Funeral Sermon p. 29. 30. As to the Doctrine of the Jesuits in plain terms saith that Reverend Person to slander another Man in defence of their own Right or Honour especially for one of the Fathers to do it in Defence of the Society some hold it plainly lawful some say it 's a Venial Sin for the Proofs you may find them together in the fifth of the Provincial Letters If so what should hinder those Men from raising all these Reports of this person since it was in defence of themselves and their Sect if they Killed him Secondly That it was their interest to Kill him 't is manifest if they have any designs against the Government And if either his Life would have hindered or discouraged them in it Or if his Death would discourage others from being active in their places But that 't is the interest of their Sect and of their Church to subvert the Government and that they for their parts design it now at this present I think that this is SO PALPABLE that I should but loose time in proving it Thirdly That they hold it Lawful to Kill in such Cases for this it is so plain delivered in their Writings as any Article of Faith is in the Creed they say first in general to Kill another is Murther indeed if you do it for Revenge or any such sinister end And therefore you must be sure to direct your intention aright and so by directing the intention tho you do the same act it is not Murther For Example if one threaten to publish grievous Crimes of my self or of my Order when I have no other way to escape this I may lawfully Kill him And 't is plain that I have no other way if he be ready to charge me or my Order before Men in Authority saith Jannerus In like manner one may kill another if it be in defence of his own Goods or of the Goods of his Society saith Lessius if one endeavours to take away any Life by revealing a Secret Crime I may Kill him nay if he endeavours but to take away my good Name by revealing a secret Crime I may kill him saith Lessius and the same saith Falliusius Now who that knows what Information our friend had against them can doubt but they might lawfully kill him by those Doctrines I know what any Jesuite would answer to this they would say That these Doctrines are some of them delivered as being only speculatively true that is they are true in their own Nature but they are not practice sequendae that is in respect of the Consequences they are not to be reduced to practice and why so If they be speculatively true why then are they not to be practised They themselves tell you why they would cause Disorders in the Common-wealth Lessius hath a better reason because if one practise them he may be Hanged for it The mean while if one can do it so secretly as not to disturb the Common-wealth and then to be sure he shall not hang for it in that Case it is to be practised according to their Doctrine Or if not whilst it is speculatively true that the thing it self is no Sin who that knows this and hath a mind to kill another and sees his occasion will make any scruple of the practice Yes they will tell you the Pope hath forbidden it in that Decree of the year 1665. which is set down in the end of the last Roman Index To their shame be it said these Doctrines are forbidden indeed but not as being untrue nor as contrary to Gods Word or having any Immorality in them Now then He saith they are adminimum scandalosae at least apt to give offence no doubt they are if we Hereticks come to know them and therefore he chargeth them upon their Obedience to himself that they must not practise these Doctrines had he said upon their Obedience to God that had been a dangerous word it would have made them afraid to practise them even in his own Service he would take heed of that not to spoil that which may be a useful Doctrine But he forbad it forsooth upon Obedience to himself which is such a restraint that the Pope may take off when he pleaseth and how can we tell when he doth or doth not That which is in his own power secretly to do or not to do we have only this measure by which to Judge He will do whatsoever he sees best for the Catholick Cause if he sees it best for the Cause we shall live if not you see it is no Sin to Kill us even the Pope being Judge so that we hold our Lives at his Courtesie Thus that Reverend Prelate What say you now Mr. Observator Is not this clear proving that the lawfulness of Plots and Assassinations when against Hereticks or it may make for the Catholick Cause are Positions of the Church of Rome insomuch that the Pope will not at any rate condemn them absolutely but only suspend their being practised during his own pleasure Vain and Fallacious is therefore your third pretence that these are but the Positions of here and there a man not Authoritative Conclusions of the Roman Church pray tell us in your next what you mean by the Church of Rome If the Church Virtual as they call it and thereby intend the Pope or the Church Representative whereby they understand such Councils as they own to be general both these we have proved do allow and Command the Destruction of Hereticks And where shall we find the Authorized Tenents of that Church if not in the publick Writings of her Divines Sure you are not ignorant that the Church of Rome hath Licensers Inquisitors and Indexes Expurgatory If she do not then authorize such Doctrines how come they to swarm in the Writings of her most Eminent and most Honoured Doctors Why are not these Books suppressed the Authors punished the Opinions Anathematized Qui non prohibet cum potest jubet He that connives in such Cases justifies The Observators last Limitation That we must prove such Positions to be the Conform Sentiments of the Members in general of that Communion is ridiculously Extravagant Does he himself use the same method towards others And how vain were it for us to seek such Conform-Sentiments amongst the Romanists when notwithstanding all their boasted Unity and infallible Art to preserve it yet will they have as many fewds and differences amongst themselves as can be found amongst any or all sorts of Protestants Nor is there I do verily believe a greater consent amongst them in any one Article than in these points That all Protestants are Hereticks and that dying such they are uncapable of Salvation and that Hereticks are to be destroyed or if there be amongst them any of softer and more charitable Sentiments in their private thoughts yet as they are imbarqued in that Church where the only Compass they sail by is to believe implicitly as the Church believes
though they do not explicitly understand what it is they are tyed up to believe any particular Dogma's obtruded upon them by their Ghostly Fathers Most true and notable to this purpose are the words of the late Lord Chief Justice Seroggs at the Tryal of Green c. Fol. 83. You must say and believe as your Priest will have you and in such Actions as these as your Priest suggests to you so does the Devil to your Priests You are upon the matter Necessitated to what they will have you think for though your Priests preach up Freedom of Will yet they allow none to the Vnderstanding they hold you may do good or evil but will not suffer you to understand Right and Wrong for you cannot be perfectly theirs if you have any thing of your own to guide your selves by I know that every body of that Party is apt to say their Priests own no such thing But it is Notoriously known to all the World that they both print and practise it What shall any of you dispute the Power of a Pope saith a Jesuite or of the Pope and Council say the most moderate Priests Have you power to say how far you will be a Papist and how far not You may as well bound the Sea and bid it go so far and no farther as Limit the Popes Authority No Gentlemen 'T is the fault of your Doctrine and 't is a monstrous Mistake in you if you think that you have any power over your selves whilst you continue in their Perswasion Let no man tell me Oh Sir We desire none of these Mischiefs you talk of VVhat not if Religion requires it or if the Pope says it does Hath not the Council of Lateran defined that every Popish Prince ought to root out Heresie upon pain of Damnation Can you go and tell the Pope how far you will believe or what you ought to do You may as well tell me that if he were once with us and had the Power he once had he would leave us to Our Selves and that if he had the same Ability he would not have the same Tyranny I shall conclude this particular with that Asseveration of the Judicious King James in his Speech Novemb. 1605. That as it is not impossible but many honest men seduced with some Errors of Popery may yet remain good and faithful Subjects So on the other part none that knows and believes the Grounds and School-conclusions of their Doctrine can ever prove good Christians or faithful Subjects This being so the Observators last Limitation that we must prove such Positions to be the conform Sentiments of the Members in general of the Church of Rome is neither possible nor requisite Must we Examine all the Papists in the World to know their conform Sentiments in general And what if some or many of them do not believe them Yet since they are of the Romish Communion and these are the Doctrines of their Schools and their greatest Divines of their Councils and their Popes and they are bound implicitely to believe as their Church believes As soon as these are manifested by their spiritual Guides to be the Doctrines of their Church which will be as oft and as soon as these spiritual Polititians find them useful to their Cause they must then believe them and practise accordingly Some of the fore-mentioned Allegations are indeed very frequent in the Mouths and Writings of the Jesuites and other Emissaries of Rome when they would colourably Excuse their Party But 't is matter of Surprize to find them muster'd up and insisted upon by a profest Protestant Gentleman who could not but know how false and frivolous they have been proved by sundry of our Learned Church-mens unanswerable Polemicks Therefore though I have as much value and deference for the Observators Person and that Figure he makes in the World as I ought to have yet as I cannot hinder many Loyal Zealous and ever-constant Sons of the Establisht Church from questioning whether some of his late Writings have shewn him so sincere a Champion for and friend to that Church as he would be counted or whether indeed the Church of Rome be not more beholding to his Pains So the mischief is That I know not how to Answer their Objections and Queries about his playing the Trimmer for the Papists And since the witty Gentleman himself though sufficiently provoked and challenged has declined that Province I am half ready to despair of seeing it done by any other Observatori pudet haec opprobia nostro Et dici potuisse non potuisse refelli 1. 'T is wonderful to see how sweet and gentle how debonair and good-natur'd the Gentleman is every where towards the Papists how tender of their Credit so ready and Laborious to Excuse them even where no Excuse can be made for them as in their before mentioned Principles and this very Case of Sir Edmundbury Godfrey's Murther Which Attempts as they were unjust and illegal so could not possibly be any Advantage or Service to the State or Church of England but rather tended to the Scandal of both and administring a causeless occasion to their Enemies to Insult and Triumph have not the Romanists busie Jesuites and Scriblers enow of their own What need was there for the Protestant Observator to foul his Fingers in being their Advocate 2. 'T is observeable that there 's no love lost in the Case no men more zealously crying up and magnifying the Observator than the Gentlemen of the Roman Catholick Communion and this not only in their common discourses but in Print Thus in a nameless Pamphlet Intituled Oats's Manifesto said to be Printed for R. L. 1683. which I think no man ever doubted to be written by a Roman in p. 25. speaking to Oates is this swaggering Rhodomontado The Observator a Person of that Eminent Learning publick Merit and known Fidelity to the Establisht Government and Church of England that is so far above thy Calumny as thou art beneath his Worth and Honesty Surely the Devil owed thee an ill turn when he Egged thee on to this Rashness for what can a Villain like thee expect less than 〈…〉 sach a Head sach a Heart such a Hand as that of L'STRANGES Suitable to this we find in a Pamphlet Intituled The Paoquet of Advice from Geneva Numb 2. p. 10. L'Estrange is undoubtedly sent from above to Act here in this Generation for the great good of his king and Countrey and to be Vere malleus Redellirm Phanaticorum Which last Pamphlet was discovered to be written by one Prat a Papist and was suppressed by the right Reverend Father in God My Lord Bishop of London as scandalizing the whole Reformation 〈…〉 of Exposing Presbyterians In brief no man that Converies with Roman Catholicks can be ignorant how they hugg admire and applaud the Observators Writings and if I do not mis-remember he himself somewhere complains of his Neighbours for taking notice of the Refort of the Red-letter'd
Observator Twedles the Nation is serenadid towards a Debauch with false insinuations and daring Fictions Factions and Animosities encreased by new Coyned Terms of Distinction and Reproach the Justice of the Government scandalled Juditial Proceedings unravell'd misrepresented and Calumniated in favour of Murtherers and Traitors The Church of England attacked and endeavours used to divide and weaken her The Papists in all things justified or excused and their Traytorous Bloody Doctrines and Practices Blanch'd extenuated or untruly denied And if there be yet any persons that will have these things accounted Services to the Government or the Establisht Church of England I must crave leave to suspect either the soundness of their Understandings or the Loyalty of their Affections to Both. I shall conclude in the words of the late cited Seasonable Discourse p. 36. If we have any Love to our Religion any obhorrence of the groffest Superstition Error or Idolatry any regard for the Safety of his Majesty any care of our Laws or our Estates any Concernment for the strength the Wealth the Number rf our Nation any desire to hold the Freedom of our Conscience the Vertue and Honour of our Families and lastly any Care of self-preservation to escape Massacres and the utmost rage of Persecution It will behoove as to beware of the prevailing of that Sect the Papists in whose successes we have reason to expect to forfeit all these Interests perish our selves and bequeath Idolatry and Beggery and Servitude to our Posterity Whether all Honest-Church-of England-Men will not or at least ought not believe this Reverend Prelate of that Church rather than the Jiggs of an Observator is the Question Postscript THE Observator Numb 145. falls foul upon Mr. Oates for saving The Popish Plot was designed in 1670. and he believed it was so in 1666 c. But if Oates had never told us one Word it would have been rational to believe That there has been a Popish Plot one foot ever since the tenth year of Queen Elizabeth when the Pope began to Thunder as Her and charged all his Children to refrain going to Church which was the first Rise of Recusancy Name and Thing I say ever since then there has been and is without doubt a Popish Plot and Trayterous Conspiracy on foot and continually going on in general to Subvert our Establisht Church and Government and introduce the Popes Supremacy and detestable Idolatries And of matters tending thereunto as of Monies raised for promoting the Catholick Cause in England or the like Why might not Oates see Memorials in some of their Records or Ledges Books without incurring that Train of Absurdities which the Observator according to his manner very pleasantly but very inconsequently raises thereupon Such a continued Plot to have been our Histories shew and Campion the Jesuite boasted That as long as there was one of that Society alive it should not be desisted Though true it is the several Scenes or Schismes of that Plot have been varied and the Mediums Actors and Methods changed according to the Oppertunities of Affairs and different Junctures of times as might easily be Demonstrated But that they had some particular formed ill Design upon the Wheel against his Majesties Government in the Year 1666. seems very evident from the Testimony of one of their own Communion though not so thorough-pac'd as their high Church-men as to the Popes Power over Princes in Temporals I mean Father Peter Walsh a Franciscan Fryer which because it also gives a Specimen of Roman Catholick Loyalty I shall here recite with the Occasion You must know then that soon after his Majesties Restauration the Laws being put in Execution against the Papists in Ireland and they resolving to Petition his Majesty for Ease therein were advised to premise therein a Protestation of their Loyalty which was drawn up in these Words as recited in the said Father Walshes History of the Loyal Formulary Printed 1674. Fol. 7. To the Kings Most Excellent Majesty The Humble Remonstrance Acknowledgment Protestation and Petition of the Roman Catholick Clergy of Ireland YOUR Majesties Faithful Subjects the Roman Catholick Clergy of Your Majesties Kingdom of Ireland do most Humbly Represent this their present State and deplorable Condition That being intrusted by the indispensable Commission of the King of Kings with the Cure of Souls and the Care of their Flocks in Order to the Administration of Sacraments and Teaching the People that perfect Obedience which for Conscience Sake they are bound to pay to your Majesties Commands They are loaden with Calumnies and persecuted with Severity That being oblidged by the Allegiance they owe and ought to swear unto Your Majesty to reveal all Conspiracies and Practices against Your Person and Royal Authority that come to their Knowledge They are themselves Clamour'd at as Conspirators Plotting the Destruction of the English amongst them without any ground that may give the least Colour to so foul a Crime to pass for probable in the judgment of any Indifferent Person That their Crimes are as Numerous and Diverse as are the Inventions of their Adversaries And because they cannot with Freedom appear to justify their Innocenry all the Fictions und Allegations against them are received as undoubted Verities And which is yet more mischievous the Laiety upon whose Consciences the Character of Priesthood gives them an Influence suffer under all the Crimes thus falsly imputed to them It being their Adversaries principal Design That the Irish whose Estates they enjoy should be reputed Persons unfit and no way Worthy any Title to Your Majesties Mercy That no Wood comes amiss to make Arrows for their Destruction for as if the Roman Catholick Clergy whom they esteem most Criminal were or ought to be a Society so perfect as no Evil no indiscreet person should be found amongst them They are all of them generally cryed down for any Crime whether true or seigned which is Imputed to one of them And as if no words could be spoken no Letter written but with the common consent of them all The whole Clergy must suffer for that which is laid to the charge of any particular Person amongst them We know what Odium all the Catholick Clergy lies under by reason of the Calumnies with which our Tenents in Religion and Our Dependance upon the Popes Authority are aspersed And we humbly beg Your Majesties pardon to vindicate both by the Ensuing Protestation which we make in the Sight of Heaven and in the presence of Your Majesty sincerely and truely without Equivocation or mental Reservation WE DO ACKNOWLEDGE and confess Your Majesty to be our true and lawful King Supream Lord and Rightful Sovereign of this Realm of Ireland and of all other Your Majesties Dominions And therefore we do acknowledge and confess our selves to be Obliged under Pain of Sin to obey Your Majesty in all Civil and Temporal Affairs as much as any other of Your Majesties Subjects and as the Laws and Rules of Government in this
Worthy and every way Conformable Divines may Evidently Domonstrate And especially the whole Scope of most of his late Papers wherein pretending to expose an Imaginary Trimmer for the Dissenters of his own making he himself really acts broad-faced a Trimmers part for the Papists 'T is far from my intent who have been Educated in and esteem it my greatest honour and happiness to continue a Son of the Legal Establisht Church of England to espouse the Cause of Schismaticks of either side for such the Papists are as well as others But as all the World knows that good Church like every Vertue lying between Extreams has many years been troubled with two ill Neighbours the one aiming at her Throat the other renting off her Garments I mean the Politick Faction for I can scarce afford it the name of a Church of Rome on the one hand and Protestant Dissenters under several Denominations on the other The former quarrelling with her Doctrines Vnchurching her and Denying Priesthood to her Bishops and Ministers nay even Salvation to any one of her Members living and dying such The latter for the most part owning her Doctrinals Church-ship and Ministry and as far as I know none of them denying the possibility of Salvation to her dying Members but scrupling certain Rites and Ceremonies on all sides amongst us held to be Indifferent which they pretend or think are without sufficient Warrant from Gods Word enjoyned or made necessary to Communion with her And on that or some such like score alledge they dare not joyn themselves with and in her Now as it seems not very difficult to determine which of these is or ought to be accounted the worst most dangerous and Irreconcilable Enemy to the Church of England so it is most suspicious that a person that pretends to be the eneral Champion for the Church as well as State yet defends her but on one side and whilst he skirmishes her own Revolted or disaffected Infantry takes no notice of the other Zanzummim Hoast of her old avowed and inplacable Adversaries nay one that whilst he flourisheth fair Colours of zeal for our Church makes it his business to raise Mutinies in her Tents and is highly beloved and applauded in if he hold not Correspondency with that formidable Camp of her Enemies whom he never engages but upon all occasions rather appears a Mediator a Panegyrist or an Advocate of and for them 'T is very suspicious that such an Undertaker is rather a Spye than a Champion an Vnderminer or Betrayer of the Protestant Church to which he pretends rather then a Cordial lover or Asserter of it I desire not to be believed upon Nude Averments or partial wrested false applyed or imperfect Sentences let every man that wears the Name of a Protestant make but use of his own Eyes his own Ears and what Reason an Judgment God hath lent him upon these Words of the Observator Vol. 2. Numb 145. Trimmer Do not the Papists hold it Lawful nay and a Point of Duty to destroy the Hereticks Observator The Argument flies in the face of ye for 't is the very Principle of the Phanaticks against the Papists But in one word to make a Popish plot on 't you must first prove the Fact Secondly The congruity of that Practice to the Positions of the Papists not to the Positions of here and there a man but to the Authoritative Positions and Concinstous of the Romish Church and the Conform Sentiments of the Members in General of that Communion Trimmer Is not all this PROVED clearly to ye Observator No No NOT AT ALL nor CLEARLY These are the very Words of the Observator and whether the most wity Jesuite in Europe could have Trimm'd it away more clevery for the Papists is left to every Protestants Consiedration 1. 'T is here asserted that the Phanaticks hold it lawful nay a Point of Duty also to destroy Papists Now it may be worth while to inquire whether the Observator had not a design to brand all Protestants particularly our English Government for making the necessary Penal Laws against the Papists for I challenge him to prove or instance in any Protestants either of the Church or Dissenters from it usually called Phanaticks that ever held or declared it lawful to destroy or take away the Lives of Papists as or because they were such I say let him name any one that hath so done not to tye him up to Authoritative Positions and Conform Sentiments in general which he requires where he fears the Romans may be pincht But on the other side that the Modern Church of Rome holds it Lawful nay a point of Duty to destroy all that she calls Hereticks and this not only by their publick Magistrates in Judicial Decrees and Sentences but if that cannot be obtained by any Private Hand that is by Clandestine Murthers and Assassinatious and this too not only against private Subjects but Princes even their own that are Hereticks and that the Church of Rome and her particular Members with her Approbation have practised accordingly is so nororious to every man tollerably acquainted with the Roman Canons and Decrees or History of Europe for these last seven or eight hundred years that to stand long in proving it I fear would render me suspected to be like the Observator one that has abundance of Leisure and Scribbles for so much a Sheet But least I should seem to those unversed in Church-History who I perceive are the Observators Admirers to swagger over by this general charge what I cannot prove be pleased to take these few Testimonies from amongst a thousand more that I could offer and those too from as good Law and as Authoritative as any Edicts of that Church 1. That the third Council of Lateran held by Pope Alexander the third and the fourth held under Innocent the third And the Council of Constance all which are owned by the Romanists to be general Councils do decree that the Goods of all Hereticks if they be Lay-men shall be Confiscated 2. That Hereticks shall be Imprison'd in Fetters and Iron Chaines till the Church have passed Sentence on them Council Constance Session 45. By the fourth Lateran Concil all Kings Emperors c. are commanded to Expel and Extirpate all Hereticks out of their Territories And adds that if any Temporal Lord neglect to do so he shall be Excommunicated and if he stand so one Year then the Pope may pronounce his Subjects to be discharged from their Obedience and Expose his Territories to be enjoyed by Catholicks who having exterminated the Hereticks shall possess it without all Contradiction And moreover that they who under the Badge of the Cross will set themselves to Root out Hereticks shall have and enoy a full Remission of tall heir Sins 3. That Hereticks shall be duely punisht by the Secular Judge they shall take them away by a Damnable Death says another of their Decrees Conc. To. 11. p. 619. and so was and to