Page:The Acts and Monuments of John Foxe Volume 3.djvu/563

 in not by Christ, but damnably by the pope, be the venomous and pestiferous tail of Antichrist.

V. That no reprobate is a member of the church, but only such as be elected and predestinated to salvation; seeing the church is no other thing but the congregation of faithful souls, who do, and will, keep their faith constantly, as well in deed as in word.

VI. That Christ did never plant private religions in the church, but, while he lived in this world, he did root them out. By which it appeareth that private religions be unprofitable branches in the church, and to be rooted out.

VII. That the material churches should not be decked with gold, silver, and precious stones sumptuously; but the followers of the humility of Jesus Christ ought to worship their Lord God humbly, in mean and simple houses, and not in great buildings, as the churches be now-a-days.

VIII. That there be two chief causes of the persecution of the Christians: one is, the priests' unlawfid keeping of temporal and superfluous goods; the causes of other is, the unsatiable begging of the friars, with their high buildings.

IX. That alms be given neither virtuously nor lawfully, except it be given with these four conditions: first, unless it be given to the honour of God: secondly, unless it be given of goods justly gotten: thirdly, unless it be given to such a person as the giver thereof knoweth to be in charity; and fourthly, unless it be given to such as have need, and do not dissemble.

X. That the often singing in the church is not founded on the Scripture, and therefore it is not lawful for priests to occupy themselves with singing in the church, but with the study of the law of Christ, and preaching his word.

XI. That Judas did receive the body of Christ in bread, and his blood in wine; in which it doth plainly appear, that after consecration of bread and wine made, the same bread and wine that was before, doth truly remain on the altar.

XII. That all ecclesiastical suffrages do profit all virtuous and godly persons indifferently.

XIII. That the pope's and the bishops' indulgences be unprofitable, neither can they profit them to whom they be given by any means.

XIV. That the laity is not bound to obey the prelates, whatsoever they command, unless the prelates do watch to give God a just account of the souls of them.

XV. That images are not to be sought to by pilgrimages, neither is it lawful for Christians to bow their knees to them, neither to kiss them, nor to give them any manner of reverence.

For the above articles, the archbishop with other bishops, and divers learned men communing together, first condemned the books as heretical, and burned them in fire; and then, because they thought the said John Claydon to be forsworn and fallen into heresy, the archbishop did proceed to his definitive sentence against the said John, personally appearing before him in judgment (his confessions being read and deposed against him) after this manner:

In the name of God, amen. We, Henry, by the grace of God archbishop of Canterbury, primate of all England, and legate of the apostolic see, in a certain cause of heretical pravity, and of relapse into the same; whereupon John Claydon, layman, of the province of Canterbury, was detected, accused and denounced, and in the said our province of Canterbury publicly defamed (as by public fame and common report notoriously to us hath been known), first, sitting in judgment-seat, and observing all things lawfully required in this behalf, do proceed to the pronouncing of the sentence definitive in form as followeth. The name of Christ being invocated and only set before our eyes, forasmuch as by the acts and things enacted, producted, exhibited, and confessed before us, also by divers signs and evidences, we have found the said John Claydon to have been, and to be, publicly and notoriously relapsed again into his former heresy, heretofore by him abjured; according to the merits and