imagination and groundless presumption which hath not the least countenance given unto it by Scripture or Antiquity What a perplexed condition must you needs cast men into if they shall attend unto your perswasions to rest on the Pope's unerring guidance for all their Certainty in Religion when the first motive you propose unto them to gain their Assent is a Proposition so far destitute of any cogent Evidence of its Truth or innate Credibility that it is apparently false and easily manifested so to be 3. Were it never so true as it is notoriously false yet it would not one jot promote your design It is about Peter the Apostle and not the Pope of Rome that we are yet discoursing Do you think a man can easily commence per saltum from the imaginary Principality of Peter unto the Infallibility of the present Pope of Rome Quid Pape cum Petro what relation is there between the one and other Suppose a man have so good a mind unto your company as to be willing to set out with you in this ominous stumbling at the threshold what will you next lead him unto You say II. That S t Peter besides his Apostolical Power and Office wherein setting aside the prerogative of his Princedome before mentioned the rest of the Apostles were partakers with him had also an Oecumenical Episcopal Power invested in him which was to be transmitted unto others after him His Office purely Apostolical you have no mind to lay claim unto It may be you dispair of being able to prove that your Pope is immediately called and sent by Christ that he is furnished with a power of working Miracles and such other things as concurred to the constitution of the Office Apostolical and perhaps himself hath but little mind to be exercised in the discharge of that Office by travelling up and down poor despised persecuted to preach the Gospel Monarchy Rule Supremacie Authority Jurisdiction Infallibility are words that better please him And therefore have you mounted this Notion of Peters Episcopacy whereunto you would have us think that all the fine things you so love and dote upon are annexed Poor labouring perfected Peter the Apostle may die and be forgotten but Peter the Bishop harnessed with Power Principality Soveraignty and Vicarship of Christ This is the man you enquire after But you will have very hard work to find him in the Scripture or Antiquity yea the least footstep of him And do you think indeed that this Episcopacy of Peter distinct from his Apostleship is a meet stone to be layed in the foundation of faith It is a thing that plainly overthrows his Apostleship For if he were a Bishop properly and distinctly he was no Apostle If an Apostle not such a Bishop That is if his Care were confined unto any one Church and his residence required therein as the Case is with a proper Bishop how could the Care of all the Churches be upon him How could he be obliged to pass up and down the world in pursuit of his Commission of preaching the Gospel unto all Nations or to travail up and down as the necessity of the Churches did require But you will say that he was not Bishop of this or that particular but of the Church Vniversal But I supposed you had thought him Bishop of the Church of Rome and that you will plead him afterwards so to have been And I must assure you that he that thinks the Church of Rome in the dayes of Peter and Paul was the same with the Church Catholick and not looked on as particular a Church as that of Hierusalem or Ephesus or Corinth is a person with whom I will have as little to do as I can in this matter For to what purpose should any one spend time to debate things with men absurd and unreasonable and who will affirm that it is midnight at noon day I know the Apostolical Office did include in it the power of all other Offices in the Church whatever as the less are included in the greater But that he who was an Apostle should formally also be a Bishop though an Apostle might exercise the whole Power and Office of a Bishop is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 somewhat allyed unto Impossibilities Do you see what a Quagmire you are building upon I know if a man will let you alone you will raise a structure which after you have painted and gilded you may prevail with many harbourless Creatures to accept of an habitation therein For when you have layed your foundation out of sight you will pretend that all your building is on a Rock whereas indeed you have nothing but the rotten posts of such Suppositions as these to support it withall But suppose that Peter was thus a Prince Monarch Apostle Bishop that is a Catholick Particular Officer What is that to you Why III. This Peter came and preached the Gospel at Rome Though you can by no means prove this Assertion so as to make it de fide or necessarily to be believed of any one man in the world much less to become meet to enjoy a place among those fundamentals that are tendred unto us to bring us unto Settlement in Religion yet being a matter very uncertain and of little importance I shall not much contend with you about it Witnesses meerly humane and fallible you have for it a great many and exceptions almost without number may be put in against your Testimonies and those of great weight and moment Now although that which you affirm might be granted you without any reall advantage unto your Cause or the enabling of you to draw any lawfull inferences to uphold your Papal claim by yet to let you see on what sorry uncertain presumptions you build your faith and profession and that in and about things which you make of indispensable necessity unto Salvation I shall in our passage remind you of some few of them which I profess seriously unto you make it not only Questionable unto me whether or no but also somewhat improbable that ever Peter came to Rome 1. Though those that follow and give their assents unto this Story are many yet it was taken up upon the credit and report of one or two Persons as Eusebius manifests Lib. 2. cap. 25. Whether Dionysius Corinthius or Papias first began the Story I know not but I know certainly that both of them manifested themselves in other things to be a little too credulous 2. That which many of them built their Credulity upon is very uncertain if not certainly false namely that Peter wrote his first Epistle from Rome which he calls Babylon in the Subscription of it But wherefore he should then so call it no man can tell The Apocalypse of John who prophesied what Rome should be in after-Ages and thereon what name should be accommodated unto it for its false worship and Persecution was not yet written Nor was there any thing yet spoken of or known among the Disciples whence
abode of Peter there never once mentions him in any of the Epistles which from thence he wrote unto the Churches and his fellow labourers though he doth remember very many others that were with him in the City 7. He asserts that in one of his Epistles from thence which as I think sufficiently proves that Peter was not then there for he saies plainly that in his triall he was forsaken by all men that no man stood by him which he mentions as their sin and prays for pardon for them Now no man can reasonably think that Peter was amongst the number of them whom he complained of 8. The Story is not consistent with what is expresly written of Peter by Luke in the Acts and Paul in his Epistle to the Galatians Paul was converted unto the faith about the 38 th year of Christ or 5 th after his Ascension After this he continued 3 years preaching the Gospel about Damascus and in Arabia In the 40 th or 41 st year of Christ he came to Jerusalem to conferr with Peter Gal. 1. which was the first of Claudius As yet therefore Peter was not removed out of Judaea 14 years after that is either after his first going up to Jerusalem or rather 14 years after his first Conversion he went up again to Jerusalem and found Peter still there which was in the 52 d year of Christ and the 13 th of laudius Or if you should take the date of the 14 years mentioned by him shorter by 5 or 6 years and reckon their beginning from the passion and Resurrection of Christ which is not improbable then this going up of Paul to Hierusalem will be found to be the same with his going up to the Councel from Antioch about the 6 th or rather 7 th year of Claudius Peter was then yet certainly at Hierusalem That is about the 46 th year of Christ some while after you would have the Church to be founded by him at Rome After this when Paul had taken a long progress through many Countreys wherein he must needs spend some years returning unto Antioch Act. 18. 22. he there again met with Peter Gal. 2. 11. Peter being yet still in the East to wards the end of the Raign of Claudius At Antioch where Paul found him if any of your Witnesses may be believed he abode 7 years Besides he was now very old and ready to lay down his mortality as our Lord had shewed him and in all probability after his remove from Antioch spent the residue of his dayes in the Eastern Dispersion of the Jews For 9 ly much of the Apostles work in Palestine among the Jews was now drawing to an end the elect being gathered in troubles were growing upon the Nation and Peter had as we observed before agreed with Paul to take the Care of the Circumcision of whom the greatest number by far excepting only Judaea its self was in Babylon and the Eastern Nations about it Now whether these and the like observations out of the Scripture concerning the Course of S t Peters life be not sufficient to out-ballance the Testimony of your disagreeing Witnesses impartial and unprejudiced men may judge For my part I do not intend to conclude peremptorily from them that Peter was never at Rome or never preached the Gospel there but that your Assertion of it is improbable and built upon very Questionable grounds that I suppose I may safely conclude And God forbid that we should once imagine the present faith of Christians or their Profession of Christian Religion to be built upon such uncertain Conjectures or to be concerned in them whether they be true or false Nothing can be spoken with more reproach unto it than to say that it stands in need of such supportment And yet if this one Supposition fail you all your building falls to the ground in a moment Never was so stupendous a fabrick raised on such imaginary foundations But that we may proceed Let us suppose this also that Peter was at Rome and preached the Gospel there What will thence follow unto your advantage what towards the settlement of any man in Religion or bringing us unto the Unity of faith the things enquired after He was at he preached the Gospel at Hierusalem Samaria Joppa Antioch Babylon and sundry other places and yet we find no such Consequences pleaded from thence as you urge from his Coming to Rome Wherefore you adde 1 V. That St Peter was Bishop of the Roman Church that he fixed his seat there and there he died In gathering up your Principles I follow the footsteps of Bellarmine Baronius and other great Champions of your Church so that you cannot except against the method of our proposals of them Now this Conclusion is built on these three Suppositions 1. That Peter had an Episcopal Office distinct from his Apostolical 2. That he was at Rome 3. That he fixed his Episcopal Sea there whereof the Second is very Questionable the First and Last are absolutely false So that the Conclusion its self must needs be a notable fundamentall Principle of Faith It is true and I shewed it before that the Apostles when they came into any Church did exercise all the Power of Bishops in and over that Church but not as Bishops but as Apostles As a King may in any of the Cities of his dominions where he comes exercise all the Authority of the Mayor or particular Governour of that place where he is which yet doth not make him become the Mayor of the place which would be a diminution of his royall Dignity No more did the Apostles become Local Bishops because of their exercising Episcopal Power in any particular Church by virtue of their Authority Apostolical wherein that other was included as hath been declared And Cui Bono to what purpose serves this fictitious Episcopacy All the Priviledges that you contend for the Assignation of unto Peter were beâ—â—owed upon him as an Apostle or as a believing disciple of Christ. As such he had those peculiar grants made unto him The Keys of the Kingdome of heaven were given unto him as an Apostle or according to S t Austin as a believer as such was he commanded to feed the sheep of Christ. It was unto him as an Apostle or a professing believer that Christ promised to build the Church on the faith that he had professed You reckon all these things among the priviledges of Peter the Apostle who as such is said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or first in order As an Apostle he had the Care of all Churches committed unto him As an Apostle he was divinely inspired and enabled infallibly to reveal the mind of Christ. All these things belonged unto him as an Apostle and what Priviledge he could have besides as a Bishop neither you nor I can tell no more than you can when how or by whom he was called and ordained unto any such office all which we know well enough concerning
his Apostleship If you will then have any to succeed him in the enjoyment of any or of all these Privileges you must bespeak him to succeed him in his Apostleship and not in his Bishoprick Besides as I said before this imaginary Episcopacy which limits and confines him unto a particular Church as it doth if it be an Episcopacy properly so called is destructive of his Apostolical Office and of his Duty in answering the Commission given him of preaching the Gospel to every Creature following the Guidance of Gods Providence and conduct of the Holy Ghost in his way Many of the Ancients I confess affirm that Peter sate Bishop of the Church of Rome but they all evidently use the word in a large sense to imply that during his abode there for that there he was they did suppose be took upon him the especial Care of that Church For the same Persons constantly affirm that Paul also was Bishop of the same Church at the same time which cannot be otherwise understood than in the large sense mentioned And Ruffinus Prafat Recog Clement ad Gâ—udent unriddles the mystery Linus saith he Clâ—tus fuerunt ante Clementem Episcopi in â—rbe Roma sed superstite Petro videlicet at illi Episcopatûs Curam gererent iste verò Apostolatûs simpleret officium Linus and Cletus were Bishops in the City of Rome before Clemens but whilest Peter was yet alive they performing the Duty of Bishops Peter attending unto his office Apostolical And hereby doth he utterly discard the present new plea of the foundation of your faith For though he assert that Peter the Apostle was at Rome yet he denies that he ever sate Bishop there but names two others that ruled that Church at Rome joyntly during his time either in one Assembly or in two the one of the Circumcision the other of the Gentile-Converts And if Peter were thus Bishop of Rome and entred as you say upon his Episcopacy at his first coming thither whence is it that you are forced to confess that he was so long absent from his charge Five years saith Bellarmine but that will by no means salve the Difficulty Seven saith Onuphrius at once and abiding at one place the most part of his time besides being spent in other places and yet allowing him no time at all for those places where he certainly was Eighteen saith Cortefius strange that he should be so long absent from his especiall Cure and never write one word to them for their instruction or consolation whereas in the mean time he wrote two Epistles unto them who it seems did not in any speciall manner belong unto his Charge I wish we could once find our way out of this maze of uncertainties This is but a sad disquisition after Principles of faith to settle men in Religion by them And yet if we should suppose this also wee are farre enough from our journeys end The present Bishop of Rome is as yet behind the curtain neither can he appear upon the stage untill hâ— be ushered in by one pretence more of the same nature with them that went before And this is V. That some one must needs succeed Peter in his Episcopacy But why so why was it not needfull that one should succeed him in his Apostleship Why was it not needfull that Paul should have a successor as well as Peter and John as well as either of them Because you say that was necessary for the Church not so these But who told you so where is the proof of what you averre who made you judges of what is necessary and what is not necessary for the Church of Christ when himself is silent And why is not the succession of an Apostle necessary as well as of such a Bishop as you fancie had it not been better to have had one still residing in the Church of whose Infallibility there could have been no doubt or question One that had the power of working Miracles that should have no need to scare the people by shaking fire out of his slieve as your Pope Gregory the 7 th was wont to do if Cardinall Benno may be believed But you have now carried us quite off from the Scripture and Story and probable conjectures to attend unto you whilest you give the Lord Jesus prudentiall advice about what is necessary for his Church It must needs be so it is meet it should be so is the best of your proof in this matter Only your fratres Walenburgici adde that never any man ordained the Government of a Community more weakly than Christ must be supposed to have done the Government of his Church if he have not appointed such a Successour to Peter as you imagin But it is easie for you to assert what you please of this nature and as easie for any one to reject what you so assert if he please These things are without the verge of Christian Religion 〈◊〉 Towers and Palaces in the ayr But what must S t Peter be succeeded in his Episcopacy and what therewithall his Authority Power and Jurisdiction over all Churches in the world with an unerring judgement in matters of faith But all these belonged unto Peter as far as ever they belonged unto him as he was an Apostle long before you fancie him to have been a Bishop As then his Episcopacy came without these things so for ought you know it might goe without it This is a matter of huge importance in that Systeme of Principles which you tender unto us to bring us unto settlement in Religion and the Unity of Faith would you would consider a little how you may give some tolerable appearance of proof unto that which the Scripture is so utterly silent in yea which lyes against the whole Oeconomy of the Lord Jesus Christ in his ordering of his Church as delivered unto us therein dic aliquem dic Quintiliane colorem But we come now to the Pope whom here we first find latentem post Priâ—cipia and coming forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with his Claim For you say VI. That the Bishop of Rome is the man that thus suecceds Peter in his Episcopacy which though it were settled at Rome was over the whoee Catholick Church So you say and so you profess your selves to believe And we desire that you would not take it amiss if we desire to know upon what grounds you do so being unwilling to cast away all Consideration that we may embrace a fanatical Credo in this unlikely business We desire therefore to know who appointed that there should be any such succession who that the Bishop of Rome should be this Successor Did Jesus Christ do it we may justly expect you should say He did but if you do we desire to know when where how seeing the Scripture is utterly silent of say such thing Did S t Peter himself do it Pray manifest unto us that by the appointment of Jesus Christ he had power so to do and that
over the flocks but Ministers of their faith By these are the flocks of Christ governed as by shepherds appointed by him the great Bishop and Shepherd of their souls according to the Rules by him prescribed for the rule of the one and obedience of the other But if by governed by another man you mean absolutely supreamly at his will and pleasure then we deny that any Disciple of Christ is in the things of God so to be governed by any man and affirm that to assert it is to cast down Jesus Christ from his Throne But you say if he be not immediate head unto all but Ministers head the people and Christ heads the Ministers this in effect is nothing but to make every Minister a Bishop Why do you not plainly say what it is more then manifest you would have All this while you heed no more the Laws of the Land then constitutions of the Gospel Answ. I have told you how Christ is the immediate Head unto all and yet how he hath appointed others to preside in his Churches under him and that this should infer an equality in all that are by him appointed to that work is most senseless to imagine nor did I in the least intimate any such thing but only that therefore there was no need of any one supream head of the whole Catholick Church nor any place or room left for such an one without the deposition of Christ himself Because the King is the only supream Head of all his people doth it therefore follow that if he appoint Constables to rule in every parish with that allotment of power which by his Laws he gives unto them and Justices of Peace to rule over them in an whole County that therefore every Constable in effect is a Justice of Peace or that there is a sameness in their office Christ is the head of every man that is in the Church be he Bishop or Minister or private man and when the Ministers are said to head the people or the Bishops to head them the expression is improper an inferiour Ministerial subordinate rule being expressed by the name of that which is supream and absolute or they head them not absolutely but in some respect only as every one of them dischargeth the Authority over and towards them wherewith he is intrusted This assertion of Christs sole absolute Headship and denial of any Monarchical state in the Church Catholick but what ariseth from thence doth not as every child may see concern the difference that is about the superiority of Bishops to Ministers or Presbyters For notwithstanding this there are degrees in the Ministry of the Church and several orders of men are engaged therein and whatever there are there might have been more had it seemed to our good Lord Christ to appoint them And whatever order of men may be supposed to be instituted by him in his Church he must be supposed to be the Head of them all and they are all to serve him in the Duties and Offices that they have to discharge towards the Church and one another This headship of Christ is the thing that you are to oppose and its exclusiveness to the substitution of an absolute Head over the whole Catholick Church in his place because of his bodily absence from the earth But this you cast out of sight and instead thereof fall upon the equality of Bishops and Ministers which no way ensues thereon Both Bishops and Presbyters agreeing well enough in the Truth we assert and plead for This you say is contrary to the Gospel and the Law of the Land What is I pray that Christ is the only absolute Head of the Catholick Church No but that Bishops and Ministers are in effect all one But what is that to your purpose will it advantage your Cause what way ever that problem be determined Was any occasion offered you to discourse upon that Question Nay you perceive well enough your self that this is nothing at all to your design and therefore in your following discourse you double and sophisticate making it evident that either you understand not your self what you say or that you would not have others understand you or that you confound all things with a design to deceive for when you come to speak of the Gospel you attempt to prove the appointment of one supream Pastor to the whole Catholick Church and by the Law of the Land the Superiority of Bishops over Ministers as though these things were the same or had any relation one to another whereas we have shewed the former in your sense to be destuctive to the latter Truth never put any man upon such subter fuges and I hope the difficulties that you find your self perplexed withall may direct you at length to find that there is a deceit in your right hand But let us hear your own words As for the Gospel the Lord who had been visible Governour and Pastor of his flock on earth when he was now to depart hence as all the Apostles expected one to be chosen to succeed him in his care so did he notwithstanding his own invisible presence and providence over his flock publickly appoint one And when he taught them that he who was greatest among them should be as the least he did not deny but suppose one greater and taught in one and the same breath both that he was over them and for what he was over them namely to feed not to tyrannize not to domineer and hurt but to direct comfort and conduct his flock in all humility and tenderness as a servant of all their spiritual necessities and if a Bishâ—p be otherwise affected it is the fault of his Person not his place And what is it that you would prove hereby is it that Bishops are above Ministers which in the words immediately foregoing you asserted and in those next ensuing confirm from the Law of the Land is there any tendency in your Discourse towards any such purpose Nay do not your self know that what you seek to insinuate namely the instiâ—ution of one supream Pastor of the whole Catholick Church one of the Apostles to be above and ruler over all the rest of the Apostles and the whole Church besides is perfectly destructive of the Hierarchy of Bishops in England as established by Law and also at once casting down the main if not only foundation that they plead for their station and order from the Gospel For all Prelate Protestants as you call them assert an equality in all the Apostles and a superiority in them to the 70. Disciples whence by a parity of reason they conclude unto he superiority of Bishops over Ministers to be continued in the Church And are you not a fair Advocate for your Cause and well meet for the reproving of others for not consenting unto them But waving that which you little câ—re for and are not at all concerned in let us see how you prove that which we know you
A VINDICATION â—F THE ANIMADVERSIONS ON FIAT LUX Wherein the Principles OF THE ROMAN CHURCH As to Moderation Unity and Truth are Examined And sundry Important Controversies concerning the Rule of Faith Papal Supremacy the Mass Images c. Discussed By John Owen D. D. LONDON Printed for Ph. Stephens at the Gilded-Lion in St. Pauls Church-yard and George Sawbridge at the Bible on Ludgate Hill 1664. Imprimatur Tho. Grigg R. in Christ. P. D. Humfr. Episc. Lond. à Sac. domesticis Decemb. 9. 1663. TO THE READER Christian Reader ALthough our Lord Jesus Christ hath laid blessed and stable foundations of Unity Peace and Agreement in judgement and affection amongst all his Disciples and given forth Command for their attendance unto them that thereby they might glorifie him in the world and promote their own spiritual advantage yet also foreknowing what effect the crafts of Satan in conjunction with the darkness and lusts of men would produce that no offence might thence be taken against him or any of his wayes he hath sorewarned all men by his Spirit what Differences Divisions Schisms and Heresies would ensue on the publication of the Gospel and arise even among them that should profess subjection unto his Authority and Law And accordingly it speedily came to pass For what Solomon sayes that he discovered concerning the first Creation namely that God made man upright but he sought out many inventions or immixed himself in endless questions the same fell out in the new creation or erection of the Church of Christ. The state of it was by him formed upright and all that belonged unto it were of one heart and one soul. But this harmony and perfection of beauty in answer to his Will and Institution lasted not long among them many who mixed themselves with those Primitive converts or succeeded them in their profession quickly seeking out perverse inventions Hence in the dayes of the Apostles themselves there were not only schisms and divisions made in sundry Churches of their own planting with disputes about Opinions and needless impositions by those of the Circumcision who believed but also opposition was made unto the very fundamental Doctrines of the Deity and Incarnation of the Son of God by the Spirit of Antichrist then entring into the world as is evident from their Writings and Epistles But yet as all this while our Lord Jesus Christ according to his promise preserved the root of Love and Vnity amongst them who sincerely believed in him entire as he doth still and will do to the end by giving the one and selfsame spirit to guide sanctifie and unite them all unto himself so the care and Authority of the Apostles during their abode in the flesh so far prevailed that notwithstanding some temporary impeachments of Love and Union in or amongst the Churches yet no signal prejudice of any long continuance befell them For either the miscarriages which they fell into were quickly retrieved by them the truth infallibly cleared and provision made for Peace Vnity and Moderation in and about things of less concernment or else the evil guilt and danger of them remained only with and upon some particular persons the notoriety of whose wickedness and folly cast them out by common consent from the communion of all the Disciples of Christ. But no sooner was that sacred Society 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with their immediate successors as Egesippus speaks in Eusebius departed unto their rest with God but that the Church it self which untill then was preserved a pure and incorruppted Virgin began to be vexed with abiding contention and otherwise to degenerate from its primitive original purity From thence forward especially after the heat of bloody and fiery persecutions began to abate far the greatest part of Ecclesiastical Records consists in relations of the Divisions Differences Schisms and Heresies that fell out amongst them who professed themselves the Disciples of Christ. For those failings errors and mistakes which were found in men of peaceable minds the Church indeed of those dayes extended her Peace and Vnity if Justin Martyr and others may be believed to such as the seeming warmer zeal and really colder charity of the succeeding Ages could not bear withal But yet divisions and disputes were multiplyed into such an excess as that the Gentiles fetcht advantage from them not only to reproach all Christians withall but to deterr others from the proâ—ession of Christianity So Celsus in his third Book deals with them for saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 At first when they were but a few they were of one mind or agreed well enough But being increased and the multitude of them scattered abroad they were presently divided again and again and every one would have his own party or division and as in a divided multitude opposed and reproved one another so that they had no communion among themselves but only in name which for shame they retain So doth he for his purpose as is the manner of men invidiously exaggerate the differences that were in those early times amongst Christians for he wrote about the dayes of Trajan the Emperour That others of them took the same course is testified by Clemens Stromat lib. 7. Augustin lib. de Ovib. c. 15. and sundry others of the antient Writers of the Church But that no just offence as to the truth or any of the wayes of Christ might hence be taken we are as I said before forewarned of all these things by the Lord himself and his Apostles as also of the use and necessity of such events and issues Whence Origen cryes out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Most admirable unto me seems the saying of Paul There must be Heresies amongst you that those who are approved may be manifest Nor can any just excception be hence taken against the Gospel it self For it doth not belong unto the excellency or â—ignity of any thing to free it self from all opposition but only to preserve it self from being prevailed against and to remain victorious as the sacred truths of Christ have done and will do unto the end Not a few indeed in these evil dayes wherein we live the ends of the world and the difficulties with which they are attended being come upon us persons ignorant of things past and regardless of things to come in bondage to their present lusts and pleasures are ready to make use of the pretence of divisions and differences among Christians to give up themselves unto Atheism and indulge to their pleasures like the beasts that perish Let us eat and drink for too morrow we shall dye Quid aliud inscribi poterat sepulchro bovis But whatever they pretend to the contrary it may be easily evinced that it is their personal dislike of that holy obedience which the Gospel requireth not the differences that are about the Doctrines of it which alienates their minds from the truth They will not some of them foregoe all Philosophical inquiries after the
acknowledge her a true Church as a theif is a true man who will not acknowledge her to be a pure Church much less most pure God be mercifull to poor worms this boasting doth not become us it is not unlike hers who cryed Is it as a Queen and shall see no sorrow I wish you begin to be sensible and ashamed of it But yet I fear it is otherwise for whereas in your Fiat you had proclaimed your Roman Church and Party to be absolutely innocent and unblameable you tell us pag. 10. of your Epistle that you can make it appear that it is far more innocent and amiable than you have made it more than absolutely innocent it seems a note so high that it sounds harshly And whereas we shall manifest your Church to have lost her native beauty we know that no painting of her which is all you can do will render her truly amiable unto a spirituall eye She hath too often defiled her self to pretend now to be lovely But to this you say I reply The Church that then was in the Apostles time was indeed true not the Roman Church that now is and adde So so then I say that former true Church must fall sometime or other when did she fall and how did the sall by Apostasie Heresie or Schisme S r you very lamely represent my Answer that you might seem to say something unto it when indeed you say nothing at all I discover unto you the equivocation you use in that expression the Church of Rome and shew you that the thing now so called by you had neither being nor name neither essence nor affection in the dayes of old it s very being is but the terminus as quem of a Churches fall I shewed you also that the Church of old that was pure fell not whilest it was so but that the men who succeeded in the place where they lived in the profession of Religion gradually fell from the purity of that profession which the Church at its first planting did enjoy But all that discourse you pass by and repeat again your former Question to which you subjoyn my first Answer which was it was possible she might fall by an Earthquake as did those of Colosse and Laodicea to which you We speak not here of any casuall or naturall downfall or death of mortals by Plague Famine or Earthquake but a morall and voluntary lapse in faith What do you speak to me of Earthquakes It is well you do so now explain your self your former enquiry was only in generall how or by what means she ceased to be what she had been before as though it were impossible to assign any such neither did I exclude the sense whereunto you now restrain your words And had I only shewed you that it was possible she might fall and come to nothing and yet not by any of the wayes or means by you mentioned without proceeding unto the consideration of them also yet your especiall enquiry being resolved into this generall one from whence it is taken how a pure flourishing Church may cease to be so I had rendred your enquiry useless unto your present purpose though I had not answered your intention For certainly that which ceaseth to be ceaseth to be pure seeing non entis nullae sunt affectiones The Church of the Brittains in this part of the â—sland now called England was once as pure a Church as ever was the Church of Rome yet she ceased to be long since and that neither by Apostasie Here sie nor Schisme but by the sword of the Saxons And to tell you the truth I do not think the old Church of Rome unconcerned in this instance then especially when Rome was left desolate by Totilas and without inhabitant for the Church of Rome is urbis and not as you vainly imagine orbiâ— Ecclesia Again I told you she might fall by Idolatry and so neither by Apostasie Heresie or Schisme To which you reply Good S r Idolatry is a mixt misdemeanour both in faith and manners I speak of the single one of faith and he that falls by Idolatry if he keep still some parts of Christianity entire he falls by Heresie by Apostasie if he keep none I am perswaded you are the first that ever gave this description of Idolatry and the last that will do so it is a mixt misdemeanour in faith and manners Manners you speak of in contradistinction to Faith and you so explain your self in which sense they relate only unto morall conversation regulated by the second Table That Idolatry hath been and is constantly attended with corruption in manners the Apostle declares Rom. 1. and I willingly grant but how in its self or its own nature it should come to be a mixt misdemeanour in faith and in manners I know not neither can you tell me which is the fleshy which is the fishy part of this Dagon what it is in it that is a misdemeanour in faith and what in manners According to this description of yours an Idolater should be an ill mannered or an unmannerly Heretick But you speak of the single misdemeanour in faith but who gave you leave so to restrain your enquiry I allowed you before to except against one instance whereby many a Church hath fallen but if you will except Idolatry and Manners also your endeavour to provide a shelter for your guilt is shamefull and vain For what you except out of your enquiry if you confess not to have been yet you do that it may be or might have been And you do wisely to let your Adversary know that he is to strike you only where you suppose your self armed but by all means must let your naked parts alone and doubtless he must needs be very wise who will take your advice The Church of Judah was once a pure Church in the dayes of David how came she then to fall by Apostasie Heresie or Schisme I answer if you will give me leave she fell by Idolatry and corruption of manners against both which the Prophets were protestants 2 King 17. 13. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God protested against them by his Prophets Again the same Church reformed in the dayes of Ezra Nehemiah Zerubbabel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the men of the Great Congregation was a pure Church how did it fall not by Idolatry as formerly but by corruption of life unbelief and rejecting the Word of God for superstitious traditions untill it became a den of Thieves You see then there are other wayes of a Churches falling from its pristine purity than those by you insisted on And if you shall enquire how it may fall you must exclude nothing out of your enquiry whereby it may do so and whereby some Churches have done so And if you will have my thoughts in this matter they are that the beginning of the fall of your Church and many others lay in unbelief corruption of life conformity to the world and other sins
this that where any persons or Churches are at variance or difference about any thing concerning Religion or the worship of God the Scripture is not sufficient for the Vmpirage of that Difference so that they may be reconciled and center in the Profession of the same Truth I wish you would now tell me what discrepancy there is between the Assertion which I ascribed unto you and that which your self here avow I suppose they are in substance the same and as such will be owned by every one that understands any thing of the matters about which we treat And this is so spoken unto in the Animadversions that you have no mind to undertake the examination of it but labour to divert the discourse unto that which may appear something else but indeed is not so 3. For your Distinction between Protestants and Puritans in England I know not well what to make of it I know no Puritans in England that are not Protestants though all the Protestants in England do not absolutely agree in every punctilio relating to Religion nor in all things relating unto the outward worship of God no more than did the Churches in the Apostles dayes or than your Catholicks do You give us then a Distinction like that which a man may give between the Church of Rome and the Jesuits or Dominicans or the Sons of S t. Benet or of S t Francis of Assize A Distinction or Distribution of the Genus into the Genus and one Species comprehended under it as if you should have said that Animal is either Animal or Homo 4. Though I had rather therefore that you had placed your Instance between the Church of Rome and Protestants yet because any instance of Persons that have different Apprehensions about things belonging to the worship of God will suffice us as to the present purpose I shall let it pass Only I desire you once more that when you would endeavour to render any thing way or acting of men odious that you would forbear to cast the Scripture into a Copartnership therein which here you seem to do The Puritan you say with the Scripture rose up and rebelled Rebellion is the name of an outragious Evil such as the Scripture giveth not the least Countenance unto And therefore when you think meet to charge it upon any you may do well not to say that they do it with the Scripture It will not be to your comfort or advantage so to do This is but my advice you may do as you see cause Tales Casus Cassandra canebat 5. The Differences you suppose and look upon as undeterminable by the Scripture are about things that in themselves really and in truth belong unto Christian Religion or such as do not so indeed but are only fancied by some men so to do If they are of this latter sort as the most of the Controversies which we have with you are as about your Mass Purgatory the Pope we account that all Differences about them are sufficiently determined in the Scriptures because they are no where mentioned in them And this must needs be so if the Word of God be as you here grant the sufficient and only means both of our Conversion and Settlement as well in Truth as in Vertue S r I had no sooner written these words in that haste wherein I treat with you but I suspected a necessity of craving your pardon for supposing my Inference confirmed by your Concession For whereas you had immediately before set down the Assertion supposed to be yours about the Scriptures you adde the words now mentioned Gods Word is the sufficient and only means of our Conversion and Settlement in the Truth I did not in the least suspect that you intended any Legerdemain in the business but that the Scripture and Gods Word had been only various denominations with you of the same precise Thing as they are with us Only I confess at the first view I wondred how you could reconcile this Assertion with the known Principles of your Church and besides I knew it to be perfectly destructive of your design in your following Enquiry But now I fear you play hide and seek in the ambiguity your Church hath put upon that Title Gods Word which it hath applyed unto your unwritten Traditions as well as unto the written Word as the Jews apply the same term unto their Orall Law And therefore as I said before I crave your pardon for supposing my Inference confirmed by your Concession wherein I fear I was mistaken and only desire you that for the future you would speak your mind plainly and candidly as it becomes a Christian and Lover of Truth to do But my Assertion I esteem never the worse though it have not the happiness to enjoy your approbation especially considering that in the particular Instances mentioned there are many things delivered in Scripture inconsistent with and destructive of your notions about them sufficient to exterminate them from the Confines of the City of God 6. Suppose the matters in difference do really belong unto Religion and the worship of God and that the Difference lyes only in mens various Conceptions of them you ask Can the Scripture alone of its self decide the business What do you mean by alone of its self If you mean without mens application of themselves unto it and subjecting of their Consciences unto its Authoritative decisions neither it nor any thing else can do it The matter its self is perfectly stated in the Scripture whether any men take notice of it or no but their various apprehensions about it must be regulated by their applications unto it in the way mentioned On this only Supposition that those who are at variance about things which really appertain unto the Religion of Jesus Christ will refer the determination of them unto the Scripture and bring the Conâ—eptions of their minds to be regulated thereby standing unto its Arbitriment it is able alone and of its self to end all their differences and settle them all iu the Truth This hath been proved unto you a thousand times and confirmed by most clear Testimonies of the Scripture its self with Arguments taken from its Nature Perfection and the End of its giving forth unto men as also from the practise of our Lord Jesus and his Apostles with their directions and commands given unto us for the same Purpose from the Practise of the First Churches with innumerable Testimonies of the Ancient Fathers and Doctors Neither can this be denied without that horrible Derogation from its Perfection and Plenitude so reverenced by them of old which is objected unto you for your so doing Protestants suppose the Scripture to be given forth by God to be unto the Church â—a perfect Rule of that Faith and Obedience which he requires at the hands of the sons of men They suppose that it is such a Revelation of his Mind or Will as is intelligible unto all them that are concerned to know
endeavours of men in their sleep wherein great workings of spirits and Fancy produce no effects I confess notwithstanding all this others may be moderate towards you I judg it their duty so to be I desire they may be so but how you should exercise moderation towards others I cannot so well discern Only as unto the former so much more am I relieved as unto this Principle from the perswasion I have of the candour and ingenuity of many individuall Persons of your Profession which will not suffer them to be captivated under the Power of such corrupt prejudices as these And for my part if I could approve of externall force in any Case in matters of Religion it would be against the promoters of the Principle mentioned Cogendus In mores hominemque Creon When men under pretence of Zeal for Religion depose all sense of the Laws of Nature and humanity some earnestness may be justified in unteaching them their untoward Catechisms which lye indeed not only against the design Spirit Principles and letter of the Gospell but Terrarum leges mundi foedera the very foundations of Reason on which men coalesce into civill society But as we observed before out of one of the Anfients Force hath no place in or about the Law of Christ one way or other That which gave occasion unto this Discourse was your insinuation of the Scriptures Insufficiency for the settlement of men in the Unity of Faith the contrary whereof being the great Principle of Protestancy I was willing a little to enlarge my self unto the consideration of your Principles and ours not only with reference unto the Vnity of Faith but also as unto that moderation which you pretend to plead for and the want whereof you charge on Protestants premising it unto the ensuing discourse wherein you will meet with a full and a direct Answer unto your Question CHAP. VII Vnity of Faith wherein it consists Principles of Protestants as to the setling men in Religion and Vnity of Faith proposed and confirmed THe next thing proposed as a Good to be aymed at is Vnity in Faith and settlement or infallible assurance therein This is a Good desireable for its self whereas the moderation treated of is only a medium of relief against other evils untill this may be attained And therefore though it be upon supposition of our Differences earnestly to be endeavoured after yet it is not to be rested in as though the utmost of our Duty consisted in it and we had no prospect beyond it It is a Catholick Vnity in Faith which all Christians are to aym at and so both you and wee profess to doe only wee differ both about the Nature of it and the proper means of attaining it For the Nature of it you conceive it to consist in the explicit or implicit belief of all things and Doctrines determined on taught and proposed by your Church be believed and nothing else with faith supernaturall but what is so taught and proposed But this description of the Vnity of Faith wee can by no means admit of 1. Because it is Novel it hath no footstep in any writings of the Apostles nor of the first Fathers or Writers of the Church nor in the practice of the Disciples of Christ for many Ages That the Determination of the Roman Church and its proposall of things or Articles to be believed should be the adequate Rule of Faith unto all Believers is a matter as forreign unto all Antiquity as that the Prophesies of Montanus should be so 2. Because it makes the Unity of Faith after the full and last Revelation of the Will of God flux alterable and unstable lyable to increase and decrease whereas it is uniform constant alwayes the same in all Ages times and places since the finishing of the Canon of the Scriptures For we know and all the world knows that your Church hath determined many things lately some 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it were but yesterday to be believed which its self had never before determined and so hath increased the Rule of Faith moved its Center and extended its Circumference and what she may further determine and propose to morrow no man knows and your duty it is to be ready to believe whatever she shall so propose whereby you cannot certainly know unto your dying day whether you do believe all that may belong to the Vnity of Faith or no. Nay 3. your Church hath determined and proposed to be believed express Contradictions which Determinations abiding on record you are not agreed which of them to adhere unto as is manifest in your Conciliary Decrees about the Power of the Pope and the Councill unto which of them the preheminence is due Now this is a strange Rule of the Unity of Faith that is not only capable of encrease changes and alterations so that that may belong unto it one day which did not belong unto it another as is evident from your Tridentine Decrees wherein you made many things necessary to be believed which before were esteemed but probable and were the subjects of Sophisticall altercations in your Schools but also comprizeth in its self express Contradictions which cannot at all belong unto faith because both of them may be false one of them must be so nor to Vnity because Contrary and adverse 4. Whereas holding the Unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace or the Unity of faith is so great and important a Duty unto all Christians that they can no way discharge their Consciences unto God without a well grounded satisfaction that they live in the performance of it this description of its Nature renders it morally impossible for any man explicitly to know and that only a man knows which he knows explicitly that he doth answer his Duty herein For 1. the Determinations of your Church of things to be believed are so many and various that it is not within the Compass of an ordinary Diligence and ability to search and find them out Nor when a man hath done his utmost can he obtain any tolerable security that there have not other Determinations been made that he is not as yet come to an acquaintance with all or that he ever shall so do and how in this Case he can have any satisfactory perswasion that he keeps the Unity of Faith is not as yet made evident 2. In the Determinations he may meet withall or by any means come to the knowledge of he is to receive and believe the things determined and proposed unto him in the sense intended by the Church or else he is never the nearer to his end But what that sense is in the most of your Churches proposals your Doctors do so endlesly quarrell among themselves that it is impossible a man should come unto any great Certainty in his enquiry after it yet a precise meaning in all her proposals your Church must have o◠she hath none at all What shall a man do when he comes
to your Question What it is that can settle any man in the Truth of Religion and unite all men therein And then because you object this unto us as if we were at some loss and incertainty therein and your selves very secure I shall consider what are the grounds and principles that you proceed upon for the same ends and purposes namely to settle any man in the Truth of Religion and to bring all men to an harmony and consent therein Now I shall herein manifest unto you these two things I. That the Principles which the Protestants proceed upon in the improvement whereof they obtain themselves assured and infallible settlement in the Truth and labour to reduce others unto the Unity of Faith are such as are both suited unto and sufficient for the end and work which they design to effect by them and also in themselves of such unquestionable Truth Certainty and Evidence that either they are all granted by your selves or cannot be denied without shaking the very Foundations of Christianity 2. That those which you proceed upon are some of them untrue and most of them dubious and questionable none of them able to bear the weight that you lay upon them and some of them such as the admission of would give just cause to question the whole Truth of Christian Religion And both these S r I crave leave to manifest unto you whereby you may the better judg whether the Scripture or your Church be the best way to bring men unto settlement in Religion which is the thing enquired after 1. Protestants lay down this as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the very beginning and first Principle of their confidence and Confession that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God as the Holy Ghost teacheth them 2 Tim. 3. 16. That is that the Books of the Old and New Testament were all of them written by the immediate guidance direction and inspiration of God the hand of the Lord as David speaks 1 Chron. 28. 19. being upon the Penmen thereof in writing and his Spirit as Peter informs us speaking in them 1 Pâ—t 1. 11. So that whatever is contained and delivered in them is given out from God and is received on his Authority This Principle I suppose you grant to be true do you not if you will deny it say so and we will proceed no farther untill we have proved it I know you have various wayes laboured to undermine the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Holy Scriptures many Queries you put unto men How they can know it to be from God to be true from Heaven and not of men many scruples you indeavour to possess them with against its Authority it is not my present business to remove them It is sufficient unto mee 1. That you your selves who differ from us in other things and with whom our contest about the best way of coming to settlement in the Truth alone is do acknowledg this Principle were proceed upon to be true And 2. That yee cannot oppose it without setting your selves to digge up the very foundations of Christian Religion and to open a way to let in an inundation of Atheism on the world So our first step is fixed on the grand fundamentall Principle of all the Religion and acceptable worship of God that is in the world 2. They affirm that this Scripture evidenceth it self by many infallible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be so given by Inspiration from God and besides is witnessed so to be by the Testimony of the Church of God from the dayes of Moses wherein it began to be written to the dayes wherein we live our Lord Christ and his Apostles asserting and confirming the same Testimony which Testimony is conveyed unto us by uninterrupted Catholick Tradition The first part of this Position I confess some of you deny and the latter part of it you generally all of you pervert confining the Testimony mentioned unto that of your present Church which is a very inconsiderable part of it if any part at all But how groundlesly how prejudicially to the verity and honour of Christian Religion in generall you do these things I shall briefly shew you Some of you I say deny the first part of this Assertion so doth Andradius Defens Concil Trident. Lib. 3. Neque enim saith he in ipsis Libris quibus Sacra Mysteria conscripta sunt quicquam inest Divinitatis quod nos ad Credendum qua illis continentur religione aliqua constring at Neither is there in the Books themselves wherein the holy Mysteries are written any thing of Divinity that should constrain us by vertue of any religious respect thereunto to believe the things that are contained in them Hence Cocleus Lib. 2. de Authoritate Eccles. Script gathers up a many instances out of the Book of the Scripture which he declares to be altogether incredible were it not for the Authority of the Church I need not mention any more of your Leaders concurring with them you know who is of the same mind with them if the Author of Fiat Lux be not unknown to you Your resolving Vniversal Tradition into the Authority of your present Church to which end there is a Book written not long since by a Jesuit under the name of Vincentius Severinus is no less notorious Some of you I confess are more modest and otherwise minded as to both parts of our Assertion See Malderus Episcop Antwerp de Object Fidei qu. 1. Vaselius Groningen de Potestat Eccles. Epist. ad Jacob. Hock Alliacens in Lib. 1. Sentent Artic. 3. Gerson Exam. dos part 2. Consid. 1. Tom. 1. sol 105. and in twenty other places But when you come to deal with Protestants and consider well the Tendency of this Assertion you use I consess an hundred rergiversations and are most unwilling to come to the acknowledgment of it and rather then suffer from it deny it downwright and that with Scurrilous reflections and Comparisons likening it as to any characters of Gods truth and Holiness upon it unto Livy's Story yea Aesops Fables or a Piece of Poetry And when you have done so you apply your selves to the canvasing of Stories in the Old Testament and to find out appearing Contradictions and tell us of the uncertainty of the Authors of some particular Books that the whole is of its self a dead letter which can prove nothing at all enquiring Who told us that the Penmen of it were divinely inspired seeing they testify no such things of themselves and if they should yet others may do and have done so who notwithstanding were not so inspired and ask us Why we receive the Gospel of Luke who was not an Apostle and reject that of Thomas who one with many the like Cavilling Exceptions But 1. That must needs be a bad Cause which stands in need of such a Defence Is this the voice of Jacob or Esau Are these the expressions of Christians or Pagans from whose
And that A man once rid of his Authority may as easily deride and as solidly confute the Incarnation as the Sprinkling of Holy water so resolving our faith of the Incarnation of Christ into his Authority or Testimony Yea and in the same page That if it had not been for the Pope Christ himself had not been taken in the world for any such Person as he is believed this day And p. 378. to the same purpose The first great fundamental of Christian Religion which is the Truth and Divinity of Christ had it not been for him had failed long ago in the world with much more to the same purpose Hence it is evident that in your judgment all Truth and Certainty in Region depends on the Popes Anthority and Infallibility or as you express it his unerring guidance This is your Principle this you propose as the only medium to bring us unto that Settlement in Religion which you suppose the Scripture is not able to do What course should we now take would you have us believe you at the first word without further triall or examination would you have a man to do so who never before heard of Pope or Church We are commanded to try all things and to hold fast that which is good to try pretending Spirits and the Beraeans are commended for examining by the Scripture what Paul himself preached unto them An implicit Credulity given up to such Dictates is the height of Fanaticism Have wee not reason then to call you and your copartners in this design to an accoun â—how you prove that which you so strenuously assert and suppose and to examine the Principles of that Authority whereunto you resolve all your faith and Religion If upon mature consideration these prove Solid and the Inferences you make from them Cogent it is good Reason that you should be attended unto If they prove otherwise if the first be false and the latter Sophistical you cannot justly take it ill of him that shall advise you to take heed that whilest you are gloriously displaying your Colours the ground that you stand upon do not sink under your feet And here you are forced to go many a step backward to fix your first footing untill you leave your Pope quite out of sight from whence you advance towards him by severall degrees and so arive at his Supremacie and Infallibility and so we shall have Reditum Diomedis ab interitu Meleagri 1. Your first Principle to this purpose is That Peter was the Prince of the Apostles and that in him the Lord Jesus founded a Monarchy in his Church So pag. 360. you call him the head and Prince of the whole Congregation Now this wee think no meet Principle for any one to begin withall in asserting the foundation of Faith and Religion Nor do we think that if it were meet so to be used that it is any way subservient unto your design and purpose 1. A Principle fundamental or first entrance into any way of Settlement in Faith or Religion it cannot possibly be because it presupposeth the knowledg of and assent unto many other great fundamental Articles of Christian Religion yea upon the matter all that are so For before you can rationally talk with a man about Peters Principality and the Monarchical state of the Church hereon depending you must suppose that he believes the Scripture 〈◊〉 be the Word of God and all things that are taught therein concerning Jesus Christ his Person Nature Offices Work and Gospell to be certainly and infallibly true for they are all supposed in your Assertion which without the knowledg of them is uncouth horrid insignificant and forraign to all notions that a man can rationally entertain of God or Religion Nay no attempt of proof or confirmation can be given unto it but by and from Scripture whereby you fall directly into the Principle which you seek so carefully to avoid namely that the Scripture is the only way and means of setling us in the Truth since you cannot settle any man in the very first proposition which you make to lead him into another way but by the Scripture So powerfull is Truth that those who will not follow it willingly it will lead them captive in Triumph whether they will or no. 2. It is unmeet for any purpose because it is not true No one word from the Scripture can you produce in its confirmation wherein yet if it be not revealed it must pass as a very uncertain and frivolous conjecture You can produce no suffrage of the Ancient Church unto your purpose which yet if you could would not presently render any Assertion so confirmed infallibly certain much less fundamental Some indeed of the 4 th Century call Peter Principem Apostolorum but explain themselves to intend thereby 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first or Leader not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Prince or Ruler And when the ambiguity of that word began to be abused unto pretensions of Preeminence the Council of Carthage expresly condemned it allowing none to be termed Princeps Sacerdotum Many in those dayes thought Peter to be among the Apostles like the Princeps Senatus or Princeps Civi atis the chief in their Assemblies or Principall in dignity how truly I know not but that he should be amongst them and over them a Prince in Office a Monarch as to Rule and Power is a thing that they never once dreamed of and the Asseveration of it is an open untruth The Apostles were equall in their Call Office Place Dignity Employments All the difference between them was in their Labours Sufferings and Success wherein Paul seems to have had the pre-eminence who as Peter and all the rest of the Apostles every one singly and for himself had the care of all the Churches committed unto him thought it may be for the better discharge of their Duty ordinarily they divided their work as they found it necessary for them to apply themselves unto it in particular See 2 Cor. 11. And this equality between the Apostles is more than once insinuated by Paul and that with speciall reference unto Peter 1 Cor. 1. Gal. 1. 18 19. ch 2. 9. And is it not wonderfull that if this Assertion should not only be true but such a Truth as on which the whole faith of the Church was to be built that the Scripture should be utterly silent of it that it should give us no Rules about it no directions to use and improve it afford us no one instance of the exercise of the Power and Authority intimated no not one but that on the contrary it should lay down Principles exclusive of it Matth. 22. 25 26. Luk. 22. 26. And when it comes to make an enumeration of all the Offices appointed by Christ in his Church Eph. 4. 11. should pass over the Prince and his Office in silence on which all the rest were to depend You see what a Foundation you begin to build upon a meer
they might conjecture Rome to be intended by that Appellation So that according unto this Supposition S t Peter intending to acquaint them unto whom he wrote where he was when he wrote unto them and to present them with the respects of the Church in that place had by an aenigmatical expression rather amuzed than informed them Besides he had before this agreed with and solemnly engaged himself unto Paul to take care of the Circumcision unto whom after he had preached a while in Palestine it is more than probable that he betook himself unto Babylon in Assyria the principal seat of their residence in their first and most populous dispersion from whence he wrote unto all their Colonies scattered abroad in the neighbouring Nations So that although I will not because of the consent of many of the Ancients deny that Peter went to Rome and preached there yet I am fully satisfied that this foundation of the Story told by them is a perfect mistake consisting in an unwarrantable causless wresting of a plain expression unto a mystical sense and meaning 3. Your Witnesses agree not at all in their Story neither as to the time of his going to Rome nor as to the occasion of it nor as to the season of his abode there Many of them assign unto him 25 years for his residence there which is evidently false and easily disproved This computation is ascribed to Eusebius in Chron. Lib. 1. but it is evidently an addition of Hieroms in whose dayes the Tradition was encreased for there is no such thing in the Original Greek Copy of Eusebius nor doth it agree with what he had elsewhere written concerning him And it is very well worth while to consider how Onâ—phrius Panvinus a very learned Antiquary of your own party makes up these 25 years of Peter's Episcopacy at Rome Annotat. in Plat. in Vit. B. Petr. Ex novem primis annis saith he post Christi mortem usque ad initium secundi and Imperii Claudii Petrum Judaea nunquam excessisse ex Actis Apostelorum Pauli Epistola ad Galatas apertissimè constat Si igitur ut inter omnes Authores convenit co tempore Romam venit illud certe necessarium videâ—ur eum ante ad urbem adventum Antiochiae septem annis non sedisse sed hanc ejus Antiochenam cathedram alio tempore fuisse Quam rem ex vetustissimorum authorum testimonio sic constitui Secundo Imperii Claudii anno Romam venit à quo tempore usque ad illius obitum anni plus minus viginti quinque intersunt quibus etsi eum Romae sedisse Veteres scribunt non tamen praeterea sequitur ipsum semper in urbe commoratum esse Nam quarto anno ejus ad urbem adventus Hierusolymam reversus est ibi Concilio Apostolorum interfuit inde Antiochiam profectus septem ibidem annis usque ad Neronis Imperium permansit cujus initio Romam reversus Romanam dilabentem reparavit Ecclesiam Peregrinatione inde per universam fere Europam suscepta Romam rediens novissimo Neronis Imperii anno martyrium Crucis passus est For the first nine years after the death of Christ unto the beginning of the second year of Claudius it is most evident from the Acts and Epistle to the Galatians that Peter went not out of Palestine If therefore as all agree he came at that time to Rome it is certain that he bad not abode at Antioch seven years before his coming thither which yet all the Witnesses agree in but this his Antiochian Chair fell out at some other time Wherefore I thus order the whole matter from the Testimony of most Ancient Authors not that any one before him ever wrote any such thing but this he supposeth may be said to reconcile their Contradictions In the second year of Claudius He came to Rome From thence unto his death were 25 years more or less which space of time although the Ancients write that he sate at Rome yet it doth not follow thence that he alwayes abode in the City for in the 4 th year after his coming he returned unto Jerusalem to be present at the Council of the Apostles thence going unto Antioch he continued there seven years unto the raign of Nero. In the beginning of his raign he returned unto Rome to repair the decaying Church there from thence passing almost through all Europe he returned again to Rome in the last year of Nero and under went Martyrdome by the Cross. You may easily discern the uncertainty at least of that Story which this learned man can give no countenance unto but by multiplying improbable imaginations to shelter one another For 1. Who ever said that Peter came from Rome to come up to the Councel at Hierusalem when it is most manifest from the Story of the Acts that he had never before departed out of Judea and this Councel being granted to have been in the 6 th year of Claudius as here it is by Onuphrius quite overthrows the Tradition of his going to Rome in his second 2. The abode of 25 years at Rome as thus disposed is no abode indeed for he continued almost twice as long at Antioch as he did at Rome 3. Here is no time at all allowed unto him for preaching the Gospel in Galatia Cappadocia Asia and Bythinia which certainly are not Provinces of Europe in which places Eusebius Hist. Lib. 3. cap. 1. Origen and all the Ancients agree that he did attend unto his Apostleship towards the Jews and his Epistles make it evident 4. Nor is there any time left for him to be at Babylon where yet we know he was so that this fancy can have no countenance given it without a full rejection of all that we know to be true in the Story 4. The Scripture is utterly silent of any such thing as Peters going to Rome Other journeyings of his it records as to Samaria Lydda Joppa Caesaria Antioch Now it was no way materiall that his coming unto any of these places should be known but only in reference unto the things done there by him and yet they are recorded But this his going to Rome which is supposed to be of such huge importance in Christian Religion and that according to Onuphrius falling out in the middest of his other journeyings as it must do if ever it fell out is utterly passed by in silence If it had been to have such an influence into the very being of Christianity as now is pretended some men will be apt to think that the mention of it would not have been omitted 5. Paul in his Epistle to the Romanâ— written a good while after this imaginary going of Peter to Rome makes no mention of him when yet he saluted by name those of chief note and dignity in the Church there So that undoubtedly he was not then come thither 6. The same Apostle being at Rome in the reign of Nero in the amidst of the time allotted unto the
God in his Word than unto these Principles of yours is rejected by you out of the limits of the Catholick Church that is of Christianity for they are the same To make good your judgement and censure then you vent endless Cavils against the Authority Perfection and Perspicuity of the Scriptures pretending to despise and scorn whatever is offered in their viâ—dication This rope of Sand composed â— false suppositions groundless presumptions inconsequent inferences in all which there is not one word of infallible Truth at least that you can any way make appear so to be is the great Bond you use to gird men withall into the Unity of Faith In brief you tell us that if wee will all submit to the Pope wee shall be sure all to agree But this is no more but as I have before told you what every party of men in the world tender us upon the same or the like condition It is not a meer agreement wee aym at but an agreement in the Truth not a meer Vnity but a Unity of Faith and Faith must be built on Principles infallible or it will prove in the close to have been fancy not Faith carnall imagination not Christian belief otherwise wee may agree in Turcism or Judaism or Paganism as well as in Christianity and to as good purpose Now what of this kind do you tender unto us Would you have us to leave the sure word of Prophesie more sure than a voyce from Heaven the Light shining in the dark places of this world which wee are commanded to attend unto by God himself the Holy Scripture given by Inspiration which is able to make us wise unto Salvation the Word that is perfest sure right converting the Soul enlightning the eyes making wise the simple whose observation is attended with great reward to give heed yea to give up all our Spirituall and eternall concernments to the credit of old groundless uncertain Stories inevident presumptions fables invented for and openly improved unto carnal secular and wicked ends Is your request reasonable Would wee could prevail with you to cease your importunity in this matter especially considering â—the dangerous consequence of the admission of these your Principles unto Christianity in generall For if it be so that S t Peter had such an Episcopacy as you talk of and that a continuance of it in a Succession by the Bishops of Rome be of that indispensable necessity unto the preservation of Christian Religion as is pretended many men considering the nature and quality of that Succession how the means of its continuation have been arbitrarily and occasionally changed what place formerly popular Suffrage and the Imperial Authority have had in it how it came to be devolved on a Conclave of Cardinals what violence and tumults have attended one way what briberies and filthy respects unto the lusts of unclean Persons the other what Interruptions the Succession it self hath had by vacancies Schisms and contests for the place and uncertainty of the Person that had the best right unto the Popedome according to the customes of the dayes wherein he lived and that many of the Persons who have had a place in the pretended Succession have been plainly men of the world such as cannot receive the Spirit of Christ yea open enemies unto his Cross would find just cause to suspect that Christianity were utterly failed many Ages ago in the world which certainly would not much promote the Settlement in Truth and Unity of Faith that we are enquiring after And this is the first way that you propose to supply that Defect which you charge upon the Scripture that it is insufficient to reconcile men that are at variance about Religion and settle them in the Truth And if you are able by so many uncertainties and untruths to bring men unto a Certainty and Scttlement in the Truth you need not despair of compassing and thing that you shall have a mind to attempt But you have yet another Plea which you make no less use of than of the former which must therefore be also now you have engaged us in this work a little examined This is the Church its Authority and Infallibilâ—ty The truth is when you come to make a practical Application of this Plea unto your own use you resolve it into and confound it with that foregoing of the Pope in whom solely many of you would have this Authority and Infallibility of the Church to reside Yet because in your mannagement of it you proceed on other Principles than those before mentioned this pretence also shall be apart considered And here you tell us 1. That the Church was before the Scripture and giveth Authority unto it By the Scriptures you know that wee understand the Word of God with this â—ne Adjunct of its being written by his command and appointment We do not say that it belongs unto the Essence of the Word of God that it be written Whatever is spoken by God wee admit as his Word when wee are infallibly assured that by Him it was spoken and that wee should do so before himself doth not require at our hands for he would have us use our utmost diligence not to be imposed upon by any in his Name Therefore wee grant that the Word of God was given out for the Rule of men in his Worship two thousand years before it was written but it was so given forth as that they unto whom it came had infallible assurance that from Him it came and his Word it was And if you or any man else can give us such assurance that any thing is or hath been spoken by him besides what we have now written in the Scripture wee shall receive it with the same faith and obedience wherewith wee receive the Scripture its self Whereas therefore you say That the Church was before the Scripture if you intend no more but that there was a Church in the world before the word of God was written wee grant it true but not at all to your purpose If you intend that the Church is before the Word of God which at an appointed time was written it may possibly be wrested unto your purpose but is farre from being true seeing the Church is a society of men called to the knowledg and worship of God by his Ward They become a Church by the call of that Word which it seems you would have not given untill they are a Church of Effects produce their Causes Children beget their Parents Light brings forth the Sunne and Heat the Fire So are the Prophets and Apostles built upon the foundation of the Church whereof the Pope is the Corner stone So was the Judaical Church before the Law of iâ— constitution and the Christian before the Word of Promise whereon it was founded and the Word of Command by which it was edified In brief from the day wherein Man was first created upon the earth to the days wherein we live never did a Person or
Church yield any obedience or perform any acceptable worship unto God but what was founded on and regulated by his Word given unto them antecedently unto their obedience and worship to be the sole foundation and Rule of it That you have no concernment in what is or may be truly spoken of the Church we shall afterwards shew but it is not for the interest of Truth that wee should suffer you without controul to impose such absurd notions on the minds of men especially when you pretend to direct them unto a Settlement in Religion Alike true is it that the Church gives Authority unto the Scripture Every true Church indeed gives witness or Testimony unto it and it is its Duty so to do it holds it forth declares and manifests it so that it may be considered and taken notice of by all which is one main End of the Institution of the Church in this world But the Church no more gives Authority to the Scripture than it gives Authority to God himself He requires of men the discharge of that Duty which he hath assigned unto them but stands not in need of their suffrage to confirm his Authority It was not so indeed with the Idols of old of whom Tertullian said rightly Si Deus homini non placuerit Deus non erit The reputation of their Deity depended on the Testimony of men as you say that of Christ's doth on the Authority of the Pope But I shall not farther insist upon the disprovement of this vanity having shewed already that the Scripture hath all its Authority both in its self and in reference unto us from Him whose Word it is and wee have also made is appear that your Assertions to the contrary are meet for nothing but to open a door unto all Irreligiousness Prophaneness and Atheism so that there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nothing sound or savoury nothing which an heart carefull to preserve its Loyalty unto God will not nauseate at nothing not suited to oppugn the fundamentals of Christian Religion in this your Position This ground well fixed you tell us 11. That the Church is infallible or cannot erre in what she teacheth to be believed And we ask you what Church you mean and how far you intend that it is infallible The only known Church which was then in the world was in the Wilderness when Moses was in the mount Was it infallible when it made the golden Calf and danced about it proclaiming a feast unto Jebovah before the Calf was the same Church afterward Infallible in the dayes of the Judges when it worshipped Baalim and Aftaroth or in the dayes of Jeroboam when it sacrificed before the Calves at Dan and Bethel or in the other branch of it in the dayes of Ahaz when the High-Priest set up an Altar in the Temple for the King to offer Sacrifice unto the gods of Damascus or in the dayes of Jehoiakiâ— and Zedekiah when the High-Priest with the rest of the Priests imprisoned and would have slain Jeremiah for preaching the word of God or when they preferred the worship of the Queen of Heaven before that of the God of Abraham Or was it infallible when the High-Priest with the whole Councel or Saâ—edrim of the Church judicially condemned as far as in them lay their own Messias and rejected the Gospel that was preached unto them You must inform us what other Church was them in the world or you will quickly perceive how ungrounded your generall Maxim is of the Churches absolute infallibility As farre indeed as it attends unto the Infallible Rule given unto it it is so but not one jot farther Moreover we desire to know What Church you mean in your Assertion or rather what is it that you mean by the Church Do you intend the Mystical Church or the whole number of Gods Elect in all Ages or in any Age militant on the Earth which principally is the Church of God Ephes. 5. 26 Or do you intend the whole diffused body of the Disciples of Christ in the world separated to God by Baptism and the Profession of saving truth which is the Church Catholick visible Or do you mean any particular Church as the Roman or constantinopolitan the French Dutch or English Church If you intend the first of These or the Church in the first sense we acknowledge that it is thus far infallible that no true member of it shall ever totally and finally renounce lose or forsake that faith without which they cannot please God and be saved This the Scripture teacheth this Austin confirmeth in an bundred places If you intend the Church in the second sense we grant that also so far unerring and infallible as that there ever was and ever shall be in the world a number of men making Profession of the saving Truth of the Gospel and yielding professed subjection unto our Lord Jesus Christ according unto it wherein consists his visible Kingdome in this world that never was that never can be utterly overthrown If you speak of a Church in the last sense then we tell you That no such Church is by virtue of any Promise of our Lord Jesus Christ freed from erring yea so farre as to deny the fundamentals of Christianity and thereby to lose the very being of a Church Whilst it continues a Church it cannot erre fundamentally because such Errours destroy the very being of a Church but those who were once a Church by their failing in the Truth may cease to be so any longer And a Church as such may so fail though every Person in it do not so for the individual members of it that are so also of the Mysticall Church shall be preserved in its Apostasie And so the Mysticall Church and the Catholick Church of Professors may be continued though all particular Churches should fail So that no Person the Church in no sense is absolutely freed in this world from the danger of all errours that is the condition wee shall attain in Heaven here where we know butin part wee are incapable of it The Church of the Elect and every member of it shall eventually be preserved by the power of the Holy Ghost from any such errour as would utterly destroy their Communion with Christ in Grace here or prâ—vent their fruition of him in Glory hereafter or as the Apostle speaks they shall assuredly be kept by the Power of God through faith unto salvation The Generall Church of Visible Professors shall be alwayes so farre preserved in the world as that there shall never want some in some place or other of it that shall profess all needfull saving Truths of the Gospel in the belief whereof and obedience whereunto a man may be saved But for Particular Churches as such they have no security but what lyes in their diligent attendance unto that Infallible Rule which will preserve them from all hutfull Errours if through their own default they neglect not to keep close unto it And your
or English had the first news of our Christianity immediately from Rome and from Pope Gregorius the Roman Patriarch by the hands of his Missioner St. Austin Sith then the Categorick Assertions are both clear namely that the Papists first brought us the news of Christianity and Secondly that the Papist is now become odi us unto us What say you to my Consequent that the whole story of Christianity may as well be deemed a Romance as any part of that Christianity we at first received is now judged to be a part of a Romance This Consequence of mine it behoved a man of those great parts you would be thought to have to heed attentively and yet you never minded it Some few Observations upon this Discourse of yours will further manifest the Absurdity of that Consequence which you seign not to have been taken notice of in the Animadversions for which you had no cause but that you might easily discern that it did not deserve it 1. Then you grant that the Gospel came out of the East into this Land So then we did not first receive the Gospel from Rome much less by the means of Papists But the Land was then called Albion or Brittany and the people Brittans or Kimbrians not Englishmen What then though the names of places or people are changed the Gospel whereever it is is still the same But the Brittans lost the Gospel until they had a new Conversion from Rome by the means of Eleutherius But you fail Sir and are either ignorant in the story of those times or else wilfully pervert the truth All the Fathers and favourers of that Story agree that Christianity was well rooted and known in Brittain when Lucius as is pretended sent to Eleutherius for Assistance in its propagation Your own Baronius will assure you no less ad An. 183. n. 3 4. Gildas de Excid will do it more fully Virunnius tells us that the Brittans were then strengthened in the faith not that they then received it Strengthened in what they had not newly converted though some as it is said were so And the dayes of Lucius are assigned by Sabellicus as the time wherein the whole Province received the name of Christ publicitus cum ordinatione by publick decree That it was received there before and abode there as in other places of the world under persecution all men agree In this interval of time did the British Church bring forth Claudia Ruffina Elvanus and Meduinus whose names amongst others are yet preserved And to this space of time do the Testimonies of Tertullian ad Judae and of Origen Hom. 4. in Ezek. concering Christianity in Brittain belong Besides if the only prevalent Religion in Brittany were as you fancy that which came from Rome how came the Observation of Easter both amongst the Brittans as Beda manifests and the Scots as Petrus Cluniacensis declares to be answerable to the Customs of the Eastern Church and contrary to those of the Roman Did those that came from Rome teach them to do that which they judged their duty not to do But what need we stay in the confutation of this sigment The very Epistle of Eleutherius manifests it abundantly so to be If there be any thing of Truth in that rescript it doth not appear that Lucius wrote any thing unto him about Christian Religion but about the Imperial Laws to govern his Kingdom by and Eleutherius in his answer plainly intimates that the Scripture was received amongst the Brittans and the Gospel much dispersed over the whole Nation And yet this figment of your own you make the Bottom of a most strange contemplation namely that God in his Providence would have all that Christianity fail which came not from Rome That is the meaning of those expressions be would have nothing stand firm or lasting but what was immediately fixed by and seated on that Rock for all other Conversions have vanished Really Sir I am sorry for you to see what wofull shelves your prejudicate Opinions do cast you upon who in your self seem to be a well meaning goodnatured man Do you think indeed that those Conversions that were wrought in the world by the means of any Persons not coming from Rome which were Christ himself and all his Apostles were not fixed on the Rock Can such a blasphemous thought enter into your heart If those primitive Converts that were called unto the faith by Persons coming out of the East were not built on the Rock they all perished everlastingly every soul of them and if the other Churches planted by them were not immediately fixed and seated on the Rock they went all to Hell the Gates of it prevailed against them Do you think indeed that God suffered all the Churches in the world to come to nothing that all Christians might be brought into subjection to your Pope which you call cementing in an Vnity of one Head If you do so you think wickedly that he is altogether like unto your self but be will reprove you and set your faults in order before your eyes Such horrible dismal thoughts do men allow themselves to be conversant withall who are resolved to sacrifice Truth Reason and Charity unto their prejudices and interests Take heed Sir least the Rock that you boast of prove not seven hills and deceive you In the persuit of the same Consideration you tell me that I will laugh at your Observation that the Tables written by Gods own hand were broken but those written by Moses remained that we may learn to give a due respect to him whom God hath set over us But you do not well to say so I do not laugh at your observation but I really pitty you that make it Pray Sir what were those Tables that were written by Moses when those written by God were broken Such mistakes as these you ever and anon fall into and I fear for want of being conversant in Holy Writ which it seems your Principles prompt you unto a neglect of Sir the Tables prepared by Moses were no less written with the finger of God then those were which he first prepared himself Exod. 24. 28. Deut. 10. 1 2 4. And if you had laid a good ground for your notion that the Tables prepared by God were broken and those hewed by Moses preserved and would have only added what you ought to have done that there was nothing in the Tables delivered unto the people by Moses but what was written by the finger of God I should have commended both it and the inference you make from it As it is built by you on the sand it would fall with its own weight were it no heavier then a feather But you lay great stress I suppose on that which follows namely that the Brittans being expelled by the Saxons the Saxons first received their Christianity from Rome You may remember what hath been told you already in answer to this Case about Romes being left without inhabitants by
faith of men is formally and ultimately resolved into so that what ever Propositions that are made unto them they may reject unless they do it with a non obstante for its supposed Revelation the whole Revelation abides unshaken and their saith founded thereon But as to the Persons who first bring unto any the tidings of the Gospel seeing the faith of them that receive it is not resolved into their Authority or Infallibility they may they ought to examine their proposals by that unerring word which they ultimately rest upon as did the Beraeans and receive or reject them at first or afterwards as they see cause and this without the least impeachment of the truth or Authority of the Gospel its self which under this formal consideration as revealed of God they absolutely believe Let us now see what you except hereunto First you ask What love of Christs dictates what commission of Christ allows you to choose and reject at your own pleasure Ans. None nor was that at all in question nor do you speak like a man that durst look upon the true state of the Controversie between us You proclaim your cause desperate by this perpetual tergiversation The Question is whither when men preach the Gospel unto others as a Revelation from God and bring along the Scripture with them wherein they say that Revelation is comprized when that is received as such and hath its authority confirmed in the minds of them that receive it whither are they not bound to try all the teaching in particular of them that first bring it unto them or afterwards continue the preaching of it whither it be consonant to that Rule or Word wherein they believe the whole Revelation of the will of God relating to the Gospel declared unto them to be contained and to embrace what is suitable thereunto and to reject any thing that in particular may be by the mistakes of the teachers imposed upon them Instead of believing what the Scripture teacheth and rejecting what it condemns you substitute choosing or rejecting at your own pleasure a thing wherein our discourse is not at all concerned You adde What Heretick was ever so much a fool as not to pretend the Love of Christ and Commission of Christ for what he did What then I pray may not others do a thing really upon such grounds as some pretend to do them on falsly may not a Judge have his Commission from the King because some have counterfeited the great Seal May not you sincerely seek the good and peace of your Country upon the Principles of your Religion though some pretending the same Principles have sought its disturbance and ruine If there be any force in this exception it overthrows the Authority and Efficacy of every thing that any man may falsly pretend unto which is to shut out all order Rule Government and vertue out of the world You proceed How shall any one know you do it out of any such Love or Commission sith those who delivered the Articles of saith now rejected pretended equal love to Christ and Commission of Christ for the delivery of them as any other I wonder you should proceed with such impertinent enquiries How can any man manifest that he doth any thing by the Commission of another but by his producing and manifesting his Commission to be his and how can be prove that the doth it out of Love to him but by his diligence care and conscience in the discharge of his Duty as our Saviour tells us saying if you love me keep my Commandments which is the proper effect of love unto him and open evidence or manifestation of it Now how should a man prove that he doth any thing by the Commission of Christ but by producing that Commission that is in the things about whâ—ch we treat by declaring and evidencing that the things he proposeth to be believed are revealed by his spirit in his word and that things which he rejects are contrary thereunto And what ever men may pretend Christ gives out no adverse Commissions his word is every way and everywhere the same at perfect harmony and consistency with its self so that if it come to that that several Persons do teach contrary doctrines either before or after one another or together under the same pretence of receiving them from Christ as was the case between the Pharises of old that believed and the Apostles they that attend unto them have a perfect guide to direct them in their choice a perfect Rule to judge of the things proposed As in the Church of the Jews the Pharises had taught the people many things as from God for their Traditions or Oral Law they pretended to be from God Our Saviour comes really a teacher from God and he disproves their false Doctrines which they had prepossessed the people withall and all this he doth by the Scripture the Word of Truth which they had before received And this Example hath he left unto his Church unto the end of the world But you yet proceed Why may we not at length reject all the rest for love of something else when this Love of Christ which is now crept into the very out side of our lips is slipt off from thence Do you think men cannot find a cavil against him as well as his Law delivered unto us with the first news of him and as easily dig up the root as cut up the branches You are the pleasantest man at a disputation that ever I met withal haud ulli veterum virtute secundus you outgo your masters in palpable Sophistry If we may and ought for the Love of Christ reject errours and untruths taught by fallible men then we may reject him also for the love of other things Who doubts it but men may if they will if they have a mind to do so they may do so Physically but may they do so Morally may they do so upon the same or as good grounds and reasons as they reject errours and false worship for the sake of Christ With such kind of arguing is the Roman Cause supported Again you suppose the Law of Christ to be rejected and therefore say that his Person may be so also But this contains an application of the general Thesis unto your particular case and thereupon the begging of the thing in Question Our enquiry was general Whither things at first delivered by any Persons that preach the Gospel may not be rejected without any impeachment of the Authority of the Gospel it self Here that you may insinuate that to be the case between you and us you suppose the things rejected to be the Law of Christ when indeed they are things rejected because they are contrary to the Law of Christ and so affirmed in the Assertion which you seek to oppose For nothing may be rejected by the Commission of Christ but what is contrary to his Law The truth is he that rejects the Law of Christ as it is his
that you may the easilier be quit of you never examine but only run on in your usual florishes about the use and excellency of Gods Word I told you in Fiat Lux what the Jew will reply to all such reasonings but you have the pregnant wit not to heed any thing that may hinder your florishes but if you were kept up in a Chamber with a learned Jew without bread water and fire till you had satisfied him in that objection I am still well enough assured for all your veryvaunts that if you do not make use of your Credo which here you contemn you might there stay till hunger and cold have made an end of you The meaning of this Discourse is that the Jews pretence of rejecting Christ upon the Authority and Tradition of their Church was not nor is to be satisfied by Testimonies given in the Scripture unto the Person Doctrine and Work of the Messias The sum of the Objection said down in your Fiat Lux is that which I have now mentioned It was the Plea of the Jews against Christ and his Doctrine managed from the Authority and Tradition of their Church That Christ and his Apostles gave the Answer unto this objection which I have now intimated namely the Testimony of God himself in the Scripture to the Truth of that which they objected against which was to be preferred unto the Authority and Testimony of their Church I have undeniably proved unto you in the Animadversions and it is manifest to every one that hath but read the New Testament with any Consideration or understanding The same way was persisted in by the Antient Fathers as all their writings against the Jews do testifie And I must now tell you that your calling the validity of this Answer into Question is highly injurious unto the honour of Christianity and blasphemous against Christ himself The best interpretation that I can give unto your words is that you are a person wholly ignorant of the Controversies that are between the Jews and Christians and the way that is to be taken for their satisfaction or confutation You tell us indeed in your Fiat that the Jews will reply to these Testimonies of Scripture which are alledged as giving witness to our Lord Jesus Christ and his Doctrine and contend about the interpretation of them and this you tell me I have the wit to take no notice of which by the way is unduly averred by you and contrary to your own Science and Conscience seeing you profess that you have read over my Animadversions and probably the very place wherein I do take notice of what you said to that purpose and replyed unto it was not far from your eye when you wrote the contrary And as I shewed you what was the opinion of the Antients of that reply of the Jews which you mention so I shall now add that nothing but gross ignorance in these things can give countenance to an imagination that there is any thing but folly and madness in the Rabbinical evasions of the Testimonies of the old Testament given unto our Lord Christ and his Gospel And your substitution of a naked fananical Credo not resolved into the Testimony of the Holy Writ in the room of that express Witness which is given in Holy Scripture unto the Person and Doctrine of our Lord Jesus Christ to oppose therewith the Judaical Plea from their Church State Power and Authority is an Engine fit to undermine the very root of Christianity and to render the whole Gospel highly Questionable Besides it is so absurd as to the Conviction of the Jews such a mere petitio principii or begging of what is in Controversie between Christians and them that I challenge you to produce any one learned man that hath made use of it to that purpose To think that your Credo built on principles which he despiseth which you cannot prove unto him will convince another man of the Truth of what you believe can have no other ground but a magical fancy that the fixing of your imagination shall affect his and conform it unto your apprehension of things Such is your course in telling the Jews of the Authority of your Church and your Credo thereupon which cannot be supposed to have any existence in rerum natura unless it be first supposed that their Church was failed which supposal that it was not is the sole foundation of their objection What end you can propose herein but to expose your self and your profession unto their scorn and contempt I know not Sir the Lord Christ confirmed himself to be the Son of God and Saviour of the world by the Miracles which he wrought and the Doctrine which he taught was testified to be Divine by signs and express words from Heaven He proved it also by the Testimonies out of the Law and Prophets all which was confirmed by his Resurrection from the dead This coming of the promised Messiah the work that he was to perform and the characteristical 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of him in application unto the person of Jesus of Nazareth the Apostles and Evangelists proved out of the Scripture to the conviction and conversion of thousands of the Jews and the confusion of the rest And if you know not that the Antients Fathers and learned men of succeeding Ages have undenyably proved against the Jews out the Scripture of the Old Testament and by the Testimony thereof that the promised Messiah was to be God and man in one Person that he was to come at the time of the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ in the flesh that the work which he was to perform was the very same and no other then what was wrought and accomplished by him with all the other important concernments of his Person and office so that they have nothing left to countenance them in their obstinacy but meer senseless trifles you are exceedingly unmeet to make use of their objections or the condition of the controversie between them and Christians For what you add in reference unto my self I shall need only to mind you that the Question is not about any Personal ability of mine to satisfie a Jew which whatever it be when I have a mind to encrease it for somewhat that I know of and which I have learned out of their writings I will not come unto you for assistance but concerning the sufficiency of that Principle for the confronting of Judaical objections taken from the Authority of their Church which I have formerly proved unto you that our Lord Jesus Christ and his Apostles made use of unto that purpose And I will not say that it was from the pregnancy of your wit that whatever heed you took unto the stating of the Case between you and Protestants in the Animadversions parallel unto that between the Jews and the Apostles seeing a very little wit will suffice to direct a man to let that alone which he finds too heavy for him to remove
the Church then the present Church is made up of the same numerical members that it was constituted of in the days of his flesh What change you suppose in the Church the body the same you suppose and assert in the head thereof And as that change excludes those former members from being present members so this excludes the former Head from being the present Head Of old the Head of the Church was the humane nature of Christ delegate under God now that is removed and another person in the same nature is so delegated unto the same office Now this is not an Head under Christ but in distinction from him in the same place wherein he was and so exclusive of him which must needs be Antichrist one pretending to be in his room and place to his exclusion that is one set up against him And thus also what you seek to avoid doth inevitably follow upon your discourse namely that you would have the Church for the preservation of its oneness and sameness to have the same head she had which is not the same unless you will say that the Pope is Christ these are the Principles that you proceed upon First you tell us that the humane nature of Christ delegate under God was the visible Head of the Church Secondly That this nature is now removed from us and ceaseth so to be that is not only to be visible but the visible Head of the Church and is no more so then the present Church is made up of the same individual members as it was in the dayes of his flesh which as you well observe it is not Thirdly That a nature of the same kind in another Person is now delegate under God to the same office of a Visible Head with that power of external Government which Christ had whilest he was that head And is it not plain from hence that you exclude the Lord Christ from being that head of his Church which he was in former dayes and substituting another in his room and place you at once depose him and assign another head unto the Church and that in your attempt to prove that her head must still be the same or she cannot be so Farther the humane nature of Christ was personally united unto the Son of God and if that Head which you now fancy the Church to have be not so united it is not the same Head that that was and so whilest you seek to establish not indeed a sameness in the Head of the Church but a likeness in several Heads of it as to visibility you evidently assert a change in the nature of that Head of the Church which we enquire after In a word Christ and the Pope are not the same and therefore if it be necessary to maintain that the Church hath the same Head that she had to assert that in the room of Christ she hath the Pope you prove that she hath the same head that she had because she hath one that is not the same she had and so qui habet aures audiat 4. You vainly imagine the whole Catholick Church any otherwise visible then with the eyes of faith and understanding It was never so no not when Christ conversed with it in the earth no not if you should suppose only his blessed Mother his twelve Apostles and some few more only to belong unto it For though all the members of it might be seen and that at once by the bodily eyes of men as might also the humane nature of him who was the head of it yet as he was Head of the Church and in that his whole Person wherein he was so and is so he was never visible unto any for no man hath seen God at any time And therefore you substituting an Head in his room who in his whole person is visible seeing he was not so do change the Head of the Church as to its visibility also for one that is in his whole person visible and another that is not so are not alike visible wherein you would principally place the identity of the Church 5. Let us see whether your Logick be any better then your Divinity The best Argument that can be formed out of your discourse is this If the Church hath not an head visibly present with her as she had when Christ in his humane nature was on the earth she is not the same that she was but according to their Principles she hath not an head now so visibly present with her therefore she is not the same according unto them I desire to know how you prove your inference It is built on this supposition that the sameness of the Church depends upon the visibility of its Head and not on the sameness of the Head its self which is a fond conceit and contrary to express Scripture Ephes. 4. 3 4 5 6 7. and not capable of the least countenance from Reason It may be you will say that though your Argument do not conclude that on our supposition the Church is not the same absolutely as it was yet it doth that it is not the same as to visibility Whereunto I answer 1. That there is no necessity that the Church should be alwayes the same as to visibility or alwayes visible in the same manner or alwayes equally visible as to all concernments of it 2. You mistake the whole nature of the visibility of the Church supposing it to consist in its being seen with the bodily eyes of men whereas it is only an affection of its publick profession of the Truth whereunto it s being seen in part or in whole by the eyes of any or all men doth no way belong 3. That the Church as I said before was indeed never absolutely visible in its Head and members He who was the Head of it being never in his whole person visible unto the the eyes of men and he is yet as he was of old visible to the eyes of faith whereby we see him that is invisible So that to be visible to the bodily eyes of men in its head and members was never a property of the Church much less such an one as that thereon its sameness in all Ages should depend 6. You fail also in supposing that the numerical sameness of the Church as a body depends absolutely on the sameness of its members For whilest in succession it hath all things the same that concur unto its Constitution order and existence it may be still the same body corporate though it consist not of the same individual persons or bodies natural As the Kingdom of England is the same Kingdom that it was two hundred years ago though there be not now one person living that then it was made up of For though the matter be the same only specifically yet the form being the same numerically that denominates the body to be so But that I may the better represent unto you the proper genius and design of your Discourse I shall
greatly desire to give some countenance unto that is an universal visible Pastor over the whole Catholick Church in the place and room of Christ himself First You tell us that the Apostles expected one to be chosen to succeed Christ in his care But to have one succeed another in his care infers that that other â—â—â—sâ—â— o take and exercise the Care which formerly he haâ— and exercised which in this case is highly blasphemous once to imagine I wish you would â—ake more Care of what you say in things of this nature aâ—d not suffer the impetuous 〈…〉 your interest to cast you upon expressions so 〈◊〉 to thâ— honour oâ— Christ and safety of his Churâ—â— And how do you prove that the Apostles had any such expectations as that which you mention Our Saviour gave them equal commission to teach all Nations told them that as his father had sent him so he sent them that he had chosen them twelve but that one of them was a Devil never that one of them should be Pope Their Institution Instruction Priviledges Charge Calling were all equal How then should they come to have this expectation that one of them should be chosen to succeed Christ in his Care when they were all chosen to serve under him in the continuance of his care towards his Church That which you obscurely intimate from whence this expectation of yours might arise is the contest that was amongst them aâ—â—â—t preheminence Luk. 22. 24. There was a strife â—mongst them which of them should be the greatest 〈◊〉 you suppose was upon their perswasion that one should be chosen in particular to succeed the Lord Christ in his Care whereupon they fell into difference about the place But 1. Is it not somewhat strange unto your self how they should contest about a succession unto Christ in his absence who had not once thought that he would ever be absent from them nor could bear the mention of it without great sorrow of heart when afterwards he began to acquaint them with it 2. How should they come in your apprehension to quarrel about that which as you suppose and contend was somewhile before determined For this contest of yours was somewhile after the promise of the Keys to Peter and the saying of Christ that he would build his Church on the Rock Were the Apostles think you as stupid as Protestants that they could not see the Supremacy of Peter in those passages but must yet fall at variance who should be Pope 3. How doth it appear that this strife of theirs who should be greatest did not arise from their apprehension of an earthly Kingdom a hope whereof according to the then current perswasion of the Judaical Church to be erected by their master whom they believed in as the true Messiah they were not delivered from until after his Resurrection when they were filled with the Spirit of the New Testament Act. 1. Certainly from that root sprang the ambitious desire of the Sons of Zebedee after preheminence in his Kingdom and the designing of the rest of them in this place from the manner of its management by strife seems to have had no better a spring 4. The stop put by our Lord Jesus unto the strife that was amongst them makes it manifest that it arose from no such expectation as you imagine or that at least if it did yet your expectation was irregular vain and groundless For 1. He tells them that there should be no such greatness in his Church as that which they contended about being like to the Soveraignty exercised by and in the Nations of the earth from which he that can shew a difference in your Papal Rule erit mihi magnus Apollo 2. He tells them that his Father had equally provided a Kingdom that is heavenly and eternal for all them that believed which was the only greatness that they ought to look or enquire after 3. That as to their Priviledge in his Kingdom it should be equal unto them all for they should all fit on Thrones judging the twelves tribes of Israel so ascribing equal power Authority and dignity unto them all which utterly overthrows the figment of the supremacy of any one of them over the rest Luk. 22. 30. Matth. 19. 28. And 4. Yet further to prevent any such conceit as that which you suppose them to have had concerning the prelation of any one of them he tells them that one was their Master even Christ and that all they were brethren Mat. 23. 8. so giving them to understand that he had designed them to be perfectly every way equal among themselves So ill have you layed the foundation of your Plea as that it guides us to a full determination of the contrary to your pretence and that given by our Saviour himself with many reasons perswading his Disciples of the equity of it and unto an acquiescency in it And what you add that he presently appointed one to the preheminence you imagine is altogether inconsistent with what you would conclude from the striâ—e about it For the appointment you fancy preceded this contention and had it been real and to any such purpose would certainly have prevented it Thus you do neither prove from the Gospel what you pretend unto namely that Bishops are above Ministers so well do you plead your Cause nor what you intend namely that the Pope is appointed over them all Only you wisely add a caution about what a Bishop ought to be and do de jure and what any one of them may â—o or be de facto because it is impossible for any â—an to find the least difference between the domination which our Saviour expresly condemns and that which your Pope doth exercise Although I know not whither you would think meet to have him devested of that Authority on the pretence whereof he so domineers in the world Finding your self destitute of any countenance from the Gospel you proceed to the Laws of the Land To what purpose to prove that Christ appointed one amongst his Apostles to preside with plenitude of Power over all the rest of them and consequently over the whole Catholick Church succeeding him in his care certainly you will find little countenance in our Laws to this purpose But let us hear your own words again As for the Laws of the Land say you it is there most strongly decreed by the consent and Authority of the whole Kingdom not only that Bishops are our Ministers but that the Kings Majesty is head of the Bishops also in the line of Hierarchy from whose hand they receive both their places and jurisdiction This was established not only by one but by several Parliament Acts both in the reign of King Edward and Queen Elizabeth What will hence follow that there is one universal Bishop appointed to succeed Christ in his Care over the Church Catholick the thing you attempted to prove in the words immediately foregoing Do not the same Laws which assert
Ostorius in the dayes of Nero upon the Conquest of Boadicia Queen of the Iceni and fully subjected in its remainders unto the Roman Yoak and Laws after some struglings for liberty by Julius Agricola in the dayes of Vespatian as Tacitus assures us in the life of his Father in Law In this Estate Brittan continued under Nerva and Trajan the whole Province being afterwards secured by Hadrian from the incursion of the Picts and other barbarous Nations with the defence of his famous walls whereof Spartianus gives us an account In this condition did the whole Province continue unto the death of Commodus under the rule of Vlpius Marcellus as we are informed by Dio and Lampridius This was the state of affairs in Britain when the Epistle of Eleutherius is supposed to be written And for my part I cannot discover where this Lucius should reign with all that Soveraignty ascribed unto him Baronius thinks he might do so beyond the Picts wall which utterly overthrows the wholy story and leaves the whole Province of Brittan utterly unconcerned in the coming of Fugatius and Damianus into this Island These are some and many other reasons of my suspition I could add manifesting it to be far more just then yours that I had no reason for it but only because I would not acknowledge that any good could come from Rome Let us now see what you further except against the account I gave of the progress and declension of Religion in these and other Nations You add then say you succeeded times of Luxury Sloth Pride ambition scandalous riots and corruption both of faith and manners over all the Christian world both Princes Priests Prelates and people But you somewhat pervert my words so to make them lyable unto your exception for as by me they are layed down it seems you could find no occasion against them I tell you p. 253. that after these things a sad decay in faith and holiness of life befell professors not only in this Nation but for the most part all the world over the stories of those dayes are full of nothing more then the Oppression Luxury Sloth of Rulers the pride ambition and unseemly scandalous contests for preheminence of Sees and extent of Jurisdiction among Bishops the sensuality and ignorance of the most of men Now whether these words are not agreeable to Truth and Sobriety I leave to every man to judge who hath any tolerable acquaintance with History or the occurrences of the Ages respected in them Your reply unto them is not a grain of virtue or Goodness we must think in so many Christian Kingdoms and Ages But why must you think so who induceth you thereunto when the Church of Israel was professedly far more corrupted then I have intimated the state of the Christian Church in any part of the world to have been yet there was more then a grain of virtue or goodness not only in Elijah but in the meanest of those seven thousand who within the small precincts of that Kingdom had not bowed the knee to Baal I never in the least questioned but that in that declension of Christianity which I intimated and remission of the most from their pristine Zeal but that there were thousands and ten thousands that kept their integrity and mourned for all the Abominations that they saw practiced in the world Pray reflect a little upon the condition of the Asian Churches mentioned in the Revelation The discovery made of their Spiritual State by Christ himself chap. 2. 3. was within less then forty years after their first planting and yet you see most of them had left their first love and were decayed in their faith and Zeal In one of them there were but a few names remaining that had any life and integrity for Christ the body of the Church having only a name to live being truly and really dead as to any acts of Spiritual life wherein our Communion with God consists And do you make it so strange that whereas the Churches that were planted and watered by the Apostles themselves and enriched with many excellent Gifts and Graces should within the space of less then forty years by the Testimony of the Lord Christ himself so decay and fall off from their first purity faith and works that other Churches who had not their advantages should do so within the space of four hundred years of which season I speak I fear your vain conceit of being rich and wanting nothing of Infallibility and impossibility to stand in need of any Reformation of being as good as ever any Church was or as you need to be is that which hath more prejudiced your Church in particular then you can readily imagine And what I affirmed of those other Churches I know well enough how to prove out of the best and most approved Authors of those dayes If besides Historians which give sufficient Testimony unto my observation you will please to consult Chrysostome Hom. 3. de Incomprehens Dei natur Hom. 19. in Ac. 9. Hom. 15. in Heb. 8. and Augùstin lib. de Fid. bon op cap. 19. you will find that I had good ground for what I said And what if I had minded you of the words of Salvian de provid lib. 3. Quemcunque invenies in Ecclesia non aut â—briosum aut adulternus aut fornicatorem aut raptorem aut ganeonem aut latronem aut homicidam quod omnibus potius est prope haec cuncta sine fine Should I have escaped your censure of giving you a story false and defamatory loaden with foul language against all Nations ages and conditions that none can like who bear any respect either to modesty Religion or Truth ne saevi magne Sacerdos What ground have you for this intemperate railing What instance can you give of any thing of this nature What expression giving countenance unto this severity If you will exercise your self in writing Fiats you must of necessity arm your self with a little patience to hear sometimes things that do not please you and not presently cry out defamations false wrath foul language c. I suppose you know that not long after the times wherein I say Religion as the power and purity of it much decayed in the world that God brought an overflowing scourge and deluge of Judgements upon most of the Nations of Europe that made Profession of Christianity What in sadness do you think might be the cause of that dispensation of his Providence Do you think that all things were well enough amongst them and that in all things their wayes pleased God is such an apprehension suitable to the Goodness Mercy Love and faithfulness of God or must he lose the glory of all his properties in the administration of his righteous Judgements rather then you will acknowledge a demerit in them whom he took away as with a Flood So indeed the Jews would have had it of old under their sufferings but he pleaded and vindicated the equality
that they would like it under a new dress which the old name might have startled them from the Consideration of But Mass or Messach let it be as you please we shall now consider what it is that you offer afresh concerning it and hear you speak out your own words Thus you say p. 81. Having laughed at my admiration of Catholick Service you carp at me for saying that the Christians were never called together to hear a Sermon to convince me you bring some places out of St. Pauls Epistles and the Acts which commend the Ministry of the Word This indeed is your usual way of refuting my Speeches You flourish copiously in that which is not at all against me and never apply it to my words least it should appear as it is impertinent I deny not that Converts were further instructed or that the preaching of Gods Word is good and usefull but that which I say is that Primitive Christians were never called together for that end as the great work of their Christianity This I have clearly proved Well Sir without retorsion which just indignation against this unhandsome management of a desperate Cause is ready to suggest be pleased to take a little view of your own words once more pag. 279. you tell us that the Apostles and Apostolical Christians placed their Religion not in hearing or making Sermons FOR THEY HAD NONE but in attending to their Christian Lyturgie and the Sermons mentioned in the Acts were made to the Jews and Pagans for their Conversion not to any Christians at all Could I now take any other course to confute these false and impious Assertions then what I did in the Animadversions I proved unto you that Sermons were made unto Christians by the Apostles for their edification that order is given by them for the instant preaching of the Word in and unto the Churches unto the end of the world and that those are by them signally commended who laboured in that work and what can be spoken more directly to the confutation of your Assertion You would now shrowd your self under the ambiguity of that expression the great work of their Christianity which yet you make no use of in your Fiat The words there from which you would get countenance unto your present evasion are these Nowhere was ever Sermon made to formal Christians either by St. Peter or Paul or any other as the work of their Religion that they came together for nor did the Christians ever dream of serving God after their Conversion by any such means but ONLY by the Eucharist or Liturgy Here is somewhat of the work of their Religion which they came together for nothing of the great work of their Christianity Now that preaching was a work of their Religion that they came together for though not the only work of it noâ— only end for which they so convened which no man ever dreamed that it was and that the Primitive Christians did by and in that work serve God hath been proved unto you from the Scripture And all Antiquity with the whole story of the Church gives attestation to the same Truth Sir it were far more honourable for you to renounce a false and scandalous Assertion when you are convinced that such it is then to seek to palliate it and to secure your self by such unhansome evasions Preaching of the word unto believers is an Ordinance of Christ and that of indispensible necessity unto their edification or growth in Grace and knowledge which he requireth of them In the practice of this ordinance were the Apostles themselves sedulous and commanded others so to be So were they in the Primitive following times as you may learn from the account given us of Church meetings by Justin Martyr and Tertullian in their Apologies and all that have transmitted any thing unto Posterity concerning their Assemblies For this end to hear the word preached Christians came together not only or solely or exclusively to the administration of other Ordinances but as to a part of that worship which God required at their hands and wherein no small of their spiritual advantage was enwrapped To deny this as you do in your Fiat is to deny that the Sun shines at noon day and to endeavour to dig up the very roots of Pâ—ety Knowledge and all Christianity to what ends and purposes and for the enthroning of what other thing in your room let all indifferent men judge And I shall take leave to say that to my best observation I never met with an Assertion in any Author of what Religion so ever more remote from truth sobriety and modesty then that of yours in your Fiat pag. 275. Nor did the Primitive Christians for 300. years ever hear a Sermon made unto them upon a Text but meerly flocked together at their Priests appointment unto their Messachs This I say is so loudly and notoriously untrue and so known to be so to all that have ever looked into the stories of those times that I am amazed at your confidence in the publishing of it It may be you will hope to shelter your self under the ambiguity of that expression made unto them upon a text Supposing that an instance cannot be given of that mode of preaching wherein some â—ertain Text is read at the entrance of a Sermon and principally insisted upon But this Fig leaf will not cover you from the just Censure of knowing men For 1. Their following adversative but meerly is perfectly exclusive of all preaching be it of what Mode it will be 2. The reading of one certain Text before Preaching is not necessary unto it but all preaching is and ever was upon some Text or Texts that is it consisted in the explication and application of the word of God that is some part of portion of it 3. Whereas it is certain that our Saviour himself preached on a Text Luk. 4. 17 18 19 20 21. as also did his Apostles Act. 8. 35. and the Fathers of the following Ages it is sufficiently evident that that was also the constant mode of preaching in the first 300. years as may be made good in the instance of Origen and sundry others You go on and except against me for saying that we hear nothing of your Sacrifice of the Mass in the Scripture and say you will neither hear nor see say you the passion of our Lord is our Christian Sacrifice do not I say sâ— too but that this incruent Sacrifice was instituted by the same Lord before his death to figure out daily before our eyes that passion of his which was then approaching in commemoration of his death so long as the world should last I must desire you to stay here a little This Sacrifice you make the main of Christian Religion Protestants for the want of it you esteem to have no Religion at all We must therefore consider what it is that you intend by it for I suppose you would not have us accept of we know not
ipsa consecratione consistere quin è contrario consecratio ad rationem Sacramenti potius quam ad naturam Sacrificii pertinet Alii existimant Sacrificii rationem tribus Sacerdotis actionibus constare consecratione oblatione sumptione Alii quidem seâ—sere ad rationem hujus Sacrificii quat uor imo quinque actiones concurrere Consecrationem oblationem fractionem sumptionem Alii rationem Sâ—crificii ponunt in duobus actibus consecratione oblatione Alii constituunt totam rationem Sacrificii in 〈◊〉 actione viz. Consecratione There are who think the nature of the Sacrifice to consist in the words rayers ceremonies and rites which are used in the Consecration because say they the nature of the Sacrifice cannot consist in the Consecration it self which rather belongs unto the nature of a Sacrament then of a Sacrifice Others think that the Sacrifice consists in three actions of the Priest Consecration Oblation and Sumption or receiving of the Host. Others in four or five as Consecration Oblation Fraction Sumption Others in two Consecration and Oblation and some in one Consecration And is not this a brave business to impose on the Consciences of all men when you know not your selves what it is that you would so impose A Sacrifice must be believed and they are all accursed by you that believe it not but what the Sacrifice is and wherein it doth consist you cannot tell And an easie matter it were to manifest that all the particulars which you assign as those that either belong necessarily unto the integrity of a Sacrifice or those wherein some of you or any of you would have its essence to consist are indeed of no such nature or importance but that is not my present business I am only enquiring what your Sacrifice is according unto you own sense and imagination And that we may not mistake I shall set down such a general description of it as the Canon of the Mass the general rubrick of the Missal the rites and cautels of its celebration will afford unto us Now in these it is represented as a sacred action wherein a proper Priest or Sacrificer arrayed with various consecrated attire standing at the Altar taketh bread and wine about which he useth great variety of â—ostures and gestures inclinations bowings kneelings stretching out and gathering in his arms with a multitude of Crossings at the end and in the midst of his pronunciation of certain words of Scripture turns them into the real natural body and blood of Christ the Son of God worshiping them so converted with religious adoration shewing them to the people for the same purpose and then offering that body and blood unto God praying for his acceptance of them so offered and that it may be available for the living and the dead for the pardoning of their sins and saving of their souls after which he takes that body of Christ so made worshipped and offered and eats and deavours it by all which Christ is truly and properly Sacrificed This is the Sacrifice of your Church wherein as you inform us the main of your Devotion and Worship doth consist Of this Sacrifice I told you formerly the Scripture is silent and I now add that so also is Antiquity You cannot produce any one approved writer for the space of 600. years that gives testimony to this your Sacrifice For what ever florish you may make with the ambiguity of the word Sacrifice which we cleared before your Transubstantion and other things asserted by you to belong unto the integrity if not the Essence of your Sacrifice are strangers unto Antiquity as hath been lately proved unto you and will no doubt be yet further confirmed so to be I told you as you observe that this Sacrifice is an utter stranger to Scripture as also that it is inconsistent with what is therein delivered The Apostle in the Epistle to the Hebrews plainly affirms that the Sacrifice of the Church of the Christians is but one and that once offered for all whereas those of the Jews by reason of their imperfection were often repeated which you choose out to reply unto and say It is true the Sacrifice of our Lords Passion of which the Apostle in that whole discourse intends only to treat in opposition unto that of Bulls and goats was so done but once that it could not be done twice But as the Sacrifices of the Old Law were instituted by Almighty God to be often iterated before the Passion of the Messias for a continual exercise of Religion so did the same Lord for the very same purpose institute another to be iterated after his death unto which it was to have reference when it should be past as the former had to the same death when it was to come So you But first This begs the Question for you only repeat and say that such a Sacrifice was institued by Christ which you know is by us utterly denyed 2. It plainly contradicts the Apostle and overthrows his whole argument and design 1. It contradicts him in express terms for whereas he sayes not only that Christ once offered himself but also that he was once offered for all that is no more to be offered you affirm that he is often offered and that every day 2. His design is to demonstrate the excellency of the Condition of the Church of the New Testament and the worship of God therein above that of the Old And this he proves to consist here in a special manner that they had many Sacrifices which were of necessity to be reiterated because they could not take away sin for saith he if they could then should they not have been repeated nor would there have been need of any other Sacrifice But now saith he this is done by the one Sacrifice of Christ which hath so taken away sin as that it hath made the repetition of its self or the institution of any other Sacrifice needless and therefore we have no more but that one and that one once performed Now unless you will deny the Apostles Assertions either 1. That if one Sacrifice can take away sin there is no need of another or 2. That the one Sacrifice of Christ did perfectly take away sin as to Attonement and also 3. assert that the condition of the Gospel Church is still the same with that of the Jews and that we have need of a Sacrifice to be repeated not only as theirs was year by year from whence he argues the imperfection of the greatest solemn Sacrifice of Expiation but day by day with a further and greater weakness repetition in the judgement of the Apostle being an evidence thereof there will be no place left for your Sacrifice that is your main worship belongs not to the Church of God at all 4. You pretend that in this worship Christ himself is Sacrificed unto God but incruenter and without suffering but the Apostle plainly tells us that if he be often offered he must often
men on that meditation of the Apostle Heb. 12. You are come to mount Sion to the City of the living God to the Heavenly Hierusalem the Society of Angels and Church of the first born written in heaven to God the judge of all to the spirits of just men made perfect to Jesus the Mediator of the new Covenant These I tell you upon the sight of an House full of Images may be the thoughts of a man distracted of his wits not of any that are sober and wise To which you reply mad men it seems can tell what figures represent sober and wise men cannot But who told you that your images represent the things mentioned by the Apostle for instance God the Judge of all the spirits of just men Angels and the Church of the first born or can any man unless he be greatly distempered in his imagination fancy any such thing The house of Micah Judg. 18. was notably furnished with Images of all sorts Judg. 17. he had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an house full of Gods or a Chappel adorned with Images for there was in it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 carved image and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sacred ornament for it and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lesser portable Image and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a molten statue Judg. 18. would it not think you notwithstanding the gaiety of all this provision have bee a mad thought in the Danites if upon their entrance into this house they had apprehended themselves to be come to the Communion of the Catholick Church and therein to the invisible God to Angels and Saints departed The truth is there is aliquid dementiae a tincture of madness in all Idolatry whence the Scripture testifies that men are mad upon their Idols but yet we do not find that these Danites though resolved upon false worship were so mad as to entertain such vain thoughts as you imagine the Chappel full of images might have suggested unto them Or do you think Ezekiel had any such thoughts when God shewed him in vision the imagery of the house of Israel with all the Deities portrayed on the wall and the elders worshipping before them Ezek. 8. God and the Prophet discover other thoughts in reference unto them Besides Sir the Holy Ghost tells us that a graven image is a teacher of Lyes Hab. 2. 18. and how likely it is that a man should learn any truth from that whose work it is only to teach lyes I do not as yet understand You proceed to another exception the violation of an image say you redounds to the Prototype if it be rightly and duely represented not else To which you reply and when then for example is Christ crucified rightly and duly represented are you one of those that can tell what figures represent or not 1. You do not rightly report my words though you might as easily have done it as set down those you have made use of My words were that the violation of an Image redounds to the Prototype provided it be an Image rightly and duely destined to represent him that is intended to be injured which is so cleared by an instance there expressed as turns your exception out of doors as altogether useless For first I require that the Image be rightly and duly destined to the representation of the Prototype that is by him or by them who have power so to do and by the express consent and will of him whose image it is who otherwise is not concerned in it Now nothing of all this can you affirm concerning your Images 2. I require an intention of doing injury or contumely unto the Person represented by the image without which whatever is done to the image reflects not at all upon him And so a man may break an Image of a King which he finds formed against his will in some ugly shape to expose him to contempt and scorn as I suppose out of Loyalty unto him without the least violation of his honour which is the very condition of your Images and those that reject them And this also may suffice to what you add about hanging of Traitors in Effigie which is a particular instance of your general Assertion that the violation of an Image redounds to the Prototype which we grant it doth when the Image is rightly designed to that purpose by them who have just authority so to do and when there is an intention of casting contempt upon it the first whereof is not found amongst your Images nor the latter among them who reject them Besides if all that were granted you which you express yet what you aime at would not ensue For though it should be supposed that the violation of an Image would redound unto the injury of the Prototype upon a meer intention of reflecting upon him without which it is a foolish conceit to apprehend any such thing yet it doth not thence follow that the honour done to an Image redounds unto him that is represented by it provided that the intention of them that give the honour be so to do For besides our intention in the worship of God we have a rule to attend unto without the observation whereof the other will stand us in little stead And if this might be admitted the grossest Idolatry that ever was in the world might easily be excused That for instance of the Israelites setting up a golden Calf and worshipping it must needs be esteemed excellent seeing they thought to give honour to Jehovah thereby When the things mentioned then are wanting Images may be dealt withal as false money which his Majesty causeth every day to be broken though it have his own Image and superscription upon it because stamped without his warrant You proceed and add as my words where the Psalmist complains of Gods enemies breaking down his Sculptures he means not thereby any Images or figures but only wainscot or carved Ceilings Would you could find in your heart rightly to report my words The reason is evident why you do not namely because then you had not been able to make any pretence of a reply unto them But yet this ought not to have prevailed with you to persist in such unhandsome dealing My words are The Psalmist indeed complains that they broke down the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or carved works in the Walls and Ceilings of the Temple though the Greeks render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 her doors the Verb signifying principally to open but that those apertiones or incisurae were not Pictures and Images for the people to adore and venerate or appointed for their instruction you may learn You see Sir I grant that the Word may denote carved works and if so I think they must be either in the walls or ceiling that which only I deny was that these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or carved works were proposed to the people to be adored or venerated This you should have confuted or held your peace But you take another course
able to except against in that discourse will speedily appear In the mean time pray take notice that I have no eagerness to oppose either you or your Church so you will let the Truth alone I shall for ever let you alone without opposition It was the defence of that and not an opposition to you that I was engaged in In the same design do I still persist in the vindication of what I had formerly written and shall assure you that you shall never be opposed by me but only so far and wherein I am fully convinced that you oppose the Truth Manifest that to be on your side and I shall be ready to embrace both you and it For I am absolutely free from all respects unto things in this world that should or might retard me in so doing But that I may hereafter speak somewhat more to the purpose in opposition unto you or else give my consent with understanding unto what you teach pray inform me how I may come to the knowledge of the customs of your Church which you say I neither do nor will understand I have read your Councils those that are properly yours your Mass Book and Rituals many of your Annalists or Historians with your writers of Controversies and Casuists all of the best note same and reputation amongst you Can none of them inform us what the Customs of your Church are If you have such Egyptian or Elâ—usinian mysteries as no man can understand before he be initiated amongst you I must despair of coming unto any acquaintance with them For I shall never engage into the belief of I know not what For the present I shall declare you my apprehension as to that Custome of your Church as you call it which we have now under consideration and desire your charity in my direction if I understand it 〈◊〉 aright It is your Custome to keep the Scriptures from the people in an unknown tongue somewhat contrary to this your former custome in this last age you have made some Translations out of a Translation and that none of the best the use whereof you permit to very few by virtue of special dispensation pleading that the use of it in the Church among the body of its members is useless and dangerous Again it is the Custome of your Church to celebrate all its publick worship in Latine whereof the generality of your people understand nothing at all and you forbid the exercise of your Church worship in a vulgar tongue understood by the Community of your Church or people These I apprehend to be the Customes of your Church and to the best of my understanding they are directly contrary 1. To the End of God in granting unto his Church the inestimable benefit of his Work and worship and 2. To the Command of God given unto all to read meditate and study his Word continually And 3. Prejudicial to the souls of men in depriving them of those unspeakable spiritual advantages which they might attain in the discharge of their duty and which others not subject unto your Auâ—hority have experience of And 4. Opposite unto yea destructive of that edification which is the immediate end of all things 〈◊〉 to be done in publick Assemblies of the Church And 5. Forbidden expresly by the Apostle who inforceth his prohibition with many cogent reasons 1 Cor. 14. And 6. Contrary to the express practice of the primitive Church both Judaical and Christian all whose worship was performed in the same language wherein the People were instructed by preaching and exhortations which I presume you will think it necessary they should well understand being 7. Brought into use gradually and occasionally through the 〈◊〉 negligence of some who pretend in the Churches of those dayes when the Languages wherein the Scripture was first written and whereinto for the use of the whole Church it had been of old translated as the Old Testament into Greek and the whole into Latine through the Tumults and Wars that fell out in the world became corrupted or were extirpated And 8 A means of turning the worship of Christ from a rational way of strengthening faith and increasing Holiness into a dumb histrionical shew exciting brutish and irregular affections and 9 Were the great cause of that darkness and ignorance which spread its self in former dayes over the whole face of your Church and yet continueth in a great measure so to do And in summ are as great an Instance of the power of inveterate prejudices and carnal interests against the light of the Truth as I think was ever given in the world These are my apprehensions concerning the Customs of your Church in this matter with their nature and tendency I shall now try whither you who blame my misunderstanding of them can give me any better information or Reason for the change of my thoughts concerning them But Carbones pro thesauro instead of either further clearing or vindicating your Customs and practice you fall into Encomiums of your Church a story of a Greek Bishop with some other thing as little to your purpose Fur es ait Pedo Pedius quid crimina rasis Librat in Antithetis doctas posuisse figuras Lundatur You are accused to have robbed the Church of the use of the Scripture and the means of its Edification in the worship of God and when you should produce your defensitive you make a fine Discourse quite to other purposes Such as it is we must pass through it First you say I have heard many grave Protestant Divines ingenuously acknowledge that divine Comfort and Sanctity of life requisite unto Salvation which Religion aymes at may with more perfection and less inconvenience be attained by the Customs of the Roman Church then that of ours For Religion is not to fit perching upon the lips but to be got by heart it consists not in reading but doing and in this not in that lives the substance of it which is soon and easily conveighed Christ our Lord drew a Compendium of all divine Truths in two words which our great Apostle again abridged into one Ans. 1. I hope you will give me leave a little to suspend my assent unto what you affirm Not that I question your veracity as to the matter of fact related by you that some Persons have told you what you say but I suppose you are mistaken in them For whereas the Gospel is the Doctrine of Truth according unto Godliness and the promotion of Holiness and Consolation which cannot at all be promoted but in wayes and by means of Gods appointment is the next end of all Religion they can be no Protestant Divines who acknowledge this end to be better attainable in your way then their own because such an acknowledgement would be a vertual renunciation of their Protestancy The judgement of this Church and all the reall grave Divines of it is perfectly against you and should you condescend unto them in other things would not embrace
you to surcease 2. This Vulgar people that you talk of as the Pharises did of them that were willing to attend unto the preaching of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Joh. 7. This vulgar rout that knows not the Law if they are Christians they are such as to whom those Epistles were originally written and for whose sakes they are preserved such as Christ hath redeemed and sanctified in his own blood and given the annointing unto whereby they may know all things and are pattakers of the Promise that they shall be taught of God The Gospel takes not away the outward differences and distinctions that are on other accounts amongst the children of men but in the things of the Gospel its self there are none Vulgar or Common nor as such to be despised but believers are all one in Christ Jesus Col. 3. 11. Jam. 2. 1 2 3 4 5 6. How it is now I know nor but I am sure that the beginning of the preaching of the Gospel the poor principally received it and the greatest number of them that were effectually called was of those whom you speak so contemptuously of as the Apostle testifies 1. Cor. 1. 26. And the same is made good in all antient story Neither are these vulgar people such Ignoramus's as you imagine unless it be where you make and keep them such by detaining from them the means of knowledge and who perish for the want of it as the Prophet complained of old I speak not of them who continue willingly ignorant under the most effectual means of light but of such as being really born of God and becoming thereby a Royal Nation an holy Priesthood as they are called yea Kings and Priests unto God do conscientiously atterd unto his teachings Of these there are thousands yea ten thousands in England who are among the vulgar fort as to their Outward and Civil Condition that if occasion were administred would farther try your Divinity then you are aware and give you another manner of account of Pauls Epistles then I perceive you suppose they would You are mistaken if you imagine that either greatness or Learning Or Secular Wisdom will give a man understanding in the Mysteries of the Gospel or make him wise therein This wisdom is from above is wrought by the Spirit of God in the use of Spiritual means by himself appointed for that purpose And we know not that men of any condition are excepted from his dispensations of Light and Grace 3. To whom and for whose instruction were those Epistles of Paul written Were they not to the Churches of those dayes to all that were at Rome called to be holy ch 1. 7. and to the Church of God that was at Corinth sanctified in Christ Jesus 1 Cor. 1. 2. with all that everywhere call on his name And why I pray may not the Churches of these dayes be concerned to know the things that the Spirit of God thought meet to instruct the former Churches in Are Believers now grown unconcerned in the Doctrine in the law and Gospel of Sin and Grace of Justification Sanctification Adoption the Obedience of Faith and duties of Holiness which S. Paul reveals and declares in his Epistles What would you make of them or what would you make of the Apostle to write things for the standing use of the Church wherein so few were like to be concerned Or do you think that there are but few things in the Scripture wherein the souls of the people are concerned and that all the rest are left for learned men to dispute and wrangle about But you say there are particular Cases in them that belonged it may be only to them unto whom their resolution was directed But are you such a stranger in the Israel of the Church as not to know that in the same Cases or others of a very neer allyance unto them determinable by the Apostolical Rules delivered in them the Consciences of your vulgar people are still concerned 4. Those Epistles of Paul wherein you instance were written by divine Inspiration and given out by the direction of the Holy Ghost for the use of the Church of God in all Ages This I suppose you will not deny If so why do you set up your wisdom built on frivolous Cavils against the Will Wisdom Love and Care of God I fear you are a stranger unto that Benefit Strength Supportment Light Knowledge Grace Wisdom and Consolation which true believers the Disciples of Christ do every day receive by reading studying and meditating on Pauls Epistles I wish you would mind some of old Chrysostoms Exhortations unto all sorts of persons to the reading and study of them they are so interwoven in all his Expositions and Sermons on them that it were lost labour to direct you unto any place in particular 5. The latter part of your Discourse would make me suspect that your converse with the Quakers that you talked of in your Fiat had a little tainted your judgement but that I can ascribe the rise of it unto another Cause Your preferring the conceived substance of Gods Will before the letter of the Scripture is their very Opinion But what do you mean by the conceived substance of Gods Will Is it the Dâ—ctrine concerning the Will of God delivered in the Scripture or is it somewhat else If some other thing why do you not declare it If it be no other why do you distinguish it from its self and prefer it above it self or do you conceive there is a conceived substance of Gods Will that is taught or may be by men better then by God himself 6. Somewhat you intimate it may be to this purpose in the close of this Discourse p. 96. where you say the Question between us is not whether the people are to have Gods Word or no but whether that Word consist in the letter left to the Peoples disposal or in the substance urgently imposed upon the people for their practice And this because you understand not but mistake the whole business all your talk in this your eighteenth Chapter vades into nothing Truly Sir I never heard before that this was the state of the Controversie between us nor do I now believe it so to be For 1. We say not that the letter of the Scripture is to be left unto the Peoples disposal but that the Scripture is to be commended unto their reverend use and meditation which we think cannot be ingenuously denyed by any man that hath read the Scripture or knows ought of the Duty of the Disciples of Christ. 2. The Conceived substance of the Word of God as by any man conceived and proposed is no otherwise the Word of God but as it answers what is written in the Scripture and by virtue of its analogy therewith 3. If by urging the substance of the Word of God on the People you understand their instruction in their Duty out of the Word of God by Catechizing Preaching Admonitions and Exhortations as
here you give us two Languages the Syriack and Assyriack which names in the Original differed but little in sound but the languages themselves did as much in nature as French and English And the Syriack you tell us was that which is now so peculiarly called but what the Assyriack was you tell us not but only that when the Princes perswade Rabshakeh to speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aramith he intended an Assyrian language that was not Syrian The boys that grind colours in our Grammer Schools laugh at these Mormoes 8. Neither do you know well what you say when you affirm that the Language of Christ and his Apostles was the same that was ever since called the Syriack for the very instance you give manifests it to have been a different dialect from it the words as recorded by the Evangelists being absolutely the same neither with the Hebrew nor Targum nor Syriack Translation of the Old Testament That wherein we have the Translation of the Scripture and which prevailed in the Eastern Church being a peculiar Antiochian dialect of the old Aramaean Tongue And that whole language called the Syriack peculiarly now and whereof there were various dialects of old seems to have had its beginning after the Jews return from their captivity being but a degenerate mixture of the Hebrew and Chaldee whereunto also after the prevalency of the Macedonian Empire many Greek word were admitted and some Latine ones also afterwards 9. You advantage not your self by affirming that Assyria and Syria were several Kingdoms For as Strabo will inform you they were both originally called Syrian and indeed were one and the same until the more Eastern Provinces about Babylon obtaining their peculiar denominations that part of Asia which contains Comogena Phaenicia Palestina and Coelosyria became to be especially called Syria Originally they were all Aramites as every one knows that can but read the Scripture in its Original Language And now I suppose you may see how little you have advantaged your self or your cause by this maze of mistakes and contradictions For no errour can be so thick covered with others but that it will rain through The Jews you suppose to have lost their own language in the dayes of Hezekiah and to have spoken Syriack the Syrian and Assyrian to have been languages as far distant as French and English that when the Princes entreated Rabshakeh to speak the Syrian language 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they intended not the Syrian Language which was indeed the Jews but the Assyrian quite differing from it and so when they desired him not to speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you suppose them to have desired him not to speak in the Jews language but to speak in the Jews language which you say was the Syriack And sundry other no less unhappy absurdities have you amassed together But you will retrive us out of this Labyrinth by a Story of what a Greek Biship did and said at Paris in the presence of Doctor Cousins now bishop of Durham how he refused the Articles of the English Church and did all things according to the Roman mode asserting the use of Liturgies in the vulgar Greek Unto which I shall say no more but that it was at Paris and not at Durham Graeculus esuriens in caelum jusseris ibit I have my self known some eminent members of that Church in England two especially one many years ago called Conopius who if I mistake not upon his return obtained the honour of a Patriarchate being sent hither by the then Patriarch of Constantinople the other not many years ago called Anastatius Comnenus Archimandrite as his Testimonials be spake him of a Monastry on Mount Sinai Both these I am sure made it their business to inveigh against your Church practices having the Arguments of Nilus against your Supremacy at their fingers ends And if the Greek Chruch and you are so well agreed as you pretend why do you censure them as Hereticks and Schismaticks and receive only some few of them who are runnagates from their own Tents What may those whom you proclaim to be your enemies expect from you when you deal thus severely with those whom you give out to be your friends But as for this matter of the Scripture and prayers in an unknown tongue though they transgress not with so high an hand as you do the old Greeks being not so absolutely remote from the present vulgar as the Latine is from our English and the Languages of diverse other Nations whom you compell to your Church Service in that toague and besides they have the Scripture translated into their present vulgar tongue for the use of private persons yet we approve not their practice but look upon it as a great means of continuing that ignorance and darkness which is unquestionably spread over the major part of that Church which in some places as in Russia is to such a degree as to dispose the people unto Barbarism We know also that herein they are gone off from the constant and Catholick usage of their forefathers who for some Centuries of years from the dayes of the Apostles themselves who planted Churches amongst them both had the Bible in their own vulgar Tongue and made no use of any other in the publick Service of their Assemblies And that their example in your present degenerate condition which in some things you as little approve of as we do in others should have any great power upon us I know as yet little reason to judge Your last attempt in this matter is to vindicate what you have said in your Fiat as you now affirm That the Bible was kept in an Ark or Tabernncle not touched by the people but brought on t at times to the Priest that he might instruct the people out of it To which you say I answer That the Ark was placed in the Sanctum Sanctorum which was not entred into but by the Priest and that only once a year And Reply But Sir I speake not there of any Sanctum Sanctorum or of any Ark in that place was there or could there be no more Arks but one If you had been only in these latter days in any Synagogue or Convention of the Jews you might have seen even now how the Bible is still kept with them in an Ark or Tabernacle in imitation of their forefathers when they have no Sanctum Sanctorum amongst them You may also discern how according to your custome they â—ringe and prostrate at the bringing out of the Biblt which is the only solemn adoration left amongst them there be more Arks then that in the Sanctum Sanctorum if I had called it a Box or a Chest or a Cupboard you had let it pass but I used that word as more sacred The oftener that you touch upon this string the harsher is the found that it yields I would desire you to free your self from the unhappiness of supposing
that it tends unto your disreputation to be esteemed unacquainted with the Jews language and customes If you cannot do so you will not be able to avoid suffering from your own thoughts especially if you cannot for bear talking al out them This was all that in your former discourse you were obnoxious unto but this renewal of it hath rendred your condition somewhat worse then it was For failures in Skill and Science are not in demerit to be compared with those in Morality which are voluntary and of choice Your words in your Fiat after you had learnedly observed that the Bible was never in Moses time nor afterwards by any high Priest translated into Syriack for the use of the People are Nay it was so far from that that it was not touched nor looked upon by the people but kept privately in the Ark or Tabernacle and brought for that times by the Priest who might upon the Sabboth day read some part of it to the people I confess your expression in the Ark or Tabernacle was somewhat uncouth and discovered that you did but obscurely guess at the thing you ventured to discourse about But I took your words in that only sense they were capable of namely that the Bible was kept in the Ark or at least in the Tabernacle that is some part of it whereunto the People had no access And he must be a man devoid of reason and common sense who could imagine that you intended any thing but the sacred Ark and Tabernacle when you said that it was kept in the Ark or Tabernacle For not only by all rules of interpretation is the word used indefinitely to be taken in sensu famosiori but also your manner of Expression will admit of no other sense or intention Now herein in the Animadversions I minded you of your failure and told you that not the whole Bible as you imagined but only the Pentateuch was placed not in but at the sides of the Ark. That the Ark was kept in the Sanctuary that no Priest went in thither but only the High Priest and that but once a year that the book of the Law was never brought forth from thence to be read to the people and lastly that whatever of this kind you might fancy yet it would not in the least conduce to your purpose it being openly evident that besides the Publick lections out of the Law that People had all of them the Scripture in their houses and were bound by the command of God to read and meditate in them continually What say you now to these things 1. You change your words and affirm that you said it was kept in an Ark or Tabernacle as though you meant any Ark or Chest. But you too much wrong your self your words are as before represented in the Ark or Tabernacle and you remembred them well enough to be so which so perplexeth you in your attempt to rectifie what you said For after you have changed the first word the addition of the next leaves you in the briars of nonsense in an Ark or Tabernacle as though they were terms convertible a Chest or a Tent. I wish you would make an end of this fond shooting at rovers 2. You apply that to the practice of the present Jews in their Synagogues which you plainly spake of the antient Jews whilest their Temple and Church state continued wherein again you intrench upon morality for an Evasion And besides you cast your self upon new mistakes For 1. The Book kept in a Chest by them and brought forth with the veneration you speak of is not the whole Bible as you imagine but only the Pentateuch which was read in their Synagogues on the Sabbath dayes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as James tells us Act. 15. 21. Only whereas their Law was particularly sought after to be destroyed by Antiochus Epiphanes they supplyed the room of it with the other parts of the Scripture divided into Haphters answerable unto the Sections of the Law Nor 2. Is that brought out to or by a Priest but to any Rabbi that precides in their Synagogue worship for they have no Priest amongst them nor certain distinction of Tribes so that if you your self have been in any Synagogue or Convention of the Jews it is evident that you understood little of what you saw them do 3. For their Prostration at the bringing out of the Book which you seem to commend as a solemn Adoration it is down right Idolatrous for in it they openly worship the material roll or book that they keep But what is it that you would from hence conclude Is it that which you attempted in yout Fiat namely that the People amongst the Jews had not the Bible in their own language and in common use among them You may as easily prove that the Sun shines not at noon day The Scripture was committed unto them in their own mother tongue and they were commanded of God to read and study it continually the Psalmist pronouncing them blessed who did accordingly And the present Jews make the same duty of indispensable necessity unto every one amongst them after he comes to be filius praecepti or lyable to the keeping of any command of God The Rules they give for all sorts of Persons high and low rich and poor young and old sick and in health for the performance of this duty are known to all who have any acquaintance with their present Principles Practices State and Condition And you shall scarcely meet with a child amongst them of nine ytars old who is not exercised to the reading of the Bible in Hebrew And yet though they all generally learn the Hebrew tongue for this purpose in their Infancy yet least they should neglect it or through trouble be kept from it they have translated the whole Old Testament into all the Languages of the Nations amongst whom in any nambers they are scattered The Arabick Translation of the Mauritanian Jews the Spanish of the Spaniards and Portugues I can shew you it you please Upon the whole matter I wish you knew how great the work is wherein you are engaged and how contemptible the engines are whereby you hope to effect it But such Positions and such Confirmations are very well suited And this is the summ of what you plead afresh in vindication of your Latine Service and keeping the Scripture from the use of the People If you suppose your self armed hereby against the express Institution of Christ by his Apostâ—es the example of Gods dealing with his people of old the nature of the things themselves and universal practise of the Primitive Church I really pitty you and shall continue to pray for you that you may not any longer bring upon your selves the blood of souls CHAP. 23. Communion THE Defence of your Paragraph about Communion in one kind is totally deserted by you I know no other cause of your so doing but a sence of your incompetency for its defence seing you
expend words enough about things of less importance But you please your self with the commendation of what you had written on this subject in your Fiat as full of Christian Reason convincing Reason and Sobriety and how it would have prevailed upon your own judgement had you been otherwise minded You seem to dwell far from neighbours and to be a very easie man to be entreated unto what you have a mind unto But you might not have done amiss to have waited a little for the praise of others This out of your own mouth is not very comely And I shall only take leave once more to inform you that an opposition to the Institution of Christ the command of the Apostle the Practice of the Primitive Church with the faith and Consolation of Believers such as is your Paragraph about Communion in one kind whatever overweening thoughts you may have of the product of your own fancy cannot indeed have any one grain in it of Sobriety or Christian Reason CHAP. 24. Heroes of the Asses Head whose Worship was objected to Jews and Christians YOur last end endeavour consists in an exception to somewhat affirmed in the twentieth Chapter of the Animadversions directed unto your Paragraph about Saints and Heroes And I am sorry that I must close with the Consideration of it because I would willingly have taken my leave of you upon better terms then your discouse will allow me to do But I shall as speedily represent you unto your self as I am able And then give you my Salve aeternumque Vale. You tell us in your Fiat that the Pagans defamed the Christians for the worship of an Asses head and you give this reason of it because the Jews had defamed our Lord Jesus Christ whose head and half Portraicture Christians used upon their Altars even as they do at this day of his great simplicity and ignorance Two things you suppose 1. That the Christians placed the Head and half Portraicture of our Saviour in those dayes on their Altars which is alone to your purpose 2. That this gave occacasion to the Pagans to defame them with the worship of an Asses head because the Jews had so blasphemed the Lord Christ as you say These things I told you are fond and false and destitute of all colour of Testimony from Antiquity That the worship of an Asses head was originally charged on the Jews themselves and on Christians no otherwise but as they were accounted a Sect of them or their off spring and that what in the same place you assert of the Jews accusing the Christians for the worship of Images or the Christians using the Picture of Christs head or his half Portraicture on their Altars are monsters that none oâ— the Antients ever dreamed of What plead you 〈…〉 your Vindication quite omitting that what 〈◊〉 alone you are concerned you only undertake to prove that the worship of an Asses head was 〈◊〉 used to the Christians as well as to the Jews which you say I deny and say that it was not charged on the Jews at all And the reason of this charge you say was because they were reckoned among the Jews in odiosis and accounted of them So well do you mind what you had said before of the rise of that imputation on the Christians from the blasplemy of the Jewes So 1. In your Fiat you say no hiâ—g of the Jews at all but only that by their 〈◊〉 the Pagans took occasion to slander the 〈◊〉 being now better instructed by the Animadversions in the rise of that foolish calumny you change your note and close in with what is in them 〈◊〉 2. You unduely affirm that I deny this to have been charged on the Christians when I grant it was and that in the very same manner and on the same account that your self now contrary to what you had written before acknowledge it to have been He must be as much unacquainted with these things as some body else whom I shall not name honoris gratia seems to be who knows not that this foolish impiety was imputed in process of time to the Christians by the Pagans among a litter of other follies as well as unto the Jews Caecilius in Minucius tells us audio â—os ineptissimae pecudis Caput Asini consecratum inepta nescio qua persuasione venerari I heer that by a foolish perswasion they worship the head of an Ass a vile beast And Tertullian Apol cap. 16. Nam quidam somniastis Caput Asininum esse Deum nostrum Some of you dream that an Asses head is our God presently declaring thereon that this imputation was derived on them from the Jews who first suffered under that Fable And if any thing gave new occasion unto it among the Christians it was not the Picture of Christ despised by the Jews as you imagine but the report of his riding on an Ass which Athanasius takes notice of Homil. ad Pagan they said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the God of the Christians who is called Christ sate on an Ass. But you will prove what you say out of Tertullian say you the same Tertullian in his Apologeticks adds these words The Calumnies saith he invented to cry down our Religion grew to such an excess of impiety that not long ago in this very City a picture of our God was shewn by a certain infamous Person with the ears of an Ass and a hoof on one foot cloathed with a gown and a book in his hand with this inscription Onochoetes the God of the Christians And he adds that the Christians in the City as they were much offended with the impiety so did they not a little wonder at the strange uncouth name the villain had put upon our Lord and Master Onochoetes forsooth he must be called Onochoctes In this Testimony of you know not what you triumph and conclude are you not a strange man to tell me that what I speak of this business is notoriously false nay and that I know it is false and that I cannot produce one Authentick Testimony no not one of any such thing but this is your Ordinary Confidence Seriously Sir I wonder where you got this Quotation out of Tertullian Let me desire you to be wary in receiving any thing hereafter from the same hand out of Authors that you want the Confidence to venture upon your self The words of Tertullian which your Translator hath abused you in are these Sed nova jam Dei nostri in ista Civitate proxime editio publicata est ex quo quidam in frustrandis bestiis mercenarius noxius picturam proposuit cum ejusmodi inscriptione Deus Christianorum Ononychites is erat auribus Asininis altero pede ungulatus librum gestans togatus risimus nomen formam Sed illi debebant adorare statim biforme numen qui canino leonino capite commistos Deos receperunt Lately in that City that is Rome there was a publick shew made of our God wherein a