A04459:101
An apology or answer in defence of the Church of England with a brief…An apologie or answere in defence of the Churche of Englande with a briefe…
An apology or answer in defence of the Church of England with a brief and plain declaration of the true religion professed and used in the same.An apologie or answere in defence of the Churche of Englande with a briefe and plaine declaration of the true religion professed and vsed in the same.
Londini: printed by Reginald Wolfe, 1564
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
But for so much as these men avouch the universal possession of the catholic Church to be their own, and call us Heretics, because we agree not in judgement with them, let us know I beseech you, what proper mark and badge hath that Church of theirs, whereby it may be known to be the ⟨image 71⟩Church of God. I wis it is not so hard a matter to find out God's Church, of a mantle will seek it earnestly and […]. For the Church of God is let upon a high and glistering place in the top of an hill, and built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets: There saith Augustine,1 •ette •• seek the Church, there let us ••ye our• matter. And as he saith again in an other place,2 The Church must be showed out of the holy and canonical scriptures: and that which can not be showed out of them, is not the Church. Yet for all this I wot not how, whether it be for fear or for conscience, or despairing of victory, these men alway abhor and fly the word of God, even as the thief fleeth the gallows. And no wonder truly, for like as men say the Cantharus by and by perisheth and dyeth, as soon as it is laid in balm, notwithstanding balm be otherwise a most sweet smelling ointment: even so these men ⟨image 72⟩well see their own matter is damped and destroyed in the word of God, as if it were in poison. Therefore the holy scriptures which our Saviour Jesus Christ didd not only use for authority in all his speech, butte did also at last seal up the same with his own blood: these men to the intent they might with less business drive the people from the same, as from a thing dangerous and deadly, have used to call them A bare letter, uncertain, unprofitable, dumb, killing, and dead: which seemeth to us all one, as if they should say, The scriptures are to no purpose or as good as none. Hereunto they add also a similitude not very agreeable, how the scriptures be like to a nose of war, or a shipman's hose: how they may be fashioned and plied all manner of ways, and serve all mens turns.