the first Collectors of the Councils among the Papists I have taken the more liberty to be somewhat copious in them that I may conveniently be more brief in perusing the residue CAP. VII Of Francis Turrian the Jesuite With what Art and Boldness he defendeth the Forgeries NOtwithstanding all the weakness and uncertainty of Isidore Francis Turrian the Famous Jesuite appears in its defence about 40 years after the first publication of it by Merlin The Centuriators of Magdenburg having met with it to his great displeasure he is so Valiant as not only to maintain all the Forgeries therein contained but the whole Body of Forgeries vented abroad by all the Collectors and Compilers following till himself appeared His Book is expresly formed against the Writers of the Centuries and is a sufficient Evidence that as soon as Isidore came abroad by Dr. Merlin's Labour and the Bishop of Paris Command it was sifted by the Protestants It is dedicated to the most Illustrious and most Reverend D. D. Stanissaus Hosius Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church and Bishop of Collein Printed by the Heirs of John Quintel and approved by Authority An. Dom. 1573. He defends all the Canons of the Apostles which are recounted by other Collectors That you may know the Mettal of the Man I will produce but two Instances The last of those Canons which he maintaineth to be the Apostles is this which followeth Qui Libri sunt Canonici c. Let these Books be Venerable and Holy to you all Of the Old Testament five Books of Moses Genesis Exodus Leviticus Numbers Deuteronomy one of Joshua the Son of Nun one of Judges one of Ruth four of Kings two of Chronicles Hester one three of the Macchabees one of Job one Book of Psalmes three of Solomon Proverbs Ecclesiastes and the Song of Songs one of the 12 Prophets one of Isaiah one of Jeremiah one of Ezekiel one of Daniel And without let your young men learn the Wisdom of the Learned Syrach But of ours that is of the New Testament there are four Gospels Matthew Mark Luke and John fourteen Epistles of Paul two Epistles of Peter three of John one of James one of Jude two Epistles of Clement and the Ordinations of Me Clement set forth in Eight Books to you Bishops which are not to be published to all because of the Mysteries contained in them and the Acts of our Apostles This is the eighty fourth Canon and in some Accounts the eighty fifth where you see the Episiles of Clement and Eight Books of his Ordinations put into the Body of the Bible As for the difference of the Accounts he sheweth you the way how to reconcile them If this be one of the Apostles Canons then Clement was an Apostle or had 〈◊〉 Power But if it be a Forgery then not only the Apostles Canons but the very Text of the Holy Scriptures is interlined and forged by the same He maintains all the Decretal Epistles and among the rest S. Clement's Whose genuine Epistle to the Corinthians they leave cut as making nothing to their purpose but five Spurious ones they record the two first of them being written to S. James and the last to the Brethren dwelling with him at Jerusalem It is good sport to see how like the shot of a great Gun the Discovery of the Protestants comes in among them Their keenness in detecting the time of S James his Death shatter the 〈◊〉 and whereas before they were all united they now fly several ways every man 〈◊〉 for himself as he is best able Baronius dislikes suen Arts of upholding the Church not as impious and unlawful but as inconvenient and pernicious Bellarmine 〈◊〉 the Epistles to be Old but dares not attest them Isidore Merlin Peter Crabbe Nicolinus Carranza and Surius own them freely without any scruple For saying nothing of the Quarrel they lay them down simply as good Records Binius Labbè and the Collectio Regia confess some of them to be false and in particular that S James was dead seven years before S. Clement could write his first Epistle to him And to salve the sore they say that it was not written to James but to Simeon who was also Bishop of Jerusalem and Brother to our Lord and that the Name of James crept into the Title Mendosè by Errour and Mistake for that of Simeon But honest Turrian maintains plainly that S. Peter and S. Clement knew very well that S. James was dead before they wrote unto him yet nevertheless they did very wisely both S. Peter in ordering the Epistle and S. Clement in writing it And his Reasons as he bringeth the matter about are pretty specious For my part I protest that such a High Piece of Impudence was to me incredible But that you may see the rare Abilities of a Jesuite to argue well for the absurdest Cause turn to his Book and read his Comment on S. Clement's first Epistle and there you shall see Wit and Folly equal in their height Wit in managing but Folly in attempting so mad a business For the sake of those who are not able to read or get the Book I will give you a Glympse of his Demonstrations First he observeth how Reason it self compelleth us especially being confirmed by so many and so great Testimonies of the Ancients to confess the Epistle to be S. Clement's whose it is reported to be He sophistically pretendeth here that there were great Authorities of the Ancient Fathers extant to prove it Whence saith he it began to be had in every mans hand to be read by the Catholicks to be put among the Decretal Epistles and produced and cited in Ecclesiastical Causes and Judgments The latter part of which Clause is true For as we before observed Gratian Ivo and the rest of the Popes Ministers have brought the Decretals into the Body of the Canon-Law which maketh the matter more fatal and abominable for being really cited in their Ecclesiastical Courts and used both in matters of Controversie and in cases of Conscience they are forced either to defend them or to pluck up their Customs by the very Roots and so further expose the Church of Rome to the shame of Levity or Fraud yet for this very cause it is far more impious and wicked to retain them So that not knowing which way is best some of them retain them and some of them renounce them But you must wink at all this and believe what Turrian says for the Authority of the Roman Church which hath seated the Forgeries in the Chair of Judgment is a greater Argument to them that believe her Infallible than any one Doctor can bring against them Neither was blessed Peter ignorant when he commanded to write to the Dead nor Clement saith he when he wrote by the Commandment but that the Readers would presently see the Epistle to be written to him whom all men knew to be dead before S. Peter they being about
into the Book and that Hadrian had a finger in it which reached perhaps farther than the beginning If the Book was as new as the Acrostick Dionysius was far enough from being its Author What Faith we are to have in the Papists when they tell us who were the Ancient Compilers of the Councils you may see by Baronius who giving us an Account of their Order reckons Isidore a known Counterfeit for one Dionysius Exiguus for the first Ferdinandus Diaconus for the second Martinus Bracarensis for the third Cresconius for the fourth and after all these Isidore for the fift As certain as Isidore was a Collector of the Councils so certain is it that Dionysius was one but further certainty yet I can see none Charles the Great perhaps having never seen the like before was pleased with the Acrostick and the putting of his Name in Capital Letters before the Councils was delightful to him Syrens sing sweetly while they deceive bloodily Hadrian I. knew well what was a Gift fit for a Scholar and a Pope of Rome If I should produce but one passage which I found in it the matter would be more effectual For after he has done with the Councils he lays down the Decretal Epistles of 13 Roman Bishops beginning with Syricius who lived in the year 385. In his Epistle to Himerius there is this passage Such is our Office saith he that it is not lawful for us to be silent for us to dissemble upon whom a Zeal greater than that of all others of the Christian Religion is incumbent We bear the burdens of all that are oppressed nay rather the blessed Apostle Peter beareth them in us who as we trust protecteth and defendeth us his Heirs in all the things of his Administration Of GOD he saith nothing here but his confidence is all in Peter There is not a word like it in all Antiquity and those words protecteth and defendeth us seem to relate to those Jars that had been before between Hadrian and Charles the King or Emperour These observations carry me to believe what I met with in Daille since Dionysius is gone from under my hands and having searched into the Book since I am further confirmed About 74 years after the Council of Chalcedon Dionysius Exiguus whom we before-mentioned made his collection at Rome which is since Printed at Paris cum Privilegio Regis out of very Ancient Manuscripts Whosoever shall but look diligently into his collection shall find divers alterations in it one whereof I shall instance in only to shew how Ancient this Artifice hath been among Christians The last Canon of the Council of Laodicea which is the 163 of the Greek Code of the Church Universal forbidding to read in Churches any other Books than those which are Canonical gives us withal a long Catalogue of them Dionysius Exiguus although he hath indeed inserted in his collection Num. 162. the beginning of the said Canon which forbiddeth to read any other Books in the Churches besides the sacred Volumes of the Old and New Testament yet hath he wholly omitted the Catalogue or List of the said Books fearing as I conceive lest the Tail of this Catalogue might scandalize the Church of Rome c. A little after he saith the Greek Code represents unto us VII Canons of the first Council of Constantinople which are in like manner found both in Balsamon and in Zonoras and also in the Greek and Latine Edition of the General Councils Printed at Rome The three last of these do not appear at all in the Latine Code of Dionysius though they are very considerable ones as to the business they relate to which is the order of proceeding in passing judgment upon Bishops accused and in receiving such persons who forsaking their communion with Hereticks desire to be admitted into the Church It is very hard to say what should move the Collector to Gueld this Council thus But this I am very well assured of that in the sixth Canon which is one of those he hath omitted and which treateth of judging of Bishops accused there is not the least mention made of Appealing to Rome nor of any Reserved Cases wherein it is not permitted to any save only to the Pope to judge a Bishop The power of hearing and determining all such matters being here wholly and absolutely referred to the Provincial Synods and to their Dio cesans Another instance which he hath is this After the Canons of Constantinople there follow in the Greek Code VIII Canons of the General Council of Ephesus set down also both by Balsamon and Zonoras and Printed with the Acts of the said Council of Ephesus in the first Tome of the Roman Edition but Dionysius Exiguus hath discarded them all c. Daille in his Treatise of the Right 〈◊〉 of the Fathers Cap. 4. pag. 45 46 47. This being true the Authority of Dionysius is very small relating to the matter of the Council of Sardica If any man hath any thing to say against it let him when he answereth this Charge of ours produce what he is able in Defence of Dionysius as to the points whereof he stands accused by Daille but we proceed to Nicolinus CAP. XII Nicolinus his Epistle to Pope Sixtus His contempt of the Fathers He beginneth to confess the Epistle of Melchiades to be dubious if not altogether Spurious He overthrows the Legend about Constantines Donation THat you may know the Genius of the Man a little better how much he was devoted to the service of the Pope and how little he valued the Authority of Councils and Fathers I have thought it meet to give you his Epistle and his Admonition to the Reader recorded by him in the words following To our Most Soveraign Lord Sixtus V. High-Priest It fell out conveniently for me Most Blessed Father in the Universal Joy of the Christian World for your Elevation to the Sublimity of the Apostleship that in so great a multitude flowing from every place to honour you I also among the Oldest Servants of your Holiness had something near at hand which is unworthy neither of the Masty of your Name or Authority and yet very fit for my Occasions to offer at your feet as suitable to the Office of my Gratitude and Veneration It is a new Edition of the Councils for the remarkable addition of two Councils especially the Nicene and the Ephesine never published so entire and full as now For to whom may the Councils of the Church aided by the Inspiration of the H. Ghost according to the seasonableness of various times for the repairing of her Ship more fitly be Dedicated than to her Chief Master to whom it is given from Heaven to call and confirm them especially him who is so well versed in all Scholastical Disciplines and Ecclesiastical History I have used all diligence according to my weak ability sparing no cost omitting no labour the most Catholick and Learned Divines of our Age being
and were Apostatical rather than Apostolical and that some of them came not in by the Door but were Thi ves and Robbers That it is not impossible to forge Records for the Bolstering up of Heresies those counter eit Gospels Acts Epistles Revelations c. that were put forth by Hereticks in the Names of the Apostles do sufficiently evidence which being extant a little after the Apostles decease are pointed to by Irenaeus condemned in a Roman Council by Gelasius and some of them recorded by Ivo Cartonensis in a Catalogue lib. 2. cap. 〈◊〉 The Itinerary of Clement and the Book called Pastor being two of the number I note the two last because S. Clement in his first Epistle to S. James is made to approve the one and Pope Pius in his Decretal magnifieth the other Which giveth us a little glympse of the Knavery by which those Ancient Bishops and Martyre of Rome were both abused having Spurious Writings fathered upon themselves for had those Instruments been their own they would never have owned such abominable Forgeries But of this you may expect more hereafter Cap. 16. and Cap. 17. These aggravations and degrees of Forgery we have not mentioned in vain or by accident In the process of our discourse the Church of Rome will be found guilty of them all except the first which is beneath her Grandeur and in so doing she is very strangely secured by the height of her impiety For because it does not easily enter into the heart of man to conceive that men especially Christians should voluntarily commit so transcendent a Crime the greatness of it makes it incredible to inexperienced people and renders them prone to excuse the Malefactors while they condemn the Accusers But that the Church of Rome is guilty in all these respects we shall prove not by remote Authorities that are weak and feeble but by demonstrations derived from the Root and Fountain I will not be positive in making comparisons but if my reading and judgment do not both deceive me she is guilty of more Forgeries than all the Hereticks in the world beside Their greatness and their number countenance the Charge and seem to promise that one day it shall pass into a Sentence of Condemnation against her CAP. II. Of the Primitive Order and Government of the Church The first Popish Encroachment upon it backed with Forgery The Detection of the Fraud in the Sixth Council of Carthage IT is S. Cyprian's observation that our Saviour in the first Foundation of the Church gave his Apostles equal honour and power saying unto them Whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained Cyprian Tract de Simpl Praelator The place has been tampered with but unsuccessfully For though they have thrust in other words into the Fathers Text in some Editions of their own yet in others they are left sincere As Dr. James in his corruption of the Fathers Part. 2. Cap. 1. does well observe But the most remarkable attempt of the Papists is that whereas they have set a Tract concerning the Primacy of the Roman Church before the Councils containing many Quotations out of the Bastard Decretals which they pretend to be extracted ex Codice antiquo out of an Old Book without naming any Author closing it with this passage of S. Cyprian they leave out these words of Scripture Whose soever sins ye remit c. as rendring the Fathers Testimony unfit for their purpose You may see it in Binius his Collection of the Councils c. When the Apostles had converted Nations they constituted Bishops Priests and Deacons for the Government of the Church and left those Orders among us when they departed from the world It was found convenient also for the better Regiment of the Church when it was much inlarged to erect the Orders of Archbishops and Patriarchs The Patriarchs being Supreme in their several Jurisdictions had each of them many Primates and Archbishops under him with many Nations and Kingdoms allotted to their several Provinces every of which was limited in it self and distinct from the residue as appeareth in that first Oecumenical Council assembled at Nice An. Dom. 327. where it was ordained Can. 6 that the ancient custom should be kept the Jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome being expresly noted to be equal to that of the other Patriarchs In the two preceding Canons they ordain 1. That in every Province Bishops should be consecrated by all the Bishops thereof might it consist with their convenience to meet together if not at least by three being present the rest consenting but the confirmation of their Acts is in every Province reserved to the Metropolitan 2. That the last Appeal should be made to Councils and that the person condemned in any Province should not be received if he fled to others Can. 4. and 5. In the first of these Canons it was ordered that the chief in every Province should confirm the Acts of his Inferiour Bishops the Patriarch of Rome in his and every other Patriarch in his own Jurisdiction In 〈◊〉 last if any trouble did arise that could not be decided by the Metropolitan provision was made in words so clear and forcible that none more plain can be put into their places that the last Appeal should be made to Councils 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But the City of Rome being in those days Queen of the World and lifted up above all other Cities as the Seat of the Empire the Bishop thereof began to wax proud in after-times and being discontented with the former Bounds invaded the Jurisdictions of his Fellow-Patriarchs For though the Foundation upon which the Government was laid was against it yet when persons were Immorigerous if any Bishop were censured by his Metropolitan or Priest excommunicated by his Bishop or Deacon offended with his Superiour who chastised him for his guilt though the Canon of the Church was trampled under foot thereby which forbad such irregular and disorderly flights the manner was for those turbulent persons to flee to Rome because it was a great and powerful City and the Roman Bishop trampling the Rule under foot as well as others did as is confessed frequently receive them Nay their ambition being kindled by the greatness of the place it tempted them so far as to favour the Delinquents and oftentimes to clear them for the incouragement of others invited by that means to fly thither for relief till at last the Cause of Malefactors was openly Espoused and while they were excommunicated in other Churches they were received to the Communion in the Church of Rome Hereupon there were great murmurings and heart-burnings at the first in the Eastern Churches because Rome became an Asylum or City of Refuge for discontented persons disturbing the Order of the Church spoiling the Discipline of other Provinces and hindering the Course of Justice while her
Records excepting some perhaps that were since invented And if the last two Ages brought so many to light an Age or two more may through Gods blessing accomplish Wonders The Secular state and security of the Pope with his Adherents which Binius in his Epistle to Pope Paul V. calls Honor Augmentum 〈◊〉 was the end of all And if men excogitate Titles to Crowns and patch up 〈◊〉 with some Flaws yet serviceable enough with the help of a Long Sword then a Chair so Politick is able to do it more neatly having had the strong Holds of the Church so long in their hands Now we shall note some few of those many Errours that are in the Pontifical which though it be a duty circumstance to have such a Text to gloss on is the Basis of their Discourses and the Rule of their Method both in the Popes and Councils It beginneth thus Peter the blessed Apostle and Prince of the Apostles the Son of John of the Province of Galilee of the City 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Brother of Andrew sate in the Chair of Antioch seven years In the end it 〈◊〉 us how long S. Peter Reigned just twenty five years two moneths and three days Binius tells us with the consent of Baronius it was rather twenty four years five moneths and eleven days The Pontifical saith Peter was Martyred with Paul on the same day Though Prudentius and S. Angustine say It was not the same year Binius reconcileth them They were slain the same day indeed but not the same year Therefore say we Peter was not Martyred with S. Paul The Pontifical says It was 38 years after the Passion of our Lord. More truly the 35. saith Binius in the 13 year of Nero and the 69 after the Birth of Christ. S Peter's Name is the Patron and 〈◊〉 of the Roman Church and therefore inserted like a Shield in the Front Next his Notes on S. Peter's Life Binius inserts the Treatise of the Roman Churches Primary Ex antiquo Codice out of an Old Book without any name at all Which puts me in mind of the Gibeonites old Bottles clouted Shooes and mouldy Bread and the notable Cheat which thereby they put on the Israelites All is Old and Ancient in the Church of Rome and this Old Book of the Primacy set before the Councils according to the Rules of Art because the End is to be proposed before the Means After this old Treatise of the Primacy he cometh to S. Linus Pope and Martyr He is pleased to call him Pope as well as Pope Peter not as if his Contemporaries called him so but because the Modern Title will not sit well on the present Popes unless it be given to S. Peter and the first Bishops of that See And ever and anon he begins with a known Lye in the top of the Chapter formally set by it self the more pleasingly to take the eye after the manner of a Title Ex Libro Pontificali Damasi Papae OUT OF THE PONTIFICAL OF POPE DAMASVS This course he continues from Life to Life throughout all the Popes so far as the Pontifical lasteth intermixing the Decretal Epistles first and then the Councils in the Lives of the several Popes or to use his form under the pope in whose Life they happened And all his Tomes being moulded into that form it makes every Pope seem to him that is not aware of the fetch the Supreme over all Councils from the beginning And with this Method he always goes on Ex libro Pontificali Damasi Papae hoping perhaps that in long tract of time he should be at last believed In all the Book there is scarce a Life wherein there are not as many Errours as in S. Peter's As in example Linus sate eleven years three moneths and twelve days 〈◊〉 the Pontifical Binius saith It was eleven years two moneths and twenty three days A days difference where the exactness is pretended to be so great shews all to be Counterfeit He saith 〈◊〉 sate twelve years one moneth and eleven days Binius tails on him for the mistake though he agrees with him in the 〈◊〉 that Linus and Cletus sate some twenty three years between Peter and Clement So that on this account S. James was dead above 27 years before S. Clement who wrote a 〈◊〉 Epistle to him came to the Chair For before he was Pope he might write an Epistle but not a Decretal Epistle Cletus saith Binius was by S. Irenaeus Ignatius and 〈◊〉 called 〈◊〉 which Baronius thinks was a mistake among the Greeks 〈◊〉 by the Errour of Writers and Libraries What shifts will a man be driven to by a desperate Cause Three of the best and most Ancient Fathers were cheated with the Errour of Writers and Libraries concerning a mans Name that was alive either not long before or together with themselves S. Irenaeus and Ignatius are extremely Ancient Ignatius lived before Anacletus was Bishop of Rome much more before his Name was put into Libraries and much more yet before it could be corrupted there by the mistake of Scribes and Writers But such Errours of Writers and Libraries are a good hint how capable they are of them and how much the Church of Rome is acquainted with them Binius is at last terribly provoked with the nonsense of the Pontifical for whereas it saith Cletus was in the Church from the seventh Consulship of 〈◊〉 and fifth of Domitian to the ninth of Domitian and the Consulship of Rufus that is from the 78 year of Christ to the 85. Binius speaking as if he were present takes him up 〈◊〉 Errorem igitur Errori addis quisquis 〈◊〉 Pontificalis Authores c. Whoever thou be that art the Author of this Pontifical thou addest Errour to Errour For if Cletus began to sit in the forementioned Consulship in the 78 year of Christ how did he immediately succeed Linus dying as thou saidst in the 69 year of Christ Capito and Rufus being Consuls How wilt thou excuse a 9 years Interregnum in the Chair made only by thy Authority contradicting it self How sayest thou that Cletus sate twelve years whose continuance thou doest circumscribe by two Consulships in the space of 7 years distant from themselves How which is more intollerable and absurd doest thou say that Clement sate from the Consulship of Trachilus and Italicus even to the third year of Trajan which is from the 70 year of Christ to the 102. and so to have administred the See 33 years whom in his Life thou affirmest to have continued only 9 years Thus far Binius When Cato saw the Southsayers saluting one another in the Roman Market-place he said I wonder they can forbear laughing to think how delicately they cheat the people Hence therefore saith Binius O Reader thou mayest perceive on what Rocks he shall 〈◊〉 whosoever shall suppose the writings of this Book to be taken up upon Trust without any Inquisition Yet when the fit is over in the
Roman Forgeries Or a TRVE ACCOUNT OF FALSE RECORDS Discovering the IMPOSTURES AND Counterfeit Antiquities OF THE CHURCH OF ROME By a Faithful Son of the Church of ENGLAND LONDON Printed by S. and B. Griffin for Jonathan Edwin at the three Roses in Ludgate-Street 1 Tim. 4. 2. Speaking lies in Hypocrisie having their Conscience seared with an hot iron 2 Tim. 3. 8 9. Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses so do these also resist the truth men of corrupt minds reprobate concerning the Faith But they shall proceed no further for their folly shall be manifest unto all men as theirs also was TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE S r ORLANDO BRIDGEMAN KNIGHT and BARONET One of HIS MAJESTIES Most Honourable Privy Council The AUTHOR Devoteth his best Services AND DEDICATETH The VSE and BENEFIT of his Ensuing Labors A Premonition THe Bishops of Rome in the persons of Zozimus Boniface and Celestine Successively opposed the Sixth Council of Carthage consisting of 217 Fathers among whom the great S. Augustine is acknowledged to be one in the matter of Appeals which was the first step made by that irregular Chair to the Exorbitant Supremacy which they afterward claimed In vindicating that Claim before the Council they produced two counterfeit Canons fathered upon the Oecumenical Synod at Nice which were by the Records of Carthage Alexandria and Constantinople in the presence of all those Fathers in the sixth Council of Carthage detected to be forgeries as well as by the Tenor of the undoubted Canons of the Nicene Council it self which are contrary to those by the Roman Church pretended and so they were esteemed by the Fathers in that sixth Council who were startled at the sight of those New unheard of Monsters at their first Publication above 1200 years ago Vpon this Passage I redoubled in the Book an observation to make it more remarkable which you will find cap. 2. pag. 9. to this purpose That in the first General Council of Nice it was ordered that the chief in every Province should confirm the Acts of his inferior Bishops And if any Trouble did arise which could not be decided by the Metropolitan Provision was made Can. 5. in words so clear and forcible that none more plain can be put into their places that the last Appeal should be made to Councils and that the Person condemned in any Province should not be received if he fled to others That Parenthesis In words so clear and forcible that none more plain can be put in their places relates to the CANON it self which here follows that you may see how forcible it is and how much plainer then the very Words into which I had contracted it It is worthy your Consideration as on of the most Important Records in Antiquity consented to by all the Popish Compilers of the Councils themselves Can. 5. Concerning those that are Excommunicated whether in the order of the Clergy or the Laitie by the Bishops in every several province let the Sentence prevail according to the Canon that they who are cast out by some be not received by others But let it be required that no man be excluded the Congregation by the Pusillanimitie or contention or any such vice of the Bishop That this therefore might more decently be inquired into we think it fit that Councils should every year throughout every Province twice be celebrated that such Questions may be discussed by the Common Authority of all the Bishops assembled together And so they that have evidently offended against their Bishop shall be accounted Excommunicated according to reason by all till it pleaseth the Community of Bishops to pronounce a milder Sentence on such But let the Councils be held the one before the Quaaragesima before Easter that all dissention being taken away we might offer a most pure Gift unto God and the second about the middle of Autumn Had the Canon said The last Appeal shall be made to Councils they that are accustomed to such shifts without blushing might easily have evaded the Words by affirming the Bishop of Rome to be particularly excepted without any need of expressing the exception because by the general and Tacit Consent of all he is above the Limits of such Laws and above the Authority of that and all other Councils Thus they might still render the matter doubtful by their Subterfuges and Pretences as indeed they do in evading one expression of the Canon it self For whereas the Fathers say Let the Sentence prevail according to the Canon that they who are cast out by some be not received by others Those Popish Hirelings make an exception of the Bishop of Rome where the Oecumenical Synod maketh none and might as well except him here though the Council had said in terms The last Appeal shall be made to Councils For the last Appeal to any subordinate Authority over which the Council had any Legislative Power was ordered they might say to be made to Councils But the Bishop of Rome being the Head of the Church and having the supreme Authority over all Councils was not thought of in this Canon nor was fit he should be at all mentioned because that would imply he was under their authority The Prodigious Height of their usurped Claim being their sole Defence and their incredible Boldness the amazement of ignorant People which is their chief security But the Council adding to the former expression this clause That Councils should every year throughout evry Province twice be celebrated for this very end that such Questions may be discussed by the common authority of all the Bishops assembled together it puts an end to the business especially when they add That they who have evidently offended their Bishop shall be accounted excommunicated according to reason till it pleaseth the community of Bishops to pronounce a milder Sentence But that which renders it most plain and forcible is this Let the Councils be held the one before the Quadragesima before Easter that all Dissention being taken away we might offer a most pure Gift unto GOD. And the second about the middle of Autumn All the wit in the world could not have invented a more clear and apparent provision against the Roman Bishops absurd and impudent Pretences No Evasion I think can possibly be made there from when it is once noted and understood For the Bar put in against the Pope is not here in Words but Things It implies that the Controversie must before Easter be fully determined The very end of calling such a Council and holding it then being the taking away of all dissention that we might offer up a most pure Gift or Sacrifice to God that is That Vnity being restored to the Church at that time we might receive the Sacrament in Peace and Charity Whereas if after the Sentence of the Council the business were to be carried to the Court of Rome Suits and Quarrels could not be ended against Easter but would be lengthened in many Provinces beyond
Easter both by reason of the Seas and Regions to be passed over by old and Crazy Persons such as the venerable Bishops were before they could come from their own Countries to the Roman Chair and by those Prolatory delays they might find there the matter being wholy referred to the Popes pleasure The Variation of the Letter in the Book made my Note on this place look too like the Text of the Council it self which for as much as it happened in a most weighty Place I could not with a good Conscience let it pass without acquainting the Pious Reader with the same Though the Letter of the Canon it self to prevent mistakes is faithfully translated afterwards page 26 and 27. Yet without giving this Gloss upon the Canon which was the occasion of this Pramonition because so necessary to a clear and full understanding of all the procedure This Note is the more weighty because the Nicene Council is confessed on both sides by us for its own sake and its conformity to the Scriptures by the Papists for the Popes that have ratified it to be of great Authority next to the Holy Bible the very first and most indisputable that is Yet this Canon laid in the foundation utterly overthrowes all the following Pretences and Forgeries of the Roman Bishops Which I beseech the Reader to examine more perfectly For though by many Arts and long Successes the Bishop of Rome bas ascended to an Ecclesiastical Supremacy and a subtile Train of Doctrines is laid to make him the Universal Monarch of the World as much higher then the Emperour as the Sun is greater than the Moon as they expresse it Yet the Sentence of an Eminent Divine well acquainted with these Affairs in a late Sermon preached before the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen in the City of London and now published is very true The Supremacy of the Roman Church was a meer Usurpation begun by Ambition advanced by Forgery and defended by Cruelty ERRATA THe Reader before he enters upon the Book is desired to correct these as the principal Errata's with his Pen. Page 35 line 15 dele now p. 43 l. 21 r. love of the world that p. 55 for Councits r. Statesmen p. 66l 16 aft Magdenburg r. and. p. 83 l. 21 for 1635 r. 1535. p. 104 l. 16 for fit r. fift p 107l 10 for 1618 r. 1608. p. 109 adde in the Margin 11. p. 137l 7 r Right use of the Fathers p 157 〈◊〉 r. Transeunt p 172 Cap. 15. Contents for Falsity r. Falsely AN ADVERTISEMENT TO THE READER IRenaeus one of the most Ancient Fathers Scholar to S. Polycarp S. John's Disciple in his Book against Heresies giveth us four notable marks of their Authors First he sheweth how they disguize their Opinions Errour never shews It Self saith he lest it should be taken naked but is artificially adorned in a splendid Mantle that it may appear truer than Truth it self to the more unskilful 2. That having Doctrines which the Prophets never preached nor God taught nor the Apostles delivered they pretend unwritten Traditions Ex non Scriptis legentes as he phraseth it 3. They make a Rope of Sand that they may not seem to want Witnesses passing over the Order and Series of Writings and as much as in them lies loosing the Members of the Truth and dividing them from each other for they chop and change and making one thing of another deceive many c. But that which I chiefly intend is the fourth They bring forth a vast multitude of Apocryphal and Spurious Writings which themselves have feigned to the amazement of Fools and that those may admire them that know not the Letters or Records of the Truth How far the Papists have trodden the foregoing Paths it is not my purpose to unfold only the last the Heretical pravity of Apocryphal and Spurious Books how much they have been guilty of imposing on the World by feigned Records I leave to the evidence of the ensuing Pages which I heartily desire may be answerable to the Merit of so great a Cause Vincentius Lirinensis another eminent Father praised by Gennadius died in the time of Theodosius and Valentinian He wrote a Book against Heresies in like manner wherein preparing Furniture and Instructions against their Wiles he at first telleth us that the Canon of the Scripture is alone sufficient Then that the concurrence of the Fathers is to be taken in for the more clear certainty of their sense and meaning Upon this latter point he saith afterwards But neither are all Heresies to be assaulted this way nor at all times but only such as are New and Green to wit when they first spring up before they have falsified the Rules of the Ancient Faith while they are hindered by straitness of time and before the Poyson spreading abroad they have endeavoured to corrupt the Writings of the Fathers So that Hereticks have inclination enough where they are not hindered by straitness of time to corrupt the most Ancient Writings of the Church For which cause he further saith in the same place But Heresies that are spread abroad and waxen old must not be set upon in this sort because by long continuance they have had opportunity to steal away the Truth Whatsoever 〈◊〉 nesses there be therefore either of Schismes or Heresies that are grown Ancient we 〈◊〉 in no case otherwise to deal with them then either to convince them if it be needful by the Authority of the Scriptures only or at least to avoid them as convicted of old and condemned by Vniversal Councils In this Admonition the Father informs us of two things First that it is possible for Errour to prevail and spread abroad to continue long and wax old Secondly that having gotten possession of Books and Libraries it may falsisie the Rules of the Ancient Faith and steal away the Truth by corrupting the Writings of the Fathers In which case he will not have the Controversie decided by the Fathers but by the Scriptures only or by old Vniversal Councils But if Errour proceed so far as to corrupt the Councils too then of necessity we must have recourse to some other remedy either to the Scriptures alone as he directeth or else we must detect the frauds whereby the Councils themselves are falsified For that they are liable to the same inconvenience is evident both by the paueity of Ancient Records and the many Revolutions that have been in the World especially since Nature teacheth men to strike at the Root attempts are more apt to be made upon them because Hereticks are prone to be most busie in undermining the Foundation That it is possible for men so far to act against their Consciences as to corrupt the Ancient Records of Truth you see by the premises and that it is an easie thing for them to effect it that have gotten all kind of Books and Libraries into their hands is apparent because they that keep
answer the Discoveries which makes Dr. James his Treatise and Blondels Pseudo-Isidorus so rare among the people Matters of Fact may be manifest enough where the means of contriving them remain unknown a conjecture in a circumstance therefore destroys not the Foundation You will find other kinds of Arguments in the subsequent Epitome than bare conjectures In the mean time be pleased to remember that the Papists have had all kind of Books nay and Libraries in their hands that the Roman Clergy especially those that attend the Chair have Glory Wealth and Pleasure enough to tempt them to such endeavours that the Pope hath Power enough to reward his Creatures and that they have actually endeavoured to corrupt such Books by their Indices Expurgatorii as also to put forth Apocryphal and Spurious Pieces which Dr. Reynolds Dr. James Bishop Jewel and the Learned Crashaw as well as the Indices themselves do evidently declare It shall here appear more clearly that they have adulterated all by Counterfeit Records the very places and things corrupted being themselves produced detected and reproved I shall not descend into the latrer Ages but keep within the compass of the first 420 years and lay open so many of their frauds as disguize and cover the face of Primitive Antiquities which ought to be preserved most sacred and pure It is sufficient to prove that all the Streams are infected by the Poyson that is thrown into the Fountain-head and to expatiate downwards would over-swell the Book which is intended to be little for the use and benefit of all Neither shall I talk of the Fathers at large I will not meddle with their Amphilochius Abdias S. Denis c. but keep close to Records and publick instruments of Antiquity which have the force of Laws Such as Apostles Canons Decretal Epistles and Ancient Councils which they have either depraved by altering the Text or falsified as it were by Whole-sale in the intire Lump And I shall concern my self in the 〈◊〉 more than the former I desire the Reader to note that I do not trust other mens information but mine own eyes having my self seen the Collectors of the Councils and searched into all their Compilers for the purpose Neither do I use our own but their most affectionate and Authentick Writers the circumstances of the things themselves in their most approved Authors detecting the Forgeries Before I stir further I shall add one passage which befel me in the Schools as I was studying these things and searching the most Old and Authentick Records in pursuance of them One Evening as I came out of the Bodleian Library which is the Glory of Oxford and this Nation at the Stairs-foot I was saluted by a Person that has deserved well both of Scholars and Learning who being an intimate Friend of mine told me there was a Gentleman his Cosen pointing to a Grave Person in the Quadrangle a man that had spent many thousand pounds in promoting Popery and that he had a desire to speak with me The Gentleman came up to us of his own accord We agreed for the greater liberty and privacy to walk abroad into the New-Parks He was a notable man of an Eloquent Tongue and competent Reading bold forward talkative enough He told me that the Church of Rome had Eleven Millions of Martyrs Seventeen Oecumenical Councils above an Hundred Provincial Councils all the Doctors all the Fathers Unity Antiquity Consent c. I desired him to name me One of his Eleven Millions of Martyrs excepting those that died for Treason in Queen Elizabeths and King James his days For the Martyrs of the Primitive times were Martyrs of the Catholick but not of the Roman Church They only being Martyrs of the Roman Church that die for Transubstantiation the Popes Supremacy the Doctrine of Merits Purgatory and the like So many he told me they had but I could not get him to name one As for his Councils Antiquities and Fathers I asked him what he would say if I could clearly prove that the Church of Rome was guilty of forging them so far that they had published Canons in the Apostles names and invented Councils that never were forged Letters of Fathers and Decretal Epistles in the name of the first Bishops and Martyrs of Rome made 5 6 700 years after they were dead to the utter disguizing and defacing of Antiquity for the first 400 years next after our Saviour Tush these are nothing but lyes quoth he whereby the protestants endeavour to disgrace the Papists Sir answered I you are a Scholar and have heard of Isidore Mercator James Merlin Peter Crabbe Laurentius Surius Severinus Binius Labbè Cossartius and the Collectio Regia Books of vast Bulk and Price as well as of great Majesty and Magnificence You met me this Evening at the Library door if you please to meet me there tomorrow morning at eight of the Clock I will take you in and we will go from Class to Class from Book to Book and there I will first shew in your own Authors that you publish such Instruments for good Records and then prove that those Instruments are downright frauds and forgeries though cited by you upon all occasions He would not come but made this strange reply What if they be Forgeries what hurt is that to the Church of Rome No! cryed I amazed Is it no hurt to the Church of Rome to be found guilty of forging Canons in the Apostles names and Epistles in the Fathers names which they never made Is it nothing in Rome to be guilty of counterfeiting Decrees and Councils and Records of Antiquity I have done with you whereupon I turned from him as an obdurate person And with this I thought it meet to acquaint the Reader AN ABRIDGMENT OF THE CHAPTERS Cap. 1. OF the Nature Degrees and Kinds of Forgery Cap. 2. Of the Primitive Order and Government of the Church The first Popish Encroachment upon it backed with Forgery The Detection of the Fraud in the Sixth Council of Carthage Cap. 3. A multitude of Forgeries secretly mingled with the Records of the Church and put forth under the Name of Isidore Bishop of Hispalis Which Book is owned defended and followed by the Papists Cap. 4. James Merlins Edition of the Councils who lately published Isidore Hispalensis for a good Record which is now detected and proved to be a Forgery Cap. 5. Divers Forgeries contained in Isidores counterfeit Collection mentioned in particular Cap. 6. A further account of Merlins design How some would have Isidore to be a Bishop others a Merchant others a Sinner no man knowing well what to make of him Cap. 7. Of Francis Turrian the famous Jesuite with what Art and Soldness he defendeth the Forgeries Cap. 8. Of Peter Crabbe his Tomes of the Councils Wherein he agrees with and wherein he differs from Indore and Merlin Cap. 9. Of Carranza his Epitome He owneth and useth the Forgeries for good Records Cap. 10. Of Surius his four Tomes
mentioneth the foresaid business at Carthage but so briefly that it is clear he did not like it And to close up all in the Life of this Boniface he endeavours to strengthen the Title of the Roman Bishop against the Patriarch of Constantinople by the Donation of Constantine another Forgery of which hereafter The two counterfeit Canons contained in the Commonitorium which the Roman Bishop sent to the sixth Council of Carthage are these as Faustinus the Italian Bishop delivered them in Greek to be read by Daniel the Pronotary in the Council 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. We are pleased that if a Bishop be accused and the Bishops of his Country being assembled together have judged him and deposed him from his Degree and he thinks fit to Appeal and shall fly to the most blessed Bishop of the Roman Church and shall desire to be heard and he shall think it just that the Tryal be renewed then he the Roman Bishop shall vouchsafe to write to the B. shops of the adjoyning and bordering Province that they should diligently examine all and define according to the Truth But if any one thinks fit that his Cause be heard again and by his own Supplication moves the Bishop of Rome that he should send a Legate or Priest from his side it shall be in his power to do as he listeth and as he thinketh fit And if he shall decree that some ought to be sent that being present themselves might judge with the Bishops having his Authority by whom they were sent it shall be according to his judgment but if he think the Bishops sufficient to end the business he shall do what in his most wise counsel he judgeth meet Here the Roman Bishop nay the meanest Priest he shall please to send as his Legate is exalted above all Councils Bishops and Patriarchs in the world he may do and undo act add rescind diminish alter whatsoever he pleaseth in any Council when the Causes of the most Eminent Rank in the Church do depend in the same All Bishops are by this Canon made more to fear the Roman Bishop than their own Patriarch and are ingaged if need be to side with him against their Patriarch the Gate is open for all the Wealth in the World to flow into his Ecclesiastical Court which is as much above the Court of any other Patriarch by this Right of Appeals as the Archbishops Court above any inferiour Bishops while we may Appeal to that from these at our pleasure Thus Bishops and Patriarchs are made to buckle under the Popes Cirdle and the Decrees of Councils are put under his foot And all this is no more but half a Step to the Popes Chair The other part of the Step in this Commonitorium was the following Canon concerning Priests 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. I ought not to pass that over in silence that does yet move me If any Bishop happen to be angry as he ought not and be suddenly or sharply moved against his Priest or Deacon and would cast him out of his Church Provision must be made that he be not condemned being Innocent or lose the Communion Let him that is cast out have power to Appeal to the Borderers that his Cause might be heard and handled more carefully for a Hearing ought not to be denied him when he asks it And the Bishop which hath either justly or unjustly ejected him shall patiently suffer that the business be lookt into and his Sentence either confirmed or rectified c. What is the meaning of this c. in Binius Labbè Cossartius and the Collectio Regia I cannot tell but doubtless the Canon intends the same in the close with the former that the last Appeal is reserved to the Roman Chair which made the Fathers in the sixth Council of Carthage so angry as we find them to see things so false and presumptuous fastned upon the first most Glorious Oecumenical Council which decreed the clean contrary in the 4 and 5 Canons The substance and force of which as we gave you before so shall we now the words of the Canons themselves Can. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It is fit that a Bishop chiefly be ordained by all the Bishops that are in the Province but if this be found difficult either because of any urgent necessity or for the length of the journey then the Ordination ought to be made by Three certainly meeting together the absent Bishops agreeing and consenting by their Writs but let the confirmation of the Acts be given throughout every Province to the Metropolitan Can. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Concerning those that are Excommunicated whether in the Order of the Clergy or the Laity by the Bishops in every several Province let the Sentence prevail according to the Canon that they who are cast out by some be not received by others but let it be required that no man be excluded the Congregation by the pusillanimity or contention or by any such vice of the Bishop That this therefore might more decently be inquired into we think it fit that Councils should every year throughout every Province twice be celebrated That such Questions may be discussed by the common Authority of all the Bishops assembled together And so they that have evidently offended against their Bishop shall be accounted Excommunicated according to to reason by all till it pleaseth the community of Bishops to pronounce a milder Sentence upon such But let the Councils be held the one before the Quadragesima before Easter that all Dissention being taken away we might offer a most pure Gift unto God and the second about the middle of Autumn The last Appeal you see is ordered by the Canon to Councils and as they please the Controversie is to be ended without flying from one to another Bishop These are the true and Authentick Canons of the Nicene Council overthrown by the Forgery CAP. III. A multitude of Forgeries secretly mingled among the Records of the Church and put forth under the Name of Isidore Bishop of Hispalis Which Book is owned defended and followed by the Papists THe Roman Chair being thus lifted up to the utmost Height it could well desire care must be taken to secure its Exaltation After many secret Councils therefore and powerful Methods used for its Establishment for the increase of its Power and Glory furthered by the Luxury and Idleness of the Western Churches of which Salvian largely complains in his Book De Providentiâ written to justifie the Dispensation of GOD in all the Calamities they suffered by the Goths who sacked Rome in the days of the forenamed Zozimus there came out a collection of Councils and Decretal Fpistles in the Name of Isidore Bishop of Hispalis about the year 790. In which Book there are neatly interwoven a great company of forged Evidences or feigned Records tending all to the advancement of the Popes Chair in a very various copious and
Elaborate manner That the Bishop of Rome had a secret hand in the contrivance and publication of them is probable if not clear from divers Reasons 1. Before they were published Hadrian 1. maketh use of the Tale of Constantines Leprosie Vision and Baptism by Pope Sylvester things till then never heard of in the world but afterwards contained in the Donation of Constantine a Forgery which in all probability lay by this Hadrian but of his own preparing when he wrote his Letter to Constantine and Irene which Letter was read and is recorded in the 2. Nicene Council on the behalf of Images being sent abroad like a Scout as it were to try what success it would find in the world before he would adventure the whole Body of his Players to publick view For if that were swallowed down without being detected the rest might hope for the same good Fortune if not the first might pass for a mistake and its Companions be safely suppressed without any mischief following 2. The Emperour and the Council having digested the first Legend exposed by the Pope so crastily to publick view the other Forgeries were a little after boldly published in this Book of Isidore together with the Legend and Donation of Constantine which when Hincmarus Archbishop of Rhemes upon its first publication set himself to write against he was taken up so roundly for the same by the Authority of Rome that he was fain gladly to acquit the Attempt for ever And their tenderness over it is I think a sufficient Indication of their Relation to it every Creature being naturally affectionate to its own Brood and prone to study its preservation The Church of Rome was so tender of Isidores Edition that as some say Hinemarus was forced to recant his Opinion and to declare that he believed and received the Book with Veneration 3. It is recorded by Justellus that the forementioned Hadrian was careful to give Charles the Great a Copy of the Councils and Decretal Epistles drawn up as he affirmed by Dionysius Exiguus Daillè accuses the Book of many faults but whether Hadrian or Dionysius were guilty of them is little material only 't was done as a Pledge of Reconciliation after several Bickerings between the Giver and Receiver Charles the Great having several times invaded Rome and now departing thence with Friendship which makes me a little the more prone to suspect Dionysius too for one of those Danaum Dona which are given like Nessus his Shirt when wounded by Hercules to his Enemies Wife for the destruction of her Husband Be it how it will it shews that Hadrian I. was a busie man that he understood the influence and power of Records what force they would have upon the minds of Lay-men and that his eyes and hands were sometimes busied in such Affairs But that which above all other Arguments discovers the Popes to have a hand if not in the Publication yet in the Reception of the Forgeries is this that the Roman Canonists Ivo Gratian c. have digested them into the Popes Laws and they are so far countenanced by the Popes themselves that almost from the time of their publication throughout all Ages since they have been received for Authentick in the apal Jurisdiction and are used as such in all the Ecclesiastical Courts under the Popes Dominion as the chief of their Rules for the deciding of Causes So that they are not only fostered but exalted by the Authority of Rome The Glory which they acquired in the Throne of Judgment advancing them for a long time above the reach of Suspition The Veneration which is due to the Chair of Holiness was their best security By the influence of the Popes Authority they were received into the Codes of Princes being as we shall shew out of Baronius in the next Chapter introduced into the Capitular Books of the Kings of the Franks by Benedictus Levita and at his instant request confirmed and approved by the 〈◊〉 Chair The Forgeries in Isidore being scattered abroad it is difficult to conceive to what a vast Height the Roman See by degrees 〈◊〉 The Splendour of so many Ancient Martyrs 〈◊〉 together with so many Canons and Decrees in her behalf so far wrought that her Bishop came at last to Claim all Power over all persons Spiritual and Temporal to have the sole power of forgiving sins to be alone Infallible to be Cods Vicar upon Earth the only Oracle in the world nay the sole Supreme and Absolute Monarch disposing of Empires and Kingdoms according to the Tenour of the Doctrines contained in those Forgeries wherein he is made the sole Independent Lord without Controul able to do what ever he lifted Some few Ages after this first Publication of Isidore there were other Records put forth though lately seen yet bearing the countenance of 〈◊〉 Antiquitie which so ordered the matter that according to them the Evangelists brought their Gospels to S. Peter to confirm them and several books of S. Clement S. Peter's Successor were put into the Canon of the Holy Bible the whole number of Canonical books being setled and defined by his sole Authority In token doubtless of the Power Inherent in all S. Peter's Successors at Rome to dispose of the Apostles and their Writings as they please S. 〈◊〉 own Canon for that purpose being numbered among those of the Aposiles That the Pope was uncapable of being judged by any that no Clergy-man was to be Subject to Kings but all to depend immediately upon the Bishop of Rome that he was the Rock and Head of the Church was the constant Doctrine of all those Forgeries when put together with many other Popish Points of less concernment sprinkled up and down in them at every turning Cui bono Among the Civilians 't is a notable mark of Detection in a blind Cause whose Good whose Exaltation whose Benefit is the drift and scope of things and 't is very considerable for the sure finding out of the first Authors That they are Forgeries is manifest Now whose they are is the Question in hand and if Agents naturally intend themselves in their own Operations it is easily solved How excessively the World was addicted to Fables about the time of Isidore's Appearance we may see by the Contents of the 2. Nicene Council Dreams Visions and Miracles being very rife in their best demonstrations and among other Legends a counterfeit Basil a counterfeit Athanasius a counterfeit Emperour maintaining and promoting the Adoration of Images As may perhaps in another Volume be more fully discovered when we descend from these first to succeeding Ages The Counterfeits in Isidore being mingled with the Records of the Church like Tares among Wheat or false Coyns among heaps of Cold lay undistinguished from true Antiquities and after Hincmarus his ill success were little examined by the space of 500 or 600 years Some small opposition there was made in particular by the Bishops in France and
perhaps by some Doctors and Bishops more sincere than ordinary or by some Learned Lawyer that rarely appeared but the general Interest of the Times the Deluge of corrupted manners the Ignorance of the Laity the Luxury of the Priests the Greatness of the Chair and the Love of Superstition so far prevailed that for a long time the Court of Rome luxuriantly fiourished in the Light of her own Glory and to this Prodigious Sun-shine owed much of its Splendour For the Pope having wrought himself by his first Arts into that high Reputation the Lustre whereof dazled the world it concerned him much to keep the Earth in a Profound Quiet and to cherish Ignorance a Vertue highly praised in the Church of Rome that as the Tares were sown they might be permitted to grow and be fruitful while men slept In which the want of Printing much assisted him Monks and Fryars being the only scribes or the chief ones and all at his Devotion Written Copies were the only Books which at most could be but few enough indeed to preserve knowledge by way of Record but being Chained up in Monasteries and Libraries they came seldom abroad unless by the report of such well-affected persons as had their Tutelage and keeping The Popes Indulgence and the Sloth 〈◊〉 made way for the Artisice of 〈◊〉 in after-ages which were not Bookish ones as this is neither were Lay-men addicted much to Reading But upon the Reformation occasioned by nothing more than the notorious impiety and excess of Popes unless the impudence and security of his Followers may contend for a share in it when Libraries fell into the Protestants hands Inquisition was made Archives were entered Books opened Records searched and diligently compared Whereupon much fraud and shufling was found and exposed to the world For as the Copies were enough had they been sincere so though they were not sincere by the Providence of God they contained Indications wherby clear Judgments might easily discern between Records and Forgeries as I found my self to my great amazement without any Warning when I first set my self to read the Councils and simply made use of none but Popish Compilers For there is not more difference for the most part between a piece of Gold and an Oyster-shell than between a true Record and a Forgery Upon this Inspection the Popes Power began to be questioned and his Throne to shake as if it had been founded on a Quagmire He therefore furnisheth himself with Armies of Priests as S. Gregory phraseth it new Orders of Jesnites and Fryars never before heard of being erected for the defence of his Tottering Chair men devoted against the Truth as those Conspirators were that swore they would neither eat nor drink till they had slain Paul for the Maintenance of whom he is at great expence unto this day Above all other arts that of providing Seminaries being the most costly and the most mysterious wherein they are secretly trained up like Sappho s Birds of whom it is reported that being ambitious to be thought a GOD he privately cherished a multitude and taught them by degrees to say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sappho is a great God which being let loose on a sudden with their Lesson all the other Birds in the Forrest were quickly instructed in the same Ditty Whereupon he withdrawing himself the people thought him gone to Heaven and a Temple was erected to the God Sappho Whether the Story be true I shall not determine I am sure it may pass for an Embleme of the Popes Atchievement who by this means has made the World to ring of a Doctrine which makes him a God or if not that at least Lord of all Councils greater than Emperours Head of the Church c. His Emissaries issuing forth from these mysterious Seminaries and filling the Earth like Locusts or like little fraudulent and simple Birds chirping out the Ditty and while all the Wood learning it one of another the Earth is full of the Miracle All the late Compilers of the Decrees and Councils seem hence to flow James Merlin Peter Crabbe Laurentius Surius Nicolinus Carranza Severinus Binius Labbè and Cossartius the Collectio Regia c. being his sworn Adjutants for upholding the Chair The last is a Book of such State and Magnificence that it consists of 37 Volumes and is in price about 50 pounds More or less they all carry on the Forgeries with one consent which were at first published in the name of Isidore of Hispalis though some had rather upon mature deliberation it should be Isidore Mercator or Isidore Peccator a Merchant or a Sinner rather than a Saint and a Bishop This Narrative of the Forgeries being thus nakedly and by way of History plainly given it remains now that the Forgeries themselves be proved to be such In the detection of which much light will reflect upon the foregoing passages All which if you please you may take only for a fair Introduction Howbeit I must close with two or three Observations First of all I do not content my self with any single Collector of Councils among the Papists lest they should say This is but one Doctors Opinion but I take the Stream of them together Secondly Detect not the Books of private men but such as are adopted by the Church of Rome being dedicated to Popes Kings Emperours and coming out cum summo Privilegio Thirdly that the first of these Compilers excepting those that were imployed in the first publication and Promotion of Isidore did begin with that Service not much above 130 years ago all of them rising up since the times of Martin Luther though their Names make a great noise and bluster in the world For upon the Reformation of the Church so happily wrought and carried on by the Protestants these Armies of Collectors were marshalled together to help a little and to uphold the Popes Chair by Forgeries Which intimates a Dearth of Antiquities since they are forced to fly to such shameful expedients Luther appeared in the year 1517. The first that appeared after him was James Merlin in the year 1535. The next was Peter Crabbe in the year 1538. After him Carranza in the year 1564. Then Surius in the year 1567. Turrian follows not as a Collector but as a Champion to defend them in the year 1573. Whom Nicolinus succeeded as a Compiler of the Councils in the year 1585. After him Binius Labbè and Cossartius and the Collectio Regia follow in their Order So that it is an easie matter to discern what set these Voluminous Writers on work to wit the great and smart occasion they received by the Reformation Finally observe that Isidore and Merlin the first of the Compilers whose Works are extant lay down the Forgeries simply and plainly for good Records but Binius and his Followers by reason of the Arguments which they cannot answer begin to confess some of them to be Forgeries So do the most Grave and Learned Cardinals
Bellarmine and Baronius though they still carry on the Design of the first Inventers by some other Methods which they hope will succeed better Nor is it any wonder that a Secular Kingdom should make men more active than the love of Heaven since we daily see how the Kings of the world expend vast Treasures of Gold and Silver and run through all dangers of Death and Battel for their own preservation and the Conquest of their Neighbours The same care which they take in building Forts and Cittadels being taken by the Bishop of Rome in maintaining Seminaries Universities Printing-Houses c. which depend absolutely on him for the securing of all that Wealth and Empire which he hath by his Wit and Policy acquired It standeth him upon for if his Religion falls his Glory vanisheth and his Kingdom is abolished What men will do for Secular Ends beyond all the belief and expectation of the Vulgar we see in Hamor and Shechem the first and most Ancient Myrrour of that kind in the world who for the accomplishment of their desires introduced a new Religion troubling themselves and their Citizens unto Blood meerly to get possession of Dinah Jacob's Daughter 〈◊〉 's Policy is about 2500 years old though much more late When the ten Tribes revolted from the House of David for fear lest they should return to their Allegiance if they went up yearly to Jerusalem according to the Law he set up two Calves for the people to worship and underwent a great expence besides the Gold in the Calves in erecting a new Order of Friests that the people might be kept at home in their perverse Obedience He very well knew those Calves were no Deities yet for secular ends he promoted their worship and was followed therein by all the Line of the Kings of Israel several hundred of years together What Demetrius the Silver-Smith did for Diana of the Ephesians and what an uproar he made purely for Gain in making her Shrines all the Christian World understandeth But the High-Priests Scribes and Elders of the Jews in acting against all the Miracles of Christ and against their Conscience especially in giving Money to the Souldiers to hold their peace when they brought the news of his Resurrection their resisting of the Holy Ghost at his Miraculous Descent these are a sufficient instance of the incredible obdurateness of mans heart and his obstinate 〈◊〉 allures his hopes as the immediate Crown of his Labours The Diana of the Romans is much more prosicuous than the Diana of the Ephesians The fattest places of the Provinces and the greatest Empire in the World are the Game they Play This Dinah animateth all their Strength to impose on the people And for the easing of their own Charge it is a usual thing with Popes to permit their Priests and Fryers for their better support to deceive the people which Dr. Stillingfleet in his Book of Popish Counterfeit Miracles does excellently open in which and in all other Arts and Tricks they have a special connivance provided they keep the poor simple Sheep within the bounds of their Jurisdiction and contribute to the continuance of their Secular Kingdom This is the truth of the Story and these are the circumstances of the whole procedure which remains now to be proved CAP. IV. James Merlin's Editions of the Councils who lately published Isidore Hispalensis for a good Record which is now detected and proved to be a Forgery JAmes Merlin's pains was to publish Isidore with some Collections and Additions of his own He positively affirmeth him to be that Famous Isidore of Hispalis a Saint a Bishop and a Father of the Church though as Blondel and Dr. Reynolds accurately observe S. Isidore of Hispalis was dead 40 50 60 years before some things came to pass that are mentioned in that Book of the Councils Blondel in a Book of his called Pseudo-Isidorus or Turrianus Vapulans Cap 2. observes how the lowest that write of Isidores death fix it on the year 647. as Vasaeus in his Chronicle Others on the year 643. as Rodericus Toletanus Hist. lib. 2. cap. 18. Or on the year 635. as the proper Office of the Saints of Spain or on the year 636. when Sinthalus entered his Kingdom as Redemptus Diaconus an eye-witness De Obitu Isidori Brauleo Bishop of Caesar-Augustana Lucas Tudensts Baronius the great Annalist Mariana Grialus and others agree with the last which is eleven years sooner than Vasaeus So that the general prevailing Opinion is that Isidore of Hispalis died in the year 636. However that we may deal most fairly with them we will allow them all they can desire and calculate our affair by the last Account which is most for their advantage Admit Vasaeus in the right that Isidore lived till the year 647. yet the Book which is Fathered upon him can be none of his for it mentions things which came to pass long after It is observed by Blondel that Honoratus who succeeded Isidore in the See of Hispalis is found in the sixth Council of Toledo whereas this pretended Isidore makes mention of the eleventh Council in the same place He talks of the sixth Oecumenical Council in the year 681. no less than 46 years after his own death by the lowest account He writes of Boniface of Mentz slain as Baronius observes in the year 755. which was threescore and sixteen years after Isidores death Yet Possevin upon the word Isidorus Hisp. and Hart in his Conference with Reynolds contend the Author of this Book to be the true Isidore Bishop of Hispalis as Merlin who first published Isidore in print and others did before them Among his Witnesses produced against this Counterfeit the first which Blondel useth is the Code of the Roman Church in which onely the Epistles of 13 Roman Bishops are contained beginning with Siricius Whereas there are in Isidore above 60. whereof five or six and thirty lived before Siricius and were all unknown until the time of Isidore His next Testimony is that of the Bishops of France about the year 865. who concluded that Isidore's Wares then newly beginning to be sold could not have the force of Canons because they were not contained in the Authentick Code or Book of Canons formerly known He next citeth the Council of Aquisgranum An. 816. the Bishops of Paris An. 829. Henricus Caltheisensis Erasmus Greg. Cassander Anton. Contius the famous Lawyer Bellarmine and Baronius the Learned Cardinals The Testimony of Baronius being more largely cited than the residue I thought it meet to search the Author and there I found these following passages Writing upon the Contest between Pope Nicholas and the French Bishops concerning Appeals he beginneth to shew how they complained that the Causes of Bishops which ought to be tryed in Councils by their Fellow Bishops were removed to the Apostolick Chair And they questioned in their Letters whether those Epistles of the more Ancient Bishops which were not inserted into the Body
Nicholas the Pope seemed to abstain from it on purpose for though he was often ingaged in these Controversies concerning Appeals to the Apostolick Chair and there were in it many and those most powerful Testimonies of most holy Popes and they Martyrs too whose Authority might be of highest force in the Church yet he wholly abstained from them which that he knew to be doubtful at least is not to be doubted using only those concerning which there was never any doubt in the Church of God because the Church did not want those adventitious and late invented Evidences because it might receive them abundantly from other places but Benedictus Levita himself also though as you have heard from Hincmarus and as he himself testifies in the Preface before his books he took many things out of that same Collection of Isidore yet being conscious in himself that the Authority of those Epistles was not so sure but that it nodded exceedingly he never cited any Author of them as he did in the other Epistles of the Roman Bishops Innocent Leo Gelasius Symmachus and Gregory naming the Authors of those whose Faith was clear and certain But further yet with great caution because he knew the Evidences taken from them not to be so firm he took care as he testifies in the end to have them confirmed by the Apostolick Authority Is not here a merry passage Benedictus Levita knew the Decretal Epistles to be false and therefore he got them to be made true by the Popes Authority at least to be confirmed as true whereas they were doubtful before It is the manner of sometimes to get others to propose the matters which they themselves design to be done that the business springing from the request of others might appear more graceful in the eye of the people We may justly enquire whether Benedictus Levita were not ordered what to Petition by private instructions from his Holiness before he made his motion to the Chair for it had otherwise been an extravagant impudence to have assaulted the Chair with such a request as that is of craving a Confirmation of new-found Records so feeble and suspected Whatever the Intrigue was the event is clear Benedictus Levita got them confirmed and so they were adopted for his Holiness Children though Pope Nicholas was shy a little out of shame and modesty and blushed to acknowledge his poor Kindred It is further observable that these counterfeit Epistles were first brought in into the Records of the Franks without naming their Authors and that a little after their quiet publication some Favourite of the Chair grew more bold and added their names unto them this of Clement that of Anacletus c. And that the work was thus perfected by degrees Baronius shews us in the following passage But he who first published the Decrees extracted out of those Epistles with the Title of the Roman Bishops in whose names they are recorded was that Hincmarus we mentioned the Bishop of Laon as appears by an Epistle or book written against him by Hincmarus of Rhemes who receiving that work of the Bishop of Laon read it not without indignation and in very many things reprovedit But others have followed the Bishop of Laon as Burchardus who writ in the following Age and others after him who prefixed the names of the very Roman Bishops before all the Chapters which Gratian also did the last of all But that those Epistles are rendered suspitious by many things which we have said in the second Tome of our Annals while we mentioned each in particular is sufficiently demonstrated Where we shewed withal that the holy Roman Church did not need them so as if they should be detected of falsity to be bereaved of its Rights and Priviledges since though she wanteth them she is abundantly strengthened and confirmed by the Legitimate and Genuine Decretal Epistles of other Popes But that the Chapters taken out of them by Benedictus Levita were at first approved as agreeable to the Canons as himself testifies by the Authority of the Roman Bishops which was done also by the latter Collectors it happened rather by long use than for any strength or firmness in themselves Thus Baronius in his Annals An. 865. nu 5 6 7 8. all together In Notis Martyrol ad 4. April he saith Vasaeus is convicted to have erred who thought this Isidore Pacensis that Isidore who collected the Epistles of the Roman Bishops and the Councils c. Hincmarus Laudunensis also and Trithemius and others err who ascribe that collection to Isidore of Hispalis That Opinion is refelled first because Brauleus and Ildephonsus who lived in those times drawing up a Catalogue of his Writings make not the least mention of that work But further all doubt is taken away concerning this matter while the Author of that work speaking there concerning the manner of holding a Council recites the words of the first Canon of the eleventh Council of Toledo and mentions Agatho the Pope in his Preface since Isidore of Hispalis departed this life long before the times of that Council and Pope Agatho Had we time we might make many curious reflexions upon these passages of Baronius He afterwards talks of another Isidore called sometimes Mercator and sometimes Peccator but of what Parents what Calling what City or what Country he was he mentioneth nothing So that this Child among all those Isidores and Fathers that are found out for it must rest at last in one that is unknown All that can be gathered from this whole discourse of Baronius is this That a new Book of Councils richly fraught with Evidences for the Roman Church and Religion came abroad under the name of Isidore containing Decrees and Decretal Epistles that were never before heard of in the world that this Book was falsly Fathered upon Isidore of Hispalis and that all those ancient Epistles of the Roman Bishops from S. Peter down to Siricius are justly suspected Nay he confesses them to be insirm adventitions and lately invented or newly found and to nod exceedingly He opposeth them to those Records which are Legitimate and Genuine though they are of late magnified and followed by all the Collectors of the Decrees and Councils being though waved by some cited and approved by other Popes as well as Doctors Jesuites Cardinals c. This is the last and best Story that can be made on the behalf of that Book the Counterfeits in which as we observed before were because they extol and magnifie the Popes Chair received for good and Authentick Laws in the Church of Rome For Baronius died not long since about the year 1607. in this last Century and when he had seen the truth of those Arguments that are urged against the Forgeries endeavours so to handle this matter in his History as to clear the Church of Rome from the imputation Bellarmine that saw not into this Mystery so clearly takes another course which when we have intimated one or
two Marginal Notes in Baronius we shall declare Baronius deals more fairly with us than Binius for the one in his Marginal Notes contradicteth his Text sometimes to delude the Reader but Baronius fairly notes in the Margin Isidori collectio vulgata in Galliis Isidori collectio ab Antiquis non adeo probata Isidori collectio ut minùs sincera notata c. Soft words for a Treatise rejected but strong Indications of a Desperate Cause The Ancients approved not the collection of Isidore It was not so sincere as it ought c. Cardinal Bellarmine to prove the Popes Supremacy draweth one Argument from the Popes themselves whose Testimonies he casteth into three Classes The first saith he contains the Epistles of Popes that sate from S. Peter to the year 300. in which Calvin and the Magdenburgenses confess the Primacy to be plainly asserted and that those Bishops were holy men and true Bishops but they say the Epistles are forged and new and falsly Fathered on those Bishops In this Class he affirmeth These Holy Fathers do clearly assert the Primacy Clemens in his first Epistle Anacletus in his third Evaristus Epist. 1. Pius Epist. 1 and 2. Anicetus Epist. 1. Victor Epist. 1. Zephirinus Epist. 1. Calixtus Epist. 1. Lucius Epist. 1. Marcellus in Epist. 1. Eusebius Epist. 3. Melchiades Epist. 〈◊〉 Marcus Epist. 1. After this he saith Quamvis aliquos Errores c. Though I cannot deny but that some Errours are crept into them and dare not affirm that they are indubitable yet I doubt not at all but that they are very Ancient As if an old Deed being called into question and the matter of Fact made certain that it was a real Forgery he that holds his possession by it should say It has been interlined indeed and corrupted in many places but 't is very old Let us see however what his reason is for the Antiquity of it He is rough with his Opponents and telleth us The Magdeburgenses do lye when they say Cent. 2. Cap. 7. near the end that no Author worthy of credit ever cited these Epistles before Charles the Great For Isidore who is 200 years older than Charles the Great in the Proem of his collection of the Holy Canons saith that by the advice of 80 Bishops he collected Canons out of the Epistles of Clement Anacletus c. Isidore did indeed begin to flourish near to the year 610. So that Bellarmine takes him right for the same Isidore Bishop of Hispalis But had he well examined the matter he would have forborn to give the Lye to men more in the right than himself confiding in the rotten Antiquity of this Counterfeit Isidore For Isidores Preface is a Counterfeit too made on purpose to countenance the Forgeries not 200 years older than Charles the Great things after the Death of Isidore its pretended Author being mentioned in the same Dr Reynolds in his Conference with Hart having smartly checked him for his fourscore Bishops out of one Isidore asked him About what year of Christ Isidore did die How doth Genebrard write because Genebrard was Hart's most admired Author He answereth About the year 637. as he proveth out of Vasaeus Asking him When the General Council of Constantinople under Agatho was kept He answereth In the year 681. or 682. or thereabout Then Isidore was dead above 〈◊〉 years saith Reynolds before that General Council He was saith Hart but what of that Of that it doth follow that the preface written in Isidores name and set before the Councils to purchase credit to those Epistles is a counterfeit and not Isidore's For in that Preface there is mention made of the General Council of Constantinople held against Bishop Macarius and Stephanus in the time of Pope Agatho and the Emperour Constantine which 〈◊〉 it was held above 40 years after Isidore 〈◊〉 dead by Genebrard's own confession by his own confession Isidore could not tell the fourscore Bishops of it And so the 80 Bishops which Turrian hath found out in one Isidore are dissolved all into one Counterfeit abusing both the name of Isidore and fourscore Bishops Hart was unable to answer him and 〈◊〉 from the Point Harding in his Book against Bishop Jewel citeth these Forgeries frequently and briskly Upon the failure of which though Baronius pretends an abundant number of other Evidences yet in the loss of 30 or 40 Primitive Bishops and Martyrs that were so long time for the first 300 years after Christ together thought to speak for the Supremacy of the Church of Rome one of the fairest Feathers in the Popes Crown is placked away and the younger Evidences in which Baronius trusts being none but the Malepert and Arrogant Testimonies of Junior Popes in their own Causes will make but a slight impression in the minds of men that have found themselves deluded with more ancient 〈◊〉 of the grave and unspotted Authorities of Holy Men that Sacrificed themselves for the Glory of God and the good of the World and sealed their Testimony 〈◊〉 their latest blood which the latter Bishops of Rome have been more Secular and Pompous than to be doing like their Predecessors CAP. V. Divers Forgeries contained in Isidore's Collection mentioned in particular Isidore as he now standeth set forth by Merlin has 50 Canons of the Apostles for pure and good Records many Decretal Epistles made as he pretends by the first Martyrs and Bishops of Rome very long and full of Popery He has two Epistles of S. Clement written to S. James Bishop of Jerusalem that was dead before S. Clement came to the Chair one to the Brethren dwelling with S. James and two others in his name He has four Epistles in the name of Anacletus who lived in the time of Trajan and sate in the Roman Chair An. 〈◊〉 In the last of which the Counterfeit Anacletus feigneth That all the Primacies and Archbithopricks in the World were divided and fetled by S. Peter and S. Clement that the Church of Rome is the Head and Hinge of all the Churches and that all the Patriarchal Sees were made such by vertue of S. Peter Antioch because he sate there before he came to Rome Alexandria because S. Mark came to sit there from S. Peter but Rome especially the first See because it is sanctified by the death of S. Peter and S. Paul As if our Saviours Death were nothing able to sanctifie Jerusalem as S. Peter's death was to sanctifie Rome though besides the Death of Christ Jerusalem hath this advantage that it is the first Church and the Mother of us all That you may a little discein the dealings of the Papists note here that Anacletus his first and second Epistles are cited by Bellarmine for good Records in the very same book where he confesseth them to be Counterfeits For though in one little passage they be confessed for the present satisfaction of a stiff Oppanent yet where men are minded to be corrupt they may serve
foolishly for in the beginning of the Book he hath a Preliminary Tract called An Annotation of Synods the Acts where of are contained in this book In which he giveth us this account in the Aquitan Council 18 Fathers made 24 Canons in that of Neocaesarea 16 Fathers made 14 Canons in that of Gangra 16 Fathers made 21 Canons in that of Sardica 60 Fathers made 21 Canons in that of Antioch 30 Fathers made 25 Canons in that of Laodicea 22 Fathers made 59 Canons in the Council of Car thage 217 Fathers made 33 Canons I had a long time coveted a sight of these Canons and finding them numbred in such an Annotation of Synods the Acts whereof are contained in this book I was much comforted with hope of seeing them But when I turned to the place I found them not Surely to slip out 33 Canons at a time made by more Fathers than were in all the other Councils put together is a lusty Deleatur There was never Deed of more importance imbezelled in the World The Nicene Council had 318 Fathers that made 20 Canons for what secret cause therefore he skippeth over the account which he ought especially to give of this is worth the enquiry He mentions it by the by and shuffles it off without an account perhaps because he was loath to say or unsay the story of 70 Canons in the Nicene Council However he dealeth fairly with us in this that having noted Aurelius to have been President in the sixth Council of Carthage he confesseth that S. Augustine Bishop of Hipyo is recorded to have been in that Council in the Reign of Honorius Ibid. Binius and all the Popish Compilers I could ever meet with before clipped off that Council in the midst without so much as signifying the number of its Canons I was glad I had a sight of their number here though I mist of themselves and was confident that however cruelly the Pope dealt with Aurelius Archbishop of Carthage S. Aug. Bishop of Hippo and other holy Fathers in cutting out their Tongues I should at last meet with them And the Learned Justellus with much honesty and honour has made us satisfaction We acknowledge some true Records among these Spurious Abominations but a little poyson spoileth the greatest Mess of the most wholesom Meat much more doth a Bundle of Forgeries that over-poyseth the true Records in size and number The method which he useth in the mixture of the Records and Forgeries is remarkable For beginning with the Counterfeit Epistles of Clement Anacletus c. he first seasoneth the Readers spirit with Artificial Charms and prepossesseth him with the high Authority of the Roman Patriarchs and after he has given him those strong Spells and Philtres composed of Roman Drugs permits him boldly to see some true Antiquities his eyes being dazled in the very Entry with Apparitions of Popes and such other Spectres Lest the Tincture should decay he reserves some of the Forgeries till afterwards that the true Records might be compassed in with an Enchanted Circle and the last Relish of Antiquity go off as strong as the first and be as successful as the prepossession Thus he cometh down with Forgeries to Melchiades and then he breaketh off the Decretal Epistles to make room for the Councils beginning with the Nicene under pretence of its Excellency and putting the Councils before it in time after it in order that he might get a fit occasion to introduce them here so running down in a disorderly manner from Ancyra to Neocaesarea Gangra Sardica Antioch Laodicea Constantinople Ephesus Chalcedon among the Greeks and then up again to the Latine Councils many of which preceded divers of the other as the first second third fourth fifth sixth Council of Carthage all which were before the Council of Constantinople Ephesus and Chalcedon From the seventh Council of Carthage he runneth down to the thirteenth Council of Toledo which happened long after Melchiades Silvester Pope Mark Liberius Felix c. were dead Then he cometh in the second part of his Work up again to Sylvester and so downwards with more Decretals that he might Husband his Forgeries well and not glut us with them altogether And remarkable it is also that he doth not give us the least syllable of notice of any Fraud among them Nay even Constantine's Donation set in the Front before the Nicene and in the midst between the first Order of Counterfeits and the Councils passeth with him silently and gravely for a true and sacred Instrument which is of all other the most impudent Imposture Let Baronius say what he will it was impossible to debauch all Antiquity and Learning with so much Labour and Art without some deep Counsel and Design What use Merlin puts all these things to and how much he was Approved in the Church of Rome you shall see in the next Chapter and how highly also he extolleth this Book ofF orgeries How plainly he fathereth it upon S. Isidore Bishop of Hispalis is manifest by the Coronis of the first Part where with it endeth Give thanks to industrious and learned men studious Reader that now thou hast at hand the Acts of the Councils as well as of the Popes which Isidore the Bishop of Hispalis collected into one Volume c. What shall we believe The first Edition of the Book it self or Baronius his Testimony Old Merlin fathers it upon Isidore before Baronius was born and all the World was made to believe the Bishop of Hispalis was the Author of it though now for shame and for a shift they fly to another Author Now if Isidore were dead before the Booke was made it must needs be a Cheat which as Merlin saith honest Francis Regnault the cunning Printer ended at Paris in the year of our Lord 1535 which unusual form of Concluding instead of allaying increaseth the suspicion CAP. VI. What use Merlin makes of Isidore and the Forgeries therein How much he was approved in the Church of Rome How some would have Isidore the Bishop to be a Merchant others a Sinner HOw false and fraudulent soever the Collection of Isidore be yet its Title is very Splendid and its Authority Sacred in the Church of Rome JAMES MERLIN'S COLLECTION OF THE Four General Councils The NICENE the CONSTANTINOPOLITAN the EPHESINE and the CHALCEDONIAN Which S. Gregory the Great does Worship and Reverence as the Four Gospels TOM I. Of 47 Provincial Councils also and the Decrees of 69 POPES From the APOSILES and their CANONS to ZACHARIAS ISIDORE being the Author ALSO The GOLDEN BULL of CHARLES IV. Emperour concerning the Election of the KING of the ROMANS PARIS At Francis Regnault 1535. All we shall observe upon this Title is this If Gregory the Great did Worship and Reverence the Four General Councils as the Four Gospels they were the more to blame that added 50 Canons to one of them and they much more that stain them all with the Neighbourhood and Mixture of such
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of a Greek Book 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into Latine by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 suite and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Latine out of an Arabick book brought to Alexandria by another man of the same Society I once thought a certain man had had the Book at Alexandria but now it seems a Jesuite brought it thither He does not tell you who nor from whence Jesuites are the Popes Janizaries and fit to be so imployed And the Vatican is an admirable Storehouse doubtless for the Greek too a very Pit of Witnesses for the Popes Supremacy As if Perkin Warbeck should have brought Evidences out of his own Closet to prove himself King of England If no body but he must be believed the veriest Cheat in the World must needs prevail Greek and Arabick are strange amusements else a Book out of the Vatican in its Masters own Cause or another man without a name that brought an Arabick Book to Alexandria with fourscore Canons of the Nicene Council in it would scarcely be regarded against the Evidence of the whole World especially in a matter so upheld by Forgeries Two things there are wherein he adventures to be a little cordial Licèt parcè timidè though seldom and with fear 1. Whereas Isidore and Merlin and Peter Crab and Surius c. have the Epistle of Melchiades without any Note of its dubiousness he 〈◊〉 it can be none of Melchiades because mention is made therein of the Nicene Council and of other things that were done after Melchiades Death 2. Whereas Binius lays a Dreadful Reproach upon Constantine the first most Excellent Christian Emperour as if after all his Glorious Acts done for the Church and State of Christendom he were an Apostate a Murderer a Tyrant a Perecutor a Parracide smitten with Leprosie for notorious Crimes for killing Licinius unjustly and his own Son Crispus And all that he might uphold the Counterfeit Donation Nicolinus begins the first Book of the Acts preceding the Nicene Council translated out of an Ancient Greek Book in the Vatican thus De Gestis post sublatum impium Licinium de Imperio Regis Constantini de Pace Ecclesiarum Dei Constantine when he had conquered his Enemies shewing himself an Emperour by the Wisdom given him of God took care to better the Affairs of the Christians day by day more and more And this he did several ways having a most flaming Faith and faithful Piety towards the God of all And the whole Church under Heaven lived in profound peace Now let us hear what Eusebius that most excellent Husbandman of the Churches Agriculture 〈◊〉 from the most Famous Pamphilus speaketh here In his tenth Book he saith What Licinius saw long ago to befall wicked Tyrants with his eyes he now suffered himself like to them and that deservedly for he would neither receive Discipline nor be admonished at any time to learn wisdom by the punishment of his Neighbors c. But Constantine the Conqueror being adorned with all kind of Piety together with his Son Crispus the Emporour beloved of God and in all things like his Father reduced all the East into his Power and brought the Empire of the Romans into one as it had been of old and obtained an Universal Kingdom from the rising of the Sun to the utmost borders of the West and to both the other Regions of the North and South in perfect peace Then the fear of Tyranny wherewith men were before oppressed was utterly taken away from the life of men then frequent Assemblies were held and Festivals kept then all things abounded with gladness and joy then they that were before of a dejected 〈◊〉 and sorrowful looked with a pleasant face and with joyful eyes then with Dances and Hymns throughout all Cities and Fields they proclaimed fast that God was truly God and the Highest King of all next they magnified the Emperour and his Children most dear unto God 〈◊〉 there was no remembrance of the former evils then all Impiety was forgotten then there was a sweet enjoyment of present goods and a joyful expectation of future Then 〈◊〉 not only the Decrees of the Emperour the most Illustrious Conquerour 〈◊〉 of Humanity and Clemency but his Laws also glorious in Magnificence and fraught with Tokens of true 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 published in all places So the 〈◊〉 Spot of all Tyranny being 〈◊〉 away and wholly blotted out Constantine alone and his Children thenceforth possessed the Helm of the Empire which by Right pertained to them it being made secure by his Authority and Government and freed from all envy and fear Hitherto Eusebius Pamphilus of all Ecclesiastical Writers most worthy of belief Thus their own Record in the Vatican justifieth Eusebius and thus Nicolinus produceth it who also defendeth Eusebius though himself holdeth the Donation of Constantine firm not discerning how that History overthroweth the same But Binius who saw the inconsistence better crys out of Eusebius for a Lyar a Flatterer an Arrian because he stands in his way Thus all of them here and there serve the Fathers For Eusebius lived in the time of Constantine himself and was Honourable in his eyes He was Bishop of Caesarea-Cappadocia and an individual Friend of Pamphilus the Martyr a Father in the Nicene Council and one of those that disputed there in person against Phaedo the Arrian As Binius also himself recordeth in the Disputation extant in his Tomes But of such Legends as this and the Tragical Story of Constantine we have more than good store in Popish Writers As you may see at large in Dr. Stillingfleet his Book of Popish Counterfeit Miracles CAP. XIII The Epistle of Pope Damasus to Aurelius Archbishop of Carthage commanding him to take care that the Decretals of the Roman Bishops be preached and published abroad Wherein the Forgeries of the Church of Rome are Fathered on the Holy Ghost DAmasus to his mest Reverend Brother and Fellow-Bishop Aurelius We have received the Epistle of your 〈◊〉 with due Veneration Wherein we understand how your Reverence and Prudence thirsteth as is fit for the Apostolical Decrees Concerning which Affair we have sent some of those which you desired and desire to send more when you shall send unto us Yet we have past by none of our Predecessors from the Death of Blessed 〈◊〉 Prince of the Apostles of whose Decrees we have not sent somewhat to you under our certain Seal by Ammonius the Priest and Falix the Deacon Which we both desire you to keep and command to be preached and published to others that they may inviolably be kept with due Veneration of all and inviolably observed and diligently reverenced by all future Ages Because the voluntary Breakers of the Canons are heavily censured by the H. Fathers and condemned by the H. Ghost by whose Gift and Inspiration they were dictated Because they do not unfitly seem to blaspheme the H. Ghost who being not compelled by any necessity but willingly as was before said either do
very next line he is at it again THE LIFE EPISTLES AND DECREES OF CLEMENT EX LIBRO PONTIFICALI DAMASI P. The Pontifical is afresh ascribed to Damasus For Friends may quarrel without falling out eternally But if they are so angry what make they together What have Scholars to do in so scandalous a Fellows Company Why of all Books in the World do they take this to follow All of them from Peter Crab to the Collectio Regia Why not the Grave Sincere and Learned Why not a true Record Why do they chuse a Counterfeit so full of lyes and contradictions It is the highest Symptom of a deadly cause that they take such a Fellow to be their Copy to write after their Text to gloss on their Guide to follow For all these gross mistakes are committed within the compass of some 30 or 40 lines in four Lives of one hundred and six And in every Life almost throughout they are exercised in the same manner If this be the best Record they can find for the purpose and all their Antiquities be like this they are as mouldy and rotten as can well be desired CAP. XVI Of the Decretal Epistles forged in the Names of the first holy Martyrs and Bishops of Rome The first was sent as they pretend from S Clement by S. Peter's order to S. James the Bishop of Jerusalem seven years after he was dead and by the best Account 27. S. Clement's Recognitions a corsessed Forgery TO stumble in the Threshold is Ominous If the first of all the Decretals be a Forgery it is a leading Card to the residue Binius his Title and the Text of the Pontifical is represented thus THE LIFE EPISTLES AND DECREES OF POPE CLEMENT I. Out of the Pontifical of Pope DAMASVS He made two Epistles that are called Canonical This man by the Precept of S. Peter undertook the Government of the Church as by Jesus Christ our Lord the Chair was committed to him In the Epistle which he wrote to S. James you shall find after what manner the Church was committed from S. Peter Linus and Cletus are therefore recorded to be before him because they were made Bishops by the Prince of the Apostles himself and ordained to the 〈◊〉 Office before him NOTES After the Method of Binius He made two Epistles called Canonical These words are adapted to the 84th Canon of the Apostles where two Epistles of Clement and his eight Books of Ordinations are made parts of the Canonical Scripture In the Epistle which he wrote to S. James Here the Pontifical openly voucheth his Epistle to S. James which Binius afterwards tells you was written to Simeon If the Pontifical be right Binius was overseen in saying the name of S. James crept by corruption into the Title of the Epistle for that of Simeon The Tales do not hang together They were made Bishops by the Prince of the Apostles c. You understand here that S. Peter out of his superabundant care for the Church made three Bishops of Rome in his own life time So that Rome had four Popes at once S. Peter S. Clement S. Linus and S. Cletus Some think that Linus and Cletus were S. Clement's Adjutants in External Affairs Some that they succeeded each other in order Some that they presided over the Church together Some say that Clement out of modesty refused the Chair till he was grown older belike It is a world to see what a variety and puzzle they are at in this matter The confusion springeth from two causes The first is the obscurity of the State of Rome in the beginning The second is the ignorance of the Forger that made S. Clement's Letter to S. James For happening so heedlesly to Father it on S. Clement he has made all the Story inconvenient S. Clement saith not one word of refusing the Chair in his Epistle nor of Linus and 〈◊〉 coming between him and it but 〈◊〉 a 〈◊〉 fair Hypocritical shew 〈◊〉 in his 〈◊〉 to S. James that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by S. Peter and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whereupon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will have this Epistle to be a good and true Record are forced of necessity to say that S. Peter did himself ordain Clement though they very well know that Linus and Cletus or Anacletus were both in their Order Bishops before him For a sure Token either that the Church of Rome was little considered in the dawning of the Gospel or that their ignorance marred her Officious Impostors nothing is more obscure and doubtful than the order and manner of her first Bishops The Pontifical undertakes to reconcile all and does it luckily were it not that it contradicts it self For he saith of Clement that he undertook the Government of the Church by the precept of Peter And yet of Linus and Cletus it saith they are recorded to be before him because by the Prince of the Apostles they were made Bishops before him Be that a contradiction or no it was neither Linus nor Cletus it seems but Clement who writ the Epistle to S. James about the death of Peter He made many books Binius upon those words observes that before his Epistles he wrote the Constitutions of the Apostles c. He did not make but write the Apostles Canous in Greek c. It is much he did not make them for the Coronis of them as Nicolinus calleth it hath by me Clement in it and for ought I know a Pope that hath the fulness of power Apostolical may make Apostles Canons at any time It is an odd observation He did not make but write the Apostles Canons Among his other Monuments saith Binius there are ten books of the circuits of Peter which by some are called The Itinerary of Clement by others his Recognitions Which since they are stuffed with Loathsome Fables and the Fathers abstained from the use of them as Gelasius also in a Roman Council rejected them for Apocryphal all wise men will advisedly abstain from reading them It is a Tradition that Clement left the Rite of offering Sacrifice to the Church of Rome in writing It is reported also that many pieces are falsly published under the Name of Clement Forgeries are you see thick and threefold in the Church of Rome but this of Clement's Itinerary which Binius disswadeth all men from reading even ten Books Cum insulsis fabulis reserti 〈◊〉 since they are stust with loathsome Fables I desire you to take special notice of because this Confession of his will discover him to be either a false man or a Fool. It is a delicate Snare and will detect S. Clement and S. Binius together As for Binius who defendeth the first Epistle of Clement to S. James for a good Record if he did read the Epistle and note what he read he was a false man for defending it against his Judgment and Conscience He that so mortally hated the Itinerary of Clement could not but know the Epistle to be Forged if he read it with
Where you have the Testimony of an Angel concerning the Celebration of Easter cited by no body while the matter was in 〈◊〉 HIginus sate saith the Pontifical four years three moneths and four days Binius faith He sate four years except two days counterfeiting as much exactness as the other If we should follow him in his Consuls saith he we should make Higinus sit twelve years But the Pontifical is guilty of a more arrogant and ambitious errour The Hierarchy of the Church it saith was made by Higinus to wit the Order wherein Presbyters were inferiour to Bishops Deacons to Presbyters the people to Deacons Binius mendeth it as well as he is able interpreting it only of a Reformation of Collapsed Discipline But it 〈◊〉 so exactly with the distinction before made in S. Clement's second Epistle who will have the Priesthood divided into the Order of Presbyter Deacon and Minister that the design seemeth deeper than so He doth not say the Hierarchy of the Church was corrected but made by Hyginus which strikes at the Root of Episcopacy as if it were not of Divine but Humane Institution and being made by the Pope alone depended only on the Popes pleasure Binius is not able to name the time wherein the Discipline of the Church was in this respect corrupted so as to need the Reformation pretended Next after Hyginus the Pontifical bringeth in Pius an Italian the Brother of a Shepherd He sate nineteen years four moneths and three days in the times of Antoninus Pius Hermes his own Brother wrote a book in which a Commandment was contained given him by an Angel of the Lord coming to him in the Habit of a Shepherd that Easter should be observed on the Lords Day This man ordained that an Heretick coming from among the Jews should be baptized c This Hermes saith Binius in his Notes on the place is the same whom S. Paul mentioneth in his Epistle to the Romans Salute Asyncritus Phlegon Hermas Patrobus Hermes c. He was at Mans Estate when S. Paul saluted him and a very old man sure for a Writer of Books in the time of Pius Binius is not willing to have him so obscure as a Shepherd but faith He was called Pastor either because he was of the Family of Junius Pastor who in the third year of Aurelian was Consul or more probably because the Angel appeared to him in the form of a Shepherd In this his Guess he is upon the brink of rejecting the Pontifical Howbeit he quits it not of a Lye for instead of nineteen years which the Pontifical giveth him Binius faith he sate but nine years A small mistake in this Learned Pontifical Concerning the Book which Hermes the Shepherd wrote he saith It was almost unknown among the Latines but very famous among the Greeks Which was very strange considering he was the Popes Brother A Book made by so eminent a person and so near home unknown among the Latines But his meaning is perhaps it was better known than trusted For a little after he saith The Latines esteemed it Apocryphal as Tertullian Athanasius and Prosper witness and as Gelasius decreed Can. Sanct. Dift 15. Now because their unmannerliness doth refiect a little upon the Pope himself who in his Decretal Epistle annexed owns his Brother with an Honourable mention of the Angelical Vision Binius to display more Learning on the behalf of the Pontifical and Pius his Decretal tells you that the Book of the true Hermes Pastor praised so much by Tertullian Origen Athanasius Eusebius Jerome c. is not now Extant Which is evident he saith because in that we now have there is no Mention at all of Easter Nay the Author of it saith he was admonished to deliver it to Clement the Pope by whom it was to be sent to forreign Cities They have as good Luck at Rome as if they held Intelligence with Purgatorie The Dead and they have as intimate a Correspondence as if the Pope knew the Way to send his Bulls thither Here is another Forgerie detected by its Dedication to S. Clement who by no unusual Providence is served just in his own kind for he disturbed S. James and another disturbes him in his Crave Yet Binius is very much inclined to this Opinion for from hence he gathereth it was longè ante haec Tempora Scriptus a Book written long before the time of Pius As no doubt it must if it be not the same that was praised by Tertullian Origen Athanasius c. For all Forgeries must be old and True or they are not worth a farthing But how comes Tertullian and Athanasius c. to esteem it Apocryphal and yet to praise it so much in the same 〈◊〉 It is Binius his Breath not theirs They poor men are made like Stage players to say whatsoever the Poet listeth Or else as Binius observes there were two Books of Hermes though it be double dealing thus to have two of a Sort the one right and the other Apocryphal But then Gelasius did very ill there being two of a Sort to condemn the one and not tell us of the other And so did Ivo For this Pastor is one of the Catalogue we told you of in the Beginning But Binius has a fetch beyond this He teaches you a way how to take both these persons for the same man and what you may say in defence of your self if you so do However saith he if any one be disposed to take them for the same Author Ex Sententiâ Illustriss Card. Barona dicendum est c. He must necessarily say as Baronius gives his Opinion that they were two commentaries written at divers times where of the first was more famous among the Greeks the later more obscure among the Latines A brave Antithesis So that upon the point the Latines had none The more obscure among the Latines was obscure every where the more famous among the Greeks and the more obscure among the Latines The Antathesis makes a shew of giving you some Solid matter but when you grasp it in your hand it turnes to Air. Unless perhaps you will learn thereby that the more obscure among the Latines was a Book made in an instant by a meer Conjecture and a pretty Mockery to gull the Reader as a shadow at least of some proof that the Pontifical and the Decretals are not Lyars Among other Things their Allowances are considerable for they are good honest reasonable men and will let you think what you will of the Book so you consent to the main and believe the Popes Supremacy And next that their Art of Instruction is to be weighed Whether it be true or no no matter If the Disciple can but defend himself by a Distinction and escape the Conviction of an Absurdity it is enough Bellarmine is at such Dicendums often Though 't is a Secret among themselves they teach their Disciples What to say not What is True But I thought
believed it hath hitherto been received and without all Controversy maintained in the Ancient Martyrologies and Breviaries both of the Roman and other Churches Baron In Append. Tom. 10. Ad hunc Annum Note here that as Surius and Binius and Baronius so even the Roman Church hath it self received this Council into her purest Records her Sacred Martyrologies and mass-Mass-books or Breviaries Which is a reason above all other reasons compelling Binius and his fellowes Baronius Labbe and the Collectio Regia to embrace this Council For it cannot be rejected without Prejudice to the Authority of the Roman Chair Which as it clears the Donatists from the pretended imputation discovers plainly who are the true Authors of this Council For though it be more than probable that some pitiful barren Head void of all Sence and Learning did at first compose it out of the affection he had to the See of Rome Yet as in Treason all are Principals so here the Receiver is as bad as the Thief The Roman Church by aiding and abetting this Abomination hath made it her own Be it forged in what empty Shop it will she hath magnified it to the Stars by fixing it in her Martyrologies The Chair is defiled with the Forgery it hath adopted and the Pope hath made it as much his as if it had been the Issue of his own Brain Being therefore it cannot now be deserted without discovering the shameful secrets of the Roman Church Binius like a good Son endeavours to maintain it but with such ill success that he shames her more by miscarrying in the enterprize First he saith Exceeding many among the most learned of men have endeavoured to prove those Acts to be spurious By these most learned of Men he means the Papists not the Protestants So that exceeding many of the most learned Papists have rejected that Council lest the Chair should be too much disgraced with the reproach of Marcellinus 2. He saith They have endeavoured to prove these Acts to be spurions truly by strong Arguments He confesseth the Arguments to be strong against it And here he varies a little from himself for besides the Persecution of Decius there are Arguments and strong ones to against this Council which he before concealed Nor do the English Innovators only but the Papists also and the most learned among them write against it What Arguments then doth Binius bring to defend it His Opinion Antiquity General Consent and all resolved into the Roman Martyrology As for the first his Nevertheless I conceive will not do against strong Arguments Antiquity which is the second stands upon other mens Legs and speaks by other mens Mouths She may be painted like a Woman but is of neither Sex And though Binius would perswade us that She fighteth in person very sharply for the Council you can see nothing but her Name and his Talk of her Majesty She wanted the tongue of the Learned and is a dumb Champion His General Consent is disturbed by those exceeding many most Learned men of which he had 〈◊〉 before that endeavonred to prove these Acts to be spurious They come out of their Graves with strong Arguments to disorder the common Assent of all by which it is beleived to defile the Majesty of Antiquity by which it is asserted and to reprove Binius for a Lyar who faith that it hath hitherto been received and without all Controversie maintained Nor is he a Lyar onely but contradicteth himself and foolishly bewrayeth his design while he shufles and cuts upon all occasions But perhaps you will say his meaning is It is without all Controversie maintained in the Roman Martyrologies and Breviaries That reserve be keeps for a 〈◊〉 then but it will not do He might say it was put in without all controversie because the Roman Martyrologies and Breviaries were works of Darkness made in Secret by the Popes Authority But is it maintained without all controversie when exceeding many of the most Learned Men endeavour to prove its Acts to be Spurious by strong Arguments Does veneralle Antiquity it self fight sharply for them compelling a Beverence from the unwilling by its Majesty or is it by the common Assent of all believed when exceeding many endeavour to refute it As for the Roman Martyrologies it is no wonder it should lie quiet in then None were by but the Actors only when the Council was put in and if by dissembling the fraud it be maintained there it is no great business But there it is and that is sufficient For my part I could not have believed that Binius or any other Sober man could ever reckon such 〈◊〉 piece of Barbarism for a Council 〈◊〉 I not seen it with my own eyes in the Author It is so much against all reason that a thing so absurd should be owned to the disgrace of all Martyrs Synods and Councils And were it not for the 〈◊〉 of the wonder the Roman Martyrologies whose credit must be saved it would be my lasting amazement Binius is so stiffe in defending this Council that in the next words he chargeth ignorance on S. Augustine for not understanding it Love and Hunger will eat through stone walls His Zeal for the Church of Rome and its Direful necessity makes him to defend this Council in the Roman Martyrologies against an apparent falsehood in the bottom of it against very many most learned men against all the barbarous intollerable Nonsence and Tautologies therein against the Killing Circumstance that there was no such City or Crypta at least in the World as well as against the Impossibility of calling it on his own Principles Besides all which the vanity of its Design and the Absurdity of its meeting on such an occasion is sufficient to detect it The Lye in the bottom of it is in those Words Cum 〈◊〉 in Bello Persarum This Council was convened as the Title sheweth when Dioclesian was in his War with the Persians Upon these words Binius saith Haec 〈◊〉 emendentur falsa sunt c. These Words be false unless they be mended for since Eusebius and divers others witness that Dioclesian in this 20. Years of his Reign devested himself of the Empire and which is more two years before triumphed at Rome with his Collegue Maximianus for having conquered the Persians how I pray you could 〈◊〉 this year be going forth with his Army against the Persians This is one reason more for which the Writers of Magdenburg and the English Innovators as he is pleased to stile them reject that Council Another is contained in Binius his Notes on the word Sinuessa num So called from the City Sinuessa in a certain Crypta whereof called Cleopatrensis they came together secretly to shun the Sword of the raging Gentiles For whereas men doubt whether any such City was ever in the World he proceedeth to tell us that it is not to be admired at al that there is no mention made either of this City or
the Imperial Seat which the Roman Princes had possest and granted it to the profit of the blessed Peter and his Bishops Which considering what follows is far more fit to be understood of the Emperours leaving Rome and granting it to the Bishop whence they pretend he did go on purpose So that the agreement between Optatus Milevitanus and the Epistle of Melchiades is very small or none at all But admit that Melchiades and Optatus Milevitanus had said both of them that the Lateran was given to Melchiades what is that to the Dominion and Temporal Kingdom A single House instead of an Empire Though that the House was given Optatus Milevitanus doth not affirm even by Binius his own confession How the things in this Epistle should be concerning the Donation of Constantine to Melchiades and Sylvester is difficult to conceive because Melchiades was dead before the Donation was made to Sylvesier It is very unlikely therefore that Melchiades should make mention of that Donation His Epistle talking of Constantine his being President in the H. Synod that was called at Nice is a manifest Imposture Melchiades being dead before the Nicene Council as is before observed Yet hence it is proved that Constantine 〈◊〉 a Donation to Melchiades and Sylvester Binius holdeth fast the Donation though he lets go the Epistle Like a Lo gician who lets go the premises but keeps the conclusion For it is most firmly proved by Optatus Milevitanus What is proved by him That Constantine the Great gave the Lateran to Melchiades How is it proved Why he testifieth that a Council of 19 Bishops met in Fausta's house in the Lateran Truly he doth not expresly write that the house was given to Melchiades But it seemeth probable to Binius his imagination And so it is most firmly proved by Optatus Milevitanus a most approved Writer Thus those things that are told concerning the Dominion and Temporal Kingdom given to the See of Rome are manifestly enough proved to be likely by what we said in our Notes upon the former Epistle But it is better proved by the continual possession of those houses by the space of thirteen Ages until now as he afterwards observeth Though the length of an unjust Tenure increaseth the Transgression Having first proved the Donation he proceedeth thus Hoc Edictum à Graecis persidâ Donatione quâ juxta illud Virg. 2. Aeneid Timeo Danaos Dona ferentes donare solent acceptum mutilum esse ac dolosè depravatum hae rationes evidenter demonstrant These following reasons evidently shew this Edict of Constantine by the persidious Donation of the Greeks to be maimed and treacherously depraved He enters upon the business gently pretending at first as if the Donation were true that it was depraved by the Greeks But afterwards when he is a little warm in the Argument and somewhat further off from his Sophistical Defences he falls foul upon it as a Counterfeit and rejects it altogether as in the close will appear to the considerate Reader But here let us see what Arguments he produceth to prove it maimed and treacherously depraved 1. Because it pretendeth the Primacy of the Church to be granted by a Lay-man which was immediately given to Peter by God himself and by our Lord Jesus Christ as is manifest by those words Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church 2. The Emperour by this Edict is made to give a Patriarchal Dignity to the Church of Constantinople Which if it be true how then could Anatolius the Bishop of Constantinople be said to take the Patriarchal Dignity to himself long after even after the Council of Chalcedon was ended Leo Gelasius and other Roman Bishops resisting him How could the Church of Constantinople be a Patriarchal See at this time wherein even the name of Constantinople was not yet given to Byzantium 3. This Edict was first published by Theodorus Balsamon out of the Acts of Sylvester the Pope falsly written in Greek under the name of Eusebius Bishop of Caesarea not that he might do any service to the Church of Rome but that he might shew the Patriarchate of Constantinople to be the eldest Which Acts of Sylvester were not known till a thousand years after Christ coming then forth in Eusebius his name out of a certain Book of Martyrs but were now increased by the Addition of this Edict of Constantine His design is if it be possible to clear the Church of Rome of this too palpable and notorious Counterfeit And for that end he would fain cast it on the Treacherous Greeks that he might thereby acquit the more Treacherous Romans Which he further pursues in the clause following The new found Hereticks that oppose this Edict of Constantine translated out of Greek into Latine with such great endeavour and impertinent study let them know that in this they rather further our Cause than fight against us Who do our selves with Irenaeus Cyprian and other Holy Fathers as well Greek as Latine profess the Priviledges of the Church of Rome not to be conferred and given of men but from Christ to Peter and from Peter to his Successors Where the 〈◊〉 are so great we need not make a Remark on the common Cheat his vain Brag of the Fathers But this we may observe that whereas the Popes Claim is somewhat blind to the Prerogative which is pretended to be given to S. Peter Binius hints at a proper Expedient to make it clear For suppose our Saviour made S. Peter the Rock on which he built his Church How comes the Pope to be that Rock Since S. Peter being an Apostle immediately inspired and able to pen Canonical Scripture some of his Prerogatives were Personal and died with him He tells you that the Priviledge was granted from Christ to Peter and from Peter to his Successors So that it was not Christ but Peter that gave it to the Bishops of Rome Now it would extremely puzzle him to shew where Peter gave that power to the Bishops of Rome in what place at what time by what Act before what Witnesses All he can produce is S. Clement's counterfeit Letter and that miscarries But in opposing the Edict of Constantine the Protestants further their Cause rather than fight against them Is not this a bold Aslertion Their Popes have laid Claim to the whole Empire of the Western World even by this very Edict or Donation of Constantine And yet the Protestants did nothing when they proved it to be a Forgery This Donation is an old Evidence proving the Divine Right of Peter's Primacy and the Popes Supremacy Did they promote their Cause that proved it to be a Cheat Certainly they that have Fingers so long as to grasp at an Empire and Foreheads so hard as to claim it by Frauds will stick at nothing they can conceive for their advantage Is it impertinent to discover Knavery in the Holy Roman Catholick Church or Imposture in the Infallible
Zozimus and Boniface About 100 years after Eulabius sate in the Chair at Alexandria some call him Eulalius Between him and Boniface 2. there are two Epistles extant out of which it is gathered that after the sixth Council of Carthage the African Churches were Excommunicated by the Roman for 100 years and reconciled at last upon the Submission of Eulalius Archbishop of Carthage accursing S. Augustine and his own Predecessors Concerning these two Epistles Cardinal Bellarmine giveth his Opinion thus Valdè mihieas Epistolas esse suspectas c. I have a mighty suspition of these Epistles For first they seem to be repugnant to those things which we have spoken concerning the Union of S. Augustine Eugenius Fulgentius and other Africans with the Roman Church And again either there was no Eulabius of Alexandria to whom Boniface seemeth to write or at least there was none at that time as is evident out of the Chronology of Nicephorus of Constantinople Besides Boniface intimates in his Epistle that he wrote at the Commandment of Justinus the Emperour But Justinus was dead before Boniface began to sit as is manifest out of all Histories Moreover the Epistle which is ascribed to Boniface consists all of it almost of two fragments of which the one is taken out of the Epistle of Pope Hormisda to John the other out of the Epistle of S. Gregory to the Bishops of France even the 52 Epistle of his fourth Book Now S. Gregory was not born at that time nor is it credible that Gregory took those words out of Boniface since the Stile is altogether Gregorian In the Epistle also which is Fathered upon Eulabius the Carthaginian there is a Sentence of S. Gregories inserted out of the 36 Epistle of his fourth Book and the rest of that Epistle is nothing but a sragment of au Epistle of John the Bishop of Constantinople to Pope Hormisda Notwithstanding all these reasons Bellarmine is afraid to damn the Epistles but Cardinal Baronius is a little more bold He judges it inconvenient for the Church of Rome that any such Forgeries were ever made And upon the occasion of these two Epistles utterly disgraces Isidore Mercator for a meer Impostor Whether in so doing he salves the Sores of the Roman Church that hath been guilty of vending them the experience of Ages yet to come will hereafter evidence In the mean time let us fee what he saith In Not. Martyrol ad 16. Octobr. he layeth down these words Scias falsam adulterinam Epistolam illam quae fertur nomine Bonifacii 2. c. Know that the Epistle which is carried abroad in the name of Boniface 2. to Eulalius Bishop of Alexandria which is extant and published in the second 〈◊〉 of the Councils of the latter Edition is false and adulterate And speaking concerning the Schism Excommunication and Re-union of the African Churches he saith Sihaec vera sunt c. If these things are true certainly then all the Martyrs and Confessors which were at that very time crowned with Martyrdom in the African Church or otherwise waxed famous by the Merits of their Eminent Sanctity must be blotted out of the List of Saints which THE HOYL ROMAN CHURCH it self hath in its Martyrology numbred among the Martyrs or reckoned among the Confessors Since it is most manifest by a thousand Sentences of Cyprian Augustine and all the Fathers that out of the Church there can be no Martyrdom nor any kind of Sanctity If Lyes were always consistent Truth would be amazed God doth infatuate the Counsels of his Enemies and turn their Wisdom into Foolishness They run into inconveniences sometimes so great that they cannot be remedied Could a Lye shun all inconvenience and see to its Interest on every side it would be as wife and perfect as Truth itself Quin amplius ex Collegis Aurelii c. But yet further among other Companions of Aurelius the most holy Father S. Augustine the most glorious Beam of the Catholick Church was accused in that Epistle Who being clouded with the same 〈◊〉 of Schism must if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be true be blotted out of the Class of the Doctors of Holy Church out of the number of Saints nay out of the Martyrology nor only so but out of the Kalender of the HOLY ROMAN CHURCH For it is most certain that after the aforesaid Aurelius he departed this life within the space of the time before-mentioned What should I reckon the Fulgentiuses the Eugeniuses and others almost innumerable men most Famous for Holiness and Learning to be accounted in the same condition It is a common Artifice in the Church of Rome to propagate these Forgeries as far as they are able by them to possess the minds of men with great apprehensions of the Popes high and Infallible Power and if at at any time they are detected to cast the blame on private persons while the Church is free they pretend from such Abominations I desire you to note therefore that the HOLY ROMAN CHURCH it self is the Author of Her Martyrologies and Kalendars and that the HOLY ROMAN CHURCH her self hath Canonized her Saints and made Holy-days and put them into her Breviaries And it was this very HOLY ROMAN CHUCH that put the counterfeit Council of Sinuessa into her Martyrologies the Lying Legend of Sylvester into the Roman Breviary Authorized by three Popes and the Council of Trent and her counterfeit Decretals among her Laws in all her Consistories and Ecclesiastical Courts of Highest Judicature So that if Baronius do not 〈◊〉 the ROMAN CHURCH is liable to the Charge of these Bastard-Antiquities For which cause he might well break out into that angry 〈◊〉 Eccè in quod Diserimen Vnus isidorus Mercator illarum Epistolarum Collector res nostras adduxit ut ex 〈◊〉 parte periclitari videatur Ecclesia c. Behold into what peril one Isidore Mercator the Collector of those Epistles hath brought out Affairs So that the CHURCH seemeth on that side to be endangered if we shall say those things which he hath collected or rather 〈◊〉 be 〈◊〉 and certain If the Roman Church be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 in Baronius his judgment 〈◊〉 is utterly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Importance did he only 〈◊〉 the things to be feigned rather than 〈◊〉 which their great 〈◊〉 of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Isidore their first Author But his acknowledgment of the hazard which the Roman Church runneth is more For they have so many Subterfuges about the Roman Church that it is more difficult to find it than to vanquish it It was not the Pope in a formal Council that Excommunicated the Church of Africa or that put her Saints first into the Roman 〈◊〉 yet it was the 〈◊〉 Roman Church And indeed if the Holy Roman Church and her Authority be not to be found in her Mass books and Breviaries her Courts and Consistories her Laws and 〈◊〉 her Martyrologies and Kalenders her Popes and Doctors I know not where to meet
room In his Letter to Paul V. he layeth all his Labours at the Popes Feet So that we are like to have good on 't when the Malefactor accused is made sole Lord and Judge of the Witnesses He hath several Prefaces to the Reader and to Persons of the Highest Rank and Splendour in which he pretends to magnifie the Decrees and Canons following as good Records He prefixeth Isidore's Counterfeit Preface before his Collection Over the Canons of the Apostles in a Splendid manner he sets this Title THE CANONS OF THE HOLY APOSTLES WITH ALL VENERATION TO BE FOLLOWED According to The Ancient Edition OF DIONYSIVS EXIGVVS A man would think now there should no more Canons be laid down than Dionysius Exiguus hath in his Ancient Edition But as if he intended to bear the Mark of the Beast in his Forehead he puts under this Title eighty four Canons of the Apostles whereas Dionysius hath but 50. Certainly 't is not well done so to Cheat his Reader with a Lye but in some blind Corner or other he will make us satisfaction Over against this he puts a Note in the Margin thus Francis Turrian of the Society of Jesus hath published a very clear Book in Defence of the Apostles Canons He approveth the Book yet rejecteth two of the Canons which Turrian defendeth but that is concealed till afterwards It is his custom in the top of his Pages Chapters and Margins eminent and conspicuous places to put Notes or Titles defending those Counterfeit Antiquities which in some little Gloss hidden in the Text he really slighteth For the Potentates of the World with their Lords and Councellors not having time enough to search into the bottom may by such means as these neatly be deceived while they think no man so impudent as in the same Leaf to contradict his pretences So that the very greatness of the Crime is their greatest security Another Artifice like this is that of putting the Preface of Dionysius Exiguus before these Tomes of his own the better to countenance the ensuing Frauds Though Dionysius were dead 1000 years before he wrote them and never intended nor thought of the greater part of them But Lyars are intangled always in the 〈◊〉 what is convenient in one respect being inconvenient in another For in that his Preface Dionysius speaking for himself saith only this In the beginning we have placed those Canons which are said to be the Apostles translated out of Greek which because the most do not easily acknowledge I thought meet to acquaint your Holiness with the same He doubts them all you see yet speaketh only of his own fifty which he hath in the Code which himself digested He does not meddle with those that make up the number of 84. no more than Isidere and 〈◊〉 do 〈◊〉 Binius when he 〈◊〉 to his Notes upon the word Canones 〈◊〉 stolorum speaketh thus after his large Copy in three Columns of all the 84. These Canons made by the 〈◊〉 of the 〈◊〉 and by Tradition from them delivered to us Clement of Rome S. Peter's Disciple wrote in Greek and Dionysius Exiguus an Abbot of Rome translated them into Latine in the time of Justinus the Emperour He does not prove that Clement wrote them unless by the last 〈◊〉 which hath Per me Clementem 〈◊〉 nor by that neither for that he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Forgery Dionysius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 before Binius does not say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 wrote them but rather the contrary He suspects them all and knows Clement could not write them all since himself has but fifty and those only by Rumour not Tradition Nay Einius himself you will see presently rejected some and yet here he pretendeth the whole number to be written both by Clement in Greek and by Dionysius in Latine For of all his Catalogue he faith These Canons c. Clement of Rome S. Peter's Disciple wrote in Greek and Dionysius 〈◊〉 an Abbot in Rome translated them into Latine as if it were not sufficient to write a Lye in the Front unless he closed up the Canons with a Lye in the Tail It would be worth the Enquiry to know where they had the 34. which were unknown to the Ancient Dionysius For after all this he seems to reject them in the passage following Horum quinquaginta priores c. saith he Only the first fifty of these the last of which is of dipping thrice in Baptism containing nothing but sound Apostolical Doctrine and approved by Ancient Bishops Councils and Fathers are received as Authentick Cap. 3. Dist. 16. And according to that common Rule of the Holy Fathers because the Author of them is unknown they are rightly believed to flow unto us by Apostolical Tradition The residue by Pope Gelasius Can. Sanct. Dist. 15. are accounted Apocryphal both because their Author is unknown as also because by the 65 and the last Canon it is evident that some of them are craftily put in by the Grecians and some of them corrupted by Hereticks This passage deserves one or two remarkable Observations 1. If the Tradition of the Apostles though committed to writing be capable of corruption what security can we have of Oral Tradition which is far more loose and liable to danger 2. If the Church of Rome were unable to secure the Apostles Canons from the Leven of the Grecians and other Hereticks or so careless as not to keep one Copy or Record sincere what assurance can we have of her care and ability in the residue This shews the weakness of these inconvenient Shifts and pitiful 〈◊〉 But the reason why some are received as Authentick and others accounted 〈◊〉 is most fit to be marked The reason why it is highly to be presumed that the first 50 Canons should be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Because the Author of them is unknown And the reason why the residue are rejected is Because the Author of them is unknown So that the same reason as Fire hardens Clay and 〈◊〉 Wax will prove contrary things And by reasoning in such a Latitude it will be easie to prove the Sun black and the Sky a Molehill Howbeit for these reasons Gelasius an Ancient Pope rejecteth some of them But Binius takes the liberty to put his judgment in the other end of the Scale and outfacing us with a Counterfeit Clement and Pretended Dionysius will have all but two to be Authentick Canons All but two namely the 65. and the last Canon by which it is evident that some of them are crastily put in by the Grecians and some of them corrupted by Hereticks Some of them put in by the Grecians must at least be two and some of them corrupted by Hereticks must at least be two more yet they are all of them except two Authentick Let his reason be what it will we observe 1. That the Church of Rome is in a tottering condition when a poor Canon of Collein shall take upon him to refel the Sentence of an 〈◊〉 Pope and fourseore Bishops for
so many did 〈◊〉 use in 〈◊〉 the Apocryphal from Cennine Books and this Sentence was Desinitive by a Pope in his Council So that 2. A Pope in his Council is not 〈◊〉 3. If Einius be right Gelasius and fourscore Bishops did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in condemning the Code 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Canons which S. Clement wrote from the mouth of the Apostles 4. The Church of Rome is divided the New and the Old Church of Rome are against each other The New is all for Additions and the very Apostles Canons allowed in Gelasius his time which was 1260 years ago are not sufficient unless more be added But let us now consider Binius his reasons Quia tamen ex his posterioribus ferè omnes praeter praedictos duos c. But because all these latter almost besides the two forementioned are either by the Authority of the Roman Bishops or by the Decrees of other Councils or by the Sentences of some Fathers confirmed and approved as is manifest by these our Marginals and Annotations So that it may not lightly or rashly he doubted whether they were taken hence by the Bishops Councils and Fathers or rather translated hither and put here out of their Writings Hereupon they may and ought rightly and deservedly all except the two excepted to be taken for Authentick How perplexed his discourse is I suppose you see His courage fails in the midst and it becomes thereupon so rough and difficult that it is scarce intelligible The occasion of its Incoherence is that Parenthesis thrust into the middle For Binius foreseeing a strong Obiection to the Discourse he was going to make claps it Sophistically into the midst of his Argument hoping thereupon that it would never more be retorted upon him Which you may easily see both by the Nature of his Argument and by the resolution of his words For his Argument is this which if you lay aside the Answer to it runs smoothly Almost all these latter Canons besides the two forementioned are either by the Authority of Roman Bishops or the Decrees of other Councils or the Sentences of some Fathers confirmed and approved hereupon they may and ought rightly and deservedly all except the two excepted to be taken for Authentick Now the Answer is the Parenthesis in the midst Certain Sentences like to these Canons are in the Fathers writings but so contained there that it may not lightly or rashly be doubted whether they were taken hence by the Bishops Councils and Fathers or rather translated hither and put here out of their Writings To doubt a thing rashly is nonsense but it may justly be feared that these Canons are Sentences pickt out of other Books and packt into a Body bearing the name of the Apostles Canons His Conscience did convict him and he replieth not a word though it be an important consideration in the case But there is a worse fault in his Logick he argues from Particulars to Vniversals for having said Fere omnes praeter praedictos duos he comes to conclude Omnes praeter praedictos duos Almost all except two are approved therefore all except two are Authentick Such Tricks as these he hath often And sometimes affects an obscure kind of speaking on purpose to blind the Reader especially when he is intangled with some difficult Argument He then Clouds himself like the Cuttle in his own Ink that he might vomit up the Hook in the dark and scape away He might have produced a General Council if he pleased to confirm all the 84 Canons and that under the Name of the Apostles too which had been more to the purpose but then he must have confessed the last Canon of Clement to be true and consequently that his eight Books of Constitutions and his two Epistles are part of the Bible or else that the Decree of the Council confirming these was Spurious or else of necessity that the Pope and Council did err But he had more kindness for the Pope than so and therefore perhaps let the Council alone He would inure you by his words to believe that Popes are equal to Councils Because they are saith he either by the Authority of Roman Bishops or other Councils or some Fathers confirmed they may and ought to be taken for Authentick Some Fathers is a dwindling expression He very well knows that 217 were rejected together in the sixth Council of Carthage Roman Bishops and other Councils are words of some weight But what can other Councils do if the Roman Bishops please to reject them The Roman Bishops and other Councils are so put in contradistinction that the Authority of Roman Bishops is set before that of other Councils And perhaps the proportion being observed the Roman Bishops must be thought as far above other Councils as other Councils above some Fathers In other places they affirm a Pope with his Council to be Infallible Here that the Roman Bishop is a Council Otherwise it is nonsense to say The Roman Bishops or other Councils The Roman Bishop hath a Council in himself And indeed it is requisite that he of all other should be the greatest Council when standing alone he is to judge of a Council and to determine even whether an 〈◊〉 Council shall be approved or disapproved This is a Tast of Binius an Elephants Clee a Scrap of five large Volumes full of the same integrity and perverseness The swelling words which they talk of approved and disapproved Councils are all to be understood of Councils approved or disapproved by the Roman Bishop From his Canons we proceed to his Council for Binius hath a Council of Apostles too on a Prodigious Theme the setting up of Images It is but a short one and hath but one Canon and that is the eighth It is set forth in this form ANTIOCHENA SYNODUS 〈◊〉 Canon 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Salvati ob Idola sed pingant 〈◊〉 Opposite Divinam Humanamque manufactam 〈◊〉 Effigiem Dei veri ac Salvatoris nosire Jesu Christi ipsiusque Servorum contra Idola 〈◊〉 Neque errent in Idolis neque similes siant Judaeis This is all and sure it is old for the Latine is very bare If you construe it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thus but hath no Greek Copy A COUNCIL of the APOSTLES at ANTIOCH Canon 3. Let not the Saved be deceived for Idols but let them paint on the Opposite the Divine and Humane unmingled Image of the true God and of our Saviour Jesus Christ made with hands and of his Servants Neither let them err in Idols nor be made like the Jews The first Authority he hath to prove it is the 2 Nicene Council 800 years almost after the Apostles And he collecteth it thence by a blind conjecture not by any evident Assertion of theirs Besides this he citeth one Pamphilus who testifieth that he found it in Origen's Study as Turrian saith against the Writers of Magdenburg So that all this resteth upon Turrian an impudent Corrupter as the World hath any Where we first observe that Origen