Vindiciæ sacræ. A treatise of the honor and maintenance due to ecclesiasticall persons. Done out of the Latin, of that famous diuine of Holland, H. Saravia, sometime prebend of Canterbury.

CHAP. VI. The possessions of Monkes are not all of like nature.

AS I haue shewed the great dif∣ference of the Estate of the Pa∣stors & Rectorsof the Church: so also are the Possessions of Monkes not all alike. It were tedious to recount how they came to so great Wealth: This chiefely would I haue obserued, that whatsoeuer was possest by Monks, that was indeed due to the Poore, and Church-Pastors, doth appertaine to the first sort of Ecclesiasticall goods, which after the Ouerthrow of Monkerie, are not to be held as escheated, while the Church hath Pastors and Poore to prouide for. Wherefore after the Eie∣ction of Poperie, those things onely were to be confiscate, which did onely serue to support the Popes Superstition

or Tyrannie. The remainder, which had no impious Ground or End, should haue beene restored to the Church. Wheresoeuer therefore all that be∣longed to Monkes and Monasteries was confiscate by the consent or coun∣sell of those whom it more neerly con∣cerned to looke to it, they were the more too blame, that did not intercede therein; and better informe the Magi∣strate: for surely, the prophanation and abuse of the Churches Patrimonic, could not be so great, as to change the nature of it, and vtterly destroy the first Donation. The Arke of God among the Philistims, was still the same: and the Vessels of the Temple, lost not their sanctitie in Babylon. What though the Pope and his Clergie fouly and im∣piously abused the true and lawfull Goods of the Church? Ought there∣sore the true Ministers of the Church to be cheated and defrauded of them? Their Possessors, are not Lords or Ow∣ners of them; but Stewards onely,

hauing the vse, fruit and administration of the Churches Estate, but no propri∣etie therein. Neither makes it any thing against me, that Bishops in times past thought that the Reuenewes dedi∣cated to Pagan Gods, did not belong (of right) to the Church; for I say not, that the Church hath any Title to those Things which were immediately dedi∣cated to Impietie: such, I haue already confessed to be in the power, and at the donation of the Magistrate: and that the Edict of Honorius and Theodosius, and other pious Emperors and Christi∣an Kings displeaseth not mee: Whose Examples, if they, whose Errors moo∣ued me to write this Treatise, would haue vouchsafed to haue followed; there had been no need of this Disputation.