he not have believed that God would never have suffer'd that Schism should have been introduc'd in the very Seat of Unity after such a manner as that the Church for almost fourty years could not be able to discern its true Pastor from him that was the Hireling and the false one seeing it self abandon'd to two Mercenaries each of which pretended to the Title and Quality in this onely agreeing together to keep the Church in a fatal Division as it happen'd towards the period of the Fourteenth Age when one of these Anti-Popes had his Seat at Avignon the other at Rome Would he not have believed that God would never have permitted that he whose principal Office is to keep all Christians in Unity should by his rash and hasty Excommunications be the occasion of whole Kingdomes Defection from the Catholick Communion and by this means an infinity of Souls miserably perish by Schism and Heresie as it came to pass in England In a Letter to Hen. IV. touching the Venetian affaire dans les Oeuvres diverses p. 874 through the precipitancy of Clement the VIIth presented with so much Zeal to Pope Paul the Vth that he might thereby stop him from falling into the like oversight in the difference with the Venetians re-inforcing it also by the Example of Leo the Xth in reference to Germany and by remonstrating to him that he ought to consider he was now in the same Crisis and at the same point in which Leo the Tenth lost Religion in Germany and Clement the Seventh ruin'd it in England but by which Clement the Eighth did preserve it in France Indeed to reason onely from that which in our fond opinions would appear most advantageous to the Church and what we should be ready to judge ought to be according to our weak apprehensions certain it is that if those who seem to be the Wisest men had been summon'd to the Counsel of God what time he was about the contrivance and model of the Church they would doubtless have thought it fitting that he should never have permitted his Lieutenants upon Earth to fall into such disorders so diametrically opposite to the duty of their Place and so prejudicial to those Souls which were committed to them But the Thoughts of God are immensely wide from the Thoughts of Men and he has by his most inscrutable Judgements resolved that the Events should totally confound all our pretended Wisedom having permitted what we should have believed he would never have permitted And therefore all truly pious Persons ought to acknowledge from so many sad and deplorable Examples That God has not thought good the Stability of his Church should depend upon the Sanctity the Wisedom and the Sagacity of one single Man though he were the Head and Supreme Pastor of it It is the religious reflexion of Cardinal Baronius upon the Disorders of the Popes of the Tenth Age Ad An. 897 n. 5. To the end saies he that God might make appear his Church was not of any humane invention but an Institution purely divine he has been pleas'd to shew that it should never lose it self or come to destruction by the Vices of ungodly Popes as Kingdomes and Commonwealths have frequently done through the Crimes and the Vices of irreligious and ungodly Kings Ut enim Deus significaret eandem suam Ecclesiam nequaquam humanum esse figmentum sed planè Divinum inventum oportuit ostendisse eam nequaquam pravorum Antistitum operâ perdi posse ad nihilum redigi sicut de aliis diversarum Gentium Regnis bene statutis Rebus-publicis factum constat It is the very same in that kind of Infallibility which these Jesuites attribute to the Pope by a mistake altogether new and unheard-of which God has permitted should yet be destroy'd by so many Examples that there is not a Divine who can ever believe it to be true without manifestly condemning himself of Heresie For if all the Decisions of Popes concerning matters of Fact themselves were as so many Articles of Faith there being hardly one able Divine which does not oppugn some of them there would in fine be none of them but would be found to oppose the very Faith it self For instance Who is there does not at present think that the Epistles attributed to the first Popes were never any of those Popes Writings but a Work or Rhapsody rather of some Cheat and Impostor And yet not onely Pope Nicolas commanded the Bishops of France to receive them but his Successors have inserted them into the Book of the Decretals which they have by their Authority Apostolical propos'd to serve as a Rule to the Universal Church and in which they speak at least as much out of their Chair as in their ordinary Bulls How then should one without gross impiety believe that these Epistles are forged P. Sermond P. Peta and others as at present all able Church-men believe them to be yea even the Jesuites themselves if we are oblig'd to acknowledge the same Infallibility in Popes as in Jesus Christ in Questions of Fact Do we think the Infallibility of J. Christ would permit us to propose to the Catholick Church pieces which are evidently false and supposititious for such as are genuine and true There is hardly any matter of Fact of more importance to the Church then to discern a Council whether it be General or not Lawfull or Illegitimate In the mean time has France been Heretical for not having acknowledged the Council of Florence as Oecumenical notwithstanding the Bulls of Pope Eugenius the Fourth and all those Declarations which he prefix'd at the head of this Council to oblige the whole World to own it for a General one Did the Cardinal of Lorrain oppose the Faith when he openly testified in these terms to Pope Pius the Fourth what his Opinion was upon this Controversie and that of all France As for the latter of those Titles which you would attribute to our holy Father taken out of the Council of Florence I cannot deny but that I am a French-man brought up in the University of Paris in which our Tenent is That the Authority of a Council is above the Pope and that they are censur'd as Hereticks who maintain the contrary That in France they acknowledge the Council of Constance for General in all its parts That they adhere to that of Basil and esteem that of Florence for neither Lawfull nor General and That all the French will sooner perish then be induc'd to believe the contrary This Letter of the Cardinal of Lorrain which he directed to his Secretary then at Rome to be shewn Pope Pius IVth is to be seen in the Collection of the Memoires of the Council of Trent published by the late Monsieur du Puis and printed by Cramoisy During the first difference of Pope Eugenius IVth with the Council of Basil he published a very authentick Bull by which he declar'd that he transferr'd the Council to
speaking of such as gave others occasion of sinning that your Brother is not yet dead through the scandal you have given him He is not dead and yet are you an homicide Et ille vivit tu homicida es We may say the very same of the Jesuites in relation to the Pope into whom they strive to inspire an Opinion so mortal Non sibi blandiantur quia ille non est mortuus ille vivit isti homicida sunt But it is not the Pope alone to whom they give an occasion of Scandal they offer it to all the Faithfull in general whilst they persuade them to establish their Belief upon the Word of a mortal Man and to submit themselves to it as to the prime Verity which can in no sort be done as has already been demonstrated without a kind of Idolatry So as the Jesuites doe in a manner the very same thing with those Hereticks who would have men render Divine honours to the Virgin For as the true respect which we owe to the Virgin the most holy of all the Creatures would not diminish the Crime of these Hereticks and their Disciples so nor would the veneration that all the Faithfull have for the Head of the Church exempt them from the guilt of a very hainous sin before God if thus deluded by the Jesuites they should render to the Word of a Man howsoever conspicuous in the Church this soveraign deference of Divine Faith which cannot be pai'd without manifest impiety but to the Word of God himself Little do the men of the world consider the magnitude of these sorts of offences since being wholly carnal they are not concern'd but with things altogether gross and exteriour These hypocritical Devotes permit themselves to be easily transported with such excesses because they conceive it a great degree of Piety blindly to embrace what-ever it be that elevates those Things and Persons to whom we owe respect and hence it is proceeds that variety of Opinions which they term Pious without at all putting themselves to the trouble of inquiring whether they are true or false as if what were false could be a fit object of Piety or that the God of Truth might be honour'd with a Lie But you my Lords know that those who are bred up in the sincere spirit of Christianism make a far different account of these matters They equally detest Lying to whose profit soever it may possibly appear advantageous were it to the Pope to the Virgin were it even to J. Christ himself And which one would hardly say had not S. Augustin said it before us for this Father was not afraid to assert it Aug. de Mendacio cap. 20. That if the Lying and the Calumny which is us'd to take away the temporal life of a man be a detestable crime much more abominable is that which tends to the bereaving us of the life eternal such as is all prevarication in matter of Religion yea though it were even employ'd in ascribing false praises to Jesus Christ himself Ibid. cap. 10. Wherefore saies the same Father it were an extreme folly for a Christian not to be rather prepar'd to suffer all sorts of indignities and even such as strike a terror into holy Souls then once condescend to whomsoever would oblige him to corrupt the Gospel by any fictitious praises of J. Christ Seeing then according to this holy Saint it would be an abominable Crime to attribute any false Praises to J. Christ himself who being God is superiour to all Praises how much greater is it to ascribe to a mortal Man inviron'd with infirmities as the Scripture expresses it the Praises which appertain to God alone But into what Labyrinths of Errours shall we not precipitate our selves if once we grant a liberty to our humane fancy to shroud its various wandrings under a pretext of Piety For if Opinions must be tolerated how false soever they may be because an ill-advis'd Piety judges them Pious and if it be a plausible and sufficient reason to exempt Popes from Faults and Errours obnoxious to humane nature by pretending one may piously believe that God having intrusted them with the Government of the Church will never permit them to fall into any Errours which may be prejudicial to it as the Jesuites do from hence believe they have a right to invest the Popes in the same state of Infallibility which J. Christ had and that even in matters of Fact when they propose them to the Universal Church why may they not as well pretend they have the same right also of attributing to the Popes the same Impeccability which J. Christ had in all those concernments which relate to the Government of the Church and the functions of their Soveraign Pontificate why should not this latter opinion be as pious as the former Would it not seem incomparably more advantageous to the Church that the Popes could not sin in this manner then to be Infallible in matters of Fact And the Souls which are purchased by the bloud of J. Christ have they not receiv'd infinitely more detriment from the wicked Administration of some Popes then they could ever contract from their want of illumination or due attention in the understanding of some particular Author A man that had liv'd in the Primitive Ages of the Church resting himself upon these Probabilities and Conveniencies of humane Witts would he not have believed he had reason to say That God would never permit that the Seat of S. Peter should for near one intire Age be possess'd by Persons so prodigiously unworthy Baron ad An. 897. n. 4. As Cardinal Baronius does with grief acknowledg it happen'd for during almost the whole Tenth Age by the power of the Marquess of Toscany who domineering with his Arms and Mony over the Clergy and people of Rome establish'd such Persons in S. Peter's Chair as were not onely wicked in regard of themselves but were so also to the Church by introducing most horrible Disorders such as the same Baronius complains were brought in by John the Xth who made a Child of five years of age Archbishop of Reims upon which the Cardinal makes this sad reflexion Tantum nefas Ad An. 923 n. 11. quo jura omnia Ecclesiastica sauciantur ejus Pontificis authoritate introductum quem infamis foemina infami operâ Petri solium intrusisset Would not this man have believed that God would never have permitted the Vicar of him who said his Kingdom was not of this World to undertake the disposal of temporal Kingdoms to depose some from them and conferre them upon others Mr. du Puis in his Treatise of the Rights of the King to the Kingdom of Navarre as Julius the II d did the Kingdom of Navarre which the Kings of Spain now possess to the prejudice of ours and that by virtue onely of a Gift pretended to be receiv'd of this Pope who took it away from its lawful King Would
The Fourth is the opinion of several other Divines who are persuaded of one part that it is most false the Fact should be separated from Right or that it should be a point of Faith to hold the Doctrine of Jansenius heretical or that a man is obliged to believe it by humane Faith but who believe on the other part that the Fact being contain'd in this Formularie those who scruple it cannot sign it without restriction since the declarations which men make to the Church ought to be intirely sincere and free of all duplicity It is visible that in this difference of Divines each party condemns the others but after a sort very different The Jesuites who make the first ought by the necessary consequence of their Opinion to condemn for Heresie not onely the last who absolutely refuse to sign that the sense of Jansenius is heretical but those likewise who do not believe it of humane Faith or that believe it not at all albeit they sign it For Heresie consists in the opinion of the spirit and not in the omission of an exterior action of the hand A person who should not believe but with an humane Faith that the Body of J. Christ were in the Sacrament of the Eucharist or that should sign it in infidelity would be never the less an Heretick then he who should absolutely refuse to sign it So as all those many Bishops that have caus'd none to sign or that receive restrictions concerning the matter of Fact or that declare they do not require the belief of the Fact or that pretend not the Fact can be otherwise believ'd then by humane Faith are as much Hereticks in the judgement of the Jesuites and of F. Annat as these Divines whom they particularly persecute True it is their Politicks oblige them to distinguish of two sorts of Hereticks in France some of which they treat civilly and others most outrageously They place the Bishops Sorbonists the Fathers of the Oratory the Benedictines c. in the first order and whom they do not yet attacque but by consequence though by a very necessary one whiles they range in the other those whom they immediately design for ruine that so they may with the greater force surprize the other Therefore it is sufficiently evident that all those persons who have sign'd the Fact either of humane Faith or without believing it shall be never the more acquitted for that but be all Hereticks in their turn when they have left off oppressing the others seeing they must of necessity be so in the opinion of the Jesuites But on the contrary all these three last parties who accord in this point that this Fact of Jansenius is very separable from Right that it does not in the least concern the Faith and that one may safely deny it without Heresie ought from a necessary consequence of this their mutual Opinion condemn the Jesuites both of Calumny and Errour It is certain these four Parties reside in the Church and that if one would now consider which of them were the most numerous one might safely affirm that there are none more profligate and abandon'd and who have fewer sincere approbators then that of the Jesuites Nor is this an aiery Supposition but a real Verity to be discern'd by every one that has a mind to it that the Jesuites stand almost single in this pretension that matter of Fact is inseparable from matter of Right and that one cannot believe without being an Heretick the Doctrine of Jansenius not to be heretical The most devoted to the Jesuites of the Bishops ask for whom the World takes them that they should believe them capable of so monstrous a Folly as is that of affirming that a Fact should be inseparably joyn'd to Faith They express as much as one would wish in words that they do not require the assent of Fact They receive the Subscriptions of those whom they very well know do not believe it and who declare as much before they sign All the Curats of Paris do solemnly approve and by an authentick Act the Distinction between Fact and Right contain'd in the first Mandat of Paris In fine they proceed with confidence that the Jesuites cannot find six Bishops in all France and ten Divines of the least considerable persons who will sign this Proposition which F. Ferrier maintains and which is the basis of all his Treatise The Fact of Jansenius is inseparable from Faith and one cannot reject the Dogm which is condemned without acknowledging it to be Jansenius ' s. And in particular they affirm that he could not make M. Grandin sign nor M. Moret nor amongst the Doctors M. Chamillart nor Monsieur de Rouën amongst the Bishops It is certain therefore that the Jesuites are in a manner alone in their erroneous opinions And 't is as true that the Divines whom they persecute are almost wholly united to the Church in this difference which is between them I confess they have yet some dispute with the other Divines because against the one they maintain that one owes not so much as humane Faith to Decisions de facto when there is any cause of doubt administred and against the other that it was not altogether sincere in them to subscribe a Formularie which clearly comprizes a Fact without being fully persuaded of the Fact But this difference has relation to Manners onely and not to Faith and in this very difference they may make use of the authority of the one to defend themselves against the other Those who sign the Fact as of humane Faith approve of their Doctrine touching the Sincerity of Subscriptions Those who sign the Fact without believing it approve what they affirm That the Church obliges none to believe the Fact by way of command so as to the truth they have this consolation that in every of the Points whereof they are accus'd they are united in Opinion with the greatest part of the Divines of the Church Whoever shall take the pains diligently to inform himself of the bottom of these particulars will clearly find that what I say is most true And if any man ask why the contrary appears to the World that the Jesuites domineer every-where and the Divines are oppress'd it is not very difficult to give a reason for it They are onely to consider what Post F. Annat holds and what Power the place in which he is affords him both at Rome and at Paris to doe what he pleases as to this matter They know nothing at Rome but from the Instructions which he sends them and he stands at the gate of all the Benefices of France to exclude who-ever stands in his way in any thing Every one has his particular business at Court and those who have no other either for themselues or their Communalty enjoy their repose in which they will not be molested Jansenism is the onely affair of Father Annat so as that people may not be cross'd in their particular businesses
whole Church seems to become heretical For admitting what is most certain that the Church has decreed Calvinism Pelagianism and Semi-pelagianism to be Heresies and that the Doctors are those who sit in the Chair to be consulted withall upon points of Religion All Catholicks are reduc'd to a most strange perplexity For if a man shall address himself to those who are of the Jansenian party they will tell him that those who are term'd Molinists are Pelagians or at least Semi-pelagians and on the other side the Molinists will bear him down that their Adversaries are Calvinists or else Novatians Now all the Doctors of the Church Catholick are either of the one or the other party except it be some few which are not yet resolv'd whether side to embrace I leave you then to consider to what prodigious streights the minds of men are reduc'd since this is held as a Maxime That whoever fails in one point of Faith fails in all To what other refuge then does this necessity seem to compell us but to have recourse to the Faith of the Primitive Church and to limit our selves to that pure simplicity of Belief wherein we are assur'd that our first Christian Brethren attained to Salvation ANno Domini 1554. die verò primâ Decembris Sacratissima Theologiae Facultas Parisiensis post Missam de Sancto Spiritu in aede sacra Collegii Sorbonae ex more c. In the year of our Lord 1554. the first day of December the Venerable Faculty of Divinity at Paris after celebration of the Mass of the H. Ghost in the Chapell of the College of Sorbon and upon Oath taken now the fourth time assembled in the same place to determine on certain Bulls which two of our most holy Popes viz. Paul the Third and Julius the Third have as they give out granted to a sort of men who out of a singular affectation would be intitled of the Society of Jesus the which two Bulls the Senate or Court of Parliament of Paris had sent to the said Faculty by an Officer to be view'd and examin'd by them After recital of their obedience to the holy See c. it follows Sed quoniam omnes praesertim verò Theologos c. But for that all men and especially Divines should be prepar'd to give satisfaction to every one that desires to be enlightned in matters which concern the Faith Manners and Edification of the Church the said Faculty have esteem'd it their duty to satisfie what has been by the said Court commanded and requir'd Having therefore diligently and frequently read repeated and understood all the Articles of the said two Bulls and as the gravity of the thing requir'd for many months daies and hours as the manner is accurately discuss'd and examin'd it they have by an unanimous consent but with all reverence and humility to the correction of the Apostolical See thus at last concluded This novel Society insolently arrogating to themselves the Name of Jesus so licenciously and without any care in the choice admitting all sorts of persons how flagitious soever illegitimate and infamous differing nothing in their exteriour Habit from the Secular Priests in Tonsure in Canonical Hours which they repeat in private or sing publickly in the Churches in Cloisters and in silence in choice of Meats and Daies Abstinences and divers other different Ceremonies by which the state and order of Religions are preserv'd and distinguish'd as having receiv'd so many and ample Privileges Indulgences and Immunities especially in what concerns the administration of the Sacrament of Penitence and of the holy Eucharist and that without any difference or regard had to Places and Persons and even in the Office of Preaching Reading and Teaching to the great prejudice of the Ordinaries and Hierarchical function and that of other Religions yea even of Princes and Temporal Lords against the Privileges of all Universities and finally to the exceeding regret and burthen of the People This Society seems to us to violate the honour and discipline of the life Monastical and to enervate and weaken the studious pious and necessary exercise of the vertues of Abstinence Ceremonies and Austerity nay gives occasion of freely apostatizing from other Religions besides it evacuates the due obedience and subjection to Ordinaries it unjustly deprives as well the Temporal as the Ecclesiastical Lords of their just Rights excites troubles and perturbations as well in the one as the other Polity induces a world of quarrells amongst the common people multitudes of dissensions variances contentions emulations rebellions and in summe an infinity of Schisms All these particulars together with sundry others having been therefore most diligently weighed and consider'd We pronounce and judge this Society to be as to matter of Faith pernicious contrary to the peace of the Church subversive of the Monastical Religion and tending rather to Destruction then at all to Edification NOw whether this Censure of that Learned Faculty were not as prophetical as by the consequence and experience of one intire Age we have found it just and reasonable let the religious and impartial Reader candidly determine since in this fatal period and Catalysis of true Piety even this very Faculty it self the so famous Sorbon has been perverted by these Atheistical Sycophants blasphemous and profane Wretches from their primary station integrity We have produc'd this Decree to justifie what we affirm and to let all the world see how requisite it is to put a timely stop to their prodigious Exorbitancies by that noble and resolute example of the Gallican Church which God Almighty in his due season improve to the consummate unity of all devout Christians THE SENSE OF The FRENCH Church Concerning the Pope's Infallibility Power Lately declared by Authority SInce the Bishop of Rome got so much Authority in the Catholick part of the World as to be able by his Ministers and Negotiations to attempt to govern private Churches out of his own Metropolitan Diocese there has been wag'd a great War amongst Divines about the Quality of his Authority And as Man's Soul by her Powers and Operations is twofold of Understanding and Will Speculation and Practice so the Divines Questions the Gates by which such Tenets get entrance into the Church are also two-leav'd the one opens to the Power the Pope has to command assent to his Resolutions of Speculative Points the other to what Obedience is due to his Commands The party whose interest it is by application to the highest See to dilate their own privileges and exemptions from the ordinary Government of the Church instituted by Christ and received by continual Tradition to our daies have striven with all their might to possess the World that both for assent to Christian Truths and for regulating of Discipline Christ had given all power to Saint Peter and his Successor so that the whole Hierarchy in effect remain'd in him alone The rest as far as not infected by them maintained constantly the contrary and
that though the Pope was chief of Bishops yet the Congregation of Bishops was the Court from whence final resolutions were to be expected The former Tenet had of late gotten a great strength through the most parts of Christendom but the Divine Providence when it found it fitting raised the French Church which at the present is very flourishing to set a bar to their great advance as may be seen by the Papers here inserted The substance of the Advocate General 's Plea against a Thesis defended in Sorbon concerning the Pope's Infallibility Translated out of the French Copy I Do saies he acknowledge my carelesness in having suffered to scape unpunished those horrible Blasphemies which the Jesuites vomited out against Jesus Christ in a Thesis defended the last year in the College of Clermont which maintained that the Pope was as infallible in matters both of Fact and Right as Jesus Christ himself Has a greater Impiety been heard of But it is ordinary with them to teach erroneous Doctrines And I believe 't is from the impunity of that Crime that the boldness has been taken to defend the like Errours in Sorbon against her Statutes the Doctrine of the Gallican Church and the Maximes of State and of this Court How That the Pope with five or six ignorant Divines with mercenary souls should be Infallible to make Articles of Faith of whatsoever Passion Interest or Ambition shall suggest to him Our Ancestors have seen the fatal consequences and effects of this pernicious Doctrine Wherefore lest this poison should spread it self farther and this pernicious Doctrine take root if it be left unpunished I conclude the Thesis shall be struck out and blotted the Defendent and President constrained to maintain the direct contrary and the Syndic never to approve such like Theses under pain of being extraordinarily proceeded against The Pope and Bishops are not Authors of our Faith but faithfull Guardians and irrefragable Witnesses of universal Tradition received from hand to hand from Jesus Christ to us according to Vincentius Lirinensis Quod semper quod ubique quod ab omnibus creditum est hoc de Fide est c. Notes upon it Those who are acquainted with the Government of France understand that the Parliament of Paris is made of Members given to Learning and reading of Fathers and to the skill of Languages particularly Greek and Latine and by consequence of Church Antiquities and that the King's Advocate who at this present is called Monsieur Talon is ordinarily one of the most eminent and that in matters of Divinity they are tenacious of the Decrees of the Sorbon the greatest Catholick University in our parts of the World and whose Doctrine passeth for the Doctrine of the Church of France especially their Ancient Decrees It is again to be noted that he saith that the Tenet of the Pope's Personal Infallibility in making Doctrines to be of new accepted for Articles of Faith is against the Maximes of the French Government that is that it toucheth upon Treason which if it be true in France it can be no less in England and he cannot be truly loyal to his Country who obstinately maintaineth that Errour The reason is clear for if that be true the Pope may define and oblige Subjects to believe that he can depose a Prince and bind his Subjects to take Arms against him as was insinuated in a Letter confidently reported to have been lately written from Rome to Ireland by a great man of that Court though others say the Letter was counterfeited Extracted out of a Letter written from France to a Person of Quality The Jesuites having defended formerly that the Pope hath the same Infallibility with Jesus Christ Monsieur Talon the Advocate General complained of it publickly in Parliament remonstrating that this was a most horrible Impiety and highly deserving open and corporal Punishment Whereupon the Court of the said Parliament has ordained that the President the Regent and the Scholars which maintain'd it should appear personally to receive a Reprehension for the first time and a denouncing of corporal and publick punishment intended and resolv'd to be inflicted in case any of them should relapse into the like Blasphemy hereafter Notes upon it The Thesis mentioned is that against which was divulged the Paper entituled THE JESUITES NEW HERESIE which insinuates that the Tenet of the Pope's Infallibility was their former Heresie which is a gentle Censure upon a Doctrine able to introduce Heresies without number into the Church of God as is evident to whosoever shall consider how easie it is for a dozen of Divines to be either corrupted or deceived and yet our Faith by this Position is made to depend on their Science and Integrity Note again that the King's Advocate professeth that the Tenet of the Pope's Infallibility in matters of Fact deserveth publick and corporal punishment which signifies no less then whipping banishment or some such like punishment and that it is a Crime deserving that the Civil Magistrate ought to take notice of it This Absurdity was invented by the Jesuites in envy to the great Scholar Jansenius to the end that people might be persuaded he held Errours not visible in his Books of the which they calumniated him and would prove him guilty of them onely by the Pope's Infallible word defining him to be so which mad Prank of theirs has made such a pother in France of late years A Decree of the Court of Parliament against a Theological Conclusion intended to have been maintain'd the 19 of January 1662 3. by Monsieur Gabriel Droüet of Ville-neufve Bachelor Given the 22 of January 1662 3 at Paris Extracted out of the Registers of Parliament and faithfully render'd into English THis day the Court having deliberated upon what was by the King's Council represented the 19 and 20 of this present Month concerning a Thesis intended to have been maintain'd the said 19 day by Monsieur Gabriel Drouet of Ville-neufve in Britany Bachelor in Divinity at the Act call'd The great Ordinary of SORBON which contain'd in its Second Position Christus Sanctum Petrum ejúsque Successores summâ supra Ecclesiam Auctoritate donavit Christ gave Saint Peter and his Successors highest Authority over the Church in its Third Romani Antistites Privilegia quibusdam Ecclesiis sicut Ecclesiae Gallicanae impertiunt The Bishops of Rome bestow Privileges upon certain Churches as upon the French Church in its Eighth Concilia Generalia ad exstirpandas Haereses Schismata alia tollenda incommoda admodum sunt utilia non tamen absolutè necessaria General Councils are very profitable to extirpate Heresies and Schisms and to take away other inconveniencies but not absolutely necessary and many other Propositions contrary to the Authority of the Church to the Ancient Doctrine alwaies received and conserved in this Kingdome to the holy Canons to the Decrees of General Councils and to the Liberties of the Gallican Church tending also to exalt the power of the Pope
above that of General Councils and beyond the limits which have alwaies been most religiously conserved in the Church of France having heard the Syndic of the Faculty of Theologie and Monsieur Vincent de Meurs Doctor in the said Faculty of the College of Navar who was to preside at the said Dispute and the said Droüet the Respondent who had all been sent for in pursuance of the Decree of the 19 of this Month as also having heard the King's Council in their Conclusions the Court hath prohibited and forbidden and doth prohibit and forbid the said Droüet to defend the said Thesis hath ordained and doth ordain that it be supprest together with all the rest that shall be found to contain such like Propositions prohibits and forbids all Bachelors Licentiats and Doctors and other persons to write defend and dispute to reade and teach directly or indirectly in the publick Schools or elsewhere any such like or other Propositions contrary to the Ancient Doctrine of the Church to the holy Canons Decrees of General Councils to the Liberties of the Gallican Church and to the Ancient Decrees of the Faculty of Theologie of Paris under pain to be proceeded against according to their demerits Prohibits the Syndic of the said Faculty and the Doctors who shall there preside at the Acts to suffer any such Propositions to be inserted in any Thesis Ordains that this present Decree be read at the general Assembly of the said Faculty of Theologie to be holden in Sorbon the first day which the Court shall command in the presence of two Counsellors of the said Court who together with one of the Substitutes of the King's Attourney-General shall go thither expresly for that purpose To which Assembly shall be summoned all the Doctors of the said Faculty as also even the Bachelors of the first Licence And this Decree shall be Registred in the Registers of the said Faculty and signified to the Rectors Deans and Proctors of the other Faculties there to be Read and Registred and sent to other Universities as also to the Bayliages and Stewardships of this Jurisdiction there to be likewise Read Publish'd and Registred by the procurement of the Substitutes of the King's Attourny-General who within one Month are to make Certificate thereof to the Court. Given in Parliament the 22 Jan. 1662 3. Signed Robert Collationed Notes upon it The Errour of the First Proposition lies in the word supra above for the French Church holds the Pope to have the highest Authority in the Church that is over particular men but not over the whole Church for so it professed in the Council of Trent that it was the Faith of France received from the Councils of Constance and Basil that a General Council is above the Pope as also hath been practised by divers General Councils The Errour of the Second Proposition is That the Privileges of Ancient Churches such as the French Church is come from the Indulgence of the Pope and not from the Succession to the Apostles and Apostolical Founders of them and their first Institution The form of which Churches is to be the Rule to all Christian Churches by whomsoever they are founded nor is it lawfull to bring in new forms without violating Divine Right delivered in the constant Tradition of the Church The Errour of the Third Proposition consisteth in this That it takes away the Practice of the Church begun by the Apostles and continued to the Council of Trent is against manifest Experience and in effect takes away all efficacity of extinguishing Heresies and Schisms reducing it to the weak principle of the Pope's Infallibility and extraordinary Power of which enough is above delivered in proportion to these short Notes to shew how dangerous the mentioned Errours are and how necessary to be condemned and avoided by all good Christians as pernicious both to Church and State Postscript Since the foregoing News 't is advertis'd that the contrary to the before-condemned Theses hath been publickly defended by the Son of Monsieur Le Tellier one of the chief Ministers of State the Arch-Bishop of Paris himself presiding FINIS
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is ANOTHER PART OF The Mystery of Jesuitism OR The new Heresie of the Jesuites Publickly maintained At PARIS in the College of CLERMONT the XII of December MDCLXI Declar'd to all the Bishops of France According to the Copy printed at Paris Together with The Imaginary Heresie in three LETTERS With divers other Particulars relating to this Abominable Mysterie Never before published in English LONDON Printed by James Flesher for Richard Royston Bookseller to His most Sacred MAJESTY 1664. To my most honour'd Friend from whom I received the Copy SIR I Transmit you here the French Copy which you were pleased to consign to me and with it the best effects of your injunction that my weak Talent was able to reach to but with a Zeal so much the more propense as I judged the publication might concern the World of those miserably-abus'd Persons who resign themselves to the conduct of these bold Impostors and who may indeed be said to be what the Athenians mistook S. Paul for 17 Act. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Setters forth of strange Gods as well as of strange and unheard-of Doctrines whilst they take upon them thus to attribute as much to Dominus Deus Papa Gloss in Extr Jo. c. 22. Cum inter de verborum signif their Lord God the Pope as to God Almighty himself I stand amaz'd that a Church which pretends so much to Puritie and that is so furious against the least dissenters to her Novelties amongst Protestants should suffer such swarms of impure Insects amongst themselves lest these Cancerous Members in stead of edifying the Church and conducting Consciences eat out in fine the very heart and vitals of the common Christianity For my part Exetasis sive Tho. Albii Purgati◠after I have seen what Mr. White has lately publish'd concerning the Method of the Roman Court in her Decrees and of her rare abilities to discern as he there affords us the Prospect I have no great reason to hope for any redress of these Enormities and then to what a monstrous growth this Head is like to arrive let all the World compute by the strange pretences of these audacious Sycophants Nor let any man wonder how those other Errours are crept into their Religion who in a day of so universal light permit such pernicious Doctrines to be publickly asserted to the dishonour of our B. Lord the scandal of his beloved Spouse and the hinderance of that glorious Unity which none does more earnestly breath after then He who subscribes himself SIR Your most humble and most obedient Servant 21 Sept. 1664. LESSIVS MOLINA S. IGNATIVS LOYOLA SOCIETATIS IESV FVNDATOR VASQUEZ ESCOBAR Optabilior est Fur quam Mendax assiduus vtrique Perditionis haereditatem consequentur Eccles. 20. vers 25. THE New Heresie of the Jesuites publickly maintain'd at Paris in the College of Clermont by Positions printed the xij of December M DC LXI Declar'd to all the Bishops of France c. AS it is the constant duty of Bishops to stifle those Errours in their very birth and cradle which tend to the ruine and subversion of Faith so is it no less that of Divines to make discovery of those Errours to them and by giving timely notice of them to excite and stir up their Pastoral Vigilancy You will therefore My Lords doubtless approve of the Information which is made you of a New Heresie that has been publickly maintain'd by the Jesuites in their College at Paris in a Thesis printed and defended the twelfth of December last The Position bears this Title ASSERTIONES CATHOLICAE de Incarnatione contra Saeculorum omnium ab incarnato Verbo praecipuas Haereses CATHOLICK ASSERTIONS concerning the Incarnation against the principal Heresies of all Ages By which they sufficiently demonstrate that abating some few Subtilties of the Schools they pretend We should accept what-ever They oppose against these Heresies for Catholick Verities and Truths indubitable In order hereunto They propose for the Heresie of the Tenth Age the Schism of the Greek Church and by these words declare the Opinions to which they expect our Assent as a mark and characterism of our aversion from that Heresie X. SAECULUM Romanae Ecclesiae Caput contra Graecos Schismaticos Hoc tandem Saeculo Schisma Photii invalescens Graecos ab Ecclesiae Capite disjunxit Christum nos ità Caput agnoscimus ut illias Regimen dum in coelos abiit primùm Petro tum deinde Successoribus commiserit EANDEM QUAM HABEBAT IPSE INFALLIBILITATEM concesserit quoties ex Cathedra loquerentur DATUR ergo in E.R. Controversiarum Fidei Jadex infallibilis ETIAM EXTRA CONCILIUM GENERALE tum in Quaestionibus Juris tum FACTI Unde post Innocentii X. Alexandri VII Constitutiones FIDE DIVINA CREDI POTEST Librum cui titulus Augustinus Jansenii esse haereticum Quinque Propositiones ex eo decerptas esse Jansenii in sensu Jansenii damnatas Propugnabuntur Deo duce auspice Virgine in Aula Collegii Claromontani Societatis Jesu die 12 Decembris An. 1661. The TENTH AGE The Head of the Church of Rome against the Schismatical Greeks It was in this Age that the Schism of Photius prevailing did separate the Greeks from the Head of the Church We acknowledge Christ to be so the Head that during his absence in Heaven he hath delegated the Government thereof first to Peter and then to his Successors and does grant unto them THE VERY SAME INFALLIBILITY WHIGH HE HIMSELF HAD as often as they shall speak è Cathedra There is therefore in the Church of Rome an Infallible Judge of Controversies of Faith EVEN WITHOUT A GENERAL COUNCIL as well in Questions appertaining to Right as in matters of FACT Therefore since the Constitutions of Innocent the Xth and Alexander the VIIth WE MAY BELIEVE WITH A DIVINE FAITH that the Book intituled the Augustin of Jansenius is heretical and the Five Propositions which are gathered out of it to be Jansenius's and in the sense of Jansenius condemned These shall be defended by the assistance of God and the favour of the Virgin in the Hall of the College of Clermont belonging to the Society of Jesus the 12 day of December in the Year 1661. This Position contains in it two parts the one concerning the Primacy of the Pope in which all Catholicks do agree the other touching that Infallibility which these Jesuites do attribute to him We do not speak here of that which is by some Divines maintain'd and which onely concerns the Judgments which the Popes have of such Truths as are revealed by God in the Scriptures in Tradition It is sufficiently known what has been upon this Subject the sense and opinions of the Gallicane Church and of the University of Paris and what we are to understand by this expression Sententia Parisiensium when we find it upon this matter in the books even of the Jesuites themselves As evident is it also
that those amongst some of the new Doctors who would be thought the most favourable to Popes as Monsieur du Val have not been afraid to maintain the Pope's being Infallible was no matter of Faith Duvallius de Suprema authorit Rom. Pontific l. 2. q. 1. Non est de fide Summum Pontificem esse Infallibilem And that the Opinion which assures us he is not is neither erroneous nor rash Ibid. Non est erroneum neque temerarium temeritate Opinionis dicere Summum Pontificem in decernendo errare posse But these very Divines however studious of exalting as much as they could possibly the Authority of the Soveraign Bishops do acknowledge as a thing certain indubitable and constant amongst all Catholicks That they are not Infallible in matters of Fact That therein they may erre and That indeed they are very frequently mistaken Bellarm de Sum. Pontif l. 4. c. 2. All Catholicks saies Cardinal Bellarmine accord in this That the Pope acting as Pope and with the Assembly of his Counsellers yea even with a General Council it self may be deceived in particular facts which depend upon the information and testimony of men And applying this general Maxime to a matter of Fact perfectly resembling that of Jansenius which is to consider whether the Heresie of the Monothelites be comprehended in the Epistles of Honorius as the VI. General Council confirm'd by so many Popes hath defin'd it he adds A General and Lawfull Council cannot erre in defining Points of Faith as neither has the Sixth Council erred therein but it may erre in Questions concerning matters of Fact Ibid. c. 11. Generale Concilium legitimum non potest errare ut neque erravit hoc Sextum in Dogmatibus Fidei definiendis tamen errare potest in Quaestionibus de Facto And Cardinal Baronius affirms the very same upon the same Subject of the Sixth Oecumenical Council We do not so strictly receive the Condemnation even of General Councils themselves as to what concerns mens Persons and their Writings For no body doubts but that who-ever it is he may be deceived in matters of Fact and then is that expression of S. Paul to take place We can doe nothing against the Truth but for the Truth Baron ad An. 681. n. 39. In his enim quae Facti sunt unumquemque contingere posse falli nemini dubium est All other Divines even the most devoted to the Court of Rome have hitherto contain'd themselves within these limits but the Jesuites will no more indure either bounds or Examples in their excess and extravagancies It suffices not them to render the Pope Infallible as some Divines may possibly have done They will have it that Jesus Christ has absolutely imparted to him the very same Infallibility which He himself possess'd upon the Earth and that as this Infallibility of Jesus Christ extended to all and not onely to things already reveal'd but to those things which had never yet been so reveal'd and that he made known himself in saying them so the Pope does also become Infallible not onely in proposing to the Church what is contain'd in the reveal'd Will of God but in proposing to her likewise matters of Fact which it is evident and certain God has never yet reveal'd as when for Instance the Question is Whether these Propositions are in a Book of the Seventeenth Age. Nor are these any Consequences which we may naturally deduce from their doctrine they draw them thence themselves and form Catholick Assertions of them conformable to the Title of their Position There is then say they an Infallible Judge of Controversies of Faith even extrinsecal to a General Council it self as well for Questions appertaining to Right as for those which concern matters of Fact And that you should not doubt what it is they would signifie by these Questions of Fact albeit the word Fact oppos'd to Right renders it sufficiently perspicuous they produce for an Example and as a new Consequence of this Infallibility of Jesus Christ communicated to the Pope That since the Constitutions we may believe with a divine Faith that the Book of Jansenius is heretical and that the Five Propositions do belong to this Author Unde post Innocentii X. Alexandri VII Constitutiones fide divinâ credi potest Librum cui titulus est Jansenii Augustinus esse haereticum Quinque Propositiones ex eo decerptas esse Jansenii Behold then here the Proposition which these men assert publickly in one of the greatest Cities of the World and it is worth observing to note the Original and the date of it For those who now at present promote it so boldly had long since scatter'd the seeds thereof in some of their Writings and it was sufficiently evident that all their design was to be bottom'd upon this Errour they had likewise themselves advanced the Conclusions in one place and the Principles in another but it was still with certain windings and ambiguities of termes which as yet furnish'd them with lurking-holes and places of subterfuge but now they discover nakedly and without disguise to the Church what it is they pretend to establish in her Let the whole Church take notice of it then and record it That it was the 12 of December in the year 1661 that the Jesuites openly publish'd that monstrous Opinion which they have been so long a-brooding That it was upon this day they propos'd as a most Catholick Assertion That whenever the Pope does speak out of his Chair HE HATH THE SAME INFALLIBILITY THAT JESUS CHRIST HATH not onely in Questions of Right BUT ALSO IN MATTERS OF FACT and that hence we are to believe WITH A FAITH DIVINE that those Five Propositions are of Jansenius It will My Lords be needless to amplifie much in letting the world see that this is not here onely a solitary Errour or simple Heresie but a whole source of Errours and as one may say an Universal Heresie which overthrows all Religion For you know My Lords that the very prime Fundamental of Christian Religion is That our Faith is not supported upon the word of Men but upon the Word of God which is Truth it self and that it is That which renders it immoveable and altogether Divine whereas it would else prove but Humane were it upheld by any other Authority less then that of God and if we were not able to render our selves that Testimony which S. Paul gives the Christians of Thessalonica To have received the Word which God hath taught us by his Church and that not as the Word of Men but as the Word of God and as in truth it is Non ut verbum hominum sed sicut est verè verbum Dei De error Abailardi c. 4. Whatsoever is comprised in the Faith saies S. Bernard is built upon solid and certain Truth persuaded by the divine Oracles confirmed by Miracle and consecrated by the production of the Virgin by the bloud of
Boulogne and that whosoever should dare maintain this Translation was unjust did erre both from the Truth and Catholick Faith Fuit igitur à Basileensi Civitate legitima pro tunc nostra Concilii dissolutio asserentes contrà sunt penitus ab omni veritate fide Catholica alieni And yet notwithstanding the Fathers of the Council of Basil persisting that this Translation was unjust and null Eugenius was forc'd to acknowledge by another as authentick a Bull that in effect it was void and that the Council was alwaies legitimately assembled from the beginning of it to that very time You may find both the one and the other of these Bulls in Raynaldus the first in the year 1433 and the latter in Anno 1434. Now shall both of these be embrac'd for Articles of Faith And shall we be oblig'd to believe that the same Council at the very same time was an Unlawfull Conventicle and a Lawfull Council of the Universal Church assembled by the Holy Spirit The same Raynaldus mentions a Bull of Eugenius the IVth against the Cardinal d' Arles Ad Ann. 1640. who presided at the Council of Basil wherein he is call'd Iniquitatis alumnus atque perditionls filius If the Suffrage of the Popes in the Judgments which they make concerning Persons by their Bulls are to be reputed as Infallible as that of Jesus Christ we should be oblig'd to hold this Cardinal for a very wicked Caitiff But what shall we think if God have judg'd otherwise concerning him and that far from willing us to detest him as a Child of Iniquity and a Son of Perdition he would have us to reverence him for one of the Blessed confirming his Sanctity by publick Miracles authoriz'd by another Pope which was Clement the VIIth who has by an authentick Bull enroll'd him among the number of the Happy by declaring not that he had done Penance after his being a Child of Iniquity but that he had alwaies led a most heavenly chast and immaculate life as it is to be seen in that Bull of his Beatification recited at large by Ciaconius These are some Examples which sufficiently discover to us the false pretence of these Jesuites But without seeking farther the very Authors of this Doctrine find themselves plung'd in Heresie by the undeniable sequel of their Errours For they maintain in this very Conclusion That Pope Honorius has taught nothing in his Epistles but what was most consonant and agreeable to the Catholick Faith concerning the two Wills and two Operations in Jesus Christ Duas in Christo Voluntates Operationes fuisse profitemur nec aliud à nobis sensit Honorius dum Operationem Christi unicam esse scripsit Now if this be a point of Faith as these Jesuites pretend That the Book of Jansenius is Heretical and that the Five Propositions are of this Author because two Popes have affirmed it and that we are oblig'd to consider what they say in those Particulars as if J. Christ had himself pronounc'd it with how much greater reason may we affirm the same of Pope Honorius's Epistles which have both been examin'd condemn'd and Burnt by a General Council of the whole Church where the Pope himself presided by his Legats and which has been confirm'd as to this very point and Article by two other General Councils more and by a very great number of Popes beside For if ever Popes speak out of the Chair it is then when they speak with the General Councils and confirm them by their Apostolical Authority And thus doubtless Leo Epist ad Constan Pope Leo the Second spake out of his Chair when in several of his Epistles which he wrote to confirm the VIth Oecumenical Council he did in particular ratifie the Condemnation of Honorius and pronounced him Anathema because he had not enlightned the Apostolical Church they are the express words by the doctrine of Apostolical Tradition but suffered her to be defiled by a prophane Tradition Qui hanc Apostolicam Ecclesiam non Apostolicae Traditionis doctrinâ illustravit sed prophanâ Traditione maculari permisit And by consequence if then when the Popes dictate from their Chair whatsoever the Subject be matter of Right or Fact they have the same Infallibility with Jesus Christ and that all which they pronounce is an Article of Faith it ought to be as much a matter of Faith that the Epistles of Honorius are Heretical and the person who denies it after assent to this general Maxime bears the most notorious mark of an Heretick according to S. Paul which is to be self-condemned It would not signifie in the least to have recourse to that pretended falsification of the Acts of the VIth Council and the Epistles of Leo the Second For as this pretence is altogether unmaintainable frivolous and extravagant as even the most devoted Bishops to the Jesuites have themselves acknowledged in the last Assembly of the Clergy were there onely this miserable evasion to excuse us from believing with a divine Faith that Honorius was justly Anathematiz'd and his Epistles legally condemn'd as replete with Heresies we must certainly have renounc'd our common Senses to form any other judgment concerning that Pope and not to hold his Epistles for Heretical But as it is the property of Errour to destroy it self He that should be engaged by this novel Opinion of the Jesuites necessarily to hold that the Epistles of Honorius are Heretical by the same would find himself oblig'd to acknowledg the Fallacy of this Opinion For how should he believe that all Popes are endow'd with a like Infallibility with J. Christ what time they speak out of their Chair considering that Honorius slipt into an Errour in a conjuncture in which 't is difficult to conceive but that he did speak out of his Chair seeing he spake as a Judge in a Controversie of Faith and in order to the adjusting of the greatest difference which was then on foot in the Church and which had divided all the Oriental Patriarchs And for all this not regarding the judgment of the VIth Council and supposing what is extremely ridiculous that the Acts thereof were corrupted how should it be pretended that Honorius had in this encounter the same Infallibility with J. Christ since having by his Letters approved the heretical Epistles of Sergius Patriarch of Constantinople either he understood it as he ought and then he erred in point of Right by approving the heretical Opinion of one single Will in J. Christ which he had acknowledg'd to be in effect contain'd in this Epistle of Sergius or he understood it amiss for accepting that in a Catholick sense which Sergius had asserted in an Heretical and so he had at least erred in point of Faith So that the Jesuites can in no sort avoid the being Hereticks in either sense For if it be Heresie as doubtless it is to attribute to Popes speaking è Cathedra the same Infallibility with Jesus Christ as well
in Questions pertaining to Right as to those of Fact so as their Decisions concerning the Facts themselves may be believed by a divine Faith they are rank Hereticks as being engag'd to maintain this Blasphemy And in case they pretend that this is a true Opinion they are nevertheless Hereticks because they oppose the Faith not submitting to the Decision of so many Popes and General Councils in reference to the condemnation of Honorius who according to their Errour we are by divine Faith oblig'd to believe had been justly condemn'd because he was so by Judges as Infallible as Jesus Christ as well in matters of Right as those of Fact I insist too long my Lords in refuting an Errour so notorious Give me leave yet to represent to you one most pernicious Consequence You have seen what the design of this Position is and how specious a Title they have prefix'd before it Assertiones Catholicae contra Saeculorum omnium praecipuas Haereses This being so what may we else imagin when we shall see by the sequel of that which they oppose to these Heresies but that they are Catholick Truths maintain'd by the Church against these Hereticks and which we are oblig'd to acknowledge under censure of being our selves Hereticks and of Apostasie from the Communion of the Church Never then according to these Jesuites must we think of receiving the poor Greeks into the Communion of the Catholick Church or re-unite these divided Members sever'd by so deplorable a Schism but in obliging them to confess that J. Christ has bestowed the same Infallibility upon all the Popes which He himself has in all that they propose to the Universal Church yea even in matters which concern particular Facts And as all the Hereticks of these last Ages have embrac'd the Errour of the Greeks against the Primacy of the holy See we must never open the doors of the Church to them before they make profession of this fine new Article of Faith But admit we should not exact that so strictly of them what an Obstacle do we not lay in the way of their Conversion what Scandal are we not guilty of and what pretext do we not afford their Ministers to decry the Catholick Church before their abus'd People by rendering her odious and contemptible and by confirming them in those their ancient Calumnies and Reproches which they have so frequently objected to the Catholicks for equalling the Pope to Almighty God 'T is well known that it is from their Principles they have inspired Rebellion into so many People Should therefore Religious and Pious persons favour them in this detestable design that they furnish them with Armes to fight against us and suffer them to look upon the deference which the Faithfull owe to the Pope as an insupportable Yoak upon the Conscience in things that do not at all concern any point of Faith and whereof the knowledge does not in the least conduce to Salvation This is it my Lords which has chiefly oblig'd us to speak upon this occasion And it was highly necessary that the Catholick Divines should make hast to decry this Impiety lest those Uncircumcis'd should take occasion of insulting over the Armies of the living God We were obliged to prevent them to the end they may see that we do no less abhor this excess in the Catholick Church for the love of Truth then they appear to detest her by the design which they pretend to justifie their faulty separation But if it be sufficient to acquit Divines of their devoir that they represent this publick Complaint it is not enough for the honour of the Church and for the entire reparation of this Scandal that there have been onely Divines which have reprov'd it It is You my Lords who ought to be enflamed with Zeal for the Purity of the Doctrine whereof You are the Depositaries for the Salvation of the Faithfull of whom You are the Fathers for the Sanctity of the Church whereof You are the Spouses les Espouses for the Honour of J. Christ of whom You are the chief Ministers to consider as in the presence of God what your Duty is upon so important an Occasion in which the Faith of the Church is violated by a Capital Errour which subverts its very Foundation where the Faithfull are empoison'd with an Opinion which tends to the changing of that Veneration into Idolatry which they ought to bear to their soveraign Bishop where the Church is prophan'd by an Impiety that dishonors and exposes her to the outrages of her Enemies in summe where J. Christ is horribly offended by the Sacrilegious Parity which is put between the words of his Servant and his own most Sacred Dictates by making the one as well as the other the Object of a divine Faith Haply some there be may reply that this Extravagance deserves not half this aggravation and doubtless they will make use of it for a pretext to induce you to connive at so foul an excess But my Lords you ought to consider that how extravagant soever this Opinion may appear it is promoted by Persons who may give us just occasion to apprehend the strange Consequences of it For 't is sufficiently evident that it is not by chance or through the blindness of any particular man that it comes thus to appear in the World It is long since that they have prepar'd and dispos'd all things for its production and entertainment though they never usher'd it in with pomp before they were well assur'd all things were favourable for its reception and that there was not a Champion remaining who had the courage or confidence to oppose it openly Perhaps indeed their Pretence is not yet so far advanc'd as to draw a formal Approbation from the Bishops But that which they hope for is since I am obliged to speak all that their credit and their power of being able to doe good or ill offices will be a means to retain all the Bishops in silence so as none of them shall dare to condemn them for fear of drawing upon them the strength and displeasure of so puissant a Society and that the Sorbonne which they now reckon to be in their dependence will never have the confidence to Censure this Doctrine whatever their aversion may be to it Thus they hope that during this Silence and whiles all the World is as it were snorting dum dormirent homines this Cockle which they have sown in the field of the Church will take root and in time get strength There they will leave it to ripen and as they use to say relinquent tempori maturandum and when it shall be arriv'd to full maturity produce the natural Consequences that must necessarily spring from it At present indeed they do but say onely One may believe Particular Facts with a divine Faith but they will shortly pronounce that men are bound to believe them which will be very easie for them to establish because it is but a
before any man had the boldness to maintain them This we generally find in all Heresies The Doctrine of Arius is an Heresie but it does not consist in the vain and indeterminate words of the Doctrine of Arius but in this particular Position or Opinion that the Son is not consubstantial with the Father It is the very same in all the rest They all maintain a peculiar and distinct Dogme independent from the name of the Author and when we do not know the Opinion any more we say that we know the Heresie no more and if a man had never known it he might well say that it never was This is sufficient say the Divines to repell that unjust Reproch which they fling upon us of being sectators of a new Heresie For we sincerely protest that we intirely acquiesce in the Authority of the Universal Church that we embrace without the least reservation all the Dogms which She proposes to us as of Faith that we submit all our Understanding and Reason to her and that our hearts do not at all accuse us of holding any Doctrine which is repugnant to her Decisions so as we can say before God with confidence upon this subject Iniquitatem si aspexi in corde meo non exaudiet Dominus We do not conceal our sense but are ready to referre it to the Pope and to the Bishops and to accept them for our Judges We have offer'd it several times and have this consolation that those who are the most prejudic'd against us have nothing to object against us In fine we are so far from embracing any particular Doctrine on the Five Propositions that though we do not acknowledge the Jesuites for the Rules of our Faith yet it is most true that we hold no Opinion upon the matter of the Five Propositions which they dare publickly accuse of Heresie before the Pope or the Bishops How clear and ingenuous Sir is this Declaration how truly Catholick and exceedingly remote from all suspicion of Heresie and that not onely for acquitting these persons of Errours but for shewing that they could not be culpable of Heresie if without their knowledge and consent they should haply fall into some Errour since all the world knows that the crime of Heresie does not consist simply in the Errour but in the Obstinacy to maintain and dwell in an Errour against the judgment of the Church Now how is it possible that these people should impudently maintain an Errour they are totally ignorant of against a judgement of the Church which they know nothing of But this does not satisfie the Jesuites and because they do not find their reckoning in it they continue their accusation of Heresie and this is it which has oblig'd the Divines to give them this defiance and which is certainly very urging Either set the Heresie you impute to us distinctly and clearly down or acknowledge your selves Calumniators for accusing us of an Heresie which you cannot tell what to make of On this it is that the Jesuites have reveal'd the Mysterie of their Politicks and the whole secret of the Heresie In stead of endeavouring to set down describe the Positions a thing which upon trial did never succeed with them they intrench themselves and have recourse to the uncertain expression of the Sense and of the Doctrine of Jansenius without any farther advance You hold say they the Doctrine of Jansenius to be Catholick the Pope declares it heretical behold then your Heresie But as they had to doe with persons very well prepar'd to defend themselves so never was there an Equivocation unriddled as this has been They told F. Annat in express terms that this was a Scholastical Sophism unworthy an old Logician as he was Nunquámne intelliges Dialectice senex puerile argumentationis vitium and they prov'd it well too For some of them it seems condemn his Sense and his Doctrine as heretical whiles others defend it for Catholick without the least difference between them concerning Faith because it is not the same precise and determin'd Sense which is thus condemn'd by some and approv'd by others though they both of them call it by the same name and that is but what we daily meet with in the different explication of an Author For there is ever in these encounters this opposition of words that some affirm the Doctrine of an Author to be Catholick and others that 't is heretical though neither of them disagree touching the true Faith The Fifth Council pronounces the Doctrine of Theodoret to be impious and heretical Father Petavius and many other Jesuites deny it are they therefore against the Faith of the Council By no means since they defend Theodoret but by interpreting him after another way then did the Council and by giving him a Catholick sense 'T is the very same case in the present Dispute The Pope saies the Doctrine of Jansenius is heretical other men say We find no such matter in Jansenius The words have indeed an appearance of contrariety but without implying the least contrariety of Faith forasmuch as the Doctrine which these Divines maintain to be Catholick and of Jansenius is not certainly the same Doctrine which the Pope condemns for heretical and as being that of Jansenius And the proof which they bring is decisive We do not say they maintain on the matter of the Five Propositions any thing save the Doctrine of Grace efficacious alone as 't is held by S. Augustine and by the whole School of S. Thomas Now 't is clear that the Pope does no-where condemn this Doctrine as he makes all the Church believe and indeed as both the Church and the Jesuites themselves do accord It is then certain that the Pope does not condemn that which we understand under the notion of the Sense of Jansenius as we likewise do not hold what the Pope condemns under these terms seeing this Doctrine excepted we have nothing at all to doe with the rest but reject it in general as we are ready to doe in particular when-ever the Church shall please to describe it in particular or to shew us where it is And thus you have the whole state of this ten-years Dispute The Jesuites stand to their sense of Jansenius and all men that will may perceive the Illusion and Equivocation of the terms But in fine F. Ferrier is come up from the very farthest part of all Languedoc to the aid of his Confraternity and has been chosen by F. Annat to publish this Heresie and to answer all those Writings which made it plainly out that it is but a mere Chimaera but especially he undertook to replie to the Treatise of Just Complaints which expressly clears this Equivocation of the Sense of Jansenius Now therefore it is that we shall shortly come to know in what this wondrous Heresie consists or else we must never hope to understand it whiles we live What saies this Reverend Father to us then That 't is expedient to publish
very gate of Desperation 't is the high-way of Obduration 't is the wide gap for men to die in final Impenitence and without Sacraments 'T is the Cullender of Hell 't is the leven to corrupt all the Priests and to make them abuse the Discoveries which they receive in secret All these Accusations were far more important then those which they now form upon the Case of Jansenius The Jesuites dispers'd them with the same assurance they treated their adversaries after the same sort with Heresiarchs Hereticks Sectaries and Schismaticks they gave them the names of Sects as they do now at present But let us see the event These bruits and Accusations gave a thousand traverses to the poor Divines whom the Jesuites did in this manner decry for they are alwaies successfull in that The Divines have continu'd to be oppress'd and the Jesuites have alwaies been very powerfull in the World Their Calumnies yet destroy'd themselves have been confounded before the face of the whole Church but still without any punishment they were still hearkning to people so altogether unworthy of belief nor was there ever yet found one Jesuite of those which appear'd in the world who has had the Conscience to testifie the least regret for the Extravagances of his Society a thing prodigious to consider For what Salvation can they hope in that thus calumniate without Repentance On the contrary they have rewarded those who help'd to vend and distribute their most execrable Impostures whither within or without their Society They procur'd for le Sieur Fileau for publishing the Fable of Bourgfontaine a Brief of Pope Innocent in his commendation with Letters from some Noblemen in France They made Father Brisacier Rector of their chief House because he was transported to excesses which were altogether inhumane By all which we may see sufficient marks of their puissance having been able to support themselves in a Cause in which any else besides themselves had certainly been overthrown But God has in the mean time been pleas'd to shew that his Truth is infinitely stronger then all the men of the World for in spight of all the Jesuites credit maugre the abandoning and oppression of these Divines not onely the Calumnies of the Jesuites are dissipated but the sincere Doctrine which they so furiously attacqu'd in the Book of Frequent Communion has been more and more authoriz'd and practis'd in the Church and on the contrary the Errours of the Jesuites have been formally condemn'd there They have censur'd in the Apologie of the Casuists the very same Doctrine which is oppos'd in the Treatise of Frequent Communion The Doctrine touching proximate Occasions and Habitudes of Sin saies the Church of Paris in her third Censure in which the Author affirms one ought not to refuse Absolution is false rash scandalous and inductive to an evident peril of sinning And the 29. Censure of M. the Archbishop de Sens upon the same Propositions and on that of Recidivations is These very Propositions are pernicious they have been invented to entertain men in a desire to sin they are injurious to Vertue and to the Sacrament of Penance They destroy the judiciary Authority which resides in Priests as Ministers of J. Christ and render them partakers with other mens Crimes Divers other of the Bishops did expressly mark in their Censures the precipitate Absolutions practis'd and authoriz'd by the Jesuites as one of the greatest Disorders of the Church and those Five Illustrious Bishops of Languedoc call them in their Censure Sacrilegious Absolutions And not onely is this Doctrine of the Book of Frequent Communion authoriz'd by these Judgements of the Church but 't is well known that many great Prelats injoyn the practice of it as amongst the rest M. the Bishop de Alet testifies in his Apologie which he has recommended to all the Confessors of his Diocese for see how he speaks of it pag. 11. As touching the delay or refusal of Absolution it is true that M. de Alet recommends to all the Confessors of his Diocese the carefull practice of the Rules of the Church in the dispensation of the Sacraments and especially that of Penance that the use of it be not prophan'd which is that they by no means absolve those who are in the proximate occasion of any Sin or that perceive themselves in a dangerous condition in which in respect of their disposition and upon experience of their life past it is morally impossible for them not to offend God such also as remain in any habitual mortal sin and do not reform themselves nor give any sign of their sincere amendment since it is the constant Doctrine of the Church and whereof the practice has been carefully recōmended by S. Charles in the advice which he prepar'd for the Confessors of his Diocese In fine the Sanctity of this Doctrine is so universally acknowledged that they oblige those who but dare to oppose it to most solemn Retractations I will shew you an Example both new and curious which I have taken word for word out of a Letter from Tolouse where the thing happened A Religious person of the Order of S. Francis of those whom they call de la grand Observance preaching this year in Tolouse January the 27 maintain'd that Confessors were not to refuse or defer the Absolution of Penitents provided they assur'd them that they were very sorry for having offended God though they had never so often confess'd the very same sins before in the belief said he that they ought to have that the moment in which they should refuse it them might be that of their Conversion The whole City not accustom'd to this dissolute Doctrine being scandaliz'd at it the great Vicar oblig'd this inconsiderate Preacher to make his publick Retractation February the 17. in these very terms which were prescrib'd him When about three weeks since I affirm'd in my Sermon of the Cure of the Leprous that the facility and the promptitude with which Iesus Christ stretched forth his hand upon him was an instruction to Confessors of the obligation which lay on them to give prompt and speedy Absolution to all Penitents provided they profess themselves sorry for having offended God and that they would reform in the future I did not mean to say that Confessors were oblig'd alwaies to believe the Deposition of Penitents which were to invalidate the authority which Priests have receiv'd in their Ordination as well to retain as to remit sins But I pretended onely generally speaking that when they are indeed sincerely repentant and that the prudence of an honest Confessor does judge them so he may then absolve them WHICH I HAVE SPOKEN WITHOUT PREJUDICE TO THE CHURCHES CANONS and to the Injunctions of this Diocese which oblige Confessors to defer Absolution to Penitents especially in case of Habitudes and proximate Occasion in a serious matter c. WHICH I ACKNOWLEDGE OUGHT TO BE INVIOLABLY OBSERVED Thus has the Dispute concerning Penance and the delay
of Absolution had the same success with the rest The power of the Jesuites has procur'd them impunitie for their Calumnies and Errours M. Arnauld and those who have supported the Cause of Truth have had Persecutions for their share But the Truth has in fine both triumph'd over these Errours and all the power of the Jesuites besides The Fourth Contestation which is that of the Morale of the Casuists is the most considerable of all the rest for the greatness of the events Every one knows what authority the Casuists had acquir'd in the Church and that albeit the honest men did alwaies govern themselves by Rules which were totally contrary to their Maximes yet they were I know not how got into possession of magisterially deciding the Morals of the Church and to make the Opinions pass for indisputable which they pleas'd to agree upon and those for probable and safe in Conscience which they thought good to doubt of or to controvert It was above fifty years that this reign of theirs continu'd in the Schools and though this their licence was become odious to many knowing persons yet the small resistences which had been made against them from time to time were too feeble to remedy so great an evil as had been fomented by all the power of the Jesuites It was not till the year 1656 that any body undertook to attacque them in good earnest He who made the first onset thought the best way to accomplish his design would be to represent them as they are in their native colours and render them ridiculous to all the world And whereas they exalted themselves like Masters of the Church he treats them as the very abjects and last of men and without troubling himself with opposing Casuist to Casuist he confounds them pel-mel Suarez Vasquez Molina Lessius Filiutius Escobar the head and the tail of the Jesuites undertaking to render them all alike odious and despicable There was never any design that to the Jesuites appear'd more rash who looking upon themselves as elevated to a degree so eminent in the Church looked down as from their sublime Throne on this Incognito that durst presume to attacque the whole Body of their August Society which is the name they give themselves and to accuse them for having corrupted all the Christian Morality Nor were they ever heard to cry out so hideously through all France The Author of the Provincials was an Heretick I and more then an Heretick He borrow'd all his reproches against them from Hereticks He assaulted amongst the Jesuites Morals the most undoubted Maximes of the Christian Faith In fine to answer Fifteen of his Letters it was enough to say according to the R. F. Annat that they were Fifteen Heretical Letters For this has ever been a common Reproch with this good Father to brand those withall who disapprov'd the Doctrine of his Companions But above all he could never sufficiently exaggerate the excess of boldness of this Incognito who should dare thus to condemn so many grave Authors And Father Ferrier does triumph in his Book of Probability in setting out this his Council of Casuists and in opposing them to this unknown Theologue But in spight of all these fine Arguments of the Jesuites maugre the infinite numbers of their Partizans and the weakness of this Adversarie they were astonish'd to find themselves in so little a time the Fable of all France and all the world declaring against them as themselves are forc'd to acknowledge in their Apologie of the Casuists I do not question saies Father Pirot Author of that Book but the Banishments and Martyrdoms have not been less grievous and more easie to support then the Abandoning which this Society finds it self constrain'd to suffer amongst these Railleries since in all their retreats the FF Jesuites were still entertain'd with honour in the Provinces which receiv'd them they had a respect to their Patience and their merit whereas on this encounter what-ever countenance they preserv'd they are basely treated The Book of Escobar having been 39 times printed for an excellent Book was printed the fourtieth time as the most wicked and abominable Book that was ever publish'd and to satisfie the curiosity onely of those who had a desire to search out the passages which the Author of the Provincial Letters had cited out of him The Curates of Paris of Rouën and of divers other considerable Towns of the Kingdome rose up against these detestable Maximes A very great number of Bishops condemn'd them by authentick Censures so as the Jesuites could not so much as find one single Bishop who would openly take upon him their defence which considering all the circumstances of this Affair ought to be taken for an infallible mark of the universal Consent of the Church in the Condemnation of the Casuists The Jesuites at first vaunted that the Pope disapprov'd what was done in France But the Pope has himself taken away this pretext so injurious to the Holy See and the Church by condemning likewise the Apologie of the Casuists and in so manifestly consenting with the Judgments which the Bishops had express'd against the Jesuites Morality I tell you here nothing but old stories having onely a design to recall them to your memory but I will now shew you some newer ones and that are more rare to let you see that the Moral of the Jesuites is as well disapprov'd at Rome as elsewhere A certain Professor of Boulogne nam'd Antony Merenda having conceiv'd a very just horror at the unbridled licentiousness of these Casuists compos'd a considerable Work against them not many years since in which he chiefly opposes their Doctrine of Probability as an Invention of the Devil Commentum Diaboli A Dominican Inquisitor of Pavia nam'd Mercorus publish'd soon after a Book against the same Doctrine and divers other Loosenesses of the Casuists And in fine after these last contestations touching the Moral a famous Prelat of Rome call'd Prosper Fagnani a person that the Pope honour'd with a particular friendship has inserted in a great Volume which he has compos'd upon the Decretals a large Treatise against the Probability of the Casuists where he represents this Doctrine as the fountain of all sorts of Corruptions and Disorders and treats it with Merenda as a Diabolical Invention Commentum Diaboli In this Treatise he mentions with an Elogy the pursuits which the Curats of Paris and of Rouën have made against the Casuists He inserts the Extracts which they propos'd to the Assembly of several dangerous Propositions of these Authors and the Censures which have been given them in the Low-Countries and had he been but acquainted with what has been since done in France there is no doubt but he would likewise have mention'd the Censures of the French Bishops as he does those of certain Bishops of Flanders This was all done by consent of the Pope and the Book it self is dedicated to him so as one may well judge it was not