of Constance as a lawful General-Council and to its Decree concerning the Superiority of a Council above the Pope and as many do to this day which also necessarily destroyeth the supposition of the Popes Infallibility because no inferiour Authority can be Infallible for that it can be controuled and corrected by a superiour over-ruling Power and that which is Infallible cannot neither ought to be controuled or corrected If any Romanists conceive and some there be who would be esteemed and pass for such with otherwise discerning men to be the more moderate sort that this is no direct consequence it were well done of them to reconcile the different pretensions and contradictory perswasions of the Pope and a Council and clearly declare whether the two contesting parties can be both Infallible for an Infallibility they will have and if there be such a thing it must be seated in the one or the other for there are no other pretenders to it and if we must have two Infallibles then which of them for the time being is the most Infallible to end the Controversy for till this be decided there can be no end of Controversies because this Controversy will be still agitated and few or none besides shall be satisfactorily determined because all others do mostly depend on this or whether it were not more prudent by way of Accommodation to compound the difference betwixt themselves that by consent the Contestants should take the Infallibility by turns the Pope have his vicissitude and the Council theirs or that it pass as a long time it hath done by a standing Rule of Catch that Catch can provided it can be so ordered that it be done without hot bickerings and canvassings But the through-paced Papists stand close to their tacklings for where they fix the Supremacy there also very consonantly to their supposition they lodg the Infallibility for thus they argue in the ease of the Pope His Authority (p) Bell. l. 4. de Pont. c. 24. Sect. 2. c. l. 2. de Conc. c. 13. And this is saith he the judgment of the best writers quos recenset ib. Sect. ult and therefore his judgment is the last and highest id l. 4. de Rom. Pont. c. 1. Sect. Sed nec Sect. denique and because it is the last and highest therefore it is Infallible ib. l. 3. Sect. contra l. 2. de Conc. c. 9. Sect. accedat c. c. 11. Sect de 2. Sect. de 3. is Supreme therefore his judgment in causes of Faith is the last and the highest and because it is the last and the highest therefore it is Infallible But upon the whole matter it is evident from what hath before been avouched that the Holy Apostles St. Peter and St. Paul were not the Founders of the present Romish Church as it is now constituted and managed but Julius the Second and Leo the Tenth by their new settlement and so their pretence of possession which at the best was tortious is quite out of doors and at last N. N's Original of Protestancy falls out to be indeed the just date and commencement of Popery Wherefore as the Papists frequently but foolishly propose to us Where was your Church before Luther So we upon the foregoing grounds may more reasonably demand of them where was your Popish Church before Julius the Second and Leo the Tenth which Question they will never satisfy till they renounce their new Faith and new Foundation of Faith upon which their new Church is superstructed 3. Supposing this acknowledgment then an 1516. and there in our parts of the World this is far from rendring it Catholick because far removed from that Golden Rule of Catholicism delivered by Vin. Lyr. and approved by all good Catholicks quod ubique quod semper quod ab omnibus c. For if before that year and age and in other parts of the World that which Protestants now call Popery was not acknowledged Catholick Doctrine it must not now be acknowledged Catholick neither ought it then and in our parts of the World to have been acknowledged Catholick the ancient Primitive is to be more respected and reverenced than the Church of the last Century and other parts of the Christian World have been and are as truly and univocally parts of the one Holy Catholick Church as ours can be and the true Faith is one and the same in all ages and places But will or can N. N. answer to Bell. who l. de notis Eccl. c. 7. positively declares that if only one Province should retain the Catholick Faith yet it should be truly and properly called the Catholick Church as long as it might be shewed as Protestants have it was the same which it was at other times in other plaees of the World Driedo dogmat Eccles lib. 4. part 2. seems to be of his mind And what will he say to Dr. Bristow who motive the 45. confesseth some there have been in many ages in some poinis of the Protestants opinion insomuch that there is scarce one piece or Article of our whole Faith but by one or other first or last it hath been called in Question and that with such liking for the time that they all have in a manner drawn after them great herds of followers these some and all were long before this Origenists Aera 1516. and what if these some of Bristow prove to be very many as the Cardinal of Praeneste reckoned them Vicards poor people of Lions Speronists Arnoldists and Waldenses who as Reinerus reports were far spread and of long standing in the Church For thus he relates the matter refort Illyric Catal. test devit tom 2. p. 543 but in an old Edition p. 32. lit D. they continued so long as no Sect hath some say it hath been since Sylvester some since the Apostles there is universality of time and there is almost no countrey wherein it spreadeth not there is universality of place and persons they have great shew of Piety living uprightly before men and believing all things aright concerning God and all the Articles of the Creed and abating his great shew they were good Catholicks because holy believers and livers but that he added a subsequent cause only they hate and blaspheme the Church of Rome and that marred all otherwise they had passed muster and St. Bernard is much to the same purpose Serm. 65. sup Cant. Edit Venet. an 1575. Tom. 1. p. 328. tit H. Si fidem interroges c. If you require an account of their Faith nothing is more Christian if of their Conversation nothing more commendable they frequent the Church honour the Priests offer their Gifts make Confession and communicate in the Sacraments these were no Schismaticks they hurt none circumvent none contemn none are true and just in all their dealings performing what they promised these were not unjust wicked men yet he had a pique at them they did not observe the Monkish Vow of Continence which he conceived
restitution thereof but he defended his Invasion and Usurpation by the warranty of the Popes Excomunication and to prevent all after-Claims by virtue of the Popes Bull bequeathed it in his last Will and Testament to his Daughter Jane Queen of Castile and ordered the union of the two Kingdoms (d) New Heresy of the Jes p. 37. inde out of Monsieur de Hay in his Treatise of the right of the King of France from the Testimony of Spanish Historians against the Cavils of Card. du Perron who attempted the vindication of the Pope and forecited Spanish Historian from Guicciardine lib. 11. Castile and Arragon But the Pope had yet a further Game to manage a Council must be had whereupon he calls a Counter-Council as Eugenius before him had convened an Anti-Synod at Florence at the Lateran in Rome where some Cardinals and Bishops who favoured his Pretensions and some on other motives assembled to him before whom at first he (e) Concil Lat. Sess 1. excused his Perjury by reason of State his next endeavour was by the publication of a Bull to condemn the Pisan Synod and by a second to null its Acts together with the Pragmatical Sanction To gain validity to this Practice he procured Francis the first (f) So the Concordate and from it Relnffusc licet de seriis li. 1. ff de Offic. Cons or rather compelled him for he protested he complied with the Pope much against his mind being constrained so to do by his pressing necessities to condescend to the Abrogation of the Pragmatical Sanction But this Pope dying some ten Months after he had assembled his Partisans and Pensioners could not perfect his Project Leo the tenth succeeds him who falls afresh upon the Pragmatical Sanction yet upon second and better thoughts he stops the Carreer for two or three years resolving however having the work half done to his hand to compleat it in convenient time and so at long run in the eleventh Session of that Conventicle upon the 19 of December 1516 the certain Birth-day of the new Popish Church he passed a Decree point blank contrary to that of Constance continued and confirmed in those of Basil Bourges Tours and Pisa viz. That the Pope had authority over all Councils and that it was necessary to Salvation that all Christians should be subject to the Pope This is Origo Papistarum thus by such unauthorized Antichristian means then upon that 19th day of December and there at Lateran Popery commenced and had its rise both name and thing for though some Romanists pretend the title of Papist to be of more antient extraction deriving it from Pope Peter Pope Paul and Pope Christ yet Dr. Bristow a bitter enemy to Protestants and a fast friend to the Cause witness his great endeavours and attempts in the Rhemish Testament is better advised and (g) Demaund 8. speaks out the whole truth The name saith he of Papists was never heard of till the days of Leo the tenth All which premises being laid together a mean accomptant may easily compute of how long standing Popery is according to the true reformed Roman account The total of all which those (h) Sess 1. And Cassander thinks Papists to be Pseudo-Catholicks they being such who will not permit the Church to be reformed though corrupt Lib. de Offic. boni viri Sect. sunt alii c. very Lateran Assemblers could not deny but have so far honestly witnessed that by reason of the malignity of the times the Popes seemed to have tollerated the Pragmatical Sanction because they could not help it thanks for nothing in as much as for all the Popes could do even to that very day it stood in full force and virtue But for all was then done the true Roman Catholicks even then did not think the Pragmatical Sanction was sufficiently annulled neither did that Lateran Decree find any kind reception amongst them but soon after was stoutly rejected as Heterodox for within four Months after towards the latter end of March ensuing the Divines of Paris spoke as undervaluingly of this Lateran Synod as it had done of the Council of Basil contemning and condemning it as Conciliabulum Conventiculum a Conspiracy or Conventicle (i) Appel Vnivers Paris à Leon. 10. facta die 27 Martii An. 1517. Bochell lib. 8. de decret Gal. Eccl. c. 4. not assembled in Gods name and the Cardinal Lorraine writ expresly after that to Pope Pius the fifth that as the French Church would never receive that of Florence so they also had always protested against the Lateran made up of a (k) New Heresy of the Jesuites p. 103. out of the History of the Concordate composed by Monsieur de Puy few Italian Bishops And that this Lateran Decree would be opposed Pope Leo foresaw who therefore cunningly contrived a way if not to prevent yet to smother and stifle all opposition For (l) 70 Decret p. 534. Caran p. 893. in a certain Decretal he ordained that hereafter for ever no man should Print or cause to be Printed any Book or Writing in the City of Rome nor in any other place unless first by his Vicar or Minister of his Palace or by some Bishop or other deputed thereto it be diligently examined and Subscribed and after the Trent-sticklers finding that Books notwithstanding this Policy were published and did creep abroad they made a Rule which they gave in charge to the Inquisitors That if in the Books of latter Catholicks written since the year 1315 that which needs Correcting can be amended by taking away or adding a few things that course should be followed otherwise let it be (m) Caran p. 894. instruct post indicem c. Index l. Prohib p. 25. altogeeher blotted out But neither the Popes Authority Power nor Policy could prevail so far with the Roman Catholicks of that time as to over-rule the Council of Basil or confirm the Lateran for many of them constantly adhered to the (n) As the Germans Kings of England and France ad Ann. 1422. in the Margin of his life p. 101. c. Ep. Synod Concil Basil Council of Basil because Eugenius the fourth by an Authentick Bull recited in the sixteenth Session acknowledged that it was Lawful and General from the beginning of it to that moment and in the last of the Bulls which he revoked after he had (o) But not till after admonition and citation Acts of Superiority 8 pronouncing him contumacious for threatning of a dissolution Caran p. 856. rejoyned himself to that Council he declared that in matters of Faith the opinion of a Council ought to be preferred to that of the Pope which cannot hold if the Pope be Infalible as the Lateran crew suggested because there is no opinion which can or ought to be preferred to the judgment of an Infallible Monarch and Umpire and as those Romanists stuck to the Council of Basil so did they to the Council
Predecessors which are favouarble to the Papal Authority to be further oppugned or questioned and therefore both the Pope and the Ordinaries and Inquisitors of Heresy are very careful lest any Book which seems to derogate therefrom be published and if any do happen to pass the Press they take a strict Order it be utterly suppressed or to be read of none without special License in writing till it be purged c. p. 344. It is a very hard matter in these times especially either to find in the Books of Catholicks any Clause which may give the least occasion of calling the Popes Right in Temporals in question or certainly to know what the Author of those Books thought of the Popes Power but they are oftentimes against the Hair compelled to deliver not their own Opinions but such as the Inquisitors of the Books do father upon them Neither Turks nor Jews have gone so far in their presumptions as to take authority over dead men's writings to alter and change them at their pleasures The same Author or Authors p. 35. of that Book hath discovered a shameful Corruption in a Prayer of the Breviary For not long since these are the words in that Page they have blotted out the word Animas Souls in that Prayer of their Reformed Breviaries by command of Clement the eighth Thus also they corrupted Agapetus his words in Bibl. SS Pairum Tom. 1. p. 108. Par. 1571 wickedly (k) Index Rom. p. 200. razing and perversly glossing that Sentence viz. Vpon earth the King the Emperour Justinian to whom he writ Epistles as Baron testifies Tom. 7. in Append. p. 665. hath no man above him contrary to his express words and meaning for thus he writeth to him c. 1. Whereas in honour thou O Emperour hasta dignity far above all other men honour him above all who gave thee this honour to wit God c. p. 27. impose upon thy self a necessity of observing Laws in as much as thou hast no living Creature in the World to compel thee thereunto And so those words of Ludovic Vives Ep. ad Regem Angl. Henr. 8. praefixa Com. Aug. de Civitate Dei cujus potestas c. Whose Authority and Majesty is greatest upon earth secundum Deum next after God are commanded to be expunged But perhaps the case may be Iliacos intra muros c. Protestants are as criminal this way as Papists and a charge strongly proved against these will not clear them N.N. hath an easy Proof for this For 2. As it appears from Gregor Martin c. But it appears N.N. either knows nothing of Greg. Martin's Discoveries or craftily concealed them for Dr. Fulk hath discovered his Discoveries to be mean loose Cavils in a full Answer thereto which hitherto hath not been replied to another Discovery he made which his own Fellows taxed him for and with a lying Discovery and Relation Bugbeared him for attempting new Discoveries so unlucky was Gregor Martin in all his Discoveries Part 3. He adds a third Proof taken from the Topicks of the Wisdom Gravity and Learning Piety and Humanity of his Catholick Divines 1. As to their Wisdom it is confessed they vvere so vvise as not to be taken vvith a Lye vvhich they might be convinced of by Thousands of Witnesses The Children of this World are Wise in their Generation therefore they took a crafty Course not to excuse the Fable till about forty years after the supposed Fact was perpetrated Neither were there many of his Catholicks who maintained it those who did took it at the first rebound from a malicious Enemy and Parasitical Pickthank Bishop Bonner's Setter But supposing these Witnesses had been called into a Court and deposed all that they could say to the Article or Quaere was they believed it and believed it because they had heard it if they had deposed it any further they had been right Affidavit-men but this Deposition being cast out if N.N. had been a fee'd Proctor in the cause he then would have set up his possibles probables and credibles if these moved not the Witnesses as Ten thousand to One they would not then he would cast his easy Answers there was a Conspiracy among the Thousands of Witnesses to give in false Evidence and deceive the Court. 2. For their Gravity and Learning that signifies little there are Grave and Learned men almost of all Perswasions yet it is notoriously known that such have been sometimes overcome with Lyes Visions Revelations Miracles and Fables there are such things in the world as over-credulity and Euthusiasm which have prevailed with men of known good parts and abilities 3. As to their Piety and good Conscience that it was so tender in N. N's opinion that they would not engage c. Protestants cannot assent to it because they know that his Catholicks did engage themselves and their Posterities to take the Oath of Supremacy which when they refused not out of Conscience but Compact and Design because by a Law whereto they were parties and chief instruments it stood established so with great reason and learning they Preached and pressed the taking thereof upon the Conscience as a Duty They who can thus play at Fast and Loose with Oaths without any violation of any of the rules of Charity may be judged to be either unconscionable Jugglers or wavering Weather-cocks But those of them who in Queen Elizabeth's time contrived her Murther and to carry on the Plot with more security and advantage published a Book wherein it was declared that it was not lawful to kill the Queen that so neither She nor any of her Council might fear any harm from such Religious Cheats and counterfeit Champions of Loyalty cannot possibly be excused This was proved and openly confessed at the Arraignment of Babington and Ballard when also the Letters of Cardinal Como written to Parry were produced which did testify that the Pope approved (l) Fulk Rhem. Test marginal note on Jude fol. 847. the Artifice Great Villanies are commonly attempted with great Hypocrisy and if Hypocrites may pass for tender-Conscienced men or good Roman Catholicks there are great store of these in the world 4. However N. N. will have them well-natured persons They will do nothing in spight against Protestants He must pardon the Protestants if they do not believe for they know they have been very spiteful one against another Stephen the sixth (m) Plat. in vit Steph. 6. Sabellic Aenead 9. lib. 1. and. those ordained by him to be re-ordained Baron An. 897. n. 2. and Sergius 3. who ruled the Papacy six years after him did the like Baron 908. n. 2. which is acknowledged T. R. P. in his Answer to some Letters writ by a Protestant p. 786. Bellar. de Pont. lib. 4. c. 12. against Formosus with Barbarous Inhumanity cutting off his three Fingers with which he was used to give Benedictions and Orders and then causing his Body to be cast into Tyber with rage It could be
determine what Intention was necessary because they could not agree about the efficacy of the Sacraments it being impossible there should be the same Intention of two who differ in their judgments concerning it The common Salvo was that the Intention to do as the Church doth was sufficient but this satisfied not the scruple because men â—â—ffered in opinion what the Church is and their opinions herein being different their Intentions in administring the Sacraments would also prove different To evade this it was pretended all the Priests had the same design but as it is impossible for any to know the things that is the purposes of Man save the Spirit of Man which is in him 1 Cor. 2.11 so it is unconceivable how they should have the same end and aim who have different Judgments Humours Passions and Interests At last they were driven to this shift perhaps there may be some such wretched Priest yet this case is rare To this the Bishop of Minori replied would God said he that the case was rare and that in this corrupt age we had not cause to doubt there were many but suppose there are but a few or one only let a Knave Priest Baptize who hath not an Intention to administer the true Baptism to a Child who being after a grown Man is created a Bishop of a great City so that he hath Ordained a great part of the Priests in his Diocess it must be said that he being not Baptized is not Ordained nor they Ordained who are promoted by him Behold Millions of Nullities of Sacraments by the malice of one (z) Histor Council of Trent fol. 241. Priest in one Act only 4. To give full measures of Doubts and uncertainties in the most mysterious act of their Religion Dr. Holden (a) Apendix of Schism p. 445. Refert Dr. Ham. dispatcher Preface p. 14. averreth All Roman Catholicks do believe and reverence the Sacrifice of the Mass as the most substantial Act of their Religion but if it be demanded wherein the substance of this Sacrifice doth consist no substantial Resolution can be expected from them their Doubts and uncertainties about the Nature and Essence thereof are so cross and various There are divers opinions concerning it saith (b) Azor. l. 10. c. 9. or part 2. l. 2. c. 14. Azor. There are six Acts of which it is doubted in which one or more of them the Essence of the Sacrifice consisteth saith (c) Tom. 3. dist 75. art 1 2. Suarez Some place it in the one Act of Consecration but the doubters dispute against it for say they Consecration belongeth rather to the nature of a Sacrament than a Sacrifice and every external Sacrifice such as the Mass is must be sensible but the Conversion made by the words of Consecration is not sensible for the real change is not and again if the Act of Consecration then the outward Elements only are the Hoast and matter offered but we may not say the Species are the Hoast others set it in the Oblation but the dissenting Brethren oppose this because Christ used no Sacrificial Act at his Last Supper and if Christ did not the Priest ought not though some of them grant it belongs to the intergrity of the Sacrifice But how the Trent-Divines were divided in their judgment herein may be read Hist Counc of Trent fol. 544 c. Some of them again conceive Consecration Consumption or Sumption to be the Essence this others contradict because then say they the Body and Blood of Christ must be destroyed for that which is Offered in Sacrifice is to be destroyed but Sumption can be no part thereof because the Act of Receiving is not for although Christ be not received after the Consecration yet is he truly said to be Sacrificed and Doctors doubt whether Christ did receive in his last Supper and the Priest receiving doth nothing in Christs person but his own others stood for Fraction but this the doubters easily disprove for it is say they an Act purely Sacramental not at all Sacrificial and Fraction being before Consecration the Substance of the Bread and Wine remaineth When N. N. hath solved all these Doubts and satisfied all these Doubters he may be more confident of the demonstrative Power of Doubts and uncertainties in the mean time he may apply them to his own Church in his own words Mutatis mutandis Therefore the Romanists before they can prudently believe themselves to have true Faith or be the Catholick Church must clear all Doubts and uncertainties not objected by Protestants but started and pursued by their own Divines concerning their Church their Head of the Church their Ordinations and the most Substantial Act of their Religion the Mass for though any Person should not c. 7. N. N. goes one step forward the step to Christian and Catholick belief is c. This hath nothing of usefulness to his Conclusion unless he prove that a Clergy not regularly ordained cannot believe all the Articles of the Christian Faith c. that the Protestant Church hath a doubtful Clergy in which his attempts have hitherto been unsuccessful and unlucky to him and his Church If his meaning be the well-grounded Credibility of his Church is the foundation of Christian belief this is to beg the Question and is false for Christian Faith is not an assent and adherence to the Objects thereof upon the bare Testimony of the Church but on that of God neither is its warranty derived from the Church's Proposition but Divine Revelation True Faith is founded on the writings of Moses and the Prophets of Christ and his Apostles Eph. 2.20 which moved Durand thus to define it It is an habit whereby we assent to the Doctrines of the Scripture for the Authority of God revealing them But if he intend only that the Church's Proposition is to her members the first motive and preparative of Faith it will not be gainsaid but then he must remember that a prudent Christian will not take the Church for well-groundedly credible till he find by the Rule of Faith She deserves to be so esteemed for it is impossible the Church can appear so to him till he know the Faith it proposeth which he cannot do but by applying it to the Rule for every intellectual and moral habit must be sufficiently known before the Acts resulting from them can be predicated of any subject capable to exercise them As I must know what Prudence is before I can truly affirm of any man that he is Prudent 8. That which N. N. mainly drives at is to seduce the members of the Church of England from her Communion and solicite them to Apostate to Rome To effect this he took as he conceived a seasonable opportunity to perplex the minds of men with his Doubts and uncertainties by reason of our late sad divisions Then the Romanists bent all their forces to perswade easy seduceable tempers This Church was either a dead or (d) Bishop
if Doulia or Hyperdoulia belong to them or any of them much more is due to Christ who if he be not God equal with the Father yet is far above all Angels Principalities and Powers and every name which is named in Heaven and Earth besides we have clear Text that we should Honour the Son even as we do Honour the Father and not the least intimation in Scripture we should so Honour the Angels but on the contrary that all Angels should Worship him in that he by Inheritance hath obtained a more excellent name than they It is altogether unnecessary to multiply Quotations from the Ancients or to cite those numerous places which are to be found in the Writings of the Fathers of the Catholick Church to prove what the Doctrine and Practice of the Catholick Primitive Church hath been in this instance it is sufficient for the satisfaction of any considerate disinterested person to let him know that the Testimonies which the Protestants have produced from them are so forcible that the great Cardinal (o) Never any Author before him had invenred those Authors Ep. ad Bell. See Bellarmin's life l. 2. c. 7. R. 3. Perron hath confessed he was forced to strain his Invention and great Parts to frame Answers to them and when he had racked them to the height all that he could Apologetically feign in excuse of the present Practice of the Romish Church was to accuse and impeach the Fathers of deep dissimulation and Imposture For first (p) Upon the Head of Invocation of Saints p. 1044 1045. he saith The Fathers in their Writings against the Gentiles said those things not which they did believe but dissembling and disguising their Practice said those things which served their cause to refute the Gentiles Objections This Scandalous Imputation is enough to crack their Credits for ever in the judgment of honest minds for who will ever believe them who for a colour to their cause are so wicked as to speak Lies in hypocrisy or ever esteem them as the chiefest Apologists and choicest Advocates of Christianity who were egregious Prevaricators and mean contemprible Proctors in their own and the Churches concern Or who will ever rely upon their Testimony who were so weak and sottish as to attempt the dissembling of that which could not be concealed and the disguising of that which could not be denied or evaded For the Gentiles as they were Artists enough to find out any Sophistical shufflings in their discourses and disputes against them so they were malicious and active Adversaries having their Spies and Trapanners abroad to give them intelligence of the Christians Practice both in their Civil and Religious Conversation and if these failed there were too many lapsed Christians who would inform them to the full and too many false Brethren who industriously pretended to Christianity that thereby when occasion served they might accuse them to the Higher Powers such as those of the Circumcision were in the Apostles time who were unawares brought in and came in privily as Spies Gal. 2. and after Ages have been all out as bad if not worse after Nero's Reign In the second place the Cardinal tells us The Fathers in their Writings against the Heathens declined to speak of the Churches Prayers lest the Gentiles might think there were some appearance of conformity though but false and fallacious betwixt the Churches Practice herein and that of the Heathen and thereby take an occasion though upon no just ground to retort upon their Practice This insimulation is somewhat more modest or less irreverent than the former but as false and fallacious For SECT III. 1 THE Fathers in their Writings to the Heathens did not decline but declare what the Churches Prayers were both for matter and form witness Just (q) Apol. 2. Clem. Alex. l. 7. Strom. p. 717. Tert. Apol. c. 30. p. 27. de Oâ—at Domini c. 1 12. Mart. Clem. Alex. and Tert. and it appears from Flinies Epistle to the Emperour Trajane The Heathens were well accquainted with the Christians Practices in their Assemblies in this therefore the Cardinal dissembleth and in the next Period of his Sentence he disguiseth and glosseth the matter For 2 The Churches Prayers then were not the same with those now in use in the Romish Church as he fallaciously suggesteth but perfectly Protestant as the Prayers of the Holy Martyr Policarp recited in Eusebius lib. 4. c. 15. to which may be added that when the People of Smyrna desired to have the Body of their Martyred Bishop for its Burial the Jews perswaded the Governour not to grant their Request upon this unworthy pretence the Christians would Worship it to which false suggestion the Christians replied We can never be induced 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Worship any other with Religious Adoration but Christ him we adore others we worthily love and respect This Protestation was thus rendered in the (r) Ex passionario M. S. 7 Cal. Febr. in Bibl. Eccl. Sarisb Dom. Rober. Cottoni Latine Edition Nunquam Christum c. We Christians can never forsake Christ who did vouchsafe to suffer so great things for our Sins nor impart precem Orationis the Devotion Religion or Supplication of Prayer to any other and accordingly as it was thus Translated it was publickly read in all the Churches of the West 3. If they did forbear to speak of the Churches Prayers lest the Gentiles should retort it upon them then because the Gentiles had good intelligence of their Practice as hath been proved but never did retort it upon them it may safely be concluded their Practice was not the same with that of the present Romish Church and that Reason assigned by some Pontificians why in the Apostles time they and their Disciples abstained from this Practice cannot hold unless we take in the Three hundred years succeeding for so long time did the Christians and Heathens live promiscuously as Fellow Subjects to the same Higher Powers and the Heathens knew what the Christians practised during which space of time if that had been the Churches Practice which is surmised by the Romanists the Heathen would have looked upon it with jealousy as a politick trick cunningly contrived by the Christians to set up a new modelled Court of Requests and take just occasion thereby to retort upon their Practice which because they did not therefore so long time there was no such practice in the Church But if their and the Cardinal's reason be good it will render the Romanists very imprudent or uncharitable or both in that when they endeavour the Conversion of the Heathen to their Church they do not conceal and forbear this so suspicious and offensive Practice to them 4. The Cardinal dissembleth in that he pretends there is but some appearance of Conformity betwixt the Practice of the Romish Church and their Heathen Ancestors For if we may believe the reports and complaints of some learned Romanists the Practice of the common