Baillie’s Parallel. Chapter I.
James Dodson
CHAP. I.
Of the Mass, and the parts of it in General.
The Papists call the Mass their Liturgy or their Service-Book.
That ye may behold the general accord, if not identity of our Liturgy and Service Book, with the Mass: consider first the words, and then the matter; for the words, the Papists most gladly will call their Mass by the name of our Service and Liturgy. And we must make no question to call our Liturgy or Service by the name of their Mass, for the accord of Papists to our name, see the Jesuit Sainctes in his Liturgy. pag. 8. printed at Antwerp. 1560. professing that the most convenient name which can be given to the Mass, is that of Liturgy and Service. Si placet Missah Hebraorum ad Græcos traducere, quo id facias aptissime, non aliud quàm Liturgias nomen comperies, contra si liturgiam Græcorum vis ad linguam sanctam revocare per Missah id cures necesse est. Si Latinè utrumque postulas nullum quam officij nomen significantius habebitur quo Latina Ecclesia cum agitur de sacrificio sæpe delectatur [If you wish to translate the Hebrew Missah into Greek, you will find no name by which to do it more aptly than the name Liturgy. Conversely, if you wish to bring back the Greek liturgy into the holy tongue, you must necessarily do so by Missah. If you ask for both in Latin, no name will be found more significant than officium, “service” or “office,” a term in which the Latin Church often delights when sacrifice is being discussed].
The Prelatical men call their Liturgy the Mass.
For our contentment to take their name of Mass to our Service, see Pocklington, Sunday no Sabbath, subscribed by Canterbury’s Chaplain about the midst, where from a supposititious testimony of Ambrose, he will have
B
(2)
the saying of their second service at the Altar, to be just the same with that which that Authour calls Missam facere cæpi dimissis catechumenis [I began the missa (mass) after the catechumens had been dismissed], that none but Schismatics will deny their harmony with the ancients in this Missification: but it is not only that part of the Liturgy which they have of late begun to call the second service, to which they will give the style of Mass, as Cozens [deceits] used to do long ago in Durham, where the former part of the Communion he was wont to call the Matins, and the latter the Mass, as ye may see in Smart’s Sermon printed at Edinburgh 1628. But the whole Service Pocklington will style with the name of Mass in the foresaid Sermon towards the end; where this supposititious testimony of Austin, quidam cogunt sacerdotem ut abbreviet Missam, & ad eorum libidinem cantet [Certain persons compel the priest to shorten the Mass, and to sing according to their pleasure], he translates, some force the Priest to curtail Divine Service, or to say or sing it after their fancy. Bishop Montagu in his Antidiatribe pag. 10. makes no scruple of the Mass so far as concerns the word; yea, and the matter too, if ye put a commodious sense upon it. Missam ipsam non damnamus quoad vocem quippe cùm nihil impietatis habeat, sed neque Missæ omnium sano sensu intellectum [We do not condemn the Mass itself as to the word, since it contains no impiety; nor do we condemn every understanding of the Mass, if taken in a sound sense]. In the words here betwixt the parties you see a perfect agreement.
Our men approve the matter of the Mass.
In the matter, consider if there be any discord of importance, the English not refusing to approve the Mass, the Papists not refusing to approve the Liturgy. For the first, Pocklington in his Altar near the end is approved by Canterbury to profess upon a very false allegiance that K[ing]. James would like well enough of the Mass, if the Priest would shrive it of Transubstantiation: now any may defend that Transubstantiation cannot be inferred by any sound reason from any part of the Mass as it is read at Rome, or if it be inferred from any passage therein, then from these mainly which of late have been put in our Book: so that they who like of the Mass, if it wanted Transubstantiation, may like of it as it stands this day at Rome; for Transubstantiation cannot be deduced from the words of it but by the glosses of the interpreters, which may agree as well to the words of our Service, as to these of their Missal
(3)
how ever Transubstantiation it self will not deter us from the Mass: here Montagu embracing that word as well as the other of the Mass, Antidiat. p. 10. De vocibus dixi ne missa quidem imo ne transubstantiationis certamen moveamus [I have spoken concerning words, so that we should not even raise a controversy about the word “Mass”—no, nor even about the word “transubstantiation.”]. And how far he is from the matter of Transubstantiation we will find hereafter; here only mark how near he draws the Romish Mass and English Liturgy in his recusancy. p. 1. [Our service is the same in most things with that in the Church of Rome, the differences are not great, nor should make any separation] how small a difference they put betwixt their service and the Mass, see the Letters of the King and his Council in King Edward’s days, Acts and Monuments, vol. 2. p. 667. [As for the service in the English tongue, it perchance seems to you a new service, and yet indeed it is no other but the old, the self-same words in English which were in Latin, having a few things taken out. If the service of the Church was good in Latin, it remaineth good in English, for nothing is altered, but to speak with knowledge, that which was spoken with ignorance.]
The Papists approve the matter of the Liturgy.
Thus do the English Prelates judge of the matter of the Mass, hear what the Papists say of the matter of the Liturgy. Pope Pius the fourth is said to have offered his approbation to the Liturgy. For this see Mortons appeal, p ult. also Cambden his life of Queen Elizabeth, p. 46. in these words. The Pope, Pius quartus [IV.] sent unto her Vincentio Parpalia, Abbot of S. Savior, with secret instructions and letters of flattery, the report goes that the Pope gave his faith that he would confirm the English Liturgy by his authority, so as she would join herself to the Romish Church, and acknowledge the primacy of the chair of Rome [i.e., the papacy]; yea, and that certain thousand crowns were promised to those that should procure the same. The Council of Trent was nothing opposite to this offer of the Pope, for about that same time being consulted by the Popish Nobility of England, if it was lawful for them to countenance the Liturgy, they did no ways discharge or give any sign of disallowance to
B 2
(4)
this fact, albeit they would not give any act of their approbation when there was no condition of advantage propounded to them. Yea long thereafter, Pope Gregory the 13. repeated the offer of Pius to the Queen of approving the Liturgy upon her admission of his Primacy, for this see the late Bishop of Canterbury, Doctor Abbots in his explicatio illustrissimæ quæstionis, c. 4. p. 112. Cum testibus Pontificiis magnates aliquot nobilisque Anglicani per legatos in ea quæstione Concilium Tridentinum interpellarint præ memoriæ lapsi aut oblivione patres non omiserunt; quin potius credo per conniventiam quandam tacitos preteriisse prospicientes quam incommodum futurum esset tot tantsque suarum partium aut carceris aut exilij molestiam facessere, & nesciebant an aliquis venturus esset Pontifex, qui jacturâ suæ partis deliberatè perpensâ ad damnum resarciendum liturgiam Anglicanam posse approbare & confirmare, id quod à Papa Gregorio 13. Reginae oblatum fuisse modo titulus supremæ gubernationis Romanæ sedi redderetur pervulgato hominum & magnorum sermone jactitatum aliquando significat Houlettus num verè illud an falsò nescio, at solet ex indulgentia sua sanctissimus Pater quæ videntur duriora nonnunquam concedere quo facilius secreta sui cordis desideria amplissimè consequatur [Since, according to Pontifical witnesses, several English magnates and nobles, through ambassadors, had approached the Council of Trent on that question, the Fathers did not omit the matter through a lapse of memory or forgetfulness. Rather, I believe that, by a certain connivance, they passed it over in silence, foreseeing how inconvenient it would be to cause the annoyance of imprisonment or exile to so many and such great men of their own party. And they did not know whether some Pontiff might yet come who, after deliberately weighing the loss of his own party, might approve and confirm the English liturgy in order to repair the damage. Houlett at one time indicates that this was commonly reported in the talk of men, even great men: namely, that this had been offered to the Queen by Pope Gregory XIII, provided only that the title of supreme government were restored to the Roman See. Whether that was true or false, I do not know. But from his indulgence the most holy Father is sometimes accustomed to concede things which seem rather hard, so that he may more easily obtain, in the fullest measure, the secret desires of his heart]. By these testimonies it is clear, how near the Papists think the Liturgy draws to their Mass, and how near the Prelates think the Mass to come to their Liturgy both in words and matter. But it will be more manifest how like either of the parties are deceived in this their judgement, If we will cut both the Bodies of the Mass and Liturgy in small parts, and so lay limb to limb, and member to member, here will the analogy or disproportion, the agreement or disagreement, the diversity or identity appear to the eye of any common beholder.
What are the parts of the Mass.
The most received division of a whole is into parts essentials, integral or subjectives, to find the essential parts of the Mass actually, and in express words in our service is no great labour; For to the essence of the sacrifice of the Mass are required but two things, or three at the most, according to Bellarmine de missa, Lib. 1. c. 27. To wit, the consecration, the oblation not before nor
(5)
after but in the consecration, and thirdly the consumption in the Priest’s receiving alone in both the kinds, these will be all found as expressly in our Book as in the missal, as hereafter shall be shewed.
The subjective parts of the Mass are the divers kinds and species of the Mass, for of Masses some are ordinary and daily, some extraordinary and solemn, and these again of a great number according to the several festivities wherein and diverse ends for which they are celebrated upon these several sorts of Masses, the greatest part of the Missal is spent, and upon these likewise more than two parts of our Book are consumed.
But the parts of the Mass most commonly spoken of are the integral of the daily & ordinary Mass, with these let us begin & that with those which are principal. The necessary ceremonies or circumstances especially the universal ones w[hi]ch run along the whole body of the Mass, such as the Priest, the altar, the vestments, the crossings, the perfumings, &c. may well receive the names of parts, at least the large & frequent Rubrics concerning them, but because these are but ceremonies & at best but among the integral parts less principal, we will let them alone till we have first considered these which are confessed by all to be most principal members of this unhappy body, of these more or fewer are made according to the diverse conceptions of writers. Innocentius reduceth all to three heads, Bellarmine to four, Durandus to five, Thomas to six.
Bellarmine’s four parts de Missa. lib. 2. c. 21. are first Missa Catechumenorum, the part of the ordinary Mass whereat the Catechumeni might have been present: secondly, the Offertory: thirdly, the Consecration or Canon: fourthly, the Communion. Our Service at the Communion hath all these parts in the same order, the first part in the English, seemed not clearly enough distinguished, for there followed no mention immediately of an offertory, nor at all of a consecration, but in our Book all are clearly professed, and in England now also are like to be better considered, for the Missa Catechumenorum by Canterbury’s men is called the first Service, per-
B 3
(6)
formed in the body of the Church, the rest as the Missa fidelium is called the second Service, and appointed to be officiate only at the Altar, and that in the Quire, none present but only Communicants expressly against the old Canons and Customs of that Church, which now no man but a Schismatic must challenge; for this see Pocklington in his Sunday no Sabbath about the midst [dimissis catechumenis missam facere cæpi (After the catechumens had been dismissed, I began to celebrate Mass). Saint Ambrose began the second Service as our Church calls it, at the Altar, having before finished the first Service in the body of the Church, no man will go about to put away this sweet harmony which our Church still keeps with antiquity but Schismatics.]
But passing the division of Bellarmine, we will follow that of Thomas in his third p. quest. 83. art. 4. in corp. as serving more to clear that black body which hath indeed much need of clearing, as being the most misty and dark piece that ever my hand touched. He draws it to six heads, the first he calls a preparation, the next an instruction, the third an offertory, the fourth a consecration, the fifth a participation, the sixth a Thanksgiving: all these we will go through in order.