THE PAMPHLET ENTITULED Speculum Ecclesiasticum OR AN ECCLESIASTICAL PROSPECTIVE-GLASS CONSIDERED In its False REASONINGS AND QUOTATIONS LONDON Printed for Ric. Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard MDCLXXXVIII IMPRIMATUR Hic Liber cui Titulus The Speculum Ecclesiasticum c. Considered c. Oct. 24. 1687. Hen. Maurice R mo in Christo P. D. Wilhelmo Archiep. Cant. a Sacris THE PAMPHLET ENTITULED SPECULUM ECCLESIASTICUM OR AN Ecclesiastical Prospective-Glass c. THere can be no greater Argument of a baffled and erroneous Cause than when the Assertors of it are forced to maintain it with manifest Impostures The Religion of the Church of Rome is in great measure owing to Legends and Forged Writings With the first they deluded the vulgar and with the second circumvented the wiser part of mankind The Usurpation of the See of Rome was never submitted to nor its Primacy believed in the West till the spurious Decretals of Isidore Mercator were universally received by a blind and ignorant Age and believed to be the genuine Decrees of Ancient Popes No sooner did Learning begin to flourish in the last Age but these Phantasms disappeared were decried and disowned by all learned and ingenuous men To produce them anew upon the stage and urge the Authority of them in this learned age can be no other than the last efforts of a despairing and dying Cause which wanteth both Reason and Truth to uphold it To recur to these Forgeries after the falseness and folly of them hath been detected and demonstrated by learned men of both Communions is an invincible Argument that the Doctrine of the Church of Rome was at first founded on them and cannot now be maintain'd without them It may justly be wondred that men whose office and design it is to uphold the Cause of the Church of Rome and perswade others of the truth of it should make use of such artifices as will infallibly when discovered make all sober men suspect her Cause of falseness and accuse her Agents of dishonesty Yet this hath been lately done by some Gentlemen of the Church of Rome in a little Pamphlet called Speculum Ecclesiasticum or an Ecclesiastical Prospective-Glass wherein all the Ancient Forgeries of the Church of Rome are reproduced and alledged as undoubted Testimonies of Antiquity An Imposture so gross and palpable that if unadvisedly committed the Ignorance of this Author must be deplorable if voluntarily his Fraud must be detestable Such miserable delusions are unfitly calculated for our Age and can serve for no other end than for what they were at first invented to amuse Children and seduce weak people The Author divideth his Prospective-Glass into eight Parts or Columes and in them undertaketh to prove the Doctrines of the Church of Rome from Scripture and the Testimonies of the Fathers of the Church for the first 500 years The proofs of Scripture I shall not consider because they are either wholly impertinent or have been often answered by the Writers of our Church and upon the Testimonies of Antiquity I will only make some few Observations For so idle a Paper deserves not a strict and severe Answer The first Column of our Adversary treateth of the Churches continued Succession and the tradition of all Christian Doctrines through all Ages of the Church This might well have been spared and concerns no more the Church of Râ—me than it doth any other particular Church In the Church of England we have a Succession of Bishops continued down from the Apostolick times to this day The nomination or particular enumeration of them is neither necessary nor useful None will deny the Churches of Ephesus Smyrna and Philadelphia to have enjoyed a continued Series of Bishops from the Apostles times yet are the names of the far greater part of them unknown Neither is the Succession of the Bishops of Rome certain and undoubted The immediate Successors of St. Peter are at this day unknown Linus most probably died before him Cletus and Anacletus were most certainly the same person In succeeding Ages many great and long Schisms happened wherein two and sometimes three Popes together pretended to the Papal Chair whose right was so dubious and uncertain that Wernerus Rolluinck professeth most learned and conscientious men could not discern to which party they ought to adhere And at this day the French and Italian Writers agree not in composing a Catalogue of Popes the first placing divers among the Popes which the second reject as Antipopes No other eminent See of the Catholick Church hath suffered these divisions So that the Succession of the Bishops of Rome is more doubtful and uncertain than any other Succession of Bishops in the World. St. Irenaeus indeed St. Augustin and Optatus alledged by this Writer disputing against the Hereticks object to thâ—m that they are upstarts men of yesterday who could not deduce their Succession from the Apostles whereas their Catholicks had a visible Succession of Bishops presiding in their Churches from the Apostles times and to prove this produce the Succession of Roman Bishops not as of so many Heads of the Universal Church but as of the Bishops of the most eminent See of the Western Church For the force of their Argument lay not in the particular Succession of the Roman Bishops but in the several Successions of all the Catholick Bishops of the Universal Church of which they produced that of Rome as an example This appears plainly from the words of Irenaeus who prefixeth this Preface to his Catalogue of Roman Bishops Seeing it is too much to reckon up the Succession of all Churches I will instante only in that of Rome As for Succession of Doctrine we may with far greater justice claim that than do our Adversaries For the Church of England admitteth receiveth and believeth all Doctrines which have been universally taught and delivered down by all Churches in all Ages and proposeth none to her Children as necessary to be believed which have not that universal testimony Whereas the Church of Rome commandeth several Doctrines to be believed upon pain of Anathema which were unknown to Antiquity and are at this day denied by the greater part of Christians The Fourth Column of the Unity of the Church is of the same stamp We no less firmly than our Adversaries believe the Catholick Church to be one We willingly allow that there is no hope of Salvation out of the Pale of that Church and have always asserted Schism to be a damnable sin But that the particular Church of Rome or in Communion with the See of Rome is that Universal Church that a small and corrupt member of it is the whole and that all Churches not Communicating with the Bishop of Rome are Schismatical this we neither believe nor can our Adversaries prove Certainly all the testimonies here alledged insinuate no such thing But if Schism be so great a sin if wilful and unnecessary Separation from any part of the Catholick Church be
damnable What shall we say of those persons whose office and employment it is to promote and foment this Schism and draw the Members of the Church of England into an unlawful separation from her To accuse the Church of England of Schism or Separation from the Papists is to go contrary to sense and reason For 't is notorious to the whole World that all the Subjects of England communicated with our Church till the 10th year of Queen Elizabeth when upon the Pope's prohibition a small party flew off into separate Assemblies who have since continued their separate Meetings under the name of Roman Catholicks And shall the Church of England be said to have separated from those men This cannot be said with any colour of Truth That Papal prohibition began the Schism which till then had no existence For the Church of England never did by any judicial act forbid her Children to Communicate with the Catholick Churches beyond Sea nor require of her Communicants the belief of any point denied by them or disbelief of any point maintained by them The third Column of the Churches Infallibility is of the same nature and equal impertinence We believe there ever was since the time of Christ and shall be to the end of the World a Church or collection of men believing all things necessary to Salvation But that this Church is no other than the particular Church of Rome and that to the belief of all necessary Articles some false and erroneous Opinions never was nor shall be intermixed we do not believe and it never can be proved Now all the Testimonies alledged by our Author amounts to no more than this That the Church of Christ is indefectible ever did and always shall exist That the whole Faith of Christ is always taught and preserved in it and that in her Bosom Salvation may ever be found and obtained But all this doth no more concern The Church of Rome than it doth the Church of England Our Author indeed alledgeth Three passages wherein the Church of Rome is particularly mentioned The first is a Complement of St. Cyprian's to Pope Cornelius That to St. Peter's Chair Infidelity cannot have access This hath been oftentimes answered by our Divines and is indeed a meer Compliment or at most a declaration of his expectations grounded upon the prospect of a Learned and Orthodox Clergy which then presided in the See of Rome Besides infinite places of the Ancients might be produced wherein they bestow no less Encomiums upon particular Churches which by the confession of our Adversaries not only may but have actually fallen from the Faith. Thus St. Ignatius saith the Church of Ephesus was predestinated before all Ages to continue for ever in a permanent and unchangeable glory An expression which infinitely surpasseth St. Cyprians Compliment The Second passage is taken from Victor Vitensis whom our Author ignorantly calls Vticensis where Eugenius Bishop of Carthage being urged by the Arian Tyrant Hunnericus to give an account of his Faith desired leave to send to all his Fellow Bishops in the whole Catholick Church that they might meet in a General Council particularly to the Bishop of Rome who was the most eminent Bishop of the Western Church and first Patriarch of the World. For no General Council could be held without the presence of all the Patriarchs either by themselves or by their Legates That Eugenius desired not the presence or advice of the Pope for any belief of his Infallibility is manifest from what Victor immediately subjoins that Eugenius said this not because there were wanting men in Africa who were able to refute the objections of the Arians and vindicate the Catholick Cause But that such Bishops might be drawn into Africa as feared not the threats and violence of Hunnericus being none of his natural Subjects The third is a passage of St. Cyril of Hierusalem in his Apology against Rusinus that the Roman Faith commended by the Apostles cannot be changed Of this Apology I shall speak somewhat hereafter To the words alledged I need only say our Adversaries can never prove that unchangeable Faith which the Apostle commended to be the Faith of the present Church of Rome Thus have we proved three of our Authors eight Columns to be wholly trifling and impertinent I will next observe his ignorance and mistakes of Chronology St. Cyprian is by him placed before Origen when as the latter was a famous Writer of the Church long before the first was converted to the Faith. Gregory Nyssen and St. Hierom are ranked before Athanasius who was a Bishop before either of the other were born Tertullian before Theophilus Antiochenus who was a Bishop near Twenty five years before the other was made Priest Victor Vitensis placed in the beginning of the 4th Age who lived in the end of the 5th But our honest Author because he writ of a Persecution thought he must necessarily mean an Heathen Persecution and therefore set him before Lactantius In the same manner he placeth St. Cyril of Alexandria before St. Chrysostom and St. Ambrose before St. Athanasius But Chronology is not the business of our Author Let us next view his Criticism where we shall find all the Fables and Forgeries of Ancient and latter times adapted and produced by him I begin with the Decretals of the Ancient Popes out of which he cites the Epistles of St. Clemens Anacletus and Pius It were superfluous to resume an Argument so often cleared and to prove these Epistles to be spurious if we had not to deal with a generation of men whose either ignorance or effrontery requireth it This hath been often confessed and at large demonstrated by Learned Writers of the Church of Rome but more fully by the Reformed Divines Insomuch that it is long since become a received and undoubted opinion among all the learned men of both Communions And indeed the thing is manifest beyond all contradiction For no Pope Father or Writer before the 9th Age ever made mention of them The Vulgar Version of the Bible is constantly used in them which was not composed till the beginning of the fifth Age. They are almost wholly made up of an infinite number of passages stoln from the Writings Canons and Constitutions of Authors Councils Popes and Emperors who lived between the Third and the Ninth Age. They are neither adapted to the genius nor necessities of those times Frequently they oppose Heresies which began not till the 4th Age. Are full of ridiculous Anachronisms barbarous Phrases and foolish Solecisms which those first and purer Ages could not be guilty of Lastly they mention many points of Discipline and Ecclesiastical Terms which were unknown to the three first Ages and not introduced till some Ages after Not only the falsity of these Decretals is apparent and confessed but their Author and age can be assigned They were first published to the World by Riculphus Bishop of Mentz who received them from Isidore Mercator
they generally believed was not bestowed to the departed Saints till the day of Judgment That Purgatory was anciently believed our Author's Testimonies do in no wise prove Some of them indeed mention a purging Fire But that Fire was not to exist till the Day of Judgment when all Souls were to pass through it and to continue a shorter or longer time in it according to their greater or lesser Purity No intermediate punishment between Death and Judgment was believed besides the delay of Resurrection if that can properly be called a punishment There remains only to consider our Author's Catalogue of general Councils Wherein he hath committed many gross and as I fear wilful mistakes He makes Pope Sylvester preside over the Council of Nice but Eusebius and Socrates whom he citeth say no such thing Baronius indeed saith it but all the World knows the contrary For Hosius Bishop of Corduba presided and subscribed in his own name before the Legates of Pope Sylvester That Damasus presided over the first Council of Constantinople is so egregiously false that that Council was both begun and ended without so much as the knowledg of the Pope or any other Western Bishops That Cyril Patriarch of Alexandria not Pope Celestin presided over the Council of Ephesus is manifest from the Acts of that Council from the Commission given to him by the Emperor for that purpose and from all the Historians of those times Cyril indeed acted for Pope Celestin but not as president but as one Fellow-Bishop manageth the Proxy of another here in England in the House of Lords In the Council of Chalcedon Pope Leo's Legates were so far from presiding that all the Canons of the Council were made in their absence and not only without but against their consent For when the Legates in the next Session protested against the Canons they were over-ruled by the Council and forced to submit That Pope Vigilius presided over the Fifth General Gouucil or Second of Constantinople is so impudent a Falshood that it might with equal reason be pretended that Luther or Calvin presided over the Council of Trent For Vigilius who was then at Constantinople gathered an opposite Convention of Western Bishops wherein publishing a long Constitution or Decree in favour of the Tria Capitula he concludes with a severe Censure and Condemnation of all who should hereafter Write Teach or Propose any thing contrary to his Decree which he knew was then in doing in the General Council The Popes Constitution was read in the Council and notwithstanding it was Decreed Can. 12 13 14. That whosoever defended the Tria Capitula or even did not Anathematize them should be himself Anathematiz'd After the Conclusion of the Council and not till then Vigilius submitted and writing an Epistle to Eutychius Patriarch of Constantinople who had presided over the Council professeth he was now very sorry that by the instigation of the Devil he had dissented from the Council and in contempt of brotherly Charity had openly disagreed from them and contended with them that now he was convinced of his Errors and therefore retracting his former actions ratified and submitted to the Decrees of the Council In the Seventh General Council our Author reckoning up the Hereticks condemned by it as Paulus Sergius Cyrus Theodosius comes off with an c. the meaning of which may easily be discovered for this c. was invented to save the reputation of Pope Honorius who together with the rest was Anathematized by the Council as a notorious and pestilent Heretick The Second Council of Nice was formerly denied to be General by Theodorus Studites altho a great Patron of Image-Worship and was condemned in the same age by the great Council of Francfort The Fourth Council of Constantinople in the Year 869 was ever accounted a Schismatical Conventicle by the Greek Church All the following Councils were confined to the West and wanted both the Presence and Suffrage of the Eastern Patriarchs and consequently were not Oecumenical Many of them are not at this day universally received in the Church of Rome and others are rejected and condemned by the Gallican Church as the First Second Third and Fourth of Lateran First and Second of Lyons as to the Constitutions and Canons injurious to the Civil Right of Princes The Councils of Florence and Fifth of Lateran are wholly rejected by her and the Council of Trent but in part received Our Author pretendeth that in the Council of Florence the Greeks were united to the Church of Rome and subscribed the Union If a forced compliance of a few Bishops compelled by the threats and force of their Emperor can be call'd an union this was indeed one But many of them subscribed for fear of Death and most for fear of starving as Sylvester Sguropulus an Eye-witness assureth us and all of them when returning home were so detested and hated by their Country-men that they were esteemed worse than Infidels and not permitted to be buried in holy Ground I might make some farther Observations upou our Authors Paper as why he left that of Constance out of the number of General Councils and yet afterwards produced its Authority how disagreeing the forms of Recantation prescribed to Berengarius are to the present Belief of the Church of Rome and how little the Testimonies produced by him in favour of Apostolical Traditions concern the Romish Doctrine of Traditions But what I have already said is enough to shew that there is a Generation of men in the World who adding a profound Ignorance to a false Zeal fear not to sacrifice all considerations of Shame and Honesty of Truth and Reason to a present Interest and the poor advantage of a short-liv'd Imposture FINIS Books lately Printed for Richard Chiswell A Dissertation concerning the Government of the Ancient Church more praticularly of the Encroachments of the Bishops of Rome upon other Sees By WILLIAM CAVE D. D. 8vo An Answer to Mr. Serjeant's Sure Footing in Christianity concerning the Rule of Faith. With some other Discourses By WILLIAM FALKNER D. D. 4 o. A Vindication of the Ordinations of the Church of England in Answer to a Paper written by one of the Church of Rome to prove the Nullity of our Orders By GILBERT BVRNET D. D. 8vo An Abridgment of the History of the Reformation of the Church of England By GILB BVRNET D. D. 8vo The APOLOGY of the Church of England and an Epistle to one Signior Scipio a Venetian Gentleman concerning the Council of Trent Written both In Latin by the Right Reverend Father in God JOHN JEWEL Lord Bishop of Salisbury Made English by a Person of Quality To which is added The Life of the said Bishop Collected and written by the same Hand 8vo The Life of WILLIAM BEDEL D. D. Bishop of Kilmore in Ireland Together with Certain Letters which passed betwixt him and James Weddesworth a late Pensioner of the Holy Inquisition of Sevil in Matter of Religion concerning the General
Motives to the Roman Obedience 8vo The Decree made at ROME the Second of March 1679. condemning some Opinions of the Jesuits and other Casuists 4 o. A Discourse concerning the Necessity of Reformation with respect to the Errors and Corruptions of the Church of Rome 4 o. First and Second Parts A Discourse concerning the Celebration of Divine Service in an Unknown Tongue 4 o. A Papist not Misrepresented by Protestants Being a Reply to the Reflections upon the Answer to A Papist Misrepresented and Represented 4 o. An Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England in the several Articles proposed by the late BISHOP of CONDOM in his Exposition of the Doctrine of the Catholick Church 4 o. A Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the Exceptions of Mons de Meaux late Bishop of Condom and his Vindicator 4 o. A CATECHISM explaining the Doctrine and Practices of the Church of Rome With an Answer thereunto By a Protestant of the Church of England 8vo A Papist Represented and not Misrepresented being an Answer to the First Second Fifth and Sixth Sheets of the Second Part of the Papist Misrepresented and Represented and for a further Vindication of the CATECHISM truly representing the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome 4 o. The Lay-Christian's Obligation to read the Holy Scriptures 4 o. The Plain Man 's Reply to the Catholick Missionaries 24 o. An Answer to THREE PAPERS lately printed concerning the Authority of the Catholick Church in Matters of Faith and the Reformation of the Church of England 4 o. A Vindication of the Answer to THREE PAPERS concerning the Unity and Authority of the Catholick Church and the Reformation of the Church of England 4 o. Mr. Chillingworth's Book called The Religion of Protestants a safe way to Salvation made more generally useful by omitting Personal Contests but inserting whatsoever concerns the common Cause of Protestants or defends the Church of England with an exact Table of Contents and an Addition of some gennine Pieces of Mr. Chillingworth's never before printed viz. against the Infallibility of the Roman Church Transubstantiation Tradition c. And an Account of what moved the Author to turn Papist with his Confutation of the said Motives The Pillar and Ground of Truth A Treatise shewing that the Roman Church falsly claims to be That Church and the Pillar of That Truth mentioned by S. Paul in his first Epistle to Timothy Chap. 3. Vers 15. 4to The Peoples Right to read the Holy Scripture Asserted 4to A Short Summary of the principal Controversies between the Church of England and the Church of Rome being a Vindication of several Protestant Doctrines in Answer to a Late Pamphlet Intituled Protestancy destitute of Scripture Proofs 4to Two Discourses Of Purgatory and Prayers for the Dead An Answer to a Late Pamphlet Intituled The Judgment and Doctrine of the Clergy of the Church of England concerning one Special Branch of the King's Prerogative viz. In dispensing with the Penal Laws 4to The Notes of the Church as laid down by Cardinal Bellarmin examined and confuted 4to Preparation for Death Being a Letter sent to a young Gentlewoman in France in a dangerous Distemper of which she died The Difference between the Church of England and the Church of Rome in opposition to a late Book Intituled An Agreement between the Church of England and Church of Rome A PRIVATE PRAYER to be used in Difficult Times A True Account of a Conference held about Religion at London Sept. 29. 1687. between A. Pulton Jesuit and Tho. Tenison D. D. ss also of that which led to it and followed after it 4to The Vindication of A. Cressener Schoolmaster in Long-Acre from the Aspersions of A. Pulton Jesuit Schoolmaster in the Savoy together with some Account of his Discourse with Mr. Meredith A Discourse shewing that Protestants are on the safer side notwithstanding the uncharitable Judgment of their Adversaries and that Their Religion is the surest Way to Heaven 4to Six Conferences concerning the Eucharist wherein is shewed that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation overthrows the Proofs of Christian Religion A Discourse concerning the Pretended Sacrament of Extreme Vnction with an Account of the occasions and beginnings of it in the Western Church In three Parts With a Letter to the Vindicator of the Bishop of Condom The Pamphlet entituled Speculum Ecclesiasticum or an Ecclesiastical Prospective-Glass considered in its False Reasonings and Quotations There are added by way of Preface two further Answers the First to the Defender of the Speculum the Second to the Half-sheet against the Six Conferences In the Press A Second Defence of the Exposition of the Doctrine of the Church of England against the new Exceptions of Mons de Meaux late Bishop of Condom and his Vindicator The FIRST PART in which the Account that has been given of the Bishop of Meaux's Exposition is fully Vindicated the Distinction of Old and New Popery Historically asserted and the Doctrine of the Church of Rome in Point of Image-worship more particularly considered 4 o. The Incurable Scepticism of the Church of Rome By the Auther of the Six Conferences concerning the Eucharist 4 o. * Fascic Temp. Perfidia Epist ad Ephes * De Persecut Vandal l. 2. †A prefat ad Reginon a De Script Eccl. cap. 25. b Concil Tom. II. p. 844. a Institut Sacerd. tit de necess Confes Lect. 2. O exterminanda cordis caecatio O perditionis animarum occasio l. 2. c. 8. a Ad an 252. a Hist Eccl. l. 7. c. 2. b Hist Con. Nic. l. 2. c. 30. c Prefat ad Version d L. 4. c. 57. e Adv. Marcion l. 4. c. 40. * De Ecclesiast Hierarch c. 7. * Orat. de SS Bernic Prosdoce * Hom. in Rom. xvi 3. in terra mot Laz. in Paulum c. Hom. ad eos qui scandalizati sunt Hom. de esemos collat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 †Lib. de Pudic. * Alix Dissert de Script Tertul. p. 70. a De initandis cap. 9. a Comm. in Psal 33. Sacramenta praedicabat ‖ De curand affect Graec. Orat. 8.
book of this Treatise for a proof of Sacerdotal confession There indeed we may find this Confession commended advised and enjoyned which is also done by the Church of England but in the mean while the necessity of it disowned and the sufficiency of a private confession to God acknowledged For the Author blaming some persons who dehorted men from Sacerdotal confession saith Let not the superstition of these Dreamers seduce you which confirmeth sinners in their resolutions of not confessing to a Priest Quia salvat Sacerdote inconsulto ad Deum peccatorum confessio Because confession of sins to God without consulting any Priest is sufficient to Salvation Where he plainly allows the truth of this proposition but blames the ill application of it But because our Author refers us to this spurious Treatise I would desire him to turn one Page farther where he will find the Doctrine of doing any Penance after Death and consequently of Purgatory called a detestable blindness of heart and occasion of the destruction of Souls The Quaestiones ad Graecos cited by our Author under the name of St. Justin Martyr are on all sides confessed to be supposititious particularly by Bellarmin Labbe and Du Pin. The justice of this Censure is evidently evinced from the frequent mention therein made of the Manichees who were not heard of till more than a Hundred years after Justin's death The Lamentation of Origen is the trifling product of some foolish Latin Writer and therefore justly rejected as spurious by Bellarmin Baronius Labbe Huetius and Du Pin. I might add that it was formerly condemned by Pope Gelasius if his Decretal were not equally spurious However that excuseth not our Author since that Decretal is universally received by all the Writers of the Church of Rome Our Author citeth Two Fragments of Eusebius Alexandrinus out of Jodocus Coccius But we have great reason to believe that they are not genuine For Eusebius Caesariensis in mentioning Eusebius Alexandrinus speaks not one word of his Writings which that accurate Historian would by no means have omitted if there had heen any known in his time No one of the Ancients make the least mention of such a Writer Nor was he ever heard of till Coccius and Turrain produced some fragments out of his Homilies As for Coccius he had not skill enough in this kind to pass a critical judgment upon the Writings of the ancients and Turrain cannot be securely trusted For all the World knows with how great violence he maintained the Apostolick Canons and Constitutions to be genuine A position which none but fools and mad men can believe The Arabick Canons of the first Council of Nice are a no less foolish than evident forgery of latter times All the Greek and Latin Copies give us no more than XX. Canons of that Council Gelasius Cyzicenus saith no more were made The African Bishops sending into the East for true and correct Copies of them receive from Atticus of Constantinople and Cyril of Alexandria no more than XX. and these LXXX Arabick Canons were never heard of till brought out of the East in the last Age by the Legates sent by Pius IV. to the Patriarch of Alexandria to invite him to the Council of Trent But I need not use many arguments They sufficiently betray themselves by the frequent mention of Names Rites and Customs which obtained not in the Church till after the Council of Nice I will instance only in their several Constitutions about Monasteries Monks and Nuns as that they be shaved and use a distinct habit from the rest of mankind customs which were not known till some Ages after And that we may not seem singular in making this Censure the Learned Abraham Ecchellensis confesseth That many of them were forged others changed and all accommodated by the several Sects of the East to their several Ages and Perswasions The sincerity of our Author deserveth next to be considered which I fear would be found very small if I had time and leisure to compare all his Citations with the Originals Those few which I have compared give me a just suspicion of his fraudulent dealing in the rest and may reasonably create the same prejudice in all his Readers I will produce a few Instances In the Fifth Column he citeth these words of Irenaeus a How can they be assured the Bread is made the Body of our Lord In the Original it is esse Corpus suum where he hath Translated esse to be made A few lines after he produceth a passage of Tertullian which no man in his right wits could ever have alledged for Transubstantiation For the intire sentence is one of the most pregnant Testimonies of all Antiquity against that monstrous opinion the words are these The Bread taken and distributed to his Disciples he made his Body by saying This is my Body that is the Figure of my Body Our Author hath cut off the latter part and given us only the first words of this Passage What name ought justly to be given to this Artifice let others judg but certainly none can call it sincerity The corruption of Justin Martyr in the 7th Column is no less gross and evident where our Author citeth these words out of his Second Apology We worship them the good Angels both by words and deeds even as we our selves have been taught and instructed The Greek words are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 honouring them both in word and deed and freely teaching every one who desireth to learn those things wherein we been instructed A little before he had cited Dionysius the Areopagite for Prayers to the departed Saints where he wilfully mistakes that Writers meaning and what the Counterfeit Dionysius speaks of the Prayers of our pious Fellow-Christians here on Earth applieth to Prayers made to departed Saints and not only so but falsifieth his words in more than one place the passage is this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This I affirm consonantly to the Scripture That the prayers of holy men are very useful in this life this way If any one desiring the Divine Graces and be well disposed for the reception of them shall as being conscious of his own unworthiness come to some holy man and desire him to assist him and pray together with him he shall receive hence the greatest benefit The words thus justly Translated do neither favour nor relate to Prayers to the Dead In the same Column he hath produced some words of St. Chrysostom with no more ingenuity for he translates 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us pray to them indeed the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 follows Let us desire them which yet our Author after his wonted manner exaggerates Let us heartily beseech them But that this was a meer rhetorical Flight may be demonstrated beyond all doubt for in the immediately foregoing sentence he speaks much greater things of their dead Reliques and Repositories to which
from day to day but this is free from corruption which whosoever religiously tasts cannot suffer corruption From which words Three several Arguments of a typical sense may be formed For first as Manna was not truly but typically the Bread of Angels So neither is the consecrated Bread truly but typically the Body of Christ Secondly The consecrated elements are as to the matter of them subject to corruption And therefore St. Ambrose believed not the matter of them but only what they represented to be the body of Christ Thirdly He affirms this incorruptible Body of Christ to be received only by the Religious communicant Whereas if Transubstantiation be true it is equally received by the most Irreligious person St. Augustin in the place cited by our Author expresly denieth all natural presence His words are these When our Lord Jesus Christ spoke of his Body He said Whosoever eateth not my flesh and drinketh not my blood shall not have eternal Life For my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed His Disciples who followed him were afraid and scandalized at that speech and not truly understanding it thought that our Lord spoke somewhat harsh as if they were to eat that flesh and drink that blood which they saw They could not bear this as if they had said How can this be Error ignorance and folly had possessed them Where he goes on to shew that this aversion of the Apostles proceeded from a misapprehension of our Lord's meaning as if he intended to give them his natural flesh and blood to eat Whereas our Lord knew what he meant he spoke of Sacraments or a sacramental presence This passage sufficiently explains the following Clause cited by our Author unless we can suppose St. Augustin in this obscure sentence to have contradicted the Doctrine by him plainly delivered in the precedent Words The Sixth Column corncerns Sacramental Confession Priestly Absolution and Penance and in all respects is wholly impertinent as may appear by these few considerations First Then the Church of England retaineth and adviseth to her Children Confession Absolution and Penance But then she maketh not the first absolutely necessary to Salvation nor the Second a judicial but only declaratory act nor the Third properly satisfactory for sins Nor do any of the Testimonies produced by our Author prove these positions Secondly The Confession used in the ancient Church was not Auricular but publick not lodged in the breast of the Priest but made before the whole Congregation And when afterwards about the time of the Decian Persecution these confessions became so numerous that the Church could not hear them all a Paenitentiarius was chosen out of the Presbyters to receive them he did not keep them secret to himself but only pass judgment which were fit to be made known to the whole Church and to be performed in the publick Congregation and which not 3. Absolution of the Priest was not believed to be judicial or authoritative and immediately to absolve before God but only declaratory of the promises of pardon made by God to all penitent sinners and to have no other necessary effect than the restoring of the penitents to the peace of the Church This may be proved by that very passage of St. Hierom which our Author citeth where he compareth the Priestly absolution to the cleansing of Lepers by the Priests under the old Law a comparison very frequent with the Fathers For as the Jewish Priests made not the Lepers clean but only declared them so to be and supposed them to be clean before their declaration otherwise the declaration would not in the least have contributed to their cleansing So a sacerdotal Absolution remits not the guilt of sins but supposeth them to have been before remitted by God and declareth so to be otherwise the absolution of a Priest will avail the sinner nothing nor set him right in the Court of Heaven 4. Penance in the ancient Church was chiefly intended not as a satisfaction to God for the violation of his Laws but as a satisfaction to the Church for the scandal given to others and reproach drawn upon the whole Church by the former crimes or irregular practice of the penitents And therefore was ever augmented or relaxed according to the various exigencies or necessities of times 5. In the ancient Church Penance ever preceded Absolution and was the means of obtaining it Whereas in the Church of Rome the Penitent is first absolv'd and then some subsequent Penance is imposed on him Which takes away the very nature of Penance Confession and Absolution as they were used and designed the ancient Christians and tends only to the interests of the Priest and delusion of private souls The Seventh Column undertaketh to prove the lawfulness of Invocation or Prayer to Saints and that they pray for us the latter we need not deny but maintain that that will not warrant the former So that when all the spurious Testimonies those which we have already answered and those which prove only that the departed Saints pray for us be expunged there remain no more than one of St. Ambrose for that of St. Hierom is a plain historical Apostrophe and one of Theodoret. As for the first I might justly oppose the authority of some learned men who maintain this Book de Viduis whence the passage is taken to be supposititious But I will content my self to say That our Author hath falsely translated the place by rendring Obsecrandi sunt Angeli pro nobis ut c. Obsecrandi sunt Martyres We are to desire the assistance of the Angels we are to pray to the Martyrs Whereas the words do not in the least insinuate an Exhortation of Prayer to be made to them by us but only a wish that they would pray for us and that we should gratefully accept their charitable kindness in so doing The Passage of Theodoret as cited by our Author is a plain forgery For Theodoret speaks not one Syllable of praying to the Martys and what our Author translates beseech them as Holy men to intercede to God for them is no more in the Greek than this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 We honour or reverence them as holy men The last Column treateth of Purgatory and Prayer for the dead The first we believe to be a Fable and to have no ground either in Scripture or Antiquity The second our Church doth not condemn only hath prudently omitted it in the publick Service because it is a thing dubious in it self and not approved by Scripture The use of it in the Ancient Church doth not in the least prove the belief of Purgatory For they anciently prayed for all Saints departed whatsoever even for the blessed Virgin Apostles Martyrs and Confessors and their Prayers respected not alleviation of freedom from any internal Punishment but only the day of Judgment that God would hasten it and when that comes receive all departed Souls into the beatifical Vision which