Tours had written in the sixth Age This is Sir affirming without proving and though a contrary affirmation is sufficient against such a proof yet I gave you there not onely the Instance of the Authour of this Sermon which I can certainly prove to have been written much after Gregory's time but the Instance of St. Bernard I will add but one more to them which I question not will satisfie all reasonable persons Isidore of Sevil lived in the beginning of the seventh Century and is allowed by all to have lived at the beginning of it and to have been not onely near Gregory of Tour's time but near his Countrey and therefore to have had the best opportunities of knowing this famous History you so much insist on and yet these are his words at the end of his account of the Life of the Virgin Mary no History informs us particulary that Mary suffered Martyrdom by the Sword nor is her Death ANY WHERE READ of nor her Burial to be found any where As this Instance shews that Isidore was ignorant of Gregory of Tour's writing and therefore no wonder that others were who lived farther from his time so it holds as strong against the forged Melito and St. Hierom and shews that Isidore was equally ignorant of them all or looked upon them as so very fabulous and Apocryphal that not one of them did deserve the name of an History And therefore as to the Equivocation that I make Fulbertus guilty of when I make him say No-body writ of such a Subject positively onely meaning that what was written was not true I must tell you Sir that you wrong me very much in this passage your onely meaning that what was written was not true is a very great misrepresentation of my words I did insist there upon Fulbertus 's not knowing as well as not regarding Gregory of Tours I need onely to put down my own expressions used in that Letter to let the world see how I am used by you My words were these in relation to Gregory of Tours It is no errour to suppose the Authour of that Sermon had never seen Gregory of Tour's book and therefore might have that expression concerning no Latin Authour treating of the Virgin Mary's Assumption or we may very well suppose that if he had he reckons his Story among those Apocryphal ones which were THEN WRIT but REJECTED by the Church of God. Whosoever will compare these expressions of mine and your charge will easily see that there was no equivocation on my part but a great deal of misrepresenting on yours Your next charge against me is as true and you tell me that you never said as I intimate that St. Bernard disbelieved the blessed Virgin 's Assumption I cannot but wonder at such strange behaviour whether you or I am the guilty person here will quickly be seen by putting down both our words about this in the two Letters which I will set one against the other that all may see the Truth or falshood of this accusation F. Sabran's Expressions in the Letter to a Peer p. 7. St. Bernard and others writ Sermons on our B. Lady's Assumption although in those very Orations we find they DOUBTED OF or DISBELIEVED her being assumed in Body into Heaven My Expressions in my Letter to F. Sabran p. 7. and not in St. Bernard who so very long after either DOUBTED or DISBELIEVED the Story of the ASSUMPTION in the vulgar corporal sense It is time to return to the business of St. Isidore you had said in your Letter to the Peer that there were several Isidores before St. Austin and that the Isidore quoted here in the 35 th Sermon must be one of them to which I answered that though there were never so many Isidores before St. Austin yet can you or dare you offer to shew that any of them were Writers All the Answer you give in your Reply to this is that it is childish But is it Sir really so the Isidore quoted was a Writer I demanded of you to shew that any Isidore before St. Austin was a Writer I do not wonder at your being disordered at this Question though all the World cannot but see how very fair and reasonable but the mischief is neither St. Hierom nor Bellarmine make mention of any such a Writer before St. Austin and therefore it was the wisest because the best answer that could be given to say mine was childish But that I might drive you from so weak a pretence I told you that we are certain that the Isidore quoted in the Sermon is He that lived in the Seventh Century and that if you did look into the Louvain Edition when you wrote your Letter to the Peer you could not have miss'd seeing what Book of his the Passage is taken from Your Reply to this is very short you say it was answered in your first Letter what answered before it was objected I said not a syllable in my Postscript nor you in your Letter to the Lord about what Book of St. Isidore this passage is taken from or that the Book was mentioned in and might be seen in the Louvain Edition and yet you tell me that you have answered this in that Letter But I easily see what it is that you mean by the Answer it is I suppose that which you next insist on in the Reply that the citation of Isidore could not be made out to be taken out of the Book cited by the Louvain Divines the doubt there proposed being obvious having been made before St. Austin 's time by St. Epiphanius I would fain know Sir what we must gather hence is it that because the doubt was made by Epiphanius before St. Austin's time therefore it was not made by Isidore who lived so long after St. Augustin's time or is it because the doubt was made then by Epiphanius therefore it could not be made by Isidore afterwards Either I see no Logick or no sense here and certainly Sir it is neither inconsistent nor impossible nor improbable that Isidore should in the seventh Century make such a doubt about the words of Simeon as St. Epiphanius had made in the fourth But all this illogical fluttering is to no purpose our debate is not about the doubt it self or the sense or words of the passage but whence the passage it self is taken out of what Authour and out of what Book the words in the 35 th Sermon de Sanctis are borrowed and here that I might put an end to the Excursions about things of no moment to the Controversie and fix you I did refer you to the Book Chapter and Page in Isidore out of which the passage in the Sermon is taken But to this I find not a syllable of answer made nor the least notice taken of it so that I should have suspected that your half hour had been out which you were willing to cast away upon answering me and therefore that you would say
no more to me did I not see that you had time still for a whole Page after this Whatever was the occasion of this Neglect whether it was because you had not one word to reply to such a demonstrative Evidence or for some other Reason I will not trouble my self to guess I intend not to be put off thus and therefore I am resolved that you shall see the Passage in Isidore and before it what the Benedictines as well Louvain Divines have said about the 35 th Sermon de Sanctis which is the Subject of the Debate betwixt us The Louvain Divines having thrown this Sermon into their Appendix as spurious and having placed iâ— the 83 d in their Appendix give this account of it This Sermon was the 35th de Sanctis but in very many Manuscript Copies it is attributed to Fulbertus Carnotensis It quotes Isidore out of his Work concerning the Life and Death of the Saints The Benedictines of Paris in their Edition lately come over have also placed it in their Appendix as none of St. Austin's and their Judgment about it is thus delivered there This Sermon is the Work of some uncertain Authour who quotes Isidore who is MUCH LATER than Sâ—… Austin out of his Work concerning the Life and Death of the Saints We have it in our Manuscripts without the name of any Authour but in very many of the MSS. of the Louvain Divines as they themselves observe it is attributed to Fulbertus Carnotensis Having now given you Sir the Judgment of the Louvain Divines as well as of the Benedictines in their own words I will next produce the Passage as it is in Isidore himself and as it is in the Sermon that so you may see which Isidore it is about whom so much noise hath been made The Words in the 35 th Sermon de Sanctis Hâ—nc Isidorus Incertum est inquit per hoc dictum utrum gladium Spiritus an gladium dixerit persecutionis Serm. 208. in Append. Tom. 5. p. 344. Edit Paris 1683. The Words of Isidore himself Quod quidem incertum est utrum pro Martyrii gladio dixerit an pro Verbo Dei valido et acuto prae omni gladio ancipiti Isidorus Hispai de Vita Morte Sanctorum c 68. p. 168. Edit Paris 1580. I can see no place left now for Cavil but this one That the Words here put down are not exactly the same in the Sermon and in the Book But such a Cavil will neither be offered at nor admitted by any Person of Learning since every learned Man knows that it is the frequent practice of those who cite other Mens Works sometimes to keep exactly to the words of the Authour cited sometimes to contract them and sometimes to give onely the Sense of them The Authour of this Sermon is an instance of this last Method who tho' he hath contracted and partly changed the Words of Isidore yet he hath given us the Sense of them which no body can deny to be that set down in the Sermon That it is uncertain whether by the Sword which Simeon said should pierce through the Virgin Mary 's Soul is meant the Sword of the Spirit or the Sword of Persecution I hope Sir that after such invincible evidence against the Sermon 's being St. Austin's you will at last forsake your wilfull mistake if such Arguments cannot perswade you it must be because you are resolved not to be perswaded herein I must before I end this take notice of your last Charge against me of imposing upon unthinking Readers when I represent that your Assertion was false when you said that the Divines of Louvain did assert to St. Austin the 18th Sermon de Sanctis I do own my words there and since you will force me I do affirm it a second time that Your Assertion is false and my farther Reason for it I will now give you here The Divines of Louvain in their Censura generalis which you may find on the back of their Title page to the Tenth Tome of St. Austin's Works have distinguished all the Sermons of that Volume into three sorts in the first sort they reckon those Sermons which did certainly appear to be St. Austin's and them they put in the Volume with St. Austin's name before them They next reckon those Sermons which are certainly not his these Sermons they cast into the Appendix as spurious their third sort are those which are doubtfull which they leave in the Volume but without St. Austin's name to them to distiuguish them from the certain ones With this information therefore we will look for the 18 th Sermon we find it indeed in the Volume but without St. Austin's name to it so that it is certain from this very Circumstance that the Louvain Divines looked upon it as dubioas and therefore did not prefix St. Austin's name to it but put that note before it which I mentioned I need add no more to so plain a proof as to your offering me Natalis Alexandre's Opinion I have here proved that if he did assert the same thing he was then as much mistaken as you But pray Sir how come you to urge me with N. Alexandre I had thought you had known that you are excommunicate sine ulla alia declaratione if you either read or kept his Books You lastly put me in mind of the Business about Invocation and your Challenge and Charge thereupon I will be as good as my word and will undertake that as soon as this Controversie is either ended or dropt You are so angry at parting that I cannot but take notice of it and therefore will be carefull to avoid a thing so indecent If I have but given you hard Arguments for your hard Words I have gained my Design I am Reverend Sir Your Friend and Servant in all Christian Offices Advertisement THE same day that F. Sabran's Reply to my last Letter was published there came out a pretended Letter from a Dissenter to the Divines of the Church of England c. wherein I am accused of being a Papist I am sufficiently certain that it came out of the same Printer's hands that F. Sabran's Reply did and that it is from a Popish hand I do here promise the World a speedy Vindication of my self from that Calumny wherein I will shew that the Authour of that Letter is as good at Misrepresentations as at stealing a Nubes Testium out of Natalis Alexandre FINIS a Letter to a Peer pag. 9. b Reply p. â— c Reply p. 2. d Reply p. 3. e Letter to a Peer p. 7. f I can meet with no Authour of this name either in your or our Criticks I suppose you mean St Ildephonsus if you did you should surely have corrected in your Reply the errour in your Letter g Letter to a Peer p. 7. h Reply p. 3. i Launoii de Controversia super exscribendo Paris Ecclesiae Martyrologio exorta Judicium Paris 1671. p. 90. k Liber qui appellatur Transitus id est Assumptio Sanctae Mariae apocryphus Concil Rom. I. sub Gelasio An. Dom. 494. in Tom. 4. Concil p. 1264. edit Cossar l Biblioth Patrum T. 7. p. 580. Edit Par. 1624. m Letter to a Peer p. 7. You have twice translated in this short passage Catholica Historia the Catholick Church n Vera autem de ejus Assumptione sententia haec esse probatur ut secundum Apostolum sive in corpore sive extra corpus Ignorantes assumptam super Angelos eam esse credamus Sermo 35. de Sanctis o Specialiter tamen nulla docet Historia Mariam gladii animadversione peremptam quia nec obitus USPIAM legitur dum tamen nec reperiatur sepultura Isidorus Hispal de Vita Morte SS num 68. p. 168. Edit Paris 1580. p Letter to F. Sabran p. 7. q Reply p. 7. r Reply p. 1. f Fuit 35. de Sanctis sed in plerijque Manuscriptis exemplariâ—us tribuitur Fulberto Carnotensi Epiâ—copo citat autem Isidorum ex opere de Vita et obitu Sanctorum Append. ad Tom. 10. Augustini p. 631. Edit Câ—lâ—â— Agripp 1616. t 〈…〉 doris qui multum Augustino reâ—entiorem Isidorum â—x Opere de Vita Obitu Saâ—â—â—doâ—â—am In nostris Codiâ—ibus M S. M S. habetur abâ—que nomine auâ—â—oris At 〈◊〉 Lovaniensium pleriâ—que ut 〈…〉 an t Manuscriptis 〈…〉 ur Fulberto Epiâ—copo Carnotenti Praef. 〈◊〉 2â—8 in Append. Tom. 5. p. 343. Edit Benedict Paris 1683.
silence of the Historians who lived in near or since that time down to Nicephorus who is the first and onely Authour according to him that broached that fable about Juvenal and Marcian the Emperour I have one argument to urge against your Juvenal and that is that it is impossible he could shew any such ancient Tradition for the Assumption since it is granted that the Writers of the Church before him never mentioned any such thing and which is more since this very Doctrine about Assumption was condemned in the same Century in a Council at Rome by Gelasius Pope with 70 other Bishops What I urge here concerns your Authour St. Melito the supposititious book under whose name was condemned as Apocryphal But pray Sir how do you prove to us that this Book under St. Melito's name was before St. Austine's time the first news we hear of it is not till above 60 years after St. Austine's time and the same time that we hear of the Book we hear of its being condemned as an Apocryphal thing Yet I will grant to you what I do not believe that the book was older will any man of tolerable sense argue from this Book a General Pious Belief of the Assumption in St. Austine's time when this very Book that taught it was condemned as Apocryphal at Rome in the same Century I cannot but stay here to wonder a little at your saying there that IF this Sermon be not S. Melito's Genuine work it must be of some other Authour nigh those times I can be no longer angry that you should stand up so obstinately for the 35 th Sermon de Sanctis when I find you at most but dubious whether that Book for so I would call it under Melito's name be genuine or no Whereas all the men of Learning in the Church have long since thrown it up as spurious and Apocryphal I have already shown how it was condemned by a Pope in Council as Apocryphal twelve hundred years ago Not long after that our Venerable Bede fell most severely upon it and lays to the charge of the Authour of it Ignorance and downright lying so that De La Bigne was about striking it out of his Bibliotheca Patrum but though he satisfied himself with some reasons for his continuing it there yet this is his Conclusion about it notwithstanding what hath been said above it is certain that this Book is falsely ascribed to S. Melito that it is Apocryphal and of no Authority and to be altogether rejected for its mixtures of Truth and falshood He then tells us that the Spanish Index Expurgatorius have ordered the whole of the Book from the 8 th Chapter to be expunged and I can assure you that the History of the Assumption is the subject of those Chapters which the Index hath ordered to be struck out And yet you Sir after all this and more which I could add are not satisfied of that Book 's being spurious Which thing among Learned Men I am sure will not add any Lustre to one who writes himself of the Society of Jesus but will satisfie the World what sort of an Adversary I have to deal with Having shewn that your Melito and your Nicephorus are of no Credit and there being no other Authours offered for my Conviction I pray Sir where and how have you shewn the General pious belief of the Virgin 's Assumption in St. Austin 's time And what ground had you for your charge of a new Errour in me when you are not able to evince the thing all see at least that you did not doe it there The next charge is a false Inference my words upon which you ground it are these if the Day of Assumption do not ever signifie the day of a Saints Death why may not this be the exception Upon this you charge me with inferring that if Assumption do not always signifie the Death of a Saint therefore here it may signifie the Corporal Assumption of the blessed Virgin therefore it doth I own that this last therefore it doth is not onely a false but a silly inference but I am sure it is not mine I onely said why may not this be the Exception I appeal to my words just put down and to all Scholars whether this be ingenuous dealing so that your second charge is fallen But before you pass to your third great charge you accuse me of a wilfull mistake in making you say that in the ancient Writings Feast or Day of Assumption when applyed to Saints did onely almost always signifie the day of their Death Well Sir and did not you say so your self in your first Letter is not the almost of your own putting in there These are the very words you used there as if Feast or Day of Assumption in the Writings of Ancients did ALMOST EVER signifie any thing else but the Day of a Saints Death I must confess Sir that I thought I had to doe with one who would admit of his own words and not charge them upon his Adversary as if they were his with one that understood English but I must now take my Lot what ever it is Your next charge is of a Cheat in endeavouring to insinuate that the 35th Sermon did not speak of the Virgin 's Death but of her Assumption in the Vulgar sense of the word But wherein is the Cheat I put down there the very words of the Sermon well but say you Assumption here does only signifie her Death and you quote a passage of the Sermon for it which is very accurately translated I am not throughly satisfied of this and my reason is this because as I was before I saw your Letter satisfied that there was not a necessity of taking Assumption here in the Vulgar sense so I was fully assured that the Authour of the Sermon hath determined for neither sense but hath left it doubtfull whether she were assumed Corporally or no You next take me to task about the mistake you made in quoting the 14th Sermon de Sanctis and you advise me to be less rash in my Rhetorical Declamations But I cannot see my fault here You did quote the 14th Sermon de Sanctis I went thither and when I could not find it there I lookt into those Sermons I mentioned in my Letter and not finding it in any of them I concluded it to be your mistake and did believe that some body had imposed upon you I afterwards looked over all the Sermons de Sanctis and not finding it any where I thought you had been deceived and I hope it was no fault to tell you so as I then did But you will have it that I was resolved to mistake you that I might fansie something to object against There are say you but two 14th Sermons de Sanctis that of the first ancient Collection and that in the other Compilation of Seventeen made by the Divines of Paris I am not Sir to be