make to themselves posies of the weedings of that Garden into which Christ himself came down upon which both the north and south-winds do blow in which is a well of living waters and streams from Lebanon about which is an enclosure of brotherly affection Will you forsake the Rose of Sharon and the Lillie of the Vallies for such a Nose-gay For I shall make it apparent unto your Majesty that the Doctrines which Protestants now hold as in opposition unto us were but so many condemned heresies by the Antient and Orthodoxall Fathers of the Church and never opposed by any of them As for example Protestants hold that the Church may Erre this they had from the Donatists for which they were frequently reproved by St. Augustin Protestants deny unwritten traditions and urge Scripture onely This they had from the Arrians who were condemned for it by St. Epiphanius and S. Augustin both Protestants teach that Priests may Marry this they had from Vigilantius who is condemned for it by St. Hieronimus Protestants deny prayer for the dead this they had from Arrius for which he is condemned by Saint August and Epiphanius both Protestants deny Invocation of Saints this they had from Vigilantius for which he was condemned by Saint Hieron Protestants deny Reverence to Images this they had from Xenias for which he is reproved by Nicephorus Protestants deny the reall Presence this they had from the Carpenaites who were saith Saint Augustin the first Hereticks that denied the reall Presence and that Judas was the first Suborner and Maintainer of this heresie Protestants deny Confession of sins to a Priest so did the Novatian Hereticks and the Montanists for which they are reproved by Saint Ambrose and Saint Hieron Protestants say that they are justified by Faith onely this they had from the pseudo-Apostles for which they are comdemned by St. Augustin Lastly as I have shewed Your Majesty that Your Church as it stands in opposition to ours is but a congeries of so many heresies to which I could easily make an enlargement but that I fear I have been too tedious already So I shall make it appeare that our Church as she stands in opposition unto yours is true and right even your selves being witnesses and you shall find our Doctrine among your owne Doctors First the Greek Church whom you court to your side as indeed they are Protestants according to your vulgar reception being you call all those Protestants who are or were in any Opposition to the Church of Rome though in their Tenents otherwise they never so much doe disagree For the Greek Church with which you so often hit us in the teeth and take to be of your faction she holds Invocation of Saints Adoration of Images Transubstantiation Cōmunion in one kind for the sick and many others Master Parker confesseth that Luther crossed himselfe morning and evening and is never seene to be painted praying but before a Crucifix As touching the Invocation of Saints saith Luther I think with the whole Christian Church and hold that Saints are to be honoured by us and invocated I never denyed Purgatory saith Luther and yet I believe it as I have often written and confessed If it is lawfull saith Luther for the Jews to have the picture of Caesar upon their Coins much more is it lawfull for Christians to have in their Churches Crosses and Images of Mary and lastly he maintained the reall Presence But let us goe a little further and consider what they held whom ye call your Predecessours under whom ye shrowd your Visibility and on whom you look beyond Luther for your Doctrines Patronage viz. First upon the Hussites who brake forth about the year 1400. they held seven Sacraments Transubstantiation the Popes primacy and the Masse as Fox in his acts and monuments acknowledgeth Let us goe further and consider Wickliffe our owne Countrey-man who appeared about the year 1370. he maintained holy water worship of Reliques and Images Intercession of the blessed Virgin Mary the rites and Ceremonies of the Masse all the seven Sacraments Moreover he held Opinions contrary and condemned both by Catholick and Protestants as that if a Bishop or Priest be in any mortal sin his Ordaining Consecrating or Baptizing is of no effect He condemned lawfull Oaths with the Anabaptists Lastly he maintained that any Ecclesiasticall Ministers were not to have any temporall possessions This last Opinion was such savory Doctrine that rather then some of those times would not hearken to that they would listen to all as the greedy appetites to Bishops Lands make some now adayes to hearken unto any thing that Cryers downe of Bishops shall foment To goe further yet to the Waldenses descended from the race of one Waldo a Merchant of Lions who brake out about the year 1220. These men held the reall Presence for which they were reproved by Calvin These men extolled the merit of voluntary poverty they held Transubstantiation and many other opinions which most Protestants no way allow And lastly I shall run your pedegree to the radix and utmost Derivation that the best read Herauld in the Protestant Genealogy can run its linc and that is to the Waldenses and to Berengarius who broacht his heresie in the year 1048. and he held all the points of Doctrine that we held onely he differed from us in the point of Transubstantiation And for this cause they took him into the name and number of Protestants and Reformers notwithstanding he presently afterwards recanted and died a Catholick So it ends where it never had beginning Finally if neither prescription of 1600 years possession and continuance of our Churches Doctrine nor our evidence out of the word of God nor the Fathers witnessings to that evidence nor the Decrees of Councels nor your owne acknowledgments be sufficient to mollifie and turne your royall heart there is no more means left for truth or me but I must leave it to God in whose hand are the hearts of Kings AN ANSWER TO THE Marquesse of WORCESTER His Reply to the KINGS Paper YOur MAJESTY is pleased to wave all the Markes of the true Church and to make recourse unto the Scriptures Ans 1. His MAJESTY did not wave all the Markes of the true Church assigned by the Marquesse but shewed them to be such as may without distinction and further explication belong to a false Church From Ier. 44. 16. His MAJESTY shewed that Antiquity Succession and Universality was alledged in defence of Idolatry That Demetrius Acts 19. alledged Antiquity and Universality for the worship of Diana and that Symmachus alledged Antiquity as a plea for all heathenish Idolatry and Superstition page 47. That Ezechiel bids Be not stiff-necked as your fore-fathers were page Ibid. These words the place being not cited I confesse I cannot
believed crederem for credidissem the Gospel except the authority of the Church did move or had moved comoveret for commovisset me to it 364 365 c. The Contents of the Second Part of the Rejoynder 1 OF the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church of England Page 1 2 2 Of Luthers Doctrine 3 to 20 3 Zuinglius vindicated from that which by the way is charged upon him 19 4 Of Calvines Doctrine 20 to 35 5 Of Zuinglius his Doctrine 35 to 40 6 Of Melancthons Doctrine 40 41 42. 7 Of Andreas Musculus his Doctrine 42. and in the addition 8 Of the divisons that are among Protestants 42 9 Of that Unity which is among them of the Church of Rome 42 to 46 10 Of Crimes charged upon Protestants and the testimonies alledged for proof of them 46 11 Of Luthers conference with the Devil 46 47 48 12 Whether Zuinglius were an Authour of war and a disturber of peace c. 48 49 13 Beza cleared of a foul aspersion cast upon him 49 50 14 Of Luthers writing against King Henry 8. 50 51 15 Of the people of the reformed Churches whether they be so vitious and corrupt as they are censured 51 52 16 A vindication of Calvin in respect of vild aspersions cast upon him 53 54 17 Mantuans testimony concerning Rome and the corrupt estate of it 54 55 18 Whether the Doctrine of the Church of Rome be the the same still that it was at first 55 19 Of Prayers for the Dead 55 56 57 20 Of Lent-Fast 57 58 21 Of mingling Water with Wine in the Lords Supper 58 59 60 22 Of diverse ceremonies which the Church of Rome useth in Baptisme 60 61 23 Of the necessity of Infants Baptisme and whether they may be saved without it 61 62 63 24 Of the several Ecclesiastical Orders which they have in the Church of Rome 63 64 65 25 Of the Pope and his supremacy 65 66 67 26 Of service in an unknown tongue 67 68 69 27 Of Festivals 69 70 28 Of Reliques 70 71 29 Of Pictures and Images 71 to 77 30 Of the signe of the Crosse 77 31 Of Luther Husse and Wickliffe holding some errours and so others that oppose the Church of Rome 78 32 That some before Berengarius as namely Bertram did professedly impugne that reall presence of Christ in the Sacrament which they of the Church of Rome maintain 79 80 CERTAMEN RELI GIOSUM OR A CONFERENCE BETWEEN The late King of England and the late Lord Marquesse of Worcester concerning Religion at His Majesties being at Ragland-Castle 1646. Marquesse SIr I hope if they catch us in the act it will not be deemed in me an act of so high conspiracy in regard that I enter the lists leaning upon a Doctor of your own Church To whom the King replyed as merrily My Lord I know not whether I should have a better opinion of your Lordship for the Doctors sake or a worse opinion of the Doctor for your Lordships sake for though you leane much upon his arme yet he may lean more upon your judgment Marq. Sir it conduceth a little to the purpose we have in hand to be a little serious in the thing you speak of your Majesty knows the grounds of my acquaintance with the Doctor and my obligation to him which difference in opinion shall never mitigate in point of affection but I protest unto you I could never gain the least ground of him yet in perswading him from his principles King It may be your Lordship hopes to meet with a weaker Disputant of me Marq. Not so and if it please your Majesty but I think thus That if it should please God to make me so happy an instrument of his Churches good as to be a means to incline your royall heart to imbrace the truth I beleeve that he and thousands such as he would be soon brought to follow your Majesty in the right way who are so constant followers of your steps whilst you are in a wrong path the Oaths which they have taken the relation which their Hierarchy have to the Crown which must be no longer so but whilst the government of the Church and soules stand as a reserve to the regiment of lives and fortunes the preferment which they expect from your Majesty and the enjoyment of those preferments which they have already which they must no longer enjoy then whilst they are or seem to be of your opinion causeth them to smother their own knowledge whilst their mouths are stopt with interest whereas if the strong Tide of your Majesties opinion were but once turn'd all the ships in the river would soon turn head Hereupon the Marquesse fell abruptly from his subject and asked the King Sir I pray tell me what is it that you want The King smiled a little at his sudden breaking off and making such preposterous haste to aske that question answered King My Lord I want an Army can you help me to one Marq. Yes that I can and to such a one as should your Majesty commit your self to their fidelity you should be a Conquerour fight as often as you please King My Lord such an Army would do the businesse I pray let me have it Marq. What if your Majesty would not confide in it when it should be presented unto you King My Lord I would fain see it and as fain confide in that of which I had reason to be confident Marq. Take Gedeons three hundred men and let the rest be gone King Your Lordship speaks mystically will it please you to be plain a little Marq. Come I see I must come nearer to you Sir it is thus God expected a work to be done by your hands but you have not answered his expectation nor his mercy towards you when your enemies had more Cities and Garrisons then you had private families to take your part when they had more Cannons then you had Muskets when the people crouded to heap treasures against you whilst your Majesties friends were fain here and there to make a gathering for you when they had Navies at Sea whilst your Majesty had not so much as a Boat upon the River whilst the oddes in number against you was like a full crop against a gleaning then God wrought his miracle in making your gleaning bigger then their vintage he put the power into your hand and made you able to declare your self a true man to God and gratefull to your friends but like the man whom the Prophet makes mention of who bestowed great cost and paines upon his vincyard and at last it brought forth nothing but wilde grapes so when God had done all these things for You and expected that You should have given his Church some respit to their oppressions I heard say You made vows that if God blest You but that day with Victory You would not leave a Catholike in Your Army for which I feare the Lord is so angry with You that I am
light was gathered into the body of the Sun this body so glorious and comfortable is but the same light which was before we cannot make it another though it be otherwise And therefore though the Church and the Scripture like the light that is concomitant and precedent to the Sun be distinct in tearms yet they are but one and the same no man can see the Sun but by it's own light shut your eyes from this light and you cannot behold the body of the Sun Shut your eyes against one and you are blind in both he never had God to be his Father who had not the Church to be his Mother If you admit Sillogismes à priori you will meet with many paralogismes à posteriori cry downe the Churches Authoritie and pull out the Scriptures efficacie give but the Church the lie now and then and you shall have enough will tell you the Scripture is false here and there they who have set so little by the tradition of the Church have set by halfe the Scriptures and will at last throw all away wherefore in a word as to deny any part of the Scripture were to open a vein so to question any thing which the Church proposes is to teare the seamelesse Coat of Christ and to pierce his body King My Lord I see you are better provided with Arguments then I am with memorie to run through the series of your Discourse satisfie me but in one thing and I shall soone yeild to all that you have said and that is concerning this Catholick Church you talke of I know the creed tells us that we must believe it and Christ tells us that we must hear it but neither tell us that that is the Church of Rome Marq. Gratious Sir the creed tells us that it is the Catholick Church and Saint Paul tells us in his epistle to the Romans that their faith was spread abroad through the whole world King That was the Faith which the Romanes then believed which is nothing to the Roman Faith which is now believed Marq. The Roman Faith then and now are the same King I deny that my Lord. Marq. When did they alter their Faith King That requires a librarie Neither is it requisite that I tell you the time when if the envious man sowes his tares whilst the husband-man was asleep and afterwards he awakes and sees the tares are they not tares because the husband-man knowes not when they were sown Marq. And if it please Your Majestie in a thing that is so apparent your similitude holds good but the differences between us and the Protestants are not so without dispute as that it is yet granted by the major part of Christians that they are errours which we believe contrary to your Tenents and therefore the similitude holds not but I shall humbly intreat Your Majestie to consider the proofs which the learned Cardinal Peroone hath made concerning this particular in his answer to your Royall Father his Apologie to all Christian Princes where he proves how that all the Tenents which are in controversie now between you and us were practised in the Church of Christ within the first three hundred years wherefore I think it would be no injury to reason to require belief that that which hath been so long continued in the Church and so universally received and no time can be set down when those Tenents or Ceremonies did arise must needs be Catholick for time and place and Apostolicall for institution though we have no warrant from the Scriptures to believe them to be such For the Apostle Saint Paul commanded Timothy to keep fast the things which he had delivered unto him as well by word as by writ Wherefore if we will believe no tradition we may come at last to believe no writings King That was your owne fault wherefore I blame your Church for the way to make the Scriptures not believed were to adde unto them new inventions and say they were Scriptures Marq. If the Church of Christ had so mean esteeme then as amongst some she hath now certainly the former books received into her Canon would have been much prejudiced by the admittance of the latter wherefore if the Church be questionable then all is brought in question King My Lord you have not satisfied me where this Church is and as concerning the Cardinals book I have seen it and have read a part of it but doe not remember neither doe I believe that he hath prov'd that which you say Marq. It may be the proofes were in that part of the book which Your Majesty did not read and as for my proving the Roman Church to be this Church by which we should be all guided I thus shall doe my endeavour That Church whose Doctrine is most Catholick and universall must be the Catholick Church but the Roman Church is such Ergo. King My Lord I deny your Minor the Romane Church is not most universall the Grecian Church is far more spreading and if it were not it were no Argument for the Church of the Mahumetanes is larger then both Marq. First This is no Argument either for an English Man or a Protestant but for a Grecian or Mahumetane not for an English Man because he received his Conversion from Rome and therefore he in Reason should not look beyond Rome or the Doctrine that Rome practised then when they converted England nor for a Protestant because he is as far distant from the Grecian Church in matter of opinion as from the Romane and therefore he need not look for that which he hath no desire to find besides the Greek Church hath long agoe submitted to the Church of Rome and there is no reason that others should make Arguments for her who are not of her when she stands in no competition her selfe besides there is not in any place wherever the Greek Church is or hath beene planted where there are not Roman Catholicks but there are diverse Countreys in Christendome where there is not one Professour of the Greek Church neither is there a place in all the Turks Dominions where there are not Romane Catholicks nor in any part of the world where there are not multitudes of Romanes neither is there a Protestant Countrey in Christendome where there are not Romane Catholicks numberlesse but not a Protestant amongst the Natives neither of Spaine or Italy Shew me but one Protestant Countrey in the world who ever deserted the Romane Faith but they did it by Rebellion except England and there the King and the Bishops were the principall reformers I pray God they doe not both suffer for it Shew me but one reformed Church that is of the opinion of another aske an English Protestant where was your Religion before Luther and he will tell you of Hus and Jerom of Prague search for their Tenents and you shall find them as far different from the English Protestant as they are from one another run to the Waldenses for
else matters of that nature will never be determined which societie is there called the Church which Church we are to find King I pray my Lord what doe you meane by the holy Catholick Church doe you meane the Church of Rome Marq. I doe so King My thinks it should be inconsistent with it to be both universall and particular Marq. No more then it is inconsistent for the Generall of Your Army to be Generall of all Your Officers and Souldiers and yet a particular man By the word Roman we intend not the particular Church of Rome but all the Churches which adhere and are joyned in Communion with the Roman Church as by the Jewish Church was not onely meant the Church of Judah onely but of all the other Tribes which had Communion with her the word Catholick is taken in three severall sences formally casually and participatively In the first sence the Societie of all the true particular Churches united in one selfe-same Communion is called Catholick Casually the Roman Church is called Catholick for as much as she infuseth universalitie into all the whole body of the Catholick Church wherefore being a Center and beginning of Ecclesiasticall Communion infusing unitie which is the form of universalitie into the Catholick Church she may be called Catholick Participatively because particular Churches agree and participate in Doctrine and Communion with the Catholick King You have satisfied me why the Church of Rome in your sence may be called Catholick but you have not yet satisfied me why other Churches may not be called casually as much Catholick as she being the Greek Church hath infused as much universalitie into the whole body of the Catholick Church as she did and was both center and circumference as much as ever she was Marq. Sir as to this point I shall refer your Majestie to the learned reply that the profound Card. Peroon so respectfully and learnedly made to Your royall Father his Apologie wherein this point is largely and to my apprehension fully answered But will Your Majestie either give or take either let me shew you this Church or else doe Your Majestie shew it me King My Lord if you can shew it me I shall not shut mine eyes against it But at this time truly my Lord I can hardly hold them open My Lord I pray will you set downe your mind in writing and I will promise you it shall want no animadversion and that I will give you my clear opinion concerning it Marq. O Sir Literae scriptae manent I doe not like that what I speak hère to your Majestie I can promise my selfe so much from your goodnesse that no bad Construction shall be made of what I speak But if my writing should come into other folks hands I may justly fear their comments wherefore I desire to be excused King My Lord I hold it more convenient so to doe I will promise you that I will let no eyes but mine owne view your Paper and I will returne it to you againe by the Doctor Marq. Upon that Condition I am contented I have one request more unto your Majestie that You would make one Prayer to God to direct You in the right way and that You would lay aside all prejudice and selfe-interest and that You will not so much fear the Subject as the Superiour who is over all and then You cannot doe amisse King My Lord all this shall be done by the Grace of God Whereupon the Marquesse called upon me to help him so that he might kneel and being upon his knees he desired to kisse His Majesties hand which he did saying Sir I have not a thought in my heart that tends not to the service of my God and you and if I could have resisted this motion of his Spirit I had desisted long ago but I could not wherefore on both my knees I pray to his Divine Majestie that he will not be wanting to his owne Ordinance but will direct Your understanding to those things which shall make You a happy King upon Earth and a Saint in Heaven And thereupon he fell a weeping bidding me to light His Majestie to His Chamber As the King was going he said unto the Marquesse My Lord it is great pittie that you should be in the wrong Whereat the Marquesse soone replyed It is greater pittie that You should not be in the right The King said God direct us both The Marquesse said Amen Amen I pray God Thus they both parted and as I was lighting His Majestie to His Chamber His Majestie told me that he did not think to have found the old man so ready at it and that he believed he was a long time putting on his armour yet it was hardly proofe To which I made answer that I believe his Lordship had more reason to wonder how His Majestie so unprepared could withstand the on-set The King being brought to His door commanded me that before I brought him his Lordspips Paper I should peruse it and give him my opinion of it Which I promised to obey and so returned to the Marquesse whom I found in the dark upon his knees whom I did not disturbe but when he rose he said unto me Doctor I will tell you what I was doing I was giving God thanks that he had preserved the use of my memory for so good a work and imploring a blessing upon my endeavours To which I made answer My Lord no question but you think it a good work or else you would not implore Gods blessing upon it Whereupon my Lord said Ah! Doctor I would to God you thought so too And waiting upon him into his Chamber he further said unto me Doctor Bayly you know I am obliged not to speak unto you in this nature yet I hope I may say thus much unto you without any breach of promise you may be an Instrument of the greatest good that ever befell this Nation I say no more Good night to you The third day after he gave me this Paper to deliver unto His Majestie which I did The Marquesse his Paper to the King IT must be granted by all that there must be alwayes in the world one holy Catholick and Apostolique Church one that it may be uniforme holy that it may be certaine Catholick that it may be knowne and Apostolick that it may succeed this Church must be either the Romane or the Protestant or else some other that is opposite to both It cannot be any Church which is opposite to both because the Church of England did not when she separated from the Romane joyn her selfe to any not to the Grecian for that holds as many Doctrines contrary to the Church of England as doth the Roman nor to any else because she agrees with none no reformed Church under the Sun that is or ever was hath the same articles of beliefe as hath the Church of England And from any other Church besides the Romane she never had a being and with
Succession In the Cities of Judah and Jerusalem There is Universalitie so Demetrius urged Antiquity and Universality for his godde 〈…〉 viz. That her Temple should not be despised 〈…〉 Magnificence destroyed whom all Asia and the world worshipped So Symachus that wise Senator though a bitter enemie to the Christians Servanda est inquit tot seculis fides sequendi sunt nobis parentes qui feliciter sequuti sunt suos we must defend that Religion which hath worne out so many ages and follow our Fathers steps who have so happily followed theirs So Prudentius would have put back Christianity it selfe viz. Nunc dogma nobis Christianum nascitur post evolutos mille demum Consules Now the Christian Doctrine begins to spring up after the revolution of a thousand Consul-ships But Ezekiel reads us another lecture Ne obdurate cervices vestras ut patres vestri cedite manum Iehovae ingredimini sanctuarium ejus quod sanctificavit in seculum colite Iehovam Deum vestrum Be not stiff-necked as your fore fathers were resist not the mighty God enter into his Sactuary which he hath consecrated for ever and worship ye the Lord your God Radbodus King of Phrygia being about to be baptized asked the Bishop what was become of all his ancestors who were dead without being baptized The Bishop answered that they were all in hell whereupon the King suddenly withdrew himselfe from the font saying Ibi profecto me illis Comitem adjungam Thither will I go unto them no lesse wise are they who had rather erre with fathers and Councels then rectifie their understanding by the word of God and square their faith according to its rules Our Saviour Christ saith we must not so much hearken to what has been said by them of old time Mat. 21. 12. as to that which he shall tell you where Auditis dictum esse antiquis is exploded and Ego dico vobis is come in its place which of them all can attribute that credit to be given unto him as is to be given to Saint Paul Yet he would not have us to be followers of him more then he is a follower of Christ 1 Cor. 11. 1. Wherefore if you cry never so loud Sancta mater Ecclesia sancta mater Ecclesia the holy mother Church holy mother Church as of old they had nothing to say for themselves but Templum Domini Templum Domini the Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord we will cry as loud againe with the Prophet Quomodo facta est meretrix Urbs fidelis how is the faith full City become a harlot if you vaunt never so much of your Roman Catholick Church we can tell you out of Saint John that she is become the Synagogue of Sathan neither is it impossible but that the house of prayers may be made a Den of theeves you call us hereticks we answer you with Saint Paul Act. 24. 14. After the way which you call heresie so worship we the God of our fathers believing all things which were written in the Law and the Prophets I will grant you that all those marks which you have set downe are marks of the true Church and I will grant you more that they were belonging to the Church of Rome but then you must grant me thus much that they are as well belonging to any other Chucch who hold and maintaine that Doctrine which the Church of Rome then maintained when she wrought those conversions and not at all to her if she have changed her first love and fallen from her old principles for it will do her no good to keep possession of the keyes when the lock is changed now to try whether she hath done so or no there can be no better way then by searching the Scriptures for though I grant you that the Catholick Church is the White in that Butt of earth at which we all must aime yet the Scripture is the heart centre or peg in the midst of that white that holds it up from whence we must measure especially when we are all in the white We are all of us in gremio Ecclesiae so that controversies cannot be decided by the Catholick Church but by the Scriptures which is the thing by which the nearenesse unto truth must be decided for that which must determine truth must not be fallible but whether you mean the consent of Fathers or the decrees of generall Counsels they both have erred I discover no Fathers nakednesse but deplore their infirmities that we should not trust in armes of flesh Tertullian was a montanist Cyprian a rebaptist Origen an Anthropomorphist Heirom a Monoganist Nazianzen an Angelist Eusebius an Arrian Saint Augustine had written so many errors as occasioned the writing of a whole booke of retractations they have often times contradicted one another and sometimes themselves Now for generall Counsels Did not that Concilium Ariminense conclude for the Arrian heresie Did not that Concilium Ephesinum conclude for the Eutichian heresie Did not that Concilium Carthaginense conclude it not lawfull for Priests to marry Was not Athanasius condemned In concilio Tyrioi Was not Eiconolatria established In concilio Nicaeno secundo What should I say more when the Apostles themselves lesse obnoxious to error either in life or doctrine more to be preferred then any or all the world besides one of them betraies his Saviour another denies him all forsake him They thought Christs Kingdome to have been of this world and a promise onely unto the Jewes and not unto the Gentiles and this after the resurrection They wondered that the holy Ghost should fall upon the Gentiles Saint John twice worshipped the Angel and was rebuked for it Apoc. 22. 8. Saint Paul saw how Peter walked not uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel Gal. 2. 14. Not onely Peter but other of the Apostles were ignorant how the word of God was to be preached unto the Gentiles But who then shall rowl away the stone from the mouth of the monument Who shall expound the Scriptures to us one puls one way and another another by whom shall we be directed Scinditur incertum studia in contraria vulgus You that cry up the Fathers the Fathers so much shall hear how the Fathers doe tell us that the Scriptures are their owne interpreters Irenaeus who was scholler to Policarpus that was schollar to Saint Iohn lib. 3. cap. 12. thus saith Ostentiones quae sunt in Scriptur is non possunt ostendi nisi ex ipsis Scriptur is the evidences which are in Scripture cannot be manifested but out of the same Scripture Clemens Alexandrinus Nos ex ipsis de ipsis Scriptur is perfectè demonstrantes ex fide persuademus demonstrative Strom. li. 7. Out of the Scriptures themselves from the same Scriptures perfectly demonstrating doe we draw demonstrative perswasions from faith Crysost Sacra Scriptura seipsam exponit auditorem errare non sinit Basilius Magnus Quae ambiguè quae obscurè videntur
conversion so as to convert meer Infidels yet in the other kinde viz. in converting mis-believers they have done much This the Marquesse pag. 44. is pleased to call perversion rather then conversion but that must be judged by the consideration of the Doctrines held by Protestants As for those conversions wrought in the Indies by the Romanists we may well conceive that it was not so much the word preached by the Jesuits as the sword brandished by the Spaniards that did worke them Franciscus de Victoria a learned Writer among the Papists writing of the Indians saith he did not see that the Christian faith was so propounded and declared to them as that under the guilt of a new sin they were bound to embrace it He heard he sayes of no Miracles and Signes that were wrought nor of very good examples of life that were given but on the contrary of many scandalous acts and many impieties Whereupon he conceiveth that Christian religion was not so conveniently and properly preached to that barbarous people as that they were bound to acquiesce in it though he grants that there were many religious and other Ecclesiasticall men who both by life and example and also by diligent preaching did sufficiently doe their indeavour but that they were hindred by others who minded other matters Thus I have as briefly as I could gone over the markes which the Marquesse assigneth of the true Church and that because he saith that his Majesty did wave them all whereas indeed his Majesty did not wholly wave them though as his occasions would not suffer him to return any answer at all to the Marquesses reply so neither would they it's likely permit him to answer the former Paper so fully as otherwise he would have done Whereas the Marquesse saith that His Majesty is pleased to make recourse unto the Scriptures This is surely the course that all ought to follow that wil discusse matters of Religion they ought to have recourse to the Scriptures by which all such matters are to be tried and determined To the Law and to the testimony saith the Prophet Esay if they speake not according to this word it is because there is no light in them Augustine speaking of the Donatists bade let them shew their Church onely by the Canonicall bookes of the Scriptures professing that he would not have any to beleeve that he was in the true Church because of the commendation that Optatus Ambrose and many others did give of it And againe Let us not heare saith he Thus say I thus sayest thou but let us heare Thus saith the Lord. Let those things be removed out of the way which we alledge one against another otherwise then from the Bookes of Canonicall Scripture I will not have the holy Church demonstrated by humane tokens but by divine Oracles But saith the Marquesse What Heretick that ever was did not do so How shall the greatest Heretick in the World be confuted or censured if any man may be permitted to appeale to Scriptures margin'd with his own notes sens'd with his owne meaning and enlivened with his owne private spirit to what end were those markes so fully both by the Prophets the Apostles and our Saviour himselfe set down if we make no use of them Answ 1. Though Hereticks make recourse unto Scripture it follows not that therefore this is not the course which ought to be followed or that therefore they are Hereticks that doe it The Marquesse himselfe did make recourse unto Scripture in setting down the markes of the true Church and so also doth he in handling sundry points in controversie betwixt Papists and Protestants This course therefore himselfe being Judge is not to be condemned neither certainly is it however Hereticks may abuse it Though Hereticks will alledge Scripture in defence of their Heresics yet are they neverthelesse to be confuted by Scripture The Sadduces thought by Scripture to overthrow the resurrection yet by Scripture did our Saviour convince them Mat. 22. 23. 32. Yea when the Devill himselfe did cite Scripture our Saviour did not therefore dislike it but made use of it for the resisting of Satan and the repelling of his temptation Mat. 4. 6 7. 2. It 's true none may appeal to Scriptures margin'd with their own Notes sens'd with their own meaning and enliven'd with their own private spirit It 's to no purpose to alledge Scripture except that sense in which it is alledged may be made good by Scripture The Jewish Rabbin as Master Selden cites him saith well All interpretation of Scripture which is not grounded upon the Scripture is vaine But what this makes against his Majesties making recourse unto the Scriptures or against any mans taking that course in disputes of this nature I doe not see For that his Majesty did so make recourse unto Scripture the Marquesse doth not say neither ought any man to be charged in this kind except it can be proved that he is indeed guilty 3. It doth not yet appear that the particulars before mentioned viz. Universality Antiquity Visibility Succession of Pastours Unity in Doctrine and Conversion of Nations that these I say were set down either by our Saviour or his Apostles or the Prophets as marks of the True Church at least so as to make any thing for the Marquesses purpose viz. to prove the Church of Rome to be the True Church Your Majesty was pleased to urge the Errours of certain Fathers to the prejudice of their Authority Which I conceive would have been so had they been all Montanists Rebaptists all Anthropomorphists and all of them generally guilty of the faults wherewith they were soverally charged in the particulars seeing that when we produce a Father we doe not intend to produce a man in whose mouth was never found guile the infallibility being never attributed by us otherwise then unto the Church not unto particular Church men As your Majesty hath most excellently observed in the failings of the holy Apostles who erred after they had received the Holy Ghost in so ample manner But when they were all gathered together in Councell and could send about their Edicts with these Capitall Letters in the Front Visum est Sipritui Sancto nobis Act. 15. 28. then I hope your Majesty cannot say that it was possible for them to Erre So though the Fathers might erre in particulars yet those particular Errours would be swallowed up in a Generall Councell c. Here the Marquesse grants that the Fathers singly and severally considered may erre but not if gathered together in a generall Councell But first doth not this invalidate the authority of the Fathers when they are severally cited as they are in this Reply frequently by the Marquesse Indeed here presently after he addes Neither is a particular defection in any man any exception against his testimony except it be in the thing wherein he is deficient But certainly if a man be liable to
sayes a little after But though it had not been one halfe quarter of that time before the Israelites wanted water againe yet that is no argument why the Apostle speaking of the Rock that followed them should not meane a materiall and visible Rock for the materiall and visible Rock that is the water that flowed from it might follow the Israelites though but for while even so long as they encamped in Rephidim neither doth the Apostle say that it followed them either perpetually or for any long time but onely that it followed them But howsoever it be understood that the Rock followed them which I confesse is somewhat obscure how by the Rock there should be meant Christ as the efficient cause giving them water to drinke For to drinke of the Rock is there expressed in the same phrase as to drinke of the Cup 1 Cor. 11. 28. Neither I thinke can one in any congruity be said to drinke of a man that giveth him either water or any thing else to drinke but onely to drinke either of the liquour or metonymically of that wherein the liquour is contained Finally Bellarmine himselfe doth acknowledge that the materiall Rock which afforded the Israelites water to drinke was a figure of Christ and that the water proceeding from that Rock was a figure of Christs Blood onely he denies that so much is meant by the Apostle in those words they dranke of the spirituall Rock that followed them and that Rock was Christ But I demand then from what place of Scripture if not from those words of the Apostle can so much bee gathered Iansenius a learned Romanist is more candid and free then Bellarmine for expounding the Parable of the sower he saith that the word is as when it is said The seed is the word of God c. Luke 8. 11. is put for signifieth as also there where it is said And the Rock was Christ And so also say we when 't is said This is my Body the meaning is This doth signifie my Body or This is a Signe a Token a Seal a Pledge of my Body The Lord saith Austine doubted not to say This is my Body when he gave the Signe of his Body And again speaking of those words Except ye eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his Bloud ye have no life in you Ioh. 6. 53. he saith That Christ seemeth to command some hainous act or some grosse wickednesse And that therefore it is a figurative speech requiring us to communicate with the Lords sufferings and sweetly and profitably to keep in memory that his flesh was Crucified and wounded for us And yet again He that is at enmity with Christ saith he doth neither eat his Flesh nor drink his Bloud although to the condemnation of his presumption he daily receive the Sacrament of so great a thing as well as others These saying of Austin doe sufficiently shew how he understood those words This is my Body and how far he was from being of the now-Romane Faith concerning the presence of Christ in the Sacrament Indeed these very words This is my Body which our Adversaries pretend to make so much for them are most strong against them and enough to throw down Transubstantiation For Christ saying This is my Body what is meant by the word This They of the Church of Rome cannot agree about it but some say one thing some another only by no means they will have Bread to be meant by it For they very well know that so their Transubstantiation were quite overthrown But look into the Scripture and mind it well and see if any thing else but Bread can be meant by the word This. It 's said Mat. 26. 26. Iesus took Bread and blessed it brake it and gave it to the Disciples and said Take eat This is my Body What is here meant by the word This What is it that Christ calls his Body That which he bade the Disciples take and eate And what was that That which he gave unto them And what was that That which he brake And what was that That which he blessed And what was that That which he took And what was that Bread For so expresly the Evangelist tells us that Iesus took Bread So then it was Bread that Christ took and Bread that he blessed and Bread that he brake and Bread that he gave to the Disciples and Bread that he bade them take and eat and Bread of which he spake saying This is my Body As if he should say This Bread which I have taken and blessed and broken and given unto you to eat even this Bread is my Body Now the word This relating unto Bread the speech must needs be Figurative and cannot be Proper For properly Bread cannot be Christs Body Bread and Christs Body being things of diverse and different natures and so it being impossible that properly one should be the other As when Christ called Herod a Fox and the Pharisees Serpents and Vipers the speeches are not Proper but Figurative so is it when he called Bread his Body it being no more possible that Bread should be the Body of Christ in propriety of speech then that a man should properly be a Fox a Serpent a Viper Besides doth not the Apostle 1 Cor. 11. speaking of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper continually call it Bread even after Consecration Indeed to distinguish it from ordinary and common Bread he calls it This Bread but yet still Bread the same in substance though not the same in use as before And which is worthy to be observed thus the Apostle calls it viz. Bread when he sharply reproves the Corinthians for their unworthy receiving of the Sacrament setting before them the grievousnesse of the sin and the greatnesse of the danger that they did incur by it Now what had been more forcible and effectuall to this end than for the Apostle if he had been of the Romish Faith to have told them that now it was not Bread though it seemed unto them to be so but that the substance of the Bread was gone and instead thereof was come the very substance of Christs Body He saith indeed That whoso eat that Bread and drink the Cup of the Lord unworthily are guilty of the Body and Bloud of the Lord But that is because that Bread and that Cup i. e. the Wine in the Cup are by the Lords own institution Signes and Seales of the Lords Body and Bloud so that the unworthy receiving of them is an indignity done to the things signified by them But to return to the Marquesse he citeth sundry passages in Iohn 6. where our Saviour speakes of eating his flesh and drinking his blood calling himselfe Bread living Bread and affirming that his Flesh is meat indeed and his Blood drinke indeed But all this is farre from proving that reall presence of Christ in the Sacrament which the Marquesse doth contend for For 1.
and fully refuted by Andreas Rivetus in his Jesuita Vapulans where he produceth the very Records of that City where this is said to have been done and sheweth by the inquisition that was there made concerning Calvin it being the place where he was born that nothing is objected against him but only his falling off from the Roman Religion And thus I hope both Calvin and others are sufficiently vindicated and purged from those aspersions that are cast upon them Now if I had a minde to recriminate I might easily to use the Marquesse his words inlarge my Paper to a volume of instances in their Popes Cardinals Monks Friars Priests and Jesuites not to speak of their other sort of people of whose monstrous wickednesse their own Authors have largely testified But I like not Camarinam hanc movere to stir this puddle I le onely cite one Distich of Mantuan who was somewhat before Luther and is commended by Bellarmine as a learned and godly Poet and one that wrote much in commendation of the Saints but see what he writes in commendation of Rome where the Popes Holinesse as they stile him hath his Palace Vivere qui sanctè cupitis discedite Româ Omnia eum liceant non licet esse bonum That is Depart from Rome if holy you would be For there may be all things but Pietie Towards the end of the Reply the Marquesse goes about to prove That the Doctrine of the Church of Rome is the same still that it was at the first But 1. if all the testimonies were truly and pertinently alleadged yet are they not sufficient to evince what he asserteth not so much as one place of Scripture being produced for proof of any of those points on which he insisteth And therefore though those ancient Writers which are cited did indeed speak so much as is pretended yet there being no ground nor warrant for those things from the Scripture we may say in the words of our Saviour From the beginning it was not so 2. Most of the particulars which are mentioned I have spoken to before and have shewed that neither Scripture nor Fathers are on their side but both against them 3. And for some few points not touched before I shall briefly consider and examine what is objected The Marquesse saith That of old the Church did offer prayers for the dead both publike and private to the end to procure for them ease and rest c. Prayer for the dead as they of the Church of Rome do now use it is grounded upon Purgatory It is certain saith Bellarmine that the suffrages of the Church do not profit either the blessed or the damned but only those that are in Purgatory Now concerning Purgatory I have spoken enough before shewing that it hath no foundation in Scripture and also that the ancient Writers do give sufficient testimony against it That prayer for the dead therefore which the ancient Church did use was not such as the Church of Rome now useth It was not to deliver any out of Purgatory-pains which they were supposed to be in but to perfect and consummate their happinesse This may appear by Ambrose his praying for the Emrour Theodosius after he was dead He beleeved him to enjoy perpetuall light and tranquillity and to have obtained the reward of those things which he had done in the body yet he prayed for him but how That God would give him that perfect rest which he hath prepared for his Saints Ambrose also praied for the Emperor Valentinan after his death But did he thinke him to be in Purgatory No such matter He was perswaded that he was removed to a better estate that what he had sown upon earth he did then reap and that he did rest in the tranquillity of the Patriark Jacob. Yet he professeth that he would not cease to pray both for him and for his brother Gratian who was departed out of this life and as Ambrose believed translated into a better before him How doth he then pray for them Only thus That God would vouchsafe to raise them up with a speedy resurrection And thus the Church as it is in some ancient Liturgies used to pray unto God to remember all those that were departed in the hopes of the resurrection of life eternal The Marquesse cites Tertullian and Austine but besides that Tertulliun was faln into the heresie of Montanus when hee wrote that book which is cited as is noted by Pamelius and the book it selfe doth make manifest besides this I say Tertullian speaks of a womans praying for her deceased husband that he might have part in the first resurrection which savours of the opinion of the Chiliasts amongst whom he is reckoned by Hierome in his Catalogue of Ecolesiastical Writers where he speaks of Papias whom he notes as the first founder of that opinion As for Austine I have showed before that he was not resolved concerning Purgatory and therefore neither can any thing be concluded from about praying for the dead in that kind as they of the Roman Church do practise it After prayer for the dead the Marquesse speaks of the fast of Lent which he saith the Church anciently held for a custome not free but necessary and of Apostolical tradition and so to fast all the Fridayes in the year in memory of Christs death except Christmas-day fell on a Friday It is true Hierome as is alleadged speaks of a Fast of forty dayes which they used to observe and that according to the tradition of the Apostles But this tradition was very uncertain it seems and the observation of the Fast very various For Socrates an ancient Ecolesiastical historian records that somewhere they fasted three weeks before Easter somewhere six weeks and that in some places they began their Fast seven weeks before Easter but did fast only fifteen dayes not altogether but now one day now another And yet which he saith he wondred at all did call their Fast Quadragesimam A forty dayes Fast He sayes also moreover that they did not only thus differ in the number of dayes in which they fasted but also in the manner of their fasting For some as he relates did eat both fish and foul Some did abstain from egges and all fruit that is inclosed in a hard shell Some did eat nothing but dry bread Some not so much as that neither Some having fasted until the ninth houre three a clock in the afternoon ' did then use divers kindes of meats And he addes that seeing there is nothing in Scripture commanded concerning this matter it is manifest that the Apostles left it free to every one to do herein as he should think meet And the like also for the different manner of observing the Lent-fast in respect of the time hath Sozomen in his Ecclesiastical history who lived in the same time with the other viz. 440. years after
2. Albus an ater sis nescio Solet dici de homine vehementer ignoto Eras Adag cent 6. adag 99. Obj. Answ Obj. Answ Obj. * It is misprinted can damn us Answ Unde colligimus peccatum originale morbum quidem esse qui tamen per se culpabilis non est nec damnationis poenam inferre potest c. donec homo contagione hâc corruptus Legem Dei transgreditur quod tum demum fieri consuevit cum Legem sibi positam videt intelligit Zuingl de Bap. tom 2 fol. 90. Some endeavor to excuse Zuinglius in this but I see not how he can be excused Bellar. de amis grat stat peccat lib. 5. cap. 7. Bellar. de grat primi hom cap. 5. Quarè non magis differt status hominis post lapsum Adae à statu ejusdem in puris naturalibus quà m differt spoliatus à nudo Proinde corruptio naturae non ex alicujus doni naturalis carentiâ neque ex alicujus malae qualitatis accessu sed ex solâ doni supernaturalis ob Adae peccatum amissione perfluxit Bell. ibid. Bell. ibid. Obj. Answ Num tanti momenti res haec est ut tantas turbas dissidia propter hanc excitare conveniat etiamsi par vulorum haptismus nullis omnino Scripturarum testimoniis inniteretur externum quiddam est ceremoniale quo ut aliis rebus exterâ—is ecclesin dignè honestè uti potest veliidem hoc omittere rite tollere quatenus ipsi ad aedificationem salutem omnium facere videtur Zuingl de Baptis tom 2. fol. 96. Baptismum in Circumcisionis locum successisse abundè satis demonstratum est Zuingl ibid. fol. 95. Prohibere ne baptismi signum infantes accipiant quid aliud est quà m eosdem à Christo repellere Ibid. fol. 86. Obj. Answ Idex toto illo tractatu constat Zuinglium in eâ sententia fuisse regna omnia esse electiva nulla proprie successiva haereditaria in quo non negamus eum errasse in facto ut loquintut contrarium enim nobis certum est sed vivebat ille in republicâ in quâ regnonorum jura non satis expenderat Hoc igitur posito fundamento existimavit eos ad quos jus electionis pertinebar illud sibi etiam reservasse ut si Rex vel Princeps electus non staret juramento suo sed reÌ„pub pessum ire sineret tyrannicè gubernaret tum etiam possent talem Principem deponere c. Quid mirum si ita senserit Helvetius c. Rivet Jes vap cap. 13. sect 8. Obj. Answ Cum lex homini est data semper peccat cum contra legem facit quamvis nec sit nec vivat nec operetur nisi in Deo ex Deo per Deum Sed quod Deus operatur per hominem homini vitio vertitur non etiam Deo hic enim sub lege est lile liber c. Unum igitur atque idem facinuâ— puta adulterium aut homicidium quantum Dei authoris motoris ac impulsoris opus est crimen non est quantum autem hominis est crimen ac foelus est Ille enim lege non tenetur hic autem lege etiam damnatur Zuing. de Provid tom 1. fol. 365. Permitto coactum esse c. Zuing. ibid. p. 366. Of Melancthons Doctrine Pag. 85. Obj. Answ Locorum Theologicorum postrema Editio absoluta anno 1545. Locorum Theologicorum postremn Editio absoluta Wittembergae anno 1543. Obj. Answ Vidimus etiam multos qui usitatas leges connubiorum ideò negligebant quod leguntur dissimilia veterum exempla de polygamiâ de conjugiis Jacobi qui duas sorores duxit Non est autem exemplis sed legibus judicandum in hâc tantâ re considerentur praecepta divina Certissimum est legem conjugii primam ita sancitam esse ut unius maris unius foeminae conjunctio esset Filius Dei nos ad primam institutionem retrahit c. Melancth tom 1 fol. 339. Obj. Answ To this purpose doth the Marquesse himself cite Mr. Bancroft page 203. Of Andraeas Musculus his doctrine Page 86. Answ Pag. 86. c. The divisions of Protestants Page 87. Answ Sir Edward Sand's Europae Spec. p. 23. c. Of the unity that is in the Church of Rome Page 202. 203. Page 204. 205. Page 114. c. Paul and his writings censured by the Jesuits and others of the Church of Rome Reasoning about matter of Religion not suffered in the Church of Rome nor scarce to talk of it Bellarmine and such like Writers scarce to be found in Italy Page 87 c. In his Advertisement Of Luther's conference with the Devil Luth. de Missprivat unct sacerdot tom 7. fol. 228 c. Aug. Confess lib. 9. cap. 8. Verum quidem est quòd mendax sit sc diabolus sed ejus mendacia non sunt simplicis artficis sed longè callidiora instructiora ad fallendum quaÌ„ humanus animus assequi possit Ipse sic adoritur ut apprehendat aliquam solidam veritatem quae negari non potest atque eam adeò callidè astutè urget acuit adeò speciose fucat suum mendacium ut fallat vel cautissimos Uti cogitatio illa quae Judae cor percussit vera erat Tradidi sanguinem justum hoc Judas negare non poterat Sed hoc erat mendacium Ergo est desper andum de gratia Dei Et tamen diabolus hoc mendacium hanc cogitationem tam violenter ursit ut Judas eam vincere non posset sed desperaret Proinde bone frater domine Papista non mentitur Satan quando accusat aut urget magnitudinem peccati c. Sed ibi mentitur Satan quando ultra urget ut desperem de gratia c. Confessus quidem sum lege Dei convictus coram diabolo me peccasse me damnatum esse ut Judam Sed verto me ad Christum cum Petro c. Luth. loc citat fol. 230. Breerl. Apol. pag. 741. Quid tunc egisti Deus meus Unde curasti Unde sanasti Nonne protulisti durum acutum ex alterâ animâ convitium tanquam medicinale ferrum ex occultis provisionibus tuis uno ictu putredinem illam praecidisti Illa enim irata exagitare appetivit minorem dominam non sanare c. At tu Domine rector coelitum terrenorum ad usus tuos contorquens profunda torrentis fluxum seculorum ordinans turbulentum etiam de alterius animae in saniâ sanasti alteram Aug. Confess lib. 9. cap. 8. Pag. 88. Answ Zuinglius vindicated Hîc ergò nonnullorum infirmitate abusa adversariorum improbitas Zuinglium iniquissimum belli authorem violentum pacis publicae turbatorem fingit c. Duo itaque hîc nobis agenda veniunt primum quòd Zuinglius nec belli author fuerit nec violento gladio immanis barbari militis instar in aciem
any other Church besides the Romane she never had Communion She cannot be that one because she is but one nor Catholick because she agrees not with any nor Apostolick because she hath acknowledged such a fine and recovery that has quite cut off the entaile which would have otherwise descended unto her from the Apostles neither can she be holy because she is none of all the other three Now if these Attributes cannot belong unto the Protestant Religion and do clearly belong unto the Roman then is the Church of Rome the Catholick Church And that it doth I shall prove it by the marks which God Almighty hath given us whereby we should know her And the first is Universality All Nations shall flow unto her Esa 2. 2. And the Psalmist The heathen shall be thine inheritance and the uttermost part of the Earth for thy possession Psal 2. 2. And our Saviour Matth. 20. 14. This Gospell of the Kingdome shall be preached in all the world as a witnesse to all Nations c. Now I confesse that this glory is belonging to all Professors of the Christian Religion yet amongst all those who do professe the name of Christ I believe Your Majestie will consent with me herein that the Romane Church hath this forme of universality not onely above all different and distinct Professors of Religion but also beyond all Religions of the world Turkes or Heathens and that there is no place in the world where there are not Romance Catholicks which is manifestly wanting to all other Religions whatsoever Now I hope Your Majestie cannot say so of any Protestant Religion neither that Your Majestie will call all those who protest against the Church of Rome otherwise then Protestants but not Protestant Catholicks or Catholicks of the Protestant Religion being they are not religated within the same Communion and fellowships for then Religion would consist in protestation rather then unity in Nations falling off from one another rather then all Nations flowing to one another neither is it a Consideration altogether invalid that the Church of Rome hath kept possession of the name all along other reformed Churches leaving her in possession of the name and taking unto themselves new names according to their severall founders except the Church of England who is now her selfe become like a Chapter that is full of nothing else whose founder was such a one whose name it may be they were unwilling to owne For antiquity if we should inquire after the old paths which is the good way and walke therein as the Prophet Jeremiah adviseth us if we should take our Saviours rule Ab initio autem non fuit sic if we should observe his saying how the good seed was first sowed and then the tares If we should consider the pit from whence we were dug and the rock from whence we were hewen we shall find antiquity more applicatory to the Church of Rome then any Protestant Church But you will say your Religion is as ancient as ours having its procedure from Christ and his Apostles so say the Lutheran Protestants with their Doctrine of Consubstantiation and many other sorts of Protestants having other Tenents altogether contrary to what you hold how shall we reconcile you so say all hereticks that ever were how shall we confute them a part to set up themselmes against the whole and by the power of the sword to make themselves Judges in their owne causes is dealing that were it your case I am sure you would think it very hard I wish you may never find it so For Visibility Our Saviour compares his Church to a Citie placed on a hill according unto the Prophet Davids Prophesie a Tabernacle in the Sun It is likewise compared unto a candle in a candle-stick not under a bushell and saith our Saviour If they shall say unto you behold he is in the desart go ye not forth Behold he is in secret places believe it not forewarning us against obscure and invisible Congregations Now I beseech Your Majestie whether should I betake my selfe to a Church that was alwayes visible and gloriously eminent or to a Protestant Church that was never eminent and for the most part invisible shrowding their defection under an Apostolicall Expression of a woman in the Revelation who fled into the wildernesse for a thousand years as if an allegory could wipe out so many clear texts of Scripture as are set down by our Saviour and the Prophets concerning the Churches invisibility And I could not find any Church in the world to whom that Prophesie of Esay might more fitly appertain then to the Church of Rome I have set watch-men upon the walls which shall never hold their peace day nor night which I am sure no Protestant Church can apply to her selfe It is not enough to say I maintaine the same Faith and Religion which the Apostles taught and therefore I am of the true Church ancient and visible enough because as I have said before every heretick will say as much but if you cannot by these marks of the Church set down in Scripture clear your selves to be the true Church you vainly appeale to the Scriptures siding with you in any particular point for what can be more absurd then to appeale from Scripture setting things down clearly unto Scripture setting down things more obscurely There is no particular point of Doctrine in the holy Scripture so manifestly set downe as that concerning the Church and the Markes thereof nothing set down more copious and perspicuous then the visibility perpetuitie and amplitude of the Church So that Saint Augustin did not stick to say that the Scriptures were more clear about the Church then they were about Christ Let him answer for it He said so in his book de unitate Ecclesiae and this he said was the reason because God in his wisdome would have the Church to be described without any ambiguity that all Controversies about the Church may be clearly decided whereby questions about particular Doctrines may find determinations in her judgement and that Visibility might shew the way unto the most rude and ignorant and I know not any Church to whom it may more justly be attributed then to the Church of Rome whose Faith as in the beginning was spread through the whole world so all along and at this day it is generally known among all nations Next to this I prove the Catholick Church to be the Romane because a lawfull succession of Pastors is required in every true Church according to the Prophet Esay his Prophecie concerning her viz. My Spirit which is upon thee and the words which I have put into thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth nor out of the mouth of thy seed nor out of the mouth of thy seeds seed from henceforth for ever This succession I can find onely in the Church of Rome This succession they onely can prove nons else offering to go about it This succession Saint
Augustin sayes kept him in that Church viz. a succession of Priests from the very seat of Peter the Apostle to the present Bishop of his time And Optatus Milevitanus reckons all the Romane Bishops from Saint Peter to Syricius who then was Pope and by this he shewed and made it his Argument that the true Church was not with the Donatists bidding them to shew the originall of their Chayre this no Protestant did or ever can doe The Romane Church gave the English Bishops Commission to preach the Doctrine of Christ as they have delivered it unto them but they never gave them any Commission to preach against her Religion which Bishops being turned out for observing the depositum wherewith they were instructed and new Bishops chosen in their room by her who not contenting her selfe with being a nursing mother thereof must needs be head of the child and moderatrix in the same Church wherein by the Apostles precept she is forbidden to speak the succession was broke off the branch cut off from the body becoming no part of the tree fit for nothing but to be chopt into smaller pieces and so fitted for the fire this proofe of succession the Bishops of England thought so necessary for proving their Church to be the true Church that they affirmed themselves to be consecrated by Catholick Bishops their Predecessors which never proved argues the interruption and affirming it shews how that in their owne opinion the succession could not hold in the inferiour Ministers as indeed it cannot for as there is a continued supply of Embassadours in all places yet the succession is in the royall race so though all vacancies are replenished by Ministers of the Gospel yet the succession of the Authority was in the Bishops as descended to them from the Apostles according to our Saviours rule I will be with you alwayes unto the end of the world Which Affirmation of theirs argues that their calling is sufficient without it and in that they would faine derive it from the Church of Rome it argues that that is the true Church and yet they would forsake her supposing her to have errors when that Reformation it selfe was but a supposition for seeing they hold that their Church may erre they can be certain of nothing and whilst for errors sake they forsake the Church of Rome the Church of England in forsaking her may be in the greatest error of all where there is neither Succession nor assurance I must leave her to her selfe and your Majestie to judge Next I prove the Romane Church to be the true Church by her unity in Doctrine for so the Apostle Paul requires all the Churches children to be of one mind viz. I beseech you that all speak one thing Be ye knit together in one mind and one Judgement 1 Cor. 1. Endeavouring to keep the unitie of the Spirit in the bond of peace Ephes 4. 3. The multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul Act. 4. 32. Continue in one Spirit and one mind of one accord and one judgement Phil. 1. 27. Phil. 2. 2. So our Saviour prayeth that they may be one So Joseph forewarned his brethren that they should not fall out by the way knowing that whilst they were with him he could order them when they came to their father he could order them but having no head they should be apt to be dissentious This Unity I find no where but in the Church of Rome agreeing in all things which the Church of Rome hath determined for Doctrine whereas the Protestant Doctrine like the heresie of Simon Magus divided it selfe into severall Sects and to that of the Donatists which were cut into small threds in so much that among the many Religions which are lately sprung up and the sub sub sub-divisions under them each one pretending to be the true Protestant excluding the other and all of them together no more likely to be bound up in the bond of peace then a bundle of thornes can expect binding with a rope of sand In vaine is their excuse if non-disagreement in fundameatalls for they dis-agree amongst themselves about the Sacrament for the Lutherans hold Consubstantiation but the Church of England no such matter Some that Christ descended into hell others not The Church of England maintain their King to be the head of the Church The Helvetians will acknowledge no such matter the Presbyterians will acknowledge no such matter the Independent will acknowledge no such matter Concerning the Government of the Church by Bishops some Protestants maintaine it to be Jure Divino others to be Jure Ecclesiastico others no such matter Some think that the English translations of the Bible in some places takes away in other places addes and other some places changes the meaning of the holy Ghost and some think it no such matter or else the Bishops would not have recommended it unto the people Lastly they are so far from agreeing about the true meaning of the word of God that they cannot agree upon what is the word of God For Lutherans deny the second Epistle of Saint Peter the second and third Epistle of Saint John the Epistle to the Hebr. the Epistle of Saint James and Saint Jude and the Revelation The Calvinists and the Church of England no such matter they allow them And I believe that these are fundamentalls If they cannot agree upon their Principalls how shall they agree upon the deductions thence If these be not fundamentall points how come Protestants to fight against Protestants for the Protestants Religion The disagreement is not so amongst the Romane Catholicks for all points of the Romane Religion that have been defined by the Church in a generall Councell are agreed upon exactly by all nations tongues and people uibicunque terrarum but in those points which are not determined by the Church the Church leaves every man to abound in his owne sense and therefore all the heat that is either between the Thomists and the Scolists the Dominicans and the Jesuits either concerning the Conception of our blessed Lady or the concurrence of Grace and free-will c. being points wherein the Church hath not interposed her decrees is no more prejudicall or objectionall against the Church of Romes Unitie then the disputations in the Schools of our Universities are prejudiciall to the 39. Articles of the Church of England But in each severall Protestant Dominion there are certain severall Articles of beliefe belonging to severall Protestant Dominions in which severall agreements not any one agrees with any of all the rest neither is there any possibility they should being there is no means acknowledged nor power ordained whereby they should be gathered together in one councell whereby they might be of one heart and of one soule neither is there this Unitie in any one particular Dominion as is in the Dominion of the Roman Church for they are all in pieces amongst themselves even in
of witnesses to the divine truth and be no more prejudicicall to their generall determinations then so many exceptions are prejudiciall to a generall rule Neither is a particular defection in any man any exception against his testimony except it be in the thing wherein he is deficient for otherwise we should be of the nature of the flies who onely prey upon corruption leaving all the rest of the body that is whole unregarded Secondly Your Majesty taxes generall Councels for committing errors If Your Majesty would be pleased to search into the times wherein those Councels were called Your Majesty shall find that the Church was then under persecution and how that Arrian Emperours rather made Assemblies of Divines then called any Generall Councels and if we should suppose them to be generall and free Councels yet they could not be erroneous in any particular mans judgement untill a like generall Councell should have concluded the former to be erroneous except you will allow particulars to condemne generalls and private men the whole Church all generall Councels from the first unto the last that ever were or shall be makes but one Church and though in their intervals there be no session of persons yet there is perpetuall virtue in their decretals to which every man ought to appeale for judgement in point of controversie Now as it is a maxim in our law Nullum tempus occurrit regi so it is a maxim in divinity Nullum tempus occurrit deo Ubi deus est as he promised I will be with you alwaies unto the end of the world that is with his Church in directing her chief Officers in all their consultations relating either to the truth of her doctrine or the manner of her discipline wherefore if it should be granted that the Church had at any time determined amisse the Church cannot be said to have erred because you must not take the particular time for the Catholick Church because the Church is as well Catholick for time as territory except that you will make rectification an error For as in civil affairs if that we should take advantage of the Parliaments nulling former acts and thereupon conclude that we will be no more regulated by its lawes we should breed confusion in the Common-wealth for as they alter their laws upon experience of present inconveniences so the Councels change their decrees according to that further knowledge which the holy writ assures us shall encrease in the latter daies provided that this knowledge be improved by means approved of and not by every enthusiastick that shall oppose himselfe against the whole Church If I recall my own words it is no error but an avoidance of error so where the same power rectifies it selfe though some things formerly have been decreed amisse yet that cannot render the decrees of generall Councels not binding or incident to error quoad ad nos though in themselves and pro tempore they may be so As to Your Majesties objecting the errors of the holy Apostles and pen-men of the holy Ghost and Your inference thereupon viz. That truth is no where to be found but in holy Scripture under Your Majesties correction I take this to be the greatest argument against the private spirit urged by your Majesty its leading us into all truth that could possibly be found out For if such men as they indued with the holy Ghost inabled with the power of working miracles so sanctified in their callings and enlightened in their understandings could erre how can any man lesse qualified assume to himselfe a freedome from not erring by the assistance of a private spirit Lastly as to Your Majesties quotations of so many Fathers for the Scriptures easinesse and plainnesse to be understood If the Scriptures themselves doe tell us that they are hard to be understood so that the unlearned and unstable wrest them to their owne destruction 2 Peter 3. 16. and if the Scripture tells us that the Eunuch could not understand them except some man should guide him as Acts 8. 13. and if the Scripture tells us that Christs owne Disciples could not understand them untill Christ himselfe expounds them unto them as Luke 24 25. and if the Scriptures tell us how the Angel wept much because no man was able either in heaven or earth to open the Book sealed with seven seals nor to look upon it as Apoc. 5. 1. then certainly all these sayings of theirs are either to be set to the errata's that are behind their books or else we must look out some other meaning of their words then what Your Majesty hath inferr'd from thence as thus they were easie id est in aliquibus but not in omnibus locis or thus they were easie as to the attainment of particular salvation but not as to the generall cognisance of all the divine mystery therein contained requisite for the Churches understanding and by her alone and her consultations and discusments guided by an extraordinary and promised assistance onely to be found out of which as to every ordinary man this knowledge is not necessary so hereof he is not capable First we hold the reall presence you deny it we say his body is there you say there is nothing but bare bread we have Scripture for it Mat. 20. 26. Take eat this is my body so Luke 22. 19. This is my body which is given for you You say that the bread which we must eat in the Sacrament is but dead bread Christ saith that that bread is living bread you say how can this man give us his flesh to eat we say that that was the objection of Jews and Infidels 1 John 6. 25. not of Christians and believers you say it was spoken figuratively we say it was spoken really re vera or as we translate it indeed John 6. 55. But as the Jews did so doe ye First murmur that Christ should be bread John 6. 41. Secondly that that bread should be flesh Iohn 6. 52. And thirdly that that flesh should be meat indeed John 6. 55. untill at last you cry out with the unbelievers this is a hard saying who can heare it Iohn 6. 60. had this been but a figure certainly Christ would have removed the doubt when he saw them so offended at the reality John 6. 61. He would not have confirmed his saying in terminis with promise of a greater wonder John 6. 62. you may as well deny his incarnation his ascention and ask how could the man come down from heaven and goe up againe if incomprehensibility should be sufficient to occasion such scruples in your breasts and that which is worse then naught you have made our Saviours conclusion an argument against the premises for where our Saviour tels them thus to argue according unto flesh and bloud in these words the flesh profiteth nothing and that if they will be enlivened in their understanding they must have faith to believe it in these words it is the Spirit that quickneth
John 6. 63. They pervert our Saviours meaning into a contrary sense of their owne imagination viz. the flesh profiteth nothing that is to say Christs body is not in the Sacrament but in the Spirit that quickneth that is to say we must onely believe that Christ dyed for us but not that his body is there as if there were any need of so many inculcations pressures offences mis-believings of and in a thing that were no more but a bare memoriall of a thing being a thing nothing more usuall with the Israelites as the twelve stones which were erected as a sign of the children of Israels passing over Jordan That when your children shall ask their Fathers what is meant thereby then ye shall answer them c. Josh 4. there would not have been so much difficulty in the belief if there had not been more in the mysterie there would not have been so much offence taken at a memorandum nor so much stumbling at a figure The Fathers are of this opinion Saint Ignat. in Ep. ad Smir. Saint Justin Apol 2. ad Antonium Saint Cyprian Ser. 4. de lapsis Saint Ambr. lib. 4. de Sacram. Saint Remigius c. affirme the flesh of Christ to be in the Sacrament and the same flesh which the word of God took in the Virgins wombe Secondly We hold that there is in the Church an infallible rule for understanding of Scripture besides the Scripture it selfe this you deny this we have Scripture for as Rom. 12. 16. we must prophesie according to the rule of faith we are bid to walke according to this rule Gal. 6. 16. we must encrease our faith and preach the Gospel according to this rule 1 Cor. 10. 15. this rule of faith the holy Scriptures call a form of doctrine Romans 6. 17. a thing made ready to our hands 2. Cor. 10. 16. that we may not measure our selves by our selves 2 Cor. 10. 12. the depositions committed to the Churches trust 1 Tim. 6. 20. for avoiding of prophane and vain bablings and oppositions of sciences and by this rule of faith is not meant the holy Scriptures for that cannot do it as the Apostle tells us whilst there are unstable men who wrest this way and that way to their owne destruction but it is the tradition of the Church and her exposition as it is delivered from hand to hand as most plainly appears 2. Tim. 2. 2. viz. The things which thou hast heard of us not received in writing from me or others among many witnesses the same commit thou to faithfull men who shall be able to teach it to others also Of this opinion are the Fathers Saint Irenaeus 4. chap. 45. Tertul de praescr and Vincent lir in suo commentario saith It is very needfull in regard of so many errors proceeding from misinterpretations of Scripture that the line of propheticall and Apostolicall exposition should be directed according to the rule of Ecclesiasticall and Catholike sense and saith Tertullian prae script advers haeres chap. 11. We doe not admit our adversaries to dispute out of Scripture till they can shew who their Ancestors were and from whom they received the Scriptures for the ordinary course of Doctrine requires that the first question should be from whom and by whom and to whom the form of Christian Religion was delivered otherwise prescribing against him as a stranger for otherwise if a heathen should come by the Bible as the Eunuch came by the Prophesie of Esay and have no Philip to interpret it unto him he would find out a Religion rather according to his owne fancy then divine verity In matters of faith Christ bids us to observe and doe whatsoever they bid us who sit in Moses seat Mat. 22. 2. therefore surely there is something more to be observed then onely Scripture will you not as well believe what you hear Christ say as what ye hear his Ministers write you hear Christ when you hear them as well as you read Christ when you read his word He that heareth you heareth me Luke 10. 16. We say the Scriptures are not easie to be understood you say they are we have Scripture for it as is before manifested at large the Fathers say as much Saint Irenaeus lib. 2. chap. 47. Origen contr Cels and Saint Ambr. Epist 44. ad Constant calleth the Scripture a Sea and depth of propheticall riddles and Saint Hier. in praefat comment in Ephes and Saint Aug Epist 119. chap. 21. saith The things of holy Scripture which I know not are more then those that I know and Saint Denis Bishop of Corinth cited by Eusebius lib. 7. hist Eccless 20. saith of the Scriptures that the matter thereof was far more profound then his wit could reach We say that this Church cannot erre you say it can we have Scripture for what we say such Scripture that will tell you that fools cannot erre therein Esaiah 35. 8. such Scripture as will tell you if you neglect to hear it you shall be a heathen and a publican Mat. 18. 17. such Scripture as will tell you that this Church shall be unto Christ a glorious Church a Church that shall be without spot or wrinkle Ephesians 5. 27. such a Church as shall be enlivened for ever with his Spirit Isaiah 59. 21. The Fathers affirm the samme Saint Aug contra Crescon lib. 1. cap. 3. Saint Cypr Epist 55. ad Cornel. num 3. Saint Irenaeus lib. 3. chap. 4. Cum multis aliis We say the Church hath been alwaies visible you deny it we have the Scripture for it Mat. 5. 14 15. The light of the world a City upon a hill cannot be hid 2 Cor. 4. 3. Isaiah 22. The Fathers unanimously affirme the same Origen Hom 30. in Math That the Church is full of light even from the East to the West Saint Chrisost Hom 4. in 6. of Isaiah That it is easier for the Sun to be extinguished then the Church to be darkned Saint Aug tract in Joan calls them blind who doe not see so great a mountain and Saint Cypr de Unitate Ecclesiae We held the perpetuall universality of the Church and that the Church of Rome is such a Church you deny it we have Scripture for it Psal 2. 8. Rom. 1. 8. the Fathers affirm as much Saint Cypr ep 57. writing to Cornelius Pope of Rome saith whilst with you there is one mind and one voice the whole Church is confessed to be the Roman Church Saint Aug de unitate Eccles chap. 4. saith who so communicates not with the whole corps of Christendome certaine it is that they are not in the holy Catholike Church Saint Hier. in Apol. ad Ruffin saith that it is all one to say the Roman faith and the Catholick We hold the unity of the Church to be necessary in all points of faith you deny it the severall articles of your Protestant Churches deny it we have Scripture for it Eph. 4. 5. One Lord one Faith one
acknowledgment The Fathers are on our side Orig. Hom. 2. in Levit. S. Chrys lib. 3. de Sacerd. S. Aug. in speculo Ser. 215. de temp Vener Bed in 6. Marke and S. James and many others Thus most Sacred SIR we have no reason to wave the Scriptures umpirage so that you will hear it speak in the mother language and not produce it as a witnesse on your side when the producers tell us nothing but their owne meaning in a language unknowne to all the former ages and then tell us that she saith so and they will have it so because he that hath a Bible and a sword shall carry away the meaning from him that hath a Bible and ne're a sword nor is it more blasphemy to say that the Scripture is the Churches off spring because it is the word of God then it is for me to say I am the sonne of such a man because God made me instrumentally I am so and so was shee for as saith Saint Aug Evangelio non crederum nisi me Ecclesiae anthoritas commoveret I should not believe the Gospel it selfe unlesse I were moved by the authority of the Church There was a Church before there was a Scripture take which Testament you please We grant you that the Scripture is the Originall of all light yet we see light before we see the Sun and we know there was a light when there was no Sun the one is but the body of the other We grant you the Scriptures to be the Celestiall globe but we must not grant you that every one knows how to use it or that it is necessary or possible they should We grant that the Scripture is a light to our feet and a lanthorne to our paths then you must grant me that it is requisite that we have a guide or else we may lose our way in the light as well as in the darke We grant you that it is the food of our souls yet there must be some body that must divide or break the bread We grant you that it is the onely antidote against the infection of the Devil yet it is not every ones profession to be a compounder of the ingredients We grant your Majesty the Scripture to be the only sword and buckler to defend a Church from her Ghostly enemies yet I hope you will not have the glorious company of the Apostles and the goodly fellow ship of the Prophets to exclude the noble Army of Martyrs and the holy Church which through all the world doth acknowledge Christ wherefore having shewne Your Majestie how much the Scriptures are ours I shall now consider your opinions apart from us and see how they are yours and who sides with You in Your opinion besides Your selves and first I shall crave the boldnesse to begin with the Protestants of the Church of England The Church of England WHose Religion as it is in opposition to ours consists altogether in denying for what she affirms we affirme the same as the Reall presence the infallibility visibility universality and unity of the Church confession and remission of sins free-will and possibility of keeping the Commandments c. All these things you deny and you may as well deny the blessed Trinity for we have no such word in Scripture onely inference then that which ye have already denyed and for which we have plaine Scripture Fathers Councels practise of the Church that which ye hold positive in your Discipline is more erroneous then that which is negative in your Doctrine as your maintaining a woman to be head Supreame or Moderatrix in the Church who by the Apostles rule is not to speak in the Church or that a Lay-man may be so what Scripture or Fathers or custome have ye for this or that a Lay-man as your Lay-Chancellour should excommunicate and deliver up soules to Sathan Whereas matters of so weighty concernment as delivering of mens soules into the Devils hands should not be executed and upon mature deliberation and immergent occasions and not by any but those who have the undoubted Authority lest otherwise you make the Authority it selfe to be doubted of A strange Religion whose Ministers are denyed the power of remitting sins whilst Lay-men are admitted to the power of retaining them and that upon every ordinary occasion as non-payment of fees and the like Whereas such practises as these have rendred the rod of Aaron no more formidable then a reed shaken with the wind so that you have brought it to this that whilst such men as these were permitted to excommunicate for a threepeny matter the people made not a three-peny matter of their Excommunication The Church of Saxony NOw for the Church of Saxony you shall find Luther a man not only obtruding new Doctrine upon his Disciples without Scripture or contrary to Scripture but also Doctrine denying Scripture to be Scripture and vilipending those books of Scripture which were received into the Canon and acknowledged to be the word of God in all ages As The book of Eccles saying That it hath never a perfect sentence in it and that the Author thereof had neither boots nor spurs but rid upon a long stick or begging shooes as he did when he was a Fryar And the book of Job that the argument thereof is a meer fiction invented onely for the setting downe of a true and lively example of patience That it is a false opinion and to be abolished that there are four Gospels and that the Gospel of S. John is only true That the Epistle of S. James is contentious swelling dry strawy and unworthy an Apostolical spirit And that Moses in his writings shewes unpleasant stopped and angry lips in which the word of grace is not but of wrath death and sin He calls him a Goaler Executioner and a cruell Serjeant For his doctrine He holds a threefold Divinity or three kinds as there are three persons whereupon Zwinglius taxes him for maning three Gods or three Natures in the Divinity He himselfe is angry with the word Trinity calling it a humane invention and a thing that soundeth very coldly He justifies the Arrians and saith they did very well in expelling the word Homousion being a word that his soule hated He affirmed that Christ was from all eternity even according to his humane nature taxed for it by Zwing in these words how can Christ then be said to be borne of a woman He affirmes that as Christ dyed with great pain so he seeems to have sustained pains in Hell after death That the divinity of Christ suffered or else he were none of his Christ That if the humane nature should only suffer for him that Christ were but a Saviour of a vile account and had need himselfe of another Saviour Luther held not onely consubstantiation but also saith Hospinian that the body and bloud of Christ both is and may be found according
to the substance not only in the bread and wine of the Eucharist or in the hearts of the faithfull but also in all Creatures in fire water or in the rope and halter wherewith desperate persons hang themselves He averreth that the Ten Commandments belong not unto us for God did not lead us but the Jewes forth of Aegypt That faith except it be without even the least good works doth not justifie and is no faith Whereof you may see him condemned and cited by That we are equall in dignity and honour with Saint Paul Saint Peter or the blessed Virgin Mary or all the Saints That all the holinesse which they have used in fasting and prayer enduring labours chastising their bodies austerity and hardnesse of life may be daily performed by a hog or a dog That in absence of a Priest a woman or a boy or any Christian may absolve That they onely communicate worthily who have confused and erroneous consciences That a Priest especially in the new Testament is not made but borne not consecrated but created That the Sacrament were true though it were administred by the Devil See him baited for it by two of his fellow Protestants That among Christians no man can or ought to be a Magistrate but each one is to other equally subject and that among Christian men none is superiour save one and only Christ That the husband in case the wife refuse his bed may say unto her if thou wilt not another will if the Mistresse will not let the maid come That the Magistrates duty is to put such a wife to death and that if that the Magistrate omit to doe so the husband may imagine that his wife is stolne away by theeves and slaine and consider how to marry another That the adulterer may flie into another Country and if he cannot contain marry againe That Polygamy is no more abrogated then the rest of Moses Law and that it is free as being neither commanded nor forbidden That it is no more in his power to be without a woman then it is in his power to be no man and that it is more necessary then to eat drink purge or blow his nose I will give you the latine of another opinion of his because they are his owne words but not any of my english shall be accessary to the transportation of such a blast into my native language Perinde faciunt qui continenter vivere instituunt acsi qui excrementa vel lotium contra naturae impetum retinere velit Luther saith How can man prepare himselfe to good seeing it is not in his power to make his waies evill for God worketh the wicked work in the wicked But I pray you where have you this or any of all this in Scripture nay what Scripture have you for it that Scripture should be no Scripture as hitherto he hath made a great part of it and Zwingl almost all the rest denying all Pauls Epist to be sacred Zwing tom 2. fol. 10. What Councel what Fathers what primitive or sequent Church Usque ad ever taught or approved such doctrine as this and how are we cryed out upon for errors notwithstanding we have all for our Justification and yet this is the man that boasted that Christ was first published by him and by all of you that he was the first reformer this is he who calls himselfe a more excellent Doctor then all those who are in the papacy This is he who thus brags of himselfe viz. Dr. Martin Luther will have it so a Papist and an Asse are directly the same so is my will such is my command my will is my reason This is he that tells you I will have you to know that I will not hereafter vouchsafe you the honour as that I will suffer either you or the very Angels of heaven to judge of my doctrine c. Nor will I have my doctrine judged by any no not by the Angels themselves for I being certaine thereof will by it be judge both of you and the Angels And lastly this is he that gave the alarme to all Christendome of the errors idolatries superstitions and prophanenesse of the Church of Rome but what Scriptures have you for it that you should not belive the Scriptures what Fathers have you that you should not believe the Church what custome have you that you should not believe the Fathers rather then any private interpretation the promised holy Ghost alwaies ruling in the Church rather then the presumed private Spirit in any particular man The Church of Geneva NOw for the Church of Geneva Calvin comming after him is not contented to stop himselfe at Luthers bounds but he goes further and detracts not onely from the Scripture but from Christ and God himselfe For first He maintaines that three essences doe arise out of the holy Trinity That the Sonne hath his substance distinct from the Father and that he is a distinct God from the Father He teacheth that the Father can neither wholly nor by parts communicate his nature to Christ but must withall be deprived thereof himselfe He denies that the Sonne is begotten of the Fathers substance and essence affirming that he is God of himselfe not God of God He saies that that dream of the absolute power of God which the Schoolmen have brought in is execrable blasphemy He saith that where it is said that the Father is greater then I it hath been restrained to the humane nature of Christ but I doe not doubt to extend it to him as God and man He severeth the person of the Mediator from Christs divine person maintaining with Nestorius two persons in Christ the one humane and the other divine That Christs soule was subject to ignorance and that this was the onely difference betwixt us and him that our infirmities are of necessity and this was voluntary That it is evident that ignorance was common to Christ with the Angels And particulariseth wherein viz. that he knew not the day of Judgement Nor that the Fig-tree was barren which he cursed till he came near it He is not afraid to censure certaine words of Christ to be but a weak confutation of what he sought to refute And saies Christ seems here not to reason solidly He tells us that this similitude of Christ seemes to be harsh and farre fetch'd and a little after the similitude of sitting doth not hang together Where Christ inferred All things therefore whatsoever you will c. Calvin giveth it this glosse It is a superfluous or vaine illation This Metaphor of Christ is somewhat harsh He saith insomuch as Christ should promise from God a reward to fasting it was an improper speech He writeth of a saying of Christ that it seemes to be spoken improperly and absurdly in French
be unnaturall Subjects seditious troublesome and unquiet spirits members of Sathan enemies to the King and the Common-wealth of their owne native Country And lastly because your Church of England most followed Calvins doctrine of any of the rest I shall shew you what end he made answerable to his beginning and course of life written by two knowne and approved Protestant Authors viz. God in the rod of his fury visiting Calvin did horribly punish him before the fearfull hour of his unhappy death for he so struck this heretick with his mighty hand that being in despair and calling upon the Devill he gave up his wicked soule swearing cursing and blaspheming dying upon the disease of lyce and wormes increasing in a most loathsome ulcer about his privie parts so as none present could endure the stentch these things are objected unto Calvin in publick writing in which also horrible things are declared concerning his lasciviousnesse his sundry abominable vices and Sodomiticall lusts for which last he was by the Magistrate at Nayon under whom he lived branded on the shoulder with a hot borning iron And this is said of him by Schlusberg She which is likewise confirmed by Jo. Herennius It may be your Majestie may taxt me of bitternesse or for the discovery of nakednesse But I hope you will give me leave to look what staffe I leane upon when I am to looke down upon so great and terrible a precipice as Hell and to consider the rottennesse of the severall rounds of that ladder which is proposed to me for my ascent unto heaven and to forewarne others of the dangers I espie their owne words can be none of my railing nor their owne accusations my errour except it be a fault to take notice of what is published and make use of what I see Ex ore tuo was our Saviours rule and shall be mine There hath not been used one Catholick Author throughout the accusation and I take it to be the providenee of God that they should be thus infatuated as to accuse one another that good men may take heed how they rely upon such mens Judgements in order to their eternall Salvation As to Your Majesties Objection that we of the Church of Rome fell away from our selves and that you did not fall away from us as also to the common saying of all Protestants bidding us to returne to our selves and they will returne to us we accept of their offer we will doe so that is to say we will hold our selves to the same Doctrine which the Church of Rome held before she converted this Nation to Christianity and then they cannot say we fell away from them or from our selves whilst we maintaine the same Doctrine we held before you were of us that is to say whilst we maintain'd the same Doctrine that we maintained during the four first Councels acknowledged by most Protestants and during Saint August time concerning whom Luther himself acknowledged That after the sacred Scriptures there is no Doctor of the Church to be compared thereby excluding himself and all his associates from being preferr'd before him concerning whom Master Field of the Church writes that Saint Aug. was the greatest Father since the Apostles Concerning whom Covel writes that he did shine in learning above all that ever did or will appear Concerning whom Jewell appeals as to a true and Orthodox Doctor Concerning whom Mr. Forrester Non. Tessagraph calls him the Fathers Monarch And Concerning whom Gomer acknowledges his opinion to be most pure Concerning whom Master Whitaker doubts not but that he was a Protestant And lastly concerning whom your royall Father seemed to appeal when he objected unto Card. Peron That the face and exteriour form of the Church was changed since his time and far different to what it was in his dayes wherefore we will take a view of what it was then and see whether we lose or keep our ground and whether it be the same which you acknowledged then to be so firm Our Church believed then a true and reall presence and the orall manducation of the body of Christ in the Sacrament as the prince of the Sacramentarians acknowledged in these words from the time of S. Augustin which was for the space of twelve hundred yeares the opinion of corporall flesh had already got the mastery And in this quality she adored the Eucarist with outward gestures and adoration as the true and proper body of Christ Then the Church believed the body of Christ to be in the Sacrament even besides the time that it was in use And for this cause kept it after Consecration for Domesticall Communions to give to the sick to carry upon the Sea to send into far Provinces Then she believed that Communion under both kinds was not necessary for the sufficiency of participation but that all the body and all the bloud was taken in either kind And for this cause in Domesticall Communions in Communions for children for sick persons by Sea and at the hour of death it was distributed under one kind onely Then the Church believed that the Eucharist was a true full and intire sacrifice not onely Eucharisticall but propitiatory and offered it as well for the living as the dead The faithfull and devout people of the Church then made pilgrimages to the bodies of the Martyrs pray'd to the Martyrs to pray to God for them Celebrated their Feasts reverenced their Reliques in all honourable forms And when they had received help from God by the intercession of the said Martyrs they hung up in the Temples and upon the Altars erected to their memory images of those parts of their bodies that had been healed The Church then held the Apostolicall traditions to be equall to the Apostolicall writings and held for Apostolicall traditions all that the Church of Rome now embraceth under that Title She then offered prayers for the dead both publick and private to the end to procure for them ease and rest And held this custome as a thing necessary for the refreshment of their souls The Church then held the fast of the forty dayes of Lent for a custome not free but necessary and of Apostolicall tradition And out of the time of Pentecost fasted all the Frydayes in the year in memory of the death of Christ except Christmay-Day fell on a Fryday which she then excepted as an Apostolicall tradition The Church then held marriage after the vow of Virginity to be a sin and reputed those who married together after their vowes not onely for adulterers but also for incestuous persons The Church held then mingling of water with wine in the sacrifice of the Eucharist for a thing necessary and of Divine and Apostolicall tradition She held then exorcismes exsufflations and renunciations which are made in Batisme for sacred
Ceremonies and of Apostolicall tradition She held then besides Batisme and the Eucharist Confirmation Marriage Orders and extream Unction for true and proper Sacraments which the Church of Rome now acknowledgeth The Church in the Ceremonies of Baptisme used then oyl salt wax-lights exorcismes the signe of the Cross the word Ephata and other that accompany it none of them without reason and excellent signification The Church held then Baptisme for infants of absolute necessity and for this cause then permitted lay men to baptise in danger of death the Church used then holy water consecrated by certain words and Ceremonies and made use of it both for Baptisme and against inchantments and to make exorcismes and conjurations against evill spirits The Church held then divers degrees in the Ecclesiasticall Regiment to wit Bishops Priests Deacons Subdeacons the Acolite Exorcist Reader and Porter consesecrated and blessed them with divers Forms and Ceremonies And in the Episcopall Order acknowledged divers seats of Jurisdiction of positive right to wit Archbishops Primates Patriarchs and one Supereminent by Divine law which was the Pope without whom nothing could be decided appertaining to the universall Church and the want of whose presence either by himselfe or his Legats or his Confirmation made all Councels pretended to be universall unlawfull In the Church then the service was said throughout the East in Greek and throughout the West as well in Africa as in Europe in Latin although that in none of the provinces except in Italy and the Cities where the Romane Colonies resided the Latine tongue was understood by the common people She observed then the distinction of feasts and ordinary dayes the Distinction of Ecclesiasticall and lay habits the reverence of sacred vessels the custome of shaming and unction for the collation of orders the Ceremony of the Priest washing his hands at the Altar before the consecration of the Mysteries She then pronounced a part of the service at the Altar with a low voice made processions with the reliques of Martyrs kissed them carried them in clothes of silke and vessels of gold took and esteemed the dust from under their reliquaries accompanied the dead to their sepulchres with wax tapers in sign of joy for the certainty of their future resurrection The Church then had the picture of Christ and of his Saints both out of Churches and in them and upon the very Altars not to adore them with God like worship but by them to reverence the Souldiers and Champions of Christ The faithfull then used the sign of the Crosse in all their Conversations painted it on the portal of all the houses of the faithfull gave their blessing to the people with their hand by the signe of the Crosse imployed it to drive away evill spirits proposed in Jerusalem the very Crosse to be adored on good Friday Finally the Church held then that to the Catholick Church onely belongs the keeping of the Apostolicall tradition the Authority of interpretation of Scripture and the decision of Controversies of faith and that out of the succession of her communion of her Doctrine and her ministery there was neither Church nor Salvation Neither will I insist with you onely upon the word then but before and before and before that even to the first age of all will I shew you our doctrine of the reall presence and holy Sacrifice of the Masse Invocation of Saints Veneration of Reliques and Images Confession and Priestly absolution Purgatory and prayer for the dead Traditions c. In the fift Age or hundred of years Saint Augustine was for the reall and corporall presence In the fourth Age Saint Ambrose In the third Age Saint Cyprian In the second Age or hundred of years S. Irenaeus And in the first Age Saint Ignatius Martyr and Disciple of Saint John the Evangelist Concerning the honour and invocation of Saints In the fifth Age we find Saint Augustine praying to the Virgin Mary ond other Saints In the fourth Age we find Greg. Naz. praying to S. Basil the great In the third Age we find S. Origen praying to Father Abraham In the second Age Justin Martyr And in the first age in the Liturgy of S. James the lesse For the use and veneration of holy Reliques and Images and chiefly of the Holy Crosse in the fifth age Saint Augustine In the fourth Age Athanasius In the third Age Origen In the second Age St. Justin Martyr And in the first Age S. Ignatius Concerning Confession and Absolutions In the fifth Age S. August In the fourth Age S. Basil the Great In the third Age S. Cypr. In the second Age Tertull. And in the first Age S. Clement Now concerning Purgatory and Prayer for the dead in the fifth Age S. Augustin In the fourth Age S. Ambrose In the third Age S. Cypr. In the second Age Tertull. And in the first Age S. Clement e. Concerning Traditions in the fifth Age S. Aug. In the fourth Age S. Basil In the third Age S. Epiphanins In the second Age S. Irenaeus And in the first Age S. Dennis Now suppose that all these quotations be right The saving of a soul of your own soul of the soul of a King of the souls of so many Kingdoms and the gaining of that Kingdome for a reward which in comparison of these Earthly ones for which you so often fight so much strive and labour so much for to obtain your tetrarchate would be a gain for you to lose it so that you might but obtain that would be worth the search and when you have found them to be truly cited I dare trust your judgement that it will tell you that we have not changed our Countenance nor fled our Colours nor fallen away nor altered our Religion nor forsaken our first Love nor denyed our Principles nor brought Novelties into the Church but that we doe antiquum obtinere whereby we should be forsaken of you for forsaking our selves but rather that we should win you unto us by being still the same we were when we won you first unto us and were at the beginning And is it for the honour of the English Nation famous for the first Christian King and the first Christian Emperour to forsake her Mother Church so renowned for antiquity and to annex their Religion as a codicell to an appeal of a company of Protesters against a decree at Spira and to forsake so glorious a name as Catholick and to take a name upon them wherein they had neither right nor interest and then to take measure of the Scottish Discipline for the new fashion of their souls and to
those times saith that mountains and woods and lakes and Prisons and deep pits were more safe then Churches and publick places of Gods worship these being all possessed by the Arrians and the true beleeving Christians having onely the other to lurke and lie hid in How visible also was the Church like to be when that should be fulfilled which is written Revel 13. 15 16 17. that as many as would not worship the Beast should be killed And that all both great and small should be forced to receive a marke in their right hand or in their foreheads And that none should buy or sell save he that had the marke or the name of the Beast or the number of his name Bellarmine himselfe saith It is certaine that the persecution by Antichrist shall be most grievous and most notorious so that all publick ceremonies of Religion and Sacrifices shall cease And againe that in the time of Antichrist the publike service of the Church shall cease through the grievousnesse of persecution and that Antichrist shall interdict all divine worship c. 4. For Succession of Pastours which the Marquesse saith is required in a true Church and is onely to be found in the Church of Rome We must distinguish of Succession There is a succession of Persons and a succession of Doctrine the former succession without the latter is to no purpose The Priests that condemned Christ had a personal succession but that was worth nothing they wanting doctrinall succession They did personally succeed those that were before them and they others and so on till they came to Aaron but they could not shew the like succession of their doctrine So neither can they of the Church of Rome shew that they hold the same faith which was delivered by the Apostles and therefore though they can shew that their Popes doe personally succeed one another from the very times of the Apostles it availes nothing Bellarmine though he struggle a little about it yet cannot deny but that a succession of persons is to be found is the Greek Church and therefore grants that it doth not necessarily follow that where such succession is there is also a true Church Yea he saith that all those Patriarchall Churches had for a long time Bishops that were manifest Heretiques and that therefore the succession of ancient Pastours was interrupted What is this else but to confesse that a succession of Pastours without a succession of the true doctrine is no mark of a true Church The ancient Doctors of the Church t is true have sometimes used this argument drawne from succession to convince Heretiques but so as to shew that a succession of doctrine did concur with a succession of persons Yea they plainly shew that it was succession of doctrine which they did stand upon and that without this they made no account of the other We must adhere unto those saith Ireneus who keep the doctrine of the Apostles This succession of doctrine he calls the principall succession So Ambrose They doe not succeed Peter who have not the faith of Peter And Tertullian speaking of Heretiques saith Their doctrine being compared with the Apostles doctrine shewes that it was not received from the Apostles nor from any Apostolicall teachers And speaking of Churches planted since the Apostles times he saith That they agreeing in the same faith are neverthelesse accounted Apostolicall for the consanguinity of doctrine 5. For Unity in doctrine by which the Marquesse proves the Roman Church to be the true Church I answer that Unity without Verity will not prove it and the one is not alwayes necessarily accompanyed with the other The words of the Prophets declare good unto the King with one mouth said the messenger to Micaiah 1 King 22. 13. They were about foure hundred Prophets ver 6. and all of them did agree in one yet they prophecyed falsly for all that there was a lying spirit in the mouth of all those Prophets how unanimous soever they were ver 22. Neither is there such unity in the Church of Rome as is pretended The difference betwixt the Dominicans and the Jesuits about Gods decrees the concurrence of his grace and the determination of mans will this difference I say betwixt them is as great and as important as any I think that is amongst Protestants Neither doth it suffice to say as the Marquesse doth that the Church hath not determined any thing in these points and therefore such difference about them is not against the Churches unity For if the Popes authority be so great and his judgement so infallible as they pretend why hath he not decided the controversie and so put an end to the difference long ere this Besides which the Marquesse took no notice of they of the Romane Church differ much about the very head of it the Pope himselfe For some will have him to be above a generall councell others hold the councell to be above the Pope and this also was the determination both of the councell of Constance and of the councell of Basill Finally I grant that unity in the truth is much to be desired and so much the places cited by the Marquesse doe prove viz. 1 Cor. 1. 10. Eph. 4. 3. Acts 2. 42. Phil. 1. 27. 2. 2. yet we see that the Apostle doth acknowledge the Church of Corinth a true Church notwithstanding the differences and divisions that were in it so that all dis-union of people is not enough to dischurch them Neither if the confessions of the reformed Churches be considered as they ought to be wil the differences that are among them however particular persons be exorbitant be found so many and so great though too many and too great I grant as our adversaries of Rome would make them 6. And lastly for the conversion of Nations which the Marquesse also will have to be a marke of the true Church and thereby prove that the Church of Rome is it and not the Church of Protestants I answer that the Scriptures which hee alledgeth viz. Esay 49. 23. and 60. 16. and Psal 2. 8. doe shew indeed that in the time of the Gospell the Gentiles should be converted and joyned to the Church which the Scripture of the New Testament and experience also shewes to have been accomplished But they doe not shew either that every true Church must necessarily evidence it selfe to be a true Church by working a conversion in infidels or that every Church that doth worke any conversion in that kind must therefore be acknowledged to be a true Church The Scribes and Pharisees did make Proselytes and were very zealous in it yet neverthelesse were guilty of grosse errors which all were to beware of as most pernicious Mat. 23. 15. Besides there is a conversion as from unbeliefe to faith so from misbeliefe to a right and found faith And though Protestants have done little or nothing it may be in the former kinde of
his book against Berengarius speaks of some Copies of Ambrose his Workes wherein those words were not Ut sint quae erant that is That those things should be which were But no such Copies either Printed or Manuscript it seems did Bellarmine meet with for otherwise I doubt not he would have given us notice of them Again with the same Lanfrancus he answers that those words are thus to be understood that in respect of outward shew the things which were still are but are changed in respect of inward substance But how can a thing be said to be what it was when as there is no substance of the thing remaining but onely a shew and appearance of it In the last place Bellarmine addes of his own that Ambrose meant If Christ could make a thing of nothing why can he not make a thing of something not by annihilating the thing but by changing it into that which is better But if a thing be changed substantially into another thing how doth it remain what it was before But so the things doe that Ambrose speaks of For Bellarmines criticisme is poor in distinguishing betwixt Ut sint id quod erant That they should be that which they were and Ut sint quae erant That the things should be that were as if these words did not import that the same substances still remain as well as the other when Christ turned Water into Wine can we say that his Word was operative and powerfull Ut esset quod erat in aliud mutaretur That that should be which was and that withall it should be changed into another thing I confesse I cannot see how the thing may be said truly and properly to be which was if it be substantially changed into some other thing Ambrose there a little after saith Tu ipse eras sed eras vetus creatura posteaquam consecratus es nova creatura esse coepisti Thou thy self wast but thou wast an old creature after thou art consecrated thou beginnest to be a new creature which cannot be meant of any substantiall change in us Chap. 5. the same Ambrose if it were Ambrose for Bellarmine is not very confident that Ambrose was the Author of those Books De Sacramentis saith indeed That before it is Consecrated it is Bread but when the words of Christ are come it is the Body of Christ But that it is so the Body of Christ as to be no longer Bread he doth not affirme That he was of another mind appears by the words before alledged And so much also may be gathered from that which he saith in this same Chapter viz. He that did eat Manna dyed but whose eateth this Body shall have remission of sins and shall live for ever Which cannot be understood of a Corporall eating of Christs Body but of a Spirituall eating of it Bellarmine cites some other sayings of Ambrose out of another Work of his viz. De iis qui mysteriis initiantur but they prove no more than these already cited neither doth the Marquesse refer us to them Yea in that same work Ambrose doth sufficiently declare himselfe against Transubstantiation For there he saith It is truly the Sacrament of Christs Flesh And after Consecration the Body of Christ is signified And again It is not therefore Corporali food but Spirituall Whence also the Apostle saith of the Type of it that our Fathers did eat Spirituall meat and did drink Spirituall drink 1 Cor. 10. The last Author Remigius is onely cited by the Marquesse at large neither doe I find him cited by Bellarmine at all and therefore untill we have some particular place cited out of him it is in vain to trouble our selves about him besides that his Antiquity is not such as that his Authority should much be stood upon being 890 years after Christ as Bellarmine sheweth in his book of Ecclesiasticall Writers Secondly saith the Marquesse We hold that there is in the Church an infallible Rule for understanding of Scripture besides the Scripture it self This you deny this we have Scripture for as Rom. 12. 6. We must prophecy according to the Rule of Faith We are bid to walke according to this Rule Gal. 6. 16. We must encrease our Faith and preach the Gospell according to this Rule 2 Cor. 10. 15. This rule of Faith the Holy Scriptures call a forme of Doctrine Rom. 6. 17. a thing made ready to our hands 2 Cor. 10. 16. that we may not measure our selves by our selves 2 Cor. 10. 12. the depositions committed to the Churches trust 1 Tim. 6. 20. for avoiding of profane and vaine bablings and oppositions of sciences And by this rule of faith is not meant the Holy Scriptures for that cannot doe it as the Apostle tells us whilst there are unstable men who wrest this way and that way to their own destruction but it is the tradition of the Church as it is delivered from hand to hand as most plainly appears 2 Tim. 2. 2. The things which thou hast heard of us not received in writing from me or others among many witnesses the same commit thou to faithfull men who shall be able to teach it to others also That there is any infallible Rule for understanding of Scripture or any other rule of Faith besides the Scripture we do deny and that by authority of the Scripture it self To the law and to the testimony if they speak not according to this Word it is because they have no light in them Isai 8. 20. Search the Scriptures for in them yee thinke to have eternall life and they are they that testifie of mee Joh. 5. 39. These were more noble then they of Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readinesse of minde and searched the Scriptures whether those things were so Acts 17. 11. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for Doctrine for reproofe for correction for instruction in righteousnesse That the man of God may be perfect thoroughly furnished unto all good workes 2 Tim. 3. 16. 17. Neither doe those places alledged by the Marquesse make for the contrary We must prophesie according to the rule of Faith saith the Apostle Rom. 12. 6. as the Marquesse hath it following therein the Rhemists translation as also their comment upon the place But the word in the originall signifies rather proportion then rule And I see not but that by the proportion of saith may be understood the measure of saith which is spoken of vers 3. But be it granted that proportion of faith is as much as rule of faith where doth the Apostle say that this rule of faith is any other then the Scripture it selfe The places before cited shew that we are referred to the Scripture as the rule whereby all doctrines are to be tried but no where doe I finde that wee are referred to any unwritten tradition Sure I am our Adversaries can evince no such thing from
ascribing so much to the Church when as 't is well known contrary to what the Bishop of Rome and the Church generally did hold he held the re-baptizing of such as had been baptized by Heretikes Though Cyprian in this did erre yet his very erring in this shewes that hee thought the Church the generality of the visible Church not onely subject to error but indeed to have erred The last Father whom the Marquesse here mentioneth for though hee say cum multis aliis yet hee nameth no more is Irenaeus l. 3. c. 4. where he saith It is not meet to seeke the truth among others which it is easie to take of the Church seeing the Apostles did lay in it as in a rich depository all things that concerne truth that every one that will may out of it receive the drinke of life This indeed is gloriously spoken of the Church and not Hyperbolically neither yet doth it not amount to this that the Church cannot erre The holy Scriptures wherein all saving truth is contained are committed to the Church and the Doctine of salvation is ordinarily held forth in and by the Church but hence it doth not follow that the Church that is such as beare sway in it is not subject to error All that Irenaeus saith of the Church is no more if so much as that of the Apostle 1 Tim. 3. 15. that the Church is the pillar and ground of truth which place it may seeme strange that the Marquesse pretermitteth Bellarmine disputing this point brings in those words in the very first place to prove that the Church cannot erre And whereas Calvin answers that the Church is so styled by the Apostle because in it the Scriptures are preserved and preached he replies that thus the Church should rather be compared to a Chest then to a Pillar But this is a frivolous objection for the Church doth not keepe the truth close and secret as a thing is kept in a chest but so as to professe and publish it and therefore is compared to a Pillar to which a thing is fastned and so hangeth that all may see it But that those words of the Apostle do not infer an infallibility of the Church and an exemption from errour is cleare by this that he speakes of a particular visible Church namely the Church of Ephesus now that a particular visible Church may erre our Adversaries will not deny and that very Church of Ephesus there spoken of doth sufficiently demonstrate The Apostle therefore in those words doth rather shew the duty of the Church then the dignity of it rather what it should be then what it alwayes is As when it is said Mal. 2. 7. Labia sacerdotis custodient scientiam The Priests lips shall keep knowledge that is as our translations rightly render it should keepe So the Jesuite Ribera doth expound it shall keepe that is saith he ought to keep The Marquesse here comes againe to the visibility of the Church and some other particulars before handled That the Church is alwayes visible he proves by Mat. 5. 14 15. The light of the World a City upon a Hill cannot be hid But I have shewed before these words Yee are the light of the world to be meant of the Apostles who as their own Iansenius expounds it were a light unto the World by their preaching So also Theophylact They did not enlighten saith hee one Nation but the whole world And the words following A City set upon a Hill cannot be hid he shewes to have been spoken by way of instruction Christ saith hee doth instruct them to be carefull and accurate in the ordering of their life as being to be seene of all As if hee should say Doe not thinke that you shall lie hid in a corner no you shall be conspicuous And therefore see that yee live unblameably that so you may not give offence to others This exposition sutes well with the admonition given vers 16. Let your light so shine forth before men that they seeing your good workes may glorifie your Father which is in Heaven The Marquesse here further addes 2 Cor. 4. 3. Isai 22. I suppose it should be Isai 2. 2. Now the former of these two places is not to the purpose viz. to prove a perpetuall visibility of the Church For how can that be inferred from those words of the Apostle If our Gospell be hid it is hid to them that are lost The Apostle having said vers 2. by manifestation of the truth commending our selves to every mans conscience in the sight of God because as Oecumenius notes it might be objected that the truth was not made manifest unto all for that all did not believe to prevent this Objection the Apostle addes If our Gospell be hid c. As if hee should say It is not our fault as if the Gospell were not plainly enough preached by us but it is their own fault who perish through their owne blindnesse That Isai 2. 2. is more to the purpose though not enough neither It is said that in the last dayes the Mountaine of the Lords House shall be established in the top of the Mountaines and shall be exalted above the Hills and all Nations shall flow unto it The Prophet there sheweth by metaphoricall expressions taken from Mount Sion where the Temple stood that by the preaching of the Gospell the Church should be increased and exalted farre above what it was before This prophesie was fulfilled by the bringing in of the Gentiles but the Prophet doth not say that in the times of the Gospell the Church should alwayes be so conspicuous and visible Neither doe the Fathers here alledged by the Marquesse viz. Origen Chrysostome Austine and Cyprian speake of the perpetuall condition of the Church but onely as it was in their time I have proved before by Scriptures and Fathers and even by the acknowledgement of our Adversaries that the Church is not perpetually visible After the Visibility of the Church the Marquesse speaketh of the Universality of it saying that the universality of the Church is perpetuall and that the Church of Rome is such a Church For proofe hereof hee citeth Psal 2. 8. Rom. 1. 8. Now the former place shewes that Christ should have the heathen for his inheritance and the ends of the Earth for his possession and consequently that the Church should not be confined as it was in the time of the Law to one Country but should be extended farre and wide throughout the World This also hath been fulfilled and yet shall be but hence it doth not follow that the Church is alwayes so universally extended throughout the World but that sometimes errors and heresies doe so prevaile and overspread all that the truth in comparison can finde no roome See before page 2. The other place viz. Rom. 1. 8. testifies indeed that the Church of Rome was a true Church and famous throughout the World but neither doth
knoweth all things Well and Ambrose saith that Tears may suffice to procure pardon and therefore no necessity of any other Confession then what is made unto God only Thus also Hilary is clear for the sufficiency of Confession made onely unto God saying that David teacheth us to confesse only unto him who hath made the Olive fruitfull It 's true the Confession that David there viz. Psal 52. 9. speaks of is the Confession of Praise and of Thanksgiving but Hilary understands it of the confession of sins saying that David does not say I will confesse unto thee for ever and ever as immediately before he said I trust in the mercy of God for ever and ever but I will confesse unto thee for ever or whiles he lived in seculum because onely in the time of this life here are sinnes to be confessed So that however Hilary did mistake Davids meaning through the Ambiguity of the word Confitebor i. e. I will confesse or I will give thanks yet he clearly expresseth his own opinion that it is sufficient to confesse unto God only And this opinion was maintained by some in the Roman Church above a thousand years after Christ For Peter Lombard who was above 1100 years after Christ disputing this point touching Confession confesseth That some thought it sufficient to confesse onely unto God This Opinion was not accounted a Heresie by the Church of Rome it self untill the time of Pope Innocent the third about 1200 years after Christ when in the Councell of Lateran it was decreed necessary to confesse unto a Priest and not unto God only And therefore Bonaventure who lived a little after that Councell speaking of those who held it sufficient to confesse only unto God saith that if any now were of that opinion he were an Heretick because the contrary was determined in a Generall Councell but before that determination that Opinion was no Heresie Thus then we see by the acknowledgment of the Romish Doctors themselves that the necessity of Sacramentall Confession as they call it is not fetched either from Scriptures or Fathers but from Pope Innocent the Third and the Councell that was in his time To conclude this point touching Confession I will only adde one Argument for Confutation of the Romish Doctrine in this particular Such Confession as they of the Church of Rome require viz. a particular enumeration of all mortall sins with all their severall aggravating circumstances is not possible And therefore neither is it of divine institution Bellarmine answers that by this reason it is impossible to confesse unto God for that we hold that Confession made unto God must be intire not of some sins onely but of all And if we say that it is sufficient to confesse unto God all so farre forth as we can come to the knowledge of them adding that of David Psal 19. 13. Who can understand his errours Lord cleanse me from my secret faults Bellarmine saith that to confesse thus to a Priest doth suffice also But I say this answer will not satisfie for there is not the same reason of confessing unto God and of confessing to a Priest as they require it God knoweth all our sinnes before we confesse farre better then we our selves doe onely we are to confesse unto him to shew our selves humble and penitent But our Adversaries say that particular Confession must be made unto a Priest because otherwise he cannot tell how to judge so as either to remit sinnes or to retain them Now to this end it is not enough to confesse unto a Priest all that one can find out but it is necessary to confesse absolutely all that one is guilty of For otherwise how shall the Priest be able to judge of those sinnes which he knoweth not If he cannot judge of those sins which are confessed except they be confessed then neither can he judge of those sins which are not confessed because they are not confessed there is the same reason for the one as for the other If the Priest can judge of those sins that are not confessed by those that are confessed then may he also by hearing the confession of one or two sins judge of all the rest though no Confession be made of them Thus the Confession which our Adversaries contend for is either not possible or at least not necessary After Confession the Marquesse comes to workes of Supererogation which they say a man may doe viz. good works more excellent then those which the Law of God doth require And that a man may doe such workes the Marquesse proves by Mat. 19. 12. There be eunuches that have made themselves eunuches for the Kingdome of Heaven he that is able to receive it let him receive it This the Marquesse saith is more then a Commandement as S. Aug. observes upon the place Ser. lib. de temp it should be Serm. 61. de temp for of precepts it is not said Keep them who is able but keep them absolutely I answer it is true of generall precepts such as concern all they are to be kept absolutely by all but for speciall precepts which concern only some they are only to be kept by those whom they do concern And so those words He that is able to receive it let him receive it are a precept but limited and restrained viz. unto some certain persons who otherwise can without inconvenience live a single life they are required to doe it not as a thing simply necessary but as necessary for them not as a thing wherein perfection doth consist but as a means whereby the better to draw towards perfection viz. To serve the Lord without distraction 1 Cor. 7. 35. Neither doe the Fathers whom the Marquesse citeth hold any such works of Supererogation as the Romanists plead for viz. works more excellent and perfect then those which the Law of God prescribeth Ambrose seemes to speake more then the rest and therefore it may be hee is put in the first place though some that are cited are more ancient then hee They that have fulfilled the precept hee saith may say Wee are unprofitable servants wee have done what our duty was to doe This the Virgin saith not nor hee that sold his Goods viz. to give to the poore Thus Ambrose but have not these words need of a favourable interpretation For will our adversaries themselves say that there are any absolutely so perfect as that they need not confesse unto God that they are unprofitable servants what they will say I cannot tell but sure I am that Christs Disciples who were as perfect as any others were not so perfect For even to them did Christ speake those words When yee shall have done all these things which are commanded you say Wee are unprofitable servants wee have done but what was our duty to doe Luke 17. 10. It may be our Adversaries will say true when they had done all things commanded them they were to say
the Roman Church have gone further in their censure of Chrysostome as Alvarez relates viz. that he held that election whereby we first accept those things that are good and resolve to doe them is before the grace of God and that then grace doth follow after whereby we are helped and God doth co-operate with us To this pur-pose I finde Tolet a Jesuite first and afterwards a Cardinall cited by Chamier though I have not his Booke now at hand to peruse And this may suffice for answer to Chrysostome yea and to those other two Fathers also that follow viz. Irenaeus and Cyrill the latter of these being by name and both of them implicitly excepted against by some of the Romanists themselves as appeares by what is cited in the margent as also by the reasons alledged by Alvarez and Iansenius why Chrysostome did exceede at least in his expressions viz. because he was so earnest against the Manichees and others and knew nothing of the contrary errour of the Pelagians which reasons might transport the other Fathers also It is true saith Alvarez that S. Chrysostome and other Fathers that wrote before the Heresie of Pelagius was risen up did speake little of the grace of Christ and much for the confirming of the liberty of the will against the heresie of the Manichees He addes that Austine also in his writings against the Pelagians did observe this and hee cites his words to this purpose Yea hee shewes that Austine in his Retractations was faine to answer in like manner for himself when as the Pelagians did make use of his former writings against the Manichees thereby to maintaine their opinion concerning the power of Free-will in opposition to the necessity and efficacy of Gods Grace Thus likewise Iansenius saith that after the Pelagian heresie was risen then Austine spake more exactly and more expresly of the Grace of God The Jesuit Maldonate doth tell us that Ammonius and Cyrill Theophylact and Euthymius so expound that No man commeth unto me except the Father draw him that they come too nigh the error of Pelagius viz. that all are not drawn because all are not worthy as if saith he before a man be drawn by grace unto grace hee could deserve grace which is to be worthy to be drawn But though Irenaeus and Cyrill be liable to these exceptions yet I see nothing in the places cited by the Marquesse wherein they make against us Irenaeus saith thus If it were not in us to doe these things or not to do them why did the Apostle and before him the Lord himself counsell us to doe some things and to abstaine from other things Here Irenaeus indeed sheweth that it is in us to doe or not to doe but hee doth not say that it is in nobis ex nobis in us of our selves by the power of our Free-will to doe things truly good He addes immediately that man from the beginning is free as God after whose likenesse hee was made is free Now this doth rather make against our adversaries then for them for it shewes that the freedome of mans will doth not consist in this that hee is free either to doe good or to doe evill seeing that God is not free in that manner hee being onely free to doe good but altogether uncapable of doing evill So man being determined by grace to that which is good yet is free because not constrained nor forced against his will in the doing of it and so on the other side hee is free in doing evill though of himselfe without grace he can doe nothing but evill As for the other Fathers viz. Cyrill that which hee saith in the place alledged is this wee cannot according to the doctrine of the Church and of the truth by any meanes deny the free power of man wich is called Free-will This is nothing against us who doe not as hath beene shewed before simply deny Free-will but onely so as our adversaries of the Church of Rome doe maintaine it To that which is in controversie betwixt us and our adversaries Cyrill here saith nothing and therefore his testimony is not to the purpose And so much for Free-will In the next place we hold it possible saith the Marquesse to keepe the Commandements you say it is impossible Wee have Scripture for it Luke 1. 6. And they were both righteous before God walking in all the Commandements and Ordinances of the Lord blamelesse And 1 Joh. 5. 3. His Commandements are not grievous For keeping the Commandements we hold not that it is simply impossible but that according to that measure of grace which God doth ordinarily bestow upon men here in this life it is not possible to keep them viz. so as not to be guilty of the breach of them If a man could fully and perfectly keep the Commandements then he should be without sin for sinne is nothing else but a transgression of the Law as Saint Iohn defines it 1 Iohn 3. 4. But the Scripture shewes that no man in this life is so perfect as to be without sinne There is not a just man upon earth that doth good and sinneth not saith Solomon Eccles 7. 20. If we say that we have no sinne we deceive our selves and the truth is not in us saith Saint Iohn 1 John 1. 8. In many things we offend all saith Saint Iames Iam. 3. 2. And Christ hath taught all to pray for forgivenesse of sinnes Mat. 6. 12. which supposeth that all even the best that live upon earth have need of it that they are guilty of sinnes and so consequently come short of the full and perfect keeping of Gods Commandements Bellarmine thinks to elude these places by saying That we cannot indeed live without Veniall sinnes but that Veniall sinnes are not sinnes simply but onely imperfectly and in some respect and that they are not against the Law but only besides it But first Veniall sinnes are against the Law as being transgressions of it for else they are no sinnes at all that being the very nature of sinne to be a transgression of the Law 1 Iohn 3. 4. 2. There are no sins so veniall but that without the mercy of God in Christ they are damnable It being written Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things that are written in the book of the Law to doe them Gal. 3. 10. And thirdly no man living upon earth is free from such sinnes as that he is able to stand if God shall enter into judgement with him If thou Lord shouldest mark iniquities O Lord who shall stand Psal 130. 3. Enter not into judgement with thy servant for in thy fight shall no man living be justified Psal 143. 2. The Fathers here are on our side Hierome having cited that of our Saviour Out of the hearts of men proceed evill thoughts adulteries fornications murders thefts covetousnesse c. addes Let him come forth that can testifie that these
no merit of his own but meerly Gods mercy And this was it that Nehemiah did flie unto even when hee recorded the good that hee had done Remember me O Lord said hee concerning this and what reward mee according to the greatnesse of my merit no but spare mee according to the greatnesse of thy mercy Neh. 13. 22. Bernard to this purpose againe It is enough unto merit to know that merits are not sufficient The Romish Doctrine of merits die not please Ferus a late member of that Church If thou wouldest keepe saith hee the grace and favour of God make no mention of thy Merits for God will give all things out of mercy Bellarmine himselfe though hee disputed eagerly for Merits yet it seemes durst not rely on them confessing as was shewed before that it is the safest course to put our whole trust meerely in Gods Mercy But the Marquesse saith that the Fathers were of their opinion citing Ambr. de apol David cap. 6. Hieron lib. 3. contra Pelag. Aug. de Spir. lit cap. ult And first for Ambrose in the place cited it 's true hee speakes merits but here wee must remember what one of their owne writers doth tell us namely Estius that the ancient Divines did often use the word Merit very largely and not properly And thus did Ambrose use the word saying Habet quis bona Merita one hath good Merits that is good workes which hee calles Merits because they doe impetrate or obtaine a reward though not properly merit it the ancients as Estius observes using merit for impetration But that Ambrose there did not make good workes to be truly and properly meritorious appeares by the words immediately following habet vitia atque peccata hee hath also vices and sins Now surely those good workes which have vices and sinnes mixed with them cannot be properly meritorious in that case there is great need to crave mercy but no cause to plead merit For Hierome lib. 3. contra Pelag. I finde nothing at all that doth so much as seeme to assert merits except perhaps those words here in this life is labour and striving there in the life to come is the reward of labour and vertue But reward doth not alwayes presuppose merit as I have shewed before Mercy I am sure and merit are inconsistent and Hierome in that very Book which the Marquesse citeth plainly testifieth that there is no man whose workes are so good and his obedience so perfect but that still hee hath need of Gods mercy And hee taxeth his adversarie Pelagius I thinke as proud and Pharisaicall for saying that he doth worthily lift up his hands to God and doth pray with a good conscience who can say Thou O Lord knowest how holy how innocent how pure from all fraud injury and rapine the hands are that I spread forth unto thee how just immaculate and free from all lying the lips are with which I powre forth prayers unto thee that thou mayest have mercy on mee Hee tells him that David sung another Song saying My wounds stinke and are corrupt because of my foolishnesse Psal 38. 5. Enter not into judgement with thy servant for in thy sight shall no man living be justified Psal 143. 2. And that Esay lamented saying Woe is mee for I am undone because I am a man of uncleane lips c. Isal 6. 5. And hee askes him how after all this swelling and boasting of himselfe after all this confidence of his holinesse hee could pretend to desire Gods mercy For if hee were so holy and innocent so pure and perfect then he had no neede to pray in that manner viz. that God should have mercy on him This and more to this purpose hath Hierome in the place alledged but whether this be for Merits or against them is easie to judge Neither hath Austine in the place which the Marquesse citeth any thing that I can see to prove good workes meritorious but something to prove the contrary For having cited many places of Scripture which shew that none is so righteous as to be without sinne hee saith Hence it followeth that it is necessary for every one to forgive that hee may bee forgiven and if hee have any righteousnesse not to presume that he hath it of his own but to ascribe it to Gods grace and still to hunger and thirst for righteousness from God who doth so work in his Saints whiles they are in this life as that hee hath still something to adde to them that aske and to pardon them that confesse For that none living in this mortall body can be found so holy but that still hee hath neede of pardon And elsewhere he saith God doth crowne his own gifts not thy merits The Marquesse goes on saying we hold that Faith once had may be lost if wee have not care to preserve it you say it cannot we have Scripture for it viz. Luke 8. 13. They on the Rock are they which when they heare receive the Word with joy which for a while believe and in time of temptation fall away So 1 Tim. 1. 18 19. which some having put away have made shipwracks of their Faith Answ We doe not hold that Faith cannot be lost though a man have no care to preserve it but that God will worke such a care in those in whom hee hath wrought true justifying Faith that they shall never lose it I will put my feare saith hee in their hearts that they shall not depart from me Jer. 32. 40. Christ prayed for Peter that his faith might not faile Luke 22. 32. And so he prayed both for him and others even for all that belong unto him I pray for them saith he I pray not for the World but for them which thou hast given me for they are thine Joh. 17. 9. And vers 11. Holy Father keepe through thine own name those whom thou hast given mee So the Apostle telleth us that whom God did predestinate them hee also called viz. according to his purpose vers 28. and whom hee called them hee also justified and whom hee justified them hee also glorified Rom. 8. 30. This clearly shewes that all that are once justified shall certainly be glorified and consequently that justifying faith once had cannot be quite lost Againe They that truly believe are the sons of God Gal. 3. 26. Now the servant abideth not in the house for ever but the son abideth ever Joh. 8. 35. Therefore true Faith cannot be lost the children of God cannot fall away And to this doe the Fathers accord Cyprian is much to this purpose The strength of such as are truly faithfull doth remaine unmoveable and the integrity of those that feare God and love him with the whole heart doth continue stable and strong And again The Lord who is the protectour and defender of his people doth not suffer wheat to be taken away out of his floore onely chaffe
hee takes Aquinas to be resolute in this point and hee cites him saying As predestination doth include a will to conferre grace and glory so Reprobation doth include a will to suffer one to fall into sinne and to inslict the punishment of damnation for sinne Hence Alvarez inferres that according to Aquinas the permission of the first sinne for which a Reprobate is damned is the effect of Reprobation And hee addes that of this permission there is no cause in the Reprobate Because before the permission of the first sinne and before the first sinne there is no other sinne for if there were then it were not simply the first sinne or man should commit some other sinne before which God did not permit whereas no sinne can be committed but by Gods permission He cites also Aquinas againe speaking thus why God doth chuse some to glory and reprobate others there is no reason but onely Gods Will. And having cited that of the Apostle Rom. 9. The children being not yet borne neither having done any good or evill that the purpose of God according to election might stand not of workes but of him that calleth it was said unto her The elder should serve the younger As it is written Jacob have I loved but Esau have I hated having cited this I say hee addes that the Apostle here both Austine and Aquinas avouching as much plainly signifies that in the absolute Election and Reprobation of Men God did not looke at Mens merits or demerits but of his own pleasure did chuse and predestinate one to glory and not predestinate another but by an absolute will did determine to suffer him to sinne and to be hardened or to persevere in sinne to the end of his life and to inflict eternall punishment upon him for sin Hee brings in also Austine confuting those who say that Esau and Iacob being not yet borne God did therefore hate the one and love the other because hee did foresee the workes that they would doe Who said Austine can but wonder that the Apostle should not finde out this acute reason for hee did not see it c. No but flies to this hee saith to Moses I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy c. So then it is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy And that none of our Romish adversaries may sleight Austine in this point Alvarez about the beginning of his Worke hath a Disputation to shew what authority this Fathers judgement is of in the point of Grace and Predestination Hee shewes that not onely Prosper but also many Bishops of Rome did approve of Austines Doctrine concerning these points and did determine it to be sound and good And therefore in the testimony of Austine wee have many testimonies and such as are irrefragable with those with whom now wee have to doe But let us heare what some other late Writers of the Church of Rome doe say as to this point concerning Reprobation God from eternity saith Cardinall Cajetan doth truly chuse some and reprobate others doth love some and hate others in that from eternity his will is to vouchsafe some the helpe of his grace whereby to bring them to eternall glory and from eternity also his will is to leave some to themselves and not to afford them that gracious help which he hath decreed to afford the Elect. And this is for God to hate and to reprobate them with which yet it doth well stand that none is damned but by his owne workes because neither the Sentence nor Execution of damnation is before that such Reprobates doe sinne So also †Estius saith that the Apostle Rom. 9. doth teach that neither mens Election nor their Reprobation is from the Merits of workes but that God by the meere pleasure of his wil doth chuse some and Reprobate others And againe upon those words O man who are thou that repliest against God c. hee saith that the Apostles intent was to answer not so much the objection as the cause of objecting And that therefore he answers concerning the Will of God Electing and Reprobating and denies that the reason of it is to be inquired by man who is Gods creature and made by him yea that by the example of a potter the Apostle shewes that God doth this out of the liberty of his Will without any other reason And he addes that Thomas Aquinas did also thus rightly expound the words of the Apostle Bradwardine who intituled the book which hee wrote of the cause of God is not to be omitted Hee saith It 's true God doth not eternally punish any without his fault going before temporally and abiding eternally yet God did not eternally reprobate any because of sinne as a cause antecedently moving Gods will What doe our Divines say even such as are of the more rigid sort as concerning this high and abstruse point of Reprobation what I say doe they lay more then is said by these great and eminent Doctours of the Church of Rome and before them by Austine and before both him and them as both hee and they conceived by the Apostle Paul himselfe The Decree of Reprobation saith Bishop Davenant is not thus to be conceived I will damne Judas whether he believe or not believe repent or not repent for this were contrary to the truth of the Evangelicall promises but thus I am absolutely determined not to give unto Judas that speciall grace which would cause him to believe and repent and I am absolutely purposed to permit him to incurre his own demnation by his voluntary obstinacy and finall impenitency And againe It must here first of all be considered that Reprobatio aeterna nihil ponit in reprobato that is That eternall reprobation doth put nothing in the person that is reprobated It putteth onely in God a firme Decree of permitting such persons to fall into finall sinne and for it a firme decree of condemning them unto eternall punishment So both hee and diverse other of our Eng. lish Divines that were at the Synod of Dort being sent thither by King Iames as they hold that Reprobation which is the denying of election doth put in God an immutable will not to have mercy on such a person as is passed by in respect of giving eternall life And that foreseene unbeliefe is not the cause of non election So withall they lay down this position God doth damne none nor appoint unto Damnation but in respect of sinne So Doctor Ames saith that it is too great a slander to say that according to our opinion God did immediately decree mens damnation whether they be sinners or no. Our opinion saith hee is this that God did not choose some as he did chuse others but did determine to let them abide in their sinnes and for those sinnes to suffer the punishment of just damnation and that of this decree
of Reprobation as the good merit of Election 2. To that question Is there unrighteousnesse with God he doth not answer that therefore there is not because the whole lumpe is depraved by sinne c. but he answers so as that he refers as well the Reprobation of these as the election of those unto the sole Will of God and so represses the curious inquirer O man who art thou c. 3. That comparison of a Potter of the same lumpe making one vessell unto honour and another unto dishonour doth exclude the supposition of a corrupt lumpe For here verily is nothing supposed in the lumpe but that it is indifferent and may be fashioned both the one way and the other Thus this learned Papist goes as farre in the point both of Election and of Reprobation as any Protestant that I know whatsoever Neither would he have us thinke that he goes alone for hee cites many as Lombard Hugo de S. Victore Aquinas Cajetan Lyra Titleman and Pererius as being of the same opinion with him and interpreting the words of the Apostle in the same manner And this I suppose may suffice to vindicate the Doctrine of Protestants even such as goe highest in this point as touching Reprobation Now for the Scriptures objected against us the first viz. Wis 1. 13. is not Canonicall Hierome brandes that booke called the the Wisdome of Solomon as falsly intituled and saith that it is no where to be found among the Hebrewes to whom the Oracles of God were committed Rom. 3. 2. and that the style doth smell of Greeke eloquence and that some ancient writers affirme it to be the worke of Philo a Jew Therefore saith he as the Church doth read indeed the Bookes of Judith Tobie and the Maccabees but doth not receive them amongst the Canonicall Scriptures so also doth it reade these two volumes viz. Ecclesiasticus and the wisdome of Solomon for the edifying of the people but not for the confirming of Ecclesiasticall Doctrines But suppose it were Canonicall the place alledged is answered to our hand by one of the Roman Church viz. Alvarez when it is said God made not death the meaning hee saith is that God doth not primarily of it selfe intend the death of any but in respect of some other great good that is joyned with it And againe that place hee saith is expounded of death in respect of the cause to wit sinne These expositions of the place doe free the Doctrine of Protestants from suffering any prejudice by it were the authority of it greater then indeed it is The next place is that 1 Tim. 2. 4. Who will have all men to be saved c. Austine gives diverse interpretations of those words First thus that the meaning is that God will have all to be saved that are saved and that none but such as hee will save can bee saved Secondly this that by all men are meant men of all sorts how ever distinguished Kings and private persons noble and ignoble c. This hee shewes to be agreeable both to the Context and also to the phrase of Scripture Luke 11. 42. You tithe Mint and Rue and every Herbe i. e. every kinde of Herbe This latter exposition of the Apostles words Alvarez saith is also followed by Fulgentius Beda and Anselme The same Alvarez relates two other interpretations which Austine gives of these words viz. first this God will have all men to be saved that is hee makes men to will or desire that all may be saved as the Spirit is said to make intercession for us Rom. 8. 26. that is makes us to make intercession or supplication c. Estius upon the place doth embrace this Exposition before any other VVho will have all men to be saved that is saith hee He willeth and maketh godly men to desire the salvation of all Though God will not save all but onely the Elect yet he will have all to be saved to wit by us as much as in us lies in that he commands us to seek the salvation of all and this desire and indeavour he workes in us This Exposition wee embrace rather then any of the rest The other Exposition which Alvarez relates is that the Apostle speakes of Gods antecedent will Thus hee saith Austine doth expound it in diverse places and for this Exposition hee also cites Damascene Prosper Theophylaot Oecumenius Aquinas as also Chrysostome and Ambrose and saith that it is common among the Doctors Now in the next Disputation hee tels us that Gods antecedent Will is that which respects the object simply considered and by it selfe and that this will is called antecedent not because it goes before the good or ill use of our will as some thinke but because it goes before that will whereby God respects the object considered with some adjunct which is the consequent and latter consideration of it If saith hee the salvation of the Reprobate be considered simply by it selfe so God doth will it but if it be considered as it hath adjoyned the privation or want of a greater good to wit the universall good of manifesting Gods Iustice in the Reprobate and of causing his Mercy the more to shine forth in the Elect so God doth not will it And in this respect were affirmed that God by a consequent will doth not will that all shall be saved but only such as are predestinate Now take any of all these foure Explications of the Apostles words wherein hee saith that God will have all men to be saved as for my part I like best either the second or the last take any of them I say and the Apostles words are nothing against that which Protestants hold concerning Reprobation As for that of Peter that God is not willing that any should perish 2 Pet. 3. 9. Bellarmine himselfe expounds both it and the former place viz. 1 Tim. 2. 4. of that Will of God which Divines call Gods Antecedent will Now what that Antecedent will of God is we have seene even now out of Alvarez if Bellarmine did understand it otherwise as Alvarez notes that some did hee is confuted by Alvarez in the place above cited Where hee also cites Austine saying Many are not saved not because they will not but because God will not which without all controversie is manifested in young children whence he inferrs that the condition which is included in Gods Antecedent will whereby he will have all men to be saved is not this if they will and if they doe not hinder it And Bellarmine himselfe also though he say It is most true that all are not saved because they will not for if they would God would not be wanting unto them Yet immediately hee addes But none can have a will to be saved except God by preventing and preparing the will make him to will it And why God doth not make all to will this who hath knowne the mind of the Lord
and who hath been his Counsellour Rom. 11. 34. The last place of Scripture which the Marquesse objecteth is Ezech. 33. 11. As I live saith the Lord I delight not in the death of a sinner Now to this also we have Alvarez to answer for us viz. first that it is meant of spirituall death which is by sinne Which God doth only permit but doth not delight in it And this Explication hee saith is confirmed by the words following but rather that he be converted and live And if it be expounded of the second death which is eternall damnation the meaning hee saith is that God will not inflict this upon any but for sinne But though God will not inflict damnation upon the Reprobate but for sinne yet this same Alvarez as I have shewed abundantly before and so other Writers of the Church of Rome doe tell us that God by his eternall Decree of Reprobation of his meere Will and Pleasure doth determine to suffer the Reprobate to sinne and so to damne them for it And thus now I have made it appeare I hope sufficiently that by the consent of the Romanists themselves the Scriptures alledged are not repugnant to the Doctrine of Protestants concerning Reprobation neither I thinke will the Fathers whom the Marquesse citeth be against it The first of them is Austine who as hath before been shewed is as much for us as we neede desire He is here produced against us but so as that I know not easily how to finde what he saith For onely li. 1. de Civit. Dei. is cited but no Chapter whereas there are no lesse then 36. in that booke this is a strange kinde of citing Authors but the fault may be in the Printer or in some other and not in the Marquesse As for Cyprian who is next cited I see not any thing in the place pointed at which is to this purpose except this Seeing it is written God made not death nor doth he rejoyce in the destruction of the living surely he that would not have any to perish desires that sinners may come to Repentance and that by Repentance they may returne unto life againe Now that which Cyprian here alledgeth viz. God made not death c. I have shewed before by the testimony of Hierome to be no Canonicall Scripture nor of sufficient force to decide any point of controversie as also that if it were yet by the acknowledgement of Alvarez it makes not against Gods Decree of Reprobation which wee maintaine It hath also beene shewed before in what sense God would have none to perish viz. by his Antecedent Will with which yet will stand the Decree of Reprobation as we hold it which likewise hath been shewed and that from both Bellarmine and from Alvarez also And that God desires sinners may come to Repentance and so to life Protestants that I know doe not deny though they hold that God doth give and so from all eternity did purpose to give Repentance unto some and not to others as hee pleaseth which I have also shewed to be acknowledged by Bellarmine Alvarez Estius and others of the Church of Rome And it is most cleare by that of the Apostle If God peradventure will give them Repentance 2 Tim. 2. 25. and that He hath mercy on whom he will have mercy and whom he will he hardneth Rom. 9. 18. The third and last Father who is here alledged is Ambrose de Cain Abel lib. 2. but what Chapter whereas there are ten in that Booke is not mentioned Now I finde that Chap. 3. hath something which probably was aimed at by the Marquesse viz. this Christ therefore offered the helpe of healing unto all that whosoever perisheth may ascribe the cause of his death to himselfe who when he had a remedy whereby he might escape would not be cured And that Christs mercy towards all might be made manifest in that they that perish doe perish by their own negligence but they that are saved are freed according to Christs sentence who will have all men to be saved and to come to the acknowledgement of the truth Now I know no Protestant but hee will assent unto this that whosoever perish must ascribe the cause to themselves and that they perish through their own default I have before cited Calvin asserting thus much That none doe perish without their desert But this assertion of his is very well consistent with his Doctrine about Reprobation as I have shewed by the testimonies of diverse famous Writers of the Church of Rome And whereas Ambrose saith that such as perish had a remedy whereby they might escape and that they therefore perish because they would not be cured No Protestants I suppose will deny but that such as perish through unbeliefe if they did believe should be saved but yet neverthelesse not Protestants onely but Papists also as I have shewed doe hold that God from all eternity did decree and purpose to give faith unto some and not unto others and that meerely of his own will and pleasure And that therefore according to Austine whose words are cited before the prime and supreme cause why some are not saved is not because they will not but because God will not For that which Ambrose hath in the last place who will have all men to be saved c. enough hath beene said before to shew that in the judgement of Austine and diverse Romanists it is nothing against the absolute decree of Reprobation and so I have done with this point In the next place the Marquesse speakes of a mans assurance of his salvation saying that Protestants hold that a man ought to assure himselfe of it and to prove the contrary which they of the Roman Church doe hold he alledgeth 1 Cor. 9. 27. saying S. Paul was not assured but that whilest he Preached to others he himselfe might become a cast-away And Rom. 11. 20. Thou standest in the Faith be not high minded but feare c. lest thou also mayest be cut off And Phil. 2. 12. Worke out your own salvation with fear and termbling Answ Concerning this point Protestants hold 1. That a Christian may be assured of his salvation 2. That a Christian ought to labour for this assurance For the former of these positions wee have diverse places of Scriptures As first that Famous place Rom. 8. 35 36 37 38 39. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ shall Tribulation or Distresse or Persecution c. Nay in all these things we are more then conquerours through Him that loved us For I am perswaded that neither Death nor Life nor Angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other Creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So also that 2 Cor. 5. 1. We know then if our earthly house of this Tabernacle were dissolved we have a building
often But saith he as it is appointed unto men to die once c. So Christ was once offered c. Bellarmine also averres that unto a true sacrifice it is required that the thing which is offered unto God for a sacrifice be plainly destroyed that is that it cease to be what it was before So that if Christ bee offered up in the Eucharist a true and proper Sacrifice then hee must be destroyed hee must cease to be what he was before Whether or no it be blasphemy to affirme this of Christ let all judge Bellarmine indeed afterward indeavours to answer this argument Let us see what he saith The argument hee propounds thus The sacrifice that is offered must be slaine Therefore if Christ be sacrificed in every Masse he must every moment in a thousand places be cruelly slaine To this hee answers thus The sacrifice of the Masse is a most true sacrifice and yet doth not require the killing of that which is offered For killing is only required in the offering of a thing that hath life and which is offered in the forme of a thing that hath life as when Lambes Calves Birds and the like are offered whose destruction consists in death But when the forme of the sacrifice is of a thing without life as of Bread Wine Frankincense and the like killing cannot be required but only such a consuming of the thing as is agreeable to it In the Masse therefore Christ is indeed offered who is a thing having life and he is offered in the forme of a thing having life in respect of representation where onely a death representative is required but not death indeed But as he is a reall and properly so called sacrifice he is offered in the forme of Bread and Wine according to the order of Melchisedech and therefore in the forme of a thing without life Wherefore the consuming of this sacrifice ought not to be Killing but Eating I have rehearsed his words at large that so his answer may be seene at full But though there be many wordes which hee useth yet it is somewhat hard to know what hee meaneth Certainly this is a very strange kinde of sacrifice that he speaketh of Christ is offered up a sacrifice both in the forme of a thing that hath life and also in the forme of a thing that is without life And as hee is offered in the forme of a thing that hath life hee is onely offered in respect of representation but as he is offered in the forme of a thing that is without life hee is really and indeed offered So that Christ being offered in the forme of a thing that hath life his death is represented but he being offered in the forme of a thing that is without life his death is not represented and much lesse is it really executed and yet Christ is so really and properly sacrificed These things do but very unhandsomely hang together But whereas hee saith that the consuming of this sacrifice is the eating of it I demand is Christs Body so eaten as that it ceaseth to be what it was before If it be not as certainly it is not Christs Body being now glorified and so free from all mutation then is it not truly and properly sacrificed Bellarmine himselfe telling us as I have shewed before that whatsoever is truly and properly sacrificed is so destroyed as that it ceaseth to be what it was before To talke here of consuming the species or forme of bread so that it ceaseth to be what it was before is nothing to the purpose for they maintaine that the Body and Blood of the Lord are that sacrifice which is properly offered and sacrificed in the Masse And whereas Bellarmine also speaketh of Christs being offered in the forme of Bread and Wine according to the Order of Melchisedech I desire to know by whom CHRIST is so offered For either by himselfe or by the Priest that saith Masse Not by himselfe for here we speak of Christs being offered in the Eucharist which is not administred by Christ hee being now in Heaven Nor by the Priest on Earth there being no Priest after the order of Melchisedech but Christ only Psal 110. 4. Heb. 7. 15 c. And thus indeed there is no Priest upon Earth that is properly so called and consequently there is no true and proper sacrifice to be offered For every sacrifice presupposeth a Priest to offer it and such as the sacrifice is such also must the Priest be hee must be a Priest properly so called if it be a sacrifice properly so called But there is no such Priest upon Earth there being none as I have shewed after the order of Melchisedech nor yet any after the order of Aaron for that order is abolished as all the Leviticall sacrifices are And of any other order besides these we read not in the Scripture Againe in a sacrifice properly so called it must be some sensible thing as our Adversaries themselves acknowledge that is offered But Christ is not sensible in the Eucharist for by what sense is hee there discerned And therefore neither is hee there truly and properly sacrificed Neither was this Doctrine viz. that Christ is properly sacrificed in the Eucharist received in the Church of Rome for more then 1100 years after Christ as appeares by the Master of the Sentences Peter Lombard who propounds the question whether that which the Priest doth be properly a sacrifice and whether Christ be sacrificed daily or were only once sacrificed And to this hee answers that that which is offered and consecrated by the Priest is called a sacrifice and an offering because it it a memoriall and representation of the true sacrifice and holy immolation that was made in the Altar of the Crosse And Christ died once on the crosse and was there sacrificed in himselfe but he is daily sacrificed in the Sacrament because in the Sacrament there is a remembrance of that which was done once Here we plainly see that he determines that Christ is not properly sacrificed in the Sacrament but improperly in that his sacrificing of himselfe upon the crosse is remembred and represented in the Sacrament which is no more then the Apostle saith viz. that Christs death is shewed forth in the Sacrament 1 Cor. 11. 26. And thus Ambrose as Lombard doth cite him Although we offer daily it is for the remembrance of his death We also offer now but that which we doe is a remembrance of the sacrifice which Christ offered To this purpose also he cites Austine Now for the places alledged by the Marquesse the first viz. Mal. 1. 11. doth not particularly concerne the Eucharist but generally the spirituall worship and service which the Prophet foreshewed should be performed unto God in the time of the New Testament and which should not be confined and limited to one certaine place and as the solemne worship and service of God in the time of the old
those that hold this doctrine 2. In what sense we deny the Real presence and the other particulars here mentined I have shewed before as also what little cause they have to boast that either Scripture or Fathers do make for those assertions of theirs wherein we dissent from them That which the Marquesse after addeth of a Womans being head supreme or moderatrix in the Church I have likewise spoken to sufficiently before That a Lay-man should excommunicate and that upon every ordinary occasion as non-payment of Fees and the like for which the Marquesse taxeth this Church I am content that it passe among the Errata's of our Church as he was pleased to speak though without cause concerning some passages in the Fathers as I have noted before It is our Doctrine and not our Discipline that I endeavour to defend After the Church of England the Marquesse commeth to the Church of Saxony and so passeth to the Church of Geneva as he pretendeth but yet indeed he speaketh only of two particular persons relating to those Churches viz. Luther and Calvin as if whatsoever were held by them were to be imputed to those Churches to which they did relate which surely is not fair dealing much lesse that all Protestants should stand charged with all their sayings were they indeed such as the misconstruction of adversaries would make them We honour these and many more as men eminently active in that great work of reforming the Church yet do we not ascribe an infallibility unto them as the Romanists do unto their Popes We do not say of them as Bellarmine doth of the Pope that if they should command vices and forbid vertues we were bound to believe vices to be good and vertues to be evil No we know the Apostle bids us prove all things and hold fast that which is good 1 Thess 5. 21. But let us see what it is that the Marquesse doth say and first of Luther 1. He chargeth Luther as saying of the book of Ecclesiastes That it hath never a perfect sentence in it and that the Author thereof had neither boots nor spurs but rid upon a long stick or in begging shooes as he did when he was a Friar The places which the Marquesse citeth for proof of this I cannot examine they not being in Luthers Works of that Edition at least which I have liberty to peruse But therein I find that Luther doth comment upon the book of Ecclesiastes and doth speak after a far other manner of it saying that it is a Book worthy that all should be much versed in it and that all and especially Magistrates should be well acquainted with it 2. He taxeth Luther for saying of the book of Job That the argument thereof is a meer fiction invented only for the setting down of a true and lively example of patience If Luther did say thus which is more also then I can find though I am far from being of his mind for I suppose that if there had not indeed been such a man as Job in the history of him is described the Prophet Ezekiel and S. James would not have mentioned him as they do Ezek. 14. 14 20. Jam. 5. 11. Yet that most famous Doctor amongst the Jewes Moses Maimonides shewes that some were of this opinion that there never was such a man as Job and that the history of him is but a parable And this opinion himself inclines unto though I confesse his reason is of small force viz. because they that hold otherwise cannot agree about the time in which Job lived 3. Luther as is alleadged against him saith That it is a false opinion and to be abolished that there are four Gospels and that the Gospel of S. John is only true Neither can I find any such thing as this in Luther that the Gospels written by the other three Evangelists Matthew Marke and Luke are not as true as that written by John But I finde that which doth sufficiently evince the contrary viz. that Luther in the fifth volume of his Works hath Annotations upon the first seventeen Chapters of St. Matthews Gospel and that in his Notes upon the first Chapter he divers times calls both Matthew and Luke Evangelists or publishers of the Gospel 4. Luther as the Marquesse alledgeth saith of the Epistle of S. James That it is contentious swelling dry strawy and unworthy an Apostolical spirit Thus also divers other Romanists have charged Luther as Campian Duraeus Breerley and Silvester Petrasancta yet the words which they mention are not to be found in Luthers works But say the Romanists they were in them though afterward they were left out I answer Then it seems if there were any such words they were not approved Duraeus confesseth that those words are not in Luthers works set forth either at Wittemberge or at Strasburge but onely in those set forth at Jena which argues that if there were any such words they found but little approbation Mr. Breerley saith that the later Editions of Luthers works at Wittemberge were corrupted by the Zuinglians and others But surely if Luthers Works were corrupted and that in the Editions of Wittemberge it must be by others and not by the Zuinglians For is it likely that the Zuinglians who were such adversaries unto Luther that Mr. Breerly and after him the Marquesse doth frequently alledge them against Luther is it likely I say that they should corrupt Luthers Works in that kinde so as indeed to purge them from that which was amisse in them And if they would do Luther this favour yet how should they do it at Wittemberge where I suppose not the Zuinglians but the Lutherans did bear sway and would have the chief hand in setting forth Luthers Works in that place And for that first Edition of Luthers Works at Jena though it seems Luther did speak lesse honorably of St. James his Epistle as I confesse I find him to speak elsewhere in his Works yet not so basely as his adversaries of Rome do charge him Gerhard a great Lutheran saith that Luther indeed in his Preface to S. James his Epistle in the first Edition of the German Bible did say that this Epistle is not of like worth with the Epistles of Paul and Peter and that it is strawie if it be compared with those Epistles But that he no where tearms it contentious swelling dry nor yet simply but onely comparatively strawie And that after the year 1526. in no Edition of Luthers Works it is so called but the contrary rather is to be found to wit that Luther did commend this Epistle though some of the Ancients did reject it and account it good and profitable It seems then that Luther himself did retract that which hee had written concerning the Epistle of S. James his censure of it having been too bad though yet not so bad as the Romanists would make it
Luthers Works as having it so as Campian alleadged And this is the more apparent in that Dureus professedly taking upon him the defence of Campian against Dr. Whitaker never so much as takes notice of that which the Doctor saith against Campian for falsifying the words of Luther so far was he from knowing of that pretended Edition anno 1551. which should have it forsooth just so as Campian quoted it 9. Luther as the Marquesse telleth us affirmed that Christ was from all eternity even according to his humane nature For proof hereof onely Zuinglius is cited But as I noted before Zuinglius his testimony is not sufficient to make good a charge against Luther Let Luthers words be produced and then it will appeare that he is justly charged 10. He affirms saith the Marquesse that as Christ died with great pain so he seems to have sustained paines in hell after death Indeed I finde such words in Luther on Plal. 16. and I acknowledge it to be a grosse errour so far am I from defending him in it But withall this I finde that Luther was nothing confident in that particular For he addes immediately that he would so understand the words of Peter Act. 2. 24. until he were better informed 11. That the Divinity of Christ suffered or else he were none of his Christ This also Bellarmine doth object against Luther and I confesse that if the word Divinity be strictly and properly taken the assertion is most erronious But Bellarmine probably was not ignorant that Aquinas observeth that because of the identity that is betwixt the divine Nature and the divine Person sometimes the Nature is put for the Person And that thus Austine saith that the divine Nature was conceived and born because the Person of the Son was conceived and born in respect of the humane nature So in like manner Luther might say that the Divinity or divine Nature did suffer because the Person of the Son did suffer according to the humane nature That Luther meant no otherwise then thus is clearly his words which I finde in Gerhard viz. these If I shall suffer my self to be perswaded that onely the humane nature did suffer for me truly Christ shall be a Saviour of small worth unto me for he himself at length will need a Saviour If perhaps that bewitching lady Reason will reclaim saying The Divinity cannot suffer nor dye thou shalt answer That indeed is true yet neverthelesse because the Divinity and the Humanity in Christ make one person therefore the Scripture because of the hypostatical union doth attribute to the Divinity all those things which happen to the Humanity and so to the Humanity those things which belong to the Divinity And truly thus it is indeed for we must needs confesse This Person Christ being pointed at doth suffer and dye But this Person is true God Therefore it is rightly said The Son of God doth suffer For though one part of him as I may so speak viz. the Deity doth not suffer yet that person which is God doth suffer in his other part viz. the Humanity For indeed the Son of God was crucified for us That same I say that same Person was crucified according to the Humanity And again If our sinnes and Gods weath due to our sinnes be weighed in one scale and in the other scale be put onely the death of humane nature or onely a man having sufered for us then the other scale will weigh us down to hel But if in the opposite scale be put the passion of God the death of God the blood of God or God having suffered for us then that scale will be more heavy and ponderous then all our sinnes and all Gods anger This doth abundantly shew that Luther was most orthodox in this point touching Christs Person and Natures And thus that also is answered which immediately followeth being indeed but the same with that which went before viz. That if the humane nature should onely suffer for him Christ were but a Saviour of vile account and had need himself of another Saviour In what sense Luther spake this and how sound and true it is in that sense wherein he spake it is evident by his own words before cited 12. The Marquesse cites Hospinian saying that Luther held the body and blood of Christ both is and may be found according to the substance not only in the bread and wine of the Eucharist or in the hearts of the faithfull but also in all creatures in fire water or in the rope and halter wherewith desperate persons hang themselves Whether Hospinian writ thus of Luther not having his book which is cited I cannot say Hospinian being though a Protestant yet against Luther in point of the Sacrament might peradventure wrest Luthers words beyond his meaning However if Luther did hold so I leave him to answer for himself or some other to answer for him I hold both him to have erred in his Consubstantiation and the Romanists in their Transubstantiation 13. Luther as is objected averreth that the ten Commandements belong not unto us for God did not lead us but the Jews forth of Egypt That Luther speaketh to this effect I grant yet was he far from teaching that Christians are free from the observation of the ten Commandements For immediately after that which the Marquesse citeth he saith thus Falsely therefore do fanaticall persons burthen us with the Law of Moses who spake nothing unto us Indeed we receive and acknowledge Moses as a teacher from whom we learn much wholesome doctrine as shall be shewed a little after But we do not acknowledge him our Lawgiver or Governour seeing he restraineâ— his Ministery to that people viz. the Jews Not to have other gods to fear God to trust in him and to obey him not to abuse his name to honor parents c. these things are to be observed by all and belong to all yet not because they were commanded by Moses but because these Laws which are rehearsed in the Deâ—alogue are imprinted in mans nature Wherefore also the heathens that knew not Moses and to whom God did not speak as he did to the Israelites knew that God is to be obeyed and worshipped that parents are to be honoured c. This doctrine of Luther is no other then they of the Roman Church do teach Estius a great Doctor of that Church writing upon those words Gal. 2. 19. I through the Law am dead to the Law saith Although the sense may seem more easie if it be understood of the Law as it is ceremonial yet may the whole Law given by Moses be understood so far forth as it was given by Moses For the whole legislative office of Moses doth cease by Christ neither is a Christian bound by the Law of the Decalogue but as it doth agree with the Law of nature and is renewed by Christ So the
he was above two hundred years after Minutius and Gregory who was about as much after Paulinus was against the worshipping of any thing made with hands as appears by the words before cited Finally saith the Marquesse the Church then held that to the Catholick Church only belongs the keeping of the Apostolical tradition the authority of interpretation of Scripture and the decision of controversies of faith and that out of the succession of her communion of her doctrine and her ministery there neither was Church nor salvation 1. For Apostolical traditions enough hath been said before 2. And so also of interpretation of Scripture and decision of controversies of faith 3. I understand not what is meant by objecting against us that out of the Catholick Church there is no Church For the Catholick Church being the Church universal and so comprehending all particular Churches as parts and members of it who can doubt that there is no Church out of the Church Catholick But what is this to the Church of Rome which once indeed was a sound part of the Catholick Church but the Catholick Church it never was nor could be except a part could be the whole In that which follows page 101. c. there is nothing but the same matter as before only the form is somewhat altered and therefore there is no need that I should trouble either my self or the Reader any further about it only I shall adde one or two Animadversions 1. Whereas it is objected page 105. c. that Luther after his deserting the communion of the Church of Rome did yet hold some points of Popery and so also Husse and Wickliffe and others that otherwise opposed themselves against the errors and corruptions of that Church I answer That as Rome was not built at once so neither was it demolished at once but by degrees it is no marvel therefore if those worthy men did at least for a while retain some Romish opinions and practices after that in many things they had discovered the truth and stood up in defence of it 2. Whereas it is pretended page 106. that before Berengarius who was above 1000. years after Christ none did oppose that reall presence of Christ in the Sacrament which the Romanists maintain besides that I have sufficiently confuted this before the Marquesse might have seen from Bellarmine himself that there were some who above 200. years before Berengarius did oppose that doctrine which in this particular the Church of Rome now doth hold namely Bertram a Presbyter who was about 800. years after Christ and saith Bellarmine was one of the first that did call in question that doctrine But Bellarmine doth too much mince the matter for Bertram did more then call in question that reall presence of Christ in the Sacrament which the Romanists do hold he did plainly assert that which Protestants maintain viz. that the substance of bread and wine doth still remain after consecration as is to be seen in Hospinians first part of the Sacramentary history and so in others that cite that Author for the book it self I confesse I have not seen that I do remember But that is here worthy to be observed which the Romish censurers of Books say speaking of this book of Bertrams about the Sacrament Although say they we do not much value this book nor should greatly eare if it were no where to be found yet seeing it hath been often printed and read of very many c. and we sufer very many errours in other ancient Catholicks we extenuate them we excuse them and finding out some device we often deny them and fain some good sense of them when they are opposed in disputations or conflicts with the adversaries we see not why Bertram may not deserve the same favour and diligent recognition lest Hereticks prate against us and say that we burn antiquity and prohibit it when it makes for them Some things therefore in Bertrams book they will have to be quite left out and some things to be quite altered as namely for visibly to be read invisibly Such devices have they of the Church of Rome to corrupt ancient Writers when they make against them and then they pretend that all are for them Thus the Marquesse in the conclusion of his Reply page 230. pretends that they have the prescription of 1600. years possession and continuance of their Churches Doctrine and evidence out of the word of God and the Fathers witnessing to that evidence and the decrees of Councels and Protestants own acknowlegdements But what ground there is for this pretence let the Reader judge by comparing and considering what is said on both sides And so I also shall leave the successe of my labour unto God in whose hand are the hearts of all An Addition of some few things omitted in the fore-going REJOINDER THe Marquesse pag. 69. citeth Basil orat in 40 it is misprinted 44 Mart. as affirming that we may pray unto the Saints departed But in that Oration Basil affirms no such thing He shews indeed his approbation of praying not unto the Martyrs but which is quite another thing to God at the monuments of the Martyrs The most learned B. Usher observes That the memory of the Martyrs indeed was from the very beginning had in great reverence and at their Memorials and Martyria that is to say at the places wherein their bodies were laid which were the Churches whereunto the Christians did in those times usually resort prayers were ordinarily offered up unto God for whose cause they laid down their lives But this is no argument that they then prayed to the Martyrs though that errour might take occasion afterwards to creep in by this meanes The Marquesse taxeth Calvin for holding that Christs soule was subject to ignorance To what I have already said in answer to this charge I adde that in this particular Fulgentius was of the same minde with Calvin For confuting those that held Christ to have no humane soul he saith thus If we must believe that the humane nature in Christ wanted a soul what is it that in Christ being an Infant is said not to have known good and evil Then he cites Isa 7. 16. expounding it of Christ and addes Therefore the humane soule which is naturally made capable of reason in Christ being an Infant is said not to have known good and evil which according to the truth of the Gospel in Christ being a child is related to have increased in wisdome c. To that also that hath been said before concerning Calvins death let this be added How far Calvin was from despairing at his death as the Marquesse doth object may appear by what he wrote to his dear friend Farel when he looked for death every moment I hardly breath saith he and expect continually that breath should fail me It is enough that I live and dye to Christ who to those that are his is both