The defence of the Marriage of priests: against Steven Eardiner bishop of Wynchester/ William Repse bishop of Norwiche/ and against all the bishops and priests of that false popish sect/ with a confutation of their unadvised vows unadvisedly defined: whereby they have so wickedly separated them whom God coupled in lawful marriage. Made by james Sawtry. Thou shalt be destroyed with the breath of the Lordis mouth/ O Anticriste. isaiah. xi. When God is our refugye and rok unspeakable/ found and felt in our tribulation. Psal. xlv. WHen the people of God called Israel Exo. i. & iij. / had ben after the death of joseph. c. xl. years in that yerney furnace and hard bondage of Egypte/ our almighty merciful father/ considering their heavy labours in clay and bryke/ & hearing their deep sighs and grievous groanings crying daily under their intolerable burdens: & again remembering his promise made with their father's/ Abraham Isaac and jacob: sent them Moses and Aaron with his word & miracles to deliver them out of that miserable servitute from under that heavy yok of hardnecked Pharaoh figureth the pope as did joseph figure Criste. Pharaoh/ the figure of the pope/ which knew not joseph the figure of Crist. Many Moses and Aaron's/ as faithful and free preachers hath our almighty God daily and oft sent with his everlasting word of salvation and deliverance/ unto the hardnecked pope's & to their indurated bishops thorough out all cristendome to deliver his silly careful floke out of the miserable antichristian bondage of their damnable doctrines / erroneous & false religion/ superstitious rites/ devillisshe traditions/ & sinful ceremonies/ even the intolerable burdens of men laid upon poor men's ●at. xx●ij. backs which theirselues they will not once to wche to ease men. And yet then/ as Pharaoh with his charmers and enchanters resisted God/ his messengers/ his word & miracles (not with standing himself with his Egyptians were so 'gree vously plagued) even so this day yet are Cristes' messengers/ his gospel and miracles to/ not only spitefully and cruelly resisted/ but destroyed/ brent & banished. Wherein yet Pharaoh/ indurated heathen idollater/ as he was/ showed himself more gentle and merciful to Israel/ then do the pope and our bishops declare themselves to their poor flocks. For Pharaoh at last seeing his first begotten son and all the first begotten children and bestis in Egypte deed leet Israel depart. But the pope & our bishops will first see not only their first begotten sons/ daughter's/ with their mothers and all their misbegoten children their bisshoprykes & themselves to clean gone/ but also the first begotten faith that only justifieth with all the christian religion taken from them & given to the Tnrkes and jews better worthy to have it then they/ ere they will suffer the almighty message of God's holy word to take place and to con sent there unto for the deliverance of Crispinus stes church out of their damnable doctrines popisshe errors and false religion/ freely to follow the true preachers of the word of their salvation in Cristes' blood. What an intolerable burden is it to young persons perpetually burning in concupiscence and desire of the to their ●en. ●●. Heb. xii● sex/ Whom God created to be thorough wedlok the lawful remedy and help one for the to there by his almighty word naturally joining & inclining the man to love the woman and the woman the man/ as the grass or tre in her time to grow & to bringeforth fruit/ and yet/ for this damnable prohibition of the pope/ they may not enjoy God's honourable ordinance and lawful remedy of wedlock instituted of God? When God Gen. iij. saw man alone/ he said/ It is not good for man sole to live. But our anticristen papists/ the very seed of the serpent/ wiser than God/ for that yet at the temptation of the serpent their father/ they daily eat of the tree of the knowledge of good & evil/ seeing man alone/ affirm and decree against God/ That it is better for man to live alone yea to have an C. whores (as once said bishop Stokesley of London in open judgement to a married priest) then to be married to his own wife. yea they had liefer (as experience teacheth) keep other men's wives abuse their daughter's/ violate their maidens and haunt every day a new where prodigiously polluted in all manner filthiness not to be spoken/ then to have their own lawful wives in chaste matrimony according to Goddis holy institution and ordinance. Besides all this/ yet much more intolerable is it for the poor married men with their lawful wives and natural dear children/ by their ungodly acts/ so cru elly and so violently (as ye see it of late) to be thus drawn insunder/ as it were with wild horses/ one member from another so painfully plucked/ that the howsband may not come into/ nor look tower the same town/ where he left his own wife & his children pain of death/ when the almighty word of God ●en ●●▪ ●at. x●● so entirely cowpleth and joineth man & wife together into one flesh perpetually to live as all one/ that grievous threats there are threatened to them/ what so ever the● be/ which are so blasphemous lie bold as to separate and slay them whom god joineth. Everlasting ij. thes. ij damnation abideth them that so arrogantly exalt themselves against the most high god/ that they will perniciously pervert and dampnab●y destroy that natural order & inclination of generation & love/ which God himself by his first farm creation with his everlasting almigh ty word hath engraven and ingra●●ed into the nature of man & woman. For when they had thus separated the wife from her own howsbonde/ then were there no small married men of birth (whom I could name) that fell to wooing of some preistis wives and would have made them their whores if the poor women had not resisted their devellisshe entysements. Thus ye see under what holy pretence the noble married men separated priests from their true wives to make them their whores/ which is but a lawghig game & gaudy unpunished unto these great men the bishops true captived ghostly children. But under what holy ypocritissh pretence (I pray you) hath this spiritual serpentine seed/ transfiguring themselves into ij. cor. xi. angels of light/ thus perverted and destroyed this first gods holy ordinance of wedlock? verily even under the feigned wifeless chastity the oc casion of all whore doom. glittering colour of wifeless chastity/ the fowntayne of all whoredom/ forbidding to mary which is as the holy ghost constantly affirmeth/ the plain doctrine i Timo. iiij. of the devil: Of the which devillisshe doctrine almost now pressed by Goddis word/ bold arrogant Steven Gardener / bishop of Wynchester with his Steven Gardener bishop of wynchester. drunken black monk Repse abbot quondam of. s. Benits & now bissh. of Norwiche with their pharisaical faction/ are the inbringers/ authors a new/ and Repse of norwich maintainers/ lively described & in their own colours painted of the holygost isaiah. lix. sitting in their profane conjuration house/ their hands polluted The bishops convocation house. with blood & fingers imbrued with sin/ their lips speaking lies/ and their tongues painting mischief. For non of these bloody byghtsheep calleth in rightwiseness for their advocate in the law non judgeth faithfully & truly/ but they lean all unto vanity & lies/ they study fantasies/ they conceive laborious business/ and at last brought they for the mischief. They did sit hatching the cokatrices eggs weaving the spiders webs: and he that eateth of their eggs shall die/ but and if he treadeth them under his foot/ the serpent shall yet brekeforthe etc. as now in the year of our Lord. M. D. xxxix. there brokeforthe these venomous virulent vepers/ Wynchester with his adulterous generation ●●●●. twenty-three. elc. xxii● i tim. iiij joan. viij / encrusted walls/ & painted sepulchres to colour this their doctrine of the devil their father/ with their vicious vows of men & women dedicated to God/ as though their were no state put a part to God but only their prodigiou see shameless shoorn adulterers. But Rom. vi. Gala. iij. Ephe. v. thou shalt know (christian reder) That whosoever be baptized into the death of Crist jesus/ perpetually to mortify their flesh/ to be revived in spirit/ as our baptism with water teacheth and monisheth all cristeans/ the same a● by that common baptism & christian profession (& not by the pope's profane inordinate orders and false religion) dedicated/ that is to say/ separated from these papistic pharisaiss & heathen idolaters/ to joan. iiij. jere. ij. serve God in spirit & trowth. And our priests of Baal/ even the popis shavelings not being content with the first and only holy sacrament of the common christian profession/ but have by a new & false sacrament instituted of the pope entered into another false religion & thereby dedicated themselves unto the devil Deut. xviij. Moloch Leu●. xx. iiij. reg. twenty-three. / children offered up unto Moloch/ perpetually to burn in all manner beastly filthenes and whoredom/ as their own lives declare them. And the women are dedicated unto that abominable ●●riapus. jere. lix. Chamoes ●enus. ●●riapus the god of the garden. idol Priapus altogether dedicated to chamos & venus. For what Sodomites what Gomorreans/ what monstrous adulterers they be/ they that have heard their filthy daily ere confessions of these priests/ & the visitors late of the suppressed religious places of men & women/ cane tell it. Whose prodigious filthenes lest it should poison the papir/ & the breath of the reder should corrupt the air and infect honest ears/ I suppress it. And yet doth passhur Of passhur turned into pavor the proud upclymer int▪ ● a freful fall. Wynchester call them holy spiritual vowers or votories dedicated to God/ as himself is dedicated to the devil. woe therefore be to you that make ungodly laws and acts to hard to keep to oppress the afflict in judgement etc. jere. ●●. Isa. x. fie upon these unnatural chil darn out of kind which dare make acts against my counsel and weave a web against my mind to heap sin upon sin/ saith the Lord isaiah. thirty. But these venomous cokatrices' eggs/ & poisoned spiders webs/ where Is●. lix. of (as isaiah saith) no cloth may be made to cover their own naked mischief & robbery etc. (God assisting me with his holy word) I shall now stamp them down under my feet/ & altobreke them that all men may see their open present poison & beware of it: creep therforth never so virulent venomous & subtile a serpent as bold as arrogant and as crafty as is pestiferous passhur Wynchester himself to defend their manifest impiety. If their articles and acts/ concern Cristis religion/ show us some one word of Crist to confirm them/ or if they be of Cristes' religion/ so must they be made in Cristis & his apostles time/ which taught and wrote us an absolute/ complete & perfect religion/ nothing omitted necessary for the christian church and for their salvation: but of these their cokatrices' eggs & spiders webs to pertain to the christian religion there is not one word nether in gospel nor pistle nor in no part of the bible/ but the plain contrary: wherefore they are very venom/ & the poisoned doctrine of the devil concerning antichrists religion. If these their cokatrices' eggs so lately laid & latelyer hatched in their spiders webs/ must pertain to Cristes' religion/ how happeneth it that nether Crist nor his apostles in their days/ nor yet the holygost all these. xv. c. years espied not them? but now at last in this new black parliament unto Wynchester and to his drunken proud crowns of Ephraim Isa●. xxviij. the bishops they be revealed? It is not fully. CCCCC. years ago sense this religion creptyn. It is all to late now in the later end of the world to receive any new articles of our faith. Nether is there any man of the power as to make us any one article of our faith/ our faith and religion is to old/ & to firm by God/ to be now new turned changed & altered by man. Crist at his departing promised his apostles that the jos. xvi. holygost should teach them all truth con cerning the christian religion/ and yet he never taught them these abominable blasphemies & lies. Belyk Cristes' church of england hath greatly erred unto this last black parliament. Crist commanded Mat. xxviij. his apostles & their successors to teach nothing but that at he had taught and commanded them to keep. The ho Deu. iiij 2. xij. Prou. ii● Eccle. iij i pet. iiij lie ghost straightly commandeth in many places/ that man add not unto his reli gion & word/ his own ded dreams & devillissh devices. In things concerning our faith & religion/ there ought noman to presume to decree/ teach or enact any thing without the express word of God/ except he willbe exalted above God/ found a liar/ a man making gods law incomplet and imperfect/ and such a presumptuous papist that usurpeth to illustre the bright son of verity with his own blind bald lying reason. Repent repent Wyn. with thy dampna Isa. xvij ble faction lest the hasty whirl wind of God's present heavy indignation carry you shortly away. When I had red in Deutero. xxviij. with what plagues and curses/ as with madness/ fury/ & blindness/ God smiteth Rom. ●. his reprobated vessels of wrath casten up thorough their own hearts lusts unto almaner filthenes: I could not so greatly marvel at Wynchesters/ & his factions indurated blindness/ where as for the defence of their abominable whoredom/ & destruction of chaste matrimony ordained of God/ he so wickedly/ so blasphemously/ against the law of nature/ all godly order/ all reason/ and wy●chesters vows. against all scripture/ diffineth. That vow to be lawful and advisedly made/ which is made after. xxi. yet old. And much less wo●der it is/ to se siche blind bishops forsaken of God/ to separate & slay the poor innocents whom God cowpleth. For as it is the doctrine of the devil which they enact and defend/ so must the children accomplesshe their father's work is which was both liar & Io. xiij. mansseyer from the beginning. If winch. and his bishops had not been thus stricken with blindness of god (I speak not in this book against the seculare sort/ in this parley▪ because that I se in this their spiritual cause/ as the bishops are the authors thereof/ so seduce they daily the ignorant simplicity of the layte as they list by their false serpentine persuasions) they might have se●e their own definition of vows to condemn themselves. For Wyn. himself/ after. xxi. years old created the pope's creature/ doctor of the popis law/ after ward popisshly preisted/ & at last Romisshly bisshopped made at every his creation a solemn vow to be obedient to the pope now dedicated to his church and holiness/ which vows either he hath broken & so is worthy hanging (as it was first enacted) or else he keepeth still his vows/ which is most to be believed. He and his/ made vows to live without their own wives/ but whether they keep other men's & whores/ let the common voice and their open acts be judges. But let us expend and way this Unad●y sedgy per tayn to discrection and no● to ve res of xx. word unadvisedly/ and see whether it pertaineth to the age and years of. xxi. or to discretion/ judgement & knowledge: He is said to do a thing advisedly that doth it with good consideration/ judge ment/ discretion & knowledge of all the circumstances that may pertain to the fact/ of what age so ever he be. For as it is not the. xxi. years of age that mesureth wisdom discretion & knowledge/ so is not judgement discretion & knowledge nor wisdom tied to any age prescript of Wynchester. Many men be more blind & foolish after they are promoved to be bishops and have once drunken of apo. xvij the glorious whores golden cup of Basilius bylon/ then when they were but poor cy sars & scholars in Oxforth & cambringe. And some/ the elder they wax/ the more fools they ar. I knew myself/ young men of. xviij. and. xx. years/ better learned/ of better judgement knowledge/ wisdom and discretion than the old hoar headed doctor/ and many are called of God unto the knowledge of his truth not afore thirty. or. xl. etc. Crist calleth not every idle man into his vineyard/ all at one hour/ as ye may see Mat. xx. nor giveth men his gifts of the spirit at Wyn thesters appointed year/ nor is not restrained by Wynchesters' definition/ from the increase of his gifts. He could sanctify jon. bapt. & jere. in their mother's wombs & call his disciples to him after or before. xxi. year/ & convert Paul when he listed/ but passhur Wyn. will appoint the holygost to age & hour/ & therefore hath he unadvisedly diffyned his unadvised vows. Tell me Win. by thy faith/ beat thou not once advisedly married to the hore of Babylon after. xxi. as thou sayst in thy book of thy true disobedience & false faith? and madest not thou than thy vow? If thou beast now divorced why keepest thou still thy whores laws? why defendest thou so stefly her wicked traditions? why so cruelly fightest thou for her ceremonies/ rites/ & this her devillissh doctrine of forbidding priests to mary? If althings that men do after. xxi. year of age be advisedly done/ why do ye undo in the later counsel the same which was decreed in the former/ and unacte this year that at ye enacted the former year? ye were no babes when ye made your first decrees/ cownsels/ acts and laws. Aduysedly & unaduysedly therefore must be referred to wit wisdom/ knowledge/ experience/ discretion and judgement (oh passhur Winifrid) & not tied to your age of. xxi. Wherefore ye played but a foolish part/ so unadvisedly to define your unadvised vows/ And more unadvisedly enacted you such unadvised vowers to be separated & hanged. And if ye repent ye not of your unadvised acts/ seperat●g them whom god cowpled/ you & your fellows must advisedly by God's decreed word jere. xx. be shortly turned into pavor: that is/ your sudden upclyming shall have a sudden fearful fall. An unad uy●ed vow. That vow therefore is made unad vysedly (of what age so ever the person be) which is made without good advisement knowledge or consideration of his own power and strength to perform it: and so for his own weakness is compelled to break it/ of which kind of vows are all the wifeless and howsbondlesse vows of all priests and nuns/ and of all such as have not the gift to live sole. Item all those vows are unadvisedly made/ when the person considereth not before whether they be lawful and consonant with God's word or no. And if they be against God's word (as are all the vows of them which to ●. ●or. vi● avoid fornication are commanded to mary) so are they not only unadvisedly made/ but also ungodly. Also what vow so ever is by compulsion extorted/ not free/ please not God/ hath nether Goddis word for it/ nor no example in holy scripture/ that same is both unadvised and ungodly/ as are the vows of priests and nuns/ as ye shall see here after: wherefore they ought advisedly to be broken. Answer me/ passhur Wynch. Whether ●erodis vo●●. 〈◊〉. xiv was Herodis vow made to his daughter for her dawnsinge before him and his gestis to give her what so ever she should ask/ lawful and advised? It was made after. xx. year of his age: ergo it was lawful. And so by winch. it was lawful for him to smite of john bapt. his head. Also the. xl. men in the Acts act. twenty-three of th'apostles: which vowed never to eat breed till they had slain Paul/ after Wyn. are lawful. And all the vows of our old bissh. and abbots made to be obedient to the pope and his laws must nediss be lawful after Wyn. & there fore he and they keep them still/ as every man may see it. I● a vow of wifeless or howsbondlesse chastity made immedi ately after. xxi. or. xxiii●. years of age be lawful and advised: why then did Pau le so diligently command the bishop Timothe to reject all young vowesses/ & none to be admitted before. lx. years of age/ but such young persons to be married/ govern their houses & to beget i Tim. v. children? adding the consideration/ that sich young persons whether they be men or women/ when they shall begin to wax wanton against Crist/ they will mary/ having a sclawnderouse infamy (for somich signifieth the Grek word translated/ in condempnationem) because they have casted away their first vow or promise. I will therefore (saith Paul.) young persons to mary/ to beget children/ giving none occasion to our adver saryes to speak evil of them. And because many men diversely take this word prima fides/ Thou shalt know (good ●irst faith or chief promise what it is. reder) that such vowers made two vows one subordined to the t'other/ The first & principal vow was/ no more to mary/ the second was to persever in obsecrationibus et prec●bus noctu dieque as it standeth in the text/ that is to continue in fervent prayers/ & not in wanton nice lyvig/ as ye read of Anna Pha Luk. ij. nuels daughter/ which departed not out of the temple serving God with watch/ sorrowful mind or heavy expectation/ abiding for the redemption of Israel etc. this is the plain simple sense as to wching their first faith no more to mary as the circumstance of the text and conference of the places declare. But here ye see plainly that Paul forbiddeth young persons to vow before lx. years: and yet Wyn. will have their vows lawful at. xxi. and. xx●iij. Gregory the. seven. pope/ otherwise call Gregory the seven. led hiltebrande/ or rather the hell fyerbrande the most ungodliest wretch that ever was/ filling all germany & France and Rome to/ yea all cristendome full of battle & strife stirring up such tragedies & tumult betwixt the emperor & his dukes as had not been seen before/ himself at last deposed and another pope setup/ one of them bitterly cursing & poisoning another/ decreed at last and compelled priests to forsake their lawful wives/ which lived. cccc. xx. years ago. Sense this wicked anticristes days/ ye se all the vows of priests to be violently extorted/ & open whoredom licentiously used & laughed at. And now at last when God of his gracious mercy had sent his preachers with his word to deliver his chosen out of this damp able & filthy living/ yet like an hardnecked pharao/ doth this Greasy gar. of win. Gregory the seven. his own son (save that Gregory was never so proud a lucifere) resist God & his word & will not suffer cristes people to be delivered out of the popis damnable decrees and miserable bondage. Were not the holy married priests & bishops of the old testa meant as Melchizedek/ jetro/ Moses/ Aaron/ Samuel/ Helye/ zacharye/ and the prophets/ and the married priests of the new testament as the Apostles & so forth the bishops a thousand years after/ till Gregoryes days as good men as these wifeless adulterers these last. cccc. xx. years? Preisthod was never clogged nor restrained unto such wicked vows until this Gregoryes days/ wherefore Gregoryes priesthood cannot be the just priesthood which Crist instituted to preach his gospel but a pro digiouse Sodomitical sect of unshame faced shavelings. Even the very author of this prohibition/ priests ●. ●im. iiij to not mary/ declareth the priesthood & the doctrine of their vows: Paul affirming it to be the doctrine of the devil/ the author of the inordinate orders. Whoso list to read the histories & holy scriptures shall see that certain of the apostles as Peter/ Paul & Philip th'evangelist or preacher had wives & the holy bishops. M. years following For this writeth the holy martyr Ignatuis Ignatius that lived in saint Paulus time in a pistle unto Philadelph/ with thought that wedlock should minissh the holiness of the married persons/ saying/ jethro and Moses were the priests of God/ & also there were of the chief of the preistis of Criste/ & yet had they wives & children. Was not Aaron and his sons the ministers of holy things? did they not offereup and pray for the people? & yet were they married. And had not also th'apostles of our Lord jesus Criste wives? I esteem them not/ nor yet the other blessed men never the worse because they were coupled in wedlock: but I pray god (saith he) I may be worthey to sit at their feet in the kingdom of God/ with these other married persons as Abraham Isaac jacob joseph isaiah and as are these holy married men Peter and Paul and other of th'apostles which were married not for no lust but to increase their posterity. yea it is written Mat. viij. That jesus entering the house of Peter/ saw his wives mother sick & healed her. And Luke in the Acts saith. And we went into the house of Philip which was one of the. seven. that preached the gospel: he had. iiij. daughters which did hear the scriptures taught them. But and if our sinful sodomyts say that after Criste had called them to preach/ to baptyze & to break the breed to admit preachers/ for this was all their administration commanded of Criste/ they forsook their wives/ My short solution i. cor. seven. is: That they lie. prove it by scriptures if they can/ for Paul thus writeth/ Them that are once married/ not I/ but the Lord commandeth them that the wife be not separated from her howsbonde/ which if she be separated/ she must abide unmarried or else be reconciled to him/ nor the man may not forsake his wy fe. And therefore Paul answering such i. cor. ix. false prophetis that reckoned him & other the less holy for carrying about their wives said: have we not power & liberty to eat & drink & to carry with us our wives as do the other apostles Peter and the brethren of the lord? Also who god hath joined/ se that noman separate them saith Crist Mat. nineteen. Saint Clemens li. iij. ca thirty. of the story Ecclesiastic. as ye read of Eusebye/ writing against them that despised wedlok/ saith these words. will ye reprove the apostles? For both Peter & Philip had wives & married their daughters to their howsbondes/ yea and even Paul himself steketh Phi. iiij not in his pistle to make mention of his wife greeting her calling her his very true faithful yokefelowe/ whom he left at Philippia for a season that he might the spedelier pass thorough the countries preaching the gospel. In the east churches many holy bishops had their lawful sons by their wives in time of their office/ as ye may read of Socrate li. ix. ca xxxviij. Tripart hysto. Constantinopolytano in Epiphanio. Also justinianus Themprowr wri tinge Epiphanius bis. married. Gregory Nazianzene bis. mar. unto Epiphanian the bishop of Constantinople/ commendeth him the more that he was a priests son. Also Gregory Nazianzene was a bishop & a priests son: For in the primitive church all the time before Gregory the wicked/ preistis had wives/ and in reading holy scriptures they succeeded their fathers in the same office/ as ye Policar pus bi● married. may read of Policarpe pastore of Ephe sine which writing in a pistle to saint Uictore confesseth himself to be the aight bissh. lynially descending from his great grandfathers into the same office. And read Euseby cesariense in his v. book. ca xxii. what is more manifest than that at Paul writeth. 1. Timo. iii. & Tit. i. That such flokfeders must be chaste married men content with one wife/ men that can well govern their own houses in bringig up their children/ supposing that such men having these/ with other there pray scribed qualities should be apt and able to teach well an hole parish. Who seeth not now therefore Wynchester for his own proud arrogant mind & wickedness worthily smitten with blindness and obstinate induration/ with Pha rao to persecute/ to divorce & slay the poor married priests? whom the spirit of God commandeth for the avoiding of fornication every one of them non except to have his own wife: and every woman/ non except/ for the same cause i. cor. v●●. to have her own howsbonde. And if thou canst not live chaste/ Paul common death the to mary. For better it is (saith he) to mary then to suffer burniges in they flesh. But unto wicked Wynchester which once seemed to favour God's word before he was promoted to the cardinal Thomas Wolsey's service/ there is no place of repentance nor no winchester sinneth against the holygost grace left to believe God's word/ becau se/ not of ignorance/ but wittingly & will ling of a set malicious purpose herdneckedly he sinneth against the truth which is the sin against the holy ghost/ which Wyn. when he saw so manifest scriptures against him/ then he turned his ordinance against priests vows making them lawful and advised because they be made at. xxi. years old/ when their own master of the sentences call the vows of the seclare priests vota tacita/ doom or not expressed vows. There is noman that ever gave priest orders that can come forth/ either to testify that ever he heard the priest whom he made by express words to vow in clear words simply virginal chastity/ or to bringforth writing of the priest his own hand that ever he vowed simpli citer siche chastity as winch. bindeth them to. But upon this condicton/ quantum permiserit humana fragilitas/ that is to say/ I vow chastity as far as man's frailty will suffer me/ and no farther do I vow. If Steven gardener esteem the still dumb vows/ & the con dicionall promises of priests somiche/ that they must die for breaking them/ why looketh he & his bishops no better to the solemn open vows of every lay man married vowing solemnly to keep himself to his own wife? why suffereth he & his faction somiche open & abominable adultery in their dioceses? both great men/ mean & low of every sort many keep whores besides there own wives contrary to their own open vows and promises/ and yet for good dinners/ festes/ gifts and favour/ and for fere/ they are suffered unpunished/ Is it sin for a poor priest to keep him only to his own lawful wife/ and no sin at all to the lay married man besides his wife to keep whores O Wynchester with your fellows? but woe/ woe/ be unto you that lay these heavy burdens upon poor men's bakks which ye will not to wche to ease them with your least fin gear/ woe be to you that say good to be Isa. v. evil/ bitter to be sweet/ darkness to be the light and econtra. Woe be to you that kill the pure innocents/ and maintain the abominable adulterers. But Wynchesters' unadvised vows wherefore the Popish priests will not mary. are not the matter why he so fiercely fighteth and incenseth the king and his nobles against married preistis/ but he and his pharisaical faction knoweth well. What a pleasure it is to keep other men's wives/ their children to sitteby other men's fierce/ and as themselves live by other men's labours so make they other men to cover their whores and whelps under the only names of howsbonde and father. Wyn. and his shaven feel what pleasure it is to have so much change of whores/ that when they be weary of one/ they may turn her up & take another. They have othermen's wives better thepe/ than their own/ It is an heavy yoke to be coupled with one (perchance a shrew) as long as they live/ be she sick or hole poor or rich etc. and then to sorrow for their children to be brought up/ and for their household. For well knew these idle soft shaven sects/ what kares'/ burdens charges & incom modites there follow and chance to true chaste and honourable wedlock. But & if they were once iustlely yoked unto one wife to sustain the molest kares of matrimony/ full soon should their prwde combs and crowns be cut & their ioylye p●kocks tails be plukt/ their riches minish/ and their vain glyterig glory glide away into dust. And yet is there another cause why the see proud prelates will not have theirowne wives. For as they willbe divided in habit/ apparel/ shaving/ buzzing & singing/ eating and drinking/ & in their strange holy profane gestures/ pope ho lie sole state from the common christian religion/ so would they by such ipocryse seem to the simple people/ yea and look for it to/ the hyghlyer to be exalted/ more reverenced/ esteemed and endued with the richer and pleasant possessions. For at such strange toys and diversity of disgoysinges in long gowns sirplices crowns copes hodes etc. the fond people stand and wonder at them/ as at an owyl out of Athens or at an ape full of pratye pastimes out of Portugal. And to be short/ therefore have these long typeted and longer tailed trey tours chosen them this strange singler separated sect that they might show themselves the plainer pharisays both in name and very deed. For a pharisay Pharisaye. in english is one separated and divided from the common sort/ both in habit/ diet/ going/ words/ dedis/ rites/ gestures/ ceremonies/ but yet I think the pharisees in Cristis time were never so shoorne nor smeared/ nor so rich and proud/ nor so ignorant beasts/ nor such abominable whoremongers as are owers for they had their own lawful wives. But in long praying in sight mat. twenty-three of almen/ in devoweringe the poor/ in teaching and not doing/ in dilating their wide and side gowns/ looking for cap/ knee/ mastership/ lordship/ grace fatherhod/ looking for the overmost place in feasts/ to be saluted in the market place and to be called rabi/ my lord bishop M. doctor/ M. person etc. our later present phariseis agree well with the first pharisaiss & former hypocrites. Also they agree in the shuttingup of the king doom of heaven from them that would enteryn/ theirselues standing without never into enter. They agree also in importune labours to procure more hypocrites daily to be shaven into their sinful sect/ more pharisayes/ like priests/ preachers/ & like bishops/ stronger to make their anticristen kingdom against the lord and his anointed/ They agree in ●sal. ij. ●at. xv. like blindness/ themselves blind leders of their blind captives/ they agree ye they exceed in covetousness ambition and pride/ and to be short/ they exceed the old pharisees in ipocrysye & in the bloudshedinge of the innocents/ which old pha. persecuted Criste & his apostles unto death. The duke's grace of Norfolk made the duke of north. reason. this politic reason in the parliament house before the king and his nobles (for scripture knoweth he non) That priests should not mary. For than/ said he/ they will perchance marry with our and other ientlemens' daughters and so have their dowryes' jointers and lands with them/ and at last ye shall see the bishops have all our lands too: which rea son/ lo/ it was well allowed. Bu● I answer the dukes grace/ No/ not so/ There is remedy enough for this sore. your grace shall make a proviso that no priest nor bishop shall mary with yours nor with no ientlemans' daughter without her parents consent according to Goddis laws. or else if this proviso will not serve/ Then restore the bishops & priests to their first orders received of Criste to be content with only meat & i. tim. vi. drink and clothing necessary and suf ficient for them. And I dare warrant you for your daughters. or else if this provi se will not hold/ let no bishop nor priest be admitted to cures & flokfedinge but such as have all the conditions and qua lights that Paul prescribeth unto Timothe i. tim. iij. ●●●. i. & Tito/ and I dare be bound that non of such priests will mary with your daughters so long as your daughters be so unlearnedly proudly so nicely and lascyviously broughtup. For s●che priests either be they married all ready or else seek they such wives as Paul there decketh and tyerethe. i Timo. iij. and appointeth to them/ that is to we●t/ L●●i. xxi sober/ learned/ modest/ shamefaced/ simple/ sad/ chaste/ godly maidens virtuously broughtup in reading and under stonding truly the holy scriptures/ which will not disdain to lay to their hands to wash/ wring/ spyne/ card/ brew baake/ to sweep the house/ make read her howsbondis dinner/ wash the dishes and to turn the speete/ nurse hirowne children with hirowne breasts/ visit the sick sore and poor be they never so lothly. Wherefore except your daughters will gladly do all these thingis/ be ye sewer there will no such priests & bishops as Paul painteth mary with your daughter's/ and if your daughters be such they will set little by your goodis and possessions. Then belike but for fere of marrying with your daughter's/ It had been lawful preistis to have had wives. They job. vi. that fear the door frost (saith job) the deep snow shall fall upon them. They that fear honest and lawful marriage to chance to their daughter's/ nothing likely to be coupled with these said priests ordered of Paul/ let them beware lest the proud papistik bishops & priests consecrated by the pope commit adultery with their daughters and wives to: for such ●haūses have happened. But yet not withstanding the dukes pollityk high reason/ his grace might have been contented at the leestwyse to have suffered the poor married priests to have kept still their own lawful poor wives which were nether dukes/ lords/ nor no ientlemens' daughters/ and not so cruelly to have rend them in sondre pain of hanging/ whom God cowpled together. At last/ forbecause/ Wynchester and his bishops had nothing else to colour their acts of the divorcement/ and wifeless chastity of priests/ but vows/ so unadvisedly/ so foolishly/ & wikedly defined. I shall define & declare more advy sedly & trwlier tell you what a lawful vow is. A vow is a free promise/ of that what is a vow. thing which is in our power to perform it/ & which thing/ we are sewer also that God accepteth it. In this definition/ three things in a lawful vow. theridamas be. iij. things to be observed/ first that it be a fire promise/ as it is written The first that it be a fire pro mice. Deutero. twenty-three. not compelled/ nor extorted for fere/ nor for that it be so intricately and ungodly wrapped in another thing and there to so wickedly annexed that whoso will receive the one/ he shallbe stinged with the t'other against his will/ as if a wasp be put in to the cup and given a blyndeman to drink that thirsteth. For nonotherwyse have they wrapped in the doctrine of the devil and cowpled it with their profane orders/ so that if thou wilt be admitted to be priest to preach the gospel (for Criste knew nonother chief office of priesthood) which thou art bound in conscience to do if thou beast called thereto of God/ yet will they bind the to live sole against thy will/ & bear y● in hand that thou vowest their chastity when thou nether sayist it nor thinkest it/ & so clog the with that other thing so covertly enwrapped that it is not in thy liberty to perform it. And thus ye see all their unlawful vows of their sacrificers and religious persons to be not free/ but extorted by compulsion/ For when many desire and vow to live their easy life in all welthey idleness/ they vow (sayeth Wyn.) wifeless chastity with they have so ungodly annexed unto their popish priesthood/ that their may noman be such a priest but he be compelled also/ and be yoked with their unlawful vow for that it is not in man's liberty to perform it. Now as is their priesthood unlawful/ so is their vow● joined thereto ungodly/ for Criste never instituted sich anodiouse ordir of shorelingis and smeared sodomy●es but only faithful preachers/ flokfeders/ and ministers of his sacraments which should also provide for the poor: for as for their miss priests matins mongers idle evensong upheapers and salve singers the scripture knoweth non siche. Now ye see that as this popish shaven priesthood with their ungodly wifeless vows thereunto devillisshly joined/ are but newly invented of the antichristian bishops of Rome/ contrary to Cristis religion/ even so they that receive such a priesthood/ they receive they watner what poison/ & vow that thing (if they vow any thing at all) which they be not able to perform/ snarling themselves and combring their consciences led captived unto per petual damnation/ if they persist in such a pestilent priesthood. The soul therefore Le●●t. v. (saith god) that hath by oath and vow pronounced with his lips to do that thing/ which is either good or evil (what so ever it be that the person unadvisedly sweareth) and so afterward under stand and perceive his own unaduysement/ he shallbe guilty in one of these things. And if any unlawful unclean le●. xxvii beast had been vowed promised or dedicated to God/ it must 〈…〉 en redeemed/ and not offered. Wh. 〈…〉 re much more aught ungodly and unlawful vows to be corrected and broken. For errors must be mended and hurts restored. If a man make a foolish oath/ as did Herode/ he aught the wyselyer to change it. A foolish and an unadvised Eccle. v. vow/ saith Solo. displeaseth God. Now what is more ungodly than a man to snarl and tangle himself with their popish priesthood haltred with such an ungodly vow which nether scripture knoweth/ nor godly ensample therein teacheth. In. S. Cyprians days: There in his. xi pistle. were diverse young women that had vowed howsbondlesse chastity/ and afterward could not keep it/ whom he with diverse other bishops considering/ caused them to mary/ saying that it were better for them to mary then here to burn in concupiscence and after to burn in hell to for their sin/ sith. God had provided a necessary remedy therefore. God is not honoured with men's vows and promises that proceed not of faith/ but with dediss of his own commandments. Secondarily/ a vow must be made ●he second ● in our power. of that thing which is in our power to perform it/ now is it not in every man's power to have the gift to live chaste with out a wife when he willeth. There is S●p. viij no man chaste but it be given him of god: Crist confirming it/ answering his disci Mat. nineteen bless/ thinking the bond of wedlock to be to hard and therefore not to be expedient to have wives but to live sole/ Crist saying almen may not receive this thing/ that is to live sole/ but such as to whom it is given. Now are not God's gifts in our power to have & to keep them/ when/ & as long as we list. The expowning of scriptures is the gift of God/ which is not given to every man that would have it/ wherefore he were but a fool that would make a vow to expone scriptures ere God had given him the gift and so sent him to preach. Nether are the gifts of God as faith/ hope/ love/ to heal the sick or to do miracles comen for every man no more than is wifeless chastity common for every priest/ as experience teacheth us. yisse (say they) The objection of the papistis is soluted. if ye would ask it of God as we do/ ye should have it as we it have/ for do not Criste promise (say they) that whatsoever ye ask the father in his name/ he will give it you? I answer this adulterous generation/ that themselves/ as they never believed this saying of Criste/ so did they never ask it in his name/ For well I wot/ & so do their own consciences & deades tell them/ that scant one among an. c. hath his gift of chastity for all their praying/ I would they which yet keep whores themselves/ & bid us pray that would or have wives/ would once sing this karoll to themselves/ Ask & ye shall have it/ and so put away their whores. But how can they ask any thing in Christ's name/ when they blaspheme his holy name and despise his holy ordinances and wholesome remedies tempting God so wikedly as they do? The petition to live sole/ as it may not be asked of every man and woman/ so is it not for the glory of his name every shaven that burneth in lust to ask it/ when god for his glory created the remedy & help saying upon such that it is not good for man alone to live/ let us therefore make him a fellow helper. He therefore tempteth God/ which (the remedy created of god despised) will pray to live alone/ so far-off is this man to glorify him. Also if every man and woman that asketh it should have it/ so were it no special gift but as common as the prayer. But be it in case that every priest asketh it/ yet shall not every priest have it/ for Crist himself saith/ Every of them is not apt nor able Mat. nineteen to receive it/ but they unto whom it is given. If their chastity might be obtained That at is asked ● obtained by petition is no vow/ but a gift. by prayer/ so were it no vow no more than faith or the gift to under stand scriptures. For we pray for that thing which is not in our liberty and power to have or to do it. And here is it plain/ by the papistis own reasening that they destroy their own vow of chastity/ making it no vow at all but a gift of God/ and not in our liberty nether to vow it nor to have it as we would. Wherefore as Wynch. hath unadvisedly made vows to let preistis marriage/ so hath he unadvisedly diffyned them. Those things which we are commanded of God to ask of him/ are plainly prescribed unto us in his scri ptures/ which are the declaration of his will and of what thing so ever maketh for his glory/ but it is nowhere red of any precept or ensample for us to live sole/ but that every man that cannot so live is commanded to mary to avoid fornication and not to pray so to live alone/ wherefore the remedy so graciously provided of God/ and set before our eyes/ it is not else but a tempting of God and not a praying to him for the gift. Nonotherwyse then when God createth meat set before the to eat it & thou forsakest it being hungry/ & prayest God to live without meat. Wherefore when our shameless chamosts allege us these scriptures to pray for their chastity/ they allege them nonotherwyse to us than did the devil unto Criste brought upon the pinnacle of the temple/ saying/ If thou be●st the son of God fall down headling/ & bid thy fa ther send the his angels to save the harmless for they are so commanded to do: wherefore even as Criste answered his adversary and tempter the devil with scriptures putting him to flight/ so answer we his imps with the same saying/ avoid ye devils. It is written/ Deu. vi. thou shalt not tempt thy lord God. Thirdly/ a vow must be of that thing/ 3. ● vow must please God. which to vow/ it pleaseth God. Now how shall we know/ thus to vow at Winchester's fool age of. xxi. that it plea seth god? It is written that such young vowers i. tim. v. at that age should be rejected/ And in no place of scripture is there precept or ensample that god accepted sich superstitious and foolish coarcted impossible vows: wherefore it followeth that Wyn. his unadvised vows please not God/ and Ro. xiv that it is sin so to vow/ for whatsoever is not of faith/ that same is sin: to vow Wynchesters' wifeless chastity hath no word of faith for it/ ergo it must ne dis be sin. Paul himself constantly affirmeth that he hath no commandment of God that any person should live sole/ Albeit (saith he) my sentence and i. cor. vi● mind is this/ that sith there is now somiche persecution of the cristens/ to be sole without wives & children/ is most ease/ & less care & trouble/ the lighter is their cross in their flight when persecution cometh upon. Wherefore my mind is/ saith he/ that sole to live is most quiet & commodious/ but & if a single or any sole person marrieth he sinneth not/ albeit/ saith he/ I would ye were without care and sorrow and at most ease and quietness/ this I tell you for your most ease but not to tangle nor to snarl you with any sole living: this is Paulis mind. Also/ it cannot be sin that God forby death not/ but God never forbade his mi nisters as his preachers and priests in general to have their own wives/ ergo/ if they mary they sin not/ Belyk Wynch. would now make better preistis and more chaste shavelings in this parliament than Criste ever made by his gospel/ but as ye see/ whiles they go about to mend their popish priesthood and to make it more pure/ they mar all & make it a very sodomitical sentyne. Repent repent winch. in time/ for the ●at. iij. are is bend at thy tresodenly to be cut-down and cast into the fire. Paul unto the bissho. Timothe and Titus/ prescribed to them in his pistles all things necessary to be taught unto the church/ even the full form of the christian religion as he did unto other churches writing/ and yet he never mentioned Winchester's unadvised vows/ but abhorred them. Paul sorrowed somiche ●. tim. iii● for the congregations lest they should be seduced by the false doctrine of such that were gone from the faith attending to spirits of error/ doctrines win. and his facci on are bear painted of Paul. of the devil/ speaking lies thorough ipocrysye/ having their consciences marked with an hotyerne/ forbidding to mary and commanding to abstain fro meatis created of God to be eaten with thanks of them that know the truth etc. that he gave Timothe plainly watnig of such unchaast hypocrites as are here painted/ and of their pestilent doctrine forbidding to mary commanding him to warn men of them and of their doctrine if he would be seen a good minister and true bishop/ But when heard ye any of our bytshepes' warning men of these things/ or any papist that ever would open this piece of that pistle i Tim. iii●. to the people? belike this piece pertaineth not to the bishop's purpo says/ it served but only for Timothe and his time▪ yiss saith the holygost/ These false teachers shall come in posterioribus temporibus/ in the later times. The world was. M. M. yeris under the law of nature not yet written unto Moses. It was M. M. yeris under the law written till Criste came: & sense Criste/ it hath been almost. M. M. years under the law of the gospel/ wherefore ye see that this devillisshe doctrine of forby dinge marriage and meatis/ as it agreeth with the persons and authors thereof/ so correspondeth it justly to the time: for it is not fully. ccccc. years ago sense these errors and false doctrines began to take place. And yet all this while have not our prelate's warned men of them/ but they have given great diligence to see this their damp able doctrine taught decreed/ enacted and kept/ pain of death. But oh men mortal & vain shadewes/ quousque spreta magnitudine dei diligetis vanitatem et queretis mendacium? how long will Psal. iii● ye despise the almighty God/ love vanity/ and go seek lies? Et nunc ergo reges Psal. ij. intelligite et erudimini/ And now now ye kings be wise and beware of your false and seditious traitorous bis shops/ for surely if ye follow their wicked counsel & false doctrine/ ye heap the heavy wrath & indignation of god upon you/ with plagues present both to you and your realms to be utterly destroyed. It is but a violent and false religion shortly to fall that must be thrustin with violence of acts armed with fire & sword/ no scripture stablisshing them/ It cannot stand long/ that at man by tyranny compelleth men to keep/ neither is that kingdom long durable that is holden by fear/ tyranny/ & violence/ & not by love & laws grownden of Goddis word. Crist thrusted not in/ his gospel by violence (& yet was it the truth) and yet it spread. His apostles compelled no man pain of death or fire to receive the cri sten religion/ although they were sewer it was the very faith & word of salvation & yet it rooted fast. And shall christian kings at the false persuasions of a few pharisays and popis porklingis which ever have been traitors to their prince's stay men or punish their true obe dient loving subtectes/ for not receyvig the bishop of Rome's devilish traditions/ superstitious rites/ false doctrine/ & sinful ceremonies/ & for cleaving to Cristes' everlasting word of their salvation? Oh ye princes of the world/ cleave to God's word of peace & power/ & fear ye no insurrection of your subjects/ preach them the word of peace/ & in peace shall ye reign over them/ but press the word of peace/ persecute & slay the preachers thereof/ & what ye feared the same shall comupon you/ make ye never so strong castles and brazen walls to defend you. Despise not God's monic●on in time/ thrust not from you his gracious word graciously offered. nequando irascatur dominus et pereatis propter studia vestra. Nam brevi exardebit ira eius: et tunc/ o felices qui sperant in eum/ that is to say/ lest the lord being wrath/ ye be destroyed for your own acts/ for shortly shall his wrath be kindled & seton fire/ but then/ oh bless sed are they that trust into him. Unto whom be glory & impery for ever/ Amen. God preserve & defend his kings from the wicked counsel of bishops & of their captived seclare men/ Amen. ¶ To the Reader. BE not oftended (godly Reader) that water be called water/ and fire be called fire/ let pride be called pride/ a dronker be called a dronker/ I marvel that men be a shamed to be called the same thing that they are/ I marvel they be ashamed to do the thing which they are ashamed to hear: do it not/ and thou shalt not be so called. Be thou no adulterer/ nor pharisaye/ and thou shalt not of the so hear it. But be thou an ipocryte/ a bloudsouper/ a tyrant/ a pharisaie/ a persewer of Criste/ and the stones in the street will so call the. Nether be thou no more offended with him that calleth an indurated obstinate pharisaye/ a whelp of the edder/ a encrusted wall/ painted sepulchres/ fox's/ venomous tongue's/ poisoned sp●res & deadly darts than thou oughtest to be angry with john baptiste/ with Criste/ with his prophets & apostles/ which all ceased not so to call the wicked vepers & venomous serpents in their time/ whose wickedness & venom was not yet then so rank/ so ripe/ and so high grown/ as our edders whelps are now/ over whose heads the imminent heavy wrath and vengeance of God hangeth/ ready to fall down from heaven upon them. Repent ye therefore in time/ if ye will no more be so called. It is nether ignorance nor weakness that may excuse you: the truth of God's word which ye wittingly & willingly resist/ is to manifest & to wide spread for to be yet unknown or dissembled/ namely of our high Rabbyns & Masters of Isra el/ our bishops & doctors I mean/ which so far as they willbe counted in nothing ignorant so far are they blind in all truth very blind leders of their blind captived papists all ready together to fall remediless into the perpetual pit of hell. And even thou Boner bishop of Londen awake/ For the innocent blood of richard Mekens/ whom of late thou cruelly didist burn in smithfield crieth vengeance upon thee/ upon Chameley the recorder of Londen/ & upon those false suborned betrayers / witnesses and falser questmongers/ whom all thorough thine importune labour/ satan excited unto this shameless slaughter. The lord see to it/ and be shortly your judge. Amen. printed at Auryk by jan Troost. M. D. XL I. in August.