But paule telleth them plainlye that they do communicate with deuills. The meates offered to Idolls of their owne nature were pure / yet when the corinthians do eate them with the Idolatrors in ther Idolatrie / then they become (saith paule) partakers of the table of deuilles: when ye then be present at a Masse / which is an Impure thinge / and do ther as the papistes do / mutch more iustly is it sayed of you / that then ye ar partakers of thos deulishe dragges which ar in the Masse. Again our men do obiecte and saye: It is not we that haue corrupted theis thinges / we wolde be gladde to haue them pure and incorrupte: ther impuritie must not be adscribed vnto vs. I answer: An other mans synne shall not indeede be imputed vnto the / for eche man shall beare his owne synne: but yet this thinge I do reproue in the / that thou dost communicate with wickednes: This is thy synne / here thou art defyled. and for this shalt thou be iudged. Paule sayde vnto the corinthians:
Ar not they which do eate of the sacrifice / partakers of the temple? what saye I then? that the Image is any thinge? or that it which is offered Images is any thinge? Naie. but this I saie / that the thinges which the gentills do offer / they offer to deuels and not to god. I wolde not that ye sholde haue fellowshippe with the deuills: ye can not drincke of the cuppe of the lorde / and of the cuppe of Deuels / ye can not be partakers of the table of the lorde and of the table of deuels. Thoughe corrupcion of meates offred vnto Idols is not to be imputed to all them that be partakres of them / (which wer not indeede corrupt of thẽ selues (as I saide), but when they wer offred vnto Idols that made them corrupte) yeat the veraye communicating and eating of them with Idolatrors is a fault iustly layed to their charge / from which they shuld haue keapte themselues aswell for the honor that they do owe vnto godd / as for the conscience which they ought to haue to edyfie other men. If it wer not so / whi did paule thus rebuke the Corinthians? Yea whi wolde not our holy martirs of the primitiue churche communicat and be partakers in the Sacrifices of the heathẽ? The martirs might haue saide / we knowe that an Idoll is nothing / and to offer vp sence to them is but an owtward thing / we do it but in bodie / our spret and harte is pure / and that we do / against our will we do it &c. They veryly did know no suche excuse / but they cõsidered that godd required this / that they shuld outwardly confes hym / and reproue / and fle from Idolatrie: And therfor aswell for their duties sake towarde godd / as bicause they wold not offend the brethern by their example / they did gyue their lyfe in the quarell without making ony such blinde excuses.
