The second tome of homilies of such matters as were promised, and entitled in…The second tome of homilees of such matters as were promised, and intituled in…

And here by the way it is to be noted, that at that time there were no Churches or temples erected unto any saint, but to God only, as Saint Augustine ¹also recordeth, saying: we build no temples unto our martyrs. And Eusebius him self calleth Churches, houses of prayer, and showeth that in Constantine the emperors time, all men rejoiced, seeing in stead of low conventicles, which tyrants had destroyed, high temples to be builded. Lo, unto the time of Constantine, by the space of above three hundred years after our saviour Christ, when christian religion was most pure, and in deed golden, Christians had but low and poor conventicles and simple oratories, yea, caves under the ground called Cryptae, ²where they for fear of persecution assembled secretly together. A figure whereof remaineth in ⟨p. 142⟩the vaults which yet are builded under great Churches, to put us in remembrance of the old state of the primitive church before Constantine, where as in Constantine's time, and after him, were builded great and goodly temples for christians, called Basilicae, either for that the Greeks ³used to call all great and goodly places Basilicas, or for that the high and everlasting king God and our Saviour Christ was served in them. But although Constantine, and other princes, of good zeal to our religion, did sumptuously deck and adorn Christians temples, yet did they dedicate at that time all Churches and temples to God or our Saviour Christ, and to no saint, for that abuse began long after in Justinian's ⁴time. And that gorgeousness then used, as it was borne with, as rising of a good zeal: so was it signified of the godly learned even at that time, that such cost might otherwise have ben better bestowed. Let saint Jerome (although otherwise to great a liker and a lower of external and outward things) be a proof hereof, who hath these words in his Epistle to Demetriades: Let other (sayeth saint Jerome) build Churches, cover walls with tables of marble, carry together huge pillars, and gild their tops or heads, which do not feel or understand their precious decking and adorning, let them deck the doors with ivory and silver, and set the golden Altars with precious stones, I blame it not, let every man abound in his own sense, and better is it so to do, then carefully