VOLUME 3

AN ANSWERE VNTO SIR THOMAS MORES DIALOGE

LOCATION
KEY Commentary Side Textual Bibliographic Scriptural

ue not that it is gods worde by the reason that they tell vs so. I answere / that there are .ij. maner faythes / an historicall faith and a felynge faith. The historical faith hangeth of the trueth and honestie of the teller or of the comen fame and consent of many. As if one told me that the turke had wonne a citie and I beleved it moved with the honestie of the man. Now if there come a nother that semeth moare honest or that hath better persuasions that it is not so / I thynke immediatly that he lied and lose my faith agayne. And a felynge faith is / as iff a man were there present whan it was wonne and their were wounded and had there lost all that he had and were taken presoner there also. That man shuld so beleue that all the world coude not turne him from his faith. Even like wise iff my mother had blowen on hir finger and told me that the fire wold burne me / I shuld haue beleued hir with an historicall faith / as we beleue the stories of the worlde / because I thought she wold not haue mocked me. And so I shuld haue done / if she had told me that the fire had bene cold and wold not haue burned / but assone as I had put my fingre in the fire / I shuld haue beleued / not by the reason of hir / but with a felynge faith / so that she coud not haue persuaded me aftir warde the contrarie . So now with an historicall faith I maye beleue that the scripture is Gods by the teachynge of them / and so I shuld haue done though they had told me that roben hode had bene the scripture of God. Which faith is but an opinion and therfore abideth euer frutelesse and fauleth a waye / iff a moare gloriouse reason be made vnto me or iff the preacher liue contrarye.

97/26 generall counsell. Louis XII of France (king, 1498–1515) and Maximilian I (emperor, 1493–1519) convened the Council of Pisa (1511–12), attended mostly by French prelates. Julius II (pope, 1503–13) condemned this potentially schismatic council and convoked his own, Lateran V (1512–17). Dominated by Julius, the first five sessions repudiated conciliarism, the theory that a council is superior to the pope. The later sessions under Leo X (pope, 1513–21) approved minor reforms of canon law, the Curia, the episcopacy and the religious orders. Historians note that this ineffectual council ended in March 1517, seven months before Luther circulated his 95 Theses (NCE 8.409; OER 2.397–99). Cf. Richard Marius, Martin Luther: The Christian between God and Death, Belknap (Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1999) 137–39. For Luther's appeal to a general council, cf. 186/1on.

98/5–10 Now . . . endure. Cf. CWM 8/1.336/27–32, 339/4–8.

98/5 last and euerlastinge testament. Cf. Heb. 8.6, 13.20.

98/9–10 all . . . scripture. Cf. John 20.31.

98/10–13 By . . . mencion. CWM 8/1.340/28–30.

the reason] reason 1573

98/13–14 And by . . . false. Cf. CWM 8/1.342/5–6.

DEUTERONOMY: 11: 49/14

98/14–19 And by . . . scripture. Cf. CWM 8/1.343/8–12.

98/16–17 they haue . . . heare them. Cf. Luke 16.29.