by General Councils and so by the Catholick Church and they have been in peaceable possession of it for many hundred of years P. 16 17. and now they cannot be divested of it neither by themselves nor by others neither in whole nor in part All these things he sets down I suppose as his own opinations and sentiments and would have his Friends to judge him by them as Orthodox and a true Convert He is not concerned whether they be true or false for he knows or may know that every one of these pretences has been proved by Dr. Barrow to be gross falsities and that almost to the evidence of Demonstration and yet our Authour brings not the least proof for any one of them from any Old Authour Indeed he tells us that we have the Succession of Bishops of Rome delivered to us by St. Augustine and that is true P. 15. but he was unlucky to put us in mind of that passage and much more because he never read it himself for had he seen the 165. Epistle of St. Augustine where that Succession is mentioned and the very next to it he might have found in that great Father a full contradiction to all his thoughts concerning the Scriptures and concerning Authority and then perhaps he would have imployed his time to better purposes than in writing this Book St. Austine in that Epistle sets down the succession of the Bishops of Rome from St. Peter and that for no other purpose but to shew that none of all those Bishops was a Donatist Augustinus Epist 165. And that because a Donatist had set down the succession of their Bishops before not that he thought any one of them after St. Peter was a Sovereign Guide or had unerring authority in him for he himself presently adds to this that if any of them had been a Donatist or worse yet the Christian Doctrine would not have suffered the least by it In illum ordinem Episcoporum qui ducitur ab ipso Petro usque ad Anastasium qui nunc super eandem Cathedram sedet etiamsi quisquam traditor per illa tempora subrepsisset nihil praejudicaret Ecclesiae innocentibus Christianis This I suppose our Authour is not willing to think because he depends so much upon Authority and so little upon the Scriptures but St. Augustine did because he relyed upon the Scriptures to teach us that Doctrine which Jesus Christ and his Apostles had revealed to the World and therefore in the same Epistle he slights all his other Arguments and fixes intirely upon the Scriptures as those alone which could give us a full and solid evidence for the truth of a Christian Doctrine Augustinus Epist 165. these are his words Quanquam nos non tam de istis documentis praesumamus quà m de Scripturis sanctis and then he cites a Text. But in the next Epistle and that against the Donatists after some other velitations and general topicks whereof Councils was one as appears by those words Faciant mille concilia Episcopi he comes to the holy Scriptures and triumphs in his Arguments and doubts not to defeat his adversaries by the force of them He begins with words frequent in his writings Augustinus Epist 166. In Scripturis didicimus Christum in Scripturis didicimus Ecclesiam has Scripturas communiter habemus quare non in eis Christum Ecclesiam communiter retinemus Then he throws out near twenty Texts one after another comments in short upon them and never doubts but that he and his Adversaries did sufficiently understand them without the assistance of a Sovereign Guide or an unerring Authority if our Authour had considered this it might have done him good but because he is pleased to find the Succession of Roman Bishops in St. Augustine I will shew him what he seems not to know two very considerable uses which that great Father made of that topick the First was to conciliate a most profound veneration to the Holy Scriptures thus therefore he writes August contra Faust Manich lib. 11. cap. 5. contra Faustum Manichaeum lib. 11. cap. 5. Distincta est à posteriorum libris excellentia canonicae Authoritatis veteris novi Testamenti quae Apostolorum confirmata temporibus per successiones Episcoporum propagationes Ecclesiarum tanquam in sede quâdam sublimiter constituta est cui serviat omnis fidelis pius intellectus A Second use that he made of this consideration of the Succession of Bishops in their Sees was in case of a dispute about a Text to evidence what was the first and so the true Christian Doctrine To this end he very frequently in his disputes with the Donatists requires them to search what was taught in the Churches of Corinth Galatia Ephesus Philippi Thessalonica all the Churches that had the honour to receive Apostolical Epistles Now if all these having several Successions of Bishops should agree in any one point that was controverted St. Augustine took their consent to be a good Argument that such a Doctrine was original and true he sends them indeed to Rome too but upon no other accompt and no higher reason than he does to those other Apostolical Churches Now I think I may presume in kindness to our Authour to give him one advice and that is this to have a care when he refers to St. Augustine that he knows his mind and that St. Augustine did write what he cites him for for I can tell him that a certain person who was of his opinion concerning a Soveraign Guide and unerring Authority to be sound in the Church of Rome came at length to believe and that consequentially to his opinion that the decretal Epistles of the Popes were of the same Authority with and to be reckoned amongst the Canonical Scriptures and to confirm his opinion he cited St. Augustine for it and this his citation had got into Gratians Decretum but the last Roman-Correctours of Gratian found it to be either gross forgery or a gross mistake and they have done St. Augustine right and a favour to such Persons as our Authour is to let them know that St. Augustine is no great friend to such fond and absurd opinions You may see Gratiani Decreti prim part Distin 19. Cap. 6. But because it may be some trouble to consult that Authour I will give you the truth and the forgery together St. Augustine in his Book De Doctrina Christiana lib. 2. cap. 8. had given us these words In Canonicis Scripturis Ecclesiarum Catholicarum quam plurium authoritatem sequatur inter quas sane illae sunt quae Apostolicas sedes habere Epistolas accipere meruerunt c. Now this was plain and good advice in the examination of Books that might be alledged to be Canonical Scriptures to give a preference to the testimony of those Churches that were called Apostolical Seats and such as had the honour to receive Epistles from the Apostles as Rome Corinth
IMPRIMATUR Sept. 5. 1687. Jo. Battely AN ANSWER To a BOOK Entituled Reason and Authority OR THE MOTIVES OF A Late Protestant's Reconciliation TO THE Catholick Church TOGETHER With a brief Account of Augustine the Monk and Conversion of the English In a Letter to a Friend LONDON Printed by J. H. for Brabazon Aylmer at the Three Pigeons over against the Royal Exchange in Cornhill 1687. AN ANSWER To a BOOK Entituled Reason Authority c. SIR I Have just now read over a late Book entituled Reason and Authority I read it with an excess of pleasure being surprized and amazed to find Reason so baffled and a monstrous Authority advanced against all reason Non-sense I perceive is in fashion and if I and You have as little sense and are as impertinent as others I may be a Writer and You a Reader I perceive by that Book P. 2 3. that a certain Man has left our Church without reason He was advised to take reason and make the best use of it in the choice of his Religion and the setling of his life and practice in order to salvation but he could find no reason to serve him P. 4 5. He narrowly escaped being an Atheist with reason and had almost denyed the Being of a God or at least his Providence with reason and something that looked like to a demonstration against the immortality of the Soul had so confounded him that he was up head and ears in the water all soused and plunged in the doubt and whether he is yet out of it we know not The Man goes on and considers the grounds of Religion the Jewish and the Christian and finds little reason to think that the five Books commonly ascribed to Moses P. 5. were ever written by him he finds so many mistakes and so many errours in the beginning of Genesis that he gives you to guess his meaning though he will not speak it to be that the Jewish Religion is little else than a forgery and that it has but small evidence of a Revelation from God Almighty Thus leaving the Jewish Religion the Man in all haste goes to the Christian P. 6. and considers the New Testament as the Book which all Christians in all Ages have owned to be the Records of the Christian Doctrine He does not say by whom they were written but at the reading of the first Chapter of St. Matthew he was hair'd out of his wits He met with such difficulties that his reason could not answer if he brought any with him to the reading of it for it is to be suspected that he used none because a little reason in such a case as this would at this time have lead him to have consulted his Authority For if he whom this Man calls God's Vicegerent and the great Elias that is supposed to solve all doubts can say no more to this difficulty than he himself could he might have kept his Reason still as bad as it was and have been content to be ignorant with Reason as well as under Authority But Dear Friend look about you now Thus far our Authour booted and spurr'd and whipping on has gone without reason just now reason comes in a most unlucky time I think for no other purpose but to fool the Man and set him to combate with an Adversary that will certainly be too strong for him for instead of fighting us he now attacks Christianity it self and does all the mischief he can to that Common Faith which he and we profess To this end he revives old Controversies and starts new ones and makes Schemes of Christian Doctrine and that to shew to the World that Christianity has as weak a Foundation as the Jewish Religion was declared before to have To this end I suppose he tells us the three next things 1. P. 7. That some of the Orthodox did not receive into the Canon of the Scripture some of the Books that are now in it P. 7. for near 200 years after the death of our Saviour 2. That every Christian is not able by reading of the Scripture to compose such a Creed as that of Athanasius 3. P. 7. That there are some obscure Doctrines hard to be understood amongst Christians and here he sets down the Trinity Consubstantiality Transubstantiation Predestination and Freewill every one of these are altogether impertinent to this Man's purpose they may be of some use to an Atheist and serve him that is resolv'd to give a secret wound to Christianity but they signify nothing to a Roman Catholick or to him that would plead for Authority to determine Controversies in Christianity in opposition to Reason For first All the Churches in the World are now agreed about the Books of the New Testament and when the Orthodox in ancient times concurr'd in the acceptance of the Books that are now in the Canon they came to this conclusion merely by the reason of the case without the least interposition of any Authority of Pope or Council the last Book doubted of was the Revelations and the reasons for receiving of that Euseb lib. 7. cap. 27. any man may reade in Eusebius lib. 7. cap. 27. as he sets them down in the words of Dionysius of Alexandria Now I cannot imagine to what purpose this Gentleman puts us in mind of this old Controversie if he has Authority for what he does it may be something for his own satisfaction I am sure he has no reason to offer in the case that can be allowed by any man else for the Church of Rome is as zealous to preserve every one of these Books in their esteem and reverence as Ours is I guess that possibly he may be tempted to shew his skill in Controversie and therefore he sets down with an appearance of accuracy that such Books were not received into the Canon by the Orthodox for near 200 years after the death of our Saviour But here the Man's skill fails him for it is certain that Irenaeus quotes the Revelations in several places Irenaeus lib. 4. cap. 37. as a Book of like Authority with the rest of the New Testament and he himself tells us that he wrote in the time of Eleutherius and Bellarmine sets him down as a Writer in the Year 180. after our Saviour's birth and that will lessen the time mentioned of 200. after his death by fifty This mistake is not worth the noting if it did not give us to see how ready some men are to lay aside not onely Reason but the Sacred Records of the Christian Faith not considering the true consequences of their own Action since it is most certain that if a full Authority be not allowed to the Books of the New Testament there can be no pretence to any either in Pope or Council or in any thing that is called Church But our Authour goes on to a second thing and proceeds with more than ordinary caution and seems as wise as
Authority than our Authour This is a blunder and shews us that new Converts are not men of the greatest skill and that some of them have as little knowledge in Councils as they have in the Scriptures This man deserves a greater lash than I will give him for bringing in his Story with that pomp and appearance of skill telling us that this Council is owned by Protestants the time of its celebration the number of Bishops who were in it And now at last it appears that whatever we Protestants do yet the Pope himself will not allow what this man challenges in his behalf But perhaps his case is piteous For more may be required of new Converts than they are able to perform He that takes up a Religion by submitting to Authority without reason may easily be confounded when he seeks to give reasons for what he has done For once I will be kind and make the best Apology for our Authour I can and I think a good one and that is this He is not the first man of the Church of Rome who has quoted Councils to little purpose He follows great Examples and the chiefest among them For thus did Paschasinus one of the Pope's own Legats in this very Council at Chalcedon and that too in his opposition against this 28th Canon After he had declared it was the Pope's pleasure that nothing should be determin'd there concerning his Power or the Power of the other Patriarchs he alledged in behalf of the Pope's Supremacy that it was fixed beyond exception or doubt by the sixth Canon of the great Council at Nice wherein it was declared that Ecclesia Romana semper habuit primatum The Bishops wondered they should know nothing of this and thereupon required the Canon to be read Paschasinus produced his Copy and there those words were But the Fathers not satisfied called for others and more attested Copies and in them there was not the least word intimating any such thing Now this compare of the Copies made Paschasinus blush and the Fathers of that Council think what sort of men they had to deal with A Roman Catholick tells us this Passage in these words Primò refertur à Paschasino Leonis in Concilia Chalcedonensi Legato Act. 16. quod Ecclesia Romana semper habuit primatum At statim Chalcedonenses Patres eundem Canonem ex codice suo sine additione istâ retulerunt Quapropter consentiunt omnes eruditi verba haec non esse genuina sed assuta Thus too in the Council of Carthage Du Pin p. 325. Faustinus Legate of Zosimus challenged a right for the Pope to receive Appeals and that by right of a Canon of the Council of Nice The African Fathers found no such thing in their Copy brought thence by Caecilianus one of the Fathers of that Council Synodi Carth. Acta Edit à Beveregio p. 5â—9 But because Faustinus insisted upon the skill knowledge or infallibility if you will of Pope Zosimus and had shewed that the Pope himself in his Commonitory directed to him and the other Legats did expresly assert that this was his right and that according to the determination of the Council of Nice the African Fathers resolved to send Messengers to the three great Seats Alexandria Antioch and Constantinople to get new Copies one from each of them attested under the hands of those Patriarchs Epist ad Coelestinum in fine Canonum Carthag à Bevereg Edit p 675. and compare them with their own and the Roman Copy At the return of the Messengers it manifestly appeared that their own Copy intirely agreed with every one of the others and that the Council of Nice had not given the least advantage to the Bishop of Rome in the case of Appeals Thus it seems that Councils are different things in Rome from what they are in other places A Pope or his Legate can reade that in them which no man else can The Popes seem extraordinarily wise in challenging a power to confirm Councils but they had as good let it alone For it will doe their business as well if they follow these Examples to take from them and add to them what they please Brietii Annales in An. 418. p. 402. Both these things I know are excused and some tell how Paschasinus was led into his mistake others say it was a mere oversight of Pope Zosimus in quoting the Nicene Council instead of the Sardican To avoid other difficulties some are willing to allow that a Pope may be deceived and that too when he is inlarging his Power over the Church Catholick with all art and subtilty Nor do I know what Article of Faith or Infidelity might not be established in the Church by such mistakes and oversights as these It 's well for succeeding Christians that the Fathers at Carthage and Chalcedon had eyes in their heads and did use them too without giving trust to Pope or Legate or Roman Copy For had they been as much mistaken or overseen as others there are enough at this day that would make advantage of it and declaim sufficiently against us pleading an oversight in the case But these Senses of men are evil things and most mischievous to the Interests of Rome These tempt men in spight of all their resolutions doe they what they can to misdoubt the Doctrine of Transubstantiation These shewed of old what was and what was not in the Council of Nice and are every day telling tales opening and disclosing some fine intrigue or other so that I cannot but wonder that Rome has not yet taken a full revenge of them For if they would oblige men to deny or at least misdoubt their Senses in every thing as well as one and require the Learned not to see what they do see in Councils and old Records as well as they require all not to see what they do see in the consecrated Elements then conversions would be easie and they might soon find an intire submission from all the World to all the Supremacy they can wish But to let that pass it is said in the defence of Zosimus that he was overseen and he easily might be For the Canon that he quoted was a true Canon made at Sardica and not at Nice and the Council of Sardica as to Faith intirely receiving and requiring all that which was concluded at Nice made onely Canons concerning Discipline and they were put into the same Book or upon the same Roll with those of Nice Which the Pope finding in the Title at the beginning might easily refer all that followed to it This is said But the Fathers at Carthage did not judge it an oversight but intrigue and design and to withstand it to the utmost made the 31st Canon which ordains most stoutly and resolutely that If any hereafter should appeal to a Foreign Power or Transmarine Judicatory he should never be received into Communion by any in Africa Upon which Canon Zonaras says 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the huffing
Pope's Supremacy In charity I was bound to pity him and tell him something which he did not know and thereby if possible to move him to take more care if ever he writes again I pitied the World too to see it in danger to be abused by such impertinencies at this time of day Onely allow me the favour to acquaint you that Petrus de Marca speaking of those Sardican Canons lib. 7. Petrus de Marca de concord Imper. Sacerdot cap. 15. par 4 5. expresly asserts that they were unknown in Africa and other Provinces till Zosimus his days and withall he shews how the Africans at last came to submit to them and that was upon many and those not commendable reasons the first of which is this Cessere tandem ob pertinaciam sedis Apostolicae Pontificum qui nihil remittere voluerunt ex jure sibi legitimè quaesito in Concilio Generali Occidentis Sardicensi nimirum praesertim cùm possessioni eorum consensissent Africani Episcopi qui ad certum tempus morem gesserant defideriis Summorum Pontificum And the last is from the difficulties which the incursions of the Vandals brought upon them who being Arians made it necessary for the Churches of Africa at any rate to purchase the savour and assistence of the Romans incursio Vandalorum Ariani erant in Africa dominabantur Africanos necessitate adigebat ad arctissimam unionem cum Ecclesia Romanâ It seems then that the Popes after long contests prevailed not by the merits of their Cause but by their stiffness or pertinacious insisting upon demands right or wrong And by making advantages of the necessities of others when Vandals and those too Arian Hereticks had master'd them and lay hard upon them for then those Orthodox Christians were forced to yield up their rights to the Popes before they could obtain necessary reliefs from them Thus said that wise and learned Roman Catholick And he himself in the writing of this gives us cause to believe the truth of this remark for he then found in his own experience the same stiffness and pertinacity and therefore puts in words to please them quite contrary to the design of his Discourse For he shews plainly that they had no right and yet was forced to say they had ex jure legitimè quaesito He shews that the Sardican Fathers who made this Canon after the secessionof the others could not make up any shew of a general Council yet says that right was obtained in Concilio generali Sardicensi nimirum Now Sir if you can think that the Roman Bishops have proceeded in these methods I hope you will hereafter less puzzle your self and your Friends with your Queries concerning the prodigious Power of the Papacy how it could get up at first by such slender pretences and how it could hand with such weak props how men could be so bold as to challenge in behalf of the Roman Bishops so illustrious a Supremacy so unlimited Authority so glorious a Vicegerency as the Vicariatship of Christ himself must speak All these will be much easier to you when you have considered these two things first the mighty effects of a pertinacious stiffness in demands right or wrong and secondly what it is to take all advantages upon the necessities of others especially at such a time when those barbarous People Goths and Vandals and Huns and Saxons had overrun so many parts of the World 2. A second point of Controversie between the Church of Rome and the Church of England which according to our Authour was determined by ancient Councils is that about the Apocryphal Books P. 20. which he says were taken into the Canon of the Old Testament in the Third Council of Carthage signed by St. Augustine Baruch onely not named Canon 47. Now to this it is sufficient to say that the Subject is exhausted and there is nothing left for another Writer to add to it The Learned Dr. Cosens in his Discourse of the Canon of the Scripture parag 82. has said more than enough for the satisfaction of any learned Roman Catholick as well as Protestant and if our Authour would presume to reply it will cost him more pains than the writing of a dozen such Books as these But some small return may be expected He shall therefore have this That the Canon he quotes out of the Council of Carthage Canon 47. apud Binnum Canon 27. in Synodico Bevereg does not provide for the taking of Books into the Canon of Scripture but for throwing of Books out of the Church It says at first that no Books should be read in Churches but these and then it says in the close that they had received from the Fathers that these were there to be read Now our Authour knows that though we call these Books Apocryphal yet we reade them in our Churches and that as much and more than they do in the Church of Rome and that all of them except the two Books of the Maccabees Now as to these Dr. Cosin 's Scholast Hist p. 112 113. they are nt mentioned in any of the Greek Copies of this Canon nor yet in Cresconius his Collection of the African Canons and how they came to be inserted we must remit him to Dionysius Exiguus for his satisfaction But if our Authour had any material doubt concerning the Church of England's Doctrine about Canonical and Apocryphal Books he would have done well to have considered the sentiments of the Doctours of the Roman Church before he had concluded against us Now I believe that Cardinal Cajetan where he endeavours to reconcile the Council of Carthage with Saint Augustine would have given him reason enough never to have used this objection against the Church of England He says indeed against Protestants but not those of the English Communion in fine Commentariorum ad Hist V. N. T. Ne turberis Novitie si alicubi reperias libros istos inter Canonicos supputatos vel in sacris Conciliis vel in sacris Doctoribus libri isti non sunt Canonici ad confirmanda ea quae sunt fidei possunt tamen dici Canonici ad aedificationem fidelium ut pote in Canone Biblii ad hoc recepti autorati Cum hâc distinctione discernere poteris scripta Augustini scripta in provinciali Synodo Carthaginensi Now this agrees well enough with the Doctrine in the Articles and practice prescribed in the Rubrick of the Church of England And besides Can. Apostol 85. this distinction has its foundation in a very venerable Authority for the Apostolick Canons make a great deal of difference and that upon the same ground between some and other Books calling some of these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 venerable and holy but then of the Book called the Wisedom of Solomon or the Son of Sirach and that most certainly is the best of the Apocrypha say it is to be learnt by the Young Men or the Catechumens for