debate called for written responses to the truth or nullity of the
propositions, and then (perhaps) extempore comments following their
reading. The first proposition was a standard criticism leveled by
Protestantism against the Catholic practice of the Mass and the liturgy
being said by the priest in Latin. For many Protestant apologists, the
service said in Latin touched the theological question of the Protestant
doctrine of the priesthood of all believers, but the Protestant disputants
at Westminster never treated it from this vantage. Instead they handled
the proposition as an exegetical matter, drawing almost the whole of
their argument from St Paul’s first epistle to the Corinthians:
The first part is most manifestly proved by the 14th chapter of the
First Epistle to the Corinthians, almost throughout the whole
chapter; in which chapter St Paul intreateth of this matter, ex
professo, purposely: and although some do cavil, that St Paul
speaketh not in that chapter of praying, but of preaching; yet it is
most evident, to any indifferent reader of understanding ... that he
plainly there speaketh ... of all other public actions which require
any speech in the church.^45Some patristic quotes are proffered, but that the whole priesthood
should be participants in worship is never treated.^46 Conversely, the
traditionalists, whose response to the point was presented by Dean
Cole,^47 addressed the matter, on the one hand, on the basis of authority:
did the Church possess the authority to order the worship of the faithful?
And, on the other, on the grounds of unity: is not Latin the tongue of the
mother church of Rome? Cole had presented first and was then followed
by Horne, though only after Horne had taken the provocatively
Protestant liberty of praying with his back to the altar, facing the people.
Friday’s part of the disputation ended after the reading of the Protestant
answer,^48 and it was determined that the following Monday, 3 April, the
respective sides would give an answer to the first day’s assertions. But at
the opening of the next session, Lord Keeper Nicholas Bacon ordered the
disputants to move to the second point and present their written treatises
on it, treatises the Catholics said they did not have. When the
traditionalists refused to treat the second point without addressing
themselves to the first, the disputation ended.^49
THE STRUGGLE FOR THE ELIZABETHAN CHURCH 63
(^45) Cardwell,History of Conferences, p. 57. These mirror the arguments used by St Cyril
the apostle to the Slavs in arguing for a Slavic liturgy.
(^46) Cardwell,History of Conferences, pp. 56–62.
(^47) Jewel contends that Cole spoke extempore, noting that the traditionalists had no
written arguments prepared. Richard Cox merely states that Cole spoke in his own name
(Zurich Letters, I, p. 27); Jewel that he was persuaded by the others (Works, IV, p. 1203).
Cardwell does have the written text of Cole’s remarks, History of Conferences, pp. 63–72.
(^48) Cardwell has the order reversed.
(^49) Acts of the Privy Council, VII, pp. 78–79. The cause of their interment is not listed,