PRELIMINARIES

from Short-Title Catalogue 13675.
Renaissance Electronic Texts 1.2.
© 1994, 1997 Ian Lancashire
University of Toronto

CERTAINE
SERMONS
OR
HOMILIES
appointed to be read in
CHVRCHES,
In the time of the late Queene Elizabeth
of famous memory.

And now thought fit to bee reprinted by
Authority from the KINGS most
Excellent Maiestie.

COnsidering how necessary it
is, that the word of GOD,
which is the onely foode of
the soule, and that most excel­
lent light that we must walke
by, in this our most dange­
rous pilgrimage, should at all
conuenient times be preached
vnto the people, that thereby
they may both learne their duety towards God, their
Prince, and their neighbors, according to the mind of the
holy Ghost, expressed in the Scriptures: And also to a­
uoyd the manifold enormities which heretofore by false
doctrine haue crept into the Church of God: and how
that all they which are appointed Ministers, haue not the
gift of preaching sufficiently to instruct the people,
which is committed vnto them, whereof great incon­
ueniences might rise, and ignorance still be maintayned,
if some honest remedy be not speedily found and proui­
ded. The Queenes most Excellent Maiesty, tendering
the soule health of her louing Subiects, and the quie­
ting of their consciences, in the chiefe and principall
points of Christian Religion, and willing also by the
true setting foorth, and pure declaring of Gods word,
which is the principall guide and leader vnto all godli­
nesse and vertue, to expell and driue away aswell all
corrupt, vitious, and vngodly liuing, as also erroneous
and poysoned doctrines, tending to superstition and i­
dolatry: hath by the aduice of her most Honourable
Counsellours, for her discharge in this behalfe, caused a
Booke of Homilies, which heeretofore was set foorth by
her most louing brother, a Prince of most worthy me­
mory, ED{VV}ARD the sixt, to be Printed anew, where­
in are conteyned certayne wholesome and godly exhor­
tations, to mooue the people to honour and worship
Almighty God, and diligently to serue him, euery one
according to their degree, state and vocation. All which
Homilies, her Maiesty commandeth, and straitly char­
geth all Parsons, Vicars, Curates, and all other hauing
spirituall cure, euery Sunday and Holyday in the yeere,
at the ministring of the holy Communion, or if there be
no Communion ministred that day, yet after the Gos­
pel and Creede, in such order and place as is appointed
in the Booke of Common Prayers, to reade and declare
to their Parishioners plainely and distinctly one of the
sayd Homilies, in such order as they stand in the Booke,
except there be a Sermon, according as it is enioyned in
the Booke of her Highnesse Iniunctions, and then for
that cause onely, and for none other, the reading of the
sayd Homilie to bee deferred vnto the next Sunday, or
Holyday following. And when the foresayd Booke of
Homilies is read ouer, her Maiesties pleasure is, that the
same be repeated and read againe, in such like sort as was
before prescribed. Furthermore, her Highnesse com­
mandeth, that notwithstanding this order, the sayd Ec­
clesiasticall persons shall reade her Maiesties Iniuncti­
ons, as such times, and in such order, as is in the booke
thereof appointed. And that the Lords Prayer, the Ar­
ticles of the fayth, and the ten Commandements, bee o­
penly read vnto the people, as in the sayd Iniunctions is
specified, that all her people, of what degree or condition
soeuer they be, may learne how to inuocate and call vp­
on the name of God, and know what duety they owe
both to God and man: so that they may pray, beleeue,
and worke according to knowledge, while they shall
liue heere, and after this life be with him that with
his blood hath bought vs all. To whom
with the Father and the holy Ghost,
be all honour and glory for
euer. Amen.


A TABLE OF THE
Sermons contayned in this
present Volume.