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A01005 The Church conquerant ouer humane wit. Or The Churches authority demonstrated by M. VVilliam Chillingvvorth (the proctour for vvit against her) his perpetual contradictions, in his booke entituled, The religion of Protestants a safe vvay to saluation Floyd, John, 1572-1649.; Lacey, William, 1584-1673, attributed name. 1638 (1638) STC 11110; ESTC S102366 121,226 198

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that of two Euills we are to choose the lesse when we cannot auoid both because a lesser Euill considered as necessary to auoyd a greater is endued with the quality of goodnesse and is not so much euill as good But to professe against ones conscience an errour small vnfundamentall (f) Cap. 3 n. 10. What else do we vnderstand by an vnfundamental errour but such a one with which a man may be saued Which doth not ouerthrow Saluation wherewith one may be saued is a lesse euill then separation from the vnity of Gods Church from subordination to the authority there of for this is most formall and proper Schisme Hence it is false what you with (g) D. Potter pag. 77. D. Potter so much auerre and lay as the fundamentall stone of your building that it is damnable sinne to professe any the least veniall errour against ones conscience and that it were better to depart from the Church and erect new Conuenticles as Protesters did then hypocritically to professe (h) Cap. 5. n. 59. versus finem that there be no Antipodes should the Church enforce you eyther to professe there be none of else forsake her Communion This is a false and pernicous principle and as I sayd agaynst the light of reason and common notion written in the hearts of all men that of two Euils we are to choose the lesse if of necessity we must do the one or the other The light of the truth seene of euery man was not hidden from you when you were not blinded with actual reflexion that by the light thereof your separation from the Church is shewed euidently to be Schismaticall For Cap. 4. n. 18. in fine you say I willingly confesse the iudgement of a Councell though not infallible is yet so farre directiue and obliging that without apparent reason to the contrary it may be sinne to reiect it at least not to afford it OVTWARD submission for publique peace sake Now what is outward submission to definitions which you do not receaue in your heart but outward Profession to belieue what in your conscience you thinke to be false If it be lawfull and men may be bound vnder sinne to professe outward submission vnto what they iudge erroneous for publique peace-sake that is for the auoyding of Schisme who doth not see that the doctrine whereon the iustification of your reuolt from the Catholique Church resteth to be false to wit that it is always impious and damnable to professe outward submission to any the least errour which in conscience you thinke to be errour The fifth Conuiction 15. TO forsake the visible Church without any cause vpon a meere fancy is damnable sinne This you affirme a thousand tymes in your fifth Chapter But Protestants abandoned the Church of Rome without any iust cause this you allow and iustify seeking to answere the obiection How may a Protestant who is at least as fallible as the Church be sure that the Church erreth and that he hath hitt on the truth that he may with a good conscience forsake her Communion you say cap. 5. n. 63. in fine Hemay be sure because he may see the doctrine forsaken by him to be repugnant to Scripture and the doctrine imbraced by him consonant to it AT LEAST this he may knowe that the doctrine which he hath CHOSEN to him SEEMES TRVE and the contrary which he hath forsaken SEEMES FALSE And therefore without REMORSE of Conscience he may professe that but this he cannot O houw true is the Prouerbe What aboundeth in the heart will out at the mouth yea out of the quill which is ruled by an vnconsidering Writer You harbour in your heart that Socinian impiety that men may be saued in any Religion but you would fayne hide it and therefore make great shew (h) Pag. 392. fine 2. Edit pag. 373. lin 26. to abhorre it as most impious and execrable doctrine by foule calumny imputed vnto you And yet in this passage you do cleerely professe it and so fully that irreligion it selfe could not do more saying absolutely without any limitation That if a man know that a doctrine to him seemeth false he may without remorse forsake it and the Church which teacheth it and go to another Society which teacheth the contrary so that if a man know that to him Christianity seemeth false and Iudaisme or Turcisme true though he haue no certaine ground so to thinke he may without scruple without remorse of conscience leaue Christianity and become a Iew or Turke Puritans Brownists Anabaptists Arians Socinians Tritheists know that to them the Religion of the Church of England seemeth false and the contrary which destroyes Christianity true may they with a good conscience without scruple or remorse leaue the Church of England and ioyne themselues to their most impure Familian Cōuenticles Churches 16. When the Maintayner of Charity layes some testimonies of Fathers in your way you fall a singing In nonafert animus (i) Cap. 5. n. 43. telling him that the Fathers be not the rule of your Faith that their testimonies be no more pertinēt thē that semi-verse Verily you could not haue found a ditty more proper and fitting the tune of your soule so fertile and full of nouelties Nor is there any man lyuing I know that can better then your selfe out of his owne experience mutatas dicere formas What you haue done your selfe you allow vnto others that by your principles they may change Religions as they do their linnen and forge new formes of fayth as often as they make new suites of apparell Being questioned about the ground of their change they may answer In noua fert animus I know that this nouel choyce to me seemeth good and that the doctrine of the Church of England to me seemeth false M. Chillingworths booke which goes for current in England assureth me that this alone without further assurance sufficeth that without remorse of consciēce I may forsake her and goe to some other Congregation in the world which pleaseth me better and whose Religion I know to me seemeth true The sixt Conuiction 17. COntradicting the leuity of your former assertion that a man though he do not euidētly know his cause to be iust may forsake the Church if at least he know that her doctrine to him seemeth false you write very grauely soberly to the contrary saying Cap. 5. n. 53. initto It concernes EVERY MAN who separates from any Churches communion euen as much as his saluation is worth to looke most carefully to it that the cause of his separation be iust and necessary for vnlesse it be necessary it can hardly be sufficient Vnder the wings of this most true propositiō I shroud this assumptiō to be made good by your principles But Protesters had no iust or sufficicient cause to rent themselues from the Roman and visible Catholique Church This I proue for their pretēce is Cap. 5. n. 107. lin 3.
you in which speach your wordes interfere gall ech others ankles destroy themselues for to say Who can deny according to the exposition of most Catholiques that this text is vnderstood of Sacramentall eating and drinking doth imply that many Catholiques and with them most of Protestants deny it And consequently Who can deny it according to most is as wise a speach as if you should say It is a most vndeniable by many iustly denied truth For do not you write Preface n. 30. in fine There is no more certaine signe that a Point is not euident then that honest and vnderstanding and in different men and such as giue themselues liberty of Iudgment after a mature deliberation differ about it 25. Thirdly you vrge Scripture as plaine against Latin seruice saying Cap. 3. n. 21. n. 71. It is a plaine reuelation of God that the publique Prayers and Hymnes of the Church should be in such a language as is most for edification yet these reuelatiōs the Church of Rome not seeing c. I omit that you corrupt the Scripture by adding to the text the word most And pag. 173. lin 3. you cite these as the very words of S. Paul to vse a language which the Assistāts generally vnderstand not is not for edificatiō which is Scripture verbatim coyned and forged in your owne head I pretermit also so many cleere and fully satisfying answeres giuen by Catholiques which you do not mentiō much lesse confute I will shew that you behead this your Argumēt with your owne sword Do not you say Cap. 3. n. 32. that the Apostles in their writings deliuer some things as the dictates of human reason and prudence and not as diuine reuelations and that you see no reason why we should take them to be diuine reuelations This supposed I assume But S. Paul deliuers this order that an vnknowne tongue is not best for edification and decency as a dictate of humane reason and prudence as is manifest by the whole tenour of his discourse Ergo there is no reason why we should take it as a diuine reuelation vpon your word We belieue it indeed as the word of God that the Apostle did iudge that obseruance most for edification and decency in those tymes when Latin Greeke were vulgar languages almost euery where commonly knowne of all Since his tyme the Latin being not knowne and vulgar in euery Country of the Latin Church as it was before whether in this respect the Latin ought to cease to be the Vniuersall language for the Liturgy of the Latin Church is a question not decided by diuine reuelation but to be decided by human reason and prudence for it is different in state and quality from that decided by the Apostle such kind of dictats of human reason being variable according to the diuersity of tymes places persons customes Adde that Latin which most men of better education and quality vnderstand and all Church-men vnderstand cannot be tearmed a language vnknowne in the Church yea rather vulgar tongues are vnknowne and barbarous in the Christian Church 26. Fourthly against infallible Iudges (g) Cap 4. nu 16. lin 23. Ca. 4 n. 53 Cap. 6. n. 61. in many other places in the Church since the A postles you come forth euery foote with this Scripture Be not called Maisters vpon earth for one is your Maistere Christ The vanity of which obiection I demonstrate by this Syllogis me wherein both propositions be your owne and most infallible truths The Apostles (h) Cap. 2. n. 155. were the infallible Iudges of Controuersies about faith so long as they lyued the Maisters Doctours Guides of the Church But the A postles heerin did not transgresse the command giuen them by our Lord be not called Maisters on earth Ergo to be and to be called Iudges and Maisters of the Church in the place of Christ and subordinate vnto him is not against that precept of our Lord. 27. I conclude this Argument requesting you in the sight of the Inspectour of hearts as you belieue there is any such to ruminate and ponder your owne saying It imports euery man who separates from any Churches Communion euen as much as his Saluation is worth to looke most carefully that the case of his separation be iust and necessary The cause pretended of your separation from the Communion of the whole Catholique Church is the euidence of Scripture against her custome The strongest testimonies you do or can pretend are these by me now answered then which you say there cannot possibly be any playner Now can you thinke in cōscience that the former testimonies are cleere euident necessary such as necessitate conuince and compell the vnderstanding to assent Can you presume you shall be so eloquent at the day of Iudgement as to make our Lord belieue you were so simple and of so little Iudgement as you did really and in conscience vndoubtedly belieue that these texts were euident necessary formall expresse as cleere as the Sunne Thinke of it I pray you for by your owne confession it cōcernes you and euery Protestant as much as his eternall saluation is worth The seauenth Conuiction 27. YOu forsake the Roman and the Catholique externall Communion not onely without iust cause but without as much as a seeming cause euen against your conscience out of hatred of knowne truth What is damnable Schisme if this be not that you goe against your conscience and impugne knowne truth though you be very loath this mystery of your heart should be disclosed yet such is your inconsideration as you professe it openly inough in words but practise the same much more openly in deeds cap. 2. n. 47 in fine The rest of this Paragraph I am as willing it should be true as you are to haue it and so let it passe as a discourse wherein we are wholy vnconcerned You might haue met with an Aduersary that would not haue suffered you to haue said so much truth together but to me it is sufficient that it is nothing to the purpose These be your words in which you lay the inside of your heart outwards and plainly discouer your wifull auersion from knowne truth You suffered Charily mainteyned to speake so much truth togeather Why did you so Not because it was truth but because it was not to the purpose that is it made not against you so you were willing it should be true And doth not this imply that had that part of the Paragraph made against you had you beene vnwilling it should haue beene true you would not haue endured it you would haue impugned it with all might and mayne though it had beene truth neuer so much Had you sayd You might haue met with an Aduersary that would not haue suffered you to haue sayd so much vntruth together but to mee it is sufficient that it is nothing to the purpose this had been some courtesy of forbearāce but to say that you would not suffer so much