CHAPTER VI. ON THE PRINCIPLES OF THE ENGLISH REFORMATION. HAVING examined the mode of reformation in these churches, and the authority by which it was effected, we are now to enter on a most important question :the principles of the English reformation. These principles have been so often misrepresented by the opponents of our catholic apostolic churches, that it becomes a matter of necessity to clear them from the imputation of schism, heresy, and anarchy, by the weight of facts. It has been already shown that one leading principle of that reformation, namely the authority of provincial or national churches to correct doctrine and discipline without the necessity of waiting for the formal judgment of the Roman pontiff, or of the universal church, is free from all imputation of schism or heresy *. But we are assured that the main, essential principle of the Reformation was the liberty of interpreting Scripture according to our private fancies, in opposition to the doctrine and the judgments of the catholic church of Christ in all ages. I believe that not one of those who brought about a See Chapter II. the Reformation ever ventured to maintain such a principle; and although some individuals may have spoken incautiously on the subject of catholic doctrine, when they were pressed with erroneous positions, deduced from spurious writings, which an imperfect criticism prevented them from promptly rejecting; the testimony of a universal consent of Christians, was generally respected by those who were favourable to reformation. In England the supremacy and sufficiency of Scripture was most rightly maintained, not against a catholic tradition teaching the same doctrines as Scripture itself, and therefore strictly confirmatory of Scripture; but against a tradition imagined to convey articles of faith in addition to those which Scripture contained. The title of Dr. Smythe's book "De veritatibus non scriptis,” sufficiently shows the principle of the papal party. The Romish controversialists of that age founded some of their articles of faith on unwritten tradition merely: against them it was maintained that for every article of faith there ought to be scriptural proof; but it was never supposed that particular churches were at liberty to affix whatever meaning they pleased to Scripture, contrary to the doctrine of the catholic church in all ages still less was it imagined, that private individuals might lawfully hold whatever doctrines they should themselves devise, without paying reverence to the authority of that branch of the church in which they should abide, and entire obedience to that of the church universal in all ages. I proceed to prove that the catholic and primitive doctrine, and the authority of the church of Christ, as opposed to modern abuses, and to the licence of an unbridled private judgment, were the principles of the English Reformation. The abolition of the papal jurisdiction, it will be allowed, was a considerable act of reformation: but we find from history that those who supported that measure, argued not only from Scripture, but from the doctrine and practice of the primitive church, the œcumenical councils, the invalidity of later councils called general, the doctrine of the fathers, the customs of the church of England, and of other churches in modern times b. Of these arguments we find a good specimen in bishop Tunstall's letter to cardinal Pole. The recognition of the royal supremacy was no inconsiderable proceeding in the reformation. We find that it was argued for, not only from Scripture, but from the doctrine of the fathers, and the exercise of such a power in the church formerly, and the customs and laws of the realm of England. Communion in both kinds was received, not only as being more agreeable to Christ's first institution, but to "the practice of the church for five hundred years after Christ." The question of the divorce of the marquis of Northampton was judged, not only from the authority of Scripture, but on "the authorities of the fathers" and councils of the church. In the public disputations on the eucharist at Oxford A. D. 1549, before Ridley and the king's commissioners, the argument of those opposed to the Romish doctrine, was derived from the ancient fathers as well as from Scripture". The "Necessary Doctrine," &c. agreed on by the whole church of England in 1543, says: "All those things which were taught by the apostles, and have been by an whole universal consent of the church of Christ ever sith that time taught continually, and taken always for true, ought to be received, accepted, and kept, as a perfect doctrine apostolic "." It declares that all Christians must take the articles of the creed, "and interpretate all the same things, according to the selfsame sentence and interpretation which the words of Scripture do signify, and the holy approved doctors of the church do agreeably entreat and defend;" and that they must refuse and condemn all opinions, "which were of long time past condemned in the four holy councils i." Cranmer evidently acknowledged the authority of catholic tradition. On what other ground could he have made those voluminous collections of extracts from the fathers, the councils, the schoolmen, and the canonists, of which we read? In his speech on general councils, A. D. 1534 or 1535, he said, "that when all the fathers agreed in the exposition of any place of Scripture, he acknowledged he looked on that as flowing from the Spirit of God; and it was a most dangerous thing to be wise in our own conceits." We see another example of his veneration for the tradition of the church, in his papers on justification, where are many passages from the fathers and schoolmen down to the time of Aquinas and Bonaventure'. His epistle to Joachim Vadianus says, with reference to certain writings of Zuinglius and Ecolampadius: "so far as they have endeavoured to point out and correct papistical and sophistical errors, I praise and approve them. And would that they had contained themselves within Formularies of Faith, p. 221. Cranmer's Works, vol. ii. p. 121, &c. Soames, Hist. Ref. * Cranmer's Works, vol. ii. p. vol. ii. p. 526. i Ibid. p. 227. 14. by Jenkins. those bounds, and had not trampled on the fruit as well as the tares, that is, violated at the same time the authority of the ancient doctors, and earliest writers in the church of Christ "." When Ridley had been induced by the perusal of the ancient writer Bertram on the eucharist, to change his opinion, Cranmer being shaken by him, re-examined the doctrine of the fathers with the greatest care", and in his work on the eucharist, he refers continually to them in confirmation of his opinions: he advances nothing without adducing their testimony (not always indeed well understood). In his preface to the Bible, a. D. 1540, he uses, as he says, "the authority of St. Gregory Nazianzen and St. John Chrysostom" in proof of the use of reading the Bible, and in admonition to the readers. Even in his epistle to queen Mary (September 1555), stating the reasons by which he had maintained his doctrine of the eucharist in his examination by Brooks, he says, "Herein I said I would be judged by the old church, and which doctrine could be proved the elder, that I would stand unto "." And that his respect for the doctrine of the catholic church was not limited merely to the primitive church, appears from his appeal to a general council. "I intend to speak nothing against one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, or the authority thereof, the which authority I have in great reverence, and to whom my mind is in all things to obey " "I protest that it was never my mind to write, speak, or understand any thing contrary to the most holy word of God, or else against the holy catholic church of Christ." m Cranm. Works, vol. i. p. 195. 113. "Le Bas, Life of Cranmer, vol. i. p. 315. • Cranmer's Works, vol. ii. p. p. P Ibid. vol. i. 380. 9 Ibid. vol. iv. |