M. ANTONIUS DE DOMINIS ARCHBISHOP OF SPALLETO, Declares the cause of his Return, out of England.  
Translated out of the Latin Copy, printed at Rome this present year.  
Vnus Dominus, una Fides, Vnum Baptisma.  Ephes. 4. 
One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism.  
Permissu Superiorum, M.DC.XXIII.   

To the Reader.  
THIS may seem a small work (good Reader) for so great a scandal as hath been given by the Author, but it is an abridgement only of another more large, & ample, that is to ensue; and yet in this, thou mayst perceive how men may so fare be transported by unbridled passions, as to fall into open schism, & heresy: on the other side thou mayst see also, the force and efficacy of God's grace in recalling of sinners by true repentance to his love, and favour. Let the one of these balance the other, and let the latter cancel the fault of his committed error. 
1 Consilium Profectionis. 2. Consilium Reditus.  That was wicked, pernicious, and detestable; this is virtuous, exemplar, and laudable. The latter counsel is always wont to be more ponderous, grave, and judicious than the former; especially when as the forformer is recalled by the latter.  
His revolt you will say was scandalous. True. But now—  
una eadenque manus vulnus openque tulit. He hath in part made amends for his former fault by his submissive confession: and this learned Prelate (as an unlearned Minister styled him) 
Hall in his honour of the married clergy. pag. ●5.  that had honoured the English Church with a Dalmatian Pall, that had passed over the Alps to leave Rome, that was so potent a Protestant as none of all our Bandogs durst fasten upon him, hath now withdrawn both Pall & Honour from that Church, hath left England, is returned over the Alps to Rome again, & like a bandog indeed hath fastened himself on the English wolves, & bites so hard as he makes them bleed; & further makes all Protestants to see their weakness (if yet they have eyes to see) & 
Hall ibid. in the answer to the advertisement.  that the whole Region of Divines and those so incomparable, that may set Rome to school, could not defend themselves from open Schism and Heresy; nor persuade one man, & he such a one as offered himself freely into their hands, to remain & continue amongst them. Magna est veritas, & praevalet.  
Thou mayst further see, with what care and sincerity our Adversaries writ against us, how they examine the matters they handle, how little truth & learning, & how much, lies, detractions, forgeries, & passionate fancies are regarded. By these base means, & shameful shifts must heresy be mantained, catholics impugned, & injured, all virtue depressed, & trodden under foot. Let the example of one be a warning unto all, & let the Retreat of this seduced Bishop make men look on what ground they stand, & not hazard their salvation, bought with the ransom of our Saviour's blood, upon the false, Heretical, and Schismatical opinions of these times.   

The Cause of M. Antonius de Dominis his Return out of England.  
EXCELLENTLY (as all other things) doth the holy Ghost by the mouth of Saint Paul reckon amongst the works of the flesh, contentions, emulations, angers, debates dissensions, and sects: these unfortunate fruits of this wicked tree I having tasted, or rather out of the corrupt disease of my mind greedily devoured, have now thought requisite, after the wholesome receit of God's grace, to cast up again, and make a perfect evacuation of this contracted filth. This that I might the more safely and readily do, and myself openly reprehend, and condemn the manifold errors that have ensued of the wicked resolution of my former bad departure; I resolved with myself the best course to be, leaving the school of errors, falsities, and heresies, to return of mine own accord to the holy Roman Church, the one & only pillar, and singular foundation of truth, and mother of all Catholics, from which so wickedly I had departed; & therefore first of all I will explicate this reprehension, condemning, and detestation of my errors past: after that I will recount other causes for which I was to leave England, and other heretical countries, and to return again to the holy Catholic Roman Church.  
2. It is a most ancient disease of our corrupt nature, as it were by inheritance conveyed from our first parent unto all his posterity, that when we err and do against that which is commanded, we either coin frivolous excuses: 
Genes. 3.  The woman whom thou hast given me etc. or else defend our faults, and with the counterfeit garment of justice, and virtue, labour all we can to mask and cover them. This to have befallen unto me I do both confess, & lament. The disease of my soul wherewith I was sick before my departure was, in that I trusted to much to my own prudence against that wholesome counsel of the Wiseman, 
Proverb. 3.  ne innitaris prudentiae tuae, and out of the confidence of my small wit, being of so small reach I judged too rashly of matters of Faith: besides this a certain frenzy of rage, not that which some ignorant companions only wise in their own conceit, objected unto me when I was to return out of England, for that, forsooth, certain Promotions, which in vain I thirsted after were denied me, but altogether caused of my unreasonable impatience whiles I took it most grievously to be under them, of whom in the Book of the causes of my departure I have without all cause complained: these things carried me upon the shelves and sands, these did beat my bark against the rocks, these sharpened my wit to pestiferous thoughts, these were the cause why I fond feigned errors of the Roman Church, whereby I might excuse my departure; these finally cast me on those extreme coasts, where I went, and that I might seem to have done well, and in some sort endeavour to avoid the imputation of imprudency and rashness, and of heresy also, first for defence of my departure I set forth my purpose and intention in the same, than other volumes, and books fraught with such things as either the art of feigning, or forging suggested, or the wisdom of the flesh did prompt unto me: and while the sickness boiled in my breast within, and the stings of wrath did prick my exulcerated mind, the itch of my tongue, and pen did break forth into an imposthume. Many things which heretics, enemies of the Sea Apostolic did believe, affirm, and profess, seemed to me, now blinded by myself to be credible, some to be true; when as yet I had never brought these controversies to the touchstone of true divinity, nor had throughly discussed them, for I had not ended any part of the Ecclesiastical Commonwealth in which I had determined to treat of points of religion, and rules of faith; nor yet had I so much as begun it, howsoever in the book of the cause of my departure I said, that I had already finished all these books. Hence it came that I rashly relying on the slanders of heretics and not on the Catholic faith, entitled one of my books, Of the cause of my departure, and another in Italian, The rocks of Christian shipwreck, and another A certain sermon, which I filled full of errors, and heresies for the most part, in hatred of the holy Roman Church, and Sea Apostolic, and of those Popes by whom I thought myself to have been injured; and affirmed those and many other things which before I knew to be false, and heretical, and after at least in part, myself misliked, and did whiles I wrote in England from my heart detest them, because they contain open heresies, against the Catholic truth, and are contrary to sound doctrine; I mean to that which the Catholic Roman Church hath always held, and holds at this day: against which whatsoever, or wheresoever is written or said by me, that in all and every part I do condemn and detest; and I will better, & more at large by God's help, condemn and detest the same, in the confutation of my books of the Ecclesiastical Commonwealth, & other books that I have written against the truth: for I submit myself, and all my books to the most holy judgement, and censure of the holy Roman and Apostolical Sea, the mistress and guide of all other Churches.  
3. In the mean time here in this exchange for a new, and sounder resolution, I most detest the former of my departure, the Infamous Rocks of the shipwracks, of myself especially, and heretics, but not of Catholics, & moreover the Sermon mentioned; neither shall I shame by casting of the garments which I had made for myself, to show my nakedness, because I was not ashamed against all law and conscience to break forth into vain fictions, open slanders, and filthy heresies. 
Dioscorides l. 6. c. 44.  The sting, and poison of the scorpion by bruising of the same scorpion that stung, hath a present remedy. If the voluntary breaking, and bruising of myself bring remedy to this poisoned wound (in case any so wounded have repent him himself) I shall esteem this my bruising, dejection, and mortification for happy: let the glory of the Catholic Church and Sea Apostolic stand immoveable, yea even with the greatest loss of temporal goods that can befall me; and since that so wickedly I have gone about to weaken, and infringe it, this course cannot (at least before God) but be glorious unto me.  
4. First therefore I confess, & in conscience truly, & sincerely testify that I wrote that book of the Cause of my departure, and the other two, to wit the Rocks, and Sermon, not out of sincerity of heart, not good conscience, not out of unfeygned faith, but that I might cast some colourable excuse on my shameful departur, & that I might be the more grateful, and welcome unto the heretics, to whom like a wretch I went, or with whom I did converse. The ten year's labour which I bragged of in the book of my departure, was not employed in maturity of deliberation, gravity of judgement, discussion of truth, but all that while I studied how to finish that vain, fruitless, and pernicious work of the Ecclesiastical commonwealth, & coin bold, and heretical fictions, and withal satisfy the impotent force of mine own rage; in so much as that vocation was not divine, but diabolical, not inspired by the holy Ghost, but suggested by a bad spirit, vexing me worse than it did Saul with the spirit of giddiness: 
2. Reg. 18 v. 10.  but for my return I doubt not but that it is to be ascribed unto God's true vocation, his divine spirit calling me back to my Mother, the holy Catholic Church.  
5. I said, that the behaviour of the court of Rome was the cause why I should for ever abhor it: I am not ignorant, that herein I spoke ill, for there were not wanting then, nor yet are at Rome very many conspicuous examples of piety, & all Christian virtues which are able to delight, and allure religious, or well disposed minds. I said that out of the forbidding of heretical books to be read, do spring evil suspicions which get credit to the books of heretics, and induce men to believe somewhat to be in them which Catholics could not confute, and this I acknowledge to have been spoken by me, not without great injury to the Catholic saith, who have found in their books, I mean of heretics, false, heretical, scandalous, and pestiferous doctrine, from reading of which, lest the Faithful be infected they are worthily to be restrained: for not unto private men who read those books, but unto the Pastors, the judgement of faith hath ever and doth still appertain, that they may know which are poisoned pasturs, and remove their flocks far from them. Moreover the arguments of heretics are deceitful, sophistical, and have most easy solutions. I affirmed the doctrine of those who oppose themselves to the Church of Rome, nothing at all, or very little to degenerate from the pure doctrine of the primitive Church, and this also is false: for the opinions in which they differ from Catholics, are all of them most contrary to those which that Church held, & nothing can convince them more certainly of error than the authority of the ancient Church from which they by these noveltyes have very far departed: in so much as for this cause they are condemned as heretics by the Church of Rome: it is therefore to be detested, & I do detest that which I said, Therefore the religion of Protestants to be condemned of the Church, because it is contrary to the sense, and corrupted manners of the Court of Rome. I said, that in Rome by extreme violence were coined new articles of belief, and this truly I did say both against my knowledge and conscience, for I never saw any such matter, nor any man else, as most certainly I know, for none can say that there are new articles coined, when there are only added the true declarations & explications of the true articles, & those gathered out of the holy scriptures, traditions of the Fathers, & very rules of religion. Again I endeavoured to deprive the Roman Church of the titles of Catholic, and Universal, wherein I exceedingly erred: for by the Roman Church is not understood that special, and particular Church alone, which is at Rome, but the collection of all other Churches adhering to the Roman in unity of the same faith, and subjection to the same chief Bishop, wheresoever they be, albeit in the uttermost coasts and corners of the earth. And doubtless this is most true, & of me, both by word of mouth, as England itself can testify, and in my written treatises of the Ecclesiastical commonwealth, and in that part which last of all (I hear) is printed in Germany, I have evinced, that there is no other Catholic Church but the Roman, understanding thereby that particular with the other adhering thereunto; whereas all other companies of Christians are defiled with heresies, and being by schism divided and separated from the truth, are out of the Catholic, universal, and true Church of Christ; and these blind souls with their blind guides, rush and fall headlong into the pit of hell, which I in my error most wickedly and without grievous injury affirmed of the Roman Catholics: for from the Roman Church at all times to all other Churches the most shining light of the pure and incorrupted faith hath flowed, and at this present flows. I remember also, that in the preface of my books of the Ecclesiastical commonwealth, I used certain words, by which I insinuated all such to be in the Catholic Church, who had received baptism in the name of the Trinity; but albeit the words have an ill sound, & make all heretical Churches true & sound members of the true Catholic Church, which is most false, and heretical, yet my meaning was, that the Arian, Nestorian, Eutichian, all heretical and condemned Churches in times past, should be excluded, and only the true believers to be retained: which true believers I thought then to be many more than indeed they are, and many Churches tainted with these latter heresies, and by Schism divided, I erroneously judged to pertain to the Catholic; but though the Catholic Church be so denominated for her Universality, yet this Universality includes no other than the true orthodox, or right believing Churches, spread over the whole world, which remain in unity with the Roman. And truly the universality of the Roman Church doth consist not only in the continual durance never yet interrupted, or ever after to be, and constance of sound belief, but also is universal, because the self same faith of Rome, and supreme government are extended after the coming of Christ to all places, and all Nations: for which respect even in these latter ages, it is no less to be termed Catholic, than it was in the time of the ancient Fathers, because the faith of the Roman Church even at this time, is propagated in the most remote, & vast regions of the East and West Indieses, even unto the furthest corners of the earth; in so much as the children of this Church even in these days passing by continual travail from the rising of the Sun unto the setting, and carrying with them the Faith of Christ, & offering clean sacrifices, that now may be said especially to be fulfilled, which God pronounced by the mouth of Malachy: 
Malach. 1. v. 11.  Ab ortu solis usque ad occasum magnum est nomen meum in gentibus, & in omni loco sacrificatur, & offertur nominimeo oblatio munda. From the rising of the sun unto the setting my name is great amongst the Gentills, & in every place there is sacrificed and offered unto my name a pure oblation. Neither was it a less injury, and slander, when I said that I had noted very many noveltyes, and errors of the Court of Rome; which novelties, which errors, I neither now, or ever yet noted, and I acknowledge it to be most false, & confess it for such, that ever there were, or are in Rome such errors, out of which the ruin, and slaughter of souls doth proceed, the peace of the Church is troubled, or public scandals have, or do arise; truly next after God all peace of the Catholic Church, her total tranquillity, and the everlasting salvation of souls is to be ascribed to the care, and solicitude of the Roman Church. I said, that the more potent Bishops under the Bishop of Rome were but equivocal, or counterfeit Bishops: and this saying contains no less falsehood than injury in it, and therefore as raylative I condemn it; for they are true, and lawful Bishops, made by lawful ordination. I affirmed others who were not Potentates, and Princes to have lost the proper dignity and power of Bishops: and truly this is also a slander, for hierarchical subordination in the Church hath been always necessary: much more do I condemn as an heresy that which I said, the Church no longer to remain under the Bishop of Rome; for as before I specified, and earnestly avouched only the Church of Rome with the rest adhering thereunto, is the true Church of Christ, & that others are no Churches at all. And to conclude much in few, I perceive that in the first book of my departure, I specially endeavoured to infringe the primacy of the B. of Rome, in which point I deny not, but that I spoke against the faith of the whole Catholic Church, and therefore greatly to have erred, for both by the Evangelicall ordinance, traditions of the Apostles, definitions of the holy Synods, & General Counsels, by very many decrees of Popes, and common testimony of Fathers, and ecclesiastical histories, it is manifest, and clear the B. of Rome always to have been taken for head of the whole Church, to have been so appointed by Christ our Lord, and always to have been taken for a singular oracle, to whom no less the East than the West, in all doubts of faith should sue for instruction of belief, definition, & secure doctrine, as a master appointed us by God, who should by his office teach and direct his Church, any scholar may observe very many examples in which the Bishops of Rome direct the Patriarches, and Bishops of the East, they warn them, rebuke them, teach them, condemn them, absolve them, depose them, restore them, control them, and that even out of their office, and power over them; and the others checked by the Popes, humbly gave them ear, obeyed, resisted not, or reclaimed; and briefly, it is clear by the confession of all the Catholic Church, the whole spirit of Christ, for determining of these things which belong unto faith, to reside in the sole, and one visible supreme head of the same Church, which is only the Pope, the chief Bishop, and S. Peter's successor.  
5. I freely confess that the book which I called the Rocks of Christian shipwreck did exceedingly displease me presently after that it was set forth, for without all choice had of the matter, without all discussion or search of truth I huddled it up, that I might some way or other please the Englishmen, after my arrival amongst them; in writing of which I considered, and laid open not what was true, but what pleased best the enemies of the Church, especially the vulgar, and unlearned multitude: and this book whiles I was in England, & preparing for my departure being objected unto me by the King, and other men, I did in plain words detest it, and myself withstood the greater part of heresies which it contains, and as far as I was able impugned them: all which here again I reject, abhor, and detest. The heresies were these. The B. of Rome not to be Christ's vicar on earth, and visible head of his Church; that he had no power over temporal things; implicit faith to avail nothing but much to hurt the faithful; the excommunications of the law to be vain bugs; the commandments of the Church not to bind under mortal sin; the unity of the Church not to be taken from one visible head; the Pope to be the capital eenemy of the whole Church; the Mass to be no true sacrifice; the ceremonies of the Mass to be light Comical gestures, no transubstantiation to be made; auricular confession with absolution to be no true Sacrament; that there is no purgatory; satisfaction for release of the punishment after that the fault is forgiven not to be necessary; no Indulgences to be, but of such penalties only as are imposed; the Saints not to be invocated; the worship of Relics, and Images not to be lawful; that there is no merit of good works to everlasting life. These, and the the like errors, and manifest heresies not so much mine, and new, as of the ancient, and modern heretics, and their babble, and doting dreams, condemned always by the Catholic Church in many holy general Counsels, are miserable rocks unto which such as approach make lamentable shipwreck of their faith and everlasting salvation; and therefore I fly from them as far as I am able: and lest that I should have been cast away upon them in England, I was of necessity to departed from thence, and rerurne to the true Church, the port and harbour of Catholics, and forsake, detest, anathematise or accurse all the foresaid errors, and whatsoever others if there be any other in those books, which agree not with the faith expressed in the sacred Counsels, especially in the late Council of Trent: on the other side I embrace, and aver the contrary truths, to wit, the chief Bishop of Rome by Christ's iustitution to be his Vicar on earth; to be the visible head of the militant Church which always hath been visible, with full power received from God to govern and order the same; the same Bishop of Rome to have power over temporal things in ordine ad spiritualia; the implicit faith to be profitable, and sometimes necescessary, as when one without his fault hath no express faith, or belief of some articles; the excommunications of the law, or delivered ipso facto, to be of force, and to be feared, as induced by exceeding great reason, and lawful power; the Popes to be able to excommunicate all faithful people of what place, or country soever, in case they deserve to be so censured, the commandments of the Church bind all under mortal sin to observe them; the unity of the Church chief to depend upon the one, visible head thereof; the B. of Rome to be the true, lawful, & towards the sheep of Christ as it behoveth, the profitable Pastor of the whole Church, the only eternal salvation of which I desire he may always thirst, and seek with all care; in in the Mass to be offered up unto God a true, proper, and propitiatory sacrifice, the ceremonies of the Mass ordained by the Fathers, and Pastors of the Church by the inspiration of the holy Ghost, to be holy, mystical, profitable, and by all means to be retained; transubstantiation to be made in the Sacrament of the Altar, that is the conversion of turning of the whole substance of bread into the body, & of the whole substance of wine into the blood of our Lord jesus Christ; by Sacramental absolution whereby the priest absolues the penitent, to be exercised a true and proper power of binding, and losing sins, which our Lord gave to the ministers of his Sacraments in the Church, to be purgatory in that manner, as the holy Roman, & Apostolic Church teacheth it to be granted; satisfaction to be much available for the releasement of the punishment after that the sin is forgiven; the use of pardons in the Catholic Church to whom Christ hath given power to bestow them, to be most ancient, most sovereign, and approved by the authority of holy Counsels; the Saints not only without all error of the faithful to be invocated, but further that it is good, & profitable to have recourse to their prayers, and help; the worship of Relics, and images to be good, lawful, and profitable; which cannot be abrogated without the spot of heresy; the merit of eternal life to depend of our good works. The later General Counsels which are of supreme authority in the Church, my stomach being over charged with ill humours, I did often despise, especially the Counsels of Florence, & Trent, many times also that of Constance, and through my procuring a certain history came forth in print of the Council of Trent, of the truth of which history I had no certainty, yea it is worthily suspected of imposture: in these things also I confess that I erred very much, for I affirm all the most wholesome decrees of these Counsels with full faith to be embraced by all the Catholics.  
6. In a certain sermon of mine had in Italian at London the first sunday in Aduent, and printed, I set down these errors, which being after repeated again in the book of the Rocks, now I have worthily detested. In that sermon I framed a certain night of papal errors in the Roman Church, whereas indeed in the Roman Church alone and others conjoined therewith there is true light, the true, and only most shining day, out of which (in England especially) is continual, & most dark night. In the Church of Rome, the light of truth, the true, and sincere understanding of the holy scriptures drives far away from it all the darkness of errors, with which darkness miserable England being overcast, groapeth like a blind man at noon day. I said in the same sermon, and reiterated again in the book of the Rocks, that S. Peter was never at Rome, but this as a soul, and ignorant lie I freely confess is to be condemned. I made all the Apostles in planting, and governing the Church to be equal, whereas notwithstanding the supremacy of S. Peter over them is clear by the very gospels and Apostolical traditions. I affirmed the Bishops to succeed the Apostles with equal power, and to be Bishops in solidum of the Universal Church, whereas yet Bishops are but Pastors of particular Churches, & have but a particular charge, the general primacy being reserved to him who in the same succeedeth S. Peter who is the B. of Rome, and chief Pastor. I said that holy water, grains, crosses, hallowed images, Papal, and Episcopal blessings, the stations, diversity of habits, cords, leather girdles, visiting Churches, and Altars, beads, processions, and the like to be toys; when as it sufficiently appeareth, almost all of these things to be ancient and allowed in the Catholic Church, which use is to be continued, yea even in those things which are more fresh inducements to piety & devotion. I affirmed that there were only two Sacraments, Baptism, and the Supper; whereas yet the Catholic Church lightened by the holy ghost, doth plainly teach & define that there be seven true Sacraments: all which, and what other heresies soever condemned by the Catholic Roman Church, I do also condemn, and with firm faith believe, hold, and profess the contrary to these heresies defined by the same: for it is most certain, that in the decrees of the holy Roman Church, reason is not severed from authority, & the school doctrine especially in articles religion, to be altogether conformable to the sense, or doctrine of the holy Fathers. This further I confess, that I have without cause complained in my books of the Court of Rome, as if it had usurped authority belonging to others; for unless that Church out of her lawful authority over Archbishops & Bishops keep them both in order, the violating of all laws will easily follow by their dissension. It is truly the greatest happiness of the Church, when her inferior Pastors under one most vigilant Pastor receive and execute from him who hath supreme authority over all, reformation of life, and the charge of sound, and sincere doctrine. And truly should not the mild, and Fatherly care of the holy Inquisition watch attentively over our Lords flock, the scabbed sheep would find no cure, and that most wicked infection would soon fare & near spread itself. The ordinary armour of that tribunal are sound doctrine and instruction full of charity, and not these others which I out of my exulcerated mind have with so many falsityes, and slanders exaggerated: but in case the festered sores do not yield to lenitive medicines, then is it both fit, and necessary that the Physician apply more sharp, and corrosive plasters.  
7. But now even the inward fire of the diseases of my mind did rage almost by miracle, after the entrance of Gregory the fifteenth to the government of the Church (whose eminent piety, singular wisdom, and continual sanctity of a most innocent life, I indeed believed to have advanced him to that high honour) I began to think of some more healthful course, the holy ghost enlightening me with the beams of his grace, in so much that now the dangers of my soul in the state I lived in, began to show themselves every day more clearly unto me, and I now wondered that I had gone so fare in folly, and error, that I would conjoin myself with them who were heretics, & plain, and absolute schismatics. Such in times past was the guileful deceit of a few Arrians in the Council of Arimini, that by secret collusion they had as it were drawn almost all the Catholics into Arianisme, tunc (saith S. Hierome) 
Hieron. contra Luciferianos.  totus mundus ingemuit, & miratus est se esse Arrianum, than all the world groaned, and marveled to see itself become Arrian: so (alas) & much worse it befell me, that I saw, wondered, and lamented myself an heretic amongst heretics, & schismatic among schismatics. And that the Englishmen complain not of me that I do them wrong, but that they may know my departure from them & return to my mother the holy Catholic Church to have been lawful, & for just cause, I am constrained to lay open their heresy, and schism with which it was no way convenient, that I should be further entangled or tainted.  
8. In England (if we speak of Religion) are many sects: there are Puritans, or rigid Caluinists: there are more moderate who call themselves only Protestants, & Reform: there are Anabaptists, & those divided into diverse sects: neither want there Arrians, Photinians & such like raff of lewd men, who albeit they be not allowed openly to profess their errors, yet are they not banished the land, nor punished at home, but are tolerated, whiles in the mean time they spread their poison, & infect others: that the Anabaptists hold many heresies none that is not an Anabaptist will deny but they in England freely have their conventicles, and his Majesty himself one day told me, that lately in London, at the assembly of the Anabaptists, a woman had made a sermon, & ministered their Sacraments. The heresies of the Puritans are notorious, to wit, that there is no free will, God to be Author of sin, God merly, because so it pleaseth him to damn many; Christ not to have died for all, to have vndergon the punishment of hell, that infants baptised be damned etc. the more moderate Protestants, although they go about, touching points of doctrine, to free themselves in some sort from heresy, because they do not admit entirely the heresies either of Caluin or Luther, if they follow the pure doctrine of the English Church, which they call Reform; yet can they not so escape or rid their hands from Puritans and Anabaptists with whom they fully communicate: and if any Anabaptist or Puritan come to their Ecclesiastical Conventicles, they neither avoid him, nor exclude him; yea almost all the Puritan Ministers handle, and minister the very Sacraments of the false English Church unto all comers, at least unto all Caluinists. And if Acacius of Constantinople, for that he had communicated with Peter Mogge an heretic of Alexandria, & if all the East Church for persisting in communion with Arrius, was separated by a long anathema or curse from the Roman, and West Church; how much more are the Protestants of England to be esteemed for heretics, because they continually communicate which heretics; neither do they condemn them; or deny them their company, but rather admit them all that will communicate in their ceremonies, rites, and Sacraments with the English Church? Doth not the deformed Church of England publicly and plainly profess communion, & Ecclesiastical league or fryendship with Geneva the mother of Puritans, and all other forrayn Caluinists? Are there not even in London the King's City, and that by public grant of the King, Churches of the French, Flemish and Italian Caluinists, which hate and abhor the doctrine, profession, & rites of England, & yet are most dearly beloved sisters of the English Synagogue? And by them Puritanisme is especially maintained, and set forward in England. Moreover with the Lutherans, polluted with very many heresies, the English Synagogue is most ready to communicate, and labours all that it can, to the end that these monsters of many heads may like Hercules hydra agree in one body, and a union (as they term it) be made of all the reformed Churches: but of purging the faith and doctrine of these different sects, & rooting out their heresies no care is had; & yet the Lutherans hate the Sacramentaries cane peius, & angue. Other heresies of Englishmen concerning faith, & good works, and justification, as also the B. Sacrament, private Masses, Merits of good works, praying unto Saints, worshipping of holy Images, holy rites and ceremonies, the souls of the departed, and the like, which they out of an heretical spirit do condemn, and abolish, and which I with the same spirit in part have once condemned, and abolished, I mean not now further to discuss; somewhat (I mean as much as this place requires) I shall after touch, and more else where in a larger work. I come to their schism.  
9 Sure I am that the English Sect which the deformed English men call the Reformed Church, to be more divided, & separated from the Church truly Catholic then they are themselves divided from the whole world, divisos toto orbe Britannos. That they are perfectly divided from the Roman Church, & other Church's subject thereunto, & commumunicating with the same in Religion and faith, they will themselues willingly confess, and the thing is most evident, most notorious. Now whereas the Roman Church with the others v is truly & properly according to the Cath. Faith, the Cath. Church of Christ, doth it not necessarily follow the English Church as they call it, to be clean cut of from the Catholic Church, and consequently that it is not the body of Christ, nor his house, nor, absolutely speaking, to be called a Church? Which when at length I plainly perceived, I was no longer to ●emain therein. They will object, & say, ●s this now plain unto thee, who yet in ●hy book of Ecclesiastical common wealth didst style Rome, Babylon, who didst deny the Church of Rome, who didst teach us that it was properly schismatical; but that which thou affirmest of our Church doth not so plainly appear unto us. So they. Wherefore I shall go about to make this point evident unto the English, who know full well that I am not Pythagoras whose only authority among his scholars for any thing that he said, was held for best proof: let them not therefore be moved with those things I have said, without other argument, yea further let my words want their weight, & credit even where I bring my reasons and proofs, if they be found to be weak and feeble. Truly my reason on which I relied, when I made Christian Rome to be Babylon, was because the prophecy o● S. john could no be explicated of Rom● as it was heathen, before it embraced the faith of Christ. 
Apocalip. 8.  But this reason is of no force; for albeit that this were granted, yet it followeth not that the Christian Rome is Babylon, for it is the opinion o● many Catholic interpreters, that in the persecution of Antichrist, the heathen Idolaters, & enemies of Christ are perhaps to subdue Rome; and that of them this prophecy not yet accomplished may conveniently be understood: yet so, as the faith of the Catholic Church stil● continue safe, and sound; by this interpretation my affection of Rome as Christian, is overthrown, and conteyns in i● a mere slander; for I know the Christian Rome not to be Babylon, nor that it can without exceeding injury be so called▪ But God forbidden that in this prophecy o● the Apocalypse, we should conceive th● Roman Church itself the mother of all Churches, & head of Religion, heretofore ●o have been, or hereafter that it shallbe Ba●ylon, for those things which are spoken of the City, are not to be transferred or explicated of the Church. I denied the Church to be at Rome, but proved it not, and therefore that deny all is to be placed amongst my curses and raylings, ●ea also amongst my heresies, especial●y myself refuting the same, by reason in my other works, in which strongly I ●aue affirmed the Roman Church with ●he others adherent to be the true & on●y Catholic Church of Christ, & now ●oe as much as I can profess, & aver the ●ame. I said that it had made a schism; ●ut than I said it, when as yet I had no exact knowledge of schism or nature ●herof, & I erred grossly herein, because it ●s a manifest falsity: the argument brought ●or the contrary is of no moment, & concludeth nothing; for he who being law ●ully made head of any body, & doth so ●…ile and proclaim himself, doth not separate himself from the body, neither ●oth he cast away the body from him, ●ut joineth himself unto it, which is a far different thing from schism; but this I will further prosecute in the review, & correction of that work: now only I declare how it is evident to me that the Englishmen, and much more a● Sectaryes of our age are truly, and properly Schismatics, for that without all lawful cause they have cut themselves from the true Church of Christ, which is the Catholic Roman Church, & all those that communicate therewith.  
10. Two causes only there may be of lawful separation, that one or more Churches of Christ, may wholly repel one or more Churches from their communicating with them, without the incurring of schism: the one is heresy, the other schism itself. The heretical Churches that are incorrigible are to b● eschewed of Catholics, who are to hau● no Ecclesiastical communion with them▪ This is a point well known among●… Christians. I often demanded of th● Englishmen why they separated themselves from the Roman Church, taking the same as it compriseth all other besides that adhere thereunto; was it for an● heresy? But truly none of them all coul● either in writing, or by word of mouth show either the Roman Catholics of of our times, or our Predecessors, in their public profession to be, or have been tainted with any true heresy. The most sovereign King of great Britain plainly, and publicly granted this unto me: this the wiser of their chief, and inferior Ministers granted, and many other learned men affirmed the Church of Rome not to err in the fundamental faith: wherefore by the grant of English Protestants this Church is not heretical. They will object perhaps, the Church of Rome not to err in the fundamental faith (which I in the book of the causes of my departure, & in the sermon made at London seemed to defend) but to err, and to have fallen into heresy in other not fundamental articles; but first of all I know not what article there is of true faith which is not fundamental: neither could I ever conceive, or were they able to explicate, how that distinction should be admitted amongst the articles of faith, that some were fundamental, & some not; for truly I always judged all and every of those articles which are truly to be fundamental, but I erred in this that from the number of fundamental, and consequently from the true articles, I excluded many which are indeed articles of faith, and consequently were all fundamental, and cannot without heresy be denied, howsoever they be not of these principal, of the Trinity, Incarnation, Necessity of grace, Baptising in the name of the Trinity etc. as are the Sacraments, justification, the necessity of works, merits, indulgences, and the like which before I set down, as now defined by the Church, because these no less rely on God's revelation then the former, and therefore as much belong unto faith as they, for he who makes God deceitful in any one article whatsoever, he must necessarily acknowledge him to be deceitful in all the rest: again I demanded of such as meant sincerely that they would produce but one article, in which the Roman Church doth hold, and teach amiss: they are wont to urge that of Transubstantiation of bread and wine into the body, and blood of Christ, out of which they gather certain heresies, to wit, Christ not to have a true body, but a fantastical one, because we put the whole body in so little a compass, or quantity of bread, in so much say they, as the body is no more a body: again, that Christ is not in heaven if he be on the altar on earth, against the article of his Ascension: finally Christ not to have been borne of the Virgin Mary, because that we do make him of bread. In these men truly that is verified which S. Hierom writes, 
In Epist. ad Titum c. 3.  nullum esse Schisma quod non sibi aliquam haeresim confingat, ut meritò ab Ecclesia recessisse videatur. There is no schism which frames not to itself some heresy, that it may seem with some reason to have departed from the Church. And as for Transubstantiation which the Catholics teach, that is most far from these heresies, for in this all the properties of a body are out of danger from being destroyed, although we grant the same body to be contained under never so little forms and accidents of bread: albeit these properties in ordine ad locum, as they are referred to place, which is a thing extrinsecall to the body, may by God's power be separated, which thing is fully explicated by the school Doctors; but what heresy can they imagine in us, if we do all constantly affirm that we believe as an article of faith, Christ to have had & still to have a true body with all natural properties, in itself, which properties we believe & confess by the same omnipotent power may be preserved although the body be reduced to never so little an external place; neither can any by Thelogical proof infringe the same: humane Philosophy neither can, nor must measure God's power, let that judge what can be done by nature, but those things that are above nature, let it reverence, but not judge: neither doth it follow hence, Christ's body not to be in heaven but on the altar: we all by divine faith believe Christ have ascended into heaven, and there for ever to sit at the right hand of his father; notwithstanding we affirm that by divine power one and the self same body may be in many places at once, at least sacramentally, and this cannot be impugned, but only out of humane Philosophy, and seeming arguments: and lastly we say not the body to be made of bread, as if it had not been before, but we hold the bread to be transubstantiated into the body of Christ, which body did preexist, or was before the consecration, and before transubstantiation, the body of Christ borne of the Virgin Mary is extant and existent, into which the bread is transubstantiated; truly these men do ignorantly forge these heresies, for he is an heretic who directly utters heresy: but if they ask of us what we believe of the truth of Christ's body, of the Ascension, of the Incarnation, they shall hear us deliver the true, and Catholic belief, notwithstanding that we affirm other things out of which they imagine to follow these erroneous opinions, which we utterly, and truly deny to follow of them, and they cannot Theologically convince us to the contrary. In so much then as pertaineth unto heresy, they can pretend no cause wherefore they have justly, & for good cause separated themselues from our Church, therefore they made an unlawful schism.  
11. The more moderate English Protestant's that are not Puritan, urge not much the heresy of the Roman Church, nor from that ground free themselves from the foul spot of schism, but they urge fiercely idolatry, and obtruding of new articles of faith, by which means they will have the Roman, that is the Catholic Church, to have fallen from the true faith, and hereby chiefly they defend the equity of their separation; this idolatry they will have to consist in the worship, & invocation of Saints, and reverence of Relics, and Images, and most of all in the Adoration of the B. Sacrament: & a more secret Idolatry they will have to lie lurking in the confidence we repose on salt, water, oil, and other things exorcised & blessed: they also complain of new articles thrust upon them by Catholics, in the definitions of the Council of Trent, about justification, Works, Merits, Purgatory, Indulgences, and the like; but all in vain. Certainly if we Catholics were indeed Idolaters, we should not only be heretics, but much worse than most heretics, & therefore aught to be avoided, and altogether separated far from all the faithful. And I wonder how any man that is in his right wits, can charge them with idolatry, who daily profess themselves to believe in one God, and for this ground, or foundation of faith are ready to shed their blood; who daily preach and teach that no divine worship can be given to any pure Creature. This then is a base slander. Are we for our invocating of Saints, worshipping of images, adoration of the B. Sacrament held guilty or suspected with these men of idolatry? Let them seek, let them understand, let them penetrate what we hold of the unity of the true God, what of divine honour not to be imparted unto creatures, and then they shall presently perceive all such to be very Sots, who judge and affirm us to be idolaters, that is worshippers of creatures with divine honour; neither let them break out into open schism, until they have found in our doctrine and practice, true Idolatry.  
12. No Catholic ever avouched dead men, or Angels to be worshipped with divine honour; we are not such fools. Vigilantius in times past objected this unto the Catholics, but falsely as S. Hier. writing against him doth show: and in this as in other things of this nature, we have the ancient Fathers, our good masters, from them we do not descent, we do not departed, we do not disagree: we willingly embrace & most exactly practise their most wholesome doctrine, and every way Catholic, touching the worshipping of Saints Originis lib. 8. contra Celsum. Epiphanij haeres. 79. August. Epist. 44. & libro de quantitate animae cap. 34. & lib. de vera relig. cap. 55. & contra Faustum lib. 23. cap. 21. Cyrilli Alexand. lib. 6. contra julianum. Theodoreti in historia Sanctorum Patrum cap. 21. I cite not the words of these, and other Fathers because the shortness of this small treatise doth not comport it. From whence then have these late blind masters borrowed their new eyes, when as the Catholic Church long ere they were born was most excellently furnished with most resplendent, most secure, & shining lamps of learning & sanctity?  
13. Festival days belong unto the honour of Saints, which we celebrate in their remembrance, praising God and thanking him, that he hath advanced mortal men, and sinners to so high a degree of holiness: neither is this a late novelty in the Church by annual devotion to keep festival days in the honour of Saints; it is an ancient use, (and so ancient that it may well be referred to the tradition of the Apostles) that besides the Sunday, the birth-days of Saints should be kept holy; which thing I see approved by the ancient custom of the Church. I find S. Cyprian very careful to have the days noted, 
Lib. 3. Ep. 6.  in which the Christians were martyred, ut talibus (saith he) celebrentur hic à nobis oblationes, & sacrificia ob commemorationes ipsorum, that on those days they suffered we in remembrance of them may celebrate here the oblations, & sacrifices. S. john chrysostom, & S. Augustine exhort the faithful to the due observance of the feasts of Saints. 
Chrysost. serm. in martyrem Pelagiam. Augu. in Psal. 88 part. 2. in fine.  Wherefore I cannot but exceedingly marvel at the new scruples of Protestants, not soberly 
* So the Protestant's translate non plus sapere quam oportet sapere, sed sapere ad sobrietatem. Rom. 12.3  but more highly thinking of themselves than they ought, whiles they have fully judged, and taught all feasts of the Saints, yea of the B. Virgin mother of God, of the Apostles, and most famous martyrs to be abrogated and taken away, howbeit the English Protestants, be not so rigorous; for in this matter they have left somewhat to remain as before, though it be very little.  
14. To invocate Saints departed, say these men, is nothing else them to make many Gods, and this our calling upon them, and worshipping of their images not to differ from the customs of Pagans, under which pretext they abhor and avoid us all they can: but for us it were easy (if this place would bear so long dispute) to beat back, and refel all these slanders of heretics: for they are forced, if they believe the Scriptures, to admit this; (as certain that the souls of the Saints with God pray for us mortal men, and that not in general only, but also in particular, and it is most evident in this life the faithful to be helped by the prayers of the virtuous;) for Moses often by his prayers turned away the wrath of God from the people of Israel, 
job 42.18.  and God exhorted the friends of job to entreat his prayers, thereby to obtain pardon for their folly. 
Eph. 6. Coloss. 4. 1. Thes. 5. 2. Thes. 3. Hebr. 13. etc.  S. Paul ofter commended himself to the prayers of the faithful: & these men may learn if they list, the Saints, whose souls live in the the sight of God, and reign with Christ, to pray for such as are yet living in the militant Church, out of Hieremy Ezechiell, and the Apocalypses. 
Hierem. 15 Ezech. 14. Apocalip. 5.8. & 8.  That for their sakes God granteth many favours unto them, they have in the same holy Scriptures, and that in many places, as Genes. 26.4.5.24. Exodus 32.13. 3. Regum 18.36. 1. Paralip. 29.18. 3. Reg. 11.12.32.34. & 15.4. 4. Reg. 8.19. & 19.34. and 20.6. and Isa. 37.35. See the commentaries which are said to be S. Chrysostom's, in the second Homily upon the 50. Psalm. Christ warneth us to make fryends of the mammon of iniquity, 
Luke 16.   cum defeceritis recipiant vos in aeterna tabernacula, that when you fail, they receive you into their everlasting tabernacles: 
August. de civitate Dei lib. 21. c. 7. Gen. 28.12. Heb. 1.14.  out of this place S. Augustine attributeth much to the intercession of Saints.  
15. This intercession of Saints the holy Fathers acknowledge, admit, and confirm▪ And truly of Angels the Ladder of jacob, and their other employments for us are notorious. See Origen contra Celsum lib. 8. Of the Angels attending upon us, see S. Augustine; 
Aug. Epi. 122.  and of our guardian Angel the Scriptures do often, and plainly make mention, 
Gen. 48. Exod. 23. Psalm. 33. Math. 18. Actor. 1●.  and the Fathers also most clearly. 
Nyssenus in vita Moysis. Basil. in Psal. 33. Hieron in 18. Mat.  If therefore every man have to assist, and guard him an Angel of our Lord, what shall hinder but that he may crave his help? I heard once in England, with great gust one of my fellow Canons of Windesor preaching before the King, and affirming roundly in his sermon that he saw no reason to the contrary, why every faithful man might not turn, and convert himself towards his good Angel, and say, Sancte Angele custos ora pro me, holy guardian Angel pray for me. Of the intercession of Angels, & their labours for our help, and benefit, any one besides the former may also read these Fathers, S. Anton. Monachorum Parentem Epist. 2. ad Arseonitas, Anastasium Synaitam in Hexam. lib. 5. Antiochum Abbat. Hom. 61. Chrysost. de incomprehensib. Dei natura. Hom. 3. & Hom in Martyrs' Aegyptios. Hieron. in Epist. 1. Cyrill. Alexandrinum apud Anastasium Nycaenum quaest. 61. Theodoretum ibidem. Damascen. Lib. 1. Parales. cap. 7. etc.  
16. For Intercession of Saints, we have the common consent of the ancient Fathers. See S. Cyprian Lib. de mortalitate. Hieron. adversus Vigilantium. August. de Baptismo. Lib. 5. cap. 7. & Lib. 7. cap. 1. & de verbis Apost. Sermo. 47. & Sermon. 46. de Sanctis. & Lib. 9 Confess. cap. 3. & Lib. de cura pro mortuis agenda cap. 16. & contra Faustum Lib. 20. cap. 21. & in Meditatio. c. 20. Leo Magnus Sermon. de Sancto Laurentio. Gaudentius Brixian. Serm. 17. Gregorius Magnus lib. 7. Indictione 2. Epist. 25. Bernard. in Cantic. Serm. 77. I pretermit innumerable others of later times: the Scriptures therefore, and Fathers, and consent of the universal Church do securely warrant us, that the Angels and souls of Saints departed this life, do pray for the living, and that also in particular. Why then should not every faithful man take courage to invocate, or call upon them whom most certainly he knows to pray for him in heaven?  
17. That the Invocation of Angels & Saints, to the end that they pray for us, and join their prayers with ours, as S. chrysostom speaketh, 
Serm. in Sanctum Meletium.  cannot be doubted of, is most evident; and of the B. Virgin Mother of God a part, that she is to be invocated by us, that she pray for us to her son, we have most evident testimonies Iraeneus lib. 5. cap. 19 Athanas in Euang. de Deipara: Nazianzen orat. in Cyprianum. Basilius Seleuciae orat 1. de verbo incarnato. August. sermo 1. de Annunciatione. Cosmas Hierosolym. & Sophronius item Hierosolymitanus orat. 6. de Angelorum excellentia▪ Hildefonsus Toletanus etc.  
18. Now for the Invocation of other Saints, beside, the sacred Virgin, that the most ancient practice of the Church doth so much as I said before, it appertaineth to the tradition of the Apostles, for this invocation hath always been in use, and never reproved by any who was not held for an heretic. It were to long a labour to recount the Fathers who invocate Saints, or teach them to be invocated; that, elsewhere I have abundantly performed. And this perpetual custom of the Church of Invocating Saints, that they pray for us, and help us with their prayers, was never so much as found fault withal, but rather the contrary error was condemned by S. Hierome in Vigilantius, which condemnation the whole Church allowed, and therefore our new Vigilantians are to be condemned by the judgement of the whole Church, whose temerity in making our Invocation to be idolatry is very singular; neither have these Vigilantians any thing of moment that they can oppose: their objections I have elsewhere fully refuted, and I think that in another work I have fully defended the reverend regard of holy Relics, which God himself, as most pleasing unto him, hath confirmed by most manifest miracles.  
19 But our Adversaries boldly affirm, that in worshipping of holy images, we commit idolatry: and from hence they will have their departure from us to be lawful: but this also is a most vain pretext of theirs: neither can they thereby free themselves from the infamous note of most filthy schism; for in case we honour images with a proper, & peculiar honour, & worship, which is exhibited to the thing itself represented by the image, that is not supreme honour and worship, nor that true adoration which alone is due unto God; whereas therefore we do most plainly profess divine honour and supreme worship, not to be due, either unto Saints, or to their Relics, & much less to their Images, why do they object Idolatry unto us? The use of Images belongs to Ecclesiastical rites, and in these the sure, certain, and infallible rule to know, whether they be lawful, and to be approved, is the practice, and use especially of the primitive Church: In so much as they are to be esteemed good, and lawful rites, which either the Apostles, or some Apostolical men have ordained, or have either silently, or expressly approved; and it is most certain, yea most uncontrollable, the Christian Church even most ancient, whole, and universal, with joint, and singular consent, without all opposition, or contradiction, to have reverenced, or worshipped holy Images, either painted or carved. S. john Damascen hath collected in his three Orations which he wrote for Images most abundant testimonies. The Fathers of the seaventh General Council have done the like: and after these many others of our Church: What ignorant companion then dare condemn that which the most holy, and most learned Fathers have commanded, have taught, have practised? that which the Catholic Church, taught by the Apostles, hath always observed? that which God himself by mamiracles hath confirmed? Are they not then, according to the verdict of S. Augustine, 
August. Epist. 118.  most insolent mad men, who retain not the use of Images, nor devoutly keep them with that peculiar honour, due unto them (so as the supreme be not given them) but rather abuse, profane, and sacrilegiously cast them away?  
20. Two things especially, do our Adversaries urge against this our worshipping of holy Images, by which they contend, that we cannot avoid this charge of Idolatry, and by ●he same they ground themselves in ●heir schism, as if it were lawful. One is God's commandment, which forbiddeth ●ll Images to be made; the other that they cannot be excused from true external idolatry who adore the true God in any exterior sign that is a mere creature. These men with Caluin will have the golden calf to have been used by the children of Israel to represent the true God: and in this above all others doth Reynolds the English Puritan settle and ground his Treatise of the Idolatry of the Roman Church: but with me there is no doubt, neither can there be with our adversaries, but the most ancient Fathers, and Catholic Church to have known the ten Commandments, and the history of the Calf, and yet without all difficulty, and scruple they used holy Images with honour and reverence: but neither doth this disputation beseem this short discourse, the time will come when I shall have opportunity to to refute this book of Reynolds Of the Idolatry of the Church of Rome, on which England doth most of all maintain her schism. Now to deal briefly▪ I call to their remembrance the doings of Solomon, who endued with divine wisdom, not only adorned his temple with those Images and works of art which God had caused to be made, as were the Cherubims etc. but added of himself, so many shapes and kerued pictures of trees and beasts, as we read in Scripture, 
3. Reg. 10. 19 20.  for there were brazen Oxen, Palms, Pomegranates etc. and his Throne he set out with great, & little golden Lions. Doubtless Solomon understood this commandment of not making Images, & hath by his own fact explicated the same unto us sufficiently, to wit, that it was not commanded for all times, nor that it was of the divine natural law (but so fare forth as it denied supreme worship to be given unto them) but only of the divine positive law Temporal, and Conditional, then and so long to be observed, when and how long there should be danger lest the picture should be cause and occasion of Idolatry: wherefore seeing in us now so well instructed, there is no danger of committing idolatry by Images, that prohibition of the law which forbiddeth pictures to be made, hath no place with us; and therefore the Image-breakers abolishing the use of Images, breaking them in pieces, and unworthily handling them, have always been esteemed of the Church, & held for most wicked heretics, & numbered among the enemies of Christian Religion.  
21. The children of Israel in adoring the Calf to have committed Idolatry, is a thing most evident; neither will I ever grant, that this Calf represented to them the true God; & it is most false & against the true sense of the Scripture to say, the Israelites in that Calf to have adored the true God; they adored the same golden Calf, which they erring most beastly, thought to have had in it the divinity of the true God: this as I hope in due place, & time I shall convince out of most clear passages of the holy Scripture, & shall refute the light arguments of Caluin & Reynolds, 
Latria.  & show them that God himself may be adored with highest honour in corporal signs, without all danger of committing Idolatry: and that the English rely on a most filthy error, whiles they dream out of Reynolds follies, to triumph over the Roman Church, as if it were truly Idolatricall, & therefore by them lawfully rejected, and forsaken. In our use of holy Images, whereas every ill circumstance, & all scandal are ordinarily wanting, because we live not amongst Idolaters, and are, or may be well instructed touching the lawful worship of Images, most fare off from the supreme worship given unto God, therefore we may lawfully kneel before an Image, and so adore the person represented thereby with supreme honour, in case he be capable thereof. So did the children of Israel adore God in the cloud at the gate of the tabernacle, 
Exod. 33.  but they adored not the cloud; likewise in the fire: 
2. Paralip. 7.3.  neither did they commit idolatry, whiles they adored God in these corporal signs: such therefore as condemn this adoration, as of itself purly & properly idolatrical, have not in them so much as one dramme of a pure, & sound Divine. In vain therefore do the Protestants complain of this Idolatry, that they may defend their schism, & in this very thing first of all they defile themselves with heresy, & further they remain true Schismatics, because there was no lawful cause of their separation.  
22. They object unto us a most clear Idolatry, or bread-worship in the adoration of the B. Sacrament of the Altar, and by this also they seek to excuse themselves from sin; but they are foully mistaken: for to us the real & corporal presence of the body, & blood of our Lord jesus-christ in the sacred mysteries of the Eucharist, is most certain, and undoubted; we adore the same body of Christ, capable of itself by reason of the hypostatical union with the Word of supreme honour, lying hidden under these forms of bread, and wine; but hereof I cannot much dispute in this place. This real and corporal presence we suppose, and this supposal by our faith is certain, because we take it from the gospel, Christ saying when he had bread in his hands, Hoc est corpus meum, this is my body, according to the promise he had made saying, 
joan. 6.  Panis quem ego dabo caro mea est: the bread which I will give is my body and therefore our adversary's cannot suspect that in this adoration we are liable unto the error of idolatry, and so neither from this can they pretend any excuse for their schism, but they are truly, and properly not only schismatiks, but also heretics, and therefore I was to departed from amongst them, and no longer to adhere unto their errors.  
23. Besides the former, they object unto us a certain hidden or secret idolatry, when after the Exorcisms, and blessings, we place a spiritual confidence in salt, in water, in oil, and the like: all which they heap together out of a desire to slander us, and that they may seem by any means to excuse their schism: but they know full well, that we place no certain confidence in these things, as if we taught these creatures to receive any certain, and infallible force from our exorcisms and prayers: these things we say are sacramentals, but not Sacraments, and hallowed to the end we may stir up our devotion by them: all our confidence is placed in God alone, who moved by the prayers of the Church, even by these creatures, by virtue of the same prayers & blessings, bestows his gifts upon us: the greatest part of those and the like rites the Church hath received from Apostolical tradition, and from hand to hand of the most ancient Church, which who so follows cannot err, & he who contemns, and casts away, is himself to be cast forth as a rash man, and enemy of the Church. Tertullian sets down the use of holy Oil: 
Tertul. li. de Baptismo.  and amongst the matters of the Sacraments S. Augustine reckons Oil. 
Aug. Ep. 119.  The hallowing of the water of Baptism hath been observed from time out of mind; for S. Cyprian makes mention of the hallowing of water, and oil, and of Unction also. 
Cyprian. li. 1. Epist. ultima.  The holy Churches, I mean the material, in case by any chance they should be defiled, were wont to be cleansed by exorcism, and washing of the walls: this we have delivered by Optatus Milevitanus. 
Optatus Mileu. lib. 2. con. Parmenian.  S. Basill also from tradition deduceth the common rite of anointing with oil the party that was baptised: 
Basil. lib. de Spiritu sancto cap. 27  all antiquity doth further teach us the sign of the Cross to have been used in every blessing and consecration: justinus quaestione 118. Nazianzen Orat. 1. in julian. & Orat. in funere Patris. Chrysostom. Hom. 55. in Matthaeum. Augustin. tract. 118. in joan. & sermo. de tempore, 181. cap. 3. Areopagita & alij. There are perhaps some rites now used in the Church not so ancient, in which we use things blessed, and consecrated; but as the primitive Church, taught by the Apostles, never feared any danger of secret Idolatry if it used consecrated oil and the like, why should we now fear who attribute no more to these new consecrated things, than antiquity attributed unto the other? For these things to fly to Schism, is supreme impiety: these rites are good, most of them were instituted by the Apostles, others have had their beginning from the devotion of Catholic Churches, no way contrary to Faith, yea most conform & agreeing thereunto: the variety of rites and ceremonies was in ancient time in Churches, and yet none under that pretence did departed from mutual communion amongst themselves: The Ancients (saith Sozomen) 
Sozomen lib. 7. c. 19●  did worthily judge it a frivolous, or foolish matter, that they for custom sake should be separated from one another, who in the chief points of Religion did agree; therefore this separation of the Englishmen is frivolous, yea rash, and wicked, by which they have divided themselves from the true Catholic Church, and have broken forth without cause into open schism, with whom to communicate in divine things, is to consent to their most unjust, and pernicious schism.  
24. Touching the new articles of which they make their complaint and excuse their schism, I will not now dispute. I should be too prolix if I should now turn aside to these points in due place to be handled: only here I demand of them, whether they think these new articles (as they call them) to be contrary unto faith or not. If they were contrary to faith, they should be heresies; and they would make the maintainers heretics, and worthily to be detested, and separated from the communion of all Catholic Churches. But I have now proved that there is no heresy in the Church of Rome; the most sovereign King of great Britanny, & very many learned men in that kingdom confessing, that the Church of Rome stands entire in the fundamental faith; but I have showed before that there is no true Article that it not fundamental, and with assured faith to be believed; therefore it hath no articles, which are contrary to the Catholic faith, and in case they be not contrary to the true faith but contain the same, they can yield no occasion of schism. But (say they) because we reject, and refuse these articles, the Church of Rome hath separated, & cut us of from that body. Truly I lament and bewail these men to have made a beastly, and perfect schism, before any thing was done, or defined concerning those which they call new Articles, in much as they cannot without exceeding vanity cover their schism by these new articles, for the effect cannot go before the cause. I endeavour to show that they made a schism without cause, & hence I knew them to be true schismatiks, and for that I departed from them. And further, these very Articles which they call new, can evidently be demonstrated out of the Scriptures, tradition, and Fathers: and the contrary decreed by themselves to be convinced of open heresy, if we will follow the judgement of Antiquity; howsoever some latter Protestants taking a more mild, & moderate course are wont to bring for some point such favourable explications (of which my self have heard many) as they seemed not to differ much from the Catholic opinion, & these seem to admit some pious agreement; who then without pernicious error, yea true heresy, will place his salvation on only Faith, and exclude the necessity of Good works? Who will absolutely deny our Merits, and that just men cannot lose their grace, and that they are impeccable, and cannot sinne? And such as stiffly hold these, and the like to be Articles of faith, and the contrary to be heresies, they undoubtedly do err in matters of faith, and show themselves to be heretics, and consequently to be well and worthily by the Catholic definitions placed amongst such: no heresy therefore of the Church of Rome, no Idolatry open, or hidden, could give occasion to the schism of Protestants. Neither can they object Schism to the same Catholic Church, for it hath made no schism, but suffered it. From her hath Luther, from her Caluin, from her have their first followers separated themselves, whiles stubbornly they refused to stand to her judgement; these have made a schism, these have divided the garment of Christ, these have erected altar against Altar, & finally these have left, and forsaken the Catholic Church.  
25. Besides the former alleged, and discussed causes, they pretend another of Reformation, forsooth, needful to be made: but I amongst them scant ever saw any reformation, or to speak more truly, saw none at all: but as for Deformations, I saw many amongst them. For the most part, all care of conscience is cast away, they are not there (excepting a very few of them) troubled with any scruples for adulteries, robberies, or deceiving their neighbours; and in like manner for cozenage, deceypts, and usuries, for they have wickedly abolished auricular Confession, fasting, penance, and the like holy means for our amendment; and if these men had found amongst us somewhat amiss, in conversation, in actions, in government, in direction, and the like, that had not argued any defect of the Church, but the errors of particular men, which of Catholics are not allowed but mysliked: neither for these lesser a matters, as manners of life, and that not in all but some, were they to to make this most ugly schism. There remains in the Roman Church a sound, an immoveable, and constant foundation: and suppose it were true, 
1. Cor. 3.  that we built thereon wood, stubble, hay; yet were we not thereby debarred from salvation: but the Protestant's have departed from the foundation itself, they have forsaken it, and except they build upon the foundation which is Christ, gold silver, & precious stones, which foolishly they boast to be theirs, all are proiecta viliora alga, wast weeds, all fruitless labours, and nothing avay leable to salvation. There is one foundation, not two, one Church not two, one Christ not two: if Christ be our foundation (which they cannot deny) he is not certainly theirs, they have made themselves a new Church, divided and separated from ours, and that also cannot be a Church, because the Church is one not two, he who willbe of their Church, he must needs be out of the true Church of Christ.  
26. I confess that I was deceived by the English Protestants, before I had considered diligently the nature of schism; for when I objected this fault unto them, some of them replied, that it was not their fault that they communicated not with the Church of Rome, who were ready to make union, and accord; but that the Pope would not receive them into communion, whom he had cut of from him and his, by excommunication. This excuse for a while seemed unto me lawful, and reasonable; yet when afterwards upon this ground I began in private disputes, and public sermons to urge an union, which I took not to be fare off from making, and whiles I strove to put my finger deeper into this festered ulcer, I perceived in England, not the English Confession which they commended unto me as modest, but the Confession of Caluin, and many doting dreams of Luther, to be the common rule of their faith: this I perceived more clearly by the counterfeit Synod of Protestants at Dort, in the which the opinions of the rigid Caluinists, by consent, and concurrence of the English sect, by their ministers sent thither, were confirmed: which opinions of the rigid Puritans, if the confession of the English Church, divided into certain Articles, do not as they pretend, include; then why under the name of the English Profession, did the aforesaid Ministers yield their consent, and set their hands to these Caluinian excesses? How can it be that those who profess themselves most eager enemies of the Church of Rome, should be thought to desire union with the same Church, and the defect thereof not to proceed from their fault? How can they cast the fault of their schism upon the Tridentine excommunications, who before these anathemas, had divided themselves by schism from the Catholic Church; and truly by a schime in some sort fare more worse, and foul, then was the schism made by Luther, and after confirmed by the instigation of Caluin? Because England in the beginning refrained from the opinions of Luther, and Caluin, and charged not the Roman Church with heresy or Idolatry, as Lutherans, and Caluinists did to cover their schism withal, and yet notwithstanding long after, not with so much as any apparent cause, it yielded to the common schism of heretics. The Englishmen now, for the most part, do praise and defend the division and separation that is made: for that they strive, for that they fly union, for that they cast away Charity; they labour all they can, that agreement do not succeed, and fraternal unity be fast knit in the bands of peace; and many of them say, that they would more willingly, and more easily have union & society with the Turks then with Papists? Is this to be ready to make concord? Is this the truth of their words, when they said, that it was not their fault they communicated not with the Church of Rome? Truly it cannot possibly be, that any union (which I thought might easily have been achieved) be made, unless they detest all heresies, and heretics, and believe aright with the Catholic Roman faith, and be united unto the same by perfect Charity.  
27. Henry the 8. had in manner only contention with the Pope, and out of an heretical spirit denied his Supremacy, and tossed with many discomposed passions, took the same unto himself: in other things concerning faith, form of Religion, and Ecclesiastical rites, he carried himself more moderately. Under his Son Edward a child, and much more under Elizabeth, not only a separation was made from the chief Bishop Christ his vicar, and supreme Pastor of the Christian flock, but also the use of Religion by main force, & injury was taken from Catholics, and by public laws (but made by Lay men) utterly suppressed. Was there any lawful Council before for this matter? Were the objections made against Catholics discussed? Were the reasons for their defence heard? Were they convinced of any error or impiety in Religion? Was this judgement made by any competent judge? Nothing less. Doth not the same violence, the same injury, the same impiety still remain? How much do they strive in England, they especially who seem to have care of their Religion, such as it is, lest the divine, ancient, pious, & prescript worship of God be restored to Catholics? Is this their meaning, when they say it is not? Their fault, that the schism is not taken away? They urge reformation, but reformation be it never so just, & necessary, yet if it be made with schism, is a most fowl deformation. That in deed is reform that remains the same in substance. Therefore Catholic Religion ought to have remained in England, and the substantial practice of the same; if any thing had been to be reform, that seruatis seruandis might have been exposed to reformation, but no other different Religion (the former being suppressed or violently kept under) was to be made, in so much as now there should be two religions disagreeing among themselves and one contrary to the other: for if the latter be another Religion from the former, the former is not reform, but, as much as lay in their power, is overthrown, and a new set up; but there cannot be two Religions of Christ, for there is but one only, and that with us, I as have showed, as there is but one Church, one foundation, one Christ.  
28. When as therefore amongst other miseries I saw myself involved in inveterate schism, and all hope of union to be taken away, seeing Altar erected against Altar, & divided from the Charity of the Church, I neither could nor ought, with safe conscience to be present: wherefore remorse of conscience compelled me to return, and it was necessary that my Agar returned to the most holy Roman Church her mistress, hearing the voice of the Angel checking her, and saying: 
Gen. 16.9.  Revertere ad Dominam tuam, & humiliare sub manu illius, return to thy mistress, & humble thyself under her hand or authority: that flight could bring me nothing but shame and ruin: God commands me to be humbled under the hand of my mistress, and in this I ought specially to follow God. I would to God, that they to whom foolishly I fled, would acknowledge their most miserable spiritual estate, not only for heresies, but also for their schism to be most desperate: from which schism now I have showed that they cannot be excused, because they have unlawfully separated themselves from the true Church of Christ, which is our Catholic Roman Church. And this point affrighted me, because schismatiks are excluded from being the Children of God: for Deum non habent patrem (saith S. Cyprian) 
Lib. de simplicitate Praelatorun  qui Ecclesiam (veram) non habent matrem: they have not God for their Father, who have not the (true) Church for their mother. Christ therefore died, 
joan. 11.51.  ut filios Dei qui dispersi erant, congregaret in unum; that he might gather in one, the children of God who were dispersed: the death therefore of Christ did work, and still worketh, not only the redemption of men, but also the union of his Church. Before the death of Christ, the children of God were dispersed, and divided, some under the Law of Moses, others under the only Law of nature, being far asunder one from the other, making together no one certain, and universal Congregation: but now the divine wisdom would so have it, that all his faithful followers, & true children by faith should make over the whole world one society, or fellowship, that they should all make one warfare under their Captain, and Emperor Christ, and under his banner, to wit, the holy and life-giving Cross, using all the same military signs, and tokens of the Sacraments: and this society, and congregation is a singular effect of the death of Christ, which procured, that disagreeing Sects and innumerable courses of life amongst themselves so different, and contrary, should meet, and be combined in one Christian unity, 
Ephes. 2.19  which truly is his work qui fecit utraque unum, who made both one, and that by the Cross. Hereunto doth Anastasius Synaita apply the words of God in the creation Congregentur aquae in locum unum; 
Anastas. 3. Hexam.  let the waters be gathered together in one place: This saith he belongeth to the Church, gathered together under the unity of one faith out of different people, countries, and sects. And for this cause, Christ said of his own Cross; 
joan. 12.  si exaltatus fuero à terra, omnia traham ad meipsum. If I shallbe exalted from the earth, I will draw all unto myself. S. Athanasius saith, 
Athanas. de Incarnate. verbi Dei.  Exaltatus enim in cruse Dominus, utroque extenso brachio utrumque populum ad se invitavit, ut utrumque amplexando in sinum suum colligeret. Our Lord being exalted or lifted upon the Cross, with both his arms stretched abroad invited to himself both people (jew and Gentile) that by embracing them both he might gather them together into his bosom. There is therefore one bosom, between the arms of our Saviour.  
29. And in the same place S. Athanasius thinks it not to want mystery, that Christ chose the death of the Cross & not Beheading, by which S. john his precursor died, nor cutting or deuiding of his body as Isaias:  in morte (saith he) sine mutilatione integrum corpus seruaret. & causa subduceretur ijs qui Ecclesiam in parts cupiunt discindere, that in the death of Christ his entire body without maiming might be preserved, and all pretext taken away from them who desire to cut the Church asunder into parts. And so heartily Christ esteemed this unity, as in that most fervent prayer which he made in the last night of his life, 
joan. 17.11 20.21.  he craved of his Father, that he would not suffer his disciples, and other believers in him to departed from this unity, ut credat mundus quia tu me misisti, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. But our Adversaries little considering these things will as much as is in them, have the death, and Cross of Christ to be destitute of this most noble effect of unity, and by their divisions & schisms give occasion to jews and Infidels of railing and blaspheming of Christ, and saying that he was not the son of God, or sent by him, seeing the society or Church founded by him, doth not subsist, but is ever now and then to be dissolved, or divided into parts; the Church of Christ is one house, and one family; he who draws himself from this family, that goeth forth out of this house, he belongs not to the family of Christ, he is deprived of salvation, as who were not in the Ark, 
Gen. 3.  were lost, and perished in the flood. The Protestants have cut themselves from the body of Christ, which is the only Catholic Roman Church, and those who are inseparably united with the same: therefore they are not members of Christ and therefore Christ is not their head, neither doth he infuse his holy Spirit, and gifts into them: they are therefore rotten members, and already cut of, because they have cut themselves off wickedly of their own accord from the body: Sunt palmites (saith S. Augustine) 
August. Epist. 50.  à vite praecisi, nulli usui nisi igni apti: neque potest esse particeps divinae Caritatis, qui est hostis unitatis: they are branches cut off from the vine, fit for no other use then the fire: 
Ezech. 15.3  neither can he be partaker of God's charity, who is an enemy of unity. So he.  
30. Of all spiritual help (if they think themselves to have any) they have made shipwreck by their schism. Si linguis hominum loquar & Angelorum, (saith S. Paul) 
1. Cor. 13.1.  Caritatem autem non habeam, nihil sum, nihil mihi prodest. If I shall speak with the tongues of men, and Angels, and have not Charity, I am nothing, it avails me nothing. Out of which words of the Apostle S. Augustine prudently admonisheth, 
August. de Baptismo Lib. 1. c. 9  no good work any way to avail a Schismatic. The same, and more than once, hath S. Cypryan delivered. 
Cyprian. lib. 4. Epist. 2.  Etsi occisus propter nomen Christi postmodum fuerit extra Ecclesiam constitutus, & ab unitate atque caritate divisus, coronari in morte non poterit: although one after that he is out of the Church, and is divided from the unity, and charity of the same, be killed for the name of Christ, he cannot be crowned in his death. The same he urgeth in other places, as Lib. 1. Epist. 1. & ad julianum, & tract. de simp. Praelatorum, seu de unitate Ecclesiae: & de Oratione Dominica, whom S. chrysostom follows in Epist. ad Ephesios'. Hom. 11.  
31. Let the Protestants, I beseech them, consider what an enormous sin they have committed by this cursed separation, because that schism destroys the Church, for it is the saying of Christ, 
Luc. 11.17.  Omne Regnum in se divisum desolabitur, every kingdom divided in itself shallbe brought to desolation: and of S. Paul, 
Galat. 5.15.  Videte ne dum invicem mordetis, invicem consummamini. Take head lest whiles you bite one another, ye be not consumed one of another: and this crime of destroying the Church may be said to be that sin against the holy Ghost, that Christ avouched not to be forgiven in this world, nor in the next, 
Math. 12.31.  as S. Ambrose showeth. 
Ambros. 2. de Paenit. cap. 4.  So that most wicked harlot in the book of Kings, had rather that there should be no child, than that it should be brought up in the bosom of the true mother, and exclaimed against her, saying, 
3. Reg. 3.26.  nec mihi nec tibi, sed dividatur; let the child neither be given to me nor thee, but let it be divided: the Schismatics labour all they can that the true and entire Faith be not kept in the bosom of the true mother the Church: they go about to dead it, that it may neither be kept alive with them nor us: but they prevail nothing; and let those know that to be spoken of them, 
Ecclesiast 10.8.  qui dissipat sepem, mordebit eum coluber, the serpent shall bite him that breateth down the hedge.  
32. And it is no marvel that the Englishmen have fallen into many Heresies, & that Puritanisme doth sway so much, howbeit when first they made their schism they were neither infected with the Lutherane or Calumian heresies. For as Irenaeus doth notably teach us, 
Iren. lib. 3. cap. 40. & lib. 4. cap. 43.  those who are cut of from the Church, do not drink out of the fountain of the spirit of God, but do dig for themselves bylakes, and do fall into most gross errors against the truth of Faith. In like manner S. Cyprian makes the Catholic Church the root, the fountain, the sun; 
Cyprian. lib. de simplic. Praelat.  that as a branch hath his life from the root, the river his water from the fountain, the sunbeam his light & spendour from the sun: so the sincerity of true belief to be had by our union with the Catholic Church: they therefore who have cut themselves from it, cannot have the truth of faith, but must necessarily fall into errors; for they are trees without a root, rivers without a fountain, & sunbeams without a sun; hereof it comes that the Fathers out of these, and the like reasons do convince, that schism in the end breaks forth into heresy: for he who refuseth to have unity with the Catholic Church, will also refuse to learn of her the truth of Faith, of which she alone is the treasurer, & preserver. S. Augustine very well defines this matter, when he saith: 
Augu. lib. 2. contra Crescon c. 7.  Inueteratum Schisma esse ipsammet haeresim, inveterate schism to be heresy itself. And S. Cyprian worthily findeth in every schism that heresy at least, whereby is taken away one or two articles of our Creed; Credo Sanctam Ecclesiam Catholicam, & Remissionem peccatorum: I believe the holy Catholic Church, & the Remission or forgiveness of sins: for they who believe the holy Catholic Church to be the true Church of Christ, they cannot if they thus believe departed from her; and in case they depart, then truly they do not believe the Catholic Church to be the true Church of Christ. So Saint Augustine saith of the Donatists, 
Aug. haeres. 69. ad Quod vult Deum.  that they had turned their schism into heresy. And S. Ambrose in the funeral Oration had of his brother approving his fact for that he had fled from the Luciferian Church, as I now from the Churches of England, saith: Non putavit Fidem esse in schismate: nam etsi Fidem in Deum tenerent, tamen erga Dei Ecclesiam non tenerent, cuius patiebantur velut quosdam artus dividi & membra lacerari, Etenim cùm propter Ecclesiam Christus pass●… sit, & Christi corpus Ecclesia sit, non videtur ab ijs exhiberi Christo fides, à quibus evacuatur eius passio, corpusque distrahitur. He thought not that there was any faith in schism: for although they kept their fayht towards God, yet they kept it not towards the Church of God, of which they permitted certain joints to be divided, and members to be torn: truly whereas Christ suffered his passion for the Church, and the Church is the body of Christ, they seem not to believe in Christ, by whom his Passion is made void, & his body dismembered.  
33. Was I then with so great damage of my soul to remain amongst Heretics, and Schimatickes? God forbidden. I am troubled with bitter grief of mind, that I remained so long amongst them, that I took wicked arms, and fought against my Mother, against the Catholic truth, and that I wrote books of the Ecclesiastical Common Wealth stuffed with heresies, which I utterly abhor, and detest, & that I have warred in the infamous tents of heretics, not without the perpetual blot, or infamy of my Name. I now loath, and am ashamed of my so great offence, and crave humbly, and with all submission, pardon for this wickedness of God, most good, most great, of my Saviour Christ, and of his supreme Vicar, or Substitute on Earth the Bishop of Rome: and submit all my faults to the singular Clemency of the same chief Pastor, because that he being to be judged of none, sits as supreme judge of all, most fully sustaining the person of Christ in the militant Church: and I confidently hope that as our Lord doth willingly open to his Penitent the bosom of his mercy; so I shallbe embraced in the arms of Clemency by his Holiness. The example of S. Cyprian against Pope Stephen the first, very much reprehended, and condemned also by the Catholic Church, confirmed me a while in my naughtiness of resisting the Pope; but now my filthy fall hath with mine own danger taught me how easily Bishops fall from the right path of Faith, who leaving the Cynosura, or Polestar, that is, the most certain, and secure direction of the Bishop of Rome, follow, to their destruction, their own foolish fancies. I would to God, that as S. Cyprian with the shedding of his own blood, did blot out all the spot of his former animosity: so also, that there may be granted unto me, who for the multitude, & greatness of my faults, have incomparably exceeded his fall, opportunity, & grace to blot out also with my blood, those soul spots, and by that means to testify the Catholic truth; which, when my ink should fail me, I am most ready by the help of God, to his praise and honour, for the advauncement of the holy Catholic Church, and glory of the Sea Apostolic, to seal with my blood. Adsit Deus. God second and assist me. Rome, the 24. of November 1622. stylo novo.  
FINIS.