valid as the intention of the Priest makes the Sacrament Some other of the same Order have given dispensations for the breach of the Moral Law * Theol. mor. to 1. l. 7 c. 20. n. 281 c. Escobar says positively virtute bullae potest votum non peccandi mutari i. e. that a man may break his Vow of not sinning by virtue of a Bull and he instances in the committing of Fornication he †Tr. 7. ex 4. n. 118. also says That a man may Lye even to his Confessor that a man may promise a general Confession and yet not confess all his mortal sins quia quamvis mentiatur id tamen parum refert ad Confessarii judicium i. e. for tho he Lye yet that hath little or no relation to the Judgment of his Confessor Now to these proofs probably you will object that this is not the Opinion of the Church but of private men to which I answer that had it not been the Opinion of your Church when those Books were written such men would never have been allowed to be Confessors which no man can be unless by the allowance of the Pope the Bishop of the Diocess c. though it is well known that the Jesuits then were and still are as Eminent for being Confessors as any other Order in your Communion and perhaps more and this notwithstanding their owning these damnable Doctrines as both you and I agree to call them Nor is it enough to say that the Book of Escobar after having been 39 times printed for an excellent Book which is an argument it was much bought and much valued was the 40th time printed only to be censured and condemn'd by the French Bishops which the poor Jansenists lookt upon to have been a condemnation both of the Author and his Opinions whereas they found at last to their cost that themselves were censured at Rome as the criminals nor that the present Pope being more wise and moderate than some of his Predecessors hath condemnd those Doctrines which vindicates us that we have not unjustly charg'd the men of your Church with such Doctrines among which propositions if you consult the 26 and 27 it is asserted That a man may either being askt or of his own accord say and swear that he did not do a thing which he really did and yet by vertue of a secret meaning be neither a lyar nor perjured And that this he may do as often as it is necessary or profitable to save his Body Honour or Estate or for any other good end For this is to acknowledge that your Church for a long time heretofore conniv'd at or allow'd of the breach of plain moral commandments since the man in authority that doth not prohibit the sin that he may hinder seems to injoyn it I also observe 1. That according to your Opinion whatever the Pope and Cardinals or other Bishops do either allow or condemn is not binding as to the Faith since the infallibility is lodg'd no where but in a general Council 2. If we look into the Censure there is nothing relating to the breach of Oaths given to Princes which is the highest trust in temporal matters and withal that the propositions are not condemn'd as contrary to the Laws of God and Nature as assertions that promote impiety and injustice but ut minimum tanquam scandalosas praxi perniciosas which is the manner of expression that Alexander 7. makes use of in his censure An. 1665. as at least scandalous and pernicious to practice and therefore to be condemn'd which whether this doth not look like a trick and juggle because you have encouraged me to use the word you your self shall be the judge for notwithstanding this censure whenever the scandal ceases which no one knows how soon that may be and they are judg'd no longer pernicious the propositions may be again owned and maintained 3. It is moreover observable that whereas former Popes have allowed these Tenents and Practices without condemning them who knows but the Successors of the present Pope may when they please licence anew the propositions which are now condemn'd 4. That some such thing hath been formerly done your * Ch. 26. m. p. 90. Adversary hath given you an instance which you did not think fit to meddle with nor to reflect upon out of Archbishop Abbot's †P. 11. Preface to his six Lectures where you will find that Pius 5. the same Pope who authoriz'd the Trent-Catechism gave his resolution to some of the English Missionaries that whenever any of them were called before a judge in England he might either refuse the Oath or Swear and answer sophistically potest Catholicus tractus coram haereticis vel recusare juramentum quod est prudentius vel sophisticè jurare sophisticè respondere suis interrogationibus And if you look into the Book called Foxes and Firebrands you will see there that Heath the Jesuit had a Bull with him dated An. 1. of the same Pius 5. allowing him to preach what Doctrine the Society of the Jesuits should order him for the dividing of the Protestants and not to instance in the dispensation given by Eugenius 4. and his Legate Card. Julian to Ladislaus King of Hungary to break his League with the Grand Signior for which he was so severely punisht in the unfortunate Battel of Varna and some other such examples the Examination of Mr. Garnet is a very plain proof of this our assertion for though some men call these little arts equivocation and mental reservation as if they were small or no sins yet you fairly and honestly condemn both alike and I know few wise and good men but look upon both as alike sinful and perhaps the equivocation the more so because the design is more cunningly laid to deceive And now I am talking of the Jesuits I think fit to mind you that whereas you seem to say * Pap. misrepre p. 69 70. that it is a scandal upon your Church to affirm that 't is more lawful to be drunk on a Fasting day than to eat flesh I have met with a Casuist †Escobar tr 1. ex 13. n. 74 75. of your commumunion who will not allow a man to eat Flesh on a Fasting day but as to drink gives great indulgence when he says that a man may drink Wine even in great quantity and if he happen to be drunk immoderatio potest temperantiam violare sed non jejun ium He may transgress the Laws of Temperance but he does not transgress the Laws of Fasting After this I will not decide the controversy between your Adversary and your self whether the story of S. Perpetua's Vision be seriously related or droll'd on who pay a great veneration to all Antient writings and can hardly think that a Martyr in view of an Eternal Crown of happiness would indulge to any thing that is light or deserves to be exposed but I have some things to
Christendom did allow of Henry the Eighth's Divorce from his first Wife which the Pope and perhaps you would not allow to be lawful but withal the two most famous Vniversities of England which to us are equivalent to all those in France and the most famous Monasteries of the Kingdom when this Question was propos'd to them An aliquid Autoritatis in hoc regno Angliae Pont. Romano de jure competat plusquam alii cuicunque Episcopo extero Whether the Pope had any lawful power in this Kingdom more than any other forreign Prelate The Answer was generally return'd in the Negative Besides who knows not that the generality of men speak as their hopes of Preferment lead them and that there was a great truth in that Observation of Aeneas Sylvius That many men wrote in vindication of the Pope's Authority and few for the Authority of a Council because a Council gave no Dignities nor Benefices but the Pope did And I should be glad to see the present French Clergy deal with the present Pope when he meddles out of his Sphere with the Crowns of Princes as their Predecessors did with Gregory the Fourth who under the pretext of being a Mediator between the Emperour Lewis the Debonaire and his Sons promoted the Rebellion and was suspected to come with a designe to excommunicate the Emperour and his Bishops for they protested †Ant. Anon vit Ludovici Pii Si excommunicaturus ad veniret excommunicatus abiret i. e. That if the Pope came to excommunicate them they would excommunicate him for acting contrary to the Authority of the ancient Canons And at last we have Advice given us * Nouvel de la rep de Lettres An. 1685. p. 716 c. That June 26. An. 1683. at Clermont in Auvergne the Jesuits publickly maintain'd four Theses in opposition to the decision of the French Clergy An. 1682. 1. That although they call their Theses Explanations of the Doctrine of the Gallican Church the first Article of the Decree did not diminish the special Authority of the Church over Kings and Princes Christian 2. That the second Article was not intended to weaken the Monarchick Primacy of the Pope over the Church 3. That by the third Article they intended not to take from the Pope the Soveraign Power of dispensing with Canons c. 4. That by the fourth Article they intended not to deprive the Pope of all Infallibility in matters of Faith Which Theses as far as I know yet pass uncensured And the Jansenist who goes under the name of René Clerc Tonsuré à l'Archevesque de Paris in his System of the Theology of the Gallican Church extracted from their Memoires proves that the French Bishops are not such Friends to Crowned heads as they would appear to be and that they take the Power from the Pope onely to place it in themselves affirming That the French King cannot be judged by a Council except the French Bishops be there implying that then he may be judged as if the last resort were to them and that the Declarations of the Pope against their King ought not to be obeyed till the Kingdom consent thereunto so that if the Kingdom consent the Deposition is lawful with other such Positions And the same Author affirms That whereas some English Gentlemen Decemb. 1. An. 1679. addressing themselves to some Doctors of the Sorbon had inclined them to decide for the lawfulness of our Oath of Allegiance the Archbishop of Paris sent to them that it was the King's pleasure they should not decide it which makes it plain that the Allegiance of the French Church is founded on the Catholick Religion and that an Heretical Prince hath not the same Right with the most Christian And though since that time †V. Caus Valesian append 6. the Sorbon An. 1686. hath given its approbation of the Oath of Allegiance with the word Heretical in it yet this is onely an honest acknowledgement of the Rights of Princes by one Colledge of learned men while in the same year the Jesuits at Gaunt in their Provincial Congregation expresly condemn'd the taking of the said Oath And who knows but the Sorbonists of the next Age may do as their Predecessors of the last did in the time of the League contradict all that hath lately been asserted Nor does the Condemnation signifie any thing in your sence since even a General Council cannot define any thing to be heretical unless it be de fide and the belief required under the penalty of an Anathema and when all this is done if the matter be of Discipline or Government you profess you may safely refuse to obey the Council To which Observation I will adde one Remark more That though Monsieur * Apologie pour là Clergie Arnald hath written in vindication of the French Church that they never owned the Deposing Doctrine yet if he be the Author of the Jesuits Morals for though Monsieur Paschal his Nephew have the honour of the Book yet all men be lieve that Arnald had a great hand in the contriving it he hath not dealt so ingenuously in this case as he might for when he quotes so many Passages out of the Moralists of the Society what liberty they give to violate Sacraments or Oaths to Lye and Equivocate and to break all Trusts Vows and Promises he never so much as touches on the many palpable Propositions in their Books which encourage and allow of the breach of Allegiance to Princes I have little more to subjoyn but this That whereas you appeal to the Council of Trent for the Faith of your Church I have observed in that Council some things how cunningly soever the Decrees were contrived and how warily soever they were penn'd which seem not to accord so well with your Catholick Principles For instance 1. †Sess 22. de Sacrif miss can 6. The Council says Si quis dixerit c. If any man shall say that the Canon of the Mass contains any Errours in it let him be Anathema And in another place * cap. 4. the Mass is said to be free from all Errour Now if it be so I suppose some of your Doctrines must fall to the ground being confuted by your Mass As 1. The Doctrine of Transubstantiation for after the Consecration the Priest calls the Sacrament Bread and Wine Offerimus panem sanctem vitae aeternae calicem salutis perpetuae And afterward desires God to look down upon it as he did on the Sacrifices of Abel Abraham and Melchizedeck And prays That those things might be carried by the hands of the holy Angels of God into Heaven For how are these Expressions suited to Christ's Corporeal Presence 2. All the Prayers of the Mass relate to a Communion and so are a consutation of private Mass and yet the Priest in a private Mass when no one but himself receives says Vt quotquot ex hâc altaris c. That as many of us
Government till the Popes began to assert their Authority in opposition to general Councils And whereas * Refl p. 6. you say that your Adversary wrongs you and imposes upon his Reader by saying that you give your private sense and Opinion only of the Articles of your Religion contrary to the Bull of Pius 4. pleading in your own behalf that you expound the Canons of the Trent Council according to the Catechism set forth by the order of the Council and the Pope as if both of them allowed of it I must say that this cannot be for the Council never saw the Catechism and consequently could never approve that they never saw unless they also were bound to exercise an implicite Faith for though they ordered a * Sess 18. Sess 25. Catechism to be publisht having observ'd how much the Protestants prevailed against their Church by their constant Catechizing they left it wholly to the Pope to see it done and to give it authority and this the Author of the Prolegomena to the Paris Edition of that Catechism An. 1671. fairly acknowledges * Proleg 2. 3. affirming that after the dissolution of the Council An. 1563. several Fathers were summon'd to Rome to make this Catechism among whom the principal man was S. Barromée as you call him Archbishop of Millan we are also told that Cardinal Seripandus made the explanation of that Article one holy Catholick Church Michael Medina of another c. and that after it was finisht it was An. 1566. offered to Pope Pius 5. for his approbation who committed the examination of it to Cardinal Sirlet who taking to himself the assistance of other learned men examined both the matter and language of it after which the Pope gave his approbation and ordered it to be printed by Paulus Manutius confirming it by his Bulls And Possevine tells us that Gregory the 13. made this Catechism the rule by which he reformed the Canon Law so that if Refl p. 6. you interpret the Canons of the Council by the Catechism then the Canons depend upon the Catechism for their meaning and the sense of the Catechism upon the Pope who gave it suthority by which deduction it appears that your Rengion is still built not on the Council but on the Pope and perhaps it was for this reason that the Italian Bishops in their Synods as do the Synods of Roven and Aix in France call it not the Trent but the Roman Catechism for in truth so it is Against all which I know only this to be objected that the same men that made the Canons made the Catechism which is hardly true as to every particular person but to that I answer that I believe you will not averr that the same men have the same assistances in a Council and out of it so that were the assertion true yet the one being done in Council had the assistance of the Blessed Spirit as you hold to assist the Compilers which I presume you will not say that the same men had when out of the Council And if this be so then does not this make the Pope judge of Controversies of Faith For say you the Church must interpret Scripture and interpret Articles of Faith declared in Councils which Church must either be the Church Representative or the Pope now to hope for a general Council upon every emergent dispute in matters of Faith is a vain exspectation and if so you will do well to show us any other judge in such cases but the Pope unless every particular Church must judge for it self or every private person be his own director and then where is the interpretation of the Church Catholick Now if the Pope be the Judge how know we but the next Pope may require the belief of the Deposing Doctrine and expound the passages of former Councils that look that way as Articles of Faith what would you do in that case especially if the generality of the Ecclesiasticks should side with him as they did in the case of the Emperour Henry 4. and of our King John and in their Synods declare for the Ecclesiastical Monarchy and upon this supposition how know we but that although the present Pope hath confirm'd the Bishop of Condom's Book another Pope may condemn his mincing the Articles of Faith for we do not want Instances of Popes who have rescinded not only one anothers Acts and Ordinations but one anothers Decrees even in what they have called matters of Faith although I must confess what is very observable that though very many Popes have asserted the Ecclesiastical Power over Princes and their Right of Deposing them we never read of one of them that condemned the Doctrine You further say * Refl p. 7. that though the Trent Council mention the Aid and Assistance of the Saints and Angels over and above their Prayers yet it means no other Aid but that of their Prayers which seem to me not so agreeable to the words of the Council †Sess 25. which are That it is good and useful ad sanctorum orationes opem auxiliumque confugere to fly to their Prayers Aid and Assistance Now I cannot believe that the Fathers of that Council would have explain'd a particular act by two more general words nor when they had mention'd in particular Prayers would they I believe have afterward inserted in general their Aid and Assistances unless the Aid and Assistances were distinct from their Intercession and this is agreeable to your allowed Prayers in your Missal where you beg God * Dec. 6. in fest S. Nicol. ut ejus meritis precibus c. that by the merits and prayers of St. Nicolas you may be deliver'd from the flames of Hell And again †Jul. 6. Octav. SS Petri Pauli That by the merits of St. Peter and St. Paul you may attain the glories of Eternity where the Merits and Intercessions of the Saints are manifestly distinguisht as they are also in the Trent-Catechism * Part. 3. praecept 1. n. 24. where in the Margin there is this Note The Saints help us with their Merits and in the body of the Catechism these They always pray for the happiness of men and God confers many benefits upon us eorum merito gratiâ for their merits and sake and truly were we assured that the Guardian Angels could hear us I see no reason why we should scruple any more to pray them to protect us against the Devil and all other Enemies that may hurt us than to beg them to intercede for us to God and this also is agreeable to the Catechism †Vbi supr n. 18. Your next Reflection * p. 8. is about the merit of good works and your self and adversary are agreed that Can. 32. Sess 6. of the Council of Trent there is no mention of the qualification of Merit with respect to dependance on God's grace goodness and promises but both in
IMPRIMATUR Z. Isham R. P. D. Henrico Episc Lond. a Sacris April 6. 1686. REMARKS UPON THE REFLECTIONS Of the Author of Popery Misrepresented c. ON HIS ANSWERER Particularly as to the Deposing Doctrine In a Letter to the AUTHOR of the Reflections Together with some few Animadversions on the same Author's Vindication of his Reflections LONDON Printed for Sam. Smith at the Prince's Arms in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1686. SIR IT is not any distrust of the Abilities of your former Adversary which have sufficiently made him known nor an overweening Opinion of my own undertaking that hath engaged me in this Controversie but a design to serve the Interests of Truth and to assure you that you have not yet convinc't the World that your Character of your Religion as you represent it is so just and exact or your Reasonings so cogent but there is something perhaps material and of weight to be objected to both and I shall follow the Method that * Refl p. 1. you profess to like to reason as closely as I can with all moderation and calmness without making any Reflections but such as cannot be avoided when I treat of some Subjects among which I dare undertake none shall personally concern you tho you will allow me to tell you you have not so carefully followed your own praescriptions when you impeach our †Refl p. 2. Church in general reckoning her Books of Homilies among those Books that have misrepresented Popery and in particular charge your learned and modest Adversary with the * P. 3 4 18. same crime and too liberally bestow your Characters on him charging him †Refl p. 6. with wronging you and imposing upon his Reader with * P. 16 17 18. Sophistry with understanding neither Law nor Logick and with being insincere and using tricks but probably the Answer hath made you angry and men in a passion cannot forbear hard Language I do acknowledge that it is severe dealing to pick up all the extravagant passages in private Authors and to father them on the whole Church no Church of whatever denomination being without both evil men as to their Morals and opinionative men as to their Tenets but withal I must say that it is one thing to cite Quotations from all sorts of Authors and another thing to cite Men of Eminence and Authority in your Church and such whose Station Learning and Repute were as great as ever the Bishop of Condom's or Monsieur Veron's whom yet you rely upon as you also sometimes quote other men of your Communion to confirm your Opinions whose Books also have come into the World with Licence and Priviledge and Commendations of the Authors and whose Assertions have never been condemned after they have been publisht and some of them probably Members of that very Trent-Councel which you stick to for the Articles of your Faith and in matters of fact which cannot be forreign to the Controversies between your Church and ours there is a necessity of having recourse to such Writers as I shall be often forc't to do in these Remarks And that I may consider every thing methodically that belongs to this Topick I cannot but observe your * Refl p. 13 14. Reflections on the Opinions of some Eminent men in our Communion which say you we are unwilling to have charg'd upon our Church For the first which you charge on your Antagonist That good works of justified persons are not free I must say that either I misunderstand your Adversary or you do misrepresent him for when †Ch. 6. p. 43. Ed. 3. he says That what we pretend to merit by must be our own free act for these are his words and not as you quote them citing for it the Authority of the Jesuit Coster's Enchiridion and adds That therefore the works of justified persons cannot be said to be their own free acts because the power of doing them depends upon Divine assistance and being done by the power of God's grace which could never have been done without it cannot be for that reason truly meritorious he is so far from giving an account of the Doctrine of our Church that he proves from the principles of your own that if good works be done only by the Grace of God and made acceptable only through the merits of Christ they cannot be truly said to be meritorious because not the free acts of them that do them When Mr. Thorndyke allows of prayers for the Dead though you quote no Book of his for that Assertion he does no more than in some sense our Church allows when it prays for a joyful Resurrection in her Office at Funerals and whatever the good man might add else of his own was but his private Opinion as is also his notion that the Eucharistical Sacrifice is truly the Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross propitiatory and impetratory as well as the other which I take upon your credit not having the Book by me out of which you cite the Opinion however we assert that Mr. Thornayke never owned Prayers for the Dead as you do but in the sense of some of the Antients for he denied Purgatory upon which you ground your Prayers for the Dead and that our Blessed Saviour is really present in the Sacrament is the Doctrine and Belief of the Church of England and did not you limit that Real Presence to Transubstantiation there would be no difference between you and us in that point I cannot but observe your disingenuous manner of treating the Author of Jovian in charging him with a disloyal principle who hath given as many Instances of his Loyalty in the most difficult times as any man of his station and were there no other the writing of that excellent Treatise in that critical juncture is an undeniable evidence of it when by defending the Succession and the Doctrine of Non-resistance he acquired the ill will and displeasure of all the disloyal Party Why did not you nor any other of the English Roman Catholicks write then in the defence of those Doctrines against the disloyal and rebellious Doctrines of Julian The Press was open for you and perhaps there was reason for your not answering of them * Praefat. Billarm ante tractat de potestate summi Pont. adversus G. Barclay because the generality of the Writers of your Church agree with that Author in his principles of disloyalty Well but you have found out one disloyal principle in Jovian but are you sure of it It is not your saying It is a disloyal principle that makes it to be so and therefore I must desire you and those that perhaps are misled by you to read the Book from p. 139. to p. 152. out of which you have cited the passage and then you will find it to be such a disloyal principle Theod. on Rom. 13.1 as will not allow any Christian subject 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to pray for the death of a Nero
Dioclesian though he set up Inscriptions ob deletum nomen Christianum Constantius or Valens but only for a Julian whose Apostasie and Wickedness is fingular in Ecclesiastical History and the like of whom in all probability can never be expected again Nay Sir this disloyal principle will not let Christian snbjects pray for the death of a Julian though he tyranizes never so much over their bodies goods and liberties if he do not blaspheme Christ and persecute the Church of God with a diabolical spite against the evidence of Divine Miracles It leaves the Christian subjects of all Tyrants but such as are Julians indeed under the obligation of praying for them according to the Apostle's direction and the practice of the Primitive Christians which the Author of Jovian hath so much insisted upon and commended and his Prince must be a Julian indeed a Julian in all circumstances before he can be so much as tempted to pray against him for he doth not say that he would pray but that he should be tempted to pray for the destruction of a Julian indeed And it had been happy for the Christian world if the chief Pastors and Bishops and Councils and Doctors and Casuists of that which you call the Catholick Church had never taught any principle more disloyal than this Now Sir I beseech you to tell me how much disloyalty there is in this principle which secures all Infidel Heretical and Apostate Princes against the Prayers of their Christian subjects unless they be in all degrees as bad as Julian and secures even Julians themselves against all resistance and how much disloyalty there is in a man who by his principles will pray for all Tyrants but such an one as Julian was according to the Author of Jovian Sir I would to God you and your Doctors would declare as much Loyalty as this and I desire you to tell me that suppose a Roman Catholick Prince should become a Julian indeed and take up the methods of that Apostate whether you think his Roman Catholick Subjects would be tempted to pray for his destruction and if they should do so and no more do you think they would transgress any rule of Christian Loyalty Answer me these two questions sincerely and possitively and if your answer to the last be affirmative give your arguments for your Opinion and I dare engage the Author of Jovian shall submit to your reasons or answer them For I am confident he hath no fondness for his Opinion to which it is evident he was led by his great Charity for the Bishop and Church of Nazianzum And though in apologizing for them he hath asserted that he should be tempted to pray for the destruction of a Julian indeed yet he is so Loyal a Person that I believe he would overcome the temptation and only forbear praying for him as having sinned the sin unto death After which Apology you will suffer me to tell you that your Reflections will hardly be called an answer to the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome because in them you have not said a word to some material points of Controversy between you and us stated in that Book out of the Trent-Council and Catechism as if either the right were on your Adversaries side which I suppose you will be loath to acknowledge or his reasonings were unworthy your second thoughts which I suppose you will not own and if you do few wise men will acquiesce in your Sentiments for you wholly praetermit reflecting upon the Chapters of the Eucharist of Indulgences of satisfaction ex condigno of keeping the Scriptures and Prayers in an unknown Tongue of communion in one kind and of adding the Apocrypha and traditions to the holy writ with some others which being some of the most material points in difference between your Church and ours will either deserve some new thoughts or you will allow us to say that that book cannot be thought an answer which in silence passes by or leaps over so many weighty things that make up so much of the Controversy You assure us * Refl p. 5. that the Council of Trent is received here and all the Catholick World over as to its definitions of Faith though it be not wholly received in some places as to its other decrees which relate only to discipline Where I shall not ask what you mean by the Catholick World for I am well assured that you mean all Christians of the Roman persuasion which is a very narrow notion of the Catholick World excluding all other Christians from being Members of the Catholick Church but those of your own Opinion so that neither the Greek Church nor the rest of the Eastern Christians are in your sense any more Catholicks than the Church of England and the rest of the Protestants though antiently any man or Church of men were called Catholick because they agreed with the whole Catholick Church in Faith but now the holy Catholick Church of Christ must lose its name if it agree not with the particular Church of Rome but I would willingly know of you whence any particular Church hath that power that it may receive a general Council as you call that of Trent in some things and not in others I thought that the highest authority of the Church on Earth had been a general Council and if so why its definitions in matters of discipline should not be received and observed by all particular Churches is to me a great question for I cannot but see that one of these two things must follow from your Opinion either that Councils and Popes are fallible for if they are deceived in one Opinion such as that of the power of the Church to depose Princes why may they not be deceived in another such as Transubstantiation or Purgatory or else that they are infallible in greater matters only and then to me it is a great wonder that they should erre in things of less moment and I never yet understood but that if general Councils could decide matters of Doctrine but that they had also as great a power in matters of discipline for if it be a lawful preface to the decrees of all Councils as your men say Visum est spiritui sancto nobis then the holy spirit is doubtless their guide in matters of discipline as well as in matters of Doctrine I am sure that the Antient Councils took upon them to decide both by their authority and all Christians thought themselves oblig'd to follow their dictates so the first general Council of the Apostles bound up all Christians from eating things strangled and Blood so the Council of Nice determin'd the precise day when Easter should be celebrated as well as the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father and so also the second general Council made Constantinople a Patriarchate as well as Rome to go no further And I find no persons disputed those constitutions though only in matters of Discipline and
as the Maxim faith Lex currit cum praxi this is very plain from the usages of the generality of people in your Church And I am sure to confirm this your way of arguing that I have somewhere read though I cannot now readily light on the place that Scribanius affirms that Adoration of Saints and Images is very lawful because Abraham bowed down to the Children of Heth Gen. 23.7 Surrexit Abraham adoravit populum terrae filios viz. Heth. As it is in the Vulgar Latine And if I must not judge of any man's Idolatry by his outward actions which is your exception then I can never know any man to be an Idolater for a Heathen may fall down before one of his Idols and call upon it for help and yet say that his intention is just and that he only meant thereby to worship the True God which is the excuse made by the men of your Church After this * Refl p. 16. you compare the Power of the Pope to that of Civil Powers as to the Obedience due to them from their Subjects but pray deal candidly Do you believe the Pope to have no more Authority in commanding Obedience than Civil Powers have Doubtless you do believe him to have more Authority or else why do so many of your Church refuse to take the Oath of Allegiance which yet you †Cath. princ sect 2. § 4. p. 3. allow to be a lawful Oath for you say they refuse it not for any unlawfulness in the Oath but because the Doctrine of Deposing Princes is therein called Heretical which they cannot allow of as the word is understood in a Catholick sense where you will allow me to observe that for the true notion of Heresie you depend on the Pope's Breve and so allow the Pope to be a Judge in matters of Faith for Heresie is contrary to the Faith and consequently the Deposing Power which the Pope hath determin'd is a matter of Faith and why do they follow the Papal Dictates in those things wherein by the Laws of God and Nations they are bound to submit to their Superiours Here also I observe that when * Popery misrepresented p. 46. you Treat of the Pope's Power you give your self a great latitude when you say That you never scruple to receive his Decrees and Definitions such as are issued forth by his Authority with all their due Circumstances and according to Law but never tell us what those Circumstances are as your Adversary well remarks which puts me in mind of somewhat which your * Tanner disp 1. de fid q. 4. dub 6. n. 263. Compton in 22. dis 22. § 5. Authors say concerning the Bull of Sixtus 5. prefixt to his Edition of the Vulgar Translation which was afterward recalled by Clement 8. That it was true the Bull was printed with the Bible but that it was not affixt to the Gates of St. Peter 's Church and in the Campo fiore so long as it ought to have been according to the Laws of the Romish Chancery as if such little things as those made Ecclesiastical Decrees more or less valid And now to shew you that your Answerer did not show his Learnlng in discovering that the Popes have dispenc't only with positive Institutions but not with the Moral Law with Lying and Forswearing as if he sought a knot in a Bull-rush and took Sanctuary in a Mystery as you term it by talking only in general terms what think you of the many Dispensations that have been given by former Popes to the Subjects of this and other Kingdoms to break their Oaths of Allegiance and Duty to their Soveraigns the relation between Princes and their Subjects being not grounded on their being Christians but on the Obligation of Civil Society so that a dispensing with the Oath of Allegiance is a dispensing with a Duty of Natural Religion which binds Subjects to obey their Superiours For either Subjection to Princes is a Duty of the Fifth Commandment as we reckon them Honour thy Father and Mother c. or it is not if it be not you will do well to assert it and we shall take care to prove it to be a Duty of that Commandment not only from the Authority of the Antients and from Reason but from the Authority of your own Catechism which †Part. 3. praec 4. § 3. 11.2 § 17 18. says That all persons who are possessors of power or dignity are included under the term Parents which is afterward explain'd by those who have Empire Magistracy or power committed to them who govern the Commonwealth But if to obey Princes be a duty of that Commandment then to dispence with that duty is to dispence with a Moral Law and to dispence with Oaths that bind to that duty is to give men a dispensation to be perjur'd and to forswear themselves And because you tell us * Pap. repraesent p. 47 48. That the Papist is taught in all Books that to Lye is a sin and to call God to witness to an untruth is damnable and that the practices of your Church are according to those praescriptions and that neither the Sacrament nor an Oath of Secrecy can excuse any man from perjury nor did you ever hear of any such thing from any Priests in Sermons or Confessions never read of them in your Books or Catechisms nor saw the practice of any of them in any of your Communion in which words there is some Art used for do you believe that any Priest of your Communion may reveal what he hears in confession against the Laws of your Church which bind him to Secrecy sub sigillo and when you tell us You never read of any such thing either in Books or Catechisms you mean I suppose Books of Devotion for in other Books you may undoubtedly read such Doctrines or else why should the Pope condemn them And when you say You never saw any such thing I hope you mean it never fell within the reach of your particular observation but if you read the account of Mr. Garnet and his accomplices you will find that they took the Sacrament as an Oath of Secrecy to carry on that Hellish design And withal subjoyn * Ib. p. 66. That the present Pope hath condemn'd all Equivocations and Mental Reservations under the penalty of Excommunication latae sententiae by his Decree March 2. 1679. We do still averr that your Church hath given dispensations for Lying and Forswearing and we know not but it may be done for the future For not to instance in the Jesuite Moralists †Filiut to 2. tr 25. n. 325. Sanches oper moral l. 3. c. 10. n. 7. 8. Filiutius Sanches c. their averring That if a man promises any thing and swears to it yet if he do not intend it he may without sin break that promise and that Oath so that the intention of the Swearer among these Casuists makes the Oath
truth the title was so proper to Princes that the Kings of the Philistim were always called Abimelech i.e. my Father the King by a general name whatever their proper name was Now I am loath to judg that those Fathers made use of an instance of a Subject called Father by his Servants that the Example might limit the Doctrine to subjection to inferiour Magistrates when had they inserted the Example of David it would plainly have proved the Obedience of Subjects to Soveraign Princes And whereas the Fathers of the same Council who were concern'd in the Catechism use to quote such places of the Antients as they thought pertinent to the Subject treated of they having * Ibid. § 17. quoted Rom. 13.1 to prove that men ought to be obedient to the Higher Powers confirm the Doctrine only by the testimony of Tertullian who it is true speaks plain and to the purpose omitting St. Chrysostom Theodoret Theophylact and others on the place who have told the World that by every Soul in St. Paul are meant Priests and Bishops as well as Laymen nay the Pope himself as says St. Bernard but this probably would have unriddled the Mystery and exposed a Doctrine which they were not willing to disown the Catechism like the Canons leaving every man in many such things a great latitude so that in short I desire you to answer this Question Either Rebellion is against a Moral Law or not if it be then the Pope cannot dispence with it and then how happens it that so many things of lesser moment were decided in the Trent Council while this was forgotten or past by If it be not against a Moral Law then by your own principles the Pope may dispence with it and what then becomes of all Obedience when another Gregory 7. or Sixtus 5. shall fill the Chair And tho the Council would not condemn the Deposing Doctrine yet why had not the Authors of the Index Expurgatorius censured such dangerous Books for if we may judg of the sense of the Trent Council by its Catechism tho made after the Council broke up why may we not judg of its sense by the Index which was ordered to be made at the same time c. by the same men who composed the Catechism In which Index more than a few passages are expunged that interfere with the Papal Grandeur but not one poor sentence condemn'd that is destructive to the Rights of Princes Here also pray suffer me to mind you of a bold assertion of a private man as you are and which I am sure as things are now you cannot accomplish * Introd p. 11. for you undertake that all Roman Catholick Nations in the World shall subscribe to the condemnation of all such principles and practices i. e. in your own words of such principles as destroy the peace of Nations with Fires and Massacres and rob Soveraigns of their Crowns and Subjects of their Liberties for I am sure there was a time when all Roman-Catholicks were not of that mind when the League was rampant against Henry 3. and 4. of France in which one of them actually fell and by the principles of which the other also was murthered not to mention what the Emperors Henry 4. and 5. and our King John suffered and when the Parisian and Irish Massacres were sufficient proofs to the contrary Nor is it possible even now to make good your promise since I have told you already what the belief of the Spanish Netherland and Hungarian Churches are in this point besides what the Italians hold Now against all this Doctrine you have nothing to object but that this Doctrine hath been condemn'd * Pap. misrepr p. 51. in France by the Ecclesiasticks there and by the Universities of Caen Rhemes Poictiers c. all which Universities are within the one Kingdom of France so that tho there be no need of considering the Argument because it is only the sentiment of one National Church against the rest of what you call Catholick Christendom if I make it appear that the French Church hath not always been of this belief and perhaps is not so now then all that you say upon that Topick will be far from proving your assertion while withal I profess that if what I am about to say doth not reach so far as a conviction and be only a well-meant Essay yet the cause which I maintain ought not to be prejudiced by it because the main position about the rights of Princes hath been already proved by other arguments and authorities And to evince this I shall pursue the method which the famous * Calvinisme Papisme mis en parallele part 3. ch 3. Monsieur Jurieu hath laid down adding here and there my own observations If therefore this be and always hath been the Doctrine of the Gallican Church then you have stated your argument aright but if it hath not been always their belief then the present Gallican Church may be as well mistaken as the former and if so where is its authority besides if the French Church do condemn the Deposing Doctrine and all the rest of the Catholick World do assert it then the Tradition is not on the side of the French Church though never defin'd as a matter of Faith by a general Council Now to prove that the Deposing Doctrine hath been the Opinion of the Gallican Church I shall produce one remarkable instance and that is the deposition of Childerick and the introducing of Pepin the first King of the second race into his Throne and I shall briefly tell the story out of the French Historian * Girard du Haillan de l'Estate c. l. 1. m.p. 66 c. that I have now by me who relates that Pepin after his Conquest of the Sarazins did so honour and reverence the Clergy and repair'd so many of their Temples that had been ruined that the most holy men of that time thought him a Saint whereupon aiming at the Crown and finding nothing stick in his way but the Oath which the French had given to their King he sent to the Pope whom he had before obliged for his dispensation Pepin having already gained the greatest part of the Nobility Ecclesiastick's and Commons to his party the Pope readily granted a dispensation the Clergy as well as the Nobility and Commons acquiesc't in what was done acknowledging Pepin for their rightful King and thrusting Childerick into a Monastery and so do Paulus Aemilius and others also relate the story and among them Cardinal Perron and * Ch. Childeric 3. An. 751. Monsieur Mezeray says that this was very likely done in that general Assembly held in March An. 751. The Bishops being there in great numbers and Boniface Arch-Bishop of Mentz in the head of them who declared to the rest of the Assembly the validity of the Pope's answer and he intimates the reason why they complied so readily with Pepin because he gave
Christ's Vicar and not to a petulant Colledge consisting of a few passionate corrupted persons yet the Pope liked the censure too well to condemn it Besides two or three dissenters in so great a body signifie nothing for had it been in an Assembly of the Clergy or in a General Council the majority would easily have out-weighed so small a number of contrary Votes and if the Syndick Faber's asserting the Right of Princes makes this no Decree of the Sorbon then the Syndick Richer's assertion An. 1611. in his Book de Ecclesiastica politicâ potestate is enough to prove that the Sorbon does not acknowledge the Government of the Church to be Monarchical nor were the Sorbonists wanting to countenance this their assertion ordering Boucher and others to preach up the Authority of the Pope in such cases and the Justice of the King's Deposition and there was a Book written in defence of the Censure the Author of it believed to be our learned Stapleton by others more likely to to be the above named Boucher de justa abdicatione Henrici 3. and to make it appear that the Assistants of the League lookt on it as a quarrel on the behalf of Religion it is remarkable that the Duke of Parma left his own and the publick concerns in Flanders in a very ill posture only that he might re-enforce the League and relieve Paris which was likely to have fallen into the hands of Henry 4. who besieged it And now we are come to the Times that succeeded the Parricide of Henry the Great who tho never so heartily reconciled to the Church of Rome was never forgiven the sin of his first Apostasie as they called it till his death in the minority of whose Son Lewis 13. When the third Estate would have past a Law that the King was deposable for no cause whatever the Clergy violently opposed it and ordered the Cardinal de Perron to make a Speech against it which after they had examin'd and approved of in the Chamber Ecclesiastick they attended him to the convention of the three Estates where he pronounc't it An. 1615. which Speech our King James learnedly answer'd in his declaratio pro jure regio where you may see it proved that the Cardinal took upon him to assert that the Pope or the Church had power to depose Princes and that it was universally owned in France ever since their Schools had been opened and the event made it appear what the design of the Speech was after which the third Estate saw it impossible to go on with their design successfully and so declin'd it and whatever F. * Vb. supr c. ult Maimburge says to the contrary yet his own argument confirms what I assert That when this difference happened between the Clergy and the third Estate the two Chambers as he calls them the Clergy inform'd Pope Paul the 5. in their answer to his Breve of Jan. 31. 1615. Angebamur non mediocriter c. That they were troubled above measure to see Catholicks transported with an undiscreet Zeal meddle with matters of Faith where you may observe that the deposing power is acknowledg'd by them to be a matter of Faith earum rerum quae ad fidem pertinent though you deny it to be so which did not belong to the third Estate who were Lay-men and Lawyers but withal they confess that the determination of this point did belong to the Church i. e. to themselves and the Pope omnem hanc authoritatem penes Ecclesiam eosque solos esse quos illa fidelium gregi praeesse voluerit By which it is plain that that Speech was not one Doctors Opinion only as Monsieur Maimbourge affirms but the Opinion of the whole Chamber Ecclesiastick or their whole Clergy And that the French Church afterward owned the Opinion of that Speech seems plain because the general Assembly of the Clergy An. 1665. gave the Abbot Gentil 6000. Livres to collect the Memoirs of the Gallican Church which were afterward solemnly reviewed by several Bishops and Abbots and then publisht among which this Speech of Cardinal de Perron is printed and approved the whole scope of which Maimbourge himself confesses is inconsistent with the independent right of Princes and their exemption from any deposing power It is true this Speech that so few years since was Printed among the Memoirs with so much applause and approbation is now ordered to be left out of them which is so far from being an argument to incline any man to acquiesce in the judgment of such a Church that it may justly affright him from confiding in such volatile changeable men who in such weighty matters vary their Opinions so often from one extreme to another And the reason is plain the French Bishops following the dictates of that Court so that since the quarrel about the Regale they have sought to stoop the Pope and probably to make his Election depend on the present French King as it did antiently on Charles the Great And of this I could give some likely proofs but that the digression would be too long But against all this it is objected That under the present King Lewis 14. the Sorbon An. 1663. condemn'd even the indirect Power of the Pope over Princes and asserted that the King of France hath no other Superiour but God to which we answer that the same Colledge did in the days of the League maintain the contrary as I have formerly proved and at last the Sorbon is not the Representative of the French Church nor can it be imagined says the * Ch. 5. p. 14. Author of the second Treatise against the Oath of Allegiance That those men who took upon them to vary from the Censures Decrees or Definitions of Rome would ever go about to set up an independent or infallible Chair in the Sorbon and deliver their Opinion either as an Article of Faith in it self or as a Rule of Faith to others But the Objection is strengthened That the Archbishops and Bishops assembled at Paris An. 1682. as Representatives of the French Church did decree the same to which we †V. Jurieu ubi supr answer that the Declaration was made but by thirty or forty Prelates within the verge of the Court whereas in a free National Council the contrary might have been determined But put the case that this had been decreed in a full and free National Synod yet neither could this have establisht an indefeasible right for I remember that in the Convocation under Henry 8. the King's Supremacy was decreed and establisht by our Bishops even by Gardiner Bonner c. who in all other things were zealous Catholicks and yet I suppose you will be loath to grant that for that reason the King had a just Right to that Supremacy And this also serves to answer your Objection from the Determinations of the French Vniversities against the Deposing Doctrine because not onely the greatest part of the Vniversities of
Pope pleases So that we see that even this seeming Enemy of the Deposing Doctrine dares not openly condemn it but leaves it as a probable Opinion and what 't is not necessary to speak of so that every Pope hath still his liberty to declare any Prince a Heretick and then to proceed to Excommunicate and to Depose him after which a Clement a Ravilliac or any other Assasine may proceed to murther him because he himself also is left at liberty to believe that the Pope is in the right when he hath deposed a Prince and that he ought as much as lies in him to obey him in bringing such Criminals to condign punishment At last †Protest Pop. p. 29. you tell us That a man may be admitted into your Church notwithstanding his refusal to admit the Deposing Doctrine and the Pope's Infallibility but as they are stated by the Representer i. e. not as Articles of Faith But this seems to imply that no man of your Communion shall dare to condemn the Doctrines which must still be look'd on as probable and disputable so that the safety of Princes and Kingdoms and the guidance of the Church in matters of Faith which depend on the plain stating of the Pope's Power and Infallibility must still be left at the mercy of opinionative men who may take liberty to dispute and write about these great and weighty points pro and con as themselves think fit And whereas your Adversary quotes Bellarmine and Canus That General Councils cannot erre even in Decrees of Discipline and Government decrera morum when they relate to things necessary to Salvation and concern the whole Church you * Protest Pop. p. 32. deny that the Deposing Doctrine is of that nature But are not the plain Offices of Morality necessary to Salvation as well as Articles of Faith If not then nothing but Infidelity damns a man and if a man's Faith be Orthodox it is no matter for his Conversation If they are necessary is not Obedience to Princes one of the moral Commands of God And if so is not the practice of that Obedience necessary to Salvation and is not Disobedience which necessarily follows the Deposing Doctrine a great sin And if so destructive of the hopes of Salvation And that it concerns the whole Church is easily proved because Princes are its Nursing-Fathers and what Evils have fallen upon your own Church by such rash Attempts some of your own Authors will tell you is plain from the instance of Henry VIII Besides the whole Christian Church and its Welfare is concern'd in the Doctrine for though all the Princes of Christendom have never been deposed at once yet what is done in one Country may be done throughout all Christendom and so the whole Church actually concern'd in the sad effects of the Doctrine And had the Empire been as intire under Henry IV as it was under the elder Emperours his Deposition had actually concern'd the whole Church And because you call that assertion that the Pope hath not condemn'd the no-deposing Power because he wants power so to do an Oracle and say you look for an Argument to prove it It is plain from History that those Popes who have been rich and stout and powerful have adventured on the practice of Deposing while others of lower Spirits less Wealth and Haughtiness have been afraid of the Attempt we are not ignorant what the Dictates of Pope Gregory VII are and how busie he was being back'd by the Countess Maud who supported him with her interest nor what Innocent III Sixtus V and some others have done in imitation of him Nor is it unknown to the World what Pope Paul V. thundered against the Republick of Venice What Pius V. did here in England and Innocent X. in Ireland during the Rebellion there for what was it that encouraged those hot Popes to go so far but that they thought their interest at least in the Church-men so great that the Countries would immediately have shaken off their Soveraigns And what is it that causes the present Pope to spare the French King about the Regale but that he is afraid of him and knows he wants power to compel him Nor need the Argument seem so ridiculous to you since Cardinal Bellarmine a man from whom most of your Writers borrow all their Materials doth not onely affirm that the Primitive Christians under the Heathen Emperours did not take up Arms against them because they wanted power but avers against Barclay †Tom. 3. Oper. c. 6 7 8. p. 874 c. that the ancient Popes did not exert their Authority against the Emperours Constantius and Valens c. not because they had no right sed quod Reges c. but because without great damage the Church could not compel them but that the Popes did exert their Authority against Leo Isauricus Henry IV. and Childeric because they were able to compel them That Jusian was very powerful and attended with many armed Legions against which an unarm'd Multitude signified nothing that it was a falshood that all his Army were Christians and that St. Gregory affirms that the Church made use of no other Remedy but her Tears quia decrant vires because she wanted strength to resist the Tyranny So that pray answer your own Cardinal or else acknowledge that your Adversary speaks such Oracles as may be confirm'd from some other Topick besides the authority of the Assertor And now I shall put a period to these Remarks when I have minded you of two things which are your own Concessions 1. That * Protest Pop p. 6 7 17 18. upon the confideration of what is here charg'd the salvation of every Roman Catholick's Soul depends that their Eternity is at stake and that if Popery be guilty of what your Answerer says it is it cannot enter into your thoughts that there is any room for it or its Followers in Heaven That all our Martyrs died for a good Cause and are doubtless in Heaven That such Tenents bid open defiance to true Honesty and Christianity strike at the World's Redeemer and are impossible to be entertain'd by any who is one degree above a Beast These are the Conclusions I acknowledge of a wise a modest and a good man but then it behoves you seriously to consider whether this Charge be not true and whether your Adversary be not to be acquitted of wronging your Church of which the impartial Reader will be the most competent Judge and withal to think whether those School-men and other Writers of your Communion that do own all the Doctrines charg'd upon you be not by your own Verdict Men of no Honesty no Religion and but one degree above Beasts For by this Concession every unbyast person is able to satisfie himself which is the true Religion that which allows its Followers to assert the Doctrine of Deposing Princes to pay Religious Worship to Images to expect more than intercession from Saints Angels