Imprimatur G. Jane R. P. D. HEN. Episc Lond. Ã Sac. Dom. March 20. 1676 7. Friendly and Seasonable ADVICE TO THE Roman Catholicks OF ENGLAND The Third Edition enlarg'd with an addition of the most convincing Instances and Authorities and the Testimony of their own Authors for the same BY A Charitable Hand LONDON Printed for Henry Brome at the Gun at the West-end of St. Pauls 1677. TO HIS Honoured and Worthy Friend M r. S. B. Concerning the former Edition SIR I Cannot answer your Inquiry till I have not only commended but encouraged your charity to your Country men of the Roman Communion it being an excellent piety to endeavour to reduce them into the right way who are so confident in the wrong The zeal of most men expresseth it self by fury and clamour against Dissenters whilst you shew your esteem for the rational principles of the Church of England by your diligence to propagate them and your desires to reconcile its misinformed Adversaries to them It is one of the great properties of Goodness to be communicative and a copy of S. Paul's most obliging charity Act. 26. 29. to wish that all whom you converse with were as happy in the choice of their Faith as you know your self to be wherefore that I may as well quicken your generous design as invite some others to imitate so good an example I will propound these few considerations 1. The relation in which the English Romanists stand to us should excite our care for they are all Natives of the same Country Subjects of the same Government and are called by the same general name of Christians many of them our kind Neighbours familiar Acquaintance or near Kindred and some of them where their Prejudice doth not blind them persons of great reason and of so good inclinations that they are not made vicious by the evil liberties which their principles do allow and shall we for want of affection or courage suffer them to be kept in ignorance and imposed on at present and to be led blindfold in such a way as will extreamly hazard the Salvation of their precious Souls hereafter If all the relations they bear to us do possess us with any real affection for them we cannot but do our utmost to undeceive them The frauds indeed of the Guides of that Church are daily more and more laid open but for want of such a charity as yours is they who are chiefly concerned seldom come to the knowledge of them I am sure those excellent pens which discover'd them did not design we should make their delusions the subject of our mirth but the means to convert the Souls of those who are linked to us in so many bonds that it is a shame we should suffer them to be so deceived 2. But we usually excuse our remisness under the pretence that it is impossible to convert them Had our Ancestors so esteemed it the World had wanted the blessing of the Reformation I grant 't is difficult because of their rooted prejudice and the policy of their Leaders yet not impossible because many have undertaken it and prevailed So that as Seneca saith in another case it is not because of the difficulty that we do not attempt it but because we do not attempt it therefore it seems difficult Ep. 104. The Philosopher tells us where there is no difficulty there is no opportunity to exercise either art or vertue and if we were once willing to take some pains for so noble an end it would much allay the trouble thereof to consider the advantages which it may bring not only to the party which is the object of our charity but to the Church yea and to our own Souls also for He that converteth a sinner from the errour of his way shall save a Soul from death and shall hide a multitude of sins Jam. 5. 20. and they who turn many to righteousness shall shine as the Stars for ever and ever Dan. 12. 3. Nay moreover if such Pious endeavours should want success on Earth they shall not fail of a reward in Heaven 3. And finally if we consider the unwearied industry of our Adversaries in seducing methinks it should awaken our diligence in strengthning the weak and reducing such as are out of the way It had been very strange if the Apostles should have been unwilling to travel for the propagation of the right faith and the winning Souls of Heaven when the Pharisees compassed Sea and Land to reconcile a Proselyte to their particular Sect and yet alas 't is too often seen that the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light S. Luk. 16. 18. The Hermit Pambo accidentally beholding a theatrick woman dance exquisitely before a loose assembly at Alexandria is said to have wept abundantly to consider how much more pains she took to serve evil ends than he himself did to serve God Had we as much tenderness as that holy man doubtless we have as great occasion for our shame and sorrow when we see others more active to advance the Mystery of iniquity than we are to promote the glory of God and the salvation of your brethrens immortal Souls These Considerations worthy Sir I know have excited your charitable resolutions and I hope will prevail with many others to endeavour the reformation of their deceived friends wherefore that I may answer your desires and contribute my poor assistance to so pious and generous a design I have sent you the following papers wherein the delusions of that party are discovered as plainly yet as modestly as may be that they may see in a little room how much it is their interest and advantage to embrace the true Catholick Religion of the English Church I know all these particulars have been more fully handled by better pens but most of these writings have been by way of dispute and intended rather to convince than perswade So that they may be very proper to give fuller satisfaction in any particulars doubted of when their great Prejudices are first a little removed besides there are many through unavoidable business company or other divertisements who either have no leisure or no inclination to read a larger volume being of Callimachus's mind that A great book is a great evil who yet may be prevailed with to spare one hour for so small an abstract as this The Jewish Talmud tells us of a noble Heathen who came to Rabbi Hillet and offered to become a Proselyte if he could teach him the whole Law at one lesson Tract Sab. fol. 31. and if you meet with any of his mind they may perhaps be gratified with this little Abridgment wherein the mistakes of the Roman Perswasion are put into as narrow a compass as they can well be reduced to so that even those who are yet resolved to be of that Church may perhaps not be unwilling to peruse it that they may at one view see what their Religion is
Emperor Anastasius The Vicar of God by the Divine command presiding over the Earth An Authority like this also was exercised by the Western Emperors of the French Line being stayled The Rulers of the True Religion a Title given to Charles the Great and to Ludovicus by two several Councils which they had called and the present French Kings do claim the Supremacy over the French Churches as may be seen in â—â—ohellus and P. Pithâ—us cited before Sect. 5. One of the French Writers telling us it is the Opinion of his Nation that Le Royiassisté de son Conseil d'estate est â—â—â—es Diâ—â— Chief Terrieâ— de l'Eglise de son Royanme 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pape And it may be proved concerning other Christian Princes that they allow not the Pope to impose his Decrees on their Kingdoms nor to exercise any Jurisdiction among them but by their special License and consent and prohibite his exercising any power over their Subjects when they please And why may not the King of England being a free and absolute Monarch be allowed as great a Priviledge in his own Dominions Do you not tell us that Pope Eleutherius called King Lucius by the Title of Vicar of Christ and doth not King Edgar call himself Christs Vicar and none taxed this Title then Did not the Saxon Kings preside in all National Councils and make Laws for Religion by the advice of their own Bishops by their own Authority Did they not erect new Sees for Bishops and change them as they saw fit Did they not invest all Bishops by delivering the Ring and Pastoral Staff And the same power was still exercised by K. William the Conqueror for all things both Divine and Humane depended on his Order saith an Old Historian And when the Pope began to encroach upon the King's Supremacy here in England he was generally opposed as we noted before And in the aforesaid Parliament of Richard the Second the Nation declared That they would not endure that the Crown of England should be submitted to the Pope and the Laws and Statutes of this Realm by him defeated and avoided at his pleasure for Bracton our most famous Lawyer affirms that The Kings of England have no Supream on earth but God And accordingly the Kings and Parliaments of this Nation made Laws in reference to Religion as they saw expedient and among the rest they enacted many Laws in a direct opposition to the Pope's Spiritual as well as Temporal Jurisdiction declaring thereby that they esteemed him no Head of this Church but an ambitious and dangerous Encroacher upon the Rights of the Crown as you will find by perusal of those several Statutes cited in the Margin By which Laws long since enacted it is declared to be Treason to receive or harbour any Agents or Emissaries from Rome against the King's Proclamations and without his special License Upon all which Considerations the Judges have declared that the Act of Parliament for Restoring the Supremacy over the Church unto the Crown was not the introducing a New Law but a declaration of the Old For it was many hundred years before that King Henry the Second did declare That be would account it high Treason in any man that should affirm the Pope's Authority was above his And before that Anselm was told That it was impossible for him to keep the Faith which he owed to the King and to pay Obedience to the Pope contrary to his Royal Pleasure Which methinks may fitly admonish you who do own the Pope's Supremacy over England and yet glory much in your Loyalty to the King to enquire how these two can stand together Our Saviour saith No mancan serve two Masters Matth. vi 24. however not two Supream Lords neither can there be two highest Powers in one Kingdom nor can any Subjects obey both since they will sometimes command contrary things 'T is true if the Roman Bishop would profess to our King as his Predecessor Leo the Fourth did to Lotharius of France Concerning your Capitulars or Imperial Precepts we through the assistance of Christ promise as much as we are able to keep and conserve the same for ever If he would acknowledge himself subject to our King in his Dominions as his Predecessors were to the Emperours of Old if he behaved himself toward his Majesty as S. Gregory did to Mauritius who calls that Emperour his Lord and himself his Servant declaring that He was subject to the Emperours Commands and accordingly had done his duty in publishing a Law which the Emperour ordered him to promulge though for his own part he thought it not agreeable to the Laws of God If the present Popes claimed no more than a Primacy of order and precedency among other Bishops then the case might easily be determined But you know of later times the pretences of Rome are much higher for she challenges a Supremacy over all Christian Princes a power to depose them an Authority to abrogate or dispense with their Laws and absolve their Subjects from their Allegiance a Priviledge to be appealed unto as to the last and highest Tribunal on Earth so that Clement the Fifth is recorded in the Acts of the Council of Vienna to have said That all the Right of Kings depended on him alone and Boniface the Eighth owned himself not only Lord of France but of all the World for So great was the Impudence of this Boniface saith the French Chronologer that he presumed to affirm the Kingdom of France was a Fee of the Papal Majesty And as to this Kingdom Pope Innocent the Fourth saith That the King of England was his Vassal and his Slave and they esteem England also a Fee of the Papacy and so is Ireland too it seems Whereupon the Pope hath dared to nominate a King of Ireland and hath given away the Kingdom of England to those who attempted to conquer it he hath condemned our Laws and absolved the Subjects of England from their Allegiance upon which many of your Party have entred into Conspiracies and Rebellion So that now it appears the Pope claims an Absolute Supremacy over our King and his Realms and how he can be a good Subject of the King of England who professes Obedience to this Forreign Princely Prelate is very hard to be understood if you believe this claim and own the Pope to be above the King you must then obey him even when his Orders contradict those of your lawful Sovereign and so you are the Pope's Subjects not the King 's nor can his Majesty have any security of your Allegiance any longer than he pleases the Roman Bishop so that he Reigns over you at the Pope's mercy I know many of you English Catholicks have so Loyal an affection for the King that your Church-men are forced to invent many plausible pretences to perswade you that the Supremacy claimed by the Pope
joyn in you will go over to the Church of England where you may Pray with the Spirit and with understanding also In the next place your Private Prayers are not so good a way of worshipping God as other Christians have The Images and Pictures which the Heathens first taught your Doctors to call The books of the unlearned and which are placed before you in time of Prayer are no help but an hindrance to all true Devotion for while your lips are repeating your Oraisons your mind is taken up with the beauty colour lineaments and workmanship of the Image so that your own Conscience will tell you by these diversions you often draw near to God with your lips when your hearts are far from him which is a vain worship Matth. xv 8. And the Casuists of your Church foreseeing that Images would take off the attention have determined most impiously That it is not necessary to Prayer that the person praying should think of what he speaks A Doctrine suitable enough to that slight and formal worship which your Church appoints and the Ordinary people among you think they have prayed sufficiently when they have pattered over so many little Oraisons as agree to the number of their Beads A new Invention which came not into the Church till all serious Devotion was ceased it being a sign he minds his Prayers but little that needs a string of Beads to reckon them by yet these Beads saith one of your own Authors are now the chief Instruments of the hypocrites counterfeit Devotion I shall not ravel into the body of your Prayers since the Author of the Reflections on the Romish Devotions hath sufficiently done this but I cannot but remark that the repeating Ave Maria and the name of Jesus so many times over as in those fifteen little Prayers in the Psalter of Jesus where the name of Jesus is thrice mentioned in each Prayer and each Prayer is ordered to be said Ten times over and those numerous names of Saints repeated in your Litanies with no petition annexed but Ora pro nobis This way of Praying is so far from agreeing with the Primitive worship of God among the Christians that it is evidently derived from that Heathenish superstition of praying by repeating a hundred names of their Deities together interposing nothing but O hear us and in this manner Baals Priests are supposed to pray 1 Kings xviii 26. But to Christians Jesus saith When ye pray use not vain repetitions as the Heathens do for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking Matth. vi 7. Wherefore though you have admired this trifling way of worship when you knew no better yet if you would acquaint your selves with the solid and rational way of praying prescribed in the Church of England wherein Great things in an exact method in plain and proper phrases and in a known Language are asked of God alone in the name of Jesus Christ you would easily leave off those formal vain and superficial Devotions which can neither be acceptable to God nor profitable unto your selves Thirdly Let us pass to the last of these particulars and enquire If the Doctrines of Rome differing from those of England do tend to promote our imitating God by a holy life and conversation without which all our worship is in vain For it is a folly and miserable errour saith S. Augustine to humble your self before him in adoration to whom you chuse to be unlike in conversation and to give him religious worship whose Example you will not follow since the sum of all Religion is to imitate him you worship Now there are several Principles of the Roman Church which seem to hinder an holy life as first The custome of Confessing to a Priest weekly or monthly together with the Absolution following of course upon this Confession this is I fear a great hindrance to amendment of life at which it pretends to aim for while men relie on this remedy they go on without fear in those sins for which they have so easie a cure at hand like those who venture without scruple on dangerous Meats because they have their Physicians beside them 'T is true there is a Penance enjoyned sometimes but it is such a one as the rich may buy off and the poor may undergo and yet both retain the sin because the Penance is not its proper cure the going in Pilgrimages giving mony saying or reading over such proportions of Legends or little chiming prayers with others far more impertinent tend not to rectifie a vicious habit and a plaister on the Toe may as soon cure the Head-ach as these Penances effect a Reformation or obtain a pardon at Gods hands And yet all men see when the day of Confession is over and the Penance past that you are generally confident of a Pardon and fancy you begin upon a new score It is not easie to enumerate all the devices which your Church hath invented to convey pardon of Sins Holy water Relicks of Saints visiting some certain Churches saying some certain Prayers making Oblations of mony to such and such uses Indulgences and other such things so that he that hath mony need never want Pardon from Rome but alas these things can never really take away the guilt of one sin and yet they embolden men to commit many For the multitude of Sinners increaseth when hope is given that sin may be bought off and men easily fall into those sins for which Mony will purchase their pardon as Arnobius said to the Heathens who relied on such like fantastical means of Remission and we may say of the Guides of your Church as Seneca in a like case They sin more in such Absolutions than the Offender doth in the Crime For by perswading men they can have Remission on so easie Terms they make them secure before they are safe because Almighty God who only finally can Remit never promised Pardon on these Terms and it is only those who forsake as well as confess their sins to whom he will shew Mercy Prov. xxviii 13. And if either the Pope or any of his Substitutes pretend to have power to forgive sins on any other Terms they abuse those who are so weak to believe them and make them forfeit their Souls I doubt for the sad price of this Credulity S. Basil saith truly The power of Absolving was not absolutely given but upon condition of the Penitents Reformation And we tell our People more sincerely that if a Priest Absolve them a thousand times over and if they give ever so much mony without amendment of life they can have no pardon according as Scripture it self teaches and the Holy Fathers also If thou givest all that thou hast and dost not forsake thy sins thou art twice deceived both in losing thy Mony and thy Pardon also Again as if the Roman Church designed to make men think their own actual Holiness
Church there as an undue Act contrary to the Ancient Canons and all Primitive Constitutions For though saith the Historian the Bishop of Rome for the dignity of his Apostolical Seat be more venerable than other Bishops yet it is not lawful for him in any thing to transgress the Tenor of Canonical rules and as every Bishop of the Orthodox Church is the Spouse of his own See and represents the person of our Saviour so it cannot agree to any Bishop boldly to act any thing in the Diocess of another the like checks the Popes frequently received for medling in France from the Princes of that Nation About that Time also the Bishops of Italy complained of the Roman Vsurpation to the Patriarch of Constantinople as appears by Photius's Letter in answer to that complaint extant in Cardin. Baronius And there are many like Examples in the Historians of those Ages wherein this bold Jurisdiction began first to be exercisedin this Western part of Europe And to this very day the Churches of France do little value the Pope's Supremacy though in other Opinions they agree with the Roman Church as may be seen in the French Writers And it is not long since the King of France was about to take away his Nations dependence from Rome by erecting the Archbishoprick of Burges into a Patriarchate And now why should you be awed into the belief of Evil and inconvenient Doctrines by a pretended Supremacy not given by Christ not challenged by the best Popes not acknowledged by the first Christians not much regarded by some Catholick Countries Why should you be enslaved by an Authority gained by fraud and policy confirmed by force and cruelty enlarged by dividing Christian Princes by the undermining the Empire and oppressing many Ecclesiastical and Temporal persons in their just Rights Why should you fear to renounce an Usurped Jurisdiction since what is unjustly seized on at first can never be legally enjoyed nor is it confirmed by the longest prescription of Time as the Civil Law speaks I must confess I cannot see that any Christians without the Pale of his own Diocess are obliged to own him further than by the respect due to a Bishop of an Ancient Patriarchal See nor so far neither if he be not content with his own and keep not close to the Primitive Faith SECTION VI. Whether the Pope hath any Right to exercise a Jurisdiction over England BUt since my Discourse is directed particularly to the Catholicks of England it will be most considerable to enquire Whether the Roman Bishop can justly claim any Authority over them and if Prejudices were laid aside I doubt not but to make it evident that the Pope neither hath nor ought to have any Authority over this Nation For first let it be considered that Britain was the first of the Provinces which did publickly profess the Faith of Christ saith Sabellicus which is also attested by other more Ancient Writers So that it is agreed on all hands here was a true and perfect Church of Christ near five hundred years before they had any Communication with the Bishop of Rome or knew one syllable of this foundation-Article of the Modern Faith of that Church viz. of the Pope ' s Vniversal Supremacy It is also certain the Church of Britain was not subject to Rome at the time of the First General Council at Nice And in the Sixth Canon of that Council it is decreed concerning the three Patriarchs Jurisdictions That the Ancient custom should be established that Aegypt Lybia and Pentapolis should be subject to the Bishop of Alexandria because the Bishop of Rome had the like Custome and likewise so it was at Antioch and in other Provinces the Priviledges should be preserved to their Churches c. Now the Ancient Custom and Priviledge of this Church of Britain then was to govern it self without subjection to any Forreign Patriarch and the Pope could not usurp any Dominion here afterwards without transgressing this Canon of the most famous General Council especially if we consider how this Canon was expounded in Ruffinus's daies viz. That Rome should have the Government of the Suburbicarian Churches And the Ancient Survey of the Imperial Provinces will tell you what the Suburbicarian Region was viz. Three Islands Sicily Sardinia and Corsica and part of Italy from the East end to the border of Tuscany Westward And this was all the Ancient extent of the Roman Bishops Jurisdiction the rest of Italy being under the Metropolis of Millain which Church of Old paid no Subjection to Rome much less could any be due to him from Britain Again in the Third General Council of Ephesus An. 431. it was decreed That in all Dioceses and Provinces it should hereafter be observed That no Bishop should henceforward lay hold of another Province which had not formerly and from the beginning been under the power of their Predecessors which Canon the Pope must break also before he can assume a power over the Church of Britain which with the Island of Cyprus and some other places was its own head as those Times phrased it and subject to no Patriarch So that when Augustine the Monk coming over to convert the Pagan Saxons required the British Bishops to profess Subjection to the See of Rome They did by virtue of these Canons refuse it telling him They had a Patriarch of their own to whom alone they were subject in Spiritual things under God and Dionothus Abbot of Bangor by divers Arguments shewed they owed no Subjection to the Roman Bishop as an Old Historian informs us And accordingly the British Bishops retained their Old Rites different from Rome and kept their Old Priviledges being consecrated by the Archbishop of S. Davids and he by his own Suffragans making no Profession of Subjection to any other Church saith their Historian which continued till the day of King Henry the First The Saxons indeed shewed more Respect to Rome because it had assisted in their Conversion hence they sometimes asked Advice of the Pope as of an Eminent neighbour Patriarch but their Bishops never professed Subjection to Rome nor did they own his Supremacy or look on him as an Infallible Judge as appears by their not obeying the Pope's Decree made in a Roman Council about restoring Wilfrid to his Archbishoprick of York An. 680. And though the Pope had confirmed and recommended the Canons of the Second Nicene Council about Images the English Church rejected and despised them writing a Book to condemn Image-worship in the name of all the Princes and Bishops of England and sending it to Charles the Great of France by the learned Alcuinus as our Histories do attest And moreover it is evident that all Ecclesiastical Laws were then made by the Saxon Kings and Bishops in their Provincial Councils by their own Authority without ever so much as acquainting the Pope therewith or desiring his
consent thereto or confirmation thereof The Popes indeed about the latter end of the Saxon times began to degenerate in Manners and aim at high things in all the Western world but his Pride was checked here even as as we shewed before it was in other places for when that Insolent Pope Hildebrand who first presumed to depose an Emperour took the boldness to require Fealty of King William the Conqueror he answered him in this manner Fealty I neither have acknowledged nor will I do it because neither did I promise it nor do I find that my Predecessors ever did it to your Predecessors as appears by the Conqueror's Letter still extant And when by Policy and evil Arts he had made some encroachments here yet still his Power was esteemed no other than a Temporal Power permitted by the favour of our Kings not due by any Original Right Hence the Historian saith That King Henry the First having subdued all his Enemies feared none but the Pope and that not for his Spiritual but his Temporal Power And an Old Record affirms that King Henry the Second smartly asked the Bishop of Chichester How he durst argue for the Pope ' s Authority which was granted by Men against his Royal Power derived from God The turbulent and seditious Attempts of T. Becket and his faction about that time to subject the English Clergy to the Pope's Vniversal Supremacy are sufficiently known but if our Ancestors whom you call Roman Catholicks had been of your Opinion in this great Article of Faith they would not have made so stout an Opposition against the Pope's Supremacy as they did It being apparent that the whole body of the Nation then looked on it as an Encroachment and an Vsurpation for in the famous Statutes of Clarendon they condemn it Decreeing among other things That all the Clergy should bonâ fide swear to the King and none should Appeal but unto the Archbishop or from him finally to the King without particular License And to restrain his medling here the Kings of England declared they had a Right to forbid the Pope's Legates from entring into this Land and often did prohibite them even Qu. Mary her self exercising this Power yea it was adjudged in a Parliament 25 Ed. 3. To be Treason to bring in the Pope's Bulls here without the Kings consent Stat. de Provisor though the sending these be an Act of Spiritual Jurisdiction but it is plain they would not allow the Pope in those days to exercise Spiritual Jurisdiction here without the King's leave for his very Excommunicating certain English Bishops in a Parliament 16 of Rich. 2. is declared to tend To the open disherison of the Crown and the destruction of the King his Law and all his Realms and a little after it is affirmed there that the Popes attempts be clearly against the Kings Crown and Regality used and approved in the time of all his Progenitors finally therefore they all promise to stand with the King against all such Encroachments with their very lives And if you be well versed as becometh English-men in the Histories and Statutes of your own Country you must needs know that the Authority which the Pope once exercised here was gotten by taking advantages of the necessities of our Kings and the divisions among the People And in those Times which are accounted most Popish it was checked by Laws complained of in Parliament and thought an Oppression by the wisest and greatest Subjects so that the most Noble Hen. de Lacy Earl of Lincoln in his dying Speech to his Son in Law Thomas Earl of Lancaster said among other things That the Church of England heretofore Honourable and Free was now enslaved by Romish Oppressions charging him to stand up like a man for the Honour of God and the Church and the Redemption of his Country And the same Author tells us that it was debated in a Council at London An. 1408. Whether all Payments and Obedience to the Pope should not be taken away Which shews they thought it in the power of this Nation to take away his Authority here when they pleased And they retained it not as being necessarily or originally due to him but only in respect of his being a Bishop of an Ancient Apostolical Seat as is evident from those Instructions which King Henry the Fifth gave to his Embassadors sent to Pope Martin the Fifth bidding them if they perceived any delay in their affair to tell the Pope That their Master the King if he yielded not to his Demands would use his own power in these Particulars for he did not apply himself to Rome out of necessity but for Respect sake And therefore when this permissive Authority grew uneasie to those who had endured it for some time it was rejected much more Legally than ever it was introduced viz. by the Regal Power with the advice and consent of the Lords and Commons in Parliament And this is to be noted the Clergy and Laity of this Parliament did hold most of the Opinions of the Roman Church in other things and yet consented to the abolishing the Pope's Vsurped Power over England as believing it to be an unjust Encroachment And Stephen Gardiner Bishop of Winchester a great Persecutor of the Protestants did then make a learned Oration De verâ obedientiâ shewing that the King was by Right and by God's Law the Supream Head of this Church of England And now that I may not only confute a false Opinion but establish the true let me intreat you impartially to consider that as it appears the Pope is not Dejure supream Head of this Church of England so it is as evident that the King of England is the Supream Head of the Churches in his own Dominions For indeed all Christian Princes are or ought to be so in their own Dominions whence it was that Constantine the Great did retain the Title of Pontifex Maximus without any blot to his Christianity saith Baronius And the highest Appeals in all Controversies Ecclesiastical even in matters of Faith were made to him though he used the assistance and Counsel of his Bishops for determining them And it is evident that he and his Successors as Cusanus before confesseth did call and Preside in all General Councils and ratified their Decrees which were no Laws till they were stamped with the Imperial Authority yea the Imperial Code sufficiently witnesses that the Emperour 's made Laws concerning Religion the whole Third book of Justinian's Basilicks being nothing else but Imperial Constitutions de Episcopis Clericis Sacris They also erected Patriarchates and gave them supream Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction over such Provinces as they pleased as at Justinianopolis in Daeia and at Ravenna in Italy it self which had no dependence on Rome till the time of Constantinus Pogon And all Ecclesiastical affairs depended on the Emperors saith Socrates so that Pope Anastasius calls the
they confess he is principally so but add that Saints and Angels are so in an inferiour manner which we utterly deny We say Christ is really present in the Sacrament of the Altar this they confess but add he is corporally there by the Transsubstantiation of the Bread c. and this we deny We say the Scriptures are the Rule of Faith and they will not absolutely deny it but add their own Traditions which we reject We say there are XXII Books of the Old Testament Canonical and they confess these all to be so but they add divers and call them Canonical which we affirm to be Apocryphal I could give more instances but these may suffice to shew that the Protestant Doctrines look most like the Ancientest as being received by both Parties but the Roman Opinions are Novel Enlargements of Old Catholick Truths so that a Protestant becoming a Romanist must take up many Articles barely upon the credit of that Church and begin to believe many things anew questioned by the bigger part of Christendom but a Romanist turning Protestant retains all the Old Essentials of his former Faith and doth only become a Primitive Roman Catholick III. The Discipline and Government of the Church of England are more agreeable to Primitive patterns than those of the present Roman Church are Our King hath the same Power that the Religious Kings of Judah had the same which the great Constantine and the succeeding Emperors for many years enjoyed the same power which the Ancient Kings of this Nation exercised viz. A power to convene his Clergy and advise with them about affairs of the Church A power to ratifie that which the Bishops and Clergy agree upon and give it the force of a Law A power to chuse fit persons to Govern the Church A power to correct all Offenders against Faith or Manners be they Clergy or Lay-men And finally A power to determine all Causes and Controversies Ecclesiastical and Civil among his own Subjects by the advice of fit Counsellors so as there lies no Appeal from his Determination and this is that we mean when we call him Supreme Governour of this Church which our King must needs be or else he cannot keep his Kingdoms in peace Besides for Spiritual Jurisdiction and sacred Administrations we have a Patriarch of our own The Arch-Bishop of Canterbury Primate of all England whom Vrban the Second call'd the Pope of the other World And his See was usually styled The Chair of the English Patriarch and is reckoned among the Patriarchates by a Forreign Writer And now his Priviledges and Liberties are restored by Law and his Title and Authority confirmed so that there lies no Appeal from him but to the King we have also Right Reverend Bishops together with other inferiour Priests and Deacons the only Primitive and proper Orders of the Clergy who can prove their Ordination to be as goodas any of the Romish Priests can do And are now Consecrated and Ordained by a more excellent Form and more agreeing to the eldest times than Rome it self can shew and if you will Judge impartially it must be confessed that the Clergy of England are altogether as Learned and generally more painful and pious than in any Catholick Country whatsoever Our Canons for Ecclesiastical Government are all founded on the Canons of Ancient Councils as I could shew by particular induction if time would permit and for the Exercise of our Discipline it is managed with more moderation and ease to the People than that of the Roman Church is IIII. You may consider our Divine Service and Sacred Administrations which as far as ever God made necessary to Salvation may be had in this Church We have the Holy Scriptures plainly translated Learnedly interpreted and practically Preached We have daily Prayers by a Form so Grave and so Agreable to the undoubted parts of Ancient Liturgies that it may challenge all Christendom to produce any thing so consonant to the purest Primitive Devotions A Form which hath all those parts of the Roman Offices which were known and used in the first three Centuries but wants all the Innovations and Corruptions of the present Mass And is used in English for the benefit of the meanest Christian in our Assemblies We have also those two Sacraments which Christ ordained and many of the Elder and Later Doctors own no more As for the other five Rites falsly called Sacraments viz. Confirmation Matrimony Holy Orders visiting of the Sick Repentance and Satisfaction for wrongs done we retain these but not by the name of Sacraments keeping the Primitive and main part of them only attended with fewer Ceremonies We press and practice also Charity and good works as much as the Roman Church doth and it may be demonstrated that more and greater gifts have been given in England to pious uses by private persons since the Reformation than in two Centuries before And though we dare not say we shall merit Eternal life by them because that is the gift of God yet we believe none can come to Heaven without good works In a word the Church of England worships God as he hath prescribed in Holy Scripture She commands all that he enjoyns and forbids all that he prohibits and therefore wanteth nothing that is necessary to Salvation V. You may look upon our Ceremonies which are few and easie Ancient and Significant and though we do not place so much Religion in Externals as the Church of Rome doth yet here is prescribed all that is needful for decency and order viz. That the Clergy always wear Grave and distinct habits and have peculiar Garments in Divine Administrations that Churches be adorned and neat that the People be Reverent in Gods House that the memory of our Saviours chief Acts and the Festivals of the Holy Apostles be religiously observed That Lent with the Vigils of great Feasts the Ember weeks and all the Fridays in the Year be kept as days of Fasting or Abstinence and if some Protestants do not observe them yet others do and are commended for it and you may follow the best not the most you will have more liberty by turning to the English Church as to Circumstantials and greater helps as to the Essentials of Religion So that it is upon all accounts your wisest and safest course to embrace this so true so Primitive so Pious and so rational a Religion Let me therefore shut up my Charitable and Friendly Advice by Requesting you to consider all these things without prejudice or passion and then I hope you will perceive how much the Religion of this Church excells that of Rome in Antiquity Integrity and Usefulness and no longer suffer your selves to be so sadly imposed on and so miserably made to serve the ends of Avarice and Ambition And if you have taken such prudent and pious Resolutions you shall not only be freed from the inconveniences you complain of here but also have