pag. 32. he discourses After all this can we believe that the Britains who earnestly contradicted Augustine in these smaller matters and were so tenacious of their own Customs would have silently received so many and incomparably greater points of Faith had they in like manner disagreed from him therein credat Judaeus Apella Here our Authour is much to be blamed because he will not permit us to give him civil Language he does not onely betray his ignorance but what is much worse in this Paragraph he challenges to have skill in Bede and Bede is the man that contradicts him in every thing he says For Bede tells us that the Britains neither received greater points of Faith nor lesser from Augustine the Monk nor his Companions But for more than one hundred years after Augustine's arrival they esteemed all his teachings to be vain and trifling and little better than Paganism He concluded his History in the Year 725. as appears lib. 5. cap. 24. and he himself tells us in his Epitome that Augustine came into England in the Year 597. Yet he says Lib. 2. cap. 20. Cum usque hodiè moris sit Britonum Fidem Religionémque Anglorum pro nihilo habere neque in aliquo eis magis communicare quà m Paganis That the Britains according to their usual way had no esteem at all for the Faith and Religion of the English and that they would no more communicate with them than with the Pagans And Bede does not onely say that the Britains had so mean an opinion of the Romans Lib. 2. cap. 4. and their Disciples but likewise that the Scots or Irish had the same For where he gives us part of the Letter that Laurentius Mellitus and Justus sent to the Scots He says that when they had tried the Britains they thought the Scots might be better Cognoscentes Brittones Scottos meliores putavimus but yet they found both alike For Dagamus their Bishop would neither eat at the same Table nor in the same House with them Dagamus Episcopus ad nos veniens non solùm cibum nobiscum sed nec in eodem Hospitio quo vescebamur sumere voluit In the same page he says that Laurentius and the rest wrote to the Britains too Sed quantum haec agendo profecerit adhuc praesentia tempora declarant That is that the present opposition which the Britains made against the Romanists in Bede's days sufficiently sheweth that Laurentius his Letter had no effect upon them and that is the same thing which we had before usque hodie that from Augustine the Monk down to Bede's days the Britains had no regard for the Romans teaching of Faith or Religion so far as it differ'd from their own From these two Passages Henry of Huntingdon made the remark which he has lib. 3. Hist Nec Britannos Henr. Huntingd Hist lib. 3. nec Scotos velle communicare cum Anglis eorum Episcopo sancto Augustino magis quam Paganis This is sufficient to shew our Authour's presumption in alledging Bede to patronize his vain Opinations concerning the Britains if we give credit to him the Britains did not receive either so many or so great points of Faith from Augustine the Monk for they received none at all And therefore his Consequence which he draws from thence is like his Premisses good for nought That is this That the Doctrines these two Points excepted their Asiatick Errour and the difference about Baptism which Augustine taught the Saxons had been delivered to the Britains from the Apostles For seeing we have an acknowledged difference in these two Points in Augustin's days and other differences as I shall shew brake out afterwards and we find no manner of agreement between Augustine and the Britains and no communication between his Followers and them for an hundred years after but an extreme aversion and abhorrence of them and their ways he can no more argue for the truth of Augustine's Doctrines from the consent of the Britains than he may for the truth of all the Doctrines which the present Church of Rome teaches from the consent of the present Church of England we oppose them and so did they we and they too reject their Novelties their unjust Usurpations their unreasonable Impositions And though the terms of Communion which they would lay upon us are much harder than those which Augustine offered to the Britains yet we thank God our charity continues towards them we call them Christians and treat them as Christians which the old Britains would not do and with meekness and humility we endeavour to shew them their Errours This is enough to the Case of Augustine and of Bede's Relation of it And enough to the First Part of this Authour July 26. 1687. Sir I am Yours A brief Account of Augustine and the Conversion of the English taken out of Bede 's Ecclesiastical History AVgustine after he had been received gratiously by King Ethelbert knew not what he had to doe He was sent to preach plain Christianity to those that were willing to learn it But he had a mind to doe something else Bede lib. 1. cap. 27. and therefore soon sent to Pope Gregory for his resolution of certain Questions most of which our modern Historians censure as Legal and Levitical and think them all excepting three to be of little use Two of these are remarkable the first concerning his own power which he would have extended not onely over Britain but to France in this latter he was repressed and told that the Pope could not nor ought to grant it because his Predecessours had before setled it on the Bishop of Arles yet over the Bishops of Britain he gives him all the power which he could wish Omnes Episcopos Britanniarum tuae fraternitati committimus Bede lib. 1. cap 27. Resp 9. ut indocti doceantur infirmi persuasione roborentur perversi autoritate corrigantur Now it was unreasonable in Augustine to ask this and injustice in Gregory to grant it For both must needs know that this was an invasion of the Rights of Bishops against the Canons of the Church against the Sixth of the Nicene Council and the Eighth of the Ephesine which says expresly that if the Rites of Churches are taken away and that by any Patriarch whatsoever that Fact should be null and invalid Barnesius Cath-Rom Pacif. p. 60. This Father Barne says gave just cause and reason to the British Bishops to withstand Austin quia videbatur Augustinus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 agere cum iis cogendo eos ut reciperent eum pro Archiepiscopo mandatis exterorum se subderent Cum antiqui mores Ecclesiae suae postularent ut omnia inter se Synodicè agerent tum pro Episcoporum ordinationibus tum pro aliis negotiis Ecclesiasticis The second considerable Query of Augustine was concerning Rituals Bede lib. 1. cap. 27. Inter. 3. Forms of Worship Missals or Liturgies in this he propos'd how it
by General Councils and so by the Catholick Church and they have been in peaceable possession of it for many hundred of years P. 16 17. and now they cannot be divested of it neither by themselves nor by others neither in whole nor in part All these things he sets down I suppose as his own opinations and sentiments and would have his Friends to judge him by them as Orthodox and a true Convert He is not concerned whether they be true or false for he knows or may know that every one of these pretences has been proved by Dr. Barrow to be gross falsities and that almost to the evidence of Demonstration and yet our Authour brings not the least proof for any one of them from any Old Authour Indeed he tells us that we have the Succession of Bishops of Rome delivered to us by St. Augustine and that is true P. 15. but he was unlucky to put us in mind of that passage and much more because he never read it himself for had he seen the 165. Epistle of St. Augustine where that Succession is mentioned and the very next to it he might have found in that great Father a full contradiction to all his thoughts concerning the Scriptures and concerning Authority and then perhaps he would have imployed his time to better purposes than in writing this Book St. Austine in that Epistle sets down the succession of the Bishops of Rome from St. Peter and that for no other purpose but to shew that none of all those Bishops was a Donatist Augustinus Epist 165. And that because a Donatist had set down the succession of their Bishops before not that he thought any one of them after St. Peter was a Sovereign Guide or had unerring authority in him for he himself presently adds to this that if any of them had been a Donatist or worse yet the Christian Doctrine would not have suffered the least by it In illum ordinem Episcoporum qui ducitur ab ipso Petro usque ad Anastasium qui nunc super eandem Cathedram sedet etiamsi quisquam traditor per illa tempora subrepsisset nihil praejudicaret Ecclesiae innocentibus Christianis This I suppose our Authour is not willing to think because he depends so much upon Authority and so little upon the Scriptures but St. Augustine did because he relyed upon the Scriptures to teach us that Doctrine which Jesus Christ and his Apostles had revealed to the World and therefore in the same Epistle he slights all his other Arguments and fixes intirely upon the Scriptures as those alone which could give us a full and solid evidence for the truth of a Christian Doctrine Augustinus Epist 165. these are his words Quanquam nos non tam de istis documentis praesumamus quà m de Scripturis sanctis and then he cites a Text. But in the next Epistle and that against the Donatists after some other velitations and general topicks whereof Councils was one as appears by those words Faciant mille concilia Episcopi he comes to the holy Scriptures and triumphs in his Arguments and doubts not to defeat his adversaries by the force of them He begins with words frequent in his writings Augustinus Epist 166. In Scripturis didicimus Christum in Scripturis didicimus Ecclesiam has Scripturas communiter habemus quare non in eis Christum Ecclesiam communiter retinemus Then he throws out near twenty Texts one after another comments in short upon them and never doubts but that he and his Adversaries did sufficiently understand them without the assistance of a Sovereign Guide or an unerring Authority if our Authour had considered this it might have done him good but because he is pleased to find the Succession of Roman Bishops in St. Augustine I will shew him what he seems not to know two very considerable uses which that great Father made of that topick the First was to conciliate a most profound veneration to the Holy Scriptures thus therefore he writes August contra Faust Manich lib. 11. cap. 5. contra Faustum Manichaeum lib. 11. cap. 5. Distincta est à posteriorum libris excellentia canonicae Authoritatis veteris novi Testamenti quae Apostolorum confirmata temporibus per successiones Episcoporum propagationes Ecclesiarum tanquam in sede quâdam sublimiter constituta est cui serviat omnis fidelis pius intellectus A Second use that he made of this consideration of the Succession of Bishops in their Sees was in case of a dispute about a Text to evidence what was the first and so the true Christian Doctrine To this end he very frequently in his disputes with the Donatists requires them to search what was taught in the Churches of Corinth Galatia Ephesus Philippi Thessalonica all the Churches that had the honour to receive Apostolical Epistles Now if all these having several Successions of Bishops should agree in any one point that was controverted St. Augustine took their consent to be a good Argument that such a Doctrine was original and true he sends them indeed to Rome too but upon no other accompt and no higher reason than he does to those other Apostolical Churches Now I think I may presume in kindness to our Authour to give him one advice and that is this to have a care when he refers to St. Augustine that he knows his mind and that St. Augustine did write what he cites him for for I can tell him that a certain person who was of his opinion concerning a Soveraign Guide and unerring Authority to be sound in the Church of Rome came at length to believe and that consequentially to his opinion that the decretal Epistles of the Popes were of the same Authority with and to be reckoned amongst the Canonical Scriptures and to confirm his opinion he cited St. Augustine for it and this his citation had got into Gratians Decretum but the last Roman-Correctours of Gratian found it to be either gross forgery or a gross mistake and they have done St. Augustine right and a favour to such Persons as our Authour is to let them know that St. Augustine is no great friend to such fond and absurd opinions You may see Gratiani Decreti prim part Distin 19. Cap. 6. But because it may be some trouble to consult that Authour I will give you the truth and the forgery together St. Augustine in his Book De Doctrina Christiana lib. 2. cap. 8. had given us these words In Canonicis Scripturis Ecclesiarum Catholicarum quam plurium authoritatem sequatur inter quas sane illae sunt quae Apostolicas sedes habere Epistolas accipere meruerunt c. Now this was plain and good advice in the examination of Books that might be alledged to be Canonical Scriptures to give a preference to the testimony of those Churches that were called Apostolical Seats and such as had the honour to receive Epistles from the Apostles as Rome Corinth
insolence of the Roman Church is here thrown out and he adds that the reasons in the case which were good in Africa are good every-where else But besides Synod Edit à Beveregio p. 675. it appears more evidently that those Fathers took this to be art and contrivance Because at the end of the Council they sent their new attested Copies to Pope Coclestine next Successour but one to Zosimus with a Letter in the name of the Council and therein they tell him roundly that they knew their right and that they would maintain it that they had received wrong by the intermedling of Faustinus in the name of Zosimus that the Council of Nice had committed Presbyters and Bishops to the regulation of the Metropolitans and according to wisedom and justice they had fixed that all Controversies and Pleas ought to be determined and adjusted in the Places and Countreys wherein they arose that the grace of the Spirit is not wanting to the Priests of Christ in every place whereby they may judge what is right and in case of errour or aggrievance there might be an appeal to the next Synod And as to judgments to be revoked by Foreigners and a new revision to be made in Places beyond the Seas they knew not how it could be well done For in these Revisions many necessary Witnesses could not be produced in such distant Places by reason of sickness weakness and many casual but yet reasonable impediments At last they conclude that all this action which gave them so much trouble tended to no good at all but would bring into the Church of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whereupon they hope he will not follow the Example of his Predecessor Thus said these great Fathers and thereby sufficiently intimate what they thought of the Action of Zosimus And we at this distance may guess at some farther thoughts of theirs which they have concealed by taking a short review of the History of those times Because that will shew us something more than an oversight in this business The Council of Nice had done nothing for the aggrandizing of Rome Two and twenty years after another Council was convened at Sardica The number of Bishops who came thither as Athanasius tells us was an hundred and seventy At the first meeting there happens to be a breach amongst them Upon that the greatest part withdraw some it may be to their own Dioceses others gathered together to Philippopolis where they make Canons and publish them with authority from the Emperour and that in the name of the Canons of the Sardican Council These for a time were the onely Sardican Canons that were known in other Countries And because these favoured Arianism St. Augustin and St. Aug. Ep. 163. p 856. Hilary declared highly against the Sardican Council and the Canons of it For they knew of no other but these But whilst the Eastern Bishops were busie at Philippopolis there remained at Sardica about eighty Bishops as some guess Briet Annales in an 347. Brietius the Jesuite says not above seventy These that they might seem to doe something agree to make Canons about Discipline And because there were none left there but good confiding Friends of Pope Julius and Athanasius Hosius leads and they all without dispute or hesitancy follow He says Notae Beveregii in Concil Sardicense p. 199. Sardic Concil Canon 3. let us doe something to honour the memory of St. Peter and they all agree to doe what he would have them to doe Therefore he proposes and they conclude to give that to the Pope which he never had before and yet that was not a power of judging and determining in a cause upon an Appeal but of requiring of a review or second judgment to be made in the Countries by the same Judges with the addition of some few others As soon as these Canons were made Julius receives them and tacks them to the end of the Canons of the Nicene Council where they lay close for seventy years and were never heard to speak a word in the Western Church for all that time Nor yet dare they so much as shew their heads in the Eastern Church in any Judicatory to this day But when Apiarius made his complaints to Zosimus he was so hardy as to make trial of them and in the name of the Canons of the Nicene Council Du Pin de Antiqua Eccl. Discip p. 113. he sends them abroad to fight for him De Marca lib. 7. cap. 5. Du Pin pag. 113. Now in all this Narration from first to last I see no manner of oversight but great appearance of prudence design and craft It was no oversight for the Friends of Rome at Sardica to make Canons of Discipline when all the Eastern Bishops who might oppose were out of the way It was no oversight in Hosius to preface his Canons in that glozing way of doing honour to the memory of Saint Peter It was no oversight in Julius to tack these new Canons that were to give him and his Successours such new powers to those of the Council of Nice It was no oversight in his Successours to make no mention of these for seventy years It was no oversight in Pope Zosimus when he resolved to make advantage of them to bring them forth in the name and credit of Nicene Canons Thus did Leo the First after him De Marca lib. 7. cap. 7. par 6. For had he called them Sardican Canons St. Augustin would have presently said that they were the Acts of Hereticks and in the next moment would have thundred against them as Falsarians and Counterfeits For those Men who made the Sardican Canons which he had seen did condemn both Athanasius and Julius August Epist 163. and then how is it possible to think that they would ever have given such new and extraordinary powers to Julius After that the whole Council would have declared that whether the Canons were counterfeit or not yet no Act of any Sardican Council had any more authority in it after the division of the Fathers than an Act of one of their Provincial Synods Upon the whole therefore whatever men talk of an oversight in Zosimus it is certain he did what was fit and necessary to be donein the case If he would use those Canons to enlarge his power he must call them Nicene Canons For those onely could be presumed to have authority sufficient to doe his business Thus his own next Predecessour Innocentius the First says in his Epistle ad Clerum Constantinopolitanum of the Nicene Canons that they and they onely were the Canons which the Roman Church stood to Alios quippe Canones Romana non admittit Ecclesia Du Pin 113. Sozomen lib. 8.26 De Marca lib. 7. cap. 12. par 1 2. But good Sir pardon this digression It has been too long Our Authour forced me to it by his consident alledging the Council of Chalcedon and the Council of Nice for the
the good rules and instructions that are in it and for this end it is read in the Church of England It is something more and to be hinted here Concil Laod. Can. 60. that the Laodicaean Council expresly requires that no Books be read in the Church but those that we accompt in strict sense Canonical Can. 60. And in the Canon 59. of that Council it is absolutely forbidden that any private Hymns or Psalms that is such as have been made by private Persons since the consignation of the Canon of Scripture should be used in Churches Now if our Authour knows his Breviary and allows any Authority to these Councils He may have more reason to object against the Church of Rome for having so many private Hymns in their Service than against the Church of England for having so few Books in that which is properly called the Canonical Scriptures This bye-consideration might have given some stop to a man that was not resolved to run too fast from his Church 3. But he mentions a third Doctrine determined in ancient Councils against us P. 20. and that is concerning the unbloudy Sacrifice now this is for want of matter to give words it is certain that the Church of England at the end of the Communion-service in the last Collect teaches us to pray to God that he would accept this our Sacrifice and our Authour knows that it never owned any Sacrifice but an unbloudy Sacrifice to be offered there I wish our Authour had told us whether the Sacrifice which the Church of Rome pretends to offer be bloudy or unbloudy They tell us ordinarily that there is bloud on the Patten and bloud in the Cup bloud with the Body concomitanter for the benefit of the Laity and bloud in the Cup to the satisfaction of the Priest I think both these are offered up according to their Doctrine as a Sacrifice propitiatory for the dead and the living They that believe Transubstantiation must believe that one part of the Sacrifice is really bloud and nothing else but bloud and they may be concern'd to call it a bloudy Sacrifice but not at all to call it unbloudy Pope Vrban the Fourth seems to have been of this mind when he instituted the great Feast of the Body of Christ commonly called Festum Corporis Christi For he did it upon this occasion that a certain Host being broken by the Priest either bled or shed drops of bloud they say miraculously but how or whether true or no we know not Now this I presume may be call'd a bloudy Host or Sacrifice Brietius Ann. 1264. in these words tells us the story Vrbanus quartus ex occasione miraculi de Eucharistia Briet Annal. in An. 1264. Hostiâ à Sacerdote fractâ reddente sanguinem Festum Corporis Christi instituit The institution of this Feast was to give honour to the Host and that not as unbloudy but as bloudy and it was to insinuate this Doctrine that all the other Hosts have bloud with them as well as this though the bloud does not always appear But as they say then it did and if so it came in seasonably to confirm the Doctrine of the Lateran Council about Transubstantiation and that which soon follow'd after it the communicating of the Laity in one Species So happy was the Church of Rome then to have a Miracle or the story of a Miracle to come in at the nick of time to patronage that which old Councils and old Fathers and sense and reason and all that is in man must have disclaim'd and oppos'd But now after all this our Authour is most unlucky to put us in mind of the true ancient Catholick Doctrine and to summon up old Councils in the defence of a word which we accept and use with submission and that most properly we believe the holy Eucharist to be a Sacrifice and that in plain and strict sense an unbloudy Sacrifice and so as the ancient Councils and Fathers did we call it And though the Doctours of the Church of Rome use the same word yet when they reflect upon the Doctrine of their own Church they must explain themselves by a much harder figure than we use when we interpret the words of our Saviour's Institution But yet our Authour will have the Councils against us and he tells us of a Council at Constantinople which he says was a thousand years agoe and that it seems used these words and so do we those old Councils are better Friends to the Protestant Doctrines than he is aware of for the Protestants studied them and learnt of them and took their rules and measures in the Reformation as near as they could after the holy Scriptures from them Then he cites the ninth Council of the Apostles now I wish he had told us whether this was a thousand or fifteen hundred or two thousand years agoe I thought at first he meant the 15th Chapter of the Acts of the Apostles But our Authour has declar'd so much against the Scriptures that we can never hope to find his sense there it is possible he means the ninth of the Apostolick Canons And that is as little to his purpose as the ninth Council of the Apostles to be sure it speaks nothing against the interest of the Church of England and nothing to the advantage of the Church of Rome Thus it is and will be as often as men adventure to write Books without skill 4. P. 20. The fourth point our Authour gives us as determined in Councils is that of the veneration and worship of Saints Relicks as also of Martyrs and holy Images which he says was according to Apostolical Tradition established in the second Council of Nice with the general concurrences of ancient Fathers This Council indeed speaks to the point for which it is alledged but because our Authour is pleas'd to fortify it with concurrences I 'll give him account of some other Councils that as to time do almost concur with this they treat upon the same subject and determine as resolutely and when he has ballanced all the concurrences together perhaps he may find as little pleasure in this allegation as in all the rest The first Council that ever determined any thing about the worship of Images was at Constantinople Anno 754. * See the Acts of the second Nicene Council in Binnius p. 621. Col. Edit Ann. 1618. This called it self the seventh general Council and so it was esteemed for thirty years after This condemned the worship of Images and declared that it was abominable that Images were Idols and the Worshippers of them Idolaters and that all and every Image was to be thrown out of Christian Churches and they spake as high in this way as any have done since the Reformation †See Binnius his Collection as before and Balsamus and Zonaras on the 7th and 9th Canons of the second Nicene Council This appears by the Acts and Canons of the second
Nicene Council where those Fathers speak against it A little more than thirty years after another Council was convened at Nice This cancelled the Acts of the former and called it self the seventh general Council This declared the worship of Images to be lawfull but gave no requisite bounds and measures to it nor yet taught the expediency of it This was done when Irene an Imperious Woman in the behalf of her young Son swayed the Empire But seven years after this Charles the Great gets another Council to meet at Francfort there met three hundred Bishops who unanimously as much damned the second Council at Nice as that had damned the former Walafridus Strabo Ado Viennensis Regino Prumiensis tell us that in this Francfort Council Pseudosynodus Graeca pro adorandis Imaginibus habita falso septima vocata ab Episcopis damnata est And Hincmarus Rhemensis tells us Tempore Caroli magni Imperatoris jussione Apostolicae sedis generalis Synodus in Francia convocante praefato Imperatore celebrata est secundum Scripturarum tramitem traditionémque majorum ipsa Graecorum Synodus destructa penitus abdicata est And a little after he tells that by the Authority of this Synod the veneration of Images was somewhat repressed But yet Pope Adrian was of another mind and his Successours after the death of Charles Pupparum suarum cultum vehementius promoverunt stirred much to advance this worship to which he gives a name which I shall not English insomuch that Lewis the Son of Charles was forced to write sharper against the worship of Images than his Father had done Now this is material and it might in reason have stopt our Authour from laying any great stress upon the second Nicene Council And all this he knew or might have known for Dr. Beveredge Notae Beveregii in Concilium Nicenum secundum in his learned Notes upon that Council had laid all this before him But to add a little more in the year 825. Ludovicus Pius called another Council at Paris and this declared as much against the worship of Images and the second Council at Nice as that at Francfort had done before The Acts of this Council lay in obscurity unknown a great while but they were printed in the year 1596. and since that time the Friends of the present Church of Rome have nothing to say against them and nothing for themselves but that Jonas Aurelianensis disputed in that Council for Images against Claudius Taurinensis Bellarminus de Script Ecclesiast An. 820. de Jona Aurelianensi But yet for all his Arguments the unanimous determinations of the rest of the Fathers was against them And besides this very Jonas though he had something to say against Claudius yet he said not enough to serve the Interest of the present Church of Rome For Bellarmine de scriptoribus Ecclesiasticis tells us that he wrote three Books pro defensione sacrarum Imaginum But he advises men to reade them with caution because he says that he and Agabardus and all the chief Writers of the French Nation in that age are in one and the same errour who though they will allow some worship for Images yet they deny that any religious worship is to be given to them Thus our Authour might have seen that we have against them three Councils for one One in the East before that of Nice most high and positive against Image-worship and two in the West and those not onely declaring against that Worship but as positively cassating and annulling the Acts of that second Nicene Council which allowed it and these two convened by the direction of two great Princes Charles the Great and Lewis the Pious who were the best Friends that ever the Church of Rome had And with these Councils agree or very near agree all the chief Men of skill and learning who were Writers in that age in the West And then in the East it is most certain that the second Nicene Council had no Credit or Reputation or Authority a great while after for all the Historians that write of the Times after the Deposition of Irene the Empress tell us of three or four Emperours immediately succeeding who fully declar'd against Images and their worship threw them out of Churches and severely punished all those that pleaded in defence of them And nothing is so common amongst them as severe and bitter complaints against the Persecution of the Iconoclasts All this is true matter of fact and it is enough to depreciate the credit of the second Nicene Council and that perhaps with our Authour himself But yet for all this it may puzzle some others to find that this second Nicene Council appears in the World as the seventh General Council and that in ancient as well as modern Collections and not onely in the West but in the East The consideration of this is beside my business but yet it is strange and surprizing and would tempt a man to venture at a guess which perhaps may move others to speak something in the case that is more material I have heard of a Proverb or proverbial saying that three things joined together will doe wonders and they are these A little good luck and some Art and a great deal of Face Now the second Nicene Council has had on its side all these three most remarkably First as to good luck about the time of this Council whilst Irene was Empress there hapned a most prodigious strange Miracle at Berytus in Phoenicia An Image of our Saviour being wounded by a Jew in the breast gave out as my Authour says so much bloud Brietii Annales in An. 765. as being divided would be sufficient to be kept and shown in all the Churches of the East and West This was soon carried abroad and a little of it as most sacred and venerable was reposited in most of the famed Churches Some of this we find was shown at Mantua and great noise and talk there was about it perhaps some were for the Miracle and some against it And it is likely that Charles the Great had not faith enough to believe it for in the year 804. he got Pope Leo the Third to determine the Controversie whether that bloud came from the Image at Berytus or no and at that time he gave his judgment against the Image but when he added that the bloud there shown came out of the side of our Saviour an honest Jesuit dare not credit him Brietius says de hoc viderint eruditi Briet Annales An. 804. Now when this bloud was shown in Churches far and near in the East and West it could not but conciliate great veneration to sacred Images in the People For they saw the bloud and it was shown with a great deal of devotion and the Priests and Monks told the story no doubt with confidence enough and it being told in so many places and so oft and after the same manner How the Jew blasphemed
and will not give us the least intimation of their Dogm's wherein his schemes did agree with theirs yet I think it very probable that he might light upon some of the same thoughts with them because I find a wonderfull agreement between the Followers of those two and this Gentleman For they had no reverence at all for Scripture and very small regard to Reason sometimes they would throw away Ed. Erasmi Basil 8vo 1571. and easily reject a great part of Scripture Iren. lib. 3. cap. 11. and at other times they would receive all Iren. lib. 3. cap. 12 pag. 302. but upon this condition that they might interpret it they made novel Inventions to be great and necessary Articles of Faith Id. lib. 3. cap. 11. p. 288. In tantum processerunt audaciae uti quod ab his non olim conscriptum est veritatis Evangelium titulent in nihilo conveniens Apostolorum Evangeliis they had a profound veneration for Authority and entirely submitted themselves to the Doctrines of Ebion and Cerinthus for they supposed that these men had a secret or mystery derived down by Tradition to them which alone was able to fix the sense of Scriptures and therefore whenever an Argument was directed against them out of Scriptures they still brought it to this Tradition without this they undervalued and slighted all the Scriptures and were the Inventers of the chiefest Arguments against them that our Authour and his Friends at this day do use All this will appear Irenaeus lib. 3. cap. 2. if we look upon Irenaeus lib. 3. cap. 2. Cum ex Scripturis arguuntur in accusationem convertuntur ipsarum Scripturarum quasi non rectè habeant neque sunt ex Authoritate quia variè sunt dictae quia non possit ex his inveniri veritas ab his qui nesciunt Traditionem non enim per literas traditam illam sed per vivam vocem and then farther toward the latter end of that Chapter they challenge something that speaks the great confidence they had in their way perhaps as much as the Infallibility of a Guide se indubitatè incontaminatè sincerè absconditum scire Mysterium The proceedings of those men are so like to the method of our Authour that I do not in the least wonder if he found in his Schemes something very agreeable to their Doctrines Some mens brains for all what that learned Spaniard teaches may be exactly of the same temper and consequently their wits of the same height I have heard of a fool who by thinking the very same thoughts with his Brother could find him out when all the wise men in the Town could not do it Thus far therefore I will be obliging to our Author and give him more credit than I will upon some other occasions I will though with some reluctancy of reason believe that whilst he was reading the Scriptures some thoughts might come into his mind agreeable enough with some of those that Ebion and Cerinthus had But after this high civility allowed him I hope he will not impose upon my Faith so far as to require me to believe that he found any thing in the Holy Scriptures that agreed with the idle whimsies and mad dreams and blasphemous prate of his two other friends Nailor and Muggleton This is such an impudence as R. C's aswell as Protestants must abhor all Popes and Councils that have ever been with wrath and indignation would have detested any man that should have dared to put so profane and vile a scandal upon those sacred writings What Anathema's would the Council of Trent have thundred out against Luther if ever he had wrote or spoken any thing so base as this It is certain that there is nothing in Scripture that can in the least seem to favour the blasphemies of those two wretches and I am unwilling to think that there was any thing in our Authour's schemes that would deserve the punishment which they justly suffered It is possible that he might have been of their acquaintance and have had very particular respects for their persons and so he might be over-easie to think that some of his thoughts might be like unto theirs This I am willing to guess because I can with confidence presume that he has kept very ill Company for though his natural temper carries him to speak soft and smooth things yet in spight of nature he is forced to be rude and saucy For why cannot he write a Book without pointing his discourse at the breasts of the Right Reverend Fathers of our Church why does he treat them with contempt and scorn why does he presume to daule 'em to twitch 'em by the Nose and pull 'em by the Beard and stand over 'em with Fescue and Ferula and tell 'em that here they were out and there they were out and that here and there and at every point he can instruct them All this comes from want of manners and good converse Muggleton would have done the same and so would Nailor and none but such as they For certainly a respect is due to them for their Character and a respect is due upon their Personal accompt they are men of excellent worth and great learning prudence piety and integrity and so conspicuously eminent in all these that our Authour is not able to match them in any one Countrey though he take as large a view of Bishops as he does of Conversions in his 14th page through Europe Asia Africa and America But when Reason and the Holy Scriptures are to be thrown down it is no great wonder if the Bishops of the Church of England fall with them I begin to be warm and you my Friend may be offended at it yet allow a little to a just indignation it may well move a man of a cold complexion to see a pert unknown come up so briskly to the heads of our Reverend Fathers and Address to them in a formal speech intimating thousands of mistakes miscarriages and errours in them and yet in all that speech the man says nothing but what is old and dull and flat insipid stuff all and every thing in it has been answer'd five hundred times since the Reformation and at least twenty within these two years This looks like perverse stupidity for men to pretend to be writers when they do not reade if our Authour had read the late Books by this writing he gives plain proof that his Reason serves as little in drawing up Plea's for Authority as it did before in making Schemes of Christian Doctrine out of the Scriptures All that he says is this that he heartily wished that God would have pleased to have left us some unerring Authority and Sovereign Guide p. 6. and then that God has not left the World without Government and given us Laws without lawfull Judges and Interpreters p. 10. From thence he presumes that there is such a thing and resolves to go in quest after it he
Philippi c. But now a transcriber of this I suppose more knave than fool changes the words thus In Canonicis Scripturis Ecclesiarum Catholicarum quamplurium Divinarum Scripturarum solertissimus indagator autoritatem sequatur inter quas sane illae sint quas Apostolica sedes habere ab ea alii meruerunt accipere Epistolas This speaks quite a different thing that the Epistles of the Apostolical Seat are to be accounted Canonical Scriptures This forgery or mistake came abroad I suppose at the same time with the counterfeit ware of Riculphus and to this with the false Epistles of the most early Bishops of Rome were put into Gratian and there it remained as a great Authority in the behalf of the Sacredness and Canonicalness of Papal Epistles untill the last Correctours were pleased honestly to reject it and prudently to tell the World that they dare not own such follies or knaveries But farther because our Authour thinks to advantage himself of the Name of St. Augustine I will acquaint him that this Father had no very extraordinary opinion of Rome or the Bishops of it when he was in quest of the true Religion he left Rome and went to Milan and submitted himself to the guidance of St. Ambrose and received the true Christianity from him He had all his days the highest reverence for him and would have yielded to his Authority when he would not have yielded to the Pope's Augustinus Epist 162. He tells us that when Melchiades judged the cause of the Donatists he was joyned with several other Bishops in the same Commission by Constantine Aug. Epist 163. when he names those two great men Julius Bishop of Rome and Athanasius as orthodox Persons and defenders of the right faith he puts Athanasius in the first place It is he that gives those hard words Quidam qui nomen habet Falcidii duce Stultitià Civitatis Romanae jactantià Levitas Sacerdotibus August quaesti mes ex utroque mixtim p. 108. 109. Edit Lugdun An. 1561. Diaconos Presbyteris coaequare contendit he tells us what it was that rais'd his passion the Deacons of Rome it seems would not yield to the Presbyters of other places upon that he says Quia Romanae Ecclesiae ministri sunt idcirco honorabiliores putantur quam apud caeteras Ecclesias propter magnificentiam urbis Romanae quae caput esse videtur omnium civitatum Si itaque sic est hoc debent Sacerdotibus suis vindicare And a little after he gives a fuller accompt of it Vides quid pariat vana praesumptio immemores enim elatione mentis eo quod videant Romanae Ecclesiae se esse ministros non considerant quid illis à Deo decretum sit quid debeant custodire sed tollunt haec de memoria assiduae Stationes domesticae officialitas quae per suggestiones malas seu bonas nunc plurimum potest aut timentur enim ne malè suggerant aut emuntur ut praestent But because this Book is accompted by several not to be St. Augustine's though sent abroad by the Monks and published in his Name I will add farther that St. Augustine's thoughts of Rome and the Bishops of that See were quite different from our Authour 's for if he thought that the Soveraign Guide and the unerring Authority had been there and that God deposited those great supports and securities of the Christian Faith in the Succession of the Roman Bishops then in all likelihood when Rome was taken by the Goths he would have lamented and mourned as a Jew formerly would have done at the taking of Jerusalem and the captivity of the High-Priest But alas there was nothing like it when this news was brought to St. Augustine all that he said of it was this Ibi multos fratres non habuimus non adhuc habemus Indeed for this expression he seems to apologize in his next Sermon but that not as to the truth of his words Serm 29. de verbis Domini but as to the spirit of mind in which he spake them that it was not out of any design to insult over the miseries of others Besides he that remembers what labour he and the rest of the African Bishops took to get the concurrence of the Bishops of Rome Innocentius and Zosimus to the condemnation of the Pelagian Heresie may well think that St. Augustine could have no great reverence for them and if we read Erasmus his Censure upon Innocent's Epistles which are printed with St. Augustine's we may possibly be tempted to entertain mean thoughts of the Bishop of so great a See These are Erasmus his words before the 96 th Ep. which is Innocents Innocentius superiori respondet suo more saevus potius quà m eruditus ad damnandum quà m docendum instructior But I must leave this and follow our Authour He goes on p. the 18 th leaping and skipping from one thing to another He speaks first of Victor what he did in casting out the Asiaticks and then what Gregory and others whom he calls Christ's Vicegerents did in bringing in converts and wonders that so many Proselytes should be made to so little purpose Then he fansies he had seen glorious and wonderfull Privileges in the Church of Rome and knows not how they could be forfeited After he falls to his wonted work of whipping our Bishops for telling him that new Doctrines had been brought into the Church which were not imposed upon the faithfull till the Council of Trent Now nothing of all this deserves an answer because it hath been so often given before But it may be expected by some As to Victor he says he excommunicated the Bishops of Asia for keeping of Easter contrary to the Institutions of St. Peter and St. Paul though tolerated by St. John Now this is fit to be said by a new Convert who must venture farther than any man of skill dare do For first the matter of fact is doubted and Valesius the last Editor of Eusebius who was all his days a Roman Catholick thinks that Victor went no farther than to high words and threatning And then as to the right of the action Eusebius lib. 5 c. 24. Irenaeus who wrote to Victor himself about it fully shews that it would have been unreasonable and against all the methods of his Predecessours But then thirdly the relation of our Authour is altogether groundless that St. Peter and St. Paul did institute and St. John onely tolerate For this is a thing that Polycrates the President of the Council of the Asiaticks never knew Victor himself never knew Irenaeus never knew Anicetus Bishop of Rome nor yet St. Polycarp that contested this point with him who too was St. John's own Disciple never knew Euseb lib. 5. c. 24. Certainly our Authour has some Pidgeon that whispers to him Secrets and Mysteries that no man knows I beg his leave a little to acquaint him with the sense
of his friend St. Augustine in a like case The Romans challenged to have a command from St. Peter for keeping the Saturday-Fast and those of the Eastern Churches quite contrarily asserted that they were expresly forbidden and that by St. John to fast upon that day A Presbyter of the Church of Rome writes to his friend and most earnestly exhorts him to do as they did and pleads thus Petrus Apostolorum caput coeli Janitor Ecclesiae fundamentum id ipsum Romanos edocuit Now St. Augustine being consulted in the case slights all that flaunting Plea of the Romans allows the allegation of the Easterns to be as good as those of the West and concludes thus that the Apostles St. Peter and St. John did not vary If they gave any rule it was the same every where And seeing there is a present difference it must be said that either the Eastern Church hath varied from the rule of St. John or else the Roman Church has varied from the rule of St. Peter Now which of these was the truth St. Augustine knew not He himself gives his sense in these words Epistola 86 Casulano Augustinus Ep. 86. Casulano After the Plea for Rome E contrario refertur occidentis potiùs aliqualoca in quibus Roma est non servasse quod Apostoli tradiderunt orientis verò terras unde coepit ipsum Evangelium ipsum praedicari in eo quod ab omnibus simul cum ipso Petro Apostolis traditum est ne Sabbato jejunetur sine aliqua varietate mansisse Upon this he concludes thus interminabilis est ista contentio generans lites non finiens quaestiones Had this great Father known any thing of a Soveraign Guide and unerring Authority seated at Rome he could never have doted so far as to have made this any matter of question But he knew nothing of that or of Peter commanding and John onely tolerating either in the one or the other case And I will presume for once that he knew a great deal more than our Authour does But the second skip our Authour takes is to Conversions and here he says he perceives P. 18. that according to the command and institution of our Saviour his Vicegerent did send out his Disciples Here I want our Authour's Spectacles for I can perceive nothing I see no Vicegerent of our Blessed Lord nor do I see any command that he ever gave to such a Person nor do I know whether he means the Disciples of the Vicegerent or the Disciples of our Lord. It is certain our Lord gave a command to the Apostles to teach all Nations and they and their Successours the Bishops have acted according to that command And if Gregory Bishop of Rome or any other have been industrious in that work we heartily thank and commend them But yet I wonder that our Authour has of a sudden grown so extremely blind as not to see that conversions may be made to what is bad as well as to what is good Pagans and Mahometans have been industrious to make converts So have all Hereticks his friends Ebion and Cerinthus Nailor and Muggleton Nay this if he had not despised and too long laid aside the Holy Scriptures he might have learn'd without the assistence of his unerring Authority from one saying of our Blessed Lord Math. 23.15 Wo unto you Scribes and Pharisees c. After this gross piece of ignorance P. 19. which he is pleased to shew to advantage with flourishes of his pen comparing his reason with that of our Reverend Bishops he may excuse me from telling him how the great Privileges and Prerogatives of the Church of Rome could be forfeited untill he hath shown me in particular what they were that he insists upon For until he has proved that Rome did really enjoy such Prerogatives as he challenges on her behalf I will not undertake to shew when and how Rome forfeited that which Rome never had Our Authour may be a Sophister and how far he is beyond that himself best knows and so he may think no farther in this Paragraph than the old trite Cavil quod non perdidisti habes And his friends at Rome will con him but few thanks for that And now our Authour begins to whip our Bishops and wo be to them He tells them what he had been told that there were some late Doctrines introduced into the Church and such as were not imposed upon the faithfull before the Council of Trent This he says he could answer by alledging that the protesting against those Doctrines was in the same time But this he waves and chooseth rather to shew that the Doctrines we oppose were establisht by Councils before And here he begins with 1. The Pope's Supremacy P. 20. which he saith was confirmed in the Council of Chalcedon one of the first four general Councils owned by Protestants above 1200 years since 630 Fathers present Quid dignum tanto feret hic promissor hiatu As for my part I wonder who either licensed or allowed this Book to be printed Will any man of skill think to advance a Plea for the Pope's Supremacy from the Council of Chalcedon It is certain that nothing was done there that might have any reference to this Point which was not disclaimed by the Legates of the Pope upon the place and afterwards highly resented by Leo the I. who was then Pope It is true that Anatolius then Patriarch of Constantinople carried on a design to advance his Seat and because he was Bishop of New Rome would have the next place after the Bishop of the Old and so would have the Pre-eminence of the Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch Du Pin de antiaua Eccl. Discip p. 53. In order to this in the absence of the Pope's Legates Anatolius and his friends got the 28 Canon of that Council to pass which gives to the Patriarch of Constantinople 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is as a learned Roman Catholick comments eadem aequalia privilegia tribuunt Episcopo novae Romae ac veteris Romae Episcopo Now assoon as the Legates of the Pope had heard of this they declared against it and obtained another Session wherein they might produce their Plea against the validity of this Canon both as to the form and matter But their objections were answered and the Canon passed against their minds though Lucentius one of the Pope's Legates protested against it and desired that his Protestation might be entred into the Acts of the Council And when Leo the Great who was then Pope heard of this he declared against it and wrote against it with a great deal of vehemence and indignation as any one may see who will consult these Epistles of his the 56 57 58 63 66. And Leo could never be brought to confirm that very Canon which our Authour tells us did confirm his Supremacy Now in this case I will presume that Pope to be a better guide and to have more
and will give full satisfaction in that Point if he were but capable of receiving it And I presume I have given him more than he can answer in the Reflexions upon the Lateran Council I. The Authority and Infallibility of the Roman Catholick Church P. 21. This he undertakes to consider how far it may bear and appear reasonable to an impartial Reader These words are not worth the notice but that they tempt out a little suspicion that they are here set for a reserve in case of opposition for if it be said as most truly it may that there is not one plain proof either of the supreme Authority or Infallibility of the Roman Church in all this Discourse Our Authour may reply that he never undertook to give it All that he engaged for was appearances P. 23. and that he has performed by using the words oft tumbling and tossing them as Hay-makers do their mown Grass one while Authority is uppermost and soon after Infallibility Authority must lead in Infallibility and Infallibility must vindicate Authority but where either of these is to be found the Man neither proves nor knows and plainly says that he is not concerned whether there be any such thing as Infallibility or no p. 24. he says Were there no Infallibility as I believe there is I would still submit my Reason and regulate my Conscience P. 24. according to the Decrees of the supreme lawfull Ecclesiastical Authority This is my belief pray blame me not All this is nothing else but appearances for neither is the Church of England nor the Church of Rome concerned in his belief or his fancy or his opinion for these may be wise or may be foolish may be well or may be ill grounded But yet it is admirable to see what great command he has over his Reason and his Conscience that he can make them turn which way he pleases and if he does but suppose a Supreme lawfull Authority to be in Ebion or Cerinthus Nailor or Muggleton or the Church of Rome He can be a Convert to any of them to day to this and to morrow to the quite contrary and that with as much reason and as good conscience to the one as to the other For which way soever he turns he may still say this is my belief pray blame me not His last Conversion was to the Church of Rome and he intimates that he changed upon this belief that there was a Supreme lawfull Ecclesiastical Authority to be found there but he has not the least reason to prove it though it must be confest that he has some appearances which I will impartially consider in their order 1. He gives us some Citations from Protestants Pag. 22 23. from Luther one and from Melancthon another whom he calls the Phoenix of Learning a fine word I wonder from whence he borrowed it another from Somaisius or Salmasius Another he would give from Grotius but what it is he has forgot he thinks it is somewhere in his Annotations upon the New Testament And then to make weight he throws in the Names of Jacob Cartwright Huss and Beza P. 23. And from hence he argues in these words These eminent Protestants were men of great learning and they had searcht and understood Scripture and History and if my judgment concurs with theirs in this point as I profess it doth then have I found that lawfull Supreme Authority Now these are dangerous words from the mouth of a new Convert it is well for him that he is not now in Spain for if he should make such a declaration there That his judgment concurs with the judgment of Luther Melancthon Huss and Beza in the Point of the Pope's Supremacy or the Supremacy of the Church of Rome he might perhaps be in danger of the Inquisition All the World knows the judgment of those men in this point and if he were before the Fathers of the Inquisition they would not be put off with a small Citation found they know not where and perhaps inserted by they know not whom He had done much better to have mistrusted his Copy than to depend upon such an Allegation Sure I am that if he made any use of those mens judgments or laid any great stress upon the words which he cites under their Names in his search or presumed discovery of a Supreme Authority of the Church of Rome he used both his Reason and his Conscience very hardly It is certain that Luther did speak variously of the Pope's Power sometimes higher and sometimes lower as appears to any one that reads either his Works or Cassander's Citations from him And as to Melancthon the Phoenix of Learning I am not concerned to search what he wrote to the Cardinal Belay And it may be I am civil in doing it He was a Wit that once charged it as an incivility upon his Acquaintance that he should take so much pains to prove him a Lyar. It is certain that Melancthon in his Loci Communes where he treats professedly upon this Subject declares fully and roundly against all this that is cited from him And therefore I presume that his judgment does not concur with Melancthon's for if it does he is no new Convert for he has found nothing that can call for a submission of Reason and Conscience nothing like to that Authority and Infallibility of the Roman Catholick Church which a new Convert is bound to defend But because our Authour in desence of the Authority and Infallibility of the Roman Church has given such Citations from Protestants I 'll indeavour to requite him by one from a very good Roman Catholick and that is Cassander He in his Book de Officio pii hominis speaks to this purpose That there are some who because they see yet remaining amongst them not a few things that have descended down from Antiquity or the first Christians will keep up the present state of the Church just as it is though it be corrupt and foully stained by abuses that have crept in by little and little Nor will they suffer any thing to be alter'd though it may be done agreeable enough to the Decrees or Canons of the Ancients Pontificem verò Romanum quem Papam dicimus tant um non Deum faciunt ejusque Autoritatem non modò supra totam Ecclesiam sed supra ipsam Scripturam Divinam efferunt sententiam ejus Divinis Oraculis parem imo infallibilem fidei regulam constituunt hos non video cur minus Pseudocatholicos Papistas appellare possis The Roman Bishop whom we call Pope they make little less than God They set up his Authority not onely over the whole Church but over the holy Scripture it self and make his determination equal to the Divine Oracles and no less than an infallible rule of faith I see no cause but that you may give to these the name of false Catholicks and Papists Thus said that good man concerning the
Sticklers for Roman Authority and Infallibility and that in a time when he contended most earnestly to bring in peace and good temper amongst Christians and had endeavoured passionately to persuade men to lay aside ill Language and odious Names such as one Party threw at another all which he says were cast up out of Hell such as these Papists Antichristians Ministers of Satan and on the other side Hereticks Schismaticks Apostates Though he heartily wish'd these Names out of the World yet he could be content that two or three of them were always ready to be thrown in the teeth of such Persons as our Authour would seem to be This remark I give to shew our Authour that I do not set down the Sayings and Opinions of others without considering first what weight and stress is to be laid upon them For I must consess that it is to me a scandal and matter of offence to find this Set of Authorities which our Authour uses in the same order and in the same words in another late Book intitled Pax vobis this seems to speak that the Authours of both these transcribed and never considered what force was in their Citations Is this fair dealing with a Man 's own Conscience or with his Readers when he is weighing of Religions and offering motives of Reconciliation either to himself or to others to act thus supinely This is worse than to take a journey to Edinburgh upon the next Hackney and never consider whether he be a Jade or no. A journey to Heaven is long to be sure of greatest importance He that takes up a new Religion to carry him thither had need use eyes and ears and heart and head too St. Paul had reason when he advised us to work out our Salvation with fear and trembling but all men will not doe this they are in too much haste They that take satisfaction without reason and in spite of reason change their Religion cannot act with that caution which the great Apostle requires If I am not much out in my guess which I must leave to the Reader 's judgment when he has compared this Set of Citations with those in Pax vobis Pag. 70 71. we have here one of the most wretched Pleas that ever was used by a Writer It is not more than this I have met with some sayings of Men whom I care not for when or where or to what end they were spoken I never considered nor yet whether upon second thoughts they did not retract them my judgment concurs with them therefore I have found that lawfull Supreme Authority I searched for and where this Authority is there is Infallibility That is the first Motive to persuade that the Roman Catholick Church has Supreme Authority over all and Infallibility in the exercise of it He should now proceed to a second But instead of that we have Pag. 24 25 26 27. a discourse upon a new Subject so far is our Authour from making these Doctrines to appear reasonable that for so long together he 'll e'en let them shift for themselves his present business is to talk and talk he will of Separation or how the Church of Rome can be said to have separated either from her self or from the Catholick Church either whole or part and where that whole or part remained from whence the Church of Rome separated and then again where she remained and where she may be found and here he is urgent and importunate and will have an answer and that from the Bishops themselves for he comes up closely to the beards of them and tells them In good faith Fathers my Salvation is highly concern'd in this question and I must be satisfied He prevents them from giving such and such answers and swaggers it bravely out in these words I 'll sooner suffer my self to be knockt down with a true Protestant Flayl than with such a Protestant Answer and at last he adds from this reasonable and important request you shall never beat me whilst I live The Man grows warm and it is well for some that they are out of his way who knows what he may doe The occasion of all this noise and clamour he gives us in the 24th Page in these words You had often told me that She the Church of Rome had fallen from her primitive purity and separated her self from the one holy Catholick and Apostolick Church Answer to Protestant Queries p. 10. declared also to be Antichristian and the true Church latent and invisible by that famous Napper to King James Brocard Fulk Sebast Francus Hospinian and many others Now what is all this to the Bishops of the Church of England must they answer for every thing that has been said by Fulk and Brocard and Napper or as you call him that famous Napper I pray how famous is he has any of the Bishops of England cited him these forty years does any of this Church reade him or depend upon him if your studies have been upon such Authours the Church of Rome have no great prize of you and these Motives as bad as they are were good enough to make you a Convert But yet there remains one Expression cited out of a little Book which it may be few of the Bishops of England ever saw but yet they must give an accompt of it and all the consequences he can gather from it for he says p. 26. his Salvation is highly concerned in it And it is a reasonable and important request And must the Bishops of England be accomptable for every little writing which they know nothing of would the Bishops of Rome think it fair that all the impertinences of our Authour should be charged upon them certainly no. But he argues that if the Church of Rome was once a pure and uncorrupted Church she remains so still for she can neither separate from her self nor from the Catholick Church Now if this Argument be good he himself is bound to answer for all the consequences that can come from a presumed separation either from it self or from the Catholick Church for we have oft proved and are always ready to prove that the Church of Rome is not the same as to purity and incorruption which it was It is changed it is altered multitudes of Innovations have overspread it and great numbers of Errours by little and little as Cassander says have crept in and prevailed over it But yet for all that we own and assert that there is a Church of Rome as well as a Church of Jerusalem Alexandria and Antioch and that though this as well as they have erred not onely in their living and manner of Ceremonies but also in matters of Faith So speaks the Church of England in her 19th Article And if she be a Church she must be a Member of the Catholick Church for every part must be contained in the whole None of us doubt but that the Church of Rome receives all the Canonical Scriptures that we
and bordering parts of Wales at the same time the Church of Rome was no less afflicted by the Heathen Emperours This is gross ignorance to talk of Saxons persecuting the Britains and Religion flying into Wales in the time of the Heathen Emperours Did the Man never hear of the name of Constantine and of the names of those glorious Christian Emperours that succeeded him in the East and West for more than two hundred years before the flying into Wales I hope he will not call them persecuting Heathen Emperours who brought the Empire into the Church The famous Council at Nice was celebrated in the Year 325. and the coming of the Saxons under Hengist into Britain was not till the Year 450 and it was near a hundred years after that before the Britains were dispossessed of the rest of their Countrey and forc'd to secure themselves amongst the Mountains of Wales This our Authour might easily have known if he had read Bede but he knew it not therefore he adds No wonder if in these days and circumstances there was but little correspondence between Rome and Wales This now is worse and worse what a little correspondence between Rome and Britain when Constantius was in Britain and Constantine and Theodosius and Maximus and the most of the chief Roman Commanders in their distinct times What! little correspondence between them though three of the British Bishops were at the Council of Arles and as many very probably at Nice and as many certainly at the Council of Ariminum and of Sardica Did this Man never hear of the names of Pelagius and Coelestius or of Palladius and Patricius and hundreds of others who came from Rome to Britain or went from Britain to Rome in all this long tract of time I would be willing to think that I mistake a little rather than judge that he mistakes so grosly But he will not allow it for he will have all the World to see how ignorant he is He adds to this these words But when the Church brought from her subterraneous refuges and set upon a Hill began to enlarge her self P. 31. and propagate the Gospel Gregory the Great sent Augustine the Monk into England to see how matters went there in this long interval of silence Certainly he does think that Gregory the Great was the first Roman Bishop that ever saw good days and that all his Predecessours were under the persecuting Heathen Emperours for now he says that the Church was brought from her subterraneous refuges and now she was set upon the Hill and now began to enlarge her self I wonder where he learnt this I hope it was from his Friend the famous Napper What is become of two and thirty Bishops of Rome so many there were between Sylvester who is said to have baptized the Emperour Constantine and this Gregory the Great did they all sleep did they doe nothing for the Church that she must be said now to inlarge her self There was near three hundred years past from Constantine's possession of the Empire to this mission of Augustine the Monk and was the Church all that time in subterraneous refuges Where were these subterraneous refuges from whence the Church came and where was the Hill upon which the Church was set in this Gregory's days I know that John of Constantinople was then most ambitious and indeavoured to mount up his Seat to higher power and dignity than that of Rome it self He challenged all the proud Titles that the Popes afterwards usurpt and designed to set his Church upon the Hill But Gregory the First wrote against him and charged him with pride and arrogancy and said plainly that whatever Bishop whether Roman or Constantinopolitan should assume those Titles he would be Antichristian or at least the Forerunner of Antichrist It is certain that Gregory the Great was content to keep things as he found them he did not set the Church upon a Hill or inlarge its power The Romanists can scarce pardon him for the great submission and deference which he yielded to the Emperour and the large expressions which he used in his Contest against John of Constantinople for the Protestants strongly argue from them against the pretences of the Popes themselves But our Authour adds that Gregory sent Augustine the Monk into England to see how matters went here in this long interval of silence He seems to think that Augustine came as a Spy or to make a discovery of an unknown Land but in this he is like himself still mistaken For Gregory knew how matters went here He knew that Bertha Queen to King Ethelbert was a Christian and that Luidhardus Bishop of Senlis was her Chaplain and that he performed to her and her Attendants all Christian Offices in the Church of St. Martin's Bede lib. 1. cap. 26. near Canterbury which was formerly built by the Romans And Gregory himself says in a Letter which he sent by this Augustine to the King of France and was delivered by him in his passage hither That the English Nation were desirous to become Christians His words are these Pervenit ad nos Greg. Epist lib. 5. Ep. 58. Anglorum gentem ad fidem Christianam desideranter velle converti sed Sacerdotes vestros è vicino negligere desideria eorum cessare suâ adhortatione succendere Ob hoc igitur Augustinum Servum Dei praesentium portitorem cujus zelus studium benè nobis est cognitum cum aliis servis Dei praevidimus illuc dirigendum Quibus etiam injunximus ut aliquos secum è vicino debeant Presbyteros ducere cum quibus eorum possint mentes agnoscere voluntatem admonitione suâ quantum Deus donaverit adjuvare and to the same purpose he writes in the next Epistle If our Authour had seen this Greg. Ep. 59. he would not have said that Gregory sent Augustine to see how matters went here in this long interval of silence But he goes on and tells us that the Britains knew him not that is Augustine untill he had confirmed his Commission by Miracles Now what had he to doe with them or they with him his Commission was to convert the Saxons or the English from their Paganism to Christianity as Gregory says in the forementioned Epistle Bede lib. 1. cap. 23. and Bede in these words Misit Servum Dei Augustinum alios complures praedicare Verbum Dei genti Anglorum Bede calls him Anglorum Apostolus to them he was sent to them he came and he had more work to doe amongst them than he was able to perform The Britains were not in the least concerned in his Commission for they were Christians and very good Christians according to our Authour's accompt For he tells us that the great Errours which Augustine found among them were chiefly two Their Asiatick Errour concerning the keeping of Easter and dissent from the Roman Church in the administring of Baptism As to the first of these their Asiatick
comes to the Church of England and demands it there they deny that they have any such Authority Not content with that he puts himself to the trouble to prove it p. 11. he goes to the Church of Rome they say they have it p. 12. and he presently believes them and after a few rubs removed out of his way he reviews Bellarmine's marks and signs of a true Catholick Church and by them endeavours to shew that there is such an unerring Authority and Sovereign Guide in the Church of Rome Now all this is nothing but a plain begging of the Cause or a discovery how little he knows in this Controversie for certain it is that the Church of England and all other Protestant Churches ever since the Reformation have demanded and most earnestly required one plain positive proof that ever God Almighty or our Blessed Lord did ever appoint any such Sovereign Guide and unerring Authority in the Church But they could never receive any plausible Answer to it by all the ways whereby a Negative can be proved they have shewed that there is no such order or appointment in it Nay lately some Writers have asserted with good reason that such a thing is not agreeable to the methods that God has us'd in the Government of the World and that it would not be of any considerable use to the advancement of piety or any eminent vertue amongst men and that the pretence of it serves onely to support an unreasonable Usurpation over the Church of Christ Great Volumes and strong Arguments remain unanswer'd and yet at this time of the day the dull and stale old accompts of it without any new ornaments or new force are sent abroad without any ground or hope of victory to vindicate the interests of it This deserves a sharper Censure than I will give but yet I would have our Authour know that a New Convert to his Old Friends the followers of Ebion and Cerinthus might have alledged in his behalf all that which our Authour here does and that to as much purpose he might have said that he had wished that God had left an unerring Authority in his Church and that God had not left the World without Government and given us Laws without lawfull Judges and Interpreters and that therefore he presumed that such an Authority was somewhere to be sound As for Irenaeus his Church and those in Communion with it they did not in the least pretend to it but the followers of Ebion and Cerinthus did fully and loudly challenge it and therefore his Reverend Fathers Irenaeus and the rest of the Orthodox Bishops must have him excused for he will rather put himself under an unerring Authority than trust to the Guidance of Those that confess themselves to be no more than fallible men But to let that pass P. 13. the next thing we find in our Authour is Bellarmine's Notes of a true Church I suppose he puts them down to encrease the bulk of his Book He could not but know that they are of no Authority with us And Answers are given out to each of them in their Order He might have added strength and force to them whilst they are so briskly attacked but he has no pretence to build upon them or defend himself by them But besides he of all men living has the least right to expect any advantage from them because the chiefest of these Notes are grounded on sayings of the Prophets and he that has so far depreciated the true value of the Five Books of Moses p. 6. will hardly persuade another that he gives any great credit to the writings of the Prophets He there gives us an objection against the Pentateuch P. 6. from the supposed intermedlings of Esdras but does not well reflect that he derives that objection by several Medium's from the Samaritans who were the first and are at this day the chiefest Adversaries and greatest Calumniatours of Esdras Now these very men keep close to the Five Books of Moses and for this they offer some pretences of reason but our Authour without any reason at all would make advantage by the Prophets and throw contempt upon Moses and all this by virtue of the credit which he seems to give to the objections made against Esdras by the Samaritans But Most certainly in this he acts beyond his skill and talks without book for be it what it will Bellarmine's Notes are of no use to him and can do him as little service as that formidable force of Pagans and Turks and I know not how many Nations which he brings in to his assistance p. 11. where he himself says he has no Adversary It is well for him that that impertinency and this did not come together into his head at the same time for if he had thought but as much of the Pagan as he does of the Atheist and Theist perhaps his reason might have been as favourable to them as it was to those others p. 4. and then if Bellarmine's Notes had come into his way who knows but that the man might have turn'd Convert again and wrote another Book of the motives for his reconciliation to old Paganism for methinks it is very probable that our Authour might have found these amongst the Pagans Vniversality and Visibility Vninterrupted continuance and Succession till the days of Constantine lastly Vnity and Vniformity he might have seen there too that which they call a High-Priest and Holy Altar and a Holy Sacrifice Miracles and Religious Colleges and Abstinence P. 14. and vowed chastity and a great many Doctrines Authoritatively imposed and universally received throughout the World I will presume this Gentleman never read either Pausanias or Zozimus or the Epistles of Symmachus and it is happy for him that he did not I will venture the little skill that I have that any impartial Reader shall find better flourishes sairer turns of the Pen and more appearance of Argument in that Speech which Symmachus makes to the Emperour Valentinian Theodosius and Arcadius in the Name of Rome Pagan than our Authour gives us here against the Church of England to our Bishops Now if these little thoughts governed him in the change of one Religion it is well for him that he never ingaged in the consideration of the other But our Authour has Bellarmine's Notes and he will make something of them by virtue of them he says he sound what he was resolved to find before the true Catholick or one Church that may be said to be true in opposition to all others Now upon this foundation he builds apace P. 15. 1. That this being one Body must have one Head upon Earth and he after our Saviour's Death was St. Peter and after St. Peter's his Successours and they are the Bishops of Rome and those are every one of them in their several times not only Successours to St. Peter P. 16. but Christ's Vicegerents This their Authority he says has been owned