PART doctor, but of the following times. King Henry suppressed the Papal tyranny in England by his legislative power, and Cranmer by his discovery of their usurpations and care to see the laws executed.

Cromwell.

Barnes.

Against Cromwell he produceth but one testimony,-that "it was generally conceived, and truly (as never thought) that the politic ways for taking away the Pope's authority in England, and the suppression of Religious Houses, were principally devised by Cromwell."

First, this is but an argument from vulgar opinion. Secondly, when Archbishop Warham and the synod did first give to King Henry the supremacy and the title of Head of the English Church, Cromwell was no Protestant. He had lately been Cardinal Wolsey's solicitor, and was then Master of the Jewel-House, of no such power to do any great good or hurt to the Protestants. And at his death he professed, that he was no Sacramentary, and that he died in the Catholic Faith".

But for the suppression of Religious Houses, it is not improbable. He might well have learned that way under 180 Cardinal Wolsey, when he procured the suppression of forty monasteries of good note for the founding of his two Colleges at Oxford and Ipswich: in which business, our historians say, the Pope licked his own fingers to the value of twelve barrels full of gold and silver.

Lastly, for Dr. Barnes, poor man, he was neither courtier, nor councillor, nor convocation-man, nor Parliament-man. All the grace, which ever he received from King Henry, was an honourable death for his religion. He said, that he,' and "such other wretches as he," had "made the king a whole kingi," by their sermons. If they did so, it was well done.

Oxf. 1822, and Append. nos. xxviii. xxix; and the Letters Patent and Bulls in Rymer's Foed., tom. xiv. pp. 155, &c. 291, &c. The story of the gold and silver is in Foxe (Acts and Mon., bk. viii. vol. ii. p. 197), but has no connection with the founding of Wolsey's Colleges.]

[Foxe, Acts and Monum., bk. viii. vol. ii. p. 444; quoted by R. C., Surv., c. iii. sect. 2. p. 46.]

III.

The meaning of "a whole king," is "a Head of the Church," DISCOURSE saith R. C. It may be so, but the consequence is naught. Perhaps he meant a sovereign independent king, not feudatory to the Pope; which he that is, is but half a king. Not only of old, but in later times, the Popes did challenge a power paramount over the kings of England within their own dominions; as appeareth by the Pope's Bull, sent to James the Fifth, king of Scotland, wherein he declareth, that he had "deprived King Henry of his kingdom," as "a heretic, a schismatic, an adulterer, a murderer, a sacrilegious person;" and, lastly, "a rebel and convict of læsæ majestatis, for that he had risen against him" (the Pope) "who was his lord'."

But now, supposing all R. C. his suggestions had been true, -that Cranmer and Cromwell had been Protestants at that time, and had been in as much grace, and had had the like opportunity of address to the king, as they had afterwards; that Cranmer had persuaded the king as a divine, and Cromwell as a politician, to separate from the Court of Rome; and that Barnes had preached against the Pope's supremacy,-yet this is far from the authoritative separation of the whole Church and kingdom from the Court of Rome. Moral persuasions may incline, but cannot necessitate, the will.

[SECTION THE THIRD.]

Catholics

be the au

thors of the separation.]

Therefore, not confiding to these broken reeds, at length [Roman he admits, that Roman Catholics were the authors of the admitted separation ;-"Be it so, that Roman Catholics were the by R. C. to authors of the division;... that is worse for Protestants," because "then Protestants continue a wicked schism, wickedly begun, against conscience, against known truth, and consequently a sin against the Holy Ghostm." And to make his assertion good, he produceth the authority of Optatus: "It appeareth evidently that you are the heirs of schismatics." He who reads this would believe, that Optatus spake posi

* [Surv., ibid.]

I Speed, [Chron., in Hen. VIII.,]

lib. ix. c. 21. [num. 84.]

m

[Surv., c. iii. sect. 3. pp. 16, 47.]

I.

"it

PART tively of Protestants, when he speaks only of Donatists; "Cum hæc ita gesta esse manifestissimè constet, et vos hæredes esse traditorum et schismaticorum evidenter appareat"—"Seeing it is most evident, that these things did fall out thus," that is, that Majorinus (whose chair Parmenianus did now possess) did divide himself from the communion of Cæcilianus, and set up a chair against a chair in the same Church, or a new chair, "quæ ante ipsum Majorinum originem non habebat,” and seeing Majorinus was a traditor and a schismatic, appears evidently" that Parmenian was the "heir of a schismatic"." Now what doth this concern us? The Donatists set up a new chair against an old chair in the same Church; we have done no such thing. God make us able to keep up the old. Secondly, the Donatists separated themselves from all other Churches; we separate ourselves from no Churches, neither from the chair of Cæcilian, nor of Peter, nor of Cyprian. But if we would know, not only who are the heirs of the Donatists, but who are their heirs in their schism, we Papists are may find them easily. It is the Roman Catholics themselves. the right heirs of the First, in their uncharitableness, in breaking the bond of Donatists, brotherly unity. The Catholics owned the Donatists for their brethren, but the Donatists refused to own the Catholics for their brethren,-" Quamvis et illi non negent, et omnibus notum sit," &c.-" Although they deny it not, and it is known to all men, that they hate us, and accurse us, and will not be called our brethren, yet" &c. "without doubt they are our brethren":" and a little after, "And because they will not have the Episcopal College common with us, let them not be our fellow Collegians, if they will not; yet, as I said before, they are our brethren "." This is just the case between them and us; we offer them the right hand of brotherhood, as the Catholics did to the Donatists, but they refuse it, as the Donatists did to the Catholics. Secondly, the Donatists separated the whole Catholic Church from their communion, and substituted themselves, being but a small part of the 181 Christian world, in the place of the Catholic Church. Just as the Romanists do at this day. Optatus speaks home unto

not Protes

tants.

III.

them, both the old and new Donatists. "Si pro voluntate DISCOURSE vestrá in angustum coarctatis Ecclesiam," &c.—"If ye for your pleasure do thrust the Church into a strait, if ye substract all nations, where is that which the Son of God hath merited? where is that which the Father hath given Him? I will give Ps. ii. [8.] Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession.' Why do you infringe this promise? or imprison this universal kingdom?" &c. "Suffer the Son to possess His Father's gift. Suffer the Father to fulfil His promise. Why do you set bounds and limits?... And still ye endeavour to persuade men that the Church is only with you." Let the reader judge who are the right heirs of the Donatists.

tholics se- sinned not

Roman against con

science in

Court their sepa

The rest of his discourse is a groundless asking of the Roman Caquestion. First, those Roman Catholics did make no paration from the Roman Church," but from the Court. Secondly, they separated from the Roman only in its innovations, without criminous schism. Thirdly, we cannot, we dare not, be so uncharitable as to judge that the whole kingdom and all the pastors of the Church did sin

against their conscience";" but we believe firmly, that it was the clear light and evidence of truth, that made them so unanimous in their separation. Fourthly, though they had sinned "against the known truth," not being done of malice, it was not "the sin against the Holy Ghost." St. Peter did not sin against the Holy Ghost when he denied Christ. Fifthly, though they had sinned "against conscience" in separating, yet, the fault being not in the thing done but in the conscience of the doer, we being better informed may with a good conscience hold, what they with a bad conscience did take away. Lastly, though they had sinned, not only in separating against conscience, but also in the very act of separation; yet we, who found the separation made to our hands, who never did any act either to oblige us to Rome or to disoblige us from Rome, holding what we received from our ancestors, and endeavouring to find out the truth, and ready to receive it whensoever God shall reveal it unto us,

ration.

PART

I.

Henry the
Eighth no

are not censurable as schismatics, as I proved out of St. Austin", though R. C. be pleased to take no notice of it.

Here he makes a short double and will needs have Henry Protestant. the Eighth to have been " a substantial Protestant *." If he was a Protestant, doubtless he was a "substantial" Protestant. But why a Protestant? Doctor Barnes and many more, who were burned by him for Protestants, would hardly have believed it. But he saith, Henry the Eighth was an "Antipapist," and that "is sufficient" to make a Protestant y. If that be sufficient to make a Protestant, it is well; otherwise, one of his friends tells us, "We had a king who by his laws abolished the authority of the Pope, although in all other things he would follow the Faith of his ancestors." Lately he told us, that the essence and "life and soul and definition of a Protestant" was to hold justification by faith alonea. Then Henry the Eighth was no Protestant, for he did not hold justification by faith alone. Now he makes the essence of a Protestant to be impugning the Pope's supremacy. I had not thought essences or definitions had been so mutable: but for my part I am glad of the change. If all Antipapists be Protestants, then all the Grecian, Armenian, Abyssene, Russian Christians are Protestants; then we shall not want Protestants to bear us company in the Church of Rome itself, so long as there are any followers of the Councils of Constance and Basle.

b

But some Protestants have confessed, that he was "a member of the Catholic Church." Why not? There are many "members of the Catholic Church" besides Protestants. Others call him a "true Defender of the true Faith 4," a "defender of the Gospel," an "embracer of the pure Gospel of Christ, rejecting devices of men contrary thereunto."

с

d

[Surv., c. iii. sect. 3. p. 48. Compare] Sanders, De Schism., p. 103, b. ed. 1585. [p. 211. ed. 1610.]" Denique nullâ [fere] in re a fide Catholicâ discessit" [(Henr. VIII.)] "nisi" [leg. "præterquam"]"libidinis et luxuriæ causa." [Andrewes, Respons. ad Cardin. Bellarm. Apolog., c. i. in fine, p. 55. ed. 1610; quoted by R. C., Surv., ibid.]

d

e

[Antiq. Brit. Eccl., in V. Cranmer., p. 338; quoted by R. C., Surv., ibid.] f[Bucer., Comment. in Epist. ad Roman., Præfat. in init. ; quoted by R. C., Surv., ibid.]