such magical rites, yet even these
dedications, saith the Magdeburgians,(478) _ex Judaismo natae videntur
sine nullo Dei praecepto_. There is, indeed, no warrant for such
dedication of churches as is thought to make them holy. Bellarmine would
warrant it by Moses' consecrating of the tabernacle, the altar, and the
vessels of the same; but Hospinian answereth him:(479) _Mosis factum
expressum habuit Dei mandatum: de consecrandis autem templis
Christianorum, nullum uspiam in verbo Dei praeceptum extat, ipso quoque
Bellarmino teste._ Whereupon he concludeth that this ceremony of
consecrating or dedicating the churches of Christians, is not to be used
after the example of Moses, who, in building and dedicating of the
tabernacle, did follow nothing without God's express commandment. What I
have said against the dedication of churches, holds good also against the
dedication of altars; the table whereupon the elements of the body and
blood of Christ are set, is not to be called holy; neither can they be
commended who devised altars in the church, to be the seat of the Lord's
body and blood, as if any table, though not so consecrated, could not as
well serve the turn. And what though altars were used in the ancient
church? Yet this custom _a Judaica, in ecclesiam Christi permanavit ac
postea superstitioni materiam praebuit_, say the Magdeburgians.(480) Altars
savour of nothing but Judaism, and the borrowing of altars from the Jews,
hath made Christians both to follow their priesthood and their sacrifices.
_Haec enim trio, scilicet sacerdos, altare, et sacrificium, sunt
correlativa, ut ubi unum est, coetera duo adesse necesse sit_, saith
Cornelius a Lapide.(481)

_Sect._ 9. 3d. If some times, places and things, be made holy by the
church's dedication or consecration of them to holy uses, then it
followeth that other times, places and things, which are not so dedicated
and consecrated by the church, howbeit they be applied to the same holy
uses, yet are more profane, and less apt to divine worship, than those
which are dedicated by the church. I need not insist to strengthen the
inference of this conclusion from the principles of our opposites; for the
most learned among them will not refuse to subscribe to it. Hooker
teacheth us,(482) that the service of God, in places not sanctified as
churches are, hath not in itself (mark _in itself_) such perfection of
grace and comeliness, as when the dignity of the place which it wisheth