are Christians Is this a satisfactory answering And yet if you will know the truth from their common writings the faith of their Church containeth these great bodies 1. All that is in the holy Scripture and the Apocrypha 2. All the Decrees of their General Councils if not also the Provincials and Popes Decretals that are de fide 3. All their unwritten Traditions de fide which they have yet to bring forth as need requireth And do you not approve his modesty that saith If any such be found that believeth all this 2. The second sort of their Church-members are All who believe explicitely all Articles and whatever belongs to them in particular by reason of their respective offices Ans. But he tells you not a word what Articles these be nor what belongeth to their Offices whether it be all the Articles of all the Creeds or also of their Councils Decrees or when it shall be known what is necessary to be believed about their office And is here any notice how to know a member of their Church any more than in the former He that believeth all that he should believe is a Christian But is there any such and what is that all and how shall we know them 3. His third sort of members are Those who so believe all things necessary necessitate medii vel praecepti extended to all the adult Ans. And what 's this but the same again we know none but the adult that are to believe And so here we are told That all men that believe all things commanded are Christians We were told this before But it was with If any such are to be found And who knows by this what your All is When we find men that do all commanded and sin not we will hope to find men that know all revealed and have no ignorance yet here is no visible Church 4. His fourth sort are All those who believe in that manner all things necessary necessitate medii according to the first opinion of the more ancient Doctors But what those things are we are not yet told but five words set down with an c. And is here yet a word to satisfie any man of reason what their faith is or what Christianity is or what maketh a member of their Church or is the bond of union But Reader hath God left us so much in the dark Is Christianity any thing or nothing If something hath it not an essence which may be defined Is this all our notice of it That men that know all that God hath reveal'd and believe it are Christians or such as believe five Articles caetera Judge now whether their Church be not invisible And if any little part of it were visible what 's that to the rest or to that visibility of particular members He tells us these are almost all Christians and yet questioned whether any of the first be found and the rest are no more to be found than they 5. And his fifth sort he confesseth himself to be uncertain which yet it s doubted are no small part that go for Papists And note I pray you that it is the present Church which they use to approach to for necessary resolution and the Recentiors are more the present Church than the Ancients And according to these 1. Their Church is confessedly doubtful or unknown as to most or multitudes of members 2. And note that their Articles being but two That God is and that he rewardeth works all the common Heathens of the world and all the Mahometans are of the Papists Faith and Church according to this opinion 3. But mark Reader another desperate corruption That Baptism must concur with these two articles O horrid corruption of Christianity it self Is this antiquity and tradition Did the Christian Church use to baptize men that believed neither in Jesus Christ nor the Holy Ghost if they did but believe a God and a Rewarder Do you baptize such in your Church I suppose even Pope Stephen himself would have been for the re-baptining of such Reader if one of us had charged such doctrine on the Papists as this their Champion doth should we not have been thought to slander them viz. That their later Doctors hold that all that believe explicitely but a God and a Rewarder and are baptized are members of the Church of Rome and consequently that all that believe but this much should be baptized that is all the Mahometans and almost all the Heathens in the world And is Baptism and the Creed come to this But I confess if the world were perswaded of this the Pope could make his use of it For when he is once taken for Governour of all the Church on earth if he can but prove all the world to be the Church it followeth that he is Governour of all the world And what need they now their feigned embassies and submissions to prove the Abassines Armenians and Greeks to be of their Church when Heathens and Mahometans are proved of it and yet are Protestants no part He tells us That a living body may be defined by head shoulders arms though there be a doubt among Philosophers whether hair humours c. be animated or parts Ans. But 1. it is known then that there is visibly head and shoulders c. But you tell us not how to know any individual persons to be visible members of your Church To tell us that there are some men that hold all that they are bound to hold maketh none visible while we are not told either what they are bound to believe or by what profession or proof it must be known that they do so When we tell you that sincere justifying faith and love do prove true Christians and that such there are it 's agreed that this proveth but a Church as invisible or unknown to us because we know not who have this sincerity So is it when you tell us that there are men that believe all that 's necessary for till it be known what that is no profession can thereby prove them Christians 2. But what if you had told us how to know those men that are certain or eminent members of your Church Is it nothing to you to leave all the world besides almost uncertain whether they be in the Church or not How know you whom to admit to your Sacramental Communion or to use as a Christian When a Congregation of many thousand persons called Papists meet you cannot tell how many of these are of your Church and yet you give them the Eucharist And it seemeth by you that they must be Baptized though you know not after whether they be members of the Church Remember Reader that our question is not what mercy God sheweth to the rest of the world nor whether any out of the Christian Church be saved But it is what is the faith which is essential to a member of the Christian Church and whether Papists make it not uncertain and whether he
Confirmation Vocation Missions Jurisdiction All these explained Sect. 8. He makes the Chapters in Queen Elizabeth days to have had the power of choosing all the Parish Priests Popes no Popes for want of common consent Sect. 9. who must choose a Monark of all the earth Sect. 10. Their succession interrupted Sect. 11. 12. Is it essential to a Bishop to have many Congregations parishes or presbyters By affirming this he nullifieth all the first Bishops who were Bishops before they made presbyters under them and so denyeth all succession by denying the root CHAP. 5. What they mean by TRADITION Sect. 1. He thinks the Tradition of all the world may be known by every Christian as easily as the Tradition of the Canonical Scripture Sect. 2. Tradition against Popery Sect. 4. The Protestants Abassines Armenians Greeks c. are of one Church Sect. 4. The contradictions of W. J. The unity of all other Christians as such greater than the unity of Papists as Papists Sect. 5. CHAP. 6. What they mean by a General COUNCIL His definition of a general Council is no definition Sect. 2. Councils of old not called by the Pope Sect. 3. His confusion and contradictions Sect. 4. General Councils were but of the Empire proved Sect. 5. The impossibility and utter unlawfulness of a true universal Council of the whole Christian world proved Sect. 6. How many make an universal Council Sect. 7. They make presbyters uncapable of voteing in councils and yet the highest ancient part of the Papacy viz. to preside in councils is oft deputed to presbyters Sect. 8. The council of Basil that had presbyters rejected by them for other reasons Sect 9. CHAP. 7. What they mean by SCHISM Papists acquit all from schism who separate not from the Whole visible Church of Christ Sect. 1. We separated not from the Greeks Arminians c. Sect. 3. He absurdly requireth that we should have our Mission and Jurisdiction from them if we have communion with them Sect. 4. We have the same faith with them Sect. 5. How far we separate from Rome Sect. 6. They were not our lawful pastors Sect. 7. Of hearing the pharises Sect. 8. We infer not Rebellion against Authority by our rejecting trayterous Usurpers Sect. 9. Whether the first Reformers knowingly and wilfully separated from the whole Church on earth Sect. 10. He pretendeth that the Churches unity is perfect and therefore that it is impossible there should be any schism in it but only from it when their own sect had a schisme by divers Popes for forty years Whether all that followed the wrong Pope those forty years were out of the Church and damned Sect. 11. His definition of schism agreeth best to the Papists who separate from all the Church save their own sect Sect. 12. An admonition to others Sect. 13. My Reasons unanswered by which I proved 1. That we interrupted not our Church succession when we broke off from Rome 2. That the Roman Church is changed in Essentials PART II. The PREFACE ALL was not well said or done by every Bishop or Council of old Sect. 1 2 3. Of the considerableness of the extra-Imperial Churches of old Sect. 4 5. The plea of Peters supremacy and their succession overthrown There never were twelve Patriarchal seats as the successors of the twelve Apostles No one Patriarch claimed to be an Apostles successor but Rome and Antioch and Antioch never claimed supremacy on that account Sect. 6. The true state of the controversie about the Churches perpetual visibility Sect. 7. Papists make Christians no Christians for not obeying the Pope and no Christians to be Christians if they will be his subjects Sect. 8 9. What I maintain Sect. 10. A discourse republished proving that Christs Church hath no Universal Head but himself Pope nor Council CHAP. 1. The Confutation of W. I's Reply Twelve instances confuâ—…ing the wild fundamental principle of W. J. that whatever hath been ever in the Church by Christs institution is essential to it Sect. 4. By this he unchurcheth Rome Sect. 5. He saith that every such thing is essential to the Church but not to every member of the Church but to such as have sufficient proposal confuted Sect 6. By this their Church cannot be known or the faith of a few may make others Christians Sect. 7. His assertion further confuted Sect. 8. His Logical proof shamed that every accident is separable and therefore all that Christ instituted to continue is no accident Sect. 9. Whether the belief of every institution for continuance be essential to the Church Sect. 10. They unchurch themselves Sect. 11. He acknowledgeth that all Christian Nations are not bound to believe the Popes supremacy expresly but implicitely in subjecting themselves to them that Christ hath instituted to be their lawful pastors Five notable consequents of this The true method of believing Sect. 12. The instance of the conversion of the Iberians and Indians vindicated He supposeth that every revealed truth was taught them by lay-persons Sect. 13. The instance of Peters not preaching his own supremacy Act. 2. vindicated Sect. 14. The Indians converted by the English and Dutch are taught the true faith Sect. 15. And so are the Abassines Sect. 16. His Doctrine against Christs visible reign containeth many gross errors commonly called Heresies And by making the Christian world a Monster if it have not one Papal Head he maketh the humane world a Monster because it hath not one humane King Sect. 17. CHAP. 2. Our Churches visibility confessed Theirs to be by them proved How far any Protestants grant the power of Patriarchs and the Pope as Patriarch Sect. 1. He biddeth me but prove that any Church which now denieth the Popes Soveraignty hath been always visible and he is satisfied whether that Church always denyed it or not Sect. 2. Notes hereon Whether they should exclaim against Christ as an invisible Head who make him as visible in the Eucharist to every receiver as a King is in his cloathes Sect. 3. Whether a Ministry be essential to the universal Church Sect. 4. His Argument against our Christianity re-examined and confuted by divers instances of such fallacies Sect. 5. He requireth an instance of any Church-Unity though without a humane head which endeth the controversie Sect. 6. More differences and greater amongst Papists than among all the other Churches Sect. 7. He hath no evasion but saying that these Churches are not Christians because they depend not on the Pope from which he before said that he abstracted Sect. 8. He denieth us with the Abassines Greeks Armenians c. to have been of the Church and of one Church both fully proved Sect. 9. The charge of Nestorianism and Eutichianism on many Churches examined Sect. 10. His shameful calling for the names of sects and requiring proof of the Negative that they are not such Sect. 11. CHAP. 3. More of our Unity Of the speech of Celestines Legat at Ephesus Sect. 1 2. His saying and unsaying Sect. 3. His
part that is there If the question be whether there be there fire water air earth gold silver or men or divels created by God I neither know nor believe that there is or is not A Sadducee or an Atheist may believe That all that is in heaven is good Is this an implicite actual belief that God Angels and Spirits are good when he believeth not that in heaven or any-where else there is any God or any Angel or Spirit A Protestant believeth that he can prove by the Bible that the Pope is a Traytor against Christ by claiming his prerogative Doth he also believe that he is Christs Vicar-General because he believeth that the Bible is true Protestants believe that all Tradition is true which really cometh down to us from Christ and his Apostles by credible evidence Doth it follow that they believe the Papists Traditions to be true when they believe multitudes of them to be novelties or fictions contrary to Scripture and to the Tradition of the greatest part of the Church The Papist woman mentioned by Dr. White believed the Creed but she knew and believed no more of Iesus Christ but that it was some good thing she knew not what or else it would not have been in the Creed But he goeth on You profess to believe that All men shall rise at the last coming of Christ and yet you have no actual knowledg of many thousands Ans. And what then If I know not that those thousands had a being and were men I cannot know or believe that they shall rise notwithstanding I believe that All shall rise and if the question be whether this or that or thousands that you may name shall rise I know not because I know not whether you feign not men that never were If any were so foolish as not to know that there ever were more men in the world than he hath seen he cannot believe that any more shall rise and yet may believe that All shall rise not all in true reality as signifying the whole that hath existed indeed but all as the subject-term in the proposition When I say all shall rise I do not only say that I believe that proposition but I know many individuals contained in the whole and I know that there are more than I personally know and that there have been more than I have heard of and by the word all I mean all these particulars inclusively and so the word being a General expressing A Totum some of whose parts I have known by sight and others by history and I know that other parts have been but some parts I know not at all that they have been accordingly my belief is according to the object partly singular partly particular partly indefinite and partly universal He proceeds Act. 24. 5 14. Credens omnibus quae in Lege Prophetis scripta sunt Yet Paul had not an actual understanding of every particular contained in them Ans. Then he had not an actual belief of those particulars He believed in general that all Gods word was true and he believed all in particular which he knew to be part of that word But when he thought that he ought to do many things against the Name of Jesus and persecuted and blasphemed him had he then an actual belief that This Iesus was the Messiah He addeth A Christian that hath forgotten some sin yet at death is sorrowful for all his sins Hath he no actual sorrow for that forgotten sin I answer No if he have no actual understanding of it There were some that Christ foretelleth would think that they did God service by killing his servants Do you think that if these repented of all sin in general and took this for a duty that this were an actual repentance for this sin Nay is a meer general repentance any actual repentance at all if it extend to no particulars If a man say I repent of all my sin but I think I have no sin but my hearing praying being a Christian c. doth he actually repent of any And as to your instance if you do but forget a sin it implieth that you did once remember it and perhaps repented of it then but if you know not or remember not that ever you committed any such thing or that it is any sin you have no actual repentance of that sin O but saith he What horrid Doctrine would this be Ans. What a childish exclamation is this It 's ten to one but if you were well examined your self you would confess that all this quarrel is but de nomine You confess that here is no particular repentance or faith of the thing in question nor are universals as containing the particulars known confusedly in themselves but with the bare name of an actual knowledg of Particulars you would cheat them that have only the knowledg of the universal Proposition That you may see it is no horrid Doctrine consider that 1. If this general repentance have also joined a particular repentance of all such sin as must be so repented of of necessity to Salvation then a virtual repentance of other forgotten particular sins will prove sufficient to pardon and salvation A general repentance which hath an actual hatred of sin as sin and a habit inclining the person unfeignedly to repent of all sin when he knoweth it joined with an actual repentance of all that he knoweth and a faithful endeavour to know all this is not an actual repentance of the unknown particulars but it may be called a virtual repentance of them because there is that cause that virtue that Grace which would produce an actual repentance if the impediment of forgetfulness were removed But even confused actual repentance hath not a total oblivion or ignorance of the particulars but only a confused knowledg and memory of them and is another thing than the knowledg of Universals He adds One that forgiveth all injuries and hath forgotten some doth he not forgive those forgotten Ans. Yes if the word forgiveness signifie the effect or his act as sufficient to that effect For it is in his power to discharge acquit or forgive another by a meer general remission or discharge though he remembred but one or no particular at all But if by forgiving you mean an act of his will whose object is the crime as well as the punishment and evil consequents remitted he so actually forgiveth in his own mental act no more than he knoweth But his general forgiveness sufficeth to all the ends without it and such a sufficient remission goeth commonly by the name of full forgiveness But instead of speaking to the point in hand you play with ambiguous words of another sense and subject Forgiving another is an act of the Will whose effect is extrinsecal and as a man may burn a house or give away or sell a house and all that is in it though he know not what is in it so a man may remit all debts or penalties
Church cannot or doth not err in telling me what is Gods Revelation before I can know or believe any of his Revelation If they mean that this act of faith must go first before I can have any other why may I not know and believe other articles of faith without the divine belief of the Churches authority or infallibility as I may believe this one God hath revealed that the Church is infallible or true in telling me what I must believe If one Article may be believed without that motive and sure it is not believed before it is believed why not others as well as that 3. And which way or by what Revelation did God confer this Infallibility on the Church If by Scripture it is supposed that yet you know not what is in the Scripture or believe it not to be true till you have first believed the Churches Veracity Therefore it cannot be that way If by verbal tradition it is equally supposed that you know not that Tradition to be Gods word and true before you know the Churches Veracity that tells you so So that the Question How I must believe the Churches Veracity herein by what divine revelation before I can believe any other revelation is still unanswered and answerable only by palpable contradiction But were it not for interpreting him contrary to his company I should by his words here judg that it is no Divine faith of the Churches Veracity which he maketh pre-requisite to all other acts of faith but it is Prudential motives of creâ—…bility which must draw him to afford credit to that authority as derived from God which commends to him the Bible as the word of God now that can be no other than the Authority of the Catholick Church Ans. Mark Reader It can be no other than the authority of the Church which must be the prudential motive to credit the authority of the Church as derived from God So the Churches Authority must be first credited that he may credit it or else the Authority not credited must move him to credit it which is all contradiction unless he mean that the Churches Authority credited by a humane faith or by some notifying or conjectural evidences besides divine revelation must move him to believe that it is authorized by God When they have told us whether that first credit given to the Church have any certainty for its object and also what and whence that certainty is we shall know what to say to them Knot against Chillingworth is fain tosay That it is the Churches own Miracles by which it is known to have divine authority before we can believe any word of God And so no man can be sure that Gods word is his word and true till he be first sure that the Church of Rome hath wrought such miracles as prove its veracity as from God which will require in the Catechumene so much acquaintance with Historical Legends which the more he reads them the less he will believe them as will make it a far longer and more uncertain way to become a Christian than better Teachers have of old made use of And 2. it seems when all is done that he taketh this Authority of the Church but for a prudential motive But is it certain or uncertain If uncertain so will all be that 's built upon it If certain again tell us by what ascertaining evidence Reader it is the crooked ways into which byassing-interest hath tempted these men to lead poor souls which are thus perplexing and confounding How plain and sure a way God hath prescribed us I have told you in a small Tractate called The Certainty of Christianity without Popery In short it is possible if a man never hear but one Sermon which mentioneth not the authority of the Church or find a Bible on the high-way and read it that he may see that evidence in it that may perswade him savingly to believe through grace that it truly affirmeth it self to be the word of God But the ordinary method for most rational certainty is To have first Historical ascertaining evidence of the matter of fact viz. that This Book was indeed written and these miracles and other things done as it affirmeth Or first perhaps That this Baptismal Covenant Lords Prayer Creed and Decalogue have been delivered down from the first witnesses of Christ and Miracles wrought to confirm the Gospel which is also written at large in that Book This we have far greater Historical Certainty of than the pretended authority of a judging-Church of Rome even the infallible testimony of all the Churches in the world and as to the essentials Baptism the Creed c. of Hereticks Infidels and Heathens which I have opened at large in a Book called The Reasons of Christian Religion and another called The Unreasonableness of Infidelity and in other writings And the matter of fact with the Book being thus certainly brought down to us as the Statutes of the Land are we then know the Gospel and that Book to be of God by all those evidences which in the foresaid Treatises I have opened at large and more briefly in a Treatise called The Life of Faith the sum of which is the Holy Spirit as Christs Agent Advocate and Witness in his Works of Divine Power Wisdom and Goodness or Love printed first on Christ himself his Life and Doctrine and then on the Apostles their Works and Doctrine and then on all sanctified believers in all ages and especially on our selves besides his antecedent prophesies Pag. 16. He again pretendeth that he need not name the necessary Articles of Faith because I my self say They must be the Essentials and it is supposed I understand my own terms Ans. A candid Disputant The light followeth him while he flyeth from it Doth it follow that if I know my own meaning I therefore know yours and if I know which are the essentials that therefore you know them and are of the same mind Pag. 17. The man would make me believe that I speak not true divinity when I say that Divine and Humane Faith may be conjunct when the testimonies are so conjunct as that we are sure that it is God that speaks by man who is therefore credible because God infallibly guideth and inspireth him He would make you believe that I am singular and erroneous here Ans. And why He saith that would make Christian faith partly humane But 1. when I talk but of two faiths conjunct what if I called the former divine faith only the Christian faith May not a humane yet be conjunct with the Christian 2. But words must be examined If Christian faith be so called from the Object then Christ and not his Apostles are the reason of the name materially we are called Christians for believing in Christ and not for believing in them 2. If Christian faith were taken subjectively it is humane faith for men are the subjects of it 3. If Christian faith be
what is the notorious Tradition of all the Christian world I that search after it in all the books that I can get can scarce give a good account of the Tradition of much of the greater part of Christians Nay no Universal Tradition at all is notorious to most Christians much less to all the Heathens and Infidels on earth It is not notorious to most in England what is the Tradition of the Abassians Syrians Armenians Greeks no nor of the Italians French Spaniards Germans c. That is notorious to Scholars which is not so to the unlearned and to Antiquaries which is not so to other Scholars Here W. I. answereth two things 1. That to know some Laws of the Commonwealth is of importance to salvation 2. That God should have made a visible Government imprudently whose Governors could not be known but by revelation R. B. 1. And how comes importing to be put instead of necessity to salvation This is but fraud 2. It were worth our diligent enquiry could we prevail with these men to open to us this mystery How it is that the Pope and his Council may be known to be the supreme Governors of the world without revelation I will abate my Antagonists the answering of all the rest if they will but be intreated to answer me this one question It seems that it is by no promise of Christ no word of God no nor by any revelation of the Spirit or Miracles that we must know them to be our Governors I confess I can know without revelation that they claim such authority as any Traytor or Usurper may do but that they have such authority it is past my reach to conjecture which way it is to be proved without revelation But I intreat the Reader to remember this in all our further disputes with them That they confess that it is not by revelation by Scripture Spirit Miracles or Tradition made known that the Pope and his Council are the supreme Governors of the Universal Church And yet we must know this before we can believe in Christ or believe the Scripture to be true And we must know it of necessity to salvation And another difficulty here seemeth insuperable viz. Seeing this is not a matter of Revelation it can be no matter of Divine faith and if so how is all other faith resolved into it and how is the belief of this which is no belief called our implicite belief of all the word of God can no man be saved that cannot unriddle all these contradictions Next I further noted R. B. That if he lay the sufficiency on the respect to all mens various capacities of receiving the notice then they can never know who are Hereticks but if they lay it on a general publication then all or almost all men are Hereticks being unavoidably ignorant of many things so published To this he saith That he Judgeth of no mans conscience Ans. But do not they judg of them that burn them and depose Princes for not exterminating them He saith It is sufficient 1. that such as acknowledg themselves they know such points of faith to be propounded by the Roman Church which I infallibly believe to be the true Church and that notwithstanding reject them as errors give me ground to presume them to be Hereticks Ans. 1. I perceive that it is not the Pope only that is infallible but you also are infallible in believing his Church But alas how many are deceived and deceivers that call themselves infallible 2. But if your belief in the Pope were infallible must all others be hereticks and be burnt that have not attained to your degree of knowledg or self-conceitedness 3. Just now you said the Governours of the Church need no revelation to make them known and now it is an article of your belief That the Roman Church is the true Church so slippery is your foundation 4. But what meaneth that hard word The true Church Is it not enough if it were proved a true Church Either you mean the universal Church or a particular Church if the former why speak you so sneakingly and did not speak out that the Roman Church is all the whole Church that Christ hath on earth Which assertion we abhor and despair of any thing like a proof of it If the latter what is it to us whether Rome be a true Church any more than whether Ephesus Thessalonica or such other be so 5. But to leave your parenthesis what 's all this to the most of the Christian world that do not acknowledg themselves that they know such points of faith to be propounded by the Church of Rome There is not one of five hundred among us that ever read your Councils nor knoweth one of many things propounded by you to be such And are all these now absolved from heresie How long will that be their security if the burning and exterminating Religion should prevail And is it my hard fate to become a Heretick more than all the rest of my neighbours because I have read your Councils when they have not Then I would counsel all that love not to be burned to take heed of medling with such Councils I have oft read how dangerous a thing you judg it for unlicensed men to read Gods word and of many that have been burned for it and its consequents and how you account it the way to Heresie But I have not oft before read how dangerous it is to read your Decrees or to know all that the Church of Rome propoundeth for he that knoweth them all must have a very ready commandable faith such as can believe in despight of Sense Reason Scripture and Tradition to escape the guilt of Heresie But I pray you were you not inexorable executioners when it cometh next to the burning of Dissenters that you will spare all that confess not that they know what is propounded by your Church yea though they take not their parish-priest that tells it them to be infallible especially if they know him to be a common lyar or one that holds that lying for mens good is a venial sin or none W. I. 2. Such as oppose what all visible Churches have most notoriously practised and believed as Divine truths while they were so universally taught and practised I may safely presume to be Hereticks R. B. 1. No Oâ—…dipus can tell whether while here refer to believed or to oppose If to the latter then neither Abassines Armenians Greeks or Protestants are Hereticks for they oppose not such points while they were so universally taught and practised whatever their forefathers did for they have themselves so many partners as derogates from the pretended Universality of the Adversaries But if by all the visible Church you mean all except themselves or if the word while relate to believe then the Church of Rome are characterized by you for certain Hereticks for I defie impudence it self in challenging it to deny that the Universal
the Cause in naming Integrals for those are not Accidents Ans. 1. My affirming that the Papacie is as much an Accident as a Leprosie is to a Man did not make me forget that I was confuteing his assertion that all is essential to the Church which is instituted to be for ever or indeed which had been ever in it for that was his saying And though Integrals be not Accidents yet they are not Essentials was this hard to see And 2. by his now putting in the word instituted he would make the Reader think that I had granted that the Papacie was instituted by Christ. 2. He saith that Nothing can be an accident to the Church which Christ hath instituted to be perpetually in the Church and consequently the Churches holding any thing to be so if true is essential to the subsistence of the Church if false is essentially destructive of the Church so that whether true or false it will never be accidental to the Church Ans. 1. What work will Interest and Errour make If so then every Errour and every Sin of the Church is essentially destructive of the Church For Christ hath instituted that the Church shall perpetually hold and teach the truth only and obey all his commands without sinning If he say that the Church never hath nor had Sin or Errour I answer 1. If an essential part of the Church have had Sin and Errour then so hath the Church had But an essential part in their account that is their supposed Head hath had Sin and Errour To pass by Peters denying Christ disswading him from suffering till he heard Get behind me Satan Mat. 16. his dissembling Gal. 2. sure Marcellinus sinfully offered Incense to an Idol and Honorius and Tyberius sinned and it was some sin in those Popes that defiled Wives and Maids at the Apostolick doors and that were Whoremongers and came in by Whores and Poyson and that were condemned as Simonists Hereticks Incarnate Devils Perjured Murderers c. and that by Councils 2. If all the particular Members of the Church have some Errour or Sin then so hath the Church But all the particular Members have c. If any Man say that he hath no Sin he is a Lyer and the truth is not in him 1. Joh. 1. And in many things we offend all Iam. 3. 2. c. 2. Why then doth he accuse us for separating from Rome if it be as certainly unchurched as it is certain that they have had Sin and Errour it is certain that the Popes were such as aforesaid or the Councils sinned that condemned them as such and it is certain that either the Councils of Constance Basil and Pisa erred and sinned which decreed that Councils are above the Pope and may condemn and depose him and that this is de fide and the contrary Heresie or else the Councils of Laterane and Florence erred and sinned that said the contrary And so of other Instances 3. But as I have proved the Antecedent of his Argument false already so his consequence that the Churches holding any thing to be instituted for perpetuity is essential and the denying destructive of the essence would not follow but on two suppositions 1. That such institutions are not only no Accidents but no Integrals 2. That every commanded truth is essential which are both false For else the institution might be essential and yet not the believing it such be essential And he confesseth that such belief is not essential to every Member nor can he tell to how many nor to whom ad esse Ecclesiae If he say To as many as have a sufficient proposal 1. Then if none had a sufficient proposal it would cease to be essential to the Church 2. Then if any one sin be committed by the Church against a sufficient proposal the Church is nullified If he said It is not known how many must believe it ad esse Ecclesiae then no man can know whether the Church be nullified or not He saith pag. 6â—… So the acknowledgment of it by all those to whom it is sufficiently propounded is necessary to make them parts of the true Church and the denyal of it when so propounded hinders them from being parts Ans. 1. Still this sayeth nothing to the question how far and in whom it is essential to the Church 2. And this unchurcheth every person that erreth and sinneth against any one word of Scripture after a sufficient proposal yet this same man said pag. 36. of his explications Whatsoever their neglect be to know what is propounded yet so long as they believe explicitely what is necessary to be believed necessitate medii and implicitely the rest they can be no Hereticks for it is not the ignorance though culpable c. And do the wilfully ignorant acknowledge it reconcile these if you can 2. This Unchurcheth your whole Church For it is sufficiently proposed even in express words in the Scripture that there is Bread in the Eucharist after Consecration thrice together in 1 Cor. 11. and that the Church should communicate with the Cup This do in remembrance of me even to shew the Lords death till he come and that we should not make to our selves any graven Image nor bow down to it nor worship it and that we should pray publickly in a known Tongue and that Bishops should not Lord it over the Flock c. and you erre and sin after this sufficient proposal Pag. 36. I had given several Instances of the Iberians Indians Americans the primitive Christians and their own Converts to prove that the belief of and subjection to the Pope is not necessary to Christianity or Salvation to which his answer is very remarkable Viz. I never said that all particular persons or COMMUNITIES are obliged to have an express belief or acknowledgment of the Roman Bishops Supremacy that being necessary to all neither necessitate medii nor praecepti It is sufficient that they believe it implicitely in subjecting themselves to all those whom Christ hath instituted to be their lawful Pastors and when the Bishop of Rome is sufficiently proposed to them to be the Supreme Visible Pastor of those Pastors upon Earth that then they obstinately reject not his authority Ans. There is some moderation in this though it utterly overthrow their cause 1. This fully proveth that the poor Abassines Armenians and such others for all the Popish Accusations of them are neither Hereticks nor Schismaticks for not acknowledging the Pope whose Supremacie hath not been sufficiently proposed to them And so that the Church is greater than the Popes Kingdom 2. This maketh out a receiving of the Popes Supremacie to be no more necessary than the receiving of every Word of the holy Scripture or tradition noâ—… than the receiving e. g. of the Cup in the Lords Supper For all are essentially necessary say they when sufficiently propounded 3. This undeceiveth us that thought their Doctrine had been that the Scripture and Christianity must necessarily be
constitute the Essence And shall I obey a trifler so farre as to trouble you with more Syllogismes for this § 8. But he denyeth the Minor and saith that Protestants profess not the true Christian Religion in all it's Essentials I proved it thus Those that profess so much as God hath promised Salvation upon in the Covenant of Grace do profess so much as God hath c. Here the trifler wants all again and then denyeth the Minor I proved the Minor by several arguments 1. All that prosesse faith in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost our Creator Redeemer and Sanctifyer and Love to Him and Absolute obedience to all his Laws of Nature and Holy Scriptures with willingness and diligence to know the true meaning of all these Lawes as farre as they are able and with Repentance for all known sins do profess so much as God hath promised Salvation upon which I proved by many texts of Scripture But so do the Protestants c. Here the trifler wants form again The Covenant of Grace was left out when I cited the Covenant of Grace it self viz Ioâ—… 3. 16. 17. Mark 16 16. Heb. 5. 9. Rom. 8. 28. 1. Act. 26. 18. And after all this what is it that he denyeth Why this that the Protestants have willingness and diligence to know the true meaning of all the Law of Nature and Scripture Answ. This is the man of form that slily puts in Having willingness instead of professing it When he saw and knew that it was not what saith men have which God only knoweth but what they proâ—…ess that we dispute of And whether we profess such willingness to understand if our words our oaths and all our books and confessions published to the world will not prove it let this mans word go for a disproof we come now to the Transubstantiation reasoning where all men Eyes and Eares are to be denyed § 9. But he addeth a reason because else they would take the expositions of the universal Church and not follow novel intâ—…pretations and private judgements Answ. This Cant must delude the ignorant that never read the history of the Church nor know the present State of the World 1. Do not we profess to preferre that which is most ancient before that which is novel But these men must have us e. g. believe that the cup may be left out of the Sacrament of Eucharist which a Sect lately and sacrilegiously introduced or else we have a novel and private interpretation of the Sacrament when the most brazen faced of them cannot deny that their own way herein is novel and the contrary as old as Christs institution and that they are singular as differing from the farre greatest part of Christians upon Earth The same I might say of most other of our differences 2. When did the Universal Church write a Commentary on the Bible where shall we find their exposition of it How little of the Bible have General Councils expounded if you mean not them what mean you sure all your Laity have not expounded it nor all your Clergy yea their Commentaries yea and Translations fight with one another where is your Universal Commentary if you had such a work will your talk make us ignorant that Papists are not a third part of the Christian world but if it be Councils you mean which of them is it that we must believe and why That at Constance and Basil and Pisa or that at Florence or the Laterâ—…ne that de fide contradict them The first and second at Ephesus or that of Calcedon which contradicteth the first indeed and the second professedly The 28th Canon of Calcedon or the Popes that abhor it The General Councils at Ariminum Syrmium c. when the world was said to groan to find it self turned Arrian should we at the 2d Council of Ephesus have followed the greater number when there was not one refuser of Eutychianism save the Popes Legates and Binnius saith that sola navicula Petri only Peters Ship escaped drowning did Rome follow the most when Melch. Canus tells us that most of the Churches and the Armes of Emperors have fought against the Roman privileges Is it a convincing way to have such a Pope as Eugenius 4th at the same time to differ from the greater part of the Christian world and also be damned by his own Church or General Council and to say you do not receive all that 's necessary to Salvation nor are willing to know the truth because you take not the expositions of the Universal Church When you have blinded us so far as to take a domineering sect that liveth not by the Word but by the Sword and Blood to be the Universal Church and all your Decretals to be the Churches expositions of Scripture and all the Scripture and Fathers that are against you to be novelties and your many novelties to be all the ancient truth such as Pet. Moulin de novitate Papismi hath laid open by that time we may think that the Church wanteth an Essential Artâ—…ole of Christianity which taketh not all the Popes expositions of Scripture But seeing this is the great damning Charge against the Protestants faith I pray you tell us next 1. Did all the Christian Church want an Essential part of their Christianity in all those Ages before the Universal Church gave them any expositions of the Scripture what exposition had they besides each Churches Pastor's for the first 300 years And what exposition did the Council of Nice make save about the deity of Christ and Easter day or such things that indeed were deliver'd not as expositions of Scripture but Traditions OF rules of order And what exposition made any of the old General Councils save about the Natures and Person and Wills of Christ and Church policie which Suarez de legiâ—… saith God made no Law for where are their Commentaries 3. Where shall we find any Commentary that the Fathers agreed in though the Trent-Oath is that you will not expâ—…nd the Scripture but according to the Fathers consent Your writers tell us that most whose works be come to us for the first 300 years were Millenaries Dionys. Petavius hath gathered the words of Arrian doctrine from most of them lib. de Trinit till after the Council of Nice yea that the chief of the Anti-Arrians even Athanassus himself was for three Gods telling us that as Peter Paul and Iohn were three names but one in Essence that is in Specie so is the Father Son and Holy Ghost when your Doctors tell us that Iustin Clem. Alexander Dionysius Alexand. Talianus Tertullian Cyprian Origen Eysebius and I know not how many more taught Heresie and Chrysostom Basil and many others that we hoped had been Christians are noted as fautors of Origen and even many of the Martyrs were Hereticks when through the reign of Theodosius Senior Arcadius and Honorius Theodosius Junior Valentinian to say nothing of Constantius and Valens c. of
His shameful reformation of Syllogisms and pretence of Logical form Sect. 6. He denieth Protestants to be of the Church of Christ. I prove it His silly cavils at the form of the Argument Sect. 7. Protestants profess all the Essentials of Christianity Proved His cavils shamed Sect. 8. His oft repeated Reason confuted of not receiving the Churches expositions Sect. 9. The novelty and discord of Popery The confusions in Councils Sect. 10. My second Argument's to prove that we hold all essentials The Popish faith explained Sect. 12. My third Argument Creed and Scriptures are with them too little and yet an insufficient proposal makes Christianity it self unnecessary Sect. 12. He giveth up his Cause confessing the sufficiency of our explicite belief Sect. 13. My fourth Argument His ridiculous denying that to deny the minor is to deny the antecedent Sect. 14. The minor proved All Protestants as such profess to love God Ergo sincere Protestants do love him What miracles believing in the Pope doth Sect. 15. He had no way to deny that Protestants profess true faith but by his impudent denying 1. That we profess to love God 2. And that we feel that we do love him Sect. 20. My second Argument to prove the perpetual visibility of our Church confoundeth him Sect. 21. Scripture sufficiency Sect. 22. My third Argument and his shameful Answer Sect. 25. My fourth Argument proveth the visibility of our Church not only as Christian but as without Popery Ten sub-arguments for that 1 From the twenty-eighth Canon of Conc. Calced 2. From the silence of the old Writers against Hereticks Sect. 28. 3. From Tradition proved 4. From Churches never subject to Rome His citations briefly confuted Sâ—…ct 30. 5. From the non-subjection even of the Imperial Churches Sect. 32. 6. From Gregory the first 's testimony Sect. 33. 7. From their confessions Aen. Silvius Reynerius Canus Binnius vindicated Sect. 38. 8. Phocas giving the Primacy to Boniface Sect. 39 9. Their Liturgy new Sect. 40. Twelve instances of new Articles of the Papists Faith which he durst not Answer Sâ—…ct 42. The tenth Argument he yieldeth the cause in sense Sâ—…ct 43. Notable testimonies unanswered Sâ—…ct 44. Papists differ de fide Sect. 47. What Hereticks are or are not in the Church fully opened His shameful exclaiming against me for distinguishing Sect. 48. Fifty six of Philastrius Heresies named many being small matters and many notorious certain truths Sect. 49. The woful work of Hereticating Councils Sect. 50. Councils hereticated Popes and one another Almost all the Christian world hereticate one another Sect. 55. His reasons answered for unchurching all Hereticks Sect. 60. Their Doctrine of sufficient proposal fullier confuted and their hereticating and unchurching themselves evinced Mr. Iohnson's alias Terret's Explication of seven Terms of our Questions examined and his confusion manifested CHAP. I. Question 1. WHAT mean you by the Catholick Church W. J. The Catholick Church is all those Visible Assemblies Congregations or Communities of Christians who live in unity of true faith and external Communion with one another and in dependance of their lawful Pastors R. B. Qu. 1. Whether you exclude not all those converted among Infidels that never had external communion nor were members of any particular visible Church of which you make the Catholick to to be constituted W. J. It is sufficient that such be subject to the supreme Pastors in voto or quantum in se est resolved to be of that particular Church actually which shall or may be designed for them by that Pastor to be included in my definition R. B. You see then that your definitions signifie nothing No man knoweth your meaning by them W. J. You shall presently see that your Exceptions signifie less than nothing R. B. 1. You make the Catholick Church to consist only of visible Assemblies and after you allow such to be members of the Church that are no visible Assemblies W. J. I make those converted Infidels visible Assemblies as my definition speaks though not actual members of any particular visible Church For though every particular visible Church be an assembly of Christians yet every assembly of Christians is not a particular visible Church I do not therefore allow such to be of the Church who are no visible assemblies as you misconceive R. B. 1. Would any man have understood that by Visible Assemblies the man had not meant only Churches but also Families Schools Cities c 2. Doth he not here expresly deny all those persons to be of the Church who are not members of some other visible assemblies And if a man be a Pilgrim a Hermite or if one or many be cast upon an uninhabited coast and if any are members of no visible assembly as Merchants Embassadors to Infidels c. when will he prove that this unchristeneth or unchurcheth them R. B. 2. You now mention subjection to the supreme Pastor as sufficient which in your description or definition you did not W. J. Am I obliged to mention all things in my definition which I express after in answering your Exceptions Ans. All that belongs to a notifying definition R. B. 3. If to be only in Voto resolved to be of a particular Church will serve then inexistence is not necessary To be only in Voto of the Catholick Church proveth no man a member of it because it is terminus diminuens but the contrary Seeing then by your own confession inexistence in a particular Church is not of necessity to inexistence in the Catholick Church why do you not only mention it in your definition but confine the Church to it W. J. I make them actually inexistent in some visible assembly according to my definition and in Voto only in a particular Church Now every particular family or neighbourhood nay two or three gathered in prayer is an actual assembly R. B. Strange Doctrine so it is of necessity to our Christianity and Salvation that we be members of a Christian City or Village or Fair or Market or some Meeting And so all Christians that live solitarily in Wildernesses or among Turks or Heathens are all unchristened and damned W. J. St. Hierome saith Ecclesia est plebs unita Episcopo In this consists your fallacy that you esteem none to be actually members of the Universal Church unless they be actual members of some particular Church which I deny R. B. I thought verily it had been I that was denying it all this while This is dispuâ—…ing in the dark Will you say that you meant in Voto who can understand you then when you say They must be of visible assemblies and mean that they need not be of any but wish they were or purpose to be so W. J. It is sufficient if they be actually of some assembly or congregation of Christians though it be no particular Church R. B. 1. Here is a new Exposition of Solomon's Vae soli Wo to him that is alone for he is unchristened by it or
is no spirit but God and the Anima Mundi and say that these are immaterial and never the more believe that Angels or Souls are spirits And no man can reasonably imagine that omnis spiritus est immaterialis doth include omnis anima est spiritus or that W. I's est spiritus immaterialis So one may say that all that are sanctified shall be glorified and yet not believe that Peter Paul yea or Christ were Holy of this sort of knowledg I mentioned that which is a belief of no more but the formal object of Faith that is Gods veracity that God cannot lye and so that all that God saith is true when yet one that confesseth this denieth all the Bible to be his Word and believeth rather Mahomet Amida or Confutius to have been Gods Messengers or the ancient Oracles at Delphos c. to have been his word But the confused Head of W. I. confoundeth several of these different sorts and because he thought that he might handsomly call a meer general knowledg or faith confused therefore he confoundeth the true confused faith with the general which are easily distinguished And first he calls for my proof That a meer general belief is no belief at all of the particulars though a confused faith may I prove it 1. Where there is no intellectual conception of the particulars there is no actual belief of the particulars But where there is only a conception of a general proposition there is no intellectual conception of the particulars Ergo c. the major is undeniable and the minor no less 2. Where the particular Object is not understood or believed there is not the particular Act of knowing or believing that Object for the Object is essential to the Act But where there is only a knowledg and belief of the general Object there the particular Object is not understood or believed Ergo c. 3. That is not an actual belief of the particulars which may consist with the actual belief of the contradictory But a meer belief of the General Proposition may consist i h the contradictory to the belief of particulars Ergo c. But he comes upon me with some instances so worded as may deceive the ignorant 1. Saith he Doth not this Proposition Omne animal vivit contain the substance of these truths Equus vivit Leo vivit Aquila vivit c Answ. No surely unless by substance you mean not the other Proposition but somewhat else what you list for it containeth not the very subject that there is such a thing as Equus Leo Aquila in being and that they are animalia May not a man that never heard or believed that there was such a creature as an Eagle Lyon c. no more than a Unicorn or Phaenix yet know that omne animal vivit 2. He saith Believing all that is in Scripture is the Word of God and true expresly I believe in confuso all that is in Genesis c. Answ. Yes if in confuso be terminus diminuens to actual belief of the particulars By meer believing the first you do not actually believe a word of Genesis or Exodus c. for your Proposition saith not that there is any such Book in the Scripture As I believe all the holy Scripture to be true and yet believe not Tobit Iudith Bell and the Dragon to be true because I believe them not to be the Holy Scriptures so may others by Genesis Exodus c. as the Hereticks of old denied many Books and as Infidels may believe all that is Gods Word to be true and yet not believe that the Scripture is his Word 3. Saith he Is not an express knowledg of the Genus a confused knowledg of species under it and so the species of the individua Answ. Yes if by confused knowledg you mean no knowledg of them it is no true knowledg of them at all 4. But he saith that my words not knowing whether you be Animal or Cadaver is a contradictory Proposition Answ. Say you so May not I see you asleep and think that you are dead Doth this Proposition Omne animal vivit include that there is such a Wight in being as W. I. or N. N or that he is now alive or that it is really a Man and not a Horse that is so called any more than that Bucephalus was a Man Yet doth he back these absurdities with advising me to a little more heed to what I write Note that page 9 he asserteth that The object of implicite faith delivered in the Schools is nothing save particular truths contained in substance under some general propositions so that they be neither known nor believed distinctly and expresly yet in confuso they are by the knowledg or belief of their general proposition Answ. But there is a confused knowledg of particulars which is actual of the Being of them though not distinct not fit or ripe for words to utter it This is different from the knowledg of meer Generals which is indeed no knowledg of the particulars that any such are contained in those generals at all He next comes to expound his words That faith believeth all that God revealeth explicitely or implicitely that is now some things explicitely and some things implicitely when as I asked him What was the faith in which we must unite who would have expected such an answer That it is a general belief of all things revealed and a particular belief of some things That it is such a belief of all particulars as is no real actual belief of some of them and it is an actual belief of other some But is any man ever the nearer the knowledg of their minds by this 1. Here is no notice what the General is that must be believed He professeth that it is not the formal object only that is The veracity or faithfulness of God the Revealer And what else it is whether that all that the Scripture revealeth is true or that all that the Church declareth to be Gods word is true and whom we must take for that Church c. he hath not told us and so hath given an answer which is no answer 2. Nor hath he told us what the Particulars are that must be believed But we may know what faith it is that the Church must unite in by hearing that it is something we know not what or that it is somewhat in general and somewhat in particular Doth this account satisfie themselves or do they look that it should satisfie us Will this distinguish their Church from Hereticks or Mahometans Do not these believe somewhat in general and somewhat in particular And do not Heathens do the same If this be enough for Christianity or Concord why do they call us Hereticks Are we not all of that Faith which believeth somewhat in General even that all Gods Word is true and somewhat in Particular But it 's well that he saith that the explicite belief of somewhat is necessary though
we may not know what And he tells us That while they have an explicite belief of some Articles they can never be thought to be without faith Answ. Either he meaneth that faith which was in the question which must notifie us from Hereticks and from others without and which the Church must unite in or some other faith If any other doth he not wilfully juggle and fly from answering when he pretends to answer If he means the faith in question then Mahometans and Heathens are of their Faith and Members of their Church yea and all that they call Hereticks and anathematize themselves yea and the Devils that believe and tremble But one would think that pag. 11 he described the necessary implicite Faith when he saith Our ordinary sense is so to believe that point that we have no distinct or express knowledg of it but only a confused understanding because it is contained in confuso under this proposition I believe all that God hath revealed or I believe all that is delivered to be believed in the Holy Scripture Answ. 1. But I must again repeat that here the word confused is used but to confound This is no actual belief of any particular under that proposition When a thing is actually known in it self but only by a General knowledg or not dâ—…stinct this is truly an Impersect knowledg It is to know somewhat of that thing though not its form or individuation If I see something which I know not whether it be a Man or a Tree a Steeple or a Rock I verily know somewhat of that thing it self but not the form of it If I see a Book open at two-yards distance I see the Letters distinctly but not formally for I know not what any one of them is If I see a clod of Earth or a River I see much of the very substance of the earth and water but I discern not the sands or the drops as distinct parts Here something is known though the special or numerical difference much more some accidents be unknown But in knowing W. I's general proposition only I know nothing at all of the particulars as shall yet be further manifested 2. And mark what his general Proposition is which he saith is the object of their Implicite saith viz. I believe all that God hath revealed or all that is delivered to be believed in the Holy Scripture Either he really meaneth that this is the implicite faith by which Christians are notifiâ—…d and which uniteth the Members of the Church and distinguisheth them from those without or he doth not If he do not what doth he but deceive his Râ—…ader If he do then as I said All Christians Hereticks most Mahometans and Heathens believe the first proposition viz. That all is true that God revealeth And Protestants and Papists and most other sorts of Christians agree in the second The Scripture-truth Here then is a justification of our Faith so far But do you think that he meaneth as he seemeth to mean Do they not hold it also necessary that men must take their Church to be the declarer of this Scripture-truth And also that Tradition not written in the Bible be believed Must not both these make up their Implicite Faith If our general Faith and theirs be the same what maketh them accuse us herein as they do But now pag. 11. he proceeds to assault me with such reasoning as this No man knoweth all that God hath revealed to wit with an actual understanding of every particular Ergo say I No man believes all that God hath revealed Now I proceed If no man believe all that God hath revealed then you believe not all that God hath revealed Then further Whoever believeth not all that God hath revealed is no good Christian nor in state of salvation But you believe not all that God hath revealed Ergo you are no good Christian nor in a state of salvation See you not how fair a thred you have spun Or will you say that he that believes not all that God hath revealed is a good Christian If you will you may but no good Christian will believe you Answ. The man seemeth in good sadness in all this Childish Play And must Rome be thus upheld And must poor mens Faith and Consciences be thus laid upon a game at Cheating Words No wonder that this Hector would have nothing said in dispute but syllogism c. Few Lads and Women would unmask his pitiful deceits whether the great disputer saw their vanity himself I know not But men at age that can speak and try sense will see that all this Cant is but the sporting-equivocation of one syllable ALL This ALL is either a term of a meer general proposition e. g. All Gods word is true Here I believe what is predicated of this general word ALL and take this for a true proposition ALL Gods word is true Or it signifieth the very things species or parts as in themselves known and so if the very things species or parts generally expressed by the word ALL be not themselves known as such things species or parts it is no actual knowledg of them at all to know that truth of the said general proposition And doth not every novice in Logick know this The same I say of Beliefs as of Knowledg He is no good Christian who believeth not that all Divine Revelations are true which Hereticks and Heathens believe But neither I nor any Christian known to him or me knoweth or believeth ALL the particular verities which God hath revealed And he believeth not one of them beside that proposition it self which is found among the rest who believeth but that general But yet he will justifie his vanity by more instances pag. 12 he saith When you profess in tâ—…e Creed that God is the Creator of all things visible and invisible I demand Do you believe as you profess If you do then you may believe with an actual belief that he is the Creator of many things visible and invisible whereof you have no actual understanding or which are wholly unknown particularly or distinctly to you or by any other knowledg than as confusedly contained in the word ALL. Ans. 1. What 's all this but to say that I believe this proposition All things of which many are unknown to â—…e are created by God This proposition I know and believe but the things themselves as such I no further believe than I know if I know not that they are I believe not that they are if I know not what they are I believe not what they are that is if I have not an intellectual conception That they are and What they are for believing is indeed but a knowing by the medium of a Testimony or Revelation and the veracity of the Revealer I believe that God maâ—… all that is about the Center of the earth and yet I neither know nor actually believe any one thing species or individual or
nothing is necessary to you to do which you cannot do without coming into the light It 's a dispute among the Papists Divines what a Christian is or what Christianity is And yet they have an Infallible Judg of all the Scripture and all Controversies And yet they can tell that Protestants are Hereticks And yet they can tell who are members of their Church though it be a dispute among Divines But mark that this is not then with them de fide any point of faith what a Christian is or what must be believed For their Divines dispute not that which they take to be de fide I told him that a man may believe that the Bible is true and Gods word and yet not know a word that is in it or that Christ is the Messias or that there was ever such a person He answereth that This is morally impossible For either such a person believes the Bible rashly and imprudently and then according to all Divines his faith cannot be supernatural and divine or sufficient to constitute him a Christian or he believeth it prudently by prudential motives of credibility Now that can be no other than the authority of the Catholick Church which he cannot be ignorant to profess the faith of Christ there being no other save that though he know not by experience that Christ is mentioned in the Bible he cannot but know that he is professed to be the Son of God and Saviour of the world by those of the Catholick Church who delivered the Bible to him as the word of God and that such a faith is necessary to Salvation Ans. Here are many things worthy our consideration 1. That a man is not a member of the Church that is a Christian unless his faith be supernatural and divine not only in the object but his act And surely no man knoweth what other mans act of faith is supernatural and divine Therefore no man knoweth who is a Christian and so their Church is still invisible 2. No man that believeth the Bible rashly and imprudently is a Christian And no man knoweth whether another believe it not rashly and imprudently yea whether he believe it at all Therefore no man knoweth who is a Christian or member of the Church of Rome 3. No other motive than the authority of the Catholick Church can serve to free a man from this rashness imprudence and nullity of his Christianity 1. But why then had we not this General The Church Catholick is to be believed and the Scripture to be received only by its authority before in the description of implicite or explicite faith 2. Was that man no Christian in the Primitive times who was converted by a single Apostle and took not the faith on the authority of the Catholick Church Did the Eunuch converted by Philip Act. 8. or the Jaylor and Lydia converted by Paul Act. 16. or the 3000 converted by Peter Act. 2. receive faith on the authority of the Catholick Church Or the Indians when converted by Frumentius and Edesus or the Abassian Empire that till lately knew nothing of the Pope and his pretensions Or do we read that the Apostles did use that argument The authority of the Catholick Church to convert their hearers or that they always first told them of the authority of such a Church If by the Church you mean any single Apostle or Teacher hold to that and we shall do well enough with you 3. But Authority is an ambiguous word and may deceive We maintain that a preserving and teaching ministerial authority is usually needful to mens conversion to the faith though not absolutely necessary to be first believed by the hearer But a judging authority viz. Whether there be a God a Christ a Scripture a Heaven c. or not which determineth by a sentence rather than teacheth by opening that evidence which caused belief in the Teacher himself this is not necessary to mans faith 4. And what if a man should hear a Preacher open the other reasons of Christianity without talking of the Catholick Church and its authority and should hereupon believe or should believe by the bare reading of a Bible how prove you that this man is no Christian nor shall be saved when Christ saith He that believeth shall be saved and shall not perish and saith not He that believeth on any other motive than the authority of the Catholick Church and that must be the Romans believeth rashly and impudently and shall perish 4. But it 's well worth the enquiry could we possibly find it out what he meaneth by knowing the Church and its profession and its authority and whether this be an act of necessary faith before any thing else can be believed Or what other points of faith are contained in our belief of this Church and its authority And what is the foundation of this faith It seems that he supposeth that the Church must be known before that the Christian faith be believed And that in knowing the Church we must know the faith of the Church It is one thing to know that they are a company of men called the Christian Church and another thing to know what a Christian Church is and another thing to know that this company of men is that Church Must all these be known before we can believe or but one or two and which 1. If the name were enough a man may know that a company of men are called Christians or Mahumetanes who knoweth not at all what Christianity or Mahumetanism is You say that it must be known that they profess to trust in Christ this they may do and not know who Christ is whether God or man or what he hath done or will do for us If you say that they must know that they profess that Christ is the Saviour so they may do and yet not know what the word Saviour signifieth or what Christ ever did or will do for our Salvation 2. But if he mean here that every one that will believe Gods Word must first know the Church as defined or know it in all its essence then 1. How few will he be able to prove to be Christians And how will he know who they are 2. And still the question recurreth what is it that must be particularly believed to essentiate the Church For if he know not that he cannot know that he knoweth what the Church is 3. And when that is done it seems he must know which is that Church considered in existence as different from all Heresies and other Societies But by this method our difficulties are multiplied 1. How shall I be sure that this Church doth not deceive me in saying that this and not that is Gods Word Is this by an act of knowledg or of divine faith If of knowledg what evidences prove it If of faith then I must believe God before I can believe him that is I must believe that this is his Revelation and true that the Roman-Catholick
part of the Church I next told him that the Jesuit Turnbull against Rob. Baronius maintaineth that Revelation is no part of the formal object of faith and therefore to deny it is not to deny the formal object 2. And that forma dat nomen and he is no Heretick that is none formally To the latter he giveth no answer and to the first as bad as none viz. that the Heretick denieth also the material object and what 's that to the case in hand and that which he is obliged by sufficient reason to believe to be revealed of God and therefore virtually denieth God to be true Ans. But I again reply 1. Virtual is not actual 2. It is no virtual denial that God is true but only that the proposer is true To be obliged to believe a thing to be Gods word only proveth that I break that obligation if I believe it not to be his word but not at all that I believe God to be a lyar whose word I believe it not to be Again this maketh all Christians to be Hereticks past dispute For all Christians receive not something or other small or great which they were obliged to belieâ—…e to be Gods word Do you err in any thing that is revealed by Scripture or Tradition or not If you say no and so that your understanding hath no sin you deceive your self and the truth is not in you If yea then were you not obliged to believe the contrary to be Gods word if not obliged then your error is no sin so that you make every sinful error to be Heresie and proudly deny that you have any sinful error lest you should be a Heretick I added that their Church is constituted of men that sinfully neglect some point of truth or other sufficiently proposed Ergo is it constituted of Hereticks To this he answers That whatever their neglect be to know what is propounded yet so long as they believe explicitely what is necessary to be so believed necessitate medii and implicitely the rest they can be no Hereitcks for it is not the ignorance though culpable but contradiction to what is known to them to be propounded by those that have power to oblige them as being their lawful superiors which makes an heretick R. B. 1. But still you agree not nor tell us what is explicitely to be believed necessarily 2. By this we are all absolved from heresie for we believe all explicitely that is necssary necessitate medii and all the rest implicitely by a double implicite faith 1. In God and our Redeemer 2. In the inspired Apostles and Prophets we believe all to be true which God hath revealed and which his Apostles have delivered as Gods word 3. Yea and all that we know to be propounded by any obliging superiors for we know not the Pope nor your contradictory Councils to be such My next Qu. 2. was What mean you by sufficient proposal W. I. Such as is sufficient among men in humanis to oblige one to take notice that a King hath exacted such and such Laws c. that is a publick testimony that such things are revealed by the infallible authority of those who are the highest tribunal of Gods Church or by notorious and universal trâ—…dition R. B. 1. Here the Reader may see that he taketh sufficiency respectively to the Promulgator viz. as much as he was obliged to do for a King is not bound to publish his Laws in every parish or county but only to make such a publication of them in the chief places of his kingdom as that men may take notice of them Kings send not Schoolmasters to teach every man how to prove that his Laws are not counterfeit and what they are and what is the meaning of them For the enacting of them being a late matter of fact and easily notified as near unto them and no other knowledg or belief of them being required but such as is necessary to that part of the obedience of them which belongeth to every man in his place this is not necessary And if such a publication of Gods Laws be sufficient millions that never heard a word of the Bible or what Christ is have such a sufficient publication for the Gospel is published in many parts of the world and perhaps in many places of the Kingdoms where they dwell though they never heard it 2. But when men have the publick testimony that such statutes are made and such a Book sent from God this doth not acquaint men what those Statutesor that Book contains sothat by this rule it should be sufficient to know that God made the Bible without knowing what is in it or else he that is but told that there is such a book is bound by that much to know all that is in it 3. But note the Popish difficulty of faith W. I. tells us after the rest that we must know these things revealed by the infallible authority of those who are the highest tribunal of Gods Church c. And is it possible for one that knoweth nothing of Christ or the Scripture or that Christ hath a Church to know yet 1. That he hath a Church 2. And that he hath authorized some men to be the highest Tribunal to judg that Church through all the world And 3. That he hath particularly authorized them to judg which is and is not his revelation 4. And to know who be the men that are this highest Tribunal to all the world viz. for those of Abassia that had not so much History as to tell them that there was such a City as Rome or such a man as the Pope in the world till Oviedo was sent who told it but to few could yet know that this Pope and his Council are their Judges and from them they must receive the Gospel 5. And to know that this Universal Tribunal is infallible before they believe in Christ himself who is supposed to give them their Infallibility Alas must every poor Infidel know all this before he can believe in Christ when we that live among them and read their laws and doctrines cannot easily believe the Infallibility of those Popes who by General Councils are charged not only with Murder Adultery Simony Perjury c. but with Heresie also or Infidelity Nor the Infallibility of those General Councils who are accused by Popes and by other Councils of Error Heresie or Schism 4. But he addeth another way Or by notorious and universal Tradition And 1. If this will serve then I hope we may have true faith that believe no humane infallible Tribunal over all the world much less that the Pope and his Council are such a Tribunal for we have notorious Universal Tradition delivering us all our Religion 2. But yet these are hard terms for every poor Heathen to come to Christ by Alas how shall the millions of people through the world who know nothing that is many days journey from their houses know
Church did notoriously believe and practice the administration of the Lords Supper in both kinds the Cup as well as the Bread and the celebration of publike worship in a known tongue and the reading and hearing of the Scripture in a known tongue by the people and others such like But yet I will not take you at your word nor call you Hereticks meerly on the account asserted by you for I know that your rule is false And if a man had known that the Universal Church had held some opinion of Chronology or Genealogy or Cosmography as about Cainan or the age of Sem or that there were no Artipodes especially in the dismal Ninth Century and if he had thought that they took this point for a Divine Revelation believing the Septuagint or some other mis-translation which was commonly received before Ieromes time this man so thinking that the whole Church then erred in so small a point was no Heretick for so thinking for I would know of your self whether the Popes and all their followers be not Hereticks For the Septuagint was long taken by the Universal Church for the Word of God and so was the Vulgar Latin long after by your Universal Roman Church and consequently that those Texts were Gods Word which yet afterward you altered Many hundred or thousand alterations in the one were made by Sixtus 5 and Clement 8 all which were so many judgments that the Church had erred that before took the other readings for the Word of God unless you can make one thing Gods word to day and the contrary to morrow 5. But by this rule also we are acquit from Heresie if it was not notorious to us that the Universal Church believed and practised contrary to us which sure is notorious to very few at most And indeed we differ from the Roman Church the more because we dare not with them differ from the belief and practice of the far greatest part of the Church of Christ in this and in former ages R. B. Is not the Bible a publick testimony and record and being universally received is an universal tradition and yet abundance of truths in it are not actually known or believed by most of your own Church W. J. It is only a Tradition that whatever is there delivered is the word of God but it is no tradition that such a determinate sense and no other is the word of God in every sentence contained in it when according to the analogy of faith the words are capable of many senses R. B. Worse and worse still 1. Tradition tells us that this Bible is Gods Word This Word of God is significant and intelligible or else it is worse and more defective than the common words of men This intelligible Bible or Word therefore delivereth to us its own sense If not then Councils do not deliver us the sense of Gods Word or their own For God could speak as well as they and their words are no more plain than his Yet a multitude of plain intelligible Texts are not understood by many of your Church whom you call not Hereticks yea your learned Commentators differ and fight about their sense 2. Therefore when you talk of every sentence you do but fly and hide your fraud If your meaning be that no sentences of Scripture are Divine revelations as they are in Gods own words but as expounded by your Church all Christian ears should abhor your blasphemy If you mean only that there are some Texts so difficult as that most Christians cannnot understand them or that are capable of various senses we grant it But what are those to all the rest Is every man a Heretick that erreth about the sense of any one plain Text of Scripture or not And it is perverse that you say of divers senses according to the analogy of faith For a Text may be expounded contrary to the plain words and context which yet is not expounded contrary to the analogy of faith if by that word you mean as is usual contrary to the harmony of Christian necessary Truths yea or contrary to any other truth whatever save that Text it self And now Reader I leave it to thy reason whether this man have given us any regardable notice at all what is Heresie or what they mean by it or have not trifled and said nothing But what Heresie is I will briefly tell you The word signifying Election was used in the beginning sometime for any Sect or Party divided from the common body of the Church And Christians were called a Heresie by the Iews By the Christians the name signified any party of men that professing to differ in some necessary thing from the common body of Christians and the Doctrine of the Apostles did separate from them as unmeet for their Communion and gather themselves into divided Societies So that differing from the Apostolical Doctrine and Churches and making different Sects or Societies therefore which separated from and opposed the Churches was called Heresie by the Apostles and it was the same thing with the grossest sort of Schism And the commonest sense of the word Schism then was lower signifying either the contentious making of divisions within a Church without separating from it or else the breaking of one Church into many without separating from other Churches or the generality of Christians And so long after the word Heresie was sometime used for such Schism only and hence Lucifer Calaritanus and the Novatians and many others were called Hereticks And sometimes used more cautelously in a narrower sense for those only that denied some essential article of faith or practice And sometimes in a yet narrower sense for those only that upon such a denial of some essential point did gather into a separated Society to maintain their error and oppugn the truth And according to these various senses of the word Horesie and Heretick we must conclude that a Heretick may or may not be saved and is or is not within the Universal Church which W. I. doth deceitfully confound Of which I have said more in the End and shewed you by an instance of Philastrius how mischievous it is to abuse the name of Heresie against every different opinion of true Christians and so to make Hereticks of all Believers in the world CHAP. III. What mean you by the Word POPE W. J. By POPE I mean St. Peter or any of his lawful successors in the See of Rome having authority by the institution of Christ to govern all particular Churches next under Christ. R. B. I am never the nearer knowing the Pope by this till I know how St. Peters Successors may be known to me Q. 1. What personal qualification is necessary ad esse W. J. Such as are necessary ad esse of other Bishops which I suppose you know R. B. If so then all those were no Popes that were Hereticks or denied essential points of faith W. J. 'T is true they were no Popes while
deny the Popes Soveraignty and that as by tradition And how lame their tradition is which is carried but by their private affirmation and is but the unproved saying of a Sect. To this he saith W. J. That this belongs to our Controversie and not to the explication of our terms And so I must pass it by R. B. Q. 2. What proof or notice must satisfie as in particulars what is true tradition W. J. Such as with proportion is a sufficient proof or notice of the Laws and Customs of temporal Kingdoms R. B. But you durst not tell us what that is that is proportionable This was answered before I added Is it necessary for every Christian to be able to weigh the credit of contradicting-parties When one half of the world say one thing and the other another thing what opportunity have ordinary Christians to compare them and discern the moral advantages on each side As in the case of the Popes Soveraignty when two or three parts are against it and the rest for it Doth salvation lye on this W. J. As much as they have to know which books are and which are not Canonical Scripture among those that are in controversie R. B. That these books were sent to the Churches from the Apostles 1. Is a matter of fact 2. And an assertion easily remembred 3. And all the Churches are agreed of all that we take as Caâ—…cal 4. And yet men that practically believe but the Creed and Summaries of Religion shall certainly be saved though they erroneously doubted of some of the uncontroverted books as Chronicles Esther Canticles c. much more that receive not the controverted Apocrypha But 1. Your Traditions in question are many particulars hard for to be remembred 2. And that of matter of faith and fact where a word forgotten or altered changeth the thing 3. And most Christians in the world are against it 4. And you would lay the peoples salvation on it yea and make it one of your cheating quibbles to prove your religion safer than ours because some Protestants say a Papist may be saved but you say that Protestants cannot be saved that is because you have less sincerity and charity Is not here difference enough If you hold that all they are damned that believed not that all the Apocryphal books were Canonical peruse Bishop Cousins Catalogue of Councils and Fathers that received them not and see whether you damn not almost all the Church But if you confess that there is no more necessity to salvation for men to be the subjects of your Pope than there is that they try all the Apocrypha whether it be Canonical and know it why then do you found your belief that Christ is the Son of God upon your forebelieving that the Pope is his Vicar or your Church his Church And why do you make such a stir in the world to affright poor people to believe and be subject to your Pope I here asked him Must all the people here take the words of their present Teacher And he durst not answer yea or nay but as much as they do for the determination of Canonical Scriptures Ans. If it be no more it giveth them no certainty but by the belief of one man as a Teacher they are brougâ—…â—…o â—…cern themselves those notifying evidences by which the Teacher himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 books are 〈◊〉 And if they attain no higher than to believe fide Dâ—… the 〈◊〉 Doctrines the doubting or ignorance of some texts or books will not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Scripture that impress of Divine authority which to a prepared heaâ—… oâ—… reader will 〈◊〉 convince him that they are of God though not râ—…e him of every particular Text and Book R. B. Then most of the world must believe against you because most of the teachers are against you Tradition quite â—…eth Pâ—…er W. J. There is no Congregation of Christians united in the same profession of faith external Communion and dependance of Pastors which is contrary in belief â—…o 〈◊〉 any way to be parallel with us in extent and multitude Prove there is and name it All our adversaries together are a patcht body of a thousand different professions and as much adversaries one to another as they are to us the one justifying us in that wherein the other condemn us so that no beed is to be taken to their testimonies non sunt convenientia R B. They agree not with your interest But if the Testimonies and Tradition of two or three parts of the Christian world be not to be heeded I doubt the testimony of your third or fourth part will prove much less regardable Let us try the case for here you are utterly confounded 1 Indeed none that our ordinary language calleth a Congregation that is men that meet locally together are so big as all your party But a Church far better united than you are is far greater than yours Those that have all the Essentials of the one Church of Christ are that one Church of Christ But the Reformed Churches the Greeks Armenians Abassines Syrians Iacobites Georgians Copties c. have all the Essentials of the one Church of Christ Therefore they are that one Church of Christ. The Major is undeniable The Minor is thus proved They that hold the same Head of the Church believing in the same God the Father Son and â—…ly Gâ—…st and are devoted to him in the same Baptismal Covenant and believe all the Articles of faith desire and practice essential to Christianity in the Creed Lords-prayer and Decalogue and receiâ—…e all the â—…re as Gods â—…ord which iâ—…â—…y here received by us as Canonical these have all the â—…ls of the one Church of Christ and much more But such are all the forementioned Christians Ergo c. The Head and the Body are the constitutive parts of the Church The Head is Christ the Body are Christians 1. They are united in the same profession of faith viz. the same Baptism â—…reed and Scriptures 2. They are united in the same external communion if you mean external worship of God in all the Essentials of it and much more They have the same Scriptures read and 〈◊〉 they preach the same Gospel they use the same Sacraments of the Covenant of Grace viz. Baptism and the Lords Supper yea they are commonly for some Confirmation Ordination 〈◊〉 of penitence and absolution of Pâ—…nitents Matrimony c. though they agree not whether the name of Sacraments be fit for them all much less Sacraments of the Coveâ—… Grace they observe the same Lords day for publick worship they pray confess sin give thanks and praises to God and hold the communion of Saints and communication to each other in want This is their external communion 3. They have the same depenâ—… of the people on their Pastors as the Ministers of Christ authorized to 〈◊〉 and guide the Churches and to go before them in the publick worshipping of God But if
is that made that Law to all the world And it 's known that the Apostles Elders and Brethren were â—…senters at Ierusalem Act 15. 2. Inferiors may come as Deputies of the Bishops for he knew that the Bishop of Rome had oft sent such to Councils so far off as his gravity would not suffer him to go to But are these Priests capable persons or not If not how can a Bishops deputation make them capable what if a Priest depute a Lay-man to consecrate the Eucharist or a Bishop depute a Priest or Deacon only to ordain will the deputation make them capable but if they are capable why may they not be there by their own right If the business of Councils be as much as our modern Papists tell us to transmit the Traditions which the several Countries have received from their Ancestors why may not ten learned grave Priests as truly and credibly tell what are the Traditions of their Country as one unlearned or learned Bishop 3. Note here how the highest acts of a Pope or Prelate with them may be done per alios by Deputies that are no Bishops To preside in General Councils was of old in the Empire the top of the Popes prerogative and yet he may do that by a Presbyter and a Bishop may vote and do all his part in a General Council by a Presbyter And is that an office properly Ecclesiastical and Sacred which may be exercised by others not of that office why then may not a Lay-man be deputed to preach baptize pray consecrate and administer the Eucharist excommunicate absolve c. if deputed And if so what is proper to the office I told him of the Council of Basil where were a multitude of Priests And he answereth W. J. Basil in many things is not allowed of by us name those others received as General Councils by us that had simple Priests with power of giving Votes as such R. B. See Reader when they have talkt of Councils and Traditions of all the Church c. all signifieth but what please the Pope and his dislike can make Councils and their judgments null at a word Basil was one of the greatest Councils that ever was but they condemned and deposed the Pope and no wonder then if the Pope dislike them and now that 's an answer to all such authority Basil is not allowed by us Nor is any thing allowed by you that is against you But if any of them would see where Priests have had Votes in Councils let them read Blondel in the end of his Def. Sent. Hieron and he shall have proof enough For I will not tire the Reader with vain citations done by many long ago Only I note 1. If Abbots that are no Bishops have Votes in Councils why not Priests saving the Popes will what makes the difference 2d If Presbyters may have Votes in National and Provincial Councils why not in General ones the will of the Pope makes and unmakes all Thus we have no satisfaction what a General Council is CHAP. VII What mean you by SCHISME W. J. I understand by Schism a wilful separation or division of ones self from the whole visible Church of Christ. R. B. If this only be Schism it 's comfortable news to many a thousand and million that some call Schismaticks I hope then there are no Schismaticks in England of those that are called Presbyterians Erastians Independents Separatists or Anabaptists For I know not one of these that separateth from the whole visible Church of Christ. But I doubt with these Judges the Church of Rome goes for the whole visible Church of Christ. I asked here Q. 1. Is it no Schism to separate from a particular Church unless from the whole W. J. No it is no Schism as Schism is taken in the Holy Fathers for that great and Capital Crime so severely censured by them in which sense only I take it here R. B. 1. He first defineth without distinguishing and then tells us that he means only one sort of Schism 2. Let the Reader but peruse all the Texts of Scriptures which mention Schism and see whether he will not find that every Text or almost every one do use the Word only of Divisions made in the Church rather than of dividing or separating from the Church and whether such separating from the whole Church be not there called Heresie rather than Schism But seeing it is only this Capital Schism that he calleth by that name I have no mind to draw him now to more censoriousness and therefore I noted how by this he absolveth the Protestants from the guilt of Schism W. J. Did not your first Protestants in Germany separate as much from the Armenians Ethiopians Greeks as they did from the Romans If they did not shew the Communion they had with them R. B. Very willingly Sir They had the same God the same Saviour the same Spirit the same Faith Baptism and Hope and so were of the same Body of Christ which is all the Union predicated by St. Paul Eph. 4. 3 4 5 6. They had also the same Scriptures the same Rule of Prayer and Practice the Lord's Prayer and the Decalogue and Precepts of Christ as well as the same Creed the same Love the same Sacrament of the Eucharist Prayses of God the Lords day for Holy Communion Pastors of the same Order and had no other Diversities in such things than St. Paul tells us are in the Body of Christ 1 Cor. 12. Is this no Communion W. J. Did your Ministers first take either Mission or Iurisdiction to preach from any of their Bishops or Patriarchs Did they take the prescription of their Liturgies Discipline or Hierarchy from them Did they upon occasion joyn in Prayer Sacraments or Sacrifice with them R. B. 1. Do we hold Communion with none that we take not Mission and Iurisdiction from What Absurdities do you thrust upon us Did the Churches of Ephesus Corinth Galatia Philippi Colosse c. hold no Communion in Scripture-times unless they had Mission and Iurisdiction from each other Must the Greeks and Armenians have Mission c from us If not why must we have it from them Your Church receiveth no Mission or Jurisdiction from others Have you therefore no Communion with them Your Language favoureth of so much Tyranny and Pride as would tempt Men indeed to take you for Anti-christian As if Subjection to you and Communion with you were all one or you would have Communion with no Christians in the World bâ—…n the relation of Servants or Subjects to you 2. When we have Qualification Election and where it may be had due Ordination we know of no other Mission necessary besides Gods own Word which chargeth Christ's Ministers to preach the Gospel in season and out of season c. God's charging all Ministers to preach is their Mission when they are Ministers Princes leave and Peoples consent do give them their opportunity and for
Jurisdiction we need and desire none but a Ministerial Power of guiding Souls towards Heaven by God's Word preached and applyed And he that ordaineth a Minister thereby giveth him all the Jurisdiction which is necessary to his Office If a Man be licensed a Physitian must he have also Mission and Iurisdiction given him after before he may practice 3. How could we take Ordination Mission and Jurisdiction from Men on the other side of the World What need we go so far for it when the Gospel is near us which telleth us how God would have Ministers more easily called than so 4. And as for the prescript of our Liturgy Discipline and Hierarchy that is one of the differences between us and you Must you needs have a Liturgy Discipline and Hierarchy of Man's forming so you have But we can live in Christian Communion with so much as Christ and his Apostles by his Spirit have prescribed us Is there no Communion to be had with any Church but that which hath arrived at that heighth of Pride as to make Liturgies Discipline and Hierarchy for all the Chrstian World and to suffer none to speak publickly to God in any words but those which they write down for them to read to God We make no such Laws to any other Church in the World nor do we receive any such Laws from any and yet we have Communion with them fraternal and not subjective Communion There is one Law-giver who is able to save and to destroy who are you that make Laws for another's Servants and judge them Had the Churches no Communion for the first 400 years when no Liturgies were imposed or when the first Law made hereabout was but that no one should use a Form of Prayer till he had shewed it to the Synod No nor when Gregory's and Ambrose's Liturgies were striving for pre-eminence Had the Church at Neocesaria no Communion with that at Caesarea because they had so different Liturgies as their quarrel against Basil intimateth And when every Bishop used what Liturgy he pleased in his own Congregation Was there then no Communion between the Churches We refuse not any meet Liturgy that is found needful to our Concord But truly for Hierarchy and Species or Forms of Churches and the substantials of Discipline we earnestly wish that no Church had any but what God hath himself prescribed to them 5. But how should we joyn with Men many hundred or thousand miles off us in Word and Sacraments otherwise than by useing those of the same species We do not locally hold such Communion with the next Parishes to us nor with many in the World for we cannot be in many places at once much less can we be every Lords day in every Assembly in Ethiopia and Armenia As for Sacrifice we know of none acceptable but the Commemmoration of Christ's Sacrifice once offered for Sin and the offering of our selves and our Thanksgivings praise and other duties to God And why you distinguish the first from Sacraments I know not W. J. Aâ—…d did they profess the same Faith in all points of Faith and those the very same wherein they dissented from the Church of Rome R. B. 1. Ad hominem it might suffice to say to you that explicitely or implicitely they did 2. But I better answer you We profess the same Faith in all points essential to Christianity and in abundance more I have told you before that we agree in all the Old Creeds and in the truth of the Canonical Scriptures 3. But do you Papists agree in all points of Faith no not by a thousand For all is of Faith which God hath intelligibly revealed in the Holy Scriptures to be believed But there is above a thousand intelligible Texts of Scripture about the sence of which your Commentators differ If all Christians agree in all that is de fide then all Christians fully understand every intelligible Word in the Scripture And then every Woman and Rustick is as wise in Divinity as the greatest Doctors yea far are the Doctors from such Wisdom W. J. If so they may as well be said not to have separated fom the external Communion of the Roman Church R. B. Some will tell you that we did not separate from you but you from us but I must say that the Roman Church is considered either materially as Christians and a part of the Church of Christ and so we neither did nor do separate from you or else formally as Pâ—…pal and so we renounce you and all Communion with you as being no Church of Christ but a Sect that treasonably usurpeth his Prerogative The pars imperans specifieth or informeth the society Christ only is the Universal Head of all Christians as such and of all the Churches with which we profess Concord and Communion In this Head Greeks Armenians Ethiopians and Protestants unite But the Pope falsly pretending to be Christ's Vicar-General is taken for the Universal Head by the Papists and in renouncing this Head we renounce no other Church but yours R. B. Not from you as Christians but scandalous Offenders whom we are commanded to avoid we separate not from any but as they separate from Christ. W. J. 1. No sure for if you did you must be Iews Turks or Infidels 2. Was there no more in it Did not the Primitive Persons who begun your breach and party owe subjection to their respective Ecclesiastical Superiors Diocesans and Pastors R. B. No none at all as they were Papal that is the subordinate Ministers of the usurping Universal Bishop W. J. And is it lawful for a Subject to subtract himself from the obedience of a lawful Pastor because he is a scandalous Offender R. B. Yes if his Offence be a ceasing to be a lawful Pastor and taking on him a false Office by usurpation Or if he remained lawful quoad hoc as Christian and adde a treasonable addition we must have no Communion with him at least in that unlawful part W. J. If you say he remaineth not in his former Power you contradict our Saviour commanding obedience to the scandalous Pharisees c. R. B. 1. The Pharisees set not up a new usurped Office of Head-ship constitutive pretendedly to the Universal Visible Church but only abused a lawful Office that God had made 2. Yet Christ requireth obedience to them no farther than as they sate in Moses's Chair and delivered the Law but warned men to renounce them as Corrupters and to take heed of their Doctrine 3. And this much was but till they shewed themselves uncurable and he set up new Officers over his Church and then all men were to forsake the Pharisees Government W. J. You destroy all Ecclesiastical Government and open a way to tread under foot all temporal Authority If you hold these Offences deprive him of all Ecclesiastical Power why not so of Kings and Magistrates and Parents and then you have spun a fair Thread c. R. B. Confusion
Church 6. Christ himself washed his Apostles Feet and taught them to do the like which was used in those hot Countries where it was a needful Act of Ministry but yet it is not essential to the Church 7. Baptism from the beginning as Instituted by Christ was Administred by dipping over Head in Water but you take not that to be essential to the Church 8. The Lord's Day 's holy Observation as Instituted by Christ and his Apostles hath ever been in the Church and yet many of your Doctors do equal it with other Holy Days and make it not essential to the Church 9. Christ and his Apostles distinguish Essentials from Integrals and Accidents in their time therefore they are still to be distinguished And it is a strange Society that hath not ever had Integrals and Accidents Christ Instituting Baptism saith He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved Thus the Essentials Yet he saith Teach them to observe all things whatever I have Commanded you But all those are not Essentials for Christ himself distinguished Tything Mint Annise and Cummin from the great things of the Law And yet saith These ought ye to have done And St. Paul saith The Kingdom of God is not Meat and Drink but Righteousness and Peace and Ioy in the Holy Ghost c. And yet more than these were then a Duty All things were to be done decently and in order And yet who ever said but you that all this is essential to the Church Christ by his Apostles instituted that Collections for the Poor should be made on the first Day of the Week yet is not that essential to the Church 10. Afflictions are Accidents of the Church and of Christ's appointment and have been ever there and yet are not essential to it 11. All the numbers of Christians and the higher Degrees of Gifts and Grace have been of Christ and ever in the Church and yet it is not essential to it that Christians be just as many as they have been or of such measures of Gifts and Grace for even Perfection is a Duty 12. Few of your own do think that extreme Unction is essential to the Church and that if it ceased it would be no Church The like may be said of many other things But see how these Men Unchurch themselves For if this be true then the Church of Rome can be no true Church For it hath cast off that which they call Essential Were it but the Cup in the Lords Supper and Publick Prayers in a Known Tongue the change hath Unchurched them These Consequents fall on them that will Unchurch most of the Church of Christ. But Page 55 56. he saith That he doth not say that every such thing must be necessarily believed by every Member No not the belief of the Pope's Supremacy but to such only to whom they are sufficiently propounded Answ. 1. And yet these Men tell our People to affright them That they cannot be saved out of their Church or in our Religion And now it is not essential to believe the Pope's Supremacy 2. But who can ever know what will pass for a sufficient propounding while twenty degrees of Mens Capacities make twenty degrees of Proposal respectively sufficient what Man of Reason can believe that such self-confuting Disputes as yours are a sufficient Proposal of the Pope's Supremacy And sure the Christian Empire of Abassia then had no sufficient Proposal when but lately your Emissaries told them that they never heard from the Pope till now because he could not have access or send to them Q. Whether that Empire be true Christians through so many Ages seeing they received not the Scriptures on the Authoritative Proposal of the Pope or Papal Church and yet confessedly were never bound to believe the Pope's Supremacy 3. By this account all Christians essentially differ from each other in their Religion and Christianity is a word of such monstrous ambiguity that it signifieth as many several Religions as there be persons in the World whose divers Capacities maketh diversity of proposal become necessary or sufficient to them But he saith that these are all essential to the Church though not to the several Members More difficulties still 1. How shall we ever know the Church this way If the belief of the Popes Supremacy be essential to some and only to some how many must they be that so believe Will one serve or one thousand to make all the rest Church-Members that believe it not Or how many will this Leven extend to Why then may not the belief of Italy prove all the World to be the Church 2. How cometh another mans belief to be of such saving use to others If you say that it is not his belief but their own who believe not then all the World is of your Church that want sufficient proposal And Unbelievers are Christians or of the Christian Church so be it they never heard of Christ and so all the unknown World and Americans and most of the Heathens are of your Christian Church And why may not the Pope be saved then without believing his own Supremacy I verily think that there is not one Pope of twenty that believeth his own Infallibility Doubtless some illiterate or ill-bred Popes have had but very defective Proposals of their own Supremacy it being rather affirmed by Flatteries than ever proved to them Pag. 57. Having first called for sense in my words because the Printer had put as for is he turneth his former assertion whatever hath been ever in the Church by Christs institution is essential to it into another Because Christ hath instituted that it should be for ever in the Church it is essential And this yet more plainly shameth the asserter than the former For no man can deny but that Christ hath instituted 1. That every word of the Canonical Scripture should be ever after its existence in the Church 2. And that no Ministers should preach any thing but truth in the Church 3. And that no man should commit any sin at all 4. And that the Eucharist be delivered in both kinds in remembrance of Christ till he come c. And yet sure all this is not essential to the Church Pag 58. He would perswade me that I miscite Fr. Sta. Clara and that he saith not that Infidels may be saved but only those that have not an explicite Faith in Christ through invincible ignorance and that he saith not that it is most of the Doctors Opinions nor that any may be saved who are out of the Church and that my Friends will be sorry to see me so defective in my Citations and he hopes I will mend it in the next Ans. That I will if plain words transcribed be any amending but I cannot amend your deceitful dealing 1. I did not say that Sta. Clara saith They may be saved out of the Church but that such are in your Church and so may be saved who indeed are no
Christians and so not of the Church indeed 2. We know of no Faith in Christ but that which you call Explicite Faith in Christ Common custome calleth those Infidels that never heard that there is a Christ or who he is or hearing it doth not believe it And he cannot believe it that doth not hear it Most of the Infidel and Heathen World profess to believe Gods veracity and that all that he saith is true if this be an implicite believing in Christ almost all the Heathen World believeth in him use Names and Words as you see cause These are Infidels in our use of speech 3. The place in Sancta Clara is pag. 113. besides 109 110. c. the words are too large to be transcribed he citeth many Authors to prove such in the Church and saved where after much to that purpose he saith What is clearer than that at this day the Gospel bindeth not where it is not authentically preached that is that at this day men may be saved without an explicite belief of Christ For in that sense speakes the Doctor concerning the Iews And verily whatever my illustrious Master hold with his Learned Mr. Herera I think that this was the Opinion of Scotus and the Common one and he citeth many for it Read the rest your self in the Book and I defie your pretence that this is unjust Citation I cite none of this as if I were handling the question whether any besides Christians are saved But whether the Nations that never heard of Christ be Christians and Members of your Church But pag. 60. he will prove that nothing which Christ hath instituted to be ever in the Church is accidental to the Church For every accident is separable from the subject without destroying the subject whose accident it is But what Christ hath instituted to be ever in his Church is inseparable from it Ans. 1. What if it were not an Accident must it therefore needs be Essential Are there not Integral parts that are not Essential parts 2. You that boast so greatly of your Logick faculty should not so absurdly erre as you do in your major Do you not hereby deny all proper accidents which agree as omni soli ita semper Is not Risibilis an accident of man and yet inseparable 2. Is not quantity inseparable from a Body or natural substance 3. What the Porphyrians speak of an Intellectual separation you ignorantly or deceitfully apply to an actual eventual separation If Christ had been otherwise put to death than by crucifying or else-where than at Ierusalem if his Bones had been broken if he had not had the same integral parts and accidents of Body as he ever had he had been Christ still But yet it was Logically impossible that any of these should have been otherwise than they were they being fore-decreed of God If the Sun should cease moving illuminating heating you may say it would be still the Sun But yet it is certain that these accidents are eventually inseparable from it If you will cause Humidity to cease from Water or separate Gravity from Earth of Stone c. I shall think you have made them other things 4. But to instance as you do in such a being as the CHURCH dishonoureth your boasted Logick greatly The ratio formalis of a Church is Relative and Relation is an accident and to say that accidents may all be separated from the Church without destroying it is to say that Relation may be separated that is the Church from it self or formal Essence without destroying it Do you conquer by such disputing as this was it by such that you had your boasted printed victory over such great Logicians as Bishop Gunning and Bishop Pierson Can you also prove that all accidents that is Relation may be separable from Families Schools Kingdoms without destroying them I hope you will not say that you mean that the separation destroyeth not the humanity of the Members and that this is the subject you mean for no more would Apostasie or Unchurching them destroy Humanity 3. And that no part may be sound your minor is false as well as your major What Christ by his Law commandeth or prescribeth to be in the Church that he instituteth But all cometh not to pass which Christ commandeth or instituteth He commandeth us higher degrees of Faith Love and other Duty than we perform You say No Man may change his institution but doth it follow that no man doth change it No man ought to plead for Errour or deceive poor Souls Doth it follow that therefore you and such others do not so It is Gods command that we never sin It doth not follow that we never do sin When the Apostles strove who should be greatest it was Christs institution that they should not seek for domination or superiority as the Princes of the Earth do but be as little Children and strive who should be most humble and serviceable and take the lowest place and it was St. Peters Doctrine that Bishops must not Lord it over the Flocks nor rule them by constraint but voluntarily but doth it follow that all this is done by all no nor by your pretended Head who is made an essential part of the Church I conclude then 1. That many accidents are not separable without destruction of the subject 2. That many more shall never be separated 3. That relation is not separable from the Church nor numbers neither 4. That there are Integral parts which are neither Accidents nor Essentials 5. That every thing is not ever in the Church nor in any man which Christ hath commanded or instituted to be ever in it And if that may be in a man which Christ forbiddeth so may it be in the Church and so that be absent which he commandeth 6. That it is a novel Opinion contrary to common Reason and all true Theologie and which a Catechized Child should be ashamed of to hold that all that Christ hath instituted to be ever in the Church is essential to it And so that the Church would be nullified if one word of the Holy Scriptures perished by the carelesness of Scribes or Printers or if one decent order were changed or if one Office were depraved c. 7. It aggravateth the errour to hold that every instituted apex or perfection for continuance is Essential to the Church and yet even the explicite belief that Iesus is the Saviour is not essential to a Church-Member or a Christian. 8. That this Disputer absolutely nullifieth the Roman Church which hath changed the Sacrament and Prayer and Church-Officers c. which were instituted by Christ to be ever in the Church But I noted to him that our question to him was Whether the holding such thing to be instituted be essential to the Church and not whether the institution it self be so May not the Opinion be but integral or an accident Here he replies without blushing 1. That thus I yield up
Churches from the beginning of the Christian Church nor was Rome it self so but ever since their beginnings they have been visible sometimes obeying the Pope and sometimes rejecting him the Abassines and several other Extra-imperial Churches never obeyed him The most of the Churches of the Empire the Eastern and African sometimes obeyed him as the chief in the Empire by the Laws of the Empire amd sometimes they cast him off when the Eastern Empire cast him off but they never obeyed him as the Soveraign Bishop of the whole World III. In the third sense of the word Congregation as it signifieth the Universal Church I confess that I can shew you no Universal Church now visible rejecting the Pope for the Universal leaveth out no part though a corrupt part and while Papists own him I cannot say that the Universal Church disowneth him but I can prove 1. That the Primitive Universal Church never owned any Universal Head or Governour but Christ and his twelve Apostles whose indefinite charge may be called Universal 2. That the Universal Church never owned the Roman Universal Soveraignty 3. That the far greatest part of the Church doth not own it at this day and therefore if the whole may be denominated from the major part we may say that now the Universal Church disowneth him And now Reader answer these like Sophisms and you have answered this man of Art 1. No Congregation of Christians hath been perpetually visible but that which acknowledgeth the Patriarchs in the Empire at least heretofore Ergo no other is the true Church of Christ. Answ. 1. But another is part and the best part of the Church of Christ. 2. And none that doth or ever did acknowledge those Patriarchs was the whole Church 3. And none of the Church acknowledged them at first before they were erected So 2. Inst. No Congregation of Christians hath been perpetually visible but that which condemneth the Monothelites the Nestorians the Eutychians the Audians the Luciferians the Quartodecimani c. Ergo no other is the true Church Answ. 1. Part of the Church condemn them and part never heard of them And before they rose none of the Church condemned them So another Instance is No Congregation of Christians hath been perpetually visible but that which Administreth the Eucharist only in one kind without the Cup and which useth publick Prayers in an unknown Tongue and which forbiddeth the reading the Scripture translated without special License c. Ergo no other is the true Church Answ. 1. Only a corrupt part now doth these The most discover it and none were guilty of it in many Generations Doth there need any other Answer to such palpable Sophismes His Argument plainly should run thus No Congregation of Christians hath been perpetually visible but that which now owneth the Trayterous Usurpation of the Pope and the Council of Trent and of Lateran and part of whose Religion is for exterminating or burning all that will not renounce all belief of Humane Senses in believing Transubstantiation and for casting out Princes that execute not this and absolving Subjects from their Oathes of Allegiance to them and which hath corrupted the Doctrine Worship and Government of Christ Ergo no other is the true Church Answ. A diseased part of the Church only is guilty of this now and the whole Church was far from it heretofore But pag. 83. he telleth me that he meaneth neither one present Assembly nor yet one as united in one visible Humane Head but abstracting from that also be it but truly and properly one whencesoever the Unity is drawn 't is all alike to the solution of the Argument Answ. Then sure our business is in a hopeful way if not as good as ended Remember this and fly not from it Our Unity is in Christ our Head One King maketh us one Kingdom All Christians are one Body of Christ. Yea moreover we are one in all the seven Points of Unity required by the Holy Ghost Eph. 4. viz. We have 1. One Body of Christ not of the Pope 2. One Spirit 3. One hope of our Calling viz. Eternal Glory 4 One Lord without a Vice-Christ 5. One Faith summarily in the Creed and integrally in the Holy Scriptures 6. One Baptisme or solemnised Baptismal Covenant 7. One God and Father of all who is above all and through all and in us all Yea as to the Integrals though our Grace hath various degrees we all receive the inspired Prophets Apostles and Evangelists Authority and Doctrine and the ordinary Pastors and Teachers that are sent by the Holy Ghost and called by the way which God hath appointed though we receive not an Usurper that maketh himself the Governour of the whole World in Title while he Governeth not the tenth part of it nor any according to God's Law and who is oft obtruded by Whores and Murders and is a wicked Slave of Satan so judged by his own General Councils We acknowledge that there are among us different Opinions but neither for Kind or Number comparable to the differences of the Papal Sectaries among themselves Not for Kind such as about Murder Adultery Perjury Lying False-witness yea about the Love of God it self are by the Iansenists charged on the Iesuits and proved out of their express words Nor such as Mr. Clarkson hath collected from the express words of their most famous Doctors of all Parties Nor such about King-killing dissolving Subjects Oathes c. as H. Fowlis hath gathered from the express words of your greatest Doctors And for Number all the Sects in the World of Christians set together have not half the Controversies and contentious Writings against each other as your Schoolmen and other Writers of your Church have For our parts we look not that our Union should be perfect till our wisdom and holiness and patience and we our selves be perfect They that know but in part will err in part and differ in part We believe that there are diversities of Gifts but the same Spirit and differences of Administrations but the same Lord and diversity of Operations but the same God who worketh all in all For as the Bedy is one and hath many Members and all the Members of that one Body being many are one Body so also is Christ For by one Spirit we are Baptised into one Body and have been all made to drink into one Spirit Thus are we the Body of Christ not of the Pope and Members in particular And God hath set some in this Body the Church first Apostles not first a Vice-Christ secondly Prophets thirdly Teachers but no Universal Vicar-Head All these are Members and should so live in love that there be no Schisme in the Body But pag. 84. the Man is not satisfied though I name them what I mean by These Churches united in one Christ. Answ. How should I make a Man know that is unwilling or how but by naming them by their Country and Profession I mean All the Christians of
the Arrians yea and of Marcian Leo Zeno Anastaslus Iustine almost all the Churches of the Empire continued charging each others with Heresie and Councils charging and condemning Councils Bishops deposing and cursing Bishops and Monks as their Souldiers fighting it out to blood when the obeying or cursing the Council of Calcedon divided the Bishops for many Princes reigns and when one part called the other Nestorians and the other called them Eutychians almost every where and when after that the Monothelites cause was in many Emperors Reign uppermost one while and down another and navicula Petri that alone scaped before was thus drowned by Honorius if Councils belie him not and Popes with the rest When the very same Bishops as at Ephesus and Calcedon went one way in one Council and another way in the next and subscribed to one Edict e. g. of Basiliscus and quickly to the contrary of another and cryed 〈◊〉 we did it through fear How should we then know by Fathers Bishops and Councils what was their concordant Commentary of the Scripture 4. I ask you what exposition of the Universal Church is it that we profess to differ from for our novelties name them if you can Either by the Universal Church you mean properly all Christians or most If All alas when and where shall we find their agreement in any more than we hold with them If most do we not know that the most two parts to one are against the Popes Sovereignty which is Essential to your Church Do not the Greeks once a year excommunicate or curse you To tell us now That above two parts of the Christian world are none of the Church because they differ from the Universal Church and that the third part is that Universal which he that believeth not is no Christian are words that deserve indignation and not belief and without the medium of Swords and Flames and tormenting inquisitions on one side and great Bishopricks and Abbies Wealth Ease and Domination on the other had long ago been scorned out of the Christian world § 10. But he also denyeth that we believe with a saving divine faith any of the said mysteries and that our Profession general and particular affirmeth it Answ. It 's like the Devil the Accuser of the brethren will deny it too of our Hearts we will not enter a dispute of our Professions let our books be witnesses Reader canst thou believe that we profess not to believe any Christian verity with a Divine faith yea but the man meaneth that it is not a Divine faith if it be not from the beleif of the Pope and his Party And how then shall we believe the Popes own authority § 11. II. My ad Argument to prove that we hold all the Essentials of Christianity was Those that profess as much and much more of the Christian Faith and Religion as the Catechumens were ordinarily taught in the ancient Churches and the Competentes at Baptisme did profess do profess the true Christian Religion in all it's Essentials but so do the Protestants c. To this he calls for Form again as if here were no Universal and then denyeth the Major but his words shew that indeed it is the Minor Because the Catechumens professed to believe implicitly all that was taught as matter of Faith by the Catholick Church in that Article I believe the Holy Church which the Protestants do not Answ. An unproved fiction on both parts 1. Shew us in Fathers Councils or any true Church-Records that Catechumens were then used to make any other exposition of those words than we do Did they ever profess that a Pope or a General Council cannot erre de fide did they not call many of those Councils General though violent and erroneous which they cursed The great doubt then was which party was the true Church and Christians then judged not of Faith by the Church-men but of the Church by the Faith else they had not so oft rejected and Hereticated many Popes Patriarches and the farre greater part of the Bishops as they did 2. And Protestants deny no article which ab omnibus ubique et semper as Lerinens speaks was accounted necessary to â—…ation yea it is one reason why they cannot be Papists because most of the Catholick Church are against the Papacy and all were against it or without it for many hundred Years after Christ. Let the Reader peruse Cyril Hieros Catech. August and all others that give us an account of the Churches Catechism and see whether he can find in it I believe that the Bishop of Rome is made by Christ the Governour of all the World and is Infallible in himself or with his Council and that we must believe all that they say is the Word of God because they say it or else we cannot be saved But it is an easie way to become the Lords of all the World if they can perswade all Men to believe that none but their Subjects can be saved 3. And what an useless thing to they make Gods Word that they may set up their own Expositions in its stead We know that the Word supposeth that the Ignorant must have Teachers Without Teaching Children cannot so much as learn to Speak And Oportet discentem credere fide humanâ that is he must suppose his Teacher wiser than himself or else how can he judge him fit to Teach him But what is Teaching but Teaching the Learner to know the same things that the Teacher doth by the same Evidence Is it only to know what the Teacher holdeth without knowing why If so must we know it by Word or Writing If by Word only when and where shall every Man and Woman come to be Catechized by the Universal Church That is by all the Christian World Or is every Priest the Universal Church Or is he Infallible And how come Words spoken to be more intelligible than words written Doth writing make them unintelligible Why then are their Councils and Commentaries written But if Writing will serve why not God's writing as well as theirs If God say Thou shalt Love the Lord thy God with all thy Heart Are not these words intelligible till a Pope Expound them When the Pope permitted his Casuists to expound them so as that Loving God once a Moneth or once a Year will serve for Salvation and that Attrition which is Repeating only out of Fear with the Sacrament of Penance will also serve Cannot a Man be saved that Believeth Repenteth and Loveth God upon the bare Commands of God and Scripture without hearing what all the Christian World or Councils say If I make to my self no Graven Image so as to bow down and Worship towards it by virtue of the second Commandment will this damn me because I receive not the Papists obliteration or contradiction of this Commandment as an Exposition If all the Docrees of Councils be as necessary as the Creed and Scripture why were not the Councils read in the
Church still three hundred Years before there was any General Council as well as the Scriptures And why do not Hierome Chrysostome Augustine c. Exhort Meâ—… and Women to read the Councils as much as the Scriptures At least methinks you should allow the Scripture an Equality with Councils But if God have spoken that which is nonsence or unintelligible till Councils or lopes Expound it Scripture is far from having such Equality Then Paul and Peter spake not intelligibly but P. Paul 4 and 5. and the Council of Trent did Then Councils may save them that know not Scripture but Scripture cannot save them that know not the Councils And do all the Papists Men and Women know the Councils In short If a Tyrannical Sect of Priests can get this Monopoly or Peculiar of expounding all Gods Laws and Word so that the Scripture will not save any but by their Expositions it will become more the word of the Pope or Council than of God And when all is done every Priest must be the pope and Council to us that never saw them and must be the immediate Object of our Infallible belief And if the Pope can so communicate to so great a swarm the sweetness of participating in his Universal Dominion and Infallibility no wonder if Self-love bid them serve his Usurpation But by that time every Woman must be sure 1. That the Pope is Christs Vicar General indeed 2. That with a Council he is Infallible 3. And that Gods Revelation must be received only on this Deliverers Authority 4. And the sence of all on his Exposition 5. And know how Men believed the first three hundred Years before such Popes or Councils ever were 6. And can tell certainly which Councils be true and which false and which of them must be believed and which not 7. And is sure that every Priest doth Infallibly Report all this to her 8. And doth give a true Exposition of each Council before another Council do Expound them 9. And be sure that she hath all that those Councils have made necessary and have not had a sufficient proposal of more I say by that time all this certainty be attained the Popish Faith will appear to be harder work than they think that hear Deceivers say Believe as the Church believeth and you shall be saved Judge how far the Pope Exalteth himself above God when it is thus confidently told us That we nor no Men believe with a Divine and Saving Faith any one word of God if we believe it meerly because God hath given it us in the Sealed Scriptures and add not the Expositions of the Papal Church § 12. My next Argument was Those that explicitely profess the belief of all that was contained in the Churches Creeds for six hundred Years after Christ and much more Holy truth and implicitely to believe all that is contained in the Holy Scriptures and to be willing and diligent for the explicite knowledge of all the rest with a resolution to Obey all the will of God which they know do profess the true Christian Religion in all its Essentials But so do the Protestants c. Here again the Formalist wants Form An Enumeration of particulars in a Description is not equal to an Universal with him unless he read All. And then he denyeth the Major 1. Because our General Profession is contradicted in particulars Answ. 1. Bare Accusation without Proof is more easie than honest 2. There is a contradiction direct and understood which proveth that the Truth is not believed and a contradiction by consequence not understood which stands with a belief of the Truth The latter all Men in the World have that have any Moral Error 3. O what self-condemning Men are these How certainly hath a Papist no true Faith if abundance of contrary Errors nullifie Faith His second Reason is You distinguish not between implicitely contained in general Principles and explicitely contained in the Creed and Scriptures Answ. A very Logical Answer To what purpose should I do it His third is the strength Creeds and Scriptures are not enough Traditions and General Councils in matters of Faith must be believed Answ. 1. I would matters of Practice were more at Liberty that Princes were not bound to Murder or exterminate all their Subjects as Hereticks that will not be Hereticks and inhumane and to Rebel perfidiously against those Princes that are Sentenced by his Holiness for not doing it 2. Alas who can be saved on these Mens terms If the belief of all the Creeds and all the Scriptures be not a Faith big enough to save him And yet perhaps you may hear again that Men may be saved without any of all this save believing that there is a Rewarding God and that the Pope and his Subjects are the Infallible Church Universal And it is but proving an insufficient proposal and we are delivered from Traditions Councils Scriptures Creeds and all And never was the proposal of Councils more insufficient than when Councils were most frequent when in the Reign of Constantius Valens Valentinian Theodosius Arcadius and Honorius good Theodosius junior Marcian Leo Zeno Anastasius Iustin Iustinian and long after Anathematizing one General Council and crying up another and setting Council against Council was too much of the Religion of those times 4. Again he denyeth that Protestants not excused by Invincible Ignorance believe any Article with a Saving Faith Answ. Easie Disputing Cannot a Quaker say so too by us and you But how unhappy a thing is Knowledge then and how blessed a thing is Invincible Ignorance which may prevent so many Mens Damnation § 13. I proved the Major by the express Testimony of many Papists ad hominem To which he saith It is to no purpose For our Question is not of what is to be believed expresly only but of what is to be believed both expresly and implicitely of all Christians respectively Answ. Reader Judge with what Ingenuity these Men Dispute And how they make nothing of giving up all their cause and yet Cant on with any of the most senseless words He had largely enough told us before that the belief of General Truths explicitely is the Implicite belief of the contained particulars though unknown to the Believer I am now proving that Protestants explicite Faith leaveth out no Article necessary to be explicitely believed To this end I cite Bellarmine and Costerus and after many others consessing what I say in plainest words even the sufficiency of our enumeration He denyeth none of my proof as to explicite belief And do we need any more Is not all that which he calleth explicite belief the meer denomination of the Explicite from the particulars implyed in it Can any Man want an Implicite belief that wanteth no Explicite belief If I am not bound explicitely to believe that the Pope and his Council is the Universal Church or the Infallible deliverer of Traditions or Expounder of Scripture or my rightful Governours how am I
bound or how can I be said to believe Implicitely their unknown Doctrine or Articles of Faith What is my Implicite belief of Scripture-Particles but my General belief that all the Scripture is Gods Word and true And what is Implicite belief of Popish Traditions in particular but the explicite belief that all Popish Traditions in general are true If therefore these Disputers confess the sufficiency of our explicite neccessary belief and yet damn us for the insufficiency of our implicite belief they shamefully contradict themselves and give up their cause § 14. Next I thus Argued If sincere Protestants are Members of the True Church as intrinsecally informed or as Bellarmine speaketh Living Members then professed Protestants are Members of the true Church as extrinsecally denominated or as it is Visible consisting of Professours But the Antecedent is true Ergo so is the Consequent To this when I had given the Reason of the Consequence undenyable and said I prove the Antecedent or Minor he saith You prove say you your Antecedent or Minor which is a Syntax in Logick and deserves a Ferula for no Minor can be an Antecedent Answ. For this Mans sake I will know a Man better than by his Hectoring before I will go to School to a boaster Reader 1. What is that Error in Logick that is called a Syntax I thought Order or Concord had been no Error I confess my self not wise enough to understand this great Logician And his Ferula is too ready which must be used for Syntaxes when it is more used for violation of Syntax 2. Risum teneatis Can no Antecedent be a Minor so did Dr. Peter Heylin tell me before him in his Certamen Epistolare I suppose I shall never hear a third say so What 's the matter that the Boys Laugh at this and say that to deny the Antecedent of an hypothetical Proposition and to deny the minor is all one Is it that Boys have made all our usual Logicks and now these two Logick Doctors have Reformed them Or hath this Man pretended to be a Champion in that Art in which he is below the Novices He had hit it if he had held to his offer to Dispute before a Lady a Girle only in Syllogism by the Pen for this with her might have past for currant and invincible Logick § 15. I proved the Minor thus All that by Faith in Christ are brought to the unfeigned Love of God above all and special Love of his Servants and unfeigned willingness to Obey him are Members of the True Church as intrinsecally informed But such are all sincere Protestants c. This Minor the Man denyeth and saith That Protestants have not these things Answ. 1. Mark how hard this Man is put to it to renounce his Charity He cannot do it without denying what he granteth A sincere Professor of any Religion is one that really is what he professeth to be He denyeth not that Protestants profess to Love God c. And yet he denyeth the Minor that sincere Protestants do love God As if he that sincerely professeth to Love God doth not Love him These are Papist's Syllogisms 2. Note That this Man seemeth to know all Protestants Hearts better than they do themselves and can prove them all Hypocrites that Love not God 3. But by this you see how he reproacheth all those Protestants that turn Papists as having all been but before but graceless ungodly Hypocrites And what wonder then if they turn 4. But it may be his word formally is a cheat A Protestant is a Christian renouncing Popery It is his Christianity which containeth his Love to God His renouncing Popery is but his freedom from their sin And perhaps the Man hath a mind to call this the Form of Protestants But I hope his Talk shall not deprive us of the Love of God or of our Neighbour In the mean time any Man that can truly say that he is not an ungodly Hypocrite without the Love of God and Man hath Argument enough to Answer any Papist in himself 5. Again Reader mark how much these Men magnifie themselves and how much they vilifie the Word and Works of God Let a Man see all Gods wonderful Goodness in his Works and in his Mercies to himself and all Mankind let him read and believe all the wonderful Love of the Father and Grace of the Son that is described in all the Scriptures Let him believe the Promises there Recorded of Everlasting Glory and All this is insufficient to cause him savingly to Love God or Man But let him but add the belief that the Pope is the Governour of all the Earth and that he and his Council must be believed in all their Traditions and Expositions and then the work will be done and he may Love God unseignedly and be Loved by him The Holy Ghost will not work by the Scripture unless we take the Pope for the Expositor Yea more if a Man never heard of Scripture or if he believe not in Christ for want of the Popes sufficient proposal he may Love God and be saved so he do but believe that the Pope with his Council is a sufficient proposer And is there any account in Reason to be given of this strange Phaenomenon why a Man can Love God if he believe in the Pope of Rome and yet cannot Love him by all his Works and Mercies with the belief of all the Scriptures Or is it as very a Miracle as Transubstantiation and Sanctification by Holy-Water or the Opus operatum and one of those Miracles that prove the Church of Rome to be all the Church on Earth § 16. But he repeateth again the thred-bare Reason Had they this they would never have disobeyed and disbelieved all the Churches in the World Answ. That is the Pope and his Priests who are against the far greatest part of the Christian World and Yearly Anathematized by the Greeks who when they had lost the Primacy of the Eastern part of one Empire have tryed to make up the loss by laying Claim to all the Earth O! of what consequence is Obedience to an Ambitious Pope or Priest in comparison of Obedience to all the written Laws of God § 17. I proved the Minor two ways 1. If this the Love of God c. be in our profession then the sincere are such indeed But this is in our profession Ergo Of this he denyeth the Minor It is not in our profession What not that we Love God and are willing to understand and obey his Word Is he not driven up to the Wall even to another denyal of all Mens Eyes and Ears Do not I profess it while I write these words And have not I professed it in sixty Volumns and more And do not Protestant Libraries contain such professions and their Pulpits ring of them every Lords Day What is a Profession but Words and Writings And are not these Audible and Visible to the World And yet the denying not of the
sincerity but the very Being of them is the Papists confutation of us § 18. Secondly I proved it from our knowledge and sense of our own Acts. When I know and feelmy Love shall I believe a Pope that never saw me that tells me I do not know or feel it To this his easie Answer serveth He saith I do not feel that I truly Love God or his Servants if I be a Formal Protestant my Heart deceives me Answ. No wonder if all these Priests are Infallible that know all our Hearts so much better than we But who shall be Judge The true searcher of Hearts If the Fruits must be the Evidence I should rather fear that such Murderers of hundred thousands as killed the Waldenses Albigenses French English Dutch c. were like to be without Love than all those meek and Godly Protestants that I have known for no Murderer hath Eternal Life But forma is sometime taken for figura and for outward appearance only And such formal Protestants as have but the cloathing of Christianity have not indeed the Love of God § 19. He addeth What would you say to an Arrian a Turk or Jew that would urge the like knowledge or feeling Answ. The same that I would do to a bloody Papist And'I would tell him that if a Bediam think that he is a Prince or a Fool that he is Wise or a Beggar that he is a Lord or an illiterate Man that he is Learned it doth not follow that no Man can know that he is a Prince or a Lord or Wise or Learned I would tell him that there can be no effect without the adequate cause nor is there a cause where there is no effect And lie that perceiveth not God's amiableness in the necessary demonstrations of it cannot Love that Goodness he perceiveth not nor can any desire or seek the Heaven which he believeth not And I would tell him that he that believeth not in a Redeemer or a Sanctifier cannot Love him nor can he Love Believers and Godly Men as such who knoweth not that they as such are Lovely And that if really he Love God and Holyness and the hopes of Heaven before this World it will work in his seeking them above the World If you had Argued rationally against our Love of God and Holyness from any proved defect in the necessary cause which is in you we had been Obliged thankfully to hear and try your words But let Reason judge e. g. whether that man be like to love this world best and be loth to leave it who looketh to go at death into the flames of Purgatory or he that looketh to go to the glorious presence of his Redeemer And whether he be like to Love God best that look eth to be tormented by him in those flames or he that looketh to passe into heavenly perfect Love Christ telleth us that forgiving much causeth Love If a man were to torment you so long would it make you love him or at least is it a good proof that Protestants Love not God because they believe not that he will torment them in flames but presently comfort them § 20. II. My ad Argument to prove the perpetual visibility of our Church was this The Church whose Faith is contained in the Holy Scripture as its rule in all points necessary to Salvation hath been visible ever since the dayes of Christ on Earth But the Church whose Faith is contained in the Holy Scriptures as it's rule in all points necessary to Salvation is it of which the Protestants are members Therefore the Church of which the Protestants are members hath been visible c. Here he wanteth Form again because the praedicate of the Minor is the Subject of the conclussion and then he distinguisheth of the Maior of containing Involutely in General principles he granteth it but if expresly he denyeth it Answ. 1. The marvellous Logician it seems is but for one mood or figure but by what authority or Reason 2. He denyeth that the Churches Faith in all points necessary to Salvation is expresly contained in the Scripture I proved the contrary ad hominem before out of Bellarmine and Costerus plain words and shall by and by further prove it Mark again the Papists value of the Holy Scriptures he that explicitly believeth all that it expresly delivereth and no more say these men cannot be saved and yet if they believe none of it but a rewarding Deity say most or some more of the Creed say others men may be saved if they do but believe that all is Gods word and truth which the Pope and his Priests or Council say is such Next he distinguisheth of all things necessary to Salvation to be by all distinctly known and expresly believed and so he granteth the Scripture-sufficiency Very good Now all that is so necessary to a distinct knowledge and express belief is there But of all things to be Believed implicitly and distinctly known he denyeth it These distinctions supposed saith he I deny your Consequence Answ. Here is all new still 1. He calleth my Conclusion my Consequence and reciteth it 2. What he meaneth by things to be distinctly known by all and yet Believed but implicitely is past my understanding having to do with that man that hath all this while described implicite Belief by the express Belief of some meer General truth And must men know all that distinctly which they Believe not distinctly but in their general the man sure was confounded or confoundeth me The General to be Believed is the Pope and Councils authority in propounding and expounding Gods word This is their saving Faith the Belief of all that they propose is implicitely contained in this but must all this be distinctly known by all and yet not distinctly Believed The first would damn all that know not every one of their Councils decrees de fide the ad will shew that they Believe nothing at all for he that knoweth distinctly what the Pope saith and yet Believeth it not distinctly cannot Believe the general of his veracity But perhaps he spake distributively of two sorts of Faith viz. both the Implicite and the Explicite and so meant to deny the Scripture-sufficiency only to the first if so I shewed the flat contradiction of it before Where there is all that is necessary to be Believed expresly eo nomine there is all that is necessary to be Believed implicitely because to be Believed implicitly with this man is but to be the unknown consequent or inclose of that which is Believed expresly § 21. For the proof of my Major the Scripture-sufficiency as to all things commonly necessary to Salvation after Bellarmine and Costerus I have cited the plain words at large of 1. Ragus in Council Basil. Bin. p. 299. 2. Gerson de exam doct p. 2. cont 2. 3. Durandus in Praefat. Hierom. in hym 4. Aquinas 22. 9. 1. à 10. ad 1. de Verit. disp de fide q.
10. ad 11. 5. Scatus in Prolegom in sect 1. 6. Greg. Armin. in Prol. e. g. q. 1. art 2. Resp. fol. 3. 4. 7. Guil. Parisiens de Legib. c. 16. p. 46. 8. Bellarmine again de verbo Dei li. 10. c. 10. ad arg 5. c. And then I most fully proved it out of the ancient Church-Doctors But to all these he giveth such frivolous Answers that it irketh me to weary the Reader by repeating and answering them And he that will faithfully peruse the Authors words I think will either need no other confutation of him or is uncapable of understanding one when he seeth it The fore-confuted contradiction of sufficient explicite and yet not sufficient implicite is the chief and next a vain supposition that to say that Scripture is sufficient to all Theological points and conclusions is less than to say it is sufficient to necessary Articles of Faith and if any of them speak of the Churches exposition he denyeth the Scripture-sufficiency as a rule and yet their Councils need exposition too § 22. III. My 3d. Argument for our Churches perpetual visibility was If the Roman Church as Christian though not as Papal hath been visible ever since the dayes of the Apostles then the Church of which the Protestants are members hath been visible ever since the dayes of the Apostles but the Antecedent is their own Therefore they may not deny the Consequent Here he wants Form again because as Christian is in the Antecedent and not in the sequel Answ. He might have seen that it is but an Expository term in a parenthesis and so the same exposition in the consequent is supposed Next he saith that it is a fallacy a secundum quid ad simpliciter Answ. so then the Church as Christian is not the Christian Church but secundum quid but we that know no other profess to be of no other nor to prove the visibility of any other than the Church as Christian. Let them prove more that pretend to any other Next he saith that the Protestants have been visible as Christians is all that can be pretended and yet that also he denyeth for they believe not one Article with an infallible supernatural divine Faith Answ. 1. The question is whether they profess not so to do nay rather whether their objective Faith that is all the Creed and Holy Scriptures be not infallible of supernatural Revelation and Divine he that denyeth this seemeth an Infidel But if all the members of the Church must have an actual subjective Faith that is of supernatural divine infusion Then 1. No hypocrite is a Church-member 2. And no man can know who is a Church-member besides himself 3. And so the Church of Rome is invisible this is clear 2. I must not too oft write the same things if the Reader will peruse a small Tract of mine called The certainty of Christianity without Popery he shall soon see whether the Papists Faith or Ours be the more certain and divine Of which also I have said more in my Treatise called The safe Religion and Mr. Pool in his nullity of the Roman Faith § 23. I here shewed that having proved our visibility as Christian I need not prove a visibility as Papal any more than he that would prove his humane Genealogie having some leprous Ancestors need to prove that all were leprous Here he denyeth Popery to be Leprosie and again falsly tells us that if it were so all the visible Church in the world was leprous which needs no more confutation than is oft given it § 24. He tells me how an 1500 the Pope was in possession and we dispossest him without order c. Answ. An old Cant but 1. I have fully proved that he never was in possession of the Government of the Christian world 2. Nor in the Empire or any other Princes dominion but by humane donation and consent as the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury is in England 3. And that they that gave him that power may on just reason take it away And that the Bishop of another Princes Countrey cannot stand here by his authority when he hath lost the Government of England himself § 25. IV. My 4th Argument added more than my Thesis required viz. If there have been since the dayes of Christ a Christian Church that was not subject to the Roman Pope as the Vicar of Christ and universal Head and Governour of the Church then the Church of which the Protestants are members hath been visible both in it's Being and in it's freedom from Popery But the Antecedent is true Ergo so is the Consequent To this 1. he wants the word ever in the Antecedent And yet before abated it but he knoweth that since was put for ever since 2. He saith I suppose that the sole denyal of the Popes supremacy constitutes the Church whereof the Protestants are members Answ. In despight of my frequent professions to the contrary who still tell him that our Christianity and Relation to Christ and one another makes us Church-members and our freedom from the Papacy is our renunciation of an Usurper § 26. I proved my Antecedent 1. from the express words of the Council of Calcedon can 28 which he answers as before where he is consuted § 27. 2. My 2d proof was from the silence of the ancient writers Tertullian Cyprian Athan. Nazianzene Nissene Basil Optatus Augustine c. that used not this argument of Popes power over all the world as of Divine Right to confute the Hereticks that they had to do with when two words had expeditiously done all if this had then been Believed Here he saith Their authors have proved that the Fathers did so Answ. Soon said and as soon denyed The books are in our hands as well as yours I will now instance but in Cyprian and the African Churches in his dayes and in Augustine and the same Churches in his dayes 1. Did Cyprian and his Council believe Stephens Universal Monarchy when he opposed his judgment with so much vehemency and set the Scripture against his plea from tradition Let him that will read his Epistles of this too long to be recited believe it if he can And when he twitted his arrogance in Council with nemo nostrum se dicit Episcopum Episcoporum 2. The plea of Aurelius Augustine and the rest of the African Bishops I have formerly recited of which Harding saith that the Africans seduced by Aurelius continued twenty years in Schism from Rome and did Augustine and all the rest then believe the Popes Sovereignty even in the Empire I did plainly show that if the Donatisâ—…s Novatians and all such Sects had believed the Roman Sovereignty and Infallibility they had not so differed from them if they did not believe it the Fathers would have taken the neerest way and wrote their Volumnes to convince them that this Papal Rule was it that must end all their controversies instead of writing voluminously from Scripture and the nature of the
cause which they did not § 28. My 3d. proof was this The Tradition witnessed by the greater part of the Universal Church saith that the Papal Vicarship or Sovereignty is an innovation and usurpation and that the Catholick Church was many hundred years without it Therefore there was then no such Papat Church Here the man is angry and saith It is an abominable untruth set down by a fore-head of brass A man in his right wits would not have the confidence to utter so loud a falshood and all the world will see that I am one of the most unsufferablest out-facers of Truth and asserters of open Falshood that ever set pen to paper yea it brings in the talk of Rebellion against his Majesty c. Answ. The apprehensions of men are very different when reading it's like the same books leaveth me past doubt on one side and him so vehemently confident on the other My proof is this 1. The greatest part of the Universal Church doth now deny the Papal Universal Sovereignty 2. The greatest part of the Universal Church do suppose and say that they hold herein to the ancient truth which was delivered down from the Apostles 3. Therefore the greatest part of the Universal Church do hold that the ancient truth delivered from the Apostles doth teach them to deny the Popes Universal Sovereignty and consequently that it is an innovation and usurpation I. As to the first it is a matter of present fact such as whether most of England speak English 1. That the great Empire of Abassia renounce the Pope and plead tradition for it Godignus the Jesuite besides others fully testifieth and justifieth Pet. Maffeius Ribade Nica and other Jesuites against 〈◊〉 new author that falsly saith they were subject to the Pope He tells us that they take the Romans for Nestorian Hereticks p. 318. 328. c. and that they resolved never to be subject to the Pope that he that told them otherwise misinformed them yea saith one of the Jesuites pag. 330. I think the Emperour had rather be under the hardest yoak of the Saracens than under the mild and gentle Empire of the Roman Pope It 's true that many errors they have and many more are charged on them which they deny and believing that Dioscorus was the true follower of Cyril and the Council of Ephes. and that Leo and the Council of Calcedon were Nestorians of which more anon they are for Dioscorus against Leo and the Council But few if any of them understand the bottom of that controversie And the Emperor told the Jesuite that he falsly charged errors on them and his mother saith seeing your Faith and ours do nothing differ but are the same why do you write to trouble quiet minds without cause The Jesuite answereth I certainly affirm to your Majesty that if you had no other Errors this one that you are separated from the Pope of Rome the Vicar of Christ on Earth is enough and too much to your everlasting destruction II. To this she replyed that she and her Countrey were subject to the Apostles Peter and Paul and first to Christ himself The Jesuite answered I deny that they are subject to Christ that are not subject to his Vicar Saith she neither I nor mine deny obedience to St. Peter we are now in the same Faith that we were in from the beginning If that were not right why for so many Ages and Generations was there no man found that would warn us of our error He answered The Pope of Rome that is the Pastor of the whole Church of Christ could not in the years past send Teaâ—…hers into Abassia c She answered To change the old Customs and Rites and receive new ones is a matter full of danger and offence He answered that their Faith was old and had nothing new c. p. 323 324 325. The Emperor also spake to the like purpose p. 319. 320 321. So that it is confessed by the Jesuites and best information from Abassia 1. That they abhorre or refuse the Papal Government 2. And that for this they plead Tradition and Antiquity And the same is notorious of the Greek Armenian and other Oriental Churches How large they were in the East when Iacobus de Vitriaco was there I have formerly shewed out of his words who saith that those Eastern Christians were more than either the Greek or Latin Church and as the Greeks anathematize the Pope every year so the rest are known to reject him To say that these are Hereticks and not the Church is but to beg the question and fitter for contempt than an answer That all such rejecters of the Papacy are the farre greatest part of professed Christians is past doubt 2. And that Greeks Armenians c. plead Tradition and the judgment and custome of their fore-fathers for what they hold is so farre past question that I will not vainly wast time in citing authors to prove it Even the Papists confess it when they tell us that these Churches joyn with them in pleading for tradition Is not then the consequence clear which W. I. is so angry at I know not what can be said against it unless that both the Greeks and Protestants do confess that once they were under the Pope but the Greeks say that they were never under him as a Governour of the whole Christian world set up by God but as the Primate of one Empire set up by man upon such reasons the Seat of the Empire as are alterable as well as unnecessary I have proved this fully before 1. From the words of the Council of Calcedon 2. From their equalling and after preferring the Patriarch of Constantinople who pretended not to a Divine Right and that as over all the world and they were not so blind as to set up a humane Law above that which they believed to be divine many other proofs I gave And even the Protestants hold that in rejecting the Papacy they follow the Tradition of the Church of Christ however some Countreys where they live and their progenitors fell under the Papal errour or terrour There are some late Papists that think that what is held in this age was certainly held in the former and that no Countreys Tradition can be false Which is contrary to all experience But if other Countreys Tradition may be false so may the Roman Niceph. saith of the Armenians They do these things from Tradition which resteth on no Reason and their ancient Legislators and Doctors do calumniously boast that Gregory the Bishop of great Armenia delivered them by hands c l. 18. c. 54. And the Abassians that received the Gospel from the Eunuch and St. Matthew being before too much addicted to some Jewish ceremonies and never cured of them retain them as by Tradition to this day And it is known how Tradition differed about Easter-day and the Millenaries opinion By all this it is evident that most of the Christian world take the
yet it is the Catholick that is the whole it self 9. That Traditions are to be received with equal pious Affection and Reverence as the Holy Scripture 10. That the Virgin Mary was conceived without Original sin Decreed at Basil. 11. That the people may not read the Scripture Translated into a known Tongue without a special License 12. That the Books of Maccabees and other such are part of the Canon of Faith against which see Bishop Cousins and Dr. Io. Reignolds See in Dr. Challenor's Credo Eccles. Cath. sixteen of their Novelties See Dallaus De cultu Latinorum their Worship proved new All this W. I. passeth over § 42. My Tenth Argument was If multitudes yea the far greatest part of Christians in all Ages have been Ignorant of Popery but not of Christianity then there hath been a Succession of Visible Professours of Christianity that were no Papists But the Antecedent is true Ergo c. Here I brought full proof of the Antecedent 1. From the Ignorance which they themselves accuse the Aethiopians Armenians Greeks Russians c. of and the Protestants also 2. The known Ignorance of the far most of the Vulgar in their own Church 3. The Papists charge on the Council of Chalcedon and others about their power 4. The difference of the Councils of Constance and Basil and Later and Florence about their Essentials 5. The large proof brought by Dr. Field Append. l. 3. Potter p. 68. Bishop Morton Apol. To this he Answers as to the last by notorious giving up his cause neither granting nor denying That there hath been a Succession of Visible Professours of Christianity that were no Papists which he saith is all that I prove Answ. And what need I more Is not the Succession of the Church as Christian granted by him Therefore if I prove it also Successively Christian without Popery I know not what else the Man would have But he saith Arrians may say so too Answ. Arrians are not Christians If his meaning be that besides our rejecting Popery we have some other Heresie which unchristeneth us 1. That 's nothing against my Argument which is but Christians Visibility ... 2. Why did he never tell us what that Heresie is Would he not if he could And was he not concerned to do it 3. It 's known that it is our rejecting Popery that is the Heresie they charge us with as to any other we defie their Accusation And 4. If any individual person be Accused let it be proved Our Religion Objective is justified by themselves from Heresie and all positive Error For it is nothing but the Sacramental Covenant briefly explained in the Creed Lords Prayer and Decalogue in the Essentials and in that and the Integrals all the Canonical Scriptures So that our proof of our Churches Visibility as Christian and not Papal is all that Reason can require of us And so this Task is done § 43. After these Arguments I added some Testimonies of Historians which shew how Melch-Canus words de facto are to be understood and how the word Catholick Church was then taken and how small a party the Papal Sovereignty had in the very worst times viz. Rog. Hoveden Mat. Paris in H. 2d shew that it was Avitas leges consuetudinis Angliae which the Pope here Damned and Anathematized all that favoured and observed them Here is Tradition Antiquity and the immutability of Rome The German History collected by Reuberus Pistorius Freberus and Goldastus fully shew That the Papal Tyranny only kept under by a Turbulent Faction the greater part by fraud and force which never consented to them The Apology of Hen. 4. the Emperour in M. Freberus To. 1. p. 178. saith Behold Pope Hildebrand's Bishops when doubtless they are Murderers of Souls and Bodies such as deservedly are called the Synagogue of Satan Yet they write that on his and on their party is the Holy Mother-Church When the Catholick that is the Universal Church is not in the Schism of any Side or Party but in the Universality of the Faithful agreeing together by the Spirit of Peace and Charity And p. 179. See how the Minister of the Devil is besides himself and would draw us with him him into the Ditch of perdition Who writeth that God's Holy Priesthood is with only thirteen N. B. or few more Bishops of Hildebrand's and that the Priesthood of all the rest through the World are separated from the Church of God our Mr. W. I. would say that only these thirteen Bishops were Univocal Christians when certainly not only the Testimony of Gregory and Innocent but the Judgment of all the Holy Fathers agree with that of Cyprian that he is an Aliene profane an Enemy that he cannot have God for his Father that holds not the Unity of the Church And p. 181. But some that go out from us say and write that they defend the party of tâ—…r Gregory not the whole which is Christ's which is the Catholick Church of Christ so the Catholick Church and the Popes Sect are distinct And p. 180. But our Adversaries that went from us N. B. not we from them use thus to commend themselves We are the Catholicks We are in the Unity of the Church So the Writer calls them Catholicks and us that hold the Faith of the Holy Fathers that consent with all good Men that love Peace and Brotherhood Us he calls Schismaticks and Hereticks and Excommunicate because we resist not the King He addeth out of Isidore Etymol l. 8. The Church is called Catholick because it is not as the Conventicles of Hereticks confined in certain Countries but diffused through the whole World Therefore they have not the Catholick Faith that are in a part and not in the whole which Christ hath Redeemed and must Reign with Christ They that confess in the Creed that they believe in the Holy Catholick Church and being divided into Parties hold not the Unity of the Church which Unity Believers being of one Heart and Soul properly belongs to the Catholick Church So far this Apol. of the Emperour Here you see what the Catholick Church is and that the Papalines were then a little Sect of thirteen or a few more Bishops And now Reader open thine Eyes and Judge whether the Emperour and all the rest of the Western Churches besides all the rest a greater part of the Christian Word are therefore no Univocal but Equivocal Christians because a Papal Faction and an Equivocating Jesuite may call them so All this the prudent Disputer thought best to Answer by silence § 44. I added because of their noise of Heresies charged on the Abassines Syrians Armenians Greeks Protestants c. 1. That they differ in greater matters yea de fide than many things which they call Heresies are 1. I repeated the differences of their Councils Const. and Basil against Later and Florence c. 2. Pighius words Hierarch Eccl. l. 6. That these Councils went against the undoubted Faith and Judgment of the
received by the Proposal of the Papal Church as such whereas now we perceive that it may be received from the Church though they know it not to be Papal And we thought it must have been received as from a General Council or the Church universal but it seems here it is needful but that it be from their particular Pastors 4. By this it seems that there are other Pastors that must be believed received and obeyed before the Pope and Subjection to them is of absolute necessity to salvation and Churchmembership when subjection to the Pope is of no such necessity How the Pope will take this we know not but 5. It leaveth us to new doubts as hard as any of the rest How to know that such indeed are our lawful Pastors before we know that there is a Christ or a Pope and how to know which are they We perceive now that Implicite Faith is not necessarily the believing Pope or Council but the believing those that Christ hath instituted to be our lawful Pastors Qu. 1. But can we know that Christ instituted them before we know that there is a Christ or that he is true Christ Q 2. Can you be true Pastors without derivation from and dependance on the Pope or be so known by the People O that you would but come into the light and tell us how And then Q. 3. tell us why the same People may not take Protestant Armenian Abassine Bishops or Presbyters for true Pastors by the same Proof Q. 4. And doth not the Proof or Knowledge that Men are our Lawful Pastors without knowing that they have Ordination Jurisdiction Mission or Confirmation as you distinguish them from the Pope or are subject to him also prove that quoad esse Men may be cur true Pastors without any of these relations to the Pope For the esse rei is presupposed to the Proof and Knowledge 〈◊〉 And in relations the Fundamentum entereth the Definition I conclude that being my self unfeignedly and earnestly desirous to know the truth whether the Pope be the appointed Church-Monarch of Government of all Christians that dwell on the Face of the Earth and having diligently read what you and abuâ—… 〈◊〉 more have written for it I profess that I never yet heard or saw any Proposal of it nor yet of abundance of your Doctrines which was sufficient to convince my understanding of it but much to convince me of the contrary And I may suppose this to be the case of most who need as clear evidence as I and therefore that we are none of us by your Concession obliged either necessitate medii or praecepti to believe you or to be your Subjects And I confess I like the preaching of these Men whose labour is only to subject Men to Christ and to their Lawful Magistrates and Domestick Governours and to the Teaching-Conduct of those that speak to them the Word of God better than theirs that make it the Foundation of their Religion to make all Men on Earth their Subjects And yet Teachers we acknowledge necessary to our Faith but it is not first necessary to believe them to be sent by Christ before we believe in Christ. But 1. The first Messengers Apostles did at once affirm that Christ is the Saviour of the World and that he sent them to witness his Resurrection Miracles and Works and to preach his Gospel And the Tongues Miracles c. by which they proved it was a Proof of both at once but principally of the former For if an un-called Preacher had wrought a Miracle it would have proved his Doctrine but not his Calling 2. But ordinary Preachers now give us the Evidences of the truth of the Gospel which were heretofore delivered to the Church The Doctrine's self-evidencing Divinity as it hath the Impress of God's Power Wisdom and Love his Holiness Justice and Mercy with the antecedent Prophesies fulfilled and the concomitant and subsequent Miracles and the continued Seal of the sanctifying Spirit in all Believers And by these we are first drawn by the inward operation of the Holy Ghost to believe in the Father Son and Holy Spirit before we believe that he sent these Men to be our Lawful Pastors Yea without believing them oft-times to be our Pastors or any Pastors at all We detest those Self-Preachers that would make the World believe that we must believe them to be our Lawful Pastors and receive them before we believe in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost and receive him And we detest that false Doctrine that saith That a Lay-man may not convert Souls to the Faith of Christ and that God's Word and Spirit may not by his opening that Word win Souls that know not yet what Ministry Christ hath instituted To my Instance of the Iberians converted by a Maid and the Indians by Frumentius and Edesius he answers 1. That he can prove the Papacy preach'd to them as well as I can Iustification by Faith alone or any other parcicular Point of our Doctrine 2. We must both say that all important truths of Christianity were preached to them and till you have evinced this of the Supremacy to be none of those it is to be supposed it was sufficiently declared to them 3. Explicating the Article of the Catholick Church it 's supposed they were told it consisted of Pastor and People united and that they must obey their Lawful Pastors in which Doctrine the Pope is implicitely included Answ. 1. Our Doctrine as you call it is Christianity and I can prove nothing preached but what made them Christians which you confess may be without believing the Pope's Supremacy 2. A brave Argument All important truths were preached Ergo you must prove that this is not one of them 1. All important truths cannot in reason be supposed to be preached by those two Lay-men and by a Maid All essential truths we may suppose preached or else they could not be Christians We heard before that you would perswade us that every truth of continued institution is not only important but essential to the Church Whence you may infer in your way that the Maid and the two Lay-men had preached every such truth and left not one out or else there was no Christians and Church 2. It 's your part to prove that the Papacy is such an important truth and not mine to prove the Negative which yet I have oft and fully done 3. The Article of the Catholick Church was not at first in the Creed as the old Copies shew And Baptism was Administred without mentioning that Article 4. If holding that People must obey their Lawful Pastors will serve then we are all right 〈◊〉 if this be an implicite belief of the Papacy we are all Papists yea perhaps Mahometans and Heâ—…thens are Papists too by such a belief To 〈◊〉 Instance from Act. 2. he saith 1. Who can tell whether Peter told them not of his Supremâ—… 〈◊〉 2. They address'd their Speech first