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 vvordes. ''Ad Pammach. epistola'' 101. ca. 2 in princip. We must,faith S. Augustine, speake according to a set rule, lest licence of wordes breede some wicked opi- nion concerning the thinges conteined vnder the vvordes. Deciuitate lib. 10. cap, 12. Vvhereof our holy forefathers and auncient Doctors had such a reli- gious care, that they vvould not change the very barbarismes or incongruities of speach which by long vse had preuailed in the old readings or recitings of scriptures. as, Neque nubent neque nubentur, in Tertullian li. 4. in Marcion. in S.Hilarie in c. 22 Mat. and in al the fathers. Qui me confusus fuerit, confundar & ego eum, in S. Cyprian ep. 63 nu. 7. Talis enim nobis decebat 'acerdos (which was an elder translation then the vulgar Latin that now is) in S. Ambrofe c. 3 de fuga feculi. and s. Hierom him felf,vvho othervvife corrected the Latin tranf- lation that was vfed before his time, yet keepeth religiously (as him self pro- fesseth Præfat. in 4 Euang. ad Damasum) these and the like fseaches, Nonne vos magis pluris estis illis? and, filius hominis non venit ministrari,sed ministrare: and, Neque nubent,neque nubentur: in his commentaries vpon these places. and, Non capit Pro phetam perire extra Hierusalem, in his commentaries in c. 2. ''Ioël. sub finem.'' And S. Augustine, who is most religious in al these phrases, counteth it a special pride and infirmitie in those that haue a litle learning in tonges, & none in thinges, that they casily take offenfe of the simple speaches or solecismes in the scriptures. de doctrina Christ. li. 2. cap, 13. See also the sameholy father li. 3 ''de doct. Christ. c. 3 and tract''. 2 ''in Euang. Ioan.'' But of the maner of our translation more anon.

Now, though the text thus truely translated, might sufficiently, in the fight of the learned and al indifferent men, both controule the aduersaries corrup- tions, and proue that the holy Scripture whereof they haue made so great vauntes, make nothing for their new opinions, but wholy for the Catholike Churches beleefe and doctrine,in all the pointes of difference betwixt vs: yet knowing that the good and simple may easily be seduced by some few obsti- nate persons of perdition (whom we see giuen ouer into a reprobat sense, to whom the Gospel, which in it self is the odour of life to saluation, is made the odour of death to damnation, ouer whose eies for sinne & disobedience God suffereth a veile or couer to lie, whiles they read the new Testamt,euen as the Apostle faith the Iewes haue til this day, in reading of the old, that as the one sort can not finde Chrit in the Scriptures, reade they neuer so much, so the other can not finde the Catholike Church nor her doctrine there neither) and finding by experience this saying of S. Augustine to be most true, If the preindice of any erroneous persuasion preoccupate the mind, whatsoeuer the Scripture hath to the contrarie, men take it for a figuratiue speach: for these causes, and somewhat to help the faithful reader in the difficulties of diuers places, we haue also set forth reasonable large, thereby to shew the studious reader in most places perteining to the controuersies of this time, both the heretical cor- ruptions and false deductions, & also the Apostolike tradition, the expositions of the holy fathers, the decrees of the Catholike Church and most auncient Cocels: which meanes whosoeuer trusteth not, for the sense of holy Scriptu- res,but had rather folow his priuate iudgemt or the arrogt spirit of these Se- ctaries,he shal worthily through his owne wilfulnes be deceiued, beseeching all men to looke with diligence, sinceritie, and indifferencie, into the case that concerneth no lesse then euery ones eternal saluation or damnation.

Which if he doe, we doubt not but he shal to his great contentment, find the holy Scriptures most clerely and inuincibly to proue the articles of