reason any further than to prevent the swallow of their Errors with this bait What I intend is to evidence that there are Matters of that weight in controversie notwithstanding the pretence of this Book to have discussed and answered the most material as will abundantly justifie the Reformed in their distance from the Church of Rome and which is more conclude them under a necessity of maintaining that distance as things now stand THE ADVERTISEMENT TO THE Bishop of Condom's Book Considered THE Advertisement begins with a Supposition which it thinks we must necessarily allow That M. Condom has faithfully expounded the Doctrine of the Church of Rome in this Treatise from his beng a Bishop in the Church whose Understanding therefore and Sincerity ought not to be suspected and afterwards from his being called to be Praeceptor to the Dauphin Son to so great a King and Defender of the Catholick Religion But yet he tells us Though the sincerer part of the Reformed acknowledged it would take away great Difficulties if approved and owned for their Doctrine yet they would never believe it such or that it would be approved at Rome being prepossessed with Prejudice and false Opinion But without reflecting either upon the Bishop's Understanding or Sincerity we have a great deal of reason to expect he shew us an Authority that warrants him to give us this Exposition and declare it to us as the faithful and true Sense and only Doctrine of the Church since the Pope hath peremptorily forbidden Bulla Pii quarti super Confirm Concil Trid. all Prelates of whatever Order Condition or Degree to set forth any Exposition of the Doctrine of the Trent-Council reserving it to the Apostolical See Setting then his Authority as questionable for the present aside I am no more convinced by the Nature of the Exposition that it is the genuine Sense of the Church of Rome in all points than those who first saw the Book Whether it be Prejudice or Prepossession that blinds my Understanding will not appear till after the Discussion of Particulars Pag. 2. He tells us of two Answers to this Treatise and that both of them agreed in questioning M. Condom's Authority to expound the Council and that his Exposition agrees not with the Decisions of the Council nor with their Profession of Faith Concerning these things I shall determine nothing till I come to the Particulars But whereas he saies Pag. 3. That one of them has drawn a wrong Conclusion from those Softnings of M. Condom to confirm themselves in a better Opinion of the Reformation I do not think the Inference altogether so absure as the Advertizer pretends it for do not they in a great measure justifie the Reformed who call for the Reformation of those Abuses which the Church of Rome herself pretends to condemn but will not or has not rectified The next Thing it endeavors is to prove p 4. That this Exposition of M. Condom's is the true Sense of the Church which is grounded first upon the general Approbation his Book received throughout the whole Church testified by Lerters from all sorts of People not in France only but at Rome especially in Eight Letters concerning it from Cardinals and others of great Merit But taking it for granted without any further Examination That all these Men by their Approbations of this Book do consent that this Exposition is the true Sense of the Church which is more than need be granted since some only say it is a Method very ingenious and good to force the Calvinists to confess the atholick Faith yet this will not suffice where there are so many Writers of as great Authority and Eminence in the Church as any of these that have though not perhaps undertook to expound the Council as this Author yet to declare and defend a Doctrine much different from this from the same Council and in behalf of the same Church And suppose the Number that approved it great yet Cardinal Bona's Letter informs us that some found fault with it and those he must mean of their own Church when he gives this Reason that he does not wonder at it Because all Works great and above the common Level find Persons still to contradict them And be the Number what it will I suppose he will not as it is not reasonable seek for the Churches Doctrine by counting Noses Then for the Letter of Cardinal Sigismond which says the Advertizer shews how ill grounded that Scruple is against this Exposition from the Pope's Prohibition to explicate the Council To me it rather shews how well it is grounded for his Words are Certainly it was never his intention to give the interpretation of the Tenets of the Council but only to deliver them in his Book rightly explicated in such sort that Hereticks may be convinced and especially in those things which the holy Church obliges them to believe Which if it signifie any thing must be That his Exposition is not an interpretation of the Council obliging any to believe it as Matter of Faith but a Design of explicating it in such sort as he judged useful for convincing Hereticks But if this will not content we have an Approbation from the Pope himself after which 't was needless to mention others says the Advertizer and let me add without which his others signifie little to his Point The Gentleman calls it a Breve wherein the Pope gives his Approbation and that so express as to leave no further doubt and in the most authentick manner that could be expected I have considered it and yet my Doubt is not vanished and when the least that could have been expected in reason on Account of the difficulty of believing it express'd by the Reformed five or six years before the Date of this Breve from the Pope as also from the Nature of the thing which being an exposition of Faith ought to be so received by all that not one man hold Tenets different from it as also from the former Pope's Prohibition of all Explication of this Council is that the Pope should have declared that this Exposition did perfectly contain the true and whole Faith of the Church in the Points expounded and that it should be lookt upon as authentick as if made by the Apostolick See it self We may have that Charity for the Advertizer as to think its his good desire to have it made authentick that makes him look upon it as such and suppresses all his Doubts But we who desire no less than he that it were so have yet some peculiar Reasons to see to our selves that we are not imposed on and therefore to examine what Authority this Approbation gives it All which the Pope here saies to approve it is no more than this That it contains such Doctrine and is composed in such a Method and with so much Prudence that it is thereby rendred proper to instruct and to extort even from the unwilling a Confession of the Catholick Faith
and superstition brought in Thus they pretend their Decree for the Worship of Saints and Relicks and the use of Images according to the Tradition or received Practice of the Catholick Church in the first times and consent of Fathers and Decrees of Councils when yet M. Condom contents himself with Tradition but from the fourth Century if we would allow it him And so the Gentlemen do well to plead that we should receive a Doctrine as coming from the Apostles when it is universally received without possibility of shewing its beginning by all Christian Churches thereby to obtrude that which had no beginning in it for three hundred years Thus they Decree Indulgences to have been in use in the Church in the most ancient times when yet they could not but be sensible that the use of them was perverted to a quite different purpose from its antient end and notwithstanding their desire that they might be restored to ancient Custom yet we know the Novel is still the modern practice Thus for Purgatory the Council commands that sound Doctrine be taught concerning it from the ancient Fathers when no such thing appears either anciently or universally in the Church And yet at another time that which Christ himself hath taught and was delivered both to and from the Apostles shall not serve to make it necessary Thereupon it Decrees Sess 21. cap. 1. That though Christ instituted the Sacrament under both kinds and delivered it in both to his Apostles yet this does not bind all men to receive it in both Now then for these men to press Traditions on us when they will neither let us know what nor how many they are nor prescribe any bounds to them nor six any certain Rules to discern them by nor be obliged themselves to stand by them and under that pretence to come now fifteen hundred years after the Apostles and impose on us the single Tradition of one Church nay not only her ancient and original Traditions but Novelties foisted in to maintain her corruptions and these as we pretend repugnant to Scripture and ancient Tradition And all this to decline an indifferent Tryal by Scripture under pretence that all necessary Truths cannot be found therein without recourse to Tradition if putting on I say so fair a disguise to so fraudulent a purpose they urge this Argument that the Apostles delivered things by word of mouth which ought to be received as of any force to oblige us to receive all which they have the confidence to tell us comes from them What is it but a vain endeavour to impose on the World as if all men had lost common sense and understanding SECT XVIII Of the Authority of the Church UPon this subject M. Condom writes after so rambling and confused a manner that I must first be at the trouble to pick out what he designs to prove before the solidity of his Arguments can be examined His aim then I take to be couched in those words pag. 45. wherein he concludes from the Article of our Creed concerning the Holy Catholick Church That they oblige themselves to acknowledge an infallible and perpetual verity in the Universal Church Now herein he has neither expresly told us what this Universal Church is whether the Church of Rome alone or all other Christian Churches with it nor whether he means the Church collective the whole body of Christians or representative the Bishops in Council or the Pope where some fix this Infallibility But whereas he afterwards confounds the Catholick Church with the Trent Council which by her Decrees if we believe him has tied herself up that she cannot make herself Mistress of our Faith I conceive I may without offence determine that the verity he intends to prove is that there is an Infallibility resting somewhere in the Catholick Church of Rome To which if he would oblige us to consent it had been but reasonable to have sixt this Infallibility in something certain though at present I will not stand upon it but consider his Discourse which begins thus The Church being established by God to be the Guardian of Scripture and Tradition we receive the Canonical Scripture from her and let our Adversaries say what they will we doubt not but it is her Authority that principally determines them to Reverence as Divine Books Which first sentence is a manifest contradiction it being absolutely impossible that that which is established by God to be the Guardian of Scripture and the Traditor of it to others should be the Authority that makes it Scripture which it is before it is put into its Guardianship and certainly its being Scripture or a Writing of Divine Inspiration is that which makes them principally reverenced as Divine Books not that which tells us that they are so But then he gives us instances of Three Books especially which he conceives received upon that authority The Canticle of Canticles St. James and St. Jude Where in the first place the Gentleman does ill to joyn these together as believed or to be believed upon the same grounds the Canticle of Cantiles being long before the Christian Church the others since Therefore I must answer him distinctly Supposing then that which common sence is able to inform us that this Book called The Song of Songs is more antient than the Church of Christ and that the Church never had as she has never pretended to have any express Revelation whether this Book was written by inspiration from God as we believe the Law and the Prophets beside the credit upon which it received it from the Synagogue it 's certain that the only thing questionable is whether it was received by the Synagogue as divinely inspired if it appears to have been so received it is not any authority of the Christian Church that has made it Scripture and if the Church had pretended it Scripture without evidence of its being received from them or particular Revelation shewn in the case it would have been never the more a Divine Book nor any man obliged to receive it as such And I marvel the Gentleman should be carried so far by the spirit of Contradiction and desire to bear down his Christian brethren as to set up a Principle that betrays our common Christianity by giving notice to the World that those Scriptures of the Old Testament whereby the Church pretends to convince the Jews of the necessity of becoming Christians are not to be received for the Word of God but upon the authority of her own Decrees Then for the Epistle of James rejected by Luther and St. Jude by others nothing can be more manifest to any that will but take the pains to consider it that the Writings of the Apostles were first kept by and entrusted in the hands of those Churches to which they were sent as the Epistles to Corinth Rome Ephesus c. It is therefore reasonable to conceive those Writings so dispersed when collected into one body and submitted to by
things represent which we look not upon as any derogation from God and therefore should not account their use of Images such To which I answer First That the Cases are very different the one though a solemn Action yet not being any part of God's ordinary worship as the other is That secondly Though an Oath be indeed a calling God to witness the Truth yet we never find that he prescribed any Rules concerning or forbid the use of any Ceremonies in it but has left it to the liberty of men to use it with what Ceremonies they please That therefore this cannot be drawn into consequence where the case is not parallel That again it does not appear that this custom of swearing upon the Gospel did ever occasion that dishonour of God that palpable Idolatry in some and danger of it in others which the use of Images in Religious worship has that if it did appear I should think it unlawful to be used any longer But to the pitiful evasion That an Image is but another manner of writing that therefore this Scripture of Images should be as venerable as that which is made upon Paper Paper and Letters being the work of mens hands as well as Sculpture and Painting I shall only say this That if such honour and worship were given to the Paper and Prints of the Bible as they give to Images I see no reason why it should not be thought highly offensive to God Besides he that shall look upon this as conclusive that we may as well use these in Gods Service as the writings of Scripture might conclude by the same reason that it was as lawful for the Jews to make Images and set them up in their Temples for God's worship as to use the Books of the Law and Prophets therein But why says he should you be more scrupulous of making your Prayers to Christ before an Image than before a Pillar or a Wall He might have forborn this Question unless he had professed the case to be the same that the Church of Rome matters not if we give no more respect to these than to the Wall or Pillar we kneel by but this I believe he dares not affirm in Behalf of his Church He further tell us It is Superstition to fear that our Devotions should terminate in the Image when we direct them to Christ. Now I would willingly know what it would terminate in if Christ should refuse to accept it and whether he can secure us that an intention to do this or that in honour to Christ shall be accepted by him though it be not what he directs us to for his honour but an invention of our own But what I most of all admire is that he should have the Face to call it Superstition for us to fear lest in honouring Images we should have our hearts drawn from honouring Christ and fix them upon these he might as well have called it Folly in God Almighty to suffer Image-worship to be the provocation of his Jealousie for if there be no reason for us to fear its drawing off our hearts from God there can be none for God to be jealous of us upon that score There will be some reason for his limiting the Commandment that forbids to make or bow down to Images only to the doing this in the Spirit of Pagans believing them filled with a divine virtue or that the Divinity is incorporated with them when he shall shew what he says he easily can That the Philosophers that bore above the common Error of Mankind and declared that they did not worship the Image but used them only to put them in mind of God did indeed notwithstanding their Declaration to the contrary put their trust in the Images themselves But till then for the same Reasons that the Scriptures call the Pagans worshippers of Stocks and Stones though they declared otherwise of themselves we can account those of the Church of Rome but little better whilst some of less understanding have been known to place a Trust and Confidence in the Images they use and the more intelligent tho' professing otherwise have relapsed into it in some kind and confirmed the Impiety of the publick Worship in adhering to and commanding of it For it is but a pitiful shift to say that the abuse of this Practice among particular persons if it be tolerated yet it is not approved by the Church since the Church continues to command that which has been the occasion of it Wherefore though I dare not with M. Meaux pass so severe a censure or pronounce any man accursed of God yet I am sure he is more likely to be accursed of him who defends a Practice that has been experienced to be the occasion of Idolatry and labours notwithstanding to seduce men to it than those who refuse submission to a Practice so manifestly destructive of God's true Worship and make it their business to prevent others from the danger of such Snares As to their Ceremonies which he seeks to defend by the use of some such in the Church of England I have before observed that it is the multitude of them that makes them so dangerous because they are hereby apt to take up the greatest part of Religion and draw men off from the spiritual Worship of God and those that spend too great a Zeal upon them will be apt to look upon them as all the Services they need pay to God and thereupon neglect the principal Duties of Religion Whereas he will have it a Calumny on their Church that they conceal the Mysteries of Religion from the People whilst they perform the Service of God in the Latine Tongue that very Decree which he thinks to get off his Church by does indeed make it the more culpable For if it be necessary lest the little ones want Bread that the Pastors explain to them some part of the Mysteries This very Reason proves that the whole Service of God ought to be performed in the vulgar Tongue that they may at all times and in all particulars understand and joyn in the Services of God to his Honour and their own growth and encrease in Grace and Virtue But at length he comes to the Doctrine of the Sacrament and herein compares us to Socinus and the Disciples of Paulus Samosatenus because we follow our humane Sense and Reason and are resolved to believe that Bread and Wine remain because they appear to our Senses But before he had fixt this Charge upon us he should have shewn us as clear a Revelation for the proof of their feigned Transubstantiation as there is for Christ's being God as well as Man and as clear a Command for us to worship the Sacrament as there is for us to worship Christ God and Man The difference betwixt the Lutheran Worship of Christ in the Sarament and that of the Adoration of the Sacrament itself which is the Roman Doctrine has been already stated p. 87. For that the