A67922:1482
Acts and monuments of matters most special and memorable, happening in the Church. [vol.…Actes and monuments of matters most speciall and memorable, happenyng in the Church. [vol.…
Acts and monuments of matters most special and memorable, happening in the Church. [vol. 1] with an universal history of the same, wherein is set forth at large the whole race and course of the Church, from the primitive age to these latter times of ours, with the bloody times, horrible troubles, and great persecutions against the true martyrs of Christ, sought and wrought as well by heathen emperors, as now lately practised by Romish prelates, especially in this realm of England and Scotland. Newly revised and recognised, partly also augmented, and now the fourth time again published and recommended to the studious reader, by the author (through the help of Christ our Lord) John Fox, which desireth thee good reader to help him with thy prayer.Actes and monuments of matters most speciall and memorable, happenyng in the Church. [vol. 1] with an vniuersall history of the same, wherein is set forth at large the whole race and course of the Church, from the primitiue age to these latter tymes of ours, with the bloudy times, horrible troubles, and great persecutions agaynst the true martyrs of Christ, sought and wrought as well by heathen emperours, as nowe lately practised by Romish prelates, especially in this realme of England and Scotland. Newly reuised and recognised, partly also augmented, and now the fourth time agayne published and recommended to the studious reader, by the author (through the helpe of Christ our Lord) Iohn Foxe, which desireth thee good reader to helpe him with thy prayer.
London: printed by John Daye, 1583London: printed by Iohn Daye, 1583
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.
Now because the tying up of Satan giveth to the Church some rest, & to me some leisure to address my self, to the handling of other stories: I mind therefore (Christ willing) in this present book, leaving a while the tractation of these general affairs, pertaining to the universal Church: to prosecute such domesticall histories, as more near concern this our country of England & Scotland, done here at home: beginning first with king Lucius, with whom the faith first began here in this Realm, as the sentence of some writers doth hold.1 And for so much as here may rise, yea and doth rise, a great controversy in these our Popish days, concerning the first origin & planting of the faith in this our Realm: it shall not be greatly out of our purpose,2 somewhat to stay & say of this question, whether the Church of England first received the faith from Rome or not. The which, although I grant so to be, yet being so granted, it little availeth the purpose of them which would so have it: for be it so, that England first received the Christian faith and Religion from Rome, both in the time of Eleutherius their Bishop. 180. years after Christ: and also in the time of Austen, whom Gregory sent hither 600. years after Christ: yet their purpose followeth not thereby,3 that we must therefore fetch our Religion from thence still, as from the chief wellhead and fountain of all godliness. And yet as they are not able to prove the second, so neither have I any cause to grant the first: that is, that our Christian faith was first derived from Rome, which I may prove by vj. or vij. good conjectural reasons. Whereof the first I take of the testimony of Gildas, 4our countryman, who in his history affirmeth plainly,1 that Britain received the Gospel in the time of Tiberius the Emperor, under whom Christ suffered. Lib. De victoria Aurelij Ambrosij. And saith moreover, that Joseph of Arimathea after dispersion of the Jews, was sent of Philip the Apostle from France to Britain, about the year of our Lord. 63. and here remained in this land all his time: and so with his fellows, laid the first foundation of Christian faith among the Britain people. Whereupon other preachers and teachers coming afterward confirmed the same, and increased it.