Historical Reflections ON THE BISHOP OF ROME CHIEFLY DISCOVERING Those Events of Humane Affaires which most advanced THE PAPAL VSVRPATION By JOHN WAGSTAFF M. A. O. C. OXFORD Printed by Hen Hall for Ric. Davis and are to be Sold by S. Thompson at the Bishops Head in St Pauls Church-yard 1660. The PRAEFACE THese Reflections having laine by me long enough to coole the heat of my invention upon a late review of them I was emboldnâ—d to this Publication And here I dare promise the Reader that he shall not meet with Crambe bis cocta or a meer garbling of other mens labours For amongst all the various Tracts written against the Pope there never came any into my hands of the same kind Now if the novelty hereof shall invite any one to a perusal perhaps he will not altogether repent his pains especially if he intend for Historical Knowledg In regard that this Treatise may serve as a Praemonstratour or Pointer out of the most remarkable revolutions in Ecclesiastique affairs and the most notable junctures of time The thing which I chiefly aime at in the ensuing discourse is to make it appeare That the Hierarchical Policy of the Roman Church was not extant in the Learned times when the old Roman Empire flourisht But was contrived in the daies of ignorance between the Bishops of Rome and the Leaders or Princes of the Barbarians Nor would the truth of this assertion be in the least manner doubted were we not almost benighted with darke ignorance in reference to preceeding ages For as on the one hand an infinite number of Books have been partly abolished partly counterfeited and Partly adulterated or corrupted So on the other hand Those Books which remaine entire are for the most part written either by unskilful or partial pens However from the very present records an unpraejudicâ—d man though of ordinary parts may gather That the modern Policy which fashions a great part of the world as well in Church as State did take it's beginning since the inundations of the Northerne People July the 20. 1660. POSTCRIPT I have not quoted any Authours for these Passages which are reflected on in the following Treatise When I read the Historians whence the foundation of my discourse is gathered it was not in my thoughts to make use of them this way Afterwards reflecting on the series of affairs in Christendome and framing several meditations thereupon Though I very well remembred the Historians yet I had forgot the names of many Historians whence I gathered it Neverthelesse I can assure the Reader that I have hardly mention'd any Historical passage which is not very obvious in one of these three Authours Blondus Baronius and Platina CHAP. I. That the Roman Bishops had no supremacy over the Primitive Christians I Have often delighted to trace out in my mind the footsteps of the papal usurpations And perhaps it will please the Reader to give him in one view the several steps or degrees by which the Roman Bishop rose unto such a heigth as to trample upon the necks not only of his fellow Bishops but also of Kings and Emperours themselves For that the Pope did not from the beginning enjoy his present great and Lordly power but arrived unto it by several gradations in a long processe of time none but those who are either wholy ignorant of History or else swayed with invincible prejudice can offer to deny It being manifest on all hands that in the Primitive times the Roman Bishops were not taken notice of as superiours to all others much lesse as sole Vicars under Christ and infallible dictatours of Divine truth Indeed you may meet in the ancient Authours with commendations given unto the faith professed by the Bishops of Rome Which is no wonder to him that considers how pious at first they were in their lives how glorious in their deaths bearing witnesse to the Truth under Persecution Besides when the whole Christian world was under one Empire and Rome the Metropolis or Emperial City It was but rational that the new and rising sect of the Christians should bestow the notabl'st men of their party in that place Hence it came to passe that the Fathers dwelling in the Provinces when they contested with Hereticks did often commend the Roman Faith as it were upbraiding their Antagonists with a departure from those who resided in the Metropolis of the Empire where usually Learning and Religion doe most flourish And to speak the truth That advantage which the Roman Bishops had by dwelling in the Emperial City was the chiefe temptation at first inducing them to affect a supremacy For that the dignity and grandeur of a City or place of residence was wont to put spirits into the Bishops residing therein Rome is not the onely example So did Alexandria puffe up her Bishops So did Jerusalem Hers. So especially did Constantinople make John the Constantinopolitan swell with ambition and pride affecting the title of Oecumenical Bishop Nay which you 'l more wonder at even so did Ravenna when proud with Exarchs animate her Bishop also in contending with the Roman for superiority Which contention went so far that the Church of Ravenna by reason of her separation from Rome was commonly called Allocephalis Now by how much the renowned and ancient Rome was more venerable in the eyes of men than other Cities by so much had the Roman Bishops a fairer opportunity than others to put themselves forward and usurp an unlawfull power Nor needed they to be minded of this advantage such of them as were of haughty spirits beginning betimes to make use of it amongst whom I may justly reckon Leo surnamed the Great For he and severall others did take all occasions to send pragmaticall letters up and down the world about every important businesse which happened in Christendome Neverthelesse let no one be afraid of the Roman Bishops and be ready to ascribe unto them an universall Diocesse when he finds them frequently sending stately letters to the Bishops throughout the Christian world Many of those letters recorded in the book entitled Epistolae decretales summorum Pontificum are false and counterfeit many adulterated or corrupted and many if true are so haughtily written as to argue the Authours pride but not his power For in the pimitive times the Christian Bishops did generally and not only the Roman write often to their fellow Bishops in whatsoever place they resided And this they did whether they had any power one over the other or no meerly from a Principle of love or Christian charity Which familiar epistolary entercourse with one another was in those daies laudable and allmost necessary In regard the whole Christian world was at that time under one Empire Consequently they were obliged to exhort and admonish one another upon a twofold respect Partly grounded on that interest which members of the same Commonwealth especially those of the same rank have with one another And partly grounded on that spiritual communion
which ought to be between believers especially those of the same calling But alas had the world been perswaded in the primitive times that the letters of the Roman Bishop were not onely charitative advisoes but dictatorian mandates necessary to be obeyed As proceeding forsooth from one whom Christ had appointed head of his Church and an oracle whence nothing but veritable answers should be heard I say had such a perswasion possessed the minds of men They would have made it the common subject of their praises and thanksgiving Without question many Panegyricall orations and many homilies would have been made upon no other theme or text than the praises of the Roman See and thanks unto God for bestowing on the Christians a visible unerring decider of controversie Whereas on the contrary if we peruse the ancient Writers we shall plainly perceive how little the noise was which the Roman Bishops did make in their daies So little that I much wonder they were no more talkt of considering as I said before their residence in the Metropolâ—◠〈…〉 and their virtues eminent in the first Bishops 〈…〉 not the Fathers been very malignant in this case if the papal pretenses were true not to leave it set down expresly in any of their writings That Christ made Peter the head of his Church and gave unto him an infallible spirit As also that Peter being Bishop of Rome The following Bishops in that City succeeded him not only in his Bishoprick but likewise in his great priviledges of headship and infallibility Moreover did not the Fathers trouble themselves to no purpose in toyling to make laborious confutations of hereticks if they might have had present recourse to a visible unerring authority in decision of controversies So that suppose the Hereticks had refused to submit unto this authority The maine worke should have been not to confute their opinions but to convince them of the duty of their obedience to the supreme judg For my own part I verily believe that if the Bishops of Rome had been acknowledged in the primitive times to be what he pretends to in these daies The eyes of all nations would have been upon that see to revere it to honour it to bow down before it in the submission of their understandings Nay further I am really perswaded Had Christ intended such a supreme power in his Church Seeing it doth so highly import the Church's welfare to be generally known We should have had it set down in Scripture with as expresse termes as we find Justification by faith or the resurrection of the dead But now on the contrary what is there left by 〈…〉 Penmen which may be said to patronize the 〈…〉 and infallibility of Peter and the Roman Bishopsâ— As for Peter how easy were it for me to evacuate those trivial arguments which are drawn from Scripture concerning him which I forbeare to doe because it is not my intent to insist upon Logical arguments either pro or con but only to reflect on Historical passages Wherefore I cannot chuse but take notice that when Peter came to Antioch he walked not according to the truth but was guilty of a great scandall and thereupon withstood to the face by Paul Who makes it his businesse in the two first Chapters to the Galatians to prove himselfe equall with the rest of the Apostles Nay when Peter to speak according to their own phrase was in Cathedra in the midst of a Councel of Apostles and other brethren The definitive sentence to which all did assent proceeded from the mouth of James As for the Roman Bishop you must not look to have any hint of him in Scripture Peter never being taken notice of under such a capacity Nay Paul in those several Epistles which he wrote either to or from Rome doth not so much as mention Peter Which is somewhat strange if Peter did dwell in that City For Paul is solicitous in mentioning severall others farre lesse considerable whom he doth either salute or send salutations from to others But what if it should be granted that Peter was at Rome I am confident it would trouble the whole Papacy to prove that ever he was Bishop of that City Paul it 's certain was there and those who contend that Peter was too doe generally hold they were both martired at the same time the one by the Sword the other by the Crosse Why then was Peter Bishop and not Paul I 'me sure the Scripture saith that Paul was entrusted with the Gospel of the Uncircumcision as Peter with that of the Circumcision Nay James and Peter and John did solemnly give the right hands of fellowship unto Barnabas and Paul That they should goe to the Gentiles and themselves unto those of the Circumcision CHAP. II. How or by what causes the Pope was advanced to a supremacy in the Church BUt I shall not trouble my selfe any longer to make it appeare that neither Peter nor the primitive Bishops of Rome had that power which the later Bishops pretend to derive from them There being few in our Nation that will gainsay the truth of what I have said Wherefore having allready made such briefe remarques as plainly evince the Pope to be an usurper I am now come to what I did chiefely intend namely to lay down the several steps or degrees by which he was advanc'd in his usurpations This I shall doe by reflecting on the events of humane affairs and giving an account in order of the several causes which did cooperate towards the bringing of the intolerable Roman yoake on the necks of our Forefathers The first Cause therefore was The removing of the Empertal seat by Constantine For though a good while after him there were Westerne as well as Eastern Emperours yet after the 〈◊〉 on Italy by the Heruls first and then the Goths The Emperial Majesty did entirely reside at Constantinople Now this City by Constantines means was grown so magnificent and august that it was dearer to the Emperours than Rome in selfe Insomuch that when Bellisarius and Narses had recovered Italy from the Goths The Emperours never affected to goe and reside at old Rome by which means the Bishop thereof gained the more elbow rome to play REX Secondly The residing of the Italian exarchs at Ravenna Justine the second was Authour of the Exarchy to which kind of government the Italian writers impute most of the calamities afterwards befalling Italy But indeed it was the occasion of an other guise calamity than they were aware of For now neither the Emperour himselfe nor so much as his Exarch resided at Rome only a petty companion who was sent by the Exarchs to praeside over the City and was called Duke in the same manner as the governour of Narni Spoleto and other townes of Italy Hence it came to passe that the splendour of Emperiall Majesty being far removed from the eyes of the Roman people Their Bishops shone so much the brighter and gaind a proportionable
increase of veneration Thirdly The comming of the Lombards into Italy who intending the finall conquest of that Country for themselves made it their businesse to destroy the power of the Emperour whom they found Lord thereof Wherefore as soone as the Emperour began to chastise the Insolency of any Roman Bishop who now by reason of the aforementioned causes began to play tricks The Lombard was at hand to help him Again on the otherside when the Lombard out of a desire to win Rome it selfe fell foule with it's Bishop The Emperour for fear of loosing his dominion was faine to helpe him whom before he did endeavour to punish Marke how capriciously things in those daies stood and how exceeding well they suited with the Roman Bishop Whensoever he had to doe with the Lombard he was sure of the Emperous help And when he contended with his Master the Barbarian presently took his part Thus did he rivet himselfe into his Authority between the Emperour and the Lombard till at last by the helpe of the French He brought them both below himselfe as to any Italian Dominion Fourthly The reputation of Gregory the first Roman Bishop of that name who was sir named the Great This man lived in the hottest season of the Barbarian violence when the Empire of the Romans and their learning failed In such an age as that was he being endowed with great natural parts and well accomplisht with acquired perfections did easily overtop his contemporaries Before he was Bishop By his retiring for devotion 's sake to the private life of a Monk By his zealous turning his own house at Rome into a Monastery In general by his outward austerity and sanctity of life he so gained upon the Roman people that they would not part with him when he proffered to goe into Brittany for to convert the Saxons And when he was sent to Constantinople upon publique employment he quickly obtained the Emperour's favour Afterwards when he was chosen Bishop By his zeale in continuing to write volume upon volume concerning the Christian Doctrine As also in destroying the Heathen Authours and those goodly buildings at Rome which he feared might tempt the admiring beholders to hanker after the ancient Roman glory By his new modelling the Christian worship adding many inventions of his own to make it more splendid and pompous in vulgar eyes By his converting the English Saxons By these and many other waies he grew renowned in the world and filled Christendome with his name Nor did his glory expire with his life About an hundred years after this Gregory our Bede in the West and Monke Damascene in the East were passionate in their respects for him and highly magnified him in their writings Nay generally the Monks for a long time did so reverence his memory that he seemed to eclipse the primitive Fathers Now this great esteem and high valuation which the world had of Gregory the first did redound upon the Roman See and proved notably advantageous for his successours But nothing more strengthned their hands than his converting our English Nation No people in the world for a long time after were more prodigal of their bloud more enpensive of their estates in behalfe of the Roman Bishops than our English No people more earnest in their devotion to Rome This can be attributed to nothing else but their conversion by Gregory and to that impression which his memory had left in the minds of their Ancestours and was handed along from father to sonne Nay what say ye if at this very day the Gregorian praises be fresh amongst our English Papists who also have a tender regard for the memory of their Convertor Austin and love the very Benedictines for his sake Fifthly The prodigious growth of the Saracenical Empire founded by Mahomet in the time of Heracltus The Saracens cut out so much worke for the Graecian Emperour in his Easterne provinces that he was forced to neglect and at last give over his interest in the West Now this may be observed all along in History that the weakning of the Emperours was the strengthning of the Popes Sixthly The general deluge of Barbarians overwhelming the Romans in the West much about the same time that the Saracens did in the East Pannonia Italie Spaine France Brittain were all over-run not many years after one another These Barbarians comming from Climates frozen with ignorance as well as cold did both give and receive a Conquest As they Conquered the Romans by their Sword So they were reciprocally foild by the Roman Learning and Religion Now the Bishop of Rome was the grand instrument of their conversion For in those times of general desolation he best held his own and was most eminent in the eyes of the Barbarians by reason of his residence in that Renowned City concerning which before their passage over the Rhine and the Danow they had heard their Fathers speak of old How feasable then was it for him to foist what he pleas'd into the beliefe of those men who newly came from worshipping such kind of Gods as Aegypt was wont to adore Alas those silly soules taken up with amazement at a discovery of the true God had neither leasure nor ability to attend the observing of those obtruded fopperies which they did imbibe together with the principles of their Religion Wherefore if he that first told them of an omnipotent eternal God whose seat was in the highest Heavens and of a Crucified Saviour did at the same time tell them of a St Peter and his Successour T is no wonder that they believed one as well as the other If Valens the Emperour be an Arrian then all those whom he converts will be Arrians too For it is well known that the Visigoths flying from before the approaching Hun when they had obtained their request from Valens for a quiet Habitation in Thrace did not only receive from him the Doctrine of Christ but that of Arrius also Insomuch that they and their posterity for a long time after did stoutly maintain Arrianism So great a prevalency hath that Doctrine which is first seated in the spirits of men Here I shall crave leave of the reader to make a small digression concerning Baronius with a promise to trouble him so no more Baronius in his annals will needs have it contrary to several Historians that these Goths were converted to Christianity long before the time of Valens His reason is because in the time of Constantine they had a Bishop named Theophilus present at the Nicene Councel But I suppose nothing can be lawfully concluded thence excepting this that some few of them were Christians in the dayes of Constantine For my part that the body of their nation was converted before their entrance into Thrace by the permission of Valens I see no reason to believe Seventhly The Collusion between Zacharias the third and Pipin Major domo to the King of France Pipin made use of Zacharias's authority towards the decision
against him for selling the Episcopal preferments Henry instead of appearing convenes a Councel at Wormes Where it is decreed that the Pope shall be degraded from his pontificial dignity because he came to it by sinister and unlawfull meanes Hildebrand hearing this excommunicates the chiefe of the Councel and not only them but the Emperour too interdicting him from Government and disengaging forsooth his Subjects from their oath of obedience Now one would have thought that the world should have whooted at the arrogance of this proud Priest and have taken him down from that domineering throne whence he had taken the boldnesse to act such a part of Lordly pride But alas the Germans were so far from checking the Papal insolence as that they were glad of an occasion to oppose the Emperour for the relieving their own grievances Wherefore they combin'd together and raised such a formidable strength that the Emperour was forced unto base submissions to the Pope And though at last Henry did so bestir himselfe that he depos'd this pragmatical Gregory the seventh Yet was not that revenge no nor the bloud of a thousand Hildebrands able to wash off that stain which the Emperial Majesty had received For the succeding Popes having once had a president case wherein they saw an Emperour was not only excommunicated and interdicted from government by a Bishop of Rome but was forc'd to stoop and submit unto that interdictment by his own subjects They never lest afterward to thunder out their Bulls of excommunication against any Prince that did but enterfere with their ambition Fourteenthly The selling of the Emperial right to many chiefe Italian Cities such as Florence Genoa Lucca Bologne and others by the Emperour Rodolph of Hasburg Who was of such a carelesse humour as that he was wont in sport to give the same reason for his not visiting Italy which the Fox did for his not Visiting the Lion To wit he could see the steps of those that went thither but not of those that came back again The truth is Rodolph's supine negligence about the Italian affairs did so break the neck of the Emperial interest in Italy that it could never hold up it's head again to any purpose For although the Emperour Henry the seventh did bestir himselfe somewhat in the setling of Lombardy and appointing a Sherif to governe Milaine yet not long after the Emperour was grown so contemptible that Charles the fourth was crowned by the consent of Pope Innocent the fourth upon this condition that he should pack immediatly out of Italy Charles obeyed his high and mighty holinesse and passing homeward through Milaine he did utterly evacuate the Emperial power in Italy by making the shreifdome of Milaine Haereditary for which he received a good sum of mony A good sum also his Son Wenceslaus did afterwards receive to make the Sherisdome a Dukedome Thus the Popes saw at last that which their hearts had so long panted after namely the Emperours quite stript of their dominion in Italy and themselves free from being under the nose of them who rais'd the pontificial greatnesse and are by right the Lords and Masters of their Holinesses After this the Emperours enjoyed only an insignificant titular paramountship over Italy whereby they did now and then for mony turne an Earldome into a Marquisate and a Marquisate into a Dukedome Fifteenthly The growing in fashion of a very corrupt ad adulterate kind of Learning called School Divinity A thing compounded of some truths some Papal inventions and some Aristotelical shall I say or rather Arabian Philosophy For it is certain that the Philosophy which then flourisht was taught and improved by such men who understood not Aristotle Nay which is worse who derived their knowledg from the Arabians that did not understand him themselves But that which made this Philosophy the more imperfect was The men who professed it were such as sate in their studies abstracted from the observation and experience of things conversing only with notions and multiplying one notion after another till at last they arrived pardon an odde phrase to the Cobweb subtilty of a wordy nothingnesse Hence it became a meer shop of controversial uncertainties and a store-house of twofac'd distinctions which serve to countenance what side of the question you please Since therefore this Philosophy is of a nature so aequivocal and jugling no man needs to wonder if the Schoolmen by applying it to Divinity were able to fashion religion into what forme they pleas'd For although the whole Masse of their distinctions could never by mincing the matter turne one falschood into a truth yet they might so far pare and slice a falshood as to make it shew trim enough to deceive a praepossessed understanding I say a praepossessed understanding Because the Pontificial Doctrine had in those daies taken possession of almost all our parts of the Christian world and had the wealth of the nations in it's own disposal Children were brought up in that perswasion and when they were grown men the hopes of all their preferment lay that way Now this is palpable enough that when the bent of our understanding is enclined to any party by the strong biasses of education and interest We straightway greedily ' embrace all shewes and appearances of reason which seem to make for our side and with abundance of selfe applause improve a meer sneaking hint of an opinion into a demonstrative confidence Sixteenthly The thriving of the Canon Law a sister profession with School-Divinity These two being as it were twins borne of their Mother the Roman Church much about the same time by the midwifery of Gratian the Monk and Peter Lombard As for the Canon Law I suppose it may not unfitly be called a messe of Divinity and Civil Law boild together but burnt too by reason that as we say in English the Bishop's foot have been in it namely the foot of the Bishop of Rome Whosoever looks into it he may easily perceive how Papal politick tenents have been forsted in as lawes But if any one be loath to take the paines himselfe he shall find many places to this purpose cited for his hand in Sleidan's third book de quatuor summis imperiis Where that Judicious Authour expresseth himselfe with much indignation against this kind of Learning Nor was he alone moved with a prejudice against it Many thousands besides him having high resentments of those many ills which spread abroad the world by reason of the Canon law Otherwise the Decretals would never have been branded with a proverbial ignominy as they were in France witnesse that notable tetrastique recorded by Gregory of Tholouse in his Commentary on the preface of the Decretals Des puis que decret ha prins ales Et les Gendarmes portent males Et les moines vont a cheval En tout le mond n' ha que mal The first and last of these verses which only concern my purpose may be thus Englished After Decretals followed
the decree Since that the world hath n'ought but knavery Now if Gregory the ninth's decretals were justly liable to such a censure what shall we say of the sixth book put out by Boniface the Eighth of the Clementines by Clement the fifth and the extravagants by John the twenty second The latter Pope still exceeding the former in arrogancy and insolence However let the Canon Law be what it will This is certain it hath been one of the notablest engines in the whole world to raise the Papal See to an adored heighth For by this means the minds of many thousands were trained up in a reverence to the Roman Bishops who seem to emulate Emperial Majesty by taking upon them to give lawes unto the world Now the names of Justinian and Tribonian began to dwindle and Gregory with his Raymund grew in request nor hath ever Aristotle nor Galen nor Justinian nor the very Bible it selfe been more zealously smothered with commentatours than the decretals of Gregory have been Nay what say ye if the Canonists have been past all shame in the heat of contending for their own faculties Charles du Moulin in his Treatise of the French Monarchy saith that some of them carp't at the Civil Lawes as impious and of no worth And Francis Hottoman in his Tract intitled Fulmen Brutum testifies that they look upon the Pope as their Jupiter giving him halves with the Emperour in the Government of the world as appeares by this verse which they commonly applied to the Pope Divisum imperium cum Jove Caesar habet This is high language you â— say but perhaps it may be accounted modest if we consider how their own law teacheth them that the Pope is above the Emperour Wherefore no man needs to doubt that the prevailing of such a profession in the world hath been an incredible advantage to the Roman Bishop as being the founder and patron thereof For we all know with what eagernesse of spirit the professours of any faculty doe usually contend for their patrons Whence I may lawfully conclude that as long as this pontificial law shall be attended with wealthy preferments So long the Pope will never want Janisaries I mean Canonists Who for the sake of their own profession and the bread which they get by it will allwaies be sure to be trusty Myrmidons in the Roman cause Thus have I at last traced out the Papal encroachments through Sixteene several causes without mentioning others which seeme not to here so great and necessary an influence Such as the title of Universal Bishop given unto Boniface the third by the Tyrant Phocas The Holy Warre trumpeted forth by Peter the Hermite at the appointment of Urban the Second The abrogation of the Roman Banderensian Magistracy whereby Clement the Fifth became absolute Master of Rome and the like Far lesse was it my intent to take notice of Constantine's donation and such other things which indeed make much for the pontificial advancement if true But their truth is questioned by all indifferent men There being as great a certainty that many false stories have been coyn'd as well as true ones suppressed by the Pope's creatures Amongst which kind of delinquents 't is probable that Pandulphus the Librarian of the Lateran Church was not the least guilty CHAP. IV. A Corollary deduced from the preceeding discourse with a Conclusion intimating how much the Pope is beholding to the want of able and Faithfull Historians ANd now let the Papists object if they please that we have have forsaken the paths of our forefathers with little regard unto ancient times I pray What is the Autiquity they boast of Or what were those ancestours they upbraid us with Can they date their Hierarchichal constitution under one supreme head higher than the barbarous times And are not we as also the Nations round about us the off-spring of Barbarians As long as the Roman Empire stood firme and the stock of primitive Christians did remaine there was no Pope to be heard of Nor is it likely that ever the progeny of those men who were converted by the Apostles and taught by the Fathers would have given way to Papal Dominion any more than the posterity of the Graecians did But in come our ancestors a barbarous generation halfe starved with the cold of their own Climates and resolved for a warmer habitation In come they and like a deluge carry all before them implanting their selves in the roome of those who were the race of first borne Christians Which when they had done they did with admiration here from their conquered enemies the newes of an Omnipotent God a Crucified Saviour a Heaven and a Hell Now what could be expected from these ignorant Barbarians whose former adoration was of no sublimer straine than to worship the Image of a dead man a peice of wood or a rotten clout Nay whose later discoveries were made unto them by word of mouth and taken upon trust they themselves being void of all kind of Learning whereby they might have been enabled to search the Ancient Writers I say what could be expected from such men but that they should be easily cozened partly with the specious pretense of a derived succession and supremacy from Peter by the Roman Bishop and partly with the collusion between the Bishops of that Emperial City and their own commanders Well then if they be deluded must we be so to Or rather ought we not to assert our own liberty and shake off that pontificial yoke under which the spirits of our forefathers did groan The revolutions of eternal providence have brought better times upon us their Children than ever they enjoyed It was much about two hundred yeares agoe that Mahomet the Great Turke did take Constantinople to the utter subversion of the Graecian Empire Whereby overcasting the Sun of Christianity with a dismal cloud in the Eastern parts he was the accidental occasion that it shone the more bright in the West For the poore Greeks being dispersed all abroad Their Learned men to wit Theodore Gaza John Lascaris Manuel Chrysaloras and others did betake themselves to the teaching of the Greeke tongue Hereupon that treasury of all arts and sciences being so happily retrerv'd the purity of Learning began to revive again And those books which ever since the daies of the Goths and Lombards had lain rotting in the publique libraries were every where pulled out of heaps of dust and recovered from the moths and worms By this means we who are the latest nephewes of our barbarous ancestours doe yet overlook them even in reference to their own daies and plainly perceive that they were Heathenish half-witted Christians for a long time void of all knowledg and receiving their instructions from the contrived policy of corrupted men We on the contrary enjoy the Original Scriptures and the Learned Monuments of the primitive Christians by which it is easy to understand that Christianity is no Carnal profession much lesse that on it is