you had said before but only this that what was not once necessary to salvation cannot by any after-declaration of the Church be made necessary as shall be abundantly manifested in the Controversie of Fundamentals What follows must be more particularly considered because therein you would fain remove the Article of Filioque from being the cause of the Schism between the Eastern and Western Churches and impute it wholly to the Pride and Ambition of the Eastern Prelates Your words are But it is also true That the addition of Filioque to the Creed was made many years before the difference brake out between the Latins and Greeks so that the inserting this word Filioque into the Creed was not the first occasion of Schism But grudges arising among the Greeks who had been a large flourishing Church with a number of most learned and zealous Prelates and held the Articles still though upon emptier heads such quickly filled with wind thinking their swelling places and great City of Constantinople might hold up against Rome they began to quarrel not for places that was too mean a motive for such as look'd so big but first they would make it appear they could teach Rome nay they spyed out Heresies in it the old way of all Hereticks and so fell to question the Procession of the Holy Ghost and must needs have Filioque out of the Creed These words of yours lay the charge of Schism on the Greeks wholly and therefore in order to our vindication of them from that two things must be enquired into 1. Whether it was in your Churches Power to make the Addition of Filioque to the Creed 2. Whether the Greeks Ambition and Pride were the only cause of the Separation between the Eastern and Western Churches 1. Concerning the addition of Filioque two things must be enquired into 1. When it began and by whom it was added to the Creed 2. Whether they who added it had power so to do and to impose on all others the use of it 1. Concerning the time of this Addition nothing seems more dark in Church-history than the precise and punctual time of it And so much you acknowledge your self elsewhere But it seems it is your concernment to say That the Addition was made before the difference brake out To that I answer if you mean that in some Churches the Procession from the Son was acknowledged before that difference I grant it as is clear by some Councils of Toledo and that the doctrine of the Procession was received in France too about the time of Charls the Great I acknowledge and that it was admitted into the solemn Offices of the Church but that it was added to the Nicene and Constantinopolitan Creed to be received by all Churches so that it should not be lawful for any to use that Creed without such Addition that I deny to have been before the Schism but assert it to have been a great occasion of it It is acknowledged that in Spain several Councils of Toledo in their profession of Faith do mention the Procession from the Son but this they delivered only as their own private judgments and not as the publick Creed received by all Churches For Petavius confesseth that in Symbolo ipso nihil adjecerunt they added nothing at all to the Creed And although the custom of singing the Constantinopolitan Creed in the Liturgy seems first to have begun in Spain from whom Petavius supposeth both the French and Germans received it yet even there it appears it was not universally received For the Church of Sevil contented it self still with the Mozarabick Liturgy in which only the bare Nicene Creed was used You tell us indeed That the inserting the Article in the Councils of Toledo is supposed to have been done upon the authority of an Epistle they had received from Pope Leo which though it be not barely supposed but asserted with great confidence by Baronius yet as most other things in him which are brought to advance the Pope's Authority it hath no other ground but his confident assertion There being not the least shadow of proof for it but only that this Leo in a certain Epistle of his to the Spaniards did once upon a time mention that the Son proceeded from the Father Therefore in Spain I grant the Doctrine to be received I deny the Addition to be made to the Constantinopolitan Creed although it be read as added to it in the 8. or 10. Council of Toledo under Reccesuintus A. D. 653. But this was still only the declaration of their own Faith in this Article and no imposing it on others In France that it began to be received in publick Use A. D. 809. must be acknowledged by the proceedings of the Legats from the Council of Aquisgrane to Pope Leo 3. But it appears as clearly that Pope Leo did then condemn the use of it as will be shewed afterwards When it should creep into the Athanasian Creed seems as hard to find out as when first added to the Constantinopolitan but if we believe Pithaeus the whole Creed was of a French Composition there being many Arguments to perswade us it never was made by Athanasius of which in their due place and Vossius adds That it is very probable it was composed about the time of Charls the Great the Controversie being then so rise about the Procession But that seems the less probable because the Article of Filioque is not found in the Ancient Copies of that Creed For Spalatensis saith That in all the Greek Copies he had seen there was only mention made of the Procession from the Father And the Patriarch Cyril saith That not only the Symbol of Athanasius is adulterated among the Latins but that it is proved to be so by the more ancient and genuine Copies But however this be we deny not but the Article of Procession from the Son grew into use especially in the Gallican and Spanish Churches before the Schism broke out between the Eastern and Western Churches but our enquiry is not concerning that but concerning the time when it was so added to the Constantinopolitan Creed that it was required to be used only with that addition For this you tell us That Hugo Eterianus affirms that it was added by the Pope in a full Council at Rome but he names not the Pope So likewise the Latin Divines at the Council of Florence pretended still that it was added by the Pope in a full Council but very carefully forbare the mention of the person or the punctual time But it is your unhappiness if there be divers opinions to be followed to make choice of the most improbable as you do here when you embrace that of Socolovius which is That the Fathers of the first Council at Constantinople sending the Confession of their Faith to Pope Damasus and his Council at Rome the Pope and Council at Rome approved of their said Confession but yet
most part yet living These are your assertions and because you seek not to prove them it shall be sufficient to oppose ours to them Our assertion therefore is that the Church and Court of Rome are guilty of this Schism by obtruding erroneous Doctrines and superstitious practises as the conditions of her Communion by adding such Articles of Faith which are contrary to the plain rule of Faith and repugnant to the sense of the truly Catholick and not the Roman Church by her intolerable incroachments and usurpations upon the liberties and priviledges of particular Churches under a vain pretence of Vniversal Pastourship by forcing men if they would not damn their souls by sinning against their consciences in approving the errours and corruptions of the Roman Church to joyn together for the Solemn Worship of God according to the rule of Scripture and practise of the Primitive Church and suspending Communion with that Church till those abuses and corruptions be redressed In which they neither deny obedience to any Lawful Authority over them nor take to themselves any other Power than the Law of God hath given them receiving their Authority in a constant Succession from the Apostles they institute no Rites and Ceremonies either contrary to or different from the practise of the Primitive Church they neither exclude or dispossess others of their Lawful Power but in case others neglect their office they may be notwithstanding obliged to perform theirs in order to the Churches Reformation Leaving the Supreme Authority of the Kingdome or Nation to order and dispose of such things in the Church which of right appertain unto it And this we assert to be the case of Schism in reference to the Church of England which we shall make good in opposition to your assertions where we meet with any thing that seems to contradict the whole or any part of it These and the like practises of yours to use your own words not any obstinate maintaining any erroneous Doctrines as you vainly pretend we averre to have been the true and real causes of that separation which is made between your Church and Ours And you truly say That Protestants were thrust out of your Church which is an Argument they did not voluntarily forsake the Communion of it and therefore are no Schismaticks but your carriage and practises were such as forced them to joyn together in a distinct Communion from you And it was not we who left your Church but your Church that left her Primitive Faith and Purity in so high a manner as to declare all such excommunicate who will not approve of and joyn in her greatest corruptions though it be sufficiently manifest that they are great recessions from the Faith Piety and Purity of that Roman Church which was planted by the Apostles and had so large a commendation from the Apostolical men of those first ages Since then such errours and corruptions are enforced upon us as conditions of Communion with you by the same reason that the Orthodox did very well in departing from the Arrians because the Arrians were already departed from the Church by their false Doctrine will our separation from you be justified who first departed from the Faith and Purity of the Primitive Church and not only so but thrust out of your Communion all such as would not depart from it as farr as you Having thus considered and retorted your Assertions we come to your Answers Nor say you does the Bishop vindicate the Protestant party by saying The cause of Schism was ours and that we Catholicks thrust Protestants from us because they call'd for truth and redress of abuses For first there can be no just cause of Schism this hath been granted already even by Protestants And so it is by us and the reason is very evident for it for if there be a just cause there can be no Schism and therefore what you intend by this I cannot imagine unless it be to free Protestants from the guilt of Schism because they put the Main of their tryal upon the justice of the cause which moved them to forsake the Communion of your Church or else you would have it taken for granted that ours was a Schism and thence inferr there could be no just cause of it As if a man being accused for taking away the life of one who violently set upon him in the High-way with an intent both to rob and destroy him should plead for himself that this could be no murther in him because there was a sufficient and justifiable cause for what he did that he designed nothing but to go quietly on his road that this person and several others violently set upon him that he intreated them to desist that he sought to avoid them as much as he could but when he saw they were absolutely bent on his ruine he was forced in his own necessary defence to take away the life of that person Would not this with any intelligent Jury be looked on as a just and reasonable Vindication But if so wise a person as your self had been among them you would no doubt have better informed them for you would very gravely have told them All his plea went on a false supposition that he had a just cause for what he did but there could be no just cause for murther Do you not see now how subtil and pertinent your Answer is here by this parallel to it For as in that case all men grant that there can be no just cause for murther because all murther is committed without a just cause and if there be one it ceaseth to be murther So it is here in Schism which being a causeless separation from the Churches Vnity I wonder who ever imagined there could be just cause for it But to rectifie such gross mistakes as these are for the future you would do well to understand that Schism formally taken alwayes imports something criminal in it and there can be no just cause for a sin but besides that there is that which if you understand it you would call the materiality of it which is the separation of one part of the Church from another Now this according to the different grounds and reasons of it becomes lawful or unlawful that is as the reasons do make it necessary or unnecessary For separation is not lawful but when it is necessary now this being capable of such a different nature that it may be good or evil according to its circumstances there can be no absolute judgement passed upon it till all those reasons and circumstances be duely examined and if there be no sufficient grounds for it then it is formally Schism i. e. a culpable separation if there be sufficient cause then there may be a separation but it can be no Schism And because the Vnion of the Catholick Church lyes in Fundamental and necessary truths therefore there can be no separation absolutely from the Catholick Church but what involves in it the
I heartily wish had been as orderly and happily pursued as the work was right Christian and good in it self But humane frailty and the heats and distempers of men as well as the cunning of the Devil would not suffer that For even in this sense also the wrath of man doth not accomplish the will of God St. James 1.20 but I have learnt not to reject the good which God hath wrought for any evil which men may fasten upon it Now to this you answer 1. By a fair Concession again that a Provincial Council is the next Chirurgion when a Gangrene endangers life but still the Popes assistance is required For fear the Chirurgion should do too much good of himself you would be sure to have the Pope as Physitian to stand by whom you know too much concerned in the maladies of the Church to give way to an effectual cure 2. But you say further That the most proper expedient is an Oecumenical Council and this you spoil again with saying Such as the Council of Trent was For what you say in vindication of that being General and free we shall consider in the Chapter designed for that purpose What you object against our National Synod 1562. will be fully answered before the end of this which that we may make way for we must proceed to the remainder of these general grounds in which his Lordship proves That when the Vniversal Church will not or for the iniquity of the times cannot obtain and settle a free General Council 't is lawful nay sometimes necessary to reform gross abuses by a National or a Provincial To this you answer in General That you deny not but matters of less moment as concerning rites and ceremonies abuses in manners and discipline may be reformed by particular Councils without express leave of the Pope but that in matters of great moment concerning the Faith and publick Doctrine of the Church Sacraments and whatever else is of Divine Institution or universal obligation particular Councils if they duly proceed attempt nothing without recourse to the Sea Apostolick and the Pope's consent either expresly granted or justly presumed Fair hopes then there are of a cure when the Imposthume gathers in the Head we are indeed by this put into a very good condition for if a small matter hurts a Church she hath her hands at liberty to help her self but if one comes to ravish her her hands are tyed and by no means must she defend her self For in case say you it be any matter of great moment it must be left to the Pope and nothing to be done without his consent no not although the main of the distempers come through him But thanks be to God our Church is not committed to the hands of such a merciless Physitian who first causeth the malady and then forbids the cure we know of no such obligation we have to sleep in St. Peters Church as of old they did in the Temple of Aesculapius in hopes of a cure God hath entrusted every National Church with the care of her own safety and will require of her an account of that power he hath given to that end It will be little comfort to a Church whose members rot for want of a remedy to say The Pope will not give leave or else it might have been cured I wonder where it is that any Christian Church is commanded to wait the Popes good leasure for reforming her self Whence doth he derive this Authority and sole power of reforming Churches But that must be afterwards examined But is it reasonable to suppose that there should be Christian Magistrates and Christian Bishops in Churches and yet these so tyed up that they can do nothing in order to the Churches recovery though the distempers be never so great and dangerous Do we not read in the Apostolical Churches that the Government of them was in themselves without any the least mention of any Oecumenical Pastour over all if any abuses were among them the particular Governours of those Churches are checked and rebuked for it and commanded to exercise their power over offenders and must the encroachments of an usurped and arbitrary power in the Church hinder particular Churches from the exercise of that full power which is committed to the Governours of them Neither is this only a Right granted to a Church as such but we find this power practised and asserted in the history of the Christian Churches from the Apostles times For no sooner did the Bishops of Rome begin to encroach but other Bishops were so mindful of their own priviledges and the Interess of their Churches that they did not yield themselves his Vassals but disputed their rights and withstood his usurpations As hath partly appeared already and will do more afterwards And that particular Churches may reform themselves his Lordship produceth several Testimonies The first is of Gerson who tells us plainly That he will not deny but that the Church may be reformed by parts And that this is necessary and that to effect it Provincial Councils may suffice and in some things Diocesan And again Either you should reform all estates of the Church in a General Council or command them to be reformed in Provincial Councils But all this you say doth not concern matters of Faith but only personal abuses But I pray what ground is there that one should be reformed and not the other Is it not the reason why any reformation is necessary that the Churches purity and safety should be preserved and is not that as much or more endangered by erroneous doctrines then by personal abuses Will not then the parity of reason hold proportionably for one as well as the other that if the Church may be reformed by parts as to lesser abuses then much more certainly as to greater Besides you say Gerson allowed no Schismatical Reformations against the Churches head neither do we plead for any such but then you must shew Who the Churches head is and By what right he comes to be so otherwise the cause of the Schism will fall upon him who pretends to be the head to direct others and is as corrupt a member as any in the body But his Lordship adds This right of Provincial Synods that they might decree in causes of Faith and in cases of Reformation where corruptions had crept into the Sacraments of Christ was practised much above a thousand years ago by many both National and Provincial Synods For which he first instanceth in the Council at Rome under Pope Sylvester An. 324. condemning Photinus and Sabellius whose heresies were of a high nature against the Faith but here you say The very title confutes his pretence for it was held under the Pope and therefore not against him But however whether with the Pope or against him it was no more then a Provincial Synod and this decreed something in matters of Faith though according to your own
Zosimus sent into Africa to negotiate this affair no sooner did they hear this but they were startled and amazed at it that such a thing should be challenged by vertue of a Canon in the Council of Nice which they had never heard of before Upon this they declare themselves willing to yield to what should appear to be determined by the Nicene Canons thence they propound that a more exact search might be made into the authentical Copies of them for they profess no such thing at all to appear in all the Greek copies which they had among them although Caecilianus the Bishop of Carthage were present in the Council of Nice and brought home those Copies which were preserved in the Church of Africa For in all the subscriptions of the Nicene Council whether Arabick or others the name of Caecilian appears now Caecilian was immediate Predecessor in Carthage to Aurelius who presided in that Council wherein these things were debated And there it is expresly said There were but twenty Canons But in order to further satisfaction they decree that a message should be sent on purpose to Constantinople Antioch and Alexandria to find out the authentick Copies of the Nicene Canons and after a most diligent search no more Canons could be found then what the African Fathers had before And thence in the Epistle of Atticus of Constantinople written to the Council of Carthage he acquaints them that he according to their desire had sent them the true and compleat Canons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Nicene Council And to the same purpose Cyril the Patriarch of Alexandria mentioning their desires of having 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the most true and authentick copies out of the Archives of that Church so he tells them he had sent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the most faithful copies of the authentick Synod of Nice Now if there had been any ground in the world for Turrianus his conjecture that the Nicene Canons were translated into Arabick by Alexander who was present at the Council for the Benefit of those in Pentapolis or Aegypt who only understood that language and that before the Nicene Canons were burnt of which Athanasius complains who was more likely to have found out these Arabick Canons then Cyril the Patriarch of Alexandria upon this occasion especially when the full and authentick Copies were so extreamly desired And since no such thing at all appeared then upon the most diligent inquiry What can be more evident then that these eighty Arabick Canons are the imposture of some latter age Besides if these Canons had been genuine and authentick what imaginable reason can be given why they were not inserted in the Codex Canonum as the other twenty were For as Jacobus Leschasserius well observes we are not to imagine that the Ancient Church was governed at Randome by loose and dispersed Canons whereby it had been an easie matter to have foisted in false and supposititious Canons but that there was a certain body and collection of them digested into an exact order so that none could add to or take away any thing from it and whatever Canons were not contained in this body had no power or force at all in the Church And that there was such a Codex Canonum that learned Person hath abundantly proved from the Council of Chalcedon which hath many passages referring to it so that there is now no question made but that which Justellus published is the true collection of those Canons of the Vniversal Church which were inserted into the Codex in which we find but only the twenty Canons of the Nicene Council and that there could possibly be no more appears by the number of the Canons as they are reckoned in the Council of Chalcedon From whence it follows that only these twenty Canons were ever own'd by the Vniversal Church for had the Fathers of the Church known of so many other Canons of the Nicene Council as surely at least the Patriarchs of Alexandria could not be ignorant of them if there had been any such can we possibly think that those who had so great a Veneration for the Nicene Council should have left the far greater part of the Canons of it out of the Code of the Churches Canons I am not ignorant of what is objected by Binius Bellarmin and others to prove that there were more then twenty Canons of the Council of Nice but those proofs either depend upon things as supposititious as the Arabick Canons themselves such as the Epistles of Julius and Athanasius ad Marcum or else they only prove that several other things were determined by the Nicene Council as concerning the celebration of Easter rebaptizing Hereticks and such like which might be by the Acts of the Council without putting them into the Canons as Baronius confesseth but there cannot be any evidence brought of any Canon which concerned the Churches Polity for about that Theodoret and Nicephorus tell us the Canons were made which was not among these twenty So that it appears that these Arabick Canons are a meer forgery of later times there being no evidence at all that they were known to the Church in all the time of the four General Councils and therefore Baronius notwithstanding the pretences of Pisanus and Turrianus from the Alexandrian Copy and that out of Marcellus his Library yet since these Canons were unknown in the Controversie of the African Church about the Nicene Canons leaves the Patronage of them to such as might be able to defend them And Spondanus in his contraction of him though in his marginal note he saith Baronius was sometimes more inclinable to the inlarged number of the Nicene Canons yet he relates it as his positive opinion that he rejected all but the twenty whether Arabick or other as spurious and supposititious You see then what a fair choice you have made of the third Canon of the Council of Nice to prove the superiority of the Pope over other Patriarchs by when neither is it the third Canon nor any Canon at all of the Council of Nice but a spurious figment like those of Isidore Mercator who thought all would pass for gold which made for the Interess of the Church of Rome But were there not such a strong and pregnant evidence from authority to make it appear that these Canons were supposititious yet the incongruity of them with the state of the Church at that time would abundantly manifest it if we had time to compare many of those Canons with it But that which is most material to our purpose concerning the equality of the Patriarchs your following words will put us upon a further enquiry into This also say you viz. That the Pope was head and Prince of all the Patriarchs the practise of the Church shews which is alwayes the best expositor and assertor of the Canons For not only the Popes confirmation was required to all new elected Patriarchs
S. Basil writes to him That he had care of all the Churches as of his own and in the same Epistle calls him The Head and chief over all Hence S. Chrysostome in the praise of Eustathius the Patriarch of Antioch saith That he was instructed by the Divine Spirit that he was not only to have care of that Church over which he was set but of the whole Church throughout the world Hence came the great endeavours of Theophilus and Cyril Patriarchs of Alexandria of Eusebius Vercellensis Hilarius Pictaviensis and several others for rooting out of Heresies not confining themselves to those Provinces allotted to them but extending their care over other Churches Hence came frequent ordinations of persons out of their own Dioceses as of Paulinus at Antioch by Lucifer Caralitanus of many Bishops in Syria and Mesopotamia by Eusebius Samosatenus and of a Presbyter at Bethleem by Epiphanius who when he was quarrel'd at by John of Hierusalem for it he defends his action by this saying That In Sacerdotio Dei nulla est diversitas i. e. where-ever a Bishop was he might exercise his power as such although the Churches prudence had set limits to their ordinary Jurisdiction From these things then we see that a general care and solicitude of the Vniversal Church doth belong to every Bishop and that some of them have been expresly said to have had the care of the whole Church which in other terms is to say They were Vniversal Bishops So that from this sense of the Title you gain nothing to your purpose though the care of the Vniversal Church be attributed to the Bishop of Rome though he acts and calls Councils and orders other things out of his own Province yet all this proves not the Supremacy you intend for this is no more than other Bishops did whom you will not acknowledge to be Heads of the Church or Vniversal Bishops in that sense 2. An Vniversal Bishop denotes a peculiar dignity over the Churches within the Roman Empire For which two things will be sufficient to manifest it 1. That the Roman Empire was then accounted Vniversal 2. That some Bishops in the Great Churches were on that account called Oecumenical or Vniversal Bishops 1. That the Roman Empire was then accounted Vniversal for which multitudes of testimonies might be cited in which orbis Romanus and orbis humanus were looked on as Synonymous thence Trebellius Pollio in Macrianus qui ex diversis partibus orbis Romani restituant and as Salmasius witnesseth in those writers of the Imperial History most of the ancient M S S. for orbis Romanus have orbis humanus for as he saith Eâ gloriâ fuerunt Romani ut totum orbem suum vocarent hinc orbis Romanus passim apud auctores reperitur pro universo orbe thence they called the Roman people omnium gentium victorem and from hence Ammianus Marcellinus calls Rome caput mundi the head of the world and the Roman Senate Asylum mundi totius the Sanctuary for the whole world thence Spartianus saith of Severus orbem terrarum Romamque despexit when as Casaubon observes he speaks only of the Roman Provinces And from hence whatever was out of the Roman Empire was called Barbaria thence the rura vicina Barbariae in Lampridius for the Marches which lay next to the enemies Country thence Marcellinus visus est in Barbarico miles and in the Imperial Constitutions as Justellus observes Barbari vocantur quicunque Imperio Romano non parebant all were called barbarous out of the Roman Empire and in the same sense barbaricum is used in the 58. Canon of the African Code and in the 206. Canon of the Code of the Vniversal Church that the Bishops 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. out of the Roman Empire should be ordained by the Patriarch of Constantinople Now since the Roman Empire was called orbis Romanus and in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as appears in that Augusius Luk. 2.1 is said to tax 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the whole world which could be only the Roman Empire and the famine in the same is said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 11.28 it is no wonder if these Bishops who enjoyed the greatest dignity in the Roman Empire were called Oecumenical and those Councils so too which consisted of the Bishops within those bounds I come therefore to the second thing That some Bishops in the Great Churches in the Roman Empire were called Oecumenical as that relates to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 viz. the Roman Empire For which we may consider the primary ground of the advancement of the Patriarch of Constantinople was the greatness of the City as is undeniably manifest by the proceedings of the Councils of Constantinople and Chalcedon about him wherein it was decreed since that was New-Rome that it should enjoy equal priviledges with the old And in all probability the ground of the Patriarch of Constantinople's usurping the title of Oecumenical Patriarch was but to correspond with the greatness of his City which at the time of the contest between Pope Gregory and him was in a better condition than Rome it self being the seat of the Empire and therefore he thought it suitable thereto to be called Oecumenical Patriarch But besides this peculiarity of Constantinople it was no unusual thing for the Bishop of the Patriarchal Churches to have expressions given them tantamount to the title of Vniversal Bishop in any sense but that of the Vniversal Jurisdiction which I shall prove as to the three Patriarchs of Alexandria Antioch and Constantinople First Of Alexandria So Greg. Nazianzen saith of Athanasius being made Bishop there he had the Government of that people committed to him which is as much as to say of the whole world and John of Hierusalem writing to Theophilus Patriarch of Alexandria saith That he had the care of all the Churches And St. Basil writes to Athanasius about the establishing of Meletius as Patriarch of Antioch that so he might govern as it were the whole body of the Church But most clear and full to that purpose is the testimony of Theodoret concerning Nestorius being made Patriarch of Constantinople He was intrusted with the Government of the Catholick Church of the Orthodox at Constantinople and thereby of the whole world What work would you make with so illustrious a testimony in Antiquity for the Bishop of Rome as this is for the Patriarch of Constantinople Use therefore and interpret but these testimonies as kindly as you do any for the Roman See and will you not find as large a power over the Church attributed to the other Patriarchs as you do to the Bishop of Rome What is it then you would infer from the title of Vniversal Bishop being attributed to him Will the very title do more then what is signified by it Or must it of necessity import something more when given to the Bishop of Rome
your Head of the Church as if they had been spoken by a Protestant against that Doctrine which you all own What is there in all this that implies that others should be no Bishops but only titular yes they may be as much Bishops as you acknowledge them to be i. e. as to their power of Order but not as to their Jurisdiction For this you say and defend comes from the Head of the Church or else your Monarchical Government in the Church signifies nothing Do not you make the Pope Vniversal Pastor of the Church in as high a sense as any of these expressions carry it And when St. Gregory urges so often That if there be such an Vniversal Bishop if he fails the Church would fail too Do you deny the consequence as to the Pope Doth not Bellarmine tell us when he writes of the Pope he writes de summâ rei Christianae Of the main of all Christianity and surely then the Church must fail if the Popes Supremacy doth And I pray now consider with your self Whether this Answer which you say hath been given a hundred times over can satisfie any reasonable man Nay Doth it not appear to be so absurd and incongruous that it is matter of just admiration that ever it should have been given once and yet you are wonderfully displeased that his Lordship should bring this Objection upon the stage again But Do you think your Answers like your Prayers will do you good by being said so often over Indeed therein they are alike that they are both in an unknown tongue Your Literal sense of Vniversal Bishop being in this case no more intelligible than your Latin-Prayers to a Country Congregation These things being thus clear I have prevented my self in the second Enquiry in that I have proved already that the Reasons which St. Gregory produceth hold against that sense of Vniversal Bishop which you own and contend for as of right belonging to the Bishop of Rome Although it were no difficult matter to prove that according to the most received Opinion in your Church viz. that all Jurisdiction in Bishops is derived from the Pope which opinion you cannot but know is most acceptable at Rome and was so at the Council of Trent that that which you call the Literal sense doth follow your Metaphorical i. e. If the Pope hath Vniversal Jurisdiction as Head of the Church then other Bishops are not properly Bishops nor Christ's Officers but his For what doth their power of order signifie as to the Church without the power of Jurisdiction And therefore if they be taken only in partem solicitudinis and not in plenitudinem potestatis according to the known distinction of the Court of Rome it necessarily follows that they are but the Pope's Officers and are taken just into so much authority as he commits to them and no more And this Bellarmine proves from the very form of the Pope's consecration of Bishops whereby he commits the power of governing the Church to him and the administration of it in spirituals and temporals And you may see by the speech of Father Laynez in the Council of Trent How stoutly he proves that the power of Jurisdiction was given wholly to the Bishop of Rome and that none in the Church besides hath any spark of it but from him that the Bishop of Rome is true and absolute Monarch with full and total power and Jurisdiction and the Church is subject unto him as it was to Christ. And as when his Divine Majesty did govern it it could not be said that any of the faithful had any the least power or Jurisdiction but meer pure and total subjection so it must be said in all perpetuity of time and so understood that the Church is a Sheepfold and a Kingdom And that he is the Only Pastor is plainly proved by the words of Christ when he said He hath other sheep which he will gather together and so one Sheepfold should be made and one Shepherd What think you now of the Literal sense of Vniversal Bishop for the Only Bishop Are not the Only Bishop and the Only Pastor all one Will not all those words of St. Gregory reach this which any of you make use of to prove that he takes it in the worst and Literal sense nay it goes higher For Gregory only argues that from the Title of Vniversal Bishop he must be sole Bishop and others could not be any true Bishops but here it is asserted in plain terms that the Bishop of Rome is the only Pastor and that as much as if Christ himself were here upon earth and therefore if your Literal sense hath any sense at all in it it is much more true of the Bishop of Rome than ever it could be of the Patriarch of Constantinople And therefore I pray think more seriously of what he saith That to agree in that prophane word is to lose the Faith That such a blasphemous name should be far from the hearts of Christians in which by the arrogance of one Bishop the honour of all is taken away Neither will it serve your turn to say which is all that you have to say that this is not the definitive sentence of your Church but that many in your Church hold otherwise That there is power of Jurisdiction properly in Bishops For although these latter are not near the number of the other nor so much in favour with your Church but are looked on as a discontented party as appears by the proceedings in the Council of Trent yet that is not it we are to look after What all in your Church are agreed on but what the Pope challengeth as belonging to himself Was not Father Laynez his Doctrine highly approved at Rome as well as by the Cardinal Legats at Trent and all the Italian party Were not the other party discountenanced and disgraced as much as might be Doth not the Pope arrogate this to himself to be Oecumenical Pastor and the sole Fountain of all Jurisdiction in the Church If so all that ever St. Gregory said against that Title falls most heavily upon the Pope For St. Gregory doth not stand upon what others attributed to him but what he arrogated to himself that therein he was the Prince of Pride the forerunner of Antichrist using a vain new rash foolish proud prophane erroneous wicked hypocritical singular presumptuous blaspemous Name For all these goodly Epithets doth S. Gregory bestow upon it and I believe if he could have thought of more and worse he would as freely have bestowed them If therefore John the Patriarch was said by him to transgress God's Laws violate the Canons dishonour the Church despise his Brethren imitate Lucifer How much more doth this belong to him that not only challengeth to be Oecumenical Patriarch but the sole Pastor of the Church and that all Jurisdiction is derived from him And by this time I hope you see that the Answer you say hath
he alledges there 's not a word of the Churches principality 2. That he only implies that he was the first of the Apostles made Bishop of any particular place viz. at Hierusalem which is called Christs Throne as any Episcopal Chair is in ancient Ecclesiastical Writers But whosoever will examine the places in Epiphanius will find much more intended by him than what you will allow For not only he saith that he first had an Episcopal Chair but that our Lord committed to him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his Throne upon Earth which surely is much more than can be said of any meer Episcopal Chair and I believe you will be much to seek where Hierusalem was ever called Christ's Throne upon earth after his Ascension to Heaven Besides if it were it is the strongest prejudice that may be against the principality of the Roman See if Jerusalem was made by Christ his Throne here And that a principality over the whole Church is intended by Epiphanius seems more clear by that other place which his Lordship cites wherein he not only saith That James was first made Bishop but gives this reason for it because he was the Brother of our Lord and if you observe How Epiphanius brings it in you will say he intended more by it than to make him the first Bishop For he was disputing before How the Kingdom and the Priesthood did both belong to Christ and that Christ had transfused both into his Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but his Throne is established for ever in his holy Church consisting both of his Kingdom and Priesthood both which he communicated to his Church quare Jacobus primus omnium est Episcopus constitutus as Petavius renders it so that he seems to settle James in that principality of the Church which he had given to it and what reason can you have to think but that Christ's Throne in which Epiphanius saith James was settled in the other place is the same with his Throne in the Church which he mentions here And What would you give for so clear a testimony in Antiquity for Christ's settling S. Peter in his Throne at Rome as here is for his placing S. James in it at Jerusalem His Lordship goes on And he still tells us the Bishop of Rome is S. Peter 's successor Well suppose that What then What Why then he succeeded in all S. Peter 's prerogatives which are ordinary and belonged to him as a Bishop though not in the extraordinary which belonged to him as an Apostle For that is it which you all say but no man proves Yes you say Bellarmine hath done it in his disputations on that subject For this you produce a saying of his That when the Apostles were dead the Apostolical Authority remained alone in S. Peter 's successor I see with you still saying and proving are all one But since you referr the Reader to Bellarmine for proofs I shall likewise referr him to the many sufficient Answers which have been given him You argue stoutly afterwards That because Primacy in the modern sense of it implies Supremacy therefore wherever the Fathers attribute a Primacy to Peter among the Apostles they mean his Authority and power over them I see you are resolved to believe that there cannot be one two and three but the first must be Head over all the rest A Primacy of Order his Lordship truly saith was never denied him by Protestants and an Vniversal Supremacy of power was never granted him by the Primitive Christians Prove but in the first place that S. Peter had such a Supremacy of power over the Apostles and all Christian Churches and that this power is conveyed to the Pope you will do something In the mean time we acknowledge as much Primacy Authority and Principality in S. Peter as D. Reynolds proves in the place you cite none of which come near that Supremacy of power which you contend for and we must deny till we see it better proved than it is by you But you offer it from S. Hierom because he saith The Primacy was given to Peter for preventing Schism but a meer precedency of order is not sufficient for that But Doth not S. Hierom in the words immediately before say That the Church is equally built on all the Apostles and that they all receive the Keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven and that the firmness of the Church is equally grounded on them and Can he possibly then mean in the following words any other Primacy but such as is among equals and not any Supremacy of power over them And certainly you think the Apostles very unruly who would not be kept in order by such a Primacy as this is unless a S. Peter's full jurisdiction over them And since it is so evident that S. Hierom can mean no other but such a preheminence as this for preventing Schism you had need have a good art that can deduce from thence a necessity of a Supremacy of power in the Church for that end For say you Whatsoever power or jurisdiction was necessary in the Apostles time for preventing Schisms must à fortiori be necessary in all succeeding ages but still be sure to hold to that power or jurisdiction which was in the Apostles times and we grant you all you can prove from it You still dispute gallantly when you beg the Question and argue as formally as I have met with one when you have supposed that which it most concerned you to prove Which is that God hath appointed a Supremacy of power in one particular person alwaies to continue in the Church for preservation of Faith and Unity in it For if you suppose the Church cannot be governed or Schism prevented without this you may well save your self a labour of proving any further But so far are we from seeing such a Supremacy of power as you challenge to the Pope to be necessary for preventing Schisms that we are sufficiently convinced that the Vsurping of it hath caused one of the greatest ever was in the Christian world CHAP. VII The Popes Authority not proved from Scripture or Reason The insufficiency of the proofs from Scripture acknowledged by Romanists themselves The impertinency of Luk. 22.32 to that purpose No proofs offered for it but the suspected testimonies of Popes in their own cause That no Infallibility can thence come to the Pope as St. Peters successour confessed and proved by Vigorius and Mr. White The weakness of the evasion of the Popes erring as a private Doctor but not as Pope acknowledged by them John 21.15 proves nothing towards the Popes Supremacy How far the Popes Authority is owned by the Romanists over Kings T. C's beggings of the Question and tedious repetitions past over The Argument from the necessity of a living Judge considered The Government of the Church not Monarchical but Aristocratical The inconveniencies of Monarchical Government in the Church manifested from reason No evidence that
the Infallibility of General Councils that I believe a Philosopher might hear them repeated a hundred times over without ever imagining any such thing as a General Council much less concluding thence that they are Infallible But because you again cavil with another expression of his Lordships in that he saith That no one of them doth infer much less inforce Infallibility from whence you not infer but inforce this consequence that he was loath to say all of them together did not I shall therefore give you his Lordships Answer from all of them together Which is likewise sufficient for every one of them And for all the places together saith he weigh them with indifferency and either they speak of the Church including the Apostles as all of them do and then all grant the voyce of the Church is Gods voyce Divine and Infallible Or else they are general unlimited and appliable to private assemblies as well as General Councils which none grant to be Infallible but some mad Enthusiasts Or else they are limited not simply to all truth but all necessary to salvation in which I shall easily grant a General Council cannot err suffering it self to be led by this Spirit of Truth in Scripture and not taking upon it to lead both the Scripture and the Spirit For suppose these places or any other did promise assistance even to Infallibility yet they granted it not to every General Council but to the Catholick body of the Church it self and if it be in the whole Church principally then is it in a General Council but by consequent as the Council represents the whole And that which belongs to a thing by consequent doth not otherwise nor longer belong unto it then it consents and cleaves to that upon which it is a consequent And therefore a General Council hath not this assistance but as it keeps to the whole Church and Spouse of Christ whose it is to hear his Word and determine by it And therefore if a General Council will go out of the Churches way it may easily go without the Churches truth Which words of his contain so full an Answer to all these places together that till that be taken off there is no necessity at all to descend to the particular places especially those which are acknowledged by your selves to speak primarily of the Churches Infallibility Yet for your satisfaction more than any intelligent Readers I shall add somewhat further to shew the impertinency of the former places and then consider the force of the two last which have not yet been handled 1. There can be nothing drawn from promises made to the diffusive body for the benefit of the representative unless the maker of those promises did institute that representation Therefore supposing that Infallibility were by these promises bestowed upon the Catholick Church yet you cannot thence inferr that it belongs to a General Council unless you prove that Christ did appoint a General Council to represent the Church and in that representation to be Infallible For this Infallibility coming meerly by promise it belongs only to those to whom the promise is made and in that capacity in which it is made to it For Spiritual gifts are not bequeathable to Heirs nor can be made over to Assigns if the Church be promised Infallibility she cannot pass away the gift of it to her Assigns in a General Council unless that power of devolution be contained in the Original Grant For she can give no more then is in her power to bestow but this Infallibility being out of her disposal the utmost that can be given to a General Council is a power to oblige the Church by the acts of it which falls much short of Infallibility Besides this representation of the Church by a General Council is a thing not so evident from whence it should come that from a promise made to one it must necessarily be understood of the other For as Pighius sayes It cannot be demonstrated from Theological grounds that a General Council which is so far from being the whole Church that it is not a thousandth part of it should represent the whole Church For either saith he it hath this from Christ or from the Church but they cannot produce one tittle from Scripture where Christ hath conveyed over the power and authority of the whole Church to a hundred or two hundred Bishops If they say It is from the Church there are two things to be shewed first that it is done and secondly that it is de jure or ought to be so done First it can never be shewed that such a thing ever was done by the Vniversal Church for if it were it must either be by some formal act of the Church or by a tacit consent It could not be by any formal act of the Church For then there must be some such act of the Vniversal Church preceding the being of any General Council for by that act they receive their Commission to appear in behalf of the Vniversal Church And this could not be done in a General Council because that is not pretended to be the whole Church but only to represent it and therefore it must have this power to represent the Church by something antecedent to its being Else it would only arrogate this power to it self without any act of the Church in order to it Now that the Vniversal Church did ever agree in any such act is utterly impossible to be demonstrated either that it could be or that it was Yet such a delegation to a General Council must be supposed in order to its representation of the whole Church and this delegation must not only be before the first General Council but for all that I can see before every one For how can the Church by its act in one age bind the Church in all ages succeeding to the acts of those several Councils which shall be chosen afterwards If it be said That such a formal act is not necessary but the tacit consent of the whole Church is sufficient for it then such a consent of the Church must be made evident by which they did devolve over the power of the whole Church to such a representative And all those must consent in that act whose power the Council pretends to have and so it cannot be sufficient to say That those who choose Bishops for the Council do it for then they could only represent those who chose them and so their authority will fall much short of that of the whole Church But suppose such a thing were done by the whole Church of which no footsteps at all appear we must further enquire by what right or authority this is done for the authority of the Church being given it by Christ it cannot be given from it self without his commission for doing it Which if we stay till it can be produced in this case we may stay long enough before we see any such Infallible
Church all the rest moulders as not being able to stand without them But that is still your way if any thing be said of the Catholick Church we must presently understand it of yours so that it cannot be said in any sense that the Church is without spot or wrinkle but by you it must be understood presently of the Doctrine of the Roman Catholick Church universally received as a matter of Faith but till you prove not only your two former assertions but that St. Austin understood those words ever in that sense your vindication of that place in him concerning it will appear utterly impertinent to your purpose And his Lordships assertion may still stand good That the Church on earth is not any freer from wrinkles in Doctrine and Discipline then she is from spots in life and Conversation Having thus vindicated his Lordships way from the objections you raised against it we must now consider how well you vindicate your own from the unreasonableness he charges it with in several particulars 1. That if we suppose a General Council Infallible and it prove not so but that an errour in Faith be concluded the same erring opinion which makes it think it self Infallible makes the errour of it irrevocable and so leaves the Church without remedy To this you Answer Grant false antecedents and false premises enow and what absurdities will not be consequent and fill up the conclusion But you clearly mistake the present business which is not Whether Councils be Infallible or no but Whether opinion be lyable to greater Inconveniencies that which asserts that they may or that they cannot err Will you have your supposition of the Infallibility of Councils taken for a first principle or a thing as true as the Scriptures So you would seem indeed by the supposing the Scriptures not to be Gods Word which you subjoyn as the parallel to the supposing General Councils fallible But will you say the one is as evident and built on as good reason and as much agreed on among Christians as the other is I suppose you will not and therefore it was very absurd unreasonable to say Supposing the Word of God were not so errours would be irrevocable as if General Councils were supposed Infallible and proved not so But this is a Question you grant to be disputable among Christians and will you not give us leave to make a supposition that it may prove not so You must consider we are now enquiring into the conveniencies of these two opinions and in that case it is necessary to make such suppositions And let any reasonable man judge what opinion can be more pernicious to the Church then yours is supposing it not to be true for then it will be necessary for men to assent to the grossest errours as the most Divine and Infallible truths and there can be no remedy imagin'd for the redress of them If then the Inconvenience of admitting it be so great men had need look well to the grounds on which it is built And I cannot see any reason men can have to admit any Infallible proponent in matters of Faith to the Church but on as great and as clear evidence as the Prophets and Apostles had that they were sent from God For the danger may be as great to believe that to be Infallible which is not as not to believe that to be Infallible which is for the believing an errour to be a Divine truth may be as dangerous to the souls of men as the not believing something which is really revealed by God But to be sure those who see no reason to believe a General Council to be Infallible cannot be obliged to assent to errours propounded by it but such who believe it Infallible must what ever the errours be swallow them down without questioning the truth of them And it argues how conscious you are of the falseness of your principles that you are so loath to have them examined or so much as a supposition made that they should not prove true Whereas truth alwayes invites men to the most accurate search into it We see the Apostles bid men search whether the things they spake were true or no and those are most commended who did it most and I hope men were as much bound to believe them Infallible as General Councils But we see how unreasonable you are you would obtrude such things upon mens Faith which must lead them into unavoidable errours if false and yet not allow men the liberty of examination whether they be true or no. But such proceedings are so far from advancing your cause that nothing can more prejudice it among rational and inquisitive men His Lordship for the clearing this proceeds to an Instance of an errour defined by one of your General Councils viz. Communion in one kind but that we shall reserve the discussion of to the ensuing Chapter which is purposely allotted for the discovery of those errours which have been defined by such as you call General Councils Therefore I proceed 2. His Lordship saith Your opinion is yet more unreasonable because no Body-collective whensoever it assembled it self did ever give more power to the representing body of it then a binding power upon it self and all particulars nor ever did it give this power otherwise then with this reservation in nature that it would call again and reform and if need were abrogate any Law or ordinance upon just cause made evident that the representing Body had failed in trust or truth And this power no Body-collective ecclesiastical or civil can put out of it self or give away to a Parliament or Council or call it what you will that represents it To this again you Answer This is only to suppose and take for granted that a General Council hath no Authority but what is meerly delegate from the Church Vniversal which it represents I grant this is supposed in it and this is all which the nature of a representative body doth imply if you say there is more then that you are bound to prove it Yes say you We maintain its Authority to be of Divine Institution and when lawfully assembled to act by Divine right and not meerly by deputation and consent of the Church But if all the proof you have for it be only that which you refer us to in the precedent Chapter the palpable weakness of it for any such purpose hath been there fully laid open His Lordship saith That the power which a Council hath to order settle and define differences arising concerning Faith it hath not by any Immediate Institution from Christ but it was prudently taken up by the Church from the Apostles example So that to hold Councils to this end is apparent Apostolical Tradition written but the power which Councils have is from the whole Catholick Church whose members they are and the Churches power from God You say True it is the calling such
is now about a twelvemonth since there appeared to the world a Book under the Title of Dr. Lawd's Labyrinth but with the usual sincerity of those persons pretended to be Printed some years before It is not the business of this Preface to enquire Why if Printed then it remained so long unpublished but to acquaint the Reader with the scope and design of that Book and of this which comes forth as a Reply to it There are three things mainly in dispute between us and those of the Church of Rome viz. Whether they or we give the more satisfactory account of the Grounds of Faith Whether their Church or ours be guilty of the charge of Schism And Whether their Church be justly accused by us of introducing many Errours and Superstitions In the handling of these all our present Debate consists and therefore for the greater Advantage of the Reader I have distributed the whole into three distinct parts which I thought more commodious than carrying it on in one continued discourse And lest our Adversaries should complain that we still proceed in a destructive way I have not only endeavoured to lay open the palpable weakness of their Cause but to give a rational account of our own Doctrine in opposition to theirs Which I have especially done in the great Controversie of the Resolution of Faith as being the most difficult and important of any other I hope the Reader will have no cause to blame me for false or impertinent Allegations of the Fathers since it hath been so much my business to discover the fraud of our Adversaries in that particular which I have chiefly done from the scope and design of those very Books out of which their testimonies are produced In many of the particular Differences I have made use of several of their late Writers against themselves both to let them see how much Popery begins to grow weary of it self and how unjustly they condemn us for denying those things which the moderate and rational men of their own side disown and dispute against as well as we and chiefly to undeceive the world as to their great pretence of Unity among themselves Since their Divisions are grown to so great a height both at home and in foreign parts that the dissenting parties mutually charge each other with Heresie and that about their great Foundation of Faith viz. the Popes Infallibility The Jansenists in France and a growing party in England charging the Jesuits with Heresie in asserting it as they do them with the same for denying it As to my self I only declare that I have with freedom and impartiality enquired into the Reasons on both sides and no interest hath kept me from letting that side of the ballance fall where I saw the greater weight of reason In which respect I have been so far from dissembling the force of any of our Adversaries Arguments that if I could add greater weight to them I have done it being as unwilling to abuse my self as the world And therefore I have not only consulted their greatest Authours especially the three famous Cardinals Baronius Bellarmin and Perron but the chiefest of those who under the name of Conciliators have put the fairest Varnish on the Doctrine of that Church However I have kept close to my Adversary and followed him through all his windings from which I return with this satisfaction to my self that I have vindicated his Lordship and Truth together As to the style and way of writing I use all that I have to say is that my design hath been to joyn clearness of Expression with evidence of Reason What success I have had in it must be left to the Readers judgement I only desire him to lay aside prejudice as much in judging as I have done in writing otherwise I despair of his doing me right and of my doing him good For though reason be tractable and ingenuous yet prejudice and interest are invincible things Having done thus much by way of Preface I shall not detain thee longer by a particular Answer to the impertinencies of our Authours Preface since there is nothing contained therein but what is abundantly answered in a more proper place And I cannot think it reasonable to abuse so much the Readers Appetite as to give him a tedious Preface to cloy his stomach If any after perusal of the whole shall think fit to return an Answer if they do it fairly and rationally they shall receive the same civility if with clamour and impertinency I only let them know I have not leisure enough to kill Flyes though they make a troublesome noise If any service be done to God or the Church by this present work next to that Divine Assistance through which I have done it thou owest it to those great Pillars of our Church by whose command and encouragement I undertook it Who the Authour was of the Book I answer I have been the less solicitous to enquire because I would not betray the weakness of my cause by mixing personal matters in debates of so great importance And whether he be now living or dead I suppose our Adversaries cannot think it at all material unless they judge that their Cause doth live and dye with him THE CONTENTS PART I. Of the Grounds of Faith CHAP. I. The Occasion of the Conference and Defence of the Greek Church T. Cs. Title examined and retorted The Labyrinth found in his Book and Doctrine The occasion of the Conference about the Churches Infallibility The rise of the dispute about the Greek Church and the consequences from it The Charge of Heresie against the Greek Church examined and she found Not-guilty by the concurrent testimony of Fathers General Councils and Popes Of the Council of Florence and the proceedings there That Council neither General nor Free. The distinction of Ancient and Modern Greeks disproved The debate of the Filioque being inserted into the Creed The time when and the right by which it was done discussed The rise of the Schism between the Eastern and Western Churches mainly occasioned by the Church of Rome Page 1. CHAP. II. Of Fundamentals in General The Popish Tenet concerning Fundamentals a meer step to the Roman Greatness The Question about Fundamentals stated An enquiry into the nature of them What are Fundamentals in order to particular persons and what to be owned as such in order to Ecclesiastical Communion The Prudence and Moderation of the Church of England in defining Articles of Faith What judged Fundamental by the Catholick Church No new Articles of Faith can become necessary The Churches power in propounding matters of Faith examined What is a sufficient Proposition Of the Athanasian Creed and its being owned by the Church of England In what sense the Articles of it are necessary to Salvation Of the distinction of the material and formal object of Faith as to Fundamentals His Lordship's integrity and T. C. his forgery in the testimony of Scotus Of Heresie and how far
the Church may declare matters of Faith The testimony of St. Augustine vindicated Page 44. CHAP. III. The Absurdities of the Romanists Doctrine of Fundamentals The Churches Authority must be Divine if whatever she defines be Fundamental His Lordship and not the Testimony of S. Augustine shamefully abused three several wayes Bellarmin not mis-cited the Pelagian Heresie condemned by the General Council at Ephesus The Popes Authority not implyed in that of Councils The gross Absurdities of the distinction of the Church teaching and representative from the Church taught and diffusive in the Question of Fundamentals The Churches Authority and Testimony in matters of Faith distinguished The Testimony of Vincentius Lirinensis explained and shewed to be directly contrary to the Roman Doctrine of Fundamentals Stapleton and Bellarmin not reconciled by the vain endeavours used to that end Page 79. CHAP. IV. The Protestant Doctrine of Fundamentals vindicated The unreasonableness of demanding a Catalogue of Fundamentals The Creed contains the Fundamentals of Christian Communion The belief of Scripture supposed by it The Dispute concerning the Sense of Christs Descent into Hell and Mr. Rogers his Book confessed by T. C. impertinent With others of the same nature T. C. his fraud in citing his Lordships words Of Papists and Protestants Vnity The Moderation of the Church of England compared with that of Rome Her grounds of Faith justified Infant-Baptism how far proved out of Scripture alone Page 98. CHAP. V. The Romanists way of Resolving Faith The ill consequences of the resolution of Faith by the Churches Infallibility The grand Absurdities of it manifested by its great unreasonableness in many particulars The certain Foundations of Faith unsettled by it as is largely proved The Circle unavoidable by their new attempts The impossibility of proving the Church Infallible by the way that Moses Christ and his Apostles were proved to be so Of the Motives of Credibility and how far they belong to the Church The difference between Science and Faith considered and the new art of mens believing with their wills The Churches Testimony must be according to their principles the formal object of Faith Of their esteem of Fathers Scripture and Councils The rare distinctions concerning the Churches Infallibility discussed How the Church can be Infallible by the assistance of the Holy Ghost yet not divinely Infallible but in a manner and after a sort T.C. applauded for his excellent faculty in contradicting himself Page 109. CHAP. VI. Of the Infallibility of Tradition Of the unwritten Word and the necessary Ingredients of it The Instances for it particularly examined and disproved The Fathers Rule for examining Traditions No unwritten Word the Foundation of Divine Faith In what sense Faith may be said to be Divine Of Tradition being known by its own light and the Canon of the Scripture The â—estimony of the Spirit how far pertinent to this Controversie Of the use of Reason in the resolution of Faith C's Dialogue answered with another between himself and a Sceptick A twofold resolution of Faith into the Doctrine and into the Books Several Objections answered from the Supposition made of a Child brought up without sight of Scripture Christ no Ignoramus nor Impostor though the Church be not Infallible C's Blasphemy in saying otherwise The Testimonies of Irenaeus and S. Augustin examined and retorted Of the nature of Infallible Certainty as to the Canon of Scripture and whereon it is grounded The Testimonies produced by his Lordship vindicated p. 161. CHAP. VII The Protestant Way of resolving Faith Several Principles premised in order to it The distinct Questions set down and their several Resolutions given The Truth of matters of fact the Divinity of the Doctrine and of the Books of Scripture distinctly resolved into their proper grounds Moral Certainty a sufficient Foundation for Faith and yet Christian Religion proved to be infallibly true How Apostolical Tradition made by his Lordship a Foundation of Faith Of the Certainty we have of the Copies of Scripture and the Authority of them S. Augustine's Testimony concerning Church-Authority largely discussed and vindicated Of the private Spirit and the necessity of Grace His Lordship's Way of resolving Faith vindicated How far Scripture may be said to be known by its own Light The several Testimonies of Bellarmine Brierly and Hooker cleared p. 202. CHAP. VIII The Churches Infallibility not proved from Scripture Some general Considerations from the design of proving the Churches Infallibility from Scripture No Infallibility in the High-Priest and his Clergy under the Law if there had been no necessity there should be under the Gospel Of S. Basil's Testimony concerning Traditions Scripture less liable to corruptions than Traditions The great uncertainty of judging Traditions when Apostolical when not The Churches perpetuity being promised in Scripture proves not its Infallibility His Lordship doth not falsifie C's words but T. C. doth his meaning Producing the Jesuits words no traducing their Order C's miserable Apology for them The particular Texts produced for the Churches Infallibility examined No such Infallibility necessary in the Apostles Successours as in Themselves The Similitude of Scripture and Tradition to an Ambassadour and his Credentials rightly stated p. 235. CHAP. IX The Sense of the Fathers in this Controversie The Judgement of Antiquity enquired into especially of the three first Centuries and the reasons for it The several Testimonies of Justin Martyr Athenagoras Tatianus Irenaeus Clemens Alexandrinus and all the Fathers who writ in vindication of Christian Religion manifested to concurr fully with our way of resolving Faith C's Answers to Vincentius Lyrinensis à Gandavo and the Fathers produced by his Lordship pitifully weak The particulars of his 9th Chapter examined S. Augustine's Testimony vindicated C's nauseous Repetitions sent as Vagrants to their several homes His Lordships Considerations found too heavy for C's Answers In what sense the Scripture may be called a Praecognitum What way the Jews resolved their Faith This Controversie and the first part concluded p. 261 PART II. Of Schism CHAP. I. Of the Universal Church THe Question of Schism explained The nature of it enquired into Several general Principles laid down for clearing the present Controversie Three grounds of the charge of Schism on Protestant Churches by our Authour The first of the Roman Churches being the Catholick Church entred upon How far the Roman Church may be said to be a true Church The distinction of a Church morally and metaphysically true justified The grounds of the Unity of the Catholick Church as to Doctrine and Government Cardinal Perron's distinction of the formal causal and participative Catholick Church examined The true sense of the Catholick Church in Antiquity manifested from S. Cyprian and several cases happening in his time as the Schism of Novatianus at Rome the case of Felicissimus and Fortunatus Several other Instances out of Antiquity to the same purpose by all which it is manifest that the Unity of the Catholick Church had no dependence on the Church of Rome
Roman Church And from what hath been hitherto said I am so far from suspecting his Lordships candor as you do that I much rather suspect your judgement and that you are not much used to attend to the Consequences of things or else you would not have deserted Bellarmin in defence of so necessary and pertinent a point as the Infallibility of the particular Church of Rome Secondly You answer to his Lordships Discourse concerning Bellarmin's Authorities That you cannot hold your self obliged to take notice of his pretended Solutions till you find them brought to evacuate the Infallibility of the Catholick or the Roman Church in its full latitude as Catholicks ever mean it save when they say the particular Church of Rome But taking it in as full a Latitude as you please I doubt not but to make it appear that the Roman Church is the Roman Church still that is a particular Church as distinct from the Communion of others and therefore neither Catholick nor Infallible which I must refer to the place where you insist upon it which I shall do without the imitation of your Vanity in telling your Reader as far as eighthly and lastly what fine exploits you intend to do there But usually those who brag most of their Valour before-hand shew least in the Combat and thus it will be found with you I shall let you therefore enjoy your self in the pleasant thoughts of your noble intendments till we come to the tryal of them and so come to the present Controversie concerning the Greek Church The Defence of the Greek Church It is none of the least of those Arts which you make use of for the perplexing the Christian Faith to put men upon enquiring after an Infallible Church when yet you have no way to discern which is so much as a true Church but by examining the doctrine of it So that of necessity the rule of Faith and Doctrine must be certainly known before ever any one can with safety depend upon the judgement of any Church For having already proved that there can be no other meaning of the Question concerning the Church as here stated but with relation to some particular Church to whose Communion the party enquiring might joyn and whose judgement might be relyed on we see it presently follows in the debate Which was that Church and it seems as is said already a Friend of the Ladies undertook to defend that the Greek Church was right To which Mr. Fisher answers That the Greek Church had plainly changed and taught false in a point of Doctrine concerning the Holy Ghost and after repeats it that it had erred Before I come to examine how you make good the charge you draw up against the poor Greek Church in making it erre fundamentally it is worth our while to consider upon what account this dispute comes in The Inquiry was concerning the True Church on whose judgement one might safely depend in Religion It seems two were propounded to consideration the Greek and the Roman the Greek was rejected because it had erred From whence it follows that the dispute concerning the Truth of Doctrine must necessarily precede that of the Church For by Mr. Fishers confession and your own A Church which hath erred cannot be relyed on therefore men must be satisfied whether a Church hath erred or no before they can judge whether she may be relyed on or no. Which being granted all the whole Fabrick of your Book falls to the ground for then 1. Men must be Infallibly certain of the grounds of Faith antecedently to the testimony of the Church for if they be to judge of a Church by the Doctrine they must in order to such a judgement be certain what that Doctrine is which they must judge of the Church by 2. No Church can be known to be Infallible unless it appear to be so by that Doctrine which they are to examine the truth of the Church by and therefore no Church can be known to be Infallible by the motives of credibility 3. No Church ought to be relyed on as Infallible which may be found guilty of any errour by comparing it with the Doctrine which we are to try it by Therefore you must first prove your Church not to have erred in any particular for if she hath it is impossible she should be Infallible and not think to prove that she hath not erred because she cannot that being the thing in question and must by your dealing with the Greek Church be judged by particulars 4. There must be a certain rule of Faith supposed to have sufficient Authority to decide Controversies without any dependence upon the Church For the matter to be judged is the Church and if the Scripture may and must decide that Why may it not as well all the rest 5. Every mans reason proceeding according to this rule of Faith must be left his Judge in matters of Religion And whatever inconveniencies you can imagine to attend upon this they immediately and necessarily follow from your proceeding with the Greek Church by excluding her because she hath erred which while we are in pursuit of a Church can be determined by nothing but every ones particular reason 6. Then Fundamentals do not depend upon the Churches declaration For you assert the Greek Church to erre fundamentally and that this may be made appear to one who is seeking after a Church Suppose then I inquire as the Lady did after a Church whose judgement I must absolutely depend on and some mention the Greek and others the Roman Church You tell me It cannot be the Greek for that hath erred fundamentally I inquire how you know supposing her to erre that it is a fundamental errour will you answer me because the true Church hath declared it to be a fundamental errour but that was it I was seeking for Which that Church is which may declare what errours are fundamental and what not If you tell me It is yours I may soon tell you You seem to have a greater kindness for your Church then your self and venture to speak any thing for the sake of it Thus we see how finely you have betrayed your whole Cause in your first onset by so rude an attempt upon the Greek Church And truly it was much your concernment to load her as much as you can For though she now wants one of the great marks of your Church which yet you know not how long your Church may enjoy viz. outward splendor and bravery yet you cannot deny but that Church was planted by the Apostles enjoyed a continual Succession from them flourished with a number of the Fathers exceeding that of yours had more of the Councils of greatest credit in it and which is a commendation still to it it retains more purity under its persecutions then your Church with all its external splendour But she hath erred concerning the Holy Ghost and therefore hath lost it A severe censure which his
sent home as empty as he came and found things in a much worse condition then he left them Which could not rationally be expected to be otherwise When the Greeks knew that the Emperour had assented that the Council should be in Italy they began strangely to be troubled at it some resolved never to communicate more in the Councils of the Vnion the Patriarch often said that he knew no good issue could come of a Council held in the Popes Territories and if they must receive their allowance from the Pope what did they else but therein confess themselves his Vassals already and therefore nothing could be expected from them but to do just what he would have them or else he might easily starve them into consent and approbation of his Will For they should be wholly under his power and if he denyed their stipends there was no possibility of getting from him Was not this then like to be a very free Council And it proved accordingly for when they were at Council the Pope kept them short enough so that many of them were reduced to the greatest necessities and were not suffered unless by stealth to go so much as out of the Gates of the City as Bessarion himself once found when he attempted it at Florence But notwithstanding all the perswasions of the wisest of his Councellors at home to the contrary notwithstanding an Express from the Emperour Sigismund to disswade the Greek Emperour in the present state of affairs from this journy into Italy yet he was resolved upon it and used all the arts he could before-hand to make choice of such persons as might be most for his purpose Himself without the consent of the Patriarch appointing the Legats of the three other Patriarchs of Jerusalem Antioch and Alexandria and when these Patriarchs had given no other instructions to these Legats then that they should have power to give their suffrages upon these terms and no other That all things were carried fairly and defined Canonically according to the decrees of Oecumenical Councils and Holy Fathers so that nothing should be added changed or innovated in the Symbol of Faith he at the instigation of one of the Latin Legats then resident at Constantinople sent away to the several Patriarchs for the altering their instructions upon a solemn Promise that the conditions mentioned by them should however be exactly observed which whether they were or no will appear by the series of the story And that we may better judge how General this Council was like to be at the same time that these negotiations for Vnion were on foot the Council of Basil was then sitting in opposition to Pope Eugenius to them and to the Pope at the same time the Emperour dispatcheth several Legats with the same instructions and both of them returned theirs to the Emperour seeking as much as possible to outvy each other in large Promises if the Greeks did joyn in Council with them both which the Emperour held in play till he could see with whom he was like to make the best terms But as the Romanists are never backward at such arts they had caused it by their Instruments to be reported at Constantinople that the Council at Basil had submitted to the Pope which within fifteen days was confuted by the arrival of the Gallyes sent from the Council to convey the Greeks over to it upon which the Emperour had much to do to keep Condelmerius the Popes Nephew from fighting the Councils Gallies within his view for he said he had express order from the Pope to sink them where-ever he met them And were not these fair tendencies to a free and General Council And yet after all this not full thirty Bishops of the Greek Church went along with the Patriarch as appears by the particular enumeration of them by Sguropulus other Officers indeed and Monks there were to fill up the number and yet these were more then the Emperour could well mould to his designes when he had them there But the Pope soon accomplished the Patriarchs prediction in keeping them bare enough when they were at his finding that he might be sure to make them hungry Greeks and then he supposed the other part of the Proverb would follow after After the Council had begun at Ferrara and continued there sixteen Sessions wherein were many publick and solemn Disputes between the Greeks and Latins it was removed to Florence where the Greeks still underwent the same hardships and the Latins sought to hold out at Disputations till the Greeks necessity should be so pressing as to necessitate them to an absolute submission to the Latin Church But Reports and Messages coming from Constantinople acquainting the Emperour with the difficulties the City was in and the Progress which the enemies made and finding that during the sitting of the Council the Pope still put him off and gave him nothing but words he therefore resolves upon another course he breaks all publick and Conciliary proceedings pretending that no issue would come of those Disputations calls a private Cabal of such whom he knew fittest for his purpose to contrive some shorter way to put an end to this business For that end makes choice first of ten Persons of either side to agree upon some proposals for Union and acquaints none else of the Greeks with their transactions When these things took no effect the Patriarch who carryed on the Emperour's design often convenes the Greeks together and in plain terms perswades them to perfect dissimulation that since the necessity of affairs was such it would be hugely for their advantage if in some things they did yield to the Latins desires When they told him that in matters of Faith they could not do it he replyes that if in twenty four Articles of Faith they yielded but in one the soundness of twenty three would make amends for the twenty fourth Such kind of Arguments as these were they driven to to bring the Greeks to hearken to any terms of Vnion After this the Latins sent them an explication of Faith which if the Greeks would subscribe there might be an Union between them which being read among them containing chiefly the acknowledgement of the Procession from the Son all but the four who were the Emperour's instruments in this work unanimously disown it and when the Emperour urged them every one to deliver their Suffrages in writings they tell him it was contrary to the proceeding of all Oecumenical Councils However he told them he commanded them to do it By which means rebuking some cajoling others he at last brought it by the multitude of Suffrages that five persons were selected among the rest to draw up a Form of Vnion which though drawn up very favourably for the Greeks yet those who were for it did not easily carry it from those who opposed it And yet to this the Latins returned no less than twelve Exceptions Upon
expect that your Anathema's will be accounted any other than bruta fulmina noise and no more CHAP. 2. Of Fundamentals in General The Popish Tenet concerning Fundamentals a meer step to the Roman Greatness The Question about Fundamentals stated An enquiry into the nature of them What are Fundamentals in order to particular persons and what to be owned as such in order to Ecclesiastical Communion The Prudence and Moderation of the Church of England in defining Articles of Faith What judged Fundamental by the Catholick Church No new Articles of Faith can become necessary The Churches Power in propounding matters of Faith examined What is a sufficient Proposition Of the Athanasian Creed and its being owned by the Church of England In what sense the Articles of it are necessary to Salvation Of the distinction of the material and formal object of Faith as to Fundamentals His Lordship's integrity and T. C's forgery in the testimony of Scotus Of Heresie and how far the Church may declare matters of Faith The testimony of S. Augustine vindicated THe Greek Church appearing not guilty of Heresie by any evidence of Scripture Reason or the Consent of the Primitive Church nothing is left to make good the charge but that the Church of Rome hath defin'd it to be so which Pretence at first view carrying the greatest partiality and unreasonableness in it great care is taken that the partiality be not discovered by not openly mentioning the Church of Rome but the Church in General as though it were impossible to conceive any other Church but that at Rome and for the unreasonableness of it it must be confidently asserted That all Points defin'd by the Church are Fundamental So to be sure the Greek Church will never escape the charge of Heresie For this end Mr. Fisher in the Conference acknowledgeth that when his Lordship had denyed the errour of the Greek Church to be Fundamental he was forced to repeat what he had formerly brought against Dr. White concerning Points Fundamental The reason of which was that easily perceiving that it was impossible to stand their ground in their charge on the Greek Church upon other terms he is forced to take Sanctuary in the Churches Definition and if that will not make it good there is nothing else remaining to do it And this is the cause of the following Dispute concerning Fundamentals wheren the main thing undertaken is the proof that the formal reason of Fundamentals is to be taken from the Definition of the present Church but as this must be confessed to be the main Fundamental of the Church of Rome for which yet the thing being manifest no Definition of that Church is necessary so withall I doubt not but it will be made evident in the progress of this discourse that never was there any pretence more partial absurd and tyrannical than this is Which his Lordship takes notice of in these words which deserve a repetition It was not the least means by which Rome grew to her Greatness to blast every opposer she had with the name of Heretick or Schismatick for this served to shrivel the credit of the persons And the persons once brought into Contempt and Ignominy all the good they desired in the Church fell to dust for want of creditable persons to back and support it To make this proceeding good in these latter years this course it seems was taken The School that must maintain and so they do that all Points defin'd by the Church are thereby Fundamental necessary to be believed of the substance of Faith and that though it be determined quite extra Scripturam And then leave the wise and active Heads to take order that there be strength enough ready to determine what is fittest for them To this you answer with an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 You call it a Squib a Fancy a weak Discourse one of the Bishop's Railleries and what not It seems it pinched you hard you cry out so Tragically But it is very certain you are more impatient to have your Politicks than your Errours discovered and if you have any Curses more dreadful than others they are sure to light on those who discover the intrigues of your Designs For if once men come to discern how much more of Artifice and cunning than of Truth and Religion there is in the managing the Interest of your Church they would not easily think the way to Heaven can lye among so many foldings of the old Serpent And this is not to think as you tragically speak That all the world is turn'd mad or Heathen for thanks be to God as Catholique as your Church is it must be a huge Catachresis to take it for all the world neither do we think your Church mad but very wise and Politick in these pretences and that still you are resolved to shew that though other Churches may be more Children of Light than yours ignorance being so much in favour with you yet yours is Wiser in its Generation But how the pretending of your Church to Infallibility and power to define Fundamentals should make us imagine all the world Heathen is not easie to conceive unless you are conscious to your self that such pretences as these are are the way to make it so But we must see still how your Cothurnus fits you No truth left upon earth but all become Juglers See what it is to be true Catholiques that if they juggle all the world must do so too as though totus mundus exercet histrioniam were Latin for the Infallibility of the Church of Rome But have you indeed such a Monopoly of Truth that if your party prove Juglers there will be no truth left upon earth if you had said none unsophisticated yet even that had been a great Truth left upon earth still But I shall cut you short in what follows of your Declamation by telling you that though your Harangue were ten times longer than it is and your exclamations louder and your Authorities better than of your Prelates Miracles Doctors Heads of Schools austere and religious persons in English Monks and Friers yet all these would not one jot perswade us contrary to common sense and the large experience of the world That Religion is not made by you an Instrument to advance the Pope's Ambition and that the Church is but a more plausible name whereby to maintain the Court of Rome And we need not go from our present subject for a proof of it I will not charge this upon all persons of your Communion for all of them do not believe the State-Principles of your Church and others are kept as much as may be from all waies of discovering the great Designs of it and therefore there may be so much innocency and simplicity in some as may keep them from prostituting their Salvation to the Pope's Greatness but this is no plea on behalf of those who have the managery of those Designs who if they do not
rest of the Points of Faith are necessary to be believed necessitate praecepti only conditionally that is to all such to whom they are sufficiently propounded as defined by the Church which necessity proceeds not precisely from the material object or matter contained in them but from the formal object of Divine Authority declared to Christians by the Churches Definition Whether therefore the Points in question be necessary in the first manner or no by reason of their precise matter yet if they be necessary by reason of the Divine Authority or Formal object of Divine Revelation sufficiently declared and propounded to us they will be Points Fundamental that is necessary to Salvation to be believed as we have shewed Fundamental must here be taken These words of yours containing the full state of the question in your own terms and being the substance of all you say on this Controversie I have recited at large that you may not complain your meaning is mistaken in them You assert then that besides that necessity which ariseth from the matter of things to be believed and from th◠absolute Command of God there is another necessity conditionally upon the Churches Definition but supposing that Definition the thing so propounded becomes as necessary to Salvation as what is necessary from the matter for in all hypothetical propositions the supposition being in act the matter becomes necessary For unless you speak of such a necessity as becomes as universally obligatory on supposition of the Churches Definition as that which ariseth from the matter or absolute command you are guilty of the greatest tergiversation and perverting the state of the Question For otherwise that cannot be said to be fundamental or necessary to Salvation in the sense of this Question which is not generally necessary to Salvation to all Christians For no man was ever so silly as to imagine that the Question of Fundamentals with a respect to whole Churches as it is here taken can be understood in any other sense than as the matter call'd Fundamental or Necessary must be equally fundamental and necessary to all persons And that this must be your meaning appears by the rise of the Controversie which concerns the whole Greek Church which you exclude from being a Church because she erres fundamentally and that she errres fundamentally because the Church hath defined it to be an errour So that what the Church determines as matter of Faith is as necessary to be believed in order to Salvation as that which is necessary from the matter or from an absolute Command For otherwise the Greek Church might not be in a Fundamental Errour notwithstanding the Churches Definition the ground of this Errour being Fundamental not being derived from the matter or absolute Command but from the Churches Definition If therefore the denial of what the Church defines doth exclude from Salvation the necessity and obligation must be equal to that which ariseth from the matter to be believed And if the Church defines any particulars to be explicitly believed as necessary to Salvation not only the not disbelieving them but the not explicit believing them will be as destructive to Salvation as if the matter of the things themselves were necessary or that it were absolutely commanded for in those cases you say the not explicit believing is that which damns and so on your principles it will do here when the explicit belief is the thing defined by the Church This will be more plain by an Instance It is notoriously known that at the shutting up of the Council of Trent a Confession of Faith was drawn up and confirmed by the Bull of Pius 4. A. D. 1564. and that ut unius ejusdem fidei professio uniformitèr ab omnibus exhibeatur That the Profession of one and the same Faith may be made known to all and declared uniformally by all In which Confession after the enumeration of the Articles contained in the Ancient Creed there are many others added concerning Traditions Seven Sacraments the Decrees of the Council of Trent as to Original sin and Justification The Sacrifice of the Mass Transubstantiation Communion in one kind Purgatory Invocation of Saints Worship of Images Indulgences the Pope's Supremacy c. All which are required to be believed with an equal assent to the former as absolutely necessary to Salvation and necessary Conditions of Catholick Communion For thus it ends Hanc veram Catholicam Fidem extra quam nemo salvus esse potest quam in praesenti sponte profiteor veraciter teneo eandem integram inviolatam usque ad extremum vitae spiritum c. This true Catholick Faith without which none can be saved which at present I profess and truly hold and will do whole and undefiled to my lives end c. Judge you now whether an equal explicit Faith be not here required to the Definitions of the Church as to the Articles of the Creed and if so there must be an equal necessity in order to Salvation of believing both of them it being here so expresly declared that these Definitions are Integral Parts of that Catholick Faith without which there is no Salvation And what could be more said of those things whose matter or absolute precept do make them necessary This Confession of Faith therefore gives us the truest state of the present Question in these particulars 1. That the Definitions of the Church are to be believed to be as necessary to Salvation as the Articles of the Ancient Creed without the belief of which no Salvation is to be expected 2. That the explicit Belief of these Definitions as necessary to Salvation may be required in order to Catholick Communion and that they are to be believed of all as such because they are defined by the Church So that the Question is not What is so required by the Churches Definition declared and propounded to us that it ought not to be dis-believed without mortal and damnable sin which unrepented destroyes Salvation as you stated it for this seems only to respect the Faith of particular persons who are to believe according as the Proposition may be judged sufficient but the true state of the Question is Whether any Definitions of the Church may be believed as Necessary Articles of Faith and whether they may be imposed on others to be believed as such so that they may be excluded Catholick Communion if they do not For this is really the true state of the Question between your Church and ours ever since the Council of Trent and as to it thus stated as it ought to be I do most readily joyn issue with you For the clearing of which important Question on which the main cause of our being separated from your Communion depends these three things will be necessary to be exactly discussed 1. What the Grounds are on which any thing doth become necessary to Salvation 2. Whether any thing whose matter is not necessary and is not required by an
are absolutely and indispensably necessary to all persons to whom God's Word is revealed Thus much may suffice concerning what is necessary to be believed by particular persons considered as such But this controversie never need break Christian Societies in that sense but the great difficulty lyes in the other part of it which is most commonly strangely confounded with the former viz. What things are necessary to be owned in order to Church-Societies or Ecclesiastical Communion For which we must consider that the combination of Christian Societies oâ— that which we call the Catholick Church doth subsist upon the belief of what is necessary to Salvation For the very notion of a Christian Church doth imply the belief of all those things which are necessary in order to the end of Christian Religion which is mens eternal Happiness From whence three things must be taken notice of 1. That the very being of a Church doth suppose the necessity of what is required to be believed in order to Salvation For else there could not be such a thing as a Church imagined which is only a combination of men together upon the belief of such a Doctrine as necessary to Salvation and for the performance of those acts of Worship which are suitable thereto Therefore to assert the Church to have power to make things necessary to Salvation is not only absurd but destructive to the Being of that Church For when it offer'd to define any thing to be necessary which was not so before was it a Church or no If it was a Church it believed all things necessary if it believed all things necessary before it Defined how comes it to make more things necessary by its Definition But of this more afterwards 2. Whatever Church owns those things which are antecedently necessary to the Being of a Church cannot so long cease to be a true Church Because it retains that which is the Foundation of the Being of the Catholick Church Here we must distinguish those things in the Catholick Church which give its Being from those things which are the proper Acts of it as the Catholick Church As to this latter the solemn Worship of God in the way prescribed by him is necessary in order to which there must be supposed lawful Officers set in the Church and Sacraments duly administred but these I say are rather the Exercise of the Communion of the Catholick Church than that which gives its Being which is the belief of that Religion whereon its Subsistence and Vnity depends and as long as a Church retains this it keeps its Being though the Integrity and Perfection of it depends upon the due exercise of all acts of Communion in it 3. The Vnion of the Catholick Church depends upon the agreement of it in making the Foundations of its Being to be the grounds of its Communion For the Vnity being intended to preserve the Being there can be no reason given why the bonds of Vnion should extend beyond the Foundation of its Being which is the owning the things necessary to the Salvation of all From whence it necessarily follows that whatsoever Church imposeth the belief of other things as necessary to Salvation which were not so antecedently necessary to the Being of the Catholick Church doth as much as in it lyes break the Vnity of it and those Churches who desire to preserve its Vnity are bound thereby not to have communion with it so long as it doth so Of what great consequence these principles are to the true understanding the Distance between our Church and yours if you see not now you may feel afterwards These things being premised I come to that which is the main subject of the present Dispute which is What those things are which ought to be owned by all Christian-Societies as necessary to Salvation on which the Being of the Catholick Church depends If we can find any sure footing for the Definition of these we shall thereby find what the necessary conditions of Ecclesiastical Communion are and consequently where the proper cause of Schism lyes in transgressing those bounds and what Foundations may be laid for the Peace of the Christian world Which being of so vast importance would require a larger discussion than this place will admit of but so far as is pertinent to our present subject I shall enquire into it and give an account of my thoughts in these Propositions 1. Nothing ought to be owned as necessary to Salvation by Christian-Societies but such things which by the judgement of all those Societies are antecedently necessary to the Being of the Catholick Church For no reason can be assigned as I said before why the Bonds of Union should be extended beyond that which is the Churches Foundation neither can there any reason be given why any thing else should be judged necessary to the Churches Communion but what all those Churches who do not manifestly dissent from the Catholick Church of the first Ages are agreed in as necessary to be believed by all this will be further explained afterwards Only I add here when I speak of the necessary conditions of Ecclesiastical Communion I speak of such things which must be owned as Necessary Articles of Faith and not of any other Agreements for the Churches Peace I deny not therefore but that in case of great Divisions in the Christian world and any National Churches reforming it self that Church may declare its sense of those abuses in Articles of Religion and require of men a Subscription to them but then we are to consider that there is a great deal of difference between the owning some Propositions in order to Peace and the believing of them as necessary Articles of Faith And this is clearly the state of the difference between the Church of Rome and the Church of England The Church of Rome imposeth new Articles of Faith to be believed as necessary to Salvation as appears by the formerly cited Bull of Pius 4. Which Articles contain in them the Justification of those things which are most excepted against by other Churches and by her imposing these as the conditions of her Communion she makes it necessary for other Churches who would preserve the Vnity of the Catholick Church upon her true Foundations to forbear her Communion But the Church of England makes no Articles of Faith but such as have the Testimony and Approbation of the whole Christian world of all ages and are acknowledged to be such by Rome it self and in other things she requires Subscription to them not as Articles of Faith but as Inferiour Truths which she expects a submission to in order to her Peace and Tranquillity So the late learned L. Primate of Ireland often expresseth the sense of the Church of England as to her thirty nine Articles Neither doth the Church of England saith he define any of these Questions as necessary to be believed either necessitate medii or necessitate praecepti which is much less but only bindeth
her Sons for Peace sake not to oppose them And in another place more fully We do not suffer any man to reject the thirty nine Articles of the Church of England at his pleasure yet neither do we look upon them as Essentials of Saving Faith or Legacies of Christ and his Apostles but in a mean as pious Opinions fitted for the preservation of Vnity neither do we oblige any man to believe them but only not to contradict them By which we see what a vast difference there is between those things which are required by the Church of England in order to Peace and those which are imposed by the Church of Rome as part of that Faith extra quam non est salus without belief of which there is no Salvation In which she hath as much violated the Vnity of the Catholick Church as the Church of England by her Prudence and Moderation hath studied to preserve it 2. Nothing ought to be imposed as a necessary Article of Faith to be believed by all but what may be evidently propounded to all persons as a thing which God did require the explicit belief of It being impossible to make any thing appear a necessary Article of Faith but what may not only be evidently proved to be revealed by God but that God doth oblige all men to the belief of it in order to Salvation And therefore none of those things whose obligation doth depend on variety of Circumstances ought in reason be made the Bonds of that Communion which cannot take notice of that variety as to mens conditions and capacities There are many things in Christian Religion which whosoever believes the truth of it cannot but easily discern to be necessary in order to the profession and practice of it in most of which the common sense and reason of mankind is agreed Not only the Existence of a Deity the clear discovery of the Wisdom Goodness and Power of God with his Providence over the world and the Immortality of Souls being therein most evidently revealed but the way and manner of the restitution of mens souls by Faith in Jesus Christ as our only Saviour and Obedience to his Commands is so fully laid down in the clearest terms that no rational man who considers the nature of Christian Religion but must assert the profession of all these things to be necessary to all such who own Christian Religion to be true But there are many other things in Christian Religion which are neither so clearly revealed in the Scriptures nor unanimously assented to in any age of the Christian Church and why any such things should be made the conditions of that Communion in the Catholick Church whose very being depends only on necessary things would puzzle a Philosopher to understand As if none should be accounted Mathematicians but such as could square circles and none Naturalists but such as could demonstrate whether quantity were infinitely divisible or no much so it is if none should be accounted members of the Catholick Church but such as own the truth and necessity of some at least as disputable Points as any in Religion Let therefore any Romanist tell me whether the Pope's Supremacy be as clear in Scripture as that Christ is Saviour of the world whether Purgatory be as plain as Eternal Life Transubstantiation as evident as that the Eucharist ought to be administred whether Invocation of Saints be as manifest as the Adoration of God the Doctrine of Indulgences as Repentance from dead works and if there be so great a clearness in the Revelation of the one and so far from it as to the other let them give any just account why the belief of the one is made as necessary to Salvation as the other is Certainly such who take in things at least so disputable as all these are and enforce the belief of them in order to their Communion cannot otherwise be thought but to have a design to exclude a great part of the Christian world from their Communion and to do so and then cry out of them as Schismaticks is the most unreasonable proceedings in the world 3. Nothing ought to be required as a necessary Article of Faith but what hath been believed and received for such by the Catholick Church of all Ages For since necessary Articles of Faith are supposed to be so antecedently to the Being of the Catholick Church since the Catholick Church doth suppose the continual acknowledgement of such things as are necessary to be believed it is but just and reasonable to admit nothing as necessary but what appears to have been so universally received Thence it is that Antiquity Vniversality and Consent are so much insisted on by Vincentius Lerinensis in order to the proving any thing to be a necessary Article of Faith But the great difficulty of this lyes in finding out what was received for a necessary Article of Faith and what was not by the Catholick Church which being a subject as necessary as seldom spoken to I shall not leave it untouched although I must premise that Rule to be much more useful in discovering what was not looked on as a necessary Article of Faith than what was and therefore I begin with that first 1. It is sufficient evidence that was not looked on as a necessary Article of Faith which was not admitted into the Ancient Creeds Whether all those Declarations which were inserted in the enlargements of the Apostolical Creed by the Councils of Nice and Constantinople and in that Creed which goes under the name of Athanasius were really judged by the Catholick Church of all Ages to be necessary to Salvation is not here my business to enquire but there seems to be a great deal of reason for the Negative that what was not inserted in the Ancient Creeds was not by them judged necessary to be believed by all Christians I know it is said by some of your party That the Apostolical Creed did only contain those Articles which were necessary to be believed in opposition to the present Heresies which were then in the Church As though the necessity of believing in Christians came only by an Antiperistasis of the opposition of Hereticks And if there had been no Hereticks to have denyed God's being the Creatour and Christ's being the Saviour it had not been necessary to have believed either of them so explicitly as now we do But when we speak of all things necessary to be believed by all I mean not that all circumstances of things contained in those Creeds are necessary to be believed in order to Salvation but that all those things which were judged as necessary to be believed by all were therein inserted will appear to any one who either considers the expressions of the Ancients concerning the Creeds then in Use or the primary reason why such Summaries of Faith were ever made in the Christian Church The testimonies of the Fathers to this purpose are so well known in this subject
all Churches in order to their being true Churches as is plain by the rise of this Controversie for Mr. Fisher was proving the Greek Church to be no true Church and in order to that proves that she erred Fundamentally for which he makes Vse of this Medium That whatever is defined by the Church is Fundamental So that the whole Process of the Dispute lyes thus TWhat ever Church is guilty of a Fundamental Errour ceaseth to be a true Church but the Greek Church is guilty of a Fundamental Errour ergo The Minor being denyed he thus proves it If whatever is defined by the Church be Fundamental then the Greek Church is guilty of a Fundamental errour because she denyes something defined by the Church but whatever is defined by the Church is Fundamental which is the thing his Lordship denyes and his adversary is bound to prove So that any one who was not resolved to wink as hard as you do might easily see the state of the Controversie doth not concern what things are Fundamental supposing men know them to be sufficiently propounded but what things are so necessary to be owned for Fundamentals that upon the denying them a Church ceaseth to be a true Church Yet this mistake as gross and palpable as it is runs through your whole Discourse of Fundamentals which without it cannot hold together If you will therefore prove that besides such things whose necessity ariseth from the matter there are other from the Formal Object which all Churches are equally bound to believe in order to their being true Churches you do something but not before But we must still attend your Motions especially when they tend towards proofs as yours do now For say you Now I shew the difficulty being understood as it ought to be of the Formal Object whereby Points of Faith are manifested to Christians that all Points defined by the Church as matter of Faith are Fundamental that is necessary to Salvation to be believed by all those to whom they are sufficiently propounded to be so defined by this Argument Whosoever refuseth to believe any thing sufficiently propounded to him for a truth revealed from God commits a sin damnable and destructive of Salvation But whosoever refuses to believe any Point sufficiently propounded to him for defined by the Church as matter of Faith refuses to believe a thing sufficiently propounded to him for a truth revealed from God Ergo Whosoever refuses to believe any Point sufficiently propounded to him for defined by the Church as matter of Faith commits a sin damnable and destructive of Salvation Before you proceed to the proof of your Minor several things must here be considered that we may better understand your meaning and know what it is you intend to prove Especially what you intend by sufficient Proposition Do you mean such a Proposition as carries evidence along with it or not in which case the very understanding the terms is sufficient Proposition as that two and two make four but I suppose you mean not this therefore it must be the sufficient Proposition of something which wants natural evidence and therefore something else must be required besides the propounding the thing to make the Proposition be said to be sufficient For Sufficiency relates to some end so that a sufficient Proposition must be such a Proposition as is sufficient for its end now the end of the Proposition of Matters of Faith is that they may be believed and therefore the sufficiency of the Proposition lyes in the Arguments or Motives inducing men to believe Now the Objects of Faith being of a different nature the Sufficiency of the Proposition must be taken from a respect to them for in things which are so clearly revealed as necessary to Salvation that none who acknowledge the Scripture to be God's Word can doubt but such things are necessary in this case the Sufficiency of the Proposition lyes in the Evidence of Divine Revelation and the clearness of it to all understandings who consider it and the Reasons or Motives of Faith in that case are the same with those which induce men to believe that the Scripture it self is from Divine Revelation But there being other things in Scripture which neither appear so clear or so necessary to be believed by all something else is required in order to a sufficient Proposition of them and in order to the making any of these things universally obligatory to Christians on pain of damnation for not believing them these things are necessary 1. It must be much clearer than the thing which is propounded to be believed on the account of it for to propound a thing to be believed by something at least as disputable as the matter it self cannot certainly be call'd a sufficient Proposition 2. It must be antecedently proved to be a true and certain Proposition before any thing can be believed on the account of it For if men cannot see any reason to believe that there is any necessary Connexion between that which you call a sufficient Proposition and any matter of Faith they cannot be guilty of any sin at all in not believing what you think is sufficiently propounded But in this case it is not your judgement what Proposition is sufficient that makes it so but the Reason of the Thing and the Evidence that God hath appointed that way to reveal his Will to men and that what is so propounded is necessary to be believed As for instance suppose you were told by the Greek Church that to believe the Pope's Supremacy jure divino were a damnable sin and that whosoever did not believe this being sufficiently propounded to them as a matter of Faith as defined by the Church were guilty of a sin destructive to Salvation what answer would you return in this case Would you not say That the Proposition though judged sufficient by them is not judged so by you and that they must first prove that whatever their Church defines as a matter of Faith is to be believed for such before the other can be believed on the account of it Just the same answer we return to you prove first of all to us in a clear and evident manner that God hath appointed the Definition of your Church as the means whereby we may be infallibly assured what is Matter of Faith and what not and then we may grant that what your Church propounds as a matter of Faith is sufficiently propounded as a matter revealed from God but not before For while I see no reason to believe the Churches Proposition to be sufficient I have no reason to believe that what she propoundes as defined for matter of Faith is truly so And as long as I can see no reason to believe it prove the disbelief of it to be a sin in me when you can Thus we see how far from being evident that Major of yours is though you are pleased to tell us it is so but we do not believe your Defining
it to be so to be any matter of Faith unless we had better reason for it than we have For say you To refuse to believe God's Revelation is either to give God the lye or to doubt whether he speak truth or no But have you so little wit as not to distinguish between not believing God's Revelation and not believing what is propounded for God's Revelation Must every one who doth not believe every thing that is propounded for God's Revelation presently give God the lye and doubt whether he speak truth or no And are not you then guilty of that fault every time a Quaker or Enthusiast tells you That the Spirit of God within him told him this and that But you said Sufficiently propounded But the Question is What sufficient Proposition is and who must be Judge whether the Proposition be sufficient or no you or the conscience of the person to whom the thing is proposed to be believed If any one indeed that judgeth a Proposition sufficient do notwithstanding question the truth of it he doth interpretatively call God's Veracity into question but not he certainly who thinks not God's Veracity at all concerned in that which you call a sufficient Proposition but he judgeth not to be so Let us now see how you prove your Assumption which is very fairly done from a Supposition which his Lordship denies which is That General Councils cannot erre But say you he adds That though he should grant it yet this cannot down with him that all Points even so defined were Fundamentals I grant those are his words and his reasons follow them For Deductions are not prime and native Principles nor are Superstructures Foundations That which is a Foundation for all cannot be one and another to different Christians in regard of it self for then it could be no common Rule for any nor could the souls of men rest upon a shaking Foundation No if it be a true Foundation it must be common to all and firm under all in which sense the Articles of Christian Faith are Fundamental What now do you prove to destroy this You very strenuously prove That if men believe A General Council cannot erre they believe it cannot erre so far and no further than it cannot erre But if you mean any thing further your meaning is better than your proof for when you would prove that to disbelieve the Churches Definition is to dis-believe God's Revelation and in order to that confound the Church and General Councils together and from the General Council's not erring inferr the former Proposition because what is testified by the Church is testified by an Authority that cannot erre you do not consider that all this while you prove nothing against his Lordship unless you first prove that whatever is testified to be revealed from God is presently Fundamental to all Churches and Christians which his Lordship utterly denies by distinguishing even things which may be testified to be revealed from God into such things as are common to all Christians to be believed by them and such things as vary according to the different respects of Christians But yet further I add that taking Fundamentals in your sense you prove not the thing you intended but only to such as do acknowledge and as far as they do acknowledge that General Councils cannot erre For they who acknowledge them infallible only in Fundamentals do not judge any thing Fundamental by their Decision but judge their Decisions infallible so long as they hold to Fundamentals and so for all that I can see leave themselves Judges when General Councils are infallible and when not and therefore if they go about to testifie any thing as revealed from God which is not Fundamental they do not believe that their testimony cannot erre and so are not bound to believe that it is from God They who believe General Councils absolutely infallible I do verily think do believe General Councils infallible in all they say for that is the substance of all you say But what that is to those who neither do nor can see any reason to believe them infallible in all they say or testifie as revealed from God I neither do nor can possibly understand And if you hope such kind of Arguments can satisfie your ingenuous Reader you suppose him a good-natur'd man in the Greek sense of the phrase But all of a sudden we find you in a very generous strain and are contented to take Fundamentals for Fundamentals which is a huge Concession and his Lordship were he living would take it for a singular favour from you Yet to deal freely with the Bishop say you even taking Fundamentals in a General way as it ought to be taken only here for a thing belonging to the Foundation of Religion and it is a strange Fundamental which hath no respect to the Foundation but they who build downwards must have their Foundations on tops of their houses It is also manifest that all Points defined by the Church are Fundamental by reason of that formal Object or infallible Authority propounding them though not alwaies by reason of the matter which they contain The main proof of which lyes in this That he who doth not believe the Church infallible can believe nothing at all infallibly and therefore no Fundamental of Religion but if he believe any thing upon the Churches Infallibility he must believe all things on the same account of her Infallibility and therefore must believe all equally and so whatever is propounded by the Church is to be believed as Fundamental This you cannot deny to be the force and strength of your verbose and confused way of arguing And therefore I give you a short Answer That I utterly deny the Infallibility of any Church to be in any thing the Foundation of Divine and Infallible Faith as you will find it abundantly proved in the proper place for it in the Controversie of the Resolution of Faith Where it will be largely discussed in what sense Faith may be said to be Divine and Infallible what the proper grounds and reasons of our believing are and how much you impose upon the world in pretending that the Resolution of Faith is into the Catholick Churches Infallibility whereby it will appear to be far from a Fundamental Errour not to believe on the Churches Infallibility and that he who denies it will have no reason to call into Question the Canon of Scripture or the Foundations of all Religion But that you rather by these absurd and unreasonable pretences of yours have done your utmost to shake the true Foundations of Religion and advance nothing but Sceptiscism not to say Atheism in the world These things I take upon me to make good in their proper place and therefore shall not enter the discussion of them here but since this is the main and in truth the only Foundation of your Doctrine of Fundamentals the vanity falshood and absurdity of it cannot be sufficiently
to Salvation and that this is owned by the Church of England This is the substance of the Argument which being resolved into its parts will consist of these Propositions 1. That some things owned not to be Fundamental in the matter are yet acknowledged in the Creed of Athanasius to be necessary to Salvation 2. That the reason why these things do become necessary is because the Church hath defined them to be so 3. That this is acknowledged by the Church of England And therefore by parity of reason whatever is defined by the Church must be necessary to Salvation But every one of these Propositions being ambiguous the clear stating of them will be the best way of solving the difficulty which seems to lye in the present Argument And the main Ambiguity lyes in the meaning of that necessity to Salvation which is implied in the Athanasian Creed as to the Articles therein contained for there being different grounds and reasons upon which things may be supposed necessary there can be no just consequence made from the general owning a necessity of the belief of some things to the making those things necessary to be believed upon one particular account of it For the necessity of believing things to Salvation may arise from one of these three grounds 1. The Supposition that the matter to be believed is in it self necessary this makes it necessary to all those persons who are of that perswasion and on this ground it is plain that the main Articles of the Athanasian Creed are generally supposed necessary viz. those concerning the Trinity in Vnity the Incarnation Resurrection and Eternal Life c. Now these being supposed to be necessary from the Matter any Church may own them under this degree of necessity in that expression used in several places of the Athanasian Creed Whosoever will be saved it is necessary that he hold the Catholick Faith which Catholick Faith is c. But then we are to consider that this is only a Declaration of the sense of that Church what things she owns as necessary and what not And this Declaration doth not oblige the conscience of particular persons any further than as the Articles of that Church are required to be owned as the conditions of Communion with her i. e. where the degree of necessity is not declared nor expresly owned by a Church but left in general terms no man is bound to believe the things judged as necessary with any particular kind of necessity exclusive of others but only that the Church in General may use that Creed supposed necessary and that the Use of that Creed is a lawful condition of that Churches Communion 2. The belief of a thing may be supposed necessary because of the clear Conviction of mens understandings that though the matters be not in themselves necessary yet being revealed by God they must be explicitly believed but then the necessity of this Belief doth extend no further than the clearness of that Conviction doth As suppose it inserted into a Creed that the Article of the Descent must be understood according to the sense of the Scriptures this doth oblige no man to any further necessity of belief of the sense of the Article then he is convinced that it is the sense of the Scriptures And the case is the same when the Article is expressed only in general terms which are known to be capable of very different senses when none of which are expressed no particular sense can be said to be necessary to Salvation to particular persons but only that sense in general which all must agree in who own it and the particulars are left to the Convictions of mens understandings upon the use of the best means of satisfaction So that he that believes fully that the meaning of this Article from Scripture is that Christ's soul did locally descend to Hell it is necessary for him to believe so upon such Conviction but he that sees no more necessary to be believed by it but that Christ's soul was during his Body's lying in the Grave in a state of Separation from it how can you prove it necessary to Salvation for him to believe any more than this And the case is the same as to all Modes of Existence and particular explications of Articles in themselves owned as of the different Subsistencies in the Trinity the manner of the Hypostatical Vnion of the two Natures in Christ's Person supposing the Doctrines themselves believed what reason can there be to assert it necessary to Salvavation to all persons to believe them under such a sense if the Article may be it self believed without it any further than as things under those explications are manifested to such persons to be necessary to be believed As Leo 3. defined in the Article of the Holy Ghost's Procession from the Son To such who by reason of capacity and apprehension could attain to the Knowledge of it it was necessary to be believed but not by others as appears in our former Discourse on that Subject Therefore from hence we see another account why things may become necessary to be believed and owned as such besides the matter and the Churches Definition These things may be said to be necessary to be believed by such who believe the Churches Proposition to be sufficient though it be not as suppose any member of the Greek Church should believe their Church infallible it is necessary for such a one to believe whatever is propounded by that Church though you suppose that judgement of his to be false in it self because you say the Greek Church is not infallible So that from hence it appears that the necessity arising from the Churches Definition doth depend upon the Conviction that whatever the Church defines is necessary to be believed And where that is not received as an antecedent principle the other cannot be supposed By this opening the several grounds of necessity your difficulty concerning the Athanasian Creed comes to nothing For granting that the Church of England doth own and approve the Creed going under the name of Athanasius and supposing that her Vse of the Creed doth extend to the owning of those expressions which import the necessity of believing the things therein contained in order to Salvation yet this doth not reach to your purpose unless you prove that the Church of England doth own that necessity purely on the account of the Churches Definition of those things which are not Fundamental which it is very unreasonable to imagine it being directly contrary to her sense in her nineteenth and twentieth Articles And thence that supposed necessity of the belief of the Articles of the Athanasian Creed must according to the sense of the Church of England be resolved either into the necessity of the Matters or into that necessity which supposeth clear Convictions that the things therein contained are of Divine Revelation From hence then it cannot at all follow because the Church of England owns the Creed
other Questions not diligently digested not yet made firm by full Authority of the Church there errour is to be born with but it ought not to proceed so farre that it should labour to shake the Foundation it self of the Church Now to this place his Lordship answers 1. He speaks of a Foundation of Doctrine in Scripture not of a Church-Definition This appears saith he For few lines before he tells us There was a Question moved to S. Cyprian Whether Baptism was concluded to the eighth day as well as Circumcision and no doubt was made then of the beginning of sin and that out of this thing about which no Question was moved that Question that was made was answered And again that S. Cyprian took that which he gave in Answer from the Foundation of the Church to confirm a Stone that was shaking Now S. Cyprian in all the Answer that he gives hath not one word of any Definition of the Church therefore ea res that thing by which he answered was a Foundation of prime and setled Scripture-Doctrine not any Definition of the Church Therefore that which he took out of the Foundation of the Church to fasten the Stone that shook was not Definition of the Church but the Foundation of the Church it self the Scripture upon which it is builded as appeareth in the Milevitane Councils where the Rule by which Pelagius was condemned is the Rule of Scripture Therefore S. Augustine goes on in the same sense that the Disputer is not to be born any longer that shall endeavour to shake the Foundation it self upon which the whole Church is grounded 2. His Lordship answers That granting that the Churches Definition was meant by S. Austin yet it can never follow out of any or all these Circumstances that all Points defined by the Church are Fundamental because this Foundation may be upon Humane Authority and that which follows only is That things are not to be opposed which are made firm by full Authority of the Church but it cannot be thence concluded They are therefore Fundamental in the Faith This is the substance of his Lordships Answer to this place which we must consider what you reply to First you say That it cannot be doubted but that S. Austin 's judgement was that all our Faith depended on the Authority of the Church and therefore that he that opposeth himself against this endeavoureth to shake and destroy the very ground-work of all Divine and Supernatural Faith This is a rare way of silencing Adversaries by telling them That cannot be doubted which others can see no reason at all to believe As in this present case you tell me that cannot be doubted which I utterly deny viz. That S. Austins judgement was that all our Faith depended on the Authority of the Church and if all the proof you have for it be only that well-known place Ego verò Evangelio non crederem c. You shall in time see what an ill choice you made of fixing your proof wholly upon that But whoever is never so little conversant in S. Augustin's way of disputing either against the Donatists Pelagians or Manichees will find very little reason to doubt but that he made the Foundation of Faith to be God's Word and not the Authority of the Church Indeed S. Austin by way of Prescription often makes use of the Churches Authority not where there hath been particular Definitions but Vniversal Consent which he understands by the settlement by full Authority of the Church but this he insists not on as the ground of Faith but to shew the unreasonableness of mens opposing those things which the Vniversal Church was agreed in as in this Controversie here disputed by him concerning Original Sin in Infants Therefore if I understand S. Austin in this place he doth not at all speak concerning what is to be owned as a matter of Faith simply in it self but what the Churches Carriage towards Dissenters is For after that Citation of S. Cyprian at the Conclusion of his Sermon he addresseth himself to the Pelagians as his dissenting Brethren Therefore saith he Let us if possible intreat this of our Brethren That they would no longer call us Hereticks because we might as well call them so if we would but we do not Why was S. Austin so scrupulous of calling the Pelagians Hereticks if he made the Definition of the Church the Foundation of Faith and looked on this Controversie as defined by full Authority of the Church And after speakes of the Churches bearing with them still in order to their instruction though they were gone so far that they were scarce to be born with and that the Church exercised great patience towards them therefore intreats them not to abuse this patience of the Church but to be reformed since they did exhort as Friends and not contend as enemies And so brings in the former words which I thus paraphrase It is a thing to be taken for granted that in disputable Points and such as the Church hath not alwaies been agreed in dissenters may be born with but if direct and full opposition to the clear sense of the Church should still be suffered it would overthrow the very Foundation of the Church it self And that this and no other is the plain and genuine meaning of S. Austin is evident to any one who impartially considers antecedents and consequents and the natural sense of the words themselves Before he spake how far the Church had born with them in the words themselves he tells them They must not expect the Church would alwaies bear with them if they joyned Obstinacy with their Errours for that would ruine the Church if she continually suffered such as violently opposed things contrary to her clearest sense and after tells them This is not expedient for hitherto it may be our patience is not to be found fault withall but we ought likewise to fear lest we be blamed for our negligence Which words immediately follow the former And is not this now a rare consequence If the Church must not alwaies bear with such as oppose her then whatever is defined by the Church is Fundamental For it is most evident S. Austin speaks not of the Churches Power in defining matters of Faith but of the Churches proceeding with obstinate Hereticks And therefore the Foundation spoken of is not the Foundation of her Belief but of her Communion which the continual bearing with such obstinate persons as the Pelagians were would in time overthrow The want of understanding this to be S. Augustine's meaning hath made you spend many words to very little purpose supposing all along that he speaks of the Churches Definition and not her proceedings Your Reply to his Lordships second Answer runs upon the same mistake that he speaks of Shaking the Foundation of Faith whereas I have already shewed that he speaks of no such thing and therefore that as well as the former Answer fall to
tam manifesta monstratur where it is plain quae which is relative only to Truth and not to Scripture or any thing else A wonderful abuse of S. Austin to make him parallel plain Scripture evident sense or a full Demonstrative Argument with Truth As though if evident Truth were more prevalent with him than all those Arguments which held him in the Catholick Church plain Scripture evident Sense or Demonstrations would not be so too What Truth can be evident if it be not one of these three Do you think there is any other way of manifesting Truth but by Scripture Sense or Demonstration if you have found out other waies oblige the world by communicating them but till then give us leave to think that it is all one to say Manifest Truth as plain Scripture evident Sense or clear Demonstrations But say you He speaks only of that Truth which the Manichees bragged of and promised As though S. Austin would have been perswaded sooner as it came from them than as it was Truth in it self I suppose S. Austin did not think their Testimony sufficient and therefore sayes Quae quidem si tam manifesta monstratur c. i. e. If they could make that which they said evident to be Truth he would quit the Church and adhere to them and if this holds against the Manichees will it not on the same reason hold every where else viz. That manifest Truth is not to be quitted on any Authority whatsoever which is all his Lordship asserts But You offer to prove that S. Austin by Truth could not mean plain Scripture But can you prove that by Truth he did not mean Truth whereever he found it whether in Scripture or elsewhere No say you It cannot be meant that by Truth he should mean plain Scripture in opposition to the Definitions of the Catholick Church or General Councils For which you give this Reason because he supposes it impossible that the Doctrine of the Catholick Church should be contrary to Scripture for then men according to S. Austin should not believe infallibly either the one or the other Not the Scriptures because they are received only upon the Authority of the Church nor the Church whose Authority is infringed by the plain Scripture which is brought against her For which you produce a large citation out of S. Austin to that purpose But the Answer to that is easie For S. Austin when he speaks of Church-Authority quâ infirmatâ jam nec Evangelio credere potero he doth not in the least understand it of any Definitions of the Church but of the Vniversal Tradition of the Catholick Church concerning the Scriptures from the time of Christ and his Apostles And what plain Scriptures those are supposable which should contradict such a Tradition as this is is not easie to understand But the case is quite otherwise as to the Churches Definitions for neither doth the Authority of Scripture at all rest upon them and there may be very well supposed some plain Scriptures contrary to the Churches Definitions unless it be proved that the Church is absolutely Infallible and the very proof of that depending on Scripture there must be an appeal made to plain Scripture whether the Churches Definitions may not be contradicted by Scripture When therefore you say This is an impossible Supposition that Scripture should contradict the Churches Definitions like that of the Apostle If an Angel from Heaven teach otherwise let him be accursed Gal. 1. You must prove it as impossible for the Church to deviate from Scripture in any of her Definitions as for an Angel to preach another Gospel which will be the braver attempt because it seems so little befriended either by sense or reason But say you If the Church may be an erring Definer I would gladly know why an erring Disputer may not oppugn her That which you would so gladly know is not very difficult to be resolved by any one who understands the great difference between yielding an Internal Assent to the Definitions of the Church and open opposing them for it only follows from the possibility of the Churches Errour in defining that therefore we ought not to yield an absolute Internal Assent to all her determinations but must examine them by the best measures of Truth in order to our full Assent to them but though the Church may erre it doth not therefore follow that it is lawful in all cases or for all persons to oppugn her Definitions especially if those Definitions be only in order to the Churches Peace but if they be such as require Internal Assent to them then plain Scripture evidence of Sense or clear Reason may be sufficient cause to hinder the submitting to those Definitions 2. You tell us That his Lordship hath abused S. Austin 's Testimony because he speaks not of the Definitions of the Church in matters not Fundamental according to the matter they contain but the Truth mentioned by him was Fundamental in its matter This is the substance of your second Answer which is very rational and prudent being built on this substantial Evidence If S. Austin doth preferr manifest Truth before things supposed Fundamental in the matter then no doubt S. Austin would not preferr manifest Truth before things supposed not-Fundamental in the matter And do not you think this enough to charge his Lordship with shamefully abusing S. Austin But certainly if S. Austin preferred manifest Truth before that which was greater would he not do it before that which was incomparably less If he did it before all those things which kept him in the Catholick Church such as the consent of Nations Miracles Universal Tradition which he mentions before do you think he would have scrupled to have done it as to any particular Definitions of the Church These are therefore very excellent waies of vindicating the Fathers Testimonies from having any thing of sense or reason in them 3. You say He hath abused S. Austin by putting in a wrangling Disputer But I wonder where his Lordship ever sayes that S. Austin mentions any such in the Testimony cited For his words are these But plain Scripture with evident Sense or a full Demonstrative Argument must have room where a wrangling and erring Disputer may not be allowed it And there 's neither of these over against these words he referrs to S. Austin's Testimony and not the foregoing but may convince the Definition of the Council if it be ill founded When you therefore ask Where the wrangling Disputer is to be found had it not been for the help of this Cavil we might have been to seek for him But when you have been enquiring for him at last you cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oh! I see now And you are the fittest man to find him out that I know You say This is done to distinguish him from such a Disputer as proceeds solidly and demonstratively against the Definitions of the Church when they are
often-mention'd distinction of the Formal and Material Object of Faith the foundation of which having been already removed whatever you offer to build upon it must of necessity fall to the ground but I shall not follow your ill example in making tedious Repetitions and then cry out You are forced to it His Lordship urgeth further from the Romanists Doctrine of Fundamentals That the Churches Definition must be the Churches Foundation His words are Besides whatsoever is Fundamental in the Faith is Fundamental to the Church which is one by the Vnity of Faith Therefore if every thing defined by the Church be Fundamental in the Faith then the Churches Definition is the Churches Foundation And so upon the matter the Church can lay her own Foundation and then the Church must be in absolute and perfect Being before so much as her Foundation is laid To which you answer But what Absurdity is it to grant That the Definition of the Church teaching is the Foundation of the Church taught or the Definition of the Church representative is the Foundation of the Church diffusive I pray inform us whether this Church teaching and representing be the same Church with the Church taught and diffusive or one different from it If it be different it must have a different Foundation and so must be fundamentally different if it be the same then the Church must still lay its own Foundation for whatever becomes Fundamental by the Definition of the Church is I suppose to be believed as necessary i. e. Fundamental by the Church teaching and representing as well as taught and diffusive Unless you think those who decree things to be believed by all in order to salvation do exclude themselves out of that number and therefore though it be necessary for all others to believe it it is still indifferent for them whether they will believe it or no. And therefore were I of your Church I should heartily wish my self of the teaching and representative Church for then others might go to Hell for not believing that which I might chuse whether I would or no. What an excellent invention this is to make the Pope and Cardinals go to Heaven though they be Atheists and Infidels For you tell us we can have no assurance of any matter of Faith but from the Infallibility of your Church this Infallibility lyes not in the taught and diffusive but in the teaching and representative Church and this distinction here supposes that what is made the Foundation of the Church taught is not the Foundation of the Church teaching i. e. what is necessary to Salvation for one is not so for the other for that is your meaning of Fundamentals Now since all things become necessary to be believed by the Church diffusive upon the Authority of the Church representative it necessarily follows from this distinction That nothing at all is necessary to be believed by the Church representative And is not this a rare Church the mean while but what is it which makes it a Church for though it represents and teaches yet it is still call'd a Church teaching and representative If it be a Church something must make it so What can make it so if not the belief of what is necessary to Salvation And if it doth not believe all that is necessary to Salvation the Church diffusive is much more truly a Church than the representative If it doth believe all that is necessary then it must believe its own Definitions because those are supposed to be so and consequently if those be Fundamental the Church must still lay her own Foundation Or else these consequences follow 1. That may be a true Church which doth not believe all things necessary to Salvation 2. The Church teaching is not bound to believe that which she teaches but only the Church taught 3. That may be the same Church which Fundamentally differs from it self 4. When the Church defines a thing to be necessary she doth not believe it to be necessary but it becomes necessary after her Definition For I pray satisfie us as to this Teaching Church when she defines something necessary to be believed in order to Salvation which was not so defined before Doth she at that Instant of her Definition believe that to be necessary to Salvation or doth she not If she doth then it is necessary before her Definition and so the belief of it as necessary cannot depend upon it But if she believes it only to be necessary because she defines it to be so then she cannot believe it to be necessary till she hath defined it and consequently defines that to be necessary which she believes not to be necessary and so defines contrary to her own judgement and belief Let me therefore ask here some more Questions which I doubt you will think troublesome If the Church representative believed that not to be necessary to Salvation which she defined to be necessary to Salvation was she infallible in that belief or no If she was not infallible then at that time what assurance could men have of any matter of Faith since you tell us That must be had from the Churches Infallibility If she were infallible then either in some things only or in all she believed if only in some things we ought to know what she is infallible in and what not lest we deceive our selves in believing her infallible in that in which she is not infallible If in all things then she is infallible in believing that not to be necessary to Salvation which yet she infallibly defines to be necessary to Salvation And so the Church may infallibly define that to be true which at the very moment of that Definition she infallibly believes to be false All these are the just and excellent Consequences of this useful Distinction of yours which you look on as the only happy Expedient whereby to free your self from asserting that the Church by making things Fundamental by her Definitions doth thereby lay her own Foundation But as absurd and unreasonable as this is you would seem to have something to say for it for you tell us That the Pastors in all Ages preserving Christian People from being carried away with every wind of Doctrine are a Foundation to them of constancy in Doctrine Wonderfully subtle it is pity such excellent reasoning should want the ornaments of Mood and Figure but thus it is in them If the Pastors of the Church may be the means of preserving men from errours then the Definition of the Church teaching is the Foundation of the Church taught which in short amounts to this If the Pastors of the Church may be a Foundation of mens constancy in Doctrine then they may be a Foundation of mens inconstancy in Doctrine If this be not that you mean I can make no sense of what you say and if it be let any one else make Sense of it that hath a gift for it For by constancy in
have had Antiquity Vniversality and Consent which had not so such as the business of not rebaptizing Hereticks and the observation of Easter which you instance in And withall we add though nothing is to be admitted for matter of Faith which wants those three marks yet some things may have all three of them and yet be no matters of Faith at all and therefore not at all pertinent to this question Such as those things are which you insist on as deposita dogmata which doubtless is a rare way of probation viz. to shew that by dogmata deposita Vincentius means some articles of Faith which are not Fundamental in the matter of them and for that make choice of such instances which are no matters of faith at all but either ritual traditions or matters of order such as the form and matter of Sacraments the Hierarchy of the Church Paedobaptism not rebaptizing Hereticks the perpetual virginity of the Virgin Mary For that of the Canon of Scripture it will be elsewhere considered as likewise those other Church-traditions How the Church should still keep hoc idem quod antea as you confess she ought and yet make some things necessary to be believed by all which before her declaration were not so is somewhat hard to conceive and yet both these you assert together Is that which is necessary to be believed by all the same with that which was not necessary to be so believed if the same measure of Faith will not serve after which would have done before is there not an alteration made Yes you grant as to our believing but not as to the thing for that is the same it was But do you in the mean time consider what kind of thing that is which you speak of which is a thing propounded to be believed and considered in no other respect but as it is revealed by God in order to our believing it now when the same thing which was required only to be believed implicitely i. e. not at all necessarily is now propounded to be believed expresly and necessarily the Fundamental nature of it as an object of Faith is altered For that which you call implicite Faith doth really imply as to all those things to be believed implicitely that there is an indifferency whether they be believed or no nothing being necessary to be believed but what is propounded to be expresly believed Which being so Can it be imagined there should be a greater alteration in a matter of Faith then from its being indifferent whether it were believed or no to become necessary to be expresly believed by all in order to Salvation And where there is such an alteration as this in the thing to be believed who can without the help of a very commodious implicite Faith believe that still this is hoc idem quod antea the very same as a matter of Faith which it was before Though the Church were careful to preserve every Iota and tittle of Sacred Doctrines yet I hope it follows not that every Iota and tittle is of as much consequence and as necessary to be believed as the main substance of Christian Doctrine Although when any Doctrine was violently opposed in the Church she might declare her owning it by some overt act yet thence it doth not follow that the internal assent to every thing so declared is as necessary as to that proposition that Jesus is the Son of God the belief of which the Scripture tells us was the main design of the writing of Scripture That General Councils rightly proceeding may be great helps to the Faith of Christians I know none that deny but that by vertue of their definitions any thing becomes necessary to be believed which was not so before remains yet to be proved You much wonder his Lordship should father that saying on Vincentius That If new Doctrines be added to the old the Church which is Sacrarium veritatis the repository of verity may be changed in Lupanar errorum which his Lordship saith he is loth to English for you tell us That Vincentius is so far from entertaining the least thought of it that he presently adds Deus avertat God forbid it should be so A stout Inference Just as if one should say The Church of Rome may be in time overspread with the Mahumetan Religion but God forbid it should be so Were he not an excellent Disputer who should hence inferr it impossible ever to be so What you add out of Vincentius only proves that he did not believe it was so in his time but doth not in the least prove that he believed it impossible that ever it should be so afterwards but notwithstanding all that you say it is evident enough that Vincentius believed it a very supposable Case by that question he puts elsewhere What if any new contagion doth not only endeavour to defile a part only but the whole Church in which he saith we are to adhere to antiquity If you answer he speaks only of an endeavour it is soon replyed That he speaks of such an endeavour as puts men to dispute a question what they are to do in such a Case and he resolves at that time they are not to adhere to the judgement of the present Church but to that of Antiquity which is all we desire in that Case viz. That the present Church may so far add to matters of Faith that we can in no reason be obliged to rely only upon her judgement Wherein we are to consider the Question is not of that you call the diffusive but the representative Church all which may be overspread and yet but a part of the other but yet if that Church whose judgement you say only is to be relyed on may be so infected it is all one as to those who are to be guided by her judgement whether the other be or no. For here eadem est ratio non entis non apparentis because it is not the reality but the manifestation which is the ground of mens relying on the Churches judgement So that if as to all outward appearance and all judicial acts of the Church she may recede from the ancient Faith and add novitia veteribus whether all particular persons in it do so or no all ground of relying on the judgement of that Church is thereby taken away Whether it be the Church her self or Hereticks in the Church which make these additions is very little material if these Hereticks who add these new articles of Faith may carry themselves so cunningly as to get to themselves the reputation of the Catholick Church and so that which ought to have been Sacrarium veritatis may become impiorum turpium errorum Lupanar which your Church is concerned not to have Englished but by the help of Rider and other good Authours of yours it is no hard matter to come to understand it And thus we see how much you have abused his Lordship
none of your own proposing but yet your very calling it a pertinent Question renders it liable to suspicion and upon examination it will be found both unreasonable and impertinent The Question was What Points the Bishop would account Fundamental and that you may shew how necessary this Question was you add For if he will have some Fundamental which we are bound to believe under pain of damnation and others not Fundamental which we may without sin question or deny it behoves us much to know what they are I have ever desired say you a satisfactory Answer from Protestants to this Question but could never yet have it in the sense demanded An unhappy man you are who it seems have in your time propounded more foolish Questions than a great many wise men were never able to answer But is it not every jot as reasonable That since your Church pretends to the power of making things necessary to the Salvation of all which were not so before we should have from you an exact Catalogue of all your Churches Definitions If for that you referr us to the Confession of Faith at the end of the Council of Trent so may not we with far greater reason send you back to the Apostolical Creed there being no objection which will hold against this being a Catalogue of our Fundamentals but will hold against that Being a Catalogue of yours Nay you assert such things your self concerning the necessity of believing things defined by the Church as make it impossible for you to assign the definite number of such things as are necessary for all persons and therefore it is very unreasonable to demand it of us For still when you speak that the things defined by the Church are necessary to the Salvation of all you add Where they are sufficiently propounded so that the measure of Fundamentals depends on the sufficiency of the Proposition Now will you undertake to assign what number of things are sufficiently propounded to the belief of all persons Can you set down the exact bounds as to all individuals when their ignorance is inexcusable and when not Can you tell what the measure of their capacity was what allowance God makes for the prejudices of Education where there is a mind desirous of instruction Will you say God accounts all those things sufficiently proposed to mens belief which you judge to be so or that all men are bound to think those things necessary to Salvation which you think so by what means shall the Churches Power of defining matters of Faith be sufficiently proposed to men as an Article of Faith Either by its own Definition or without If by its the thing is proposed to be believed which is supposed to be believed already before that Proposition or else the Enquiry returns with as great force Why should I believe that Definition more than any other if without it then the sufficiency of Proposition and the necessity of believing depends not on the Churches Definition These Questions I am apt to think as pertinent and necessary as yours was and now you know my sense and are so discontented you could never meet with a satisfactory Answer from Protestants prevent the same dissatisfaction in me by giving a punctual Answer to such necessary Questions But if you think the demands unreasonable because they depend on such things which none can know but God himself I pray accept of that as a satisfactory Answer to your own very pertinent Question But if the Question be propounded not concerning what things are Fundamental and necessary to particular persons which on the reasons formerly given it is impossible to give a Catalogue of but of such things which are necessary to be owned for Christian Communion as I have shewed this Question of Fundamentals ought only to be taken here then his Lordship's Answer was more pertinent than the Question viz. That all the Points of the Creed were such For saith he Since the Fathers make the Creed the Rule of Faith since the agreeing sense of Scripture with those Articles are the two Regular Precepts by which a Divine is governed about the Faith since your own Council of Trent decrees That it is that principle of Faith in which all that profess Christ do necessarily agree Fundamentum firmum unicum not the firm only but the only Foundation since it is Excommunication ipso jure for any man to contradict the Articles contained in that Creed since the whole body of Faith is so contained in the Creed as that the substance of it was believed even before the coming of Christ though not so expresly as since in the number of the Articles Since Bellarlarmin confesses That all things simply necessary for all mens Salvation are in the Creed and Decalogue What reason can you have to except Thus far his Lordship though from hence it appears what little reason you have to except yet because of that I expect your Exceptions the sooner and therefore very fairly passing by the sense of the Fathers you ask concerning the Council of Trent What if that call the Creed the only Foundation Are you come to a What if with the Council of Trent But I suppose it is not from disputing its Authority but its meaning for you would seem to understand it only of prime Articles of Faith and not of such as all are bound upon sufficient Proposition expresly to believe for that is all the sense I can make of your words But whoever was so silly as to say That all such things which are to be believed on sufficient Proposition that they are revealed by God are contained in the Creed When you seem to imply That this was the sense the Question was propounded in it is a sign you little attend to the Consequence of things when it is most evident that the Question was started concerning the Greek Church and therefore must referr only to such Fundamentals as are necessary to be owned in order to the Being of a true Church And when you can prove that any other Articles are necessary to that besides those contained in the Creed you will do something to purpose but not before But you suppose them to take the Creed in a very large sense who would lap up in the folds of it all particular Points of Faith whatever and I am sure this is not the sense it is to be taken in here nor that in which his Lordship took it He saith indeed That if he had said that those Articles only which are expressed in the Creed are Fundamental it would have been hard to have excluded the Scripture upon which the Creed it self in every Point is grounded For nothing is supposed to shut out its own Foundation And this is built on very good reason For the things contained in the Creed are proposed as matters to be believed all Faith must suppose a Divine Testimony revealing those things to us as the ground on which we
sifted were it for no other end but to lay open the juglings and impostures of your way of resolving Faith Which we now come more closely to the discovery of for as you tell us The Bishop propounding diverse wayes of resolving the Question first falls to the attaquing your way who prove it by Tradition and authority of the Church And his first onset is so successful that it makes you visibly recoyle and withdraw your self into so untenable a Shelter as exposeth you to all the attempts which any adversary would desire to make upon you For whereas you are charged by his Lordship with running into the most absurd kind of argumentation viz. by proving the Scriptures infallible by Tradition and that Tradition infallible by Scripture you think to escape that Circle by telling us That you prove not the Churches Infallibility by the Scripture but by the motives of credibility belonging to the Church This then being your main principle which your following discourse is built upon and in your judgement the only probable way to avoid the Circle that you may not think I am afraid of encountering you in your greatest strength I dare put the issue of the cause upon this Promise that besides the weak proofs you bring for the thing it self which shall after be considered if this way of yours be not chargeable with all the absurdities such an attempt is capable of I will be content to acknowledge what you say to be true which is That your way of resolving Faith hath no difficulty at all and that ours is insuperably hard which I think are as hard terms as can be imposed upon me Now there are two grand Absurdities which any vindication of an Opinion are subject to first If it be manifestly unreasonable and 2. If supposing it true it doth not effect what it was intended for now these two I undertake to make good against this way of your resolving Faith that it is guilty of the highest unreasonableness and that supposing it true you are in a circle as much as before 1. First I begin with the unreasonableness of it which is so great that I know not whether I may abstain from calling it ridiculous but that I may not seem to follow you in asserting confidently and proving weakly it will be necessary throughly to examine the grounds on which your opinion stands and then raise our batteries against it Three grand principles your discourse relyes upon which are your postulata in order to the resolving Faith 1. That it is necessary to the believing the Scriptures to be the Word of God with a Divine Faith that it be built on the infallible testimony of the Church 2. That your Church is that Catholick Church whose testimony is Infallible 3. That this Infallibility is to be known and assented to upon the motives of credibility These three I suppose if your confused discourse were reduced to method would be freely acknowledged by your self to be the Principles on which your resolution of Faith depends And although I am sufficiently assured of the falseness of your two first Principles as will appear in the sequel of this discourse yet that which I have now particularly undertaken is the unreasonableness of resolving Faith upon these Principles taken together viz. That the Infallible Testimony of your Church is the only Foundation for Divine Faith and that this Infallibility can be known only by the Motives of Credibility If then in this way of resolving Faith you require Assent beyond all proportion of evidence if you run into the same Absurdities you would seem to avoid if you leave men more uncertain in their Religion than you found them you cannot certainly excuse this way from unreasonableness and each of these I undertake to make good against this way of yours whereby you would assure men of the Truth and Divinity of the Scriptures 1. An Assent is hereby required beyond all proportion or degree of evidence for you require an Infallible Assent only upon Probable grounds which is as much as requiring Infallibility in the conclusion where the premises are only probable Now that you require an Assent Infallible to the nature of Faith appears by the whole series of your Discourse for to this very end you require Infallibility in the Testimony of your Church because otherwise you say Our Faith would be uncertain it is plain then you require an Infallible Assent in Faith and it is as plain that this Assent according to you can be built only upon probable grounds for you acknowledge the motives of Credibility to be no more than such yet those are all the grounds you give why the Church should be believed Infallible If you say That which makes the Assent Infallible is that Infallibility which is in the Churches Testimony I reply That this is a most unreasonable thing to go about to establish an Infallible Assent meerly because the Testimony is supposed to be in it self Infallible For Assent is not according to the Objective Certitude of things but the evidence of them to our Vnderstandings For is it possible to assent to the truth of a Demonstration in a demonstrative manner because any Mathematician tells one The thing is demonstrable for in that case the Assent is not according to the Evidence of the thing but according to the opinion such a person hath of him who tells him It is demonstrable Nay supposing that person infallible in saying so yet if the other hath no means to be infallibly assured that he is so such a ones Assent is as doubtful as if he were not infallible Therefore supposing the Testimony of your Church to be really infallible yet since the Means of believing it are but probable and prudential the Assent cannot be according to the nature of the Testimony considered in it self but according to the reasons which induce me to believe such a Testimony infallible And in all such cases where I believe one thing for the sake of another my Assent to the Object believed is according to my Assent to the Medium on which I believe it for by the means of that the other is conveyed to our minds As our sight is not according to the light in the body of the Sun but that which presseth upon our Organs of sense So that supposing your Churches Testimony to be in it self infallible if one may be deceived in judging whether your Church be infallible or no one may be deceived in such things which he believes upon that supposed Infallibility It being an impossibility that the Assent to the matters of Faith should rise higher or stand firmer than the Assent to the Testimony is upon which those things are believed Now that one may be deceived according to your own principles in judging whether the Church be Infallible appears by this That you have no other means to prove the Infallibility of your Church but only probable and prudential Motives For I desire to know
whether an Infallible Assent to the Infallibility of your Church can be grounded on those Motives of Credibility If you affirm it then there can be no imaginable necessity to make the Testimony of your Church infallible in order to Divine Faith for you will not I hope deny but that there are at least equal Motives of Credibility to prove the Divine Authority of the Scriptures as the Infallibility of your Church and if so why may not an Infallible Assent be given to the Scriptures upon those Motives of Credibility as well as to your Churches Infallibility If you deny the Assent built upon the Motives of Credibility to be Infallible how can you make the Assent to your Churches Testimony to be infallible when that Infallibility is attempted to be proved only by the Motives of Credibility And therefore it necessarily follows That notwithstanding your bearing it so high under the pretence of Infallibility you leave mens minds much more wavering in their Assent than before in that as shall afterwards appear these very Motives of Credibility do not at all prove the Infallibility of your Church which undoubtedly prove the Truth and Certainty of Christian Religion Thus while by this device you seek to avoid the Circle you destroy the Foundation of your Discourse That there must be an Infallible Assent to the truth of that Proposition That the Scriptures are the Word of God which you call Divine Faith which how can it be infallible when that Infallibility at the highest by your own confession is but evidently credible and so I suppose the Authority of the Scriptures is without your Churches Infallibility And thus you run into the same Absurdities which you would seem to avoid which is the second thing to manifest the unreasonableness of this way for whatever Absurdity you charge us with for believing the Doctrine of Christ upon the Motives of Credibility unavoidably falls upon your selves for believing the Churches Infallibility on the same grounds for if we leave the Foundation of Faith uncertain you do so too if we build a Divine Faith upon Motives of Credibility so do you if we make every ones reason the Judge in the choice of his Religion so must you be forced to do if you understand the consequence of your own principles 1. It is impossible for you to give a better account of Faith by the Infallibility of your Church than we can do without it for if Divine Faith cannot be built upon the Motives proving the Doctrine of Christ what sense or reason is there that it should be built on those Motives which prove your Churches Infallibility so that if we leave the Foundation of Faith uncertain you much more and that I prove by a Rule of much Authority with you by which you use to pervert the weak judgements of such who in your case do not discern the Sophistry of it Which is when you come to deal with persons whom you hope to Proselyte you urge them with this great Principle That Prudence is to be our Guide in the choice of our Religion and that Prudence directs us to chuse the safest way and that it is much safer to make choice of that way which both sides agree Salvation is to be obtained in than of that which the other side utterly denies men can be saved in How far this Rule will hold in the choice of Religion will be examined afterwads but if we take your word that it is a sure Rule I know nothing will be more certainly advantagious to us in on present case For both sides I hope are agreed that there are sufficient Motives of Credibility as to the belief of the Scriptures but we utterly deny that there are any such Motives as to the Infallibility of your Church it then certainly follows That our way is the more eligible and certain and that we lay a surer Foundation for Faith than you do upon your principles for resolving Faith 2. Either you must deny any such thing as that you call Divine Faith or you must assert that it may have no other Foundation than the Motives of Credibility which yet is that you would seem most to avoid by introducing the Infallibility of your Church that the Foundation of Faith may not be uncertain whereas supposing what you desire you must of necessity do that you would seem most fearful of which is making a Divine Faith to rest upon prudential Motives Which I thus prove It is an undoubted Axiom among the great men of your side That whatever is a Foundation for a Divine Faith must itself be believed with a firm certain and infallible Assent Now according to your principles the Infallibility of the Church is the Foundation for Divine Faith and therefore that must be believed with an Assent Infallible It is apparent then an Assent Infallible is required which is that which in other terms you call Divine Faith now when you make it your business to prove the Churches Infallibility upon your prudential Motives I suppose your design is by those proofs to induce men to believe it and if men then do believe it upon those Motives do you not found an Assent Infallible or a Divine Faith upon the Motives of Credibility And by the same reason that you urge against us the necessity of believing the Scriptures to be the Word of God by Divine Faith because it is the ground why we believe the things contained in the Scripture we press on your side the necessity of believing the Infallibility of the Church by a Faith equally Divine because that is to you the only sufficient Foundation of believing the Scriptures or any thing contained in them 3. You make by this way of resolving Faith every man's Reason the only Judge in the choice of his Religion which you are pleased to charge on us as a great Absurdity yet you who have deserved so very ill of Reason are fain to call in her best assistance in a case of the greatest moment viz. On what ground we must believe the Scriptures to be the Word of God You say Because the Church is infallible which delivers them to us but how should we come to know that she is infallible you tell us By the Motives of Credibility very good But must not every ones reason judge whether these Motives be credible or no and whether they belong peculiarly to your Church so as to prove the Infallibility of it as it is distinct from all other societies of Christians in the world You tell us indeed That these Motives make it evidently credible but must we believe it to be so because you say so If so then the ground of believing is not the Credibility of the Motives but of your Testimony and therefore you ought to make it evidently true that whatever you speak is undoubtedly true which whosoever reads your Book will hardly be perswaded to So that of necessity every mans reason must be Judge whether your Church
That the external accidents might remain where the substance was changed Now therefore when the Assurance of Christian Religion came from the judgement of the Senses of those who were Eye-witnesses of the Miracles and the Resurrection of Christ if the Senses of men may be so grosly deceived in the proper Objects of them in the case of Transubstantiation what assurance could they themselves have who were Eye-witnesses of them and how much less assurance can we have who have all our Evidence from the certainty of their report So that it appears upon the whole that take away the certainty of the judgement of Sense you destroy all Certainty in Religion for Tradition only conveys to us now what was originally grounded upon the judgement of Sense and delivers to us in an undoubted manner that which the Apostles saw and heard And do not you then give a very good account of Religion by the Infallibility of your Church when if I believe your Church to be infallible I must by vertue of that Infallibility believe something to be true which if it be true there can be no certainty at all of the Truth of Christian Religion 2. Another principle is That we can have no certainty of any of the grounds of Faith but from the Infallibility of your present Church Whereby you do these two things 1. Destroy the obligation to Faith which ariseth from the rational evidence of Christian Religion 2. Put the whole stress of the truth of Christianity upon the proofs of your Churches Infallibility by which things any one may easily see what tendency your doctrine of resolving Faith hath and how much it designs the overthrow of Christianity 1. You destroy the obligation to Faith from the rational evidence of Christian Religion by telling men as you do expresly in the very Title of your next Chapter That there can be no unquestionable assurance of Apostolical Tradition but for the infallible authority of the present Church If so then men cannot have any unquestionable assurance that there was such a Person as Christ in the world that he wrought such great miracles for confirmation of his Doctrine that he dyed and rose again it seems we can have no assurance of these things if the present Church be not Infallible And if we can have no assurance of them what obligation can lye upon us to believe them for assurance of the matters of fact which are the foundations of Faith is necessary in order to the obligation to believe I mean such an assurance as matters of fact are capable of for no higher can be required then the nature of things will bear And what a strange assertion then is this that matters of fact cannot be conveyed to us in an unquestionable manner unless the present Church stamp her Infallibility upon them Cannot we have an unquestionable assurance that there were such persons as Caesar and Pompey and that they did such and such things without some infallible testimony if we may in such things why not in other matters of fact which infinitely more concern the world to know then whatever Caesar or Pompey did But this will be more at large examined afterwards I only now take notice of the consequence of this principle and how fairly it destroyes all rational evidence of the truth of our Religion which whosoever takes away will be by force of reason a Sceptick in the first place and an Infidel in the second Neither is the danger meerly in destroying the rational evidence of Religion but 2. In putting the whole weight of Religion upon the proofs of the present Churches infallibility which whosoever considers how silly and weak they are cannot sufficiently wonder at the design of those men who put the most excellent Religion in the world and which is built upon the highest and truest reason to such a strange kind of Ordeal tryal that if she pass not through this St. Winifreds needle her innocency must be suspected and her truth condemned So that whosoever questions the truth of this kind of Purgation will have a greater suspition of a juggle and imposture if she be acquitted then if she had never submitted to such a tryal And when we come to examine the proofs brought for this Infallibility it will then further appear what uncertainty in Religion men are betrayed to under this confident pretext of Infallibility Thus we see what Scepticism in Religion the principles owned upon the account of Infallibility do bring men to 3. When you have brought men to this that the only sure ground of Faith is the Infallibility of your Church you are not able to give them any satisfactory account at all concerning it but plunge them into greater uncertainties then ever they were in before For you can neither satisfie them what that Church is which you suppose Infallible what in that Church is the proper subject of this Infallibility what kind of Infallibility this is nor how we should know when the Church doth decide Infallibly and when not and yet every one of these questions is no less then absolutely necessary to be resolved in order to the satisfaction of mens minds as to the foundation of their Faith 1. You cannot satisfie men What that Church is which you suppose to be Infallible Certainly if you had a design to give men a certain foundation for their Faith you would not be so shy of discovering what it is you understand by that Church which you would have Infallible if you had meant honestly the first thing you should have done was to have prevented all mistakes concerning the meaning of the Church when you know what various significations it hath not only in Scripture but among your selves Whether you mean the Church essential representative or vertual for every one of these upon occasion you make use of and it was never more necessary to have explained them then in this place and yet you with wonderful care and industry avoid any intimation of what you mean by that Church which you would prove Infallible When you plead so earnestly for the Churches Infallibility I pray tell us what you mean by the Church do you intend the truly Catholick and Vniversal Church which comprehends in it all such as own and profess the Doctrine of Christ in which sense it was well said by Abulensis Ecclesia universalis nunquam errat quia nunquam tota errat The universal Church never erres because the whole Church is never deceived Or do you mean by your Catholick Church some particular part of it to which you apply the name of Catholick not for Vniversality of extent but soundness of Doctrine then it will be necessary yet further to shew what part of the Church that is by what right and title that hath engrossed the name of Catholick so as to exclude other Societies of Christians from it and whether you must not first prove the absolute integrity and soundness of her Doctrine before
you can attribute this title to it For otherwise you will find that marvellously true which the same Tostatus saith Ecclesia Latinorum non est Ecclesia Vniversalis sed quaedam pars ejus ideò etiamsi tota ipsa errâsset non errabat Ecclesia Vniversalis quia manet Ecclesia Vniversalis in partibus illis quae non errant sive illae sint numero plures quà m errantes sive non So that if you prove the Infallibility of the Catholick Church this proves nothing at all as to the Roman Church which at most can be supposed to be but a part of it and though that should err the Catholick Church might not err because that remains in those parts which err not though they be more or less in number then those that err This is the sense of his words who seemed to have a much truer conception of the Vniversal Church than those now of your Sect and Party If then we may believe the Church to be infallible and yet in the mean time condemn your Church for the grossest Errours Will it not be found necessary for you to tell us yet more distinctly What you mean by the Church you would prove Infallible But supposing that only those parts you esteem Catholick make up the Catholick Church even among them the Question will still return What you mean by this Catholick Church Do you mean all the Individual Persons in this number taken either distributively or collectively or Do you mean all those who are entrusted with the Government of these and then Whether all Inferiour Pastors or only Bishops And if Bishops Whether all these collectively or else by way of Representation in a Council and still remember to make it good that what you pitch upon as the acception of the Church be not an effect of humane Policy as Albertus Pighius said All Councils were no more but that what you fasten the acception of the Church-Catholick upon you be sure to make it out that is the Catholick Church to whom the Promises are made in Scripture And be sure to tell us How a Church comes to be infallible by Representation Whether as they who make the Church representative deliver the sense of the Church they represent or by an immediate Promise made to them upon their Convention If the former Whether it will not be necessary in order to the Infallibility of the Council to know that it speaks the sense of all those particular Churches whom they represent If the latter you must remember such places as belong to them as representing the Church for otherwise any company of Christians assembled together will challenge an equal interest in them and then you will find it a hard matter to prove one infallible and not the other But if after all this your Windmill should dwindle into a Nutcracker and this harangue concerning the Infallibility of the Catholick Church should at last end in one particular Person which by a strange Catachresis must be call'd the Church or else as Heir at Law to her doth take possession of all her priviledges Then the Testament must be produced wherein he is named so and those clauses especially wherein the rights and priviledges of her are devolved over to him and his Heirs for ever There being then so much ambiguity and uncertainty in the very name of the Church-Catholick which you would prove infallible that if nothing else discovered your Imposture yet this would sufficiently that you would undertake to resolve Mens Faith by the Infallibility of the Church and yet never offer to shew what that Church is 2. Supposing you had shewn what the Church is yet you never tell us what the subject of Infallibility is in that Church For when in this case you speak of Infallibility you must remember you are not to shew what that Church is which is not deceived in judging concerning things necessary to Salvation but what that Church is which is infallible in her Direction of others to Salvation For you speak of such an Infallibility as must be a Guide to others and whose infallible judgement must be known to all such who must resolve their Faith into her Testimony You would have done then no more than was absolutely necessary to have precisely shewn us where this infallibility is lodged in your Church whether in Pope or Council or both together I suppose it can be no news either to you or to the Reader what Controversies there are among the greatest of your side whether the Pope or Council be the greater and to whom this Infallibility belongs neither are either side fully agreed in their own way for some that are for the Infallibility of a general Council will make that infallible without the Pope others account that opinion if not haeretical the next step to it Those who are for the Pope's Infallibility are not agreed neither when he shall be said to be infallible They who speak Oracles tell us when he doth define ex Cathedrâ but what that is neither they nor we can well tell some say it is when he hath a Congregation of chosen Cardinals about him others make the whole Colledge of Cardinals necessary and therefore some in the late Definition concerning the Jansenists were refractory because it was defined only by a Congregation of chosen Cardinals which they said was not defining ex Cathedrâ some again make neither of these necessary but suppose the Infallibility lodged in the Pope himself And are we not at a fine pass for the certainty of our Faith if it must rely upon the infallible Testimony of your Church and yet you your selves not at all agreed to whom this Infallible Testimony doth belong Think not that we will be put off with that silly evasion That these differences among you hinder not the certainty of Faith because it is not de fide either way For 1. How shall we come to know among you what is de fide and what not till you are agreed to whom this Infallibility belongs And if it belongs to a general Council then it is de fide for it was determined at the Council of Basil in behalf of the Council and therefore if one of the opinions be true it must be de fide for I suppose you make that to be so which is determined by the infallible Testimony of your Church 2. How shall a man believe that any thing at all is de fide among you if that on which your Faith is to rest be not de fide For supposing a difference to happen which hath often done between the Pope and Council and they decree contrary things to each other if it be not de fide to believe either the one or the other distinctly to be infallible upon what Testimony at such a time must that which supposeth the infallible Testimony of your Church rely 3. If it be said not to be de fide because not determined by the same reason your Churches
Infallibility cannot be de fide because not determined neither For if the Determination of the Church be necessary to make any thing de fide it must by the same reason be necessary to make your Churches Infallibility de fide and I suppose you will not readily instance in any decree of the Catholick Church where the Testimony of your Church is determined to be infallible And yet one would imagine that if there were such a necessity in order to Faith of the Infallible Testimony of your Church there would be an equal necessity of believing this Infallibility on the same Testimony or if one may believe one Article especially so important a one as that without any precedent infallible Testimony why not any other nay why not all the rest Thus you still see how uncertainties grow upon us when we search into your account of Faith 3. You are not certain neither What kind of Infallibility this is For you offer to prove the Church infallible by the same way that Moses Christ and his Apostles were proved infallible A very fair Offer if you could make it good but then we were in hopes you would have proved such a kind of Infallibility as they had you tell us No for your Infallibility is Supernatural but not Divine that it is precise Infallibility but not absolute that it is not by immediate Revelation but by immediate Assistance of the Holy Ghost Something you would have but you cannot tell what an Infallibility in the Conclusion without any in the Vse of means an Infallibility by immediate Assistance of the Holy Ghost yet but in a sort Divine an Infallibility yielding nothing to Scripture in point of Supernaturality and Certainty yet nothing so infallible as Scripture Are not these brave things to make wise men certain in their Religion with that they are to believe the Scriptures upon a Testimony infallible yet not infallible divine yet not divine and therefore certain but not certain true but not true But of the silliness of these Distinctions afterwards But can you think to perswade wise or rational men to believe their Religion on such terms as these are Had they no other evidence than what you give them would they not be shrewdly tempted to reject all Religion as a meer Imposture as no doubt your Doctrine of Infallibility is A strange kind of Talisman which secures your Pope from a possibility of erring but still he must be under the certain direction of his Stars for if he be not in Cathedrâ this Telesm doth him no good at all It were heartily to be wished if he should once happen to be in Cathedrâ he would infallibly determine what it was to be in Cathedrâ for ever after for it would ease mens minds of a great many troublesome scruples which they cannot without some infallible Determination get themselves quit of But still we are bound to believe your Church infallible But I pray whence comes this Infallibility Comes it from Heaven or is it of Men From Heaven no doubt you say for it is by a promise of the Holy Ghost This were something if it were proved but yet you maintain this Infallibility in such a manner that none that read the Scriptures could ever think it were promised there For there they alwaies read That the Spirit of Truth is a Spirit of Holiness and never dwells in those who are carnal or wicked men but you tell us That let the lives of Popes be what they will they have no promise to secure them from being wicked but the Spirit of God doth by immediate Assistance secure them from being fallible But I pray Which of these two is not only more contrary to Scripture but to Humane Nature Wickedness or Fallibility This latter so consequent upon the imperfection of our understandings that till we put off the one we can hardly be freed from the other but Wickedness is that which the whole design of Christian Religion is against and administers the highest Motives and the greatest Assistance for the conquest of and can it then be thought suitable to such a Doctrine that the Divine Spirit should like Mahomet's Dove be alwaies ready to whisper in the ear of the most profligate person if it be but his fortune to sit in Cathedrá Such a kind of Infallibility as this I assure you will never prevail with any such persons who understand Christian Religion to believe the Doctrine of it upon such pretences as yours are 4. Supposing you could tell men intelligibly and suitably to the Doctrine of Christianity What kind of Infallibility this is yet if you cannot satisfie them When your Church doth define infallibly you leave them still in the same Labyrinth without any clue to direct them out of it But if we consider what things are necessary to be believed before we can believe any definition of your Church infallible how impossible it is to be infallibly assured of any such definition of your Church sure you cannot blame us for crying out of the Labyrinth you have brought us into 1. How many things in Christian Religion are to be believed before we can imagine any such thing as an infallible Testimony of your Church And if the Infallibility of that be the ground of Faith on what account must those things be believed which are antecedent to the belief of such an infallible Testimony Now that many things and some of them far from being clear are to be believed antecedently to an infallible Testimony will appear if we do but consider what they commonly mean by that Church which they suppose infallible and what must be supposed that this Infallibility be the Rule of Faith By the Church they tell you they mean the Catholick Church but lest you should think them too honest in saying so at next word it is the Roman-Catholick Church just as if one should say the German-Vniversal Emperour But lest you should think at least they meant the Roman Church of all Ages and think you might have some relief from the Primitive Roman Church they will soon rectifie your mistakes by telling you it is the present Roman-Church they mean but if it be the present Roman-Church it may be you would be willing to hear the judgement of all the honest men in that Church and that you hope many of the people and learned men not in Orders may speak their minds freely To prevent that they tell you they mean only the representative Church But still the Bishops who make up this representative Church may in their several Synods complain of abuses and rectifie miscarriages therefore they understand not Bishops by themselves or particular Synods but met together in General Councils But yet if the Councils were truly Oecumenical there might be some hopes of redress But for that they are sure for they allow none to be members of the General Councils which are in Schism or Heresie and their own Church is to be Judge what
Schism and Heresie is and they are hugely to blame then if they admit any but those of their own party But yet some Councils have stood upon their priviledges in opposition to the Pope as those of Constance and Basil. Therefore to make all sure no Council is lawful in it self or its decrees bind the Church but such as is call'd and confirmed by the Pope who is strangely to blame then if he suffers any thing to pass to his own prejudice So that this Infallibility of the Pope is the last resort in the resolution of Faith for all the rest we see are uncertain And what a vast measure of Faith greater than that which our Saviour said would remove mountains is necessary to believe this Infallibility of the Pope for in the first place unless he believes the particular Roman-Church to be the Catholick Church he spoils all the Conjuring afterwards with not having Faith enough about him Again he must believe that Christ hath promised an Infallible Assistance to the Pastors of the Church as distinct from the People but this avails little still unless he believes these Credentials must not be opened but in full Council and that Council such a one as the Pope calls and in which himself presides either in Person or by his Legates and that the Decrees of the Council oblige not the Church without the Pope's Confirmation and to that end you must believe that S. Peter was made Monarch of the Church by Christ that this Monarchy was to be derived to all his Successors in all places but as to this where-ever he was besides he never had any Successor any where but at Rome And these Successors of his at Rome cannot for their lives err if they do but sit in Cathedrâ Certainly he that hath Faith to swallow all these things is hugely to blame if he stick at any thing and by that time a man's understanding is debauched sufficiently by these Principles I make no question but such a one will believe Infallibility Transubstantiation or any thing in the world But beside these things in order to the making the Churches Testimony the Rule of Faith to any one there must another dose of Principles be taken which have Opium enough in them to lay asleep all the remainders of reason For he must infallibly believe the Church to be infallible though no infallible Argument be brought for the proof of it That this Church doth judicially and authoritatively pronounce her Sentence in matters of Faith though we know not what that Church is which must so pronounce That he infallibly know that this particular Sentence was so pronounced though he can have no other than Moral Means of knowing it And lastly That the Infallibility must be the first thing believed although all these things must of necessity be believed before it And if after this second Purgation he be not a true Son of the Church of Rome he deserves to be Anathematized as an obstinate person for having any thing of reason in him Therefore I wonder not that the Doctrine of Infallibility seems no strange thing to you for a man must devour such Giant-like Absurdities before he comes to it that when he comes at it he finds it nothing But still one would think it a little strange that this Infallibility should be the only Foundation of believing all things in Religion and yet so many things and some of them very strange ones must of necessity be certainly believed before it 2. Supposing a man not only believes all these things before it but doth really believe your Church infallible yet he is uncertain still how he should know When your Church defines infallibly For so many things are required in reference to the Person defining so many for the definition it self that it will be no easie matter to remove those difficulties which lye in the way of his Assent to such a Definition As to the Person if he be not a Christian if he be not a Priest if not a Lawful Pope all his Definitions are far from being infallible yet none of all these can any one be assured of according to your Principles of the intention of the Priest being necessary in the administration of Sacraments in order to the effect of them But the large train of Consequences following from hence I forbear to urge you with because they have been so often urged by abler Pens But What will you say when we are so far from assurance as to the Pope's being legally chosen that we have if not great Evidence yet very high Presumptions of the contrary what becomes then of your Pope's Infallibility Nay from the illegality of one follows the illegality of all his Successors because they were chosen by Cardinals made by him who could be no lawful Cardinals because he was no legal Pope and consequently not they who were made by them The case is this There is a Bull of Pope Julius the second against the Simoniacal Election of any Pope which the Cardinals upon their first entrance into the Conclave swear solemnly to observe In which Bull it is expresly said That if any Pope be Simoniacally chosen by any of the Cardinals upon any gift or promise whatsoever that such an Election is ipso facto null and the Cardinals may oppose one so chosen as if guilty of manifest Heresie and that none ought to receive or look on such a one as Pope neither can this Simoniacal Election be made good by inthronisation course of time submission of Cardinals c. And that they ought all to avoid him as a Magician Heathen Publican or the Founder of Heresie This is the substance of that Bull. Now it is notoriously known that Sixtus the fifth was Simoniacally chosen Pope For that he might be chosen he did under his hand promise to Cardinal d'Este who had a great interest in the Conclave that in the time of his Popedome he would never create Jerome Matthew the Cardinals great enemy a Cardinal upon which promise he was through his interest chosen Pope But when afterwards the Pope violated his Faith to him by creating his enemy Cardinal d'Este being highly incensed against him for it sent the very instrument subscribed by the Pope's own hand to Philip the second King of Spain who in the year 1589. sent the Duke of Suisse extraordinary Embassador to Rome to intimate to Sixtus the fifth his intention of calling a General Council according to the Bull of Julius the second for declaring this Simoniacal Election When this Message was delivered to the Pope and he saw the Instrument was discovered under his own hand he fell into such a perplexity that he dyed soon after which stopt the progress of the business By this it evidently appears that Sixtus himself was no lawful Pope and therefore could create no Cardinals and because the Cardinals created by him had a voice in the Election of the subsequent Popes it follows That there hath
is roving and uncertain 2. That notwithstanding his brags he must have recourse to a private spirit himself 3. That though the Bishop would seem to deny it diverse eminent Protestants do resolve their Faith into the private spirit This being the substance of what you say I shall return a particular Answer to each of them For the first you tell us He delivers himself in such a roving way of discourse as signifies nothing in effect as to what he would drive at No that is strange when that which his Lordship drives at is to shew how far this opinion is to be allowed and how far not which he is so far from roving in that he clearly and distinctly propounds the state of the question and the resolution of it which in short is this If by the testimony of the spirit be meant any special revelation of a new object of Faith then he denies the truth of it at least in an ordinary way both because God never sends us to look for such a testimony and because it would expose men to the danger of Enthusiasms but if by the testimony of the Spirit be meant the habit or the act of Divine infused Faith by vertue of which they believe the object which appears credible then he grants the truth but denyes the pertinency of it because it is quite out of the state of the question which inquires only after a sufficient means to make this object credible against all impeachment of folly and temerity in believing whether men do actually believe or not And withal adds that the question is of such outward and evident means as other men may take notice of as well as our selves Judge you now whether this may be called roving if it be so I can freely excuse you from it in all the discourses I have met with in your Book who abhorre nothing more then a true stating and methodical handling any question But yet say you the Bishop cannot free himself from that imputation of recurring to the private Spirit against any that should press the business home Sure you refer us here to some one else who is able to press a business home for you never attempt it your self and instead of that only produce a large testimony out of A. C. That he did not acquit the Bishop wholly of this Whether he did or no is to little purpose and yet those very words which his Lordship cites are in your testimony produced out of him Only what you add more from him that he must be driven to it that his Lordship denies and neither A. C. or you have been able to prove it But though the Bishop seems not only to deny any such private revelation himself but will not confess that any Protestants hold it yet you say there can be no doubt in this since Calvin and Whitaker do both so expresly own it But according to those principles laid down before both these testimonies are easily answered For 1. Neither of them doth imply any private revelation of any new object but only a particular application of the evidence appearing in Scripture to the conscience of every Believer 2. That these testimonies do not speak of the external evidence which others are capable of but of the internal satisfaction of every ones conscience Therefore Calvin saith Si conscientiis optimè consultum volumus c. if we will satisfie our own consciences not If we will undertake to give a sufficient reason to others of our Faith So Whitaker Esse enim dicimus certius illustrius testimonium quo nobis persuadeatur hos libros esse sacros c. There is a more certain and noble testimony by which we may be perswaded that these Books are sacred viz. that of the Holy Ghost 3. Neither of these testimonies affirm any more than the more judicious Writers among your selves do Your Canus asserts the necessity of an internal efficient cause by special assistance of the Spirit moving us to believe besides and beyond all humane authorities and motives which of themselves are not sufficient to beget Faith and this a little after he calls Divinum quoddam lume◠incitans ad credendum A divine light moving us to believe and again Interius lumen infusum à Spirit◠Sancto An inward light infused by the Spirit of God There is nothing in the sayings of the most rigid Protestants is more hard to explain or vindicate from a private revelation then this is if as you say one would press it home Nay hath not your own Stapleton Calvins very phrase of the necessity of the secret testimony of the Spirit that one believe the testimony and judgement of the Church concerning Scripture And is there not then as much danger of Enthusiasm in believing the Testimony of your Church as in believing the Scriptures Nay doth not your Gregory de Valentiâ rather go higher then the testimonies by you produced out of Calvin and Whitaker on this very subject in the beginning of his discourse of the resolution of Faith It is God himself saith he in the first place which must convince and perswade the minds of men of the truth of the Christian Doctrine and consequently of the Sacred Scriptures by some inward instinct and impulse as it appears from Scripture it self is fully explained by Prosper If you will then undertake to clear this inward instinct and impulse upon the minds of men whereby they are perswaded of the truth of Christianity and Scripture from Enthusiasm and a private spirit you may as easily do it for the utmost which is said by Calvin or Whitaker or any other Protestant Divine This therefore is only an argument of your desire to cavil and as such I will pass it over For what concerns the influence which the Spirit hath in the resolution of Faith it will be enquired into afterwards The last way mentioned in order to the resolution of Faith is that of Reason which his Lordship saith cannot be denyed to have some place to come in and prove what it can According to which he tells us no man can be hindred from weighing the tradition of the Church the inward motives in Scripture it self all testimonies within which seem to bear witness to it and in all this saith he there is no harm the danger is when a man will use no other scale but reason or prefer reason before any other scale Reason then can give no supernatural ground into which a man may resolve his Faith that the Scripture is the word of God infallibly yet Reason can go so high as it can prove that Christian Religion which rests upon the authority of this Book stands upon surer grounds of nature reason common equity and justice then any thing in the world which any Infidel or meer naturalist hath done doth or can adhere unto against it in that which he makes accounts or assumes as Religion to himself This
before conclusions there is little hopes of your being a true Roman Catholick But I must tell you this is not the way You must first believe the Church and then you may believe any thing Scept But would you have me attain Infallible certainty without any reason that is Infallible But because you quarrel with my method I will yield to yours but let me desire to know first What those things are which I must believe upon this Infallibility and then Whether nothing short of this Infallible certainty will serve in order to Faith for if so I must confess my self not only a Sceptick but an Infidel T. C. All objects of Faith must be believed with Infallible certainty and nothing short of that can be true Faith for true Divine Faith must rely on Divine Authority or some Word of God now because you cannot rely on Gods written Word for the Divine Authority of it self you must rely on some Divine unwritten Word which can be no other but what is delivered by the Infallible Testimony of the present Roman Church Scept I was in hopes you intended my cure but now I perceive you aim at making me worse for I never heard so many things uttered in a breath with so great confidence and so little shew of reason that if I were not a Sceptick already I should commence one now You tell me indeed very magisterially that I cannot believe without Infallibility because Faith must rely on a Divine Testimony this Divine Testimony is not in Scripture as you call it but in the Infallibility of your present Roman Church I find my doubts so increase by this discourse of yours that they all croud so to get out I know not how to propose them in order but as well as I can You tell me the ground why you require Infallible certainty is because Faith must rest on Divine Authority and that this Authority must be that of your Church which you say is Infallible these things therefore I desire of you first to shew how your Churches Authority comes to be Divine 2. How her Testimony comes to be Infallible 3. How I may be Infallibly certain of this Infallibility 4. Supposing the Catholick Churches Testimony to be so how such a Sceptick as I am should know your Roman Church to be that Catholick Church T. C. Your first question is How our Churches Authority comes to be Divine I see there is little hopes of doing good on you that ask such questions as these are you ought quietly to submit your Faith to the Church and heartily believe all these things without questioning them for I must tell you such kind of questions have almost ruined us and hath made scrupulous men turn Hereticks and others Atheists but since I hope your questions may go no further then my answers nor be any better understood I must tell you That though we say that it is necessary that Divine Faith must rely on Divine Authority because that seems to promise Infallibility yet when we come to our Churches Testimony we dare not for fear of the Hereticks call it Divine but Infallible and in a manner and after a sort Divine hoping they would never take notice of any Contradiction in it but still we say As far as concerns precise Infallibility it is so truly supernatural and certain that it comes nothing short of the Divinest Testimony but yet this is not Divine though it be by the Testimony of the Holy Ghost and yet is no immediate revelation but still it is so much as if the Church should erre Gods veracity may be called in question assoon as the Churches Scept I took you for a Priest before but now I take you for an absolute conjurer but I confess I like this discourse well for I perceive your Religion is built on such grounds as you never intend should be understood wherein I commend your discretion for these distinctions will doubtless do your work among silly and ignorant people which are a great part of mankind and much the greatest of your Church I am therefore infinitely satisfied with this answer to my first question answer but the rest so and I promise you to be less a Sceptick then ever I was T. C. to your second How her Testimony comes to be Infallible because I perceive you are an understanding person I will acquaint you with our way The Hereticks trouble us with this question above all others for they presently cry out If you know the Scripture to be Infallible by the Church and the Church Infallible by Scripture we run into a Circle and this we know as well as they but do not think fit to let the people know it and therefore we tell them of things being known in themselves and to us between the formal object and the Infallible witness between the principal cause and a condition prerequisite between proving of it to Hereticks and to our selves but I see some of my brethren of late have been much beholding to some things with vizards upon them called Motives of credibility and the generality are so frighted with them that they will rather say they are satisfied then ask any more questions but if they do these do so little in truth belong to our Church that then we storm and sweat and cry out upon them as Atheists and that it is impossible they should believe any Religion who question them and if that doth it not then we patter over the former distinctions as we do our prayers and hope they are both in an unknown tongue Scept Well I see you are the man like to give me satisfaction I pray to your third question How I may be Infallibly certain of this Infallibility T.C. that is a question never asked by Catholicks and if we find any propounding it whom we hoped to proselyte we give them hard words and leave them for because we offer to prove our Infallibility by only motives of credibility they presently ask us Whether our Infallibility be an Article of Faith if it be then they may believe an Article of Faith without Infallible certainty and then what need our Churches Infallibility and then to what end do we quarrel with their Faith for being built on greater motives of credibility which being such untoward questions we see there is no good to be done on them and so leave them but in our Books we are sure to cry out of the fallibility and uncertainty of the Faith of Protestants because they acknowledge their Churches not Infallible and cry up our Church because she pretends to it if they ask How we prove it we seek to confound the state of the question and run out into the necessity of an unwritten Word or bring such motives as hold only for the Primitive and Apostolical Church and make them serve ours too If all this will not do we have other shifts still but it is not yet fit to discover them Scept To your fourth Question and then
Tradition thus If the Light of the Scripture be insufficient to shew it self unless it be introduced by the recommendation of the Church How came Luther Calvin Zuinglius Husse c. to discover this Light in it seeing they rejected the Authority of all visible Churches in the world c Sure your Discourser was not very profound in this that could not distinguish between the Authority of Vniversal Tradition and the Authority of the present visible Church or between the Testimony of the Church and the Authority of it Shew us where Luther Calvin c. did ever reject the Authority of an uncontrouled Vniversal Tradition such as that here mentioned concerning the Scriptures being the Word of God Shew us where they deny that Vse of the Testimony of those Churches whose Authority in imposing matters of Faith they denied which his Lordship asserts viz. to be a means to introduce men to the knowledge and belief of the Scritures and unless you shew this you do nothing 4. He argues against that Light in Scripture because it is not sufficient to distinguish Canonical Books from such as are not so For saies he Had not the Ancient Primitive Fathers in the first three hundred years as much reason and ability to find this Light in Scripture as any particular person Yet many Books which do appear to us to be God's Word by their Light did not appear to be so to them by it till they were declared such by the Catholick Church I answer 1. Where doth his Lordship ever say or pretend that any person by the Light contained in the Books can distinguish Books that are Canonical from such as are not All that can be discovered as to particular Books in question is the examination of the Doctrine contained in them by the series of that which is in the unquestionable Books for we know that God can never speak contradictions but still this will only serve to exclude such Books as contain things contrary but not to admit all which have no Doctrine contrary to Scripture 2. The reason why the Primitive Fathers questioned any Books that we do not was not because they could not discover that Light in them which we do for neither can we discover so much Light in any particular Book as meerly from thence to say It is Canonical but there was not sufficient evidence then appearing to them that those Copies did proceed from Apostolical persons and this was therefore only an Argument of that commendable care and caution which was in them lest any Book should pass for Canonical which was not really so 3. When the Catholick Church declared any controverted Book to be Canonical Did not the Church then see as much Light in it as we do but that Light which both the Church and we discover is not a discriminating Internal Light but an External Evidence from the sufficiency and validity of Testimony And such we have for the Canonical Books of the Old Testament and therefore you have no cause to quarrel with us for receiving them from the Jewish Synagogue For who I pray are so competent witnesses of what is delivered as they who received it and the Apostle tells us That to the Jews were committed the Oracles of God 5. Hence your discoursing Christian argues That if one take up the Scripture on the account of Tradition then if one should deny S. Matthew 's Gospel to be the written Word of God he could not be accounted an Heretick because it was not sufficiently propounded to him to be God's Word Whether such a person may be accounted a Heretick in your sense or no I am sure he is in S. Paul's because 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 self-condemned and that for the very contrary reason to what you give because this is sufficiently propounded to him I pray tell me What way you would have such a thing sufficiently propounded as a matter to be believed that this is not propounded in Would you have an unquestionable evidence that this was writ by one of Christ's Apostles called S. Matthew so you have Would you have all the Churches of Christ agreed in this Testimony in all Ages from the Apostles times so you have Would you have it delivered to you by the Testimony of the present Church so you have What then is or can be wanting in order to a Proposition of it to be believed Why forsooth some infallible authoritative sentence of the present Church which shall make this an Object of Faith See what a different mould some mens minds are of from others For my part should I see or hear any Church in the world undertaking such an office as that I should be so far from thinking it more sufficiently propounded by it that I should not scruple to charge it with the greatest presumption and arrogance that may be For on what account can it possibly be a thing credible to me that S. Matthew's Gospel contains God's written Word any further than it is evident that the person who wrote it was one chosen by Christ to deliver the summe of his proceedings as an Apostle to the world And therefore I have no reason to think he would deceive men in what he spake or writ The only Question then is How I should know this is no counterfeit name but that S. Matthew writ it Let us consider what possible means there are to be assured of it I cannot imagine any but these two Either that God should immediately reveal it either to my self or to some Church to propound it to me or else that I am to believe those persons who first received those Copies from his hands by whose means they were dispersed abroad in the world from whence they are conveyed by an unquestionable Tradition down to us Of these two chuse whether you please if the first then particular immediate Revelations are necessary to particular persons to have such an Object of Faith sufficiently propounded to them and then the Church cannot authoritatively pronounce any Books of Scripture to be Canonical without immediate Revelation to her that this Book was written by such a person who was divinely assisted in the writing of it And this you have denied before to belong to the Church If you take up with the second the unquestionable Testimony of all Ages since the Apostles then judge you whether S. Matthew's Gospel be not sufficiently propounded to be believed and consequently Whether any one who should question or deny it be not guilty of the greatest peevishness and obstinacy imaginable From hence we may see with what superfluity of discretion the next words came from you Nay hence it follows that even our blessed Saviour who is Wisdom it self would have been esteemed by all the world not a wise Law-giver but a meer Ignoramus and Impostor For shame man forbear such insolent expressions for the future and repent of these For Must Christ's Wisdom be called in question and he liable to be accounted an
Ignoramus and Impostor if he doth not make your Church infallible I have told you often before how much your Doctrine of Infallibility tends to Atheism and now you speak out For the meaning of your words plainly is If God hath not entrusted your Church with a full and absolute power to declare what is his will and what not Christ was an Ignoramus and Impostor For that is the substance of your next words For had he not framed think you a strange and Chimerical Common-wealth were it alone destitute of a full and absolute power to give an authentical and unquestionable declaration which is the true and genuine Law Now it is evident from all your discourse foregoing you only plead for this full and absolute power in your Church and judge you then what the consequence is to all those who cannot see any shadow of reason for this your pretended Infallibility neither more nor less than that Christ is liable to be accounted by all the world an Ignoramus and Impostor Nay that they are fools who account him not so if they do not believe this present Infallibility of your Church for it is apparent say you that he hath ordered his Common-wealth worse than ever any one did And now let any that consider what pitiful silly proofs you have produced for this present Infallibility nay such that I am confident that you cannot think your self you have in the least measure proved it then judge what thoughts of Christ you are forced to entertain your self upon your own Argument viz. as of an Ignoramus and Impostor Hath not your Infallibility lead you now a fine dance Is not this the way to make Faith certain and to reclaim Atheists I had thought it had been enough for your Canonists to have charged Christ with indiscretion if he had not left a Vicar on earth but now it seems the profound Philosophers learned Divines and expert Historians for such a one you told us your discoursing Christian was supposed by you to be in whose name these words are spoken do charge Christ with folly and imposture if he hath not made your Church infallible For shift it off as you can you cannot deny but that must be the aim of these words for you are proving the necessity of an infallible Declaration by the present Church in order to a sufficient Proposition of the Scripture to be believed and it is notorious you never pretend that any Church hath any share in this Infallibility but your own And therefore the consequence unavoidably follows that since there can be no sufficient Proposition that the Scripture is to be believed without this infallible Testimony since no Church pretends to this Infallibility but yours since without such provision for the Church Christ would have been esteemed by all the world not a wise Law-giver but a meer Ignoramus and Impostor What then follows but that if your Church be not infallible He must be accounted so And if you dread not these consequences I hope all Christians do and have never the better thoughts of your Infallibility for them 6. Let us see how he comes closer to the matter it self and examines how this Light should be Infallible and Divine supposing the Churches Testimony to be humane and fallible The substance of which is this If the Church may erre we may suppose she hath erred in testifying some Books to be God's Word in that case Books that were not God's Word would be equally recommended with those that were And that it would be impossible for any particular person by reading them to distinguish the one from the other To which I answer 1. It is all one with you to suppose a Church fallible and suppose that she hath erred To put a case of a like nature The Testimony of all mankind is fallible May you therefore suppose that all mankind hath erred in something they are agreed in The Testimony of all those persons who have seen Rome is fallible May I therefore question whether they were not all deceived But of this afterwards 2. When you speak of the Church erring Do you mean the Church in every Age since Christ's Coming concerning all the Books of Scripture or the present Church concerning only some Books of Scripture If you suppose the Church of all Ages should be deceived you must suppose some who were infallible should be deceived those were the Apostles in writing and delivering their Books to the Churches of their time or else you must suppose all the Apostolical Churches deceived in taking those Books to have come from the Apostles which did not And is not this a congruous Supposition Well then if it be unreasonable to suppose the Apostolical Churches deceived and impossible to imagine the Apostles deceived in saying They writ what they did not Where then must such an universal-errour as this come in Or Is it not equally unreasonable to suppose all the Christian Churches in the world should be deceived without any questioning of such a deceit supposing but the goodness and common providence of God in preserving such records and the moral industry used by Christians in a matter of such importance It is therefore a very absurd and unreasonable thing to imagine That all the Churches of Christ in all Ages should erre in receiving all the Books of Scripture Let us then see as to the present Churches erring as to particular Books 1. Either the Records of former Ages are left to judge by or no If they be as certainly they are we thereby see a way to correct the errour of the present Church by appealing to these records of the Church in former times if they be not left how could any of these Books be derived from Apostolical Tradition when we have no means to trace such a Tradition by 2. Supposing only some Books questioned or that the present Church erres only in some particular Books then it appears that there remains a far greater number of such Books whose Authority we have no reason at all to question and by comparing the other with these we may easily prevent any very dangerous errour for if they contain any Doctrine contrary to the former we have no reason to believe them if they do not there can be no very dangerous errour in admitting them Thus you see how easily this errour is prevented supposing the Churches testimony not only fallible but that it also should actually erre in delivering some Books for Canonical which are not so but supposing a Church pretends to be Infallible and is believed to be so and yet doth actually erre in delivering the Canon of Scripture what remedy is there then for while we look on the Churches testimony as fallible there is scope and liberty left for enquiry and further satisfaction but if it be looked on as Infallible all that believe it to be so are left under an impossibility of escaping that errour which she is guilty of And the more dangerous such
places did live in the exercise of their Religion without them But what is there in all this to inferr that not the Scriptures but the Infallibility of the Church is the foundation of Faith Doth St. Augustine suppose that men may have Faith Hope and Charity without believing or that men may believe without the Scriptures when in the precedent Chapter he hath this remarkable expression concerning Faith That it will soon stumble if the Authority of the sacred Scriptures be weakned and doth not this imply that Faith stands on the Authority of the Scriptures as its proper foundation But this were pardonable if the very design of all that Treatise did not so evidently refute all your pretensions as nothing can do it more effectually For can you possibly perswade any reasonable man to think that St. Augustine dreamt of any such thing as the Infallible Testimony of the present Church to be the ground of Faith who when he purposely discourseth concerning the Christian Doctrine the principles of it and the best means to understand it never so much as mentions any such thing but on the contrary directs to no other but those you call Moral and Fallible means For understanding the principles of Christian Doctrine he shews us the several natures of things some to be enjoyed some to be used and others both that the main thing we are to enjoy is God and therefore begins with him as our last end in whom our happiness lies and then shews the means to come to this enjoyment of God by explaining the principles of Faith and the efficacy of it In his second Book he shews how we may come to the sense of Scripture and first discovers the nature of signs which represent things and of letters which are signs of words and since there are diversities of tongues how necessary the translation of Scripture is into them a good citation for you to justifie your Bibles and Prayers in an unknown language with and then shews what great reason there was why there should be some doubtful and obscure places left in Scripture to conquer our pride by industry and to keep the understanding from nauseating which commonly slights things that are easily understood Then shews what preparation and disposition of soul is requisite for Divine wisdome and so comes to the understanding the Scriptures for which first is requisite a serious and diligent reading of them in order to which he must carefully distinguish such as are Canonical from such as are not and for judging of these he never so much as mentions much less sends us to the Infallible Testimony of the Roman Church but bids us follow the Authority of the most Catholick Churches among which those are which are worthy to be call'd Apostolical See's and had Epistles sent to them What Authority then had the Church of Rome to judge of Canonical Scriptures more then Ephesus Philippi Thessalonica c. To be sure then St. Augustin was not of our Discourser's mind as to the judgement of Canonical Books and why should he send men to those Churches which received the Epistles but that there they were like to meet with greater satisfaction as to the authenticalness of the Copies of those Epistles After this he gives directions for understanding hard places First by diligent reading and remembring the plainest places for in them saith he are found all those things which contain matters of Faith and Practice An excellent citation for you for several purposes especially when you would prove the obscurity of Scripture the necessity of an Infallible Judge or your Doctrine of Fundamentals out of St. Augustin And then bids them compare obscure and easie places together to understand the proprieties of words to get knowledge in the Tongues to compare Versions Antecedents and Consequents to be skil'd in all humane Arts and Sciences these and several other instructions to the same purpose are the scope of his following Books Would any one now but T. C. have ventured so unluckily upon this Treatise of St. Augustin above all others to prove the Infallibility of the Churches Testimony as necessary to Faith by Could any Protestant have delivered his mind more punctually and plainly than he doth And can you or any one else that doth but look into that Book imagine that St. Augustin ever imagined that any such thing should ever be thought of in the world as that the Testimony of the Church of Rome must be owned as the Infallible foundation of Faith and the Infallible Interpreter of Scripture But this it is to converse with the Fathers only by retail as they are delivered out in parcels to you with directions upon them what use they are for by Bellarmin and such Artists as himself This is instead of quoting the Fathers to challenge them and you see they are not afraid to appear though to your shame and confusion But for all this you have a Reserve in St. Augustin still let us see what quotation that is which lies so in Ambuscado behind the hedges and is so loath to come out There is good reason for so much reservedness for when we come to search we find only bushes instead of Souldiers I have throughly examined the place you referr us to and cannot meet any thing the least pertinent to your purpose unless the question of the Lawfulness of Hereticks Baptism prove your Churches Testimony to be Infallible But it may be it is but a venial mistake of a Chapter or two forward or backward and there we may find it Which when I look into I cannot but suspect that some Protestant had trepanned you into this Book and place of St. Augustine there being scarce any Book or place in him more begirt with Arguments against you than this is I was at first fearful you had quoted Fathers at a peradventure but upon my further considering the place I soon rectified that mistake I will therefore reckon you up some of the most probable Citations out of St. Augustins Books of Baptism against the Donatists and choose which of them you please to prove the necessity of an Infallible Testimony of the present Church as a foundation of Faith by I suppose that you intended is in the Chapter but one following where St. Augustine Cites that passage of Cyprian That we ought to recurre to the fountain i. e. to Apostolical Tradition and thence derive the channel into our own times this saith St. Augustin is the best and without doubt to be done No doubt you think you owe me great thanks for finding out so apposite a place for you so near that you intended but before we have done with it you will see what little reason you have to thank me for it The place you see is cited by St. Augustin out of Cyprian in whose Epistle it is to Pompeius against Stephanus Bishop of Rome we therefore consider that it was Stephen who pleaded custom and tradition to
record of it kept in the Publick Archives of the Nation Would not mens interest make them careful to preserve it inviolable especially considering the frequency of causes whose decision depends upon it and the dispersion of the Copy's abroad and the diligence of such whose profession leads them to look to such things And will not the same reasons hold in a greater measure for the integrity and incorruption of Scriptures Do not the eternal Concerns of all Christians depend upon those sacred records that if those be not true they were of all men most miserable Were not innumerable Copy's of these writings suddenly dispersed abroad and all Christians accounted it a part of their Religion to search and enquire into them Hath there not alwayes been a succession of diligent and faithful persons whose office and profession it hath been to read interpret and vindicate these Books and who have left excellent monuments of their endeavours in this nature Is it then possible to suppose all those Copy's at once imbezeled all those Christians in one age deceived all those Divines so secure and negligent that there should be any considerable alteration much less any total depravation of these writings When once I see a whole Corporation consent to burn their publick Charter and substitute a new one in the place of it and this not be suspected or discovered When I shall see a Magna Charta foisted and neither King nor people be sensible of such a Cheat When all the world shall conspire to deceive themselves and their children I may then suspect such an imposture as to the Scripture but not before And will not all this perswade you that there is no necessity of making your Church Infallible in order to our certainty that we have the same books of Scripture which were delivered by the Apostles If not the next news I shall expect to hear from you will be That we can have no certainty of the Being of God or the Foundation of all Religion but from your Churches Infallibility there being every jot as much reason to say that all mankind should be deceived into the belief of a Deity by some cunning Politicians as that all Christians should be deceived as to the belief of such Books to be Scripture which were universally corrupted and if you understood Consequences you would have urged one assoon as the other But still remember into what precipices this good doctrine of Infallibility leads you But it may be your meaning is more gentle and easie than to suppose there could be no certainty as to all the Books being the same but only that we cannot have any Infallible certainty that there are no corruptions crept into these Books which we have but from your Churches Testimony To which I answer 1. That there is no reason to suppose this should be your meaning 2. Supposing it were your meaning there is no reason in the thing 1. There is no reason to suppose this should be your meaning for you are speaking of such things which are necessary to be believed and therefore are properly objects of Faith but that there are no kind of corruptions crept into the Copy's of Scripture cannot with you be an object of Faith For those of your party do some of them confess and others contend that there are many corruptions crept into the Hebrew Text of the Old Testament and the Greek of the New and that there are abundance of corruptions in your Vulgar Latin is not only abundantly proved by our Writers but acknowledged by the learnedst of your own and irrefragably demonstrated by the different editions of Sixtus and Clement Suppose this were your meaning there were no reason in the thing For 1. Your Church cannot Infallibly assure us there are no corruptions 2. We may be sufficiently assured of it without the Testimony of your Church 1. Your Church cannot assure us at all much less Infallibly that there are no such corruptions For what reason can there be Why we should rely on the judgement of only a part of the whole Society of Christians and that part at great opposition with many other considerable Churches must we then believe your Church where it agrees with or it differs from the rest If only where it agrees with the rest then it is not the testimony of your Church we rely on but the Vniversal consent of all If where it differs shew us some reason why we should believe your Church in opposition to all others Especially 1. When we consider what contradiction there hath been in the testimony of your Church about this very thing as appears not only by the great difference among your writers concerning the authentick Copy's some still defending the Hebrew and Greek Texts and others standing up for that great Diana of Rome the Vulgar Latin Considering then that by the decree of the Council of Trent the Vulgar Latin is looked on by you as the most authentick Copy of the Scripture let any one judge whether ever this could be judged more authentick than when the Pope himself in Cathedrâ doth revise any edition of it and use all possible care for the setting of it forth not only comparing it with the best ancient MS S. but taking the pains to correct it with his own hand both before and after the press and all this was done by Sixtus 5. as himself declares in the Preface to his edition of the Vulgar Latin A.D. 1590. Yet within little more then two years after comes out the edition of Clement 8. which as appears by the computation of such who have taken the pains to compare them differs from the other in some thousands of places Now I pray tell me what Infallible certainty are we like to have concerning the Copy's of Scripture being the same with those delivered by the Apostles from the Infallibility of your Church when this testimony of your Church doth so finely contradict it self within little more then two years time Nay when Sixtus 5. his care was so great and extraordinary in his edition that an Inscription was made in the Vatican in perpetuam rei memoriam which is in letters of Gold in these words SACRAM PAGINAM EX CONCILII TRIDENTINI PRAESCRIPTO QVAM EMENDATISSIMAM DIVVLGARI MANDAVIT Which Inscription as Angelus Roccha tells us was purposely made to set forth that infinite care and pains which the Pope took in that edition Which were so great saith he that it is impossible that any should recount them and for his own part he stood astonished when he saw them for he not only carefully corrected the Copy before the Impression but reviewed it sheet by sheet after that the edition might be the more faithful And shall we after all this believe that Sixtus 5. never lived to see this edition compleat which is the miserable shift some of your party have to avoid this evident contradiction Or shall we think what others pretend That he never
is so great integrity and incorruption in those Copies we have that we cannot but therein take notice of a peculiar hand of Divine Providence in preserving these authentick records of our Religion so safe to our dayes But it is time now to return to you You would therefore perswade us That we have no ground of certainty as to the Copies of Scripture but comparing them with the Apostles Autographa but I hope our former discourse hath given you a sufficient account of our certainty without seeing the Apostles own hands But I pray what certainty then had the Jews after the Captivity of their Copies of the Law yet I cannot think you will deny them any ground of certainty in the time of Christ that they had the true Copies both of the Law and the Prophets and I hope you will not make the Sanhedrin which condemned our Saviour to death to have given them their only Infallible certainty concerning it If therefore the Jews might be certain without Infallibility why may not we for if the Oracles of God were committed to the Jews then they are to the Christians now You yet further urge That there can be no certainty concerning the Autographa's of the Apostles but by tradition And may not every universal tradition be carried up as clearly at least to the Apostles times as the Scriptures by most credible Authours who wrote in their respective succeeding ages I answer We grant there can be no certainty as to the Copies of Scripture but from tradition and if you can name any of those great things in Controversie between us which you will undertake to prove to be as universal a tradition as that of the Scriptures you and I shall not differ as to the belief of it But think not to fob us off with the tradition of the present Church instead of the Church of all ages with the tradition of your Church instead of the Catholick with the ambiguous testimonies of two or three of the Fathers instead of the universal consent of the Church since the Apostles times If I should once see you prove the Infallibility of your Church the Popes Supremacy Invocation of Saints Veneration of Images the necessity of Coelibate in the Clergy a punitive Purgatory the lawfulness of communicating in one kind the expediency of the Scriptures and Prayers being in an unknown tongue the sacrifice of the Mass Transubstantiation to name no moâ—e by as unquestionable and universal a tradition as that whereby we receive the Scriptures I shall extoll you for the only person that ever did any thing considerable on your side and I shall willingly yield my self up as a Trophey to your brave attempts Either then for ever forbear to mention any such things as Vniversal Tradition among you as to any things besides Scriptures which carry a necessity with them of being believed or practised or once for all undertake this task and manifest it as to the things in Controversie between us Your next Paragraph besides what hath been already discussed in this Chapter concerning Apostolical tradition of Scripture empties it self into the old mare mortuum of the formal object and Infallible application of Faith which I cannot think my self so much at leasure to follow you into so often as you fall into it When once you bring any thing that hath but the least resemblance of reason more than before I shall afresh consider it but not till then What next follows concerning resolving Faith into prime Apostolical Tradition infallibly without the Infallibility of the present Church hath been already prevented by telling you that his Lordship doth not say That the infallible Resolution of Faith is into that Apostolical Tradition but into the Doctrine which is conveyed in the Books of Scripture from the Apostles times down to us by an unquestionable Tradition Your stale Objection That then we should want Divine Certainty hath been over and over answered and so hath your next Paragraph That if the Church be not infallible we cannot be infallibly certain that Scripture is Gods Word and so the remainder concerning Canonical Books It is an easie matter to write great Books after that rate to swell up your discourses with needless repetitions but it is the misery that attends a bad cause and a bad stomach to have unconcocted things brought up so often till we nauseate them Your next offer is at the Vindication of the noted place of S. Austin I would not believe the Gospel c. which you say cannot rationally be understood of Novices Weaklings and Doubters in the Faith This being then the place at every turn objected by you and having before reserved the discussion of it to this place I shall here particularly and throughly consider the meaning of it In order to which three things must be enquired into 1. What the Controversie was which St. Austin was there discussing of 2. What that Church was which St. Austin was moved by the Authority of 3. In what way and manner that Churches Authority did perswade him 1. Nothing seems more necessary for understanding the meaning of this place than a true state of the Controversie which S. Austin was disputing of and yet nothing less spoke to on either side than this hath been We are therefore to consider that when Manes or Manichaeus began to appear in the world to broach that strange and absurd Doctrine of his in the Christian world which he had received from Terebinthus or Buddas as he from Scythianus who if we belieue Epiphanius went to Jerusalem in the Apostles times to enquire into the Doctrine of Christianity and dispute with the Christians about his Opinions but easily foreseeing what little entertainment so strange a complexion of absurdities would find in the Christian world as long as the writings of the Apostles and Evangelists were received every where with that esteem and veneration Two waies he or his more cunning Disciples bethought themselves of whereby to lessen the authority of those writings and so make way for the Doctrine of Manichaeus One was to disparage the Credulity of Christians because the Catholick Church insisted so much on the necessity of Faith whereas they pretended they would desire men to believe nothing but what they gave them sufficient reason for But all this while since the Christians thought they had evident reason for believing the Scriptures and consequently none to believe the Doctrine which did oppose them therefore they found it necessary to go further and to charge those Copies of Scripture with falsifications and corruptions which were generally received among Christians But these are fully delivered by S. Austin in his Book de utilitate credendi as will appear to any one who looks into it but the latter is that which I aim at this he therefore taxeth them for That with a great deal of impudence or to speak mildly with much weakness they charged the Scriptures to be corrupted and yet
of Christians in opposition to others is the true Church for resolving this question that we look on it as a great argument of the Credibility as well as Vniversality of this Tradition that all these differing Societies consent in it And not only they but the greatest opposers of Christianity Jews or Philosophers could never see any reason to call in question such a Tradition His Lordship the better to represent the use of Tradition in the last resolution of Faith makes use of this illustration That as the knowledge of Grammer and Logick is necessary in order to the making a Demonstration yet the knowledge of the Conclusion is not resolved into Grammer or Logick but into the immediate principles out of which it is deduced So a mans first preparative to Faith is the Churches Tradition but his full and last assent is resolved into the internal arguments of Scripture This you quarrel with and tell us There is not the same Analogy between Logick and Church Tradition your meaning I suppose is because Logick doth Physically by inlarging the understanding fit men for demonstrations but Church-Tradition cannot enable men to understand the Scripture But cannot you easily discern that Analogy which his Lordship brought this illustration for which is that some things may be necessary preparatives for knowledge which that knowledge is not resolved into Is not this plain in Logick and is it not as plain between Tradition and Scripture For though Tradition doth not open our eyes to see this light yet it presents the object to us to be seen and that in an unquestionable manner But for all this say you a man must either receive it on the sole authority of Church-Tradition or be as much in the dark as ever Why so Is there any repugnancy in the thing that Scripture should be received first upon the account of Tradition and yet afterwards men resolve their Faith into the Scripture it self May not a man very probably believe that a Diamond is sent him from a Friend upon the testimony of the Messenger who brings it and yet be firmly perswaded of it by discerning the Sparklings of it But say you further The Scriptures themselves appear no more to be the Word of God then the Stars to be of a certain determinate number or the distinction of colours to a blind man If this approach not to the highest blasphemy against the Scripture I know not what doth He that shall compare this saying of yours with that in the precedent Chapter That if Christ had not left the Church Infallible he might be accounted an Impostor and Deceiver may easily guess how much of Religion you believe in your heart when on so small occasions you do so openly disparage both Christ and the Scriptures It is well yet your Churches Infallibility can stand on no better terms than these are which will be sufficient to keep any who have any true sense of the truth and excellency of Christ and the Scriptures from hearkening to it But are you in good earnest when you say that Scriptures themselves appear no more to be the Word of God than the distinction of colours to a blind man which is as much as nothing at all Is there nothing at all in the excellency of the Doctrine and Precepts contained in the Scriptures nothing in those clear discoveries of God and our selves nothing in all those transactions between God and men nothing in that Covenant of Redemption between God and man through Christ nothing in the clear accomplishment and fulfilling of Prophesies nothing in that admirable strain and style which is in the writings nothing in that harmonious consent which is discovered in writers of several ages interests places and conditions nothing in that admirable efficacy which the Doctrine of it hath upon the souls of men to perswade them to renounce sin the world and themselves for the sake of it is there nothing more I say in all these which makes the Scripture appear to be the Word of God than the distinction of colours to a blind man Could you assoon think to account the starrs as discern any thing of Divinity from these things in the Scriptures If your eyes were as blind as your understanding could you assoon distinguish white from black as the Scripture from the Alcoran if they were both presented to you to read and judge of them according to the evidence you found in them Is it possible a man that owns himself a Christian should utter such opprobrious language of the Scripture You had been before speaking what honour you give to the Scripture notwithstanding you pretend your Church Infallible and I had mentioned some of those passages which occurr in your writers in disparagement of them but I must needs say they all fall short of this the Nose of Wax the Inky Divinity the Lesbian rule are Courtlike expressions to this of yours for this puts no difference in the world between the Scripture and the Alcoran if your Church should propound the one as well as the other For you could not possibly say worse of the Alcoran then that of it self it appeared no more to be the Word of God than distinction of colours to a blind man I might here send you to be chastised for this insolent Atheistical expression to the Primitive Fathers who speak so much in admiration of the excellency of Scriptures who did vindicate them from all assaults of the Heathen Philosophers I might send you to those of your own party who if they have any love or tenderness for Christian Religion will not suffer such passages to pass without the most severe rebukes I might sufficiently prove the contrary from the arguments used against Atheists by Bellarmine and others but I shall content my self with that noble and Christian confession of your Gregory de Valentiâ from whom you might learn more piety and modesty towards the Sacred Scriptures There being many things in the Doctrine of Christianity it self which of themselves may conciliate belief and authority yet that seems the greatest to me as hath been observed by Clement of Alexandria Lactantius and others that I know not with what admirable force but most divine it affects the hearts of men and stirs them up to vertue It is written with great simplicity and without almost any artifice or ornament of speech which is an argument that its authority is not humane but Divine for no humane writing hath any power on the minds of men without a great deal of art and eloquence How many things are there in this ingenuous and pious confession of this learned Jesuite which might if you have any shame left make you sensible of the Blasphemy of your former expression For 1. He saith there are many things in the doctrine of Christianity which for themselves may conciliate our belief and manifest their authority If for themselves then certainly the Scriptures of themselves have a great deal more evidence
not of falsifying Hookers words yet of perverting his meaning let the Impartial Reader judge CHAP. VIII The Churches Infallibility not proved from Scripture Some general considerations from the design of proving the Churches Infallibility from Scripture No Infallibility in the High-Priest and his Clergy under the Law if there had been no necessity there should be under the Gospel Of St. Basils Testimony concerning Traditions Scripture less lyable to corruption than Traditions The great uncertainty of judging Traditions when Apostolical when not The Churches perpetuity being promised in Scripture proves not its Infallibility His Lordship doth not falsifie C's words but T. C. doth his meaning Producing the Jesuits words no traducing their Order C's miserable Apology for them The particular texts produced for the Churches Infallibility examined No such Infallibility necessary in the Apostles Successours as in Themselves The similitude of Scripture and Tradition to an Ambassadour and his Credentials rightly stated THE main design of this Chapter being to prove the Infallibility of the Church from the Testimonies of Scripture before I come to a particular discussion of the matters contained in it I shall make some general Observations on the scope and design of it which may give more light to the particulars to be handled in it 1. That the Infallibility you challenge to the Church is such as must suppose a promise extant of it in Scripture Which is evident from the words of A. C. which you own to his Lordship That if he would consider the Tradition of the Church not only as it is the Tradition of a company of fallible men in which sense the Authority of it is humane and fallible but as the Tradition of a company of men assisted by Christ and his Holy Spirit in that sense he might easily find it more than an Introduction indeed as much as would amount to an Infallible Motive Whence I inferr that in order to the Churches Testimony being an Infallible Motive to Faith it must be believed that this company of men which make the Church are assisted by Christ and his Holy Spirit Now I demand Supposing there were no Scripture extant the belief of which you said before in defence of Bellarmine was not necessary to salvation by what means could you prove such an Infallible Assistance of the Holy Spirit in the Catholick Church in order to the perswading an Infidel to believe Could you to one that neither believes Christ nor the Holy Ghost prove evidently that your Church had an assistance of both these You tell him that he cannot believe that there is a Christ or a Holy Ghost unless he believes first your Church to be Infallible and yet he cannot believe your Church to be Infallible unless he believes there are such things as Christ and the Holy Ghost for that Infallibility by your own confession doth suppose the peculiar assistance of both these And can any one believe their assistance before he believes they are If you say as you do By the motives of credibility you will prove your Church Infallible But setting aside the absurdity of that which I have fully discovered already Is it possible for you to prove your Church Infallible unless antecedently to the belief of your Churches Infallibility You can prove to an Infidel the truth of these things 1. That the names of Christ and the Holy Ghost are no Chimerical Fancies and Ideas but that they do import something real otherwise an Infidel would speedily tell you these names imported nothing but some kind of Magical spells which could keep men from errour as long as they carried them about with them That as well might Mahomet or any other Impostor pretend an infallible assistance from some Tutelar Angels with hard Arabick names as you of Christ and the Holy Ghost unless you can make it appear to him that really there are such Beings as Christ and the Holy Ghost and when you have proved it to him and he be upon your proof inclinable to believe it you are bound to tell him by your Doctrine that for all these proofs he can only fancy there are such Beings but he cannot really believe them unless he first believes your Church infallible And when he tells you He cannot according to your own Doctrine believe that Infallibility unless he believes the other first Would he not cry out upon you as either lamentable Fools that did not understand what you said or egregious Impostors that play fast and loose with him bidding him believe first one thing and then another till at last he may justly tell you that in this manner he cannot be perswaded to believe any thing at all 2. Supposing he should get through this and believe that there were such Beings as Christ and the Holy Ghost he may justly ask you 1. Whether they be nothing else but such a kind of Intellectus Agens as the Arabick Philosophers imagined some kind of Being which did assist the understanding in conception You answer him No but they are real distinct personalities of the same nature and essence with God himself then he asks 2. Whence doth this appear for these being such grand difficulties you had need of some very clear evidence of them If you send him to Scripture he asks you To what end for the belief of that must suppose the Truth of the thing in Question that your Church is infallible in delivery of this Scripture for Divine Revelation But he further demands 3. Whence comes that Church which you call Infallible to have this Assistance of both these Do they assist all kind of men to make them infallible You answer No. But Do they assist though not all men separately yet all societies of men conjunctly You answer No. Do they assist all men only in Religious actions of what Religion soever they are of Still you answer No. Do they assist then all men of the Christian Religion in their societies No. Do they assist all those among the Christians who say they have this Assistance No. Do they thus assist all Churches to keep them from errour No. Whom is it then that they do thus infallibly assist You answer The Church But what Church do you mean The Catholick Church But which is this Catholick Church for I hear there are as great Controversies about that as any thing You must answer confidently That Church which is in the Roman Communion is the true Catholick Church Have then all in that Communion this Infallible Assistance No. Have all the Bishops in this Communion it No. Have all these Bishops this Assistance when they meet together Yes say you undoubtedly if the Pope be their Head and confirm their Acts. Then it should seem to me that this Infallible Assistance is in the Pope and he it is whom you call the Catholick Church But surely he is a very big man then is he not But say you These are Controversies which are not necessary for you to know it sufficeth
belief of Fundamentals makes it a Church and the not belief of them makes them cease to be a Christian Church I speak of an Essential and not of an Organical Church and I know not who those persons are who out of those places do inferr the perpetuity of an Organical Church nor if they did doth it thence follow they must suppose an Infallible Assistance beyond an Essential to make it an Organical Church For I cannot imagine what necessity can be supposed of Infallibility in order to that which may be sufficiently constituted without it 2. I answer the perpetuity of the Church doth rather argue the Infallibility of the Promise then of the Church Which if you did consider you would not certainly inferr Infallibility from a promise of Perpetuity For all the Infallibility supposable in this case is an Infallibility of Accomplishment of the Promise made As in a clear and parallel Instance of that Promise The Scepter shall not depart from Judah nor a Lawgiver from between his feet untill Shiloh come Taking it in the most received Interpretation among Christians that the Jewish Polity should remain till the dayes of the Messias doth this inferr that there should be a continual Infallibility in the Jewish Polity because there was a Promise made of its perpetuity When God saith In Jerusalem have I set my name for ever doth it follow that Jerusalem should be alwayes Infallible But how would you triumph beyond all reason if you had but any thing like such a promise for Rome as that is for Jerusalem Supposing then that the Promises by you insisted on should be so far extended as to imply a perpetuity of a Christian Church what doth that argue but only this that to make it appear that Promise is Infallibly true there shall alwaies be a succession of Christians in the world 3. Suppose I should grant that the being of a Christian Church doth suppose the assistance of Gods Spirit is there no assistance but what is Infallible If not no one can be a Christian without Infallibility For we speak of no other assistance but what is necessary to make men Christians for what makes them such severally take them conjunctly makes them a Church But if you besides what assistance is requisite to make them Christians do suppose somewhat more to make them a Church I pray name what it is and whatever it be it will not be owned by such who inferr a perpetuity of a Church out of these places But if in order to that no more be meant as no more can be meant then what is necessary to make men Christians then Infallibility will grow so cheap and common it will not be worth challenging by you for your Church 4. Suppose I grant this assistance to be Infallible doth all Infallible assistance make an Infallible Testimony I am sure not in their sense who say the Church is infallible in Fundamentals for they never offer to assert that the present Church is Infallible in defining what are Fundamentals and what not And this is the only Infallibility in question viz. Such a one as makes the Testimony of those who have it Infallible For such a kind of assistance was that of the Apostles which is only the thing enquired after If you can therefore prove such an Infallibility in your Churches Testimony as the Apostles had you do something but what is short of this is nothing at all to the purpose 5. Suppose I should grant the Testimony of the Catholick Church to be Infallible yet all these concessions were nothing for your advantage unless you could as evidently prove that your Church is the only Catholick Church Which that you can never do will appear when we come to that question 6. Suppose I should yield the Catholick Churches Testimony to be Infallible and your Church to be the Catholick Church yet all this is far from proving Pope or Council or both to be Infallible For By what means come they to claim the Infallibility as belonging to them which is given to the Church by what deeds are the conveyances settled of the priviledges of the Church to them Where is it ever said in Scripture or in the least intimated that the Promises made to the Church are to be understood of the representative Church The Apostles had this Promise in their personal capacities made to them and not in a representative how comes then the Promise to be understood of a representation afterwards Thus you see that you are at least six removes from any title to claim this Infallibility from these Promises by and therefore you have little hopes that your claim should be admitted upon so slender a title From this therefore at present you fly off to the vindicating A. C. from asserting Infallibility belonging to all the Doctors and Pastors of the Church which yet is a very good design to vindicate a man from his own words For are they not as express as may be viz. That there is the Promise of Christ and his Holy Spirits continual presence Luk. 10.16 Matth. 28.19 20. Joh. 14.16 not only to the Apostles but to their Successours also the lawfully sent Pastours and Doctors of the Church in all Ages To which his Lordship saith Here 's a deal of Infallibility indeed and yet errour store You presently cry out But what shall we say to an Adversary that forges what Chimerical doctrine he pleases and then fights against it What Chimerical Doctrine is that which he forges doth he not relate A. C's words and do you or can you deny them to be his words But say you This was not his meaning I suppose you mean That his words as they are are not defensible and therefore you must have a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for them which is That he did not understand these words of every Doctor apart but of Pastors and Doctors lawfully assembled in Oecumenical Councils But 1. Are Pastors and Doctors never lawfully sent but when they are in Oecumenical Councils for it is plain A. C. speaks of them as lawfully sent 2. Have Pastors and Doctors met in Oecumenical Councils in all Ages I would you could prove a truly Oecumenical Council in any Age but sure you never pretend to it in all Ages yet if A. C's words have any sense in them they speak of such an Infallibility as belongs to the Church in all Ages And therefore this plaister is a great deal too narrow to cover the sore But say you Every Authour is to be understood to mean by his words what they will properly bear and is consonant with the meaning of his other words I most freely grant you this and all that follows if you will prove it impossible for any man to speak non-sense or contradictions But I can more easily prove it very possible for a man to speak things which contradict one the other which I have sufficiently proved from your own dear self in this very Discourse
Catholick Church may be easily discerned which it is plain from the proceedings in it were as in all such emergent cases what should be determined and agreed on by the consent of the Catholick Church i. e. of those Churches which all consented in the same Catholick Faith and therefore made up one Catholick Church Now if the Church of Rome had been the center of Ecclesiastical communion and had infused Catholick unity into the Church at this time what way or possibility had there been for restoring the Churches unity Neither was the appeal made to forraign Churches meerly because Rome it self was divided and so the Controversie could not be ended there but it appears from the whole story of the proceedings that this was looked on as the proper means for preserving the unity of the Catholick Church at that time when the Faith and communion of the Apostolical Churches were so fully known and distinguished from all others These things will more fully appear from St. Cyprians Epistle to Antonianus upon the occasion of this Schism Who it seems at first adhered to Cornelius and with him to the Catholick Church not as though his joyning with Cornelius was the cause of his being with the Catholick Church but because in joyning with him he joyned with the Catholick Church which declared for him but it seems afterwards by some Letters of Novatianus he began to stagger and desires Cyprian to give him an account what Heresie Novatianus broached and what the reason was why Cornelius communicated with the lapsed persons As to which particulars he endeavours to satisfie him and withall to give an account why they joyned with Cornelius in opposition to Novatianus and what the practise of the Church was as to lapsed persons and on what reasons it was built wherein he tells him That though some of their own Bishops had formerly denyed communion to lapsed persons yet they did not recede from the Vnity of the Catholick Church or communion of their Fellowships because by them they were admitted For saith he the bond of concord remaining and the communion of the Catholick Church continuing every Bishop orders and disposeth his own actions as one that must give an account of his design to God Doth St. Cyprian here speak like one that believed the Church of Rome to be the center of Ecclesiastical communion or that the unity of the Church lay in acknowledging the Pope to be Christs Vicar or in dependence on the Church of Rome when every Bishop is left to himself and God in all such things which he may do and yet hold communion with the Catholick Church And therefore afterwards he tells us That there is one Church divided into many members throughout the world and one Episcopal office spread abroad by the consenting multitude of many Bishops If this Church be one in this sense and the whole Government of the Church but as one Bishoprick as all the Bishops unanimously consent in the management of it then here is not the least foundation for the Catholick Churches taking its denomination causally from the Roman Church and much less for the Bishops having dependence on her or relation to her Since the care and government of the Church by these words of Cyprian appears to be equally committed to all the Bishops of the Catholick Church And from thence it was that in this Epistle we read that St. Cyprian writ to the Church of Rome after the death of Fabianus to advise them what to do in the case of lapsed persons which letters of his were sent through the world which Rigaltius well observes did arise from that unity of Ecclesiastical discipline whereby Cyprian not doubting but the care of all Churches was upon him dispatched these letters to the Clergy at Rome from whence they were sent through the Catholick Church as an evidence that there was but one Episcopal office in the whole Church part of which was committed in full power to every Bishop Thus we see a quite different account given of the unity of the Catholick Church than what you from Cardinal Perron would perswade us of It being an easie matter for men of wit and parts especially such as that great Cardinal was master of to coyn distinctions to make the most absurd things seem plausible but yet when they come to be examined they are found to have no other bottom but the invention of that person who coined them And that it is so as to this distinction of the formal causal and participative Catholick Church will be further evident from another case which happened in St. Cyprians time which was this Felicissimus and Fortunatus being cast out of communion by a Synod of African Bishops when they saw they could do little good in Africa run over to Rome and bring letters to Cornelius the Bishop there misrepresenting the whole business of their being ejected out of the Church on purpose to perswade Cornelius to admit them into communion Who at first being unwilling to hearken to them was at last by their threats and menaces brought to receive their letters Upon which St. Cyprian writes an Epistle to Cornelius wherein he tells him That if the threats of such profligate persons should relax the Churches discipline all the power and strength of it would be soon taken away that the ground of all Schism and Heresie arises from disobedience to the Bishop Certainly he doth not mean the Bishop of Rome but every Bishop in the Catholick Church for it was not Cornelius but Cyprian and the African Bishops who were disobeyed upon which he falls upon the matter of their appeal to a forraign Church and after some fair commendations of the Church of Rome the meaning of which will be afterwards examined he very sharply condemns these appeals to forraign Churches as unreasonable unjust and dishonourable to those Bishops whose sentence they appealed from For What cause saith he could these persons have of coming and declaring against their Bishops For either they are pleased in what they have done and continue in their wickedness or if they are displeased at it and recede from it they know whither to return For since it is decreed by us all and it is a thing just and reasonable in it self that every ones cause be heard where the fault was committed and every Pastour hath a part of the flock committed to him which he is to rule and govern as being to give an account of it to God it is requisite that those whom we rule over ought not to run about and break the concord of Bishops by their headdiness and subtilty but there to defend their cause where they may have accusers and witnesses of their faults Vnless it be that to a few desperate and profligate persons the authority of the Bishops of Africa seems less to them who have already sate in judgement upon them and solemnly condemned them lately for their crimes Can any thing be more express
the Faith of the Roman Church considered as a particular Church For any one who reads that Epistle will easily see that St. Hierome there speaks of the Roman Faith not as it proceeds from the Roman Church but as it was received by it and that he doth not understand it of the then present Roman Faith any further then it agreed with that Faith which the Apostle commended in them So that the utmost which can be extracted out of this testimony is that it was the glory of the Church of Alexandria to hold the same Faith which the Primitive Roman Church did for which the Apostle commended it Which is apparent by the design of the whole Epistle which is to encourage Theophilus the Patriarch of Alexandria to suppress the Nefarions Heresie as he calls it of the Origenists for it seems Theophilus then dealt more mildly with them which Hierome was displeased at And therefore tells him that although he took some care by the discipline of the Church to reduce them yet that was not enough and thence brings in these words But withall know that nothing is more our design then to preserve the rights of Christ and not to transgress the bounds of our Fathers and alwayes to remember the Roman Faith commended by the mouth of the Apostle which it is the glory of the Church of Alexandria that she is a partaker of If you had dealt so fairly as to have cited St. Hieromes words at large any one might easily see how remote they were from your purpose it being manifest by them that St. Hieromes only design was To perswade Theophilus to assert the ancient Faith against the incroachments of modern Heresies and to incourage him to it mentions that commendation which was given to the ancient Faith by the Apostle writing to the Romans upon their receiving it and therefore since the same Faith was in the Church of Alexandria which the Romans were commended for receiving of Theophilus ought to be a vigorous assertor of it against the oppositions of Hereticks But how from hence we should inferr that the Church of Rome was the fountain of Faith as well as center of communion is a thing we are yet to seek for till you further direct us Yet it may be the strength of it lyes in this That the Roman Faith was commended by the Apostle And was not the Faith of other Churches where it was pure commended as well as that And although the Fathers in their complemental addresses to the Church of Rome were pleased often to mention this That the Roman Faith was praised by the apostle yet as Rigaltius well observes That the Latin Fathers took those words of the Apostle as though their Faith were more pure and sincere then in other places whereas the Apostle only saith that he gave thanks to God that there was such a fame abroad that the Romans who swayed the world had embraced the Christian Faith Which by reason of the dignity of the City which was head of the world and Empress of Nations did conduce much to the propagation of the Christian Faith For that there was no peculiar excellency in the Roman Faith above the Faith of other Churches appears from the scope of this Epistle which was to instruct and settle them in the right Faith and from the testimonies of the Author of the Commentaries under St. Ambrose's name and St. Hierome himself The former tells us The reason why St. Paul commended their Faith was Because though they saw no miracles yet they believed though not so purely as they ought to have done And afterwards saith That St. Paul commends their Faith although it were not exact according to rule yet since by that they came to worship God in Christ he rejoyceth in it knowing they might increase more in it And St. Hierome elsewhere speaking without design or interest saith Not that the Romans have any other kind of Faith then what all other Churches have but that there was greater devotion and simplicity in believing And withall adds that the very same faults which the Apostle condemned them for then did continue still among them the greatest of which was Pride And if this present Controversie do not make good St. Hieromes observation till this time we are strangely mistaken for what greater Pride can there be than for any particular Church to arrogate the title of Catholick to her self and to make all others no farther Catholick then they participate of her Faith and Communion Your next Testimony is that of John the Patriarch of Constantinople who did in his Epistle to Hormisda judge those to be severed from the communion of the Catholick Church who did not consent in all things with the See Apostolick but the main force of your testimonies lyes in a presumption that men will never take the pains to examine them We must therefore consider the occasion and manner of the writing this Epistle for those words you cite are not the words of the Patriarch himself but of the form of subscription required by Hormisda in order to an Vnion of the Eastern and Western Churches which had been then a long time in a Schism For after that Acacius stood up so resolutely in defence of the rights of his See at Constantinople the Roman Bishops who made it then their design to infringe the liberties of other Churches the better to inhance their own would by no means admit of any reconciliation unless the names of Acacius and those who defended him in that See being his Successours as Phravita Euphemius Macedonius c. were expunged out of the Diptychs of the Church which being so unjust and unreasonable a demand for a long time the Patriarchs of Constantinople would by no means assent to it But after the death of the Emperour Anastasius Justin succeeds in the throne one who made it his business to have this breach made up in order to which he writes to Hormisda and earnestly perswades him to a reconciliation and so likewise doth the Patriarch John But it hath been the common practise of the Bishops of that Church to be therein unlike the unjust Judge that they will not be wrought on by importunities but have been the more implacable the more they have been sought to as it appeared in this present case For this soure and inflexible Pope would not yield to any terms of Vnion but upon conditions of his own prescribing which were the expunging of Acacius and subscribing that form which he sent to them Which when the Emperour and Patriarch saw though they were sufficiently displeased at it yet out of their greedy desire of peace they were contented rather to swallow these hard conditions than suffer the Schism to remain still Now it is in this form of subscription that these words are contained wherein they promise not to recite the names of those in the sacred mysteries who are severed from the communion of the Catholick
Church i. e. who consent not in all things with the See Apostolick But lest these words being thus inserted by the Pope himself should be interpreted to the disadvantage of other Churches and particularly that of Constantinople The Patriarch makes a Preface to that Subscription by way of Protestation wherein after declaring the reception of the Popes letters and congratulating the hopes of Vnion he manifests his own desire of peace and his willingness to refuse the communion of all Hereticks For saith he I look on those most holy Churches of your elder and our new Rome as both making but one Church And after declaring his assent to the decrees of the four General Councils he adds That those who opposed them he judged fallen off à Sanct â Dei generali Apostolicâ Ecclesiâ from the holy Catholick and Apostolick Church Now when the Patriarch was thus careful to explain himself so as to assert that the Church of Rome and that of Constantinople made but one Church when he adds what he means by the Catholick Church viz. the truely General and Apostolical Church inferr as much from Hormisda's words as you will I am sure you can do little to your purpose from the Patriarchs taking them in the sense he explains himself in by this Protestation So that the meaning of them is only this that as he judged the Church of Rome a member of the Catholick Church whose Vnity required that those who were out of communion in one Church should be so with the rest so he consented to acknowledge them justly excommunicated whom the Church of Rome would have to be so So that hence nothing ariseth to your purpose more then will equally advance the authority of any other particular Church whose excommunications did oblige the whole Church as we have seen already in the case of Sinope and Ptolemais You proceed to another Testimony of St. Austin addressing himself to the Donatists telling them That the succession of the Roman Bishops is the rock which the proud gates of Hell overcome not thereby insinuating that the very succession of those Bishops is in some true sense the Catholick Church But from whence doth it appear that the succession of the Roman Bishops is the Rock here spoken of For St. Austin was there arguing against the Donatists and shewing them the danger of being separated from the unity of the Catholick Church that if they were cut off from the vine they would wither and be in danger to be cast into the fire and therefore exhorts them to come and be planted into the vine it being a grief to them to see them cut off Now in order to this he brings in the former words to acquaint them with the way whereby they might better understand the Catholick Church which could not in reason be confined to their own age but must be derived from the Apostles So that his counsel is of the same nature with that of Tertullian and Irenaeus who put men upon a diligent search into the successions of the Apostolical Churches But now when by this search they have found out the Catholick Church he tells them That is the Rock which the proud gates of hell cannot overcome For so elsewhere St. Austin calls the Catholick Church a Rock as he calls it likewise a House and a City in several places of these disputations against the Donatists As here before he calls it the Vine from whence all who are cut off wither and dye But what is all this to the particular Church of Rome which none of the Disputes with the Donatists at all concerned As is fully manifest from the whole management of that Controversie in which though he was so much put upon shewing what and where the Catholick Church was yet he never once expressed any such thing as that the Church was called Catholick from any relation to the Church of Rome but still mentions it as a particular Church which with other Churches made up one Catholick Church So in his Commentaries on the 44. Psalm Behold Rome saith he behold Carthage behold several other Cities these are Kings daughters and have delighted the King in his honour but they all make up but one Queen How incongruous had this expression been had St. Austin believed the Roman Church to be so much above all others that the ground why any others were called Catholick was from their union with her and therefore he must according to your principles have saluted the Church of Rome as the Queen of all the rest and made other particular Churches but as her daughters and hand-maids But St. Austin knew of no such difference but looked on all particular Churches whether at Rome Carthage or elsewhere as making up but one Catholick Church And to the same purpose he frequently speaks when he sayes That the Church is call'd One in regard of her Vnity and Many in regard from the several Societies of Christians abroad in the world When he calls the several Churches members of that one Church which is spread all over the world without setting any note of discrimination upon one above all the rest When he reckons the Roman Corinthian Galatian Ephesian Churches together and that all these and the Churches propagated from them do conspire in one Vniversal Church But the places are so many to this purpose in him that it would look too much like ostentation to offer to prove a matter so evident to all that read any thing in him And is it possible then for you to think That St. Austin made the succession of Bishops at Rome in any sense the Catholick Church You might as well say that he made the Church spread all over the world a particular Church as that he made any particular Church whether at Rome or elsewhere for he makes no difference to be in any sense the Vniversal Church But that which you seem to lay the greatest force on is the testimony of Optatus Milevitanus Who say you after he had said that St. Peter was head of all the Apostles and that he would have been a Schismatick who should have erected another chair against that singular one of St. Peter as also that in that chair of St. Peter being but one Vnity was to be kept by all he adds that with Syricius then Pope he himself was united in communion with whom the whole world saith he meaning the whole Catholick Church agrees by communicatory letters in one Society of communion See here say you how clearly he makes the union with the Bishop of Rome the measure of the Catholick Church which the Bishop calls a Jesuitism and further proves himself to be in the Catholick Church because he was in communion with the See of St. Peter For our better understanding the meaning of these words of Optatus we must consider the state of the Controversie between Optatus and Parmenianus by which it will appear how
with the power of the City the potentior principalitas in Irenaeus which advanced its reputation to the height it was then at What matters of doctrine do you find brought to the Church of Rome to be Infallibly decided there in St. Cyprians time how little did St. Cyprian believe this when he so vehemently opposed the judgement of Stephen Bishop of Rome in the case of rebaptization Doth he write speak or carry himself in that Controversie like one that owned that Church of Rome to be head of all other Churches to which they must be subordinate in matter of doctrine Nay in the very next words St. Cyprian argues against appeals to Rome and is it possible then to think that in these words he should give such an absolute power and authority to it And therefore any one who would reconcile St. Cyprian to himself must by those words of Ecclesia principalis only understand the dignity and eminency and not the power much less the Infallibility of the Church of Rome And no more is implyed in the Second That it is said to be the fountain of Sacerdotal Vnity which some think may probably referr to the Priesthood of the Church of Africk which had its rise from the Church of Rome as appears by Tertullian and others in which sense he might very well say that the Vnity of the Priesthood did spring from thence or if it be taken in a more large and comprehensive sense it can import no more then that the Church of Rome was owned as the Principium Vnitatis which certainly is a very different thing from an infallible judgement in matters of Faith For what connexion is there between Vnity in Government and Infallibility in Faith Suppose the Church of Rome should be owned as the principal Member of the Catholick Church and therefore that the Vnity of the Church should begin there in regard of the dignity of it doth it thence follow that there must be an absolute subordination of all other Churches to it Nothing then can be inferr'd from either of those particulars that by perfidia errour in Faith must be understood taking those two expressions in the most favourable sense that can be put upon them But considering the present state of the Church of Rome at the time when Felicissimus and Fortunatus came thither I am apt to think another interpretation more probable than either of the foregoing For which we must remember that there was a Schism at Rome between Novatianus and Cornelius the former challenging to be Bishop there as well as the latter upon which a great breach was made among them Now these persons going out of Africa to Rome that they might manage their business with the more advantage address themselves to Cornelius and his party upon which St. Cyprian saith Navigare audent ad Petri Cathedram atque ad Ecclesiam principalem unde Vnitas sacerdotalis exorta est thereby expressing their confidence that they not only went to Rome but when they were there they did not presently side with the Schismatical party of the Novatians there but as though they had been true Catholicks they go to Cornelius who being the legal successour of St. Peter in opposition to Novatianus calls his See the chair of St. Peter and the principal Church and the spring of the Vnity of the Priesthood because the contrary party of Novatianus had been the cause of all the Schism and disunion which had been among them And in this sense which seems very agreeable to St. Cyprians words and design we may easily understand what this perfidia was viz. that falseness and perfidious dealing of these persons that although they were Schismaticks themselves yet they were so farr from seeming so at their coming to Rome that as though they had been very good Catholicks they seek to joyn in communion with Cornelius and the Catholick party with him By which we see what little probability there is from those expressions that perfidia must be taken for an errour in Faith But 3. You say To what purpose else doth he mention St. Pauls commendation of their Faith if this perfidia were not immediately opposite to it But then inform us what part of that Apostolical Faith was it which Felicissimus and Fortunatus sought to violate at Rome It is apparent their whole design was to be admitted into communion with the Church of Rome which in all probability is that access here spoken of if therefore this perfidia imported some errour in Faith it must be some errour broached by those particular persons as contrary to the old Roman Faith which was extold by the Apostle And although these persons might be guilty of errours yet the ground of their going to Rome was not upon any matter of Doctrine whereby they sought to corrupt the Church of Rome but in order to the justifying of their Schism by being admitted into the communion of that Church Notwithstanding then any thing you have produced to the contrary there is no necessity of understanding perfidia for an errour in matter of Faith And St. Cyprians mentioning the praise given to the Romans for their Faith by the Apostle was not to shew the opposition between that and the perfidia as an errour in Faith but that being the greatest Elogium of the Church of Rome extant in Scripture he thought it now most convenient to use it the better to engage Cornelius to oppose the proceedings of the Schismaticks there Although withall I suppose St. Cyprian might give him some taste of his old office of a Rhetorician in the allusion between fides and perfidia without ever intending that perfidia should be taken in any other sense then what was proper to the cause in hand You having effected so little in the solution of his Lordships first answer you have little cause to boast in your following words That hence his other explication also vanishes into smoak viz. when he asserts that Perfidia non potest may be taken hyperbolically for non facile potest because this interpretation suits not with those high Elogiums given by St. Cyprian to the Roman Church as being the principal Church the Church whence Vnity of Faith and Discipline is derived to all other Christian Churches If you indeed may have the liberty to interpret St. Cyprians words as you please by adding such things to them of which there is no intimation in what he saith you may make what you please unsuitable to them For although he calls it the principal Church from whence the Vnity of the Priesthood is sprung yet what is this to the Vnity of Faith and Discipline as derived from thence to all other Churches as you would perswade the unwary reader that these were St. Cyprians words which are only your groundless interpretation of them And therefore there is no such improbability in what his Lordship sayes That this may be only a Rhetorical excess of speech in which St. Cyprian may
he did not see them sown and our Saviour hath told us That the time of sowing tares by the enemy was when the men were asleep So we say The errours and corruptions of your Church came in in a time of great Ignorance when little notice was taken of them and few records preserved of those times and all the passages of them Since Learning and Religion commonly decay and flourish together How is it possible there should be as exact an account given of the decay of Religion as of the flourishing of it Besides Are there not many things you judge errours and corruptions your selves which you can give no account when they first entred into the Church As the necessity of communicating Infants name us the person who first broached that Doctrine and the time in which it was first received in the Church That no souls of men departed shall see God till the day of resurrection is I suppose with you an errour yet it would puzzle you to find out the first Authour of it So for the rebaptizing Hereticks and many things of a like nature it is easier to shew when they appeared publickly than when they first came into the Church And as evident is it in the decay of the primitive Discipline of the Church the altering the orders of penitents and the rites belonging to them the leaving of the communicatory Letters between Churches and many other customes of the Church grown into disuse and yet I suppose you will not presume to name the persons who first altered the former orders of the Church and methinks this is as reasonable as the naming the punctual time when other corruptions came in If you say the primitive Discipline decayed gradually and insensibly so say I that the Churches corruptions came in as the other went out in the same gradual and insensible manner and if you cannot name the precise time of the one it is not reasonable you should expect the other from us 2. We may have sufficient reason to judge what are errours and corruptions in a Church though we cannot fix on the time when they came in Which is by comparing them with that Rule of Faith which is delivered down by an interrupted tradition to us and with the practice of the first Ages of the Christian Church What is apparently contrary to either of these we have reason to reject though we cannot determine when it first came in For as long as these are our certain standards it matters not who first departed from them as long as we see that they have departed But when we own an absolute and infallible Rule of Faith and manners to question Whether any thing contrary to it be an errour or no because we cannot tell when it first began would be as if the Aegyptians when they saw their Land overflowed by the Nile should question Whether it were so or no because they could not find out the head of Nilus 3. They who assert their Doctrines and Practices to be Apostolical are bound to shew the continued succession of them from the Apostles times And if they fail in this upon their own principles they must be errours and corruptions though the punctual time of their first obtaining in the Church cannot be set down Since therefore you affirm you are bound to prove If you say The judgement of your Church being infallible you need prove no more than that I answer you must prove that this Infallibility then hath been ever received in the Church but if there be not the least footstep of it in the records of the ancient Church we justly look on this as an errour of the first magnitude though we cannot tell you the minute of its first rising 4. We have sufficient evidence from your selves that many Doctrines and Practices are owned by you which are of no great antiquity in the Christian Church Thus by the confession of Scotus Transubstantiation is no elder than the Council of Lateran Purgatory not much heard of in the primitive Church by the acknowledgement of Bishop Fisher Communion in one kind confessed by most to be contrary to the primitive practice and institution Prayer in an unknown tongue can be no elder than the general disuse of the Latin tongue in the Roman Provinces And so for many others for which we have the confessions of your own party but I need not insist upon that since your very Doctrine of the Churches power to declare matters of Faith may make things necessary in one Age which were not in a foregoing and in that case sure it is no great difficulty to tell you when some things of School-points became necessary Doctrines but then the Question goes off from the time to the matter Whether any thing declared by your Church can be an errour but of that enough hath been said already 5. There may be a sufficient account given why the beginnings of errours and corruptions in your Church have been so obscure because they came not in all of a sudden but some at one time some at another because they rise gradually as is apparent in Invocation of Saints and Worship of Images because many of those things which ended in great corruptions were taken up at first out of good designs to win more upon the Gentile world because many things were at first practised freely which afterwards were urged as necessary because Barbarism came into the Church along with these corruptions because many who gave occasion to them were persons of great esteem in their age and others strove to follow their example more than the Rule because the state of the Church did very much alter from it self in several ages which altered mens apprehensions and judgements of things in regard of their suitableness and necessity because those persons who brought in and contended for these things were the persons chiefly in power then in the Church which hindered their being cast out of communion as others had been because a long time most of these errours and corruptions were but the private opinions and practices of a faction though then the more prevalent in the Church and therefore not so vehemently opposed in the first rise of them as when this imposthumated matter was grown to a head and then there was a necessity of lancing it These and several other reasons might be given why the first originals of errours and corruptions in your Church cannot with so much clearness be manifested as that they were errours and corruptions Although such who would take the pains to travel in an argument of that nature might with very great probability trace the most both of your errours and corruptions to the time and age when they were first publickly owned and received But thus much may here suffice as to your demand That if your Church be not the same she was we should mention the time when the change was made As though Chronical distempers could not be known unless we could set
all for such things without which that can be no Church separates from the communion of the Catholick Church but he that separates only from particular Churches as to such things which concern not their Being is only separated from the communion of those Churches and not the Catholick And therefore supposing that all particular Churches have some errours and corruptions in them though I should separate from them all I do not separate from the communion of the whole Church unless it be for something without which those could be no Churches An evidence of which is that by my declaring the grounds of my separation to be such errours and corruptions which are crept into the communion of such Churches and imposed on me in order to it I withall declare my readiness to joyn with them again if those errours and corruptions be left out And where there is this readiness of communion there is no absolute separation from the Church as such but only suspending communion till such abuses be reformed Which is therefore more properly a separation from the errours than the communion of such a Church Wherefore if we suppose that there is no one Visible Church whose communion is not tainted with some corruptions though if these corruptions be injoyned as conditions of communion I cannot communicate with any of those Churches yet it follows not that I am separated from the external communion of the Catholick Church but that I only suspend communion with those particular Churches till I may safely joyn with them As suppose all the particular men I can converse with were infected with Leprosie my not associating with them doth not imply that I am separated from the communion of all mankind but that I am loath to be infected as they are and therefore withdraw my self till I can meet with such healthful persons with whom I may safely associate again And if several other persons be of the same mind with me and we therefore joyn together Do we therefore divide our selves from the whole world by only taking care of our own safety And especially if any company of such leprous persons should resolve that none should live among them but such as would eat of those meats which brought that distemper upon them our withdrawing our selves and associating without them will still appear more reasonable and commendable Therefore we say We do not necessarily separate from all Churches that have errours or corruptions in them supposing those errours and corruptions be not imposed on us as conditions of communion and thence though we should grant No one visible Church free from taint or corruption yet it is not necessary we should separate from them all For we may lawfully joyn in Communion with Churches having errours and corruptions if our joyning be not an approbation of them Thus though the Greeks Armenians Albigenses Abyssms may have some errours or corruptions yet if they be not Fundamental and be not injoyned as necessary to be approved in order to their Communion notwithstanding them we may lawfully Communicate with them It doth not then at all follow that if there may be no one visible Church free from errour and corruption it would be necessary to separate from the Communion of the Catholick Church because 1. All those particular Churches may not make those errours conditions of Communion 2. Though they did we separate not from them as Catholick but as corrupt and erroneous particular Churches And therefore you might have spared your labour in telling us from the Holy Fathers and the Reverend and learned Dr. Hammond That it can never be lawful to separate from the Catholick Church for we assert the same but have made it appear that it follows not from the premises which were laid down His Lordship having said That the Roman Church before Luther was a corrupt and tainted Church in his Margin produceth a Citation to that purpose of Cardinal de Alliaco who acknowledgeth infinite abuses Schisms and Heresies to prevail over the Christian world so that it is plain The Church of God stands in need of due reformation From which his Lordship saith That it will hardly sink into any mans judgement that so great a man as Pet. de Alliaco was in that Church should speak thus if he did not see some errours in the Doctrine of that Church as well as the manners To this you answer That he speaks not of false Doctrines taught by the Roman Church but of Schisms and Heresies raised against the Church not fostered by her in all parts of Christendom But I appeal to any indifferent Reader of this Testimony whether he can conceive that the Cardinal intended to acquit or accuse the Roman Church in those words of his For taking them in your sense they must contain a high commendation of the Roman Church that in the midst of so many Heresies and Schisms raised against her she preserved her Faith entire and think you that he that said The Church of God needed reformation thought there was nothing in the Church which stood in need of it And therefore this Testimony doth sufficiently prove that the Roman Church was a tainted and corrupted Church If there be sufficient evidence that there are tares sown in the Church of Rome it is not to much purpose to enquire Whether they were sown while the Bishops slept or whether they themselves did not help to sow them But it seems in their private capacities they might sow them as private Doctors and then it is not likely that in their publick capacity they would pluck them up If the Catholick Faith only as you tell us oblige us to maintain that the Pope is Infallible when he defines a General Council then there will be opportunity enough for errours to be sown and grow up in the interval of such definitions But you further add That though this be all which men are obliged to maintain for no man can be bound to impossibilities yet that it is a very pious opinion to hold That no Popes have personally erred as private Doctors i. e. you have a very good mind to maintain it if you knew how for that is the meaning of your pious opinion For if you thought it had been defensible no doubt it had been de fide long ago But it was hard thwarting the Records of former ages wherein the errours of Popes and their mutual contradictions are so visible to all that search after them and therefore it was wisely concluded that this should not be held de fide but if any would venture upon a thing so acceptable at Rome as Personal Infallibility is it should be accounted a very pious undertaking And accordingly Bellarmin hath with the greatest care and industry endeavoured it in several Chapters but as his Lordship truly saith All Bellarmin's labour though great and full of art is not able to wash them clean And this if you had undertaken the defence of Bellarmin should have been
just cause of actual separation of one Church from another in that Catholick body of Christ the Church of Rome hath given as great cause as any since as Stapleton grants there is scarce any sin that can be thought on by man Heresie only excepted with which that Sea hath not been fouly stained especially from eight hundred years after Christ. And he need not except Heresie into which Biel grants it possible the Bishops of the Sea may fall And Stella and Almain grant it freely that some of them did fall and so ceased to be Heads of the Church and left Christ God be thanked at that time of his Vicars defection to look to his Cure himself But you tell us The discovery of some few motes darkens not the brightness of the Sunshine I wonder what you account Beams if the Sins of your Popes and others be but motes with you We grant that the Sun himself hath his Maculae but they are such as do not Eclipse his Light we find the Maculae in your Church but we are to seek for the bright Sunshine Or Doth it lye in the service of your Religious Votaries For that is the great part of the conspicuous Piety of your Church which you instance in But Is this indeed the bright Sunshine of your Church that there are so many thousand of both Sexes you do well to joyn them together who tye themselves by perpetual vows never to be dissolved by their own seeking and therefore doubtless pleasing to God whether they are able to keep them or no and these pray if they understand what they say and sing Divine Hymns day and night which makes the Sunshine the brighter which you say is a strange and unheard of thing among Protestants What that men and women though not in Cloysters pray and sing Hymns to God no surely For as the Devotion of our Churches is more grave and solemn so it is likewise more pious and intelligible You pray and sing but how Let Erasmus speak who understood your praying and singing well Cantiuncularum clamorum murmurum ac bomborum ubique plus satis est si quid ista delectant Superos Do you think those Prayers and Hymns are pleasing to God which lye more in the throat than the heart And such who have been wise and devout men among your selves have been the least admirers of your mimical uncouth and superstitious devotions but have rather condemned them as vain ludicrous things and wondered as Erasmus said what they thought of Christ who imagined he could be pleased with them Quid sentiunt obsecro de Christo qui putant eum ejusmodi cantiunculis delectari Are these then the glorious parts of your Devotions your Prayers and Hymns But they pray and sing Divine Hymns day and night If this be the only excellency of your Devotion How much are you out-done by the ancient Psalliani and Euchitae that spent all their time in prayer and yet were accounted Hereticks for their pains Still you pray and sing but to whom to Saints and Angels often to the Virgin Mary with great devotion and most solemn invocations but to God himself very sparingly in comparison If this then be the warm Sunshine of your Devotions we had rather use such wherein we may be sure of Gods blessing which we cannot be in such Prayers and Hymns which attribute those honours to his creatures which belong wholly to himself But you not only sing and pray but can be very idle too and the number of those men must be called Religious Orders and the Garment of the Church is said by you to be imbroidered by the variety of them and for this Psalm 44.10 is very luckily quoted And are those indeed the ornaments of your Church which were become such sinks of wickedness that those of your Church who had any modesty left were ashamed of them and call'd loud for a Reformation Those were indeed such Gardens wherein it were more worth looking for useful or odoriferous flowers as you express it than for Diogenes to find out an honest man in his croud of Citizens Therefore not to dispute with you the first Institutions of Monastick life nor how commendable the nature of it is nor the conveniencies of it where there are no indispensable vows the main things we blame in them are the restraints of mens liberties whatever circumstances they are in the great degeneracy of them in all respects from their Primitive Institutions the great snares which the consciences of such as are engaged in them are almost continually exposed to the unusefulness of them in their multitudes to the Christian world the general unserviceableness of the persons who live in them the great debaucheries which they are subject to and often over-run with and if these then be the greatest Ornaments of your Churches Garments it is an easie matter to espy the spots which she hath upon her What you add concerning the good lives of Papists and bad of Protestants if taken universally iâ— as unjust as uncharitable if indefinitely it shews only that not thâ— particular lives of men on either side but the tendency of the Doctrine to promote or hinder the sanctity of them is here to be regarded And to that you speak afterwards but in a most false and virulent manner when you say That though sins be committed among you they are not defended or justified as good works whereas among Protestants Darkness it self is called Light and the greatest of all sins viz. Heresie Schism Sacriledge Rebellion c. together with all the bad spawn they leave behind them are cryed up for perfect Virtue Zeal good Reformation and what not I doubt not but you would be ready to defend and justifie this open Raillery of yours and call it a good work notwithstanding what you said before If we had a mind to follow you in such things How easie a matter were it to rip up all the frauds impostures villanies of all sorts and kinds which have been committed by those who have sate in your Infallible Chair and charge them all on your Church with much more justice than you do the miscarriages of any under the name of Protestants For the Protestant Churches disown such persons and condemn those practices with the greatest indignation whereas you excuse palliate and plead for the lives of the Popes as much as you dare and not out-face the Sun at Noon which hath laid open their Villanies Where do the Principles of Protestants incourage or plead for Heresie Schism Sacriledge Rebellion c. much less cry them up as Heroicall actions Doth not the Church of England disown and disclaim such things to the uttermost Have not her sufferings made it appear how great a hater she is of Heresies Schisms Sacriledge and Rebellion Did she ever cry up those for Martyrs who died in Gun-powder treasons Did she ever teach it lawful to disobey Heretical Princes and to take away their lives
the stage in the Questions of the Pope's Authority and Infallibility of General Councils I come to your following Chapter in which you enter upon the Vindication of the Roman Churches Authority 2. That which his Lordship hath long insisted on and evidently proved is The Right which particular Churches have to reform themselves when the General Church cannot for impediments or will not for negligence do it And your Answers to his proofs have had their weakness sufficiently laid open the only thing here objected further is Whether in so doing particular Churches do not condemn others of Errours in Faith To which his Lordship answers That to reform themselves and to condemn others are two different works unless it fall out so that by reforming themselves they do by consequence condemn any other that is guilty in that point in which they reform themselves and so far to judge and condemn others is not only lawful but necessary A man that lives Religiously doth not by and by sit in judgement and condemn with his mouth all prophane livers but yet while he is silent his very life condemns them To what end his Lordship produceth this Instance any one may easily understand but you abuse it as though his Lordship had said That Protestants only by their Religious lives do condemn your Church and upon this run out into a strange declamation about Who the men are that live so Religiously They who to propagate the Gospel the better marry wives contrary to the Canons and bring Scripture for it Yes surely much more then they who to propagate your Church enjoy Concubines for which if they can bring some Canons of your Church I am sure they can bring no Scripture for it They who pull down Monasteries both of Religious men and women I see you are still as loth to part them as they are to be parted themselves but if all their lives be no more Religious then the most of them have been the pulling of them down might be a greater act of Religion then living in them They who cast Altars to the ground More certainly then they who worshipped them They who partly banish Priests and partly put them to death Or they who commit treasons and do things worthy of death But you are doubtless very Religious and tender-hearted men whose consciences would never suffer you to banish or put any to death for the sake of Religion no not in Queen Maries time here in England They who deface the very Tombs of Saints and will not permit them to rest even when they are dead Or they who profess to worship dead Saints and martyr living ones with Fire and Faggot If this be your religious living none who know what Religion means will be much taken with it I shall easily grant that you stick close to the Pope but are therein far enough from the Doctrine or life of St. Peter If any of you have endured Sequestrations Imprisonments Death it self I am sure it was not for any good you did not for the Catholick Faith but if you will for some Catholick Treasons such as would have enwrapt a whole Nation in misery If this be your suffering persecution for righteousness sake you will have little cause to rejoyce in your Fellow-sufferers But if you had not a mind to calumniate us and provoke us to speak sad truths of you all this might have been spared for his Lordship only chose this Instance to shew that a Church or person may be condemned consequentially which was not intentionally But you say Our Church hath formally condemned yours by publick and solemn censures in the 39. Articles Doth his Lordship deny that our Church in order to our own reformation hath condemned many things which your Church holds No but that our Churches main intention was to reform it self but considering the corruption and degeneracy of your Church she could not do it without consequentially condemning yours and that she did justly in so doing we are ready on all occasions to justifie But his Lordship asks If one particular Church may not judge or condemn another What must then be done where particulars need reformation To which his Adversary gives a plain Answer That particular Churches must in that case as Irenaeus intimateth have recourse to the Church of Rome which hath more powerful principality and to her Bishop who is the chief Pastour of the whole Church as being St. Peters Successour c. This is the rise and occasion of the present Controversie To this his Lordship Answers That it is most true indeed the Church of Rome hath had and hath yet more powerful Principality then any other particular Church But she hath not this power from Christ. The Roman Patriarch by Ecclesiastical constitutions might perhaps have a Primacy of order but for principality of power the Patriarchs were as even as equal as the Apostles were before them The truth is this more powerful Principality the Roman Bishops got under the Emperours after they became Christian and they used the matter so that they grew big enough to oppose nay to depose the Emperours by the same power which they had given them And after this other particular Churches especially here in the West submitted themselves to them for Succour and Protections sake And this was one main cause that swel'd Rome into this more powerful Principality and not any right given by Christ to make that Prelate Pastour of the whole Church To this you Answer That to say that the Roman Churches Principality is not from Christ is contrary to St. Austin and the whole Milevitan Council who in their Epistle to Innocent the first profess that the Popes Authority is grounded upon Scripture and consequently proceeds from Christ. But whoever seriously reads and throughly considers that Epistle will find no such thing as that you aim at there For the scope of the Epistle is to perswade Pope Innocent to appear against Coelestius and Pelagius to that end they give first an account of their Doctrine shewing how pernicious and contrary to Scripture it was after which they tell him that Pelagius being at Jerusalem was like to do a great deal of mischief there but that many of the Brethren opposed him and especially St. Hierom. But we say they do suppose that through the mercy of our Lord Christ assisting you those which hold such perverse and pernicious principles may more easily yield by your Authority drawn out of Scripture Where they do not in the least dream of his Authority as Vniversal Pastor being grounded on Scripture but of his appearing against the Pelagians with his Authority drawn out of Scripture that is to that Authority which he had in the Church by the reputation of the Roman See the Authority of the Scripture being added which was so clear against the Pelagians or both these going together were the most probable way to suppress their Doctrine And it hath been sufficiently proved
and by an Epistle of Pelagius 1. A. D. 555. it appears that the Bishops of Aquileia and Milan were wont to ordain each other which though he would have believed was only to save charges in going to Rome yet as that learned and ingenuous person Petrus de Marcâ observes the true reason of it was because Milan was the Head of the Italick Diocese as appears by the Council of Aquileia and therefore the ordination of the Bishop of Aquileia did of right belong to the Bishop of Milan and the ordination of the Bishop of Milan did belong to him of Aquileia as the chief Metropolitan of the general Synod of the Italick Diocese Although afterwards the Bishops of Rome got it so far into their hands that their consent was necessary for such an ordination yet that was only when they began more openly to encroach upon the liberties of other Churches But as the same learned Author goes on those Provinces which lay out of Italy did undoubtedly ordain their own Metropolitans without the authority or consent of the Bishop of Rome which he there largely proves of the African Spanish and French Churches It follows then from the scope of the Nicene Canon and the practice of the Church that the Bishop of Rome had a limited Jurisdiction as the Bishops of Alexandria and Antioch and other Primates had 2. That what Churches did enjoy priviledges before had them confirmed by this Canon as not to be altered For it makes provision against any such alteration by ordaining that the ancient Customs should be in force still And accordingly we find it decreed in the second Canon of the Constantinopolitan Council That the same limits of Dioceses should be observed which were decreed in the Council of Nice and that none should intrude to do any thing in the Dioceses of others And by the earnest and vehement Epistles of Pope Leo to Anatolius we see the main thing he had to plead against the advancement of the Patriarch of Constantinople was that by this means the most sacred Decrees of the Council of Nice would be violated We see then that those priviledges which belonged to Churches then ought still to be inviolably observed so that those Churches which then had Primates and Metropolitans of their own might plead their own right by virtue of the Nicene Canon So we find it decreed in that Council of Ephesus in the famous case of the Cyprian Bishops for their Metropolitan being dead Troilus the Bishop of Constance the Bishop of Antioch pretended that it belonged to him to ordain their Metropolitan because Cyprus was within the civil Jurisdiction of the Diocese of Antioch upon this the Cyprian Bishops make their complaint to the General Council at Ephesus and ground it upon that ancient custom which the Niccne Canon insists on viz. that their Metropolitan had been exempt from the Jurisdiction of the Bishop of Antioch and was ordained by a Synod of Cyprian Bishops which priviledge was not only confirmed to them by the Ephesine Council but a general decree passed That the rights of every Province should be preserved whole and inviolate which it had of old according to ancient custom Which was not a decree made meerly in favour of the Cyprian Bishops but a common asserting the rights of Metropolitans that they should be held inviolate Now therefore it appears that all the Churches then were far from being under one of the three Patriarchs of Rome Antioch or Alexandria for not only the three Dioceses of Pontus Asia and Thracia were exempt although afterwards they voluntarily submitted to the Patriarch of Constantinople but likewise all those Churches which were in distinct Dioceses from these had Primates of their own who were independent upon any other Upon which account it hath not only been justly pleaded in behalf of the Britannick Churches that they are exempt from the Jurisdiction of the Roman Bishop but it is ingenuously confessed by Father Barns That the Britannick Church might plead the Cyprian priviledge that it was subject to no Patriarch And although this priviledge was taken away by force and tumult yet being restored by the consent of the Kingdom in Henry 8. time and quietly enjoyed since it ought to be retained for peace sake without prejudice of Catholicism and the brand of Schism If so certainly it can be no Schism to withdraw from the usurped Authority of the Roman Church But these things have been more largely insisted on by others and therefore I pass them over 3. From thence it follows that there was then an equality not only among the Patriarchs whose name came not up till some time after the Council of Nice but among the several Primates of Dioceses all enjoying equal power and authority over their respective Dioceses without subordination to each other But here it is vehemently pleaded by some who yet are no Friends to the unlimited power of the Roman Bishop That it is hardly conceivable that he should have no other power in the Church but meerly as Head of the Roman Diocese and that it appears by the Acts of the Church he had a regular preheminence above others in ordering the Affairs of the Church To which I answer 1. If this be granted it is nothing at all to that Vniversal Pastorship over the Church which our Adversaries contend for as due by divine right and acknowledged to be so by consent of the Church Let the Bishop of Rome then quit his former plea and insist only on this and we shall speedily return an Answer and shew How far this Canonical Primacy did extend But as long as he challengeth a Supremacy upon other grounds he forfeits this right whatever it is which comes by the Canons of the Church 2. What meerly comes by the Canons of the Church cannot bind the Church to an absolute submission in case that authority be abused to the Churches apparent prejudice For the Church can never give away her Power to secure her self against whatever incroachments tend to the injury of it This power then may be rescinded by the parts of the Church when it tends to the mischief of it 3. This Canonical preheminence is not the main thing we dispute with the Church of Rome let her reform her self from all those errours and corruptions which are in her communion and reduce the Church to the primitive purity and simplicity of Faith and Worship and then see if we will quarrel with the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome according to the Canons or any regular preheminence in him meerly in order to the Churches Peace and Unity But this is not the case between us and them they challenge an unlimited power and that by divine right and nothing else will satisfie them but this although there be neither any ground in Scripture for it nor any evidence of it in the practice of the Ancient Church But however we must see what you produce for it First
by the Bishops of their own Province But this Answer is very unreasonable on these accounts 1. If Appeals do of right belong to the Bishop of Rome as Vniversal Pastor of the Church then Why not the Appeals of the Inferiour Clergy as well as Bishops Indeed if Appeals were challenged only by virtue of the Canons and those Canons limit one and not the other as the most eager pleaders for Appeals in that age pleaded only the Canons of the Church for them then there might be some reason Why one should be restrained and not the other but if they belong to him by Divine Right then all Appeals must necessarily belong to him 2. If Appeals belong to the Pope as Vniversal Pastor then no Council or persons had any thing to do to determine who should appeal and who not For this were an usurping of the Pope's priviledge for he to whom only the right of Appeals belongs can determine Who should appeal and who not and where and by whom those Controversies should be ended So that the very act of the Council in offering to limit Appeals implies that they did not believe any such Vniversal Pastorship in the Pope for had they not done so they would have waited his judgement and not offered to have determined such things themselves 3. The Appeals of the upper and inferiour Clergy cannot be supposed to be separate from each other For the Appeal of a Presbyter doth suppose the impeachment of the Bishop for some wrong done to him as in the case of Apiarius accusing Vrban the Bishop of Sicca for excommunicating him So that the Bishop becomes a party in the Appeal of a Presbyter And if Appeals be allowed to the Bishop it is supposed to be in his favour for clearing of his right the better and if it be denied to the Presbyter it would savour too much of injustice and partiality 4. The reason of the Canon extends to one as well as the other which must be supposed to prevent all those troubles and inconveniencies which would arise from the liberty of Appeals to Rome and would not these come as well by the Appeals of Bishops as of Inferiour Clergy Nay Doth not the Canon insist on that that no Appeals should be made from the Council of Bishops or the Primates of Africa but in case of Bishops Appeals this would be done as well as the other and therefore they are equally against the reason and design of the Canon 5. The case of Presbyters may be as great and considerable as that of Bishops and as much requiring the judgement of the Vniversal Pastor of the Church As for instance that very case which probably gave occasion to the Milevitan Canon viz. the going of Coelestius to Rome being condemned of Heresie in Africa Now What greater cause could there be made an Appeal to Rome in than in so great a matter of Faith as that was about the necessity of Grace And therefore Petrus de Marcá proves at large against Perron that in the Epistle of Innocent to Victricius where it is said That the greater causes must be referred to the Apostolick See is not to be understood only of the causes of Bishops but may referr to the causes of Presbyters too i. e. when they either concern matter of Faith or some doubtful piece of Church-discipline 6. The Pope notwithstanding this Canon looked on himself as no more hindred from receiving the Appeals of Presbyters than those of Bishops If therefore any difference had been made by any act of the Church surely the Pope would have remanded Presbyters back to their own Provinces again but instead of that we see he received the Appeal of Apiarius But for this a rare Answer is given viz. that though the Presbyters were forbidden to appeal yet the Pope was not forbidden to receive them if they did appeal But to what purpose then were such prohibitions made if the Pope might by his open incouragement of them upon their Appeals to him make them not value such Canons at all for they knew if they could but get to Rome they should be received for all them Notwithstanding all which hath been said you tell us That in the Council of Africk it was acknowledged that Bishops had power in their own cause to appeal to Rome for which you cite in your Margent part of an Epistle of the Council to Boniface But with what honesty and integrity you do this will appear by the story Apiarius then appealing to Zosimus he sends over Faustinus to Africa to negotiate the business of Appeals and to restore Apiarius for which he pleads the Nicene Canons an account of which will be given afterwards the Fathers all protest they could find no such thing there but they agree to send Deputies into the East to fetch the true Canons thence as hath been related already in the mean time Zosimus dyes and Boniface succeeds him but for the better satisfaction of the Pope the Council of Carthage dispatch away a Letter to Boniface to give him an account of their proceedings in which Epistle extant in the African Code of Canons after they have given an account of the business of Apiarius they proceed to the instructions which Faustinus brought with him to Africa the chief of which is that concerning Appeals to be made to Rome and then follow those words which you quote in which they say That in a Letter written the year before to Zosimus they had granted liberty to Bishops to appeal to Rome and that therein they had intimated so much to him Thus far you are right but there is usually some mystery couched in your c. for you know very well where to cut off sentences for had you added but the next words they had spoiled all your foregoing there being contained in them the full reason of what went before viz. that because the Pope pretended that the Appeals of Bishops were contained in the Nicene Canons they were contented to yield that it should be so till the true Canons were produced And is this now all their acknowledgement that Bishops might in their own causes appeal to Rome when they made only a Provisional decree What should be done till the matter came to a resolution But if you will throughly understand what their final judgement was in this business I pray read their excellent Epistle to Pope Celestine who succeeded Boniface after they had received the Nicene Canons out of the East Which being so excellent a Monument of Antiquity and giving so great light to our present Controversie I shall at large recite and render it so far as concerns this business After our bounden duty of Salutation we earnestly beseech you that hereafter you admit not so easily to your ears those that come from hence and that you admit no more into communion those whom we have cast out for your Reverence will easily perceive that this is forbid by the Council of
their rights and liberties and thereupon gave present notice to Caelestine to forbear sending his Officers amongst them lest he should seem to induce the swelling pride of the World into the Church of Christ. And this is said to have amounted into a formal separation from the Church of Rome and to have continued for the space of somewhat more then one hundred years For which his Lordship produceth two publick instruments extant among the ancient Councils the one an Epistle from Boniface 2. in whose time the reconciliation to Rome is said to be made by Eulalius then Bishop of Carthage but the separation instigante Diabolo by the Temptation of the Devil The other is an exemplar precum or Copy of the Petition of the same Eulalius in which he damns and curses all those his Predecessours which went against the Church of Rome Now his Lordship urges from hence Either these Instruments are true or false If they be false then Boniface 2. and his Accomplices at Rome or some for them are notorious forgers and that of Records of great consequence to the Government and peace of the whole Church of Christ and to the perpetual Infamy of that See and all this foolishly and to no purpose On the other side if these instruments be true then 't is manifest that the Church of Africk separated from the Church of Rome which separation was either unjust or just if unjust then St. Austin Eugenius Fulgentius and all those Bishops and other Martyrs which suffered in the Vandalike persecution dyed in actual and unrepented Schism and out of the Church If it were just then is it far more lawful for the Church of England by a National Council to cast off the Popes Vsurpation as she did than it was for the African Church to separate because then the African Church excepted only against the Pride of Rome in case of Appeals and two other Canons less material but the Church of England excepts besides this grievance against many corruptions in Doctrine with which Rome at that time was not tainted And St. Austin and those other famous men durst not thus have separated from Rome had the Pope had that powerful Principality over the whole Church of Christ and that by Christs own Ordinance and Institution as A. C. pretends he had This is the substance of his Lordships discourse to which we must consider what Answer you return Which in short is That you dare not assert the credit of those two Instruments but are very willing to think them forgeries but you say the Schismatical separation of the African Church from the Roman is inconsistent with the truth of story and confuted by many pregnant and undeniable instances which prove that the Africans notwithstanding the context in the sixth Council of Carthage touching matter of Appeals were alwayes in true Catholick Communion with the Roman Church even during the term of this pretended separation For which you produce the Testimony of Pope Caelestine concerning St. Austin the proceeding of Pope Leo in the case of Lupicinus the Testimonies of Eugenius Fulgentius Gregory and the presence of some African Bishops at Rome To all which I Answer that either the African Fathers did persist in the decree of the Council of Carthage or they did not if they did persist in it and no separation followed then the casting off the Vsurpations of the Roman See cannot incur the guilt of Schism for these African Bishops did that and it seems continued still in the Roman Communion by which it is evident that the Roman Church was not so far degenerated then as afterwards or that the Authority of those persons was so great in the Church that the Roman Bishops durst not openly break with them which is a sufficient account of what Caelestine saith concerning St. Austin that he lived and dyed in the Communion of the Roman Church If you say the reason why they were in Communion with the Roman Church was because they did not persist you must prove it by better instances then you have here brought for some of them are sufficient proofs of the contrary As appears by the case of Lupicinus an African Bishop appealing to Leo who indeed was willing enough to receive him but what of that Did not the African Bishops of Mauritania Caesariensis excommunicate him notwithstanding that appeal and ordained another in his place and therefore the Pope very fairly sends him back to be tryed by the Bishops of his Province Which instance as it argues the Popes willingness to have brought up Appeals among them so it shews the continuance of their stoutness in opposing them And even Pope Gregory so long after though in his time the business of Appeals was much promoted at Rome yet he dares not challenge them from the Bishops of Africa but yields to them the enjoyment of those priviledges which they said they had enjoyed from the Apostles times And the testimonies of Eugenius and Fulgentius imply nothing of subjection to Rome but a Praeeminence which that Church had above all others which it might have without the other as London may I hope be the Head-City of England and yet all other Cities not express subjection to it But if after that Council of Carthage the Bishops of Rome did by degrees encroach upon the liberties of the African Churches there is this sufficient account to be given of it that as the Roman Bishops were alwayes watchful to take advantages to inhance their power and that especially when other Churches were in a suffering condition so a fit opportunity fell out for them to do it in Africa For not long after that Council of Carthage fell out that dismal persecution of the African Churches by the irruption of the Vandals in which all the Catholick Bishops were banished out of Africa or lived under great sufferings and by a strict edict of Gensericus no new Bishops were suffered to be ordained in the places of the former This now was a fair opportunity for the Bishop of Rome to advance his Authority among the suffering Bishops St. Peters pretended Successour loving to fish in troubled waters and it being fatal to Rome from the first Foundation of it to advance her self by the ruins of other places But we are call'd off from the ruins of other Churches to observe the methods whereby the Popes grew great under the Emperours which his Lordship gives an account of from Constantines time to Charles the Great about five hundred years which begins thus So soon as the Emperours became Christian the Church began to be put in better order For the calling and Authority of Bishops over the Inferiour Clergy that was a thing of known use and benefit for preservation of Vnity and Peace in the Church Which was confessed by St. Hierom himself and so settled in mens minds from the very Infancy of the Church that it had not been to that time contradicted by any The only difficulty then
was to accommodate the places and precedencies of Bishops among themselves for the very necessity of order and Government To do this the most equal and impartial way was that as the Church is in the Common-wealth not the Common-wealth in it as Optatus tells us So the Honours of the Church should follow the Honours of the State and so it was insinuated if not ordered as appears by the Canons of the Councils of Chalcedon and Antioch And this was the very Fountain of the Papal Greatness the Pope having his Residence in the great Imperial City But Precedency is one thing and Authority another It was thought fit therefore that among Bishops there should be a certain subordination and subjection The Empire therefore being cast into several Divisions which they call'd Dioceses every Diocese contained several Provinces every Province several Bishopricks The chief of a Diocese was call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and sometimes a Patriarch the chief of a Province a Metropolitan next the Bishops in their several Dioceses as we now use that word among these there was effectual subjection respectively grounded upon Canon and Positive Law in their several Quarters but over them none at all all the Difference there was but Honorary not Authoritative To all this part of his Lordships Discourse you only say That it is founded upon his own conjectural presumptions more then upon any thing else and that you have shewed a far different Fountain of the Popes Authority from Tu es Petrus super hanc Petram c. The meaning of what you say is That his Lordships Discourse hath too much Truth and Reason to be Answered solidly but because it is against the Popes interest you defie him and cross your self and cry Tu es Petrus c. and think this will prevent its doing you any harm For if we look for one dram of Reason against it we must look somewhere else then in your Book though you tell us You have often evidenced the contrary but when and where I must profess my self to seek and I doubt shall continue so to the end of your Book But his Lordship proceeds If the ambition of some particular persons did attempt now and then to break these bounds it is no marvel For no calling can sanctifie all that have it And Socrates tells us that in this way the Bishops of Alexandria and Rome advanced themselves to a great height 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even beyond the quality of Bishops Now upon view of story it will appear that what advantage accrewed to Alexandria was gotten by the violence of Theophilus Patriarch there A man of exceeding great Learning and no less violence and he made no little advantage out of this that the Empress Eudoxia used his help for the casting of St. Chrysostome out of Constantinople But the Roman Prelats grew by a steady and constant watchfulness upon all occasions to increase the honour of that See Interposing and assuming to themselves to be Vindices Canonum as Greg. Naz. speaks Defenders and Restorers of the Canons of the Church which was a fair pretence and took extreamly well But yet the world took notice of this their aim For in all Contestations between the East and West which were not small nor few the Western Bishops objected Levity to the Eastern and they again arrogancy to the Bishops of the West as Bilius observes and upon very warrantable testimonies For all this the Bishop of Rome continued in good obedience to the Emperour enduring his censures and judgements and being chosen by the Clergy and people of Rome he accepted from the Emperour the ratification of that choice Insomuch that about the year 579. when all Italy was on fire with the Lombards and Pelagius the second constrained through the necessity of the times contrary to the example of his Predecessours to enter upon the Popedome without the Emperours leave St. Gregory then a Deacon was shortly after sent on Embassie to excuse it To all these things you give one general Answer by calling them impertinencies which is a general name for all that you cannot Answer The Popes obedience to the Emperours you say was constrained their ratifications of Popes elections only declaring them Canonical Socrates was a Heretick the Eastern Bishops partial This is the substance of all you say whereof the two former are manifestly contrary to the truth of stories as when you desire it may at large be manifested and the two latter the pitiful shifts of such who have nothing else to say But though you cannot answer particulars you can overthrow his whole design though you cannot Fiddle it seems you can conquer Cities but they must be very weak then His main design you tell us is to overthrow the Pope's Supremacy by shewing it was not lawful to appeal to Rome but Catholick Authours to be sure you are in the number frame an unanswerable argument for his Supremacy even from the contrary thus it was ever held lawful to appeal to Rome in Ecclesiastical affairs from all the parts of Christendom therefore say they The Pope must needs be Supreme Judge in Ecclesiastical matters This is evidenced out of the 4 and 7 Canons of the Council of Sardica accounted anciently an Appendix of the Council of Nice and often cited as the same with it Will you give us leave to come near and handle this unanswerable argument a little for persons of your profession use to be very shie of that But however since it is exposed to common view we may take leave to do it And seriously upon consideration of all the parts and circumstances of it I am of your mind without flattering you that it is an unanswerable argument but quite to another purpose than you brought it for even against the Pope's Supremacy as I shall presently discover so that those Catholick Authors have served you just as Lazarillo did his blind Master in bidding him leap over the water that he might run his head full butt against the tree For that which your best Authors shun as much as may be and use their best arts to get besides it you run blindly and therefore boldly upon it as though it were an excellent argument to your purpose You say The evidence for Appeals is from the Canons of the Sardican Synod but if this be an unanswerable argument for the Pope's Supremacy 1. How come these Appeals to be pleaded from the Sardican Synod 2. How come these Appeals to be denied notwithstanding the Canons of it The former will prove that the Supremacy if granted from hence was not acknowledged from Divine Right the latter that it was not universally acknowledged by the Church after and therefore both of them will make an unanswerable argument against that which you would prove viz. the Pope's Supremacy First If the Pope's Supremacy be evidenced from hence 1. How comes it at all to depend on the Canons 2. Why no sooner than
And the oppression of the Church of Rome he further adds is the great cause of all the errours in that part of the Church which is under the Roman Jurisdiction And for the Protestants they have made no separation from the General Church properly so called but their Separation is only from the Church of Rome and such other Churches as by adhering to her have hazarded themselves and do now miscall themselves the whole Catholick Church Nay even here the Protestants have not left the Church of Rome in her essence but in her errours not in the things which constitute a Church but only in such abuses and corruptions as work towards the dissolution of a Church Let now any indifferent Reader be judge Whether his Lordship or A. C. be the more guilty in begging the Question For all the Answer you can give is That his Lordship begs it in saying that the Roman Church is not the whole Catholick Church and that the Roman Catholick Church may be in an errour but the former we have proved already and I doubt not but the latter will be as evident as the other before our task be ended But as though it were not possible for you to be guilty of begging the Question after you have said that the Roman Church cannot erre you give this as the reason for it Because she is the unshaken Rock of Truth and that she hath the sole continual succession of lawfully-sent Pastors and Teachers who have taught the same unchanged Doctrine and shall infallibly continue so teaching it to the worlds end Now Who dares call this Begging the Question No it must not be called so in you it shall be only Taking it for granted Which we have seen hath been your practice all along especially when we charge your Church with errourâ— for then you cry out presently What your Church erre No you defie the language What the Spouse of Christ the Catholick Church erre that is impossible What the unshaken Rock of Truth to sink into errours the Infallible Church be deceived she that hath never taught any thing but Truth be charged with falshood she that not only never did erre but it is impossible nay utterly impossible nay so impossible that it cannot be imagined that ever she should erre This is the summ of all your arguments which no doubt sound high to all such who know not what confident begging the Question means or out of modesty are loath to charge you with it Much to the same purpose do you go on to prove that Protestants have separated not from the errours but the essence of your Church And if that be true which you say That those things which we call Errours are essential to your Church we are the more sorry for it for we are sure and when you please will prove it that they are not cannot be essential to a true Church and if they be to yours the case is so much the worse with you when your distempers are in your vitals and your errours essential to your Churches Constitution What other things you have here are the bare repetitions of what we have often had before in the Chapters you refer us to And here we may thank you for some ease you give us in the far greatest remaining part of this Chapter which consists of tedious repetitions of such things which have been largely discussed in the First part where they were purposely and designedly handled as that concerning Traditions chap. 6. that concerning necessaries to salvation chap. 2 3 4. that concerning the Scriptures being an Infallible Rule throughout the Controversie of Resolution of Faith and that which concerns the Infallibility of General Councils we shall have occasion at large to handle afterwards and if there be any thing material here which you omit there it shall be fully considered But I know no obligation lying upon me to answer things as often as you repeat them especially since your gift is so good that way It is sufficient that I know not of any material passage which hath not received an Answer in its proper place That which is most pertinent to our present purpose is that which concerns the necessity of a Living Judge besides the Scriptures for ending Controversies of Faith As to which his Lordship saith That supposing there were such a one and the Pope were he yet that is not sufficient against the malice of the Devil and impious men to keep the Church at all times from renting even in the Doctrine of Faith or to soder the Rents which are made For oportet esse Haereses 1 Cor. 11.19 Heresies there will be and Heresies there properly cannot be but in the Doctrine of Faith To this you answer That Heresies are not within but without the Church and the Rents which stand in need of sodering are not found among the true members of the Church who continue still united in the Faith and due obedience to their Head but in those who have deserted the true Church and either made or adhered to Schismatical and Heretical Congregations A most excellent Answer His Lordship sayes If Christ had appointed an Infallible Judge besides the Scripture certainly it should have been for preventing Heresies and sodering the Rents of the Church So it is say you for if there be any Heresies it is nothing to him they are out of the Church and if there be any Schisms they are among those who are divided from him That is he is an Infallible Judge only thus far in condemning all such for Hereticks and Schismaticks who do not own him And his only way of preventing Heresies and Schisms is the making this the only tryal of them that whatever questions his Authority is Heresie and whatever separation be made from him is Schism Just as Absalom pretended that there was no Judge appointed to hear and determine causes and that the Laws were not sufficient without one and therefore he would do it himself so doth the Pope by Christ he pretends that he hath not taken care sufficient for deciding Controversies in Faith therefore there is a necessity in order to the Churches Vnity he should take it upon himself But now if we suppose in the former case of Absalom that he had pretended he could infallibly end all the Controversies in Israel and keep all in peace and unity and yet abundance of Controversies to arise among them by what right and power he took that office upon him and many of them cry out upon it as an Vsurpation and a disparagement to the Laws and Government of his Father David and upon this some of the wiser Israelites should have asked him Whether this were the way to end all Controversies and keep the Nation in peace Would it not have been a satisfactory Answer for him to have said Yes no doubt it is the only way For only they that acknowledge my power are the Kings lawful subjects and all
the rest are Rebels and Traytors And Is not this just the same Answer which you give here That the Pope is still appointed to keep peace and unity in the Church because all that question his Authority be Hereticks and Schismaticks But as in the former case the surest way to prevent those Consequences were to produce that power and authority which the King had given him and that should be the first thing which should be made evident from authentick records and the clear testimony of the gravest Senatours so if you could produce the Letters Pattents whereby Christ made the Pope the great Lord Chancellour of his Church to determine all Controversies of Faith and shew this attested by the concurrent voice of the Primitive Church who best knew what order Christ took for the Government of his Church this were a way to prevent such persons turning such Hereticks and Schismaticks as you say they are by not submitting themselves to the Popes Authority But for you to pretend that the Popes Authority is necessary to the Churches Vnity and when the Heresies and Schisms of the Church are objected to say That those are all out of the Church is just as if a Shepherd should say That he would keep the whole Flock of sheep within such a Fold and when the better half are shewed him to be out of it he should return this Answer That those were without and not within his Fold and therefore they were none of the Flock that he meant So that his meaning was those that would abide in he could keep in but for those that would not he had nothing to say to them So it is with you the Pope he ends Controversies and keeps the Church at Vnity How so They who do agree are of his Flock and of the Church and those that do not are out of it A Quaker or Anabaptist will keep the Church in Vnity after the same way only the Pope hath the greater number of his side for they will tell you If they were hearkned to the Church should never be in pieces for all those who embrace their Doctrines are of the Church and those who do not are Hereticks and Schismaticks So we see upon your principles What an easie matter it is to be an Infallible Judge and to end all Controversies in the Church that only this must be taken for granted that all who will not own such an infallible Judge are out of the Church and so the Church is at Vnity still how many soever there are who doubt or deny the Popes Authority Thus we easily understand what that excellent harmony is which you cry so much up in your Church that you most gravely say That had not the Pope received from God the power he challenges he could never have been able to preserve that peace and unity in matters of Religion that is found in the Roman Church Of what nature that Unity is we have seen already And surely you have much cause to boast of the Popes faculty of deciding Controversies ever since the late Decree of Pope Innocent in the case of the five Propositions For How readily the Jansenists have submitted since and what Unity there hath been among the dissenting parties in France all the world can bear you witness And whatever you pretend were it not for Policy and Interest the Infallible Chair would soon fall to the ground for it hath so little footing in Scripture or Antiquity that there had need be a watchful eye and strong hand to keep it up But now we are to examine the main proof which is brought for the necessity of this Living and Infallible Judge which lyes in these words of A.C. Every earthly Kingdom when matters cannot be composed by a Parliament which cannot be called upon all occasions hath besides the Law-Books some living Magistrates and Judges and above all one visible King the highest Judge who hath Authority sufficient to end all Controversies and settle Vnity in all Temporal Affairs And Shall we think that Christ the wisest King hath provided in his Kingdom the Church only the Law-Books of holy Scripture and no living visible Judges and above all one chief so assisted by his Spirit as may suffice to end all Controversies for Vnity and Certainty of Faith which can never be if every man may interpret Holy Scripture the Law-Books as he list This his Lordship saith is a very plausible argument with the many but the Foundation of it is but a similitude and if the similitude hold not in the main argument is nothing And so his Lordship at large proves that it is here For whatever further concerns this Controversie concerning the Popes Authority is brought under the examination of this argument which you mangle into several Chapters thereby confounding the Reader that he may not see the coherence or dependence of one thing upon another But having cut off the superfluities of this Chapter already I may with more conveniency reduce all that belongs to this matter within the compass of it And that he may the better apprehend his Lordships scope and design I shall first summ up his Lordships Answers together and then more particularly go about the vindication of them 1. Then his Lordship at large proves that the Militant Church is not properly a Monarchy and therefore the foundation of the similitude is destroyed 2. That supposing it a Kingdom yet the Church Militant is spread in many earthly Kingdoms and cannot well be ordered like one particular Kingdom 3. That the Church of England under one Supreme Governour our Gracious Soveraign hath besides the Law-Book of the Scripture visible Magistrates and Judges Arch-Bishops and Bishops to govern the Church in Truth and Peace 4. That as in particular Kingdoms there are some affairs of greatest Consequence as concerning the Statute Laws which cannot be determined but in Parliament so in the Church the making such Canons which must bind all Christians must belong to a free and lawful General Council Thus I have laid together the substance of his Lordships Answer that the dependence and connexion of things may be better perceived by the intelligent Reader We come now therefore to the first Answer As to which his Lordship saith It is not certain that the whole Church Militant is a Kingdom for they are no mean ones which think our Saviour Christ left the Church-Militant in the hands of the Apostles and their Successours in an Aristocratical or rather a mixt Government and that the Church is not Monarchical otherwise than the Triumphant and Militant make one body under Christ the Head And in this sense indeed and in this only the Church is a most absolute Kingdom And the very expressing of this sense is a full Answer to all the places of Scripture and other arguments brought by Bellarmine to prove that the Church is a Monarchy But the Church being as large as the world Christ thought fittest to govern it Aristocratically
by divers rather than by one Vice-Roy And I believe saith he this is true For so it was governed for the first three hundred years and somewhat better the Bishops of those times carrying the whole business of admitting any new consecrated Bishops or others to or rejecting them from their Communion And this his Lordship saith He hath carefully examined for the first six hundred years even to and within the time of S. Gregory the Great Now to this you answer 1. That though A. C. urgeth the argument in a similitude of a Kingdom only yet it is of force in any other kind of settled Government as in a Common-wealth But by this A. C. seems a great deal the wiser man for he knew what he did when he instanced in in a Kingdom for he foresaw that this only would tend to his purpose concerning the Popes Supremacy but though there be the same necessity of some Supreme Power in a Common-wealth yet that would do him no good at all for all that could be inferred thence would be the necessity of a General Council And by this you may see How little your similitude will hold any other way than A.C. put it Therefore 2. You answer That the Government of the Church is not a pure but a mixt Monarchy i. e. the Supream Government of the Church is clearly Monarchical you confess yet Bishops within their respective Dioceses and Jurisdictions are spiritual Princes also that is chief Pastors and Governours of such a part of the Church in their own right How far this latter is consonant to your principles I have already examined but the former is that we dispute now concerning the Supreme Government of the Church Whether that be Monarchical or no and this is that which his Lordship denies and for all that I see we may continue to do so too for any argument you bring to the contrary Although you produce your Achilles in the next paragraph viz. that since the Government of one in chief is by all Philosophers acknowledged for the most perfect What wonder is it that Christ our Saviour thought it fitter to govern the Church by one Vice-Roy than Aristocratically or by many as he would have it But Are you sure Christ asked the Philosophers opinions in establishing a Government in the Church The Philosophers judged truly that of all Forms of Civil Government Monarchy was the best i. e. most conducing to the ends of Civil Government for the excellency of such things must be measured by their respect to the ends Now if we apply this to the Church we must not measure it by such ends as we fancy to our selves or such as are only the ends of meer Civil Societies but all must be considered with a respect to the chief design of him who first instituted a Church And from thence we must draw our Inferences as to what may tend most to the Peace and Vnity of it Now it appearing to be the great design of Christ that mankind should be brought to eternal Happiness we cannot argue from hence as to the necessity of any manner of Government unless one of them hath in it self a greater tendency to this than another hath For in Civil Governments the whole design of the Society is the Civil Peace of it but it is otherwise in the Church the main end of it is to order things with the greatest conveniency for a future life Now this being the main end of this Society and no manner of Government having in it self a greater tendency to this than other It was in the power of the Legislator to appoint what Government he pleased himself But when we consider that he intended this Church of his should be spread all over the world and this to be his immediate errand he sent his Apostles upon to preach to every creature and to plant Churches in the most remote and distant places from each other we can have the least ground to fancy he should appoint an Vniversal Monarchy in his Church of any Government whatsoever For if we will take that boldness you put us upon to enquire What form is fittest for a Society dispersed into all parts of the world and that are not bound upon their being Christians to live nearer Rome than Mexico or Japan Could any one imagine it would be to appoint one Vice-Roy to superintend his Church at such a place as Rome is Suppose all the East and West-Indies consisted of Christian Churches What advantage in order to the Government of those Churches could the Popes Authority be What Heresies and Schisms might be among them before his Holiness could be acquainted with them These are therefore very slender and narrow Conceptions concerning Christs Institution of a Government over his Catholick Church as though he should only have regard to these few adjacent parts of Europe without any respect to the good of the whole Church But since we see Christ designed such a Church which might be in most remote and distant places from each other and yet at such a distance might equally promote the main ends wherefore they became Churches it is very unreasonable to think he should appoint one Vice-Roy to be Head over them all For which let us suppose that Europe might be as the Eastern Churches have been over-run with the Turkish Power and only some few suffering Christians left here and the Pope much in the same condition with the Patriarch of Constantinople But on the other side that Christianity should largely spread it self in China and the East Indies and the Christian Church flourish in America Could any Philosopher think that fixing a Monarchy at Rome or elsewhere were the best way to Govern the Catholick Church which consists of all these Christian Societies For that is certainly the best Government which is suited to all conditions of that Society which it is intended for now it is apparent the Christian Church was intended to be so Catholick that no one Vice-Roy can be supposed able to look to the Government of it If Christ had intended meerly such a Church which should have consisted of such persons which lay here near about Rome and no others the supposition of such a Monarchy in the Church would not have been altogether so incongruous though liable to very many inconveniencies but when he intended his Religion for the universal good of the world and that in all parts of it without obliging them to live near each other it is one of the most unreasonable suppositions in the world that he should set up a Monarchical Government over his Catholich Church in such a place as Rome is But now if we suppose only an Aristocratical Government in the Church under Christ as the alone Supreme Head nothing can be more suitable to the nature of the Church or the large extent of it than that is For where-ever a Church is there may be Bishops to govern it and other Officers of the Church
to over-see the lesser parts of it and all joyn to promote the Peace and Unity of it which they may with the more ease do if no one challenge to be Supreme Head to whom belongs the chief care of the Church For by this means they cannot with that power and authority redress abuses and preserve the Churches Purity and Peace which otherwise they might have done So that considering barely the nature of things nothing seems more repugnant to the end for which Christ instituted a Catholick Church than such a Monarchy as you imagine and nothing more suitable than an Aristocracy considering that Christian Churches may be much dispersed abroad and that where they are they are incorporated into that Civil Society in which they live according to the known saying of Optatus Ecclesia est in republicâ c. and therefore such a Monarchy would be unsuitable to the civil Governments in which those Churches may be For it were easie to demonstrate that such a Monarchy as you challenge in the Church is the most inconvenient Government for it take the Church in what way or sense you please Whether as to its own peace and order or to its spreading into other Churches or to the respect it must have to the civil Government it lives under And if we would more largely enquire into these things we might easily find that those which you look on as the great ends wherefore Christ should institute such a Monarchical Government in his Church are things unsuitable to the nature of a Christian Church and which Christ as far as we can judge did never intend to take care that they should never be which are freedom from all kind of Controversies and absolute submission of Judgement to the decrees of an Infallible Judge We no where find such a state of a Christian Church described or promised where men shall all be of one mind only that peace and brotherly love be continued is that all Christians are bound to much less certainly that this Vnity should be by a submission of our understandings to an Infallible Judge of whom we read nothing in that Book which perswades us to be Christians and without which freedom of our understandings which this pretended Infallibility would deprive us of we could never have been judicious and rational Christians But granting that wise men have thought Monarchy the best Government in it self What is this to the proving what Government Christ hath appointed in his Church For that is the best Government for the Church not which Philosophers and Politicians have thought best but which our Saviour hath appointed in his Word For he certainly knew best what would suit with the conveniencies of his Church And these are bold and insolent disputes wherein those of your side argue That Christ must have instituted a Monarchy in his Church because all Philosophers have judged That the most perfect Government I need not tell you what these speeches imply Christ to be if he doth not follow the Philosophers judgement Will you give him leave to judge what is fittest for his Church himself or do you think he hath not wisdom enough to do it unless the Philosophers instruct him Let us therefore appeal to his Laws to see what Government he hath there appointed And now I shall deal more closely with you You tell me therein Christ hath appointed this Monarchical Government But I may be nearer your mind when you will Answer me these following Questions When and where did any wise Legislator appoint a matter of so vast concernment to the good of the Society as the Supreme Government of it and express no more of it in his Laws than Christ hath done of this Monarchical Government of the Church Is there not particular care taken in all Laws about that to express the rights of Soveraignty to hinder Vsurpations to bind all to obedience to determine the way of Succession by descent or election And hath Christ instituted a Monarchy in his Church and said nothing of all these things When the utmost you can pretend to are some ambiguous places which you must have the power of Interpreting your selves or they signifie nothing to your purpose So that none of the Fathers or the Primitive Church for several Centuries could find out such mysteries in super hanc Petram dabo tibi Claves and pasce oves as you have done If such a Monarchy had been appointed in the Church what should we have had more frequent mention of in the Records of the Church than of this Where do we meet with any Histories that write the affairs of Kingdoms for some hundred of years and never mention any Royal Acts of the Kings of them If St. Peters being at Rome had setled the Monarchy of the Church there what more famous act could have been mentioned in all Antiquity then that What notice would have been taken by other Churches of him whom he had left his Successour What addresses would have been made to him by the Bishops of other Churches What testimonies of obedience and submission what appeals and resort thither And it is wonderful strange that the Histories of the Church should be silent in these grand Affairs when they report many minute things even during the hottest times of persecution Did the Christians conspire together in those times not to let their posterity know Who had the Supream Government of the Church then Or were they afraid the Heathen Emperours should be jealous of the Popes if they had understood their great Authority But then methinks they should have carried it however among themselves with all reverence and submission to the Pope and not openly oppose him assoon as ever he began to exercise any Authority as in the case of Victor and the Asian Bishops But of all things it seems most strange and unaccountable to me that Christ should have instituted such a Monarchy in his Church and none of the Apostles mention any thing of it in any of the Epistles which they writ in which are several things concerning the Peace and Government of the Church nay when there were Schisms and divisions in the Church and that on the account of their Teachers among whom Cephas was one by that very name on which Christ said he would build his Church and yet no mention of respect more to him then to any other no intimation of what power St. Peter had for the Government of the Church as the Head and Monarch of it no references at all made to him by any of the divided parties of the Church at that time no mention at all of any such power given him in the Epistles written by him but he writes just as any other Apostle did with great expressions of humility and as if he foresaw what Vsurpations would be in the Church he forbids any Lording it over Gods heritage and calls Christ the chief Pastour of the Church And this he doth in an Epistle not writ
to the Catholick Church which had been most proper for him if Head of the Church but only to the dispersed Jews in some particular Provinces Can any one then imagine he should be Monarch of the Church and no act of his as such recorded at all of him but carrying himself with all humility not fixing himself as Head of the Church in any Chair but going up and down from one place to another as the rest of the Apostles for promoting the Gospel of Christ To conclude all Is it possible to conceive there should be a Monarch appointed by Christ in the Church and yet the Apostle when he reckons up those offices which Christ had set in the Church speak not one word of him he mentions Apostles Prophets Evangelists Pastours and Teachers but the chief of all is omitted and he to whom the care of all the rest is committed and in whose Authority the welfare peace and unity of the Church is secured These things to me seem so incredible that till you have satisfied my mind in these Questions I must needs judge this pretended Monarchy in the Church to be one of the greatest Figments ever were in the Christian world And thus I have at large considered your Argument from Reason Why there should be such a Monarchy in the Church which I have the rather done because it is one of the great things in dispute between us and because the most plausible Argument brought for it is The necessity of it in order to the Churches peace which Monarchy being the best of Governments would the most tend to promote To return now to his Lordship He brings an evidence out of Antiquity against the acknowledgement of any such Monarchy in the Church from the literae communicatoriae which certified from one great Patriarch to another Who were fit or unfit to be admitted to their Communion upon any occasion of repairing from one See to another And these were sent mutually and as freely in the same manner from Rome to the other Patriarchs as from them to it Out of which saith his Lordship I think this will follow most directly that the Church-Government then was Aristocratical For had the Bishop of Rome been then accounted sole Monarch of the Church and been put into the definition of the Church as he is now by Bellarmin all these communicatory Letters should have been directed from him to the rest as whose admittance ought to be a rule for all to communicate but not from others to him at least not in that even equal brotherly way as now they appear to be written For it is no way probable the Bishops of Rome which even then sought their own greatness too much would have submitted to the other Patriarchs voluntarily had not the very course of the Church put it upon them To this you Answer That these literae communicatoriae do rather prove our assertion being ordained by Sixtus 1 in favour of such Bishops as were called to Rome or otherwise forced to repair thither to the end they might without scruple be received into their own Diocese at their return having also decreed that without such letters communicatory none in such case should be admitted But that these letters should be sent from other Bishops to Rome in such an even equal and brotherly way you say is one of his Lordships Chimaera's But this difference or inequality you pretend to be in them that those to the Pope were meerly Testimonial those from him were Mandatory witness say you the case of St. Athanasius and other Bishops restored by the Popes communicatory letters But supposing them equal you say it only shewed the Popes humility and ought to be no prejudice to his just authority and his right and power to do otherwise if he saw cause But all this depends upon a meer fiction viz. That these communicatory letters were ordained by Sixtus 1 in favour of such Bishops as were called to Rome than which nothing can be more improbable But I do not say that this is a Chimaera of your own Brains for you follow Baronius in it for which he produceth no other evidence but the Authour of the lives of the Popes but Binius adds that which seems to have been the first ground of it which is the second decretal Epistle of Sixtus 1 in which that Decree is extant But whosoever considers the notorious forgery of those decretal Epistles as will be more manifested where you contend for them on which account they are slighted by Card. Perron and in many places by Baronius himself will find little cause to triumph in this Epistle of Sixtus 1. And whoever reflects on the state of those times in which Sixtus lived will find it improbable enough that the Pope should take to himself so much Authority to summon Bishops to him and to order that none should be admitted without Communicatory letters from him It is not here a place to enquire into the several sorts of those letters which passed among the Bishops of the Primitive Church whether the Canonical Pacifical Ecclesiastical and Communicatory were all one and what difference there was between the Communicatory letters granted to Travellers in order to their Communion with forrain Churches and those letters which were sent from one Patriarch to another But this is sufficiently evident that those letters which were the tessera hospitalitatis as Tertullian calls it the Pass-port for Communion in forrain Churches had no more respect to the Bishop of Rome than to any other Catholick Bishop Therefore the Council of Antioch passeth two Canons concerning them one That no Traveller should be received without them another That none but Bishops should give them And that all Bishops did equally grant them to all places appears by that passage in St. Austin in his Epistle to Eusebius and the other Donatists relating the conference he had with Fortunius a Bishop of that party wherein St. Austin asked him Whether he could give communicatory letters whither he pleased for by that means it might be easily determined whether he had communion with the whole Catholick Church or no. From whence it follows that any Catholick Bishop might without any respect to the Bishop of Rome grant Communicatory letters to all forrain Churches And the enjoying of that Communion which was consequent upon these letters is all that Optatus means in that known saying of his that they had Communion with Siricius at Rome commercio formatarum by the use of these communicatory letters But besides these there were other letters which every Patriarch sent to the rest upon his first installment which were call'd their Synodical Epistles and these contained the profession of their Faith and the answers to them did denote their Communion with them Since therefore these were sent to all the Patriarchs indifferently and not barely to the Bishop of Rome there appears no difference at all in the letters sent to or
soever For still I hope the Head must be over the members and you say it will bring the Church to confusion if any shall except against their Superiours as parties You must therefore absolutely and roundly assert that it is impossible that the Superiours in the Church may be guilty of any errour or corruption or that if they be they must never be called to an account for it or else that it may be just in some cases to except against them as parties And if in some cases then the question comes to this whether the present be some of those cases or no and here if you make those Superiours Judges again what you granted before comes to nothing This will be more clear by a parallel case Suppose the setting up the Calves at Dan and Bethel had been done without such an open separation as that of Jeroboam was but that the people had sensibly declined from the worship of God at Hierusalem and had agreed to assemble at those places the High-Priest and the Priests and Levites having deserted Hierusalem and approving this alteration of Gods worship But although this might continue for many years yet some of the Inferiour Priests and others of the people reading the Book of the Law they find the worship of God much altered from what it ought to be which they publish and declare to others and bring many of the people to be of their mind but the High-Priest and his Clergy foreseeing how much it will be to their prejudice to bring things into their due order they resolutely oppose it I pray tell me now what were to be done in this case Must the people stand wholly to the judgement of those Superiour Priests who have declared themselves to be utterly averse from any Reformation And if a Council be called is it reasonable or just that he should sit as President in it because he pretends to be the Head over the members and that if Superiours be once accused as parties all order and peace is gone Is there any way left or no whereby the Church of Israel might be reformed Yes say you by a General Council but Must it be such a General Council wherein the High-Priest sits as President and all who sit with him sworn to do nothing against him Is this a Free and General Council likely to reform these things And is it not all the Justice in the world that such a Council should be truly Free and General and those freely heard who complain of these as great corruptions and that before the most equal and indifferent Judges or in case such cannot be assembled that by the Assistance of the civil power the Church may be reformed by its parts so that still these parts be willing to give an account of what they do before any Free and General Council where the main party accused sits not as President in it But what then may you say will you allow all Inferiours to proceed to a Reformation in case the Superiours do not presently consent No but men ought first to exhibit their complaints of abuses and the reasons against them to those who are actually the Superiours of the Church and that with all due reverence to Authority but if notwithstanding this they declare themselves willful and obstinate in defence of those things by the concurrence of the Supream power they may lawfully and justly proceed to a Reformation Well but you say all this comes not to your case for the Pope was not justly accusable of any crime for you deny not but that other Bishops in Council may proceed against the Pope himself if the case do necessarily require it as if he be a Heretick If you will then grant that in some cases as in that of Heresie the Pope may be excepted against as a Party you destroy all that ever you say besides For when the Pope is accused for Heresie in a Council Who must sit as President in that Council the Pope himself or not If the Pope must sit as President for the Head you say still must be over the members Do you think he will ever be condemned for Heresie if he hath the supream management of the Council If he may not sit as President then by the same reason he ought not to do it when he is accused of errour or Vsurpation but the other Bishops of the Church met together by the Assistance of Christian Princes in a Free and General Council ought to be Judges in that case as well as the former And this is no more then is agreeable to the Doctrine and practise of the Councils of Constance and Basil for if they had suffered the Popes to have been Presidents in them or have had that power over them which the Popes had in the Council of Trent Do you think they could have done so to the present Popes as they did But the Popes were grown wiser afterwards they had these examples fresh in their memory and therefore they were resolved never to be ridden by General Councils more And thence came that continual opposition to all proposals of the Emperour for a General Council till necessity put the Pope upon yielding to it thence came the resolution at Rome not to venture any more Councils in Germany for that place breathed too much freedome for the Popes interest though this were most vehemently desired by both the Emperour and German Princes and Bishops Thence when a Council must be call'd he summons it first at Mantua then at Vicenza and when none would come thither at last he yields it should be at Trent a most inconvenient place for the Germans to come to when they were there though all art possible was used to prevent the mention of any thing of Reformation yet sometimes some free words breaking out troubled the Legats who dispatch notice of it to Rome and receive instructions what to do yet all could not prevent their fears and jealousies lest something concerning the Popes Interest should be discussed upon which to make all sure they translate the Council to Bononia and leave the Emperour's bishops to blow their fingers at Trent And when upon the Emperour and King of France's Protestations the Pope saw a necessity of removing it back to Trent again though any fair pretence would have been taken to have dissolved the Council yet since that could not be the greatest care must be used to spin out the time in hopes of some occurrence happening which might give a plausible pretext for breaking it up But to be sure nothing must pass but what was privately dispatched to Rome and approved there first a good sure way to prevent any mischief and thence the Holy Ghost came in a Portmantue once or twice a week as the common by-word was then But when notwithstanding all this the grand points of the Residence and power of Bishops were so hotly debated by the Spanish Bishops What arts were used to divert them when that
Synodical Epistle by which I shall prove it impossible that either the Letters of Pope Damasus did concern the calling of the Oecumenical Council or that the sitting of the Council at Rome and the General one at Constantinople could be at the same time The first is from the date of those Letters which is thus expressed there that they met together at Constantinople having received the Letters which were sent the year before from them to the Emperour Theodosius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after the Synod at Aquileia Now the Synod at Aquileia by Baronius his computation was held the same year A. D. 381. in which the Oecumenical Council at Constantinople was held and much later in the year too for this was held in the Nones of September and the other in May and so much is likewise confessed by Binius in his notes on that Council Now let me demand of you Whether is it impossible that Damasus should by his Letters summon the Oecumenical Council when the date of those Letters to Theodosius is so long after the sitting of it But besides this these Eastern Bishops in that Council which sate after these Letters of Damasus clearly distinguished themselves from the Oecumenical Council of the year foregoing for after they had given a brief account of their Faith they referr the Pope and Western Council to that declaration of Faith which had been made the year before by the Oecumenical Council assembled at Constantinople 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Is it possible then any thing should be more evident than that this Council assembled upon the Letters of Damasus to Theodosius and sitting with the Council at Rome is clearly distinct from the Oecumenical Council of Constantinople And thus I hope I have dispelled those mists which you would cast before the Readers eyes by confounding these two Councils and thereby offering to prove that the Pope had some kind of very remote Presidency in the second General Council Which is so far from being true that there is not any intimation in any of the ancient Historians Theodoret Socrates or Sozomen that the Pope or any of the Western Bishops had any thing at all to do in it But you will ask How comes it then to be accounted an Oecumenical Council For this indeed Baronius would fain find out some hand that Damasus had in it or else he cannot conceive how it should become Oecumenical but all the proof he produceth is Because in the Acts of the sixth Council it is said that Theodosius and Damasus opposed Macedonius and so I hope he might do by declaring his consent to the Doctrine decreed in this Council not that thereby his approbation made it Oecumenical And as that Doctrine was received and that Confession of Faith embraced all over the world so that Council became Oecumenical For I cannot see but that if Damasus had stood up for Macedonius if the Decrees against him had been received by the Catholick Church it had been never the less Oecumenical in the sense of Antiquity That testimony which Baronius brings out of his own Library and a Copy of the Vatican expressing that Damasus did summon the Council at Constantinople is not to be taken against the consent of the ancient Church-Historians it being well known what Interess those Roman Copies have a long time driven on I deny not therefore but that the Council of Constantinople was assented to by Damasus and the Western Bishops in the matters of Faith there decided but I utterly deny that Damasus had any thing to do in the Presidency over that Council So that we find a Council alwaies acknowledged to be Oecumenical in which the Pope had no Presidency at all and this very Instance sufficiently refutes your Hypothesis viz. that the Popes Presidency is necessary to a General Council In the third General Council held at Ephesus A. D. 431. it is agreed on both sides that S. Cyril Patriarch of Alexandria was the President of it but the Question is In what capacity he sate there whether in his own or as Legat of Celestine Bishop of Rome All the proof you produce for the latter is That it appears by a Letter written to him by the Pope long before he sent any other Legats to that Council in which Letter he gives S. Cyril charge to supply his place as is testified by Evagâ—ius Prosper Photius and divers other Authours But here again you offer to confound two things which are of a distinct nature for you would have your Reader believe that this Letter was sent by Coelestine to Cyril in order to his Presidentship in the Council whereas this Letter was sent the year before without any relation to the Council as appears by the series of the story which is briefly this the differences in the Eastern Churches increasing about the Opinions broached by Nestorius S. Cyril of Alexandria chiefly appearing in opposition to them they both write much about the same time to Pope Coelestine impeaching each other of Heresie But before Coelestine had read the Letters from Nestorius in vindication of himself Possidonius a Deacon of Alexandria comes with several dispatches from S. Cyril wherein a large account is given of the heresie and actions of Nestorius upon which the Pope calls a Council at Rome and therein examines the allegations on both sides which being done the Council condemns Nestorius and passeth this sentence on him That ten daies should be allowed him after notice given for his repentance and in case of obstinacy he should be declared excommunicate And for executing this sentence Coelestine commits his power to Cyril not as though it belonged to the Pope only to do it but that by this means there might appear the Consent of the Western with the Eastern Bishops in putting Nestorius out of the communion of the Catholick Church S. Cyril having received these Letters by the return of Possidonius dated the third of the Ides of August as appears by the Letters extant in Baronius calls a Council at Alexandria in which four Legats are decreed to be sent to Constantinople in pursuance of the sentence against Nestorius they deliver the Letters of Coelestine and Cyril to him he returns them no answer at all but addresses himself to the Emperour Theodosius and complains of the persecutions of Cyril which occasioned a very sharp Letter of the Emperour to him charging him with disturbing the Churches Peace But this was not all for Cyril having with the Synodical Epistle of the Council of Alexandria sent twelve Anathematisms to be subscribed by Nestorius he was so far from it that he charges Cyril with the heresie of Apollinaris in them and sends them to Johannes Antiochenus who with the Syrian Bishops of his Diocese joyn with Nestorius in the impeachment of Cyril So that by this means the sentence against Nestorius could not be put in execution because of the dissent of the Eastern Bishops and that S. Cyril stood
Hereticks if none appear from any other more remote Churches still the same plea will serve to exclude them all For my part I much approve the saying of Eugenius in the Council of Florence when they spake of the paucity of Bishops for a General Council That where he and the Emperour and the Patriarch of Constantinople were present there was a General Council though there were no more And Pope Pius the fourth might have saved a great deal of mony in his purse with which he maintained his Bishops Errant at that Council had he been of the same mind But the scene of things was altered in Europe there were such clamours made for a General Council that something must be done to satisfie the world and as long as the Pope knew how to manage the business there would be nothing could breed so great danger in it He therefore barely summons a Council without acquainting any of the Eastern Patriarchs with it as was the custom in the ancient General Councils among whom it was debated after the Emperours indicting of it these summoned by the Emperours order their Metropolitans the Metropolitans the Bishops the Bishops they agreed among themselves who should go to the Council who on that account might be said to represent those Churches from whence they came What was there like this in the Council of Trent What messages were there sent to the Eastern Patriarchs of Constantinople Antioch and Alexanandria What Metropolitans came thence What Bishops by the consent of those Churches And if there were nothing of all this What boldness is it to call this a General Council Just by the same figure that your Church is called the Catholick Church which is by an insufferable Catachresis And must six fugitive Greek-Bishops give vote here for all the Eastern Churches and two fugitive English-Bishops for all the Church of England I do not then at all wonder How easily this might be a General Council though there were so very few persons in most of the Sessions of it But you say There was no need of any particular sending from the Greeks as the case then stood and still continues 't is sufficient they were called by the Pope Sufficient indeed for your purpose but not at all for a General Council For if the Greek Churches had been in condition to have sent an equal number of Eastern to Western Bishops the Popes would rather have lost all than stood to the judgement of such a Council And this you know well enough for all your saying That the Greek Church condemns the Protestants You dread the Greek Churches meeting you in a Free General Council and therefore to prevent that they must be called Schismaticks and excluded as such though you would never permit the debate of the Schism in a Free Council As the case then stood and still continues there was no need of sending And Why so Is it because those Churches were then under persecutions and are still and therefore there is no hopes that the Bishops should come to a General Council But all that thence follows is that as things stood then and do still there can be no truly General Council and that is a just inference but I suppose you rather mean because those Churches were then in Schism and are still which still discovers what a wonderful good opinion you have of your selves and how uncharitable you are to all others And so great is the excellency of your Bishops that one of them may represent a whole Nation and so about fifty will be more than sufficient for the whole world And therefore I rather wonder there were so many Bishops at Trent for if the Pope pleased as he made Patriarchs Primats and Arch-Bishops of such places where they never durst go which he knew well enough it had been but appointing such to stand for such a Nation and such for another and a small number might have served turn without putting any to the trouble of coming from any forein Countries at all For otherwise if we go about to examine the numbers of Bishops by their proportions to the Churches they come from as it ought to be in General Councils we shall find a most pitiful account in the Council of Trent For as his Lordship saith Is it to be accounted a General Council that in many Sessions had scarce ten Arch-Bishops or forty or fifty Bishops present In all the Sessions under Paul 3. but two Frenchmen and sometimes none as in the sixth under Julius 3. when Henry 2. of France protested against that Council And from England but one or two by your own confession and those not sent by Authority And the French he saith held off till the Cardinal of Lorrain was got to Rome As for the Spaniards they laboured for many things upon good grounds but were most unworthily over-born Now to this you have a double Answer ready 1. That mission or deputation is not of absolute necessity but only of Canonical provision when time or state of the Countries whence Bishops are sent will permit in other cases it sufficeth they be called by the Pope 2. For those who were absent the impediment was not on the Councils part and in the latter Sessions wherein all that had been formerly desined by the Council was de Novo confirmed and ratified by the unanimous consent of all the Prelates 't is manifest the Council was so full that in the number of Bishops it exceeded some of the first four General Councils I begin with your first Answer which necessarily implies that a General Council is not so called by representation of the whole Church but by relation to the Popes Summons So that if the Pope make a General Summons that must be called a General Council though none be present but such whom the Pope shall think fit to call thither But Where do you find any such account of a General Council in all Antiquity I have given you instances already of General Councils in which the Popes had nothing at all to do with the summoning of them nay all the four General Councils were called by the Emperour and not by the Pope as any one may see that doth not wilfully blind himself The Pope sometimes did beseech and intreat the Emperour to call a Council but never presumed to do it himself in those daies And this is evident not only from the Historians but from the authentick Acts of the Councils themselves and Perron's distinction of the temporal and spiritual call of Councils is as ill grounded as the Popes temporal and spiritual power there being no foundation at all in Anquity nor any reason in the thing for two such several Calls the one by the Emperour and the other by the Pope But this is a meer evasion the evidence being so clear as to the Emperours calling those Councils the Nicene by Constantine the Constantinopolitan by Theodosius the Ephesine by the Junior Theodosius the Chalcedonian
by Martian and Valentinian And this is so clear that Bellarmine in his Recognitions confesseth his mistake about the Constantinopolitan Council being called by the Letters of Pope Damasus and acknowledges that to be true which I at large proved before That the Synodical Epistle was not sent by the General Council but by another the year after If then the calling of Councils belongs not of right to the Pope it is not his summoning which can make a General Council without mission and deputation from those Churches whom they are to represent And any other sense of a General Council is contrary to the sense of Antiquity and is forced and unreasonable in it self For it must be either absolutely general or by representation none ever imagined yet an absolutely General Council and therefore it must be so called as it doth represent if so then there is a necessity of such a deputation But here a Question might arise Whether those Deputies of Churches have power by their own votes to oblige the Churches they are sent from by conveying in a General Council or else only as they carry with them the sense of those Churches whom they represent and this latter seems more agreeable to the nature of a truly General Council whose acts must oblige the whole Church For that can only be said to be the act of the whole Church which is done by the Bishops delivering the sense of all particular Churches and it is not easie to understand How the Vniversal Church can be obliged any other way unless it be proved that General Councils are instituted by some positive Law of Christ so that what is done by the Bishops in them must oblige the Catholick Church and then we must find out not only the Institution it self but the way and manner how General Councils should be called of which the Scripture is wholly silent And therefore there is no reason that there should be any other General Council imagined but by such a representation and in order to this the consent of all those Churches must be known by the particular Bishops before they can concurr with others so as to make a General Council The most suitable way then to a General Council is that the Summons of them being published by the consent of Christian Princes every Prince may call together a National Synod in which the matters to be debated in the Council are to be discussed and the sense of that Synod fully declared which those Bishops who are appointed by it to go to the General Council are to carry with them and there to declare the sense of their particular Church and what all these Bishops so assembled do all agree in as the sense of the whole Church may be called the decree of a General Council Or in case some great impediment happen that such Bishops cannot assemble from all Churches but a very considerable number appearing and declaring themselves which upon the first notice of it is universally received by all particular Churches that may ex post-facto be called a General Council as it was with the first four Oecumenical Councils And yet that in them there was such a deputation as this is appears by that expression in the Synodical Epistle of the Bishops of Constantinople before mentioned for in that they give this account Why they could not do what the Western Bishops desired because they brought not with them the consent of the Bishops who remained at home to that purpose 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And concerning this only Council viz. at Constantinople have we brought the consent of those Bishops which remain in the Provinces So that they looked on the consent of the other Bishops to be necessary as well as their own But now if we examine your Council of Trent by this Rule How far is it from any appearance of a General Council What Bishops were there sent from the most of Christian Churches Those that did appear What equality and proportion was there among them For Voices in General Councils ought not to go by the number of Bishops but by the number of Churches so that if six were sent from the Church of England or France delivering the sense of that Church they come from they have equal Votes with the greatest number of Italian Bishops But here lay the great imposture of that Council first that the Councils being general depended upon the Popes general Summons though never so few Bishops appeared next that the Decrees of the Council were to be carried by most Voices and the Bishops to give their bare placet these things being thus laid when there was any fear that businesses would not go right it was but the Legats using some art in delaying it and sending intelligence to Rome and forty Bishops are made together and posted to Trent to help out the number of voices and thus it was in the case of the Institution and Residence of Bishops And this is that you call a General Council 2. To your other That what was wanting in number at first was made up at last when all former Decrees were confirmed by a full number of Bishops it is soon replied That this is as all the rest of the proceedings of that Council was but a meer Artifice For it appears by the History of that Council that in the last Session under Pius 4. a Proposition was made that all the Decrees under Paul and Julius should be approved which was opposed because they said it would be a derogation to the Authority of the Council of those times if it should seem that the things then done had need of a new confirmation of the Fathers and would shew that this and that was not all one because none can confirm his own things But upon the French Bishops earnest insisting upon it it was determined simply to read them and no more And Do you call this a confirming and ratifying them de novo So that for all appears by this last Session the Authority of those Decrees must as far as concerns the Council depend upon the number of the Bishops then present which was but very small certainly for a General Council there being not so many in most of the Sessions as were in the Donatists Council in Africa so far were they from the number of the ancient General Councils But here comes your grand Objection in the way That nothing is pretended by us against the Council of Trent which might not have been in effect as justly objected by the Arrians against the Council of Nice But Is not there easily discernable a vast disparity between these two which way soever we conceive them The one called by the Emperour who in person sate in the Council to prevent all disorders and clancular actions the other by the Pope who presided in it by his Legats and ordered all things by his directions In that of Nice the Arrian Bishops were as freely admitted to debate as
the Catholick Church with them and there was the greater hopes of it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Since neither part did agree with the Bishop of old Rome or the Church which joynes with him but both oppose the evil customs and abuses which come by him which bears the same date with the Patriarchs first Answer to the Tubing Divines May 15. 1576. And the Patriarch in his letter heartily wishes an union and conjunction between them From hence we may easily gather how true both those things were viz. That the intent of their writing was to be admitted into the communion of the Greek Church and that the Patriarch did not in the least approve their Doctrine but confirmed the Tenets of the Roman Catholick Church But we must look further into the writings themselves to see how far they agreed and wherein they differed It appears then that the Patriarch did profess his consent with them in these things besides the Articles of the Creed and the satisfaction of Christ and other more general points viz. That the Sacrament was to be received in both kinds that the use of marriage was not to be absolutely forbidden the Clergy though their custom is that they must be married before they take Orders besides the grand Articles of the Popes Supremacy and the Roman Churches Infallibility Doth he that joyns with them in these things not in the least approve their Doctrine but confirm the Tenets of the Roman Catholick Church But withall it must be confessed that besides that common Article of the Procession of the Spirit wherein he disputes most earnestly there are five others in which they dissented from each other about Free will justification by Faith the number of Sacraments Invocation of Saints and Monastick life and about these the remaining disputes were In some of which it is easie to discern how far the right state of the question was from being apprehended which the Lutheran Divines perceiving sent him a larger and fuller explication of their mind in a body of Divinity in Greek but the Patriarchs troubles coming on Cantacuzenus deposing him too and other businesses taking him off upon his restauration he breaks off the Conference between them But although he differed from them in these things yet he was far enough from rebuking them for departing from the Roman Church although he was desirous they should have joyned with them in the approbation of such things as were in use among themselves And in those things in which he seems to plead for some practises in use in the Roman Church yet there are many considerable circumstances about them wherein they differ from the Church of Rome as hath been manifested by many others As in the Article of Invocation of Saints the Patriarch saith They do not properly Invocate Saints but God for neither Peter nor Paul do hear us upon which ground it is impossible to maintain the Romish Doctrine of Invocation of Saints And in most of the other the main difference lies in the want of a true State of the Questions between them But is this any such great matter of admiration that the Patriarch upon the first sight of their confession should declare his dissent from them in these things It is well enough known how much Barbarism had crept into the Greek Church after their being subdued by the Turks the means of Instruction being taken from them and it being very rare at that time to have any Sermons at all in so much that one of your Calogeri being more learned then the rest and preaching there in Lent was thereby under great suspicion and at last was by the Patriarch himself sent out of the way It is therefore more to be wondered they should preserve so much of the Doctrine of Faith entire as they have done then that any corrupt practises should prevail amongst them The most then which you can make of the judgement of the Patriarch Hieremias is that in some things he was opposite to the Protestants as in others to the Church of Rome But what would you have said if any Patriarch of Constantinople had declared his consent so fully with the Church of Rome as the Patriarch Cyril did afterwards with the Protestants who on that account suffered so much by the practises of the Jesuits of whom he complains in his Epistle to Vtenbogard And although a Faction was raised against him by Parthenius who succeeded him yet another Parthenius succeeding him stood up in vindication of him Since therefore such different opinions have been among them about the present Controversies of the Christian world and there being no declared Confession of their Faith which is owned by the whole Greek Church as to these things there can be no confident pronouncing what their judgement is as to all our differences till they have further declared themselves PART III. Of Particular Controversies CHAP. I. Of the Infallibility of General Councils How far this tends to the ending Controversies Two distinct Questions concerning the Infallibility and Authority of General Councils The first entered upon with the state of the Question That there can be no certainty of faith that General Councils are infallible nor that the particular decrees of any of them are so which are largely proved Pighius his Arguments against the Divine Institution of General Councils The places of Scripture considered which are brought for the Churches infallibility and that these cannot prove that General Councils are so Matth. 18.20 Acts 15.28 particularly answered The sense of the Fathers in their high expressions of the decrees of Councils No consent of the Church as to their infallibility The place of St. Austin about the amendment of former General Councils by latter at large vindicated No other places in S. Austin prove them infallible but many to the contrary General Councils cannot be infallible in the conclusion if not in the use of the means No such infallibility without as immediate a revelation as the Prophets and Apostles had taking Infallibility not for an absolute unerring power but such as comes by a promise of Divine Assistance preserving from errour No obligation to internal assent but from immediate Divine Authority Of the consistency of Faith and reason in things propounded to be believed The suitableness of the contrary Doctrine to the Romanists principles IF high pretences and large promises were the only things which we ought to value any Church for there were none comparable to the Church of Rome For there can be nothing imagined amiss in the Christian world but if we believe the bills her Factours set up she hath an Infallible cure for it If any enquire into the grounds of Religion they tell us that her testimony only can give them Infallible Certainty if any are afraid of mistaking in opinions they have the only Infallible Judge of Controversies to go to if any complain of the rents and divisions of the Christian world they have Infallible Councils either to
time viz. the direction of the Holy Ghost this spiritual power not being of humane but divine Institution and not proceeding so much from the abilities of the persons as from the co-operation of the Holy Spirit with them To which I reply that all this had need be more then thus barely asserted it being confessed by your selves as his Lordship shews that a General Council is a representative of the whole Church you ought to have shewed us the Divine Institution of this Representative and the promises made to it under that notion or else we may still say with his Lordship That all the power and assistance it hath is by vertue of that body which it represents But I need not in this urge the Arguments of Protestants against you for in this as in most other Controversies we have enough from those of your own party to oppose against these affirmations of yours For Albertus Pighius not only asserts but proves that General Councils are not of divine but humane institution arising from a dictate of right reason that matters of doubt may be better debated by many prudent and experienced persons then by a few So that as the supream authority for administration of affairs belongs to one so it is most agreeable to right reason that debates should be by many This he proves at large that nothing but humane reason is the foundation of Councils in the Church for saith he In Scripturis Canonicis nullum de iis verbum est nec ex Apostolorum institutione speciale quicquam de illis accepit illa primitiva Christi Ecclesia There is not a word of them in Scripture neither did the primitive Church receive any particular order from the Apostles concerning them which he from thence proves because in all the time of the primitive Church till the Nicene Council there is no mention at all of them And at that time it did not receive any new revelation concerning the celebrating General Councils but the Emperour Constantines zeal for the peace of the Church was the first cause and original of them From whence he concludes that they have no supernatural or divine Institution sed prorsus humanam but altogether humane for they are saith he The invention of Constantine sometimes useful but not at all necessary This man speaks intelligibly and not like those who jumble Pope and Council together to make something Infallible between them For he sayes It is the better way by far to go immediately to the Apostolical See and consult that as the Infallible Oracle in all doubts of Faith And very honestly tells us That he believes Constantine was ignorant of that priviledge of the Holy See when he first instituted General Councils Than which nothing could be spoken truer If you have then nothing more to say for the Divine Institution of General Councils then what you have acquainted us with it would be much more wisedom in you to contend with Pighius for the Popes Infallibility and let that of General Councils shift for it self His Lordships second Consideration you admit of viz. That though the Act which is hammered out by many together must needs be perfecter then that which is but the child of one mans sufficiency yet this cannot be Infallible unless it be from some special assistance of the Holy Ghost Therefore omitting your very impertinent addition to this consideration viz. So as to make its Decrees Infallible which is the thing in question We proceed to the third which is That the Assistance of the Holy Ghost is without errour which saith he is no question and as little that a Council hath it But the doubt that troubles is whether all assistance of the Holy Ghost be afforded in such a high manner as to cause all the definitions of a Council in matters fundamental in the Faith and in remote deductions from it to be alike Infallible From this last expression you would very subtilly infer contrary to his Lordships design That he granted General Councils to be Infallible in deductions as well as fundamentals but not to be alike Infallible whereas it is plain his Lordship means no more by alike Infallible then Whether the assistance be alike in both to make them Infallible And this you might easily perceive but it would have prevented your cavil about a graduated Infallibility which I know none assert but your self This Consideration brings on the main of the battel in those texts of Scripture which are most insisted on to prove the Infallibility of General Councils viz. John 16.13 I will send you the Spirit of Truth and he shall lead you into all Truth John 14.16 This Spirit shall abide with you for ever Matth. 28.20 Behold I am with you to the end of the world Matth. 16.18 The founding of the Church upon the Rock against which the gates of hell shall not prevail Luke 22.32 Christs prayer for St. Peter that his Faith should not fail Matth. 18.20 Where two or three are gathered together in my Name I will be in the midst of them Acts 15.28 It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us All which places except the two last have been already examined as far as concerns any promise of Infallibility in the questions concerning the Churches and the Popes Infallibility and there being no reason at all given why any Infallibility at all is promised by them to the Church after the Apostles times it may seem wholly needless to bestow a particular consideration again upon all of them For it is evident in those places all your drift and design is only to prove a promise of Infallibility in the Church and to the Councils only by vertue of that But having at large before shewed that no such thing can be inferred from these or any other places that which is built upon it is wholly taken away too For the only pretence that you have why Councils should be proved hence Infallible is because the Church hath Infallibility promised by these texts which must be very well proved and much better then you have done either here or elsewhere before the other can be deduced from hence And yet supposing I should grant that Infallibility was promised to the Church I see no such necessary consequence from thence that General Councils must be Infallible unless you can prove from Scripture that the Infallibility of the Church is meant of the Church representative and not diffusive which is a new task which you have not yet undertaken For it is not enough to say That the body of the Church is bound to believe and profess the doctrine taught by the representative and therefore the representative must be Infallible unless you could first prove that there is a necessity of some continued Infallible teaching by the Church representative which I despair of ever seeing done I am so far therefore from thinking as you do That these texts are sufficiently clear in themselves to prove
as you say Vtopian too for he will prevent if possible their ever appearing in Europe Therefore all this discourse of his Lordship doth suppose such a state of the Church as that was in the time of the Nicene Councils and after when there might be a liberty of calling such Councils that in case one errs another might be summoned to reverse it But this is not to be expected in faece Romuli in this state of the Christian world that there should be such a General Council so called and so proceeding as he supposes and therefore there is no such danger of being united in errour by vertue of its Decrees but if the state of things would bear such a Council so decreeing we might as well think it would bear another to reverse it if need were and then his Lordships supposition would come to act that in the interstice of those Councils private men ought not to oppose the Decrees of the former but patiently wait till the latter reverse them But as things are now in the Christian world his Lordship doth not suppose that any Council hath such a power to oblige because it calls it self a General Council but a truly General Council being as you say morally impossible nothing is left but that the Church reform it self by parts and wait to give an account of its proceedings therein till such a General Council as we before described be assembled in the Christian world Thus we see how vain and empty your first Objection is That from his Lordships opinion it would follow that the Church must be united in errour which is only the direct consequent of your own assertion that men are bound to believe the Decrees of those you call General Councils to be Infallible Your next great Objection is That this Doctrine exposes all to uncertainties for Who shall be judge whether it be a lawful Council and proceeds lawfully Whether the errours be fundamental and intolerable or no Whether there be Scripture and demonstration against them or no For if every man be judge there can be no such submission to any General Council This is the force of the many words which in several places you spend upon this subject and therefore I shall consider them together I answer therefore 1. In general if this be so intolerable an inconvenience it is unavoidable upon your own principles and therefore it is unreasonable to object that to another which you cannot quit your self of For you say That the Infallibility of General Councils confirmed by the Pope is the best way to end Controversies but there is not one term in the main Proposition but is liable to the same uncertainty which you here object to his Lordship for 1. You do not say that all Councils are Infallible but only General Councils Who then shall be judge whether the Council you would have me believe be General or no You do not say that all must be there to make a General Council but the Popes General Summons is sufficient But Who must be judge whether that be sufficient or no You say so but I see no reason for it Must you be my judge or I my own If I may be my own judge so must every one else and so every man is left to believe what Councils to be General he please himself 2. You say General Councils are Infallible Who must be judge of that too Must the Council be infallibly believed in it But that is the thing in Question Must the Pope be judge But no man you say is bound to believe him Infallible without the Council Must the Scripture be judge But Who must judge what the sense of the Scripture is 3. Who must be judge in what sense and how far the Council is Infallible Who must judge how the Council comes to be Infallible in the Conclusion that was fallible in the use of the means And when any Controversie arises concerning the meaning of the Decrees of the Council Who must be judge which is the Infallible sense of them for there is but one sense Infallible though the words may bear many and unless I know which is the Infallible sense I am not bound to yield my assent to it But Who must decide this The Council cannot for that leaves no exposition with the decrees The Pope cannot for he is not Infallible without the Council So that still it falls to every mans private reason to judge of it 4. Who must be judge that the Popes Confirmation is necessary to make the Decrees Infallible Not the Council without the Pope not the Pope without the Council for you say We are not bound to believe them Infallible but as they are together And together they cannot for that is the Question Why not a Council without the Popes Confirmation as well as with it and When did Pope and Council determine that no Council without the Pope is Infallible but the contrary hath been determined by a Council viz. that a Council is above the Pope and consequently needs not his Confirmation So that for all your pretending to end Controversies you leave men at as great uncertainties as any whatsoever Being not able to resolve some of the most necessary Questions in order to the Churches peace according to your own principles 2. I answer more particularly that his Lordships opinion doth not expose near to so great uncertainties as yours doth upon this reason because you requiring an internal assent to the Decrees of Councils and Infallible Certainty in all that men believe must of necessity leave men in the greatest perplexities where you cannot give them that kind of Certainty on which they may build their Faith but his Lordship only requiring external obedience to the Decrees of Councils a far less degree of Certainty will be sufficient That is such a kind of Moral Certainty as things of that nature are capable of You ask then Who shall be judge whether a Council were lawfully called and did lawfully proceed or no I answer let every man be judge according to the general sense and reason of mankind If there were sufficient authority for calling them together according to the known practice of the Church if there was no plain ground of suspicion of any practises by the power of any particular Prelate no complaints made of it either in or after the Council if there be no plain evidence that it takes any other Rules for its Decrees but the Scripture then we say They are bound to yield external obedience to them supposing the Council generally received in the Christian world for a lawful and General Council If you ask again How should it be known when errours are manifest and intolerable and when not We here appeal to Scripture interpreted by the concurrent sense of the Primitive Church the common reason of mankind supposing the Scripture to be the Rule of Faith the consent of wise and learned men which certainly will prevent the
a publick person representing the Church not parabolically for that is no sustaining the person at all but really and historically And that S. Austin means As a publick person appears by the other expressions in the places cited that he did universam significare Ecclesiam signifie the whole Church and that those things which are spoken of Peter Non habent illustrem intellectum nisi cum referuntur ad Ecclesiam cujus ille agnoscitur in figurâ gestâsse personam Have no clear sense but when they are referred to the Church whose person he did bear Can you say this of a King who receives the Keyes of a Town whereof he takes possession for himself though it be for the good of the Kingdom that he signifies the whole Kingdom in it and that it cannot have any clear sense but when it is applied to the Kingdom which he represents No this cannot be for the King takes possession in his own full right and it is not the possession but the administration which is referred properly to the good of the Kingdom But this might be properly said of a Duke of Venice that he takes possession of a Town in the person of the State and that the proper sense is that the State took possession and he only representing it So that the full right lyes in the body of the State but he as chief member represents the whole And this is that which S. Austin means when he saith That S. Peter represented the Church propter primatum for the Primacy which he had amongst the Apostles i e. such a Primacy of order whereby he was fittest to represent the whole Church For it is impossible to conceive that he should mean that S. Peter should receive this as Head of the Church when you acknowledge that he was not Head of the Church till after the Keyes were given him For you say The performance of Christ's Promise in making him Head of the Church was not till after his resurrection But Will you say the Church had no power of the Keyes till then and then only finally too and not formally What became then of the power of the Keyes at S. Peters death if only formally in him and not in the Church What becomes of them at the death of every Pope Will you say as Bellarmin doth that Christ takes them and gives them to his Successour But he must be sure to wait till the Cardinals agree To whom he must give them Nothing then could be further from S. Austin's meaning than that S. Peter received the Keyes as Head of the Church and so that he represented the Church only finally whereas his expressions carry it that he means the formal right of them was conveyed to the Church and that S. Peter was only a publick person to receive them in the name of the Church But whatever S. Austin's meaning was the strength of his Lordships assertion doth not stand or fall with that for there are arguments sufficient besides to prove that the Authority for governing the Church was not committed formally to S. Peter much less to any pretended successour but that it primarily and formally resides in the whole body of the Church And were that the thing to be here disputed you must not think to take it for granted that if the Keyes were given personally to S. Peter by them was meant the Supreme Authority of governing the Church exclusively of the other Apostles To the third Consideration you answer That in case a General Council erre there can be no redress for errour in Faith for if one Council may erre so may another and a third and a fourth c. This indeed is very suitable to your Doctrine from the beginning that a man can be certain of nothing but what it is impossible should be otherwise I hope you are certain your self you do not erre but I suppose you do not think it impossible you should So although we do not think it impossible a Council should erre yet we may be certain it doth not and supposing it should we do not say It is impossible that a Council should not erre so that another Council may correct the errour of the former And doubtless men may be certain of it too if as his Lordship saith plain Scripture and evident demonstration be brought against the former errour But these are strange Doctrines that because a Council may erre therefore a Council can never afford remedy against inconveniences For one great inconvenience is the breaking the Churches peace that is remedied by the Councils Authority another is errour in Faith that may be remedied by another Council No say you for that may erre too but Doth it follow that it must erre or Is it probable that it should erre if the former errour be so discovered and the Council so proceed as his Lordship supposes For your other difficulty about the calling another General Council I have answered it already when I shewed what we meant by a General Council and when it was lawfully call'd When you after add That the Church never represented her self in another Council but where the former Council was unlawful and instance in the Councils of Ariminum and Ephesus you say the same which his Lordship doth for these Councils were therefore accounted unlawful because erroneous and factious and he never asserts the necessity of calling a new Council but in those two cases But if you would have us account none such but whom you do you must excuse us till we see greater reason for it then we do yet and so likewise for what follows that the Councils which rectified the errours of those were called by the Popes authority as that of Trent and others were which to speak mildly is a gross untruth You urge from his Lordships granting That the Church hath a Praetorian power to controul and censure too where errours or crimes are against points Fundamental or of great consequence that therefore he and all Protestants are justly censured by the Roman Church for opposing those Doctrines which are with her Fundamental and of great consequence But still there is no difference with you between the Roman Church and the Catholick between Papal Councils and Free and General between what she judges Fundamental and what all are bound to judge so If you prove then that we are bound to rely only on the judgement of your Church your consequence is good but otherwise it is tyed with a rope of sand and therefore we do not fear the lashes of it And the same fault runs through your subsequent discourse in which you suppose the Church Infallible in all she propounds which you know is constantly denyed and hath been at large disproved in our first Part. For the ground of your resolution of Faith being removed I see the Fabrick of your Church falls down with it For take but away your pretence of Infallibility and your confounding the Catholick and Roman
assemblies was taken up and hath for its pattern the example of the Apostles Act. 15. yet surely there is little doubt to be made but the Apostles had both direction and precept too for doing it so often as just occasion required from Christ himself The whole force of which Answer lyes in those well placed words Surely there is little doubt to be made for as to any thing of reason you never offer at it Just such another of Bellarmins Sine dubio's comes after Though a General Council be the Church representative and do not meet or assemble together hic nunc but by order and deputation from man yet it follows not but the power and authority by which they act when they are met may be from God as doubtless it is Can any man have the face to question Whether the Authority of General Councils be of Divine Institution or no when you say Yes surely there is no doubt to be made of it doubtless it is We do not question as you would seem to imply afterwards Whether the people or the Pastours have right to send to General Councils but what ground you have to assert that General Councils are an immediate Divine Institution But I must needs say I never saw any thing affirmed oftener and offered to be proved less then that is here and yet as though you had done it invincibly you triumphantly proceed General Councils then are a principal and necessary part of that Ecclesiastical Hierarchy which Christ instituted for the Government of his Church and not an humane Expedient only taken up by the Church her self meerly upon prudential considerations as the Bishop will needs conceive It strangely puzzles me to find out any thing that Particle then relates to and after all my search can find nothing but surely without doubt and doubtless I pray Sir think not so meanly of us that we should take these for Arguments or Demonstrations Deal fairly with us and if we fall by the force of reason we yield our selves up to you But you are very much deceived if you think these things are taken for proofs with us we can easily discern the weakness of your cause through the most confident affirmations If you had brought any Law of Christ appointing that General Councils should be in the Church any Apostolical precept prescribing or giving directions concerning them you had done something but not so much as to offer at a proof and yet conclude it as confidently as if it were impossible to resist the force of your Demonstrations is an evidence that either you know your cause to be weak or suppose us to be so Much such another discourse is that which follows wherein you pretend to give a reason Why what is defined by one Council in point of Doctrine cannot be reversed by another Which is because the true Christian Faith is ex natura rei unchangeable that it admits not of yea and nay but only yea that it is alwayes the same that it must stand without alteration for ever nay that it is to be invariable and admit no change All these expressions we have in one Paragraph and for all that I see are the greatest strength of it But what is it you mean by all this Do you think we could not understand what you meant by the unchangeableness of Christian Faith without so many diversified expressions of it And what follows now from all this That one Council cannot repeal the Decrees of another How so was not the Faith of Christ as unchangeable in the time of the Arrian Councils as it is now and yet then one Council repealed the Decrees of others in point of Doctrine and yet by that nothing was derogated from the Institution or honour of Christ by such a reversing those Decrees Though the Faith i. e. The Doctrine of Christ be alwayes the same Doth it thence follow then men shall alwayes believe all this unalterable Doctrine If so how came Arrianism to overspread the Church How came six hundred Bishops at the Council of Ariminum to be deceived in a Doctrine of Faith by your own confession It is therefore a profound mistake to infer from the fallibility of General Councils the alteration of the Faith of Christ. The Faith of Christ is founded on a surer bottom then the Decrees of Councils though all men are lyars God is true and Christ the same yesterday to day and for ever But of this more afterwards You would seem to argue more pertinently in the following pages against his Lordships opinion for you say He sayes and unsayes the same and what he seems to attribute to General Councils in one proposition he takes away in another That which his Lordship sayes is That the definitions of a General Council are binding to all particulars and it self but yet so that they cannot bind the whole Church from calling again and in the after-calls upon just cause to order and if need be to abrogate former acts And after adds And because the whole Church can meet no other way the Council shall remain the Supream external living temporary Ecclesiastical Judge of all Controversies Only the whole Church and she alone hath power when Scripture or Demonstration is found and peaceably tendered to her to represent her self again in a new Council and in it to order what was amiss Now we must consider what we find contradictious and repugnant to themselves in these words Three things if I mistake not the main of this charge may be reduced to 1. That men should be bound to that which Scripture and Demonstration be against But this is very easily answered for his Lordship doth not say Men are bound to believe it but not so to oppose it as to break the peace of the Church by it 2. That another Council cannot be call'd without opposition to the other this his Lordship prevented by supposing that the just reasons against the decrees of the former Council ought to be peaceably tendred to the Church but no boisterous opposition to be made against it 3. To what purpose should another Council be call'd if the whole Church be satisfied that there is Scripture and Demonstration against the decrees of the former But 1. His Lordship supposes there may Scripture and Demonstration be where the whole Church is not satisfied and therefore there may be necessity of calling another Council 2. That the Council may free all those who may suppose themselves still bound not to oppose the former errour 3. That no erroneous Decree of a Council may remain unrepealed in the Church that so no erroneous person may challenge such a Decree of a Council as a ground for his opposition to the Doctrine of the Church And where now lyes any such appearance of contradiction in his Lordships words 3. The last thing his Lordship chargeth your way with unreasonableness in is That you do not only make the definition of a General Council
erred yet we have yielded so much to you as to disprove what you have in general brought for the one before we come to meddle with the other But that being dispatched we come to a more short and compendious way of overthrowing your Infallibility by shewing the palpable falsity of such principles which must be owned by you as Infallible truths because defined by General Councils confirmed by the Pope Whereof The first in the Endictment as you say is that of the Priests Intention defined by the Councils of Florence and Trent both of them confirmed by the Pope to be essentially necessary to the validity of a Sacrament Concerning this there are two things to be enquired into 1. Whether this doth not render all pretence of Infallibility with you a vain and useless thing 2. Whether it be not in it self an errour We must begin with the first of these for that was the occasion of his Lordships entering upon it for he was shewing That your claim of Infallibility is of no use at all for the settling of Truth and Peace in the Church because no man can either know or believe this Infallibility It cannot be believed with Divine Faith having no foundation either in the written Word of God or Tradition of the Catholick Church and no humane Faith can be sufficient in order to it But neither can it be believed or known upon that decree of the Councils of Florence and Trent that the intention of the Priest is necessary to the validity of a Sacrament And lest you should think I represent his Lordships words too much with advantage I will take his Argument in the words you have summed it up in which are these Before the Church or any particular man can make use of the Popes Infallibility that is be settled and confirmed in the Truth by means thereof he must either know or upon sure grounds believe that he is Infallible But sayes the Bishop this can only be believed of him as he is S. Peters Successour and Bishop of Rome of which it is impossible in the relatours opinion for the Church or any particular man to have such certainty as is sufficient to ground an Infallible belief Why because the knowledge and belief of this depends upon his being truly in Orders truly a Bishop truly a Priest truly Baptized none of all which according to our principles can be certainly known and believed because forsooth the intention of him that administred these Sacraments to the Pope or made him Bishop Priest c. can never be certainly known and yet by the Doctrine of the Councils of Florence and Trent it is of absolute necessity to the validity of every one of these Sacraments so as without it the Pope were neither Bishop nor Priest Thus I grant you have faithfully sum'd up his Lordships Argument we must now see with what courage and success you encounter it Your first Answer is That though it be level'd against the Popes Infallibility yet it hath the same force against the Infallibility of the whole Church in points fundamental for we cannot be Infallibly sure there is such a number of Baptized persons to make a Church By this we see how likely you are to assoil this difficulty who bring it more strongly upon your self without the least inconvenience to your adversary For I grant it necessarily follows against the pretence of any Infallibility whether in Church Councils or Pope as being a certain ground for Faith for all these must suppose such a certainty of the due administration of Sacraments which your Doctrine of Intention doth utterly destroy For these two things are your principles of Faith that there can be no certainty of Faith without present Infallibility of the Church and that in order to the believing this testimony Infallible there must be such a certainty as is ground sufficient for an Infallible belief Now How is it possible there can be such when there can be no certainty of the Being of a Church Council or Pope from your own principles For when the only way of knowing this is a thing not possible to be evidenced to any one in any way of Infallible certainty viz. the intention of the Priest you must unavoidably destroy all your pretence of Infallibility For To what purpose do you tell me that Pope or Councils are Infallible unless I may be Infallibly sure that such decrees were passed by Pope and Council I cannot be assured of that unless I be first assured that they were Baptized persons and Bishops of the Church and for this you dare not offer at Infallible certainty and therefore all the rest is useless and vain So that while by this Doctrine of the intention of the Priest for the validity of the Sacraments you thought to advance higher the reputation of the Priesthood and to take away the assurance of Protestants as to the benefits which come by the use of the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lords Supper you could not have asserted any thing more really pernicious to your selves than this Doctrine is So strange an incogitancy was it in those Councils to define it and as great in those who defend it and yet at the same time maintain the necessity of a present Infallibility in the Church and General Councils For can any thing be more rational then to desire the highest assurance as to that whose decrees I am to believe Infallible And yet at the last you confess we can have but a moral certainty of it and that of the lowest degree the utmost ground of it being either the testimony of the Priest himself or that we have no ground to suspect the contrary Now what unreasonable men are you who so much to the dishonour of Christian Religion cry out upon the rational evidence of the truth of it as an uncertain principle and that Protestants though they assert the highest degree of actual certainty cannot have any Divine Faith because they want the Churches Infallible testimony and yet when we enquire into this Infallible Testimony you are fain to resolve it into one of the most uncertain and conjectural things imaginable For what can I have less ground to build my Faith upon than that the Priest had at least a virtual intention to do as the Church doth Whom must I believe in this case and whereon must that Faith be grounded On the Priests Testimony But how can I be assured but that he who may wander in his intention may do so in his expression too Or must I do it because I have no reason to suspect the contrary how can you assure me of that that I have no reason to suspect the contrary no otherwise then by telling me that the Priest is a man of that honesty and integrity that he cannot be supposed to do such a thing without intention So that though I were in Italy or Spain where some have told us it is no hard matter to meet with Jews
besotted on their old worm-eaten Images that when they were to have new ones in their rooms they begg'd with tears to have their old ones still But although you grant these people guilty of indiscretion yet by no means of Idolatry because they did not call them their gods If you think none were Idolaters but such as did believe their Images to be gods I doubt you may find the number of Atheists as great as that of Idolaters in the world But if we may guess at peoples apprehensions by their actions these seemed as much to believe them to be gods as any Heathens you can instance in Your vindication of Llamas from saying That the Images of Christ and the Saints as they represent their exemplars have Deity or Divinity in them as it is undertaken somewhat fearfully because you say you hope to clear his meaning whatever his words seem to import so at last it stands on the sandy foundation of relative and absolute Worship which being taken away that and your Images fall together I conclude this subject with his Lordships wish That men of learning would not strain their wits to spoil the truth and rent the Peace of the Church of Christ by such dangerous such superstitious vanities For better they are not but they may be worse And I fear are so CHAP. IV. Of the possibility of Salvation in the Roman Church Protestants Concessions ought not to be any ground to preferr the Communion of the Church of Rome How far those Concessions extend The uncharitableness of Romanists if they yield not the same to us The weakness of the Arguments to prove the Roman Church the safer way to salvation on Protestant Principles The dangerous Doctrines of Romanists about the easiness of salvation by the Sacrament of Pennance The case parall'eld be-between the Donatists and Romanists in denying salvation to all but themselves and the advantages equal from their adversaries Concessions The advantage of the Protestants if that be the safest way which both parties are agreed in manifested and vindicated in several particulars The Principle it self at large shewed to be a meer contingent Proposition and such as may lead to Heresie and Infidelity The case of the Leaders in the Roman Church and others distinguished The Errours and Superstitions of the Roman Church make its communion very dangerous in order to Salvation THe main thing which now remains to be discussed is Whether the Communion of your Church or ours be rather to be chosen in order to salvation For that being the great end of our Faith the tendency to the promotion of that ought to be the Rule by which we should embrace or continue in the society of any Church And since the regard men ought to have of their eternal welfare doth oblige them to make choice of the best means in order to it the bare remote possibility of salvation in any Church ought to have no force or consideration at all in the determining their choice in a matter of so great importance As supposing a Pilot at Sea whose only desire is to bring his ship safe into his desired Port should be told that there are two passages homewards the one free and open in which there is no danger the other amidst many Rocks and Shelves in which yet there is a possibility of escaping Would not he be accounted a very weak man that should chuse this latter way meerly because it is possible he may escape and neglect the other in which there is no danger of miscarrying So it is here in our present case the Protestants confess there is a possibility for some to escape in the Communion of the Roman Church but it is as men may escape with their lives in a shipwrack but they undertake to make it evident there can be no danger if they observe the principles of Protestant Religion VVould it not be madness in any then to neglect this and make choice of the other meerly because Protestants agree with you that there is a possibility of salvation for some in the Roman Church Yet this is the great Argument you make use of whereby to Proselyte such persons who want judgement enough to discern the weakness and sophistry of it That therefore we are now to enquire into is Whether your Communion or ours be more eligible upon principles of reason and prudence in order to Salvation And two things are insisted on in behalf of your Church first That Protestants grant the possibility of salvation in your Church but you deny it in ours and therefore yours is the safer way Secondly That the Faith of Protestants doth not stand upon those sure grounds which your Faith doth As to the first there are two things to be considered 1. How far we grant a possibility of salvation to those in your Church 2. What can be infer'd from that Concession in the choice of Religion The occasion of entering upon this debate was the Lady's Query Whether she might be saved in the Roman Faith to which his Lordship answers in General that the ignorant that could not discern the errours of that Church so they held the Foundation and conformed themselves to a religious life might be saved and more particularly to the Lady that it must needs go harder with her even in point of salvation because she had been brought to understand very much for one of her condition in these Controverted causes of Religion And a person that comes to know much had need carefully bethink himself that he oppose not known truth against the Church that made him a Christian for salvation may be in the Church of Rome and they not find it that make surest of it And after he explains himself more fully That might be saved grants but a possibility no sure or safe way to salvation the possibility I think saith he cannot be denyed to the ignorants especially because they hold the Foundation and cannot survey the Building And the Foundation can deceive no man that rests upon it But a secure way they cannot go that hold with such corruptions when they know them Now whether it be wisdom in such a point as salvation is to forsake a Church in the which the ground of salvation is firm to follow a Church in which it is but possible one may be saved but very probable he may do worse if he look not well to the Foundation judge ye So that still his Lordship asserts the Protestants way to be the only safe way to salvation and that in the Church of Rome there is only a limited possibility of it which is such that he say's A. C. or his fellows can take little comfort in For as he after declares himself Many Protestants indeed confess there is salvation possible to be attained in the Roman Church but yet they say withall that the errours of that Church are so many and some so great as weaken the Foundation that it is very
this you call The Doctrine of Catholicks The Doctrine rather of a proud tyrannical and uncharitable faction of men who that they might gain Proselytes to themselves shew how little they are themselves the Proselytes of Christ. But you offer us a reason for it Because all Catholicks hold that neither Faith nor Hope nor any Repentance can save us but that only which is joyned with a perfect Love of God without the Sacrament of Pennance actually and duely received and because Protestants reject this they cannot be saved But you are not at all the less excusable because you assert such Doctrines from whence such uncharitableness follows but the dreadful consequence of such Doctrines ought rather to make you question the truth of them For can any one who knows and understands Christianity ever believe that although he had a most hearty repentance for sin and a most sincere love to God he should eternally perish because he did not confess his sins to a Priest and receive absolution from him I can hardly perswade my self that you can believe such things but that only such Doctrines are necessary to be taught to maintain the Priests authority and to fright men into that pick-lock of conscience the useful practise of Auricular Confession To what purpose are all the promises of grace and mercy through Christ upon the sincerity of our turning to him if after all this the effect depends upon that Sacrament of Pennance of which no precept is given us by Christ much less any necessity of it asserted in order to eternal Salvation If this then be all your ground of condemning Protestants they may rejoyce in this That your reasons are as weak as your malice strong But it would be more fit for you to enquire Whether such who live and dye in such a height of uncharitableness whether with or without the Sacrament of Pennance can be in any capacity of eternal Salvation For that is a plain violation of the Laws of Christ this other even among your selves a disputable Institution of Christ and by many said not to be at all of that necessity which you suppose it to be For neither Medina nor Maldonate even since the Council of Trent dare affirm the denyal of your Sacrament of Pennance to be Heresie and must then the souls of all Protestants be sent to hell for want of that which it is questionable whether it were Instituted by Christ or no. But if this Sacrament of Pennance be so necessary to Salvation that they cannot be saved who want it What becomes then of all the Primitive Church which was utterly a stranger to your Sacrament of Pennance as shall be manifested when you desire it what becomes of the Greek Church which as peremptorily denies the necessity of it as Protestants do Both which you may find confessed and proved by Father Barns and many testimonies of your own Authours are brought by him against the Divine Institution and necessity of it Who very ingenuously confesses That by the Law of Christ such a one by the sentence of very many Catholicks may be pronounced absolved before God who manifests the truth of his Faith and Charity although he discovers not a word of the number or weight of his sins What unreasonable as well as uncharitable men are you then to assert That no Protestants can escape damnation for want of that which so many among your selves make unnecessary for the pardon of sin But it is just with God that those who are so ready to condemn others should be condemned by themselves and if your Consciences do not condemn you here your Sentence may be the greater in another world Your second Argument against Protestants is Because they want certainty of Faith by denying the Infallibility of Church and Councils but this hath been so throughly sifted already that I suppose none who have read the preceding discourses will have the least cause to stick at this and therefore we proceed to the Vindication of your censures from being guilty of the want of Charity For you are the men who would have us thank God when you condemn us to hell that we escape so and are angry with us that we do not believe that you most entirely love us when you judge us to eternal flames For you say that your denyal of Salvation to us is grounded even upon Charity If it be so you are the most charitable people in the world for you deny Salvation to all but your selves and some Heathens But say you If Salvation may be had in your Church as Protestants confess and there be no true Church or Faith but one it follows that out of your Church there is no Salvation to be had To which his Lordship had fully answered by saying T is true there is but one true Faith and but one true Church but that one both Faith and Church is the Catholick Christian not the particular Roman So that this passage is a meer begging the question and then threatning upon it without all reason or charity And all your declamations about the way of knowing the Doctrine of the Catholick Church have been spoiled by what hath been said already upon that subject We come therefore to that which is the proper business of this Chapter which is to examine the strength of that Inference which is drawn from the Protestants concession of the possibility of Salvation in your Church viz. That thence it follows that the Roman Church and Religion is the safer way to Salvation Two things his Lordship observes the force of this Argument lyes in the one directly expressed viz. The consent of both parties of the possibility of Salvation in the Roman Church the other upon the By viz. That we cannot be saved because we are out of the Church And of these two he speaks in order First he begins with the confession as to which his Answer lyes in three things 1. That this was the way of the Donatists of old and would hold as well for them as the Church of Rome 2. That if the principle on which this Argument proceeds be true it will be more for the advantage of Protestants then of your Church 3. That the principle it self is a contingent Proposition and may justifie the greatest Heresies in the world By this methodizing his Lordships discourse we shall the better discern the strength of your Answers to the several particulars of it In the first place he shews How parallel this is with the proceedings of the Donatists for both parts granted that baptism was true among the Donatists but the Donatists denyed it to be true baptism among the Catholick Christians and therefore on this principle the Donatists side is the surer side if that principle be true That it is the safest taking that way which the differing parties agree on To this you Answer nothing but what will still return upon your selves and discover the
weakness of your Argument For the crimes of Schism and unsoundness of Faith are still as chargeable upon you though we may grant a possibility of Salvation to some in your Church And I cannot possibly discern any difference between the judgment of the Catholicks concerning the Donatists and ours concerning you for if they judged the Donatists way very dangerous because of their uncharitableness to all others so do we of yours but if they notwithstanding that hoped that the misled people among them might be saved that is as much as we dare say concerning you And you very much mistake if you think the contrary For his Lordship no where saith as you would seem to impose upon him That a man may live and dye in the Roman Church and that none of his errours shall hinder salvation whatsoever motives he may know to the contrary But on the other side he plainly saith That he that lives in the Roman Church with a resolution to live and dye in it is presumed to believe as that Church believes And he that doth so I will not say is as guilty but guilty he is more or less of the Schism which that Church first caused by her corruptions and now continues by them and her power together And of all her damnable opinions too and all other sins also which the Doctrine and mis-belief of that Church leads him into Judge you now I pray Whether we think otherwise of those in your Church than the Orthodox did of the Donatists So that if the Argument doth hold for you it would as well have held for them too And therefore his Lordship well inferrs That this Principle That where two parties are dissenting it is safest believing that in which both parties agree or which the adversary confesses may lead men by your own confession into known and damnable Schism and Heresie for such you say the Donatists were guilty of And such his Lordship saith there is great danger of in your Church too for saith he in this present case there 's peril great peril of damnable both Schism and Heresie and other sins by living and dying in the Roman Faith tainted with so many superstitions as at this day it is and their tyranny to boot I pray now bethink your self What difference is there between the Orthodox judgement of the Donatists and ours concerning your Church And therefore the comparison between Petilian the Donatist and his Lordships adversary holds good still for all your Answer depends upon a mistake of Protestants granting a possibility of Salvation as I have already shewed you And in what way soever you limit this agreement you cannot possibly avoid but that it would equally hold as to the Donatists too for the concession was then as great in order to Salvation as it is now But you say Whether he asserts it or no it must needs follow from the Bishops Principles that there can be no peril of damnation by living and dying in the Roman Church because he professedly exempts the Ignorant and grants as much of those who do wittingly and knowingly associate themselves to the gross superstitions of the Roman Church if they hold the Foundation Christ and live accordingly From whence you argue That if neither voluntary nor involuntary superstition can hinder from Salvation then there is confessedly no peril of damnation in your Church And yet his Lordship saith All Protestants unanimously agree in this That there is great peril of damnation for any man to live and dye in the Roman Perswasion And therefore saith he that is a most notorious slander where you say that they which affirm this peril of damnation are contradicted by their own more learned Brethren By which we see the unjustice of your proceeding in offering to wrest his Lordships words contrary to his express meaning and since all your Argument depends upon your adversaries confession you ought to take that confession in the most clear and perspicuous terms and to understand all obscure expressions suitably to their often declared sense Which if you had attended to you would never have undertaken to prove that this Lordship grants that there is no peril of damnation in your Church which he so often disavows and calls it a most notorious slander and a most loud untruth which no ingenuous man would ever have said And even of those persons whom he speaks most favourably of he saith That although they wish for the abolishing the superstitions in use yet all he grants them is a possibility of Salvation but with extreme hazard to themselves by keeping close to that which is superstition and comes so near Idolatry Are these then such expressions which import no peril of damnation in the Roman Church And therefore when he speaks of the possibility of the Salvation of such who associate themselves wittingly and knowingly to the gross superstitions of the Romish Church he declares sufficiently that he means it not of those who do in heart approve of them but only of such who though they are convinced they are gross superstitions yet think they may communicate with those who use them as long as they do not approve of them Which errour of theirs though he looks on it as dangerous yet not as wholly destructive of Salvation But since your Answer to this is That he mistakes very much in supposing such persons to belong to your Church and Communion you are not aware How much thereby you take off from the Protestants Confession since those whom we contend for a possibility of Salvation for are such only whom you deny to be of your Churches Communion and so the Argument signifies much less by your confession than it did before Thus we see how this Argument upon the same terms you manage it against us would have held as well in the behalf of the Donatists against the Communion of the Catholick Church For what other impertinencies you mix here and there it is time now to pass them over since the main grounds of them have been so fully handled before We therefore proceed to the second Answer his Lordship gives to this Argument viz. That if the Principle on which it stands doth hold it makes more for the advantage of Protestants than against them For if that be safest which both parties are agreed in then 1. You are bound to believe with us in the point of the Eucharist For all sides agree in the Faith of the Church of England that in the most blessed Sacrament the worthy Receiver is by his Faith made spiritually partaker of the true and real body and blood of Christ truly and really and of all the benefits of his passion Your Roman Catholicks add a manner of this presence Transubstantiation which many deny and the Lutherans Consubstantiation which more deny If this Argument be good then even for this consent it is safer communicating with the Church of England than with the
Roman or Lutheran because all agree in this Truth not in any other Opinion You say This can hold no further than communicating in the belief of this Opinion let that be granted and Doth it not then follow that the Church of England's Opinion is the safest upon your own ground No say you for it is not such a common consent as doth exclude the manner of presence by trans or consubstantiation But How sensless an Answer is this for the Argument proceeds so far as all are agreed and the Church of England asserting that real presence which all acknowledge as simply necessary in order to the effects of it her Communion is more desirable on this account than of either of those Churches which offer to define the manner of Christ's presence since even the greatest men of your perswasion as Suarez and Bellarmin assert the belief of Transubstantiation not to be simply necessary to Salvation and that the manner of it is secret and ineffable It is therefore quite beside the purpose when you offer to prove that Suarez believed Transubstantiation for although he did so yet since he grants it not simply necessary to do it his Lordships Argument in behalf of the Church of England holds firm still unless you can prove that Suarez held the belief of that to be as necessary as the belief of the real and spiritual presence of Christ. But you after attempt at large to prove that the real participation of Christ in the Sacrament in your sense is quite different from that of Protestants If you mean a corporal participation indeed it is so but that is not it which is now enquired after but Whether you do not allow any real and spiritual presence of Christ besides the corporal manducation of that you call his body by Transubstantiation If you do not you would do well to shew what effects that hath upon the souls of men if you do then still the Church of England is of the safer side which holds that in which all are agreed Which is as much as we are here concerned to take notice of as to this subject the Controversie it self having been so lately handled 2. His Lordship instances in the Article of our Saviour Christ's descent into Hell both are agreed as to the Article of descent but the Church of Rome differs in the explication therefore it is safer holding with the Church of England which owns the Article without defining the manner But you say He proceeds on a false supposition for both are not agreed what is meant by Hell whether it be the place of the damned or no But this doth belong to the manner of Explication and not to the Article it self which both equally own and therefore the Church of England hath the advantage there 3. He instances in the Institution of the Sacrament in both kinds in which it is agreed by both Churches that Christ did institute it so and the Primitive Church received it so Therefore according to the former Rule 't is safest for a man to receive the Sacrament in both kinds This you say is as little to the purpose as the former because you do not agree that he did it with an intention or gave any command that it should be alwaies so received but still you are quite besides the business for that is not our Question but Whether it be more safe to adhere to that which Christ instituted and the Primitive Church practised as you confess your selves Or to your Church which prohibits the doing that which you confess Christ and the Primitive Church did And we see how great your Charity is when you deny a possibility of Salvation to those who assert that Christs Institution is unalterable or that all who communicate are bound to receive in both kinds For all other things concerning this subject I must referr the Reader to the precedent Chapter in which they are fully discussed 4. The dissenting Churches agree that in the Eucharist there is a sacrifice of duty and a sacrifice of praise and a sacrifice of commemoration Therefore it is safest to hold to the Church of England in this and leave the Church of Rome to her superstitions that I say no more Here you still pretend you differ in sense but all this is only to say you assert more than we do which we grant but assert upon your Principle that we are on the safer side And so in the intention of the Priest you agree with us as to the necessity of matter and form and therefore it is safer holding to that than believing the necessity of the Priest's intention which many deny And if the Rule doth hold as you assert That that which both are agreed in is safer than the contrary it will hold in matter of Opinion too that it is safer to believe no more is necessary to the Sacrament than both parties are agreed in The last Instance is That we say there are divers errours and some gross ones in the Roman Missal but you confess there is no positive errour in the Liturgy of the Church of England and therefore it is safest to worship God by that and not by the Roman Mass. This you answer as all the rest by running off from the business for you say It cannot be safer to use that because you Catholicks say That to use it in contempt of the Roman Missal is certainly damnable sin and destructive of Salvation But as it is not material what you say in this case so it is not at all to the purpose for if your Rule holds good it must be safer and if it be not you must confess the Principle is false That what both parties agree in is the safest to be chosen in Religion The same might be at large proved concerning the main things in difference between us that if this Principle be true we have very much the advantage of you as You and we are agreed that the Scripture is God's Word but we deny that Tradition is so therefore it is safer adhering to the Scripture and let Tradition shift for it self You and we are agreed that there are sufficient Motives of Credibility to believe the Scripture but we deny that there are any such Motives to believe the present Churches Infallibility therefore it is safer to believe the Scripture than the present Church So that this Principle if improved by these and other Instances will redound more to our advantage than yours considering that in the case we grant it as to you it is joyned with a Protestation of the extreme hazzard which those run who venture on your Communion on the account of it but there is no such danger upon the agreement with us in those Principles which are agreed upon between us 3. His Lordship answers truly that this Proposition That in point of Faith and Salvation 't is safest for a man to take that way which the
Church because that was the root and matrix of the Catholick Church his advice had signified nothing for the Question was not between the Church of Rome and other Churches in which case it might have been pertinent to have said they should adhere to the Church of Rome because that was the root c. But when the difference was at Rome it self between two Bishops there this reason had been wholly impertinent for the only reason proper in this case must be such as must discriminate the one party from the other which this could not do because it was equally challenged by them both And had belonged to one as well as the other in case Novatianus had proved the lawful Bishop and not Cornelius And therefore the sense of Cyprian's words must be such as might give direction which party to joyn with at Rome on which account they cannot import any priviledge of the Church of Rome over other Churches but only contain this advice that they should hold to the Vnity of the Catholick Church and communicate only with that party which did it This reason is so clear and evident to me that this place cannot be understood of any priviledge of the Church of Rome above other Churches that if there were nothing else to induce me to believe it this were so pregnant that I could not resist the force of it But besides this his Lordship proves that elsewhere S. Cyprian speaks in his own person with other Catholick Bishops nos qui Ecclesiae unius caput radicem tenemus we who hold the head and root of one Church by which it appears he could not make the Church of Rome the root and matrix of the Catholick this being understood of the Vnity and Society of the Catholick Church without relation to the Church of Rome and S. Cyprian writes to Cornelius that they had sent Caldonius and Fortunatus to reduce the Church of Rome to the Vnity and Communion of the Catholick Church and because no particular Church can be the root of the Catholick and if any were Jerusalem might more pretend to it than Rome and because S. Cyprian and his Brethren durst not have suspended their communion at all if they had looked on the Church of Rome as the root and matrix of the Catholick as Baronius confesses they did all which things are largely insisted on by his Lordship and do all confirm that hereby was not meant any Authority or Priviledge of the Church of Rome above other Apostolical Churches which in respect of the lesser Churches which came from them are called Matrices Ecclesiae by Tertullian and others But you are still so very unreasonable that though no more be said of the Church of Rome than might be said of any other Apostolical Church yet because it is said of the Church of Rome it must import some huge Authority which if it had been said of any other would have been interpreted by your selves into nothing For so do you deal with us here for because it is said that they who joyned with Cornelius did preserve the Unity of the Catholick Church therefore it must needs be understood that the Roman Church is the root of the Catholick But he must have a very mean understanding that can be swayed by such trifles as these are For Was there not a Catholick and Schismatical party then at Rome and if they who joyned with Novatianus did separate from the Catholick Church then they who were in communion with Cornelius must preserve the Vnity of it And Would not this Argment as well prove the Catholick party at Carthage to be the root and matrix of the Catholick Church as well as at Rome But such kind of things must they deal with who are resolved to maintain a cause and yet are destitute of better means to do it with So that I cannot find any thing in all your Answer but what would equally hold for any other Church at that time which was so divided as Rome was considering the great care that then was used to preserve the Vnity of the Catholick Church And what particularly S. Cyprian's apprehension was concerning the Nature and Vnity of the Catholick Church we have at large discoursed already to which place we referr the Reader if he desires any further satisfaction Your whole N. 5. depends on personal matters concerning the satisfaction of the Lady's conscience but if you would thence inferr That she did well to desert the Protestant Communion you must prove that it can be no sin to follow the dictates of an erroneous conscience For such we say it was in her and you denying it all this discourse signifies nothing but depends on the truth of the matters in controversie between us But you most notoriously impose on his Lordship when because he asserts the possibility of Salvation of some in your Church you would make him say That it is no sin to joyn with your Church You might as well say Because he hopes some who have committed Adultery may be saved therefore it is no sin to commit Adultery So that while you are charging him falsly for allowing dissimulation you do that which is more in saying that which you cannot but know to be a great untruth If our Religion be not the same with yours as you eagerly contend it is not let it suffice to tell you that our Religion is Christianity let yours be what it will And if it please you better to have a name wholly distinct from us yours shall be called the Roman Religion and ours the Christian. If you judge us of another Religion from yours because we do not believe all that you do we may judge you to have a different Religion from the Christian because you impose more by your own confession to be believed as necessary in order to Salvation than ever Christ or the Apostles did And certainly the main of any Religion consists in those things which are necessary to be believed in it in order to eternal happiness In your following discourse you are so far from giving us any hopes of peace with your Church that you plainly give us the reason why it is vain to expect or desire it which is that if your Church should recede from any thing it would appear she had erred and if that appears farewell Infallibility and then if that be once gone you think all is gone And while you maintain it we are so far from hoping any peace with you that the Peace of Christendom may still be joyned in the Dutchmans Sign with the quadrature of the circle and the Philosophers Stone for the sign of the three hopelesse things How far we are bound to submit to General Councils hath been so fully cleared already that I need not go about here to vindicate his Lordships Opinion from falsity or contradiction both which you unreasonably charge it with and that still from no wiser a
though this had never been questioned by any If you had asked Whether he had been an Ancient and Learned Authour living sometime within the first four hundred years you should not have met with any opposition from me But if you will needs have him to be the true Dionysius you must prove it better than by meer referring us to what Bellarmin Baronius and Del-Rio have said upon that subject and you are very strangely deceived when you say That only Erasmus and Valla and some few others did doubt of it but at present you suppose few learned men doubt of the matter For even Bellarmin himself doubts of it and What think you of Habertus Sirmondus Launaeus Petavius Are not all these with you learned men who have all declared their doubts of it and so will any one else do that impartially examines the Arguments brought on both sides But we have no reason to insist longer upon this since you say It is sufficient that he is acknowledged for a Writer of great Antiquity Well But what is it then this Authour saith only that Prayers were made for the deceased party that God would forgive his sins and place him in the Light and Country of the Living But say you both the Arch-Bishop and Primate would have thought that man a Papist who would have made the like prayer for his deceased friend in their hearing And very good reason they might have to think so when they know beforehand that your intention of praying for the Dead is to deliver their souls from the pains of purgatory but if they had heard one use such a Prayer in the Ancient Church they could not have imagined it was for any such intention since the same person in Dionysius is said to be replenished with divine joy and not fearing any change to the worse but knowing well that the good things possessed shall be firmly and everlastingly enjoyed as he speaks at his entrance upon that discourse And if this be in effect to teach Purgatory as you would have it you must set your Purgatory a great deal higher than you do for you say It is but an upper Region of Hell a little after when Dionysius speaks of those who were in a Region of rest and happiness Your second Authour is Tertullian and three Citations you produce out of him In the first he only mentions the oblations for the Dead which we have confessed to be used already but without any respect to Purgatory In the second a mention is made of begging of God refrigerium refreshment for the soul of one departed this were some thing to the purpose if you had first proved that Tertullian did suppose that soul to be then in the pains of Purgatory for then it were but reason to think this refrigerium did relate to the easing of them But he elsewhere tells us what he means by this refrigerium Sinus Abrahae interim refrigerium praebiturus est animabus justorum by which he understands not any deliverance from pains but contentment in expectation of the future Resurrection It was the ardency of the desire after that which made them pray for this refrigerium not out of any punishment they were supposed to be under for sin but their earnest expectation of future glory And since they supposed different degrees of refreshment which the souls had in the bosom of Abraham this prayer only notes the desire of the continuance and increase of it and not being under present pains for the want of it In the last place of Tertullian you would fain have the Carcer infernus to be Purgatory but he means no more by it than Hades or the common receptacle of souls till the day of Resurrection which Irenaeus calls locum invisibilem which renders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exactly in which he makes souls to stay till the day of Resurrection and Tertullian explains himself afterwards when he sayes Constituimus omnem animam apud Inferos sequestrari in diem Domini and therefore Bellarmin confesses Tertullian to be one of those that held that no souls did enjoy the beatifical vision till the day of Resurrection at which time he supposed the order of rising to be according to the degrees of holiness and therefore he makes the punishment of souls not to be any Purgatory pains but the mora resurrectionis that they should be longer before they rise from the dead viz. towards the latter end of the thousand years for so he makes the Resurrection to continue the thousand years of Christ's Reign upon earth and as the highest rank of Christians should rise in the beginning of it so others in their order according to their degrees and the most slothful and negligent to be punished morâ resurrectionis by their Resurrection being deferred to the conclusion of it By which we fully understand Tertullian's meaning Judex in carcerem te mandet infernum unde non dimittaris nisi modico quôque delicto morâ resurrectionis expenso by which lower prison he intends neither Hell nor Purgatory but the common receptacle of souls wherein they were held till they should rise sooner or later according to the measure of their graces and sins The next place to be examined is the noted one of S. Cyprian to Antonianus where he gives an account of the difference between the lapsed persons who become penitents and the Martyrs Aliud est ad veniam stare aliud ad gloriam pervenire aliud missum in carcerem non exire inde donec solvat novissimum quadrantem aliud statim fidei virtutis mercedem accipere aliud pro peccatis longo dolore emendari purgari diu igne aliud peccata omnia passione purgâsse It is one thing to stay in hope and expectation of pardon another thing to come presently to glory 't is one thing to be cast into prison and not to come out thence till you have paid the last farthing another to receive presently the reward of our Faith 't is one thing to be amended for sins by long grief and to be purged with fire a great while another to have purged away all his sins by suffering Martyrdom Did not S. Cyprian say you think of Purgatory when he taught this No that did he not if we believe your own Writers For Rigaltius tells us that S. Cyprian here speaks of the severities of pennance which the lapsed persons underwent in order to pardon and compares them with the present felicity which Martyrs were possessed of And this was that purging fire in order to their amendment which he insists on to shew what great disparity there was between the state of these penitents and the Martyrs thereby to shew that though penitents were admitted by the Church yet it was with so much severity that might give little encouragement for men to fall in hopes of admission For that was the main thing which S. Cyprian there discourses of And thus
understood till we have gone through the Account of the Grounds of Faith If S. Augustine make some no Catholick Christians for holding obstinately some things of no great moment in his Book of Heresies it was because by Catholick Christians he understood all such and only such as were the members of the sound and Orthodox Church in opposition to all kind of unnecessary separation from it upon matters of small moment and not because he believed the Churches Infallibility in defining all matters of Faith and that all such things were so defined which men are call'd Hereticks for denying of unless you will suppose it was ever infallibly defined that there were no Antipodes for some were accounted Hereticks for believing them and that by such whom you account greater than S. Austin But for S. Austin how far it was from his meaning to have all those accounted Fundamental Errours which he recounts in his Book of Heresies appears not only from the multitude of particulars mentioned in it which no one in his senses can acknowledge Fundamental or declared by the Church as necessary to be believed by all but from his declared scope and design in the preface to that Book wherein it appears he was desired not only to write the greater errours concerning Faith the Trinity Baptism Repentance Christ the Resurrection the Old and New Testament Sed omnia omnino quibus à veritate dissentiunt i. e. all kind of errours whatsoever and do you think that there could then be no errour but it must be against some thing then defined by the Church as necessary to Salvation If not then all truths were then defined by the Church and consequently there could be no new Definitions ever since if there might then those errours mentioned by S. Austin were not about matters necessary to be believed and so S. Austin's Book of Heresies makes nothing for you but very much against you considering that in all that black list of Hereticks there are none brought in for denying those grand Fundamentals of your Church the Pope's Supremacy your Churches Infallibility nor any of that new brood of necessary Articles which were so prudently hatcht by the Council of Trent But if S. Austin do you no good you hope S. Gregory Nazianzen may because he saith That nothing can be more perillous than those Hereticks who with a drop of poison do infect our Lord 's sincere Faith Therefore all things defined by the Church are Fundamental What an excellent Art this Logick is that can fetch out of things that which was never in them What a rare consequence is this If Heresie be dangerous then whatever is defined by the Church is Fundamental but it may be the strength lyes in the drop of poison as though S. Gregory thought a drop of poison as dangerous as a whole dose of it But were I your Physitian instead of the least drop of poison I should prescribe you good store of Hellebore and should hope to see the effect of it in making better consequences than these are But to see yet further the strange effects that Logick hath upon some men for say you in the prosecution of your proof that all things defined by the Church are Fundamental Hence it is that Christ our Saviour saith Matth. 8.17 If he will not hear the Church let him be to thee as a Heathen and a Publican The Argument in form runs thus Whosoever deserves excommunication is guilty of a Fundamental Errour but he that will not hear the Church deserves Excommunication ergo Or else there may be more in it than so For no doubt the Heathens and Publicans as such were guilty of Fundamental Errours therefore they who will not hear the Church are guilty of as Fundamental Errours as Heathens and Publicans But before you urge us any more with this dreadful Argument I pray tell us What that Church is which our Saviour speaks of what the cases are wherein the Church is to be heard what the full importance is of being as a Heathen and Publican and you must prove this Church to be understood in your sense of the Catholick Church and that this Church hath hereby power to define matters of Faith and that none can possibly in any other sense be accounted as Heathens and Publicans but as guilty of as Fundamental Errours as they were Your next Objection concerning giving God and the Church the lye and preferring and opposing a man's private judgement and will before and against the Judgement and Will of God and the Church if men deny or doubt of any thing made known by the Church to be a truth revealed by God signifies nothing at all unless it be antecedently proved that the Church can never erre in declaring any thing to be a truth revealed by God which none who know what you mean by the Church will easily assent to till you have attempted a further proof of it than yet we find And although the questioning Divine Veracity be destructive to that which you call Supernatural Faith yet I hope it is possible to believe God to be true and yet that all men are lyars or that there is no such inseparable Connexion between God's Veracity and the present Declarations of any Church but that one may heartily assent to the former and yet question the truth of the latter If you think otherwise shew your pity to the weakness of our understandings by something that may look like a proof of it which we are still much to seek for But your greatest strength like Sampson's seems to lye there where one would least suspect it viz. in Athanasius his Creed For thus you go on Wherefore it is said in S. Athanasius his Creed which is approved in the thirty nine Articles of the pretended English Church that Whosoever will be saved it is necessary that he hold the Catholick Faith which unless every one hold whole and inviolate without doubt he shall perish for ever Neither can the Bishop reply That all Points expressed therein are Fundamental in his sense for to omit the Article of our Saviours descent into Hell he mentions expresly the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son which his Lordship hath denyed to be a Fundamental Point as we saw in the former Chapter But the better to comprehend the force of this Argument we must first consider what it is you intend to prove by it and then in what way and manner you prove it from this Creed The matter which you are to prove is that all things defined by the Church are Fundamental i. e. in your sense necessary to Salvation and that the ground why such things whose matter is not necessary do become necessary is because the Church declares them to be revealed by God now in order to this you insist on the Creed commonly call'd Athanasius his wherein some things acknowledged not to be Fundamental in the matter are yet said to be necessary