Whereas in Holy Writ, when the Apostles (and the Papists commonly call
Augustine the English apostle, how properly we shall see hereafter,)
went to a foreign nation, 'God gave them the language thereof, &c.'
What a loss that Fuller has not made a reference to his authorities for this assertion! I am sure he could have found none in the New Testament, but facts that imply, and, in the absence of all such proof, prove the contrary.
Ib. s. 6.
Thus we see the whole week bescattered with Saxon idols, whose pagan
gods were the godfathers of the days, and gave them their names. 'This
some zealot may behold as the object of a necessary reformation,
desiring to have the days of the week new dipt, and called after other
names'. Though indeed this supposed scandal will not offend the wise,
as beneath their notice, and cannot offend the ignorant, as above
their knowledge.
A curious prediction fulfilled a few years after in the Quakers, and well worthy of being extracted and addressed to the present Friends.
Memorandum.—It is the error of the Friends, but natural and common to almost all sects,—the perversion of the wisdom of the first establishers of their sect into their own folly, by not distinguishing between the conditionally right and the permanently and essentially so. For example: It was right conditionally in the Apostles to forbid black puddings even to the Gentile Christians, and it was wisdom in them; but to continue the prohibition would be folly and Judaism in us. The elder church very sensibly distinguished episcopal from apostolic inspiration; the episcopal spirit, that which dictated what was fit and profitable for a particular community or church at a particular period,—from the apostolic and catholic spirit which dictated truth and duties of permanent and universal obligation.
Ib. cent. 7.
This Latin dedication is remarkably pleasing and elegant. Milton in his classical youth, the aera of Lycidas, might have written it—only he would have given it in Latin verse.
B. x. cent. 17.
Bp. of London. May your Majesty be pleased, that the ancient canon may
be remembered, 'Schismatici contra episcopos non sunt audiendi'. And
there is another decree of a very ancient council, that no man should
be admitted to speak against that whereunto he hath formerly
subscribed.
And as for you, Doctor Reynolds, and your sociates, how much are you
bound to his Majestie's clemencye, permitting you contrary to the
statute 'primo Elizabethae', so freely to speak against the liturgie
and discipline established. Faine would I know the end you aime at,
and whether you be not of Mr. Cartwright's minde, who affirmed, that
we ought in ceremonies rather to conforme to the Turks than to the
Papists. I doubt you approve his position, because here appearing
before his Majesty in Turkey-gownes, not in your scholastic habits,
according to the order of the Universities.