of their ingenuity in Defence of the Popes Authority and that I saw not well what Advantage they could draw from the Infallibility of the Church which they maintained with so much ardor that doubled my attention to sound the depth of the matter and I found that by the help of this Infallibility they would conceal every thing so as to save the Popes Authority and all the Temporal Advantages which flow from it and I made no further doubt of it when I saw they applied it particularly to the Clergy excluding all the people and many men to the Pope alone excluding all other Bishops Since these Discoveries I have always held it as a Maxim wherein I have never been deceived which is That when any practice or Custom in the Church brings profit or honour to the Ecclesiasticks I presently suspect and examine it At length having a long time reflected upon all the abuses of this Papal Authority and having observed the Deplorable condition to which it hath reduced the Christian Religion as well without as within the Church and seeing it was that which having driven the Greeks and Protestants out of the Church is still the cause why they return not again unto its Communion and that it even draws strange Persecutions upon the Church from these scattered sheep by reason of the attempts of the Court of Rome and its favourers I at last resolved to publish this little Treatise to disabuse mankind in respect of the unjust and criminal Devotion which they have for the Papacy and also to purge the Church of it as well as of all other vices and misfortunes it hath there caused being perswaded that an Infallible fruit of this Reformation would be the Conversion of the Greeks Protestants Pagans Jews and Mahometans not to mention the Honour it would do to all the Catholick Princes whose Majesty and Greatness are vilified by this shameful subjection to and dependance on the Popes which make them to be despised by other Princes who have freed themselves from their Tyranny A Senator of Sweden told me one day a very good saying of Tacitus to this purpose Viri muliebria patiuntur Men act the parts of women which is as much as to say they are the Catamites of the Popes However since it is in their power to treat those as Hereticks and Enemies of the Church who oppose their Ambition and Interest I prepare my self against it and that doth not at all discourage me It is more Honourable to be hated by such people than loved Illi maledicent at tu Domine Benedices I know the Reader will in this Work of mine presently look after the Caracters of either Jansenist Calvinist or Lutheran or lastly of a man who could not be promoted to Benefices and many times he will think he hath found me As for Benefices I might perhaps have had one if I had had a mind to it but by the Grace of God I will have none nor have I need of any nor was I ever designed for it The Jansenists are as yet too much Papists to speak ill of the Papacy As for the Calvinists and Lutherans I wish they could be brought to own the opinions which I do and which I have no mind to betray in this my Book It is true they have both written often against this power but not with design that the Catholick Religion should be the better for it to which this Work wholly tends Whatever men will judg I think I ought not to renounce any truth because the Hereticks know it nor to put my eyes out rather than see the Injustice of the Papacy because the Hereticks see it If I had not here drawn the Picture of the Jesuits Religion it may be those they call the Jansenists would have suspected them to have been the authors of it as the present times go and for the Calvinists I am sure that in many places they will say that I do but gild over the Pill that they may the more easily swallow down the poyson as some people have said of the Book of Mr. de Condom they may judg of it what they please I have followed the sentiments which the reading of the Holy Scripture hath inspired me with and in which I am confirmed the more by reading the Fathers and the Ecclesiastical History and by making reflection upon all that I have seen in foreign Countries and upon what I see every day here If the Romanists hear this Work spoken of they will say without doubt as heretofore at the Council of Trent when Mr. de Faber made Remonstrances on the Kings behalf concerning the disorders of the Church Gallus Cantat they cried I have no better answer than what he made them Vtinam ad Galli cantum Petrus resipisceret let them come and renounce the Dominion and Tyranny they exercise over the Church and over the World and let our Bishops for time to come behave themselves like worthy Successors of this Apostle This Work shall be divided into Three Parts which will contain so many Chapters In the first I shall prove that the Papacy hath no foundation in the Word of God and shall shew the vanity folly of those arguments which they pretend to draw from the Gospel In the second I shall make it appear that the Primitive Church never knew it and that in the darkest Ages there were ever some who opposed it and I shall confute many human reasons which for want of the Scripture and of the Fathers are made use of for its defence And in the third and last I shall examine all the pretended advantages which this Authority procures to the Church or to States and I shall shew that 't is so far from bringing any real good to the Church or to Catholick States that it is the cause of the Desolations of the Church and of the greatest part of the Disorders among all Christians of Ignorance Heresies Schisms and Irreligion that reign No man ought to be surprised that I conceal who I am in so perverse an age as we live in where Truth and Honesty as well as those who profess it are exposed to cruel Persecutions and wherein I shall have as many mortal enemies as there are worldly Catholicks and Papists and people in possession of Benefices without mentioning the Monks I have no reason to flatter my self with any great success this Book may have by reason of the extream disorder and irreligion of the Age and I do it more to discharge my self of the load lying upon me and for the consolation of my own mind than for any other thing as heretofore Petrarch said upon a like occasion Haec scribo non tam ùt saeculo meo prosim cujus tam desperata miseria est quam ut me conceptis onerem Animum scriptis soler I write these things not so much to profit the age I live in whose misery is so desperate as to unburthen my self of my own thoughts
John the 23 d. of Benedict the 13 th and Gregory the 12 th and even to give encouragement to all other Princes to do as he had done and he had much less cause to do it than we have at this time You see his reasons in the Letters of the University of Paris in Theodore a Nyem which were that they would not consent that the disorders of the Church should be regulated by a free Council and that they would not submit themselves to the Decisions of the Church Are not we now again just in the same condition since the Councils of Constance and of Basil For those which have been Assembled since deserve not the name of Councils because there was no liberty in them and every thing was there done by the Inspiration not of God but the Popes France did but half free it self from this yoke for quickly after we suffered our selves to be drawn in and have been like to have been undone many a time since by it Nor do I make any great account of the Conduct of the Venetians which is so highly commended who after having known the nature of the Papacy and the Genius of this power have but half freed themselves from this slavery nay less than half They have behaved themselves in this according to their ordinary custom following moderate Councils where excess was not to be feared and where it could not be committed Consilia media quod inter ancipitia deterrimum est nec ausi sunt satis nec providerunt For they have still this Viper in their bosom which they stupifie as much as they can but he may some time or other revive and devour them They have every day a thousand difficulties with these cunning Romans who will be always spying out occasions to destroy them and to reduce them absolutely under their yoke They should renounce perfectly and for â—ver all dependance upon this See and thus shall they be better able to regulate their Clergy which is as licentious as that of Rome which they dare not reform because it would be to be feared that to maintain themselves in this Roman Libertinism they should give assistance to the Pope to oppress the Republick that they might always enjoy the full liberty of the children of the See of Rome Vulgo dissoluta gratior est quam Temperata vita vivere ut quisque velit permisit quoniam sic magna erit tali Reipublicoe faventium Magnitudo Et hoc Humanitas vocabatur ac ne pars servitutis esset c. Will any man still say Ought we not to be of the Roman Church People are not contented with being in the Catholick and Apostolick Church if they are not in the Roman they seem desirous of having a share in the Abominations of this City and of this Court but the Romans are not at all desirous to be of the Gallican Church I would fain know for what reason we should be rather of the Roman Church than the Romans of the Gallican Church Rome is not as heretofore it was the Seat of the Empire and tho it were we hold no longer of the Empire and it is a contradiction for a man to be in the Catholick Church in the Gallican and in the Roman Churches both together for the first is the General and the other two are particulars You may always have Communion with all the Romans who live in the fear of God with the Pope of Rome himself if he be a Christian but not to depend upon him nor upon Rome You shall be as the Christians of the Primitive Church were for more than six hundred years You shall pay no more Annates you shall buy no more Bulls nor Dispensations You shall be much more Catholick than before for then you may hold Communion with the Greeks and Protestants by drawing them home to the Faith of the Church whereas the See of Rome is at this time a wall of Separation between them and us CHAP. III. That the pretended Authority of the Papacy hath never done any good to the Church A Confutation of whatever is said to the advantage of this Power to prove it necessary to the world by shewing at the same time that it hath been the cause of all the Evils of the Church THEY maintain that the Papacy hath heretofore done and still doth a great deal of good to the Church and to the world this I can confute all at once by a thing which the world knows which is that we have in no place so many true Christians as in those Catholick Countries where this power is least known as in France Flanders and Germany But let us see particularly what good the Papacy doth It is a common saying that there is nothing so bad but that you may make some use of it either in its nature or in conjunction with other things Let us then examine the usefulness of the Papacy omitting nothing that can be said to its advantage It is says Cardinal Perron The Center and the root of Chriâ—tian Vnity These are fine words I confess but we shall find but very little sense in them if we a little consider them for I ask him In what this Unity doth consist and how the Pope is the center and the root of it If this Unity be in the pure service of God methinks that God should be the center of it and not the Pope and that it is also God who is the root of it that is the influencing principle over the will and strength of men to serve him and to do well If this Unity be for doing what is evil it is then but a conspiracy and I do confess that in regard of wicked Clergy-men who are the members of the Pope he is the source of all their Impiety Ambition and Dissoluteness and he is the center of the Unity of these people who belong all to him and as for themselves he is the center of their worship and would be so to all other men Palavicini says that the union and submission of all Catholicks to the Pope makes a band a life perfectly Politick Vna conjunctione di vita perfâ—tta mente Politica He says not a Christian but a Politick life and according to him it is the same thing And in another place he says the Church is the most happy Body Politick in the world Corpo Politico il piu felice che sia in terra This Unity as I said before consists only in their obedience to the Pope whom they all honour for thâ—ir profit looking upon him as the source of Riches of Honours and of all the pleasures whiâ—h they have according to the flesh Secondo la carne This Unity is in the conformity of judgment which they all make of the riches of the Churches Patrimony which is that they are good It is certain that it is not in their opinions for what Clergy-man is there who cares for the Popes
the Church instead of being governed is devoured by a Faction of Villains who eat the people of God like bread But say they you speak of abolishing the Primacy in the Church and nevertheless there is no Society no Families no Colledge but hath it Without it these Societies cannot subsist It is not so much the Primacy which I condemn as the Tyranny which hath been joined to it The Primacy of Place might yet be suffered although Jesus Christ hath not instituted it in the Church but that of Pope is a Primacy of Jurisdiction to which the Universal Church and the whole World is subject as they pretend I condemn the Primacy of a Bishop who is a Worldly Prince who hath more than Twenty Millions of Revâ—nue this Primacy which is the Cause of all the Disorders of the Church Whereas the end and ordinary use of Lawful Primacies is to maintain good Order in all Societies And I wish nothing more than to see re-established in the Church that Primacy which Jesus Christ hath there instituted viz. that of Councils and that they should be often assembled as they were in the Primitive Church for it is the want of these Councils which hath undone the Church We see in the Preface of the Eleventh Council of Toledo that the Fathers say That having wanted the Light of Councils for the space of Ten Years the whole World went astray and the Church fell into disorder and confusion How much more reason have we now to complain of that we who for above these Hundred Years have seen none and which is more can never hope to see a Lawful one whilst the Papacy shall subsist Substracta Luce Conciliorum integro decennie Matrem Omnium Errorum ignorantiam otiosas Mentes occupasse adeo ut Babylonicae Confusionis olla succensa purpuratae Meretricis incrementa Sacerdotes sequerentur quia Ecclesiastici Convenius non aderat Disciplina nec erat qui Errantium Corrigeret partes cum Sermo Divinus haberetur Extorris Is not this the cause of so many Superstitions of so many Heresies Schisms and Licentiousness which we see in the Clergy Is it not a ridiculous thing that no more Councils shall be called whilst we see the Monks both Capucins Carthusians and Jesuits often assemble their Congregations for the augmentation of their Societies It is no wonder if the Church daily runs to ruin whilst these Societies fortifie themselves Is it not clear as the day that if Provincial Synods were called every year National every three or four years as heretofore they were under our great Kings and Oecumenical Councils at least once in Ten years that Remedies would be found out for the Calamities of the Church Might not a Patriarch in every State aided by the Secular Power excute the Decrees of the Church with more facility less jealousie and more security for Religion and for the State than a forreign Ambitious and potent Prince who resolves to take no care for Religion but to model every thing to his own Interest If this Patriarch should neglect his Duty or carry it like a Master should not the Prince chastise him nor depose him Experience shews us that the Church never flourished but when she was Aristocratically governed and when there was no other Primacy in the Universal Church than that of Councils and all Primates and Patriarchs were subject to them But since the Patriarch of Rome hath had the sole disposing of Religion in the West we have seen nothing but Confusion Anarchy Schism Heresies Impiety Atheism Cruelty and Barbarity Ipsa Ecclesia Vnus est Princeps Vnitati fidelium non singulis haec Jurisdictio a Domino conceditur c. Quia Vnitas Ecclesiae multo major est atque perfectior quam Vnitas Vnius Regis aut Imperatoris terreni Thus did the Holy Council of Basil answer the false Reasons of Pope Eugenius his Orators who pretended That the Unity of the Church was preserved much better by a Pope than by the Council There are others who would have the Pope's Authority confin'd within the bounds which the Councils of Constance and of Basil had marked out for it but they never understood the Moral Impossibility that there is not only of making the Popes consent to it but suppose they were constrained to consent to these Rules for a season to make them observe them always or for any long time And Experience confirms what I say with reference even to these Councils which have put no stop at all to their career for they live in contempt as well of these as of all other Lawful Councils Have not they called others in Italy who have destroyed whatever these had established even to treat with the Name of Heresie this Holy Doctrine of the Superiority of the Council Have not the Popes been sufficiently Sacrilegious to raze out of the Roman Edition of General Councils the Council of Basil from among the Oecumenical Councils It is then impossible that with the Impiety and Ambition wherewith the Court of Rome is wholly made up and with the enormous power which the Popes at this time have which equals that of the greatest Kings that they should be reduced to submit themselves to the Council of Constance And even that would signifie nothing for this Council gives them too much Authority It gives them the power which belongs to the Emperors of assembling General Councils of presiding in them and concluding and of executing the Canons of Councils in regard of particular Churches and even of making Decrees during the Intervals of Synods and of being judged only by a General Council They ought then to be deprived of this temporal power the Cardinals to be abolished and the Monks to be Enfranchised and Released from the rash Vows they have made to the Popes the disposing of the Palls of Archbishops ought to be taken from him and the faculty of Investing Bishops and of dispencing with them for holding so many Benefices with all the other Simonical Traffick which will still renders him the Tyrant of the Church the Master of all States and the Devil the possessor of many souls It is much more easie to restore all at once the ancient Discipline I promote a Paradox but my reason is that there will never be a good change but it must happen after some strangely surprizing or if I may so say some violent manner such violence as forces its way into the Kingdom of Heaven Whilest we stand upon treating the Popes shall maintain themselves always with the times either by Intriegues or by some Devilish inventions the most zealous shall grow cold upon the business Ministers shall be corrupted either by money or by Cardinals Caps the Prince shall have other affairs found him to look after or shall be killed by the hand of some Monk or other All the Jesuits and the Monks shall be everlastingly for the Papacy whatever shew they at this time make Gerson somewhere says that there will never
we say that it was owing to the eagerness of his temper which being not always well regulated made him commit greater faults than any others of the Apostlâ—s except the perfidious Judas which made him be called Satan by his good Master which none of the other were We ought also to attribute to this temper the blow he gave Malchus with the Sword as well as that warmth that made him promise wonders of Fidelity to his Master and induced him to accompany him to the Emperors Court where he denied his Saviour So that it is with very little reason that they make an argument of this to prove his Royalty in the Church In Spain where the most Honourable walk the last they will not fail to alledg places where St. Peter is named last as in the passage where it is said I am the Disciples of Paul and I of Apollos and I of Caephas who is Peter For I remember that at Paris where they understand Divinity a little better than in Spain a good Bishop and an Abbot did maintain to me that the passage where it is said that James Peter and John are esteemed Pillars of the Church I having alledged against them another where he is named the first they maintained to me I say that this passage confirmed that which they alledged and proved very well the Primacy of St. Peter For said the Bishop when three persons of worth are walking together they always put the most Honourable in the middle This is according to the common saying That a Lawyer well paid shall always find the cause of his Client good His Benefices made him see clear in this passage There are three other passages which the greatest part of our Doctors produce against our Adversaries with a little more colour which are Thou art Peter c. I will give thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven c. Feed my sheep Which passages we shall examine one after another to see if St. Peter had any priviledg above the other Apostles they say that in the first of these passages Jesus Christ doth establish the Church found it and built it upon St. Peter I do not deny but that St. Peter was one of the Pillars of the Church because he is so called as well as James and John. Nor can it be denied but that he was and is one of the foundations of the Church since that he is not excepted out of the number of the Twelve who in Scripture are called the Foundations of the New Jerusalem But I maintain that the Church is no more founded upon him than upon St. Paul and the other Apostles I would fain have these Gentlemen tell me upon whom the Church was founded before St. Peter and why the Church changed its foundation and upon whom Peter himself was founded It was without doubt upon Jesus Christ upon the Rock which is the Christ. And it is without all question that St. Peter and we ought to have no other foundation than that which St. Paul had who says That no man can lay any other foundation than that which is laid which is Jesus Christ. Also we see in this passage that it is upon the Rock upon the Rock of Ages that our Saviour builds his Church and not upon St. Peter The Holy Ghost would have changed neither name nor person if he would have had us to have believed this of St. Peter He would not have said Super hanc Petram sed super te Petrum Vpon this Rock but upon thee Peter To the end that no difficulty may remain we must observe what goes before and what follows after Jesus Christ had demanded of all the Apostles together whom they thought he was Peter either as the eldest or most zealous answers for all and says to him Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God. Whereupon Jesus Christ says to him Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church c. It is evident that as our Saviour's discourse was directed to all and that Peter answered for all the following part of our Saviours Discourse was directed also to them all and related no more to Peter than to any other particular Apostle And men must have lost their understandings to think that Jesus Christ in this place founded his Church upon Peter whom in the same Chapter he calls Satan What Foundation would the Church have had and what would have become of her when he deni'd his Saviour It must then necessarily be acknowledged that it is not the visible Church that is here spoken of which they pretend St. Peter to be the Head of But the Invisible the Society of the Faithful and the Elect. For the Gates of Hell would have prevailed against the Church not only when St. Peter denied his Master since that the foundation being run to decay that which is built upon it falls to ruin But since that time have they not very often prevailed against this Church which they would have the Bishops of Rome the pretended Successors of St. Peter to be the Heads of For Example when according to the Fathers the whole World was Arian the Bishops of Rome and all their Flock and so many other times as the Popes have been Magicians Sodomites Atheists Hereticks c. And what would have become of the Church in the time of that great Schism that succeeded Gregory the Ninth which lasted fifty years when the French would not have an Italian Pope nor the Italians a French one and many Princes would have neither one nor other to whom at length Charles the Sixth joined himself for three years and the Kingdom of France was very well contented without a Pope and many other Princes for a longer season And what shall we say of that great Schism which the Popes made and caused with the Greek Church by cutting them off out of Devilish pride from the Communion of the Church because they would not submit to their yoke but demanded the observation of the Canons What shall we say also of that great Apostacy that happened about 130 or 140 years since or thereabout when so many States separated themselves from the Church by reason of the Impiety and Tyranny of the Popes Doth not all this prove that Hell hath prevailed against this exterior and visible Church which the Popes govern and whereof St. Peter according to them was the Head It is then the Invisible Church which is here spoken of the Society of the Faithful the Heavenly Jerusalem whereof Jesus Christ is the principal Corner-stone upon which St. Peter himself saith believers are built as living stones He says not it is on himself that they are built but on the contrary he pretends himself as well as others to be one of these living stones which are built upon the Corner-stone which is Christ. It is then upon the Rock confessed by Simon Peter or upon his Confession that the Church is founded on that which he declared
their Government and destroy the Maxims by which they have managed themselves so long They answer That then their lives would be in danger and that the Court of Rome would destroy them as they did Adrian the Sixth who thought to have reformed the Church of whom Cardinal Palavicini gives this Account That he was Ottimo Ecclesiastico Pontefice Mediocre a Good Priest but an Indifferent Pope But if the Popes cannot find a Remedy for the Disorders which are so prevalent because as they say their Authority is not sufficient what are they then good for and why shall we any longer suffer this Tyranny in the Church If they can find a Remedy and will not they are then not only unprofitable but detestable Creatures It is certainly one or other or both together for we see that every thing is overturned in the Church And what If they are the Vicars of Jesus Christ and Successors of St. Peter ought they not to think themselves happy to die for the Glory of God and Good of the Church Is it better to be the Object of Mens Worship to provoke the Jealousie of God and to do so much mischief in the Church Where is the Zeal of Moses or of St. Paul who would have died for their Brethren and have been even accursed and of the first Bishops of Rome who suffered Martyrdom so Couragiously They love rather to give them Money and Benefices because that thus they put out all to great Usury they sow that they may reap they give what is none of their own or else what signifies nothing to them If it be true that they are careful of the Salvation of these People why are they not so of their own Why do they not labour for the Salvation of Catholicks That would cost them no Money There needs nothing but to allow the Reading of the Holy Scripture every where and recommend it as God hath recommended it to us to suffer Divine Service to be read in a Language which every body understands For it cannot be denied but that the want of these things doth produce among us great Ignorance with which Piety is never to be found But to give Money to convert People it is the mark of a very prophane Spirit and a very dishonest method and an Example for Mahometans and Hereticks to make use of even towards Christians And to give Benefices it is yet worse for by this the Clergy is filled up more and more with Hypocrites and People of no Religion who spend the Goods of the Poor upon Debauchery and Luxury and most commonly are of no use at all to the Church They say That they make Religion to be respected But how Is it by their own Piety or Sanctity or that of their Court or by their Humility No truly these Vertues are wholly there unknown and the contrary Vices have ruled the Rost long since but their fine Court and the Greatness and Magnificence of the Cardinals are the things we hear of But are these the things that ought to make men love Religion Is it Gold and Silver costly Furniture Riches Carnal Pleasures which the Prelates glut themselves withal Is it their Cavalcades to Montecavallo their Horse and Foot-Guards their Armies and their Fleets which make Religion to be respected If it be so both Jesus Christ and his Apostles deserved to be despised in comparison of their Vicars and the Christian Religion also was very contemptible in their days Is it to Excommunicate all the World when they please without Authority without Cause and against the Nature of the Gospel which is Charity it self But wise men are so far from respecting them for this that they look upon them as Fools Is it to hold a Chappel or Consistory where they treat only of prophane things and of promoting of Cardinals What doth this signifie or what Relation hath it to the Glory of God or the Salvation of Men And what is there in all this which the Patriarch of Venice or the Archbishop of Lyons might not do as well as the Pope if he had a mind to it We must not dissemble All the Respect which men have for the Papacy at least they who hope for no advantage by it comes only from the Respect or from the Fear which they see Princes have of it And this respect of Princes if it be voluntary proceedeth from great Ignorance of Religion in which they have been brought up for that purpose or from the ill Council of some Ambitious Clergy-man who compasses his Designs at the Prince's Expence If this Respect be forced as ordinarily it is it is then out of the fear which men have of the Popes Power whereby he rules the vast Numbers of the Ecclesiasticks and especially the Monks who govern the meaner People who as Palavicini says are the disposers of the Religion of Countries It is said That they have the Power of making the Laws of God to be observed If so they ought themselves to give an Example they ought to apply to themselves what our Saviour said to St. Peter not to draw his Sword. It is a thing both ridiculous and horrible that these People should have Armies and make War. They do it in Germany after the Bishop of Rome his Example But where is it that they make the Laws of God to be observed Is there any place where they are violated more than where they have most Authority Is Rome at this day better than Sodom Do not they on the contrary favour as much as in them lies the very Crime by the Example of their Court by their Expences by their pretending to exempt all Clergy-men from the Jurisdiction of the Civil Magistrate that so they may commit all sorts of Crimes and go unpunished But they say furthermore That they make Kings stand in Awe and hinder them from professing Heresie On the contrary it is they who made them become Hereticks as in England Sweden and Denmark and who by their Tyranny hinder them from returning into the bosom of the Church It is also pretended That they are very useful for the composing of Differences between Princes being looked upon as common Fathers to them all On the contrary their Artifices and Ambition are so well known that thâ—re is no Prince whom they are more distrustful of They never carried on their own Interest better than during the Wars of Italy Germany France and Spain which either they always began or kept on foot They are also constant Enemies to Great Princes What is alledged might take place if the Popes were not thâ—mselves become Temporal Princes at the Expence of the Emperoâ—â— and other Princes whom they have robbed And it is kâ—own that they have Pretensions over all Christian Kingdoms That there is no Court more refined in Policy than theirs or that makes less Conscience of taking to themselves what belongs to another In truth they think it not taken wrongfully because they pretend that it is