imagination and groundless presumption which hath not the least countenance given unto it by Scripture or Antiquity What a perplexed condition must you needs cast men into if they shall attend unto your perswasions to rest on the Pope's unerring guidance for all their Certainty in Religion when the first motive you propose unto them to gain their Assent is a Proposition so far destitute of any cogent Evidence of its Truth or innate Credibility that it is apparently false and easily manifested so to be 3. Were it never so true as it is notoriously false yet it would not one jot promote your design It is about Peter the Apostle and not the Pope of Rome that we are yet discoursing Do you think a man can easily commence per saltum from the imaginary Principality of Peter unto the Infallibility of the present Pope of Rome Quid Pape cum Petro what relation is there between the one and other Suppose a man have so good a mind unto your company as to be willing to set out with you in this ominous stumbling at the threshold what will you next lead him unto You say II. That S t Peter besides his Apostolical Power and Office wherein setting aside the prerogative of his Princedome before mentioned the rest of the Apostles were partakers with him had also an Oecumenical Episcopal Power invested in him which was to be transmitted unto others after him His Office purely Apostolical you have no mind to lay claim unto It may be you dispair of being able to prove that your Pope is immediately called and sent by Christ that he is furnished with a power of working Miracles and such other things as concurred to the constitution of the Office Apostolical and perhaps himself hath but little mind to be exercised in the discharge of that Office by travelling up and down poor despised persecuted to preach the Gospel Monarchy Rule Supremacie Authority Jurisdiction Infallibility are words that better please him And therefore have you mounted this Notion of Peters Episcopacy whereunto you would have us think that all the fine things you so love and dote upon are annexed Poor labouring perfected Peter the Apostle may die and be forgotten but Peter the Bishop harnessed with Power Principality Soveraignty and Vicarship of Christ This is the man you enquire after But you will have very hard work to find him in the Scripture or Antiquity yea the least footstep of him And do you think indeed that this Episcopacy of Peter distinct from his Apostleship is a meet stone to be layed in the foundation of faith It is a thing that plainly overthrows his Apostleship For if he were a Bishop properly and distinctly he was no Apostle If an Apostle not such a Bishop That is if his Care were confined unto any one Church and his residence required therein as the Case is with a proper Bishop how could the Care of all the Churches be upon him How could he be obliged to pass up and down the world in pursuit of his Commission of preaching the Gospel unto all Nations or to travail up and down as the necessity of the Churches did require But you will say that he was not Bishop of this or that particular but of the Church Vniversal But I supposed you had thought him Bishop of the Church of Rome and that you will plead him afterwards so to have been And I must assure you that he that thinks the Church of Rome in the dayes of Peter and Paul was the same with the Church Catholick and not looked on as particular a Church as that of Hierusalem or Ephesus or Corinth is a person with whom I will have as little to do as I can in this matter For to what purpose should any one spend time to debate things with men absurd and unreasonable and who will affirm that it is midnight at noon day I know the Apostolical Office did include in it the power of all other Offices in the Church whatever as the less are included in the greater But that he who was an Apostle should formally also be a Bishop though an Apostle might exercise the whole Power and Office of a Bishop is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 somewhat allyed unto Impossibilities Do you see what a Quagmire you are building upon I know if a man will let you alone you will raise a structure which after you have painted and gilded you may prevail with many harbourless Creatures to accept of an habitation therein For when you have layed your foundation out of sight you will pretend that all your building is on a Rock whereas indeed you have nothing but the rotten posts of such Suppositions as these to support it withall But suppose that Peter was thus a Prince Monarch Apostle Bishop that is a Catholick Particular Officer What is that to you Why III. This Peter came and preached the Gospel at Rome Though you can by no means prove this Assertion so as to make it de fide or necessarily to be believed of any one man in the world much less to become meet to enjoy a place among those fundamentals that are tendred unto us to bring us unto Settlement in Religion yet being a matter very uncertain and of little importance I shall not much contend with you about it Witnesses meerly humane and fallible you have for it a great many and exceptions almost without number may be put in against your Testimonies and those of great weight and moment Now although that which you affirm might be granted you without any reall advantage unto your Cause or the enabling of you to draw any lawfull inferences to uphold your Papal claim by yet to let you see on what sorry uncertain presumptions you build your faith and profession and that in and about things which you make of indispensable necessity unto Salvation I shall in our passage remind you of some few of them which I profess seriously unto you make it not only Questionable unto me whether or no but also somewhat improbable that ever Peter came to Rome 1. Though those that follow and give their assents unto this Story are many yet it was taken up upon the credit and report of one or two Persons as Eusebius manifests Lib. 2. cap. 25. Whether Dionysius Corinthius or Papias first began the Story I know not but I know certainly that both of them manifested themselves in other things to be a little too credulous 2. That which many of them built their Credulity upon is very uncertain if not certainly false namely that Peter wrote his first Epistle from Rome which he calls Babylon in the Subscription of it But wherefore he should then so call it no man can tell The Apocalypse of John who prophesied what Rome should be in after-Ages and thereon what name should be accommodated unto it for its false worship and Persecution was not yet written Nor was there any thing yet spoken of or known among the Disciples whence
Church yield any obedience or perform any acceptable worship unto God but what was founded on and regulated by his Word given unto them antecedently unto their obedience and worship to be the sole foundation and Rule of it That you have no concernment in what is or may be truly spoken of the Church we shall afterwards shew but it is not for the interest of Truth that wee should suffer you without controul to impose such absurd notions on the minds of men especially when you pretend to direct them unto a Settlement in Religion Alike true is it that the Church gives Authority unto the Scripture Every true Church indeed gives witness or Testimony unto it and it is its Duty so to do it holds it forth declares and manifests it so that it may be considered and taken notice of by all which is one main End of the Institution of the Church in this world But the Church no more gives Authority to the Scripture than it gives Authority to God himself He requires of men the discharge of that Duty which he hath assigned unto them but stands not in need of their suffrage to confirm his Authority It was not so indeed with the Idols of old of whom Tertullian said rightly Si Deus homini non placuerit Deus non erit The reputation of their Deity depended on the Testimony of men as you say that of Christ's doth on the Authority of the Pope But I shall not farther insist upon the disprovement of this vanity having shewed already that the Scripture hath all its Authority both in its self and in reference unto us from Him whose Word it is and wee have also made is appear that your Assertions to the contrary are meet for nothing but to open a door unto all Irreligiousness Prophaneness and Atheism so that there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nothing sound or savoury nothing which an heart carefull to preserve its Loyalty unto God will not nauseate at nothing not suited to oppugn the fundamentals of Christian Religion in this your Position This ground well fixed you tell us 11. That the Church is infallible or cannot erre in what she teacheth to be believed And we ask you what Church you mean and how far you intend that it is infallible The only known Church which was then in the world was in the Wilderness when Moses was in the mount Was it infallible when it made the golden Calf and danced about it proclaiming a feast unto Jebovah before the Calf was the same Church afterward Infallible in the dayes of the Judges when it worshipped Baalim and Aftaroth or in the dayes of Jeroboam when it sacrificed before the Calves at Dan and Bethel or in the other branch of it in the dayes of Ahaz when the High-Priest set up an Altar in the Temple for the King to offer Sacrifice unto the gods of Damascus or in the dayes of Jehoiakiâ— and Zedekiah when the High-Priest with the rest of the Priests imprisoned and would have slain Jeremiah for preaching the word of God or when they preferred the worship of the Queen of Heaven before that of the God of Abraham Or was it infallible when the High-Priest with the whole Councel or Saâ—edrim of the Church judicially condemned as far as in them lay their own Messias and rejected the Gospel that was preached unto them You must inform us what other Church was them in the world or you will quickly perceive how ungrounded your generall Maxim is of the Churches absolute infallibility As farre indeed as it attends unto the Infallible Rule given unto it it is so but not one jot farther Moreover we desire to know What Church you mean in your Assertion or rather what is it that you mean by the Church Do you intend the Mystical Church or the whole number of Gods Elect in all Ages or in any Age militant on the Earth which principally is the Church of God Ephes. 5. 26 Or do you intend the whole diffused body of the Disciples of Christ in the world separated to God by Baptism and the Profession of saving truth which is the Church Catholick visible Or do you mean any particular Church as the Roman or constantinopolitan the French Dutch or English Church If you intend the first of These or the Church in the first sense we acknowledge that it is thus far infallible that no true member of it shall ever totally and finally renounce lose or forsake that faith without which they cannot please God and be saved This the Scripture teacheth this Austin confirmeth in an bundred places If you intend the Church in the second sense we grant that also so far unerring and infallible as that there ever was and ever shall be in the world a number of men making Profession of the saving Truth of the Gospel and yielding professed subjection unto our Lord Jesus Christ according unto it wherein consists his visible Kingdome in this world that never was that never can be utterly overthrown If you speak of a Church in the last sense then we tell you That no such Church is by virtue of any Promise of our Lord Jesus Christ freed from erring yea so farre as to deny the fundamentals of Christianity and thereby to lose the very being of a Church Whilst it continues a Church it cannot erre fundamentally because such Errours destroy the very being of a Church but those who were once a Church by their failing in the Truth may cease to be so any longer And a Church as such may so fail though every Person in it do not so for the individual members of it that are so also of the Mysticall Church shall be preserved in its Apostasie And so the Mysticall Church and the Catholick Church of Professors may be continued though all particular Churches should fail So that no Person the Church in no sense is absolutely freed in this world from the danger of all errours that is the condition wee shall attain in Heaven here where we know butin part wee are incapable of it The Church of the Elect and every member of it shall eventually be preserved by the power of the Holy Ghost from any such errour as would utterly destroy their Communion with Christ in Grace here or prâ—vent their fruition of him in Glory hereafter or as the Apostle speaks they shall assuredly be kept by the Power of God through faith unto salvation The Generall Church of Visible Professors shall be alwayes so farre preserved in the world as that there shall never want some in some place or other of it that shall profess all needfull saving Truths of the Gospel in the belief whereof and obedience whereunto a man may be saved But for Particular Churches as such they have no security but what lyes in their diligent attendance unto that Infallible Rule which will preserve them from all hutfull Errours if through their own default they neglect not to keep close unto it And your
Their perswasion in this matter is expressed in the beginning of the Epistle of Clemens or Church of Rome unto the Church of Corinth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Church that is at Rome to the Church that is at Corinth both locall Churches both equall And such is the language of all the Writers of those times It was not so in the dayes of the Fathers and Councels of the next three Centuries who still accounted it a particular Church Diocesaen or Patriarchal but all of them particular never calling it Catholick but upon the account of its holding the Catholick faith as they called all other Churches that did so in opposition to the Errours Heresies and Schilms of any in their dayes We desire then to know when it became the only or absolutely Catholick Church of Christ As also secondly by what means it became so to be It did not do so by virtue of any Institution Warrant or Command of Christ You were never able to produce the least intimation of any such Warrant out of any Writing of Divine Inspiration nor approved Catholick Writer of the first Ages after Christ though it hugely concern you so to do if it were possible to be done but they all expresly teach that which is inconsistent with such pretences It did not do so by any Decree of the first Generall Councels which are all of them silent as to any such thing and some of them as those of Nice Ephesus and Chalcâ—don expresly declare and determine the contrary at least that which is contrary thereunto We can find no other way or means whereby it can pretend unto this vast Priviledge unless it be the grant of Phocas unto Boniface that he should be called the Vniversal Bishop who to serve his own ends was very liberal of that which was not at all in his power to bestow And yet neither is this though it be a means that you have more reason to be ashamed than to boast of sufficient to found your present Claim considering how that name was in those dayes no more than a name a meer aâ—ry ambitions Title that carried along with it no reall power and stet magni nominis umbra Secondly We cannot give our assent unto this Claim of yours because we should thereby be necessitated to cut off from the Church and consequently all hope of salvation farre the greatest number of men in the world who in this and all foregoing Ages have called and do call upon the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ their Lord and ours This we dare not do especially considering that many of them have spent and do spend their dayes in great Affliction for their Testimony unto Christ and his Gospell and many of them every day seal their Testimony with their blood so belonging as we believe unto that holy army of Martyrs which continually praiseth God Now as herein we dare not concurre with you considering the charge given unto Timothy by Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be not partaker of other mens sins so indeed we are perswaded that your opinion or rather presumption in this matter is extreamly injurious to the Grace of Christ the Love and Goodness of God as also to the Truth of the Gospell And therefore Thirdly We suppose this the most Schismaticall Principle that ever was broached under the Sun since there was a Church upon the earth and that because 1. It is the most groundless 2. The most unchritable that ever was and 3. Of the most pernicious consequence as having a principal influence into the present irreconcileableness of Differences among Christians in the world which will one day be charged on the Authors and Abettors of it For it will one day appear that it is not the various Conceptions of the minds of peaceable men about the things of God nor the various degrees of knowledge and faith that are found amongst them but groundless impositions of things as necessary to be believed and practised beyond Scripture warrant that are the Springs and Causes of all or at least the most blameable and sinfull differences among Christians Fourthly We know this pretence should it take place would prove extreamly hazardous unto the Truth of the Promises of Christ given unto the Catholick Church For suppose that to be one and the same with the Roman and whatever mishap may befall the one must be thought to befall the other for on your Supposition they are not only like Hippocrates twins that being born together wept and joyed together and together died but like Hippocrates himself as the same individuall Person or thing being both the same one Church that hath two names Catholick and Roman that is Universall-Particular no otherwise two than as Julius Caesar was when by his overawing his Collegue from the execution of his Office they dated their Acts at Rome Julio Casare Consulibus For as they said Non Bibulo quiâ—quam nuper sed Caesare factum est Nani Bibulo fieri Consule nil memini Now besides the failings which we know your Church to have been subject unto in point of Faith Manners and Worship it hath also been at least in danger of Destruction in the time of the prevalency of the Gâ—ths Vandals Huns and Longobards especially when Rome its self was left desolate and without Inhabitant by Totilas And what yet farther may befall it before the End of the world 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Only this I know that many are in expectation of a sad Catastrophe to be given unto it and that on grounds not to be despised Now God forbid that the Church unto which the Promises are made should be once thought to be subject unto all the dangers and hazards that you wilfully expose your selves unto So that as this is a very groundless presumption in its self so it is a very great aggravation of your miscarriages also whilest you seek to entitle the Catholick Church of Christ unto them which can neither contract any such guilt as you have done nor be liable to any such misery or punishment as you are Fifthly We see not the Promises made unto the Catholick Church fulfilled unto you as we see that to have befallen your Church which is contrary unto the Promises that ever is should befall the Catholick The conclusion then will necessarily on both instances follow that either your are not the Catholick Church or that the Promises of Christ have failed and been of none effect And you may easily guess which part of the Conclusion it is best and most safe for us to give assent unto I shall give you one or two instances unto this last head Christ hath promised his Spirit unto his Church that is the Catholick Church to abide with it for ever Joh. 14. 16. But this Promise hath not been made good unto your Church at all times because it hath not been so unto the head of it Many a time the Head of your Church hath not received the Spirit of Christ
for our Saviour tells us in the next words that the world cannot receive him that is men of the world carnally minded men cannot do so for he is the peculiar inheritance of those that are called sanctified and do believe Now if ever there was any world in the world any of the world in the earth some many of your Popes have been so and therefore by the testimony of Christ could not receive the Spirit that he promised unto his Church Again it is promised unto the Church Mysticall or Catholick in the first and chiefest notion of it that all her children shall be holy all taught of God and all that are so taught as our Saviour informs us come to him by saving faith you will not I am sure for shame affirm that this Promise hath been made good to all either Children or Fathers of your Church Innumerable other Promises made to the Catholick Church may be instanced in which you can no better or otherwise apply unto your Church than one of your Popes did that of the Psalmist to himself Thou shalt tread on the Lion and the Basilisk when he set his foot on the neck of Fredrick the Emperour But the Arguments are endless whereby the vanity of this pretence may be disproved I shall only adde Sixtly That it is contrary to all Story Reason and common sense For it is notorious that far the greatest part of Christians that belong to the Catholick Church of Christ of have done so from the dayes that Christianity first entred the world successively in all Ages never thought themselves any otherwise concerned in the Roman Church than in any other particular Church of name in the world And is it not a madness to exclude them all from being Christians or belonging to the Catholick Church because they belonged not to the Roman This I could easily demonstrate throughout all Ages of the Church successively But we need not insist longer on the disproving of that Assertion which implyes a flat Contradiction in the very terms of it If any Church be the Catholick it cannot therefore be the Roman and if it be the Roman properly it cannot therefore be the Catholick 2. If you shall say that you mean only that you are a Particular Church of Christ but yet that or such a Particular Church as hath the great Priviledges of Infallibility and universall Authority annexed unto it which makes it of necessity for all men to submit unto it and to acquiesce in its Determinations I answer 1. I fear you will not say so you will not I fear renounce your claim unto Catholicism I have already observed that your self in particular affirm the Roman and Catholick Church to be one and the same It is not enough for you that you belong any way to the Church of Christ but you plead that none do so but your selves 2. Indeed you do not own your selves in this very Assertion to be a Particular Church your claim of Universall Authority and Jurisdiction which you still carry along with you is inconsistent with any such concession 3. To make the best of it that we can what ground have you to give us this Difference between the Churches of Christ that one is fallible another infallible that one hath power over all the rest that one depends on Christ all the rest on that one where is the least intimation given of any such thing in the Scripture where or by whom is it expresly asserted amongst the Antient Writers of the Church Was this Principle pleaded or once asserted in any of the Antient Councels Some ambiguous expressions of particular Persons most of them Bishops of Rome in the declining days of the Church you produce indeed unto this purpose But can any rationall man think them a sufficient foundation of that stupendious fabrick which you endeavour to erect upon them I suppose you will not find any such Persons hasty in their so doing Those who are already engaged will not be easily recovered For new Proselytes unto these Principles you have small ground to expect any unless it be of Persons whose lives are either tainted with sensuality which they would gladly have a refuge for against the accusations of their Consciences or whose minds are entangled with worldly secular advantages suited to their conditions tempers and inclinations Thus I have with what briefness I could shewed you the uncertainty indeed falsness of those Generall Principles from which you educe all your other pleas and reasonings into which they must be resolved And now I pray consider the ground-work you lay for the bringing of men unto a Settlement in the Truth and unto the unity of Faith in opposition to the Scripture which you reject as insufficient unto this purpose The summe of it is an acquiesceney in the proposals and Determinations of your Church as to all things that concern faith and the worship of God The two main Principles that concurre unto it we have apart considered and have found them every way insufficient for the end proposed Neither have they one jot more of strength when they are complicated and blended together as they usually are by you than they have in and of themselves as they stand singly on their own bottoms A thousand falshoods put together will be farre enough from making one Truth A multiplication of them may encrease a Sophism but not adde the least weight or strength to an Argument An army of Cripples will not make one sound man And can you think it reasonable that we should renounce our sure and firm Word of Prophecy to attend unto you in this chase of uncertain Conjectures and palpable untruths Suppose this were a way that would bring you and us to an Agreement and take away the evil of our Differences I can name you twenty that would do it as effectually and they should none of them have any evil in them but only that whch yours also is openly guilty of namely the Relinquishment of our Duty towards God and Care of our own Souls to come to some peace amongst our selves in this world which would be nothing else but a plain Conspiracy against Jesus Christ and rejection of his Authority At present I shall say no more but that he who is lead into the Truth by so many Errors and is brought unto establishments by so many uncertainties hath singular success and such as no other man hath reason to look for Or he is like Robert Duke of Normandy who when he caused the Saracens to carry him into Jerusalem sent word unto his friends in Europe that he was carried into Heaven on the backs of Devils It may also in particular be easily made to appear how unsuited your means of bringing men unto the unity of faith are unto that Supposition of the present Differences in Religion between you and us which you proceed upon For suppose a man be convinced that many things taught by your Church are false and contrary to the
the Church then the present Church is made up of the same numerical members that it was constituted of in the days of his flesh What change you suppose in the Church the body the same you suppose and assert in the head thereof And as that change excludes those former members from being present members so this excludes the former Head from being the present Head Of old the Head of the Church was the humane nature of Christ delegate under God now that is removed and another person in the same nature is so delegated unto the same office Now this is not an Head under Christ but in distinction from him in the same place wherein he was and so exclusive of him which must needs be Antichrist one pretending to be in his room and place to his exclusion that is one set up against him And thus also what you seek to avoid doth inevitably follow upon your discourse namely that you would have the Church for the preservation of its oneness and sameness to have the same head she had which is not the same unless you will say that the Pope is Christ these are the Principles that you proceed upon First you tell us that the humane nature of Christ delegate under God was the visible Head of the Church Secondly That this nature is now removed from us and ceaseth so to be that is not only to be visible but the visible Head of the Church and is no more so then the present Church is made up of the same individual members as it was in the dayes of his flesh which as you well observe it is not Thirdly That a nature of the same kind in another Person is now delegate under God to the same office of a Visible Head with that power of external Government which Christ had whilest he was that head And is it not plain from hence that you exclude the Lord Christ from being that head of his Church which he was in former dayes and substituting another in his room and place you at once depose him and assign another head unto the Church and that in your attempt to prove that her head must still be the same or she cannot be so Farther the humane nature of Christ was personally united unto the Son of God and if that Head which you now fancy the Church to have be not so united it is not the same Head that that was and so whilest you seek to establish not indeed a sameness in the Head of the Church but a likeness in several Heads of it as to visibility you evidently assert a change in the nature of that Head of the Church which we enquire after In a word Christ and the Pope are not the same and therefore if it be necessary to maintain that the Church hath the same Head that she had to assert that in the room of Christ she hath the Pope you prove that she hath the same head that she had because she hath one that is not the same she had and so qui habet aures audiat 4. You vainly imagine the whole Catholick Church any otherwise visible then with the eyes of faith and understanding It was never so no not when Christ conversed with it in the earth no not if you should suppose only his blessed Mother his twelve Apostles and some few more only to belong unto it For though all the members of it might be seen and that at once by the bodily eyes of men as might also the humane nature of him who was the head of it yet as he was Head of the Church and in that his whole Person wherein he was so and is so he was never visible unto any for no man hath seen God at any time And therefore you substituting an Head in his room who in his whole person is visible seeing he was not so do change the Head of the Church as to its visibility also for one that is in his whole person visible and another that is not so are not alike visible wherein you would principally place the identity of the Church 5. Let us see whether your Logick be any better then your Divinity The best Argument that can be formed out of your discourse is this If the Church hath not an head visibly present with her as she had when Christ in his humane nature was on the earth she is not the same that she was but according to their Principles she hath not an head now so visibly present with her therefore she is not the same according unto them I desire to know how you prove your inference It is built on this supposition that the sameness of the Church depends upon the visibility of its Head and not on the sameness of the Head its self which is a fond conceit and contrary to express Scripture Ephes. 4. 3 4 5 6 7. and not capable of the least countenance from Reason It may be you will say that though your Argument do not conclude that on our supposition the Church is not the same absolutely as it was yet it doth that it is not the same as to visibility Whereunto I answer 1. That there is no necessity that the Church should be alwayes the same as to visibility or alwayes visible in the same manner or alwayes equally visible as to all concernments of it 2. You mistake the whole nature of the visibility of the Church supposing it to consist in its being seen with the bodily eyes of men whereas it is only an affection of its publick profession of the Truth whereunto it s being seen in part or in whole by the eyes of any or all men doth no way belong 3. That the Church as I said before was indeed never absolutely visible in its Head and members He who was the Head of it being never in his whole person visible unto the the eyes of men and he is yet as he was of old visible to the eyes of faith whereby we see him that is invisible So that to be visible to the bodily eyes of men in its head and members was never a property of the Church much less such an one as that thereon its sameness in all Ages should depend 6. You fail also in supposing that the numerical sameness of the Church as a body depends absolutely on the sameness of its members For whilest in succession it hath all things the same that concur unto its Constitution order and existence it may be still the same body corporate though it consist not of the same individual persons or bodies natural As the Kingdom of England is the same Kingdom that it was two hundred years ago though there be not now one person living that then it was made up of For though the matter be the same only specifically yet the form being the same numerically that denominates the body to be so But that I may the better represent unto you the proper genius and design of your Discourse I shall
Principles whereby you attempt the confirmation of that absurd position are of that nature that they exclude the Headship of Christ and inâ—er no less change or alteration in the Church then that which must needs ensue thereon and the substitution of another in his room which destroyes the very essence and being of it Let us now consider what you further reply unto that which was offered in the Animadversions unto the purpose now discoursed of Your ensuing words are And here by the way we may take notice what a fierce English Protestant you are who labour so stoutly to evacuate my argument for Episcopacy and leave none of your own behind you nor acquaint the world with any though you know far better but would make us believe notwith tanding those far better reasons for Prelacy that Christ himself as he is the immediate Head of invisible influence so is he likewise the only and immediate Head of visible direction and government amongst us without the interposition of any Person delegate in his stead to oversee and rule under him in his Church on earth which is against the tenor both of sacred Gospel and St. Pauls Epistles and all Antiquity and the present Ecclesiastical Polity of England and is the Doctrine not of any English Protestant but of the Presbyterian Independent and Quaker How little cause you have to attempt an impeachment of my Protestancy I hope I have in some measure evidenced unto you and shall yet farther make it manifest as you give me occasion so to do In the mean time as I told you before that I would not plead the particular concernment of any party amongst Protestants no more then you do that of any party among your selves so I am sure enough that I have delivered nothing prejudicial unto any of them because I have kept my self unto the defence of their Protestancy wherein they all agree Nor have I given you an answer unto any Argument that tends in the least to the confirmation of such a Prelacy as by any sort of Protestants is admitted but only shewed the emptiness and pernicious Consequences of your Sophism wherewith you plead in pretence for Prelacy indeed for a Papal Supremacy and that on such Principles as are absolutely destructive of that Protestant Prelacy which you would be thought to give countenance unto And your ensuing Discourse wherein you labour to justifie your reflection on me is a pittiful piece of falsehood and Sophistry For first this double Head of the Catholick Church one of influence the other of direction and government which you fancy some Protestants to admit of is a thing that they declare against as injurious to the Lord Christ and that which would render the Church biceps monstrum horrid and deformed It is Christ himself who as by his Spirit he exercises the office of an head by invisible influence so by his Word that of visible direction and rule He is I say the only Head of visible direction to his Church though he be not a visible Head to that purpose which that he should be is to no purpose at all 2. If by the interposition of any person under Christ delegate in his stead you understand any one single Person delegated in his stead to oversee and rule the whole Catholick Church such an one as you now plead for in your Epistle it is intolerable arrogancy to intimate that he is designed either in the Gospel or St. Pauls Epistles or Antiquity whereas you are not able to assign any place or text or word in them directly or by fair Consequence to justifie what you assert And for the present Ecclesiastical policy of the Church of England if you yet know it not let me inform you that the very foundations of it are laid in a direct contrary supposition namely that there is no such single Person delegated under Christ for the Rule of the whole Catholick Church which gives us a new evidence of your Conscientious â—are in what you say and write 3. If you intend that which is not at all to your purpose Persons to rule under Christ in the Church presiding according to his direction and institution in and over the Particular Churches whereunto they do relate governing them in his name by his Authority and according to his Word I desire you to inform me wherein I have said or written or intimated any thing that may give you the least countenance in your affirming that by me it is denied or where it was ever denied by any Protestant whatever Prelatical Presbyterian or Independent neither doth this concession of theirs in the least impeach the sole Soveraign Monarchy of Christ and single Headship over his Church to all ends and purposes A Monarch may be and is the sole supream Governour and Political Head of his Kingdom though he appoint others to execute his Laws by virtue of Authority derived from him in the several Provinces Shires and Parishes of it And Christ is the only head of his Church though he have appointed others to preside and rule in his name in those distributions of his Disciples whereinto they are cast by his appoinment But you proceed Christ in their way is immediatâ— head not only of subministration and influence but of exterior derivation also and government to his Church Ans. He is so the supream and only Head of the Church Catholick in the one way and other though the means of conveying influences of Grace and of exterior Rule be various Then say you is he such an Head to all Belivers or no to all the whole body in general and every individual member thereof in particular if he be so to all you say then no man is to be governed in Affairs of Religion by any other man But why so I pray can no man govern in any sense or place but he must be a supream Head The King is immediate Head unto all his subjects he is King not only to the whole Kingdom but to every individual person in his Kingdom doth it thence follow that they may not be governed by officers subordinate delegated under him to rule them by his Authority according to his Laws or that if they may be so that he is not the only immediate King and supream Head unto them all The Apostle tells us expresly that the Head of every man is Christ 1 Cor. 11. 3. And that an head of Rule as the husband is the head of the wife Ephes. 5. 23. as well as he is an head of influence unto the whole body and every member of it in particular 1 Cor. 12. 12. Col. 2. 19. And it is a senseless thing to imagine that this should in the least impeach his appointment of men to rule under him in his Church according to his Law who are thereupon not heads but in respect of him servants and in respect to the particular Churches wherein they serve him Rulers or guides yea their servants for his sake not Lords
your selves to wave I should have wholly passed by this discourse unto which no occasion was administred in the Animadversions but now as you have hanâ—dled the matter unless I would have it taken for granted that the Principles of the Roman Church are more suited unto the establishment and promotion of the interest and Soveraignty of Kings and other supream Magistrates and in particular the Kings of these Nations then those of Protestants which in Truth I do not believe I must of necessity make a little further enquiry into your Discourse And I desire your pardon if in my so doing any thing be spoken that suits not so well your interest and designs neither expecting nor desiring any if ought be delivered by me not according to Truth To make our way the more clear some of the ambiguous expressions which you make use of to cloud and hide your intention in your enquiry after the Head of the Church must be explained 1. By the Church you understand not this or that particular Church not the Church of this of that Nation Kingdom or Countrey but the whole Catholick Church throughout the world And when you have explained your self to this purpose you endeavour by six Arguments no less p. 67 68. to prove that no King ever was or can be Head of it He said well of old In causa facili quemvis licet esse disertum I wonder you contented your self to give us six Reasons only and that you proceeded not at least unto the high hills of eighteenthly and nineteenthly that you talk of in your Fiat Lux where you scoff at the preaching of Presbyterians it may be you will scarely ever obtain such another opportunity of shewing the fertility of your invention So did he florish who thought himself secure from adversaries Caâ—ut altum in praelia tollit Ostenditque humeros latos alternaque jactat Brachia protendens verberat ictibus auras But you do like him you only beat the ayre Do you think any man was ever so distempered as to dream that any King whatever could be the absolute Head of the whole Catholick Church of Christ we no more think any King in any sence to be the Head of the Catholick Church then we think the Pope so to be The Roman Empire was at its hight and glory when first Christianity set forth in the world and had extended its bounds beyond those of any Kingdom that arose before it or that hath since succeeded unto it And yet within a very few years after the Resurrection of Christ the Gospel had diffused it self beyond the limits of that Empire among the Parthians and Indians and unto Britannorum Romanis inaccessa loca as Tertullian calls them Now none ever supposed that any King had power or Authority of any sort in reference unto the Church or any members of it without or beyond the precise limits of his own Dominions The Enquiry we have under Consideration about the Power of Kings and the obedience due unto them in Ecclesiastical things is limited absolutely unto their own Kingdoms and unto those of their subjects which are Christians in them And this Hi motus animorum atque haec certamina tanta Pulveris exigui jactu concussa quiescunt A little observation of this one known and granted Principle renders not only your six Reasons altogether useless but surpersedes also a great part of your Rhetorick which under the ambiguity of that expression you display in your whole Discourse Secondly You pleasantly lead about your unwary Reader with the ambiguity of the other term the Head Hence p. 58. you fall into a great exclamation against Protestants that acknowledging the King to be the Head of the Church they do not supplicate unto him and acquiesce in his judgement in Religious affairs as if ever any Protestant acknowledged any King or any mortal man to be such an Head of the Church as you fancy to your selves in whose determinations in Religion all men are bound spiritually and as to their eternal concernments to acquiesce and that not because they are true according to the Scripture but because they are his Such an Head you make the Pope such an one on earth all Procestants deny which evacuates your whole Discourse to that purpose p. 58 59. It is true in opposition unto your Papal claim of Authority and Jurisdiction over the subjects of this Kingdom Protestants do assert the King to be so Head of the Church within his own Realms and Dommions as that he is by Gods appointment the sole fountain and spring amongst men of all Authority and Power to be exercised over the Persons of his subjects in matters of external cognizance and order being no way obnoxious to the direction supervisorship and superintendency of any other in particular not of the Pope He is not only the only striker as you phrase it in his Kingdoms but the only Protector under God of all his subjects and the only Distributor of Justice in rewards and punishments unto them not depending in the administration of the one or other on the determinations or orders of your Pope or Church Not that any of them do use absolutely that expression of Head of the Church but that they ascribe unto him all Authority that ought or can be exercised in his Dominions over any of his Subjects whither in things Civil or Ecclesiastical that are not meerly Spiritual and to be ministerially ordered in obedience unto Christ Jesus And that you may the better see what it is that Protestants ascribe unto the King and to every King that is Absolutely supream as his Majesty is in his own Dominions and withall how exceeding vain your unreasonable reproach is which you cast upon them for not giving themselves up unto an absolute acquiescency in humane determinations as meerly such on pretence that they proceed from the Head of the Church I shall give you a brief account of their thoughts in this whole matter First They say that the King is the supream Governor over all Persons whatever within his Realms and Dominions none being exempted on any account from subjection unto his Regal Authority How well you approve of this Proposition in the great astignations you pretend unto Kingly power we shall afterwards enquire Protestants found their perswasion in this matter on the Authority of the Scripture both Old Testament and New and the very Principles constituting Soveraign Power amongst men You speak fair to Kings but at first dash exempt a considerable number of their born subjects owing them indispensible natural Allegiance from their jurisdiction Or this sort are the Clergy But the Kings of Judah of old were not of your mind Solomon certainly thought Abiathar though High Priest subject to his Royal Authority when he denounced against him a sentence of death and actually deposed him from the Priest hood The like course did his successors proceed in For neither had God in the first provision he made for a
Assemblies would not drop one word of any indignity shewed to any of their sacred images when they pass not by their wrath against their houses goods and cattel Such things are fond to imagine 2. Many of the Antients do note it as an abomination in some of the first Hereticks that they had introduced the use of Images into their worship with the adoration of them Theodoret. haeret sub lib. 1. tells us that Simon Magus gave his own image and that of Selene to be worshistped by his followers And Iraeneus Lib. 1. cap. 23. that the followers of Basilides used images and invocations and cap. 24. that the Gnosticks had images both painted ones and carved and that of Christ which they said was made originally by Pontius Pilate and this they adored And so doth Epiphanius also Tom. 2. lib. 1. Haer. 27. Carpocrates procured the images of Christ and Paul to be made and adored them and the like is recorded of others Now do you think they would have observed and reproved this practice as an abomination in the haereticks if there had been any thing in the Churches usage that might give countenance thereunto or at least that they would not have distinguished between that abuse of images which they condemned in the hereticks and that use which was retained and approved among themselves But they are utterly silent as unto any such matter contenting themselves to report and reprove the superstition and idolatry of the Hereticks in their Adoration of them But this is not all 3. They positively deny that they had any images or made any use of them and defend themselves against the charge of the Pagans against them for professing an imageless Religion Clemen Alexand. Strom Lib. 6. plainly and openly confesseth and testifieth that Christians had no Images in the world And in his Adhortat ad Gent. he positively asserts that the arts of Painting and Carving as to any religious use were forbidden to Christians and that in the worship of God they had no sensible image made of any sensible matter because they worshipped God with understanding What was the judgement of Tertullian is known from his book de Idololatria from whence if we should transcribe what is argumentative against image worship very little would be remaining But of all the Antients Origen doth most clearly manifest what was the doctrine and practice of the Church of God in his dayes as in other places so in his seventh book against Celsus he directly handles this matter Celsus charged the Christians that they made use of no images in the worship of God telling them that therein they were like the Persians Scythians Numidans and Seres all which impious nations hated all images as the Turks do at this day To which discourse of his Origen returning answer grants that the Christians had no images in their sacred worship no more then had the Barbarous nations mentioned by Celsus but withall adds the difference that was between those and these and tells you that their abstinence from Image worship was on various accounts And after he hath shewed wherefore those Nations received them not he adds that Christians and Jews abstained from all sacred use of Images because of Gods command Thou shalt fear as he reads the text the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve and thou shalt not make to thy self any graven image nor the likeness of any thing that is in heaven above or in the earth beneath and adds that they were so far from praying to the images as the Pagans did that saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a thing expresly commanded in the Nicene Conventicle we do not give any honour at all to Images least we should give countenance to the error of ignorant people that there were somewhat of Divinity in them with very much more to the same purpose expresly condemning all the use of Images in the worship of God and openly testifying that there was no such usage among the Christians in those dayes heard of in the world Arnobius or Minutius Faelix acknowledgeth the same Cruces nec colimus nec optamus we do no more worship Crosses then desire them and grants that Christians had nulla note simulachra because no image could be made to or of him whom alone they worshipped What was the judgement of the Elibertine Council I have before told you Lactantius in his Institut ad Constant. lib. 2. by an happy anticipation answers all the arguments that you use to this day in defence of your image worship and concludes peremptorily that where there are any Images there is no Religion shewing how perverse a thing it is that the image of a dead man should be worshipped by a living image of God The time would fail me to relate the words of Eusebius Athanasius Hilarius Ambrosius Cyrillus Chrysostome Epiphanius Hierom Austin and others to the same purpose I cannot but think that it is fully evident to any one that consults antiquity that the image use and worship which is become the Tessera of your Church Communion by your espousing the Canons and Determinations of the second Nycene Synod was in part utterly unknown unto and in part expresly condemned by the whole Primitive Church for 600. years after Christ and that you have plainly by your Tridentine decree and Nicene Anathematismes cut off your selves from the Communion of the Catholick Church of Christ and all particular Assemblies that worship him in sincerity for the space of some hundreds of years in the world Thus things went in the Church of God before your Nicene Convention How did they succeed afterwards did image worship presently prevail upon their determinations or was that then the faith of the generality of the Church of Christ which was declared by the fathers of that Convention nothing less no sooner was the rumor of this horrible innovation in Christian Religion spread abroad in the world but that upon it there was a full assembly of 300. Bishops of the Western Provinces assembled at Franckeford in Germany wherein the superstition and folly of the Nicene Assembly was layed open their Arguments confuted their determinations rejected and image worship absolutely condemned as forbidden by the word of God and contrary to the Antient constant known practice of the whole Church of God And now Sir as I said you may begin to see what you have to do if you intend to speak any thing to the purpose concerning your figures and Images You must take the Decree of your Council of Trent and the Nicene Canons therein confirmed and prove confirm and vindicate them from the opposition made to them by Tertullian Arnobius Origen Lactantius the Synod of Franckeford and others of the Antients innumerable by whom they are rejected and condemned and yet when you have done so if you are able so to do your work is not one quarter at an end You can make nothing of this business untill you have confuted or burned the
antient Church-Fathers and Councils Imposing Rites unnecessary Persecution for Conscience Papal Supremacy The Branches of it Papal Personal Infallibility Religious Veneration of Images p. 48 CHAP. 5. The Principles of Fiat Lux re-examined Things not at quiet in Religion before Reformation of the first Reformers Departure from Rome no Cause of Divisions Returnal unto Rome no means of Vnion p. 89 CHAP. 6. Further Vindication of the second Chapter of the Animadversions Scripture sufficient to settle men in the Truth Instance against it examined removed Principles of Protestants and Romanists in reference unto Moderation compared and discussed p. 99 CHAP. 7. Vnity of Faith wherein consists Principles of Protestants as to the setling men in Religion and Vnity of Faith proposed and confâ—rmed p. 121 CHAP. 8. Principles of Papists whereon they proceed in bringing men to a setlement in Religion and the Vnity of Faith examined p. 161 CHAP. 9. Proposals from Protestant Principles tending unto Moderation and Vnity p. 204 CHAP. 10. Further Vindication of the second Chapter of the Animadversions The remaining Principles of Fiat Lux considered p. 301 CHAP. 11. Judicious Readers Schoolmen the Forgers of Popery 〈…〉 Discourse in Fiat Lux. p. 308 CHAP. 12. False Suppositions causing false and absurd consequences Whence we had the Gospel in England and by whose means What is our Duty in reference unto them by whom we receive the Gospel p. 315 CHAP. 13. Faith and Charity of the Roman Catholicks p. 351 CHAP. 14. Of Reason Jews objections against Christ. p. 362 CHAP. 15. Pleas of Prelate Protestants Christ the only supream and absolute Head of the Church p. 370 CHAP. 16. The Power assigned by Papists and Protestants unto Kings in matters Ecclesiastical Their several Principles discussed and compared p. 398 CHAP. 17. Scripture Story of the Progress and declension of Religion vindicated Papal Artifices for the promotion of their Power and Interest Advantages made by them on the Western Empire p. 423 CHAP. 18. Reformation of Religion Papal contradictions Ejice ancillam p. 447 CHAP. 19. Of preaching the Mass And the Sacrifice of it Transubstantiation Service of the Church p. 452 CHAP. 20. Of the Blessed Virgin p. 47â— CHAP. 21. Images Doctrine of the Council of Trent Oâ— the second Nicene The Arguments for the Adoâ—ration of Images Dctrine of the antient Church Of the chief Doctrine of the Roman Church Practice of the while Vain foundations of the pretences for Image Worship examined and reproved p. 477 CHAP. 22. Of the Latine Service p. 526 CHAP. 23. Communion p. 558. CHAP. 24. Heroes Of the Asses Head whose worship was objected to Jews and Christians p. 559 ERRATA PAge 2. l. 13. r. caeterarum p. 3. l. 23. r. advantage p. 4. l. 1. r. ultio l. 2. r. uocens p. 5. l. 16. r. up p. 7. l. 5. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p 11. l. 1. r Crescens p. 12. l. 16. r. you have neither p. 15. l. 1. r. pleadable p. 16. l. 11. r. â—v l. 29 r. parcas p. 67. l. 22. r. that p. 69 l. 5. r. what p. 71. l. 26. r. revengeth p. 75. l. 15. r. tumbled p. 76. l. 22. r. Lybya p 77. l. 24. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p 82 l. 10. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p 84. l. 1. r. pseudopigraphall p. 85. l. 30 r. Tharasius p. 87. l. 12. r. Demetriad l. 31 r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 91 l. â— r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 105 l. 32. r. from p. 106. l. 27. l. feat l 34. after that add they p. 117 l. 33. r. indispeasible p. â—19 l. 9. r. Bogomilus p. 127. l. 5. r. infallibly p. 132. l. 14. r. the p. 139. l 28. r. produce p. 144 l. 6. r. gencri l. 32. r. utique p. 145. l. 34. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 152. l. 8. dele it p. 335. l 7. r. retritius p. 337 l 4. r. suprstitious p. 343. l. 14. r. ipse p. 353. l. 1. r. quoi p. 355. l. 8. r. your Church p 357. l. 31. r. homines p. 359. l. 3 r. Brentius p. 375. l. 3. r. your p. 383. l. 13. r. the Church l. 14. r. affect it p. 389. l. 29. r. preside p. 393. l. 14. r. to p. 396. l. 12. r. preside p. 410. l. 24. r. whereas p. 417. l. 32. r. Panoruitanus p. 419. l. 16. r. with p. 420. l. 7 r. He l. 8. r. the p 439. l. 8. r. with p. 441. l. 22. r. nor p 455. l. 16. add part corr In divers places the Copy was mistaken the Church is Printed instead of our Church the intelligent Reader may easily see the mistake and do the Author right therein A Vindication of the Animadversions on Fiat Lux. CHAP. I. SIR I Have received your Epistle and therein your excuse for your long silence which I willingly admit of and could have been contented it had been longer so that you had been advantaged thereby to have spoken any thing more to the purpose than I find you have now done Sat citò si sat benè Things of this nature are alwayes done soon enough when they are done well enough or as well as they are capeable of being done But it is no small disappointment to find 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a fruitless flourish of words where a serious debate of an important cause was expected and looked for Nor is it a justification of any man when he has done a thing amiss to say he did it speedily if he were no way necessitated so to do You are engaged in a Cause unto whose tolerable defence opus est Zephyris hirundine multa though you cannot pretend so short a time to be used in it which will not by many be esteemed more than it deserves for all time and pains taken to give countenance to errour is undoubtedly mispent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the great Apostle We can do nothing against the Truth but for the Truth which Rule had you observed you might have spared your whole time and labour in this business However I shall be glad to find that you have given me just cause to believe what you say of your not seeing the Animadversions on your Bock before February As I find you observant of Truth in your Progress or failing therein so shall I judg of your veracity in this unlikely story for every man gives the best measure of himself And though I cannot see how possibly a man could spend much time in trussing up such a fardle of trifles and quibbles as your Epistle is yet it is somewhat strange on the other side that you should not in eight moneths space for so long were the Animadversions made publick before February set eye on that which being your own especiall concernment was to my knowledg in the hands of many of your party To dial friendly with you nolim caeterarum rerum te socordem codem modo Yea I doubt not but you use more diligence in your other affairs
though in generall the matter in debate between us seems to be your Principall concernment But now you have seen that Discourse and as you inform me have read it over which I believe and take not only upon the same score of present Trust but upon the Evidence also which you give unto your Assertion by your carefull avoiding to take any further notice of the things that you found too difficult for you to reply unto For any impartiall Reader that shall seriously consider the Animadversions with your Epistle will quickly find that the main Artifice wherein you conside is a pretence of saying somewhat in general whilst you pass over the things of most importance and which most press the cause you defend with a perpetuall silence These you turn from and fall upon the Person of the Author of the Animadversions If ever you debated this procedure with your self had I been present with you when you said with him in the Poet Dubius sum quid faciam Tene relinquam an rem I should have replied with him me sodes but you were otherwise minded and are gone before Ego ut contendere durum est Cum victore sequar I will follow you with what patience I can and make the best use I am able of what offers its self in your Discourse Two Reasons I confess you adde why you chose vadimonium deserere and not reply to the Animadversions which to deal plainly with you give me very little satisfaction The first of them you say is because to do so would be contrary to the very end and design of Fiat Lux which shall immediately be considered The other is the threats which I have given you that if you dare to write again I will make you know what manner of man I am S r Though it seems you dare not reply to my Book yet you dare do that which is much worse you dare write palpable untruths and such as your self know to be so as others also who have read those Papers By such things as these with sober and ingenious Persons you cannot but much prejudice the interest you desire to promote as well as in your self you wrong your conscience and ruine your reputation Besides all advantage springing from untruth is fading neither will it admit of any covering but of its own kind which can never be so encreased but that it will rain through Only I confess thus far you have promoted your design that you have given a new and cogent instance of the Evils attending Controversies in Religion which you declame about in your Fiat which yet is such as it had been your duty to avoid What it is that you make use of to give conntenance unto this fiction for malum semper habitat in alieno fundo I shall have occasion afterwards to consider For the present I leave you to the discipline of your own thoughts Prima est haec ultio quod se Judice nemo nocens absolvitur And I the rather mind you of your failure at this entrance of our discourse that I may only remit your thoughts unto this stricture when the like occasion offers it self which I fear it will do not unfrequently But S r it will be no advantage unto mee or you to contend for the Truth which we profess if in the mean time we are regardless of the observance of truth in our own hearts and spirits Two Principall Heads the Discourse which you premise unto the Particular consideration of the Animadversions is reducible unto The first whereof is your endeavour to manifest that I understood not the design and end of Fiat Lux a Discourse as you modestly testifie hard to deal with and impossible to confute The other your Enquiry after the Author of the Animadversions with your attempt to prove him one in such a condition as you may possible hope to obtain more advantage from than you can do by endeavouring the refutation of his Book Some other occasionall passages there are in it also which as they deserve shall be considered Unto these two Generall Heads I shall give you at present a Candid Return and leave you when you are free from Flies to make what use of it you please The Disign or Fiat Lux I took to be the promotion of the Papall Interest and the whole of it in the relation of its parts unto one another and the generall End aimed at in it to be a perswasive induction unto the embracement of the present Romane Faith and Religion The means insisted on for this end I conceived principally to be these 1. A declaration of the evils that attend differences in Religion and disputes about it 2. Of the good of Union Peace Love and Concord among Christians 3. Of the impossibility of obtaining this good by any other wayes or means but only by an embracement of the Roman Catholick Faith and Profession with a submission to the deciding Power and Authority of the Pope or your Church 4. A defence and illustration of some especiall parts of the Roman Religion most commonly by Protestants excepted against This was my mistake unto this mistake I acknowledge my whole discourse was suited In the same mistake are all the persons in England that ever I heard speak any thing of that discourse of what perswasion in Religion soever they were And Aristotle thought it worch while to remember our of Hesiod Moral Nicom lib. 7. that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That report which so many consent in is not altogether vain But yet least this should not satisfie you I shall mind you of one who is with you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of as much esteem it may be as all the rest and that is your self you are your self in the same mistake you know well enough that this was your End this your Designe these the means of your persuing it and you acknowledge them immediately so to have been as we shall see in the consideration of the evidence you tender to evince that mistake in me which you surmize First you tell me pag. 4. That I mistake the drist and design of Fiat Lux whilest I take that as absolutely spoken which is only said upon an Hypothesis of our present condition here in England This were a grand mistake indeed that I should look on any thing proposed as an Expedient for the erding of Differences about Religion without a supposition of Differences about Religion But how do you prove that I fell into such a mistake I plainly and openly acknowledge that such differences there are all my discourse proceeds on that supposition I bewaile the evil of them and labour for moderation about them and have long since ventured to propose my thoughts unto the world to that purpose All that you suppose in your Discourse on this account I suppose also yea and grant it unless it be some such thing as is in controversie between you and Protestants which you are
walk in the steps of their faith herein It believed that all Image-worship was forbidden Exod. 20. And whether you abide in the same perswasion we shall afterwards examine And many more instances of the like kind you may at any time be minded of You hast to that you would fain be at which will be found as little to your purpose as those whose consideration you so carefully avoid You say Did she fall by Heresie in adhering to any errour in Faith contrary to the approved doctrine of the Church Here you smile seriously and tell me that since I take the Roman and Catholick Church to be one she could not indeed adhere to any thing but what she did adhere unto S r I take them indeed to be one but here I speak ad hominem to one that doth not take them so And then if indeed the Roman Church had ever swerved in faith as you say she has and be her self as another ordinary particular Church as you say she is them might you find some one or other more generall Church if any there were to judge her some Oecumenicall Councell to condemn her some Fathers either Greek and Latin expresly to writs against her as Protestants now do some or other grave Authority to censure her or at least some company of Believers out of whose body she went and from whose faith she fell None of which since you are not able to a assign wherein you have spoken more rightly than you were aware of for not to be able to assign none of them infers at least an ability to assign some if not all of them my Query remains unanswered and the Roman still as flourishing a Church as ever she was Answ. 1. You represent my Answer lamely I desire the Reader to consult it in the Animadversions pag. 66 67 68. What you have taken notice of discovers only your fineness in making Heresie an adherence to an errour in faith contrary to the doctrine of the Church and your selves the Church whereby you must needs be secured from Heresie though you should adhere to the most hereticall Principles that ever were broached in the world But nothing of all this as I have shewed will be allowed you 2. As we have seen some of the Reasons why you were so unwilling to try the Cause of your Church on the heads of Idolatry and Apostasie so here you discover a sufficient Reason why you have passed over your other head of Schism in silence You avow your self one of the most schismaticall Principles that were ever adhered unto by any professing the name of Christ. The Roman Church and the Catholick are with you one and the same Is not this Petilianus his in parte Donati nay Basilides his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epiphan Heres 4. We only are men all others are Dogs and Swine Macte virtute If this be not to shew modcration and to persue reconciliation at once to shut out all men but your selves from the Church here and consequently Heaven hereafter what can be thought so to be In earnest S r you may talk what you please of moderation but whilest you avow this one wretched schismaticall Principle you do your endeavour to exclude all true Christian moderation out of the world 3. Why do you conclude that your Query is not answered Suppose one Question could not be answered doth it necessarily follow that another cannot I suppose you take notice that this is another Question and not that at first proposed as I told you before Your first enquiry was about your Churches crime this is about her conviction and condemnation and your Conclusion hath no strength in it but what is built on this unquestionable Maxim that None ever offended who was not publickly judged as though there were no Harlot in the world but those that have been carted It is enough S r that her condition is sub judice as it will be whether you or I will or no and that there is not evidence wanting for her conviction nor ever was since her fall though it may be it hath not at all times been so publickly managed And yet so vain is your triumphant Conclusion that we rest not here but prove also that she hath been of old judged and condemned as you will hear anon And thus I have once more given you an Answer to your enquiry how your Church fell namely that she hath done so by all the wayes and means by which it is possible for a Church to fall She failed under the just hand of God when the persons of that Vrbick Church were extirpated partly by others but totally by Totilas as the Brittish Church in England fell by the sword of the Saxons She hath fallen by Idolatry and corruption of life as did the Church of the Jews before the Captivity She hath fallen by her relinquishment of the written Word as the only rule of faith and worship and by adhering to the uncertain traditions of men as did the Church of the Jews after their return from captivity She hath fallen by Apostasie in forsaking the profession of many important truths of the Gospel as the Church of the Galatians did for a season in their relinquishment of the doctrine of Justification by grace alone She hath fallen by Heresie in coyning new Articles of faith and imposing them on the consciences of the Disciples of Christ as the Montanists did with their new Paraclete and rigid observances She hath fallen by Schisme in her self as the Judaical Church did when divided into Essenes Sadduces and Pharisees setting up Pope against Pope and Councell against Councell continuing in her intestine broils for some ages together and from all others by the wretched Principle but-now avowed by you as the Donatists did of old She hath fallen by Ambition in the Hildebrandine Principle asserting a Soveraignty in the Pope over the Kings and Potentates of the earth whereof I can give you no precedent instance unless it be of him who claimed the Kingdomes of the world to be his own and boasted that he disposed of them at his pleasure Mat. 4. And now I hope you will not take it in ill part that I have given you a plain Answer unto your Question which as I suppose was proposed unto us for that end and purpose But although these things are evident and sufficiently proved yet I see nothing will satisfie you unless we produce testimonies of former times to manifest that your Church hath been arraigned judged condemned written against by Fathers Councils or other Churches Now though this be somewhat an unreasonable expectation in you and that which I am no way bound unto by the Law of our Discourse to satisfie you in yet to prevent for the future such Ivasions as you have made use of on all occasions in your Epistle I shall in a few pregnant and unquestionable Instances give you an account both when how and by whom the falls of your Church have been
is lawfull for him to depose Emperours I hope you will not be offended at the calling over these Heresies because the so doing is not suited to our present design I took them out of your Cardinal Baronius in the place above quoted who hath placed them as on a pillar V. D. P. L. P. where they may be easily read by all men And that you may not think that these were the Heresies of Gregory alone the same Baronius affirms that these Dictates were confirmed in a Synod at Rome whereby they became the Heresies of your whole Church Did Peter thus feed the sheep of Christ seeing Pasce oves meas is the great pretence for all these exorbitances Alas Hic alienus oves custos his mulget in horâ— all this is but the shearing milking and slaying of a stranger the shepherds being driven into corners But have these noisome Heresies of your Church think you passed without controll Was she not judged censured written against and condemned in the person of her chief Pastor You must be a very stranger unto all History if you can imagine any such thing A Councell assembled by the Emperor at Worms in Germany reckons up the miscarriages of this Hildebrand and pronounceth him deposed with all those that adhered unto him Another Synod an 1080. at Brixia in Bavaria condemns him also for the same causes All the Heroick Potentates of Europe especially the Emperors of Germany the Kings of England and France with whole Assemblies of their Clergy have alwayes opposed and condemned this branch of your Supremacy And to this purpose hundreds of their Laws Decrees Edicts and Declarations are at this day extant 4. Your Pope's Personall Infallibility with the requisite Qualifications is another Hereticall Opinion that your Church hath fallen by And herein you are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 condemned of your selves and we need no further witness against you you have been often taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the very fact I know there is an Opinion secretly advancing amongst some of you whereby you would cast out of the bounds of your defence this Personall Infallibility of your Pope but we have no more reason to esteem that opinion the Doctrine of your Church than we have to conclude that the Jesuits new Position asserting him Infallible in matter of fact is so And though I know not perfectly what your opinion is in this matter yet I may take a time to shew how utterly unserviceable unto your purpose the new way of the explication of Infallibility is For it hath but these two generall inconveniences attending it First that it is not the opinion of your Church Secondly if that be the only Infalliblity we are to rest on the whole claim of your Church and its interest therein falls to the ground both which I hope to have an opportunity to manifest In the mean time we take that for the Doctrine of your Church which is declared by its self so to be which is explained and defended by her most famous Champions And indeed you in your Fiat assert as I have shewed the Pope Personally to be an unerring guide which is that we enquire after Bellarmine tells us that all Catholicks agree in these two things 1. Pontificem cum Generali Concilio non posse errare in condendis decretis fidoi vel generalibus praeceptis morum That the Pope with a generall Councell cannot erre in making decrees of faith or generall precepts concerning manners 2. Pontificem solum vel cum suo particulari Concilio aliquid in re dubia statuentem sive errare possit sive non esse ab omnibus fidelibus obedienter audiendum All believers must willingly obey the Pope either alone or with his particular Councell determining in doubtfull matters whether he may erre or no. I confess if this be so and he must be obeyed whether he do right or wrong whether he teacheth truly or falsly it is to no great purpose to talk of his Infallibility for follow him we must whither ever he leads us though it should be to Hell And the Catholick Proâ—osition that he asserts himself is that Summus Pontifex cum totam Ecclesiam docet in his quae ad fidem pertinent nullo casu errare potest The Pope when he teacheth the whole Church can in no Caseerre in those things which appertain unto faith De Rom. Pontif. lib. 4. cap. 2 3. What a Blind that is of teaching the whole Church children can see The Pope can no way teach the whole Church but as he declares his opinion or judgement which may be divulged unto many as those of another man Let us see then how well they have made good this their Infallibility and how well their judgement hath been approved of by the Church of old I will not here mind you of the Decree fathered on Clemens wherein he determines that all things among Christians ought to be common and among them wives because I know it is falsly imposed on him though you may be justly charged with it who are the Authors of those forgeries whereof that is a part Nor shall I rake the Epistles which you ascribe unto divers of the Ancient Bishops of Rome that are full of ignorance errors and pittifull non-sence because they are questionless Pseudopigraphcall though you who own them may be justly charged with their follies Nor will I much insist on the Testimony of Tertullian in his Book against Praxeas that the Bishop of Rome owned the Prophesies of Montanus untill Praxeas perswaded him to the Contrary because it may be you will say that perhaps Tertullian spake partially in favour of a Sect whereunto he was himself addicted though for ought I know he is as sufficient a Witness in matter of fact as any one man upon the Roll of Antiquity But what say you to Marcellinus Did he not sacrifice to Idols which according unto you is a mixt misdemeanour in faith and manners Con. Tom. 1. Vita Marcell and therefore certainly a shrewd impeachment of his Infallibility and was he not judged for it What think you of Liberius did he not subscribe to Arianism Soomen tells you expresly that he did so Lib. 4. cap. 15. And so doth Athanasius Epist. ad Solitarios giving the reason why he did so namely out of fear And so doth Hierome both in Script Ecclesiast Fortunat. and in Euseb. Chron. Pope Honorius was solemnly condemned for a Monothelite-Heretick in the sixth generall Councell Act. 12 13. which Sentence was afterwards ratified by your own darling the second of Nice Act. 3 and Act. 7. and is mentioned in a decretall Epistle of Pope Leo the second So Infallible was he during his life so infallible was he thought to be when he was dead whilest he lived he taught Heresie and when he was dead he was condemned for an Heretick and with him the Principle which is the hindg of your present faith Neither did Vigilius behave himself one jot better in his Chair
The Councell of Pisa deposed Gregory the twelfth and Benedict the thirteenth for Schismaticks and Hereticks The Councell of Constance accused John the twenty third of abominable Heresie Sess. 11. And that of Basil condemned Eugenius as one à fide devium pertinacem Haereticum Sess. 34. an erroneous Person and obstinate Heretick Other instances of the like nature might be called over manifesting that your Popes have erred and been condemned as persons erroneous and therein the Principle of their In fallibility I would be unwilling to tire your patience yet upon your reiterated desire I shall present you with one Instance more and I will do it but briefly because I must deal with you again about the same matter 5. Your Church is fallen by Idolatry as otherwise so in that Religious Veneration of Images which she useth whereunto you have added Heresie in teaching it for a Doctrine of Truth and imposing the belief of it by your Tridentine Determination on the Consciences of the Disciples of Christ. I know you would fain mince the matter and spread over the corrupt Doctrine of your Church about it with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 silken words as you do the Posts that they are made of with Gold when as the Prophetspeaks of your predecessors in that work you lavish it out of the bagge for that purpose But to what purpose Your first Councell the second of Nice which yet was not wholly yours neither for it condemns Honorius calls Thâ—rnsius the Oecumenicall Patriarch and he expounds in it the Rock on which the Church was built to be Christ and not Peter your last Councell that of Trent your Angelicall Doctor Thomas of Aquine your great Champions Bellarmine and Baronius Suarez Vasquez and the rest of them with the Catholick practise and usage of your Church in all places declare sufficiently what is your faith or rather misbelief in this matter Hence Azorius Institut Lib. 9 cap. 6. tells us that Constans est Theologorum sententia Imaginem èodem honore cultu coli quo colitur id cujus est Imago It is the constant judgement of Divines that the Image is to be worshipped with the same honour and worship wherewith that is worshipped whose Image it is The Nicene Councell by the instigation of Pope Adrian Anathematizeth every one who doth but doubt of the Adoration of Images Act. 7. Thomas contendeth that the Cross is to be worshipped with Latria p. 3. q. 25. a. 4. which is a word that he and you suppose to express Religious worship of the highest sort And your Councell of Trent in their decree about this matter confirmed the Doctrine of that Lestricall convention at Nice whose frauds and impostures were never paralleled in the world but by it's self And do you think that a few ambiguous flourishing words of you an unknown person shall make the world believe that they understand not the Doctrine and Practise of your Church which is proclaimed unto them by the Fathers and Mâ—sters of your perswasion herein and expressed in practises under their eyes every day Do you think it so easie for you Cornieum oculos configere as Cicero tells us an Atturney one Cn Flavius thought to do in going beyond all that the great Lawyers had done before him Orat. pro Muraena We cannot yet be perswaded that you are so great an Interpreter of the Roman Oracles as to believe you before all the Sages before mentioned to whom hundreds may be added And what do you think of this Doctrine and Practise of your Church Hath it been opposed judged and condemned or no The first Writers of Christianity Just In Martyr Irenaeus Origen Tertullian Arnobius Lactantius utterly abhorred the use of all Images at least in Sacris The Councell held at Elibâ—ris in Spain twâ—ve or thirteen years before the famous Assembly at Nice positively forbid all use of Pictures in Churches Can. 36. Plaquit Picturas in Ecclesia esse non debâ—re ne quod colitur adoratur in parietibus depingatur The Councell resolved that Pictures ought not to be in Churches that 〈◊〉 which is worshipâ—d and adored be not painted on walls Cyprian condemns it Epist. ad Demetriad And so generally do all the Fathers as may be gathered in the pittifull endeavours and forgeries of the second Nicene Councell endeavouring to confirm it from them Epiphanius reckons it among the errors of the Gnosticks and himself brake an Image that he found hanging in a Church Epist ad Johan Hierosol Austin was of the same judgement see Lib. de moriâ— Eccles. Cathol cap. 34. Your Adoration of them iâ— expresly condemned by Gregory the great in an Epistle to Serinus Lib. 7. Ep. 111 and Lib. 9. Epist. 9. The Greek Church condemned it in a â—ynod at Constantinople an 775. And one learned man in those last dayes undertaking its defence and indeed the only man of learning that ever did so untill of late they excommunicated and cursed him This was Damascenus concerning whom they used those expressions repeated in the second Nicene Councell 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Unto Mansour of an evil name and in judgement consenting with Saracens Anathema To Mansour a worshipper of Images and writer of Falshood Anathema To Mansour contumelious against Christ and traytor to the Empire Anathema To Mansour a teacher of impiety and perverse interpreter of Scripture Anathema Synod Nic. 2. Act. 6. For that it was Johannes Damascenus that they intended the Nicene Fathers sufficiently manifest in the Answer following read by Epiphanius the Deacon And this reward did he meet withall from the seventh Councell at Constantinople for his pains in asserting the veneration of Images although he did not in that particular pervert the Scripture as some of you do but laid the whole weight of his opinion on Tradition wherein he is followed by Vasquez among your selves Moreover the Western Churches in a great Councell at Frankeford in Germany utterly condemned the Nicene Determination which in your Tridentins Convention you approve and ratifie An. 794. It was also condemned here by the Church of England and the Doctrine of it fully confuted by Albinus Hoveden Annal. an 791. Never was any Heresie more publickly and solemnly condemned than this whereby your Church is fallen from its pristine purity But hereof more afterwards It were no difficult matter to procced unto all the Chief ways whereby your Church is fallen and to manifest that they have been all publickly disclaimed and condemned by the better and founder part of Professors But the Instances Insisted on may I hope prove sufficient for your satisfaction I shall therefore proceed to consider what you offer unto the remaining Principles which I conceived to animate the whole Discourse of your Fiat Lux. CHAP. V. Other Principles of Fiat Lux re-examined Things not at quiet in Religion before Reformation of the first Reformers Diparture from Rome no Cause of Devisions Returnal unto Rome no means of Union YOu proceed unto the fourth Assertion
this that where any persons or Churches are at variance or difference about any thing concerning Religion or the worship of God the Scripture is not sufficient for the Vmpirage of that Difference so that they may be reconciled and center in the Profession of the same Truth I wish you would now tell me what discrepancy there is between the Assertion which I ascribed unto you and that which your self here avow I suppose they are in substance the same and as such will be owned by every one that understands any thing of the matters about which we treat And this is so spoken unto in the Animadversions that you have no mind to undertake the examination of it but labour to divert the discourse unto that which may appear something else but indeed is not so 3. For your Distinction between Protestants and Puritans in England I know not well what to make of it I know no Puritans in England that are not Protestants though all the Protestants in England do not absolutely agree in every punctilio relating to Religion nor in all things relating unto the outward worship of God no more than did the Churches in the Apostles dayes or than your Catholicks do You give us then a Distinction like that which a man may give between the Church of Rome and the Jesuits or Dominicans or the Sons of S t. Benet or of S t Francis of Assize A Distinction or Distribution of the Genus into the Genus and one Species comprehended under it as if you should have said that Animal is either Animal or Homo 4. Though I had rather therefore that you had placed your Instance between the Church of Rome and Protestants yet because any instance of Persons that have different Apprehensions about things belonging to the worship of God will suffice us as to the present purpose I shall let it pass Only I desire you once more that when you would endeavour to render any thing way or acting of men odious that you would forbear to cast the Scripture into a Copartnership therein which here you seem to do The Puritan you say with the Scripture rose up and rebelled Rebellion is the name of an outragious Evil such as the Scripture giveth not the least Countenance unto And therefore when you think meet to charge it upon any you may do well not to say that they do it with the Scripture It will not be to your comfort or advantage so to do This is but my advice you may do as you see cause Tales Casus Cassandra canebat 5. The Differences you suppose and look upon as undeterminable by the Scripture are about things that in themselves really and in truth belong unto Christian Religion or such as do not so indeed but are only fancied by some men so to do If they are of this latter sort as the most of the Controversies which we have with you are as about your Mass Purgatory the Pope we account that all Differences about them are sufficiently determined in the Scriptures because they are no where mentioned in them And this must needs be so if the Word of God be as you here grant the sufficient and only means both of our Conversion and Settlement as well in Truth as in Vertue S r I had no sooner written these words in that haste wherein I treat with you but I suspected a necessity of craving your pardon for supposing my Inference confirmed by your Concession For whereas you had immediately before set down the Assertion supposed to be yours about the Scriptures you adde the words now mentioned Gods Word is the sufficient and only means of our Conversion and Settlement in the Truth I did not in the least suspect that you intended any Legerdemain in the business but that the Scripture and Gods Word had been only various denominations with you of the same precise Thing as they are with us Only I confess at the first view I wondred how you could reconcile this Assertion with the known Principles of your Church and besides I knew it to be perfectly destructive of your design in your following Enquiry But now I fear you play hide and seek in the ambiguity your Church hath put upon that Title Gods Word which it hath applyed unto your unwritten Traditions as well as unto the written Word as the Jews apply the same term unto their Orall Law And therefore as I said before I crave your pardon for supposing my Inference confirmed by your Concession wherein I fear I was mistaken and only desire you that for the future you would speak your mind plainly and candidly as it becomes a Christian and Lover of Truth to do But my Assertion I esteem never the worse though it have not the happiness to enjoy your approbation especially considering that in the particular Instances mentioned there are many things delivered in Scripture inconsistent with and destructive of your notions about them sufficient to exterminate them from the Confines of the City of God 6. Suppose the matters in difference do really belong unto Religion and the worship of God and that the Difference lyes only in mens various Conceptions of them you ask Can the Scripture alone of its self decide the business What do you mean by alone of its self If you mean without mens application of themselves unto it and subjecting of their Consciences unto its Authoritative decisions neither it nor any thing else can do it The matter its self is perfectly stated in the Scripture whether any men take notice of it or no but their various apprehensions about it must be regulated by their applications unto it in the way mentioned On this only Supposition that those who are at variance about things which really appertain unto the Religion of Jesus Christ will refer the determination of them unto the Scripture and bring the Conâ—eptions of their minds to be regulated thereby standing unto its Arbitriment it is able alone and of its self to end all their differences and settle them all iu the Truth This hath been proved unto you a thousand times and confirmed by most clear Testimonies of the Scripture its self with Arguments taken from its Nature Perfection and the End of its giving forth unto men as also from the practise of our Lord Jesus and his Apostles with their directions and commands given unto us for the same Purpose from the Practise of the First Churches with innumerable Testimonies of the Ancient Fathers and Doctors Neither can this be denied without that horrible Derogation from its Perfection and Plenitude so reverenced by them of old which is objected unto you for your so doing Protestants suppose the Scripture to be given forth by God to be unto the Church â—a perfect Rule of that Faith and Obedience which he requires at the hands of the sons of men They suppose that it is such a Revelation of his Mind or Will as is intelligible unto all them that are concerned to know
unto one of your great Masters to be acquainted with the genuine sense of one of your Churches Proposals this being the way that he takes for his satisfaction First he speaks unto the Article or Question to be considered in Generall then gives the different senses of it according to these and those famous Masters the most of which he confutes who yet all of them professed themselves to explain and to speak according to the sense of your Church and lastly gives his own interpretation of it which it may be within a few moneths is confuted by another 3. Suppose a man have attained a knowledge of all that your Church hath determined and proposed to be believed and to a right understanding of her precise sense and meaning in all her determinations and proposals which I believe never yet man attained unto yet what assurance can he have if he live in any place remote from Rome but that your Church may have made some new Determinations in matters of faith whose embracement in the sense which she intends belongs unto his keeping the Unity of Faith which yet he is not acquainted withall Is it not simply impossible for him to be satisfied at any time that he believes all that is to be believed or that he holds the Vnity of Faith Your late Pontific all Determination in the Case of the Jansenists and Molinists is sufficient to illustrate this instance For I suppose you are equally bound not to believe what your Church condemneth as Hereticall as you are bound to believe what it proposeth for Catholick Doctrine 4. I desire to know when a man who lives here in England begins to be obliged to believe the Determinations of your Church that are made at Rome It may be he first hears of them in a Mercury or weekly News book or it may be he hath notice of them by some private Letters from some who live near the place or it may be he hath a knowledge of them by common report or it may be they are printed in some Books or that there is a brief of them published somewhere under the name of the Pope or they are put into some Volume written about the Councels or some Religious Persons on whom he much relyes assures him of them I know you believe that your Churches Proposition is a sufficient means of the Revelation of any Article to make it necessary to be believed but I desire to know what is necessary to Cause a man to receive any Dictate or Doctrine as your Churches proposition not only upon this account that you are not very well agreed upon the Requisita unto the making of such a Proposition but also because be you as infallible as you please in your Proposals the means and wayes you use to communicate those Proposals you make unto Individuals in whom alone the faith whereof we treat exists are all of them fallible Now that which I desire to know is What is or what are those certain means and wayes of communicating the Propositions of your Church unto any Person wherein he is bound to acquiesce and upon the application of them unto him to believe them fide divina cui non potest subesse falsum Is it any one thing or way or means that the hinge upon which his assent turns Or is it a Complication of many things concurring to the same purpose If it be any one thing way or medium that you fix upon pray let us know it and we shall examine its fitness and sufficiency for the use you put it unto I am sure we shall find it to be either infallible or fallible If you say the former and that particular upon which the Assent of a mans mind unto any thing to be the proposall of your Church depends must in the testimony it gives and evidence that it affords be esteemed infallible then you have as many infallible Persons things or writings as you make use of to acquaint one another with the determinations of your Church that is upon the matter you are all so though I know in particular that you are not If the latter notwithstanding the first pretended infallible Proposition your faith will be found to be resolved immediately into a fallible information For what will it advantage me that the proposall of your Church cannot deceive me if I may be deceived in the Communicating of that Proposall unto me And I can with no more firmness certainty or assurance believe the thing proposed unto me than I do believe that it is the Proposall of the Church wherein it is made For you pretend not unto any self-evidencing efficacy in your Churches Propositions or things proposed by it but all their Authority as to me turns upon the Assurance that I have of their relation unto your Church or that they are the Proposals of your Church concerning which I have nothing but very fallible evidence and so cannot possibly believe them with Faith Divine and Supernaturall If you shall say that there are many things concurring unto this Communication of your Churches Proposals unto a man as the notoritty of the Fact suitable proceedings upon it books written to prove it Testimonies of good men and the like I cannot but mind you that all these being sigillatim every one apart fallible they cannot in their Conspiracy improve themselves into an Infallibility Strengthen a Probability they may testifie infallibly they neither do nor can So that on this account it is not only impossible for a man to know whether he holds the Vnity of Faith or no but indeed whether he believe any thing at all with Faith Supernaturall and Divine seeing he hath no infallible evidence for what is proposed unto him to believe to build his faith upon 5. Protestants are not satisfied with your generall implicit assent unto what your Church teacheth and determineth which you have invented to solve the difficulties that attend your Description of the Vnity of Faith Of what use it may be unto other purposes I do not now dispute but as to this of the preservation of the Vnity of Faith it is certainly of none at all The Vnity of Faith consists in all mens express believing all that all men are bound expresly to believe be it what it will Now you would have this preserved by mens not believing what they are bound to believe For what belongs to this keeping the Vnity of Faith they are bound to believe expresly and what they believe implicitly they do indeed no more but not expresly disbelieve for if they do any more than not disbelieve they put forth some act of their understanding about it and so farre expresly believe it So that upon the matter you would have ment to keep the Unity of Faith by a not believing of that which that they may keep the Unity of Faith they are bound expresly to believe Nor can you do otherwise whilest you make all the Propositions of your Church of things to be
to your Question What it is that can settle any man in the Truth of Religion and unite all men therein And then because you object this unto us as if we were at some loss and incertainty therein and your selves very secure I shall consider what are the grounds and principles that you proceed upon for the same ends and purposes namely to settle any man in the Truth of Religion and to bring all men to an harmony and consent therein Now I shall herein manifest unto you these two things I. That the Principles which the Protestants proceed upon in the improvement whereof they obtain themselves assured and infallible settlement in the Truth and labour to reduce others unto the Unity of Faith are such as are both suited unto and sufficient for the end and work which they design to effect by them and also in themselves of such unquestionable Truth Certainty and Evidence that either they are all granted by your selves or cannot be denied without shaking the very Foundations of Christianity 2. That those which you proceed upon are some of them untrue and most of them dubious and questionable none of them able to bear the weight that you lay upon them and some of them such as the admission of would give just cause to question the whole Truth of Christian Religion And both these S r I crave leave to manifest unto you whereby you may the better judg whether the Scripture or your Church be the best way to bring men unto settlement in Religion which is the thing enquired after 1. Protestants lay down this as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the very beginning and first Principle of their confidence and Confession that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God as the Holy Ghost teacheth them 2 Tim. 3. 16. That is that the Books of the Old and New Testament were all of them written by the immediate guidance direction and inspiration of God the hand of the Lord as David speaks 1 Chron. 28. 19. being upon the Penmen thereof in writing and his Spirit as Peter informs us speaking in them 1 Pâ—t 1. 11. So that whatever is contained and delivered in them is given out from God and is received on his Authority This Principle I suppose you grant to be true do you not if you will deny it say so and we will proceed no farther untill we have proved it I know you have various wayes laboured to undermine the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Holy Scriptures many Queries you put unto men How they can know it to be from God to be true from Heaven and not of men many scruples you indeavour to possess them with against its Authority it is not my present business to remove them It is sufficient unto mee 1. That you your selves who differ from us in other things and with whom our contest about the best way of coming to settlement in the Truth alone is do acknowledg this Principle were proceed upon to be true And 2. That yee cannot oppose it without setting your selves to digge up the very foundations of Christian Religion and to open a way to let in an inundation of Atheism on the world So our first step is fixed on the grand fundamentall Principle of all the Religion and acceptable worship of God that is in the world 2. They affirm that this Scripture evidenceth it self by many infallible 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be so given by Inspiration from God and besides is witnessed so to be by the Testimony of the Church of God from the dayes of Moses wherein it began to be written to the dayes wherein we live our Lord Christ and his Apostles asserting and confirming the same Testimony which Testimony is conveyed unto us by uninterrupted Catholick Tradition The first part of this Position I confess some of you deny and the latter part of it you generally all of you pervert confining the Testimony mentioned unto that of your present Church which is a very inconsiderable part of it if any part at all But how groundlesly how prejudicially to the verity and honour of Christian Religion in generall you do these things I shall briefly shew you Some of you I say deny the first part of this Assertion so doth Andradius Defens Concil Trident. Lib. 3. Neque enim saith he in ipsis Libris quibus Sacra Mysteria conscripta sunt quicquam inest Divinitatis quod nos ad Credendum qua illis continentur religione aliqua constring at Neither is there in the Books themselves wherein the holy Mysteries are written any thing of Divinity that should constrain us by vertue of any religious respect thereunto to believe the things that are contained in them Hence Cocleus Lib. 2. de Authoritate Eccles. Script gathers up a many instances out of the Book of the Scripture which he declares to be altogether incredible were it not for the Authority of the Church I need not mention any more of your Leaders concurring with them you know who is of the same mind with them if the Author of Fiat Lux be not unknown to you Your resolving Vniversal Tradition into the Authority of your present Church to which end there is a Book written not long since by a Jesuit under the name of Vincentius Severinus is no less notorious Some of you I confess are more modest and otherwise minded as to both parts of our Assertion See Malderus Episcop Antwerp de Object Fidei qu. 1. Vaselius Groningen de Potestat Eccles. Epist. ad Jacob. Hock Alliacens in Lib. 1. Sentent Artic. 3. Gerson Exam. dos part 2. Consid. 1. Tom. 1. sol 105. and in twenty other places But when you come to deal with Protestants and consider well the Tendency of this Assertion you use I consess an hundred rergiversations and are most unwilling to come to the acknowledgment of it and rather then suffer from it deny it downwright and that with Scurrilous reflections and Comparisons likening it as to any characters of Gods truth and Holiness upon it unto Livy's Story yea Aesops Fables or a Piece of Poetry And when you have done so you apply your selves to the canvasing of Stories in the Old Testament and to find out appearing Contradictions and tell us of the uncertainty of the Authors of some particular Books that the whole is of its self a dead letter which can prove nothing at all enquiring Who told us that the Penmen of it were divinely inspired seeing they testify no such things of themselves and if they should yet others may do and have done so who notwithstanding were not so inspired and ask us Why we receive the Gospel of Luke who was not an Apostle and reject that of Thomas who one with many the like Cavilling Exceptions But 1. That must needs be a bad Cause which stands in need of such a Defence Is this the voice of Jacob or Esau Are these the expressions of Christians or Pagans from whose
quiver are these arrows taken Is this fair sober Candid Christian dealing have you no way to defend the Authority of your Church but by Questioning the Authority of the Scripture Did ever any of the Fathers of old or any in the world before your selves take this course to plead their interests in any thing they professed Is this Practice Catholick or like many of your Principles singular your own Donatisticall Is it any great sign that you have an interest in that living Child when you are so ready he should be destroyed rather than you would be cast in your Contest with Protestants 2. Do you think that this course of proclaiming to Atheists Turks and Pagans that the Scripture which all Christians maintain against them to be the Word of the Living GOD given by inspiration from Him and on which the Faith of all the Martyrs who have suffered from their opposition rage and cruelty and of all others that truly believe in Jesus Christ was and is founded and whereinto it is resolved hath no Arguments of its Divine Original implanted on it no lines of the Excellencies and Perfections of its Author drawn on it no power or efficacy towards the Consciences of men evidencing its Authority over them no ability of its self to comfort and support them in their tryals and sufferings with the hope of things that are not seen Is this think you an acceptable service unto the Lord Christ who will one day judg the secrets of all hearts according unto that Word or Is it not really to expose Christian Religion to scorn and contempt And do you find so much sweetness in Delus an Virtus quis in hoste requirat as to cast off all Reverence of God and his Word in the pursuit of the supposed Adversaries of your earthly Interests 3. If your Arguments and Objections are effectuall and privalent unto the end for which you intend them will not your direct issue be the utter overthrow of the very foundation of the whole Profession of Christians in the world And are you like Sampson content to pull down the house that must fall upon your selves also so that you may stifle Protestants with its sall It may be it were well you should do so were it an house of Dagon a Temple dedicated unto Idols but to deal so with that wherein dwels the Majesty of the Living GOD is not so justifiable It is true Evert this Principle and you overthrow the foundation on which the faith of Protestants is built but it is no less true that you do the same to the foundation of the Christian Faith in generall wherein wee hope your own concernment also lyes And this is the thing that I am declaring unto you namely that either you acknowledg the Principles on which Protestants build their Faith and Profession or by denying them you open a door unto Atheism at least to the extirpation of Christian Religion out of the world I confess you pretend a relief against the present instance in the Authority of your Church sufficient as you say to give a Credibility unto the Scriptures though its own self-evidencing Power and Efficacy with the Confirmation of it by Catholick Tradition exclusive to your present suffrage be rejected Now I suppose you will grant that the Prop you supply men withall upon your casting down the foundations on which they have laid the weight of their eternall Salvation had need be firm and immoveable And remember that you have to do with them who though they may be otherwise inclineable unto you Non tamen ignorant quid distent aera a lupinis and must use their own judgement in the Consideration of what you tender unto them And they Ask you 1. What will you do if it be as you say with them who absolutely reject the Authority of your Châ—â—ch which is the condition of more than a moyety of the Inhabitants of the world to speak sufficiently within compass And 2. What will you advise us to say to innumerable other Persons that are pious and rational who upon the meer consideration of the lives of many of the most of the guides of your Church your bloody inhumane practices your pursuit of worldly carnall designs your visible secular interest wherein you are combined and united cannot perswade themselves that the Testimony of your Church in and about things that are invisible spirituall heavenly and eternall is at all valuable much less that it is sufficient to bear the weight you would lay upon it 3. Was not this the way and method of Vaninus for the Introduction of his Atheism first to question sleight and sophistically except against the old approved Arguments and Evidences manifesting the beeing and existence of a Divine self-subsisting Power substituting in their room for the confirmation of it his own Sophisms which himself knew might be easily discussed and disproved Do you deal any better with us in decrying the Scripture's self-evidencing Efficacy with the Testimony given unto it by God himself substituting nothing in the room thereof but the Authority of your Church A man certainly can take up nothing upon the sole Authority of your Church untill contrary to the pretensions Reasons and Arguments of far a greater number of Christians than your selves he acknowledge you to be a true Church at least if not the only Church in the world Now how I pray will you bring him into that state and condition that he may rationally make any such judgement How will you prove unto him that there is any such thing as a Church in the World that a Church hath any Authority that its Testimony can make any thing credible or meet to be believed You must prove these things to him or whatever assent he gives unto what you say is from fanaticall credulity To suppose that he should believe you upon your word because you are the Church is to suppose that he believes that which you are yet but attempting to induce him to believe If you persist to press him without other proof not only to believe what you first said unto him but also even this that whatever you shall say to him hereafter that he must believe it because you say it Will not any rationall man nauseate at your unreasonable importunity and tell you that men who have a mind to be befooled may meer with such Alchymisticall pretenders all the world over Will you perswade him that you are the Church and that the Church is furnished with the Authority mentioned by rational Arguments I wish you would inform me of any one that you can make use of that doth not include a Supposition of something unproved by you and which can never be proved but by your own Authority which is the thing in Question or the immediate Authority of God which you reject A number indeed of pretences or it may be Probabilities you may heap together which yet upon examination will not be found so much neither unless a
man will swallow amongst them that which is destitute of all Probability but what is included in the evidence given unto it by Divine Revelation which is not yet pleaded unto him It may be then you will work Miracles to confirm your Assertions Let us see them For although very many things are requisite to manifest any works of wonder that may be wrought in the world to be reall Miracles and good Caution be required to judge unto what end Miracles are wrought yet if we may have any tolerable evidence of your working Miracles in Confirmation of this Assertion that you are the true and only Church of God with the other Inferences depending thereon which we are in the Consideration of you will find us very easie to be treated withall But herein also you fail You have then no way to deal with such a man as we first supposed but as you do with us and produce Testimonies of Scripture to prove and confirm the Authority of your Church and then you will quickly find where you are and what snares you have cast your selves into Will not a man who hears you proving the Authority of your Church by the Scripture ask you And whence hath this Scripture its Authority yea that is supposed to be the thing in Question which denying unto it an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you yet produce to confirm the Authority of that by whose Authority alone its self is evidenced to have any Authority at all Rest in the Authority of God manifesting its self in the Scripture witnessed unto by the Catholick Tradition of all Ages you will not But you will prove the Scripture to be the Word of God by the Testimony of your Church and you will prove your Châ—â—â—h to be enabled sufficiently to testifie the Scriptures to be of God by the Testimonies of the Scripture Would you knew where to begin and where to end But you are indeed in a Circle which hath neither beginning nor ending I know not when we shall be enabled to say Inventus Chrysippe tui finitor acervi Now do you think it reasonable that we should leave our stable and immoveable firm foundations to run round with you in this endless Circle untill through giddiness we fall into Unbelief or Atheism This is that which I told you before you must either acknowledge our Principle in this matter to be firm and certain or open a door to Atheism and the Contempt of Christian Religion seeing you are not able to substitute and thing in the room thereof that is able to bear the weight that must be laid upon it if we believe For how should you do so shall man be like unto God or equall unto him The Testimony we rest in is Divine fortified from all Objections by the strongest humane Testimony possible namely Catholick Tradition That which you would supply us with is meerly Humane and no more And 4. your Importunity in opposing this Principle is so much the more marvellous unto us because therein you openly oppose your selves to express Testimonies of Scripture and the full Suffrage of the Ancient Church I wish you would a little weigh what is affirmed 2 Pet. 1. 19 20. Psal. 119. 152. Joh. 5. 34 35 36 39. 1 Thess. 2. 13. Act. 17. 11. 1 Joh. 5. 6 10. 1 Joh. 2. 20. Heb. 11. 1 Tim. 1. 15. Act. 26. 22. And will you take with you the consent of the Ancients Clemens Alexand. Strom. 7. speaks fully to our purpose as he doth also lib. 4. where he plainly affirms that the Church proved the Scripture by its selfâ— and other things as the Unity of the Deity by the Scripture But his own words in the former place are worth the recital 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the beginning of Faith or Principle of what we teach we have the Lord who in sundry manners and by divers parts by the Prophets Gospel and holy Apostles leads us to knowledge And if any one suppose that a Principle stands in need of another to prove it he destroys the nature of a Principle or it is no longer preserved a Principle This is that we say The Scripture the Old and New Testament is the Principle of our Faith This is proved by its self to be of the Lord who is its Author and if we cause it to depend on any thing else it is no longer the Principle of our Faith and Profession And a little after where he hath shewed that a Principle ought not to be disputed nor to be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of any debate he addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is meet then that receiving by Faith the most absolute Principle without other demonstration and taking demonstrations of the Principle from the Principle its self that we be instructed by the voice of the Lord unto the knowledge of the Truth That is we believe the Scripture for its own sake and the Testimony that God gives unto it in it and by it and do prove every thing else by it and so are confirmed in the faith or knowledge of the Truth So he further explains himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For we do not simply or absolutely attend or give heed unto men determining or defining against whom it is equall that we may define or declare our judgements So it is whilest the Authority of man or men any Society of men in the world is pleaded the Authority of others may be as good reason be objected against it as whilest you plead your Church and its definitions others may on as good grounds oppose theirs unto you therein And therefore Clemens proceeds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For if it be not sufficient meerly to declare or assert that which appears to be truth but also to make that Credible or fit to be believed which is spoken we seek not after the Testimony that is given by men but we confirm that which is proposed or enquired about with the voice of the Lord which is more full than any demonstration or rather is its self the only demonstration according to the knowledge whereof they that have tasted of the Scriptures are believers Into the voice the Word of God alone the Church then resolved their Faith this only they built upon acknowledging all humane Testimony to be too weak and infirm to be made a foundation for it And this voice of God in the Scripture evidencing its self so to be is the only Demonstration of Faith which they rested in whereupon a little after he addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so wee having perfect Demonstrations out of the Scriptures are by Faith demonstratively assured or perswaded of the Truth of the things proposed This was the Profession of the Church of old this the resolution of their faith This is that which Protestants in this Case adhere unto They proved the Scripture to be from God as he elswhere speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as
his Apostleship If you will then have any to succeed him in the enjoyment of any or of all these Privileges you must bespeak him to succeed him in his Apostleship and not in his Bishoprick Besides as I said before this imaginary Episcopacy which limits and confines him unto a particular Church as it doth if it be an Episcopacy properly so called is destructive of his Apostolical Office and of his Duty in answering the Commission given him of preaching the Gospel to every Creature following the Guidance of Gods Providence and conduct of the Holy Ghost in his way Many of the Ancients I confess affirm that Peter sate Bishop of the Church of Rome but they all evidently use the word in a large sense to imply that during his abode there for that there he was they did suppose be took upon him the especial Care of that Church For the same Persons constantly affirm that Paul also was Bishop of the same Church at the same time which cannot be otherwise understood than in the large sense mentioned And Ruffinus Prafat Recog Clement ad Gâ—udent unriddles the mystery Linus saith he Clâ—tus fuerunt ante Clementem Episcopi in â—rbe Roma sed superstite Petro videlicet at illi Episcopatûs Curam gererent iste verò Apostolatûs simpleret officium Linus and Cletus were Bishops in the City of Rome before Clemens but whilest Peter was yet alive they performing the Duty of Bishops Peter attending unto his office Apostolical And hereby doth he utterly discard the present new plea of the foundation of your faith For though he assert that Peter the Apostle was at Rome yet he denies that he ever sate Bishop there but names two others that ruled that Church at Rome joyntly during his time either in one Assembly or in two the one of the Circumcision the other of the Gentile-Converts And if Peter were thus Bishop of Rome and entred as you say upon his Episcopacy at his first coming thither whence is it that you are forced to confess that he was so long absent from his charge Five years saith Bellarmine but that will by no means salve the Difficulty Seven saith Onuphrius at once and abiding at one place the most part of his time besides being spent in other places and yet allowing him no time at all for those places where he certainly was Eighteen saith Cortefius strange that he should be so long absent from his especiall Cure and never write one word to them for their instruction or consolation whereas in the mean time he wrote two Epistles unto them who it seems did not in any speciall manner belong unto his Charge I wish we could once find our way out of this maze of uncertainties This is but a sad disquisition after Principles of faith to settle men in Religion by them And yet if we should suppose this also wee are farre enough from our journeys end The present Bishop of Rome is as yet behind the curtain neither can he appear upon the stage untill hâ— be ushered in by one pretence more of the same nature with them that went before And this is V. That some one must needs succeed Peter in his Episcopacy But why so why was it not needfull that one should succeed him in his Apostleship Why was it not needfull that Paul should have a successor as well as Peter and John as well as either of them Because you say that was necessary for the Church not so these But who told you so where is the proof of what you averre who made you judges of what is necessary and what is not necessary for the Church of Christ when himself is silent And why is not the succession of an Apostle necessary as well as of such a Bishop as you fancie had it not been better to have had one still residing in the Church of whose Infallibility there could have been no doubt or question One that had the power of working Miracles that should have no need to scare the people by shaking fire out of his slieve as your Pope Gregory the 7 th was wont to do if Cardinall Benno may be believed But you have now carried us quite off from the Scripture and Story and probable conjectures to attend unto you whilest you give the Lord Jesus prudentiall advice about what is necessary for his Church It must needs be so it is meet it should be so is the best of your proof in this matter Only your fratres Walenburgici adde that never any man ordained the Government of a Community more weakly than Christ must be supposed to have done the Government of his Church if he have not appointed such a Successour to Peter as you imagin But it is easie for you to assert what you please of this nature and as easie for any one to reject what you so assert if he please These things are without the verge of Christian Religion 〈◊〉 Towers and Palaces in the ayr But what must S t Peter be succeeded in his Episcopacy and what therewithall his Authority Power and Jurisdiction over all Churches in the world with an unerring judgement in matters of faith But all these belonged unto Peter as far as ever they belonged unto him as he was an Apostle long before you fancie him to have been a Bishop As then his Episcopacy came without these things so for ought you know it might goe without it This is a matter of huge importance in that Systeme of Principles which you tender unto us to bring us unto settlement in Religion and the Unity of Faith would you would consider a little how you may give some tolerable appearance of proof unto that which the Scripture is so utterly silent in yea which lyes against the whole Oeconomy of the Lord Jesus Christ in his ordering of his Church as delivered unto us therein dic aliquem dic Quintiliane colorem But we come now to the Pope whom here we first find latentem post Priâ—cipia and coming forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with his Claim For you say VI. That the Bishop of Rome is the man that thus suecceds Peter in his Episcopacy which though it were settled at Rome was over the whoee Catholick Church So you say and so you profess your selves to believe And we desire that you would not take it amiss if we desire to know upon what grounds you do so being unwilling to cast away all Consideration that we may embrace a fanatical Credo in this unlikely business We desire therefore to know who appointed that there should be any such succession who that the Bishop of Rome should be this Successor Did Jesus Christ do it we may justly expect you should say He did but if you do we desire to know when where how seeing the Scripture is utterly silent of say such thing Did S t Peter himself do it Pray manifest unto us that by the appointment of Jesus Christ he had power so to do and that
God in his Word than unto these Principles of yours is rejected by you out of the limits of the Catholick Church that is of Christianity for they are the same To make good your judgement and censure then you vent endless Cavils against the Authority Perfection and Perspicuity of the Scriptures pretending to despise and scorn whatever is offered in their viâ—dication This rope of Sand composed â— false suppositions groundless presumptions inconsequent inferences in all which there is not one word of infallible Truth at least that you can any way make appear so to be is the great Bond you use to gird men withall into the Unity of Faith In brief you tell us that if wee will all submit to the Pope wee shall be sure all to agree But this is no more but as I have before told you what every party of men in the world tender us upon the same or the like condition It is not a meer agreement wee aym at but an agreement in the Truth not a meer Vnity but a Unity of Faith and Faith must be built on Principles infallible or it will prove in the close to have been fancy not Faith carnall imagination not Christian belief otherwise wee may agree in Turcism or Judaism or Paganism as well as in Christianity and to as good purpose Now what of this kind do you tender unto us Would you have us to leave the sure word of Prophesie more sure than a voyce from Heaven the Light shining in the dark places of this world which wee are commanded to attend unto by God himself the Holy Scripture given by Inspiration which is able to make us wise unto Salvation the Word that is perfest sure right converting the Soul enlightning the eyes making wise the simple whose observation is attended with great reward to give heed yea to give up all our Spirituall and eternall concernments to the credit of old groundless uncertain Stories inevident presumptions fables invented for and openly improved unto carnal secular and wicked ends Is your request reasonable Would wee could prevail with you to cease your importunity in this matter especially considering â—the dangerous consequence of the admission of these your Principles unto Christianity in generall For if it be so that S t Peter had such an Episcopacy as you talk of and that a continuance of it in a Succession by the Bishops of Rome be of that indispensable necessity unto the preservation of Christian Religion as is pretended many men considering the nature and quality of that Succession how the means of its continuation have been arbitrarily and occasionally changed what place formerly popular Suffrage and the Imperial Authority have had in it how it came to be devolved on a Conclave of Cardinals what violence and tumults have attended one way what briberies and filthy respects unto the lusts of unclean Persons the other what Interruptions the Succession it self hath had by vacancies Schisms and contests for the place and uncertainty of the Person that had the best right unto the Popedome according to the customes of the dayes wherein he lived and that many of the Persons who have had a place in the pretended Succession have been plainly men of the world such as cannot receive the Spirit of Christ yea open enemies unto his Cross would find just cause to suspect that Christianity were utterly failed many Ages ago in the world which certainly would not much promote the Settlement in Truth and Unity of Faith that we are enquiring after And this is the first way that you propose to supply that Defect which you charge upon the Scripture that it is insufficient to reconcile men that are at variance about Religion and settle them in the Truth And if you are able by so many uncertainties and untruths to bring men unto a Certainty and Scttlement in the Truth you need not despair of compassing and thing that you shall have a mind to attempt But you have yet another Plea which you make no less use of than of the former which must therefore be also now you have engaged us in this work a little examined This is the Church its Authority and Infallibilâ—ty The truth is when you come to make a practical Application of this Plea unto your own use you resolve it into and confound it with that foregoing of the Pope in whom solely many of you would have this Authority and Infallibility of the Church to reside Yet because in your mannagement of it you proceed on other Principles than those before mentioned this pretence also shall be apart considered And here you tell us 1. That the Church was before the Scripture and giveth Authority unto it By the Scriptures you know that wee understand the Word of God with this â—ne Adjunct of its being written by his command and appointment We do not say that it belongs unto the Essence of the Word of God that it be written Whatever is spoken by God wee admit as his Word when wee are infallibly assured that by Him it was spoken and that wee should do so before himself doth not require at our hands for he would have us use our utmost diligence not to be imposed upon by any in his Name Therefore wee grant that the Word of God was given out for the Rule of men in his Worship two thousand years before it was written but it was so given forth as that they unto whom it came had infallible assurance that from Him it came and his Word it was And if you or any man else can give us such assurance that any thing is or hath been spoken by him besides what we have now written in the Scripture wee shall receive it with the same faith and obedience wherewith wee receive the Scripture its self Whereas therefore you say That the Church was before the Scripture if you intend no more but that there was a Church in the world before the word of God was written wee grant it true but not at all to your purpose If you intend that the Church is before the Word of God which at an appointed time was written it may possibly be wrested unto your purpose but is farre from being true seeing the Church is a society of men called to the knowledg and worship of God by his Ward They become a Church by the call of that Word which it seems you would have not given untill they are a Church of Effects produce their Causes Children beget their Parents Light brings forth the Sunne and Heat the Fire So are the Prophets and Apostles built upon the foundation of the Church whereof the Pope is the Corner stone So was the Judaical Church before the Law of iâ— constitution and the Christian before the Word of Promise whereon it was founded and the Word of Command by which it was edified In brief from the day wherein Man was first created upon the earth to the days wherein we live never did a Person or
flattering your selves with an imagination of any other Priviledge is that which hath wrought your ruine You are deceived if in this matter you are of Menander's mind who sayed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all will of its own accord fall out well with you though you sleep securely As for all other Churches in the world besides your own wee have your concession not only that they were and are fallible but that they have actually erred long since and the same hath been proved against yours a thousand times and your best Reserve against particular charges of Errour lyes in this impertinent generall pretence that you cannot erre It may be you will ask for you use so to do and it is the design of your Fiat to promote the â—nquiry If the Church be fallible that is to propose unto us the things and Doctrines that we are to believe How can we with faith infallible believe her proposals And I tell you truly I know not how we can if we believe them only upon her Authority or she propose them to be believed solely upon that account but when she proposeth them unto us to be believed on the Authority of God speaking in the Srciptures we both can and do believe what she teacheth and proposeth and that with faith infallible resolved into the Veracity of God in his Word and we grant every Church to be so farre infallible as it attends unto the only Infallible Rule amongst men When you prove that any one Church is by any promise of Christ any grant of Priviledge expressed or intimated in the Scripture placed in an unerring condition any farther than as in the use of the means appointed she attends unto the only Rule of her preservation or that any Church shall be â—ecessitated to attend unto that Rule whether she will or no whereby she may be preserved or can give us an instance of any Church since the foundation of the world that hath been actually preserved and absolutely from all errour other than that of your own which you know we cannot admit of as you will do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great and memorable work so we shall grant as much as you can reasonably desire of us upon the account of the Assertion under consideration But untill you do some one or all of these your crying out The Church the Church the Church cannot erre makes no other noyse in our ears than that of the Jews The Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord the Law shall not fail did in the ears of the Prophets of old Neither do we speak this of the Church or any Church as though we were concerned to question or deny any just Priviledges belonging unto it thereby to secure our selves from any pretensions of yours but meerly for the sake of Truth For we shall manifest anon unto you that you are as little concerned in the Priviledges of the Church be they what they will more or less as any Society of the Professours of Christianity in the world if so be that you are concerned in them at all So that if the Truth would permit us to agree with you in all things that you assign unto the Church yet the difference between you and us were never the nearer to an end for we should still differ with you about your share and interest therein and for ever abhor your frowardness in appropriating of them all unto your selves And herein as I sayed hath lyen a great part of your ruine Whilest you have been sweetly dreaming of an Infallibility you have really plunged your selves into errours innumerable and when any one hath jogged you to awake you out of your fatall sleep by minding you of your particular errours your dream hath left such an impression upon your imagination as that you think them no errours upon this only ground because you cannot erre I am perswaded had it not been for this one errour you had been freed from many others But this perfectly disiâ—ables you for any candid Inquisition after the Truth For why should he once look about him or indeed so much as take care to keep his eyes open who is sure that he can never be out of his way Hence you inquire not at all whether what you profess be Truth or not but to learn what your Church teacheth and defend it is all that you have to do about Religion in this world And whatever Absurdities or Inconveniencies you find your selves driven unto in the handling of particular points all is one they must be right though you cannot defend them because your Church which cannot erre hath so declared them to be And if you should chance to be convinced of any Truth in particular that is contrary to the determination of your Church you know not how to embrace it but must shut your eyes against its light and evidence and cast it out of your minds or wander up and down with a various assent between Contradictions Well said he of old 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is flat folly namely for a man to live in rebellion unto his own light But you adde III. That your selves that is the Pope with those who in matters of Religion adhere unto him and live in subjection unto him are this Church in an assent unto whose infallible teachings and Determinations the Vnity of Faith doth consist Could you prove this Assertion I confess it would stand you in good stead But before we enquire aftes that we shall endeavour a little to come unto a right understanding of what you say When you affirm tâ—at the Roman Church is the Church of Christ you intend either that it is the only Church of Christ all the Church of Christ and so consequently the Catholick Church or you mean that it is a Church of Christ which hath an especiall Prerog ative enabling it to require obedience of all the Disciples of Christ. If you say the former we desire to know 1. when it became so to be It was not so when all the Church was together at Hierusâ—lem and no foundation of any Church at all laid at Rome Acts 1. 1 2 3 4 5. It was not so when the first Church of the Gentiles was gathered at Antioch and the Disciples first began to be called Christians for as yet we have no tydings of any Church at Rome It was not so when Paul wrote his Epistles for he makes express mention of many other Church in other places which had no relation unto any Churches at Rome more than they had one to another in their common Profession of the same faith and therein enjoyed equall gifts and Priviledges with it It was not so in the dayes of the Primitive Fathers of the first three hundred years who all of them not one excepted took the Roman to be a local particular Church and the Bishop of Rome to be such a Bishop as they esteemed of all other Churches and Bishops
the only Church of Christ in the earth at least that others are so only so far as they agree with us we being our selves the Rule and Standard of all Gospell Church state laying weight upon what we differ from others in for the most part exceedingly above what it doth deserve Were the Same mind in us that was in Christ Jesus the same frame of spirit that was in his blessed Apostles we should be willing to try the effects of his love and care towards all that profess his Name by a Sedate Consideration at least how far he hath instructed them in the knowledg of his will and what effects this learning of him may produce And to tell you truly I do not think there is a more horrid monster in the earth than that opinion is which in the great diversity that there is among Christians in the world includes happiness and Salvation within the limits and precincts of any party of them as though Christ and the Gospell their own faith obedience and sufferings could not possibly do them any good in their station and condition This is that Alâ—cto Cuitristia bella Iraque insidiaeque crimina noxia Cordi Odit ipse pater Plâ—ton odere sorores Tartareae Monstrum Tot sese vertit in ora Tam saevae facies tot pullulat atra Colubris Whereever this opinion takes place which indeed bidâ— defiance to the Goodness of God and the blood of Christ with a Gigantick boldness for men to talk of Moderation Vnity and Peace is to mock others and to befool themselves in things of the greatest importance in the world altera manu ostentant panem alter a lapidem ferunt for my own part I have not any firmer perâ—wasion in and about these things nor that yields more satisfaction and contentment unto my mind in reflections upon it than this that if a man sincerely beleive all that and only that wherein all Christians in the world agree and yield obedience unto God according to the guidance of what he doth so beleive not neglecting or refusing the knowledg of any one Truth that he hath sufficient means to be instructed â— he need not go unto any Church in the world to secure his Salvation Hic murus aheneus esto It is true it is the Duty of such a man to joyn himself unto some Church of Christ or other which walks in professed subjection unto his institutions and in the observation of his appointments But to think that his not being of or joyning with this or that Society should out him off from all hopes of a blessed eternity is but to entertain a viper in our minds or to act suitably to the Principles of the old Serpent and to put â—orth the venome of of his poyson Some of the Antients indeed tell us that out of the Catholick Church there is no Salvation And so say I also buâ— withall that the beleif mentioned of the Truths generally embraced by Christians in their present divisions in the world I still speak of the most famous and numerous Societies of them and its profession do so constitute a man a member of the Catholick Church that whilest he walks answerably to his profession it is not in the power of this or that no not of all the Churches in the world to divest him of that Priviledge Nor can all these cryes that are in the world We are the Church and we are the Church you are not the Church and you are not the Church perswade me but that as every Assembly in the generall notion of it is a Chorch so every Assembly of Christians that ordinarlly meet to worship God in Christ according to his appointment is a Church of Christ Haec mi pater Te dicere aequum fuit id defendere when you talked of Moderation and Unity such Principles as these had better become you than those which you either privately couched in your Discourse or openly insisted on Men that think of Reducing unity among Christians upon the precise terms of that Truth which they suppose themselves insolidum possessors of Ipsi fibe somnia fingunt do but entertain themselves with pleasant dreams which a little Consideration may awake them from Charity condescension a retrenchment of opinions with a rejection of secular interests and a design for the pursuit of generall obedience without any such respect to the Particular enclousures which diversity of opinions and different measures of Light and Knowledge have made in the field of the Lord as should confine the effects of any Duty towards the Disciples of Christ unto those within them with the like actings of minds suited unto the example of Jesus Christ must introduce the desired Vnity or wee shall expect it in vain These are some of my hasty thoughts upon the Principles of Protestants before mentioned which you and others may make use of as you and they please In the mean time I shall pray that we may amidst all our Differences love one another pray for one another wait patiently for the communication of farther Light unto one another leave evil surmizes and much more the condemning and seeking the ruine of those that dissent from us which men usually do on various pretences most of them false and coyned for the present purpose And when we can arrive thereunto I shall hope that from such generall Principles aâ— before mentioned somewhat may be advanced towards the Peace of Christians and that there will be so when the whole concernment of Religion shall in the Providence of God be unravelled from that worldly and secular interest wherewith it hath been wound up and entangled for sundry Ages and when men shall not be ingaged from their cradles to their graves in a precipitate Zeal for any Church or way of Profession by outward Advantages inseparably mixed and blended with it before they came into the world In the mean time to expect unity in profession by the Reduction of all men to a precise agreement in all the Doctrines that have been and are ventilated among Christians and in all Acts and wayes of worship is to refer the Supream and last Determination of things evangelical to the sword secular power and violence and to inscribe vox ultima Christi upon great guns and other engines of war seing otherwise it will not be effected and what may be done this way I know not Sponte tonat coeunt ipsae sine flamine nubesâ— CHAP. 10. Further Vindication of the second Chapter of the Animadversions the remaining Principles of Fiat Lux considered IT is time to return and put an end unto our review of those Principles which I observed your Discourse to be built upon The next as laid down in the Animadversions p. 103. is That the Pope is a good man one that seeks nothing but our good that never did us harm but hath the Care and inspectirn of us committed unto him by Christ. In the Repetition hereof you leave out all
rather think that fails you at present then your Conscience but a failure I am sure there is and you shall take the liberty to charge it where you please which is more then every one would allow you I would indeed desirously free my self from the labour of transcrtbing ought that you have written to this purpose in your Fiat and only refer you to the places which you seem to have forgotten But because this is the last instance of this kind that we are to treat about and you have by degrees raised your Confidence in denying your own words to that height as to accuse them of madness who do but remind you of them I shall represent once again unto you what you have written to this purpose and I am perswaded upon your review of it you will like it so well as to be sorry that ever you disowned it I shall instance only in one place which is Sect. 22. p. 270 271. where your wordsare these When I beheld in the Catholick Countreys the deep reverence and earnest Devotion of the people the Majesty of their Service the Gravity of their Altars the decency of their Priests certainly said I within my self this is the House of God the Gate of Heaven Alass our Churches in England as they be now be as short of those either for decency use or piety as stables to a Princely Pallace There they be upon their knees all the week long at their prayers many of them constantly an hour together in the morning and half an hour he that is least and my house said God is the house of Prayer but our Churches are either shut up all the week or if they be open are wholly taken up with boyes shouting running and gambolling all about On Sundayes indeed our people sit quiet and decently drest but to bow the knee is quite out of fashion and if any one chance to do it as it is rare to behold so he is very nimble at it and as soon up as down as if he made a courtship with his knees and only tryed if his nerves and sinews were as good to how as to stand upright and our whole Religious work here is to sit quietly whilest the Minister speaks upon a Text and that we spend all our dayes ever learning and teaching c. If this Discourse must be esteemed Text I pray tell me whose it is yours or mine or whether it doth not contain a comparison between the Devotion of your Catholicks and Protestants and whether that that of the former be not preferred above the other And when you have done so pray also tell me whether you suppose it an honest and candid way of handling matters of this importance or indeed of any sert whatever for a man to say and unsay at his pleasure according unto what he apprehends to be for his present advantage And whether a man may believe you that you so accurately pondered the words of your Fiat as you seem to pretend seeing you dare not abide by what you have written but disclaim it And yet I confess this may fall out if your design in the weighing of your words was so to place them as to deceive us by them which indeed it seems to have been But it is your unhappiness that your words are brought unto other mens seales after they had so fairly passed your own For the Devotion its self by the way of Catholicks which you here paint forth unto us it looks very suspitiously to be painted The piety of your Churches wherein they exceed ours I confess I understand not and your peoples frequenting publick places to perform their private devotions leans much to the old Pharisaism which our Saviour himself hath branded to all eternity for hypocriticall and carried on with little attendance unto his precept of making the closet and that with the door shut upon the Devotionists the most proper seat of private supplications Besides if their prayers consist as for the most part they do in going over by tale a set number of sayings which they little understand you may do well to commend your Devotion to them that understand not one word of Gospel for those that do will not attend unto it And so I have once more passed through the Principles of your work with a fresh discussion of some of them which I tell you again I suppose sufficient to satisfie judicious and ingenuous Persons in the sophistry and inconclusiveness of the whole My further proceedure being intended for the satisfaction of your self and such others as have imbided the prejudices which you endeavour to forestall your minds with all and thereby have given no small impeachment unto your judgement and ingenuity CHAP. 11. Judicious Readers Schoolmen the forgers of Popery Nature of the Discourse in Fiat Lux. YOur ensuing Discourses are such as might well be passed by as containing nothing serious or worth a review An passim sequerer corvum Ludicrous Similitudes with trisling exceptions to some words in the Animadversions cut off from that coherence wherein they are placed are the chief ingredients of it With these you aim with your wonted success to make sport Venite in ignem Pleni ruris insicetiarum Annales Volusi I wish we had agreed before hand Vt facerestu quod velles nec non ego possem Indulgere mihi That I might have been freed from the Consideration of such trifles As the Case stands I shall make my passage through them with what speed I can First You except against the Close of the consideration of your Principles namely that I would do so to my Book also if I had none to deal with but ingenuous and judicious Readers And tell me that it seems what follows is for Readers neither judicious nor ingenuous But why so I pray That which is written for the information of them who want either judgement or ingenuity may be also written for their use who have both Neither did I speak absolutely of them that were ingenuous and judicious but added also that they were such as had an acquaintance with the state of Religion of old and at this day in Europe with the concernment of their own souls in these things With such as these I supposed then and do still that a discovery of the Sophistry of your Discourse and the falseness of the Principles you proceeded on was sufficient to give them satisfaction as to the uselesness of the whole without a particular ventilating of the flourishes that you made upon your sandy foundations But because I know there were some that might by the commendation of your friends light upon your Discourse that either being prepossessed by prejudices might want the ingenuity to examine particularly your Assertions and Inferences or through unacquaintedness with the Stories of some things that you referred unto might be disenabled to make a right judgement of what you averred I was willing to take some further pains also for your satisfaction
readiness to receive it when it shall be so manifest upon the Authority of the Author of the whole is not in the least danger to be induced by that disbelief to question any thing of that which he is convinced so to be revealed But as I said your Concernment lyes not therein who are not able to prove that Protestants have rejected any one part much less substantial part of Religion and your conclusion upon a supposition of the rejection of errours and practises or the contrary to the Gospel or principles of Religion is very infirm The ground of all your Sophistry lyes in this that men who receive Christian Religion are bound to resolve their faith unto the Authority of them that preach it first unto them whereupon it being impossible for them to question any thing they teach without an impeachment of their absolute Infallibility and so far the Authority which they are to rest upon they have no firm foundation left for their assent unto the things which as yet they do not question and consequently in process of time may easily be induced so to do But this presumption is perfectly destructive to all the certainty of Christian Religion For whereas it proposeth the subject matter of it to be believed with divine faith and supernatural it leaves no formal reason or cause of any such faith no foundation for it to be built upon or Principle to be resolved into For how can Divine faith arise out of humane Authority For acts being specificated by their objects such as is the Authority on which a man believes such is his faith humane if that be humane divine if it be divine But resolving as we ought all our faith into the Authority of God revealing things to be believed and knowing that Revelation to be entirely contained in the Scriptures by which we are to examine and try whatever is by any man or men proposed unto us as an object of our faith they proposing it only upon this consideration that it is a part of that which is revealed by God in the Scripture for us to believe without which they have no ground nor warrant to propose any thing at all unto us in that kind we may reject any of their proposals which we find and discern not to be so revealed or not to be agreeable to what is so revealed without the least weakning of our assent unto what is revealed indeed or making way for any man so to do For whilest the formal reason of faith remains absolutely unimpeached different apprehensions about particular things to be believed have no efficacy to weaken faith its self as we shall farther see in the examination of your ensuing Discourse The same way and means that lopt off some branches will do the like to others and root too but the errours and mistakes of men are not branches growing from the root of the Gospel A Vilification of that Church wherein they find themselves who have a mind to prevaricate upon pretence of Scripture and power of interpreting it light spirit or reason adjoyned with a personal obstinacy that will not submit will do it roundly and to effect This first brought off the Protestants from the Roman Catholick Church this lately separated the Presbyterians from the English Protestant Church the Independent from the Presbyterian and the Quakers from the other Independent And this left good maintains nothing of Christian Religion but the moral part which indeed and truth is but honest Paganism This speech is worthy of all serious Consideration That which this Discourse seems to amount unto is that if a man question or reject any thing that is taught by the Church whereof he is a member there remains no way for him to come unto any certainty in the remaining parts of Religion but that he may on as good grounds question and reject all things as any As you phrase the matter by mens vilifying a Church which a mind to prevaricate upon pretence of Scripture c. though there is no consequence in what you say yet no man can be so mad as to plead in justification of such a proceeding For it is not much to be doubted but that he who layeth such a foundation and makes such a beginning of a separation from any Church will make a progress suitable thereunto But if you will speak unto your own purpose and so as they may have any concernment in what you say with whom you deal you must otherwise frame your hypothesis Suppose a man to be a member of any Church or to find himself in any Church state with others and that he doth at any time by the light and direction of the Scripture discover any thing or things to be taught or practised in that Church whereof he is so a member which he cannot assent unto unless he will contradict the Revelation that God hath made of himself his mind and will in that compleat Rule of all that Religion and worship which are pleasing unto him and therefore doth suspend his assent thereunto and therein dissent from the determination of that Church then you are to assert for the promotion of your design that all the Consequents will follow which you expatiate upon But this supposition fixes immoveably upon the penalty of forfeiting their interest in all saving truth all Christians whatever Greeks Abissines Armenians Protestants in the Churches wherein they find themselves and so makes â—â—ustrate all their attempts for their reconciliation to the Church of Rome For do you think they will attend unto you when you perswade them to a relinquishment of the Communion of that Church wherein they find themselves to joyn with you when the first thing you tell them is that if they do so they are undone and that for ever And yet this is the summ of all that you can plead with them if there be any sense in the Argument you make use of against our relinquishment of the opinions and practises of the Church of Rome because we or our forefathers were at any time members thereof or lived in its communion But you would have this the special Priviledge of your Church alone Any other Church a man may leave yea all other Churches besides he may relinquish the principles wherein he hath been instructed yea it is his duty to renounce their Communion only your Church of Rome is wholly sacred a man that hath once been a member of it must be so for ever and he that questions any thing taught therein may on the same grounds question all the Articles of faith in the Christian Religion And who gave you leave to suppose the only thing in Question between us and to use it as a medium to educe your Conclusion from is it your business to take care bullatis ut tibi nugis Pagina turgescat dare pondus idonea fumo We know the condition of your Roman Church to be no other then that of other Churches if it be not worse
then that of any of them And therefore on what terms and reasons soever a man may relinquish the opinions and renounce the Communion of any other Church upon the same may he renounce the Communion and relinquish the Opinions of yours And if there be no reasons sufficiently cogent so to deal with any Church whatever I pray on what grounds do you proceed to perswade others to such a Course that they may joyn with you Dicisque facisque quod ipse Non Sani esse hominis non sanus juret Orestes To disintangle you out of this Labyrinth whereinto you have cast your self I shall desire you to observe that if the Lord Christ by his Word be the Supream Revealer of all Divine Truth and the Church that is any Church whatever be only the Ministerial proposer of it under and from him being to be regulated in all its propositions by his Revelation if it shall chance to propose that for Truth which is not by him revealed as it may do seeing it hath no security of being preserved from such failures but only in its attendance unto that Rule which it may neglect or corrupt A man in such a Case cannot discharge his Duty to the Supream Revealer without dissenting from the Ministerial proposer Nay if it be a Truth which is proposed and a man dissent from it because he is not convinced that it is revealed he is in no danger to be induced to question other Propositions which he knows to be so revealed his faith being built upon and resolved into that Revelation alone All that remains of your discourse lyes with its whole weight on this presumption because some men may either wilfully prevaricare from the Truth or be mistaken in their apprehensions of it and so dissent from a Church that teacheth the truth and wherein she so teacheth it without cause therefore no man may or ought to relinquish the errors of a Church which he is really and truly convinced by Scripture and solid reason suitable thereunto so to be An inference so wild and so destructive of all assurance in every thing that is knowable in the world that I wonder how your Interest could induce you to give any countenance unto it For if no man can certainly and infallibly know any thing by any way or means wherein some or other are ignorantly or wilfully mistaken we must bid adiew for ever to the certain knowledge of any thing in this world And how slightly soever you are pleased to speak of Scripture Light Spirit and Reason they are the proper names of the wayes and helps that God hath graciously given to the sons of men to come to the knowledge of himself And if the Scripture by the assistance of the Spirit of God and the light unto it communicated unto men by him be not sufficient to lead them in the use and improvement of their Reason unto the saving knowledge of the will of God and that assurance therein which may be a firm foundation of acceptable obedience unto him they must be content to go without it for other wayes and means of it there are none But this is your manner of dealing with us All other Churches must be sleighted and relinquished the means appointed and sanctified by God himself to bring us unto the knowledge of and settlement in the Truth must be rejected that all men may be brought to a fanatical unreasonable resignation of their faith to you and your Church if this be not done men may with as good reason renounce Truth as Error and after they have rejected one error be inclined to cast off all that Truth for the sake whereof that error was rejected by them And I know not what other inconveniences and mischiefs will follow It must needs be well for you that you are Gallinae filius albae Seeing all others are Viles pulli nati infelicibus ovis Your only misadventure is that you are fallen into somewhat an unhappy age wheréin men are hard-hearted and will not give away their Faith and Reason to every one that can take the confidence to beg them at their hands But you will now prove by instances that if a man deny any thing that your Church proposeth he may with as good reason deny every Truth whatever I shall follow you through them and consider what in your matter or manner of proposal is worthy that serious perusal of them which you so much desire To begin See if the Quakers deny not as resolutely the regenerating power of Baptisme as you the efficacy of Absolution See if the Presbyterians do not with as much reason evacuate the Prelacy of Protestants as they the Papacy All things it seems are alike Truth and Error and may with the same reason be opposed and rejected And because some men renounce errors others may on as good grounds renounce the Truth and oppose it with as solid and cogent reasons The Scripture it seems is of no use to direct guide or settle men in these things that relate to the worship and knowledge of God What a strange dream hath the Church of God been in from the dayes of Moses if this be so Hitherto it hath been thought that what the Scripture teacheth in these things turned the scales and made the embracement of it reasonable as the rejection of them the contrary As the woman said to Joab They were wont to speak in old time saying they shall surely ask counsel at Abel and so they ended the matter They said in old time concerning these things To the Law and the Testimonies search the Scriptures and so they ended the matter But it seems tempora mutantur and that now Truth and Falsehood are equally probable having the same grounds the same evidences Quis leget haec min tu istud ais Do you think to be believed in these incredible figments fit to bear a part in the stories of Vlysses unto Alcinous Yet you proceed See if the Socinian Arguments against the Trinity be not as strong as yours against the Eucharist But where did you ever read any Arguments of ours against the Eucharist Have you a dispensation to say what you please for the promotion of the Catholick Cause Are not the Arguments you intend indeed rather for the Eucharist then against it Arguments to vindicate the nature of that holy Eucharistical Ordinance and to preserve it from the manifold abuses that you and your Church do put upon it That is they are arguments against your Transubstantiation and proper sacrifice that you intend And will you now say that the Arguments of the Socinians against the Trinity the great fundamental Article of our Prosession plainly taught in the Scripture and constantly believed by the Church of all Ages are of equal force and validity with those used against your Transubstantiation and Sacrifice of the Mass things never mentioned no not once in the whole Scripture never heard of nor believed by the Church of old and
greatest moment and of most indispensible necessity unto Salvation whereby you render it perfectly useless according to the old Rule Quod non potest intelligi debet negligi it is fit that should be neglected which cannot be understood And 8. There is a book lately written by one of your party after you have been frequently warned and told of these things entituled Fiat Lux giving countenance unto many other hard reflections upon it as hath been manifested in the Animadversions written on that Book 9. Your great Masters in their writings have spoken very contemptuously of it whereof I shall give you a few instances The Council of Trent which is properly yours determines as I told you that their Traditions are to be received and venerated pari pietatis affectu reverentia with an equal affection of piety and reverence as the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament which is a setting up of the Altar of Damascus with that of God himself in the same Temple Sess. 4. Dec. 1. And Andradius no small part of that Convention in his defence of that Decree tells us that cum Christus fragilitati memoriae Evangelio scripto succurrendum putavit it a breve compendium libris tradi voluit ut pars maxima tanquam magni precii thesaurus traditionibus intimis Ecclesiae visceribus infixis relicta fuerit As our Lord Christ thought meet to relieve the frailty of memory by the written Gospel so he would have a short compendium or abridgement committed unto books that the greatest part as a most precious treasure might be left unto Traditions fixed in the very inward bowels of the Church This is that cordial and absolute respect even unto admiration that your Catholicks bear unto the Scripture And he that doth not admire it seems to me to be very stupid It contains some small part of the mysteries of Christian Religion the great treasure of them lying in your Traditions and thereupon he concludes Canonem seu Regulam fidei exactissimam non esse Scripturam sed Ecclesiae judicium that the Canon or most exact Rule of Faith is not the Scripture but the judgement of the Church Much to the same purpose as you plead in your Fiat and Epistola Pighius another Champion of your Church Ecclesiast Hierarch Lib. 1. c. 4. after he hath given many reasons to prove the obscurity of the Scripture with its flexibility to every mans sense as you know who also hath done and referred all things to be determined by the Church concludes Si hujus Doctrinae memores fuissemus haereticos scilicet non esse informandos vel convincendos ex Scripturis meliore same loco essent res nostrae sed dum ostentandi ingenii eruditionis gratia cum Luthero in certamen discenditur Scripturarum excitatum est hoc quod proh dolor nunc videmus incendium Had we been mindful of this Doctrine that Hereticks are not to be instructed nor convinced out of the Scriptures our affairs had been in a better condition then now they are but whilest some to shew their wit and learning would needs contend with Luther out of the Scriptures the fire which we now with grief behold was kindled and stirred up And it may be you remember who it was that called the Scripture Evangelium nigrum and Theologiam atramentariam seeing he was one of the most famous champions of your Church and Cause But before we quite leave your Council of Trent we may do well to remember the advice which the Fathers of it who upon the stirs in Germany removed unto Bononia gave to the Pope Julius the third which one that was then amongst them afterwards published Denique say they in their letters to him quod inter omnia consilia quae nos hoc tempore dare possumus omnium gravissimum ad extremum reservavimus Oculi hic aperiendi sunt omnibus nervis adnitendum erit ut quam minimum Evangelii poterit praesertim vulgari lingua in iis legatur Civitatibus quae sub tua ditione potestate sunt sufficiatque tantillum illud quod in missa legi solet nec eo amplius cuiquam mortalium legere liceat Quam diu enim pauculo illo homines contenti fuerunt tam diu res tuae ex sententia successêre â—aedemq in contrarium labi caeperunt ex quo ulterius legi vulgo usurpatum est Hic ille in summa Est liber qui praeter caeteros hasce nobis tempestates ac turbines conciliavit quibus prope abreptisumus Et sane siquis illum diligenter expendat deinde quae in nostris fieri ecclestis consueverunt singula ordine contempletur videbis plurimum inter se dissidere hanc doctrinam nostram ab illa prorsus diversam esse ac saepe contrariam etiam Quod simul atque homines intelligant à docto scilicet aliquo adversariorum stimulati nou ante clamandi finem faciunt quam rem plane omnem divulgaverint nosque invisos omnibus reddiderint Quare occultandae pauculae illae chartulae sed abhibita quadam cautione diligentia ne ea res majores nobis turbas ac tumultus excitet Last of all that which is the most Weighty of all the advices which that at this time we shall give unto you we have reserved for the close of all Your eyes are here to be opened you are to endeavour with the utmost of your power that as little as may be of the Gospel especially in any vulgar tongue be read in those Cities which are under your government and Authority but let that little suffice them which is wont to be read in the Mass of which mind you also know who is neither let it be lawful for any man to read any more of it For as long as men were contented with that little your affairs were as prosperous as heart could desire and began immediately to decline upon the custome of reading any more of it This is in brief that book which above all others hath procured unto us those tempests and storms wherewith we are almost carryed away headlong And the Truth is if any one shall diligently consider it and then seriously ponder on all the things that are accustomed to be done in our Churches he will find them to be very different the one from the other and our Doctrine to be divers from the Doctrine thereof yea and oftentimes plainly contrary unto it Now this when men begin to understand being stirred up by some learned man or other amongst the adversaries they make no end of clamouring until they have divulged the whole matter and rendred us hateful unto all Wherefore those few sheets of Paper are to be hid but with caution and diligence least their concealment should stir us up greater troubles This is fair and open being a brief summary of that admiration of the Scriptures which so abounds in Catholick Countreys That Hermannus one of some account in your Church affirmed that the
Scriptures could be of no more Authority then Aesops Fables were they not confirmed by the Testimony of your Church we are informed by one Brentius and we believe the information to be true because the saying is defended by Hosius de Authoritat Script Lib. 3. who adds unto it of his own Revera nisi nos Authoritas Ecclesiae doceret hanc scripturam esse Canoncam perexiguum apud nos pondus haberet the truth is if the Authority of the Church did not teach us that this Scripeure is Canomical it would be of very light weight unto us Such Cordial respects do you bear unto it And the forementioned Andradius Defens Con. Trid. Lib. 2. to the same purpose Neque enim in ipsis libris quibus sacra mysteria conscripta sunt quicquam in est Divinitatis quae nos ad credendum quae in illis continentur religione aliqua constring at sed Ecclesiae quae codices illos sacros esse docet antiquorum Patrum fidem pietatem commendat tanta inest vis amplitudo ut illis nemo sine gravissimâ impietatis nota possit repugnare neither is there in those books wherein the Divine Mysteries are written any thing or any character of Divinity or divine original which should on a religious account oblige us to believe the things that are contained in them But yet such is the force and Authority of the Church which teacheth thâ—se books to be sacred and commendeth the faith and piety of the Antient fathers that no man can oppose them without a grievous mark of impiety How by what means from whom should we learn the sense of your Church if not from your Council of Trent and such mighty Champions of it Do you think it equitable that we should listen to suggestions of every obscure Frier and entertain thoughts from them about the sense of your Church contrary to the plain assertion of your Councils and and great Rabbies And if this be the respect that in Catholick Countries is given to the Scripture I hope you will not find may of your Countrymen rivals with them therein It is all but Hayle and Crâ—cifie We respect the Scriptures but there is another part of Gods word besides them we respect the Scriptures but Traditions contain more of the Doctrine of Truth we respect the Scriptures but think it not meet that Christians be suffered to read them we respect the Scripture but do not think that it hath any character in it of its own Divine original for which we should believe it we respect the Scripture but yet we would not believe were it not commended unto us by our Church we respect the Scripture but it is dark obscure not intelligible but by the interpretation of our Church Pray Sir keep your respects at home they are despised by the Scripture it self which gives Testimony unto its own Authority Perfection Sufficiency to guide us to God Perspicuity and Certainty without any respect unto your Church or its Authority And we know its Testimony to be true And for our parts we fear that whilest these Joabs kisses of respect are upon your lips you have a sword in your right hands to let out all the Vitals of Divine Truth and Religion Do you think your general expressions of respect and that unto admiration are a covering long and broad enough to hide all this contempt and reproach that you continually poure upon the Scriptures Deal thus with your Ruler and see whether he will accept your Person Give him some good words in general but let your particular expressions of your esteem of him come short of what his state and regal dignity do require will it be well taken at your hands Expressions of the same nature with these instanced in might be collected out of your chiefest Authors sufficient to fill a volume and yet I never read nor heard that any of them were ever stoned in your Catholick Countreys whatever you intimate of the boyling up of your zeal into a rage against those that should go about to diminish it Indeed whatever you pretend this is your faith about the Scripture and therefore I desire that you would accept of this account why I cannot comply with your wish and not speak any more of Papists slighting the Scripture seeing I know they do so in the sense and way by me expressed and other wayes I never said they did so From the account of your Faith we may proceed to your Charity wherewith you close this Discourse Speaking of your Roman Catholicks you say the Scripture is theirs and Jesus Christ is theirs who will one day plead their Cause What do you mean Sir by theirs Do you intend it exclusively to all others so theirs as not to be the right and portion of any other It is evident that this is your sense not only because unless it be so the words have neither sense nor emphasis in them but also because suitably unto this sense you elsewhere declare that the Roman and the Catholick Church are with you one and the same This is your Charity fit to accompany and to be the fruit of the faith before discoursed of This is your Chatholicism the impaling of Christ Scripture the Church and consequently all acceptable Religion to the Roman Party and Faction down right Donatism the wretchedest Schism that ever rent the Church of God which makes the wounds of Christendome incurable and all hope of coalition in Love desperate Saint Paul directing one of his Epistles unto all that in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that no countenance from that expression of our Lord Jesus Christ might be given unto any surmize of his appropriating unto himself and those with him a peculiar interest in Jusus Christ he adds immediately both their Lord and ours the Lord of all that in every place call upon his name 1 Cor. 1. This was the old Catholicism which the new hath as much affinity unto as darkness hath to light and not one jot more The Scripture is ours and Christ is ours and what have any else to do with them what though in other places you call on the name of Jesus Christ yet he is our Lord not yours This I say is that wretched Schism which cloathed with the name of Catholicism which after it had slain it robbed of its name and garments the world for some ages hath groaned under and is like to do so whilst it is supported by so many secular advantages and interests as are subservient unto it at this day CHAP. 14. Of Reason Jews objections against Christ. PAg. 27. You proceed to vindicate your unreasonable Paragraph about Reason or rather against it What reason we are to expect in a dispute against the use of Reason in and about the things which are the highest and most proper object of it is easie for any one to imagine For by Reason in Religion we understand not meerly the Raâ—ocination
over the flocks but Ministers of their faith By these are the flocks of Christ governed as by shepherds appointed by him the great Bishop and Shepherd of their souls according to the Rules by him prescribed for the rule of the one and obedience of the other But if by governed by another man you mean absolutely supreamly at his will and pleasure then we deny that any Disciple of Christ is in the things of God so to be governed by any man and affirm that to assert it is to cast down Jesus Christ from his Throne But you say if he be not immediate head unto all but Ministers head the people and Christ heads the Ministers this in effect is nothing but to make every Minister a Bishop Why do you not plainly say what it is more then manifest you would have All this while you heed no more the Laws of the Land then constitutions of the Gospel Answ. I have told you how Christ is the immediate Head unto all and yet how he hath appointed others to preside in his Churches under him and that this should infer an equality in all that are by him appointed to that work is most senseless to imagine nor did I in the least intimate any such thing but only that therefore there was no need of any one supream head of the whole Catholick Church nor any place or room left for such an one without the deposition of Christ himself Because the King is the only supream Head of all his people doth it therefore follow that if he appoint Constables to rule in every parish with that allotment of power which by his Laws he gives unto them and Justices of Peace to rule over them in an whole County that therefore every Constable in effect is a Justice of Peace or that there is a sameness in their office Christ is the head of every man that is in the Church be he Bishop or Minister or private man and when the Ministers are said to head the people or the Bishops to head them the expression is improper an inferiour Ministerial subordinate rule being expressed by the name of that which is supream and absolute or they head them not absolutely but in some respect only as every one of them dischargeth the Authority over and towards them wherewith he is intrusted This assertion of Christs sole absolute Headship and denial of any Monarchical state in the Church Catholick but what ariseth from thence doth not as every child may see concern the difference that is about the superiority of Bishops to Ministers or Presbyters For notwithstanding this there are degrees in the Ministry of the Church and several orders of men are engaged therein and whatever there are there might have been more had it seemed to our good Lord Christ to appoint them And whatever order of men may be supposed to be instituted by him in his Church he must be supposed to be the Head of them all and they are all to serve him in the Duties and Offices that they have to discharge towards the Church and one another This headship of Christ is the thing that you are to oppose and its exclusiveness to the substitution of an absolute Head over the whole Catholick Church in his place because of his bodily absence from the earth But this you cast out of sight and instead thereof fall upon the equality of Bishops and Ministers which no way ensues thereon Both Bishops and Presbyters agreeing well enough in the Truth we assert and plead for This you say is contrary to the Gospel and the Law of the Land What is I pray that Christ is the only absolute Head of the Catholick Church No but that Bishops and Ministers are in effect all one But what is that to your purpose will it advantage your Cause what way ever that problem be determined Was any occasion offered you to discourse upon that Question Nay you perceive well enough your self that this is nothing at all to your design and therefore in your following discourse you double and sophisticate making it evident that either you understand not your self what you say or that you would not have others understand you or that you confound all things with a design to deceive for when you come to speak of the Gospel you attempt to prove the appointment of one supream Pastor to the whole Catholick Church and by the Law of the Land the Superiority of Bishops over Ministers as though these things were the same or had any relation one to another whereas we have shewed the former in your sense to be destuctive to the latter Truth never put any man upon such subter fuges and I hope the difficulties that you find your self perplexed withall may direct you at length to find that there is a deceit in your right hand But let us hear your own words As for the Gospel the Lord who had been visible Governour and Pastor of his flock on earth when he was now to depart hence as all the Apostles expected one to be chosen to succeed him in his care so did he notwithstanding his own invisible presence and providence over his flock publickly appoint one And when he taught them that he who was greatest among them should be as the least he did not deny but suppose one greater and taught in one and the same breath both that he was over them and for what he was over them namely to feed not to tyrannize not to domineer and hurt but to direct comfort and conduct his flock in all humility and tenderness as a servant of all their spiritual necessities and if a Bishâ—p be otherwise affected it is the fault of his Person not his place And what is it that you would prove hereby is it that Bishops are above Ministers which in the words immediately foregoing you asserted and in those next ensuing confirm from the Law of the Land is there any tendency in your Discourse towards any such purpose Nay do not your self know that what you seek to insinuate namely the instiâ—ution of one supream Pastor of the whole Catholick Church one of the Apostles to be above and ruler over all the rest of the Apostles and the whole Church besides is perfectly destructive of the Hierarchy of Bishops in England as established by Law and also at once casting down the main if not only foundation that they plead for their station and order from the Gospel For all Prelate Protestants as you call them assert an equality in all the Apostles and a superiority in them to the 70. Disciples whence by a parity of reason they conclude unto he superiority of Bishops over Ministers to be continued in the Church And are you not a fair Advocate for your Cause and well meet for the reproving of others for not consenting unto them But waving that which you little câ—re for and are not at all concerned in let us see how you prove that which we know you
greatly desire to give some countenance unto that is an universal visible Pastor over the whole Catholick Church in the place and room of Christ himself First You tell us that the Apostles expected one to be chosen to succeed Christ in his care But to have one succeed another in his care infers that that other â—â—â—sâ—â— o take and exercise the Care which formerly he haâ— and exercised which in this case is highly blasphemous once to imagine I wish you would â—ake more Care of what you say in things of this nature aâ—d not suffer the impetuous 〈…〉 your interest to cast you upon expressions so 〈◊〉 to thâ— honour oâ— Christ and safety of his Churâ—â— And how do you prove that the Apostles had any such expectations as that which you mention Our Saviour gave them equal commission to teach all Nations told them that as his father had sent him so he sent them that he had chosen them twelve but that one of them was a Devil never that one of them should be Pope Their Institution Instruction Priviledges Charge Calling were all equal How then should they come to have this expectation that one of them should be chosen to succeed Christ in his Care when they were all chosen to serve under him in the continuance of his care towards his Church That which you obscurely intimate from whence this expectation of yours might arise is the contest that was amongst them aâ—â—â—t preheminence Luk. 22. 24. There was a strife â—mongst them which of them should be the greatest 〈◊〉 you suppose was upon their perswasion that one should be chosen in particular to succeed the Lord Christ in his Care whereupon they fell into difference about the place But 1. Is it not somewhat strange unto your self how they should contest about a succession unto Christ in his absence who had not once thought that he would ever be absent from them nor could bear the mention of it without great sorrow of heart when afterwards he began to acquaint them with it 2. How should they come in your apprehension to quarrel about that which as you suppose and contend was somewhile before determined For this contest of yours was somewhile after the promise of the Keys to Peter and the saying of Christ that he would build his Church on the Rock Were the Apostles think you as stupid as Protestants that they could not see the Supremacy of Peter in those passages but must yet fall at variance who should be Pope 3. How doth it appear that this strife of theirs who should be greatest did not arise from their apprehension of an earthly Kingdom a hope whereof according to the then current perswasion of the Judaical Church to be erected by their master whom they believed in as the true Messiah they were not delivered from until after his Resurrection when they were filled with the Spirit of the New Testament Act. 1. Certainly from that root sprang the ambitious desire of the Sons of Zebedee after preheminence in his Kingdom and the designing of the rest of them in this place from the manner of its management by strife seems to have had no better a spring 4. The stop put by our Lord Jesus unto the strife that was amongst them makes it manifest that it arose from no such expectation as you imagine or that at least if it did yet your expectation was irregular vain and groundless For 1. He tells them that there should be no such greatness in his Church as that which they contended about being like to the Soveraignty exercised by and in the Nations of the earth from which he that can shew a difference in your Papal Rule erit mihi magnus Apollo 2. He tells them that his Father had equally provided a Kingdom that is heavenly and eternal for all them that believed which was the only greatness that they ought to look or enquire after 3. That as to their Priviledge in his Kingdom it should be equal unto them all for they should all fit on Thrones judging the twelves tribes of Israel so ascribing equal power Authority and dignity unto them all which utterly overthrows the figment of the supremacy of any one of them over the rest Luk. 22. 30. Matth. 19. 28. And 4. Yet further to prevent any such conceit as that which you suppose them to have had concerning the prelation of any one of them he tells them that one was their Master even Christ and that all they were brethren Mat. 23. 8. so giving them to understand that he had designed them to be perfectly every way equal among themselves So ill have you layed the foundation of your Plea as that it guides us to a full determination of the contrary to your pretence and that given by our Saviour himself with many reasons perswading his Disciples of the equity of it and unto an acquiescency in it And what you add that he presently appointed one to the preheminence you imagine is altogether inconsistent with what you would conclude from the striâ—e about it For the appointment you fancy preceded this contention and had it been real and to any such purpose would certainly have prevented it Thus you do neither prove from the Gospel what you pretend unto namely that Bishops are above Ministers so well do you plead your Cause nor what you intend namely that the Pope is appointed over them all Only you wisely add a caution about what a Bishop ought to be and do de jure and what any one of them may â—o or be de facto because it is impossible for any â—an to find the least difference between the domination which our Saviour expresly condemns and that which your Pope doth exercise Although I know not whither you would think meet to have him devested of that Authority on the pretence whereof he so domineers in the world Finding your self destitute of any countenance from the Gospel you proceed to the Laws of the Land To what purpose to prove that Christ appointed one amongst his Apostles to preside with plenitude of Power over all the rest of them and consequently over the whole Catholick Church succeeding him in his care certainly you will find little countenance in our Laws to this purpose But let us hear your own words again As for the Laws of the Land say you it is there most strongly decreed by the consent and Authority of the whole Kingdom not only that Bishops are our Ministers but that the Kings Majesty is head of the Bishops also in the line of Hierarchy from whose hand they receive both their places and jurisdiction This was established not only by one but by several Parliament Acts both in the reign of King Edward and Queen Elizabeth What will hence follow that there is one universal Bishop appointed to succeed Christ in his Care over the Church Catholick the thing you attempted to prove in the words immediately foregoing Do not the same Laws which assert
the order you mention exclude that which you would introduce Or would you prove that Bishops by the Law of this Land have a jurisdiction superior unto Ministers who ever went about to deny it or what will the remembrance of it advance your pretensionâ— And yet neither is this fairly expressed by you For as no Protestants assert the King to be in his power and office interposed between Christ and Bishops or Ministers as to their ministerial office which is purely spiritual so the power of supream Jurisdiction which they ascribe unto him is not as you falsly insinuate granted unto him by the Laws of King Edward and Queen Elizabeth but is an inseparable Priviledge of his imperial Crown exercised by his Royal Predecessours and asserted by them against the inâ—rusions and usurpations of the Pope of Rome only diclared by those and other Laws But I perceive you have another design in hand You are entring upon a discourse wherein you compare your selves not only with Presbyterians and Independents but Prelate Protestants also in what you ascribe unto Kings in Ecclesiastical affairs preferring your selves before and above them all What just cause you have so to do we shall afterwards consider Your Confidence in it at first view presents its selâ— unto us â— on whereas there was not in the Animadversions any occasion of it administred unto you and your self confess that your whole discourse about it is besides your purpose pag. 66. yet waving almost every thing that was incumbent upon you to have insisted on if you would not plainly have appeared vadimonium deseruisse and to have given up your Fiat as indefensible you divert into a long harangue about it The Thesis you would by various florishes give countenance unto is this That Papists in their deference unto Kings even in Ecclesiastical matters and in their principles of their obedience unto them 〈◊〉 Protestants of all sorts That this is not to ouâ— present purpose your self cannot but see and acknowledge Hower your Discourse such as it is relating to one special head of Difference between us shall be a part considered by its self in our next Chapter CHAP. 16. The Power assigned by Papists and Protestants unto Kings in matters Ecclesiastical Their several Principles discussed and compared YOur Discourse on this head is not reducible by Logick its self unto any method or rules of Argument For it is in general 1. So loose Ambigucus and Metaphorically expressed 2. So Sophistical and inclusive 3. So inconsistent in sundry instances with the Principles and practices of your Church if you speak intelligibly 4. So false and untrue in many particulars that it is scarcely for these excellent qualifications to be paralleld with any thing either in your Fiat or your Epistola First It is loose and ambiguous 1. Not stating what you intend by the Head of the Church which you discourse about 2. Noâ— determining whither the King be such an head of Execution in matter of Religion as may use the Liberty of his own judgement as to what he puts in execution or whether he be not bound to execute your Popes Determinations on the penalty of the forfeiture of his Christianity which I doubt we shall find to be your opinion 3. Not declaring wherein the power which you assign unto him is founded whether in Gods immediate institution oâ— the Concession of the Pope whereon it should solely depend unto whom it is in all things to be made subservient Secondly Sophistical 1. In playing with the ambiguity of that expression Head of the Church and by the advantage thereof imposing on Protestants contradictions between their profession and practice as though in the one they acknowledged the King to be head of the Church and not in the other whereas there is a perfect consonancy between them in the sence wherein they understand that expression shrowding your own sence and opinion in the mean time under the same ambiguity 2. In supposing an absolute universal Head of the whole Catholick Church and then giving reasons why no King can be that Head when you know that the whole Question is whither there by any such head of the Catholick Church on earth or no. 3. In supposing the Principles and practises of the Primitive Church to have been the same with those of the present Roman and those of the present Roman to have been all known and allowed of old which begs all that is in Controversie between us and sundry other instances of the like nature may be observed in it Thirdly Inconsistent with the Principles and Practices of your own Church both 1. In what you ascribe unto Kings and 2. In your stating of the power and Jurisdiction of your Pope if the ambiguity of your words and expressions will allow us to conclude what you intend or aim at Fourthly False 1. In matter of fact as to what you relate of the obedience of your Church unto Kings 2. In the principles and Opinions which you impose on your Advertaries 3. In the declaration that you make of your own and 4. In many particular Assertions whose consideration will afterwards occur This is a business I could have been glad you had not necessitated me to the Consideraâ—ion of for it cannot be truly and distinctly handled 〈…〉 such reflections upon your Church and way as may without extraordinary indulgence redound unto your disadvantage Your have by your own voluntary choice called me to the discussion of those Principles which have created you much trouble in these Nations and put you oftentimes upon attempting their disquiet Now these are things which I desire not I am but a private man and am very well contented you should enjoy all that peace and liberty which you think not meet in other Nations where the Pâ—wer is at your disposal to grant unto them that dissent from you Lex talionis should be far from influencing the minds of Christians in this matter however the equity of it may at any time be pleaded or urged to relieve others in other places under bondage and persecution But I am sure if I judge your proceedings against other men dissenting from you in Conscience to be unjustifiable by the Scripture or Light of Nature or suffrage of the Antient Church as I do I have no reason to desire that they should be drawn into president against their selves in any place in the world And therefore Sir had you provided the best colour you could for your own Principles and palliated them to the 〈◊〉 so to hide them from the eyes of those who it may be are ready to seek their disturbance and trouble from an apprehension of the evil that may ensue upon them and had not set them up in comparison with the Principles of Protestants of all sorts and for the setting off your own with the better grace and luster untruly and individiously reported theirs to expose them unto those thoughts and that severity from supream powers which you seek
his Successors may be added 3. Protestants reach unanimously that it is incumbent on Kings to find out receive embrace and promote the Truth of the Gospel and the Worship of God appointed therein confirming protecting and defending of it by their Regal Power and Authority as also that in their so doing they are to use the Liberty of their own judgements informed by the wayes that God hath appointed for that end independently on the dictates determinations and orders of any other Person or Persons in the world unto whose Authority they should be obnoxious Heathen Kings made Laws for God Dan. 3. chap. 6. Jona 3. And the great thing that we find any of the Good Kings of Judah commended for is that they commanded the worship of God to be observed and performed according unto his own appointment For this end were they then bound to write out a Copy of the Law with their own hands Deut. 14. 18. and to study in it continually To this purpose were they warned charged exhorted and excited by the Prophets that is that they should serve God as Kings And to this purpose are there innumerable Laws of the best Christian Kings and Emperours still extant in the world In these things consists that Supremacy or Headship of Kings which Protestants unanimously ascribe unto them especially those in England to his Royal Majesty And from hence you may see the frivolousness of sundry things you object unto them As first of the Scheme or Series of Ecclesiastical Power which you ascribe to Prelate Protestants and the Laws of the Land from which you say the Presbyterians dissent which you thus express By the Laws of our Land our Series of Government Ecclesiastical stands thus God Christ King Bishop Ministers People The Presbyterian Predicament is thus God Christ Minister People So that the Ministers head in the Presbyterian Predicament toucheth Christs feet immediately and nothing intervenes You Pretend indeed that hereby you do exalt Christ but this is a meer cheat as all men may see with their eyes For Christ is but where he was but the Minister indeed is exalted being now set in the Kings place one degree higher then the Bishops who by Law is under King and Bishops too If I mistake not in my guess you greatly pleased your self with your Scheme wherein you pretend to make forsooth an ocular Demonstration of what you undertook to prove whereas indeed it is as trivial a fancy as a man can ordinarily meet withal For 1. Neither the Law nor Prelates nor Presbyterians ascribe any place at all unto the Kings Majesty in the Series of Spiritual Order he is neither Bishop nor Minister nor Deacon or any way authorized by Christ to convey or communicate power meerly spiritual unto any others No such thing is claimed by our Kings or declared in Law or asserted by Protestants of any sort But in the series of exteriour Government both Prelate Protestants and Presbyterians assign a Supremacy over all Persons in his Dominions and that in all Causes that are inquirable and determinable by or in any Court exercising Jurisdiction and Authority unto his Majesty All sorts assign unto him the Supreme place under Christ in external Government and Jurisdiction None assign him any place in Spiritual Order and meerly Spiritual Power Secondly If you place Bishops on the Series of exterior Government as appointed by the King and confirmed by the Law of the Land there is yet no difference with respect unto them 3. The Question then is solely about the Series of Spiritual order and thereabout it is confessed there are various apprehensions of Protestants which is all you prove and so do magno conatu nugas agere who knows it not I wish there were any need to prove it But Sir this difference about the Superiority of Bishops to Presbyters or their equality or Identity was agitated in the Church many and many a hundred year before you or I were born and will be so probably when we are both dead and forgotten So that what it makes in this dispute is very hard for a sober man to conjecture 4. Who they are that pretend to exalt Christ by a meer asserting Ministers not to be by his institution subject to Bishops which you call a cheat I know not nor shall be their advocate they exalt Christ who love him and keep his Commandments and no other 2. You may also as easily discern the frivolousness of your exclamation against Protestants for not giving up their differences in Religion to the Vmpirage of Kings upon the assignment of that Supremacy unto them which hath been declared When we make the King such an Head of the Catholick Church as you make the Pope we shall seek unto him as the fountain of our faith as you pretend to do unto the Pope For the present we give that honour to none but Christ himself and for what we assign in profession unto the King we answer it wholly in our practical submission Protestants never thought nor said that any King was appointed by Christ to be supreme infallible Proposer of all things to be believed and done in the Worship of God no King ever assumed that power unto himself It is Jesus Christ alone who is the Supreme and absolute Lawgiver of his Church the Author and finisher of our Faith and it is the honour of Kings to serve him in the promotion of his Interest by the exercise of that Authority and duty which we have before declared What unto the dethroning and dishonour as much as in you lyeth of Christ himself and of Kings also you assign unto the Pope in making him the Supreme head and fountain of their faith hath been already considered This is the substance of what you except against Protestants either as to Opinion or Practice in this matter of deference unto Kingly Authority in things Ecclesiastical What is the sense of your Church which you prefer unto your sentiments herein I shall after I have a little examined your present pretensions manifest unto you seeing you will have it so from those who are full well able to inform us of it Fas mihi Pontificum sacrata resolvere jura atque omnia ferre sub auras â—Siqua tegunt tenear Romaenec ligebus ullis For your own part you have expressed you seâ—f in this matter so loosely generally and ambiguously that it is very hard for any man to collect from your words what it is that you assert or what you deny I shall endeavour to draw out your sense by a few enâ—quiries As 1. Do you think the King hath any An â—ority vested in him as King in Ecclesiastical affairs and over Ecclesiastical Persons You tell us That Catholicks observe the King in all things as well Eeclesiastick as Civil pag. 59. that in the line of Corporal power and Authority the King is immediately under God p. 61. with other words to the same purpose if they are to any purpose at all
I desire to know whither you grant in him an Authority derived immediately from God in and over Ecclesiastical affairs as to convene Synods or Councils to reform things amiss in the Church as to the outward administration of them or do you think that he hath such power and Authority to make constitute or appoint Laws with penal Sanctions in and about things Ecclesiastical And Secondly Do you think that in the work which he hath to do for the Church be it what it will be may use the liberty of his own judgement directed by the light of the Scripture or that he is precisely to follow the declarations and determinations of the Pope If he have not this Authority if he may not use this liberty the good words you speak of Catholicks and give unto him signifie indeed nothing at all If then he hath and may you openly rise up against the Bulls Briefs and Interdicts of your Popes themselves and the universal practice of your Church for many Ages And therefore I desire you to inform me Thirdly Whether you do not judge him absolutely to be subject and accountable to the Pope for what ever he doth in Ecclesiastical affairs in his own Kingdoms and Dominions if you answer suitably to the Principles Maximes and practise of your Church you must say he is and if so I must tell you that whatever you ascribe unto him in things Ecclesiastical he acts not about them as King but in some other capacity For to do a thing as a King and to be accountable for what he doth therein to the Pope implyes a Contradiction Fourthly Hath not the Pope a power over his Subjects many of them at least to convent censure judge and punish them and to exempt them in Criminal Cases from his Jurisdiction And is not this a fair Supremacy that it is meet he should be contented withal when you put it into the power of another to exempt as many of his Subjects as he pleaseth and are willing from his Regal Authority 5. When you say that in matters of faith Kings for their own ease remit their Subjects to their Papal Pastor pag. 57. Whether you do not collude with us or indeed do at all think as you speak Do you think that Kings have real power in and about those things wherein you depend on the Pope and only remit their Subjects to him for their own ease You cannot but know that this one Concession would ruine the whole Papacy as being expresly destructive of all the foundations on which it is built Nor did ever any Pope proceed on this ground in his interposures in the world about matters of faith that such things indeed belonged unto others and were only by them remitted unto him for their ease 6. Whether you do not include Kings themselves in youâ— general Assertion pag. 55. That they who after Papal decisions remain contâ—nacious forfeit their Christianity And if so whether you do not at once overthrow all your other Splendid Concessions and make Kings absolute Dependents on the Pope for all the Priviledges of their Christianity and whether you account not among them their very Regal Dignity it self Whereby it may easily appear how much Protestant Kings and Potentates are beholding unto you seeing it is manifest that they live and rule in a neglect of many Papal Decisions and Determinations 7. Whether you do not very fondly pretend to prove your Roman Catholicks acknowledgement of the power of Princes to make Laws in Cases Ecclesiastical from the Laws of Justinian p. 59. whereas they are instances of Regal Power in such Cases plainly destructive of your present Hildebrandine faith and Authority and whether you suppose such Laws to have any force or Authority of Law without the Papal Sanction and confirmation 8. Whither you think indeed that Confession unto Priests is such an effectual means of securing the peace and interest of Kings as you pretend p. 59. and whether Queen Elizabeth King James Henry the third and fourth of France had cause to believe it and whether you learned this notion from Parry Raviliac Mariana Clement Parsons Allen Garnet Gerard Oldcome with their Associates 9. Whether you forgot not your self when you place Aaron and Joshuah in government together p. 64. 10. Whether you really believe that the Pope hath Power only to perswade in matters of Religion as you pretend p. 65. and if so from what Topicks he takes the Whips Wires and Racks that he makes use of in his Inquisition And whether he hath not a right even to destroy Kings themselves who will not be his Executioners in destroying of others I wish you would come out of the clouds and speak your mind freely and plainly to some of these enquiries Your present ambiguous discourse in the face of it faiâ—ed unto your interest gives no satisfaction whilest these snakes lye in the grass of it Wherefore leaving you a little to your second thoughts I shall enquire of your Masters and Fathers themselves what is the true sense of your Church in this matter and we shall find them speaking it out plainly and roundly For they tell us 1. That the Government of the whole Catholick Church is Monarchical A State wherein all Power is derived from one fountain one and the same Person This is the first Principle that is laid down by all your Writers in treating of the Church and its power and that which your great Cardinal Baronius layes as the foundation on whirh he builds the huge Structure of his Ecclesiastical Annals 2. That the Pope is this Monarch of the Church the Person in whom alone the Soveraign Rule of it is originally vested so that it is absolutely impossible that any other Person should have enjoy or use any Ecclesiastical Authority but what is derived from him I believe you suppose this sufficiently proved by Bellarmine or others Your self own it nor can deny it without a disclaimure of your present Papacy And this one Principle perfectly discovers the vanity of your pretended attributions of Power in Ecclesiastical things to Kings and Princes For to suppose a Monarchical estate and not to suppose all Power and Authority in that state to be deâ—ived from the Monarch in it and of it alone is to suppose a perfect contraiction or a State Monarchical that is not Monarchical Protestants place the Monarchical State of the Catholick Church in its relation unto Christ alone and therefore it is incumbent on them to assert that no man hath or can have a power in the Church as such but what is derived from and communicated unto him by him And you placing it in reference unto the Pope must of necessity deny that any power can be exercised in it but what is derived from him so that whatever you pretend in this kind to grant unto kings you allow it unto them only by concession or delegation from the Pope They must hold it from him in cheif or he cannot be the chief
only and absolute head and Monarch of the Catholick Church which you would perswade us to believe that he is Kings then may even in Church affairs be strikers under him be the servants and executioners of his will and pleasure but Authority from God immediately in and about them they have none nor can have any whilest your Imaginary Monarchy takes place This one fundamental Principle of your Religion sufficiently discovers the insignificancy of your florish about Kingly Authority in Ecclesiastical things seeing upon a supposition of it they can have none at all But you stay not here for 3. You ascribe unto your Popes an universal Dominion even in Civil things over all Christian Kings and their subjects In the explanation of this Dominion I confess you somewhat vary among your selves but the thing it self is generally asserted by you and made a foundation of practice Some of you maintain that the Pope by Divine right and Constitution hath an absolute supream Dominion over the whole world This opinion Bellarmine Lib. 5. de Pont. cap. 1. confesseth to be maintained by Augustinus Triumphus Alvarus Pelagius Hostiensis and Panoruitanus And himself in the next words condemns the opinion of them who deny the Pope to have any such temporal power as that he may command secular Princes and deprive them of the Kingdoms and Principalities not only as false but as down right Heresie And why doth he name the first opinion as that of four or five Doctors when it is the Common opinion of your Church as Baronius sufficiently manifests in the life of Gregory the seventh That great preserver of your Pontificial omnipotency in his Bull against Henry the German Emperour affirms that he hath power to take away Empires Kingdoms and Principalities or what â—ver a mortal man may have as Platina records it in his life As also Pope Nicholas the second in his Epistle ad Mediolanens asserts that the rights both of the heavenly and earthly Empires are committed unto him And he that hath but looked on the Dictates of the forenamed Gregory confirmed in a Council at Rome and defended by Baronius or into their Decretals knows that you give both swords to the Pope and that over and over Whence Carerius Lib. 1. c. 9. affirms that it is the Common opinion of the School Divines that the Pope hath plenissimam Potestatem plenary power over the whole world both in Ecclesiastical and Temporal matters and you know the old comparison made by the Canonists cap. de Major Obed. between the Pope and the Emperour namely that he is as the Sun the Emperour as the Moon which borrows all its light from the other Bellarmine and those few whom he follows or that follow him maintain that the Pope hath this Power only indirectly and in order unto spiritual things the meaning of which assertion as he explains himself is that besides that direct power which he hath over those Countreys and Kingdoms which on one pretence or other he claims to be Feaudatory to the Roman See which are no small number of the chiefest Kingdoms of Europe he hath a Power over them all to dispose of them their Kings and Rulers according as he judgeth it to conduce to the good and interest of the Church which as it really differs very little from the â—ormer opinion so Barclay tells us that Pope Sixtus was very little pleased with that seeming depression of the Papal Power which his words intimate But the stated Doctrine of your Church in this matter is so declared by Bozius Augustinus Triumphus Carerius Schioppius Marta and others all approved by her Authority that there can be no question of it Moreover to make way for the putting of this indirect Power into direct Execution you declare 4. That the Pope is the supream Judge of faith and his Declarations and Determinations so far the Rule of it as that they are to be received and finally submitted unto not to do so is that which you express Heresie or Schism or Apostacy About this Principle also of your Profession there have been as about most other things amongst you great Disputes and wranglings between the Doctors and props of your Church Much debate there hath been whither this power be to be attributed unto the Pope without a Council or above a Council or against one About these Chimaera's are whole volumes filled with keen and subtil argumentations But the Popes Personal or at least Cathedral Determination hath at length prevailed For whatever some few of you may whisper unto your own trouble and disadvantage to the impeachment of his Personal Infallibility you are easily decryed by the general voice of your Doctors and besides those very persons themselves wherever they would place the Infallibility of the Church that they fancy are forâ—ed to put it so far into the Popes hand and management as that whatever he determines with the necessary solemnities in matters of faith is ultimately at least to be acquiesced in So your self assure us averring that he who doth not so forfeits his Christianity and consequently all the Priviledges which thereby he enjoyes and we have reason sufficient from former experience to believe that the Pope have he ability unto his will is ready enough to take the forfeiture Whither upon a Princes falling into Heresie in not acquiescing in your Papal determinations his subjects are discharged ipso facto from all obedience unto him as Dominicus Bannes and others maintain or whither there needs the Denunciation of a sentence against him by the Pope for their absolution you are not agreed But yet 5. You affirm that in Case of such Disobedience unto the Pope he is armed with Power to depose Kings and Princes and to give away and bestow their Kingdoms and Dominions on others Innumerable are the instances whereby the Popes themselves have justified their claim of this Power in the face of the world and it were endless to recount the Emperours Kings and free Princes that they have attempted to ruine and destroy in the persuit of some wherof they actually succeeded with the desolations of Nations that have ensued thereon I shall mention but one and that given us in the dayes of our Fathers and it may be in the memory of some yet alive Pope Pius V takes upon him contrary to the advice and entreaties of the Emperour of Germany and others to depose Queen Elizabeth and to devote her to destruction To this end he absolved all her Subjects from their Allegiance and gave away her Kingdoms and Dominions to the Spaniard assisting him to his utmost in his attempt to take possession of his grant and all for refusing obedience to the See of Rome You cannot I presume be offended with my mention of that which is known unto all for these things were not done in a corner And is it not hence evident that all the power which you grant unto Kings is meerly precarious which they hold of your Pope
Platin. vita Gregor 6. Sigon de Reg. lib. 8. From that time forward untill the Reformation no one age can be instanced in wherein great open and signal opposition was not made unto the Papal Authority which you seek again to introduce The instances already given are sufficient to convince the vanity of your pretence that never any opposition was made unto it Of the same nature is that which you nextly affirm of all the Bishops and Priests of Africa Egypt Syria Thrace Greece and all the Christian world by an hundred experiments acknowledging the supream spiritual Authority of the Roman Patriarch I must I see still mind you of what it is that you are to speak unto It is not the Patriarchate of your Pope with the Authority Priviledges and preheminences which by virtue thereof he layes claim unto but his singular succession to Christ and Peter in the absolute Headship of the whole Catholick Church that you are treating about Now supposing you may be better skilled in the affairs of the Eastern Church then for ought as I can yet perceive you are in those of the Western let me crave this favour of you that you would direct me unto one of those hundred experiments whereby the acknowledgment you mention preceding the Conversion of the Nothern Nations may be confirmed It will I confess unto you be a singular kindness seeing I know not where to find any one of that nature within the time limited noâ— to tell you the Truth since unto this day For I suppose you will not imagine that the faigned Prosessions of subjection which poverty and hopes of supplies from the Court of Rome hath extorted of late from some few mean persons whose Titles only were of any Consideration in the world will deserve any place in this disquisition Untill you are pleased therefore to favour me with your information I must abide in my ignorance of any such experiments as those which you intimate The Artifices I confess of your Popes in former dayes to draw men especially in the Eastern Church to an acknowledgement of that Authority which in their several seasons they claimed have been many and their success various Sometimes they obtained a seeming compliance in some and sometimes they procured their Authors very shrewd rebukes It may not be amiss to recount some of them 1. Upon all occasions they set forth themselves the dignity and preheminence of your See with swelling Encomiums and Titles asserting their own Primacy and Power Such self assumings are many of the old Papal Epistles stuffed withall A sober humble Christian cannot but nauseate at the reading of them For it is easily discernable how Antievangelical such Courses are and how unbecoming all that pretend themselves to be Disciples of Jesus Christ from these are their chiefest Testimonies in this Case taken and we may say of them all they bear witness to themselves and that contrary to the Scripture and their witness is not true 2. When and wherever such Letters and Epistles as proclaimed their Priviledges have been admitted through the inadvertency of Modesty of them to whom they were sent unwilling to quarrel with them about the good opinion which they had of themselves which kind of entertainment they yet sometimes met not withall the next successors allwayes took for granted and pleaded what their predecessours had presumptuously broached as that which of right and unquestionably belonged unto them And this they made sure of that they would never lose any ground or take any one step backwards from what any of them had advanced unto 3. Wherever they heard of any difference among Bishops they were still imposing their Vmpirage upon them which commonly by the one or other of the parties at variance to ballance thereby some disadvantages that they had to wrestle withall was admitted yea sometimes they would begin to take part with them that were openly in the wrong even Hereticks themselves that they might thereby procure an address to them from others which afterwards they would interpret as an express of their subjection And wherever their Vmpirage was admitted they were never wanting to improve their own interest by it like the old Romans who being chosen to determine a Controversie between other People about some lands adjudged them unto themselves 4. If any Person that was really injured or pretended so to be made any Address unto them for any kind of Relief immediately they laid hold of their Address as an Appeal to their Authority and acted in their behalf accordingly though they were sometimes chidden for their pains and advised to meddle with what they had to do withall 5. Did any Bishops of note write them Letters of respect presently in their rescripts they return them thanks for their profession of subjection to the See Apostolick so supposing them to do that which in truth they did not they promise to do for them that which they never desired and by both made way for the enlargment of the confines of their own authority 6. Where any Prince or Emperour was entangled in his affairs they were still ready to crush them into that condition of trouble from whence they could not be delivered but by their assistance or to make them believe that their adherence unto them was the only means to preserve them from ruine and so procured their suffrage unto their Authority Unto these and the like heads of Corrupt and sinful Artifices may the most of the Testimonies commonly pleaded for the Popes Supremacy be referred By such wayes and means hath it been erected Yet far enough from any such prevalency for seven hundred years as to afford us any of the experiments which you boast of The next thing you except against in my story is my affirming that Austin the Monk who came hither from Rome was a man as far as appears by story the little acquainted with the Gospel In the repetition of which words to keep your hand in ure you leave out that expression as far as appears by the story which is the evidence whereunto I appeal for the Truth of my Assertion and add to aggravate the matter the word very very little and then add here is the thanks that good St. Austin hath who out of his love and kindness entred upon the wild forrest of our Paganism with great hazards and inexpressible sufferings of hunger cold and other corporal inconveniencies But in the place you except against I acknowledge that God made him a special instrument in bringing the Scripture or Gospel amongst us which I presume also he declared according to the light and ability which he had But you are your own Mothers Son nothing will serve your turn but absolute most pure and perfect For what I have further intimated of him there are sundry things in the History of his coming hither and proceedings here that warrant the suggestion The Questions that he sent for Resolution unto Gregory at Rome discover what manner of man he
then some of them have been If this be to blaspheme then some of your own Councils all your Historians many of the most learned men of your Church are notorious blasphemers But you wilfully mistake and begg that their Schismatical Papal faction may be esteemed the innocent Catholick Church of Christ without a Concession whereof your inferences and perswasions are very weak and feeble Of the like nature unto this is your ensuing discourse about the Contradictions which you fancied in your Fiat Lux to be imposed on Papists pag. 77. Two things you insist upon waving those that you had formerly mentioned as finding them in their examination unable to yield you the advantage you thought to make of them you feign a new contradiction which you say is imposed on Papists For say you while our Kings reign in peace then the Papist Religion is persecuted as contrary to Monarchy when we have destroyed that Government then is the Papist harrassed spoyled pillaged murdered because their Religion is wholly addicted unto Monarchy and Papists are all for Kings These are Contradictions is there not somewhat of the power of darkness in this But you again mistake and that I fear because you will do so There was no Persecution of Papists in this Land at any time but what was in persuit of some Laws that were made against them Now not one of those Laws intimate any such thing as that they were opposite unto Monarchy but rather their design to promote a double Monarchy on different accounts in this Nation the one of the Pope and the other of him to whom the Kingdom was given by the Pope and who for many years in vain attempted to possess himself of it And on that account were you charged with an opposition to our Monarchs but not unto Monarchy it self And yet I must say that if what hath been before discoursed of your faith and perswasion concerning the Papal Soveraignty be well considered it will be found that if not your Religion yet the Principles of some of the chief Professors of it do carry in their womb a great impeachment of Imperial Power Nor can I gather that in the times of our Confusion you suffered as Papists for your friendship and love to Monarchy whatever some individual Persons amongst you might do Seeing some of you would have been contented with its everlasting Seclusion so that your interest in the land might have been secured And whether your Popes themselves be not of that mind I leave to all men to judge who know how much they are wont to preferr their own interest before the rights of other men In the mean time you may take notice that whilest men are owned to persue one certain End they may at several times fix on mediums for the compassing of it opposite and contrary one to another Haec non successit alia aggrediamur via when one way fails another quite contrary unto it may be fixed on And whilest it is supposed that their end is the promotion of the Papal Interest it is not improbable but that at several times you may make use of several wayes and means opposite and contrary one to another and that this may be imputed unto you without the charge of Contradictions upon you But you may if you please omit discourses of this nature I am none of those that would charge any thing upon you to your disadvantage in this world Neither do I desire your trouble any more then mine own My aim is only to defend the Truth which you oppose Your next attempt is to vindicate your self from any such intention in your application of ejice ancillam cum puero suo as I apprehended Whither what you say to this purpose will satisfie your Reader or no I greatly question For my part as I shall speak nothing but what I believe to be according unto truth so if I am or have been at any time mistaken in my apprehension of your sense and mind I am resolved not to defend any thing because I have spoken it Homo sum and therefore subject to mistakes though I am not in the least convinced that I was actually mistaken in my conceptions of your sense and meaning in your Fiat But that we may not needlesly contend about words yours or mine I shall put you into a way whereby you may immediately determine this difference and manifest that I mistook your intention if I did so indeed And it is this Do but renounce those Principles which if you maintain you constantly affirm all that in those words I supposed you to intimate and this strife will be at an end And they are but these two 1. That all those who refuse to believe and worship God according to the Propositions and Determinations of your Church are Hereticks 2. That obstinate Hereticks are to be accursed persecuted destroyed and consumed out of the world Do but renounce these Principles and I shall readily acknowledge my self mistaken in the intention of the words you mention If you will not so do to what purpose is it to contend with you about one single expression ambiguously as you pretend used by you when in your avowed Principles you maintain whatever is suggested to be intimated in it Thus easily might you have saved your longsome discourse in this matter And as for the embleme which you close it with of the Rod of Moses which as you say taken in the right end was a walking staff in the wrong a Serpent it is such a childish figment as you have no cause to thank them that imposed it upon your credulity CHAP. 19. Of preaching the Mass And the Sacrifice of it Transubstantiation Service of the Church WE are arrived at length unto the Consideration of those particulars in your Roman faith which in your Fiat you chose out either to adorn and set off the way in Religion which you invite your Countreymen to embrace or so to gild it as that they may not take any prejudice from them against the whole of what you profess The first of these is that which you entituled Messach which you now inform us to be a Saxon word the same with Mass. But why you make use of such an absolete word to amuze your Readers withal you give us no account Will you give me leave to guess for if I mistake not I am not far from your fancy Plain downright Mass is a thing that hath gotten a very ill name amongst your Countreymen especially since so many of their forefathers were burned to death for refusing to resort unto it Hence it may be you thought meet to wave that name which both the thing known to be signified by it in its own nature and your procedure about it had rendred obnoxious to suspicion So you call it by a new old name or an old new name that men might not at first know what you intended upon your invitation to entertain them withal and yet it may be
men on that meditation of the Apostle Heb. 12. You are come to mount Sion to the City of the living God to the Heavenly Hierusalem the Society of Angels and Church of the first born written in heaven to God the judge of all to the spirits of just men made perfect to Jesus the Mediator of the new Covenant These I tell you upon the sight of an House full of Images may be the thoughts of a man distracted of his wits not of any that are sober and wise To which you reply mad men it seems can tell what figures represent sober and wise men cannot But who told you that your images represent the things mentioned by the Apostle for instance God the Judge of all the spirits of just men Angels and the Church of the first born or can any man unless he be greatly distempered in his imagination fancy any such thing The house of Micah Judg. 18. was notably furnished with Images of all sorts Judg. 17. he had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an house full of Gods or a Chappel adorned with Images for there was in it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 carved image and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sacred ornament for it and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 lesser portable Image and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a molten statue Judg. 18. would it not think you notwithstanding the gaiety of all this provision have bee a mad thought in the Danites if upon their entrance into this house they had apprehended themselves to be come to the Communion of the Catholick Church and therein to the invisible God to Angels and Saints departed The truth is there is aliquid dementiae a tincture of madness in all Idolatry whence the Scripture testifies that men are mad upon their Idols but yet we do not find that these Danites though resolved upon false worship were so mad as to entertain such vain thoughts as you imagine the Chappel full of images might have suggested unto them Or do you think Ezekiel had any such thoughts when God shewed him in vision the imagery of the house of Israel with all the Deities portrayed on the wall and the elders worshipping before them Ezek. 8. God and the Prophet discover other thoughts in reference unto them Besides Sir the Holy Ghost tells us that a graven image is a teacher of Lyes Hab. 2. 18. and how likely it is that a man should learn any truth from that whose work it is only to teach lyes I do not as yet understand You proceed to another exception the violation of an image say you redounds to the Prototype if it be rightly and duely represented not else To which you reply and when then for example is Christ crucified rightly and duly represented are you one of those that can tell what figures represent or not 1. You do not rightly report my words though you might as easily have done it as set down those you have made use of My words were that the violation of an Image redounds to the Prototype provided it be an Image rightly and duely destined to represent him that is intended to be injured which is so cleared by an instance there expressed as turns your exception out of doors as altogether useless For first I require that the Image be rightly and duly destined to the representation of the Prototype that is by him or by them who have power so to do and by the express consent and will of him whose image it is who otherwise is not concerned in it Now nothing of all this can you affirm concerning your Images 2. I require an intention of doing injury or contumely unto the Person represented by the image without which whatever is done to the image reflects not at all upon him And so a man may break an Image of a King which he finds formed against his will in some ugly shape to expose him to contempt and scorn as I suppose out of Loyalty unto him without the least violation of his honour which is the very condition of your Images and those that reject them And this also may suffice to what you add about hanging of Traitors in Effigie which is a particular instance of your general Assertion that the violation of an Image redounds to the Prototype which we grant it doth when the Image is rightly designed to that purpose by them who have just authority so to do and when there is an intention of casting contempt upon it the first whereof is not found amongst your Images nor the latter among them who reject them Besides if all that were granted you which you express yet what you aime at would not ensue For though it should be supposed that the violation of an Image would redound unto the injury of the Prototype upon a meer intention of reflecting upon him without which it is a foolish conceit to apprehend any such thing yet it doth not thence follow that the honour done to an Image redounds unto him that is represented by it provided that the intention of them that give the honour be so to do For besides our intention in the worship of God we have a rule to attend unto without the observation whereof the other will stand us in little stead And if this might be admitted the grossest Idolatry that ever was in the world might easily be excused That for instance of the Israelites setting up a golden Calf and worshipping it must needs be esteemed excellent seeing they thought to give honour to Jehovah thereby When the things mentioned then are wanting Images may be dealt withal as false money which his Majesty causeth every day to be broken though it have his own Image and superscription upon it because stamped without his warrant You proceed and add as my words where the Psalmist complains of Gods enemies breaking down his Sculptures he means not thereby any Images or figures but only wainscot or carved Ceilings Would you could find in your heart rightly to report my words The reason is evident why you do not namely because then you had not been able to make any pretence of a reply unto them But yet this ought not to have prevailed with you to persist in such unhandsome dealing My words are The Psalmist indeed complains that they broke down the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or carved works in the Walls and Ceilings of the Temple though the Greeks render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 her doors the Verb signifying principally to open but that those apertiones or incisurae were not Pictures and Images for the people to adore and venerate or appointed for their instruction you may learn You see Sir I grant that the Word may denote carved works and if so I think they must be either in the walls or ceiling that which only I deny was that these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or carved works were proposed to the people to be adored or venerated This you should have confuted or held your peace But you take another course
in sacrificing according to the Order of that then in preaching of the Mysterie and Doctrine of this Did never any man inform you that one end of preaching the word was to regenerate the whole souls of men and to beget them anew unto God that it was also to open their eyes and to illuminate them with the saving knowledge of God in Christ that it was to beget and encrease faith in them that it was to be a means of their growth in Grace and in the knowledge of God that the Word preached is profitable for reproof Correction Dotrine and instruction in righteousness that it is appointed as the great means of working the souls of men into a likeness and conformity unto the Lord Jesus or the changing of them into his Image that it is appointed for the refreshment of the weary and consolation of the sorrowful and making wise of the simple Did you never hear that the word preached hath its effect upon the understanding and will as well as upon the Affections and upon these consequentially only unto its efficacy on them if they are not deluded Is growth in knowledge faith grace holiness conformity unto Christ Communion with God for which end the word is commanded to be preached nothing at all with you is being made wise in the mysterie of the Love of God in Christ to have an insight into and some understanding of the unsearchable treasures of his Grace and by all this the building up of souls in their most holy faith of no value with you Are you a stranger unto these things and yet think your self a meet person to perswade your Countreymen to forsake the Religion they have long professed and to follow you they know not whither Or do you know them and yet dare to thrust in your scurrility to their exclusion Plainly Sir the most charitable judgement that I can make of this Discourse of yours is that it proceeds from ignorance of the most important truths and most necessary works of the Gospel You next proceed to your plea from the Cherubims set up by Moses in the Holy place over the Ark and thence you will needs wrest an argument for your Images and the worship of them Although your Vasquez is ashamed of it and hath cashiered it long ago and that worthily as not at all belonging unto thus matter For 1. The Cherubims were not Images to which you say since the real Cherubims are not made of beaten Gold those set up by Moses must be only figures but it is of Images that we are speaking precisely and not in general of figures figures may include Types and Hieroglyphicks and any representation of things Images represent Persons and such alone are those about which we treat And if a Person be not presented by an Image it is not his Image Now I pray tell me what personal subsistences these Cherubims with their various wings and faces did represent Do you believe that they give you the shape and likeness of Angels It is true John the Bishop of Thessalonica in your Synod of Nice with the approbation of the rest of his company affirms that it was the opinion of the Catholick Church that Angels and Archangels were not altogether incorporeal and invisible but to have a slender body of ayre or fire Act. 5. But are you of the same mind or do you not rather think that the Catholick Church was belyed and abused by the Synod And if they are absolutely incorporeal and invisible how can an Image be made of them Should a man look on the Cherubims as Images of Angels would not the first thing they would teach him be a ley namely that Angels are like unto them which is the first language of any Image whatever The truth is the Mosaical Cherubims were meer Hieroglyphicks to represent the constant tender love and watchfulness of God over the Ark of his Covenant and the people that kept it and had nothing of the nature of Images in them 2. I say suppose of them what you please yet they were not set up to be adored as your Images are To which you reply It is not to my purpose or yours that they were not set up to be adored for Images in Catholick Churches are not set up for any such purpose nor do I anywhere say so No man alive hath any such thought no Trâ—â—â—tion no Council hath delivered it no practice infers it And do you think meet to talk at this rate have you no Tradition amongst you that you plead for the Adoration of Images hath no Council amongst you determined it doth not your practice speak it were you awake when you wrote these things did you never read your Tridentine Decree or the Nicene Canons commended by them is not the adoration of Images asserted an hundred times expresly in it hath no man alive such thoughts are not only Thomas and Bonaventure but Bellarmine Gregory de Valentia Baronius Suarez Vasquez Azorius with all the rest of your great Champions now utterly defeated and have not one man left to be of their judgement I would be glad to hear more of this matter Speak plainly do you renounce all adoration and worship of Images is that the Doctrine of your Church prove it so and I shall publickly acknowledge my self to have been a long time in a very great mistake But it was for this cause that I gave you a little Image of the Doctrine and practice of your Church in this matter at the entrance of our discourse foreseeing how you would prevaricaâ—e in our progress Come Sir if Image Worship be such a shameful thing that you dare not avow it deal ingenuously and acknowledge the failings of your Church in this matter and labour to bring her to amendment If you think otherwise and in truth yet like it well enough dâ—al like a man and dare to deteâ—d it at least as well as you can and more no 〈◊〉 can look for at your hands You mention somewhat of the different opinions of your Schoolmen in this matter which you sleight But Sir I tell you again that you and all your Masters are agreed that Images are to be adored and venerated that is worshipped and their disputes about that honour that rests absolutely on the Image and that which passeth on to the Prototype with the kind of the one and the other are such as neither themselves nor any other do understand You tell us indeed All Catholick Councils and practice declare such sacred figures to be expedient assistants to our thoughts in our divine meditations and prayers and that is all you know of it But if you intend Councils and practice truly Catholick or Primitive you can give no instance of allowing so much to Images as here you ascribe unto them no not one Council can you produce to that purpose for some hundreds of years but a constant current of Testimonies for the rejection of such pretend expediencies and assistances
your communion whilest you impose upon them a necessity of Celebrating the worship of God in a tongue unknown unto them amongst whom and for whose sâ—ke it is publickly celebrated The reasons you subjoyn to the concession you mention I presume are your own they are like to many others that you make use of The best sense of the entrance of your words that I can make is in that description they afford us of the worship of your Church as to the peoples concernment in it The words of it may â—it perching upon your lips as on the tongue of a Parrot or it may be may be got by heart or as we say without Book when the sense of them affects not your minds nor understandings at all If in these vain loose expressions you design any thing else it seems to be an opposition between reading and studying the Scriptures or joyning with understanding in the prayers of the Church the things under Consideration and the getting of the power of the word of God to dwell in the heart which is skilfully to oppose the means and the end and those placed in that relation not only by their natural aptitude but also by Gods express appointment and command So wisely also do you oppose reading and doing in general as though reading were not doing and a part of that obedience which God requires at our hands and a blessed means of helping and furthering us in the remainder of it For certainly that we may do the will of God it is required that we know it And what better way there is to come to the knowledge of the will of God then by reading and me litating in and upon the word of Truth wherein he hath revealed it with the advantage of the other means of his appointment for the same end in the publick preaching or proposition of it I am not as yet informed And I wish you had acquainted us with those two words of our Saviour and that one of the Apostle wherein they give us a Compendius of all Divine Truths For if it be so I am perswaded you will be to seek for your warrant in imposing your long Creeds and almost Volumes of Propositions to be believed as such But you cannot avoid mistakes in things that you might omit as not at all to your purpose Our Saviour indeed gives us the two general heads of those duties of Obedience which are required at our hands towards God and our Neighbours and the Apostle shews the Perfection of it to consist in Love with its due exercise but where in two or three words they give us the Compendium of all Divine Truths which we are to believe that we may acceptably perform the Obedidience that in general they describe we are yet to seek and shall be so for any information you are able to give us In your following Discourse you make a florish with what your Church hath in Gospels Epistles Good books Anniversary observations and I know not what besides But Sir we discourse not about what you have but what you have not nor will have though God command you to have it and threaten you for not having it You have not the Scripture ordinarily in a language that they can understand who if they are the Disciples of Christ are bound to read study and meditate in it continually which are therefore hindred by you in the discharge of their duty whilest you neither enter into the Kingdom of heaven your selves nor suffer them that would Nâ—y you have burned men and their Bibles together for attempting to discharge that duty which God requireth of them and wherein so much of their spiritual advantage is enwrapped Neither have you the entire worship of God in a tongue known to the people whereby they might joyn in it and pray with understanding and be edified by what they hear which the Apostle makes the end of all things done or to be done in publick Assemblies but are left to have their brutish affections led up and down by dumb shews pestures and gestures whereunto the Scripture and Antiquity are utter strangers These things you have not and which renders your Condition so much the worse you refuâ—e to have them though you may though you are entreated by God and man to make use of them yea where great and populous nations under your power have humbly petitioned you that by your leave and permission they might enjoy the Bible and that Service of God which they could understand you have chosen rather to run all things into confusion and to fall upon them with fire and sword then to grant them their request O curvae in terris animae caelestium inanes But you add Besides what you mention what can promote your Salvation for say you What further Good may it do to read the letter of St. Paul ' s Epistles to the Romans for example or Corinthians wherein Questions and Cases and Theological discourses are treated that vulgar people can neither understand nor are at all concerned to know And I pray you tell me ingenuously and without heat what more of Good could acrew to any by the translated letter of a book whereof I will be bold to say that nine parts in ten concern not my particular either to know or practice then by the conceived substance of Gods will unto me and my own duty towards him Sir I shall deal with you without any blameable heat yet so as he deserves to be dealt withall who will not cease to pervert the right wayes of the Lord. And 1. who taught you to make your apprehensions the measure of other mens faith and practice If you know not of any thing needfull to promote Salvation but what you reckon up in the usage of your Church hinder not them that do It is not so much your own practice as your Imposition of it on others that we are in the consideration of Would it worth suffice you to reject as to your own interest the means appointed of God for the furtherrance of our Salvation and that you would not compell others to joyn with you in the refusal of them Is it possible that a man professing himself a Divine a Priest of the Catholick Church an Instructor of the Ignorant an undertaker to perswade whole Nations to relinquish the way of Religion wherein they are engaged to follow him and his in wayes that they have not known should profess that he knows not of what use unto the promotion of the Salvation of the Souls of men the use of the whole Scripture given by inspiration of God is Be advised not to impose these conceptions of your fancy and mind as it seems unexercised in that heavenly treasury on those who have 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 senses exercised therein so as to be able to discern between good and evil It no other reason can prevail with you I hope experience may give you such a despair of success as to cause
here you give us two Languages the Syriack and Assyriack which names in the Original differed but little in sound but the languages themselves did as much in nature as French and English And the Syriack you tell us was that which is now so peculiarly called but what the Assyriack was you tell us not but only that when the Princes perswade Rabshakeh to speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aramith he intended an Assyrian language that was not Syrian The boys that grind colours in our Grammer Schools laugh at these Mormoes 8. Neither do you know well what you say when you affirm that the Language of Christ and his Apostles was the same that was ever since called the Syriack for the very instance you give manifests it to have been a different dialect from it the words as recorded by the Evangelists being absolutely the same neither with the Hebrew nor Targum nor Syriack Translation of the Old Testament That wherein we have the Translation of the Scripture and which prevailed in the Eastern Church being a peculiar Antiochian dialect of the old Aramaean Tongue And that whole language called the Syriack peculiarly now and whereof there were various dialects of old seems to have had its beginning after the Jews return from their captivity being but a degenerate mixture of the Hebrew and Chaldee whereunto also after the prevalency of the Macedonian Empire many Greek word were admitted and some Latine ones also afterwards 9. You advantage not your self by affirming that Assyria and Syria were several Kingdoms For as Strabo will inform you they were both originally called Syrian and indeed were one and the same until the more Eastern Provinces about Babylon obtaining their peculiar denominations that part of Asia which contains Comogena Phaenicia Palestina and Coelosyria became to be especially called Syria Originally they were all Aramites as every one knows that can but read the Scripture in its Original Language And now I suppose you may see how little you have advantaged your self or your cause by this maze of mistakes and contradictions For no errour can be so thick covered with others but that it will rain through The Jews you suppose to have lost their own language in the dayes of Hezekiah and to have spoken Syriack the Syrian and Assyrian to have been languages as far distant as French and English that when the Princes entreated Rabshakeh to speak the Syrian language 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they intended not the Syrian Language which was indeed the Jews but the Assyrian quite differing from it and so when they desired him not to speak 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you suppose them to have desired him not to speak in the Jews language but to speak in the Jews language which you say was the Syriack And sundry other no less unhappy absurdities have you amassed together But you will retrive us out of this Labyrinth by a Story of what a Greek Biship did and said at Paris in the presence of Doctor Cousins now bishop of Durham how he refused the Articles of the English Church and did all things according to the Roman mode asserting the use of Liturgies in the vulgar Greek Unto which I shall say no more but that it was at Paris and not at Durham Graeculus esuriens in caelum jusseris ibit I have my self known some eminent members of that Church in England two especially one many years ago called Conopius who if I mistake not upon his return obtained the honour of a Patriarchate being sent hither by the then Patriarch of Constantinople the other not many years ago called Anastatius Comnenus Archimandrite as his Testimonials be spake him of a Monastry on Mount Sinai Both these I am sure made it their business to inveigh against your Church practices having the Arguments of Nilus against your Supremacy at their fingers ends And if the Greek Chruch and you are so well agreed as you pretend why do you censure them as Hereticks and Schismaticks and receive only some few of them who are runnagates from their own Tents What may those whom you proclaim to be your enemies expect from you when you deal thus severely with those whom you give out to be your friends But as for this matter of the Scripture and prayers in an unknown tongue though they transgress not with so high an hand as you do the old Greeks being not so absolutely remote from the present vulgar as the Latine is from our English and the Languages of diverse other Nations whom you compell to your Church Service in that toague and besides they have the Scripture translated into their present vulgar tongue for the use of private persons yet we approve not their practice but look upon it as a great means of continuing that ignorance and darkness which is unquestionably spread over the major part of that Church which in some places as in Russia is to such a degree as to dispose the people unto Barbarism We know also that herein they are gone off from the constant and Catholick usage of their forefathers who for some Centuries of years from the dayes of the Apostles themselves who planted Churches amongst them both had the Bible in their own vulgar Tongue and made no use of any other in the publick Service of their Assemblies And that their example in your present degenerate condition which in some things you as little approve of as we do in others should have any great power upon us I know as yet little reason to judge Your last attempt in this matter is to vindicate what you have said in your Fiat as you now affirm That the Bible was kept in an Ark or Tabernncle not touched by the people but brought on t at times to the Priest that he might instruct the people out of it To which you say I answer That the Ark was placed in the Sanctum Sanctorum which was not entred into but by the Priest and that only once a year And Reply But Sir I speake not there of any Sanctum Sanctorum or of any Ark in that place was there or could there be no more Arks but one If you had been only in these latter days in any Synagogue or Convention of the Jews you might have seen even now how the Bible is still kept with them in an Ark or Tabernacle in imitation of their forefathers when they have no Sanctum Sanctorum amongst them You may also discern how according to your custome they â—ringe and prostrate at the bringing out of the Biblt which is the only solemn adoration left amongst them there be more Arks then that in the Sanctum Sanctorum if I had called it a Box or a Chest or a Cupboard you had let it pass but I used that word as more sacred The oftener that you touch upon this string the harsher is the found that it yields I would desire you to free your self from the unhappiness of supposing