which are seales and principall markes of this heauenly likenesse Subscribe to this doctrine or else wee will say to your face that you are infected with Pelagianisme The Iesuites hold that Adams sinne was small and not so outragious as it is made Let vs say better that our protoplastes haue lost their faith That it was an Heresie asinne of incredulitie an apostasie a fault that could not be amended by any other then the Sonne of God Like as the Moone after her coniunction with the Sunne is replenished with a diuine power which she imparteth vnto all things so also the soule of this little world being rauished through contemplation and as it were vnited with that great intellectuall Sunne was inflamed with an heauenly light and an inestimable power and if it should bee separated from thence what would remaine but darkenesse and infirmitie As touching Hell neyther Caluin nor we did euer speake any such thing neyther yet any thing that commeth neere vnto that which you alledge it is deceite and calumny Let vs proceede to the rest of your accusations We rule not onely our externall actions but also the affections of our heart The word of God is the square Those concupiscences that tickle and sting our soules ought to bee bridled and for this cause we account them as sinnes yea euen in the persons of the regenerate but that they liue not that they reigne not that they are not imputed vnto vs through the benefit of faith This is it which we beleeue What haue we to doe then with the heretike Proclus What simpathie is there betweene vs and the Messalians You know not what concupiscence meaneth you know not the effects thereof And sith we are speaking thereof doe you not falsifie the Scripture wheras of the last commandement of God which forbiddeth concupiscence you make two against Saint Pauls meaning who comprehendeth the forbidding of concupiscence all vnder one commandement In the end we auouch that the Pepuzians admitted women vnto the sacred ministrie of the Church Luther is slaundered as if he had followed the footsteppes of this false doctrine To say that sinnes are remitted through Repentance whether the Priest absolue them of the same or not is this to follow the Pepuzians To say that a woman or a child hath as much power to forgiue sinnes as the Pope hath is this to attribute the Priesthood vnto that sexe which the Heauenly Oracle forbiddeth to teach in the Church We are better taught then so and in effect this present discourse shall declare vnto you that you can neuer be able to free your selues from Pepuzianisme The Nouatians acknowledged no other meanes to reconcile men to God in the Church then Baptisme and taught that such as were baptised ought to be anointed with the Bishops Chrisme Acknowledge your brethren here but let vs answere Nouatus admitted not vnto repentance those that had fallen after Baptisme Doe we teach that It is true indeed that we deny two things that penitence is a Sacrament that the force of Baptisme doth not continue vnto the end of mans life S. Hierome calleth repentance the second table after shipwracke Let vs say that it is not the cause of the remission of sinnes it is the merey of God purchased vnto the faithfull through their onely Sauiour Iesus Christ but onely the signe of remission and the remedy whereby those that are baptised do helpe themselues among those great confusions and disorders arising from their faults Moreouer who hath foughten better then we against Sabellius who acknowledged but one person in the sacred Trinitie Why then do you match vs with that pest The bookes written by our men beare record of our Orthodoxall faith and the punishment that Seruet suffered declareth the practise thereof Wherefore if it be sufficient to accuse who shall be found innocent Arrius made the Sonne to be meaner then the Father The Tritheites taught the same You shall be contented if it please you that we produce a simple negatiue against a bare affirmation and in like manner if we send you vnto the learned writes of our men In the meane season we will by order deny that we are in any wayes acquainted with the Manicheans contemners of nature and deniers of free will We acknowledge a free will in euill things and remoue the same from spirituall graces Touching sinne we doe attribute it to the will of man to the Deuill and not to God And if the same Manicheans haue accused the Fathers of the old Testament to wit Abraham Iacob Sampson Sara Rebecca and others as wicked and detestable persons shall it be sayd likewise that Caluin hath scourged these fathers with the rod of slander Those did so that they might make their memorie hatefull vnto the posteritie he had no other intent but to declare how fraile our life is and that our infirmitie ought to minister occasion vnto vs to suspect our naturall forces as in themselues incapable of vertuous actions and heauenly mysteries The former to wit the Manicheans haue followed Cham the latter sendeth vs vnto the grace of God who vpholdeth our right hands that we may not fall into this puddle of sinne Shall we be Donatists g also They closed the Church within the bounds of Africke they reiected sinners from the libertie and communion of the visible Church proclaimed open wars against the Catholicke Bishops Caluin and we say you doe in like manner You speake onely by report or by dreaming We confesse indeed that the Catholicke Church which consisteth of the elect onely is inuisible The eternall election whereupon Gods couenant is grounded which is the essentiall forme of the Church and maketh it to be a Church cannot be made knowne and manifest but through the holy Ghost and through the word of God The election of the visible elect is inuisible Seeing therefore that to be in the Church or of the Church doth not declare the essence of man but sheweth the eternall election whereunto Gods couenant had a relation and that you beleeue after this manner why doe you slaunder vs as if we were partakers with the Donatists Concerning the limits of the Church we doe not diminish them they are extended throughout all the climates of the earth and it is you that inclose them within the walles of Rome And if we haue a criminall action against your Bishops you must not therefore conclude that we are enemies to those that with the Bishops sea haue the succession of the Apostolicke doctrine Aerius would not pray for the dead nor yet we Are we heretickes therefore Then let S. Hierome if your consequence be true Chrysostome Austin that most worthy Bishop of Hippona and Theophilactus be Aerians and heretickes for they affirme all after one manner that after this life there is neither time nor place to make satisfaction for
offence that can be committed you thinke that life euerlasting is lost Truely the righteousnesse of the faithfull we answere doth not decay for euery transgression Wee confesse indeed that all sinnes are deadly euen the smallest which the Pelagians would not acknowledge We will not therefore place all manner of sinnes in one degree we are not Stoickes some are more hainous then others And that inequalitie set downe by Christ Iesus in the paines of the reprobate doth it not proceede of the inequalitie of the offences You thinke it strange that we call all sinnes saue that against the holy Ghost veniall that is to say pardonable Betake your selues therefore to the mercy of God who desireth not the death of a sinner What farther A certaine great person and a seruant of God in our age and one whom God endueth daily with more and more graces thought once that there had beene two hypostaticall or personall vnions in Christ the one of the soule with the bodie the other of the diuinitie with the humanitie Shall it not be lawfull for vs to recant and cancell that which through mistaking we haue thought and written amisse as S. Austin did very commendably He yeelded to the admonitions that were giuen him and declared his meaning in his learned treatise of the hypostaticall Vnion of the two natures in Christ Iesus Shall he therefore be accounted a Nestorian that established two persons in Christ And we shall be farre lesse of the Eutichian sect which admitted but one nature as well as one onely person in Christ although Swenckfeldius Smidelinus and others haue written so which we disaduouch We should neuer haue done and this Preface would exceede its bounds if it behoued vs by little and little to follow the footsteps of Alphonsus a Castro of one Prateolus of Bellarmine and others of that kind which haue filled vp therwith huge and great paltrie volumes and set vp trophees of their accusations on this subiect That which we haue sayd shall serue for a proofe that it may be knowne to the posteritie that with the like facilitie we are able to refute the other heresies which we haue not set downe here to the end that we might eschew prolixitie and whereof you accuse vs wherwith we haue refuted the former And this little discourse shall declare how vaine your proiects are by seeking to make vs worthie to be detested among men and that our innocencie shall be a decree of condemnation against you in so farre as you haue shewed your selues false accusers and rebels vnto the truth Those great vants of your huge and large Temples doe nothing but make an Eccho of this word heretickes your cheekes are altogether swelled therewith You can say no worse taking it in that sense wherein it is commonly spoken It seemes that the Eccho of those vast dennes of your Temples taketh pleasure to double and repeate seuen times ouer these iniurious words that they may the better be distilled into the braines of your flockes And who would not easily obtaine the victorie when the enemie doth not appeare Would God that we had libertie to answere you by and by in the same pulpits from which you threaten vs so much I beleeue that within a short time you would become Curats without Parishioners For we should haue iust cause to prescribe against you because of your reuolting for that you are blind leaders for that you agree not with the holy words of Christ Iesus yea and because you are heretickes You will iudge here that I am inciuill and iniurious yet can I not terme a house otherwise then a house and euery thing by the owne name I loue your persons I hate your heresies and errours and it is against them and not against you that I prepare this combate for the safetie both of you and of that poore people whom you haue bewitched This little table shall represent not in small for it were impossible but in great the harmonie and agreement which is betweene your Poperie and old heresies And it were as much as to enter into an Ocean if we would make a Register of the great heapes of your errours sith that the decree of the blessed Trinity being excepted there is nothing sound throughout the whole bodie of the Romish Religion Many with good successe haue laboured to discouer them though to your great griefe and haue manifested that which you would had beene hid for euer in the thickest of Cimmerian darkenesse I beare you no malice God is my witnesse my onely intent is that it may be knowne euidently to which of vs two this loathsome epithet hereticke belongeth Two things do support each other in errour the presuming of the truth before it be knowne and the defending of the presumed falshood after that the truth hath bin manifested vnto vs. We haue accused you yea and haue vanquished both of the one and the other of presumption and obstinacie Heresie proceedeth not from the Scripture but from that it is not rightly vnderstoode it is a crime not of the words but of the sense You erre in both twaine and although it be against your owne consciences yet so it is that you chuse rather to be damned then vanquished by the truth God of his infinite mercy open your eyes and make you see the beames of his graces in his Church where being gathered with vs we may worship together that Pastor and soueraigne Bishop of our soules our Lord Iesus Christ who in the vnitie of the Father and of the holy Ghost liueth and reighneth God eternally So be it THE THIRD CONFORMITIE CHAP. I. Of God YOu are not ignorant Sirs that there is but one maker of all creator of all Moyses speaking vnto the Israelites exhorteth them to giue eare vnto him and saith that the Lord their God is the onely God The principalitie of man hath a certaine analogie and correspondence with the diuine power All things are delighted in this vnitie and in truth S. Hierome bringeth forth some notable examples Yet notwithstanding the Manicheans haue made two infinite beginnings although it be impossible that any other infinite thing can bee together with God in Thought Will Might Goodnesse and Essence If there were two beginnings the one might destroy that which the other had wrought both twaine should possesse each other and by possessing should also borrow one from the other as being imperfect If there be two which of the two hath made this World Who hath gouerned it If the one ruleth what doth the other If the one hath made this world and the other ruleth it how hath this ruler entered into the house which is none of his Wee will conclude therefore that there is but one God but one beginning onely And although the heresie that maintaineth the contrarie is not embraced generally of you all yet Austin Steuchus famous among your Doctors hath written that the Empyreall heauen is
coeternall with God If it be so behold two Gods in your Church as well as among the Manicheans For that which hath no begining is God The consequence followeth seeing that the Empyreal heauen is eternall it is God You will obiect vnto vs that all doe not agree with Steuchus This may be true but where doth the Pope censure this matter Where is the scraping out hereof in your Index Expurgatorius Truely this silence maketh vs suspect that in holding your peace you haue all agreed with him therein And if any of vs had spoken and written so what tempests what thundrings should we haue heard ouer our heads CHAP. II. Of the body of Christ Iesus ANd how haue you spared the body of Iesus Christ You haue deified the same by making it inuisible altogether spirit without place without dimensions and to bee in all places wheresoeuer any sacrifice is offered after your manner This is to make the body of Christ with the Eutichians equall with the diuinitie for to be in diuers places at one moment and to bee euery where are the markes of diuinity What Haue not Marcion and the Manicheans taught that the body of Christ was but counterfeit and phantasticall Basilides followed their footesteps This is the same that you teach vnto your flocks And that body hid according to your doctrine vnder the accidents of bread and wine in the Eucharist can not stand but through a phantasticall doctrine in an imaginary body And what manner of body I beseech you which is voide of all its owne qualities and essentiall properties Euery true body is in some place is furnished with its owne dimensions otherwaies it is not a body It belongeth vnto you therefore to bee aduised by what means you may escape and purge yourselues from Marcionisme and Manicheisme You confesse that Christ is in heauen contained within a place and that hee is likewise in the Sacrament of the Eucharist but without any place is not this as much as if you had said that this sacramentall body is more glorious spirituall heauenly then the body which is in heauen and is glorified by the Father Herein you agree with the Hereticks called Helcesceans who maintained that there was many Christs or at least two whereof the one dwelled in heauen and the other vpon earth Some of your Doctors conforming themselues to the Abbot Eutiches haue not beene ashamed to write that Christs body is neyther creator nor creature but something betweene them both which your Canonists hold likewise to be true of the Pope O monster If S. Austin were aliue he would answere you that which hee hath written namely that euery substance that is not God is a creature and that which is a creature is not God as being a thing inferiour to God Mahomet in hss Alcoran holdeth that Christ was neuer crucified or if hee was that it was without cause Alanus following that which the Councell of Trent ordained saith that the blood of Christ Iesus that was shed before hee was crucified in mount Caluarie is the ratification and foundation of the eternall and new Testament of the Sonne of God whose body without all shame he affirmeth to haue beene offered vp at the Supper before his passion Dare you confesse it If you hold the affirmatiue what neede had Christ to shed his blood the next day following If Christ our Paschall Lambe was offered vp in the Supper it behoued him to haue made satisfaction vnto his Father and that our redemption was accomplished there And what neede was there if it be so that hee should suffer the morrow after And when you alledge those closed gates whereof mention is made in the Gospell where you would haue two bodily substances to concurre together in one onely place is not this to ground your selues on the same argument which the Manicheans abused to the end that they might ouerthrow the truth of the humane nature that was in Christ What large and ample matter should S. Hierome finde here to speake and say vnto you Cum dicit Manicheus similis Manicheorum Dominus non resurrexit in corporis veritate vt scias non verum fuisse corpus clausis ingressus est ianuis Nos quid dicemus Domine libera animam meam de labijs iniquis à lingua dolosa And if this be true behold the article of the incarnation abolished and the truth of the body of Christ Iesus ouerthrowne at least since his resurrection The ascension shall be nothing but the changing of a visible and limited nature throughout all its dimensions into an inuisible substance and which is more spirituall and Angelicall and his second comming shall not be to returne and come back againe realy and substantially but without any remouing from beneath here hauing beene inuisible euer since his resurrection vntill his returning to become visible like some iugler But when will you leaue reauing And the arguments which you draw from posse ad esse are fitter for the Manicheans and Euticheans then for those that say that they professe true Christianity And call to remembrance that which Vigilius wrote against the substantiall presence of Christs body in the Eucharist Caro Christi quando in terra fuit non erat in coelo nunc quia est in coelo non est vtique in terris The Nestorians made a separation betweene the two natures in Christ you doe in like manner when you will not acknowledge him to be mediator both according to the one and the other nature The Monothelites gaue vnto Christ but one will onely which the Iesuits haue confirmed by condemning of vs that haue written the contrarie Alanus hath written that Christ did neuer sacrifice after the manner of Aaron It is as much as if hee had said that he neuer shed his blood Truth it is indeede that Iesus Christ is a Priest after the order of Melchisedec a dignitie which hath a relation vnto his person but that doth not hinder his sacrifice to bee bloody as were those of Aaron otherwise wee should not as yet be reconciled to God CHAP. III. Of Christs Soule VVE beleeue that Christs Soule being for a certaine season separated from the body was in Paradise and not in the Lymbus set vp and builded by you in the fourth mansion of the infernall Palace S. Austin and Ireneus haue in like manner taught the same that we hold and beleeue in our Church Notwithstanding Bellarmine gathereth out of Durandus his words that Christs soule is yet still in hell Is not this all one with that which the Christolites said to wit that this glorious soule of our redeemer remained still in hell CHAP. IIII. How men are saued THe whole Scripture teacheth vs that the being the life and grace fauour and goodnesse which are poured downe by God on vs
ostentation of your Reliques with great pompe and are not ashamed to place among them shooes haire combes shirts nailes and other iewels whereof our writers haue set downe whole Catalogues in their Print bookes Is not this to imitate the Sampseans who kept the spittle and dust of two womens feet whom they adored thinking that these were fit to cure diseases Thus hath Epiphanius written And like as the Heliotropites honoured such herbes as turned about with the Sunne so doe you embrace euery thing yea euen to the taile of the asse that carried Christ Iesus to Ierusalem and is kept at Genua and the myse that eate your hoste which if like good Cats you doe once catch you make reliques thereof S. Chrysostome reproueth and condemneth those Reliques I will send you to those passages which I haue noted in the Margent CHAP. XX. Of the Crosse. WHen we speake of the crosse wee meane not of the crosse of wood and of the signe of the crosse For when our Lord sayth that we ought to take vp our crosse and follow him we must not vnderstand this signe that is in wood as if we were to carie it on our shoulders but rather that we may crucifie our affections vnder the commaundement of Christ Iesus as also that we may vndergoe all manner of crosses and afflictions for his names sake By the crosse therefore we vnderstand the death and passion of our Lord and not this crosse whereupon Christ Iesus suffered death For the Ecclesiasticall historie assureth vs that Helena deuided the same in two parts whereof the greater she left in Ierusalem inclosed within a siluer cace and sent the other to the Emperour her sonne who placed the same in his statue that was set vpon a pillar of Porphyre in the midst of the market place of Constantinople The Pagans mocked this adoration and Caecilius reproued the Christians for so much as they worshipped the dolefull wood of the crosse and honoured that which they had deserued and ought to haue suffered But what doth Octauius answere vnto them Behold what Arnobius sayth We adore not the crosse neither yet desire the same S. Ambrose sayth Helena the Empresse found out the title and adored the King and not the wood because it is an heathenish errour and an vngodly vanitie And the historie of Epiphanius that broke and bruised the image of the crucifix that was placed in the entrie of the temple is manifest You adore the crosse plainely These be your words O crux aue spes vnica There is a verse in your breuiaries Crucem tuam adoramus Domine And in that are you not Armenians who adored the crosse of our Lord and for that cause were called Staurolaters Tertullian and S. Basill say indeed that this manner of making the signe of the crosse in the aire hath proceeded from an Apostolicke tradition But from what tradition I beseech you From the Euangell of Nicodemus where we read those pleasant fables that Charinus and Lentius being risen againe make the signe of the crosse on their tongues That Christ being in the Lymbus made the same signe vpon Abraham and the rest and that he made this signe on the hands of the good theefe that he might shew the same to the Porter of Paradise in case he would not suffer him to enter CHAP. XXI Of Mariage and Celibate I Will beginne at Mantuans verses Tutius esse volunt qua lex diuina sinebat Isse via veterumque sequi vestigia Patrum Quorū vita fuit melior cum coniuge quam nunc Nostra sit exclusis thalamis coniugis vsu. What ample matter I could find here to conuince you Sirs that forbid that order and vocation of persons to marry which is in the first degree of holinesse and religion among you Behold your prating here That it is an vnseemely thing that those which ought to be the temple of our Lord should be the slaues of beds and vncleannesse You guard your selues with the Councels of Ancyra of Neocaesarea of Arles of Elibera and which are prouincials which neuerthelesse were ruled by the first generall Councell of Nyce I abhorre these blasphemies that your Canons spew out against mariage That it is nothing else but the filth of carnall copulation a reprochfull vncleannesse When mariage is called obscaenae cupiditates When maried Bishops are termed contaminati carnali concupiscentia When againe they are called Sectatores libidinum praeceptores vitiorum The Popes Syricius and Innocent call mariage pollution Gregorie surnamed the great would not suffer such maried persons to enter into the Church as had lyen together the night before vnlesse they had first bin purged and washed and grounded himselfe vpon an ancient custome that had beene vsed in Rome and it may be that it is that whereof the heathenish Poet maketh mention Haec sanctè vt poscas tyberino in gurgite mergis Mane caput bis terque noctem flumine purgas And what manner of songs be these but of owles and scratchowles fowles that are ominous And what shall become of so many great worthie persons that haue deserued so well of the Church who were married S. Hilarie Bishop of Poictiers was married Oceanus Numidicus Seuerus Restitutus Chaeremon Philogonius Apollinaris Synesius being all renowmned married Bishops and Pastours Gregorie Nazianzene was a Bishops sonne Item Gregorie of Nysse brother to S. Basile was married as Nicephorus writeth and among the modernes Baptista Mantuanus And when you thus detest mariage is it not to raise Saturnillus from death againe who abhorred the same as a villanous fact and said that matrimony proceeded of Sathan and not of God And that accusation is notable which Epiphanius frameth against the Origenists grandfathers to the Fryers and Nunnes of our time They banish mariage sayth he and not lecherie they pollute their soules and bodies with filthinesse Some liue solitarie like Fryers some women also liue in desert places in the habit of those that lead a solitarie life They are polluted accomplishing in themselues their concupiscences yea and practising the infamous act of Onan the sonne of Iudah The chastitie whereof they make profession is fained and beareth onely the name Their butt and ayme is this that women may not conceiue and bring forth children fearing that they might be diffamed among men and through the meanes of this fained chastitie they would purchase fame and prayse vnto themselves Behold what hath caused in the church this so slaunderous and execrable introduction of chastity afterward confirmed with so many curses by Gregorie the seuenth The Gnosians forbad their Priests to marie as Eusebius writeth Scuerus witnesse Epiphanius calleth the woman the workmanship of the Deuill by consequent that such as are ioyned in matrimonie doe performe the worke of the Deuill