Non-elect and Reprobates so that it is absurd that God should cause his Gospel to be preached to a herd of Reprobates among which there is not one person on whom the Word can produce its effect It will be therefore in vain that God should preserve Christians in all the East and South for these Christians being out of the saving Unity will be damned just in the same manner as if they were Pagans Fourthly The Schism of the Ten Tribes gives us a convincing Proof that in Schismatical Churches every single Person is not in a state of Damnation Jeroboam separated ten Tribes from the other two he would not suffer them to go up to Jerusalem but engaged them in a formal Schism nevertheless God there preserved both Prophets as Elijah and Elisha and a multitude of Persons which he affirmed to be his own because they had not bowed the knee to Baal There is therefore no particular Church that has reason to boast it self of having Unity alone to the prejudice of all other Churches Fifthly The truth is that on one side the Jews converted to Christianity in the time of the Apostles and on the other side the Pagan Converts lived in a true Schism for these Jewish Christians would have no Communion with the converted Pagans nevertheless they did not mutually damn each other therefore we ought not to damn those which live in Schism whatever it be The converted Jews had considerable Errors they observed the Law and would retain Circumcision with all their might Things incompatible with Christianity as S. Paul declares so positively as to say If any one be circumcised Christ should profit him nothing nevertheless God suffers and saves them with considerable Errors It is not therefore true that the Church is shut up in one sole Communion and that every Error damns when we separate from a Society that is justly called the Church but it 's true that remaining in a Society bearing that Name we may nevertheless be damned when there are mortal Errors there as there are in the Church of Rome Sixthly Ask your Converters who would oblige you to return to the Church of Rome on pain of Damnation under pretence that Unity is in that Church alone ask them I say whether they would pronounce that all the Greek Christians of whom there are millions are damned for this only reason because they will not adhere to the Roman Church who alone has Unity in her possession If they have the front to say yea ask them if they acknowledge the Greeks for Christians They will also also answer you yea pursue and press them by asking how God can abandon to eternal Damnation an infinite number of Christians who according to the Church of Rome hold no Capital Errors and are only mistaken in things of small consequence If the Papists boast of the consent of all Christians of other Communions and particularly of the Geeks in the Invocation of Saints in the Adoration of Images in the Doctrine of Transubstantiation the real Presence and Adoration they do therefore hold all that the Church of Rome esteems necessary to Salvation why therefore will they damn them for little things and for this alone that they will not live in this pretended Unity To compleat the confusion of your Converters by themselves on the subject of this Unity out of which we are departed Ask them if this Unity be not a certain circle in which the true Church is enclosed They will answer you yea proceed to ask them Whether this certain Circle of Unity has not its Centre that is to say a certain eminent Church to which all the rest ought to have their Relation to the end that they may be within the ciâ—cle of Unity they will also answer you yea and they will add that the Pope or Bishop of Rome is this centre of Unity Monsieur de Meaux finds a way to secure himself from the Thunders of Rome by frequent repeating this and indeed this Supposition according to their Hypothesis is of absolute necessity for if this Circle of Unity have no Centre of Adherence it vanishes immediately a man will always be able to say with good reason To what Church would you that I should adhere is it to that of Paris or that of Toledo These are particular Churches which may err if therefore the Pope be ruined if the necessity of Adherence to the Pope be removed the circle of Unity perishes with him which they call the centre of Unity Now observe that at this day the Divines of the French Church your Converters ruine the Pope from head to foot they take away the centre of Unity and by destroying the centre they destroy the circle 'T is to this that so many modern Writings of Maimbourgh Gerbas Noel Alexander made after the Kings Declarations and the Definitions of the Bishops on this Subject or in prospect of them do tend But the Gallican Church never spake so openly as she hath done but a little while fince by the Pen of a Doctor of the Sorbonne called Elias Pin touching the ancient Discipline of the Church Those among you my Brethâ—en which do not understand the Latin Tongue may consuâ—t those that do and they will inform you that in this Book may be read 1. That the Bishop of Rome had originally no power over other Churches 2. That in the first Institution of Patriarchs he had no power but over the Suburbicane Provinces that is to say those near to Rome 3. That the Popes by little and little ruined the Rights of the Metropolitan Bishops and by Usurpation ascribed them to themselves 4. That the Pope has no right to review and finally judge the Causes determined by the Bishops 5. That the Priviledges which the See of Rome at this day enjoys are not by divine Right but either by Usurpation or the Concession of Councils 6. That to be a good Catholick and a good Christian it is in no wise necessary in many Occurrences to adhere to the See of Rome 7. That the Primacy of the Church which the Pope possesses appertains not to him but by a tolerated Usurpation or as a Priviledge granted by Councils This gives him no character of Infallibility nor the right of judging finally and above Councils Behold exactly the Divinity of the Gallican Church at this day for this man in the view of the Court had not written thus without its Order Behold also the centre of Unity intirely subverted and so subverted as it was by Calvin and Luther This being so why do these Gentlemen everlastingly beat upon your ears about their Unity and the centre of Unity There is no more Unity in the Church of Rome since there is no centre of it there for since adherence to the Pope is no farther necessary to be a true Christian you are not departed from Unity and Christianity by departing from the Communion of the Pope observe therefore thereon that Monsieur de Meaux and your
that though even the Church should fall into Idolatry we cannot be saved if we separate from it And I say although even the Church of Rome should have Reason at the bottom and were not Idolatrous and that we were out in our Separation we should not hazard our Salvation by continuing as we are Men are every where well where they have Christianity and the marrow and substance of it and 't is a folly to imagine that the Salvation of men depends upon the humor of their Guides It may be therefore that Luther and Calvin were mistaken i. e. That the corruption of the Church of Rome was not great enough to oblige the Faithful to go out of her let us suppose they had done better to leave things as they were I do nevertheless maintain that at this day you do not in any wise hazard your Salvation by continuing where they have placed you because however it be you have Christianity in its integrity you have it wholly pure and uncorrupt In every Society where that is found a man may be saved after whatsoever manner it be formed The Idea which men have formed of Schism for many Ages past is the most false that can be imagined but besides the falshood of it 't is the most dangerous and cruel Chimera that could be found Every Society would be Catholick Church to the exclusion of all others The Church of Rome pretends thus far for her self The Greek Church makes no less pretence thereto He that goes out of this Church breaks the Unity and he that breaks it is no longer in the Church Now he who is no longer in the Church is no longer in a state and way of Salvation whatever he say and whatever he do Behold what they say behold the Chimera We must therefore rectifie this Idea of Schism according to the Unity which we have given you The Unity of the Universal Church does not subsist within the bounds of one certain Communion nor in adherence to certain Pastors to the exclusion of all others but in the Unity of Spirit Doctrine Sacraments and Evangelical Ministry in general i. e. of Pastors declaring the Truth of the Gospel What must be done then to make a Schism with respect to the Church Universal He must renounce the Christian Doctrine the Sacraments of the Church and the Gospel Ministry that is to say He must be an Apostate or an Heretick But every Society that goes out of another and greater Society of which it was a part makes no Schism with respect to the Church Universal whilst it retains the Doctrine the Sacraments and the Ministry of the Gospel it goes not out of the Church because it carries the Church with it and it carries the Church with it because it carries Christianity with it It carries say I the Church with it in such a manner nevertheless that it leaves it in the Society which it leaves for leaving true Christianity there it leaves the true Church there also And the advantage of being the Church and of having Christianity is a Privilege which may be possessed intire and without prejudice to other Christian Societies We must therefore know that there is an Vniversal and Particular Schism Particular Schism is a Separation from a particular Church a Universal Schism is a Separation from the Universal Church Universal Schism consists in the Renunciation of the Universal Church by renouncing her Doctrine Sacraments and Ministry For example If the one half of Christians should separate from the other and set up a new Gospel according to which Moses should be set side by side with Jesus Christ the legal Ceremonies re-established the Evangelical Ministry should be changed into the Ministry of Priests after the Order of Aaron the Sacraments of the Church should be joyned to the Sacraments of the Old Testament it were certain that this would be a true Schism for these Men would renounce the Doctrine the Sacraments and the Ministry of the Gospel The Mahometans without renouncing Jesus Christ and calling him false Prophet have set up a Prophet superior to him and receive the Impostures of Mahomet admit Circumcision and reject Baptism have made a Religion truly and essentially different from that of Christ's 'T is therefore a true universal Schism The Socinians who have renounced almost all the Fundamentals of the Christian Religion who despise and neglect the Sacraments by going out of the Church are become Schismaticks and true Schismaticks with respect to the Church Universal for they have not carried the Church with them because they have not carried Christianity with them According to this Idea Universal Schism or Schism with respect to the Universal Church doth not essentially differ from Heresie and Apostacy Particular Schism is when a Man separates from a particular Church be it for some Point of Doctrine be it for some quarrel about Discipline be it for some personal Differences of the Guides among themselves Of this sort of Schisms there is an infinite number of Examples In the Second Age there was a Schism between the Church of Rome and the Church of Asia about a controversie of Ceremonies about the day on which Easter ought to be observed The Churches of Asia maintained that the Christian Passover ought to be observed on the same day that the Jews observed theirs and they said they held it as a Tradition from St. John. The Church of Rome on the contrary said that Christians ought to observe Easter on the Lord's-day following the Jewish Passover And for the sake of this goodly Controversie Victor Bishop of Rome was so rash as to separate the Churches of Asia from his Communion This Schism continued not only until the Council of Nice but a very long time after for mention is made of the Quartodecimani in the General Council of Ephesus against Nestorius in the year 431. So they called those who celebrated Easter with the Jews on the 14th day of the Month of March. In the Third Age Novatian formed a considerable Schism about a Point of Discipline viz. Whether we ought to receive those who fell in times of Persecution to the Peace of the Church This Schism continued a long time We find this Schism continuing amidst all the great troubles that were betwixt the Arrians and the Orthodox the union of Opinions that was between the Novatians and the Catholicks with respect to the Doctrine of Arrius did not put a period unto it In the same Age the Donatists made another Schism in Africa about the choice of a Bishop of Carthage Two Parties being formed about it a Division was made it spread through all Africa and continued many Ages There happened another in the beginning of the Fifth Age by one named Nestorius Bishop of Constantinople who taught there were two Persons as well as two Natures in Christ Another was made a little while after by Eutyches Abbot of a Monastery in Constantinople who desiring to oppose Nestorius who distinguished two Persons
hath erred therefore it can err You will put your Converters in their turn into some kind of perplexity For there will be a necessity either that they hold their peace and say nothing but absurdities or else that they endeavour to prove by discussion of Opinions that the Church of Rome has not erred and 't is a Head of Discourse where I am in no fear or concern for you for how little soever you are instructed in the Word of God you will easily dismount the most able Sophisters when you endeavour to prove that neither Transubstantiation nor the Worship of Images nor the Invocation of Saints nor the Adoration of the Eucharist nor the Mass nor Purgatory are in the Scripture There needs no greater ability for that than for a Man to prove that a Chamber is empty when there is nothing in it They object unto you that the Scripture has not said all but 't is a sensible absurdity that the Scripture should be given to instruct us concerning what we ought to adore and it should forget three fourth parts of the objects of our Adoration It speaks not to us but of the Adoration of God and nevertheless Religious Worship must be given to Saints to Images to Reliques and to the Sacrament of the Altar Are you so filly as to be taken in so pitiful a snare The Scripture has not said all let it be granted with respect to the Ceremonies and Orders of Discipline which are not of the Essence of Religion but to believe that the Scripture has not told us all which is of the Essence of the Christian Religion is ridiculous I do maintain that he ought to have lost all shame that shall advance it and to permit himself to be persuaded thereof he must have lost all reason and be degenerated to a Beast Was it agreeable to the Wisdom of God imperfectly to instruct the Apostolick Church and to leave to posterity the charge of adding those essential parts which were wanting But provided you can draw your Converters from these Methods of Prescription which are the true Snares of the Devil invented as his last Remedies I shall not fear or be concerned for you altho they should batter you with the Arms of Tradition and tho they should tell you an hundred times the Scripture has not said all Tradition adds the rest For you will always have an infallible Refuge in the Scripture and you will be able to say if Tradition may add to the Scripture at least it ought not to destroy and teach or command that which the Scripture condemns After which it will not be difficult to prove that not only the Scripture says nothing of Transubstantiation or the taking away of the Cup or the Sacrifice of the Mass of Purgatory or the Worship of Images or the Invocation of Saints c. but that the Scripture does formally condemn them Behold the first general method for ruining the fallacious Arguments on the behalf of Infallibility Behold another the most sensible proof and that unto which you will be obliged to have regard when they would prove that you ought to have a blind submission to the Church of Rome is Texts of Scripture 'T is for example that which our Lord Jesus said Matth. 16. That he hath built his Church upon S. Peter in such sort that the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it That which S. Paul says in 1 Tim. 3.15 That the Church is the pillar and ground of truth There 's that which is their strength But first of all demand of these Gentlemen whether the Church of Rome be mentioned there Say I grant that Text signifies that the Church is infallible and that the Devil never can introduce any Error but how shall I know that 't is the Roman Church to whom this glorious promise of Infallibility is made The Greek Church that of the Nestorians Jacobites or Eutychians are very great Communions in the East which call themselves Christians upon as good a Title as the Church of Rome The Apostles certainly founded the Eastern Churches it is without peradventure and it is apparent that Jesus Christ hath left the privilege of being infallible to them Why should he cause it to pass from the East to the West To that they will say you see that 't is to the Church of S. Peter that the promise of Infallibility is made Upon thee will I build my Church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it Now the Roman Church is the Church of S. Peter Upon that demand that they prove by the Scripture these two Articles First That this promise was not made but to the Church of S. Peter Secondly That S. Peter is the Founder of the Church of Rome The first thing is impossible to be proved 'T is a prodigious absurdity that of the twelve Apostles to whom Christ Jesus said that they ought to found Churches he should have no regard but to S. Peter and to the Church which he ought to found 'T is more clear than the day that that which our Lord promised he promised to the twelve Apostles and to other Churches But your Converters will have yet more trouble to prove by the Scripture that the Roman Church is the Church of S. Peter There appears not any Footstep thereof in the whole New Testament on the contrary 't is clear there was a Church at Rome before S. Peter and S. Paul had been there It may be one may prove that S. Peter was never at Rome At least it may be proved that he never resided there in the Quality of Bishop For S. Paul says expresly that S. Peter was the Apostle or Bishop of the Jews or Circumcision and that he was the Bishop of the Gentiles Therefore S. Peter in the Quality of the Bishop of the converted Jews ought to have his Seat either at Jerusalem or Babylon in the Confines whereof was the main body of the dispersed Jews Moreover he writ and dated his Epistles from Babylon You may therefore hold your selves there and say I am well content that there be an infallible Church on earth but when I see with all my eyes that the Roman Church has erred you shall permit me to search an infallible Church elsewhere and to keep me where I am expecting till I sind it You may I say keep you there but don't do it move on further and tell your Converters Gentlemen I perceive that these words the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against the Church may have two senses For they may signifie that the Devil shall never introduce any error into the Church of what nature soever it be Or it may signifie that the Devil shall never ruin the Church that he shall never entirely destroy it by ruining its Foundations i. e. it s fundamental Verities Tell me do these words signifie necessarily the first that is to say that the Devil shall never introduce any capital or considerable Errors into the
We have nothing more to say about the Article of Purgatory than what we have said concerning it on the Subject of Oblations and Sacrifice for the Dead we will only add that Origen a Man of great sense in that Age and also of great boldness who among many bold and rash Opinions advanced that of a temporary Hell that is to say properly of Purgatory of a Fire in which the Wicked ought to be purified that they may be saved after some Ages of Torment And 't is of this temporary Hell jumbled with the separate state of Souls that the Purgatory of the Roman Church is at last formed and made We therefore pass to Worship Adoration and Invocation of Creatures of Saints of the Blessed Virgin of Angels of Relicks and of Images This is a place of Triumph for the Truth and Confusion for Error Ask my Brethren ask and be you never weary thereof bid them shew you Tertullian Cyprian Clemens of Alexandria Minutius Foelix Gregory Thaumaturgus Arnobius Lactantius and Origen of whom we have so many Writings let them shew you them I say recommending the Worship of the Virgin the Invocation of Saints and the Adoration of Relicks Their Silence suffices to make it known that then men knew not what this unhappy Superstition was and if their Silence be not enough remember that which we have proved unto you 't is first that then they prayed for all Saints in general both Apostles and Martyrs now it is inconsistent to pray to a Saint and for him as your Converters will acknowledge seeing to pray to a Saint supposes him glorified and to pray for a Saint or Martyr supposes him not glorified Secondly Remember also that in those Ages the prevailing Opinion was That the Martyrs themselves and Apostles were not yet in Heaven and by consequence did not see the face of God so that they could neither learn from God the necessities of the Living nor intercede for them before him After this know That in this Age as well as that preceding Christians made open Protestations That they did not serve adore nor invoke any other but God. Tertullian said * Scorpiac cap. 4. That 't is appointed that I call upon no other God that I may no more make another God by my tongue than by my hand 'T is ordained that I adore or worship no other after what manner soever it be besides the One God which commands this in his Law. * Ad Scapul cap. 2. We serve but one only God which you naturally know whose Thunder and Lightnings you fear and from whom you receive Blessings with great joy He serves himself of the Words Venerate and Serve and they are general words Where is the Papist that will say That he gives no Worship but to God alone Clemens of Alexandria saith †Strom. lib. 6. The Greeks ought to learn from the Law and the Prophets to serve but one only God who is truly Almighty Origen repeats the same thing in a hundred places That Christians worship and serve God alone But if this be not enough hear Origen after he had said in express words ‖ Lib. 5. cont Cels That we ought to address all Prayer Supplication Request and Thanksgiving to the Supream God Lord of all things by the Eternal Word God the High Priest who is above all Angels after that say I he excludes by name Angels from the number of those which ought to be invoked To the end saith he that Angels may be propitious to us and that they may do all things for us it suffices in the first place that we be very closely united to God and disposed to imitate Angels who imitate God c. That 't is best to trust in God and to beg of him all the aid and all the succour which can come to us from good Angels c. For 't is saith he a thing altogether unreasonable that we should invoke Angels seeing we know nothing of their service or knowledge because it is above men Although we should grant that their knowledge which is admirable and secret may be understood this same knowledge which we have of their Nature and of the thing over which every one of them presides would hinder us from daring to invoke any other but the Lord who is over all things and sufficient for all 'T is certain that Origen had lost his Understanding if at that time they invoked Angels and if they did not invoke Angels how could they invoke the Saints departed Do we not learn from Scripture that Angels are round about us and by consequence that they hear us Do we not know that God hath committed to them the care and preservation of his Children we know nothing of all this concerning Saints so those which did not invoke Angels certainly never did invoke Saints As for Relicks my Brethren ask your Converters ask their Proofs that men took them from their Tombs that they put them in Boxes that every one carried his part thereof in great Devotion that they wrought Miracles that Men went in Pilgrimage to the Tombs of Martyrs where Relicks were laid that they kissed them and fell on their knees before them If they cannot prove this let them confess that this Worship was perfectly unknown in the third Age. Mr. Demabis a revolted Minister confesses clearly enough that in the first Ages they gave not this external Honor to Relicks because says he the state in which they were did not permit it Is not this a miserable defence They say 't was a time of Persecution I confess it but it was the more easie for them to get the Ashes and Bones of Martyrs for they made them every day 't is true that in some places the Pagans hindred the Christians from taking their Bodies but in many others they left them on the Dunghil to him that would first take them and all their rigour could not hinder them from getting some one of their Bones from the flames as did the Believers of Smyrna those of Polycarpus The Persecution did not hinder Christians from kissing these Bones on their knees in their private Houses and Oratories As to what concerns Images I cannot resolve to make an Article thereof although I had intended it for I do not think that there is any learned man among your Converters who hath the impudence to maintain that there were Images in Churches during the time of the third Age and that men worship'd them after we have proved unto them that in that Age Painters and Statuaries were accounted infamous and that they drove them from the Communion of the Church as they did Comedians Bauds and other instruments of Wickedness and beastly Pleasures and that there the Christians scoffed at the Pagans which prostrated themselves before Images of Wood Copper Stone Gold and Silver which might be stoln and carried away in the mouths and ears whereof Mice made their Habitations and upon which Birds laid their Ordure They
first Author of that Separation But 't is a ridiculous Chimera to imagine that they were out of the Essential Unity seeing that when they went away they carried with them the true Jesus the true Doctrine and the true Sacraments They were yet the Church they were Christians whatever St. Cyprian says of them and not only their Martyrs obtained the Crown of Martyrdom but their penitent Christians obtained Salvation although they died in Schism There are particular Unities and a general Unity Particular Unity consists in certain Bonds such as are common Ecclesiastick Government common Discipline and certain common Ceremonies You are not in particular Unity with the Episcopal Church of England with respect to Government But this Unity signifies nothing to Salvation he must be a mad man to damn Christians because they either have or have not Bishops The general Unity which consists in the three things which I have said is the only essential necessary and saving Unity If you agree with the Church in Government Discipline and Ceremonies and don 't agree with it in Opinions in Sacraments and Spirit you have no Communion with it if you differ in Government and Discipline and agree in Truths Sacraments and the same Jesus you are at Unity with it and with God. This Vnity of the Church whereof we have now discoursed makes me think of that unity of Souls which ought to prevail among the true Members of the Body of Christ It is the Character under which the Apostolick Church is described unto us They were all of one heart and one mind 'T is this holy Unity which draws down the holy Spirit for when the firy Tongues fell upon the Apostles they were all with one accord assembled in one place 'T is the absence of this holy Unity which in part hath drawn down those unhappy Effects of the Wrath of God under which we now groan Call to mind the Divisions the immortal Hatreds Jealousies Quarrels and Strifes which have been seen in the midst of you even on occasions and in things for which Peace and the Spirit of Charity were particularly requited One was of Paul another of Peter but not one for Jesus Christ Men made their own Passions and Interests to triumph and trampled under foot the Glory of God and the publick Edification The strictest friendships were always ready to break on the first transport of Passion The Spirit of Vengeance had no rest till it had revenged the Injuries it thought it had received and we knew not what it was to sacrifice a resentment to the Love of God and his Christ God has made these civil Wars to cease by a cruel and strange War. You have a common tye more than you have had you have had the same Faith the same Sacraments the same Churches and the same Holy Table besides you have at this day your common Affliction and your common Misfortunes 'T is certain that even in the World this makes a tye among Souls and it should do with far greater reason when men suffer the same grief for the same cause and for the same God. You ought mutually to love each other because you are afflicted for God and by consequence you ought to love those also who suffer for you they are your Confessors who have the glory to maintain in the Prisons those Truths with you have been so weak only to keep close in your Hearts having not the courage to shew them openly Among those which are in divers Prisons of the Realm for the Cause of God there are an infinite number that want all things these are Voices that cry against you to Heaven in a terrible manner and say What a shame is it that Jesus Christ is in Prison that he is Sick Hungry and Thirsty that he freezes with cold during the rigor of the Winter and that these Peters who grew pale at the word of a Servant don't go to visit him to give him Bread and Cloaths You know what will be the Sentence that the Lord will give to such think of it and partake-in the Bonds of your Brethren though they be at the utmost ends of the Kingdom Feb. 1. 1687. The TWELFTH PASTORAL LETTER AN Article of Antiquity The beginning of the History of Christianity of the Fourth and Fifth Ages Of the Original of Monks An Article of Controversie Of the Unity of the Ministry HAving finished the History of the Christianity of the Third Age we enter upon the Fourth We shall not distinguish that of the Fourth and Fifth they are so interwoven that they cannot be separated All the Superstitions false Worship and Corruptions of Discipline which are found established in the Fifth Age took their beginning in the Fourth We enter upon Ages in which the Church had entirely changed its Face it is no longer a persecuted Church it triumphs it reigns it ascends the Throne The Emperors becoming Christians drew along with them by their Authority and Examples an infinite number of Pagans who had that Complaisance and Civility for their Masters as to become Christians But the Church also on her part had the Complaisance to burthen Religion with vain Worship and Ceremonies borrowed from Paganism All that which she thought might be innocently taken from thence she took to draw them over to her The Bishops inrich'd by the Liberality of Constantine and his Successors became proud they would have a distinct Jurisdiction from the Civil they established for themselves Tribunals It appears by the Book of Constitutions falsely ascribed to the Apostles that the Bishops had Flatterers which said of them or rather they said of themselves many incredible proud and impertinent things * Vit. Const lib. 2. cap. 37 38. They set themselves above Kings they said that they must pay them Tributes and Tenths and that Men owed them greater Honors than Kings and that they had power to condemn to everlasting Fire Above all the Pomp and Pride of the Bishops of Rome that ruling City became such that they gave jealousie to the Chief Magistrates of the Empire They added to the Sacraments new Ceremonies an Unction before Baptism beside that which followed after it the Prayers and Ceremonies of the Liturgy of the Eucharist which they call at this day the Mass were much increased and augmented they made use of Holy Waters they consecrated Oyls and Chrism their Funerals were enriched with Ceremonies borrowed from Judaism or Paganism they had their Ninth day their Fortieth day and their yearly Obits or Prayers for the Dead they affixed Prayers to certain hours which at this day they call Canonical the Cock crowing Nine of the Clock Mid-day Three of the Clock and Vespers In these Ages they did essentially alter Divine Service by intermingling therewith the Service of Creatures A kind of Furie for Relicks seized on the Spirits of Men nothing was heard to be spoken of but Visions by which they had been discovered and Miracles which had been done by them they carried
is it we see so few Saints called upon in the Fourth Age Why did they not call upon S. Peter S. Paul and all the Apostles Is it not clear from thence that neither the Apostles nor the Apostolick Church did institute this Worship Why did they forget all the Saints of the Old Testament and almost all those of the first and second Ages of the Church 't is evident that it was Mens Superstition for Relicks which gave birth to this Superstitious Invocation and that then they invoked only those whose Relicks they believed they had as I shall make appear in what follows Behold a third demonstrative Proof of the Novelty of this religious Invocation of Saints 'T is that in the same Age in which they invoked Saints they formally condemned the Invocation of Angles Theodoret is assuredly one of those Authors of the fifth Age where we see the most express Invocation of Saints †Lib. 8. De curandis Graec. affect nevertheless the same Author condemns the Invocation of Angels in a manner so express that one knows not what to answer to it 'T is in his Commentary on those Words of the second Chapter of the Epistle to the Colossians Let no man persuade you through humility to the Worship of Angels Those which were for the Law says Theodoret persuaded Men also to the Worship of Angles saying that the Law was given by Angels and this Superstition continued a long time in Pisidia and Phrygia for which reason a Synod assembled at Laodicea the Metropolis of Phrygia made a Law to hinder the Invocation of Angels Behold the most ridiculous and fantastical Conceit that ever was It is certain by the Scripture and the consent of all Christians that Angels are administring Spirits sent forth for those which shall inherit Salvation they are in our Churches they assist at our Assemblies and by consequence hear and understand us moreover they give an account to God of their conduct they know what we do they hear our Prayers whereas according to the Opinion of the Doctors of the Fourth and Fifth Ages it was very uncertain whether the dead Saints did hear the Prayers of the Living and yet more uncertain whether God gave them any Commission or Charge with respect to us nevertheless they look'd upon it as an impious folly to adore Angels but were willing it should be accounted a reasonable Worship to invoke a Saint What a fantastical Imagination is this And is it not clear that this savors of Superstition in its birth which hath as yet no Principles and which guides it self by the practice of the People and establishes it self upon popular Errors We have yet some invincible Proofs of the Novelty of this Worship but we will reserve them for the following Letter An Article of Controversie An Answer to the Reasons of the New Converts on the Subject of Schism and Separation AT the end of the preceding Letter we heard the Reasons which the New Converts offer to themselves to abide peaceably in the Estate where Violence hath placed them Behold exactly the Disposition of these Gentlemens minds they find some difficulty to resolve to acknowledge that there is Idolatry in the Church of Rome or rather they find it difficult to confess it for at the bottom we may believe they are convinced thereof But this Point being excepted they do confess that there are all sorts of Corruption in the Roman Church that the Real Presence and Transubstantiation are Errors that the Sacrifice of the Mass established only upon this Transubstantiation is therefore a false Sacrifice that Adoration which is a consequence of the real Presence as they pretend is superstitious that Masses without Communicants are contrary to the Institution of Jesus Christ that the Privation of the Cup is criminal that Purgatory is a dream that Service for the Dead Masses Penances and Indulgences are Superstitions that the Invocation of Saints the Worship of Hyperdulia which is given to the Blessed Virgin the Service of Images Veneration for Relicks are loathsome Additions made to Christianity and that they pollute and dishonour it that the Latin Tongue to very ill purpose hath been preserved in the Publick Worship to rob the People of that Edification which they might find by understanding what was said that the Government is tyrannical that the Pope usurps a Power which appertains not to him and that it may be he is Antichrist that the Church of Rome is so far from being Infallible that she hath erred in a Hundred and a Hundred things Behold say I exactly the Idea which these Gentlemen form of Popery Nevertheless they prove by Reasons which we have heard that they may continue there Now upon this supposition let us hear them speak and examin their Opinions one after another 'T is said That we must suffer and not separate from the Vnity of the Church My dear Brethren who seek to deceive your selves hear me What is this Unity of the Church according to your Principles from which we must not separate Do you believe that this Unity of the Church is the Unity of the Roman Church If it be so according to you there is no Church out of the Roman Communion if there be no Church out of the Roman Communion there is then none among the Christians of the East which are out of the Communion of the Pope and the Latin Church If there be no Church out of the Roman Communion there is no Salvation out of it and if no Salvation it follows that you damn all those Men which are in those Christian Communions some whereof are far less corrupt than the Roman Church But that is not all in the Church where you have lived hitherunto and where your Fathers died there hath been no Church for what reason Because these Assemblies according to you were out of the Vnity of the Church Nevertheless you do acknowledg that the Assemblies of your Fathers had a Christianity more pure without Mass Images Invocation of Saints Purgatory a barbarous Language in the Worship of God and other Superstitions and that the Roman Church hath all these so that you will put the Church and Salvation in a Society where Christianity is altogether corrupt according to you and you will take it from a Society where in your own opinion Christianity is intirely pure Are not these foolish Errors and such whereof you will be ashamed my Brethren as soon as you shall duly consider them It comes from this that you are willing to reconcile the Form of the Communion in which you are entered with those sentiments of Truth which you have preserved in your Hearts They inculcate these Maxims to your Ears continually Unity must not be broken you must not go our of it There is but one Church you ought to keep in it to separate is to go out of the Unity These miserable Juggles have some probability whilst we suppose as the Roman Church doth that the Church is
will always teach with these Pastours i.e. they must be Infallible I intreat you my Brethren to attend to what I shall say concerning these three Consequences 1. These Gentlemen suppose that the Church cannot be perpetual and perpetually visible without being pure and without continuing pure and exempt from corruption in the Faith. The Church is always visible therefore pure preaching must always remain there Can a man argue more pitifully 't is just as if I should say Whilst Man hath a Soul in his Body he must be always sound and hail as if Health were inseparable from Life Where have they found that Purity with respect to Faith is in separable from Visibility And because the Church is always visible doth it follow that she is always sound if the nature of the Church consisted in an indivisible point and in that certain state of purity of Faith in which there was no kind of Errors t is true the Church would perish cease to be and by consequence to be visible as soon as the Christian Doctrine should come to be mingled with any Doctrine that is strange and forreign thereto And indeed 't is the supposition of your Converters But 't is the most foolish Dream that ever entered into the mind of Man the most contrary to the Word of God and Experience that ever was asserted The most contrary to the Scripture for the Scripture says That there shall be in the Church thorns and thistles mingled with the good grain Wolves will creep in and destroy the flock That there must be heresies That men will build upon the foundation wood bay stubble And that even the Son of perdition will sit in the Church and Temple of God. The most contrary to Experience for for the space of 1300 or 1400 years which way soever we cast our Eyes we behold Christianity every-where spoiled by false and strange Doctrines Lay down this therefore as a thing indisputable that the Church must be always visible that she must always subsist but not that she must always subsist pure and underfiled The Church began to be corrupt considerably in the fourth Age and in two Ages the Corruption became such that Antichristianity which is the highest degree of the corruption of Christianity proceeded and came out from thence But in the midst of this great Corruption Christianity nevertheless preserved it self it remained very visible and by consequence the Church also continued visible for yet once more the Church remains every-where where Christianity remains and the Church remains visible every-where where Christianity remains yisible Remember-therefore that Popery is a very high and extream Corruption of Christianity but 't is not the Annihilation of it for we must well distinguish betwixt Annihilation and extream Corruption of it If the Church of Rome had rejected the Foundations as the Turks and the Socinians have done she would have been no more visible than as a dead Body is visible But because she hath only added an infinite number of false Doctrines superstitious and idolatrous whilst she hath retained Fundamentals she hath only corrupted Christianity But Christianity in the midst of these Corruptions hath not failed to remain visible to those which search after it with diligence and attention Imagine you an Egg not broken which swims in dirty and stinking water 't is the perfect Emblem of the Roman Religion The Egg whole and not broken is the Christian Creed preserved in its integrity in the sense of the Church The filthy and stinking Water where this Egg swims is the heap of Superstitions Errors and Idolatries of Popery The Egg remains visible in the midst of this filthy Water and even the opposition of the blackness of the Mire to the whiteness of the Egg make it in some sort more visible The Body of Christianity is also visible in the heap of Popish Errors and to him that will give attention thereunto it may be said that the true Christianity which doth continue in the Roman Religion serves to discover and make the ugliness of Popery more horrible The Mud and the stinking Water which encompasseth this Egg is visible as well as the Egg. 'T is the light of the day which manifests the one and the other The Corruption introduced by Popery in the Roman Religion is visible as well as Christianity 'T is the light of the day i.e. the light of the Word of God which manifests both for the Word of God manifests Christianity in the Romish Religion by the fair conformity of the three Creeds that of the Apostles that of Nice and of Athanasius with the Revelation This same word manifests Antichristianity the Mud and the Dirt of Popery by the frightful dissimilitude and unlikeness which is between Popery and Revelation It seems to me that he must be very blockish not to perceive all this and not to see that the Church may always endure and always be even visible although it be not necessary that she always continue in perfect Purity But nevertheless there is in the first consequence of your Converters some truth which serves for a foundation to that gross Illusion which they would put upon you They say The Church is always visible therefore pure Preaching must always continue there If the meaning be 't is of necessity that something of pure Preaching do always remain there yea and that the essential parts of true Preaching remain there 't is true for if the Fundamentals and essential parts of Christianity were not there there were no Church there Moreover 't is true that in Popery in the Religion of the Greeks in the Oriental Communions the Cophtis the Nestorians and the Armenians pure Preaching doth continue as to the Fundamentals of the Creed which make the Essence of Christianity But it doth not follow at all that Preaching must necessarily remain there wholly pure and incorrupt Not being able to proceed at this time to the examination of the two last consequences which your Converters draw from the perpetual visibility of the Church I will conclude by answering a Question which they put unto you and which it may be you put unto your selves Can a man be saved in Communions which you compare to a great Bason full of Dirt and stinking Water in which swims a good Egg clean and in its integrity This respects those who desire to save themselves in the Roman Church because she retains the Egg the Creed of Christians in its perfection You may well think that we should have a great many things to say to them if we would say all and were willing to repeat what we have said concerning it in our Seventeenth Letter But in this place I shall only answer to them That it does not follow that a man may be saved in a Communion which retains the Egg of Christianity whilst he swims in the Dung which compasses the Egg and nourishes himself with it a man plunged in a hideous Mire which receives the stinking dirt by his
't is that for which we ought to pour out tears of bloud that Christians should fall into so prodigious a Stupidity and into so great a want of Reason that if the Mahometans should fall into one like it and would prove their Religion after this manner by their Alcoran we should take them for mad men They ought not to tell you I dissemble their principal proofs drawn from Scripture for those points whereof we speak unto you for they have no other and the case is the same in all other Articles of Popery without excepting their Faith concerning the Eucharist For these words this is my Body although they should signifie a real Presence do not signifie Transubstantiation by any means in the World. 'T is a truth so evident that Cajetan and many other Doctors after him have confessed it Is it not a shame that on an Article so important as is the Adoration of the Sacrament when they should produce proofs from Scripture they cannot produce so much as one but these words this is my Body which do not speak one word concerning Adoration When they ought to prove the Power which is given to the Church to take away the Cup again they quote this is my Body This is in propriety of speech to mock men being not willing to confess plainly that which is truth i. e. our Religion hath no conformity to the Holy Scripture My Brethren that I may compleatly possess you of this truth that Popery hath no kind of Bond Union or Conformity with the Scripture observe these two things First That Popery treats the Scripture as a declared Enemy It disputes against its perfection its clearness its sufficiency and its authority It makes vast Volumes to prove it is obscure that 't is a Nose of Wax that 't is a Sword with two edges that it hath been an occasion by its obscurity of all Heresies that it contains not half the things that are necessary for salvation that it hath no authority without the testimony of the Church that it must be interpreted according to the Voice of the Church and her Practices that she contains a hundred things capable of raising scruple and giving scandal You have heard of the famous Cardinal Perron who collected together all that seems ridiculous to the profane in the Scripture as the Jaw-bone of Sampson's Ass and other like things to make it lose its authority They add that the Scripture is maimed and half lost corrupted by the Jews or Hereticks and as the top of all the Popes the Councils the Doctors the Inquisitors and the Parliaments have even forbidden the reading of it to the People as a dangerous Book Is not this to declare themselves and to act as enemies to the Scripture The other Reflection which I wish you would make is that the Church of Rome looks on the Scripture as her Enemy Popery is always on its guard against the Holy Scripture always prepared to give a Push always drawing back and recoiling always answering always distinguishing sometimes distinguishing Sacrifice into bloudy and unbloudy sometimes Adoration into Dulia and Latria sometimes the Head of the Church into Principal and Ministerial sometimes the Essence of the Body of Jesus Christ into natural and sacramental sometimes Mediators into Mediators of Intercession and of Redemption always to repel the Scripture and always to serve themselves of it Is it not therefore very clear that Popery is at a perfect opposition with the Scripture It attacks it as an Enemy by a hundred false Accusations it defends it self against it as against an Enemy by a hundred and a hundred imaginary distinctions to ward off the blows the Scripture gives it To attack and defend is all that Enemies do to one another Observe well my Brethren in the Instructions which your Converters give you in these late times the Scripture doth not enter among them They are ashamed of the proof which their Doctors have heretofore drawn from the Scripture to support their Doctrines At this day they beat and press upon you by nothing but the pretended Authority of the Church and Passages of the Fathers which you never read From all this I conclude that Popery in the quality of true Religion and the Church of Rome in quality of the true Church are by no means visible seeing they are destitute of that Light which alone can make the true Church visible viz. Conformity with the Holy Scripture An INDEX for the first Year OF THE PASTORAL LETTERS 1 LEtter A Refutation of what M. de Meaux says in his Pastoral Letter concerning the Manner of Conversions A Letter of M. de Meaux to M. D. V. 2 Letter Concerning the Right of Persecutors A Letter of Queen Christiana about Persecution The Use of the Sword of Princes extends not itself over the Conscience They do all that is necessary to assure themselves of the Damnation of the New Converts A Letter of M. P. M. a Confessour condemned to the Gallies 3 Letter Against the Necessity of a living and speaking Authority Against Successions of Seats Assemblies in Gevennes 4 Letter Advice to those which frequent the Sermons of Papists A History of many Assemblies in Cevennes The Martyrdom of the Blessed Teyssier of Burfort and Fulcran Rey in Languedoc 5 Letter The Form of Christianity in the first Age. A Letter to M. de M. a Confessour and his Answer 6. Letter What was the Form of Christianity in the second Age. 7 Letter Concerning Singing and Voices heard in divers places 8 Letter The Christianity of the third Age. M. de Monceaux Doctor in Physick of La Ferte Au-Coll his Confession M. de Juigne of Villiers a Confessour his Death in Prison M. Palmentier of Ville Dieu l'Aunay his Martyrdom Mademoiselle Carquett Vicountess of Novion and M. Chenevix drawn to the Dung-hill 9 Letter The Christianity of the third Age. M. de Voutron with two Damsels of Laon their Confession The Massacre of the Christians in Cevennes M. de Toumeyrol his Martyrdom M. le Feure a Confessor of Niuernois Mademoiselle de Chalmot indured the burning of her hand her Confession 10 Letter The Christianity of the third Age. Concerning the Unity of the Church we are not gone out of that Unity 11 Letter The Christianity of the third Age. A Continuation of the matter concerning Unity 12 Letter Concerning the Original of Monks Advice to persons which are in Convents Concerning the Unity of the Ministry A Letter from Geneva concerning the Christians of Piedmont 13 Letter Concerning the Original of Oecumenical Councils Seven Reasons against their Infallibility The true Idea of Schism 14 Letter Concerning the Original of the Tyranny of the Popes and the Hierarchy Concerning Schism Although the Corruption of the Church of Rome were not extream it would not be allowed us to return thither 15 Letter Concerning the Original of the Invocation of Saints in the fourth Age Three Proofs of its Novelty An Answer to a New Convert about Schism The
off Heads to hang and burn therefore it ought not to be imputed to her A Sovereign Magistrate contents himself to be Judg and to condemn to Death but he doth not execute he leaves that to the Hangman by consequence if he condemn the Innocent and cause them to die it ought to be imputed to the Hangman and not to him The Church doth a very fine honour to Magistrates she makes them her Hangmen she herself doth not kill but she constrains Princes to kill and burn She constrains I say by Excommunications Censures Exhortations Seductions Sollicitations and the end thereof is she would be able to say The Church dips not her hand in Blood the Church by it self never makes use of force Did the Devil ever cheat after a more impudent and frontless manner I will not say after a more fine and subtil manner for it is to lye without any hope to deceive the Snare is so broad and so ridiculous It were better without Craft to take the way that the Bishop of Meaux takes at last and to maintain that Christian Princes as such have right to punish pretended Hereticks with Death Understand you says he That Princes who are Sons of the Church never ought to make use of the Sword to abuse the Enemies thereof Do you dare to say contrary to the opinion of your Doctors which have maintaind by so many Writings that the Republick of Geneva had power and right to condemn Servetus to the Fire for having denied the Divinity of the Son of God It must be avowed that these Gentlemen are admirable in their confidence Do you dare to say Yes we dare to say it since we say it with most part of the Ancients and with the wisest and most understanding of the Moderns We dare say that the Doctrine which the B. of Meaux maintains here is bloody and cruel and that the Church ought to leave it in share to him who was a Liar and Murderer from the beginning Servetus was burnt at Geneva therefore it is lawful to burn Hugonots and the Calvinists God forgive these unhappy men which have the Cruelty to compare us with Servetus This man was not only an Enemy of the Divinity of Jesus Christ but he was an Enemy of all Divinity he was impious he was a Blasphemer And although he made profession of believing one God the irreverent manner wherewith he speaks of Holy Mysteries makes it plain enough that he had renounced all Religion as well as all Shame It ought to be permitted us to quit our hands of such men They object unto us the Sentiment of our Doctors I answer Our Doctors never did believe that we ought to persecute and burn men that confess God and Jesus Christ according to the three Creeds They never put Papists to Death for the sake of their Religion But although some of our first Writers should have gone too far in speaking concerning the punishment of Hereticks it ought to be known that our Authors are not our Teachers we have but one only Teacher and that is Jesus Christ speaking by his Prophets and Apostles We swear to no mans words but to those of God. And without serving my self of the Examples and Authority of your Doctors tell me in what place of Scripture Hereticks and Schismaticks are excepted from the number of those Malefactors against whom S. Paul hath said that God hath armed Kings and Princes It appertains not to us to shew you that Hereticks are not of the number of those against which God hath put a Sword in the hands of Princes 'T is for you Gentlemen Persecutors to prove to us that they are comprehended there For we have sense reason piety and humanity on our side and besides we have the consent of sound Antiquity for more than four hundred years How could the Church be able to put the Sword in the hand of Magistrates for the punishment of her Enemies in a time when the most scrupulous Christians found it difficult to consent to the Death of those Criminals that disturbed the publick peace and that of particular persons and did maintain that Christians without exception never ought to dip their hands in Blood. In what Dictionary hath Monsieur de Meaux found that evil thinkers and evil doers are the same thing Princes have right to punish evil doers with Death therefore they have also right to punish evil thinkers with Death They have right to punish those whose Crimes are apparent to the publick ruine therefore they have right to burn men whose Crime is in the Conscience the Empire whereof appertains only to God. If the Church have right to call in the Secular Power for the punishment of Hereticks why did S. Paul say simply A man that is an Heretick reject after the first and second admonition Why did he not say Deliver him to the secular Power that he may be burnt Did he not know that in a few Ages Princes would become Christians and have the Sword in their hands Did he only give Precepts for the present time and state Hath this Cruelty of Massacring honest well-meaning but mistaken Persons any affinity with the Precepts of Jesus Christ which commands us to serve our selves with Sweetness Humanity Prayers Exhortations and reasons for the reduction of them It is then permitted to Massacre the Jews for there are none greater Enemies to the Church than they are Is that the Spirit of the Gospel which promises a return and conversion to that Nation How shall they return if they be destroyed Will men never be ashamed of this Antichristian Barbarity Will they never know that it is the Beast in the Revelations who makes himself drunk with the Blood of Saints devours their Flesh makes War upon them and overcomes them and is therefore called Beast Lion Bear and Leopard For he must have renounced reason and humanity and be transformed into a Savage Beast that behaves himself towards Christians as the Church of Rome behaves it self towards us Monsieur de Meaux affirms that what they do against us at this day is nothing but a lawful exercise of the Power that Princes enjoy by Authority from God for the punishment of Offenders And I will prove to him in three words that it is false 1. Princes in the use of the Sword against Malefactors design their ruin that publick Societies be no more troubled with them 'T was the end that was heretofore proposed in Persecutions for Religion 'T was the end that Charles the Ninth pretended to have in the Massacre of S. Bartholomew 'T is the end of the Inquisitors who burn all those that are suspected of Heresie It hath been the end of all Persecutors in past Ages But this is not their end at this day they intend not the Destruction of the pretended Hereticks but their Conversion Therefore although it should be true that Hereticks are not eccepted out of the number of those Malefactors against whom God hath armed Princes this will
of the Sun as they suppose in producing those words this is my body our fear would have no foundation To defend us against this prejudice Monsieur de Meaux produces the false fear of the Arrians and the Disciples of Paulus Samosatenus who feared lest they should be made to worship a Man an Infant a Creature however perfect and highly priviledged he were Let not Monsieur de Meaux be displeased behold a shred of Antiquity ill placed and disposed for a person that prides himself of knowledg It supposes that the Arrians and Samosatenians have heretofore refused to adore Jesus Christ under pretence that he was a Creature a Man an Infant just as we refuse at this day to adore the Sacrament under pretence that it is but Bread. I would be very glad that he would a little shew us those places in the Ancients where the Arrians refused to adore Jesus Christ because he was nothing else but Man. First of all they did not say he was a mere Man they acknowledged he was God of God and Light of Light and that he was before Abraham but they said he was a God created before all Ages and afterwards incarnate And as for the adoration they so little refused to give it to Jesus Christ that all the Fathers made it their Crime and convinced them of Idolatry because supposing Jesus Christ was a Creature they nevertheless adored him It is good my Brethren that you observe this passage and that you conclude that these-Gentlemen know not how to quote the Ancients without impressing some footsteps of their falsness and perfidiousness on those quotations They ought to find an example about vain fear in Antiquity like unto ours they can find none and therefore it is expedient to make one But although it were true that the Arrians did refuse to adore Jesus Christ for fear that they should adore a Man an Infant they had been mistaken and we shall have reason to be unwilling to adore the Sacrament for fear of adoring Bread. For the Orthodox did invincibly prove to the Arrians that this Man was the Eternal Son of God but the Papists will never prove that the Sacrament is the true Body of Jesus Christ Your Reformers have done nothing but renew the Controversies ended six hundred years since when Berengarius moved them And if you call in doubt the judgment that was given against him others with as much reason will doubt concerning preceding Councils and behold us then obliged to examine anew all which hath been Decreed as if we began to be Christians and that all that our Fathers have determined is good for nothing It is not true that we have done nothing else but renew Controversies ended six hundred years ago We acknowledge no Authority in an Antichristian Church such was that in which Berengarius lived to determine Controversies It hath no right to determine them or at least we have right to have no regard to her decisions It is precisely that which our Arrians do now at this day say unto us your Divines and Schoolmen have done nothing else but renew Controversies already determined more than twelve hundred years ago in the Councils of Tyre Jerusalem Millan and Ariminum The date is a little older and the Authority in my opinion a little greater For the Church of the Arrians was much more pure than that of the Man of Sin. It had been a great marvel if Monsieur de Meaux had neglected to bring into this short Letter the Sophisms about the Judge of Controversies These Gentlemen have nothing else to say it is their only Rampart it is necessary they always return thither If it be permitted us to reject the Councils that have condemned Berengarius behold us under a necessity to examine anew all the Councils which have decided the Controversies against the Arrians Nestorians c. This signifies nothing neither according to my Principles nor those of Monsieur de Meaux Hath Monsieur de Meaux forgotten that according to his Principles no Councils are infallible but those that are General Wherefore then doth he demand the same submission for the Councils that condemned Berengarius as for those that condemned Arrius Nestorius and Eutyches These last are considered as Oeconomical and by consequence as Infallible in the Church of Rome But a Council of Tours of Verseille a Council of Rome which have condemned Berengarius were but particular Councils Therefore they were not Infallible Some of them had the Pope for their Head yea but according to Monsieur de Meaux a great friend of the Theology of the Gallican Church the Pope is not Infallible nor can he communicate it to any one Let these Gentlemen fix their Principles or let them not delude us by comparing Councils which can err to Councils which according to them are Infallible and cannot be mistaken If this be worth nothing according to the Principles of Monsieur de Meaux it is worth less according to mine These Gentlemen will not take it amiss if we have mote veneration for Councils held in the fourth Age where they judged by the word of God than for Councils of the eleventh Age held in a time in which the Church was plunged into an abyss of Corruption according to the confession of Baronius and others like unto him Therefore one may doubt of the truth of decisions of the Councils of that Age and not doubt of those of all the preceding Councils But because we are willing to have some submission for the decisions of the Councils of the fourth Age must we therefore pluck out our Eyes Must we cease to see that they did decide conformably to the Scripture Must we cease to build the submission that we have for Councils principally upon the conformity of their decisions with the Holy Scriptures Behold us obliged to examine all anew as if we began to be Christians Behold us obliged to examine all anew yea every one for himself And does not every one of us begin to be Christian when he begins to live and to make use of his reason Monsieur de Meaux is at agreement that when a Man begins to be a Christian he has right to examine Societies and Confederate Churches do not always begin to be Christians and therefore it is not always necessary that they examine And when once they have formed their Confessions upon the word of God it is not necessary that they repeat it at least unless it be made appear that they have erred and be mistaken But every particular person begins to be a Christian he hath therefore right to examine And so behold the right of single persons re established by the reasoning of Monsieur de Meaux We will not touch the rest of the private Letter of Monsieur de Meaux at this time because what he adds concerning the Judge of Controversies and the reflections which we have to make thereon will fall in very well with what follows in his Pastoral Letter
very desirous thereof weeping and professing that she would never go to Mass but it was refused her until they should receive greater marks of the sincerity of her return and repentance A few days after there was another Assembly in a Desart under the covert of a Barn in the Parish of St. Martin de Carcones where there were full out sixteen hundred persons It was in the night and continued until two hours before day Two days after there was another Assembly in the Parish of St. John de Gardoningue where there were seven or eight hundred persons The day after on the Lords day in the Parish of St. Cross de Caderles there was another where there were about fourteen hundred persons from all the Neighbouring Villages They had knowledge of this Assembly The Intendant and Judges sent an Advocate named Joly to inform them concerning it all their diligence went no further than to discover three or four persons there was so much fidelity among those that made up these Assemblies They took one which they threatned with death he seemed to comply and promised to tell what he knew But whether indeed he knew no body or was not willing to name them he discovered at first but two persons Nevertheless those of the Village of St. John who believed that they had been all discovered by the persons that had been taken fled and saved themselves in the Woods This flight discovered them and the way with which they serve themselves to force confessions learnt the Persecutors almost all those which had assisted at these Assemblies But they found the number of them so great that it forced them and also constrained them to cease these Persecutions seeing that they must depopulate the Country if they proceeded rigorously against the accused They therefore resolved to send them back upon promise that they would return thither no more reserving nevertheless liberty to themselves of chastising those which they called Heads of these undertakings These threatnings and these Persecutions could not oblige the faithful to give over and a few days after without more delay they had another Assembly in a Meadow in the same Parish of St. John where there were near two thousand persons There was Prayer Preaching and the Communion As they were in the middle of this exercise a voice was heard to say that the Dragoons drew near upon which he that performed the Office of a Pastor cryed out La those that fear depart but not one person stirred every one prepared himself to suffer Martyrdom The Dragoons came not on the place until the day after They saw the Grass trodden and thereupon the Priest which accompanied them said that the Devil had kept his Sabbath there the day before They made Prisoners some of the Peasants of the neighbouring Villages and carried them to Montpellier where they took their Depositions and released them These methods of proceeding were designed to affrighten them but they prevailed nothing for the Monday following there was another Meeting or Assembly of two thousand persons in another place of the same Parish An unhappy Apostate of the Town of Caderles named Mazel went and accused and discovered them to the Curate of the Village of St. John who went thither the day after with some Officers of Justice that he might repair to Bebe which was the place where the Assembly was held they must pass over Precipices and Rocks which made them think it was impossible that they should pass that way by night and the Curate said in a Language common enough with those honest Men I do not know how these Devils could pass here in the night I would my Brethren that you should compare your tenderness with this unwearied Zeal This is nothing to what you will see afterward but it is nevertheless enough to shew you that God hath chosen the weak things of the World to confound the strong These poor Inhabitants of the Mountains with their ignorance and rusticity will rise up in judgment agaiest you We hear that you run in troops to the Popish Churches to hear their Sermons It is not there that you ought to seek the word of God. You will not find it there but corrupt and mingled with human Traditions and although some Preachers should affect and chuse to Preach nothing but Morality unto you nevertheless there will be danger in going to hear them But we intend to discourse you more at large on this subject till when we recommend you to the Grace of God. October 1. 1687. The FOURTH PASTORAL LETTER TO THOSE That frequent the Popish Churches Assemblies of Christians in Cevennes The Martyrdom of many Christians of that Country and particularly of Sr Fulcran Rey Student in Theology My dearly beloved Brethren in our Lord Jesus Christ Grace and Peace be given to you from our God. WE will begin our Letter where we ended the precedent We have learn'd that those among you which have not yet been prevailed on to go to Mass do nevertheless fill the Popish Churches at the hours of Service and worship particularly in great Cities as Paris You intend thereby to satisfie your Persecutors in part you think by this means to turn away or at least delay the violence wherewith they threaten you that they may force you to go to Mass and communicate And besides you imagine that yon do no evil because you go to hear Men that preach the Word of God tho not in a manner so pure as you desire it and you think your selves sufficiently able to separate the good from the bad Moreover among Preachers you chuse those that out of complaisance and kindness to you speak little of Controversie and with very much moderation and entertain you for the most part of the time with Truths which are common to us with the Church of Rome and Duties of Morality the necessity whereof is acknowledged by all Christians It is better say you to hear the Word of God in this manner than not to hear it at all Behold these are your Excuses But I pray my Brethren give heed to what I am about to say You do not perceive whither this conduct will lead you 1. In frequenting constantly the exercises of Devotion of the Romish Religion and being often in the Popish Churches you will insensibly abate in the aversion you ought to have for those places of Devotion which Superstition hath rendred entirely profane You enter without indignation into those places in which the great God jealous of his Honor is provoked to jealousie by Idolatry You accustom your selves to see Images before which men prostrate themselves and to which they give Religious Honor contrary to the express Commandment of that Law which was given in the midst of Thunders to signifie that the Transgressors thereof should be smitten with the just Thunders of the Divine Vengeance You behold without emotion those Altars where that unhappy Sacrifice is offered which is so great a shame to the
its Ceremonies were intirely unknown As to what appertains to other Sacraments as is that of Marriage and Penance he must have a mind blinded by prejudice beyond all imagination to believe they may be found in the Scripture Marriage and Penance are indeed found there but there is not one word which does establish them as sacred Ceremonies designed to seal the Covenant of Grace and to confer forgiveness of sins Confirmation is found there i. e. the custom of laying on of hands for the giving the Holy Spirit and that of Anointing the Sick to recover them from Diseases Some of the Proselytes of these Gentlemen make a great business of it and have said to us as a great reproach that we have taken away Confirmation and Extreme Unction It is a great pity that minds which seem inlightned should stumble at trifles And is it not clear that this Imposition of Hands and Extreme Unction was designed for doing of Miracles which are long since ceased But they say that the following Ages did nevertheless practise it That we shall see afterward The Invocation of the Holy Virgin and Saints the Worship of Relicks Adoring of Images and the Service of Creatures in Popery is an affair so considerable that it fills almost all Nevertheless the Scripture of the New Testament says nothing of it Nor is it possible that Men well Educated can persuade themselves that these are Apostolical Traditions when we see not the least footsteps of them in the Writings of the Apostles It is a blindness which cannot be understood As to matter of Fact we can have no dispute with Papists concerning it They must acknowledge that the Apostles and Evangelists speak not one word either of the Invocation of Saints and Angels nor of the Veneration of Relicks nor of the Adoration of Images As to matter of Right if the Church has power to introduce these new Worships let it be proved and put past doubt and Controversie for I do affirm that he must be smitten with a spirit of blockishness that maintains that we may Religiously invoke creatures without the Authority of God and order of his Apostles Plainly it will be said that the Apostles have appointed the Invocation of Saints and that they themselves have practised it but they have left nothing written concerning it I do affirm that he must have a Forehead made of Brass who shall say such a thing And the new Converts who can be persuaded of it make no use of their reason It will never enter into the mind of a reasonable Man that the Apostles have appointed Invocation of Saints and said nothing of it in their Writings Purgatory which they would have pass for a little thing is nevertheless a very great one For Prayers for the dead publick and private Masses and almost all the Roman Worship is founded thereon So that the Holy Spirit could not let it slip If there be a Purgatory it must be in the Scripture or there is none .. I take it for granted and 't is to scoff People to go search this pretended Fire in the prison whence we must not go out till we have paid the utmost farthing in the fire that ought to try all things at the end of the world in the prison where are the Spirits to which Noah preach'd If Heaven and Hell were no other ways revealed in the Scripture the profane would have a fair opportunity to laugh at us The Authority of the Pope is the last of those Articles of Popery that I have represented 'T is an Affair about which there can be no Controversie which has any foundation in the World. Ask your Converters where-is the Pope in the Scriptures they will quote to you the Words of Jesus Christ to S. Peter Thou art Peter and upon this rock will I build my church Call a Turk a Jew or any other Man that hath common sense and ask him whether he sees therein that God hath established a Man at Rome with full authority to guide the whole Church to damn to save to judge of all Differences to determine without Appeal to excommunicate Kings Princes and Sovereigns he will believe you laugh him to scorn The new Converts which see therein the Apostolick Chair from S. Peter to Innocent the Eleventh have very good Eyes I beseech you my Brethren take your Converters a little to those Texts of Scripture where S. Paul enumerates the Officers of the Church He has given some to be Pastors Teachers Apostles Evangelists Bishops Deacons Elders and Prophets in those places where he declares the Duties of those who enjoy the Offices of the Church Press them say I and demand of them whether they dare say that the Apostle hath omitted the first of all Offices an Office alone in its kind infinitely superior to all others Ask them if they do believe in good earnest that S. Paul declared the Duties of Bishops in general and that he said nothing for the Regulation of the Bishop of Bishops I am persuaded if you press them earnestly thereon they will blush in your Faces Behold I do maintain that I have said enough already for the History of the first Age. The silence of the Scripture about all the Articles of Popery is an indisputable proof that then it was wholly unknown But there is much more you have an hundred positive Proofs that then the Christian Religion was wholly opposite to Popery Against the Real Presence you have all those Passages where the Eucharist is called Bread and a Commemoration of the Death of our Lord all those where 't is said our Lord is on high and not here below Against the Sacrifice of the Mass you have all the Epistle to the Hebrews Against the Worship of Creatures you have the Decalogue and a thousand other Commandments which do appoint that you adore and invoke God alone Against the taking away the Cup and the Adoration of the Eucharist you have the History of its Institution Against Purgatory you have an hundred Texts which tell you that after this life Believers go to Heaven Against the Pope you have all those places where our Lord and the Apostles forbid the Domination of Church-Men both over their Flocks and one another This is not a place to engage in a long Controversie by the Scripture we compose a History not a Disputation Know therefore historically in the following Articles what was the Primitive Christianity Behold what was the form of the Apostolick Church 1. Christians having as yet no Churches assembled where they could for the Service of God and it was almost always from House to House This is apparent both in the History of the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistles of S. Paul. 2. In the Assemblies they preached and declared the Word of God. This is also certain and read in divers Texts in the Book of the Acts. 3 They brake Bread from House to House the Sacred Scripture says so expresly that is to say
those that were baptised both before their Baptism and it may be after But it is ridiculous to make a Sacrament of this Imposition of Hands Concerning which my Brethren you ought to know 1. That Imposition of Hands is a Ceremony descended from the Jews our Lord approved and practised it for which reason he laid hands on all the Children they brought to him when he blessed them 2. You ought to be advertised that Imposition of Hands was an Appendage of Prayer and that they served themselves of that Ceremony as often as they would implore the extraordinary assistance of God upon any one When any one was sick they prayed and laid their hands on them When any one was reconciled to the Church they begged of God pardon of sins for him laying their hands on him When any one was admitted to a publick Office they prayed to obtain that assistance that was necessary for him and laid on him their hands When they sent any one upon a difficult Commission they laid hands on him and prayed as may be seen in Acts 13. The fathers after they had fasted and prayed laid hands on Paul and Barnabas to the end they might go preach the Gospel amongst the Gentiles They were already Presbyters and had received Mission from God and the Church When they married they received also Prayer and the Benediction of the Church with Imposition of Hands annex'd unto it 'T is a prodigious Blindness to make of these differing Impositions of Hands so many Sacraments I should as soon chuse or rather sooner chuse to make of these differing Prayers which were made on sundry occasions so many Sacraments For 't is certain that Prayer over the baptised the penitent the sick those that took Office those that were sent on Commission those that were married was the chief of the Action and Imposition of Hands was but a decent Gesture and a Rite which signified that they desired the Grace of God and his assistance on the person that was concerned therein 'T is a pityful thing that Men lay hold alway on the Skin and meddle not with the Marrow and if the principal Action be accompanied with some little Ceremony which is but accessory the love of that which is external and easie to practise presently changes the principal into accessory and the accessory into principal Bowing the Knee and Imposition of Hands are two Rites of the same kind and of the same necessity To bend the Knee and lift up the Hands have been two signs which almost always accompanied Prayer the first signifies the Humiliation of the Spirit the second the Elevation of the Heart and when this Elevation of the Hands is made on the Head of any one 't is to signifie that the Heart lifts up it self according to the desire and intention of him over whom they lift up their hands Behold the whole Mystery of this Ceremony whereof they have made four or five Sacraments And 't is the first original of the Sacrament of Confirmation of Penance of Marriage of Orders and of Extreme Unction If the Humor of Popery and Superstition had turn'd on the other hand we had had it may be fourteen Sacraments instead of seven For of the Genuflection which is made in praying for the whole and sound of that which is made in praying for the sick for hardened Sinners and for those that are penitent c. Of these Genuflections say I they might have made as many Sacraments with as much reason as they have made five Sacraments of the five Orders of Prayers to which Imposition of Hands has been annexed Let this serve my Brethren to make you understand that nothing is more absurd that to make a Sacrament of Confirmation because in the first and second Age they laid hands on those which had been baptised The Apostles practised it also because they had power to obtain the miraculous Gifts of the Holy Ghost for those which had received Baptism The Bishops affirming themselves Succession of the Apostles appropriated to themselves afterward a Ceremony which became vain and empty because they had not the power to cause the Holy Ghost to descend upon those on whom they laid hands Jesus Christ laid hands not only on Children brought to him but also on the sick as it appears in the Gospel of S. Mark * Mark 6.5.8.13 and that of S. Luke †Luke 4.40 When he healed the Woman that had been bowed together during the space of eighteen years he also ‖ Luke 13.13 laid his Hands upon her When * Act. 9.17 Ananias would give sight to Saul he laid his hands on him When S. Paul would heal the Father of Publius Prince of Malta of his Fever and Bloody Flux he laid his hands on him To conclude a Man must have a Spirit prejudiced beyond all that can be imagined not to see that Imposition of Hands is a simple Ceremony annexed to Prayer Concerning Extreme Unction i. e. the Ceremony of anointing the dying to obtain for them Vigor and Strength necessary to overcome death 't is that whereof there is not found the least footstep in all the Authors of this second Age. We do not doubt at all but that they did serve themselves of that Unction of which the Evangelist and Apostle speak an Unction wherewith they served themselves for the miraculous Cure of Diseases As in the second and third Ages there continued in the Church some Remainders of the Gift of Healing they might also serve themselves with the Ceremony of Unction But boldly defie your Converters to shew you any Example of a Man dying that was anointed with Oil in the second Age with this intent to make the passage of death more easie to him Press them with the same confidence about their other false Sacraments Orders Penance and Marriage and oblige them to shew you by antiquity in the second Age that the Doctors of the Church did regard them as Sacraments Purgatory in Popery is a Foundation upon which they build an infinite number of idolatrous and superstitious Worships for which reason 't is of importance to see what Men believed of it in the second Age of the Church The State of Souls after death hath always been an Abyss in which Men have seen nothing without Revelation And for that reason the Pagans fell in this regard into prodigious Errors and the Jews before our Saviour floated about in great Uncertainties The Primitive Christians fell close to that which our Lord said to the good Thief This day shalt thou be with me in paradise To that which S. Paul had taught 1 Cor. 5. Phil. 1. That if our earthly house of this tabernacle c. And that when we depart from hence we shall be with Christ Jesus To that which the Holy Spirit hath said in the Revelations that those which die in the Lord are happy and their works follow them About the middle of the second Age a Christian apparently come over
Religious Worship and this is that which the Ancient Christians call here to communicate with the body of the Martyr that is to say assemble where he was buryed Pray to God and Celebrate the Mysteries of the Christian Religion in the same place and even over the Tomb of the Martyr In this there is nothing Criminal all is done with a good meaning Nevertheless we shall see how insensibly all did degenerate into Superstition It does not appear that either they Prayed to Polycarpus or that they Prayed for him on the day Consecrated to his memory but we shall see in the third Age they Prayed for the Martyrs and in the fourth Age they Prayed to them Give attention to this passage I earnestly intreat you As to what appertains to Images I think I shall do a thing of great advantage if I prove that the Christian Church had none in their Temples in the second Age for it will appear by the Ages following that they had all sorts of Images even out of Temples in the greatest abhorrence Fasts Lent Abstinence from certain Meats and other Mortifications of like kind which makes so great a part of the Roman Religion which dazle the Eyes of some of our New Converts were intirely unknown in the second Age. We there see and observe Prayers and Fasts very often but there is nothing Read which may make us suspect that they were affixed to certain days of the week or certain months of the year all the days of Prayer except the Lords day were almost always days of Fasting But it was by accident because the Fasting of the New Testament was often joyned with Prayer that the Ancient Christians made it a duty to Fast on days of Prayer But it was a thing unheard of precisely to make Devotion to consist of Fasting without any respect to Prayer and those that do affirm it was the use of the Primitive Church must prove it Now we are certain that they cannot find any proof thereof in the Writings of the second Age. And as to what remains as we shall make it appear by the clearest evidence that the Popish Fasts were unknown in the third Age it will appear by consequence that they were of no use in the second only it appears that they prepared for the Communion of Easter by a Fast of two days St. Ireneus writ to Victor Bishop of Rome on occasion of the Controversie touching the day on which they ought to Celebrate Easter * Euseb Hist Eccles lib. 5. cap. 24. is not only disputed concerning Easter-day but also concerning the form of the Fasts antecedent thereto for some think they ought not to Fast but one day others two others more and others measure their Fast-day by the space of twenty four hours night and day and this diversity in the observation of the Fast had not its being in our Age but hath begun from the time of our Fathers who by negligence simplicity and ignorance have suffered this custom to slip in Nevertheless they lived in peace with each other and we retain it to this day Observe well it is not Lent but the beginning and original thereof These forty hours of Fast are greatned and grown up to forty days So it is that the most innocent practices have been the original of Superstition so dangerous is it to make Innovations although they seem without hazardous consequence let them shew you other solemn Fasts besides this in the second Age. It remains that we speak a word concerning the Pope and the prodigious Authority he arrogates to himself It is a Capital affair in Popery he is the Principle of Unity he is the Centre unto which your Converters tell you you ought to be united if you will be saved God knows what they think of it but we defie them to shew you that the Church of Rome had then any Superiority over other Churches We may assure you without rashness that the most part of the Churches which were in the extreme Parts of Asia scarce knew whether there were any such thing as a Church of Rome they neither knew the name of its Bishop nor the form of its Government nor Customs and therefore were far enough from being subject to its Orders and Decrees We may also assure you there were also Christians in Persia and in the farthest parts of the East which knew not whether there were a Roman Church in the World. Send your Converters to the famous de Launy Doctor of the Sorbonne who makes appear with sufficient clearness and evidence the independence of other Churches and the few bonds and ties that they had with Rome by proving that the adherence they had to the Roman Seat was not accounted necessary in any Age of the ancient Church They produce to you in the second Age Victor who cut off from his Communion the Churches of Asia on occasion of the Controversie about Easter-Day But you ought to understand that this was an attempt without example and which had no effect but was despised of all the World. And besides this was no right that was particular to the Bishop of Rome for other Churches pretended to have that right of cutting off other Churches from their Communion as well as that of Rome Moreover the nearer the Churches of the World were to Rome the more respect and consideration they had for the Church which was there The Churches which were without the Bounds of the Roman Empire scarce knew that there was a Church at Rome The Provinces at a distance from Italy such were Asia and Africa beheld her so far off that they scarce knew either her Customs or her Doctrine nor did they think themselves under any obligation to be instructed in them or to follow them And therefore they continued a long time to celebrate Easter with the Jews and to rebaptize Hereticks without any regard to the Decisions of Victor and Stephen Bishops of Rome The Churches of France which beheld her near at hand had her in greater value and estimation because they were smitten and amazed not at the Majesty of the Church but at the Majesty of the Empire which had its Seat at Rome This is it which made Ireneus Bishop of Lions to say That it was necessary that the whole Church should travel to the Church of Rome because of its more powerful principality That is to say because it was the Seat of the Empire that all Nations come thither and that Christians were found there of all the Provinces of the Empire from whose Mouths might be learn'd what was that Faith which was scattered all over the Earth Behold what was the Christianity of the second Age. And behold the Additions that we find there which afterward was the Seed of Superstition and Idolatry First of all they mingled Water with the Wine in the Eucharist which was not used in the time of the Apostles 2. They carried the Sacrament to the absent which was not usual
neither in the Apostolick Church 3. They undertook a custom of bringing Offerings and Alms not in Silver but in Merchandize Bread Wine Corn Raisins Fruits c. And of that they offered on the Holy Table those things which might be of use in the publick Service whereas in the Apostolick Church we see no other Alms but such as were gathered by the Hands of the Deacons either at the end or beginning of their Assemblies 4. Of these Alms of the Believers they made Oblations to God consecrating them by Prayer 5. At the end of their Prayers before the Communion they added the mutual kiss which was not of Apostolick Institution and was afterwards abolished 6. Many persons entertained an opinion of the separate state for Souls after death a third place which was utterly unknown to the Apostles 7. They conceive an excessive Love for the Bones of the Martyrs nevertheless without giving them any kind of Worship or Religious Homage This excessive love for Bones was not reasonable nor was it of the Apostolick Age. 8. About the end of the second Age they appointed Feasts to celebrate the memories of the Martyrs which was not neither of Apostolick Institution 9. They appointed a day or two for Fasting before Easter Behold the principal Innovations in the second Age in which there is nothing almost that can be blamed considered in it self and separated from the Fruits and Consequences thereof To conclude to the end that you be not abused by false Authors you ought to know that we entertain none for the Writers of the second Age but these S. Clement the Disciple of S. Paul who writ an Epistle to the Corinthians S. Ignatius of whom we have many Epistles concerning which the Learned doubt with reason but we will nevertheless receive them in the present Affair S. Polycarp who wrote an Epistle to the Philippians the Epistle of the Church of Smyrna concerning the Martyrdom of S. Polycarp Justin Martyr whose Works ought to be distinguished for there are many among them which are falsly attributed unto him Athanagoras the Athenian of whom we have an Apology for the Christians and a Discourse concerning the Resurrection Theophilus of Antioch of whom we have three Books written to Autolycus Tatian of whom we have a Discourse in Defence of the Christian Religion and against that of the Pagans And in fine S. Ireneus Bishop of Lyons of whom we have a considerable Work against the Heresies of his Times If they quote unto you the Liturgies of S. Mark of S. James of S. Peter the Works of Dionysius the Areopagite the Canons of the Apostles and other like Discourses you ought to reject them as being false and forged in the opinion of all the Learned who have any thing of sincerity November 15 1686. THE SEVENTH PASTORAL LETTER CONCERNING Songs and Voices which were heard in several places in the Air. Dear Brethren in our Lord Grace and Peace be given to you from our God and Saviour Jesus Christ IN the last of our Letters we engaged our selves to communicate unto you certain notable matters of Fact which some of our Brethren have thought adviseable to impart unto us Amongst these matters of Fact I do not think there 's any one that better deserves to be examined than that which hath been reported to us That in many places where there have been formerly Churches Voices have been heard in the Air so perfectly like to our singing of Psalms that they could not be taken for any thing else If this be true 't is a wonder which very well deserves the labor of our attention We shall think our selves very ungrateful to the Divine Goodness if we should suppress so illustrious a Testimony of his Approbation He must be bold in this Age that dares speak of Prodigies Marvels Presages and other such like things There are times in which Men believe every thing in this wherein we now are they believe nothing I think there is a mean to be chosen we may not believe every thing but surely something ought to be believed For this Spirit of Incredulity and this Character of a brave Spirit is good for nothing and I have not as yet discovered the use thereof 'T is true Credulity hath destroyed Religion and introduced a thousand Superstitions for these unhappy Tales of Miracles done at the Tombs of Saints these Apparitions of Souls these pretended Visions of Spirits that come from the other World these say I have produced the Invocation of Saints the Adoration of Images Purgatory Masses the Prayers of the living for the dead For which reason I am content that Men stand upon their Guard when any thing is debated and reported concerning wonderful and pious Histories The generality of those which are called honest Men are come so far from thence that they have cast themselves on the other extreme and believe nothing 'T is to expose a Man's self and to be turned into Ridicule to maintain that there have been Miracles and that there may yet be they mock at Presages and have no Faith for that which they call Prodigies Nevertheless whither goes this and what will be the Issue of it 'T is to deny Providence 't is to make our selves believe God does not intermeddle in the Affairs here below and to ruine all the Principles of human Faith and by consequence to cast our selves on a perfect Scepticism which is peradventure a disposition of mind the most dangerous to Religion of any in the World. By doubting all matters of Fact which have any appearance of extraordinary they tell us they have no intention to extend it any farther than the History of the World. But we don't perceive that we insensibly entertain a habit of doubting which extends it self to every thing There is a God we all consent thereto There is a Providence we all profess and avow it Nothing comes to pass without him Is it possible that God should so hide himself behind his Creatures and under the veil of second Causes that he should never at any time tho never so little draw aside the Curtain If we have taken a resolution to deny the truth of all extraordinary matters of Fact what shall we do with History both sacred and profane Can we persuade our selves that the Historians of all Ages intended to deceive us by making us believe that the great Revolutions which have happened in the Societies of Men and the Church have been preceded by extraordinary Events such as Earthquakes Signs in Heaven and Prodigies on Earth They will say the most part of these Histories are Fables it may be so but if the most part be Fables there have been some which have been true If there had never been any true Prodigies they would not have reported those that were false for falshood is an imitation of Truth He must have a hardness and impudence that I understand not that can put all Historians in one rank and range them all together
offered I say a thousand Reproaches to the Pagans about their Statues all which might be retorted against the Christians if they had had any themselves and to expose themselves to these Replies it must be said that they had lost both Memory and Sense I would very willingly know what Clemens of Alexandria would have said had he seen Images in Churches who said concerning Women that beheld themselves in Glasses * Pedag. lib. 3. c. 2. If Moses did for bid Men to make any Image which represented God how can these Women be innocent who by a fictitious Representation make Images of themselves Read therefore Tertullian Arnobius Minutius Foelix Lactantius Clemens of Alexandria and Origen And if ye be not qualified my Brethren for the reading of them ask your Converters if what we have said above be not true they will not have the impudence to deny it 't is a matter of Fact which is confessed by the more honest of the Roman Religion amongst others by Baluzius in his Notes upon Lactantius concerning the Death of Persecutors In the Third Age they began to give Rules concerning days of Fasting The African Church besides the Lords Day had two other days in the week consecrated to Prayer that is to say Wednesday and Friday Instead of Friday the Roman Church set apart Saturday to that end and use According to the Discipline of the Ancient Church it was not permitted to fast on the Lords Day and for that reason she set apart two other days in the Week to join Prayer with Fasting and called those days Stations They were reckoned for half Fasts because they fasted no longer than till three hours after Noon whereas in compleat Fasts they abstained from eating till the Sun were set At this day instead of half Fasts as they call them they ought to call them Fasts less than half for they fast not but from six in the Morning until Noon in the Church of Rome a great Mortification to make so great account on These half Fasts were accompanied with publick Prayers For the Christians assembled together continued in Prayer at the Church until three hours after Noon and as it was the custom of that time to communicate in all publick Assemblies they concluded these Stations or half Fasts with the celebration of the Eucharist They did not communicate in the Morning in the beginning of their Assembly because those days were accounted days of Fast and they then believed that the Bread and Wine of the Eucharist did break their Fast for as yet they were not instructed in the method of withdrawing the Substance and leaving nothing but Accidents there To conclude Lent and the other Fasts of this day were then wholly unknown They fasted in this Age as they did in the second the Passion-day and that which followed it but no more And because the Montanists a sort of Hereticks amongst which Tertullian listed himself towards the end of his life would consecrate two Weeks in the Year to fast in The Catholick Church made a great stir about it and that which is remarkable is that then the Church served it self exactly of the same reason against the Montanists which we make use of against the Fasts of the Papists * Tertul. Lib. de Jejun c. 15. particularly they made use of those words of S. Paul who said That false teachers should come who should command to abstain from meats which God had permitted to believers that we must not observe days and months and years that we must eat of every thing and at all times without asking questions for conscience sake We must suppose an extravagance of mind without excuse to believe that men who disputed thus against the Montanists about two Weeks Fasting should themselves have and observe five or six Nevertheless you must hold this for certain that these two Weeks of Fasting of the Montanists were the beginning of Lent for a little while after the Church was ashamed to see it self surpassed with Mortifications by persons they accounted Hereticks and therefore she was willing to out-bid and out do them My Brethren they make you extracts from S. Cyprian Bishop of Carthage a great Man and a very holy Martyr in which you oftentimes read the words Satisfactions and Indulgencies But let this example teach you not to suffer your selves to be seduced by a similitude of terms and words for those Satisfactions and Indulgencies have no alliance or cognation with those of the Church of Rome Then the Discipline of the Church was extremely severe upon mens Faults and Crimes against which the Romish Confessors at this day do oftentimes appoint but very gentle Penances and no forbearance from the Sacrament But they commanded Sinners the forbearance of many years together with many long and tedious Fasts and Mortifications Those who had accomplished their years of Penance and Forbearance were said to make and have made Satisfaction But First They did not then imagin that these Satisfactions were intended to excuse them from the pains of Purgatory as hath since been believed Secondly These Satisfactions were properly made to the Church and its Discipline and not to the Justice of God. 'T is true that S. Cyprian speaks sometimes of Satisfying God but these words with him signifie no more than to appease God with Prayers and Humiliations Those Christians which fell through the violence of Persecution did owe to the Church very rough and severe Penances according to the Rules of her Discipline All were not capable of bearing the trouble of long Penances therefore they desired that they would remit the whole or some part of it and receive them to the Peace of the Church To obtain which they made their applications to their Martyrs and Confessors which were in Prison for the Cause of Jesus * Cypr. Epist 10 11 12 c. These Confessors wrote Letters of intercession addressed to the Bishop Presbyters and People to the end that they might receive these Sinners to the Peace and Communion without causing them to pass through the rigor of their Discipline They had so great a respect to the Confessors of the Name of Jesus Christ that they could deny them nothing So that at their Intercessions they admitted Sinners without Penance and this was called Indulgence this is it whereof S. Cyprian complains in many of his Epistles I intreat you my Brethren to observe in this place how the Devil takes occasion from things the most innocent to establish Opinions and Practices greatly faulty and criminal For behold the first original of application to the Intercession of Saints Indulgences and Merits of Supererogation From Saints who were in Prison for the Name of Jesus Christ they ascended to the Saints who are in Heaven At first they prayed the Holy Martyrs that were on earth to intercede for them with the Church Afterwards they came to pray the same Martyrs in Heaven to intercede with God for them They called Indulgences the relaxation of
the Severity of Discipline which the Church granted at the request of the Martyrs At this day they call Indulgence the relaxation of the Justice of God which he grants as they suppose in considerations of the Merits and Sufferings of the Martyrs who suffered more than was necessary for themselves To conclude they have changed the Consideration and Respect which they had for the Intercessions of Confessors and Martyrs into Merits and Works of Supererogation The Church did retard the rigor of her Law against Sinners because of the esteem which she had for those that suffered for the Name of Jesus Christ At this day they grant Indulgences by the application of the Merit of those which have suffered too much either by involuntary Persecutions or by chosen and voluntary Mortifications But hear how the same S. Cyprian speaks very aptly concerning one of these Confessors named Lucian who carried himself too haughtily and desired too earnestly that they should have respect to his Letters of Intercession * Epist 34. The Lord Jesus Christ hath said that we must Baptize Nations in the Name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Ghost and that all Sins past are forgiven in Baptism But this man that is to say the Confessor Lucian knowing neither the Law nor the Commandments commands that we give Peace and pardon Sins in the Name of S. Paul not considering that they are not the Martyrs who make the Gospel but that it is the Gospel which makes the Martyrs Therefore at that time they did not alledge the Threats of S. Paul S. Peter the Martyrs and Confessors as the reasons for which they granted Indulgences that is to say the relaxation of the Discipline of the Church In the same Age that is to say the third they will produce unto you the word Confession and the terms of being on their knees at the feet of their Priests And they will not fail to find for you there the Auricular Confession practised at this day but there is nothing more false For those which dazle your Eyes thereby do very well know that the Greek word which signifies Confession was not at that time any secret Confession But the whole Act or Actions of publick Penance were so called And if at that Age Penitents were seen at the feet of Papists this was not done in secret and in a place appointed for the receiving Confessions where they acknowledged all their Sins in the Ear of the Priest But in Churches and in publick that they might be admitted by Prayer and imposition of hands either to Penance or to the Peace of the Church It was so certainly a publick Action that the Pagans took occasion from thence to accuse the Christians of adoring the shameful parts of their Priests This Confession was made in publick with Sack-cloth Ashes and Tears begging the Prayers and Assistance of all Christians This may be seen fully explicated in the Ninth and Tenth Chapters of Tertullian's Book of Repentance A Point of Controversie Concerning the Vnity of the Church that it is not in the Church of Rome and that we are not departed from it WHen a City is besieged and assaulted of all sides those that have a desire to defend it would be every where at the same time but they cannot which is their trouble My Brethren we have the trouble at this day you are besieged you are attack'd at an hundred places they batter you by a thousand wicked Reasons we would be every where and defend you on all sides but whilst we endeavour to defend you on one side they deceive and ruine you on another The rash and bold adventure of the Bishop of Meaux who hath told you in his Pastoral Letter That from the Apostles days to his no alteration has happened in the Doctrine of the Church hath engaged us that we may confound him to make you perceive the essential Changes which have been introduced both in its Doctrine and Worship at least in the first five Ages to the end that from thence you may judg of all the rest But whilst we pursue this design which cannot presently be executed I understand that they seduce you by the Sophisms of the Church of its Unity Visibility and the horror of Schism And that which grieves us most is that by the Letters which come or are communicated to us we see that the most part of you who are willing at any rate whatsoever to be at ease and rest where they are do also endeavour to possess themselves of and obstinately to maintain these wicked Reasons and it may be that one of you will know himself in the following words All the World reasons concerning Religion agreeably to their own Light and Passions But the Questions which do most trouble and confound it are these 1. The positive separation which our Fathers made 'T is said that we ought to suffer without separating from the Communion of the Church that the Abuses introduced by Governors may not be imputed to Believers But the Scriptures that make mention of the Heresies that must arrive in the Church do not command Separation for the sake of them On the contrary they exhort us mutually to bear with one another they say that Wood Hay and Stubble may be built on that foundation which is Christ Jesus and that he alone will separate one from the other that the good Grain and the Chaff shall be separated at the last day but we must let them grow together till then Behold exactly the Religion 1. Of our revolted Ministers There has been sent unto us an Account of a Conference which Cheyron an Apostate Minister of the City of Nismes had with the famous Confessor called Mr. Matthew an Advocate of Duras who is in the Town of Constance at Aggues-Mortes that which this Wretch says is the same with what hath been written and you have read 2. 'T is also the Religion of all those which have any understanding or illuminations they cannot but see that the Church of Rome is extremely corrupt But the question is say they whether we ought to separate from it because of its Corruptions yea they say we ought to bear them and add further after all there is but one true Church and although it be corrupt it is nevertheless the Church and we must endure its Diseases and Imperfections The Poyson of this illusion is so eating and dangerous that we have reason to fear that it continues long upon your Minds it will penetrate into them and totally corrupt them and so whilst we are pursuing other Subjects your hearts will be poysoned by this mischievous Sophism in that manner and to that degree that you will never recover This is it which obliges us to return to the Bishop of Meaux's Letter sooner than we intended Nevertheless without forsaking the subject matter we are upon for we will endeavour to intermix things in such a manner that in every one of our following
Letters you will find one Article concerning Antiquity and another concerning the Questions of the Church as you will find in this And forasmuch as these Letters ought to be instead of Sermons to you we will joyn unto them some words of Exhortation as often as we can We return therefore to the Letter of Monsieur de Meaux one of the Bishops of Rome We are considering the third Article of his Pastoral Letter This third Article and that which follows will give us an occasion to confute the Sophisms which they make or you make for your selves about the Church The Bishop of Meaux in his Pastoral Letter does six things 1. He endeavours to establish the Idea and Unity of the Church principally upon the Testimony of S. Cyprian and in consequence thereunto the Unity of the Ministers 2. He proves * Page 12. There is none allowed to separate from the Church and that all separate Assemblies are in a state of Damnation †Page 14. so that a Martyr which dies for the Faith of the Church out of this Unity is nevertheless damn'd 3. ‡ Page 13. That we must not examin Opinions to know whether such an Assembly be the Church ‖ Page 14. But we must know if an Assembly be the Church and judg from thence concerning the truth of Opinions 4. He endeavours to answer to that Text Where two or three are gathered together in my Name I will be in the midst of them A Text that proves wherever is Truth there is a True Church and then comes to his Chimera that all Separation ruins Unity a Chimera which he supports by the Testimony of the great S. Cyprian who is indeed his only Author 5. * Page 17. By the same S. Cyprian he proves that the Church with whom we must preserve Union is the Church of Rome or the Chair of S. Peter 6. In conclusion he falls on the common place of the invalidity of the Call of our first Reformers he proves their Vocation invalid because they were either Laicks or Renegado Priests which had renounced the Ministry The first never having Mission the last having it no longer cannot be lawful Pastors This is the Abridgment of a great number of Volumns which have been made to seduce you within twenty years last past concerning which we do intreat you to be attentive to these invincible Arguments which we have to produce for the subversion of these wicked Engins Although we do not account it a Duty to follow precisely the order of the Articles of the Bishop of Meaux Nevertheless seeing he begins with the Unity and Visibility of the Church we will begin there also and we will make you understand 1. What is the true Unity of the Church 2. What is the Unity of its Ministry 3. What is its perpetual Visibility 4. That to separate from a corrupt Church is not to break the Unity thereof 5. That there is such a degree of Corruption that obliges to separation and that the Church of Rome is corrupt to that degree First My Brethren it is necessary that you make to your selves a just and ligitimate Idea of the Unity of the Church They tell you that there is but one Catholick Church and that there cannot be many This is true there is but one Church universal and even the Word Universal that is added thereunto makes it apparent that there can be but one Just after the same manner that the word Universe by which is signified the World signifies also that there is but one for if there were another World besides this ours would not be the Universe seeing it would not comprehend totally all But the Bishop of Meaux and those that are like unto him give you a pleasant Idea of its Unity and Universality both together The Church of Rome say they is this universal and only Church it is universal and yet nevertheless out of it and separate from it there are many other Churches This is just as if I should say our World is the Universe nevertheless there be many other Worlds besides it Is not this absurd But it will be said that these Propositions are not alike nor the same for we mean thereby all other Churches besides the Roman Churches are false Churches This is another absurdity altogether alike as if a person or a man should say 'T is true there are many Worlds besides ours nevertheless ours is the Universe because all the rest are false Worlds If they Church of Rome did say Indeed I am but part of the Church Universal but I am the only sound and entire part the others are sick and diseased where a man cannot be saved If it should speak thus say I it would speak false but it would speak nothing absurd or contradictory and there would be reason to examin its pretensions to the bottom to know if indeed it be the only Church that is sound and without Errors But it must have renounced common sense to avow that out of her Bosom there are many Churches and nevertheless call her self the Church universal However it be her pretension is that the Unity of the Church consists in a certain Communion characterized and distinguished from all others by certain limits and boundaries and under certain Pastors out of which Communion whether you believe in Jesus Christ or not whether you have considerable Errors or no you are always out of the Church and hopes of Salvation altho you should believe and maintain all the truths of the Gospel from the beginning to the end tho you should be Orthodox as S. Paul retaining all the Articles of the Christan Faith yea of the Faith of the Church of Rome if nevertheless you live in separation with this certain Seat and this certain Church which is the Church Catholick you must be certainly damned I intreat you my Brethren before you go further propose a Question to your Converts Tell them I am content to grant there is a certain particular Church in which is that Unity from which we must never separate But how shall I know that this Church in which is that Unity to which we ought to adhere is the Church of Rome for I have heard say that there are many other Churches among others it hath been told me there is a Church in the East called the Greek Church which hath six Patriarchs that is to say for Popes the Bishops of Constantinople Antioch and Alexandria and these do all in like manner Anathematize the Pope of Rome Propose to them say I this difficulty and press it home and you will see them brought into such streights that they can say nothing but impertinences and absurdities They will tell you that Rome is the seat of S. Peter it is to her that this Priviledg was granted all those which separate from her depart from Unity So that the Greek Church and the three Popes whereof we have spoken are out of the Unity Can there be a
greater Absurdity than to answer by that which has been under dispute It is not true that Rome is the Chair of S. Peter we shall it may be have occasion to prove it to you in some other place But although it should be true where is it said that the Priviledg of Unity ought to be affixed to the Chair of S. Peter The Pope of Constantinople says I am in the Chair of S. Andrew who was an Apostle The Pope of Antioch says 'T is I who am in the true Chair of St. Peter for according to Tradition St. Peter was seven years Bishop of Antioch before he was Bishop of Rome so that it is the first Chair sounded by the chief of the Apostles The Pope of Alexandria saith I am in the Chair of St. Mark who was an Evangelist and had the Spirit of Infallibility as well as St. Peter Behold three Popes against one three Churches against one three Apostles or Evangelists against one wherefore then Gentlemen Converters would you that I should esteem you as only in the rightful possession of Unity to the prejudice of Persons which pretend to have as good a Title to it as your selves Press these false Babylonish Teachers on this point and you will see such confusion and such a multitude of Words in their Discourse which will discover to you the falseness of their pretensions After this we will consider the Proposition in it self The Vnion that is necessary to Salvation is included in the Church of Rome alone out of it there is neither Salvation Faith Grace Remission of Sins nor the True Church so that every man which is separate from it by Schism alone without Heresie dies eternally I do maintain That this Proposition is the most foolish but withal the most cruel and barbarous that ever was asserted and I do beseech you my Brethren to be attentive to the proofs that I shall make thereof First According to the Scripture Fathers and Evidence of Reason the Unity of the Church ought to contain Universality in it self that is to say That Church which is One ought to be universal and extended through all the World it ought to comprehend all Christians I will not prove this for it 's clear and also confessed 't is a truth so known among the Ancients that they look on certain Schismaticks of the fourth and fifth Age called Donatists as Fools These People in the beginning of the fourth Age separated themselves from the rest of the Church of Carthage and all Africa this Separation was caused by the Election of a Bishop of Carthage This hath always been one of the most fruitful Sources of Division These Donatists said precisely that which the Church of Rome says at this day * Aug. de Agone Christi Cap. 28. All the Church is fall'n into Apostasie and is only preserved in the Communion of Donatus upon which St. Augustine thus cries out Oh proud and wicked Tongue Certain other Schismaticks called Luciferians fell into the same dotage That the Church was perished and continued not but in Sardinia and some Mountains near Rome where they had Followers and Disciples St. Jerome treats them on that Subject as men that had lost their Understanding †Jerome Dialog adv Lucifer If it be so says he Jesus Christ died only for the Peasants of Sardinia Where then is the accomplishment of that word of the Father Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine Inheritance Behold exactly the folly of the Papists the Church is perish'd throughout the World except at Rome and in the West but we with the Scriptures and the Fathers say Let the North give up and let not the South keep back All the parts of the World shall bring forth Children to God and the Church ought to be extended to all places where the Gospel is Now the Church of Rome is not at Constantinople nor in Muscovy Asia Egypt Africa or Ethiopia where nevertheless there are multitudes of Christians it is not in England Holland Sweden Denmark nor in a great part of Germany The Church of Rome reacheth not to all the Countries and Kingdoms for 't is ridiculous to say that 't is dispersed throughout the World because there are some Jesuits at London in the Low Countries Sweden Constantinople and in the East and some Latines hid here and there where they have small Congregations but little known and as it were under ground I might as well say that Calvinism is extended through all Italy because there are some of the Reformed scatter'd here and there in it Secondly According to the Hypothesis of the Church of Rome every one that errs though never so little that is to say who goes off from that which the Romanists determine is out of the Unity of the Church and without hopes of Salvation Behold how ill this agrees with that notable Passage whereof those of ours that are weak and fearful make great use 't is that of St. Paul 1 Cor. iii. 11. where the Apostle says For other Foundation can no man lay than that is laid which is Jesus Christ Now if any man build upon this Foundation Gold Silver precious Stones Wood Hay Stubble every mans work shall be made manifest c. and the fire shall try every mans work c. And if any mans work be burnt he shall suffer loss but he himself shall be saved Without taking notice of what may be difficult in this Passage 't is clear That those which build are Teachers that the Gold Silver and precious Stones are sound Doctrines that the Wood Hay and Stubble are such as are unsound and false 't is also clear that they which teach these false Doctrines may be saved and with greater reason they which are seduced by them It follows not from thence as our perverted People pretend that a person may be saved in the practice of that Worship which ruines the Foundation as they do in the Church of Rome but it follows at least that a person may be saved that teaches Doctrines opposite to Truth provided that they subvert not the Foundation and by consequence the Church of Rome is ridiculous as well as cruel to damn all those which are out of her Communion for Errors that are light and trifling for having pronounced Anathema against those which deny for example that Infants dying without Baptism are damned Mr. Nicholas makes no difficulty to condemn all those which do not believe the sovereign and absolute necessity of Baptism Thirdly We have a third proof of the falseness of this Pretence that the Roman Church is in possession of that Unity out of which there is no Salvation in this That God preserves the Ministry of his Word in many Places and in many Churches which do not submit to the Latin Church The Word of God never returns without effect The Wisdom of God will not permit that he should preserve the Ministry in places where there are none but
Words of Tertullian ill understood learn from the Example of St. Cyprian who lived in the same Age That Tradition was at that time a proof whereof Men made use according to the diversity of their Apprehensions and their Interests Tertullian seems to make great account of it and St. Cyprian laughs at it when on the subject of Hereticks which he would re-baptize contrary to the Practice of the Church they objected to him Tradition Custom ancient Usage and antique Practice he rejected these Proofs with Contempt and Scorn Stephen had written to him Let nothing be innovated in Tradition Where is this Tradition answers he ‖ Epist 74. is it in the Gospels in the Acts or in the Epistles An ancient Custom without truth is nothing but an old Error And in another Epistle he saith * Epist 63. Since we must hear none but Jesus Christ we need not examine what those that went before us have done but that which Jesus Christ hath done before all for we must not follow the Custom of Men but the Truth of God. To conclude they endeavour to put Scruples in your minds on the Question of the pretended Primacy of the Bishop of Rome and the Roman Church by certain Passages of Tertullian and St. Cyprian either corrupted or ill expounded But that is a business the discussion whereof is too long to be handled at this time yea 't is above the capacity of most of you only know that 't is so far from truth that they did acknowledge the Sovereign Authority of the Pope in that Age that Tertullian makes no scruple to scoff at the Pretensions of the Bishop of Rome and to call him in Raillery the Bishop of Bishops because of some kind of Primacy which he began to pretend to For even in that time the Mystery of Iniquity began to work St. Cyprian despises the Excommunications of Stephen Bishop of Rome and opposes himself to the attempt of those who would appeal to Rome about matters determined in the Provinces of Africa This is that St. Cyprian to whom some Persons attribute the Acknowledgment of the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome who said on the Question of the Baptism of Hereticks and of the Admission of Bishops which had lapsed and fallen †Epist 72. In which case we will do violence to no man nor will we give Law to others observing that every Bishop may use the Power given him according to his Will in the Government of the Church being under no Obligation to give an account thereof to any one but the Lord. 'T was to Stephen Bishop of Rome that he spake thus Judge you whether he acknowledged him for his Superior Hear how the same Cyprian speaks in the face of a Council assembled at Carthage in the Year 258. Let none of us call himself Bishop of Bishops or endeavour to force his Collegues to a necessity of Obedience by a tyrannical fear and terror seeeng every Bishop is Master of himself and cannot be judged by another Bishop nor can he judge other Bishops 'T was also with respect to Stephen Bishop of Rome that he spake thus Has any one the front to say That speaking thus he acknowledged him for his Superior Observe that it was no small Affair that was now under debate 't was about the Baptism of Hereticks a Question which had made a great noise and which Stephen would have decided with too much Authority The Bishop of Meaux after a hundred others of his Communion to prove the Primacy of the Pope by S. Cyprian quotes a Passage from his fifty second Epistle which proves that these Gentlemen do not fear to make themselves ridiculous provided they may seem to say somewhat 'T is a Passage where he pretends S. Cyprian says That the Roman Emperor did suffer in Rome a Priest which was his Rival with more impatience than he suffer'd a Caefar in his Armies which disputed the Empire with him That is to say that the Roman Emperors did impatiently suffer that the Bishop of Rome should be called High Priest to the prejudice of that Dignity which the Emperors assumed unto themselves So that according to this reckoning they were jealous of the Bishops of Rome and look'd upon them as their Rivals in the High Priesthood In truth this is more ridiculous than if one should say The King of England who calls himself Head of the English Church were jealous of the Curate of the Parish of St. Martin in London The Christians certainly were not above one in a hundred in Rome and the Bishops of Rome at that time made less Figure in the World than an Incumbent of five hundred Crowns per annum makes at this day for besides that they were Poor they were also humble What Agreement could the Emperor in quality of a Pagan High-Priest have with this pretended High-Priest of the Christians To be his Rival he must aspire to the same thing I should rather have chosen to have said That the Mufâ—i looks on the Patriarch of Constantinople as his Rival The meanest Scholar knows that the Word Aemulus which signifies Rival signifies also Enemy and 't is clear that S. Cyprian means that that cruel Persecutor the Emperor Decius beheld with more Indignation a Priest that opposed his Religion than he would have look'd upon an Enemy that had disputed the Empire with him To conclude although St. Cyprian should have intended to compare the Bishop of Rome with the Pagan High-Priest it would not follow that the Bishop of Rome was Head of all the Christians in the World for the Roman Priest was not Head but of the Religion of the City of Rome and not of the whole Empire 'T is true that St. Cyprian corrupted the Idea of the Church and opened a door to the most cruel Doctrine that ever was advanced he made a false Idea of the Unity of the Church which he encloses in one only external Communion And because the Unity of one visible Head was not yet invented he imagined I know not what Unity of Episcopacy which all the Bishops did individually possess whereof nevertheless they all administred but a part This inconsistent Imagination gave place afterwards for the Substitution of one single Head to the end that a visible Head might be given to the Unity of the visible Communion which might be the centre thereof This suffices to give you an Idea of the Christianity of the Third Age and by this History you may observe what was altered in Doctrine or Worship 1. They introduced the use of the Sign of the Cross at least in private for we find it not as yet in the publick Acts of Religion We have said nothing to you concerning it as yet because it is a little thing about which we should never make Complaints against any one provided they be not superstitious in the use of it 2. The Liturgy of the Sacrament of the Eucharist was augmented and increased exceedingly by many Prayers
and I will leave them in their Retirement very peaceably provided they put themselves into a state of Inaction as well in respect to us as to God but if they continue to trouble us the Dispute may have an Issue which will not turn to their honor This Digression which hath been longer than I could have wished will be the cause that we cannot proceed far in the Article of Controversie We are on the true Idea of Unity The last part of our preceding Letter was employed in refuting the false Idea of Unity We have made it appear that 't is a foolish and cruel Opinion to shut up Salvation in any single Communion and that of all the Sects of Christianity that of Rome has the least right to pretend to it The Bishop of Meaux brags much of four or five Passages of St. Cyprian to prove this cruel Paradox This ancient Doctor goes so far as to say * Lib. de Vnitate That there can be no Martyr but in the Church that when a man is separated from its Vnity 't is in vain that he sheds his blood for the Confession of Christ Jesus This Maxim in a large signification may be endured for indeed there may be Hereticks who confessing the Name of Jesus Christ but on the other side ruining the Foundations of the Christian Religion may dye for the Religion of Jesus Christ to no advantage but the Application which S. Cyprian makes thereof is one of those faults over which wise men ought to draw a Curtain He proceeds so far as to apply it to the Novatians Now it must be known these Novatians were good Christians a thousand times better than are the Papists seeing they did not ruine any of the Foundations but retained and believed all the Christian Verities only they were something severe in Discipline and would not receive those that fell in times of Persecution to the Peace of the Church Was not this a great crime Was not this a fine occasion to say as Cyprian did That a Novation was no Christian Was not this a very fine Foundation for that terrible and cruel Sentence That a Novation dying a Martyr for Jesus Christ was nevertheless damned Of what make and constitution are the Doctors of the Roman Church that make use of these Excesses which ought to be hid out of Honor to those great men which fell into them These are Scars remaining in their Flesh to the end that we should not exalt them too much by reason of their great Virtues Behold my Brethren the eye wherewith Mr. de Meaux looks on you he for your sakes makes use of the eyes which St. Cyprian had for the Novatians concerning whom he said A Novatian is out of the Church he is no Christian So says Mr. de Meaux concerning you The Calvinists are out of the Church and are no Christians And why then Gentlemen do you address to us Pastoral Letters Why do you call us your wandring Brethren Will you dare to say that we are no Christians Let these Writers of Pastoral Letters says Mr. de Meaux who shrowd themselves with some shreds of S. Cyprian take all his Doctrine entire Go to Mr. you may say unto him If you find the Doctrine of S. Cyprian so good why don't you take it whole and entire Why don't you say that all the Greeks and all the Christians of the East are not Christians Dare you say that all the Greeks which have been martyred by the Turks and Saracens since the Tenth Age are damned and that they did not suffer Martyrdom although they suffered for Jesus Christ For my part I am persuaded that if you press your Converters on this Subject with their Passages of St. Cyprian they will blush on both Cheeks Remember therefore with respect to St. Cyprian that the love which he had for the Peace of the Church and the horror that he had for Schism ran him into that excess to believe or say That out of that I know not what exterior Unity of the Church a man could not be saved 'T was in this Age that men began to corrupt the Idea of the Church as I have already observed To what will all this come and what profit will you draw thence my Brethren 'T is that thereby you will prove to your Converters the falseness of this Doctrine That the Unity of the Church is included in the Roman Church that out of this Church or in any other private Communion there is no Salvation and thereby you will convince them that they are not infallible for if this Article be false That the Roman Church alone possesses that Vnity she hath erred and that in an important and capital Affair You will also thereby convince them That the Roman Religion is the most cruel and the most damnable of all the Sects of Christianity forasmuch as it condemns the most men For by defming that she alone possesses saving Vnity and by condemning all those that are not in this Vnity she damns three fourth parts of the Christian World. And to conclude you will establish your selves in a holy confidence that by being or having been out of the Roman Communion you have not bâ—en out of the Vnity and you have not shut the door of Salvation upon your selves since Salvation is not included precisely in the Roman Communion and that saving Vnity is not shut up within the circle of any certain Communion On the Subject of this Vnity you will desire me without doubt that I will furnish you wherewithal to answer the Question which your Converters will put to you In what then does the Vnity of the Church consist if it does not consist in adherence to such and such Pastors Answer them my Brethren That this Vnity consists 1. In the Vnity of Spirit forasmuch as God and the Spirit are the Soul of all Christian Communions which do retain the fundamental Truths 2. In the Vnity of Doctrine which is one through all the World where Jesus Christ is purely taught 3. In the Vnity of Sacraments which are the same every where where they have been preserved and not corrupted Let Churches be separated and set at a distance one from another as far as the Antipodes are from us let them have no knowledge one of another They will not cease to be one by this triple Vnity of Spirit Doctrine and Sacraments If there were a pure Church in the farthest part of Ethiopia or in the utmost part of China we should be one Church with them though we had never heard any thing said one of another It is not therefore the Unity of Ceremonies of Worship Discipline and Pastors which makes the Essential Vnity that 's an accidental Unity which a man may break without going out of the true Unity So the Novatians which were separated from the Church for a little unhappy point of Discipline were in the wrong no doubt and greatly in the wrong and Novatian above all who was the
is also a Spiritaal Romance made up of Stories which do no Honor neither to S. Anthony nor S. Athanasius nor in general to the Christian Religion I know not what Spirit of Fanaticism and Melancholy does mingle it self therein they had or they feigned themselves to have Visions the Devils appeared to them they tempted and sollicited them to fleshly Sins and when they could not prevail upon them they beat them cruelly The Abbot Serenus in Cassian says * Cass Collat. 7. cap. 23. As soon as we have formed a Convent of Eight or Ten Monks the fury of the Devil rages in such a manner against them that they experience his Assaults very frequently and in a plain and obvious manner for which reason they dare not sleep all together but whilst some sleep others watch To this may be joyned a Spirit of Superstition which produces Excesses some whereof are capable of horror and astonishment A Monk named Batteus * Sozom. lib. 6. cap. 34. mortified himself through Fasting to that degree and measure what Worms were bred in his Gums and came out of his Teeth another named Cyrus †Ibid. lived Seventy years without tasting any Bread. Another named Acepsemus * Theod. lib. 4. cap. 28. lived Sixty years shut up in a Cell never going out or being seen of any one One named Macarius ‖ Socrat. lib. 4. cap. 23. during the space of Twenty years lived by Bread and Water he did eat and drink by weight he fastened his Body by night to a Wall that he might not sleep Another called Dorotheus * Sozom. lib. 6. cap. 29. made it a thing necessary and a part of Devotion never to stretch out his Legs upon his Bed. Another called Didymus lived to the Age of Ninety years without speaking to or seeing any Person Another named Pior * Ibid. 6. having made a Vow never to see any Person his Sister after Fifty years passionately longed to see him and he was obliged by his Superiors to give her that satisfaction He came therefore and presented himself at the Door of his Sister he made himself seen to her but he shut his Eyes that he might not see her and after he had repeated certain Psalms he went his way Another Sirnamed Stilites * Evag. lib 1. cap. 13. because of the Pillar on which he lived spent Thirty Seven years thereon And many afterwards in imitation of him did the same things and obtained the Sirname of Stilites †Niceph. lib. 11. Amonius a Companion of S. Anthony being chosen Bishop cut off his Ear to the end that he might not be so and declared he would cut out his Tongue if they pressed him farther thereon A Monk named Thomas * Soz. lib. 6. an Inhabitant of Thebais lived Thirty years without speaking Another Monk named Paul †Ibid. in his Devovotions imposed a necessity upon himself of making three Hundred Prayers to God every day and that he might not miscount he had three Hundred little Flints whereof he threw one out of his Bosom at every Prayer that he made Behold what was the Character of the Monks of the Fourth Age and behold that which at this time men report to the Honor of these poor Ideots which did pass for great Saints or of these Hypocrites which did impose upon mankind But can a Man read without horror that which Evagrius reports concerning the customs and manner of Life of the Monks of Jerusalem in the time that the Empress Eudoxia Wife of Theodosius the younger went thither Some of them made a War upon themselves so cruel that oftentimes they remained upon the ground without appearance of Life and were taken for unburied Carcases others lodged themselves in Holes where they could neither lye nor stand others hid themselves in Caves and made it a piece of Devotion to live among wild Beasts others both Men and Women stript themselves naked covering only their shameful Parts and in this nakedness exposed themselves to be roasted in the Beams of the Sun from Morning to Evening in the Summer and in the Winter they continued in the same estate exposing themselves to the severest rigors of cold they ate nothing of what Men do use to eat they fed on Grass like Oxen they were also called Boscoi i. e. Eaters of Herbs and in time they became altogether like Beasts not preserving the very appearance of Men and human shape if they saw Men afar off they ran to hide themselves as from Bears in some Cave or they secured themselves upon Rocks with the swiftness of a wild Goat But all this is nothing in comparison of what Evagrius adds There are Monks who to make it appear that they had extinguished Concupiscence conversed in the World promiscuously Men and Women all naked they went into Brothel Houses into the most infamous places they lay together both Men and Women the Men bathed themselves with Women and Women with Men and all this in publick view without Shame and without covering their Faces Besides the Madness is there not Impudence in these Devotions and must not a Man have a depraved taste in matters of Piety to look on these Extravagancies with admiration as at that time they did Besides all this the Spirit of Lying and Error seized on these Men a Man may say truly that all the Depravations of the Christian Religion did take their Original from Monks In the Fifth and Sixth Age they became Anthropomorphites and Originists and those who have any knowledg of the History of the Church do know that they stirred up many Troubles there They maintained their Opinion and their Friends not only by Words and Clamors but by Blows Socrates reports that during the Controversies that Cyril Bishop of Alexandria had with Orestes Governour of Egypt * Soc. lib. 11. cap. 14. five Hundred Monks came from the Mountain Nitria to the City for the assistance of Cyril their Bishop They stirred up a Sedition against the Governour one of these Monks called Ammonius gave him a knock on the Head with a Flint whereby he lost a great deal of Blood. There are no Heresies or Superstitions of which they may not be called the Authors 't is they which introduced the Superstition of invocating Saints and adoring Relicks Eunapius a Pagan Author who lived at the end of the Fourth Age saith That in Egypt they appointed Monks in the Village Cannopus to worship Slaves so they called the Martyrs And S. Austin in the Book concerning the Work of Monks says That in his time a Swarm of Monks scattered themselves abroad every where and made Merchandise of the Bones of Martyrs It was they who brought Images into the Church and that Worship which gives so much Grief to Souls which are jealous of the Love of God and so much Scandal to Christians Also in the War between the Breakers of Images and the Worshipers of Images they were the principal
to the decisions of Bishops those which came after and above all Councils might very well correct them After which he adds * De Bapt. cont Donat. lib. 2. cap. 3. And even the Councils which are held in every Country and in every Province do without difficulty give place to full Councils which are assembled from all the Christian World and these full Councils so he calls Oecumenical Councils may be corrected by those which follow when that which was hid is discovered and by some experience men come to know what they were ignorant in Observe that the thing under debate was not a matter of Discipline only as they will tell you but to know whether the Baptism of Hereticks were of any value 'T was a Point of Doctrine if there were ever and such 7. To conclude I conjure you my Brethren give yet attention to this 't is that although the Dream of your Converters should have some foundation and that the Church Universal assembled in a Body by its Guides were Infallible the Church of Rome would have no part in this Privilege nor would it extend it self to the Councils since Berengarius which they desire you should look upon as the Rules of your Faith. For these Councils were never Assemblies of the Church Universal since the Schism of the Greeks they are at most but Councils of the Latin Church but the Latin Church say they is become the Universal and Catholick Church excluding all other Christian Communions which are separate from her and by consequence her Councils are those of the Church Universal This is the most foolish of all Pretensions That the Roman Church should be the only Church excluding all the Communions of Asia Africa and Europe We have shewn the extravagance of this Pretence in our former Letters for which reason at present we may well suppose it as indisputable viz. that the Church of Rome for 800 years past hath had no Oecumenical Councils in the sense that she her self understands the Word from whence you may conclude that she hath had no Infallible Councils Furthermore 't is necessary to oblige you to give attention to this Original of Oecumenical Councils in the fourth and fifth Ages because without doubt it was one of the means which the Devil made use of to establish the Empire and Domination of Antichrist Not that the first Councils called Oecumenical were not assembled with good intention and were not very useful at that season and in that time But it happens to this good thing as to the most part of others which have been introduced with a good intention the Devil hath taken occasion from thence to bring in either Opinions or Practices which have destroyed the Church Martyrdom is an excellent work yet from thence men have taken occasion to introduce the Opinion of Merits and Works of Supererogation Respect for the Martyrs is very just and very reasonable yet that hath made way for Indulgences the Invocation of Saints Adoration of Relicks and Images The use of Oecumenical Councils hath been found good upon several occasions The Bishops coming from all Parts have appeared not as Judges but as Witnesses of the Faith of their Churches and this unanimous consent in the Faith hath produced a very good effect for the establishing of Points fundamental But the Spirit of Lies hath nevertheless made use thereof afterwards as a means to build that Universal Empire over the Church an Empire which is one of the characters of Antichrist At the beginning it was the Emperors which assembled these Councils These Assemblies were made by their Authority the Bishops of Rome were of the number of those called to them he must have renounced all Sincerity that doth not agree unto it after he hath read Eusebius Socrates Zozomon and Theodoret. When the Roman Empire was ruined in the West the Emperors having no Authority and longer to call Assemblies of the whole Church because they were no longer Masters of it the Popes who advanced according to the measure that the Emperors declined were willing to lay hold of this Right They endeavoured to re-unite under their Authority all the Provinces which had formerly been united under the Emperors in which they were successful and thereby formed the second Roman Empire which is the Empire of the Boast and of Antichrist These Oecumenical Assemblies were of great use to them in this at the head of which Assemblies they placed themselves in the quality of the first Patriarchs The custom which the Councils took in the Fourth Age of adding Anathema's to their Decisions did also serve them afterwards to possess men with a Chimera of their Infallibility I have not been able to find that Councils did anathematize any one before the Council of Nice We have the Council of Carthage reckoned for the third in the Collection of Father Labbeus held under Cyprian in the year 258. Zonarus holds it for the most ancient of all the Councils he means whose Decisions we have It seems to me we have therein the form of the ancient Councils Every one there speaks his Opinion modestly that which had the plurality of Voices passed but they there made no Decrees nor Anathema's We do not see that in the first two Ages they held Councils for the deciding matters of Faith and Doctrine There was one held about the Controversie concerning Easter that is to say Whether they ought to celebrate the Fourteenth of the Month of March but this was a Point of Discipline There was in those times an infinite number of Hereticks as appears by the Book of Irenaeus but I have not observed that they did assemble Councils against them before the third Age nevertheless if they had look'd upon Councils as Infallible it would have been necessary to prevent Seduction and to secure the Faith of Christians An Article of Controversie The true Idea of Schism That those which are called Schismaticks are not out of the Church AFter having spoken of Vnity and confuted the Sophism which they draw from this Vnity in the preceding Letters we must answer the Sophism which is drawn from the Schism which ruines this Unity 'T is a Point which your Converters do continually repeat and beat upon you Schism say they is a hideous crime Schismaticks are out of the Church there is no Salvation for them and although the Church of Rome it self were corrupt you ought not to break with her Their modern Writers which seem willing to soften the Maxims of the Roman Church do nevertheless observe no measure on this Subject and on this Point They proceed so far as to maintain That although it should be true that even the Church of Rome should be fallen into Idolatry we ought not to forsake her and could not justly set up Altar against Altar We must return to these Gentlemen not Paradox for Paradox but Truth for Lies but a Truth which is opposite to their Falshood as our Antipodes are opposite to us They say
in Christ Jesus confounded the two Natures that he might not separate them and these two Schisms have continued for 1200 years and do continue to this day In the Tenth Age happened the great Schism of the Greek Church from the Latin. The Church of Rome it self has had an infinite number of Schisms in her own Bowels occasioned by her Anti-Popes And the greatest which may serve for a Rule for all was the great Schism of Popes and Anti-Popes whereof the one sat at Rome and the other at Avignon This Schism divided the West into two different Parties under two distinct Heads To conclude in these last times a great Schism is happened in the Latin Church which is divided into three great Bodies the Papists the Lutherans and the Reformed I pass by an infinite number of little Schisms which have been in the East between Church and Church and oftentimes among the Members of the same Church Two Bishops were seen for a long time at Antioch the Party of one of them was called Milesians the other Party Eustathians this was in the Fourth and Fifth Ages These are say I particular Schisms And it may be said that not one of these Schismatical Parties did separate from the Universal Church because not one of them abandoned Christianity they returned and carried it with them Now the Illusion in this matter comes from hence that we confound these two sorts of Schisms those that are Universal with those which are particular and we ascribe to particular Schisms that which belongs only to Schism universal viz. Exclusion from Salvation For 't is true that he who makes a Schism from the Universal Church by renouncing her Doctrine Sacraments and Ministry is utterly out of the Church and without any right to eternal Life But 't is false that particular Schism either from the Church of Rome or from the Greek Church or Schism of the Church of Rome in it self doth exclude from Salvation This folly proceeds from another and that is that every particular Church looks on herself as the Catholick and Universal Church and her particular Doctrines as the Universal and Fundamental Doctrines of Christianity In such manner that those who separate themselves from her and renounce her Doctrines she looks on them as being separate from the Universal Church and as having renounced the Universal Doctrine of Christianity But no Church hath carried this folly to that degree of extravagance as the Church of Rome hath done for she calls herself the Catholick and Universal Church to the exclusion of all others And she would fain that the Doctrines which are peculiar to her as the Supremacy of the Pope Transubstantiation Purgatory c. should be accounted the Universal Truths of Christanity Thence it comes to pass that she considers as Schismaticks and damned all those which separate from her and renounce the most inconsiderable Doctrines which she hath consecrated by her Anathema's To make this foolish Pretension vanish and disappear no more is to be done but to make more evident the true Idea of Schism which the Disputes of these last Ages and the Prejudices of the Ancients have strangely perplexed and confounded To this end it will be useful to consider divers of those Schisms of which we have spoken and see what we ought to judge concerning the Salvation of those who lived in them First there have been Schisms which have been made without any Controversies about Doctrine or Discipline only upon personal Quarrels between Bishop and Bishop such was that furious Schism of the Donatists in Africa which was made only upon the occasion of the choice of a Bishop of Carthage Afterwards the Donatists espoused the Opinion of S. Cyprian about the Nullity of the Baptism of Hereticks and it may be some other Opinions of little importance that they might the more easily maintain and continue their Schism with the Catholicks But the true foundation of the Schism was nothing but a particular Quarrel The Donatists held all the Opinions of the Catholick Church they had the same Sacraments the same Discipline and the same Ministry This being so he must be very cruel that will damn an infinite number of private Persons who followed their Guides as the Inhabitants of Jerusalem followed Absalom in the simplicity of their Hearts I say nothing concerning the Authors of the Schism nor of those who did maintain it as they violated the Laws of Charity and troubled the Peace of the Church we leave them to the Judgment of God We say nothing neither of the Circumcellians a sort of People which arose among the Donatists and offered an Hundred Violences to the Orthodox I speak of those plain People who in the simplicity of their Heart do without Dissimulation believe in Jesus Christ according to the Creed explicated according to the sense of the Church Universal who believe all the Christian Doctrine from the first Article to the last and besides labour with great diligence in the practice of Holiness and Devotion to condemn these Men say I only because they do not communicate with the Pastors of the Catholick Church is a foolish and a barbarous Doctrine of which I do not think there is a Man in the World throughly perswaded although there be a Thousand and a Thousand pretend so to be There are other Schisms which were made about Controversies in Doctrine such is the Schism of the Nestorians and that of the Eutychians who continue at this day and comprehend an infinite number of Christians in the East I believe that Nestorius designed to reduce the Opinion of Paulus Samosatenus to another form which Opinion is that of our Socinians who make Jesus Christ a mere Man. But we must judg otherwise of their Successors At this day the Nestorians and the Eutychians embrace the Apostles Creed and that of Constantinople as do the Greeks and the Latins they believe in Jesus Christ the eternal Son of God God himself dead and raised again for the Salvation of Men and the Disputes which they have with the rest of the Church are at present nothing but Questions about Words and differing manners of expression To damn these Millions of People because of the rashness of a single Man who had the boldness a Hundred and twenty years ago to teach contrary to the manner after which we ought to conceive of the Incarnation of the Word is a Cruelty founded in a most prodigious Error and Mistake 'T is evident that we ought to range them with the rest of the Eastern Church which is not much more pure than that of the West and to leave their Salvation to the judgment of God who alone knows how far his Patience will proceed These two Schisms were without doubt criminal in their Original But time hath changed the state of things and at this day those Christians which are called Jacobites and follow the Schism of Eutyches supposing they embrace all Christian Truths necessary to Salvation are as
same place or in another 'T is a matter of Fact which our Adversaries cannot deny In the 20th of the Acts the Apostle speaking to the Presbyters or Elders of the Church of Ephesus calls them Bishops and in his Epistles to Timothy and Titus where he speaks sometimes of a Bishop he speaks more frequently of Elders and by Elders he understands the very same which he had called Bishops In the Cities where the Churches were great there were many Presbyters one of them did preside over the rest not by turn but by a privilege which did always appertain to him St. Paul speaks of this President The Elder which rules well is worthy of double honor This presiding Presbyter in the beginning of the second Age arrogates to himself the name of Bishop which before was common to his Collegues so that there was no other but the President of the Presbytery who call'd himself Bishop He attributed to himself also the right of imposing hands as well on those which were received as Pastors as on the Penitents and those which were received to the Communion of the Mysteries In all this there was as yet no Hierarchy no Dependence no Appeals no Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Every Bishop with his College of Presbyters was Sovereign in his District and in his Church and this Church was not dependent of any other You may remember how S. Cyprian in our Eleventh Pastoral Letter hath told us in express words * Epist 74. Every Bishop may use his Authority in the Government of his Church according to his own Will being under no obligation to give an account thereof to any but the Lord. And elsewhere †Concil Carth. Anno 258. That every Bishop is Master of himself and cannot be judged by another Bishop as he also cannot judge other Bishops All honest men are agreed at this day therein The Divines themselves of the Gallican Church maintain it and at this time they lend us their Studies and Illuminations to refute the Flatterers of the Papal Tyranny who would find in the three first Ages of the Church Proofs of the Primacy i. e. of the Principality of the Bishop of Rome over all the Churches of the World. The Defenders of this Antichristian Power quote to us the Action of Victor Bishop of Rome who about the end of the Second Age excommunicated the Churches of Asia because they would not keep Easter precisely the same day that he did and from thence they conclude That the Pope was even then the Prince of all Churches But to this your own Converters do answer for us that in this Victor exercised no Right but what was common to all Bishops and that the Bishops of Asia might exercise it on Victor as he had exercised it on them that this Excommunication of Victor was a separation from his Communion that the Bishops did communicate one with another by Letters which they called Letters of Communion formed Letters c. When they were angry or discontented one with another they did no longer write these Letters of Communion to those of whom they believed the Church had reason to complain and they received no more from them that this is it which Victor then did and that all Bishops have Right by custom to do the same thing The Flatterers of Popes quote to us also the Words of Irenaeus who speaking of the Church of Rome says * Lib. 3. cap. 3. That it was necessary all other Churches should have recourse to this Church because it was the principal and the most potent But the French Roman Catholick Doctors answer for us that the sense is That the Roman Church because the City of Rome was the Capital City of the Empire and because of its grandeur might be a sufficient Witness of Apostolical Tradition because Christians came thither upon business from all Parts of the World and that coming thither they might there be Witnesses of the Faith of all Churches scattered throughout all the Empire and that so the Roman Church made up and formed of all Nations might be a Witness of the Faith of all the Churches in the World. They object to us also That it appears by the Works of St. Cyprian that Bishops condemned and deposed in Africa had recourse to the Bishop of Rome for their re-establishment But the French Doctors answer with us That by the same Letters of St. Cyprian it appears also that these Attempts were disallowed and condemned and that they gave the Bishop of Rome to understand that he had nothing to do to receive the Complaints of any of the Ecclesiasticks of the African Church So that these Gentlemen acknowledge with us that in the three first Ages of Christianity there was no Principality no subordinate Jurisdiction nor no dependence of one Church upon another not excepting the Church of Rome it self But we do also maintain unto them That from the Third Age the Churches that had their Seats in those Cities which are called Metropoles i. e. Heads of the Provinces did obtain a certain Superiority upon the lesser Churches that were in the little Villages of the Neighbourhood because of the need they had of them The Metropolitan Cities were the dwelling places of the Governors of the Provinces the Courts of Justice were there 't was thither they carried their Tributes so that all the Provinces had business there besides the Bishops of these Cities were ordinarily more able than those of little Cities for it has always been the ordinary custom to choose the ablest men for the conduct of the most important Churches and such as were most exposed to the Temptations of human Authority Besides this there were in these Cities many Presbyters which assisted the Bishop and who with him made a Senate able and knowing in matters of Faith and Discipline For these Reasons the Churches of the Country and such as were Provincial addressed themselves to the Churches of the Metropolitan Cities in all their doubts and in all their necessities sometimes to obtain Pastors sometimes to know how they should suppress Hereticks and those which were scandalous and sometimes in other cases and on other occasions This was the reason that the Churches of the Metropolitan Cities obtained by consent a kind of Superintendence over others They confirmed by imposition of hands Pastors in vacant Churches after the People of those Churches had made an Election of them This is the estate in which the Government was found in the beginning of the Fourth Age. Before that time the Names of Arch-Bishops Primates Exarchs Patriarchs and every other Name of Power and Dignity were wholly unknown in the Church But the Emperors becoming Christians Pride introduced it self into the Ecclesiastical Government and in the space of an 150 years or thereabout that Hierarchy was seen to be born and to establish it self which certainly made way for the birth of the Antichristian Empire of Rome and behold how it came to pass Constantine the Great
Hundred and sixty Years Justin Martyr Clemens Alexandrinus Ireneus Cyprian Eusebius Athanasius Hillary and so many others should not speak one word of this religious Worship of Creatures if it had been then in use Besides this negative Proof we make use of all those positive Proofs which we have proved from the Second and Third Age by which it appears that the Primitive Christians invoked none but God and that they did not invoke even Angels 'T is that which Origen hath plainly told us and 't is that which Ireneus had said before him * Iren. lib. 2. cap. 58. That the Church doth nothing by the Invocation of Angles nor by any other wicked Curiosity but by Addressing purely plainly and openly her Prayers to the Lord the maker of all things Among these positive Proofs we have seen some of them which formally tell us that the Church neither worships invokes nor adores Martyrs such is the Epistle of the Christians of Smyrna about the Martyrdom of Polycarpus Is it not therefore an amazing boldness in your Converters to mantain to you that there was no change in the Doctrine and Practice of the Church thereon in the Fourth Age 'T is clear that Men did not invoke Saints in the Third Age it is clear that they began to do it about the end of the Fourth it is therefore clear that a Change did happen But they will say where is the Author of this Change Where is the Innovator This Question is absurd 'T was not one single Person that introduced this alteration in Worship 't was the superstitious People the great respect which the People saw Men had for the Tombs of Martyrs carried some Dotards to advance that the Souls of Martyrs were about their Tombs And 't is apparently according to the conjecture of Albespinus that which the Thirty fourth Canon of the Council of Eliberis hath respect unto * Albasp Annot in Concil Eliberitan That we ought not to light up Torches in the day time in the Coemetaries lest we disturb the Spirits of the Saints They imagined that these Spirits fluttering about their Tombs might suffer inconvenience by the Smoak of Torches and Candles Is not this a pleasant Imagination S. Jerome writing against Vigilantius doth also say That the Souls of Martyrs love their Ashes hover about then and are always present with them We know that the Vulgar are naturally inclined to Superstition and 't is easie to conceive how the People instructed in such an Opinion should conceive an extraordinary respect for those places where were the Bodies and Souls of Martyrs And conceiving that these Souls which conversed about their Tombs had also the liberty of flying back to Heaven when they thought good it was very easie for ignorant People to fall into a perswasion that it was very good to recommend themselves to their care and intercession There was therefore no need of an Innovator or a new Preacher nothing more was needful but to let the People do as they pleased Mark this well all Heresies have been introduced by Doctors for there is need of Wit and Knowledg to innovate in Opinions but all Superstitions have been introduced by the People For nothing more is needful to become superstitious than Sottishness Simplicity and Ignorance therefore the Authors of Innovation in Doctrine may be observed for they are ordinarily single Persons but we cannot observe the first Innovators in matter of Superstition because they are the People But it will be said why did not the Doctors oppose themselves to the Superstition of the People First it is not true that the Doctors did not oppose themselves to Superstitions at their birth S. Austin and S. Jerome himself blamed the Superstitions which began to take place in their Age and which afterwards overcame all Contradiction But nevertheless 't is true that they did not oppose them as they ought to have done yea that they suffered themselves to be carried away with them as others did because that these Superstitions were established by little and little and that the beginnings which the Doctors did easily suffer because 't was but a small matter gave place to the toleration of that which was introduced afterwards which nevertheless was altogether intolerable To conclude 't is of little importance to us how and why the Doctors suffered themselves to be carried into Errors and popular Superstitions The matter of Fact is certain and ought to be indisputable by the proof that we have made thereof and by that which we shall make thereof in what follows Our Second Proof of the novelty of this Worship in the Fifth Age is that then Men did not invoke all the Saints as 't is done at this day yea they did not invoke those Saints which are most eminent such were the Apostles excepting S. Peter and S. Paul whose Relicks were believed to be at Rome others had no Churches Temples Memorials nor Persons devoted to them S. Basil the most ancient of all those which speak of the Invocation of Saints celebrates the Memory only of the Forty Martyrs that of Julitta and the Martyr Mamas In this Homily upon Julitta the Martyr there is nothing that teaches us they did invoke her In the Homily upon the Forty Martyrs he says indeed that Persons fled to them for refuge and that the pious Wife prayed there for her Children that she there desired the return of her absent Husband and his Health when he was sick First it appears that this was the Devotion of Women who are inclined to Superstition Secondly 't is not very clear that these Prayers were addressed to Martyrs for in the beginning these Prayers are addressed to the God of Martyrs with respect to the Merits and Sufferings of Martyrs to whom God would do Honour by Miracles 'T is true that in the Homily on the Martyr Mamas the Invocation of the Saint appears more express But observe that this Julitta this Mamas and these Forty Martyrs were obscure Saints and of little Reputation in comparison of the Apostles concerning the Invocation of whom S. Basil speaks not one word This is a strange thing and that whereof they know not how to give us a reason Make the same observation upon the Passages of S. Austin which they quote unto you for the Invocation of Saints He there speaks of the Invocation of S. Protais and of S. Garvais Good God! what Saints are these in comparison of S. Matthew and S. John. 'T is true that this Father speaks of the Invocation of S. Stephen the first Martyr But however eminent this great Saint was he was but a Deacon and we ought not to make him equal with the Apostles Nevertheless there appears no Invocation of the Apostles in the Writings of S. Austin I call not this a simple Proof 't is a Demonstration of the Novelty of this superstitious Worship If the Worship and Invocation of Saints were ancient if they were from the time of the Apostles why
included in her Communion that she is Infallible that out of her there is no Salvation But this Language becomes a frightful Gibberish in the mouth of Men which are convinced as you are 1. That the other Communions of Christians which do not adhere to Rome are nevertheless as much Christians or more than she 2. That your Fathers doing ill in separating nevertheless did well in purging Christianity and that their Christianity is intirely pure 3. That the Communion of our Reformers was not dangerous and that a Man might be saved therein yea much more easily than in that of the Roman Church because he would not have the trouble of making a Separation in his Mind of true Opinions from false ones 4. That the Roman Communion is corrupt 5. That in separating from it a Man separates from the Corruption without separating from the Christianity seeing that he carries that which is Christian along with him Behold say I that which you think and that which the exact account of your Illusions speak being formed by one of your selves Now see how this agrees with this Unity and with separation from that Unity whereof you speak For if the Church be out of the Communion of Rome I may go out of that Communion without going out of the Church and by consequence without separating my self from the Unity where the Church is there is the Unity If the Roman Church be corrupt as you confess by separating from that which is corrupt in her a Man does not separate from the Unity seeing that Unity is not in Corruption it is in Christianity If a Man may be saved out of the Roman Communion as you do fully believe not concluding us damned we are not out of the Unity for whoever is out of the Unity is out of a state of Salvation because Salvation is not found but in the Church which is one and which alone possesses Unity In the Name of God my Brethren learn by this Example not to speak without understanding what you say to please your Converters and above all your own Self-Love But let us return and retake the same Opinion 'T is said that we must suffer without separating from the Vnity of the Church I intreat you my Brethren how far must this Toleration go Set me the Bounds unto which my Toleration must proceed that I may continue in this pretended Unity Are you of the opinion of M. Nicholas and of M. Ferrand That though the Roman Church were Heretical and Idolatrous yet we ought not to separate from it by a positive Separation all that we are obliged unto is not to communicate in its Heresies and Idolatries I do very well perceive that the inclinations of your own Hearts would carry you even thither and indeed that is needful to set you in full security For whilst you say if the Church of Rome be not Idolatrous although she be very corrupt we ought nevertheless to continue there you will never have your Hearts at case and liberty and you will never be without Fears lest the Invocation of Saints Worship of Images and the Eucharist should be Idolatry The Heart finds it difficult to rest upon an it may be the Roman Church is not it may be Idolatrous so that to procure that false Peace which you seek after you must disenthral your selves and say with your Converters That though the Roman Church were Heretical and Idolatrous we ought not to separate from it My Brethren I knock hard at the door of your Consciences awake you that sleep and behold the horror of this Proposition If it be true we know not reasonably how to give any bounds to this toleration for the Errors of the Church If we ought to continue there though she become Idolatrous and Heretical we must continue there if she embrace the Heresie of the Manichees who believed two Gods and two Principles if she embrace the Error of the Socinians who destroy the Trinity and Incarnation who deny both the Resurrection of the Body and Immortality of the Soul. We must continue there though she embrace Mahametism and adore the Sun and Moon provided she continue to worship Jesus Christ and bear the Name of Christian Are ye able to stand firm against these frightful Consequences Every Church which is not Infallible but may err and be corrupt may ascend to the highest degree of Corruption For who is it that shall stay it in the midst of its descent from a Precipice or hinder it from tumbling to the bottom Tell me do you believe that a Society which becomes indeed Heretical and Idolatrous can continue at the same time the true Church and the true Body of Jesus Christ Is there any thing more opposite to Christianity than Idolatry How will you reconcile this It is true that God who is rich in means and ways of bringing Men to Salvation may save some Persons in Idolatrous Communions This is that which we shall consider and therein we shall follow the order of your Ratiocinations But doth it follow from thence that therefore we must tolerate Idolatry and Heresie without separating from it This is that which we shall see hereafter My Brethren make a third Reflection upon this unhappy Principle We must suffer the Corruption of the Church rather than separate from its Vnity And give me leave to tell you that in the apprehensions wherein you now are there are the loosest Dispositions of mind which can happen to Men of Honor such as you make profession to be for you are not of opinion that the Corruption of the Church extends it self only to Manners and Discipline you confess that it extends to all things you do not believe that her Errors and Superstitions are light and small and how can your Conscience be otherwise than dead and past all feeling to have Churches full of Images before which Men offer Prayers Incense Supplications Adorations and Homages to Creatures to Saints and Saintesses to have withdrawn the Cup made a false Sacrifice covered a hidden divine Service under a barbarous Language to amuse the People with Relicks Bones Indulgences Stations Jubilees c. How say I are you able not to perceive that this is not an extreme Corruption But what need have I to sollicit your Conscience thereon Your mouths speak and your selves tell us though the Pope he Antichrist we may not separate from him This is that which I call the loosest Opinion that can be imagined to perceive that a Man is in a Communion so corrupt that it may well be Antichristianity and to say that we may not separate our selves from it Tell me I pray you is the state of Corruption in which you find the Roman Church is it say I the natural state of the Church Is it well in this condition You will answer me no If your Answer be true and sincere is it not true that 't is my Duty to do all that I can to recover the Church from this state of
Corruption because it is a state of Violence and against Nature Now how can we recover the Church from this Corruption but by separating our selves from it You will say we ought to continue in it and remonstrate against its Corruption But you know well that this is impossible you know that they burnt our Fathers because they made remonstrance against it By continuing and remonstrating against Idolatry and Superstition should we not be immediately seized by the Inquisition or by the Bishops and secular Judges where there are no Inquisitors Should we not be put in Prison hanged and burnt Therefore it is necessary that we go out or remain there in silence Now behold what kind of loosness is this to know that we are in a very corrupt Communion and which is it may be Antichristianity and to keep and continue there without saying any thing If this state of Corruption be violent to the Church if it be contrary to the nature of it certainly the intention of God cannot be to leave her always in it for the intention of God is that when things are at a distance from their own natural state they should return unto it as soon as may be Now with what means can God serve himself for the Reformation of the Church Certainly he ought to serve himself of Men for it is not his ordinary method of proceeding to send Angels to preach upon earth Now how can these Men reform the Church if they do not represent unto her her Corruption and if they do not break with her in case she do not reform If separation be not granted Reformation will never happen For a Church perswaded that she is pure and even Infallible takes no care to renounce those Doctrines and Worships for which she produces to you a possession of many Ages and a Title of Infallibility Tell me a little I intreat you my Brethren what will you do to reform the Roman Church by continuing in it If you speak freely saying that her Worship Innovations and Adorations of Creatures are true Idolatries they will send you the Dragoons and peradventure hang you If you hold your peace will your secret Sighs and Groanings reform the Church Will God send from Heaven a secret and immediate Inspiration for Reformation though no body speak one word of it And this in the favour of whom Either the ancient Catholicks who are plunged in Superstition or in favour of many ancient illuminated Papists and those that are re-united to them who both one and the other are loose Dissemblers which retain the Truth of God in unrighteousness You ought to understand at present my Brethren that we shall never attain the end of reforming the Roman Church unless we have right to go out of it because she will never stir for Complaints and Counsels experience has made it plain enough And therefore the temper of your Soul ought to be such as this rather than move our selves and trouble our repose 't is better that we suffer the Church to perish and be overwhelmed with Corruption This say I is the most wicked sentiment which can enter into the Mind of an honest Man and much more of a Christian But let us continue the examination of your Illusions Abuses introduced by Governours may not be imputed to private Christians you tell us This is it which we will refute in that which follows at present we go on All the holy Scripture which makes mention of Heresies doth not command Separation How dare you say this Do you not read that Passage so express Go out of Babylon my People for fear lest by partaking in its Sins you partake in its Plagues This Babylon is a false Church which says of her Church I am a Queen and shall see no sorrow I am the Church which cannot fail It imports not at present where this Church is but do you not see that God commands those that are there to go out of it Wherefore doth S. Paul say to his Disciples A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject How can a Person shun any one and stand at a distance with him without Separation from him Doth not S. Paul say to the Corinthians Put from among you that wicked person will you restrain these wicked Persons to the vicious and except the Hereticks See how the same Apostle describes those Hereticks that denied the Resurrection he says * 2 Tim. 2. That as to the faith they made shipwreck thereof that their words eat like a gangreen that they have proceeded even to impiety and that they are vessels of dishonour These are therefore wicked Wretches and by consequence ought to be cast out Do you not remember the same Apostle saith to the Galathians That if any none preach to you any other Doctrine besides that which you have received let him be to you Anathema Do you believe that it is allowed you to adhere to those which you ought to have in execration and to whom you ought to say Anathema The Scripture on the contrary exhorts us to a mutual support of each other And where is it that you find this It exhorts you to support the weak but about what About the distinction of Meats about the use of some Ceremonies of little importance Behold the things about which St. Paul commands that we bear with each other * Rom. 14. Now as to him which is weak in the Faith receive him to you but not to doubtful disputations one believes that he may eat all things another that is weak eateth herbs But where do you find that we must tolerate Heresies which ruine the Worship of the true God and oppress and sink Christianity under a heap of Superstitions But I will confound you with your own Weapons If it be the Spirit of Christianity and of the true Church to tolerate Abuses and Corruptions you are not in the true Church for that Church will allow no Toleration she burns and condemns to Death If we are obliged to suffer her in her Corruptions at least she is obliged to bear with us in our Complaints and Admonitions If we ought to hear with her when she speaks false with much more reason she ought to bear with us when we tell her the Truth She hath no Charity she is cruel erroneous and raging in her Error See if you can have Communion with such men The Scripture says that we may build upon the foundation which is Christ Wood Hay and Stubble Do you understand that this Wood Hay and Stubble which we may safely build are Idolatries Superstitious Doctrines Depravations in Morality monstrous and enormous Opinions such as are found in the Roman Church Is that it which you think But to persuade our selves into the belief of so great a Paradox we must have either Authorities of Reasons For Reasons have you any which can persuade you that the Invocation of Saints by which are given to the Blessed Virgin all
St. Chrysostom and St. Austin Sermons or Works that are none of theirs and a man needs but indifferent Learning and little Sincerity to be convinced thereof But Father Crasset who has neither the one nor the other neither Skill nor Science takes and gives all for good In the Fifth Age he quotes Cyril of Alexandria who is surely one of the first which gave occasion to the Religious Worship of the Virgin. For by opposing Nestorius who would not suffer Mary to be called the Mother of God he passed unto the other extreme and advanced as far and as high as he could the praises of the Virgin Mary Nevertheless this might be reduced to Apostrophes Figures of Oratory and great Elogies but there is nothing of Invocation therein No Author of the Fifth Age speaks more expresly nor vehemently of the Invocation of Martyrs and of the Worship which is given to the Reliques than Theodoret. Nevertheless in the passage which Father Crasset quotes from him in his Commentary on the words of Solomon's Song My beloved is one there is nothing that favours the Worship of the Virgin in the least He applies these words My Dove my only one to the Virgin and that were the place to speak of the honour which ought to be given to her if ever there were any But all that he says concerning her is that she is the Mother of God a pure Virgin that all Nations call her blessed that she is the Dove and the only one which brought Christ Jesus into the World that in Charity she surpasses the Cherubims and Seraphims That were the place to have said that we ought to commend ourselves to her Charity and invoke her as our Mediatrix To conclude let these Gentlemen find us in the Fourth and Fifth Ages Chappels and Oratories consecrated to the Virgin as they find them consecrated to the Martyrs unless it be about the end of the Fifth age Now this being supposed I dare say that a man must have renounced all honour all modesty all sincerity and all judgment not to confess that here is an indubitable evidence that Invocation of Saints was a Novelty in the Fourth and Fifth Ages For these men had been fools not to have invoked the Virgin in those times when they invoked St. Protais and St. Gervais if they established Invocation upon the merit the dignity and the reputation that these Saints might have with God. I would fain know if those two Giants which suffered Martyrdom under Decius were in condition to intercede with God with so much efficacy as this Virgin-Mother to the Saviour of the World This false Worship had its birth from that foolish love which men had for Reliques And as they had no Reliques of the blessed Virgin so they consecrated no Churches or Chappels to her and in consequence thereof they did not call upon her We shall bring you yet in what follows new Proofs of the Novelty of this Worship An Article of Controversie A Continuation of the Answer to the Illusions of the New Converts LEt us take up again at present what follows of the Illusions which the New Converts make for themselves who endeavour to lay their Consciences asleep They conclude two things 1. That all the fundamental Truths of Christianity being Confessed by the Church of Rome they are obliged to remain with her so you go on These fundamental Truths which Popery hath preserved are the Articles of the Three Creeds that of the Apostles that of Niece or Constantinople and that which is call'd by the name of St. Athanasius 'T is true that the Church of Rome hath retained these but to conceive how you cheat yourselves I intreat you to suppose Christians which receive these three Creeds and who nevertheless Adore the Sun the Moon the Earth and almost all the Idols of Paganism you will say that these things are inconsistent But you deceive yourselves for there is nothing more possible than that that a man should believe God is the Creatour of Heaven and Earth that Jesus Christ is his eternal Son and the Creatour of the World that he was Born that he Died that he was Crucified that he will come to Raise and Judge the Living and the Dead and nevertheless that he should believe that we may Adore the Earth the Trees the Sun and Moon because God does animate and fill them The Greed says not that we must Worship none but God yea it says not that we must Worship him So that a Religion may receive the Creed in good earnest in the sence of the Universal Church and adore every thing but God Why may not men be capable of Adoring the Stars because God fills them since they Adore Bread under a supposition that Jesus Christ is there after a manner invisible precisely as God is in the Stars and Elements It is therefore a particular Providence that Christians who Adore the Eucharist are not fallen so far as to Adore the Sun Moon and Stars for I do maintain that the Papists may be carried to Adore a Stone as naturally as they are carried to Adore the Bread in the Eucharist on supposition that Jesus Christ is included under it Suppose you that they were come so far would you yet say Since all the fundamental Truths are Confessed by this Communion which Adore the Sun and Moon yea Stones we are obliged to continue with it Learn you therefore that we may retain the fundamental Truths of Christianity and build thereon Dung Poison and all sorts of Impurities The spirit of Man is capable of reconciling those things that are molt irreconcileable Behold another thing whereof you ought to be advertised that you ought to distinguish fundamental Truths from fundamental Errours You imagine that to retain all the fundamental Truths and to have no fundamental Errours is the same thing and because we do confess the Roman Church retains all the fundamental Truths you think that we confess to you that she has no fundamental Errours In this you are much mistaken a person may retain the fundamental Truths of Christianity and add thereunto fundamental Errours I gave you an Example in men who might believe the Creed in good earnest in the sence of the Church and which might add under a hundred false pretences of Devotion Pagan Idolatries I do maintain that a man may adopt into the Religion of Christians almost all the Abominations of the Bonzes of Japan and the Brachmns of India without any formal Renunciation of the Doctrine of the Christian Faith. I demand if whilst men retain the fundamental Truths they do not add fundamental Errours by espousing these Pagan Worship 'T is exactly that which the Church of Rome has done upon the Foundations of Christianity she hath built a thousand Superstitions which are purely Pagan Popery is Paganism renewed and built upon Christianity 't is an Idol Temple raised upon the Temple of Jesus Christ. A fundamental Errour is therefore an Errour or Practice which
Saints are said to appear 't is not they which return 't is the Angels which appear and speak for them Behold I pray you how unformed and floating this Theology is But there is more than this in these same ages when they prayed to Martyrs at one time they prayed for them at another They prayed say I for the Martyrs and for the Apostles yea for the blessed Virgin and this is a new Proof of the Novelty of this Superstition This appears by the Liturgies of that time In that of St. Chrysostom we read We offer to thee this reasonable Service for those which rest in the Faith of our Ancestors our Fathers the Patriarchs the Prophets the Apostles the Preachers the Evangelists the Martyrs the Confessors the Continents and for all the Spirits which were initiated in the Faith principally for the most holy immaculate and blessed above all Women our Lady Mary Mother of God and always a Virgin. And in that which is attributed to Cyril of Jerusalem O God have mercy on our Fathers on our Brethren which are at rest whose Souls are acceptable unto thee give them repose and remember also all the holy Patriarchs Prophets Apostles Martyrs Confessors Evangelists and all the Spirits of the Just which are dead in the Faith and principally the holy and the glorious Mary Mother of God always a Virgin. It would be at this day the greatest of all absurdities to pray for a dead man and pray to him at the same time Indeed if he be in a condition of doing us good if he see God if he be with him he hath no need of our Prayers The inconsistency of these two Worships which nevertheless were both used at the same time is a demonstrative proof that the Invocations of Saints was a Novelty Prayers for the Martyrs were found in the ancient Liturgies out of respect to Antiquity they were left there but the torrent of Novelty added unto them Prayers unto the Martyrs without taking notice that these latter were inconsistent with the former To conclude I do maintain that those who will not give attention to these Demonstrations which prove the Novelty of the Invocation of Saints in the 4th Age have an insensible and seared Conscience and so I think it unprofitable to dispute any more against them I well understand that the New Converts who are willing to be content with their change will yet find two Fortifications for their security They will say that this Worship of Saints was then new but that it was not evil and that therefore the Church might introduce it as a pious Custom and proper to incline the minds of men towards Devotion But let these Gentlemen have a little patience Monsieur de Meaux in that which follows will give us occasion to make it plain to you that this Worship and this Invocation is Paganism renewed and that it is in nothing better than the Invocation of Angels and Hero's which the Pagans practised in their Devotions we will make them see that 't is a true Idolatry The other Fortification is the Antiquity of this Worship However it be say they you do confess that the Invocation of Saints hath more than one thousand two hundred Years on its head Does this put you to no troubles Have you no respect for so goodly a piece of Antiquity and how can you believe that God hath left his Church under Idolatry for so many Ages We answer That we cannot have respect for Antiquity without Truth and in this we are of the Religion of St. Cyprian We add That we are not astonisht to see an Idolatry so aged in the Church because it hath been expresly predicted to us The Prophet St. John calls Idolatrous Christians Pagans and the Spirit saith to him * Revel 11. cap. 12. I have given up the outward Court of the Church to the Pagans that they may tread it under foot for forty two Months These are the thousand two hundred and sixty Days in which the Woman i. e. the Church ought to be hidden as in a Wilderness for the space of these thousand two hundred and sixty Days And the two Prophets which prophesied in Sack-cloth i. e. the Truth published by a small number of Witnesses and those under the Cross ought to continue under the oppression of Idolatry the same number of Days i. e. a thousand two hundred and sixty Now these thousand two hundred and sixty Days are so many Years according to the stile of the Prophets who denominate Years by Days We shall have it may be in what follows an opportunity to prove it to you It must be therefore that Idolatry Rule in the Christian Church one thousand two hundred and sixty Years It hath done so almost for that space of time it is therefore near its end But we ought not to be amazed that it hath continued so long An Article of Controversie A Continuation of the Answer to the Illusions that the New Converts put upon themselves WE take up again the Continuation of the Controversie at the place where we left the Illusions of the New Converts The common Faith say you is a kind of Agreement to live under the same Ministery without being accountable for all the Abuses that have slipt into the Church By this fine reasoning we may live in safety among the Turks we believe as they do that there is one GOD one Paradise one Hell and that Jesus Christ is the greatest Prophet which ever came into the World. This common Confession of Faith will be an Agreement to live together safely under the same Ministery And we will leave to the Turks their prophane Abuses and their absurd and impious Doctrines Believe me such an Agreement resembles that of Pilate and Herod who agreed to despise and put to death Christ Jesus When the Ministery introduces small Corruptions this may be granted but when Corruption goes to the heart of Religion the Agreement signifies nothing and lays no obligation all is deadly either by itself or by its neighbourhood or contagion Provided that we Adore the same God and Profess the same Fundamentals of Christianity all the rest is not imputable to private persons Above all then when there is a necessity of joyning ourselves to this first Christian Society and when we cannot find any publick Worship more pure and edifying This is the Continuation of your Apology There are two words therein Provided and above all which destroy you Provided that we profess the same Fundamentals I have made it appear already that this provided is insufficient You must add Provided that fundamental Errours be not added to the Foundations Now Popery hath added to the Foundations of Christianity Tyranny Superstition and in one word Antichristianism So behold yourselves thrown out of your Fortification Provided that The Above all is no better Above all when there is a necessity of joyning ourselves There is no necessity of joyning ourselves to a Communion which we acknowledge
Paulinus that this leud saying hath taken its original That Images are the Books of the Ignorant 4. The fourth thing to which you ought to give attention is That then they did not set in Churches any Figure Image or Statue of a single person but Historical Representations in large Tables where many persons and many actions were represented This makes almost an infinite difference for it never entred into the mind of Man that Historical Tables whereon were some times represented the Devil tempting Jesus Christ oftentimes Hang-men pblucking off the flesh of a Martyr with Pincers were placed there for Worship For so men would Worship the Devil as well as Jesus Christ and the Hangmen as well as the Martyr Indeed when the Idolatry of Images was brought into the Church 't was by Pictures or Statues which represented but one or two of the Saints Now 't is certain say I that about the end of the fourth Age those which gave themselves liberty of introducing Images into Churches placed nothing there but Historical Pictures and Tables To prove the contrary to you they may produce a passage of Gregory Nazianzen where he complains of this That some would destroy the City of Diocesarea raze the Temples and pull down the Statues thereof * Epist ad Olympium Our greatest grief says he is not that the Statues are pluckt down although that be troublesome too Because immediately before he was speaking of the Ruine of Temples some it may be will serve themselves of that to perswade you that Statues were in their Temples But that is false and 't is certain that he speaks of Statues which were in their publick places Our grief is says he that with the Statues they pull down and destroy an ancient City And to the end that you may not be able to delude your selves thereby be advertised That the Greeks would never suffer Statues in their Churches and that yet to this day they Adore nothing but Images or plain and flat Pictures and by a humour sufficiently pleasant they accuse the Latines of being Idolators because they Adore Statues As if their Images of Mosaick Work were much more worthy of Adoration than Embossed Figures However it be this demonstrates that Gregory Nazianzen could not speak of Statues which were in Churches 5. To conclude the last thing whereof you are to be advertised about the Original of Images is That in the time that this mischeivous Custom of putting Images in Churches began in some places the good Bishops opposed themselves thereto with Zeal and treated it as an Abomination It were convenient that you should read thereon a passage of Epiphanius Bishop of Salamina in Cyprus who lived about the year 375 that is to say exactly in the same time that Gregory Nissen suffered Pictures in the Churches of Cappadocia I came one day says Epiphanius into a Village which is called Anablata 't was a Village in Palestine * Epiphan in Epist ad Joh. Jerus having seen there as I passed by a burning Lamp I enquired what place it was I learnt that it was a Church and being entred there to Pray I found on the Door of the Church a died Vail hanging there having an Image painted on it as it were of Christ or some Saint for I do not remember in good truth whose Image it was having therefore seen that contrary to the Authority of the Scripture they had hung the Image of a Man in the Church I rent the Vail and advised the Sexton of the place to employ it rather to wrap up the body of some poor dead person to carry him to his Grave John Patriarch of Jerusalem took it ill that Epiphanius had attempted such an Action in a Diocess where he had no Jurisdiction but he did not condemn the Action in itself This passage is without reply and your Seducers will never have any thing to answer to it It appears that the use of introducing Images into Churches was so rare and so little received that he which undertook to put one in the Church of Anablata did not dare to put it any farther then the Door At this day men have the insolence to set them upon Altars And even Epiphanius a little while before in the Church where this Image was lookt upon the attempt as the Violation of the Law although it were even the Image of Jesus Christ for he supposes it might be the Image of our Lord nevertheless he made not the least scruple to rend it and hated not the attempt ever the less Notwithstanding 't is very probable that after St. Epiphanius the Custom of so placing Pictures and Tables in the Churches of the Martyrs did continue and increase The People which naturally fall into Superstition did not tarry long ere they abused those Images which were placed for them in the Sepulchres of the Martyrs 't is from the People that the Worship of Images came as well as the Invocation of Saints that could not stay long after this for when they adored men which might be painted 't is natural to make Images of them So St. Austine learns us that in his time the Invocation of Saints passing from the People to the Pastors the People running much father began to Adore the Pictures of the Martyrs But behold how he speaks of it The Manichees heaped together all the popular Superstitions and all the Actions of private Persons to make Crimes of them against the Church and upon that St. Austine tells them * Lib. 1. de-Moribus Eccl. c. 34. Do not collect those who making profession of being Christians have nothing which answers to their Profession do not joyn yourself to the croud of ignorant People who being on the side of true Religion are superstitious c. I know there are many which Worship Pictures and Sepulchres Unto the middle of the fifth Age nevertheless few Images were seen in Churches after the year 450 many of them were seen there 'T was not only those of the Martyrs that were placed there they put also those of the Bishops in the Churches of their Diocesses The Image of Thomas Bishop of Apamea was set on the top of the Church †Evag. lib. 4. cap. 26. Theodorus Lector tells us That in the Reign of Anastatius * Lib. 2. Macedonius Bishop of Constantinople caused his Images to be set in Churches and that Timothy who was put in his place some time after would not perform Divine Offices in any Church before he had caused the Images of Macedonius to be removed It cannot be imagined these Images were set there for Adoration for no man makes his own Images to be adored But that in the fourth and fifth Ages men did not give any Religious Worship to Images by the publick Authority and Approbation of the Pastors is a truth which cannot be disputed by those who have any remains of Conscience and Honour This appears by the Testimonies of Authors of that time
more plainly that the Eucharist is nothing but a Sacrifice of Commemoration And if it be a simple Commemoration where is the Real Presence where is the Propitiatory Sacrifice for the Living and the Dead They are the same Authors which say That Jesus Christ by his Servants f In Epist ad Heb. cap. 8. vers 4. hath accomplished among men that which respects Sacrifice representing by Bread and Wine the Misteries of his Body and of his Saving Blood. The Author of the imperfect Work upon St. Matthew under the name of Chrysostome sâ—â—â—h That the Christian g Homil. 19. ib. offers the Sacrifice of Bread and Wine And St. Jerome h Jer. lib. 2. Advers Jovin That Melchizedeck did not offer the Victims of Flesh and Blood but that he did dedicate the Sacrament of Jesus Christ with Bread and Wine which is a simple and pure Sacrifice And St. Austine i Lib. 16. de Civit. Dei. c. 22. lib. 17. c. 5. 17. That to eat Bread under the New Testament is the Sacrifice of Christians and that men offer every-where under the High-Priest Jesus Christ that which Melchizedeck brought when he blessed Abraham That is to say Bread and Wine And Isidore of Pelusium k Lib. 1. Ep. 401. That the Oblation of Christians is an Oblation of Bread. And St. Fulgentius l Ad Petrum de Fide cap. 19. That the Catholick Church does not cease to offer throughout all the Earth an Oblation of Bread and Wine And Eucherius Bishop of Lions m In Genes lib. 2. cap. 18. That Jesus Christ hath commanded Christians to offer in Sacrifice not Victims of Beasts as did Aaron but the Sacrifice of Bread and Wine I would willingly know how an Oblation of Bread and Wine can be a true Sacrifice of Humane Flesh propitiatory for the sins of Men They have not spoken otherwise even until the establishment of the Opinion of the Real Presence for venerable Bede in the eighth Age saith n In Psal 133. That the Lord hath changed the Sacrifices of the Law into the Sacrifices of Bread and Wine And Isidore of Seville in the seventh Age o Lib. de Alleg. That the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ i. e. the Oblation of Bread and Wine is offered through all the World. The same Fathers have also said with one consent That the Christian hath no other true Sacrifice but that of the Cross Origen in the third Age did say p Homil. 17. in Numb That when the perfect Oblation and Lamb without spot came to take away the Sins of the World the Sacrifices which were offered to God one after another did seem superfluous seeing that by one only Sacrifice all the Worship of Demons was destroyed It had been natural to say that the Worship of the Sacrifice of the Mass was put in the place of the Worship of Devils And St. Chrysostome a Homil. 17. in Johan That Jesus Christ hath offered one only Sacrifice for Sins and that he always cleanseth us by this Sacrifice alone And elsewhere b Hom. 13. in Heb. There is no other Sacrifice one Sacrifice alone hath purified and cleansed us To speak thus is indeed to forget ones self seeing we have a daily and continual Sacrifice which is that of the Mass It would be to no purpose to quote more Authors for they all speak after the same manner An Article of Controversie A Conclusion of the Matter of Schism the extream Corruption of Popery hath forced us to a Separation IN the preceding Letter we began to make for you a Picture of Popery to convince you of the Justice and Necessity of our Reformation This Corruption of Popery may be either considered in its Guides its Head and principal Members or in its Doctrine We did consider this Corruption in its Head i. e. the Pope in its Guides i. e. the Cardinals Primates Archbishops and Bishops in its principal Members such are the Priests the Monks and the Nuns and in all this we have seen the Characters of the Conductors of Babel and the Emissaries of Antichrist These are the Mouths of Popery but what can proceed out of such Mouths 'T is easie to judge They appoint for you at this day Preachers which speak good things There have been for some time past a number of persons raised up to obtain the use of the Word of God and the Holy Scripture for the people But this is neither ancient nor general you must know the Popish Ministery by what it was not long since and by what it is in all places where 't is regnant hear those which tell you the Holy Scripture is a dangerous Book an obscure Book all full of Traps Snares and Precipieces that an infinite number of men have ruined themselves thereby that 't is from thence that Hereticks have drawn their Heresies that 't is imperfect that it contains not half the Christian Religion that to understand the true sence of this half there needs another which is called the Unwritten Word Tradition the infallible Voice of the Church And a man knows not where to find this Voice However it be they do assure you that the Scripture has no Authority without Tradition that without the Testimony of the Church we were no more obliged to believe the Gospel than Titus Livius or the Fables of Homer Moreover at this day the Jansenists great Defenders of the Holy Scriptures tell you plainly and without scruple or hesitation That by the Holy Scripture we cannot prove the Divinity of Jesus Christ and that it were a Folly more clear than the day to go about to prove the Divinity of the Holy Scriptures by the Scripture itself There is nothing that Popery doth not do to decry this sacred Book Not only 't is insufficient obscure it has no authority by itself but it is maimed imperfect many Books thereof are lost those which remain are corrupt either by the Jews or by the negligence of Transcribers we cannot know with any certainty what is intire or what is not the Translations thereof are spoiled there are none of them conformable to the Original Good God what a Prodigy is this And how great must the patience of God be to tollerate a Religion which makes it its business to annihilate to vilifie and abase those Oracles which ought to be so venerable among all Christians What Christianity is this but that in which for the space of more than a thousand years the Scripture was an unknown Book almost to all Christians and is so yet at this day in all those places where Popery domineers without contradiction Observe also the profound Ignorance in which those people live that are subject to the Popish Inquisition To find among them the Figures of Aretine or some other infamous Work is no fault but to find there a Bible in the Vulgar Language is a crime not to be forgiven for which reason
That they are divided into three Sects of which Zuinglius Calvin and Luther made themselves the Heads That if the Spirit of God had sent them to Reform the Church he would also have united them in this great design and have inspired them with the same thoughts and the same apprehensions 5. To conclude they say that they have rent and torn each other by transports of Passion which are the true Characters of false Pastors and false Christians As to the first Objection I cannot avoid baptizing it by its own name and calling it an Impertinence Why should our Reformers work Miracles and why were they obliged thereunto When Jehu reformed the Church of Israel pull'd down the Temples of Baal broke in pieces his Statues rooted out his Prophets and abolished his Worship did he work Miracles or had he any need thereof Was it any spot to that Holy Reformation that Josiah made when he re-established the Service of God which was almost wholly under a heap of forreign Idolatries that he wrought no Miracles When Theodosius the Great reformed the Christian Church and drove away Arianism which was become the reigning Religion did he do Miracles or had he any need thereof There is no need to work Miracles but when men bring a new Religion and a new Revelation For that reason the Apostles wrought Miracles because they had a new Revelation to propose to the World. They brought a Gospel unknown to Jews and Gentiles and opposite to the prejudices of the one and the other We brought no new Gospel into the World we propounded the Old and the New Testament the one and the other were received without contradiction by all those Christians which we desired to reform When it shall please God to convert the Jews to Christianity according to his promises there is much probability that he will send them some Prophets which will work Miracles and that will be necessary For although the Gospel-Revelation be already manifested and we have the Books of the Evangelists and the Apostles nevertheless this is nothing with respect to the Jews because they do not esteem our Books Canonical but believe the Apostles to be Cheats and Impostors There is therefore need of new Miracles to recover them from their prejudices and oblige them to give attention to the truth But as for us it was in no wise necessary to work Miracles to establish that Book whereof we served our selves Otherwise as often as the Kings of Judah produced the Law of Moses to make Reformation in their Church they had been obliged to work Miracles They had nothing else to do but to produce the Book and make it evident that the Abominations which had been introduced into Religion were either forbidden or not commanded there Behold all that they had to do behold all that we have to do and 't is to misunderstand the Conduct of God and the Spirit of the Gospel to imagine that the truth cannot be commended to Unbelievers but by Miracles How many millions of men have been converted to Christianity since the days of the Apostles and the cessation of the gift of Miracles Miracles are designed to deliver men from their evil prejudices and to endue them with such as are good that they may hearken to the truth Men that believe not the Christian Religion but only for the sake of its Miracles are very ill-Christians And among those which became Converts by the preaching of the Apostles those who had no other reason to embrace this New Religion but the Miracles which they saw done by those which preacht it were very miserable Converts such persons are the seed of Apostacy and adhere to the Church but by a very feeble root We ought to adhere to it for the love of truth now 't is the knowledge of the truth and not the sight of Miracles which gives birth to the love thereof If Miracles be not necessary for the Conversion of Unbelievers with far greater reason they cannot be of necessity for the bringing back of wandring Christians to the right way For there needs no more but to shew them the holy Scripture which so exactly marks out the path in which they ought to walk As to what they say that those who will establish a new Ministry must have Miracles for the support of it 't is an Affair to be treated on elsewhere We have already said something concerning it and we shall have yet farther occasion to speak of it and shew that we have no more established a new Ministry than we have introduced a new Gospel Where there is no new Revelation there is no new Ministry our Ministry is that of the Apostles because our Doctrine is theirs The second Accusation which they make against the Authors of our Seperation is their Scandalous Life There is no probability say your Converts that God should suffer so strange an Alliance as that would be of a great abundance of the Spirit of Light on the one part and of so great disorders of Manners on the other And thereon they publish a hundred ugly stories to cry down the Memory of Luther Zuinglius Calvin Martyr Beza c. First we say that truth is truth without any dependance on those who declare it Your Converters have said somewhere That the Citizens of Babel may sometimes build Jerusalem 'T is a truth so certain that to deny it a man must be ignorant and false For in all Ages there have been very Evil men who have defended the part of truth and who have even maintained it against Hereticks whose Conduct and Manners have been very regular and oftentimes more edifying than that of the Orthodox We must not form a prejudice against the Doctrine upon the ill Conduct of those which preach it we must judge of Truth by it self So that although it should be true that our Reformers were such as they report them nevertheless it would behove us to see whether these Citizens of Babel were not the Builders of Zion But God forbid that we should have no other fortification to defend our selves We have made to appear the innocence of the Lives of the Authors of our Separation by Apologies of so much strength that their Calumniators have been covered with Confusion and the most part of our most resolved Enemies have been obliged to renounce them The Bolsacs the Bertheliers the Florimond de Raymonds and other like Calumniators ought to be the Horror and Execration of all Honest men The Author of the Legitimate Prejudices against the Calvanists and other like Authors who are willing to preserve themselves in the Esteem of Honest men fortifie and establish themselves upon notorious matters of fact such is for example Marriage of Priests Persons who have made a Vow of Chastity say they and who were obliged to celibate by so many Oaths have violated their Vows in the face of the Sun they have opened Cloysters to take Wives from thence and so have committed a
Church be he Priest Bishop or Guide thereof Make Reflections in this place on the monstrous Doctrines of your Converters of whom the most part will tell you that to be a true Member of the Church it suffices to make profession of the Faith and to adhere to lawful Pastors So that Priests that are Sorcerers and Sodomites which you have oftentimes seen burnt at Paris were the true Members of Jesus Christ This is capable of making a man tremble with horrour They will say to you thereon if they were not true Members of the Church and of the Body of Jesus Christ they could not be the Guides thereof Such a one is an evil Man he is nevertheless a true Bishop he must therefore be a true Member of Jesus Christ and of his Body Answer to this that which one of the Writers of Port Royal says somewhere That oftentimes those which Build Jerusalem and Guide it are the Citizens of Babylon Tell them that to be a lawful Pastor and Guide of the Church to be able to administer the Word and Sacraments with Authority it s enough to be a Member of the external and visible Society it is not necessary to be a Member of the true Church to be in the hand of God an Instrument of his Work. A King may administer Justice and administer it very well by a wicked man who hath inwardly all sorts of inclinations to Injustice It will be said a man cannot be the Head and Guide of a Body without being a Member thereof for the Head is one of its principal Members It must be answered That false Pastors are true Members of the visible Society of the Church and that they are also true Heads of that Society whereof they are true Members but they are neither Heads nor Members of the principal and invisible part of the Church who are true Believers and truly righteous persons They are not therefore true Heads but of that part whereof they are true Members and that sufficeth them for the external Administration of the Word and Sacraments for the truely Righteous receive the Word and Sacraments in quality of the Members of the external Society They will press you further and tell you You do confess the Church is visible because she hath a Body which is an external Society But is it always visible Although you should answer That it is not necessary that the Church be always visible they would not be able to convince you of the contrary by reason For a man who is visible by his body may be sometimes hidden and by that means be invisible May not the external Society of the Church which is visible have been at sometimes and in some seasons hidden through the Persecution of Pagans or Hereticks But confess to them that the Church hath been always visible and will be to the end of the World. 'T is true that the Persecutions under the Pagan-Emperours were very great but they never proceeded so far as utterly to destroy all Assemblies of the Church to that degree that there were no visible Society of Christians the Christians were well known under the Persecutions seeing they knew where to find them to make Martyrs of them the Church was visible in the midst of the flames She remained visible in the Heretical Assemblies of the Arrians for those that held the Truth in those Assemblies themselves were more numerous than those that erred concerning it If there were any place where the Church were become invisible it was in the Papism for never was there a Church so corrupt and drowned in Superstitions as that Nevertheless the Church continued there visible because that Christianity and the Fundamentals of the Christian Religion did abide there I do not say that they did remain there in their Integrity but the contrary nevertheless it sufficeth that they did continue there 't is necessary therefore that you know that where-ever Christianity fore that you know that where-ever Christianity remains sensible and visible the Church remains visible for it is Christianity that makes the Church If a Sect become so corrupt that Christianity is no longer visible in it such are the Mahumetans and the Socinians who have rejected the Foundations the Church is no longer visible among them unless it be as a dead man remains visible but it is also visible that he is dead without life and without soul so in the Sects which have rejected the Foundations the Church remains visible but it 's also visible that such Churches are without life without soul without salvation In the Sects which preserve Christianity although they have added very many things thereunto and even such things as overturns the Foundations thereof the Church doth not fail to remain visible because Christianity both is there and is seen there If therefore they do inquire of you Where was your Church before Luther and Calvin Answer them She was in the Christian Societies that were in Aethiopia in those which were in Aegypt and in Africa in those which are and were in Asia in the Greek Church that was at Constantinople and Antioch in Muscovy and the Churches of Russia and she was even in the Church of Rome itself If they ask of you Was the Church visible in these Societies or were the Members thereof hidden Answer them That the Church was visible in these Societies forasmuch as Christianity and the Creed of the Apostles in the true sence thereof explained in the first six General Councils were visibly preserved there Add you that the true Members of Jesus Christ and of the Church were hidden and not visible because those that sincerely and truly adhered to this true Christianity contained in the Creeds of the Christian Church were not known by name but that these Believers were hidden was not at all peculiar to these corrupt Churches because of their Corruption for the case is the same in the purest Churches the true Members of Jesus Christ and of his body are hidden because we do not certainly know those which adhere to the Christian Faith in sincerity and with the heart Behold a pure and native Explication of the true Visibility of the Church and of the Perpetuity of that Visibility The Bishop of Meaux and your other Converters will seem to you very well pleased in this that you confess the Church is visible and always visible Behold they will say one point gained For if the Church be always visible 't is of necessity that there be a Succession in the Ministry a train of legitimate Pastours There will always be Teachers with whom Jesus Christ will teach and the true Teaching will never cease in the Church These are Monsieur de Meaux that great Converter's own words That is to say from the perpetual Visibility of the Church he draws these three conclusions 1. That pure and true Teaching hath never ceased in the Church 2. That there will always be a series and train of legitimate Pastours 3. That Jesus Christ
being made by men Behold an admirable Divine which believes that a man can make a God and do a Miracle if I may so say that exhausts all the Divine Power To conclude to these three or four words of St. Austin That none eats the flesh of Jesus Christ before he hath adored it we ought to oppose what he says in the third Book concerning the Christian Doctrine †De Doctr. Christ lib. 3. cap. 9. That every one knows the Sacrament of Baptism and the celebration of the Body and Bloud of our Lord that 't is well known whereunto they have respect and that they are reverenced not by a servitude i.e. after a carnal manner but by a spiritual liberty Here St. Austin desires that we give to Baptism the same honour as to the Sacrament of the Eucharist We must confess if St. Austin did adore the Sacrament we ought to make no scruple therein we owe him this complaisance for that he hath spoken as absolutely concerning it as our selves For during the space of two hundred years past there hath not been either Zuinglian or Calvinist which hath spoken more boldly or more clearly against the Real Presence and Transubstantiation If this suffice not to know what kind of Worship was given to the Eucharist we must learn it from the History of matters of fact We learn from Mr. de Valois in his Notes upon Eusebius ‖ Euseb lib. 7. cap. 9. Hist Eccles That the Believers which were to communicate approached the Altar and there received the Body of Jesus Christ from the hand of the Priest standing upright and not on their knees as at this day The Author has passed for a good Roman Catholick he is learned and he is a Modern Writer so that he wants nothing to give him an authority in the hearts of the New Converts who refer themselves much more concerning Religion to what their new Authors speak of it then to what is said thereof by those that are more ancient And indeed how could they communicate otherwise than standing since they prayed standing on the Lords day and the fifty days which are from Easter to Whitsontide in memory of the Resurrection When they were ready to consecrate they put out the Catechumens i.e. well nigh half the Christians is it probable that they would deprive them of the comfort of adoring their Saviour if it had been then the custom of adoring him in the Sacrament In those Ages they did communicate Infants and how could they exact Adoration before the Manducation since Infants are not capable of performing an Act of Adoration I may also reckon amongst those Articles concerning which there was no change in the fourth and fifth Ages that of Purgatory For the opinion of a separate place where Souls were to be kept till the day of Judgment without seeing the face of God but without suffering any thing there was the Opinion of the greatest men of those Ages of St. Ambrose St. Chrysostom St. Hillary St. Jerome and under names so great it may not be doubted but it was the prevailing Opinion 'T was the third place of the Christians that then were but as yet there were but few footsteps of a fourth place seen 'T is true that in these Ages a man may shew you some passages of Gregory Nyssen and even some of St. Jerome which speak of a Purgation of Sins which ought to be made after death by the means of a Penal Fire But this is not the Purgatory of Popery 't is that of Origen according to whom we have seen that all intelligent Creatures without excepting Devils and wicked men who die impenitently ought to be recovered and re-established Originism did not die with Origen and many famous Fathers of the fourth Age were infatuated with it Those which know the History of the Quarrels between St. Chrysostom and Epiphanius are not ignorant thereof I think indeed that few men did then dare to maintain the Opinion of Origen crude as he left it touching the future salvation of the Devils and the damned But many endeavoured to soften and smooth it and said at least Christians who died in the profession of the Faith but without Holiness and Repentance would one day be recovered 'T is without doubt that this Opinion mitigated and softned was one step which made the Church fall into the Error of Purgatory For after they had restrained those that were to be purged by a Penal Fire to such as died without Holiness and Repentance by little and little they restrained them to such who dying without Repentance had not satisfied the Canonical Penances of the Church St. Austin was not of the opinion of those who believed that ill Christians dying without repentance were to be purged by fire nevertheless he thought it probable * Enchir. cap. 67 that those who had too much affection for temporal good things during the space of this Life after death would be afflicted with grief for the loss of them and that this would serve them for a Castigation Nevertheless he proposes this but as a doubtful conjecture It is not incredible says he †Enchir. cap. 69. but that something of like nature happens after death and it may be disputed whether it be so that some Believers shall be saved sooner or later by a purging fire according as they have more or less loved these perishing good things By this Purgative Fire or Purgatory he understands nothing but the grief of being deprived of these perishing things And this is that which he means in the same Book ‖ Enchir. cap. 109. That during the whole space of time between a mans death and the last Resurrection Souls are in hidden Receptacles according as they are worthy of repose or misery with respect to what they have been during this life A man cannot deny but this is Purgatory in its birth but it was not as yet believed and received of all the Church nor hath it been received nor perfected any where but in the Latin Church Behold that which I have to tell you concerning the changes happening in Doctrines and Worship I will not pass on to the following Ages because 't is not my design to give you a compleat History of all the changes which have happened in the Church for 1700 years I only desire to confound the boldness of Monsieur de Meaux and such-like which dare to affirm that Christianity in their hands is in the same estate in which it was when it passed from the Apostles to their immediate Successors and that time hath changed nothing that is essential in the Doctrine and Worship of the Church that insensible changes whereof some men speak to you are but Dreams Behold say I enough to ruine these rash affirmations of your Converters for from this short History which I have given you of the Doctrine and Worship of the Church for the space of 500 years it appears 1. That during these five Ages
not invocate Saints in the three first Ages of the Church I find afterwards the Invocation of Saints about the end of the fourth Age. Is not this to observe the point of its birth what does the name of the first Author signifie in this case Besides superstitious and idolatrous Practices had not one single Author they had many 't is the sottish and ill instructed people who introduce Superstitions and who introduce them insensibly and by little and little But for speculative Heresies 't is the learned which give them birth for which reason 't is easie to mark both their Authors and the precise time of their original Fifthly To conclude I observe in this light which Mr. Nicholas forms to us to make the Church of Rome visible there is no more of sound judgment than of honesty For although even all that he says were solid and his method would prove the Invocation of Saints the Adoration of Reliques Lent c. were Apostolical Traditions this would not prove that which ought to be proved here viz. that the Church of Rome is the only true Church For it must be known that the Greek Church which according to the Papists is schismatical and which a man cannot secure his salvation do also invocate Saints worship Images and observe Lent. 'T is therefore necessary to find in Tradition a proof which makes it evident that the Church of Rome is the true Church with exclusion to all other Sects and this is it which the reasoning of Mr. Nicholas doth not prove neither directly nor indirectly The other Source from whence Mr. Nicholas will draw a light by Tradition to make the Church of Rome visible to the weak is yet more dark and obscure 'T is a ratiocination which supposes 1. That Tradition teaches that there hath been a visible and infallible Church in the World. Tradition doth not teach it and although it should teach it a plain weak man which cannot read the Greek and Latin Fathers the Councils and the Opinions of the Doctors would not be in a condition to assure himself thereof 2. This reasoning supposes in its second Proposition that the Church of Rome is this only visible infallible Church And this is that which must be proved that is that which is obscure and must be made plain to the eyes of the weak Is it not therefore very absurd to pretend to make a light for the weak to render the Roman Church visible of that which is denied and contested by all the World yea although it should be true that there is one visible and infallible Church it would not follow that this were the Church of Rome for three fourth parts of Christians dispute this priviledge with her Mr. Nicholas hath found an admirable secret to draw the weak out of this difficulty It is not needful as he insinuates to make known to the weak that there be other Sects as ancient as the Church of Rome who pretend to be the Church Nothing more is necessary than to make them see the new Sects of Lutherans and Calvinists in opposition to the Church of Rome For they will easily see that this visible Church which ought always to be in the World cannot be that of Luther and Calvin and they will not be so much as tempted to search any other Church but that of Rome I think I have pressed Mr. Nicholas thereon after such a manner as to cover him with a confusion out of which he will never escape For I have made him see that it is properly to cheat the weak to let them believe there is no other Church in the World but the Roman and the Protestant The Protestant Church not having the marks of perpetual visibility since she was not till about two hundred years ago the weak without inquiring further believe that the Roman Church is the only true Church on supposition that she is the only ancient Church Mr. Nicholas confesses that this supposition is false for he acknowledges the Greek Church is as ancient as the Roman But nevertheless according to him 't is expedient to permit the weak to believe this false supposition as if it were true that they be not tempted to search any other Church but the Roman On this matter of fact and about all the rest of the Book against Mr. Nicholas we do declare to him that his silence is look'd upon as a conviction They write that he prepares an Answer to the first Part of the System of the Church where the Nature of the Church is spoken to If it be so we declare to him that that is not the capital Controversie between him and me 'T is about the impossibility of examination of particular Controversies 't is about the Authority of the Church which he ought to answer and to which he will never answer the 2d light which Mr. Nicholas forms to make the Church of Rome visible is drawn from the external marks which make her known for the true Church to the weak and ignorant These external marks according to him may be reduced to two they are Miracles and Sanctity Now this Sanctity and these Miracles which must make the Roma Church visible are either those of the present or those of past Ages Mr. Nicholas searches the visibility of the Church of Rome more in the Miracles of the first Ages than in those of this And behold how he reasons the Church of the two or three first Ages had marks sufficiently evident of the Divine Spirit wherewithal she was animated the miraculous Holiness of her Members and the Miracles which were done there made her sufficiently visible and sufficiently supported her authority If the Church of the three first Ages had this character both of authority and evidence we cannot refuse it to the Church of the fourth Age for 't was the same Church She possessed all the advantages of the three first Ages That is to say her Miracles and her Prodigies of Sanctity which appertained to her by right of succession and she had those which were her own and which were not inferiour to them For she had her Martyrs her Prodigies of Sanctity and her Miracles and these Miracles were done in that same Church where by the confession of the Ministers they prayed to Saints and worshipped Reliques These Prodigies of Sanctity and these Miracles did yet continue in those Ages in which the Ministers do confess that they had Images and believed Transubstantiation For example in the Age of St. Bernard which is the 12th This St. Bernard wrought Miracles and taught all that which is believed in the Church of Rome Follow on from Age to Age and you will come even to the Church of the present Age who hath right to attribute to her self not only the Miracles of the Apostles but all those which have been wrought since and above all those which were done by the Reliques of Saints in the fourth and fifth Ages As the Miracles which St. Austin reports
all to awaken mens minds to oblige them to give attention to Truth Mr. Nicholas to the Miracles and Prodigies of Sanctity of the Ancients which make the Church of Rome according to him visible joyns also the Sanctity of the present Church of Rome her Reformed Orders her great Men the Nuns de Trap c. and concludes That although a man should have regard to nothing but the Sanctity of the Manners of the Church of Rome she is even thereby distinguished from all other Societies and that she hath in persons of eminent Piety sensible Characters of the Spirit of God which will animate and inspire her to the end of the World. Mr. Nicholas speaking of all preceding Ages did always joyn Miracles with Sanctity At present he lays by Miracles and why is this He well knows his Church pretends as yet to have the Gift of Miracles And there is not a place eminent for Devotion as are the famous Ladies of Arsillieres of Montferrat of Loretto where they do not pretend to see Miracles The Father de Aviano ran all the World over to make it evident that the Gift of Miracles did not dye with the Apostles He dares not produce to us that as a Light he perceives very well that all these Miracles are suspected Plainly he himself hath not much Faith for them And so by this silence Mr. Nicholas doth tacitly consent that at this day the Roman Church doth no Miracles If it be so I would very willingly know why the Roman Church worke no more Miracles at this day when she had never more need thereof to convert so many ill converted Hereticks and which cry out so loudly of the Violence which they have suffered by the sending of the Dragoons The Miracles whereof they tell us as done at present may very well be Juggles or Fables according to what Mr. Nicholas lets us think by saying nothing of them for what reason may not all those of the Ages past for seven or eight hundred years particularly be very well also accounted Impostures These Miracles of the Church of Rome and of Popery do very well deserve that we should make larger Reflections on them and an occasion thereof will be presented to us elsewhere But in the mean while I pray give attention to this It is if they reckon the Miracles which are found in the Legends from the fifth Age wrought expresly to support the Invocation of Saints Adoration of Reliques Worship of Images and of Purgatory it will be found that God hath wrought without Hyperbole a thousand times more Miracles for the establishment of these false Doctrines these wicked Worships than he hath wrought to confirm the Christian Religion We have told you long since that a Monk for his part raised two and fifty dead persons and others in proportion Now judge if it were probable that these new Doctrines supposing they were true should be so important that to confirm them God should work a thousand and a thousand times more wonders than he hath wrought to establish the Faith of the greatest Mysteries of the Christian Religion As to the Article of the Holiness of the Church of Rome at this day whereof Mr. Nicholas and Mr. Arnold make an evidence for her I can destroy it by making appear the enormous Corruptions which are yet seen in her most considerable parts of Spain and Italy I can prove the disorders of her Clergy and of her Monks I can prove that these prodigious Austerities which they produce to us as the effects of the Spirit of God are but the effects of the Spirit of Hypocrisie or Fanaticism But to the end that I may not trouble those that pride themselves of the Virtue and Piety in the Roman Church I will say that if there be Piety in some of the Members of that Church they owe it not to Popery and Antichristianism but to the remainders of Christianity which continue in that Communion I come to the third Light by which Mr. Nicholas would make the Church visible It is the Holy Scripture To conclude behold him come to the only place from whence the true Light can be drawn It is false saith he that this Author hath believed that the point concerning the Church cannot be proved by the Scriptures and that the proofs are not accommodated to the capacity of the Vulgar We have shewn Mr. Nicholas how much there is of Absurdity in what he says here that a man may prove the point concerning the Church by the Scripture after a manner that is fitted to the capacity of the Vulgar and yet we know not how to prove the other Articles of Faith which are controverted after the same manner It hath been made evident that the Controversie concerning the Church is the most difficult of all It hath been represented to him that to deside this Controversie by the Scripture according to the method which he hath imployed against us it is necessary that an ignorant man should be able to compare the Translations with the Originals and by consequence that he should understand Greek and Hebrew that he may be able to read the Commentaries of the Ancients and the Moderns and by consequence that he should be able to understand Latine All this is as necessary to determine one single Controversie as to determine a hundred We have proved unto him that it is false to say that a man may very well prove by Scripture the Soveraign Authority of the Church but that he cannot prove thereby the Trinity or Incarnation and on that subject he is reduced to an eternal silence For which reason we shall not press him farther on an Article which he grants us by his silence But it is necessary to acquaint you that his Affirmation is intirely false and rash viz. That the Holy Scripture furnishes sufficient Light to the Vulgar to make them see that the Roman Church is the true Church Either these Gentlemen mean that by the Scripture they can easily prove that there ought to be always a visible and infallible Church upon Earth or they mean that the Holy Scripture shews with its finger the Church of Rome and makes it known for the true Church to the Exclusion of all other Sects of Christians or to conclude they mean the Holy Scripture forms a Light to make the Roman Church visible because it contains includes and teaches all the Doctrines and Worship which this Church doth authorize and command As to the first sence although it should be true Popery would gain nothing thereby although they should prove even by the Scripture that there ought always to be a visible and infallible Church upon Earth this would not prove that this must be the Church of Rome For the Greek Church pretends to be that Church which is built upon the rock and against which the gates of hell cannot prevail to the exclusion of the Latine Church and 't is that in which we ought to observe the perpetual Illusion
of the Roman Doctors They oppress you with Sophisms to convince you that there ought to be a Judge an infallible Interpreter of Scripture a Church that cannot err Answer them in one word Although all this which you say should be true it would be no advantage to you we must seek this Church and this infallible Interpreter elsewhere for 't is certain you have erred I come to the second sence viz. That the Scripture makes a Light which renders the Church visible because it shews with the Finger the Roman Church as the true Church to the exclusion of all others Now this is a Falshood sensible to all the World the Holy Scripture speaks not one word of the Church of Rome or of her Infallibility 'T is true there is an Epistle addressed to the Church of Rome but St. Paul so little thought of her as infallible that he speaks to her as a Church that would fall or at least as one that might be cut off from the true Olive and from the root of Jesus Christ There remains only the third sence in which your Converters can say that the Scripture forms a Light which makes the Church of Rome visible 'T is that the Doctrine of the Scripture is found perfectly conformable to that of the Church of Rome That is it which they must say if they will say any thing that is solid for the truth is that there is not any mark of the Church but this viz. Her conformity to the Holy Scripture Let alone therefore all this pretended heap of Marks of the Church which are either false or equivocal and keep you close to this alone Tell your Converters if you will make your Church visible to me let me see it conformable to the Scripture and 't is there you will reduce them to Extremities 'T is here that we have an evident proof that Popery is an Antichristian Religion Behold a proof to which all the subtilty of Hell can never oppose any thing we say then every Society and every Religion which hath nothing conformable with the Law of Jesus Christ is not the true Religion now Popery hath nothing conformable to the Law of Jesus Christ therefore it hath nothing of Christianity I intreat you to give attention to this If a Sect of the Turks calling themselves Mahometans had nothing among them like to the Alcoran which is the Law of Mahomet would you not tell them that they lie If the Jews calling themselves Jews should re-establish a Worship which hath nothing like the Worship prescribed by Moses would any one endure that they should say they were of the Religion of Moses Every Religion hath its Books and every Sect to shew that 't is of such a Religion ought to prove its conformity with those Books Common sence say thus If therefore Popery have nothing at all like the Writings of Christians 't is clear that 't is not Christianity Now this is it which we take for granted and which we are ready to prove before all sorts of Judges even Jews and Pagans viz. That Popery hath no conformity with the Scripture which is the common Law of Christians To be convinced of this my Brethren first separate Christianity from Popery in the Roman Church and don 't suffer yourselves to be blinded by what your Converters say unto you Are not we Christians Do we not believe one God in three Persons one Jesus crucified for the sins of men one Resurrection one Paradise and one Hell Does not the Scripture teach all this Is not our Religion therefore conformable to Revelation Answer them thereon Yea you are Christians in all that you believe with us but you are Antichristians in that wherein you believe without us These points whereof you speak are in the Scripture 't is true but 't is my Religion rather than yours 't is Christianity whereof 't is true I acknowledge you have preserved the Fundamentals But this makes nothing for your Religion which is Popery it makes nothing for Purgatory Invocation of Saints Adoration of Images and Reliques the Sacrifice of the Mass the Adoration of the Sacrament the Latine Tongue in the Worship of God a Communion without the Cup a Head of the Church besides Jesus Christ Behold Popery and 't is that which we maintain hath no conformity with the Scripture Indeed when your Converters will prove their Doctrines by the Scripture it seems they have renounced common Sence as well as Faith and Honesty To understand this there is no need to examine any Books of Controversie as they would fain perswade you there needs no more but eyes to open and read them For Example When they endeavour to prove the Pope is the Soveraign Head of the Church the Center of Unity the Mouth that utters Oracles and him to whom we must adhere if we will be saved and they produce to us for the whole proof these words Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not feed my sheep When say I they produce this and produce nothing else to prove the most important point of Popery which is the Authority of the Pope I do maintain that he must be stricken with a Spirit of Blockishness to regard it as proof He must I dare say be abandoned to a Spirit of Reprobation to suppose that the Scripture that tells us of Pastors and Teachers as Guides of the Church should not speak one word of this great Office of Pope and Soveraign Pastor When for the Sacrifice of the Mass propitiatory for the living and the dead they produce to us as proof from the holy Scriptures these Texts Melchizedeck offered bread and wine they shall offer to my Name a pure sacrifice from the rising of the Sun to the going down of the same Soveraign wisdom hath prepared her victuals and mingled her wine We have an Altar of which they have no right to partake which serve the Tabernacle Do this in remembrance of me When say I they produce these passages for the intire proof of the Sacrifice of the Mass are you not tempted to believe they do not speak in good earnest for nothing seems more opposite to sound sense To prove that we must invocate Saints they refer us to those words of Jacob The Angel which delivered me from all evil keep the lads and those of Eliphaz to Job And to which of the Saints wilt thou turn thy self that is to say of the Saints which are upon Earth and those of Daniel Have mercy upon Israel for the sake of Abraham Isaac and Jacob. To prove that we must prostrate our selves before Images and worship Reliques they produce those words of God to Moses Pluck off thy shoes for the place where thou standest is holy ground and those of David Worship before his footstool and those of St. Paul to Timothy From thy childhood thou hast learnt the holy Scriptures Here is nothing to be laught at