A67927:804
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. 2, part 2] 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. 2, part 2] 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
No title page in the transcription: set from the catalogue record.
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 this is the readiest way (ye say) to stir up sedition to trouble the quiet of the common wealth: therefore are these things to be repressed in time, by force of laws. Behold Satan doth not cease to practise his old guiles, and accustomed subtleties.1 He hath ever this dart in a readiness to hurl against his adversaries, to accuse them of sedition that he may bring them (if he can) in danger of the higher powers. For so hath he by his ministers always charged the Prophets of God. Ahab said unto Elijah: art thou he that troubleth Israel? The false Prophets also complained to their Princes of Jeremiah, that his words were seditious and not to be suffered: did not the scribes, and Pharisees falsely accuse Christ as a seditious person, and one that spake against Cesar? Did they not at the last cry,2 if thou let this man go, you are not Caesars friend? The Orator Tertullus, how doth he accuse Paul before Felix the high Deputy? We have found this man (saith he) a pestilent fellow, & a stirrer of sedition, unto all the Jews in the whole world. &c. But I pray you were these men as they were called seditious persons? Christ, Paul, and the Prophets? God forbid. But they were of false men falsely accused. And wherefore I pray you but because they reproved before the people their giles, superstition, and deceits. And when the other could not bear it, and would gladly have had them taken out of the way, they accused him as seditious persons, and troublers of the common wealth, that being by this means made hateful to the people, and Princes, they might the more easily be snatched up to be tormented, and put to death. But how far they were from all sedition, their whole doctrine, life and conversation doth well declare. For that which was objected last of all, that he cannot be a faithful subject to his prince, which professeth openly that he will not observe the laws, which the Princes hath made: here I would wish that I might have an indifferent Judge, & one that feareth God to whose judgement in this cause I promise I will stand. I answer therefore, a man ought to obey his Prince, but in the Lord, and never against the Lord. For he that knowingly obeyeth his Prince against God, doth not a duty to the Prince, but is a deceiver of the Prince and an helper unto him to work his own destruction.
But this is the redyest way (ye say) to stir vp sedition to trouble the quiet of the common wealth: therefore are these things to be repressed in tyme, by force of lawes. Beholde Sathan doth not cease to practise hys olde guiles, and accustomed subleties.