that D. Hutton had inhibited me that D. Benefield whose bookes I was not worthy to carry had publikely confuted my doctrine c. with such like frivolous allegations ANSVVER Here to helpe your memory which wandreth as much as your iudgement you forget that vpō your bragge that all the Latine Church held with you D. Aglionbee asked you what was the Church and you receiving a blow where you had no ward were driven so farre out of the way as to affirme the last resolution of the Church to be not in primam veritatem but in the iudgement of men the absurdity of which position I haue dealt with in your Epistle The Vicechancellour seeing such presumptuous insolence ioined with ignorance herevpon remembred you how the inhibition by authority and the confutation of that controversie might haue staid your proceedings and added the due worth of the Doctor who had determined that point in his solemne Lecture Mr LEECH As for D. Hutton his inhibition I answered as before adding farther that I respected not his iudgement in this matter For I knew indeed that as his vnderstāding is not very deepe so his affection is not very good who in a certaine booke or rather statizing pamphlet concerning the crosse in baptisme defendeth this laudable Christian ceremony by tradition of the Church as it is witnessed by the holy Fathers and yet now in a point of greater importance expressed in Scripture taught by Fathers practised by the Saints defined by the whole Church he blushed not to accuse me nay S. Gregory himselfe of Popery in this doctrine But singular is my comfort to consider by what Iudge I am thus vsed in what cause and with what Patrone from whom our Nation first receiued her first faith for whose faith I must now forsake my nation ANSVVERE You leaue the answer of your neglect of D. Huttons gouernement and traduce his iudgement Inhibition is matter of authority not of learning why disobeyed you that command you answere but not to the purpose you respected not his iudgement Let not malice be iudge but cōsider how base infamous malitious your reproaches be his soūdnes of iudgment is approved sufficiently by the consent of our whole Vniversity And that booke which so scornfully you reproach is esteemed deservingly and is of reverend respect with the best Bishops of our Church Where the Fathers agreeing to Scripture are truly vrged and vnderstandingly interpreted both D. Hutton and all of our part with all willingnesse receiue their assertions But when Fathers are misvrged arrested and impostured by Coccius or Bellarmin and you receiue them at second hand not from the foūtaine but from the ditches we returne your party-coloured blended sentences as vnworthy of approbation because they be vsed as the Tyrant entertained his guest if to long for his bed to chop of if to short to racke them out The doctrine which you call a point of great importance expressed in Scripture taught by Fathers practised by the Saints and defined by the whole Church is not so founded as you presume to teach Scriptures no where expresse it Fathers teach it not the Saints of God haue not practised it the Church of Christ hath not defined it Therefore he only accused you of Popery but not Gregory For as formerly hath beene said D. Hutton and all any way seene in Gregories Moralls may perceiue how you foist into the Text the words Evangelicall Counsells Your comfort will proue your corrasiue your Iudge in this was God others were but his deputies the cause was religiō nay the very marrow pith of Religion and the opposition of many absurd hereticall positions Your Patron was not Gregory hee neither taught you this nor from him our Church received their first faith Neither for defending this were you cōstrained to leaue the Land you forsooke your Religion rather then your Nation Vegetius tells that in the Roman Armies Vegetius Non fugere was a speciall precept The way for you to Triumph had beene to recant and to remaine in your station not to fly Bosquiers speech is true Bonsq cont 7 the Devill is overcome by resisting but the flesh and the world by running away but you fled because you would run into the world Mr LEECH As for D. Benefield with his lecture his bookes I passed them over considering that M. Vicechancellour made excursions from the point loading me only with contumely and disgrace ANSVVER You passed him ouer because he doth so far overpasse you but he is in your bosome his Lecture lyeth heavy on your heart it is such a pang that you will not easily remoue The Vicechancellour loading you as you call it with disgrace knewe you had a back provided for a burthen If his speech seeme harsh to you you turned his tongue being turned your selfe Otherwise his tongue is the hearauld of encouragement and comfort himselfe the refuge of innocencie a Tutor to his Colledge and a father to the Clergy in his Accademicall governement Mr LEECH Wherefore not suffering him to divert mee from the maine issue Haeretici est praecepta Patrum declinare saith worthy Flavian in his first epist to LEO the great I desired him to deale punctually that is to say first to admit a triall by the Fathers or to deny it if he denied it he should be thereby sufficiently convinced Secondly if he admitted this triall then either to disproue my authorities or to approue my doctrine ANSVVER To deale punctually is so proper vnto all his discourses that all his Auditors will acknowledge this a speciall felicity in the power of his speech Your demands were preposterous in your Epistle you commit your selfe to the censure of the Church now to the triall of the Fathers no appeale at all to the Scriptures without which whatsoever is taught is like Israells building in Aegypt without stuffe no warrant for the matter they build with Mr LEECH But he not daring to make a briefe and punctuall answer to my reasonable demands fell extravagantly into a mention of the reformed Churches summoning me before their tribunall for the censuring of this doctrine ANSVVER Not daring Why continueth this Bracchadochian humor it hath long beene in the consumption it will at length spend it selfe What dareth not he that vndertakes without rashnes and performes without feare did ever your experience finde him to be a read shaken with the winde or to want the sinewes of courage and resolution No you knowe hee is ballaced with wisedome and worth able to vndertake the most resolute and vndauntedest of the contrary side in the worlde Neither in this was there the least note of extravancie as your exorbitancie of accusation doth impute for by whom should a minister of the reformed Churches bee censured but by the power iudgement of the reformed Churches Mr LEECH Which course of proceeding I vtterly disclaimed as vnequall because the later Church is not to iudge the former but contrarily the former
Biell in their distinction of faith they hold that it is either fides infusa inspirata an infused faith wrought in vs by the inlightning spirit of God and resting it selfe vpon the truth of God or else it is acquisita suasa a naturall faith grounding it selfe vpon humane authority and wrought by humane motions and persuasions The faith wee haue of the points in Scripture is of the former and better kind not relying on the testimony of the Church whose authority is but a created thing from the first verity as a Prin. fid doct lib. 8. Stapleton confesseth when as the first verity enforceth the minde without further autority to yeeld obedience As also Scripture is that b Rom. 1.16 power cōmanding that c Eph. 6.17 sword dividing that d Ier. 23.27 hammer driving in that e 2. Cor. 10. Pyoner powerfull to overthrow strong holds and to cast downe every high thing therefore onely the authority of the Scripture is to be relied vpon because our faith would reele and totter and fall if the authority of Scriptures stand not fast O then submit your selfe to the censure of Scripture whose maiestie is ineffable whose decree inevitable which rightly looked into with the eye of humility harkned vnto with the eare of attention and vnderstood with the hart of faith wil be the certaine rule authority testimony only to be relied on the piller of truth and Schoole of goodnesse Mr LEECH his Title A TRIVMPH OF TRVTH ANSVVERE A Triumph and why c Ludov. Vives in praefatio ad libros Aug. de civit Dei Honorius the Emperor had a fighting Cocke called Rome wherevpon Vives recordes that when the Goathes surprised Rome the Citty news was brought that Rome was lost the Emperour thought it was his Cocke not his Cittie Your Triumph and his Cocke may go togither d A booke in folio vpō the 4. Gospels Iohannes de la Hay the Jesuit hath lately robd you of the Title his great volume being intituled Triumphus Veritatis and surelie he had some semblance for it for his volume seemed to bee a vessell of good lading though it haue nothing in it but stubble and hay But you to giue your boate of so small burden the Title of a man of warre sure your title is too big your booke is too little It is A Triumph got by flying or a triumph got without fighting Let the Pharisee bee the Herauld of his owne praises Pigmalion enamored with his owne devises let Narcissus do ate on his shaddow let Thersites vaunt without modesty but how much better were it for you that you had styled your booke with some humble and religious title savouring of grace not of vaine-glory But alas Religion without Truth wil be ever vnsavory and reading without iudgement ever peremptory Mr LEECH CHAP. 1. INtreating of this parcell of holy scripture I sawe the dead In a sermon at christ-Christ-Church in Oxford 1607 Apoc. 20.12 both great and small stande before God I distinguished a fowrefolde acception or signification of great and small FIRST great and small for worldly authoritie and temporall condition SECONDLY great and small in respect of heavenly supereminency of grace and spirituall infusion THIRDLY great and small in lieu of diversity of rewards and retribution FOVRTHLY great and small in regard of contrariety and disparitie of workes and operation ANSVVER A time there shall bee when the bookes of everie mans conscience shall be laide forth a day of feare and furie when an vniversall flowde of fire shall overstreame the whole world when the heavens shall threaten the earth cast vp al creatures cry vengeance devils accuse conscience giue evidence and the whole Iurie of Saints passe verdict vpon sinners and then the secrets of all harts shall be disclosed In holy Scripture this iudgement is often mentioned but of all others Hier. that glorious Eagle S. Iohn mounting the high spheare of divinest contemplation doth most expresly by his vision and revelation manifest the declaration thereof and of all other places most pregnantly in this your text Apoc. 20.12 And I saw the dead both great and small stand before God and the bookes were opened Was there no other place to confirme an vntruth but that which shall confound all vntruth no other Scripture to iustifie you but that which shall iudge you Would you sow tares vpon that ground vpon which wheate and tares shal be distinguished Remember whence you are fallen and repent and doe the first workes or else I will come against thee saith Christ Rev. 2.5 O the eternity of that cursed time Rev. 2.5 to be spēt in wretchednesse and confusion no myriads of yeeres to free from the execution of that perpetuall iudgement An end not ending a death not dying should terrifie and amase you and make you returne seeing the dead both great and smal shall stand before God But to your distinction There is a great mistake in your fourfold acception of great and small For antiquity which you so much boast of doe all expound it otherwise a Rupert in Apoc. Rupertus by mortuos magnos and pusillos vnderstanding homines impios spiritus malignos b Anselm in Apoc. 12. c Lyra in Apoc. 12. Anselmus Lyra d Hugo in Apoc. 12. Hugo the e Gloss in Apoc. 12. ordinary glosse and many others vnderstanding by the dead great and small malos only wicked men And f Carthus in eund Carthusian intimateth so much of St Austins opinion that he vnderstandeth not by mortuos magnos and pusillos the Saints but by libros apertos Carthusians words be plaine Augustinus per libros apertos intelligit Sanctos in quibus mali poterunt legere seu videre bona quae facere debuerunt neglexerunt Austin vnderstandeth by the books that were opened the Saints in whome the wicked might see and reade the good which they ought to haue done and haue neglected How then holdes your fourfold acception if by the dead you meane the living and by the wicked you meane the Saints g Caelius Rhodog lib. 20. Rhodogine recordeth that Polemo being the spectator of a Tragoedy at Smyrna a ridiculous actor comes out vpon the stage and being to pronounce O coelum ô terra bends his hands and eies to the earth and crieth ô coelum and then lifts his eies and hands to the heaven and pronounceth ô terra Polemo condemneth his action for a soloecisme It is no lesse in you to call evill good and good evill and in the Prophet it is forewarned with a woe Whose fourfold acception this should be I knowe not If your owne I am sorry for the mistake and I confesse it is the first notice that I ever tooke of your breathing in any Schoole learning and in that I shall doe you no more iniury then h Gretzer App. 1. ad lib. 1. Bellarm. § Idem dictū pag. 558. Caietanus homo
whatsoever he was in other points sure hee was no father or author of your position your citations out of him haue no one word of Evangelicall Counsails of perfection Mr LEECH The report and rumor whereof by relation of some friends no sooner came vnto my eares but presently knowing well the assured grounds of my doctrine I addressed my selfe to haue satisfied and contented any ingenious and vnpassionate auditour by a second repetition with a briefe punctuall and perspicuous explanation and confirmation of my aforesaid doctrine For I was altogether vnwilling to suffer the least imputation or scandall to be fastned vpon it or vpon the Author were it but in corners secretly and farther though I intēded not to run into a publike opposition yet now occasion might bee ministred vnto me others to vindicate a necessary truth from the detraction of calumnious tongues ANSVVER To satisfie anie auditor is not only ingenuous but a religious act But did you giue content to any mā that conferred with you in it Did you not rather in your preparation for the second sermon take occasion to cast the stumbling blocke of offence in your third verifying that speech 〈◊〉 Finis vnius mali gradus est futuri I will not aske you whether the second sermon were your owne or whether you purged the bowels of a Fryers Postill culd all those your pearles as you thought them out of the Dunghill of some moath-eaten Monke tyed vp in chaines till you came to free him and to binde your selfe The generall iudgemente vpon your booke when it came first foorth was this that it was composed of two styles diverse in forme vneequall in fabrique the one somewhat dull and leaden very resty the other more nimble and quicke-silvered but somewhat scurvy whervpon a familiar acquaintance of yours censured it thus that the grounde of your paper was plowed by an oxe and an asse a coniunctiō forbidden in the law I do not desire to make my paper guilty of idle wordes but yet this I must professe that your second repetition which you mētion doth savour of much vnsavory stuffe and hath in it d sapientiam attramentalem non mentalem Senec. You say you did not purpose to run into a publicke opposition when you did reiterate that in your second which you had in your former sermon But I desire you to summon the sobriety of your senses before your owne iudgement and confesse plainely how it could otherwise be But that the proclamation of cōtradiction in you would proue a publicke oppositiō mainetained by you weigh this in the ballance of discretion and you will finde it lightnes and innovation you seeme to ioine your forces in mainetenance of your position when you say occasion was given to you and others to vindicat this necessary truth What others assisted you Among vs all desire to purge the Temple from superstition to sweepe away those cobwebs which the Spiders of Rome haue hanged vp There is no one that dare polute our Holie places publiklie with anie such infectious doctrine so farre are your fellow Counsailors from making a plural number that a duall number never shewed themselues amongst vs yet in this controversie Mr LEECH CHAPT 3. BEing thus occasioned by the secret clancular murmuration of Brethren the fame whereof began now to disperse it selfe abroad to addresse some defence of my former doctrine I tooke the next opportunity to supply the publike place willing rather to giue a litle farther touch to convince the said Brethrē then to dwell as yet vpon any maine and full discourse which was not my purpose the point being yet not publiquely contradicted I repeated and dilated vpon the point more at large as it was originaly deduced out of the last brāch of S. Gregorie his distinction to wit quidā non judicantur regnāt to this purport and effect ANSVVER OCcasion and scandall be either given or taken they were both given by you rather then offered you You desired to giue a touch to convince the said Brethren all of vs were brethren in this all agreed in dislike of your manner of preaching which was so dull and Delphically mysticall that fewe heard you and none approved you But I woulde willingly desire you to reconcile these two places in this paragraph First that the fame of the brethrens murmuratiō began to spread it selfe abroad and yet within fiue lines you confesse the point was not publikely contradicted If murmuration be contradictiō then non sense may serue as a marginall note But because you breath at the brethren againe in this chapter though I defende none that Schismatically contradict the state or breake the blessed peace of our flowrishing Church neither doe know any such here God that knoweth the secrets of all hearts bearing me recorde seeing you so malitiouslie traduce this Honorable Vniversity as if it were an Anabaptisticall Seminary I doe challendge you or anie of your part to answer these two points First that there be * Vide Iohan Pappium Peace of Rome and many other bookes more materiall differences in points of religion and more grosse pointes of Chatharisme amōg Papists then among al the Schismatiques or Separists Secondly that the Church of Englande never had any so Puritannical as to iudge themselues celestiall men terrestriall Angels excelling surmounting transcending in perfection fulling the law nay more then the law Mr LEECH Of this point said I I may speake as S. Iohn speaketh to the seauen churches of Asia cōcluding euer the burthē of his admonitiō which a pathetical Epiphonema in the reprehension Let him that hath an eare to heare heare what the spirit saith to the churches And may not I apply let him that hath not only an eare to heare but a soule to saue by the eares hearing heare what the coelestial Oracle heauēly spirit Catholike Church iointly speak deliuer concerning Evangelicall Counsells ANSVVER Remember not only what S. Iohn endeth his epistle with but also what he sealeth vp his whole revelatiō with I a Apoc. 22.19 protest vnto euerie man that heareth the Words of the prophecie of this book If any māshal adde vnto these things God shall adde vnto him the plagues that are written in this booke For that sweet aphorisme and acclamation of everie of S. Iohns Epistles cited by you I acknowledge the power and divine spirit speaking in it For what is recorded of Hercules Gallicus that his speeches tyed the eares of his hearers to his tongue is more true by many degrees concerning God and therefore it is not onlie Davids incitation * Ps 34.9 O come and see and taste how good the Lord is but b Ps 34.12 Apoc. 1. O come hither chidren and harken I will teach you the feare of the Lord. And S. Iohns proclamation in the first of the Apocalyps Blessed are they that read and they that heare and they that keepe the words of this booke therfore let
that you wil deeply answere this vnlesse you staine your cheekes with the blushes of recantatiō sende over the forme of your penance without the secret glosses of double and reserved senses Did some in over much charity petitionat for your pardon from the heavy burden of censure do you traduce their innocency so far as to accuse thē for connivency nay for authorizing your doctrine You shall pardon me for crediting this any more thē that of Doctor Kilby of whom in your first booke and 8. chapter you report that hee contested with Doctor Hutton for the truth of the Doctrine and that you might answer it with credit whose reverend protestation against that speech and against your opinion against this subscription into which you entitled him is forcible and suasible and availeable with any honest hart to measure this speech by that and to assure all that here you traduce others as there him Mr LEECH But I pray you Sir to be advertised by me that I neuer made vse of their letters one reason whereof meeteth with your obiection For as I assumed this doctrine from the holy Scriptures and ancient Fathers so I determined to maintaine it vpon these grounds without any assistance and much lesse was I set on by anie of them ANSVVER This is a firme confirmation of my former opinion Would not you haue vsed those letters and produced thē if you had any such You that ransackt al the inventories and catalogues you could to muster vp testimonies your modesty so to modifie your cause as not to vrge vivum testimonium the living witnesses of your assertiō Absit far be it but that al here should hate falshoode more then death and bee so faithfull Clients of truth as not to yeeld an eare much lesse a hand or hart to any startling opposer Obiect as oft as you will that you vsed not these letters because you relyed on Scriptures and Fathers yet if you had had but the least manuall or oral assistance you would haue produced it and traduced the Authors whosoever Mr LEECH And that you may know vpon what authority I first began and do now proceede here are the Doctours 24. in number 12. Greeke 12. Latine who set me on here are their testimonies produce their bookes conuince me if you can ANSVVER And that you may know that there bee ashes scattered to descry your footing it is manifest that as in your sermon you gleaned frō Bellarmine very much so in your proofes you haue borrowed from Coecius much more the Quotations that you cite in the same order found in him as in you But as Bellarmine in the point of Purgatory professing to proue it by 10. places in the old Testamēt 9. in the New to make for it is afterwards cōstrained to cōfesse that there is no direct place in Scripture For being in the last Chap. 1. booke of Purgatory vrged by the argument of Peter Martyr and others that Purgatory is foūd in no place of Scripture therefore no matter of faith answereth Non est necesse vt Scriptura vbique omnia dicat Bellar. c. vlt. lib. 1. de Purg. And againe Talia enim ad Apostolicam traditionem sunt referenda So some of your Fathers haue not so much as the word Counsaile others that vse it doe either in the same wordes or in other places as I haue shewed distinguish the generall from the special precept by the name of Counsell that whereas some Challendge their Iury your Iury doeth challendge you of rash indiscretion and false information Mr LEECH Whereat his courage began to abate and first he excepted against me for producing the Greeke in whose language said he you haue but slender skill ANSVVER His purposes be so deliberate and resolution so firme that your paper gun could not abate his courage as you falsely enforme your leane-heart-fretting envie fatting it selfe with contumelious scornes You were questioned with twise whether you vnderstoode the Greeke first your answer was affirmatiue being pressed againe you confes you vnderstood it only by the translation It was replied by the Vicechancelour that if the translation erred then you did partake in that error instance given in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so much mistaken in the vulgar to this you did nor could answer a word You were not able to vnderstand the Greeke fathers and in retaliation none of the Greeke fathers will afford you one word of Counsell Mr LEECH To which malitious and impertinent exception I answered first that it was sufficient for me to rely vpon the translations approved commonly in the Church Secondly that I had so much skil in Greek as to compare the translation with the originall and that none there was so exact as to vnderstand some Greeke fathers and namely S. Gregory Nazianzen in their natiue idiome Thirdly that if I had no Greeke Author on my side yet here is a sufficient Iury of Latine Fathers whose language I vnderstand and whose conspiring tenent I hope you dare not renounce ANSVVER A Scandalous and vnreuerent Phrase Was it malitious and impertinent to aske whether you vnderstood the Greeke whē you dosend vp the greek fathers as if they had been pickled herrings yet vnderstood them only by the vse of an interpreter That you answer first it was sufficient for you to relie vpon translations I say in point of controversie it is not so S. Hierome did practise and did Counsell the contrarie Hier. Epist ad Suniam Fret tom 3. Aug. de Doc. Christ lib. 2. c. 11. Theol. Lov. Praef. lib. var. lect in lat Bib. edit vulg and S. Austin giveth the same rule in his booke de Doctrina Christiana The Divines of Lovaine approue the same Villavincentius doth prescribe it as most necessary In differences or doubts or cōtroversies to repaire to the Hebrew for the old Testament and to the Greeke for the new Secondly in that you affirme that you haue so much knowledge in Greeke as to compare the Translation with the originall and that none there were so exact as to vnderstād some greek father c. both parts be faulty He that is able to cōpare the translation must carry in his head a Lexicon you haue the roome but you lack this furniture It is the labour of a wel read throughly grounded Grecian And that any father should be so hard to bee interpreted that it were difficulty to finde out in this choice company one able to translate him it is a calumnie to the ancient Fathers and to these reverend Doctors the former writing elegantly these able to translate thē faithfully Your third hath cut off the third part but halfe your army of Fathers you are driven out of Greece and as the Greeke Fathers knew you not so the Latine Fathers as is plentifully proved assist you not Mr LEECH Doctour Aglionbee being thus pressed by me having nothing to answere in his defence D. King interposed himselfe obiecting
is to iudge the later ANSVVER Who ever that was a supposed member in our Ecclesiasticall state durst disclaime the iudgement censure authority of our Church But your reasonlesse reason is the later Church is not to iudge the former If by the former Church you meane the ancient Catholike Church for the first 500. yeeres we maintaine our reformed Church to bee the same but if by the former church you meane the now Roman Catholike faith as Bristow and the Rhemists deliver Bristow mot 12. in marg Rhem in Annot in Rom. 1 8. that the Romane and Catholike Church be all one then we reiect and abhorre that Synagogue of Sathan wherein Ziim and Iim the Ostrich and Vulture and Schritchowle doe remaine And by many more degrees then Papistes prefer the Pope before the Emperour wee preferre the Reformed Churches which doe mainetaine the ancient Catholike Apostolike faith reformed from errors superstitions and heresies stealing in by the degrees of time and occasion into the window of the Church Mr LEECH And what did I herein good Reader but obserue the prescription of Antiquity in this behalfe Contr. Iulian Pelag. lib. 2. and namely that of S. Augustine against the Pelagian hereticks Patres oportet vt populi Christiani vestris novitatibus anteponant eisque potius eligant adhaerere quà m vobis ANSVVER Nay what did you but as Pelagian himselfe did magnifie the nature of man so strengthen the arme of flesh as if you would incite it to rebell against heaven and what did you otherwise then as hereticks of all ages who haue stoode so much vpon authorities out of some authors falsely collected that they will not be drawn no not by Scriptures to the acknoweledgemēt of their errors Such S. Austin observed the Donatists to be Aug. contra Donatist Quis autem nesciat sanctam Scripturam Canonicam tam veteris quā novi Testamēti c. where in a large discourse hee manifesteth that the Canon of Scripture is only so sure that there ought to bee no doubt or disputation thereof but for Fathers and Ancient Bishops much might be reprehended therein The cause that S. Austin in confuting the Pelagians did appoint the reading of the fathers to the people was this because the fathers formerly had delivered by strength of scripture the contrary doctrine to that heresie And yet that holy father speaking of himselfe and al the ancients before him Neque enim debeo negare saith he ad Vincentiū sicut in ipsis maioribus Aug. ad Vincentium Victorem ita multa esse in tam multis opusculis meis quae possunt iusto iudicio culpari that in him nor in any other this is a prescription of Antiquity to rely only on fathers Mr LEECH Here D. Airay distasting my refusall to stand vnto the verdict of the reformed Churches questioned with me about the rule of my faith I answered him briefly Contr. haeres cap. 1. c. See D. Field pag. 239. that I wholly followed Vincentius Lyrinensis his direction to wit Canonicall scripture and Ecclesiasticall traditiō the first being sensed by the second ANSVVER To refuse the iudgement of the ruler and to fly to a stranger is punishable in Policy to condemne and contemne your owne mother Church and to stand to the iudgement of a strange Church nay of a Synagogue a stranger from the Church is culpable in divinity It was a seasonable question to aske the rule of your faith whē it was manifest you had forsaken the faith your answer was vnsound ioining with Canonicall Scripture Ecclesiasticall tradition these be two therefore not the rule but rules whereas Canon regula must be but one Aq. lect 1. in 1. Tim. 6. Aquinas on Timothy affirming that the Doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles is called Canonicall because it is the rule Traditions wee renounce as vnworthy to be ioyned with Scripture Melch. Can. lib. 3. c. because Canus in this doeth expresly teach that whatsoever the Church of Rome practiseth and hath not warrant from Scripture the same things and the practise of them shee hath received by Tradition which Popish traditions we abhorre to supply scripture with as knowing that the Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation and also affirme that the most certaine rule of interpretation is by comparing Scripture with Scripture Vincentius Lerinensis is not for you he alloweth nothing barely vpon Tradition For by all the passages of his booke he doth plainely teach that no Traditiō is to be received but that which is consonant vnto Scripture such as S. Austin delivereth Quod vniversa tenet Ecclesia Lib. 4. contra Don. cap. 23. such as the whole Church hath doth hold agreeing to the Canon of the revealed word And from famous D. Field that powerfull hammer of all Heretikes that claime tenure in the Church you cā produce nothing to helpe your cause either in that page or in his whole booke Neither is Tradition to sense or expound the Scripture as you say This is your third interpreter first you appealed to the Church then to the Fathers now to Traditions the next appeale must bee to the Pope or else you will be cashierd Mr LEECH This rule he called Popish exclaiming against it as the very ground of Popery and superstition Wherevpon I desired him for my better instruction to giue a rule of faith more certaine infallible then this which be brāded with such disgracefull imputation ANSVVER Popish it is without all gainsaying For howsoever we reiect not all Traditions as first D. Field in his 4 booke of the Church the number and names of the Authors of Canonicall Scripture secondly the cheefe heades of Christian doctrine as delivered in the Creed of the Apostles Thirdly the religion purely collected out of Scripture delivered to succeeding ages fourthly the continuall practise of the Primitiue Church though not expresly commaunded but necessarily contained in Scripture and lastly Traditions of order not of faith such as are our Canons and Constitutions agreeing to the ancient and grounded on S. Paules speech Let all things be done in order I say we reiect not these though Waldensis in his time complained Waldens tom 3. tit 7. cap. 63. that the necessary Traditions of the Church were so confounded that they could hardly be discerned from the rest The points that we deny bee these first Scripture needeth not the Adiectiue help of Traditions it is a most sufficient rule and containeth all things necessary to salvation Secondly wee abhorre the comparison of these two and much more the preferring of tradition before Scripture as Hosius Baronius Symancha and others professe some affirming Hosius contr Petric c. 92. Baron an 33. nu 11. Sym. instit tit 24. n. 40. that all Scripture came to vs by Tradition therefore Tradition more worth others that Scripture needeth help from Traditions but Traditions neede no assistance from Scripture And therefore if you
THE DEFENCE OF TRVTH AGAINST A booke falsely called THE TRIVMPH OF TRVTH sent over from Arras A. D. 1609. BY HVMFREY LEECH late Minister Which booke in all particulars is answered and the adioining Motiues of his revolt confuted BY DANIELL PRICE of Exeter Colledge in Oxford Chaplaine in ordinary to the most high and mighty the Prince of Wales 1. King cap. 20.11 Let not him that girdeth his harnesse boast himselfe as he that putteth it off AC OX AT OXFORD Printed by Joseph Barnes 1610. TO THE MOST ILLVSTRIOVS PRINCE HENRY PRINCE of Wales Duke of Cornwaile and Earle of Chester the confluence of those choise blessings Peace Grace and Glory MOST GRATIOVS PRINCE with all reverence and devotion I present to your Highnesse this labour To whom shoulde I dedicate it But to your Princelie goodnes to whose service I haue consecrated my tongue and pen and heart and all the offices of my life it is an answer to a revolted late Minister a busines I may say imposed me by some of very honorable respect much encouraged by others especially the most Reverend Archbishop our late Chancelour It is the maintenance of truth O let it receiue countenance from the royall heire apparant of the defender of the truth The infection of Popery spreads too farre some come not to our Church others fly our Land and Church both revile and slander the Church The eies and harts and hopes of all the Protestant world be fixed vpon your Highnesse all expecting your Gracious faithfulnes readines in the extirpation of that man of sinne March valiantly herein Most Gracious Prince and the God of Princes shall protect you his Grace and Providence shall reward your faith and Confidence and shall heape vpon your Highnesse favor and honor and glory in both worldes For which as long as I haue being I shall never cease praying Your Highnesse most humbly devoted and faithfull servant DANIELL PRICE ANSWERE TO THE EPISTLE Mr LEECH TO the learned wise and ingenious Academicks flowrishing in the renowned Vniversitie of Oxford ANSVVER SIR your booke sent from Arras as a peece of worke of divers colours is at length surveyed and reviewed to see whether it be worth the answering The opinion of many was as that of Tully cōcerning a Act. 4. in verrem Heius that you had rather mard the cause then bettred it and therefore your tract vnworthy to bee answered But my minde was otherwise that the cause mard you and therefore you and it to be viewed to be pittied to be answered In which succeeding discourse would I could deale with you as S. b Ierome Tom. 2. Ierome desired to deale with Origen that our Countrymen shoulde know your best things and bee ignorant of your worst For my witnesses be in heaven in my owne bosome that no motion of envy gaine glorie irregular provocation or popular ostentation haue drawne me to this but the all guiding spirit of God by the honourable motion of some and comfortable encouragement of others And therefore I doe refraine all disparagements and personall aspersions against you wishing you had done so against those manie worthy Doctors of our Vniversity An act which I know you once disliked in that baaling Priest c His booke entituled de Triplici hominis officio his epistle to the Vniversitie Weston who as if he had beene one of Psilli who only fed on Poyson or the voice of a man in the mouth of a Devill d Esay 36.4 or Rabshekah sent out of Hell to blaspheme God did vilifie all the Bewclarks of learning aliue dead Doctors and governors of our Academy But let his branded character remaine vpon him and his memory Cams curse and Cains marke e Gen. 4.12 vagus profugus in terris The front of your Epistle sheweth at first that you thinke otherwise of vs thē he doth seeing that you stile our students the learned wise ingenious Academicks flowrishing and our Vniversity the renowned Oxford we shall see how you proceede Mr LEECH Experience doth well approue Saint Bernards saying Efficacior lingua quà m litera the tōgue is of greater efficacie then the pen. And therefore I suffer no little disadvantage in that I must now speake vnto you in a silent letter pleade my cause by a mute advocate of my mind ANSVVER It is true efficacior lingua quà m litera but yet melior anima quà m lingua If your pen expresse not what your tongue is able fullie I would your hart woulde conceiue that which your tongue may speake truly that as some thinke there bee certaine strings that passe from the hart to the tongue so there might bee a concatenatiō that what your hart thinketh your tongue speaketh and your pen writeth may so agree that they may be all to the glorie of God the instructing of others and saving of your owne soule For if your tongue could thunder as f Aul. Gell. lib. 17-c 17. Aristophanes spake of Pericles or you had a tongue like a trumpet as g Hier. adver Ruffin tom 2. fol. 221. Hierome saith Hilary had or as Saint h 1. Cor. 13. Paule observeth the tongue of men or Angels and had not Charitie it were but vayne sounding tickling tinckling The tongue not powerfull without charity and charity not fruitfull without verity S. Austin noted that all marvailed at Tullies tongue but not at his invention and at Aristotles invention but not his tongue I know not that ever you were admired for either But remember to vse the talent given in both as you ought thinke not you suffer disadvantage in that you speake in a silent letter I would it were not silent both for proofe and profit and that your mute advocate were not mutinous Mr. LEECH But since I write vnto thē who are not strangers in my busines but as well eie witnesses of the wrongs which I haue endured as eare witnesses of the doctrine which I preached among you my vndoubted hope is that your harts will be touched with some compassion either toward me vnworthyly entreated by a faction for I will not impute the crime of a few vnto all or towards your selues whome this particular doth very highly import in respect of your learning honor and estimation ANRVVERE You write to those that are strangers to your doctrine not to your person or strāgers not to the hearing but approuing your opinion strangers wee are all to any wrongs done to you not to the wrongs offered by you And therefore thinke you not to touch the hartstrings of our students with a dittie of compassion as if you were as you say wrongfully and vnworthily entreated by a faction Compassion every honest hart will afford you for being misled rather then misused i Lib. 1. de Controver ad Cler. c. 31. St Bernard distinguisheth of pacidicos and pacificos those that in word speake of peace but indeed make ready to battaile So may I
Pez p. 552. Pezelius noteth they make thē Perfectiores leges Evangelicas which be but Enarrationes decalogi But to your supposition how vmbragious soeuer you seeme to be it is manifest you never vnderstood the state of the question Counsells are precepts I can easily bring a Iurie of Fathers to proue it not such as you impanelled to condemne your selfe Precepts I say they be to particular men who exceed others in gifts of grace And because much shall bee required of him that hath much giuen him therefore a Counsell as a praecept doth oblige not all in generall but him that is particularly furnished by God for such a purpose and service and therefore he that hath the gift of chastity other circumstances concurring is bound sub poena not to marry S. Hierom doth only speake of generall precepts and the place in Gregory is oft cited and as oft answered but not quoted at all But I say the same of him Greg. mor. l. 26. cap. 25. as of Hierome for Gregory is most plaine in the point in the 25 Chapt. of the 26 booke of Moralls his words be specialis iussio and specialia praecepta and specialiter imperatur and the distinction of generale praeceptum speciale praeceptum is so often repeated about the midst of that Chapter as nothing can be more plain So that Ierome and Gregory come over to vs for they meane speciall precepts not generall And certainely as S. Basil speaketh if virginity were a generall command to all it would exclude marriage but being not some may marry some liue chast all doe well Mr LEECH This I demanded but hee then passed it ouer with silence and therefore I expect his answere now how hee cā avoid this consequence which followeth vpon his own learning ANSVVER Eccles 12. The words of the wise are like Goads like nailes fastened by the masters of the assemblies saith Salomon His words might haue satisfied you if truth and reason would haue yeelded you satisfaction but a false opinion once grounded is like poison fully setled or like Deianiraes shirt it wil hardly be shaken of without plucking the skinne with it Mr LEECH As for sending me vp to London to answere the point there my reply was that for my part I was ready to answere vnto the point and to iustify the doctrine either there or else where in what consistory soever in the kingdome Only for your own credit sake and place said I which you supply I wish that it would please you to bee better advised at least to conferre with some other doctors who heard the sermon as well as your selfe and maturely to deliberate whether there be scandalum datum or acceptum a scandall on my part iustly giuen or on your part vniustly taken and whether your exception against my doctrine will beare waight or no being poysed in an indifferent ballance of equity before you resolue vpon this precipitation Otherwaies you shall bewray great want of sound iudgement in opinion and disclose much oversight in discretion ANSVVER o Theod. in Plut. Pericl Pericles had that skill in wrastling that though he receiued a fall yet hee would perswade the wrastler that cast him and others that beheld him that he cōquered I know no such subtelty in you as you would haue your hearers to beleeue but sure I am you did not braue it so with the Doctor as you here relate In all these proceedings of D. Hutton you haue iniured him much but your selfe more you know what slayeth the soule and therefore ought to forbeare al insulting tearmes iniust imputations circumstantiall disparadgments false relations and to regard age and authority learning piety so are you bound by feare and conscience What other Doctors iudged concerning your sermon you knowe by those reverend Divines and governors among vs when you were censured about it and therefore it is an idle question whether you gaue or tooke the offence The doctrine you know was Papisticall therefore you ought not to haue obtruded such a point in the pulpit Christs speech is generall p ◠Mat. 18.6 whosoeuer shall offend one of these little ones that beleeue in me it were better for him that a milstone were hanged about his neck and that hee were drowned in the depth of the sea Your weapons were made on the Philistims forges Aug. your arguments were neither de veritate nor pro veritate Neither truth of matter nor sobriety of speech had place in your tempestuous conceit disiointed sermon You were not so willing to answere at London nor so peremptory to accuse the Doctor for want of iudgement in opinion or ouersight in discretion Mr LEECH And farther I assure you call me whether you will into questiō I shall discharge my selfe with sufficient credit when you shall gaine little by questioning my doctrine or molesting me causelesly ANSVVER You wel ad the word farther for you never spake so farre as this you haue a strange gift of amplification you scarse spake the tēth part of that which you haue here so enlarged as is confirm'd and averred by wise honest witnesses that heard it This large discourse was not extant then You neither durst nor could babble so much in so short a time you durst not for your distraction that night observed by many was very much it shewd that then you had not altogether dispassioned your conscience but that there was some sparke which did feare and follow you observed by her owne eie though no other eie should perceiue her chased by her own foot though nothing either in heauen or earth should pursue her Relation tells me there was some ouerture of compunction then in you your looks gestures words gaue testimony that you durst not speake so peremptorily And that you could not it is plaine scarse three questions and answers passing between you and those rather commanding your Coppy then disputing the question Mr LEECH Here the kitchin-conference brake vp only in the loose he required a copy of that doctrine of Counsells delivered by me out of S. Gregory To this I voluntarily condescended adding these words to intimate my confident resolution Sir For the doctrine I will request no fauor at your hands only I hope that you will doe me iustice if not assure your selfe I shall right my selfe else where This was the last period of our conference at that time and so wee parted supper calling vs both away ANSVVERE So much for your saucy vnsauory kitchin-stuffe You need not againe to insist vpon the place a circūstance in that businesse lest materiall And the advantage of malice and hatred hence is very small if duly considered Therefore breefly to enforme the Christian indifferent Reader Concerning that aspertion of disgrace you call the kitchin conference thus it was as I haue receiued it from the mouthes vnder the hands of those it concerneth Presently vpon your sermon you were sent for because of the generall
our Christian perfection wherevnto the abdication of riches fitteth prepareth a man listening not so much to that which is lawfull as to that which is expedient avoiding riches and other things of like nature not as things vnlawfull but as impediments and hinderances vnto righteousnes ANSVVER Abdication of riches fitteth those indeede that are covetously minded for to such only these are hinderances and impediments and no other Did God grant a clogge to Salomon when he gaue him wealth Let me propose a Question Is it lawfull for all men to sell all that they haue and pursue this perfection I see no reason but they should for why in good matters should not one be as forward as another If so who should buy when all sell or giue almes or exercise deedes of liberality when they haue nothing If otherwise then this is no arbitrary counsell but a particular precept to some to whom it may doe good And howsoever that be true which S. Austin in the 61. Psalme speaketh that God doth not say Nolite habere Aust 61. Psal sed nolite cor apponere Non enim damnat divitias sed cor appositū quod scilicet non expendit sed recondit yet I say Riches are vnlawfull when they be impediments vnto righteousnesse Mr LEECH And S. Augustine in his Enchiridion ad Laurentium is of opinion that perfection of charity which is the perfection of Christian life consisteth neither in the sole performance of the actions of precepts conformable to non moechaberis nor yet in the performance of the actions of Counsells vnlesse both actions of precepts and counsells be rightly referred with relation to the ende of all the actions of precepts and Counsells which is charitas erga Deum proximum propter Deum charity toward God primarily and charity towards our neighbour for Gods sake secondarily ANSVVER This place of Austin is most forcible for our assertion and returneth vpon you vnavoidably For if all that we can doe by precepts and Counsells Deut. 6.5 Mat. 22.37 Marc. 12.30 Luk. 10.27 are referred as meanes to attaine this end to loue God aboue al c. and if this be so expresly and often commanded not only by Moses in the law but thrise by Christ in the Gospell how then can counsells outstrip precepts that by them may be performed works of supererogatiō vnlesse the meanes should exceed the ende and the middle the top S. Austin doth highly extoll our loue of God the more to exhort vs therevnto and the Schoolemen with him and out of him doe vrge the worthinesse of charitie being as they affirme bonorum principium quia à Deo bonorum medium quia secundum Deum Albert. Aquin. bonorum finis quia propter Deum and do further obserue that whereas other vertues haue bonum for their obiect and yet not for their end charity hath bonum pro fine obiecto all as Austin speaketh performed to God and all Christian offices to our neighbour for Gods sake Nostrarum haec meta viarum Mr LEECH And because the performance of the actions of precepts are in themselues absolutely necessary for atcheiving this end being such as without it the ende cannot be attained and the performance of the other of Counsells doth only secondarily tende therevnto as a help or as a removens impedimentum hence is it that schoole-divines haue this distinction or rather conclusion comprised in a distinction viz. Perfectiō of charity which is the perfection of Christian life consisteth primario essentialiter in praeceptis but secundario accidentaliter in Consilijs primarily and essentially in precepts but secondarily and accidentally in Counsells ANSVVER You come neerer and neerer to vs. If Perfection consist accidentaliter secundariò in Consilijs then Counsells are of lesse value then precepts Caietan in Th. Aq. 22 ae hoc articulo as much as the circumstance is lesse then the substance And Caietans graine of salt must season this distinction and then it may well be admitted precepts necessary to all as including the thing to be done Counsells necessary to some as prescribing secondarily and accidentally the best maner for them of fulfilling the precepts which as I haue often said bee particular to such Gers de confilijs Evang. Paludan in sent lib. 3. dist 34. q. 3. because each man is tied to the fulfilling of the law in the highest degree and best sort he can according to the talent receiued the abilitie wherewith God hath endowed him So Gerson and Paludanus the one in his tract de Consilijs Evangelicis statu perfectionis the other In Sent. lib. 3. distinct 34. q. 3. Mr LEECH Benefield his confederats in Iovinians heresy If any be so wedded to his owne private humor as not in this sense to admit of Evangelicall Counsells of perfection quoad viam and quoad gradum but that they will confound Precepts and Counsells together holding both of like necessity Counsells as well precepts so did the heretiques called Apostolici Austin haeres 40. Epiphane haeres 61. or that Counsells containe in them no kinde of perfection it is a branch of Iovinian and Vigilantius their condemned heresie Read Saint Hierom against Iovinian and S. Ambrose in the 10. booke of his Epistles the 80. and 81. Epistles Or lastly if any will hold the profession of them vnlawfull and that there be none the first crosseth many pregnant testimonies of Scriptures veritie and the second thwarteth the ioint consent of all orthodoxe Antiquitie The which Tertullian de praescriptionibus adversus haereticos Cyprian de vnitate Ecclesiae Augustine de vtilitate credendi Vincentius Lyrinensis in his Commonitoriū against all the prophane innovation of heretiques of his time make to be the very square of propheticall and Apostolicall interpretation drawne along by the line of the Church ANSVVER Wee admit of Evangelicall Counsells in the same sense that the Fathers did not as transcending the strict meaning of the law That famous and ancient Chancelor of Paris did sufficiently taxe the errour of those that vnderstand not the Fathers in this point for according to his iudgement Counsells precepts be coincident and yet neither that famous Gerson nor wee doe maintaine any heresy herein Our Tenet is this we deny not but there may be a verball distinction of precepts and Counsells as that thrise worthy Austin of our age the Deane of Winchester doth grāt D. Morton in his appeal lib. 5. c. 4. sect 3. num 11. but we abhorre and detest the maintaining of them as the workmen of Babell vphold them Wee holde that they transcend not the strict meaning of the law nor haue heate enough to hatch the addle egges of workes of supererogation which are of a later brood but we maintaine against the gates of Rome and the strength of hell that Counsells tie not all but those only who are better enabled with guifts then others or tied by their vocation to
done the like you had never rambled on such a Collection as this to say Christ had erroneously taught him the way to life by vade vende omnia if this bee not a Counsell of voluntary poverty Your sequell is out of ioint and absurd rather Christ would haue never applied this plaister if he looking through the windowes of this young mans soule into his inward most retired roome had not found covetousnes to be his hinderance and encombrance And this proveth it selfe in the Text for he went away sorrowfully I cannot but note the malice and virulent dealing of your ignorant contradicting spirit traducing Calvine for a blasphemous interpreter who taught no more then he learned of the Fathers and if among those that did interpret Scripture since the fathers time any one is worthy to be accounted fidus interpres Horat. Art Poet. for his soūdnesse and profoundnesse blessed Calvin is who was as Eramsus wrot of Tonstall a world of learning Eras epist 84. Claud. Verderius conscio in Autores pag. 174. and as Theodorus Gaza testified of Plutarch that if any mā were so limited that he could only read one humane authors bookes he would read Plutarch so many renowned Divines next vnto sacred Scripture haue of all other authors choisly and cheefly selected this holy servant of God So that in this Paragraph you blaspheme God iniure truth accuse your knowledge and abuse your conscience Mr LEECH Lastly I would but demand what S. Paule meant 2. Cor. 7.25 Vid. Damas dict Gnomi in Indice to distinguish plainely betwixt Precepts Coūsells thus praeceptum non habeo consilium do for so the vulgar readeth which all the latine Church followeth and all the Greeke Fathers haue so taken it if there be no Counsells For he groundeth this his distinction vpon his Masters wordes Non omnes capiunt and therefore S. Paul had no precept But qui potest capere capiat And hence floweth the second branch consilium do as S. Hierom S. Basill and divers others of both Churches doe obserue ANSVVER Discourses that grow tedious are odious and such is this your frequent and too often querulous quaere The distinction in S. Paule is betweene 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 betweene a precept and sentence no word signifying Counsell in that place I haue already shewed how Antoninus maketh S. Dominick the Author of Evangelicall Counsells Anton. parte 3. vt ante and S. Paul the teacher of faith and the law and yet you produce S. Paul as a speciall bullwark for your Counsel house Many Fathers haue I confesse read that Text so but the originall ministreth no such interpretation nor doe the Fathers themselues otherwise hence ground but that qui potest being enabled is qui debet hee that is commanded You and Coccius teach the Fathers to speak very preposterously Beware of the Fathers curse or rather of Gods curse seeing you call them to beare false witnesse against the Law Gospell and God himselfe Mr LEECH And that this point may be every way full and perfit builded vpon so many seuerall rockes as there bee seuerall places of Scriptures let the Doctors of the Church speake Vincentius Lyrin in cōmonitorio being the most probable Maisters and teachers in the Church against quot capita tot sensus the very bane of all religion mother of innovatiō let the church interpret Scripture and hee that will not heare the Church you know what followeth 2. Pet. 1. vlt. sit tibi tanquam haereticus Nay sit tibi tanquam ethnicus For as it is said of the letter of the scripture that it is not of any private inspiration For it came not in old time by the will of man but holy men spake as they were moved by the holy Ghost Serm. 17. in Cantic So may it be as truely saide of the sense of the Scripture that it is not of any priuat spirits interpretation And the reason why every man should flie from a private spirits interpretation A sentence that striketh the Religion in England as dead as a dore naile is this as it is excellentlie rendred by that mellifluous Father S Bernard Nonnulli adesse putant spiritum cùm non adest suúmque sensum pro sensu spiritus sequuntur deviantes suásque sententias magistrorum sententijs praeferūt that is for I cānot but translate it many men thinke that they haue the spirit of God when they haue it not erroneouslie following the sense of their owne private spirits for the meaning of the holy Ghost preferring their owne private opinions before the publique iudgements of their masters and teachers ANSVVER You haue suffered shipwracke vpon your rockes They be severall indeed Psal for they are severed far from you which is manifest in that you rocke to and fro in your preposterous building like a tottering wall or like a broken hedge You call for advocates the Doctors of the Church Num. 23.38 and fetch them in as Balaac did Balaam but they answer as there hee did but with a more holy spirit We are come vnto thee and can we nowe say any thing at all The worde that God hath put in our mouthes that shall we speake But if this helpe you not you call the Church to testifie with you To the church we leaue as much as the spowse hath made her iointer in the interpretation of Scripture by the Church Tertull. libro de praescrip haereticorum that of Tertullian is to be remembred who warneth of some Qui non ad materiam Scripturas sed materiam ad Scriptur as excogitant and thereby run into one of those two miseries which S. Austin observeth Aust Comm. Faustum lib. 22. cap. 32. Caiet in praef Com. in lib. Mosis aut falli imprudenter aut fallere impudenter you say the Fathers of the Church are for you yet Caietā beleeveth that God hath not tyed the exposition of the Scriptures to the senses of the Fathers And if the Fathers serue not you saie let the Church interpret Scripture We distinguish the Church from the Synagogue of Antichrist and seeing wee hold that Scriptures must tell which is the Church wee must deny that the Church must tell vs the sense of Scripture Gerson doth disclaime the iudgement of Pope Gerson de exam doct part 1. cō 5. Councell or Church cōcerning interpretation of Scriptures and trial of doctrine when hee delivereth that the examination of doctrine concerning faith belongeth not to the Councell or Pope but to every one that is sufficiently learned in Scriptures Cus Ep. 2. pag. 833. And Cusanus cannot deny but that by the iudgement of the Church the Scripture is fitted to the time and the sense altered as the time altereth We make the spirit of God speaking in Scripture to be iudge of the Scripture and Act. 17.17 as the men of Berea sought the Scripture to approue the
should be ready to cast a stone the stone which I cast against superogatiō is no other thē that which S. Iohn cast against it who giveth the lie to him that saith he hath no sin Bell. de Mon. lib. 2. c. 13. And Bellarmine is constrained to cōfesse that S. Austin Bernard and Thomas doe thinke it impossible to keep that Commandement Thou shalt loue the Lord thy God with all thy heart with all thy soule and with all thy minde Mr LEECH These are wiser fuller of zeale then Christ himself who suffred nay gaue commandement as it is in the parable that both tares and wheat should grow together vntill the harvest of the last iudgement and then shoulde the tares and weeds be bound vp in bundles fitted for the fire and the wheate should be gathered into his barne For at the last iudgement Sermo 3. de le iunio collectis 1. Cor. 3.12.13 there are some things vrenda flammis other things condenda horreis as S. Leo speaketh And doth not S. Paul allude to this Whose words be if any man build vpon Christ the foundation gold silver precious stones timber hay stubble every mans worke shal be made manifest for the day shal declare it because it shal be revealed by the fire and the fire shall try every mans workes of what sort they are To which fire let this Doctrine be reserved to stand or fall to burne as stubble hay timber or rather to escape as gould silver and precious stones ANSVVERE True zeale is the true seale of a Christian If you had any sparke therof I would wish as Porsenna did to Scaevola concerning his Country Lavater Iuberem macte virtute esse si pro mea patria virtus ista staret So I for true Religion Iobs friends had a bad cause but handled it well Iob had a good cause but maintained it ill neither ability of the cause nor dexterity of the handling haue assisted you The multiplicious abuse of Scripture in your text is frequēt that as the Prophet spake of aslying book so may al of your lying book You wold by intimation of that Scripture in the Parable of the Tares desire that as the tares are suffred to growe Mat. 13.30 so your doctrine may remaine vncēsured till the iudgement It is well that you acknowledge your doctrine to be like the Tares Fearefull will that iudgement be at that vniversall Sessions where Christ will be iudge the Saints the Iury when you are accused with those words of the Parable Master sowedst not thou good seed in thy field whence thē are these tares In that Parable of Christ as the streame of interpretation doth carry it is meant that by the evill seed mixt with the good the Church shall never be free from some wicked that it is impossible to roote them finally out for if wee wish to avoide these so fully as the godly could wish wee must goe out of the world as the Apostle speaketh So that of lewd persons not of hereticall positions that place is to be vnderstoode for Christ doth threaten the Churches in the Revelation for connivencie of false doctrine Laodicaea Rev. 2.3 chap for beeing neither hot nor cold Rev. 2.14 Rev. 2.20 Gal. Pergamus for maintaining the doctrine of Balaā Thyatira for suffring Iesabell to teach and deceiue his servants The Church of Galatia is reproved for that they suffered the Copartnership of Iewish Ceremonies when they were established in the Gospell of Christ and shall Religion the truest bond betwixt man and man the knot of coniunction and consociation In Dion Cass shall it bee divided Shall Maecenas wish Augustus to hate and correct any that change any thing in the service of the Gods Ioseph cont ap 2. Shall the Athenians enact that they that spake of their God otherwise then the law appointed should be severely punished And shall we so much neglect the attonement of iudgements and peace of soules as to suffer blending of doctrines not only leaven in our Lumpe but poison in our bread Far be it frō vs and from our seed for ever Let it be the brand not only of a luke-warme affection and of a Policie overpolitique but of Machiavillians and matchlesse villaines to call for connivency of hereticall positions From hel it came to hell it must returne againe We cannot chuse but suffer the Tares of iniquitie to grow vp but we will endeavour pro aris focis to eradicat the Tares of heresie Your second place of Scripture out of S. Paule A chardgeable Appeale is very fit for your purpose and the words in the next present verse as fit for mine 1. Cor. 3.11 Let every man take heed how he buildeth the later of those verses shall bee my praier for you that though your worke burne at that day and you loose yet you may be saved In the meane time Scripture hath disapproved you and the fathers haue refused you Mr LEECH Now to God only wise be rendred praise power might maiestie rule dominion and thanksgiving and let al the creatures in heavē in earth or vnder the earth say so be it Amen ANSVVER Vnto that supreame iudge Rev. 22.13 and to the last iudgment be this referred and vnto the everliving God who is in himselfe α ω in Angelis sapor et decor Aust in iustis adiutor protector in reprobis pavor et horror be ascribed the admiration of his Maiesty the acknowledgment of his mercy the awful remembrance of his power the ioyfull continuance of his favor And Hallelu-iah Rev. 19.1.2 Salvation and glory and honor and power be to the Lord our God for true and righteous are his iudgements for he hath condemned that great whore which did corrupt the earth with her fornications Amen Hallelu-iah CHAP. 8. Mr LEECH THus gentle Reader thou hast seene my maine defence of this doctrine wherein I haue followed the mature advise of the Philosopher and Oratour For I thought it not sufficient to confirme truth in the former part of this sermon vnlesse I confuted falshood also in the later And this I did for establishing thee if thou be in the right or reducing thee vnto it if thou hast been in the wrong ANSVVER THus Gentle Reader thou hast seen the meane defence of this doctrine wherein whether the author as he professeth hath followed the advise of the Philosopher or Orator iudge by the contradictions misapplications falsifications in the sermon Can Oratory or Philosophy be obtained without Grammar or cannot a Grammarian distinguish between Concilium Consilium the one comming originally à conciendo Calepin id est convocando the other derived from Consileo eo quòd vno consulente caeteri consileant It was a most probable tryall of the Ephraimits in shibboleth Iudg. 12.6 and sibboleth the mistaking cost the death of the body It was a laudable triall betweene the Coūsell of Nice and
desire to be taught the rule of faith out of an humble and a religious meaning here you may learne it it was a question worth his asking a point worthy your learning Mr LEECH Why said he what other ground of faith then the pure word of God I demaunded then who shall interpret this word Hee replied the spirit What spirit good Sir The spirit of God only which privat men thinke they haue Against which rule I except for that it was the common plea of all condemned Heretiques Wherefore I required a triall of this pretended spirit for I cannot admit that to be God his spirit in any private man which consenteth not with the spirit of the Catholique Church And thus you see M.D. Airay that what you formerly reiected out of my rule as Popish you must necessarily admit as true that is Ecclesiasticall Tradition annexed to the sacred Canon for the discerning of private spirits Otherwaies each Heretique will sense Scripture in the mould of his owne braine ANSVVER That the word of God is the ground of beleefe in God sacred Scripture it selfe proveth in manifold and pregnant places as in the olde Testament in the Proverbs Prov. 2.9 They make a man vnderstand righteousnes and iudgement and equity and every good path Esay 8.19.20 in Esay should not a people enquire at their God at the law and at the Testimonie they that speake not according to this word there is no light in them by Malachie Mal. 4.4 Remember the law of Moses which I commanded all Israell with the statutes and iudgements in the new Testament in S. Paul 2. Tim. 3.15 The Scriptures are able to make a man wise vnto salvation through the faith which is in Christ Iesus in S. Peter 2. Pet. 1.19 We haue a most sure word of the Prophets wherevnto we must giue heed as to a light that shineth in darknesse till the day starre arise in our hearts Luc. 1.4 in S. Luke They containe the certainty of those things whereof we are instructed and in S. Iohn Ioh. 5.39 These things are written that yee might beleeue that Iesus is that Christ the sonne of God and in beleeuing yee might haue eternall life and by Christ himselfe sealing this point Search the Scriptures for in them you haue eternall life and they are they which testifie of mee but to this also the Fathers with all reverence haue agreed Basil Ep. 80. ad Eust Med. Let the Scriptures be arbitrators betweene vs saith Basill in his 80 Epistle and whosoever holds consonant opiniōs to those heavenly oracles let the truth bee adiudged on their side We are to enquire for iudges saith Optatus Contra Parmenianum de coelo quaerendus est Iudex Optat. cont Parmen l. 5. the Iudge must bee had from heaven but saith hee wherefore need we to knock at heauen when we haue a iudge wohm wee finde in the Gospell The Scripture is the rule of faith saith Tertullian contra Hermogenem Tertull. cont Hermog Chrysost in 13. Homil. in 2. Corinth It is a most exquisit rule saith Chrysostome in his 13 homily vpon the second to the Corinths It is an inflexible rule Greg. Nyss Grati. de ijs qui adeunt Hierosolymā saith Gregorius Nyssenus And S. Austin ample for this in many places in his booke de bono viduitatis testifieth that the Scripture pitcheth downe the rule of our faith And not only the Ancient Fathers but the Schoole-men haue succeeded in the same resolution Aquinas writeth expresly Aq 1. qu. 1. art 8. that our faith must rest vpon the Canonicall bookes of Scripture Durand agreeth with this Durand pref in senten that the maner of our knowledge exceed not the measure of faith and the holy Scripture expresseth the measure of faith Sum part 3. tit 18. c. 3. Nay Papists haue acknowledged this Antoninus confesseth that God hath spoken but once to vs and that in Scripture so plentifully that hee voucheth Gregory in the 22 book of his Moralls thus God needeth to speake no more concerning any necessary matter Al. 1. sent quaest 1. art 3 1. Coroll seeing all things are found in Scripture Alliaco consenteth to this The verities of Scripture bee the Principles of divinity quoniam ad ipsas saith he fit vltima resolutio Theologici discursus Bell de verbo Dei lib. 1. c. 2. In one word Bellarmin agreeth to all these Testimonies in his first book de verbo Dei Sacra Scriptura est regula credendi certissima tutissima This may serue to shew you that there is no other ground of faith then the worde of God Scriptures Fathers Schoolemen nay even our Adversaries being witnesses Deut. 32.31 as Moses speaketh You demaund who shall interpret this word It is replied the spirit of God which spirit the elect doe know certainly that they haue not only thinke as you traduce the speech of this reverēd Doctor but they assure thēselus that they haue the spirit and hee that knoweth not this ◠Cor. 3.16 is ignorant as Paul teacheth by an interrogatiō Knowe yee not that yee are the Temples of the holy Ghost and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you But against this rule you except for this was you say Chrysos prolog in Epist ad Rohan 3. de Lazar. the plea of al Heretiques It is false Heretiques and the devill did vrge Scripture but these could never for wāt of Gods spirit compare Scriptures together The privat spirit even every Priuat man of himselfe saith Chrysostom only by reading may vnderstand yea need nothing else but to read Chrysos hom 13. in Gene◠by which he meaneth to confer one place of Scripture with another And the same Father giveth the reason Scriptura seipsam exponit auditorem errare non sinit The scripture expoundeth it selfe and suffereth not the hearer to be deceived Distinct 37. Relatum So speaketh Chrys 13. hom in Genes The Canon Law is most plaine herein Non enim sensum extrinsecus alienum extraneum sed ex ipsis Scripturis sensum capere veritatis oportet For we must not from without them seeke a forraine and strange sense but wee must out of the Scriptures themselues receiue the meaning of the truth And a clowde of witnesses do testifie the same Wherefore it is no way necessary that we aske helpe of Tradition which is as I formerly spake the cittie of refuge for all runnagate points in your religion Popish Tradition in the Church soiourning only as the deuill doth to deceiue as a treacherous stranger not to be acquainted with or as an Infidell not to be conversed with and therefore D. Airay taught you the truth when you heretically thought you might mould the sense of scripture in the brain of the brasen head Tradition Mr LEECH And now M. D. Airay being thus overthrowne in the rule of his faith proposed vnto me a question of
may suffice for thy instruction concerning these Motiues Onely I may not forget to advertise thee that whereas through their titles I vse this perpetuall stile THE PROTESTANTS c. howbeit the most learned amongst them differ in iudgement from the common sort and in this respect cannot bee concluded in the generality of ALL I haue not done this without good consideration For though the principall divines in England do vtterly distast the vaine opinions of D. King and such like yet since by publike profession of the truth they giue not sufficient notice vnto the world of their Catholique positions I must involve them also in this common accusation And as they against their knowledge Corde creditur ad iustitiam ore fit confessio ad salutem doe suffer a preiudice to fall vpon God his truth they must likewise against their will suffer an infamy to remaine vpon their owne persons ANSVVER The Catholikes like to the olde Circumcellions are Individua vaga ever in motion Campians reasons Bristowes motiues the one ten the other 48 yours a Iurie This former treatise hath answered all yours But seeing they so commanded your affection and convinced your vnderstanding wee will heare your descriptions and marke the motions If it be the good of your Reader you wish you would not leade him into so many darke entries of the Chambers of death your booke is come into the hands of many better informed soules then your selfe and some that haue breathed lately from their Antichristianisme that haue seene and heard more then you haue and haue hated and abhorred and returned You seeke to iustifie but do condemne your selfe and you hope your satisfaction will proue an infection to some But each man doth disdaine that these should draw ouer any wise Proselyte They are the same in substance as in your sermon only as the Patron of error can change his shapes so doe these You say you must not forget to advertise and I cannot omit to discrie the vntruth in the advertisement For if with an indifferent eie ANY observant in the state of our Church doe looke vpon the more learned Of our Divines he shal finde that either they be writers or publike Readers or continuall Preachers against Popery neither doe they differ in iudgement from the common sort as most iniuriously you traduce them By publike profession in the vnity of the spirit in the bond of peace in the essense and substance of religion all agree And howsoever there haue beene some differences in opinion betweene many of the most orient fixed starres in the firmament of the Church as betweene Ruffinus Ierom Ierom Austin Austin Symplician and many others yet all the world wil free our Church from hauing in her Religion any diversly affected from the truth addicted to Popery at the least any that ever were of deserving note or accounted the Principall divines If there be any such homely and home-made peeces as your selfe that coccle they be no sooner noted but punished Your preiudice and infamy will returne vpon your selfe for accusing our worthiest to maintaine a linsey woolsey blended mangled Religion Being supplanted your selfe in reputation you seeke to supplāt others the vtmost spirits of your malice and spite being as Enginers to overthrow the credit of those that by their learned paines do seeke to overthrow the wals of Babell Their publique profession and positions free them from your common accusation their sermons Lectures writings might satisfie you but that these heavenly showers haue fallen besides you Error surprising your will ignorance your knowledge a smale things may moue you that were never setled Mr LEECH The First motive The Protestants admit not a triall of their Religion by the testimony of the Fathers whatsoever they pretend to the contrary BEcause it is a preposterous devise to iudge the former ages of the Church by the later D. Field pag 204. We willingly admit a triall by the Fathers saith he in the name of his Church therefore the courses of my study haue ever beene directed vnto a diligent pervsall of ancient Fathers whose authority simply considered as it may preponderate our moderne writers so in reference vnto the Church being her witnesses who is the iudge to define all controversies their testimony is to be preferred before all Authors whatsoever Neither resolued I thus without serious deliberation and especially contra haeref cap. 1. 2. the graue counsaile of Vincentius Lyrinēsis did prevaile with me seeing that learned holy men did generally conspire in this opinion If any man will discerne Heretical pravity from Catholike verity he must be furnished with a double helpe first the Canon of sacred Scripture Secondly the tradition of the Catholique Church wherein three things inseparably concurre Vniversality Antiquitie Consent The reason of which prescription is yealded by him to be this The Scripture is sublime and forasmuch as all men sense it not alike it is necessarie to adioine therevnto the continuall interpretation of the Church Vpon this infallible ground evident vnto all men of any apprehension I builded my faith conforming it alwaies vnto those Orthodoxe principles which I had derived out of the venerable Fathers Hence I assumed this doctrine of Evangelicall Coūsells which as I delivered out of the sacred volumes of Antiquitie so Antiquitie it selfe deduced it with mee out of the divine Oracles of holy Scripture And therefore seeing that my opinion was cleerely built vpon this foūdation I pressed it vncessantly vntill my vniust Iudges were enforced to forsake this meanes of triall and consequently to punish the Fathers in me as I had spoken by them But when I plainely saw that my doctrine could not be condemned without condemnation of the ancient Church and that my Iudges were driuen to this extremity I inferred that their Religion could not be good and that their consciences were verie bad ANSVVER It is a most preposterous devise to make the Fathers iudges of the Scriptures whereas the Scriptures as S. Austin confesseth ought to be the iudges of the Fathers otherwise what you impute to vs is the practise of your selues which you seeke approbation of the former Church by the latine That the Fathers may preponderate the moderne writers I answere for their antiquity they doe but where the same truth is in both for their authority they do not exceed Hath the Church had no growth since their time Hath the sonne of righteousnesse Psal 19. going from the ende of the heauens and in his compasse returning to the ende thereof againe by his beames given no more light then when it first rose Hath not God revealed somethings to one which he hath not to another 1. Cor. 14.30 as S. Paul speaketh Our reverend estimation of the Fathers is most learnedly and fully delivered by his Maiestie in his premonition and our willingnesse of a triall by the Fathers is openly testified by the Reverend Bewcleark D. Field these exceptions
or rather annotations considered that there are divers Fathers meerely forged as Hyppolitus Amphilochius the epistles of Cletus Anacletus c. B. Iuell D. Rainolds that world of learning the honorable B. of Winchester haue proued which point was never answered as yet Secōdly divers false tracts are fathered on the true fathers as Mr Perkins Probleme a book neuer answered the worke now in our Oxford library in hand for comparing all the Fathers with their most ancient manuscripts do shew 136. bastard Epistles already discovered in Gregory Thirdly the Fathers are reiected most scornefully by Papists where they cannot wrest them to their purpose as is proved by the practise of Canus Villa vincētius Sixtus Senensis Baronius Bellarmine Fourthly that all of these Papists haue taxed the Fathers for particular errors Fiftly omitting many more reasōs the fathers make more for vs thē for Papists nay only for vs not for Papists as that precious Iewell of the Church hath irrefragably proved The counsaile out of Lyrinensis is already answered but this I adde hee doth not there meane vnwritten verities or a supply to bee made to scripture for hee doth acknowledge in the next Chapter and so againe in the 41. that solus Canon Scripturae sufficit ad omnia Vincent Lirinens satis supérque that the Scripture is sufficient alone against all Heretickes yea alone for all things more thē this that it is more then sufficient his 41. Chapter doth plainely deliver vnam regulā to be scripture the interpretation of which is ever to bee approved by Scripture And for those notes of vniversality Antiquity and consent which you say doe inseparably concurre Vinc. c. 4. c. 5. 11. he saith not so the word inseparably is not his for Vincentius sheweth that Heretikes haue claimed the two former shewing that the Arrians had vniversality and the Donatists Antiquity And for consent he forewarneth as a Prophet in 39 Chapter that when men endeavor Maiorum volumina vitiare to corrupt the ancient Fathers as Papists most openly doe to obtaine Consent then the only remedy is sola Scripturarum authoritate convincere to convince them by the only authority of Scripture And therefore if you built your fort vpon this ground as not hauing red or not vnderstood your Author choosing some fragments and not observing all the particulars and passages of his meaning your foundation is not on the corner stone the foundation rotten the building reeling and your doctrine hath no approbation from Vniuersality Antiquity or lastly from consent either iointly from all from the greatest number of fathers or from that which is the only Countenance and Approuer of Spirits Doctrines from the Scripture That therefore which you make your first motiue to haue rended you from the truth the same I make my first confirmation to settle me therein and to detest Popery that seeing Papists admit not a trial of their religion by Scriptures that the Fathers admitte none that reiect Scriptures as also that Papists approue not alwaies the Testimony of the Fathers as they pretend I infer in particular that this doctrine of yours is worthily condemned but not the Ancient Church as also in generall that by condemning of vs in any point you cōdemne Antiquity seeing our Reformed Churches be reduced to the ancient Primitiue And therfore your New foūd Religion is Rebellion against the Truth Apostasie frō Scripture and Antiquity Mr LEECH The second Motiue The Protestants preferre their Reformed Congregations before the ancient Catholique Church AS my violent Iudges did palpably disclaime the sentence of the ancient Church so they vnreasonablie required my submission vnto their reformed Congregations which as they be not comparable with the purity of the former so their principal Doctours Luther Zwinglius men no lesse odious each vnto the other S. Austin S. Ambros S. Hierom. then both are hatefull vnto the Church of Rome are no waies matchable with the Patrones of my doctrine For as S. Gregory Nazianzen iustly excepted against the Arrians in this māner If our faith be but 30. S. Gregory Epistola 1. ad Cledō contra Arrianos yeeres old 400 yeares being passed since the incarnation of Christ then our gospell hath been preached in vaine our martyrs haue died in vaine vntill this time c. So if for a point of faith I must remit my selfe vnto Luther Zwinglius Calvin and their reformed conuenticles rather then vnto the holy Fathers ancient Church thē surely the gospell hath beene miserably taught and all our predecessors haue beene pitifully deceiued for 1600. yeares since Singular therefore was the folly and partiality of my Iudges to detract authority from our blessed Fathers to yeeld it vnto Lutherans men of as new a stāpe in these times as the Arrians were in S. Gregory Nazianzen his time whose carnal appetites and base condition of life drew them to allow that in their doctrine which they performed in their practise being contrary in both vnto the canon of scripture and continual succession of the Church The consideration whereof did manifestly detect vnto me that either their vnderstāding is very meane or their will very perverse who feared not to disauthorise the Fathers yet would not grant me the same liberty against their brethren in whom I neuer approued any thing other waies then it was consonant with the prescription of Antiquity or dissonant from hir Tradition ANSVVER THe reformed Church that hath left Babylon and is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowler having received true Religion 〈◊〉 according to Scripture was in all reason to haue had submission performed from you both because that the truth professed is against this position as also for that profession and subscription you had willingly afforded to her when you were supposed to be not only a member but a Minister in her Congregation Had you straied as a sheepe through simplicity it had been lamentable but to fly being a shepheard through Apostasie this is damnable Luther and Zwinglius though they agreed not in all points yet they both ioined in demolishing your Dagon Great lights of the Church haue diffred in some particulars nay haue whet their pens like rasors and edged their tongues like swords yet in the truth of God they haue agreed to the suppressing of the kingdome of Sathan The differēces between these two were nothing so scādalous as their ioint conflicts with Rome were victorious To coūtervaile your place out of Gregory Nazianzene Prudent Peristep hym 10 which you apply improperly Prudētius witnesseth the heathens did scornfully so deale with the religiō of Christianity in the beginning thereof Nunc dogma nobis Christianum nascitur post evolutos mille demū Consules so you as if after so many holy Fathers our Religion had beginning from Luther Zwinglius or Caluin But how contrary to all truth this is Bristow Motiue 45. Bristow his confession sheweth in
beene over luxuriant in commending virginity and condemning matrimony your own men had not so censured him as they do Gregory Nazianzene his speech concerning Basill no doubt is as true of many thousād Protestāts who haue bridled the appetites and lusts of the flesh and haue subdued themselues to the obedience of Gods spirit And howsoever Antiquity haue commended the restraint of lawfull thinges to vs yet in this they ever taught that lawfull things when they are hurtfull to vs are vnlawfull we are bound to avoide al things that are hinderances to Gods service Cōtinue your virulency and acrimony of speech against Luther let his works and studies testifie whether hee were of so delicate a spirit as you affirme and if by his carnall sectaries you meane Protestants read our D. Downham Mr Rogers Mr Greenham nay Luther himselfe and see whether we maintaine not that a Christian is bound to watch and pray fast thē consider whether we teach a single faith or no for as wee teach that faith only must iustifie vs so also wee declare that workes must iustifie our faith and continually we preach the excellency and necessity of good works If you lacked Chastisement you might haue complained and beene supplyed fasting I doubt not but you were practised in you were put out of Commons for whipping the Monkes exercise though it sort better that you haue it abroad then at home yet that should not haue been wanting to you if you had acquainted your friends Seriously I answere that Protestants are not lulled a sleepe in the cradle of security How many sighes do many send vp to heaven for their sins what straines of compūction what streames of contrition flow from the limbecke of many of their souls And yet this only serveth not For if this had beene the only way to happines thē had the Pharisies by violence obtained heavē The holinesse of their carriage continuance at devotiō avoidance of all meanes of polution their yeerely tithing monthly almes weekely fastings dayly whippings howrely praiers had holp them But of al such God asketh Who required these things at your hands nay who counselled any man to do this but only such as require will-worship Al these waies in the ballance of the sanctuary appeare to be but hay and stubble straw To this the way hath not led the guides not directed the teachers not informed For performing of this the true Saints haue not beene registred in this the true church hath never bin practised Wherfore my fourth confirmation is to sticke to the vnity of that happy Church which hath so worthily cleared it selfe from these visards of perfection and ragges of superstition Mr LEECH The fift Motiue The Protestants corrupt the holy scripture in defence of their opinions THe proper meanes designed by God to convince Heresie are two to wit sacred scripture and Ecclesiasticall Tradition Now because Heretiques are clearely refuted by the second therefore they fly only vnto the first which they depraue and mangle according to the liberty of their spirits And this they performe partlie in their translations and partly in their interpretation thereof Though many examples might be afforded in this kind yet I need not seeke after further proofe then this present busines doth afford whereof I now intreate For whereas the words of our Saviour are easie and plaine all men do not receiue this saying as though there were such an impossibility therein that the freedome of will concurring with the grace of God could not subdue the inclinations of corrupt nature Tom. 7. in ep ad Wolfgang Hence Luther the slaue of his affections saith that the propension of fervent nature in MAN towardes a WOMAN is so created by God in his body that it cānot be extinct by any vowes and therefore he that resolveth to liue without a WOMAN must leaue the name of a MAN and make himselfe to be plainly an Angell or spirit For it is by no meanes granted vnto him by God so that it is aboue his strength to containe himselfe from a woman And this is by the compulsiue word of God willing and commanding the same Wherefore the Counsaile of virginity is intollerable with them that conceiue such an impossibility to fulfill it To increase Tom. 5. serm de matrimon and multiply it is not a precept saith Luther but it is more then a precept it is implanted nature it is as necessary as meate and drinke It is no more in the power of Man to liue without a womā then to be a woman and no man In vaine then doth our Saviour giue his advise and S. Paul his Counsaile For in Luthers gospell it is more then a precept to avoide virginity And yet my Iudges not admitting it to be a Counsaile could not deny it to be a precept Which yet if it be so why doe they then make lesse conscience to fulfill a Precept then Catholiques do to follow a Counsaile For the neglect of the first is a sin but it is not so in the second vnlesse we tie our selues vnto it by a voluntary vow being not constrained therevnto by a necessary command ANSVVER THe proper meanes appointed by God to confute all sprouting Heresie is Scripture which because it is so powerfull against Popery therefore Papists doe disclaime it and with the most contemptuous Phrases brand that testimony that hath marked them with the stamp of heresie Tearming it a nose of waxe as Peresius blasphemously doth Peres de Tradit praef Pighius con◠3. Eckius Enchr c. 1. prop. 4. or dead inke a dumb iudge as Pighius and besides many other titles of disgrace Eckius affirmeth that God never cōmanded his Apostles to write any Scripture Thus they vilifie the word to magnifie tradition which tradition we acknowledge not for with Mary wee haue chosen the better part and doe assure our selues that there is no means so absolute as scripture to cōvince Heretikes which meanes you would take from vs by laying to our charge false translations and corrupt interpretations Concerning false Translations much might be spoken conferring yours with the Originall how many hundred differences wil be foūd how many Additions Detractions Falsifications Depravations Lyndan de opt gen Interpret l. 3. c. 1. 2. 4. 6. and intolerable Barbarismes be in the vulgar Lindanus hath confessed who acknowledgeth that there be monstrous corruptions of all sorts in it scarse one booke of Scripture that is vndefiled and so haue Bannes and Sixtus Senensis and others accused it And I desire but this resolution of any learned Papist that seeing the Councell of Trent hath approved commanded the vse of the vulgar translation affixing a Bull before it and Sixtus Quintus hath afterwards commanded only his translation to stand in force shewing many errors in the vulgar therefore hath prefixed his Bull before it after him Clemens Octavus finding manifold corruptiōs in the Bible of his Predecessor caused it againe to
if marriage be like to be an vnavoideable hinderance to the service of God a man must cut of the thought of marriage not by advise but by expresse cōmand Mat. 5.30 yea vpon paine of eternal damnation as Christ doth witnes If thy hand offend thee cut it of and if thy eie offend thee put it out better it is to go into heavē with one eie or one hand then into hell Now for your Authorities Coccius what * Cocke hatched your Authority and like a Cuckow brought them into his owne nest I finde whence these Testimonies bee vrged verbatim as you quote them The most authorities drawne from Bellarm. Coccius others from their tracts of Monkish life Coccius Treasury out of the bad treasure of his hart lent you them Vita Monastica is the Commō place and Arsenall from whence you furnished your selfe which is the lesse credit to your opinion and you cānot deny but from mare mortuū you did fetch your water in as much measure as the Pitcher of your vnderstanding could carry otherwise Bellarmine Iodocus Coccius coulde haue furnished you with manie more * I am far from tearming the ancient Fathers so but I meane the authorities falsly sinisterly drawne out of them bee false witnesses false witnesses But if I should take out a Commission from the kings bench of Scripture to examine these not one of them would stande to you You beginne with Saint Hierome if I shoulde vsher Saint Hierome with the estimation that some great Clarkes among your Priests and Iesuits haue afforded him for his contempt of marriage in comparison of Virginity Tom. 14. in 1. Cor. 7. Disput 14. § ad dubium De continēt lib. 3. cap. 11. De rati studij Theol. l. 4. c. 5. obl 2. I should quickely vnedge the authority you seeke from him Salmerō affirming that he was in this iniquior acerbior Espencaeus that he was aequus sanè parum nuptijs Villavincentius Malè audit accusatúrque Hieronimus dum pro virginitate propugnans the Iesuit Acosta Virginitatis oppugnatores insectans videtur aliquando matrimonio iniquior But I proceed to the expositiō of him rather then exposing so holy a Father to detractiō S. Hierom ad Eustochiū hath these words Quod non habet Domini de virginitate praeceptum c. Besides that S. Hierom is hardly cēsured by your own for that and the like speeches it is manifest that there his words bee rather declamatory then assertatory and howsoever he speake thus Si virginitas imperata nuptiae videbantur ablatae yet that virginity is commaunded he granteth when in another place hee calleth it praeceptum virginale Againe in his 1. booke against Iovinian though he hath such words as you intende Quia vbi consilium datur offerentis arbitrium est vbi praeceptum necessitas est servientis yet I againe answer S. Hierom doth cal that which is here by him tearmed a counsell a precept in his Commentary on the 19. of Mat. he hath not only the words before vrged but more praeceptū pudicitiae praeceptum virginale c. Secondly if you vrge the power and strength of this his speech vbi consilium datur offerentis arbitrium est I answer that the worde arbitrium doeth interpret the worde consilium for it is arbitrium in respect of the things cōmanded which lie indifferent to the choice but it is mandatum in respect of the Commāder Answer to S. Ambros S. Ambrose authority out of the first place vpon the words of the Apostle Apostolus de virginibus praeceptum nō habet consilium habet non enim praecipitur quod supra legem est It is thus easily resolved S. Ambrose did follow the vulgar translation of the Bible which so doth read that place of S. Paule but there is no warrant for such interpretation What need we seeke light of a Candle when wee haue the most resplendent beames of the Sun And what need we to craue the help of a translation in a point of controversie when we haue the original 2. Cor. 7.25 First I say the greek hath the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth advise not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is interpreted Counsell therefore though I owe al reverence to S. Ambrose and the other Fathers yet if they read it so when the word in the Primitiue sacred Coppy doeth not so render it I had rather proue the Fathers by Scripture then proue Scripture by the Fathers Sixt. Senens Bibl. lib. 8. in fine p. 365. D. Bannes in 1. Part. Thomae q. 1. p. 67. Line de Opt. gen interpr l. 3. c. 1.2.4.6 Sixtus Senensis Dominicus Bannes but especially Lindanus doe condemne the vulgar Translation to haue mōstrous corruptions of all sorts scarse one coppy to be found vndefiled sundry places to bee thrust from their naturall sense the Translator to be no Latinist but a smattering Graecian And sure as your owne doe thus condemne your owne Coppie of the Trent vulgar Translation so doe I the old vulgar for I wil never beleeue that S. Ierom so translated it But as Lindan thought of your Translation that he was a Grecian no Latinist so thinke I the cōtrary of him that interpreted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to signifie Coūsell he was scarse Latinist but sure no Grecian But to the later inference out of Ambrose Quod supra legem est non praecipitur it is true if we consider supra legem to be supra legis observationem so Virginity is aboue the law aboue the generall law commanded to all but not aboue that proper Law and Precept of virginity which S. Hierome calleth praeceptum virginale Hier. in 19. Math. Ambros tract de viduis The second place you vrge out of Ambrose Foeminae non coguntur autoritate aliqua praecepti c. It is ment not by authority of any generall precept commanding all women but by the especiall which doeth inioine some furnished with that spirit and gift and the words following enforce not any more Honorabile cōiugium sed honorabilior integritas Marriage is honourable but integrity more honorable integrity not virginity for in Marriage there may be great measure of integrity That which closeth vp this sentence bene dixit Apostolus De Virginibus praeceptum nō habeo consiliū do the Fathers are no straungers to this interpretation that there is praeceptum omniū commune Greg. in 26. Moral c. 25. praeceptū aliquorum particulare a generall precept enforcing al men such a precept concerning Virgins the Apostle had not and there is an especiall precept enioyning some mē this was the Counsell Paule meant and that Counsel is the precept which Christ gaue Qui potest capere capiat S. Austin in his 61. Sermon de tempore Answer to S. Austin hath these words Aliud est consilium aliud praeceptum distinguishing there the common precept from a speciall precept which he
calleth by the name of Counsell and so doth expound himselfe in his 3 booke de Doct. Christ c. 17. when he affirmeth alia omnibus communiter PRAECIPI alia singulis quibusque generibus personarum here is the vniversall or common and that proper or speciall precept distinguished he giueth the reason that God hath not in this only taken care for the generall infections sicknesse of sinne in al but particularly for the spirituall disease and infirmitie of every one Psal 103. he hath giuen medicine to heale these sicknesses and the directiō of the receipt is a Praecipi Conf. l. 10. c. 29.30 And not only here but in his Confessiōs he acknowledgeth that god doth command virginity and continency Imperas nobis cōtinentiam continentiam iubes da quod iubes iube quod vis The second and third places of S. Augustin may be so answered But in a word to either the former of the two in which I must aime at the worde for I finde no quotation of these places oft vrged I say the former of these * Evāg quaest 2. l. cap. 19. whence you would proue not only Counsells but supererogation meaneth nothing else but that a man may by grace outstrip the common iniunction enioined other men but that ex debito not ex consilio as in other places Austin holdeth And to his latter place Enchr. ad Laur. c. 121. Quaecunque ergo mandat Deus c. Danaeus answereth that howsoever Austin seemeth to distinguish Counsells and precepts there yet the very word in that place speciali Consilio doth sufficiētly manifest his meaning to bee of precepts For an especiall Counsell is only herein especiall as hauing reference to a generall but generall Counsells there bee none but only Precepts therefore it is plaine by speciali consilio he meant a speciall precept Thus you are left without authority the scabbard whereof you will presume to keepe for you see the sword is taken from you or else so vnedged that it serveth not for your turne Mr LEECH Precepts and Counsailes therefore differ thus Precepts are of necessity Counsailes arbitrary left to our free choice Both aime at the marke of heaven by shooting at the butt of Christian perfectiō but differ in the māner Both levell at the meanes of salvation that is perfection of charity yet Counsailes after a more exquisite and excelling perfection ANSVVER Counsels and precepts do differ no more then Genus and species for Counsailes bee but the braunches and species of Precepts neither bee they left to our free choice for we haue no free choice but in every good thing the directing hand of heavē doth dispose of vs. Secondly they be not Arbitrary simply If we graunt them to be Arbitrary in regarde of the things to bee vndertaken which be indifferent yet they be not so in regard of the persons vndertaking who are bounde to loue serue and feare God as much as they can with their best gifts and yet in the end bee vnprofitable servants Mr LEECH The stage of this worlde and the theater of the Church present vnto our free choice the worlds trash and heavēs true treasure the more man cleaveth to heauens permanent felicity the more perfit excellent is he nay to cast the worlds trash wholy away in lue of heauens treasure as seafaring men do their goods wares in danger of shipwracke when the life is in hazard this is no precept of necessity but only an advise of greater perfection ANSVVER The stage of the world and the Theater of the Church are very vnfit Phrases and more vnfit to bee coupled But these do not present to our free choice the casting away of the worlds trash for the Apostle necessitate praecepti Heb. 12.1 doth binde every man to cast away every thing that presseth downe And yet all Christians are not generally commanded to giue away all or cast away al but to imitate the merchant in a dangerous tempest to cast away all rather then hazard his life and this is but conditionall and when the danger is lesse hee will depart but with some part reserving the rest for helping forward his traffique So the Christian sea-faring man will vpon an extremity rather forsake all worldly profit then endanger the shipwracke of faith a good conscience Neverthelesse in the common course of his life which is ordinarily hazardous will not be wāting to throw daily some of his goods into the salt sea of other mens misery for their reliefe alwaies so giving that he may alwaies giue Mr LEECH Transgressors of the lawes precepts deserue punishment but they that performe not Counsailes sin not only they want some measure of perfection ANSVVERE They that performe not counsailes as Evangelicall precepts particularly inioined them sin peccato omissionis For a man must serue God as much as he is able obligatione praecepti as it is iterated in Matthew Mark Mat. 22.37 Mark 12.30 Luc. 10.27 and Luke Thou shalt loue the Lorde thy God with all thy hart with all thy soule and with all thy minde which is not only by the Fathers Aq. 22ae q. 44. art 5. Com. in Math. 22. but by Aquinas and Caietā thus expounded that in the service of the heart is dedicated the affection in the soule the consecration of the life in the minde the sacrifice of the vnderstanding Yea scire is required in the heart velle in the soule posse in the minde all our faculties of soule and body are required by that precept delivered in the law confirmed in the Gospell and containing the very summe of Law and Gospell of Precepts and Counsailes and requiring the vtmost degrees of perfection that may be performed in this life Mr LEECH Observers of Counsailes shall haue greater reward yea they shall sit vpon thrones and not only iudge the twelue tribes of Israell but doome both men and Angels It was Christ his promise of remuneration made to his disciples for their consolation to encourage them to goe forwardes with the practise of Christian perfection embracing for his and heauens sake voluntary pouerty virginall chastity and humble obedience It was proclaimed also by that trumpet of the Apostles preacher of the world Apostle of the Gentiles and descrier of heavenly mysteries holy and blessed S. Paul know you not that we shall iudge the Angels c. The words are so pregnāt that all the wrāgling wits and contentious private spirits in the world cānot wrest them But law breakers without repentance shal haue greater punishment ANSVVER To the Saints in generall it is promised by the Oracle of truth Mat. 19.28 the truth himselfe not only in Matthew that they shall sit vpon twelue throanes and iudge the twelue tribes of Israell Luk. 22.30 but also in Luke that they shall eate drinke at his table in his kingdome sit on seats and iudge the twelue tribes of Israell And it is most true that