Sermons on the Card, and Other DiscoursesLatimer, Hugh
Religion
Sermons on the Card, and Other Discourses
Latimer, Hugh
Church of England -- Sermons; Sermons, English -- 16th century
The end of your convocation shall shew what ye have done; the fruit that
shall come of your consultation shall shew what generation ye be of. For
what have ye done hitherto, I pray you, these seven years and more? What
have ye engendered? What have ye brought forth? What fruit is come of
your long and great assembly? What one thing that the people of England
hath been the better of a hair; or you yourselves, either more accepted
before God, or better discharged toward the people committed unto your
cure? For that the people is better learned and taught now, than they
were in time past, to whether of these ought we to attribute it, to your
industry, or to the providence of God, and the foreseeing of the king's
grace! Ought we to thank you, or the king's highness? Whether stirred
other first, you the king, that he might preach, or he you by his
letters, that ye should preach oftener? Is it unknown, think you, how
both ye and your curates were, in [a] manner, by violence enforced to let
books to be made, not by you, but by profane and lay persons; to let
them, I say, be sold abroad, and read for the instruction of the people?
I am bold with you, but I speak Latin and not English, to the clergy, not
to the laity; I speak to you being present, and not behind your backs.
God is my witness, I speak whatsoever is spoken of the good-will that I
bear you; God is my witness, which knoweth my heart, and compelleth me to
say that I say.
Now, I pray you in God's name, what did you, so great fathers, so many,
so long a season, so oft assembled together? What went you about? What
would ye have brought to pass? Two things taken away--the one, that ye
(which I heard) burned a dead man; the other, that ye (which I felt) went
about to burn one being alive: him, because he did, I cannot tell how, in
his testament withstand your profit; in other points, as I have heard, a
very good man; reported to be of an honest life while he lived, full of
good works, good both to the clergy, and also to the laity: this other,
which truly never hurt any of you, ye would have raked in the coals,
because he would not subscribe to certain articles that took away the
supremacy of the king:--take away these two noble acts, and there is
nothing else left that ye went about, that I know, saving that I now
remember, that somewhat ye attempted against Erasmus, albeit as yet
nothing is come to light. Ye have oft sat in consultation, but what have
ye done? Ye have had many things in deliberation, but what one is put
forth, whereby either Christ is more glorified, or else Christ's people
made more holy I appeal to your own conscience. How chanced this? How
came it thus? Because there were no children of light, no children of
God amongst you, which, setting the world at nought, would study to
illustrate the glory of God, and thereby shew themselves children of
light? I think not so, certainly I think not so. God forbid, that all
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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