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book_n	church_n	scripture_n	word_n	7,766	5	4.4516	3	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A33486	The converted capuchin, or, The recantation of Father Basil after he had continued nigh forty yeares a fryer of that order and perswaded many Protestants to the Romish-beliefe : with his answers to those reports framed against him since he left his convent at Roüen to be one of the reformed church at Sedan / English according to the French copy.; Declaration du sieur François Clouet, cy-devant appelé Père Basile de Rouen, où il déduit les raisons qu'il a eues de se séparer de l'Eglise romaine. English	Basile, de Rouen, d. 1648?	1641 (1641)	Wing C4738; ESTC R23037	16,013	23

THE CONVERTED CAPUCHIN OR The Recantation of Father BASIL After he had continued nigh forty yeares a Fryer of that Order and perswaded many Protestants to the Romish-Beliefe With his Answers to those Reports framed against him since he left his Covent at ROÜEN to be one of the Reformed Church at SEDAN Englished according to the French Copy LONDON Printed by E. G. and are to be sold by Richard Harper at the Signe of the Harpe in Smithfield 1641. BEhold here a true Convert an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile no Spalata to change a petty Bishoprick for a better Deanry and lose that too to turne againe in hopes of a Cardinals Hat by the allowance of the Pope his Schoole-fellow Here is one of Gods little Ones whom no ambition or earthly preferment spurres forward but a holy ayme at the Kingdome of Heaven who having forsaken a certaine being unites himselfe with a Church upon whose charity depends his whole reliefe with a Church which admits no Priority in the Ministry and therefore could have no expectances of Ecclesiasticall promotions In his old Age after he had passed nigh forty yeares in the Capuchin Order where were novices enough to have travelled for his maintenance and have kept him warme in his Covent He was the Popes Missionary whose faculties by vertue thereof were severall and notable as hereafter are expressed And as his eminency for them besides his golden tongue which graced his Sermons to the admiration of his auditors made his revolt from them the more considerable So hath he gotten store of contumelious reports from them who in him have lost the glory of their Order and their Chaire and the best benefactor to their Edifices his perswasions prevailing more upon the devotions of the auditors then all the rest he left behinde him But let their Aspersions be as many as malicious The Church of England is well acquainted with the nature of Popish flamme● as in that of our sometimes reverend Bishop King and others neither will our Fryer beg any helpe in his vindication nor doubts but by what followes to give his Reader satisfaction Some way may be given his Adversaries to load him with lyes since t is not so much fault as custome among them and the prime weapons they use in defence of their precious Religion to wit their jugling exorcismes and lying miracles as in the boy of Bilson c. Yet because their Abuses may passe for Truths if unanswered and my selfe was told by a Fryar of the same Order that Father Basil our Converts departure was for the love of liberty I have translated for Thee their Calumnies and his Answers whereby Thou mayest easily discerne the untruths and malice of his Accusers That he was not a man of that Disorder those of that Order would have thee beleeve surely Father Joseph that great wit and Confessor to the Cardinall of Richelieu would have us think when he sollicited him by Letters to accept the superiority of the Queens Capuchins but his Fraternity finding him to be of more profitable use among them as the sequell intimates hindred his voyage hither And that his austere and exemplary life together with his elaborate preaching gained him a rare opinion from his compatriots those many hundreds of Protestants he drew into the Romish folds are witnesses for which his soule doth hourely pennance and his eyes shed rivolets of teares in prayer for their safe returne into the bosome of the Church againe So that if God had pleased to have wrought in him this work among us we might have hoped the rest of his Order here as well as divers of them in France might have become Converts through his example besides many of our English Renegadoes who happily might have beene stopped in in their flight from their holy Mother the Church of England to that adulterous one of Rome There are strong Reasons and Motives written by the same pen which engaged this Convert upon his Resolution more at large then here set downe And when I shall finde thou hast procured an appetite to them by reading these I shall take some paines to make them Converts for thy fuller satisfaction To the Church of ROME Sirs I Make no doubt but my alteration will beget an ill interpretation of it in them who are ignorant of the motives and because each man will deliver himselfe according to his owne fancy I desire to satisfie all by this my Declaration intreating them to suspend their judgements untill I have enformed them of the reasons which I am here setting downe First after I have humbled my selfe before my God praying him that my unworthinesse passed over he would be pleased to illuminate my understanding guiding my soule and my hand so that I may alleage things conformable to his Word I do in his glorious presence as before him that is my Judge and knowes my heart make this protestation That I have not embraced this profession to live at more ease and better my worldly condition or to leade a life of more liberty or plenty For in that religion whereof I earst was under a cloake of being poore I had store of all things and while I so continued had wherewith to please my selfe in abundance farre was I from having any cause to complaine of want and was honoured among them and had a setled Lively-hood but by the Religion I have now entred am reduced to an assured poverty and deprived of the best of my worldly conveniencies losing the good will of Millions who highly valued me yet this poverty and disgrace I entertaine as an honour since it is for Gods cause and that Jesus Christ hath scored out our way herein by his owne miseries and sufferings My life I thank my God hath beene blamelesse and I am provided for the convincing of those which would urge ought to the contrary Had I been a man prophane and vicious they would not have allowed me the office of Superior for twelve years which I did yet exercise but the last yeare among those of mine owne Order nor did I leave it for any misdemeanor I had committed but to obey the call of my gracious God who so knocked at the doore of my conscience that I could not be quiet I dare without vanity say that I have been in the Church of Rome and the Capuchin Order of good repure I preached vehemently against the Church of God wherewith I have now by the Lords great mercy ranked my selfe not thinking then that I waged warre against my owne Captaine and Saviour and that is it wherein I confesse with perfect sorrow I have grievously offended his sacred Majestie I had there no other booke than the holy Scripture which might be termed the Word of God nor was it thence I digged ordinarily the doctrine which I taught no more than others who preach in the Romish Church that tye not themselves to the interpretation of holy Writ and when I entred into the Order I

word had I been wicked as this man writes and had desired to live in dishonest liberty I should have remained whence I came rather then came away For having had the meanes to practice them among them I should have had much more meanes to continue them there then in the condition I now am The Fourth Calumnie THe last slander in the Letter aforesaid containes the most untruth as it is the most outragious and uncivill t is thus If the Church and our Order in particular used not the more purity and holinesse of life he would never have escaped us to have cast himselfe into Ministeriall bonds who have furnished him with what he sought a glut of his sensuall delights among them and a promise of assistance and protection in his vices This poore man must be pardoned for it appeares either he sinnes through ignorance or that his passion hath blindfolded him He shewes you that he knew not how I made my retreat nor how Ministers behave themselves upon those occasions for he never came so neere to know so much His Sword was somewhat of the shortest But to shew that he speaks as a man ignorant and to instruct them that desire to imitate me behold here the method I kept to atchieve the quiet of my conscience by a true conversion After I had a long time striven with the troubles and pricks of conscience which tortured and grievously afflicted my heart and urged my departure from the Romish Church where I observed the Hierarchicall and Priviledged ready to devoure one another and thousands of superstitions I addressed my selfe to the Father of Lights after whose heavenly assistance the reading of holy Scripture and the bookes of Mr du Moulin among the rest his Novelty of Popery and Buckler of Faith gave some stay to my tired soule and guided me in framing my last resolution But because I could not put it in execution without knowing what Order I ought to keepe of some one of the Religion nor was acquainted with any body at Roüen to whom in this case I might addresse my selfe I made use of the occasion of my going to Bresse neare Mount S. Michel whereof I have spoke before By the way I saw a Gentleman of the Religion at whose house I was halfe a day and learned from him how to comport my selfe therein I finished my voyage and a moneth after my returne to Roüen I went from the Covent without either seeing speaking or writing to any Minister whatsoever True it is that while I stayed a little at Roüen after my going from them I had the honour to see two Ministers who gave me the visit at my lodging but our discourse was so short that I had no leisure but to unfold my purpose and they to tell me I must prepare to beare the Crosse of Jesus Christ in professing the true Religion and that if I quitted the Monastery to finde more freedome or means to comply with evill appetites I was very ill bestead I was indeed extreamly comforted I went forth of Rouen at shutting the gate and in day and a halfe arrived at Paris whence I am hither come in the only protection of the Almighty Who report mee a man engaged in wenching or wiving shall accuse themselves of this sinne next Easter I regard not his prate as being usual among the Papists upon the like occasions See how the Ministers have furnished me with what satisfaction I sought not of my senses but my poore soule which sighed after its deliverance I would prolong the discourse to make apparant the cheats of this Detractor who speaks of the Ministers as of men who have furnished me with what I sought for among them sensual and beastly satisfaction and promised protection for my vices But because I cannot do it without I set forth the vertues I observed in them since I frequented them and knowing that their modesties would not approve it I will content my selfe with this onely since it is fit something be said That I observed nothing in their words and actions which did not tend to my spiritual edification and folly perswaded me that they are altogether free from that the Romish rabble doth like it selfe injuriously put upon them I protest I never saw any of them go from house to house to prattle with and court young maids and joyne under pretence of giving ghostly counsel if Ministers go abroad it is to visit the sick comfort the afflicted treat in consistory of the means for reliefe of the poore or else somewhat very beseeming their being or their callings when they goe from home I see them not laden with gay shewes Crosses Agnus Dei kneaded with relicks holy graines mother Lewis's crosse nor Medals nor any of that which they call Aucupia Monachorum Friers toyles to catch those who snatch at them wch nets they reach forth principally to those of the femall sex as the simpler and more enclined to superstitious devotion They cannot complaine of Ministers that in their common talke we never heare them use the Name of God so vainly in good or bad as divers Seculars have noted in the vaine discourses of Monks and complained thereof Nor doe we see them complement with wenches and women three or foure houres together in their portalls as doe the Friers but above all the begging ones The Ministers intents of discourse with any women are examined and if they give an ill example it is not borne with I marvell not that the Holy Ghost infuseth into them such profound notions of holy Writ and that it bestowes upon them such excellent illuminations in Divinity as the Professors of this University deliver unto all that will come to heare them I can never forget what I noted from one of them who handling in his Lecture the Commandement Thou shalt not commit adultery I never saw so grave a stayednesse in words nor so much carefulnesse in discovering this subject which gave mee occasion to detest the Romish Casuists and among other Sanchez a Jesuit who in a sordid manner turnes to and againe the filth that comes along with this uncleannesse for there is nothing foule or base in the most execrable excesses of beastlinesse and sensuality which is not tossed to and fro in his imagination and found in his most prodigious and horrible booke of Marriage See now what in my conscience I knew of them in whose bande they say I am cast Hee to whom this invective against them and my sele is written can judge of these impostures and of the truth of what I assever who forsooke the reformed Church at threescore yeares of age and therefore had time enough to be well acquainted with the behaviours of Ministers What this reverend Sir addes in his letter the Huguenots of Rouen themselves say if I had been an honest man I had not left the Capuchins is a lye by which he makes himselfe a laughing stock and abuseth him he writes to by making a baby