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fomewhat of the fame fpirit, and (6) insisted that the pope, without his permiffion, had no manner of jurifdiction in England. Early in this century, there (7) appeared at Orleans fome heretics as they were called, who maintained that the confecration of the priest could not change the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, and that it was unprofitable to pray to faints and angels; and they were condemned by the council of Orleans in the year 1017. Not long after thefe (8) appeared other heretics of the fame ftamp in Flanders, who were also condemned by the fynod of Arras in the year 1025. They came originally from Italy, where they had been the disciples of Gundulphus; and they are faid to have admitted no fcripture but the gospels and apoftolical writings; to have denied the reality of the body and blood of Chrift in the eucharift; to have attributed no religious worship to the holy confeffors, none to the crofs, none to images, nor to temples nor altars; and to have afferted, that there was no purgatory, and that penances after death could not abfolve the deceafed from their fins.

Collier's Ecclef. Hift. B. 4. p. 279.

(7) Dupin XI. Siecle. Chap. 13.Fred. Spanhemii Hift. Chriftian Sæc. XI. Cap. 10. Se&t.

1.

(8) Spanhem. ibid. Dupin. ibid. Allix's Remarks upon the ancient' church of Piedmont. Chap. 11.

M 2

(9) Ufr.

fins. Other tenets were afcribed to them, which were really heretical: and perhaps they might hold fome errors, as well as fome truths; or perhaps their adverfaries, as it hath been their ufual artifice, might lay things to their charge merely to blacken and defame them. Not long after thefe (9) arofe the famous Berengarius, a native of Tours, and archdeacon of Angers, who more profeffedly wrote against the doctrin of transubstantiation; and also (1) called the 'church of Rome a church of malignants, the

council of vanity, and the feat of Satan.' It is true that he was compelled by the authority of popes and councils to renounce, abjure, and burn his writings. But his was all a forced, and not in the leaft a voluntary recantation. As often as he recanted, he relapsed again. He returned like a dog to his vomit, as a (2) contemporary popish writer expreffeth it. He lived and died in the fame fentiments. His herefy was from him called the Berengarian herefy; and his followers were fo numerous, that as (3) old historians relate, he had corrupCalvino Turcifm. Lib. 2. Cap. 5. Uffer. ibid. Sect. 24.

(9) Uffer. ibid. Cap. 7. Sect. 24, &c. Dupin. ibid. Chap. 2. Spanhem. ibid. Cap. 8. &c. &c. (1) Ecclefiam Romanam, ecclefiam malignantium, concilium vanitatis, et fedem Satanæ vocabat. Gulielm. Reginald.

(2) Qui licet eandem hærefin fæpiffime in fynodo abjuravit, ad vomitum tamen fuum canino more non expavit redire. Bertoldus Conftantienfis prefby

ter

corrupted almost all the French, Italians, and English with his depravities. When Gregory VII had, both by letters and by a council held at Rome in the year 1074, ftrictly forbidden the marriage of the clergy, it raised (4) great commotions among the ecclefiaftics in Germany; who not only complained of the pope for impofing this yoke, but likewife accufed him of advancing a notion infupportable, and contrary to the words of our Saviour, who faith that all are not able to live in continence, and to the words of the apoftle, who ordereth thofe who have not the gift of continence to marry. They added that this law, in forcing the ordinary courfe of nature, would be the cause of great diforders; that they would rather renounce the priesthood than marriage; and the pope fhould provide, if he could, angels to govern the church, fince he refufed to be ferved by men. This was the language of these corrupt ecclefiaftics, as (5) Dupin hath called them but the decree of the pope was no lefs oppofed

ter apud Uffer. ibid. Sect. 34.
(3) Eodem tempore, Beren-
garius Turonenfis,in hæreticam
prolapfus pravitatem, omnes
Gallos, Italos, et Anglos, fuis
jam pene corruperat pravitati-
bus, Matt, Weftmonalt, et Hift.

Roffen. in anno 1087. Uffer. ibid, Sect. 27.

(4) Dupin. ibid. Chap. 5. Spanhem. ibid. Cap. 7. Sect. 4. (5) C'est ainsi que ces ecclefiaftiques corrompus parloient, Dupin, ibid, p. 36, M 3 (6) Collier's

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opposed in France, in Flanders, in Italy, and England, than in Germany. A council was held at Winchester in the year 1076, wherein it was (6) decreed indeed, that no canon fhould marry; but the priests in the country, who were already married, were allowed to cohabit with their wives; whereas the pope had injoined all priefts without diftinction to put away their wives, or to forbear the exercife of their office. Whereupon Mr. Collier hath made this juft reflection; "From hence it appears "that the papal fupremacy had not reached its "zenith in this century, and that the English bishops did not believe the patriarchal power arbitrary and unlimited, but that a national "church had fome referves of liberty, and might diffent from the conftitutions of the "fce of Rome upon occafion."

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Europe hitherto was involved in the dark night of popery, with only fome stars appearing here and there in the horizon; but in the twelfth century there began to be visible some streaks of the morning light, fome dawnings of a reformation. Here in England, during the reign of Henry II, the famous conftitutions of Clarendon were fworn

(6) Collier's Ecclefiaft. Hift. B. 4. P. 248, 249. Spelmanni Concil. Vol. 2.

(7) Platina in vita Pafchal. II. Spanhemii Hift. Christian, Sæc. XII. Cap.5. Sect. 2. Cave

fworn to and figned both by the clergy and the laity, in recognition of the rights of the crown,. particularly forbidding all appeals to Rome without the king's licence, and appointing the trial of criminal clerks before fecular judges: But the best account of this as well as of the other memorable transactions of this reign the public expects with fome impatience from one of the most masterly and elegant writers of the present age, a friend to religion and virtue, a friend to liberty and his country. Fluentius bishop of Florence (7) taught publicly, that Antichrift was born, and come into the world: whereupon pope Pafchal II went to Florence, held a council there in the year 1105, and feverely reprimanded the bishop, and strictly forbad him to preach any fuch doctrin. St. Bernard himself, devoted as he was and bigotted to the church of Rome in other refpects, (8) yet inveighed loudly againft the corruption of the clergy, and the pride and tyranny of the popes, faying that they were the minifters of Chrift and ferved Antichrift, that nothing remained but that the man of fin should be revealed, that the beaft in the Apocalyps occupied St. Peter's chair, with other expreffions to the

Hift. Litt. Sæc. XII. Concilia. Vol. 2. p. 258. Calmet. Di&t. in ANTICHRIST.

(8) Spanhem. ibid. Uffer de Chriftian Ecclef. fucceffione et ftatu. Cap. 7. Se&, 5, 6. M 4 (9) Rogeri

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