130 The HISTORY of the PURITAN'S. Chap. IV. 'eon " ceremonies were no better than the devices of men, and had been Elizabeth, .a. abufed to idolatry. He declares openly againft the crois, againft images 1 J" to churches; and againft a variety of garments in the fervice of God. " If a furplice be thought proper for one, fays his lordfhip, it fhould " ferve for all divine offices. The bifhop is for the people's receiving " the facrament into their hands, according to the example of Chrift " and the primitive church, and not for putting it into the people's " mouths : And as for the potture, that it fhould be rather ftand- " ing than kneeling ; but that this fhould be left to every one's " choice." Strype's An- Not one of the firf' fet of bill-lops after the reformation, approved of nais. Vol. I. the habits, or argued for their continuance from fcripture, antiquity, or P 177. decency, but fubmitted to them out of neceßìty, and to keep the church in the queen's favour. How much are the times alter'd ! Our firft re- formers never afcribed any holinefs or virtue to the veftments, but wifbed and prayed for their removal; whereas feveral modern conformifls have made them fential to their miniflrations, and have reprefented reli- gion as naked and defective without them. State q¡the But the queflion that divided the reformers, was The LAWFULNESS quion about of wearing habits that had been cónfecrated to idolatrous and fuper/litious . the habits. ufes, and were the very marks and badges of that religion they had re- nounced. Upon this they confulted the foreign divines, who all agreed in the reafonablenefs of abolifhing the habits, but were divided in their fentiments about the lawfulnefs of wearing them in the mean time : Some were afraid of the return of lutheranifin or popery, if the minifters fhould defert their flations in the church ; and others apprehended, that if they did not rejet them at firft, they fhould never obtain their re- moval afterwards. Sampfon and Dr. Humphreys and Sampfon, two heads of the non- conforrnifhs, wrote Hemphrey's to Zurich the following reafons againfi the lawfulnefs of wearing the theehabfs,nhI habits : " Thatthey did not think the prefcribing habits to the clergy merely .a civil thing; nor that the habits now prefcribed were decent; " for how can that habit be decent, that ferves only to drefs up the theatrical pomp of popery ? The papifls glory in this, that thefe " habits were brought in by them, for which they vouch Otho's con- " flitutions, and the roman pontifical. They add, that in king Edward's " time, the furplice was not univerfally ufed nor preffed, whereas the " ° copes then taken away are now to be. reflored. This is not to extir- " pate popery, but to plant it again, and inflead of going forward in re- " formation, to go backward. We do not place religion in habits, " fay they, but we oppofe them that do, [the .papilla]. Befides, it gives force authority to fervitude, to ;depart from our liberty. We hate
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