A reply unto M. Hardinges answerA replie vnto M. Hardinges ansvveare

S. Ambrose witnesseth that the people of the East had a custom in his time, to be houseled but once in the year.¹ And he rebuketh harpely such as follow them, after this sort: Si quotidianus est cibus, cur post annum illum sumis▪ quemadmodum Grae•• in orient facere consueverunt? If it be our daily meat (saith he) why takest thou it but once in the year, as the Greeks are wont to do in the East?² S. Augustine uttereth the same thing, almost with the same words. And in the seconde book De sermone Domini in monte, the twelfth Chapter, expounding the fourth petition of our Lords Prayer, Give us this day our daily Bread, showing that this may be taken either for material Bread, either for the Sacrament of our Lords Body, or for Spiritual meat, which he alloweth best: would that concerning the Sacrament of our Lords Bo•ie, they of the East should not move question, how it might be understanded to be their daily Bread, which were not daily partakers of our Lords Supper, (35)³ where as for all that, this Bread is called Daily Bread: There he saith thus: Ut ergo ill• taceant, neque de hac resententiam suam defendant, vel ipsa authoritate Ecclesiae sint contenti, quòd sine scandalo ista faciunt, neque ab eis qui Ecclesiis praesunt, facere prohibentur, neque non obtemperantes condemnantur: Wherefore that they hold their peace, and stand not in defence of their opinion, let them be content at least way with the authority of the Church, that they do these things without offence thereof taken, neither be forbidden of those that be over the Churches, neither be condemned when they disobey. Here we see by S. Augustine, that they of the Orient, who so seldom received the Sacrament, were holden for all that Christen People by tauthoritie of the Church, none offence thereof was taken, neither were they inhibited of their custom: and though they obeyed not their Spiritual governors, moving them to receive more often, yet were they not condemned, nor excommunicated.