But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given.
Ver. 11. All men cannot receive this saying] Nor may we simply pray for the gift of continence, but with submission, since it is not simply necessary to salvation, but only of expedience: inasmuch as he that can keep himself unmarried, hath little else to care for but how he may please the Lord, and attend upon his work without distraction, sitting close at it (as the Greek word signifies) and not taken off by other business. a An instance whereof was clearly to be seen in George Prince of Anhault, whose family is said to have been ecclesia, academia, curia, a church, a university, and a court; whose sanctity and chastity in the single estate to his dying day was such, that Melancthon publicly delivered it of him, that he was the man, that of any then alive, might most certainly expect the promised reward of eternal life. b But this is not every man's happiness; and where it is, the pride of virginity is no less foul a sin than impurity, saith Augustine. And Paphnutius, a single man, and a confessor in the primitive Church, said that the marriage bed undefiled was true chastity. c Those Popish votaries, that boasted so much of the gift of continence in themselves, and exacted it of others, have (for a punishment of their arrogance and violence) been often given up to notorious filthiness, as the Cardinal of Cremona, after his stout replying in the Council of London against priests' marriage, was shamefully taken, the night following, with a notable whore. Lanfrancus, Archbishop of Canterbury, a great enemy to priests' marriage, for all his gay show of monkish virginity and single life, had a son called Paulus Monachus Cadoneusis, whom he so gladly preferred to be Abbot of St Alban's. Dr Weston (Prolocutor in the Disputation at Oxford against Cranmer, Latimer, and Ridley, who also passed sentence upon them, inveighing against Cranmer, for that he had been sometime a married man), was not long after taken in adultery, and for the same was by Cardinal Pole put from his spiritual livings.
Save they to whom it is given] Maldonatus the Jesuit saith, it is given to any one that is but willing to have it, and asketh it of God; and that, because marriage is given to all that are willing to it. But this Isaiah 1:1,31. False, for our Saviour excepts eunuchs. 2. Inconsequent, because the gift of marriage proceeds from a principle of nature, but continence from a special indulgence, 1 Corinthians 7:7; which they that have not are required to marry for a remedy. And yet Papists most injuriously forbid some to marry at any time, as their clergy, all at some times; and that, not as a precept of convenience, but necessity and holiness.
a 1 Corinthians 7:35. ευπαρεδρον, απερισπαστως .
b Ex Bucholcero Melancthonis auditore hoc habeo. Scultet.
c Congressum cum legitima uxore castitatem esse dicebat. Hist. lib. i. cap. 11.