men so wilfully seek to blind themselves and others in a question as clear as that two and three make five Suppose of those Divines whom the Pope heard in this question the one held that souls were delivered before the day of Judgment out of Purgatory and the other as stoutly deny'd it And the Pope asked them whether at least they agreed in this that whensoever the souls went out of Purgatory they went straight to Heaven and both answered yes they both hold that the Pope could not without nonsence tell them he would define that which they both agreed upon without mâ—dling with the question they disagreed in And if this be as plain as that two and three make five if it were the ordinary Rule and proceeding of the Fathers in the Council of Trent as every one may see in the Catholick History of it is it not pure frowardness and pertinacy in your Divine to spend some four leaves to prove this Nonsence But you may reply for him that there was no such opposition of Divines First I ask how he knows it for he hath cited never a Diariâ—… of what passed about making of the Bull. But suppose there was not doth what passed a day or a month before make the Pope's proposition as it lyes to be Sence or Nonsence And the substance of this answer by all probability your Divine had read in Religion and Reason pag. 69. since though without naming it he often cites it and yet resolvedly rambles upon other solutions without taking notice of this which was the main I would intreat my Reader who shall not be satisfy'd with this to read the place newly cited for this Divines Catching of Larks and Pope Joan is such stuff as deserves not to be looked into 13. In his twelfth Number he falls upon the Council of Florence but speaketh nothing of any consequence which hath not been answered Wherefore I reâ—it the Reader to Religion and Reason p. 58 59 60. 14. N. 13. he turns us back to his fifth Chapter where he had mention'd Gennadius and the truth is my answer there was short and must be still For although I am secure that what I there sayd was true yet I am desirous to see the Book it self before I give a fuller answer not to your Divine but to another who before him objected the same Authority a great deal more strongly against me There remains no more in this Chapter but to joyn in prayer with your Divine for the good man who published in English this Bull of Pope Benedict and the Council of Florence that every Judicious man may see who truly stand to their words and meaning and who do violently strain them against both words and sence NINTH DIVISION Containing an Answer to his fifteenth and sixteenth Chapters Universality of Opiners no way obliging to Belief His bold and weak Challenges That the imagin'd Corporeity of Spirits grounded the Opinion of their Mutability What foâ—…ed and spread it A short Account of J. M's weak performances hitherto 1. HIS fifteenth Chapter carries for title The Verdict of the Catholick world for us A brave title 〈◊〉 and I will do him that right as to testify he follows it handsomely His first Argument is that suppose the delivery of souls before Judgment had been but a probable opinion yet Universal to all Pastors Doctors and leading Teachers for five hundred years it would be far more rational to follow it then another which should be pretended a Demonstration but for whatsoever the Auditour can tell may have some horrid Errour ly for a while couched in it which might in time be discovered To this I give two answers 2. The first is that in Metaphysical rigour of truth no multitude of men can be so vast no gravity and wisdome of them so high and great as to oblige any ingenious man to beleeve that which themselves profess they do not know whether it be true or no. â—or all Belief is grounded upon the knowledg of another If I be secured he does not know the thing I should beleeve upon his credit I have no ground of belief for upon this point he is a pure Ignorant If you reply though he do not know it to be true yet he thinks so I must answer that I ought to beleeve him the less seeing he is not so honest to himself but that he will cozen himself by trusting that to which his own conscience telleth him he ought not to trust Now this is the condition of all those who hold a proposition as probable And therefore though all the world for five hundred Ages had held the deliverableness of souls out of Purgatory onely as probable in rigour it made no advantage at all 3. My second Answer is more accommodated to human practise and it is taken out of Nature and Experience out of which St. Austin took it This distinguishes Mankind into two degrees One that is able fully and properly to judge of a truth proposed with due proof and as it should be The other that either for natural dullness or for unwillingness to take pains is not in state to look upon truth in it self and therefore is fittingly to be governed by Authority To the former no multitude nor time can bring obligation to refuse a well proposed Verity as long as the contrary Authority is uncertain The other ought indeed not to meddle but if by any necessity he must do beyond his reach it is clear the greater number ought to oversway with him as far as he is not able to weigh the worth of both sides By these two Answers you will see the pleading of multitudes of Opinatours will not much advantage your Divines opinion further then amongst them who ought not to meddle in such questions 4. Although this evidently ruines his Argument yet I cannot omit to shew another weakness unsufferable for its plainness For he adds that if they had no other witness then of the Latin Church for these last five hundred years this alone were not to be sleighted I pray why not Is not the contrary Testimony of the Greek Church predominant over the Latin where there is but an opinion of five hundred years on one side and one thousand five hundred on the other Nay put case the Greek Church were not against it considering that the subject is a matter not otherwise to be known then by Revelation were it not intolerable to bind any man to the belief of it otherwise then because it is revealed which if it were but of five hundred years standing were impossible to be For the Church professes no Revelations for her guide since the Apostles dyed If then your Divine professed no farther he must confess it to be a weak and ungrounded Innovation For supposing it cannot be known but by Revelation and that there has been no Revelations these six hundred years it is clearly wholly ungrounded And because the subject is a subject of Revelation that is
they had performed their charge But because it was time to end the Council referred the execution of the Decree to the Pope as also of the setting forth the Catechism and reforming the 〈◊〉 and the Breviary and ordered the Popes determination in 〈◊〉 question that rose aboâ—… these Books should be held for deciâ—… 17. If I had been left to mine own Judgment I should have thought this no great honour to the Pope further then as it was a good Action in him to concuâ— to the good of the Church For if the Pope had refused it they must have appointed some Congregation to have done the same as we see the Inquisition and Provincial Councils to have done the like in divers Countries Now your great Divine finds in this great Mysteries that the Council gave the Pope Authority to determine the Verity of all propositions Was there ever such a pâ—ece oâ— Mountebankery Or is not the Pope well seâ— up to have got such Champions to proclaim his Power and Authority And what again hâ—… Divinity made that now we have so many Articles of faith confirmed by the Definition a General Council that must be received as there be sentences either put out or allow'd in the Books censured in the Index Expurgatorius I must not conceal his Demonstration for this Learned Conclusion Could saith he the Council give him Authority to do that after the sitting of the Council which by his own Authority he could not 〈◊〉 by himself before the Council And out of this infers that the Pope does it by his own Authority As for his question I will not meddle with it but hold it at present for one of those doubtfull Articles which God will not have known though he may find many Divines who would answer him that the Council could but what I am certain of is that the Council could not give him that which he had before and therefore your Divine contradicts himself in alleadging the Council for giving the power and saying he had it before 18. The following Numbers untill the twelfth are but Repetitions of the same Onely one Argument of his tenth number is worth the nothing where he asks Who can say the Council of Trent approved not the the Pope's proceeding in this point It is answer'd onely they that read the Council or otherwise have understood that the Council never took notice neither to nor fro what the Popes had done in this kind But he urges that the Council left to the Pope the ordering of the faults and abuses in the matter of Indulgences And who knows not who knows any thing of those times that the Pope promised to reform what belonged to the Court of Rome by himself So that the Council had no need to meddle in such points in which it is expected the Pope would do well of himself Now whether the Pope reformed all that deserved reformation or no is a thing impertinent to our question in which there is all agreement to the Popes decrees and t is a thing not fitting to be made publick table-talk as our Books are like to be 19. In the twelfth Number he seeks the Antiquity of the use of Indulgences for the dead And no wonder he cannot find any great Antiquity for them seeing Caietan and our Holy Bishop of Rochester had looked before him and could find none Caietan's words be Opusc. 16º 〈◊〉 No Holy Scripture no written Authority of Ancient Doctours either Greek or Latin hath brought this the beginning of Indulgences to our knowledg But this onely concerning Ancient Fathers is written some three hundred years since that St. Gregory began the Indulgences of the Stations These Indulgences were as I remember of seven years penances remission for visiting certain Churches no mention of any for the dead granted by St. Gregory But what says the great Bishop It perswades says he â—er adventure â—any not to trust very much to these Indulgences that the use of them seems to be too new and very late invented amongst Christians I â—â—swer sayth he That it is not certain who first began them and some say that amongst the most Ancient Romans there was some kind of use of them Nor doth any man doubt but that later wits have both better examin'd and clearly understood many things both out of the Gospels and other Scriptures then their Predecessours So that you see this great man thought that the Scriptures explicated onely by hâ—man wit were the solid Foundation upon which Indulgences were to be grounded for want of Ancient Testimony Not so your Divine but he can prove it out of Ancient Records and first of Paschal the first some eight hundred or more years since which is a very long time as he well notes for the Church to be in Errour This Paschal is sayd to have given an Indulgence to the Church of St. Praxedes in Rome for the freeing of one soul out of Purgatory But the ill â—â—ch is that this Monument is accounted to be Apocryphal in Rome it self and not esteemed of by men accurate in History of that nature And so neither Caietan who was very inquisitive nor Baroâ—… ever alledged it And Fabers story of its being approved by eleven Popes if properly understood must needs declare as much seeing it is impossible any writer living in Rome could be ignorant of so notorious a thing But I pray take notice by the way of the spirit of these men to abhor it See how they keep the souls of those who will believe them in an Egyptiaâ—al slavery perswading them that if this Pope had committed a private fault the Church had been in an Errour 〈◊〉 years even though no more know of the Popes mistake then have heard of this peece of Paper lying in a private Sacriâ—ty As to Bellâ—râ—ine's approbation we answer he is to be thanked for his pains of gathering so many things together not to be proposed for an Authority for the reasons I alledged above in the like occasion 20. The next instance is out of Baronius or Spondanus in the year 878 how Pope John the eighth gave an Indulgence to all whose hâ—p it had bâ—en to dye in the war for the defence of the Church or whose hap it should be hereafter Before we look into this Testimony I must not omit to note that this very Spondanus was bred a Minister was very conversant with Bellarmins works and after his conversion with his Person and as it is reported had Baronius his approbation to the compendium of his History which he made and clear it is such a man must needs â—e zealous to put in his work whatsoever was to help the Catholick cause and this if it were not in Baronius in notes of his own as he doth divers times This I note to let you understand that this man could not be ignorant of the former Testimony of Paschalis and living in Rome when I first went thither after Bellarmin's death could want no commodity to search
DEVOTION AND REASON FIRST ESSAY WHEREIN Modern Devotion for the Dead is brought to solid Principles and made Rational In way of Answer to Mr J. M's Remembrance for the Living to pray for the Dead By THOMAS WHITE Gent. In quo quemque invenerit suus novissimus dies in eo eum comprehendet mundi novissimus dies Aug. Epist. 80. ad Hesychium PARIS MCDLXI PREFACE To the Gentleman who sent me Mr. J. M's Book SIR PEradventure you may desire as well my Judgment of Mr. M's Book as the answering of it In Brief then The man I knew many years ago and concieved a good Idea of his honesty and such Learning as could then be expected from him He went after beyond the Seas where as I heard he follow'd other studies and at his return I saw him once but had a good Character of him from a common friend as touching his Honesty For as to his Learning either my friend had not try'd it or we had no occasion to discourse of it With this Character of his Person I undertook the reading of his Book In which I find all the Arts necessary to the dâ—fending of a bad cause with as little shame as is possible He brings known Heresies for his defence of lawfull Authours he stretches their Persons to the heighth their words beyond their extent if he lights upon an Authority of some Church Book you would think it were the Definition of a General Council he so presses the Authority of the Church for it By Interpretations and Translations he makes them say what he lists He imposes upon his Adversaries Erroneous Doctrin sometimes because he hath not taken the pains to understand them and other times because otherwise his cause would be openly gone He specially presses my opposition to Popes Bulls as ayming by confirmation of them to have me censured Of two the one he corrupts the other he understands more like a Banquier then a Divine and yet sets his rest upon them Most of his Arguments are from places common to both sides A great weapon with him is to tax his Adversaries Arguments as employed by Hereticks to prove Errours not knowing that it is a principal Method of gaining Science to use the Arguments of extream Errours to conclude the middle Truth a way much practised by Aristotle and very laudable For as Aristotle teaches there is nâ— famous Errour without some truth in it seeing wiâ—h â—t shew of Truth Nature could not receive it He hath made a Collection of good and bad I think of as much as can be said but seems to make no distinction between those that have some weight and those which have none His Answers are sometimes the admitting of plain Contradiction sometimes admitting of all we say and for the most some difference in words more then in meaning Yet he brags fearfully of his great Exployts and Triumphs When he pleases he explicates my opinions in disguised Language and ordinarily imperfectly I hope his Book will prove the decision if not of the cause at least of the handling of it He hath had two great Advantages against me One by which a witty Spanish Preacher called Padre Mancio overcame his corrival to a Sermon in a Country Parish For putting him to say his Pater noster in Latin before the People to try his learning when his corrival said it right he would correct him according to the false pronunciation of the common People which the People applauding preferred him So your Authour has the Advantage by explicating Spiritual things corporally to have the apprehension of Ordinary both Men and Divines and consequently the applause for him The secend is that he hath commodity of Books which to me being a stranger and unknown and in a Town not extraordinary boâ—kish are hard to find for which reason I am fain to be content with the faults his citations afford without being able to give so ample satisfaction as the seeing of the works themselves might have made me able to exhibit Yet all this doth not cause me to make an evil apprehension of the man I know the nature of the cause and the perswasions he hath been imbued with must needs have this effect that he must help himself by all the means he can and very likely is conceited that he doth Sacrifice to God in making my opinion seem the worst he can His way of Piety his instruction to handle Divinity by the Authorities of Authours whose Votes have no force his Obedience and the Utility of his Friends all drive him to this I on the other side am forced to treat sometimes his opinions rudely sometimes his Arguments because the English Tongue makes our Controversy exposed to such Judgments as are to be told what the nature of proofs or saying are and well it falls out when even after telling it they be able to see it But I do not desire any of my sayings should reflect 〈◊〉 his Person for his Learning beseems well enough the Narrative Divinity that he hath followed which hath no deeper root then whether some Classical Authour under which nation comes many a mean Divine hold such an opinion and if some Number hold it then it is Canonized for good Doctrin But it is not my Theme here to declaim against the weakness of vulgar Divines but to recommend my pains and self to you desiring yours and your friends opinion of them and of Your ever Friend and Servant Thomas White FIRST PART Refuting the Arguments from Authority and Reason against the Doctrin of the Middle State FIRST DIVISION Containing what in the first four Chapters concerns the Authour to answer The Adversaries misrepresentings of the Author's Doctrin and mistakes of the Council of Trent His Arguments to prove that some Saints of the Old Law reassum'd not their Bodies drawn from Authority and their remaining Reliques shown inefficacious and springing from shallowness in Philosophy SIR 1. THE Book you sent me put me in mind of a punishment St. Hierom reports to have been used to some Martyrs whom first the Pagans anointed with hony and then exposed to be tortured with flyes and gnats For so it serves me first it declares my opinion reasonable candidly It testifies that I aim at shewing the Fabrick of the World to be a perfect work of Wisdom and not a wilfull and arbitrary government Thus far is Hony for if I do perform it questionless I play the part of a good Divine if I do not at least he gives me the commendation of intending it Some parts of my opinion he explicates not well but I conceive it is our of mistake One thing he fumbles in which was plain enough Whereas I put in a sin three parts the strong and resolute Affection Reliques in the Soul after the resolution is changed and lastly the outward Action and give to all these for punishment their several proper effects so that the Resolution which is properly the Sin may be forgiven and cancell'd and
of the Abbot I confess I understand it not For had he had the apprehension that the torments of Purgatory be so great as Divinity tells us he could never methinks have with a Christian heart spoken those words It is now a good while since our brother who is departed remains in torments of fire and therefore we must shew him some charity As who should say I am content he hath suffer'd the pains of Purgatory for one month nay two for so long it was before he designed him to be released Imagine he had caused him to be rack'd or impal'd so long would not all the Christian World have abominated the cruelty What conceit then had he of Purgatory that would let his Brother burn in that cruel fire so long without shewing him any Charity I would to God your Divine had told us where we might find that Vindication o◠the Book he speaks of For the more I consider it the more unworthy it seems to me to be our great Doctour and savour more of the Monk then of the Pope Though besides he tells us that this story hapned three years before his writing and Baronius tells that the Book was written in the fourth year of St. Gregory's Popedome at which time St. Gregory could not be in his Monastery Nor do I think Baronius can rattle Canus for this opinion then since he held it himself in his eighth Tome and revoked it in his ninth Therefore he may have patience with one who falls into the Errour into which himself fell before 9. Let us omit that ridiculous opinion of excommunicating souls in Purgatory and answer the question he puts what any Judicious Catholick can say to the story Which is that the Authour of this Book sheweth no such exact inspection into every circumstance as that any man should be bound to believe that he could not be deceived either in his Judgment or in his narration as that truly Copiosus knew not of the saying of the Masses And I wish you to note your Divine's advice he gives that when the Authour makes this Argument that concordante visione cum Sacrificio res apertè claruit he speaks like a Doctour Is this Tradition or Scripture or Councils upon the which Doctour's proceed or a common and ordinary prudence by which every man conducts his private business 10. There follow two stories out of Venerable Bede written as an Historian should write and as it was worthy of his Learning and Wisdome The first is nothing to the Alledger's Purpose being but of the profiting of the Mass to the dead which is the position common to us both That which he chiefly takes notice of is this word delivery or loosing as if we held the souls were never to be deliver'd or that their delivery came not to pass by prayers and other good works So that this being agreed on and that there is no specification of time there is nothing particular in this story but that many who heard this story were devoutly inflamed in faith to wit to pray for the dead by which we understand that this story was the occasion of their apprehension of suddain delivery which hath no other ground then the parallelling of the loosing of his fetters to the help in Purgatory which every man would guess of according to the principles he was before imbued with So that both the effect is common to both opinions and the ground every ones application of the Miracle to a spiritual effect which they saw no otherwise then in a corporeal allegory But your Divine explicates inflamed in faith which as it lyes signifies no more then that they grew fervent towards good life to signifie that they had recieved this faith from the beginning which seeing there is no ground for it in the Authour is but a kind of a corruption of the Text by the Divines addition to it 11 The later story of Drithelmus hath one circumstance that favours your Divines opinion but the very same words have a blot to mar it that is what you◠Divine I doubt will acknowledg to be a flat Heresy I mean that these words all shall come to Heaven in the day of Judgment include some who have no Obstacle of Sin to wit those in the fourth place So that he affirms them not to go to Heaven as soon as purged against the Council of Florence and Benedictus his Bull. Whence by the Rule that no Revelations are to be admitted which contain any thing inconsonant to Faith this Revelation is to be rejected not so far as concerns venerable Bede who truly relates what Drithelmus not onely reported but truly thought But that he Drithelmus was some way deluded either because the Vision was a natural effect of forgoing thoughts or that he mistook himself in the rehearsal or some such like cause whereof the contingency of sublunary causes furnish us with store I pray take notice also that the works of the living help many to be freed before the day of Judgment be the words of the Angel not of Venerable Bede narrative not doctrinal Whence you may see this Divine continues still his practice of proving earnestly that which is not in controversy and saying little or nothing of that which is the true difficulty SIXTH DIVISION Containing an Answer to his tenth Chapter Of the Nature and Certainty of private Revelations The rare Spright in the Jesuits House at Vienna His Relations for what in them concerns the Alledger's purpose found to be in likelihood what himself intitles them Stories 1. IN his tenth Chapter we must launch into the Ocean of Revelations for after once by the foregoing Relations they grew into fashion every Spiritual body had of them either truly or at least put upon him Nay this very day there want not spiritual directours which profess a kind of skill in such a space of time to bring their Ghostly Children to Extasies and Revelations And who doubts but that if a Devout soul of her self subject to those passions which Galen and other Physicians call Extases or Enthusiasms light into the Government of a Ghostly Father delighted with admirable accidents both their thoughts being continually busied upon spiritual matters the Ghostly Father having such a pitch of Divinity as to correct in his Ghostly Child's apprehensions what is plainly naught and contrary to Faith and Christian life both being constantly conceited that God uses to discover extraordinary verities to those who much converse with them who I say can doubt but many relations of wonderfull sights must needs proceed from them nay many times of things which verily fall out as they see them as all Heathen Histories recount some which hapned so as Philosophers teach us by a secret combination of the soul with outward causes amongst which the Divine Providence mingles it self to work its proper ends 2. But your Divine and I frame about these two propositions seeming contrary yet so well agreeing that one good conclusion
will follow out of both joyn'd together His proposition is that these Revelations are undenyable because the Authours are known to be of great vertue and integrity who for a world would not recommend what they thought to be a ly or not as they deliver it and the Relatours are either those who had the Vision or some who had it from them immediately so that there can likewise be no moral difficulty or doubt of their true relating This proposition I fully acknowledge and a man would think that in so doing I give him full content Here must I advance my Proposition which if it please him as well as his does me I hope we shall agree in the conclusion to be drawn out of both Mine then is that Revelations Visions Apparitions c. cannot be certain to any body but onely to whom they are made and by consequence it is a folly to seek to prove them to any one who doth not of his own good nature take them for true As for the party to whom the Revelation is made I doubt not but God may have such a kind of influence as to make it beyond all doubt that it is himself who speaks to the party But that it must not rely upon the Authority of this party whatsoever is communicated to others that is the position I deny I say therefore the security of a Revelation may be as great as the Authority of the party to whom it is made And it must be certain to others that such a party neither was nor could be deceived in this kind before we can make any argument from the Revelation Out of these two propositions I gather this conclusion That private Relations for the most part can neither be proved nor deny'd and therefore make nothing probable or improbable and so by Divines are to be let alone and lay'd by to let the Historians first resolve of them whether they be true or false which is impossible to do unless there be some outward effects which seldom happen in matters of Purgatory of which we treat 3. I must add one note about his undenyable stories that divers of his Authours are known sometimes to have miscarry'd in their Revelations as by name St. Brigit and St. Bernard as likewise St. Catharin of Sena St. Mathildis and others And since I know no more assurance for others then for these I believe that prudent men will neither doubt but that divers Revelations are true nor precipitate easily to believe that this in particular is to be held for such Nevertheless I except those apparitions which come out with Authority beyond exception As I have light upon one which the Authour brags of that its Authority is not begged from ancient writers but signified by present experiences rhe year the Authour printed the seventh Edition of his Book So that it may be of as great Authority as our Authours Latin book which was translated into many Languages It came to Sevill where Father Martin de Roa a great Jesuit printed his brave Book in the year 1634 on Munday the twenty ninth of May when his seventh Edition was quite done and so it was fain to be put after the end to give you a faithfull Testimony of the duration of the pains of Purgatory The Title of the Book is Estado de las almas de Purgatorio and you may have in it both for Theological resolutions and for fine stories concerning Purgatory what your heart can wish Having told you where you may find what you want I may contract the story it self Not forgetting that it past at Vienna in Austria in the Jesuits house there which I do not know for they had three in that Town The substance of the story carryes that a woman one hundred and thirty foure years before had killed her two Children with poyson and dyed six and thirty years and an half afterward having recieved the Sacraments and suffered incredible torments ninety four years and four months And the Authour notes that surely they all three had no body to pray for them that they lay so long in Purgatory First appeared one of the sons to a lay Brother as he went to see whether all doors were wel shut and lay'd hands on him to carry him to the Church but being contented with the promise of three Masses let him go to bed Yet as it seems repenting of his bargain two hours after came to his bed to get him out of his bed to go to the Church though being fed with the promise of four Masses more it left him but so broken with resisting the violence of the spirit that he could not stir himself Some three weeks after he came again two several nights with the like violence and some eight days after came again as it seems more gently and waking him out of his sleep bad him say nothing and follow him but the Brother speaking and asking what he was vanished away Now whether the souls in Purgatory want civility to treat one so rudely of whom they desire succour or that they do not understand how to insinuate themselves without frighting of People I leave to your Divine for the Authour gives no account nor likewise why he could not endure to be spoken to A while after the spirit came to his chamber and led him silent into the Church where were other two spirits but all vanished as soon as the Brother being frighted cry'd out and he was found on the Floor in a Town from which the Physician freed him yet was he not for some days able to go he was so weakned Eight days after he had a new vision and the next night the apparition of two of the Spirits who after a great intreating that he would not speak told him the story above mentioned and having intreated some prayers and that he would keep fast and silence 34 hours let him alone so long and then appeared all glorious though two of them before had appeared all white and the first ever yet they were all three delivered together It seems the two Children expected their Mother They told him how they meant to have led him to their Mother's grave whom he should have seen in such a case that it would have killed him if they had not negotiated for his life by the Intercession of their good Angels because it was revealed unto them that by his prayers they should that year be set free 4. I doubt not but that the great Divine will out of this Revelation draw high points of Divinity and enrich the Art of Apparitions greatly It must needs be more certain then Venerable Bede's revelations seeing at least three housefull of Jesuits were witnesses to the whole Process Therefore it is no doubt but it is as strong a princple of Divinity as any if not all the Revelations hitherto cited and set forth expressly to inform the Christian World of the conditions of Purgatory I pray then use your diligence to your great
confess those were satisfy'd with a threatning of a greater Champion to follow yet I must take leave to remit my Reader to that Answer when your Divine goes no farther then the Vindicatour As for your Divine my first exception is that in his first number he affirmeth that both sides agreed that what was left to be purged at death might in some time before the day of Judgment be often truly sayd to be now wholy purged and he adds in Latin Jam Purgatum ex toto I see it is happy for him that he has a good pair of Spectacles such as can make him see deep into a Mill-stone For I that can see onely the outside find no such sence in these words I find nothing in the words cited by him that speaks of Esse Existentiâ— as Philosophers term it but onely of Esse Essentiae that is of this consequence These men are purged what follows That they go to Heaven or no. I never learned in Logick that an Interrogatory form was affirmative Had he sayd that both parties had agreed that this should be the question I perforce must have submitted but to make the world believe that he who asks what is to be sayd in such a case should be supposed to think the case true is beyond my Logick But you may reply that it is no great matter for his Logick may be far beyond mine Nor can I deny it specially if he can make them agreed of what they never thought of For in the same Paragraph he tells us that before our unhappy age he finds no mention of any Catholick who denyed such Souls to be deliverable before that day He had done me a great pleasure if he had set down what Hereticks before that time had deny'd it For then we might have gather'd all Catholicks had agreed against those Hereticks Now the Agreement must be such as was the Solution a School-fellow of mine was wont to give to the difficulties he found in his dictates which was to forget them So this Agreement was never to think or motion it or at most to hold it no way concerning the difficulty then proposed 7. This I believe is the substance of this whole Chapter For I see he tosses it and tumbles it in divers expressions but gets not a foot farther For what he tells us in the next Number to wit that this question concerned much the souls in Purgatory is very true but how he can inser it belongs to the Popes question is what I make difficulty of For I do not understand the Pope either meant to handle all questions or any one of Purgatory or to make an exhortation to pray for the dead by this Definition but onely to declare the efficacioâ—sness of Grace to carry people to perfect bliss as is evident by the Popes so much insisting upon the explication of the fullness to which men arrive 11. In his fourth Number he presses what an intolerable thing it is to keep the souls of one who hath spoken but one Idle word so long not onely from the sight of God but also in most afflictive punishments I do not remember I have any where declared that any man was sent to Purgatory for just one Idle word I think my way teaches that the next world depends on the habits not on the acts otherwise then as they are causes of remaining dispositions in the soul I do not know also where I have determin'd how far the pangs of death do satisfy for sins so that I take his supposition to be very aerial but it is not here place to discuss it In the mean while I see it was a providence of God that your Divine lived not before our Saviour ' s Passion for had he gone to Limbo he would have so murmured against God for keeping Holy Abel so many years out of Heaven for Original sin which Divines hold to be less then any Venial sin that it would have troubled the whole company 9. He seems to press that this will retard men in their progress towards Heaven But he that were to speak for my opinion would say no but that it would press them so much the more to be of that number that shâ—ll not be stay'd so long from their desired reward seeing it is in their own hands to go immediately to Heaven if they will For the case the Pope speaks of differs from ours in this that in his case it was not in the power of the living to obtain their coming to Heaven but in our case it is For Purgatory must needs be a place for tepid people seeing it is written of Heaven that Violence doth carry it 10. In his fifth Number he tediously repeats the same Argument of pressing the word esse to signify existence onely he adds a more silly confirmation For where the Pope speaks of all three sorts of souls being in Heaven in common and uses the three tenses have been are and shall be he presses that these 3 tenses must be true of all 3 sorts of souls whereas any one soul is enough to verify those three tenses seeing who once has been in Heaven is there and ever shall be And this upon no other ground then because it is fit for his purpose So willfull an Interpreter he is 11. In his sixth Number he finds a gross Errour in him that shall say the Pope made but one Definition concerning the state of souls departed What a piece of Divinity is this It is agreed upon by both sides what the Pope determins and in particular there is no disagreement of any point whether it be defined or no And your Divine finds a gross Errour whether it is to be called one Definition or more And I take it for so pidling a question that though the Book ly by me and to my memory it is sufficiently resolved in former writings yet I do not think it worth looking the place to see what the resolution and proof is but onely that it is a great impertinency to count it a gross Errour though it should be found to have missed 12. In the same sixth Number your Divine finds the Popes definition concerning the point in difference in these terms That if there shall be any thing to be purged in them when after death they shall be purged they presently after the afore said purgation even before the resumption of their Bodies and before the general judgment were are and shall be in Heaven have seen and do see God Now I am so blind that I can find neither good sence nor true English in these He begins with if there shall be any thing to be purged and ends with were are and shall be have seen and do see So that in the same proposition the mediuâ— is future and the effect passed Which is a rare piece of Grammar and newly invented to make the Popes Definition reach to what the Pope thought not of Would it not turn a mans stomack to see
merit he will here needs make an act of Charity not begun in the Man's life but in the first instant of his great knowledg of the next World enough to make such a weak one as I am worse then an Origenist For I know not why by his Argument any body should be damn'd or rather could be damn'd for questionless every Soul whatsoever it be hath at her separation so clear an understanding of the goodness of God and the variety of all corporal goods that if there were then place of Repentance and making of new an act of Charity she could not chuse but cancel all her idle desires and turn to God For if there be Repentance it may be as well in the choice of her chief good as of the ways to it But whence shall we know the good Thief was violently set upon his evil courses For my good Nature inclined me to think he had been for want or ill company brought into inconvenience But seeing it is fitting for the Divine's Argument let it pass what will follow That if he repented in this life there is place of Repentance in the next for all that have a perfecter knowledg of God's Goodness and their own Folly 12. His ninth Number sheweth a great fear that some in Purgatory may be honoured for Saints But what if they were Are not they God's Friends Are they not truly Saints Why then should the Church erre in declaring them so But that he may not be afraid I would desire him to believe until he gains knowledg that it is the Habits gotten in this life and not the acts which make Saints For the Acts pass but the Habits remain and budd into Affections of their own Nature in the next life So that if his Saints have no evil Habits the obreption of an act will do them no harm besides that the anguishes of Death have vertue in such men to purge sleight sins As for his Stories he will understand that I am more a Lover of good ones then a Creditour of unlikely ones as of that out of St. Peter Damian concerning Saint Severinus for I cannot judge his act to have been irrational as far as you recount it The Story also of Paschasius I beleve is of no better credit then of Baronius who was as I take it the last Correctour of the Roman Martyrologe and gave more credit to the Dialogues called St. Gregories then I do 13. Now are we arrived to the tenth Number in which he puts a Second Principle of mine though you will find in effect it is the same with the former or at least so joyn'd with it that he hath already impugn'd it Yet that is nothing to me so he brings new matter That which most terrifies me is that he threatens after he has done with it here he will make a new Chapter of it So desirous are People of making great Books though it be with the tedious repetition of the same thing ten times over But says he this Point is attended with so long a train of absurdities that one Chapter will not serve and so one must be largely prosecuted in this Chapter The Principle is that what affections the Soul embraces at her separation she persists in the same the whole time of her separation His inconvenience he finds in this Doctrin is that he must find some present asswagement of the pains in Purgatory when the Prayers are made for the Dead And repeats over the Authours he cited before to that purpose whereof the Devil in the Scul and Metaphrastes a Tale-finder are to his purpose All the rest speak but what we will hold as well as he yet must be plain for him Onely I must note that he changes the former Text he cited out of St. Isidore into paying part of the pain I must desire him to look well into his Books and see whether his own Fellows teach the Doctrin which here he presseth to wit that at that very time when a Mass is sayd or an Alms is given there be some relaxation of pain given as his fine Stories relate For I know the ordinary way is of delivering Souls or at least of the shortning the time of the Souls punishments whereas present Refreshments would rather make the pains longer and the delay of Heaven greater which would be worse to the Souls in Purgatory then to be without such relief and so by the greatness of the pain to make the time shorter therefore if there be not a perfect release the comfort should stay until the end may come with or by it Another quaint conceit is that all the above-used Authorities makes relief flow from the pious acts effectively Truly this is to be a great Divine The Authorities all that are esteemable say that good Prayers and Works help the Dead and we agree with this saying But it is necessary for him that it be presently done and immediatly these very words no whit changed signify that it is presently done 14. This is not enough for him but he requires that the Prayers should do them effectively and upon his least beck the words ply themselves to signify an effective causality Is not this strong Divinity to make the words of Councils and Fathers so plyable to his Will that without any change they signify what he pleases What would not Simon Magus have given to have had the Holy Ghost so in a string He objects that the relief of Souls is certain and must not be made depend of the probable opinion that Souls know future things Where should I have learned this Divinity if I had not met with it here I might have read all Suarez and Vasquez over and have found all the Mysteries of our Faith explicated by probable Opinions of which they dissent among themselves without ever understanding that therefore the mysteries depend of those Opinions But hereafter I must be waryer and know that probable Opinions are not to be employed in that kind and therefore I pray let him think I hold it for certain that separated Souls know future things as we have an example of Samuel Moses and of Onias and Hieremias He cites next the Authour of the Supplement at the end of Saint Thomas his Sum which Work hath not the Authority of Saint Thomas no not when the Authour uses the very words of St. Thomas For St. Thomas having in his Sum much change of his Doctrin in his other Works the Sum is the absolute Work which beareth the authority of St. Thomas the other Works as far as they disagree not with the Sum are confirmations of it or consequent to it Which I mark because this Divine freely useth the name of St. Thomas when he cites this Work whereas in truth what is in the Supplement must first be proved to be St. Thomas his Doctrin at least in other Books before it can be father'd upon him For the very name of Supplement shews the credit of the Doctrin to depend
so out of the way in the whole that I cannot set him right for he mistakes all and makes no sence of my sayings of this point and corrupts what he cites of other points Therfore I must seek the remedy of desperate evils to cut out all this discourse as incurable until he having read what I have written upon his fifth Number become capable of speaking and hearing fence in this matter THIRD DIVISION Containing an Answer to his Eighteenth Chapter Bellarmin's Errours advantageous to Hereticks The Arguments in the Middle-State from Scripture maintain'd to be solid and the Adversary's mis-interpretations shown weak and inconsistent 1. SO thorough many Brambles we are come to his eighteenth Chapter In the Preface of which he gives me two warnings The first that in reason he should expect some clear demonstration to justify the abandoning the known persuasion of the Church And although I have already justify'd that it is no persuasion of the Church but onely a popular Errour which I forsake yet will I not insist upon that not to make needless repetitions But I must tell him he must not expect to see clear demonstration For that belongs to them that have scientifical eyes and not to them who learn onely to bable of what they understand not A Demonstratour must begin from the first Principles of Philosophy and drive them on to his Conclusion not take up his opinions upon Reasons that fall into his mouth out of the Ayr. What he takes out of Faith he must not be onely able to say the words or cite them out of some good Book but he must be sure to understand them well and see that his Explication contradicts neither Divinity nor any other Science And of these two courses neither he nor his Masters as far as I could see were ever guilty They take Texts and urge the letter without ever penetrating the sense and foregoing all principles they fly at every question with fantastick flashes like Hawks at their prey where ever they spy it 2. His second warning is that my Arguments are the out-casts and refuse of their Authours And I am far from denying it For indiscreet people are as subject to reject the best as the worst and if I be not mistaken in hâ—s Authours they ordinarily chuse the worst Opinions for themselves being men that in Sciences hunt after vanity and the pleasing of the unlearned mustitude and so are fit to make a shew in discourse until the weaker sort be beyond their speculation but never understand things solidly nor are able to give satisfaction to sober Wits who look into the depth of a difficulty He concludes that we never take notice of the Answers so fully made to the Objections we take out of his Authours I will not return this upon him and ask him how many Answers he has read in Religion and Reason and my other Writings which he hath read as appears by the impugning of the Doctrin yet will not cite that he may say he knew not of those Solutions which he impugns not But I will onely say let this encounter betwixt him and me bear testimony how fully and solidly the Answers are made 3. He begins his plea with telling his Reader that I borrowed the first and chiefest Objection from that infamous Heretick Ochinus How does he know this Bellarmin says Ochinus uses this Argument What then therefore I found it either in Bellarmin or Ochinus How proves he that The Spirit with which he writes tells him so And my Spirit tells me that the Spirit which tells him so is the Spirit of Errour and Calumny For when I wrote my Book I had neither Bellarmin nor Ochinus Nor did I ever study Bellarmin so much as to remember such particularities out of him I am not ashamed if I had taken any thing out of Bellarmin to acknowledg it For I acknowledg him to be the best Dictionary of Controversies I have seen but a man must beware how he trusts either his Arguments or Solutions Yet he is very good to suggest to a man occasions and matter that may be well used Neither should I be ashamed to use any Argument I had found in Ochinus or any other Heretick so the Argument be solid to my purpose And it is the prognostick of cosenage in the carriage of the cause to make such exceptions An Argument is good and bad by it self not by his Authour and Aristotle used to find the middle truth by comparing the falsities extreâ—mly opposit and so if I by comparing Ochinus and your Divine should find the truth to ly in the middle I should think my action deserve honour and to be profitable to the Church Let us then look into the Argument it self Ochinus to prove there was no Purgatory argu'd if there be a Purgatory then Souls are delivered before the Day of Judgment by prayers but that is false by the Text alleaged c. Now Bellarmin if he had been a solid answerer would have deny'd his first proposition and told him whether prayers deliver'd them before or not yet Purgatory remain'd safe and Ochinus choak'd that he could not have open'd his mouth and this Answer I have found printed at Rome against the Greek Hereticks 4. This Errour produced a greater to wit that their great Bellarmin was forced to confess that the words of the Scripture as they ly or in the plain sence are false and so he fairly betrayes the Catholick position of Purgatory to set up his own fancy For his solution says that these words If there were no Resurrection signify ' If the soul were not immortal which be so different meanings that by many Philosophers the one was confest and the other deny'd So that the two propositions are neither the same nor such as that their connexion is plainly seen Therfore to make this good he fains a third either falsity or at least not proved nor very probable which is that the writer of the second book of Macchabees wrote after Jonathas his time when by reason of a firm peace the Jews fell to dispute about their Law and so into great divisions and sects Whereas by probability this Book was written in Judas his time For it makes no mention of his death which it had been a fault to leave out if it had passed before the book was written which if it be true these words must not be spoken against any infection of Sadduces but of Greeks who had long domineer'd over Jury specially in Antiochus his time 5. His fourth Errour is that he makes our Saviour also make a false Argument and to conclude the Immortality of the soul in stead of the Resurrection and to make this consequence Abraham and Isaac and Jacob's fouls are alive therefore Abraham and Isaac and Jacob's bodies shall rise again The which would not have silenc'd the Sadduces but rather have made them contemn our Saviour For they better understood Resurrection then the being of an abstracted spirit
some sin remains truly in Purgatory to be purged and that if onely pains are put in Purgatory it is no Purgatory This consequence we handled before when he pressed we put no Purgatory because there was nothing purged untill the day of Judgment Ch. 17. N. 4. Where I shewed how he himself acknowledges that there must be something that hath the nature of a Blemish that purgation be necessary His first objection is that Calvin uses this Argument I answer it was the fault of them who explicated Purgatory as Bellarmin and he does to give such an advantage to Hereticks by evil explicating our Faith that their argument though otherwise weak against Faith yet are demonstrative against it in their Explications His second solution is to fall into that condemned Heresie that after the souls are perfectly purged yet they remain in Purgatory For he will needs put a most intense act of charity and contrition for the first act of the soul separated which expels the guilt of Venial sin and by consequence the souls after they be purged remain to be tormented Besides he doth not reflect that if this act can deserve the Remission of the sin it can also the Remission of all pain which Doctours assign to perfect Contrition His third solution is that by the name of sin is to be understood lyability to punishment Which is very true if it be taken proportionally as it ought for there can be neither sin without pain due to it nor owing of pain but by sâ—n But the mistery is that he wil not understand this though a man should beat it into him with a pestil but will if you say the sin is not wholly remitted as long as pains are due for it cite you I know not how many Texts of Councils against you and yet now he can cite out of St. Thomas that the Remission of the pain belongs to the entire Remission of the sin and promises he will shew it to be the sence of the Fathers which I shall be thankfull to him for because it is a most plain truth But yet I cannot allow his consequence that when our Saviour says that a Sin shall not be forgiven either in this World or in the next it must in this World signify guilt and in the other onely pain For our Saviour does not use to make his words straddle so wide as within three words and continuing the same proposition to make a double sence of the same word He concludes that hitherto his Adversaries have brought no Demonstration Which whether it be true or no let wiser men then judge I can onely say that he hath solved no one Authority with any colourable answer but either by falling into Errours or abusing the words of Scripture by Paraphrases or inconsequent explications which are easily made appear to any one who attentively reads my Replyes FOURTH DIVISION Containing an Answer to his nineteenth Chapter The Testimonies from Fathers and Antiquiquity brought for the Authours Doctrin in his Book of the Middle State maintain'd to be assertive of it and the Adversary's Interpretations shown to be most weak and senceless distortions of their words and meanings 1. HE begins his nineteenth Chapter with the Comparison of the multitude of Fathers he hath brought to the paucity of mine To which I have nothing to say for a comparison ought not to be made before both parts are seen and he will have the Reader judge before he hath made any discussion of mind Let the Reader therefore remember what is passed concerning his Fathers which he professeth to have cited plentifully to wit one class of them who speak of our Saviours Resurrection in which we are more forward then he that all souls were then delivered Another class of such Testimonies as are confessedly Erroneous and Heretical The rest of Fathers speaking in common what we both agree in unless St. Julian of whom I cannot pronounce having not seen the Books Lastly certain stories which some Fathers mention your great Divine making no difference betwixt the stating of Divinity and telling of news but parallelling what a Father says he heard to what the Church receives from Jesus Christ and his Apostles Is not this think you a goodly score to vaunt so much of He adds for the last thousand years not so much as a whisper of any one Father In what age then lived Alacinus St. Anselm and St. Thomas who are cited for holding the Fire of Judgment to be the fire of Purgatory and were in a manner the beginners of the Scholemen 2. In his second Number he comes to the objections Before I begin them I must give you a short note of the state of the question You are therefore to take notice of two famous propositions in Antiquity which modern use has much relinquished The one is that in the primitive Church the day of Judgment was hotly proposed to Christians as in which both rewards and punishments were to be expected Whereas now adays all the preaching almost tends to the present going to Heaven or to Hell And this is so plain thathe himself renders causes why it was so The second Doctrin was that because some souls needed purging and this was apprehended to depend of Judgment also the day in which the rewards or punishments were given was deputed for the purging of the souls which needed purgation This purging was by the Saints generally taken to be done by fire therfore of the last conflagration and other purging we hear not of until private Revelations took Authority to build Diuinity new Principles since which time almost all the Devotion of the Latin Church runs after the delivery of souls from present pains of fire which the Greek Church professed in the Council of Florence not to have heard of But as in the former proposition the difference betwixt Antiquity and the present use maketh not either reprehensible so in this later question there is no formal opposition but the Essence Purgatory is conserved in both to wit that some souls are in torment until they be delivered But Antiquity makes no mention of any delivery but at the day of Judgment Our later Revelations make irregular deliveries upon divers occasions Now what I aym at in the citation of Fathers is to shew that the Testâ—… brought out of them for purging of souls all or generally speak of the day oâ— Judgment so that as to the Fathers the question is all one if whether there be a Purgatory and whether the souls be released at the day of Judgment and all the Authorities which prove Purgatory fire be such as to prove that fire to be at the day of Judgment Whence it follows that who will put a Remission before must look for Fathers who say that directly and not rely upon the common speeches Farther the question is of that nature that it depends from solid Revelation out of Scripture or Tradition and no less Authority is able to make it a
made in him and not onely concerning merit and demerit Likewise the following words are For such as in that day he departs such in the last day shall he be judged Which sentence plainly says if he dyes impure and deserving to be purged the last day shall find him impure and deserving to be purged what stories soever Bellarmin tells us of another thing 14. There follows â—â—ffinus his Testimony which of it self might have been common to both opinions if it had not clearly alluded to the words of St. Paul which he and Bellarmin with him acknowledge to be spoken of the day of Judgment and which by consequence draw the words of Ruffinus to be meant of the same To Eâ—cheriâ—s Lugdunâ—â—â—is he answers that he hath shewed his words are against us and there where he endeavoured to shew this that is Ch. 7. N. 8. I have answer'd his proof Onely I must note that he cites the words for St. Austin's wheras t' is clear they are not nor that homily of which the one half where these words are is taken out of Eâ—cheriâ—s and therefore the whole Homily must be of an Authour later then St. Eucherius whence his pressing of St. Austin's other places to confirm this is nothing to the purpose 15. He concludes his Chapter with saying there is no one Authority alleadged by which it is made clear that every one though he dy'd never so long since is to be detain'd in Purgatory untill the last day though he had but one Venial sin to answer for In which words there are so many circumstances that it were indeed very hard to find the proposition formally and in terminis in Scripture or Fathers Therefore I deem it enough for me if I find that the faithfull who dy in sin without exception must be purged by the fire of Judgment if I find no mention of any ending of purging but by this fire nay if I find that there is no remission of sin in the next world unless it be at the day of Judgment and finally if I find the whole direction of Scripture and Fathers publickly to be to that day without any mention of any change in the Interim This I think enough for me and plainly enough lay'd down since your Divine hath not given a plausible solution to any one place of Scripture or Father alleadged He confesses the tryall by fire but puts it to be a manifestation against the force of the words without other reason then because it would be against his opinion He confesses the Universal direction to be to the day of Judgment He confesses there is no true Remission of sin in the next world unless it be in the first instant or be as we say with the Fathers in the day of Judgment What can I ask more unless it be how the fire acts upon the good and bad For he not putting it to have this force by preparing their Bodies to Resurrection must of necessity make some fine procession of all who rise thorough this fire and a great discretion in it to know which it must touch and which not and how much every one must suffer and when it will be time to end the dance and tumble with the wicked down to Hell which will make a curious piece to contemplate and so I must expect his farther leasure and prepare my self to his next Chapter FIFTH DIVISION Containing an Answer to his twentieth Chapter Of Vindicative Justice and in what sence 't is transferrible to God His Ignorances and Mistakes of our Dâ—ctrin and Arguments Why Fire cannot be an Instrument to torment Spirits His rare Mystery of surceaâ—ing from Action by pure cessation and of Obediential Power 1. THough his twentieth Chapter bear in the front of its title to answer the objection of Novelty yet it discourseth of other circumstances As that Pope Gregory puts not any to go to Heaven but onely to be delivered out of pains and Venerable Bede the like out of which we do not infer Novelty but Errour and want of Authority in the Revelations they bring For Alcuinus I do not remember I cited him for any such matter but for the opinion it self to be for us Nor do we make this consequence because Abel went not to Heaven therefore others go not now but onely by this example reâ—ute the importunity he makes from the length of Time He says no man can deny that St. Anselm and St. Thomas held this delivery out of Purgatory and brings for witness his first Number of the tenth Chapter where there is nothing but stories written in the two Saints lives which to take for their Authorities is a great mistake For the Authority of those stories belongs to the writers of the lives who how prudent and exact they are and by how many hands they received them are guesses in the ayre I was told within this week a story how the Devil fetcht away a Minister at Zurick It was read me out of a Letter of a man against whom I had no exceptions but because it came thorough more hands neither he to whom it was written nor I could find faith enough to trust it 2. As to his defence that their opinion is not new I remit my self to 〈…〉 Answers in the places he cites that is 〈…〉 Answers of the fifth and sixth Number Chap. 9. his N. 12. Ch. 7. N. 11. and 12. Ch. 5. N. 11. and 12. Ch. 14. And as to his solid Judgment that those proofs are sufficient to make this opinion be defined for an Article of Faith if it be not already as of one side the Church expects no new Faith since the Apostles time so on the otherside what he brings in his fifteenth Chapter is not able to make his opinion as much as probable For the matter being a matter not knowable of his side but by Revelation seeing it depends wholly upon Gods free counsel and will beyond our reach otherwise then by Revelation so it must needs follow that the Verdicts of all men who go not out of solid Revelations are the Verdicts of blind men judging of colours 3. In his second Number he tells his Reader as concerning whether God sets pains purely vindicative that we dressup old Arguments in new Clothes the which I must needs confess to be a custom not onely laudable but necessary For otherwise no Argument that were old could be good whereas experience teaches that oftentimes they are the best and by the regular course of nature they must be so for what is strongest endures the longest But let us look into his process 〈…〉 cites out of the Supplement two Arguments to prove there are no pains in Hell and concludes Thus you see these Arguments do the Devil as good service in taking away Hell as they do our Adversaries to take away our Purgatory So that your Gentleman after he hath spent so large a book to make people believe that the pains of Purgatory are not so great as
duration of every Angelical â—…ellection did not hold up more parts of our time and therefore must needs be higher then our time But he will say they have a time of their own and so cast us upon the other question what it signifies Time to be true which he understands as little not knowing that in Analogical Terms or such as are by design equivocal no secondary sence but onely the primary is the true sence of the word 9. Out of this he proceeds N. 21. to exemplify in the Locality of Angels in which he tells us that we know they are truly in a place in St. Thomas his Doctrin Whereas St. Thomas tells us it is per se notum sapientibus in corporalia non esse in loco That to wise men it is known of it self or without need of proof that spirits are not in place He concludes that men should content themselves to know that St. Michael was ever in Heaven as properly as Christ descended in-Hell I must answer so they do but that is to know that neither is properly spoken no more then it is properly spoken that the Sâ—n of God descended out of Heaven at his Incarnation And because they know that both are improperly spoken therefore they endeavour to know in what sence they are spoken that they may not chatter words without understanding like Magpyes as is the use amongst his Divines He adds it is no hard matter for a Scholler of ordinary capacity to conceive the succession of Acts in Angels Which is very true but peradventure it is a hard matter to overcome that apprehension and to see that Angels cannot be governed like Bodies nor are to be apprehended to have such a succession To the like purpose is it that he says that our absurdities will be infinitely increased by putting that the acts of a spirit are her very substance For the good man understands not that the playstering and mason-like Philosophy he has been bred unto is the most prostituted absurdity that can be taught 10. Pag. 378. He begins to answer objections and first this that if there be no inâ—rinsecal change the torment cannot be greater for the passing of time And he doth ingenuously confess it cannot But when he comes to apply his Doctrin he first advances this â—bsurdity that in our corporal torments there are no parts but the same part of the torment is put in more parts of time I do not wonder that an oversight might escape him whom peradventure weariness had dulled but that he had never a friend or overseer of his Book that could tell him corporal torments were motions and had their divers parts proportion'd to the parts of time I can hardly beleeve mine own eyes when I see it in his Book I pray consider to what absurdities their positions leads them it The next absurdity is nothing less though peradventure more cover'd He grants that if there be no real change there is no greater pain and he puts that time purely makes no real change but what it puts the same pain in a new time Be it so Where is the real change in the pain No for you say it is the same To be the same signifies not change Where then in the tiâ—… you say that adds nothing Where then in the putting of the pain to the time He says not so And it is plain that signifies but permaâ—…e or that the pain is the same in a 〈◊〉 time Where all novelty or change is in the time and onely in the time So that he puts both parts of the contradiction the pain without change is no greater and the pain without change is greater and in matching of these lyes his solution 11. After this he hopes it will not be hard to answer another objection he will put and he has reason For such solutions which admit both parts of a contradiction to be true are most easy to be made and impossible to be reply'd well against But let us hear the objection Saith the objectour if two acts be indivisible they cannot succeed one the other but they will be together This your Divine makes to be the objection and answers No they will not be together but succeed one the other And then says St. Thomas well observes this and that Aristotle for want of knowledg in Scripture knew not this and that he has proved it by above a dozen better demonstrations then this so often miscalled by that â—ame What can I say to this great Doctour Whence your Divine hath taken this Argument I cannot remember though my fancy gives that some where I have used Letters in this or some like subject but I cannot find the place I find the substance of the Argument is in my twelfth Account of the Treatise of the Middle State But there it is put in this Tenour that seeing the act of a Spirit hath no parts nor is capable of them either it will dure but for onely one moment of our time or else by by its nature it will dure for ever To dure for one moment of our time is not to dure at all for there are no instants in time or motion for they signify nothing but the not-being of motion Now if you assign a part of time in which this indivisible act continues you give it a duration essentially above the nature of time and therefore by its nature to endure all time if not longer then time There is added to this Argument this confirmation suppose of two acts which begin together in divers Angels one be put to dure longer then the other without any real addition of duration wherein can this consist that is it consists in nothing and therefore is impossible and Chimerical Of this Argument he brings no more then that of two acts succeeding one must needs be together with the other without any proof why which makes me think he aym'd not to bring this Argument though he professed to answer all he had ever heard of By the form of the Argument as he relates it the Authour of it seems to aym at this Conclusion that two acts of the same Spirit cannot be disjoynted by an intermission or Cessation from all act because there would be no medium but this your Divine seems not to â—ym at So that I can see nothing into this Argument but that it is imperfectly related Unless peradventure the Arguer takes the duration of Angelical acts to be purely Instantaneous as are the instants of time and your Divine speaks so ambiguously that a man cannot understand by his words whether he ever lookd into that point or desir'd to meddle with it For Aristotle hath demonstrated that two such instants cannot be together and that St. Thomas made no scruple to admit though your Divine seems to contradict Aristotle in his Doctrin which may easily be for not understanding either St. Thomas or the question or the force of a Demonstration As he plainly shews by bringing in Zeno's Errour in