things as Marks of Distinction only without any further Design of lessening their Natures and Qualities by them p. 31. 4. It does not follow that because the Name Catholick in that time when it was for the most part conjoined with the Catholick Faith was a sure Note of a true Church it must always be so even when the Name and the Thing are parted p. 32. The worst of Hereticks laid claim to it p. 33. The Rule to know the True Church by proved from Lactantius and St. Austin ibid. 5. It doth not follow that because the being called after the Names of particular Men in that Age when all so called were for the most part corrupt in the Faith was a sure Hand of Schismaticks and Hereticks that it must always be so p. 33 34. III. The Church of Rome having egregiously corrupted the Catholick Faith or Religion neither is nor deserves the Name of a Catholick Church p. 34. This justified by comparing her Doctrine in several Points with that delivered by Christ and his Apostles p. 35. For Instance that Angels and Saints are to be prayed unto and worshipped this contrary to Scripture ibid. The worshipping of Images contrary to the second Commandment which they make the same with the first p. 36. The Scripture commands all Persons indifferently to read the Scriptures the Church of Rome allows not this Liberty to the Laity but upon License ibid The Scriptures forbid Prayers in an unknown Tongue and the Church of Rome enjoins such and no other p. 37. Purgatory contrary to Scripture ibid. The denying the Cup to the Laity contrary to the express Instistitution of our Saviour p. 38. The Scripture saith that the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament even after Consecration is Bread and Wine the Church of Rome says the Bread and Wine is Transubstantiated into the natural Body and Blood of Christ. p. 39. The Propitiatory Sacrifice of the Mass according to the Scripture derogatory to Christ's own Priestly Oblation whereby he once offered himself a compleat Sacrifice of Expiation p. 40. In all these Particulars the Church of Rome a Corrupter of the Christian Faith and Doctrine and consequently deserves not the name of Catholick ibid The Second Note ANTIQUITY THis Mark and Character of a true Church is not proper to the Church of Rome alone nor in truth doth it belong to it To prove this three things are here offered I. That the Plea of bare Antiquity is not proper to the Church but common to it with other Societies of false Religion p. 41. The Notes of a thing must be proper to that of which they are a Note and not common to it with other things p. 42. 1. Because what is proper to a thing is inseparable from it and did ever belong to it since it had a being and can at no time be absent from it ibid. 2. Other Societies have laid claim to this Note and it could not be denied them and therefore no proper Note of a Church ibid. This shews that bare Antiquity cannot be a Note of Truth p. 44. Antiquity and Priority widely different p. 45. A twofold Antiquity one in respect of us the other absolute and in it self ibid. The Church of Rome will not be tried only by the Scriptures which is the true Antiquity p. 46. Error almost as ancient as Truth for which reason several wicked Doctrines running down to Posterity have made use of the plea of Antiquity to give them countenance and support p. 47. II. The present Church of Rome vainly pretends to true Antiquity i.e. to ancient Truth p. 48. Wherein true Antiquity doth consist ibid. The present Church of Rome not ancient by reason of that alteration they have made in the ancient Creed p. 49. Cardinal Bellarmin's Ratiocination against this charge consisting of 6 things to be observed in all Changes of Religion none of which he says can be shewn in the Church of Rome since the Apostles time ibid. His reasoning built upon very false grounds this considered and largely answered in four Particulars p. 50. 1. As being contrary to all History and Experience there having been great Changes in Religion the Authors and the beginnings c. of which cannot be known p. 50. 2. Neither do the Examples they alledg for this their reasoning serve to no other purpose but to shew the falseness of it as in the case of the Nestorian and Arrian Heresies p. 51. 3. Supposing them true they would uphold the greatest Impieties ibid. The Heathen Gods and their Oracles supported by this Argument p. 52. 4. The Roman Church it self an instance of this there being an acknowledg'd change in it and yet they cannot tell who first began it viz. Communion in one kind ibid. Two instances out of Polydore Virgil when and by whom they were brought into the Church of Rome p. 53. 1. Their grand Article of Faith the Papal Authority brought in by Victor and carried on by the following Bishops ibid. The present Definitions of the Catholick Church and the Power of the Pope to depose Kings not challenged till Gregory VII i.e. 1000 Years after Christ ibid. 2. It is known when Images crept into the Church p. 55. A little more than 100 Years since unwritten Traditions were decreed to be a part of the Rule of Faith i. e. of the Word of God. ibid. III. That the Religion of the Church of England by Law established is the true Primitive Christianity p. 56. The Third Note DURATION THree things are here considered I. What is to be understood by the term Duration p. 58. Duration includes 3 things 1. A Being of a Church from the beginning p. 58 2. The continuance of that Church to the end p. 58 3. The continuance of that Church from the beginning to the end without interruption p. 58 Bellarmine's Application of the first of these to the Church of Rome yet deficient in the latter Branches p. 59. II. How far Duration is a Note of the true Church p. 59. This is no Note by which a true Church is to be found out or distinguished from the false ib. For four Reasons 1. The nature of the thing will not permit that it should be a Note p. 60. 2. That cannot be a Note of the true Church which doth not inseparably belong to the Church in all seasons and cases p. 61. 3. That which is a Note must be proper to the thing which it is the Note of and not common to other things as well as that p. 61 62. Common to false Churches as well as true ibid. 4. If it be a Note of a true Church then those could not be true Churches which have not not had that Duration ib. This unchurches the 7 Churches of Asia p. 62 63. III. The Church of Rome hath no just and sufficient title to this Character p. 63. This proved as to 1. Place 2. Persons 3. Order 4. Doctrine these being the things by which a Church doth exist and is made
172. The Eighth Note Sanctity of Doctrine THat this Note as well as the others is far from performing what is promised for it by the Cardinal is sufficiently made evident by four Particulars p. 173. I. What is here meant by Sanctity of Doctrine p. 174. Tho' that is the best and purest Church which hath the least of Error and Corruption in its Doctrine and Discipline yet that which is the best is not the only true Church p. 157. II. That Sanctity of Doctrine i.e. a pure profession of true Religion without any mixture of Error is no true Note or Character whereby a man may distinguish the true Church from all false Churches p. 176. That this can be no true Note of the true Church made evidently appear from the consideration of those necessary Properties of all true Notes by which Things are to be known and distinguished p. 177. These are Four. 1. Every true Note ought to be common to all of the same kind with the thing which it notifies p. 177 to 180. 2. Every true Note ought to be proper and peculiar to that kind of things of which it is a Note and not common to Things of another kind p. 181. 3. Every true Note ought to be more known than the Thing which it notifies p. 182 183. 4. Every true Note ought to be inseparable to the Thing which it notifies p. 184 to 188. III. In what sense this may be a Note of the true Church p. 189. That is a true Church which professes all the Essential Articles of Christian Faith and receives all the Essential parts of Christian Worship and Discipline p. 190. The Church of England willing to be tried by this p. 192. IV. According to the Principles of the Church of Rome the true Church is not to be found by this Note in which soever of the two Senses we understand it ibid. This clearly made out in Four Particulars 1. The Church of Rome decryes mens private judgment of Discretion as utterly insufficient to make any certain distinction of Truth from Falshood in matters of Religion p. 194. 2. Shee allows no sufficient Rule without the true Church to guide and direct our private Judgment of Discretion p. 195. Which is the true Church not to be resolved by Principles of Nature but those of Revelation p. 196. No other Rule while we are out of the Church to direct us in this Enquiry but only that of Scripture ibid. This the Church of Rome tells us is insufficient and that for two Reasons 1. Because the Scripture is not full enough as to all Doctrines of Faith and Manners And therefore there are certain unwritten Traditions in the Church of equal Authority with it by which its defects are supplied p. 197. 2. Because it is not clear enough the Sense of it being so obscurely expressed that we can never be certain what it is without the interpretation of the true Church p. 198. These considered and answered 3. The Church of Rome resolves all certainty as to matters of Faith into the Authority of the true Church which indeed is the Fundamental Principle of Popery p. 199. A short Dialogue upon this Argument between a Papist and Protestant p. 200 to 202. 4. The Church of Rome gives Authority to the true Church to impose upon us a necessity of believing such Things as before they were not obliged to believe p. 203. to the End. The Ninth Note Efficacy of Doctrine BY Efficacy of Doctrine Two Things understood Either 1. The power which the Word of God hath in the hearts of particular men to dispose them to believe aright and to live well Or 2 That Success which it hath in drawing Multitudes outwardly to profess and embrace it p. 209. The first too inward and the second which is that which the Cardinal understands by it too uncertain a thing to be a Note of a True Church ibid. Many other things besides Efficacy of Doctrine which have and may convert whole Nations to the Christian Religion such as hopes and fears outward force necessity p. 210. An Instance hereof in the Conversions wrought by Charles the Great p. 211. The difference between such Conversions and those which were made in the first Ages of the Church p. 212. In answer to the Cardinal upon this Note Three things laid down I. That the prevalency of any Doctrine can be no Note of a True Church p. 213. This appears 1. From what our Saviour hath said in this matter ibid. 214. 2. From the Consideration of the Temper and Constitution of Mankind p. 215. to 217. 3. From plain matter of Fact. p. 218 219. Error hath such an influence often up n mens minds that they have rejected Truth and preferred the most gross and impious Opinions before it ibid. This apparent from the Histories of all Ages ibid. More particularly in the Case of Arianism p. 219. And in that of Mahomitanism p. 220. The Conversions wrought by those if the Greek Church whom the Church of Rome accounts Hereti ks p. 221. The Efficacy of the Reformed Doctrine ibid. II. That the Prevalency of the Doctrine professed in the Church of Rome is no Note of its being a True Church p. 222. And that for these reasons 1. Because of that great mixture of Errors which there is with the Truth which it professes p. 223. 2. Because the Doctrine of the Church of Rome is so much altered from what it formerly was ibid. 3. Because it hinders those who embrace it from throughly examining it p. 224. 4. Because Art and Force have sometimes been made use of to make it prevail p. 225. III. The Arguments the Cardinal makes use of to prove this to be a Note of the True Church proved to be Insufficient p. 226. 1. His Arguments from the Scriptures considered ibid. 2. His Arguments from the prevalency of the Christian Doctrine in the beginning of the Church examined p. 227. 3. His Arguments from the particular Instances which he gives of Conversions wrought by those of the Church of Rome reflected on p. 227. I. The Conversion of the English by Austin the Monk considered p. 228. Four Things alledged in answer to it ibid. 2. The Conversion of the People of Franconia by Kilianus replied to p. 228 229. 3. The Conversion of a great part of Germany by Vinofrid otherwise called Boniface considered ibid. The Conversion of the Vandals of the Danes of the Bulgarians Slavonians c. Ascribed to other Causes than the naked Efficacy of the Christian Doctrine ibid. The Barbarous Cruelties that were used by the Spaniards in the Conversion of the Indians p. 230. The Instance of Heraclius the Emperors Letter to Dagobert King of France concerning the method he made use of for the Conversion of the Jews p. 231. The Conclusion The Tenth Note Holiness of LIFE IN this Argument it is shewn I. What the Notion of Holiness is p. 233. Holiness is of Two kinds 1. Holiness of Calling and Dedication What
venture their Cause to any other Sentence but that of Scripture which had so plainly decided for them and was indeed the most proper to be appealed to yet the greatest number and the most learned of the Protestant Writers have never declined the Judgment of the Primitive Church but next to the inspired Writings of the Apostles have always esteemed and been willing to be determined by it And we are well assured that the Ancient Church even the Roman it self as well as the whole Christian besides is in all material Points on the Protestant side and a perfect Stranger if not an utter Enemy to those new Articles of Faith and Corruptions of Doctrine which have been since brought into the Western Church and which we have for that Reason protested against because they were unknown and contrary to the Faith and Doctrine of the Primitive Church It would too much exceed the set Limits of this Paper to make this out so fully as might easily be done by going through the chiefest Points of Difference between us Bellarmine in his Discourse upon this Note goes wholly off from it and chuses rather to pursue Luther and Calvin and some other worthy Reformers through all the Paths of Calumny and Slander but I shall not follow him to take him off from those false and injurious Representations he hath made of their Doctrines If any Body has the curiosity to see the Art of Misrepresenting in its greatest perfection let him but read that Chapter but if he will see it as perfectly shamed and exposed let him read Bishop Morton's long and learned Answer to it * Apologia Catholica p. 61. to p. 278. We are examining the Doctrines and finding out the Marks of the Church and not of particular Men and had Calvin or others taught any such Doctrines as are very falsly there laid to their Charge I know none had been concerned in them but themselves and no Church could have been prejudiced by them any farther than it had received them I shall therefore keep more close to Bellarmine's Note tho not to his Method upon it and I assure a late Adviser †Advice to the â—onfuter of Belâ—â—mine 't is not the design of confuting him but setting Men right in the way to the True Religion and the True Church when others are so busy to draw them off by false Marks and Pretences which is the cause of this Vndertaking I confess it would be too prolix as Bellarmine says to produce all the Testimonies of the Ancients thereby to shew what was the Doctrine of the Primitive Church in every particular Point controverted between us I shall therefore offer only some plain and brief Remarks by which the sense of the Primitive Church may be undeniably known in most of the Controversies and by which it will appear what was the Doctrine of the Church then and how contrary that of the Church of Rome is now to it And here I should first begin with the most Primitive that is with the Apostolick Church which truly and only deserves the Title of being Mother and Mistress of all Christian Churches that ever were or shall be in the World it is as vain as arrogant for any later and particular Church to assume that to it self which is but a Sister-Church at most and younger than some of the rest and tho more fine and proud yet not half so honest and uncorrupt This Apostolick Church which was founded and governed by the Apostles over all the World is the true Standard of the Christian Church and as in revealed Religion That which is first is true according to Tertullian's * Id verum quod prius id prius quod ab initio ab initio quod ab Apostolis Tertul. de praescript l. 4. Axiom because it comes nearest to the first pure Fountain of Revelation so as he adds That is first which is from the Beginning and from the Apostles We should first then examine what was the Faith and Doctrine of the Apostolick Church the greatest and almost only account of which we have in their own Canonical Writings which are received and allowed as such by the whole Christian Church and in these our Adversaries find so little of their own late and new Doctrines that they cannot but own that these are insufficient to authorise and establish most of them without the Authority of the present Church and without the help of unwritten Traditions When we produce Scripture against our Adversaries we then produce the only Authentick Records of the Apostolick Church and the only certain account we have of the Faith and Doctrine of the most Primitive Church let them object therefore never so much against Scripture as a Rule of Faith yet whilst it contains the only sure Testimony of what was taught and believed by the first Christian Church so far as any of these Doctrines are not in Scripture so far they cannot appear to be the Doctrine of the Apostolick Church and whilst we hold all that Faith and all those Doctrines that are contained in Scripture we hold all that can be known to be so in the most pure and most Primitive Church and whatsoever they have added to Scripture which they will needs have to be but an imperfect Rule of Faith they have added so far as can be known to the Doctrine of the Apostolick Church for if Scripture be not the only Rule of that yet it is the only Historical Account we have of it But I shall not at present deal with them out of Scripture tho as it is only a Record and Evidence of the Apostolical Faith they will count this but a Trick I know to draw them into a Scripture Dispute which they are mighty averse to and which they design to avoid by an Appeal from that to the Primitive Church we will go on therefore with our Note as they I suppose mean and understand it and that we may not be too troublesom to them with Scripture and the Apostolick Writings we will go several Ages lower even down to those Times wherein the Church was in its glorious State under the first Christian Emperors and whether their Doctrines or ours were most agreable to those of this Primitive Church Let us now come briefly to enquire in some particular Instances and by some few short Remarks and Observations And First Was any such thing as their pretended Supremacy then allowed of when in the first general Council at Nice * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Conc. Nicen. Can. 6. There was a limited Power assigned to the Bishop of Rome as there was to the other Metropolitans of Alexandria and Antioch who were to keep their Bounds set them by antient Custom which is utterly inconsistent with an Universal Supremacy over the whole Church by a Divine Right as is since pretended and claimed contrary to all Antiquity For the next General Council appoints the Bishop of Constantinople to have Prerogatives of Honour
they are we can never be certain whether any one Church in the World doth profess 'em or no for how can we know whether or no a Church professes we know not what And unless we certainly know that these Principles are true we can never be certain whether that be a true Church which professes 'em for seeing it is the profession of the true Principles of Religion that makes a true Church it is impossible for us to know whether any Church be a true Church till we know whether the Principles it professes are true So that before a Man can be secure that he hath found the true Church by this Note he must be certain either that every thing it professes is true or at least that the main and fundamental Principles of its Profession are true Neither of which he can be certain of according to the Principles of the Church of Rome For First She decries Mens private Judgment of Discretion as utterly insufficient to make any certain distinction of Truth from Falshood in matters of Religion Secondly She allows no sufficient Rule without the true Church to guide and direct our private Judgment of Discretion Thirdly She resolves all Certainty as to matters of Faith into the Authority of the true Church Fourthly She authorizes the true Church to impose upon us an absolute necessity of believing such Things as before were not necessary to be believed First The Church of Rome decries Men's private Judgment of Discretion as utterly insufficient to make any certain distinction of Truth from Falshood in matters of Religion Seeing we are to seek the true Church by Notes our certainty that we have found it must wholly depend upon our certainty that we have found in it the Notes of the true Church but tho there is no one thing in the World of which we are more concerned to be certain than that we have found the true Church and are in Communion with it because no less than our Eternal Salvation depends upon it yet it is only our own private Judgment of Discretion that by applying the Notes of the true Church can ascertain us in this Point For while we are in quest of the true Church we have no other way to find it but by carrying the Notes of it along with us and by examining and judging by our own private Discretion which Church these Notes do belong to either our private Discretion is sufficient to assertain us in this Matter or it is not if it be not we can never be certain which is the true Church if it be it must be sufficient to assertain us in all other necessary Points of Religion because one of the Notes by which we are to seek the true Church and that a principal one too is Sanctity of Doctrine or an unerring profession of the true Religion at least in all necessary points But before we can be certain which Church this Note belongs to we must be throughly satisfied in our own private Discretion what this unerring Profession is which we can never be till we are certain of the Truth of all the Particulars of it and when we are certain of this we are certain at least as to all necessary points of true Religion which must all be included in every unerring Profession of it So that before we can be certain of any Church that it is the true Church we must be certain that it doth not err in its profession and before we can be certain of this we must be certain of the Truth of all those particular Doctrines whereof its Profession is composed and of this we have as yet no other way to be certain but only by our own private Judgment of Discretion because till we have found the true Church its impossible we should conduct our selves by its Authority and in the absence of the true Churches Authority we have nothing to conduct us but our own private Discretion either this our private Discretion therefore is sufficient to assertain us of the Truth of all the particular Doctrines whereof an unerring Profession of Religion is composed or it is not if it be it must be sufficient to assertain us as to all necessary points of Religion if it be not as the Church of Rome affirms it is not it is impossible we should ever be certain that we have found the true Church again either therefore the Church of Rome must allow that certainty in all at least in all necessary Points of Religion is attainable by the free and honest use of our own private Judgment of Discretion which as I shall shew by and by she can never allow without undermining her own Foundations or she must leave Men hovering in eternal Uncertainty as to one of the most necessary Points of Religion viz. which is the true Church Secondly The Church of Rome allows no sufficient Rule without the true Church to guide and direct our private Judgment of Discretion Seeing the Constitution of the true Church is not natural but entirely founded upon Divine Institution this Question Which is the true Church is not to be resolved by Principles of Nature but by Principles of Revelation and therefore without some revealed Rule which is every way sufficient to guide and direct our private Discretion we shall never be able to find out which is the true Church because without such a Rule we have nothing but the Principles of Nature to go by which in this Enquiry are utterly insufficient to direct us But while we are out of the Church we have no other revealed Rule to direct us in our Enquiry after it but only that of Scripture for as for Tradition the Church of Rome teaches that the true Church is the sole Conservator of it and that tho it be a part of Divine Revelation yet no Man is obliged any farther to believe it than the true Church hath defined and declared it And seeing I can have ho certainty what is a true Tradition till such time as I am got into the true Church How can Tradition be a Rule of Faith to me while I am out of it Or How can that be the Rule of my Faith whilst I am in quest of the true Church which I have no other Obligation to believe but only the true Churches Authority Whilst therefore I am out of the true Church the only Rule I have to go by in my Enquiries after it is Scripture And this the Church of Rome tells me is insufficient both because it is not full enough and because it is not clear enough Which if true I can never be certain I have found the true Church by this Note of an unerring Profession 1st She teaches that the Scripture is not full enough as not containing in it all necessary Doctrines of Faith and Manners but that there are certain unwritten Traditions in the Church of equal Authority with it by which its defects are supplied And if so How is it possible I should find the true Church by the direction of Scripture For since according to this Note that can be no true Church which
doth not unerringly profess all necessary Doctrines of Faith and Manners when I have found a Church which professes all such necessary Doctrines as are in Scripture I cannot be secure that it is a true Church supposing there are other necessary Doctrines out of Scripture viz. in the unwritten Traditions because then the profession of these will be altogether as necessary to its being a true Church as the profession of those All that the Scripture can satisfy me in is only this whether such a Church profess all the necessary Doctrines in Scripture but if there are any necessary Doctrines out of Scripture it 's certain that the profession of them is as necessary to the being of the true Church as the profession of those that are in it And therefore before I can be certain that it is the true Church I must be fully satisfied that it professeth both which I can never be unless I have some other Rule to go by besides this of Scripture 2dly The Church of Rome teaches that the Scripture is no sufficient Rule in respect of clearness the Sense of it being so obscurely exprest that we can never be certain what it is without the Interpretation of the true Church Which if true it 's utterly impossible for one who is out of the true Church ever to find it by the direction of Scripture For according to this Note that only is the true Church which doth not err in its Profession at least in any necessary Point either as to Doctrines of Faith or Doctrines of Manners But before I can know whether any Church doth not err in its Profession I must be certainly informed what the true Profession is or what are those Doctrines of Faith and Manners of which this true Profession consists as to which the Scripture can never certainly inform me if it be not sufficiently clear For if I can never be certain what the true sense of Scripture is without the Interpretation of the true Church How is it possible that while I am out of the true Church I should ever be certain of its Sense as to all the particular Doctrines which the true Profession of Religion contains So that according to this Principle the Scripture is so far from being a sufficient Rule to one that is out of the true Church that it is perfectly useless to him in his Enquiry after it for either it can certainly direct him to the true Church or it cannot if it can it must be sufficiently clear to inform him of its own Sense without the Interpretation of the true Church concerning all those Doctrines of Faith and Manners whereof the unerring Profession of the true Church is composed and if so this Principle of the Roman Church is erroneous if it be not to what purpose doth it serve unless it be to lead him into an endless Maze of Uncertainties wherein the further he wanders the more he will lose himself So that if a Man hath had the misfortune to be born and bred out of the true Church in an Heretical or Schismatical Communion and is enquiring his way in by this Note of an unerring Profession he hath no other Rule to instruct and inform him what this unerring Profession is but only that of Scripture which according to the Principles of the Church of Rome is insufficient for his Purpose How then is it possible he should ever be certain that he hath found the true Church when the only Rule he hath whereby to enquire what that unerring Profession is whereby he is to seek it is utterly insufficient to resolve him Thirdly The Church of Rome resolves all Certainty as to matters of Faith into the Authority of the true Church and indeed this is the fundamental Principle of Popery viz. That the only ground of Certainty as to matters of Faith is the Authority of the present true Church teaching and proposing ' em Till such time therefore as we have found the true Church and do believe upon the Authority of its teaching we can never have any true Certainty of the matters which we are to believe And yet before we can be certain that we have found the true Church by this Note of an unerring Profession we must have very good certainty as to all matters of Faith for we can never be certain upon the Authority of any Church that what we believe is true till such time as we are certain that it is the true Church nor can we ever be certain that it is the true Church until we are certain that it doth not err in its Profession or which is the same thing that all the matters of Faith which it teaches and professes are true So that the certainty of our Faith after we have found the true Church and do believe upon its Authority must depend upon the certainty of our Faith while we were seeking it and did believe without its Authority Because before we can believe with any certainty upon the Authority of any Church we must be certain that it is the true Church but we can never be certain that it is the true Church till we are first certain that its Profession is true as to all the matters of Faith contained in it To make the matter more plain I will briefly represent it in a short Dialogue between a Protestant and a Papist Protest You tell me I can never be certain as to matters of Faith unless I believe upon the Authority of the true Church Pap. I do so and upon the Truth of this Proposition all my Religion is founded Protest But I beseech you May I be certain as to matters of Faith if I believe upon the Authority of any Church tho I am not certain whether it be the true Church or no Pap. To what Purpose do you ask this Question Protest Because if I may then in believing upon the Authority of the Church of England which you say is a false Church I shall be as certain as to matters of Faith as you who believe on the Authority of the Church of Rome which you say is the only true Church Pap. Why then I tell you you can never be certain as to matters of Faith in believing upon the Authority of any Church unless you are certain it is the true Church upon whose Authority you believe ' em Protest Why so Pap. Because it is not the Authority of a Church merely that is the true ground of Certainty but the Authority of the true Church otherwise the Authority of all Churches true or false would be equally a true ground of Certainty And therefore you can never be certain that the Authority of that Church upon which you believe is a true ground of Certainty unless you are first certain that it is the true Church Protest I do allow your Reason But then pray
how shall I be certain that it is the true Church Pap. Why this you must examine by certain Notes of the true Church whereof one and that a principal one is Sanctity of Doctrine or an unerring Profession of the true Religion Protest But Good Sir can I not be certain that it is the true Church till I am first certain that it doth not err in its Profession Pap. No. Protest Why then I must be certain of the Truth of all those matters of Faith whereof its Profession consists before I can be certain that it is the true Church Pap. You must so Protest But pray how shall I If that be true which you told me just now viz. That there is no true ground of Certainty but the Authority of the true Church For how is it possible I should ever be truly certain when as yet I know no true ground of Certainty Pap. Why have you not the Authority of the true Church Protest But as yet I am not certain that the Church upon whose Authority you would have me believe is the true Church and till I am certain of this with what Certainty can I depend upon her Authority Would you have me be certain that whatsoever she professes is true upon her own bare Word and Authority before I am certain that she is the true Church If so why may I not as well believe any other Church to be the true Church seeing there is no other Church but what will pass its Word for the Truth of its own Profession as well as yours If not you must allow me to have some other ground of Certainty as to Matters of Faith besides the Authority of the true Church For before I can securely rely upon the Authority of any Church as the true ground of Certainty I must be certain that it is the true Church and my Certainty that she is the true Church must depend upon my Certainty of the Truth of all those Matters of Faith comprised in her Profession So that before I am certain of the Truth of her Profession it is too soon for me to rely upon her Authority as the only ground of Certainty and when I am certain of it it is too late because I am certain already Fourthly And Lastly The Church of Rome gives Authority to the true Church to impose upon Mens Minds a necessity of believing such things as before they were not obliged to believe For she makes the Church's Authority not only a concurrent motive of Faith but the very formal reason of it so that we are not only obliged to believe what the Church declares but we are therefore obliged to believe it because she declares it 'T is true some of the Roman Doctors tell us that the Church hath no power to make new Articles of Faith but only that seeing there some old Truths in Scripture and the unwritten Tradition of the Church which the Church hath not yet declared and which therefore Men are not yet obliged to believe the Church hath Authority when ever she thinks meet to declare 'em and thereby to oblige Men under pain of Damnation to believe 'em but others of 'em and particularly Cardinal Bellarmin de Potest Sum. Pontif. tell us That the Church of later Time not only hath power to explain and declare but also to Constitute and Command those Things which belong to Faith. And indeed the difference between declaring and constituting or making an Article of Faith is only Verbal For an Article of Faith is a Truth that is necessary to be believed And therefore if the Church by declaring a Truth which was not necessary to be believed makes it necessary to be believed it thereby makes that Truth an Article of Faith which was not an Article of Faith. And so to declare and to make is the very same thing But in this they are all agreed that the true Church hath power to make those things necessary to be believed which were not so before And if this be true no Man can ever be certain by this Note of an unerring Profession that he hath found the true Church For before I can be certain of any Church as for instance the Roman that it is the true Church I must be certain that that Church's Profession is true but when I proceed to examine the particular Articles of it as I must do before I can be certain of the Truth of the whole I shall find there are several of them of the Truth of which in the opinion of several even of her own Doctors I have no sufficient ground to be certain either in Scripture or Tradition which while I am seeking the true Church are the only Rule I have whereby to examine them as particularly Transubstantiation Seven Sacraments Necessity of Auricular Confession Roman Purgatory and Indulgences Vid. Note the Sixth pag. 125. c. And if these Roman Doctors pretend to be certain of them upon no other Reason but because their Church which they are sure is the true Church hath declared them How shall I be certain of them who am but an Enquirer whether it be the true Church or no And therefore as yet cannot be supposed to be sure that it is for without her Declaration they themselves confess I have no sufficient ground to be certain of the Truth of them And till I am sure she is the true Church her Declarations are no ground of Certainty to me And as I cannot be certain that these Articles are true till I am sure that the Church which declare them is the true Church so supposing that the true Church hath power to impose upon me a necessity of believing such Things as before I was not obliged to believe I cannot be certain that they are false because no Authority can be supposed to have a right to impose upon Men such a necessity of believing but what is infallible and cannot impose what is false on them unless it be supposed that Men may be rightfully obliged to believe what is false If therefore the Roman Church be the true Church as for all I yet know it may then for all I yet know it hath Authority from God to impose upon me a necessity of believing whatever she declares and consequently for all I yet know she is Infallible But as for my self I know that I am a fallible Creature and therefore whatsoever Infallibility declares to me must certainly be true whatsoever Probabilities yea or seeming Demonstrations I may have against it how then can I be certain that any Article is false which is declared to me by a Church that for all I yet know is Infallible if it be Infallible I am sure that whatever it declares is true And if it be the true Church it must be Infallible Supposing that the true Church hath Authority to impose new Necessities of believing but whether it be the true Church or no is the Thing I am now enquiring by this Note of
Christians Now I must confess these Notes as he well observes are common to all Christian Churches and were intended to be so and if this does not answer his Design we cannot help it The Protestant Churches do not desire to confine the Notes of the Church to their own private Communions but are very glad if all the Churches in the World be as true Churches as themselves The whole Catholick Church which consists of a great many particular Diocesan or National Churches has the same Nature And when the whole consists of univocal parts every part must have the same Nature with the whole And therefore as he who would describe a man must describe him by such Characters as fit all Mankind so he who gives the Essential Characters of a Church must give such Notes as fit all true Churches in the World. This indeed does not fit the Church of Rome to make it the only Catholick and the only true Church nor do we intend it should but it fits all true Churches wherever they are and that is much better To answer then his Argument when we give Notes which belong to a whole Species as we must do when we give the Notes of a true Christian Church there being a great many true Churches in the World which make up the Catholick or Universal Church we must give such Notes as belong to the whole kind that is to all true Christian Churches And though these Notes are common indeed to all true Christian Churches yet they are proper and peculiar to a true Christian Church as the Essential Properties of a man are common to all men but proper to mankind And this is necessary to make them true Notes For such Notes of a true Church as do not fit all true Churches cannot be true Notes As for what the Cardinal urges That all Sects of Christians think themselves to have the true Faith and true Sacraments I am apt to think they do but what then If they have not the true Faith and true Sacraments they are not true Churches whatever they think of it and yet the true Faith and true Sacraments are certain Notes of a true Church A Purchase upon a bad Title which a man thinks a good one is not a good Estate but yet a Purchase upon a Title which is not only thought to be but is a good one is a good Estate All that can be said in this case is That men can be no more certain that they have a true Church than they are that they have a true Faith and true Sacraments and this I readily grant But as mens mistakes in this matter does not prove that there is no true Faith nor true Sacraments so neither does it prove that a true Faith and true Sacraments are not Notes of the true Church 2. The Cardinal 's second Objection is That the Notes of any thing must be more known than the thing it self which we readily grant Now says he which is the true Church is more knowable than which is the true Faith and this we deny and that for a very plain reason because the true Church cannot be known without knowing the true Faith for no Church is a true Church which does not profess the true Faith. We may as well say that we can know a Horse without knowing what the shape and figure of a Horse is which distinguishes it from all other Creatures as that we can know a Christian Church without knowing what the Christian Faith is which distinguishes it from all other Churches or we may as well say that we can know any thing without knowing what it is since the very Essence of a true Church consists in the true Faith which therefore must be first known before we can know the true Church But the Cardinal urges that we cannot know what true Scripture is nor what is the true interpretation of Scripture but from the Church and therefore we must know the Church before we can koow the true Faith. As for the first I readily grant that at this distance from the writing the Books of the New Testament there is no way to assure us that they were written by the Apostles or Apostolical men and owned for inspired Writings but the Testimony of the Church in all Ages But herein we do not consider them as a Church but as credible Witnesses Whether there be any such thing as a Church or not we can know only by the Scriptures But without knowing whether there be a Church or not if we know that for so many Hundred years these Books have been owned to be written by such men and have been received from the Apostles days till now by all who call themselves Christians this is as good an Historical Proof as we can have for any thing and it is the Authority of an uninterrupted Tradition not the Authority of the Church considered as a Church which moves us to believe them For setting aside the Authority of Tradition how can the Authority of a Company of men who call themselves the Church before I know whether there be any Church move me to believe any thing which was done 1600. years a-go But there is a Company of men in the World and have been successively for 1600. years whether they be a Church or not is nothing to this question who assure me that these Books which we call the Scriptures were written by such inspired men and contain a faithful account of what Christ did and taught and suffered and therefore I believe such Books and from them I learn what that true Faith is which makes a true Christian Church As for the true interpretation of Scripture that we cannot understand what it is without the Church this I also deny The Scriptures are very intelligible to honest and diligent Readers in all things necessary to salvation and if they be not I desire to know how we shall find out the Church for certainly the Church has no Character but what is in the Scripture and then if we must believe the Church before we can believe or understand the Scriptures we must believe the Church before we can possibly know whether there be a Church or not If we prove the Church by the Scripture we must believe and understand the Scripture before we can know the Church If we believe and understand the Scriptures upon the Authority and Interpretation of the Church considered as a Church then we must know the Church before the Scripture The Scripture cannot be known without the Church nor the Church without the Scripture and yet one of them must be known first and yet neither of them can be known first according to these Principles which is such an absurdity as all the Art of the World can never palliate 3. The Cardinal 's third Objection is That the true Notes of the Church must be inseparable from it whereas the Churches of Corinth and Galatia did not always teach true Doctrine some of the Church
have also divided from them For 't is very idle to say that tho we were Members of that Church when we first began to differ from it yet that by our Divisions we cut our selves from her Communion and therefore that the Unity of her Communion is not affected by our Departure For thus we may as well excuse all the separations from ours or from any other Church viz. that by separating from us they no longer belong to us We are very confident that in all Points of Doctrine of any great moment we of the Church of England do agree much more together than those of the Church of Rome and as for them who have gone out from us they as little break the Unity of the rest whom they are gone from as Luther's departing from the Church of Rome broke the Unity of those who still remained in it So that either the Church of Rome must renounce her pretence to Unity upon this account that Sects and Parties have not broken away from her or she must set up this wise Note of the true Church that all her Members are united except those that are divided from her which is a Mark that will fit any Society in the World. But the Cardinal does here offer a difference between the Division of Hereticks from the Church and a Division from Heresy That in their Church they have a certain Rule for ending Controversies viz. the Sentence of the chief Pastor or the Definition of a general Council and therefore Dissension does not arise among them from the Doctrine of the Church but from the Malice of the Devil Now in answer to this not to be importunate with that Question That if these be the ways of compounding Controversies how comes it to pass that their Controversies still remain I would know 1. Why were not these the means of composing those Controversies that carried us away from them Our Fathers were once of their Communion and those means were not sufficient to retain them in it To say this arose from the Malice of the Devil is to say in effect that the Devil was in 'em which is a little too Magisterial for a Controvertist though he were a Cardinal Unless he resolves to ascribe it to the Devil that they were taken off from an implicit Faith and a blind Obedience to the Church of Rome For it seems to be some Peoples Opinion when Men begin to judg a little for themselves the Spirit of Heresy comes in and then away they go But from hence I gather that the Sentence of the Pope or of a plenary Council is no certain Rule for ending Controversies nor certain means of preventing Divisions if some other means be not used to keep Men from trying the Spirits and proving all things What they are the Cardinal knew very well but mentioned them not nor shall I need to do it In the mean time when whole Countries went off from that Church as soon as they had a little considered what they had believed upon her Authority I need not say whether the Separation was caused by the Doctrine of that Church or by the Malice of the Devil but leave the World to judg But 2. How could those be certain means of composing Controversies concerning which even in their own Church there were the greatest Controversies of all What deference is to be given to the Sentence of their chief Pastor has always been a great Dispute amongst them and the best if not the greatest Part of their Church do not think him infallible Nor is it yet agreed what is requisite to make the Sentence of a general Council decisive nor of those Councils that have contradicted one another which they are to follow And that cannot be a certain Rule for deciding Controversies which is it self controverted So that they have neither that Union of Members among themselves nor those certain means of Union which they pretend to have Which I shall farther shew from a Learned Writer of their own the Famous ‖ Ep. par 8. p. 353. Launoy who in an elaborate Epistle to Nic. Gatinaeus wholly overthrows the pretence in Question For whether or no there be such an Union in the Church of Rome as will serve the Cardinal's turn I will leave the Reader to judg by this short and faithful account of that Epistle First then He proves unanswerably by numerous and apposite Testimonies of every Age That from the Apostles Times till the Council of Trent the constant universal Doctrine concerning the Church was this that it is the Society of the Faithful without ever inserting into the Definition of it any thing relating to its being united to the Pope or any other Bishop as to a Visible Head. Nay P. 400.415 Secondly That all the most Learned Lovers of Antiquity and Godly Opposers of Novelty in the Roman Communion both in the Time of the Council of Trent and ever since have retained that Notion of the Church and stuck to the Ancient Definition And Thirdly P. 415.419 That Canisius and Bellarmin have egregiously innovated in their Doctrine by adding to the ancient Definition such things as are repugnant to all Antiquity and mean while that they opposed each other Canisius making it of the nature of the Church to be under a * Uno summo post Christum capite Monarch and giving no place in his Definition of it to other Governours to whom the Church also is to be united Whereas Bellarmin makes an Aristocracy wherein one is Chief at least †Esse caetum hominum c. colligatum sub regimine legitimorum pastorum ac praecipue unius Christi in terris Vicarii Romani Pontificis De Eccl. l. 3. c. 2. a tempered and limited Monarchy essential to the Church going in this matter against Antiquity against Canisius and against himself in that he elsewhere makes Antiquity a Note of the true Church and says 't is a Demonstration of the Novelty of a Doctrine when the first Authors can be named and pointed to which is his own Case and Canisius's as to this Doctrine He reflects upon both of 'em P. 418 419.428 for ill Logick in these Definitions and shews how they destroy each other He censures the Followers of Canisius sharply and judiciously and then remarks that tho Bellarmine have greater Authority amongst Divines yet Canisius's Definition is more generally received and that for four Reasons because there is more Court-Flattery in it because it is put into Catechisms which the other is not and so sticks by virtue of an early Impression because some Men are mad upon Novelties and lastly others insufferably Ignorant as to the Holy Scriptures and Ancient Tradition the Principles of true Theology Fourthly He thinks they have done harm to the Church and that for these Reasons 1. Because P. 430. for want of Logick they have confounded the Nature of the Church with the State of it 2. They have neglected St. Paul's
THE NOTES OF The Church As Laid down By Cardinal BELLARMIN Examined and Confuted With a Table of the Contents IMPRIMATUR Apr. 6. 1687. Guil. Needham LONDON Printed for Richard Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard MDCLXXXVIII THE SEVERAL TRACTS Contained IN THIS VOLUME 1. A Brief Discourse concerning the Notes of the Church with some Reflections on Cardinal BELLARMIN's Notes 2. An Examination of Note concerning BELLARMIN's First The Name of Catholick 3. His Second Note Antiquity 4. His Third Note Duration 5. His Fourth Note Amplitude or Multitude and Variety of Believers 6. His Fifth Note The Succession of Bishops 7. His Sixth Note Agreement in Doctrine with the Primitive Church 8. His Seventh Note Vnion of the Members among themselves and with the Head. 9. His Eighth Note Sanctity of Doctrine 10. His Ninth Note Efficacy of the Doctrine 11. His Tenth Note Holiness of Life 12. His Eleventh Note The Glory of Miracles 13. His Twelfth Note The Light of Prophecy 14. His Thirteenth Note Confession of Adversaries 15. His Fourteenth Note The Vnhappy End of the Church's Enemies 16. His Fifteenth Note Temporal Felicity 17. A Vindication of the Brief Discourse concerning the Notes of the Church in Answer to a Late Pamphlet Intituled The Vse and great Moment of the Notes of the Church as delivered by Cardinal Bellarmin de Notis Ecclesiae Justified 18. A Defence of the Confuter of Bellarmin's Second Note of the Church Antiquity against the Cavils of the Adviser 19. A TABLE of the Contents THE CONTENTS Of the following NOTES The INTRODUCTION to the Notes of the Church THE Visibility of the Catholick Church takes away the Necessity of finding out Notes to distinguish it by especially of such Notes as are matter of Dispute themselves p. 3. The Vse of Notes of find out an Infallible Church and these appropriated by the Cardinal to the Church of Rome only p. 4. What Protestants intend in those Notes they give of the true Church and what the Papists by their Notes of a Church p. 5. The Protestant Way of finding out the Church by the essential Properties of a true Church p. 6. Three things objected to this by the Cardinal and Answers returned p. 7 8 9 10 11 12. The Cardinal's Way considered and examined 1st To find out which is the True Church before we know what a True Church is p. 13. Two Enquiries in order of Nature before which is the True Church whether there be a True Church or not and what it is ibid. No Notes of these but such as they dare not give viz. the Authority of the Scriptures and every Man 's private Judgment of the Sense and Interpretation of them p. 14. 2ly She gives us Notes whereby to find out the True Catholick Church before we know what a particular Church is p. 15. Impossible to know what the Catholick Church is before we know what a particular Church is ibid. No other Notes of a True Church but what belongs to every True particular Church and that can be nothing but what is essential to a Church and what all Churches do agree in viz the true Faith and Worship of Christ p. 16. The 6th which is the same with the 2d and the 8th are the chief if not the only Notes of this Nature and here our Claim is as good if not better than theirs ibid. His 9th 10th 11th and 12th not properly Notes of a True Church any otherwise than as they are Testimonies of the common Christianity which is professed by all true Churches ibid. The 13th 14th 15th no Notes at all because they are not always true ibid. His 3d and 4th Notes are not Notes of a Church but only God's Promises made to his Church p. 17. His 1st Note doth not declare what a Church is but in what Communion it is and is no Note of a true Church unless it be frrst proved that they are true Churches which are in Communion with each other ibid. His 5th common to the Greek and any other Church who have Bishops in Succession from the Apostles or Apostolical Bishops p. 18. The 7th Note serves to purpose the Cardinal's Design and doth his Business without any other Note ibid. 3dly Another Mystery in forming these Notes is to pick out of all the Christian Churches in the World one Church which we must own for the Catholick Church and reject all others as Heretical or Schismatical or Vncatholick Churches who refuse Obedience and Subjection to this one Catholick Church p. 19. That there is but one True Church in the World and that the Catholick Church doth not signify all the particular True Churches but some one Church which all others are bound to submit to and communicate with if they will be Members of the Catholick Church this necessary to be proved before the Cardinal had given us these Notes of a Church p. 20 21. 4thly Another Design in making these Notes is to find out such a Church on whose Authority we must rely for the whole Christian Faith even for the Holy Scriptures themselves p. 22. But here we must first be satisfied that the True Church is Infallible this can never be proved but by Scripture which a Man must first believe before it can be proved to him that there is an Infallible Church p. 23. The Church is not the first Object of our Faith in Religion since we ought to know and believe most of the Articles of the Christian Faith before we can know whether there be any Church or no. p. 23 24. The Contents of the First NOTE CATHOLICK THE sincere Preaching of the Faith or Doctrine of Christ as it is laid down in the Scripture is the only sure and infallible Mark of the Church of Christ p. 25. The Church of Rome declines being examined by this Rule p. 26. Bellarmin's Argument for the Name Catholick being an undoubted true Mark of a True Church p. 26. The Weakness of the Cardinal's Argument exposed in three Particulars I. In what respect the Name Catholick was esteemed by some of the Fathers in their Time a Note of a Catholick Church and in what respects 't will ever be a standing Note of it p. 27. This shewn to be upon the account of the Catholick Faith and therefore in their time is joined with the Word Catholick p. 28. What the Catholick Faith and why called Catholick ibid. None in the first Ages of Christianity went by the Name of Catholick but those who profest the true Catholick Faith. p. 29. II. No Argument can be drawn from the bare Name of Catholick to prove a Church to be Catholick p. 29. I. The Christian Church was not known by the Name Catholick at the Beginning though of an antient and early Date and therefore no essential Note of it p. 30. 2. Names are oft times arbitrary and at random and falsly imposed on things and therefore nothing can be concluded from them ibid. 3. Names are oft times imposed on
visible p. 63 64. Rome not always the principal Seat of the Church p. 63. Avignon was for 70 Years where the Pope and the whole Court recided ibid. Several Popes Hereticks p. 64. Two Popes at once contending for the Chair and this for above 40 Years together and at one time 3 Popes p. 64. The Church of Rome compared with it self in reference to several Doctrines p. 65. What the Church of Rome now holds and what the Church of Rome hath held ibid. Her being the Mother-Church and the Pope being Christ's Vicar ibid. Concerning the Apocryphal Books ibid. Scripture and Tradition p. 66. Scripture in unknown Tongues ibid. Merit p. 67. Indulgences ibid. Purgatory p. 68. Prayers in an unknown Tongue ibid. Praying to Saints p. 68 69. Image-worship p. 69. Sacraments the Number of them ibid. Transubstantiation p. 70. Communion in one kind ibid. Solitary Masses p. 70 71. Auricular Confession p. 71. Extream Vnction ibid. Priests Marriage ibid. In all these Particulars Rome is not now what it hath been The Fourth Note Amplitude or Multitude and Variety of Believers THE Scriptures first gave us the Notion of a Church p. 73. A true Christian Church professes the true Christian Faith. p. 74. Instead of this the Church of Rome have invented several Notes and Characters of a Church which are not to be met with or are not plainly delivered in Scripture ibid. Of which this Amplitude or Multitude c. is one ibid. What Bellarmine understands by this Note p. 75. In Answer to him I. It is shewed this cannot be a Note of the true Church ibid. 1. Whether you consider the Members thereof under either the Notion of a great Multitude or 2. a great Multitude of Believers ibid. Satan's Kingdom more numerous than the Kingdom of Christ. ibid. The Worshippers of Mahomet exceed the Members of Christ's true Church in number since the Romanists make themselves the only Catholicks p. 76. The Kingdom of Christ not to be distinguished from the Kingdom of Antichrist by this Note ibid. This Note therefore no true Character of a Church p. 77. The several Places of Scripture whence Bellarmine pretends he fetches this Note of his ibid. This is so far from being a Note of the Church that it is no more than the variable State and Condition of it p. 78. This acknowledged by the Cardinal himself in his Explication of this Note ibid. The present State of the Church not to be compared with what it shall be before the End of the World. p. 79. Many plain Prophecies brought for the Proof of this ibid. The Cardinal's Citation of Vincentius Lirinensis for the confirming this Note considered p. 80 81. II. Supposing this to be a true Note of the Catholick Church it doth not advantage the Church of Rome as to that her pretention of being the true Catholick Church ibid. 82 to 85. III. Supposing again this Note to be true it doth the Reformed Churches a very great Service in demonstrating them to be true Parts of the Catholick Church p. 85. This demonstrated by two Arguments p. 86 87. 1. That in the first Ages of Christianity the Catholick Church then was more ours than now it is the Romanists p. 86. That there is a great Agreement between the antient Church of Rome and the present Church of England ibid. This is evident by comparing the Doctrine and Worship of each together ibid. 2. That upon computation the Churches subject to the Roman See exceed not the Reformed Churches in Amplitude or Multitude of Members p. 87 to 91. The Conclusion p. 92. The Fifth Note Succession of BISHOPS IN Examination of this Note Three Things are inquired into I. How far this Note may be necessary to any Church p. 94. True and Lawful Pastors necessary to the Constitution of the Church and this Pastoral Power Originally from Christ ibid. Power of Ordination entrusted with Bishops the chief Governors of the Church and ordinary Successors of the Apostles p. 94 95. The Government of the Church of England by Bishops and its Succession not interrupted in the Reformation ibid. 1. Obs Tho Succession of Bishops be necessary to the compleat constitution of a Church yet it may be doubted whether it is indispensable to the very being of it so as to unchurch every place that wants these 2. Obs It is not necessary for every Church which firmly presumes upon this Lawful and Orderly Succession even from the Apostles should be able to produce the Records of its conveyance thro' every Age and in every single Person by whom it hath past p. 95. The Antients contented themselves in delivering down to us the Succession of Bishops in the greater Sees and Mother-Cities As of Rome Alexandria Antioch Jerusalem c. ibid. 3. Obs Some irregularities and uncanonical proceedings in times of great Schisms or publick Disturbance have been interpreted for no interruption of this Authentical Succession p. 97. II. How far the Succession of Bishops may be granted to the Church of Rome p. 98. Little left upon Record of many of the first Bishops in the Church of Rome excepting their bare Names ibid. If Heresie breaks the Succession this is chargeable upon the Church of Rome p. 99. If Schismatical Intrusions can dissolve the order of Succession this chargeable likewise on the Bishops of that Church viz. Felix the 2. and Vigilius ibid. 1. The Case of the Roman Succession extreamly changed since the first time p. 101. No Supremacy to be found in the Church of Rome for more than the first 500 Years p. 101 102. 2. The Church of Rome not very favourable to the Order of Bishops ibid. The Divine Right of Episcopacy disputed in the Council of Trent ibid. 3. Their Catechism makes this no distinct Order but only a different degree of the same Priesthood p. 103. III. How insufficient a proof this will afford them of any great advantage ibid. 1. Succession is no sufficient evidence of the Truth of the Doctrine of any Church p. 104 105. 2. An unintterrupted Succession of Bishops is no warrantable ground of the Claim of Superiority over another Church which hath not so clear evidences thereof p. 105 106. The Cardinals Testimonies out of St. Augustine Irenaeus Tertullian and Epiphanius examined p. 107 108. His Inference from these citations about Succession considered p. 109 110. The Conclusion The Sixth Note Agreement in Doctrine with the Primitive Church THis is acknowledged a True Mark of a Church p. 113. The Infallibility of the present Church is to be laid aside till it be first known whether it agrees with the Primitive Church or not p. 114. The True Chuch only to be discovered by the True Faith. p. 115. Those matters of Faith in Controversie betwixt us are to be determined by the Doctrines and Practices of the Primitive Church p. 116. The Church of Rome waving Particular Controversies that may be made plain and evident to most capacities delights rather to run out into General Controversies
of Infallibility Church-Authority and resolution of Faith and Judge of Controversies c. p. 119. The Reformation never did decline the Judgment of the Primitive Church for its Justification p. 120 121. Luther and Calvin misrepresented by Cardinal Bellarmine p. 122. The Apostolick Church founded and governed by the Apostles over all the World is the true Standard of the Christian Church ibid. The Scriptures the only Authentick Records of the Apostolick Church and the only certain account we have of the Faith and Doctrine of the most Primitive Church p. 123. Several Doctrines Examined by Antiquity 1. Supremacy not allowed of by the first Council of Nice nor that of Constantinople nor Chalcedon p. 125. 2. Transubstantiation acknowledged by many of the Schoolmen not to have been the Doctrine of the Primitive Church ibid. This Doctrine brought into the Church a little before Berengarius and not throughly understood even then by those who held it p. 126. Berengarius his Recantation and the Gloss upon it p. 127. The Number of the Sacraments not declared to be seven by the Primitive Church nor mentioned by any Author till 1100 Years after Christ ibid. Necessity of Auricular Confession questioned by Learned Men in the times of Peter Lombard p. 128. Purgatory not mentioned by any Antient Writers p. 128 129. Indulgences received very late into the Church ibid. Prayers and Oblations for the Dead an Antient Practice but no Doctrine of the Primitive Church ibid. Prayers in an unknown Tongue never the Practice any where of the Primitive Church ib. Worship of Saints and Angels and of Images of no Antient date in the Church ibid. All these Doctrines of the Roman Church which distinguish it from the Reformed that they were not Doctrines of the Primitive Church is further proved 1. From their Expurgatory Indices p. 130. 2. From the Correcting or rather Corrupting the Fathers and the counterfeiting so many false ones and obtruding Spurious Authors upon the World. p. 131 132. 3. From that little esteem and regard they too often have for Antiquity when ever it makes against them p. 133. 4. From the Determinations and Decrees of the Present Church which are the only things they stick to and which they prefer a thousand times before Antiquity or the whole sence of the Primitive Church The Seventh Note The Union of the Members among themselves and with the Head. UNity no proper Character of a true Church because found upon Societies of different natures and contrary designes p. 137. It is a good mark when 't is a duty as 't is a duty when the terms of Vnion are so ibid. Wherein this Vnity consists according to Bellarmine p. 138. Hereupon three things are endeavoured 1. That the Vnity here offered is no true Note of the Church forasmuch as Vnion with the Pope as Head of the Church hath no Foundation in Scripture Reason or Antiquity p. 140. 1. Scripture p. 141 142 143. 2. No Foundation of it from Reason p. 144 145. 3. Nor any Colour from Antiquity p. 145 to 149. The Cardinals Argument for the necessity of this Vnion from Experience considered p. 149. 2. The Vnion which they pretend to among themselves as Members no certain Note of the Church p. 150. 1. This is no more than what any Society may have as well as the true Church and any other Church as well as the Roman p. 151. 2. As there may be this Vnion out of the true Church so its may not be within it ibid. II. If Vnity were a true Note of the Church yet the Roman Church hath it not which is probably true of the first and most certainly true of the second branch of the Cardinals Vnity p. 152. 1. It is probable that there is not now nor hath been for many Ages any true Pope for the Church to be Vnited to ibid. 2. Neither is there that Vnion in all points of Doctrine amongst the Papists or such a Vnion of their Members as shall prevent the breaking away of some from the Communion of the rest p. 153. Not that wonderful agreement as the Cardinal pretends in the Sacred Writers of their Church nor in the Decrees of their Lawful Councils nor in those of their Popes p. 154. Several Disputes between the Canonists and Schoolmen in many material points of Doctrine between the Thomists the Scotists and Occamists between the Franciscans and Dominicans about the conception of the Blessed Virgin the Jansenists and Molinists p. 155 156. Bellarmin's Answer to all this viz. They differ not in those things that belong to Faith considered p. 156 157. The Cardinals difference between the division of Hereticks from the Church and a division from Heresie considered p. 158. If there be in the Church of Rome a certain rule for ending Controversies viz. The Sentence of the chief Pastor or a definition of a General Council ibid. 1. Why were not these the means of composing those Controversies that carried us away from them ibid. 2. How could those be certain means of composing Controversies concerning which even in their own Church there were the greatest Controversies of all p. 159. This largely shewn from the Learned Launoys Epistle to Nicholas Gatinaeus upon this Question p. 160 161 162 163. III. That that Vnity which is indeed a Note of the Church we Protestants have and that in a much greater degree than they p. 164. The true Grounds and Notions of Church-Vnity represented ibid. 1. Vnity of Submission to one Head our Lord Jesus Christ ibid. 2. Vnity of professing the Common Faith once delivered to to the Saints grounded upon the Authority of Scriptures and summarily expounded in the Antient Creed p. 165. 3. Vnity of Sacraments in the Church ibid. 4. Vnity of Obedience to all Institutions and Laws of Christ p. 165. 5. Vnity of Christian Affection and Brotherly kindness ibid. 6. Vnity of Discipline and Government ibid. 7. Vnity of Communion in the Service and Worship of God. p. 166. Some tho' not all of these necessary to the being of a Church viz. The acknowledgment of our Lord the profession of one Faith and admission into the state of Christian Duties and Priviledges by one Baptism ibid. Those particular Churches which keep Vnity in all these respects better than others do have the mark of Ecclesiastical Vnity in a higher degree than those others have p. 167. The Church of Rome as she holds one Lord one Faith one Baptism is part of the Catholick Church and so far maintains Catholick Vnity ibid. Wherein she departs from Catholick Vnity Purity and Charity shewed in several instances p. 167 168. The Church of England not chargeable on the same account ibid. 168 169. Vnity of Communion in the Church of Rome is Vnity of Communion among themselves but not Catholick Vnity of Communion because the terms of it are many of them unlawful and unjust p. 170. The Contrary to which the true Case of the Church of England ibid. 171. The Conclusion p. 171
meant by it p. 234. 2. Holiness of Mind and Manners What understood by it ibid. II. Neither of these kinds of Holiness can be properly called a Note of the True Church ibid. Not the first because it appertains to its Essence and Constitution shews what a Church is and belongs to every Church whether Greek Abyssine Roman or English p. 235. Not the Second kind and that for Three Reasons 1. Because of that general admission of men of all Nations and Conditions upon their profession of the common Christianity into the bosome of the Christian Church p. 236. 2. Because many men live sometimes with more and sometimes with less Morality p. 237. 3. Because a man must first understand the Nature and Doctrine of the Christian Church or he cannot know what Sanctity is and what that is in the Life of any man which he is to take for the Holiness of a Christian p. 238. III. If Holiness of Life were a Note of the true Church the Roman Church would not from this concession derive any great advantage p. 239. Other Churches as famous as that of Rome for their Faith and manners ibid. In latter Ages the goodness of Morals in several of that Communion to be ascribed not so much to Popery as its cause but to those Principles that are common to all Christians p. 240. The Reformation not free from bad Men tho this proceeds from the Men not from the Cause ibid. Luther herein misrepresented by Bellarmine and others p. 241. Great complaints of Corruptions in the Romists Writers in the Latin Church p. 242. Many in the Romish Church Infamous for their Impieties p. 243. Reflections on Pope Gregory the Great who is said to be the last of the good and the first of the bad p. 244. On Pope John the XII p. 245. On St. Dominick ibid. On the Austerities and Mortifications of their several Orders p. 246. Many things in the Roman Church which by helping forward an ill life do in part deface this mark of Sanctity p. 248. The Eleventh Note The Glory of Miracles BEllarmins Explication of this Note and the grounds upon which he builds it p. 250. In answer to this Three things are laid down I. That meer Miracles withou any other consideration are not a sufficient Note of any Church or Religion whatever p. 252. The Miracles of the Primitive Church compared with those that are more peculiarly appropriated to the Church of Rome p. 253. The several Circumstances considered which recommend the Primitive Miracles viz. 1. That they were highly beneficial to Human Nature p. 254. The Miracles of the Church of Rome very many of them defective herein p. 255. 2. The Primitive Miracles of great importance and significancy and the design of them plainly laid down before-hand in the Prophecies of the V. T. p. 256. This applied to those of the Church of Rome p. 257. Miracles in the most comprehensive sense of the Word are no proof of the Truth and Divinity of that Doctrine they would advance p. 258. This Instanced in those of Jannes and Jambres and of Apollonius Tyaneus p. 259. Photius his Censure of those of Apollonius Tyaneus p. 260. Miracles whether supposed in a Heathen or a Heretick not acknowledged by the Fathers to be a good proof that either of them are in the right p. 261. This apparent from St. Origen ibid. St. Cyprian ib. St. Irenaeus p. 162. St. Austin p. 263. II. Miracles of the Church of Rome no proof or confirmation of those Doctrines Practices wherein the Reformed Church differs from them p. 264. Here three Things are considered 1. That there is no ground throughout the whole Scriptures to expect any Miracle for the Confirmation of any particular Doctrine whatever p. 265. This evident from the Mosaic dispensation ibid. The Christian Institution p. 266. The following Ages of the Church ibid. 2. Many of those Doctrines for which these Miracles are alledged are so far from being asserted or warranted in the Holy Scriptures that they are rather contrary to them ibid. This Instanced in Transubstantiation p. 266 267. Adoration of the Host p. 266 267. Worshipping of Images p. 266 267. Praying to Saints departed p. 266 267. Purgatory c. p. 266 267. Miracles for the advance or support of those Doctrines justly suspected p. 268. 3. No ground of certainty as to matter of Fact of most of those miracles which the Romanists make the Glory of their Church p. 269. The Story of the Bones of Babylas considered ibid. Those of Gâ—rvatius and Proatsius revealed by Vision to St. Ambrose reflected on p. 270. The fabulous Stories of later Ages amongst them condemned by several Writers of the Church of Rome p. 271. 1 Persons St. Bernard reflected on p. 273. St. John Damascen p. 274. Some Miracles wrought in confirmation of Transubstantiation considered p. 273 c. III. We of the Reformed Religion as we do not pretend to the Working of Miracles in our Age so if we did we could pretend to prove nothing by them but what hath been already sufficiently proved by the Miracles of Christ and his Apostles p. 280. The Twelfth Note The Light of Prophecy TWO Things to be understood by the Light of Prophecy 1. That Divine Revelation whereby a man is enabled to foretel such or such contingent Events will come to pass p. 285. 2. Or the Testimony that is given by the fulfilling of Prophecies to some Doctrine that was designed to be confirmed by it p. 286. In the latter sense it may be admitted as a mark or rather an Argument of that Doctrine the Profession whereof makes the Church p. 287. Great caution must be used in laying down the fulfilling the Predictions as an Argument to prove the Truth of Christianity ibid. Two Things here Examined I. Whether this be a Note of the Church The Cardinal offers three Arguments to prove it p. 288. The first of them disproved and the Prophecy of Joel applied by St. Peter Acts 2.16 to the Church explained and vindicated p. 289. His second Argument that none knows future Contingences but God only considered p. 290. His third Argument from the 18th of Deut. examined and overthrown p. 291. The foretelling of a future contingent Event no certain Note of true Doctrine ibid. There have been true Prophecies among Heathens the famous Acrostic of the Sybilla Erythroea the Books of Hystaspes the prediction of Balaam which shew the gift of Prophecy not to be confined within the Communion of the Church p. 292 293. Light of Prophecy no Note of the Church because separable from it there having been true Prophecy out of the Church and because it hath not alwayes continued in the Church p. 294. II. If it was a Note the Cardinal hath not sufficiently proved it belongs to his Church and no others p. 295. His Instance of Agabus and the Old Prophets may serve any Christian Church as well if not better than his ibid. His Instance of Gregory Thaumat Bishop
whole Work. p. 390. FINIS Books Printed for and Sold by Richard Chiswell Dr. CAve's Lives of the Primitive Fathers in 2 Vol. Folio Dr. Cary's Chronological Account of Ancient Time. fol. Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity fol. Sir John Burlace's History of the Irish Rebellion fol. The Laws of this Realm concerning Jesuits Seminary Priests Recusants the Oaths of Supremacy and Allegiance explained by divers Judgments and Resolutions of the Judges with other Observations thereupon By William CawleyEsq fol. Dr. Towerson's Explication on the Creed the Commandments and Lord's Prayer in 3 Vol. fol. Bishop Nicholson on the Church-Catechism 40. Mr. John Cave's seven occasional Sermons 40. Bishop Wilkin's Natural Religion 80. His Fifteen Sermons 80. Mr. Tanner's Primordia Or the Rise and Growth of the first Church of God described 80. Spaniards Conspiracy against the State of Venice 80. Dr. Cave's Primitive Christianity in three parts 80. Certain genuine Remains of the Lord Bacon in Arguments Civil Moral Natural c. with a large account of all his Works By Dr. Tho. Tenison 80. Dr. Henry Bagshaw's Discourses on select Texts 80. Mr. Seller's State of the Church in the three first Centuries Dr. Burnet's Account of the Life and Death of the Earl of Rochester 80. Vindication of the Ordinations of the Church of England 80. History of the Rights of Princes in the Disposing of Ecclesiastical Benefices and Church-lands 80. Relation of the present state of the difference between the French King and the Court of Rome to which is added the Pope's Brief to the Assembly of the Clergy and their Protestation published by Dr. Burnet 80. Dr. Cumber's Companion to the Altar 80. Dr. Sherlock's Practical Discourse of Religious Assemblies 80. Defence of Dr. Stillingfleet's Unreasonableness of Separation 80. A Vindication of the Defence of Dr. Stillingfleet in answer to Mr. Baxter and Mr. Lob about Catholick Communion 80. Sir Rob. Filmer's Patriarcha or natural Power of Kings 80. Bishop Wettenball's Method and Order for private Devotion 125. Valentine's Private Devotions 40. Dr. Spencer de Legibus Hebraeorum Ritualibus earum Rationibus fol. Dr. John Lightsoot's Works in English in 2 Vol. fol. Sir Tho. Brown's Vulgar Errors with all the rest of his Works fol. Patris Simonii Disquisitiones Criticae de Variis per diversa Loca Tempora Bibliorum Editionibus Accedunt Castigat Opusc Is Vossii de Sibyllinis Oraculis 40. The Case of Lay-Communion with the Church of England considered 40. Two Letters betwixt Mr. R. Smith and Dr. Hen. Hammond about Christ's Descent into Hell. 80. Dean Stratford's Disswasive from Revenge 80. Dr. Hez Burton's first Volume of Discourses of Purity and Charity of Repentance and of seeking the Kingdom of God. Published by Dean Tillotson 80. Sir Thomas More 's Vtopia newly made English by Dr. Burnet 80. Mr. Seller's Devout Communicant assisted with Rules Meditations Prayers and Anthems 12â— Dr. Towerson of the Sacraments in General Of the Sacrament of Baptism in particular 80. The History of the COVNCIL of TRENT in which besides the Ordinary Acts of the Council are declared many notable Occurrences which hapned in Christendom for 40 Years and particularly the Practices of the COVRT of ROME to hinder the Reformation of Their Errors and to maintain Their Greatness Written by Father Paul of the SERVI To which is added the Life of the Author and the History of the Inquisition Books lately Printed for Richard Chiswell Dr. Burnets History of the Reformation of the Church of England in 2 Vol. Fol. A Collection of Sixteen several Tracts and Discourses Written in the Years from 1678 to 1685. inclusive by Gilbert Burnet D. D. To which are added A Letter written to Dr. Burnet giving an Account of Cardinal Pool's Secret Powers The History of the Powder-Treason with a Vindication of the Proceedings thereupon An Impartial Consideration of the Five Jesuits dying Speeches who were Executed for the Popish Plot 1679. 40. A Dissertation concerning the Government of the Ancient Church more particularly of the Encroachments of the Bishops of Rome upon other Sees By WILLIAM CAVE D. D. Octavo An Answer to Mr. Serjeant's Sure Footing in Christianity concerning the Rule of Faith With some other Discourses By WILLIAM FALKNER D. D. 40. A Vindication of the Ordinations of the Church of England in Answer to a Paper written by one of the Church of Rome to prove the Nullity of our Orders By GILBERT BVRNET D. D. Octavo An Abridgment of the History of the Reformation of the Church of England By GILB BVRNET D. D. Octavo The APOLOGY of the Church of England and an Epistle to one Signior Scipio a Venetian Gentleman concerning the Council of Trent Written both in Latin by the Right Reverend Father in God JOHN JEWEL Lord Bishop of Salisbury Made English by a Person of Quality To which is added The Life of the said Bishop Collected and written by the same Hand Octavo The Life of WILLIAM BEDEL D. D. Bishop of Kilmore in Ireland Together with Certain Letters which passed betwixt him and James Waddefworth a late Pensioner of the Holy Inquisition of Sevil in Matters of Religion concerning the General Motives to the Roman Obedience Octavo The Decree made at ROME the Second of March 1679. condemning some Opinions of the Jesuits and other Casuists Quarto A Discourse concerning the Necessity of Reformation with respect to the Errors and Corruptions of the Church of Rome Quarto First and Second Parts A Discourse concerning the Celebration of Divine Service in an Unknown Tongue Quarto A Papist not Misrepresented by Protestants Being a Reply to the Reflections upon the Answer to A Papist Misrepresented and Represented Quarto An Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England in the several Articles proposed by the late BISHOP of CONDOM in his Exposition of the Doctrine of the Catholick Church Quarto A Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the Exceptions of Monsieur de Meaux late Bishop of Condom and his Vindicator 40. A CATECHISM explaining the Doctrine and Practices of the Church of Rome With an Answer thereunto By a Protestant of the Church of England 80. A Papist Represented and not Misrepresented being an Answer to the First Second Fifth and Sixth Sheets of the Second Part of the Papist Misrepresented and Represented and for a further Vindication of the CATECHISM truly representing the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome Quarto The Lay-Christian's Obligation to read the Holy Scriptures Quarto The Plain Man's Reply to the Catholick Missionaries 240. An Answer to THREE PAPERS lately printed concerning the Authority of the Catholick Church in Matters of Faith and the Reformation of the Church of England Quarto A Vindication of the Answer to THREE PAPERS concerning the Unity and Authority of the Catholick Church and the Reformation of the Church of England Quarto Mr. Chillingworth's Book called The Religion of Protestants a safe way to Salvation made more generally useful by
omitting Personal Contests but inserting whatsoever concerns the common Cause of Protestants or defends the Church of England with an exact Table of Contents and an Addition of some genuine Pieces of Mr. Chillingworth's never before Printed viz. against the Infallibility of the Roman Church Transubstantiation Tradition c. And an Account of what moved the Author to turn Papist with his Confutation of the said Motives An Historical Treatise written by an AUTHOR of the Communion of the CHVRCH of ROME touching TRANSVBSTANTIATION Wherein is made appear That according to the Principles of THAT CHVRCH This Doctrine cannot be an Article of Faith. 40. The Protestant's Companion Or an Impartial Survey and Comparison of the Protestant Religion as by Law established with the main Doctrines of Popery Wherein is shewed that Popery is contrary to Scripture Primitive Fathers and Councils and that proved from Holy Writ the Writings of the Ancient Fathers for several hundred Years and the Confession of the most Learned Papists themselves 40. The Pillar and Ground of Truth A Treatise shewing that the Roman Church falsly claims to be That Church and the Pillar of That Truth mentioned by S. Paul in his first Epistle to Timothy Chap. 3. Vers 15. 4o. The Peoples Right to read the Holy Scripture Asserted 4o. A Short Summary of the principal Controversies between the Church of England and the Church of Rome being a Vindication of several Protestant Doctrines in Answer to a Late Pamphlet Intituled Protestancy destitute of Scripture Proofs 4o. An Answer to a Late Pamphlet Intituled The Judgment and Doctrine of the Clergy of the Church of England concerning one Special Branch of the King's Prerogative viz. In dispensing with the Penal Laws 4o. A Discourse of the Holy Eucharist in the two great Points of the Real Presence and the Adoration of the Host in Answer to the Two Discourses lately Printed at Oxford on this Subject To which is perfixed a Large Historical Preface relating to the same Argument Two Discourses Of Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead The Fifteen Notes of the Church as laid down by Cardinal Bellarmin examined and confuted 4o. With a Table of the Contents Preparation for Death Being a Letter sent to a young Gentlewoman in France in a dangerous Distemper of which she died By W. W. 12o. The Difference between the Church of England and the Church of Rome in opposition to a late Book Intituled An Agreement between the Church of England and Church of Rome A PRIVATE PRAYER to be used in Difficult Times A True Account of a Conference held about Religion at London Sept. 29 1687 between A. Pulton Jesuit and Tho. Tenison D. D. as also of that which led to it and followed after it 4o. The Vindication of A. Cressener Schoolmaster in Long-Acre from the Aspersions of A. Pulton Jesuit Schoolmaster in the Savoy together with some Account of his Discourse with Mr. Meredith A Discourse shewing that Protestants are on the safer Side notwithstanding the uncharitable Judgment of their Adversaries and that Their Religion is the surest Way to Heaven 4o. Six Conferences concerning the Eucharist wherein is shewed that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation overthrows the Proofs of Christian Religion A Discourse concerning the pretended Sacrament of Extreme Vnction with an account of the Occasions and Beginnings of it in the Western Church In Three Parts With a Letter to the Vindicator of the Bishop of Condom The Pamphlet entituled Speculum Ecclesiasticum or an Ecclesiastical Prospective-Glass considered in its False Reasonings and Quotations There are added by way of Preface two further Answers the First to the Defender of the Speculum the Second to the Half-sheet against the Six Conferences A Second Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the new Exceptions of Mons de Meaux late Bishop of Condom and his Vindicator The FIRST PART In which the Account that has been given of the Bishop of Meaux's Exposition is fully Vindicated the Distinction of Old and New Popery Historically asserted and the Doctrine of the Church of Rome in Point of Image-worship more particularly considered 40. The Incurable Scepticism of the Church of Rome By the Author of the Six Conferences concerning the Eucharist 40. Mr. Pulton Considered in his Sincerity Reasonings Authorities Or a Just Answer to what he hath hitherto Published in his True Account his True and full Account of a Conference c. His Remarks and in them his pretended Confutation of what he calls Dr. T 's Rule of Faith. By Tho. Tenison D. D. A Full View of the Doctrines and Practices of the Antient Church relating to the Eucharist wholly different from those of the Present Roman Church and inconsistent with the belief of Transubstantiation Being a sufficient Confutation of CONSENSVS VETERVM NVBES TESTIVM and other Late Collections of the Fathers pretending to the Contrary 40. A BRIEF DISCOURSE Concerning the NOTES OF THE CHURCH With some REFLECTIONS on Cardinal BELLARMIN's Notes LICENSED April 6. 1687. JO. BATTELY LONDON Printed for Ric. Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard MDCLXXXVII PAge 11. l. 15. for Character r. Charter and p. 14. l. 8. r. Charter p. 16. l. 12. after Ancient and Apostolick Church add Which is the same with his second Note concerning Antiquity which must refer to the Antiquity of its Doctrine for an Ancient Church tho founded many years since if it have innovated in Doctrine cannot plead Antiquity and a Church founded but yesterday which professes the Ancient Faith may p. 18. l. 6. f. first r. fifth p. 22. l. 14. f. now r. more A BRIEF DISCOURSE Concerning the Notes of the CHURCH c. IF Cardinal Bellarmin had not told us That this is a most profitable Controversie Controv. T. 2. L. 4 de Notis Ecclesiae I should very much have wondered at that pains which he and so many other of their great Divines have taken to find out the Notes of the Church For is not the Catholick Church visible And if we can see which is this Church what need we guess at it by marks and signs and that by such marks and signs too as are matter of dispute themselves Cannot we distinguish between the Christian Church and a Turkish Mosque or Jewish Synagogue or Pagan Temple Cannot we without all this ado distinguish a Christian from a Turk or a Jew or a Pagan And it will be as easie to find out a Christian Church as it is to find out Christians for a Christian Church is nothing else but a Society of Christians united under Christian Pastors for the Worship of Christ and where ever we find such a Society as this there is a Christian Church and all such particular or National Churches all the World over make up the whole Christian Church or the Universal Church of Christ But this will not do the Cardinal's business Though the Christian Church is visible enough yet not such a Church as he
of Corinth denying the Resurrection and the Galatians warping towards Judaism and the Church of Corinth being guilty of great miscarriages in receiving the Lords-Supper and yet were owned for true Churches by the Apostles An argument which much became the Cardinal to use it being the best evidence I know of for the Church of Rome being a true Church that every corruption in Faith and Sacraments do not Unchurch but how this proves that true Faith and true Sacraments are not an essential note and character of a true Church I cannot guess I would desire any one to tell me for him whether a corrupt Faith and false Sacraments be the Notes of a true Church or whether it be no matter as to the nature of a Church what our Faith and Sacraments are Secondly Let us now consider the Cardinal's way by some certain marks and notes to find out which is the true Church before we know what a true Church is To pick out of all the Churches in the World one Church which we must own for the only true Church and reject all other Churches which do not subject themselves to this one Church To find out such a Church on whose authority we must rely for the whole Christian Faith and in whose Communion only pardon of sin is to be had That this is the use of Notes in the Church of Rome I have already shewn you and truly they are very pretty things to be proved by Notes as to consider them particularly 1. To find out which is the true Church before we know what a true Church is This methinks is not a natural way of inquiry but is like seeking for we know not what There are two inquiries in order of nature before which is the true Church viz. Whether there be a true Church or not and what it is The first of these the Cardinal takes for granted that there is a Church but I wont take it for granted but desire these Note-makers to give me some Notes to prove that there is a Church There is indeed a great deal of talk and noise in the World about a Church but that is no proof that there is a Church and yet it is not a self-evident proposition that there is a Church and therefore it must be proved Now that there is a Church must be proved by Notes as well as which is this true Church or else the whole design of Notes is lost and I would gladly see those Notes which prove that there is a Church before we know what a Church is To understand the mystery of this we must briefly consider the reason and use of Notes in the Church of Rome according to the Popish resolution of Faith into the authority of the Church the first thing we must know is which is the True Church for we must receive the Scriptures and the Interpretation of them and the whole Christian Faith and Worship from the Church and therefore can know nothing of Religion till we have found the Church The use then of Notes is to find out the Church before and without the Scriptures for if they admit of a Scripture-proof they must allow that we can know and understand the Scriptures without the authority or interpretation of the Church which undermines the very foundation of Popery Now I first desire to know how they will prove That there is a Church without the Scripture That you 'l say is visible it self for we see a Christian Church in the World but what is it I see I see a company of men who call themselves a Church and this is all that I can see and is this seeing a Church A Church must have a Divine Original and Institution and therefore there is no seeing a Church without seeing its Character for there can be no other Note or Mark of the being of a Church but the Institution of it And this proves that we cannot know that there is a Church without knowing in some measure what this Church is for the Charter which founds the Church must declare the Nature and Constitution of it what its Faith and Worship and Laws and Priviledges are But now these essential Characters of a Church must not be reckoned by the Romanists among the Notes of a Church for then we must find out the true Church by the true Faith and the true Worship not the true Faith by the true Church which destroys Popery Hence it is that these Note-makers never attempt to give us any Notes whereby we shall know that there is a Church or what this Church is for there are no Notes of these but such as they dare not give viz. The Authority of the Scriptures and every mans private judgment of the Sense and Interpretation of them for at least till we have found a Church we must judg for our selves and then the Authority of the Church comes too late for we must first judg upon the whole of Religion if we must find out a true Church by the true Faith before we can know the true Church and we cannot rely on her Authority before we know her and therefore they take it for granted that there is a Church which they can never prove in their way and attempt to give some Notes whereby to know which is the Church and then learn what the Church is from the Church her self which is like giving marks whereby to know an Unicorn before I know whether there be an Unicorn or not or what it is 2. Another blunder in this Dispute about Notes is That they give us Notes whereby to find out the true Catholick Church before we know what a particular Church is For all Bellarmin's Notes are intended only for the Catholick Church and therefore his first Note is the name Catholick whereas the Catholick Church is nothing else but all true Christian Churches in the World united together by one common Faith and Worship and such acts of Communion as distinct Churches are capable of and obliged to Every particular Church which professes the true Faith and Worship of Christ is a true Christian Church and the Catholick Church is all the true Christian Churches in the World which have all the same Nature and are in some sense of the same Communion So that it is impossible to know what the Catholick Church is before we know what a particular Church is as it is to know what the Sea is before we know what Water is Every true single particular Church has the whole and intire nature of a Church and would be a true Church though there were no other Church in the World as the Christian Church at Jerusalem was before any other Christian Churches were planted and therefore there can be no other Notes of a True Church but what belong to every true particular Church and that can be nothing but what is essential to a Church and what all true Christian Churches in the World agree in viz. The True Faith and Worship
one Church which we must own for the only Catholick Church and reject all other Churches as Heretical or Schismatical or Un-catholick Churches who refuse Obedience and Subjection to this One Catholick Church For if this be not the Intent of it what will all the Notes of the Church signify to prove that the Church of Rome is the only true Catholick Church And if they do not prove this the Cardinal has lost his labour For tho the Notes he assigns were the Notes of a true Church yet they may and must belong to all other true Churches as well as to the Church of Rome unless he can prove that there is but One true Church or but One Church which is the Mistress of all other Churches and the only Principle and Center of Catholick Unity And this ought to have been proved first before he had thought of the Notes of the Church So that there are many things to be proved here before we are ready for the Notes of the Church They must first prove that there is but one true Church in the World for tho we all grant that there is but One Catholick Church yet we say there may be and hope nay more than so know that there are many true Churches which make up the Catholick Church Yet before the Notes of a true Church can do any Service to the Church of Rome they must prove that there is but one true Church in the World and then it will signify something to prove the Church of Rome to be that true Church They must prove also that the Catholick Church does not signify all the particular true Churches that are in the World but some one Church which is the Fountain of Catholick Unity which all other Churches are bound to submit to and communicate with if they will be Members of the Catholick Church For tho all the Churches in the World were in Subjection to that Church yet they receive their Catholicism from their Communion with that Church and therefore that only is the Catholick Church It is not meerly the Communion of all Churches together which makes the Catholick Church but it is the Subjection of all Churches to that one Catholick Church which makes them Catholick So that they must prove that there is one particular Church which is the Catholick Church that is that a part is the whole that one particular Church is all the Churches of the World for so the Catholick Church signifies in Ancient Writers This is so absurd that some of our Modern Advocates for the Catholick Church of Rome tell us that they do not mean the particular Diocess of Rome by the Catholick Church but all those Churches which are in Communion with the Church of Rome But suppose this yet it is only the Church of Rome which makes all the other Churches Catholick and therefore she only is the Catholick Church And I will presently make them confess it to be so For let us suppose that no other Churches should submit themselves to the Church of Rome by the Church of Rome understanding the particular Diocess of Rome would she be the Catholick Church or not If notwithstanding this she would be the Catholick Church then it is evident that they make the particular Church of Rome the Catholick Church if she would not then I cannot see how Communion with the Church of Rome is essential to the Catholick Church These things I say ought to have been proved before the Cardinal had given us the Notes of the Church for it is a hard thing to prove by Notes that the particular Church of Rome is the only Catholick Church till it be proved that a particular Church may be the Catholick Church or that there is one particular Church which is the Catholick Church This he knew we all deny and it is a ridiculous thing to think to convince us by Notes that the Church of Rome is the particular Catholick Church when we deny that there is any such Church and affirm that it is a Contradiction to own it as great a Contradiction as it is to say that a Particular Church is the Universal Church 4thly But when I consider the farther Design of these Note-Makers to find out such a Church on whose Authority we must rely for the whole Christian Faith even for the holy Scriptures themselves it makes me now admire that they should think this could be done by some Notes of a Church especially by such Notes as the Cardinal gives us For suppose he had given us the Notes of a true Church which is the utmost he can pretend to before we can hence conclude that this Church is the Infallible Guide and uncontroulable Judg of Controversies we must be satisfied that the true Church is Infallible This indeed Bellarmin attempts to prove in his third Book of the Church and it is not my Concern at present to inquire how he proves it But I am sure this can never be proved but by Scripture for unless Christ have bestowed Infallibility on the Church I know not how we can prove she has it and whether Christ have done it or not can never be known but by the Scriptures So that a Man must believe the Scriptures and use his own Judgment to understand them before it can be proved to him that there is an Infallible Church and therefore those who resolve the belief of the Scriptures into the Authority of the Church cannot without great Impudence urge the Authority of the Scriptures to prove the Church's Infallibility and yet thus they all do nay prove their very Notes of the Church from Scripture as the Cardinal does and think this is no Circle neither because we Hereticks believe the Scriptures without the Authority of their Church and therefore are willing to dispute with them out of the Scriptures But this is a fault on our side and when we dispute with them whatever we do at other times we should not believe the Scriptures till they had proved them to us their way by the Authority or their Church and then we should quickly see what blessed Work they would make of it How they would prove their Church's Infallibility and what fine Notes we should have of a Church when we had rejected all their Scripture-proofs as we ought to do till they have first satisfied us that theirs is the only true Infallible Church upon whose Authority we must believe the Scriptures and every thing else I confess I would gladly hear what Notes they would give a Pagan to find out the true Infallible Church by It is certainly a most sensless thing to resolve all our Faith into the Authority of the Church as if the Church were the first Object or our Faith in Religion whereas it is demonstrable that we must know and believe most of the Articles of the Christian Faith before we can know whether there be any Church or not The order observed in the Apostles Creed is a plain Evidence
of this for all those Articles which are before the Holy Catholick Church must in order of Nature be known before it That there is a God who made the World that Jesus Christ is the only begotten Son of God who was conceived by the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary suffered under Pontius Pilate was crucified dead and buried and descended into Hell that he rose again the third day from the dead and ascended into Heaven and sitteth on the Right-hand of God the Father Almighty and from thence shall come to judg the Quick and the Dead I believe in the Holy Ghost and then we may add the Holy Catholick Church and not till then For the Church is a Society of Men for the Worship of God through the Faith of Jesus Christ by the Sanctification of the Holy Spirit which unites them into one Mystical Body So that we must know Father Son and Holy Ghost before we can know what the Catholick Church means And is it not strange then that our Faith must be founded on the Authority of the Church when we must first know all the great Articles of our Faith before we can know any thing about a Church This inverts the order of our Creed which according to the Principles of the Church of Rome should begin thus I believe in the Holy Catholick Church and upon the Authority of that Church I believe in God the Father Almighty and in Jesus Christ and in the Holy Ghost and no doubt but the Apostles or those Apostolical Men who framed the Creed would have put it so had they thought the whole Christian Faith must be resolved into the Authority of the Church This short Discourse I think is enough in general concerning the Notes of the Church and I shall leave the particular Examination of Cardinal Bellarmin's Notes to other Hands which the Reader may expect to follow in their order The End. BELLARMIN'S First Note of the Church concerning the name of Catholick EXAMINED Prima Nota est ipsum Catholicae Ecclesiae Christianorum nomen Bellar. cap. 4. de notis Ecclesiae p. 1477. IMPRIMATUR Apr. 8. 1687. Guil. Needham RR. in Christo P. ac D. D. Wilhelmo Archiep. Cant. a Sacr. Domest THat the sincere Preaching of the Faith or Doctrine of Christ as it 's laid down in the Scripture is the only sure Infallible Mark of the Church of Christ is a Truth so clear in it self so often and fully prov'd by Learned Men of the Reformation that it may justly seem a Wonder that any Church which is not conscious to her self of any Errors and Deviations from it should refuse to put her self upon that Tryal This gave Being to the Church of Christ at first makes it One and makes it Catholick According as this fares in any Part or Member of it is that Church distinguish'd and denominated it will be True or False Pure or Corrupt Sound or Heretical according as the Faith it holds bears a conformity or repugnance to the written Doctrine of our Saviour An Orthodox Faith makes an Orthodox Church but if her Faith becomes Tainted and Heterodox the Church will be so too and should it happen wholly to Apostatize from the Faith of Christ it would wholly cease to be a Christian Church This may seem to be the Reason that the present Church of Rome being notoriously warp'd from Truth declines the being examined and measur'd by this Rule having indeed some reason to be against the Scripture that is so evidently against her and endeavours to support her self with great Names and Swelling Titles Hence it is that we so often hear of the Name of Catholick Antiquity Amplitude Vnity Succession Miracles Prophecy and several others that their great Cardinal sets down as so many perpetual and never-failing Marks and Characters to find out the True Church and to Assert his own I shall in this short Tract examine the first of these and that I may give it all the fair play imaginable endeavour to represent it in its full force and to its best advantage Bellarmin makes it thus to speak for it self The Apostle in 1 Cor. 3.4 makes it the Sign and Mark of Scismaticks to be called after the Name of particular Men tho' of the Apostles themselves whether of Paul or Apollos or Cephas And in the Writings of the ancient Fathers the Orthodox Churches were known and distinguish'd by the name of Catholick and the Conventicles of Scismaticks and Hereticks by the Names of their first Authors And therefore since the Church of Rome is by all even her bitterest Adversaries called Catholick and the several Sects of the Reform'd after the Names of their particular Doctors as Luther Calvin Zuinglius and the like it follows that the Name of Catholick is not only a sure undoubted Mark of the true Church but also that this Church of Rome is that Church This is his Argument and as much as he values his Church upon it I can see no more in it but this that because Churches professing the true Orthodox Faith were anciently styl'd Catholick therefore all that have been styled Catholick since be their Faith what it will must be True and Orthodox Churches And because the Apostle forbids Christians to be call'd after the Name of particular Men tho of never so great Eminency in the Church And those mentioned in the Works of the Ancients were really Scismaticks and Hereticks that were so call'd as the Valentinians Marcionites Montanists and others Therefore all that in after-Ages shall be so nick-nam'd tho out of Malice and Ill-will by their Enemies whilst they disown it themselves must go for Scismaticks and Hereticks This is so weak a Topick that I might justly break off here having expos'd it sufficiently by a bare Representing of it Yet for the Reader 's farther Information and Satisfaction in this matter I shall proceed to shew these three Things I. In what Respect the name of Catholick was esteemed by some of the Fathers in their Time a Note of a Catholick Church and in what Respects 't will ever be a standing Note of it II. That from the bare name of Catholick no Argument can be drawn to prove a Church to be Catholick III. That the Church of Rome having egregiously corrupted the true Catholick Faith neither is nor deserves the Name of a Catholick Church I. In what Respect the Name of Catholick was esteemed by some of the Fathers in their Time a Note of the Catholick Church and c. And this as evidently appears from their Writings and even from those Testimonies cited by Bellarmine was upon the Account of the Catholick Faith that in their Time was generally and for the most part in conjunction with the Name of Catholick and when ever it is so 't will be an Infallible Note of a Catholick Church The Catholick Faith is that which was deliver'd by Christ himself to his Apostles and by them to the Church contain'd in those Writings which they by
to claim the highest degree of Worship The Scripture says See Discourse concerning Invocation of Saints 1684. How shall they call on him in whom they have not believed Making God alone the Object of Prayer who is the only Object of Mens Faith and Confidence Rom. 10.14 The Scripture says Two others in 1686. There is one God and one Mediator between God and Man the Man Christ Jesus who gave himself a Ransom for all 1 Tim. 2.5 6. The Scripture says See particular examination of Monsieur de Meaux in the Articies of Invoc of Saints and Worship of Images 1686. as it is in Thou shalt not make to thy self any graven Image nor the likeness of any thing c. Thou shalt not bow down to them nor worship them Exod. 20.4 Where we see all use of Images in the worship of God whether Carved or Painted are expresly forbidden without any Exception or Distinction See Treatise on Search the Scriptures 1685. As also the Lay-Christian's Obligation to read the Scriptures 1687. The Scripture commands all Persons indifferently to read to search to meditate on the Scriptures that the Word of God dwell in them richly in all Wisdom Luk. 16.29 John 5.39 Psal 1.2 Col. 3.16 See Disc of Divine Service in an unknown Tongue 1685. The Scripture expresly forbids Prayers in an unknown Tongue as altogether unprofitable and unedifying in the Church 1 Cor. 14.2 He that speaks in an unknown Tongue speaketh not unto Men ver 11. If I know not the meaning of the Voice he that speaketh shall be a Barbarian unto me ver 16. If thou shalt bless with the Spirit by the gift of an unknown Tongue how shall he that occupieth the room of the unlearned say Amen at thy giving of thanks since he understands not what thou sayest The Scripture says Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord they rest from their Labours Rev. 14.13 To Day said our Saviour to the repenting Thief on the Cross shalt thou be with me in Paradise Luk. 23.43 And Paradise is acknowledged by them to be a place of Peace and Joy. Bellar. de Sanct. Beat. l. 1. c. 3. Test 4. The Scripture says that the Blood of Jesus Christ the Son of God cleanseth us from all Sin. 1 Joh. 1.7 And that God for Christ's sake hath forgiven us all our Trespasses Eph. 4.32 Col. 2.13 See Discourse of the Communion in one kind in answer to Monsieur de Meaux 1687. The Scripture says that when our Saviour instituted the blessed Sacrament of his Body and Blood he commanded it to be administred and receiv'd in both kinds the Cup as well as the Bread saying Drink ye all of this Mat. 26.27 Neither were the Disciples any more Priests when they took the Cup than when they received the Bread for if they were made Priests by our Saviour's pronouncing these Words Do this in Remembrance of me they became so before they had taken at least before they had eaten the Bread as well as before they had received the Cup It not appearing that Christ made any Pause betwixt his saying Take eat This is my Body and his saying Do this in Remembrance of me but spake them as it were in a Breath as one continued Sentence and then upon this account the whole Sacrament the Bread as well as the Wine must belong only to the Priests See Discourse of Transubstantiation 1685. The Scripture says that the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament even after Consecration is Bread and Wine still 1 Cor. 11.26 27. And it is very evident that when our Saviour said Another of the Real Presence c. in Answer to two Discourses from Oxford 1687. This is my Body he meant it only as the Representation of his Body a manner of Speech well understood by the Jews who commonly said the same thing of the Paschal Lamb They call'd it the Body of the Passover whenas it was but the Memorial a Figure usual in Sacraments and indeed essential to them Adeò potenter efficaciter ut si Christus necdum esset incarnatus per haec verba hoc est Corpus meum incarnaretur Corpusque humanum assumeret Cornel. a Lapid Com. in Esa c. 7. The Scripture says that Christ needed not daily as those High Priests to offer up Sacrifice c. for this he did once when he offer'd up himself Heb. 7.27 And that without Blood there is no Remission of Sin Heb. 9.22 The Church of Rome says that Angels and Saints are to be worship'd and pray'd unto Catech. Rom. par 3. c. 2. n. 8 9. Tho with an inferiour kind of worship not the same that 's given to God. Ibid. The Church of Rome says It 's good and profitable to pray to Saints and Angels Concil Trid. Sess 25. de Invocat The Church of Rome prays to Saints as Intercessors and teaches that God bestows many Favours upon Men by their Merit Grace and Intercession Catech. Rom. par 3. c. 2. n. 12. The Church of Rome requires that due worship and veneration be given to them such as kissing uncovering the Head and falling down before them and denounces a Curse against those that think otherwise Concil Trid. Sess 25. Catech. Rom par 3. c. 2. n. 24. And then to cover the Shame and Guilt of this claps the Second Commandment to the First and by making it of the same sense with that makes it to have none of its own nor of any signification The Church of Rome allows not this liberty to the Laity but upon Licence that is not easily to be obtained and says that more hurt than good comes by the reading of them Reg. Ind. libr. Prohib Reg. 4. Nay a liberty to read them under such a Restriction was thought too much and therefore the Faculty of granting such Licences was by the order of Pope Clement the 8th quite taken away Reg. Ind. libr. Prohib Auct Sexti 5. Clem. 8. Obser circa 4. regul The Church of Rome strictly enjoins such and no other viz. in the Latin Tongue and denounces a Curse against those who say that Divine Service ought to be administred only in the vulgar Tongue Concil Trident. Sess 22. c. 8. Can. 9. Hereby making the People perform to God an unreasonable Service whilst it takes from them the knowledg of the Prayers offered in their Name and suffers them not to understand their own Desires The Church of Rome says that Souls who die in a state of Grace but are not sufficiently purg'd from their Sins go first into Purgatory a place of Torment bordering near upon Hell from which yet their deliverance may be expedited by the Suffrages that is Prayers Alms and Masses said and done by the Faithful that are alive in their behalf Bellar. de Purgat l. 2. c. 6. Catech. Rom. par 1. c. 6. n. 3. Concil Trid. Sess 25. Decret de Purgat Now how this resting from their Labours and being in Paradise can be
consistent with the Pains and Fire of Purgatory which Bellarmin tells us is hotter than Hell it self is past my Apprehension The Chuch of Rome says that Souls are to continue in Purgatory till they have made full satisfaction for their Sins and are throughly purged from them and that whoever says that there is no Debt of temporal Punishment to be pay'd either in this World or in Purgatory before they can be admitted into Heaven is accursed Concil Trid. Sess 6. Can. 30. The Church of Rome says the Cup is not to be administred to the Laity and gives many reasons for it lest the Blood of Christ should be spilt lest the Wine kept for the Sick should fret lest Wine may not always be had or lest some may not be able to bear the smell or taste of it Whether these are sufficient Reasons or no the Council of Trent enjoyns all to believe them so under an Anathema Concil Trid. Sess 21. Can. 1. 2. The Council of Constance acknowledges that our Saviour instituted the Sacrament in both kinds and that it so continued in the Church of Rome many Centuries and yet with a Notwithstanding to both these it sacrilegiously robs the People of the Cup. Concil Const Sess 13. The Church of Rome says that the Bread and Wine in the Eucharist by the Priests pronouncing these Words Hoc est corpus meum is transubstantiated into the natural Body and Blood of Christ the Species or Accidents only of the Bread and Wine remaining and hath made it an Article to be believed by all under an Anathema Concil Trid. Sess 13. de Real Praes c. 1. Cornel. a Lapide tells us that it was the Opinion of some of their grave Divines that this Change is made after so powerful and effectual manner that if Christ had not been incarnated before the force of this Charm would have incarnated him and cloath'd him with Human Nature The Church of Rome says that in the Sacrifice of the Mass Christ is offered as often as that is celebrated and that tho' therein he be unbloodily offer'd yet is it a true propitiatory Sacrifice for the Sins both of the Living and Dead Concil Trid. Sess 22. Cap. 1. And declares the Person accursed that denies any part of this Ibid. In all these Particulars you see and several other might be instanc'd in the Faith and Doctrine of the Church of Rome bears a manifest repugnance to the Gospel of Christ Now if the Holy Scripture may be allow'd so much as to be a Rule of Faith and Manners in those things it particularly treats of the Church of Rome contradicting that Rule in those things must be condemned for a Corrupter of the Christian Faith or Doctrine And having thus made it evident that she holds not the true Catholick Faith 't is as evident that she is not and consequently deserves not to be called a Catholick Church THE END LONDON Printed for Richard Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-yard 1687. The Second Note of the CHURCH EXAMINED VIZ. ANTIQUITY Secunda Nota est ANTIQVITAS Bellar. L. iv c. v. de Notis Ecclesiae IMPRIMATUR Apr. 5. 1687. JO. BATTELY IT is a shrewd sign that a Church is in an ill Case when the most learned and witty Defenders of it commend it to the World by such Marks and Characters whereby they say it may be known as are neither proper to it alone nor in Truth belong to it But more truly and evidently belong to them whom they oppose That this is the Case of the present Church of Rome in that Famous Note of ANTIQUITY which Bellarmin and others make a Mark of the true Church I will clearly and distinctly demonstrate by shewing these three Things I. That the Plea of bare Antiquity is not proper to the Church but common to it with other Societies of false Religion II. That true Antiquity is not on the side of the present Roman Church But III. That it is truly on Ours I. It is confessed by all even by them who make Antiquity a Mark of the Church that the Notes of a Thing must be proper to that of which they are a Note and not common to it with other Things Which quite destroys this Note of Antiquity upon a double Account First Because that which is proper to a Thing is inseparable from it and did ever belong to it since it had a Being and can at no Time without the destruction of its Being be absent from it This every Fresh-Man in Learning knows and by that may know that Antiquity is not a Note proper to the Church because it did not always belong to the Church For there was a Time when the Church was New. Which was objected to it by the Adversaries of our Religion and the Defenders of the Church answered the very same to them then that we do to the Romanists now as will appear in the second Thing I have to observe Secondly That other Societies have laid claim to this Note and it could not be denied them and therefore 't is not a proper Note whereby the true Church may be certainly known being common to it with others that are not of the Church 1. For first the Samaritans claimed it against the Jews as appears from the Womans Discourse with our Saviour Joh. iv 20. Our Fathers worshipped in this Mountain c. They had done so for many Ages before they worshipped in Jerusalem For here God appeared unto Abraham who here also built an Altar when he came first out of Chaldea Gen. xii 6 7. Here Jacob likewise built an Altar when he came out of Mesopotamia Gen. xxxiii 20. Here there was a Sanctuary in the Days of Joshua who gave his last Charge to Israel and made a Covenant with them in this Place Chap. xxiv 25 26. Here the Patriarchs were buried v. 32. Nay here-abouts was Shiloh Judg. xxi 19. where by the order of Joshua the Tabernacle and the Ark of God were setled long before it was brought to Jerusalem Josh xviii 1 2. which was all this time in the Hands of the Jebusites To which Plea the Jews could not make an Answer but by maintaining this Principle That not the Antiquity of Place but the Authority of God's Precept was to be their direction in this Case And God it appeared by the Holy Books had chosen Jerusalem to place his Name there 2. Thus the Jews themselves argued against Christ that he did not follow the Tradition of the Elders which had been derived to them from ancient times Mark vii 1 c. and against Christians whom they called the Sect of the Nazarens Acts xxiv 5. as much as to say Hereticks newly sprung up from Jesus of Nazareth 3. And thus the Pagans argued against them both particularly against the Christians saying to St. Paul at Athens May we know what this New Doctrine whereof thou speakest is Acts xvii 19. And in after-times calling it a Novel Religion a
have been or that the Note of Duration belongs not to them Either then they must disprove the Duration of those Churches or discharge it from being the distinguishing Note of the true Church Lastly I may add If Duration be the standing Note or the true Church Then those could be no true Churches which have not had that Duration and so they must un-Church the seven Churches of Asia c. which have now no Existence but are utterly extinguished For if they had been true Churches they would have had Duration but having not Duration they could not according to this Doctrine have ever been true Churches But I am not willing thus to leave the Subject and shall therefore § III. Consider whether the Church of Rome after all its pretence to Duration and its establishment of this Note of the true Church has a just and sufficient claim to it When we would know whether a Church has this Note of Duration belonging to it we must consider what there is in a Church that is capable of being tried by this Character and that is either as to Place Persons Order or Doctrine for by these is it that the Church doth exist and is made visible and so the Church that puts in a Claim to Duration must be able to shew some Evidence for it from hence as far as she admits them for Instances of that Duration she pleads for 1. As to Place When we hear so much of the Church of Rome it 's to be supposed that Rome is the principal Seat of that Church as well as the Pope of Rome is the Head of it But this they cannot pretend to Duration in for if we look backward we find not only the City of Rome frequently sack'd and destroyed and wholly depopulated as it was by Alaricus Gensericus and Totylas but even deserted by the Popes themselves who with their whole Court resided at Avignon for 70 Years together as is acknowledged Bellarm. de Pontif. l. 4. c. 4. If we look forward all that Bellarmine dares to offer upon the Point that the Chair of St. Peter shall not be separated from Rome is that it 's a pious and the most probable Opinion But if we consult others they say positively Vega Jesuita in Apoc. 18. com 7. §. 4. Rhem. Annot. in Apoc. ◠17.5 that Rome shall depart from the Faith and shall be an Habitation of Devils by reason of its Wickedness and Idolatry and be the Seat of Antichrist 2. If we proceed to Duration as it respects Persons where shall we expect that to be intire and uninterrupted if not in the Popes And yet if we may judg of Popes as Bellarmine doth of a Church De Not. l. 4. c. 8. §. dico secundo and that Heresie doth nullify their Elections and Successions as it doth the Verity of a Church there is nothing more shattered For if we look into the Catalogue of them we shall find Zepherinus a Montanist Marcellinus sacrificing to Idols Liberius and Faelix Arrians Anastasius a Nestorian Honorius a Monothelite John 23. denying a future Life with many others Go we on and where shall we find more or greater Schisms one Pope cursing another and undoing what his Predecessor had done as was the Case of Formosus Romanus Stephanus and Sergius Often two Popes together contesting for the Chair as it was for above forty Years at once and at one time three Popes that had such pretences to the Papacy that each had Learned Men for their Patrons De Pontif. l. 4. c. 14. §. Tricesimus septimus and it could not be easily judged which of them was the true and lawful Pope as Bellarmine himself acknowledges But this belongs to Note five of which more in its due place 3. If we proceed to Order either in Worship or Discipline the Case is so notorious as to the several Formularies used heretofore in that Church that it needs not to be insisted upon and it 's impossible for them to deny it 4. Therefore I shall proceed to Doctrine which indeed is the great Character by which a Church is to be discovered and tried And here that I may not either intrench upon what has been said before concerning the Variation of the Church of Rome in this Point from the Scriptures Vid. Note first and second and Antiquity or prevent what may further be said upon Note nine I shall compare the Church of Rome with it self if I can therein prove that it is not now what it hath been in many main Points De Not. l. 4. c. 6. §. Quamvis autem it will follow that it has no pretence to this Note of Duration for upon this Point of Alteration doth Bellarmine put the Issue What the Church of Rome doth hold 1. The Church of Rome is the Mother and Mistress of all Churches and to believe her so to be is necessary to Salvation Concil Trid. Sess 7. de Bapt. Can. 3. Bulla Pii 4. 2. The Pope of Rome is Christ's Vicar and hath the Supream Power over the whole Church and without Subjection to him as such is no Salvation Concil Trid. Sess 6. Decret de Reform c. 1. Bulla Pii 4. Apocrypha 3. The Apocryphal Books are Canonical and Tobit and Judith c. are as much the Holy Scripture as Genesis c. and whosoever rejects these as not Canonical is accursed Council Trid. Sess 4. Scripture and Tradition 4. Scripture alone is not a Rule of Faith without Tradition and Traditions are to be received with the like Regard and Veneration as the Scriptures Trid. Sess 4. Scripture in unknown Tongues 5. The Scriptures are not to be read in the vulgar Tongue without Licence because more Prejudice than Profit will redound from it Reg. Ind. Libr. prohib R. 4. Merit 6. Good Works do truly deserve Eternal Life and whoever holds the contrary is accursed Trid. Sess 6. c. 16. Can. 32. Indulgences 7. By Indulgences granted by the Popes and Prelates of the Church Persons are discharged from Temporal Punishment here and in Purgatory Trid. Sess 25. Bull. Pii 4. Purgatory 8. There is a Purgatory after this Life where the Souls of those that are not purged nor have satisfied for their Sins here are there to be purged and to give Satisfaction unless their Time be shortned by the Prayers Alms and Masses of the Living Trid. Sess 25. Sess 22. Can. 3. Service in an unknown Tongue 9. It 's required that Divine Service be performed in the Latin Tongue and whosoever saith it ought to be administred in a vulgar Tongue is accursed 10. In the Church of Rome they pray to Saints and Angels as their Intercessors Trid. Sess 25. Catech. Rom. par 4. c. 9. Images 11. Images are not only to be placed in Temples but also to be worshipped as if the Persons thereby represented were present Trid. Sess 25. Catech. Rom. par 4. c. 6. n. 4. Sacraments 12. There are
from themselves is consistent with their Nature and for all which if the Errors are not fundamental they are Churches still but to find Errors and Contradictions in an Infallible Church is to confound the nature of things to give the Infallible Church no advantage over the Fallible and to expose the Persons that betake themselves to that shelter to all the Disquietudes Uncertainties and Disappointments of Ignorance and Error For what is the usual Reason given for forsaking other Churches but because they are Fallible What is the Reason why they go over to the Church of Rome but because she is as they are made to believe Infallible But if with her Infallibility she has mistaken if with her Certainty she contradicts her self if she was one thing in one Age and another in another then there is the same Reason to quit the Church of Rome as there was to imbrace it and such persons must either be contented with a Church that is Fallible or be of none THE END Pag. 63. Marg. lin ult read in Apoc. 17. 5. LONDON Printed by J. D. for Richard Chiswel at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1687. The Fourth Note of the CHURCH EXAMINED VIZ AMPLITUDE or Multitude and Variety of Believers Quarta Nota est Amplitudo sive Multitudo Varietas Credentium Bellarm. L. iv c. vii de Notis Ecclesiae IMPRIMATUR Apr. 27. 1687. GVIL. NEEDHAM WE could very willingly appeal to our Adversaries themselves were they unconcerned whether a plainer Proof can be given of a Baffled Cause in a Controversy relating to any Point of revealed Religion than for the Assertors of it to decline maintaining it by those Books which alone can acquaint us with Divine Revelations But 't is Notorious that the Romanists are highly chargeable upon this Account in their Endeavours to persuade the World that theirs is the only true Church They need not be told that we are beholden to the Holy Scriptures for our having any Notion of such a thing as a Church and they and we are agreed that that only is the true Christian Church which professeth the true Christian an Faith and therefore how is it possible they should not be aware that the best way to be satisfied whether those who challenge to themselves the Title of the True and Catholick Church have it really belonging to them is to examine their Faith by the Holy Scriptures Which 't is hard to imagine they can think to be so imperfect a Rule of Faith as to believe it a justifiable thing to be so averse to this Method as we have ever found they are This we of the Reformation have always stuck to and we are desirous of nothing more than that it may be tryed by the Faith we profess whether we are sound Members of the Catholick Church and the soundness of our Faith may be tryed by the Scriptures But instead of taking this Course those of the Roman Communion have invented and do insist on a Company of Notes and Characters of the Church which are either not to be met with or are far from being plainly delivered in Scripture Had this been our practice I appeal to their own Consciences whether they could have imputed it to a better Cause than our being conscious to our selves of the disagreeableness of our Faith with the Doctrine of Scripture and our not daring to have it brought to this Touch-stone Of this sort of Notes Cardinal Bellarmine hath given us no fewer than Fifteen among which he could afford no Place to this Note of ours though 't is as evident as the Light that this one alone would have signified much more to his Purpose than all that long Bead-roul put together The Design of this Discourse is to examine his Fourth Note viz. Amplitudo sive Multitudo Varietas Credentium Amplitude or Multitude and Variety of Believers And how far he makes it to extend his next Words inform us viz. Ecclesia enim verè Catholica non solum debet amplecti omnia Tempora sed etiam omnia Loca omnes Nationes omnia Hominum Genera The truly Catholick Church ought not only to comprehend all Ages but also all Places all Nations and all Sorts of Men. And First He endeavours to prove this to be a true Note Secondly To make it to belong to the Church of Rome and to her alone Thirdly To perswade us that those particularly who call themselves the Reformed Churches can lay no claim to it And it shall be my Business First To shew that this cannot be a Note of the true Church And Secondly Supposing it to be so that the Church of Rome will however gain nothing by it as to her Pretension nor the Reformed Churches lose any thing Nay on the contrary that it will quite overthrow her Pretension of being the whole Catholick Church and do the Reformed Churches as great Service as Her Prejudice First I will briefly shew that this cannot be a Note of the true Church By a Note is understood a distinguishing Character but this is such a Character of the true Church as no one could less distinguish it And that whether we consider the Members thereof under either the notion of a great Multitude or a great Multitude of Believers Considering them under the Notion of a great Multitude the Church which is Christ's Kingdom is far from being distinguishable as such from the Kingdom of Satan which was always incomparably more numerous Or from that part of it which consisteth of Idolatrous Pagans What Romanist can boast of his Church in reference to this Note as Demetrius the Silver-Smith did of his Diana when he said That all Asia and the World worshipped her Nor can the Church of Christ by the Number of its Members be distinguished from the Worshippers of that great Impostor Mahomet which the Sons of the Roman Church must especially grant to be far exceeding the Members of Christ's true Church in Number since they make themselves the only Catholicks Again considering them under the Notion of a great Multitude of Believers there was an Age in which the Orthodox Christians could not be distinguished from Hereticks by the greatness of their Number whom the Romanists will not admit to be Members of the Church in any sense for in the Reign of Arrianism ingenuit Orbis mirabatur c. The World lamented and wondred to find it self turned Arrian saith St. Hierom. And it became a Proverb Athanasius against the whole World and the whole World against Athanasius And lastly the Church of Christ is not to be thus distinguished from the Kingdom of Antichrist I wish our Adversaries could impartially consider whose Note that of having Power given him over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations is most likely to be Apoc. 13.7 And who it is that is described by sitting as upon seven Hills so upon many Waters Chap. 17.1 Which Waters are Peoples and Multitudes and Nations Vers 15. and Tongues These
things considered nothing is more apparent than that the true Church is neither to be distinguished from other Bodies of Men or of Professors of Christianity by the largeness of its Extent or the Numerousness of its Members and therefore that a true Note thereof cannot result from these And besides a true Note of the Church must be Essential to it must belong thereto as the true Church and therefore is inseparable from it But how could Amplitude or Multitude be ascribed to the true Church in the Time of our Saviour when he called it a little Flock and said Strait is the Gate and narrow is the Way that leadeth unto Life and few there be that find it c. But Bellarmin pretends to fetch this Note of his out of the Bible and not only to be beholden to Vincensius Lyrinensis for it whom he first cites in favour of it tho little to his Purpose as will be seen anon The Texts he produceth are four two in the Old Testament and two in the New. Those in the Old Testament are Psal 2.8 Where God the Father promiseth his Son That He will give him the Heathen for his Inheritance and the uttermost parts of the Earth for his Possession And Psal 72.8 Where 't is prophesied That Christ shall have Dominion from Sea to Sea and from the River unto the Ends of the Earth Those in the New Testament are Luke 24.47 Where our Lord declareth That Repentance and Remission of Sins should be preached in his Name among all Nations beginning at Jerusalem And Acts 1.8 Where he tells his Apostles That they shall receive Power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon them and they shall be Witnesses unto him both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and in Samaria and unto the uttermost parts of the Earth And it cannot be doubted but that these Texts do prove that the Members of Christ's Church shall be a very vast Multitude and that its Amplitude should even extend over all the World. But nevertheless 1. It doth not from hence follow that the Conjunction of Amplitude and Multitude doth make a Note or distinguishing Character of Christ's true Church It is one thing to say it belongs thereto as an Attribute and another that 't is appropriated to it as a Note That may be even Essential to a Thing which yet is not a Note of Distinction or peculiar Property whereby it may be known from all other Things The power of Sensation is essential to a Man yet for all that he is not distinguishable thereby from a Beast But it is evident from what hath been discoursed that the true Church is not to be distinguish'd from the Kingdom of Satan nor of Antichrist nor from Erroneous Sects by Amplitude and Multitude And that these together or apart are not so much as Essential to the Church of Christ since there was a time when as hath been said it was without them both 2. This is so far from being a Note of the Church that 't is no more than a variable State and Condition thereof since it hath had from time to time its Ebbs and Flows and hath had sometimes larger and other times straiter and narrower Bounds This the Cardinal was aware of and therefore among other things he would have to be observed for the right understanding of this his Note he saith That Although the Church ought not necessarily to be in all places at the same time yet now it ought necessarily to be or to have been in the greater part of the World For 't is acknowledged by all even the Hereticks themselves meaning the Protestants that the Church is now in her old Age and therefore must be past growing By the way though all his Hereticks no doubt do believe that the Church hath daily grown elder and elder yet I know not how many he hath found asserting that she is now arrived at old Age. But it will by no means be granted him that the Church is yet grown so old as to be past growing or to have a period put to its time of Encreasing And therefore I add 3. That we have great Assurance that the Church hitherto hath not deserved to be compared with what it shall be before the end of the World both in respect of its Amplitude and the number of Believers For there are very many plain Prophecies from whence this may certainly be concluded which all that without prejudice consider them must needs be satisfied have not hitherto been accomplished Namely those which have reference to the Calling of the Jews and the bringing in of the fulness of the Gentiles and the most plentiful Effusion of the Spirit and perfect rest from Persecution and universal Peace with the most wonderful outward Prosperity of the Church There are I say abundance of the plainest Predictions and Promises of this Nature which the Church hath not as yet experimented the performance of and they are expressed in such Words as that it may reasonably be believed that those great things which God hath heretofore done for his Church either Jewish or Christian are no better than Types and Emblems of what he intends to do in His appointed time Among those Predictions and Promises the Reader may consult these following which are but a few in companion of the whole Number viz. in the Old Testament Psal 22.27 to 31. Isa 2.1 to 6. Chap. 11. throughout Jer. 32.37 to 43. Chap. 33.7 to the end Dan. 7.13 14. And in the New Testament Mat. 24.14 Rom. 11.12 and ver 25 to 33.2 Cor. 3.15 16. Apoc. 20.1 to 7. Though the fulfilling of these Scriptures hath been deferred for so many Ages yet He is Faithful that hath promised so glorious an encrease of His Church with the other unspeakable Blessings now mentioned and will fulfil them when the Time is come which His infinite Wisdom knows to be the fittest for that Purpose And thus much may suffice to be said in reference to the Cardinal 's proving this Note by Scripture As to those Words in the next place of Vincensius Lyrinensis in his Commonitorium which he produceth for the confirming thereof viz. Eos propriè esse Catholicos qui tenent id quod semper quod ubique quod ab omnibus creditum est Those are properly Catholicks who hold that which hath been always every where and by all believed I answer 1. That Vincensius doth not pretend to give us in these Words a Note of the Catholick Church but of such a Christian This is evident at first sight And so is this 2. Whereas he makes it the Character of a true Catholick to hold what hath been believed semper ubique omnibus it cannot be hence inferred that he believed Amplitude or a Multitude of Believers to be so much as an Attribute of the Catholick Church and therefore much less a Note 3. If these Words lay down a true Note of a Catholick Christian then no Body of Christians can be
more evidently proved to be no true Catholicks than those of the Roman Communion may in all those Articles of Faith which are peculiar to themselves For as to Points of mere Belief how much more than the Apostles Creed can they shew us to have been received always every where and by all Christians But as for that large Addition of Tridentine Articles annexed to that Creed by P. Pius the 4th no unbiassed Person can believe they have ever done any thing like proving that any of them have been received always and much less every where and by all those whom themselves own for Catholick Christians 4. By this Note of a Catholick no Society of Christians can bid so fair for Catholicism as the Reformed Churches but especially the Church of England whose avowed Principle it is to receive nothing as an Article of Faith but what is contained in the holy Scriptures Artic. 6. or may be proved thereby Nor doth she embrace any one Doctrine as an Article of Faith but what is clearly expressed in those Books of whose Canonicalness there never was the least Dispute in the Primitive Church Secondly I proceed to shew that if we should acknowledg this to be a true Note of the Catholick Church instead of enabling the Church of Rome to make good her Pretension of so being it will destroy it And instead of doing Disservice to the Reformed Churches it will do them excellent Service and be a certain Argument of their being true Parts of the Catholick Church And 1. I will shew that it will not at all Advantage the Church of Rome as to that her Pretension and therefore can do us no Prejudice The Cardinal proves 1. That his Church began to fructify throughout the World in the Days of the Apostles from these Words of St. Paul Col. 1.6 The Truth of the Gospel is come unto you as it is in all the World and bringeth forth Fruit as it doth also in you c. But what is this to his Church Is the Gospel's bringing forth Fruit in all the World the same thing with the Church of Rome's so doing 2. He adds the Authority of several Fathers for this Church's being spread in their Time all over the then known World but gives us none of their Sayings except St. Prosper's The first Father he cites is St. Irenaeus in the 3d Chapter of his Book Edit Paris p. 53. But the Father here only saith That this Faith which he sums up immediately before and is but the chief part of the Apostle's Creed the Church disseminated throughout the World diligently preserves as if it were confined but to one House But how doth this concern the Church of Rome Which is not once mentioned with others here particularly named except we could be made to believe that wheresoever the Word Church is found that Church is still to be understood Next he cites Tertullian adversùs Judaeos Edit Rig. p. 189. and having search'd that Book these or none are the Words he means viz. Those Words of David are to be understood of the Apostle's their Sound is gone forth in all the Earth and their Words unto the End of the World For in whom have all Nations believed but in Christ who is now come The Parthians Medes Elamites and those that inhabit Mesopotamia Armenia Phrygia Cappadocia Pontus Asia and Pamphilia Egypt Africa and beyond Cyrene the Romans and Jews now in Jerusalem and other Nations as now of the Getuli and Moors all Spain divers Countries of the Gauls and those of the Britains which the Romans could never conquer are subject to Christ c. But I again ask What is all this to the Church of Rome more than to any other particular Church belonging to any one of the many Nations of which that of the Romans is one and two whole Quarters of the World here mentioned His third Father is St. Cyprian Edit Oxon. p. 10◠in his Book de Vnitate Ecclesiae But here is nothing he could fancy to be for his purpose except these Words The Church is one which by its Fruitfulness is extended into a Multitude As there are many Rays of the Sun and but one Light c. So the Church of our Lord which being filled with Light sends forth her Beams through the whole World is but one Light which is diffused every-where But though this be said of the Catholick Church is here the least Intimation that the Church of Rome is this Catholick Church After St. Cyprian follow several of the later Fathers their Books being only directed to But the narrow room I am confined to will not permit me to examine them nor need we look any farther to be satisfied how this greatest Man of the Roman Church condescended to the most shameful impertinence in citing Scripture and Fathers for the doing her Service But we must not overlook St. Prosper's Verses in his Book de Ingratis viz. Sedes Roma Petri quae Pastoralis Honoris Facta Caput Mundo quicquid non possidet Armis Relligione tenet i. e. Rome the Seat of Peter being made the Head of Pastoral Honour in the World whatsoever Country she possesseth not by her Arms she holds by her Religion But considering how early this Father lived viz. about the beginning of the Fifth Century he could mean no more than this That the Church of Rome the most Honourable of all other by means of that Cities being the ancient Seat of the Emperors keeps still possession of those places by the Religion they received from Her over which she hath lost Her Old Dominion And what is this but another plain Instance of most idle quoting of Ancient Authors Not to reflect upon Fetching Arguments from Poetical Flourishes But not to stand to consider how Ample the Roman Church was in the times of those Fathers nothing is more evident than that that part of Christendom she took up was but a small Spot of Ground compared with the Space those Churches filled which tho they held Communion with Her were distinct Churches from Her and owned no Subjection to Her. And it was about or above an Hundred Years after the youngest of those Fathers that the Pope was inverted by that Execrable Wretch Phocas a Blessed Title in the mean time with the Primacy over all Churches And Gregory the Great who died in the Beginning of the Sixth Century not only sharply inveighed against John Patriarch of Constantinople and his Successor Cyriacus for assuming to themselves the Title of Vniversal Bishops though there was no appearance of their designing any thing more thereby than an Addition of Honour not of Power to that Patriarchate but also called those who should affect such a Haughty Title Greg. Epist 37. 70. lib. 11. Ep. 30. l. 4. the Forerunners of Antichrist And as these Bishops taking this Title was a Demonstration that they acknowledged not the least Subjection to the Bishops of Rome so Pope Gregory's calling
those Bishops who should so do without Exception Forerunners of Antichrist is as plain a Proof that the Bishops of Rome to his time did not look on themselves as having a Primacy over all Churches And 't is manifest that in the time of the Council of Nice the Church of Rome was not thought to include the Catholick Church or to be any more than one part thereof This I say is manifest from the Sixth Canon of that Council viz. Let the ancient Customs be preserved for the Bishop of Alexandria to have Jurisdiction over Egypt Lybia and Pentapolis because the Bishop of Rome hath a like Custom c. Which is as much as to say that the Bishop of Alexandria had then the same uncontroulable Power in his large Jurisdiction that the Bishop of Rome had in his And therefore that Council knew nothing of this Bishop's having any Power over the Alexandrian and much less over the whole Catholick Church Nor is any thing more certain than that the mere Superiority of Honour which the Roman Church had was founded on no Divine Right but only on that Cities being the Seat of the Empire For as the Second General Council viz. that of Constantinople decreed in its Third Canon That the Bishop of Constantinople should have the priviledg of Honour next to the Bishop of Rome upon the account of its being the Imperial City and therefore called New Rome So in the Twenty eighth Canon of the Fourth General Council viz. that of Chalcedon it was ordained that for the same Reason the Bishop of Constantinople should have equal priviledges with the Bishop of Rome So that 't is a plain Case that whosoever shall undertake to prove from any Sayings of the Ancients for the first 500 Years at least that the Church of Rome and the Catholick Church were reputed to be the same and consequently that whatsoever they said of the Amplitude of this is to be understood of that Church must necessarily make as sad work of it as Bellarmin hath here done And therefore it is apparent too that no Service can be done to the Church of Rome by this Note as to her pretension of being the true Catholick Church From whence it will likewise follow that no prejudice can from thence accrue to the Reformed Churches But this is not all For 2. This Note were it a true one would be Destructive to that her Pretence and do the Reformed Churches great Service viz. in demonstrating them to be true parts of the Catholick Church This also may be concluded from what hath been said but it will be made more evident by these following Considerations 1. If the Church of Rome had as Ample a Spread over the World for some of the first Ages as Bellarmin contends for this would far more redound to the Advantage of our Churches of the Reformation were Amplitude a distinguishing Property of the Church than to the Advantage of the present Church of Rome because that Church then was more ours than now it is the Romanists For there can scarcely be a greater Disagreement in Doctrine and Worship between any two Christian Churches than there hath for a long time been between the same Church as she was then and is now But the Agreement is as great between the Ancient Church of Rome and our Churches and especially between Her and the Church of England This our Adversaries could not but see would they impartially compare the Doctrine and Worship of each together And the only Quarrel they have with us is that we will not admit more into our Creed than the Christians of the First Ages did into theirs And that we worship God only by the alone Mediation of Jesus Christ as they did That our Laity partake of the Communion in both kinds as theirs did And in short that we believe the Holy Scriptures to be a compleat Rule of Faith as it was every where believed to be by the Primitive Catholicks and that we will not receive into our Worship the Roman Novelties those things which were utterly unknown to both the Roman and all other Churches in those Ages Now whereas the Cardinal would have it observed for the better explaining the meaning of this Note That if one Province alone should retain the true Faith it might properly be called the Catholick Church so long as its Faith is one and the same with that which at one time or other had prevailed in the whole World We desire no greater Advantage to our Church and all other in Communion with Her since these and those Churches which in the Primitive Times were extended all over the then known parts of the World are agreed in much more than all the Fundamental Points of Faith. 2. It hath been estimated upon Computation that the Churches subject to the Roman See exceed not much the Reformed Churches in Amplitude or Multitude of Members Especially since Italy Spain See the Preface to Brerewood's Enquiries and Portugal are detained in the Romish Religion not by Choice or Judgment but by Ignorance and the Tyranny of the Inquisition But who can be ignorant that the Church of Rome bears not the least proportion upon those Accounts with these Churches considered in Conjunction with that part of Christendom which agreeth with them as in all the main Points of Christianity so in refusing Subjection to that Church and in most of those Doctrines and Practices which we condemn in Her as contrary to Holy Scripture or as not founded thereon and yet made necessary to Salvation by Her and not taught by the Primitive Church So that should all the Churches which deny that of Rome to have any Authority over them deal with Her as she hath dealt with them and pronounce Her to have nothing more left Her than the mere Name of a Church this Her Note would be an unanswerable Objection against Her being A true Church as well as The true Church on supposition that as she holds of two Parties of Christians rejecting Communion with and unchurching each other but one of them can be a true Church That so large a part of Christendom I say agrees with the Reformed Churches in all the Grand Articles of Faith and in the Chief of those wherein they are at Varience with the Church of Rome as makes the whole an incomparably greater Body of Believers than all those together who own that Church for their Mother is so notorious that 't is impossible our Adversaries should dispute it The Cardinal indeed tells us on this Note That Besides all Italy and Spain and almost all France which the Church of Rome possesseth And besides Germany England Poland Bohemia Hungary Greece Syria Aethiopia Egypt in which many Catholicks are found even in the New World viz. America She hath Churches without the mixture of Hereticks And we can Reply That Besides England Scotland and Ireland in which Protestancy is the National Religion and in the two former of which the Number
Cardinal Bellarmin's Fourth Note of the Church were as true as we have proved it false And that it would then overthrow instead of establishing the Church of Rome's marvellous Pretence of being The True or Catholick Church THE END Pag. 80. lin 18. read ab omnibus LONDON Printed by J. D. for Richard Chiswel at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1687. The Fifth Note of the CHURCH EXAMINED VIZ The Succession of Bishop Quinta Nota est Successio Episcoporum in Romanâ Ecclesiacirc ab Apostolis deducta usque ad nos Bellar. L. iv c. viii de Notis Ecclesiae IMPRIMATUR May 9. 1687. JO. BATTELY THE Disputers of the Roman Communion boasting in nothing so much as in the venerable Name of the Catholick Church using all means to appropriate it to themselves exclusivly to any others And it being the most popular Argument they flee to and with which they commonly begin and end all Debates We are concerned faithfully and plainly to examine their Title or Claim to so honourable a Denomination and the many vast Priviledges founded thereupon Among the Notes of the Church in Bellarmin their chief Champion the Fifth in order and it may be not the least Plausible in all his Number is this of the Succession of Bishops the Subject of this short Essay in which three Inquiries may be made 1. How far this Note may be necessary to any Church 2. How far this may be granted to the Roman Church 3. How insufficient a Proof it affords to them of any great Advantage by it In answer to the former Iniquiry 1. Concess 1. it may I presume be generally yielded That to the compleat Constitution of the Church it will be always needful that there be in it True and Lawful Pastors not only for the rightful Administration of God's Word and Sacraments but also for the due and orderly Government thereof and the Dispensation of wholsom Discipline to the Flock committed to their charge requiring all tender Care vigilant Inspection and indulgent Provision from Them And all cheerful and humble Submission and ready Subjection from These Requisites to any Society confirmed by many Precepts and Examples in Scripture We yield this Pastoral Power originally to be from Christ Concess 2. the Head of his Church the chief Bishop and Pastor of his Flock and by him immediately conveyed to the Apostles and from them derived by Imposition of Hands or Ordination to their Successors in the several Churches which they planted and so to be continued by a Regular Succession to the End of the World As may be proved by the several Directions in the Epistles to Timothy and Titus and Examples in the Acts of the Apostles and the following Practice of the Church in all Ages and Places of which we have any Records extant No Man taketh this Honour all himself Heb. 5.4 We grant farther Concess 3. that according to the best Evidence of Scripture-Rule or Example and the constant Practice of Christ's Church the Power of Ordination is entrusted with the Bishops the chief Governours thereof and ordinary Successors of the Apostles unto the End of the World. And we as readily embrace the Canonical Provision of the Constitutions under the name of the Apostles by St. Clemens or the Decree of the ever-renowned first Council of Nice That every Bishop be ordained by three Bishops or two at the least c. All most agreeable to the Doctrine and Practice of the Church of England Such is our Government and Succession not at all interrupted in the Reformation whatever Difficulties it struggled with elsewhere A signal Happiness for which we have Reason ever to bless God and not peevishly to endeavour by wilful schismatical Separations to deprive our selves of that Priviledge which may be the chief Eye-sore to our Adversaries and thereby to furnish them with new and better Arguments than ever yet they found against us If their Succession be good so is ours for sure it is not tyed to one place whether we derive it through them by Augustin the Monk though ordained in France or from or by the British Bishops who had been here several Ages before his Coming and by as Regular a Succession from Apostolical Times without any dependance as they profess or as far as we can find on the See or Bishop of Rome However it may be noted Observ 1. that though this Succession of Bishops be necessary to the compleat Constitution of the Church yet it may well be doubted whether it is indispensable to the very Being of it so as to unchurch every Place that wants these For Baptism alone gives us Admission into the Church and a Title to the Heavenly Inheritance upon the Performance of our Part of the Covenant And although this obliges all Christians to endeavour to provide themselves with lawful Pastors for their constant Supply in all the means of Grace and so to seek them abroad as far as they can where they have them not at home Yet in a supposed case where these may not be had or but upon conditions out of their Power to yield or in the mean time they who suppose Baptism to be valid though in case of necessity administred by any Christian nay according to their Catechism by Jew Infidel or Heretick if he but intend to do what the Church designs hereby must not presently unchurch any Place or exclude all Persons that want this full Provision of all needful Helps and Advantages though some of most immediate Divine Institution What Allowances God may make for great Necessities or almost invincible Difficulties and Prejudices where Men are not wilfully and obstinately wanting to themselves we cannot or must not determine It is not necessary that every Church which may firmly presume upon this lawful and orderly Succession even from the Apostles Observ 2. should be able to produce the Records of its Conveyance through every Age and in every single Person by whom it hath past Few Churches of of long continuance have been so happy as to preserve Authentick Registers of all their Transactions from their first Plantation which must not weaken their Authority or make doubtful the Effect of their Ministrations where no positive Evidence is brought to the contrary The Antients content themselves in delivering down to us the Succession of Bishops in the greater Sees and Mother-Cities not of Rome only but of Alexandria Antioch Jerusalem and others though Bellarmin insinuates the contrary here as is most apparent in Eusebius c. Answ to 3d Object The Eminence of their Place and Power the frequent Resort of other neighbouring Churches to them from whom they were generally derived or as Dependant on their Cities in Civil Administrations which the Ecclesiastical usually followed these and such like Reasons made them more the notice of all about them and their Successions more carefully recorded in Church-Writers Which possibly they might have then done in many of the lesser
that she imposes must be set by till it appears that she requires the same Doctrine and no other than what was taught and believed by the Primitive Church For according to this Note it does not appear which is the true Church till it first appears that it agrees with the Doctrine of the Primitive and till it appears that it is a true Church it cannot sure appear to be an Infallible one for it cannot he pretended that Infallibility belongs to any but the true Church and therefore it must be first known that the present Church agrees with the Primitive before it can be known that she is an Infallible Guide or Teacher So that we manifestly gain this first by this Note of the Church that all those big and blustering Claims to Infallibility must be postpon'd and laid aside till that of agreeing with the Doctrine of the Primitive Church be made out and when that is done we shall not have quite so much reason to question her Infallibility We desire nothing more than to have the matter brought to this Issue Whether the Doctrines of the Reformed or the Romish Church do agree best with the Primitive Since for Reasons well known to themselves and very much suspected by others they are so willing to goe off from Scripture and to decline the Judgment of that as incompetent and insufficient in most of the Controversies between us we are very ready to leave them to be decided by any other indifferent Arbitrator for we think it is a little odd and unreasonable they should make themselves the only Judges of what is in difference between us and therefore we are very ready to stand to the Award and Vmpirage of the Primitive Church and we are not in the least afraid to venture our whole Cause to the sentence and decision of That for tho the Scripture be our only Rule of Faith and Doctrine necessary to be believed by us because we know of no other Revelation but that and nothing but Revelation makes any Doctrine necessary to be believed yet we are very willing to take the sence and meaning of Scripture both from it self and from the Primitive Church too so according to Vincentius Lyrinensis to have the line of Scriptural Interpretation be directed by the Rule of Ecclesiastical and Catholick Judgment †Ut Propheticae Apostolicae interpretationis linea secundum Ecclesiastici Catholici sensus normam dirigatur Vincent Lyrinens contra haeres c. 2. that is to have the Primitive Church direct us in interpreting Scripture where it stands in need of it or there is any Controversy about its meaning Let the Scripture therefore as sensed by the Primitive Church and not by the private Judgment of any particular Man be allowed and agreed by us to be the Rule of our Faith and let that be accounted the true Church whose Faith and Doctrine is most conformable and agreeable with the Primitive We desire nothing more than to find out the true Church by the true Faith and we think this is the true way to find it out For Christian Faith is prior and antecedent to the Christian Church and that must be first known and supposed before we can know any such thing as a Church for 't is the Faith makes the Church and not the Church the Faith and therefore the true Church is to be known by the true Doctrine and not the true Doctrine by the Church as is some Folks way If a Church then has never so many other glorious Marks yet if it has not the true Faith according to the Rule before laid down it cannot be the true Church and if it have never so true a Succession of Pastors deriving their Power in an uninterrupted Line from the Apostles yet if it have not a true Succession of Doctrine too from them it is not a true Church So far indeed as it holds and professes the common Christian Faith so far for that very Reason it is a true Church and so far we allow the Roman to be a true Church and so far they cannot deny us to be one neither as the same Faith Fundamentals of Christianity are received and believed by both of us for this Faith being the same to both of us makes us both so far to be true Churches upon the same grounds but so far as we differ in Matters of Faith whether we or they be the true Church is the question between us and we are willing to have this determined by the Primitive Church If the Faith then and Doctrine of the Roman Church wherein it differs from us be the same with the Faith and Doctrine of the Primitive Church then that is the true Church If it be contrary and unagreeable to the Faith and Doctrine of the Primitive then it is not the true Church but a false and erroneous one And here we ought to make a particular enquiry and examination of all those Matters of Faith which are in controversie between us and bring each of them to the Test and Trial and see which Church does most agree in all those disputed Doctrines with the Doctrine of the Primitive Church for here we must be allowed to examine particular Doctrines that are in difference between us and every private Christian who is seeking for the true Church must if he would find it by this Mark of Bellarmine be allowed to inquire into and examine the Doctrines of the present Church and see whether they are agreeable to those of the Primitive or no and this he must do by his private Judgment and by the best means and helps he can use to this purpose for he is not yet supposed to have found out the true Church but to be finding it out by this Mark given of it and till he has found it out by this Mark and Direction he cannot be under its guidance and conduct so that he must make use of his own Reason and Judgment at least till he has thus found it that is he must have the Liberty to search and inquire into the Faith and Doctrines of the Primitive Church and to judg for himself as well as he can by his own best Discretion and the best helps he can use which Church does best agree in its Faith and Doctrines with the Primitive and according as he shall upon his own enquiry and examination find so he must choose that Church which he thinks is the truest but he must not give himself up to the absolute guidance and direction of any Church at least till he has by this way found out the true which is another manifest Advantage that we have by this Note against our Adversaries who are rather for bearing Men down with the bold pretence of Infallibility and the terrible fright of Damnation out of the true Church rather than suffering them according to this true Method to find it out And as he must thus use his own Judgment in an impartial search
into the Doctrines of the Primitive Church which will have as many Inconveniences in it I fear as they are apt to object against searching to this end into the Scriptures so he must examine all the particular Doctrines that are controverted between both Churches to see which are most agreeable to the Faith of the Primitive for he cannot know this in the Lump and by the Gross and to tell him as they sometimes do that 't is impossible for their Church to have departed from the Faith of the Primitive and that the present Age could not alter from the Doctrine of the foregoing and so upward this is not to make the Primitive Faith a Note of the present Church but to prevent all enquiry about this Note and to make it wholly useless and insignificant He that will therefore make use of this Mark to know the true Church by must be supposed and allowed to inquire into the Doctrine of the Primitive Church about all those particular Controversies and Matters of Faith that are in difference between us and must not have his Enquiry stopt and precluded by any general Pretences of the Infallibility either of Oral Tradition or of the present Church but must freely and impartially examin the particular Doctrines that are controverted that so he may bring every one of them to the Touchstone of the Primitive Faith and try whether they are agreable to the same or no and according as he finds this that is whatsoever Church he finds to hold the same Doctrine with the Primitive in all the particular Points of difference That he must conclude to be the true Church from this Note given of it Our Adversaries do not usually care to enter into particular Points of Controversy wherein they are very sensible they shall be sooner foiled and bafled and therefore they generally wave those which are capable of being made more plain and evident to most Mens Capacities and they chuse rather to dispute and wrangle about more general and intricate Matters in which there is some more room to cavil and to amuse and perplex themselves and others with seeming Difficulties so that tho particular Controversies may be made very plain and it appears often in them as clear almost as the Light on which side the Truth is as Whether Prayers ought to be in a known Tongue Whether the Communion ought to be in both kinds Whether the Scriptures are to be read by the People and the like yet to avoid those and to prevent the Disadvantage of such manifest and particular Points they carry the Dispute off to other things and run into the general Controversies of Infallibility and Church-Authority and Resolution of Faith and a Judg in Controversies and the like and here they think there is more room for Cavil and Sophistry and they can hereby lead Men if not into Scepticism and Doubtfulness yet into a Maze and Labyrinth where they shall not so easily get out Which way of theirs seems to me just as if a Person in a plain Controversy about Weight or Measure which were otherwise easy to be determined should to avoid that think fit to run into the perplext Dispute What was the true Standard of Weights and Measures or everlastingly wrangle about that Question Whether Matter consisted of Divisible or Indivisible Parts and because he could raise Difficulties here and keep up a long and intricate Controversy about those Matters would not be brought to yield that a Pound was heavier than an Ounce or an Ell longer than an Inch. I cannot but think that some of our particular Controversies may be almost as clearly decided as those two and that the running into some general ones is as remote and sophistical as the other We must therefore according to this Note of the Church not be foreprized or prevented with any general and more perplext Dispute but we must fairly examine all the particular Doctrines of the Church and see whether they are agreeable with those of the Primitive Church or no before we can find out the true Church at present not that the true Church we are to look for is confined to any particular Place or Country but like a great Homogenial Body every Part of which is of the fame nature with the Whole wherever the true Primitive Faith is profest in all the Parts of it there is a True Church and all particular Churches being united together in the same Bond of Faith do make up the Catholick Church over all the World. If there were but one Particular Church upon the whole Earth that did profess this True Faith that alone might be called the Catholick Church because that alone had that Catholick Faith which did properly make and constitute the True Church But this Faith being common to a great many Particular Churches this makes them to be all true and all Catholick as to Faith but as to Place 't is ridiculous to call any one Catholick and as absurd as to call a Part the Whole in that sense no Church is Catholick in the other every Church is that holds the Whole Christian Faith We are not therefore to seek for any Particular Church that shall usurp to it self the Name of Catholick in exclusion to all others but for any Church that maintains the true Catholick Faith profest by the Primitive which upon that account is a True Church and acknowledged so by this Mark which is here given of it To find out such a one and to distinguish it from others we must very carefully enquire into all the particular Doctrines and Points of Faith which are held by it and see whether they are agreeable to the Faith and Doctrine of the Primitive Church and according to this Method and saving to our selves all the forementioned Advantages of it we are very willing to have the Difference adjusted between us and the Church of Rome and to have it decided by this Note whether we or they are the True Church that is whether we or they in all Matters of Controversy between us do most agree with the Doctrine of the Primitive Church And here is a very large scope offered to me and what has taken up a great many Volumes on both sides so that to most People Scripture one would think should be a shorter and an easier and therefore a better way to know the True Church by but since our Adversaries are not willing to leave the Case to that we are ready to accept of the Primitive Church to be Judg between us and as has been often offered before by Bishop Jewel and others we shall be very willing to stand to its award and decision for however some few Divines of the Reformation before they were so well acquainted with Antiquity and when they could not so well distinguish what was genuine from what was spurious and corrupted by your Church were at first especially more jealous and distrustful than they need to have been of it and unwilling to
diversa sentire inveniuntur quia super his varia ac penè adversa tradidisse videntur Doctores Lomb. Sent. l. 4. dist 17. That Learned Men were found to have different Sentiments about it and that the Doctors delivered themselves variously and differently upon it and therefore it could not be the Doctrine of the Church then but of this see a learned Treatise written on purpose Was the Roman Purgatory a Doctrine of the Primitive Church of which Alphonsus à Castro confesses There is almost no mention of it in any of the ancient Writers ‖ De Purgatorio fere nulla in antiquis Scriptoribus mentio Alfons de Castro contra Haeres l. 8. p. 115. Bp Fisher * Roffens contra Luther Art. 18. is of the same mind with him and that old Christian Custom of celebrating the day of their Friends Death as a Festival and Day of rejoycing because they were then released from all Pain and Sorrow †Nos non nativitatis diem celebramus cum sit dolorum atque tentationum introitus sed mortis diem celebramus utpote omnium dolorum depositionem Comment in Job apud Origen l. 3. is to me a plain Argument they did not in the least believe any such thing What shal we think then of Indulgences as they relate to Purgatory Had the ancient Church any such Notion of them But meerly as abatements of Canonical Penance and Purgatory I suppose is no part of that Does not Alfonsus own That they were received very late into the Church * Earum usus in Ecclesiâ videtur sero receptus Alfonsus de Castro l. 8. p. 115. And Cajetan say There is no Authority of Scriptures or of any Fathers Greek or Latin that bring them to our Knowledg †Cajet Opusc 15. c. Prayers and Oblations for the Dead I confess are a very antient Practice but I know no Doctrine the Primitive Church had concerning them but of the Communion of Saints which was both in the Church Militant and Triumphant and they are so far from bordering upon the Roman Doctrine of Purgatory that they utterly destroy it for they were offered for those who were owned to be in Happiness and could never be supposed to go to Purgatory to wit for Saints and Martyrs and Apostles and even for the Virgin Mary her self as appears by the antient Liturgies ‖ Lyturg. Aegyptiac Lyturg. Chrysost As to Prayers in an unknown Tongue this cannot I hope be said to be the Practice of the Primitive Church and if the Language of Rome had been as unalterable as she pretends her Faith is her Prayers had been in a known Tongue now but I doubt they are both equally changeable As to the Worship of Saints and Angels and the offering up Prayers to them and to the Blessed Virgin I shall offer but one Observation out of Antiquity which does for ever destroy all manner of Worship of what degree soever to any but the true God and that is the Charge of Idolatry which was laid by all the Orthodox Fathers against the Arians for worshipping and praying to Christ when they believed him not to be the true God but only a Creature tho of the most exalted Nature This does so fully shew the sense of the Church against all Worship be it of what kind it will to any Creature for it was not the highest and most sovereign Worship which the Arrians were supposed or charged to give to Christ that it is the plainest thing in the World that there could be no manner of Worship then to Saints or Angels or to the Blessed Virgin as there is now in the Roman Church But he that will see the clearest Account of Antiquity in this matter let him consult a most excellent Discourse concerning the Worship of the Blessed Virgin and the Saints with an Account of the Beginnings and Rise of it among Christians against Monsieur de Meaux As to the Worship of Images it is too well known at what time and with what opposition that was brought into the Western Church and how great a Part of it did then declare against them so that it was impossible that should have been the Doctrine of the Primitive Church which was with so great a strugle and violence brought into the Roman at the latter end of the 7th Century As to the first Ages it is plain from the Instance of Epiphanius and the Council of Eliberis that they would not suffer Images and Pictures in their Churches and at first hardly thought the very making of them to be lawful as appears from Clemens Alexandrinus But I must not insist on Particulars I offer only some few undeniable Breviates of Antiquity by which it cannot but evidently appear to any ingenuous Man that these Doctrines of the Roman Church which distinguish it from the Reformed were not the Doctrines of the Primitive Church but are plainly and notoriously contrary to the best Antiquity tho they are very apt to brag of that upon all occasions yet how little they esteem it and how conscious they are to themselves that it is not for their purpose and that it is truly against them I shall by some general Remarks unquestionably demonstrate and make them if they have any shame confess it themselves And First What mean their Expurgatory Indices whereby they have corrected so many Fathers and blotted out and expunged so many Sentences out of the Writings of the most antient Doctors of the Church and by new Additions made them speak contrary to themselves in so many places of their Works if they were not sensible that those ancient Authors who bring down to us the Doctrine of the Primitive Church were in many things Witnesses against them and bore evident Testimony against their new Opinions This is so plain a Confession that Antiquity is against them and renders them so much self-condemned that they intended to have kept these Indices very private and it was only by chance that we came to the first knowledg of them Our Learned James has acquainted the World with the Mystery of them as he calls it but it is so plain a Mystery of Iniquity that it needs nothing to discover the Fraud and Villany of it To raze ancient Records is a Crime of the highest nature and they who are guilty of it as the Church of Rome is in the greatest degree by thus purging and correcting the Fathers by an Inquisition the most cruel of any other and that appointed by the Council of Trent need no other proof to convict them that that Cause which stands in need of such Arts is not to be defended without them and this is such a Note of a Church that it brands and stigmatizes it with another Mark than that of Antiquity 2. Besides the correcting or rather corrupting so many Fathers which were genuine Monuments of Antiquity the counterfeiting so many false ones and obtruding so many spurious Authors upon the World is a
plain Evidence of the want of true Antiquity This is like suborning of Witnesses which is enough to make all the World suspect that what they are brought for and what they depose is not true it is no other than forging of old Writings and Instruments to help out the known Weakness of a crackt Title Thus the Decretal Epistles were counterfeited to prop up the Pope's Spiritual Power and Constatine's Donation to establish his Temporal The Cheat of the first was so evident from the Style being so sordid and so unlike those Ages and yet being so like it self in all parts as shew'd it to have throughout but one Author that tho they were formerly made use of and did great Service yet they are now laid by as too gross to be owned by most of the Learned Men of that Church and the other tho it be still defended by some of them yet has such marks of Forgery as makes most of them confess it but great numbers are there of forged and spurious Authors whole Testimonies are still produced by these Writers for those Doctrines and Opinions which are destitute of true Antiquity a Collection of which is given us by our James in his Bastardy of the false Fathers and all those Criticks who have wrote Censures upon the Fathers Works cannot but own it I cannot charge this upon any publick Act of the Church as that of purging and correcting the Fathers but most of their Writers who bring such large and false Musters of the Fathers are guilty of it and particularly some of their late Books amongst us * Consensus Veterum Nubes Testium We have a very great and early Instance of this notorious way of Forgery in the very Head and Governours of that Church and that was in falsifying the Nicene Canons and thrusting in a Canon of a particular Synod among those of a General Council thereby to claim a Power of Appeals to themselves which was such an Imposture as shows what some Men will do to gain Power and Authority over other Churches and what an unfaithful Preserver a Church may be that pretends to be infallible not only of Oral Tradition but even of Writings too for they had Copies without question of the Council of Nice and if the other great Churches of Constantinople Antioch and Alexandria had not had authentick and agreeing Copies to the contrary the Churches of Africa had been run down by one of the most palpable Forgeries in the World and the Church of Rome would no doubt have made a great deal more use of it afterwards than upon that particular occasion But 3. Tho Antiquity is to be sometimes supprest and stifled that it may say nothing against them and sometimes suborned and counterfeited that it may bear false Witness for them and tho they generally make a fair show and a great noise with the pretence of it yet they cannot but often betray the little Esteem and Regard which they have of it thus to give an Instance or two In the famous Question of the Virgin 's immaculate Conception tho the Fathers are acknowledged to be generally against it and their own Bishop Canus †De Sanctorum Auctoritate l. 7. loc Theolog. c. 1. Lovan reckons up St. Ambrose St. Austin St. Chrysostom and a great many more who expresly assert her being conceived in Original Sin and says that this is the unanimous Opinion of all the Fathers who happen to make mention of it (a) Sancti namque omnes qui in ejus rei mentionem incidere uno ore asseuerarunt beatam Virginem in Peccato originali conceptam hoc vid. Ambig hoc August hoc Chrysost c. Ib. yet he declares this to be a very weak and infirm Argument which is drawn from the Authority of all the Fathers and that notwithstanding that the contrary Opinion is piously and probably maintained and defended in the Church (b) Infirmum tamen exomnium authoritate argumentum ducitur quin potius contraria sententia probabilitèr piè in Ecclesiâ defenditur Ib. and Bellarmine says (c) Inter Catholicos non sunt numerandi Bellarm. de Amis grat l. 4. c. 15. they are not to be reckoned among Catholicks who are of another Opinion tho it be contrary it seems to all Antiquity Thus at other times Bellarmine shifts off the Authority of St. Cyprian when he plainly opposes that of the Pope and says that he mortally erred and offended in so doing (d) Videtur mortalitèr peccasse Bellarm l. 4. de Romano Pontifico c. 7. and concerning Justin Martyr Irenaeus and others their Opinion he says cannot be defended from great Error (e) Eorum sententiam non video quo pacto ab errore possumus defendere Bellarm. de beat §. l. 1. c. 6. when it is against his own thus also of St. Hierom he was of that Opinion but it is false and it shall be refuted (f) Videtur Hieronymus inâ—eâ sententiâ fuiâ—se sed falsa est c suo loco râ—fâ—llenda Bellarm. de Pontif. Rom. l. 1. c. 8. And to mention no more tho they stick not upon all occasions to slight and contemn Antiquity when it will not make for them Baronius one of their greatest Searchers into Antiquity but as great a Corrupter of it who had taken that Oath I suppose prescribed by Pope Pius 4th not to receive or expound Scripture but according to the uniform Consent of the Fathers yet doth unwarily but ingenuously confess that the holy Fathers whom for their great Learning we justly call the Doctors of the Church yet the Catholick that is Roman Church doth not always follow nor in all things the Interpretation of Scripture * Nam sanctissimos Patres quos Doctores Ecclesiae ob illorum sublimem eruditionem merito nominamus in Interpretatione Scripturarum non semper ac in omnibus Catholica Ecclesia sequitur Baron Annal. Eccles an 34. n. 213. p. 238. Colon. They can go off it seems from their Oath and from the Fathers too when they think fit and they are not always bound to keep so close to Antiquity as they give out at other times and pretend they do But in the last place 4. The Determinations and Decrees of the present Church are the only things they stick to and 't is the Authority and Infallibility of that which they relie more upon and a thousand times more regard than all Antiquity or the whole Sense of the Primitive Church They pretend indeed not to determine any thing contrary either to Scripture or to the Primitive Church but they make themselves the only Judges of both they tells us they make no new Doctrines nor no Innovations in Faith but they keep to themselves the Power of declaring what Doctrines are new and what are not and then I can see little difference between their making and their declaring new Articles of Faith since 't is their declaring makes them to be believed
and received as such when they were not to be so before and how then does that differ from making them Articles of Faith Bellarmine speaks plainly out tho against his own Note when he says The Church of latter time hath Power not only to explain and declare but constitute and command those things which belong to Faith †Tract de potest Sum. Pontif. If the present Church has a Power to make more Doctrines and Articles be believed as necessary to Salvation than were believed by the Primitive Church then it may make Additions to the Christian Faith and make that necessary to be believed at one time which was not at another if it has not this Power let them declare it and not count others Hereticks who receive all the ancient Creeds and hold the Faith of all the ancient Councils and believe all those Doctrines that the whole Primitive Church in all Places and at all times ever held Here with Lyrinensis we fix and set our Feet and here we resolve to stand and keep our Ground and not be moved with every Wind of Doctrine that shall blow out of a new Quarter and that a small part of the present Church shall declare to be an Article of Faith when It was never so declared by the Primitive To say that they have made no new Articles of Faith in their Church but only the same Articles made Explicit which were Implicit before in the Primitive Church is as if they should say there are no new Men in the World since Adam or Noah but only the same Men that were before Implicit in their Loyns are now explicitly born into the World. Thus the Church tho it be never so fruitful in producing Doctrines and Articles of Faith that never were before in the Church yet makes nothing new and however spurious its Doctrines may be and however degenerating from the Faith of our Forefathers yet it must be said to be of the same Kind and Species Faith it seems in the Primitive Church was but an Embrio or like a small Seed or Kernel implicitly containing all the Parts entire but in little but when it is grown up and enlarged by the explicit Declaration of the Church then it may swell into a mighty bigness and increase even into the largest Tridentine Bulk and be it never so unlike the former yet it must be called the same still But if this implicit Faith was sufficient for the Primitive Church why may it not be so for the present and what need have we of a more explicit Faith to save us now than they had to save them then All the essential Articles of Christian Faith are to be explicitly believed at all times and 't is strange that we must be now obliged to a more explicit Faith and a more implicit Obedience than the Primitive Church was ever acquainted with But after all I hope those Doctrines that are contrary to the Doctrines of the Primitive Church were not then implicitly believed by it and if they were not I am sure most of the Doctrines of the Roman Church as different from the Reformed were not her implicit Doctrines but unless Error may be folded up with Truth and one part of a Contradiction may be involved in the other the late Corruptions and Decrees of the Roman Church in her Trent Articles were no way contained in the quite different Doctrines of the Primitive Church And thus because I have gone too far with this Discourse I must abruptly take leave of Bellarmin and his Church tho I resolve by God's Grace to keep always to this his true Note of the Church and therefore to that Church in which I am which is the most agreeable to the Primitive of any in the World both as to Doctrine and every thing else THE END LONDON Printed by J. D. for Richard Chiswel at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1687. The Seventh Note of the CHURCH EXAMINED VIZ The Vnion of the Members among themselves and with the Head. Septima Nota est Vnio membrorum 〈…〉 inter se cum Capite Bellar. L. iv c. 10. de Notis Ecclesiae IMPRIMATUR May 26. 1687. Guil. Needham THE Church as the Cardinal observes is called in the Scriptures one Body one Spouse one Sheepfold But he that infers from hence that Unity is a proper Mark of the True Church ought to be very well assured that the Head and Members are united no-where but in the Body of Christ and that the Harlot cannot be One as well as the Spouse c. But the World has hitherto been persuaded that bare Unity is a Character to be found upon Societies of different Natures and contrary Designs that of it self it infers neither Good nor Evil and may belong to a Body of Rebels no less than to an Army of Loyal Subjects Unity is then indeed a good Mark when 't is a Duty as 't is a Duty when the Terms of Union are so For which Reason the Union of the Church is of all others the most excellent because all Men ought to follow that Truth and Goodness which are necessary to Salvation and these are best preserved and maintained by Union among those who follow them For which Reasons also 't is celebrated in the Gospel with variety of Expressions But to argue from hence that the Union of Members among Themselves and with their Head is a proper Note of the true Church is just as if I should conclude upon seeing a thousand Men marching in good Order and with equal Pace after their Leader that therefore of necessity they must be going to York Notwithstanding therefore this Argument from Vnity being attributed to the Church the Cardinal did not think fit to leave his Mark so very loose and common but slips into the mention of those things wherein the Unity of the Church consists as he pretends He tells us that the Head with which the Members are united is the Pope And as for their Union among themselves he afterwards proves that all Catholicks must needs agree in all Points of Faith since they all submit their own Sense to the Sense of one and the same chief Pastor guiding the Church from the Chair of Peter with the advice of other Pastors So that now we know what he means by the Union of the Members to their Head and among themselves that is to say the Union of the Members of the Roman Church to the Pope as to their Head and their Union among themselves in believing all that he teaches from the Chair of St. Peter c. Which Note does for its part make good what was observed at first concerning the general Design of these Notes which is not so much to describe to us the proper Characters of a true Christian Church as to prove that the Church of Rome is the only True Church Whatever the Cardinal insinuated at first he seemed to be very sensible that the Union of the Members
with the Head and among themselves was too large a Note to fit no other Society but a true Christian Church Now if in restraining his Note he had understood Christ by the Head and by the Union of the Members to one another an Agreement in the Faith that was once delivered to the Saints this indeed would have served for the finding out of a True Church but then this was too large for the Cardinal's Purpose which was to find no other Church to be True but the Roman And therefore by the Head it was necessary to understand the Pope and by the Union of the Members an Agreement in all that Doctrine which is taught by the Roman Church For it was to be hoped that this would mark all the Roman Communion in but it would most undoubtedly mark all other Christians out of the only true Church For this is the admirable reasoning to which it leads That is the true Church which acknowledges the Pope for its Head and for its Faith professes the Doctrine whatever it be that is taught in the Church of Rome And from hence it must needs follow that the Church of Rome is the only True Church Quod erat demonstrandum And if the Cardinal had left the Matter thus in shorf he had in my mind done better for his Church and his reasoning had been less exceptionable than he has made it in the pursuance of his Enlargements When a Man has to do with an untractable piece of Matter it often happens that the more he strives to fashion it to his own Purpose the farther he is from it And so this great Man by labouring over-much to make this his Mark of Unity utterly unserviceable to any other Church has given it that Figure at last which makes it unfit for his own as we shall see in convenient place For I shall endeavour to make out these three things I. That the Unity here offer'd is no true Note of the Church II. That if it were yet the Roman Church has it not III. That that Unity which is indeed a Note of the Church we have and that in a much greater degree than they I. That the Vnity here offered is no true Note of the Church which I shall shew concerning both his Instances of it And First Concerning Vnion with the Pope as Head of the Church That this should be a Note of the Church is a pretence that hath neither Scripture Reason nor Antiquity for it but all against it 1. For Scripture the Cardinal offers not any proof from thence of his Presumption which yet had been very requisite to a point of so vast a Consequence if the Scripture had afforded any Testimony to his purpose That the Pope should be the Head of the Church and the Center of its Unity that Union to him should be an essential Character of the Church and the very Being of it depend upon him But that the Scripture should not give us the least intimation of it is a thing so perfectly unaccountable that the very silence of the Scripture in a matter of this high nature is to us a sufficient Argument that the Apostles knew nothing of any such Constitution Especially since they did not forget to make plain and frequent mention of another Head of the Church to which all the Members are to be united viz. our Lord Jesus Christ They tell us Eph. i. 20 22 23. That when God raised him from the dead he gave him to be HEAD over all things to the Church which is HIS BODY That as there are many Members in one Body so we being many Rom. xii 4 5. are ONE BODY IN CHRIST That as the Body is one and hath many Members so also is CHRIST 1 Cor. xii 12 27. i.e. Christ and the Church the whole being denominated from the Head for we are the BODY OF CHRIST We are told That he is the Head Eph. iv 16. even Christ Vers 23. from whom the whole Body is fitly joyned together c. That he is the Head of the Church and the Saviour of the Body That he is the Head of the Body the Church Col. i. 18. And much more to this purpose might be added Now when the Church is so frequently declared to be one Body and to this one Body one Head is so frequently assigned and no more What can any Man who is not possest with prejudice make of this but that there is no other Head of the Church besides him who is so often mentioned as such and that by the same Reason that any Man goes about to add another Head to the Church he might if he pleased find out another Church for the Head Nor does it help at all that they pretend the Pope to be but the Vicarious and Ministerial Head of the Church since if without Union to him we are out of the Church and have no part in Christ it was necessary that this pretended Vicarious Head should have been as plainly and frequently expressed as we know the True and Real Head to have been Nay it was something more necessary since a very slender intimation might have been sufficient to assure us that he who is the Image of the Invisible God Col. i. 15 18. by whom all things were created and by whom all things consist is also the Head of the Body the Church Ver. 14. That he in whom we have redemption through his Blood who is the Saviour of the Body and for our sakes humbled himself to the Death of the Cross should be also the Head of the Body and be exalted to be Head over all things unto his Church He I say in whom infinite Power and Goodness met But that there should be another Head given to the whole Church to be united to which was no less necessary than Union to Christ himself And that this Catholick Head should be no other than a sinful Man and he very often none of the best this was so far removed from self-Evidence or even Probability that it certainly needed very express mention if not frequent inculcation Now that he should be frequently mentioned as Head of the Church who in comparison needed not to be mentioned at all And that no mention at all should be made of another Head of the Church that needs it very much is for them to give an account of who make Union to this later Head no less necessary to a Part in the Body of Christ than Union to the former Which account will be much harder to be given inasmuch as there is no mention at all of this pretended Head where there was the most fair and inviting occasion for it that can be well imagined Thus St. Paul shewing what Gifts Christ bestowed upon his Church after his Ascension saith He gave some Apostles and some Prophets Eph. iv 11 12 c. and some Evangelists and some Pastors and Teachers for the edifying of the Body of
Direction of not being tossed to and fro c. 3. Are condemned by Tertullian who bids us adhere to what is first And 4. By Vincentius Lyrinensis And 5. Have given ill Example by which the Reformers can justify themselves And lastly Have plainly condemned several Popes and the whole Lateran Council under Innocent III as not sufficiently knowing what the Church was since their Notion of it could not content those which came after them A great Injury and of dangerous Consequence Lastly Upon a Comparison of one with the other P. 432 c. and of both with the Antient Doctrine and Discipline of the Church he looks upon Bellarmin's Definition as the better of the Two because it may be so mollified by the Help of the Word Praecipuè chiefly which is in it as to admit of a tolerable Reconciliation with the Definition of the Antients which as he shews can no way agree with that of Canisius And upon the whole he concludes P. 450. That however Bellarmin's might be preferrable if either of them were necessary yet it will be hard for Catholicks to make their Complaints of Innovating which they heap upon Hereticks to appear just so long as they themselves shall retain such a Novel Definition and that if Gregory VIIths Rule were observed viz. That nothing should be drawn into Example or Authority which is contrary to the Fathers then even this his Definition tho it had been received yet ought to be rejected To this purpose that Accurate Writer as he is deservedly called by ‖ Letter to Bp. of Linc. p. 319. F. Walsh has argued to the utter confusion of the Cardinal's Argument from Union with the Pope as Head or of the Members among themselves For how can that be a Note of the True Church now which never was thought to belong to the Nature of it for 1500 Years together and which their own most Learned Lovers of Antiquity and Pious Opposers of Novelty do not think essential to it at this Day And where is the so much boasted Consent of the Members amongst themselves in all Matters of Faith I believe the holy Catholick Church is an Article of Faith. I would know of those Gentlemen who are at such perfect agreement amongst themselves what this Church is Bellarmine answers one thing Canisius another so contrary that if one speaks true the other must needs have told me that which is false And while the Definition of the former is followed by some and that of the later which is the worse is more generally received Launoy and many more of the most Learned sort stick to the Antients who are as different from both as they are from one another And yet after all we must be told that they are perfectly agreed in all matters of Faith and that this invisible unintelligible Union shews plainly that the Roman is the true Church One would hardly think that they are in earnest unless by Union they mean an equal Resolution to carry on the Dispute as long as they can contend and no longer Which kind of Union is to be met with almost every Term in Westminster-Hall where one may see two Parties prosecuting one another with all imaginable vigour who yet resolve to be quiet when the Bench has made them so Not that the Party who is cast in the Suit must needs change his Opinion of his own Cause because the last Verdict was against him but that if a new Trial will not be granted he is bound to acquiesce in the Judgment of the Court because it has a Sheriff with the Posse Comitatus to put it into Execution Thus they that make the Sentence of the Pope and they that make the Sentence of a Council the Sentence of the Church are united in a Resolution to stand to the Arbitrement of the Church there being a certain sensible Obligation upon them to profess that they will acquiesce in its Determination But in the mean time they may undoubtedly quarrel amongst themselves about Questions of such mighty Importance as that we mentioned even now and this without breach of Union amongst themselves till the Sentence of the Pope or the Sentence of a Plenary Council or the Sentence of both comes to part them Which yet will be long enough first if each side of the Question be abetted with numerous and able Parties that are at present both of 'em resolved to submit absolutely to the Church lest one of them upon an unseasonable Sentence should be provoked to change its Resolution And thus as we observed before the Question about the Immaculate Conception has been left undecided so long lest by determining that a more dangerous Question should be raised by the disobliged Party But if it should so happen that the Church cannot well avoid declaring her self in such a Case this new-fashion'd Union goes forward still tho she speaks so ambiguously that each Party fancies the Sentence to be on its own side which was done often at Trent with great Application and Art Particularly in the Decrees concerning Grace and Assurance of being Justified c. Which being finished Soto and Vega differed not only as much but something more than they did at first for now they had a new Question to debate viz. on which side the Council had decreed and so they fell to writing great Books upon it against one another But for all this they were admirably agreed because they agreed in submission to the Council I proceed to shew III. That that Vnity which is indeed a Note of the Church we have and that in a much greater degree than they Which Point will I hope yield some Discourse that will be more useful than barely to discover Mistakes and expose Sophistry For here I shall represent as well as I can the true Grounds and Notions of Church-Unity and then see who has most reason to pretend to it they or we 1. There is the Vnity of submitting to one Head our Lord Jesus Christ which is the Foundation of all other Christian Unity and therefore mentioned by St. Paul amongst the principal Reasons why the Church is one Body Eph. iv 5. One Lord. 2. There is the Vnity of professing the Common Faith that was once delivered to the Saints which is grounded upon the Authority of the Scriptures and summarily expounded in the Antient Creeds And therefore to One Lord the Apostle in the forementioned place adds one Faith. 3. There is an Unity of Sacraments in the Church One Baptism by which we are all admitted into the same state of Duties and of Priviledges undertaking the Conditions of the New Covenant and gaining a Right to the Promises thereof Thus saith St. Paul 1 Cor. xii 13. By one Spirit we are all Baptized into one Body And the like Unity is inferred from the other Sacraments 1 Cor. x. 17. We being many are one Bread and one Body for we are all partakers of that one Bread. And again
Church it is agreed of all sides that it is only to the true Church And therefore I must be certain which is the true Church before I can be ascertained which Church is infallible Seeing therefore that every true Note is inseparable to the Thing which it notifies before I can be certain that I have found the true Church which Christ hath promised to continue to the end of the World by this Note of not erring I must have very good assurance not only that my Church doth not err at present but also that not to err is always inseparable to it both for the time past and the time to come Seeing therefore there is no one Church now in being of which we can be rationally assured as to this matter the necessary Consequence is that by this Note no Man can certainly discover which is the true Church And now having proved that according to the true Properties of the Notes of the true Church this of Sanctity of Doctrine as Bellarmin explains it is no true Note for an honest Enquirer to seek the true Church by I proceed III. To enquire in what Sense this is a true Note of the true Church In short if by Sanctity of Doctrine we understand professing all the necessary and essential Articles of Christian Faith and admitting all the essential parts of Christian Worship and Discipline this wherever it is is a certain Note of a true Church for nothing can be a certain Note of a true Church but what is essential to it as a true Church for whatsoever is accidental to it is separable from it and whatsoever is separable from it it may have or not have and yet be a true Church notwithstanding that therefore which doth not appertain to it as it is a true Church may appertain to a false Church as well as a true But to say that that is not a true Church which hath all the essentials of a true Church is a downright Contradiction If therefore we would have such Notes of a true Church as we may certainly depend upon we must fetch 'em from the Essence of a true Church and consequently we must first state what a true Church is before we can be certain what are the true Notes of it Now what it is that is necessary to constitute a true Christian Church may be easily collected by considering what is necessary to make a true Christian for a true Christian Church is nothing but a Society of true Christians And seeing that Christianity consists of Doctrines of Faith and Laws of Worship and Discipline he only is a true Christian that owns and receives Christianity in all these parts of it that is who acknowledges all the Essentials of true Christian Faith Worship and Discipline And consequently that must be a true Christian Church or Society of true Christians which professes all the Essential Articles of Christian Faith and receives all the Essential parts of Christian Worship and Discipline whereever therefore I find a Religious Society of Men professing all the necessary Doctrines of true Christian Faith worshiping the one God through the one Mediator communicating in the true Christian Sacraments and submitting to the true Christian Discipline duly administred by true Christian Pastors and Governours there I am certain I have found a true Church if that be a true Church which hath all the Essentials that constitute a true Church Wherefore before we can know whether this or that be a true Church we must be rightly imformed what a true Church is and before we can state what a true Church is we must learn what the true Faith and Worship and Discipline is because these are the Essential Ingredients of which a true Church is composed And when we have learn'd what these are by them we may certainly discover whether this or that be a true Church or no. If therefore by Sanctity of Doctrine we understand the publick profession and admission of all the Essentials of Christian Faith Worship and Discipline it is not only a certain Note of a true Church but the only certain Note of it because there can be no certain Note of a true Church but what is Essential to it and there is nothing Essential to it but what this Note comprehends Where-ever this is there is the entire Essence of a true Church and if there were but one Church upon Earth that had it that would be the only true Church in the World and if there were ten thousand Churches agreeing in it there would be ten thousand true Churches So that whereas all other Notes are separable from a true Church and consequently may direct us to a false Church instead of a true this is no more separable from it than a true Man is from the Human Nature And if I had found a Church that hath in it all the other Notes of Bellarmin excepting this I should still be to seek for a true Church as on the contrary if I had found a Church that wants all the rest but this I should nevertheless sit down fully satisfied of its Truth and seek no further And thus I have given a brief Account in what Sense Sanctity of Doctrine is a certain Note of the true Church and by this our Church is willing to be tryed by any honest and ingenuous Enquirer whose Business it is to seek for Truth and not for Gain and Preferment and if upon Examination he cannot find in it as I am sure he may if he examine fairly all the Essentials of that Faith and Worship and Discipline which the Scripture teaches and the Primitive Ages profess'd and embraced in God's Name let him seek farther abroad but if after he hath missed of it in the Church of England he should happen to find it in the Church of Rome imports him as much as his Soul is worth to enquire into one Point more viz. whether he sought it by his Reason or by his Interest And now I proceed IV. And Lastly To shew That according to the Principles of the Church of Rome the true Church is not to be found by this Note in which-soever of the two Senses we understand it for if by Sanctity of Doctrine we mean with Bellarmin an unerring profession of the Truth without any the least intermixture of Error before we can be certain we have found thē true Church by it we must be very well assured concerning the profession of that Church which we take to be the true Church that it is in all particulars true without any the least Ingredient of Error Or if by Sanctity of Doctrine we only mean the profession of all the Essentials of Christian Faith Worship and Discipline before we can be certain that we have found the true Church by it we must be very well assured not only that there are such Essential Principles and what they are but also that they are true for unless we certainly know that there are such Principles and what
others has to pretend that it is the Character of its being a true Church I desire in the second place that these following Particulars may be considered 1. That altho we charge the Church of Rome with many Errors and Mistakes yet we allow it to contain in it a mixture of Truth Now this very mixture of Truth may perhaps be of sufficient force to make Proselytes but then it does not follow but that such Proselytes may likewise have embraced the Errors which are mixed with it as well as the Truth it self The Indians whose Conversion to the Romish Faith I shall speak of afterwards were not so void of Reason but that if they compared the Religion of their Conquerors with their own Worship they might be perswaded to embrace the former rather than adhere still to the latter And altho by this means they were but half converted to the Truth yet it was better that it should be thus than that they should not have been converted at all for by this means they were much nearer the reception of the whole Truth than they were formerly which was a great advantage and therefore we reckon those but an ill sort of Protestants who would rather have Men Turks and Infidels than of the Romish Church But at the same time the Conversion of never so many to Church of Rome is no Argument of its not being a corrupted Church as long as we can prove it to maintain such gross Errors as it does altho accompanied with such a mixture of Truth as may be of great force to bring over such as had before little or no knowledg thereof 2. That the Prevalency of the Doctrine of the Church of Rome can be no Note of its being a true Church because it is so much alter'd from what it formerly was The Doctrine of the Church of Rome was in the beginning of Christianity the same with that which was deliver'd by Christ and his Apostles to the Saints Afterwards new Doctrines insensibly crept into and were received by that Church and at last Matters came to be settled as we now find them in the Council of Trent This has been often cleared by Learned Men and in some of those Discourses which have of late been writ Barrow of the Pope's Suprem Discourse of Transubst Disc concerning the Worship of the blessed Virgin and the Saints Disc of Commun in one kind Vindicat. of the Answ to some late Papers c. some of the new Doctrines have been traced step by step and the manner now they came to be receiv'd set down and in others the Church of Rome has been compared with her self and what was determin'd by the Council of Trent has been shown to be quite another thing from what was held some Ages ago Now it is impossible that things that are different should be the distinguishing Character of that which is always the same Since then I suppose it will be readily granted that the Church of Rome has always been the true Church the Efficacy of its Doctrine can be no Note thereof since in some Ages those Doctrines have prevailed in it which are directly contrary to those which have prevailed in other 3. That the Prevalency of any Doctrine can be no Note of a true Church where those who embrace it are hindred from thoroughly examining it For without a thorough Examination it never can be rightly understood and what Efficacy can it have upon his Mind who does not rightly understand it Now the Church of Rome exacts of the Members of her Communion a tame Submission to and Compliance with whatever she proposeth to their Belief and Practice and by forbidding them the use of the Scriptures she takes from them the use of that Rule whereby they are to judg of the Reasonableness of her Proposals How then can the reception of her Doctrine be a Note of her being a true Church when perhaps not one amongst a thousand of her Members who receeive it is capable of understanding what he is bound to believe 4. That the Prevalency of any Doctrine can be no Note of a true Church where Art and Force are made use of to make it prevail For it is no difficult matter for cunning Deceivers to impose upon unstable Souls and it must be a great courage and constancy of Mind which can make Men for-go Father and Mother Houses and Land c. for the sake of Truth Now that the Church of Rome has taken this course to propagate her Doctrines we may be assured by some of her own Members There are saith Erasmus Erasmus in Annot. in Mat. 23. those who after a new Example make Christians by force but whilst they pretend the Propagation of Religion they do in reality study the Inlargement of Riches and Power Not unlike these are those Monks who inveigle others to take upon them their Order and do use a great deal of cunning to insnare such as are young and unskilful and who neither understand Themselves nor the Nature of true Religion And Stapleton declares very freely Stapleton Epist Dedic de oper Justific Edit Paris 1582. Eo sane loco haereses sunt c. Heresies are come to that pass that their Gordian Knots are not to be dissolved by Art and Industry but by the Sword of Alexander and the Club of Hercules is more fit to subdue them than the Harp of Apollo I might quote several others to the same purpose but the constant Practices of the Inquisition in those places where it is received and the extraordinary Methods which have of late been made use of in a Neighbouring Nation to gain Proselytes do sufficiently shew that the Church of Rome does more depend upon something else than upon the Efficacy of her Doctrine for the making of Converts Which will more fully appear if in the third place we consider the insufficiency of the Cardinal's Arguments which are fetched First From the Scriptures Secondly From what happened in the beginning of the Christian Church Thirdly From the particular Instances which he gives of Conversions wrought by those of the Church of Rome First As to the Scriptures which are quoted Ps 19.7 The Law of the Lord is perfect converting the Soul and Heb. 4.12 For the Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged Sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of Soul and Spirit and of the Joynts and Marrow and is a discerner of the Thoughts and Intents of the Heart It may be answer'd 1. That the latter of these is by several Expositors interpreted of the Son of God and not of his Doctrine 2. That if they are both interpreted of the Efficacy of any Doctrine yet that the Efficacy which is spoken of is wholly internal as we before observ'd and consequently such as cannot be accounted a Note of the true Church For the Note of a Church must be what any one can come to the knowledg of 3. Suppose by these words
virtutes magnas in terris facere sublimis utique admirabilis res est non tamen regnum coeleste consequitur quisquis in his omnibus invenitur nisi recti justi itineris observatione gradiatur Cypr. de Unitat. Eccles St. Cyprian discoursing of some that had broken off from the Church and yet supposing it possible for them to signalize themselves by Miracles quoting that Passage of St. John Ep. 1. ch 2. They went out from us but they were not of us tells us that though the doing such Miracles is an high and admirable thing yet if they take not heed to go in the just and right way it gives them no Title to the Kingdom of Heaven where it is observable that the recti justi itineris observatio is not to be understood meerly a good and vertuous Life for that is acknowledged on all hands that some Persons inwardly wicked but outwardly holding Communion with the true Church might work Miracles as probably Judas did amongst the other Disciples But St. Cyprian means it of those that had turn'd out of the right way and thrô Schism had broken off from the true Church as the tenor of that Discourse carries it †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Irenae advers Haeres l. 1. c. 9. Irenaeus tells us of the prodigious Errors of Marcus the Heretick and yet two of the Wonders he did viz. When he was consecrating or giving of Thanks over the Cup mixt with Wine drawing out his Invocations to a mighty length he made the Cup appear of a Purple or Red Colour and that it should seem that that Grace that comes from the place which is above all things did by the power of his Invocation distil its own Blood into the Cup that those that were present should vehemently desire to taste of the same draught that so that very Grace boasted of by the Magician might actually flow into them too He further instances in a Magic Trick he had of filling a greater Cup with a much less and to the view of others inspiring some of the seduc'd Women with the gift of Prophesying and the like This passage of Irenaeus is quoted verbatim by Epiphanius who also calls this Marcus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one perfectly skill'd in the Magic Art. * Epiphan in Haeres 34. Marcosii (b) August Exposit in Evang Johann Tractat. 13. versus finem St. Austin directs thus Let no Man saith he vend Fables amongst you Both Pontius wrought a Miracle and Donatus pray'd and God answer'd him from Heaven First either they are deceived themselves or else they deceive others However suppose he could remove Mountains yet saith the Apostle If I have not Charity I am nothing Let us see whether he hath not Charity I should have believed it if he had not divided the Unity of the Church for God hath warned me against such Wonder-Mongers if I may so call them * Istos mirabiliarios In the latter Days there shall arise false Prophets doing Signs and Wonders c. Mark xiii Ergo cautos nos fecit sponsus quia miraculis decipi non debemus Therefore hath our Lord warned us because we should not be deceived by Miracles And so he goes on with that which we find in Decret part 2. Caus 1. Quaest 1. cap. 56. Teneamus ergo unitatem fratres mei praeter Vnitatem qui facit miracula nihil est Let us hold fast the Vnity out of this Vnity even he that works Miracles is nothing Peter the Apostle saith he rais'd the Dead Simon Magus did many things there were many Christians that could do none of these things neither what Peter nor what Simon did but what did they rejoice in That their Names were waitten in Heaven This Father hath many other Passages of this kind in his Book de Vnitate Ecclesiae but they are already so largely quoted in that excellent Preface before the School of the Eucharist lately made English that I refer the Reader thither not only for that but also for the whole Argument about Miracles which might justly have superseded this Discourse upon the Note of Miracles had it been so ordered in its due Place So that Miracles meerly we see in the Judgment of the Fathers were never accounted a full and adaequate Note of any true Church Which in Truth the Cardinal himself after the great Foundation he seem'd to have laid as to the sufficiency of Miracles does in some measure yield when he tells us in this very same Chapter Ex miraculis demonstratur Ecclesia non quoad evidentiam vel certitudinem rei sed quoad evidentiam certitudinem credibilitatis Bel. l. iv c. 14. That the Church is demonstrated by Miracles not as to the evidence and certainty of the thing but only as to the evidence and certainty of Credibility Which is as much as to say that Miracles may be a Note of the Church and they may not be so that is such a kind of Note by which we may give a good guess at the true Church but cannot be certain For as one of their own Writers expresseth it Miracula Deo Diabolo Christo Antichristo sunt communia * Espencaeus in 2 ad Tim. Miracles are common to God and the Devil to Christ and Antichrist II. If Miracles in general are no sufficient Note or Proof of any Church whatever much less are those Miracles alledg'd in the Church of Rome in Confirmation of those particular Doctrines and Practices wherein we of the Reform'd Church differ from them much less I say are they any just Note of their Church or Evidence of the Truth of those Doctrines There are a Variety of Miracles offer'd to us in their Histories or in their Legends in Confirmation of the several Doctrines of Sacramental Confession Adoration of Images and Reliques Invocation of Saints Purgatory the bodily Presence in the Eucharist and the Holiness of particular Persons that have flourish'd in their Church Now as to this we are to consider these things First That we do not observe any ground throughout the whole Scriptures either of the Old or New Testament to expect any Miracle for the Confirmation of any particular Doctrine whatever Secondly That many of those Doctrines which these Miracles are alledg'd in Confirmation of are so far from being expresly asserted or warranted in the Holy Scriptures that they rather bear a direct Contrariety Thirdly That there is no tolerable ground for Certainty as to the truth of most of those Miracles which the Romanists do make the Glory of their Church First That we do not observe any ground throughout the whole Scriptures either of the Old or New Testament to expect any Miracle for the Confirmation of any particular Doctrine whatever The Miracles under the Mosaick Dispensation were to confirm and establish that And the Miracles perform'd by Christ and his Apostles as I have already intimated were to bring in and establish
this Testimony of Pliny Tertullian tells us that the Heathens would not hear the Cause of Christians whom they knew to be guiltless but condemned it at all Adventures and that the best Emperors favoured Christianity and that 't was persecuted by the worst All this however it may serve the common Christianity does not make for the purpose for which the Cardinal does produce it The same may be said as to what he mentions of the Efficacy of the Prayers of the Christian Souldiers from the Epistle of M. Aurelius and if St. Antony St. Hilarion and St. Martin were reverenced by the Pagans I do not so much as imagine what Service this will be to the Cause the Cardinal hath undertaken to defend or what Prejudice 't will be to ours So that hitherto here is nothing said to the purpose in hand nothing said but what the Protestants may as well apply to themselves as the Church of Rome His next Set of Witnesses are Jews if we examine them we shall only find that he hath wisely made choice of two great Names but that neither of them speak one Word to the purpose His Authors are Josephus the Historian and Philo Judaeus two incomparable Authors they are and by no means to be excepted against Here 's the Mischief that neither of them have a Syllable that makes for the Defence of the Church of Rome or the Prejudice of the Reformed However let us hear them speak And first let us hear what Josephus the elder of the two hath to say It is this that Jesus was a wise Man Jofeph Antiq. Jud. l. 18. c. 6. if it be lawful to call him a Man that he was the Effector of wondrous Works c. and that he was the Christ or Messias By the way the Cardinal makes Josephus speak Non-sense as he reports his Testimony For he says not only that Josephus does affirm Christ to be more than a Man but that he was truly the Messias Now Josephus would never speak at this rate to affirm that Christ is the Messias is to affirm that Christ is Christ for the Messias and Christ are the same Josephus affirms that Jesus lived at that time which he mentions and that Jesus was the Christ or Messias But to let this pass I grant that Josephus affirms that Jesus was the Christ what is this to the Church of Rome any farther than it concerns our common Christianity I would fain know why the Cardinal produceth this in behalf of his Church or what reason can be assigned why Protestants may not as well apply it to their own The common Christianity is concerned in such a Testimony and so far the Roman Church is also But set aside that Consideration and take the Church of Rome as the Cardinal does as distinct from and opposed to other Christians that are not of her Communion and I dare say I will produce Testimonies as pertinent as this of Josephus out of any Page of Homer's Iliads or the Commentaries of Julius Caesar For what Coherence is there between these two Propositions Josephus confesseth that Jesus was the Christ Therefore the Church of Rome is the Catholick Church And yet this is in truth the Cardinal's way of arguing Let us hear next what Philo Judaeus hath to say in behalf of the Christians of the Church of Rome Now it would be to me a wonderful thing to find Philo say any thing in behalf of those Christians when he never once mentions the Name of Christian in all his Works Yet the Cardinal hath the Confidence to affirm that Philo hath written a famous Book of the Praises of those Christians who lived in Egypt under St. Mark the Evangelist After this his positive Affirmation that Philo had written such a Book as being sensible that Philo hath no Book that bears any such Title he adds the Testimony of some of the Ancients that Philo meant the Christians and not any Sect of the Jews as the Centuriators would have I do not think it worth my while to examin his Antient Writers which he quotes for his Opinion Philo Judae de vitâ Contemplativâ I will for once take it for granted that Philo means the Christians of whom he gives so good a Character under the Title of Therapeutae Let it be so What is this to the Business Because those Christians in Egypt were good Men and such as Philo describes them must therefore the Church of Rome be the Catholick Church The next Witnesses which the Cardinal produceth are Turks He tells us that in the Alcoran 't is said that Christans are saved that Christ was the greatest of Prophets and had the Soul of God and that the Sultan of Egypt reverenced St. Francis whom he knew to be a Christian and a Catholick To what purpose all this is produced I do not understand I am sure it cannot serve that of the Church of Rome as she stands separated from other Christians And if it be a Testimony in behalf of our common Christianity then all Christians are concerned in it as well as that of the Church of Rome The Alcoran will do the Cardinal no Service unless he could have produced some Testimony peculiar to the Roman Church or that might have justified the Worship of Images Adoration of the Host the Doctrine of Transubstantiation or some of those Doctrines and Practices peculiar to that Church The last Set of Witnesses produced by the Cardinal he calls Hereticks A Man would think the case very desperate that needs such Witnesses But yet I find the Church of Rome does not disdain such as these when they speak of her side But in the present Question we shall find they do that Church no Service The Substance of what the Cardinal alledgeth is what follows viz. That an Arian King honoured St. Benedict a Catholick That Luther when an Heretick owned that in the Papacy were many good Things nay all that was good e. g. The true Scripture Baptism c. That Calvin calls Bernard a pious Writer and yet he was a Papist That another Protestant acknowledgeth Bernard Dominic and Francis to be Holy Men To which he adds a Passage of Cochlaeus who reports an Article of Agreement wherein the Protestant Helvetians write that they would dismiss their Confederates Quiet as to their true undoubted and their Catholick Faith. From all which I see not what he can collect for the Interest of the Church of Rome We do honour every Man that is good in the Church of Rome but this does not infer that we justify all her Doctrines We own that they have the true Scripture and Sacraments but this does not justify their addition of Apocryphal Books to the Canon of the Scriptures nor of more Sacraments than were owned to be strictly so in the Antient Church We will allow that there have been pious and holy Men of that Church and are not scrupulous in calling them by the Name by which they are commonly
Constance and Trent that 't was the ancient Practice For the Doctrine of Transubstantiation See a Treatise of Transubstantiation by one in the Communion of the Church of Rome Printed 1687. one of the Communion of the Church of Rome hath given us an Account lately he proves from many Doctors of the Church of Rome that it is not ancient viz. from Peter Lombard from Suarez Scotus the Bishop of Cambray Cardinal Cusanus Erasmus Alphonsus à Castro Tonstall and Cassander And that 't is not taught in the holy Scriptures he proves from the Testimonies of Scotus Ockam Gabriel Biel and Cardinal Cajetan and after all that it was not the Doctrine of the Fathers of the Church It would have been very fit I should here have made an end having considered every thing which the Cardinal hath offered as to this Note of the Church But there is a late Writer I will not call him Author hath taken the Confidence to produce the Testimony of the Jewish Writers in behalf of the Church of Rome Mr. Sclater's Consenf Vet. and which is most surprising of all he quotes the Rabbins in Defence of the Doctrine of Transubstantiation which they are as far from asserting as he is from understanding them The Cardinal was too learned and modest to attempt any thing of this Nature but this Gentleman advanceth higher than he thought fit to do What he offers speaks nothing so lowdly as the Writers Effrontery and Ignorance not to say something worse Tho he thought fit to desert his Mother the Church of England yet it little became him to fly in her Face and suborn a Rout of Jews against her His Discourse is so weak that I shall bestow very little time and pains about it I shall however say something to it that he may not think any Part of his Pamphlet unanswered and do heartily wish him Repentance for his Folly and that he may learn Modesty for the future And for my better proceeding in this matter I shall do these things First I will briefly shew the true use and value of the Testimony of Jews as to the Christian Religion Secondly I shall shew the gross Ignorance not to say Dishonesty of this Writer in this Matter Thirdly I shall prove that the Jewish Writers are so far from serving the Church of Rome that they bear witness against it and that also in this very matter of Transubstantiation First I shall consider how far the Testimony of the Jews is useful to Christianity And several such there are that serve the common Christianity 1. The Jews as to matter of Fact confess that there was such a Man as Jesus that he wrought wonderful Works They do in their Talmud and elsewhere mention several of those Names which are mentioned in the New Testament and are there mentioned to have been at the same time in which they are placed there This is an useful Testimony and serves the common Christianity and saves us the labour in our Books against the Jews of proving these Matters of Fact. 2. They are also good Witnesses as to the Number of the Canonical Books of the Old Testament which were deposited in their Hands This is owned by Cardinal Cajetan who affirms that this is one Advantage we receive from the Obstinacy of the Jews Cajetan in Rom. xi v. 11. that tho they believe not in Christ themselves yet they approve the Books of the Old Testament and therefore those Books cannot be supposed to have been invented by the Christians to have served their turn This Testimony of theirs serves indeed the common Christianity but is so far from serving the Church of Rome that it is a good Evidence against the Council of Trent who have receiv'd those Books for Canonical which the Jews never received into the Canon of Scripture 3. They are good Witnesses of the Promise of a Messias which is reckoned among the Fundamental Articles of the Jewish Faith. And this is an other Advantage that Christians receive as Cajetan well observes in the Place mentioned before from the Obstinacy of the Jews Abravenel C. Fidei c. 1. They agree that such a Promise was made and that therefore it cannot be supposed either a Forgery of the Christians or a vain Belief peculiar only to them 4. They are good Witnesses where they interpret those Texts of the Old Testament of the Messias which belong to that matter and which are by the Writers of the New Testament applied to that purpose And the more ancient Jews do thus The Chaldee Paraphrasts and other of the more ancient Jewish Doctors do apply those Texts to him which the Christians also understand to be spoken of him Of which were it not too great a Digression it would be easy to produce very many Proofs This serves the common Christianity greatly and in our Disputes against the Jews affords us very great Advantages 5. Nor do I deny but that some of the Catholick Doctrines of the Christian Religion I mean such as have been always believed from the first Beginning of Christianity may receive some Confirmation from the Writings of the most antient Jewish Doctors But to produce them as Witnesses as this Writer does to a Doctrine never received by the antient Church is the most extravagant thing imaginable Secondly I shall shew the gross Ignorance not to say Dishonesty of this Writer in this matter His Author from whom he borrows all his Rabbinical Learning is Galatinus He tells if we will believe him that he was always accounted a very learned Man Preface to Consens Veterum It would have been more to his purpose to have vouched for his Honesty After this he falls into a Fit of Devotion he is of a sudden transported with Admiration that the Hebrew Writers long before Christ's time take Mr. Sclater's word for that should have such Notions But the Wind bloweth were it listeth c. He might have staid till he had been sure of the matter of Fact and then 't would have been time enough to admire at it But the Reader is to know that Mr. Sclater was mightily inclined to believe in this matter with the Church of Rome or else Galatinus could never by his Arguments have prevailed upon him This appears from his own Words after he had drawn up his Evidence from Galatinus P. 27. he tells his Reader that Galatinus thought and I 'le assure you 't is hard to say what a Jew that professeth himself a Convert to the Church of Rome does really think these Prophecies and Interpretations he might have called them Dreams and Figments argumentative not only against the Jews but a Confirmation also of the Christian Religion against all Hereticks c. But if you ask Mr. Sclater what confirms him in this Belief you 'le find him not hard to believe I am confirmed says he by the Title-page of his Book Of so great force is the Title-page of Galatinus his Book with Mr. Sclater of
the receiving of Apocryphal Books into the Canon of Scripture and other Opinions and Practices in the Christian Church And for the Doctrine of Transubstantiation as it is against the common Sense of Mankind and destroys the certainty of every thing else so the Jews upon all occasions object against it We have a Witness beyond Exception even of the Roman Church who brings in the Jews objecting against this Doctrine Fortalitium Fidei Lugd. Anno 1525. and representing the unreasonableness and absurdity of it from fourteen several Heads of Argument which I may not here represent to the Reader because it would be too great a Digression Nor do I find this Learned Author who writes in Defence of the Roman Church and attempts to answer these Objections alledging that this was the Doctrine which was taught by the Hebrew Doctors The Jews have so far abhorred this Doctrine Decret Gregor l. v. Tit. vi cap. 13. Accepimus autem c. and so far detested Christians upon this account that they were wont when they made use of Christian Nurses to force them to throw away their Milk for three Days together before they gave suck when it happened that at Easter these Nurses had received the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ This Pope Gregory complains of and decrees upon it that Christians should not for the future be Servants to the Jews J. Albo Ikkarim And Josephus Albo disputes against this Doctrine of Transubstantiation very vigorously And so do many others V. Nizach vet p. 255. in their Books against Christians And many more Testimonies might be produced Lipman Nizachon p. 11. were not most of their Books printed in Italy where it is not safe for them to be too plain And Learned Men do very well know that the Passage in Joseph Albo against this Doctrine of the Roman Church hath been expunged in one Edition of that Author 'T is very well known that all the later Jews are against this Doctrine And that Trypho the Jew and the most ancient Writers have not objected it against Christians is only an Argument that this Doctrine was not so old as that time in which they lived This Doctrine the Jews are certain cannot be true because if they are not certain of the Falsity of this they have no Certainty of their own Religion nor can ever be convinced of the Truth of ours The Truth is this is one great occasion of hardening them against Christianity and we are never like to see them come into the Christian Church till this Doctrine of Transubstantiation and the Worship of Images be removed out of it But then the Practice annexed to the Doctrine of Transubstantiation of worshipping a Creature is so dangerous that even they who own the Doctrine confess if that be not true they cannot be excused from Idolatry God give us a just Sence of these things that we may not hereafter have besides our own Sins which will be load great enough the Obstinacy of the Jews in great measure to answer for THE END LONDON Printed by J. D. for Richard Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1687. The Fourteenth Note of the CHURCH EXAMINED VIZ The unhappy End of the Church's Enemies Decima quarta Nota est Infelix exitus seu finis eorm qui Ecclesiam oppugnant Bellarm. L. iv c. 17. de Notis Ecclesiae IMPRIMATUR July 27. 1687. Guil. Needham IF he be an unwise Builder who pulls down what he intends to build up then Cardinal Bellarmin tho one of the Master-Builders of the Church of Rome deserves not to be reckon'd one of the wisest For he must shut his Eyes close who does not plainly see that he frequently defeats his own Design by giving Notes which conclude that Church to be false which he design'd to prove was the only true one Such for instance is that which is now to be consider'd as shall in the Sequel of this Discourse be made appear The Confutation of which cannot be difficult since I find nothing in the whole Chapter that hath so much as the shew of an Argument Whereas some of his Notes are guarded with a pretence at least of Scripture Reason and Antiquity this is exposed naked to the Assaults of its Adversaries without so much as a Paper Shield to protect it He tells us indeed many Tragical Stories of unhappy Deaths some of which are true some doubtful and others false some of Persons who were deadly Enemies other of Persons who were zealous Defenders of the true Church But had the Stories been all certainly true and had the Persons who thus died been all of them implacable Enemies of the Church of Rome yet what does it signify unless he had also proved That when a Person dies an unnatural Death the meaning of it is That that Church of which he professed himself a Member is false and the Church he opposed the only true one But how unwise soever he was in the choice of his Note he was so wise as not to attempt the proof of this unless the Citation of this Scripture may pass for a Proof Praise his People O ye Nations for he will avenge the Blood of his Servants and will render Vengeance to his Enemies (a) Deut. 32.43 God will avenge the Blood of his Servants therefore if a Protestant die an uphappy Death the Church of Rome is the only true Church But why did the Cardinal send out this Note so forlorn For a good Reason because no Defence could be found for it But why did he then bring it into the Field Because he knew it was Popular and might serve the Cause better than another that was never so well fenc'd For will not he dread to oppose the Church of Rome who is persuaded that God will set a Note of Vengeance upon those that do so Will not he stedfastly adhere to it who believes that that is a certain way to an happy Death In short whosoever can be persuaded to believe that the Church of Rome is by this Note distinguish'd from all other Churches he will as much dread to turn Protestant as he does to die the most prodigious sort of Death But the Mischief is That however serviceable this pretended Note may be to them among weak and undiscerning Persons it will do there as much disservice among those who are judicious and able to examine it For when they shall once see what a palpable Cheat it is and in case that it were a Note of the true Church that the Church of Rome hath the least Reason of any Church in the World to pretend to it they will be thereby disposed to break off from the Communion of that Church which contradicts its own Marks and betake themselves to some other Church which hath a better Title to them For the effecting of which I shall proceed in this Method I. I shall premise some Things as preparatory to what follows II. Shew that this can
prosperous Life hath an honourable Death and Burial for I saw says Solomon the Wicked buried (h) Eccles 8.10 that is as Cardinal Cajetan expounds the Words in such a pompous Sepulchre as transmits an honourable Memory of them to Posterity I grant that the Notes of Divine Vengeance are in some Mens Deaths fairly legible But then as I have before observed from God's Judgments against this or that Person nothing can be concluded against that Church of which they are Members 2. Besides these general Declarations the Scripture further assures us by a particular Instance that a true Church may be without this Mark and that the Enemies of the true Church may have it Thus the Church of Israel was without it and the uncircumcised Philistins had it when the High Priest fell backward and brake his Neck and his two Sons Hophni and Phineas with thirty thousand of the Israelites fell in one day by the Sword of the Philistins (i) 1 Sam. 3. Again when Zedekiah the Defender of the true Church was taken his Nobles slaughtered his Sons slain before his Eyes his Eyes then put out and he carried Captive to Babylon and put in Prison till the day of his Death If this was then a Note of the Church the Babylonians were the only true Church of God for their Enemies had then the most unhappy Ends So contrary is this Note to what we find in Scipture Secondly Nor is it less repugnant to daily Observation and the History of foregoing Ages For 1. All the World can testify that the same kind of Death happens to Men of different yea of opposite Churches That as dies the Christian so dies the Jew as dies the Catholick so dies the Heretick That the Protestant and Papist lie down ALIKE in the Dust to use Job's Phrase (k) Job 21.26 That as they often agree in their Deaths who while they lived were of different Churches so they often widely differ who were united in the same One hath a natural another a violent Death one falls by the Hand of God another by the Hand of his Neighbour one goes off gently in a Calm another is hurried away in a Storm one lives out the Term of Nature another is cut off in the midst of his Days one dies leisurely another is snatched away suddenly one finds a Grave in the Earth another in the Sea another finds none at all but is exposed as a Prey to Beasts and Birds This is so obvious that it is needless to produce Instances for the Confirmation of it 2. Whosoever has any Acquaintance with the History of the Christian Church knows that for several of the first Ages at least the best Men had generally the worst Deaths That the Apostles of our blessed Lord were set forth as a Spectacle to the World suffered the Deaths of the basest Malefactors that St. Peter and St. Andrew were crucified St. James the Just stoned and his Brains knocked out with a Club St. Bartholomew flead alive That not one of the Apostles can be named who did not end his Life by an unnatural Death except only St. John who escaped it by Miracle for he was cast into a Cauldron of boiling Oil. That the first Bishops their Successors followed them in the like Tragical Deaths That St. Clemens Bishop of Rome was thrown into the Bottom of the Sea St. Simeon Bishop of Jerusalem crucified St. Ignatius Bishop of Antioch exposed to the Lions St. Polycarp Bishop of Smyrna burnt at a Stake Yea that the Christians for the most part for three hundred Years together met with the most horrid Deaths One was torn in pieces by wild Beasts another was roasted on a Spit another was broiled on a Gridiron another had his Flesh scraped off to the Bones with sharp Shells and Salt and Vinegar poured into his green Wounds and for one of their bloody Persecutors an hundred Christians may be found who died a terrible Death These were the happy Ends that the first and best Christians were blessed with happy indeed if we respect the Cause for which they died and the blessed Reward they were crowned with but none ever more unhappy in the Eye of the World. As they had been of all Men the most miserable had they had Hope in this Life only so if this Note be true their Hope could not have reached beyond it 3. Nor is this Note more repugnant to Scripture and Experience than it is to Reason One prime fundamental Principle of Reason is That Contradictions cannot be true or that the same thing cannot be and not be This we are as sure of as that we our selves are or that any thing else is whatsoever therefore it be from whence it plainly follows that Contradictions may be true we are as sure that it is false and therefore that the Note now under consideration is so because if it be true the most palpable Contradictions will be true also Of those many that offer themselves I shall mention a few As 1. That that was a false Church which was most certainly the true Church For if the burning alive of Valens the Arian Emperor was a certain Sign that the Arian Faith is false the burning alive of many of the first Christians is as certain a Note that the Primitive Faith is false If it follows that Manichaeus was a damnable Heretick because he was flead alive must we not conclude that St. Bartholomew was as bad and by consequence all the holy Apostles because he suffered the same kind of Death 2. That a Church remaining the same without any Change in Doctrine Worship or Discipline may be to day a false Church to morrow the only true Church So the Church of Israel was a false one when the High Priest fell backward and brake his Neck within a few days after when the Hand of the Lord was against the Philistines and they were smitten with a foul Disease of which they miserably died it was a true Church again Thus the Church of Rome in the Year 1656 when a dreadful Pestilence for that is one of Bellarmin's unhappy Ends swept away three hundred thousands in three Months time in the Kingdom of Naples and made great havock at Rome and Genoa †Athanas Kircheri Scrutin Physico-Med Contag Luis quae dicitur Pestis P. 426. was a false Church but in the Year 1665 when the like dreadful Pestilence raged in London it became a true Church again Yea 3. That there is no one Church in the World but by this Note it may be and it may not be the true Church because the Opposers and the Defenders of any one and the same Church may have both of them unhappy and both of them happy Ends. Now as the Opposers have unhappy Ends it is a true Church as the Defenders have unhappy Ends it is by the fourth thing premised a false one Again as the Opposers have an happy End it is a false Church as the Defenders have
from being dazled at the Sight that they were no more affected than if I had looked on a Piece of Green Silk But I doubt he will censure them very hardly for it and think they are a sort of malignant Cavaleerish Eyes I can't help that but whatever Eyes they be since I have been able to hold them open so long against the glaring imaginary Splendor of These These Triumphant NOTES I will venture to draw out the whole Train once more and give a little Remark upon every one of them as they pass by 1. The Name of Catholick This is a Note which may be easily usurped by every bold Pretender but till it can be proved that it is joyned with the Profession of the true Faith the Name alone is nothing but an empty and insignificant Sound 2. Antiquity I shall not here mention the Antiquity of some Errors nor that there were many Churches in the World before there was any at Rome but will freely confess that that had been ancient enough if it had preserved that Doctrine in its Purity which it received at the first But it is well known that the Additions she has made unto that concerning Infallibility Images Purgatory and the like cannot be pretended to be of Antient and Apostolical Tradition Nay many of their present Tenents were never declared necessary till the last Age and the Church of Rome as it is now constituted can be esteemed no older than the Council of Trent that is about fourty Years younger than the Reformation 3. Duration By this the Cardinal would perswade us that his true Church has been from the Beginning and shall continue to the End of Christianity The first we deny the second can never be proved till the Day of Judgment We are sure the Church of Rome has been changed already from what it was and we hope and believe that it will be changed again from what it is And then what would become of the Duration they boast of if they should ever reform themselves from those Errors and Abuses which have crept in among them as has been often attempted and a long time most earnestly desired by many of the best and most impartial of their own Communion So that granting this to be a Note it would make against them both ways For what is past we know what Alterations have been made by them and they can never be secured against others that may happen hereafter 4. Amplitude or Multitude and Variety of Believers This can by no means be made a Note of the Church for the time was once that Christ's Flock was a little Flock Acts 1.15 and the number of the Names together were but about an hundred and twenty And afterwards the Arrian Heresy had almost overspread the Face of Christendom insomuch that the whole World was thought to be against Athanasius and Athanasius against the whole World. Or should we let it pass for a Note they could gain but little by it For they are infinitely exceeded in Multitude not only by Heathens and Mahometans but by Christians of other Denominations 5. Succession of Bishops How far this may be necessary to the Being of a Church I need not dispute But the uninterrupted Succession they of Rome are wont to glory in is manifestly false For besides the long Vacances that have sometimes happened and the many Schisms they have had when two or more have pretended to the Papacy and no Man could determine who had the Right which must make it dubious the confessed Hereticks that have possessed themselves of the Infallible Chair must quite cut off at least interrupt the Succession Or if they have it notwithstanding this or any other Objection that might be made We of the Church of England can plead the same 6. Agreement in Doctrine with the Primitive Church This is a good Note indeed if they mean the truly Primitive Church for that agreed with the Scripture and Doctrine of the Apostles But then I hope they will not have the Confidence to affirm that their Prayers in an Unknown Tongue their Half-Communion their Adoration of the Host and many other things which they now receive are agreeable to the Practice and Belief of that Primitive Church 7. The Vnion of the Members among themselves and with the Head. Of this they are continually making their Brags but the many and violent Contentions that have often been betwixt the several Pretenders to the Papal Dignity and the endless Feuds and Animosities that are kept up amongst them about many Controverted Points do sufficiently declare that their Church has been rent and torn with Factions and Intestine Divisions as much as any other Society Or if they were as firmly Vnited as they pretend it is no more than other Combinations of Men have been in known and wicked Errors 8. Sanctity of Doctrine For they generally assert as the Cardinal does here that the Roman Church maintains nothing that is False either in Matter of Faith or Manners If they were able to prove this there might be some Reason indeed that their Church should be esteemed the Mother and Mistress of all Churches as she has been wont of late to stile her self But since the Power of deposing Princes has been openly assumed and frequently practised and never yet condemned by any either Pope or Council since the Doctrine of Aequivocation and many other absurd and impious Opinions are taught by their Casuists and made use of by their Confessors in directing the Consciences of their Penitents and since these and many more very dangerous Errors do not only escape without a Censure but are approved of and incouraged by their Governours I do not see how they and their Church can possibly be excused from the Guilt of them 9. The Efficacy of Doctrine Here we are told of the wonderful Success they have had in the Propagation of their Faith and the Conversions that have been made of whole Nations And supposing it were as they say yet Heresy and Infidelity has often had as great and swift a Progress in the World as any that their Doctrine can boast of and considering the Pravity and Corruption of Human Nature it is not strange that the most gross and pernicious Errors should be more readily received and spread themselves faster than the most divine and sacred Truths 10. Holiness of Life This is indeed the most real Commendation of a Christian and I will not go about to rob them of the Glory of it But then it cannot be denied but meet Philosophers and some of the Antient and many of those whom they account Modern Hereticks have been of a very strict and unblamable Conversation and divers of their Popes and other Ecclesiasticks of the greatest Eminency of Place have been very infamous for all sorts of Wickedness and Debauchery and their very Religious Orders have been often complained of for the neglect of their Discipline and loosness of their Lives as is abundantly testified by their
own Authors 11. The Glory of Miracles These alone were never a Note of the true Church And those extraordinary Gifts which were bestowed at first for the Confirmation of Christianity we think they are ceased long ago But we are forewarned of False Christs and false Prophets Mat. 24.24 which should shew great Signs and Wonders which me-thinks should make a Church very careful how they made any pretension to Miracles But the Church of Rome is resolved to do it and would fain perswade us that there are many great Ones wrought among them to this very Day and as they believe always will be But we know and they will not deny it that many of the Miracles they have talked of are meer Forgeries and Delusions others altogether incredible and but weakly attested and wholly unworthy of the Seriousness and Gravity of the Christian Religion most of them said to be done in Corners and are never to be seen but among themselves When they please to oblige us Protestants with the sight of a few of them they may then deserve to be farther considered till that be done they must give us leave to think that their Church is reduced to great Streights when it shall stand in need of such slight Artifices as these to support it 12. The Light of Prophecy This if they had it can bring no more Advantage to their Cause than the other The Church of God anciently when extraordinary Revelations were more common had not always Prophets in it And when any appeared the Prophet was to be tryed by the Faith of the Church and not the Church by the Predictions of the Prophet And we are still commanded to try the Spirits whether they are of God 1 Joh. 4.1 Because many false Prophets are gone out into the World. 13. The Confession of Adversaries This if the Cardinal's Instances were pertinent would yet be but of little Consequence for if some Protestants have spoken favourably of his Catholicks some of his Catholicks have spoken favourably of Protestants Or if we should be willing to hope well of some of them as we are and they should adjudge us every one to Eternal Damnation as they generally do this would be but an ill sign that their Church must therefore be the truer because it is more Censorious and Uncharitable than Ours 14. The Vnhappy End of the Church's Enemies A wise Man would be something afraid of passing this into a Note before he was himself safe in his Grave For all things come alike to all Eccl. 9.2 there is one Event to the Righteous and to the Wicked Many of the most Zealous Patrons of the Romish Persuasion have met with as Tragical and Unfortunate Ends as the most accursed Heretick that ever was devoured by Vermin or burnt at a Stake 15. Temporal Felicity This may be placed in the same Rank with the former it is altogether as variable and inconstant as that no certain Judgment can be made upon it They are not to learn that the Enemies of their Church have been often successful and that Victory has not always waited upon their Catholick Arms no not in their most Holy Wars when Religion has been the only ground of the Quarrel Thus upon a Review of all the Notes in order as they are mustered up by the great Cardinal it may appear to any unprejudiced Enquirer that he has missed of his Aim For that they are either no Notes of a Church at all or not proper to that of Rome And now after the highest Pretences of an Infallible Church and the absolute Deference and Submission which they say is due unto it any Man that shall seriously consider the Matter must needs wonder they should have no surer means at last to find it out than a few slight and improbable nay some of them very vain false and extravagant Conjectures The Protestants whom they will not allow to be certain of any thing have far better Evidences than these and as good Assurances of the Truth of their Church as can be desired For we think the True Faith True Worship and a Right Administration of the Sacraments do unquestionably make a True Church These the Romanists themselves cannot deny to be the great and necessary Notes and if the Controversy betwixt us come to be determined by these it will soon appear which Communion we ought to prefer We make Profession of the whole Catholick Apostolick Faith as it is contained in the Holy Scriptures and briefly comprized in the three Creeds which is all that was ever received in the Primitive Church They have made large Additions to the Antient Belief and increased the number of the Articles from Twelve to Four and Twenty many of which were not so much as heard of in the First Ages and never made necessary to be believed till above fifteen hundred Years after the Publication of the Gospel We Worship Almighty God and none but him and unto him we Pray in a Language we understand through Jesus Christ our only Mediator in whose Name when we ask we are sure to be heard They have a kind of Worship which they give to Saints and Images which as to all External Acts of Adoration is the very same they pay to God himself and when their Addresses are directed unto Him all their Publick Service is in an unknown Tongue and they set up to themselves many Mediatours of Intercession when they cannot tell whether they hear them but it is most certain that God has never promised to hear them for their Sakes We receive the two Sacraments which Christ ordained in his Church and administer them both in such Manner and Form as he has appointed They without any Divine Authority have made Seven Sacraments and in the Lord's Supper they believe that there is offered up a proper Propitiatory Sacrifice for the Living and the Dead they adore the Elements which they think are Transubstantiated into the Body and Blood of our Saviour and suffer the Laity to communicate but in one kind robbing them of the Cup contrary to the plain Institution and express Command of our Blessed Lord. And since we have the True Faith True Worship and the Sacraments rightly Administred it is evident that we are not deficient in any thing that is necessary to the Constitution of a True Church But They will never be able to prove themselves such a One by the late Additions they have made to the Creed and their many Deviations from the Primitive Rule And yet they will be continually vaunting that they are not only a True Church but the only True Church in the World and upon this Presumption they thunder out their Anathema's upon all Christendom besides and confidently condemn them for a Company of Heretical and Schismatical Conventicles But they cannot justify that rash and uncharitable Sentence nor make good any part of this heavy Charge For we that heartily believe all the Antient Creeds cannot be accused of Heresy neither are we guilty of Schism because we only Reformed those Errors and Corruptions which they had introduced and wanted not sufficient Authority for what was done But if they are still absolutely resolved to stand to the Censure they have passed and allow no True Church upon Earth but their Own it is not Cardinal Bellarmin's Fifteen Notes that will ever prove it FINIS ERRATA Pag. 367. l. 3. for not r. most P. 371. Marg. l. ult for cap. 3. r. 13. LONDON Printed by J. D. for Richard Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1687. BOOKS lately printed for Richard Chiswell THE Pillar and Ground of Truth A Treatise shewing that the Roman Church falsly claims to be That Church and the Pillar of That Truth mentioned by St. Paul in his First Epistle to Timothy Chap. 3. Vers 15.4o. The Peoples Right to read the Holy Scripture Asserted 4o. A Short Summary of the Principal Controversies between the Church of England and the Church of Rome being a Vindication of several Protestant Doctrines in Answer to a Late Pamphlet Intituled Protestancy destitute of Scripture Proofs 4o. Two Discourses of Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead An Answer to a late Pamphlet Intituled The Judgment and Doctrine of the Clergy of the Church of England concerning one Special Branch of the King's Prerogative viz. In dispensing with the Penal Laws 4o. A PRIVATE PRAYER to be used in Difficult Times 8o.
in their own Tongue to have it in Latin they stoutly resisted him So that the Pope that he might keep up his usurped Authority was forced to pretend that he gave them leave to have it in their own Language But amongst all his Instances the Cardinal had least reason to have mention'd the Conversion of the Indians and Jews For as for the Indians the unheard-of Cruelties which even the Popish Historians relate to have been used towards them and their gross Ignorance after their Conversion are a sufficient Evidence how little they were beholden for it to the Doctrine which was taught them One would wonder how it were possible for Mankind to be guilty of such inhuman Barbarities as Bartolomaeus Casas who was a Bishop and lived in India relates the Spaniards to have committed In abhorrence whereof Acosta has a Discourse on purpose to shew the Unreasonableness of making War against the Barbarians L. 2. c. 2 c. De Ind. salut procur upon the account of Religion He afterwards discourses of the Capacity of the Indians asserting that they ought to have better Instructors sent them That those which they then had had been of such little use to them that after the space of forty Years there were scarce any found amongst so great a number of Converts who understood two Articles of the Creed L. 4. c. 3. p. 358. or had any apprehension what Christ Eternal Life or the Eucharist meant But this concerning the Conversion of the Indians has already been mentioned in Note the fourth As for the manner of converting the Jews I shall only make mention of one Instance which happened in the time of Heraclius the Emperour who writ to Dagobert the King of France that he would command all the Jews in his Dominions to turn Christians Aimoin iv 22. and either to banish or slay those who would not who accordingly did so banishing as many as would not be baptized Since Erasmus who knew these matters well enough has so freely declared that altho their Conversion be a thing much to be wished for yet that such Courses were taken by some to effect it that of a wicked Jew Erasm Annoâ— in Mat. 23. it often happened there was made a Christian much more wicked than he was before his Conversion Having thus shewn the weakness of the Cardinal's Arguments all that I shall add upon this Subject shall be only this That the mean Account some of our new Converts have given of Themselves and the Motives of their Change looks not very favourable upon this Ninth Note and makes it suspicious that the Efficacy of Doctrine was not the only thing that did the work But that on the other hand since the chiefest Patrons of the Romish Cause do at this time endeavour to disguise their Religion with so much Artifice and to represent it as like ours as they can they do really think their Doctrine by its own Worth and Excellency then most likely to prevail when it is made appear to be most akin to that of the Reformed Churches THE END ERRATA PAge 212. line 26. read sets it in Page 223. line 22. r. the Church LONDON Printed by J. D. for Richard Chiswel at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1687. The Tenth Note of the CHURCH EXAMINED VIZ HOLINESS of LIFE Decima Nota est Sanctitas Vitae Auctorum sive primorum Patrum nostrae Religionis Bellarm. L. iv c. 13. de Notis Ecclesiae IMPRIMATUR June 22. 1687. Jo. Battely IN this Argument it may suffice if it be shown I. What the Notion of Holiness is II. That Holiness is not properly a Note of the true Church III. That if it were a Note of the true Church yet it would not so belong to the Roman as to distinguish it from all other Churches and to appear upon it as the Infallible Character of the only Fold of Christ I. For Holiness it is of two kinds Holiness of Calling and Dedication of Mind and Manners By Holiness of Calling and Dedication I mean the Separation of Persons from the unbelieving and wicked World and the incorporating of them by Baptism into the Spiritual Society of the Christian Church And by such means the dedicating of them to the Service of Christ according to the tenour of the Evangelical Covenant In this Sense St. Paul told the Members of the Church of Corinth (a) 1 Cor. 6.11 that they were wash'd and sanctify'd or by their Christian Calling or Dedication made Sacred and Holy. By Holiness of Mind and Manners to which Bellarmin here gives the Name of Probity a Vertue commended by him but coldly obey'd I understand the habitual private and publick Practice of Christian Religion as it proceeds from the true Principle of it the Love of God as it is measur'd by the True Rule of it Right Reason in Conjunction with the Revealed Will of God And as it is directed to its proper Ends the Glory of God and the Good of all reasonable Creatures For this kind of Holiness St. Paul (b) 1 Thess 5.23 makes pious Application to God in behalf of the Thessalonians saying The very God of Peace sanctify you wholly and I pray God your whole Spirit and Soul and Body be preserved blameless to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ Now II. Neither of these kinds of Holiness can be properly called a Note of the true Church For the first Kind It is confess'd that the Christian Church is Holy and it was called Holy in the Creed before the Epithet of Catholick was inserted into that Sum of Faith (c) S. Cypr. Epist 70. p. 190. cum dicimus h. e. Baptizandis credis in vitam aeternam remissionem Peccatorum per Sanctan Ecclesiam And the Supream Pastor of the Church lov'd it in such extraordinary manner that (d) Ephes 5.25 26 27. He gave himself for it that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of Water by the Word by Baptism and Assent to the Doctrine and Conditions of the Gospel That he might present it to himself a glorious Church not having spot or wrinckle or any such thing any thing which may seem uncomely to Christ to whom she as Supream Head is united That it should be Holy and without blemish This Holiness of Dedication is elegantly set forth after the manner of the Oriental Poesy in the Book of the Canticles in which is represented the Spiritual Marriage of Christ and his chaste and unblemish'd Church Though some Romanists have wrested these and other places which speak of her Dove-like and undefiled Nature and apply them to that which they please to call the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin (e) V. Coron preuves par l' Escriture du contenu en la foy Catholique p. 1. So ready are they who upbraid the Reformed with Interpreting Scripture out of their own Heads to do the same thing themselves and with a much greater mixture of
Extravagance That the Church is Holy we daily profess Nevertheless such Holiness of the Church cannot properly be called a Note of it for it appertains to its Essence and Constitution and shews what a Church is and belongs to every Church whether Greek Abyssine Roman or English and is not according to Bellarmin's Sense of a Note an External Mark by which we may distinguish betwixt Churches and upon grounds of good Assurance discern any true one from such as are false For the Second kind of Holiness that of Mind and Manners neither is That so far as Man can take Cognizance of it a certain Sign by which we may find out the true Christian Society For First The Officers of the Christian Church invite Men of all Nations and Conditions to come into the Bosom of it and admit them upon their Profession of the common Christianity not being able to penetrate into the Secrets of their Hearts or to foresee whether they who are now in good earnest will persevere or fall away They may therefore admit into the true Fold such as are Wolves in Sheeps-cloathing For Novatian himself did not deny that Men could be secretly wicked before and at Baptism tho he was so rigid as not to believe the Sins committed after it to be forgiven Hence our Saviour compar'd his Church to a Net which contained in it good and bad Fishes And the bad may either soon appear or be long conceal'd under the close Vail of Hypocrisy So deceitful a mark of Incorruption in the Monument is the superficial Whiteness and Ornament of it Bellarmin himself does here furnish us from Theodoret with the Instance of Nestorius who by the help of a pale Look set Speech and grave Apparel deceived both the People and the Officers of the Church and by such Arts lifted himself into an Episcopal Chair Now he is not a Christian who is meerly one outwardly neither is that compleat Baptism which is outward only in the Flesh But he is a Christian who is also one inwardly And Baptism is that which is likewise inward in the Spirit whose praise is not only of Men but of God. Besides where there is no such gross Hypocrisy there may be a specious shew of Holiness not uniform and entire yet proceeding from devout temper some Seeds of natural Reason and some few Principles of Christian Religion whilst the rest are not embrac'd Thus it was with the Sect of Priscillian who by some kinds of real Strictnesses upbraided the looseness of that Age. Yet the Catholick Christians did not from the regularity of their Lives infer the soundness of their Party Likewise there are some Practices which both the Persons and the Spectators judg to be Holy which are not so Such a Practice was that of Ignatius Loyola (f) Masseius in vitâ Ignat. l. 1. p. 74 75. who gave an Alms readily to a poor Man and to all the rest who upon that poor Mans Report press'd immediately upon him till he had emptied all his Stock and was forc'd that Night to beg Bread for himself This Charity how indiscreet soever it was mov'd the poor to cry out with much Admiration as Storyeth Maffeius A Saint a Saint Seeing then the weak will mistake the very Nature of Holiness and the most judicious can only see the external part of it it is not safe arguing for the goodness of the Cause from the seeming goodness of the Life It is true we ought to use a Judgment of Charity But in a Case where we are proving our Faith it becomes us to proceed upon more unquestionable Grounds Secondly Under the same Constitution People may live sometimes with more and sometimes with less Morality If therefore we should prove the State or Church by the manners of the Members the same Constitution at different Times would be good and bad and vary as Men do Bellarmin speaks of the Holiness of Doctrine and the Efficacy of it but it is not irresistibly efficacious And often we find worse Men under better Means and better Men under worse Thus it falls out in Civil Societies where the Model remaining or being improv'd the Vertues of the Subjects decline It did so towards the latter end of the Roman Empire in which tho the Laws remain'd the Dregs of Romulus began to rise again Thus it was in the Church of Israel which was always as God had fram'd it a true Church But if Holiness of Life had been made a Note of it it might in some Junctures have been called a Church but oftner no Church at all Before their Captivity there was a general Corruption of Manners and their Reformation upon their Deliverance was imperfect And the Sense of God's Goodness to them began to wear off and tho they did forbear to adulterate the worship of the true God with mixtures of Idolatry yet they admitted of the formal Religion of the Pharisees which made void real and solid Piety Insomuch that when our Saviour visited the World he could scarce find any Probity in it There are many ways by which Men under the same Constitution may lead more or less virtuous Lives Such are The good or bad Examples of Great Men strict or loose Discipline Affliction or overgrowth in Wealth and Power War or Peace And the last of these is too often tho not the just Cause yet the occasion of Security and of the growing of a kind of slothful Rust upon those who are at ease St. Cyprian (g) S. Cypr. Ser. de Lapsiss p. 123. Ox. Pax longa corruperat jacentem fidem poenè dixeram dormitantem c. speaking of the little quiet the African Church had for a few Years from Severus to Decius tho not without some trouble from the Heathens complains of the Corruption which it bred among Christians Thirdly Add to this that unless a Man do first understand the Nature and Doctrine of the Christian Church he cannot know what Sanctity is and what that is in the Life of any Man which he is to take for the Holiness of a Christian So that the way to be well assured about a true Church is to take our measures not from the Lives of the Members but from the Doctrines of their Society And one might imagine that Cardinal Perron himself (h) Card. Perr Reply to King James l. 4. c. 6. in this Argument had more regard to the Doctrine than the Life when he alluded to an Expression in the Canticles in this fanciful manner The Church sings and will always sing I am black but I am fair that is to say I am black in Manners but fair in Doctrine Which blackness of Manners if he intended as a spot of Beauty upon his fair Doctrine he did not see with Christian Eyes But III. Admitting that Holiness of Life were a Note of the true Church the Roman Church would not from this Concession derive any great advantage It is true and it is granted First That at the