St. Ambrose and St. Augustine vindicated. 417 Ch. lxxii. 10. which attainment unto any gracious benefit by him bestowed BOOK V. the phrase of antiquity useth to express by the name of merit 72; but if either St. Augustine or St. Ambrose have taught any wrong opinion, seeing they which reprove them are not altogether free from error, I hope they will think it no error in us so to censure men's smaller faults that their virtues be not thereby generally prejudiced. And if in churches abroad, where we are not subject to power or jurisdiction, discretion should teach us for peace and quietness' sake to frame ourselves to other men's example, is it meet that at home where our freedom is less our boldness should be more? Is it our duty to oppugn, in the churches whereof we are ministers, the rites and customs which in foreign churches piety and modesty did teach us as strangers not to oppugn, but to keep without show of contradiction or dislike? Why oppose they the name of a minister in this case unto the state of a private man? Doth their order exempt them from obedience to laws? That which their office and place requireth is to shew themselves patterns of reverend subjection, not authors and masters of contempt towards ordinances, the strength whereof when they seek to weaken they do but in truth discover to the world their own imbecilities, which a great deal wiselier they might conceal. [10.] But the practice of the Church of Christ we shall by so much the better both understand and love, if to that which hitherto hath been spoken there be somewhat added for more particular declaration how heretics have partly abused fasts and partly bent themselves against the lawful use thereof in the Church of God. Whereas therefore Ignatius hath said, "if any keep Sundays' or Saturdays' fast 73 (one only Saturday in the year excepted) that man is no better than a "murderer of Christ," the cause of such his earnestness at that time was the impiety of certain heretics, which thought 74 46 72 [S. Amb. Ep. 63. 17. "Qui sunt hi præceptores novi, qui meritum "excludant jejunii?”] 73 Ei TIS KUριakηv † σáßßатov vηστεύει πλὴν ἑνὸς σαββάτου, οὗτος XPLOTOKTÓVOS ÉσTÍ. Epist. ad Philip. [c. 13.] 74 [Simon Magus, Menander, Saturninus, Basilides, Carpocrates, HOOKER, VOL. II. Cerinthus, and the whole body of Ee Ch. lxxli. 11. 418 Heretical Notions on Fasting.Tertullian's Error. BOOK V. that this world being corruptible could not be made but by a very evil author. And therefore as the Jews did by the festival solemnity of their Sabbath rejoice in the God that created the world as in the author of all goodness, so those heretics in hatred of the Maker of the world sorrowed, wept, and fasted 75 on that day as being the birthday of all evil. And as Christian men of sound belief did solemnize the Sunday, in joyful memory of Christ's resurrection, so likewise at the selfsame time such heretics as denied his resurrection did the contrary to them which held it, when the one sort rejoiced the other fasted. Against those heretics which have urged perpetual abstinence from certain meats as being in their very nature unclean, the Church hath still bent herself as an enemy ; St. Paul giving charge to take heed of them which under any such opinion should utterly forbid the use of meats or drinks. The Apostles themselves forbade some, as the order taken at Jerusalem declareth. But the cause of their so doing we all know. [11.] Again when Tertullian together with such as were his followers began to Montanize, and pretending to perfect the severity of Christian discipline brought in sundry unaccustomed days of fasting, continued their fasts a great deal longer and made them more rigorous than the use of the Church had been, the minds of men being somewhat moved at so great and so sudden novelty, the cause was presently inquired into. After notice taken how the Montanists held Beveridge's edition. Can. 43. εἴ τις Can. 45. Εἴ τις ἐπίσκοπος, ἢ πρεσ- σκανδάλου πολλοῖς γενόμενος. Can. 56. Εἴ τις κληρικὸς εὑρεθῇ τὴν κυριακὴν ἡμέραν ἢ τὸ σάββατον, πλὴν τοῦ ἑνὸς μόνου, νηστεύων, καθαι ρείσθω· ἐὰν δὲ λαϊκὸς ᾖ, ἀφοριζέσθω. ap. Coteler. PP. Apost. i. 449, 450.] 75 [Of Marcion in particular Epiphanius says, Hær. xli. c. 2; τὸ σάβ βατον νηστεύει, διὰ τοιαυτὴν αἰτίαν ἐπειδὴ, φησὶ, τοῦ Θεοῦ τῶν Ἰουδαίων ἐστὶν ἡ ἀνάπαυσις τοῦ πεποιηκότος τὸν κόσμον, καὶ ἐν τῇ ἑβδόμῃ ἡμέρᾳ ἀναπαυσαμένου, ἡμεῖς νηστεύσωμεν ταύτην, ἵνα μὴ τὸ καθῆκον τοῦ Θεοῦ τῶν Ἰουδαίων εργαζώμεθα. t. i. 304. Β. ed. Petav. Paris, 1622.] Fasting, how urged by Tertullian and the Montanists. 419 Ch. lxxii. 11. these additions to be supplements of the gospel, whereunto BOOK V. the Spirit of prophecy did now mean to put as it were the last hand, and was therefore newly descended upon Montanus, whose orders all Christian men were no less to obey than the laws of the Apostles themselves, this abstinence the Church abhorred likewise and that justly. Whereupon Tertullian proclaiming even open war to the Church, maintained Montanism, wrote a book in defence of the new fast, and entitled the same, A Treatise of Fasting against the Opinion of the Carnal Sort. In which treatise nevertheless because so much is sound and good, as doth either generally concern the use, or in particular declare the custom of the Church's fasting in those times, men are not to reject whatsoever is alleged out of that book for confirmation of the truth. His error discloseth itself in those places where he defendeth his fasts to be duties necessary for the whole Church of Christ to observe as commanded by the Holy Ghost, and that with the same authority from whence all other apostolical ordinances came, both being the laws of God himself, without any other distinction or difference, saving only that he which before had declared his will by Paul and Peter, did now farther reveal the same by Montanus also. "Against us ye pretend," saith Tertullian 76," that the public orders which Christianity is "bound to keep were delivered at the first, and that no new thing is to be added thereunto. Stand if you can upon this point. For behold I challenge you for fasting more than at "Easter yourselves. But in fine ye answer, that these things "are to be done as established by the voluntary appointment “of men, and not by virtue or force of any divine commandWell then," he addeth, "ye have removed your "first footing, and gone beyond that which was delivered by doing more than was at the first imposed upon you. You say you must do that which your own judgments have allowed, 66 "ment. 66 Ch. lxxii. 12. 420 66 Fasting, how depreciated by Aerius. BOOK V. " we require your obedience to that which God himself doth "institute. Is it not strange that men to their own will should yield that which to God's commandment they will not grant? "Shall the pleasure of men prevail more with you than the 66 power of God himself?" [12.] These places of Tertullian for fasting have worthily been put to silence. And as worthily Aërius condemned for opposition against fasting. The one endeavoured to bring in such fasts as the Church ought not to receive, the other to overthrow such as already it had received and did observe: the one was plausible unto many by seeming to hate carnal looseness and riotous excess much more than the rest of the world did, the other drew hearers by pretending the maintenance of Christian liberty: the one thought his cause very strongly upheld by making invective declamations with a pale and a withered countenance against the Church, by filling the ears of his starved hearers with speech suitable to such men's humours, and by telling them no doubt to their marvellous contentment and liking 77, “Our new prophecies are refused, "they are despised. Is it because Montanus doth preach "some other God, or dissolve the gospel of Jesus Christ, or "overthrow any canon of faith and hope? No, our crime is, we teach that men ought to fast more often than marry, the "best feast-maker is with them the perfectest saint, they are "assuredly mere spirit, and therefore these our corporal de"votions please them not:" thus the one for Montanus and his superstition. The other in a clean contrary tune against the religion of the Church 78, "These set fasts away with "them, for they are Jewish and bring men under the yoke of "servitude; if I will fast let me choose my time, that "Christian liberty be not abridged." Hereupon their glory was to fast especially upon the Sunday, because the order of 66 77 [Tertull. de Jejun. c. 1. "Hi c. 17. "Qui sanctior inter vos, nisi "Paracleto controversiam faciunt, "convivandi frequentior, nisi obso66 propter hoc novæ prophetiæ recu"santur, non quod alium Deum "prædicent Montanus et Priscilla "et Maximilla, nec quod Jesum "Christum solvant, nec quod ali quam fidei aut spei regulam ever- "nandi pollucibilior, nisi calicibus "instructior? Merito homines solius "animæ et carnis spiritalia recu"satis." Hooker seems to have read the last sentence without the et."] 66 78 [Οὔτε νηστεία, φησὶν, ἔσται τεταγμένη· ταῦτα γὰρ Ἰουδαικά ἐστι, 66 Need of solemn Fasts for private Offences. 421 "On Church BOOK V. Ch. lxxii. 13. the Church was on that day not to fast 79. 66 [13] By this of Epiphanius it doth appear not only what fastings the Church of Christ in those times used, but also what other parts of discipline were together therewith in force, according to the ancient use and custom of bringing all men at certain times to a due consideration and an open humiliation of themselves. Two kinds there were of public penitency, the one belonging to notorious offenders whose open wickedness had been scandalous; the other appertaining to the whole Church and unto every several person whom the same containeth. It will be answered that touching this latter kind it may be exercised well enough by men in private. No doubt but penitency is as prayer a thing acceptable unto God, be it in public or in secret. Howbeit as in the one if men were wholly left to their own voluntary meditations in their closets, and not drawn by laws and orders unto the open assemblies of the Church that there they may join with others in prayer, it may be soon conjectured what Christian devotion that way would come unto in a short time: even so in the other we are by sufficient experience taught how little it booteth to tell men of washing away their sins with tears of repentance, and so to leave them altogether unto themselves. O Lord, what heaps of grievous transgressions have we committed, the best, the perfectest, the most righteous amongst καὶ ὑπὸ ζυγὸν δουλείας. . .εἰ γὰρ ὅλως βούλομαι νηστεύειν, οἵαν δ ̓ ἂν αἰρήσομαι ἡμέραν ἀπ ̓ ἐμαυτοῦ, νηστεύω διὰ τὴν ἐλευθερίαν. Οθεν παρ' αυτοῖς πεφιλοτίμηται μᾶλλον ἐν κυριακῇ νηστεύειν. . .ἔν τε ταῖς ἡμεραῖς τοῦ Πάσχα, ὅτε παρ ̓ ἡμῖν χαμευνίαι, ἁγνείαι, κακοπαθείαι, ξηροφαγίαι, εὐχαὶ, ἀγρυπνίαι τε καὶ νηστεῖαι, καὶ πᾶσαι τῶν ψυχῶν αἱ σωτηρίαι τῶν 79 [Ibid:] |