not onely overthrown ours but all Religion not onely acquitted your self of Schism but also quite taken away all possibility of being a Schismatick since no Authority can with any face or conscience oblige to a belief of which her self is not certain But I doubt not you make your self sure of the conquest not apprehending any but Saints and Angels in Heaven and God himself to be infallible To which you adde of your own invention impeccable as your custom is never to speak of our Tenet without the disgraceful addition of some forged calumny or other imposed upon us But that none else should be infallible except those you mention I much wonder I thought the Apostles had been also infallibly assisted when they pen'd the sacred Writ and peach'd the Gospel I thought also our Saviour when he sent them to teach and promised them his assistance had said He would remain with them always even till the end of the world that is with the succeeding Church I thought there had been some means to be infallibly-certain that such and such Books were Gods Word and genuine Scripture without an Angel Saint or Christs coming from Heaven or the Doctors private-spirited opinion which he will call God Neither do I doubt but the Doctor himself will grant it impossible That all the Protestants in England should be fallible or mistake in witnessing whether twenty years ago there were Protestant Bishops or no and that such was the Tenet and Government of their Church at that time Yet a thousand timeâ— greater evidence have we of the indefectibility of the Churches Faith and her infallibility As you may to your amazement see if you will but open your eyes in that incomparable Treatise of Rushworth's Dialogues vindicated from all possible confute by that excellent Apology for it writ by the learned Pen of Mr. Thomâ—â— White in his Friends behalf whose Dialogues he set forth enlarged and defended against your acute Friends Faulkland and Digby Persons who did not use to treat Controversies iâ— such a dreaming shallow way as it hath been your misfortune to do here nor stand Preaching to their adversary when they should Dispute To these Dialogues and their Apology I refer you that you may know what to do if you confute them solidly and demonstrate plainly That our Church is liable to Error you will eternally silence us and clear your selves But take heed you bring not whimpering probable may-be's and onely-self-granted suppositions for proofs These might serve your turn in your first Book which might hope for the good fortune to scape without answering but in your second and after you are told of it it will fall short of satisfactory Remember Mr. Hammond that you granted â— cheerful obedience and submission of your judgments and practices to your Superiors under penalty oâ— not being deemed true Disciples of Christ. If this be real as I wish it were then what easier condescension and deference to the judgment of Superiors can be imagined then to submit oneâ— private judgment when he has onely probability to the contrary Evidence therefore demonstrable evidence you must give in of the Churches erring ere your pretence that you were obliged by her to subscribe to Errors can take place and so excuse you from Schism But as your profession of the obligation you have to submit your judgment to the Church renders your probable Reasons insufficient to fall to judge her so God be praised your own self acknowledged fallibility will secure us from the least fear of your Demonstrations Yet unless you do this you undo your cause for if the Church could not erre she could need no reforming So that your Preaching of Reformation is vain your Faith vain and by consequence your selves Schismaticks and an Ace more SECT 4. Concerning the ground of Unity groundlesness of Schism and of Dr. Hammonds manner of arguing to clear himself of the later ALl that is material in the Doctors second Chapter is sum'd up in these two heads that the Church does ill in obliging men to subscribe against their present perswasion and That the Church which they left was erroneous and so obliged them to the subscription of Errors Upon these two notes as on a base-ground he runs division all along this Chapter repeating them so often in each Paragraph that I was forced to omit my intended method at present not making a Countet-sermon to each in order but bringing together his dispersed Doctrine into Heads and then confuting them not doubting but the Leaves and Branches which counterfeit some small flourish of devotion will quickly fade into Hypocrisie when the sapless roots are pluckt up from their rotten ground The former of them hath been discovered in the former Section to be worse then weak his manner of arguing from the second shall be laid open in this But because I perceive Mr. Hammond very much unacquainted with our grounds why our Church obliges her sons to rest in her belief and continue in her Communion thinking her doubtless very discourteous that will not leâ— her subjects in civility as the modest and moderate Church of England does hold and do what they list I will at present undeceive him somewhat in that point having a better occasion to do it more largely hereafter First The Doctor stumbles much and as Ignorance iâ— ever the Mother of admiration thinks Master Knot 's Inference very strange that the Church iâ— infallible otherwise men might forsake her Communion Whereas on the contrary I not onely think it strange to infer otherwise but as great an absuâ—dity as can be imagined for why may not meâ— forsake the Communion of the Church if they may forsake her Doctrine since it is impossible to preserve the former if he renounce the latter and why may they not forsake her Doctrine if she have no Power nor Authority â—o tie them to the belief of it and how can she have any Authority to binde them to the belief of it if she her self knows not certainly whether it be true oâ— no that is be not infallible Or what man living who hath so much wit as to raise or understand the difficulty can possibly so degenerate from Reason which is his nature as to submit it in believing things above his Reason and which concern his eternal Salvation upon such an Authority as may perhaps lie and so damn him for believing her since Without true Faith it is impossible to please God Hence follows by an inevitable consequence that since the Church pretends and hath ever pretended to have a Promise from Christ of a perpetual assistance from Error if Christ have made good that promise that is if she be infallible then her obliging her sons to rest in her Faith is most plainly evidenced to be charitable just and necessary because in that case it were both mens obligation and also their greatest good to believe so qualified a Mistress Whereas on the other side any other Congregation
who denies it Therefore what Ergo Kings are supreme in Ecclesiastical affairs How follows that since the onely word is wanting to wit supreme which can make good the inference The affairs of the Head depend on the Arms and Shoulders therefore will the Doctor infer they are supreme or highest as though dependence could not be both mutual and unequal It must needs argue a Soul very empty of reason to catch thus at every shadow of any aery word and think to deduce thence a full sentence The fourth is from Optatus noting it as a schismatical piece of language in the Donatists to say Quod Imperatori cum Ecclesiâ What has the Emperor to do with the Church citing for it his second Book But though perhaps I may be mistaken in not seeing so small a Testimony I finde no such thing in that place he quotes Indeed I finde that ancient Father arguing like a present Catholike calling the Doctor Schismatick and quite confuting and contradicting all his book saying Negare non potes scire te in urbe Româ PETRO PRIMO Cathedram Episcopalem esse collatam in quâ sederit omnium APOSTOLORUM CAPUT PETRUS Thou canst not deny that in the City of Rome the Episcopal Chair was given to PETER THE FIRST in which sate PETER THE HEAD OF ALL THE APOSTLES Then he proceeds to reckon up all the Popes of Rome successors of S. Peter till Pope Siricius who lived in his days Cum quo nobis totus orbis in commercio Formatorum in unâ Communionis societate concordat With whom the whole world agrees in one society of Communion by correspondence of communicatory Letters And afterwards probatum est nos esse in Ecclesiâ Sanctâ Catholicâ per Cathedram Petri quae nostra est per ipsam caeteras Dotes apud nos esse etiam Sacerdotium It is proved that we are in the holy Catholike Church by the chair of Peter which is ours what will become of the Doctor who can lay no claim nor hath any right to it nay hath disclaimed its right and who findes here a reason why we may justly be called Roman Catholikes It follows and by the chair of Peter other gifts are also with us even Priesthood Alas poor Doctor Hammond who having lost Communion with that Church hath lost also his Priesthood Mission and power to preach if this holy Father say true What hard fortune it was that Optatus lived not in the primitive times for then the Doctor had believed him and turned Papist but in regard he wrote after the three hundreth year the fatal period of any certain truth in Gods Church as the Doctor afterwards intimates he hath quite lost his labour and his Authority is invalid for writing Truth so late As for the Testimony it self which probably is this Fathers in some other place I see no difficulty at all in it For the Emperor being a nursing Father to the Church whose secular power she invoked to punish and repress such as were the Donatists none but Schismaticks would deny that power so granted to be sufficiently Authoritative to punish their pernicious Apostasie Then follow six Testimonies out of heathen writers all in a cluster that their Kings ought to be Priests and Augurs c. and the Doctor would have the example transfer'd to Christianity Indeed if Iesus Christ had not come from heaven to found a Church and besides what hath been said of St. Peters Primacy left it under the Government of Ecclesiastical persons the Apostles committing all jurisdiction in affairs of that nature to them without dependence of any secular superior then for any thing I know we might have come ere this to have been in statu quo prius that is Heathens again and so the Doctors Argument might have ta'ne place But if Christ founded a Church upon Apostles Ecclesiastical persons without the help of secular supports leaving all power both of Ordination and Iurisdiction to it the Doctor must either prove no disparity between the sacred oeconomy of Christs House and the Babel of heathenism or else grant his parity improper and absurd I never imagin'd there was any such extraordinary holiness in the heathenish Rites but a secular power might serve to perform and overlook them And as the reason why they were used by the Emperors was onely because their mock-Religion was nothing but a policy to delude and bridle the vulgar so if Christian Religion were nothing but a trick of State-policy it would do very well indeed in a secular Princes hands to alter and fashion it to the mold of the peoples humors But our all-wise God hath dealt more prudently with his Church encharging his sacred Mysteries and the Churches-Government to those persons whose very state of life being purely dependent on God and his service secures them from being cross-byass'd by worldly interests and secular pretences Yet the Doctor is so deeply immers'd in Schism that he relishes and fancies better the Pope-destroying example of heathen policy then the ever-sacred and heaven-instituted Government of Christianity His eleventh instance is from David who order'd the courses of the Priests and Solomon who consecrated the Temple but the Doctor may consider that David and Solomon were Prophets as well as Kings and so no wonder if according to the more particular prudence given them by God they did something extraordinary Neither doubt I but if nowadays any King were both a Saint and a Prophet it were very convenient he should assist and instruct the Church in a more particular way and yet not thank his Kingly Dignity for that Authority neither But indeed neither David nor Solomon shewed any strain of a higher Jurisdiction Their greater zeal might invite them and their exacter knowledge make their assistance requisite to order the courses of the Priests And as for Solomons Consecrating the Temple it was performed by offering Sacrifice which he himself offer'd not but the Priests so as his Consecrating it was nothing else but his causing them to Consecrate it A pittiful proof that Kings are over the Church in Ecclesiastical affairs His twelfth Testimony is of Hezekiah and Iosiah who ordered many things belonging to the Temple So wonderfully acute is this Doctor that no King can do a pious deed or even scarce say his Prayers but his honor-dropping-pen streight way entitles him Head of the Church His thirteenth is of St. Paul who saith he appealed from the judgement of the chief Priests to the Tribunal of Caesar. So as now Caesar a Heathen Emperor is become Head of the Church nay of two Churches according to Master Hammond the Heathenish and the Christian. But the good Doctor is most grievously mistaken here as he hath been almost in every place of Scripture he hath yet produc't I observe that though he be pretty good at mistaking all over his Book yet when he omes to alleadge any thing out of Gods Word he errs far more accurately For St. Paul appealed
Folio on the Bible 167 15 How Doctor H will have the allowance of a House to dwell in and Meat to eat the erection of a Primacy 172 16 The Doctor constant to his Principles putting the strongest Argument in the Rear 173 17 The Doctor cryes he is out of his way when he comes to a Passage he cannot get over 177 18 How Doctor Hammond blows and sups all at once 187 19 The Doctor as valiant as Sir Iohn Falstaff 211 20 Doctor Hammonds two sorts of Gifts given and not-given 214 21 How the Doctors ill-favored c. dashes out the best 221 22 Dr. H. like the Fellow that thought the Sun set at the next Town 226 23 The Doctors confusion for Methods sake 230 24 Dr. H. neither goes to Church nor stays at home 233 c. 25 The Doctors courteous point of Faith obliging all the Apostles under pain of Damnation to make a leg to St. Peter 241 26 The Doctors wise appointment of time and place for his Duel in a Wilderness and a daâ—k night 246 27 A magnanimous piece of docible humility in Dr. H. and his Church 251 28 How the world must needs look upon Dr. Hammond as another St. Iohn Baptist 254 29 The Doctors Logick proving Protestants no Schismaticks because they have all Noses on their faces 270 30 How Dr Hammonds Church keeps open house for all comers 273 31 The Doctor never meddles with any point but he blunders and destroys all the Reason that ever concerns it 277 32 The Doctors Goliahs sword has no more edg then a Beetle 278 33 Dr. Hammonds artificial incomparable nonsence 286 c. And for digestion a solid Postpast under the slight name of Down-Derry THE Introduction IT bred in me at first some admiration why the Protestant Party who heretofore seem'd still more willing to skirmish in particular Controversies then bid battle to the main Body of the Church or any thing which concern'd her Authority should now Print Books by Pairs in defence of their disunion from her and subducing themselves from her Government Especially at this time when it were more seasonable for the Church of England as they entitle themselves to denounce to those many minute Sects gone out of their Communion the unreasonableness of their Schism then plead the reasonableness of their own and to threaten them with the Spiritual Rod of Excommunication unless they return then cry so loud Not guilty after the lash has been so long upon their Shoulders But the Reason of the latter I mean why their Pens rather decline to endeavor the reducing their own Desertors I conceive is because no colourable pretence can possibly be alleaged by the Protestants why they left us but the very same will hold as firm nay much more for the other Sects why they left them For that we pressed them to believe false Fundamentals Dr. Hammond and his Friends will not say since they acknowledge ours a true Church which is inconsistent with such a lapse They were therefore in their opinion things tolerable which were urged upon them and if not in the same rank yet more deserving the Church should command their observance then Copes or Surplisses or the Book of Common-Prayer the allowance whereof they prest upon their Quondam-Brethren The Reason of the former that is their earnestness at this time to clear themselves from the imputation of Schism I conjecture to be the self-consciousness of feeling at length the smart of their own folly in the present dissipation of their Church proceeding from their leaving that Body in which alone is found the healthful vigor of Peace-maintaining Discipline the want of which causes all their distractions Yet not willing to acknowledge an inveterate Error they seek to cover the deformity of their breach with the veil of innocency that that which evidently causes their misfortune may at least seem not to have been their fault And indeed this is the last game they have to play for after their coy conceit of an Invisible Church was unmasked and found plainly to be nothing but a blinde Chimera and less then a Conventicle After that by consequence a visible Church was found necessary to perpetuate a line of Successive Governors without obedience to which they saw by dear experience all Order would be level'd into Anarchy After the consideration of this had oblig'd them to grant that to raise a Schism or to subtract ones self from Obedience to those Governors was in a high manner destructive to Gods Church and therefore a sin deserving the deepest damnation in the abetters and maintainers of it as also in their voluntary adherents Lastly since it was most manifestly acknowledged on all sides That our Church was that Body of Christianity in whose Bowels their Predecessors the first Reformers were bred with whom onely and no other community in the world before the Rupture was made they communicated and from which Body by little and little they became and now are totally disunited they saw plainly and Dr. Hammond will not stick to grant it That no Sacrifice remained to expiate that hainous sin of Schism in the present Protestants but to wipe off the Aspersion from themselves and lay the occasion of the breach at the doors of the Catholick Church This is the scope as far as I understand of Dr. Hammonds Book at which I aym this Answer Only solicitous that he was so tedious in things acknowledged by both parties or which little or nothing concern'd the main point in question as to make up three parts of his Books of these trifles And of the very hinge of the Controversie which is When and why the Schism began to say so little and so weakly that being the chief knot to be untied in this difficulty But since the Doctor will have it otherwise I must be content in most of the Book to Answer meer words that is to fight with the air at least when any thing occurs which may seem to have some mixture of a solider element I shall allow it such a reflexion as I conceive in Reason it may deserve I am his Friend and will goe along with him hand in hand through his whole Book Not that the solidness of the Treatise it self requires so exact a proceeding but the weakness of less-understanding Readers who suspect frivolous things that bear a bulk and a specious shew of Words to be important unless the Answerer either out-word them or manifest them plainly to be impertinent of which as the former is far from my intent so the later must for the reason alledged be a part of my present Task and consequently I hope a satisfactory Plea for my seeming unnecessary tediousness to the more judicious Reader SCHISM DISARM'D THE FIRST PART Containing an Answer to the four first CHAPTERS SECT 1. Notes upon Dr. Hammonds first Chapter of the Danger and Sin of Schism HIS first Chapter is most of it a good Sermonlike preparative to his ensuing Theme Who
his own private interpretation of Scripture nor the Church he is in is infallible or secured from Error by any promise of Christ. The denying this Infallibility therefore Mr. Doctor is the greatest crime we charge you with but you free of your Suppositions suppose it your chief virtue and put it for the ground of all your excuse In this Infallibility is founded all the power of the Church obliging to belief the inviolableness of her Government the unjustifiableness of any Schism the firm security that Faith is certain and lastly whatever in the Church is sacred The Doctor therefore in clearing himself by denying the Infallibility of the Church does the self-same as if some discontented subject having first out-lawed himself by denying the Laws and rejecting the Government of England and afterwards becoming obnoxious to those Laws by Robbing Murthering c. should endeavot to plead Not guilty by alledging That though indeed the English Subjects who accept the Laws and allow the Government of England are liable to punishment if they offend against them Yet I saith he who suppose this Government Tyrannical and these Laws unjust especially having a present perswasion and thinking in my Conscience they are so cannot be obliged to keep them and therefore must not be accounted a factious man nor be liable to punishment if I break them What will become of this malefactor Master Doctor your Logick clears him But the Reader and I am perswaded wiser judgments will think him more highly deserving the Gallows for refusing subjection to the Laws and Government and you more deeply meriting Excommunication for rejecting the Churches Infallibility the onely ground of her Authority then for all the rest of your particular faults which issue from that false principle But it is pretty to observe how the Doctor never clears himself from Schism upon any other grounds then those which if admitted would prove all the Malefactors in the World innocent and make it lawful nay an obligation in Conscience to dissolve the whole Fabrick of the Worlds Government So true it is That the very position of a Fallibility of Faith first lays and in time hatches the Cockatrice Eggs of both Atheism and Anarchy SECT 5. Containing some Observations upon Mr. Hammonds third Chapter of the Division of Schism WHen I had perused his third Chapter with intent to see what it might contain worth the answering finding scarce any thing which made either against us or for him I thought I had mistaken the Title of his Book but looking back I found it to have indeed this Inscription OF SCHISM A DEFENCE OF THE CHVRCH OF ENGLAND AGAINST THE EXCEPTIONS OF THE ROMANISTS BY H. HAMMOND D. D. So that now I remain'd satisfied what was the Title but much more unsatisfied to find my expectation so totally deluded and that in a large Chapter containing thirty six pages almost a full quarter of the Book not five words were found which touched the question directly nor could in any way be a preparative to it So as we have here 66 pages of 182. well towards half the Book premised by the Doctor to introduce the Question like the Mindian Gate too large an entrance for so narrow a Corporation Frivolous then had been the long Preamble of this Chapter had it been to the purpose and tended to the Question but if it be found nothing at all to the Question but to wave and conceal the main and indeed sole matter which concerns it nay more to have prevaricated from the very scope for which he would seem to intend it then I will leave it to the Reader to imagin what commendations this Chapter and its Author doth deserve Our Question is of Schism In this Chapter he undertakes to shew the several sorts of it which therefore he divides into Schism against Fraternal Charity and Schism against some one particular Governor as in the People against a Priest or Deacon in those against a Bishop in Bishops against their Arch-Bishops in Arch-Bishops against their Primate or Patriarch and there he stops lest if he had ascended a step higher to the Authority of the Pope he should have said more truth then will serve his turn For you must know he has a deep design against Antichrist and is resolved that half a score odd stories or some few words and unwarrantable practices of discontented persons especially being cited in Greek shall utterly overthrow him in despite of manifest practice of Antiquity clouds of testimonies from Fathers and the Doctrine of the Catholick Church of whose fallibility he is far from even pretending to any infallible Evidence But that we may manifest what we laid to his charge that all this long Chapter is but waste-paper the Reader may please to take notice that the Schism we charge the Protestants with is not of the peoples Schism against a Deacon or Presbyter nor of a Deacon or Presbyters Schism against a Bishop nor any link in that chain of Schisms which he there enumerates but we accuse them and their Fore-Fathers the first Reformers First of a Breach or Schism from the whole Catholick Church This is without controversie the Schism of Schisms and which in the first hearing of the word Schism objects it self to our understanding as being simply properly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such whereas the other are nothing but particular refractory disoâ—â—diences in comparison of this and may well consist with your obedience to the Universal Church This this I say is the chief and main Schism we impute to his fellow Protestants yet the Doctor in his present Book entituled Their Defence from Schism takes no notice of the chief thing he ought to clear them of will not have it come into play nor allow it a place in his Division as if it were either none at all or else such a slight one as was not worth taking notice of Strange that he could use such prolixity in trifling Schisms impertinent to the present discourse and not afford the least mention to the greatest Schism of all when the scope and aim of his Chapter necessarily required it and the Question forcibly exacted it Strange that he could remember even the peoples Schism against a Deacon or Presbyter and forget that which breaks from the whole body of the Universal Church But the Doctor is more carefull to preserve his own Copy-hold then the Churches Free hold for according to his division and Doctrine in this Chapter his Parishoners would be Schismaticks for disobeying him or a puny Deacon but neither he nor the Deacon Schismaticks at all for disobeying the whole Church And thus the Dr. has established his own Authority to be more inviolable then the Popes and by this one Division has quite conquered and got the upper-hand of Antichrist Secondly What is become of General Councils all this while Have not they as great an Authority as any private Patriarch Primate Arch-Bishop Bishop Dr. Hammond or a Deacon Far grâ—â—ter
Fore-fathers nor were scandalized at the then received Doctrine of the Church holding as a point of Faith that the Pope was its Head but abominated the contrary as sacrilegious and schismatical The first urger of the breach then was the King as is also acknowledged let us see then what or who urg'd him that so we may trace the schism to its first original and shew the new-born brat its right Parent As for the King while his blood was yet in due temper and not over-heated with passion that is while his Conscience was uncorrupted it is well known he was as humble a son to the Church and her supreme Pastour the Bishop of Rome as any King in Christendom is at this present admitting appeals thither and his jurisdiction here nay indeed more officiously obedient then any King now-adays can pretend writing or else causing to be set out in his name a Book against Luther in defence of the Roman-Catholick Faith and the Popes Authority which that Apostate rejected for which work also he received in recompence from the Pope the title of Defender of the Faith inherited by the succeeding Kings though they have forfeited the claim to it by disavowing the fact which deserved it What was King Henries judgment of the Popes Universal Authority till he fell into passion is easie to be seen in his own Book where he strongly and rationally proves it in these words Negare Lutherus non potest quin omnis Ecclesia fidelium Sacro-Sanctam sedem Romanam velut Matrem Primatemque recognoscat ac veneretur quaecunque saltem neque locorum distantiâ neque periculis interjacentibus prohibetur accessu Quamquam si vera dicunt qui ex India quoque veniunt huc Indi etiam ipsi tot terrarum tot marium tot solitudinum plagis disjuncti Romano tamen Pontifici se submittunt Ergo si tantam tam latè fusam potestatem neque Dei jussu Pontifex neque hominum voluntate consecutus est sed quâ sibi vi vendicavit dicat velim Lutherus quando in tantae ditionis erupit professionem Num potest obscurum esse initium tam immensae potentiae praesertim si intra hominum memoriam nata sit Quod si rem dixerit unam fortasse aut duas aetates superare in memoriam vobis redigat ex Historiis Alioqui si tam vetusta sit ut rei etiam tantae obliteratae sit origo Legibus omnino cautum esse cognoscat ut cujus jus omnium hominum memoriam ita supergreditur ut sciri non possit cujusmodi habuerit initium censeatur habuisse legitimum Vetitumque esse constat omnium consensu Gentium ne quae di◠manserunt immota moveantur Luther cannot deny but all the Church of the faithful acknowledges and venerates the See of Rome as their Mother and Chief at least whatsoever Church is not hindred from coming thither by distance of place or dangers in the way Although if credit may be given to those who come from the Indies even the very Indians separated by such vast Lands Seas and Wildernesses submit themselves to the Bishop of Rome Wherefore if the Pope hath obtained so great and far-spread an Authority neither by the command of God nor the will of men but hath arrogated it to himself by some violence I would know of Luther when and at what time the Pope broke forth into the profession of so ample a Iurisdiction Can the beginning of such a vast power be obscure Especially if it were born within the memory of man But if he shall say this power exceeds one or two ages let him bring it into our memory by histories Otherwise if it be so ancient that the original of a matter even of so great importance be worn out of memory then let him know it is expresly provided for by the Laws that his right and title which so transcends all memory of man as it cannot be known how it began is judged to have had a lawful original and it is manifest that the consent of all Nations forbid those things should be moved which have long remained setled and firm Thus was King Henry affected and in this affection continued till he found an itching I conceive not too conscientious to his darling Anne Bullen she being too crafty to forgoe the glittering offer of a Crown made unto her by the love-besotted King he grew straight perplext in minde for his former marriage began to think it unlawful though till now neither he nor any in the world ever scrupled it The devotion he bore to his Saint Anne Bullen put a new heat of Religion into his tender heart his restless Conscience alas perswaded him that his marriage with Katherine although confirmed by two and twenty yeers continuance and sealed with the endearing pledge of issue must needs be disanuld The Pope was urged to dispence with his second marriage though his former wife lived King Henry wooed intreated bribed then grew into choller and at last plainly threatned a Schisme unless the Pope would grant and justifie his unlawful desire Here now if the Romish Religion were made up onely of Policy as those think whose eys her prudent and heaven-ordered Government dazles into a blind envy of her priviledges the Pope should rather have sought pretences to yeeld to this unwarrantable request then have denyed it with the loss of a Kingdom from his Jurisdiction but the common Father of the Church more considered unless we will give way to the suspicious Reports of enemies what detriment and scandal to the whole world was likely to result from such an impious example in so eminent a person then consulted with flesh and blood how to second his desire or cloak his grant with the outside of a dangerous necessity He first counselled friendly then reprehended him Fatherly at last refused his consent absolutely Upon this King Henry grew furious put away his most pious and vertuous Lady Queen Katherine whose Angelical Sanctity and Dove like patience he always continued to honour when as he beheaded her assumed Rival Her disenthronement was Anna Bullens enstalment The marriage was celebrated with a divorce of our poor Country from the Church Appeals to Rome denied under pain of death The Popes Authority which had remained inviolable ever since we English were by its means converted utterly rejected nay the very name of Pope rased out of all the Books in England Monasteries and Religious Houses pulled down or robbed their Revenues given by their devout Founders to pious uses confiscare and consecrared to the Kings riotous Lust. Subscriptions forced to a new and till that time unheard of Church-Government a Secular Head of an Ecclesiastical Body they that would not subscribe disgraced or put to death Thus the Reformation was first set on foot and this lust of King Henry was so fruitful that it at once begot Tyranny Rapine the Reformation Adultery Protestancy at least the embrio of it Sacriledge Queen Elizabeth
would not think he intended to treat the question in earnest seeing him begin with so serious a Preamble In the first five Paragraphs there is not a word concerning our question to be taken notice of in quality of a difficulty being nothing but a moral Preface indifferent to either side Only I desire by way of Memorandum that we may reflect well upon and bear in mind that vertue of ready and filial obedience of those under authority to their lawfully authorized Superiors mentioned by him and extolled for a vertue of the first magnitude And the indifferent Reader will aâ— once both easily discern hereafter whether the present Catholicks who hear the Church and believe her in her Lawfully authoriz'd Governors or the first Reformers who without any and against all Authority disobeyed and disbelieved her have the better title to that eminent vertue and he will also wonder why the Doctor should face his Book with the Encomiums of that Vertue the bare explication whereof applyed to the carriage of the first Reformers must manifestly condemn them and quite confute and disgrace all Doctor Hammonds laborious endeavours But a pretence to a vertue if confidently carried on seems to the vulgar an argument of a just claim and high commendations of it makes the pretence more credible For who willingly praises but what is either his own or his friends or dispraises but what is his enemies Which makes him in the next three Paragraphs proceed in the same tenor of Rhetorick and from Scriptures and Fathers paint â—ut the horrid vice of Schism in her own ugly shape as that it is carnality self-condemning contrary to charity bereaving one of the benefits of prayers and Sacraments as bad as and the foundation of all heresies that there is scarce any crime the place cited is absolute that there is not any crime though he mince it with scarce so great as Schisme not Sacriledg Idolatry Parracide that it is obnoxious to peculiar marks of Gods indignation Antichristianism worshiping or serving the Devil not expiable by martyrdom it being according to Iraenâ—â—s impossible though the Dr. mitigates the dangerous expression with very hard if not impossible to receive such an injury or provocation from the Governors of the Church as may make a separation excusable And lastly impossible according to St. Austin that there should be any just cause for any to separate from the Catholick Church Instead of which last words the Doctor full of jealousies and fears puts the Church truely Catholick as if there were much danger lest perhaps any should imagin Christs Church of which I conceive St. Austin meant it to be untruly Catholick And now what good honest well-minded Reader not much acquainted with the Doctors manner of Rhetorick would be so unconscionable as to think him guilty of that vice which he so candidly and largely sets forth in its own colours although in those expressions which might too directly prejudice his future work he seems something chary And indeed I wonder for whose sake he hath gathered such a bundle of severe rods out of the sacred Scriptures and the best Fathers to whip Schismaticks Such expressions as I hope will strongly incite the Protestant Reader whom a true care of his eternal good may invite to seek satisfaction in this point seriously to consider that the decision of no one controversie is more nearly concerning his salvation than this as appears by the abominable character of Schisme which the Doctor hath with so much pains deciphered to be an Abridgement of all the most hainons damnable inexcusable unexpiable vices that can be named or imagin'd Of which Augaean stable if Mr. Hammond can purge the Protestant Church he shall ever wear the most deserved title of the Reformers Hercules But I am sorry to foresee that the more he handles his work the more the dirt will remain sticking upon his own fingers He proceeds or rather infers from the former Premises an irrefragable Conclusion as he calâ— it that the examination of the occasion cause or motive of any mans Schism is not worth the producing or heeding in this matter This besides the manifest advantage it gives us of which hereafter is the preâ—tiest fetch to wave the whole question and whatsoever is material in it that I ever met with That you are excommunicated or separated from the Communion of our Church whence as you say the Schisme springs all the world sees and acknowledges What remains then to justifie or condemn you or us but that there was or was not sufficient cause to cast you out and deny you Communion For that our Church had authority to do it if you be found to deserve it being then her subjects or children none doubts If then there were no cause our Church was tyrannical If there were you are truely and properly Schismaticks first in giving just cause of your own ejection next in remaining out of our Church still and not removing those impediments which obstruct your return This is most evidently the very point of the difficulty which being in great haste to shorten your method you would totally decline Make what haste you please so you take the question along with you For assure your self however you would avoid it now you cannot possibly treat it without examining the causes and motives of breaking as de facto you do afterwards Although if you can evidence that there is actually no Schisme made between us then indeed I must confess there can be no need of examining the causes of a thing that is not But it is impossible to make this seem evident without putting out ours your own and the whole worlds eyes But you desire only that the truth of the matter of fact be lookt into whether the charge of Schisme be sufficiently proved c. It is proved Mr. Doctor if you be proved to have so misbehaved your selves within the Church that to conserve he Government inviolate she was forced to our-law you from her Communion These are the motives and causes which you conscious of and very tenderly sensible in those parts would have us leave untouch'd But on this we shall insist more at large when the very handling the question forces you though unwilling to touch the occasions or causes of Schisme at least such as you thought fit and seem'd most plausibly answerable by the notes you had glean'd up and down to that purpose SECT 2 Concerning his Notion of Schisme and the Excommunication of the Church HIs second Chapter begins with the distinction of Heresie and Schisme concerning which what he hath said is true but yet he hath omitted some part of the truth which was necessary to be told Wherefore let him but take along with him that not only Schisme is a dissenting from Authority and Heresie an introducing a false doctrine into the Church but also that all heresie which it concerns his cause to be willing to pretermit must necessarily include
Schisme and we shall not fall out about this point For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying electio that is a chusing to onesself some private opinion contrary to the commonly received Doctrine of the Church it follows that by every Heresie the Church is truely wounded and rent asunder the proper effect of Schisme So that to conserve her self in her primogenial integrity when shee sees that pertinacity hath throughly and irrecoverably corrupted such a member she is obliged even in charity as well as justice to cut it off ne pars sincer a trahatur His next Observation is an Eagle ey'd Criticisme about the passive vetb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which he will have to signifie reciprocal action and passion from and upon himself and to answer to the Hebrew Hithpael which he tels you he could largely exemplifie in the use of other words But first if we may have leave to criticize upon so acute a Critick since it is only for want of conjugations as he saies designed to supply the place of the Hebrew Hithpael how knows he it must necessarily supply that place here since 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and its fellows coming from perfect actives must in the first place have a signification perfectly passive and so only for want of Conjugations be translated upon occasion to signifie the neutropassive So that all the Doctors Criticisme at the best is come to this that the Verbe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be capable of such a signification in which though the word did not force it he was pleased without any end or necessity but only to shew his art to take it at this time Secondly though in the Hebrew Language the Voyces and Conjugations be jumbled and therefore the Grammarians admit there eight Conjugations whereas in reality there is but one and rather eight Votes as the said Grammarians affirm yet it is certain and evident to every School-boy that in the Latine and Greek Tongues Voyces and Conjugations are things distinct and of a farr different nature The former alluding chiefly to the sence and signification of the word as appears in our active passive c. the latter being taken from some diversitie in the letters of the word which in the Greek is the characteristical letter in the Latine some long or short letter or syllable correspondent and fit to cause by a constantly-divers manner of varying a distinction in the Conjugation Now comes this Doctor of new Grammar who hath quite forgot his accidence and tels us a passive verbe must have a neuter signification for want of Conjugations as if vapulo and amo could not be of the same conjugation and yet have a different sence the one signifying actively the other neutrally Thirdly if Conjugations will do the deed that is make the Verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifie neutrally I see no reason why the Dr. should complain for want of Conjugations in the Greek Language there being more there than in Hebrew Fourthly whereas he saith this nice kind of signification is fully exprest by the Latine neutrals which partake both of active and passive but are strictly neither I conceive the instances of such verbs as sto and ardeo will best fit his purpose the former signifying either I stand or I am standing the latter I burn or I am burning and then he need not have run so farre as Hithpael since the first Conjugation Kal more properly challenges such kind of absolute or intransitive verbs as appears by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 stetit which is of that Conjugation Fifthly our Latine neutrals as such do not signify reciprocal action or passion frâ—om and on himself though the Dr. saies they fully expresse it for we say Roma ardet and yet affirm also that the action of that burning came from Nero and use not to blame Rome that it burnt it self Sixthly the Hebrew Hithpael when it is not coincident with Kal or Niphal as sometimes it is signifies an express action upon it self as fully as two words in Latine or Greek can render it insomuch as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 expresse as perfectly he delivered over himself as in Greek is denoted by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or in Latine by tradidit seipsum and then I would know where the Doctor among all his critical observations can shew me one Verb in all the Latine or Greek Language to parallel it or as the Doctor expresses it that is of the nature of Hithpael Seventhly either he meant his Criticisme of the verbal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which seems more likely it being the word in question or of the verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if of the former it is most evident to any man that ever saluted Greek à limine that those verbals signifie a thing done in a sence as perfectly passive as can be imagined without relating at all to the person or any the least intimation whether the action which inferr'd that passion were performed by himself or some others as appears by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. which denote a work done an Ordinance constituted without reference to the person that wrought or ordained it The self-same is visible in our present verbal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies a rupture made for which reason St. Pauls words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are rendred in the Latin translation Audio scissuras in vobis esse which scissure or rupture signifies most perfectly a division made passively not as the Doctor would have it a reciprocal action or passion from and on himself since a rupture is equally called a rupture whoever it be that makes it But if the Doctor means the Verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 then I desire to know where he reads that passives in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 forming verbals in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are used in his sence upon the account of being such passives Indeed it may happen and does often that a Verb in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 hath a neuter signification and consequently is used in a neuter sence but that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Verb perfectly passive coming from a perfect active and consequently that all passive Greek verbs should be observable to be of the nature as he saies of the Hebrew Hithpael is such an observation as none could ever before discern but Doctor Hammond who both here and all over his Book by much hending his sight creates objects at pleasure oâ— else by an extraordinary faculty sees things thaâ— are not no not even so much as in their causeâ—… Lastly whereas the word was out of controversie between us and good enough before he medled with it he has made it by his unnecessary scruing it speak perfect nonsence as is manifest by the plain link of consequences which evidently follow out of the nice sence which maugre all Grammar he will needs give it Foâ— that I may be allowed to speak rigorously and critically when I am examining a Criticisme if it signifie
Apostles the Doctor will not deny the first to signifie St. Peter to whom he and his fellows are content at least to grant from our Saviours words a priority of Order This first foundation then shadowing to us St. Peter is here Chap. 21. 19. said to be a Iasper the self-same Stone whose lustre shined in our Saviour Apoc. 4. 3. and also in his Church Apoc. 21. 11. Whence follows would the Doctor triumphantly cry out as an IRREFRAGABLE EVIDENCE that St. Peter onely having the same lustre with our Saviour is like him in representation and so onely he resembles him as his Vicegerent or Vicar As also that being the same Stone the Church is made of and the first of all the rest it is unquestionably true would he say that he is the first part of the Church that is her Head Under what luckless Constellation was Mr. Hammond born to meddle with the Foundation-stones in the Apocalypse and not fore see this dangerous rub which makes him so far from evidencing against us thence that the very place objected happens to be an Evidence against himself I mean such a kinde of proof as he would call an Evidence And thus he concludes his fourth Chapter containing the first substantial part of his Book In which as I sincerely profess I have not found one word to the purpose that is not one restrictive word of St. Peters Universal Pastorship nor one express equalizing term of his power of the Keys to the rest of the Apostles so I must confess withal that I have both wearied my own patience in laying open such a gallimaufry of shallow impertinences and I fear my Reader also who may think his time ill-employ'd in perusing the confutation of so weak a Writer The Second Part. Comprehending the Answers of the Fifth Sixth and Seventh Chapters SECT 1. Of the pretended Primogeniture of Antioch and the Doctors mistake of the Council of Chalcedon THis Champion of Schism having as he thought empal'd the Universal Jurisdiction of St. Peter to the dispersed Iews onely proceeds laying first his own mistakes for his grounds in this fifth Chapter to depose the Pope which he entitles thus The Evidences from the Bishop of Romes succeeding Saint Peter examined as he did the fore-going Chapter The pretended Evidences of the Romanists c. Where first he would perswade many good honest Readers that he had urged our Evidences home and afterwards salved them whereas indeed he onely puts down a word or two of our bare tenet and that not even as we explicate it much less as we evidence it Secondly He would seem to intimate again that it belongs to us to evidence Let the Doctor know the Churches Evidence is her long-and-quietly enjoy'd possession of the belief of Infallibility in which she was actually found when his upstart and disobedient Forefathers the first Reformers went out from her-Communion POSSIDEO QUIA POSSIDEO OLIM POSSIDEO PRIOR POSSIDEO is all the Evidence and all the reason she is bound to give to her rebel-sons and out-lawed Subjects So as it is your part to evidence hers to hold and possess her own till you sufficiently that is demonstrably evidence her title to be unjust Thirdly The Doctor is here also as indeed generally every where contrary to himself inscribing the Chapters as answers to our Evidences yet spending almost the whole Chapters in producing pretended Evidences of his own so performing the quite contrary to what he promised But this is nothing with him His first Paragraph sayes onely That St. Peter having no Primacy the Bishop of Rome his Successor could consequently have none But because his Antecedent hath already been dash'd in peeces by my Answer to his former Chapter no Consequence can be built upon it till he have repaired his ground-work by a stronger Reply Yet Mr. Hammond is so self-conceitedly confident of the invincibleness of his former Chapter that he accounts this a work of Supererogation Whereas if to prove his first Evidence he hath produced any one express Testimony That St. Peters Iurisdiction was limited to the Iews onely which onely was the thing in question or if to prove his second EVIDENCE he hath produced any one express place to prove That the Keys though given to all yet were not more particularly given to St. Peter which onely is there the thing in question I will quit the field and yeeld though not my cause yet my own particular conquer'd But if he have not what a vanity is it to brag when he had said nothing at all to the Controversie that he hath said all that is necessary nay even supererogated and said more then needs In this second Paragraph the Doctor would evidence That the Priviledges attending St. Peters succession belong rather to the Bishop of Antioch then of Rome And this he endeavors by asking three Questions to which I shall answer in order First he asks Whether St. Peter did not as truly plant a Church of Iewish believers at Antioch and leave a Successor Bishop there as at Rome he is supposed to have done I answer If you mean he planted a Church there of Iewish believers onely so as he had no power over the Gentiles also I absolutely deny it and in your last Chapter your proper place to prove it in you had not one word to bless your self with but what you added of your own That he left a Successor Bishop there If you mean such an improperly call'd Successor as both himself and St. Paul left in many other places that is made some one a Bishop and left him to overlook and govern that Church I easily grant but if you mean such a Successor as should succeed in the amplitude of Saint Peters authority so as St. Peter should devest himself of his Primacy and give it him not carrying it along with him to Rome I deny he left there any such kinde of Successor neither can there be the least shadow of Reason why he should nor is there any Testimony or Ground that he did Your second Quere is Whether this were not done by him before ever he came to Rome I answer in the manner I have declared doubtless he did Your third Quere is Whether these two Concessions do not devolve all power and jurisdiction on the Bishop of Antioch St. Peters Successor there which by that tenure and claim of Succession from St. Peter can be pretended to by the Bishop of Rome I answer the first is not a Concession unless first distinguished as I shewed before and the distinction given intercepts the passage to his Conclusion To manifest which the better we may distinguish in St. Peter resident at Antioch two diverse qualities of dignity First his particular care of that Church as private Bishop in that See Secondly his publick office of Head of the Church in which consists his Primacy Now when he left that City and went to Rome he devested himself of the private care of
not from the Tribunal of the Jews much less their Synagogue representing their Church as the Doctor would perswade us but from the Tribunal of Portius Festus a Roman Governor under Caesar to Caesar himself I will onely put down the words as I finde them in their own Translation and so leave the Doctor to the Readers Judgement either to be accused for willfully abusing or ignorantly mistaking them But Festus willing to do the Iews a pleasure answered Paul and said wilt thou go up to Ierusalem and there be judged of these things before me Then said Paul I stand at Caesars judgement-seat where I ought to be judged c. Act. 25. 9 10 c. And now is not this Doctor think you the fittest man among all the sons of the Church of England to have a Pension for writing Annotations in folio on the Bible His last proof is that Iustinians third Book is made up of Constitutions de Episcopis Clericis Laicis Bishops Priests Laymen First we answer and the same may be said of the Theodosian Code that all the Laws found there must not necessarily be Iustinians since the Keepers of the Laws use not onely to put in their Law-books those Constitutions themselves made but also those they are to see observed among which are the Canons and Laws of the Church made before by Councils and other Ecclesiastical Powers Secondly We grant Iustinian may make Constitutions of his own concerning Bishops and Clergymen in what relates to temporal affairs or as they are parts of the civil Commonwealth And lastly If he shall be found to have made any Laws concerning them and without the Authority of the Church entrenching upon Ecclesiastical businesses let the Doctor prove he had power to make such and he will in so doing clear him in that part from that note of Tyranny which is objected against him What you say concerning the Canons of Councils that they have been mostly set out by the Emperors It is very certain you might if you had pleased instead of your Mostly have put Always the causing them to be promulgated belonging to the Office of the supreme secular Powers whose obligation it is to see that the Churches decrees be received and put in execution What you clap in within a Parenthesis as your custom is to intermingle truth with falshood that Canons of Councils received their Authority by the Emperor In the sence you take it is a great error For never was it heard that an Emperor claimed a negative voice in making a Canon of a Council valid which concerned matters purely Spiritual nay nor disaccepted them decreed unanimously by the Fathers but all the world lookt upon him as an unjust and tyrannical incroacher They receive indeed Authority from the Emperor in this sense that his subscription and command to proclaim them makes them have a more powerful reception and secures them from the obstacles of turbulent and rebellious spirits But this will not content you your aym is that they should not have the Authority or validity of a Canon without the last-life-giving-hand of the Emperors vote which is onely a strain of your own liberality to him or rather of your envy towards the Church without any ground of his rightful claim to any such Jurisdiction over Councils SECT 7. Other empty Proofs of this pretended Right confuted THese rubs being removed it will be our next sport to address an answer to his nineteenth Section it self where omitting his ten Parenthesisses which contain nothing but either sayings of his own or Greek out of Strabo's Geography That the Romans kept their assizes at divers places or Testimonies from the Council of Chalcedon already answered omitting these I say I will briefly resume the whole sence of the Paragraph as well as I can gather it out of the some-thing-more Lucid intervals of his mad Parenthesisses And this I take to be the sum of it That Kings should according to emergent conveniences change their Seats of Iudicature and that the same reasons may require a removal of Ecclesiastical Seats wherefore there being nothing to the contrary constituted either by Christ or his Apostles it follows That Kings may when they please erect and consequently remove Primacies and Metropolitans I answer That Secular Courts may be removed upon good occasions is so evident to every Fool that it needs neither Greek nor Strabo to prove it That Ecclesiastical Seats for greater conveniences of the Church be also subject to removal is likewise evident and constituted by the Council of Chalcedon Can. 17. But his inference That it belongs to the right of Kings to erect and transfer them is weaker then water nor has the Doctor infused into it the least grain of Reason to strengthen it Yet first to prove it he says Nothing is found either by Christ or his Apostles ordered to the contrary Which is a most pitiful Negative proof as indeed the greatest part of his Book iâ— and supposes to make it good That neither Christ nor his Apostles said did or ordered any thing but what is exprest in Scripture which is both expresly contrary to Scripture it self and to common reason also Besides this wise proof is both most unjust towards us and silly in him to expect unjust towards us ingaging us to prove out of Scripture That Kings cannot erect Primacies and Patriarchates whereas there is no such word there as either Primate or Patriarchate which he would have us shew thence not subject to Kings Nor is it less silly in him to expect That the Scripture should make mention of the erection or not erection of Primacies and Patriarchates by Secular Powers since the Secular Powers when the Scripture was written being most bloody Tyrants and Persecutors of the Church were more likely to hang up all Primates and Patriarchs then either erect or remove their Seats to a more convenient place Yet if you would see something to the contrary why Kings should not use Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction I can produce you the sence of the Catholick Church the best Testimony that can be alleaged for the meaning of Gods Spirit but because this weighs little with you I shew you next the Testimony of common sence and reason which tells you Faber fabrilia tractet and that those whose education institute of life particular designment to and total dependence on any course of life makes them more strongly addict all their thoughts to perfect themselves knowingly and magisterially in that their proper profession are fitter by far for such an employment then those whose diversly-distracted studies render them half-knowing or half-careful in such performances How much then is it more convenient that Ecclesiastical persons should manage the affairs of the Church then Secular Princes whom partly their necessary Temporal occasions partly voluntary Recreations Court attendances and entertainments so quite take up that they can have but saint and weak reflections either of knowledge or care in comparison of the others upon
be rendred that the Government was injust ' which as you see could not Irrational therefore was that present perswasion of theirs and if so not sprung from reason therefore from unreasonable passion that is from vice therefore sinful and obnoxious to punishment as all other like perswasions are which make men think and act against their duties and obligations Besides all the Logick we have hitherto heard assures us nothing can convince the understanding but evidence and therefore men take so much paines about the moods and figures that the discourse may prove evident wherefore whatsoever assent comes not out of Evidence must come from our will and wilfulnesse and by consequence cannot be free from desert of punishment if it happen to be wrong and wrongfull Neither availes it to pretend invincible ignorance since no man living if free from a proud spirit can be so sottish as not to know that it is his obligation to obey his Superiors so long setled in the possession of their command till most open and undeniable Evidences and not seeming ones onely should discover that Authority null And if the obligation be of belief he must condemn the Churches judgment in not seeing the falsity of her doctrine and prefer his own before millions more learned who liv'd and dy'd in that faith which savours too strong of a self-conceited pride or else imagin so little sincerity left in the Church that all see and wilfully adhere to a known falshood but himselfe which is a plain sign of a rash and Pharisaical presumption And are not those punishable yet the Doctor would stroke such a fellow on the head and give him sugar plums for following his present perswasion and self-conceit which he nicknames conscience Nay he highly applauds his first Reformers whose conscience no doubt was tainted with the same leaven The Material Schism then which was manifestly your fact is made formal by your want of evidence that the doctrine was erroneous and consequently her Government violable Both which joyn'd together give you in plain termes your own name of flat proper and formal Schismaticks and entitle you to all the bed-roll of vices and curses which you hoarded up for your self and your friends in your first Chapter SECT 11. The Doctors argument that the Popes power in England was deriv'd under the Kings Concession refuted BUt it is now high time to returne to overlook the work who after the declaration of the matter of fact confesses no great hold can be taken from the freeness of the Clergy's determination and therefore the whole difficulty devolves to this one enquiry whether the Bishop of Rome were Supreme Head or Governour of the Church of England in the reign of King Henry the eighth That is we are come about again to the beginning of the Book But I am mistaken he tells us he hath largely disproved in his Chap. 4 5 6. all pretensions from St. Peters Supremacy and from Englands Conversion to whose particular answers I refer the Reader for full satisfaction and he has now invented a new ground of the Popes Supremacy in England to wit the voluntary Concession of our Kings What the Doctor meanes I cannot imagine Some particular priviledges and as I may say pious curtesies have out of a special respect been granted by our Kings to that See to whom they owe their first knowledge of Christ and his Law but these are not the thing in debate The right of Supreme Authority is our question now who ever held this to come from the Concession of our Kings Yet this ayr-beating Champion of Schism first fancies this to be our tenet and then beats it all to dirt He is as valiant as Sir Iohn Falstaff let him tell his own story and hee 'l make you beleeve he has kill'd eleven Enemies when but one opposed him We onely found the Popes Primacy upon his Succession to St. Peter This is the onely adversary-point the Doctor is to combate which he hath most weakly opposed with grosse mistakes palpable contradictions to Scripture and pinning all the words that made for his purpose to every testimony as hath been shew'd But to counterfeit a triumph he makes every trivial thing done either by or about the Pope to be the very ground of his Primacy and then falls to work and impugnes them as really as if he thought we held them The Pope cannot doe any good action or convert a Nation but that must be the ground of his Universal Pastorship over us and be impugned accordingly A beggerly penny cannot be given to the Pope by our Kings for pious uses and out of a gratefull obligation but the poore Peter-pence and such like petty grants must presently be the Popes Universal Authority given him by the Concession of our Kings and that as such must be impugned The Kings of England France c. cannot be said by G de Heimburgh to be free from swearing obedience to the Pope at their instalment an obligation peculiar to the Empire of Germany but presently the Doctor concludes hence an absolute power in our Princes I suppose he means in Ecclesiastical matters for in temporal none denies it so as now the very ceremony of swearing obedience to the Pope is become the very granting of the formal universal Pastorship and they that doe it not are concluded to be free from the Popes Jurisdiction though he knows well enough that the King of France who as he confesses performes no such ceremonious courtesie towards him acknowledg'd notwithstanding himselfe subject to him as the Head of Gods Church Lastly which he touches here againe he cannot read in some Authors that Kings de facto executed the erecting and removing of Patriarchates though the testimony doe not exclude the Churches fore ordering it but presently the Popes Universal Power must be supposed to be transdignifi'd into a private Patriarchate and as a Patriarchate impugned Thus nothing can come amiss to the Doctor Every argument he undertakes to manage is equally strong and unresistable A pot gun will serve him to batter downe the walls of Rome He was borne a Controvertist and it is an even wager whether hee be better in the gift of Use and Applicatioon or in the Art of Dispute and Consutation Next comes another Dilemma or forked Argument which though proceeding on the former false supposition needs no answer yet for the Readers recreation we will afford a glance First it is observable that he never brings this bug-bear Argument upon the stage but when he has made a Prologue for it of some forg'd supposition of his own and then the Thing in vertue of that acts and talkes through the vizard of a mistake and yet ere it comes to a Conclusion the Doctors weak reason cracks to make both ends meet The summe of it is this that The Authority of the Pope was either originally in our Kings so as they could lawfully grant it to the Pope or not if not then the grant
no doubt bid God give his foes a rap Then then it was that that second Solomon Robert Wisedom inspired questionless from Heaven warbled out that melodious and exquisit hymn which with a sweet twang closes up the book of Psalmes Preserve us Lord by thy dear word From Turk and Pope defend us Lord. And the rest of that devout piece able to ravish any Christian heart to hear it These and such other rarities of Reformation were then added as harmonious Epithalamiums to this under-age Bride-Church to celebrate her espousals or marriage with her Infant-Head After this the Dr. treates of the Reformation made under Queen Elizabeth in his 15. Paragraph consisting of five or six lines on either side a long Parenthesis which Parenthesis tells us partly strange news that Queens as well as Kings have according to our Laws Regal Power partly open fictions that this plenitude of power is as well in Sacred as Civil affairs and that they have this by the Constitution of our Monarchy Whereas he cannot but know there had been many a Monarch in England ere their Schismatical Laws were made which first allowed the King a plenitude of power in sacred matters In the next place he touches the ordination of their new created Bishops evidenced as he saith out of the records to have been performed according to the ancient Canons by the imposition of the hands of the Bishops Yet this modest evidencing Record durst never shew its head for about fifty years notwithstanding the outcries made by Catholicks against the pretended ordinations of Protestant Bishops and strong presumptions to the contrary till at length when the memory of that present age was past which might discountenance that pretence and argue it of impudence out steps a new old Record assuring us that they were regularly ordained And this is the firmest Basis the Protestant Ministry or Bishops have to witnesse that they have any more Authority to preach then an Anabaptistical Zelot whose profession is perhaps a Weaver his Calling his own Intrusion his Pulpit a Tub and his Diocesse a Conventicle But suppose you had a material Mission from the hands of Catholick Bishops and that Mr. Mason had vindicated you in this point yet can either Mr. Mason or any else even pretend to manifest that those Catholick Bishops gave you a Mission that is sent and Authorised you to preach Protestant Doctrines or could do it in case they would having no such power from the Church from whom they have all their power Unlesse you evidence this both Mr. Mason and Dr. Hammond may as well say nothing For since they gave you no such authority as you make use of that is to preach against the formerly received Faith nor sent you any such errand as you now declare and preach it follows that whatever you do to prejudice and extinguish that doctrine to propagate which they meant your Mission is done onely upon your own head without any authority but your own selfe-assumed licentiousnesse to talk and say what you list not derived from the consecrated hands of your Catholick Ordainers but from your own unhallowed schismatical hearts But Mr. Dr. is always afraid where no fear is answering at large here a supposed objection of ours against Q. Elizabeth for unchairing some Bishops and installing others But alas I am more courteous to the Queen than the Doctor imagines and think no worse of her but onely that in that fact she did after kind for supposing her once the Head of Schisinaticks and Chief-Bishopesse of their Church I see no reason but she should depose Bishops Catholikely affected and install heretical ones and in a word she and her Bishops voâ—e and act whatever they thought good and I cannot tell what should hinder them since the now rejected Authority of Gods Church could not All the superstructures of the Reformation then which the Doctor so often and so largely in this Chapter hath shown to be done regularly I grant him to have been done as regularly as his own heart could wish or mans wit imagine for the Authority of the Church being schismatically renounced and the infallible rule of Faith which could onely oblige men to an unanimous beleefe being broken and rejected these grounds I say being layed I yeeld that the superstructure not onely of their heresie but even of Lutheranism Zuinglianism Calvinism Arminianism Puritanism Brownism Socinianism Presbyterianism Anabaptism with those of Quakers and Adamites but even of Turcism and Atheism were all very regular orderly rational and connatural superstructures upon the forelaid foundations The ruine of all Faith must needs accompany the renouncing of Certainty Yet I had forgot to let the Reader see how the Doctor excuses the Queen for devesting some Bishops of their dignity and his excuse is because those Bishops refused to take the oath of Supremacy concluding that therefore she dealt justly in devesting those Bishops which thus refused to secure her Government or to approve their fidelity to their lawfull Soveraign By which one may see the Doctor knowes not the difference between the oath of Allegiance and the oath of Supremacy The oath of Allegiance or fidelity was instituted expresly for that purpose what needed she then presse them to take the oath of Supremacy to approvâ— their Fidelity or Allegiance cannot one be a true subject to his King by acknowledging him his Liege Soveraign unless he will take his oath he is Head of the Church As if neither any of the former Kings of England nor any of the Catholike Princes that now are or ever have been had so much as one true subject because none of them takes the Oath of Supremacy What followes is onely a narration how the Schism went on and the rent was made worse At length he shuts up this Chapter by pronouncing an absolute Negative of their guiltiness of Schism from this one evidence that all was done by those to whom and to whom onely the rightful power legally pertained to wit the King and Bishops of this Nation So as the King must be Head of the Church that 's concluded hoagh all the world say and swear the contrary though himselfe have not brought one express word to prove it Nay more he hath EVIDENCE it is no Schism because the King and the Bishops voted it as if whatsoever the King and Bishops vote let it be what schismatical doctrine it will though Socianism and Turcism it must not be schismatical so blind is prejudice that it can neither see without its own spectacles nor beyond its own narrow limits The Doctor discourses all this Chapter long as if he made account all the world were comprised in one poor corner of it England like the home-bred fellow that thought the Sun set at the next town if a King or Queen here with a few Bishops partly out of feare partly out of favour some out of malice and contradicted by others decree any thing it makes the case irrefragable
a man that goes about to clear another of an imputed fault should as I conceive propose the objected fault with the presumptions of the defendants guiltiness and then diluere objecta wipe off the stain of the accusations and clear his innocencie What does the Dr he takes no notice of what is objected but in stead of that onely reckons up some few indifferent things which their Church hath not rejected and sure it were a hard case if they had rejected all which their Forefathers taught them and then thinks the deed done In particular he tells us first that they retain the Government of Bishops but why they have innovated a new Church-government making the King Head in Ecclesiastical matters or why they obey those Bishops who can derive their mission of doctrine from no former Church or Authority which only are the things objected to them as schism of these two points hee sayes nothing That they now obey their Bishops he tells us but why they obey'd not him or why they cast out his Authority whom they held before to bee the Chief-Bishop that 's a matter not worth clearing The Pope's Antichrist and ther 's an end Then he clears his side from Schism because they assemble in Churches but he never considers that wee charge them with plain Sacriledge for meeting there and deatining those places anciently ours and built by us out of the true owners hands and applying them to prophane uses All that with him is very laudable and needs no clearing either from injustice or sacriledge He clears their Church of Schism because they observe yet some Festivals and the like may bee said of Sacramentals and Ceremonies but considers not that the schism consists in this that they at their own voluntary pleasure refusing some and admitting others denied consequently obedience to that Authority which recommended both unto them and which disobedience their own grounds condemnes as shall presently bee shewed He cleares his Church of Schism by alledging they observe some form of Prayer but never takes notice that the crime wee object to them is this that they ruin'd Religious houses to build dwelling Halls so they mangled our Holy and ancient service-Service-books to patch up their reformed piece of the book of Common-prayer leaving out all the most sacred parts of it to wit Canon Missae and what ever concerned the Heaven-propitiating Sacrifice that highest and soul-elevating Act of Religion and onely taking out of it those sleighter things which might satisfie the lowersiz'd devotion of their reformed spirits and was enough to serve them to cry Lord Lord. He brings as a proofe of their innocencie from schism that they have celebration of Sacraments Preaching and Catechizing c. But thinks it not worth clearing that of seven Sacraments they have retain'd onely the substance of one and the shadow of another Nor ever considers whether their doctrine be true or false All is one for that with the Doctor if they doe but preach pray and catechise let it be what it will it is a certain note that they are no schismaticks Lastly hee puts as an argument to cleare them from schism that they have some Discipline to bind to these performances c. that is they use some little wit or meanes to maintain their schism and hold their tribe together but he waves that for which onely we accuse them of Schism to wit that they utterly renounced all the discipline and even all ground of it in that Church of which theirs was once a member and fancied to themselves a new one without any ground of Authority and with direct opposition and contempt of the former discipline Nor hath he onely in this present endeavour to clear his Church of Schism omitted the very mentioning those matters which were to be cleared but even the things he alledges as whose retaining hee makes account frees their Church from schism are such pitifull ordinary businesses so indifferent to all or most schismaticks and hereticks that they can no way particularize them to be none or exempt them from the common crue of their fellowes For what schism ever arose but had some kind of government or discipline had their meetings in some set places at some set times pray'd in their own new way preach't taught and catechiz'd their own doctrine So as the Doctor might with â—ar better Logick have concluded the Protestants no schismaticks because they have all noses on their faces this being common to Catholikes as well as Schismaticks and so might seem partly to excuse them whereas the other of admitting such points and no more which are the Doctors notes of his Church are disclaimed by all Catholikes and common to almost all Schismaticks Nay some schismaticks and hereticks have retained much more of what their Ancestors taught them as Lutherans some almost all points as the Greeks and the old Arians the latter of which excepting their one heresie against Christs divinity had twenty times more markes of a Church in all other things than the Drs could ever pretend to Fourthly hee assures us that the Popes Authority is an usurpation and the use of more ceremonies and Festivals an imposition of the Romanists How so Mr. Doctor if the Supremacy of the Bishop of Rome was brought in 900. yeares agoe when Pope Gregory sent to convert our Forefathers to Christs faith as your selfe and your followers grant then how is it an usurpation of the present Romanists Were wee who now live alive 900. yeares agoe or are they who lived 900. years ago alive now But in regard you onely say it and bring no proof I shall not trouble my self in vouchsasing you an answer As for the imposition of more ceremonies which you say the present Romanists used towards you without any authority from the Primitive Church it is so silly so contrary both to our grounds and your own also that you make your selfe ridiculous to any man that understands either one or the other For since the institution of Ceremonies is one of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or things indifferent left to the ordering of Gods Church as both the 20th Article of the new English Creed expressely determines and all moderate Protestants hold I wonder why our Church should not when she saw convenient ordain new Ceremonies and the like may bee said of new Festivals which are things indiferent also and recommend the observation and practice of them to you who were then members of that Church her subjects and children Most lawfully then did our Church even in your own grounds in imposing new Ceremonies on you her then-subjects and if so as unlawfully did you in spurning against her Ordinances Neither consequently can those few you retain upon your own head and not her Authority excuse you from Schism Equally absurd is your zealous profession of conforming your selves in ceremonies to the Primitive times for if the Church hath Authority upon emergent conveniences and difficulties to institute new Ceremonies and
to overload a weak patience and every small discountenancing makes those that have enjoy'd a long case cry out persecution I see your parchment Church shrinks and â—naâ—kles at the sight of the fire while the Catholike remaines firm and unconsum'd nay growâ— clearer in the midst of it And yet I doe not intend to deny many of you have been very great losers by these late Revolutions but onely to say your sufferings are to bee refer'd to a civil not religious account or at least that nothing even in your own judgment essential to Religion is persecuted or so much as deny'd in England for Bishops and Service-book and Kings Supremacy you must not call essential without contradicting your own both profession and practise since you can so kindly embrace your Sister-Churches and communicate with them who deny those points as zealously as the fiercest Anabaptist Lastly our literal sound of Hoc est Corpus meum which the Doctor calls our principal espoused doctrine of Transubstantiation Indeed wee had rather wed our beleefe to that sence of Gods word which Fathers Councils and the perpetual doctrine and practise of Gods Church hath recommended to us as the Virgin-daughter of him who is the Truth than to a loose Polygamy of 40. several interpretations Minerva's born of your own heads whose mutually-contradicting variety â—hews them to come by the paternal line from him who is the Father of all falshood For these prejudices instill'd into the hearts of Catholikes the Doctor and his Church spare us very charitably and are far from casting us out of the Church For Gods sake Mr. Dr. whither would you have cast us Would you throw the house out of the windowes I mean the Church Gods house out of the window of Schism which you broke in the side of it Again let us but see how artificial nay incomparable nonsence this Dr. speakes I conceive nothing can bee cast out of a thing that was never in it shew us then that there was once a constituted Church of Protestants govern'd by the King as Supreme Head and holding their doctrines and practises in which the Roman Catholike once was but receded from that Doctrine and Government and invented this new Religion which hee holds at present Unlesse the Catholikes were once thus in you how could you cast them out What a weakness is this to think that Robin Hood Little Iohn and a few Outlawes doe King Richard and all England a great deal of favour in not casting them out of their Rebel-commonwealth as no true members of it and denying them the protection of their seditious counter-lawes under which Lawes and in which Common-wealth neither the King nor his good subjects were ever reputed One word more ere I leave this point to let the rational Reader see whether the Protestants or we bee more chargeable of judging and despising others Suppose Mr. Doctor wee who are sons of the Catholike Church had both judged and despised you upon our own private heads it had been but to judge and despise our equals But your Reformation had been impossible unlesse you had first both judged despised and prefer'd your selves above your Supreme Governours the Church and all your Forefathers The chief Government impower'd actually over you in Ecclesiastical Affaires you rejected and cast out of this Island Next many of your wise Brethren since preaching teaching and writing whole Bookes to shew that that Governour is Antcichrist the Beast in the Apocalypse and what not Could these things bee done without judging and despising You made Reformations and recessions from the former Churches doctrine cry'd out she had erred was a Strumpet the Whore of Babylon impious sacrilegious idolatrous Was not this the most rash judging the most venemous railing at and reviling of Gods sacred Spouse formerly your Mistresse and Mother that ever was foam'd out of the mouth of madness it selfe Again the whole world whom you esteemed before good Christians and all your Ancestors in England condemned by their contrary beleefe your new Reformed Doctrine And doe you think your innovators could have broach't their opposite doctrines without both judging and despising all this vast Authority Your Charity then Mr. Doctor in this point can bee onely imagin'd to consist in this that you have not judged and despised your selves for all else that you thought formerly to deserve any Authority you both judged despised rejected revil'd and condemned In a word our judging you is our subscribing in our own thoughts to that Verdict which the Church has past against you whose tribunal was held by all the whole Christian world and your selves also till you became guilty to be the most high and sacred that ever gave sentence since the world's Creation As for despising your persons we deny it as a meer calumny and professe our selves bound to honour every one according to his quality and degree the reasons indeed which you produce to clear your selfe from Schism we despise as worse than ridiculous A Paradox in a matter indifferent if maintain'd ingeniously deserves its commendations but the most manifest absurdities that can bee imagin'd and in which are interessed mens salvations such as is the renouncing an Authority granted to bee the most ancient most sublime most sacred in the world upon fallible incertain and unevident grounds and onely sustain'd by plain contradictions false and self-â—eign'd suppositions ID ESTS of our own adding the best proof not arriving so high as a probability These I say Mr. Doctor have nothing to secure them from our despising unlesse perhaps it bee their falling below ouâ— contempt Of the mixt temper of these is the constitution of your Book which shews that you have been used to row at your own dull pleasure in the shallow and softly-murmuring current of a Sermon but never launch't with a well rigg'd Ship of Reason into the â—oysterous Maine of deeper controversies Thus the Doctor concludes his Treatise of Schism closing up his tenth Chapter with these words I foresee not any objection which may give mee temptation or excuse further to enlarge on this matter No truly I could never yet discern you guilty of that fault that objections gave you any great temptation to answer them since I have not seen you put one Objection or Argument of ours worth a straw from the beginning of the Book to the end On the contrary when you light on a wrong supposition of your own as that the Pope is onely a private Patriarch that the Papal Authority in this Island came to the Pope from the Title of its Conversion or from Concession of our Kings then I observe a very strong temptation in you to enlarge a whole Chapter upon that which no body objects except your own fancy Hee adds that he professes not to know any other branch of Schism or colour of fastning that guilt upon our Church made use of by any which hee hath not prevented Yes Mr. Doctor I told you before how you
unity of Church-government then not onely we but all the Angels and Saints in heaven who rejoyce at the conversion of sinners shall joyn in exalting Jubilees for the Blessed and long wish't for return of òur wandring and self-disinherited Brethren The former of these if Mr. Hammond will not beleeve it I have told him where he may see it as visibly as is possible any thing should be made to the eye of Reason The latter to wit the Popes Supremacy is defin'd in the Florentine Council subscribed to both by the Greek and Latine Churches where what the fourth General Council held at Chalcedon wrote to Pope Leo that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he was over the members of the Church as their Head is more plainly exprest in these words Wee define that the holy Apostolical See and the Bishop of Rome have the primacy over all the world and that the Bishop of Rome is Successour to S. Peter the Prince of the Apostles and truly Christs Vicar and Head of the whole Church and the Father and Teacher of all Christians and that there was given him in S. Peter from Christ a full power to feed direct and govern the Catholike Church To these two points if the Protestant will subscribe that is secure inviolate that which touches the root and most vital and intrinsecal part of the Chruch to wit the Rule of Faith she will not stick to open her outward rind that is offer some violence to her uniformity in indifferent and more extrinsecal practises to re-ingraft their dry and sapless branch which now lies withering into her ever-flourishing body To which if these poor endeavours of mine may in the least contribute I shall for the future not reprehend but congratulate Dr. Hammond for his fortunate Errours and honour his ill grounded reasons as of richest value which by stirring up others to detest them and shew what weak pleas are producible for Schism became the happy occasion of his own and others salvation and of Embosoming the Daughter-Church of England in a Charitable Communion with her dearest Mother by whose painful throwes she was first born to Christ her Spouse at whose breasts shee suck'd the first milk of his Doctrine and from whose arms and ever-cherishing embraces first by the malignity of an ill-govern'd passion next by humane policy shee has been so long separated FINIS DOWN-DERRY OR Bishop BRAMHAL'S Iust Vindication of the Church of England refuted MY choice at first directed me rather to answer Mr. Hammond than my Lord of Derry having observ'd his Book not only to bear a greater vogue in the world but to be inwardly furnished with Arguments more suitable to the profession of a Divine But after I had advanc'd past the mid-way of my journey I met some Protestant friends who though formerly they had still cry'd up the Doctor yet soon as I told them in confidence that an Answer to his Schism would instantly bee ready for the the Press they immediately began to extol the Bishop and demand either a present Reply to him or else they should not spare to conclude the Victory their own When I had exprest how weak and unreasonable their discourse was which if admitted would always judg him to have the right cause that speaks the last word I parted with a promise if in stead of that sport which he far more than the other tempts a wit-at leasure to make with him they would accept of a short Refutation of the substantial passages I should not fail to endeavour their satisfaction which thus I perform Reading with some diligence the Bishops Book I find that as there is much commendable in it for industry so is it expos'd to an unavoidable Check of being Patron to an ill Cause whence it may bee a pattern of wit and labour but little assistance to the truth further than by shewing how weak Errour is But not to spend time and paper in vain let us state the controversie clearly that it may be seen how strongly and pertinently his Discourse proceeds Not that I intend minutely to examine his whole Work whereof the far greater part is little or nothing to our controversie as will appear by the bare stating the Question but onely to say enough for him whom the substance can content without engaging into unnecessary and circumstantial disputes He begins his Book telling us nothing can be objected with more colour of truth against the Church of England than that they have withdrawn themselves from obedience to the Vicar of Christ and separated from the Communion of the Catholike Church And that this crime is justly charg'd upon his Church not onely with colour but with undeniable evidence of fact will appear by the very position of the Case and the nature of his Exceptions As for the first it is unquestionably certain and universally assented to by all Protestants who understand any thing that at the beginning of Henry the eighths Reign nay at his first courting his Protestant Mistress the Church of England agreed with that of Rome and all the rest of her Communion in two Points which were then and are still the Bonds of Unity betwixt all her Members One concerning Faith the other Government For Faith her Rule was that the Doctrines which had been inherited from their Forefathers as the Legacies of Christ and his Apostles were solely to bee acknowledg'd for obligatory and nothing in them to bee changed For Government her Principle was that Christ had made St. Peter First or Chief or Prince of his Apostles who was to be the first Mover under him in the Church after his departure out of this world and to whom all others in difficulties concerning matters belonging to the universal either Faith or Government should have recourse And that the Bishops of Rome as Successors of St. Peter inherited from him this priviledge in respect of the Successors of the rest of the Apostles and actually exercised this power in all those countries which kept Communion with the Church of Rome that very year wherein this unhappy separation began It is no lesse evident that in the dayes of Edward the sixth Queen Elizabeth and her Successors neither the former Rule of Unity of Faith nor this second of Unity of Government which is held by the first have had any power in that Congregation which the Protestants call the English Church This is our chief objection against you As for us our Tenet is That those Churchs who continue in Communion with the Roman are the onely Churches which in vertue of the first Principle above mentioned have the true Doctrine and in vertue of the second the right Government and in vertue of both the unity and incorporation into the Church of Christ necessary for salvation And by consequence Wee hold them onely to make the entire Catholike or Universal Church of Christians all others by misbelief or Schism being excluded Now because no understanding man can deny this to be
the true Charge the only way for a Protestant to clear his Church from Schism is to shew it not guilty of doing this either by disproving the former to be the necessary Rule of Unity in Faith or the latter the necessary Bond of Government both which though they somtimes say yet because in these Books professedly composed for their Vindication from the guilt of Schism they directly and of set purpose handle neither it is clear they intend to shuffle not speak pithily The first Principle which also includes the truth of the second wee hold by this manifest Evidence that still the latter Age could not bee ignorant of what the former beleev'd and as long as it adhered to that method nothing could bee alter'd in it which way of assurance carries with it the Testimony of all that are truly called Christians and this by so ample a memory and succession as is stronger than the stock of human Government and action no right of Law or human Ordinances being able to offer so ample clear and continued a Title They must remember how their Forefathers who began that which they call the Reformation were themselves of this profession before their pretended reform They ought to weigh what reasons their Ancestors should have had to introduce such an alteration They must confesse themselves guilty in continuing the breach unless they can alledge causes sufficient to have begun it had the same ancient Religion descended to these daies For the constant beleefe of the Catholike world both was at the time of your division and still is that these Principles are Christs own ordination recorded in Scripture derived to us by the strongest Evidences that our nature is capable of to attain assurance what was done in Antiquity Evidences inviolable by any humane either power or proof except perfect and rigorous demonstration to which our Adversaries doe not so much as pretend and therefore without further dispute remain unanswerably convicted of Schism And though after this it bee superfluous to say any thing to any Book which does not so much as attempt to demonstrate either of these Points false yet I shall bestow a few thoughts to declare the quality of the Lord of Derry's Arguments not examining them any further than to shew how litle they are to the purpose In his two first Chapters though there bee many things false and more taken up without proof yet I will not touch them because hee onely pretends to settle the Question which is already done for my part And so I will begin my Animadversions where he begins his Arguments in the third Chapter His first proof is because not Protestants but Roman Catholikes themselves made the first separation 1. If it were so how does that acquit you since continuance in a Breach of this nature which cannot be sodered by time is as guilty as the very beginning Now these two Bonds of Unity being of Christs own institution no time can sear the bleeding wound And this because we hold by the fore-declared strength they now must have demonstrations to contradict it as well as the first Separaters 2. How does he prove they were not Protestants because they persecuted Protestants what then did not Luther persecute Carolstadius and Zuinglius doe they not now in Germany and other Countries Lutherans permit no Calvinists Calvinists no Lutherans Did not you persecute Puritans and Brownists Doe you not now complain to bee persecuted by others will you make all these Papists or why are not they Reformers as well as you you will say many of these first breakers died Catholikes True but upon Repeutance Of Gardiner whom you presse so particularly it is recorded that upon his death bed he said Peccavi cum Petro exivi cum Petro sed nondum flevi cum Petro and so fell on a bitter weeping for that offence But in a word is not this renouncing the Pope the most essential point of your Reformation All the rest your good natur'd Religion can either embrace or censure and as occasion serves admit or refuse Communion with the deniers of any other Article never so fundamental this only is indispensable Then be sure wee never hear you again deny but that they who made this first Breach had in them the quintessence of your Reformation and were far less consistent with Catholicism than your modern younger brother Sectaries are with your kind of Protestancy since your selves confess the admittance of the Popes Authority more destructive to you than the denial of Prelacy His second Argument is because in the separation of England from Rome there was no new Law made but onely their ancient Liberties vindicated The first part is so notoriously false that I wonder any one can have the face to pronounce it a Law was made in Henry the 8ths time an Oath invented and exacted by which was given to the King to be Head of the Church and to have all the power the Pope did at that time possess in England That this was a new Law none but impudence it self can deny As for the second part let us see how hee proves it Hee brings divers allegations wherein the Popes pretences were not admitted as being in the prejudice to the State or Church of England What is this man about that hee so forgets the question Doe wee professe the Pope can pretend no more than his right or is the question of this or that particular action of the Popes or does he think a legitimate Authority in common is rejected when the particular faults of them who are in Authority are resisted Is Magistracy or Royalty rejected when Pleas are commenced against Kings or Commonwealths as going beyond their true Jurisdiction Yes but the Pope is expresly deny'd the Power to doe such or such things Why then even by this fact hee is acknowledged to have power in other things since to limit an Authority implyes an admittance of it in cases to which the restraints extend not But hee presses Lawes anciently receiv'd in our Kingdome What is his meaning were not those Lawes in force in the beginning of Henry the eighths Reign or was his breach but the conservation of these Lawes and wee began our Religion there Are there any of these laws which are not equivalently in France Spain Germany Nay Italy it selfe Are none of these therefore Catholikes are they in as little communication with the Pope as Henry the eighth after his breach or the Protestants in Q Elizabeths times How ridiculous how impudent a manner of speaking and arguing is this to force his Readers to renounce their eyes and ears and all evidence In this fifth Chapter hee argues out of the Liberties of the Britannick Churches But first I would know what this belongs to us unless it bee prov'd that their practicks were an obliging precedent to us have wee any Title from the Britannick Churches otherwise than by the Saxon Christians who onely were our Ancestors and by whose conquests and lawes
examine whether his complaints bee true or false since he does not shew there was no other remedy but division and much more since it is known if the authority be of Christs institution no just cause can possibly be given for its abolishment but most because all other Catholick Countries might have made the same exception which England pretends yet they remain still in communion with the Church of Rome whose Authority you cry out against as intolerable nay the former Ages of our Countrey which your selfe cite had the same cause to cast the Popes supremacy out of the land yet rather preferred to continue in the peace of the Church then attempt so destructive an innovation as Schism draws after it Neither nâ—w after we have broke the ice do our neighbour Nations think it reasonable to follow our example and drown their unity in the waters of Contradiction Lastly the pretences on which the English Schism was originally made were far different from those you now take up to defend it there was then no talk of imposing new Creeds as the conditions of Communion no mention of the abominations of Idolatry and Superstition which now fill your Pulpits nor indeed any other original quarrel but the Popes proceeding according to the known Lawes of the Church which unfortunately happen'd to bee contrary to the tyrannical humour of the King The other point of due moderation is a very pleasant Topick had I a mind to answer at large his Book The first part of moderation is the separating themselves from their Errours not their Churches this signifies to declare them Idolaters superstitious wicked and neverthelesse communicate with them reconciling thus light to darkness and making Christ and Antichrist to be of the same society I confesse this a very good moderation for him that has no Religion in his heart or acknowledges his own the worst there being no danger for him to fear seducing by communication with others But whoever is confident of his own by this very fact implicitely disapproves others I cannot say mine is true but I must say the opposite is false mine is good but the opposite I must say is naught mine necessary but I must judge that which is inconsistent carries to damnation though I am bound both to pity and love the person that disâ—ents Therefore who does not censure a contrary Religion holds not his own certain that is hath none The second part of moderation hee places in their inward charity which if hee had manifested by their external works we might have had occasion to beleeve him Our Saviour telling us the tree is known by the fruit it bears The third part therefore hee is pleased to think may bee found in that they onely take away Points of Religion and adde none Wherein is a double Errour For first to take away goodnesse is the greatest evil that can be done What more mischievous than to abrogate good lawes good practises Let them look on the Scotch Reformation who have taken the memory of Christ from our eyes by pulling down Pictures and Crosses the memory of His principal actions by abolishing Holydayes the esteem of vertue by vilifying his Saints and left him onely in the mouths of babling Preachers that disfigure him to the people as themselves please What if they took away the New Testament too and even solemn Preaching and left all to the will of a frantick Teacher were not this a great moderation because they added nothing The second abuse is that he who positively denies ever adds the contrary to what hee takes away Hee that makes it an Article there is no Purgatory no Mass no prayer to Saints has as many Articles as he who holds the contrary Therefore this kind of moderano is a purefolly The last Point hee deems to be a preparation of mind to beleeve and practise whatever the Universal Church beleeves and practises â— and this is the greatest mock-fool Proposition of all the rest First they will say there is no Universal Church or if any indeterminate that is no man knowes which it is and then with a false and hypocritical heart professe a great readiness to beleeve and obey it Poor Protestants who are led by the nose after such silly Teachers and Doctrines who following the steps of our old mother Eve are flatter'd with the promses of knowledge like the knowledge of God but paid onely with the pure experience of evil In his seventh Chapter hee professes that all Princes and Republicks of the Roman Communion doe in effect the same things which the Protestants doe when they have occasion or at least plead for it What non sense will not an ill cause bring a desperate man to All this while hee would perswade the World that Papists are most injurious to Princes prejudicing their Crowns and subjecting their Dominions to the will of the Pope Hee has scarce done saying so but with a contrary blast drives as far back again confessing all hee said to be false and that the same Papists hold the very doctrine of the Protestants in effect and the difference is onely in words So that this Chapter seems expresly made to justifie the Papists and to shew that though the Popes sometimes personally exceed yet when their passion is over or the present interest ceases then they acknowledge for Catholikes and Orthodox those who before oppos'd them as also that the Catholike Divines who teach the doctrine of resisting the Pope in such occasions are not for that cast out of Communion which is as much as to say it is not our Religion or any publick Tenet in our Church that binds any to those rigorous assertions which the Protestants condemn If this be so what can justifie your bloody Lawes and bloodier Execution for the fourscore years you were in power Why were the poor Priests who had offended no farther than to receive from a Bishops hands the power of consecrating the body of Christ condemned to die a Traitors death Why the Lay-man that harboured any such person made liable to the same forseiture of estate and life Why were Baptisms Churchings Burials Marriages all punished Why were men forced to goe to your Synagogues under great penalties Seldom any lawful conviction exacted but proceeding upon meer surmises A Priest arrested upon the least suspition and hurried before the Magistrate was not permitted to refer his cause to witnesses but compelled to be his own Accuser and without any shadow of proof so much as enquir'd after if he deny'd not himselfe immediatly sent to prison as a Traitor A Priest comming to his Trial before the Judges was never permitted to require proof of his being a Priest It sufficed that having said Mass or heard a Confession he could not prove himselfe a knave What shall I say of the setting up of Pursuivants to hare poor Catholikes in all places and times I have seen when generally they kept their houses close-shut and if any knock't there was a sudden
Church Where first I would ask the Doctor in which of these words he places most force in Their Consecration by their own Suffragans and by no other What difficulty in this As if the Pope could not be Head of the Church but he must needs consecrate all the Bishops in the World yet more then once the Doctor hath bob'd us with this Or is it in these words Nullâ penitus c. No profession c As little follows hence for the custom of making a profession or exhibiting subjection to the See of Rome when the Bishops were consecrated exprest in those words facere subjectionem was not then in use and though it were not now it would not at all prejudice the amplitude of the Popes Jurisdiction as Head of the Church Besides the words being Alteri Ecclesiae To another Church not specifying Rome in particular it affords nothing express for the Doctors purpose but may well bear the interpretation of the Bishop of St. Davids being independent of any within that Continent or as before was said of Cyprus of any private Patriarch With which as is evident may well consist a subjection to the Pope as the Churches chief and Universal Pastor To what follows in the fifth Section of the Abbot of Bangors answer who flatly denied subjection to the Pope of Rome First we reply It matters not much what the old Abbot said for every one who hath read those Histories knows the ill-will of the Britains was so extreme against the Saxons at St. Austins coming thâ— apprehension of their tyrannous usurping their Country and driving them out of their own being then â—lagrant and fresh in their memories That they refused to joyn with St Austin for the salvation of their Souls And they might probably be afraid lest admitting and coming under Saint Augustins Jurisdiction they might open a gap for the further encroachment of their late cruel persecutors Neither was it hard to imagin seeing the Britains ever since Aetius came to assist them by reason of the turmoils of the Empire and several incursions of barbarous Nations had little or no commerce with Rome A remote Abbot whose office is to look to his own private Monastery should be ignorant of what was due to the chief Pastor of the Church especially other as great errors being crept in among that Nation But what 's all this to us unless the Doctor can prove that whereas the whole Christian world held the then Pope Gregory the Great Head of the Church as appears by his Epistles to all Churches This Abbot did well in denying that Authority which all else granted and submitted to or that this Abbot communicated with them who admitted and acknowledged it For we do not undertake to defend that there could not be at any time two three or more persons who either out of disgust ambition interest or ignorance might speak or act against the Popes Authority but that it was the profession of the then Catholick Church The words therefore of this Abbot can make nothing against us unless the Doctor will undertake to vindicate him from ignorance and interest and that out of settled and imprejudiced Reason he in so saying pronounced the sence of the whole Catholick Church Yet I have not done with this story of the Abbot thus I alleage moreover that it is either absolutely faâ—ulous or else both all ancient Histories and which is more Doctor Hammond himself is mistaken and therefore however it may possibly be true yet can claim no credit if it be once taken in a lie It makes the Abbot in the close of his blunt Speech affirm Nos sumus c. We are under the rule of the Bishop of Caerlegion upon Usk who is to overlook and govern us under God Whereas it is manifest there was no such Bishoprick at that time it being translated in King Arthurs days which was fifty years before this from Caerusk to St. Davids as the Doctor himself grants in the foregoing Paragraph But for a more full and perfect answer to this upstart instance of that ancient Nation if what I have said suffice not I desire the Readers perusal of the ingenuous and solid Appendix to that excellent Manual of Controversies lately composed by the Learned H. T. where I believe he will finde this new piece of Antiquity irrecoverably confuted What follows in the sixth Paragraph is onely a conclusion out of what he hath said That the whole Iland is not Schismatical because St. Augustine converted not the whole Where first he onely proves the Welshmen no Schismaticks but still leaves himself and his Fellow-Englishmen whom he ought to have cleared first in the suds Nay though the Britains were not then Schismaticks upon that account not being converted by St. Augustine yet now being subjected to the English Bishops and incorporated into their Church if this Church be proved Schismatical The Welshmen who are Sons Subjects depending on and a part of her must needs incur the same censure Besides his premises being all invalidated and his grounds wrongly laid his conclusion must needs be weak and ruinous For we do not accuse him of the substance of Schism for refusing obedience to the Pope as his Successor who sent to convert England but as Successor to him who had the Primacy by the Donation of Christs own mouth However the former may render the rupture more enormous seeing that part of Christs Seamless-coat was close knit to the whole by such a near and firm obligation SECT 4. His continuance of the same Fundamental Error and some mistaking Proofs That Kings can erect Patriarchates BY this time the Doctor through Gods assistance and his Readers Christian patience is come to the second part of his Text which is that even this part of the Iland which was converted by St. Austin cannot entitle the Pope to Supremacy over them Where to omit that his whole grounds are erroneous as I have before manifested in supposing that to be our Plea sor the Popes Primacy let us see at least how consequently he handles it To prove his position he tells us The Nations converted by St. Paul were not to be ever subject to that Chair where St. Paul sate Good Mr. Doctor inform us what you intend by the Chair where Saint Paul sate Whether in the Church of Antioch or Rome or the like say you But first it is meerly a fiction that St. Paul ever sate in any Chair or was fixt Bishop in any place but at Rome onely with St. Peter and to demand whether all Countreys converted by him ought to be subject to his Successor there that is to the Pope who succeeded both him and St. Peter is onely in another phrase to ask over again the Question of the whole Book and is the same as if he should ask whether the Pope be Head of the Church Next you tell us That Timothy and Titus were supreme in their Provinces and independent from any
other See This indeed the Doctor says and we must believe him though he brings not a word of proof for it which the second part of his Assertion concerning their independency did necessarily require onely he says the contrary hath no degree of truth in it which he makes account will carry the business without bringing the least degree of probability for it As for the first part I would ask the Doctor whether St. Paul were supreme over them in his life time or no if he were as I suppose both his Epistles to them and the Doctors former large Testimony from the monosyllable COME will manifest then their being supreme in their own Provinces consisting still with the superiority of St. Paul may for any thing deducible from that reason alone admit the Supremacy of the Head of the Church and their subjection to him And the obligation lies yet upon the Doctor to prove positively That Timothy and Titus were totally exempt from St. Peters Jurisdiction for which Negative proofs are insufficient or indeed for any thing else Yet the Doctors Quiver is full of such blunt shafts and it is an evidence with him to argue thus I have not read it or it is not exprest in this Testimony therefore there is no such thing or therefore it is false As hath been often discovered in the process of this Answer That which follows That it is the nature of Primates or Patriarchs to have no Superior to exercise Iurisdiction over them is onely his own saying and so with like facility denied as asfirmed The Ordination of them by others I have already shewn not to prejudice the Universal Authority of the Head of the Church whose duty it is not to descend to otherwise suppliable actions about particular Members of that Body but from the top of his Primacy to govern and overlook the whole and to be conversant about that more Universal sort of actions reserved and proper to his larger power to the managing of which the short-handed Jurisdictions of particular Patriarchs were not able to reach But now comes the most dangerous blow of all The Doctor did but take his aym all this while now he is fetching the fatal stroke and me thinks I see the Ax even now falling upon the neck of Rome He threatens in his ninth Section To put the whole matter out of controversie And how think you he tells us That Kings could ever erect and translate Patriachates in their own Dominions and therefore that the Kings of England may freely remove that power from Rome to Canterbury and subject all this Iland to that independent Archbishop or Primate There is a trick now for the Pope which he never dream'd of Where first you see Mr Hammond supposes as granted That the Popes power is but meerly Patriarchal which is the chief if not onely thing in question between us So as his method to put the whole matter out of Controversie is to beg the supposal of the whole matter in Controversie This supposal laid for a ground he repeats again for his first instance those two late answered Acts of Iustinian erecting Iustiniana Prima and Carthage two Arch-Bishopricks or Primacies Though himself acknowledges That Carthage was not originally dignified but onely restored to its Primacy by the said Emperor after the Wandals were driven our which being onely an Act of preserving the former Canons of the Church inviolate every good Christian Emperor and Prince not onely may but also ought to do it and when he does it it is by the power of the Canons of the Church As for the first instance concerning Iustiniana Prima the Dr. thinks perhaps good man that he doth well but put the proof in form and he will I am confident be ashamed of the consequence Iustinian erected Patriarchates saith the History therefore Kings have power to do such acts of themselves infers the Doctor where the force of the illation is the same as if one should say The late Parliament took away Bishops therefore Parliaments have a power to take them away That a particular matter of fact may conclude a self-and-proper power in him that did it you must first prove that power to be originally his own and not delegated to him by another pretending to it himself who in our case is the Pope Next you must prove That if he did it without that delegation yet his action was lawful These if you first prove your instances will come to something otherwise they are senceless and infer less then nothing wanting both the crutches which may enable them to advance forwards to a conclusion Your next instance is That the Emperor Valentinian did by his Rescript constitute Ravenna a Patriarchal Seat where you quote no Author but Anno Dom. 432. And indeed you did well for the Rescript is accounted spurious and to have been foisted into the Monuments of that Church in the time of their Schism Had you told us how invalid the Authority of it was and how not onely for that but for many other things it lay under just exceptions you had been put to the puzzling task of defending its authentickness The exceptions against it are these First It begins in a different manner from the constant tenor of all other Rescripts Next the decree is singular and consequently to be suspected in this that all the other Rescripts made in the reign of the two Emperors though constituted by one of them onely yet were ever authorized by both their names whereas the name and Authority of the Emperor Theodosius is wanting to this Thirdly the Inscription of Imperator Major is new and unheard of all the rest entitling Valentinian Imperator Maximus Fourthly the Bishops of Rhegium Placentia and Brixillis are in the Rescript named as under the Archbishop of Ravenna which is a plain forgery since not long afte◠Pope Leo commanding Eusebius Archbishop of Millain to gather a Provincial Council of the Bishops subject to him those three Bishops met there and subscribed to that Council as appears by the Synodal Epistle yet extant Fiftly The same Rescript which gives them Archiepiscopatum an Arch-Bishoprick which you make a Patriarchate granted them also the use of the Pall which was never accustomed to be given by the Emperors but by the Popes onely as appears by the Epistles of Gregory the Great to the then Archbishops of Ravenna This last rub so puzzled Hieronymus Rubens to smooth it who out of a preposterous love of his Countrey cited this Rescript for its priviledge that he was forced to explicate that Pall to be Caesarum Paludamentum such an Imperial Robe as the Cesars used to wear whereas besides the unlikeliness of the action it is plainly contrary to the Rescript it self which grants them such a Pall Sicut Caeteri sub nostrâ Christianissimâ potestate saepe degentes fruuntur Metropolitae As the rest of the Metropolitans in his Dominions often wore Which every one who hath but tasted