WORTHY SIR:
I confess, I somewhat incline to be of your mind, that if to the authorities drawn out of Scriptures and Fathers (which are common to us with others) a true discovery were added of that religion which anciently was professed in this kingdom, it might prove a special motive to induce my poor countrymen to consider a little better of the old and true way from where they have hitherto been misled. Yet on the one side, that saying in the Gospel runs much in my mind: If they hear not Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead; and on the other, that heavy judgment mentioned by the Apostle: because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved, God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe lies. The woeful experience whereof, we may see daily before our eyes in this poor nation: where, such as are slow of heart to believe the saving truth of God delivered by the Prophets and Apostles, do with all greediness embrace, and with a most strange kind of credulity entertain those lying legends, wherewith their monks and friars in these latter days have polluted the religion and lives of our ancient saints.
I do not deny but that in this country, as well as in others, corruptions did creep in by little and little, before the Devil was let loose to procure that seduction which prevailed so generally in these last times: but as far as I can collect by such records of the former ages as have come to my hands either manuscript or printed, the religion professed by the ancient bishops, priests, monks, and other Christians in this land, was for substance the very same with that which now by public authority is maintained therein, against the foreign doctrine brought in there in later times by the Bishop of Rome's followers. I speak of the more substantial points of doctrine, that are in controversy between the Church of Rome and us at this day; by which only we must judge, whether of both sides has departed from the religion of our ancestors: not of matters of inferior note, much less of ceremonies and such other things as appertain to the discipline rather than to the doctrine of the Church.
And whereas it is known to the learned, that the name of Scoti in those elder times (whereof we treat) was common to the inhabitants of the greater and the lesser Scotland (for so heretofore they have been distinguished), that is to say, of Ireland, and the famous colony deduced from there into Albania: I will not follow the example of those that have of late labored to make dissension between the daughter and the mother, but account of them both, as of the same people.
Tros Rutulusve fuat, nullo discrimine habebo. The religion doubtless received by both, was the self same; and differed little or nothing from that which was maintained by their neighbors the Britons: as by comparing the evidences that remain, both of the one nation and of the other, in the ensuing discourse more fully shall appear.
