinions and errours and none doth as much as pretend to it but the Roman Bishop 10 The infallibility of some visible Judge of Controversies alwayes at hand especially when generall Councells can not meete conveniently is soe agreable to evident reason and soe necessary for the unity of Faith and peace not onely of the Catholick Church but also of the Christian Commonwealth that the Protestants who were most against it are now most for it and wish that the Pope if hee bee not were as infallible as wee pretend If their wish bee rationall as without doubt it is wee are to presume that God the Author of reason was as rationall in this particular as they can wish And though it bee strange how they can imagine that God can bee unreasonable in any matter and in one that soe much concerned his Church yet they are convinced by wofull experience that our belief of the Popes infallibility is as beneficial to Catholicks as their obstinacy against it hath beene prejudiciall to Protestants who make Scripture the ground and warrant of all attempts and rebellions against their Soveraignes whereas wee submit our judgements to the ancient and setled interpretation of Gods Word and when that is not cleare we conforme our selves to the sentence of the Pope a very indifferent person and supreme Judge in matters of Christian Religion at least he is more unpartiall to Princes then their owne subjects interpreting Scripture by fancy interest or passion Why should wee Catholicks believe that the Bishop of Rome is infallible and Christs Vicar upon earth rather then hee of Constantinople or any other is as much as to demand why doe wee rather believe that Philip the 4. or Lewis the 14. are lawfull Kings of Spaine and France then other men that never could pretend right to those Kingdomes See the Protestants Apology for the Church of Rome tr 1. see 3. subd 10. see 7. subd 5. 9. tr 2 see ◠3 subd 10. There is not any man upon earth who can pretend right be bee infallible in determining controversies of Religion but the Bishop of Rome Hee hath a more constant and universal tradition for his spiritual jurisdiction and infallible authority then any King hath for his temporal superiority Why should wee deny to the Pope what all antiquity acknowledged and all men must grant if it bee not out of animosity against his person or obstinacy against his prerogative which wee ought not to measure by his personal merits but by Gods providence and the publike good and necessity of the Catholick Church If wee looke upon the greatnesse of the prerogative it s more probable that one man may deserve it better and bee more capable of it then every one of them who concurre to the infallible definition of a generall Councell neither ought it to seeme soe strange that God should bee pleased to make one Pope infallible in S Peters chaire if wee believe that every Bishop is infallible in a Councell who concurres to a definition when all Christendome is assembled together in an universal Synod Noe Catholick doth believe that the Pope is infallible in all his words and actions or as a particular Doctor but onely when he proposeth or speaketh any thing in Gods name and as his Interpreter to the Catholick Church CHAP. X. That the foundation of Iustice and forme of Iudicature is wholy destroyed by penall Lawes and oathes against any point of the Roman Catholick Religion 1 THe foundation of Justice and Judicature is evidence of lawfull witnesses against whose testimony the accused person can have no rationall exception As the judge must have evidence of witnesses for the sentence he pronounceth so must the witnesses have some evidence for the testimony they give There is a great difference betweene the evidence of witnesses required against persons accused for Religion and for other crimes Eye-witnesses have best evidence against malefactours apprehended for civill crimes but in matters of Faith and religion all goeth by heare-say Rom. 10. he is the best witnesse who relyes least upon his owne knowledge his best evidence is the testimony of others dead before he was borne and though their bodies lye rotten in graves their Faith and Doctrine must be fresh in the memory and testimony of the present Catholick Church and Christian posterity 2 As the Judge must have evidence for his sentence and the witnesse for his testimony so must the Legislatour
have evidence that his Law or Statute doth not contradict the Law of God his legislative power must be subordinate to Christian Religion Henry the VIII Edward the VI. and Queene Elizabeths penall Statutes are evidently against the Law of God and Christian Religion if we may credit antiquity and stick to the Faith and practise of the Church and Catholick Princes that went before them not onely in England but in all other Christian Kingdomes No persons living have any other evidence for the Law of God and Catholick Religion but the test mony of the immediatly precedent age confirmed with supernaturall signes all former ages speake to us by the mouth of the last with which we conversed we must cake their word for all the rest and for the sense as well as for the letter of Scripture The 14. age delivered to the 15. the Roman Catholick Faith which we now professe assuring that it was the true sense of Scripture which they had learned from the 13. age and so forth to the Apostles What evidence had Henry the VIII or his daughter Queen Elizabeth to oppose against the testimony of all former ages confirmed with so many miracles and to make Statutes against the knowne and practised Law of God and Christianity His luxury and his daughters bastardy are the onely evidence which Protestants can produce for the ground of penall Lawes against the Popes supremacy and other points of the Roman Catholick Religion an excellent foundation of Protestant Lawes Justice and Judicature 3 To pronounce sentence of death losse of goods or banishment against persons without any proose is rather tyranny then injustice The greatest crimes even that of treason require at least one lawfull witnesse let Protestant produce but one lawfull witnesse against the Religion of Catholicks and their sense of Scripture and we will not murmure against their penall Lawes and rigourous proceedings Antiquity affords them none because though in divers ages some odde men did testify sometimes one errour of theirs sometimes another they were in those very times contradicted by the whole Catholick Church and declared infamous Impostours and Hereticks In this present age no Protestants can be lawfull witnesses for their owne Religion or against ours because their testimony cannot be valid against so constant and universall a tradition as we Catholicks have for our Doctrine and sense of Scripture It s as ridiculous and unjust in a Judge to pronounce sentence against Roman Catholicks for their Religion upon the evidence and testimony of Protestancy as if he had in open Court condemned men to forfeit their estates and ancient inheritance upon the word of a mad fellow that produceth no other evidence to confirme his claime but interiour motions of the spirit of coveteousnesse and ambition or some obscure text of the Law appliable to all cases and subjects for all the Protestant evidence is reduced to the private spirit and the pretended clearnesse of Scripture If this be not to destroy the foundation of Justice and the forme of Judicature Protestants have a different way of proceeding from all other Nations and have altered the stile of naturall reason humane nature and the practice of all antiquity 4 They cannot excuse their persecution against Catholicks with the example of Christian Emperours and Kings that both for zeale of Religion and humane Policy to avoid the danger of rebellion made Lawes and Statutes against Hereticks and Innovatours of the ancient Faith and sense of Scripture which descended to them by tradition from the Apostles Protestants take the quite contrary way they make Lawes and Statutes against the ancient Religion and knowne sense of Gods Word and persecute Catholicks for professing it whereas their Predecessours Emperours and Kings punished new Religions and Novelists This last was lawfull in secular Princes but the practise of Protestants is unjust and wicked because it destroyes Justice and the true Religion confirmed by the publike testimony and practise of the Christian world since the Apostles time to this present If the Roman Catholick Religion were not the true Apostolicall Faith but as new as Protestants pretend how is it possible that in history there should be no mention made of any person that suffered as an Heretick for broaching or maintaining any one point which we now professe If any Doctrine of ours were judged an heresy or a novelty by antiquity without doubt we had not all escaped the rigour of penall Lawes made against Hereticks and Novelists I am sure Protestants cannot brag nor say so much for their owne Doctrine many if not all the points whereof have beene condemned as heresy by the Church in ancient times and punished as novelties by Christian Kings and Emperours which was the onely reason that moved the first English Protestants to cause the young child Edward the VI. when he knew not what he did to repeale all the Lawes and Statutes that any Christian King of England and the Kingdome had made against Hereticks being convinced that themselves and not Catholicks were comprehended in that number All who suffered persecution or death for any point of the Roman Religion were looked upon by the Catholick Church in all ages as glorious Confessours and renowned Martyrs Amongst the most pretious jewells of the Easterne Church were accompted such as were put to death for defending the worship of Images against the Iconuclasts Baron an 723. Conc. Nicaen 2. Act. 5. who were the first that persecuted Christians for that Doctrine at the instance of one Serantapicus a Magician and a Jew that promised to Gizedo Prince of the Saracens he should live 30. yeares if he would command all Images to be taken away and not worshipped in his Dominions by the Catholicks But Gizedo dying within a yeare and a halfe his sonne Vlidus condemned the Jew to death as a perfidious lmpostour and the Images were worshipt as formerly untill three yeares afterwards Leo Isaurus the heretick Emperour at the instance also of Jewes Concil Nicaen 2. Baron an 726. raised that most terrible persecution against the Catholick Church for practising so pious a custome which had continued amongst Christians without the least danger of idolatry since the time of the Apostles to that present and t will not be interrupted untill the day of judgement notâ—ithstanding the clamours endeavours and vaine pretended feares of Protestant zealots in behalfe of Serantapicus their Patriarch and his Hebrew tribe their loving brethren 5 Their persecution against Catholicks can be no more excused by the proceedings of the Spanish and Italian Inquisition Of the Inquisition then their penall Statutes have beene by the Lawes of ancient Kings and Emperours against Hereticks 1. Because the Inquisition proceeds according to the rules and forme of Justice none is declared an Heretick or guilty by a new Law or oath made onely to the end that by them men may be intrapped both in soule body and estate it was no crime in England to be a Catholick before
his Prince for not punishing or banishing his evill Councellours and these who looke more upon their owne preservation then the Prince his safety or honour engage him more and more in their quarell by perswading him that to Rebells nothing must be granted who at length get all by force with the ruine of their Soveraigne and his posterity All this you may see verified in the life of Edward the Second King of England 3 But in case the quite contrary way be taken and that the Subjects to comply with perverse inclinations and those who are in power strive who shall be most wicked from thence must greater danger arise to the Prince then from any other emulation or discontent Vertuous men are few and consequently the Prince may without great difficulty finde them employments but if vice be rewarded he will not finde in his Kingdome wherewith to content half the number of dishonest pretenders and to satisfie some few of them is to disgust all the rest who being men of as little honour as conscience will make use of their number and power to obtaine what they could not by favour and will clime up to the height of their ambition by force and wicked devices This is the reason why Princes ought to esteeme and reward vertue and discountenance vice and why none ought to be of his Councell whose integrity is not notorious to his Subjects for how can a Prince discountenance vice if his Favourits be vicious and dishonest persons Their ill example may be his ruine because all men who desire to be preferred will prostitute their consciences to the Favourits will and pleasure and neglect his Master and when the Favourit hath gained the greatest part of the Subjects to his owne devotion perhaps he will plot something against the Soveraignes person and promote to the royall Throne some of his owne relations A Prince cannot be too suspicious and jealous of dishonest Councellours the greatest tye of fidelity being conscience they who have none must prove disloyall whensoever it stands with their conveniency Therefore it s most dangerous and want of true Policy in Princes to trust themselves or their affaires in the hands of such men for though it be their interest this day to be faithfull to their King it may be the contrary to morrowe I am sure it can never be his interest to stick to them or owne their dishonest proceedings The interest of Kings lyeth in the affection of his Subjects and its impossible they should affect a King who not onely protects but ownes manifest injustices Subjects are men and as apt to resent and revenge injuries as the Soveraigne He must handle them very gently and not expose them to the contempt or tyranny of wicked Ministers for though they may have patience for a time at length they may growe furious and he will finde himselfe mistaken in their temper when it is too late to dismisse or punish those who occasioned their distempers 4 Amongst all Princes ruined by the wickednesse of Ministers none is more to be pittied then Edward the VI. of England because he could as little depose as choose his Counsellours being alwayes in his minority It is the opinion of most Writers that Dudley Duque of Northumberland after beheading Seamour the Protectour did poyson the King to the end his sonne Guilford who married the Lady Iane Gray might in her right be King and himselfe in the right and reigne of his sonne governe England excluding Queene Mary and the Queene of Scots I doe not thinke that any history can give testimony of more dishonest Counsellours in one time and in one Kingdome then we read of in this poore childs reigne Seamour himselfe violated his oath and promise given to Henry the VIII that no new Religion should be brought into England during the Kings minority Afterwards he caused his owne brother to be beheaded The Duque of Northumberland plotted the Kings death dissembled his Faith which at length upon the scaffold he professed dying a Roman Catholick and exhorting the Nation to sticke to that Religion But what I desire Princes should reflect upon is how dangerous it is for them to have Counsellours void of all Religion and conscience A man would thinke that Dudley could have no other interest but that of King Edward whom he ruled together with the Kingdome and yet we see how farre he went to fetch a contrary interest and by what wicked and dishonest wayes There is no interest remote or too farre from one of a large conscience if he be perswaded its more for his purpose then the present which he manageth Let Princes therefore countenance vertue and banish vice from their Courts and Counsells if they have any care of their owne interest and security But now let us see CHAP. XIII How necessary it is for a Statesman to be a man of honour and of his word and how great a difference there is betweene Policy and Craft 1 ALl Statesmen must be Gentlemen in their actions They must shunne as much meane wayes in themselves as they must seeme not to dislike of them in other meane persons whom they employe or entertaine as necessary and base instruments They must countenance spyes but scorne to be spyes themselves The maxime of a Statesman must be not to betray any man that confides in him for the food of Policy is information and knowledge of businesses which none will give that is afraid of being betrayed A man may be faithfull to his Prince without being a Traitour to his Subjects or any other and the favour of a Minister with his Prince must not be grounded upon information of other mens defects but upon his owne services strength of judgement and dexterity of managing affaires He who creeps into favour by telling tales and such meane wayes is rather a petty spy and informer then a wise Statesman I have knowne a great Minister of State who told a Gentleman that desired to be advised by him he would helpe him in what he could but warned him before hand that he would make use of any thing he heard for his Masters service and therefore bid him consider whether it was for his purpose to communicate unto him any secrecy This was honourable and plaine dealing he would serve his King and not betray others and yet this Minister of State is knowne to be as faithfull to his Master as ever Subject was to Prince having lost for his service as great an estate as any Subject in our parts of Christendome doth possesse 2 There are some persons that place the essence of a Polititian in being a Favourite of that faction which actually beareth sway they thinke it wisdome though not worth to change their friends as often as these doe their fortune and which is worse to become enemies or those who raised them from nothing because it s so necessary to humour the present power Such cut-purses and cut-throates are the infamy of Courts and the
forced to retire to a village and gaine his living by cutting wood and selling fagots a dangerous occupation for an Hererick if it were in Spaine or Italy where his fuel would be applied to his owne use At length being weary of that life he cast himselfe into Zwinglius his hands and opinions He is said to be the first Priest that married to celebrate his Nuptials with greater solemnity he writ to a Nobleman his neighbour desiring him to send him some venison and the Nobleman very discreetly sent him the head of an asse well dressed and baked for a buck the mistake was not perceived untill the yong couple had eaten so much of the supposed venison that they fell to pick crummes and at length to picke the asses eares to their great confusion laughter of the company and extraordinary contentment of him that sent the present good enough for so sacrilegious a feast and solemnity The Lutheran writers say that Carolstadius in his last Sermon did see the Devill who came to applaude his Doctrine and three dayes after being sick he came to fetch his person the Sacramentarians deny this story but Catholicks believe that he is gone to the Devill though they will not dispute whether the Devill came to see him in his last Sermon or sicknesse 4 Oecolampadius was a Priest and a Monke of Saint Brigits order infamous for being convinced of so notorious lyes in his writings He married a woman that was thought to have murthered him but others write that his friends injured the woman by casting this aspersion upon her and that he was strangled by the Devill its certaine he was found unexpectedly dead in his bed at Basile where he is enterred with this Epitaph Auctor Euangelicea doctrinae in hac urbe Templi ejus verus Episcopus These are the Apostles of all who deny the reall presence They were so vaine and ambitious of being esteemed Authors of new Religions that though all three agreed in the substance of their errour yet every one would needs maintaine it upon a different word and ground from the rest Carolstadius denyed the reall presence because he said that the word Hoc This was not referred by Christ our Saviour to what he had in his hands but onely to himselfe as sitting at the table Zwinglius laid hold of the word Est is and interpreted it significat signifieth my body thrusting into the very text signifieth and taking out is Oecolampadius grounded his fantasticall errour upon the word Corpus Body which he interpreted figura corporis a figure of the body not according to the language of Tertullian but as if the figure did exclude the reality of a body contrary to Tertullians phrase and doctrine as Pamelius in his Comments upon him doth plainely shew by many examples Thus we see how three Sycophants have rendred to their followers the words of God not onely inessicacious but wholly unsignificant and how the most absurd dreames of a distempered braine worke upon simple people and how apt Polititians are to worke their ends with thefe mad fancies my Reader may see in the Protector Seamour who brought into England this Zwinglian Religion and I will declare when I speake of the English Church in Edward the Sixth his time SECT IV. Of Calvinisme 1 THe Sect whereof Princes can make least advantage is this which now I am to describe because it was invented by Calvin to make himself Prince of Geneva and not to humor Monarchs he being confined to a towne where popular governmeÌ„t prevailed to which at length he accommodated his discipline contrary to his owne inclination and first designe Iohn Calvin therefore meanly borne in Noyon of Picardy hearing how many of his ranke had made fortunes by inventing new Religions and how easy it was to apply texts of Scripture to humane fancies resolved to sollow the steps of Luther Zwinglius and others especially after that he despaired to satisfie his ambition amongst the Catholick Clergy being branded with an infamous marke for Sodomy in his owne Countrey a truth so undeniable that his great friend and champion Whitaker speaking in his defence against learned and eloquent Campian who in his ten Reasons termed Calvin stigmaticus perfuga a branded spirit Whitak answ to Campians reasons printed 1582. sol 7â— gives this witty and pious answer si stigimaticus fuit fuit etiam Paulus fuerunt alij It was never heard that Saint Paul was branded with an infamous marke before and if Whitaker means not to disfame Saint Paul by making him as infamous as Calvin but onely compares the signes of Christs wounds which he had in his his body to Calvins marke he gaines nothing by his evasion but rather augments his malice and blasphemy Calvins first Master inheresy was Melchior Wolmar a German Lutheran though others attribute this honour to one Robert his owne kinsman Being suspected of heresy he retired to Angolesme where he went by the name of Deparcan and there remained three yeares studying hereticall bookes out of which he copiâ—â—â— hâ—s Institutions and the greatest part out of the workes of Melanchton and Hyperius Sapoerius yet Westphalus the Lutheran saith he stole all from Oecolampudius its certaine he never learnt Divinity in any Schoole such as it was either he stole from others or had it by private inspiration from his Master the Devill He communicated his erroneous opinions to Lewis Tiluis a Canon of Angolesme and his singular benefactor who liked well of them but desired Calvin to accompany him to Germany and there they both would conferre with the Authors themselves of so new Doctrine Tiluis was recalled from his way both to Germany and to Hell by a brother of his called Iohn of no small accompt in the Court of France but Calvin went on his journey and remained in Germany waiting upon one Rufus his Countreyman and a perverse heretike by whose meanes he became acquainted with all the German Reformers 2 Having by his conference with many dived into the ground of their errours and resolved to follow the Zwinglian Doctrine though not altogether his thoughts now were busied to finde out a place where he might with security divulge his heresy without being subordinate to any other heretike or Reformation He fixed upon Ferrara in Italy but could not long remaine notwithstanding that the Dutchesse the French Kings sister did incline to protect him At Liege he was refused entertainment and so was forced to returne into France and live privatly at Poitiers It happened that walking there in a garden he fell into discourse of the new Religions with some more curious then learned the question was whether Luther his opinion was more tolerable in matter of the Sacrament then that of Zwinglius Calvin laid hold of this opportunity to declare his owne condemning both the former He affirmed that Christ was not realy present in the Sacrament as Luther imagined neither was he realy absent as Zwinglius pretended that there was
out of the Netherlands The prudent King not doubting that to grant this was to betray himselfe and his posterity and bestowe his inheritance upon rebells declared that he would give as little encouragement to new Religions as Charles the V. his Father Whereupon Henry Bredenrod Lewis of Nassau Orange his brother and others of the Nobility headed the Hereticks who profaned Churches sackt Monasteries abused the Clergy and Religious and trampled under their feet the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar Lind. de fug idol Neare Ruremond they were cutting in pieces Saint Authonies image and going to burne it on a suddaine all were toucht with wild fire and dyed the next day They tooke Antwerpe then Orange declared himselfe for them and with all Governour of that famous and rich City 2 Before the Hereticks had committed these outrages they made a procession in Brussells wherein every one carried a medall hanging upon his brest with King Philips image on the one side and on the other two hands joyned with a beggars wallet with this motto Fidi Regi usque ad bisaccium In this manner they presented themselves to Margaret of Parma that then governed the Low Countries for her Brother Surius in Comment Schardius in reb gest sub Maximil Belear lib. 30. alij at which sight when her Highnesse seemed to be frighted the Earle of Barlamont a zealous Catholick told her that nothing was to be feared from such Geuses which is a word of contempt in Walloun and signifies Vagabond Beggars This was the occasion whereby the Hereticks of the Netherlands came to have so honourable a denomination as their brethren the Hugonots in France The Catholicks to be discerned from Hereticks or Geuses wore also medalls about their necks or tyed to their beads with the Image of Christ our Saviour on the one side and on the other his blessed Mother If Hereticks thought it was a profession of fidelity and devotion in themselves to their King to weare and worship his image I see no reason why they should finde fault with Catholicks for wearing medalls or worshipping the images of Christ his Mother and Saints I am sure we meane better to God in doing it then they did to their King when they were called Geuses The King of Spaine was not jealous that they would rebell with his image or make it King there was no danger of such a foppery It s a foppery and madnesse in Hereticks to imagine that God is jealous of Catholicks worshipping his owne or his servants images and as for the pretended danger of Idolatry it is no greater then that which the Geuses did incurre of setting up their medalls for their King or Earle of Flanders The difference betweene our medalls and theirs is that ours is a profession of love respect and devotion which we beare to God and his Saints because they are his servants theirs was a pretext of treachery and rebellion against their Soveraigne who was as farre from their hearts and effections as his image was neare their brests 3 There was never any Prince that did more to humour his Subjects then Philip the Second did for his in the Low Countries First he removed from thence the Duke of Alba because he was thought to be over severe and sent in his place Requesens one of a mild disposition After whose death he was content to confirme the Governours themselves had chosen untill he was advertised that the first act of their government was a league made against the Spaniards at the instance of Orange whose ambition could be satisfied with nothing but the whole Countrey at his owne disposall to which end he caused himselfe to be named Admiral of the Sea turned Don Iohn of Austria out of the Countrey had Brabant joyned to his government of Holland and Zealand imprisoned the Duke of Arschor and two Bishops because they sent for Mathias the Archduke who being arrived was but a cifer Orange being named his Vicar did governe all and obtained liberty of conscience for the Hereticks in all the 17. Provinces that thereby his friends and faction might encrease after Mathias his departure he sends for the Duke of Anjou a cifer also but thinking by his meanes to engage France in the quarrell was content to let him have the title of Governour and Master keeping all the power in his owne hands 4 All those things were done by Orange with that ordinary and specious pretext of rebellion the liberty of the Subject and of conscience whereby many Catholicks were deceived and joyned with him and his Hereticks But they perceiving at lengthy that nothing would satisfy Orange and that he aymed at making himselfe Master of his Confederats and to that end promoted heresy thereby to engage the people more against their Catholick King endeare them to himselfe and that many insolences were committed by the Geuses and countenanced by their Protector Orange Hannonia Artois and some other Provinces declared against him and his ambitious hereticall proceedings The King also seeing that Orange would be contented with no lesse then the propriety and dominion of all the Low Countries promised great rewards by proclamation to any person that would kill him Whereupon in the yeare 1584. this Rebell was sent to the other world by one Gerard a Burgundian If he had lived longer perhaps the United Provinces had beene a Kingdome not a Commonwealth for its certaine his designe and desire was not to make them a free State though he freed them from their obedience to the King of Spaine And albeit by his policy he made them cast of one yoke he oppressed them with another farre more intolerable that is with heresy whereby they became slaves to the Devill and rebells against God and the Church Thus we see how the multitude hath beene misled by one politick head that concealed his ambition with the zeale of a new Religion and the ancient liberties of his Nation SECT VI. Of the Protestant Church of England in King Edward the VI. his time 1 IT s now time to drawe homeward and examine whether the Protestant Church of England be also a branch of Policy That luxury and covetcousnesse was the occasion of denying the Popes jurisdiction and supremacy is evident by our Chronicles in the life of Henry the VIII who being weary of Queene Catharine of Spaine and despairing or issue male by her as also enamoured of Anne Bullen desired the Pope to declare null a marriage that no person living called in question for the space of 20. yeares but now forsooth it was against Seripture because Saint Iohn Baptist told Herod that it was not lawfull for him to keepe his brothers wife in the lifetime of his brother and himselfe being also married If Prince Arthur were living the text had made as much for Henry the VIII as for Herods brother Yet King Henryes tender conscience could not be quiet untill Anne Bullen were Queene of England therefore he bribed Universities abroad and
threatned those of his owne Kingdome to the end they might subscribe to his wicked passion Act of Parl. an 1. Mariae c. 1. and because the Pope refused to doe the same Henry declared himselfe Pope in his owne Dominions and all others to be Traitors that refused to sweare his supremacy And because many refused to damne their soules by knowne perjury he tooke away their lives amongst others that suffered death for refusing the oath were two Cardinals three Bishops thirteen Abbots Priors David Camer Scot. lib. 4. c. 1. Monkes and Priests five hundred Archdeacons fourteen Canons threesoore Doctors fifty Dukes Marqueses and Earles with their children twelve Barons and Knights twenty nine Gentlemen three hundred thirty six Citizens a hundred thirty foure Women of quality a hundred and ten In this Ocean of innocent and noble bloud was laid the first stone and fundation of the English Protestant Church it s no mervaile that it thrived no better 2 Notwithstanding Henry the VIII wickednesse he never permitted any new Sects to be professed in England during his reigne though many crept in by Cranmers negligence and connivance In the latter end of his reigne he felt the remorse of his guilty conscience and did often resolve with himselfe to be reconciled to the Church of Rome but know not how it might be done with his honour which he preferred before that of God and the salvation of his soule even in his last sicknesse for sending to Stephen Gardiner Bishop of Wâ—…ester who was the onely man that durst speake truth to the King for his advice he exhortâ—d him to declare and recant his errour in Parliament if God would give him life if not to testifie repentance with his hand and seale assuring him that God would accept his good will if time were wanting to performe what he desired This was resolved upon but as soone as Gardiner departed he fell of from his pious resolution and within a short time dyed despairing of Gods mercy because quoth he I never spared man in my wrath nor woman in my lust His last words were All is lost The greatest Policy and Majesty upon earth comes at length to be nothing and repentance differed doth commonly end in despaire and damnation 3 To King Henry the VIII succeeded in his Kingdome and Headship of the Church his sonne Edward the VI. a child of 9. yeares old His tender age was a faire oportunity for heresy and policy to conspire against Catholick Religion which had never beene suppressed in England untill that time His Uncle and Protector Seamor declared himselfe a Zwinglian and established that Sect in England by Act of Parliament but could not exclude the name of Bishops that had beene so much reverenced in the Nation since it was converted to Christianity though they looked upon the Ordination both of Priests and Bishops as upon a superstition of Rome and badge of Antichrist Witnesse their translating in the Bible Ordination by imposition of hands as Saint Hierome D. Greg. Martin in his Discovery of the corruptions of holy Scriptures by English Sectaries chap. 6. and all the Fathers doe the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ordination by election and for the word Priest they alwayes translated Elder for Priesthood Eldership Cranmer Archbishop of Canterbury who ought to have opposed these wicked practises did accommodate himselfe to the times and prevailing party in King Henryes time he writ a booke in defence of the reall presence and now in King Edwards time he writ another against it both which bookes Bishop Bonner of London produced to his face Fox pag. 1200. col 1. num 2. Persons cap. 7. num 32. when Cranmer and Ridley were sitting in judgement against him to deprive him of his Bishoprick 4 After that the Zwinglian Clergy of England had corrupted Scripture and wrested both words and sense to their owne hereticall and mad fancies they composed their book of Common prayer and instituted a new forme of making Priest and Bishops which was rather a declaration and protestation against holy Orders then a manifestation or the Ordainers power and intention or of the effects of that Sacrament It s a received principle amongst all men who knowe any thing that a Bishop or Priest cannot be validly consecrated without words involving the name or at least the particular power and authority of a Bishop or Priest in the English forme of Ordination the names are not mentioned and the power or authority is not so much as insinuated The power and authority of a Priest must involve power to make Christs Body and Blond really present as our English Protestant Doctors now confesse whether with or without Transubstantiation is not the controversy let them examine whether any such power be mentioned in their forme which is this Receive the holy Ghost English Rituall printed at London 1607. whofe sinnes thou doest forgive they are forgiven and whofe sinnes thou doest retaine they are retained and be thou a faithfull Dispenser of the Word of God and his holy Sacraments in the name of the Father and of the Sonne and of the holy Ghost To dispense ot minister â—he Sacraments come farre short of declaring power to consecrate the elements or make present Christs Body Deacons did minister and dispense the Body of Christ to the people in ancient times but were never thought to have power to consecrate or make present Christs Body and Bloud They have no reason to cite Santa Clara in their behalf Franc. à S. Clara in exposit paraphr Confess Anglic. artic 36. I knowe not his intention but I am sure his words favour not their Ordination and much lesse these of Innocent the IV. Sussiceret Ordinatori dicere sis Sacerdos vel alia aequipollentia Be thou a Priest or some words equivalent but they who blotted the word Priest out of Scripture never thought to make use of it in the forme of their Ordination and they who denyed the reall presence were farre from expressing in their forme of making Priests any power to consecrate or make present Christs Body and Bloud in the Sacrament and Sacrifice of the Altar 5 Their forme of making Bishops is no lesse deficient then the former The words are Take the holy Ghost and remember that thou stirre up the grace of God which is in thee by imposition of hands for God hath not given us the spirit of feare but of power love and sobernesse This advertisement of Saint Paul to Timothy after he had made him Bishop doth suppose 2. ad Tim. 1. and not give the Order of Episcopacy it is an admonition to exercise the function and not the ordination it selfe because it doth not declare in particular the name or authority of a Bishop Take the holy Ghost is said to Priests as well as to Bishops and the spirit of love power and sobernesse is communicated also by Priesthood Here is nothing peculiar to Episcopall Ordination But the truth is
the Zwinglian Church of England that composed these formes made no difference betweene a Bishop a Priest and a Christian because that was the current Doctrine in all reformed Churches in those dayes and particularly in the Zwinglian See the 23. of the 39. articles of the Church of England a Priest or a Bishop was he that was appointed by the Congregation to preach their Ghospel it was but an extrinsecall denomination a meere formality taken from the will of the faithfull brethren and from a square cap and a linnen rochet This is made evident by the example of Iohn Hooper who could never be dispensed withall by Cranmer and Ridley in the cap and rochet when he was to be made Bishop of Glocester though they never troubled him with imposition of hands or ordination Pag. 1366. I cannot tell faith Fox what sinister and unlucky contention concerning the ordaining and consecration of Bishops and of their apparrell with other like trifles began to disturb the good and lucky beginning of this godly Bishop c. In conclusion he was faine to agree to this condition t at sometimes he should in his sermons shew himselfe apparailed as the other Bishops were His upper garment was a long scarlet shymar downe to the foote and under that a white linnen rochet that covered all his shoulders Vpon his head he bad a geometricall or mathematicall cap that is a foure squared cap with foure angles dividing the whole world into foure parts albeit his head was Round You may perceive by this how little they valued Ordination in King Edwards dayes all their care was that the appearance and exteriour formality of a Bishop should be maintained because that would maintaine them and keepe them in possession of the Bishops revenues and of a place in the upper House of Parliament All was policy there was nothing of Religion 6 They tooke as little care of Priesthood as of Episcopacy which you may gather also out of Fox his Calendar Pag. 1456. Doctor Ridley saith he that worthy Bishop of London called John Bradford to take the degree of Deacon according to the order that then was in the Church of England but for that this order was not without some such abuse as to the which Bradford would not consent the Bishop then was content to order him Deacon without any abuse even as he desired So that you may guesse how all Protestants were ordered not onely in King Edwards reigne but also in his Fathers Henry the VIII seeing Ordination was not urged but given to every man in the forme that he desired And this is the reason why most Writers say that all who were Hereticks in King Henry his time and are pretended to be ordained Bishops in the latter end of his reigne as Barlow and some Suffragans were really never ordained because Ordination did not agree with their spirit and was contrary to their inclination and to the Tenets and practise of all Churches pretending Reformation Fox also tells us of one Robert Drakes made Deacon by Doctor Taylor of Hadley who was no Bishop and afterwards was admitted Minister of Gods Words and Sacraments by Cranmer and Ridley not after the order then in force but after such order as was after established every one was ordained as he desired And as for Iohn Bradford after his Deaconship he was immediatly without any other orders made Prebend and Preacher of Saint Paules where sharply saith Fox he opened and reproved sinne sweetly he preached Christ crucified pithily he impugned heresies and errours earnestly he perswaded to good life And all this you must knowe was performed with one onely yeares study in Cambridge Bradford having beene all his life before a serving man None that will read what we have said of this Zwinglian Clergy can admire Brookes novell cases Placito 463. sol 101. printed at London 1604. that in Queene Maries reigne all King Edward the VI. Bishops were declared no Bishops both in the spirituall and temporall Courts and therefore all Leases made by them as Bishops were not available It s very like the Judges informed themselves of the matter of the fact before they pronounced the sentence and if Protestants have no exceptions against the sentence of Queen Maries Courts but the Catholick Religion of the Judges how can themselves expect to be heard or credited in any matter of fact or faith that concerns Roman Catholicks 7 This politike Religion and lay Clergy was banished out of England by Queene Mary after the death of her brother King Edward many of the chiefe pillars thereof were burnt as obstinate Hereticks according to the ancient Lawes of Christian Emperours and Kings of England others to escape the sire passed over the Seas to Germany the native soile of their errours No sooner were they arrived to Frankford but Calvin pretended a right in them as agreeing with his Doctrine though they would not admit his Discipline and therefore he writ to Knox and Whittingham Calvin ep 200. ad Knox. In Anglicana Liturgia qualem describitis multas video fuisse tolerabiles ineptias I see that in the English forme of Service as you describe it there were many tolerable fooleries Many there were saith my Protestant Author and that of the learnedst of those that then departed the Realme The survay of the pretended holy Discipline printed an 1593. pag 46. as Doctor Cox Doctor Horne Master Iewell with sundry others who perceiving the tricks of that Discipline did utterly dislike it So as when they came afterwards to Frankford they wholy insisted upon the platforme of England and in short time obtaining of the Magistrats the use thereof they did choose either Doctor Cox or Doctor Horne as I guesse or some such other as had beene of speciall account in King Edwards time to be as it were their Superintendent Now we see clearly how the English Ordination was not in those dayes by imposition of hands but by election according to their translation of Scripture and how the Congregation did make their Bishops for they translate also in their Bible Superintendent for Bishop Why should any rationall man doubt but that the very same men who without any Episcopall consecration made a Bishop in Frankford wold doe the same in the Nags-head at London Iewell Horne Cox and the rest at Frankford were the first pretended Bishops of England in Queene Elizabeths reigne But of this more hereafter in the ensuing Section SECT VII Of the English Protestant Church in Queene Elizabeths reigne 1 IF ever Policy was transformed into Religion it was by Queene Elizabeth and those who favoured her illegitimacy against the knowne right of Mary Steward to the Crowne of England It was as evident that she was right heire as it was that Henry the VIII could not have two lawfull wives at once and in the first yeare of Queene Maries reigne it was declared by Act of Parliament that Queene Catharine was lawfull to King Henry
chastity They are beholding to her for their Ordination which she made good and valid by her supreme authority notwithstanding any matter or nullity of forme to the contrary as you may see by an Act of Parliament Act of Parliam 8. Eliz 1. in the 8. yeare of her reigne which relates to the Records of her Letters Patents but not to any of her Bishops consecration at Lambeth as our Nags-head Ministers would faine make poore seduced soules believe and cite for a witnesse of the solemne Ordination of Parker at Lambeth so honourable a person as Charles Howard Earle of Nottingham and Lord Admiral of England but they durst not name him in Masons first edition because he was then living and would have contradicted so notorious an untruth eight or nine yeares after in the second edition they name this noble person When he was dead and yet not as an eye witnesse of the imaginary Ordination but as a guest at the banket I doubt not but Master Parker might invite the Earle of Nottingham to dine with him at Lambeth many times especially if he was his kinsman as Masons pretends but its evident he never assisted at his consecration if his Lorship was not at the Nags-head in Cheapside when Scory made him a Bishop with a knock of his Protestant Bible bidding him to take authority to preach the Word of God sincearly SECT VIII Of the English Protestant Church in King Iames and his Sonnes reigne 1 KIng Iames had too much wit to be of Calvins Religion though his education was committed to Calvinists he did perceive that it was not invented for the good of Princes but rather for their ruine and that petty Ministers and poore Elders might beare the sway in Christian Commonwealths Being called by the English Councell and Nobility to the possession of that Crown which descended to him by the evident right of his mother Mary Steward his first thoughts in England were bent against the Puritanicall discipline as one who had beene sufficiently disciplined by the Kirk of Scotland Therefore he commanded a Synod to be celebrated in London wherein himselfe was declared spirituall Head of the Church and 141. Canons made for the suppression of Puritanisme the Bible was corrected in such places onely as seemed to condemne the Puritanicall discipline and doctrine Traditiones was translated Tradition and not Ordinances or Documents as in Queene Elizabeths dayes Idols were not translated Images nor their worshippers Idolaters as formerly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was not interpreted now Ordination by election but by imposition of hands because all this was necessary to confute Puritans Yet all other corruptions that seemed to condemne Catholick Relâ—gion were applauded as much as before in Queene Elizabeths reigne Though Hell was not translated grave nor soule carcasse yet other devices were found to divert mens thoughts from a third place betweene heaven and hell and therefore Saint Peters words wherein he declares that Christs soule did descend to Limbus Patrum 1. Pet. 3. v. 18.19 were translated thus Quickened by the spirits by which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison c. whereas the true translation is Quickened or alive in his spirit or soule in which spirit or soule he coming preached to them also that were in prison 2 The new translation which King Iames caused to be made Knot in his Protestancy condemned pag. 89. was overseene corrected and altered by Doctor Abbats of Canterbury and Smith of Glocester as Sir Henry Savill told Master Richard Montague afterwards pretended Bishop of Chichester and of Norwich For Master Montague wondring that Sir Henry to whose care was committed the translating of Saint Peters Epistles would pervert the sense of the Apostle about Christs descent into hell Sir Henry answered that the forenamed Bishops corrupted and altered the said Translation made by King Iames his order This was to transforme the very Scripture into Policy and slight both conscience and Religion Let any sober person judge how scrupulous would Master Abbots be and the other pretended Bishops in his time to forge and falsify Masons Records to the end they might make good imposition of hands at Lambeth when so impudently and wickedly they corrupted Gods Word fearing that by force of the text they should be forced to admit of Limbus Patrum and from thence be lead into Purgatory but none who dyes in the Protestant Religion needs feare going thither In the same Translation they have translated Gal. 5.17 The flesh lusteth against the spirit so that ye cannot doe the things ye would whereas the Greeke and Latin is Ye doe not de facto the things ye would And to prove their heresy averring a necessity and Divine precept for all persons to receive both kindes 1. Cor. 11. v. 27. They falsely translate thus Whosoever shall eate this bread and drinke this cup of the Lord unworthily c. Whereas both in the Latin and Greeke it is Whosoever shall eate this bread or drinke this chalice c. which disjunctive or cannot inferre the necessity of both kindes as the conjunctive and might seeme to doe both here and in other places if by this they were not so clearly interpreted And because the Protestant Clergy even in King Iames and his Sonnes reigne were loath to depart with their wives though they pretended to be as true Priests as the Apostles they did not correct the false translation of 1. Cor. 1. Have not we power to lead about a wife as if Saint Paul had one and the rest of the Apostles they notwithstanding put in King Iames his Translation woman in the margen but wife remained in the text They did not correct the corrupting of 2. Pet. 1. Labour that by good workes you make sure your vocation and election they leave out good workes as they have done also in Queene Elizabeths translations though it be in all the Latin and in the most authentike Greeke copies 3 It were tedious to mention all the falsifications of the English translations of Scripture and these I hope are sufficient to prove that in King Iames and King Charles reigne there was as little Religion in the Church of England as in Queene Elizabeths Scripture was made speake whatsoever Courtiors and Polititians fancied and desired It was ridiculous to see how the Church did on a suddaine accommodate it selfe to the Court and how Bancroft pretended Bishop of London after of Canterbury did write and preach for Episcopacy as a distinct order of Priesthood in King Iames his reigne whereas a little before he answered Master William Alabuster when he objected that no Bishop laid hands Holiwood lib. de investig Christi Ecclesia cap. 4. or ordained Parker and his Camerades that a single Priest might ordaine Bishops in case of necessity Truly he was put to a necessity of giving this answer because the Nags-head Ordination could not be contradicted nor Masons forged Records produced 4 Before King Iames was in
possession of the Crowne of England he was engaged to many Princes that he would ease Catholicks by repealing the penall Lawes and without doubt had performed if he had not beene diverted from it by Cecil and other upstarts and Polititians whose interest was begunne and grounded upon heresy and the destruction of the ancient Nobility and Gentry of the Kingdome There was a treaty of peace betweene him and the King of Spaine whose Ambassadour in London had in his Instructions to insist upon liberty of conscience for Catholicks and the King was resolved to grant it rather then to breake of the treaty and told Cecil so much who undertooke to the King that he would make peace with the Spaniard without any obligation to favour Catholicks advising his Majesty to oblige his owne Subjects and not to permit them to owe so great an obligation to the King of Spaine or any other forreigne Prince Cecil therefore deales with an Italian Polititian by whom the Spanish Ambassadour was to by advised in all his negotiation and tells him that King Iames and himselfe also were as willing to grant liberty of conscience to Catholicks as the Catholick King was earnest in demanding it because it was not onely just but convenient for the State Catholicks being the fittest instruments to oppose Puritanisme which the King so much did feare and hate therefore they should have liberty of conscience but it was not convenient or possible to article concerning any such thing because the Kingdome would be offended and the Subjects would owe the favour to the King of Spaine not to their owne who was resolved within a little time to repeale all penall Lawes Whether the Italian believed Cecil I Knowe not but its certaine that these two Polititians resolved no mention should be made of Religion in the articles notwithstanding King Iames being of a gracious disposition told Cecil he would not persecute for conscience the Catholicks and I believe would have beene very moderate if Cecil had not invented the Gun-pouder treason plot That Cecil was the contriver or at least the fomenter of it was testified by one of his owne domestick Gentlemen who advertised a certaine Catholick his friend by name Master Buck two moneths before of a wicked designe his Master had against Catholicks one Master Tresham and another Catholick who were thought to have beene Cecils instruments in all this businesse having accesse to him even at midnight were sent to the Tower and never seene afterwards least they should tell tales and it s very certain that Percy and Catesby might have beene taken alive when they were killed but Cecil knew full well that these two unfortunate Gentlemen would have related the story lesse to his owne advantage then himselfe caused it to be published therefore they were dispatched when they might have beene made prisoners having no other weapons offensive or defensive but their swords 5 This wicked plot of Cecil made the Catholicks so odious that it was not in the Kings power to doe them his intended favour yet whether it was that he suspected Cecils knavery or that he would not have the crime of few men attributed to their Religion and to the multitude he declared he innocency of both and did not persecute Catholicks as much as Protestants desired yet the barrells wherein the pouder was are kept as reliques and were often shewed to the King and his posterity that they might not entertaine the least thought of clemency towards Catholick Religion There is not an ignorant Minister or Tub-preacher who doth not when all other matter failes remit his Auditors to the Gun-pouder treason and describe these tubs very pathetically the onely reliques thought fit by them to be kept in memory They might have kept other monuments of farre more barbarous savage cruelty whereunto none but themselves can lay claime practised by the French and Scotch Hugonots so horridly foule and abominable not onely to the thoughts but eyes of men that it is a shame to Christianity to see it degenerate by heresy to more ugly enormous outrages then ever humane nature could be transported into by the fury of Paganisme I forbeare the bloudy practises of England in Queene Elizabeth time as not so barbarous in appearance though more wicked in substance as being exhibited by publick Magistrates under the colour of Law and pretext of peace of the Land the starving and racking of so many innocent worthy learned persons the tearing out of hearts and bowels in the publike view upon suborned testimonies of base vagabond perjured catchpoules hired to sweare what they and their hirers knew to be false and all the world sawe to be voyd of all signes of truth But to returne to Cecil the mischiefe contrived by him was imputed to men that had no more hand in the plot then to disswade their penitents from it in confession the seale whereof is so sacred that it cannot be broken which obligation of secrecy is of greater aduantage to prevent treason then if it were lawfull to reveale the mischiefe imparted in that Sacrament because none will confesse a treason that he thinks may be revealed and by acquainting his Confessour with treacherous purposes he may be disswaded from them but not absolved unlesse he doth promise to desist and heartily repent It was foretold to Cecil that the hand of God would fall heavily upon him and that he should dye in a ditch and be burried in a dunghill a thing very unlikely to happen all circumstances considered and yet it happened for being jealous of my Lord Henry Howards getting into the Kings favour Cecil made such hast from the Bath to London notwithstanding a troublesome disease that going to ease himselfe in a ditch there he dyed and was afterwards burried in a Chappell that himselfe had built upon a dunghill And thus a man raised from durt came to be dissolved into his owne element and to rest in his native soile Not onely Catholicks but Protestants have reason To curse the memory of this man and his gun-pouder plot for if Catholicks had beene countenanced as King Iames intended Puritans and other Sectaries would never have had the power to bring his Sonnes head to the block and the Nation to so much bloudshead Let Polititians say what they please there is no greater support of Monarchy then Catholick Religion 6 Though in King Iames his time Religion was squared to his Majesties interest and inclination but alwayes with some regard to that which had beene formerly professed in Queene Elizabeths dayes for feare of causing a distemper by a suddaine alteration yet in King Charles his reigne the Church of England came to that perfection that it professed no Religion at all Protestants had beene so shamefully beaten from all their negative articles and lurking holes by Catholick Divines that they were forced to doe what petty Princes are accustomed when they are oppressed and overpowred by great Monarchs confining with their Estates now they side with
and consequently Anne Bullen could not be during her life and Queene Elizabeth must needs be a bastard Cecil and others whose fortunes were to be built upon the ruine of the ancient Religion and Nobility perswaded the Queene that her security was not consistent with the Popes supremacy and authority in her Dominions therefore it was necessary to declare her selfe a Protestant and supreme Governesse of Christs Church She followed his advice and tooke the spirituall government so vainely upon her that she visited Diocesses invented now Ceremonies rejected what she pleased of the old reprehended Preachers in their very Sermons and which is most ridiculous of all consecrated with her faire hands Master Whitgift pretended Archbishop of Canterbury if they both be not very much wronged by persons of integrity that related the story as a most certaine truth to Fitz Herbert a man well knowne for his profound judgement great learning and solid vertue We may believe without the least note of credulity what he printed an 1612. after setting downe this story of a reformed Ordination related by Scherer A few yeares since not farre from Vienna Scherer postilla de sanct conc â— de S. Steph. a certaine noble woman did call the Master of her children to the office of a Preacher or Minister and did order and consecrate him by the imposition of her hands and of her apron which she did use instead of a stole Whether any such imposition of hands Fitz Herbert in the Preface to Persons discussion of Master Barlowes answer in sine aprons or Kyrtles were used to the first Prelates by Queene Elizabeth saith Fitz Herbert I knowe not but I have beene credibly informed that Master Whitgift would not be Bishop of Canterbury untill he had kneeled downe and the Queene had laid her hands on his head by which I suppose ex opere operato he received no grace According to Protestant principles Queene Elizabeth might and ought to ordaine Bishops seeing she was baptised and Ordination is but Baptisme in their Religion Let not our modern Protestants censure Master Whifgift he understood the grounds of Reformation and their practise also in those dayes better then any that now will condemne his receiving Ordination by imposition of Queene Elizabeths gracious hands if the was Pope why could she not give orders and consecrate Archbishops 2 The change of Religion which the Queene made in England was by corrupting most of the Nobility though I belive more of them stood for the Catholick Faith then the Earle of Shrewsbury and Viscount Montacute Camd. in Eliz. I admire how Camden saith that onely a Talbot and a Browne opposed the intended Reformation whereas all other Authors affirme that Catholick Religion was cast by one onely voice or three at most It s certaine that all the Bishops did their duty in defending the true Faith and that many of the Nobility were perverted by the Duke of Norfolke and the Earle of Arundell One of 14. Bishops that were in Parliament of whom there was an opinion of sanctity when he perceived how flexible many of the Lords were to the Queenes desires in changing the ancient Faith and establishing Protestancy uttered these terrible words The curse of God and of mine fall upon your selves and your posterity which will be destroyed by this very Religion that ye have voted for this day Whether this was a prophecy or no I will not dispute but what the Bishop foretold is now visible to the whole world There is not upon the face of the earth a more contemptible generation of men then the English Nobility at this present One simple Souldiour or Read-coate is sufficient to keepe them all in awe and three or foure Troopers may disarme three hundred and be more uncivill if they please If Catholick Religion had stood the Nobility had never fallen from their ancient splendour they had beene as famous abroad and beloved at home as their renowned Ancestors who were all Roman Catholicks Policy never thrives long against Religion and fortunes built upon the ruines of the Church seldome descend to the fourth generation and often vanish away from the first The Duke of Norfolk head of our Parliament Polititians that gathered votes for the Queene and Protestancy lost his head upon a block when it was thought he was in hopes to have it crowned by marrying the Queene of Scotland Many others of the English Nobility and Gentry had â—he same unfortunate end and their posterity is like to continue that slavery which for them hath beene purchased by their Grandsires at so deare a rare as the exchange of Catholick Faith for Heresy They may attribute their owne misery and captivity to the liberty which they gave in that fatall Parliament to the people of interpreting Scripture as they should thinke fit It was no lesse want of Policy then Religion not to stick to the old Roman infallibility seeing they could not make their Enghlish Church infallible The Popes supremacy and infallibility is not so prejudiciall to the world as Hereticks pretend it takes away all ryranny and rebellion that may be covered with a cloake of Religion if both Prince and people will submit their judgements to his who is an indifferent person All England hath reason to curse Queene Elizabeth and her first Parliament for depriving them of so necessary a support of the Soveraignes authority and the Nations liberty as the Popes spirituall jurisdiction and authority 3 After that the Catholick Religion was voted downe in Parliament the Queene commanded that all the Catholick Bishops should be deposed he of Landaffe onely excepted an old and simple man because he tooke the oath of supremacy as some of the rest had done in King Henry the VIII his time yet the Hereticks who were named to succeede in the other Bishops Seas could not prevaile with Landaffe to consecrate them at the Nags-head in Cheapside where they appointed to meete him and therefore thâ—y made use of Scory who was never ordained Bishop though he bore the name in King Edwards reigne kneeling before him he laid the Bible upon their heads or shoulders and bid them rise up Sacrobosco Fitz Simons Constable Champney Fitz Herbert in his Preface to F. Persons and many others with Harding and Stapleton and preach the Word of God sincearly This is so evident a truth that for the space of 50. yeares no Protestant durst contradict it nothing being more common in England as hath beene lately demonstrated in a booke called A Treatise of the Nature of Catholick Faith and Heresy to which I remit the Reader where he will see how the Protestant Ministers abuse the world with cheating tricks and false records to cry downe this most certaine story The Bishops named by the Queene were Parker for Canterbury Grindal for London Horne for Winchester and Iewell for Salsbury besides many others who were all or most of them at Franckford in Queene Maryes time and there named a