Government is nothing according to our Great Kings Laws but according to your own devised Canons and in nothing in Nothing I say agreeable to the Laws of Christ in the Scripture for the right Government of his Church Nay that Government which Christ hath prescribed in his word and which is practised in the best Reformed Churches beyond the Seas you doe utterly and openly condemn and the Churches themselves that doe practise the Discipline of Christ and his Apostles while you deny them to be any Churches of Christ at all Againe Every Kingdome as it hath but one King over it so it is capapable of no more then onely one Vice-Roy so as by that Title he that is your Ordine Primus and hath a more Potent Principality the Pope had he but a good Title would carry that honour from you all if you value the worth and Dignity of that Vice-Royship after the value of your Bishopricks and not after vertue Either then you must acknowledge the Pope to be the sole Vice-Roy which you are loth to doe For why should not the Patriarch of the other world be as capable of that honour as he or you must give us leave to find out the onely true Vice-Roy of Christ in his Church and that is The Holy Ghost For when our Great King went into his Celestiall Kingdome to his Church Tryumphant leaving his Militant here on Earth under the Kingdome of Grace as touching his bodily presence he sent the Holy Ghost to be his Vice-Roy or Vice-Gerent to be perpetually resident in his Kingdome of Grace here for the Governing of his Church Militant and that according to the Law of Christ in his written word leading the People of Christ into all truth by revealing unto them all the Mysteryes of Christs will contained in the Scripture As Christ saith He shall gâ—orifie Me for he shall receive of mine and shew it unto you And v. 13. When the spirit of Truth is come whom v. 7. I will send unto you he will guide you into all Truth for he shall not speake of himselfe but whatsoever he shall heare that shall he speake Loe here then a faithfull Vice-Roy indeed And will or dare you deny this Spirit of God to be an All sufficient Vice-Roy who doth execute Christs Kingly Office in his Church in all things just so as Christ himselfe willâ—th And therfore except you can prove that Christ hath many Kingdomes of Grace here on earth or any more Churches Militant then one onely here is no Rome for any such Vice-Roys as you pretend to be For here we see it plain that of Christs one and onely Kingdome of Grace here on earth the Holy Ghost is the onely Vice-Roy And who is fit to be Christs Vice-Roy in his spirituall Kingdome but the Spirit of God and of Christâ— Ye are therfore no Vice-Roys because you are altogether carnall and your Kingdome is of this world And therfore Thirdly how can you Prelates pretend to be Vice-Roys over Christs Church whenas as is noted before ye are not so much as any members at all of Christs Kingdome For you are the Members of Antichrists Kingdome and so you are or may be Antichrists Vice-Roys over his severall Provinces 'T is true you style your selves spirituall Lords spirituall and your Courts spirituall and you are an Hierarchy as much to say as a Holy Kingdome or Government but it is not spirituall of Christs spirit but of that spirit that ruleth in the ayre that gave you all that Authority So as you do with Bellarmine turne those words of Christ to Peter Pasce oves meas Feed my Sheep to Regio more Impera Rule as a King And what similitude is there between Christ and you that you should be his Vice-Roys in his Church-Militant When he was here in person he was among his own as a servant and Minister He had no staâ—ely and Princely Palaces he kept no such Pontificiall house nor Court he governed not his Church by Chancellors Arch Deacons Deanes Chapters Commissâ—â—â—â—s Offiâ—ialls Pursuivants Apparitors and all that Rabble Christ had no such face of a Kingly Government So as you have altogether perverted the Kingdome of Christ which is altogether spirituall and holy into a meere temporall and carnall Kingdome wherein therfore you are none of Christ Vice-Roys but Viâ—ious Roys and Tyrannicall Lords O Antichâ—istian Generation O notorious Hypocrites O proud and blind Guides How shall you escape the vengeance to come that dare thus impiously abâ—se the Name of our Lord Iesus Christ and so impose upon the world by your bold usurpations Vsurpations indeed You call your selvs Vice-Roys Apostolicke Bishops Spirituall Church Grace Holinesse meere Nominalls which you have usurped and patched together to become a veile to cover your deep hypocrisie and to seem glorious in the eyes of the world and all to hold up your earthly Kingdome which consists altogether of earthly things honours riches pleasures But blind world that suâ—ferest thy selfe to be thus guld and befoold with such glittering stuffe and to be made a slave to such Lords and to be cheated of thy salvavation by these Antichristian Mountebanks And yet they pretend and professe that this their carnall pompous and Pontificiall Kingdome is Christs spirituall Kingdome here in the state of Grace Let them then cleare themselves herein from that damned Heresy of that old Heretick â—erinthus who lived in S. Iohns time His Heresy was That Christs Kingdome after his Resurrection was earthly and that now the flesh conversing in Ierusalem was to serve lusts and pleasures See Euseb. Eccl. Hist. lib 3. cap. 22. Now is not the Prelates Kingdome just that in practise with Cerinthus his Heresy If so As S. Iohn forsook the Bath wherein Cerinthus was what cause have Christians to fly from that roofe where such an Antichristian Hierarchy domineereth But in the next place let 's consider of your Reason How stands it good that because Christs Church is as large as the world therfore he thought it fitter to governe it by Diverse then by One Vice-Roy Now we have proved your Hierarchy not to be an Aristocrasie a Government of the Best men and that by good Laws seeing therfore you must needs be some Government then it must be an Olegarchie that is the Government of a few of the worse men such as rule by their lusts and not by any good Laws either of God or Man But now tell me my Lord if you argue upon this ground that because the Militant Church is as large as the world therfore 't is fitter it be governed by many Vice Roys then by one why may not aswell one Prelate as the Pope be sole Vice-Roy over the whole world as my Lord of Canterbury be a Vice-Roy over all England For doth not the Pope and you Governe your Churches by substitutes Why then may not the Pope Governe the whole by his Curates as you doe all England by your Curates For
the strength of your powerfullest perswasive reasons and draw them by your gentlest motives but doe not hale and dragge them with the violence of your Archiepiscopall power and Romish zeale Throw not Godly Ministers out of their Ministry and Means and that by Hundreds with their Wives and Children exposed to all miseries of poverty and all because they will not dare not yeeld to your lawlesse Prelaticall Impositions Innovations Usurpations But if you will needs proceed on in that your violent course against Christ and Christian liberty and peace of mens Consciences assure your selfe you shall not prâ—sper you shall not be victor Christ will confound you with all your Power and Pollicie And He shal be both Irenaenus and Victor for his Church both to Conquer his Enemies and to restore Peace to his People And thus much of your example of Irenaeus and Victor L. p. 141. Well thus the whole Militant Church is holy and so we beleeve And if she erre in the Foundation that is in some one or more Fundamentall points of Faith then she may be a Church of Christ still but not Holy but becomes Hereticall And most certaine it is that no Assembly be it never so Generall of such Hereticks is or can be holy P. Doe you beleeve the whole Militant Church to be holy And so doe I. But your whole Militant Church is not the same with that which I beleeve is holy For your whole Militant Church whereof you professe to be a member is in plain terms the Antichristian Church and the Church Malignant which is a persecuter of the true Militant Church of Christ as both hath been and yet will be made more manifest So as your Militant Church is properly so called for no other reason but because it makes Warre against Christ and his Saints Rev. 12.7 and 13.7 and 16.14 and 17.14 but the true Militant Church of Christ is so called because she fights spiritually under Christs banner against Sinne the World the Flesh the Devil and cruell Persecuters whom she overcomes by the blood of the Lambe and by the word of her Testimony not loving her life unto the death So as your Militant Church is a name which you have usurped abused and perverted whereas it is to be named according to its nature The Church Malignant For further proofe hereof you say if she erre in some one or more Fundamentall points c. Which implyes your Militant Church may erre in points Fundamentall Which cannot possibly be understood of the onely true holy Catholicke Militant Church of Iesus Christ. For this whole Militant Church of the Elect cannot either in whole or in part or in the least member of it erre in any Fundamentall point so as thereby to becâ—me unholy For this were else to fall from Christ and from â—he Comâ—munion of Saints by being seduced by Antichrists and false Prophets who shall deceive if it were possible but it is not possible the verâ— Elect. This erring in the Foundation belongs and extends to all the Reprobates of the world who are by Antichrist seduced unto their perdition who because they receive not the love of the Truth that they might be saved God shall send them strong Delusions to bâ—leeve a lye yea to beleeve that for truth which their own â—eared Conscience tells them is a lye For not to receive the love of the truth implyes that they had received the truth unto acknowledgement and conviction but the love of this truth they imbraced not But the whole Militant Church of Christ I say cannot be so seduced unto perdition or to fall from Christ. What is it to fall from Christ To fall from Christ is to fall from that Faith and love of Christ which once they professed that is from the Faith of the Doctrine of Christ and from that love which they professed towards it And this faâ—ling from the Faith of Christ is when any one Fundamentall point of faith is denyed and persisted in as we have formerly proved as in the Resurrection and Circumcision and sundry others I might adde here many other Instances as the Deniall of all the Doctrines of Grace in Gods Free Election Redemption c. which Grace and Merit of Christ is peculiar to the Elect onely I will onely adde one more here which I but touched before He that denyes the Lords day to be the Sabbath day of Christians commanded no lesse to Christians in the 4th Commandement then the seventh or last day of the week was to the Iewes he erres in the Foundation becomes unholy and falls away from the Faith of Christ. This I demonstrate thus First The 4 th Commandement is Morall and so eternall and unchangeable And as the eternall sabbatisme is in heaven belonging to the Church Tryumphant so there is a sabbatisme temporall pertaining to the Church Militant in this world This sabbatisme as the other is the rest of God His Rest saith David This Sabbatisme in the Church Militant is by God himselfe appointed to be solemnly observed of the whole Congregation on that seventh day of the week wheron himselfe rested This Sabbath or rest of God was on the seventh or last day of the week upon the finishing of the worke of creation And therfore for that very cause God commanded his People in the Old Testament to sanctifie that Sabbath day weekly This is given as the Reason of its sanctification by the People The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God For in six dâ—yes he made heaven and earth and rested the seventh Therfore c. Remember to sanctifie the Sabbath day the Lords Sabbath day And note he saith not Remember to sanctifie the seventh or last day of the week but Remember to sanctifie the Sabbath day These words are the Morall substance of the Commandement The rest is an exposition and application of it the exposition to keep holy that Day for Sabbath which is the Lords own Sabbath day wherein himselfe hath rested Note this well for I will speak much here in few words Weigh them therfore number them not The particular application of the seventh or last day of the week as wherein God rested from his works of Creation is commended and commanded to Gods people under the Old Testament So as if there had not come in afterwards a more glorious Sabbath or rest of Gods as from a more glorious worke of a more glorious Creation we Christians also should have kept that seventh day that the Jewes kept But that this more glorious day of a more glorious rest of God from a more glorious worke being come then the same 4 th Commandement commands us Christians to keep this new Day of Rest of the Lord our God So as though the Day be changed yet the Commandement is the same It binds us still to sanctifie the Sabbath of the Lord our God Secondly for the application of the 4 th Commandement to us
Christians Remember to keep the Sabbath day holy What Sabbath day Or what day for Sabbath The Sabbath day of the Lord thy God wherein himselfe rested What day is that The first day of the weeke This is another seventh day reckoning the weeke backward Now on this first day of the week the Lord our God Iesus Christ after that he had finished the worke of Redemption being a new Creation and much more glorious then the former in many respects rose againe from the dead and so entred into his Rest that morning and moment of his Rising again He entred then I say into the state of Rest though not into the place of Rest till his Ascension This is sufficient But the work of Redemption was finished on the Crosse. Not altogether on the Crosse Christ indured and finished his suffering of the pangs and paines of death when he said Consummatum est It is finished but there remained the bonds of death to be indured and that was in the grave 3 dayes to redeem us aswell our bodies from the grave as our soules from hell on the Crosse. Now all this being finished to wit the whole worke of Redemtion Christ rising the 3 d day therein rested from his worke And this being the Sabbath or Rest of the Lord our God surpassing the former Rest in glory and into which rest or sabbatisme all beleeving Christians do enter and have an Interest as Heb. 4.3 it follows necessarily that as by Christs example of Resting on that day as by his Commandement to keep the Sabbath day of the Lord our God wherein himselfe hath rested that we Christians do sanctifie the Lords day the first day of the week for our Christian Sabbath day according to the 4 th Commandement Which if we doe not as not holding our selves bound by the 4 th Commandement Then all these errors in the fundamentalls of faith follow upon it As first by not sanctifying the Lords day for our Christian Sabbath day we utterly deny overthrow and destroy the Morality of the 4 th Commandement which to the Militant Church on earth stands in this To sanctifie the Sabbath day of the Lord our God It commands us this or nothing and if nothing it loseth both the Nature and Name of a Commandement And if you doe acknowledge and beleeve it to be as it is one of Gods ten Morall Commandements then of necessity you must either sanctifie the first day of the week for Sabbath whereon Christ arose and rested or else you must sanctifie that seventh day of the Old Testament which God rested on from his worke of Creation which the Jewes observed And if you keep the Jewes Sabbath you must turn Jew and deny Christ to be come in the flesh For in Deuteronomy God commands them to keep the Sabbath day in memory of their Redemption from Aegipt and so their Sabbath day was turned into a type of another Sabbath or Rest that was to be brought in upon the accomplishment of our spirituall Redemption Which being now finished that typicall Sabbath is vanished being the last Type which was fulfilled by Christ resting in his Grave on that day and so utterly abolished in that more glorious Rest of his Resurrection If then you keep the Jewes Sabbath you do with them deny Christ to be come And if you sanctifie not the first day of the weeke instead of and succeding in place of the old Sabbath day then as you utterly deny and destroy the 4 th Commandement so you deny the worke of Redemption finished on the Crosse and in the Grave you deny his Resurrection wherein he rested from that worke and you deny the very rest of heaven and you deny the Communion of Saints both in the Church Militant and Triumphant First you deny the Accomplishment of the worke of Redemption on the Crosse and in the Redemption it selfe in denying the Rest of Christ in the day of his Resurrection For if he then rested not the worke of Redemption was not finished And you deny he rested in denying his rest to be the rest of the Lord our God which the 4 th Commandement commands us Christians to keepe weekly on that day which if we keep not Christ hath not rested and so he hath not redeemed us Secondly in denying Christs rest you deny his Resurrection For if he rested not he arose not For the very first moment of his Resurrection began his rest If then you sanctifie not the Day of his rest for the Christian Sabbath day you deny as Christs rest so his Resurrection and the whole vertue of it by which we arise from Sinne spiritually and from the Grave corporally And cursed is he that hath not his part in the first Resurrection for on him the second death that is eternall death shall have power because Blessed and holy is he that hath his part in the first Resurrection for on him the second death shall have no power Thirdly in thus denying Christs rest in his Resurrection while you deny that day to be the holy rest or Sabbath day of Christians you deny as Christs eternall rest in heaven so that rest or sabbatisme which remaines for the people of God As the Apostle saith There remaineth therfore Sabbatismòs a sabbatisme or Sabbaticall holy rest for the people of God Therfore Wherupon is this inferred Upon the former verse where he speaks of this very Sabbath or Rest day of Christians which is as the first fruits of the eternall sabbatisme For saith he If Iesus Iosua had given them rest then would he not afterwards have spoken of another day Another day What other day but that rest day which our Iesus rested on and which is our rest day For when Christ in his Resurrection entred into his rest he made that day the day of our rest which gives us an Interest in and brings us to his eternall rest For Certainly if we doe not rest with Christ in the Day of his Rest weekly here according to the Commandement we shall never rest with him eternally in heaven He that keeps not this Other Day which succeeded that under the Law hath no sabbatisme remaining for him in heaven Lastly in denying this Rest-day of Christ to be our Christian Sabbath to be sanctified according to the Commandment you deny the Communion of Saints in the Church Militant and consequently in the Church Triumphant For except there be a Communion of Saints in the Church Militant which is the seed of the Church Triumphant what Communion of Saints can be in heaven For none are Saints there which were not fiâ—st Saints here And what Communion of Saints can be here but especially in the holy and solemne Assemblies where they are to Communicate together in Prayer and Thanks-giving and hearing of the Word and receiving of the Sacrament And how can this be if there be not a set day for it And who shall appoint this day but God himselfe And what Day
Resurrection Indeed you inatate â—he Apostles in their Philâ—â—â—ikÃâ— emulation and contention which should be the greatest which Christ condemneth and utterly forbiddeth in them But this was in them onely before they knew the Mystery of Christs Kingdome aright They dreamed of a Temporall Kingdome but after Christs Resurrection when they had received the Holy Ghost they were of another mind no such emulation then who should be the chiefest there but who should shew greatest love and fidelity to Christ in preaching the Gospell and building up spirituall Temples to God But you I say imitate them in their carnall estate wherein that which they blindly imagined you have erected an Image of namely a Temporall Kingdome like that of Heathen Kings and Princes and other Temporall Lords Which shews that you are none of Christs Disciples I say or the Apostles successors and that you have not Christs Spirit but are altogether carnall and sensuall as the Apostle saith For had you Christs Spirit you would be truly spirituall as the Apostles were But you are sâ—nsuall having not the Spirit And if any man have not the Spirit of Christ the sâ—me is none of his And in that you veile your hypocrisie and all your sensuality and carnall state which you call your Hierarchy under the specious termes and Titles of spirituall Holy Grace Church Bishops Christs Vicars or Vice-Roys Apostoliâ—ke successors oâ— the Apostles wherewith you gull the blind world this is that very Mystery of Iniquity the Apostle speaks of which began to work even in his dayes as we noted before you being those false Prophets that come in Christs Name in sheeps clothing but are inwardly ravening Wolves You may think my language sharpe but it cannot be too sharpe against such a cursed proud Generation as you Prelates are usurping Tyrants Rebells against Christ Perverters of all truth and faith corrupters of all true honesty holinesse Religion and the worship of God who are made to be destroyed with that Beast of Rome whose Image you beare and with whom the false Prophets such as you are and all those that in you do worship the Image of the Beast and receive his marks shall goe into the bottomlesse pit and burning lake L. p. 204. Now it the Church of Rome must be a Tryumphant Church here Militant no longer P. I hope then if Rome be here as she is a Church Triumphant and no more Militant but in warring against Christ and his Saints for she saith in her heart I sit a Queen and am no Widow and shall see no sorrow And in her Decretalls she hath made a firme Decree for her perpetuall tranquility and felicity here in all pleasures and prosperity free from all incursions and invasions which is an estate Tryumphant there also you and your Hierarchicall Lady Church of England will not be farre behind your Sister Queen at Rome For you are both one and the same Church and one in that especially which makes you a Church Tryumphant and that is your Kingly Hierarchy and Lordly Prelacy and therfore if that Queen be tryumphant at Rome your Lordship and your Churches Ladyship must be tryumphant in England as indeed you are in all your Ruffe and Gallantry And as Rome hath now a long time tryumphed over the poore Saints of God and Martyrs of Iesus martyring and massacring them and garrowsing full cups of their blood even unto drunkennesse and surfet so your Tryumphant Chariot marcheth after her apace trampling the Saints under your feet and tryumphing over them in shedding their innocent blood and so glorying in your Bestiall and Diabolicall cruelty in oppressing and tyrannizing over Gods people and that so fiercely as if you would outstrippe your Elder Sister in all her bloody barbarisme and therein exalt your tryumph above hers For wherein else should the Glory and magnificence of your Prelaticall Princes and Heroicall Vice-Roys shine forth but in being mounted on Horsebacke while the true Princes lacky it by them on the earth And thus you ride in tryumph as the Heathen Kings were wont to doe Oh how you tryumphed when you looked through one of your Court-windowes when you passed your tryumphall Censure to behold those THREE looking through your Pillory-windowes whose blood you had before how justly your own Conscience can tell you condemned there to be shed But the wonder was that they even theâ—e as in their tryumphall Chariot tryumphed over your Barbarous cruelty But thus you are a Tryumphant Church too and in nothing Militant but as is noted before in your warring against and persecuting the poore Saints of God But your tryumph shall end in your shame and confusion verifying that which shall be fulfilled in your Sister or Mother Rome Reward her even as she rewarded you and double unto her double according to her works in the Cup which she hath filled fill to her double How much she hath gâ—â—rified her selfe and lived delicioutsly so much torment and sorrow gâ—ve her for she saith in her heart I sit a Queen and am no widow and shall see no sorrow Therfore shall her plagues come in one day c. L. p. 205. The Kings under the Law but sâ—ill according to it did proceed to necessary Râ—formations in Church-businâ—sses and therin commanded the very Priests themselves as appeares in the Acts of â—lesechiah and Iosiah 2 Chro. 29.4 and 4 King â—â— 2 P. All this is true you here affirme so as iâ— confirmes what we said before of Christian Kings in matters oâ— Religion that they ought to doe nothing but still according to the Law of God All Allways in All things not varying in the least Circumstance or Ceremony All this is well But what makes this for your Priest What saith your practise This Ergo the King giving way to the Priest or Prelate of Canterbury he may of his own head appoint and impose what Ceremonies his Romish Devotion thinks fit in the worship of God This is your usuall Logicke This your usuall perverting and abusing of Scripture Well What more A little before ibid. you tell us Omnis anima Every soule All spirituall men even to the highâ—st Bishop and in spirituall Causes so the foundations of Faith and good Manners be not shaken must be subject to the Higher Powers And where they are shaken there ought to be Prayer and Patience there ought not to be opposition by force Now for your highest Bishop and all spirituall men we have done withall That all Obedience is due from all men to Kings and Princes in all things where the foundations of Faith and Good Manners be not shaken we all acknowledge with you and where they are shaken there ought to be Prayer and Patience of every particular and private Christian without his opposition by force when he is pressed to doe that which is against Gods word and his own Conscience Now here by the way I pray you resolve me as in a Case of
the end of the world Whereas by saying Peter represented the Person of the Church you must meane that the Church is wholly contained in the Ministers For you usually call your Clergy the Church as if you had no Church but that whereas the Congregation or society of all the Faithfull is the Church of God as is shewed before So as in no respect did Peter receive the Keys in the person of your Priest and Prelaticall Church L. p 258. Where 't is said That Christ makes to himselfe a Church without spot or wrinckle Eph. 5. That is not understâ—â—d of the Church Militant but of the Church Tryumphant And to maintain the contrary is a brand of the spreading Heresie of Pelagianisme P. That speech of the Apostle includes as well the truâ— Church Militant as the Tryumphant both which containe and consist of all the Elâ—ct onely And these Elect that in the Church Militant live by Faith though they have enoikouâ—an kì euperÃstton aâ—mratÃan as the Apostle saith sinne dwelling in them and easily besetting them yet they are in Gods sight through Faith in Christs blood that fountaine set open for Israel washed from all the spotâ— of sinne being in Christs imputed Righteousnesse and holynesse presented and accepted in Gods sight as most pure without spot or wrinkle As the the Apostle Iohn saith The blood of Christ cleanseth us from all sinne And Christ saith to his Spouse his Church Militant Thou art all faire my Love there is no spot in thee Concerning that place which you cite out of Augustine where he saith The whole Church prayeth forgive us our debts 'T is true speaking there of the visible Church quae in toto terrarum orbe clamat ad deum which over all the earth crys to God And if he meane it of the Elect onely which are the onely true Spouse of Christ in all the world their praying forgive us our debts hinders not nor interrupteth their perpetuall purity in Gods sight notwithstanding For we may be and are through faith in Christ accepted for pure in Gods eyes when in our own eyes through sin and manifold corruptions still dwelling but not raigning in us we are impure And therfore we pray forgive us our debts because we have dayly failings and infirmities whereof our Consciences accuse us and the confession of them with deprecation is a meanes to have that stain and guilt cleaving to our Conscience and corrupt nature wiped off Faith still renewing the application of Christs merits as a Balme to heale our wounds and to assure us that our sinnes are blotted out in his blood For as Iohn saith If we confesse our sinnes he is faithfull and just to forgive us our sinnes and to cleanse us from all unrighteousnes Now as for the Pelagians One of their errours was in Arrogating purity to their own sect and that they had no Originall sinne but that they were Justi by a selfe-Righteousnesse calling those of their own sect Justi Righteous as Augustine tells us But where you name the spreading Heresie of the Pelagians I know none to whom that is more beholden then to him your selfe I meane who hath given it a footing and rooting too in the Articles of the Doctrines of the Church of England and under whom it hath shot forth its branches both in height and breadth that it dare both overtop and overdrop the Truth without controule But I had almost forgot one thing and that is this you allow not Purity in your Church Militant in this life If therfore there be not a full purgation of the Church and her Children here in this world where will you have her purged Purged she must be and that thorowly that she be without spot or wrinkle before she come into heaven For in thither no unclean thing entâ—eth Me thinks then I smell here the smoke of some Purgatory fire after this life which must purge away all the reliques of sins spots And upon this very ground that you goe on it is that the Papists have very prudently as in a case of necessity devised their Purgatory to cleanse all after this life seeing here they say there is no Perfection of Purity But perhaps you thought not of this consequence when you writ those words That the Church Militant is not without spot or wrinkle But so how will you avoyd the consequence of Purgatory So as while you pretend to avoyd the Pelagian Rocke you fall into the Roman fiery Phlegetom or Purgatory-Gulfe According to the old Proverbe Incidit in Scyllam dum vuâ—t vitare Charâ—â—â—in But you seem afterwards not to allow of Purgatory telling some stories of it but bringing not one Argument from Scripture against it as That the blood of Christ doth cleanse a true beleever from all sinne in this life and the like But hereof in its place Againe In saying That Christ doth not make the Church Militant in this life to be without spot or wrinkle you doe 〈◊〉 overthrow that Article of Faith I beleeve the holy Catholicke Church Now doth not the holy Catholicke Church 〈…〉 Church Militant Is not the Church Militant 〈…〉 if holy is it not then without spot or wrinkle 〈…〉 But this is no Article of your Faith because your Catholicke Church is not thus holy without spot or wrinkle L. p. 275. In and by the Councel of Trent the Pope 〈…〉 of Saints and Adoration of Images to the 〈…〉 of Christianity and as great hazzard of the weake P. What no more but so First In the Councel â—f 〈…〉 the Pope teach no more but these two And these two he could teach long before the Councel of Trent There they had the Pâ—pâ— confirmation but not their Christendome But you tell us not â— word in all your Booke of the Popes teaching of 〈…〉 mans works and merits and of his Anathematizing of 〈…〉 by Faith onely which the Scripture teacheth Nor a 〈…〉 teaching the Masse to be a Propitiatory sacrifice for 〈…〉 quicke and dead Nor how he teacheth a New order of sacriâ—â—â—cing Priests Nor That Originall sinne is no sinne saying Although the Apostle define it to be sinne yet the holy Councel of Trent decreeth it not to have the nature of sinne And all these and many more such the Pope teacheth in the Councel of Trent Secondly Are Invocation of Saints and Adoration of Images no more but a great hazzard to the weake Are they not so also to the strong while they make the strongest to stoope to them and therfore so much the more hazardous Except you meane that to the strong they are damnable not onely dangerous But is plaine Idolatry in both these both adoration of Images and Invocaâ—iâ—n of Saints onely hazardous to the weake Is not Idolatry damnable Nay is it not damnation to Idolaters Doth it not shut them out of heaven For no Idolaters shall inherit the Kingdome of God Know ye it not saith the Apostle
Kingdome meerly Temporall 283. Their Government Oligarchicall ibid. Christs Congregations have no need of Prelates to visit them having their own lawfull Pastor to feed them 285. The Govenment of Christs Church is most perfect of all other as consisting of the 3 States of good Politie or Government to wit the Monarchiall the Aristocraticall and the Democraticall 286. Prelates Lordly Tyranny expresly condemned by Christ as Heathenish 287 to 290. 204. The Prelaticall Church in England no lesse Tryumphant then the Prelate taxeth Rome to be 290 291. 205. By the Prelates own allegation nor Kings nor Priests may doe any thing in Reformation of Religion besides Gods prescript Law 291 292. And so by his Confession implicitly where the foundation of Faith and Good Manners are shaken therein Magistrates are not to be obeyed in which respect the Prelate is shrewdly put to it in sundry instances 293 to 297. 210. The Prelate againe blasphemeth Gods Name as if a favourer of the Prelaticall practises in England 297. A blasphemous Article of Faith of the Prelates pinning upon the Church of England ibid. Prelaticall Canons yea and Papall too yoaked and equalled by the Prelate with Scriptures in Governing the Church We must not joyn in Prayer with notorious profane Hypocrites and Enemies of Christ and of his Truth 298. A speciall Prayer for the King in these perillous times ibid. King and State abused and indangered by the Prelates practises and putting forth of this his Booke ibid. The Prelate proves all his Speculations with his bare word 199. What a Polititiant he Ch. of Eng. is grown under such a Primate Prelates no visible Judges of Gods Institution proved at large against the Prelates Blasphemy 399 300 301. Prelates Canons such Law-books as wherewith Christs Law-book cannot consist but is made of none effect They are Antichristian bondage ibid. No more necessity of one Primate over all England then of one pope over All 302. A Speciall duty of Christian Magistrates ibid. 212. How uniny and certainty of Faith is preserved by the Prelates 303. 194. The Prelate makes the Scripture a blind dumb and dead Judge 303 304. Of Generall Councels sundry notable Passages scattered along his Booke and collected by the Replyer and detected to be some of them ridiculous and all of them most impious and detestable from 304 to 324. How by the Prelates Doctrine both himselfe and his Church of England are bound to worship Images and to forbeare the Cup in the Sacrament as being decreed by Generall Councels and not yet reversed by any other equall to those 312 313. The Apostles Assembly Act. 15. no Precedent for Generall Councels in after Ages to be Judges in Controversies of Faith 314 315. and therfore that example not prudently but surreptitiously taken up by the Prelaticall Church The Prelate confesseth that Generall Councels have no Authority by Christs Institution 312 313. How unlike Prelaticall Councels are to that Act. 15. whereof not only the Apostles but the Presbyters and the Brethren the People of God were the Body 313 314. How the Prelate holds the Difinitions of Generall Councels to be infallible and that there is no more question to be made of the assistance of the Holy Ghost in them then that the Holy Ghosts assistance is without errour 325 326. The Prelate boldly professeth that he absolutely maketh a Generall Councel Judge of Controversies 327. Wherein he is abolutely fallen from the Catholick Faith His sundy assertions some ridiculous some contradictorious some blasphemous some darke riddles which he propounds and leaves unresolved and can never Resolve 321 322. He is catcht fast in his own Net And the more he struggleth to unwind himselfe out the mâ—re he is intangled 213. Though the Councel of Trent were not Generall yet it is so Generall as the Decrees thereof do bind all Papists under Anathema 328. 227. Another Reason of the Prelates why a Generall Councel erring yet should stand in force namely for the peace of Christendome confuted He is content to forgoe the Truth for Peace sake 328. The Prelates Heresie in holding it a branch of Heresie to say The Church Militant is without spot or wrinckle according to Ephes. 5. confuted 329 330. The Prelate overthrows an Article of the Faith 331. The Prelates Key of Doctrine primely in the Church wherewith he shuts out Truth and lets in Errour 329. He makes it but a supposition for the Key of Doctrine to let in Truth ibid. The Prelates subtile but futile and vaine Distinction of Transubstantiation confuted 332. He makes Christs Institution not to be cleare against Transubstantiation as against Communion in one Kind Confuted fully 333 334. Romish Adoration of Images minced by the Prelate set forth by the Replyer in its full proportion and shewed to be more grosse Idolatry then that of the Heathen 334 335 336. 280. The Prelates notorious hypocrisie in confessing Images in Churches and other Romish Superstitions to have given great Scandall to many so as to drive them quite away from them detected and selfe-condemned by his practises 337 338. Will-worship in Altar-Service and the like a Service of the Devil 340 341. The Prelates hot zeale in pressing more of Romes Ceremonies makes the old justly suspected as smelling ranke 341. Ilustrated by a similitude ibid. The Prelates Ceremonies condemned by the Same Testimony which he alledgeth 343 344. the By beâ—ng put for the Maine See before 280. The Prelate stands stiffly in this That a silly ignorant Papist living and dying in the Romish Faith may thereby conforming himselfe to his Romish Religious life be saved with his Reasons his so learning of Christ and his Charity not mistaken confuted 345 to 350. That which the Prelate calls Churlishnesse in the Protestants is better then the Prelates Charity ibid. 294 295. The Prelates quoting of 3. Martyrs for the Name of Reall Presence which he would faine have to be brought in use answered 350 351 352 353. Reasons why we ought not to name the Reall Presence in the Sacrament 351. 297. The Prelate dallies with Transubstantiation Purgatory Forbearance of the Cup in saying they are Disputed or Disputable and Improbable Questions 353 354. Romes Tyranny confessed by the Prelate the Image whereof is proved to be in the Prelacy of England 356 357. How he dawbes with the Jesuites about their Salvation 357 358. 299. The Prelate contradicts himselfe and so overthrows his Faith and Charity concerning a silly Papists Salvation in Saying That as a Romanist he cannot be saved 357 358. The Prelates vaine ridiculous and absurd hope of the Salvation of some Papists living in the Church of Rome 358 to 363. The Prelates confession of the Romanists Faith crosseth his hope of their Salvation 372. The Prelate still hath a Reservation for the Salvation of his silly ignorant Papists 302. The Prelates worth misled the greatest misleader 363. The Prelates Rule 'T is safest to beleeve the Article of Christs Descent into hell as both the Churches of England
smart of it though perhaps an ordinary Bee may smell it out yet I will not take upon me to divine it But if you will contend and offer violence to a whole Hive forcing the Bees beyond their nature though you be never so well armed Cap a pied from top to toe as with Sauls armour so as the Bees cannot reach you yet how shall you escape the sting of the great Master-Bee JESUS CHRIST who is able with one whoope to rayse an army of flies to plague the Aegyptian Tyrants and Taskmasters for their extreame violence offered to his poore Bees And never look that such Bees should ever brook your Priest as having learned by too much experience that he comes not but to kill and take the honey As Christ saith of the Thiefe or Vsurper that climbeth up into the Sheep-fold another way He cometh not but to steale kill and to destroy Againe I must crave a little more of your patience while I somewhat more thorowly Scan your Conjunction of the King and Priest so closse and inseparably together The King and the Priest or The King and the Prelate or The King and the Bishop according to a new Late Start up Proverbe or as you make it a new Maxime in the Politicks No Bishop no King Now for a ground whereon to pitch the Mathematicall Staffe of my ensuing Demonstration I must begge two Aitâ—mata or Demands First That ever a King is good this is such a principle as transcends the Demonstration of Art For He 〈◊〉 Minister of GOD to thee for Good Ergo Good The Second is That a Priest or Prelate as being out of the ranke of Gods Creation and Ordination is ever Bad. These two things granted as they may not be denyed I say It is not good that Good and Bad be joyned together Although as Scaliger saith Malum non est nisi in bono Evill is not but in good But the King and Priest thus linked together are like to two Planets in Conjunction the one as Astronomers tell us Benigne the other Malignant and during the Conjunction the Benigne Planet is not so forcible in its kindly influence as the Malignant is potent in hindering it and in sending forth his own more predominant Malignity not so easily qualified by the Benignity of the other And they say againe that some Planets are of such a temper as they are neither good nor bad but as they are in Conjunction with others if with a good Planet they are good if with a bad evill As we read of King Ioash who so long as good Iehoiada the High Priest lived raigned well but he being dead he by the bad Counsell of his Princes fell to Idolatry So an evill Planet being in Conjunction with an indifferent may cause it to doe hurt which in its owne nature is not much malignant Againe 't is observed of the Oake which for strength among all the Trees may be an Embleme of a King being all overgrown with the Ivie which for its many insinuations and windings every way may well resemble your Priest it thrives not the fewer leaves and branches it puts forth for shade and protection from a shower or storme or heat of Summer and litle fruit to feed the hungry for it is hide-bound so guirt in by the Ivie that it cannot prosper Yea such a Conjunction cannot be more fitly parallelled in my judgement then to the feet of that Image in Daniel the Head whereof was of gold the breast and armes of silver the belly and thighs of brasse his legges of iron his feet part of iron and part of clay The Image represented the Successive Raignes in the Babilonian Monarchy each worse then other till at last it came to ruine And it may be an Embleme of all Kingdomes and States which if they want the ancient Roman Lustration or Purgation every five yeares like some old Statutes of England for a Trienniall Visitation a certain thing which was wont to be called a Parliament or so will according to an old observation in the Politicks easily grow worse and worse As the Roman Poet observed in his time Aetas parentum pejor avis Tulit nos equiores mox daturos Progeniem vitiosiorem In English thus Our Fathers Age which they did passe Grew worse then our Grand-fathers was Our selves worse then our Parents be And our next race proves worse then we But we pitch to be silent in the rest of the Image upon the feet mixt of iron and clay the last legges as the Proverb which that Empire went upon Iron as Daniel interprets it signifies strength but Clay brittlenesse which intermeddled with the Iron addes no strength to it but onely makes it swell the bigger which swelling portends and causes ruine For the Iron relying on its mixture with the Clay and the Clay presuming to doe great things by being joyned and backed with the Iron here is the Portent In the Revelation we read of Kings giving their power to the Beast that is giving way to the Beast or to his limbs the Priests to exercise a power over them and their Kingdomes For which cause England was wont to be called the Popes Asse The ten hornes which thou sawest upon the Beast these shall hate the whore and shall make her desolate and naked and shall eate her flesh and burne her with fire For God hath put in their hearts to fulfill his will and to agree and give their Kingdome unto the Beast untill the words of God shal be fulfilled On this GOD and on his word will we wait Sure we are that the whore of Babylon with her Priests shall come down into the dust And all Gods people are admonished to come out of her least they partake of her sinnes and receive of her plagues So in due time when Gods word shall be fulfilled the Iron shall unmixe it selfe from the Clay that the one may be preserved and the other goe to his owne place to the earth whence it came and wheâ—eof it is But in the next place for what good end and purpose doe you linke your Priest with the King Because say you They more then any other are bound to looke to the Integrity of the Church in Doctrine and Manners Surely for the first the King we doe in all humility imbrace and acknowledge him as Gods vicegerent bound to doe that office for the true Church of Christ which Gods word hath injoyned and requires of him And that consists generally in â—his as he is Custos utriusque Tabulae the Keeper in trust of both the Tables of the Law he is to see ut currat Lex that Gods Law and Word hina treke that it may run have a free passage without impeachment that the Commandements of the Law be kept Sarta tecta safe and sound without diminishing much lesse demolishing any one of them that nothing be done either in Doctrine or Manners or in the
that principally They came about him like Bees Who The High Priests the Scribes and Pharisees who also hooked in the secular power Caesar and the Priest these came Swarming about Christ like Bees which they did first in the Garden where they apprehended him then in the High Priests hall where they accused him then in the Praetorium before Pilate where they condemned him as before Herod where they mocked him and last of all they Stung him to the heart with a Roman Speare his hands and feet fast nayled to the Crosse. Thus the Great Master Bee of the Hive was stung to death by the Hierarchies instigation And thus indeed GOD grant it never be our Kings case as it was Christs Thus I hope you see by this time what a Divine you are in your application of Scripture If you heare but the buzzing of a Bee presently that 's the Bee that stings you Whereas in truth you and all such as you who are persecuters of Christ and murtherers of him in his Saints and Servants are those Bees that David and in him Christ complaines of They came about me like Bees But take with you what followes They these Bees are quenched as the fire of thornes For in the Name of the Lord I will destroy them The Second place which I wonder at more and yet I will now cease to wonder at any thing you either doe or dare to speake which you quote is Rev. 22.12 Behold I come quickly and my reward is with me to give to every man according as his works shal be Now this you apply to your selfe as a medicine to cure that sting which you say the Bees have given you Why what Bees doe sting you If any are they not and that by your own confession the Bees of Gods own Hive his true Church And why doe they sting you Is it not for your slapping of them and smoaking them out of their Hive But how or wherewithall do they sting you Alas poore soules they have no other stings but Prayers and Teares and the sting of Truth which they preach and professe These are their proper stings Perhaps as they have cause enough they pray against you as a most cruell persecuter of the poore painfull Bees of Christ his Ministers and an overthrower of their Hives and a destroyer of the Bees But such stings you little care for as which you are not affraid to provoke more and more against you every day But beleeve it their Prayers like winged darts or arrowes fly swiftly and pierce deep and will deadly wound where they light though as yet ye be not sensible of it But all this while I heare not a word of the Hornets-Selfe stinging Why doe ye not yet cry out of the deadly sting of your own Conscience For all the innocent blood of Gods Servants which you have shed and for all the havock you have made in his Hive Nay rather your heart is so hardned with sinne and blinded with Romish zeale that instead of remorse you look for a reward And a reward you shall have of him whose words you feare not to cite who Saith Behold I come quickly and my Reward is with me to give to every man according as his works shal be But you tell us immediately before this that you are stung of the Bees many times for no offence nay sometime for Service done them would they see it Many times for no offence Therfore it seems sometimes it is for offence done them by you But can you name any one time when they sting you without being extreamely provoked by your offence given them Shew it if you can Nay sometimes you say for Service done them Somtimes When And what Service Your oppressing and burthening their Consciences with more and more Romish rites and Ceremonies Your fetching them up to your High-Commission and there undoing of them clipping their wings that they can now no more doe their office and bring any more honey to the Hive and so muzling their mouthes that they cannot dare not so much as humme What other Service can they see you doe them Or do you your selfe know any that you do in private for these Bees Do you now and then whisper a good word for them in the Kings eare That were a good heareing if you did it on the right side But this service we confesse you do them You drive them closser to their GOD make them pray the more earnestly and fervently and to be the more provident in the well husbanding of that poore stock of honey they have got both because you have stocked up all those flowers on which they should gather more and least that which they have you should take from them For a Conclusion of this your similitude of the Bee-hive the Church of Christ upon earth you compare to a Hive of Bees And when the Priest putteth his hand to the Hive he shal be sure to be Stung and there is no Honey for him This Priest is the Prelate an Hierarchicall man And as I noted before the true Bees of Christ his true Church cannot brook such Priests such Hierarchicall men to meddle with them Ergo hence I conclude that the Hierarchy consisting of Priests and such like men as Prelates or an Hierarchicall Church is no true Church of Christ is not this Hive of Bees to which you compare the Church of Christ upon earth How so For your Prelaticall Church is such a Hive of Bees as the Priest may put his hand to the Hive without any feare or danger of stinging at his pleasure For in that Hive all the Bees are so conformable to the Priest their Master-Bee as they yeeld all subjection to his dictates neither doe they or dare they at any time offer to sting him But if this Priest offer to meddle with Christs Bee-hive and to impose his Cannon Law and Ceremonies upon Christs Bees to inforce them to conformity to his Rules the Bees doe no more acknowledge such a Priest or Prelate for a Master then Christs Sheep which will not heare the voyce of a strange Shepheard And if he will needs force them he must not blame them if they sting him For as Christ said to the Jewes Ye are not of my Sheep So such Priests with their Hierarchy are none of Christs Hive Prelaticall Churches therefore are none of Christs true Churches And thus much of the Bee-Hive L. p. 15. The Church of England is in a hard Condition She professes the Ancient Catholick Faith and yet the Romanist condemnes her of Novelty in her Doctrine She practises Church Government as it hath been in all Ages and places where the Church of Christ hath taken any rooting both in and ever since the Apostles times and yet the Seperatist condemnes her for Antichristianisme in her Discipline P. It matters not so much who they be that thus condemn your Church of England as how true it is whereof you are condemned Doth the
Romanist condemn you of Novelty in Doctrine And what defence have you against this charge You say She professeth the Ancient Catholick Faith Is this your best Apology for your Church of England Is profession sufficient when you are departed from the Ancient Catholick Faith And is not the Ancient Catholick Faith that which Christ and his Apostles taught and have left recorded in the Scriptures Dare you deny this Now in what particular the Romanist condemnes you for Novelty in Doctrine I know not Surely not in those wherein themselves are equally condemned I will instance in two Doctrines wherein both you and they are Apostatized and departed from the Ancient Catholick Faith in your Novelty of Doctrine The first is your Forbidding of Marriage wherein thus farre you goe with the Romanist in forbidding Marriage to all sorts of persons for certain times in the yeare in all amounting to upon 20. weeks wanting not halfe a quarter of halfe of the yeare The Second is Forbidding Certain Meates on certaine dayes and weeks in the yeare And your Zeale in the observation hereof showeth plainly that you make it a matter of Religion as the Romanist doth and not a meere civill thing as the Statute makes it Now let us see what the Adostle saith of both these for he couples them together Now the Spirit speaketh expresly that in the latter times some shall depart from the Faith giving heed to seducing Spirits and Doctrines of Devils speaking lyes in hypocrisie and commanding to abstain from Meats which GOD hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which beleeve and know the Truth For every Creature of GOD is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving For it is sanctified by the Word of GOD and Prayer If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things thou shalt be a good Minister of Iesus Christ nourished up in the words of Faith and good Dâ—ctrine whereunto thou hast attained So the Apostle Where we may observe these particulars First That these two Doctrines Forbidding of Marriage and certaine Meates are Doctrines of Devils Secondly they proceed from lying Spirits Thirdly they are lyes spoken in hypocrisie as if some times were more holy then Marriage it selfe which is honourable amongst all and at all times or as if some meates were holyer then other or some more uncleane then other at some times Fourthly such as teach hold and practise these Doctrines have cauterized or seared Consciences which instead of remorse glory in these Doctrines and stiffely maintain them and out of which your Prerogative Courts and other Episcopall Courts sucke no small advantage making a rich merchandise of them Fifthly That the holding of these Doctrines is a departing from the faith Apostâ—sonta tines some shall apostatise or be Apostates from the faith such as hold these Doctrines And this faith is the true ancient Catholick Faith which they depart from Sixthly These Doctrines are the markes and fruits of the last times perillous times times of Antichrist and Antichristian Apostacie and therfore they are Doctrines of Novelty Seaventhly For the truth and confirmation of all this The Spirit speaketh it expresly So as it admits of no doubting or gainsaying Eightly and lastly That it is the duty of every good Minister of Iesus Christ nourished up in the words of faith and good Doctrine to put the Bretheren in remembrance of these things So as it were to be wished that the Church of England had some good Ministers of Iesus Christ that durst and would cry out against these Doctrines of Divels practised by the Prelates and their Disciples and learned from Antichrist himselfe and upheld by his Canon Law against the expresse word of God Thus then doth not the Church of England justly lie under the Apostles sentence of condemnation for Novelty in Doctrine yea holding Doctrines of Devils and that by the expresse testimony not of Romanists but of Gods Spirit that cannot lye I could give many more instances of novelty in your Doctrine though not as yet generally professed yet practised preached and printed by Authority though if ye be charged home with it either that Book shal be burned and the Printer blamed or they will prove but private mens opinions as you say in your Book As Invocation of Saints Iustification by Charity Erection of Altars with many other Popish Doctrines as also New Arminian Heresies old Pelagianisme newly raked out of hell againe whither they had been long agoe remaunded which to entertaine and maintaine in your Church of England you have made your Articles of Religion and that by an Edict or Declaration prefixed before them to be of a dubious sense and to equivocate having a mentall Reservation of sense for the adverse party while the Orthodox imagineth the letter to be on his side and as it hath ever so been taken till you altered the case But the two former Instances shal be sufficient witnesses against you for the present that you are departed from the Ancient Catholick Faith being justly condemned of Novelty in Doctrine yea Doctrines of Divels So as here ye may have a sounder Answer to stoppe the Romanists mouth charging the Church of England with Novelty in Doctrine then to say She professeth the Ancient Catholick Faith Tell the Romanist by way of Retortion That in some things the Church of England is no more to be condemned of Novelty in Doctrine then the Church of Rome is nor altogether so much We come now to your discipline wherein the Separatist you say condemnes her the present Church of England of Antichristianisme A sore Charge and sufficient if true to seperate from you But what defence have you for this Surely you say She practiseth Church-Government as it hath been in use in All Ages and all Places where the Church of Christ hath taken any rooting both in and ever since the Apostles times and yet the Seperatist condemnes her for Antichristianisme in her Discipline Here you say something indeed and to some purpose could you make it good For to say you professe is nothing but to professe and practise that 's matter of cleare evidence And yet I say could you prove it so it were but to some purpose and not sufficient to acquit you from Antichristianisme which is the maine Point For Some things were in use even in the Apostles times and have continued ever since in all Ages and all Places too where the Church you meane of hath taken now in tract of time a deepe rooting in the Earth yea even there also where Christs true Church hath taken rooting and yet all this is no sufficient Argument or warrant for the true Church of Christ presently to imbrace them For instance The Mystery of Iniquity began to worke in the Apostles time as he affirmeth 2 Thesse 2.7 And an example hereof St. Iohn notes in his third Epistle of Diotrephes who was ambitious of Prelacie hee loved to have The
this case to sit as King in the throne which he hath set up for himselfe in every mans conscience And Christ hath redeemed us from all bondage and subjection to humane devises in Spirituall things as the Apostle saith Ye are bought with a price be not the servants of men So as this Kingly office this Kingdome over his Church Christ hath purchased with a deare price even his precious blood But Prelates â—raâ—ple this blood of Christ under their feet and make this his purchase voyd by setting themselves in his throne by sitting in and over mens consciences making Laws and imposing Rites as absolute Kings over the Church binding the Conscience to a necessary conformity to them in the worship of God And to this purpose this their Kinglike Authority indeed intollerable usurpation and Tyranny comes usually armed with a strong guard of Canons and attended with metà polleÌ„s phantasÃas with a pompous train of Ceremonies ever waiting at their heeles For their Maxime is No Ceremonies no Bishop A Bishop and his Ceremonies are Relatives and can no more be seperated one from the other then an Altar and a Priest But of Ceremonies I shall have occasion to speak more anon and therefore I am the briefer here The Summe is That a Prelate as a Prelate attended with his Ceremonies which he imposeth upon the Consciences of Gods people in the worship of God doth thereby deny Christ to be the onely King of his people and so to be their Redeemer as who hath freed them as from all Leviticall and Legall Rites so from all humane Ordinances and Devices in the worship of God I conclude therefore That a Prelate by his very place profession and practise as a Prelate usurping domination over mens Consciences in Gods worship by imposing his Ceremonies denyeth Christ to be the King of his people denyeth Iesus to be the Christ and so is a Lyer and Antichrist For who is a lyer but he that denyeth Iesus to be the Christ He is Antichrist Thus the Case being so that the Church of England being a Prelaticall and Hierarchicall Church and so for Church-Government and Discipline ruled and Lorded over by the Prelates doth thereby as a Prelaticall Body united to Prelaticall Heads and by subjection and conformity unto their Lordly impositions and injunctions in point of Ceremonies and of the worship of God conspire with the Prelates in denying Christ to be her onely King and so with them denying that Iesus is the Christ is justly condemned of Antichristianisme I should now proceed to some other passage but that one rub here comes in the way and that is concerning the Church of Christ which here ye name For you say The Church of England practises Church-Government as it hath been in use in all Ages and all Places where THE CHRCH OF CHRIST HATH TAKEN ANY ROOTING Why my Lord what say you to all the reformâ—d Churches beyond the Seas Hath your Church-Government in England been in use in all places where thâ—se Churches have been rooted now for the space of at least 100. years What In Geneva In France In Belgia and other places Now therfore you must either plainly confesse this one Clause to be most notoriously false or else that the best Reformed Churches beyond the Seaes are no true Churches of Christ. But for that you passe not much to confesse that those Reformed Churches are no true Churches because they have no Prelates This you Spake openly not long agoe at your High-Commission in Cathedra when your charity called that famous and glorious shining Lamp Mr. CALVIN Rascall when you gave those Churches that doom Had you been a Prelate in Queen Elizabeths time durst you have done so Nay in King Iames his time who with the Church of England gave all those Reformed Churches the right hand of fellowship as true Churches of Christ as in the Councel of Dort durst you have done it And why now tam audax omnia perpeti as that Heathen Poet said And have not these Churches taken rooting How then have they continued so long and flourished so much and put forth so many beautifull and goodly branches godly and learned Divines and brought forth such abundant good fruit Could all this be without taking root yea and a sound rooting too well planted by Gods own hand and watered abundantly with his blessed showers of Grace from heaven and fenced about with the wall of his mighty protection against Stormes and Tempests And I trust they shall stand and flourish when all degenerate plants which our heavenly Father hath not planted shal be plucked up by the roots as bearing no other fruit but the Apples of Sodome without beautifull but all black and rotten within Although it might justly be feared could you effect your so laboured thorow Reconciliation with Rome to become all one as you say you already be you would doe your best to root out all those Reformed Churches as that of the Palatinate now is And 't is true inded that no particular visible Churches can promise to themselves perpetuity of continuance in one place longer then God is pleased But for thee O daughter of Babylon thou Mother of whoredomes God hath particularly designed and marked thee out for destruction so as thou with all thy confederate Lovers shall not escape and the day of thy visitation sleepeth not But for the Kingdome and Church of Iesus Christ it shall abide to triumph over Antichrist and all his accursed Crew And for thee ô Church of England beware of being an Ivie about that old rotten Romish Oake least you both be cut down together and be cast into the same burning Lake for ever beware of grappling thy selfe with that old leaking and sinking Peter-boate as thy Pilate would perswade thee least you both be swallowed up together L. ibid 'T is very remarkeable that while both these the Romanist and Seperatist presse hard upon the Church both of them cry out of Persecution like froward Children c. P. What cause the Romanist hath so to cry I know not especially if the just Lawes against them be suffered to sleepe But for your Seperatists among whom you reckon and ranke godly and zealous Ministers and all good men whom you hunt after and prosecute continually in all your Courts what cause these have to cry out of persecution and that even in the throwing of them out of their Churches and Houses and native Countrey that they can rest no where for you and so what cause they have to cry and complain to their GOD of such persecution as having none on Earth to complaine to both the world may see and you shall one day feele withot speedy repentance which we have as little hope of as you can have of heaven But they being thus persecuted you impute the cause to their hard pressing upon the Church comparing them to froward Children Indeed Children will cry when they are swadled or beaten and misused And
have stopped all the Ministers mouthes binding them to peace and externall obedience Although I cannot yet conceive how that Declaration should be the Church of Englands though published in the Kings Name and perhaps compiled in the Conclave of Canterbury And thus also that Order for the Altar of S. GREGORIES which yet is but Dormant in Cryptis not published in Print in which respect it cannot be called the Declartion of the Church yet must be of force to bind all Ministers to Peace and Obedience first to Peace not to speake a word against Altars for his Eares and next to Obedience that if he refuse to have an Altar set up in his Church himselfe shal be made a Sacrifice But why should such an Order thus bind I must crave pardon for making Question And the rather because your Lordship here gives us a Rule or Canon saying The Churches Declaration can bind us to Peace and externall Obedience where there is no expresse Letter of Scripture and Sense agreed on Now though we have expresse Letter of Scripture proving Christ to be the onely Altar of Christians as before is shewed yet because this sense is not agreed on by your Lordship and so by your present Church of England therefore men must be peaceable and obedient in that point and quietly submit to Authority in the admitting and the Adoring too if you will of Altars in every Church And so in all other your superstitious Ceremonies of what force is the expresse Letter of the Scripture where the Sense of it is not by you and your Church agreed upon To give an Instance or two more This is my Body the Sense of these words is not agreed on between your Church of England and that of Rome though you are in Substance both one Church what then Ergo Ministers are bound to Peace and Obedience in not medling to or fro with the manner How Christ is present in the Sacrament though your Article of the Lords Supper doth declare it both affirmatively and negatively how it is and is not but to content themselves with Really which is a very peaceable word about which Rome and you have no great reason to fall at oddes Againe for bowing at the nameing of the Name Iesus although you have no expresse Letter of Scripture for it no not Phil. 2.10 where it is Said En to onómati In or as your Translation hath it at the name of Iesus every knee should bow but it is not Said En to onomazethai tò onoma Iesoun or Iesous In the naming of the name Iesus every knee should bow So as that place is plainly expounded and agreed on by other places of Scripture as Isa. 45.23 and Rom. 14.10 as some of your old English Bibles note those places in the Margent over against the place as in that of Isaiah there is set in in the Margent Rom. 14.10 and Phil. 2.10 all which three places unanimously shew the universall Subjection of all Creatures in heaven and earth and under the earth to Christ in the day of Iudgement yet because this Sense is not agreed on by the present Church of England therefore her Declaration in her Canon binds all to Peace and Obedience to Peace in not speaking or writing against bowing at the nameing of the name Iesus nor in preaching to expound the Letter of Scripture Phil. 2.10 by the plain sense of other Scriptures as afore cited and to Obedience by bowing themselves when they heare that Name to be named So as your Lordships Rule here is very usefull for many things although you have neither Letter nor Sense of Scripture for them L. p. 32. The power of adding any thing contrary and detracting any thing necessary are alike forbidden No power of the Church can doe this P. This Sentence you alledge out of Vincentius and allow it So as it is to be accounted your owne Confession which I suppose you will not deny Whereupon you with your Church fall under just condemnation both for adding things contrary and detracting things necessary For you adde to the service of God as you call it your Altars and sundry other superstitionâ— which the Scripture excludes and condemnes and so are contrary and you detract things necessary as Preaching of the saving Doctrines of Grace Preaching on the Lords dayes in the after noon Preaching Week-day Lectures and Cathechising by expounding the Grounds of Religion Which things are necessary profitable and usefull to the people of God and which God commaundeth as 2 Tim. 3.15.16 and 4.1.2 Gal. 6.6 Let him that is Katekoúmenos Cathechised in the word communicate To katekounti to him that Catechiseth or instructeth him in all good things Thus you and your Church take upon you to do those things which are alike forbidden and which no power of the Church can doe though you can L. p. 35. Wrangle while you will you shall never be able to prove that any thing which is but de modo a consideration of the manner of being onely can possibly be fundamentall in the Faith P. Wrangle I will not but prove that some things which are de modo considered in the manner of being onely not onely may possibly but are really in that very respect fundamentall in the Faith So as to deny them or not to beleeve them is in it selfe damnable And hereof I shall give some Instances 1. Christs body in receiving of the Sacrament is to be considered in the mâ—nnâ—r of its being present to the beleeving Communicant In so much as to exclude such manners of being present as doe destroy either the Article of his perpetuall Residence in heaven till his câ—ming againe or the truth of his Naturall Body doth deny and destroy two Articles of the Faith 1. touching Christs sitting 〈◊〉 tâ—e rigâ—â— hand of God from whence he shall come to Judgemâ—â—â— and 2 ly that he was borne of the Virgin Mary with a true humane body As the Papists apprehending and beleeving Christs naturall body to be locally present in the Eucharist doe thereby overthrow his perpetuall residence in heaven till his coming againe and withall the truth of his naturall body which being a true naturall body with all its naturall properties cannot be locally or corporally in many places at one and the same time which yet the corporall presence in the Eucharist doth necessarily import And if the truth of Christs naturall body be destroyed as by the Manichees and other Hereticks Christ is wholly evacuated and shall profit nothing Besides this Popish beliefe of Christs corporall Presence in their Eucharist makes Christs natural body which hath its dimensions of length breadth thicknesse to be a meere fantasticall and imaginaâ—y body as being contained within the narrow circle and compasse of a thinne Wafer-cake and so they destroy Christs body And so also in that they beleeve they eat this body of Christ which is to destroy it as 1 Cor. 6.13 And this beliefe of Christs corporall presence as aforesaid
you a reason of my Faith Can you give one reason of yours concerning this Article as you take and beleeve it with your Church of England Show but one reason or shadow of a reason out of Scripture Nay except you bring every Article of the Creed to the examen or tryall of Scripture for the staying and establishing of your Faith you may run into many monstrous errours What doe you beleeve concerning Christs death You beleeve that hee dyed But for whom Whether for the Elect onely in Gods Purpose Account Appointment Acceptance or universally for all men Elect and Reprobate I tell you my Lord if you beleeve that Christ dyed for all men universally as well for the Reprobate as the Elect you destroy both Gods Grace in giving Christ for his people onely the Elect and also the merit and effâ—icacy of Christs death The Scripture shewes these things aboundantly But I mention this onely by the way Againe What doe you beleeve concerning the holy Catholicke Church You beleeve I dare say and you doe say it that the Catholicke Church on earth consists visibly of all Prelates and those that are subject unto them as one intire Body This is your Faith But if you examine this by the Scripture you will find it to be an Errour no lesse soule then false as hath been shewed So doe you not beleeve the Article of the Communion of Saints You doe But who are your Saints on earth You will hardly allow any Saints on earth till after their death they be Canonized by his Holinesse at Rome Nay in plaine termes you persecute both the Saints themselves and their Communion Can you indure such as but professe holinesse And for their Communion doe you not hunt out and persecute Private Fasting and Prayer among the poore soules of Christ when publick they can have none and no other remedy or weapons are left them to defend themselves withall against your bloody Cruelty So as the truth is you neither rightly beleeve the Holy Catholicke Church nor the Communion of Saints but are a notorious both denyeâ— and persecuter of both And therefore we see what a necessity there is that we should bring the Articles of the Creed to the Standard Rule the Scripture both as the surest and safest way yea and the onely way to preserve our Faith from Errour But you object the Fathers for the Sense of this Article of Christs Descent into hell as you beleeve it What if they beleeved so Is their example a sufficient Rule for us We must examine their sense they held of it by the Scripture If it be not according to the Scripture we reject it The Fathers might for a time hold an erronious generally received opinion before it came to be controverted and well sifted and examined by Scripture But they were ever ready to have their faith and opinions tryed by the Scriptures All the ancient Fathers were of this mind and spirit As before Pelagius his time the Fathers spake too liberally of Mans Free-will which after upon his Heresie they reformed and by Scripture abundantly confuted the Pelagians and especially Augustine Ierome Prosper Fulgentius Hilarius and others And Augustine inticing a Donatist to dispute about that Heresie Saith unto him Ratione agamus divinarum Scripturarum authoritate agamus Let us dispute the matter by Argument let us be guided by the Authority of the Divine Scriptures Not what I and thou Say but what Christ Saith And this was the Spirit I say and practise of all the Fathers in such cases So as if this Article of of Christs descent into hell had been by occasion of controversie about it well searched into and examined by the Scripture no doubt but the Fathers would therein have regulated their Faith according to the truth of Scripture But the Church of England say you holds and beleeves that Article as you doe No marvaile when you doe And should you hold otherwise must it not doe so too And yet we have but your bare word for it But you will alledge your Article That Christ went downe into hell But we must examine your Article by the Scripture And it is not the sound of your Article but the sense and that it agreeth with Scripture But we have shewed that no such thing is in Scripture And you tell us withall what Mr. Rogers upon the Articles saith of this That then Then I say in diebus illis the Church of England was not resolved of this Article and he was then the Arch-bishop of Canterbury his Chaplein your Predecessor Richard Bancroft But now your Lordships bare word is enough to Sway the Ballance which before stood but in aequilibrio in an even peize not resolved but now resolved But this I can tell you what ever your Church of England now beleeves there is and I hope a good sound Church of Christ yet in England that beleeves the Creed and all the Articles thereof and this in particular no otherwise then they find them agreeable to the Scripture and the Analogy of Faith And this is agreeable to that which once a Prelâ—te of England said By the generall confâ—ssion of all Antiquity Traditions must he warranted by the Scriptures or els we must reject them And Isidore saith A Prelate if he teach or command any thing besides that which is evidently cammanded in the holy Scriptures let him be taken for a false witnâ—ssie to God and a committer of Sacriledge But looking a little further I find you confessing That the Church of England hath not determined as yet either way by open Declaration upon this Article No hath she not How then doe you affirme and would perswade us that you beleeve with the Church of England that Christ descended into hell without any further Dispute We hope therefore it will not be long before your Declaration come forth with a Definitive Sentence determining the sense of this Article one way or other And the rather because in the late Declaration before the Articles wherein this Article of Christs going down into hell is particularly set downe for one they are declared to be of ambiguous sense and yet men must hold to the letter of the Article So as by that Declaration we are lesse resolved of the Articles then before A new Declaration therefore we would faine see which is cleare Declarative and Determinative and therein tell us whether Christs Soule descended into Hell the place of the damned or into Purgatory the Suburbs of hell and whether Locally and for what end and purpose because the Scripture is altogether silent in this whole mystery and whether you find hell to be in the Center of the Earth or no because your Article saith He went down into hell c. But in the mean time I have for my part ingenuously given you a reason of my Faith touching this Article which I am so resolved on by the Scripture that whatsoever Declaration you or your Church of England
parts of mans body yet still that member wants other members to beare witnesse unto it that it is a part of mans body As if every particular member of mans body by its inherent proper motion were not a sufficient witnesse not onely to all the rest of the body that it is a living and true organicall body of man but also to it selfe that it is a true living member of this body Or as thus It is not the whole frame of heaven and earth that can assure us that we doe well to thinke that God made all the world for if any one Creature should give testimony to all the rest yet still that Creature would require another Creature to give testimony to it that it is one of Gods Creatures and so we should never come to any pawse to rest our assurance this way that God created the whole world heaven and earth and all the Creatures therein Now what is there besides the Creature that can assure us of this What The Authority of men or the Tradition of the whole world No for By Faith we come to understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God so that things which are seen were made of things which did not appeare Now whereupon is this Faith grounded Surely on the word of God and confirmed abundantly by the whole frame of heaven and earth and all the Creatures therein not one of them but having a stampe of the Creator upon it to assure us that it is his Creature And how doe we come to be assured that this word of God is contained in the Scripture By the Authority of the present Church Doth Hooker Say so Had you Said The Ancient Church as the Jewes in witnessing for the Old Testament and the Ancient Apostolick Church in witnessing for the New you had said Somthing As also if you had put the Ministry of the Word for the Authority of your present Church For as we said before the Ministry of the Word is Gods own voyce which commends unto us the Scripture as the word of God This is Gods owne ordinary meanes to bring men to Faith and not the Authority and Tradition of I wot not what present Church And now against Mr Hookers sensible Demonstration as you call it I will oppose another Demonstration which is not onely sensible but most true as proving that the testimony of Scripture to be the word of God is in the Scripture it selfe First Paul in the Epistle to the Romans witnesseth that unto the Iewes or Israeliets under the Old Testament were committed the Oracles of God those Oracles were contained in all the severall Bookes of the Old Testament which the Jewes kept intire and inviolate without the mixture of Profane Books And of this Scripture Paul speaketh and testifieth saying All Scripture is given by inspiration from God And Christ himselfe giveth testimony of the Old Testament saying to the Jewes Search the Scriptures for in them ye think ye have eternall life and they are they which testifie of me And what those Scriptures were the Jewes knew well enough for they were deposited with them and they kept them as their chiefest treasure And Peter also gives testimony to the Old Testament saying of it that Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost speaking of the Scripture expresly in that place in the former verse And To Him give all the Prophets witnesse Thus the New Testament gives testimony to the Old that it is the word of God And I hope you will not except against this testimony as insufficient Againe the New Testament gives witnesse to it selfe that it is the word of God Peter witnesseth of Pauls Epistles that Paul wrote them according to the wisdome given unto him that is the Holy Ghost And Christ said to Peter I have prayd for thee that thy Faith faile not Yea He sent the Holy Ghost to all his Apostles that should lead them into all truth Ergo what they preached and wrote was the Truth and word of God And Christ made all his Apostles his witnesses who in all their writings beare-witnesse of him both of what they saw and heard and so their record left in writing is true See Luk. 1.2 1 Joh. 1.3 3 Joh. 12. And none writ the New Testament but either Euangelists or Apostles all indued with the Holy Ghost And the Wisdome of Christ reserved his beloved Disciple Iohn as the last surviver of all the rest to write the Book of the Revelation and to conclude as the New Testament so the whole Bible with that Charge If any man adde to this Book or take away from it c. as shewing that the whole and intire Scripture was now compiled and consummate I might be copious in this point But I will summe up all this The New Testament gives testimony to the Old that it is the word of God also to it selfe one Book to another one Apostle to another who were all witnesses of Christ Christ and the Holy Ghost to all the Apostles all their writings being guided by the Spirit of Truth and giving joynt witnesse unto Christ and to the truth of the Gospell Yea and the severall parts beare witnes to themselvs As 1 Cor. 14.37 If any man think himselfe to be a Prophet or Spirituall let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the Commandements of the Lord. And 1 Pet. 5.12 I have written brieflly exhorting and testifying that this is the true Grace of God wherein ye stand And Joh. 20.31 These things are written that ye might beleeve that Iesus is the Christ the Son of God and that beleeving ye might have life through his Name So 1 Joh. 1.3 4. 2 Joh. 5. 3 Joh. 12. And we also â—eare record and ye know that our record is true And as the New Testament doth every where beare witnesse both to the Old and to it selfe both in the whole and every part even by the Spirit of God that speakes and breathes in the whole and every part So the Old Testament in like manner beares witnesse both to it selfe and to the New Testament and that by many Types and Prophecies all which are fulfilled in the New So as these two Testaments are as Ezechiels Wheeles one within another the New Testament being the Old revealed and the Old the New veiled Or they are like the two Cherubims both looking towards the Mercy-Seat which is Christ the Summe of them both the Old looking upon him as he was promised and to come the New as he is now exhibited and come Thus we have here a full true and evident Demonstration that the whole Scripture gives testimony to it selfe that it is the word of God And yet you Say That Truth it selfe cannot say that Scripture it selfe can doe it But you adde L. ibid. That Scripture cannot beare witnesse to it selfe nor any one part of it
Church of Rome and of the Church of England And that the greatest too And I am perswaded the Church of England since it professed the Gospell never had such a monstrous and Bayeyard-like bold misleader as this Great worth of Canterbury hath proved to be or will certainly proove in effect if it find as blind Disciples to deale witthall as it selfe is a Master Although it is much hoped that if any Man hath conceived such an high Opinion of your worth as to account you for the most Profound Divine the most Pregnant Politician and the most potent Champion of the Church of England the very Reading of this your Book with a corrected judgement will either convert him from this errour or at least prevent that this errour of your Doctorship shall not Commence or Proceed to the degree of Heresie L. p. 303. 'T is safest to beleeue the Article of Christs Descent into hell as both the Churches of England and of Rome do agree upon that is That he descended into the place of the damned And this is the truth P. Surely if this be the truth that Christ descended locally into hell the place of the damned it were safest to beleeve it whether you and Rome consent in the beliefe of it or no. But because you beleeve as the Church of Rome beleeves will you thereupon conclude This is the truth Certainly we have the more cause to suspect that truth for a falshood wherein you and Rome doe both agree But how true your beliefe with Rome is and how true this Truth we have before sufficiently discovered But will this hold for a good Rule that in what you and Rome agree it is safest to beleeve it You agree in Altars Priests Sacrifice all manner of wil-worship Antichristianisme and many things more forespecified Ergo is 't safest to beleeve these things Or for whom safest safest for all those that affect to be of your Church Tryumphant here and would not come under your persecution But how agrees this with that which you adde ibid. that Rome will not indure this that Christ descended into the place of the damned but onely in Limbum Patrum a Region in the upper part of Hell Ergo rather then faile if Rome will not beleeve as you doe That Christ discended into the place of the damned you will beleeve as she beleeves that he dâ—scended in Limbum Patrum For agree you must and that 's the safest beliefe L. p. 307. I my selfe have heard some Iesuites confesse that in the Liturgie of the Church of England ther 's no positive errour P. 'T is a signe then your Liturgie agrees pretty well with the Romish Messal as is noted by the way before For surely such a Testimony from a Jesuites mouth gives us the more cause of suspicion that all is not so well in your Liturgie as it should be As Diogenes sayd when the people applauded him he began to suspect himselfe that he had committed some absurdity or other saying Wherein have I miscarryed my selfe that this people doth so commend me L. p. 318. Though Dr. White late Bishop of Ely was more able to answere for himselfe yet since he is now dead and is thus drawn into this Discourse I shall as well as I can doe him the right which his learning and paines for the Church deserved And I grant as well as he that there must be some one Church or other continually visible P. First for Dr. White he being now dead which he was long before I will say no more but this For his deserving pains for the Church the Church of England you meane as now it stands the same Church with that of Rome and of the same Faith with her and of which Faith he also declared himselfe to be when he told a Minister that the Difference between the Church of Rome and of England in the Doctrines of the sixt Session of Trent and by name of Grace and Justification was little or nothing how great it was his Works extant can witnesse as namely his Approbation prefixed to your now Brother of Chichester his Appeale to Caesar wherein is maintained the whole Body of your Arminian Heresie together in all or most of the grossest points of Popery as worship of Images at least with Doulia and the like and assaying to prove the Pope not to be Antichrist as if he would solem è coelo tollere also Dr. Whites Book of the Sabbath to prove no Sabbath to Christians and the fourth Commandement not to be Morall for the keeping of one day in the weeke as the Lords Day allowing also of vaine sports and profane pastimes on that Day and commending of praying towards the East where your Altar is placed and such like stuffe in all which he so well deserved of your Church of England as he scarce had his fellow onely if he were now living againe he would yeeld the Bucklers to your Lordship as the bravest Champion of the now Chuch of England that hath risen up in this latter Age or yet succeeding times may hope to produce But let us now heare the right which your Lordship does him and which his paines for the Church deserved But first let me tell you you forget here to give him his Title of Lord Bishop which you indeed gave him in the very first page of your Booke But now his Lordship is dead let not Lord and Bishop be separated in any case no not by death it selfe For indeed Lord-Bishop is a peculiar Title differencing you from all true Bishops indeed as the Scripture commendeth for the onely Bishops as is shewed before yet I know not how it is come to passe that in the best Reformed Churches beyound the Seas the Pastors are never called Bishops I suppose it is because as Kings of old were stiled Tyranni and that in meliorâ—m partem untill degenerating into Lawlesse Tyrants indeed good Kings would thereupon never after be called Tiranni but Kings so the Reformed Churches seeing how the name of Bishop grâ—w to be odious the Office and Calling of it being changed 〈◊〉 that of a Parochiall Pastor into a Diocesan Lordship and so 〈◊〉 have for this cause layd aside the Name of Bishop though otherwise the Name is good as it pertaines to the true 〈◊〉 and Presbyters over particular Congregations as is before shâ—wed so as the Reformed Churches doe herein as the Ancient Romans did who when their Kings turned Tyrants the lâ—st wheâ—of was Tarquinius surnamed Superâ—us for his extreme 〈◊〉 they for ever banished both the name of Kings and 〈◊〉 out of their Commonweale But let us see how you recompense the omission of this Lordly Title in this place to such a well deserving man You adde And I grant as well as he that there 〈◊〉 be some one Church or other continually visible Aâ— well aâ— he This then may seem to be some recompense by way of honour and 〈◊〉 some doing of him Right for indeed his main
reward he had in his life time and what he hath now I cannot tell that the Lords Grace of Canterbury is pleased to Grace the late Lord Bishop of Eli by being of the same opinion with him Well what 's the Opinion That there must be some one Church or other continually visible That some one Church or other hath still been visible I shall not grudge you But take my meaning withall Some false Church or other hath been though why must be I see no reason saving that there must be Heresies even among the Churches of God continually visible ever since the Apostles times And the Church of Rome for Instance hath bore the bell away which degenerating into an Antichristian Church hath been still visible though not alwayes in one and the same place but most What at Rome and somtimes at Aninion in France for where the Popes Court is there is the Church in its glorious conspicuity yet somtime without a Head somtime with two Heads somtime with three Heads that a man might say The Porter of Heaven-gates had three Heads as the Poets fained Cerberus the Porter of Hell to have had But for the true Church of God that may somtimes be hid For first as we shewed before there was no true Church visible among the revolted Ten Tribes Secondly not in Ahaz his time when he shut up the Temple and and served Idols in every Corner of Ierusalem and then where was the Church visible the while when the whole publick service and worship of God was suppressed the Temple being shut up Againe also in Ioah his time was the like as ye may reade 2 Chro. 24.17 to 22 c. Lastly when the Temple was burnt and all the people of God dispersed Captives in Babylon where they could not sing one song of Sion Where was then the visible Church the while But you will say They might have Synagogues in Babylon But you cannot prove it And the Prophet Esay saith That they were hid in Prisons As many of Christs deare servants are at this day in your Church of England And what say you for that 30 dayes Interdiction that no man should make any suit to God or man during that space Where was then the Church visible But that was but for 30 dayes But you and Dr. White are for a continuall visibility And it seems you herein jumpe with the Jesuites who stand upon a continuall visibility every day alledging that of Christ And loe I am with you paâ—as tà s e mâ—meras which our English turnes Allwayes but they All the dayes to wit everyday Which they doe to puzzle Protestants in shewing their visible succession every day without fayle since Christs time But you will say perhaps Daniel was found praying in those dayes But he was but one single Man and so not Ecclesiâ a Church or Congregation And if he prayed with his Family it was but in his private house and you will hardly allow that for a visible Church but rather call it a private Conventicle And if with this Family then if at least you had but sent your Pursuivants not onely Daniel but according to the Kings strict Decree his whole Family should have been cast with him into the Lyons denne So during the Aegyptian servitude what conspicuity of a Church in Israel Now and then perhaps in some godly Families there might be two or three assembled Yet this private still visible you will not call it For you will not allow Churches in private Families though they were in the Apostles time And such Churches so visible as two or three are visible when you see them but the world takes no notice of them as Churches Christ never fayles to have in the world And these Congregations in private Families being driven from your publick Idolatrous Superstition in your Churches are so hid many times that your blood-hounds cannot trace them or hunt them out But as for such a Conspicuous Glorious Visibility of succession of such Prelaticall Heads of Hierarchicall Churches though such may be alwayes in some Countrey or other resplendent eminent and apparent yet Christs poore Church the while may be and commonly is hid as little starres especially where such great Luminaria as your Lordships spread out your hot and fiery beames As the Woman the Church as before which here we recapitulate to incounter two such Giants when she fled from the Dragon and his flood of persecution into the Wildernesse who saw her then and there And when the whole world was turned Arian where was the true Church visible And so since Antichrist came to his Xenith or Vereticall point to his Meridian brightnesse how hath Christs Church been hid in corners as among the Merindolians Cabriers Waldensis and others who were still persecuted by that Beast and his Crew As Solomon saith When the wicked rise men hide themselves And so we may truly say When Prelates rise and beare sway and grow most resplendent and predominant in their Potent Principalities then Gods people hide themselves And the Apostle saith of the beleevers in the Old Testament in times of persecution or captivity or of the Maccabees They wandred about in sheep-skins and Goat-skins being destitute afflicted and tormented of whom the world was not worthey they wandred in Deserts and in mountains and in dennes and caves of the earth And who were all those trow you but the true Church of God And how was then the Church of God visible but that one might see another But such you will not allow to be visible Churches 1. because you cannot see them 2. because you do not allow to be Churches visible no more then you do the Reformed Churches in Geneva and among the Canâ—oâ—s and those mountains where you cannot see them which is their safety as not to feele you And where was the visibility of Gods true Church in England in Queen Maries dayes in the midst of the black tempest of persecution where you could not discerne one true Professour and Protestant but by the light of that fire which was by the Prelates kindled to burn them for Martyrs Or if you or your Beagles had hunted among the Woods perhaps ye might have found halfe a dozen poore soules under some Tree shading them from the present heat of persecution where they did solace their soules with having among them some few leaves of St. Pauls Epistles which they read to strentghen and arme them against their â—urne came Call you this a visible Church But you will say The Church of England was then visible and conspicuous in the Bishops and the publick Congregations throughout the Churches of the land where Divine service or Masse was sung or sayd every day Then was the Church visible in Edmund of London and Stephen of Winchestr and other their Associates who were as Zealous Champions for the Church of England then as you are now So as that Church
Church whose outward beauty is black but inwardly is glorious outwardly blasted as an Oake but the holy seed is the substance thereof And if by black you understand the bare name of a Church and profession of Christianity That she hath changed too as the Snake doth her skin slipping off the old and taking on a new For she is not content to be called Christs holy Church but the Roman Catholicke Church Whereas Christs Church is not denominated from any place And as she is the Roman Church so the Papall Church being denominated from the Pope as her Head Ergo none of Christs Church for this acknowledgeth none for her Head but Christ alone who is the root of this Vine and Olive Tree that ministers sap and fatnesse unto it If therfore Rome be any Tree at all she is such as is in Daniel the Embleme of the Old Babylonian Tyranny and so a Type of Romes Babylonish usurped Power § That Tree stretched out its boughs over the whole Earth under whose shadow all the Beasts must have their sanctuary as Rome applyeth that of the Psalme 8.6 7. And is this Tree say you but wether-beaten Or but in some things unsound When it hath lost not onely the barke but the pith of Christs Church being all rotten within Being such a Tree as Iude describes déndron phthinoporinòn akarpon dìs apothanòn a corrupt Tree without fruit twice dead and to be hewed down plucked up by the roots and cast into the fire So as Rome is altogether naught Intus incute Pith and Barke Root and Branch Fruit and Leafe Onely a painted Tree by which painting as you say she deceives the world and your Lordship too while you would be glad to take her with all faults and be reconciled to her takeing her painting for true beauty or at the least on her outside more beauty then painting and in her inside more soundesse then corruption For you say In some things onely both for life and beliefe corrupted L. p. 321. Dr. White sayd onely that some Errours of the Church were fundamentall reductive that is if they which imbrace them did pertinaciously adhere to them having sufficient meanes of Information And againe expresly That none were damnable so long as they were not held against Conscience P. Thus we come to know Dr. Whites judgement and therein yours also But against you both as erronious in this point I alledge the Scripture What saith Christ of the Pharisees Let them alone They are blind leaders of the blind and if the blind lead the blind they both fall into the ditch So you may see here if ye be not blind that blindnesse is damnable But you will say This was obstinate blindnesse fighting against the light 'T is true that the blindnesse of the Pharisees was obstinate against the cleare light and their own Consciences but the blind people whom they led were simply blind out of meere ignorance and so not against their Conscience and yet both the leader and the led fall into the ditch of damnation He that drinks deadly poyson ignorantly perisheth as he that wittingly drinks it The poyson is in it selfe mortall to all that drinke it with what mind soever they doe it And such is the poyson of sin and errour Onely he that erres of ignorance is more easily recovered then one that is obstinate in his errour and both living and dying in the same errour as of infidelity and the like which all Popery is both are tormented in hell but the obstinate more then the other yet God is just in punishing both So as all errour is damnable in all but in some more in some lesse And it is of the same righteous judgement of God to deny to the ignorant means and to others the right use of the means by withholding his grace and accordingly he is just in punishing all with a due proportion And so ther 's a difference between simple Papists living in the midst of the Aegyptian darknesse where there is no light nor meanes of knowledge and simple Papists living in Goshen where the light shineth where the Gospell is preached and doe close their eyes wilfully so as they obstinately refuse to see or heare The sin of these certainly is much more damnable then of the other who have no meanes at all Againe Errours that are in their own nature damnable are damnable in whomsoever they be onely in some more in some lesse but we cannot say they are to some damnable and to others not damnable All sinne in its owne nature is damnable and brings damnation with it to every Mothers son is it then damnable to some and not to others Did not death come upon all men in asmuch as all men had sinned And is not Errour whether in life or beliefe whether in the ignorant or men of knowledge sinne Thus you and Dr. White mazzle ignorants in sinne And if the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the pit But enough of this L. p. 32â— I would faine soe any one point maintained by the Church of England that can be proved to depart from the Foundation P. Would you see it againe We have proved it before and that abundantly that you maintain not one but sundry points wherein you depart from the foundation Look before and you shall see how you depart from the Foundation in your Tyrannicall Hierarchy or Prelacie in your Altars in overthrowing the Doctrines of Grace in destroying the Doctrine and Practise of the 4 th Commandement in sanctifying the Lords day in forbidding Meates and Marriage at certaine times which the Apostle calls directly and expresly a departing from the Faith and Doctrines of Devils Look backe and see L. p. ibid. There is a latitude in the faith especially in reference to different mens salvation To set bounds to this and strictly to define it for particular men Iust thus farre you must beleeve in every particular or incurre damnation is no worke for my pen. P. For the ground of this your speech you quote Bellarmine in the Margent I thought you raked it out of some puddle seeing the Fouâ—taine it selfe the Scripture affords you no such corrupt stuffe Nay more then that you expresse your selfe in farre worse termes then Bellarmine doth For Bellarmines words which you quote are these Multa sunt de fide quae non sunt absolutè necessaria and salutem There be many things of Faith which are not absolutely necessary to salvation But you bring it down to every mans salvation as if some things of faith were more absolutely necessary for some mens salvation then for others I passe by Bellarmine and insist upon your own words leaving him to cleare himselfe There is say you a latitude of faith especially in reference to different mens Salvation Oâ— saving and justifying faith you must meane no question For what faith is necessary for every mans salvation but the saving faith which comprehends in it