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XI. Whether Christ must needs intend Laws unchange

able altogether, or have forbidden any where to
make
any

other Law than himself did deliver.
“In the Third Book, Hooker deals with an
assertion which was meant to serve as a major
premise for settling the controversy : the
assertion that in Scripture there must be of
necessity contained a form of Church polity,
the laws whereof may in nowise be altered.'
For it seemed to the Puritans derogatory to
the importance of Church polity and to the
completeness of Scripture to doubt that Scrip-
ture had made full and permanent provision
for the government and discipline and order of
the Church .... Hooker begins the Third
Book by asking what the Church is.” 1

THE FOURTH BOOK

CONCERNING THEIR THIRD ASSERTION, THAT

OUR FORM OF CHURCH POLITY IS COR-
RUPTED WITH POPISH ORDERS, RITES, AND
CEREMONIES, BANISHED OUT OF CERTAIN
REFORMED CHURCHES, WHOSE EXAMPLE
THEREIN WE OUGHT TO HAVE FOLLOWED
I. How great use Ceremonies have in the Church.
II. The first thing they blame in the kind of our Cere-

III. The second, that so many of them are the same

which the Church of Rome useth; and the reasons which they bring to prove them for that cause

blame-worthy. IV. How when they go about to expound what Popish

Ceremonies they mean, they contradict their own

arguments against Popish Ceremonies. V. An answer to the argument whereby they would

prove, that sith we allow the customs of our fathers to be followed, we therefore may not allow such customs as the Church of Rome hath, because we cannot account of them which are of

that Church as of our fathers. VI. To their allegation, that the course of God's own

wisdom doth make against our conformity with

the Church of Rome in such things. VII. To the example of the eldest Churches which they

bring for the same purpose. VIII. That it is not our best polity (as they pretend it is)

for establishment of sound religion, to have in these things no agreement with the Church of

Rome being unsound. IX. That neither the Papists upbraiding us as furnished

out of their store, nor any hope which in that respect they are said to conceive, doth make any more against our ceremonies than the former

allegations have done. X. The grief which they say godly brethren conceive

at such ceremonies as we have common with the

Church of Rome. XI. The third thing for which they reprove a great part

of our ceremonies is, for that as we have them from the Church of Rome, so that Church had

them from the Jews. XII. The fourth, for that sundry of them have been they say) abused unto idolatry, and are by that mean

become scandalous. XIII. The fifth, for that we retain them still, notwith

standing the example of certain Churches reformed

before us, which have cast them out. XIV. A declaration of the proceedings of the Church of

England for the establishment of things as they

are.

“In the Fourth Book, Hooker deals with another general ground of Puritan antagonism to the rites and ceremonies of the Church ; the assertion that our form of Church polity is corrupted with Popish orders, rites, and ceremonies, banished out of certain reformed Churches, whose example therein we ought to have followed.'”

He regards ceremonies as “ the outward fashion in which great public duties are done; not the substance of these duties, but their becoming accessories and circumstances, serving either to teach or to move men's hearts." He traces the general principle of using outward ceremonies to the law of nature. “ The ceremonies which we have taken from such as were before us, are not things that belong to this or that sect, but they are the ancient rites and customs of the Church of Christ, whereof ourselves being a part, we have the selfsame interest in them which our fathers before us had, from whom

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