A VINDICATION OF THE BISHOP of CONDOM's EXPOSITION OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE Catholic Church In Answer to a Book Entituled An Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England c. With a Letter from the said Bishop Permissu Superiorum LONDON Printed by Henry Hills Printer to the King 's Most Excellent Majesty for His Houshold and Chappel 1686. A VINDICATION OF THE EXPOSITION of the DOCTRINE OF THE Catholic Church PART I. Containing an Answer to the Preface IT is no less strange than much to be deplored that Religion which ought to be the Common Band of Unity should by the subtilty of Satan become the Occasion of Discord and Contention amongst Christians And that all the Methods which the Catholic Church makes use of or the Means her dutiful Children can suggest should be so far from opening the Eyes of many otherwise clear-sighted and well-meaning Persons led away with the Prejudice of Education as to give them occasion to calumniate her Doctrines censure her Practices and condemn her Pastors One would have thought such a Book as is the Bishop of Condom's Exposition free from Passion grounded upon the Pure Doctrine of the Council of Trent and seconded by the greatest Authority in the Church next to that of the Council it self should have calm'd the Minds of them who pretend to be lovers of Peace and Unity and have made those who propose to themselves any thing of sincerity in matters of such high concerns to acknowledge the Doctrines of the Catholic Church to have been faithfully Expounded in it But we see the contrary and that a Book thus grounded upon the manifest Doctrine of a General Council approv'd as such by the Learned Prelates of divers Nations and by the Pope himself must be made to pass amongst our New Reformers as a Book which Palliates or Prevaricates the Doctrine of our Church and the very Approbations as meer Artifices to deceive the World and not as Sincere much less Authoritative Approbations either of the Nature or Principles of the same Doctrine Pref. p. 15. Had the Author indeed of this Calumny who pretends to lay down the Doctrine of the Church of England given us some more Authentic Testimonies for what he Publishes or taught us some better Method whereby to know the Doctrine of a Church he might have had a more plausible appearance of Reason to complain But when we see him giving us the Doctrines of his Church upon no better Testimony than his own and that of an Imprimatur when we see him to be so far from fixing himself to the known Doctrine of the Church of England exhibited in her Canons and Thirty nine Articles that in several places he asserts what is not to be found amongst them and when we hear him telling us he has forborn to set his Name to it Pref. p. 18. least perhaps any prejudice against his Person might chance to injure the Excellence of the Cause which he maintains I cannot without some wonder reflect upon his Censure and the Reception his Book is said to have had But it seems for him to tell us He is so assured he has not Palliated or Prevaricated the Doctrine of the Church of England in his Exposition Ibidem that he entirely submits himself and it to her Censure and the sight of an Imprimatur Carolus Alston R. P. D. Hen. Episc Lond. prefix'd before it is sufficient in some Mens Judgments to Authorize an Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England when the Approbation of so many Learned Judicious and Pious Prelates of the Church of Rome together with that of the whole Assembly of the Clergy of France and of the Pope himself at two several times must by our Author be noted as proceeding from a Peculiar Art unknown to Protestants who are accustomed as he says to sincere dealing Pref. p. 13. But we shall have occasion shortly to examine whether he has made use of that sincerity to which he makes so strong Pretentions Indeed an Answer to his Book seems so needless that I often thought it would be sufficient to tell this Nameless Author That when his Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England has receiv'd from the Church of England as full and as Authentick a Testimony of being neither Palliated nor Prevaricated by him as hath the Exposition of the Bishop of Meaux from the Church Catholic and that when his Arguments appear so much as directly to confront the Bishops Exposition it would be time enough to Publish a Justification of that Work against his Calumnies But because this Author has declar'd tho rashly in the name of Protestants that they look upon those Opinions to be indefensible Pref. p. 16. which are not maintain'd against the Assaults of every one that pleases to write against them and that 't is an open and shameful forsaking of them not to take care to defend every thing that is Publish'd it may be some unwary Persons may look upon all he has said as Gospel unless his Discourse be unravell'd and the mistakes he has fallen under with the Sophistry of his Arguments be shewn But before I begin it will be necessary to give the Reader a short Account of the Bishop of Meaux's Intention in publishing this Book and what he expected from any one who should go about to Answer it which may serve for a true state of the Question And First as for his Intention having all along observ'd that our Doctrines were strangely Misrepresented and that not only the private Opinions of Scholastic Authors but even the Inventions of our Enemies were most commonly objected to us as the Tenets of our Church he thought it necessary to propose her Doctrine plainly and simply Expos p. 1. and to distinguish it aright from those Tenets which have been falsly imputed to her Note that the Quotations out of the Exposition are from the Impression published by His Majesty's Command by which he hop'd many of those false Notions of her Doctrine which divers Persons had form'd to themselves would have been remov'd and an Union much more easily obtain'd For it is a certain Truth That if the Doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church when truly Represented be Innocent and Pure and so far from destroying the acknowledg'd Foundations of the Christian Faith that it alone bears proportion and conformity to them then all the pretended Reformations of that Doctrine are but vain and unprofitable Labours and a Separation from that our ancient mother-Mother-Church upon no better Grounds must be Schismatical and therefore all those who have broken the Unity of the Church upon such a pretended Reformation are oblig'd to return to her Bosom and Communion So that his Intentions were not so much to Argue or Dispute upon Points of Catholic Doctrine as to Propose them truly and render them Intelligible And therefore he pitch'd upon the Council of Trent as the fittest Compass by which he might
steer his Course resolving not to deviate from its Sence being that of the Catholic Church but meerly to separate Matters of Faith from such Opinions as are neither necessarily nor universally receiv'd Expos p. 2. And therefore he declar'd Secondly That they who would go about to Answer his Exposition ought not to undertake to Confute the Doctrine contain'd in it Expos p. 43. seeing his Design was only to Propose it without going about to Prove it That it would be a quitting the Design of his Treatise to Examine the several Methods which Catholic Divines make use of to Establish or Explicate the Doctrine of the Council of Trent and the different Consequences which particular Doctors have drawn from it That it would avail them nothing Advert p. 20. either to object against us those Practises which they call general or the particular Opinion of Doctors because it suffices in one word to say That those Practices and Opinions be they what they will which are not found conformable to the Intent and Decisions of the Council are nothing to Religion nor to the Body of the Catholic Church nor ought by Consequence as the pretended Reform'd do themselves avouch Daillè Apol c. 6. p. 8. to give the least pretence to Separate from us because no one is oblig'd either to approve or follow them Expos p. 43. Lastly That to urge any thing solid against his Treatise and which may come home to the Point it must be prov'd that the Churches Faith is not faithfully Expounded in it and that by Acts which the same Church has oblig'd her self to receive or else it must be shown that this Explication leaves all the Objections in their full force and all the Disputes untouch'd or in fine it must be precisely shown in what this Doctrine subverts the Foundation of Faith So that if they who Answer'd his Book brought only Arguments against the Doctrine deliver'd in it from private Authors holding particular Scholastic Opinions and not from Authentic Acts receiv'd by the Catholic Church or did not manifestly show the Bishop of Condom to have left out the chief Matters in Dispute and touched only lesser Difficulties or did not demonstrate how the Doctrine as Expounded by him subverted the remaining Maxims wherein both Protestants and we agree the Bishop might justly esteem their Answers not worthy his Reflection and that every Judicious Reader would grant his Pieces were as this Author terms them tho' in derision of a spirit and force sufficient to despise whatever Attempts could be made upon them of that nature Pref. p. 16. How true it is that nothing solid of this kind was objected by the Pretended Reform'd in France appears by his Advertisement And what our Author of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England has Propos'd is now our Province to Examine And first as to his Preface He tells us of a first Edition suppress'd and another with Corrections publish'd in its place because the Sorbon refus'd to Approve the first He tells us of one Imbert and a Pastor of Mechlin Condemn'd the one by the Archbishop of Bourdeaux and the other by the Faculty of Lovain tho' they both alledg'd the Bishop of Condom's Exposition for proof of their Doctrines He tells us that Cardinal Capisucchi and Father Crasset have taught Doctrines contrary to that of the Exposition c. But suppose all he there says should be true what force can his Argument bear against the Doctrine as now Explicated in the later Editions of the Exposition what if some particular Persons have sustain'd Scholastic Opinions which in some sence seem to thwart the Doctrine of the Exposition as to such Scholastic Opinions and others like drowning Persons have grasp'd at any thing to save themselves whether for them or against them It follows not that the Exposition gives us not the Doctrine of the Church But to show the World what has been imposed upon them on this account by those who in their own Countries studied to maintain old Calumnies by new Inventions I shall here insert the Copy of a Letter lately sent me by that Learned and Pious Prelate in which they will see the true Matter of Fact as to those things alledg'd against his Exposition Very Reverend Father IT will not be difficult to answer your Letter of the Third Instant nor to solve the Objections drawn from Matters of Fact sent you out of England against my Exposition of the Catholic Doctrine The English Minister who has oppugn'd it and whose Objections you have sent me has done nothing but gather'd together the vain Inventions which our Huguenots endeavor'd to publish here and which are come to nothing of themselves without my being oblig'd to combat them This Author first tells us the Sorbon would not Approve to my Book But all the World here knows I never so much as thought of asking it The Sorbon is never us'd to Licence Books in Body If it did I should not need its Approbation having that of so many Bishops and being Bishop also my self That Venerable Company knows better what is due to Bishops who are naturally and by their Character the true Doctors of the Church than to think they have need of the Approbation of her Doctors when moreover most of those Bishops who have approv'd my Book are of the Body of the Sorbon and I my self also partake of that Honor. It is a great weakness to require of me to produce the Approbation of Sorbon when they see in my Book that of so many Learned Bishops that of the whole Clergy of France in the General Assembly of 1682 and that of the Pope himself You see by this Sir that it is a manifest Falsity to say that a first Edition of my Book was suppress'd because the Doctors of Sorbon had something to say against it I never did publish nor cause to be Printed any other Edition but that which is in the Hands of every one to which I never added nor diminish'd one Syllable and I never yet fear'd that any Catholic Doctor could find in it any thing worthy of Reprehension This to the first Objection of the English Author As for what he adds in the Second place That a certain Catholic whose Name he designs by a Capital Letter had written against me suppose it had been true so much the worse for that ill Catholic But this is as the rest an Invention of their own Heads Our Huguenots have in vain endeavour'd to vend such false Wares here no body ever yet heard of that Catholic they could never name him and all the World has scoffed at them for going about it In the Third place he tells us That Father Crasset a Jesuit has oppugned my Doctrine in a Book Entituled La veritable Devotion envers la Sainte Vierge I have not read that Book but neither did I ever hear it mention'd there was any thing in it contrary to mine and that
particular Account was given him by Letter touching these Matters of Fact There are two things remaining in the Preface which seem to require a farther Examination because they were not fully Represented to the Bishop The first is the Objection drawn from Cardinal Capisucchi's Book which this Author affirms to contradict the Bishop of Condom's Exposition The other is the Consequence he draws from thence and from other pretended Actions to wit That Roman-Catholics think it lawful even to set their Hands to Pref. p. 13. and approve those Books whose Principles and Doctrine they dislike To the First Whereas he affirms Cardinal Capisucchi to have contradicted the Doctrine of the Exposition we must first take notice The Bishop of Condom's intention was not to meddle with Scholastic Tenets but purely to deliver that Doctrine of the Church which is necessarily and universally receiv'd whereas Cardinal Capisucchi being oblig'd to no such strictness would not it may be contradict the Problematical Niceties of those Schools in which he had been Educated so that what he said might pass without a Censure And yet even in this if his Sence be rightly understood the unbiass'd Reader will plainly see that his Doctrine is the same with that of the Exposition The Bishop of Condom declares Expos p. 8. Sess 24. Dec. de Invoc c. from the Council of Trent That we are forbidden to believe any Divinity or Vertue in Images for which they ought to be reverenc'd That the Honour which is given to them ought to be referr'd to the Prototypes represented by them And this the Cardinal tells us in express Terms Oh! but he tells us of a Divine Worship says this Author paid to the Images of the Holy Trinity of our Blessed Saviour and of the Holy Cross Whether he use that Expression or no I know not having not yet seen the Book but yet this very Author tells us how the Cardinal explicates himself That the Honour which is paid to the Images is only upon account of the Things represented by them and not upon account of the Images themselves as thinking any Divinity in them for to do that he confesses would be Idolatry Ibidem And what is this but what the Bishop of Condom has express'd in other Terms from the Council of Trent That the Honour we render to Images has such a reference to those they represent Sess 25. Dec. de Inv. c. that by the means of those Images we kiss and before which we kneel we adore JESUS CHRIST Nay more the Cardinal tells us That this Honour is not to be paid to them otherwise than upon account of the Things represented by them and as they are in that respect one and the same with the Thing which they represent And what is that but to adore God or JESUS CHRIST in presence of the Image Ibid. Pontif. de Bened Imag. as the Bishop of Condom has express'd it from the Pontifical This St. Thomas explicates by a familiar Example of the Royal Robes For as we plainly see the Purple puts us in mind of the Prince and so do's the Cross of our Crucified Saviour We pay a Sovereign Honour to the King when in His Robes but in Incognito we pay not a Respect with such Formalities 't is not the Purple or the Robes we honour for themselves but as making one with the King nor is it the Cross we honour but in respect of CHRIST If the Honour which we shew to the Purple or the Chair of State may in some sence be call'd Regal or Sovereign Honour 't is only in respect of our King or Sovereign and in like manner if that Honour which is shewn to the Crucifix may in some sence be call'd Religious or which is more Divine 't is purely in respect of JESUS CHRIST who is both God and Man All the difference therefore betwixt Cardinal Capisucchi and the Master of the Sacred Palace is thus easily reconcil'd and if there be any difference it only consists in this that when the Master of the Sacred Palace wrote to the Bishop of Condom he approv'd his Book in which he stuck close to the necessary and universally receiv'd Doctrine of the Church and conform'd himself to the Language of it making a distinction betwixt the Images and things represented by them whereas the Cardinal Capisucchi conform'd himself to a Scholastic Stile and suppos'd the Representative as Representative to be representatively one and the same with the thing represented But I needed not to have taken this pains to reconcile the Bishop of Meaux with Cardinal Capisucchi seeing another particular Examination of the Bishop's Book upon this Point Answ to Papist Protesting c. pag. 91. has reconcil'd the Bishop's Doctrine with that of St. Thomas that is with Cardinal Capisucchi's tho' he erre in the right Explication of both their Doctrines Now Secondly as for his Assertion That we think it lawful to disguise the Sentiments of our Religion and his Confirmation of it from the Procureur General of Paris his Answer to Father Thomassin Pref. p. 14. That they suffer'd in France an Italian should write according to the Principles of his Country but for a Frenchman to do the same was another matter He ought to have made a distinction between Matters of Faith and Scholastic Opinions or to use other Terms the Doctrines of a Church and the Doctrines in a Church Every one knows that the Doctrines of a Church or Matters of Faith being Tenets necessarily and universally receiv'd ought upon no account to be dissembled or disguis'd and he can bring no one Example of that nature But as for Scholastic Opinions or the Doctrines in a Church of which daily Disputes are rais'd in the Schools we see not only one Nation commanding one thing to be taught and another quite the contrary but even one University against another in the same Country nay one College against another in the same University without the least breach of Unity or note of Intriguing Dissimulation Thus Father Thomassin having undertaken a Scholastic Dispute of the Authority of the See Apostolic above that of a General Council a Dispute which is defended in the Schools of Italy but forbid in France and neither generally nor necessarily received by the Church no wonder if the Procureur General of Paris should refuse to suffer it to be Printed Thus also it is the Jesuits have found it convenient upon other accounts also it may be as well as that such as is the difficulty of sending to Rome for the Approbation of every Book c. to take their Licences from their respective Provincials Thus much for his Preface And as for the Collections he has given of some Passages in the Edition printed without the Bishop of Condom's consent we have little to say to them more than what the Bishop has himself answer'd in his Letter unless it be to thank this Author for being so ingenuous as to
print them for every unbiass'd Reader may there see that the first Edition instead of proposing the Doctrine of the Church of Rome as this Author says it did so loosly and favourably Pref. p. 2. that many undesigning Persons of that Communion were offended at it Ibid. p. 3. did on the contrary if any fault be to be found on that score propose the same Doctrine with too much strictness They may see also that the Sorbonne was so far from marking out as he says several of the most considerable Parts of it Ibid. wherein the Exposition by too much desire of palliating had absolutely perverted the Doctrine of their Church that this very Author in his Collections could not propose one Doctrine so perverted without a forced Interpretation of his own nay on the contrary he is sensible that in some places the Bishop had rather spoken with too much strictness and therefore after his wonted way of turning all things to a wrong intention he tells his Reader Collect. p. 23. That th' other was really the true Sence of the Church but it was thought too ingenuous and 't is not fit Protestants should know it And in another place Ibid p. 32. That the first Exposition ran much higher than it seems the Spirit of the Gallicane Church could bear But it may be what was struck out of the Exposition to please the Correctors M. de Meaux recompensed in his Letter to satisfie his Holiness But if in some other Places he has either retrench'd or alter'd his Expression any one who is not willing to take every thing by a wrong Handle may easily see it was not out of such ill Designs as this Author endeavours to persuade us but purely to retrench what was not conformable to his Design of a bare Exposition or what had been sufficiently express'd before to keep himself more precisely to the Doctrine of the Council of Trent or to obviate any malicious Interpretations which Persons disposed to take all things in a wrong sence might force upon his Expressions if he worded them not more cautiously But above all it seems to me most strange that any especially one who dares publish to the World the Doctrine of a Church should make the alteration or retrenchment of some manner of Expressions in a Book writ as he owns four Years before so hainous a Crime that the Author must needs pass for one that either did not understand his own Doctrine Pref. p. 4. or at least had not the Sincerity to Expound it right He may wish it may be he had been as cautious in his own Book as the Bishop was in his However we have nothing to do with the first Impression 'T is this other put out by the Bishop of Meaux himself which has been presented to you and to which so many Authentic Approbations and Testimonies have been given And I affirm he must be strangely deceiv'd or wilfully blind who will not grant it to contain the true Doctrine of the Church according to the Sence of the Council of Trent But now to the Book it self PART II. ART I. INTRODVCTION SHould I undertake to examine all the Calumnies Misrepresentation unsincere Dealings and Falsifications of this Author in almost every Article I should swell this Answer beyond the Bounds I have prescrib'd to my self and make it tedious to the Reader yet some however I shall take notice of as they fall in my way from whence I hope we shall find this advantage that all those Books to which an Imprimatur Carolus Alston c. is prefixed will not hereafter be concluded free from Errours nor will every nameless Author who professes to be sincere pass hereafter for an Oracle His Introduction is Calumny in a high Degree and the State of his Question drawn from thence as unsincere He tells us of adoring Men and Women Crosses Introd p. 3 4 5. Images and Relics of setting up our own Merits and making other Propitiatory Sacrifices for Sin distinct from that of the Cross which he says P. 5. are contrary to our pretended Principles to wit That Religious Worship is due to God alone That we are to be sav'd only by Christ's Merits and That the Death of CHRIST was a perfect Sacrifice but yet are not as he tells us obscure Consequences drawn from our Doctrines but the plain and confessed Opinions of the Church of Rome the Practice and Prescription of the Chiefest Authority in it and therefore for us to refuse their Charge is to protest against a matter of Fact a Plea which even Justice it self has told us may without Calumny be rejected as invalid Were these Doctrines and Practices which he alledges the plain and confessed Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome he would 't is true have reason to say they contradict our Principles But seeing they are all so solemnly renounced by us that we detest the very thoughts of them and cannot hear these repeated Accusations without nauseating them and seeing he has been so often told that these Consequences are not only far-fetch'd obscure and disavowed but Consequences which are so false that no Connection can be found betwixt them and our Doctrines and Practices when truly represented we have just reason to refuse the Charge and tell him they have no more Justice to accuse us of them than Dissenters from the Church of England have to accuse her of Idolatry and Superstition for Bowing to the Altar and at the Name of JESUS or for using the Cross in Baptism or then the Quakers have for accusing them and us of breach of the First Commandment because we use the Civility of Hat and Knee to them who are but meer Creatures as we our selves But however these things must be charged upon us as an Introduction and then the Question must be stated after a new mode and we represented as consenting to it He tells us therefore Pag. 5. That they have got thus much at least by that Reflection that it shews them how they who have been so often charged by the Church of Rome as INNOVATORS IN RELIGION are at last by our own Confession allowed to hold the Ancient and Vndoubted Foundation of the Christian Faith and from this pretended Concession he draws up the State of the Controversie you may be certain favourably to himself But who is it I pray that allows him this Proposition That the New Reformers hold the Ancient and Vndoubted Foundation of the Christian Faith and where do's he allow it The Exposition has Sect. 2. p. 2. 't is true a Section to shew how those of the Pretended Reform'd Religion acknowledge the Catholic Church to embrace all the Fundamental Articles of the Christian Religion But how do's he from thence shew that Catholics reciprocally grant them to hold all those Fundamental Articles I say all for no body ever deny'd they held some of them This Author knows very well we are so far
but wonder that Persons should use so many endeavours not to understand us Expos p. 10. and because as the Bishop of Condom has observ'd in one sence Adoration Invocation and the name of Mediator are only proper to God and JESUS CHRIST we are astonish'd why they will still misapply those terms to render our Doctrine odious whereas if they would but strictly keep to the sence in which we use them all their Objections and Accusations would loose their force and we might have some hopes of a more Christian Unity ART III. Invocation of Saints AS for the Invocation of Saints Art 3. p. 9. he grants with Monsieur Daillè that several of the Primitive Fathers in the Fourth Age of the Church pag. 7. made Addresses to them but will have them to be only Innocent Wishes and Rhetorical Flights What Authority do's he bring for this Assertion and his farther accusation of these Fathers of the Fourth Century that they did certainly begin to depart from the Practice and Tradition of those before them pag. 8. Did any in that or the following Ages accuse or censure them If not by what Authority do's he condemn those Prayers those Innocent Wishes and Holy Raptures as he calls them because he will not have them to be Prayers as fond things vainly invented c. We only tell you it is lawful to Pray to them and condemn such as censure all those Antient and Orthodox Fathers What Authority have you to oppose us You say it is repugnant to Gods Word shew that Word If you cannot we are in Possession and the Antiquity and Uninteruptedness of our Doctrine besides the Reasonableness and Innocence of it confirms us in our belief and ought to be more prevalent with us than all the Sophistical Arguments brought against us We name them in our Sacrifices and give God thanks for the Victories they have obtain'd through his Grace and humbly beseech him to vouchsafe to favour us by their Intercession if we mention their merits 't is only those Victories they had obtain'd by his Favours which we beseech him to look upon and not to regard our unworthiness even as we beg of him to hear their Prayers which are more prevalent then our own because more pure But this is far from such an idle fancy as if Christ who is our Sacrifice pag. 12. needed as he says the Assistance of St. Bathildis or Potentiana to recommend him to his Father or the deserts of a St. Martin to obtain our forgiveness We detest such thoughts and abominate such Doctrines The Bishop of Condom has fully explicated our Tenets what this Author or others impose upon us we are not to answer for nor are we concerned to maintain the ill consequences which follow from such Impositions ART IV. Images and Relics HIs next Article of Images and Relics complains how the approved Doctrine of our most reputed Writers contradicts what M. de Meaux would have us to think is their only design in that Service Art 4. Pag. 13. Let us examine this a little The Bishop of Condom's business is to explicate the universally approv'd Doctrine of the Church according to the Sentiments of the Council of Trent and not to meddle with Scholastic Opinions or those Practices which are neither necessary nor generally received He tells us therefore Expos Sect. 5. pag. 8. That all the Honour that is given them ought to be referred to the Prototypes represented by them and that we do not attribute to them any other Vertue but that of exciting in us the Remembrance of those they represent That the Honour we render them is grounded upon this that the very seeing of the Image of JESUS CHRIST Crucified cannot but excite in us a more lively Remembrance of him who died upon the Cross for our Redemption That whilst this Image before our Eyes causes this precious Remembrance in our Souls we are naturally moved to testifie by some exteriour Signs how far our Gratitude bears us which exteriour Signs are not paid to the Image but to JESUS CHRIST represented by that Image So that properly speaking according to the Bishop of Meaux's sence and that of the Council the Image of the Cross is to be only look'd upon as a Representative or Memorative Sign which is therefore apt to put us in mind of JESUS CHRIST who suffered upon the Cross for us and the Honour which we there shew precisely speaking and according to the Ecclesiastic Style is not properly to the Cross but to JESUS CHRIST represented by that Cross Not to JESUS CHRIST as present in or with or to that Cross as if the Cross it self were the Object of our Worship as another Answerer represents our Doctrine Answer to Papist Protesting Sect. 5. passim but to him in Heaven whose becoming Man and dying for us we remember by looking upon the Cross So that JESUS CHRIST is the sole Object of our Adoration and not the Cross The Cross therefore whether taken as Wood or Stone or moreover as the Image of JESUS CHRIST Crucified is not properly the Object of our Worship but is a Help to recall our wandring Thoughts back to a Consideration of the Benefits we have received by his dying for us and whilst we have these good thoughts in our Minds our Affections are inflamed and we in presence of that Image which occasioned those pious Affections shew by some exteriour Act what are our inward Sentiments and pay our Adorations to our Redeemer but not to the Image that represents him This is the Pure and Innocent Doctrine of the Church without mixture of Scholastic Subtilities and this the above-named Author acknowledges to be very innocent Ibid. p. 84. It is says he a very innocent thing to worship GOD or CHRIST when any Natural or Instituted Sign brings them to our minds even in the presence of such a Sign as if a Man upon viewing the Heavens and the Earth and the Creatures that are in it should raise his Soul to God and adore the Great Creator of the World or upon the accidental sight of a Natural Cross and why not upon the designed sight of an Artificial one should call to mind the Love of his Lord who died for him and bow his Soul to him in the most submissive Adorations But because he could not deny this to be Innocent therefore he will not have it to be the Doctrine of our Church but will have the Use of Images in our Church to be not primarily for Remembrance but for Worship Ibid. Pag. 85. and this he tells us the Council of Trent expresly teaches but is far from proving it The Council indeed tells us as he cites That the Images of JESVS CHRIST Sess 25. Dec. de Invoc c. c. are to be had and retained especially in Churches not as he renders it especially to be had and kept in Churches and that due Honour and Veneration is to
as it is his Resemblance neither is that Statue his Delegate but a memorative Sign of him and which we honour as such and thus as the Indignities offered to that Statue are interpretatively offered to the King so is the Honour which is shewn it as representing him interpretatively offered to the King whom it represents In like manner that Homage which we pay to JESVS CHRIST represented by the Cross is properly speaking Adoration But nothing at all is due to the Cross for it self for that is an inanimate Being capable of no Honour but that Adoration is due to him who being an animate Nature is called to our Minds by that Resemblance The want of taking this our Doctrine in a right sence has been the occasion of that Author 's prolix Discourse of about Twenty three Leaves in which he has not at all combated our Doctrine but only some Scholastic Opinions and that with so few Additions of any new Difficulties that all he has said has been formerly refuted in the Just Discharge to Dr. Stillingfleet 's Vnjust Charge of Idolatry against the Church of Rome to which I will refer the Reader and return to my other Antagonist and see what he brings against this our Doctrine First he tells us That St. Thomas and his Followers were never Censured for maintaining in plain terms That the Image of the Cross ought to be worshipped with the same Worship as that Saviour who suffered on it Expos of the Doct. of the Ch. of Engl. p. 14. In answer to this I need only tell him We are not here to maintain every Opinion held by the Schools nor is it necessary the Church should Censure them unless they formally contradict her Doctrine which St. Thomas is far from being guilty of But if he had been sincere he ought to have taken notice of the Reason brought by St. Thomas and his Followers which shews That it is purely upon account of JESVS CHRIST represented that is brought to our remembrance by it and not upon any account of the Cross it self Which Reason if rightly understood speaks no more than this That whilst I see the Figure of our Blessed Saviour Crucified I by bowing in presence of that Crucifix adore him in Heaven and if I bow or kneel or prostrate my self before that Crucifix that Bowing Kneeling or Prostration may be termed Adoration because it tends to JESVS CHRIST the true Object of our Adoration who is represented to my Mind by that Crucifix It is therefore an Adoration of JESVS CHRIST represented by the Crucifix but not an Adoration of the Crucifix it self For this Holy Doctor declares 3. Qu. 25. Art 3. in Corpore That no Reverence is due to any thing for it self but to a Rational Nature but that an Irrational Creature may be honoured with respect to a Rational Nature which it represents which Honour do's not terminate in the Irrational Creature but in the Rational Nature upon which account he maintains That that Honour is the same with that which is paid to that Rational Nature The Pontifical also says he admits the same In the same sence I grant but not in that which he would willingly make us believe it do's He tells us indeed That in the Prayers for Blessing the Image of the Cross he who performs that Ceremony amongst other Prayers begs of God That as many as bow down before it may find Health both of their Souls and Bodies by it Which he will have to be irreconcilable with the Bishop of Condom's Doctrine and that of the Council of Trent which forbids us to believe any Divinity or Vertue tied to Images for which they ought to be adored c. But if he had dealt ingenuously he would not have suppressed the Reason of that Bowing mentioned by the Pontifical which would have easily reconciled the whole The Words are these See also the same quoted and falsly rendred in English by the Answerer to the Papist Protesting pag. 76. Vt orantes inclinantesque se propter Deum ante istam Crucem inveniant corporis animoe sanitatem But he thought it better to leave out the words propter Deum for the sake of God And this is his usual way of citing Authors All the rest of his Expressions drawn from the Pontifical are of the same nature either lame or patch'd up from several Places and therefore if they make any thing against us are not worthy our regarding But he has another Argument and that from an Authentic Act of the Church her self in her Good-Friday Solemnity in which the whole Church addresses her self says he to the Cross in these very dangerous words Behold the Wood of the Cross come let us adore it And he tells us the whole solemnity of that days Service plainly shews we do adore it in the utmost propriety of the Phrase But here he has been also so unfortunate as not to give us all the Words of the Church and to add another which is not there to make it speak his Sence The Words sung by the Church in that Service are these Ecce Lignum Crucis in quo pependit Salus Mundi venite Adoremus Behold the Wood of the Cross on which the Saviour of the World did hang come let us Adore He saw well enough these words taken altogether would be a clear Explication of our Doctrine and shew it was not the Cross we adored but the Saviour of the World who hung upon it and therefore he concealed these last Words and added the word it and so gives us this mutilated Sentence Behold the Wood of the Cross come let us Adore IT instead of the other But do's not the Church in her Hymns of the Passion and Invention pray to the Cross in express terms In this indeed he seems to have some shew of reason but how often has he been told these are Poetical Expressions and that the word Cross by a Figure sufficiently known to Poets signifies JESUS CHRIST Crucified to whom we pray in those Hymns Now as the Honour which we pay to Images is referr'd to those who are represented by them so likewise is that Honour and Veneration which we pay to the Sacred Relics of those Saints who were Victims to God entirely referr'd to them whose remains they are He tells us If that be the state of the Question which the Bishop of Condom has propos'd pag. 17. they confess that the Explication of it has taken away a great part of the difficulty and that if this be all M. de Meaux desires of them they are ready to profess their Opinion that they judge it to be neither offensive to God nor fit to be scrupled by Man But least we should be thus agreed the Bishop must not be allow'd to have explicated our Tenets right and therefore either some practices or abuses which might have past amongst those which he says we complain of must be brought against him or else the Council
paid to them is referred to the Originals which they represent So that by means of those Images which we kiss and before which we uncover our Heads and Kneel we adore CHRIST and venerate those Saints whose resemblance they bear which Doctrine has been taught by the Decrees of Councils against all Oppugners of Images Conc. Nicen. 2. Actio 3 4 6. especially by the second Synod of Nice But above all let the Bishop◠diligently teach That by the Historical Representations of the Mysteries of our Redemption painted or expressed in other forms the People are taught the Articles of our Faith and confirmed in them by a frequent Commemoration and Recollection as also That great Fruit is reaped from the use of all Holy Images not only because the People are admonished by them of the Benefits and Gifts which are bestowed upon them by JESVS CHRIST but also because the Miracles and salutary Examples which God has been pleased to shew us by his Saints are visibly represented to the Faithful that they may give God thanks for them and may conform their Lives and Manners to the Examples of the Saints and may be excited to adore and love God and practise Piety But if any one do teach or think contrary to these Decrees let him be Anathema But if any Abuses should chance to creep in amongst these holy and wholesom Observances the Sacred Synod earnestly desires they maybe entirely abolished so that no Images shall be permitted which may give the ruder People occasion of believing false Doctrines or dangerous Errors But if it shall sometimes happen to be expedient for the Instruction of the unlearned People to express or figure out some Histories or Relations of the Holy Scripture let the People be taught the Divinity is not therefore figured to them as if it could be seen with our corporal Eyes or expressed by Colours or Figures c. This is our Doctrine all other Additions or particular Doctrines we are not to answer for and this is what the Bishop of Condom has expresly taught ART V. Of Justification IN his Article of Justification he tells us Art 5. p. 19. That the Doctrine of Justification is one of those Points that deserves their careful Consideration as being not only one of the chiefest of those Points wherein they suppose the Church of Rome to have prevaricated the Faith but one of the first that gave occasion to that Reformation that was made from it If therefore the Doctrine of the Church Catholic when rightly explicated be clear from those gross Apprehensions they had of it and be in it self innocent and pure I hope he will grant the first Reformers to have been strangely out in their Measures and that all those who have followed their Footsteps in that Schism are obliged to return to their Mother-Church He speaks of wonderful Extravagances in Pardons Indulgences c. in former times and that generally the People put more confidence in the Inventions of Men than in the Merits of JESVS CHRIST but allows us to be better instructed since or at least more cautious for which he says we may thank the Reformation But I believe he will find that all those strange Extravagances were only the Fictions of their own Brains and Calumnies raised on purpose to make us odious and that if he look into our Councils and Doctors of those Ages he will find our Doctrines to have always been the same and our Practices conformable I need not take notice how much he consents to the Exposition of the Bishop of Condom nor of the nice Distinction which he gives us betwixt Justification and Sanctification which he tells us is the Doctrine of their Church but I believe will be hard put to to prove it neither need I tell you how much he imposes upon us as if we made our inward Righteousness a part of Justification and so by consequence said that our Justification it self is wrought also by our Good Works for since he tells us That were these things clearly stated and distinguished the difference betwixt us considered only in the Idea would not be very great and that they might safely allow whatsoever M. de Meaux has advanced upon this Point provided it be but well and rightly explained we need not make any further demur but go on with him to see how the following Doctrines will stand upon this Foundation ART VI. Of Merits HEre he tells us Art 6. Pag. 22. That if what the Bishop of Condom has explicated be all the Church of Rome ascribes to Good Works that is That our Justification proceeds absolutely from Gods Bounty and Mercy and but accidentally only in as much as God has tied himself by his Word and Promise to reward them from our own performances they need no long Exhortations to receive a Doctrine which they have always defended But he presently dashes these our hopes of Union by flying to the particular niceties of the Schools and thinks it sufficient to shelter the Justice of their dissent in those Particulars from our Accusations because some of those niceties have not been censured by the Church I need not here say any thing more to him than what I have said before that it is sufficient the Church has declar'd her Doctrine in the Council of Trent and that the Bishop of Meaux has explicated it accordingly The niceties of the Schools when truly represented as they make no Division in the Church so ought they not to make any amongst Christians But however if this Author had been so ingenuous as to have given us the Words or the true Sence of those Authors he cites the World would have seen no such great difference as he pretends there is betwixt them and the Church of Rome He tells us first That Maldonate the Jesuit upon Ezek. 18.20 says That we do as truly and properly merit Rewards when we do well as we do merit Punishments when we do ill But had he read Maldonate he would have found his Words when taken as they lie to carry with them a very different sence from what he seems to conclude they bear For being to explicate this part of the twentieth Verse Justitia justi super eum erit impietas impii erit super eum The justice of the just shall be upon him and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him he tells us Ex hoc loco perspicuum est in nobis aliquam esse nostram ut vocant inhoerentem propriamque justitiam quamvis ex Dei Gratia largitate profectam nos tam proprie ac verè cum Gratia Dei bene agentes proemia mereri quam sine illa male agentes supplicia meremur De proemio enim justi supplicio impii eodem prorsus modo loquitur i. e. From this Passage it is very clear both that there is in us an Inherent as they call it and Proper Justice of our own altho' proceeding from the
Relative This in that Proposition This is my Body referred to the Bread that our Saviour held in his Hands the natural repugnancy there is betwixt the two things affirmed of one another Bread and CHRIST's Body will necessarily required the Figurative Interpretation But unless he can prove that the Pronoun hoc this must necessarily relate to Panis Bread and not to Corpus Body his Argument will avail him nothing but that all his Logic will never be able to effect Pag. 45. His Argument is this What did he say was his Body but that which he gave to his Discipoles What did he give to his Disciples but that which he broke What brake he but that which he took And St. Luke says expresly He took Bread But what follows from all this but that JESVS took Bread and blessed it and brake it and gave it to his Disciples saying Take eat THIS IS MY BODY But he go's on What JESVS took in his Hands that he blessed What he blessed the same he brake and gave to his Disciples What he gave to his Disciples of that he said This is my Body But JESUS says the Text took Bread of the Bread therefore he said THIS IS MY BODY But what do's all this argue against us unless he beg the Question and suppose that no real Change was made by those Words Which to shew how true it is let us propose an Example We will suppose and that not incongruously that our Blessed Saviour in changing the Water into Wine might have made use of these either mental or vocal Words This is Wine or let this be Wine Now here it is manifest the Word This was not determined but only signified Substance till the Word Wine was annexed This supposed if any one would see the force of his Argument let him change the Expression and instead of Bread use Water and instead of Body use Wine and then reflect whether he can from thence prove that these Words This is Wine must necessarily mean This Water is Wine or rather whether that would not be a Proposition which implies a Contradiction Gratian de Consecrat d. 2. c. 55. Bellarm. l. 3. c. 19. SS prumum as Gratian and Cardinal Bellarmine prove in the foregoing Places cited by him of the like Proposition This is my Body But it will not be amiss to consider Cardinal Bellarmine's Argument to which this Author refers He tell us there how these Words Take and eat for this is my Body must necessarily infer either a real Change of the Bread as Catholics or else a metaphorical Change as the Calvinists hold but that they will by no means admit of the Lutheans sence Which Proposition he endeavours to prove against the Lutherans assirming the Words This is my Body to bear necessarily one of these three sences First This which is contained under the species of Bread is my Body which is the Catholic sence and supposes a Mutation The second is that of the Sacramentaries who admit of no Mutation and their sence is This Bread is the Figure of my Body The third which is that of the Lutherans who admit of no Change but yet allow a Real Presence must bear this Interpretation This truly Wheaten Bread is truly and properly my Body But this says he can by no means be admitted whether we speak of the thing it self or of the Proposition For it cannot possibly be that one thing should not be changed and yet should be another for it would be that thing and would not be that thing Moreover in an Affirmative Proposition it is necessary the Subjectum or thing of which any thing is affirmed and the Praedicatum or thing affirm'd of it should have a regard to the same thing Then follow the Words which he cites It cannot therefore be that that Proposition should be true in which the Subjectum or former part designs Bread and the Praedicatum or latter part the Body of CHRIST For Bread and the Body of CHRIST are two very different things This indeed may prove that the Words of the Institution may possibly lead to a Figurative Interpretation but are far from proving that they oblige us to take them so which was what the Bishop of Condom affirmed and which he if he had used Sincerity should have oppugned and not have spent so much time to prove what was not the Question But as I said it is not my Business here to justifie our Tenets but to see what he has to say against the Exposition as such I do not find he pretends here that the Bishop of Meaux has palliated or prevaricated the Doctrine of the Catholic Church But I observe he uses frequently the Word Corporeally and the Corporeal Presence which the Bishop has avoided keeping himself to the Terms of the Council of Trent which tells us only that JESVS CHRIST is truly really and substantially present in the Sacrament but uses not the Word Corporeally I suppose because it may bear a double sence and signifie either first that the Body is really and substantially present tho' not after a carnal gross manner with all the Qualifications of a Natural Body and this is the sence of those Catholics who make use of it Or secondly it may be taken as signifying the Body to be present after a corporeal carnal manner with all the Conditions and Qualities of a Natural Body which sence our Enemies are apt to impute to us as if it were our Doctrine tho very unjustly But had he been Faithful in giving us the Doctrine of the Church of England I doubt not but the Arguments he brings against the Bishop of Meaux would have proved as much against it as it do's against ours He tells us Pag. â—â— They confess this Sacrament to be somewhat more than a meer Figure but they deny that therefore it must be his very Body I would gladly know what that is which is not the thing it self but yet is more than a meer Gigure of it If he mean that it is not the Body Corporeally according to the Explication of the word as I have given it in the Second Sence we agree with him But if he mean by this somewhat more than a meer Figure that the Body and Blood of JESUS CHRIST is verily and indeed taken and receiv'd by the Faithful in the Lords Supper as their Church Catechism has it I see not also in what the difference consists betwixt us neither can I see how his Arguments oppugn our Doctrine without confuting theirs 'T is true their Twenty eighth Article tells us that The Body of Christ is given taken and eaten in the Supper only after a Heavenly and Spiritual manner and that the means whereby the Body of CHRIST is receiv'd and eaten in the Supper is Faith Yet because I am not willing to think their Canons and Church Catechism contradict one another I am willing to think the meaning of the saying that Faith is the means by which they
receive it is that they cannot receive the benefit of Christs Presence without a lively Faith but should rather Eat and Drink their own Damnation as is more fully express'd in the next Article and also that the expressions of a Heavenly and Spiritual manner are only to oppose that Carnal and Gross manner which a Natural Body has as having local extention c. which Body as such cannot possibly be in more places then one as St. Augustin affirms and to which that part of the Article in Edw. Sparrow's Canons pag. 49. the Sixths days to which this has succeeded do's allude If he think I impose upon their Church I desire him to let us know by some Authentic Testimony what is the meaning of that part of the Article and to shew us how it can stand with the Doctrine deliver'd in the Church Chatechism which affirms as I have told you that The inward thing signified is the Body and Blood of our Lord JESUS CHRIST which is verily and indeed taken and receiv'd by the Faithful it do's not say by Faith but by the Faithful As also how it agrees with these words of the same Article The Bread which we break is a partaking of the Body of CHRIST and likewise the Cup of Blessing is a partaking of the Blood of CHRIST If then he admit with King James Causab Ep. ad Card. Per. that they believe JESUS CHRIST to be as really present in the Sacrament as Roman Catholics do but only know not the manner Pag. 61. What becomes of all his Sarcasms of Worshipping a Deity whose substance they first form'd and then spake it into a God c. He knew full well that such Objections were the very Calumnies of the Heathens who did not only object to Christians their eating of their God but also of eating Mans Flesh in their Sacrifices of drinking Childrens Blood and several other such like accusations all which proceeded from some imperfect knowledge they had got of the Christian Sacrifice notwithstanding all the care the Primitive Christians took to conceal that Adorable Mystery from Infidels and even Catechumens What becomes of all the Arguments brought from pretended contradictions and an impossibility of being present in many places at once Do's not their real Participation if as the Bishop says there be any Sence in the Words fall under the same censures And what becomes of all his Objections rais'd from the difference betwixt some Schoolmen who endeavour to explicate the manner of his presence and the free acknowledgment of others that we are ignorant of it Do not they themselves profess the same And if we cannot comprehend how God can be three and one or the Divinity be Incarnate must we necessarily therefore deny the Blessed Trinity or the Incarnation In a word what will become of all the Arguments in General brought against Transubstantiation substantiation Adoration Sacrifice of the Altar Communion under one Species c. seeing Learned Protestants themselves confess that if the words of the Institution be taken in a Literal Sence without which a Real Presence can never be admitted they must yield up the Cause in all those Points to Roman Catholics This Brerelay has shown in his Liturgy of the Mass Printed Anno 1620. pag. 225 339. from several of their own Authors But he tells us that many of our Schoolmen acknowledge there is not in the Scripture any formal proof of Transubstantiation that there is not any Texts that without the declaration of the Church would be able to evince it that it was not a matter of Faith till the Council of Lateran and then triumphs as if these expressions were a perfect yielding up of our Cause But I would gladly have him to consider upon what account it is these Learned Men use those expressions and examine a little their Reasons and then I doubt not but if he observe the Connection of their Discourse he will not find such an occasion of triumphing It is an usual thing with Novelists to pretend nothing must be admitted as a matter of Faith but what can be manifestly proved from plain Texts of Scripture This Catholics deny and tell them such a proposition destroys all our Faith because no body can prove for example by Scripture the Books of the Gospels or the Epistles of St. Paul to be the Word of God or Divine Revelation and if they cannot prove those Scriptures to be Divine but by Tradition and the Interposition of the Church and yet tell us Tradition and Church Authority are not sufficient what will become of all the Articles contain'd in those Books Nay further Catholics tell them that if they rely only upon the bare words of Scripture without having recourse to the Authority of a Church and the Consent of Pastors and Teachers in all Ages and Places they will never be able to demonstrate any one Doctrine that is they can never prove it so clearly as to convince those who rely wholly upon their Reason and will admit of nothing for a proof in such weighty matters but what is so clear that whoever understands the Terms and Propositions must necessarily consent to the Conclusion drawn from them The Schoolmen do not only instance the Real Presence and Transubstantiation in proof of this but the Trinity also and Incarnation and in a word all the Articles of our Creed And the very opposition which Heretics in the several Ages of the Church have form'd against those Doctrines is a clear proof of this seeing they upon all occasions pretended Scripture for their grounds and because Catholics could not bring any Text of Scripture against them so clear but they could elude it by some seeming Exposition therefore Scripture alone could never decide the Controversies but the voice of the Church in her Councils was in all Ages esteem'd necessary to stop their Mouths and her Decisions and Declarations of the Sence of Scripture was that which confounded all their Errors Thus it was that Arius and his followers were condemned by the Council of Nice not by the sole words of Scripture but by the words of Scripture as understood and explicated by the consent of the Catholic Church and thus it was that Berengarius and his followers were condemned by the Council of Lateran and several others and that Condemnation confirm'd by that of Trent He tells us moreover That this Doctrine was no matter of Faith till the Council of Lateran Pag. 56 1200 years after CHRIST and had not That and the Council of Trent interposed it would not have been so to this very day And cites Lombard Scotus Gabriel and Bellarmine for this Assertion Let us examine his Quotations but first we will represent the State of the Question as the best Method to understand their Meanings We must therefore take notice that the word Transubstantiation was first publicly used in the Council of Lateran as the word Consubstantial was in the first Council of Nice but that
But the second continues he which the Gospel has not explicated we have expresly received from the Church that is the Conversion of Bread into the Body of CHRIST which he says we have not only received from the ancient Doctors of the Church but from the Council of Lateran under Pope Innocent the Third De Summa Trinit Fide Cath. Firmiter credimus where both Points are expressed viz. That the Body and Blood of CHRIST are truly contained in the Sacrament of the Altar under the species of Bread and Wine which regards the first And it follows The Bread bein transubstantiated into his Body and the Wine into his Blood by Divine Power After this he speaks of the Reality of CHRIST's Body in the Eucharist and of the Manner how it becomes there viz. by Conversion and of the first he says Sciendum est omnes circa primam novitatem continentiae re voce consensisse dum omnes communiter fatemur corpus Christi prius non contentum sub hac hostia modo veraciter contineri quamvis circa modum quo continetur variae sint opiniones i.e. We must know that all Persons are at perfect agreement both as to the manner of Expression and as to the thing it self when we speak of the first new Change which is there made of the thing contained seeing we all commonly confess that the Body of CHRIST which was not at first contained under this Host is now truly there contained tho there be various Opinions concerning the manner how he is there contained Then summing up several of those Opinions as Whether it be by such a Change as is made by Nutrition or Whether the Bread be Annihilated or Whether it be by a true Conversion he undertakes to prove that it is by a Conversion which do's produce and effect the Presence of CHRIST in the Host and freely confesses that this Conversion is not explicitly mentioned in the Gospel but only deduced from the words This is my Body by the Doctors of the Church After which returning to his first Point in which he had concluded that the Body of CHRIST was truly in the Sacrament he tels us In hoc omnes fideles conveniunt sed modus quo est in disputationem vertitur All the Faithful agree in this but as to the manner how he is there that is a disputable Question This is in short the Intent of that Article which is far from what this Author has imposed upon him Next he tells us That the generality of our Commanion confess that if the Words of Consecration refer to the Bread which is changed by them they must be taken in their Figurative sence Pag. 74 75. But this has been sufficiently cleared already Lastly He tells us That this Doctrine was no matter of Faith till the Council of Lateran 1200 years after CHRIST and that had not That and the Council of Trent since interposed it would not have been so to this very day What Doctrine do's he here mean Not that of the Schools concerning the manner of CHRIST's Existence in the Sacrament for a little after he tells us That Anathema's have been pronounced against them and they esteemed Heretics and Schismatics for opposing it But the Church never yet proceeded so far as to declare the Manner or censure any Opinions concerning it By this Doctrine then which he tells us was not of Faith till the Council of Lateran he must understand the Doctrine of the Church and say That the Body and blood of JESUS CHRIST was not till then believed to be truly really and substantially present under the species or appearances of Bread the Substance of Bread being not so present after Consecration But how do's he prove this He first brings Scotus cited by Bellarmine but we have already examined his Concessions pag. 84. which make but little for our Adversary Then he quotes Gabriel cited by Suarez T. 3. Disp 50. sect 1. But Suarez there undertaking to prove two Assertions the first That the Sacrament of the Eucharist is made by a true Conversion of the Bread and Wine into the Body and Blood of CHRIST which he tells us is of Faith and the second That this Sacrament is made by a true Transubstantiation of the Bread into the Body and of the Wine into the Blood of CHRIST he tells us That the word Transubstantiation taken in its proper and strict sence signifies transitum seu conversionem totius substantiae in totam substantiam a Transition or Conversion of a whole Substance into a whole Substance After which he concludes thus From this Doctrine of Faith we may gather first That the Scholastics as Scotus and Gabriel are to be corrected and secondly That the thing it self was ancient and perpetually believed in the Church Non suerit tam apertè explicata sicut mode est tho perhaps in former times it was not so fully explicated as now it is In the last place he quotes Lombard L. 4. Dist 11. Lit. A. But it is manifest that Lombard speaks there only of a Scholastic Tenet Which to the end you may see as also what was esteemed of Faith in his time before the Council of Lateran I will give you a short account of his whole Doctrine as to this Point He begins his eighth Distinction telling us Lomb. in 4. dist 8. Lit. B. That the Blessed Sacrament was instituted when JESUS CHRIST after the Typical Lamb gave to his Disciples his Body and Blood in the Last Supper Then speaking of the Form This is my Body c. Lit. C. he tells us Cum haec verba proferuntur conversio fit panis vini in substantiam corporis sanguinis Christi That when these words are pronounced there is made a Conversion of Bread and Wine into the Substance of the Body and Blood of CHRIST Then speaking of a Sacrament as being the Sign of a Sacred thing Lit. D. he tells us what is the sign and what is the Thing in this Sacrament The Form i.e. Appearance says he of Bread and Wine in the Sacrament is the Sign of the Sacred thing So that the species bear the Name of the Things which they were before that is of Bread and Wine But the thing signified is twofold the one contained under those species and signified by them the other signified but not contained The thing contained and signified is the Flesh of Christ which he took from the Blessed Virgin and the Blood which he shed for us But the thing which is signified and not contain'd is the Unity of the Church in those who are Predestinated Called Justified and Glorified So that there are says he three things to be distinguish'd one which is only a Sacrament and not the thing viz. the visible species of Bread and Wine another which is the Sacrament and the thing viz. the proper Flesh and Blood of Christ and a third which is the thing and not the Sacrament viz.
and properly speaking tho' not possibly in such a rigorous sence as may be put upon the Words If she do not what means her Ordination and the Title of Priesthood which her Ministers challenge with so much earnestness And if she do why will he quarrel with the Council of Trent for calling it a True and Proper Sacrifice Sess 22. c. a True and Proper Priesthood especially since the same Council tells us that this Sacrifice is instituted only to represent that which was once accomplished upon the Cross to perpetuate the Memory of it to the end of the World Sess 22. c. r. and so apply to us the saving virtue of it for the remission of those Sins which we commit every day In a word The Bishop of Meaux has expressed himself so clearly and consequently to the Doctrine of the Council of Trent and of the Catholic Church that I cannot but admire any one who affirms as this Author do's that the Doctrine the Bishop of Meaux has express'd Pag. 63. is truly the Doctrine of the Catholic Church and such as the Church of England has never refus'd and except it be their doubt of the Corporeal Presence Mons de Meaux had certainly reason to expect there was nothing in it which they could justly except against I cannot I say but admire he should upon no better grounds than a pure Cavil about the Name and Nature of a Sacrifice when taken in the strictest Sense and the word Corporeal instead of Real Pag. 62. affirm this to be one of the most dangerous Errours that offend them But the Breach must be kept open and widened too if possible And because the offering of Christ once made is that proper Redemption Propitiation and Satisfaction for all the Sins of the whole World and because there is no other Satisfaction for Sin but that alone Article 31. as their Article expresses it and we allow therefore this Author must from thence conclude that the Representation Commemoration and Application of that first Offering by those who are Members of that Priesthood according to the Order of Melchisedec which the Apostle tells us was to be perpetual must not be called a True Heb. 6. Proper and Propitiatory Sacrifice tho' it be only Commemorative and Applicatory ART XVII Of the Epistle to the Hebrews BUT the next Article shews us more manifestly Art 21. p. 67. that all this Dispute is purely de Nomine In which it manifestly appears that he mistakes the Sence of the word Offer Pag. 32. as used by the Catholic Church in this place for the Bishop of Meaux tells us the Catholic Church forms her Language and her Doctrine not from the sole Epistle to the Hebrews but from the whole body of the Holy Scripture and therefore tho' in that strict sence in which the Epistle to the Hebrews uses the word Offer JESUS CHRIST cannot be said to be now offered neither in the Eucharist nor any where else yet because in other places of Scripture the word is used in a larger signification where it is often said we offer to God what we present before him therefore she do's not doubt to say that she offers up our Blessed JESVS to his Father in the Eucharist in which he vouchsafes to render himself present before him But this must not suffice for then that which he calls the principal and most dangerous Errour would appear to be none at all and therefore because the Epistle to the Hebrews speaks of one Offering which has fully satisfied for our Sins of one Offering which was no more to be offered that is of an Offering in a strict Sence in which there must be a Real Suffering and Death of the Victim therefore this Epistle must be against the Doctrine of the Roman Church tho' she speak only of an Unbloody Sacrifice of a Commemorative Sacrifice which without the Sacrifice of the Cross would be no Sacrifice which takes its Virtue Efficacy and very Name from it because it refers to it and applies the Virtue of it to our Souls Let any one judge if this be not next door to a wilful misunderstanding of our Tenets Pag. 63. especially when he had before confessed that the presenting to God Almighty the Sacrifice of our Blessed Lord is a most effectual manner of applying his Merits to us and that if this were all the Church of Rome meant by her Propitiatory Sacrifice there is not certainly any Protestant that would oppose her in it This is what she means by it that is an application of the Merits of the Sacrifice of the Cross which was to be but once offered and from whence it takes all its value But this he will not have to be our Doctrine and I see no reason for it but because if he admit it to be so one of the greatest grounds of their pretended Reformation must needs vanish ART XVIII Reflections upon the foregoing Doctrine HIs Reflections upon this Doctrine run altogether upon the same strain Art 22. p. 69. and therefore what I have said will suffice in answer to that Article If he admit a Real Presence with the Church of England Reason must necessarily assure us that where Christ is really he ought to be Ador'd and where he really presents himself to his Father to render him Propitious to us he may be said to offer up himself a Propitiatory Sacrifice And those who will admit the Reality or not condemn the belief of it in others ought not to condemn the necessary Consequences of it in us into which we have penetrated better than they ART XIX Communion under both Species COmmunion under one kind being also a Consequence of the Doctrine of the Real Presence Art 23. p. 72. Those who admit the Real Presence or condemn it not ought not to condemn the Consequence of it He refers us to the Answer to M. de Meaux's Book of Communion and I refer him to M. de Meaux's Book which so fully explicates and proves this Doctrine that all the effects against it are but vain But if the Church of England allow the Communion to be given under one Species in case of necessity See Art 30. how will it stand that she esteems it to be the express Command of JESUS CHRIST which is certainly indispensable Edw. Sparrows Canons p. 15. the Sixth in his Proclamation before the Order of Communion ordains That the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of our Saviour JESUS CHRIST should from thenceforth be commonly deliver'd and administred unto all Persons within our Realm of England and Ireland and other our Dominions under both kinds that is to say of Bread and Wine except necessity otherwise require And after the Order of Communion there is this Annotation Note that the Bread that shall be Consecrated shall be such as heretofore hath been accustomed And every of the said Consecrated Breads shall be broken into two pieces at
order to which the best Method will certainly be to keep close to the Point in Question which is whether the Bishop of Condom has truly represented the Doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church without either Palliating or Perverting it I say the Doctrine of the Church for we have nothing here to do with the Doctrine of the Schools Seeing therefore the Bishop of Condom professes to conform himself to the Doctrine of the Church as delivered in the Council of Trent to which all Catholics do submit They who will oppose his Exposition must if they will bring any solid Arguments against him shew he has corrupted that Council and given us a Doctrine which is neither conformable to that of this Council nor consistent with some other Public Authentic and Universally receiv'd Definitions and Decisions of the whole Church If any thing of this nature be produc'd I promise an Ingenuous return shall be made without the least Cavil or reflecting Language To aovid which I have one thing earnestly to beg of you that before you publish any thing of this nature you would be pleas'd to take the pains your selves to peruse the Authors cited by you and not to Transcribe Quotations nor take up things by hear-say You cannot be ignorant but it has ofen been objected to Protestant Writers by us that they are faulty in this and subject to great mistakes if not wilsul Prevarications I hope therefore you will hereafter consult at least your Reputations if the search after Truth be not a sufficient motive and take nothing from any of them without a serious examination of the Sence of the Authors quoted by them and a sincere Application of it to the Point in Question If you please to take that necessary Advice along with you for profitably reading Books of Controversie extracted out of Walsingham 's search into matters of Religion Part 3. c. 10. Printed at the end of the Second Edition of the Complaint of the French Clergy and follow it precisely I hope you your selves will one Day see the Truth and to the Glory of God profess it However this benefit will come by it that you will save others the pains of examining so many different Authors that you will remove that just occasion which is now given of censuring your Religion as not maintainable without such sinister doings and lastly you will free me from that troublesome and ungentile Office of demonstrating to the World that unsincerity which you have shewn in your Quotations the falsications of which I would not have taken notice of in this had not Truth and Religion been at Stake FINIS THE CONTENTS PART I. COntaining an Answer to the Preface Pag. 1 PART II. Art 1. Introduction 22 Art 2. Religious Worship is terminated in God only 27 Art 3. Invocation of Saints 29 Art 4. Images and Relics 31 Art 5. Of Justification 46 Art 6. Of Merits 48 Art 7. Satisfactions Purgatory and Indulgences 54 Art 8. Of the Sacraments in general 59 Art 9. Of Baptism 61 Art 10. Of Confirmation 63 Art 11. Of Penance and Confession 64 Art 12. Of Extream Vnction 68 Art 13. Of Marriage 70 Art 14. Of Holy Orders 71 Art 15. Of the Eucharist 72 Art 16. Of the Sacrifice of the Mass 94 Art 17. Of the Epistle to the Hebrews 96 Art 18. Reflections upon the foregoing Doctrine 97 Art 19. Communion under both Species 98 Art 20. Of the written and unwritten Word 100 Art 21. Of the Authority of the Church 101 Art 22. Authority of the Holy See and of Episcopacy 106 The Conclusion Ibid. A Catalogue of Books Printed for Henry Hills Printer to the King 's most Excellent Majesty for his Houshold and Chappel 1686. And are to be Sold next door to his House in Black-fryers at Richard Cheese's REflections upon the Answer to the Papist Mis-represented c. Directed to the Answerer Quarto Kalendarium Catholicum for the Year 1686. Octavo Papists Protesting against Protestant-Popery In Answer to ā Discourse Entituled A Papist not Mis-represented by Protestants Being a Vindication of the Papist Mis-represented and Represented and the Reflections upon the Answer Quart Copies of Two Papers Written by the late King Charles II. Together with a Paper Written by the late Dutchess of York Published by his Majesty's Command Folio The Spirit of Christianity Published by his Majesty's Command Twelves The first Sermon Preach'd before their Majesties in English at Windsor on the first Sunday of October 1685. By the Reverend Father Dom. P. E. Monk of the Holy Order of S. Benedict and of the English Congregation Published by his Majesty's Command Quarto Second Sermon Preached before the King and Queen and Queen Dowager at Their Majesties Chappel at St James's November 1. 1685. By the Reverend Father Dom. Ph. Ellis Monk of the Holy Order of S. Benedict and of the English Congregation Published by his Majesty's Command Quarto The Third Sermon Preach'd before the Kind and Queen in their Majesties Chappel at St. James's on the third Sunday in Advent Decemb. 13.1685 By the Reverend Father Dom. Ph. Ellis Monk of the Holy Order of St. Benedict and of the English Congr Chaplain in Ordinary to His Majesty Published by His Majesties Command Quarto Sixth Sermon Preach'd before the King and Queen in their Majesties Chappel at St. James's upon the first Wednesday in Lent Febr. 24.1685 By the Reverend Father Dom. Ph. Ellis Monk of the Holy Order of St. Benedict and of the English Congregation Publish'd by his Majesty's Command Quarto An Exposition of the Doctrine of the Catholic Church in Matters of Controversie By the Right Reverend James Benigne Bossuet Counsellor to the King Bishop of Meaux formerly of Condom and Preceptor to the Dauphin First Almoner to the Dauphiness Done into English with all the former Approbations and others newly published in the Ninth and Last Edition of the French Published by His Majesties Command Quarto A Sermon preach'd before the King and Queen in Their Majesties Chappel at St. James's upon the Annunciation of our Blessed Lady March 25.1686 By Jo. Betham Doctor of Sorbon Published by His Majestics Command Quarto An Abstract of the Douay Catechism for the Use of Children and Ignorant People Now Revis'd and much amended Publish'd with Allowance Twentyfours A Pastoral Letter from the Lord Bishop of Meaux to the New Catholies of His Diocess Exhorting them to keep their Easter and giving them neeessary Advertisements against the False Pastoral Letters of their Ministers With Reflections upon the Pretended Persecution Translated out of French and Publish'd with Allowance Quarto The Anser of the New Converts of France to a Pastoral Letter from a Protestant Minister Done out of French and Publish'd with Allowance Quarto The Ceremonies for the Healing of them that be Diseased with the Kings Evil used in the time of King Henry VII Published by His Majesties Command Quarto in Latin Twelves in English A Short Christian Doctrine Composed by the R. Father Robert Bellarmin of the Society of Jesus and Cardinal Published with Allowance Twelves ERRATA PAge 8. l. 15. dele to p. 10. l. 23. r. Are the men p. 22. l. 18. r. Misrepresentations p. 98. l. 14. r. Efforts p. 108. l. 31. r. is it not
as the thing intended by the word Consubstantial was all along of Faith before that Council so was the thing intended by Transubstantiation ever believed by the Faithful in all Ages The thing intended by the word Transubstantiation is expressed by the Council of Trent in these words If any one shall say Sess 13. Can. 2. That the Substance of Bread and Wine remains in the most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist together with the Body and Blood of our Lord JESUS CHRIST and shall deny that wonderful and singular Conversion of the whole Substance of the Bread into the Body and of the whole Substance of Wine into the Blood the Species of Bread and Wine only remaining which Conversion the Catholic Church do's most aptly call Transubstantiation Let him be Anathema This Council having before expressed our Belief of the true Ibid. Can 1. Chap. 1. real and substantial Presence of the Body and Blood of JESUS CHRIST in the most Holy Sacrament brings this Transubstantiation or Conversion of one Substance into another as the natural Consequence of it But because there are many sorts of Conversions of one Substance into another all which may be called Substantial Conversions and by consequence the word Transubstantiation might be properly enough used to express that Change therefore it is manifest the Church do's not intend here to fix the Manner of that Conversion but only to declare the Matter viz. That the body and Blood of JESUS CHRIST becomes truly really and substantially present the Bread and Wine ceasing to be there truly really and substantially present tho the Appearances thereof remain This Matter is that which is of Faith and was always so before the Council of Lateran but as for the Manner how this Conversion is made it is even at present a disputable Question in the Schools It being then manifest that our Dispute with protestants is not about the Manner how JESUS CHRIST is present but only about the thing it self whether the Body and Blood of JESUS CHRIST be truly really and substantially present after the Words of Consecration under the species or appearance of Bread and Wine the Substance of Bread and Wine being not so present let us examine whether the Authorities he brings as to both his Assertions have any force against our Tenets He tells us first That Lombard Scotus and many others confess that there is not in Scripture any formal Proof of Transubstantiation and cites in the Margin Lombard 4. Sent. dist 10. But there is no such thing in him as I shall more fully shew in declaring his Doctrine He brings in Scotus also 4. Dist 2. Qu. 11. whereas there are only two Questions in that Distinction His next Quotation is Bellarmine Bellar. de Euch. l. 3. c. 23. ff Secundo dicit who he says confesses and cites many others of the same Opinion That there is not any formal Proof from Scripture that without that Declaration of the Church would be able to evince it 'T is true Bellarmine here acknowledges that Scotus said there was not any Place in Scripture so express that it would evidently compel any one to admit of Transubstantiation without the Churches Declaration which he confesses is not altogether improbable For says he altho the Scripture which we have mentioned above do's appear to us so clear that it may compel a Man who is not perverse to believe it yet whether it be so or no we may justly doubt since Learned and Acute Men such as in the first place Scotus was have thought the contrary And this is all he says 'T is true also that Scotus in 4. Dist 11. Qu. 3. n. 5. brings this Objection That nothing is to be held as of the Substance of Faith but what is expresly to be had out of Scripture or is expresly declared by the Church or evidently follows from what is plainly contained in Scripture or plainly determined by the Church But that it neither appears manifestly from Scripture nor from the Churches Declaration nor is it evidently inferred from either that the Substance of Bread do's not remain in the Eucharist And answers it n. 15. thus That the Church has declared it in the Council of Lateran c. Firmiter Credimus In which Chapter he tells us the Truth of some things which are to be believed are more explicitly declared than they were in the Apostles Creed or in that of Nice or that of St. Athanasius So that from hence some have concluded that Scotus probably held this Assertion That the Scripture did not evince it as also the other That the Doctrine of Transubstantiation was not so explicitly believed before that Council of Lateran as it was since But this is no more than what he or any one might say of the Consubstantiality of the Son before the Council of Nice It is also to be taken notice that this Distinction of P. Lombard was wholly written upon the Manner of CHRIST's Existence in the Sacrament and other Scholastic Disputes of that nature and not upon the thing it self as of Faith and therefore no wonder if Scotus writing upon that Distinction should grant how that manner of Conversion which he thought was a Consequence of the Council of Laterans Definition was not so explicitly known before that Council as since or not clearly found in Scripture But if you look upon him Dist 10. qu. 1. n. 2 3. where he is to treat of the Real Presence of CHRIST's Body and Blood under the species of Bread and Wine he tells us that it is a Truth which was expresly delivered from the beginning even from the very time of the Institution of the Eucharist His Words are Ista enim veritas a principio fuit expressè tradita ex quo Eucharistia fuit instituta And he adds That the Foundation of that Authority are the Words of the Institution This is my Body and this is my Blood which he says cannot be taken Figuratively if we observe the Rule of St. Augustin Aug. 83. Quest qu. 69. That the Circumstances of Scripture do clear the Sense of it For CHRIST having added to these Words This is my Body this Circumstance which shall be brokeâ— for you and to these Words This is my Blood thâ—â— Circumstance which shall be shed for you it is manifest they ought to be taken in a Literal sence Then he tells us That Cardinal Cajetan acknowledges That had not the Church declared her self for the proper sense of the Words the other might with as good warrant have been received and quotes him in 3. D. Thomae qu. 75. art 1. But he says no such thing nay rather the contrary as will appear to any one who reads that Article in which he tells us That we learn from the Truth of the Words of our Lord taken in their proper sence that the Body of CHRIST is truly in the Eucharist which is the first thing says he which we learn concerning this Sacrament from the Gospel
least or more by the discretion of the Minister and so distributed And Men must not think less to be received in part than in the whole but in each of them the whole Body of JESVS CHRIST In the Proclamation it is ordain'd that it shall be commonly deliver'd under both kinds except necessity otherwise require which shews manifestly that the Church of England thought then that one kind was sufficient in case of necessity and that whole Sacrament was contained under one kind for half a Sacrament is no Sacrament And if a necessary occasion be sufficient to dispense with the Administration of it in both kinds who ought to be Judge but the Pastors and Teachers in every Age or the Church Representative which shews that this is a part of Discipline and not of Faith since both sides confess that in case of necessity it may be given in one kind and that by receiving each Particle one receives the whole Body of JESUS CHRIST as appears by the Annotation so that the Bishop of Condom's Argument against the Calvinists of France has its full force against the Church of England ART XX. Of the wrÃtten and unwritten Word IN the next Articlé we are agreed in the main Art 24. p. 75. We both acknowledge the unwritten Word to have been the first Rule of Christians and that it was so far from losing any thing of its Authority by addition of the Written Word that it was indeed the more firmly established We receive with equal veneration the Written and the Unwritten Word when we are assured they come from the Apostles And as we do not admit of every thing which is called Tradition so what is made appear to have been received in all Churches and in all Ages we are ready to embrace as coming from the Apostles Our difference consists only in this who shall be judge when this Tradition is Universal We rely upon the Judgment of the present Church in every Age either assembled in the most general Council that Age can afford or else declaring her Doctrine by her constant practice and the uniform Voice of her Pastors and People and are assured it is not sufficient for any Private Persons or Church to say we suppose or we are persuaded they are contrary to the Written Word or we find it not there to make the Churches Sentence void or justifie a dissent ART XXI Of the Authority of the Church IN his next Article Art 25. p. 76. of the Authority of the Church he grants many things which the Bishop of Meaux had asserted from which we might expect great Fruit but he presently nips all our hopes in the very bud He grants the Catholic Church to be the Guardian of the Holy Scriptures Pag. 76 77. and of Tradition and that it is from her Authority they reeeive both That they never deny the Church to have an Authority not only in matters of Order and Discipline Pag. 78. but even of Faith too That they neither fear the entire defection of the Catholic Church nor that she should fall into such an entire Infidelity as should argue her not to be a Church Pag. 80. And in his next Article he allows the Church a just Authority in matters of Faith and declares as a Doctrine of his Church that they allow such a deference to a Churches Decisions as to make them their directions what Doctrine they may or may not publicly maintain and teach in her Communion that they shew whatever submission they can to her Authority without violating that of God declared to us in the Holy Scripture And lastly that whatsoever deference they allow to a National Church or Council the same they think in a much greater degree due to a General In which none shall be more ready to assist nor to which none shall be more ready to submit These are fair offers to establish a Church-Authority and did he manifestly destroy all he has here said by some other exceptions we might have hoped some good effects of such a Submission He tells us Pag. 79. and that truly that any particular Church may either by errour lose or by other means prevaricate the Faith even in necessary points of it And yet notwithstanding he do's not only set up a particular Church to examin the Churches Decisions Pag. 78. which he tells us after all may err but even every individual Person who according to his Doctrine may not only examine the Decisions of the whole Church but glory in opposing them if he be but evidently convinced that his belief is founded upon the undoubted Authority of Gods Holy Word His words are these Pag. 79. Tho' we suppose the Scriptures are so clearly written that it can hardly happen that in necessary Articles of Faith any one Man should be found opposite to the whole Church in his Opinion He had told us a little before that any particular Church such as he esteem'd the Church of Rome to be might either by Errour lose or by any other means prevaricate the Faith even in necessary points of it and yet what he there wishes they had not too great cause to fear the Church of Rome has in effect done he here tells us can hardly happen to one particular Man But what follows is more intolerable and since he gives us it as a Doctrine of the Church of England I desire him to tell us in what Canon Article or Constitution it is contain'd But says he if such an one were evidently convinc'd that his belief was founded upon the undoubted Authority of Gods Holy Word so far would it be from any Errour to support it against the whole Church that it is at this day the greatest Glory of St. Athanasius that he slood up alone against the whole World in defence of Ghrists Divinity when the Pope the Councils the whole Church fell away Behold here a Doctrine which if admitted will not only maintain all the Dissenters that are but that ever can be from a Church a Doctrine which will establish as many Religions as there are Persons in the World every one of which may if he be but evidently convinced that is if he have but impudece enough to think he is so that his belief is founded upon the undoubted Authority of Gods Word not only oppose the whole Church but glory in it And a Doctrine backed by as false and Authority as the Assertion it self is false and scandalous for never any one yet before this Man said that the Pope the Councils and the whole Church fell in St. Athanasius his time on the contrary it is manifest to all those who have read any thing of History that the Pope and all the Western Churches and the approved General Councils of those times all stood up for St. Athanasius and if he said he was against all and all against him it was only to express the great number of Eastern Bishops that oppos'd his Doctrine
from granting this to them that on the contrary we always accuse them of Innovations and denying those Articles which are Fundamental and as necessary and as plainly revealed as many of those others which they admit We always affirm We are in possession of our Doctrines and our Practices that these have been delivered down to us by our Predecessors as Truths revealed to the Prophets and Apostles we always tell them We have the Decisions of a Church in our behalf a Church I say 1 Tim. 3.15 which is the Pillar and Ground of Truth Matth. 16.18 a Church against which the Gates of Hell by the express Promise of JESUS CHRIST was never to prevail Eph. 4.11 12 c. and in which Pastors and Teachers were to remain for ever lest we should be led away with every wind of Doctrine We tell them He who denies one Article revealed by God and proposed by his Church as so revealed is as guilty of the Breach of Faith as he who denies them all because he rejects God's Veracity upon which that Faith is grounded And by consequence we cannot but tell them That whilst they renounce those Articles which we believe are revealed Truths they are guilty of Fundamental Errors and hold not the Ancient and Vndoubted Foundation of the Christian Faith So that the true State of the Controversie in general betwixt Catholics and Protestants is whether they or we do Innovate they in refusing to believe those Doctrines we profess to have receiv'd with the Grounds of Christianity or we in maintaining our Possession And the Dispute is Whether Roman Catholics ought to maintain their Possession for which many Protestants themselves grant they have a Prescription of above 1000 Years or whether the Authorities brought by Protestants against the Roman Catholic Doctrine be so weighty that every Roman Catholic is oblig'd to renounce the Communion of that Church in which he was bred up and quit his Prescription and Possession Which certainly they are not obliged to do unless it can be plainly prov'd they have innovated or taught such Doctrines as overthrow those Truths which are on both Sides allow'd to be Divine This the Bishop of Condom knew they could never do and that our Doctrines when truly represented were so far from contradicting those mutually-received Articles of our Faith that on the contrary they confirm'd our Belief of them And therefore he undertook to separate the Articles of our Faith from what was falsly imputed to us and resolved to propose them according to the received Sence of the Church declared in the Council of Trent And whether he has faithfully perform'd this Undertaking or no is our present Question which we are to examine in these following Articles What do's it therefore avail this Author to tell us Pag. 6. he will in the following Articles endeavour to give a clear and free Account of what they can approve and what they dislike in the Doctrines of the Catholic Church unless he first shew us and that by some Authentic Acts of the Church that those are her Doctrines and secondly give us some assurance of greater Authority then the Prescription of the Roman Catholic Church that they are Novelties or Erroneous ART II. Religious Worship is terminated only in God THat all Religious Worship is terminated in God alone is the Biship of Condom's Assertion Art 2. and the Churches Doctrine to which both this and another later Author agree Answer to a Discourse entituled Papists Protesting c. but both of them will have the Invocation of Saints and the Honour which we pay to Images and Relics to be inconsistent with that Maxim What the Bishop has said is enough to satisfie any one who is not obstinate his Words are these The same Church teaches us Expos p. â— That all Religious Worship ought to terminate in God as its necessary End and that if the Honour which she renders to the Blessed Virgin and to the Saints may in some sence be call'd Religious it is for its necessary relation to God From which Words it is plain the Bishop thought Religious Honour or Worship might be taken in a double sence the first strict and that he acknowledges is only due to God the other in a larger sence which may be paid to Creatures But how this other may be called Religious Honour he tells us is because of the reference which it has to God Thus that Civil Honour or Obedience which we pay to Magistrates if we do it for Conscience sake that is purely to obey the Ordinance of God may be not improperly call'd a Religious Honour or Obedience because by Honouring or Obeying them for God's sake we Honour and Obey God Thus to visit the orphan and the widow in their tribulations is called by St. James a clean and unspotted Religion James 1.27 But if we take Religion in a stricter sence for a Supreme and Sovereign Honour or an adhesion to an Independent Being with all the Powers of our Soul c. it is only proper to God and cannot be paid to Creatures and in that sence the Honour which we pay to our Blessed Lady and other Saints is far from being a Religious Honour Let Mary be Honoured Epiph. Haer. 79. but let God be Adored was the Saying of an ancient Father not with Divine Honour for that is due to God alone Soli Deo honor gloria but with an Inferiour Honour which if our Authors will not have us call Religious we will not dispute about the Name We ought not to deprive God of any thing that is due to him alone that we may give it to his Creatures neither Honour nor Worship nor Prayer nor Thanksgiving nor Sacrifice But yet we may honour those whom God has honoured we may give an inferiour Degree of Worship to those who are in some Degree of Honour above us in this World and why not to the Invisible Inhabitants of the other so it elevate them not above the State of Creatures We may pray to our Friends and Parents here on Earth to pray for us without derogating from our Duty to God and why the same may not be addressed to Saints and Angels who are no less our Friends without robbing God of what is his due is I must confess to me unintelligible If you tell me the first is only Civil or if it may be called a Religious Love or Honour Answ to Papist Protest p. 38. when it is done for God's sake yet it is but an extrinsecal Denomination from the Cause and Motive not from the Nature of the Act and therefore cannot make Gods of them we affirm the same of the second and renounce any other sort of Religious Worship which is so from the nature of the Act and by consequence only due to God This Distinction reflected on will be sufficient to answer all the Objections brought against our Doctrine by both those Authors And we cannot
Grace and Bounty of God as also that we do as properly and truly when we do well TOGETHER WITH THE GRACE OF GOD merit a Reward as we do merit Punishments when we do ill WITHOUT IT For he speaks here after the very same manner of the Just Man's Reward and of the Punishment of the Wicked These are his Words but our Author whose Religion as he tells us accustoms him to sincerity had it may be forgot himself a little here or read it in hast or copied it from some other Author upon whose sincerity he relied which made him leave out these words Together with the Grace of God His next Quotation is from Bellarmine who tells us says he De Justif lib 5. c. 17. That our Good Works do merit Eternal Life condignly not by reason of God's Covenant and Acceptation but also by reason of the Work it self The Title indeed of that Chapter is something towards that sence for the Words are these Opera bona justorum meritoria esse ex condigno non solum ratione pacti sed etiam ratione operis The Works of the Just are condignly meritorious not only by reason of God's Covenant but also by reason of the Works But if we look into the Chapter it self we shall see his Sence and that he only holds a Scholastic Opinion as most probable and one not so inconsistent with the Doctrine of the Church as he would have it nor so erroneous as that it needs an Index Expurgatorius He tells us first There are three ways by which Good Works may be condignly meritorious either by reason of the Covenant alone or by reason of the Work alone or upon account of them both together Then he tells us That several Authors have held some one and some another of these ways but he himself will keep the middle as most probable and shew That the Good Works of the Just are condignly meritorious of Eternal Life not only by reason of the Covenant but also of the Work together with it And in proving this Assertion he explicates his meaning and shews first That the Good Works of the Just taken of themselves alone without that Covenant are not condignly or so rigorously meritorious of Eternal Life that God could not without an Injustice refuse such a Reward And secondly That in Good Works proceeding from Grace there is a certain Proportion and Equality to the Reward of Eternal Life because Eternal Life is John 1.16 as St. John tells us GRACE FOR GRACE that is the Grace of a Reward for the Grace of Merit because Grace is SEMEN GLORIAE the Seed of Glory and because our Merits depend upon the Merits of CHRIST both in this that he has merited for us the Vertue of Meriting and in this that we merit as the Living Members of JESVS CHRIST and by an Influence which we receive from him as from our Head So that he concludes from these and several other Reasons brought by him all of which shew he do's not understand that either our Works can be called Good or we be esteemed Just without the Grace of God I say from these he concludes That it would be to detract from the Glory of CHRIST that our Merits which receive all their Value from him should be so imperfect as not to be condignly meritorious unless it were purely by reason of God's Acceptance Now let any impartial Man be judge whether this Doctrine require so severe a Censure as he would have the Church to give upon it Then he brings in Vasquez In D. Th. 1. c. qu. 114. d. 214. c. 5. alibi whose Doctrine is much what the same as Bellarmine's as to the first of the three Conclusions brought by him The second as appears by the Words is only a pure Scholastic Dispute about a Possibility and therefore I need say nothing to them As for his third after some search I could not find any Conclusion bearing that sence But touching his Remarkable Corollary I must needs tell him he has been so disingenuous as to leave out those Parts which would have shewn his Reader upon what Matter he was treating and how little it made for his purpose or against us But that he may see I love sincere Dealing tho' I be no Protestant I will transcribe his Words At vero cum opera Justi condigne mereantur vitam oeternam tanquam oequalem mercedem proemium non opus est interventa alterius meriti condigni quale est meritum Christi ut eis reddatur vita oeterna quinimo aliquid habet peculiare meritum cujuscunque justi respectu ipsius hominis justi quod non habet meritum Christi nempe reddere ipsum hominem justum dignum vitâ oeternâ ut eam dignè consequatur meritum autem Christi licet dignissimum sit quod obtineat a Deo Gratiam pro nobis tamen non habet hanc efficaciam virtutem ut reddat nos formaliter justos dignos oeternâ vitâ sed per virtutem ab ipso derivatam hunc consequuntur effectum homines in se ipsis Et ita nunquam petimus a Deo per merita Christi ut nostris dignis operibus meritoriis reddatur merces oeternoe vitoe sed ut per Christum detur nobis Gratia qua possumus dignè hanc mercedem promereri quod etiam manifestum signum est non expectare nos novam imputationem meritorum Christi proeter eam qua initio acceptimus gratiam virtutem ad recte operandum condigne promerendum Nam cum dicimus Christum meruisse nobis vitam oeternam non intelligimus illam ita nobis meruisse ut nostris operibus meritis condignis non reddatur nisi posteriori illa applicatione meritorum Christi sed quia Christus merito suo obtinuit nobis justificationem ea omnia quibus ad illam proeparamur proeterea obtainuit jam justificatis auxilia quibus recte operarentur vitam oeternam promererentur But says he seeing the Works of the Just do condignly merit Eternal Life as an equal Recompence and Reward there is no need that any other Condign Merit such as that of CHRIST should interpose to the end that Eternal Life might be rendred to them for the Merit of every Just man has something peculiar in respect of himself who is Just which the Merit of CHRIST has not that is to render him Just and worthy of Eternal Life that he may worthily obtain it whereas the Merit of CHRIST tho' it be most worthy to obtain Grace for us from God yet it has not this Efficacy and Power to render us formally Just and worthy of Eternal Life but Men do in themselves by a Virtue deriv'd from Him obtain this Effect And thus we never beg of God that by the Merits of CHRIST the Reward of Eternal Life may be given to our Worthy and Meritorious Works but that through CHRIST Grace may be given us whereby we
may be enabled worthily to merit this Reward which is also a manifest sign that we do not expect a new Imputation of the Merits of CHRIST besides that by which we at first received Grace and Strength to operate rightly and merit worthily For when we say that CHRIST has merited Eternal Life for us we do not understand it as if he merited it so for us that it would not be rendred to our Good Works and condign Merits unless by that succeeding Application of the Merits of CHRIST but because CHRIST by his Merits has obtain'd Justification for us and all other things by which we are prepared to it and moreover obtained for them who are already justified those Helps by which they might rightly operate and merit Eternal Life From which last Words and the others left out by this Author it appears manifestly that Vasquez was not disputing whether we merited Grace and Glory of our own selves without the Assistance of the Grace of JESVS CHRIST but whether after that JESVS CHRIST had merited for us Justifying Grace and all other Helps necessary to make our Works good acceptable and meritorious there was still another Grace of JESVS CHRIST required over and above these his other Assistances without which we could not obtain Eternal Life Is this that Doctrine then which he says they most justly detest Pag. 23. and are not a little surprized to finde that no Index Expurgatorius no Authentic Censure has ever taken notice of so dangerous a Prevarication Or rather are they not his own Prevarications which he has put upon us as our Doctrines and which are as detestable to us as they are to him nay more if he thinks these Authors held it possible for us to merit of our selves without the Grace of God which prevents accompanies and Crowns all our Actions for he acknowledges that such a Doctrine of Merit as that which he has represented as theirs would at least justifie a Dissent from a Church in those Particulars tho' it would not engage them wholly to forsake a Church that taught such things whereas we doubt not to say That it cannot be a True Church which teaches such Erroneous Doctrines and therefore that we ought not to communicate with such an one ART VII Satisfactions Purgatory and Indulgences HIs next Article is of Satisfactions Art 7. p. 24. In which he confesses that what the Bishop of Meaux has said they could most readily allow of Pag 25. were there but any tolerable Arguments to establish the Doctrine that requires it Pag. 27. He tells us also that they practice that Discipline for many other benefits of it and wish it were universally established even in a strictness equal to what it is fallen from But yet he will impose upon us a belief that by our own endeavours we are able to make a true and proper satisfaction to God for sin How do's he prove it Ibidem Or how do's he shew that the Council of Trent is contrary to the Bishop of Meaux's Exposition He tells us indeed Page 26. that the Council of Trent declares Conc. Trid. Sess 14. c. 8. That the justice of God requires it and that therefore the Confessors should be charged to proportion the Satisfaction to the Crime which he thinks is more than what the Bishop had explicated when he affirm'd That the necessity of this payment do's not arise from any defect in Christs Satisfaction but from a certain Order which God has established for a wholsome Discipline and to keep us from offending and tells us that Bellarmine concludes from these words of the Council that it is we who properly satisfie for our own sins and that Christs Satisfaction serves only to make ours Valid and cites in the Margin Lib. 1. de Purg. c. 14. whereas there are but eleven Chapters in that Book But that you may see how just he is in his Accusation of the Council of Trent I will give you the words of it The Council having declar'd the necessity of Satisfactions both from various Examples of Scripture Gen. 3. 2 King 12. Numb 12 20. in which it appears manifestly that God sometimes remits the guilt of Sin and yet retains a Punishment as also from the Justice of God which seems to exact a severer punishment for Sins committed against a greater Grace and Knowledge than for Sins committed through Ignorance before Baptism And having also declared the use and benefits of Penitential Works to form in us a true Sense of the Enormity of Sin to be as a Curb to keep us from sinning and as a Medicine to heal the remnants of Sin and conquer evil habits and to render us conformable to our Head CHRIST JESUS with whom if we suffer (a) Rom. 8.17 Conc. Trid. Sess 14. c. 8. we shall raign also adds these words Neque vero ita nostra est satisfactio hoec quam pro peccatis nostris exsolvimus ut non sit per CHRISTUM JESUM nam qui ex nobis tanquam ex nobis nihil possumus eo cooperante qui nos confortat omnia possumus Ita non habet homo unde glorietur sed omnis gloriatio nostra in Christo est in quo vivimus in quo meremur in quo satisfacimus facientes fructus dignos Poenitentioe qui ex illo vim habent ab illo offerunt Patri per illum acceptantur a Patre Debent ergo Sacerdotes Domini quantum Spiritus prudentia suggerit pro qualitate criminum Poenitentium facultate salutares convenientes satisfactiones injungere ne si forte peccatis conniveant indulgentius cum Poenitentibus agant loevissima quoedam opera pro gravissimis delictis injungendo alienorum peccatorum participes efficiantur But this Satisfaction which we make for our Sins is not so ours that it is not JESUS CHRIST 's for we who (b) 2 Cor. 3.5 Phil. 4.13 of our selves as of our selves can do nothing can do all things with him who strengthens us So that Man hath nothing wherein to glory (c) 1 Cor. 1.31 2 Cor. 10.17 Gal. 6.3 But all our glory is in Christ in whom (d) Acts 17.28 we live in whom we merit and in whom we satisfie bringing forth (e) Matth. 3.8.4.17 Luc. 3.8.10 17. Fruits worthy of Repentance which have their Power from him By him are offered to his Father From all which the Council concludes thus Therefore the Priests of our Lord ought as Prudence and the Spirit of God shall dictate to enjoyn salutary and convenient Satisfactions according to the Quality of the Crimes and the Abilities of the Penitents least if they should chance to connive at Sins and be too indulgent to Penitents by enjoyning light Penances for great Offences they should be made partakers of the Sins of others Is not this the very Sense of the Bishop of Meaux And what proof can he bring from hence that we think we can
of our selves make a true and proper satisfaction to God for Sin as he insinuates I would gladly therefore have this Author and with him all Protestants to consider whether what he says be a sufficient ground to break off from an establish'd Church and separate from her Communion All the Authority he brings is Pag. 24. We think the whole of this point to be the advancement of a Doctrine grounded upon no Authority of Scripture c. and we are persuaded that when ever God remits the Crime he remits the Punishment also Pag. 25. it being a way most suitable to his Divine Goodness He tells us indeed that this is the Doctrine of the Church of England but cites no Authority of Canons or Articles for it which is very strange seeing this Doctrine is of such concern that it gives more to a Sinner for saying a bare Lord have Mercy upon us than all the Plenary Indulgences of the Catholic Church against which they make such clamours And here also I cannot but wonder that he who so often uses no other Argument but we are persuaded we think we suppose that in almost every Article he brings this as his chiefest Argument we suppose this is contrary to Scripture or we think this is not to be found in it or in Antiquity Pag. 25. should yet quarrel with the Bishop of Meaux for using that word and tell us he ought to have brought some better proof for so great a Doctrine than barely we suppose And this especially when the Bishop did not use the word but only nous croyons we believe and so it was rendred by me But it matters not this served to make a shew of an Argument Pag 25 27 31. and must be improved upon several occasions Indulgences INdulgences follow next Art 7. pag. 27. And here he tells us That the Bishop of Meaux has stated our Doctrine after a manner so favourable to them that he is persuaded he will find more in his own Church than in theirs to oppose his Doctrine We do not hear of any one yet that has opposed it nay on the contrary we see it almost every where approved If the Disputes in the Schools have descended to some particular Niceties not expressed by the Bishop neither he nor we are concerned in them and if some Abuses have crept in seeing he acknowledges that both the Council and the Bishop of Meaux seem willing to have them redressed Pag. 28. methinks it should suffice He tells us indeed of many Practices in the Church of Rome different as he says from that of the Primitive Church but these being neither necessary nor universally received we will not quarrel with him about them but content our selves with what he has promised if he will stand to his word That whenever the Penances shall be reduc'd to their former Practice they will be ready to give or receive such an Indulgence as Monsieur de Meaux has described and as the Primitive Ages of the Church allowed of Purgatory THo' he will not allow a Purgatory Act. â— yet he is forced to acknowledge Prayer for the Dead in the very second Century Pag. 31. He would willingly attribute this to any other Intention than that of the Church of aiding or helping Souls departed nay further he tells us they will not condemn the Practice Pag. 32. so it be not made an Article of our Faith But since two General Councils have declared it that of Florence in which the Grecian Bishops were and that of Trent and since the Practice of all Nations and the Testimonies of every Age confirm the Custom of Praying for the Dead that they might receive help what can we say to them who make a Breach in the Church and condemn Antiquity upon no other grounds than a bare supposition that it is injurious to the Merits of JESVS CHRIST which yet has no other Proof but their vain Presumption ART VIII Of the Sacraments in general IN his second Part he tells us Art 9. pag. â—â— That the Doctrine of the Sacraments has always been esteemed one of the most considerable Obstacles to their Union with the Church of Rome That they cannot imagine why M. de Meaux should insinuate as if our Disputes about these except it be in the Point of the Eucharist were not so great as about other Matters unless says he it be to serve for an Excuse for his own passing so lightly over them or to make us less careful in examining their Doctrine One would think to hear this Discourse that this Author had something very material to bring against our Church neither has he given us any reason to suspect he would be careless in such a grand Concern We will trace him in each Sacrament and see whether the Arguments he brings be sufficient or no to justifie a Breach in the Church which has been the occasion of so great Evils And first in this Article we find little difference betwixt our Doctrines as to the Nature and Efficacy of the Sacraments or as to the Necessity of them or manner how they confer Grace or the Dispositions requisite to partake of their Effects the chief difference lying in the diversity of Expression And as for the number of Sacraments he has removed the chief Obstacle by telling us in the close of this Article That their own Church says but little more than what our greatest Schoolmen have voluntarily confessed But he needed not to have gone to the Schoolmen for if they exact this Notion of a Sacrament that it must be generally necessary to Salvation as their Catechism expresses it 't is true they will not find Seven Sacraments but I am afraid also they will scarce establish Two and if they add with this Author that the other Sacraments are not Sacraments after the same manner that Baptism and the Lords Supper are pag. 41. it will be readily granted them seeing the very Words of our Profession of Faith express much-what the same thing when it tells us there are Seven Sacraments of the New Law Instituted by JESVS CHRIST for the Salvation of Mankind tho' all be not necessary for every Man If the number of Seven Sacraments be not mentioned by the Ancient Fathers it is no wonder seeing they writ not Catechisms but neither do they limit them to Two It is sufficient that in discoursing upon any of these Seven they generally and properly call them Sacraments Neither can any Argument drawn from Scripture against this Number be of force since the Scripture do's not term any of them Sacraments but only Marriage It is sufficient Eph. 5. that the Scripture mentions an exteriour Ceremony and an interiour Grace annexed thereto which shews the nature of a Sacrament ART IX Of Baptism AS for Baptism we both agree Art 10. p. 35. That it is the Law of Christ which the Eternal Truth has established that seeing all men are
conceived and born in Sin none can enter into the kingdom of God except he be regenerate and born anew of Water and the Spirit What reason therefore they have to break Communion with an established Church because she will not be more Charitable than JESVS CHRIST whose Law this is I cannot understand But says he This Law as well as others must be interpreted according to the Rules of Natural Equity and since the Roman Church acknowledges that God sometimes accepts of the Will for the Deed the ardent Desire of Baptism for Baptism it self when it cannot be had why should we not think he will accept of the Desire of the Church and of the Believing Parents to satisfie for the want of Baptism in Children who die without it seeing St. Paul tells us 1 Cor. 7. That the Seed of faithful Parentage is Holy from the very Birth I must confess I am astonished to see this Argument and to hear the Church condemned for her Uncharitableness in this Point by one who pretends to give us the Doctrine of the Church of England whereas she determines nothing of it Pag. 37. as he confesses If he had been a Huguenot or Puritan it might have seemed reasonable to justifie a Breach with the Church of Rome for a Doctrine which they condemn But for a Church of England Man to justifie a Breach for a Doctrine which he affirms his Church has determined nothing of is to me a Riddle but shews how little he esteems the Sin of Schism Certainly there is a vast difference betwixt the ardent Desire of those who are by Age capable of receiving Baptism and the Desire of the church or Parents The one proceeds from Faith working by Divine Charity already infused into the Soul of the Unbaptized Person which if he extinguish not by the neglect of a Precept will no doubt of it produce a good Effect The other is wholly extrinsecal to the Child and cannot affect the Soul of it unless by the application of that Sacrament which by the Institution of JESVS CHRIST must wash away our Original Guilt So is there also a vast difference betwixt a Legal Purity of which St. Paul speaks in the above-mentioned Text and a Cleanness from Original Sin of which we treat ART X. Confirmation HE acknowledges Confirmation Art 11. pag. 39 40. or Imposition of Hands upon those who had been Baptiz'd to have been very Antient in the Church and which the very Apostles themselves practis'd as also that the use of Chrism in Confirmation was very antient He tells us they allow none that is not of Episcopal Order to Confirm and that they piously hope the Blessing of the Holy Spirit descends upon those who receive it through the Prayer of the Bishop to enable them to keep their Baptismal Covenant to Arm them against Temptations and to assist them in the way of Vertue and Religion c. All which shew an outward visible Sign of an inward Spiritual Grace and the Divine Institution of this Sacrament seeing none but God can promise Grace to an outward Sign such as the Imposition of Hands and Chrism are and certainly strength to keep our Baptismal Covenant to resist Temptations and to practice Vertue are no small Graces which he at least piously hopes are granted by God through the Prayer of the Bishop he might have added Imposition of Hands also and should have given us a reason why they left off the use of Chrism which he grants was early in the Church and why they will not call this a Sacrament which has all these marks of it and which the Antient Fathers frequently termed so But if he will have it only to be a Sacrament not so generally necessary to Salvation as some others are we will not dispute about the name under so strict a notion tho' we affirm it to be a Sacrament properly speaking ART XI Of Penance and Confession HE wishes their Discipline were both more strictly required Art 12. p. 40. and more duly observ'd as to Penance and Confession than it is He tells us that their Canons require perhaps as much as the Primitive Christians themselves did but that it proceeds from the decay of Piety in the People rather than any want of care in their Church that they are not as well and as regularly practised He cannot deny but that Confession both public and private were very antiently practis'd both in the Eastern and Western Churches but supposes them to have been only a part of Christian Discipline and therefore tells us the Primitive Christians interpreted these Passages cited by the Bishop of Meaux Matth. 18.18 Joh. 20.23 with respect to Public Discipline If he had produced those Fathers and shown that they taught it to be only the Orders of a Public Discipline of the Church and not an obligation upon a Sinner either to confess publicly or privately to the Priest which was sometimes called Confession to God as Absolution was called Absolution from God it would have been some satisfaction to the Reader He insinuates as if we permitted every Priest to hear Confessions and only just to hear them and then without any more ado to say Pag. 41. I ABSOLVE THEE But this it is not to understand our Discipline which permits none to hear Confessions but such as are approv'd of after a diligent examen of their Learning and Capacity that they may be not only as Judges to pass a right Sentence upon the Enormity of the Crimes the various species of them the Obligations of Restitution c. but also as Physicians to prescribe wholesome Remedies to prevent Relapses c. which cannot be done without the Knowledge of the Case And therefoe tho' we assert the great convenience of Private or Auricular Confession to take away the occasions of Fear Shame and Scandal yet our Dispute is not so much upon that as upon a necessity of declaring our Sins to a Spiritual Physician which whether it be publicly or privately matters not so it be done and without doing which we say neither can a Judge pronounce a just Sentence nor a Physician prescribe wholesome Remedies We grant therefore that Public Confession was much in use in the Primitive Church for Public Sins and that it was follow'd with a Public Penance for them but that was most commonly either after or accompanied with Private Confession of their Secret Sins also That this Public Confession was a part of Discipline and therefore alterable at pleasure we deny not but that either Public or Private Confession were necessary we affirm He tells us Pag. 4â— That the Church of England refuses no sort of Confession either Public or Private which may be any ways necessary to the quieting of Mens Consciences or to the exercising of that Power of binding and loosing which our Saviour CHRIST has left to his Church That her Absolution is so full Pag. â—â— that the Church of Rome it self could
not defire to add any thing to it That they Advise even Private Confession upon many accounts which the Bishop of Meaux has remarked and which they willingly allow as very useful to the Penitent that is I suppose he allows with the Bishop the Penitential Court of Judicature to be a curb to Liberty Expos pag. 18. a plentiful sourse of Wise Admonitions and a sensible consolation for Souls afflicted for their Sins all which he acknowledges render it very useful and convenient even to those who have no doubt nor scruple But yet he will not have this so beneficial an exercise to be necessary where the Sinner can quiet his Conscience without it but calls it an unnecessary Rack to Mens Consciences So that if a Man be either insensible of his sins or have brought his Conscience to such a pass that it checks him not or be presumptious of Gods Mercies and upon that think himself secure of a Pardon it seems it is not necessary with them he should either have that Curb or those Admonitions whereas we think those Persons have most need of all the helps imaginable and doubt not but that God who gave so large a Commission to his Priest to bind or loose did not exempt those who stand in need of it from a due submission to that Tribunal We assirm therefore that Penance is necessary not for every Man in particular but to those only who have offended mortally after Baptism That true Contrition which must vertually include all the parts of it is sufficient in case of a non-possibility of performing some of them That Confession which is one of the parts of it either public or private is necessary to be performed to a Priest that they who have Authority to bind or loose may know upon what it is they are to pronounce Sentence That tho' our Sentence be absolute yet since we cannot know when the Penitent has those due Dispositions which are required to receive the Benefit of it neither also can we be sure that God always confirms our Sentence These are our Doctrines this we have always held and practis'd and this we affirm to be conformable to the practice of the most Antient and Orthodox Churches and we cannot but be astonished why they should be rejected and no better grounds brought than we suppose Pag. 43. or we must beg leave with assurance to say that such Doctrines ar directly contrary to the Tradition of the Church and to many plain and undoubted places of Holy Scripture If he say he only undertook an Exposition of their Doctrine and therefore was no more oblig'd to prove it than the Bishop of Meaux himself I must tell him the difference is great for the Bishop of Meaux undertaking to Expound a Doctrine establish'd in the Church that very Possession was a sufficient proof of its Antiquity and Universality it being a constant maxim in our Church that no particular Opinions or Practises ought ever to be establish'd as necessary to all and that nothing can be declared as an Article of our Faith which was not materially so before that is which was not handed down to us by universal Tradition as a reveal'd Truth Whereas this Author undertaking to give us an Exposition of a Doctrine which dissents from ours so establish'd and of which we are in possession if he would have it bear any weight he ought to have given some solid Reasons for their defection from those Doctrines which had been establish'd in England for above a Thousand Years from the very time that Pagan Idolatry was rooted out by St. Augustin the Benedictin Monk he ought I say to have given some solid Reasons such as were no less than Domonstrations or manifest Revelations to which and to no other those who are in Possession of a Doctrine so establish'd ought to submit and without which all Arguments for a Reformation dwindle into this which is very inefficacious we suppose we have a just reason to reform we think we are in the right we are persuaded it is according to Scripture c. but we are not certain ART XII Of Extream Vnction AS to the Sacrament of Extream Vnction Art 13. p. 44. this Author cannot deny but the words of St. James If any man be sick James 5.14 15. let him call for the Priests of the Church and let them pray over him anointing him with oyl in the Name of our Lord. And the prayer of Faith shall save the sick and our Lord shall lift him up and if he be in sins they shall be remitted to him I say he cannot deny but these words exhibit to us an outward Visible Sign and an Inward Spiritual Grace but yet he will not have the meaning of this Passage to reser at all to a Sacrament but only to the miraculous Cures of the Apostles contrary to the express words of Scripture and to the sence of them received and delivered to us by Antiquity The Grace of Curing the Sick was not given to all Priests or Elders alike but only to some select Persons these did not only cure the Sick but the Lame and the Blind their Power of Miracles was not tied to the Ceremony of Unction only all those that were anointed were not cured neither had all they who were cured by them who had the Gift of Healing any assurance by that Cure of the Forgiveness of their Sins Yet St. James here speaks of those only that are Sick he appoints them to call in the Priests in general and not them only who had the Gift of Healing he speaks only of anointing them with Oyl and not of any other Ceremonies used by CHRIST or his Apostles in order to the curing of the Sick He promises The prayer of faith shall save the sick adn the Lord shall lift him up which if it had been meant of Bdily Health those only would have died in the Apostles time who either neglected this Advice or whose Deaths prevented the accomplishment of that Ceremony And lastly he pronounces That if they be in sins they shall be remitted which shews plainly enough it cannot belong only to Bodily Cures as he would have it But he tells us The Rituals of the Roman Church for above Eight hundred years understood it plainly of Bodily Cures and that Cardinal Cajetan himself freely confesses that it can belong to no other Had he only told us that the ancient Roman Rituals shew this Ceremony had a respect to Bodily Cures as well as to the Cures of the Mind he had told us nothing but what our Rituals at this day manifest and what may be gathered from the Council of Trent as the Bishop of Meaux observes Sess 14. de Sac. Extrem Unc. cap. 2. which speaking of the Effects of this Sacrament tells us That the Sick Person do's sometimes by it obtain Health of Body when it is expedient for the Salvation of the Soul Had he told us also only that
his Mystical Body that is his Church but the visible species are the Sacrament or Sign of both these things Then in his Ninth Distinction speaking of a two fold Manducation the one Sacramental in which the good and bad do Eat the Body of Christ and the other only Spiritual in which only the good are made partakers of it which is by Faith he proceeds to tell us of the Errours of some who held that the bad did not receive the Body of Christ and affirms that it must be undoubtedly held that it is received by the good not only Sacramentally but Spiritually whereas the bad receive it only Sacramentally that is under the visible species of Bread and Wine they receive that Flesh of Christ which he took from the Blessed Virgin and the Blood which he shed for us but not the Mystical Body that is the benefits of his presence All which he there proves from St. Gregory and St. Augustin and explicates some ambiguous terms which might give occasion of errour His next Distinction cited by this Author which Bist 10. treats De hoeresi aliorum c. Of the Heresie of others who say that the Body of Christ is not upon the Altar but in Sign tells us That there are others who transcend the madness of the former Heretics who measuring the Power of God according to the manner of natural things do more audaciously and dangerously contradict the truth affirming that the Body and Blood of Christ are not on our Altars and that the substance of Bread and Wine are not converted into the substance of his Flesh and Blood and take occasion of erring from the words of Truth whence began the first Heresie against this Truth amongst Christ's Disciples Then shewing what pretensions they make for their Errour both from Scripture and Fathers and having solved them he says Satis responsum est Hoereticis objectionibus eorum We have sufficiently answered Heretics and their Objections who deny the true Body of Christ to be on our Altars and the Bread to be changed into his Body and the Wine into his Blood by a Mystical Consecration Then setting down his proofs out of the Fathers to confirm our Doctrine he concludes this Distinction with these words Ex his aliisque pluribus constat c. From these and many others it is manifest that the true Body and Blood of Christ is on our Altars yea that whole Christ is there under both species and that the Substance of Bread is converted into his Body and the substance of Wine into his Blood Having thus confirm'd the substance of our Faith as to the thing Dist 11. Lib. A. he proceeds in his next Distinction cited also by this Author to treat of the manner how this Conversion is made whether it be Formal or Substantial or of some other kind and this being a pure Scholastic Nicety he tell us he dare not undertake to define it but declares that if we ask him about the manner he will give us this short answer Lit. C. Mysterium fidei credi salubriter potest investigari salubriter non potest A Mystery of Faith may be safely believ'd but not safely searched into This is the Doctrine of Lombardus who lived before the Council of Lateran and this is the Doctrine we now hold without the least alteration and this Doctrine was always held ever since the Institution tho' it was thought convenient by the Primitive Fathers to conceal it from the Enemies of Christianity and from those who were not Initiated so that it may be said that it is now more publicly taught than it was then but was always equally believ'd by the Faithful These things being thus cleared and the charge he has made against us being found to be thus false the consequences he has drawn from thence will fall upon himself and we must needs tell him that we cannot but admire the Power of Truth and hope that God has permitted him thus to misrepresent our Tenets to disguise the Truth and to cite Authors contrary to their Intentions that the Eyes of of all those of his Communion may be opened and that they may see what blind guides they follow who either take up things upon trust or wilfully prevaricate the Text that they may keep them in Ignorance Moreover this Author affirms Pag. 61. the Church never taught nor practised the Adoration of the Sacrament for above 1000 years that the Elevation of it was not heard of till the Seventh Century and then used not to expose it to the People to be adored but to represent the lifting up of CHRIST upon the Cross that all the Circumstances of this Worship are but Inventions of yesterday that the Primitive Christians did several Actions which seem inconsistent with Adoration c. And we must take all these Assertions upon his bare word for Truths I shall nto go about to swell this Answer by proving an Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament within the first 400 years and the Expressions of the first Ages which argue an Elevation nor the other Proofs we have for a Real Presence nor the Consent of the most Learned Protestants this has been too frequently done to repeat it here The Reader who is desirous of searching into the Truth may see if he understand French what M. Arnold has writ in Three Volumes of the Perpetuity of Faith or else what Brierlay has written concerning the Sacrifice of Mass what Coccius in his Thesaurus and what many others have published upon those Accounts in which they will find that our Doctrine is conformable to Scripture that it has been continued down to our time by an uninterrupted Succession and that our Practices have been always conformable to our Doctrine which is sufficient to evince the Truth of it and shew the unjust Pretences of a Reformation ART XVI Of the Sacrifice of the Mass IN his Twentieth Article Of the Sacrifice of the Mass Pag. 62. which he tells us is justly esteemed one of the greatest and most dangerous Errours that offends them he yet acknowledges That seeting aside the Foundation of the CORPOREAL PRESENCE on which the Bishop builds and his Consequence That this Service is a TRVE AND REAL PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE which he says they are persuaded his manner of Expounding it will never bear there is little in it besides but what they could readily assent to but if he cannot allow of the Corporeal Presence will be with the Church of England in her Catechism allow a Real Presence If he do I would gladly know whether that Foundation be not solid enough to build those Doctrines on which M. de Meaux has founded upon that Reality If he will not allow of a Real Presence how is he of the Church of England Again I would gladly know of him what the Church of England holds concerning her Priests whether they be truly Priests or no whether she acknowledge a Sacrifice and an Altar truly
But any thing must pass now to deceive the vulgar tho' Men of Sence see the contrary Another Argument he brings to delude the Authority of the Church of Rome is to make her apss only for a particular Church But how often have they been told that Catholics do not take the Church of Rome as it is the Suburbican Diocess to be the Catholic Church but all the Christian Churches in Communion with the Bishop of Rome And that this is the true Church appears by the marks of it deliver'd in the Nicene Creed no other Church being able to pretend to that Unity Sanctity Universality and Antiquity which she is manifestly invested with The true Church must be one and by conquence free from Schism which destroys that notion which some of late have held that the true Church is that Catholic Church which is composed of all Christians the Roman the Grecians the Armenians Prtoestants c. all which they acknowledge to be Members of the True Church tho' they may be rotten ones and this notion our Author seems to have of it when he tells us that the Roman Church has in all ages made up but a part of the Church Pag. 77. and that not always the greatest neither The true Church must be also Holy and must by consequence be free from Heresie and teach no Erroneous Doctrine which how it stands with that Idea which this Author insinuates that the Church of Rome has erred event in necessary points of Faith and is yet a Member of the True Church is worthy a mature Consideration This indeed made the first Reformers who accused the Roman Catholic Church of Idolatry and Superstition say that the Church of JESUS CHRIST was hidden fled into the Wilderness See the Protestant Authors cited by Brereley in his Protestant Apology Tract 2. Cap. 1. Sect. 4. and invisible for 1000 or 1200 years that the Pope was Antichrist and the Church of Rome Antichristian But the Men of our Age being sufficiently convinced that the Church of Christ was to have Kings and Queens for Nursing Fathers and Nursing Mothers that she was to have Pastors and Teachers in all Ages Whitakers contra Duraeum l. 3. p. 260. that the Administration of the Sacraments and the Preaching of the true word of God were the Essential Proprieties of the Church c. and that all these marks do necessarily denote a Visible Church and finding moreover they could never prove any Christian Kings before Luther Converted to Protestancy or any visible Pastors or Teachers of their Doctrine or any Assembly that Administred the Sacraments as they do or Preached the word of God in their Sence and finding they could not deny the Conversion of many Kings and Nations to the Religion established in the Church of Rome found themselves obliged also to admit her as a part of the True Church tho' a corrupted one and would rather destroy the Sanctity of Christs Church and her Vnity than acknowledge themselves to be justly cut off from being Members of her The third Mark is Catholic which is universal as to Place Time and Doctrine that Church cannot be the true Church the sound whereof is not gone through the whole Earth and is not it self spread over and visible in all Nations that cannot be the true Church which has not continued in all Ages Visible Holy and Uniform neither lastly can that be the true Church which either adds or diminishes from the Doctrines revealed by God to the Prophets and Apostles so that those are as guilty of the Breach of Faith who refuse to believe what has been taught as those who impose new Doctrines The last mark of the Church is that she must be Apostolic that is grounded upon the Doctrines and Faith of the Apostles and deriving a continual Succession from them All which marks are so far from being applicable to the Church of England or to the Universal Church according to the notion given of it be these late Writers that a Man of the smallest judgment if Impartial cannot but see the fallacy thereof ART XXII Authority of the Holy See and of Episcopacy AS for his two other Articles The Opinion of the Church of England as to the Authority of the Church and that of the See Apostolic and Episcopacy I have nothing to say to him but to desire him to remember his promises Pag. 81. and to enquire what is the Authority the Antient Councils of the Primitive Church have acknowledged and the Holy Fathers have always taught the Faithful to give to the Successour to St. Peter and whether the first Four General Councils might not be termed neither General nor Free with as much Reason as the Council of Trent or those others acknowledged by all the Western World and most of the Eastern Churches before the new pretended Reformation The Conclusion I Come now to his Close in which he sums up all the Poison of his Book lays what he pleases to our charge and draws what Consequences he will to inflame his Reader He tells us of Bitter and Vnchristian Hatred we have conceiv'd against them Pag. 82. and desires to know what warrant we have for it I desire all unprejudic'd Persons to consider whether we have not more reason to complain than he Here was a Church established in England Truths delivered to her with Christianity it self were here Practis'd and Preach'd Religious Houses were here endow'd with ample Revenues c. when behold a Pretended Reformation comes destroys this Church dissolves all the Constitutions of it changes the established Doctrines and alters many of its antientest Practices pulls down Religious Houses and Churches alienates the Revenues turns the Religious Inhabitants into the wide World make Laws against all those who should defend that Doctrine Imprisonment loss of Goods and Fortunes nay even of Life it self are the Punishments ordained for them who are found guilty of Practising or Preaching that Religion And what less could such a Church do than Excommunicate they who thus Renounc'd her Doctrines Contemned her Authority and persecuted her Children But this Excommunication must be called Severity and unchristian hatred And if we declare that all those who forsake the Unity of the Church are guilty of Schism and they who will not acquiess to those Points of Faith which God has Revealed and the Church which is the Pillar and Ground of Truth has declar'd to have been so Reveal'd are guilty of Heresie and that Heresie and Schism will bring inevitable damnation to all those who die without repenting of them we must be esteem'd uncharitable I must therefore Retort his Popular Argument and ask him and all unprejudic'd Protestants what they can find in all our Doctrines when truly Represented to warrant that bitter and unchristian hatred they have conceiv'd against us a hatred which has occasioned so many Penal and Sanguinary Laws and still makes them use all endeavours to keep them in full force against
us Do we not firmly believe the Holy Scriptures according to the Sence and unanimous consent of the Antient and Primitive Fathers Do we not embrace the three Creeds nay and believe all the fundamental Articles of the Christian Religion Do you not acknowledge us to be true Members of the Catholic Church and by Consequence your Brethren tho' you will have us to be unsound and weak If we maintain any Doctrines different from yours do we not shew you plain Texts of Scriture for most of them and the consent of Primitive Fathers and the acknowledged Practices of the Church for above 1000 Years for every one of them Do we not fix our Grounds upon the undoubted Word of God deliver'd down to us either by Writing or uninterrupted Tradition and explicated by the unanimous consent of the Pastors and Teachers in all times and places If we tell you a due Honour is to be paid to Images purely upon the account of being Representatives and not for themselves is it not agreeable to your own Practice who bow to the Altar keep uncover'd in a Church bend the Knees at the Name of JESVs not for the sake of the Altar Fabric or Sound but with a reference to the Victim which Consecrates the Altar to God who is in a peculiar manner present in the Church and to JESVS CHRIST the Son of God understood by that sound which Honour if it may be called Religious in some respect it is not manifestly because it tends ultimately to God himself If we desire the Saints and Angels who Reign in Heaven to Pray with us and for us to their and our Common Creator and if we acknowledge such Prayers are good and beneficial to aid and help us in our necessities we know no more injury is done to JESVS CHRIST our sole Redeemer by such Addresses than by your own to a Parent or a Friend we detest that Religion of Angels mentioned by the Apostle Col. 2. 18. accoding to that Sence that place manifestly bears and as the Antient Fathers understood it but we think with the same Fathers that a due Honour ought to be given them as to the Messengers and Friends of God And any undue Worship which elevates them above the pitch of our fellow Creatures we detest What more can any one in reason desire of us And if we pronounce Anathema's against those who deny it to be lawful to make such innocent Addresses or to pay such a due and limited Honour it is because they contradict Antiquity and the approved Fathers of the Church We acknowledge 't is true a Real Presence of the Body and Blood of JESVS CHRIST under the Species or Appearances of Bread and Wine and are we not assured of it by the very Words of JeSVS CHRIST by the manifest consent of Antiquity by the continual practice of both the Greek and Latin Churches If we be ignorant of the manner at least we are not of the thing And do's not your Chatechism and your most Learned Divines acknowledge as much your Confession of your ignorance of the manner of his being present do's not hinder you from acknowledging the Body and Blood of our Blessed Saviour to be verily and indeed taken and receiv'd not only by Faith but by the Faithful in the Lords Supper This Real Presence is grounded upon the Words of our Blessed Saviour This is my Body taken literally from whence also it necessarily follows that after the words of Consecration 't is not more Bread and Wine but the Body and Blood of JESVS CHRIST This Consequence of the Real Presence many Protestants themselves confess and acknowledge that if the words must be taken literally they must necessarily grant both Transubstantiation Adoration and all the rest of our Doctrines about this Sacrament And if any one ask us why we take it literally we may with the Bishop of Condom say they may as well ask us why we keep the High Road that is all the Fathers of the Church in all Ages having taken it in that Sence we ought no more to deviate from it than from a beaten Road. If we adore our Blessed Saviour in the Sacrament it is but a necessary Consequence of his Real Presence and what they who believe him present cannot but think themselves oblig'd to do We acknowledge that where Gods Commands are Positive they are indispensible and therefore if we judge Communion under both kinds not to be positively Commanded we judge so because the Church in all Ages dispensed with it and you your selves grant that in cases of necessity eveyr Pastor may give it under one kind only and is he not left judge when that case occurs and when he may make use of it These things considered I must use your own words Men and Brethren Pag. 84. consider we conjure you these things and if you please consider us too what we are and what our Manners and Conversation amongst you has been even when Perjury and Faction loaded us with all the Injuries Hell it self could invent and exercised their utmost severities upon us What also we are at present and how our change of Fortune makes us neither remember former Injuries nor desire to revenge them Believe us at least that we have no other ends but Truth no designs but to convince your Judgments and if we dare not be over curious in enquiring into the manner how the Mysteries that are revealed can possibly be true 't is because we know they are revealed and doubt not of Gods Veracity Believe us that we have no other Interest but the Salvation of our own Souls and those of others by endeavouring to represent our Doctrines as they truly are and soliciting the Children of the Church to return to their Mothers Bosome We are in possession the Proofs you bring against us are only Negatives and meer Conjectures you think them convincing Arguments but are not certain but that you may fail in your Concjectures You cannot shew one positive Argument against the Invocation of Saints either from Scripture or from Fathers Not one against the Doctrine of the Real Presence Transubstantiation Veneration of Images upon account of their Representations not one against the number of Sacraments not one to prove Communion under both kinds to be indispensible or that Children dying without Baptism are saved In a word you cannot shew one positive Argument against any one Doctrine of our Church if you state it right All you can say is it do's not appear to us out of Scripture it do's not appear to us from Antiquity shew us you say your Authentic Records your Deeds of Gift your Revelation and we will believe as if uninterrupted possession were not sufficietn Proof Our Plea is good olim possidio prior possidio If you will dispute our Title you must shew your positive Records of a more Antient Date But what need of so much bitterness whilst you plead your Cause Is it not enough to dispossess us