ANDERTON, Lawrence

by Lawrence Anderton

£5,250 · Offered by Sokol Books

Extremely rare first edition of this controversial Catholic work clandestinely printed in England, probably at a secret press in Lancashire connected with William Wrench. Brerely was a pseudonym, and the true author is supposed to be the seminary priest Lawrence Anderton, though the text is sometimes attributed to James Anderton. It represents the beginnings of a new sort of controversial literature that aimed to refute its opponents using his, or his supporters', own words. This work aimed to establish Catholic claims "by the testimonies of the learned Protestants themselves". This first edition proved "something of a sensation" on publication and was "frequently praised and imitated by subsequent Catholic apologists" (Milward). The work is particularly interesting for its accounts of the earlier reformation movements of Huss, Wyclif, Waldo and others and their distinction from Lutheran Protestantism, as well as its historical appeal to Englishmen that they and their kings lived and died in the Catholic faith, with numerous examples. A short but valuable bibliography of Protestant writers and their works precedes the text. Bereley was a seasoned controversialist. As early in James s reign as 1604, Bereley s Apologie of the Romane Church had set out to prove the continuance of the Catholike Romane Religion ever since the Apostles time , that the Protestantes Religion was not so much as in being, at or before Luthers first appearing , and that Catholickes are no less Loyall an

• Binding: Hardcover

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