that considers the pretences upon which the Dominion of the Pope and his Supremacy is founded by the Roman Courtiers For though neither did the French Church nor other Bishops ever intend to submit unto several superstitious and destructive tenets that the Papacy and Canonists urge yet into what dangers some are fallen and ensnared and others are threatned to be involved is manifest and all this from too great tendernesse in point of Ecclesiastical Communion It is manifest from the mutability and frailty of humane nature and the usual effect thereof upon temptations that where such a power or Sovereignty is lodged it may be applied to the introducing of Superstitious and Idolatrous practices Thus Ieroboam the son of Nebat made Israel to sin they perhaps innocently complied with that Sovereignty when Orthodox and he misimploying it diverted them from the true worship of God So Nebuchadnezar one day erects an Idol and appoints all upon pain of death to worship it by and by commands all to worship the God of the three children Thus Darius makes a Decree that none shall put up any prayer or petition to God but onely to the King for thirty dayes the transgressor being to be cast into the Lyon's denne How many think we by holding Communion with a Prince owning such a power were by those Caprichio's ingaged not into the peril of but actual Superstition and Idolatry Nor are the Papal pretenses lesse the Canonists and Decretals ascribing unto him a power even to alter the Christian faith and not onely to enlarge it that He and Christ have but one Tribunal that He is God that if He vary from the Scripture and Christianity t is to be presumed that God Almighty hath changed his mind with such expression heretofore the Papal Letters and Canonists were stuffed and what danger there is from our Historian's communion of Superstition and Idolatry appears from the Determinations that have been made about Transubstantiation and the consequent worship and superstitions about that Breaden God In fine for I will not insist upon so notorious a point since the Councill of Constance could determine and involve others in a superstitious and impious compliance that non obstante notwithstanding any thing in the Scripture to the contrary the Communion in one kind should be celebrated T is strange for any man to say that there is no danger in communicating with one pretending to such a power though not yet abusing it there being so evident instances of fact to the contrary If there were no other argument for the continuance and advancing of the study of Philology and all ancient Learning and Church History the horror of this Assertion of our Virtuoso is such that no Protestant of the Church of England can otherwise but assent thereunto now Any man that understands the controversies betwixt the Papists and Protestants and contests about Image worship and several other Papal Superstitions and Idolatries which have hapned in Greece Germany France Spain and England of old and later dayes betwixt those of the Roman Catholick Communion will never assent to our Author's opinion or free him from the imputation of grosse and intolerable ignorance The second Question Whether it be possible for any Protestant of the Church of England to communitate with the present Church of Rome in her tenets and Ecclesiastical offices without danger of Superstition is easily determin'd by considering the nature of Ecclesiastical communion which I explained in the beginning and the nature and grounds of our separation from Rome and Reforming our selves No man can hold such an assertion but he must desert the Thirty nine Articles wherein the invocation of Saints and Image worship prayers in an unknown Tongue the five additional Sacraments Communion under one kâ—nd Transubstantiation worshipping of the Hoste are all condemned Nay the last additional Rubrique declares it to be express Idolatry to worship the Bread Now the actual acknowledging of all these superstitions and errours the actual complying with such as relate to practice is so required of all such as hold communion with the Church of Rome that none can remain therein without being sensible thereof so that either our Virtuoso understood not what it was to communicate with the Romanists or was ignorant what Superstition and Idolatry are when he writ this passage But so much hath been said by me in the foregoing passages in vindication of our Church for departing from the Romish Communion and our Laws together with other Ecclesiastical constitutions are so positive and severe against all such Communion that I need not insist hereon further but leave it to the Consideration of my Superiours and of those that are skilled in the Laws of the Land How consonant this passage of our Historian is thereunto how pernicious towards the subversion of the established Religion and how far punishable it being a notorious endeavour to withdraw the King's Majesties subjects from the Religion established to the Romish Religion Histor. R. S. pag. 349. He the Natural and Experimental Philosopher will be led to admire the wonderful contrivance of the Creation and so to apply and direct his praises aright which no doubt when they are offer'd up to Heaven from the mouth of one that hath well studied what he commends will be more suitable to the Divine Nature than the blind Applauses of the Ignorant This was the first service that Adam perform'd to his Creator when he obeyed him in mustering and naming and looking into the nature of all Creatures This had been the onely Religion if men had continued innocent in Paradise and had not wanted a Redemption THe former part of this passage is contrary to the Analogy of Faith and Scripture in that it makes the acceptablenes of mens prayers to depend more or less on the study of Natural Philosophy Whereas the Apostle suspends the acceptablenes of all Prayers unto God in being made unto him in the name and for the mediation of Christ Iesus applied by faith Hebr. 10.19 20 21 22. Having therefore Brethren boldnesse to enter into the holiest by the bloud of Iesus By a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us through the vaile that is to say his flesh and having an High priest over the house of God let us draw neer with a true heart in full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled from an evill conscience and our bodies washed with pure water Here is not any mention how that Experimental Philosophie doth render any prayers more suitable to God than those of the lesse curious this knowledg is no where in the new or old Testament so far recommended unto us as that without this qualification the Saints should be said to offer up the blind applauses of ignorant persons Particularly I do not find this circumstance endeared unto us by that of the Apostle 1 Cor. 13.2 Though I have the gift of Prophesy and understand all Mysteries and all knowledg and though I have
do grant it Hart. They grant that the Pope may be an Heretick perhaps by a supposal as many things may be which never were nor are nor shall be For you cannot prove that any Pope ever was an Heretick actually though possibly they may be whereof I will not strive This point of the fallibility of the Pope and his subjection to a Council is so notorious with every man that is acquainted with the more ancient and modern Writers so known to any one that hath either read the determinations of Bishop Davenant qu. 5. or the defense of the Dissuasive of Bishop Taylour pag. 40. or the Review of the Council of Trent written by a French Catholick from whom the Disswader borrowed his allegations or that hath so much as read over the History of the Council of Trent that I need not insist on it any longer Notwithstanding the earnestnesse of the Iesuits under Laynez in the Council of Trent yet neither was the Pope's superiority over a Council nor the Infallibility of the Bishops of Rome defined there directly as appears out of the Review of that Council lib. 4. c. 1. and out of the English History pag. 721 722. Neither is there to this day amongst the Papists any thing enacted or determined in that Church which obligeth a man under pain of Excommunication to hold any such thing as the personal Infallibility of the Bishops of Rome the contrary being daily maintained there by more than the Iansenists much lesse is there any Sovereignty in matters of Faith ascribed unto them at this day All books of the Papists are subjected to the judgment of the Church not to the Arbitrement of the Pope The fides Carbonaria or Colliers faith so famed amongst the Papists was not established upon the infallibility or sovereignty of the Bishops of Rome no he told the Devil that He believed as the Church believed and the Church as He. And how necessary soever they make the communion with the particular Church of Rome how great influence soever they ascribe to the Pope over Councils yet the Decrees of the Council of Trent run in the name of the Holy Synod not Pope and there it is determined sess 4. that none dare interpret Holy Scripturs against the sense which our Holy Mother the Church hath held or does hold If you enquire in-the doctrines of M r White D r Holden Serenus Cressy and such others as endeavour at present and that with great shew of wit and artifices to seduce the English to that Apostaticall Church there is not one of them that I knowe of who attributes any infallibility to the Pope or submitteth his faith to the Sovereigne decisions of the Bishop of Rome As for Serenus Cressy he very judiciously deserts the School-terme of Infallibility for that of the Churches Authority and saith that the exceptions and advantages which the Protestants have against the Roman Church proceed only from their mis-understanding of her necessary doctrines or at most that all the efficacy they have is onely against particular opinions inferences made by particular Catholique writers He shews that D r Stapleton asserts that the infallible voyce and determination of the Church is included in the decree of the Church speaking in a Generall Council representatively In which the Church is infallible with this restriction viz in delivering the substance of faith in publique doctrines and things necessary to salvation Other Catholiques and namely Panormitan teach that the decrees of Generall Council are not absolutely and necessarily to be acknowledged infallible till they be received by all particular Catholique Churches because till then they cannot properly be called the faith of the universall Church or of the body of all faithfull Christians to which body the promise of infallibility is made And this was the Doctrine of Thomas Waldensis and some other Scholmen c. An opinion this is which though not commonly received yet I do not saith S. C. find it deeply censured by any yea the Gallican Churches reckoned this among their chiefest priviledges and liberties that they were not obliged to the decisions of a Generall Council till the whole body of the Gallican Clergy had by a speciall agreement consented to them and so proposed them to the severall Churches there And to this last opinion doth S. C. incline and his book was approved at Paris as consonant to the Catholique faith He guides himselfe by the Authority of received Councils he acknowledges that to be onely necessarily accounted an Article of Catholique faith which is actually acknowledged and received by Catholiques and since contradictions cannot be actually assented unto it will follow that whatsoever decisions of Councils may seem to oppose such articles are not necessarily to be accounted Catholique doctrines and by consequence not obligatory He denies that Generall Councils can make new articles of faith they are witnesses of what hath been delivered not Sovereigns to determine of new truths either by way of addition to the former or in opposition thereunto Their Infallibility is limited to Tradition and spiritually assisted in the faithfull reporting of what hath been delivered what ever reports or decrees they make of another nature they are to be received with a different assent from what is Catholique faith There is a double obligation from decisions of Generall Councils the first an obligation of Christian beliefe in respect of doctrines delivered by Generall Councils as of universall Tradition the second onely of Canonicall obedience to orders and constitutions for practice by which men are not bound to believe those are inforced as from Divine authority but onely to submit unto them as acts of a lawfull Ecclesiasticall power however not to censure them as unjust much lesse to oppose and contradict them Much more doth the same Author adde which give little countenance to that state of the controversie which our Author forms unto us No Soveraigne dominion over our faith is by him ascribed to the Bishop of Rome or Nationall or Generall Counâ—ills and as to Infailibility which Mr Chillingworth had impugned he thus acquits himselfe I may in generall say of all his Objections that since they proceed only against the word Infallibility and that word extended to the utmost heighth and latitude that it possibly can beare Catholiques as such are not at all concerned in them seeing neither is that expression to be found in any received Council nor did ever the Church enlarge her authority to so vast a widenesse as Mr Chillingworth either conceived or at least for his particular advantage against his adversary thought good to make show as if he conceived so As to the subject wherein Infallibility or Authority is to be placed since Catholiques vary as to that point he sayes 't is evident thereby that they are not obliged to any one part of the Question only they are to agree in this Tridentine decision Ecclesiae est judicare de vero sensu Sacrae
pronunciat Hoc quidem res ipsa manifestissimè ostendit sive privata quaedam Ecclesia eò loci intelligitur appellatione Babylonis sive universae pars major eam priùs fuisse legitimam Ecclesiam cum qua pii piè communicarent postea verò quà m longiùs processit ejus depravatio jubentur pii exire communionem abrum pere ut facile fit vobis intelligere non omnem communionem cum iis qui de nomine Christi appellantur fidelibus esse expetendam sed illam demum quae sit salvâ doctrinae coelitus revelatae integritate Out of which words and they seem to be the words not of Casaubon or K. Iames but the Church of England if I am able to deduce any consequence I am sure this is one that it is not at any time lawful to hold with any Church a communion with her ènown defaults and impieties and that how desireable soever Unity be yet the regard thereto ought never to transport us so far as to mix the service of God with that of Belial that some circumstances do legitimate an holy war and that a bad agreement is not to be chosen before a contest and separation in the behalf of real Godlinesse I am sure I am by the tenor of that Letter justified if I dare not joyn with a Church service wherein Transubstantiation and the sacrifice of the Masse and prayers for the dead and to the Saints not to mention the mutilation of the Communion and Image-worships must be owned or hypocritically complyed with to the dishonour of God 1 Cor. 10.20 21 22. the detriment and offense of the weak Christians 1 Cor. 8.10 11 12. and the strengthning of the party communicated with in those errors and Blasphemies How far further I am warranted by that Letter and the practice of the primitive fathers to rescind a Communion not otherwise erroneous or faulty upon the account of errors Idolatry or conceived Blasphemy in the practice or speculative tenets of a Church or person what private men what a particular Bishop or national Church may do I shall not entermeddle with as having alledged enough in opposition to what our Virtuoso layes down I should proceed now to enquire whether that we may hold communion with the Bishops of Rome supposing that they challenge a Sovereign dominion over our faith But since there was no such thing pressed upon the English Church to occasion the first rupture the generality of Christendome being then and at the first calling of the Council of Trent inclined to the contrary tenet of the Pope's being inferiour to a Council General denying his Sovereignty and Dominion over the faith of the Church and his personal Infallibility being an opinion scarcely to be mentioned or insisted on much lesse authenticated in those dayes and since that now neither the one or other tenet can justly be charged upon that Church nor is a condition of their Communion at present since the Controversie would be large and intrigued with distinctions I leave the debating thereof as inutile and content my self with having sufficiently refuted our Virtuoso already in what hath been alledged though seemingly to another purpose Undoubtedly there is no conniving or complying with such a person for one that is to avoid the appearance of evill It is a dethroning of Christ whom God hath appointed to be the head of the Church and by him all the body furnished and knit together by joints and bands increaseth with the increasing of God It is the introducing of another Corner-stone and another foundation the creating of another fabrick then what is built upon Christ and the Apostles and Prophets at least it is a compliance with all such unchristian Monstrosities a silence that is equivalent to an Assent in such high cases I have learn'd it from Dr. Raynolds Seeing that to exercise this rule and dominion is a prerogative Royal and proper to the King of Kings to give it either in whole or in part cannot be a lesser offense than High Treason Fifthly that the Church of Rome according to its present establishment and under that constitution wherein the first Reformers found it may be denominated a Church Ancient and Famous and that upon these accounts for none other are mentioned possibly there doth belong a respect unto it or an obligation to communicate therewith The first part of the Proposition is false and notoriously contradicts the doctrine of the Thirty-nine Articles and Homilies of the Church of England For although it be granted that even those Articles the Homilies and our Writers and I my self do bestow vulgarly the appellation of a Church yet is that an impropriety of speech and not to be justified otherwise then by professing that when the name of Church is attributed to Rome and England the predication is equivocal since that the definition of a true Christian Church which makes up the Ninteenth Article cannot be accommodated to the Romanists viz The visible Church of Christ is a Congregation of faithful men in the which the pure word of God is preached and the Sacraments be duely ministred according to Christ's ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same This Definition is asserted and enlarged upon in the second Homily for Whitsunday in these words The true Church is an universal congregation or fellowship of God's faithful and elect people built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Jesus Christ being the head-corner stone And it hath alwaies three notes or marks by which it is known Pure and sound doctrine The Sacraments ministred according to Christ's holy institution and the right use of Ecclesiastical Discipline This description of the Church is agreeable both to the Scriptures of God and also to the doctrine of the Ancient Fathers so that none may justly find fault with it Now if you will compare this with the Church of Rome not as it was in the beginning but as it is presently and hath been for the space of Nine hundred years and odde you shall well perceive the state thereof to be so far wide from the nature of the true Church that Nothing can be more For neither are they built upon the foundation of the Apostles retaining the sound and pure Doctrine of Jesus Christ neither yet do they order the Sacraments or else the Ecclesiastical Keyes in such sort as he did first institute and ordain them but have so intermingled their own Traditions and inventions by chopping and changing by adding and plucking away that now they may seem converted in a new guise Christ commanded to his Church a Sacrament of his Body and Bloud they have changed it into a Sacrifice for the quick and the dead Christ did minister to his Apostles and the Apostles to other men indifferently under both kinds they have robbed the Lay-people of the Cup saying that for them one kind is sufficient Christ ordained no other Element to
be confined to any Methodical Creeds or Articles but be left in that latitude of phrase wherein the Scriptures have delivered it 't is manifest that they look with indifferency on the things signified by those words and forms 't is manifest that they make way for growing Atheisme and Socinianisme 't is manifest that they overthrow the Constitutions of the Church of England whose Articles make use of those significant terms transmitted from the Fathers to our Schools and subvert the Basis of our Religion as it is represented in our Laws to consist of an owning of three Creeds and four Councils besides the Holy Scripture Thus primo Elizabethae cap. 1. The four General Councils are mentioned after the Scripture Canonical and that is to be adjudged Heresie which hath been adjudged ordered and determined to be Heresie by the Authority of the Canonical Scripture or by the first four General Councils The same is averr'd by King James in his Letter Rex Ecclesia Anglicana quatuor prima Concilia Oecumenica quum admittant And that King challengeth the Title of Catholick as due to him Qui tria Ecclesiae Symbola Concilia quatuor Oecumenica prima agnosceret This is evident to all that know any thing of our Church and 't is as manifest and whosoever writes otherwise repugnes to our Laws and whatever he subscribes unto or professeth is no true Son of the Church established in England Histor. R. S. pag. 362. The grounds whereon the Church of England proceeds are different from those of the Separists and also of the Church of Rome and they are no other but the Rights of the Civil power the imitation of the first uncorrupt Churches and the Scriptures expounded by Reason This last clause is so far from being true that 't is directly contrary to the constitutions of our Church and better becomes a Socinian from Poland or Amsterdam then a Divine of our Church not that I say that our Church did ever expound the Scripture against Reason but that our Church did never relie upon Reason as it is opposed to Authority of the Ancient Fathers in the determining of the will of God revealed in Scripture If the Historian meant nothing else but that the actions of men are alwayes rational and that the assent we yield to any thing is never so blind and implicite as to be destitute of all motives and inducements thereunto so that we resign our selves up to Authority upon the score of Reason If he meant no more then this why doth he speak in the language rather of a Socinian than a Protestant This expression is dangerous as it is worded because the Socinians may derive advantage from it and the Orthodox may think and find themselves injured especially in these times when the Socinians multiply upon us by it amongst the unwary as if there were no use of the Fathers but that we were without researching of Antiquity to consult the grounds of Reason such as are commonly found in men and bred in them either Naturally or from the contemplation of the ordinary course of things Physical and Moral in this World Whence what confusion will arise when all holy Sobriety is cast of any man knows who hath but inquired into the controversies of these last Centuries when the Scripture hath not been made by men the Rule of Faith or formal object thereof but only accommodated to the phansies and imaginations of prejudicate prepossessed men Upon this account the Church of England hath by her Canon in which she follows the Council in Trullo tied her Doctors as much as the Council of Trent does to expound Scriptures according to the sense of the Ancient Fathers This Bishop Taylor avows in the Introduction to his second Dissuasive This Doctor Heylyn in his Cyprianus Anglicus pag. 52. doth aver and I shall here set down the Canon of our Church Concilium Trullanum sive Synodus quinisexta Canon 19. edit per Francisc. Ioverium Parisiis A. D. 1555. Quod oportet eos qui praesunt Ecclesiis in omnibus quidem diebus sed praecipuè Dominicis omnem Clerum populum docere pietatis ac rectae religionis eloquia ex divinâ Scripturâ colligentes intelligentias judicia veritatis non transgredientes jam positos terminos vel divinorum patrum traditionem Sed si ad Scripturam pertinens controversia aliqua excitata fuerit ne eam aliter interpretentur quà m quomodò Ecclesiae luminaria doctores ex suis scriptis exposuerunt majorem ex iis laudem assequantur quà m si quae à se dicuntur componant Liber Canonum quorundam Londini 1571. Concionatores Inprimis verò videbunt nequid unquam doceant pro concione quod à populo religiosè teneri credi velint nisi quod consentaneum sit doctrinae veteris aut novi Testamenti quodque ex illâ ipsâ doctrinâ Catholici Patres veteres Episcopi collegerint Thus K. Charles I. in his third Paper to Mr. Henderson If the practice of the Primitive Church and the universal consent of the Fathers be not a convincing Argument when the Interpretation of Scripture is doubtful I know nothing for if this be not then of necessity the interpretation of private spirits must be admitted the which contradicts S. Peter 2 Pet. 1.20 Is the Mother of all Sects and will if not prevented bring these Kingdoms into confusions Histor. R. S. pag. 414 415. The Wit that may be borrowed from the Bible is magnificent and as all other Treasures of Knowledge it contains inexhaustible This may be used and allowed without any danger of Profaneness The ancient Heathens did the same They made their Divine Ceremonies the chief subject of their phansies By that means their Religions had a more awfull impression became more popular and lasted longer in force than else they would have done And why may not Christianity admit the same thing if it be practised with sobriety and reverence What irreligion can there be in applying some Scripture-expressions to Naturall things Why are not the one rather exalted and purified then the other defiled by such applications The very Enthusiasts themselves who are wont to start at such wit as Atheistical are more guilty of its excesses then any other sort of Men for whatever they alledge out of the Historical Prophetical or Evangelical writings and apply it to themselves their Enemies or their Country though they call it the mind of God yet it is nothing else but Scripture-comparison and similitude It is to be observed that this passage is inserted into a discourse concerning Wit as it discovers it selfe in the ordinary conversation and writings of the Railleurs and is founded on certaine images as our Historian phraseth it which are generally known and are able to bring a strong and a sensible impression on the mind It is an Humour that hath generally possessed the Gallantilloes of this age whereby they endeavour to recommend