History of Monothelism Pope Honorius willing to agree both parties writes Letters to Patriarch Sergius which the Monothelites made use of for Authorising their Heresie The Popes John IV. Theodore and St. Martin follow a contrary conduct to his The Emperor Constantine Pogonatus with consent of Pope Agatho calls the sixth Council The History of that Council The Letters of Sergius and Honorius are examined there They are condemned of Heresie and that Pope is Anathematised He is also condemned in the Emperors Edict in the Letter of Leo II. to the Emperor In the Ancient diurnal Book of Rome in the Ancient Breviaries and in the VII and VIII Councils Convincing Arguments that the Acts of the sixth Council have not been falsified and that it cannot be said that the Fathers of that Council understood not well the meaning of Honorius All Antiquity which hath received that Council as we have it hath believed that the Pope is not infallible p. 143 CHAP. XIII Of the Popes Clement III. Innocent III. Boniface VIII and Sixtus V. THE Error of Clement in his Decretal Laudabilem recalled by Innocent III. The Error of Innocent concerning the secret of Confession He condemns that Error in the Council of Lateran That of Boniface in his Bull unam Sanctam recalled at the Council of Vienna That of Sixtus V. in the Edition of his Bible A ridiculous Answer of some Moderns p. 165 CHAP. XIV The instance of John XXII WHAT he did for Establishing his Error concerning the beatifick vision The sacred Faculty of Paris declares the Doctrin of that Pope heretical It had been condemned by Clement IV and was since in the Council of Florence King Philip of Valois obliges that Pope to recant p. 173 CHAP. XV. The tradition of the Church of Rome as to that THE Popes themselves have acknowledged that for ending difference in Religion by a Sovereign and infallible sentence there was a necessity of a Council The Heresies which Popes have condemned without a General Council have been so condemned by the consent of the Church Popes who have confessed that they had not the gift of Infallibility p. 179 CHAP. XVI The state of the question concerning the Superiority of the Council over the Pope or of the Pope over a Council WHether after a Council is lawfully Assembled the Pope being present in it or not that Council has or has not Supreme Authority over the Head as well as over the other Members of the Church or whether or not all its Authority depends on the Pope p. 187 CHAP. XVII That it is the Holy Ghost which in the definitions of Faith pronounces by the mouth of the Council WHAT is to be concluded from that Principle What it is according to the Doctrin of Antiquity to approve and confirm a Council p. 190 CHAP. XVIII That the Ancient Councils have examined the Judgments of Popes to give a last and definitive sentence upon them THE History of the Patriarch Flavian and the Pope St. Leo who submits his Judgment to that of a General Council An instance of the fifth Council that rescinds a sentence solemnly pronounced by the Pope and of the sixth which examines the sentences of Martin I. and Honorius I. approves the one and rejects the other The History of Constantine of the Donatists and of the first Council of Arles which examines the sentence given by Pope Melchiades in his first Council of Rome p. 199 CHAP. XIX That the Ancient Popes have always acknowledged and protested that they were subject to Councils THE History of Pope Sicicius and of the Council of Capona Of St. Leo in the case of St. Chrysostom against the Patriarch Theophilus Of Innocent III. in the case of the Marriage of Philip the August Instances of Pope St. Agapetus and Silvester II. p. 213. CHAP. XX. That the Ancient Popes have believed that they were subject to the Canons PRoofs of this from the conduct and protestations of the Popes Celestin I. St Leo St. Martin St. Gregory the Great John VIII Eugenius III. and Silvester II. What the Council of Florence hath defined as to that The true sense of these words against a false interpretation that hath been made of them Popes are obliged to govern the Church according to the Canons In what case they can dispense with them That they may abuse their Power Of an Appeal to a Council and of an Appeal as abusive to a Parliament p. 225 CHAP. XXI What General Councils have decided as to that Point THE History of the Council of Pisa where that question was first canvassed The debates that arose upon that Subject in the Council of Constance which is a continuation of that of Pisa The Decrees of that Council of Constance and of that of Basil upon the same Point The approbation of these Decrees by the Popes Martin V. and Eugenius IV. p. 241 CHAP. XXII Of the Writing of the Sieur Emmanuel Schelstrate against the two Decrees of the Council of Constance THE Declaration which the Clergy of France met in the Year 1682. made of their Opinion touching these two Decrees which they hold to be of infallible Authority approved by Popes and for those times when there is no Schism as well as during a Schism The Sieur Emmanuel Schelstrate undertakes to refute these three Articles in the three Chapters of his Dissertation p. 256 CHAP. XXIII A Refutation of the first Chapter of the Dissertation of M. Schelstrate THE Decree of the fourth Session hath not been falsified by the Fathers of Basil The Manuscripts of M. Schelstrate are defective and ours are true A demonstration of this Truth by two Sermons of John Gerson who rehearses that Decree before the whole Council of Constance word for word as we have it The Manuscripts by which these two Sermons have been reviewed and the other places were Gerson relates the same Decree An other demonstration of that truth by Pope Eugenius IV. and even by the Manuscripts of M. Schelstrate That question was sufficiently examined The Council consisted of the greatest and soundest part of the three obediences and the absence of others hinders not the Council from being lawful p. 261 CHAP. XXIV A Refutation of one of the two other Chapters of M. Schelstrate PRoofs of the approbation of these two Decrees of Constance The true interpretation of that word Conciliariter The abuse that may be made of the Appeal to a Council is condemned but not the Appeal it self All the Authority of Councils proceeds not from the Pope but chiefly from the Catholick Church p. 297 CHAP. XXV A Refutation of the other Chapter of M. Schelstrate THese two Decrees of the Council of Constance are for all times whilst there was a Schism and when there is none An Ecumenical Council is a whole whereof the Pope is but a part The Pope is the Head but not the Master of the Church The difference betwixt the Power of Popes and of Kings An authentick act of the Superiority of a
condemn it may be seen that the ancient Church believed and did what Catholicks believe and practise concerning the Eucharist the Sacrifice of the Mass the seven Sacraments the Consistency of Grace with Free-will the Authority of Tradition the Invocation of Saints Churches dedicated and consecrated to God in memory of them the Veneration of their Relicks and Images Prayer for the dead the Fasts of Lent and of the Ember weeks the distinction of Holy days and working days that of the Habits of Lay-men and Church-men the single life of the Clergy Vows Sacred Ceremonies in the administration and use of the Sacraments and in publick Worship Divine Worship in Greek all over the East and in the Latine Tongue in the West though in most Provinces this was not understood but by the Learned in a word concerning all that distinguishes us from Protestants but especially Calvinists This the famous Cardinal Perron made out by unquestionable testimonies in his Reply to the King of Great Britain where he shews the conformity of the Ancient Catholick Church with ours in the Eighteenth Chapter of the first Book and throughout the whole Third Fourth Fifth and Sixth Books of that Learned Work And to which also David Blondel a Man incomparably more able than Calvin especially in the knowledge of Antiquity thought it not fit to make an Answer in that overgrown Volume which he wrote against the Reply and wherein he thought it convenient to begin his pretended refutation onely at the Three and twentieth Chapter of the first Book and to end it with the Four and thirtieth of the same Book But to pass by the Protestants against whom I pretend not to Dispute It is enough to me that hitherto without any disputation I have proved by Antiquity alone the Primacy of St. Peter and of the Popes his successours in the Chair of Rome and the Prerogatives and Rights which are inseparable from that Primacy wherein all Catholicks agree However it is very well known that at present they are not all of the same mind as to certain other Prerogatives which some grant and others will not allow to him and especially these four which are Infallibility Superiority over a General Council the Absolute Power of Governing the Church independantly of the Canons and the Direct or Indirect Power over Temporals And therefore I must now without deviating from my Principle drawn from Antiquity make appear without disputing and reasoning but as a bare Relater of the sentiments of the Councils and Fathers nay and of the Popes themselves what venerable Antiquity hath always believed concerning these points CHAP. VI. The Question stated concerning the Infallibility of the Pope THE Question here is not to know whether the Pope as a private Doctour and onely giving his opinion and thought of a point of Doctrine concerning Faith and Manners may be deceived for it was never doubted but that in that quality he speaks onely as another Man and that by consequent through the weakness and infirmity which is incident to all Men he is subject to Errour according to the saying of the Psalmist Omnis homo mendax Nor is it the question neither to enquire whether he be infallible when he pronounces from the Chair of the Universal Church jointly with the Members that are subject to him as to their head whether it be in a General Council where he presides in person or by his Legats or with the consent of the greatest part of Catholick Churches and Bishops For as we all allow that Jesus Christ hath given the gift of Infallibility to his Church and to a Council which represents it for determining Sovereignly by the Word of God the differences that might arise amongst Catholicks concerning these points of Doctrine so we do confess that when the Pope speaks and decides in that manner according to which he may say Visum est Spiritui Sancto nobis his words and decisions are Oracles and he can in no ways be deceived As to this there is no disagreement amongst Catholicks The question then that may be debated is to know whether when he speaks from his Chair of Rome as the Master and Teacher of all Believers and having well examined the point in hand in several Congregations his Consistory or his Synod of his Suffragans of his Cardinals and Doctours nay and having consulted Universities and by most publick and solemn Prayers begg'd the assistance of the Holy Ghost he teaches all Christians defines proposes to the whole Church by a Bull or Constitution what Christians are to believe whether I say when he pronounces in this manner he be Infallible or not and whether his Judgment given and declared in that manner may not be corrected by an Universal Council And this methinks is all that can be said in clear and formal terms as to the state of this formal question And it is the very same about which all Catholick Doctours do not agree For most part of the Doctours on t'other side of the Alpes especially the famous Cardinals Cajetan Baronius and Bellarmine and all the Authours who have followed them will have the Pope in that case when he declares solemnly to all Believers by his Constitutions what they are to believe as to any controverted point to be no ways liable to a mistake On the contrary an infinite number of the most noted Doctours of their time as Gerson Major Almanus the Faculty of Theologie of Paris so often and so publickly praised by the Popes and all France as it is even acknowledged by the Doctours Navarr Victoria and John Celaia Spaniards Denis the Carthusian Tostatus Bishop of Avila in his Commentaries upon St. Matthew and in the second part of his Defensorium Thomas Illyrius a Cordelier in his Buckler against Luther which he dedicated to Pope Adrian VI. The Cardinals of Cusa of Cambray and of Florence the Bishops of France in their Assembly representing the Gallican Church Aeneas Sylvius before he was Pope Pope Adrian VI. when he was Professour at Louvain in his Commentary upon the Fourth of the Sentences which he caused to be reprinted at Rome when he was Pope without any alterations and a thousand other most Catholick Doctours of the Universities of France Germany Poland and of the Low Countries who have all very well defended the Primacy of the Pope all these I say maintain that he is not Infallible if he do not pronounce in a General Council or with the consent of the Church The diversity of Sentiments amongst Catholicks about that Subject is then a matter of fact not to be question'd But what part are we best to take in this dispute as the most rational and best grounded that 's a question which I ought not to answer according to the design I have taken and the method that I have proposed to my self in this Treatise I shall onely then barely relate what hath been believed as to that in Antiquity and I shall do it without touching at the
of the Pagans in Antiquity that Porphyrius one of their greatest Philosophers upbraided the Christians as St. Jerome informs us that their St. Paul was so rash as to have dared to reprove the Prince of the Apostles and his Master Hieron Ep. 89. Since then all venerable Antiquity hath believed the Primacy of St. Peter which our Protestants contest by the novelty of their Doctrine we have reason once more to say to them Desinat incessere novitas vetustatem After all it is so evident that Jesus Christ who will have his Church to continue to the end of the World hath given St. Peter the Primacy and Supreme dignity of visible Head of the Church for himself and Successours in that Principal Chair which that great Apostle fixed at Rome that it would be superfluous to attempt to prove it For if it had been so confined to his Person that it descended not to his Successours it would follow that after the death of St. Peter the Church was fallen that it had no longer that Principle of unity which makes it one that it was no more but a body without a head and a ruinous building without a foundation Besides Is it not well known that it is an order naturally fixed in lawfull Successions that Kings and other Princes and their Officers in the Civil State Bishops Metropolitans Primates and Patriarchs nay and Ministers amongst our Protestants succeed to the rights and powers of their Predecessours But though we had no such convincing reasons Concil Sardic Ep. ad Jul. in frag Hil. Con. Constant ad Dam. Conc. Ephes Conc. Calcedon ad Leon. Conc. 6. Act 18. Ep. ad Agath Iren. l. 3. cont Valent Cyprian ad Corn. Ep. 55. l. de unitat Optat. contra Parm. l. 2. Vincent Lirin lib. contra Haer. c. 3. Hier. ad Dam. August de duab Ep. Pelag. l. 1. c. 1. Ep. 92.162 Chrysost Ep. 1. ad Innoc. Prosper de voc gent. l. 8. c. 6. St. Leo. St. Gregor Theodoret. Socrates Sozom. alii passim yet it would be enough to say that all the same evidences of Antiquity that have given testimony to the Primacy of St. Peter and to his supreme power in the Universal Church have also by common consent attributed it upon the same words of Jesus Christ to the Bishops of Rome who are the Successours of the Prince of Apostles There is nothing more ordinary in the Councils and Fathers where the same things that are said of the Primacy of St. Peter and of the Prerogatives of his Chair at Rome are in formal terms most frequently found repeated to express the Primacy of the Popes their super-intendance in the Universal Church and the superiority of their Chair and of the Church of Rome to which they declare that all the rest ought to be united as Lines to their Centre and as to the source of Sacerdotal Unity And that 's the reason why we call the Universal Church the Roman-Catholick and Apostolick Church because all particular Churches of which that great body is constituted must be united in communion with the Pope of Rome their Head that so they may be Members of the true Church of Jesus Christ which is no ways one but by that union which maketh its perfect unity I have me thinks made it hitherto clear enough according to all Antiquity opposite to the novelty of our Protestants what is the belief of Catholicks concerning St. Peter and of his Successours in his Bishoprick of Rome We must now in order examine sticking close to Antiquity against all Novelty what Prerogatives and Rights that Primacy gives to Popes what it is that all Catholicks agree in and wherein it is that they differ about that point and prove by uncontroverted matters of Fact without disputation what Antiquity which ought to direct our belief in spight of all the attempts of Novelty hath believed concerning points of that importance CHAP. V. Concerning the rights and advantages that the Primacy gives to the Bishop of Rome over all other Bishops I Think that point cannot better be decided than by the Decree of the Council of Florence in the year 1439. when that famous re-union was made betwixt the Latin and Greek Churches after many celebrated conferences and great contests that happened there during the space of fifteen months betwixt the learnedst men of both Churches about that Subject and other controverted points This is the definition of the Council Item we define that the Holy Apostolick See and the Pope of Rome have the Primacy over all the world that the Pope of Rome is the Successour of St. Peter Prince of the Apostles that he is the true Vicar of Jesus Christ and Head of all the Church the Father and Teacher of all Christians and that our Lord Jesus Christ hath given him in the person of St. Peter full power of feeding ruling and governing the universal Church in the manner specified in the Acts of Councils and holy Canons For it is precisely so in the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in the Latin Juxta eum modum qui in Actis Conciliorum in Sacris Canonibus continetur As it is to be read in Blondus Secretary to Pope Eugenius Decad. 3. l. 10. who presided in that Council In Ekius his Treatise of the Primacy of the Pope Lib. 1. in the Bishop of Rochester's five and twentieth Article against Luther Cap. Vlt. and in Albertus Pighius his fourth Book of the Hierarchy That is to say in English To govern the Church in the manner which is found expressed in the Acts of the Councils and in the Holy Canons not as Abraham of Candie hath very ill rendered it quemadmodum etiam which gives it a quite contrary sense to the intention and words of the Council as will manifestly appear in another place of this Treatise At present it is enough that we know according to that Council that the Primacy of the Pope entitles him to the inspection of all that concerns the government and welfare of the Church in general which is more than any Bishop of what dignity soever he may be can challenge For the power that other Bishops have by Divine Right to govern the Church reaches not beyond their Dioceses but that of the Pope as Head of the Church Universal extends every where when the good of all Believers in general is concerned of whom he is to take the care And that supreme dignity gives him a great many rights which none but he alone can enjoy To him application is made to have resolutions in difficulties that may arise in matters concerning Faith Hieron ad Ageruch Ep. 2. Innoc. 1. apud Aug. Epist 93. August Epist 106. Jul. apud Athan. Apol. 1. manners or general Customs Of this we have evident proofs in the Holy Fathers and an illustrious instance of it hath been seen in our days in that famous letter which the Bishops of France wrote to Pope
were not reputed Hereticks Victori non dederunt manus Hieron Ibid. cut off from the communion of Catholicks It was about an hundred and eight years after that the great Council of Nice abolished that custome in respect that Saint John had onely allowed it for a time in these Provinces of Asia that bordered upon the Jews to give an honourable Funeral to the Synagogue and that the other practice was taken universally as transmitted from the Apostles after which there lay an obligation upon Christians to submit to that Decree and they who headstrongly refused to obey it were declared Hereticks under the name of Quartodecumans This being so it is evident to all Men that neither these Bishops of Asia and of the East nor St. Irenaeus and the Gallican Church nor the Bishops of other Countries who wrote so smartly to Pope Victor in favour of these Eastern Churches did believe the Pope to be Infallible For had they believed it it is certain on the one hand that these Asiaticks would have submitted to the Decree of the Pope as they afterwards submitted to that of a Council because they believed as all other Catholicks doe that a Council is Infallible and on the other hand it is very clear that St. Irenaeus and so many other Bishops would not have written as they did to Pope Victor and found fault with his conduct For they never questioned but that those who refused to obey an Infallible Tribunal ought to be condemned and punished It was not then believed in the Church that the Pope had the gift of Infallibility though he might make a Decree for the instruction of all believers CHAP. IX What inference is to be made from that famous contest that happened betwixt the Pope St. Stephen and St. Cyprian concerning the Baptism of Hereticks THis famous question that hath made so much noise in the Church was fourty years before St. Cyprian solemnly examined in a Council held in Africa by Agrippinus Bishop of Carthage Ann. 217. and there it was determined that the Baptism of Hereticks being null there was a necessity of Re-baptizing all those who having abjured their Heresie should return to the bosome of the Church Cypr. Epist 71. ad Quin. Epist ad Jubaian Commonit 6.9 Vincentius Lirinensis hath Written that that same Agrippinus was the first who contrary to the custome of the Universal Church and the determination of his Brethren thought that Hereticks ought to be Re-baptised But saving the honour and respect that is due to so great a Man it is evident he was mistaken For besides that the Bishops of Africa and Numidia Cypr. loc citat with common consent and in conjunction with Agrippinus decided the same thing Tertullian Ann. 203. Cap. 12. who Wrote his excellent Book of Prescriptions against Hereticks fourteen years before the Council of Agrippinus says therein very plainly that their Baptism is not valid Cap. 15. Which in his Book of Baptism he also asserts in most express terms a Book Written by him before he fell into the Heresie of the Montanists Ann. 200. Strommat 1. Clemens Alexandrinus who flourished in the same time also rejects the Baptism of Hereticks which shews that it was the doctrine and custome of the Church of Alexandria the chief and most illustrious Church next to that of Rome So that Agrippinus and the Bishops of Africa and Numidia whom he assembled in a Council to determine that Question are not the first who established that Custome and Disipline which appoints all Hereticks who return into the bosome of the Church to be Re-baptized Probably it may be objected by some that what these ancient Authours say ought onely to be understood of the Hereticks of their times who all of them blaspheming against the most Holy Trinity Baptized not in the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost and that therefore their Baptism was null which is most true But the reason whereupon they ground the nullity of the Baptism of Hereticks to wit that they are strangers without the Pale of the Church Ad quos vetamur accedere quis servus cibaria ab extraneo ne dicam ab inimico domini sui petat c. Tertull. de praescrip Quos extraneos utique testatur ipsa ademptio communicationis Id. de Baptis Trajicies aquam alienam c. Clem. Alex and that we are forbidden to have any commerce with them proves manifestly that what they said ought to be understood of all sorts of Hereticks both present and to come because they are all out of the Pale of the Church Now seeing some considerable time after the Council of Agrippinus Novation who was the first Anti-pope caused Catholicks who followed the party of the true Pope Cornelius to be Re-baptized the Question concerning the Baptism of Hereticks was argued afresh in Africa where it was put Whether or not the Novatian Schismaticks who returned to the Church ought to be Re-baptized Litt. Synod ad Epis ad Episc humid ap Cypr. Epist 90. Numid ap Cypr. Epist 70. Whereupon St. Cyprian having assembled a Provincial Council at Carthage it was there declared that since no body can be lawfully Baptized out of the Church there was a necessity of Re-baptizing Hereticks and Schismaticks those excepted who having been Baptized in the Catholick Church Cypr. Epist 74. ad Pomp. had afterward separated from it because Baptism once rightly administred could never again be reiterated The Bishops of Numidia who had received the Decree of the Council of Agrippinus Litt. Synod ad Epise Numid having consulted Saint Cyprian upon that new emergent received also the Decree of the Council of Carthage and that it might be rendered more Authentick Saint Cyprian assembled them together with the Bishops of his Province in a second Synod where the decision of the former was confirmed And thereupon a Synodal Letter was written to the Pope St. Stephen Cypr. Epist 73. ad Jubai informing him of what had been decided in those two Councils to wit that all those who being out of the Church Eos qui sunt foris extra Ecclesiam tincti apud haereticos schismaticos profanae aquae labe maculaeti quando ab nos venerint Baptisare oportere eo quod parum sit eis manum imponere Epist 70. Apud Cypr. ap August l. 6. 7. de Bapt. had been polluted by the profane Baptism of Hereticks and Schismaticks ought to be Re-baptised which was also confirmed in a third Council wherein were present the Bishops of Mauritania with those of Africa and Numidia Pope Stephen though his Predecessours had not opposed the Council of Agrippinus but left the Africans in the possession of their custome thought that he ought to condemn it as contrary to Apostolical Tradition And thereupon Euseb Hist l. 6. c. 5. in two Letters which he Wrote to the Africans he made a Decree quite contrary to that of St. Cyprian
contradiction which that great Cardinal had not leisure to mind For the Patriarch Denis speaks onely here of what these Bishops had done under the Pontificate of Pope Cornelius and he prays Stephen the Successour of that Pope not to use them harshly for the Judgment they are of that the Baptism of Hereticks is null Them says he who under his Predecessour condemned the Heresie of Novatian Is there any thing clearer than that Baronius without minding it hath taken the Counter-sense and besides Denis of Alexandria would have had care not to call an opinion which he believed to be true an Heresie Firmilian then and the Asiaticks persisted still in their opinion as well as St. Cyprian the Africans and their successours till the decision of a General Council as may be clearly seen in an hundred passages of the Books of St. Austine which he Wrote concerning Baptism against the Donatists I know that St. Jerome says in the Dialogue against the Luciferians that the Bishops of Africa returned to the ancient custome saying What do we doe and that abandoning St. Cyprian they made a new Decree conform to that of Saint Stephen But all the Learned agree that that holy Doctour who Wrote that Dialogue before the most part of his other Works had taken that out of some Apocryphal Writings such as that which bears for Title The Repentance of St. Cyprian and was declared false and supposititious in a Synod held at Rome Threescore and fourteen years before the death of St. Jerome For to be short the quite contrary is to be seen in the Books of St. Austine that I have just now alledged in the Letter of Saint Basil to Amphilochius and in the Eighth Canon of the first Council of Arles Now if during the life of Saint Stephen there were so many Bishops who refused to obey his Decree there were as many that opposed it after his death For the Patriarch Denis of Alexandria Wrote in a high strain to Pope Sixtus the Successour of St. Stephen Euseb l. 7. hist c. 4. exhorting him to follow a conduct contrary to that of his Predecessour and not to break as he had done with so many Bishops for a constitution contrary to his own since it had been approved in several Councils Hic in Cypriani Africanae Synodi dogma consentiens de Haereticis Re-baptizandis ad diversos plurimas mifit epistolas quae usque hodie extant Hieron de script Ecclesias in Dionys and St. Jerome himself in his Treatise of Ecclesiastical Writers which he made long after his Dialogue against the Luciferians assures us that that great Man declared openly for the Doctrine of Saint Cyprian and African Bishops and that he thereupon Wrote many Letters which were still extant in his time That was the cause that the Successours of Sixtus entertained Peace with the African and Asiatick Bishops every one freely following their custome and opinion as to that Point without being blamed for it untill that a General Council had pronounced Supremely in the matter This we learn from St. Austine in his Books of Baptism against the Donatists These August l. 1. de Bapt. contra Donatis c. 7. who began their Schism against Cecilian Bishop of Carthage in the year Three hundred and two alledged continually the example of St. Cyprian and of his fellow Bishops to justifie the conduct which they held as well as those in Re-baptizing all Hereticks It is most evident that they durst not have made use of that instance if St. Cyprian and those Bishops had retracted For St. Austine would have confounded these Schismaticks upon the spot by saying that all these Bishops had condemned their former opinion Yet he never did so On the contrary he confesses that they always believed that Hereticks must be Re-baptized but he adds that it was lawfull for them to believe it and for all who have succeeded them to doubt of that point which was then in controversie and to dispute about it As indeed there were many conferences great disputes and debates on Church decided that difference and all submitted to that Sovereign Authority Cui ipse cederet si jam eo tempore quaestionis hujus veritas eliquata declarata per plenarium concilium solidaretur Ibid. c. 4.89 as St. Cyprian would have done without doubt saith St. Austine if the whole Church in a full and general Council had in his time pronounced concerning that point And because the Donatists would not submit to the Decree of that Council in that they added Heresie to their Schism Now before we come to shew what that General Council decided as to that point we must make a serious and solid reflexion upon what we have now said which will suffise to make it clearly out to us what Antiquity hath believed concerning the Infallibility of the Pope Here then we have a Pope of famous memory in the Church who makes a Decree whereby he instructs all Believers concerning a point of highest importance where the question is about the validity or nullity of Baptism without which one cannot be saved and by that Decree he pretends to oblige the whole Church to believe that Hereticks who are converted ought not to be Re-baptized and does so pretend it that he cuts off from his communion great Bishops who would not submit to his Decree And nevertheless St. Cyprian all the Bishops of Africa Mauritania and Numidia those of Cappadocia Cilicia Galatia and Phrygia Denis Patriarch of Alexandria and the Bishops of his Patriarchate will not receive that so solemn a Decree of Stephen Pope of Rome Besides St. Austine and all the African Catholicks united with that great Doctour of the Church against the Donatists say that before the decision of the Council that came not till long after that Decree of the Pope it might freely without making a separation from the Church be held what St. Cyprian had believed concerning the Baptism of Hereticks In fine St. Athanasius St. Optatus Melevitanus Athanas Or. 3. contra Arian St. Cyril of Jerusalem Optat. l. 4. Cont. Parmen St. Basil and some others Cyril Hieros praef in Catech. who have Written as well as they after that General Council Basil Epist 3. Con. 47. whereof St. Austine speaks and before that of Constantinople have believed that all Hereticks who have not the true Faith of the Trinity ought to be Re-baptized who in those first Ages of the Church were incomparably more numerous than the other Hereticks who believed that great Mystery These are not bare conjectures that may be doubted of but uncontroverted matters of fact A Man needs no more but eyes in his head to prove them by Reading the testimonies alledged It must necessarily then follow seeing they submitted to a Council because they knew it to be Infallible which was not done in regard to the Pope St. Stephen that St. Cyprian Firmilian of Caesarea Denis of Alexandria St. Athanasius Saint
Churches And seeing it was not doubted but that Pope John XII in the manner he set about it acted with all his Authority and Force to introduce and establish that Error in the Church so also was it believed in that Fourteenth Age that the Pope teaching the Church might err and that he is not Infallible but when he pronounces from the Chair of the Universal Church as Head of it in a general Council or with consent of the principal Members of the Church who are the Bishops CHAP. XV. The Tradition of the Church of Rome as to that IT will be no difficult Task for us to prove that that Doctrine is conform to the constant Tradition of the Church of Rome as appears by the conduct of ancient Popes who in great Controversies about Faith after that they themselves had pronounced against Error have thought that for condemning it by a sovereign and infallible Sentence there was need of a Council or at least by another way the consent of the Church Vt pleniori Juâ—acio omnis possice ror aboleri Ep. 15. ad Ephes concil to the end that Error might be abolished by a more solemn and decisive judgment said the great St. Leo writing to the second Council of Ephesus though he himself had already condemned Eutyches in his particular Council which for that end he held at Rome This hath been confirmed by the Popes of the last Age when that after Leo X. had published his Bull against the Errors of Luther Solumque Concilium generale remedium à nostris praedecessoribus in casu simili usurpatum superesse Clem. VII in Bull. indict Concil 1533. Tam necessarium opus Pius IV. in Bull. confirm they declared in their Bulls speaking of the Council of Trent which was called for the supreme Decision of that Controversie that that was the last and necessary Remedy which had always been made use of by their Predecessors on the like Occasions Wherein all the Popes perfectly well agree with the fifth Council which for proving that necessity alledges the Example of the Apostles who decided in common with St. Peter the Question touching the Observation of the Law of Moses Nec enim potest in communibus de fide disceptationibus aliter veritas manifestari and then declares that otherways Truth cannot be found in Controversies that arise about the Faith It is evident by that that the Popes and that Council did not believe that the Pope was infallible for had they believed him infallible they would also have been persuaded that it was sufficient to consult that Oracle or that after his Responses and Decisions it would not have been necessary for abolishing Error entirely to have recourse to the determination of the Church represented by a Council But if it be said that there are some Heresies which the Popes alone have condemned and which have always been reckoned lawfully condemned without the Interposition of a Council it is easily granted but at the same time it may be said that that concludes nothing at all because in the three first Ages of the Church there were Heresies such as that of Cerinthus of the Ptolemaits the Severians Bardesanites Noetians Valesians and many others that single Bishops or particular Synods have condemned and which we are obliged to account Heresies tho neither Popes nor General Councils have had any hand in their Condemnation Not that these Bishops and Synods are infallible but because all the other Bishops who abominated these Heresies as much as they condemned them as they had done by approving all that they had done So when Popes have decided against any Doctrine which is afterward to be esteemed heretical it is so because they have defined with consent of the Church which hath received their Constitutions as we have in our days seen an illustrious Instance of it That which more confirms that ancient Tradition of the Roman Church is the great number of Popes who condemning some of their Predecessors after Oecumenical Councils have thereby declared that they themselves no more than others have not received of God the gift of Infallibility which he hath only bestowed upon his Church And indeed two great Popes of the last Times were so fully persuaded of this that they would not accept of it from the hands of men that would have attributed it unto them The first is Adrian VI. who in his Commentaries upon the fourth of the Sentences Art 3. de Mines confirm says positively and in a most decisive manner Certum est quod Pontifex possit err are etiam in iis quae tangunt fidem haeresiâ—â— per suam determinationem aut decretalem asserendo that he is certain the Pope may err even in matters belonging to the Faith teaching and establishing a Heresie by his Definition or by his Decretal which afterwards he proves by many Instances and very far from following Pius II. and changing Opinion as he did when he came to be Pope he persisted in it so constantly that he thought fit during his Pontificat that a new Edition of his Book should be printed at Rome exactly conform to that which he published when he was Doctor and Dean of Louvain wherein that Passage is entire without the Omission or Alteration of one single Word The second is Paul IV. who before his promotion to the Papacy had been great Inquisior Relat. Joann Hay Paris Theol. Addit aux mem de Casteluam c. 2. b. 6 the most severe and zealous that ever was for the preservation of the purity of the Catholick Faith against all Heresies Num matrimonium per verba de prasenti contractum quod est verum matrimonium verum sà cramentum juxta sanclorum Theolegorum sententiam authoritate nâ—stra dissolvi possit intelligo cum carnalis nulla conjunctio intercessit This Pope in the Year One thousand five hundred and fifty seven held a great Congregation of Cardinals Bishops and Doctors at Rome for the examining that important question Whether by the power of the Keys which Jesus Christ had given him as Successor to St. Peter he could dissolve the Marriage which the Mareschal of Montmorency had contracted in formal terms de praesenti with the Lady de Piennes Having proposed the matter to them by giving them to understand that the Question was about the deciding of a Point of very great Importance concerning a Sacrament he declared to them that he would not have them alledge to him the Examples of his Predecessors Non dubito quin ego decessores mei errare aliquando potuerimus non solum in koc sed etiam in pluribus aliis rerum generibus that he would not follow them but in so far as they were conform to the Authority of Holy Scripture and solid Reasons of Divinity For I make no doubt added he but that my Predecessors and may fail not only in this but in many other things Which he even proved by Testimonies
People except a very few who still adhered to the Schismaticks Martin V. who was chosen Pope in place of John XXIII in the forty fifth Session approved the Decrees which had solemnly been made in that Council and protested that he would observe them inviolably In fine in the Bull wherein he enjoyns what is to be asked of Hereticks who return from their Heresie amongst others this Article is put Whether they believe not that all Believers ought to approve and hold what the holy Council of Constance representing the Vniversal Church holds and approves for the Integrity of the Faith and the Salvation of Souls and whether they condemn not and repute not condemned what the same holy Council hath condemned and condemns as contrary to the Faith and good Manners This without doubt is one of the most authentick Approbations that a Pope can give to a Council Now seeing in compliance with a Decree of this Council the Pope had called another at Pavia afterward at Sienna and lastly at Basil where it was held fourteen Years after that of Constance under Eugenius IV. who caused the Cardinal Julian of St. Angelo named by his Predecessor for that Function to preside in it in his place that Council in the second Session when without contradiction it was very lawful the Pope presiding therein by his Legate renewed those two Decrees and defined the same thing in the same terms touching the Superiority of General Councils to which Popes were obliged to submit in matters concerning the Faith the extinction of Schism and the Reformation of the Church in its Head and Members This was not all for sometime after Eugenius having sent the Archbishops of Colossis and Taranto to the Council to represent the Reasons and Authority that he had to dissolve it and to transfer it to another place The Fathers in a general Assembly made a Synodal Respons Synod Sess 6. Answer by way of Constitution containing more than twenty four large Pages wherein having refuted all the Reasons whereby one of these Archbishops would have proved the Superiority of the Pope over a Council Septemb. 1432. they on the contrary evince by many Reasons and by the Authority of the Council of Constance and of the Gospel which remits St. Peter to the Church that the Council which represents her hath all her Authority and again define once more that the Council is above the Pope However Eugenius dissolved it contrary to the Advice of Cardinal Julian who presided therein But when he perceived that that began to produce very bad Effects Ann. 1433. he made the Year following a new Constitution whereby annulling and rescinding all that he had done for dissolving it Illas alias quascunque quicquid per nos aut nestro nomine in praejudicium derâ—gationem sacri Concilii B siliensis seu contra ejus authoritatem factum attentatum seu assertum est cassamus revocamus nullas irritas esse declaramus that that Council had lawfully continued till then from the Beginning and approves whatever had been done in it even so far as to declare null certain Constitutions in one whereof he declared that in matters belonging to the Government of the Church he had power over all Councils And that was so authentick and solemn that Pius II. even in the Bull of his Retractation ingenuously confesse that Pope Eugenius consented to the Decrees of that Council Accessit iâ—sias Eâ—gâ—nit consenâ—us qui dissolutionem Conâ—â—â—ii à se sactam revocavit progressam eâ—â—e approbavit approved its progress and continuation and recalled the Bull whereby he had dissolved it There are two Councils then without speaking of that of Pisa whereof the Council of Constance was a continuation and two Councils in formal terms approved by two Popes Martin V. and Eugenius IV. and these Councils determine the one during the Schism and the other after the Schism was extinct that every Council representing the Universal Church is superiour to the Pope Now all the Doctors of that party which hold for the Pope's Superiority acknowledge that a Council universal and approved cannot err in its Decisions whence it may easily be concluded that since the Decrees of these Councils one is obliged to believe what all Antiquity before these Councils believed that is that an Oecumenical Council lawfully assembled is above the Pope I don't see how one can avoid this without finding ways to invalidate the Authority of the Councils and particularly of that of Constance which is held for the sixteenth General Council And this a modern Author hath attempted to do in a Book written on purpose and last Year printed at Antwerp by John Baptista Verdussen We are now to see how he hath succeeded in it CHAP. XXII Of the Writing of the Sieur Emmanuel Schelstrate against these two Decrees of the Council of Constance THree years since Ann. 1682. Cleri Gallicani de Ecclesiasticâ potestate declaratio the Clergy of France representing the Gallican Church being by Order of the King assembled at Paris made an authentick Declaration in four Articles of what they believe and define concerning Ecclesiastical Power conform to the Holy Scriptures Tradition and the practice of the whole Church and particularly of that of France Amongst other things they declare in the second Article That the Popes Successors of St. Peter have in such manner full power over the spiritual That the Decrees of the holy Council of Constance approved by the Holy Apostolick See and contained in the fourth and fifth Session concerning the Authority of General Councils must also remain in their full force and not at all be infringed And they add That the Gallican Church approves not the Opinion of those who would weaken these Decrees and rob them of all their force saying that their Authority may be called in question that they are not sufficiently approved or that they extend not beyond the time when there is a Schism in the Church Doubtless there is nothing more authoritative and at the same time more modest than that Declaration of a Church so venerable in all Ages as the Gallican hath been and which next to that of the Apostles hath always maintained and made the Catholick Faith to flourish in France in its full Integrity without having been ever suspected of the least Error Nevertheless there is a late Writer to wit the Sieur Emmanuel Schelstrate Canon of Antwerp and Under-Library-keeper of the Vatican who as he declares at first in the Scheme of his Dissertation undertakes to overthrow all that the Clergy of France hath asserted concerning these Decrees and to shew in three Chapters first that one may and ought rationally to doubt of their Authority secondly that it is only to be understood during the time of a Schism and in regard of controverted Popes and lastly that they are so far from being approved that they have been manifestly rejected by an express Bull. Now
Matter having been diligently examined Now it is sure adds he with the greatest Confidence imaginable and as if no body could doubt of the truth of what he says without so much as bringing any proof for it the thing being clear in it self It is then says he most certain that that Decree of the Superiority of a Council was made by the Council of Constance without any Examination sine ullo examine I have two things to say to that first that a manifest Falshood was never asserted with so much Boldness for never was there a Question examined nor debated in the Council with greater heat than this as I have already made it appear and as it even appears by the Manuscript of M. Schelstrate For there it is to be seen that before the fourth Session the Deputies of the Nations and the Cardinals after many Contests and Oppositions of the same Cardinals all agreed Habita fuit non modica disceptatio inter D. Regem D. D. Cardinales deputatos nationum c. by a sudden Inspiration of the Holy Ghost in one Judgment concerning that Point of the Superiority of a Council over the Pope who ought to obey it in what relates to Faith and the Extirpation of Schism And he adds that before the fifth Session Die Sabbati 6 Aprilis cum per prius inter D. D. Cardinales Nations altercatum fuisset tandem ordinatum conclusum est c. which was not held till eight days after and wherein according to himself it was defined that the Pope ought to obey the Council in what concerns the Reformation of the Church in the Head and Members there fell out again great Debates betwixt the Cardinals and the Deputies of the Nations How can it then be said so boldly without bogling as Cardinal Bellarmine hath done Nullo facto examine I declare that it is a thing I cannot comprehend after the unquestionable Testimonies that I have before alledged to the contrary The next thing that I have to say against the Answer of Bellarmine is that that word Conciliariter signifies not only as he hath interpreted it the matter in question having been well examined but also being afterwards solemnly decided in a Session of the Council without which nothing is defined In the Council of Constance Votes went by Nations There were at first four the Italian English French and German and afterward the Spanish was added The Deputies of every Nation consulted first severally and then all the Nations communicated their Opinions after which all these Nations held an Assembly where every private Person had liberty to speak and give his Voice yet all the Voices made but one Suffrage for each Nation though they differed in the number of Prelates and Doctors In fine when they were all agreed after much disputing and debate that was no more but preliminary and a necessary Condition to a final Decision which was only made in a General Assembly of Cardinals Archbishops Bishops Generals of Orders Ambassadors of Princes and in a word of the whole Council with great Ceremony after high Mass Litanies and other Prayers in the publick Session held in the Cathedral Church where after that a Cardinal or Bishop having from the Pulpit read the Decrees and Articles framed in the Assembly of the Nations demanded if they approved them it was still free to every one to say what he pleased concerning them And when they had all unanimously said Placet We consent to them as they never failed to do after these previous Deliberations shorter or longer according to the greater or less difficulty of the matters that they had examined then was the Decree authentically made and had its full force and that in the terms of Martin V. is called a Decree made Conciliariter In this manner the Errors of Wickleff were condemned in the eighth Session that of John Huss and the damnable Proposition of John Petit in the fifteenth definitive Sentence pronounced against John XXIII who was deposed in the twelfth and the Decrees of the Superiority of the Council made in the fourth and fifth Session Before that the Council had determined nothing at all nor laid any Obligation upon Believers This the Pope like a very knowing man expresses in the terms he makes use of approving the Council in the five and fortieth Session The Colledge of Cardinals and of the Nations concluded that a certain Book of F. John Falkenberg full of Heresies ought to be condemned The Ambassadors of the King of Poland and of the great Duke of Lithuania who concerned themselves in that Condemnation publickly besought the Pope to condemn it in full Session before the conclusion of the Council according to the Resolution taken by the Cardinals and the Nations and they pressed him to it in so offensive a manner that they protested in name of those Princes their Masters that in case of a refusal they appealed to the next Council Seeing these Ambassadors had spoken so haughtily and in so disobliging a manner under the specious Pretext of an extraordinary Zeal for the Faith and that besides it was not at all to the purpose that the Pope in the present Juncture should give cause to think that he thought himself obliged to submit to what the Cardinals and Nations had determined in their Assemblies he weighed his Words and answered very prudently making it by his Answer appear that on the one hand he was not wanting to comply with his Obligations and on the other that he knew very well how to preserve his Rights and Liberty For he told them that he would always inviolably observe and stick to what the Council had decided in matter of Faith Conciliariter That shews that he had at least as much Zeal for the Faith as these Ambassadors had who pressed him in so disrespectful a manner to condemn a Book And at the same time he adds that he approves all the Decrees which the Council had made authentically and according to the forms Conciliariter but not at all what was done otherwise as if he would give them to understand that tho he be obliged to obey the Council and inviolably to approve and observe what hath been defined in the Sessions yet he is not at all bound to submit to what the Cardinals and Nations might conclude in their Assemblies without the Authority and Approbation of the Council in their Sessions This I think may undeceive M. Schelstrate who pretends that the Pope by speaking so makes it appear that he is above the Council he ought to say above not the Council but the Colledge of Cardinals and the Assemblies of the Nations when they are not authorised in the Sessions And therefore when one of the Ambassadors of the King of Poland would still appeal to the next Council the Pope commanded him Silence upon pain of Excommunication and he did very well because that Appeal was manifestly rash abusive and unwarrantable it being most evident that a
bare Resolution of the Cardinals and Nations without the Authority of the Council could not oblige the Pope And this was the reason why Martin justly provoked by so unworthy a Proceeding made shortly after a Bull Joan. Gerson Tract an quomodo possit appellari à Papa which he caused to be read not in the Council but in a publick Consistory whereby he declares that it is not lawful for any one to appeal from the Holy See or the Pope nor to decline his Judgment in cases of the Faith which as being greater Causes ought to be brought before the Pope and Holy Apostolical See M. Schelstrate alledges these words as his last Argument which he thinks invincible to prove that the Pope is absolutely above all Councils But it is very easie to give him an Answer that hath been an hundred times made without Reply That these Words and others of the like nature ought to be understood with relation to all Churches taken particularly to all Bishops Archbishops Primates and Patriarchs from the Judgment of any of whom Appeals may be made to the Pope and not to any of them from the Judgment of the Pope who is their Superiour not when they are assembled in Body in a General Council representing the whole Church but when they are taken separately and each of them in particular according to these Words of St. Austin in his second Book of Baptism against the Donatists Quis nescit illam Apostolatus prercipatu cuilibâ—t Episcopatui prâ—fereâ—dum L. 2. de Bapt. contra Donatist c. 1. Who knows not that St. Peter by reason of the Primacy of his Apostleship ought to be preferred before any other Episcopacy whatsoever He says before every Episcopacy and not before all Episcopacy in a General Council So that that Bull of Martin V. no more than another of Pâ—as II. which begins Execrabilis cannot absolutely condemn and forbid the Practice but only the Abuse that may be made of an Appeal to a General Council by appealing to it rashly without Reason and a lawful Cause as those Ambassadors of Poland and Lithuania did If notwithstanding all this M. Schelstrate will have the Pope by that Bull absolutely to condemn all Appeals to a General Council which nevertheless it doth not express he may be answered without difficulty that were it so yet it could be of no force because it was not made Conciliariter and facro approbante Concilio nor with the consent of the Church which hath never pretended but that in certain Cases Appeals may be made from the Pope to a Council Quomodo an liceat à summo pontifice appellare ejus Judicium declinare To be persuaded of this he need only read the Treatise written upon that Subject by that learned and holy man John Gerson Chancellor of the University of Paris and the Declaration which that famous University made by an authentick Act to Philip the Fair Decl. Univ. Paris Ann. 1303. mense Septemb. that a Comcil might be called and appealed unto against Boniface VIII and that the University consented and would stick according to the holy Canons to that Convocation and Appeal which the King and all France made to the Council If I mistake not I have hitherto shewed the Weakness or rather the Nullity of what M. Schelstrate objects and that Martin V. solemnly approved the Decrees of the fourth and fifth Session by the Declaration which he made in the last Session and by the Questions that he will have to be put to Hereticks that are converted But though we had not those two so formal Declarations of that Pope would our Author make no account of that of Pope Eugenius concerning which it hath not pleased him to tell us one word Nevertheless he cannot be ignorant that the Council of Basil Basiliense Concilium initio quidem fuit legitimum nam legatus aderat Pontificis Episconpi plurimi Bellar. l. 3. de Eccles Milit. c. 16. l. 2. de Conc. c. 19. which all men even Cardinal Bellarmine himself own to be lawful in the second Session after its first opening renewed these Decrees of Constance which were approved by the Cardinal of St. Angelo Juliano Caesarini who presided therein in name of that Pope Nor do I doubt but that he knows that Eugenius IV. himself in the Bull which he made during the time of the sixteenth Session approved all that the Council till then had done and consequently these Decrees of Constance renewed in the second Session and the Synodal Answer wherein the same Council anew confirms those Decrees and backs them with very strong Reasons which are there specified at length And now I have but two words to say to M. Schelstrate concerning the Approbation of these Decrees First if he be not satisfied with it he must of necessity reckon as null all the Decrees which the first Councils made against the Arians Macedonians and the other Hereticks because it is never to be found that these Councils have been approved neither so formally nor so many times as the Decrees of Constance have been by the Popes Martin V. and Eugenius IV. Again that he ought to know as I have formerly made it appear that in the Ancient Church no other Approbation nor Confirmation was ever known to have been made of Councils by the Popes but the consent which they themselves as well as others were obliged to give to them For if after that the Councils of Nice and Constantinople which were lawfully assembled in the Holy Ghost had defined the Consubstantiality of the Word and the Divinity of the Holy Ghost the Popes Silvester and Damasus would not have received these Decrees nor have approved them it is certain that they would have been reputed Hereticks by the whole Church Who can doubt of that And these Councils would have been no less infallible than they were in making their Definitions by the Inspiration of that divine Spirit which is the Soul of all Oecumenical Councils according to these Words Visum est spiritui sancto nobis For to say that all the Authority of Councils is derived from the Pope who may not follow and approve their Decisions concerning the Faith and thereby take from them all their force is an error condemned by the learned Cardinal of Cambray Peter D' Ailly in most significant terms when preaching before the whole Council of Constance and Pope Martin V. in the Year 1417. the second Sunday in Advent about a month after the Election of that Pope he related the whole History of the Council which the Apostles celebrated at Jerusalem and then expressed himself in these Words By that it is manifest Manifestè reprobatur error quorundam perniciosissimus toti Ecclesiae periculosissimus qui adulando potestati Papae ita detrabunt Authoritati sacri Concilii c. that the Authority of deciding and defining ought not to be attributed to the Pope alone but to
the whole General Council whence it follows that the most pernicious and dangerous Error to the Church of some men ought to be condemned who to flatter the Pope so rob the Council of its Authrity that they have the Boldness to say that the Pope is not of necessity obliged to follow the Decisions of the Council and that on the contrary we should test upon the Judgment of the Pope if he oppose that of the Church or of a General Council Thus that great Cardinal from the chair of Truth before the whole Council of Constance conform to its Decrees and in presence of the Pope himself who found no fault with it and seemed not at all displeased that that Opinion was called an Error most pernicious and most dangerous invented by the Flatterers of Popes Decr. Facult Ann. 1429. Kal. April So also the sacred Faculty following so good an Example about twelve years after made F. John Sarasin retract that Proposition which he had put into one of his Theses All the Authority that gives force to the Decrees of a Council Tota authoritas dans vigorem statutis residet in solo summo pontisice resides in the Pope alone He was obliged to make a publick recantation and to change his Proposition into this All the Authority that gives force to the Decrees of a Council Toâ—â— authoritas dans vigorem statutis residet non in solo summo pontifice sed principaliter in spiritu Sancto in Catholica Ecclesia resides not in the Pope alone but chiefly in the Holy Ghost and Catholick Church And certainly it is very rational that the Pope should depend upon the Will of the Holy Ghost who teaches as it pleases him all Truth to the Church and to the Council which represents it and not that the Holy Ghost should depend upon on the Will of the Popes as it must needs do if after that divine Spirit hath by the Council defined the Consubstantiality of the Word the Divinity of the Holy Ghost the Unity of Person and the Plurality of Natures Wills and Operations â—n Jesus Christ and such other Truths concerning the Faith his Decisions had no Authority if it pleased not the Pope to consent to â—hem And this I think is sufficient in relation to the Approbation of the Decrees of Constance one word more as to what M. Schelstrate pretends that they were only made for the time of a Schism CHAP. XXV A Refutation of the other Chapter of M. Schelstrate THis Objection that is made against us is of an old ruinous Engine ready to fall of it self tho we set no strong hand to it to push it down The truth is the Council of Constance which foresaw that it might be made use of to weaken the supreme Authority of Oecumenical Councils did anticipate and overthrow it even before it was made and for that end in the fifth Session wherein it declared that all men of what Dignity soever are obliged to obey the Decrees and Ordinances of that sacred Council of Constance these words are added And of any other General Council lawfully assembled Et cujuscunque alterius Concilii Generalis legitimè congregati He that speaks of any other Council without Restriction comprehends all times both out of Schism and during a Schism So the Council of Basil which was a long time lawful when there was no Schismâ— declared that the Pope was obliged to obey it and every other Council and the Reasons given for it in that long Synodal Answer approved by Pope Eugenius necessarily comprehend all times as may be seen in the two Reasons which only I shall alledge The first is That an Oecumenical Council is a whole and a Body whereof the Pope or he that presides in it in his place is the Head For there is no Acephalous Council as M. Schelstrate speaks that is to say without a Head calling that of Constance so in the Absence of the Pope Nay if he refuse to preside when he might or withdraw himself from it there is always some body that presides therein in his place and represents him in that quality of Head as the whole Council represents the Universal Church and it will be acknowledged without difficulty that the Head is no more but the chief Member and principal Part of that great Body Certè Petrus Apostolus primum membrum universalis Ecclesiae est Gregor l. 4. Ep. 8. as Saint Gregory speaking of Saint Peter positively affirms Not as Jesus Christ who is not only the Head but also the Master of the Universal Church which he hath purchased with his own Blood and by consequent it is his Church it properly belongs unto him and he can dispose thereof as he thinks fit as an Owner can do with his Estate Dominus est Hence it is that he cannot be said to be but a part of the Church Domious Vniverss noâ— est pars universiâ—â—â— Arist 12 Meâ—aph he is over all as God who is the absolute Master of the World is not a part of that whole of that Universe whereof he is the Master as Aristotle himself hath acknowledged It is not so with the Pope who is indeed Head of the Church Universal but not Master Jesus Christ having said to St. Peter as well as to all the other Apostles Matth. 20. Mark 12. Luke 22. The Princes of the Gentiles exercise Dominion over them but it shall not be so among you And that entirely ruines that odious Comparison that some would make between our Kings who are over the States of their Kingdom and the Popes whom they would place over the whole Church There is a great deal of Difference Our Kings are the Masters in their States exercise Dominion over them but not the Popes in the Church but it shall not be so with you The Pope then is but a part of the Church and of a General Council that represents it and not the Master Now it is evident by the light of Nature that the whole is more noble than every part and carries it over them according to that sentence of St. Austin L. de Bapt. c. 4. Vniversum partibus semper optimo Jure praeponitur And upon that Maxim received of all Men without contradiction St. Jerome in one word derides that question when he saith Ep. ad Evagr. Major est Authoritas orbis quam urbis Thus the Pope as the chief part and Head of the universal Church is above every part and his power regulated according to the Canons extends over all the Churches taken particularly and none are exempt from his Jurisdiction but no ways over all the Churches assembled in a General Council unless it be for calling of them and presiding therein And in this manner is to be understood what is to be found in the Bulls of Eugenius IV. and Leo X. in the Councils of Florence and the Lateran besides that this last is not agreed upon to be
the Iconoclaste Before that saith the same Author Popes were Subject to the Emperors and durst neither judg nor resolve of any thing that concerned them Imperatoribus suberant de iis Judicare vel quicquam decernere non audebat Papa Romanus Thus the Ancient Popes behaved themselves and so much they believed of their Pontifical Authority which does not at all reach the Temporal And to this you may add Onuphr Pavin in vit Greg. VII ex edit Gresser pag. 271. 272. that in the eight first Ecumenical Councils there is nothing to be found but what speaks the compleat submission that is due to Emperors and Kings but nothing that can in the least encroach upon or invalidate the absolute independence of their Temporal Power Now if in some of the Councils which succeeded the Pontificat of Gregory VII Kings have been threatned to be deposed and if an Emperor hath been actually deposed that was not done by the way of decision and though a Council had made a decision as to that yet it must only have been an unwarrantable attempt upon the Right of Princes and could have been of no greater Force than the Bulls whereby it hath been often enough offered at to dispossess them of their States but which have always been condemned and rejected as abusive For after all there will be reason everlastingly to say that which all Antiquity hath believed that the Church her self infallible as she is which the Pope according to the same Antiquity is not hath not received from her heavenly spouse the gift of Infallibility but as to matters purely Spiritual and wholly abstracted from the Temporal and the Kingdom of the World wherein Jesus Christ who hath said my Kingdom is not of this World would never meddle CHAP. XXX What hath always been the opinion of the Gallican Church and of all France as to that The conclusion of this Point and of the whole Treatise HItherto I have made appear what hath been the Judgment and Doctrin of Jesus Christ of his Apostles the Fathers Ancient Popes and of the Councils that is of all venerable Antiquity concerning that Power at least indirect which some would attribute to Popes Now seeing the most Christian Kingdom above all other States of Christendom hath always stuck close to the Ancient Doctrin of the Church which is the solid foundation of their Liberties Therefore it was that all the Bishops of France representing the Gallican Church the faculty of Theology of the great University of Paris so much respected in the World the chief Parliament of France and in imitation of it the rest acting in the Name and by the Authority of the King as Protector of the Canons and holy Decrees have even in this Kingdom maintained the Ancient Doctrin and upon all occasions condemned that pernicious novelty which is contrary to it This I intend briefly to prove The Gallican Church since the settlement of the most Christian Monarchy amongst the Gaules hath always inviolably observed the Rights of the Royalty in her Councils which were so often called by the sole Authority of Clovis and his Successors especially during the first and second race of our Kings And when the Popes would have attempted any thing upon their Temporal the French Bishops have always opposed it with all imaginable force and vigour Of this I shall give you some instances Lotharius Louis and Pepin Sons of Louis the Debonaire instigated by some who had a mind to make their advantage of the dissentions that they had sowed betwixt the Father and his Children Auct Anonym Vic. Ludou Pii rose in Arms against him and found means to engage into their party Pope Gregory IV. Ann. 832. who came in person to their Camp to favour their pretentions The Emperor on the other Hand accompanied with a great part of the Bishops of France failed not to advance with a Powerful Army in May the year following as far as Worms not far distant from the Camp of the Princes his Children Ut si more praedecessorum suorum aderat curâ—tontas necteret moras non sibi occurrendo Immediately he sent them some of his Bishops who exhorted them to return to their duty and who told the Pope in his name that if he was come according to the custom of his Predecessors he much wondered that he had so long delayed to come and wait upon him But when it was discovered that instead of keeping within the bounds of a bare Mediator for reconciling the Children to their Father so as it was believed he was come with a design to Excommunicate the Emperor and his Bishops if they obeyed not his Will and the Princes for whom he thereby manifestly declared himself against the Emperor Then these Bishops without being startled Nullo modo se velle voluntati ejas succumbere sed si Excommunicaturus adveniret Excommunicatus abiret cam aliter se babeas antiquorum Canonum autoritas made it known to him plainly that in that they would no ways obey him and that if he was come to Excommunicate them he should return Excommunicated himself seeing the Authority of the ancient Canons prescribes and ordains the quite contrary to what he attempts The truth is that expression seems to me a little too high but it cannot be denied but that it makes it clearly out to us that the Bishops of France would not at all suffer that the Pope should offer to enjoyn any thing concerning the Government of the State and the Temporal interests which were the Points that occasioned the War and besides that they were very well persuaded that Popes are Subject to the Holy Canons and by consequent to the Councils which have made them Moreover the great clashing that Philip the Fair had with Pope Boniface VIII who openly attacked the Rights of his Crown is very well known and it is also well known what the Gallican Church did for maintaining them and the cautions they took against the Bull unam Sanctam which raised the Popes in Temporals above all Sovereigns It is likewise known what decisions she gave Louis XII for the preservation of his Rights in the difference that he had with Julius II. and what the Clergy of France Assembled at Mante during the League Anno 1591. declared upon occasion of the Bull of Gregory XIV against Henry IV. To the Estates General at Paris 1614 1615. Now if Cardinal Duperron hath in his Speeches said something not altogether consistent with the Doctrin always maintained by the Clergy of France that is but the opinion of one private Doctor who hath oftener than once changed his sentiment and on that occasion transgressed the orders of the Ecclesiastical Chamber of the States General in name of whom he spake and who would have him only represent to the third Estate that it did not belong to them but to the Church to decide that Point of Doctrin concerning the Pontifical Power as it
little longer to live and who according to my Profession can contribute nothing to your Conquests but by my ardent Prayers I shall reckon my self most happy and shall die content if I can but joyn a little by my Pen to those which you daily Atchieve for enlarging the Empire of the Church by the Conversion of Hereticks which by most soft and efficacious ways you procure And if by my Writings and particularly by this I can make it known to all the World as I hope I may that I am as true a Catholick as a good French Man and that I will die as I have lived SIR Your Majesties Most Humble most Obedient and Faithful Subject and Servant LOUIS MAIMBOURG A TABLE OF The Chapters and of their Contents CHAP. I. The design and draught of this Treatise and the Principle upon which it moves THE true Church is the Kingdom of Jesus Christ The definition thereof It s unity in the multitude of particular Churches which make but one Episcopacy and one Chair by the communion they have with a chief Church which is the center of their Vnity Antiquity is to be followed against Novelty in Doctrin that is contrary to it Vpon this Principle it is proved in this Treatise against the new Opinions what Antiquity hath believed of the first Foundation and Prerogatives of that chief Church which is the Church of Rome Page 1. CHAP. II. Of the Foundation and Establishment of the Church of Rome That St. Peter hath been at Rome A Refutation of the Erroneous reasons that some Protestants alledge for overthrowing that Truth St. Luke hath omitted a great many other things which notwithstanding are true The true Chronology which agrees with the progress and coming of St. Peter to Antioch and Rome against the wrong Chronology contrived to subvert it There were Christians at Rome when St. Paul arrived there All Antiquity hath believed that St. Peter was at Rome The Extravagance of those who have said that the Fathers were mistaken in taking the Country of Rome or Romania for the City of Rome Page 15 CHAP. III. That the Church of Rome hath been founded by St. Peter that he was the first Bishop of it and that the Popes are his Successors in that Bishoprick THAT truth acknowledged by all Antiquity In what sense Bishops sit in St. Peter's Chair and are his Successors and how Popes are in another manner Page 31 CHAP. IV. Of the Primacy of St. Peter and that he hath been established by Jesus Christ Head of the Universal Church THE true interpretation of these words Thou art Peter and upon that Rock will I build my Church How the Church is built upon Jesus Christ upon the confession of his Divinity and on the person of St. Peter His Primacy of Jurisdicton over all Believers proceeds from the confession of Faith which he made for all the rest All Antiquity hath acknowledged that Primacy of St. Peter and of all his Successors in the Bishoprick of Rome Page 37 CHAP. V. Of the Rights and advantages that the Primacy gives to the Bishop of Rome over other Bishops WHAT the Council of Florence decided as to that The superintendence of the Pope over all that concerns the Government and good of the Church in General The right he hath of calling Councils for the Spiritual and presiding in them That appeals may be made to his Tribunal and that he ought to judge of greater causes An illustrious instance of that Supreme Authority of the Pope in the History of Pope Agapetus of the Patriarch Anthimius and the Emperor Justinian The prodigious Ignorance of Calvin in Ecclesiastical History The System of his Heresie quite contrary to the Doctrin of Antiquity What are the Prerogatives of Popes that are disputed amongst Catholicks Page 51 CHAP. VI. The state of the Question concerning the Infallibility of the Pope WHether or not when he defines without a Council and without the consent of the Church he may err p. 72 CHAP. VII What Antiquity hath concluded from that that St. Peter was reproved by St. Paul WHether St. Peter was blame-worthy His action is called an error by St. Austin The opinion of St. Jerome refuted by that holy Doctor He compares the Error of St. Cyprian with that of St. Peter The History of the Error of Vigilius in regard of the three Chapters and his change compared by Pelagius II. with the Error and change of St. Peter The Schism of the Occidentals founded upon the constitution of Vigilius According to Pope Pelagius for quenching that Schism the Holy See is to be followed in its change as believers were obliged to imitate St. Peter in that which he made from evil to good St. Paul believed not St. Peter to be infallible It was before the Council of Jerusalem that St. Peter was reproved by St. Paul The true interpretation of that passage I have prayed for thee Peter that thy faith fail not p. 77 CHAP. VIII What follows naturally from the great contest of Pope Victor with the Bishops of Asia DIfferent customs in the Church concerning the celebration of Easter and of the Fast before that Feast The good intelligence betwixt Pope St. Anicetus and St. Polycarp Bishop of Smyrna notwithstanding the diversity of their customs The Decree of Pope Victor rejected by Polycrates Bishop of Ephesus and by the other Asiaticks St. Ireneus in name of the Gallican Church opposes Pope Victor None of these Bishops of the East and West believed the Pope to be infallible p. 103 CHAP. IX What ought to be inferred from the famous debate that was betwixt the Pope St. Stephen and St. Cyprian concerning the Baptism of Hereticks WHAT was the Judgment of St. Cyprian in that question and what was that of St. Stephen Councils held thereupon on both sides The Decrees of the one and other quite contrary St. Stephen cuts off from his Communion the Bishops that would not submit to his Decree Neither these Bishops nor St. Cyprian did for all that change their opinion and practice It was also permitted long after the death of St. Cyprian to maintain the same opinion and to follow the same conduct The Holy Fathers who held a Doctrin contrary to the Decree of the Pope St. Stephen What the great Council of Arles Nice and Constantinople have decided as to that question All then except the Donatists submitted to the Decrees of these Councils because they were believed to be Infallible which was not thought of Popes p. 111 CHAP. X. The fall of Liberius HIS Letters published in all places wherein he condemns St. Athanasius suppresses the term Consubstantial receives the Arians to his Communion and subscribes the Formulary of Sirmium He is for that deposed by the Church of Rome p. 135 CHAP. XI The instance of Pope Vigilius THE constitution of that Pope for the three Chapters The fifth Council which is Infallible condemns them p. 140 CHAP. XII The condemnation of Honcrius in the sixth Council THE
Council over the Pope What in signifies in M. Schelstrates Manuscript That the Pope Elected cannot be bound The Judgment of the Vniversity of Paris and of the Gallican Church concerning the superiority of a Council over the Pope p. 317 CHAP. XXVI The state of the Question touching the Power that some Doctors have attributed to Popes over the Temporal THE distinction of the direct and indirect Power p. 341 CHAP. XXVII What Jesus Christ and his Apostles have taught us as to that A False distinction of Buchanans refuted It was upon an obligation of Conscience and not through weakness that Christians obeyed infidel Emperors and Persecutors The Allegiance that Subjects owe to their Sovereigns is of Divine Right with which Popes cannot dispence All the passages cited for the contrary opinion are understood contrary to the interpretation of the Fathers of the Church which is forbidden by the Council of Trent p. 345 CHAP. XXVIII What hath been the Judgment of the Ancient Fathers of the Church as to that Point THE distribution that God hath made of the Spiritual for the Church and her Pastors and of the Temporal for Kings An Exhortation of the passage Here are two Swords Dominion forbidden to the Popes and how p. 359 CHAP. XXIX The Judgment of Ancient Popes touching the Power over Temporals that some Doctors of late times attribute to the Pope THE Testimony of Gelasius Of Gregory II. That Pope offered not to depose Leo Isauricus nor to make Rome revolt against him Testimonies of Pelagius I. Stephen II. St. Gregory the Great and of Martin I. supposititious Bulls of St. Gregory Pope Gregory VII is the first that offered to depose Emperors Pope Zachary deposed not Childerick and Leo III. transferred not the Empire to Charlemagne p. 370 CHAP. XXX What hath always been the Opinion of the Gallican Church and of all France as to that The Conclusion of this Point and of the whole Treatise HOW the Bishops of France opposed the attempts of Gregory IV. against Louis the Debonnaire They have always done the like upon all occasions What the Chamber of the Clergy declared concerning the absolute independence of our Kings in the Estates Assembled in 1914. Their Declaration in the year 1682. in relation to the same Subject The sentences of Parliament and the Edicts of Kings upon the same occasion Conclusion of this Treatise p. 387 AN Historical Treatise Concerning the FOUNDATION AND PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH of ROME And of her BISHOPS CHAP. I. The Design and Draught of this Work and the Principle on which it moves TO maintain a State in peace and tranquillity which makes Subjects happy according to the scope that true Policie proposes to it self The first thing that is to be done is to beat off the enemy that hath taken up Arms for the ruine of it and then to take care that the quarrels and troublesome contests which sometimes arise amongst the chief members of the State proceed not so far as to occasion a Civil War All Christians agree that the true Church of Jesus Christ is that Spiritual Kingdom which he came to establish in this world and which nevertheless as he himself hath said is not of this world because the whole end of it is to procure us eternal happiness a thing no ways to be attained to upon Earth Hereticks and Schismaticks have often risen against the Lord and his Christ that they might overturn that beautifull kingdom and establish their particular Churches upon its ruines every one pretending that his is the Church of the Lord though indeed they be no more all of them but the Synagogue of Satan and the Kingdom of him who in the Gospel is called the Prince of this world Besides it falls out many times that amongst Catholicks who alone are members of the true Church disputes and controversies arise which may trouble the tranquillity and peace that Jesus Christ hath left unto them for securing their happiness in his Kingdom It is necessary then for the service of the Church and for maintaining it always in the flourishing state wherein Jesus Christ hath established it to fight and beat off the enemies that attack it and to compose and calme the quarrels that arise amongst the children of the Church about points that are disputed with heat on all hands and which might in the end disturb the repose and peace of the Kingdom of the Son of God As I have wholly devoted my self to the service of the Church so have I endeavoured as much as lay in my power to acquit my self of the former of those two duties in my Treatises of Controversie and especially in that of The true Church I think I have been pretty successfull in that engagement and repelled all the efforts of our Protestants in making it appear by evident and unanswerable Arguments That there is no true Church but ours which is enough without more dispute to put an end to all our Controversies since they acknowledge with us that the true Doctrine is always that of the true Church of Jesus Christ I discharge my self also as well as I can of that obligation in one part of that Treatise where I maintain against Hereticks the declared enemies of the Holy See the primacy rights power and authority of the visible head of the Church At present then that I may fulfill my duty in its full extent I must labour to prevent the springing up of any dangerous division amongst Catholicks by reason of some private opinions that divide them as to that important subject of the Church into which they are all equally incorporated Now that I may solidly carry on so laudable and necessary an undertaking It is at first to be presupposed that according to Catholick doctrine the Universal Church which ought allways to be visible and to continue without Interruption untill the consummation of all things is the Society of Christians dispersed all over the World united together by the profession of the True Faith the participation of the True Sacraments by the bond of the same Law and under one and the same Head Because the Church Joh. 10. v. 16. Ephes 1. v. 22. August Ep. 50. whose first and principal property is to be perfectly one is the mystical body of Jesus Christ and that the members of a living body may receive the influences of life they must be united to the Head Hence it is that according to Saint Austin Epist 48. p. 151. l. de un Eccl. c. 4. though one may have all the rest yet if he be separated from the Head and by consequent from the body which is united to him he is out of the Church Catholick by Schism as Hereticks are cut off from it because of the want of True Faith And as all the members of the body have not the same functions but the parts that constitute it being subordinate one to another in a lovely order there are some which are for giving motion to the
rest by the spirits that they send over all and some for distributing the nourishment which the rest receive for growth and for perseverance in the perfection of their state So amongst the multitudes of believers that make up the Church and who cannot all be immediately governed instructed and edified by one single man for edification of the body of Jesus Christ there must be as the great Apostle speaks a great diversity of Ministers and many Pastours subordinate one to another in an holy Hierarchy Act. 20. v. 28. to the end the people may have the Sacraments administred unto them be instructed and governed And that 's the reason that there are in the world so vast a number of particular Churches which have their several Bishops and which are all subordinate to a Principal Church of which the Bishop is the head of all the rest And these being assembled in name of their Churches in an Oecumenical Council represent the Universal Church which we believe to be infallible for absolutely deciding the points of Faith when her Bishops who are the Pastours and Teachers of Christians being one and the same as well as she say in her name to all her members in perfect unity Visum est Spiritui Sancto vobis For as the Universal Church is a whole consisting of all believers and of all particular Churches which are one by the Communion which they have with one Principal Church that is the source principle root and centre of their Unity as Saint Cyprian speaks So according to the doctrine of the same holy Father Episcopatus unus est multorum Episcoporum concordi numerositate diffusus Cypr. l. de unit Eccl. Epist 55. there is but one Episcopacy in the Church whereof each Bishop fully possesses a part and by consequent there is but one Chair wherein all Bishops sit by virtue of the Union which they have with him Episcopatus unus est cujus à singulis in solidum pars tenetur Cypr. Ep. 52. Ecclesia una Cathedra una Domini voce fundata Cyp. Ep. 40. Ad Trimitatis instar cujus una est atque individua potestas unum esse per diversos antistites sacerdotium Sym. Ep. ad Aeon Arclat whom they ought to acknowledge for their Head This Pope Symmachus explains in a very sublime manner by an excellent comparison taken from the Trinity In the same manner saith he as there is but one Omnipotence by the Unity of Essence and Nature which so unites the three Persons that they are but one God So amongst the many Orthodox Churches throughout all Christendom there is but one onely Priesthood that is to say but one Episcopacy through the unity not onely of Faith and Belief but also of communion of all the Bishops with a Head whence results that unity which is inseparable from the Church of Jesus Christ This being presupposed in which all Catholicks do agree Aug. on Ps 101. it is certain that Jesus Christ himself hath established his Church which he purchased by his own bloud and unto which he hath given the Faith Act. 20. v. 28. the Sacraments the Law of Grace in his Gospel and a visible Head to represent him as his Vicar upon Earth And as from a very small beginning it hath enlarged it self according to the Prophecies over the whole earth So also the Apostles and their Successours after the departure of Jesus Christ have founded particular Churches establishing them themselves or ordaining Bishops for governing the believers distributed into several Dioceses in all the quarters of the World Now seeing that particular Church which within a few years after the Ascension of Jesus Christ was setled in the Capital City of the Empire is without doubt the most illustrious of all others that on the one hand Hereticks not being able to endure its splendour and greatness have always furiously risen up and conspired to destroy it and that on the other all Catholicks who are sensible of the real advantages that distinguish it from all others are nevertheless divided about certain prerogatives which some attribute to it and others dispute I shall shew without speaking of other Churches what hath been the first establishment of that of Rome what is the excelling dignity thereof and what are the prerogatives rights and privileges of its Bishops And because a subject of this nature is not to be handled by Philosophical reasonings but by matters of fact drawn from Scripture interpreted according to the Fathers Councils and ancient Traditions which are the two principles of true Theology therefore you are not to expect any speculation or Philosophy in this Treatise which is purely Historical I do in the very entry declare that there is nothing of mine in this work For I doe no more but as a sincere and exact Historian barely alledge by uncontroverted matters of fact drawn from the one or other of those two sources what venerable Antiquity believed concerning that important matter This method we usefully employ against our Protestants We make it clearly out to them that what we believe of the Eucharist the Sacrifice of the Mass the Invocation of Saints prayer for the dead and other controverted points is the ancient Doctrine of the Church and that so their belief contrary to ours being new is false We force them to acknowledge that what they hold with us concerning Infant Baptism the Baptism of Hereticks and the change of the Sabbath into Sunday of which Scripture makes no mention they have it onely from Tradition and the ancient Practice of the Church and that therefore they reject the anabaptists because of the Novelty of their Doctrine And this is also the great Principle that the ancient Fathers made use of against the Hereticks of their times Let us onely consult the order of time Ex ipso ordine manifestatur id esse dominicum verum quod sit prius traditum id autem extraneum falsum quod sit posterius immissum Tertull de praescr c. 32. and we shall know that that which hath been first taught us cometh from the Lord and that it is truth but that on the contrary what new thing hath since been introduced cometh of the Stranger and is false And in his fourth Book against Marcion Quis inter nos determinabit nifi temporis ratio ei praescribens autoritatem quod antiquius reperietur ei praejudicans vitiationem quod posterius revincetur l. 4. cont Marci c. 4. Who can put an end to our differences unless it be the order and decision of time which Authorizes the Antiquity of Doctrine and declares that defective which comes not till after that ancient Belief Upon the same ground St. Jerome who flourished about the end of the fourth Century said to one of his Adversaries who would have made a new Party in the Church Why do you offer after four hundred years Cur post quadringentos annos docere nos
union with one principal or chief Church the principle and centre of their unity So there is but one general Chair in the Church and one Episcopacy Cathedra una super Petrum Domini voce fundata Cypr. Epist 40. Optat. contra Parmen l. 2. composed of all the Episcopal Chairs by the communication which they have with the Head of that Church and with that chief Chair whence their unity proceeds So that as all Believers are members of the same Church when they are united to its Head so all Bishops taken in general and every one in particular sit in the same Chair by the communion which they have with him that sits in that principal Chair from whence by that union which they preserve with it results the unity of the Chair and of Episcopacy in the Church But besides that every one of them hath his particular Chair wherein none of the rest have any share as they have all a share in that Chair which is but one in the Universal Church And because Saint Peter is head of it as we shall presently make it appear not onely his particular Chair of Rome but likewise that of the whole Church is by the holy Fathers often called the Chair of St. Peter It is in that sense then that all Bishops sit in St. Peter's Chair as all the Doctours of the old Law sate in the Chair of Moses But for all that all Bishops sit not in St. Peter's particular Chair no more than his Successours in that Chair sit in the Chairs of other Bishops every one possessing entirely his own as a part of the Universal Episcopacy And thus also is to be understood what is said that all Bishops are the Successours of St. Peter Take it in this manner I have clearly made it out in my Treatise of the true Church even according to Calvin and the ablest of our Protestants that the true mark of the true Church which distinguishes her from all others is the perpetuity that will make her continue without ever failing to the end of the World And seeing she is that great Sheep-fold wherein all believers who are the sheep of Jesus Christ are gathered together into one flock she cannot subsist in that unity without there be Pastours and Sheep some to teach and others to receive the truths which they are to believe guides and people to be guided and unless these pastours and guides succeed one another without interruption to the end for governing and guiding believers Now that is not to be seen but in the Catholick Church by the Union that all these particular Churches and their Bishops have with him whom they own for their Head For in what time soever these Churches began to be planted some sooner some later they may ascend by virtue of that Union through a perpetual Succession from Pastours to Pastours and from Bishops to Bishops till they come to him whom Jesus Christ hath given them for Head And because St. Peter is he as we shall presently see it is evident that it is by that that they are his Successours since by the Union which they have with the Bishop of Rome their Head who in a streight line succeeds to St. Peter they mount up without interruption by a continuity and collateral Succession even to that Apostle as all the branches of a Tree are united to the root in oblique and indirect lines by the union with the trunk and body of that Tree But we must now consider the rights and prerogatives of St. Peter who was the first Bishop of Rome CHAP. IV. Of the Primacy of St Peter and that he hath been established by Jesus Christ head of the Vniversal Church I Shall not enlarge in a long discussion of this point which the great and large volumes that so many learned men of the past and present age have composed for clearing of it have drained in alledging all that solidly can be said as to this Article of our Faith on which depends that perfect unity which we avow to be essential to the Church I shall onely say what all Catholicks agree in that Jesus Christ chose St. Peter amongst all his Apostles to give him not onely the Primacy of order honour and rank by assigning him the first place as one chief in dignity amongst his equals and in those gifts talents and graces which are inseparable from the Apostleship and Episcopacy but also the Primacy of Jurisdiction Power and Authority over all believers in the whole Church of whom he appointed him head This they learn from the Gospel in that famous passage of the sixteenth Chapter of St. Matthew where St. Peter having answered for all the Apostles to our Saviour who had asked them what they thought of him Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God our heavenly Lord commending his faith said to him Blessed art thou Simon Bar-jona for flesh and bloud hath not revealed it unto thee but my father which is in heaven And I say unto thee that thou art Cephas that is to say in the Syriack Tongue a Stone and upon this rock I will build my Church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it And I will give unto thee the Keyes of the kingdom of heaven and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven Most of the holy Fathers especially those that were before the Council of Nice interpret to the person of St. Peter these words and upon that rock I will build my Church according to the reference that they must necessarily have to those which go before I say unto thee that thou art Cephas that is to say a Stone or Rock Tertul. de praescr c. 32. Origen in Ep. 14. hom 5. Cypr. Epist 71. p. 73. ad Jabaium Hilar. lib. 6. de Trinit Greg. Nist in opera de adv Domini Ambros in cap. 2. Ep. ad Eph. Chrysost in Matt. 15.83 in cap. 1. Ep. ad Gal. Hier. in Matth. c. 6. August in Joan. Tract 124. There are others particularly since the Council of Nice who to confute the impiety of the Arians have understood them of that illustrious confession of Faith that St. Peter made when he said Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God and some have referred them to Jesus Christ himself who is the foundation and corner Stone of which St. Paul saith That no man can lay another than that which is already laid which is Jesus Christ But besides that the same Authours say elsewhere that the Church is founded on St. Peter it is easie to reconcile all these opinions together which without any difficulty may be reduced to one that results from all the three by saying that these words ought to be understood of the person of St. Peter confessing Jesus Christ to be the Son of the living God It is evident that these three interpretations naturally resolve
Innocent X. He alone hath the right of calling Councils for Spiritual Affairs and to preside in them personally or by his Legates I say he hath that right without speaking of matter of Fact which is under debate in respect of some Councils and cannot prejudice his Primacy For though he hath not presided in the first Council of Constantinople which perhaps neither did he call and that it be most certain that he did not call the fifth nor presided in it though he was at Constantinople where that Council was held yet it is not to be doubted but he might have done both the one and the other if he had pleased seeing that in the Letter which the Patriarch Entychius wrote to him for obtaining of that Council Concil 5. Act. 1. he prayed him to preside in it and that he onely presided therein upon his refusal For thus it is in the Original praesidente nobis vestrâ beatitudine and not residente nobiscum as the Minister Junius hath corrupted it by a correction made of his own head against the clear sense of the following words Besides is it not past all controversie that the Pope presided by his Legates in the Council of Chalcedon as he hath done in almost all the others which have been held since For I speak not here of the great Council of Nice nor of that of Ephesus because as I conceive I have elsewhere proved by invincible Arguments not onely against our Protestants but also against the sentiments of some Catholick Doctours that the Popes by their Legates presided in them nay and that they called them as to what relates to the Spiritual Authority which they have over the Bishops as the Emperours to whose rights Kings and Christian Princes have succeeded may call Councils in regard of Temporals by that sovereign power which they have received from God over their Subjects in virtue whereof they may oblige their Bishops to assemble in a certain place either within or without their Territories there to treat of matters purely spiritual wherein they meddle not but as protectours of the Church in causing the Decrees and Canons of these Councils which strike not at the Rights of their Crown to be put in execution It is certain then that the Popes as Heads of the Church have right to call general Councils and to preside in them Moreover seeing the Pope in that quality Concil Sardic Can. 3.4.7 Gelas Epist ad Epis Dardan Innoc. Epist ad Victric St. Leo. Ep. 82. Cap. Car. Mag. lib. c. 187. Hincmar ad Nicol. 1. Flodo Hist Eccl. Rom. l. 3. Gerson de Protestant Eccl. Cons 8. is without dispute above every Bishop of what Dignity soever he may be and above all particular Churches and Synods Appeals may be made from all these Bishops and Synods to his Tribunal It belongs to him to judge of greater Causes such as those which concern the Faith and that are doubtfull universal Customs the deposing of Bishops and some others which I have observed elsewhere the decision whereof belongs and ought to be referred to him In that manner the Inferiour Judges appointed by Moses according to the advice of Jethro Exod. 18. judged of causes of less importance and the greater were reserved to that great leader of the People of God Hence it is also that the Pope hath right to judge yet always according to the disposition of the Canons of the causes of Bishops Metropolitans Primates and Patriarchs This appears clearly by the judgment in the case of St. Athanasius Athan. Apol. 2. Theodoret. l. 2. Socr. l. 2. c. 15. Sozom. l. 3. c. 81. Paul Patriarch of Constantinople Marcellus Primate of Ancyra Asclepas Bishop of Gaza and Lucius Bishop of Adrianople whom Pope Julius restored to their Sees from which they had been illegally Deposed and by the case of Denis Patriarch of Alexandria who being accused Athan. de sent Dionys defended himself in writing before the Pope in a word by an infinite number of other instances in all ages of the Church which may be seen in my Treatise of the judgment of the causes of Bishops I shall onely mention one which wonderfully sets off that supreme Authority of the Pope After the death of Epiphanins Liberat. c. 10. Patriarch of Constantinople the Empress Theodora one of the wickedst Women that ever was and above all a great Eutychian in her heart and a great enemy to the Council of Chalcedon prevailed so far by the great power that she had got over the mind of the Emperour Justinian her Husband who could not resist her Artifices that Anthimius was made Patriarch though he was Bishop of Trebizonde by that means possessing at the same time two Episcopal Chairs against the manifest constitution of the holy Canons without any Precedent and without lawfull dispensation Besides that naughty man was both a frank Heretick and great Cheat. For though he was not onely Eutychian but also the head of those Hereticks Justin Nov. 42. Niceph. l. 17. c. 9. yet he always professed that he might deceive the Emperour who at that time was a good Catholick that he received the Doctrine of the four Councils but without ever condemning Eulyches who had been condemned by the holy Council of Chalcedon That occalioned a great deal of scandal and trouble in the East and seeing when matters were in this state Concil Constant sub Men. Act. 1. St. Agapetus the Pope was come from Rome to Constantinople whither Theodatus King of the Goths had obliged him to go that he might endeavour to obtain of Justinian the peace which the Goths demanded The Monks of Syria and many other zealous Catholicks presented him Petitions against that Intruder and Heretick This without doubt is one of the most illustrious marks and one of the strongest proofs of the Authority of the Holy See and of the Primacy of the Pope that ever was seen in the Church The Emperour who loved Anthimius and thought himself obliged in honour to protect him as being his Creature solicited on his behalf and by his earnestness in the Affair made it apparent that he intended to maintain him Theodora who was more concerned still than the Emperour in the preservation of her Patriarch employed all her Artifices and spared neither offers prayers nor threats to shake the constancy of a Pope whom she saw resolved to make use of the power which he had received from Jesus Christ for the good of the Church The Empire was then in a most flourishing state the Emperour shining in glory After the defeat of the Vandals in Africa Constantinople in great splendour Anthimius most powerfull through the favour of his Prince and the Grandeur and Majesty of the Patriarchal See of the Imperial City where he thought himself too well fixed to fear that he could be turned out Rome on the contrary being no more the Seat of the Empire since it was fallen under the Dominion of the Herules and
Goths retained now nothing that was great besides its own ruines and name The Church of Rome Tyrannically opprest by these Barbarians was if I dare say so in the chains of the Ostrogoths who used it like a slave The Pope forced to comply under the haughty commands of Theodatus who sent him to negotiate his affairs in the East so little esteemed by that Barbarian and so poor that he was obliged to sell the Plate of his Church to raise money for this Voyage was almost all alone at Constantinople without a Court without Cardinals without Train without Equipage without support and onely upheld by his spiritual power which was not backed by any of those glorious marks that at present renders the Pontifical Majesty so venerable to all the world Nevertheless in that condition he pronounces two thundering sentences against the Patriarch Anthimius Con. sub Men. Act. 4. Marcell in Chron. Liber in Brev. c. 2. Vict. Tun. in Chron. one upon the spot whereby by reason of his manifest intrusion he deposes him from his Patriarchship and puts the Priest Mennas in his place whom he himself consecrated Bishop and Patriarch of Constantinople and the other shortly after for the Crime of Heresie of which he was strongly suspected guilty ordaining that if he cleared himself not of it by obeying the holy Canons he should also be deposed from his Bishoprick of Trabizonde And seeing the holy Pope died the same year that sentence was the year following put in execution in a Council held by Mennas at Constantinople Anno 537. where because Anthimius would never condemn Eutyches Concil sub Men. Act. 4. he was deprived of the Bishoprick of Trabizonde and of all sacerdotal Dignity according to the sentence of the Pope And which is still more wonderfull Justinian acknowledging that Supreme Authority of the Pope to which he submitted and joyning thereto his own as Protectour of the Canons for causing that to be put in execution made against Anthimius that famous constitution which is to be seen in his two and fourtieth Novel in the tenth collation of his Authenticks wherein he positively says that he hath been justly Deposed by the Pope as well because he had intruded Neque ipse abdicare auctores impiorum dogmatum qui prius à Sanctis Synodis percussi fuerant Inst Nov. 42. contrary to the Holy Canons into the Chair of Constantinople as that he would not condemn those who had been Condemned by Councils Was there ever a more admirable effect of the Spiritual Power and Authority of the Vicar of Jesus Christ But before I conclude I must upon occasion of this Council of Constantinople under Mennas shew the Prodigious ignorance of Calvin in relation to the History of the Ancient Church I have said in the History of Calvinism and I say it again that that man having never entered the Schools of Divinity understood nothing at all in that Sacred Science which is a Key absolutely necessary for unlocking the sentiments and sentences of the Holy Fathers that contain the Principles of true Theology as they are to be found in a lovely order in the Master of Sentences But it is to be confessed that his ignorance appears incomparably more pitifull when he undertakes to prove his new Opinions by Church History in which he was never versed Take this as an evident proof of it This Innovatour who strikes chiefly at the Primacy of the Pope says in that place for overthrowing it Calvin Inst l. 4. c. 7. that Mennas presided in the fifth Council and that the Pope being called to it did not contest with him about the place of Honour but without difficulty suffered the Patriarch of Constantinople to preside therein Ridiculous mistake Mennas was dead long before the fifth Council was called which was held in the Seven and twentieth year of the Empire of Justinian as Calvin Consil 6. Act. 3◠had he ever read the Councils might have learned from the sixth Ecumenick Council third Action How then could that dead man have presided in that Council which was not held till five or six years after his death under his Successour Eutychius Now if it be alledged for excuse of that mistake that Calvin by that Council means the other which was held by Mennas yet that makes him but still ridiculous For besides that that particular Council is very different from that which is called the Fifth and which holds that rank amongst the General Councils the onely Pope that was at Constantinople in the time of Mennas to wit St. Agapetus was dead before that Council wherein Mennas calls him Act. 4. his Father of holy and blessed memory And had that Pope been still alive How durst Mennas have pretended to the first place in his presence he whom that Pope had made Patriarch who protests in the same Council that he is subject to the Holy See and who knows the thoughts of the Emperour Justinian 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cod. l. 7. that declares publickly That the Pope is the Head of all the holy Prelates of God and who will have his Patriarch of New Rome to have the next place to the holy Apostolick See of Old Rome Novel 131. So that to what side soever Calvin turn he shall always find his Man dead in stead of alive And as it is very well known that God favour'd him not with the gift of working Miracles he can never raise him again to place him there where nothing but his extreme ignorance could put him By the same defect of knowledge accompanied with a ridiculous boldness that he may strip the Pope of his Primacy he takes Nice in Thracia for Nicoea in Bithynia Pope Julius for Silvester the first place for the last in citing Sozomene who beginning by this Man L. 1. c. 16. in the enumeration of the Patriarchs ascends in order to the first where he puts the Legats of the Pope speaking of the first Council wherein by the grossest ignorance that can be in History and which none but Calvin could be capable of he makes Saint Athanasius preside who was then but a simple Deacon waiting upon Alexander his Patriarch at that Council Athan. Apol. 2. Such was the ignorance of the head of our Protestants in Ecclesiastical History I do not at all wonder at it for that was none of his study But I am astonished to see that men of wit and learning dance to his Pipe in that they implicitely assent to his ignorance in Antiquity when in the systeme of his heresie he rejects matters that are manifestly authorised by Tradition and History which is the Court of Record of it nay even when he traces it back to the Primitive Ages of the Church wherein they are forced to confess that it was in its purity There are evident proofs of this in the History of the Fathers and Councils where setting aside some frivolous superstitions of weak people which we
quamvis incomparabiliter inferior Cypriano sicut illud Apostoli Petri quod Gentes Judaizare cogebat nec accipio nec facio quamvis inferior incomparabiliter Petro. l. 2. contra Craescon c. 32. though I be incomparably inferiour to that great Man as though I be incomparably less than St. Peter yet I admit not neither doe what he did in compelling the Gentiles to Judaize An infinite number of great Men have in that followed St. Augustine as the Master and chief of the Doctours but at present I shall onely produce one whose authority far surpasses that of all the rest And that is Pope Pelagius II. who following the example of St. Austine in relation to St. Cyprian acknowledges and at the same time excuses the errour of Pope Vigilius by that of St. Peter It is a very remarkable matter of fact Take it thus After that wicked Nestorius had been condemned in the Council of Ephesus some of his party published certain Writings of Theodore of Mopsuestia Liberat. in Breviar c. 10. wherein under other terms than those which that Heresiarch had used he said almost the same thing making it apparent enough that by the two natures which he admitted to be in Jesus Christ he understood two distinct Persons But seeing that errour was not expressed in such formal termes that all men might discover it and that besides this same Theodore had in his life-time been held in great veneration that as it commonly happens occasioned great debates some as John Patriarch of Antioch saying that there was nothing to be found fault with in his Book Others who were headed by Rabula Bishop of Edessa maintaining that it contained pure Nestorianism a little disguised This dispute growing hotter after the death of Rabula Ibas who succeeded him in the Bishoprick of Edessa taking a course quite contrary to his Predecessour wrote a long Letter to Maris Persan a Nestorian Heretick wherein he thought it not enough to give great praises to Theodore but inveighs also sharply against St. Cyrill of Alexandria the scourge of Nestorianism though at the same time he condemns the Doctrine of Nestorius whether he spake sincerely or that he would thereby caution himself against the process that might have been brought against him for that he had so openly declared for Theodore The truth is sometime after he was accused in the famous Council of Chalcedon where that Letter was produc'd against him Ann. 451. Concil Chalced. Act. 16. and read in full Council But seeing there was nothing to be found in it but praises of Theodore whose Book had not been examined and invectives against the person and conduct of St. Cyril and besides that Ibas in that Council pronounced Anathema against Nestorius and condemned his Doctrine more severely than he had even done in his Letter He was Absolved as well as Theodoret who did the same though he had Written against St. Cyrill more bitterly than Ibas had done But the Council took no notice of that Treatise Nevertheless seeing these three Writings which are very well known by the famous name of the Three Chapters so much talked of favoured Nestorianism and that that Heresie is directly opposite to that of Eutyches which admits indeed but one person but also but one nature in Jesus Christ The Emperour Justinian was easily persuaded that if these Three Chapters were condemned the Catholicks might be reconciled with the Acephali who were a remnant of Eutychians Ann. 546. This Prince who at that time desired nothing more than the Peace of the Church zealously undertook that affair He made an Edict against these Three Chapters Petav. 1. p. Ration l. 7. c. 7. which was signed by Mennas and the other Patriarchs of the East and to render that condemnation still more authentick seeing he was at that time Master of Italy having driven the Goths out of it he made Pope Vigilius come to Constantinople that he might oblige him to sign it as the other Patriarchs of the East had done There is nothing in History more extraordinary than the fortune of that Pope His ambition at first made him Anti-Pope having got himself to be chosen by the interest of the Empress Theodora who put him in the place of Sylverius the lawfull Pope Liber c. 28. that she caused to be deposed and banished and to whom that Intruder promised to condemn the Three Chapters Victor Tunon in Chron. and to approve the faith of Anthimius as he did And therefore Sylverius for all he was banished Sylver Epist c. Excommunicated him as an Anti-pope This holy Prelate dying shortly after that Condemnation the Clergy of Rome for avoiding a Schism elected of new Vigilius Canonically who by that means became true Pope and then changing his conduct that he might overturn all that he had done in favour of Theodora he condemned Anthimius as an Eutychian Greg. l. 2. c. 36. Paul diacon l. 17. and recalled the Condemnation of the Three Chapters which indeed were contrary to the Eutychians but also bordering upon the other extreme mightily favoured the Nestorians In this condition was he then when the Emperour called him to Constantinople to approve the Condemnation of the Three Chapters He had much adoe to resolve upon it Forundus Hermianen because he thought as many Occidentals did that that was to empeach the Council of Chalcedon which had received Ibas and Theodoret the defenders of Theodore of Mopsuestia But it was represented to him that the Council had not received them untill they had condemned the Nestorians and that it had not examined neither the Book of Theodore nor that of Theodoret and that seeing now they were sufficiently convinced and persuaded that the Doctrine of Nestorius condemned in the Council of Ephesus was contained in these Writings he ought to condemn them thereby to take all advantage from the Nestorians Vigilius at length Ann. 547. Judicatum acquiesced to these Remonstrances and the year following made his Decree whereby he condemns the Three Chapters but with this reserve Saving the respect and submission which is due to the Council of Chalcedon Justinian not satisfied with that would have the Pope seeing the question concerned not that Council which had not examined these Books to condemn them absolutely and without that modification lest the Nestorians might make use of it for eluding a like condemnation But Vigilius who was always loth to offend that Council would not condescend to it how badly soever they treated him to oblige him to doe so In fine after many debates about the subject Justinian who resolved to put an end to that affair for restoring peace to the Church caused the Fifth Council to be held at Constantinople in spight of Vigilius Ann. 553. V. Syn. 5. Tom. 3. Concil Constitutum who was so far from granting the Emperour what he desired that he made a new Constitution wherein he again takes upon him the protection of the
Three Chapters and forbids to condemn them But notwithstanding all his efforts that Council where he would not assist absolutely condemned them and because Vigilius would not consent to that condemnation he was banished by Justinian who some time after gave him his liberty and sent him home to his See because once more changing his conduct and opinions he condemned in Writing the Three Chapters Evagr. l. 4. c. 37. Phot. de septom Synodis according to the Decree of the Council and that was the fourth and last time that he had changed for as he was upon his return to Rome Appen Marcell he died in Sicily the year following However this last change did not cure the Schism that was formed in the Church about that point For though the Successours of this Pope had admitted the Decrees of that Council Greg. Pap. 1. Ep. 24. alib saepe which holds the fifth place amongst the Ecumenical Councils yet many Bishops and amongst others those of Africa and Istria Vict. Tun. Farund Herm. taking no notice in the least of that last change of Vigilius stuck obstinately to his former constitution whereby he had publickly declared for the Three Chapters forbidding all Believers to condemn them and though Pelagius II. who held the Holy See Two or three and twenty years after Vigilius did all he could to persuade and bring them to their duty and to undeceive them of their errour he could never succeed in it For they always alledged Pelag. 11. Ep. 7. quae est tertia ad Episc Istriae Dicentes quod in causae principio sedes Apostolica per Vigilium Papam omnes Latinarum Provinciarum principes damnationi trium capitulorum fortiter restiterunt ibid. Errorem tarde cognoverunt tanto eis celerius credi debuit quanto eorum constantia quousque verum cognoscerent à certamine non quievit ibid. that the Roman Church had formerly Taught them the contrary of what they would have them at present confess and that the Holy See by Pope Vigilius and the other Bishops of the West when that cause began to be debated had vigorously opposed the condemnation of these Three Chapters Whereupon that wise Pope told them ingenuously and convincingly That for that very reason they ought to condemn them because that vigorous resistance was an evident sign that the Romans and other Occidentals yielded not till at length they came to the knowledge of the truth which they had not known before and clearly saw that they had been mistaken in approving and maintaining Writings which ought to be condemned and he adds that it is a very laudable change to turn from errour to truth He moreover confirms that Argument by the examples of St. Peter and St. Paul St. Paul Quia diu veritati restitit unde ad confirmanda corda credentium in ejusdem praedicatione veritatis adjutorium sumpsit said he long resisted the truth of the Gospel and was the most zealous asserter of Judaisme against the Christians whom he persecuted By that he proves to the Jews and Gentiles that they ought to embrace Christianity because after so great resistance he would not have yielded to Jesus Christ if he had not clearly known the truth and that he had been in an errour before St. Peter continues he Diu quidem restitit ne ad fidem Gentes sine Circumcisione c. diu se à conversaram Gentium communione subtraxit c. Ab eodem Paulo pestmodum ratione suscepta cum vidisset quosdam c. dixit cur tentatis Deum imponentes jugum c. held long for the necessity of the legal observations compelling the Gentiles to Judaize He yielded afterward to reason and truth by the reproof that St. Paul gave him telling him that he walked not uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel After that changing his conduct he powerfully withstood those who in the Council of Jerusalem would have subjected Christians to the yoke of the Ancient Law Would they have had reason then to have said to him Haec quae dicis audire non possumus quia aliud ante praedicasti when they saw him Teach the quite contrary to what he had Preached before We will not hear what you tell us at present because you formerly Preached to us quite another thing Not at all because these two Apostles having long resisted the truth of the Gospel each in his way and at length followed that truth changed from evil to good So goes on that Pope making a right application of these two instances to the point of the Three Chapters The Holy See ought not to be upbraided with a change Si igitur in trium capitulorum negotio alind cum veritas quaereretur aliud autem inventâ veritate dictum est cur mutatio sententiae huic sedi in crimen objicitur c. since after it hath found out the truth which it searched into it now condemns the Three Chapters which it approved before it found the truth It is in my Judgment very clear that Pope Pelagius in that place says plainly and without biass that as St. Peter and St. Paul had erred before their change to which they ought to adhere so Vigilius was mistaken in his constitution whereby he obliges Believers to maintain the Doctrine of the Three Chapters and that they must imitate the Holy See in its change Quid obstat si ignorantiam suam deserens verba permutet when having approved them with Vigilius it condemns them after he had discovered the truth which he knew not before These are the words of Pelagius II. I know very well that Cardinal Baronius says and labours to prove in his Annals that St. Peter upon that occasion erred not at all and committed not the least fault I shall not undertake to refute and overthrow his Arguments Baron ad Ann. 51. n. 39. as some think they have done with very little difficulty I dispute not at all in this Treatise where I am onely to relate matters of Fact It is enough then that I say It 's true that that great Cardinal is of that Judgment because he believed Saint Peter to be infallible In the mean time St. Austine so far from believing it thought he erred five times when he was in fear of being drowned and our Saviour told him Et cum in mari titubasset cum dominum carnaliter à passione revocasset cum aurem servi gladio praecidisset cum ipsum dominum ter negasset cum in si mulationem postea superstitiosam lapsus esset August de agone Christiano c. 30. O thou of little faith wherefore didst thou doubt when he would have diverted him from suffering for us and was rebuked by these piercing words Get thee behind me Satan When he cut off Malchus his Ear and three times denied his Master and last of all when he fell into that failing for which St.
Paul reproved him St. Austine then St. Ambrose St. Cyprian Pope Pelagius and even St. Paul speak positively to the contrary of what Baronius says as I have just now demonstrated This has made learned men argue from St. Austine who they think cannot be answered Either Saint Paul spoke truth when he said St. Peter was to be blamed that he walked not uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel and compelled the converted Gentiles to Judaize or what he said was false If he spoke truth it is then true that St. Peter was not Infallible since he actually erred in that particular If he did not speak truth it must then be concluded that the Epistle to the Galatians which makes a part of H. Scripture is not the Word of God which is a manifest errour in matter of Faith Again when St. Paul spake in that manner either he thought as he spoke or did not If he believed what he said to be true it was his opinion then that St. Peter was not Infallible If he believed it not then must he in the same Epistle to the Galatians wherein he protests before God that he lied not have told a lie which is not to be said without Blasphemy since what he writes in that Epistle is the Word of God who cannot lie And thus it is made out that according to St. Paul those great Saints and that wise Pope who understood himself very well St. Peter was guilty of a notable mistake at that time when he insinuated to the Jews and Gentiles that they were obliged to keep the Law of Moses which the Church immediately after condemned in the Council of the Apostles held at Jerusalem For it is to be observed which a great many have not minded that as that Pope whose words I have cited does expresly say it was before that Council of the Apostles that St. Peter did that action which rendred him blame-worthy And who does not see that he had been incomparably more worthy of blame and reproof if as Cardinal Baronius will have it he had done it immediately after the Decree of the Council which had just then defined he himself having subscribed to the Decree that Christians were no more obliged to observe those legal Rites excepting in one small point and that for a certain time and that after he had spoken so well on that subject to free Christians from that Yoke he should have again endeavoured to subject them to it by obliging them to Judaize That would have been so strange a thing and so unbeseeming an Apostle and the Prince of Apostles that I make no doubt but that for the honour that is due to him it is far better to follow in that the judgment of that ancient Pope than the Opinion of this Cardinal who lived but in the last age It follows then from these matters of Fact which I have now most faithfully related that a great Pope and those Holy Fathers the most venerable and learned of Antiquity have not believed even according to St. Paul that St. Peter was infallible nor by consequent that the Popes who have no greater privilege and prerogative than St. Peter had have received that gift of Infallibility Inter omnes Apostolos hujus Ecclesiae Catholicae personam sustinet Petrus huic enim Ecclesiae claves regni coelorum datae sunt cum ei dicitur ad omnes dicitur amas me pasce oves meas August de Agon Christ lib. 30. Ita Ambrose l. de dign Sacerd. c. 2. Chrys hom 79. in Matth. 24. Cypr. de unit Eccles Hier. contra Jovin lib. 1. Vt Petrus quando ei dictum est tibi dabo claves in figura personam gestabat Ecclesiae quando dictum est pasce oves meas Ecclesiae quoque personam in figura gestabat August in Psal 108. Tract 1.118.129 in Joan. Ser. de 4. quaest apud poss c. 5. 6. Serm. 13. sup Matth. c. 2. As to the objections that are drawn from the words of Jesus Christ spoken to St. Peter Vpon that Rock will I build my Church I will give thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not feed my sheep It is easie to answer them by saying that according to the common interpretation of the Fathers and especially of St. Austine they were spoken to St. Peter as representing the Church by the union of its Pastours with him as with their Head and who by virtue of that union make with him but one universal Episcopacy And the better to express that unity he applies himself and speaks to one onely that is to the head to whom he gave the Primacy over the rest So that when in that union or rather that unity he pronounces and defines jointly with them in a Council or with consent of the Church by her Bishops he cannot err the foundation stands always sure and the sheep are always well governed and well fed But because Cardinal Bellarmine and those who follow him will have these words I have prayed for thee Peter that thy faith fail not to be applied absolutely to the Person of St. Peter and without relation to the Church which he represents by virtue of his Primacy we must grant them what they pretend For the truth is they may be understood also in that sense but then they have a very natural and literal meaning which is that of almost all the ancient Fathers and Interpreters of Holy Scripture who say that in this place our Saviour onely spake of the time of his Passion when the Apostles were to be terribly tempted as he himself foretold them Then addressing himself to St. Peter told him that he had prayed for him not that he might not commit any sin of Infidelity for he committed a fearfull one against the confession of Faith by denying his Master thrice but that being recovered from his fall he might not lose the Faith for ever that by the example of his Repentance he might confirm therein his Brethren who were much startled and shaken and that afterwards he might persevere unto the end Non dixit non negabis sed ut non deficiat fides tua curâ enim illias factum est ne omnino Petri fides evanesceret Ne deficiaet fides tua hoc est ne in fine pereas humanam arguens naturam cum ex se nihil sit Chrys hom 63. Quid enim rogavit nisi perseverantiam usque in finem Aug. de Cor. Ge. c. 6. Vt non periret finaliter Hug. in c. 22. Luc. Non ut Petrus non caderet sed ut non deficeret quia quamvis reciderit resurrexerit Bonav in Luc. Ne penitus extirpetur aut finaliter deficiat Dion Carth. in Luc. Vt non finaliter deficiat fides tua Albert. Mag. in hunc locum This is the common interpretation of the Holy Fathers and particularly of St. Chrysostome and Saint Austine who often make use of
that passage to prove the necessity of praying and of obtaining grace from God without which we cannot persevere And this is also the sense that Theophylact Oecumenius Euthymius Cardinal Hugo Albertus Magnus St. Thomas St. Bonaventure Lyranus Dionysius Carthusianus and all the rest of the most famous Interpreters and Divines have followed as being the true literal sense It is evident that that onely agrees with the time of the Passion and the Person of St. Peter alone wherein his Successours can have no part And though they should pretend they had yet that would not hinder but that they might fail and fall as St. Peter did by publishing a falshood contrary to the true faith which is more against the duty of a Pope than to believe an Errour without publishing it CHAP. VIII What follows Naturally from the great debate that Pope Victor had with the Bishops of Asia THere had been for a long time very different Customs in the Church about the Celebration of the Festival of Easter and the observation of the Fast which ought to go before that holy day For all over the West according to the practice observed from the beginning in the Church of Rome that Festival was kept on Sunday which is the day of our Saviour's Resurrection But the Churches of Asia founded by the Apostle St. John Euseh Hist Eccl. l. 5. c. 24. Hieron de script c. 44. Exod. 12. Hieron de script in Polychr some of their Neighbours and many other Churches of the East kept it always the fourteenth of the Moon of March as the Passover is appointed to be kept in Exodus and according to the Tradition which they had received from St. John As to the Fast that is to be observed before Easter there was still a greater diversity in the Customs established in several places Irenae ap Euseb hist l. 5. c. 24. For some fasted but one day before that Feast as we do on the Vigile of Christmas and of Whitsunday others fasted two days some who were numerous fasted longer and many observed punctually the Fourty days fast of Lent Omnes Ecclesiae tum eorum qui decimo quarto die diem festum pachat is observabant tum eorum qui secus tranquillâ pace inter ipsas fruebantur Euseb Ibid. However these different customs that were amongst Christians of the second nay and of the first age of the Church concerning Lent and Easter made no breach at all of the peace and every one observed peaceably the custom of their Church which they thought to be good without condemning the practices of others This is so true that St. Polycarp Bishop of Smirna being come to Rome under the Pontificat of Saint Anicetus these two great Saints in a long conference which they had about the celebration of the Feast of Easter did what they could mutually to draw one another over to their party and seeing both remained stedfast in their opinions St. Polycarp saying always that he had from St. John his Master the custom that was observed in his Church and St. Anicetus affirming that that which was followed at Rome and in the Western Churches was derived from St. Peter they could never agree upon the matter Yet that hindred not but that they still lived together in great amity and in the same communion insomuch that the Pope to doe honour to St. Polycarp Ibid. prayed him to officiate publickly in his Church That good intelligence continued always betwixt the Popes and Asiatick Bishops Ann. 193. Euseb l. 5. c. 22. untill Victor I. who having held several Councils at Rome about that subject amongst the Gauls and elsewhere where the practice of the Roman Church was observed Euseb c. 24. would needs compell the Asiaticks to conform to it by celebrating Easter on Sunday And because these who thought not themselves obliged to obey him contrary to the tradition which their Churches had from St. John Omnes fratres eam incolentes regionem prorsus à communione secludendos edicit Ibid. would by no means comply He threatened them with Excommunication and published against them that which now adays is called a Monitory Polycrates who was at that time Bishop of Ephesus held also a Council with his brethren about the same subject and answering in name of all by a Synodal Letter to Pope Victor and his Bishops he says That what the Asiaticks did had been religiously observed by the Apostles St. Philip and St. John Hieron de Script in Polychr by another St. John a Bishop and Martyr whose body rested at Ephesus by St. Polycarp Bishop of Smirna by the Martyr St. Thraseas and by many other holy Bishops who had always celebrated that Holy day the fourteenth of the Moon according to that Tradition that for himself who was sixty five years of age having consulted many able Men of all Nations and carefully read all Writings for informing himself in that controverted Peragratâ omni scripturâ non formidabo eos qui nobis minantur c. point he did not fear those that threatned him because it hath been said by his Predecessours that it is better to obey God than Man And seeing Victor still persisted in his threats and that he would by all means Excommunicate the Asiaticks if they obeyed not Verum ista caeteris omnibus parum place-bant Episcopis ....... quorum verba utpote Victorem acrius acerbius coarguentium scriptis prodita adhuc extant Euseb l. 5. c. 24. Ibid. several Bishops of other Countries who blamed his proceeding wrote sharply to him to divert him from his enterprise Amongst others St. Irenaeus the great Archbishop of Lyons sent him a long Letter in name of all the Gallican Church whom he had assembled for that effect wherein he represents to him with as much force at least but with far greater moderation than the rest that he ought not for a difference of that nature cut off from the Universal Church so many particular Churches so many Bishops and so many Believers who acted according to an ancient Tradition upon which they founded themselves He adds that he would doe far better to follow the example of so many holy Popes his Predecessours Anicetus Pius Hyginus Telesphorus and Sixtus who though they as well as he had observed a quite different custome from that of the Bishops of Asia yet never treated them as Hereticks for that nor forbore to communicate with them in a perfect union Multos Asiae orientis Episcopos ..... damnandos crediderat Hieron de script Eccles c. 24. But notwithstanding all these Remonstrances Victor was still of the mind that they ought to be Condemned Nay there are some who affirm that he did actually condemn and thunder an Anathema against them However it be it is certain that they would not submit to his Ordinances that the custome of their Churches concerning the Feast of Easter was allowed them and that they who observed it
Optatus St. Cyril of Jerusalem Saint Basil St. Austine and most Catholick Bishops of Aegypt Asia and Africa not to mention those who in the interval of almost Threescore years that was betwixt Pope Stephen and the Council had liberty to follow the party of St. Cyprian believed not in the Third Fourth and Fifth Ages of the Church that the Pope was Infallible What can be answered to that Let us now consult the Council in Question or rather the Councils which have pronounced Sovereignly concerning that point of the Baptism of Hereticks You have three of them First the full Council which is the first Council of Arles to which the Pope St. Sylvester sent four Legats in the year 314. makes this Decree in the Eighth Canon upon occasion of the Africans De Afris quod propriâ lege utantur ut Re-baptisent placuit ut si ad Ecclesiam aliquis de Haeresi venerit interrogent eum symbolum si perviderint eum in patre filio Spiritu Sancto Baptizatum manus ei tantum imponatur sic accipiat Spiritum Sanctum Quod si interrogatus non responderit hanc Trinitatem Rebaptisetur who Rebaptized all Hereticks If any Heretick return to the Church let him be asked the Question and if it appear that he hath been Baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost that hands be onely laid upon him to the end he may receive the Holy Ghost but if he answer not according to the Mystery of the Trinity let him be Re-baptized Moreover the great Council of Nice Twelve years after ordains in the Canon 19. that the Paulanists who return to the Church should be Re-baptized De Paulanistis ad Ecclesiam Catholicam confugientibus definitio prolata est ut iterum Baptisentur omnimodis Aug. de haer ad quod vult Haeres 44. because as St. Austine says these Hereticks the Disciples of Paulus Samosatanus who believed not the Trinity nor the Incarnation of the Word Can. 1. observed not the form of Baptism in Baptizing in the Name of the Three Persons of the Trinity But as to the Novatians who Baptized in the Name of the Trinity as Catholicks did the Council declares that it is sufficient to lay hands upon them In fine Can. 7. the first Council of Constantinople which is the second General ordains also the Montanists Sabellians and such other Hereticks who Baptized not in the Name of the Three Persons of the Trinity against which they blasphemed should be Re-baptized but not the Novatians the Quartodecimans nor yet the Arians and Macedonians because although these had not the true belief which ought to be had of that great Mystery yet they Baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost which St. Austine who hath Written after that Council of Constantinople assures to be sufficient for the validity of the Sacrament though the Faith of him who Baptizes be not pure So that saith he Manifestum est fieri posse ut fide non integraÌ„ integrum in quoquam maneat Baptismi Sacramentum ....... Quamoâ—rem nisi Evangelicis verbis in nomine Patris Filii Spiritus Sancti Marcion Baptismum consecrabat integrum erat Sacramentum quamvis ejus fides sub iisdem verbis aliud opinantis quam Catholica veritas docet non esset integra Aug. l. 2. de Bapt. cont Donatist c. 14 15. if Marcion Baptized using the words of the Gospel in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost his Baptism was good though that Heretick under these words believed a thing quite different from what the Catholick Church teaches That being so there is no more to be done but to compare these Decrees of Councils with those of the Pope St. Stephen and of Saint Cyprian Si quis à quacunque Haeres c. manus ei tantum imponatur This Pope Decrees that if any one return from any Heresie whatsoever he shall have onely hands laid upon him without being Re-baptized Si quis à quacunque Haeresi Qui ex quacunque Haeresi c. Baptisentur c. St. Cyprian says on the contrary that if any one return from any Heresie whatsoever he ought to be Re-baptized These are two extreams directly opposite one to another The Three Councils take the middle course explaining the one and condemning the other They are not for Re-baptizing the Novatians and other Hereticks who Baptize in the Name of the Three Persons of the Trinity and they hold their Baptism to be lawfull and good according to the true Apostolical Tradition but they are also absolutely for Re-baptizing the Paulanists and all such who Baptize not in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost thereby clearly defining that their Baptism is null And therein they explain and rectifie the Decree of the Pope St. Stephen adding but in formal terms an exception which is onely understood therein They plainly then declare on the one hand how the Decree of St. Stephen is to be understood and on the other that St. Cyprian Nondum veritas eliquata declarata per plenarium concilium who expressed himself clearly enough in his was deceived but very innocently because as St. Austine says L. 1. de Baptis Contra Donatis c. 7 8 9 17. the truth was not then discovered and declared by the Council Now seeing before that Declaration one might according to that holy Father freely follow the opinion of St. Cyprian notwithstanding the Decree of the Pope and that after that of the Council one had not the same liberty it is altogether evident that it must once more be concluded that it is because the ancient Church believed that a Council is Infallible and that the Pope is not CHAP. X. The fall of Liberius THESE two holy Popes Victor and Stephen whom so many Catholick Bishops of the Ancient Church have not believed to be Infallible had notwithstanding the truth on their side and in their favours the Councils decided But there are others who according to the unquestionable testimonies of the Ancients have fallen into errour whence it may be irrefragably concluded upon better reason that Antiquity reckoned them not Infallible I shall onely alledge seven or eight of the most evident instances which will be sufficient to prove that the Ancients acknowledged no other Infallibility amongst Men but what God hath given to his Church The first is Liberius who to get himself recalled from the Exile to which the Arian Emperour had Banished him and to remount the Pontifical Throne which Felix had usurped Ann. 357. solemnly approved Arianism This he did by condemning jointly with the Arians St. Athanasius the great defender of the Faith and scourge of Arianism besides by suppressing the Term Consubstantial which distinguished a Catholick from an Arian and which was in a manner the
Character and Mark of Catholicity nay more by receiving the most obstinate Arians into his Communion and in a word by subscribing to the scandalous Formulary of Sirmium which was presented to him by the Head of the Semi-Arians And at length that it might not be doubted but that he acted as Pope who makes known to the whole Church what Men ought to believe for that was the thing the Arians pretended to who were willing it might be known that the Head of the Church was on their side He Wrote two long Letters which were made publick all over the Empire one to the Emperour Constantius the great Protectour of Arianism and the other to the Arian Bishops wherein he declares his intention in terms most significant and most advantagious for the Arians Vbi cognovi quando Deo placuit Juste vos illum condemnasse mox consensum meum commodavi sententiis vestris Lib. Epist 7. ad Episc Orientales Amoto Athanasio à communione omnium cujus nec Epistolia à me suscipienda sunt dico me cum omnibus vobis pacem unanimitatem habere ut sciatis me veram fidem per hanc Epistolam meamloqui hanc ego libenti animo suscepi in nullo contradixi c. For there he saith That having known when it pleased God to illuminate him that they had justly condemned Athanasius he presently consented to their Judgment that he had Excommunicated him that he would not so much as receive his Letters and that he would have them to know that he was perfectly united with them in mind and heart that he professes in that Letter the true Faith which Demophilus had made known unto him which they had declared and received at Sirmium and that he most willingly embraces it without the least contradiction This methinks may be said to be an Authentick Declaration for Arianism and a falling from on high into the Abyss of Heresie And it cannot be known by a more unquestionable evidence than his own that he fell so unfortunately And therefore St. Hilary In fragment à Pithaeo editis Liberius taedio victus exilii in haereticâ pravitate subscribens Romam victor intraverat Hieron in Chron. de scrip Eccles in Fortunati who lived in that time most positively calls him Heretick pronouncing three or four Anathema's against him one upon the heels of another And St. Jerome in more than one passage of his Works says That that Pope subscrib'd to the Arian impiety and that the vexation he lay under for his Banishment having made him subscribe to Heresie in a Victorious manner he again entered Rome But not to mention all the others who have spoken of that deplorable fall of Liberius Auxili l. 1. de ordinati c. 25. l. 2. c. 1. alii we need no other proof fully to persuade us of it than Rome her self and all her Clergy or to say better the Church of Rome which so abhorred that scandalous Declaration of Liberius that on the spot she deposed him from his Papacy as an Arian Heretick of publick notoriety Nor was he chosen and acknowledged of new for true Pope till that after his Successour St. Felix had suffered Martyrdom he abjured his Heresie and was again become the same Liberius that he was before his fall a wise generous and zealous Pope This being so Is it not clear that the Church of Rome her self in the fourth age did not believe the Pope to be Infallible CHAP. XI The instance of Pope Vigilius THE Second instance that I produce is that of Pope Vigilius I have already related that example upon occasion of St. Peter's being reproved by St. Paul and shall at present apply it in a few but decisive words to the subject whereof I treat in this Chapter This Pope before the fifth Council made a Constitution Vigilii Constitutum ad Justin Imper. Ex verbis Epistolae viri venerabilis Ibae rectissimo ac piissimo intellectu perspectis c. Nec quemquam hoc nostro constituto permittimus aliquando praesumere super ejusdem Epistolae negotium ..... quoquo modo aliquid temerariae novitatis inferre which he addressed to the Emperour Justinian wherein amongst other things undertaking the defence of the Letter of Ibas Bishop of Edessa he declares that according to the words of that Letter understood in the sound sense that might be given unto them it seemed to be Orthodox and strictly prohibits any whosoever to innovate any thing touching that Letter in what manner soever it might be nor to condemn it seeing Ibas had been absolv'd and received as a Catholick in the Council of Chalcedon The Fifth Council which was held sometime after Ann. 553. and at which Vigilius would never assist though he was then at Constantinople where that Synod was celebrated decides exactly the contrary For having well examined the Letter of Ibas Si quis defendit Epistolam quam dicitur Ibas ad Marim Persam scripsisse quae abnegat Deum verbum de sancta Dei genitrice semper virgine Maria incarnatum hominem factum esse dicit autem c. ..... defendit Theodorum Nestorium impia eorum dogmata conscripta Si quis igitur memoratam impiam Epistolam defendit non Anathematizat eam c. .... qui praesumit eum defendere vel infertam ei impietatem nomine sanctorum patrum vel Concilii Chalcedonensis ..... Anathema sit Synod 5. Coll. 3. c. 14. concerning which the Council of Chalcedon had pronounced nothing it solemnly declares the same Heretical and impious as containing the Blasphemies of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Nestorius against Jesus Christ and his holy Mother and pronounces Anathema against all those who Anathematise it not and dare undertake the defence thereof as if it had been approved in the Council of Chalcedon There you have two decrees quite contrary one to another Whence it must follow that either the Council in its decision or the Pope in his constitution are deceived and maintain an errour Or whether that Pope did at length consent to that Council as I have said upon the credit of very good vouchers or that he never consented to it as there are some who affirm It is certain that his Successours Pelagius II. and St. Gregory the Great have approved it and that it hath always been received since without contradiction by all the Western Church as a true Ecumenical Council which cannot err It is then most certain that Vigilius decided wrong in his constitution and that by consequent even according to the Popes and Church of Rome in the fifth Age The Popes for all they are heads of the Church are not therefore Infallible CHAP. XII The Condemnation of Honorius in the Sixth Council THE same appears clearly also in the case of Pope Honorius of whom so much hath been Written in these later times I am not for contesting with any body I shall onely produce matter of Fact
which being barely related will clearly determine that affair Sergius Patriarch of Constantinople being corrupted by Theodore Bishop of Pharan Lateran Synod sub Martr 1. Authour of the Heresie of the Monothelites who would not acknowledge two Wills and two Operations the one Divine and the other Humane in Jesus Christ undertook to spread that Heresie all over the East For that end seeing he had already on his side Cyrus Bishop of Phasis Histor Miscell l. 18. Cedren Zonar in Heracl who was shortly after Patriarch of Alexandria Macarius Patriarch of Antioch and Athanasius Patriarch of the Jacobites he acted so cunningly that being powerfully seconded by these three Bishops who were much esteemed by the Emperour Heraclius he drew that poor Prince in his declining Age into that Heresie So that he prevailed with him to make that famous Edict under the name of Ecthesis or the exposition of Faith whereby he commands all his Subjects inviolably to follow that Doctrine And then that Patriarch of Constantinople having caused it to be signed by all the Bishops of his Patriarchy whom he had assembled in a Council he affixed it upon the Doors of his Cathedral Church at the same time that Cyrus planted the same Heresie in Aegypt Now seeing Sophronius Patriarch of Jerusalem vigorously opposed it he caused that pernicious Doctrine that came near the Errour of Eutyches who confounded the two Natures in Jesus Christ reducing them singly into one to be condemned in his Synod as the Council of Chalcedon had condemned the other Sergius finding himself attacked in this manner Sect. Syn. Act. 12. wrote a long Letter to Pope Honorius wherein he accuses Sophronius of troubling the Peace of the Oriental Church by introducing a new Doctrine by these new terms of Two Wills and Two Operations which had never been heard of before neither in the Fathers nor Councils Cyrus failed not to second his Collegue in Impiety complaining as he had done of Sophronius to the Pope And that Patriarch also on his part did what he ought in defending himself well and in making known to Honorius the extreme danger they were in in the East of seeing errour triumph by power and by the Artifices of these Hereticks if a speedy course were not taken It was never more apparent than on this occasion that when the Catholick Faith is to be declared one must never biass nor dissemble and conceal part of truth for reconciling both parties and bringing back to the Church those Sext. Synod Act. 12. who through Heresie or Schism have separated from it Honorius who was a very peaceable Man and so zealous for the peace of the Church that he endeavoured to accommodate all matters and content both parties Wrote back to Sergius in a manner whereby that Patriarch and his party took great advantage publishing in all places and persuading many by the reading of these Letters That the Bishop of Rome owned at that time by the Greeks for Head of the Church and Ecumenical Pope approved their Doctrine which rendered the party of the Monothelites more powerfull than ever The Successours of Honorius Hist Miscel Cedr Zonar who in the interim died took a conduct quite contrary to his for quenching that great conflagration that spread over all the East John the IV. in his Council of Rome annulled all the Decrees which these Monothelites had made in their Synods Pope Theodore condemned and deposed Pyrrhus Anastas in Theodor who succeeded Sergius and maintained his Heresie and after him his Successour Paul the most furious of all those Hereticks who as a foaming and raging Bear ravaged the Vineyard of our Lord For he grew to that height of more than Barbarous fury as to cause the Popes Nuncio's sent to Constantinople for remedying these disorders to be scourged The Illustrious Pope Martin Auct Vit. S. Mart. Pap. Successour to Theodore acted more vigorously than his Predecessour For in a Council of an Hundred and five Bishops which he held at the Lateran where the Writings of the Monothelites were examined with the Petitions that were presented against them he declared their Doctrine Heretical Anathematised Theodore of Pharan Cyrus of Alexandria Sergius Pyrrhus and Paul Patriarchs of Constantinople who had always maintained it Exhorted the Gallican Church Epist Mart. Pap. ad Amand. Trajectens which hath always vigorously defended the Catholick Faith against all Heresies to thunder against this as he had done and solemnly condemned the Ecthesis or Edict of the Emperour Heraclius Hist Misc l. 19. Auct Vit. S. Mart. Anastas in S. Mart. Cedr Zonar in Constante This put the Emperour Constans Grandson of Heraclius and a great Protectour of the Monothelites into such a rage that he caused the Holy Pope to be carried away from Rome and having most outragiously used him Banished him into the Chersonesus where being overwhelmed with miseries and poverty he gloriously accomplished a long Martyrdom which shortly after was followed by the deplorable death of that Tyrant His Son Constantine Pogonatus a great Catholick by his prudent conduct repaired all the faults of that unhappy Prince For having settled the Empire by the great Victories which he obtained over all his Enemies he resolved also to give Peace to the Church which his Father had troubled near Fifty years by the Monothelites Anno 680. Hist in Miscel Cedr Zonar Anastas in Agath Id. Synod 6. Act. 9. For that effect with consent of Pope Agatho he called the sixth Council at Constantinople where the business of the Monothelites was sifted to the bottom and sovereignly determined to their shame In that Council there were above Two hundred Oriental Bishops four Legats of Pope Agatho Theodore and George Cardinal Priests John a Deacon who was afterwards Pope and Constantius Sub-deacon and on the part of the Council of Sixscore Bishops held for the same purpose at Rome Three Bishops the Deputy of the Archbishop of Ravenna and many other Learned Church-men and Monks who were sent thither from the Western Church The Writings that had past on both sides upon that subject Concil 6. Act. 12. were read there and particularly the Letter of Sergius to Pope Honorius and the Pope's Answer to that Patriarch And after they had been well examined this is the Judgment which the Council in the following Session solemnly pronounced against them and is the same which we have in all the Editions and particularly in the last of Paris Act. 13. Has invenientes omnino alienas existere ab Apostolicis dogmatibus à definitionibus Sanctorum Conciliorum Cunctorum probabilium Patrum sequi verò falsas doctrinas haereticorum eas omnino abjicimus tanquam animae noxias execramur Honorium qui fuerat Papa antiquae Romae eo quod invenimus per scripta quae ab eo facta sunt ad Sergium quia in omnibus ejus mentem secutus est impia dogmata confirmavit
Having found the Epistle of Sergius to Honorius and that of Honorius to Sergius wholly contrary to the Doctrine of the Apostles the Definitions of Councils and the Judgment of the Holy Fathers and that they were conform to the false doctrine of Hereticks we absolutely reject and abhor them as pernicious to Souls We have moreover Judged that the names of Theodore Sergius Cyrus Pyrrhus c. ought to be blotted out of the Church and that with them Honorius heretofore Pope of ancient Rome ought to be Excommunicated because we have found by his Letters to Sergius that in all things he hath followed the mind of that Heretick and that he hath confirmed his impious Doctrines The holy Council repeats that Condemnation in the definition of Faith that was made in the Eighteenth Session and again Anathematises him as also the Heretical Patriarchs Sergius Pyrrhus Paul and Peter of Constantinople Cyrus of Alexandria and Macarius of Antioch Ad haec Honorius Antiquae Romae Papa hujusmodi haereseos confirmator Sext. Syn. p. 1084. Edit Paris in the thanks that were given the Emperour at the end of the Council And that Emperour in his Edict whereby he Banishes the Heresie of the Monothelites out of his Empire declares the same against the Heretical Bishops and against Honorius whom he calls the confirmer of that Heresie The Council being ended the Legats brought an Authentick Copy of it to the Pope St. Leo II. who succeeded Agatho that died during that Council And this Pope Leo who understood Greek very well took the pains himself to Translate it into Latin such as we have it Afterwards Writing to the Emperour to whom he sent his Approbation of all the Acts of the Council he Anathematises Honorius Necnon Honorium qui hanc sedem Apostolicam non Apostolicae Traditionis Doctrinâ lustravit sed immaculatam fidem subvertere conatus est T. 6. Concil Edit Paris p. 1027. who enlightned not says he the Apostolick Church by the Doctrine of Apostolical Tradition but who on the contrary endeavoured to destroy the Faith And in the Letters which he Wrote to the Bishops of Spain and to the King Ervigius to whom he sent the Definition of the Council to be signed he expresses himself as to that point in words at least as significant and weighty Qui immaculatam Apostolicae traditionis regulam quam à praedecessoribus suis accepit maculari consensit Ibid. p. 1252. saying That that Pope hath been smitten with an Anathema with Theodore Cyrus and Sergius for having consented that the Immaculate Rule of Apostolical Tradition which he had received from his Predecessours should be corrupted What this Pope who had Read Examined Translated and Approved that Council said of Honorius other Popes his Successours have also said in the following Ages For in the ancient Diurnal-book which is a kind of Ceremonial of the Church of Rome the Confession of Faith which all the new Elected Popes did make is to be seen and wherein they declare That they receive the Sixth General Council where Sergius Pyrrhus Paulus c. Vnà cum Honorio qui pravis eorum assertionibus fomentum impendit inventers of the Heresie of the Monothelites are say they condemned with Honorius who favoured and countenanced their wicked Doctrines Adrian II. in his Epistle that was read and received with applause in the seventh Action of the Eight Ecumenical Council confesses That the Orientals pronounced Sentence of Anathema against Honorius accused of the Heresie of the Monothelites And that great Eighth Council which so strongly maintained the Primacy of the Pope against Photius yet for all that with consent of the Popes three Legats who presided in that Council in the definition of Faith they Anathematised Theodore of Pharan Sergius Pyrrhus c. and with them Honorius Bishop of Rome Cyrus of Alexandria and Macarius of Antioch These are matters of fact to be read in the Councils and in the Books which I cite and they are so strong and decisive against the Infallibility of the Pope that Baronius Bellarmine Pighius and the other modern Authours who will absolutely have the Pope to be Infallible have been forced to deliver themselves from the persecution of those troublesome matters of fact to alledge forgery in them and boldly to say that the Acts of the Sixth Council have been corrupted by Theodore of Constantinople who in hatred to the Popes foisted in immediately after the Council all that concerns Honorius and that the Epistles of St. Leo are false and have been forged by some Impostour an enemy of the Holy See For say they what likelihood that after the Letter of Pope Agatho had been read in the fourth Action wherein he sayth That the Apostolical Church hath never swerved from the truth they would have condemned one of his Predecessours and that Leo his Successour should doe the same But they who yield not to that reason nor to some other conjectures which they find to be weaker object reasons against them which they think can never be answer'd For say they if that wicked Patriarch had corrupted the Acts would not the Popes Legats who presided in the Council and brought a Copy of them to Rome have clearly seen the Imposture and that what was inserted concerning Pope Honorius was no Act of the Council which had not mentioned him Would they not have complained to the Emperour of that horrid Cheat Would they not have told Pope Leo that these Acts were falsified Would they have suffered without speaking one word that he should have Translated them in that manner to impose upon the whole Church And would the Emperour who was himself present at the Council put into his Edict that Honorius had been condemned there or at least would he have suffered that Edict to be falsified in his presence Now if any one to excuse the Legats and Pope Leo should think fit to say That these Acts were not corrupted till long after their death Might not his mouth be stopt with this Reply To what end then was that Imposture Was there not to be found in the Records of the Vatican the true Copy of that Council the Translation of it made by Pope Leo and besides a Thousand Copies of it elsewhere which might have been opposed to those Falsaries for discovering their Cheat Would not Pope Adrian very far from Writing to the Fathers of the Eighth Council that Honorius had been condemned in the Sixth have advertised them that their Copies were corrupted Durst the Fathers have renewed the Anathema against Honorius and Adrian's three Legats never have opposed it Yet they did no such thing and there was no complaint made at that time that the Acts of the Sixth Council were falsified because there have never been any other Copies of these Acts either in Writing or in Print except those which we have wherein Honorius is condemned with Sergius and Pyrrhus and the other heads of the Monothelites
As to the Epistles of Pope Leo Father Francis Cambesis a learned Jacobin Edit Paris 1648. hath so cleared the truth of them that at present no body doubts of it And besides he hath given us a very rare piece which alone might end the Controversie if there still remained any about a point so fully determined That is a little work of the Deacon Agatho Keeper of the Records and Vice-Chancellour of the Church of Constantinople For he saith there that Officiating as Secretary in the Sixth Council he Transcribed all the Acts with his own hand which were carefully kept in the Imperial Palace and that by the command of the Emperour he took five Copies of them for the five Patriarchs that so the Decisions of the Council might not be altered by Consequent it was one of these Copies which the Legats carried to the Pope who without doubt is the first of the five Patriarchs A little after he adds Id praeterea autoritate decernens ut Sergii Honoriique ac caeterorum pariter ab eâdem sanctâ oecumenicâ Synodo ejectorum nomina in sacra Ecclesiarum dyptica praeconio publico referrentur eorumque per loca imagines erigerentur that Philippicus who from his youth was bred in the Heresie of the Monothelites being advanced to the Empire caused a Picture to be removed from before the Gate of the Palace before he would enter it which represented the Sixth Council and commanded that the Images should be set up again and that the Names of Sergius Honorius and of all the rest who had been Anathematised in the Holy Ecumenical Council should be replaced in the Sacred Dypticks So many convincing evidences make it manifestly out that the Acts of that Council have not been corrupted by the Greeks And therefore most part of those that said it before abandoning so weak a defence have retrenched themselves behind another saying That the Fathers were mistaken in not having rightly understood the sense and meaning of the Epistles of Honorius who made use of a wise dispensation for uniting and calming all Winds But that is a worse and far more dangerous Answer than the former For it strikes onely at some private persons who are accused but not known upon bare conjectures of having falsified the Acts but the other attacks a whole Ecumenical Council robbing it of all the authority and force which it ought to have against Hereticks The truth is by the same liberty that is taken to say that the Council hath not rightly understood the Letters of Pope Honorius thought it hath examined them the Monothelites if there were any at present might say That it hath not rightly understood the Scriptures nor the Fathers upon the credit of whom it pretends to have rightly condemned the doctrine of Theodore of Pharan Sergius Pyrrhus Paul of Constantinople and of Macarius of Antioch and thereby are made useless all the Decrees of Councils and all the Constitutions of Popes received in the Church which have condemned as Heretical certain doctrines and certain propositions particularly pointed at and contained in the Books of some Authours as the Fathers of the Fifth Council did in regard of the Three Chapters and in our time Pope Innocent X. and Alexander VII in regard of the Book of Jansenius These are Arguments which in my opinion can never be answer'd But since the method of this Treatise is not the way of Arguments which draws always Dispute after it against those who that they may not seem to be at a stand when they are put to it by evident reason never fail of the subterfuges of perplexed distinctions which are never well understood I 'll keep within the bounds that I have set to my self and onely make use of unquestionable matters of Fact in Antiquity that History furnishes us with Upon that ground then I say for an Answer to both in the first place that whether the Acts of the Sixth Council have been corrupted or not it is certain that all Antiquity hath received it in the same manner as we have it at present with the Condemnation of Honorius Detestamurque cum eâ Sergium Honorium c. Act. ult That appears not to say any thing of Pope Leo by the Decree of the seventh Council which as the sixth did anathematises Sergius Pyrrhus and Honorius Anastas in Vit. Leon Epist. ad Joâ—â— diacon by Anastasius the Library-keeper who certainly saw the Copy that was brought from Constantinople and who in the Life of Leo II. saith that that Pope received the sixth Council where Cyrus Sergius Pyrrhus and Honorius were condemned by that Letter of Adrian II which I have alledged by the determination of the eighth Council and by the Confession of Faith which the ancient Popes made after their Election nay more than that by the constant Tradition of the Gallican Church as it may be seen in the Chronicle of Ado and in the most ancient Manuscript of his Martyrology Aetat 6. which is to be found in the Mazarine Bibliotheke This is also to be seen in the Opuscles of Hincmar Archbishop of Reims Opusc de non Trin unit where he puts the Condemnation of Honorius in the sixth Council with that of the other Monothelites And for that very reason it was that writing to Pope Nicolas he saith Opusc 33. c. 20. That it is known that all the Churches of France are subject to that of Rome and that all the Bishops are subjected to the Pope by reason of his Primacy and that therefore they ought all to obey him Apud Flodard l. 3. Hist c. 13. but salva fide adds he the Faith being secured which it is most clear he would not have added had it not been believed in France as elsewhere that Popes might err as well as Pope Honorius In fine for an authentick Confirmation of all this there is no Author to be found who before some Moderns of the last Age durst say even contrary to the Tradition of the Church of Rome that the Acts of the sixth Council have been corrupted by the Greeks This is so true that in the ancient Breviary of Rome printed at Venice in the year 1482 and 61 years after at Paris in the Year 1543 after that it is said in the first Lesson of the second Nocturn of the Office of St. Leo on the eight and twentieth of June Hic suscepit sanctam sextam Synodum in the second it is to be read In qua synodo damnati sunt Cyrus Sergius Honorius Pyrrhus Paulus c. But in the new Breviary the Name of Honorius is left out and it hath been thought sufficient to put into that second Lesson In eo Concilio Cyrus Sergius Pyrrhus condemnati sunt Whereupon it is easie to conclude from most manifest matters of Fact alone that all Antiquity Oecumenick Councils Popes all the Gallican Church nay and even the Church of Rome until the last Age have believed that
the sixth Council received by all the Church hath condemned Pope Honorius and ranked him amongst Monothelite Hereticks Whence it clearly follows That Antiquity hath believed that the Pope was not infallible The same may be said to those who maintain that the Council in condemning the Epistles of Honorius to Sergius did not rightly understand them Whether that be so or no it is certain according to your selves that it condemned them Then a whole great Council of above two hundred Bishops of the seventh Age representing the Universal Church in her Pastors lawfully assembled did not believe the Pope to be Infallible for had they been of that Belief they would have had a care whether they had well or ill understood these Letters not to have anathematised him as they did The Result of all is That Antiquity in the Seventh Eighth and Ninth Ages as well as in those that preceded hath believed that the Pope was not Infallible This is it that I was to prove leaving the Modern Doctors who hold his Infallibility to their Liberty of thinking and saying thereupon whatever they please by Logick that can never overthrow the truth of matters of Fact which I have produced and which make known to us what Antiquity hath believed concerning the Infallibility of the Pope CHAP. XIII Of the Popes Clement III. Innocent III. Boniface VIII and Sixtus V. SUch as apply themselves to the Study of Antiquity find that in the Ages following there have been other Popes that have erred in their Decisions as these that follow In the twelfth Age Ostiens C. Quarto de Divortiis Clement III. declared in his Decretal Laudabilem That the Wife of an Heretick being converted and her Husband continuing obstinate in his Heresie might be married to another which doubtless neither Catholicks nor Protestants could at present suffer to be brought into practice And therefore Pope Innocent III. who filled the Holy See shortly after Clement recalled that Constitution thereby plainly declaring that his Predecessor had erred This is affirmed by Cardinal Cortzeon who flourished in the Pontificat of Innocent III. in his Sum which I have seen in Manuscript in the Abbey Royal of St. Victor And this same Pope Innocent himself for all he was so able a man was subject to the same failing from which Popes according to the Belief of Antiquity are not exempted that is to be deceived even when they decide a point of Doctrine in their Council without the Consent of the Church The matter of Fact is related by Caesarius a Cistertian Monk Lib. 3. Historiar Memorab c. 32. and contemporary with Innocent He says that a Monk of his Order who without doubt before he entered the Monastery had given it out that he was a Priest committed daily a dreadful Sacriledge in celebrating Mass though he had never received sacred Orders Having confessed this to his Abbot who failed not to enjoyn him as he ought to abstain from saying it for the future he would not obey him for on the one hand he feared that by refraining he should disgrace himself and give occasion to his Brethren to think ill of him and on the other he thought he had no cause to apprehend that his Abbot to whom he had discovered his Crime under the inviolable Seal of Confession durst do him any prejudice because of that Discovery The Abbot being in great perplexity bethought himself to propose this Case in general Terms in a Chapter of his Order that was held some time after and asking the Question what was to be done if such a Case should ever happen in their Monasteries the whole Assembly were as much puzled as the good Abbot had been and neither the Chapter of the Cistertians nor any of the rest durst ever undertake to decide that case of Conscience which was thought to be so difficult that it was resolved upon by all to write about it to the Pope for a Resolution Innocent III. the then Pope assembled thereupon the Cardinals Doctors and Learned Men to take their Advice who after some debate agreed all in his Judgment to wit That such a Confession being rather Blasphemy than a Confession the Confessor in such a case ought to discover so horrible a Crime because it might bring great prejudice to the Church And the Year following he wrote to the Chapter what he had determined Et placuit sententia omnibus scri sitque sequenti anno Capitulo quod fuerat à se determinâ—tum à Cardinâ—libus approbatum and what was approved in that great Congregation of Cardinals It is not at all to be doubted but that that Definition is wrong So that the same Pope a little after made no Scruple to retract it in the great Council of Lateran where he himself presided Ann. 12 15. which positively declared the contrary in these Terms Caveat sacerdos ne verbo vel signo vel alio quovis modo prodat aliquatenus peccatorem Qui peccaâ—um in poenitentiali Judicio sibi detectum praesumpserit revelare non solum à sacerdotali officio deponendum decernimus verum etiam ad agendara perpetuam poenitenâ—iam in arctum Monasterium detrudendum Let the Priest have a care that he discover not either by Word Sign or in any other way whatsoever the Sin of his Penitent That if any one adds it presume to reveal the Sin that hath been discovered to him at the Tribunal of Confession we ordain not only that he be deposed from the Sacerdotal Office but also that he be confined to a Monastery there to do Penance during Life These are two quite opposite Decisions upon a Point of highest Importance Conc. Later 4. c. 21. and which concerns a Sacrament one of the Pope with his particular Council or his Council of Cardinals Priests and Deacons who represent the Church of Rome the other of the same Pope with a great Council representing the Universal Church Whence comes that difference if it be not That the Pope pronouncing and deciding upon any Point concerning Doctrine and Manners in a general Council or with the Consent of the Church is Infallible and when he acts otherwise he is not This appears still more manifestly in the Bull Vnam Sanctam of Boniface VIII whereby that Pope whose History is sufficiently known proposes to all Believers as an Article of Faith the Belief whereof is necessary to Salvation That Popes have a Supream Power over all the Kingdoms of the World as to the Temporal It was believed then in all these Kingdoms and is so still that that Definition is wrong Even they themselves who hold that the Pope hath some Power over the Temporal have a care not to say That one is obliged to believe it upon pain of Damnation and it is known that Clement V. recalled that Bull in the Council of Vienna Cap. meruit de Privilegiis That Pope then and that Council in the fourteenth Century believed not that
the Pope was infallible The same may be said of the Bull of Sixtus V. which he caused to be printed with his Bible and whereby he declares to the whole Church That that Bible is corrected according to the Primitive Purity of the Vulgar Translation And nevertheless because it was afterwards clearly seen that it was not Clement VIII suppressed that Bull and caused another to be printed wherein all the Faults of the former are very well corrected and so it may very well be concluded that Clement VIII was persuaded that his Predecessor instructing all Believers in a point that regards even the Principle of Faith might be deceived However I will not say so because I will not at all enter into Dispute with some Modern Doctors who to slip the Collar have bethought themselves to say That it is true the Bull was printed with the Bible Tannerus disp 1. de Fide q. 4. dub 6. n. 263. Thom. Comptonus in 2.2 dis 22. de sum pontif sect 5. which is still to be seen in many Libraries but that it was not affixed upon the Gates of St. Peter's Church and on the Field of Flora so long as it ought to have been according to the Laws of the Chancery of Rome As if the Truth or Falshood of the Contents of a Bull depended on the time that is to be taken in publishing it and as if the Pope who makes it became not Infallible but at the precise Minute of the Accomplishment of the time that it should have been affixed Let us leave that Instance then of Sixtus V. that we may not engage into that Sophistry of Disputation which to me seems not altogether so serious in a matter of that Importance CHAP. XIV The Instance of Pope John XXII I Shall produce no more Instances but that of Pope John XXII That Pope in his extream old Age of near fourscore and ten Years took a Conceit that as a certain and constant Truth the Opinion of some ought to be established in the Church Contin Hangii who had heretofore taught that the Souls of those who died in Grace and had been entirely purged from all the remaining dreggs of their Sins did not see the Face of God till after the Resurrection He did all that lay in his Power to have it pass He taught it publickly in Conferences and Congregations which he held upon that Subject he preached it himself he obliged by his Example the Cardinals and Prelates of his Court and other Doctors openly to maintain it He caused a learned Jacobin named Father Thomas de Valas Ibid. Gobel persona in Cosmodr aet 6. c. 71. Paul Langius in Chron. Citizen to be put in Prison who not doubting but that Opinion was an Error contrary to the express Word of the Son of God who said to the good Thief This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise preached the contrary even in Avignon where the Pope held his Court. In fine I find a Doctor of very great Authority Hadrian 6. in 4. sentent art 3. de Minist Confirm 22. whose eminent Virtue and singular Learning with a consummated Prudence in the management of Affairs raised him afterwards to the highest Dignity of the Church that says very plainly Publicè docuit declaravit ab omnibus teneri voluit quod animae c. That he obliged all men to hold that Doctrine for the future Be as it will it is certain that he did what lay in his Power to bring into his Opinion the Sacred Faculty of Theology and University of Paris which was by all men reverenced as the Mother of Sciences that for that end he sent thither two Doctors with the General of the Cordeliers who publickly maintained that Doctrine and preached the same which stirred up all Paris against them Whereupon King Philip de Valois caused all the Bishops and Abbots that then were at Paris Continu Hangii to assemble with the Doctors of the Faculty who in his Presence confounded those of Avignon and proved to them that what they had preached by order of the Pope was heretical That Prince who would suffer in his Kingdom no Novelty of Doctrine wrote to his Holiness with a great deal of Force and Respect beseeching him to retract that wicked Opinion Quatènus sententiam Magistrorum de Parisiis qui melius sciunt quid debet teneri credi in fide quam Jurista alii Clerici qui parum aut nihil sciunt de Theolâ—gia approbaret Ibid. which caused so much Scandal in the Church Nay he prayed him to send a Legate into France who in his Name might approve and confirm the Decree of the Doctors of Paris who knew far better what was to be believed as a matter of Faith than his Canonists and other Clergy of Avignon that were no great Divines The Pope who would neither wholly retract nor yet on the other hand provoke the King whose Protection he stood in need of took a middle Course which he thought would not be disagreeable unto him and prayed him to be satisfied Epist Joan. ad Philip 14. Calend. Decemb Pontif. 12. that every one might continue in their Opinion and Say Teach and Preach what they thought good upon that Subject As to that Proposition the King would again have the Advice of the Faculty Joan. Gerson Serm. in die Paschat coram Rege Petr. de Alliac prop. de toll sc coram Rege An. 1406. Gob. Perso Langius Odor Rayn ad An. 1334. whom he there assembled and the Faculty by a Decree of the Second of January One thousand three hundred and three at the Mathurins declared of new That the Opinion in question was Heretical and that by consequent it could neither be Preached nor Taught After that Philip proscribed it by Sound of Trumpet prohibiting all his Subjects to teach or maintain it and then that he might oblige the Pope to condemn it he wrote to him a second time in so forcible and extraordinary Terms that at length the Pope retracted it a little before his Death which hapned the Year following I have said all that I could in my History of the Fall of the Empire to excuse him even so far as to affirm with some that that Doctrine which he would have established by his own Authority was not as yet condemned as it was afterwards by Benet XII his Successor There are some notwithstanding who say that it had been long before rejected by the Roman Church as appears by the Confession of Faith that Clement IV. sent in the Year Two hundred threescore and seven to the Emperour Michael Paleologue whereof I have spoken in my History of the Schism of the Greeks However it be it is certain that it is an Error condemned not only by Pope Benet but much more solemnly above an hundred Years after in the third Article of the Definition of Faith which the Council of Florence made for reuniting the two
of Scripture which teacheth us Nec rationem habere ullam exempli quod hic vel ille decessor meus c. that God permits that men should for a time be ignorant of that which afterwards he discovers to his Church Perspicite an decessores nostri id satis intellexerint quod de indissolubili matrimonii vinculo disquirimus Who knows then now said he but that God may manifest by our means what others have not known touching the indissolvable Bond of Marriage Wherefore have no respect to Examples and don 't tell me what this man or that man of my Predecessors have determined about this matter in a like Case Confider only whether these Popes have understood rightly or not what they have decided concerning this matter of Marriage which we examine There is a Pope who doubtless will never be accused of having failed in maintaining the pontifical Authority that nevertheless frankly confesses and in very plain terms that he and his Predecessors may have erred in Decisions that they may have made concerning points relating to the Faith So that from all that I have hitherto said upon that Subject it may evidently be concluded That great Saints of the ancient Church Bishops in all parts of Christendome in the East in the West and in Africa full and general Councils ancient Popes who have either presided in or consented to these Councils in a word that all Antiquity hath believed that the Pope deciding by his pontifical Authority without the consent of the Church is not at all infallible CHAP. XVI The state of the Question touching the Superiority of a Council over the Pope or of the Pope over a Council IF I proceeded in this Treatise by way of Discourse and Argument I might soon conclude and not fear that any Objection could be brought against my Conclusion for if Antiquity hath believed as I think I have demonstrated that the Pope is not Infallible and that he may be deceived in his Decrees it 's most evident that it hath also believed by necessary consequence that the Tribunal of the Universal Church which without contradiction is infallible and represented by a general Council is above that of the Pope But because for avoiding of Dispute I only alledge evident matters of Fact against which all the Arguments in the World can never prevail for in fine can one by dint of Argument make that which has been never to have been I shall only relate what the Ancient Church hath believed touching that famous Question Seeing the State of the Question ought plainly and without Ambiguity to be proposed for avoiding perplexity to the end that people may at first agree about the thing that is in question and that it may not be said as it oftentimes happens after much jangling and dispute without concluding any thing that the thing was understood in a quite different sense than it was proposed in Take therefore the state of the Question as follows It is enquired Whether after that a Council is lawfully assembled the Pope who without contradiction is Head of it presiding in it in person or by his Legates or not being present nor presiding therein either the one way or t'other as it hath happened oftner than once and is to be seen in the second Oecumenical Council of an hundred and Ann. 381. fifty Bishops Ann. 553. and in the fifth of above an hundred and sixty Whether I say that Council considered in its Membets united either under the Pope who has Right to preside in it or failing of him under another President is above the Pope and hath sovereign Authority over him so that he is obliged to submit to its Decrees and Definitions to approve them and consent thereunto as all others are though he be in his own particular of a contrary Judgment or whether the Pope is so above all the other Members of that Council united together be he there or not that if he approve and confirm not by his Assent and Authority the Decrees and Definitions thereof That Council has no Authority neither over Him nor over Believers In this precisely consists that Question which hath not been moved in the Church but since the Council of Pisa some two hundred and forty Years ago Ann. 1409. And the reason why it was never spoken of before is because it was not at all doubted in the Ancient Church but that a Council was above the Pope I shall make it out by matters of Fact against which no Reply can be made CHAP. XVII That it is the Holy Ghost which in the Definitions of Faith pronounces by the Mouth of the Council ANtiquity hath always believed as it is believed at this day That the Council held at Jerusalem concerning the Legal Observations to which many amongst the converted Jews pretended that all who embraced the Faith of the Gospel were tied hath been a pattern to all Oecumenical Councils which have been since celebrated in the Church for the supreme Decision of other points of Controversie which have often divided Christians inâ—o very different Opinions and when the matter in question had been well examined the Decree that pass'd in that Council proceeded from the Holy Ghost which was uttered in these Words Visum est spiritui sancto nobis It hath ever since also been believed that when other Councils after an exact Enquiry into the Truth defined what was to be believed or what was to be done it is the Holy Ghost that speaks in their Decrees and that it may truly be said as it was said at Jerusalem It hath seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to this Assembly This hath been expressed by St. Leo in these terms Sanctorum patrum canones spiritu Dei conditi totius mundi reverentia consecrati St. Leo Epist 84. ad Anast Thessalonic which have been received with so much Applause in the whole Church when he saith in one of his Epistles That the Canons of the holy Fathers have been made by the Spirit of God and that they are consecrated by the Veneration of the whole Earth Now it is certain that St. Peter depended upon the Holy Ghost as well as St. James St. John St. Paul St. Barnaby the Elders and other Brethren who were present in that Council and if after that he compelled by his Example the Christians to Judaise as Cardinal Baronius hath thought he had been much more to be blamed for having disobeyed the Holy Ghost and the Council than when St. Paul rebuked him openly before the Council as I have made it clearly out by the Testimony of the Fathers and of Pope Pelagius II. So that it ought to be concluded that the Pope who is no less inferiour to the Holy Ghost than St. Peter to whom he succeeds is obliged to submit to his Judgment against his own to obey and consent to his Decisions and consequently to those of the Council who neither speaks nor decides
but with the Holy Ghost according to those high Words which contain all the Force Authority and Soul of Oecumenical Councils Visum est spiritui sancto nobis This is so true that if after the great Council of Nice for example defined by Plurality of Voices that the Word is consubstantial to the Father the Pope St. Sylvester had not received that definition and believed the Consubstantiality of the Word as the Arians did not he would have been reckoned an Heretick as well as they And therefore he failed not to consent to the Decrees of that Council by approving and confirming them by his own Assent and by the Assent of the Bishops whom he had assembled at Rome upon that occasion I offer you says he in his Epistle to the Fathers of Nice if that Letter be true as Cardinal Baronius thinks I offer you my Hand and that of my Disciples Meum chirographum discipulorum meorum in vestro sancto concilio quicquid constituistis unà parem dare consensum T. 1. Concil for consenting with you to all that ye have determined in your holy Council And it 's that precisely which in the Ancient Church is called the confirming of a Council to wit to consent by Vote and an authentick Act to what hath been established in it That appears evidently by the Letters of two great Popes St. Leo and St. Martin The Council of Chalcedon made Decrees concerning the Faith for condemning the Heresie of the Eutycheans and the Remains of that of the Nestorians and by the eight and twentieth Canon thereof to honour the Imperial City the second place among the Patriarchs was given to the Patriarch of Constantinople which is contrary to the Council of Nice that disposed of it otherways and to which St. Leo also would never condescend what Instance soever the Fathers of Chalcedon made to him for it He was nevertheless apprehensive that this might have a bad Effect and that because of that Refusal it might be thought in the World that he would not consent to the determinations of that Council which had so well asserted the Faith against the Heresie of Eutyches therefore he wrote to them in these terms Ne per malignos interpretes dubitabile videatur utrum quae in Synodo Chalcedonensi per unanimitatem vestram de fide statutae sunt approbem haec ad omnes fratres Coepiscopos nostros scriptae direxi Vt fraternitas vestra omnium fidelium corda cognoscant me non solum per fratres qui vicem meam executi sunt sed etiam per approbationem gâ—storum synodalium propriam vobiscum iniisse sententiam in sola fidei causa c. St. Leo Ep. 61. Syn. Chalced. Lest by malign Interpreters of my Intentions it might seem doubtful whether or not I approve what you have with unanimous Consent determined concerning the Faith in the Council of Calcedon I write to all my Brethren and Fellow-Bishops these Letters which the most glorious Emperour as he hath desired will deliver unto you to the end your Fraternity and all Believers may know that not only by the Approbation of my Legates but also by my own I have joyned my Judgment to yours but only in those Points which concern the Faith for the sake of which this Universal Council hath been celebrated by the express Order of the Emperours and the Consent of the Holy Apostolick See You see then that to approve a Council according to St. Leo is to conform in Judgment to that of the Fathers and to consent to the Definitions that have been made in it This is still more clearly apparent by the circulatory Letter which the Pope St. Martin wrote to St. Amand Bishop of Vtrecht and to all the Bishops of France sending them the Acts of the Council of an hundred and five Bishops whom he had assembled at Rome against the Monothelites Ann. 549. and exhorting them to subscribe to them in a Council of the Gallican Church Secundum tenorem Enclyticae à nobis directae scripta unà cum subscriptionibus vestris nobismet destinanda concelebrent confirmantes consentientes iis quae pro orthodoxâ fide destructione haereticorum vesaniae nuper exortae à nobis statuta sunt Mart. 1. Ep. ad Amand. Traject ext post Act. Concil Later sub Mart. and to send them back to him with their Subscriptions whereby we may see That they confirm and consent to all that hath been defined in the Council of Rome for the Catholick Faith and for overthrowing that furious Heresie which of late hath risen against the Church He desires that the Bishops of France may confirm the Decisions of Rome concerning a Point relating to Faith it is not for all that to be said that the Gallican Church is superiour to the Roman and there would be no reason to say so because to confirm Definitions is nothing else as St. Martin explains himself but to consent unto them by Vote and Suffrage So that every Bishop who subscribes to the Decrees of Council approves and confirms it in consenting to it by his hand-writing which perfectly agrees with what St. Cyril of Alexandria wrote to the Bishop of Meteline whom some would have made believe Ne credat hoc sanctitas tua scripsit ènim consona sanctae Synodo omniaque nobiscum confirmavit nobiscum sentit Cyril Alex. Epist ad Acacium Meliten Episc that the Pope protected Nestorius Believe it not said he to him for I assure you that the Pope hath written to us conform to the Decisions of the Council of Ephesus that he hath with us confirmed all the Acts and that he agrees with us in one and the same Judgment This it is then which the Popes themselves call confirming a Council and it is never to be found in the Ancient Church that Councils by their Synodal Letters directed to the Popes have demanded any other Confirmation of their Decrees relating to the Faith than their Consent and Approbation which they were obliged to give For in fine if the Holy Ghost speaks by a Council lawfully called when they pronounce concerning a matter of Faith and that they say Visum est spiritui sancto nobis the Pope must needs approve and obey what the Holy Ghost hath said And if the Holy Ghost speak not by the Council until the Popes have given their Approbation to it then might they alone by refusing that have been the cause that the Holy Ghost who is to teach us all Truth might never have instructed us and that Arianism and all other Heresies had only been tolerable Opinions which in my Judgment no Man dares to say CHAP. XVIII That Ancient Councils have examined the Judgments of Popes that they might pronounce the last and definitive Sentence upon them THough Councils have always had a great Respect for the Popes and that in great Controversies which have given occasion for calling them for giving a supreme
Decision in controverted Points they have many times pronounced Sentences conform to those which the Popes had already past against one of the two Parties nevertheless they have examined them to know whether they were just or not which makes it apparent that they believed that they had a Superiority over the Pope altogether like to that which superiour Judicatures have over inferiour Take two famous Instances of this which puts the Truth thereof beyond all doubt Flavian Patriarch of Constantinople in his particular Council condemned the pernicious Doctrine of Eutyches who acknowledged but one Nature in Jesus Christ and the great Pope St. Leo by his Judgment confirmed that of the Patriarch as appears by the Letters which he wrote unto him wherein he wonderfully well asserts the Catholick Belief concerning the Distinction of two Natures the divine and humane in one only person in Jesus Christ against the Error of that Arch-Heretick who confounded them Dioscorus Patriarch of Alexandria who openly declared himself the Protector of Eutyches undertook his Business and prevailed so far by favour of Chrysaphius who could do any thing with his Master the Emperour Theodosius the younger that this Prince called the second Council of Ephesus there to examine what had been determined at Constantinople and Rome against Eutyches St. Leo who approv'd not this Proceeding that look'd like cabaling Quia etiam talium non est negligenda curatio piè ac religiosè Christiamssimus Imperator haberi voluit Episcopale concilium ut pleniori Judicio omnis possit error aboleri fratres nostros c. qui vice meâ Sincto conventui vestrae fraternitatis intersint communi vobiscum sententia quae domino sunt placitura constituant hoc est ut primitus pestifero errore damnato c. at first withstood it but consented thereunto at length for the sake of Peace hoping that all things would be carried in that Council according to Canonical Forms and that then the definitive Judgment that would be pronounced there would calm the Troubles of the Church Whereupon he sent his Legates thither with Letters to the Patriarch Flavian and to the Council wherein having declared what he had done against the new Heresie of Eutyches he adds that however seeing all care is to be taken to reclaim those who were gone astray and that the Emperour had appointed a Council to be held for that Effect to the end that Error might entirely be abolished by a more ample Judgment he sends a Bishop a Priest and a Deacon with an Apostolical Natory to assist thereat in his Name and there to settle by common Advice what was fit for the Service of God that is to say Si tamen sensus haereticos plenè aperteque propria voce subscriptione damnaverit St. Leo Ep. 15. ad Ephes Syn. that after so pernicious an Error should be condemned they would take into consideration the re-establishment of the Author of it always provided that he condemned his Heresie by Word and Writing This great Pope openly declares That that Opinion of Eutyches is Heresie Ep. 16. ad Flav. Nay he writes to Flavian that it is so manifest that there was no necessity to assemble a Council for condemning it and nevertheless he is content that one be held to the end that Error may be entirely abolished by a more ample Judgment But more still For that second Council of Ephesus by the Power of Chrysaphius and Violence of Dioscorus being become that infamous Den of Thieves where all Order was over-turned and Eutyches absolved this holy Pope who would have that Heresie thundred by a definitive Sentence made continual Instances to the Emperour Marcian and the Empress Pulcheria after the Death of Theodosius for calling of a new Council which was held at Chalcedon where after Examination of the Doctrine of Eutyches and the Letters of St. Leo they confirmed by their Sovereign Authority and by a supreme Judgment what the holy Pope had pronounced against that Heresie And in that he gloried when writing to Theodoret who had condemned in that Council the Heresie of Nestorius whereof he was suspected and that of Eutyches after he had congratulated with him in a most obliging manner he subjoyns upon his account these lovely Words We glory in the Lord Gloriamur in Domino qui nullum nos in nostris fratribus detrimentum sustinere permisit sed quae nostro prius ministerio definierat universo fraternitatis firmavit assensu ut verè à se prodiisse ostenderet quod prius à primâ omnium sede formatum toâ—ius orbis Judicium recepisset St. Leo Ep. 63. ad Theodor. who hath not permitted that our Brethren should do any thing to our Disadvantage but on the contrary hath confirmed by the Assent of the whole Council what had been before defined by our Ministery to shew that that Judgment has truly proceeded from him which being first rendered by the chief of all Sees hath been received by the Judgment of the whole Church Is not that to say that to know whether the Decisions of the Pope proceed from God or not they must be received by the whole Church and that by consequent the Council which represents it and which gives them their full force by its supreme Authority is above the Pope This appears still more clearly by one other Instance where it is to be seen that a General Council having examined a Judgment solemnly rendered by the Pope rescinds it and passes a contrary Sentence It is that which the fifth Council pronounced against the three Chapters and against the Constitution of Pope Virgilius whereby he had approved them forbidding all men whosoever to condemn them I have already spoken of that Action which standeth not in need of any long discourse to set it off in its full Force and Vigour In this Council the Doctrine of the Three Chapters and the Constitution of the Pope who approves them are examined He is prayed to preside in that Assembly and in the Examination that is made there of these Writings He refuses though he was then at Constantinople where the Council was held and with all his might still maintains those three Chapters and nevertheless they are condemned and are to this day reckoned to have been very lawfully and justly condemned nay he was afterwards necessitated to submit to that Decree as I have already said upon the Credit of very good Vouchers and if yet he did not submit to it it is still certain that the Council examined his Judgment and rescinded it After that can it be doubted but that the ancient Church believed that a Council is superiour to the Pope Let 's reflect a little upon what I said of the sixth Council which condemned the Heresie of the Monothelites In it was examined what the Pope St. Martin had decided concerning that Subject in his Council of the Bishops of Italy celebrated at Rome and what Pope Honorius had before him
declared in relation to the same Controversie in his Epistles to Sergius Patriarch of Constantinople one of the chief Authors of that Heresie The Judgment of St. Martin was approved in that Council and that of Honorius so severely censured that the Pope was there anathematised Whether these Letters were well or ill understood it makes nothing to our present purpose The Council passes Judgment upon him and no body ever objected against it in Antiquity This is sufficient to conclude invincibly that the Council is superiour to the Pope But is there any thing more convincing and decisive for fixing of this Truth than what was done in the case of the Donatists who by their Schism troubled all the Church of Africa Optat. Milevit l. 1. contr Parmen Euseb Eccles hist l. 10. c. 5. They applied themselves to the Emperour Constantine who was then in Gallia and desired of him Judges chosen from among the Bishops of the Gallican Church against Cecilian Bishop of Carthage because they would shun the Judgment of the Pope whom they distrusted August Ep. 162. ad Gelor Eleus Ep. 165. ad Generos 166. ad Donatist 167. alib saepe The Emperour nevertheless having protested that it belonged not to him to meddle in Ecclesiastical matters sent them back to the Pope to whom as Head of the Church it belongs to judge of greater Causes Pope Miltiades took for Assessors in this Judgment fifteen Bishops of Italy to whom he joyned three famous Bishops of the Gallican Church Maternus of Cologne Rheticius of Autun and Marinus of Arles whom the Emperour had sent him to be of the number of the Judges that the Donatists might not have cause to say that every thing had been refused them That Cause was solemnly judged in that Council of Rome Donatus Head of the Schismaticks appeared there with ten Bishops of his Party and alledged all that he had to say against gainst Cecilian who appeared also accompanied with ten other African Bishops and defended his Cause and that of the Church so well against the Authors of that Schism that they were condemned They were very willing to be judged by this Council imagining as St. Austin observes Ep. 162. that either they might gain their Cause by Artifices and Calumnies or that if they lost it yet they might still maintain their Party by complaining loudly in all places that the Pope and his Bishops who were prejudiced against them had judged partially The truth is they did so and pressed the Emperour so hard to give them new Judges and in greater number that that good Prince overcome by their extream Importunity Orabida furoris audacia Opt. loc cit which he called extream Fury granted their desine and seeing he passionately desired to restore Peace to the Church and utterly to abolish so fatal a Schism by a supreme Sentence that might for ever put an end to that great Contest he called the great Council of Arles Apud Arelatum eandem causam diligentius examinandam terruinandamque curasse August Ep. 162. Euseb l. 10. c. 5. August Ep. 167. ad Fest which St. Austin calls a full and universal Council because as Eusebius assures us and after him that holy Doctor there was there an infinite number of Bishops of all the Provinces of the Empire Ex omnibus mundi partibus praecipue Gallicanis Concil Arelat 11. Ganls The Legates of Pope Sylvester with the eighteen Bishops who had been at the Council of Rome were present there The Cause of the Donatists was examined there afresh with the Judgment which Pope Melchiades the Predecessor of St. Sylvester had given against them and they were again condemned by a definitive Sentence and without appeal in regard of the Ecclesiastical Tribunal for the Appeal which these Schismaticks who observed no measures brought to the Tribunal of Constantine August Ep. 162. was most unjust as was frankly acknowledged by that Emperour who said that if he at length took cognizance of that Cause to stop the mouth of these Hereticks and arrest the course of their Fury he humbly begg'd pardon of the Bishops whose Authority in what concerns the spiritual he should invade Whereupon St. Austin answering the Complaints that the Donatists of his time always made of Pope Melchiades Quae vox est omnium malorum litigatorum cum fuerint etiam manifestissimâ veritate superati Ibid. as their Ancestors had done jeered them pleasantly saying that they acted like bad Lawyers who having lost their Cause blame their Judges and complain to all men that they have been unjustly condemned when they have even been convicted by the most manifest discovery of the Truth Ecce putemus illos Episcopos qui Romae judicarunt non bonos Judices fuisse restabat adhuc plenarium Ecclesiae Vniversalis concilium ubi etiam cumipsis judicibus causa posset agitari ut si male judicasse convicti essent torum sententiae solverentur Ibid. Then to confound them he adds these great Words which plainly decides the Question that we examine and to which nothing can be replied Suppose that the Judges who condemned your Ancestors at Rome had judged amiss was not there still the full Council where that Cause might be again examined with the same Judges who had already judged it that if it had been found that their Judgment was not just their Sentence might have been rescinded I freely confess that I cannot see how it can be better made out that the Pope's Tribunal is subject to that of a full and general Council which may confirm or rescind a Sentence past at Rome as a supreme Court can confirm or rescind the Judgment of an inferiour So when the same St. Austin says in another place speaking of the Pelagians Jam enim do hac causâ duo concilia missa sunt ad sedem Apostolicam inde etiam rescripta venerunt causa finita est August Serm. 2. de Verb. Dom. c. 10. We have Rescripts come from Rome the Cause is ended that 's to be understood that it is ended at Rome whither these Hereticks after they had been condemned in the Councils of Africa appealed to the Pope and thought to have gained their Cause by their Artifice which had once succeeded with them It was not judged supremely but in the Council of Ephesus We must then of necessity conclude that it cannot more clearly he seen than in those Instances which I have now alledged of universal Councils which have judged the Sentences of Popes That it was believed in the ancient Church before Saint Austin and in his Time and after him without the least doubting that a general Council is above the Pope And that 's the thing I was to prove CHAP. XIX That the ancient Popes have always acknowledged and protested that they were subject to Councils BUT that I may farther prove it upon as solid a ground and which ought to be the more plausible and
less to be rejected because I shall produce as Evidences for this Truth those who are most concerned in the Affair I need say no more but that the ancient Popes whom of late in spight of themselves they would have elevated above Councils do themselves protest that they are subject unto them and that they ought to obey them in matters belonging to Faith the Regulation of Manners the universal Good and general Discipline of the Church Is there any thing clearer and more sincere as to that Subject than the Testimony of Pope Syricius Successor to Damasus The Emperours Theodosius and Valentinian the younger Ann. 390. had called a great Council of the Eastern and Western Bishops at Capoua Ambros Epist ad Theoph. Alexand. Epist Syricii ad Anys Thessalon for quenching the Schism of Antioch which after the Death of Meletius and Paulinus still continued by the Election that the two different Parties of that Church made of Flavian to succeed to Meletius and of Evagrius Successor to Paulinus Seeing Flavian appeared not the Council delegated Theophilus of Alexandria to judge and determine that great difference with consent of the Bishops of Egypt and at the same time since the Council was informed against a Bishop of Macedonia called Bonosus accused of Heresie and Impiety against the holy Virgin who durst not appear the Council committed the Tryal of the Cause to Anesius of Thessalonica that he might determine it in a Synod which he should hold with the Bishops of Macedonia and Illyrium These whether to discharge themselves of the Judgment which they well foresaw they must of necessity pass against one of their Brethren Cum hujusmodi fuerit Concilii Capuensis Judicium ut finitimi Bonoso atque eâ—us accusatoribus Judices tribuerentur advertimus quod nobis Judicandi forma competere non possit Nam si integra esset bodie synodus recte de iiâ— quae comprehendit scriptorum vestrorum series decerneremus Vestrum est igitur qui hoc recepistis Judiâ—ium sententiam ferre di oâ—nibus vicem enim Synodi recepistis quos ad examinandum Synodus elegit Primum est uti ii judicent quibus judicandi faculias est data vos enim totius ut scripsimus Synodi vice decernitis nos quasi ex Synodi authoritate judicare non convenit or out of the Veneration that they had for the Holy See referred that Judgment to Pope Syricius But he wrote back to them that if the Council had determined nothing about the Cause of Bonosus he would have pronounced a just Judgment concerning what they had written to him of that Bishop but that since the Council had commissionated them to take Cognisance of that Cause by a decisive Judgment with the Bishop of Thessalonica he frankly confessed that he had no Power to judge of it It is you said he who are to supply the place of the Council in that Judgment and who received the Power to determine it to whom it belongs to pronounce about that Affair Epist Syricii ad Anys Thes in collect Roman bipertit veter monument Romae 1662. seeing you represent the Council which hath transferred its Authority upon you and not to me who have it not There is a Pope of the fourth Age who ingenuously confesses That the Delegates of the Council much more the Council it self have greater Power than he hath and who by consequent acknowledges that the Authority of Councils is above that of Popes Innocent I. who three Years after Syricius was Pope and who had observed his Conduct in relation to the Council of Capoua walked also according to the Tradition of the Roman Church Chrys Ep. ad Innoc 1. Ep. Inn. ad Jo. Chrys apud Sozom. l. 8. c. 26. Innoc. Episc ad cleric Constant Pallad dial de vit Chrysost c. 2. and the Example of his Predecessors who never thought that their Power was equal and far less superiour to that of a Council For in the great Persecution that Theophilus Patriarch of Alexandria rais'd against St. John Chrysostom who was condemned and deposed in a Synod of Bishops of the Faction of Theophilus Theophili Judicium cassum irritum â—sse decrevit dicens oportâ—re conflare aliam iâ—repâ—ehensiâ—ilem Synodum occiâ—entalium sacâ—rdotum cedentibâ—s aâ—ciâ—is primun dâ—inde inimicis neutraâ—um quippe partiam ut plurimum â—ectum esse Judicium Pallad loâ— cit and Enemies to that Saint seeing the Pope and Western Bishops had been written to on both sides that holy Bishop did indeed rescind that Judgment past contrary to all the Forms and Rules of Councils by incompetent Judges against an Absent who had judicially appealed to a lawful Council but as to the Substance of the Affair and the Accusation in hand he would never meddle in it He thought that considering the Importance of the Affair wherein the Honour and Dignity of a Patriarch whose Faith had always been so pure and his Learning and eminent Sanctity in so high a Veneration over all the Church was struck at Quodnam remedium hisce rebus afferemus necessaria erit Synodalis cognitio nothing but an impartial Council wherein the Friends and Enemies of neither side should be present could pronounce a definitive Sentence concerning the matter Ea sola est quae hujusmodi procellarum impetus retardare potest Innoc. This he wrote to both Parties and in the Letters which he directs to St. Chrysostom to his Bishops and Clergy of Constantinople he says positively that that Council Cum opem ipse ferre non posset Pallad even the same to which that holy Patriarch had appealed was absolutely necessary for determining that great Affair by a supreme Sentence that there was no other Remedy but that for the Evils that afflicted them that he could not help them otherwise Multum deliberamus quonam modo synodus Oecumenica congregari possit per quam c. Expectemus igitur vallo patientiae communiti c. that an Oecumenical Council alone could restore Peace to the Eastern Church and calm so furious a Tempest and that in the mean time it behoved them to arm themselves with Patience and have recourse only to God expecting till that Council should be called wherein he laboured incessantly searching out the Measures that might be taken for having it called Could that Pope express himself in clearer terms that a general Council hath an higher power and of larger Extent than his own and that by consequent it is above him However if I mistake not there is somewhat that strikes higher in what Innocent III. one of his Successors no less zealous than he was for the Grandeur and Rights of the Holy See wrote to Philip August This Prince who had a great desire to have the Marriage which he had contracted with the Queen Ingerbuge dissolved instantly pressed the Pope to declare it null that so he might be free to marry another That wise Pope writing back to
the King protests before God Innoc. III. in l. 3. Regest 15. Ep. 104. ad Philip. Reg. Franc. Non auderemus in hujusmodi casu de nostro sensu pro te aliquid definire that if he could in Conscience grant what he demanded he would do it with all his Heart but that tho he would stand by that which the Queen had answered Cardinal Robert Cortzeon in favour of the dissolution of that Marriage who had interrogated her judicially yet he could not of himself determine any thing about so important an Affair as that and that Si super hoc absque deliberatione Concilii determinare aliquod tentaremus praeter divinam offensam mundanam insamiam quam ex eo possumus incurrere forsan ordinis officii nostri periculum immineret If he offered to do it without a Council besides offending of God and the Disgrace that he should draw upon himself in the World he might perhaps be in danger of being deposed and of losing his Pontifical Dignity There was a Pope and one of the most learned that ever sat in St. Peter's Chair who twice and in few Words confesses with much Sincerity that the Council is above him once by saying that he could determine nothing in that Affair proposed to him without the Definition of a Council and then if he offered to do so that he should run a hazard of being deposed from the Popedom By whom Without doubt by a Power that was superiour to his which as it is evident could be none other upon Earth but that of a Council Pope Agapetus long before said the same upon an occasion where the Question however was not about a matter of so great Importance as this and of which it is fit I should give my Reader an Account in few words In one of the Councils which Pope Symmachus held at Rome there was a prohibition made That no Pope for ever should alienate the Goods of the Church and especially of the Church of Rome which at that time were not Cities and Provinces as they were after the Donations of the Kings of France but some Lands and Farms which it held of the Bounty of Believers besides the Oblations which in those days made up the greatest part of it I give you here the most considerable terms of the Decree which prohibits that Alienation Ann. 500. We ordain in the Presence of God Mansuro cum Dei consideratione decreto sancimus ut nulli Apostolicae sedis praesuli à praesenti die donec disponente domino Catholicae Fidei manserit doctrina salutaris liceat praedium rusticum quantaecunque fuerit magnitudinis vel exiguitatis sub perpetuâ alienatione vel commutatione ad cujustibet jura transferre nec cujusquam excusentur necessitatis obtentu by this Decree that from this present day so long as the Doctrine of the Faith continues in the World by the Disposition of divine Providence that it be never lawful for any Pope to alienate any farm great or small nor to transfer the same by way of Exchange to any whosoever under pretext and excuse of any necessity that may happen Now seeing about thirty six years after there was a Permission desired of Pope St. Agapetus to alienate some of these Lands Concil Rom. sub Symmach de bon Eccles non alien c. 4. under a very specious pretext of relieving the poor he made Answer that the venerable Constitutions of his Predecessors that had prohibited such kinds of Alienations tied him from granting it that he thought they would not take it ill that he did nothing contrary to those Decrees whatever the occasion might be for any Respect in the World Nor would I have you think adds he in his Epistles to Caesarius Bishop of Arles Nec tenacitatis studio aut saecularis utilitatis causâ hoc facere vòs credatis sed divini consideratione Judicii necesse nobis est quicquid sancta synodalis decrevit authoritas inviolabiliter custodire that I do so out of Covetousness or any temporal Interest But considering the strict Account that I must give at the last Judgment I think my self obliged to observe inviolably what the holy Council hath enjoyned us Yet all this while this was but a National Council of Italy which had made that Decree to which Pope Agapetus says that he was obliged to submit upon stronger Reason without doubt would he have said the same if it had been a Decree of an Oecumenical Council There are a great many Popes who have expressed themselves as plainly as these that they were subject to a Council I 'll mention no more but one who delivers his Mind upon that Subject in such a manner as no man is able to reply to And that is the famous Gerbert Silvester II. who filled three Sees successively of Reims Ravenna and lastly of Rome and was a most Learned Pope whom I have characterized in some of my Histories For that purpose he makes use of this passage in the Gospel where our Saviour says to his Disciples That if your Brother offend you reprove him privately and then in presence of two or three Witnesses and if he amend not tell the Church of him and if he obey not the Church let him be as a Publican and as a Heathen Defensor p. c. c. 29. The famous and learned Tostatus Bishop of Avila employs that Passage to prove that the supreme and highest Tribunal of the Church is that of a Council to which Jesus Christ referred all his Disciples and by conquent St. Peter who is therefore subject to it as to his lawful Judge from whom he is to expect the Justice that he may demand against his Brother Pope Silvester makes use of it in another manner but for the same end for he pretends what is true that these Words spoken to St. Peter by our Saviour in relation to his Brethren were also spoken to the same Brethren in regard St. Peter as well as of the rest Whereupon that Pope writing to Seguinus Archbishop of Sens Constanter dico quod si ipse Romanus Episcopus in fratrem peccaverit saepiusque admonitus Ecclesiam non audierit hic inquam Romanus Episcopus praecepto Dei est habendus sicut Ethnicus Publicanus Sylvest 2. Epist ad Seguin Senon hath made no difficulty to express himself in these very pithy and significant Words I say it boldly that if even the Bishop of Rome offend against you and that being often admonished he obey not the Church that Bishop of Rome I say ought to be look'd upon by the Command of God himself as a Publican and as a Heathen Could that Pope have expressed himself more clearly That he thought the Popes for all they are Heads of the Church are still subject to a Council that represents it CHAP. XX. That the ancient Popes have believed That they were subject to the Canons IT is another invincible Argument that Antiquity hath always
been in that Belief that the ancient Popes have always protested in their true Epistles for I speak not of those which are supposititious that they were obliged in the Exercise of their Power and in the Government of the Church to square their Conduct according to the Canons and holy Decrees of Councils against which they could undertake nothing Is there any thing plainer as to that point than what is to be seen in the Epistle of Pope Gelasus to the Bishops of Dordany Vniuscujusque Synodi constitutum quod universalis Ecclesiae probavit assensus non aliquam magis exequi sedem prae caeteris oportere quam primam That no man ought more exactly to execute what is ordained by the Universal Council than the Bishop of the chief See In that of Celestin I. to the Bishops of Illyrium The Regulation of Councils must be our Rules and have dominion over us Dominentur nobis regulae non regulis dominemur â—imus subjecti canonibus dum canonum praecepta servam 〈◊〉 and not that we should raise our selves above these holy Rules that we may dispose of them at our Pleasure let us submit our selves to the Canons by observing what they enjoyn In what St. Leo wrote to Anatolius Nimis haec improba nimis sunt prava quae sacratissimis canonibus inveniantur esse contraria Whatsoever is contrary to the most holy Canons is too wicked and d praved to be tolerated In the Letter of Simplicius to the Patriarch Acacius Per universum mundum indissolubili observatione retiâ—etur quod à sacerdotum universitate est constitutum What is established by an Vniversal Council is retained throughout the whole World by an inviolable Observation In that of Pope St. Martin to Jâ—hn Bishop of Philadelphia Defensores divinorum canonum custodes sumus non Fravaricatores quandoquidem Praevaricatoribus conjunctae sunt retributiones We are the Defenders and Guardians of the holy Canons and not the Prevaricators of them for we know that great Correction is reserved for those that betray thâ—m St. Gregory the Great speaks with as much force as these in an hundred places of his Epistles as when he says in the thirty seventh of his first Book Absit hoc à me â—t statuta majorum in qualibet Ecclesiâ infringam Far be it from me that I should infringe the Statutes of our Predecessors in any Church whatsoever And writing to John Patriarch of Constantinople Dum concilia universali sunt consensu constituta se non illa destruit quis â—uts praesumit aut solvere quos ligant aut lâ—gare quos solvunt He that presumes to loose those whom General Councils have bound or to bind those whom they have loosed destroys himself and not the Councils He was so well persuaded of his Duty that obliged him to observe the Canons that he even thought that that Obligation extended to matters which he found to be established by an ancient Custom and Tradition in his Church For the Empress Constantina having entreated him to send her either the Head or some other considerable part of the Body of St. Paul to be put in a Church which she had built to the Memory of that great Apostle that holy Pope wrote back to her Illa praecipitis quae facere nec possum nec audeo c. In Romanis vel totius occidentis partibus intolerabile est atque sacrilegium si sanclorum corpora tangere quisquam â—ortasse volucrit quod si praesumpserit câ—â—ium est quia haec temeritas impunita nullo modo remanebit lib. 3. Indic 12. Ep. 30. ad Constant Augusâ—am That he could have passionately desired that her Serenity had commanded him in any thing wherein he could have served and obeyed her but as to what she ordered him to do he neither could nor durst do it because said he it is at Rome nay in all the West looked upon as unsupportable and a great Sacriledge to touch the Bodies of the Saints and if any one have the boldness to attempt it his rashness will never pass unpunished Perhaps if at Rome they had made any Reflexion on this Epistle when it was resolved there to have an Arm of the Body of St. Francis Xavier the Apostle of the Indies which was then to be seen at Goa in his stately Monument above threescore years after his Death as fresh and ruddy as when he was alive they would not have given Orders to have it cut off and that if he who obeyed that Command had read that Letter he would have answered with as much respect as St. Gregory did Nec possum nec audio For besides that that Arm which is now to be seen at Rome is all withered and that since that time the holy Body is not so fresh as it was before they who were employed in that Office and had the boldness to lay hands upon that sacred Body died within the Year And I have learned of a very honest Gentleman of Quality who lately returned from the Indies that those of Goa attribute to that Action all the Evils they have been afflicted with since that time and all the Losses which the Portuguese have sustained in the East-Indies Thus the holiest Popes when they were desired any thing to the prejudice of the Canons or even of the ancient Customs which pass for so many Laws have not scrupuled to confess that their power extended not so far For besides the Instances that I have just now alledged Ne in aliquo patrum terminos praeterire videamâ—r contra majorum statuta agâ—re neqâ—iviâ—us Joan. VIII Epist ad Carol. Reg. John VIII speaks in the same manner to one of the Kings of France We could not act against the Decrees of our Predecessors lest it should seem that we transgress the Bounds set to us by our Fathers Contra Deum sacrâ—rum câ—nonum sanctiâ—es nulli omniâ—o petitioni possumus praeberâ— consâ—â—sum And Eugenius III. to the Bishops of Germany We can grant no Demand against God and against the Decrees of the sacred Canons The meaning of that is that as the Pope can grant nothing against the Service of God because he is inferiour to God so neither can he grant any thing against the Canons of Oecumenical Councils because he is under them In fine that we may not alledge an infinite number of other Testimonies which may be seen in the true Epistles of the Popes since Syricius I shall conclude with that of Silvester II. to the Archbishop of Sens Sit lex communis Eâ—â—â—â—sie Catholinae Evanâ—â—lium Aposâ—oli Prophetâ— Canones spirâ—tu Dâ—i condati 〈◊〉 totius mundi reverentia consâ—â—erati decretâ— seâ—as Apostolicae oh his non disâ—oâ—dantia Epist ad Seguin Arch. Senon wherein he says This is the Law according to which the Catholick Church is to be governed The Gospel the Writings of the Apostles and Prophets the Canons which
the Spirit of God hath made and which are consecrated by the Veneration of all the World and the Decrees of the Apostolick See which are not contrary to these Canons Ex Art Concilii Florent è Sesi 25. Antiq. Eâ—ition cum aâ—â—rob Clement VII And that is the very same that was defined in the Council of Florence after long debate betwixt the Latins and Greeks concerning the primacy and power of the Pope in the Universal Church It was agreed upon on both sides That the Pope as Successor of St. Peter was Head of the Church the Father and Teacher of all Believers who had received from Jesus Christ in the person of St. Peter full power to govern the Church The difficulty only rested in expressing the manner how he might and ought to govern it The Latins would have the Definition run thus That he had above all others the priviledge and full power of governing the whole Church according to the Sayings and Sentences of the holy Fathers Juxta determinationem sacrae Scripturae dicta sanctorum The Emperour John Paleologue and Greek Prelates An siquis inquit sanctorum in Epistola honoret Papam accipiet hoc pro Privilegio vigorously oppos'd that Clause dicta sanctorum How said he if any of the Holy Fathers writing to the Pope says to him what he thinks fit for rendering him greater Respect and more Honour shall the Pope take these Expressions of Complement and Civility for Priviledges that belong to him Besides in the draught of the Bull of Union of the two Churches the Pope having only put his own name Eugenius Bishop Servant of the Servants of God as if he alone had made these Decrees the Emperour and the Greeks would by all means have that amended and that there should no mention be made of the Pope in it unless the other Patriarchs were also named At length after that these two considerable Clauses had been well examinâ—d the Union was made in the manner that the Greeks desired it to which the Latins agreed Then the Bull was framed which began thus Eugenius Servant of the Servants of God c. Our death beloved Son John Paleologue illustrious Emperour of the Romans those who hold the place of our venerablâ— Brethren the Patriarchs and all the rest who represent the Eastern Church consenting to all the Decrees which anâ— in this Bull c. And then amongst other Articles it was defined 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 mâ—dâ—m qui in â—â—â—tiâ— conciâ—iâ—â—â— in canonibus conâ—â—â— That Jesus Christ hath given to the â—ope in the person of St. Peter full power to govern the Universal Church in the manner as is contained both in the Acts of Oecumenical Councils and in the sacred Canons and not according to the false Translation Quemadmodum etiam in gestis Conciliorum c. as if it were said that the Canons of Councils attribute also to the Pope the power of governing the Universal Church It is a quite contrary Sense to the Words of the Council which says only that the Pope hath received from Jesus Christ the power of governing the Church in the manner as is prescribed to him by the Canons Juxta eum modum qui in gestis Conciliorum in Canonibus continetur Which comprehends all because it is supposed as it is very true that the Canons of Oecumenical Councils are conform to holy Scripture Tradition and the true Sayings of the holy Fathers from whom we derive our Tradition From those two Clauses of the Bull wherein both the Eastern and Western Churches after they had well examined them agreed two things may be unquestionably concluded the one that the Pope can determine nothing in his Constitutions of infallible Authority without the Consent of the Church and the other that the Exercise of his power which is not infinite and unlimited ought to be moderated according to the Rules prescribed to him by the Canons of the Councils to which all Believers are subject What the Popes have over others is the Care they ought to take to see them observed not only by their Authority but by their Example which is of greater force and efficacy than their Ordinances and if they themselves violate them acting arbitrarily as they please without regard to the Canons which ought to be their measures or suffer them to be violated by others without punishment they become culpable before God who hath made them not the Masters but the Stewards of the Church to act according to her Orders and cause them to be obeyed This the great St. Leo expressed admirably well in those rare words which he wrote to the Emperour Martian With the Assistance of Jesus Christ I must constantly continue my Service In quo opere auxiliante Christo fideliter exequendo necesse est me perseverantem exhibere famulatum quoniam dispensatio mihi credita est ad meum reatum tendit si paternarum regulae sanctionum quae in Synodo Nicenâ ad totius Ecclesiae regimen spiritu Dei instruente sunt conditae me quod absit connivente violentur Ep. 54. ad Martian Dum tamen evidens utilitas vel necessuas id expoâ—cunt Greg. IX In talibus eadem utilitas urgens necessitas secundum instituta canonum debet attendi Innoc. III. Ep. ad Episc Favent in faithfully executing what I am commanded because he has trusted me with the Care and Dispensation of his House and I make my self guilty of great Vnfaithfulness if by my Connivance which God preserve me from I suffer the Rules and Canons to be violated which have been made by the Inspiration of the Holy Ghost in the Council of Nice for the Government of the whole Church Not but that the Pope who ought to take the care of the general Good of the Church may on certain Occasions dispense with the Canons but in that thing it self he is subject to the Canons seeing he cannot dispense with them as he pleases and without any other reason save that of his Will but only in Cases prescribed by the Canons when urgent necessity Vbi necessitas non est inconvertibilia maneant sanctorum patrum institâ—ta Gelas Vbi necessitas non est nullo modo violentur sanctorum patrum constituta St. Leo. or manifest advantage makes it appear according to the Canons that the Church intended not to oblige to them Except in such cases the ancient Popes say openly that the Canons and holy Decrees must be inviolably kept and that they cannot dispense with them Whereupon St. Bernard writing to a Pope Quid Prohibes dispensare non sed dissipare c. ubi necessilas urget excu abilis diâ—pensatio est ubi utilitas provâ—cat dispensatio laudabilâ—s est utilitas dico con munu non propria nam cum borum nih lâ— est non plane fideâ—is dâ—â—sheâ—satio est sed câ—â—eussima dissipation Bern. de cons ad Eugen
l. 3. c. 6. told him with a great deal of holy liberty that he forbids not to dispense but to dissipate that he knows very well that the Popes are the Stewards of the house of God but for Edification and not for Destruction and that the Steward ought to be faithful when Necessity urges Dispensation is excusable and laudable when Advantage not of a private person but of the publick requires it and when neither appear in that which is defired then what is granted is no more a faithful Dispensation but a most cruel Dissipation And this as a learned Pope teacheth Hadrian V. de dispens Apostolic renders both him that obtains that Dispensation and him that grants it criminal in the sight of God unless he that granteth it hath been without his Fault imposed upon by a false Information as many times it happens The power then of dispensing exempts not Popes according to the Ancients from the Obedience which they owe to the Decrees of Councils and when they do otherwise and act in their Constitutions contrary to the Canons that is not a lawful practice but an abusing of their power and an abuse that draws many others after it Priâ—cipium maiorum inde fuisse quod nonnulli pontisices coacervaverant sibi magistros prurientes auribus ut eorum studio calliditate inveniretur ratio quâ liceret id quod liberet pontificem esse dominum beneficiorum onniâ—nâ— Ita quod voluntas pontificis qualiscunque ea faerit sit regâ—la quâ ejus operationes actiones dirigantur c. This that great Assembly of Cardinals and Prelates pick'd out of the best and ablest men of the Court of Rome which Paul III. called in the Year One thousand five hundred and thirty eight to search for means of remedying the Troubles of the Church represented to him with much Vigour and Respect when they told him that the source of so many Disorders was the Flattery of some new Doctors who strained their false Subtilties to make his Predecessors believe that they were the absolute Masters of all in the Church that they were above all Canons and that there was no other Law for them but their own Will and Pleasure So that when it happened that some Popes manifestly abusing their power transgressed the limits set them by the Canons Appeals were made to the next Oecumenical Council Ann. 1303. as was done upon account of the Bull of Boniface VIII who pretended to a Sovereign power over all the Crowns upon Earth as the University of Paris in the Year 1491 appealed to a Pope better informed and to the first general Council concerning certain exactions and gatherings of Tenths which were attempted against the Canons and Liberties of the Gallican Church and as hath been done oftner than once in Germany upon the like Occasions But seeing that Remedy is tedious and that it may be abused by Appeals very ill brought which seeing they could not be judged in an whole Age would render the pontifical Authority useless in the smallest matters which Pius II. and Julius II. have most justly condemned instead thereof we have in France an Appeal as of Abuse to theâ—â— arliament which representing the King sitting in his Chair of Justice to whom as protector of the Canons it belongs to hinder any thing from being acted contrary to them has Right to judge whether there be any matter in the Bulls Ordinances and Ecclesiastical Sentences which wound the Canons and our Liberties For in this chiefly consist the Liberties of the Kingdom and Gallican Church that no new thing can be commanded or enjoyned us contrary to the holy Decrees of the Councils received in France and against the ancient Law in the possession whereof we have always maintained our selves without submitting to any other Laws unless we our selves consent to them so that whatever derogates from these ancient Constitutions which are our inviolable Laws is by Decree rescinded And this seems to be grounded upon that excellent Sentiment of Innocent III. a great Pope great Canonist and great Lawyer who speaks like a Pope when he says Quae in derogationem sanctorum canonum attentantur tanto potius infringi volumus carere robore firmitatis quanto authoritas universalis Ecclesiae cui praesidemus ad id nos provocat inducit Innoc. III. l. 1. Ep. ad Episc Favent We will that all that is undertaken and attempted against the holy Canons be void and null and we will it so much the rather that the Authority of the holy Church wherein we preside moves and inclines us to it As if by that he would tell us that the Authority of the Church depends upon the Observation of her Canons and Laws and not on the Liberty that a Pope might take to violate them From all that I have said in this Chapter this truth of Fact results That all Antiquity hath believed that Popes being subject to the Decrees of Councils and obliged to act and govern according to the Laws that are prescribed to them by the Canons Councils by consequent are above the Popes CHAP. XXI What General Councils have decided as to that Point SEeing that Question was not moved in the Ancient Church when all were of the Opinion that I have now mentioned Councils that decide nothing but upon occasion of Differences and Disputes which arise amongst Christians about some certain point of Doctrine have given no definitive Sentence as to that particular till it was begun to be questioned and disputed about Concil Pisan t. 11. Edit Paris Act. conc ex codic Gemmetic t 6. Spirit Monach. Dionys 1.29 l. 1. sequen Niem l. 23. Platina Ciacconius And this I think happened upon occasion of the Council of Pisa which the Cardinals of both obediences that is of Gregory XII and Benet XIII with consent of almost all Kings and Sovereigns called for extinguishing that Schism which these two Competitors and pretended Popes entertained by their Collusion and Obstinacy contrary to the express Promise they had made of resigning up their Pretensions For seeing some who stood for Gregory Ann. 1409. protested against the Council which as they said had no Authority over the Popes such an unprecedented protestation in the Church being exploded the famous Doctor Peter Plaoust one of the Deputies from the University of Paris which at that time was in the Meridian of its Reputation made a long and learned Speech in full Council 29 May. wherein he proved by many Reasons that the Universal Church and by consequent a General Council which represents her is above the Pope adding that that was the Judgment of the University of Paris and of all the other Universities of France No sooner was he come down from the Pulpit but that the Bishop of Novare stept up and read aloud a Writing which declared that an hundred and three Doctors and Licentiates of Divinity deputed by the Universities to that Council being
assembled by order of the Cardinals to consult about that matter were all unanimously of the Judgment of the University of Paris and he affirmed that besides the Universities of France it was also the Judgment of the famous University of Bologna 1 June from which they had Letters and of that of Florence who had given it in writing under the Hands of sixscore Doctors Six days after the Process that was brought against Gregory and Benet having been proved and made out in a judicial manner the Council past a definitive Sentence whereby it declares Pietro de la Luna and Angelo Corario heretofore called Popes Benet XIII and Gregory XII obstinate Schismaticks and Hereticks convicted of enormous Crimes of Perjury Impiety and of Collusion to deceive Believers and to keep up the Schism which so long had rent the Church and as such deposes them from the Papacy This the Council did pursuant to the Decree whereby it had before determined that that Council represented the Church universal and that it was the only supreme Judge upon Earth to whom the Judgment of that Cause belonged though it was most certain that one of these two Pretenders was the true Pope After wards they chose Alexander V. who was acknowledged by the Universal Church except those two wretched Remains of Obedience who held out still for the two Antipopes and that Pope approved all the Decrees of the Council even a moment before his Death which was most holy and precious in the sight of God I have heretofore proved according to the Judgment of almost all the Churches of Christendom of that of Rome in particular nay and of the Universal Church represented by the Council of Constance which was but a continuation of this that it ought to be reckoned without contradiction lawful But since on the one hand it hath pleased some Doctors beyond the Alpes to doubt of it and that on the other I decline all dispute in this Treatise I will only stick to matter of Fact which cannot be contested to wit that this Council of Pisa hath been one of the greatest Assemblies that was ever seen in the Church For there were in it five and twenty Cardinals four Patriarchs six and twenty Archbishops an hundred fourscore and two Bishops either in person or by Proxy two hundred fourscore and ten Abbots amongst whom were all the Heads of the Orders the Generals of the Carthusians and of the four Mendicant Orders the great Masters of Rhodes of the Holy Sepulchre and the Teutonick Knights the Deputies of the Universities of Paris Tholouse Orleans Anger 's Montpellier Bologna Florence Cracovia Vienna Prague Cologne Oxford and Cambridge and of some others and those of the Chapters of above an hundred Metropolitan and Cathedral Churches above three hundred Doctors of Divinity and of the Law the Ambassadors of the Kings of France England Poland Bohemia Sicily and Cyprus of the Dukes of Burgundy and Lorrain Brabant Bavaria of the Marquess of Brandenburg Lantgrave of Thuringe and of almost all the other Princes of Germany besides that the Kings of Hungary Sweden Denmark Norway and in a word those of Spain except Arragon shortly after adhered to that Council and by consequent all these Prelates all these Doctors all these Orders all these Universities all these Kingdoms all these States that 's to say in a word almost all Christians in the beginning of the fifteenth Century when that Dispute was started concerning the Superiority of the Council or of the Pope believed conform to the Belief of Antiquity That a Council is above the Pope But you are to take notice of somewhat more particular and convincing still When five years after the Council of Constance was opened for continuing that of Pisa as it had been decreed in that Council which was rather interrupted than concluded the Dispute concerning the Superiority of the Pope or of the Council was started again with greater Heat than before For some Cardinals being arrived from Scaffhausen whither the Pope who had escaped from Constance had retired attempted in full Assembly where Sigismund the Emperour was present to prove that the Council was dissolved because John XXIII who had abandoned it being owned for true Pope by all that were present was above the Council which could have no Authority without him Then was there a general murmuring in the Assembly and many of those who had greatest Authority and Reputation by reason of their Dignity and Knowledge Et iis responsum fuit alacriter per plures de ipso concilio viros magnae authoritatis scientificos scilicet quod Papa non esset supra Concilium sed sub concilio facta est illie contentio magna hinc inde Niem in vit Joann J. Gers Serm. coram Concil undertook to refute them and to prove on the contrary That the Council was superiour to the Pope conform to the Sermon that the famous John Gerson had made to the Council a few days before wherein he had made it out in twelve propositions That a general Council representing the Universal Church is above the Pope not only in the doubt whether or not he be true Pope but also in the Assurance that is to be had whether he be lawfully chosen or not Etiam ritè electi as they did undoubtedly hold John XXIII to have been Wherefore that Question both before and after the Sermon of Gerson having been examined in the Conferences of Nations according to the Order appointed by the Council a Report of it was made in the fourth Session Act. Concil Constan t. 12. con Ed. Paris Anton. tit 22. c. 6. §. 2. where nine Cardinals and two hundred Bishops were present with the Emperour Sigismund the Ambassadors of the Kings of France England Poland Norway Cyprus Navarr and many Princes of Germany and there seeing it had been already declared in the preceding Session that the Council subsisted and still retained all its Force and Authority tho the Pope had withdrawn himself it was by common Consent thus concluded and defined That the Holy Council lawfully assembled and representing the Church Militant hath received immediately from Jesus Christ a Power which all and every one even the Pope himself are obliged to obey in all that concerns the Faith the extirpation of Schism and the general Reformation of the Church of God in its Head and Members And to the end that it might not be said what some have said since without having carefully read the Council of Constance that that is only to be understood during the time of a Schism it is added to the Decree in the following Session That whatever Pope refuses to obey the Decrees not only of this Council but also of any other that shall be lawfully called ought to be punished if he amend not The Council afterward exercises its sovereign Authority over Pope John XXIII acknowledged by them for true Pope by the Church of Rome and by all Christian
seeing the authentick Acts which we have of the Councils of Constance and Basil are in the hands of every Body and owned for true for above two hundred and threescore Years and no man ever dream'd to call them into question he hath bethought himself of disputing us that lawful and peaceable possession authorised by the long Prescription of almost three hundred Years And this he pretends to do by opposing to us certain old Manuscripts that he hath raised out of the Grave which contain the Register and Acts of the Council of Constance which had never been seen as they are there and which God by a singular Providence as he saith hath suffered to be found almost at the same time when the Gallican Church made her Declaration as if he would afford means of confounding it at the very Instant that it was published This without doubt is an Undertaking magnificently projected But what is it founded upon Upon the most ruinous Foundation in the World and which I might easily overturn and by consequent all the Superstructure by saying in one word which is most true that the pretended good Manuscripts that he produceth against us after a Possession of two hundred threescore and ten Years are not more to be received and are not near so good as those from which the Decrees that we have of the Council of Constance have been taken Should I answer him in this manner it would lie at his door to prove that his Manuscripts are better than ours which he will never be able to do as we shall presently see But to do him a favour I am content not to handle them according to Rigour only will clearly and calmly make it out to him with all the respect that is due to his Character that the Consequences which he draws from what he finds there are false and that after his way of arguing all Oecumenical Councils might be strip'd of the Authority which they ought to have and which they have had in the Church to this present CHAP. XXIII A Refutation of the first Chapter of the Dissertation of M. Schelstrate THIS Author undertakes to prove in this Chapter against the Gallican Church That the Decrees of the fourth and fifth Session of the Council of Constance are of dubious Authority first because the Decree of the fourth Session hath been corrupted by the Fathers of the Council of Bâ—sil who in the Extract that they caused to be made in the Year 1442. of the Decrees of the Council of Constance omitted in the first Decree the words ad fidem and added thereunto these words Et ad reformationem generalem Ecclesiae Dei in capite in membris That all men even the Pope are obliged to obey that Council in what concerns the Reformation of the Church in its Head and Members As to the Omission of the word ad fidem he is so favourable as to excuse it for it appears only to have been done by the fault of the Transcriber because that word is generally to be found every where and indeed ought to be there As to the words which he pretends have been added he confesses that they are in all the Editions of the Councils that have been hitherto made because as he says they have all followed the first that was made in the Year One thousand four hundred fourscore and nineteen at Haguenau from a Copy of that Extract of the Fathers of Basil but he pretends that it is not lawful and that those Fathers have added these Words upon no other proof but that they are not to be found in the ancient Manuscripts which he hath seen Well must it be allowed then upon a proof of this Nature and a bare negative Argument which does not conclude to accuse a whole Assembly of Prelates of an Imposture in which a Cardinal presided a man of a very austere Virtue whom Pope Clement VII hath canonized Let him be accused of Head-strongness and of abounding in his own Sense in what he thought to be just I consent to that there was his weak side but that he should be taken for an Impostor and a Falsary and be treated so upon so bare a conjecture is a thing that honest men can hardly suffer The Manuscripts which M. Schelstrate hath seen contain not these last Words of the Decree be it so we take it upon his Word reckon him an honest man and shall never accuse him of having imposed upon us but only of having reasoned ill in concluding from thence that the Fathers of Basil have falsified that Decree for who hath told him that the Manuscript from which the Fathers of Basil made their Extract contained not these words Why does he without being well assured of it accuse them of Imposture Don't we daily see that there is difference amongst several manuscript Copies of one and the same work that there is to be found in one what hath been omitted in another and that therefore ancient Editions are corrected Witness that true and famous History of St. Austin which the Fathers of Saint German des Prez cause to be made from a great many Manuscripts the differences whereof they mark and from some of which they take what they add to the ancient Editions which want certain words that are not to be found in the Copies from which they have been printed Ought he not to presume that that Copy of Basil hath been taken from a Manuscript that had these last Words which he hath not found in his own that ought to be reckoned defective And to prove to him that they are so I declare that those which I have seen and which are very ancient have the same Words at the end of the Decree of the fourth Session And at the very Instant that I am writing this in my Apartment in the Monastery of St. Victor at Paris where the Canons regular of that Royal Abbey have done me the favour to let me chuse an honourable Retirement suitable to my Profession and way of Living I have before me that famous Manuscript of their celebrated Library from which Monsieur de Sponde hath taken all that is most rare in his History of the Council of Constance which is certainly the finest part of his work Now in this Manuscript which is the most ancieat that can be seen I read that Decree word for word as it stands in the printed Acts and in the last Editions the most exact and most correct of all But there 's one thing still more observable We have in these Manuscripts of St. Victor the Extract of the Sessions which they who were at the Council for the French Nation sent to Paris as fast as they got them and that Decree of the fourth Session is to be found therein in express terms as we have it Will M. Schelstrate say that the Council of Basil which was not held till many Years after the Council of Constance hath falsified these Extracts What can he answer to
that And that he may not think to object to us the multitude of his Manuscripts for he quotes nine of them I can tell him that there are ten in Paris all conform to that of St. Victor which alone is worth all his And certainly I can very well exceed that number seeing I my self not to speak of ot her Manuscripts which they who are more curious than I am without doubt have in their Libraries have discovered ten of them Besides we may produce against him the unquestionable Evidences of Peter D' Ailly Cardinal of Cambray and of the famous John Gerson Chancellor of the University of Paris who was at the Council of Constance not only as the Deputy of that great Body but also as Ambassadour from the King for in fine that holy and learned man who cannot be suspected of Imposture and whose Manuscripts we have in many places relates that first Decree of the fourth Session word for word as it is in the Manuscript of St. Victor Tractat. de potestat Ecclesiast Tract an quomodo licèt appel Serm. pro viagio Reg. Rom. directione prima Serm. coram Concil dom secunda post Epiph. and the printed Acts and what can never be answered he related it even in presence of the whole Council in the Sermon which he made for the Journey of the King of the Romans and having recited the Decree entirely with that Clause Ad generalem reformationem Ecclesiae Dei in Capite in Membris immediately after he said to all the Fathers of the Council declaring his Judgment these very significant and expressive words Conscribenda prorsus esse mihi videretur in eminentioribus locis vel in culpenda per omnes Ecclesias saluberrima haec definitio lex vel regula tanquam directio fundamentalis c. vilut infallibilis adversus monstruosum horrendumque offendiculum quod hactenus positum erat per multos de Ecclesia in itinere mandatorum Dei determinantes ex textibus Glossae non ad regulam evangelicam aternam acceptis Papam non esse subjectum Generali Concilio neque Judicari posse per ipsum quod praeterea Generale Concilium ab ipso robur immediatè sumebat nec poterat sine eo casu quocunque convocari vel stabiliri quod nemo poterat ei dicere Cur ita facis Quoniam solutus erat legibus supra jus Et ita de plurimis per quae blonda fallax subdola adulatio fovebat libidinem dominandi in tyrannidem Ecclesiae destructricem Papatum seu ejus usum convertebat ita ut non pateret via reductionis seu pacis I am of Opinion that in all Churches and in the most eminent Places of the World this holy and most useful Definition this Law or Rule of the Council ought to be written or even engraved in great Letters as being the fundamental and infallible Direction which we ought to follow against the horrible and monstrous Scandal which is a stumbling Block that many amongst us have cast in the way of the Commands of God determining and endeavouring to prove by Texts of the Gloss ill understood contrary to the Evangelical and Eternal Rule that the Pope is not subject to a General Council and that he cannot be judged by it besides that a General Council receives from him immediately all its force and that in no case it can be called and held without him that no man may say to him Why do you do that because he is not bound to obey the Laws and that he is above all Canons and many other such Maxims whereby a soft fallacious and malicious flattery fomented the unbridled desire of predominating and changed the Pontifical Power or the exercise of it into a Tyranny which wholly ruined the Church so that there would no way remain of reducing matters into good Order and of setling Peace Now I would beseech M. Schelstrate to tell me ingenuously if he dares think that the Chancellor of Paris had the Impudence to recite in a Sermon and before all the Fathers of the Council the Decree of the fourth Session otherwise than they themselves had made it and add impudently these words Ad reformationem Ecclesiae in Capite in membris which the Council had not put into it and afterwards to speak to them in the manner I have now mentioned I take him to be a man of too much Honour and too prudent ever to let that Thought enter into his Head and I make no doubt but that he will give Glory to God by confessing That since Gerson recited that Decree before the whole Council as we have it in the printed Acts it is altogether evident that the Council made it so and that it is not in the least falsified that otherwise the Council would have given him the Lie as an impudent Impostor But what now if I shew that that so famous Doctor hath done the same oftner than once as may be seen particularly in the Sermon which he made before all the Fathers of the Council the second Sunday after the Epiphany upon that Text of the Gospel There was a Marriage in Cana of Galilee There he treats very amply of the Marriage of Jesus Christ with his Church represented by the Council of Constance and having said that the second Advantage of that Spouse is the fullness of Power that the Council which represents her hath even over the Pope and that that was solidly proved in a Book lately before published he speaks in this manner Quamvis ultra multiplicare sermonem quid opus est super eâ veritate cujus decisio clarissima solidissimaque facta est per hoc sacrum Concilium cui non licet obniti nec ipsam in argumenta deducere quoniam disputationum argumentationum evasionum frivolarum nullus unquam esset finis sed casus assiduus in errores absurdos insanos impios Vere graviter Ecclesiastes Quia cito non profertur contra malos sententia filii hominum absque ullo timore perpetrant mala Nunquid non ideo sacra hujus synodi Constantiensis impugnantur Judicia qua sic habent But what necessity is there to enlarge Discourse or reason any more upon that Truth which hath been most clearly and solidly decided by this sacred Council to which it is not lawful to gainsay nor to bring that Question any ways under Examination again to clear it by Arguments for there would be no end of disputing Evasions and frivolous Distinctions would always be found out to betray men into absurd mad and impious Errors The Preacher hath truly and gravely said that because Sentence against an evil Work is not executed speedily therefore the Heart of the Sons of Men is fully set in them to do Evil Is it not therefore that there are some who dare boldly impugn the Determinations and Decrees of this Council of Constance of which the Tenor follows Primo declarat
c. Here he relates at length the Decree of the fourth Session with that Clause Et ad reformationem Ecclesiae in capite in membris and having done so This says he to the Fathers of the Council is the Decree that you have made Dare M. Schelstrate after this still say that those of Basil have falsified that Decree by adding thereunto those Words And since for convincing him he hath obliged me to alledge so authentick a Piece in that part of this excellent Sermon which John Gerson made to the Council of Constance I should be glad he might know what after the Rehearsal of the Decree as we have it that learned Doctor adds speaking still to the Council These are his own Words which are very considerable Huic veritati fundatae supra petram sacrâ—e Scripturae quisquis à proposito detrahit cadit in haeresim jam damnatam quam nullus unquam Theologus maxime Parisiensis Sanctus asseruit Whoever opposes and contradicts that Truth founded upon the Rock of Holy Scripture falls into the Heresie that now hath been condemned which no Divine especially of the Faculty of Paris nor no Saint ever maintained In this manner Gerson speaks of the Opinion of those who will not have a Council to be above the Pope We give it a softer term and reject it not as heretical but as contrary to the Doctrine of Antiquity and consequently false Then he goes on with greater force still and expresses himself in these Words I lately saw St. Thomas and St. Bonaventure I have not here the Books of other Doctors They allow the Pope the supreme and full Ecclesiastical Power Vidi nuper Sanctum Thomam Bonaventuram hic reliquorum libros non habeo dant supremam plenam summo pontifici potestatem Ecclesiasticam rectè proculdubio sed boc faciunt in comparatione ad fideles singulos particulares Ecclesias Dum etiam comparatio facienda fuisset ad anctoritatem Ecclesiae Synodaliter congregatae subjecissent Paepam usum potestatis suae eidem Ecclesiae tanquam matri suae cujus legem dimitti non debere iradit sapiens tanquam praeterea regulae vel legi directivae infallibiliter cui se submittere tenetur omnis frater peccabilis de Ecclesia cujus anctoritatem si non audierit frater quilibet etiam Papa qui nobiscum dicit Pater Noster audi itur quid dixerit omni Catholico Christus sit tibi inquit sicut Ethnicus Publicanus id est excommunicatus and without doubt they are in the right because saying so they compare the Pope with all Believers and all Churches taken particularly But if they had been to compare him with the Authority of the Church assembled in a Council they would have subjected him and the exercise of his Power to the same Church as to his Mother whose Laws the Wise Man says one should never forsake and as to the Rule which directs us infallibly and to which all men in the Church liable to failing are obliged to submit And if any one whoever he be of our Brethren though he were Pope who says his Pater Noster as we do will not acknowledge her Authority and obey her let us hearken to that which Jesus Christ enjoyns to every Catholick Let him be to you saith he as an Heathen and as a Publican that is to say as an excommunicate Person And this is just the same which the Pope Silvester II. said in express terms many Ages before Gerson And to prevent M. Schelstrate from offering to say that the Text of this Doctor hath been falsified by adding thereunto these words Et ad reformationem Ecclesiae in caepite in membris I declare unto him that the Treatise de potestate Ecclesiastica where that great man quotes that Decree hath been collationed with four Manuscripts two of the History of St. Victor marked N N. S. and M M. 11. with one of the Colledge of Naevarr and of the Bibliotheke of Monsieur Colbert marked 99. That the Treatise An quomodâ— appellare liceat à summo pontifice where the same Decree is to be found is altogether conform to two Manuscripts one of St. Victor marked N N. 9. and the other of the Bibliotheke of Navarr That the Sermon pro viagio Regis Romanorum hath in like manner most exactly been compared with a Manuscript of St. Victor marked according to the ancient Catalogues N N. 11. with one of the Bibliotheke of Navarr and with one of the Library of Monsieur Colbert marked 99. In a word that what is to be read in the Sermon Nuptiae factae sunt c. wherein Gerson repeated before the Council the Decree of the fourth Session is to be found in a very ancient Manuscript of St. Victor marked N N. 19. word for word as we have caused it to be printed All these Manuscripts have been communicated to me by Monsieur d' Herouval Regular Canon of St. Victor and Doctor of the Surhonne whose merit already well known to the Learned will shortly be to the Publick in the new Edition that he is preparing of the Works of Gerson which by his Care and Pains will be found restored to their Perfection that they have never hitherto had This I think is enough to oblige M. Schelstrate to yield Would he have any thing more precise He shall be satisfied The Council of Basil ten Years before the Extract made which he pretends they falsified proposed that Decree such as we have it and renewed the same in the second Session Cardinal Julian who was nominated by Martin V. to preside in that Council and who after the Death of that Pope presided therein in Name of Eugenius IV. consented to that Decree in behalf of the Pope in that second Session and defended it in the Letter which he wrote to Eugenius to remonstrate to him the Reasons which obliged his Holiness not to offer to dissolve that Council Had not this Decree been that of Constance most faithfully proposed would he have consented to it Would not he have objected against that notorious Falsification Et tibi prout opus â—â—deris esse juxta tibi injuncta ordinata in Concilio Constantiensi optimè provideas Julian Ep. 2. ad Eugen Would not he have protested that what was added to the end of the Decree was no part of it he who was very well acquainted with his Council of Constance and daily studied it having express Orders from Eugenius to act in the Council of Basil as he should find it expedient according as he was enjoyned and directed by the Decrees of the Council of Constance Would he have more still Here is enough to satisfie him Eugenius IV. in the Bull which he published during the sixteenth Session declares That according to the Decrees of Constance he had called the Council of Basil for the Extirpation of Heresies the Peace of Christian People and the general Reformation of the Church
in Capite in Membris and seeing the Council was lawfully assembled Qui nimo praefatam dissolutionem irritam inanem declarantes ipsum sacrum Concitium purè simpliciter cum effectu ac omni devotione favore prosequimur prosequi intendimus it hath still continued and so ought to be continued for procuring those three ends as if it had never been dissolved Then he rescinds all that he had done for the dissolution of it protesting that he approves it and will have it to continue purely simply and with all Devotion and Favour Thus the Pope speaks who when he was Cardinal was present at the Council of Constance whose Decrees he could not be ignorant of and by consequent if the Decree of the second Council of Basil related in the same Council as being that of Constance had not been the same in proper terms it is not to be doubted but that Eugenius would have affirmed it to be false and have rejected it In fine in the very same Manuscript which M. Schelstrate produces there is to be found in the Preface of the Decree as in our Acts that This Holy Council of Constance lawfully assembled for the Extirpation of the present Schism for the Vnion and for the Reformation that ought to be made of the Church in its Head and Members to the end that that Union and Reformation of the Church may the more easily more surely more amply and more freely be obtained ordains declares and defines as follows to wit That all men of whatsoever Dignity they be even Papal are obliged to obey the Council in all things belonging to the Faith and the Extirpation of this Schism And who does not see that for compleating the Sense according to the Intention and express words of the Council one must not stop there but that it must necessarily follow and to the Reformation of the Church in the Head and Members thereof So it is in our Copies which are true and is wanting in his which unjustifiable Omission makes them clearly appear to be defective But says M. Schelstrate one of my Manuscripts affirms that the day before and the very same day of the fourth Session there were great Debates concerning the matters to be put into the Decree and that at length by a sudden Inspiration of the Holy Ghost all agreed that nothing should be put into it but the Points that are to be seen in that Copy and the other Manuscript informs me that the Emperour made them all agree by finding a moderation to which he brought the Cardinals to consent Now that is exactly what we would be at I 'll tell ye how There were four Points to be examined relating to that Decree first Whether the Council hath received immediately from Jesus Christ a full Power to which the Pope himself is obliged to submit in what concerns the Faith and the Extirpation of Schism secondly and if it ought to be put into it in what concerns the Reformation of the Church in the Head and Members thirdly whether in case the Pope would not obey it he might be punished and fourthly if all that ought to be understood of any other Council as well as of that of Constance As to the first since all the Nations agreed upon it it easily past but as to the three others some and especially the Cardinals who at least would therein gratifie the Pope opposed them Now the mean and moderation which the Emperour Sigismund found out to unite all dissenting minds was that in the Decree of the present fourth Session the two first Points only should be inserted and that for the other two they might afterwards consider what was to be done about them in the following Senssion That appears manifestly by our Acts by our Manuscripts and even by that of M. Schelstrate wherein as I have just now proved there is a necessity considering that Proceeding for making a rational and compleat Sense that these Words which have been omitted in it be added And as to what concerns the Reformation of the Church in the Head and Members This is more clearly still to be seen in the fifth Session which was held eight days after and wherein for putting an end wholly to that Affair and for proposing without Interruption and at one glance what men ought to believe concerning that Point they put in the first place the Decree of the fourth Session word for word as we have it and then made a Decree by which the two other Points were defined and declared to wit that the Pope himself is obliged to obey not only that Council of Constance that was held during the Schism but also all others and that if he refuse to submit to them he may be punished And this is to be seen not only in our Acts and Copies but likewise in the Manuscript of M. Schelstrate as he himself confesses and therefore he must acknowledge that even though these Words for the reformation of the Church in the Head and Members had not been put into the Decree of the fourth Session as he pretends yet that would not at all reach the bottom of the Affair because they are actually in the Decree of the fifth Session For to render a Decree authentick what matters it in what Session it hath been made After all it must necessarily be concluded from what I have now said as to these uncontroverted matters of Fact that we ought not to correct the Council of Constance according to the Manuscripts of M. Schelstrate But on the contrary it is his part to correct them according to ours and according to the Council as we have it And so the first Argument that he alledges why we should doubt of the Authority of these Decrees is null The other two are of the same force and in a few words may without any difficulty be overthrown Seeing he cannot deny but that these two Decrees are in the fifth Session he saith what he hath learned from those Vltramontanian Authors who have written for the Superiority of the Pope against that Council to wit that they were made in a hurry without sufficient Deliberation and against the Judgment of many who opposed them This is the very same thing that the Nestorians nay and some of our Protestants have said against the Council of Ephesus and against St. Cyril whom they accuse of having caused Nestorius to be condemned with extream Precipitation without hearing him and without possibility of having the cause sufficiently examined All Hereticks might say as much and do indeed say so of all Councils which have condemned their Heresie But not to rest on that I maintain to M. Schelstrate that there never was a Question better examined than that which was moved in this Council For since the Council of Pisa where it was first started had decided in favour of the Council it was almost the whole Subject of Disputes and Conferences and was tossed to and froâ—
in the Council of Constance even before and after the Sermon of John Gerson Besides after that Assembly wherein all that the Cardinals who were sent from the Pope objected had been convincingly refuted it was so well examined that all the four Nations acquiesced in the Point I know very well there were great Debates about it and that the Cardinals opposed it I even grant him what he hath found in his Manuscript and which he confesses had never been known before and which perhaps is not true that the Cardinals nay and the Ambassadours of France made a private Protestation in the Chamber of Presence that it was only for avoiding of Scandal that they assisted at the fifth Session and not for consenting to what they knew was to be defined in it What can he conclude from thence Hath not he read the History of the Conclaves where after a thousand Intrigues a thousand Oppositions and a thousand other things more than I can tell at length a lawful Election is made to which all the Cardinals who were so divided before consent Let him read the Histories of the Council of Trent written by Fra. Paolo and Cardinal Pallavicini there he will find a great many Debates about Points that were to be decided in the Sessions and nevertheless the Holy Ghost which unites all minds into one Judgment made all the Decrees of that Council to pass with the unanimous Consent of all the Fathers who had been so divided before It is just so with this Council of Constance I grant there may have been Oppositions Contests private Protestations and whatever M. Schelstrate pleases to inform us of from his Manuscripts yet when all is done these Cardinal and all they who debated and protested privately were present at the fifth Session and seeing the Holy Ghost unites all minds in a Council to the end they may say Visum est spiritui sancto nobis the two Decrees of that Session past by common Consent as the Acts say to which M. Schelstrate has nothing at all in his Manuscripts that can be objected Quibus articulis sive constitutionibus lectis concilium cos cas uniformiter approbavit conclusit This is the Language of the Acts These Articles and Decrees having been read the Council with a common Consent approved them In fine the third Argument he makes use of to weaken the Authority of the Decrees of these two Sessions is that the Council being then only made up of those of the Obedience of John XXIII could not represent the Universal Church Now to convince him of the Insignificancy of that Argument which without doubt is the weakest of all I need only tell him in two words that what he supposes after Bellarmine who hath supplied him with all his weak Objections is very false For almost all the Cardinals of the two Obediences of Gregory XII and Benet XIII were united in the Council of Pisa where these two pretended Popes who by Collusion played upon all Christendom were declared Schismaticks and Antipopes and Alexander V. chosen who was acknowledged for true Pope by most Churches without any Competition and especially by the Church of Rome Now the same Cardinals and Bishops who constituted that numerous Council continued it at Constance as Pope John XXIII owned by the same Council for true Pope declares in express terms in the Bull whereby he calls that Council according as it had been decreed at Pisa five Years before So that the Obedience of John XXIII besides the Concurrence of almost all the Kingdoms of Christendom nay and of the Church of Rome also was over and above composed of the greater and sounder part of the two other who were re-united at Pisa and continued that Council at Constance If M. Schelstrate pretend that the Absence of those who held for the one or other of those two who had been declared Schismaticks and Antipopes hinders the Council from being Oecumenical he must know that his unjust Pretence would ruine most of the Oecumenical Councils for the Hereticks that have been condemned in them might say that those of their Party who had right to be present in them either were not there or would not own them for lawful and Oecumenical Councils And Protestants might say the same especially of the Council of Trent where neither the Bishops of the Church of England nor of Denmark Norway Sweden and that part of Germany who followed the Confession of Ausbourg nor the Bishops of Greece of the East and of Egypt who own not the Pope for Head of the Church and who are no more of his Obedience than those at the time of the Council of Constance who held for Pietro de la Luna or Angelo Corario were present All these Bishops I say of so great a part of the Christian World were absent from the Council of Trent when it made its Decrees and would not own it Is there any thing more certain And nevertheless M. Schelstrate is obliged to confess with all other Catholicks that their Absence could not hinder that Council from being Oecumenical because for making it universal it is enough that all be invited to it as they were and that they might be present there if they pleased or if the Princes on whom they depend gave them leave So that the Absence of the Prelates who were the Dregs of those two Obediences hinders not but that the Decrees of Constance are the Definitions of an Universal Council and that they have an infallible Authority But there is still somewhat that presses more home for if it were not so and if it were to be approved which Bellarmine says before M. Schelstrate that these Decrees have no Authority by reason of that Absence and that there was no Pope in Council when they were made strange things would follow from thence In the first place the Condemnation of the Errors of Wicleff and John Huss would be null because they were condemned in the fifteenth Session Sess 15. before the Union of the remnant of those two Obediences and when as yet there was no Pope there in the Council Secondly that detestable Proposition of John Petit that any private man might meritoriously kill a Tyrant any way whatsoever would not be lawfully condemned of Heresie by the same reason And lastly that the Condemnation and afterwards the Deposition of John XXIII Sess â— which happened long before the Union of the two Obediences must have been made without any lawful Power Cardinal Julian who presided in the Council of Basil for Pope Eugenius wrote this to him to take him off of his design of dissolving it because of the Decrees of the second Session And would to God Cardinal Bellarmine and M. Schelstrate had read and considered that Letter before they made an Objection that draws after it so dangerous Consequences Nam â—quis dixerit decreta illius concilii non esse valida neâ—essâ— babet sateri privationem oliâ—â— Joannis
factam vigorâ— illorum decretorum non valuisse Si illa non valent nec etiaâ—â—apae Mâ—rtini tenuit electio facta illo superstite Si Martinus non fuit Papa nec sanctitas vestra est quae per Cardinales ab ipso factos electa est c. Ep. 2. Juliani ad Eugen. I am obliged said he to him most holy Father to remonstrate to your Holiness that if the Decrees of Constance which the Council of Basil has renewed have no Authority that whereby John XXIII was deposed is of no force If it be so the Election of Pope Martin V. which was made during the Life of John XXIII is null and consequently that of your Holiness seeing you must then have been elected by Cardinals of his Creation who was not Pope By the same reason it is evident that all the other Elections made since Martin V. until the present Pope must be unlawful M. Schelstrate without doubt will answer to that that John XXIII consented to his Condemnation and even ratified it when he was at liberty But he must needs have done so considering the condition he was in and it is enough to read the very Author who is cited that is Leonard Aretin to be informed that the poor deposed Pope went to Florence to cast himself at the feet of Martin V. only because he knew not whither to betake himself Consilio Martini cognito id erat ut Manâ—ouae perpetuo carcere tencretur antequam c. Leonard Aretin Hist ver Italic and that he was informed that it was resolved that if he did it not his Person should be seised and confined to perpetual Imprisonment And besides is it not well known that the Ratification cannot be good if the Act that is ratified be null Bellarmine's Answer has as little force Though saith he Etsi Concilium sine Papa non potest definire nova dogmata fidei potest tamen judicare tempore Schismatis quis sit verus Papa c. L. 2. de Conc. c. 19. the Council without the Pope cannot determine new Doctrines of Faith yet it may judge during a Schism who is the true Pope and provide a true Pastor for the Church when there is none certain In the first place he grants by that that all which the Council determined against Wicleff John Huss and Jerome of Prague and against that damnable Proposition of John Petit is null as having been decided by an incompetent Judge Who dare maintain such a thing Secondly it is absolutely false that a General Council without the Pope cannot make Decrees concerning the Faith Did not the first Council of Constantinople make such against Macedonius concerning the Divinity of the Holy Ghost And did not the fifth condemn the Heresie of the three Chapters not only without Pope Vigilius but likewise contrary to his Constitution who would have had them not to be condemned Besides it was not the Business of that Council to judge who was the true Pope for the Council of Constance never questioned but that John XXIII was it would only have had him perform the Promise which he made to renounce his Right and freely to lay down for Peace sake tho he was true Pope And in the fourth place if that Council was not then as he called it before but a particular Council where a third part of the Church only met it could not lawfully have condemned John XXIII because as all agree none but an Oecumenical Council representing an Universal Church hath that Power and supreme Authority nay and many deny that it can unless in case of Heresie proceed against any Pope much less if that Council held him for a true Pope as the Council of Constance owned John XXIII to have been From all this it follows that the three Reasons alledged by M. Schelstrate in as many Articles to prove against the Clergy of France that one may doubt of the Authority of the Decrees of the fourth and fifth Session of the Council of Constance are not only false but also of dangerous consequence to the Church Thus we have dispatched his first Chapter the other two will not long hold out CHAP. XXIV A Refutation of one of the two Chapters of M. Schelstrate THis Writer in one of these Chapters pretends to prove that those Decrees of the fourth and fifth Session are not approved I have already made it out that Martin V. approved them twice solemnly once by ordaining that those who return from Heresie should be interrogated whether or not they approved without Exception all which that Council approves and condemned all that it condemns and another time in the last Session where he declares that he approves and will inviolably observe all the Decrees that have been made in that Council concerning matters of Faith and as he expresses it by a new word Conciliariter Upon which two Objections are raised against us The first from these Words concerning matters of Faith from which M. Schelstrate concludes that the Pope hath only approved the Decrees against Wickleff and John Huss because they alone saith he concern matters of Faith What then will become of the other Decrees that were made for the Extirpation of Schism and for the Reformation of the Church which are the two principal Points for which the Council and the Popes Martin and Eugenius in express terms declare that the Holy Synod representing the Universal Church was called Let him tell me whether those Decrees be approved or not if they be not he must then according to his Principles grant that the Deposition of John XXIII is null that all that followed upon it is invalid and that all the good Laws that were made in that Council for Reformation are of no Authority and oblige no Man And if they be approved it is not to be doubted but that those of the fourth and fifth Session are also approved seeing they were chiefly made for the extinction of Schism For if the Council were not above the Pope even lawfully elected as John Gerson saith and if it had not Power to depose him when that is necessary for the common Good of the Church in case of Heresie Schism or enormous Scandal as it hath happened oftner than once the Council could never have compelled the Pope who was acknowledged to be true and lawful to renounce his Right for peace sake The other Objection brought against us is weaker still than the former Cardinal Bellarmine whom M. Schelstrate hath followed step for step upon that word Conciliariter from which he concludes that these Decrees of Constance have not been approved by Pope Martin V. because the Pope declares Id est move aliorum Conciliorum re diligenter examinata Constat autem hoc decretum sine ullo examine factum à Concilio Constantiensi L. 2. de Concil c. 19. that he only approves those which have been made Conciliariter or as that Cardinal interprets it in the manner as other Councils have made their Decrees the
an universal Council The other reason of the Council of Basil in its Synodal Answer is that an Ecumenical Council hath received the gift of Infallibility as well as the universal Church which it represents and that the Pope may err as I have proved it to have been the belief of all Antiquity But to avoid disputing This reason may be set off in a stronger and more convincing manner by saying They who hold an opinion contrary to that of the Superiority of a Council are still ready to grant that during a Schism it is above the Pope who is controverted because what is certain ought always to be preferred before the uncertain This is a Principle then agreed upon on both sides from whence it may be thus argued It is certain that a general Council representing the Universal Church is Infallible no Catholick can doubt of this On the other hand it is not certain that the Pope is so seeing many very able and Catholick Doctors and most famous Universities not only doubt of it but teach and vigorously maintain that he is not Hence it must necessarily be concluded that seeing what is certain ought to be preferred before the uncertain The tribunal of a Council which as it is certainly known cannot err in its determinations is over that of the Pope who perhaps may be deceived there being no certainty of his Infallibility It is evident that those two reasons of the Council of Basil when it was very lawful and approved by Pope Eugenius make it appear that every General Council is above the Pope both in the time of a Schism and when there is no Schism seeing in both times the Council is a whole of which the Pope is but a part and that it is certain that in both these times the Council is alike Infallible and that at least it is not certain that the Pope is neither in the one nor other of these times Having said so much I think I have fully answered M. Schelstrate as to what he hath alledged in the dissertation that he hath made against one of the chief Articles of the Declaration of the Clergy of France For as to the long discourse which that Author makes in one of his Chapters to persuade us upon the credit of his Manuscript that after great debates among the Nations it was at length resolved by common consent that the Reformation of the Church in the Head and Members should not be attempted 'till after the election of the Pope It is without doubt pitiful and deserves not any answer Can it be concluded from thence that a Pope lawfully elected who is present and presides in the deliberations of a Council is not a part of that whole and of that Body which represents the Universal Church whose Authority ought to be preferred before that of any of its Members in particular by that reason which proves that the whole is greater and more noble than any of its parts And by what Philosophy does he pretend to make us acknowledg that from the presence of a Pope in a Council it follows that that Pope is not obliged to submit to the Decrees that may be made in it even contrary to his own Judgment when they are carried by the plurality of Voices whether it be of individual Persons or of Nations That is the very thing in question to wit if a Council whether the Pope be there or not is above the Pope How will he make out his proof Besides it was not concluded in that Assembly of the Nations that no Decrees concerning Reformation could be made before the Election of a Pope but only that before that time they should not all be made and especially such as moderated the Power of the Pope and confined it to just limits it being very reasonable that he should be present at those deliberations wherein he was so much concerned The truth is not to speak of the other Decrees of Reformation that were already made in the Council there was a very considerable one made relating to the Pope in the nine and thirtieth Session before the Election of Martin V. who was not chosen till after the one and fourtieth It is appointed by that Decree that the Popes being so much the more obliged to make the light of their Faith conspicuous by how much they are raised in Dignity above all others shall for the future make in presence of those who have elected them and before their Election be Published their Confession of Faith according to the Form prescribed to them by the Council in the same Session That without doubt was a pretty important Reformation seeing thereby was revived what heretofore had been practised and what King Childebert demanded of Pope Pelagius I. to inform himself of his belief because it was thought that that Pope had too much favoured the Eutichyans who had surprised him by their Artifices The Council then might have made the other Decrees of Reformation before the Election of the Pope but they were willing they should not be made till after that the Pope was elected and the manner how they appoint that Reformation to be made is so far from favouring M. Schelstrate that it infers a conclusion quite contrary to what he pretends and manifestly proves that the Pope even when not questioned is inferiour to a Council Statuit decernit And indeed the Council wills and ordains in the fourtieth Session that the Pope either with the Council or with the Deputies of the Nations do reform the Church in the Head and Members as to the Points that were to be given him and that he make that Reformation before the dissolution of the Council Was there ever a more authentick act of supreme Authority than this When there was no more Schism after the union of the three obediences as M. Schelstrate owns The Council ordains that an undoubted Pope such as certainly he that was to be elected must be do reform the Church in the Head and Members but it will have it to be done with consent of the Council Any Bishop may do as much the difference is that he shall not be President of the Assembly where he shall give his Vote as all the rest do Now if the Council will not in Body set about that work it refers it to the care of the Pope in conjunction with the Deputies of the Nations He doth not act then in that Reformation but by the authority of the Council that deputes him and all the advantage that he is to have over the rest is that he shall be the first Deputy at the Head of all the others In fine they prescribe to him both the Articles upon which they would have the Decrees of Reformation made and the time wherein they should be expeded If that be not to ordain prescribe command and consequently if these be not evident marks and Authentick acts of Authority and Superiority I know none in the World What will
M. Schelstrate then say now with his long discourse about the five Nations agreeing that the Reformation should not be made 'till after the Election of a Pope But once more What does he mean with the great mystery he makes of this that after much debate in the Assembly of these Nations concerning the manner how the Decree should be made whether by obliging the Pope with these Deputies to make the Reformation formation before his Coronation Postea fuerunt factae diversae formae decreti ad h. c Tandem dictum fuit quod Papa electus ligari non poterat or after it was at length said Papa electus ligari non poterat that when a Pope is chosen he cannot be bound Does he by that then pretend that we are obliged to believe that a Pope lawfully elected as St. Silvester was is not obliged to subscribe to the Decrees of an Ecumenical Council as that of Nice was And that when such a Council hath decided the consubstantiality of the word and forbidden Priests to marry the Pope is not bound by these Decrees as well as the rest of Christians are and that he is still at liberty to believe of the one what he thinks fit and to act in regard of the other as he pleases But does he not see that to have the true meaning of those words they are to be applied to the Subject in question to wit whether it should be put into the Decree that the Pope who was to be chosen Ante Coronationem Pape Administrationem aliquam should be obliged to make the Reformation before his Coronation nay and before he could have any part in the Government of the Church and to give good security for it as the German Nation demanded Whereupon they had reason to say that a Pope could not be obliged to a thing so unbeseeming the Pontifical Majesty nor so tied up as to deprive him of the Power he hath by Divine Right to Govern the Church by virtue of his Primacy from the very instant that he is Canonically elected Successor of St. Peter Thus ought these words to be understood in relation to what goes before and not that the Pope is not obliged to any thing The truth is in the Decree that was made after that Conciliariter in the fourtieth Session The Pope was not obliged in that manner as the Germans had proposed nevertheless he was bound in another most reasonable manner if I may say so that is to say he was obliged to reform the Church in the Head and Members with consent of the Council or with the Deputies of the Nations before the end of the Council But if M. Schelstrate will still be opinionative and pretend that the Nations understood something else by these words Quod Papa electus ligari non poterat there need no other answer to be made unto him but that we must not stick to what hath been said in the Assembly of the Nations as he doth but to what hath been defined Conciliariter in the Session as we have just now mentioned I am apt to believe now that M. Schelstrate will be fully satisfied with me seeing I have exactly answered Point for Point all that he hath said upon his Manuscripts unknown to the whole World for near three hundred years and which at present he thinks fit to object to us as most Authentick Pieces in the dissertation he hath made against the Declaration of the Gallican Church and against the perpetual Edict of the King who as Protector of the Church and of her Canons makes it to be observed in all his Territories and in fine against the Council of Constance received by all Christendom and especially by France which looks upon and reverences it as its Palladium the prop support and defender of its liberties This being so there remains no more but in a few words to conclude what I have hitherto said of the superiority of a Council over the Pope I made it out in the beginning that all Antiquity believed it without the least dispute as to that Subject as there happened about the time of the Council of Pisa Then I clearly shew'd what that Council and the two following of Constance and Basil even approved by the Popes Alexander V. Martin V. and Eugenius IV. determined on that Subject in favours of Councils As to the times that have succeeded these three Councils it is certain that all those great Men those Bishops Cardinals Popes those Universities and Learned Doctors of all Nations who as I have said have taught that Popes are not Infallible have by consequent maintained that an Ecumenical Council which cannot be doubted but to be Infallible is above the Pope But in a particular manner it is a Doctrin which the more renowned Doctors of Paris have always taught I say of that learned University the ancientest and most famous of all others of whom if I should make a List with the quotations of their Opinions it would easily fill up a whole Book It is enough for me to mention here what the great Cardinal of Lorraine fearing that some term might be slipt in the Council of Trent that might be interpreted against that Doctrine of all France caused his Secretary to represent to Pope Pius IV. in the year 1563. These are the proper terms that he put into his instructions concerning that Point I cannot deny but that I am a French Man and have been bred in the Vniversity of Paris where it is held that the Pope is subject to a Council and they who teach the contrary there are looked upon and noted as Hereticks The French will sooner lose their lives than renounce that Doctrin It would be folly to think that there is one Bishop in France that ever would consent to the opinion contrary to that truth The truth is Edit Card. Borom 9. Jan. 1563. Pallabicin Hist conc Trid. l. 19. c. 12. n. 10. c. 13. n. 2. The Legates of the Council being instructed from Rome that they should endeavour so to bring it about that in the Canon concerning the Pope the terms of the Council of Florence should be used by putting into it that the Pope hath received the Power of Governing the Universal Church Ibid. n. 7. inesse summo Pontifici potestatem regendi Ecclesiam universalem the Bishops of France opposed it and were followed by most of the Fathers of the Council Not that these words regendi Ecclesiam universalem signifie any thing else but that general Jurisdiction of the Pope which reaches all the parts of the Church in what concerns the Publick good of all Christendom that he may see to it according to the Canons as the Council of Florence expresses it so as we have made it appear But they would not have these words Ecclesiam universalem so much as abused to insinuate thereby that the Pope is above the Church universal taken altogether assembled and represented by an Ecumenical
Council And therefore to remove all ambiguity and to prevent the wresting of these words to a sense contrary to the Superiority of a Council they said that instead of Regendi Ecclesiam universalem it ought to be put into the Canon Potestatem regendi omnes fideles omnes Ecclesias that the Pope hath the Power of Governing all Believers and all Churches which is to be understood of all not Assembled in Council but taken severally and in particular none of them being exempted from the Jurisdiction of the Pope in what relates to the publick good the general Government and the cases limited by the Canons So careful even to a scruple have our Ancestors been to stand upon their guard on that side that no attack in the least might be made against the ancient Doctrin always inviolably observed in this Kingdom And it is most remarkable that at that time when the Doctors of Paris most strenuously maintained that Doctrin after the Councils of Constance and Basil against those that strove to invalidate their Decrees Innoc. VIII Litter ad Theol. Paris 7. iâ— Sept. Ann. 1486. Innocent VIII sent them a Brief wherein he makes their Elogy and amongst other things magnifies the greatness of their zeal which they expressed for maintaining the honour and rights of the Holy Roman Church and for defending the Catholick faith against the Heresies which they incessantly confuted After all that I may end where I began to handle this question I shall conclude with the testimony of another Pope whom the Authors who will have it as M. Schelstrate will that Popes are above Councils can never reject And that is Pius II. who when he was no more but Aeneas Sylvius Picolomini Clerk to the Council of Basil whereof he hath given us the History maintained with all his might as well as the Doctors of Paris that the Authority of a General Council is Superior to that of a Pope But when he himself was promoted to be Pope he thought for a reason that may easily be guessed at that he ought to make known to the World that he had changed his Opinion and that then he thought the quite contrary of what before he had maintained with all the heat that a Man ought to have who is well persuaded of the Justice of the Cause whereof he undertakes the defence And that he solemnly did by a Bull wherein he retracts and in that Recantation that he might declare that he followed another Opinion he would not stiffle the manifest truth concerning the nature of the Opinion which he forsook and of the other that he embraced For in this manner he speaks in his Bull hinting at the Conferences and Disputes that were had with Juliano Cesarini Cardinal of St. Angelo who stood up for the interest of the Pope as much as he could and yet for all that agreed in Judgment with the Council wherein he presided Tuebamur antiqaam seutentiam i le novam defendebat Extollebamus generalis concilii autoritatem ille Apostolicae sedis potestatem magnopere commendabat He defended says that Pope the Ancicient Doctrin and he took the part of the new We extolled the Authority of the Vniversal Council and he magnified extreamly the Power of the Apostolick See This now is plain dealing Pius II. in Bull. retract That Pope who was willing to change his Opinion with his condition which after him Adrian VI. did not declares fairly and honestly in his Bull that the Doctrin whereof he had formerly undertaken the Defence concerning the Superiority of a Council is the Doctrin of Antiquity and that the other is new And that is all I would be at I need no more to gain my cause For all that I have pretended to in this Treatise is to shew what Antiquity hath believed concerning the Points in hand So that after so authentick a Declaration of Pope Pius II. I have ground to say as to this Article what I have already oftener than once said in relation of the others with Pope Celestin I. writing to the Bishops of the Gallican Church Desinat incessere novitas vetustarem CHAP. XXVI The state of the question touching the Power that some Doctors have attributed to Popes over the Temporal I Have if I mistake not made it clearly appear in all the preceding Chapters of this Treatise how far the Ancient Church hath believed that the Power over Spirituals which Jesus Christ gave to St. Peter and his Successors as Heads of the Universal Church extended I am now to shew whether according to the Judgment of venerable Antiquity they have also any Power over the Temporal of any person whatsoever and especially of Kings and other Sovereigns by virtue of the primacy that by Divine right belongs to them Heretofore there have been some so passionately concerned for the Grandieur of the Apostolical See or rather so blindly devoted to the Court of Rome that differs much from the Holy See that they have dared to publish that the Pope representing the person of Jesus Christ who is King of Kings Lord of Lords and Universal Monarch who hath an absolute Power over all Kingdoms from which he may even depose Kings if they fail in their duty as these Kings may turn off their Officers who behave not themselves as they should And this is called the direct Power which Boniface VIII thought fit to take to himself in his Tuae unam Sanctam that his Successor Clement V. was obliged to recal That is not the question here For I cannot think that now a days there is any Man who hath the boldness to maintain so palpable and odious a falshood But there are a great many beyond the Alps who by the Philosophical distinction of an indirect Power which they have invented teach that the Pope may dispose of Temporals depose Kings absolve Subjects from their Oath of Allegiance that they have taken to them and transfer their Dominions to others when he judges it to be necessary for the good of Religion because say they since he hath the inspection over every thing that concerns it so hath he Power to remove destroy and exterminate every thing that may annoy the same and by that clinch they cunningly enough come home to their Point though they would seem to forsake it For a Pope will always take the pretext of the welfair of Religion when he has a mind to undo a Prince as all these Popes have done who after Gregory VII deposed Emperors and since them Julius II. who transferred the Kingdom of John King of Navarre to Ferdinand King of Arragon because that King would not declare against Louis XII whom this Pope persecuted Now seeing that Opinion which the Gallican Church and all our Doctors have always reckoned very dangerous and inconsistent with publick tranquillity hath still vouchers amongst some Modern Doctors especially beyond the Alps I must now make it appear according to the method which I have
that the contrary opinion has not so much as the least appearance of any rational ground in Scripture For of all the passages that are cited for maintaining it there is not so much as one that is interpreted by the Church in Councils nor by any of the Holy Fathers in that most erroneous sense that they put upon them Wherein these Modern Authors who in that manner do interpret them act directly contrary to the Decree of the Council of Trent fourth Session and against the Confession of Faith enjoyned by Pius IV. which will have Scripture never to be interpreted but according to the sense that Holy Church gives it and according to the common Interpretation of the Fathers These new Doctors in that most dangerously follow the conduct of Hereticks who for maintaining their Errors interpret as they please and not as the Church pleases the Scriptures that they may wrest them to their sense Bellar. l. 5. de Rom. Pont. c. 7. Suarez l. 3. de Prim. Sum. Pont. c. 3. l. 6. de form Jur. fidel c. 4. Becan Anglico contr c. 3. qu. 3. This appears manifestly in those two passages upon which Bellarmin Suarez and after them Becanus and all the others who as these have copied or abridged them chiefly ground their opinion John Last The first passage is that where Jesus Christ saies to St. Peter Feed my Sheep Feed my Lambs Is there so much as one of the Holy Fathers who hath understood these words of the Power which St. Peter hath received over the Temporal of Princes There is none of them who hath not expounded them as they ought to be of the Spiritual Pasture which Popes are bound to give to Believers by Doctrin Example and good Government and never one of these Doctors and Masters in the Church ever let it enter into his Head to wrest them to a Temporal meaning as these new Divines have done And more Ambres l. de dig Sacer c. 2. Chrys hom 79. in Matth. c. 24. August de Agen. Christian c. 30. Tractat. 47. in Joan. in Ps 108. alii most part of these Holy Fathers having said what is most true that Jesus Christ applies these words in the person of St. Peter to the whole Church in general and to all its Pastors in particular if the new sense that these new Doctors give to them were to be followed it must be said that all Bishops and all Curates had right to dispose of the Temporals of those who by their bad Doctrin or scandalous deportment do injury to the Spiritual good of their Churches And as to that comparison which they make betwixt the Shepherd in respect of the Wolf which he may dispatch omni modo quo potest and the Pastor of the Church in regard of a Prince who may have fallen into Heresie it is not only a base Sophism contrary to the rules of right Logick but also impious and detestable which leads Men in a full career to Parricide and for which the Books that contain it have been justly condemned to the fire The second passage is taken out of St. Matthew Chapter sixteenth where the Son of God saies to St. Peter That whatever he shall bind upon Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatever he shall loose upon Earth shall be loosed in Heaven Whence these new Rabbies conclude that the Successors of St. Peter have Power to dissolve the obligation that binds Subjects to their Prince by the Oath they have made to him and by the tie of Allegiance which binds them in fidelity to him Is it not strange that Catholicks should take this liberty of wresting the sense of Scripture to what they list without any respect to the common interpretation of the Fathers to which the Council of Trent obliges them For of all the Holy Fathers who have expounded that passage there is not so much as one to be found who hath so understood it all of them have interpreted it of the Power that that Apostle received of loosing and absolving Penitents from their sins Nor do the Popes themselves expound it otherways Paul 1 Ep. â—0 ad procem Fran. Adâ—i Ep. 1. ad Carol Magn. as it may be seen in the Epistle of Pope Paul I. to the French Lords and in that of Adrian I. to Charlemagne To absolve Men from their sins is it to absolve them from their Allegiance And that whatever which signifies only any sort of sin and censure and some obligations that are not of Divine Right can that Power I say be extended to ths Temporal and to the duty that Subjects owe to Kings To persuade us of the contrary we need only read the words that go before these I shall give thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven saies Jesus Christ and not of the Kingdoms of the Earth for deposing of Kings And those that follow comprehend the use of the Power of the Keys that he giveth him for opening the Kingdom of Heaven by forgiving Men their sins or for shutting it by not absolving them John 20. as he in another place expresses himself speaking to all the Apostles after his Resurrection But that we may not swerve from the words in question we need no more but read the Eighteenth Chapter of the same Gospel of St. Matthew There it is to be seen that Jesus Christ repeats them to all his Disciples and gives them the whole Power that they import by saying to them Verily I say unto you that whatever ye shall bind upon Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatever ye shall loose upon Earth shall be loosed in Heaven If these words comprehend the sense that the new Authors give them and that their meaning is also of the Temporal it must needs be said that all the Bishops who are the Successors of the Apostles nay and all Priests who have the Power of binding and loosing may depose Kings and dispence their Subjects from the Oath of Allegiance which is the highest extravagance Or else let these Gentlemen tell us by what Authority of the Church or Holy Fathers they find that when they were said to St. Peter they have a different meaning from that which they ought to have when they were spoken to St. Peter and to all the Apostles Now that is a thing they 'll never be able to find out Miss Rom. An. 1520. Paris apud Francis Renaud Miss Rom. à Paulo III. nefar Ann. 1543. Diurn Monast Congrez Cassin à Greg. XIII confir Venet. ap Juris And this is so true that the Church of Rome her self sticking to the sense wherein all the Holy Fathers have expounded these words which Jesus Christ said to St. Peter will not understand them but of the Power which he hath given him of binding and loosing Souls For in all the ancient Missals Breviaries and Diurnals in this manner was read that Prayer which is said in the Feastival of St. Peter's Chair at Antioch Deus qui
recessara sit The first That it is not the Doctrin of the Faculty that the Pope hath any Authority over the Temporal of the most Chrishian King that on the contrary it hath always opposed even those who would have that Authority only indirect The other That it is the Doctrin of the same Faculty that the most Christian King hath no other Superior in Temporal affairs but God alone and than that is the ancient Doctrin of the Faculty from which it will never swerve After all these Decrees of the Gallican Church and of the sacred Faculty have always been powerfully supported by the Edicts of the Kings and the thundring sentences of Parliament against all such as ever durst in France maintain and teach that pernicious Doctrin condemned by these Decisions and Censures Of 2 Decemb. 1561.4 Januar. 1594. 7 10 Jan. 1595. 27 May 26 Nov. 1610. 27 July 1614. 2 Jan. 1615. c. which in this Kingdom are reverenced as proceeding from God upon whose word they are grounded So that a Doctrin so well established and which all France look upon as the chief foundation of our Liberties can never be shaken much less overturned by Novelty which whatsoever effort it may make shall never amongst us prevail against Antiquity to which we will always stick close as to the Principle and solid Foundation of true Tradition And therefore also it is that the King as Protector of the Canons of the Councils received in France and of the Gallican Church in particular by his perpetual Edict registred in all the Parliaments not only prohibits all his Subjects and all strangers within his Kingdom to teach or write any thing contrary to the Doctrin contained in the Declaration of the Clergy of France but also commands all secular and regular Professors to submit to and teach it Wherein it is most evident that his Majesty does no more but what many Generals of Orders do who for preserving the uniformity of Doctrin in their Congregation as to Points which they look upon to be of great importance for the good and reputation of their Body oblige their inferiours to maintain and teach certain Opinions which the whole Order hath adopted against others who dispute them Much more ought it to be lawful for so great a King so zealous for Religion and for the Ancient Doctrin upon which are founded the inviolable rights of one of the most August Crowns of Christendom and liberties of the Gallican Church to oblige his Subjects for preservation of Uniformity of Opinion within his Kingdom as to Points of that importance to maintain and teach the Doctrin of the Clergy of France in all things conform to that of the Ancient Church And so much I had to say in this Treatise wherein always following that Principle which both Catholicks and Protestants equally agree to I have held a mean betwixt the two extremes that ought to be shunned One is of those who blinded by the hatred which they have conceived against the Church of Rome from which they have separated would take from the Pope the Prerogatives which Antiquity hath believed were given him by Jesus Christ as Successor of St. Peter The other of those who through a zeal not according to knowledg nay and if I dare say with those Cardinals of Paul III. through a too great compliance with Popes attribute to them what Antiquity instructing us by the Fathers the Councils and even by the most Ancient and most holy Popes themselves have believed they never have received from Jesus Christ Seeing the mean is the place of Virtue and Truth I think one cannot mistake the way when he follows Antiquity for his guide which placing us with it self in that lovely mean will make us condemn our Protestants who are in the first extreme and abandon those who abandon themselves to novelty under the conduct whereof they are fallen into the other extremity Now if it be said to me that these new Authors who have fallen into that which I call the second extreme have only done so out of the great zeal which they have for Religion It will be easie for me to answer with the great Pope St. Leo That many times Men carry on their private interests under a specious pretext of Piety Privatae causae pietatis aguntur obtentu câ—piditatum quisque suarum Religionem habet velut pedissequam St. Leo Epist 25. ad Theodos Imper. and that every one maketh Religion to be the handmaid of his lusts and desires The truth is it may very well be that the lustre of the Purple wherewith at Rome the three Authors who have most highly exalted the Power of Popes by raising it beyond all the bounds that Antiquity prescribed to it were cloathed may have dazled the Eyes of that croud of Modern who have followed them and who for all that what ever they may have expected never received a like reward But not to Judge of the secret motives of their Heart which it belongs to God alone to dive into I had rather Answer with Vincentius Lirinensis one of the most zealous Defenders of the true Doctrin Mos iste semper in Ecclesiâ viguit ut quo quisque religiosior foret Vincent Lerin l. 1. Commonit c. 3. eo promptius novellis adventionibus contrairet It hath always been the custom in the Church that the more of Piety and Religion any one had the more ready he was to oppose all new inventions in Doctrin And to conclude my Work with the excellent words of the same Author I should be glad that Men would think that in composing it I have had no other design but to discharge the duty of a good Catholick by doing what he enjoyns me when he says Christianus Catholicus providebit ut Antiquitati inhaereat quae prorsus non potest ab ulla Novitatis fraude seduci The Catholick Christian will have great care to stick close to Antiquity which cannot be deceived by the artifice of Novelty FINIS Books Printed for and sold by Joseph Hindmarsh at the Black Bull in Cornhill over against the Royal Exchange THE famous History of Auristella Translated from the Spanish The whole Art of Converse Cicero's three Books touching the Nature of the Gods done into English A Breviary of the Roman History written in Latin by Eutropius Translated into English by several young Gentlemen privately Educated in Hatton-Garden The Countermine by Dr. Nalson History of Count Zosimus done into English Love Letters between a Noble Man and his Sister The Doctors Physitian or Dialogues concerning Health Translated out of French The Prerogative of Primogeniture by David Tenner B. D. Navigation rectified by Peter Blackborough The Works of Mr. John Oldham together with his Remains A Discourse of Monarchy as it Relates to the Succession of his Royal Highness James D. of York Seneca's Morals by way of Abstract by Mr. Lestrange Beaufions or a new discovery of Treason in an Answer to the Protestant Reconciler Familiar Epistles of Col. Hen. Martin The Rampant Alderman a Farce Dame Dobson or the Cunning Woman a Comedy Jovial Crew or Merry Beggar a Comedy Venice preserved a Tragedy Sir Hercules Buffoon a Comedy The disappointment a Play An Essay upon Poetry Choice new Songs never before Printed by Tho. Dirfey Gent. The Malecontent being the sequel of the progress of Honesty Vivat Rex a Sermon Preach'd at Bristol on the 9th of Septemb. 1683. by Mr. Kingston The History of the Civil Wars of France Written in Italian by H.C. D'Avila Translated out of the Original The Second Impression whereunto is added a Table FINIS