there is no absolute necessity of a ratification and if it was fallible the Authority of the Decree must be resolved simply into the Popes insallibility For the ratification that is subsequent to the Councils Vote puts no more authority in the Council than it had when it passed the Vote It is true in matters of Policy I know there be such Constitutions which is the case of the Votes of our two Houses of Parliament that have no force without the Le Roy le veut but if the Council be infallibly directed then it is not in the Popes power to reject their Decisions And if the Council be fallible then the Infallibility rests in the Pope alone and who shall expect I can think the Council of Constance infallible in taking the Chalice from the Laity and fallible in subjecting the Pope to the Council Certainly the Authority was the same in both but because the Pope was a party in the one particular he was sure not to ratifie it 18. Who must be the Infallible Expounder of the Decrees of Councils If you will leave this to every private person then all these inconveniences will follow that you object against private persons expounding Scripture For they may be drawn to several meanings and opinions And we know that at Trent when the Divines differed in many Points of Religion the great business was to find a temper and to contrive the Decree in such general terms as might displease neither Party And thence it was that two of the Divines that were in the Council and disputed in the Points defined but differed in their Opinions after the Council had passed the Decree did publish Treatises for their Opinions both of them pretending the Council decreed of his side And though this was done before the dissolution of the Council yet the Council took no notice of it By which it seems they designed their Decrees should be Oracles as well for their misterious Ambiguity as for their Authority Where then shall we find a Judge of Controversies concerning the true meaning of the Decrees of Councils If you put this in the Popes hands you give all up to him and so the Decrees of the Council shall signifie no more than he is pleased to allow them 19. When new Controversies arise among Christians to whom must they go for decision Must they rest on the Popes definition Then all the power is in his Person Or must they stay for a decision from the Council If this last be setled on then I am afraid you Romanists are in as great a hazard as we are to have your Controversies endless For ever since the Council of Constance the Popes have such mortal jealousies of Councils that the World is not like to see more of them We have seen none now above a hundred years and the very thoughts of one are laid to sleep and yet this is not for want of reason to call a Council For there be great Controversies that do very much divide you but in these you must not expect a decision As whether the Infallibility rest in the diffusive Church or in the Council or in the Pope which is a great thing to be resolved in and hot Contests have been about it It is also of great concern whether Grace be efficacious of it self or only when the Will chuses to make good use of it and about this there have been sharp disputes Great complaints are also made by men of much learning and worth in your Church against a corruption of Morals and all Political Government which approved Doctors and Casuists in your Church have publickly taught and printed with licence which deserves to be condemned by publick authority as well as confuted by private Doctors and Censured by some Civil Judicatories But for all these reasons we are not like to see another general Council in this Age. Suffer me therefore to ask you in this long interval of Councils whether there be any Infallible Judge of Controversies or not If not then all your high pretences vanish if there be one he can be no other than the Pope and if you make the Popes Infallible in the interval of Councils as there is no necessity of them since we have already an Infallible Judge so it were an inexcusable folly in the Popes to call a Council if the world acknowledge them Infallible 20. I must ask one Question more about this general Council you tell me None but Bishops have a decissive Vote in it How then shall I know when there is a general Council For the Intention of the Priest is by your Doctrines necessary to the Sacrament how then shall I know if the pretended Bishops were baptized by one that intended to do it or not And how shall I know that they received Orders from one that gave them with a right Intention And yet all this is necessary before I can acknowledge them Bishops Nor must this be known only in this one Instance though even that depending on the sacred thoughts of the Priest which are known to God alone is a thing wherein I can never hope to arrive at any certainty but I must drive up the same question through the whole succession to the very days of the Apostles for if one Link of the Chain fails the whole falls asunder Since any one that was either baptized or had orders from any who did not intend it is neither a Christian nor a Bishop by your Doctrines And all who are either baptized or ordained by one who is neither Christian nor Bishop are neither Christians nor Clergy men Here is a difficulty in my way that were all the other removed I cannot see how it can possibly be cleared 21. Having now tried your patience with some troublesome questions about your Church in general I came to be satisfied in some particulars that stick with me concerning the Pope to whom I see you must either yield an absolute Authority or be without an Infallible Judge of Controversies And let me first apply my last Question to the Pope and ask how you know that all your Popes have been Christians Priests and Bishops Since this depends on the Intention So that for ought appears to me you may acknowledge for the head of your Church one who is neither a Christian nor in Orders If then my Faith must be resolved into the Popes Authority I am sure it rests on a sandy foundation since I cannot be assured he is truly Pope And let me ask you Do you think that with any colour of reason it can be doubted that there was never an Atheistical Priest or Bishop in the Christian Church whose Intention went not along with the Sacrament I am told that in Spain many pretended Priests are discovered to be Jews and sure these when they baptise will be far from joyning their Intention with that Sacrament So here I stick in the first step and must do so still except you can help me forward
THE Infallibility OF THE CHURCH OF ROME Examined and Confuted IN A LETTER TO A Roman Priest By GILBERT BURNET LONDON Printed by M. Clark and are to be Sold by H. Brome and B. Tooke in S. Paul's Churchyard 1680. A Letter to a Priest of the Roman Church wherein the Grounds of their pretended Infallibilities are called for and examined in some Queries SIR WHatever our differences be in many points of Religion we agree in this That it is the great concern of Mankind to examin well the grounds that lead him to his belief in matters of so high a nature You always tell me That out of the true Catholick Church there is no salvation adding That this Catholick Church is the Roman though this seems to be a Bull as plainly as a general particular Indeed so severe a Certificate makes me look to my self I confess this method of dealing with me seems not so fair nor rational For if any man study to draw me into a design by telling me That as I must ingage in it all I am Master of so I must surrender up the conduct of it to others of whose honesty industry and discretion I must not doubt I presently apprehend a trappan and you will not dispute it much that he deserves to be cosened who suffers himself to be imposed upon so grosly But certainly if my soul be more valuable than my estate and if eternity be preferrable to the vanishing shadows here below then I have great reason to be strongly prejudiced against those who would oblige me to hazard my soul in a tame and blind subjection to the Dictates of any man or Society of men Reason being the only part of our Nature that was born to Liberty and can defie all the severe rigours of Tyranny You will easily believe I cannot be induced on slight grounds to forgo this dearest and most essential piece of my brother-right And believe me it was enough that the Roman Church for a Succession of some Ages was Mistris of the Crowns and Empires of her Vassals and had the dispose of the Lives and Goods of the better part of Europe This was highly severe though Conscience had been left free The Law makes my House my Sanctuary but if I stir abroad I must be at my hazard So whatever Power the Civil Magistrates or the Guides of the Church may have over my Actions or profession of my Faith yet as long as it keeps within my head and breast its natural dwelling place it is a violation of the sacredness of that Sanctuary to invade it there or make it prisoner And when I further consider that Reason is nothing but a communication of Divine Light to make me understand those Propositions of which some hints were born with my Soul and the rest are offered to me in Sacred Writings if I throw off this and betake my self to the Dictates of others I exchange the Sun for the Moon and the Day for the Twilight and renounce the liberty of the servants of God for a bondage that excludes the freedom of a thought And at least if I were to come under so heavy a yoke I must before-hand be well assured of the sacredness of the Masters of my Faith No man can be wheedled to trust himself to any of whose fidelity and good conduct he is not well assured but he that commits himself to noted and known Impostors is the object of all mens scorn He must therefore have a great opinion of his own Rhethorick and of my easiness that attempts to perswade me to subject my belief to the Verdict of a Succession of men who do not so much as pretend to high learning much less to be eminent Saints and in whom I can discern no great Characters but of Temporal Authority and high pretensions to an uncontrouled Jurisdiction and neither of these can with any reason determine my belief for one unerring Judg. But since I observe both from my own knowledg and what I hear by others that you of the Mission place your greatest strength in the Authority and Infallibility of your Church and ply every body most with it I have therefore considered this with all the application of mind I am Master of as the fundamental Article of your belief For if your Church be priviledged from error all her Decrees must certainly pass for Oracles and there is no disputing them but if she be subject to error she is the boldest Imposturess that ever appeared in the World who dares pretend to an unerring assistance in all her decisions without good ground Suffer me therefore to offer you a few Queries of which when I am satisfyingly resolved I will be brought so much nearer a belief from which as long as these difficulties lie in my way I must confess my self at a great distance 1. And first let me ask you What necessity there is of an Infallible Iudg to whose Decrees all must yield absolute obedience If you convince me this is necessary I shall without difficulty yield to you that there is such a Judicatory since I am perswaded our blessed Saviour who loved his Church so dearly as to die for her would certainly provide her with all that was necessary for her preservation But here I know you triumph in the supposed necessity of such a Judg without whom there is no preserving either Truth or Peace For if there be not a Court to whose Award all must stand then every man is at liberty to believe as he will and there is no end of errors Which appears plainly in the Churches that have thrown oft the Roman Authority but are subdivided into many fractions which are the natural results of their opinions for if every man must search the Scriptures and believe what he thinks is the sense of them then according to the variety of mens complexions educations or inclinations there shall be a numberless variety of opinions And if none have authority over the perswasions of others they cannot be blamed much less condemned for their opinions This seems such an inconvenience that the Church must be in a very bad condition if there be no remedy for it This Sir I suppose is in short the strength of all you will alledge on this head but all this does not prevail with me to acknowledge an Infallible Iudicatory for to live well is the chief end of Religion and to think and believe aright is a necessary mean for that end from which I infer That if there be no necessity of an Infallible Power to make men live well neither is there any for making us think aright and certainly vice and immorality is as opposite to the designs of the Gospel as error now it is confessed there are no certain and infallible ways of restraining vice And if it must needs be a defect in the Constitution of the Church if there be no infallible means to restrain error what must I conclude if there be no infallible restraint
must adore his person and submit to his Decrees And if there be not some strange charm in his Chair I cannot force on my self a belief of his being inspired How then I must be directed to find this infallible Umpire of all differences If you send me to a Succession you give me a hard task to labour in and when I have found it it is no more but what all must allow to be in the Greek Church And I cannot see any thing in the Scriptures of the Bishops of Rome so I am at a loss for want of some good directions and clear characters of this Infallible Iudge 4. My fourth question is In what person or persons of the Roman Church this Infallibility doth rest If you tell me in a Council then I must ask you Where this Council is to be found for all your arguments perswade the necessity of a living speaking Judg therefore I would gladly be satisfied in what City or corner of the World this Council sits for if you send me to the Decrees of the Councils this overthrows all your own grounds from which you plead against the Authority of the Scriptures and if I go to any Writings why not to the Scriptures rather than the Decrees of Councils for every one that has compared them will find a plain simplicity in the one and much of the subtlety of Metaphysicks and the nicety of School terms in the other 5. My fifth Question is What grounds there are for believing this supposed Infallibility tied to the collective Body of the Church and that it is not rather spread over the whole diffusive Body of the Christian World For if the Church be only infallible when gathered in a Council then as there was no Infallibility in the Church for three Ages so it was afterwards subject to the pleasure of the Emperors who called Councils when they would and is now wholly in the Popes hands And as it was in the power of the Emperor so it is now in the Popes to suppress this infallible Authority which is thus subject to outward accidents and must live or die at the pleasure of the Popes and Emperors And indeed the Popes have taken up such jealousies of general Councils that the World is not like to be troubled with more of them 6. If this Infallibility be spread among all Christians I am not a whit nearer the resolution I desire for when they differ in so many opinions how shall I know which of them are in the right must I travel all the Christian World over to examine of which side the greatest number is This is our endless labour therefore I must have a shorter way to work 7. Who of all the Societies of Christians must have the interest to meet and give vote in a Council must all the Lays be excluded and only the Clergy be admitted I must tell you I see no reason for throwing out the Laity You know the Epistles wherein St. Paul gives the Rules for the Order and Government of the Churches are directed to all the Saints and faithful in the Churches by which it seems they were to have an interest in the Government as well as their Pastors We are sure among the Jews the Sanhedrim that judged in all things Civil and Ecclesiastical was not only made up of Priests and that the High-Priest himself was no Member of it by his Office unless he were chosen to be of the number nor can I find any thing in the New Testament that excludes the Laity On the contrary the Promises of the Holy Ghost are made to all that believe without exception and all Christians are called a Royal Priesthood and in the first Council at Ierusalem the Brethren concur'd in the Decision and Synodal Epistle with the Apostles and Elders 8. Supposing none but these in Orders be admitted to a General Council then what interest must they have there shall all be alike or must the Bishops only have a Suffrage You must give good authority for this before all must submit to it It is not determined in Scriptures in the Council of Ierusalem the Presbyters had a Suffrage so it continued in the first Ages of the Church We find the Presbyters subscribing in many Provincial and National Councils Why must they be allowed there and excluded in a General Council it being only an Assembly of all National Councils But if Bishops only must vote in Councils by what warrant do Cardinals as such vote in your General Councils since as Cardinals they are only the Presbyters and Deacons of Rome Abbots also though but Priests get a Vote in the Western Councils for as Abbots they cannot pretend to a Divine Character or institution and if as Priests they vote in your Councils why are not all Priests allowed the same privilege 9. How shall I be assured a Council thus constituted is infallible especially if I see or be told by the Historians of both sides that all things are managed in this Council by factious Parties and intrigues each Party studying to wait opportunities when they may carry a Vote and bringing all of their faction to the Council This was plainly the case at Trent as even Pallavicini represents it And you will hardly prevail on any who has considered a little what the direction of the Holy Ghost is to make him believe that in a packt Meeting where all is full of cunning and design the Holy Ghost must be ever ready to direct them when they go to the Vote and that this shall only be when the Bishops are in their Formalities at a Session and not in a Congregation which is the Council resolved in a Grand Committee I know Sir our House of Commons understands this distinction but what grounds have you to pretend to it where all are acted by an infallible direction 10. Whether must the whole Council agree in a Decision or the major part determine I know you choose the latter but it is not easie to make any body hope that the greater part of any Assembly must be the better and wiser part since we see it is most commonly otherwise I know this must be the rule in a Court that determines any thing by equal Suffrages but if a Jury must all agree in the disposal of my life it were but reason that all should also agree in the determining my faith which upon the matter is the disposal of my soul. And I know no reason to believe the Holy Ghost will certainly assist the major part more than that he will assist every person that is allowed a Suffrage in the Council 11. How shall I know what is a General Council what not for I find great numbers of Bishops have run together and flatly contradicted one another The Nicene Council decreed the Son was of the same substance with the Father this was rejected by many other Councils some decreeing he was of a like substance with the Father others that he was of a
of them is infallible 27. Is the Pope infallible in all he says or onely when he gives out of his Chair his Decision of Controversies I know you choose the latter but then let me ask you what is necessary to put him in his Chair Must the Cardinals concur then you share the Infallibility among them without any colours either from Scripture or Antiquity Nor do I believe your Popes will allow this in their Decisions what ever they may do in the Political Government of the Ecclesiastical State By what means therefore shall I be assured the Pope speaks from his Chair that so I may acknowledg him infallible and if in any thing I must submit to his sentence then most especially when he according to the Decree of a Council takes care to publish a Bible which must be by all Christians submitted to as the Rule of Faith and set up as the Standard by which all other Translations Copies nay and the Originals of the Hebrew and Greek are to be compared This is a weighty and considerable business as any can be and yet we have seen Sixtus the Fifth publish a Bible with all the assurances could be that it was an authentical and true Edition requiring all Christians to receive it as the Rule of their Faith but upon this he dies and his Successor Clement the Eighth gives the World another Edition of the Bible and imposes it with the same Authority Sixtus did and took all care to suppress the Copies of the former Edition yet some escaped his industry The difference of those two Editions is such that the Catalogue of them makes up a Book and any that has compared them will find that in many places the whole sense is varied in these Editions This is as clear an evidence as may be that the Chair cannot make them infallible who do so flatly contradict one another and that in a matter of so high and so general concern 28. What reason have I to believe the Bishops of Rome infallible or that they have an absolute Jurisdiction over Christendom since I can find no traces of this in the beginning of Christianity though the defining it was then of great necessity I find the Apostles all acting by an equal Commission as indeed it must be where all were inspired with infallible Illumination And why must I think that St. Peter left none of this Infallibility at Antioch or Alexandria but brought it all entire with him to Rome And why was he so sullen as not to name his Successor when our Saviour shewed him that he was to put off his Tabernacle shortly Certainly it is hard to imagine that when he was writing his second Epistle as his last Will and Testament that though he had concealed till then who must succeed him he should not then have named him I deny not but the Faith of the Roman Church was spoken of throughout the whole World and that a Series of blessed and glorious Martyrs governed that See yet even then what ever reverence the eminence of the Imperial City and their own more eminent qualities procured them the absolute submitting all things to their Decision was not thought of It is true the Fathers gloried much in the first Founders of that See and in the worthy succession derived down from them but thought of nothing less then subjecting Christendom to their Authority Nor did the other Patriarchs pay any homage or subjection to them but still pleaded an equality of Jurisdiction yielding them nothing but a bare precedence It is a thing I will not here attempt to shew by what steps that See did degenerate from its first purity nor how it mounted to that height of Authority in which it glories at present but any who is acquainted with the Histories and Writings of the first six Ages must needs confess that the Scene of the Church is quite altered from what it was then in this obedience which the World does now pay the Bishops of Rome 29. What reverence can I pay a Succession of men who have plainly trampled on all Laws Divine and Humane Who have pretended to an absolute Temporal Power who have deposed as well as excommunicated Emperours Kings and other Princes who have animated their Subjects to rebel against them who have set on their neighbouring Princes to invade their Dominions which they had rent by Civil Wars and Rebellions and did for a Succession of many Ages fill Christendom with war and cover it with blood Nor are these excesses to be onely charged on some particular Popes as their personal faults but they founding them on a pretence to an absolute Temporal Authority to which they laid claim either they erred in that Decision or not if they erred then they are not infallible if they erred not then though the Reformation has made them a little more cautious yet still they are vested with the same power and all these Decretals of Pope Gregory the Seventh are still in force so that the Princes of Cristendome are at the Popes mercy for their Crowns and Dominions and are more obliged to the Reformation than they apprehend or acknowledg for the peaceable possession of their rights But it is apparent the Popes still retain the same high thoughts and onely wait an opportunity of executing them as appear'd from the attempts of Pope Paul the Fifth on the State of Venice 30. In the interval of the Sede vacante who is Head of the Church Is it a dead body without a head or is it a Monster of many heads Does the Authority li edivided among the Cardinals or have they none at all You know the Conclave have been sometimes very tedious in their Elections the last continued divers months and others have been shut up much longer pray then satisfie me who has the Supreme Power of the Church all that while If you vest the Cardinals with it then you set up a Presbytery to govern the Church For the Cardinals as such are the Presbyters of Rome and thus before we are aware Geneve is translated to Rome and the Scottish Presbytery culminates in the Vatican and governs the whole World 31. If after these difficulties about the Authority of Pope and Council you tell me the Infallibility of the Church rests in the whole body and is to be taken from the universally received Opinions then what had become of me if I had lived when the whole World was become Arrian and Athanasius alone withstood the stream Certainly I must have run with the Current and may be should not have known what to have answered those who should have asked me Where was your Faith before Alexander and Athanasius 32. But upon the whole matter how shall I know what is either decreed by Councils or Popes or received by the body of Christians It is not to be expected I can go over the World to examine the belief of all Christians Nor can I examine all the Canons and Decrees of Councils much less all the Popes Decretals Into what therefore must I resolve my Faith You tell me a living speaking Judge is necessary but such a one is not to be had in every part of the World therefore I must languish under great and constant uncertainties otherwise I must resolve my faith into the Testimony of my Priest and Confessor And thus all these pompous high sounding expressions of the Infallible Catholick Church do at length dwindle into this that every one of your Communion must in all things believe what their Priest tells them without inquiry And in what a perplexity must they be when one Priest assures them one Opinion is the Doctrine of the Church another tells them the plain contrary is the Doctrine of the Church And this has fallen out in not a few cases betwixt the Molinists and Iansenists So that upon the whole I cannot see how private persons can be satisfied what is the belief of the Church And now Sir after I have led you through a great many Thickets and Inclosures I am afraid I leave you in a labyrinth out of which I protest I cannot help you but by advising you to break through or leap over these banks and hedges within which you have intangled your self And therefore you must forgive me if I cannot follow you unless I see you furnished with some thread to lead you out of that intricate Maze of difficulties that must follow on your Opinions in these particulars And I choose rather than ingage in so dangerous a passage to take the sacred Writings which you and I both acknowledge to be divine and peruse them with all serious care hoping that God will so direct me that if I be not wanting to my self I shall not err in any matter of salvation You will find I have treated these Opinions I have considered with all possible fairness and modesty of Stile and indeed the sad prospect I have of Christendom which is abused by such colours into so many and great mistakes raises in me thoughts full of pity and commiseration and not of insulting and scorn If you send me any return to this I shall expect the like fair dealing from you and if you give me satisfying answers to these difficulties you shall find that you deal with one over whom reason hath more Power than either Education Humour or Interest And so I bid you farewell FINIS Errata Page 1. line 3. read Infallibility pag. 2. l. 6. birth right pag. 3. l. 9. for one r. an pag. 6. l. 3. for derided r. decried pag. 9. l. 6. for then r. their pag. 12. l. 13. for means r. meanness l. 17. r. Westward l. 19. r. Priests p. 24. l. 8. for sacred r. secret l. 25. r. come