Sexes dedicated to God Religious Ceremonies and all sorts of enticements to love heaven and follow good life So that the Antiquity the Protestant pretends to is of wanting wilfully those means of helping soules which the primitive Church wanted by the Violence of Persecution and the Antiquity meaned by Catholicks is of being like the Ancient Church in all things that promote vertue inwardly and outwardly The ninth Shuffle Of the Word Tradition TO Antiquity hangs Tradition that is the receiving of Doctrine and Customes from the Ancient Church The which Catholicks place in this that it is derived fom the Apostles to us by the continuall and immediate delivery of one Age to another the sons continuing their Fathers both beliefe and conversation in Christian life and treading the same paths of Salvation This was a bit of too soure a digestion for Protestants being not able to shew any Masters from whome they had received theire beliefe Yet a Tradition they must have not to be openly convinced of having forged their doctrine Some of them therefore sayed they received their doctrine by the Tradition of the Bible made unto them by the Churches continuing since the Apostles time Wherein you see an open equivocating in the word of Tradition Catholicks taking it for the delivery of doctrine that is of sense and meaning the Protestants for the delivery of a mute book or killing letter Others call Tradition the Testimony of the Fathers of all Ages and so att least divert the Question Turning the proof of Religion which is plaine and easie to every ordinary understanding into a business of learning and long study in which though they be worstted yet the People cannot see it nor descry theire falshood The tenth Shuffle Of the word Really TO descend from the Universality or defence of their whole Religiō to speciall articles of it wee shall finde them there like themselves As for example those who beare an outward respect to the Fathers finding them concurring so thick to testify Christes Body to bee in the Holy Eucharist will see me to say the same and use the word of Christ being Really and verily and truely in the Sacrament and that they onely question the manner how he is there which is lawfull amongst Catholicks to do So that you cannot almost distinguish them from Catholicks Vntil you come to explicatiō There the Catholick sayeth that Christes Body is in the sacrament as the substance of Bread was in the thing which before wee called Bread and now is no more but turned into that body wich was hanged on the Cross by an entitative and reall mutation The Protestant wil tell you that it is stil Bread and naturally and entitatively the same thing wich it was before consecration but that by faith which is a real actiō it is Christes true body to us How to justify these words that by Faith it is Christes true body is impossible unless they wil have us believe by faith what they tell us is false Therefore others say it is an assurāce of Christs Body as a bond is of mony Peradventure of enjoying Christe in Heaven But how different both senses bee from the Catholick which they seek to be thought theirs and from the natural meaning of the words every mā cā see So that the manner of being Christes Body which they question signifies whether it bee truely there or no but onely by a false apprehension they call Faith The eleventh Suffle Of the Word Sacrifice The like is of the word Sacrifice and Altar and such other In which the Catholick position makes these words proper and that the Mass is as or more properly signified by the word sacrifice as the sacrifice of the old law That there is a true and real separatiō of the body of our Saviour from his bloud and more proper to the names then nature can make which can not make a true body when the bloud is separated nor true bloud whē the body is left out wich in this sacramēt is performed and nevertheless Christe entire and untouched But a Protestāt wil tel you that whē the Holy offering is called a sacrifice it is meaned a sacrifice of praise or thanks giving that is in reality no sacrifice but an outward ceremony of praise or thāks giving others that it is a resemblāce or represētatiō of a sacrifice to wit of that of the holy Cross so that you see the differēce of the two significatiōs is no less thē whē by the same word as of Christes one means Christs Person another a Crucifix or the picture of Christe The twelfth Shuffle Of the Word Priesthood In consequēce and conformity to this they abuse the Word of Priesthood For finding al Antiquity gloriously full of this name they must also use it and finding St. Paul had too expressely taught us that a Priest was a publick Officer ordained to offer to God giftes and sacrifices and that he ought to be legitimately called to the office and that Catholiks take Priesthood in this meaning And how on the other side themselves had taken out of the Church all solemn offerings and sacrifice the business of a Priest and nevertheless shame on one side and ambition on the other egged them on to call themselves Priests they were forced to corrupt the Word sacrifice first as is declared to come to the name Priesthood So that Priesthood in the Protestant meaning is an officer chosen to sing Psalmes in the sight of the People The which how different it is from the Catholick explication of being the publick Officer of the eternall sacrifice is too plain to be declared Onely I must add that who takes ordination with the intention onely to become the chief or high singer of the Parish receiveth not Priesthood as it is meaned and used in the Catholick Church The thirteenth Shuffle Of the word Faith THe abuse of this name Faith must not bee omitted which Catholicks taking for a perswasion of such truths as are necessary to bring us to good life and salvation which perswasion wee settle upon Christes doctrine delivered unto us by Tradition of the Church The which meaning is cleare in the Apostle who expresseth himself to speak of faith that works by Charity The first Protestants took the word Faith as excluding Charity and cryed downe good works as improfitable the latter ashamed of this as destroying good life and plainly contrary to the whole designe of Scripture and Fathers took it for the same faith that Catholicks do but would have it have force precisely out of its being a persuasion and the working to follow to no effect but as a hanger on without any End whereas Catholicks make the persuasion to bee chiefly or wholly to breed Charity which is the true cause of salvation But the presbiterian party and the plainer dealing Protestants have quite changed and destroyed faith saying faith is a Persuasion that the believer must have that hee in Person is one of the
CONTROVERSY LOGICKE Or The Methode to come to truth in debates of Religion Written by THOMAS WHITE GENTLEMAN ANNO 1659. THE INTRODUCTION MR. John Biddle who is represented to me as one of the most learned and most rationall among the enemies of the Roman Church wrote a booke wherein he declared what opinion he had framed to himselfe out of Scripture concerning the blessed Trinity And that not out of Scripture alone but also out of the Fathers of the first three Centuries smoothly skipping ouer according to the vsuall actiuity of a Protestant Doctor aboue a thousand yeares att a leaue By which proceeding he pretendeth that neither the Caluinist nor any other who sticketh to pure Scripture nay not the Protestant himselfe who extendeth his authority to the Fathers of the first three hundred yeares and no further haue any law or right to censure him seeing he maintaineth all the Principles of both these sortes of persons and offereth to justify out of them by disputation whatsoever he hath written Excepting which two pretended authorities namely of Scripture and of the Fathers of the first three Centuries both of them privately interpreted there is nothing but meere willfulnesse to move any of the fore-mentioned persons to believe firmely any conclusion of faith and Religion or to censure rationally any who hold the contrary opinions This man not withstanding his so conformable plea and the maine position of liberty of Prophecying which is the Basis of all those who refuse the judgment of a speaking Church wee see detained prisoner by publike authority and his booke burned by the hand of the publike Executioner This begott in me as I conceive it did the like in sundry others a desire and curiosity of speaking with him Which not being able to compasse by my slender power My next worke was to reade his booke After which I must not deny him this commendation that supposing the principle of every mans choosing his Religion out of Scripture Grammatically intrepreted at is the manner of all those who recede from the authority of tradition he proceedeth very rationally and consequently Neither do I imagine that any of his persecutors is able to give a satisfactory answere to what he hath written And this hath bin confirmed in me since I have vnderstood that some have sett out workes against him which haue not afforded the discreeter part even of their owne followers the content they expected from them And that others have attempted to do the like but have bin soo discreete as to suppresse their endeavours vpon their finding the successe did not correspond to their wishes This hath made the booke be esteemed exceeding dangerous to Christian Religion by those who thought they have no rule to know what is solide and what is not in Matters of Religion yet are by the force of custome and consent of the greatest part of the Christian name detained from renouncing the God-head of the whole Trynity as esteeming it the maine foundation for a materiall point of Christian beliefe and that which hath brought forth during to many ages those heroyke actions and noble effects wherewith the Christian world is enriched aboue the neglected times of Paganisme Now this consideration or rather experiment as it conuinced clearly that disputations betweene all such as adhere solely to Scripture are for the most part meerely vaine and fruitlesse for witty men will neuer commit too great a folly as to maintaine by Scripture what is palpably and vngloseably against it so it made me reflect that euen the disputations which we Catholikes do vse against Protestants are seldome and onely by accident profitable And by farther rumination my thoughts sprunge out the ensuing treabise I may not conclude this preamble without reflecting vpon Mr. Biddles appeale to the Fathers of the first three Ages which exclusion of those of the following Ages Not because it is his but because it is common to him and to the Protestants and euer to the learnedest Caluinists as may be seene in the workes of Chamier and Daille Truly to my thinking it is a most ridiculous and vnreasonable proposition For I would faine know how it can fall into the braines of any indifferently discoursine man to doubt whiter the Fathers of the fourth Age did not know what the Fathers of the former Ages held better then we can discouer it out of their writings that remaine to vs Then more of them were extant Neither was there any cauils or att least very few which of them were trew which suppositions The stile the phrase the circumstances the practises of the times wherein those Fathers wrote were then better vnderstood And which is the chiefe ô fall there were yet wittnesses aliue who either had knowne them or att least knew others that had knowne them and had conuersed with them so that by being acquainted with the opinions of the men they could not doubt of the sense and interpretation of such hard passages as by inaduertence naturall euen to the most diligent and most wary writers could not chose but sometimes fall from their pennes These were the aduantages of the 4.th Age ouer this wherein we now liue And consequently if we can aske the 4.th Age what it was that these fathers held and may haue their assured answere to our question There can be no comparison betweene that euidence and what we can guesse att out of those scrappes and remnants of darke expressions which in many cases must be the subject of our enquiry if we examine their writinges I will giue you for an example this booke of Maister Biddle that hath occasioned the following discourse Reade the testimomyes he alleageth they will seeme to you the very contexture of the treatises out of which he hath drawne them so large in some places so continuedly page after page whereas generally our Protestant citations are bur of a line or two spoken vpon the by whiles the Authors discourse concerneth an other businesse And yet neuer the lesse nothing can be more manifest then that the doctrine he pretendeth to abett by those testimonies was not the opinion of the fathers he alleageth for it The councill of Nice called the Great that is the Vniuersall Christian world with open mouth and one consent condemning the Arrians of nouelty And St. Athanasius so many times vpbraiding them to their faces that their progenitors were onely Caïphas and Artemas and such like and that their Clergy men were faine to learne how to professe their faith and how to speake a certaine token of their hauing bin formerly taught the contrary The like in effect is in all other controuersies betweene Protestants and vs for in any of them the 4.th Age doth testify that the doctrine it holdeth is descended from their fore-Fathers and is in quiet possession of beliefe in the Church and that the opiniō they dispute against is a nouuelty they do thereby declare the doctrine of the precedent age more efficaciously then any testimonies
he followeth any other or so much as misdoubteth there can be any other comparable to this As for the other sort of men who of themselves are able and curious to look into the veins in which the rootes of Religion do runne Lett them but reflect on the change that hath been made in the world since Christian Religion began to flourish that is since Constantines time and since the first 300. yeares after Christ and they may demonstratiuely conclude that seeing the long space of 4. or 5 thousād yeares of nature was not able to produce those great and noble effects which wee evidently see have sprung up so aboundantly in so farre shorter a time the finger of God must necessarily be in this time and that Protestants by rejecting it as Papisticall do confesse plainely that all the great effects of Christian Religion are proper to those whom they terme Papists And seeing that the Ages since the first three after Christ are the whole flourishing time of the Christian Church this their disclayming them will appeare unto any understanding man to be the very renouncing of Christianity it selfe Now if he who pretendeth to knowledge be able to manage humane nature and to see how a freedome of heart from the pleasures and cares of this world is that which bringeth all good to man both in temporall and in spirituall considerations And that this freedome can not be introduced without a settled assurance of the goods of the next world nor that persuasion be wrought by any other meanes then by faith and by the course which Christ tooke for it He will not onely forbeare admiring that the world though fraught with arts in the first 2000. yeares should deserve the just revenge of the deluge-waters But will also discerne that as in the latter 2000. yeares before Christ it had advanced nothing att all So had it endured 4000. yeares more without the light that Christ brought into it it would never have growne better The love of worldly goods exalting arts and civility to a certaine pitch and then by its encrease into immoderation reducing all backe to barbarisme Or at least floating mankinde in a certaine compasse too and fro and never permitting it to grow into any heighth of perfection The fifth REFLEXION How Christian Religion hath been propagated and conserved THe threade of our discourse hath by this time woven vs into the consideration of the meanes where by one may come to the true Religion In which two inquiries occurre vnto vs the one concerning the beginning and first publication of Religion the other concerning the circumstances that belong unto it now in the present age wherein we live As for the former wee hauing our Saviours command to expresse that it ought to be done by preaching and hauing the testimony of all Christians euer since that it was so performed there remaineth no place to question how Christian Religion came first into the hearts of mankinde The Apostles had by Gods speciall gift the knowledge of all languages By this they could speake to all natitions And so it is generally vnderstood they did and that by word of mouth they propagated through all the world that faith which themselues had learned from Jesus Christ But that they carried any bookes about with them or that they did sett the nations they preached vnto on learning those languages in which the scripture was written there is no mention at all Nor is it either probable or possible that they did so it is well knowne that many of the Nations which att that time became Christian had no writing or reading in many ages after And so it is euident that the generall propagation of Christian faith was by vocall preaching and by vocall tradition from father to sonne of the doctrine first planted among them by the Apostles And indeed supposing Nations to be vnlearned it is cleare that there can be no other ordinary way of conueying this necessary discipline to posterity No doubt but the methode of the first institution is in a manner Ideall to the following continuation which is but a kind of repetition of the beginning And so we might justly conclude without any further paines that the conseruation of Religion ought to be likewise effected by original deliuery that is to say by Tradition But the very thing it selfe affordeth vs more light to see evidently the truth of our Conclusion For looking into the nature of that which is to be done we shall see plainly that it is impossible it should be effected by any other way What is it we meane by planting Religion in a Country but that the People of it should haue the knowledge of the way how to goe to Heauen Lett us then examine what signifyeth this word People There are two Notions of it The first is that it signifyeth the men the women and the Children of a common wealth or nation so comprising all the individuals of humane Nature that live in that nation Now of these it is the property of children to believe what is told them without doubting wheter it be true or no or ever judging of the thing proposed As for women a great part of them participateth of the same quality And the most of them are governed by their husbandes esteeming them if they have any worth in them the best of men The third member of this division falleth under the second notion of the word People and single is the whole subject of it for it signifyeth a multitude of men employed in seeking and in attending to their livelihoods and subsistance not looking after learning or applying themselves to study for which the greatest part of them wanteth either leisure or capacity or inclination Now in which sence soever this word is taken I◠appeareth manifestly that Tradition is the necessary and onely meanes to establish faith in the people For the Maxime is well known that he who is not of an art must in what belongeth to that trust those whose particular skill and profession that art is And thus it is euident that the People taken according to the explication giuen must rely vpon an Authority for knowing what is the true Religion and what is not But when we once come to Authority there is no pretence for any but for that of the Catholike Church shee onely can speake authoritatiuely all others speaking from their owne heads and shee onely professing to speake from the mouth of Christ and of his Apostles shee onely hauing had the sense and meaning of the Apostles deliuered to her because shee onely hath continued euer since their times all the rest hauing nothing but dead words and the killing letter deliuered to them whiles for the sense of those wordes they haue no further recourses them to their owne imaginations and discourses In the next place lett us consider what is the knowledge of heaven And our first remarke will tell vs that it is such a knowledge as God himselfe was