Ultimate but as something in general which relates to Christ's Institution or the Appointment or Practice of the Church or the like Sect. 6. 5. That a Virtual Intention is Necessary and Sufficient Sect. 7. Your Sense of the Terms must as was said before be mine And that I have truly represented your Sense your Authors already produced or referred to will amount to a full Certificate They will secure me upon the Supposition made that the Doctrine of your Councils is capable of being understood at least by the leading Members of your own Church If it be not you magnifie those your Councils without Reason which either could not speak intelligibly or for some odd Ends seemed to define Faith when they did Nothing 6. I deny that your Priesthood taken Indeterminately or in general doth in an Ordinary way or without Special Revelation admit the infallible Certainty of Divine Faith Or that taken determinately or in particular it admits either the aforesaid Certainty of Faith or an Experimental or yet a Moral Certainty properly so called § 1. By certainty I still mean an Intellectual certainty such as is consentaneous to its Object which is the Measure and Foundation of it These things being thus set in open view it will be easily apprehended That our Question is a Complex Question and is resolvable into two simple ones which as they are stated will stand thus § 2. 1. Whether the Roman Church which makes Priestly Orders necessarily depend upon the Ordaining Bishops at least Virtual Intention of the End of Ordination can be certain with an absolute or infallible Certainty of Faith that they have some true Priests in general § 3. 2. Whether that Church can be certain with the aforesaid Certainty of Faith or with a Moral Certainty That they have This or That true Priest in particular Now I deny to your Church the fore-named respective Certainties of their having a true Priesthood in either Sense and which is more have taken upon me to prove the Negative a task I cannot complain of though it be not very natural because I was for once content to take it upon my self Pray mark That I moreover deny a Theological Certainty of your Priesthood taken in either of the Senses of it above-mentioned That is I deny that it can be concluded either from two Revealed Propositions or from one Revealed and another Evident by the Light of Nature Bellarmine's Silence of it tempted me to omit it in the last Section THE SECOND PART BEING Argumentative SECT I. The general Order of proceeding The first part of Mr. G's Letter set down and examined HAVING finisht the Explications required of me in a far other and ampler manner than was required and whatever else I thought useful in a previous way for the clearer sight of the point in question I shall now declare in what general Order I purpose to proceed § 1. 1. I shall evince by managing the Medium already exhibited that the Roman Church is uncertain of their having any Priesthood as Priesthood is taken determinately or as I may say in the parcels This was the only thing I formerly stood upon when I had occasion in a very short Paper a single Folio page to expose the Evils incident to Roman Catholicks from their doctrine of the Intention Let me say by the way I mean that Paper to which one of your Priests told me in your hearing he had some years ago seen an Answer I add I wish I could see it too that I might for some reasons compare it with yours And this was the only thing I intended to do at the first starting of the Argument with you as knowing it would enable me when made good to load you sufficiently with unwelcome consequences and to set That in the light which it would be your interest to keep in darkness § 2. 2. I shall consider a little beyond my first purpose how far your Priesthood taken indeterminately and as I may say in the gross will follow the fate of the other This being said I come to produce your Letter purporting an Answer to my Argument and to examine its force If I find my self so bridled up by it that I cannot run my designed course I will acknowledge the power of your Curb but if not I surely go forward to your loss The former part of Mr. Goodall's Letter Sir It was alledged to you that the Orders of the English Church had been by Roman Catholicks judged invalid by reason of your altering the Form of Ordination and sufficient discovering your Intention not to do as the Church doth in that Sacrament And your way of defending your Ordination seemed to me very strange when you retorted in this manner I deny say you that the Roman Church is certain that she hath any Priesthood or Sacraments according to her own Principles and I oblige my self to deal with Mr. Goodall about this point Witness my hand Thomas Marsden I accepted and subscribed Edward Goodall For when you deny that we are certain that we have any Priesthood according to our own Principles it were but reasonable for you to expect of us that we should be uncertain at least that you have any since you so earnestly contend to derive your Succession and Orders from us See for this Mr. Mason Archbishop Laud Bishop Bramhal Bishop Taylor Dr. Fern Dr. Hammond c. And there is an old rule you know Nil dat quod in se non habet But whatsoever you pretend of our being uncertain concerning the truth of our Priesthood yet for our comfort you are certain enough of it and therefore you never re-ordain those Priests who sometimes though rarely Apostatize from the Roman Catholick to joyn in your Communion The words you have used in Stating the point against the Roman Catholick Church are very extraordinary when you deny her to be certain that she hath any Priesthood or Sacraments according to her own principles Thus you The Examination of it follows Sir Although the Prefatory part of your Letter here recited does not at all affect my Argument by way of Answer and so without any prejudice might be passed by without regard yet on other accounts I find it my concern to dissect it and to expose its putrid parts § 3. You then undertake two things in it 1. To relate some matters of Fact which passed between you and me 2. To insinuate some disadvantages incurred on my part through at least an unwary manage of things Both these shall be inspected For the first Your Relation of Fact contains two things 1. Your charging the Church of England with the invalidity of her Orders both because we had altered the Form of Ordination and also discovered our Intention not to do as the Church doth in that Sacrament as you term it 2. My attempt to discharge her by denying the Roman Church to be certain that she hath a true Priesthood or Sacraments according to her own principles
true Bishop or Priest which is proved it follows that the Jesuits who lay so much weight upon the Papal Chair cannot know the Pope to be so much as a Priest nor consequently that he is an Infallible Judge of Faith. Those they account Successors of Saint Peter in the Universal Pastorship of the Church to whom they appropriate special Priviledges and particularly that of Infallibility are not to be Lay-men sure but such as have the Sacerdotal Character But since no man alive as is proved is sure according to your doctrin that any particular man is Priest no man is sure the Pope is such and consequently that he is an Infallible Judge of Controversies The Intention of him who Baptized and Ordained the Pope and the capacity of his Ordainer were and ever will be hidden things and hence springs the Uncertainty § 18. 2. Now a word to those called the Parisian Divines If you cannot know that any particular men are true Bishops or Priests you cannot know that any of your Roman Councils have defined Infallible Truth in as much as your selves hold that the promise of Divine Assistance by which alone they can be supposed to be preserved inerrable is not made to any Assemblies but such as consist of men in Holy Orders You are indeed content that Lay-men be present there and act in a certain inferior Sphere viz. That they assist in examining difficulties consult debate approve protect c. But to none of them do you allow the power of Determination or Decision Those Synods then as your selves hold are to be made up of Bishops or Priests or both Now because it cannot be known that these ever had Priestly Orders for want of Knowledge that they were truly Baptized and Ordained you must be Uncertain whether such were true Councils and consequently whether they decreed and defined Infallible Faith. Although you may have some true Priests in general yet in regard you are uncertain who they are How know you that the major part of such Councils ex gr that of Trent were true Priests and consequently capable of making Infallible determinations I will speak a less word How know you that the 4th part there were such You might have a true Clergy I say and yet it is possible that few or none of them might be in that Synod For the Clergy in a Council usually bears but a very small proportion for number to the rest Many of these may possibly have true Orders when most of the Members of such a Council want them Unless you know both the capacity and Intention of those who Baptized and Ordained such Members you are not as hath been proved assured they were Bishops or Priests and consequently that the Holy Ghost assisted them in their work If sending men to a Council will indeed by Post-fact justifie mens Baptism and Orders it were well worth the while whatever it cost to have as frequent Councils as possible and to send numerous flocks of the Clergy thither to stay one Session to be succeeded still by more till the Uncertainty of the Baptism and Orders of most of the Bishops and Priests be removed But I think my self the first that ever spoke of this Cure for this Disease and therefore think it will never be pleaded against me by my Adversaries However the distemper remains till some Remedy be found out you know not that the Members of your Council are true Priests and so interessed in the promise of Divine Assistance and so capable of making infalltble decisions § 19. 3. For those that hold Pope and Council when conjoyned to be Infallible I say but this to them Neither Pope nor Council will be more surely proved to have had Baptism and Orders when they are together than when they are a-sunder that is it cannot be proved at all if the Roman doctrin by me exhibited be true and then they can hardly be thought to be Infallible Determiners of Faith. § 20. 4. If no Roman Catholick can know that any particular man of theirs is a true Priest then the boasted Argument taken from the Un-interrupted Succession of Lawful Pastors in the Roman Church is of no force till they can be sure of the Intention of the respective Baptizers of every Pope and that every Pope from the Apostles days hitherto was Ordained by such as were capable of giving them Orders and Intended to do it in each respective Ordination which as I have evinced can never be known their Succession rests but upon bare presumption without proof and therefore amounts not to a cogent Argument Thus have I as I think accomplish't my Undertaking not leaving one Member of the Roman Communion certain that there is among them any one true Priest in particular nor any Sacraments in particular given or received in the Roman Church and all this from the Medium I laid down at first viz. your doctrin of the Intention § 21. Now I think fit to re-mind the Reader that to do This 1. I have explicated the Terms from Roman Catholick Authors 2. I have taken their doctrines for the grounds of my Inferences nor have I in Order to any part of my work needed to ruffle or quarrel any of their Notions otherwise than my mere deductions from their Principles will do it It is all one to me if they would make Seventy instead of Seven Sacraments provided I prove they are not certain of their Giving and Receiving them It is all one to me if they should make each Bishop of their Church as Infalllible as the Jesuits make the Pope and every Provincial Council as Infallible as they do those they call General provided I prove they cannot be sure that those Bishops or Members of Councils are in Holy Orders and thereby capable of that power of Decision or Determination which they would attribute to them None then ought to wonder that I speak their language without crossing several Principles of theirs which I have occasion to mention since it hath been my only design to render all their things loose and uncertain from their own Doctrine § 22. If it be said I have proved some things which Roman Catholicks deny not I answer 1. The worst that will follow hence is There is a little labour lost 2. It may be of some advantage to the Truth to publish That among the Vulgar which though the more learned Romanists cannot deny yet they would gladly bury in silence This Article of the Intention I believe to be one of that kind For want of representing This honestly and generally the Credulity of Persons of both Perswasions is apt to be abused § 23. 1. Not a few of the Romanists are liable to be filled with an ungrounded Confidence that Sacramental Grace ever attends the performance of the exterior Sacramental Actions One of that sort I can name who upon receiving an Absolution from his Confessor came forth of his House and leapt up for joy and told some judicious
Roman Catholicks UNCERTAIN Whether there be any True PRIESTS OR SACRAMENTS IN THE Church of Rome Evinced by an Argument urg'd and maintain'd upon their own Principles against Mr EDWARD GOODALL of Prescot in Lancashire By THOMAS MARSDEN Vicar of Walton in the same County The Treatise divided into Two Parts The First being Explicative of Terms The Second Argumentative LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's-Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard MDCLXXXVIII THE EPISTLE TO THE PROTESTANT READER Courteous Reader IF thou art skilled in good Authors I freely make thee Judge of these Papers and covet thy Admonition if thou seest any thing Material amiss in them defiring nothing more than that Truth may take place I have nothing more to say to thee if thou art what I suppose thee to be But if thou art less seen in Books I crave leave to give thee some Advice Read over this small Treatise with a present Mind and such Light may chance to beam forth from it upon thy Vnderstanding as may shew thee the crazy Estate of the Roman Church notwithstanding the proclamations many make of its welfare If thou findest that not one Person of that Communion measuring his State by their own Doctrine can be certain whether he enjoys the Ordinary Means appointed by God for Man's Salvation which I pretend to prove I would oblige thee to these few Things 1. Heartily to pity them and pray that it may be better with them Pray I say that they may see and reject their Errors and retain neither more nor less for Faith than That once delivered to the Saints 2. To praise God thou art in Communion with the Establish'd Church of England whose Faith rests Vnmoveable upon the Holy Scripture and Ancient Creeds and whose Government for the Substance of it is truly Primitive and Apostolical 3. As thou hast sound so to hold fast That which is Best Let neither a fond Affection to Novelty nor a groundless Admiration of Mis-called-Antiquity turn thee aside from the truly Old Paths In Order to This strive to work thy Soul to an high Esteem of Truth and Peace the two Grand Legacies our dear Lord hath lest his Church For These cannot be in safe Keeping unless the Heart assist the Head in Order to their safeguard Cold Speculation secures not from the prevalency of Temptations Men may part with Truth not because they like it not at all but because they hope by Exchanging it for Error to get something to boot they like better All times and places have Experience of This. Now if thou expectest to be assisted with some previous Instructions for thy more Vseful Reading of what follows Know I need but give thee Little here having all-along in my passage enlarged some will say to a fault on several Heads that I might acquaint thee with the whole Nature of the Subject treated of The Fourth Part of what I have written might I suppose have sufficed to have let my Adversary know my Mind so far as he hath obliged me to impart it The Rest is employed in Vnfolding Things for thy sake And more I would have done for thee in this kind had not the Multiplicity of my Affairs which for many Years have divided my Endeavours into several Chanels allowed me onely much interrupted parcels of time for this Occasion Being jealous of being mis-understood I shall explain a few things here which otherwise might possibly chance to be a Stumbling-block in thy Way 1. I frequently call men Priests and Bishops whil'st I am questioning whether they be truly Such And I say They Baptize and Ordain whil'st I question the validity of those Acts. Which may seem to thee a sort of Contradiction But know all Authors speak in the like manner who speak of the like Matters I deal with The meaning is but this We call them Priests and Bishops because the Matter and Form of Ordination hath been Outwardly applied to them and they are therefore reputed such In like sort I. say They Baptize Consecrate c. When the Outward Sacramental Action is performed and They are therefore reputed to do so But since the Roman Church declares That an inward invisible Act of the Minister's Will called his Intention is necessary to the perfecting Ordination and Baptism c. I therefore question How her reputed Priests or Bishops can be known to be true Priests or Bishops Or their reputed Baptism true Baptisne according to their Doctrine To save a Circuit of Words Men generally speak as is aforesaid and the Meaning of the Words is easily known by the other Words they are connected with in the Discourse 2. Note when at any time I call the Church of Rome The Church it is where the Contexture of the Matter obligeth me to accommodate my Language to them and not otherwise for I am fully satisfied the Roman is out a Church not the Church viz. but a particular not the universal Church 3. If at any time I say to this Effect Ordination and your other Sacraments I do but occasionally suit my Words to theirs as not at all approving their Number of Sacraments God hath blest me with better eye sight I praise his Name for it than to agree with the Roman Church in any One point wherein She disagrees with the Church of England I add Thou art not in a Discourse of this Nature to expect a Stile dress'd with brisk Metaphors or pretty little Turns of Wit nor yet with much variety of Words To speak openly and with sure dependence is the Province of a Disputant and all that a Wise man looks for from him This is all I had a mind to tell thee and so I bid thee heartily Farewell The General CONTENTS OF THE FIRST PART SECTION I. MAtter of Fact related 2 SECTION II. Mr. G. Vnseasonably calls for Explication of Terms His request is granted The Order of proceeding in it set forth 7 SECTION III. What Councils have dealt with the Intention The Roman Church requires it as necessary to a Sacrament 10 SECTION IV. The Intention of doing the Exterior Action is not required but presupposed 16 SECTION V. The Intention defined That of the End required 22 SECTION VI. The End particularly considered is not required but generally The Virtual Intention is required and held sufficient 32 SECTION VII R. Catholicks not certain of their Priesthood taken in general by any simple or absolute Certainty Nor certain of it taken in special by any simple or so much as a Moral Certainty 35 SECTION VIII The several Explications before given summ'd up And the Question resolved into its parts 41 The General CONTENTS of the SECOND PART SECTION I. THe General Order of proceeding The first part of Mr. G's Letter set down and examined 43 SECTION II. Mr. Goodall sets forth the Argument and his Answer to it as follows 50 SECTION III. A more general view of the mistakes of Mr. G's Answer 54 SECTION IV. The Intention of the Bishop in
to enquire of him what the doctrin of the Intention amounted to as establish'd by your Councils He affirmed to the Lady as I can shew under her well known hand these three things § 23. 1. That the Intention respected the Exterior Act only saying That it is impossible for a Priest that is in his right Wits to perform the exterior Action required without Intending to do as he then doth Now I have proved that there is required an Intention of the End which confounds his false account of the matter § 24. 2. He said The Roman Church never declared the Doctrin of the Intention to be matter of Faith. But I have proved it to be One if a Decree or Definition of such Councils as the Body of Roman Catholicks hold for General can Oblige to Faith. And if these cannot do that farewel Pope Pius's Creed § 25. 3. He only assigned this for the occasion of the Councils medling with this matter viz. That some held an Opinion that the Consecrating and Conferring the Sacraments by madmen who knew not what they were about was valid But I have shewed that it is granted aforehand That the Exterior Action should be Humane i. e. the issue of previous Knowledge which a mad-man as such cannot exert And I have also shewn that the Intention the Councils deal about reaches farther and is of another Nature And so his frantick Story is void of Patronage § 26. I confess School men treating of their Matters put every Objection that can possibly come into their too fine spun thoughts but if a man hatch from thence in his head swarms of Sectaries that are supposed seriously to embrace the matter of many of them he can make them exist no where but in his fancy § 27. And I doubt this is the case when any one reports there were a Sect of people who held stark and staring Mad men to be effectual Ministers of the Sacraments Authors do indeed speak of Mad-men with a respect to our Case and pronounce them unfit Ministers because they as such cannot exert Humane Acts but then their Argument amounts to this because Mad men cannot do the less viz. Intend the exterior Act much less can they do the more viz. Intend the End or Effect of an Institution which is required by the Roman Church § 28. I wish the Assertor would tell us in what Age there were such a Sect of men in what Region they lived who headed them who began the Error what Pens seriously defended it what Bishop excommunicated any man for holding it or what Pope suspended or deprived any Bishop for embracing it I would learn what Notoriety of Fact there was for these things that it should be worth a General Councils while to cast an eye this way and labour to stop the growing evil § 29. I have read several Catalogues of Heresies some Ancient and some Modern but I can find nothing like This amongst them all I wish my plain dealing with him to which I have had more than sufficient provocation may whet him to the innocent revenge of making good against me if he can his Affirmations above described Till this be done I shall conclude him either a most unlearned man or one of a poor Spirit who could find in his heart so to abuse and impose upon a worthy Lady's want of skill in Roman Doctors and Councils Sir I acknowledge I have stept out of our way a while to salute a friend but I do not desire you to take any notice of that unless you please However those that are more concern'd will do it and subscribe to the justice of my Visit SECT VI. The End particularly considered is not required but generally The Virtual Intention is required and held sufficient HAving already proved the Intention of the End to be required I come now to view your next Question whether that End be Proximate or Ultimate § 1. And I must say I see not what Reason you have to ask this Question here the matter of it having no necessary influence upon the subject of our debate For if it be the End however consider'd whether confusedly and in general or distinctly and in special it is alike out of the compass of the Inspection of others which is the formal Ground I argue from to your Uncertainty of having a true Priesthood or any Sacraments at all I say if it be the End more generally consider'd ex gr to do an Action as Sacred as Relative to an Institution as a Mean to this or that indefinite End all this comes to one with a respect to my design § 2. Nevertheless I shall chearfully go some paces though upon a needless Errand which way you shall please to drive me I affirm then Your Councils and Doctors require not the intending any End thus or so distinctly considered or specified but as something in general which Christ and the Church or Christ or the Church intends to do by the instituted Action § 3. This something is it seems sufficient to the Sacraments although very hardly as we may learn from the words of the trent-Trent-Council which I shall here repeat There is required of the Ministers of the Sacraments an Intention of doing at least what the Church doth The saltem at least sounds to me a poor word where a dogmatical Article is defined however I must take it as it is and shall explain the matter briefly from your Authors § 4. After G. Biel had told us as is aforesaid That the Ministers are required to will that to be done for which the Sacrament was instituted he immediately adds Et haec Intentio est duplex scil specialis quâ intendit ut Baptizatus fiat filius Regni qui est finis remotus vel propinquus qui est remissio peccati Originalis Gratiae infusio aut quod fiat Chritianus membrum Ecclesiae militantis vel generalis ut fiat quod Ecclesiae intendit licet non cogitetur aut ignoretur vel etiam non credatur id conferri per baptismum quod Ecclesia intendit i. e. And this Intention is twofold viz. Special whereby he intends that the baptized person may attain Salvation which is the remote End or that he obtain the pardon of Original Sin and the infusion of Grace or that he be made a Christian or a Member of the Church Militant which is the proximate End of it Or it is general viz. that That may be done which the Church intends althogh it be not considered nor understood or not believed that That is conferred by Baptism which the Church intends We see here it is a very general and indistinct End that is set forth by these words what the Church intends or doth And our Author goes on to reach our point in his third Conclusion Ad veritatem Sacramenti non requiritur intentio Ministri respectu effectus Baptismatis in specie sed sufficit intendere quod Ecclesia intendit in
of his Commentators that I have met with excepted against This nor any others of your Church Your self a little beneath grants the point where you say with relation hereunto The means are necessary to the end Several of your men Bellarmine in particular * De Clericis cap. 3. contend that Protestant Churches are no true Churches because as they alledge they want a true Priesthood Besides enough is to be fetcht for this purpose out of your Trent Council | Sess 23 de Sacram. Ordinis but it is needless to do it § 11. From hence then I present you with this Scheme founded on your own Authority you are no surer you have a true Church than you are that you have a true Priesthood you are no surer that you have a true Priesthood even taken in general than you are that you have true Ordination you are not surer that you have true Ordination than you are that your Ordaining Bishops Intend as your Church requires Now in regard you agree not to claim for the Intention the Infallible Certainty of Faith which immediately depends upon divine Revelation I see not how you can reasonably agree to claim the Infallible Certainty of Faith for the truth of your Church Which I commend to the Reader 's observation § 12. You first tell us in general of some Known Principles of your Church from which the Knowledge of the Intention is deducible and afterwards reckon them to be these viz. That the Roman is the only Catholick Church That God will continue and preserve that Church to the Worlds end and all this say you appears from divine Revelation You conclude hence they must have a true Priesthood the Means being necessary to the End. Therefore say you whatsoever Intention of the Prelates is by them believed as Necessary for this End they do certainly believe according to their Principles that God's Providence will secure it his Omnipotence is able to make good his Fidelity § 13. For reply 1. I observe to the Reader That though you have presented us with a list of those Principles from which you pretend to deduce the Knowledge of the Ordainer's Intention yet you only say They appear from Divine Revelation without shewing either what this Revelation is or where it is to be found § 14. 2. As our discourse was at first Personal every one will conceive that if your thoughts had then enabled you to make the above-named distinction I must have asked What the Revelation was and where it appeared on which your said Principles are pretended to rest Nor could you have refused to satisfie my Question without bringing a Cloud upon the Cause you manage And you may easily believe that if I had known what you had been writing at London I should have wisht you would have set down What and Where the Revelation you speak of is that so I might have consented with you or refuted you according to the best judgment I could make of the Thing exhibited I assure you Sir to obtrude upon the World Doctrines under the Notion of Articles of Faith without due proof of their Divine Original is too great an Empire for Creatures to arrogate to themselves nor can one reasonably submit to another in such cases whether they respect God's honour or their own safety Therefore when you talk of Divine Revelation you should have shewed it § 15. You would surely enroll me in the Catalogue of Franticks if I should upon this Occasion spend Years in hunting through all Books for Texts of Scripture which your Popes or their Subjects have fancied to be useful for proving the Roman to be the Universal Church and in confuting their vain Glosses when I have sound them Your Person is not adverse to me but your Cause and therefore you leave the Field and cease to be my Adversary unless you shew me your places of defence and wherein their strength lies and then defy my Assaults But this is not done here Tell me is the Revelation you speak of recorded in the first Verse or Chapter of Genesis or the last Verse of the Revelation or in any Verse between those Have you not read that Pope Boniface the VIII proved the Pope of Rome to be the sole Head of the Christian Church with relation-to which Head you call yours the One and the Whole Church out of the first Verse of Genesis In the beginning God created c. He collected the Argument thus Dicitur in principio non in principiis c. It is said quoth that Pope in the Beginning not in the Beginnings c. And this is urged to prove that there must be One visible Head of the Church and this the Pope of Rome with whom all Christians must believe and to whom all must submit Have you not read how Pope Gregory the VII a great while before that fetcht a proof for the Point out of the 16th Verse of that Chapter God made two great lights the greater light to rule the day c. Illa dignitas quae praeest diebus id est Spiritualibus Major est That is That Dignity that rules the Days that is Spirituals is greater I shall omit the comparison between Popes and Kings which this Text is brought to settle and only apply it to the Point in hand That God made the Pope to Rule all Christians is all that I shall take Notice of as proved by it I have brought these two infallible Interpreters of Scripture upon the Stage and which of you should be such if your Popes be not only to shew it would be endless to seek out those many Texts supposed by Roman Catholicks to tend to make out that the Roman is the One Catholick Church of Christ upon Earth and to expose their extravagant Mis-expositions of them I might soon begin with Genesis but might be long before I had run through the Bible If these two Popes had spoken onely in general words as you do of Divine Revelation for their Headships on which your Matter vertually depends I am so dull I should never unless by chance have found out what Scriptures they referred to for it And so though I had discussed a hundred other Texts if those had been left out it might have been said I had left my work undone But wise Men will not judge I ought to undertake Unreasonable tasks or seek a Needle in a Bottle of Hay But I spend time For it had been enough to say I am only proving a Negative and need do no more than over-turn what you are pleased to erect for your Defence You have set me no more work here than I have considered and so I have no more to do here about your divine Revelation whether you refer to Scripture or any thing else § 16. Yet it cannot but be worth our Notice That your Method of maintaining your Church is most easie and expedite When you find your selves unable particularly to prove your performance of
8. To this I replied by Explicating what I meant by these words the Intention of the Bishop viz. the Intention of such as were truly and indeed Bishops Upon which I added That your Bishops know not whether they exert that Intention which your Church requires to Ordination for want of certainty that those duely Intended who Ordained them and consequently that themselves are true Bishops For it is not the Intention of a man consider'd otherwise than as a true Bishop that will serve to the purpose of Ordination Nor can any Bishop be surer that his Intention together with the due application of Matter and Form is effectual to Ordination than he is that his who undertook to Ordain him was so But how he should be certain of that I am to learn. § 9. The Sum then is Nothing short of all this I have exprest will reach home to the purposes of your Church and therefore your Councils have fallen short of their main end if in handling this matter they require not all this in their Definitions or at least presuppose not that part of it as necessary which they do not formally require And sure I am That none is more sure that he Intends as a Bishop than he is sure That he is a Bishop Which assurance he may begin to seek when he pleases but I am confident he will never find it till he hath found a Casement in his Ordainer's breast through which he may view his very heart The Major then for ought I see remains true in the most extended signification of the words no man living no not the Ordaining Bishops themselves knowing that the Condition of the requisite effectual Intention of any Bishop is fulfill'd in Ordination Although Sir I spoke not all these words to you yet you know I exprest the full matter of them § 10. But because you was not satisfied with this Notion but why you should not let others judge I limited the Signification of those words no man living by contradistinguishing all men to the Ordaining Bishops And then the sense stood thus No man living except the Ordaining Bishops know whether the required Intention be present in Roman Catholick Ordinations Which explication of the words you accepted I was well content I confess to take up with this for that time as thinking with my self That the Romanists might well forbear their mighty claims if it could be made appear and this I never doubted That no Priest nor Deacon nor Sub-deacon nor any of the lesser Orders nor any one Lay-person amongst them can be certain That there is any true Priesthood in that Church nor any true Sacraments given or received in it § 11. I would with your patience add one thing more Immediately after I had received my Paper from you you demanded to have it in keeping and when I told you there was no reason you should have my Script in exchange for your vanisht breath you acted a sort of triumph telling me I durst not give it as being conscious to my self of its infirmities You too often dared me to give it you with repeated promises you would answer it At last wearied with importunities I gave it and you engaged to answer it under your hand I have not reported this out of any design to blame your zeal but to let others know you may thank your self for it if I chance to toil you a little more than you have a mind of § 12. Sir I hope your memory when a little rubb'd up will serve to assure you That what I have now related as matter of Fact is substantially true However I am ready to give you a Certificate of any part of it which you shall please to question Signed by the hands of the then present Gentlemen SECT II. Mr. G. unseasonably calls for Explication of Terms His request is granted The Order of proceeding in it set forth § 1. NOW I come to acknowledge the receit of your Letter dated London September 29. in Answer to my Paper delivered to you about the Sixth of August It is I hope the issue of mature advice and deliberation and therefore may save me the trouble of expecting from you any thing of greater moment on this subject 'T is some satisfaction to know the uttermost strength of an enemy You pronounce it a full Answer to my Argument and full admits not of increase You also insinuate it probable that I may acquiesce in it which indeed I ought to do if it be a full Answer Truth being the thing you and I are to run in quest of and to rest in being found But if I chance not to see your Answer such as in truth I cannot for want of eye-sight or for want of Object and will therefore pursue the point further you invite me to state the Case distinctly and clearly Your words are these § 2. If you have any thing more to Offer against us be pleased to state the point distinctly and clearly by telling us what sort of Intention you think is required in these Councils viz. of Florence and Trent as a Principle of our Church when you say That the Intention of the Bishop is a Condition which no man living viz. contradistinguished from the Ordaining Minister knows whether it be fulfilled or no. Whether you think an Habitual Actual or Virtual Intention be there declared and whether such as is conversant about the Act which is exercised or about the End and whether this End be Proximate or Vltimate As also what certainty you speak of in your Propositions whether it be Moral Metaphysical or Mathematical That so I may return you a distinct answer § 3. Sir Your request that I would explicate the Terms in my Propositions is reasonable but it had been more reasonable you should have made it sooner if you really doubted of my meaning in them First to write a deliberate Answer from a seven weeks consideration of the Terms I used and after that to ask the meaning of them is wonderful inartificial such a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as a person of your standing in an University is seldom guilty of While you look upon my Words as Equivocal you can fasten no determinate sense on them and then except you had run through all the various significations of them and shew'd that none of them would be serviceable to me against your Church you have answer'd but at a venture and fought hoodwinkt Had you proceeded after this manner Sir If you mean That the Intention is required to be conversant only about the Sacramental Act none in his wits can miss it and so no uncertainty ariseth thence if about the end you mistake our doctrine or we are sure the Ministers of the Sacraments always carry their Intention so far If you mean an actual Intention is required you misunderstand our Church if an habitual or virtual this is indeed required but then the Ministers can never fail of Intending so c. Had
you done this you had not needed now to crave of me the Explication of the Terms as having your self met with them in all their shapes and rendred them unuseful to my interest But not having done this as will appear beneath you have run the risk of making an impertinent answer whatsoever it may prove to be at last Not to speak ad idem is to speak to no purpose and you know not you have spoke ad idem till you know what I mean. § 4. Had you askt me at Prescot what I meant by them I must have told you or become the object of your scorn for he that cannot explain the Words he hath spoken by way of Argument against another will be thought to want common Wit or Language and he that will not explain them to a fair inquirer will be suspected to have spoken no good sense But you were not then doubtful of the Terms as appeared by your bare denying a Proposition without more ado § 5. Or had you by the Post called me shortly after to this performance I must for the same reasons have been your Obedient Servant But not to ask this till your Answer was given is a very great rarity § 6. However though it come unseasonably for your self your request is just and I will set my self to fulfil it And I shall the more largely explicate the Terms you mention with some other things if I find as I go on that occasion requires it for the ampler satisfaction of the Reader for saving my self all future trouble in this kind and for bringing the matter in Controversie to a more evident period In Order to this work I shall require that two things be granted me by the Romanists § 7. 1. That when your Councils speak of the Intention of the Ministers of the Sacraments they mean something by their Words and also express their Sense in such sort that it may be understood To deny me this would be to blast the reputation of your Oracles § 8. 2. That the Romanists at least whose Faith is guided by or rested upon such Councils are and have been able to declare the true Sense of their Decrees and Definitions This follows from the other for if the Councils writ intelligibly which I take for granted the Romanists have concern enough to inquire into and skill enough to find out their Sense and therefore shall be concluded to have done so This being premised I shall explicate the Terms so far as is needful from Roman-Catholick Authors What they mean by them I must mean by them otherwise our Controversie can be nothing else but a strife about words § 9. To do this more Orderly I shall shew 1. What your Councils say of the Intention 2. In what manner of quality or under what Notion they require it with relation to the Sacraments whereof they make Orders one 3. About what it is conversant there 4. What sort of Intention is required 5. What certainty I speak of when I deny that the Roman Church is certain of her having any true Priesthood This done I shall attempt to judge of the strength or weakness of your Answer according to the state of the Question SECT III. What Councils have dealt with the Intention The Roman Church requires it as necessary to a Sacrament § 1. FIrst Two of your Councils only have dealt in this Matter What they were and what they have said of it I come now to shew Pope Eugenius's Decree propounded by way of Instruction to the Armenians was read and approved in the Florentine Council and thereby made a Synodical Decree in the year 1439. Wherein after the Number and Names of the Sacraments are recited and fixed and the Ends or Uses they serve to specified We read this Haec omnia tribus perficiuntur viz. rebus tanquam Materia verbis tanquam Forma Persona Ministri conferentis Sacramentum cum intentione faciendi quod facit Ecclesia Quorum si aliquod desit non perficitur Sacramentum i. e. All these Sacraments are perfected by three things Viz. Things as the Matter Words as the Form and the Person of the Minister conferring the Sacrament with an Intention of doing what the Church doth if any of which be wanting the Sacrament is not perfected § 2. The Council of Trent in the year 1547. the 7th Session 11th Canon De Sacram. in genere saith thus Si quis dixerit in Ministris dum Sacramenta conficiunt conferunt non requiri intentionem saltem faciendi quod facit Ecclesia anathema sit i. e. If any one shall say That there is not required in the Ministers whilst they make and confer the Sacraments an Intention at least of doing what the Church doth let him be accursed Thus have we seen what these two Councils have said of the Point § 3. Secondly I am to shew in what Manner or under what Notion they require the Intention And here I doubt not to affirm That they require it as Necessary to the very Being of the Sacraments insomuch that though all the Externals according to Christ's Institution be exactly performed yet there is a Nullity in them if the Intention be a wanting The Council of Florence speaks clearly enough to this purpose making the Word Perfected equally respect Matter Form and Intention And consequently a Sacrament may as well be perfected without Matter or Form as without the Intention That is Not at all This the dullest eye may find by a review of the Citation § 4. I confess the Trent-Council only says The Intention is required not adding How far or in What manner it is so But that it means required as necessary to the Being of the Sacraments I prove by these Arguments § 5. 1. It will be granted me that the two Councils determining or declaring the very same Article must by their Words mean the very same thing And Nature teaches me to make the more plain Unfolded Words of the former a Commentary upon the more general infolded Words of this And then there can be no Orders or other Sacraments where there is not the requir'd Intention § 6. 2. I prove it from the Stile of the Trent-Council which makes the Word requiri required where-ever it is mentioned in her Canons to signifie required as of necessity to the thing it is applied to For instance in the 14th Session 9th Canon De Poen Sacram. we read thus If any one shall say That the Confession of the Penitent non requiri is not required in Order to the Priest's Absolving him let him be accursed Again in the 4th Canon thus If any one shall deny that Contrition Confession and Satisfaction requiri are required in the Penitent as the matter of the Sacrament of Penance c. let him be accursed And so the Word is used elsewhere And then the Sense runs thus As there can be no Absolution without Confession so there can be no Sacrament without the Intention §
proper Province did not gad so far out of their Way as to determine and decree mere unrevealed Natural Points such as this we have in hand § 7. To prevent mistakes I wot well there are several Points of Natural Knowledg revealed in Scripture which are therefore by accident become also Points of Faith And that if these were denied by any Body of Christian People Councils might congruously declare them But the Exteriour Intention is none of these and my Argument respects only such as this § 8. I add if your Councils might draw within their Sphear mere Points of Natural Knowledge like this I have insisted on Aristotle's Books might chance to be adopted into our Christian Creed which would look but odly Could such work rightly be done it would be worth a Council's while to make a Compleat Course of Infallible Philosophy to save much pains and endless wrangling in your Schools For if all such things were once defined a Roman Catholick could no longer question them § 9. But this onely upon Supposition your Councils have defined the Intention to be necessary to humane Acts. I for my part clear them from any such guilt But if you do Sir What means your Question § 10. It appears also That there is such an evident dependence of the Sacramental and all other humane Acts upon the Will or Intention that no Man of Sense ever did or can question it And therefore besides that the work were improper for a Synod of Divines it were altogether needless and fruitless to determine it it were to act without a Motive in my Opinion Those that would do This might at the next step be expected to decree it Necessary That all Lectors open their eye-lids when they read a Chapter and that all Preachers open their Mouths when they exhort the People Now Sir you must either joyn with me in loading your Councils with these absurdities or in concluding That it is not the Exterior Intention which is the Matter of their Decree and Canon § 11. But whatever you do Bellarmine will befriend all I have said on this Head. De Sacram. in gen l. 1. cap. 27. Neque tamen volumus à Concilio definitum id quod vult Catharinus Chemnitius vellet nimirum ut solum intendat Minister facere actum exteriorem quem Ecclesia facit id enim non erat opus definire cum à Nemine unquam negatum fuisset nec posset neg ari i. e. We mean not that That is defined by the Council which Catharinus means and which Chemnitius would have namely that the Minister should onely intend to do that Exterior Act which the Church doth For there was No Need of defining That in regard it hath never been denied by any body nor could be denied The Cardinal here declares 1. That the Council of Trent did not define the Intention we now speak of 2. That they had no Motive to do it forasmuch as none ever did or could deny it Whose Testimony shall shut up this Particular § 12. 2. I argue from the Nature of the Controversie between Papist and Protestant about the Intention Which cannot respect it in the present Sence of the Word there being no Protestant that I ever read or heard of who denies its necessity to the Act. None of us ever asserted that any Madman as such was fit to manage any Civil Concern much less Spiritual In this case then we could hardly contend because we concur in the Thing Or at least it would follow That the Learned men of both Parties quarrel not onely about Trifles but about just Nothing Which thing methinks a Romanist should be unwilling to impute however he judge of us to the wisest Men of his own Communion Hence then I conclude That it is a further Intention than this of the Act which the Roman Church requires And this breeds the Quarrel § 13. After all this Were it supposed that your Councils had stoop'd to that impertinent and needless work of defining the Necessity of the Exterior Intention You are not a-whit the safer except they had onely done that Had they done that and stopt there we could not possibly have inferr'd from thence That you were therefore uncertain of the Truth of your Sacraments But if they have required the Intention of the End which lies not open to humane perception you must still be liable to my charge And that it is such a One which they require I am to shew in the next place SECT V. The Intention defined That of the End required HAving already shew'd that the Intention of the Act is not that which is established in your Councils I apply my self to evince what it was that is I affirmed it was the Intention of the End or Effect of the Sacraments And I shall prove this according to my Method from the Learned Writers of the Roman Church Some of which assert the Thing expresly Others obliquely by putting or stating Cases from which a very mean Understanding cannot but infer the truth of what I have affirmed But before I produce them I think fit to premise these things 1. What Intention properly so called is According to the general consent of School men I may safely define it thus § 1. It is an Act or Motion of the Will tending to some End by or through some Mean or Means To this very purpose speaks Aquinas Gerson Gabriel Sylvester and Others The words of some of them I shall set down but need not English them the sense of them amounting to no more than the Definition now given Motus voluntatis qui fertur in finem secundum quod acquiritur per ea quaesunt ad finem vocatur Intentio saith Aquinas 1ª 1 ae q. 12. art 4. Est actus voluntatis in aliquem finem tendentis per aliquid vel aliqua ad illum finem ordinata saith Altenstaig from Gerson verb. Inten Intentio est motus voluntatis tendentis in finem per aliquod medium saith Sylvest verb. Inten Intentio propriè accepta est volitio finis assequendi per media saith Gabriel Biel Repert l. 2. dist 38. § 2. I note from hence That the mere Intention of the Act which took up our last Section is not Intention properly so called inasmuch as it came short of the End to which the Act was to serve as a Mean. I note also that the Minister then only properly intends whiles he celebrates the Sacraments when he wills the End of them considered generally or specially some way or other as attainable by the Use of the instituted Actions § 3. 2. I premise That if my Authors prove the Intention of the End to be required they also make out That the Intention of the Act only is not required Your question Sir is disjunctive Whether of the Act or the End. If I prove the latter I remove the former 3. I repeat my desire to have it kept in memory That the Sacraments faring all alike
with a respect to the Intention if my Authors shall under that Relation speak of any of them they as truly do it of all the rest Now to my Authority § 4. I begin with Gabriel Biel the clearness of whose words leaves no room for cavil * Ad veritatem Baptismi requiritur Intentio Ministri non tantum respectu Actus Baptizandi ut Objecti sed etiam respectu ejus ut Finis Termini l 4. dist 6. q. 1. To the truth of Baptism the Intention of the Minister is required not only in respect of the Act of Baptizing as its Object viz. as that which the Intention is only carried out to stops at or is terminated by but also in respect of its effect as its End and Term. This Author divides this conclusion into parts and presents Arguments for the proof of them But it would be superfluous to transcribe the whole He saith the Intention to do the Act is necessary but adds non sufficit that it is not sufficient And the Reason he gives amounts to this That though the Act of Baptism be done with Intention yet in several cases it may become fruitless and void there may be no Baptism notwithstanding that Act for want of another Intention viz. that which respects the End. Again our Author speaks clearly * Non sufficit Intentio exercendi Baptismum ut est talis Actus in Natura sed ut est signum ad certum finem institutum It sufficeth not that the Minister intends to Baptize as that is a Natural Act but as it is a Sign instituted to a certain End. § 5. Here note That none can use a Sign as such but he must have a respect to the thing signified to which the Sign as such hath an essential Relation and cannot be considered as a Sign without it So that all Sacraments being in genere Signi Signs as all the Roman Doctors do and must teach and the Ministers being required to exercise them as such as the cited place affirms the Intention according to them must not be terminated or rest in the Outward Act of the Sacraments but it must in some manner reach the Effect or End of them without which we see They are not made and conferred And hither to save time I refer Bellarmin's saying That the Action is to be done not as it is a certain Natural work but as it is a Sacred work | Sed utest opus Sacrum de Sacram l. 1. c. 27. which equally proves our point and is to be understood in the like manner § 6. Gabr. Biel writ in the time between the Two Councils and hath spoken fully and plainly to our purpose and his Seniors would assure us had we a mind to consult them that his Language was no novelty in the Roman Church Alexander Alensis * Intendere facere quod facit Ecclesia est intendere abluere exterius ut Deus abluat interius de Sacr. Bapt quaest 8. may serve to do this who is very liberal upon the same subject To Intend to do what the Church doth is to intend to wash outwardly to the end that God may wash inwardly He tells us the Sacramental Action est actio relata is a Relative Action and that which it relates to is the Action of God and collects unde intentio respicit utramque actionem that the Intention respects both the Actions as a Cause without which there cannot be a Sacrament Our Author hath here taught us by most transparent words That the Intention must of necessity be carried to the Action of God which is nothing else but the conferring of Sacramental Grace and this Grace is the End or Effect of the Sacraments Which was the Thing to be proved § 7. Guliel Parisiensis speaking of Orders cap. 5. asserts the mental Intention to be Essential to the Form of the Sacraments and that though the words be duly pronounced yet a contrary Intention evacuates and robs them of their meaning Again treating of Baptism cap. 2. he declares That vitious Ministers cannot deprive the Sacraments of their due Effects nor defraud the worthy Receivers of them but he doth it with this reserve That they strive not against them with a contrary Intention He implies All is nothing if that should happen § 8. Aquinas | Cum aliquis non intendit Sacramentum conferre par 3 q 64. art 10. makes the Action void When the Minister intends not to confer the Sacrament I grant he speaks a little before as if it were sufficient to intend the bare Action art 8. But besides the contradiction he would in that case be liable to the learned Romanists declare he meant no such thing I shall call two of them out to speak to this because I would not have so great a man to stand in my way § 9. Thus speaks Cardinal Cajetan upon the place * Non est intelligenda ut verba sonant puta quod non requiritur in Ministro Intentio proprie mentalis sed sufficit Intentio Ecclesiae per verba expressa quicquid intendit ipse Minister interius His mind is not to be understood as the words sound as if there was not required in the Minister an Intention properly Mental but the Intention of the Church expressed by the words would suffice whatever the Minister may intend in his mind § 10. | Vt Opinio illa salsissima est ita nullatenas est S. Thomae Requiâ—itur secunaum cum Intentio non solum ap licandi materiam formam sed ipsius effectus Dom. Soto shall make up the pair who was one of the most renowned Members of the Trent-Council As the Opinion that Intending to do the Act only is sufficient is a most false one so it is not at all S. Thomas 's For according to him there is required not only an Intention of applying the Matter and Form but of the Effect it self § 11. Aquinas's sense of the Article being fixt let us further observe Soto's judgment He delivers it a little before thus * Ea ratione Christu discipulos suos Sacramentorum Ministros sibi substituit ut sua ipsius Intentione bujusmodi obsequia perficerent Christ therefore substituted his Disciples to be Ministers of the Sacraments that they might perform such Offices with his very own Intention And he calls This an Intention like to that of God. Now it being plain that the gracious Ends or Effects of the Sacraments are intended by Christ he infers they are also to be Intended by his Ministers And this he all along makes Essential to a Sacrament § 12. I cannot forbear to recite what I meet with to this purpose in Altenstaig viz. That it is required to intend to exhibit the matter and words of the Sacraments | Tanquam ea quae ad certum effectum instituta sunt à Christo hoc est exhitere in fide Ecclesiae Verb. Sacram. as those
genere i. e. To the truth of the Sacrament there is not required such an Intention of the Minister as respects the effect of Baptism in special but it suffices to intend what the Church intends in the general § 5. De Burgo cap. 5.2 par having described the Intention in the like manner concludes thus Requiritur ergo generalis intentio ad minus c. i. e. There is a general Intention required at the least c. Which exactly jumps with the sense of the Trent definition But I need cite no more for This the Roman Doctors being generally of the same mind § 6. You ask again Whether the Intention required he Habitual Vertual or Actual To which my Answer must be the same your selves use to give viz. The Habitual is too short as being no more than one asleep may have The Actual through humane infirmity and wandring of thoughts may sometimes happen to be wanting in well-meaning Ministers and therefore is not necessarily required But the Vertual is necessary to the Sacraments § 7. By Vertual Roman Catholicks mean the force of the Actual Intention exerted a little before the doing of the Sacramental Action ex gr If a Bishop intends actually to make N. N. a Priest of Christ's Church or to do something to him which Christ or the Church hath appointed the Action of Ordination for or the like and goes to Church and attires himself c. for that purpose though while he applies the respective Matter and Form his mind happens to range out to some other Objects yet the Action done by vertue of the late Actual Intention hath those influences shed into it from the past Intention which suffice to perfect the Ordination § 8. I shall set forth Bellarmine's words to evince the point because they are short and clear de Sacram. in gen l. 1. c. 27. Non requiritur necessario actualis intentio nec sufficit habitualis sed virtualis requiritur sufficit quamvis danda sit opera ut actualis habeatur i. e. Actual Intention is not required necessarily nor is Habitual sufficient but a Virtual Intention is required and is sufficient although endeavours are to be used that the Actual may be had § 9. To him I shall joyn a Book which will outweigh ten thousand private Authors viz. the Mass-book of Pope Pius the 5th de defect c. num 7. Si intentio non sit actualis in ipsa Consecratione propter evagationem mentis sed Virtualis cum accedens ad Altare intendit facere quod facit Ecclesia conficitur Sacramentum etsi curare debet Sacerdos ut etiam actualem Intentionem abhibeat i. e. If there be not actual Intention in the very Consecration of the Eucharist by reason of the wandring out of the mind but a Virtual one when the Priest coming to the Altar intends to do what the Church doth the Sacrament is made although the Priest ought to take care that he also actually intend We conclude then that the Actual Intention is congruous but the Virtual is necessary and sufficient SECT VII Roman Catholicks not certain of their Priesthood taken in general by any simple or absolute Certainty Nor certain of it taken in special by any simple or so much as a Moral Certainty YOur last Question is What certainty I speak of in my Propositions when I deny the Roman Church to be certain She hath any true Priesthood whether it be Moral Metaphysical or Mathematical § 1. Here I must premise a distinction in Order to the clear resolution of your Question Your Priesthood may be considered either confusedly and in general as inherent or existing in some persons of your Church indeterminately consider'd as if it were said there are in the Roman Church some true Priests although it be not known that This or That individual person be such a one Or distinctly and in particular as inherent in These or Those persons determinately considered whose names may be told or their persons mark'd or pointed out As if it were said Father A. or B. is a true Priest § 2. Now for Answer I deny the Roman Church is simply or absolutely certain that she hath any true Priesthood in the first sense The Proposition is not evident by its own light to all that understand the Terms and therefore I deny that you have for it the certainty of Intelligence which is all one I suppose with that you call Metaphysical certainty Nor is it any Conclusion evidently deduced from first Principles and therefore I deny that you have for it the certainty of Science which is the same I suppose that you call Mathematical certainty If you make good your Priesthood either of these ways our understandings could not resist the evidence presented inasmuch as the Reason of our assent to first Principles is the clear immediate connexion of the Terms and the Reason of our assent to Scientifical Conclusions is the clear connexion of the Terms with an evident Medium But your men never pretended to prove this point either of these ways that I have heard of nor would I have said one word of this kind had not the Terms of your Question offered me the occasion However to accommodate my self to your thoughts so far as I can I will suppose You meant not to use those words Mathematical and Metaphysical in a proper sense but only in an allusive way to denote by them a simple Certainty equal to that of Intelligence or Science which you suppose to spring from a diverse root viz. Divine Revelation But then I must answer on as I have begun by denying that you have any Certainty of Faith for the Matter § 3. For the Proposition taken in the second Sense viz. That you have any Persons in your Church determinately or singularly considered as Father A. or B. who are true Priests I deny that you have for it either the absolute and infallible Certainty of Faith or so much as a Moral Certainty properly so called § 4. And here it will be as needful a piece of work as any I have yet done to prepare the Reader for making a sure judgment of what shall follow to open the Nature of Moral Certainty And because your Authors are sufficiently agreed about it it will not matter much which of them I call forth to describe it Let Cardinal Bellarmine be the Man who sets forth the Matter very distinctly Le justif lib. 3. cap. 2. He then as others do having divided Certainty into Evident and Obscure Certainty assigns three degrees to both of them Of the Evident he gives the first degree to first Principles the second to Science the third to Experience Of Obscure Certainty he gives the first degree to Divine Faith the second to Humane Faith the third to Opinion Having said this in a previous way I shall now produce what he says touching Moral Certainty Secundum gradum c. Those things saith he obtain the second degree of
and obliging my self to deal with you on that Head. This is what you declare for Fact. Now I confess were the case exactly such as you represent it I made but a very weak defence of our Church how freely soever I might strike at yours To argue that my Coin is current because my Neighbour cannot prove his to be so would be very inconcluding But what would not a man give for Faith in a Historian § 4. Sir You have said both too little and too much concerning your self and me 1. Too little For when you affirmed our Orders to be invalid in the judgment of Roman Catholicks I justified them by those of the Roman Church unto which our first Reformers were admitted And when you said the Nullity of our Orders proceeded from our forsaking the old Ordinal and from our giving power to the Ordained only to dispense the Word and Sacraments which said you any Deacon might do I shewed how you mistook the thing by taking the word dispense in too narrow a sense whereas it comprehends the whole duty of Gospel-Ministers and therefore the alteration was only verbal and not real This Fact I have set forth more particularly Part I. Sect. 1. whither I refer the Reader This Sir was a direct Answer to your Objection and consequently a perfect desence of our Priesthood against your assault Now I am sorry you should conceal not only the forenamed Relation I made to your Orders but also the Instance you gave and my Answer to it on purpose as much as I can gather from your words to make people believe I had nothing at all to say in behalf of our Ministry but deserted it at first view of your wretched Objection and requited you with a bare Recrimination Nay which is yet more gross that I used that as a Medium and my only Medium for the Vindication of our Church Your own Conscience besides the Testimony of our Auditors who were no Children can assure you that such was the Matter of your Objection and such the Matter of my Answer as is set down before § 5. 2. You have said too much in reporting that to invalidate our Orders you urged our sufficient discovery of our Intention not to do as the Church doth This Sir I am obliged to call pure fiction no such words being named but by me upon the Question now in hand after our slight skirmishes concerning the other were ended I could make your own Authors ridicule you about the very matter of your charge but I forbear lest you should take some light occasion from it to desert your less grateful POST What I quarrel is only your report and truly I would hope that some cares or troubles had blended your thoughts when you writ these things being loth to think there was much of Will in these Errors However I would as a friend advise you to be cautious hereafter of treating even your enemies at such a rate § 6. For the Second viz. the disadvantages you suppose me to ly under by some unlucky or unadvised proceedings on my part I know not well how to word it § 7. The first reputed disadvantage is my strange way of defending our Church by taxing yours Answer This is washt off already by detecting to speak softly your partial Relation of Fact. The Second is If we make you Uncertain of your own Priesthood you must be supposed to be at least Uncertain of Ours who contend to derive our Orders and Succession from you § 8. Answer 1. Pray What mortal harm is this to us who rest not for any thing of moment upon the sole judgment of the Roman Church 2. For our deriving our Orders from you we mean only this by it that our first Reformers received their Orders from Christ by the Ministry of such English Bishops as were in Communion with the Roman Church and these considered onely as Christian Bishops Which surely might be done and yet you may have embraced a Doctrine which till you discard it will render you uncertain that you have and consequently convey true Orders And whether that of the Intention be not such is to be the matter of the approaching tug between us and therefore is to be referred to its proper place 3. Your Nihil dat quod in se non habet seems quite besides our business which is not to scan whether you have none but whether you are uncertain of your having any Priesthood You may have and give without being certain of either whilst you hold to the Doctrine of the Intention The third is Though we pretend you to be Uncertain yet for your Comfort We are certain enough of the truth of your Priesthood and therefore never reordain c. § 9. Answer You are it seems grown wonderful kind upon a sudden in granting us to be certain enough of the truth of your Priesthood To be certain is a great Word Certain enough a greater And your Priesthood is a great Matter to be certain of You puzzle me to think How this should be For your great Writers allow not us you call Hereticks to understand Scripture or Fathers or Councils but appropriate all this to the Sons of your Church And then what Way is there left for us to arrive at this Certainty But I will take your Word for it and desire you to remember against another time that Protestants whilst such may be certain of Matters of no small moment in Religion But I should not I think build too much upon this concession because I have sometimes found a trick in things of this kind viz. Our judgment is good when we declare any thing in your Favour But when we charge you to the best of our judgments with any Errours We are very Idiots § 10. This is surprizing also that you build Comfort upon our Certainty of your Priesthood I had thought Roman Catholicks were so top ful of Comfort from their own Grounds that there was no room left for our supplying them but you have undeceived me here We add it seems to your stock Comfort is a precious thing and you ought henceforth instead of counting us a mere Offence to you to acknowledge us for your Benefactors § 11. But heark you If we be certain of the Thing which you grant and you chance to be uncertain how redound this to our disadvantage unless our perfection be reckoned against us as a Crime Or what is the Reason of your mentioning our Certainty here Is it that if we be certain you must be so too Non sequitur If one Man so hoodwink himself that he cannot rightly distinguish Objects relating either to himself or others may not he yet do both who keeps the muffle off his face This is the case You are hoodwink'd with the Doctrine of Intention as will be found anon but we are not so And till you put that off you will not be able to see any one man in your Church to be a true
rational stress can be laid on such Testimony § 11. 3. Were the Object of it self liable to common observation yet one witness is not sufficient to challenge our Credence God himself was pleased in the Old Testament * Deut 19.5 to intimate that a single witness was less credible than many and not to be trusted in matters of moment and our Blessed Saviour hath repeated it in the New ‖ Matth. 18.16 That in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be est ablished From whence we may estimate how slender a satisfaction the Bishop's word would give in that great concern if he should say I intended to do as the Church doth in my Ordaining such a person § 12. 4. As there can be no more but a single witness in the Case so he may reasonably be suspected to affirm on his own behalf or for his own Interests and if so which will appear shortly it will much lessen the value of his Testimony With a respect to This our Blessed Saviour said * John 5.31 If I bear witness of my self my witness is not true Gagneius's Gloss upon the Text may both illustrate and accommodate it to my Case ‖ loquitur ut purus homo hominis autem puri testimonium de se recipi non solct in 8. cap. Johannis Jesus speaks as a meer man and it is unusual to give credit to a meer man when he bears witness on his own behalf § 13. Now that any Bishop in the world may be a party concerned and therefore an incompetent witness in affirming he intended as the Church requires will be easily made appear If he be declared Anathema as he is by the Trent Council who denies the necessity of the Intention to the Sacraments sure no light punishment would be allotted to that Bishop who should discover that he defeated his Ordinations of their Efficacy by omitting to intend as the Church requires This crime is called Sacriledge by your Authors and it must be such in a high degree according to your Hypothesis it being beyond comparison more hainous to rob mens souls of Sacramental Grace than Churches of consecrated Cups or Patens Excommunication may be well supposed to be inflicted upon the Criminal Bishop which Censure is followed with suspension from Office and Benefit and with the loss of the priviledges of the Laws as your Authors teach ‖ See for this Card. Cajetan's Summuls verb. Excom At best shame and reproach will attend such a discovery on which account I find some of your Casuists shie of advising the Ministers of the Sacraments to reveal the matter when they have rendred them inessectual through their Not-intending or otherwise For example when a Priest hath given an invalid Absolution he must be cautious of making it known * Nè si poenitens admoneatur sequetur scandalum vel infamia Suarez tom 4. par 2. disp 32. Sect. 6. Left some scandal or infamy follow his revealing it to the Penitent But on the contrary he is obliged say they to make the defect known when it may be done without any great harm to himself and without scandal ‖ quando sine gravi nocumento ipseus confessoris sine seandalo seri potest ibid. But guilt is jealous of the harms sometimes subsequent to such discoveries and since the offender will be judge he will hardly think himself safe save in a deep concealment of such his faults and therefore will like those Authors best that furnish him with the best Evasions § 14. Thus have we found that the Bishop's confession of their Not-intending aright may expose them to loss or shame or both and sad experience tells us that many are more tender of their Riches and Reputation than of their Conscience and apt to sackisice Truth to their worldly welfare And therefore when a Bishop is askt how he intended in such an Ordination none knows but such respects may prevail with him to make an untrue Answer If he have wilfully offended in that point we may expect he will cloak his malice with a Lye if through gross carelesness he may studiously conceal it But suppose he hath done his duty his telling us so cannot prove it because it is but every way the same Answer they give who have transgress'd it § 15. The summ hereof is this There is hardly any thing alike between the two Things I have now compared There an object liable to the observation of many not so here There several Witnesses affirm here is only singularis testis There no personal interest makes the Testimony suspicious here the single witness deposeth for himself The Inference from hence is this There a strong Assent is founded here a weak one There is certainty here is none § 16. I add I am perswaded that Roman Catholicks seldom if ever actually have the slender security of the said single Testimony For I never heard in my Converse with them nor read in any of their Books that they use to ask their Ministers whether they Intend aright or no. They presume they do so and rest in that good natur'd belief without troubling them with such questions But we are to consider that a blind Perswasion and Intellectual certainty are far different things That is incident to all sorts of Hereticks This to the Orthodox only § 17. Now Sir if I am not a partial judge in my own Cause I have made it plain that the Ordaining Prelate's Intention cannot be known either by Reason or Authority than which I find no other grounds of certain Knowledge Which was the thing I undertook to prove SECT VI. Roman Catholicks have but a bare Opinion to secure them of the point § 1. IT now remains Sir that I only leave the Roman Catholicks that weak assent to the point usually termed Opination Had this been granted me at first viz. That you hold your Priesthood considered in particular by no other claim than that of bare Opinion as Opinion is opposed to moral certain Knowledge I had not taken the trouble of writing much but gone on immediately to infer from that Grant the crazy estate of your Church I shall briesly say upon What some of your great men found their Assent to the presence of the Ministers Intention and then evince that their Foundation will bear up no more than bare Opinion § 2. 1. It is the Probity of the Ministers of the Sacraments they rely on as a sufficient security that they intend aright Soto shall declare this for himself and others * Cum videmus homines probos uti forma Materia Ecclesiae credimus sanas etiam Christianâsque habere mentes dum Sacramenta ministrant in 4. Sent. dist 1. qu 5. art 8. When we see honest sincere vertuous men use the matter and form of the Church we also believe that they have sound and Christian minds while they administer the Sacraments 2. To shew what a small weight
absence Christ surely instituted his Sacraments for great Spiritual Ends which are as surely attained by the worthy partakers of them How deplorable then is the estate of the Roman Church since not one of its Members knows that in his whole life time he receives any One Sacrament this in general § 3. I will now infer more particularly from the Virtue of the Premisses already laid down and proved 1. Not one Member of your Church can without special Revelation which is excepted in the State of our Question be ascertained he had the Blessing of Christian Baptism which you hold to be a Sacrament necessary to all and without which your Trent Council saith There is no Salvation * Siquis dixcrit Baptismum non esse necessarium ad salutem Anathema sit Sess 7. c. 5. § 4. I know the Canon is generally interpreted thus An adult is Savable by Contrition and the desire of Baptism if the Minister chance to have robbed him of it by Not intending But behold the miseries he is yet liable to notwithstanding that 1. You cannot plead that such a one is capable of any Office purely relating to the Service of God's Church 2. nor that he is capable of the Benefits of any other Sacrament Sacraments as I said were appointed by Christ for great Blessings to his people as being not only signs but also instrumental causes of the Grace they signifie and therefore the next to the misery of wanting them it is most lamentable to be Uncertain whether or no a man indeed has them which is apparently the Case of all Roman Catholicks § 5. But if an Infant dye defrauded of the Baptizer's Intention and none can be assured that any particular one is not according to the current of your doctrin he is eternally shut out of the Kingdom of Heaven in as much as he is not capable of making up the defect by Contrition and desire of Baptism If there be no assurance had of the Baptizer's Intention there can be none had of the Child's Salvation according to your doctrin Which must make the Funerals of poor Babes far more bitter to their Christian Parents and Friends than they would be had they just grounds of security for their Reigning with Christ in Glory § 6. 2. No Roman Catholick is sure that after a Confession of sins made to his Priest he gains from him a true Sacramental Absolution As Baptism is with you necessary to all without exception for taking away Sin and for the infusion of Grace so is Penance necessary to all them that after Baptism have fallen into mortal sin and the effects of it are no less say you than Pardon and Reconciliation This is the only Plank to swim safe to shoar on after a moral Shipwrack without which all such sink down into the Abyss of Perdition Well the more necessary you esteem This to be and the more valuable its Effects the more comfort would proportionably fall to your share if you were sure you had it But on the contrary it will be your misery not to know you are inriched with that treasure When you have come to the Priest Contrite and opened all your sins to him without Reserve and are disposed to satisfie for all injuries done by you it is a mournful thing after all this to come away Uncertain of your being indeed Absolved for want of Knowledge that the Priest could Effectually and did Actually Intend to Release you of your sins Which is the sad case of every Roman Catholick § 7. 3. No Roman Catholick is certain that he at any time receives the Sacrament of the Eucharist Though you make not This altogether so necessary as you do Baptism and Penance yet you hold it to be matter of great advantage to the Soul. The Substantial Body of Christ you say is received there and with and by it Spiritual Nourishment whereby the Graces of the Spirit are sustained and increased and the Soul consequently made more vigorous for performing all Christian duty Now the more excellent the Effects of this Sacrament are known to be the greater comfort it is apt to yield to all that are certain they receive it and do this as they hope Worthily But on the contrary how doleful is it to be uncertain how great soever their preparations have been for it whether they at any time truly have it for want of Knowing that the Priest could Effectually and did Actually Intend to Consecrate without which the Elements remain Unsanctified and cannot be Vehicles of those Blessings designed by Christ to be communicated that way to the Soul. And yet this is the sad case of Roman Catholicks § 8. It remains that I add you are not only unhappy in not knowing This with respect to the foresaid Blessings to be received by it But also with respect to two great Duties as you count them to be done which depend upon the Consecration One is the Adoration of the Host the other the Offering it as a Sacrifice both for the quick and dead If your Church do both these on Uncertain grounds it will look a very sad thing And that she doth so will be inferred from what hath been already proved Consecration it self which alone can be supposed to support them being found to be an Uncertain thing That nothing may remain obscure touching these matters I shall take room enough to explain them For the First viz. Adoration of the Host The Trent-Council delivers this Doctrine to warrant the practice of it There is no place left for doubt but all the faithful of Christ may exhibite Adoration which is due to the true God to this most Holy Sacrament in their Veneration of it * Nullus dubitandi locus relinquitur quin omnes Christi fideles latriae cultum qui vero Dco debetur buic sanctissimo Sacramento in veneratione exhibcant Sess 13. cap. 5. And the Council there subjoins that the Custome was piously and religiously brought into the Church of Yearly setting a Day apart for carrying the Sacrament in Solemn Procession through frequented Ways and publick Places in order to its being Adored c. It is too well known to be insisted on that assoon as the Priest hath consecrated he pays to the Sacrament the Worship that belongeth to God alone and the People present upon the Usual Notice given them do the same And that in the most populous Towns of the Roman Communion when it is carried through the Streets to any Sick person under a Canopy all that meet it fall down and adore it § 9. I have said all this to evince that the Adoration spoken of hath not for its Object our Blessed Saviour considered as corporally present in Heaven but as present under the Species of Bread or Wine or both It is the Sacrament that is to be Adored your Council and practice tell us But now the Body is no Sacrament without the Species for there would be wanting in that case
Knowing without mentioning for some time any object of that Knowledge which you should have supplied thus I distinguish between Knowing of a Condition required to Ordination c. Then though you mention a Condition yet you do not keep to it but forthwith as it were forgetting it run from it to Priesthood it self that is you run away from the consideration of a Sacrament to the res Sacramenti Effect of it Your words are these Supposing the Roman Catholick Church makes Priestly Ordination to depend upon a Condition that no man living knows in the former way whether it be fulfill'd or no yet it doth not follow She must be Vncertain whether she hath any true Priesthood This is true if the Condition can be known to be fulfill'd any other way but it is impertinent in this place for it should have been thus said Yet it doth not follow she must be uncertain whether the said Condition be fulfill'd or no. Or if it may not be known that way yet it may be known another Here then is a manifest sliding from the Condition required to Ordination which I afterwards made to be the Ordainer's Intention to the Priesthood § 6. Now had I in my Reply grosly swallowed this Gulgeon and submitted my self to deal about the proof of the Roman Priesthood in an indefinite unlimited manner I must have lost my present Argument which precisely depends upon the incapacity of all men to know another man's Intention But know Sir your Answer is no Answer to me farther than you speak relatively to my Argument and though you seem willing to slink away from a Condition to Ordination to Priesthood the Effects of it which you would find some plausible way to maintain if you could shake off my Medium yet I will surely keep you to it It is an Argument ad hominem I grant but it will bite you sorely § 7. Here I shall take occasion to advertise the Reader that though an Argument ad hominem be in many cases less considerable yet in mine who argue against Roman Catholicks from their established doctrin it hath as much Virtue and Cogency against them as if I made my Inferences from the four Gospels or the Divine Epistles For they hold the voice of their Church in their Councils of Florence Trent c. to have the same Obligation upon Conscience that those Gospels and Epistles have If my deductions be good they must either grant the whole to their great loss or by denying the Principles I go upon loose and undo the whole frame of the Roman Church Other Churches that assume not Infallibility in such a case part only with a particular Tenet the rest of their frame standing as it did before but Roman Catholicks who attribute un errableness to their Church on which pretended ground their present Fabrick stands utterly ruin their whole Building if they grant their Councils to have been mistaken in any one Article they have defined for Faith. § 8. Now I come to the Matter your Words present us with for ascertaining the required Intention of your Ordaining Bishops considered I suppose you mean in general As your Words seem to run at first sight you lay down two Grounds for this 1. The Nature and End of Ordination in general 2. Deductions from other known Principles of the Roman Catholick Church I shall consider both these § 9. For the first I know indeed that every Institution sets forth the Nature of what is to be observed and the Ends they are appointed for are notified by the Institutor but I never learned that Institutions carry power in them to cause themselves to be observed The Churches named in the Revelation which long since perished these and others once had all Christian Institutions but in process of time lost or left them what proof then is the Nature and End of Ordination of its true Existence or due performance in the Roman Church But if you intended the Two I mentioned to be but one Ground-work by their conjunction so that the Sense is this The Nature and End of Ordination in general in Union or together with Deductions from other known Principles of the Roman Catholick Church c. I am well content as not being inclined to make any man's words howsoever put to signifie what their speaker or writer meant not And I confess some of your own words perswade me they look this way I shall therefore consider them together under the next particular § 10. For the second You tell of the Bishop's Intention to be Knowable by way of Deduction from some known Principles of the Roman Church grounded upon divine Revelation The Reader may mark you do not say This Knowledge is immediately deducible from divine Revelation but from some Principles grounded on it For ought I see by this you are not agreed to claim an Infallible certainty of the Intention of your Ordaining Bishops even considered in general that is that there are any at all in the Roman Church that exert the required Intention And yet without this we have found there is no Ordination and so no Priest nor any of those 5. Sacraments that you consent to say depend on the Priestly character or lastly that your Church is a true Church which yet is less than an Infallible Church Deductions are but the work of Reason and Reason is but a fallible Principle say many of you The dependence of all the links of this Chain hath been made good before save the last which is this where there is no true Priesthood there is no true Church Where there is no Infallible Certainty of the Being of a Priesthood there is is no Infallible Certainty of the Being of a Church To confirm this I need but say little Thomas Aquinas lays down this distinction A thing may two manner of ways be called necessary in respect of an End 1. When the End cannot be had without it as Meat is necessary to sustain man's life And this is simply necessary to an End. 2. When the End cannot so conveniently be obtained without it as a Horse is necessary for a journey But this is not simply necessary to an End. This being premised for the clearer Resolution of the Case in hand he adds There are three Sacraments necessary by the first way of Necessity two to particular persons viz. Baptism simply and absolutely and Penance upon supposition of mortal sin committed after Baptism But the Sacrament of Order is viz. simply necessary to the Church But other Sacraments are necessary by the second manner of necessity c. * Primo igitur modo necessitatis sunt tria Sacramenta necessaria duo quidem personae singulari baptismus quidem simpliciter absolutè poenitentia autem suppoposito peccato mortali post baptismum Sacramentum autem Ordinis est necessarium Ecclesie Sed secundo modo necessaria sunt alia Sacramenta c. Sum. Theol. par 3. q. 65. art 4. Nor have any
those things which your Councils require to the making your Institutions valid yet your work is done by saying We are the Catholick Church which God hath promised to preserve to the World's end and therefore all we require will be certainly performed though we cannot otherwise make it out You may also prove all your more speculative Doctrines had you a thousand more than you have by the same easie Method We are the onely Church you may say to which God hath promised his Spirit to lead us into all Truth and therefore our Articles cannot be false tho' we cannot otherwise prove them to be true § 17. If this be sufficient how imprudent have many of your Men been to spend their pains and health and time about evincing your particular Points to be founded on Revelation when a few general Words would have done it to rational Satisfaction Besides as Cart loads of Books on this supposition are unnecessarily written so the Readers of them are at unnecessary expence of Moneys in buying them and of labour in perusing them What an easie World should we have had if this your Method had all-along generally obtained To shorten the way to knowledge is a praise-worthy enterprize and to teach how to defend truth without care and trouble is a mighty thing Well You have shewed us an expedite Art of Controversie and such as may be taught even illiterate Plow-men in half an hours time And I leave it to the Reader to determine whether a Plowman of your Perswasion could have said less in this Matter than you have done We are the Onely Church c. § 18. However consider Sir This you use is but an accidental Argument and can bestead you no longer if any other Body of Christians shall please to call themselves the Catholick Church without offering the least proof of it Which is most apparently your case here The Donatists of old who appropriated to themselves the name of the Catholick Church might have easily quelled all Arguments brought against them at your rate of answering For the said name being arrogated and the premisses belonging to it all the rest will follow readily § 19. If you think to relieve your self by saying I am bound to accept any deductions you shall make from any of your Principles I reply no surely I was indeed to prove a Point from some of them and have I hope done it The more you speak of That I fear you expose your self the more to derision § 20. From the view of your Answer it will appear that though you called to me out of due time for the Explication of more than a few Terms yet you have not had the heart to explain one of them in your Answer neither what you mean by Intention nor what by Certainty nor any of the rest Instead of saying what is the particular nature of the Intention required by your Church you describe it no otherwise than thus Whatsoever Intention of the Prelates is by them believed as necessary Instead of telling us the particular nature of your knowledge of the Intention you only say I deny not that it may sufficiently be known You have no mind it seems to swim out of your depth it being a silly thing to court danger nor are you so hardy a Champion as to step a few paces out of your hold to meet an enemy being mindful enough of the old Proverb It is good sleeping in a whole skin Your frank opening your self this way might have led me if I had mistook any thing of yours to the true mark but could not have caused my digression from it and therefore though you were not bound in rigour further than to make your Answer apposite and useful to have done this yet it would have lookt brave and generous to have done it Whether others shall interpret your carriage in this kind to be due caution or no I shall not concern my self Nevertheless I must say this you knew the point must be beaten out at last and it had been manly to have contributed something towards it whereas he that knew not the particular Nature of the Subject before knows it but very little better by any help you give him in your Answer I hope the Reader will excuse me for staying a little too long here in recompence of the labour I have been at in the first part of this Tractate to make the state of the question plain to him § 20. Whatsoever shall become of any higher Certainty which you cannot challenge me to yield upon Principles you have hitherto barely beg'd without offering the least colour of proof for them you seem to have a mind to secure to your self a moral Certainty of the Intention of your Bishops in general Your words are these It is morally impossible that all the Prelates in the Roman Catholick Church should be so malicious as wilfully to have omitted any thing in Ordination which they believed to be Essential to it and which the Church requires as so supposing it possible for them to do it and not be discovered It is impossible for us to believe according to our Principles that they should all turn devils and conspire to damn the whole Church when withal they could propose no advantage at all to themselves by this but the clean contrary Thus you I Reply The Pillar you have placed here for supporting your moral certainty of the Intention is too weak to bear it up Which will appear by considering the following particulars § 21. 1. You say not It is impossible that any one or several or many of your Bishops should out of Malice withdraw the required Intention You only say It is morally impossible that all should turn devils and conspire to damn the whole Church § 22. 2. I say if Some may withhold their Intention through Malice which you deny not Others may upon other accounts omit it viz. for Unbelief culpable Ignorance gross Negligence natural Inadvertence c. I shall speak a little of some of these § 23. For Vnbelief It is Morally possible that some of your Bishops have internally or mentally embraced Paganism or Judaism notwithstanding their profession of the Christian Religion It is notorious that the Inquisitors of Heretical pravity in Roman Catholick kingdoms have often met with such men after they had many years lain hid under the disguise of the Christian profession and is it any way repugnant that the same Cloak which frequently covers Merchants and Gentlemen and others should cover Priests and Bishops also Now these disbelieving the virtue of all Christian Institutions and that of Ordination in particular nay judging them to be the devices of certain Politick men or the Off-spring of deluded Fancies may omit Intending in their Ordinations without designing to damn or otherwise hurt the Ordained party § 24. For Culpable Ignorance which the Schools call Antecedent It is morally possible that more than a few in your Church have in
a Visible Sign which is the Genus of a Sacrament This Point being fixt I come to ask What if there happen to be no true Consecration when the Exterior Sacramental Action is done which is a thing you all grant may happen § 10. Why the same Adoration is paid still upon a presumption of true Consecration If I ask again What is adored in that case It must be answered a Creature viz. the Bread is adored instead of God. And then this is in one sense or another Idolatry It follows also upon the same ground That when men are Uncertain whether there be true Consecration they are also uncertain whether they commit not Idolatry in such their Adorations Now I conclude that Roman Catholicks are at no time certain that they commit not Idolatry in Worshipping the Host I add God is very jealous of his Honour and Men should be tender of it too and therefore I would think they should have either simple Evidence or Revelation for the Divinity of the Object before they pay to it that greatest Tribute of Adoration But Roman Catholicks light far short of that Certainty of the matter and yet venture to adore hit or miss § 11. For the Second The Eucharist according to you is a proper Sacrifice That is the Body and Blood of Christ are by the Priest truly and properly offered to God in the Mass under the visible Species of Bread and Wine And this is a Propitiatory Sacrifice God being pleased with this Oblation grants to those for whom it is Offered Grace Repentance Remission of many and grievous Sins and Supplies for their several Necessities Nor doth this profit Men alive onely but after Death Thus your Church teaches I cannot but acknowledge that this Doctrine is believed among you for I find that most Men of Estates in your Communion do at their Death leave good round Sums of Mony to certain Priests who in consideration of it are to shorten their Benefactors stay in the acute pains of Purgatory by saying of Masses or Offering this Sacrifice in their behalf And if this Doctrine be true the Service done them is worth their Mony which cannot be better employed otherwise § 12. But if there be no Consecration made by those respective Priests who promise to help them by that Means there will be a great disappointment somewhere But I shall say no more of that However this I may say having laid down a Warrant for it that neither Priests nor People are certain that there will be a return of Masses for the Mony as not knowing whether they be true Priests and so intend how they will capable of turning the Bread and Wine into the Body and Blood of Christ which are the supposed Matter of that Sacrifice In this condition are all Roman Catholicks Thus Sir supposing for Argument-sake your Doctrin of Transubstantiation to be true though I profess it was never in my power to believe it the sundry things I have here alledged do nevertheless hold good against you § 13. 4. No Roman Catholick is sure that he ever partakes of your other Sacraments not yet particularly mentioned by me as Confirmation and extreme Unction as not knowing whether the Ministers of them could effectually and did actually Intend in the Administration of them Without which as I have often shewed there is no Sacrament Being almost weary of enlarging on particulars I have put these together Number and describe all the great Effects you can attribute to them and in any thing of this kind I will grant your Supposition for argument-sake as I have all along in these Papers and after you have done this you will find that no Roman Catholick is fure he shares in any one of them for the Reasons often alledged before Bishops Priests and all other Members of your Communion are wrapt up in an inextricable Uncertainty § 14. All I can honestly to the best of my Knowledge grant you according to your Principles laid down is this That the Ministers of Baptism know that those they have Baptized are partakers of that Sacrament I mean it only of Infants who could not put in a bar against the Efficacy of it But yet neither the said Ministers nor any other of your Body knows that himself was Baptized as not Knowing how he intended who Baptized him So that what I inferred stands firm viz. that not one of you knows that he doth or hath received any one of your Sacraments § 15. I advertise This is it which makes the difference in this respect between the Ministers of Baptism and those of your other Sacraments treated of before Those need no special character to qualifie them for that work Any man or woman whether Jew Heathen or Turk may Baptize with Effect provided they Intend to do what the Church doth according to your doctrin Whereas the Ministers of the other Sacraments Matrimony excepted must have special power and authority from Christ to Administer or else they Act in vain And though Matrimony depend not to speak your language on the Priestly character the parties Marrying being the proper Ministers of that Sacrament yet I cannot grant them the same Certitude with the Ministers of Baptism because Two must there Intend alike or nothing is done and neither of them can be sure judges save of their own respective Intention That they make a civil Contract to lead an individual life plainly appears when he saith I take thee for my Wife and she I take thee for my Husband But whether both parties also Intend to make those Words signifie the sacred Conjunction of Christ with his Church in a general or special Sense in a more distinct or confused and thereby to obtain Grace cannot appear to either party The man can be sure but for himself nor can the woman but for her self § 16. Here is to be noted when I make the Contracting parties Ministers of Matrimony I follow only the greater part of your Authors Where you vary I cannot represent you as agreed But for those that make a Priest the Minister of it they are not a whit the nearer Certainty because they know not his Intention Before I move forward I shall re-mind the Reader that the Inferences hitherto drawn speak forth misery to Roman Catholicks on these two grounds put together 1. There is no Sacramental Grace conveyed where there are no true Sacraments The Terms are essentially Relative 2. There is an equal Uncertainty of the Sacraments and of the fruits of them Now I say each Roman Catholick for ought he can know wants the Sacraments and by consequence their Effects and if he have them he yet wants the comfort of Knowing it Which makes the Roman Church in a sad condition Sir When you have considered what hath been already said I would commend a few Inferences more to the exercise of your thoughts § 17. 1. If none of you can know that any particular man in your Church is a