SECT III. The Papists as much bounden to declare their Explicites as the Protestants their Fundamentalls This distinction may bee rightly used for the manifestation of our union with the Fathers to prove the perpetuall visibilitie of the Church professing the same Fundamentalls with us but unjustly objected as a ground of our severitie against Papists who are punished here as Traytors for overthrowing the foundations of State not as Hereticks for contradicting the foundations of Faith HEe goes on I should bee glad to know of the Authors of this distinction what points of their faith which are controverted betweene them and us or betweene the Lutherans and them are fundamentall and which are not fundamentall Then he sayes That a fundamentall point being such that whosoever beleeves it not cannot be saved there is nothing which more imports a man exactly to learne then what is fundamentall and what not and yet there is absolutely no one thing which hath beene so frequently and so importunately desired as that they would give in some exact List or Catalogue of all and the onely fundamentall points of faith and yet there is no one thing wherein wee are so little satisfied and which upon the matter they doe so absolutely refuse And yet as hath beene here expressed if according to their grounds a man should faile of beleeving any one fundamentall point of faith by his not knowing through their fault that the point which he beleeved not was fundamentall hee must bee sure to perish and that for ever First to his question what are fundamentalls and what not hee ought to give an answer himselfe for hee himselfe hath told us Page 74. That some doctrines are of farre more importance then others because they may containe the very heads and first grounds of Christianitie more then others doe and therefore exact a more Explicite beliefe and consequently may bee accounted in some respects more fundamentall It being then acknowledged by him that there are such doctrines of farre greater importance then others that exact a more Explicite beliefe and are more fundamentall why doth hee not answer himselfe concerning that which himselfe affirmeth and yet withall questioneth Let him truly tell us or himselfe if hee please which are those doctrines of more importance that containe the heads of Christianity and are more fundamentall and give us a List of them and wee may tell him or hee may tell himselfe an answer to his question And then also may he by this List as by a Touchstone and Rule finde what differences betweene us and any others are fundamentall and not fundamentall So that hee being herein ingaged himselfe either hee hath spoken that whereof hee cannot give an account or else askes of us an account of that which hee knowes and wherein hee can answer himselfe And indeede the Authors owne partners or rather leaders have layd the foundation of these fundamentalls in their Explicites for their Heads Articles and Grounds of Religion to which they require an Explicite beliefe are such as those which we call fundamentall yea not onely wee but the Author himselfe calleth such points more fundamentall and his owne Priests call them positively fundamentall Besides the very rules of faith mentioned and rehearsed by Tertullian and Irenaeus and other Fathers the Symboles and Creeds of Nice other Councels and of Athanasius and Lirinensis his precipua Capita or chiefe Heads yea hee hath the word fundamentall are summes and acknowledgements of such fundamentals And now how can this Authour either bee so farre uncatechised as not to know such grounds of Religion or call Protestants the authours of this distinction and how can hee object any thing against Protestants or require any thing of them but object the like against his owne Teachers yea against the Fathers of the Church and require the like of them Accordingly how can hee aske an exact List and Catalogue of Fundamentals of Protestants more then of Fathers yea of his owne Doctors and Masters And indeed let him bring an exact List and Catalogue of all the onely Articles of Faith contained in the Fathers rules of faith and an exact List of all and the onely Explicites of the Romists and hee may quickly receive a Catalogue of our Fundamentals But this Authour is here againe exceedingly out of his way and that the Title of his Chapter might tell him by the warinesse of it for his businesse is not to deny a distinction of fundamentals and not fundamentals in regard of greater or lesser importance of the Articles themselves but this being granted to adjoyne and superedifie that though this distinction doe stand yet even points of lesser importance and in themselves not fundamentall may bee made fundamentall by the command and authority of the Pope So that his quarrelling at this distinction is not onely a quarrell from his errand but a quarrell against the Fathers and a quarrell against himselfe and against his fellow-Romists and if hee make quarrels against himselfe and his fellowes why may wee not leave them and him to make up their owne quarrell among themselves And accordingly whereas this Authour makes a fearfull noyse how dearely it concernes men to know which are fundamentals wee might turne him to get an answer for this out-cry from himselfe and his fellow-Romists yea from the Pope himselfe for Romists say that the Explicites are such points that hee who doth not know them cannot bee saved Then the Authours terrible words doe thus warfare against himselfe putting Explicites for Fundamentals That there is nothing in all Christian Religion which imports a man more exactly to learne then what are these Explicites without the knowledge whereof none can bee saved And an exact List and Catalogue should be given of these Explicites which yet the infallible Pope hath never given to his Papists So that if a Papist should faile of beleeving an Explicite by not knowing it to bee an Explicite hee must be sure to perish and that for ever Yet the Cavalier in wrath and warre against unity proceeds further in fighting against his owne confessed and undeniable distinction of Explicites and Fundamentals and hee so proceeds that it may easily bee seene that his anger puts out the eye of his judgement or carryes him beyond the kenne of it For thus hee saith Whereas if either they framed not the distinction of Fundamentals at all or else would clearly let men know which points alone were fundamentall then this would follow That whensoever wee should convince them in any particular Doctrine which is denyed by them and which yet was beleeved by the ancient Fathers they would bee obliged to confesse that either that point was not fundamentall which would dis-able them from railing at us for beleeving the same or else that the Fathers were of a different Religion in fundamentall points from them and that in their owne opinion those very Fathers could not bee saved which would put them to much prejudice
Explicites or Fundamentals with some reasons of those differences and directions for discerning fundamentall points from others THe Cavalier thus goes on It is more then probable that one reason why they are so unwilling to give in any Catalogue of the fundamentall points is Because they know so well how ridiculous they would make themselves by the infinite variety of their Catalogues For if it be so familiar with them to bee of different mindes concerning particular doctrines how much more would they bee so in this which is a roote of many branches or rather a monster of many heads and so there can bee no doubt but that some of them would not bee more resolute in restraining the fundamentall points into a narrow compasse then others would bee in enlarging them into a broader The Authour here goes about to make the Fathers yea himselfe and his owne partners ridiculous for if varietie in the Catalogues of Fundamentals or chiefe heads and grounds of Christianity bee ridiculous how shall the Fathers escape the merriments of this Authour Yea how shall himselfe and his owne partners not bee mocked by himselfe For it is plaine that neither Irenaeus nor Tertullian in sundry patternes of the rule of Faith doe enumerate Articles just of the same number and breadth Neither doe the three usuall Creeds hold equall measure by the Authours ell yea let the Authour himselfe who confesseth that there are such Heads and Grounds of Christianity more fundamentall make a Catalogue of these Heads and hee can never agree with all his fellowes who agree not among themselves And thus if hee will looke into this glasse hee may see himselfe laughing at himselfe And indeed if the Reader will peruse the Romists where they write of their Explicites they may see the same variety wherewith the Cavalier here makes himselfe merry some contracting them into a narrower some enlarging them into a broader compasse And to save labour to the Reader I will here give him a Modell of this variety Bellarmine saith That there are some things in Christian Doctrine as well of faith as of manners which are simply necessary to all unto salvation as the knowledge of the Articles of the Apostles Creed tenne Commandements and some Sacraments other things not being so necessary that without their explicite knowledge and faith and profession a man may not bee saved But Vasques thus differs from Bellarmine in some Articles of the Creede There are saith hee some Articles in the Apostles Creed and the other of Nice which the ignorant are not commanded to know nor commonly the faithfull for all doe not know the Communion of Saints yea you shall finde not a few learned men that know not what the Communion of Saints is and the Article of the Church seemes hard to teach and learned men thinke that the ignorant doe commonly erre in it Yea hee comes at length to this short measure of faith I would not doubt to grant that there are not a few Countrey people that without fault are ignorant of some of those mysteries which are necessary Azorius the Jesuite speakes of other differences and varieties differing also himselfe from others First hee saith That every Beleever ought explicitely to beleeve all the Articles of faith either as according to the number of the Apostles they are accounted twelve or according to the sentence of Divines they are reckoned foureteene But then hee adds That some affirme the unlearned must beleeve more then these Articles because they must beleeve the immortality of the soule originall sinne c. Againe hee saith Some hold that both the twelve Articles and the fourteene must bee beleeved but himselfe thinks that it is sufficient to salvation if a man beleeve explicitely the one or the other Yea at length hee comes to shew That if a man bee so dull that hee cannot perceive the Article of the Trinity it will suffice if hee beleeve explicitely some other plainer Articles as that Christ the Sonne of God is borne of a Virgin that hee suffered was crucified dâ—ed and was buryed that hee rose againe from the dead and ascended into heaven Canisius as wee have seene before saith That the summe of faith or of all things to bee beleeved is the Apostles Creed And whereas Thomas Aquinas concludes that the Articles to bee beleeved of Christs Divinity and Humanity are fitly numbred either twelve or foureteene Lorca after this acknowledgement adds Perchance the Church did not intend in this summe to comprehend all these Articles which containe any speciall difficultie or ought explicitely to bee beleeved of all the faithfull And when hee comes to speake of those Explicites hee confesseth plainely That in assigning the Rule by which it may bee defined what the vulgar should beleeve Divines doe differ and doe put divers Rules the most common Rule is That they should beleeve those Articles which are by Solemnities celebrated in the Church and that it sufficeth if they beleeve these But this Rule seemes insufficient to others both in excesse and defect Scotus seemes to say That the common precept of faith doth onely binde to the beliefe of the easie which hee calleth grosse points Some of the later as Suarez It â—ufficeth the common people if they beleeve the Articles in the Creed But Lorca himselfe goes beyond all that hitherto have beene mentioned and saith These Rules being laid aside it is to bee affirmed That it is commanded to all the faithfull explicitely to beleeve first the Articles of faith both the foureteene and the twelve in the Creede They must also beleeve the Decalogue and the more common Precepts which are reduced to the Decalogue the doctrine of the seven Sacraments of Prayer of the Popes authoritie and the Prelates Behold a great variety in Romish Explicites Yet I confesse that I find not my selfe so merry hereat as the Cavalier at our supposed differences in Fundamentals but will rather strive to excuse them and to finde reasons for their varietie for the reasons seeme to bee serious as the matter which they goe about is weightie and profitable even the proposall of those grounds whose knowledge is necessary to salvation So farre is it from being a monster as this Authour termes it that his calling of it by this Title is so much the more monstrous as it is true that himselfe acknowledgeth that there are such Heads of Christianitie which himselfe thus calleth monstrous Behold a Truth of the Authours owne bringing forth and then mocked by him for a monster but I will goe on to speake for his Truth and against his Monster even against him to plead for him and his fellowes True it is that there may bee a different enumeration of the Articles in the Fathers Rules of faith in the Creeds and in the Explicites of later Writers as well as our Fundamentals and that for divers reasons One may bee this Because some Catalogues may put in more Articles for more full unfolding
many whatsoever this Authour saith have not deprived themselves voluntarily of marriage but have taken it upon them as a yoke and burden which neither they nor their Predecessors were able to beare many sinking under it unto the very pit of Hell And let them labour with their wits and pennes so much as they can they will never by reason nor by the lives of their Priests disprove Christs truth That all men cannot receive it nor prove their owne untruth That all men can receive it And surely the Fornications Adulteries Murders and pollutions that have issued from this Law of Coelibate I doubt not cry aloud to heaven against Rome as once against Sodome for that sore to which it is condemned Hee adds further In like manner Saint Peter saith That Saint Paul in his Epistles had written certaine things which were hard to bee understood and which the unlearned and unstable did pervert to their destruction Saint Augustine declares upon this place that the places misunderstood concerned the doctrine of Iustification which some misconceived to bee by faith alone by occasion of what Saint Paul had writ to the Romanes and of purpose to countermine that errour hee saith that Saint James wrote his Epistle and proved therein that good works were absolutely necessary to the Act of Iustification Hereupon wee may observe two things the one That an errour in this point alone is by the judgement of Saint Peter to worke their destruction who imbrace it And the other That the Apostles Creede which speakes no one word thereof is no good Rule to let us know all the fundamentall points of faith To this I answer First That this Authour goes on still upon a false ground as if wee said that all errours in faith that may damne men were fundamentall and expressely against some Article of the Creede Whereas wee have often affirmed That any errour though not fundamentall may damne men that by a lively faith hold not rightly the fundamentals and so are without Christ. And it seemes that these men were not well grounded and founded by fundamentals in Christ Jesus whom Saint Peter calls unlearned and unstable and their errour the errour of the wicked A generation of vipers turne wholesome food into poyson and abuse Scriptures to their owne condemnation But secondly That faith doth not justifie but that good workes are absolutely necessarie to the Act of Iustification is most untrue and against Saint Augustine himselfe Untrue for a man is justified by faith in Christ and not by his owne merits which in your language are good workes as divers of your owne Authours affirme And a man in the instant of his Justification may dye before he hath had time to do good works and yet his Justification may be good And it is against Saint Austin even in the same place whence the former saying of Saint Peter is taken where you may find that commonly knowne sentence of his Opera sequuntur justificatum non praecedunt justificandum Good works follow justification and doe not goe before it So that whiles this Authour observes two things hee gives more then two scandalls to his Reader For first hee chargeth falsly not Saint Austin onely but Saint Iames with holding this errour That good workes were absolutely necessary to the act of justification And then secondly he will make him to say that the not holding of this errour is an errour which may worke their destruction that embrace it Yea thirdly that the Apostles Creed is no good rule to let us know all the fundamentall points of faith because it speakes no one word to teach us that the Cavaliers errour is a fundamentall point of faith Lastly his owne Doctors doe bring into their Explicites our faith in Christs passion resurrection for justification but not this his Article That good workes are absolutely necessary to the act of justification And if they doe not why doth hee require it of us in our fundamentalls SECT II. Wherein his Exceptions against the 39. Articles of Religion established in this Church are answered BUt having quarrelled in vaine with the Creed to prove the insufficiency of it for fundamentalls now hee comes to the Articles where he thus begins Others say that the Booke of the 39. Articles declares all the fundamentall points of Faith according to the Doctrine of the Church of England but this also is most absurdly affirmed For as it is true that they declare in some confused manner which yet indeed is extremely confused what the Church of England in most things beleeves so it is true that they are very carefull that they bee not too clearly understood And therefore in many Controversies whereof that Book speakes it comes not at all to the main difficulty of the question between them and us and especially in those of the Church and Free-will While the Authour speaks of a confused manner and which is extremely confused his words do returne upon himselfe and his owne discourse For that he may make his discourse confused it seemes hee makes use of this doubtfull word Declare For if wee say That the Booke of Articles declares our fundamentalls of faith wee doe not say it declares all the knots of questions which are between us and the Romists For it is well knowne there are divers controversies between us and the Romists which are not of fundamentalls And neither the Fathers in their rules of Faith neither Romists in their Explicites doe declare the knots of questions which may arise even concerning fundamentalls themselves if the fundamentalls be so expressed that their true and saving sense may bee received and beleeved by the working of that Spirit which makes Christs sheep to hear Christs voice They that thus beleeve shall bee saved though they know not all the knots which cunning and erring men doe make They that write rules of Faith Explicites and Fundamentalls doe not in the same undertake to write all knots of controversies which concerne them And the Cavalier doth not find them in his owne Doctors among their Explicites wherefore the answer which he makes for them let him take for us Secondly for his particulars of the Church and Free-will First for the Church Doth our Church hold that the visibility and inerrability of the Church are fundamentalls And if shee doe not how can this Authour accuse her for not shewing fundamentalls because she shewes not those points which she doth not hold to be fundamentall The Church is not the foundation of the Church but she her selfe is built on that onely foundation Christ Jesus And even your owne men are not agreed about making the Article of the Church one of the Explicites or at least agree not in declaring these points of controversies concerning her to be explicitely beleeved And for Free-will I might aske first Doth this Authour find in any of his Doctors this knot of Free-will for an Explicite But secondly Doth the Councell of
him a right Citizen of Sodom And now call him a Monk if you will hee shall bee but a Monk of the Order of Sodome his function farre from sacred farre from the Spirit but even a hellish trade of fleshly abominations And so I think we have drawn up these conclusions First That it should not bee true Christian charity which by excessivenesse gives that provision which makes such a childe of hell Secondly It may bee no charity because it may bee an erroneous opinion of merit and satisfaction And it is too well knowne that the supposed expiation of crying sins hath laid the foundation of too many Monasteries Thirdly This Provision may be a fruit not of Romish Charity but of Romish Policy for Rome may cherish this provision and enriching of Monasteries that they may serve as so many Garrisons for Rome against Princes for by them they may diminish Kingdoms and as much as they take from these so much they adde to the Kingdome of Rome The Champion passeth on and having wrought a glittering curtaine bespangled with the seeming good works of Visiting the condemned Redeeming captives Instructing the ignorant hee spreads this curtaine before the eyes of his Readers at once to dazle them with this glorious shew and to cover from them the horrid spectacle of Romes bloudy uncharitablenesse That there are no good works in the limits of Rome I will no more say then I will say there are no knees there â—hat doe not bow to Baal And these as I said before serve well the turne of the Beast to make his hornes shew like those of the Lambe as they doe at this time serve our Author to make a shew that Rome is charitable But take out of his Inventory those works that are done for satisfaction to pay God the debt of sins and so to make them Saviours or for merit and supererogation to bring God in debt unto man I doubt not the remaining works like Gideons Army will abate from thousands to hundreds And indeed the greater multitude there is of erroneous works the more Arguments not of Romish charity but of Romish error and superstition But when among these works of Romish charity I see the Instructing of the ignorant I wonder at the Cavaliers blinde partiality that could not see this which hee brings forth as a proofe of Romish charity to bee an high proofe and accusation of Romish uncharitablenesse and this uncharitablenesse is the greater for his owne reason because soules are more precious then bodies So that the great deluge of this transcendent uncharitablenesse to soules seemes to drowne all the former wâ—rks of charity to the body And indeed what instruction can a Latin Pater noâ—ter a Latin Creed a Latin Ave Maria a Latin Masse give to an ignorant soule It hath been to mee a spectacle of compassion when beyond the Seas in some principall City I have met with a poore Popish soule that spake some of these her devotions in that which was thought to be Latin but could not bee understood to bee Latin by those who knew that language much lesse by the party that knew it not what instruction can these words give to the ignorant which the ignorant know not This is not to take away ignorance but to add new ignorance to the old And surely they need not to send men to compasse sea and land to convert Infidels abroad untill they have converted their ignorant unbeleevers at home for if they make no better Christians abroad then they leave thousands at home it is but to pollute that glorious Name wherewith wee are called and to put the name of Christians on those that know not Christ. Now that Rome is this cruell Stepmother whose children thus lye swowning dying in the streets for hunger though our eies have seen it let Romish words speak it Let us hear their great Jesuit Navarre setting forth the ignorance of the Romish Church as her shame whereas the Cavalier sets forth the Instruction of the ignorant as her glory Hee sins mortally saith he who being come to the judgement of reason neglects explicitely and particularly to know the second Person of the Trinity that is That the Sonne of God the Father was made man was born and dyed c. And he that is ignorant of other Articles of the Creed at least those which the Church doth solemnize by Festivall dayes c. Wherefore we desire all Curates Godfathers Parents Confessors especially of the common people and all Preachers of Gods Word that they will not cease to inculcate this particular and explicite faith of these Articles and of those other which are contained in the Apostles Creed which the holy Church of Rome doth use For in the whole Church of Christ there is so great negligence about these that every where you shall finde many that beleeve no more explicitely and in particular of these then an heathen Philosopher endued onely with the naturall knowledge of one true God And now if the Reader withdraw this painted and deceitfull curtaine that seemes to represent a Heaven sprinkled with the Starres of seeming good works and looke into the Hell of Romish uncharitablenesse whereof a small but true modell was represented in the former Chapter Or if he see it not there he will look into the Inquisition House and there behold it set forth to life or rather to death in severall torments I doubt not but this pleasant image will soon be frighted out of his Imagination by the terrible shape of Rome appearing all bloudy and drunken with the bloud of the saints And so the improbability of Romish uncharitablenesse to Protestants will vanish away like a fantasie and a Poeticall fable And indeed if the Pharisee notwithstanding his tyth-paying and fasting went away condemned because proudly and uncharitably hee despised and damned the Publicane though hee did neither imprison noâ— burne him how shall Rome escape this condemnation which both despiseth and damneth and imprisoneth and tortureth and burneth Protestants whom shee accounteth worse then Publicans and Heathens And thus though the Cavaliers words may bee true that At the first sight it is wholly improbable that Rome is uncharitable yet at the second sight it is more then probale because it is proved This Chapter is almost ended but before the end of it the Champion shoots an arrow like a Parthian flying even then to hurt us when hee seemes to looke from hurting us Hee would seeme to spare Protestants in not recriminating yet in naming this not recriminating hee did not spare us but indeed hee did spare himselfe most in not urging it more for wee have such proofs of Protestant charity as may shame his Recrimination For they are ready to bee brought forth against a Recriminator and may binde his Recrimination as a crown to the head of the Protestants And when a catalogue of them is brought forth wee may boldly say and that not without Recrimination to Romists that
Deum Where himselfe also makes an exact Catalogue of all the heresies which had sprung untill his time and where by the way I must needs observe in a word that hee recounts divers heresies which are held by the Protestant Church at this day and particularly that of denying prayers and sacriâ—ices for the dead and then hee concludes in the end that whosoever should hold any one of them were no Christian Catholick But here I must challenge this Champion first that hee deales not fairely with us in putting in these words In disobedience to the Church For let the world know that this is not our holding That a different opinion being held in a purposâ—d disobedience to the Church is safe or compâ—tible with unity of charity but that some different opinions in points of doctrine by darknesse of understanding or weaknesse of faith not apprehended or beleâ—ved yet not without a purposed disobedience to the Church may be compatible with unity and salvation Secondly if it were true which hee saith that unity were broken by the obstinate beliefe of any one doctrine joyned with disobedience to the Church how doth not this make against Rome which maintaineth her universall Supremacy and other errors directly against the Canons of the Church Thirdly wee deny Rome to bee that Church which the Fathers speake of Fourthly this Authors allegations make directly against his owne end and overthrow the authority of Rome which hee goes about to establish For let him speake upon his conscience and reputation Were all those heresies mentioned by Epiphanius and Augustine adjudged and condemned for heresies by the Church of Rome If not then it seemes there may bee hereticks without any judgement of the Church of Rome and there may be hereticks that hold some errors not adjudged heresies by the Church of Rome But if so then what is become of this Authors heresie described to be the obstinate beliefe of any one doctrine in disobedience to the Church the Church in the Authors sense being no other then the Church of Rome How was this Church disobeyed in those things which shee had not decreed and even his particulars of prayers and sacrifices for the dead Had the Church of Rome adjudged these at this time to bee points of faith Hee cannot say it How plaine deceit then is this to seeme to prove these to bee heresies because held in a disobedience to the Church when the Church in his Romish sense had not decreed the doctrines to bee beleeved which are contrary to these supposed heresies Let us now come to his particular citations and see yet more particularly how they make not against us but mostly against himselfe Hee begins with Saint Irenaeus lib. 1. cap. 3. The Church having received this word preached and this faith as was shewed before and having spread the same over the whole world doth diligently preserve it as inhabiting one house and doth likewise beleeve those things which are taught thereby as having one soule and one heart and in the same conformity shee preaches and teaches and delivers it as possessing but one moâ—th For though there bee in the world different expressions and tongues yet the vertue and power of Tradition is but one and the same And neither those Churches which are found in Germany nor those others in Spaine nor those in France nor they which are in the Easterne parts nor they which are in Egypt nor they which are in Lybia nor they which are in the middle parts of the world doe beleeve or make tradition of doctrine any otherwise in one place then they doe in another but as that creature of God the Sunne is one and the same in the whole world so is the preaching if the Truth And those Prelates of Churches who have most power and grace of speech will deliver no other things but these for no man is above his Master neither will such an one as hath meaner Talents in speech make this doctrine and Tradition lesse but since Faith is but one and the same neither doth hee inlarge it who is able to speak much of it nor that other diminish it who speakes lesse I answer that this place is produced improperly in regard of the Point deceitfully in regard of the Reader For Irenaeus in the second Chapter next preceding had set downe a forme of Faith and a summe of chiefe Articles agreeable to our Creed And then in the third whence this allegation is taken hee saith that the Church having received this faith doth uniformly preach it and with one Mouth through all nations neither doth the more learned increase it nor the lesse learned diminish it Now this being spoken of the principall points of faith â—oth rather prove our unity in fundamentalls but not prove our Champions entire unity in inferiour points therefore it comes not home to the Authors marke but indeed he goes about to deceive the Reader when he brings it in as a proofe of that which it proves not Secondly this place makes mightily against the Papacy and that Confederacy for in the faith which Irenaeus sets downe in the foregoing chapter there is not one Article concerning the Popes Supremacy nor worshiping Images nor of praying in an unknowne tongue c. These therefore being now decreed by the Pope are inlargements of faith wherefore the Popes that thus inlarge the faith are by Irenaeus censured not to bee these Prelates of Churches who have most power and grace of speech yea not so good as the others of lesse grace but withall hee censureth them that they are above their master and their master being Christ it fits right with the saying of Paul That hee sits as God and exalts himselfe above all that is called God Hee comes next to Tertullian Tertullian shewes plainly that whosoever denyes any one doctrine of the Church rejects all for thus hee saith upon occasion Valentinus approveth some things of the Law and the Prophets some things hee disallowes that is hee disallowes all whiles he approves some The Author here also imposeth upon his Reader if wee may beleeve Tertullians learned but Romish Adnotator Pamelius For not to insist on this that the words are Omnia improbat dum quaedam reprobat he disallowes all whiles hee refuseth some from Pamelius we learne that these words are not spoken of all points of faith proposed by the Church much lesse if the Church bee taken for the Papacy but of the bookes of the Law and the Prophets which Protestants do by no meanes reject For this is Pamelius his sentence immediatly after these words Quod usque adâ—o verum agnoverunt alii scriptores ut disertis verbis scribant inter caeteros Damascenus quod vetus Testamentum reprobaverit This by other writers is said to be so true that they expresly write and Damascen among others that hee refused the old Testament And indeede hee that did deny the old Testament did deny more then one doctrine of
the Church which is the Cavaliers point to be proved by this place for he denyeth many doctrines and fundamentall ones of the Law and the Prophets yea of God himselfe The next place doth much accuse the Cavaliers need of Allegations and yet withall excuseth him not from an indeavour to deceive his Reader The place alledged by him is this Quod apud multos c. That which is found to be one amongst so many is not to be thought to have crept in by errour but to have beene commended by Tradition The place cited is this Quod apud multos unum invenitur non est erratum sed traditum That which is one among so many is not an errour but a thing delivered The question in hand was concerning the rule of Faith or the Creed as the Reader may see by comparing the thirteenth chapter where the Creed is rehearsed and the end of the one and twentieth where he saith That it remained for him to shew whether the doctrine in the former rule came from the delivery or if you will Tradition so it bee not a Tradition beyond that which is written for there is no such in this rule of faith of the Apostles And having refuted these objections That the Apostles delivered not all and that they knew not all he comes after to this objection That the â—hurches did not purely reteine what the Apostles delivered and thus hee refells this objection Age nunc omnes erraverint deceptus sit Apostolus de Testimonio reddendo Nullam respexerit Spiritus sanctus uti eam in veritatem deduceret ad hoc missus à Christo ad hoc postulatus de Patre ut esset doctor veritatis neglexerit officium Dei Villicus Christi vicarius sinens Ecclesias aliter interim intelligere aliter credere quod ipse pâ—r Apostolos praedicabat Ecquid verisimile est ut tot ac tanâ—a in unam Fidem erraverint Nullus inter multos eventus est uâ—us exitus Varâ—asse debuerat error doctrinae Ecclesiarum â—aeterùm quod apud multos unum invenitur non est erratum sed traditum Whereof the summe is this that though the Holy Ghost the Vicar of Christ had not looked to his office of leading the Church into truth yet there is no likelihood that so many Churches had erred into one Faith But the Faith wherein there is such unity among many should not be an errour but a Truth delivered by the Apostles Now this place is so far from saying that all Churches agreed in sin all points beyond and besides the Creed that it speaks onely of their agreement in the rules of Faith and doctrine of the Creed And he saith that such an agreement comes not by errour which commonly is divers but by one uniforme delivery and doctrine of the Apostles So the Cavalier is still to seeke for a necessary unity in every smal doctrine and in points without the Creed Cyrill is mainly for the Protestants even as himselfe alledgeth him For we agreeably affirme That to be the Catholick Church which teacheth without defect all things necessary to salvation And in the doctrine of faith such things necessary to salvation are points fundamentall Cyprian comes or is rather drawne in next against his will and meaning and thus the Author produceth him The Church being stricken through by the light of our Lord doth send her beames throughout the whole world But yet that light which is cast so far abroad is but one and the same Shee spreads her branches over the whole earth after a plentifull manner Shee extends her flowing streames with great aboundance and to a great distance But yet is Shee one Head and one Root and one Mother who is fruitfull by such store of issue Now I thinke it were needlesse to help a Reader to take this place from the Author For it is plaine to every eye that this place speakes not of the unity of the Church in all points of doctrine but of their unity in one Love and one mysticall Body So that this place is not onely unserviceable to the Author but serves much against him and his lady Mother who cuts off noble and excellent members of the Church from her or rather her selfe from the Church if they doe not submit to her universall Tyranny Cyprian it seemes hath not said enough and therefore he must say more but indeed lesse Let us see how the Cavalier rather teacheth him then suffereth him to speake The same S. also speaking of the sin of Core Dathan and Abiram implies that the one Church must not onely be entirely beleeved but followed also in all her doctrines and directions For hee saith that though Core Dathan and Abiram did beleeve and worship one God and lived in the same Law and Religion with Moses and Aaron yet because they divided themselves from the rest by Schisme resisting their Governours and Priests they were swallowed up quick into Hell Here first wee may observe how hee tells his Reader what hee would have Cyprian say for hee saith not that Cyprian doth speake it plainely but the S. implyes and what doth he imply That the Church must not onely bee intirely beleeved but followed also in all her doctrines and directions But did Core Dathan and Abiram differ from Moses and Aaron in doctrine His owne place denyes it which saith They did beleeve and worship one God and lived in Moses his Law and Religion with Moses and Aaron And the place further assignes the true fault Division by Schisme They denyed the authority of those whom God had placed to be Governours over them Just the same sinne into which Pope Pius the fifth drew the English Papists by his Bull so that this place makes exceedingly against Romish doctrine of rebellion against Princes such as those of the North and in Ireland But let me give the Author one question at parting Was Aaron to bee followed in all his doctrines and directions what doth the Author think of this doctrine concerning the Calfe These be thy Gods O Israel which brought thee up out of the Land of Egypt Saint Basill is next produced thus speaking in Theod. They who are well instructed in holy writ permit not one syllable of divine doctrine to be betrayed or yeelded up but are willing to embrace any kinde of death for the defence thereof if need require Hereupon the Author thus commenteth That man of God had beene sollicited by some to relent for a time to yeeld though it were but to a little he refused in such sort as you have seene and he did it with much disdaine to be attempted in that kinde Now let the Reader see here the fairenesse of our Author Hee speakes of Basils not yeelding to a little and what was this little Denying the sonne of God to be God of one substance with the Father Is this a little Surely he should be a great Hereticke that should deny
this little So that this being not a little but a great point S. Basill doth not speak against us but for us who sayes that in these great points there should be no difference Now it might be called little by some not for the little weight of the point but for the litte odds in the sound of the word so that in the little difference of a syllable the great point lay affirmed or denyed And indeed it were better that death were imbraced then any such point of divine doctrine should bee betrayed Besides â—s there a desire on our side of betraying or delivering up any lesser points of divine doctrine but rather a charitable hope that men may be saved though differing in opinion concerning some lesser matters by not knowing that they be divine doctrines or not reaching to them by a weake and inferiour degree of a faith But who so will truely judge our maine quarrell with Romists hee shall finde it to be a defence of divine doctrine against humane fictions and traditions And Romists most grossely offend against the words and example of S. Basil who permit many syllables of the divine doctrine in the second Commandement forbidding worship of imâ—ges to be left out of their Catechismes and the divine doctrine of halfe a Sacrament to be denyed and made voyd to the people and the divine doctrine of praying in a known tongue in the Church to be actually betrayed Saint Gregory Nazianzen is next who as our Author saith thus delivers himselfe Nothing can be more dangerous then those hereticks who when they run straight through all the rest doe yet with one word as with some drop of poyson infect the true and sincere faith of our Lord. If this Champion had gotten this place by his owne knowledge he could not well but take notice that the sincere faith whereof Gregory speaks is the faith contained in the Nicene Creed which Creed is set at the head of the Tractate and accordingly the one word of which hee speaks as being dangerous to the faith is the word that giveth not to Christ one Substance with the Father This word Nazianzen often names in this discourse so that the Cavalier could not well oversee it if hee had seene the place yea hee saith plainly that it lets in the Arian heresie And if it be thus this Champion is yet far from his Conclusion by this Antecedent which must thus lead the way It is most dangerous to differ in one word of the Creed which concernes a point fundamentall even the Deity of Christ therefore it is most dangerous to differ in points out of the Creed which are extra-fundamentall and of the Popes decreeing But let Romists look whether this place doe not fight against them who thrusting the word Roman after or into the word Catholick have drawne the soules of too many to beleeve in the Pope or Popish Church in stead of God and so have changed the very foundation of their faith Saint Hierome must have the same answer no man denying but that for some one word or two contrary to the faith or Creede in points fundamentall many heresies have been and ought to bee cast out of the Church It followes Saint Leo saith That out of the Catholick Church there is nothing pure According to that of the Apostle Whatsoever is not of faith is sinne But what doth this here where the question is not Whether they sin that be out of the catholick Church but Whether they be out of the catholick Church that differ in any smal point of doctrine from some other members of the same Church But because this place wants help hee adds a second If it be not one it is no faith at all We acknowledge there is but one saving and fundamentall Faith in Christ Iesus as but one Baptisme and this faith was once delivered to the Saints and the Saints still doe so uniformely receive it as that they who have any other fundamentall faith have none at all But if Romists will have faith to bee one in all points then by this Popes doctrine they have no faith for their faith is not one in all points with the one faith once delivered to the Saints nor with the faith in the time of Leo for in that one faith there was no worship of Images no universall Monarchy of the Pope no worship of Bread The Cavaliers first place of Augustine I am loth to bring forth to spare both the Cavalier and the Reader It is somewhat long but very short of the Cavaliers mark it proves against the Donatists That the Church in earth and the Church in heaven are not two Churches but one But who denyes this yea who denyes the true Church on earth to bee but one and this is the Protestants maine businesse to keep it one though differing in some lesser points of doctrine And it is our Authors businesse to breake this unity even by this place which he produceth under a shew of proving unity but not proving by it such an unity as by it hee may make a division hee is faine to set a second Buttresse to support his wall of separation Thus hee reareth it To shew moreover by the judgement of Saint Augustine that the Church in her doctrine was to be truly one hee spake thus of the Donatists who called upon the same God preached the same â—ospel sung the same Psalmes had the same Baptisme observed the same Easter and the like in those things they were with mee yet not wholly with mee in schisme not with mee in heresie not with me in a few not with mee but in regard they were not with mee in a few their being with mee in many could not help them If the Cavalier had gone on in his Allegation the very next words would have given him an answer to the objection which hee drew out of the former for those words say that the one thing wherein they were not one was Charity And the want of this hee proves out of Saint Paul 1 Cor. 13. to make all the rest unprofitable But our question is not of want of charity but of differing in some small point of faith True it is that this uncharitablenesse was back'd with an error which hee called an heresie That the Catholick Church was onely in the part of Donatus and so as Saint Augustine infers that the Church was not catholick But let our Author remember That this voucheth an Article of the Creede as denyed by the Donatists but with the denyall of any such Article he cannot charge us But yet that their error did not kill nor cut them off all from being truly of the Church except the error were accompanied with the want of that one thing which was true charity we have great probabilities if not proofes out of Optatus and Saint Augustine the former of which commonly calls them brethren and the later denies not but some of them might be
that abides not in Christs doctrine and faith But in all this hee doth not say that the Protestants are not in the Church neither that they remaine not in Christs Doctrine and Faith but it may rather concerne the Papacie which hath made a new Church against the Church of Christ and a new Faith by adding twelve Articles more to the former It doth also plainely shew them that they suffering for Treasons of Powder Rebellion c. cannot expect thereby a Crown of faith but a punishment of perfidiousnesse Saint Augustine is next alledged and hee useth the like or very same words and so the like or the same answer might serve But indeed Augustine so punctually speaketh against the Papacie and pierceth it through that no one place can well bee lost because every one is serviceable against the Papacy for which it is produced These are the words first alledged out of Saint Augustine Would you have men so blinde and deafe as not to heare or reade the Gospel where they may know that faith our Lord left to his Apostles concerning his Church Now what the Papists will answer to this I know not who make many men so blinde as not to reade at all and so deafe as not to heare the Gospel but in Latin And secondly hee sayes that Saint Augustine puts himselfe to shew That this is that Church of Christ which is spread over the whole world Who can more plainly say that the Roman Papacie is not this Church whose universall power and extent is denyed by other Patriarchs and is unbeleeved yea and unknowne in a great part of the Christian world The last place out of Augustine seconded with the consent of Cardinall Perron hee turnes to this use That Catholick is not onely a name of beleefe and faith but of charitie and communion which whosoever should want should also want salvation But withall I must say that long before I knew this opinion of Perron I beleeved this truth and I also beleeved that it did make mightily for us and mightily against the Papacie That it makes mightily for us I have shewed in the first Chapter who doe imbrace a catholick love with the whole body of Christ which is his Church That it makes mightily against the Papacie I have shewed in the second Chapter because it excludes from love and communion many eminent parts of the Church even so much of the Church and body of Christ as extends beyond subjection and obedience to the Papacie And indeed this Champions allegations doe so fight for us against his owne Papacie that a suspicious Reader may doubt hee hath been hired by us But by the next allegation perchance hee thinkes his suspicion may be somewhat cleered where thus hee commenteth in the behalfe of his mother Saint Hierome writing to Pope Damasus saith not onely of the catholâ—ck Church indefinitely but denoting that to bee the Roman that that Church is the Arke out of which whosoever liveth shall bee drowned in the deluge and that that Church is the House out of which whosoever should eate the Lambe were a profane person But doth Hierome here denote the catholick Church both for breadth and length to be Roman and no Church to be catholick which was not Roman that is under the Roman subjection this was farre from his meaning Hee meant that at that time the Roman Church was by one faith the same with the catholick Church anâ— in union with it as a member of the body and that out of this one Church wherewith Rome was then one in faith there was no salvation Secondly Hee did not say that that Church shall bee the Arke out of which shall bee no salvation but that Church is the Arkâ— shewing what it then was and not what it shall be Indeed the Papacie even the Man of sinne the Head and his members in the Mystery of iniquity now call themselves the Church of Rome But Rome at the best had never Religion and the Church faster tyed to it then Jerusalem and therefore we may take leave to say of Rome as it was said of Jerusalem How is the faithfull Citie become an Harlot It hath been manifestly proved that this Mysterie of iniquitie or Papacie is farre different from the ancient Church of Rome and Saint Hierome himselfe hath taught us that Rome should bee the seate of Antichrist and hee did not meane that when Rome is the seate of Antichrist shee should bee taken for the Arke out of which no man should bee saved Therefore this place that made for Rome then while shee was a pure part of the catholick Church makes against her now when she is the seate of the Man of sin or Antichrist and they that might be invited to come to her then as an eminent part of the Arke and catholick Church may now bee driven out from her by a voice from heaven Come out of her my people that ye be not partakers of her sins and that ye receive not of her plagues There follow two places out of Lactantius whereof the first indeed saith for us and against these Romists that are divided from us and our Church That they that enter not into the Temple of God or depart out of it shall bee deprived of the hope of salvation But the second place I know not how it may serve for the point in hand but it otherwise is an wholesome exhortation for Romists and I wish it may doe good to the Author No man must flatter himselfe with an obstinate kinde of contention for the questions here about salvation and life which if it bee not watchfully and diligently provided for it will be extinct and lost The Cavalier ends in a tempest which he puls downe on his own head S. Fulgentius hath this dreadfull saying wherewith I will conclude this point c. where he brings in Fulgentius saying That neither Baptisme nor Almes nor Martyrdome can be of any benefit towards his salvation that holds not unity with the Church A place indeed that ought to be dreadfull to the Romists for their Schism described in the second Chapter but no way dreadfull to us for our catholick Charity expressed in the first SECT III. The Cavaliers indeavour to prove that the Protestants and Papists cannot bee both members of this one Church doth not absolve the Papists from uncharitablenesse ANd having thus concluded the Allegations hee thus gives a reason of his conclusion Nor will I so much distrust either the attention or the discretion of my Reader as to thinke that I need presse this point any further A saying good at last but much better at first for if there had bin at first no distrust of the Readers discretion there had beene no neede of any one of those Allegations which have beene brought forth to prove a point not denyed There is but one Church out of which there is no salvation But let us see what immediatly followes So that now in the
saved who avoyd the mortall infection of these points and what caution must be used to preserve this Charity from crossing with Truth HAving discovered many Untruths in at least foure maine points of this Chapter wee are come to a fifth point whose truth is so powerfull that it overcomes mee and makes mee to acknowledge with the Author That it divides Protestants and right Romists so farre as salvation and damnation And I must cleere either side from uncharitablenesse in saying that these who faile in this point are in a state of damnation And it is very true that hee promiseth That this Reason strikes at the roote which is taken from the nature and propertie of Faith The point is this That whosoever doth give his faith and assent to all the Articles of Christian doctrine yet if hee doe it not upon the right and infallible motive hee hath no saving Faith Now hereunto wee subjoyne That true and right Papists or Romists doe not beleeve upon the true and infallible motive Therefore they can have no saving Faith And indeed though they have many and pernitious errors yet this is the great and generall error that makes up the Mystery of iniquity which wee call the Papacie and the Papists call the Church For the ordinary motive of faith in those who are the right and naturall members of the Head of that Mysterie is to beleeve the Articles of Faith because the Church whose mouth head and spirit is the Pope propounds and commands them to bee beleeved And this Author saith that the onely true and infallible ground is The Revelation of Almighty God and the proposition and direction of the Church Wherein first hee joyneth the Church with God in this ground of Faith and so gives as it were halfe of the ground of Faith to the Church from God and makes it halfe unsafe and damnable But even this halfe hee seemes elsewhere wholly to take away and so to leave men wholly to bee damned by a Faith wholly grounded on a motive which cannot raise a saving and supernaturall Faith for hee saith That if the Church hath not decided propounded and commanded a doctrine to bee beleeved by her children a man may thinke and doe as hee sees cause without incurring the crime of heresie Thus wee see that the Revelation of God is not a motive of Faith of it selfe but the Church is the motive of beleeving Gods Revelation so first wee see the Church to put God aside and to take place of him and knowing who is the Head Heart if not the Whole of this Church wee finde him just in his owne place and that is lifting himselfe up above all that is called God And secondly wee see the deadly motive and ground of Faith proposed by Papists to Popish soules even the word of a man and a Man of sinne on whom whatsoever Faith is finally grounded it can give nothing but damnation Neither are wee put by other Papists to lay pieces together to prove this their damning motive of Faith for besides the common voice of the people that they beleeve as the Church beleeves wee have before heard that the Rhemists acknowledge the Popes to bee an Order of Governors to whom wee are bound to cleave in Religion and to obey in all things And thereupon they infer that A Papist is a Christian man a childe of the Church and subject to Christs Vicar So the Christianity of a Papist and his being a child of the Church depends on his cleaving to the Pope and obeying him in all things But yet againe we may see it more acknowledged in their Writers Lorca brings forth Medina affirming that The Testimonie of the Church doth so farre partake of being the formall object or motive of faith that the utmost resolution of faith is into the authoritie of the Church and the proofes produced for it are to bee heard in the common language of Romists If it bee asked why thou beleevest the Trinity in Unity and thou answer Because God saith it It will then bee demanded of thee how thou knowest that God saith it thou hast no other Answer left but this Because the Church saith it and so are they taught in the Catechisme and so answer both the learned and unlearned Behold the common answer and common faith of Romists Now this object of faith being man and not God it cannot raise that supernaturall and saving faith whose object is the prime Veritie even God speaking to the soules of his servants And seeing this humane faith hath so possessed Romists that their Prophets doe make the obeying and cleaving to the Pope in his doctrine the very Character of a Christian and childe of the Church this Church consisting of these children thus adhering to the Pope is against such truely affirmed not to bee the Church and so may the Homily of our Church clearely bee interpreted which denyeth the Church of Rome that is the Pope and his Adherents to bee the true Church for thus to adhere unto the Pope and to lay beliefe on him is so farre from making a true childe and member of the Church that it makes a member of the Papacie and so of Antichrist it makes a Synagogue for Sathan and Hell and not a Church for Christ and salvation And whereas this Author both in this Chapter and the beginning of the eighth objects it to us that wee condemne their doctrines and account the Church of Rome to bee the Seate of Antichrist and the Synagogue of Sathan Hee hath here seene one reason of it and it is a reason of his owne and his fellowes even because the Romish Doctors and Champions tell us that the Church of Rome is made of those children which beleeve in the Pope And this faith being humane cannot make a Church to Christ but to the Pope and thus the Pope stands in the place of Antichrist for putting Christ out of his place and stepping into it whiles thus hee makes his sheepe to heare his voice before Christs yea both herein and often otherwise against Christ. But a second Reason may bee given of their calling the Church of Rome the Synagogue of Sathan the Church of Rome being taken in a larger sense even for all those parts of mankinde that have reference to Rome For they finde this Church of Rome overspred not onely with this false and Antichristian faith but with other mortall errours and abhominations such are grosse and almost universall Idolatry in the worship of Images and especially of the Sacrament confidence in workes for justification and merit and a grosse ignorance even a not knowing of Christ which before hath beene touched Now many seeing a field overcome with these deadly and killing weeds and so overcome that they seemed to cover the face of the field they tooke it to bee a field of Weeds and not of Corne And because the usuall manner of speaking is to say that a horse is blacke and
first there hath beene shewed a sore called difference in points defined and points de fide And by the Authors rule they that hold any one point of faith contrary to Romish definition are not of Romish faith nor Church therefore if they bee of a divers faith or Church their Altar is against the Romish Altar Secondly for their peace notwithstanding these differences I dâ—sire to know whether that should be called peace when a Dominican is burned by Franciscans and a Canon in Sevill is condemned as an Heretick for a point either not defined or defined for him by the second Councell of Nice And againe what peace is that betweene the Priests and Jesuits when the Priests call them Hereticks Traytors c. Surely hereby it seemes the peace that is among such is but a warre under the name of peace and this name or title is forced by feare of the forged but fiery and burning head of unity for even the infernall kingdome it selfe hath some bond of unity though not of verity and charity And accordingly the Papacy agreeth under a head called Abaddon and Apollyon And indeede this Author himselfe hath shewed us that where there is a difference in any point of faith upon such a difference one should be to another as Cerinthus to Saint Iohn So that if they hold communion still it seemes by his rule it is not a spirituall but a carnall communion not a communion of Saints but a communion that is faulty and whose fault is this that it is a communion But I say againe to this Author that his owne Answer will be turned against him as an unanswerable objection For if Romists being at such differences in opinions can yet hold communion one with another why do they not hold the like communion with other Christians that maintaine the like differences But herein lies a mystery and it is the mysterie of iniquity And if the Reader know it not I will bring him one that shall teach him Lorca plainly tels him that he is no heretick that beleeves contrary to any Article of faith so he do not rebell against the Church So the Pope the Church vertuall is the whole matter of Popish religion and Popish unity Beleeve the Pope and obey him in what hee saith upon his word and though you beleeve not Christs word in any Article of faith you have both faith and unity Disobey Christs command of beleeving the very Article of Christs Incarnation if you beleeve the Pope and bee the Popes good subject you shall not be an heretick Accordingly it is said of the Divines of Coleine they held an hereticall opinion in that point which the Cavalier magnifies by calling it the Justification of souls yet they were not hereticks but godly Catholicks And of Catharinus he held contrary to the Councell in the point of assurance yet was a catholick Bishop And others before named by Bellarmine contrary to the Councell of Nice in the point of Image-worship yet in being good Papists they are good Catholicks So the Pope is the summe of Popish religion and unity And is it our unhappinesse that because we beleeve not in the Pope but beleeve in Christ our beliefe in Christ will not serve our turn for religion unity and salvation But now in his Answer to the second objection somewhat like a right Cavalier of Rome he runs at Tilt against Calvin and thus he breaks his Lance on him The next objection is yet more stupid then the former and I wonder how Calvins rage against the Church could put him so farre out of his wits as that hee would ever take it into his mouth For it is hee who being pricked with our noting their want of unity towards their fellow Brethren thinks to retort it back upon us by saying that wee are not in case to object any such thing against them for asmuch as that forsooth wee have as many Sects among us as we have severall Orders of religious men and then hee reckons up Benedictines Carmelites Dominicans Franciscans and whom he will Wicked man who well knew that none of these holy Orders doth differ in any point of doctrine from any of the rest and are so farre from breaking communion with them as that still they prevent one another in all honour and good respect All this wee must take upon his bare word and his title also which he giveth to Calvin wicked Calvin yet well fare the honest Belgicks purgers for when Calvin was named they in stead of Calvin did put in studiosus so upon the matter they called him not wicked but studious Calvin But why wicked Calvin because he knew that no one of those Orders doth differ in any point of doctrine Did Calvin know this or doth any man yea the Author himselfe yet know it We come but now from the differences of Jesuites and Priests Dominicans and Franciscans c. And this Authour himselfe confesseth there that each opposeth the contrary opinion by all arguments that occurre Besides it is no new nor strange objection that divers covents have their severall Masters whom they follow Againe look on the Jesuites doctrine of killing Kings doe all Friers agree in these doctrines upon which much more justly may be cryed out wicked Mariana wicked Friar Clement wicked Barradius wicked Garnet doctrines in my opinion plainly contrary to the faith since the faith is plainly taught by the Scripture in this point And I think more hereticall it is to deny and contradict such a point being thus plainely taught in the Scripture by David Solomon Peter and Paul then to deny what the Pope hath decided by letters sent from Rome unto Trent But will you see this Authors ingenuity hee accuseth Calvin but produceth not the place whence hee taketh his accusation the neerest place that I finde is not for the Authors purpose for there Calvin retorts not the want of unity of faith among the Friars by the diversity of Sects among them But Calvin shewes That the Friars by dividing themselves from others in the Sacraments and publick Assemblies did dissolve the Communion of the Church and depart from it and excommunicate themselves And he saies that so many Ministeries as there be of this kinde so many Assemblies of schismaticks he saies not hereticks as differing in faith which troubling the Order of the Church are cut off from the lawfull fellowship of the faithfull And that this departing should not bee secret they have given to themselves divers names of Sects Neither were they ashamed to boast of that which S. Paul doth so much detest In stead of Christians wee heare some called Benedictines some Franciscans some Dominicans So that here we find neither mention of Carmelites nor indeed of differing in points of faith but of a schismaticall separation from other Christians by different sects expressed by different names And to them hee might have added Jesuits who by a more neer separation have
others doe and therefore doe exact a more explicite beliefe and consequently may bee accounted in some respects more fundamentall This I desire the Reader to observe because this confirmeth that which hath beene formerly spoken concerning the agreement between Fundamentals and Explicites and must serve hereafter for a Confutation of his owne objections against Fundamentals In the meane time that which paines him for the present is this That wee doe not beleeve every Decree or Errour of the Pope as well as these important grounds of Christianitie for thus hee presently subjoyneth There is no doctrine at all concerning Religion the beliefe whereof is not fundamentall to my salvation if the catholick Church propound and command mee to beleeve it So the Cavaliers quarrell against us is this That wee doe not make the worship of Images kindred of Gossips and such popish vanities fundamentall to our salvation as the Articles of the Trinity and Christs Incarnation A fearfull blasphemy and which should make his heart hate his hand for writing it but they well deserve to bee given up to the beliefe of such impious errours who receive not the love of the truth revealed in the word with duâ— estimation For such will easily equall the word of Man to the word of God and will not suffer the word of God to stand for a sufficient saving verity nor a sufficient ground of unity except man give his word for the word of God and Man add his word to the word of God For if the Pope give his word for a doctrine contained in Gods word then his Popish disciples must receive it and untill that they may without heresie not beleeve it and if the Pope adde his word to the word of God Gods word is not a sufficient ground of unity but the unity made by that word is to be torne in pieces if withall we do not joyne the word of the Pope in one beliefe with it Thus is the Pope made Christs Rivall and takes the faith of the spouse from her husband to himselfe And so whereas he would accuse us of an high craft our craft is no other then that simplicity of S. Paul by which hee did labour to espouse the Church as a chaste Virgin to one Husband which was Christ But this Romish doctrine is the very craft of the old Serpent and Dragon which goes about to seduce Eve the patterne of the Church from her Husband and to marry her to the Pope or rather to make her his Adulteresse But let him remember Whoremongers and Adulterers especially such great ones God will judge Yet this would hee approve by that which followes For there is no errour in faith which may not bee made damnable by the manner of holding it when it is done so obstinately as that in defence thereof a man denyes the authority of the Catholick Church But briefly I answer First that the Church cannot make a point of faith of that which is none Secondly Stapleton tells us that the Church hath no promise to bee infallibly directed in the decision and resolution of small or light points and so the Church not having this infallible direction cannot have authority to make such points fundamentall nor to command faith to them where she hath no infallible direction in them Thirdly the Church in these lesser points not having this authority hee doth not disobey the authority of the Church who beleeveth not these points which she hath no authority to command as points of faith Fourthly if the Church were this foundation and could make a point fundamentall yet the Pope and his confederacy for whom this Author fights is not the Church Fifthly the same Popish Church hath taught and propounded many grosse errours and untruths for points of doctrine which are so farre from being fundamentall to salvation that they shake the very foundation and so are rather fundamentall to damnation But here I cannot but complaine of this Author in that hee useth craft which himselfe accuseth for while he goes about to lay the Pope the Chimera of Rome for a foundation of faith hee names him not in his whole booke but still tells us of the catholick Church let him come forth plainly out of his Covert and shew us his catholick Church even the Pope and his adherents if he be not ashamed of them and not thus draw disciples to a fancy and a piece of Poetry under the reall and reverend name of the catholick Church But this may serve as a caveat to the Reader that the Cavalier tells us of the Church when the Pope is his errand Another point whereof he seemes to be ashamed is the worship of Images which he never reckons among the doctrines of difference but if it please him he may now fitly conjoyne them together and then his discourse may runne thus If the Pope decree the worship of Images it may be fundamentall to salvation if with the deniall of Idolatrie the Popes authority bee denyed Yet our Author having spoken that which is proved to be fearfully untrue in his sense that what the Pope and his conspiracy under the name of the catholick Church doe propound and command to be beleeved is fundamentall he is bold to say This untruth is unanswerably proved by the meere catalogues of heresies which have beene made by severall Fathers of the Primitive Church and especially by S. Austin in his Treatise ad quod vult Deum which I have toucht before and which I earnestly exhort my Reader to peruse at large This is so farre from being unanswerable that it hath beene answered and our Author can never make it good that those points which hee acknowledgeth to be of little importance in themselves were there declared to bee fundamentall for being obstinately maintained against the decision command of the Pope and his Councell eâ—ther private or publick so that the Author onely makes up with boldnesse and undertaking what hee wants in evidence and proofe And as in the following piece hee preferres his Reader to the sixth and fifth Chapters so I also referre him to the answer of those Chapters and there besides other solutions hee may see that the example of Saint Cyprian makes mightily against the Popes authority since it plainly appeares that Saint Cyprian did hold the Popes fallibilitie when he plainly held the contrary to that which the Pope had decided And thus being put besides his premisses hee is also deprived of his conclusion The distinction of points of faith into fundamentall and not fundamentall doth stand still in such full truth and power that the unbeliefe of points not fundamentall doth not presently forfeit salvation though the same points bee decided by the Pope and his conspiracy much lesse doe worship of Images Prayer in an unknowne tongue salvation by merits the Popes supremacy especially taken for a foundation of faith though decided and commanded by the Pope cause damnation by being unbelieved but rather by being believed
and expressing of other Articles so it is said by the Councell of Chalcedon that the Additions in the Creeds of Constantinople concerning the holy Ghost was onely that the Essence and God-head of the holy Ghost might thereby bee more cleared and expounded And Ruffinus speakes to the like effect A second reason of this variety might be the various measure of capacities Some measures of understanding and faith are small and it is not to bee denied but that some Articles which are now necessary to be particularly knowne and beleeved were then knowne onely and beleeved in grosse without danger of salvation And that there is now no toleration of lesse degrees in this kind for weaknesse of faith or shallownesse of capacity I thinke wise men scarce dare to affirme A third reason of this variety may be the various affection and intention of the designers of these heads For one perchance would be sure not to exclude any man from salvation that hath any true though never so little interest in it by the knowledge of never so few fundamentalls and therefore this man contracteth them Another hee feares lest by the lessening of them thereby to include the salvation of some others may bee excluded from salvation by not knowing or not beleeving those points which are lessened and therefore enlargeth them Now these reasons being given to defend this Authour and his fellowes against himselfe I will adde essayes of some certainty upon this variety A first That certainly so much must bee knowne and beleeved of God in Christ Jesus as may unite us to him and so make us partakers of his death and resurrection unto remission of sinnes and regeneration And therefore ordinarily his Incarnation Death and Resurrection are certainly to be knowne and beleeved Secondly That so many Heads and Articles as conduce to this union may be called Fundamentall because they knit and unite us to Christ the foundation Accordingly more of these points being knowne to one then to another and the more points working the union in one and the fewer in the other the more may be called Fundamentall to the one and the fewer to the other so a great house built on a rocke and by more stones knit unto the rocke then a lesser may bee said to have more fundamentalls then the lesser yet both have as true an union with the rocke each as other Thirdly it is good in teaching to enlarge the points as much as may be so to give a full measure of fundamentals for the largest measure of knowledge and capacity that no measure may want his fulnesse But in censuring to damnation it is good to contract the measure as much as truth will possibly give way to charity that the least measure of saving knowledge and faith be not damned Fourthly as the Teacher should enlarge his teaching so let not the Learner voluntarily shut or contract his learning knowing nor beleeving the grounds of Christianity but goe on as farre as his measure will give him leave untill hee have found Christ Jesus dwelling in his soule by his Spirit and by that Spirit witnessing to his soule that he is a Sonne of God even an heire annexed with Christ For then and onely then shalt thou have a comfortable certainty of the sufficiency of thy fundamentalls when thou feelest thy selfe an habitation of God by the Spirit Besides if God intend to lay in thee the foundations of a palace do not thou contract them into the foundations of a cottage CHAP. XI In opposition to the Cavaliers ninth Chapter containing a vaine Challenge of Protestants for not daring to declare their Fundamentalls divided into three Sections SECT I. Wherein are confuted his Cavills against the Apostles Creed as not containing all points Fundamentall THe title of this Chapter and the Chapter it selfe are at some discord For the title saith That the Protestants neither doe nor dare declare what are their fundamentall points of Faith and the Chapter even in the first words saith this It is usuall with many to affirme that the Apostles Creed containes all fundamentall points of Faith So it seemes that Protestants doe declare and doe not declare their fundamentall points and the Title beats them for not declaring and the Chapter beats them for declaring Thus the Protestants must bee beaten howsoever not indeed for declaring or for not declaring but because they are Protestants A right marke of faction which commonly makes an ill construction of all even of the good actions of those against whom it is factious But let us see how hee chastiseth us for our declaring These men when they are pressed grow soone ashamed of that opinion when they are told that in the Creed there is no mention made at all either of the Canon in holy Scripture or of the number or nature yea or so much as the name of Sacraments But let this Authour consider whether hee ought not to be ashamed who thus casting shame on Protestants casts it also on the Fathers For doe the Fathers in their rules of Faith make mention of the Canon of Scripture or the number or of the name of the Sacraments Let him survey them in Irenaeus Tertullian c. and hee shall see that they doe not And yet Tertullian saith of the rule of Faith Nihil ultra scire est omnia scire Againe doe you not thus cast shame on your own fellowes For do not many of your owne Doctors in their Explicites called by your selfe more fundamentall leave out the Canon of Scriptures and the number yea the nature and name of Sacraments If therefore they do say that it is a mortall sinne not to know explicitely these important points which are more fundamentall then may they bee ashamed to leave their Disciples in mortall sinne by not naming the Canon or number of the Sacraments explicitely to be beleeved And if you cleare them you shall cleare us also But withall give me leave to aske even in defence of these your fellowes Doe you thinke that no man can be saved that doth not know the number of Canonical Books if he beleeve the fundamentall points contained in those Books Or doe you thinke that one who was baptized in his infancy not knowing then the vertue and use of the Sacrament of Baptisme and dying before he come to the knowledge of the use of the Eucharist may not bee saved by beleeving in Christ and being regenerate by this faith Your owne Jesuite Becanus may stop your mouth when he saith That Faith is not so stirred up by the Sacraments that it is the effect of them and that otherwise the Sacraments would not profit children So till you answer him doe not require of us to bring in Sacraments as fundamentalls of that faith which is denied by your owne to be an effect of them But you are soone weary and I hope ashamed of this point and therefore wander to another not much more of kinne to
the point then the Chapter hath been hitherto to the Title You say there are great differences between the Protestants and you about the understanding of the Article of the descent of Christ into Hell and the other of the holy Catholick Church and the Communion of Saints c. But what doe you here talk of differences in understanding fundamentals where the present question is Whether the Protestants doe acknowledge their fundamentalls to bee contained in the Creed For if Protestants declare that their fundamentals are contained in the Creed then your Title is gone which saith That they do not nor dare not declare them And surely it will aske a greater strength and a farre bigger volume then Charity mistaken to prove that Protestants doe not rightly understand the Articles of the Creed But secondly the Authours objection is grounded not onely upon a new but upon a false supposition if his fellow Romists may bee Judges For his supposed proposition is this That all the Articles in the Creed are Fundamentall Now this is different from the first proposall of our opinion That all fundamentall Articles are in the Creed It is also denied by his owne fellowes For though all fundamentall Articles be there yet they say that some Articles that are there may not bee fundamentall or explicitely to be known upon losse of salvation as before hath been shewed out of Vasquez and Azorius Therefore to stand upon a different understanding of those Articles which are denied by your owne men to bee Explicites or doubted is besides the matter But thirdly Do we differ from you in understanding those points What is that to the point undertaken in the end of the last Chapter and promised to be shewed in this That wee differ among our selves in the number of Fundamentalls You are now gone â—â—om our ridiculousnesse by differing in the number of fundamentalls and are come to a ridiculousnesse of your owne by your differing from us in the false understanding of some Articles of the Creed which all your owne Prophets doe not account Fundamentals But you add It is to little purpose to know or confesse that the Creede containes all Fundamentals unlesse there were some certaine way to understand them right This is againe a ranging from shewing our differences among our selves or that wee have not these Fundamentals Yet I answer Wee have a certaine and the best way of understanding them right wee have a learned Ministery endued with gifts from on high which teacheth and preacheth these Fundamentals and the right meaning of them And the right meaning thus taught the Spirit in the hearers doth so discover and certifie the truth of them that the hearers see the Articles to bee Gods truth and not mans And accordingly their faith thus beleeving them resteth on God as the sole Foundation of their faith and this teaching of the Catholick Church wee use commend and allow But that The single Article of the holy Catholick Church should containe the reason of all our faith fundamentally seemes to mee an high kinde of Blasphemie And this blasphemous doctrine as wee have before shewed is the very spirit of Popery or Antichrist which sets up the Pope in Gods place and makes his beleevers truely Papists or Antichristians And this great offence and mysterie of iniquitie carryeth Papists by throngs into the Land of darknesse and into this secret of theirs the soules of the saved may not enter True it is that God useth the service of the Ministers or if you will of the Church in publishing the Articles of faith but no other Foundation of supernaturall faith there is but God himselfe though speaking by man unto man the Fundamentality of our faith passeth through man that is the instrument and resteth wholly upon God But saith hee If wee understand it otherwise the Scripture it selfe speakes of particular errours which are damnable in them by whom they are imbraced and yet they are not at all against any expresse Doctrine of the Creed As namely where Saint Paul calls it a Doctrine of Divels to forbid marriage and meates c. I answer first That the Authour hereby proves that which wee deny not and disproves not that which hee saith wee affirme For the point is not Whether there bee any damnable errours besides those that are against some expresse doctrine of the Creede But Whether there bee in the Creede those fundamentall points which being truely beleeved will cause unity with Christ the Head and unity with his Body the Church Other errours against other Truths in Scripture not fundamentall wee acknowledge there are many and proceeding from the Divell the Father of Lyes and in themselves damnable to such as hold not the true Foundation Christ Jesus by beleeving Fundamentals And it is to bee feared that such are many of those true Papists whose foundation is the Pope But otherwise they may bee rather damnable in themselves then actually damning to those who by infirmities hold them and by beleeving fundamentals are in Christ Jesus to whom there is no condemnation Secondly not onely Fathers in their Rules of faith but the Romists themselves doe not place the lawfulnesse of meates and marriage among their chiefe Heads of Christianitie or Explicites and Fundamentals and therefore this Authour doth ill require of us that which hee cannot obtaine of his fellowes Wherefore let him first make this objection against them and when hee hath their Answer then let him take it for us But being unhappily as well as impertinently fallen into the mention of these damnable errours hee saw that as soone as they were brought in they looked at least asquint on the Church of Rome and claymed kindred of her And therefore hee thought that there was need of an Apologie to put off this kindred and acquaintance Which by the way is not to bee understood of the chastity and fasts of the Catholick Church as Protestants doe most perversely affirme which knowes that those things are lawfull but that yet it is most gratefull to God when his servants for his love deprive themselves of those delâ—ghts But of the Heresies of the Manichâ—es as Saint Augustine doth expressely declare who forbad both marriage and meates as being abominable and impure through the institution thereof which they said was derived from a certaine second ill conditioned god of their owne making But this nor all the water in the Sea will wash away all the kindred betweene Romists and these errours For though Saint Augustine may apply this Prophecie to the Manichees yet may hee not also apply them to the Montanists Tertullian himselfe acknowledging that they have beene taxed out of this very place And if to the Montanists why not to those Romists who with Durandus maintaine a curse and so an impurity of flesh and cleannesse of fish who also forbid marriage to Priests which this place plainly condemneth And whereas this Authour talkes of voluntary deprivation it is certaine that
that hee himselfe can by name say that we admit him So it seems wee had no great depth in hiding the name of Saint Iames which our Authour as shallow as his pen runs did so easily find But I confesse I am sorry both for him and my selfe for him that hee is troubled with working such Cob webs and for my selfe that I have the labour of sweeping them away Yet will hee needs goe on in such industrious vanities But abstracting from all these insincerities wherewith that booke of Articles is full fraught they doe not so much as say that the Articles of Doctrine which they deliver are fundamentall either all or halfe or any one thereof or that they are necessarily to be beleeved by them or the contrary damnable if it be beleeved by us But they are glad to walk in a cloud for the reasons which have been already toucht Our Author commends the booke of Articles while he calls the Insincerities of it These Insincerities that is these which before have been shewed to be invisible and no Insincerities Insincerities only in the eye of the Author which did cast the shape of them on the booke when he read it But saith he They shew not which are fundamentall and which are not Neither did they ever promise you that they would do so The fundamentalls are said to be there but no man said for ought I know that there it was shewed which are fundamentalls and which are not Your selves hold points of importance which are more fundamentall and to bee explicitely knowne and doth every Romish Councell tell you which are these points and which are not And if it doth not why doe you demand it of our Church in her Synod more then of your own Or if you can excuse your own why doe you quarrell with ours It was not the intended much lesse promised businesse of our Church there to distinguish fundamentalls from superedifications but to set downe both fundamentalls and superedifications And these being taught to her children the Spirit of Christ the foundation will discover the fundamentalls to his members and thereby settle them on Christ and further build them up by the superedifications according to their appointed measure And I have before shewed how our fundamentalls may bee discerned though I may say somewhat like to that of our Saviour to the Jewes Why of your selves discern ye not that which is right and rightly fundamentall For if you know how to find out these grounds of Christianity which must bee explicitely knowne which your selves acknowledge to be more fundamentall you may easily find out our fundamentalls so that all this is but an empty out-cry to affright the Reader with noise without reason thus to call for a designment of fundamentalls where none was undertaken and where in like case your selves do it not and to quarrell with fundamentalls which your self and yours do acknowledge Yet when Romists have agreed of the set number themselves let them send to us their Catalogue defined by a Synod and it may be we may deale with them upon exchange The Cavalier goes on Master Rogers indeed in the Analysis which hee makes of those nine and thirty Articles speakes loud enough by way of taxing the Doctrine of the Church of Rome as being contrary to that of the Church of England and hee gives it 〈◊〉 many ill names as his impure spirit can devise and affirmes among other things that many Papists and namely the Franciscans blush not to affirme that S. Francis is the holy Ghost and that Christ is the Saviour of men but one mother Jane is the Saviour of women a most execrable aspersion of Postellius the Iesuite with a great deale of such base trash as this And yet his Booke is declared to have beene perused and by the lawfull Authoritie of the Church of England permitted to be publick But yet even Master Rogers himselfe is not so valiant as to tell us in particular which point of their doctrine is fundamentall to salvation and which is not True it is that Master Rogers doth very clearely and audibly speake against and condemn divers errours of the Church of Rome as being not onely contrary to the doctrine of the Church of England but to the Word of God with which commonly he confronts the errours which hee brings forth to judgement And among them hee sheweth some errours of a high nature which make Saviours of Merits and Masses and Popish Pardons yea which carry the faith of the soule from God unto man the Pope and his Councels And for ought I see hee doth not give worse names then the purest and holiest Spirit gives to the Pope who calleth him the Man of sinne and sonne of perdition c. And the impurity which this Authour at his owne costs and upon his owne word layes on him Mr Rogers layes on Rome by proofes and allegations as in divers places so particularly in the nineteenth Article Propos. 7. whereof the Title is this That the Church of Rome most shamefully hath erred in life ceremonies and matters of faith But for that to which this Authours spirit gives the ill name of base trash it is brought in as the filth of his owne Associates and testified by other Writers and therefore the basenesse of it most justly should light on them that are the first Authours of it Neither is it strange amongst Papists to make creatures to share salvation with our Saviour the hymnes concerning the milke of the blessed Virgin the bloud of Thomas the vertue of the woodden Crosse singing it aloud in the ears of the world Filthinesse and basenesse most abominable and that deserves to bee swept out of the Church with detestation and to bee carried out as the Filthinesse out of the holy Place in the Reformation of Hezekiah And why in an equall judgement should not Master Rogers his Books much rather be permitted to bee publick for naming such filthinesse with detestation then Rome allowed to bee Catholick though using such filthinesse with practicall approbation Lastly The want of valour in Master Rogers to tell us which point of our doctrine is fundamentall and which is not I thinke is no just accusation because for ought I know hee did not undertake this as his businesse neither had any Romish Cavalier yet challenged him upon this quarrell SECT III. Wherein is discovered the vanity of his boasting That the Protestant Church is unlikely to define which are the fundamentall differences betwixt them and the Papists since they scarce dare avow any difference at all HEe goes on Much lesse is there any appearance that ever the Church of England should doe it since even now wee have seene that it dares not in divers points so much as declare in publick manner that it professes the expresse contrary of what wee held Nay wee are not likely to see the fundamentall points of faith whereof they talke so loud to bee avowed by so much as either
best is hee who by a fundamentall faith is built upon Christ the true foundation can never be damned by unbeleeving any Article of faith created and coined by the Pope a counterfeit foundation And here while the Authour doth quarrell with the poornesses of the Doctour not being able to maintaine a combate with his richâ—s it seemes hee doth it with a greater poornesse For what a poore quarrelling is it with the Doctour for saying That Papists will not let Protestants to bee saved though they beleeve the same Creed except they will beleeve the same Mathematicks and govern themselves by the same Kalendar when thiâ— Authour knowes his meaning and expressed it himselfe in the words nearly preceding That the Romane Church makes â—oyes fundamentalls And might not the Pharisees thus have taken a poore exception at our Saviour for saying that they strained Gnats whereas they strained not Gnats but payed the tythe of Mint and Cummin Besides he doth not say that it is really so done but premising this When every thing must be called Foundation wee shall never know where to stop where to consist If we should beleeve their Sacrificium incruentum their unbloudy sacrifice in the Masse if we did not beleeve their Sacrificium cruentum too that there was a power in that Church to sacrifice the bloud of Kings wee should be said to be defective in a fundamentall Article If we should admit their Metaphysickes their transcendent Transubstantiation and admit their Chimiques their Purgatory fires and their Mythologie and Poetry their apparitions of soules and spirits they would bind us to their Mathematicks too and they would not let us be saved except we would reforme our Almanackes to their ten daies and reforme our clockes to their foure and twenty houres for who can tell when there is an end of Articles of faith in an arbitrary and occasionall Religion So the Doctour only shewes how such an unlimited making of fundamentalls may goe on in a perpetuall procession it having already made things not so profitable as Clocks and Kalendars Articles of faith and points fundamentall Witnesse the Service in an unknowne tongue the Lords Supper without wine c. But the Cavalier fights in earnest with this supposition and tells us that Romists doe rather governe themselves with the lesse perfect Kalendar which now is used in this place Yea hee gives a morall of this their deed letting the world see thereby how willingly we can accommodate to them in all things which belong not meerly to Religion The controversie of Kalendars I leave to the Critickes of time to bee decided and rectified in their emendatione Temporum But the argument of accommodation taken from our Almanackes is retorted by a greater argument remembred in our Almanackes For when in them wee see the Papists Treason on the fifth of November wee are thereby put in mind that Papists doe not accommodate to Protestants in all things that belong not meerly to Religion For it is not meerly a matter of Religion for a King to sit in Parliament and yet the Papists would have accommodated him by blowing him up with powder thus sitting in Parliament But the Cavalier having thus spoken to ill effect to amend the matter brings not forth the Doctours words but his saying to this effect But that the Reader may be his owne guide and the Doctour the speaker of his owne effect and the Cavaliers faire carriage may more plainly appeare I will here confront the Doctours words with the Cavaliers The Doctours words are these Call not superedifications foundations nor call not the furniture of the house foundations call not ceremoniall and rituall things essentiall parts of Religion and of the worship of God otherwise then as they imply disobedience for obedience to lawfull authority is alwaies an essentiall part of Religion The Cavalier thus repeats him That difference in beliefe in points which are not very important is not to prejudice a mans salvation unlesse by not beleeving them hee commit a disobedience withall For saith he obedience indeed is of the essence of Religion I thinke that the Cavalier seeing his face in this glasse finds that it lookes red with blushing at the mis-reporting of the Doctour The Doctour speakes of ceremonies the Cavalier reports him speaking of differences in beliefe The Doctour speakes of ceremonies commanded by lawfull authority the Cavalier of points of faith commanded by the unlawfull authority of the Pope But if it please him to remember what hath been already told him That the Church much lesse the Pope hath an Inerrability in points of small importance and where she hath no Inerrability she hath no authority Again in respect of the different capacities of the hearers all are not capable of every little point and subtlety of faith and I thinke no Pope hath power to command his disciples to beleeve that which their capacity is not able to understand But lawfull Rites or Ceremonies not being points of faith but of action and being easie to bee understood the obedience to lawfull authority in them may more concerne the essence of Religion then obedience to the Pope in those small points of faith wherein the Pope hath no unerring power and no authority to make a lawfull command for the people doe not sinfully disobey where the Pope hath no lawfull authority to command The Author having thus lost his premisses and proofes yet goes on to a conclusion which cannot but be lost in the losse of his premisses so that his concluding inferences This shall serve for discharge both of what they object against our unity in faith and of what they alledge in the behalfe of theirs And I conceive that I have sufficiently secured these two maine grounds upon which this whole discourse is turned are but commendations of a false conception and of a discourse which is turned upon grounds over-turned For neither is his first ground sufficiently secured That there is but one true Faith and one true Religion and Church out of which there is no salvation the word Out being understood in the sense of the Authour that is That if a man be out of the faith professed in the Church in the least haire part or degree that there can bee to him no salvation Nor more secured is his second ground That Catholicks and Protestants cannot possibly be accounted of that one Religion Church and Faith For as it may be true that Protestants and all Catholickes doe not agree in every small title and mite of faith yet it is most true that true Catholickes and Protestants are so entirely of one saving Faith and Religion that they are also of one Church And from these Catholickes I desire not to exclude all of the Romane Diocesse But indeed Papists whose humane faith is grounded on the Pope as their foundation being ready to beleeve Idolatry Treason or whatsoever the Pope shall decree for a matter of faith these I know not how to account members with us
sufficient to deprive any soule thereof and so Protestants may still suffer a false charge of Heresie to bee laid on them by Romists and yet bee sure enough of salvation And thus not any degree is yet made good toward the freeing of this charge of uncharitablenesse justly laid on the Romists So that the matter stands still though the Author moving his pen thinkes that the matter moves with it And for the Allegations that follow which seeme to labour for these two points That out of the Church is no salvation And that Heresie and Schisme doe put men out of the Church these being proved no way hurt us or help the Romists but helpe us and hurt the Romists among whom wee have found most fearfull and bloudy Schisme and wee may discover damnable Heresies but they can never prove that Protestant doctrine maintaines either Heresie or Schisme but by that which they call Heresie as relying wholy on Christs merits and not our owne for redemption and worshiping God in spirit and truth and not worshiping Images c. wee serve the God of our Fathers SECT II. The Allegations of Scriptures and Fathers made by the Cavalier are more forcible to exclude the Papists out of the Church then the Protestants against whom they are produced THat being yeelded which this Author indeavours to prove I know not what to doe with his Allegations but onely to turne them against Romists Therefore we very well allow the place alledged out of Esay and say it makes against the Pope who doth not submit himselfe to the Church in a generall Councell and so doth the place of Matthew formerly alledged and answered upon the same Reason And we very well allow those places of Paul to Titus and Timothy as making much against the Pope and his adhaerents and say that they give us just ground of avoiding him being Hereticall and Schismaticall after many admonitions But this Author did wisely in not naming Timothy in his margent but Titus though hee alledge these words out of 1. Tim. 4.1 2. That they attend to doctrines of Divels and spirits of Errour That they are Lyers and Hypocrites lest the Reader looking to the place might finde this which followeth Forbibbing to marry and commanding to abstaine from meats which wee know that Protestancie doth not but if Papistry doe then who are now his Hereticks Hypocrites and Lyers excluded from the Church and so from salvation Hee did also very discreetly in his namelesse alledging some pieces out of 2. Tim. 3. where is mention of Iamnes and Iambres and to make use of the verse fore-going having the form of godlinesse and the verses following That they are ever learning but without attaining to the knowledge of the truth but left out the middle verse which is this Of this sort are they which creep into houses and lead captive silly Women laden with sins and led with divers lusts which words being notable markes of seducers for what reason the Author left them out he best knowes but if wee may beleeve their owne Priest it doth rightly hit with some Romish proselite-makers so that the simple Reader if hee had seene this place wholy alledged might perchance have thought hee had seen in these the very Iamnes and Iambres of these times His last Scripture is out of S. Paul to the Galathians where striving to prove that the word Sects in Latin is Heresies in the Greeke he somewhat Heretically I doubt even when he speaks against Heresie leaves the decreed Latin to follow the Greeke But this being taken for a fault in the Latin let the word be as it is in the Greeke and then to the shame of the Papacy wee read indeed that Heresies are works of the flesh which certainly those are most likely to fall into that strive to set up a fleshly monarchy and to abound in the glory and wealth of the world For such men will sell heaven and truth and the Gospell for a messe of Pottage even for base and transitory vanity It is the sentence of Gods spirit that where is the love of the World there is not the love of God and where is not the love of God there cannot bee the love of the truth and where is not the love of truth there is a giving up to strong delusions to beleeve lyes that they all may bee damned who beleeved not the truth Now among innumerable examples of the Papacies love of the world and preferring temporall greatnesse and wealth above the truth let the lamentable conference betweene Adrian the sixth and the Cardinall be a lively proofe and spectacle where the poore Pope and herein not a Pope and therefore hee did well soone to bee gone speaking of the necessity of reformation There was no consideration of the truth of this necessity but a plaine confutation of whatsoever truth there was in it by the Popes Audit and Exchequer even by worldly profit But the Scriptures thus being lost except onely in making against their owne Papacy hee comes to Fathers not so much to hurt with them as to bee hurt by them Tertullian saith hee affirmeth That Hereticks cannot bee accounted Christians But of what heresies doth hee speake there Of any Protestant opinions He doth not say that any Protestants are hereticks He repeats there a rule of faith as it were the body of a Creed consisting of divers Articles Doe the Protestants deny any of these Articles True it is that of this rule of faith hee saith Nullus habet apud nos quaestiones c. There are no questions among us of this rule but those which Heresies make and doe make Hereticks But wee doe not make question of this rule and so are not made hereticks by it But they doe rather question this rule that bring in another faith the Popes Oracles and new Articles For whereas Tertullian here saith Fides in regula posita est The faith is set downe in that rule which before hee rehearsed the Romists faith is not in that rule For there was not one word of the Pope nor of Christs being under the forme of bread by Transubstantiation but In Coelos ereptum sedere ad dextram Patris misisse vicariam vim Spiritus Sancti qui credentes agat Being taken away into heaven hee doth sit at the right hand of his Father and hee hath sent his Vicar not the Pope but the power of the Holy Ghost which should leade those that beleeve And in the 33. Chapter making an Inventory of certaine Heresies amongst others hee names this which I doubt is some kinne to the Papacie Timotheum instruens Nuptiarum quoque interdictores suggillat He saith That S. Paul instructing Timothy doth condemne the forbidders of marriage Saint Cyprian is next brought in to say that thousand times produced sentence that Out of the Church there is no salvation Hereunto is added that There is no reward of any suffering whatsoever neither is hee a Christian
divided Jesus from Christ and so themselves from Christians though as it hath been told them and as it is said by a Pope from S. Paul all Christians are called ad societatem Iesu Christi to the society both of Jesus and of Christ 1 Cor. 1.9 But surely if this be the Authors place in Calvin it is likely hee hath either forgotten Calvin or was not trusted with the reading of Calvin and some one that was trusted but not trusty told him it would serve his turne and deceived him As for the wonderfull wisdome which this Author speciously sets forth in the differences of those Order That wisdome is here come to passe which Solomon condemneth when he saith Be not wise over much for humane wisdome hath so far wrought herein that Orders have been multiplied far beyond the gifts of continency yea above the good both of Church and Common wealth And so far were they as this Author saith from stripping themselves from earthly incumberances to fly fast into heaven that too much they stripped both Laiâ—y and Clergy of earthly maintenances and therewith have made to themselves fleshly incumberances But of this wisdome before hath been given to the Reader such a representation that I think it appeared to him not to be spirituall but carnall earthly and divelish if not in the invention yet in the execution and therefore for brevity thither I remit the Reader Only I wish the Author would prove what hee saith by some place of Scripture That God inspired the Founders of Orders with severall spirits and that there is a speciall spirit with which an Order was first endued especially if that Scripture were rightly applyed by Abbot Whitgift That Monkery was a plant which the heavenly Father planted not and therefore should bee pulled up by the rootes Which Prophecie was soon after fulfilled in this Land The Cavalier comes now to dismount a third objection of Protestants concerning Romish difference which ariseth as hee saith in regard of the differences betweene learned and unlearned men which hee assayeth to take away by a distinction of explicite and implicite faith in this manner A man is said to have explicite faith of any article or doctrine when he hath heard it particularly propounded to him and hath some particular knowledge thereof and gives particular assent thereunto But as for implicite faith of any article or doctrine a man is then said to have it when hee beleeves that concerning it which the Church teacheth them explicitely who are capable thereof although for his owne part he have not perhaps so much as heard of it in particular or if he did hee hath forgot it or if he did remember it he hath not capacity enough to apprehend or understand it And when he hath shewed this distinction he labours with great vehemency to prove it and affirmes That without this it would be wholly impossible to maintaine any Church in any unity of faith at all and finally concludes That this sword of ours is turned into a buckler wherewith to defend them First for the pains he takes to make good this distinction hee takes it to make good our objection and so labours for us and against himselfe for upon this distinction being grounded we ground our objection and say that this distinction leaves even the like differences amongst Romists for which they accuse and damne us and leaves no better unity among them then it leaves among us And if thus then it is both a sword in our hand to hurt them and a buckler also to defend us against them neither have they any buckler to defend themselves against this sword much lesse will this sword that wounds them become a buckler to defend the wounds which it selfe gives But the onely safe way is with that King who comes with the weake side to send Ambassadors for peace to the stronger Now to shew that this distinction being strengthened doth strengthen our objection and so is a true sword against Romists I say That in those points of faith which are beyond the explicites or fundamentals are called implicites there are differences among Romists as well as among us and these differences are not onely such as are discovered by the ell by which the faith of the unlearned is found shorter then that of the learned but the Cloth it selfe within the measure of the learned is torne into pieces and the learned themselves doe differ in the beliefe of the said points among themselves as well as from the unlearned And this hath bin shewed before and is indeed a part of D. Whites undertaking formerly mentioned I may instance in a point or two Transubstantiation is an Article of their new faith and not usually reckoned among their explicites the one part of the learned hath beleeved that the substance of Bread being abolished the Body of Christ is brought to the place of it another part beleeves that the substance of Bread is changed into the substance of Christs Body which I nothing doubt was the first meaning of this new doctrine each confutes either And an unlearned man that stands by may easily being over-weighed with the reasons of both either beleeve neither or somewhat else of his owne And indeede I my selfe have asked one of their Proselites whether he would chew or teare the body of Christ with his teeth and he told me that he did not think that their Doctors would say it so also in the point of Image-worship a matter of deepe consequence and much concerning life and death yet by them left among Implicites One side of the Doctors holds a plaine worship of the Image of Christ with Latria or divine honour and others hold this honour given properly to Images to be Idolatrie and either give it improperly or give an inferiour reverence or no religious reverence at all But the unlearned man when he sees the Image set in Churches covered with gold turning his head and eyes weeping working miracls saith with the Lycaonians Gods are common to us in the shape of men and thinkes hee cannot worship God too much and therefore doth it with all his soule and all his might even with a perfect Idolatrie Now are not these differences of momeÌ„t among them in their Explicites many more such there are which it were too tedious to repeat indeed their differences must needs bee much more then ours because many of their learned Explicites are errours and in errours there can never bee a full agreement for if any one hath that good spirit which maks discovery of them he commonly is opposed and contradicted by the others errour as here the not worshippers of the Image with divine worship is opposed by the worshipper Besides he that is in the darke and sees not what to beleeve if he beleeve any thing he can but beleeve an imagination of his owne and not a reall ttuth and so must needs differ from him who seeth
another way Here leaving to the Authour his owne terme of railing wherein I wonder hee should delight but that I see elsewhere hee takes pleasure in the mentioning of scurrill and blasphemous Invectives I say that some errors bee not fundamentall which are found in the Fathers and now maintained by Romists yet wee are not disabled by this distinction to reprove Romists for them for wee doe not say in this distinction that no errours should bee reproved but those which are fundamentall for even lesser errours are to bee reprehended but wee say that these errours in lesser points doe not breake the unity which by greater and more fundamentall points is made betweene Christ and his members and betweene the members themselves And secondly wee say that Romists are much more to bee reproved if they hold any errours of the Fathers now in controversie betweene us for these controverted errours have beene now by the Scriptures more evidently discovered to bee errours and it is a thing farre more worthy of blame if a man should runne into a ditch by day then if he should stumble into it by night But whatsoever exactnesse this Authour may require or imagine in this distinction this exactnesse being granted it will never make it to appeare that wee differ from the unanimous beliefe of the Fathers in the maine points mentioned in their rules of faith now called Fundamentals And for his Argument concerning the Lutherans it doth not endanger us for if the Lutherans should bee found by this distinction to differ from us in these fundamentall points which should unite them to Christ it is no hurt to us to renounce the communion of those who renounce communion with Christ. And on the other side if by it they bee found to differ from us in points not fundamentall it would bee no danger nor just disreputation to us to avow those points wherein wee differ not to bee fundamentall but wee will much rather disavow the quarrels which are made where there is no fundamentall difference The period which followes as farre as it is a true Narration of our way of making peace by this distinction with the Fathers and the Lutherans is a commendation both of the distinction and our peace-making by it But by the way I deny That Romists have brought us from denying via facti That the Fathers taught the doctrine of Praying to the Saints or for the dead in the sense and manner of Rome for the Fathers did not unanimously teach praying to Saints I am sure Saint Augustine who was above 400. yeers after Christ doth deny Saints to know ordinarily the affaires of the living which happen after their decease And for prayers for the dead in Purgatorie the Cavalier cannot shew a good patterne for more yeares then the former As for the difference in the number of Canonicall Bookes which it seemes this Author is sorrie that it is not avowed to bee fundamentall it is not altogether new but ancient and wee see it at this day in the Syriack and it were pitie to cut off from salvation all the Churches and Fathers which ever differed in this number yea he must damne many Romists if hee will make this difference fundamentall They that beleeve all necessary saving truths though they bee not fully perswaded that just so many Books were wholly indited by some one of the Apostles or Evangelists I know now how this Author may damne them if these saving truths being beleeved doe save them sure I am that in their owne Explicites or points of importance which wee call fundamentall and they say must bee knowne and beleeved under paine of damnation they doe not mention any names much lesse the number of Canonicall Bookes So it seemes by their owne doctrines the names and full number of the bookes of Scripture are none of their owne Explicites and Fundamentals but other points beleeved may serve to save such beleevers And if such may bee saved though they know not the set number of Books why would you have us to breake unitie for a point the not explicite knowing and beleeving whereof in your owne doctrine doth not exclude salvation Hee goes on and objects a second good use that wee make of points fundamentall which is a proofe of the visibility of our Church And true it is That if there have beene still a visible Roman Church which hath held points fundamental until the Reformation begun by the Protestants then is that visibility since that time still continued by us The former we leave to the Romists to prove for their owne sakes and the later we can very easily prove for our selves And whereas hee repeats but confutes not that some of ours have said that there is no necessity that the Church must have been continually visible I tell him that if this were an absurd Doctrine as he terms it they were led to this absurdity with a great shew of reason For not to run out at large into the common place of visibility when Lirinensis saith at the deluge of Arianisme The whole Romane Empire was fundamentally overthrowne and removed And we reade elsewhere the Pope himselfe was turned Hereticke where was the visibility of the Cavaliers Romish Church it selfe But I need not to dwell much on the defence of this doctrine because he only confutes it by the Epithite Absurd and because that which followes next most concernes the present businesse though this also is a rehearsall and not a confutation Some few of them affirme when they are urged by us to shew that visible Church of theirs that theirs and ours doe make but one true Church and so in shewing the visibilitie of ours they doe withall as they say shew their owne to have beene visible And these men tread in this way because they well know that no other Church but ours can indeed be shewed to have beene visible through all ages since Christ our Lord. But I must here deny his repetition if by the word Church he meane the Pope and those that have made him the foundation of their faith for these and ours wee say not to be one Church with us because they have changed the foundation But if you meane those that by beleeving fundamentalls have fastned their faith on Christ the true foundation wee allow That our Church hath beene one with them and hath been visible in their visibilitie yet avoyding this That hee can ever prove that other Churches have not beene as truly and continually visible as Rome for it will still trouble the Author to shew that the Churches of Greece and Africk have bin lesse truly visible then Rome since the Primitive times of their first conversion And now this Authoâ— being past our use of fundamentalls for visibility yet walkes on though beyond his right businesse but hee that is out of the way in his maine matter of making division to excuse Romish uncharitablenesse may well walke into by-wayes in his prosecution
have indeed the divine gift of Love and thereby love God as a Father that hath already so merited of them all that they are and have that his merit is to them a most sufficient motive to serve him heartily even with all that might and being which they have received from him Accordingly the man according to Gods owne heart calls upon all mankinde for their service as due to God for making them Come let us kneele and worship before God our Maker Againe the love of God in redeeming us hath deserved all our love and service and accordingly the Apostle rap'd into the third heaven saith The love of Christ constraineth us and why doth it constraine because wee thus judge that if Christ dyed for us wee should live to him Gods merits in creating and redeeming us are strong motives to serve him though wee cannot merit of him though Gods merit is so great that it hath swallowed up all our merits we are therefore to serve him not the lesse but the more the more hee hath deserved beyond our requitall A good Sonne would serve and obey this heavenly Father for that which hee hath done though hee gave him nothing hereafter And surely if there were not such an affection even in humanitie how should thee sonne of a poore father ever doe him service But yet wee doe not stop here because the bounty of our heavenly Father doth not stop but enlargeth it selfe further for though God hath already deserved of us all that we can doe so that all that wee can doe were but our dutie yet hee goes on and promiseth to give rewards even for doing our duty And doth not this reward move us as much being given by free promise as if it were gotten by the workers merit yea much more in a noble worker For such a one will reason thus My heavenly Father freely gives mee infinite rewards even an excessively exceeding weight of glory for small and moment any passions and actions hee gives mee that which hee is not bound to give hee gives that which I can never deserve and shall I not couragiously and affectionately serve him who is so freely gracious and bountifull to mee far beyond my deserts But indeed much rather and that contrary to Romish Divinity out of a right consideration of Gods great rewards and our great unworthinesse wee being if Iacob say true lesse then the least of Gods mercies wee may truely affirme That we can have no courage to good workes if wee will not worke without a true confidence of Merits For if Gods rewards be beyond all merits as it needes must bee since hee himselfe whom all that we have and are cannot merit is our exceeding great reward how should there bee good works raised from the confidence in that merit which is not And though there be an excellency in the grace of the Spirit by which wee worke yet even that grace is a free loane and wee are debters to God for it and how can wee merit of him by growing in debt unto him especially because the money wherewith we should pay those debts is of a baser Alloy by the mixture of our corruption then that which wee received and whereby wee became debtors And wee cannot pay debts much lesse become meriters by paying ten borrowed Talents of pure gold with ten Talents of the metall of Nebuchadnezzars Image Therefore the Saints trust perfectly in the grace of God and not in their merits and from that grace as from a boundlesse and bottomelesse Ocean fetch most sufficient motives of good works While they have grace that enables them to worke and grace that forgives the imperfection of their workes and grace that rewards whatsoever goodnesse is in their workes yea even the will for the deede they are mightily encouraged to continue in good workes knowing that Their labour thus is not in vaine in the Lord. And herein their hearts agree with the heart of him that rewardeth them For his eyes are on them that feare him and trust in his mercie They feare God and by good workes keepe his Commandements but they trust not in the merits of their workes but in Gods mercy And in such God takes delight and loves to behold them and if God love to behold them hee will also bring them to behold him in a beatificall vision SECT II. Wherein are contained these two Tenets 1. That the best workes of Gods children are mixed with some sinne 2. That no man doth or will perfectly fulfill the whole Law And yet contrary to the Cavaliers lame Inferences there are encouragements sufficient to good works and to use our best endeavours toward the fulfilling of the Law BUt that which followeth next requires a patient Reader For if the Articles of the Church of England bee but compared with this Authours words I doubt the Reader will feele some need of patience The Authours words are these And what cause can they assigne why men should abstain from sin when they teach them that the best workes which are performed by the greatest Saints in the world are no better then sinnes and they in their owne nature mortall The Articles words are these Albeit that works which are the fruits of faith and follow after justification cannot put away our sinnes and endure the severity of Gods judgement yet are they pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ. And the like approbation of good works by the Church of Scotland and forraine Churches of Protestants is to bee seene in the harmonie of Confessions Wherefore I should offend my Reader to say much against this which appeares so plainely to be a scandall even one of those coales of Iuniper which comes from devouring tongues and I wonder it had not burned the tongue or the conscience of the speaker Briefly wee hold that a good tree made good by Regeneration and ingrafted by faith into Christ Jesus bringeth forth good fruit even this fruit of good works and these works as much as they come from the sappe of the roote of Christ Jesus and partake of his fatnesse so much are they good but as much as they partake of us and our remnant of corruption so much are they faulty This faultinesse hath need of mercy and receiveth it through Christ into whom wee are ingrafted but this being removed by Christ the goodnesse which the worke hath from Christ shall eternally bee rewarded And this reward is a very good motive to good works unto all those who with Moses have an eye of faith where with truely to see the recompence of the reward Hee goes on and askes When they teach men that the Commandements of God are not possibly to bee kept by any man even with the helpe of Divine grace what reason can they have either to exhort men to keepe Gods Commandements or to reprove them for infringing the same The Cavalier is here troubled and troubles us with an old
temporibus abscedentes à fide c. Tert. de Iejun adver Psychios b How shall a spectator beleeve that flesh is not thought uncleane when he seeth a Fast to exclude it and yet to admit all delicate and incendiary fishes conserves and wines Licet liberè saepius vinum Navar. Man cap. 21. n. 13. In more positum est ut in diebus jejuniorum piscibus leguminibus fructibus vino similiter utamur omnes communi consensu testantur id quod solum in potum non in â—ibum sumitur cujusmodi vinum etiam est jejunium minimè relaxare Azor. lib. 7. cap. 10. c Est verum omnes qui volunt posse continere Bâ—llarâ— de Monaâ—bis cap. 31. Yet we read in the History of Trent lib. 7. many reasons were given for Priests marriage whereof one waâ— Want of continent persons fit to exercise the Ministery And the chiefe reason of forbidding it is there expressed It would turne the Priests affections to their Families from the Popes Hierarchie d Sodomitium scelus ex Coelibatus rigore eas radices in Clero Romano defigit ut Petrus Damianus eremum petere coactus librum conscribat cui Titulus Gomorrhaeus in quo omnes ejus species edisserit quales tum a pud eos bacchabantur eumque Lâ—oni nâ—no inscribit cujus adversus tanti mali diluviem opem implorat Pâ—ess Mâ—st. Iniquit ad annum 1060. In the yeere 1563. Proclamation was made within the Province of Sivil that whosoever knew or heard of any Monks or religious persons that had abused Auricular Confession to abominable acts with Matrons and Maidens they should come in within 30. dayes laying great penalties on the refusers Presently there came in such a number of women only inhabitants within the City of Sivil that twenty Notaries and as many Inquisitors would not have sufficed to take the complaints Wherefore the Inquisitors gave 30. daies more The Monks Friers and Priests go up and downe very melancholy and as great a plague was feared as the persecution which was then hot against the Lutherans But the Inquisitors fearing to bring their spiritualty into hatred and oblâ—quy and especially to discredit their Auricular Confession contrary to all mens expectations made a stay therein though the Court was orderly seised Discov of the Spanish Inquisition e Pighius Contarenus Colonienses Ferus c. And the very Councell of Trent saith That Justification is free and not merited by faith or workes Nihil eorum quae Justificationem praecedunt sive fides sive opera gratiam promeretur Concil Trident. Sess. 6. Cap. 7. And therefore Becanus Sequitur ipsa Justificatio id est acquisitio seu infusio justitiae inhaerentis Cujus justitiae duplex est effectus formalis Alter expulsio seu remissio peccatorum Alter sanctificatio renovatio interioris hominis uterque respectu nostri gratuitas And he cited this Chapter of Trent Bec. Manu lib. 1. cap. 16. c Cum ergo dicit Apostolus arbitrari se justificari hominem per fidem sine operibus Legis non hoc agit ut praeceptâ ac professâ fide opera justitiae contemnantur sed ut sciat se quisque per fidem posse justificari etiamsi Legis opera non praecesserint sequuntur enim justificatum non praecedunt justificandum unde in praesenti opere non opus est latiùs disputare praesertim quia modò de hac quaestione prolixum librum edidi qui inscribitur de litera spiritu August de fide operibus cap. 14. Per ipsam Gratiam quippe justificatur gratis id est nullis suorum operum praecedentibus meritis alioquin gratia jam non est gratia quandoquidem ideo datur non quia bona opera fecimus sed ut ea facere valeamus August de spiritu litera cap. 10. d Quem commissio peccatorum diabolo subdidit remiflio peccaâ—orum per sanguinem Christi data à diabolo eruit ut sic justiâ—iâ vinceretur diabolus non poâ—entiâ Sed quâ justitiâ Jesu Christi Et quomodo victus est eâ Quia in ea nihil dignum morte inveniens occidit eum tamen Et utique justum est ut debitores quos tenebaâ— liberi dimittantur in eum CREDENTES quem sine ullo debito occidit Lombard ex Aug. lib. 3. dist 20. h Sciendum est quod Ecclesiam credere non tamen in Ecclesiam credere debeamus quia Ecclesia non Deus sed domus Dei est August de tempore sâ—â—m 181. i Acknowledged before by Vasquâ—z and by those who hol◠〈◊〉 fourteen Articles to suffice for Explicite faith Hist. Trent lib. 2. k Vocabulum ambiguum in altero sensum verum bonum in altero falsum perniciosum Bellar lib. 4. de lib. â—rb cap. 6. ex Calvin Instit. lib. 2. cap. 2. Act 9.1 6. 21.13 Rev. 12.17 Gal. 3.16 28.29 Psal. 110.2 3. Psal. 2.8 Rom. 4.21 Rom. 9.7 8. Rom. 4.11 34. Collect of Christ his Circumcision First Sunday in Lent First Sunday after Triniâ—y 17. Sunday Qâ—idam non credendo credunt Tertul. a Natura hâ—â—mana etiam si in illa integritate in qua est condiâ—a permaneret nullo modo scipsam Creatore suo non adjuvante servaret Concil Ar. Ca. 19. 1 Pet. 1.5 b Rom. 7.23 Mat. 16. Joh. 3.9 * 1 Cor. 1.9 1 Cor. 10.13 1 Thes. 5.14 2 Thes. 3.3 Heb. 10.23 a Cass. Art 18. ex Bonavent Hoc piarum mentium est ut nil sibi tribuant sed totum graâ—iae Dei unde quantum cunque aliquis det gratiae Dei à pietate non recedet etiamsi multa tribuendo gratiae Dei aliquid subtrahat pâ—testati Naturae vel liâ—eâ—i arbâ—t 〈◊〉 cù◠verò aliquid gratiae Dei subtrahitur Natuâ—ae tâ—ibuituâ— quòd graâ—â—â—â— est ibi potest periculum intervenire b Then was a Saint of Rome a Cardinall rather Jewes then Christians by the Cavaliers censure for thus saith Lorca Gravior Controversia est de his liâ—ris quos à Canone â—ejiciunt non solum haeâ—etici recentiores sed etiam sanctus Antonius Cajâ—tanus Tract de loc Cathol lib. 1. Disp. 3. Mem. 3. ubi de libris Tobiae Iudith Ecclâ—siastici Sapientiae Maccabaeorum disputat Rom 3 1 2. a Nec tamen concedendum est hos libros antiquae Synagogae ante adventum Câ—risti ignorâ—â—â—uisse exâ—ra Canonemâ— quoniam â—â—â—lâ—sia ab eâ—s prâ— Apâ—stoliâ—is 〈…〉 b 〈◊〉 Scriptuâ—am quae appâ—llatur Maccabâ—â—â—rum â—udaei non hâ—bent sicut Legem Prophetas Psalmos c. 〈…〉 Epiâ—â— Gauâ—enâ— l. 2. ca. 23. c Non oportet libros qui sunt extra Canâ—nem lâ—gere nisi soloâ— Canonicos Novi Veteris Testamenti Qâ—â—e aâ—tem opoâ—â—â—at legi in authoritatem recipi haec sunt Genâ—sis 〈…〉 Aâ— Maccaâ—â—â—oâ—um libâ—i in hoâ— Catalogo nusquam leguâ—tur 〈◊〉 Lâ—odicen in sâ—xta Syâ—odo confirmaâ—um 2 Thess. 2. Tu per Thomae sâ—nguinem c. Laâ—