Reformed Church of England to Romanism again which God forbid where was your Religion before 86 or before such a time Would they not answer at Rome and in England also only kept under and obscured by Hereticks And Christianity though not so visible yet was purer when its Professors dwelt in Mountains and Dens places of Obscurity and Privacy in the Reigns of Nero Decius and Dioclesian than when some Kings were called its Nursing Fathers and took possession of the seven Halls as when it groaned under Arianism in the days of Constantius and Valens 2. When some peremptorily require from us the Aera of all the Popish Errors may it not be as pertinently demanded when the Acephali began which was such a ridiculous Linsy-Wolsey Heresie as to be a Compound of these Contraries Nestorianism and Eutychianism and yet gave great trouble to the Church for many years for Baronius and Bellarmin ingenuously acknowledge that they know neither the Heresiarch or the Epocha of the Heresie nor when Filioque was inserted by the Latin Church into the Creed and if they know not the Aera of their Truths how can it be rationally expected that we should design the precise times when all their Errors began since it s in the Night Season that the Adversary Sows his Tares in the Field of the Church 3. It may be demanded what more pertinency amongst Disputers is in that old Thred-bare Question Where was your Church or Religion before Luther than in this amongst Husbandmen Where was the Corn before it was Weeded For if our Forefathers under the Papacy embraced the true Faith we have it still the Faith not being removed but the Corruption 4. Since the Church of England obligeth none to believe any thing as necessary to Salvation but what is plainly proved from holy Scripture and intirely holds the Apostolick Nicene and Athanasian Creeds and obeys more Canons of the first general Councils than those of Rome do and approves that Exposition of Scripture which hath the consent of the Fathers of the four first Centuries Yea holds all that the Church of Rome held necessary for Salvation for five or six hundred years together so that a Romanist may turn Protestant without adding any Article to his Faith but a Protestant cannot turn Romanist without the addition of many new ones or novel Inventions which have neither Foundation in Scripture nor genuin Antiquity May it not then be most rationally concluded that the Protestant way is the surest and safest because both sides agree therein and that their Church was long before Papacy appeared in the World 5. Since its impossible to produce any genuin Work of any of the Fathers who lived within Four Hundred Years after Christ that positively asserts the practice or the lawfulness of Prayer in an unknown Tongue of taking away the Cup from the People or with-holding the Scriptures from the Laicks or Adoring Images or having them in Churches the Pope's Infallibility or Supremacy Indulgences in the Sense of Pope Leo the Tenth the Doctrine of Merit in the Sense of the Council of Trent that there are neither more nor less than Seven Sacraments the necessity of the right Intention of the Priest for the Validity of a Sacrament Transubstantiation the Limbo of unbaptized Infants Private Masses the Popes deposing Power c. may it not more pertinently be demanded of the Romanists Where was Popery before Boniface the Third than they can enquire of the Protestants Where was your Church before Luther 6. Since its impossible to find any of the Primitive Fathers or any Christian Writer a thousand years after Christ and more who believed all the Twelve new Articles of Faith which P. Pius the Fourth hath added to the Apostolick Creed may it not be pertinently demanded of the Romanists Where was your Faith to be found intirely before the Council of Trent And is not the Modern Papacy younger by many years than Martin Luther himself 7. Since not one of the Twelve new Articles of the Creed of P. Pius the Fourth is to be found in any ancient Creed or Confession of Faith generally allowed in the Christian Church whence it is evident that they are Innovations destitute of Primitive Authority may we not more pertinently demand of them Where was Papacy when those Confessions were framed than they can enquire of us Where was your Church before Luther 8. Since every true Reformation necessarily pre-supposeth Corruptions and Errors to have been before it what Advantage can the Romanists have in charging our Reformation with Novelty For if a real Reformation be made the thing justifies it self and a Reformation must begin sometime and when ever it begins it is certainly new Besides it ought to be considered that this Objection of Novelty lyes against all Reformation whatsoever tho never so necessary and tho things be never so much amiss So that tho our Reformation was as late as Luther our Religion is as antient as Christianity it self for when the Additions which the Church of Rome hath made to the antient Christian Faith and their Innovations in Practise are par'd off that which remains of their Religion is ours and this they cannot deny to be every tittle of it the antient Christianity And what other Answer I pray could the Iews have given to the like Question if it had been put to them by the Antient Idolaters of the World Where was your Religion before Abraham or Moses Or what other Answer could the Primitive Christians have given to those Pagans who pretended Venerable Antiquity and Universality for their Polytheisme but the very same in substance which we now give to the Church of Rome And if any be so fond as to brand the Protestant Religion with Novelty because of some negative Articles in opposition to the Corruptions of the Roman Church which by accident are become a part of our Faith occasioned by their Errors they may as well tax the Primitive Church with Novelty because the renouncing of the Doctrines of Arianism at the Council of Nice of Macedonianism at the Council of Constantinople of Nestorianism at Ephesus and of Eutychianism at Calcedon came a part of the Catholick Religion after the rise of those Heresies 9. But to shut up this Point if to Pray without Understanding to obey without Reason and to believe against Sense be the surest Evidences of the Antiquity of a Church then I pray where is that Protestant to be found who is so contentious for Priority as not to yield upon these accounts the Precedency to the Church of Rome above all Christian Societies in the World SECT XIX Of the Infallibility of the Pope with his Councils Qu. 1. IF the Pope or Church of Rome be infallible wherefore are they so uncharitable to the World at least to their own Incorporation as not to give an infallible Comment on Scripture but suffers her Doctors to write as fallible Comments and in many things as contrary to each other as any
S. Cyprian 21. Since to be the ultimate Object of Appeals or dernier besort as the French phrase it is the Essential Privilege of all Monarchs is it accountable that the Council of Nice believed the Bishop of Rome's Supremacy over the Catholick Church when it determined that all Appeals during the Intervals of general Councils should be determined in the Provincial Synods or by the respective Patriarchs and that there should be no Appeal from the one to the other 22. If the Churches of Africa believed the Popes Supremacy to be jure divino how could 217 Bishops in the 6th Council of Carthage whereof S. Austin was one have opposed Three Popes successively in the matter of Appeals to Rome and condemned all those as Schismaticks who did thus Appeal and made a formal Separation of their Churches from the Roman upon the account of its Illegal and Uncharitable Incroachments 23. If that Separation was unjust how comes S. Augustin to be reputed over all the Christian World and at Rome too an eminent Saint since he died as the Romanists think in actual and unrepented Schism since S. Augustin denied the Popes Supremacy in matter of Appeals to Rome no less than Henry the Eighth of England might not P. Coelestin as justly have Excommunicated S. Augustin as P. Paul the Third did Henry the Eighth of England 24. Since by many of the Epistles of Gregory the Great to the Emperour Mauricius and Iohn the Patriarch of Constantinople its apparent that he declares all those Prelates who usurp the Titles of Oecumenical Patriarch Universal Bishop and Head of the Catholick Church to be the Forerunners or Harbangers of Antichrist may it not be pertinently demanded if all those Popes who from Boniface the Third inclusively have affected those Titles do not stand condemned by the Judgment of their Predecessour as Antichristian 25. If it be the Popes Prerogative as the Romanists pretend to assemble all the general Councils how did it chance that during a Thousand years after Christ and more there was not an Oecumenical Synod in Italy no not in all the West unless that of Frankford be accounted one which was indicted by Charlemain against the Conventicle at Nice and that they were very desirous to have one in Italy is most evident from the Letters of P. Leo the First none of the meanest spirited Popes to Theodosius the Younger his Sister Pulcheria the Emperour Marcianus Valentinian the Third with Eudoxia the Empress whom he did Supplicate on his Knees with many Tears thus he phraseth it for a Council to be holden in Italy against the Eutychians but could never obtain his desire as to that Circumstance 26. If the Emperours were nothing else but the Popes Mandatarij in the indicting of Councils as some term them what could be the reason that P. Vigilius being personally in Constantinople would not Countenance the 5th general Council assembled there by Iustinian the Great till he was haled thereto by the Authority of the Emperour and forced to obey the Mandat of his pretended Mandatarius in condemning the tria Capitula which by a former Constitution he had approved 27. If the Confirmation of a general Council by the Pope be so necessary that all its acts are invalid without it as some Romanists pretend how could the Patriarchs of Constantinople be so irregular as to possess the place in all succeeding Councils where they were present which the 2d and 4th general Councils had allotted to them notwithstanding of all the Protestations of P. Leo the First and his Successors against those Council Acts 28. Since the Bishops of the Primitive Church were promiscuously termed Popes from the old Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies a Father their Episcopal Sees Thrones and Empires and themselves how small soever their Diocess were were also called Princes if we believe S. Gregory Nazianzen and S. Hilary of Poictiers all were termed the Successors of the Apostles and equal as to the intrinsi Power of Bishops whether it were the little Bishoprick of Eugubium compared with that of Rome Rhegium with that of Constantinople Tanis with Alexandria if we give Faith to S. Hierom therefore it may pertinently be demanded What solid Grounds had Hildebrand to Monopolize those Titles to the Bishop of Rome 29. If the Romanists can produce any Authentick Author for the Decretal Epistles of all the Popes from Clemens to P. Sirvius that is to the middle at the least of the 4th Century though they have made up a considerable part of the Canon Law before Riculfus Archbishop of Mentz who lived 500 years after those Popes were dead 30. Since the Belief of an Infallible Headship in the Bishop of Rome is with many Romanists the reason why they receive their Articles of Faith must it not then be the fundamental Article of all others And ought it not to be the best attested by some plain places of Scripture and not leave by its silence this sole visible Vicegerent of Christ to the Suspicion of bearing witness to himself 31. Since the Pope receives his Office with an Oath to observe the Apostolick Canons as they are termed with the Canons of the Eight first general Councils and notwithstanding it is evident from the 35 and 36 Canons of the Apostles or the 33 and 34 Canons as Binius hath them that these are directly against the Popes Supremacy as also the 6 and 7 Canons of the First general Council the 9 17 and 28 Canons of the Fourth general Council the Fifth in condemning the Sentence of P. Vigilius in favour of the tria Capitula tho he was very vehement in the cause the Sixth and Seventh in Condemning P. Honorius of Heresie the Eighth and last by imposing a Canon upon the Church of Rome and challenging Obedience thereunto viz. its Condemning a Custom of the Sabbath Fast in Lent may we not very rationally hence conclude that the Fathers during eight hundred and seventy years after Christ knew no such thing as the Popes Supremacy by Divine Right or any Right at all seeing they opposed it And that they did not believe the Infallibility of the Church of Rome that they had no Tradition of either that Supremacy or Infallibility that it is in vain to plead Antiquity in the Fathers or Councils or Primitive Church for either and that the Canons of these eight general Councils being the sense both of the ancient and the professed Faith of the present Church of Rome the Popes Authority must needs stand Condemned by the Catholick Church at this day by the ancient Church and the present Church of Rome her self as she holds Communion at least in Profession with the ancient And in fine how can the Church of Rome escape the charge of Heresie for he who believes the Popes Supremacy denies in effect the eight first general Councils at least in that point and that 's Heresie and he who believes the Council of Trent believes the Article of the Popes
Imprimatur Aug. 19th 1687. Guil. Needham A REQUEST TO Roman Catholicks To Answer the Queries upon these their following Tenets § I. Their Divine Service in an Vnknown Tongue II. Their taking away the Cup from the People III. Their witholding the Scriptures from the Laicks IV. The Adoration of Images V. The Invocation of Saints and Angels VI. The Doctrine of Merit VII Purgatory VIII Their Seven Sacraments IX Their Priests Intention in Baptism X. The Limbo of unbaptized Infants XI Transubstantiation XII The Propitiatory Sacrifice of the Mass. XIII Private Masses XIV The Sacrament of Penance XV. The Sacrament of Marriage with the Clergies Restraint therefrom XVI Their Sacrament of extream Vnction XVII Tradition XVIII That thred-bare Question Where was your Church before Luther XIX The Infallibility of the Pope with his Councils XX. Tho Pope's Supremacy XXI The Pope's Deposing Power XXII Their Vncharitableness to all other Christians By a Moderate Son of the Church of England LONDON Printed for Brab Aylmer at the Three Pigeons over against the Royal Exchange in Cornhil MDCLXXXVII A REQUEST TO Roman Catholicks c. SECTION I. Their Divine Service in an Vnknown Tongue Quest. 1. MAY not the Seventh Commandment be as easily reconciled to Adultery as the Service of the Roman Church in an unknown Tongue to 1 Cor. 14. where the Apostle Five several Times expresly prohibits it and gives so many pregnant Reasons for the Inhibition 2. If the various Gestures and Ceremonies practised by the Priest at Mass be sufficient to excite Devotion in the Spectators may not a dumb Priest be as useful for that effect especially he who babbles with a Stentorian Voice as he who speaks in an unknown Language since one who cannot speak at all may be as mimical as he who can speak more Languages than ever Ioseph Scaliger did or as many as were at the Confusion of Babel 3. Since it 's possible that the Priest may be so Diabolical as to be practising Conjuration in an unknown Language instead of Devotion or may be cursing his Congregation in lieu of blessing them would not Reason without the Apostolick Authority perswade us of the necessity of understanding his Language that we may say Amen to what he says 4. Since the Priest in these publick Offices is the Mouth of the People in offering up their Tribute of Honour and Adoration to God if the Congregation understand him not how can he more justifie himself than if he did celebrate the Service in a Tongue himself knows nothing of and which neither the one nor the other did understand 5. Since it 's given as the principal Reason of the Roman Service in Latin by the Rhemish Annot. that Christians where-ever they travel may find the same Service and Priests officiating in it as at home it may be demanded if for the sake of some few that travel the many that stay at home should be left destitute and for one Man's Convenience a Thousand be exposed to eternal Perdition for there will not be one to a Thousand who understand Latin in the Christian World 6. Since in the Service in an unknown Tongue the People are wholly left to the Ability and Sincerity of their Priest Is not the case of that People very lamentable For if the Priest wants the former he may through Ignorance turn the most Solemn Part of their Service into Ridicule and Nonsense or Blasphemy And if he want the later he may use a Spell for Prayer or the antient Charm of the Valentinians Abracadabra for Ave Maria nay instead of Baptizing in the Name of the Father c. he may do by the Person as a Iew under the Profession of a Priest is said to have done by a certain Man in this last Age who Baptized him in the horrid Name of the Devil there being nothing so absurd or wicked which according to this case may not be practised 7. Since Scripture the Reason of the Thing the Fathers and Practice of the Church for about Seven Hundred Years together are for the Expedience and Necessity of having God's Publick Service in a Tongue understood by the People may it not justly be enquired with what Effrontory the Council of Trent hath Anathematized all those who believe the necessity of having God's Solemn Worship in a known Tongue as if Trent because a City of the Alps were transformed into Mount Ebal whence they might curse that great Doctor of the Gentiles in the first place 8. Is it not evident from 1 Cor. 14. that in St. Paul's Judgment they deserve to be reckoned Mad-men who Pray to God in an Unknown Tongue 9. Is it not probable that the Romanists have borrowed their Service in an Unknown Tongue from some Heathens who as Clemens Alexandrinus reports thought those Prayers most effectual which were uttered in a Barbarous Language or from their Neighbours the old Cusleans of whom Varro testifies that their Priests did scarcely understand their own Sacred Rites 10. Since the English Liturgy is so agreeable to the undoubted parts of the most antient Liturgies it being a Form which hath all those parcels of the Roman Offices that were known and used in the first Three Centuries but wants all the Innovations and Coruptions of the present Mass May we not truly and pertinently challenge all Christendom to produce any publick Platform or Solemn Church-Service so constant to the purest Primitive Devotions 11. Since the Famous Bishop of Condam hath most cunningly endeavoured a palliative Cure by soft and smooth Words as to many Practices in the Roman Church which stand in need of Amputation yet both in his Exposition and Exhortation he still passeth by their Service in an Unknown Tongue Is it not because he had no Tongue of his own to answer for that Practice which is so directly repugnant to Scripture and Antiquity having despaired it seems to find either Butter or Oyl to cicatrise or soften that Wound SECT II. Their taking away the Cup from the People Quest. 1. SInce the Council of Constance Anno 1418. made it an Article of Faith That the Laity ought to receive the Eucharist only in One Kind non obstante of the Institution of Christ as it was then acknowledged and the constant Practice of the Catholick Church above a Thousand Years Wherefore may they not Christen the Laick's Children only in the Name of the Holy Ghost leaving out the Father and the Son by the way of Concomitancy it being as lawful to Baptize as to Communicate by halves and no less certain that since the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity partake of the same individual Nature where one is all the rest must be suppose the Mutilation of the Eucharist could not be disparaged by that Emblem of the Effusion of Christ's Blood which is necessarily required in the Sacrament 2. Since the principal Reason assigned by Gerson for that Canon of the Council of Constance which abstracts the Cup from the People is the Danger of
Supremacy therefore he who believes the Council of Trent doth not believe the eight first general Councils and therefore is guilty of Heresie And how can any Pope evade the Brand of Schism the foulest that ever the Church groaned under aggravated with the horrid Crime of Perjury since the Pope as such professeth to believe and sweareth to govern the Church according to the Canons of the first General Councils yet openly claims and professedly practiseth a Power condemned by them all thus quatenus Pope he stands guilty of Separation from the ancient Church and as Head of a new and strange Society draws the Body of his Faction after him into the same Schism in flat contradiction to the ancient Church and to that solemn Oath by which also the Pope as Pope binds himself at his Inauguration to maintain the Doctrine and Practice thereof SECT XXI Of the Pope's Deposing Power Qu. 1. SInce the Fourth Lateran Council under Innocent the Third promised a Plenary Pardon of all their Sins and a greater Degree of Glory hereafter to those who did extirpate Hereticks if it may not be presumed that this most bountiful Proffer doth animate Traitors to murther their own Princes whom Rome hath declared Heretical 2. What greater reason is there of expounding these words spoken to Ieremy I have set thee over Kings to root out to pluck up and destroy of the Pope's Supremacy and Deposing Power as both Innocent the Third and the Canon-Law do than had the Donatists of applying those words in the Canticles Tell me O thou whom my Soul loveth where thou feedest where thou makest thy Flock to rest at Noon to the Flock of their Party in the Southern Country of Africa 3. If any be so quick-sighted as to find the Popes Universal Monarchy and Deposing Power in these Words Feed my Sheep Heretical Princes being those Wolves which are to be driven away as hurtful to the Flock may not such a Lyncean Eye by a like kind of Interpretation find this other Mystery in the Words that all Christians are Fools because Sheep are silly Creatures 4. Since the Doctrine of Deposing Power in Popes by which I mean not only their excommunicating absolute Monarchs but also the exposing their Dominions as a just Prey to the first Invader is so scandalous to the Christian Religion in the Eyes of all sober Romanists and hath been found so mischievous to many Sovereign Princes wherefore was not that destructive Doctrine condemned by some General Council they having had many which they account such since the Fourth Council of Lateran under Innocent the Third where it was certainly defined let them call it an Article of Faith a Point of Discipline or what they will. 5. Since it is evident from Baronius Binius Platina Onuphrius and many others that Gregory the 7th nick-named Hildebrand did excommunicate Henry the 4th Emperor of Germany P. Paschal the 2d Henry the 5th Alexander the 3d Frederick the 1st Innocent the 4th Frederick the 2. Boniface the 8th Philip the Fair of France Iulius the 2d Lewis the 12th with him who was King of Navarre at that time on which putrid Title Ferdinand the Catholick seized on his Kingdom and that Alexander the 3d did also excommunicate Henry the 2d of England And Innocent the 3d King Iohn Six years before the Resignation of his Crown into the Hands of that Popes Legat may it not be justly doubted if they who can confidently aver that never any Pope presumed to excommunicate an absolute Prince did ever read those Histories if so be they have put in Print what they did think 6. Whether that place 1 Pet. 2. 13. which is quoted by P. Innocent the 3d. in his arrogant Epistle to the Emperour of Constantinople doth prove that the Pope is as much greater than the Emperor as the Sun is greater than the Moon which strange Comparison is inserted by Gregory the 9th into the Body of the Canon-Law and ever since continued in all the Editions of that Law. 7. If Gregory the Great imagined himself superiour to the Emperor Mauritius and not rather much his Inferiour when he wrote to that Emperor that in Obedience to his Commands he had published one of his Laws which himself judged scarce agreeable to the Law of God 8. If according to the Doctrine of the Church of Rome it can properly be called Rebellion to resist and dethrone a deposed Prince or if it can be termed true Loyalty to defend him Since the deposing Doctrine doth import that when a Prince is deposed by the Authority of their Church they absolve their Subjects from their Fealty and then it is no Rebellion to take up Arms. 9. Since the deposing Doctrine hath been decreed and practised by their Popes and General Councils and that no Pope or Council since Gregory the 7th hath ever condemned it and that the Jesuits do still maintain it their greatest Champions Bellarmin Suarez Becan Gretzer Mariana Sanctarellus and many others having expresly declared for it yea tho the present Pope who is not the worst of the Pack did lately censure some other Jesuitical Doctrines as great Immoralities yet he thought fit to let the deposing Doctrine escape without Censure may we not justly admire how some of this Age have the Effrontory to out-face all Mankind who have Eyes in their Heads and Skill enough to read the Decrees of their Popes and Councils by saying that the deposing Doctrine is not the Doctrine of the Church of Rome but of a nameless Party 10. As for those who Found their Loyalty upon this Supposition that the deposing Doctrine is not the Doctrine of the Roman Church doth not this Hypothesis afford a shrewd Suspicion that if it were the Doctrine of the Church of Rome or ever should be so or they should ever be convinced that it is so then they would be for the deposing of Princes no less than those who at this Day believe it to be the Doctrine thereof 11. May it not be justly doubted whatever some little inferiour People in Communion with the Church of Rome think of these Matters while the Governing part of the Church believes otherwise as they certainly do at this day if the Pope and his Adherents are the Governing Part Princes have no security that Popes will not challenge and exercise this Authority but their want of Power to do it which is wholly owing to the Reformation for till Princes had Subjects who valued not the Popes Authority they themselves were the Popes Vassals and must necessarily be so again could they extinguish this pestilent Northern Heresie as they phrase it the great Fault of which is that it hath given Strength and Security to Princes by weakning the Popes Pretensions 12. Since the Council of Constance owns the 4th Council of Lateran for a General Council Sess. 39. where the deposing Power is as expresly declared as any thing can be unless Men will quibble upon Words and make Nonsense of them