time by (e) Marsil Petav. def part 2. c. 18. the Nicene Council But because N. N. stands so much upon his points of Prudence it may be neither an imprudent nor impertient digression to compare the Romish Principles and Practices with the Protestant and by discussing one of them more largely to judg of the rest more clearly It is universally acknowledged that the Doctrine of all Apostolical Churches disseminated over the whole Christian World is Infallibly certain because attested by Vniversal Tradition which in it self is so but it is generally confessed that the Tradition of an Apostolical Church of one denomination may prudently be traversed because often found certainly False Now Protestants rely upon Vniversal Tradition truly such for Time Place and Persons and the Authority of all Apostolical Churches Papists content themselves and sit down in security with the Tradition and Authority of the Roman Church and which is worse of the present Romish Church of this age Protestants prescribe for Sixteen hundred years there is no Law nor Custom to destroy or over-rule a Prescription of so long standing Papists plead as N. N. doth the acknowledgment of the sixteenth Century over-leaping all the rest and that but in our parts of the World Protestants believe the Scripture to be the adequate Rule of Faith as to the essentials thereof Papists hold unwritten Traditions are to be received with the same reverence and respect Protestants esteem those Books to be Canonical Scripture which the Catholick Church hath so adjudged Papists singularly superadd others to the Canon Protestants believe the Truths they profess to be Divine Revelation because God by his Son Jesus Christ hath delivered and promulgated them to Mankind Papists believe their supernumerary Articles which they assume to themselves because defined by an Infallible Pope with the advice and consent of a presumed General Council Protestants assert the Pope is not Infallible for Pope Honorius was a Convicted Heretick as before hath been proved The Catholick Church hath always resolved against his Infallibility and the Doctors of that Church cannot agree about it and some of them oppose it neither was that Council General say the Protestants because no Southern nor Eastern Bishops was there nor any Northern but one titular only Olaus magnus the Goth who for that time passed as an Arch-Bishop of Sweethland no English Bishops nor Irish save another blind Sir Robert the Scot who for that time being was reputed the Primate of Ireland only two French Bishops six Spanish the rest were Italians who when they came to be arrayed were mustered but to Forty three in all This was a Plot of the Pope to keep what his Predecessor Leo the tenth had got by the Lateran Assemblers and after him others still maintained but he was for all this contrivance possessed with fears and jealousies the Council would be tampering with his Jurisdiction as other Councils had done and therefore was very careful to have fresh supplies in readiness for a reserve and according as the Pope suspected it hapned for the Council began to form Canons for the redress and reformation of several abuses and to abridg the Popes unlimited Power in granting Dispensations of which design he received early intelligence from his Legates and thereupon moved the Council to desist from any further progress therein for six weeks which being accepted and condescended to he dispatched his new recruits of Auxiliaries forty Italian and Sicilian Bishops who within the time limited ariving at Trent over-voted the reformers in the Council and quite quashed their attempts which made the Apulean Bishops cry out in open Council O we are the Popes Creatures we are the Popes (f) Carol. Malin l. de ton Frid. n. 21. Slaves Protestants rely only upon the Mercy of God and Merits of Christ for their Salvation This Bellarm. saith is the safest way and therefore it is the most Prudential Papists will join in their own Merits of Works done by Grace which Bellarm. confesseth is a more uncertain way and therefore less Prudential Protestants ascribe all Religious Worship to God and to God only Papists give it to Images and the Consecrated Host Protestants know it is an indispensable duty to Pray to God for all things necessary both for Soul and Body and direct their Prayers only to God the Father through and for the Merits and Mediation of Jesus Christ alone Papists Pray to God by Jesus Christ for which Duty Zanchee entertains a charitable opinion of them but withall they invocate Angels and Saints departed as Conductors secondary and subordinate Mediators for which Practice Protestants aver there is no warranty in Scripture no Authority from Primitive Antiquity nor any rule in Reason to approve it either a necessary lawful or an expedient Duty But because some eminent Protestants have declared that Papists have more to say for this particular than in any of their other eleven additional new forged Articles if this Principle and Practice of theirs be cogently proved unscriptural unpractical and irrational the same may be concluded of the rest CHAP. VI. SECT I. IT is Vnscriptural The Scripture teacheth us and commands us to ask the Father in the name of his Son Jesus Christ it prescribeth no rule to ask in any other name but declareth against it For it proposeth Christ to us as our only Mediator and Intercessor there is one God to whom we are to make our requests known by Prayer and Supplication and there is one Mediator between God and Man 1 Tim. 2.5 the God-man Jesus Christ by whom we have boldness of access to the Throne of Grace The Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is emphatical importing thus much as there is one God only and no more even so there is one Mediator betwixt God and Man in reference to our Prayers Supplications Intercessions and Thanksgivings ver 2. one God and no other besides him even so one Mediator and none but he who is our Advocate with the Father Jesus Christ the righteous 1 Joh. 2.1 who as he performed all Righteousness for us so the virtue and value thereof qualifies and capacitates him for the Office of being Advocate for us viz. to recommend open and plead our Cause for us and procure our Prayers to be granted none can effectually Mediate for us but he who did Redeem us he only can be our Advocate who is the Propitiation for our Sins which was Jesus only who for the more effectual execution of his Office of Advocate after he had offered himself a Propitiatory Sacrifice for our Sins was advanced to sit on the right hand of God the Father Rom. 8.34 where it may be observed that it is the same Person that died for us and therefore as Jesus alone died for our Sins and rose again for our Justisication so for the application of these Benefits and Priviledges to us he only sits at God's Right-hand and makes Intercession for us this Office being as proper and
nature and kind so they shall have distinct natural qualities and operations for then the Angels shall remain as they are more Spiritual substances the Saints departed shall have Bodies though these also in some respect Spiritualized and incorruptible but some only and these specified and intimated in the Context in that Spiritualized state they shall not need Matrimony for the propagation of their kind nor Food for the preservation of their numerical persons as Alphonsus (k) Alphonsus à Castro l. 3. c. haer Jansen Harm Evaug c. 117. a Castro and Jansen understand the words and so they shall be as the Angels or equal to them in being the Children of God for that they are Children of the Resurection which in effect amounts to this they as the Angels shall be free from all the necessities of a temporal human life and from all material and corporeal affections and which is more shall be equal to the Angels in the participation of eternal bliss and the immovable possession of that Inheritance which is incorruptible undefiled and fadeth not away and reserved for them Again they produce Rev. 5.8 four and twenty Elders fell c. but Viega Lyra and Haimo will tell them these four and twenty Elders are not the members of the Church Triumphant Saints reigning in Heaven but of the Church Militant and principally the Pastors (l) Viega in Apoc. c. 4. Lyr. in 8. pl 1. and Bishops thereof And lastly they cite Rev. 8.4 but several of their learned Expositors will satisfie them that that Angel is Christ Albert. Viega Hug. Card. (m) Haimo in loc Aug. Hom. 4. in Apocal. Neither were these Supplications for Pardon and Grace but for Thanksgivings for the redemption of the World as appears by ver 9 and 13. August Hom. 6. in Apocal. Haimo the Glosses and Diouys Carthus saith the Catholick Doctors understand it so SECT II. IT is unpractical Indeed the Tridentine Assemblers affirm it is a good and profitable Practice to Invocate Angels and Saints departed and their great reason of this their affirmation is that it is a Custom received from the Apostles and perpetually hath been retained in the Church of God and agreeable hereunto it is so resolved in the Roman Catechism Par. 2. c. 2. Sect. 5. p. 297. and yet it is most evident that St. Paul when he instructed the Christians of his time in the Duty of Prayer not only for the Substance thereof but descending to a consideration of its convenient circumstances never hinted the expediency of this so supposed profitable Practice which certainly he would not have omitted if he had entertained such a conceit of the profitableness of this Duty as the Romanists do For he professeth that he kept nothing back that was profitable to the Asians during the time of his residence with them but that publickly and privately which is all one with in season and out of season he taught them Repentance towards God and Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ now because it is impossible to make it appear by any one instance that either he taught this Doctrine of Invocating the Blessed Spirits or prescribed the Practice or ever exemplified it to them by his own usage it necessarily follows he never deemed either the Doctrine or Practice to be any profitable Duty or any part of Repentance towards God or of Faith in our Lord Jesus Christ But as it was no Apostolical practice so neither could it be the constant Custom of the Church in the Primitive succeeding Centuries For the Doctrine and the present Practice of the Church of Rome being grounded on this supposition that the Saints departed do now Reign in Heaven and enjoy the Beatifical Vision whereby they are capacitated to have cognizance of the Devotions of their humble Petitioners those Primitive Doctors who did peremptorily deny the supposition cannot be supposed to assert the Doctrine and Practice founded thereupon because he that denies the supposition must consequently deny the Doctrine and Practice established upon it unless he be presumed to be so inconsiderate and interested as to believe and act contrary to his received Principles and it is hardly to be believed that those ingenious Romanists who profess great reverence to antiquity will think so hardly of the ancient Fathers Now Learned Romanists do confess that Eighteen Catholick Doctors and Fathers of the best note both of the Western and Eastern Church have constantly affirmed the Saints departed do not enjoy the Beatifical Vision but after death are kept in certain hidden receptacles in Rest and Peace till the General Resurrection and they were great names who are confessed to be of this opinion viz. Clem. Rom. Just Mart. Orig. Tert. Ambr. Lact. Hil. Chrysost Prud. Theod. Theod. Theoph. Euih Oecum Ar. Caesar and Bernard Neither could those eminent Fathers who from the Catholick Practice of Invocating God by his Son Jesus Christ and praying in the Holy Ghost be supposed to Invocate the Blessed Saints because they concluded from this Practice the Divinity of the Son and the Holy Ghost disputing against the Arrians and Macedonians viz. Catholicks did Pray unto them the force of which argument depended upon a received rule among them that God alone was to be Invocated neither could those Ancients have justly condemned the Arrians of Idolatry for Invocating Christ whom they conceived to be a Creature but that they had resolved that no Creature was capable of the Divine honour of Invocation But both Bellarm. and (n) Vide Infra Petavius confesseth we must not say their Argument was weak and inconclusive and it was so if a distinction would have invalidated it for then the Arrians would by such evasion have worsted the Catholicks because they could have retorted upon them with great advantage For if the Catholicks had practiced this invocation of the Blessed Spirits the Arrians would have galled them with this return You Catholicks or who would be reputed so charge us with the guilt of Idolatry in that we Pray to Christ whom we judg a Creature whereas you give the same honour to Blessed Spirits the Angels and Saints departed and therefore take the guilt home to yourselves and object not that to us wherein you your selves are more criminal if the Catholicks had replied in excuse of this their Fact as the Romanists now do We indeed Invocate those Creatures with indirect subaltern and relative Prayer but direct soveraign and final we render to God only and when we Pray to him we have more high and hohourable Conceptions of his Divine Majesty than we have to those Creatures when we Pray to them The Arrians would have smartly rejoyned even so do we Invocate Christ and in our inward thoughts we honour him above all other Creatures and we have better reason to Invocate Christ than you have to Invocate Angels or Saints departed because confessedly Christ is superiour to them and deserveth greater Honour than they can expect or is due to them
he had been a Rebel and a Traitor and therefore deserved not the Honour of Martyrdom whereupon they procured the Kings Injunction to blot out his name out of all Publick Prayers Hours and Missals to demolish his Shrine and Picture Erected at Canterbury and strictly forbad any to call him (h) Hist Conc. Trent fol. 87. Saint and Martyr Other Pontificians there be who although they resolve the Pope may err in matters of Fact yet will not endure to hear that he can err in his Canonizations which is very strange because the inerrability of his Canonizations depends wholly or chiefly on matters of Fact but their Reason is remarkable which is this for (i) Particularly Catherinus advers nova dogm Cajet p. 125. say they if any one Saint Canonized by the Pope may be called in question then all the Saints which have been or shall be Canonized by the Pope may be doubted of and then no man can invocate or worship them without peril of Idolatry Then let Cajetan and Canus be taken at their words that the Popes Canonization is subject to Error and thank we Catherinus and Bell for their inference and conclude from both laid together that because many Canonized by the Pope have been doubted of as Tho. Becket St. Francis St. Dominick St. Ignatius Loiola and Father Henry Garnet c. therefore all the Pope hath Canonized may be doubted of and therefore none of them can be Invocated without peril of Idolatry But then how comes the Invocation of a doubted Saint to be Idolatry this cannot be unless the Invocation of all Saints be Latria for Doulia as it is by the Romanists contradistinguished to Latria is not contradictorily opposed to Idolatry Latria is for as Latria imports the Honour proper to God only so Idolatry consists in the exhibition of that Honour to that which is not God but Doulia according to them is not part of Religious Worship due only to God and therefore the erroneous Supplicant who pays this Homage of Doulia to a doubted Saint instead of an undoubted one which doubted Saint he believes a real one may fall under the censure of Folly Rashness or Errour but the well meaning Petitioner in this case who makes his addresses to a mistaken Advocate and with relative Worship only according to their Principles cannot lie under the guilt of Idolatry because in their account the conception and intention abates it and to attribute Doulia or Relative Worship is not Idolatry if it be the Sin lies at their doors who confessedly Practice it To Conclude It is therefore the most prudent and profitable course to follow the advice which the Holy Martyr St. (k) Ep. ad Philadelph Ignatius gave to the Virgins of his time and by consequence to all who profess the name of Christ viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O ye Virgins have Christ alone in your eyes and his Father in your Prayers being enlightned by the Spirit which in effect is an exhortation to all who are Baptized according to the form of the Institution for being enlightned and being Baptized are still Synonyma's both in Scripture and Primitive Antiquity and therefore the advice concerns all Christians as well as those Virgins and so Epiph. 79 Haeres 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and again 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Therefore Glory be to God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Ghost three Persons one God For thine is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory for ever and ever AMEN Lact. lib. 4. de Vir. Sap. c. 22. Quanquam apud bonos Judices satis habeant firmitatis vel Testimonia sine Argumentis vel Argumenta sine Testimoniis nos tamen non contenti alterutro sumus cum suppeditet nobis utrumque nè cui perversè ingenioso aut non intelligendi aut contra disserendi locum relinquamus Aug. de Trin. l. 4. c. 6 Contra rationem nemo sobrius contra Scripturas nemo Christianus contra Ecclesiam nemo pacificus senserit THE JESUITS LETTER Hon. c. THere have been many Discourses betwixt us for matter of Religion wherein little profit did accrue in regard of my inabilities having to deal with a person of your Knowledg and Parts so fully accomplished and fraught with Arguments But seeing the true Religion is the sole mark we ought to aim at the disquisition thereof cannot be too much searched and I am confident you wish and desire my eternal good and in the integrity of my heart I wish the same to you wherefore I shall only desire to receive solution to two Questions and I shall totally decline to scruple all others the Questions are these 1. To nominate the Professors of the Protestant Faith successively since the Apostles 2. To evidence that the English Clergy hath a lawful Mission for it is said No man taketh this Honour upon him but he that was called and Faith cometh by hearing The holy Scripture doth fully express that upon the Walls of Jerusalem Watch-men should be day and night for ever that the Word should not depart out of the mouth of his Seed for ever our Blessed Saviour saith Go tell the Church and that he would be with them to the end of the World which is not verified unless there were such persons in the World Answer to the first Question 1. IS it not sufficient Protestants prove their Faith Apostolical from the Monuments and Records of the Apostles were not the Apostles assisted by the HOLY SPIRIT in an higher manner and measure than any of their Successors can pretend to did not they deliver the whole will of GOD by their Preaching while they lived and by their Writings for ever and are not their Writings as clear and comprehensive and more authentical than any of those of the following Pastors and Doctors are not the Decrees of Councils and Works of the Fathers as liable if not more to fraud and forgery to misinterpretations and wrestings as the holy Scriptures Is there any Record or Writing extant which can equally pretend to Apostolical and Original Tradition or hath such an universal and constant attestation as the HOLY BIBLE I conceive the Apostolical Writings are the best evidences of Apostolical Doctrine and in causes of Religion judg them Criminals who decline a Trial by them but since this way of Probation will not please you a shrewd suspition all is not right with you I add further 2. Supposing not granting Protestants were not able to nominate the successive Professors of their Faith since the Apostles would this conclude them Hereticks and their Faith not Apostolical no sure for suppose we one Philosopher to hold all the opinions of Plato another those of Aristotle would you determine the one not to be a Platonist the other not an Aristotelian because neither of them could present you with a list and line of successive Academicks and Peripateticks this among Philosophers would be adjudged irrational But where hath Christ or his Apostles