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A67649 Dr. Stillingfleet's principles of Protestancy cleared, confuted, and retorted And the infallibility of the Roman-Catholick Church asserted; and that the same church alone is the whole Catholick church. In a letter from a Catholick gentleman to a Protestant knight. Warner, John, 1628-1692. 1673 (1673) Wing W911; ESTC R219411 19,248 38

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following a guide that owns not to be fully assured whether his own Doctrine be the right way to Heaven The 5. Conclusion makes it lawful for every man to reject the authority of the Church of England and to make himself sole Judge of the Scriptures and all this out of love to his soul and out of reverence to Gods Veracity which is in equivalent terms to make Dr. Stilling fleets Religion inseparable from Heresie and Rebellion and inconsistent with the safety of any State or Soveraign Conclusion VI. Though nothing were to be delivered as the Will of God but what is by the Catholick Church declared to be so yet this doth not at all concern the Church of Rome which neither is the Catholick Church nor any sound part or member thereof From all which it follows that it can be nothing but wilful Ignorance weakness of judgment strength of prejudice or some sinful passion which makes any one forsake the Communion of the Church of England to embrace that of the Church of Rome This 6. Conclusion I shall endeavour to confute by proving that the Roman-Catholick Church alone is the whole Catholick Church In order whereunto I will set down these few Propositions 1. That there is and always hath been upon earth a visible Catholick Church otherwise Christ would not have commanded us to repair to it in our differences nor the Apostles have made it an Article of our Creed 2. The Catholick Church must have some visible and supernatural signes far exceeding all others in the appearance of being such whereby it may be discerned from all ●agan and Heretical Congregations pretending to be a part or the whole Catholick Church If this be not granted no man is obliged to be of any Church nay rather all men are obliged to be of no Church because not having any signes to prefer one Church before the other none could know which is the true one and therefore it 's a hundred to one at least they would fall into some Heretical Congregation there being so many and the true Church or Congregation but one 3. That no supernatural signs or Miracles can be visible and wrought for conrfimation of doctrine in any Congregation but in that one which is the true Church because the signes or Miracles which Christ said would follow the Beleevers Mark 16. or the true Church are of the same nature of Christs Miracles and in order to gain credit for the testimony it gives of it self and his doctrine and God being the Author of truth and concord cannot give supernatural signes of his trust or truth to any two or more dissenting Churches for if he did the wisest course as I said learned and pious men could take would be to turn Scepticks and not believe in God Hence also it followeth 4. That the Catholick Church cannot be composed of any two Congregations dissenting in any one point which eith●r holds to be an Article of Faith fundamental or not fundamental the reason is because if they be of equal authority men ought rather to suspend then submit their judgments to either of those Congregations and though both should agree in fundamental Articles yet because God being truth it self is as contrary to small as great un●ru●hs or errors he can no more permit the Testimony of his Church and his Miracles to confirm a little then a great untruth and so it must be infallible as well in not fundamentals as in fundamentals 5. Gods being of infinite Veracity as hath been proved in my confutation of Dr. Stillingfleets 6 16 17. Propositions cannot permit any false Church to have or shew so credible an appearance of true Miracles as hath been alwaies and now is pretended to be in the Roman-Catholick Church They are so convincing that our adversaries can as little prove the fraud as deny the fact They are so frequent that there is scarce a Countrey in Christendom wherein they have not been wrought They are so authentick I speak only of such as are approved by the Bishops of Rome in order to the canonization of Saints that there cannot be a more narrow scrutiny into the nature and cure of the disease nor into the sincerity and sufficiency of the Witnesses and the severity of our judgments against such as we finde to be cheats and Impostors is notorious even in Ireland where our Ecclesiastical discipline is restrained by the Laws we have ventured to silence James Finanghty a simple ignorant Priest because himself and he who caused them to be printed were so weak as to fancy they were true Miracles I know Dr. Stillingfleet may object against this Proposition the Miracles of Antichrist but his Miracles will not be of the same nature with the Miracles of Christ and ours he will not convert Nations to Christianity by imitating the Apostles humility poverty and chastity as the Apostolical men of our Church have done in all former ages and even in this Witnesse both the Indies Brasile Ethiopia Persia Japan and China Besides though Antichrist's Miracles could be in appearance as palpable and as plausible as ours yet besides the precedency and prediction of ours as true the particular circumstances wherewith Scripture hath described that man of sin and the warning it hath given us not to beleeve his Miracles do so discredit him and them that no man who will reflect upon the Scriptures words and recurr to God for help will be deceiv'd by Antichrist's Impostures and lying Prodigies True it is that according to * See D. Stilling fleets Answ pag. 469. D. Stillingfleets Principles making every particular person Judge of Divine Revelation and admitting nothing as such that he thinks doth contradict sense in its proper object Antichrist's Miracles must be judged true Miracles and by consequence his Doctrine must be embraced as Divine Revelation For upon this account alone doth Dr. Stillingfleet deny the Miracle and Mystery of Transubstantiation notwithstanding the clearness of Scripture for it being impossible to express that Truth or any other in more clear terms then by Christs saying This is my body so likewise it must be concluded from Dr. Stillingfleet Principles that though Christ tels you clearly Antichrist's Miracles will not be true Miracles yet if your eyes tels you that is if you see a man lie like dead and afterwards see him stand and move by Antichrist's command you must prefer this evidence of sence in its proper object before Christs clear words and Revelation For the proper object of sense goes no further then to the outward appearance or accidents it doth not penetrate to the substance of bread or wine much less to the life or soul of a seeming dead man and by consequence men may be mistaken in the substance of both though they rely upon senses evidence in its proper object which is only the species or outward appearances or if you will follow the modern opinion certain impressions made upon the Organs of our senses and this may be
performed by Antichrist or by any other that the devil hath a kindness for without any concurrence or real existence of the Object you fancy to see hear smell touch or taste and of this we have sufficient proofs and examples in visions and apparitions both of good and bad spirits both in sacred and prophane History We ought not therefore to attribute so much to the evidence of sense in its most proper Object it cannot have evidence in any other as to wrest the words of Scripture from their literal and plain sence in the Mystery of Transubstantiation seeing we must confess that Antichrists false Miracles will have no other colour of truth but what will be grounded upon the Evidence of sense in its most proper Object and if this Evidence ought not to prevail in favour of Antichrists Miracles I see no reason why it ought to prevail against Christs words This is my body As for matters of faith that suppose matters of fact the certainty of their belief doth not depend so much upon the sences evidence of the fact as D. Stillingfleet imagines pag. 469. For we do not beleeve that any of the Apostles or others did see Christ in the very act or instant of his Resurrection though they did see him a little after but they did not see the Resurrection it self and though they had seen it the assurance of their faith must have been grounded upon divine Revelation not upon that sight So that not only succeeding ages but the Apostles themselves believed Christs Resurrection with Christian faith not because they did see him revived but because he told them he was the very same Christ that had been dead and this his assertion is confirmed by the same signes and testimonies whereby the other mysteries of Faith are Conclusion SEeing therefore the whole Catholick Church cannot be composed of many or any two dissenting Congregations in any point of Faith whether fundamental or not fundamental and that the same Catholick Church must have supernatural signes and Miracles whereby it may be discerned from all Heretical Congregations and that no other * D. Do● ham in 〈◊〉 Treatise● Antichr● l. 1. c. 7. p● 111. sait● Neither Turks n● Jews no● any other Church of Christian but only th● Pope and Church of Rome do vaunt of Miracles Christian Congregation but the Roman-Catholick doth as much as pretend to supernatural signes and Miracles and that this pretence of Miracles in the Roman-Catholick Church is so well grounded that the wisest and wariest men of the world for many ages and in this also did take it to be good and sufficient evidence to build thereupon their hopes of salvation and that such as deny the sufficiency of this evidence cannot dispute it otherwise then by saying contrary to universal Tradition and to the Testimony of all Histories that they who believed and wrought our Miracles were cheats or mad-men and that there can be no greater madness then so rash an assertion seeing I say all this hath been made out in my Propositions I hope it may be evidently concluded that the Roman-Catholick Church and only the Roman-Catholick Church is the whole Catholick and true Church of God From whence must follow the quite contrary of D. Stillingfleets Principles and Conclusions This Sir is my Opinion of a Book so much applauded by those that understand not its Principles nor the inconveniencies it may draw upon the Religion and Revenues of the Church of England by making that Church as useless for saving souls as its Revenues are thought by Statesmen necessary for supporting the State I am March 17. 1671. Yours J.W. FINIS Errata In the Page on the back-side the Title line 3. for Principles of Christianity reade Principles of Protestancy page 6. line 14. reade confirmed p. 10. l. 10. r. which the Church then and for p. 12. l. 5. r. S. Xavier