Acts and Monuments Volume 2 Part 2, Book 11 · Account 14 · Article – Examination 1
The Articles.
IN dei nomine, Amen. Nos Iohannes Lincolne. Articles ioyntly and seuerally ministred to D. Ridley and M. Latymer, by the Popes deputies.Iacobus Glocest. & Iohannes Bristol. Episcopi▪ per reuerendis. dominum Reginaldum miseratione diuina S. Mariae in Cosmedin. &c.
1 We doe obiecte to the Nic. Ridley, and to thee Hughe Latimer, ioyntly and seuerally, first that thou Nicholas Ridley in this high Uniuersitie of Oxford. Anno. 1554. in the monthes of Aprill, May, Iune, Iulye, or in some one or moe of thē, hast affirmed, and openly defended & maintayned, and in many other tymes and places besides, that the true and naturall body of Christe, after the consecration of the priest, is not really present in the sacrament of the altar.
2. Item, that in the yeare and monthes aforesayde, thou hast publickely affirmed and defended, that in the Sacrament of the altar, remayneth still the substaunce of breade and wine.
3. Item, that in the sayde yeare and monthes, thou hast openly affirmed, and obstinately mayntayned, that in the Masse is no propiciatory Sacrifice for the quicke and the dead.
4. Item, that in the yeare, place, and monthes aforesayd, these thy foresayd assertions solemnly hauehave bene condemned, by the scholasticall censure of this schoole, as hereticall, and contrarye to the Catholicke fayth, by ye worshipful M. Doctor Weston Prolocutour then of the conuocation house, as also by other learned men, of bothe the Uniuersities.
5. Item, that all and singular the premisses be true, notorious, famous, and openly knowne by publicke fame, as well to them neare hand, as also to them in distaunt places farre of.
Examination vppon the sayd Articles.
ALl these articles I thought good here to place together, that as often as hereafter rehearsall shall be of any of them, ye reader may hauehave recourse hether, and peruse the same, and not to trouble the storye with seuerall repeticions thereof.
Lincolne.
After these Articles were read, the Bishoppes tooke counsayle togethers. At the last the Bishop of Lincolne sayde:B. Ridley examined vponupon the Articles aforesayd. these are the very same Articles whiche you in open disputation here in the Uniuersitie did mayntayn and defend. What say you vntounto the first? I praye you aunswere affirmatiuely, or negatiuely.
Ridly.
Why my Lorde, I supposed your gentlenes, had bene such, that you would hauehave geuen me space vntyll to morow, that vponupon good aduisement, I might bring a determinate aunswere.
Lincoln.
Yea M. Ridley, I meane not that youre aunsweres nowe shall be preiudiciall to your aunsweres to morow. I will take your aunsweres at this tyme, and yet notwithstāding it shalbe lawfull to you to adde, diminish, alter, and chaunge of these answeres to morow what you will.
Ridly.
In deede, in like maner at our laste disputations I hadde many thinges promised, and fewe performed.The Catholicke promise fayre, but they performe nothing. It was sayde that after disputations, I shoulde hauehave a copye thereof, and licence to chaunge myne aunsweres, as I should thinke good, It was meete also that I should hauehave seene what was writtē by the Notaries at that time.The hie Priestes had not power to put Christ to death, but they had power to commit him to Pilate, neyther would they suffer him to ab…solue Christ. So your Lordship pretended great gentlenes in geuyng me a tyme, but this gentlenes is the same, that Christ had of the high priestes: for you, as youre Lordshippe saythe, hauehave no power to condemne me, neyther at anye tyme to put a man to death, so in like sorte the high Priestes sayd, that it was not lawfull for them to put any man to death. but committed Christ to Pilate, neyther would suffer him to absolue Christ, although he sought all the meanes therfore that he might. Then spake Doctour Weston, one of the audience.
West.
What? do you make the king Pilate?
Rid.
D. Westō shooteth his bolte.No mayster Doctor, I doe but compare youre deedes with Cayphas his deedes and the high Priestes, whiche woulde condemne no manne to deathe, as ye will not, and yet would not suffer Pilate to absolue and deliuer Christ.
Lincol.
M. Ridley, we minde not but that you shal enioy the benefite of aunswering to morow, and will take your aunsweres now as now, to morow you shal change take out, adde, and alter what you will. In the meane season we require you to aunswere directly to eueryevery Article, either affirmatiuely, or negatiuely.
Ridly.
Seyng you appoynt me a time to aunswere to morow,The protestatiō of D. Ridley. and yet will take mine aunsweres out of hande, first I require the Notaryes, to take and write my protestation, that in no poynt I acknowledge your authority, or admit you to be my Iudges, in that poynt you are authorised from the Pope. Therefore what soeuer I shall say or doe, I protest, I neither say it, neither do it willingly, thereby to admit the authoritie of the Pope: & if your Lordship will geue me leaue, I wil shew the causes, whiche moueth me thereunto.
Lincol.
No M. Ridley, wee hauehave instructions to the contrary. We may not suffer you.
Ridley.
D. Ridley cannot be suffered to speake.I will be short: I pray youre Lordships suffer me to speake in fewe wordes.
Linc.
No M. Ridley, wee may not abuse the hearers eares.
Rid.
Why my Lord, suffer me to speake three words.
Linc.
Well M. Ridley, to morow you shall speake 40. The time is farre paste: therefore wee require your aunswere determinately. What say you to the first article? and thereupon rehearsed the same.
Rid.
The reall presence in the Sacrament may hauehave a double sense. Equiuocation in the word really. How the body of Christ may be sayd to be really, and how not really in the Sacrament.My protestation alwaies saued, that by this mine aunswere I do not condescend, to your authoritie, in that you are Legate to the Pope, I aunswere thus: In a sense the first article is true, and in a sense it is false: for if you take really for verè, for spiritually by grace and efficacye, then is it true that the naturall body and bloud of Christe is in the sacrament verè & realiter, in deede and really: but if you take these termes so grossely, that you woulde conclude thereby a naturall body hauing motion, to be contayned vnderunder the formes of bread and wine verè & realiter, then really is not the body and bloud of Christ in the Sacrament, no more then the holy Ghost is in the element of water in our Baptisme. Because this aunswere was not vnderstoode, the Notaries wist not how to note it: wherfore the Bishop of Lincolne willed him to aunswere either affirmatiuely, or negatiuely, either to graunt the Article, or to deny it.
Rid.
My Lorde, you know that where anye aequiuocation (whiche is a woorde hauyng two significations) is, excepte distinction bee geuen, no direct aunswere can bee made: for it is one of Aristotles fallacies, containing two questions vnderunder one, the whiche cannot bee satisfied with one aunswere. For both you and I agree herein, that in the sacrament is the verye true and naturall bodye and bloud of Christ, euen that whiche was borne of the Uirgine Marye,…. Questions vnderunder one. whiche ascended into heauen, whiche sitteth on the right hand of God the Father, which shall come frō thence to iudge the quicke and the dead, onelyonly we differ in modo:The Papistes & Protestantes in graunting the presence do agree… onelyonly in the maner of being they differ. How Christes body is effectuously receaued in the Sacramēt. in the way and maner of being: we confesse all one thing to be in the sacrament, and dissent in the maner of being there. I being fully by Gods word thereunto perswaded, confesse Christes naturall body to be in the sacrament in deede by spirite and grace, because that whosoeuer receiueth worthely that bread and wine, receiueth effectuously Christes body and drinketh his bloud, that is, he is, made effectually partaker of hys Passion: and you make a grosser kynde of being, enclosing a natuall, a lyuely and mouing body vnderunder the shape or forme of breade and wyne.
Now, this difference considered, to the question thus I aunswere:How Christ may be graunted to be really in the Sacramēt, and how not. that in the sacrament of the altar is the naturall body and bloud of Christ verè & realiter, in deede and really, if you take these termes in deed and really for spiritually by grace and efficacy: for so eueryevery worthy receyuer receiueth the very true body of Christe: but if you meane really and in deede, so that therby you woulde include a liuely and a mouable body vnderunder the formes of bread and wyne, then in that sense is not Christes body in the sacrament really and in deede.
This aunswere taken and penned of the Notaryes, ye Boshop of Lincolne proposed the second question or Article. To whome he aunswered.
Rid.
Alwayes my protestation reserued, I aunswere thus: that in the sacrament is a certayne chaunge in the…r ye Bread whiche was before was common bread, is nowe made a liuely representation of Christes Bodye,What change is in the Sacramentall bread. Sacramentall mutation. The substaunce of bread and wine in the… Sacrament not chāged. and not onelyonly a figure, but effectuously representeth his body, that euen as the mortall bodye was nourished by that visible bread, so is the internall soule fed with the heauenly foode of Christes body, whiche the eyes of faythe seethe, as the bodily eyes seeth onelyonly breade. Such a sacramental mutation I graunt to be in the bread and wyne, whiche truely is no small chaunge, but suche a chaunge as no mo tall man can make but onelyonly that omnipotencie of Chrystes worde.
¶Then the Byshoppe of Lincolne willed hym to answere directly, eyther affirmatiuely or negatiuely, without further declaration of the matter. Then hee aunswered:
Rid.
That notwithstanding this sacramentall mutation of the whiche he spake,Comparisō betweene the Sacrament of the Communiō and of Baptisme. and all the Doctours confessed the true substaunce and nature of bread and wine remaineth, with the whiche the bodye is in like sorte nourished as the soule by grace and spirite with the body of Chryste. Euen so in Baptisme the body is washed with the visible water, and the soule is clensed from all filth by the inuisible holy Ghost, and yet the water ceaseth not to be water but keepeth the nature of water still: In like sort in the sacrament of the Lordes supper the bread ceaseth not to bee bread,
Then the Notaryes penned, that he aunswered affirmatiuely to the second article. The Byshop of Lincolne declared a difference betweene the sacramente of the altar and Baptisme,What difference the Catholicks put betweene the Sacrament of the Cō munion, and Baptisme. because that Chryste sayde not by the water this is the holy Ghost, as he did by the bread: thys is my body.
Then mayster Ridley recited saynct Austen, whiche conferred both the sacramentes the one with the other: but the Byshoppe of Lincolne notwithstanding therevpon recited the third article, and required a directe aunswere. To whom Ridley sayd.
Rid.
Chryst as saynct Paule wryteth, made one perfecte sacrifice for the sinnes of the whole worlde, neyther can anye man reiterate that sacrifice of his,Aunswere to the 3. Article. and yet is the Communion an acceptable sacrifice to God of prayse and thanksgeuing: but to say that thereby sinnes are taken away (whiche wholy and perfectly was done by Christes passion, of the whiche the Communion is onelyonly a memory) that is a great derogation of the merites of Chrystes passion:Propitiatory sacrifice of the masse is a derogation to Christes passion. for the sacrament was instituted that wee receyuing it, and thereby recognising and remembryng hys Passion, shoulde be partakers of the merites of the same. For otherwise doth this sacrament take vponupon it the office of Christes Passion, whereby it might follow that Christe dyed in vayne.
¶The Notaryes penned this hys aunswere to be affirmatiuely. Then sayd the Byshop of Lincolne:
Lin.
In deede as you alledge out of Sayncte Paule, Christ made one perfecte oblation for all the whole world, that is, that bloudy sacrifice vponupon the crosse:Vnbloudy sacrifice. yet neuerthelesse he hath lefte this sacrifice, but not bloudy, in the remembraunce of that, by the whiche sinnes are forgeuen: the whiche is no derogation of Christes Passion.
¶Then recited the Byshop of Lincolne the fourth article. To the which M. Ridley aunswered:
Rid.
That in some part the fourth was true, & in some parte false, true in yt those hys assertions were condemned as heresies, although vniustly:Answere to the 4. Article. false in that it was sayde they were condemned scientia scholastica, in that the disputations were in suche sorte ordered, that it was farre from any schole acte.
¶This aunswere penned of the Notaryes, the Byshop of Lincolne rehearsed the fift Article. To the whiche he aunswered:
Rid.
That the premisses were in suche sorte true, as in these his aunsweres he had declared. Whether that al men spake euill of them he knew not, in that hee came not so much abroad to heare what eueryevery man reported.
¶This aunswere also written of the Notaryes, the bishop of Lincolne sayde:
Lin.
To morow at eyght of the clocke you shall appeare before vsus in S. Maryes Churche,D. Ridley assigned to appeare agayne the next day. and then because wee cannot well agree vponupon your aunswere to the first article (for it was long before hee was vnderstoode) if it wyll please you to wryte youre aunswere, you shall hauehave penne, inke, and paper, & bookes suche as you shall require: but if you wryte any thing sauing your aunswers to these Articles, wee will not receaue it: so hee charging the Maior with him, declaryng also to the Maior that he shoulde suffer hym to hauehave penne and inke dimissed M. Ridley, and sent for Master Latimer, who being brought to the Diuinitie Schole, there taryed tyll they called for hym.