all which are forbidden to be read wherein are contained the proceedings of the Councell of Constance against Hierome of Prague and John Husse where the decree is mentioned for the 19. Session of the Councell of Constance viz. a Sess 19. decernitur Haereticis non esse servandam fidem quam vocant Salvum conductum Paralip p. 378. That faith is not to bee kept with Heretikes which is wholly omitted and purged in your printed Councels Honorius Bishop of Anthum in France Anno 1220. Honorio Angustodunensi falso ut creditur adscriptus liber de praedestinatione libero arbitrio Ind. lib. prohib p. 47. wrote a Booke of Predestination and Free-will but so different from your doctrine that your Inquisitors forbid him to be read untill hee be purged What good soever the Elect doe it is God that workes it in them as it is written God doth worke in us both the will and the deed according to his good pleasure if therefore God doe worke in us what reward is imputed to man God doth worke and the Elect do worke God doth worke his Elect by his preventing Grace to be willing and by his subsequent Grace to bee able and both co-operate by Free-will by consenting with a good will this good will is rewarded in them as it is written We have received Grace for Grace wee have received Grace when God prevented us to be willing and followed us to make us able Looke into his forbidden Dialogues Turne thee saith he to the Citizens of Babylon consider the principall persons there and thou shalt finde the See of the Beast for they neglect the service of God pollute his Priesthood seduce his people and reject all Scriptures which belong unto salvation Vide Illyr p. 1426 in Dialog d. Praedestin lib. arbitrio For these and the like discoveries of the corruptions in your Church he is forbidden and under this pretence also that the Booke of Dialogues is falsely ascribed to him In the fourteenth age flourished William Ocham a Fryer Minorite and a learned man saith Bellarmine An. 1320. Bell. de script Eccl. p. 269. de Gulielmo Ocham but being too earnest a favourer of Ludovike the Emperour by that meanes hee fell into some errours and therefore deserved to have his name registred amongst the Bookes prohibited Now observe those errors Ocham Compend Error Joh. 22. He complained that many in his dayes perverted the holy Scriptures denyed the sayings of the holy Fathers and rejected the Canons of the Church and civill Constitutions of the Emperours He professed according to St. Hieromes and the doctrine of Gregory the Great that the Bookes of Judith Idem Dial. par 3. Tract 1. l. 3. c. 16. Tobit the Machabees Ecclesiasticus and the Booke of Wisdome were not to bee received for confirmation of any matter of faith He professed that the Pope and Cardinals were no rule of faith Idem Tract 2. part 2. c. 10. Dial. part 1. l. 5. c. 25. p. Mihi 494. He professed that a Generall Councell although it be a part of the militant universall Church yet is not the universall Church and consequently saith he It is rashnesse to say that a Generall Councell cannot erre against the faith Idem Dial. l. 3. prim Tract 3. part c. 8. He professeth that it cannot be proved manifestly by Scripture that Peter was Bishop of Rome or that he removed his seat from Antioch to Rome or that the Rishop of Rome succeeded St. Peter Idem Dial. part 1. l. 2. c. 3. p. 413. or that the Church of Rome hath the Primacie or that hee governed the Church of Rome or any thing touching the Papacie thereof He professeth with us Idem Dial. l. 2. c. 1. part 3. p. 788. that though it be expedient there should be one Bishop over some part of the Church and People of God yet there is not the same reason there should be one over the whole Christian world And lastly touching Pope John the 22. he reports from the mouthes of them that heard it that in the yeare 1333. on Munday being the third of January Idem 2. part proem p. 740. Guliel Ocham opus 90. dierum Item Dialogi script omnia contra Johannem 22. Ind. l. prohib p. 4. Pope John held a publike Consistorie wherein by word of mouth with great earnestnesse he indeavoured to prove that the soules of Saints being purged see not God face to face till after the day of judgement These are the supposed errors which caused his Dialogues and other of his workes to be prohibited In the fifteenth age Anno 1420. Nicholai Clemangis opera quamdiu expurgata non prodierint Ind. lib. proh p. 71. Clemangis de corrupto statu Ecclesiae Nicholas Clemangis Doctor of Paris Archdeacon of Bayeux so long as his works remaine unpurged saith your Index are forbidden Now observe the reasons why hee is put to silence The truth is he wrote a Booke Of the Corrupt estate of the Church he declared that the Pope was the cause of all the calamities and disorders of the Church he shewes that he was not contented with the fruits and profits of the Bishopricke of Rome and St. Peters Patrimonie Idem c. 4. though very great and Royall he layd his greedie hands on other mens flocks replenished with milke and wooll Cap. 5. 7. and usurped the right of bestowing Bishoprickes and livings Ecclesiasticall throughout all Christendome Cap. 5. and disannulled the lawfull elections of Pastors by his reservations provisions and advowsons Cap. 6. Cap. 7. Cap. 8. and oppressed Churches with first fruits of one yeere of two yeeres of three yeeres yea sometimes of foure yeeres with tithes with exactions with procurations with spoiles of Prelates and infinite other burthens Cap. 9. and ordained Collectors to seize upon these taxes and tributes throughout all Provinces with horrible abusing of suspensions interdictments and excommunications if any man refused to pay them Cap. 10. Cap. 11. Cap. 12. and used such merchandise with suites in his Court and rules of his Chancery that the house of God was a denne of Theeves Cap. 13. and raised his Cardinalls as complices of his pompe from Clergie men of low estate Cap. 14. to be the Peeres of Princes and enriched them with his dispensations to have and to hold Offices and Benefices not two or three or ten or twenty but a hundred or two hundred yea sometimes foure hundred or five hundred or more and those not small or leane ones but even the best and fattest To bee short in that he filled the Sanctuary of the Lord with dumbe dogges Cap. 19. 20. Cap. 7. 14. Cap. 29. Cap. 42. Cap. 18. Cap. 3.4.5.9 and evill beasts even from the highest Prelates to the basest hedge-Priests through usurpations exemptions compositions symony prostitution and fornication committed with Princes of the earth and all to maintaine the pride and
of Baruch and the second booke of the Macchabees and the booke of Nehemiah which the present Romane Church receiveth for Canonicall Secondly Gelasius with his Roman Councell freely give their censure of all Theologicall bookes then extant but they clip not the tongues of any Authors nor burne their bookes If the Romish Inquisitors had done no more if they had let the Records and Evidences remaine and onely censured them at their pleasure wee would not so much have blamed them for using the freedome of their judgements wee would only freely have censured their Censures Lips Epist Critica nostra non effugêre 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and left all to the judicious and intelligent Readers judgement An errour in Criticisme is pardonable but the making away of the evidence of Truth Advers Gentes l. 3. Intercipere scripta publicatam velle submergere lectionem non est Deos defendere sed veritatis testificationem timere and defacing authenticall Records is a damnable practise and an undoubted Argument both of an evill conscience and a desperate cause as Arnobius layeth the Law to the Gentiles To the third Gelasius his testimonie of the Romane Church whereof hee was then Bishop can be of no great moment It seemeth at that time the Church of Rome wanted good neighbours that the Pope was faine to blazon his owne armes and guild his owne Diocese not thinking of the old Proverbe Laus propria sordet in ore Howbeit wee grant in Gelasius his time the Romane Church had not many spots and wrinkles for then shee was young in comparison now she is old and decrepit and all full of wrinkles and after the manner of crooked old age boweth downe to wit to rood-lofts Images and Pictures But neither then nor now hath shee any power to forbid the use of any Books through the whole Church but onely within her owne jurisdiction To the fourth This Plaister is a great deale too narrow for the Sore of the Romane Church to which the Iesuit applieth it For it is not their admonitions to the Children of their owne Church which we here complaine of but their cutting out of the tongues of learned Authors when they witnesse the truth not the censuring their own Writers but the mangling of some of them and utterly abolishing others Vnder colour of taking away Rats-bane out of the way they take away Sugar from their Children and which is worse debarre them from the sincere Milke of the Word I meane the Scriptures in the vulgar language Yet were there Rats-bane in some of the Writers with whom the Inquisitours have to deale they should have onely given notice thereof or prescribed some Antidote against it considering that Physitians and Apothecaries and Housholders also make good use of Rats-bane sometimes To the fift The Iesuit doth well not to undertake justifying of the Inquisition which hee well knoweth hee is not able onely here and there hee nibleth at some Author or other that hath falne into their hands as Bertram in this place whom the Knight long agoe rescued and gave unto him the wings of the Presse to flie abroad whereby hee hath received no disgrace but many thankes from all that love the Truth in sinceritie For the translation thereof which the Iesuit imputeth to the Knight as a great disparagement to him the truth is the Knight translated not Bertram but published the translation of another by re-printing it and gracing it with a learned and elegant Preface of his owne Which I marvell not that the Iesuit kicketh at because hee and his fellow Iesuits are sore Galled with it When the Iesuit shall prove any falsification in the translated Copie or any errour inserted into it hee shall receive a further answer Till then let the brand remaine upon the Romane Index for damning the originall and upon the Iesuit for defaming the true translated Copie of so learned and orthodox a Writer as Bertram was To the sixt In citing the Councell of Laodicea and detecting the Inquisitours foule dealing with it by turning Angels into Angles to gaine a starting hole for their Idolatrie the Iesuit by recrimination objecteth to the Knight errour in Chronology and corruption of the Councell To the first I answer that the Primate of Armath and other learned Antiquaries have set this Councell about the yeare mentioned by the Knight your Binius ingeniously confesseth quo anno celebratum fuit incertum est It is uncertaine in what yeare of our Lord this Councell was held hee saith it was celebrated before the Councell of Nice but hee brings no proofe of it If wee should grant him that this Councell were elder by 40 or 50 yeares than the Knight accounteth it it would be more for our advantage and against him sith Councels the more ancient they are caeteris paribus the more authority they carrie with them To the second I answer that the translation which the Knight followed agreeth verbatim with the originall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which words two of the Romish Translators set in Columnes one against the other by Binius render as followeth The first thus Quod non oporteat Christianos relictâ dei ecclesiâ abire Angelos nominare The other thus Quod non oporteat ecclesiam dei relinquere atque Angelos nominare That is that Christians ought not to leave the Church of God and goe their wayes and name Angels that is mention them in our Prayers or take their names in our lips as the Psalmist speaketh of Idoll-worshippers Psal 16.4 Their drink-offerings of blood will I not offer nor take their name in my lips And thus Theodoret in his Comment upon the second Chapter of St. Paul to the Colossians vers 18. alleageth the Canon of this Councell Because saith hee they commanded men to worship Angels Saint Paul enjoyneth on the contrarie that they should send up Thanksgiving to God the Father by him that is Christ and not by the Angels The Synod of Laodicea also following this rule of the Apostle and desiring to heale that old disease made a Law that they should not pray unto Angels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Here the Iesuit hath both the Canon and the Report the Canon of the ancient Councell held at Laodicea thundring against their Invocation of Angels and the learned and ancient Father Theodoret his Report of it To the seventh Those men whom the Iesuit nameth were not Fathers of our Religion but Brethren onely of our profession neither was their motive for the change of their Religion carnall love as the Iesuit like impure Nero judging others by himselfe conceiveth but a voyce from Heaven saying unto them goe out of Babylon my people Apoc. 18.4 lest you partake of her Plagues It is true those instruments of Gods glory were married as the Apostles St. Peter and St. Phillip and many of the chiefe Bishops and Pastours in the Primitive Church were of whom it may be said as Sozomen spake of
witnesses for proofe of the Catholike Faith beginneth with Martyrs those particularly who being Pastours of the Roman Church suffered Martyrdome successively one after another to the number of thirty three These saith Campian were ours and nameth some of them as Telesphorus Victor Sixtus Cornelius with the particular points which they held conformably with us against Protestants That these Martyrs are ours notwithstanding they died not for any of those points the Knight mentioneth is plaine because they professed the same Catholike Faith which wee doe which wee also prove by the Faith of their successour Vrban the eigth who as hee holdeth their seat so also their Faith for Peters Chaire and Faith goe together as the very Heretike Pelagius confessed to Pope Sozimus saying to him Tu qui Petri fidem sedem tenes Not to stand here upon the most effectuall and infallible Prayer of our Saviour himselfe Oravi pro te Petre ut non deficiat fides tua which proofe must stand firme till Sir Humphrey can tell us what Pope began to vary from his predecessors For adoration of Images whereas the Knight asketh whether any of these three and thirty were canonized for it though there be no speciall mention of any of these three and thirty their adoration of Images yet there is very pregnant presumption thereof by this that Pope Sylvester who was the very next after the three and thirtieth and was Pope in time of Constantines conversion had the pictures of Saint Peter and Saint Paul which it is most like he received from his Predecessors Moreover it is plaine that those three and thirty were ours by their owne decretall Epistles which are so full of those points which Father Campian citeth that the Heretikes have no other shift but to denie the authority of the same Epistles That the consecrated Bread depending upon the Priests intention is the reall Flesh of Christ or that this Priest Garnet by name hath power to consecrate is no matter of Faith but that in the Sacrament the matter forme intentton and all things requisite concurring the Bread and Wine is really and truely converted into the Body and Blood of Christ this is a matter of Faith and this a man is to die for Neither maketh it any matter whether any man have died for it or not for that is more in the persecutors power to appoint what point of a mans Faith hee will put him to death for than in the Martyrs owne who must be readie to die for all and every one as well for one as for another The Hammer IN this Chapter the Knight pulleth the garland of Red Roses off from the heads of all Papists I meane the Crowne of Martyrdome by three most forcible arguments which may thus be reduced into Syllogisticall forme 1. None of those who suffered death for the common Articles of the Christian Faith which we all professe are to be accounted Popish Martyrs But the 33. Popes and all the Martyrs in the Primitive Church suffered death for the common Articles of faith which we all professe Ergo none of them were Popish Martyrs neither can they lay any more or better claime to them then we if so good 2. All that may be tearmed truely Popish Martyrs must suffer death either for the profession of the Trent Faith in generall or some speciall point of it wherein they differ from the reformed Churches But none of the Primitive Martyrs suffered death for the profession of the Trent Faith in generall or any point thereof wherein they differ from the beliefe of the reformed Churches Ergo none of the Primitive Martyrs were Popish 3. If the Articles of the Romish Creed published by Pope Pius were either unknowne to the Primitive Church or not then declared to be de fide none in those dayes could suffer Martyrdome for them But the twelve new Articles of Pope Pius his Creed were altogether unknowne to the Primitive Church or not then declared and defined to be de fide as the Iesuit Page 490. in part acknowledgeth Ergo none in the Primitive Church could suffer Martyrdome for them What wards the Iesuit hath for these blowes we shall see in the examination of the particular exceptions before mentioned To the first It is as true that those 33. martyred Popes were Martyrs of the Romish Religion as that Campion the Iesuit who suffered death for Treason against Queene Elizabeth was a Martyr The truth is that although Campion in his tenth Reason search Heaven and rake Hell also for witnesses to prove the truth of the Romish Religion yet he findeth none as D. Whitaker clearely demonstrateth in his answer to that tenth reason and his defence thereof against Dureus To let others passe those 33. Bishops of Rome the Iesuit mentioneth who now weare Crownes of Martyrdome in Heaven never ware the Popes triple Crowne on Earth P. 486. l. 16. I answer that those Martyrs suffered death not for the points now in controversie with Haeretikes but for the profession of Christianity at the hands of the enemies of Christ They sate as Bishops of Rome they sate not as Lords over the whole Church neither was the cause of their death any contestation with Princes for Soveraignty nor the maintenance of any points now in controversie as the Iesuit himselfe confesseth but the profession of Christianity They were not therefore Martyrs of the Roman Church as she is at this present nor of their Trent Creed but of the Catholike Church and the common faith once given to Saints To the second The Iesuits argument drawne from these 33. Bishops of Rome to Pope Vrbane the eighth fall short at least by 1300. yeares If he should thus argue in the Schooles Pope Vrbane the eighth in the yeare of our Lord 1633. held the Trent faith and beleeved Pope Pius the fourth his Creed therefore the 33. Bishops that suffered Martyrdome under the Heathen Emperours within 300. yeares after Christ held the same faith and subscribed to the same Articles of Trent he would be stampt at and hissed out by all present for who knoweth not that George the Arian immediatly succeeded Athanasius the most Orthodox Bishop and that all the Arian Bishops in Constantius his time held the Sees of those Orthodox Bishops who in the first Councell at Nice condemned that blasphemous haeresie In our memory did not Cardinall Poole a Papist succeede Cranmer a Protestant Bishop and Martyr againe did not Parker in Q. Elizabeths daies a learned Protestant succeed Cardinall Poole an Arch-papist in his Arch-bishoprick of Canterbury What a wooden Argument then is this to inferre succession in Doctrine from succession in the same Chaire This wretched Argument the Iesuit proves as lewdly by the testimonie of Pelagius the Heretike This is indeed to Aske his brother if he be a thiefe or no to aske an Heretike whether your Romish Doctrine be not hereticall Yet so unfortunate is hee in his proofe that even this his onely witnesse how liable
viz. in leaving out the second and altering the fourth in your Breviaries and Psalters You say you print them in your Bibles and therefore they are not absolutely left out as long as they are elsewhere Mute quod scimus It is true the words are contained in your Bibles But Dic quod rogamus why doe you not publish Gods commandements as hee wrote them Admit that in your Catechismes you should set downe this forme of Baptisme I baptize thee in the name of the Father and leave out the Sonne and the Holy Ghost would it be sufficient to say it is not absolutely left out because it is contained in the Bible Shew mee the man amongst your Papalins that dare alter a Kings command or a Popes Breve and will your Church attempt more against the Precepts of God than against a Popes Bull or a Kings Proclamation But the truth is and you know it too well if the second precept were expressely set downe in your Psalters the common people would be too busie in expostulating the cause why Image-worship should be commanded by the Church and yet condemned by Gods word Yea but it is part of the first commandement say you or otherwise it is ceremoniall Let it bee one or other since God thought it needfull to be added how dare you leave it out Deut. 4.2 It was the voice of God himselfe You shall not adde unto the word which I command neither shall you diminish ought from it that you may keepe the commandement of the Lord your God Againe how is it a part of the first if it be ceremoniall when the first is agreed on all hands to be naturall morall The truth is it is not ceremoniall but morall and plainly distinct from the former for the first forbids the true worship of any false god the second forbids any false worship of the true God and howsoever Peresius and Catharinus and you for company would have gladly the Law against Images to be positive and ceremoniall and so to cease at the comming of Christ yet your owne Bellarmine disavowes it with a Non probatur Bellarm. de Imag. l. 2. c. 7. This opinion is not allowed of us both for the reasons made against the Jewes and for that Irenaeus Tertullian S. Cyprian and S. Austin doe all teach that the commandements excepting the Sabbath are a Law wholly naturall and morall After your Apologie for your maimed commandements you grow so virulent as if the poyson of Aspes were under your lips you crie out I notoriously falsifie some Authors and impertinently alledge others you charge me with execrable perjurie you say I am a framer of lies and I offend in all kinde of falshood and lastly you conclude the booke to bee none of mine but some Ministers because you heare it from some that I scarce skill of ordinarie Latine I professe for my learning I cannot boast of it I doe willingly assume that saying of Origen Gratias ago Deo quod ignorantiam meam non ignoro Orig. 1 Cor. 1.27 Psal 82. I am not ignorant of my ignorance but let me tell you as in Gods cause I seeke no praise so I feare no reproach for God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise nay more out of the mouth of babes sucklings he hath ordained strength to still the enemie and the avenger And howsoever seemingly you condemne mee for ignorance yet I am verily perswaded that if I were more ignorant than you make mee you would love me the more for your Church commends Ignorance for the mother of Devotion and the rather because your owne Clemangis tels us Nich. Clemang c. 6. before the dayes of reformation Many Priests who had cure of soules were sent to their flocks not from their studies or from the schoole but from the plough and they understood as much Latine as Arabick nay they could not read and that which was shamefull they could not distinguish an Alpha from a Beta Neither can it be denied that many Popes have dispensed with ignorant men who per saltum without any learning have leaped into a Bishopricke Pope Paul the third created Robertus Venantius Arch-Bishop of Armach for two speciall qualities Tum quod Missam bellè canere tum quia cursu Veredario in equo vehi peritè diceretur Gentil Exam. Concil Trid. l. 2. sess 1. p. 33. the one because hee could sing Masse sweetly the other because he could ride a Post horse skilfully And in the latter ages it was so usuall to admit any Ignoramus's into a Bishoprick that when our King Edward the third sollicited Pope Clement the sixth to create Thomas Hartfield Bishop of Durham notwithstanding the Cardinals cried out he was a Lay-man and an Ideot the Pope replyed If the King of England had entreated for his Asse Si Rex Angliae pro asino suo supplicâsset votum suum hac vice obtinuisset Walsing citat apud Antig. Brit. in vita foh Uffordi And Godwin in his Catal. of Bishops p. 526. Eras Encom Mor. Heb. 7.3 he should have obtained it at that time To come neerer to the times Julius the third made the keeper of his monkey a Masse-priest and I presume he had small store of Latine The Friar who would prove from the words of Christ An non decem facti sunt mundi that God made ten worlds had scrace skill of ordinarie Latine And lastly hee was Sr. John Lack-Latine who would prove that Melchisedeck offered salt with bread and wine because he read in the text Rex Salem which is the King of peace I speake not this by way of recrimination but to let you know how well you and your fellowes are read in the two titles of the Law De maledicis De Clerico promoto per saltum Take therefore from me what learning you will distraine it and impound it at your pleasure I will never trouble you with Replevin onely I say with S. Austin Seeke others of more learning but beware of them that presume of learning And whereas you conceive a Minister made my booke and I beare the name onely for to countenance the worke If I had received help from some in this kinde you need not blame me for it for it is ordinarie with your men to have whole Colledges joyne their helping hand in defence of your cause But in answer to your supposall and to vindicate our Ministers from those great aspersions of ignorance of corruption of obstinacie of perjurie laid unto their charge as Authors of the worke I witnesse a true confession before God who knowes I lye not a Minister was so farre from making my booke Via Tuta Via Devia that I neither had help from Clergy-man nor Lay-man for composing or making either of my bookes Let it suffice for me to have said the truth which although it appeare never so simple yet it is able to remove a mountaine of learning if
Aeneas when he retracted as Pope that which he had written or when he condemned that which hee had retracted No surely he was Pius in nothing in the opinion of your Church but in his Bull of Retractations and he was Aeneas in nothing more than in condemning that which he retracted And accordingly he himselfe beggs of your Church Bulla Retractat Pii 2. Illud Gentile nomen parentes indidere nascenti hoc Christianum in Apostolatu suscepimus Ibid. Pium recipite Aeneam rejicite Receive you Pius but reject Aeneas and he gives his reason for it Aeneas is a heathenish Name which our Parents gave us at our Birth but Pius is a Christian name which we assumed in our Apostolike calling You may adde to this Aeneas was a private man and subject unto errour but Pius was a Pope and therefore in his determinations infallible or rather you may truly say with him Nihil mentiti sumus nihil ad gratiam nihil ad odium retulimus Bulla Retractat that Aeneas before he was Pope delivered the truth neither for feare nor hatred and yet he was forced to retract it but Pius * Cum doctrinā non sanam suspectam quae offensionem parere potest contineant c. Class 2. in Ind. lib. prohibit when he was Pope delivered false and suspected doctrine and such as was offensive to your Church and for that cause is commanded to bee purged Quid Pius Aeneas in te committere tantùm What ill hap had good Aeneas or rather what ill fortune had Pope Pius that he could neither satisfie your Church either as he was Aeneas or as he was Pius neither as a private Doctor nor as an infallible Pope Rivet Criticū Sacr. Specimen c. 7. p. 49. or rather I may say with your owne Canus What doth it availe men who desire to know the truth to raze Records out of their Bookes when they cannot blot it out of their mindes Petrus Crinitus was a Romish Priest Anno 1450. and is commanded to be purged and if we shall examine the reason we shall finde it for no other cause but that he speakes the truth against your Pope and Popish Doctrine To instance in particulars Let both the Title and the Chapter be razed say your Inquisitors touching Pope Boniface the 8. Petr. Crinit l. 7. c. 13. de dom Disciplinâ and the reason is pregnant that Chapter shewes the insosolencie and pride of the Pope in particular in matter of fact and it further declares that under pretence of Religion the Popes in generall thinke they may doe what they list Againe when he speakes of ancient Lawes Idem l. 14. c. 5. made in generall for Marriage and propagation of Children they command that page to be strucken out and there can be no other reason but because on the contrary it is a positive law of your Church to forbid Marriage Lastly whereas he shewes that Leo the Emperour made an Edict Idem l. 9. c. 9. that all Images in Churches and houses of the Christians should be razed and hee declares in his opinion that it doth not appertaine to Religion to adore any mans Image and that Valens and Theodosius made Proclamation to all Christians that they would suffer no man to fashion to grave or paint the Image of our Saviour either in colours or in stone or in any other kinde of metall or matter and that wheresoever any such Image should bee found they commanded it to be taken downe Index Belgic p. 421. Index Madrid p. 150. Ind. lib. prohibit p. 79. 718. Bulla Pii 4. Art 9. Art 22. These and the like passages your Inquisitors in three severall Indices command to be razed out and what cause can you pretend but that it makes against a speciall Article of your faith viz. that Images should be set up in Churches and worshipped and by this meanes you strike likewise at the Articles of our Church and when you have made such Doctrines and Evidences invisible by razing the records then you bid us shew where the Church was visible before Luther Now what credit shall the Reader give unto you and to your Trent Councell that would assure us that your Church intended the purging of no Authors but from the yeare 1515. when as it appeares plainely that you have spared neither the writings of the Apostles nor the Fathers in razing and falsifying their owne very words and sentences And as touching other Authors in the latter ages you have gone beyond your Commission hundreds of years in falsifying corrupting forbidding and purging them and this was long before your prefixed yeare of 1515. In the sixteenth age Luther began his Heresie saith Bellarmine Anno 1517. Anno 1517. Bell. Chronol p. 3. pag. 117. and your Church to make some shew that your Index Expurgatorius had a relation onely to Luther and his followers tooke her rise from the yeare 1515. which was but two yeares before his comming as if all the members of your Church before his comming had lived in the unity of one faith and doctrine This deceivablenesse of your unrighteousnesse I have in part discovered Now I come to your Authors of this last age for I will cite none but your owne Authors and therein lieth another mysterie not inferiour to the first and that is this your Index Expurgatorius was first proclaimed generally against all Heretickes meaning the Protestants but when it comes to examination it points especially at the particular members of your owne Church and that which is most remarkable after that your Trent Councel had distinguished with Anathema's her Roman faith from the faith of Protestants after she had forbidden and condemned by her Index divers of your owne Authors as savouring of suspected and false and scandalous doctrine nay more after she had declared all to be Heretickes and their Doctrine Hereticall who would dare to teach or publish any contrary beliefe to that which was once established by a Generall Councell yet I say the members of your owne Church and those not of the meanest ranke both Bishops and Cardinals have delivered in print many points of Doctrine agreeable to the Articles of our Church and yet you say they never left the Church they are not personally to be noted nor ranked amongst Heretickes when for the very same Tenets we are accused accursed forbidden and utterly condemned as Heretickes and Reprobates and thus the head of your Church being divided from the members in points of saving faith may say unto the tongue I have no need of thee and consequently may cut it out Howsoever this use we may safely make of your Index that if in after ages by new Impressions the true doctrine of Protestants shall be razed and utterly abolished in your Roman Authors yet your very Index will appeare as a strong Evidence to shew that such doctrines were taught in former Ages and howsoever the faction in the
Roman Ferus hath left out the word ridiculum est and saith That some will have Cephas taken for the head which is most ridiculous Claudius Espencaeus Bishop of Paris lived and dyed a member of the Roman Church yet is purged because hee speakes not Placentia sutable to your Trent Doctrine In his Commentary on the Epistle to Titus in his first digression hee is commanded to be purged per quinque paginas five leaves together in which hee complaines of the abuses and corruptions growne into the Roman Church and See he shewes that their greedinesse of gaine and love of money caused them to dispence with all kindes of wickednesse as namely with unlawfull and forbidden marriages with Priests keeping of Concubines with incests murders rapes witchcraft killing of Fathers of Mothers of Brothers and things not to be named and under the name and title of the Taxes of the Apostolicke Chamber for so they terme them in which Booke saith hee being publikely and daily printed Taxae Camerae Apostolicae you may learne more wickednesse than in all the summes and catalogues of vices Then hee shewes that the Councell of Trent was a third time assembled by the command of Pius the fourth Adeo tamen Romanam curiaÌ„ repurgare non permisit yet by no meanes would hee permit that the Court of Rome should be reformed And thus in severall pages Ind. Madrid f. 60. Belg. p. 74. Delean tur illa verba in Ep. ad Tit. c. 1. p. 74 p. 76 77 78. 82 83 84. where hee complaines of the like abuses in the See and Court of Rome the Inquisitors command to be blotted out Lastly hee proves out of Gregory the Great and Saint Bernard a Ibid. p. 526. In Tit. c. 3. That every soule is subject to the higher power that is the Priesthood to the secular power the Bishops and Archbishops to Emperours and Kings and in conclusion when it is questioned saith hee touching the reformation of the Clergie and orders of Monkes for sending the Shepheards to their owne folds and compelling them to feed their owne flocks they say it is a thing that belongs to a Synod Res est synodica pontificia Ibid. p. mihi 526. and the Bishop of Rome But was there any Reformation at the Councell of Trent Did the Pope and Councell cause them to bee more diligent in their calling c. This and much more to the like purpose they command to be blotted out Polydore Virgil a member of your Church is purged in many points of Doctrine which make against you Possev Appar p. mihi 294. Tom. 2. Possevine tells us that his Booke De inventionibus rerum is permitted to be read if it be such as Pope Gregory the thirteenth commanded to be purged at Rome 1576. Now if any man list to compare that and Polydore printed at Paris 1528. Parisiis ex Officinâ Roberti Stephani Anno 1528. hee shall finde that the true Doctrine of Polydore is not allowed which protesteth against many points of Popery Polyd. de Invent Rerum l. 2. c. 23. in initio p. mihi 41. but by the Inquisitors command hee is inforced contrary to himselfe to speake the Trent language As for instance whereas the true Polydore saith When God is every where present certainly there is nothing more foolish than to counterfeit his image in your later Editions you have added these words In the beginning after the first creation there was nothing more foolish as if it were wisdome to represent God the Father in these dayes which in the beginning of the world was foolishnesse In his fifth Booke and fourth Chapter Ibid. l. 5. c. 4. p. 84. usque adp 87. your Inquisitors command seven whole pages to bee stricken out and the reason is pregnant The marriage of Priests which is prohibited by a positive Law of your Church is proved to be lawfull yea and in some case commanded by the Apostles Doctrine and justified by the examples of Saint Paul of Peter of Philip and other Apostles that had wives and he addeth that according to Saint Pauls Doctrine the Bishops and Deacons and consequently all orders of Priesthood had them and this custome saith hee continued long in the Church Porro dum sacerdotes generabant legitimos filios Ecclesia faelici prole virüm vigebat tum sanctissimi erant PoÌ„tifices Episcopi innocentissimi Presbyteri DiaconÃque inregerrimi castissimÃque Ib. p. 86 87. Ibid. c. 9. and withall concludes Furthermore whilst the Priests did beget lawfull sonnes the Church flourished with a happy off-spring of men then your Popes were most holy your Bishops most innocent your Priests and Deacons most honest and chaste Then he proves from Pope Pius the second that as Marriage upon good cause was taken from the Priests so it ought to be restored upon better This and much more concerning the marriage of Priests is commanded to be stricken out In his ninth Chapter hee saith Worship thou one true and eternall God but worship thou no Image of any living creature Ind. Belg. p. 175 deleatur say your Inquisitors let it be strucken out In his sixth Booke Idem l. 6. c. 13. and beginning of his thirteenth Chapter he testifies from St. Hierome That almost all the holy ancient Fathers did condemne the worship of Images for feare of Idolatrie He proves from the Law of Moses that nothing made with hands should be worshipped and from the Prophet David Confounded bee all they that worship graven Images Hee shewes further that Gregorie the Great albeit hee reprehended Serenus Bishop of Marsilia for breaking downe of Images yet hee commends him for forbidding the worshipping of them These and the like passages are commanded to be strucken out per octodecem lineas Ind. Belg p. 177. Ind. lib. expurg p. mihi 725. for eighteen lines together Ludovicus Vives a Priest of your second Classis is purged and namely by the Divines of Lovan Plantins print at Antwerpe 1576. in their Edition of St. Austins workes at Antwerp Anno 1576. In his Epistle to King Henry the 8th where he saith that Princes are supreme Governours on earth next under God this is commanded to be blotted out And where he saith The Saints are worshipped and esteemed by many as were the Gods among the Gentiles this passage without a command in the aforesaid Edition is razed out Againe in his Comment on the 8th Booke of the Citie of God he tells us how your Romish Priests upon good Friday doe celebrate Christs passion upon the stage There Judas saith he playeth the most ridiculous Mimick Lud. Viv. in August de Civit. Dei l. 8. c. 27. even then when he betrayes Christ there the Apostles runne away and the Souldiers follow and all resounds with laughter then comes Peter and cuts off Malchus eare and then all rings with applause as if the betraying of Christ were now revenged and by and by
sense of the Calvinists and withall confesseth that St. Austins opinion is more probable If this I say may bee deemed raving then will I confesse your railing is a good answer But he despaires say you of his cause who seeth Maldonats saying practised by the Church of Rome against his Church and doctrine I confesse with the blessed Apostle Acts 5.38 39. If our counsell or worke be of men it will come to nought and then I might despaire of it but if it be of God yee cannot overthrow it lest happely yee be found even to fight against God We have no cause blessed be God to despaire of our Religion which in one Age hath spread over the better part of Christendome But I conceive there is little hope of you or your cause who have sold your selves either with Ahab to worke wickednesse and maintaine Idolatrous worship for your owne advantage or like Maldonat See Maldonat Col. 1536. Unum è duobus intelligatur necesse est aut tunc non scandaliz abimini cùm videritis filium hominis ascendentē ubi erat prius aut contra tunc magis scandaliz abimini prioremsensum plerique sequātur Chrysost Augustin c. Yet Maldonat followeth the latter openly to professe greater hatred to Protestants than love to the truth it selfe For it is apparent ex professo he preferreth his owne opinion without any authoritie before St. Austin nay contrarie to St. Austin and hee gives this reason for it Because this sense of mine doth more crosse the sense of the Calvinists But I may say to you as sometimes a Ludov. Viv. de Civ Dei l. 13. c. 24. Ludovicus Vives spake upon the like occasion St. Austin is now safe because of his age but if he were alive againe he should be shaken off as a bad Rhetoritian or a poore Grammarian And yet this good Saint was so farre from defending any opinion against the knowne truth that on the contrarie he preferreth the interpretation of b August contr Cresc Grammat l. 1. c. 32. l. 2. c. 32. p. mihi 218. 241. Cresconius a Grammarian before St. Cyprian the Martyr because it seemed to him more probable and agreeable to the truth CHAP. VI. The summe of his Answer to my Sixth Section THe Knight saith he seemes to acknowledge that he cannot assigne the time and persons when and by whom the errors of the Roman Church came in Good Physitians use to enquire of the causes effects and other circumstances and upon the circumstance dependeth the knowledge of the disease We pleade prescription for our doctrine from the beginning The difference betwixt Heresie and Apostasie The Church cannot fall away without some speciall note and observation The Reply I◠is to be wondered what art and policie your Church doth use to put off the triall of her cause when it should come to hearing If we speake of a depravation of your Faith you crie out it is blasphemie If we shew your owne mens complaints for a reformation of your doctrine you say they meant a reformation onely of Discipline If we plainly prove the noveltie of your Trent Articles by comparing them with the Tenets of ancient Religion you threaten to bring an action of the Case against us for slandering and defaming of your Church except we can assigne the precise time and person when those errors came in Let us use the words of your fellow Campian Can I imagine any to be stuffed in the nose Camp Rat. 2. that being forewarned cannot quickly smell out this subtle juggling Why doe you not rather complaine of the Noveltie of our doctrine and bid us shew the time when and the Authors who first broached our two Sacraments our Communion in both kindes our Praier in a knowne tongue our spirituall presence and the like if I faile in these then say The Knight seemeth to acknowledge he cannot doe it The errors in your Church which wee complaine of are negative Articles amongst us and the proofe lies on your side If you cannot shew Apostolicall Authors for your owne doctrine must we be therefore condemned because we doe not prove the Negative Or otherwise it must needes follow by your Logick that it is the same doctrine which was once delivered to the Saints because we cannot shew the first Author of it You cannot denie that there are many particular errors in the Church whose first Authors cannot be named by you nor us and therefore will you conclude they are no errors The custome of communicating little children in the Sacrament of the Lords bodie and bloud was an error and continued long in the ancient Church yet the first Author of it was not knowne There were many did hold there was a mitigation and suspension of the punishment of the damned in hell by the suffrages of the living this error was anciently received yet the first Anthor was not knowne The opinion that all Catholike Christians how wicked soever shall in the end be saved as by fire was an ancient error but the Author is not knowne Againe Alph. contr haeres verbo Indulgentia p. mihi 354. there are many things saith your Alphonsus knowne to later writers which the Ancients were altogether ignorant of There is seldome any mention of Transubstantiation amongst the Ancients almost none of Purgatorie what marvell if it so fall out with Indulg ences that there should bee no mention of them by the Ancients If therefore such errors crept into the Church in the first and best Ages which are now condemned by your selves and us without enquiring after the time and Authors that first broached them Nay more if your points of Faith as namely Transubstantiation Purgatorie and Indulgences were altogether unknowne to the Ancients as your men confesse why should you require us to shew the first Authors of your doctrines which were utterlie unknowne to the ancient Fathers Or rather why do you not condemn them with us as you do the errors which were received for true doctrines amongst the Ancients If St. Peter were at Rome no doubt the Church received beleeved his Prophesies There shal be false Teachers among you 2 Pet. 2.1 who privily shall bring in damnable heresie If the Apostle both forewarned you and us that errors and heresies must steale in privily sensim sine sensu secretly and by degrees into the true Church and yet would not reveale the Authors of the heresies what madnesse were it in you or us to passe by those damnable Heresies or rather to pleade for them because wee cannot learne the name of the false Teachers Vincentius Lyrinensis Vincent Lyr. de haeres c. 15. who was living 400. yeeres after the Apostles time complaines that certaine in his dayes did bring in errors secretly which a man saith he cannot soone finde out nor easily condemne The Serpent hides himselfe as much as hee can saith Tertullian and sheweth his chiefe skill in wreathing himselfe into folds Tertull.
there be in mee I say not any talent but onely a mite of a talent my prayer unto God is ever was it may be bestowed wholly to the honour of his truth and the benefit of his Church And whereas you charge mee with obstinacie and malice which say you is the true cause of all my errours let mee tell you if I were in an errour you have not the patience to shew it me but by bitternesse and railing Your learning haply may worke miracles in the eares of the unlearned that cannot judge but it cannot turne darknesse into light nor errour into truth And although your bitternesse might justly occasion that malice of which you accuse me yet it is so farre from my thoughts that I pitie you and in requitall of your paines I pray for you and that which S. Paul said of the Israelites Rom. 10.1 I wish to the Romanists and members of your Church Brethren my hearts desire and prayer to God is that they may be saved But say you these were not your first fruits for you translated and published Bertram an obscure Author with a preface of your owne and thereby gave sufficient triall of your ignorance and corruption whereof you were convinced by O.E. but never cleered your selfe of so foule a taxe It is true that some ten yeeres since I caused Bertram to be reprinted and published with a preface before it and it is as true that hee being a Romish Priest taught our doctrine of the Eucharist above eight hundred yeeres since and therefore by way of prevention you terme him an obscure Author though he were famous in his time As touching the foule taxe of ignorance and corruption in false translating it wherewith you charge mee you are much mistaken for I never translated it but onely reprinted the old translation this both hee and you might have seene in the Frontispice of the booke in these words Translated and imprinted in the English tongue Anno Dom. 1549. and now the third time published so that the Translation into English was made before I was borne Againe in the end of my preface you shall finde these words Pittie it were but this lamp should receive a new light by reprinting him which the iniquitie of the time had almost extinquished Now I pray Sir what cause was there of any answer to your namelesse Author or rather what cause was there of his and your bitternesse in charging mee with false translating with ignorance and corruption I professe I am not ignorant that your men are guiltie of many such false accusations ad faciendum populum to make your Proselytes beleeve that all our bookes are full of lyes of whom I may truly say as S. Austin sometimes spake of the Donatists When they cannot by slie and wily cosenage creep like Aspes with open professed violence they rage like Lions Lastly you say that an Answer to my booke hath hitherto beene deferred because no man of learning would thinke it worth his paines to make any Let mee tell you I have received three printed answers to Via tuta besides two written copies from namelesse Authors the first was from a Merchant and that is called Via verè tuta the second from a Priest and that is called A paire of Spectacles to see the way the third is from a Clerk and that is termed A Whetstone of Reproofe The first printed Author is termed Mr. John Heigham whose Treatise savours too much of blasphemie and ribaldrie the second is Mr. John Floyd whose worke is full of bitternesse and subtiltie the third is Tom Tell troth for so he termes himselfe whose pamphlet is fraught with all childishnesse and impertinencie Now if none of these were men of learning as you confesse because no learned man would take the paines to answer it what may I thinke of your wisdome which hath returned an answer full of railing accusations such as the Angell of God would not have brought against the Devill himselfe I say in regard your bitter lines are rather a libell without a name than a Christian and moderate confutation I might well have declined a replication to it and have told you with S. Jerome Your bitternesse deserves rather an answer with scorn Magis indignationem scribentis quam studium Hieron advers Vigil than a refutation in earnest But when I considered it was the fruit of your religion and common practice of your Church that for want of matter you commonly fall upon the person I resolved with my selfe to call you to a sober reckoning that the truth of God might appeare and that by your owne bitternesse you might better discerne the character of a bad cause and an evill spirit For a conclusion take but a short view of your bitter reproaches you term me a blind Guide a Ministeriall Knight you say my booke is a Labyrinth of errours you crie out my sirname hath the two first letters of a lye you say the title of Sir will be left for me you condemne me of execrable perjurie you affirme I am a framer of lyes and abound in all kind of falshood you tell me I scarce understand Latine and it is conceived a Minister made my booke you charge me with obstinacie with malice with corruption with ignorance with false translating you proclaime the fearefull judgements of God upon me for perverting soules and as if I were past all grace you say I am not capable of any good advice yet at last as if you would make mee some amends for all your accusation you conclude I forbeare to say any more resting howsoever your well-wishing friend Surely you have said enough and you doe well to forbeare to say more for I thinke the words of your Epistle are so sufficiently dipt in lye and gall that they will serve for your whole worke but I pardon you and shall returne you no other answer than the Arch-Angell gave to Satan Jude vers 9. The Lord rebuke you onely let me tell you I cannot thinke you a well-wishing friend whose heart and tongue is full of cursing and bitternesse for I may truly say of you as Cato sometimes said of Lentulus Dicam falli eos qui negant os habere Seneca They are much deceived that deny you to have a mouth and a foule one too In the meane time you must remember that for your idle and vaine words you must give accompt to God and for your fifteene severall falsifications you must give an accompt to your Reader And thus by way of Traverse and deniall to all other things impertinently alledged I answer No to your railing I answer nothing AN ANSWER TO HIS PREFACE to the Reader Good Christian Reader FIrst thou shalt observe that the author of the Spectacles chiefe aime is either by shifts and cavils to outface the truth or by Sophistrie and bitter words to darken it one while hee cries downe my booke and slights it in such a scornefull manner as if
true though the things there spoken be not understood in a proper sense but in a metaphoricall sense onely Nay more your Jesuite Suare Suarez Tom. 3. disp 46. confesseth that this Cardinall in his Commentary upon this Article doth affirme that those words of Christ This is my body doe not of themselves sufficiently prove Transubstantiation without the authoritie of the Church and therefore by the command of Pope Pius the fifth that part of his Commentary is sponged out of the Romish Edition Thus one while you correct your Authors another while you purge them for delivering the truth in our behalfe Look upon your Cardinall Bellarmine although he will not allow that sense which the Lutherans give Bell. de Euch. l. 2. c. 19. yet hee granteth that those words This is my body may imply either such a reall change of the bread as the Catholiques hold or such a figurative change as the Calvinists hold And although hee would seeme to prove that the words of Scripture are so plaine that they may compell a refractorie man to beleeve them yet having well weighed the reasons and allegations of other Schoole-men Bell. de Euch. l. 3. c. 23. at last concludes It may justly be doubted whether the text be cleere enough to inforce it seeing men sharp and learned such as Scotus was have thought the contrary How therefore your Church should ground a point of faith upon a doubtfull opinion or on such words as by the testimonies of your best learned Divines may receive a double construction I leave it to be judged But farther in proofe of Pope Pius Creed I could urge Sr. Humfrey say you with the 39. Articles appointed by the authoritie of the Church of England to be uniformely taught by all Ministers which they are to sweare unto which Articles though they be indeed new coyned as the foundation of a new Church yet Sr. Humfrey being his mothers Champion will not I suppose yeeld her or her doctrine to bee new Thus you It is true as you say there are 39. Articles appointed by our Church to bee uniformely taught by all Ministers and it is as true that they are published and received with unitie and consent which your men acknowledge for a proper marke of the true Church And withall let me adde this one thing for your observation and indeed it is a thing remarkable whereas all your Trent Articles have beene questioned and confuted by Chemnitius Chamierus Gentilletus and other Protestant writers yet there was never any Papist could goe farther than to tell us as you doe I could urge you with the novelty of the 39. Articles I say never as yet did any Romanist attempt much lesse was able to confute and overthrow our Articles which stand like a house built upon a rocke immoveable and cannot be shaken Let me tell you further your comparisons betwixt our Articles and yours doe not hold for all your Articles are fundamentall points to your Trent beleevers and the deniall of any of them makes them heretiques and damned persons as your Popes Bull expressely declareth Bulla Pii quarti On the other side some of our Articles concerne the discipline of the Church and are not essentiall to salvation others concerne the ancient and latter heresies wherein we teach the negative and those are not properly Articles of faith which we beleeve but points of doctrine which wee condemne and beleeve not And that you may know our Articles are not new nor newly coyned by our men if you will put on your spectacles you shall finde that most of our prime Articles are taught and received by your owne Church as well as ours and therefore I hope you will confesse they are not coyned and built upon the foundation of a new Church Briefly touching our 39. Articles The first sort are in the Affirmative both ours and yours and all those are uniformely received by both Churches The second sort are ours onely which we affirme and you deny and those are very few in number and are evidently deduced from the Scripture The third sort are yours which we deny and you affirme and for that cause you terme our religion negative and those remaine for you to make good Joyne therefore those negative Articles which are wholly yours to those positive Articles which you hold with us and you shall easily discerne if the denomination followeth the greater part those Articles may most properly bee termed Articles of your faith for I dare confidently avow that of the 39. Articles there are above 35. yours that is either such which you hold with us which are at least twentie or such wherein the affirmative is yours and not ours which are at least fifteene take therefore your owne libertie either confute ours or make good your owne herbam porrigemus and I will give you the bucklers You proceed and upon a false supposall that our Church hath created new Articles you proclaime in the name of your owne Church these words We teach that for Articles of faith the Church can make none as she cannot write a Canonicall booke of Scripture Thus you When Diogenes saw a supposed Bastard casting stones in a presse of much people he gave the boy this caveat Take heed lest thou hit thy father This is like to bee your case for by this Tenet you will wound the Church your Mother and amongst others you will surely hit your holy Father the Pope It appeares first that you endevoured to shew that your Church hath created no new Articles of faith but for want of solid proofes you begin to faint and thinke it the safest way to turne Protestant in this point and say the Church can create none but I wonder how you dare pronounce in the name of the Church we teach whereas in truth your Church teacheth it not This is therefore but a cunning device of yours to dazle the eyes of the ignorant with your false glasses and to make them beleeve it is the generall Tenet of your Church and then you thinke they will conclude according to your Assertion Ergo The Church hath created none when as your saying makes more strongly against you if either your Articles prove new or the Pope and his Agents professe the contrarie Mr. Heigham who first answered my Book Mr. Heigham in his answer called Via verè tuta pag. 199. 200. was a member of your Church and he cries aluod that the Church hath power to decree and promulgate new articles of faith But your third Replyer Tom Tell-troth in his Whetstone of Reproofe thought it the wisest way to decline the question for hee knew well when you were both at odds and taught flat contrarie doctrine each to other the Whetstone of necessitie would belong to one of his fellow writers But to let passe such differences amongst your selves bee it spoken to your comfort Friar Walden about two hundred yeares agoe affirmed the same that you doe Waldens
doct Fidei Tom. 1. l. 2. Art 2. c. 22. p. 203. viz. that the Church could not create a new article of faith How can any such article saith he framed after many yeares be catholique and universall when as it was unknowne to our fore-fathers for foureteen hundred yeares before It was not beleeved because not heard of when the Apostle tels us faith commeth by hearing Such an article therefore although it be of faith yet it cannot be catholique and this hee proves directly from Fathers and Councels And whereas you affirme that your Church can no more make an article of faith than shee can make a Canonicall Booke of Scripture Canus loc Theol. l. 2. c. 7. p. 38. Canus your Bishop of Canaries will joyne with you That the Church of the faithfull now living cannot write a Canonicall Booke of Scripture and hee gives the reason for it There are not now any new revelations to be expected ither from the Pope or from a Councell or from the universall Church and from hence it will follow of consequence by your owne Logick Therefore the Church can create no new article of faith Thus farre I have waded in your behalfe that you may the better justifie your owne Assertion for you wil find your Church is like a house divided against it selfe and therefore cannot stand long I say that Quere which was made in Waldens dayes was resolved above two hundred yeares before by your profound Schoole-man Thomas Aquinas in your Churches behalfe that the Pope had power Condere articulos fidei to create new articles of faith to remove therefore these fig-leaves with which you would cover the naked truth This learned Doctour well understood that there were many new articles of religion crept into the Church in his dayes he knew well that albeit he were the prime Schoole man of his time yet with all his sophistrie hee could not make them comply with the ancient Catholique faith and thereupon he thought it the surest way to give the Pope an absolute and independant power over faith and religion and accordingly resolved Ad solam authoritatem summi Pontificis pertinet nova Editio Symboli sicut alia omnia quae pertinent ad totam Ecclesiam Thom. 2.2 q. 1. Art 10. It belongs onely to the authoritie of the Soveraigne Pope to make a new Edition of the Creed and all things else that concerne the universall Church Then he concludes the question and gives this reason for it The publishing of a new Creed belongs to his power who hath authoritie finally to determine matters of faith and this saith he belongs unto the Pope Upon which passages Andradius a chiefe pillar of your Trent Councell confesseth that the Bishops of Rome Romanos Pontifices multa definiendo quae anteà latitabant Symbolum Fidei augere consuevisse Andrad Def. Concil Trid. lib. 2. in defining many things which had beene formerly hidden have been accustomed to increase their Creed Now what thinke you of your Aquinas position and your Andradius confession I hope you perceive that your learned Schoole-men are of another opinion And that you may know that your Church doth not approve your pretended Tenet for Catholique doctrine hearken and consider what your holy Father the Pope declareth touching this question and then consider in what case you stand Pope Leo the tenth sent out his Bull against Luther and amongst other articles Certum est in manu Ecclesiae aut Papae prorsus non esse statuere articulos fidei Tom. 4. Conc. Par. 2. in Bulla Leon. 10. in fine Lateran Conc. novissimi p. 135. he chargeth him in particular with this that Luther should say It is certaine that it is no way in the power of the Church or Pope to ordaine articles of faith This you see is Luthers Tenet and this is yours Now what exception think you might the Pope take at this your Assertion Behold for this and the like Tenets he thundereth Anathema against him hee declareth this with the rest of his Articles to be a pestiferous pernicious scandalous and seducing errour to well-minded men he protesteth it was contrarie to all charitie contrarie to the reverence of the holy Church and mysteries of faith and in conclusion condemnes all his Articles as hereticall Inhibentes in virtute sanctae obedientiae ac sub majoris excommunicationis latae sententiae Ibid. p. 136. forbids them to be received by vertue of holy obedience and under paine of the graund Excommunication You have heard the sentence of your Lord Paramount and by it you may know your owne doome If you hold with Luther you are in danger of Excommunication and stand as a condemned heretique by his Holinesse with the Lutherans If you forsake your hold you have lost your faith And thus you have a wolfe by the eares you stand in danger whether you hold him or let him goe I wonder that you having taken so long a time to answer so poore a Work and having many Assistants for the composing of it they and you could be all ignorant of the Popes infallible Bull. Your Cardinall Bellarmine Quasi Ecclesia posterioris temporis aut deserit esse Ecclesia aut facultatem non habeat explicandi declarandi constituendi etiam jubendi quae ad fidem mores Christianos pertinent Bell. in Barcl who in these latter times hath laboured more than any other to uphold your new Articles of faith yet in obedience to the Pope and saving all advantages to his cause when in the question of deposing Kings he failed of antiquitie and proofe out of Scriptures and Fathers at last returnes this peremptorie answer As if the Church of these latter times had ceased to be a Church or had not power to explaine and declare yea to ordaine and command those things which appertaine to faith and Christian manners and that you may know that you and your Co-adjutors stand single in opinion against the Pope and his Cardinals your Jesuite Salmeron will shew you Doctrina fidei admittit additionem in essentialibus Salm. Tom. 13. Disp 6. Par. 3. §. Est ergo Idem Disp 8. that it stands with great reason to make additions in essentiall points of faith and hee gives this answer for it Because nature is not capable of all truths at one time and from this and the like reasons he concludes therefore there may be new traditions concerning faith and manners though they were never created or declared by the Apostles Thus you see the unitie amongst your selves and howsoever these positions may seeme strange to you and others of your opinions yet your Schoolmen and Lawyers have played the Popes Midwives yea Pope Leo the tenth hath put to his helping hand to deliver your Pope Pius the fourth of that issue I meane those new borne Articles of which your Church hath so long time before travailed Briefly let mee tell you your Articles are detected by your owne men
because the Author of it hath borrowed both the matter and manner of writing from St. Peter and therfore he was thought some scholar of theirs but no Apostle Others said he brought in a profane Author concerning the strife of the Arch-angell and the Devill about the body of Moses which cannot be found in Canonicall Scripture Lastly the Revelation of St. John was likewise doubted of first because of the noveltie of the title of John the Divine secondly because of the difficultie and obscuritie of his Prophecies These and the like reasons were motives to some in the Church to question the Authors of those Books but it was never generally impeached For further proofe of this Assertion let antiquitie be heard and it will appeare that all those Bookes were cited for doctrine of faith by the writers of the first ages and consequently were approved from and after the dayes of the Apostles Hieronym ad Dardan◠de terra repromissionis Ep. 129. p. 1105. Looke upon St. Hierome he proclaimes it to the Church Illud nostris dicendum est Be it known to our men that the Epistle to the Hebrewes is not only received by all the Churches of the East that now presently are but by all Ecclesiasticall writers of the Greek Churches that have beene heretofore as the Epistle of Paul though many thinke it rather to be written by Barnabas or Clemens and that it skilleth not who wrote it seeing it was writby an Author approved in the Church of God and is daily read in the same This ancient Father shewes plainly that howsoever some doubt was made of the Author of that Epistle yet it was received both by the Easterne Westerne Churches And howsoever some of the Ancients did attribute it to St. Luke others as namely Tertullian did attribute it to Barnabas yet all agreed in this that it had an Apostolike spirit and accordingly Cardinall Bellarmine tels you in your eare Ineptè dici vetustatem de hac Epistola dubitâsse Bell. de verbo Dei lib. 1. cap. 17. It is foolishly spoken in saying Antiquitie did doubt of this Epistle when there is but one Caius a Grecian and two or three Romanists in respect of all the rest that speake against it and if we respect not the multitude but the antiquitie of the cause the Roman Clemens is more ancient than Caius and Clemens Alexandrinus than Tertullian and Dionysius Areopagita than both who cites this Epistle of Paul by name Touching the second Epistle of St. Peter it was cited by Higinus Bishop of Rome within an hundred and fiftie yeares after Christ and that by the name of Peter The Epistle of St. Jude was cited by Dionysius Areopagita by the name of Jude the Apostle within seventie yeares after Christ Dionys de divinis nominibus cap. 4. Tertuil de habitu muliebri Orig. l. 5. in c. 5. ad Romanos Cypr. in lib. ad Novatianum by Tertullian within two hundred yeares after Christ by Origen and Cyprian within two hundred and fiftie yeares after Christ Lastly touching the Revelation of St. John it was received for Canonicall in the first and best ages Dionysius Areopagita cals the Revelation The secret and mysticall vision of Christs beloved Disciple Arcanam mysticam visionem dile cti discipuli Dionys Eccles Hier. cap. 3. In Dial. cum Tryphone Iren. lib. 1. cap. ult and this was seventie yeares after Christ Justin Martyr doth attribute this Booke to St. John and doth account it for a divine Revelation and this was an hundred and sixtie yeares after Christ Irenaeus saith this Revelation was manifested unto St. John and seene of him but a little before his time and this was an hundred and eightie yeares after Christ Tertull. de praescript l. 4. Tertullian amongst other things accuseth Cerdon and Marcion of heresies for rejecting the Revelation and this was two hundred yeares after Christ Origen in his Preface before the Gospel of St. John sayth that John the sonne of Zebedee saw in the Revelation an Angel flying thorow the middest of Heaven having the eternall Gospel and hee flourished two hundred and thirtie yeares after Christ Thus you see the Catholique Christians and most ancient Fathers in the first ages received both the Epistle to the Hebrewes the second Epistle of St. Peter the Epistle of St. Jude and the Revelation of St. John with one consent accounting them no better than Hereticks which either doubted of them or denyed them and yet you to outface the truth would make the world beleeve that it was three or foure hundred yeares before they were received into the Church and made canonicall and upon this vaine supposall you would know of me Whether there were any change of faith in the Church when they were admitted or whether those Books received any change in themselves To answer you in a word your proposition is foolish and your question is frivolous for those Books were alwayes received even from the first times and no more could that word of God bee changed than God himselfe who is immutable and yet we see your faith is daily altered for want of that foundation and thereupon it behoves you to get more and better proofes for the confirmation of your new Creed From your justification of your Trent faith you begin to looke asquint thorow your Spectacles at the reformed Churches and after your wonted manner you crie out They have no certaine rule of faith wherewith wee may urge them authoritie of Church they have none Scripture they have indeed but so mangled corrupted perverted by translation and mis-interpreted according to their owne fancies that as they have it it is as good as nothing Thus you Have we no certaine rule of faith What thinke you of the Scriptures Doe not we make them the sole rule of our faith and is not that rule by your own Cardinals confession Bell. de verbo Deo l. 1. c. 2. Regula credendi certissima tutissimaque the most certaine and safest rule of faith And as touching the authority of the Church it is an Article of our Religion Art 20. That the Church hath power to decree rites or ceremonies authoritie in controversies of faith and yet it is not lawfull for the Church to ordaine any thing that is contrarie to Gods word written neither may it so expound one place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another This Article shewes our obedience to the Scriptures it declares the authoritie of our Church and it vindicates our Ministers from perverting and misinterpreting of the Scriptures wherewith you charge us in the next place It is true say you Scripture you have indeed but mangled corrupted perverted by translation Here your charge is generall and your accusation capitall therefore you must give me leave for the better discoverie of the truth to send out a Melius inquirendum that your Translation and ours being compared in particulars the truth may better appeare First then
gloriam pervenire c. Ind. lib. prohib p. 696. Dost thou beleeve to come to glory not by thine owne merits but by the vertue and merit of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ Dost thou beleeve that our Lord Jesus Christ did dye for our salvation and that none can be saved by his owne merits or by any other meanes but by the merits of his Passion then for a conclusion it followes fol. 35. b NoÌ„ erit desperandum vel dubitandum de salute illius c. Ordo baptizandicuÌ„ modo visitandi Imp. Venet. Ind. Belg. p. 419. 1575. Ind. Madrid p. 149. Ind. lib prohib p. ut supra We ought not to doubt or despaire of the salvation of that man who beleeveth with his heart and confesseth with his mouth the forenamed propositions These severall passages are commanded by three severall Indices to be blotted out Nay more the Booke which containes this Doctrine you thrust it into the third Classis amongst those namelesse Authors which deliver Doctrine say you in some sort pernitious to the Catholike faith as if the foundation of all comfort in Christ were pernitious to the Christian faith But let me tell you your Inquisitors have much forgot themselves for they forbid that Booke which say they was printed at Venice 1575. when as by their owne rules they professe openly that they never meant to condemne any namelesse Authors but such onely as have beene published since the yeere 1584. nor any Author whatsoever by their Trent Decree but from the yeere 1515. Howsoever this namelesse Author was both printed at a See Bishop Ushers answer to the Jesuites Challenge cap. Of Merits p. 513. Venice at Antwerp at Coleine at Paris juxta ritum S. Romanae Ecclesiae for so be the words according to the rites of the Romane Church b Cassan in Append ad opusc Jo. Roff. de fiducia misericordia Dâ—i Cassander tells us the Book was to be had in all Libraries and particularly was found inserted among the Epistles of Anselme who was commonly accounted to be the Author of it and the like is confessed by Cardinall c Hosius in confessione Petri cap. 73. Hosius himselfe But this was the time wherein the Dâ—vill was let loose and wherein your Pope Hildebrand did not onely d Non solum fabulas comminiscitur annales corrumpit res gestas invertit sed etiam coelestia oracula adulterat Aven Annal. l. 4. pag. 455. invent Fables corrupt Chronicles and inverted things that were done but did also adulterate the Scriptures themselves and therefore Cardinall Beno who wrote of the life of Hildebrand and was living in that age is e Ind. lib. prohib p. 11. vide Illyric de vita Hildebrand p. 1322. forbidden also to be read because he toucheth to the quicke your Caput fidei the head of your Church In the twelfth age a Sigeberti liber contra Papam Gregorium contra Epist Paschalis Papae Ind. lib. prohib p. 85. Sigebertus Monachus Gemblacensis wrote a Booke against Pope Gregory The twelfth Age An. 1100. to 1200. and against the Epistle of Pope Paschalis hee lived and dyed a member of the Roman Church yet his Booke is prohibited because it complaineth of the state of your declining Church b Sigebertus Ab. ep p. 188. in lib. Goldasli Replio Hactenus interpretatur ideo docuisse PetruÌ„ per Babylonem siguare Romam quia tunc temporis Roma confusa erat Idololatriâ omni spurtitie At nunc dolor meus mihi interpretatur quòd Petrus prophetico spiritu dicens Ecclesiam in Babylone collectam praevidit confusionem dissentionis quâ hodie scinditur Ecclesia Ibid. For what greater confusion saith he was there in times past in Babylon than there is now in the Church In Babylon there was a confusion of languages among the Gentiles in the Church of Rome the tongues are divided and the minds of the faithfull Saint Peter saith the Church which is Babylon salutes you hitherto hee did interpret that Peter by Babylon did signifie Rome because Rome at that time was confounded with Idolatry and all uncleannesse But my griefe doth now interpret unto mee that Peter by a propheticke spirit by the Church at Babylon foresaw the confusion of dissention which doth now rent the Church of Rome If this testimonie had made for our Church as it doth against yours certainly you would never forbid the Record to be read nor to be blotted out but this shewes that there was a revolt a defection from the faith after the loosing of Sathan which were proper for your men to permit to bee read and seene in after ages that the truth might appeare in all and every age of the alteration of the Church c Arnol de villa Novaopera nisi repurgâ—ntur Ind. lib prohib p. 5 36. 37 Arnoldus Carnotensis Abbas bonae vallis his workes are forbidden till they be purged and for no other reason as I can conceive but because he discovers the errours of your Church He tells us that Cloyster Monkes are damned because they falsifie the doctrine of Christ and leade soules to Hell He tells us that your Clergie-men did most perfidiously mingle Philosophicall dreames with the sacred Scriptures He tells us that Masses did neither profit the living nor the dead and for these and the like Protestations against the abuses of his time he is now condemned by your expurgatory Indices In the thirteenth Age Anno 1215. Urspergensis in Anno 793. Urspergensis Abbas is both corrupted and purged by the Inquisitours The Synod saith he which not long before was assembled under Irene and Constantine his sonne at Constantinople called by them the seventh generall Councell was there in the Councell of Franckford rejected by them all as voyd and not to be named the seventh nor any Councell at all This Councell was assembled at Nice and not at Constantinople but the word Constantinople is forged in stead of Nice that the honour of that Councell for Images might not seeme to be impeached or condemned when as the Synod at Constantinople banished Images Now what answer I pray is made in defence of this forgerie August Stench de Donat. Constant l. 2. numero 60. Behold your Augustine Stenchius Keeper of the Popes Librarie tells us that wee have forged those Bookes and conveyed them into the Popes Library where they lye written in ancient hands How probable this answer may seeme that wee should forge Authours in defence of your cause and convey them into the Vatican at Rome I leave it to be judged sure I am it stands corrupted in your Copie printed by command of your Inquisitours and Superiours Againe there be certaine additions to the Historie of Urspergensis which treate of divers memorable things from the time of Fredericke the second Ind. lib. prohib p. 94. unto the time of the Emperour Charles the fifth that is from the yeare 1230. to the yeare 1537.
Merchant God saith he will have nothing to lay to this mans charge at the dreadfull day of Judgement His meaning it may be is God can charge him with nothing because this man knew nothing This doctrine of Obedience doth well agree with Cardinall Bellarmines exposition upon that place of Job Bell. de Justif l. 1. c. 7. The Oxen did plow and labour and the Asses fed by them By the Oxen saith hee are meant the learned Doctors of the Church by the Asses are meant the ignorant people which out of simple beliefe rest satisfied with the understanding of their Superiors And accordingly your Cardinall Casanus perswades his Proselytes to relye upon the Church without further inquirie of the truth Cusan exercit l. 2. l. 6. For saith he Obedience without reason is a full and perfect obedience that is when thou obeyest without enquiring of reason as a horse is obedient to his Master He that shall make a question in your Church whether the Pope can erre must resigne up his understanding with this beliefe Bellar. de Pont. l. 4. c. 5. If the Pope should so farre forth erre as to command vices and forbid vertues the Church were bound to beleeve that vices are good and vertues are evill unlesse she will sinne against her owne conscience This is Bellarmines lesson and that must bee your Faith Nay more Cardinall Tollet will assure you that if one beleeve his Bishop Toll de Instruct sacerd l. 4. c. 3. although it be contrary to the faith yet in beleeving that falshood hee shall performe an act meritorious I understand you are a Jesuite and therefore I doe not much wonder that you so much insist upon the justification of an implicite faith for you had it from your founder and are injoyned to make it good by your owne Order There is a little Pamphlet entituled Regulae Societatis Jesu which your selves have caused to be printed at Lyons in which Ignatius Loyala the Spanish Souldier and Patron of your Sect Anticotton or a refutation of Cottons letter to the Queene Regent p. 24. printed at Lyons by Jaques Roussin Anno. 1607. hath laid downe these rules to your Societie Entertaine the command of your Superiour in the same sort as if it were the voice of Christ Againe Hold this undoubtedly that all which a Superiour commands is no other than the commandement of God himselfe and as in beleeving those things which the Catholike faith proposeth you are presently carried with all the strength of your consent so for the performance of all those things which your Superiour commands you must be carried with a certaine blinde impetuosity of will desirous to obey without further inquiring why or wherefore And lest that such command might seeme sometimes unjust and absurd he commands your Jesuits so to captivate their understanding that they sift not the commands of their Superiours but that they may follow the example of Abraham who prepared even to sacrifice his sonne at the commandement of God and of Abbot John who watered a drie log of wood a whole yeare together to none other purpose but to exercise his obedience and another time put himselfe to thrusting downe of a great Rocke which many men together were not able to move not that hee held them things either usuall or possible but onely that hee would not disobey the command of his Superiour This is that blind obedience and implicite faith which wee laugh at and this is the ridiculous Doctrine which your Rhemists teach He saith enough Rbem Annot. in Luc. 12.11 and defendeth himselfe sufficiently who answereth he is a Catholike man and that his Church can give a reason of all the things which they demand of him But we have not so learned Christ wee are ready alwayes according to the Apostles instruction 1 Pet. 3.15 to give an answer to every man that asketh us a reason of the hope that is in us And for the better fulfilling of the Law and the Prophets wee testifie with Moses Secret things belong to the Lord our God Deut. 29.29 but the things revealed belong to us and our children that we may doe all the words of the Law We say therefore particular knowledge is to be joyned with the assent of faith for no man can assent to that which hee never heard and therefore I thinke no man of understanding with a blind obedience and implicite faith will resigne up his eie-sight and looke through such spectacles as you have tempered for them For without doubt it was the constant and uniforme Doctrine of the ancient Church that howsoever faith apprehends mysteries not to bee inquired into yet the proposition and doctrine of all the Articles of Faith were distinctly taught and conceived by all and thereupon Theodoret who was then living gives us to understand that in his dayes You might see every where the points of our Faith to bee held and knowne 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Theod. Graec. Serm. 5. not onely to them who are Masters in the Church and Teachers of the people but even of Coblers Smiths and Weavers and all kinde of Artificers of all sorts of women and all these you may finde saith he discoursing of the Trinitie and the creation of all things CHAP. II. The summe of his Answer to my first Section THe Church of Rome not without cause bitter against the Reformed Churches because they are Heretikes Theodoret is impertinently alledged Bellarmine is falsified The Catholike Church cannot be depraved because of her promises And this setting aside your reproches and impertinencies is the substance of your second Chapter in answer to my first Section The Reply First you say in your Title The Church of Rome not bitter against Heretikes It is true the Church of Rome is not bitter against Heretikes as you understand them for Protestants for they are no Heretikes but if the termes of Luthers whelpes Hell-hounds of Zwinglius damned persons and worse than Infidels if such termes I say be Catholike complements which your fellow Jesuits have given us I shall freely confesse your Charitie is mistaken But say you the word Heretike which is the worst of all hath ever gone with such as have held new particular doctrines 1 John 2. and such St. John calleth Antichrists Surely you have my assent and wishes with you that is that the name of Heretike may alwayes goe as it hath gone with such as teach new and Antichristian doctrine But let me tell you this description of yours is a perfect Character of the Roman Church and I verily beleeve that if all the pictures and patternes of a Papist were lost in the world they might all againe be recovered and a Papist painted to the life in the description of such an Heretike as you here define Looke upon the particular doctrines of private Masse your halfe Communion your Prayer in an unknowne Tongue and tell me if these be not new why
else doe you and your associates confesse that the contrary Tenets were taught and revived by the Ancients And as touching the name of Antichrist if that be appropriate to Heretikes it cannot touch the members of our Church for we make Christ and his Apostles the sole rule of our Faith On the other side if you consider the Pope either as he sits in the place of Christ as his Vicar Generall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is agâ—â—â—â— Christ in the place of Christ as his Vicar or as he and his adherents teach and uphold a doctrine against Christ for the word Antichrist imports both without doubt they beare the markes of Antichrist and consequently the word Heretike reflects upon your selves Cassander tells us there be some who make the Pope of Rome Almost a God Cassand de officio Pii viri preferring his authoritie not onely above the whole Church but above the sacred Scriptures holding his judgement equall to the divine Oracles and for an infallible rule of Faith I see no reason saith he but that these men should be called Pseudo-Catholikes or Papists Indeed I must confesse I much wonder that any Protestant should give you that honourable title of Catholike especially when you terme them by the name of Heretikes Those that have the marke of the Beast imprinted in their foreheads have borrowed both the Name and Nature from him and therefore your Cardinall tells us Bell. de Not. Eccles c. 4. The word Papist is derived from the Pope such as was Peter And more particularly your Gregory Martin and the Rhemists give you to understand Rhem. Annot. in Acts. 11.26 that to be a Papist is to bee a Christian man a childe of the Church and subject to Christs Vicar You that are so inquisitive after other mens pedigrees see if with all your Heraldrie you can make good your nominal descent from Christ and as you stile him Pope Peter Your Father Bristow Bristow Demand 8. as a knowne Antiquarie in this point gives your Father Bellarmine the lye for he avowes it for certaine that your name Papist was never heard of till the dayes of Pope Leo the Tenth and this was 1500. yeares after Christ and this opinion I am sure is most probable and more sutable to the Noveltie of your Religion But say you we Catholikes stile the Knight and the Reformers by the common name of Hereticks You told me formerly the title of Sir would be left for me now you have added to the title the name of Hereticke and you professe it is the worst word of all It seemes the worst word you have is good enough for me But I pardon you and I must let you know that the name of Catholike is as comely with the Professors of your new doctrine as a golden ring in a swines snout And as touching the name of Hereticke wherewith you charge me you rightly resemble Athalia 4 Kings 11. who when shee understood that Joas the right inheritour of the Crowne of Judah was proclaimed King ranne in her furie to the Temple and cryed out Treason Treason when the treason was not in King Joas but in herselfe that wrought it Your Alphonsus à Castro hath written a Booke against the Heretickes in all ages and in his Index haereticorum I have searched diligently and I finde the names of certaine Popes among them but mine owne name I doe not finde For I professe with St. Austin Errare possum haereticus esse nolo I may erre but I will not bee an Hereticke Shall I make my confession unto you I beleeve all things which are contained in the Scriptures and nothing contrary or besides them as matter of faith necessary to salvation Cum hoc credimus priuscredâ—mus nihil amplius credendum esse Tertul. Ibid. I beleeve the holy Catholicke Church This is an Article of my Faith and this I first received from the Apostles Creed Next I undoubtedly beleeve the Nicene Creed and this was called Catholicke by those holy Fathers to distinguish the Heretikes from the Orthodoxe Christians in the Primitive Church or according to your owne words Chap. 1. p. 2. appointed to be publikely professed by all such as meant to bee counted Catholikes Concil Trid. Sess 3. and for the same cause your Councell of Trent decreed it to be received as a Shield against Heresies and therefore by your owne confession the Councels decree and your Creed it selfe I am free from the name of Heretike Lastly I professe and beleeve Athanasius Creed and that Holy and ancient Father witnesseth of that confession Haec est fides Catholica This is the Catholike Faith If therefore I beleeve the Scriptures and Catholike Church which teacheth the true Faith If I beleeve the Articles of the Nicene Creed which distinguisheth the right Beleevers from the Heretikes If I receive Athanasius Creed which containes the summe and substance of all Catholike Faith and doctrine what remaines then why I should not be exempted from the name of Heretike unlesse I shall acknowledge with you the fourth Creed published by Pope Pius the fourth and consequently subscribe to new particular doctrines which as you confesse doth ever accompanie the nature of Heresie But the Reformers are Heretikes He that shall heare but the word Reformers in all probability will conceive that they were men which opposed some errors or heresies crept into the Church and for that cause desired a Reformation In the Churches of Corinth Galatia Pergamus and Thyatira there were some of the Sadduces opinion who denied the Resurrection others that joyned Circumcision and the workes of the Law with Christ and the worke of salvation The Apostles you know did reprove those errors in their dayes and no doubt many accordingly did reforme themselves Now will you condemne those reformed persons for Heretikes because they differed from the rest with an utter dislike of those errors which the seduced partie retained Surely this is the true state and condition of our Church and accordingly your Trent Fathers made a decree for Reformation in the Councell and pretended that it was summoned to redresse Heresies which were crept into the Church and will you say if they had redressed them the Reformers had beene Heretikes The Rogatian Heretikes would have made the world beleeve that they were the onely Catholikes and the Arrian Heretikes called the true Christians sometimes Ambrosians sometimes Athanasians sometimes Homoâ—sians And in this manner St. Paul himselfe was called before the Judges to make answer to matter of Heresie and according to this way which you call Heresie Acts 24. so worship we the God of our Fathers beleeving all things which are written in the Law and the Prophets They that so rashly pronounce and call every thing Heresie are often stricken with their owne dart Alph. de Heres l. 1. c. 7. saith your owne Alphonsus and fall into the same pit which themselves have digged for others Hee shewes therefore
Religion This you confesse is true in your Councell but to these you answer nothing Concil Trid. Sess 22. Can. 9. You might have added to these abuses both Superstition and Idolatry in the Masse for your Councell confesseth them both and I thinke it toucheth your errors in Doctrine But have you reformed all or any of these things Is your superstitious number of Masses and lights in the Church abated Are your lascivious and wanton songs set to the Organs and mingled with other Church musicke redressed Is your covetousnesse in Priests with their Superstition and Idolatry in the Masse abolished Mirae mirae entis Res. Juvenal These corruptions are things and things as you call them and such as I wonder your Councell was not ashamed to confesse much more to tolerate or rather to practice in the daily sacrifice of your Masse I hasten to the Reformation in doctrine but you tell me it is a Lye the Councell never intended it I instance in private Masse Latin Service c. You answer it is most false for the doctrine is the same still and ever was I perceive your passion makes you much forget your selfe for your doctrine I confesse which is commonly received is the same now that was decreed in the Councell of Trent but that it was ever the same as now it is all the Colledge of Cardinals and Jesuits cannot prove Looke upon your owne confession in those two particular instances Your private Masse where the Priest communicates alone is not the same now as it was heretofore For say you it was the practise of the Primitive Church for the people to communicate every day with the Priest Spectacl pag. 191. Your Prayer in an unknowne tongue is not the same now as it was heretofore for say you Prayer and Service in the vulgar Tongue was used in the first and best Ages Pag. 271. and now the vulgar is become the Latin unknown tongue Take heed therefore of these confessions for by such palpable contradictions you may lose your Proselytes and bring the Lye upon your selfe Againe you confesse that the Councell wisheth that the standers by did communicate not onely spiritually Pag. 53. but also sacramentally and doth not your Church in this wish a reformation in doctrine Doth it not in this preferre the practice of the reformed Churches before their owne and in a manner confesse an error in the allowed practice of the Roman Church Your Councell commands Pastors that have care of soules to expound that to the people which is delivered in the Masse in an unknowne tongue and doe not those that require the Priests to expound it to the people shew likewise that without such exposition the people are little better for the Masse and that the Church intended the people should understand it What is this else but to joyne hands with the Protestants and to acknowledge a reformation needfull in your Church for requiring Service to bee celebrated in a knowne tongue that the people may understand it But that I may make good my assertion and that the Reader may know I have said nothing but the truth in affirming the Councell of Trent did make decrees for Reformation for doctrine as well as manners looke upon the second Session and tell me if they did not professe a reall intention in both Concil Trid. Sess 2. the words of the Session are these Whereas it is the speciall care and intention of the Councell that the darkenesle of Heresie being expelled which so many yeares hath covered the earth the light and parity of the Catholicke truth may shine through the helpe of Christ which is the true light and that those things which need reformation may be reformed the Synod exhorteth all Catholikes assembled or to be assembled and especially those who are skilful in the sacred Scriptures that with continuall meditation they may diligently consider with themselves how these things may bee effected that they may condemne those things which are to be condemned and approve those things which are to be approved that the whole world with one mouth and confession of one and the same faith may glorifie God the Faiher and our Lord Jesus Christ Take a review of the words of your Councell First Praecipua cura intentio ut propulsatis errorum tenebris quae per tot annos operiarunt terram the chiefe care to dispell the darkenesse of errour which covered the earth which words cannot be meant of the Protestant doctrine For our light is pretended by you to be lately come in and but in a part or corner of the world Secondly peritiam habeant sacrarum literarum ut sedulâ meditatione secum ipsi cogitent c. ut probare probanda damnare damnanda queant There needed not this diligence and skill in Scriptures for Luthers Religion for they were condemned before by the Pope Thirdly Nullus debeat c. obstinatis disceptationibus contendere which should not be about Lutheran points but about doctrines of their owne Fourthly in the third Section de extirpandis haeresibus c. which say they is adversus spirituales nequitias in caelestibus which heavenly places are meant by their owne Church not by Luthers as is most evident For they would never acknowledge our Churches heavenly places Now I pray what thinke you of your Councels Decrees Will not they extend to a Reformation in doctrine or will you say that Heresies in manners crept into the Church and the most learned in the Scriptures were chiefly to be imployed for reforming them that thereby there might be one Faith of Papists and Protestants through the Christian world De extirpandis haeresibus moribus reformandis quorum causa praecipue est congregata Sess 3. Looke upon the third Session and there likewise you shall finde a Decree for rooting out of Heresies in doctrine aswell as rectifying of manners and the discipline of the Church and for both those causes saith your Decree the Councell was principally called It is a most evident truth then howsoever you redouble the lie upon me that the Councell did intend a Reformation in doctrine for otherwise to what end should the Pope summon all Christian Bishops out of all Nations even at that time when the Protestants were in number infinite and had discovered and proclaimed the errors of the Roman Church Besides to what purpose were those disputes and oppositions in the Councell against particular points of Doctrine if they had not beene adjudged erroneous and needed a reformation But herein the Reader shall easily discerne the policie of your Church At the first calling of the Councell when these first Sessions were made the number of Bishops were but few about 40. but after the faction of the Popes creatures in multitude prevailed all hope of reformation was abandoned And thereupon the Bishops of Apulia publikely declared that the Trent Fathers were nothing else but the Popes creatures and his bondslaves See
is a poore Pedanticall observation for to spend many lines about such toyes and trifling words and to passe by the maine sinew strength of the Citation this is to confesse in plaine termes that you cannot justifie your doctrine and the rather it appeares in this particular point wherein Master Harding doth not onely condemne the people for their neglect but excuseth hereby your Churches ordinance in generall as being not guilty of the coldnesse of the people Nay more hee plainly intimates the Antiquitie and Vniversalitie of our Doctrine in these words Iuel Divis 7. p. mihi 11. In case the people might be stirred to such devotion as to dispose themselves worthily to receive their Howsel every day with the Priest as they did in the Primitive Church what would these men have to say And as touching Safety and Certainty of our Doctrine hee freely expresseth his thoughts and liking of our Communion of Priest and People saying It were to be wished Iuel in Art 1. Divis 9 p. 17. as oftentimes as the Priest doth celebrate the high Sacrifice that there were some who worthily disposed might receive their Rites with him and be partakers Sacramentally of the Body and Blood of Christ with him and hee gives a reason for it Idem Divis 25. p. mihi 45. Because it would be more commendable and more godly on the Churches part And thus much touching your three Authors whom say you I have so egregiously belyed Touching your worshipping of Images I referre it to his proper Section And whereas wee charge you with flat Idolatrie in the adoration of the Sacrament of Reliques of Images and the like howsoever I say you excuse your selves with the manner of your adoration yet to our endlesse comfort be it spoken you cannot charge us in the Positive Doctrine of our Church no not with the least suspition of Idolatrie This I told you before and blessed be God you have not wherewith to charge us in your Reply But you say It is far greater evill for you to be truly charged with Heresie than for us to be charged with Idolatrie yet neither you nor all your fellow-Jesuits could ever prove us guilty of either But what may wee thinke of your Church which is justly charged and highly guilty of both Your Popes which the Jesuits resolve to be the Church are condemned for Heretikes by your Councels acknowledged Heretikes by the Popes themselves and condemned of Heresie by your best learned Divines Your worship of Images and Saints concludes in flat Idolatrie and in particular by the Doctrine of your owne Church the adoration of the Sacramentall Bread and Cup for want of a right intention becomes an Idoll in the Temple These things I have in part proved which in place convenient shall be more fully handled hereafter But it is observable after I had ended my Section with this point of Idolatrie I say after this conclusion you flye backe to the middle of the chapter and now question me where our Church was before Luther but when I answered that from your addition and Articles of Faith The question doth truly result upon your selves Where was your Church that is where was your Trent Doctrine and Articles of the Roman Creed received de fide before Luther You are so farre from shewing it that you cunningly suppressed these words and not so much as mentioned them and thus one while suppressing the point in question other whiles by declining the true state of the question you shew your wit is better than your cause and declare your Sophistrie to be better than your Divinitie But to follow you backe againe you say Wee must shew you a companie of men in former times distinct from yours It were no difficult matter to shew you many that did seperate both from you and the errours of your Church in former Ages The Waldenses were a distinct companie of Beleevers and separate from your Church above 500. yeares since Reinerius the Inquisitor confesseth upon their examination that hee found they had in one Diocese one and forty Schooles in another ten B. pp. Tom. 13. Reiner contrà Wald. cap. 3. p. mihi 299. and withall reckons up forty Churches by name in Lombardy in Province in France and other Kingdomes he protesteth that amongst all Sects There was none more pernitious to the Church of Rome than it and that for three causes First Ibid. because it is of longer continuance for some say it hath continued from the time of Sylvester which is three hundred yeares after Christ others say from the time of the Apostles Secondly because it is more Vniversall for there is scarse any Country wherein this Sect hath not crept Thirdly whereas all other sorts blaspheme God this Sect hath a great shew of godlinesse for they live justly before men they beleeve all rightly concerning God and the Articles of the Creed onely they speake evill of the Church of Rome and hate it and by this meanes draw multitudes to their beliefe after them Thus if you require Antiquity for their Doctrine they derive it either from Christ or from Sylvester 300. yeares after Christ if Vniversality all Countries were filled with their Doctrine if good life they lived well before men and beleeved all rightly concerning God and the Articles of their Faith and this the force of truth hath extorted from your grand Inquisitor Augustus Thuanus Presicent of the Parliament of Paris Thuan. hist Tom 1. 1550. p. 457. 465. tells us that these who are commonly called Waldenses Picards Albigenses Cathari Lollards though by their difference of place they had divers names yet they held the same faith which Wicliffe held in England and Husse in Bohemia and gathered strength at the comming of Luther especially in the Caparienses who professed a Religion agreeing almost in all things with Martin Luther But withall he ingeniously professeth that Cardinall Sadolet did examine them and found many things malitiously fained against them Poplinerius saith that about the yeare 1100. these men did publish their doctrine differing but a little from the Protestants Poplin Hist Franc. l. 1. Bb. Vsher de statu Eccl. c. 8. p. 209. not onely through France but also through all the coasts of Europe For both French Spaniards English Scots Italians Germans Bohemians Saxons Polonians Lituanians and other nations doe peremptorily defend it to this very day And by reason they separated from the doctrines of the Roman Church Pope Innocent the third about the yeare 1198. authorised certaine Monkes who had the full power of the Inquisition in their hands to deliver the people by thousands into the Magistrats hands and the Magistrats to the Executioners Histor of the Wald. c. 3. St. Dominick who instituted the order of the begging Monkes called Dominicans was a great persecutor of them and their doctrine The Mother of this Monke saith your Martyrologe Martyrologe in the life of St. Dominick P. mihi 556.
deliros senes sed qui magis quà m Phormio deliraret vidisse neminem I will leave the application to your selfe and the interpretation to the Reader because you say I cannot translate Latin Some truth or modesty I should gladly heare from you but this is such an impudent Calumny as Bellarmine himselfe would have beene ashamed to have heard it fall from the Pen of any learned Papalin heare therefore what your owne men confesse of Calvin and others and what we professe in the name of our Church Your F. Kellison saith of Calvin Kellis Surney lib. 4. cap. 5. p. mihi 229. That if hee did meane as hee speaketh hee would not dispute with him but would shake hands with him as with a Catholike And then hee repeats Calvins words I say that in the Mysterie of the Supper by the signe of Bread and Wine is Christ truly delivered yea and his Body and his Blood And a little before those words hee giveth the reason Because saith he Christs words This is my Body are so plaine that unlesse a man will call God a deceiver hee can never be so bold as to say that hee setteth before us an emptie Signe This is likewise Bellarmines confession of him Bell de Euch. lib. 1. cap. 1. Non ergo vacuum inane signum It is no vaine and empty signe Thus you see your fellowes and you agree like Harpe and Harrow you say it is an empty peece of Bread they answer in Calvins behalfe and ours that it is not an empty signe Idem ibid. c. 8. Nay saith Bellarmine both Calvin and Oecolampadius and Peter Martyr doe teach the Bread is called Christs Body figuratively as being a signe or figure of his body but they adde withall it is no bare and empty figure but such as doth truely convey unto them the things signified thereby Bilson in the difference betwixt Subjection and Christistian Rebellion Part. 4. p. mihi 779. for which truthes sake Christ said not this Bread is a figure of my body but it is my body To give you an instance in some of our Church God forbid saith our learned Bilson wee should deny that the flesh and blood of Christ are truly present and truly received of the Faithfull at the Lords Table It is the Doctrine that wee teach others and wherewith wee comfort our selves Wee never doubted but the Truth was present with the Signe and the Spirit with the Sacrament as Cyprian saith Wee knew there could not follow an operation if there were not a presence before Neither doe I thinke you are ignorant of this but that you have inured your selfe to falsities and reproaches For it is apparently true that the question in these dayes is not of the truth of the presence but of the manner that is whether it be to the Teeth and the Belly or Soule and Faith of the Receiver And therupon our learned and Reverend B. Andrews returned his Answer to Bellarmine Wee beleeve the presence Wee beleeve B. Andrew ad Bell. Apol. Resp c. 1. p. mihi 11. I say the presence as well as you concerning the manner of the presence we doe not unadvisedly define nay more wee doe not scrupulously inquire no more than wee doe in Baptisme how the blood of Christ cleanseth us From the Sacraments you procceed to our two and twentie Bookes of Canonicall Scripture and indeed wee allow but two and twentie But will any Catholike say you allow this to have been Catholike Doctrine Yes without doubt Scil. Orig. in Exposit Psal 1. many good Catholikes did follow the Hebrew Canon of the Iewes which saith Origen compriseth but two and twentie bookes of the old Testament according to the number of the letters among them Melito Bellar. de verbo Dei l. 1. c. 20. Bishop of Sardis was a Catholike and saith Bellarmine hee did follow the Hebrew Canon of the Iewes Hilary Hilar. in Prolog in Psal explanat Bishop of Poictiers was a Catholike and he told us The old Testament was contained in two and twentie bookes according to the number of the Hebrew letters St. Cyril Cyril Catechis 4. Bishop of Hierusalem was a Catholike and hee gave us the like Lesson Peruse the two and twentie books of the old Testament but meddle not with the Apochrypha Athanasius Anthanas in Synops Bishop of Alexandria was a Catholike and affirmes that the Christians had a definite number of books comprehended in the Canon which were two and twentie equall to the number of the Hebrew letters Ruffinus was a Catholike Bellar. de verbo Dei l. 1. c. 20. and Bellarmine confesseth hee did follow the Hebrew Canon which conteined our two and twentie books Gregory Nazianzen was a Catholike Naz. Carm. Iamb ad Seleucum Iamb 3. and hee shewed to Seleucus a Catalogue of the Canonicall bookes and hee cites the bookes in order from Genesis to Malachie the last of the Prophets and leaveth out all the Apochrypha The Fathers of the Councell of Laodicea were Catholikes Concil Laod. cap. 59. and in the 59th Canon they allow onely those two and twenty bookes for Canonicall which wee receive There are others whom you terme Catholikes as namely Damascene Hugo de Sancto Victore Lyranus Hugo Cardinalis Tostatus Waldensis Driedo and Cajetan all which differ from your Tenet of the Apochryphall bookes which are canonized by your Trent Councell such agreement is there amongst your best learned touching the greatest point of your Beleefe and yet forsooth your Church cannot be depraved But here is one thing say you which giveth mee much cause of wonder which is that you talke of Traditions as distinct from Scripture I ever tooke you to be so fallen out with them that you made the deniall of them a fundament all point of your Religion that you would not indure the word Tradition but alwaies translated or rather falsified it into Ordinances Thus you It is a true saying of the Heathen Orator Cicero Hee who once goeth beyond the bounds of Modestie had need to be lustily impudent I protest I onely termed your Additions Traditions and you question our Church for false translating of the word And cannot wee indure the word Traditions Doe not we allow of all the Apostolicall Traditions which agree unto the Scriptures Nay more doe wee not translate the word Traditions in the Scripture when the Text will beare it according to the Greeke originall Looke upon the fifteenth of Matthew Matth. 15. v. 2 3 6. and in three severall verses 2 3 6. wee use the word Tradition Looke upon the seventh of Marke Marke 7. v. 3 8 9 13. and in foure severall places of that chapter you shall find likewise wee translate Traditions Looke upon Saint Paul to the Colossians Galatians and upon Saint Peter Colos 2.8 Galat. 1.14 1. pet 1.18 and in all these in the Translation joyned with your Rhemish Testament you shall find the word Traditions How
of the Apostle the cup of blessing which wee blesse 1 Cor. 10.16 is it not the Communion of the bloud of Christ the Bread which wee breake is it not the Communion of the body of Christ for wee being many are one bread and one body because wee are all partakers of that one bread is pertinently alledged by the Knight against private Masse which is a communion without communicants much like to Caesars monument Philippica 1. which the Oratour fitly tearmeth insepultam sepulturam an unburied buriall How is the cup of blessing a Communion if none pledge as it were the one the other in it how is the Bread a Communion if it bee communicated to none How are the people made one bread and one body by it if they partake not of it I grant the union betweene the head and members and Priest and people may remaine though the Priest say Masse and the people receive not as likewise it may remaine though the Priest say no Masse nor communicate himselfe because there are other meanes of this Communion besides the Sacrament yet because this Sacrament was ordained principally to confirme this union and communion and from thence taketh its name they who impropriate a common and of a publike communion make a private Masse destroy both the name and nature of this Sacrament Moreover as the worthy participation of the Sacrament wonderfully confirmeth so it was instituted by Christ to represent the union of the Priest with the people which cannot bee done in private Masses wherein the Priest communicateth alone For that representeth rather a distinction and separation of the Priest from the people then an union Yea but saith the Iesuit if this argument of the Knight were good it would follow that not only some but all the people must receive together with the Priest and that the people must not receive one without the other I answer that it followeth indeed that all the people that are solemnly invited by the Priest and come prepared ought to receive together and this the Apostles words strongly enforce wee being many are one bread and one body 1 Cor. 10.17 because wee are all partakers of that one bread marke it all partakers of one bread and therefore all one bread and one body How can Papists make this argument good out of their private Masses wherein none partaketh of the Bread or tasteth of the Cup but the Priest To the fifth By the Iurie of twelve men true and honest in the Iesuits account for they all lived and died in the communion of the Church of Rome all Priests that say I cannot say celebrate private Masses are cast as transgressours of the traditions and customes of the primitive Church Nay farther as novelists and innovators For they all testifie and that joyntly that the practise of the primitive Church is for our publike Communion and against their private Masses true saith the Iesuit they testifie concerning the practise of the primitive Church but they affirme not that the contrary practise was unlawfull the people then did communicate ordinarily with the Priest but there was no necessitie so to doe Admit this answer were true that the verdict of this Iurie passed for the practise and manner of the primitive Church not for any Canon or precept so to doe yet the Knight hath the better of the cause For they all prove that for which hee produceth them viz. that by the confession of our Adversaries antiquitie is for us in this point and that there was a Church celebrating the Lords Supper as we doe in the first and best ages when there was no Church extant in the world either maintaining or practising private Masses No man doubteth but that the constant and uniforme practise of the primitive Church ought to sway more with all religious Christians De sacrific Miss Dur. rat l. 4. c. 53. in primitivâ ecclesiâ omnes qui celebrationi missarum intererant communicabant Bellith in explicat can c. 50 Micro de eccles observat Tolos de Ritibus c. 38. Innocent 3. l. 6. myster mis c. 5 Odo in expos ean antiquitùs nullae missae sine collectâ hoc est caetu aliquo modò offerentium sacramenta participantiura agebantur Iustin in 1 Cor. 10. olim quod nunc etiam Graeci usurpant ex uno eodemque pane cōsecrato delibatae particulae singulis tribuebantur ut melius unio conjunctio cum Christo atque apertiùs significaretur then any novell constitution or practise of any later Church whatsoever If wee had nothing but their practise that alone were of great moment Yet wee have more I meane their judgement For sith whatsoever is not of faith is sinne especially in actions of this nature their constant and uniforme practise in this kind may serve as a demonstration to any sober-minded man that what they did they thought most agreeable to Christs institution But the Witnesses depose farther for some come home to the point of unlawfulnesse of private Masses Albeit Cocleus saith no more then that anciently the Priests and people did communicate together and Durandus that all that were present at the celebration of the Masse did every day communicate And Bellichus and Micrologus and Tholosanus and Innocentius the Third that in the infancie of the Church all that were present together at the Sacrament were wont to communicate Yet Odo Cameracensis goeth a step farther saying in the Primitive Church they never had Masses without the convention of the people to communicate together Iustinian addeth to the practise of the primitive Church the present practise of the Greeke Church backing them both with a good reason In ancient times saith hee which the Greeke Church useth at this day of one loafe of bread Consecrated divers parts were distributed to each communicant that by this their Communion their union with Christ might bee more plainly expressed Hugo de S. Vict. in spec eccles post baec dicitur communio quae sic appellatur ut omnes communicemus vel dicitur communio quia in primitivâ ecclesiâ populus communicabat quolibet die Cassand de solitar miss propriè communio dici non potest nisi plures de eodem sacrificio participant Ioan citat Cassand consult de solit miss res ipsa clamat tam in Graecâ quà m in Latinâ ecclesiâ non solùm sacerdotes sacrificantes sed reliques presbyteros diaconos nec non reliquam plebem aut saltem aliquam plebis partem communicà sse quod quomodo cessaverit mirandū est c. Bellar. li 2 de miss c 9 et 10 Durandus de hoeret l. 2. c. 4. and Hugo out strippeth him saying it is therefore called the Communion to teach us that we ought all to communicate of it or because the people in the primitive Church did communicate every day together Cassander enforceth the Argument drawne from the name of this Sacrament yet farther against private Masses it cannot bee said
them which is in other words to acknowledge them for a Rule of faith and consequently of infallible authoritie neither can any thing be said more against the present Church and present Councell of Trent then against the Church of that time and the Councels of those times The Knight impertinently alledgeth the testimonies of S. Paul You know that I have withdrawne nothing that was profitable v. 27. I have not shrunke to declare unto you the whole counsell of God Acts 20.20 and Bellarmine l. 4. d. verb. Dei All those things are written by the Apostle which are necessarie for all men and which they preached generally unto all For S. Paul speaketh not of the written word but of the doctrine of Christ by him preached neither doth Bellarmines saying helpe any thing because though those things which are necessarie in generall for all to know which are but few bee written there bee yet many more not written which are necessarie to bee knowne by some in the Church The Knight in praying that the Anathema decreed by the Councell of Trent might fall upon his head if any Papist could shew the number of seven Sacraments to have beene the beliefe of the Church for a thousand yeares after Christ is too forward to draw malediction upon himselfe it will come fast enough to his cost It is an heavier thing then he is a ware of to have the curse of a mother and such a mother as the Church which doth not curse without cause Ecclesiasticus 3.11 nor out of passion For as the Scripture saith maledictio matris eradicat fundamenta the malediction of a mother doth roote out the foundations The Knights definition of a Sacrament to wit that it is a seale witnessing to our consciences that Gods promises are true is senselesse and without ground largely refuted by Bellarmine Bell. l. 1. de sac in genere c. 14.16 and proved to bee most absurd For how can the Sacraments bee seales to give us assurance of his words when all the assurance wee have of a Sacrament is his word this is idem per idem Besides what promises are these that are sealed or if they be sealed what need we more seales and Sacraments then one if there may bee more why not seven as well as two Againe how doe wee see the promises of God in the Sacraments these are but foolish fancies bred in hereticall braines and so to be contemned The Knights Argument against five of our Sacraments that in them the element is not joyned to the Word or they have not their institution from Christ or they bee not visible signes of invisible saving grace is frivolous For confirmation and extreame Vnction have the element and the Word to wit oyle and the forme order and penance have institution from Christ as is confessed in order the patten with an Host and Chalice with wine in it is the outward element in penance humble confession with prayer fasting and almes-deedes are the outward element in Matrimonie the bodyes of a man or woman are as much an outward element as water in baptisme and though Matrimonie might bee a naturall contract before the Gospell yet was it exalted to the dignitie of a Sacrament by Christ and though it bee an holy thing as order is yet as order is forbidden to all women so upon good reason Mariage is forbidden to all Priests because it is good but of an inferiour ranke and not so agreeable to the high estate of Priest-hood That S. Ambrose Austine Chrysostome and Bede Aug. in Iohan. tract 15 de latere in cruce pendentis lanceâ percusso sacramenta ecclesiae profluxerunt teaching that out of Christs side came the Sacraments of the Church prove no more two then seven Sacraments For they say not that they were then instituted or that there were no more Sacraments instituted or that other Sacraments did not issue from thence Saint Ambrose maketh expresse mention of the Sacrament of confirmation L. 2. de sacram c. 24. and of penance as Bellarmine sheweth who also yeeldeth a reason why S. Ambrose in his bookes de Sacramentis mentioneth no more but three Sacraments because his intent in that worke is only to instruct the catechumenie in those things which are to bee done at the time of Baptisme For hee neither writeth to the beleevers of his age but only to some beginners as is manifest by the title of one of his bookes neither doth he there speake of the Sacraments which the Church hath taught and declared but of the Sacraments which those beginners that hee spake to had newly received S. Austine in those places where hee speaketh of two Sacraments restraineth not the number to two only Respice ad munera ecclesiae munus sacramentorum in baptismo in Eucharisliâ et caeteris sanctis sacramentis For in his first Sermon upon the 103. psalme hee saith cast thine eyes upon the gifts or offices of the Church in Baptisme the Eucharist and the rest of the holy Sacraments and in his Epistle 118. having brought in the two Sacraments Baptisme and the Lords Supper he addeth this generall clause and if there bee any thing else commended in canonicall Scriptures Neither doth the place the Knight citeth out of the third booke de doctrinâ christianâ availe him any thing for it is plaine by the word sicuti that he bringeth in Baptisme and the Lords Supper for example only which doth no way restraine the number Besides his word in this place is not sacraments as the Knight citeth him but signa signes which is therefore a corruption of the Knights S. Cyprian de ablutione pedum reckoneth but five Sacraments not that hee thought there were no more Cyp. doi ablut ped propter hoc benignissime Domine pedes lavas discipulis quia post baptismum quem sui reverentia iterari non patitur aliud lavacrum procurasti quod nunquam debeat intermitti but that it pertained not to his purpose to speake of more in that place his scope being only to speake of such Sacraments as had relation to our Saviours last Supper and by ablutio pedum that Authour meaneth the sacrament of penance as appeareth by the words following for this O most benigne Lord thou didst wash thy Disciples feet because after Baptisme which may not be iterated thou hast procured another laver which must never bee intermitted S Isidore in his sixt booke of Etymologies cited by the Knight doth not so much as intend to speake of any Sacrament at all but his only intent is to treat of the names of certaine feasts as the title of the chapter sheweth to wit of feasts and their names Among which he putteth Christs Supper Moreover to shew that S. Isidore held more then the three Sacraments the Knight speaketh of in his second booke de Ecclesiast offic c. 16. l. 23. c. 19. he mentioneth two more Penance and Matrimonie Alexander hales in the place
are not written And of S. Chrysostome all things that are needfull are manifestly set downe in holy Scriptures And againe in the holy Scriptures wee have a most exact ballance and rule of all things And of S. Ierome who maketh the Scripture a two edged sword cutting heresies on both sides both in the excesse and in the defect We beleeve saith he because were ade in Scriptures we beleeve not what were ade not And of S. Austine among those things which are openly set downe in Scriptures all such things are to bee found as appertaine to faith and manners And so of S. Cyril all things which Christ spake and did are not written but all are written which the writers of the Gospell thought to bee sufficient for doctrine of faith and manners And of S. Vincentius Lyrinensis the Canon of the Scripture is perfect and over and above sufficient for all things And of the prime of the Schoole-men Gabriel Biel The Scripture alone teacheth us what we ought to beleeve and to hope for what things are to bee done and what to bee shunned and all other things that are necessarie to salvation And of William Pepin Dom. 2. advent sala haec scriptur adocet perfectè planè quid credendum c. The holy Scripture alone teacheth perfectly and plainely what wee ought to beleeve as the articles of our Creed what wee ought to doe as all divine precepts what wee ought to desire as heavenly joyes what we ought to feare as eternall torments And of Scotus In prim sent prol q. 2. sacra scriptura sufficienter continet doctrinam necessariam viatori The holy Scripture sufflciently containes doctrine necessarie for away faring man that is in his travell to heaven Howbeit because Cardinall Bellarmine beareth downe all before him the more to convince this Iesuit and nonplus all Papists I will examine what the Knight alledgeth out of him to our present purpose All thing are written saith he by the Apostles which are necessarie for all men to know If all things which are necessarie for all men to know then all things which are necessarie for all Priests Bishops Cardinals yea and the Pope himselfe to know unlesse the Iesuit will prove them to bee no men Assuredly the Apostles and the Fathers assembled at Nice and Constantinople set not downe a different Creed for the Priest and for the people but one for all Christians Yet I grant that as the measures of the sanctuarie were double to the common so the learning of a Priest ought to bee double at least to that of the common sort a more exact full and exquisite knowledge of all both the principles and conclusions of faith is required in thom then in the other yet nothing is required of them as necessarie to salvation which may not bee drawne out of holy Scriptures in which are contained all the treasures of wisdome and knowledge 2 Tim. 3.16.17 Oecum Chrys in huno locum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lit. ad Phil. Hisp reg Nam quod ad Theologiam attinet quae summa Philosophia est his libris omnia nostrae religionis divinitat is mysteria explicantur quod verò attinet ad eam partem quae moralis nominatur hinc quoque omnia ad omnes virtutes praecepta colliguntur quibus quidem duabus partibus omnis nostrae salutis falicitat is ratio continetur Banes in 1. p. Tho. q. 1. art 8. conclus 1. omnia quae non consonant judico eorum gravioribus censuris inurunt idque tanta facilitate ut meritò irrideantur The Apostle saith not only they are able to make wise unto salvation indefinitely but that the man of God that is the minister of God may be wise not only wise unto salvation but furnished to every good worke that is as S. Chrysostome and Oecumenius expound it fully accurately and exactly instructed And for ever to seale the Iesuits mouth thus much Gregorie the thirteenth Pope of Rome in his letters to Philip King of Spaine freely confesseth thus expatiating in the praises of holy Writ as for Theologie which is the prime Philosophie or metaphysick in these bookes speaking of the Bible all the my steries of our religion and divine knowledge are unfolded and as for that part which is tearmed morall from hence all precepts to all vertues are gathered and on these two parts depend all the course or meanes of our salvation and happinesse 3. To the third What Dominicus Banes wrote of certaine Divines in his time that were so free in their censures of other men that they became a laughing stook to all men of judgement may bee truly applyed to the Bishops assembled at Trent who are so free in casting their thunder-bolts of anathemaes against all that differ from them in judgement that the learned and judicious account divers of their Canons no better then Pot-guns As arrowes that are shot bolt upright fall downe upon their heads that shoot them unlesse they carfully looke to it so causelesse curses fall alwayes upon the cursers themselves and hurt none else This made the Knight so much sleight the bruta fulmina of your Trent Councell Yea but saith the Iesuit It is a heavie thing to have the curse of a mother Apo. 17.5 and such a mother which doth not curse without cause The Church of Rome I grant is a mother but mater fornicationum as shee is tearmed the mother of fornications and abominations of the earth but shee is none of our mother Ierusalem or to speake more properly the catholike christian Church is our mother the Roman Church must speake us very faire if wee owne her for a sister even this sheweth her to bee no Mother that shee is ever cursing us the true Mother would by no meanes suffer her child to bee divided This cruell Stepdame not only suffereth those whom shee would have taken for her children to be cut in sunder but her selfe as much as in her lieth by her curses divideth them from God and all the members of Christs mysticall body yet wee spare to apply the words of the Psalmist unto her shee loved not blessing and therefore it shall bee farre from her Ps 109.17.18 shee delighteth in cursing and therefore shall it enter like oyle into her bowels and like water into her bones Howsoever wee are not scared with the bugbeare the Iesuit goeth about to fright us withall Maledictio matris eradicat fundamenta the curse of a Mother doth roote out the foundation For first the booke out of which he citeth this text is not Canonicall Next we denie that the text any way concerneth us who are blessed and not cursed by our Mother the true Catholike Church as for the Roman Church shee can in no sence bee tearmed our mother For we had Christian Religion in this Island before there was any Church at Rome at all as I have else-where proved at large Lastly the text the Iesuit
Baptisme and the holy Eucharist of the body and bloud of Christ the double gift of the holy Ghost Paschasius the Catholique Sacraments of the Christian Church are Baptisme and the body and bloud of Christ Fulbertus the way of Christian religion is to beleeve the Trinitie and veritie of the Deitie and to know the cause of his Baptisme and in whom the two Sacraments of our life are contained Of all these arguments brought by Protestants the Iesuit could not be ignorant Yet hee glaunceth only at one of them to wit the second which he would make us beleeve to bee an absurd begging the point in question How can saith he Sacraments bee Seales to give us assurance of his Word when all the assurance we have of a Sacrament is his Word This is idem per idem or a fallacie called petitio Principij As S. Austine spake of the Pharisees Quid aliud eructarent quà m quo pleni erant What other things should these Pharisees belch out then that wherewith they were full wee may in like manner aske what could wee expect for the Iesuit to belch out against the Knight then that which he is full of himselfe sophismes and fallacies That which hee pretends to find in the Knights argument every man may see in his to wit a beggarly fallacie called homonymia For the Word may be taken either largely for the whole Scripture and in that sense wee grant the Sacraments are confirmed by the Word or particularly for the word of promise and the Word in this sense is sealed to us by the Sacrament and this wee prove out of the Apostle against whom I trust the Iesuit dare not argue what Circumcision was to Abraham and the Iewes that Baptisme succeeding in the place thereof is to vs but Circuncision was a Seale to them of the righteousnesse of faith promised to Abraham and his posteritie Rom. 4.11 therefore in like manner Baptisme is a seale unto us of the like promise What Bellarmine urgeth against our definition of a Sacrament to whom the Iesuit sendeth us is refuted at large by Molineus Daneus Rivetus Willet and Chamier to whom in like manner I remand the Iesuit who here desiring as it seemed to bee catechised asketh what promises are sealed by the Sacraments I answer of regeneration and communion with Christ His second quaere is what need more seales then one or if more why not seven as well as two I answer Christ might adde as many Seales as hee pleased but in the new Testament hee hath put but two neither need wee any more the first sealeth unto us our new birth the second our growth in Christ If I should put the like question to the Iesuit concerning the King what need he more Seales then one or if he would have more why not seven as well as two I know how hee would answer that the King might affix as many seales to his patents and other grants as hee pleaseth but quia frustra fit per plur a quod fieri potest per pauciora because two seales are sufficient the Privie seale and the broad seale therefore his Majestie useth no other Which answer of his cuts the wind-pipe of his owne objection His last question is a blind one how may wee see saith he the promises of God in the Sacraments S. Ambrose and S. Austine will tell him by the eye of faith Magis videtur saith S. Ambrose quod non videtur that is more or better seene which is not seene with bodily eyes Sacraments saith S. Austine are visible words because what words represent to the eares that Sacraments represent to their eyes which are anointed with the eye-salve of the spirit In the Word we heare the bloud of Christ clenseth us from our sinnes in the Sacrament of Baptisme we see it after a sort in the washing of our body with water in the Word wee heare Christs bloud was shed for us in the Sacrament of the Eucharist after a sort we see it by the effusion of the Wine out of the flagon into the Chalice and drinking it In the Word wee heare that Christ is the bread of life which nourisheth our soules to eternall life In the Sacrament after a sort wee see it by feeding on the Consecrated elements of Bread and Wine whereby our body is nourished and our temporall life maintained and preserved To the fift In the former Paragraph we handled those Arguments which the Logicians tearme Dicticall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this we are to make good our Elencticall in the former we proved positively two Sacraments in this privatively we are to exclude and casheere all that the Church of Rome hath added to these two which deviseth Sacraments upon so weake grounds and detorteth Scripture in such sort for the maintenance of them that a learned Divine wisheth that as for the remedie of other sinnes so there were a Sacrament instituted as a speciall remedie against audacious inventions in this kind and depravations of holy Scripture to convince them For of an Epiphonema this is a great mysterie Ephes 5.32 they have made a Sacrament the sacrament of Matrimonie of a promise whose sinnes yee remit Iohn 20.23 they are remitted they have made a second Sacrament the sacrament of Penance of an enumeration of the Governours and Ministers of the Church Ephes 4.11 And hee gave some Apostles some Prophets some Pastours some Evangelists some teachers a third Sacrament the sacrament of Order of a relation what the Apostles did Acts 8.17 In laying hands on them who received the gift of tongues a fourth Sacrament the sacrament of Confirmation Of a Miracle in restoring the sick to their former health by anoynting them with oyle in the name of the Lord a fift Sacrament the sacrament of Extreame Vnction A child cannot be bishopped a single partie contracted a Priest or Deacon ordained a penitent reconciled a dying man dismissed in peace without a sacrament the sacrament of Extreame Vnction If they take Sacrament in a large sense for every divine Mysterie holy Ordinance or sacred Rite they may find as well seventeene as seven Sacraments in the Scriptures if they they take the Word in the strict sense for such a sacred Rite as is instituted in the New Testament by Christ with a visible signe or element representing and applying unto us some invisible sanctifying and saving grace I wish the Iesuit might but practise one of their Sacraments that is doe penance so long till hee found in Scripture that and the other foure Sacraments which they have added to the two Instituted by Christ To begin with them in order and give Order the first place wee acknowledge the ordination of Priests and Deacons by Bishops to be de jure divino and we beleeve where they are done according to Christs Institution that grace is ordinarily given to the party ordained but not sacramentall grace not gratia gratum faciens but gratia gratis data a ghostly power
wee are still out of our reckoning wee heare nothing of Order and Extreame Vnction Secondly as the plaister is too narrow so the salve spread on it is of no vertue at all For though S. Isidore compareth Penance to Baptifme in respect of the effect thereof viz. washing away of sinne yet he maketh not thereby Penance a Sacrament Whatsoever washeth away sinne is not therefore a Sacrament Acts 15.9 Faith purifieth the heart as the Apostle speaketh Luk. 11.41 and Christ himselfe saith doe Almes and all things shall bee cleane unto you Yet doth it not from thence follow that either Faith or Charitie are Sacraments For Matrimonie he saith indeed there are three boones or good things in it or as the Iesuit translateth the words three goods of it fides proles sacramentum faith issue and a Sacrament but by sacrament there hee understandeth the great mysterie of the union of Christ with his Church whereof Matrimonie is a signe and hee alludeth to the words of the Apostle Ephes 5.34 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this is a great my sterie Apoc. 17.17 I will tell thee the myslerie of the woman and of the beast which the Latine interpreter translateth sacramentum as hee doth also the sacrament of the woman and as strongly might they conclude out of him that the Whore of Babylon is an eight Sacrament as Matrimonie is the seventh So S. Aug. de peccaâ—â—â—â—t remis l. 1. c. 26 calleth bread which was given to the Catecumeni an holy Sacrament and in Psal 44. the mysteries of Christian religion Sacramenta docl rinae In our booke of Homilies Mariage is called a Sacrament as all sacred Rites may in a large sense The Iesuit should have proved according to his undertaking pag. 202. that Mariage is a Sacrament in a strict sense but his proofes are as his honesty is at large To the eleventh Hallensis lived in a darke age yet in this point hee saw some light through a chinke whereby he discovered that three of their supposed Sacraments to wit Order Penance and Matrimonie had their being before the New Testament Part. 4. q. 5. memb 2. and consequently were not to bee said properly the Sacraments of the new Law and hee giveth us also a sufficient reason to exclude the fourth to wit Confirmation because as hee teacheth the forme and matter thereof were not appointed by our Saviour but by the Church in a Councell held at Melda Yea but saith the Iesuit hee addeth fine praejudicio dicendum let this bee spoken with leave adding let us heare but such a word from the Knights mouth and hee shall see the matter will soone bee ended For answer whereunto I say first that the words of Hallensis sine praejudicio no whit prejudice the truth of his assertion but only shew the modestie of the man Next for the Knight whosoever peruseth his Booke with the Preface shall find that hee speaketh farre more modestly and submissively then Hallensis here doth Part. 4. q. 5. memb 7. art 2 Sed tumor Iesuitae non capit illius modum What Hallensis concludeth that there be neither more nor fewer then seven Sacraments maketh little against us for he neither addeth Sacraments properly so called nor Sacraments of the new Law in quibus vertitur cardo quaestionis if the Iesuit so expound Hallensis he maketh him contradict himselfe and so utterly disableth his testimonie For all Sacraments properly so called of the new Law must be instituted by Christ the authour of the new Law which Hallensis denieth of Confirmation Againe they must have their being by the new Law not before which hee affirmeth of three of the seven Sacraments as I shewed before To the twelfth Wheresoever the Knight maketh mention of Hugo the Iesuit maketh an hideous noise like an hue and cry you say saith the Iesuit P. 231. of Hugo that hee excludeth Penance from the number of the Sacraments and admitteth holy water For both which Sir Humphrey a man may hold up his finger to you and wagge it you know what I meane c. The Knight knoweth well what you meane and also what manner of men they are who hold up their finger in such sort viz. fooles or mad-men utrum horum mavult accipiat Is it a matter that deserveth such hooting to alledge Hugo de sancto victore out of Master Perkins in his Problemes a most learned worke against which never a Papist yet durst quatch How many hundred testimonies doe Bellarmine and Baronius and this Iesuit alledge at the second hand Were the allegation false Master Perkins must beare the blame who misquoted Hugo not the Knight who rightly alledgeth Master Perkins but the Iesuit neither doth nor can disprove the allegation but out of another booke of Hugo he alledgeth a passage for seven Sacraments which yet as I shall shew hereafter may well stand with that which Master Perkins alledgeth out of him against Penance But before I expound Hugo I wish the reader to observe in the Iesuit how true that is which the Naturalists relate concerning Serpents that the more venemous they are Plin. l. 8. c. 23. Aspidi hebetes oculi dati eosque non in fronte sed in temporibus habet the shorter sighted they are Hee who odiously and malitiously chargeth the Knight with a false quotation in this very place falsly quoteth the same Authour himselfe For the words hee alledgeth out of him to wit that there are seven principall Sacraments of the Church are not found in the booke he quoteth viz. speculum de myst Eccles c. 12. It is true such like words are found in another Treatise of his to wit de sacrament is but this neither excuseth the Iesuits negligence nor helpeth at all his cause For he that saith there are seven principall Sacraments implieth that there are more then seven though lesse principall Either Hugo taketh the word Sacrament in a large or strict sence if in a large he contradicteth not us if in a strict sence he contradicteth the Iesuit and the Trent Fathers for they teach there are no more then seven Sacraments whether principall or not principall Hugo reckoning seven as principall tacitly admitteth other as lesse principall Yet the Iesuit singeth an Iôpoean to himselfe and most insolently insulteth upon the Knight P. 231. saying Bcause you may lesse doubt of Penance whereof for thus abusing your authour and reader you deserve no small part he hath a particular â—â— hapter wherein hee calleth it as wee doe with S. Ierome the second board after shipwrack and saith that if a man endanger his clensing which hee hath received by Baptisme he may rise and escape by Penance How say you to this Sir Humfrey have I not just cause to tell you your owne Agreed suum cuique let the Iesuit tell the Knight and I will tell the Iesuit his owne the Knight neither holdeth with the doctrine of Merit nor the sacrament of Penance the
and Hezekias nay farther Polydore accounteth him a dissolute and audacious man who judgeth otherwise of the worship of Images then hath beene approved by the Decree of two or three Councels which he there alledgeth Peresius denieth not the worship of Images but that the picture is to bee adored with the same worship as the prototype or thing represented by it which maketh nothing against the doctrine of the Catholique Church touching the worship of Images Agobardus his drift in his booke De picturis imaginibus is onely against the idolatricall use or abuse rather of images against which hee speaketh very much by occasion of some abuses in his time Although it were true that some silly women or ignorant rusticks should bee so blockish as to conceive some Divinitie in pictures and accordingly adore them yet the use of pictures must not bee taken away for the abuse for the axiome of the law is utile perinutile non vitiatur The Hammer AS those who beheld the head of Medusa wereturned into stocks and stones and presently deprived of all life and sense so those who gaze upon with admiration this head of the Romish doctrine concerning Image-worship become so stupid and senslesse as if they were turned into those stocks and stones to which they give religious veneration A notable experiment hereof we have in a conference in France in which a Sorbon Doctour present hearing how absurdly the Patrones of Images maintained the worship of them said of a truth I find the words of Psalmist verified those that make them are like unto them and so are all they that put their trust in them But wee need not goe so farre for an instance the Iesuit in this Section maketh good that observation shewing us a forehead of the same metall the images are made for which hee pleadeth For he loadeth the Knight with shamelesse calumnies and most impudently defendeth such grosse idolattie as the wiser of the heathen were ashamed of hee whetteth his poysonous tooth and like a mad dogge snaps at all hee meeteth with and farre out-raileth Rabsekah himselfe as the Reader cannot but judge if hee peruse but a few passages ensuing namely first page 298. This is your discourse Sir Humphrey wherein you have given so sufficient testimonie of notorious had dealing especially in the two places of Eusebius and of the civill law that if there were nothing else falsified or corrupted in your whole booke this were enough utterly to deface all memorie of you from among honest men And page 301. What say you to all this Sir Humphrey looke now into your owne conscience and see whether it can flatter you so much as to say you are an honest man And page 205. May not you then beare away the bell from all lying and corrupting fellowes that have ever gone before you Hee that seeth such foule stuffe come out of the Iesuits mouth would hee not thinke that he were sicke of the disease called miserere but I leave his Grobian language and come to consider first what hee laieth to the Knights charge and after how hee dischargeth himselfe of the idolatrie and superstition wherewith the Knight in this chapter burdeneth the Roman Church First he chargeth the Knight with false translation of the Councell of Trent Wee teach that the image of Christ the Virgin Mother of God and other Saints are chiefly in Churches to be had and reteined which Decree he might have translated a little better and more clearely by saying that those images are to bee had and reteined especially in Churches the Latine word being praesertim and his translating it chiefly and placing it so odly gives cause to thinke he had an evill meaning therein as if hee would have his reader thinke that the Councell taught that those images were the chiefe things to be had in Churches c. It is a signe of a light head to stumble at a straw yet here lyeth not so much as a straw in the Iesuits way only he wanted a festrawe to point to the accent which is set upon Churches not upon had the meaning of the Councell and the Knights is all one to wit that images by that Decree were to bee had and reteined chiefly or especially in Churches not to bee had or held to bee the chiefe thing in Churches For no man would imagine that the Councell could bee so absurd and impious as to preferre images before the sacred Scriptures the Font and Chalice the Altar or communion Table much lesse the sacred Symbols of Christs body and bloud Secondly he chargeth the Knight with grosse ignorance in Chronologie But I may aske you saith hee how come you to say the Iewes never allowed adoration of Images for foure thousand yeares when as the people of the Iewes were not such a people above two thousand yeares nay Moyses lived not past 1500. yeares before our Saviour so that of your owne liberalitie and skill in Chronologie you have added 2000. yeares to make your doctrine seeme ancient There is a grosse mistake I confesse but in the Iesuit not in the Knight who saith not 4000. yeares but for almost 4000. yeares in the first edition and in the later editions this scape of the presse is mended and the figure altered For the matter it selfe the Knight might truly have said that the people of God who lived partly under the law of nature partly under the law of Moyses never allowed adoration of Images for 4000. yeares so ancient is the doctrine of the reformed Churches in this point Thirdly he chargeth the Knight with Simbolizing with Iewes in the hatred of Christ You saith hee in alledging the Iewes hate of the crosse as an argument why you should also hate the same tacitly confesse that you love Christ so well as they 1 Cor. 16.22 A fearefull charge for whosoever loveth not the Lord Iesus let him bee anathemamaranatha but a ridiculous proofe for a man may hate an idolized crucifix out of love of Christ because hee cannot endure Christ his honour to bee given to graven images Heate of zeale against idolatrie doth no way argue coldnesse of affection to the true religion 2. King 15.4 Witnesse King Hezekiah the non pareil of a religious Prince who demolished the brazen Serpent and stamped it to powder calling it nehustan though it were an image and type of Christ crucified as Christ himselfe teacheth us Io. 3.14 As Moses lifted up the Serpent in the wildernesse So must the Son of man be lifted up Witnesse Saint Peter who loved Christ more then the rest of the Disciples 1 Pet. 4.3 Diligis me plùs quà m hi and yet hee brandeth all Image worship by the title of abominable idolatrie Nay witnesse S. Iohn the beloved Disciple who went behind none in zeale against idolatrie 1 Io. 5.21 saying babes keepe your selves from idols It is one thing to dislike crucifixes in Churches out of hatred of Christ as Iewes Turkes and Infidels
etiam patres Ambrosius Hilarius c. minime loquuntur de indulgentiis Prierias cont Luth. de Indul. Indulgentiae authoritate scripturae non intuere nobis sed authoritate ecclesiae Romanorum Pontificum Major in 4. sent dist 2. q. 2. Difficile est modum indulgentiarum fundare authenticè in scripturâ sacrâ Roffensis artic 18. cont Luther Quamdiù nulla fuerat de purgatoria cura nemo quesivit indulgentias nam ex illo pendet omnis indulgentiarum estimatio ceperunt igitur indulgentiae postquam ad purgatorii cruciatus aliquandiù trepidatum erat The Scriptures speak not expressely of Indulgences neither the Fathers Austine Hilarie Ambrose Jerome c. Sylvester Prierias affirmeth that Pardons have not beene knowne to us by the authority of Scriptures but by the authority of the Church of Rome and the Popes Fisher Bishop of Rochester confesseth that of Purgatorie there is little or no mention amongst the ancient Fathers and that as long as Purgatory was not cared for there was no man sought for Pardons sith Purgatorie therefore hath beene so lately knowne and received of the whole Church who can now wonder concerning Indulgences And here Master Flood is at a stand his Flumen is turned into Stagnum for having made offer to answer Durand and finding that his answer would not hold his heart failed him and hee durst not venture to shape any answer at all to the Authours last mentioned namely Alfonsus a Castro Alfon. de verbo Indulg Harum usus in ecclesiâ videtur serò receptus de Transubst antiatime rara in antiquis mentio de purgatorio fere nulla quid ergo mirum si ad hunc modum contigeret de indalgentiis ut apud priscos nulla sir mentio Antonin part 1. tit 10. de indulgentiis nihil expressè habemus in sacrâ scripturà aut etiam patrum scriptis Cajet opus 15. 1. Nulla scriptura sacra nulla priscorum doctorum grecorum aut latinorum authoritas indulgentiarum ortum ad nostram deduxit notitiam Bellor de indul l. 1. c. 17. Neque mirum videri debet si authores antiquiores non habemus qui harum mentiorum faciunt whose words are There is nothing in Scripture lesse opened or wherof the ancient Fathers have lesse written than of Indulgences and it seemeth the use of them came but lately into the Church there is seldome any mention of Transubstantiation among the Ancients almost none of Purgatorie What marvell then if it so fall out with Indulgences that there should be no mention of them by the Ancients Antoninus There is not any expresse testimonie for proofe of Indulgences either in Scriptures or in the writings of the ancient Fathers Cajetan There is no authoritie of Scriptures or ancient Fathers Greeke or Latin that bringeth the originall of Indulgences to our knowledge Bellarmine It is not to be wondered if wee have not many ancient Authours which make mention of Indulgences for many things are reâ—â—â—ned in the Church onely by use and custome without writing See how the Romanists second one the other Bellarmine saith That not many ancient Authours make mention of Indulgences Cajetan and Antoninus say Not any Durand saith that The Scriptures speake not expresly of them Prierias saith That they speake not at all of them To the tenth The Indulgences those Fathers and Councells speake of have no more affinitie with the Pardon 's the Pope selleth now adaies than the Rivers of Paradise have with Styx or Avernos or Simon Peter with Simon Magus or Phillip the Apostle with Phillip King of Macedon as I shewed before To the eleventh The Iesuit hath neither proved the practise of the Catholike Church nor of the Romane time out of mind for Indulgences but onely practises of later times since manifold abuses crept into the Roman Church As for his negative Argument to wit that It is a strong evidence of consent for Indulgences because none is found to have spoken against them unlesse hee otherwise qualifie it it will no more prove Purgatorie or the lawfull use of Indulgences than it will prove there is a Common-wealth in Eutopia or Cities or Countries in the Moone or many worlds because peradventure none is found to have spoken or written against them And for the Waldenses that they were the first impugners of Indulgences is said by the Iesuit but not proved much lesse that these Waldenses were known Heretikes For they were farre from heresie by the confession of their greatest adversarie the Inquisitor Rainerius Cont. Wald. cap. 4. They live saith hee justly before men and believe all things well concerning God and all the Articles contained in the Creed Solummodo Romanam Ecclesiam blasphemant Clerum onely they speake evill of the Romane Church and Clergie To the twelfth It was happy for Durand that hee lived before the Inquisition and Index Expurgatorius Durand in 4. sent dist 2. q. 3. Quod dictuÌ„ est Petro. Mat. 16. tibi dabo claves c. intelligitur de potestate ei data in foro poenitentiae de collatione autem indulgentiarum non est quomodò debeat intelligi sancti enim Ambrosius Hilarius Augustinus Hieronimus minime loquntur de indulgentiis For he argueth so strongly against Indulgences saying that Little can be spoken of any certainty concerning them because the Scripture speaketh not expressely of them for what is spoken Matthew the 16. to Peter I will give thee the Keyes and whatsoever thou bindest on earth shall be bound in heaven is understood of the power given him in the penitentiall Court and cannot be understood of the bestowing of Indulgences for the holy Fathers Ambrose Hilarie Augustine Jerome speake not at all of Indulgences that his writings if not his person would have beene purged by fire if hee had lived in these times yet true it is that having argued strongly against Indulgences and the Church Treasurie so farre as it consisteth of the merit of Saints hee bethought himselfe and pro formâ alleageth to the contrarie the Custome and Doctrine of the Church meaning the Romane Church whose lash hee feared if hee should not have given backe that by Whole-sale which hee had taken away from her by Re-tale It s true also that hee mentions Indulgences at the stations of Rome in the dayes of Saint Gregory but let it be noted that Gregory is without the compasse of the Primitive times and that hee was interested in the cause for Purgatorie fiers began to singe men in his time and thereupon Indulgences to be in request which afterwards proved a Staple commoditie to the See of Rome Lastly Mart. Epig. de Lab. Non es crede mihi bonus quid ergo ut verum loquar optimus malorum Pisones Senecasque Memmiosque et Crispos mihi redde sed priores fies protinus ultimus bonorum as Martial writeth of Labulla it may be truly said of this Gregory that hee was the worst of the good and best of
contradict Romish doctrines not out of disobedience to man but out of obedience to him who commandeth us to contend for the true faith and to reprove and convince all gainesayers What Papists intentions are we take not upon us to judge their doctrines we put to the test of Gods word and finde them false and adulterine and all be it some points of their beliefe considered in themselves might seeme indifferent yet as they hold them they are not because they are not of faith Rom. 14.23 and what soever is not of faith is sinne Now no point of the Romish Creed as they hold it is of that faith the Apostle speaketh of that is divine faith because they ground and finally resolve all their articles not upon Gods word but upon the authority of the Pope Resp ad Archiepis Spalaten c. 47. Firmitas fundamenti â—â— firma licet implicita in aureo hoc fundamento veritatis adhaesio valebit ut in Cypriano sic in nobis ad salutem faenum stipula imbecilitas caries in tecto contignatione explicitae erroris opinio non valebit nec in Cypriano nec in nobis ad perâ—â—tiem or Church of Rome which is but the authority of man whereas on the contrary as Doctor Crakent horpe demonstrateth If any Protestant build hay or stubble upon the true foundation he may he saved because be holdeth the true foundation which is that every doctrine of faith ought to be built upon Scripture If the Iesuit wonder at this conclusion let him weigh the Authors reasons and he will be forced to confesse that the errors if there be any in Protestants in regard they sticke close to the true foundation and implicitly deny them cannot in them be damnable whereas the very true doctrines of faith in Papists because they hold them upon a wrong ground and foundation very much derogatory to God and his truth are not so safe To the third With what face can the Iesuit avow this considering that Prieras before alleaged and other writers approved by the Church of Rome mainetaine this blasphemous assertion that the authority of the Church is greater then the anthority of Scripture and all Papists of note at this day hold that the Scripture is but an imperfect and partiall rule of faith all Protestants on the contrary teach that it is an entire and perfect rule of faith Papists believe the Scripture for the Churches sake Protestants the Church for the Scripture sake Papists resolve all points of faith generally into the Popes infalibility or Churches authority Protestants into the written word of God which as Bellarmine himselfe confesseth De verbo Dei non script l. 4. c. 11. containeth all things necessary for all men to beleeve and is a most certaine and safe rule of beleeveing Yea but saith the Iesuit out of Vincentius Lerinensis De verbo Dei l. 1. c. 2. he that will avoid the deceits and snares of Haeretikes and remaine soundin the faith must strengthen his faith two wayes to wit by the authority of the divine law and the tradition of the Catholike Church This advise of Vincentius is sound and good if it be rightly understood and not in the Iesuits sense Vincentius there by tradition of the Catholike Church understandeth not unwritten verities but the Catholike expositions of holy Scriptures extant in the writings of the Doctors of the Church in all ages and we grant that this Catholike exposition of the Doctors where it can be had is of great force to confirme faith and confound Heretikes Vt Scripturae ecclesiastice intelligentiae jungatur authoritas For the stopping of whose mouth that Father saith and we deny it not that there is great neede to add to the Scripture the Churches sense or interpretation albeit as he there addeth which cutteth the throat of the Iesuits cause The Canon of Scripture is perfect and sufficient of it selfe for all things nay rather as hee correcteth himselfe Over and above sufficient cum sit perfectus scripturae canon sibique adomnia satis superque sufficiat To the fourth Here the Iesuit would make his Reader study a little and his Adversarie to muse Vero nihil verius certo nihil certius but it is indeed whether hee be in his right wits or no. For first as Seneca well resolveth one thing cannot be said truer than another one truth in Divinitie may be more evident to us than another but in it selfe it cannot be truer or surer Secondly admitting there could be degrees of certainty at least quoad nos there can be yet no comparison in regard of such certaintie betweene an Article of the Creed assented unto by all Christians and a controverted conclusion maintained onely by a late faction in the Westerne Church But the sitting of Christ at the right hand of his Father is an Article of the Creed set downe in expresse words in holy Scripture Mark 16.19 Luke 24. consented unto by all Christians in the world whereas the carnall presence of Christ in the Sacrament by Tranfubstantiation is no Article extant in any Creed save onely that of Pope Pius his coyning in the yeare of our Lord 1564. It is neither in words set downe in Scripture as the other Articles are neither can it be necssarily inforced or deduced by consequence as foure great Cardinals of the Roman Church confesse Cameracensis Cajetan Roffensis and Bellarmine Neither was this Doctrine of the Romane Church ever assented unto by the Greeke Church nor by the Latine anciently or generally as I shewed before Thirdly the Iesuit contradicteth himselfe within eight lines for having said in the eighteenth line Pag. 384. that Christ his corporall presence in the Sacrament was more sure than his presence in heaven at the right hand of his Father about seven lines after forgetting himselfe hee saith that Wee shall find as much to doe marke as much not more in expounding that Article of the Creed as they doe in expounding the words This is my Body Wherein it is well hee confesseth that Papists make much to doe in expounding the words This is my Body which is most true for by the demonstrative Hoc they understand they know not what Neither this Body nor this Bread but an Individum vagum something contained under the accidents of Bread which when the Priests saith Hoc it is Bread but when hee hath muttered out an Vm it is Christs Body Likewise by the Copula est is they understand they know not what either shall be as soone as the words are spoken or is converted unto or is by Transubstantiation Lastly by Body they understand such a body as indeed is no body without the extension of place without distinction of Organs without facultie of sense or motion and will hee make this figment so incredible so impossible as sure nay more sure than the Article of Christs ascension into heaven and his sitting at the right hand of his
to be grandement suspicious of new coynage and if for no other cause yet for this alone they give a just occasion and jealousie when such poore shifts and evasions are devised by your Pope and his adherent to make them good for it is a true saying of a renowned Bishop and it is the faith of all reformed Catholiques B. Morton Grand Impost cap. 2. sect 2. He can onely make an article of faith who can create a soule and after make a Gospel to save that soule and then give unto that soule the gift of faith to beleeve that Gospel I proceed to your doctrine That is onely to bee called a new faith say you which is cleane of another kind that is differing or disagreeing from that was taught before Thus you I will not take advantage of your first Assertion that your faith is grounded upon the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles which you can never prove but wil joyne issue with you upon your last Assumpsit That is only to be called a new faith which is cleane of another kind and is different disagreeing from what was taught before but such are many of the Articles of Pope Pius the fourth extracted from the Councell of Trent as shall appeare by proofes at large in their proper places In the meane time let me tell you your Church teacheth not onely Novê but Nova not onely Praeter but Contra even besides and contrarie to that which she first received from the ancient Church so that howsoever you seeke to darken truth by faire and specious pretences yet in truth your Trent Additions are forraine to the faith as neither principles nor conclusions of it And that you may know and acknowledge with us that your Trent faith is differing and disagreeing from what was taught before I pray call to mind your owne confessions touching these particular Articles of your Roman Church Your doctrine touching Lay-peoples communicating under one kind namely in bread onely is an Article of the Roman faith and now generally taught and practised in the Roman Church but this practice by your owne confession is different and disagreeing from what was taught before for you say pag. 253. touching the Authors which you bring for proofe That it was the common practice of the Church for the Laytie to communicate in both kinds I allow of their authoritie Your Prayer and Service in an unknown tongue as it is now used in the Roman Church by your owne confession is different and disagreeing from what was taught before for say you pag. 270. It is true that Prayer and Service in the vulgar tongue was used in the first and best ages according to the precept of the Apostles and practice of the Fathers In the beginning it was so Your doctrine of Transubstantiation which at this day is generally received de substantia fidei for an Article of Faith yet by your owne confession is different and disagreeing from what was taught before for say you pag. 167. Transubstantiation might well be said not to have beene de substantia fidei in the Primitive Church as Yribarne speaketh because it had not beene so plainly delivered nor determined in any Councell till Gregorie the seventh his time and this was above a thousand yeares after Christ Your private or solitarie Masse wherein the Priests doe daily communicate without the people is by your own confession different and disagreeing from what was taught before and practised for say you pag. 191. They say speaking of divers Authors it was the practice of the Primitive Church to communicate everie day with the Priest I grant it These points of controversie which are so eagerly pursued by your men against the members of our Church the strength and force of truth hath extorted from you and therefore I may truly conclude Exore tuo from your owne confession that your Trent faith is new because it is different and disagreeing from what was taught before You that have taken an oath to maintaine the Papacie and are so ready to teach others you I say have either violated your oath or at leastwise have forgot your old lesson Oportet esse memorem c. for verily it behoves him that speakes lyes and contradictions to have a good memorie But it seemes you did conceive the Reader might easily passe by many such contradictions being in severall passages and farre distant pages For otherwise it would seeme strange that you which so bitterly inveigh against our reformed religion should confesse the antiquitie of our Articles and the noveltie of your owne with flat contradictions to your owne Assertions I will say to you therefore as sometimes St. Hierome spake in his Epistle to Pamachius and Oceanus Hieronym ad Pamach Oceanum Tom. 2. Thou who art a maintainer of new doctrine whatsoever thou he I pray thee spare the Romane eares spare the faith that is commanded by the Apostles mouth why goest thou about now after foure hundred yeares I may say foureteen hundred yeares to teach us that faith which we before never knew why bringest thou forth that thing that Peter and Paul never uttered Evermore untill this day the Christiam world hath beene without this doctrine To pursue the rest of your Allegations The Church of England say you admitteth of divers Books of the New Testament for Canonicall whereof there was doubt of three or foure hundred yeares to gether in the Church of God as the Epistle to the Hebrewes the second Epistle of St. Peter the Epistle of St. Jude the Apocalyps of St. John and some others which were after admitted for Canonicall 〈◊〉 I would know of him whether upon the admittance of them there were any change of faith in the Church or whether ever those books have received any change in themselves Thus you It seemes you begin to feare that your Trent faith would be discovered to be different and disagreeing from what was taught before and thereupon you would seemingly illustrate the antiquitie of your new Articles by the authoritie of the ancient Books of Canonicall Scripture But I pray where doe you find that the Books of the New Testament as namely the Epistle to the Hebrewes the Epistle of St. Peter and St. Jude and the Apocalyps were not received for three or foure hundred yeares for Canonicall It is true there was some doubt who were the right Authors of those Books but their divine authoritie was ever generally approved by all Christian Churches and allowed for Canonicall The Epistle to the Hebrewes was therefore doubted of by some because the difference diversity of the stile made them think it not to be St. Pauls and by others because the Author of it seemed to them to favour the error of the Novatian heretikes in denying the reconciliation of such as fall after Baptisme The second Epistle of St. Peter which you speake of some doubted of because of the diversitie of the style The Epistle of St. Jude was doubted