for, doth concur; and that the very majesty and holiness of the place
where God is worshipped, bettereth even our holiest and best actions. How
much more soundly do we hold with J. Rainolds,(483) that unto us
Christians, "no land is strange, no ground unholy,--every coast is Jewry,
every town Jerusalem, and every house Sion,--and every faithful company,
yea, every faithful body, a temple to serve God in." The contrary opinion
Hospinian rejecteth as favouring Judaism,(484) _alligat enim religionem ad
certa loca_. Whereas the presence of Christ among two or three gathered
together in his name, maketh any place a church, even as the presence of a
king with his attendants maketh any place a court. As of places, so of
times, our opposites think most superstitiously. For of holidays Hooker
saith thus,(485) "No doubt as God's extraordinary presence hath hallowed
and sanctified certain places, so they are his extraordinary works that
have truly and worthily advanced certain times, for which cause they ought
to be with all men that honour God more holy than other days." What is
this but popish superstition? For just so the Rhemists think that the
times and places of Christ's nativity,(486) passion, burial, resurrection,
and ascension, were made holy; and just so Bellarmine holdeth,(487) that
Christ did consecrate the days of his nativity, passion, and resurrection,
_eo quod nascens consecrarit praesepe, moriens crucem, resurgens
sepulchrum_. Hooker hath been of opinion, that the holidays were so
advanced above other days, by God's great and extraordinary works done
upon them, that they should have been holier than other days, even albeit
the church had not appointed them to be kept holy. Yet Bishop Lindsey
would have us believe that they think them holy, only because of the
church's consecration of them to holy political uses. But that now, at
last, I may make it appear to all that have common sense, how falsely
(though frequently) it is given forth by the Bishop, that holidays are
kept by them only for order and policy, and that they are not so
superstitious as to appropriate the worship to those days, or to observe
them for mystery and as holier than other days:--

_Sect._ 10. First, I require the Bishop to show us a difference betwixt
the keeping of holidays by Formalists, and their keeping of the Lord's
day; for upon holidays they enjoin a cessation from work, and a dedicating
of the day to divine worship, even as upon the Lor