our redemption was near Therefore St. Paul calls the good Christians Those who love his coming Therefore in the Apocalyps Christ shews himself as coming and adds My Reward is with me Therefore in the end of the Apocalyps we read that importunate calling on him Come and let him that hears say Come and this was the primitive devotion to desire to be with Christ Now to conclude he that by his Prayers effects the coming of the day of Judgment as far as he doth that so far he procures to his Friend the eternal Reward the main good the compleat satisfaction of the desires of Nature elevated by Grace The next consideration reaches to the particular good that accrews to the party pray'd for For the understanding whereof you are to remember the Doctrin of the Saints that for our selves we are heard as often as we ask in due manner what is good for us for our friends not so but according as is suitable to the rest of Gods providence Yet it is agreed that many times such Prayers bring some advantage even to the special party for whom they are made but when and how Gods providence doth carry such graces we know not unless the effect prove visible Now we pray for the change of the soul of our friend from misery to bliss If he be in capacity to be help'd without doubt our prayers are heard but when and in what degree onely he knows who grants it unless he hath reveal'd it And as when we pray for a living sinner the effect of our prayers if it be fit they should be heard is that circumstances are so cast in respect of this prayer that he lights into convenient dispositions to bring on his conversion so our prayers for the dead work that in the Resurrection such grace is increas'd to the party pray'd for as is fitting to be retributed to the prayers and affections devoutly powr'd out for him The third Consideration reaches even to the rendring less and more tolerable to them those pains they suffer before the day of Judgment in Purgatory which is to relieve them there To understand which we are to consider that the State of Purgatory differs from that of Hell mainly in this that this of Hell is ever accompany'd with the horrour of Despair that of Purgatory with the comfort of Hope to see God's divine face Now all Hope of a future good if it be rational is grounded in knowing the strength and efficacy of the causes which are to effect and bring it and the stronger causes appear to be layd in order to such an effect the livelier and firmer is our Hope and by consequence more vigorous and sweet the Comfort which springs from that hope thus erected wherefore the suffering souls by knowing that the releasment of all in generall and each in particular is procur'd by the prayers of the Church the more and the more fervent prayers they see powr'd out for them the stronger hope and comfort they conceive To apply then this to particulars as the aym and hope and present comfort of each Soul is its future eternal Happiness as best improovable to it by the order of Causes laid by Gods Wisdom and Goodness so the fore-knowledg that the prayers of Friends will bring to each with proportionable advantage their due reward as I exprest it in my second Consideration gives each soul anticipatedly present sentiments even in Purgatory of Hope Joy and Comforts for those advantages their Friends Prayers shall procure them in the day of Judgment which surely none that understand it can deny to be a very great relief The fourth consideration extends this advantage of prayers for a particular Soul even to the state of Heaven it self which to explicate we may remember the pious opinion commonly receiv'd that S. Francis S. Benedict and other Saints in Heaven have new accidental Joyes there for any good effect perform'd by the Order they founded that is for the arrivement of any good towards which they as Causes had any influence in this World now of all Goods imaginable none is or can be comparable to the bringing of the Kingdom of Heaven or universal Bliss this being the But and End of all our wishes and of all both natural and supernatural motion nay the onely aym of his Providence who is Goodness it self most certainly then they who in this World layd means of many efficacious prayers for the dead and for themselves in particular will in my Doctrin see themselves and rejoyce in Heaven to have been particularly influential towards that happiest and noblest effect of bringing that day Add that this will be gratefully acknowledg'd by the whole Court of Heaven and they respected accordingly which will cause almost infinit multiplications of the best accidental Joyes which they who in this World neglected to use and procure this devotion will deservedly want Reflecting then this thought back upon a Soul in Purgatory who has deserv'd by her carriage in this World and taken order to be efficaciously pray'd for that is to have a particular share in bringing Christ's coming in Glory she has antecedently even in Purgatory by foreknowledg of those accidental Joyes she shall futurely reap thereby a sence of them at present by meanes of the certain Hope to attain them and thence in due measure a proportionable comfort ease and relief even in Purgatory So that you see according to my Doctrin both Essential Bliss and best accidental Joyes in Heaven and from the foreknown efficacy of prayers to accomplish these a present comfort accrues to the Souls in that State through our suffrages for them You will say these motives will not be efficacious enough to stir up the hearts of your penitents I can answer nothing but that I doubt they are not well instructed and exhorted And that it is the Preachers duty to endeavour to stir up their hearts with solid Christian truths not by incertainties guilded over with a shew of piety For indeed what is not true cannot be pious When such Inventions have taken a good effect I bless God that shews his goodness as wel by weakness as by strength But to advise any man to teach or preach that out of which he and the Church thorough him may be upbraided to cozen the credulous faithfull into false and prejudiciall confidences and make them rely upon such Doctrins and Practises as have no reality in them I am not a fit Counsellour I leave that to you who like it In your thirty sixth Section you over-reach'd me again for by your beginning I perswaded my self I was come to a period of my pains and that the rest had been but personal quarrels which I could easily have swallow'd how bitterly soever prepar'd by your rash and angry hand But looking a little farther I perceiv'd I must tug again And first as for that question whether you had intention to wrong me in printing your Bull I beleive you had not because you
among Divines concerning the vision of the Souls of Just men after their death in which nothing was to be purg'd when they departed out of this world or if there were it was now totally purg'd whether they see the Divine Essence before the re-assumption of their bodies and the Generall Judgment and also concerning other matters c. I pray you now in vertue of your Logick shew us here what is the subject of the Question what the Predicate To my apprehension the Subject is divided into two parts one is of Just men in whom at their death nothing is to be purg'd the other of them who at their death had somewhat to be purg'd but now are totally purg'd The Predicate is the seeing of God's Essence before the day of Judgment If this be so then resolve me whether the Subject of the Proposition be affirm'd by the Proposition or be that of which the Predicate is affirm'd We whose Logick tends to Demonstration agree that the Subject is not affirm'd but is that of which the Predicate is affirm'd What your eminent Schollars that square Philosophy and consequently Logick to their not understood Faith will say to this I expect you to teach us who are a great Professour I doubt not in their way In the mean while give me leave to think and tell you that the Question whether any Souls be purg'd before the re-assumption of their bodies is no part of the Popes Answer and neither part of the Predicate nor of the Copula and this so evidently that no ingenuous person can reply upon it which I may very well ghess to be the reason why you would not scan the Popes words Nor need I make other answer to Cherubinus he as your self say agreeing with the Pope This is the main prop of your whole cause and yet how weak it proves when seriously and indifferently examin'd though I freely confess it might easily be mistaken by an unwary Reader fully possess 't of the contrary perswasion You see now Sir the way a Scholar that understands Logick would have taken here is since every Question is of whether something be or be not that is of some Proposition that is whether some Predicate be identify'd to the Subject to show that the Predicate of the proposition you would evince is the Predicate here your Subject the Subject By this method you might have hop't to arrive to some strength of sence But instead of doing this you onely cry aloud the words are most plain and express for you that they most clearly and evidently condemn us and then to prove it you are very high against your Adversary's over sight his prepossession his boldness his confidence Sometimes he is blam'd for an absurdity almost impossible in over-looking it Anon you say to do him right as if you would confess you did him wrong before he did see it and cite it Strange challenge of over-sight which consists with a grant of both seeing and citing So that all you bring in your own behalf and this in the main support of your cause is contradiction to your self calumny of your Adversary many bold sayings and not one Schollar-like attempt of proof Sweet Sir will this serve think you to prove your Adversary a Puny and your self a great Clerk or rather will not the Reader judge that the differences of your performance will transpose those appellations In your thirteenth Section you reprehend your Adversary that he pretends there was but one Question onely disputed and defin'd at that time and affirm stoutly that it is not possible for him to perswade aâ— Intelligent Reader thereof though both the Pope and Cherubinus by your confession call it a Question and not Questions 'T is an hard case that the Pope's own word cannot protect him but we must be put to prove the Pope spake what he thought But let us see your Arguments You say the Pope makes two Questions and that Cherubinus does the same their words being equivalent I see not why I should make two disputings of the same case the first of Souls in which nothing remain'd to be purg'd the other of Souls in which something is to be purg'd But since by your own confession and by the words cited by your self they say these two made but one Question a man would have expected you should bring somewhat to prove what you say and not upon your bare word force us to beleeve they contradict themselves in the same period But to speak sence as well as words who knows not that the word Question may have two meanings one to signify what may be ask't another what is or may be doubted An asking may be fram'd of any proposition we are ignorant of a doubting onely of those against which we have some kind of apparent reason Now you are pleas'd to look no farther than for what may be ask't but your Adversary goes on to what may be doubted of and therefore finding no speciall doubt of one part of the persons you divide which was not in the other he was so clear-sighted as to find that the Pope and Cherubinus exprest themselves properly and dogmatically whereas you make them break the common Laws both of Sence and Grammar and when they would speak of many Questions to use the singular number You add a confirmation out of the Title of the Bull in which in the plurall number Articles are sayd to be defin'd not distinguishing betwixt Articles and Questions whereas an Article must be fore-debated to be call'd a Question So that if there had been but one Article doubted of and debated there was but one Question decided though many Articles defin'd Nor do you well appeal to the 2d Scholion of Cherubinus where you onely find that ten Heresies are condemned by this Bull for it is a far different thing to condemn a known falsity and to determin a doubted question So that your clear-sight fail'd you also in this point As for Eymericus I easily confess of his worth all that Pegna writes But as all that doth not except him from being a man so neither from having had his imperfections and this in particular that he was too censorious which is pardonable in him few Saints arriving to a perfect exinanition of proper interest till towards the End of their dayes Wherefore as all Judges for the most part are subject to draw causes to their own Courts so this Inquisitour was willing to make many heads upon which Delinquents might fall within the compass of the Inquisition by which means he set great quarrels betwixt his own Order and that of Saint Francis condemning Raymundus Lullus whom the Franciscans maintain to be a Saint of Heresy for attempting to demonstrate the Trinity In which controversy our modern Divines side much with the Franciscans Hence I infer you can ground little upon this Author as to increasing Articles of Faith Your citation out of Spondanus is less to the purpose for his relation reports
prudently foyl'd you in every encounter in this Question that he hath left nothing for me but to discover your falshood in such by-questions as you thrust in to stuff out your Volume FOURTH DIVISION Containing an Answer to his seventeenth Section The Authours Doctrin of Councils explicated This new opinion of Purgatory in likelihood later than Saint Gregory IN your seventeenth Section you first put upon me that I am arm'd against the Authority of Popes and Councils and then you run headlong on with declamatory invectives upon that supposition But as the world is curious I conceive some will light on my defence as well as on your calumny to whom I thus explicate the true state of the question It is known to all Christians that Christ and his Apostles taught the world the Christian faith It is known to all Catholicks that this same faith has continued in the Catholick Church now fifteen ages It is known to the same that the means of continuing this faith hath been by Pastours and Fathers teaching their Children what themselves had learn'd by the same way It is likewise known that in divers ages there arose up divers Hereticks who endeavour'd to bring in Doctrins contrary to the received Faith and that Bishops sometimes in particular especially the Bishop of Rome sometimes in Collections or Councils with-stood and confounded such Hereticks confirming the old belief and rejecting all new inventions It is evident that to do this it fuffices to have veracity enough to attest what the old Doctrin was and power enough to suppress all such as stir against it Thus far all goes well Of late Ages among our curious School-men some have been so subtle that the Old faith would not serve them but they thought it necessary to bring in new points of Faith and because what was not of Faith could not become of Faith without a new revelation they look't about for a new revelation and finding the two supreme Courts of Christian discipline seated in General Councils and the Pope they quickly resolv'd to attribute the power of encreasing Christian Faith to these two Springs of Christianity Now the first difference betwixt the two parties engag'd in the present controversy is whether the Faith deliver'd by the Apostles be sufficient to govern the Church by or there be necessary fresh Additions of such points as cannot be known without a new revelation In which they whom I follow hold the negative they whom I suppose you follow the affirmative Out of this question springs a second whether in the Councils and in the Pope is to be acknowledg'd a Prophetical kind of Spirit by which towards the ordinary government of the Church they have a gift to reveal some things not before revealed nor deducible out of things already revealed by the natural power of discourse which God has left to mankind to govern it self by In which point also I follow them that deny you and your eminent learned men stand up for the Affirmative I hope by this any ingenious Reader will perceive that if the Faith deliver'd by Jesus Christ joyn'd with the natural power of discoursing be sufficient to govern the Church of God then those who give power to Councils and Popes sufficient to govern by this way give them as much as is necessary for the Church But if new Articles be necessary to the government of the Church then and onely then they fall short So that no understanding person reading these lines can doubt but the true question is this whether the Faith deliver'd by Christ be sufficient for the government of the Church or that we must expect new additions to our Faith every age or when occasion presents it self Whence it will easily appear that all the great noyse you make and furious Rhetorick you use of my denying the Authority of Councils my being arm'd against them and such like angry stuff are but uncharitable uncivil and highly injurious clamours without any true cause or ground at all But we shall hear more of these hereafter Now any prudent Christian that shall with moderate attention have read but so far will judge the question already decided For who dare maintain Christ's Doctrin was imperfect And indeed all that have any little modesty on your side will not say new Articles of Faith are necessary but that whatsoever the Church defines was before revealed though when they come to declare themselves they demand really new Articles onely calling them Explications of the former or Deductions from them And if they would justify that they were but such Deductions as natural reason can deduce there would remain no controversy which in very deed the Churches practise shews to be the truth In the first Council it being recorded that there was Conquisitio magna and all Councils and Popes ever since proceeding in the same style But here I must remember you what you said in the beginning concerning Pargatory that the reason why you write against my opinion was because it was translated into English And so I now protest that you are the cause why I write of this subject in English My books generally are to debate what I think in the points I write of with learned men whose care it is to divulge truths to the people dispensing to every one the quantity he is capable of not to raise any new thoughts in ignorant heads Your crying out against me forces me to a necessary defence before the people wherefore if any disputings concerning this matter displease any person of Judgment let it light upon your head who are the provoker and compeller of me into this new task which both age and other thoughts make me slowly and unwillingly undertake But I must not be mine own chuser but follow God As to what you say against this Doctrin first you desire your Reader to consider that if these grounds to wit that the Pope and the Council can err without distinguishing in what either matter or manner of proceeding Christian Faith is a meer mockery I confess the proposition grave in words but in sence not worthy a School-boy For first I ask you whether you mean in necessary points or unnecessary ones If you say in both I doubt your whole School will desert you For who is there that hath an ounce of brains who will give authority to the Church to determin all the subtle quirks of the School But if you say onely necessary ones then before you went farther against me you should have prov'd that the verities come by inheritance from Jesus Christ are not all that are necessary which question you never think on and so brandish your Logick against the apparitions in the clouds Secondly I ask you whether without counsel or with it If you say without it again your School will desert you If you say with it I ask you how much counsell and to what period In all which you will be at a loss Must it hold till by reason they
fault is that I say the opinion of Souls being deliver'd before the day of Judgment proceeded from the not following a Doctrin of St. Thomas That in abstracted Spirits there is no discourse or any manner of composition of knowledg Whence I infer there can be no falsity in them This is my position of which you tell us that it importeth not to consider whether the knowledg of Angels be by true discourse or onely by virtuall to which say you suffices a priority of causality But if a man should tell you that the causality you imagin cannot be without true time then peradventure it would be necessary to dispute whether there be a true discourse in Angels and this is the very case For take away succession and all corporeall causes which depend on time are taken away There remain then nothing but the spirituall qualities of the Angels to be causes which neither are distinguished from one the other nor from their subject and so all notion of Cause and Effect as they are proper to the Efficient are quite taken away and so there will not remain any discourse at all but a pure cleer sight fram'd on them by their Creatour in which I beleeve you will not say there is any Errour or can be So that the whole question resteth upon this whether there be true discourse or no Now how do you prove what you say is to the purpose to wit that it doth not follow out of this Doctrin of St. Thomas that there is no Errour in Angels Your proof is because St. Thomas notwitstanding this Doctrin acknowledges Errours in Devils Good Sir as long as you have been a Divine did you ever hear that it was a gross injury to St. Thomas to say some opinion of his was not true or not consequent to another Truly I desire not to do an injury to any much less to my Reverenc'd Master to whom after God I acknowledg it if I know any thing either in Philosophy or Divinity Yet I have no fear not to follow all his opinions much less not to make good all his consequences And so Sir I hope I am rid of your objections out of St. Thomas Onely because you often repeat that to say every thing hath a cause to make it before it be is an Epicurean Lucretian Pagan principle c. I must intreat you again to look to the sence of your words and not to beat so carelesly the Ayre If at anytime you happen to dispute of Liberty I will endeavour to shew you your Ignorance but for vapouring words let others judge how far they become you You go on in the same strain to except against the comparison of an Embryoes designing the Child to be born and mans life framing the Soul deliver'd into the next World But what you dislike I cannot tell you say it has no connexion with the immutability of the future state The answer is it was not brought to that purpose but to open the Readers understanding to aym at of what disposition the Soul is at her going out But if the Antecedent reach home you say 't is a position destructive of all Christianity But you say not to what it should reach but fain something as if you imagin'd I would have the body of a Child never grow in strength or good parts When I shall know what you aym at I may know what to answer So we may leave you to conclude your Chapter with a high conceit of the Victories you have obtain'd FOURTH DIVISION Containing an Answer from Section the thirty fifth to Section the fortieth The Vindicators forgetfulness that Eternall Happiness was any Good at all That Prayers for the dead in the Authours Doctrin manifoldly profit the Souls in Purgatory and relieve them even there Charity asserted to be the immediate Disposition to Bliss The Authours Doctrin consonant to the Council of Trent in the points of Remission and Satisfaction Diverse Squibs and Insincerities of the Vindicatour toucht at THere followâ—â—our five and thirtieth Section in â—â—ich you have after so long a digression remember'd again the question of Purgatory And intend to shew that prayers for the dead are of no profit if Souls go not to Heaven before the day of Judgment An objection of every Gentlewoman but I hope seeing you have come into the lifts as their Champion you will set it high And so you do for scorning the lower waies of others who press this difficulty That the day of Judgment will come of it self at the time appointed and Then every one shal receive according to his deserts whether any prayers have been said for them or no you fly so high as to tell us that though the prayers made for the dead impetrate eternal bliss for those in Purgatory yet they are of no profit Is not this a gallant attempt What may be your Arms fit for so great an Atchievment Why say you the duration of separated Souls is according to me above time and comprehensive of it therefore it is but a moment whether bliss ever come or never therefore there is no profit in the prayers though they bring bliss and this is the full import of your discourse Could a man have expected such an Argument from 〈◊〉 Logick Master not to distinguish betwixt substance and an Accident yet undoubtedly according to his ordinary phrase All Christianity is ruin'd unless this consequence be good You were assuredly in a great Metaphysicall rapture when in the same short discourse you took two such hyper-Metaphysicall propositions as that it was indifferent to have or not to have the greatest good God hath created for a Person and that there could actually be an infinite Quantity or Time I must confess they are both very fit for your sort of Learning to bolt out words without looking into what they signify But because this is onely your private errour and the World is to be contented too which doth not apprehend any great benefit in hastning of Christ's coming I must a little shew the good that the prayers of the faithfull do for the dead Let us then consider that our chief Good is Heaven and the perfect sight of God at which we aym in all our actions and progresses from the first basis of our inclination to the End of nature even to the highest step of Charity from whence we immediately reach it This depends on two created causes The perfection of the World and The perfection of the private Person which is to attain it For God hath made the work of the World in so exact a method that it shall happen to be wound up all in a day St. Paul hath told us he would not have the foregoers be perfected before the rest the Apocalyps expresses the same Therfore Christ taught us in his own Prayer to say to his and our Father Thy Kingdom come Therefore he bad us when we saw signs of the approaching Judgment to lift up our Heads with hope because