Apostasie also For why must that needs be the notion of these termes in the division you made that you now express Is it from the strict sense and importance of the words themselves or from the Scripturall or Ecclesiasticall use of them or whence is it that it must be so and that it is so None of these will give you any relief or the least countenance unto your fancie Both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in themselves of an indifferent signification denoting things or acts good or evill according to their accidentall limitations and applications It is said of some 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they will depart from the faith 1 Tim. 4. 1. And the same Apostle speaking of them that name the name of Christ sayes let every one of them depart from iniquity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Tim. 2. 19. so that the word it self signifies no more but a single and bare departure from anything way rule or practice be it good or bad wherein a man hath been ingaged or which he ought to avoid and fly from And this is the use of it in the best Greek Authors 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are such in Homer who are farre distant or remote on any account from any thing or place And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Aristotle things very remote To leave any place company thing Society or Rule on any cause is the common use of the word in Thucydides Plutarch Lucian and the rest of their companions in the propriety of that language Apostasia by Ecclesiasticall writers is restrained unto either a back sliding in Faith subjective and manners or a causeless relinquishment of any Truth before professed So the Jews charge Paul Acts 21. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thou teachest Apostasie from Moses Law Such also is the nature of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a speciall option choyce or way in profession of any Truth or Error So Paul calls Pharisaisme 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 26. 5. the most exact heresie or way of Religion among the Jews And Clemens Alexandrinus Strom lib. 8. calls Christian Religion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the best Heresie And the great Constantine in one of his Edicts calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Catholick or generall Heresie and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the most holy Heresie The Latines also constantly used that word in a sense indifferent Cato faith Cicero est in ea heresi quae nullum orationis florem sequitur The words therefore themselves you see are of an indifferent signification having this difference between them that the one for the most part is used to signifie the Relinquishment of that which a man had before embraced and the other a choice or embracing of that which a man had not before received or admitted And this difference is constantly observed by all Ecclesiasticall writers who afterwards used these words in the worst or an evill sense so that Apostasie in this appropriation of it denotes the relinquishment of any Important Truth or way in Religion and Heresie the choice or embracement of any new destructive Opinion or Principle or way in the profession thereof A man then may be an Apostate by partiall Apostasie that is depart from the Profession of some Truth he had formerly embraced or the performance of some duty which he was engaged in without being an Heretick or choosing any new opinion which he did not before embrace Thus you signally call a Monke that deserts his Monasticall Profession an Apostate though he embrace no opinion which is condemned by your Church or which you think hereticall And a man may be an Heretick that is choose and embrace some new false opinion which he may coyn out of his own imagination without a direct renunciation of any Truth which before he was instructed in And this is that which I intended when I told you that your Church is fallen by partiall Apostasie and by Heresie Shee hath renounced many of the important Truths which the old Roman Church once believed and professed and so is fallen by Apostasie And she hath invented or coyned many Articles pretended to be of faith which the old Roman Church never believed and so is fallen by Heresie also Now what say you hereunto Why good S r in this division Apostasie is set to express a totall relapse in opposition to Heresie which is the partiall But who gave you warrant or leave so to set them It would it may be somewhat serve your turn in evading the Charge of Apostasie that lyes against your Church but Good S r will not prove that you may thus confound things for your advantage Idolatry is Heresie and Apostasie is Heresie and what not because you suppose you have found a way to escape the imputation of Heresie I say then yet again in answer to your enquiry that your Church is fallen by Apostasie in her relinquishment of many important truths and neglect of many necessary duties which the old Roman Church embraced and performed That these may be the more evident unto you I shall give you some few instances of your Apostasie desiring only that you would grant me that the primitive Church of Rome believed and faithfully retained the doctrine of truth wherein from the Scripture it was instructed That Church believed expresly that all they who die in the Lord do rest from all their labours Rev. 14. 8. which truth you have forsaken by sending many of them into the flames of Purgatory It believed that the sufferings of this life are not worthy of the glory that shall be revealed in us Rom. 8. 18. Your Church is otherwise minded asserting in our works and sufferings a merit of and condignity unto the glory that shall be received It believed that we were saved freely by grace by faith which is not of our selves but the gift of God not by works left any one should boast Eph 2. 8. Tit. 3. 5. and therefore besought the Lord not to enter into judgement with them because in his sight no flesh could be justified Psal. 130. 4. 143. 2. And you are apostatized from this part of their faith It believed that Christ was once only offered Heb. 10 12. and that it could not be that he should often offer himself because then he must have often suffered and died Heb. 9. 25. Which faith of theirs you are departed from It believed that we have one only Mediatour and Intercessour with God 1 Tim. 2. 5. 1 Joh. 2. 2. Wherein also you have renounced their perswasion as likewise you have done in what it professed that we may invocate only him in whom we do believe Rom. 10. 14. It believed that the Command to abstain from Meats and Marriage was the doctrine of Devils 1 Tim. 4. 1 2. Do you abide in the same faith It believed that Every soul without exception was to be subject to the higher Powers Rom. 13. 1. You will not
walk in the steps of their faith herein It believed that all Image-worship was forbidden Exod. 20. And whether you abide in the same perswasion we shall afterwards examine And many more instances of the like kind you may at any time be minded of You hast to that you would fain be at which will be found as little to your purpose as those whose consideration you so carefully avoid You say Did she fall by Heresie in adhering to any errour in Faith contrary to the approved doctrine of the Church Here you smile seriously and tell me that since I take the Roman and Catholick Church to be one she could not indeed adhere to any thing but what she did adhere unto S r I take them indeed to be one but here I speak ad hominem to one that doth not take them so And then if indeed the Roman Church had ever swerved in faith as you say she has and be her self as another ordinary particular Church as you say she is them might you find some one or other more generall Church if any there were to judge her some Oecumenicall Councell to condemn her some Fathers either Greek and Latin expresly to writs against her as Protestants now do some or other grave Authority to censure her or at least some company of Believers out of whose body she went and from whose faith she fell None of which since you are not able to a assign wherein you have spoken more rightly than you were aware of for not to be able to assign none of them infers at least an ability to assign some if not all of them my Query remains unanswered and the Roman still as flourishing a Church as ever she was Answ. 1. You represent my Answer lamely I desire the Reader to consult it in the Animadversions pag. 66 67 68. What you have taken notice of discovers only your fineness in making Heresie an adherence to an errour in faith contrary to the doctrine of the Church and your selves the Church whereby you must needs be secured from Heresie though you should adhere to the most hereticall Principles that ever were broached in the world But nothing of all this as I have shewed will be allowed you 2. As we have seen some of the Reasons why you were so unwilling to try the Cause of your Church on the heads of Idolatry and Apostasie so here you discover a sufficient Reason why you have passed over your other head of Schism in silence You avow your self one of the most schismaticall Principles that were ever adhered unto by any professing the name of Christ. The Roman Church and the Catholick are with you one and the same Is not this Petilianus his in parte Donati nay Basilides his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epiphan Heres 4. We only are men all others are Dogs and Swine Macte virtute If this be not to shew modcration and to persue reconciliation at once to shut out all men but your selves from the Church here and consequently Heaven hereafter what can be thought so to be In earnest S r you may talk what you please of moderation but whilest you avow this one wretched schismaticall Principle you do your endeavour to exclude all true Christian moderation out of the world 3. Why do you conclude that your Query is not answered Suppose one Question could not be answered doth it necessarily follow that another cannot I suppose you take notice that this is another Question and not that at first proposed as I told you before Your first enquiry was about your Churches crime this is about her conviction and condemnation and your Conclusion hath no strength in it but what is built on this unquestionable Maxim that None ever offended who was not publickly judged as though there were no Harlot in the world but those that have been carted It is enough S r that her condition is sub judice as it will be whether you or I will or no and that there is not evidence wanting for her conviction nor ever was since her fall though it may be it hath not at all times been so publickly managed And yet so vain is your triumphant Conclusion that we rest not here but prove also that she hath been of old judged and condemned as you will hear anon And thus I have once more given you an Answer to your enquiry how your Church fell namely that she hath done so by all the wayes and means by which it is possible for a Church to fall She failed under the just hand of God when the persons of that Vrbick Church were extirpated partly by others but totally by Totilas as the Brittish Church in England fell by the sword of the Saxons She hath fallen by Idolatry and corruption of life as did the Church of the Jews before the Captivity She hath fallen by her relinquishment of the written Word as the only rule of faith and worship and by adhering to the uncertain traditions of men as did the Church of the Jews after their return from captivity She hath fallen by Apostasie in forsaking the profession of many important truths of the Gospel as the Church of the Galatians did for a season in their relinquishment of the doctrine of Justification by grace alone She hath fallen by Heresie in coyning new Articles of faith and imposing them on the consciences of the Disciples of Christ as the Montanists did with their new Paraclete and rigid observances She hath fallen by Schisme in her self as the Judaical Church did when divided into Essenes Sadduces and Pharisees setting up Pope against Pope and Councell against Councell continuing in her intestine broils for some ages together and from all others by the wretched Principle but-now avowed by you as the Donatists did of old She hath fallen by Ambition in the Hildebrandine Principle asserting a Soveraignty in the Pope over the Kings and Potentates of the earth whereof I can give you no precedent instance unless it be of him who claimed the Kingdomes of the world to be his own and boasted that he disposed of them at his pleasure Mat. 4. And now I hope you will not take it in ill part that I have given you a plain Answer unto your Question which as I suppose was proposed unto us for that end and purpose But although these things are evident and sufficiently proved yet I see nothing will satisfie you unless we produce testimonies of former times to manifest that your Church hath been arraigned judged condemned written against by Fathers Councils or other Churches Now though this be somewhat an unreasonable expectation in you and that which I am no way bound unto by the Law of our Discourse to satisfie you in yet to prevent for the future such Ivasions as you have made use of on all occasions in your Epistle I shall in a few pregnant and unquestionable Instances give you an account both when how and by whom the falls of your Church have been
to give us an unquestionable settlement in Religion Whether it be meet to hearken unto God or men judge you For our parts wee seek not for the foundation of our settlement in long uncertain discourses doubious conclusions and inferences fallible conjectures sophisticall reasonings such as you would call us unto but in the express direction and command of God Him we can follow and trust unto without the least fear of miscarriage Whither you would lead us wee know not and are not willing to make desperate experiments in things of so high concernment But since you have been pleased to overlook what hath been discoursed unto this purpose in the Animadversions and with your usuall confidence to affirm that I no where at all speak one word to the Case that you proposed I shall for your further satisfaction give you a little enlargement of my thoughts as to the Principles on which Protestants and Romanists proceed in these matters and compare them together that it may be seen whether of us build on the most stable and adequate foundation as to the superstruction aymed at by us both Two things you profess if I mistake not to ayme at in your Fiat at least you pretend so to do 1. Moderation in and about our differences whilest they continue 2. The reduction of all dissenters unto an unity in faith and Profession Things no doubt great and excellent He can be no Christian that aymes not at them that doth not earnestly desire them You profess to make them your Design Protestants do so also Now let us consider whether of the two you or they are fitted with Principles according unto the diversity of Professions wherein you are engaged for the regular accomplishment and effecting of these ends And in the consideration of the latter of them you will find your present Case fully and clearly resolved For the first of Moderation I intend by it and I think so do you also the mutuall forbearance of one another as to any effects of hatred enmity or animosities of any kind attended with offices of Love Charity Kindness and Compassion proceeding from a frame of heart or gracious habit of mind naturally producing such effects with a quiet peaceable deportment towards one another during our present differences in or about any thing in Religion Certainly this Moderation is a blessed thing earnestly commended unto us by our Lord Jesus Christ and his Apostles and as necessary to preserve peace among Christians as the Sunne in the firmament is to give light unto the world The very Heathen could say 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Moderation is the life of all things and nothingis durable but from the Influence which it receives from it Now in pressing after moderation Protestants proceed chiefly on two Principles which being once admitted make it a Duty indispensable And I can assure you that no man will long follow after moderation but only he that looks upon it as his Duty so to do Incident provocations will quickly divert them in their course who pursue it for any other ends or on any other accounts The first Principle of the Protestants disposing them to moderation and indispensably exacting it of them as their Duty is that amongst all the Professours of the Name of Christ who are known by their Relation unto any Church or Way of Note or Mark in the world not actually condemned in the Primitive or Apostolicall times there is so much saving Truth owned and taught as being received with faith and submitted unto with sincere obedience is sufficient to give them that profess it an Interest in Christ and in the Covenant of Grace and Love of God and to secure their salvation This Principle hath been openly defended by them and I profess it to be mine It is true there are wayes whereby the Truth mentioned may be rendred ineffectuall but that hinders not but that the Principle is true and that the Truth so received is sufficient for the producing of those effects in its kind and place And let men ptetend what they please the last day will discover that that Faith which purifieth the heart and renders the person in whom it is accepted to God by Jesus Christ may have its objective Truths confined in a very narrow compass yet it must embrace all that is indispensably necessary to salvation And it is an unsufferable Tyranny over the Souls and Consciences of men to introduce and assert a necessity of believing whatever this or that Church any or indeed all Churches shall please to propose For the proposall of all the Churches in the world cannot make any thing to be necessary to be believed that was not so antecedently unto that proposall Churches may help the faith of Believers they cannot burthen it or exercise any dominion over it He that believeth that whatever God reveales is true and that the holy Scripture is a perfect Revelation of his mind and will wherein almost all Christians agree need not fear that he shall be burdened with multitudes of particular Articles of Faith provided he do his Duty in sincerity to come to an acquaintance with what God hath so revealed Now if mens common Interest in Christ their head and thereby their participation of the same Spirit from him with their union in the bond of the Covenant of Grace and an equall sharing in the Love of God the Father be the Principles and upon the matter the only grounds and reasons of that speciall Love without dissimulation which Christians ought to bear one towards another from whence the moderation pleaded for must proceed or it is a thing of no use in our present case at least no way generally belonging to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and if all these things may be obtained by vertue of that Truth which is professed in common among all known Societies of Christians doth it not unavoidably follow that we ought to exercise moderation towards one another however differing in or about things which destroy not the Principles of Love and Union Certainly we ought unless we will resolvedly stifle the actings of that Love which is implanted in all the Disciples of Christ and besides live in an open disobedience unto his commands This then indispensably exacts moderation in Protestants towards them that differ from them and that not only within the lines of Protestancy because they believe that notwithstanding that dissent they have or may have for ought they know an interest in those things which are the only reasons of that Love which is required in them towards the Disciples of Christ. There is a moderation proceeding from the Principles of Reason in generall and requisite unto our common interest in humanity which is good and an especiall ornament unto them in whom it is especially if they are Persons exalted above others in place of Rule and Goveanment Men fierce implacable revengefull impatient treading down all that they dislike under their feet are the greatest defacers of the
endeavours of men in their sleep wherein great workings of spirits and Fancy produce no effects I confess notwithstanding all this others may be moderate towards you I judg it their duty so to be I desire they may be so but how you should exercise moderation towards others I cannot so well discern Only as unto the former so much more am I relieved as unto this Principle from the perswasion I have of the candour and ingenuity of many individuall Persons of your Profession which will not suffer them to be captivated under the Power of such corrupt prejudices as these And for my part if I could approve of externall force in any Case in matters of Religion it would be against the promoters of the Principle mentioned Cogendus In mores hominemque Creon When men under pretence of Zeal for Religion depose all sense of the Laws of Nature and humanity some earnestness may be justified in unteaching them their untoward Catechisms which lye indeed not only against the design Spirit Principles and letter of the Gospell but Terrarum leges mundi foedera the very foundations of Reason on which men coalesce into civill society But as we observed before out of one of the Anfients Force hath no place in or about the Law of Christ one way or other That which gave occasion unto this Discourse was your insinuation of the Scriptures Insufficiency for the settlement of men in the Unity of Faith the contrary whereof being the great Principle of Protestancy I was willing a little to enlarge my self unto the consideration of your Principles and ours not only with reference unto the Vnity of Faith but also as unto that moderation which you pretend to plead for and the want whereof you charge on Protestants premising it unto the ensuing discourse wherein you will meet with a full and a direct Answer unto your Question CHAP. VII Vnity of Faith wherein it consists Principles of Protestants as to the setling men in Religion and Vnity of Faith proposed and confirmed THe next thing proposed as a Good to be aymed at is Vnity in Faith and settlement or infallible assurance therein This is a Good desireable for its self whereas the moderation treated of is only a medium of relief against other evils untill this may be attained And therefore though it be upon supposition of our Differences earnestly to be endeavoured after yet it is not to be rested in as though the utmost of our Duty consisted in it and we had no prospect beyond it It is a Catholick Vnity in Faith which all Christians are to aym at and so both you and wee profess to doe only wee differ both about the Nature of it and the proper means of attaining it For the Nature of it you conceive it to consist in the explicit or implicit belief of all things and Doctrines determined on taught and proposed by your Church be believed and nothing else with faith supernaturall but what is so taught and proposed But this description of the Vnity of Faith wee can by no means admit of 1. Because it is Novel it hath no footstep in any writings of the Apostles nor of the first Fathers or Writers of the Church nor in the practice of the Disciples of Christ for many Ages That the Determination of the Roman Church and its proposall of things or Articles to be believed should be the adequate Rule of Faith unto all Believers is a matter as forreign unto all Antiquity as that the Prophesies of Montanus should be so 2. Because it makes the Unity of Faith after the full and last Revelation of the Will of God flux alterable and unstable lyable to increase and decrease whereas it is uniform constant alwayes the same in all Ages times and places since the finishing of the Canon of the Scriptures For we know and all the world knows that your Church hath determined many things lately some 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it were but yesterday to be believed which its self had never before determined and so hath increased the Rule of Faith moved its Center and extended its Circumference and what she may further determine and propose to morrow no man knows and your duty it is to be ready to believe whatever she shall so propose whereby you cannot certainly know unto your dying day whether you do believe all that may belong to the Vnity of Faith or no. Nay 3. your Church hath determined and proposed to be believed express Contradictions which Determinations abiding on record you are not agreed which of them to adhere unto as is manifest in your Conciliary Decrees about the Power of the Pope and the Councill unto which of them the preheminence is due Now this is a strange Rule of the Unity of Faith that is not only capable of encrease changes and alterations so that that may belong unto it one day which did not belong unto it another as is evident from your Tridentine Decrees wherein you made many things necessary to be believed which before were esteemed but probable and were the subjects of Sophisticall altercations in your Schools but also comprizeth in its self express Contradictions which cannot at all belong unto faith because both of them may be false one of them must be so nor to Vnity because Contrary and adverse 4. Whereas holding the Unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace or the Unity of faith is so great and important a Duty unto all Christians that they can no way discharge their Consciences unto God without a well grounded satisfaction that they live in the performance of it this description of its Nature renders it morally impossible for any man explicitly to know and that only a man knows which he knows explicitly that he doth answer his Duty herein For 1. the Determinations of your Church of things to be believed are so many and various that it is not within the Compass of an ordinary Diligence and ability to search and find them out Nor when a man hath done his utmost can he obtain any tolerable security that there have not other Determinations been made that he is not as yet come to an acquaintance with all or that he ever shall so do and how in this Case he can have any satisfactory perswasion that he keeps the Unity of Faith is not as yet made evident 2. In the Determinations he may meet withall or by any means come to the knowledge of he is to receive and believe the things determined and proposed unto him in the sense intended by the Church or else he is never the nearer to his end But what that sense is in the most of your Churches proposals your Doctors do so endlesly quarrell among themselves that it is impossible a man should come unto any great Certainty in his enquiry after it yet a precise meaning in all her proposals your Church must have o◠she hath none at all What shall a man do when he comes
unto one of your great Masters to be acquainted with the genuine sense of one of your Churches Proposals this being the way that he takes for his satisfaction First he speaks unto the Article or Question to be considered in Generall then gives the different senses of it according to these and those famous Masters the most of which he confutes who yet all of them professed themselves to explain and to speak according to the sense of your Church and lastly gives his own interpretation of it which it may be within a few moneths is confuted by another 3. Suppose a man have attained a knowledge of all that your Church hath determined and proposed to be believed and to a right understanding of her precise sense and meaning in all her determinations and proposals which I believe never yet man attained unto yet what assurance can he have if he live in any place remote from Rome but that your Church may have made some new Determinations in matters of faith whose embracement in the sense which she intends belongs unto his keeping the Unity of Faith which yet he is not acquainted withall Is it not simply impossible for him to be satisfied at any time that he believes all that is to be believed or that he holds the Vnity of Faith Your late Pontific all Determination in the Case of the Jansenists and Molinists is sufficient to illustrate this instance For I suppose you are equally bound not to believe what your Church condemneth as Hereticall as you are bound to believe what it proposeth for Catholick Doctrine 4. I desire to know when a man who lives here in England begins to be obliged to believe the Determinations of your Church that are made at Rome It may be he first hears of them in a Mercury or weekly News book or it may be he hath notice of them by some private Letters from some who live near the place or it may be he hath a knowledge of them by common report or it may be they are printed in some Books or that there is a brief of them published somewhere under the name of the Pope or they are put into some Volume written about the Councels or some Religious Persons on whom he much relyes assures him of them I know you believe that your Churches Proposition is a sufficient means of the Revelation of any Article to make it necessary to be believed but I desire to know what is necessary to Cause a man to receive any Dictate or Doctrine as your Churches proposition not only upon this account that you are not very well agreed upon the Requisita unto the making of such a Proposition but also because be you as infallible as you please in your Proposals the means and wayes you use to communicate those Proposals you make unto Individuals in whom alone the faith whereof we treat exists are all of them fallible Now that which I desire to know is What is or what are those certain means and wayes of communicating the Propositions of your Church unto any Person wherein he is bound to acquiesce and upon the application of them unto him to believe them fide divina cui non potest subesse falsum Is it any one thing or way or means that the hinge upon which his assent turns Or is it a Complication of many things concurring to the same purpose If it be any one thing way or medium that you fix upon pray let us know it and we shall examine its fitness and sufficiency for the use you put it unto I am sure we shall find it to be either infallible or fallible If you say the former and that particular upon which the Assent of a mans mind unto any thing to be the proposall of your Church depends must in the testimony it gives and evidence that it affords be esteemed infallible then you have as many infallible Persons things or writings as you make use of to acquaint one another with the determinations of your Church that is upon the matter you are all so though I know in particular that you are not If the latter notwithstanding the first pretended infallible Proposition your faith will be found to be resolved immediately into a fallible information For what will it advantage me that the proposall of your Church cannot deceive me if I may be deceived in the Communicating of that Proposall unto me And I can with no more firmness certainty or assurance believe the thing proposed unto me than I do believe that it is the Proposall of the Church wherein it is made For you pretend not unto any self-evidencing efficacy in your Churches Propositions or things proposed by it but all their Authority as to me turns upon the Assurance that I have of their relation unto your Church or that they are the Proposals of your Church concerning which I have nothing but very fallible evidence and so cannot possibly believe them with Faith Divine and Supernaturall If you shall say that there are many things concurring unto this Communication of your Churches Proposals unto a man as the notoritty of the Fact suitable proceedings upon it books written to prove it Testimonies of good men and the like I cannot but mind you that all these being sigillatim every one apart fallible they cannot in their Conspiracy improve themselves into an Infallibility Strengthen a Probability they may testifie infallibly they neither do nor can So that on this account it is not only impossible for a man to know whether he holds the Vnity of Faith or no but indeed whether he believe any thing at all with Faith Supernaturall and Divine seeing he hath no infallible evidence for what is proposed unto him to believe to build his faith upon 5. Protestants are not satisfied with your generall implicit assent unto what your Church teacheth and determineth which you have invented to solve the difficulties that attend your Description of the Vnity of Faith Of what use it may be unto other purposes I do not now dispute but as to this of the preservation of the Vnity of Faith it is certainly of none at all The Vnity of Faith consists in all mens express believing all that all men are bound expresly to believe be it what it will Now you would have this preserved by mens not believing what they are bound to believe For what belongs to this keeping the Vnity of Faith they are bound to believe expresly and what they believe implicitly they do indeed no more but not expresly disbelieve for if they do any more than not disbelieve they put forth some act of their understanding about it and so farre expresly believe it So that upon the matter you would have ment to keep the Unity of Faith by a not believing of that which that they may keep the Unity of Faith they are bound expresly to believe Nor can you do otherwise whilest you make all the Propositions of your Church of things to be
believed to belong to the Unity of Faith Lastly The Determinations of your Church you make to be the next efficient Cause of your Unity now these not being absolutely infallible leave it like Delos flitting up and down in the Sea of Probabilities only This we shall manifest unto you immediately at least we shall evidence that you have no cogent reasons nor slable grounds to prove your Church infallible in her Determinations At present it shall suffice to mind you that she hath Determined Contradictions and that in as eminent a manner as it is possible for her to declare her sense by namely by Councils confirmed by Popes and an infallible determination of Contradictions is not a Notion of any easie digestion in the thoughts of a man in his right wits We confess then that we cannot agree with you in your Rule of the Unity of Faith though the thing its self we press after as our Duty For 2. Protestants do not conceive this Vnity to consist in a precise Determination of all Questions that are or may be raised in or about things belonging unto the Faith whether it be made by your Church or any other way Your Thomas of Aquine who without question is the best and most sober of all your School Doctors hath in one Book given us 522 Articles of Religion which you esteem mraculously stated Quot Articuli tot Miracula All these have at least five Questions one with another stated and determined in explication of them which amount unto 2610 Conclusions in matters of Religion Now we are farre from thinking that all these Determinations or the like belong unto the Unity of Faith though much of the Religion amongst some of you lyes in not dissenting from them The Questions that your Bellarmine hath determined and asserted the Positions in them as of faith and necessary to be believed are I think neer 40 times as many as the Articles of the antient Creed of the Church and such as it is most evident that if they be of the nature and importance pretended it is impossible that any considerable number of men should ever be able to discharge their duty in this business of holding the Vnity of Faith That a man believe in generall that the holy Scripture is given by inspiration from God and that all things proposed therein for him to believe are therefore infallibly true and to be as such believed and that in particular he believe every Article or point of Truth that he hath sufficient means for his instruction in and conviction that it is so revealed they judg to be necessary unto the holding of the Unity of Faith And this also they know that this sufficiency nf means unto every one that enjoys the benefit of the Scriptures extends its self unto all those Articles of Truth which are necessary for him to believe so as that he may yield unto God the obedience that he requireth receive the holy Spirit of promise and be accepted with God Herein doth that Vnity of Faith which is amongst the Disciples of Christ in the world consist and ever did nor can do so in any thing else Nor doth that variety of Apprehensions that in many things is found among the Disciples of Christ and ever was render this Vnity like that you plead for various and incertain For the Rule and formall Reason of it namely Gods Revelation in the Scripture is still one and the same perfectly unalterable And the severall degrees that men attain uuto in their Apprehensions of it doth no more reflect a charge of variety upon it than the difference of Seeing as to the severall degrees of the sharpness or obtuseness of our bodily eyes doth upon the Light given by the Sunne The Truth is if there was any common measure of the Assents of men either as to the intension of it as it is subjectively in their minds or extension of it as it respecteth Truths revealed that belonged unto the Vnity of Faith it were impossible there should be any such thing in the world at least that any such thing should be known to be Only this I acknowledg that it is the Duty of all men to come up to the full and explicit acknowledgment of all the Truths revealed in the word of God wherein the Glory of God and the Christians Duty are concerned as also to a joynt consent in Faith objective or propositions of Truth revealed at least in things of most importance though their faith subjective or the internal assent of their minds have as it will have in severall Persons various degrees yea in the same Persons it may be at different seasons And in our labouring to come up unto this joynt-acknowledgment of the same sense and intendment of God in all revealed Truths consists our endeavour after that perfection in the Vnity of Faith which in this life is attainable as our moderation doth in our walking in peace and love with and towards others according to what we have already attained We may distinguish then between that Unity of Faith which an interest in gives Vnion with Christ unto them that hold it and Communion in Love with all equally interested therein and that Accomplishment of it which gives a sameness of Profession and consent in all acts of outward Communion in the worship of God The first is found in and amongst all the Disciples of Christ in the world where-ever they are the latter is that which moreover it is your Duty to press after The former consists in an Assent in generall unto all the Truths of God revealed in the Scripture and in particular unto them that we have sufficient means to evidence them unto us to be so revealed The latter may come under a double consideration for either there may be required unto it in them who hold it the joynt perception of and assent unto every Truth revealed in the Scripture with an equall degree of certainty in adherence and evidence in perception and it is not in this life wherein the best of us know but in part attainable or only such a concurrence in an assent unto the necessary Propositions of Truth as may enable them to hold together that outward Communion in the worship of God which we before mentioned And this is certainly attainable by the wayes and means that shall immediately be layed down And where this is there is the Vnity of Faith in that compleatness which we are bound to labour for the attainment of This the Apostolicall Churches enjoyed of old and unto the recovery whereof there is nothing more prejudiciall than your new stating of it upon the account of your Churches Proposals This Unity of Faith we judg good and necessary and that it is our Duty to press after it So also in generall do you It remains then that we consider what is the way what are the means and Principles that Protestants propose and insist upon for the attainment of it that is in answer
we also do Strom. 4. To this purpose speaks Salvianus de Gub. Lib. 3. Alia omnia idest humana dicta argumentis testibus egent Dei autem Sermo ipse sibi test is est quia necesseest ut quicquid incorrupta verityas loquitur incorruptum sit testimonium veritatis All other sayings stand in need of Arguments and witnesses to confirm them the Word of God is witness to its self For whatever the Truth incorrupted speaks must of necessity be an incorrupt Testimony of Truth And although some of them allowed the Testimony of the Church as a motive unto believing the Gospell or things preached from it yet as to the belief of the Scripiure with faith Divine and Supernaturall to be the Word of God they required but these two things 1. That Self-Evidence in the Scripture its self which is needfull for an indemonstrable Principle from which and by which all other things are to be demonstrated And that Self-Evidence Clemens puts in the place of all Demonstrations 2. The Efficacy of the Spirit in the heart to enable it to give a saving assent unto the Truth proposed unto it Thus Austin in his Confessions Lib. 6. cap. 5. Persuasisti mihi ô Domine Deus non eos qui crederent libris tuis quos tanta in omnibus ferè Gentibus authoritate fundasti esse culpandos sed eos qui non crederent new audiendesesse siqui mihi forte dicerent Unde scis illos libres unius veracissimi Dei Spirituesse humano generi ministratos idipsum enim maximè credendum erat O Lord God thou hast perswaded me that not they who believe thy Books which with so great Authority thou hast setled almost in all Nations were to be blamed but those who believe them not and that I should not hearken unto any of them who might chance to say unto me Whence dost thou know those Books to be given out unto mankind from the Spirit of the only True GOD for that is the thing which principally was to be believed In which words the holy man hath given us full direction what to say when you come upon us with that Question which some used it seems in his dayes A great Testimony of the Antiquity of your Principles Adde hereunto what he writes in the 11 th Book and 3 d Chapter of the same Treatise and wee have the summe of the Resolution and Principle of his Faith Audiam saith he intelligam quomodo fecisti Coelam terram Scripsit hoc Moses scripsit abiit transivit hinc ad Te. Neque enim nunc ante me est nam si esset tenerem eum rogaremeum per Teobsecrarem ut mihi ist a paâ—derct praberem aures corporis mei sonis erumpentibus ex ere ejus At si Hebraea voce loqueretur frustra pulsaret sensum meum nec inde mentem meam tangeret si autem Latinè scirem quid diceret sed Unde scirem an verum dicoret quod si hoc scirem num ab illâ— scirem Intus utique mihi intus in domicilio cogitationis nec Hebraea nec Graeca nec Latina nec barbara verityas sine oris linguae organis sine strepitu syllabarum diceret verum diâ—it ego statim â—â—tus confidenter illi homini tuo dicerem Verumolits Cum ergo illum interrogare non possim Te quo 〈◊〉 vera dixit Veritas rogo Te Deus meus rogo partepeccatis meis qui illi servo tuo dedisti haec dicere 〈◊〉 mihi haEc intelligere I would bear and understand O Lord how thou hast made the Heavens and the earth Moses wrote this he wrote it and is gene and he is gone to Thee For now he is not present with mee if he were I would lay hold on him and ask him and beseech him for thy sake that he would unfold these things unto me and I would cause the ears of my body to attend unto the words of his mouth But if he should speak in the Hebrew tongue he would only in vain strike upon my outward sense and my mind within would not be affected with it If he speak in Latine I should know what he sayed but whence should I know that he spake the Truth should I know this also from him The Truth that is neither Hebrew Greck Latine nor expressed in any Barbarous Language would say unto me inwardly in the dwelling place of my thoughts without the organs of mouth or tongue or noyse of syllables He speaks the Truth and I with confidaence should say unto him thy servam Thou speakest the Truth Seeing therefore I cannot enquire of him I beseech Thee that art Truth with whom he being filled spake the Truth I beseech thee O my God pardon my sinnes and thou who gavest unto him by servant to speak these things grant unto me tounderstand Thus this holy man ascribes his assent into the one unquestionable Principle of the Scripture as to the effecting of it in himself to the work if Gods Spirit in his heart As Basil also doth on Psal. 11. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Faith which draws the soul unto consent above the efficacy of all rational wayes or methods of perswasion Faith that is wrought and begotten in us not by geometricall enforcements or demonstrations but by the effectuall operations of the Spirit And both these Principles are excellently expressed by one amongst your selves even Baptista Mantuanus Lib. de Patientia Cap. 32 33. Saepenumerò faith he mecum cogitavi Unde tam sâ—adibilis esset ista Scriptura ut tam potenter insluat in animos auditorum unde tantum habeat energiae ut non adopinandum sed ad solidè credendum omnes inflectat I have often thought with my self Whence the Scripture is so perswasive whence it doth so powerfully influence the minds of the hearers whence it hath so much efficacy that it should incline and bow all men not to think as probable but solidly to believe the things it proposeth Non saith he est hoc imputandum rationum evidentiaequas non adducit non artis industriae verbis suavibus ad persuadendum accommodatis quibus non utitur It is not to be ascribed unto the evidence of Reasons which it bringeth not neither to the excellency of Art sweet words and accommodated unto per swasion which it makes no use of Sed vide an id in causa sit quod persuasi sumus eam à prima veritate flâ—xisse But see if this be not the Cause of it that wee are perswaded that it proceeds from the prime Verity He proceeds Sed unde sumus ita persuasi nisi ab ipsa quasi ad ei credendum non sua ipsiâ—â— trahat Authoritas Sed unde quaeso hanc sibi Authoritatem vindicavit Neque enim vidimus nos Deum concionantem scribentem docentem tamen ac si vidissemus credimus tenemus à Spiritu Sancto fluxisse quod legimus Forsitan
flattering your selves with an imagination of any other Priviledge is that which hath wrought your ruine You are deceived if in this matter you are of Menander's mind who sayed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all will of its own accord fall out well with you though you sleep securely As for all other Churches in the world besides your own wee have your concession not only that they were and are fallible but that they have actually erred long since and the same hath been proved against yours a thousand times and your best Reserve against particular charges of Errour lyes in this impertinent generall pretence that you cannot erre It may be you will ask for you use so to do and it is the design of your Fiat to promote the â—nquiry If the Church be fallible that is to propose unto us the things and Doctrines that we are to believe How can we with faith infallible believe her proposals And I tell you truly I know not how we can if we believe them only upon her Authority or she propose them to be believed solely upon that account but when she proposeth them unto us to be believed on the Authority of God speaking in the Srciptures we both can and do believe what she teacheth and proposeth and that with faith infallible resolved into the Veracity of God in his Word and we grant every Church to be so farre infallible as it attends unto the only Infallible Rule amongst men When you prove that any one Church is by any promise of Christ any grant of Priviledge expressed or intimated in the Scripture placed in an unerring condition any farther than as in the use of the means appointed she attends unto the only Rule of her preservation or that any Church shall be â—ecessitated to attend unto that Rule whether she will or no whereby she may be preserved or can give us an instance of any Church since the foundation of the world that hath been actually preserved and absolutely from all errour other than that of your own which you know we cannot admit of as you will do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a great and memorable work so we shall grant as much as you can reasonably desire of us upon the account of the Assertion under consideration But untill you do some one or all of these your crying out The Church the Church the Church cannot erre makes no other noyse in our ears than that of the Jews The Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord the Law shall not fail did in the ears of the Prophets of old Neither do we speak this of the Church or any Church as though we were concerned to question or deny any just Priviledges belonging unto it thereby to secure our selves from any pretensions of yours but meerly for the sake of Truth For we shall manifest anon unto you that you are as little concerned in the Priviledges of the Church be they what they will more or less as any Society of the Professours of Christianity in the world if so be that you are concerned in them at all So that if the Truth would permit us to agree with you in all things that you assign unto the Church yet the difference between you and us were never the nearer to an end for we should still differ with you about your share and interest therein and for ever abhor your frowardness in appropriating of them all unto your selves And herein as I sayed hath lyen a great part of your ruine Whilest you have been sweetly dreaming of an Infallibility you have really plunged your selves into errours innumerable and when any one hath jogged you to awake you out of your fatall sleep by minding you of your particular errours your dream hath left such an impression upon your imagination as that you think them no errours upon this only ground because you cannot erre I am perswaded had it not been for this one errour you had been freed from many others But this perfectly disiâ—ables you for any candid Inquisition after the Truth For why should he once look about him or indeed so much as take care to keep his eyes open who is sure that he can never be out of his way Hence you inquire not at all whether what you profess be Truth or not but to learn what your Church teacheth and defend it is all that you have to do about Religion in this world And whatever Absurdities or Inconveniencies you find your selves driven unto in the handling of particular points all is one they must be right though you cannot defend them because your Church which cannot erre hath so declared them to be And if you should chance to be convinced of any Truth in particular that is contrary to the determination of your Church you know not how to embrace it but must shut your eyes against its light and evidence and cast it out of your minds or wander up and down with a various assent between Contradictions Well said he of old 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is flat folly namely for a man to live in rebellion unto his own light But you adde III. That your selves that is the Pope with those who in matters of Religion adhere unto him and live in subjection unto him are this Church in an assent unto whose infallible teachings and Determinations the Vnity of Faith doth consist Could you prove this Assertion I confess it would stand you in good stead But before we enquire aftes that we shall endeavour a little to come unto a right understanding of what you say When you affirm tâ—at the Roman Church is the Church of Christ you intend either that it is the only Church of Christ all the Church of Christ and so consequently the Catholick Church or you mean that it is a Church of Christ which hath an especiall Prerog ative enabling it to require obedience of all the Disciples of Christ. If you say the former we desire to know 1. when it became so to be It was not so when all the Church was together at Hierusâ—lem and no foundation of any Church at all laid at Rome Acts 1. 1 2 3 4 5. It was not so when the first Church of the Gentiles was gathered at Antioch and the Disciples first began to be called Christians for as yet we have no tydings of any Church at Rome It was not so when Paul wrote his Epistles for he makes express mention of many other Church in other places which had no relation unto any Churches at Rome more than they had one to another in their common Profession of the same faith and therein enjoyed equall gifts and Priviledges with it It was not so in the dayes of the Primitive Fathers of the first three hundred years who all of them not one excepted took the Roman to be a local particular Church and the Bishop of Rome to be such a Bishop as they esteemed of all other Churches and Bishops
nascitur ordo Jam nova progenies Coelo demittitur alto The old glorious beautifull face of Christianity would be restored unto it again which many deform more and more every day by painting a dead carcass in stead of the living Spouse of Christ. And if ever we intend to take one step towards any agreement or unity it must be by fixing this Principle in the minds of all men that it is of no advantage to any man whatever Church or way in Christian Religion he be of unless he personally believe the promises and live in obedience unto all the precepts of Christ. And that for him who doth so that it is a trampling of the whose Gospel underfoot to say that his salvation could be endangered by his not being of this or that Church or way especially considering how much of the world hath immixed its self into all the known wayes that are in it Were this once well fixed on the minds of men and did they practically believe that men shall not be dealt with all at the last day by gross as of this or that party or Church but that every Individuall Person must stand upon his own bottome live by his own faith or perish for want of it as if there had been no other persons in the world but himself wee should quickly find their keenness in promoting and contending for their severall parties taken off theirheat allayed and they will begin to find their business and concernment in Religion to be utterly another matter than they thought of For the present some Protestants think that when the Roman Power is by one means or other broken which they expect that then wee shall agree and have peace Romanists on the other side look for and desire the extirpation of all that they call Heresy or Hereticks by one way or other some pretending highly to Moderation on both sides especially among the Protestants hope that it may be attained by mutuall condescension of the Parties at variance contemperation of opinions and practises unto the present distant apprehensions and interests of the chief leaders of either side what issue and event their desires hopes and attempts will have time will shew to all the world For my part until by a fresh powring out of the Spirit of God from on high I see Christians in profession agreeing in pursuing the end of Christianity endeavouring to be followers of Jesus Christ in a conversation becoming the Gospell without trusting to the Parties wherein they are engaged I shall have very little hopes to see any Unity amongst us that shall be one jot better than our present Differences To see this if any thing would make me say O mihi tam longe maneat pars ultima vitae The present face of Christianity makes the world a wearisome wilderness Nor should I think any thing a more necessary Duty than it would be for Persons of Piety and ability to apologize for the Religion of Jesus Christ and to shew how inconcerned it is in the wayes and practises of the most that profess it and how utterly another thing it is from what in the world it is represented to be so to put a stop unto that Atheism which is breaking in upon us from the contempt that men have of that Idaea of Christian Religion which they have taken from the manner of its profession and lives of its Professors were it not that I suppose it more immediately incumbent on them and us all to do the same work in a reall expression of its power and excellency in such a kind of goodness holiness righteousness and heavenliness of conversation as the world is only as yet in sacret acquainted withall When this is done the way for a farther agreement will be open and facile and untill it be so men will fight on Ipsique nepotesque Et nati natorum qui nascentur ab illis We shall have no end of our Quarrels Could I see an Heroick temper fall on the minds of men of the severall parties at variance to bid adieu to the world its customs manners and fashions which are all vain and perishing not in a locall corporall retirement from the men and lawfull businesses of it or a relinquishment of the necessary callings and employments in it but in their spirits affections could I see them taking up the Cross of Christ not on their backs in its figure but on their hearts in its power and in their whole conversation conforming themselves unto his blessed example so teaching all others of their parties what it is that they build upon for a blessed Eternity that they may not please and deceive themselves with their conceited Orthodoxie in the trifling Differences which they have with other Christans I should hope the very name of persecution and every thing that is contrary to Christian Moderation would quickly be driven out of Christendome and that errour and what ever is contrary to the Vnity of Faith would not be long lived after them But whilest these things are farre from us let us not flatter our selves as though a windy flourish of words had any efficacy in it to bring us to Moderation and unity At variance we are and at variance we must be content to be that being but one of the Evils that at this day triumph in the world over conquered Christianity This being suposed 11. Whereas the Doctrine of God is a Mystery in the knowledge where ofmen attain unto Wisedome according to that measure of light and Grace which the Spirit who devides unto every man as he will is pleased to communicate unto them if men would not frame any other Rule or standard unto that Wisedom and the various degrees of it but only that which God himself hath assigned thereunto the fuell would upon the matter be wholly taken away from the fire of our Contentions All men have not nor let men pretend what they please to the contrary ever had nor ever will have the fame light the same knowledg the same spirituall Wisdome and understanding the same degree of assurance the same measure of comprehension in the things of God But whilest they have the same Rule the same objective Revelation the use of the same means to grow spiritually wise in the knowledg of it they have all the agreement that God hath appointed for them or calls them unto To frame for them all in Rigid confessions or Systemes of supposed credible Propositions a Procrustes bed to stretch them upon or crop them unto the size of so to reduce them to the same opinion in all things is a vain and fruitless attempt that men have for many Generations wearâ—ed themselves about and yet continue so to do Remove out of the way Anathemas upon Propositions arbitrarily composed and expressed Philosophical Conclusions Rules of faith of a meer humane composure or use them no otherwise but only to testifie the voluntary consent of mens minds in expressing to their own
Scriptures could be of no more Authority then Aesops Fables were they not confirmed by the Testimony of your Church we are informed by one Brentius and we believe the information to be true because the saying is defended by Hosius de Authoritat Script Lib. 3. who adds unto it of his own Revera nisi nos Authoritas Ecclesiae doceret hanc scripturam esse Canoncam perexiguum apud nos pondus haberet the truth is if the Authority of the Church did not teach us that this Scripeure is Canomical it would be of very light weight unto us Such Cordial respects do you bear unto it And the forementioned Andradius Defens Con. Trid. Lib. 2. to the same purpose Neque enim in ipsis libris quibus sacra mysteria conscripta sunt quicquam in est Divinitatis quae nos ad credendum quae in illis continentur religione aliqua constring at sed Ecclesiae quae codices illos sacros esse docet antiquorum Patrum fidem pietatem commendat tanta inest vis amplitudo ut illis nemo sine gravissimâ impietatis nota possit repugnare neither is there in those books wherein the Divine Mysteries are written any thing or any character of Divinity or divine original which should on a religious account oblige us to believe the things that are contained in them But yet such is the force and Authority of the Church which teacheth thâ—se books to be sacred and commendeth the faith and piety of the Antient fathers that no man can oppose them without a grievous mark of impiety How by what means from whom should we learn the sense of your Church if not from your Council of Trent and such mighty Champions of it Do you think it equitable that we should listen to suggestions of every obscure Frier and entertain thoughts from them about the sense of your Church contrary to the plain assertion of your Councils and and great Rabbies And if this be the respect that in Catholick Countries is given to the Scripture I hope you will not find may of your Countrymen rivals with them therein It is all but Hayle and Crâ—cifie We respect the Scriptures but there is another part of Gods word besides them we respect the Scriptures but Traditions contain more of the Doctrine of Truth we respect the Scriptures but think it not meet that Christians be suffered to read them we respect the Scripture but do not think that it hath any character in it of its own Divine original for which we should believe it we respect the Scripture but yet we would not believe were it not commended unto us by our Church we respect the Scripture but it is dark obscure not intelligible but by the interpretation of our Church Pray Sir keep your respects at home they are despised by the Scripture it self which gives Testimony unto its own Authority Perfection Sufficiency to guide us to God Perspicuity and Certainty without any respect unto your Church or its Authority And we know its Testimony to be true And for our parts we fear that whilest these Joabs kisses of respect are upon your lips you have a sword in your right hands to let out all the Vitals of Divine Truth and Religion Do you think your general expressions of respect and that unto admiration are a covering long and broad enough to hide all this contempt and reproach that you continually poure upon the Scriptures Deal thus with your Ruler and see whether he will accept your Person Give him some good words in general but let your particular expressions of your esteem of him come short of what his state and regal dignity do require will it be well taken at your hands Expressions of the same nature with these instanced in might be collected out of your chiefest Authors sufficient to fill a volume and yet I never read nor heard that any of them were ever stoned in your Catholick Countreys whatever you intimate of the boyling up of your zeal into a rage against those that should go about to diminish it Indeed whatever you pretend this is your faith about the Scripture and therefore I desire that you would accept of this account why I cannot comply with your wish and not speak any more of Papists slighting the Scripture seeing I know they do so in the sense and way by me expressed and other wayes I never said they did so From the account of your Faith we may proceed to your Charity wherewith you close this Discourse Speaking of your Roman Catholicks you say the Scripture is theirs and Jesus Christ is theirs who will one day plead their Cause What do you mean Sir by theirs Do you intend it exclusively to all others so theirs as not to be the right and portion of any other It is evident that this is your sense not only because unless it be so the words have neither sense nor emphasis in them but also because suitably unto this sense you elsewhere declare that the Roman and the Catholick Church are with you one and the same This is your Charity fit to accompany and to be the fruit of the faith before discoursed of This is your Chatholicism the impaling of Christ Scripture the Church and consequently all acceptable Religion to the Roman Party and Faction down right Donatism the wretchedest Schism that ever rent the Church of God which makes the wounds of Christendome incurable and all hope of coalition in Love desperate Saint Paul directing one of his Epistles unto all that in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that no countenance from that expression of our Lord Jesus Christ might be given unto any surmize of his appropriating unto himself and those with him a peculiar interest in Jusus Christ he adds immediately both their Lord and ours the Lord of all that in every place call upon his name 1 Cor. 1. This was the old Catholicism which the new hath as much affinity unto as darkness hath to light and not one jot more The Scripture is ours and Christ is ours and what have any else to do with them what though in other places you call on the name of Jesus Christ yet he is our Lord not yours This I say is that wretched Schism which cloathed with the name of Catholicism which after it had slain it robbed of its name and garments the world for some ages hath groaned under and is like to do so whilst it is supported by so many secular advantages and interests as are subservient unto it at this day CHAP. 14. Of Reason Jews objections against Christ. PAg. 27. You proceed to vindicate your unreasonable Paragraph about Reason or rather against it What reason we are to expect in a dispute against the use of Reason in and about the things which are the highest and most proper object of it is easie for any one to imagine For by Reason in Religion we understand not meerly the Raâ—ocination
his Successors may be added 3. Protestants reach unanimously that it is incumbent on Kings to find out receive embrace and promote the Truth of the Gospel and the Worship of God appointed therein confirming protecting and defending of it by their Regal Power and Authority as also that in their so doing they are to use the Liberty of their own judgements informed by the wayes that God hath appointed for that end independently on the dictates determinations and orders of any other Person or Persons in the world unto whose Authority they should be obnoxious Heathen Kings made Laws for God Dan. 3. chap. 6. Jona 3. And the great thing that we find any of the Good Kings of Judah commended for is that they commanded the worship of God to be observed and performed according unto his own appointment For this end were they then bound to write out a Copy of the Law with their own hands Deut. 14. 18. and to study in it continually To this purpose were they warned charged exhorted and excited by the Prophets that is that they should serve God as Kings And to this purpose are there innumerable Laws of the best Christian Kings and Emperours still extant in the world In these things consists that Supremacy or Headship of Kings which Protestants unanimously ascribe unto them especially those in England to his Royal Majesty And from hence you may see the frivolousness of sundry things you object unto them As first of the Scheme or Series of Ecclesiastical Power which you ascribe to Prelate Protestants and the Laws of the Land from which you say the Presbyterians dissent which you thus express By the Laws of our Land our Series of Government Ecclesiastical stands thus God Christ King Bishop Ministers People The Presbyterian Predicament is thus God Christ Minister People So that the Ministers head in the Presbyterian Predicament toucheth Christs feet immediately and nothing intervenes You Pretend indeed that hereby you do exalt Christ but this is a meer cheat as all men may see with their eyes For Christ is but where he was but the Minister indeed is exalted being now set in the Kings place one degree higher then the Bishops who by Law is under King and Bishops too If I mistake not in my guess you greatly pleased your self with your Scheme wherein you pretend to make forsooth an ocular Demonstration of what you undertook to prove whereas indeed it is as trivial a fancy as a man can ordinarily meet withal For 1. Neither the Law nor Prelates nor Presbyterians ascribe any place at all unto the Kings Majesty in the Series of Spiritual Order he is neither Bishop nor Minister nor Deacon or any way authorized by Christ to convey or communicate power meerly spiritual unto any others No such thing is claimed by our Kings or declared in Law or asserted by Protestants of any sort But in the series of exteriour Government both Prelate Protestants and Presbyterians assign a Supremacy over all Persons in his Dominions and that in all Causes that are inquirable and determinable by or in any Court exercising Jurisdiction and Authority unto his Majesty All sorts assign unto him the Supreme place under Christ in external Government and Jurisdiction None assign him any place in Spiritual Order and meerly Spiritual Power Secondly If you place Bishops on the Series of exterior Government as appointed by the King and confirmed by the Law of the Land there is yet no difference with respect unto them 3. The Question then is solely about the Series of Spiritual order and thereabout it is confessed there are various apprehensions of Protestants which is all you prove and so do magno conatu nugas agere who knows it not I wish there were any need to prove it But Sir this difference about the Superiority of Bishops to Presbyters or their equality or Identity was agitated in the Church many and many a hundred year before you or I were born and will be so probably when we are both dead and forgotten So that what it makes in this dispute is very hard for a sober man to conjecture 4. Who they are that pretend to exalt Christ by a meer asserting Ministers not to be by his institution subject to Bishops which you call a cheat I know not nor shall be their advocate they exalt Christ who love him and keep his Commandments and no other 2. You may also as easily discern the frivolousness of your exclamation against Protestants for not giving up their differences in Religion to the Vmpirage of Kings upon the assignment of that Supremacy unto them which hath been declared When we make the King such an Head of the Catholick Church as you make the Pope we shall seek unto him as the fountain of our faith as you pretend to do unto the Pope For the present we give that honour to none but Christ himself and for what we assign in profession unto the King we answer it wholly in our practical submission Protestants never thought nor said that any King was appointed by Christ to be supreme infallible Proposer of all things to be believed and done in the Worship of God no King ever assumed that power unto himself It is Jesus Christ alone who is the Supreme and absolute Lawgiver of his Church the Author and finisher of our Faith and it is the honour of Kings to serve him in the promotion of his Interest by the exercise of that Authority and duty which we have before declared What unto the dethroning and dishonour as much as in you lyeth of Christ himself and of Kings also you assign unto the Pope in making him the Supreme head and fountain of their faith hath been already considered This is the substance of what you except against Protestants either as to Opinion or Practice in this matter of deference unto Kingly Authority in things Ecclesiastical What is the sense of your Church which you prefer unto your sentiments herein I shall after I have a little examined your present pretensions manifest unto you seeing you will have it so from those who are full well able to inform us of it Fas mihi Pontificum sacrata resolvere jura atque omnia ferre sub auras â—Siqua tegunt tenear Romaenec ligebus ullis For your own part you have expressed you seâ—f in this matter so loosely generally and ambiguously that it is very hard for any man to collect from your words what it is that you assert or what you deny I shall endeavour to draw out your sense by a few enâ—quiries As 1. Do you think the King hath any An â—ority vested in him as King in Ecclesiastical affairs and over Ecclesiastical Persons You tell us That Catholicks observe the King in all things as well Eeclesiastick as Civil pag. 59. that in the line of Corporal power and Authority the King is immediately under God p. 61. with other words to the same purpose if they are to any purpose at all
nature and causes of things here below though they know well enough that there was never any agreement amongst the wisest and severest that at any time have been engaged in that disquisition nor is it likely that ever there will be so And herein they can countenance themselves with the difficulty obscurity and importance of the things inquired after But as for the high and heavenly mysteries of the Gospel the least whereof is infinitely of more importance then any thing that the utmost reach and comprehension of humane wisdom can attain unto they may be neglected and despised because there are contentions about them Hic nigrae succus loliginis haec est Erugo mera The truth is this is so far from any real ground for any such conclusion that it were utterly impossible that any man should believe the truth of Christian Religion if he had not seen or might not be informed that such contention and differences had ensued in and about it for that they should do so is plainly and frequently foretold in those sacred oracles of it whereof if any one be found to fail the veracity and authority of the whole may justly be called into question If therefore men will have a religion so absolutely facile aud easie that without diligence endeavour pains or enquiry without laying out of their rational abilities or exercising the faculties of their souls about it without foregoing of their lusts and pleasures without care of mistakes and miscarriages they may be securely wrapt up in it as it were whither they will or no I confess they must seek for some other where they can find it Christianity will yield them no relief God hath not proposed an acquaintance with the blessed concernments of his Glory and of their own eternal condition unto the sons of men on any such terms as that they should not need with all diligence to employ and exercise their faculties of their souls in the investigation of them in the use of the means by him appointed for that purpose seeing this is the chiefest end for which he hath made us those souls And as for them who in sincerity give up their minds and consciences unto his Authority and guidance he hath not left them without an infallible dâ—rection for such a discharge of their own duty as is sufficient to guide and lead them in the middest of all differences divisions and oppositions unto rest with himself and the difficulties which are cast upon any in their enquiring after truth by the errour and deviation of other men from it are all sufficiently recompenced unto them by the excellency and sweetness which they find in the truth it self when sought out with diligence according to the mind of Christ. And one said not amiss of old 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I dare say he is the wisest Christian who hath most diligently conâ—idered the various differences that are in and about Christianity as being built in the knowledge of the truth upon the best and most stable foundations To this end hath the Lord Jesus given us his holy word a perfect and sure Revelation of all that he would have us to believe or do in the worship of God This he commands us diligently to attend unto to study seach and enquire after that we may know his mind and do it It is true in their enquiry into it various apprehensions concerning the sense and meaning of sundry things revealed therein have befallen some men in all ages and Origen gives this as one occasion of the differences that were in those dayes amongst Christians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lib. 3. Con. Celâ— 1. When many were converted unto Christianity some of them variously understanding the holy Scripture which they joyntly believed it came to pass that heresie ensued For this was the whole rule of faith unity in those dayes the means for securing of us in them imposed on us of late by the Romanists was then not heard of not thought of in the world But moreover to obviate all danger that might in this matter ensue from the manifold weakness of our minds in apprehending spiritual things the Lord Jesus hath promised his holy spirit unto all them that believe in him and ask it of him to prevent their mistakes and miscarriages in the study of his word and to lead them into all that truth the knowledge whereof is necessary that they may believe in him unto the end and live unto him And if they who diligently and conscientiously without prejudices corrupt ends or designs in obedience to the command of Christ shall enquire into the Scriptures to receive from thence the whole object of their faith and rule of their obedience and who believing his promise shall pray for his Spirit and wait to receive him in and by the means appointed for that end may not be and are not thereby secured from all such mistakes and errours as may disinterest them in the promises of the Gospel I know not how we may be brought unto any certainty or assurance in the Truths of God or the everlasting consolation of our own souls Neither indeed is the nature of man capable of any further satisfaction in or about these things unless God should work continual miracles or give continually special revelations unto all individuals whch would utterly overthrow the whole nature of that faith and obedience which he requires at our hands But once to suppose that such persons through a defect of the means appointed by Christ for the instruction and direction before mentioned may everlastingly miscarry is to cast an unspeakable reproach on the goodness grace and faithfulness of God and enough to discourage all men from enquiring after the truth And these things the Reader will find further cleared in the ensuing discourse with a discovery of the weakness falseness and insufficiency of those rules and reliefs which are tendred unto us by the Romanists in the lieu of them that are given us by God himself Now if this be the condition of things in Christian Religion as to any one that hath with sincerity consulted the Scripture or considered the Goodness Grace and Wisdom of God it must needs appear to be it is manifest that mens startling at it or being offended upon the account of divisions and differences among them that make profession thereof is nothing but a pretence to cloke and hide their sloth and supine negligence with their unwillingness to come up unto the indispensable condition of learning the truth as it is in Jesus namely obedience unto his whole will and all his commands so far as he is pleased to reveal them unto us With others they are but incentives unto that diligence and watchfulness which the things themselves in their nature high and arduous and in their importance of everlasting moment require at your hands Further on those who by the means formentioned come to the knowledge of the truth it is incumbent according as they are
they seek to promote what can rationally be concluded but that they not only disbelieve themselves what they outwardly profess but also esteem it a fit mask and cover to carry on other interests of their own which they prefer before it and what can more evidently tend unto its disreputation and disadvantage is not easie to conceive Such is the course here fixed on by you It is the Religion of Christ you pretend to plead for and to promote but if there be a word true in it the way you take for that end namely by openly false accusations is to be abhorred which manifests what regard unto it you inwardly cherish And I wish this were only your personall miscarriage that you were not encouraged unto it by the Principles and Example of your chiefest Masters and Leaders The learned Person who wrote the Letters discovering the Mystery of Jesuitisme gives us just cause so to conceive for he doth not only prove that the Jesuits have publickly maintained that Calumny is but a veniall sin nay none at all if used against such as you call Calumniators though grounded on absolute falsities but hath also given us such pestilent instances of their practice according to that Principle as Paganisme was never acquainted withall Lett. 15. In their steps you set out in this your first Reason wherein there is not one word of truth I had formerly told you that I did not think you could your self believe some of the things that you affirmed at which you take great offence but I must now tell you that if you proceed in venting such notorious untruths as here you have heaped together I shall greatly question whether seriously you believe that Jesus Christ will one day judge the world in righteousness For I do not think you can produce a pleadable dispensation to say what you please be it nere so false of a supposed Heretick for though it may be you will not keep faith with him surely you ought to observe truth in speaking of him You tell us in your Epistle to your Fiat of your dark obscuirity wherein you dye daily but take heed S r least Indulgentem tenebris imaeque recessis Sedis in aspectos Caelo radiisque Penates Servantem tamen assiduis circumvolet alis Saevadies animi scelerúmque in pectore dirae Your next Reason is Because he talks of Swords and Blood Fire and Fagot Guns and Duggers which doth more than show that he hath not let go those hot and furious imaginations But of what sort by whom used to what end Doth he mention any of these but such as your Church hath made use of for the destruction of Protestants If you have not done so why do you not disprove his Assertions If you have why have you practised that in the face of the Sun which you cannot endure to be told of Is it equall think you that you should kill burn and destroy men for the profession of their faith in Christ Jesus and that it should not be lawfull for others to say you do so Did not your self make the calling over of these things necessary by crying out against Protestants for want of moderation It is one of the priviledges of the Pope some say to judge all men and himself to be judged by none but is it so also that no man may say he hath done what all the world knows he hath done and which we have just cause to fear he would do again had he power to his will For my part I can assure you so that you will cease from charging others with that whose guilt lyes heavier upon your selves than on all the professors of Christianity in the world besides and give any tolerable security against the like practices for the future I shall be well content that all which is past may be put by us poor worms into perpetuall oblivion though I know it will be called over another day Untill this be done and you leave off to make your advantages of other mens miscarriages pray arm your selves with patience to hear sometimes a little of your own 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said wise Homer of old and another to the same purpose He that speaks what he will must hear what he would not Is it actionable with you against a Protestant that he will not take your whole Sword into his bowels without complaining S r the Author of the Animadversions doth and ever did abhorre Swords and Guns and Crusadoes in matters of Religion and Conscience with all violence that may tantamount unto their usuall effects He ever thought it an uncouth sight to see men marching with Crosses on their backs to destroy Christians as if they had the Alcoran in their hearts and therefore desires your excuse if he have reflected a little upon the miscarriages of your Church in that kind especially being called thereunto by your present contrary pretences Quis tulerit Graculos de seditione querentes and Major tandem porcas insane minori It were well if your wayes did no more please you in the previous prospect you take of them than they seem to do in a subsequent reflection upon them But this is the nature of evil it never comes and goes with the same appearing countenance not that it self changeth at any time for that which is morally evil is alwayes so but mens apprehensions variously influenced by their affections lusts and interests do frequently change and alter Now what Conclusion can be made from the premises rightly stated I leave to your own judgement at your better leasure Thirdly You adde Your prophetick assurance so often inculcated that if you could but once come to whisper me in the ear I would plainly acknowledge either that I understand not my self what I say or if I do believe it not gives a fair character of these fanatick times wherein ignorance and hypocrisie prevail'd over worth and truth whereof if your self were any part it is no wonder you should think that I or any man else should either speak he knows not what or believe not what himself speaks That is a man must needs be as bad as you can imagine him if he have not such an high opinion of your ability and integrity as to believe that you have written about nothing but what you perfectly understand nor assert anything in the persuit of your design and interest but what you really and in cold blood believe to be true All men it seems that were no part of the former dismall tempest have this opinion of you Credat Apella If it be so I confess for my part I have no relief against being concluded to be whatever you please Sosia or not Sosia the Law is in your own hands and you may condemn all that adore you not into Fanaticisme at your pleasure but as he said Obsecro per pacem liceat te alloqui ut ne vapulem if you will but grant a little truce from this severity I doubt not but
they never opposed the Merit of Good works as you fain me to say in your Epistle neither the one nor the other but I say that Protestants teach the Christian Doctrine of Good works as revealed in the Gospell and oppose the Merit of Good works by you invented and as by you explained and now avowed And whilest you talk at this rate as if you were perfectly innocent you begin your story as if you had nothing to do but to accuse another of fraud like him that cried Nec si me miserum fortuna Sinonem Finxit vanum etiam mendacemque improba fingit when you know what his business was But the truth is when you talk of the merit of Good works you stand in a slippery place and know not well what you would have nor what it is that you would have me believe Your Tridentine Convention hath indeed provided a limber Cothurnus to fit if it were possible your severall statures and postures But generall words are nothing but the proportion of a Cirque or Arena for Dogmatists to contend within the limits of The Antient Ecclesiasticall importance of the word Merit wherein as it may be proved by numberless instances it denoted no more than to obtain you have the most of you rejected and do urge it in a strict Legall sense denoting working for a reward and performing that which is proportionable unto it as the labour of the Hireling is to his wages according unto the strict Rules of Justice See your Rhem. An. 1 Cor. 3. Heb. 6. 10. So is the judgment I think of your Church explained by Suarez Tom. 1. in Thom. 3. d. 41. A Supernaturall work saith he proceeding from Grace in its self and in its own nature hath a proportion unto and condignity of the reward and 〈◊〉 of sufficient value to be worth the same And you seem to be of the same opinion in owning that description of Merit which Protestants reject which I gave in my Animadversions namely an intrinsecall worth and value in works arising from the exact answerableness unto the Law and proportion unto the reward so as on the Rules of Justice to deserve it Of the same mind are most of you See Andrad Orthodox Explic. lib. 6. Bagus de Merit Op. Lib. 1. cap. 9. Though I can assure you Paul was not Rom. 6. 23. Ch. 8. 18. so that you must not take it ill If Protestants oppose this Doctrine with Testimonies out of his Epistle to the Romanes as well as out of many other portions of the holy Writ for they look upon it as an opinion perfectly destructive of the Covenant of Grace Nay I must tell you that some of your own Church and way love not to talk at this high and lofty rate Ferus speaks plain unto you on Mat. 20. If you desire to hold the Grace and favour of God make no mention of your own merits Durand slicks not to call the opinion which you seem to espouse temerarious yea blasphemous Quest. 2. d. 27. In the explication of your distinction of congruity and condignity how wofully are you divided as also in the application of it there is no end of your altercations about it the termes of it being horrid uncouth strangers to Scripture and the antient Church of an arbitrary signification about which men may with probabilities contend to the worlds end and yet the very soul and life of your Doctrine of Merit lies in it Some ascribe Merit of Congruity to works before Grace and of Condignity to them done in a state of Grace some Merit of Congruity to them done by Grace and Merit of Condignity they utterly exclude Some give Grace and the Promise a place in Merit some so explain it that they can have no place at all therein Generally in your Books of Devotion when you have to do with God you begin to bethink your selves and speak much more humbly and modestly than you do when you endeavour to dispute subtilly and quell your Adversaries And I am not without hope that many of you do personally believe as to your own particular concernments far better than when you doctrinally express your selves when you contend with us As when that famous Emperour Charles the fist after all his bustles in and about Religion came to die in his retirement he expresly renounced all merit of works as a proud sigment and gave up himself to the sole Grace and Mercy of God in Jesus Christ on whose purchase of Heaven for him he alone relied Toto pectori in Deum revolutus sic ratiocinabatur saith the renowned Thuanus Hist. lib. 21. se quidem indignum esse qui propriis meritis regnum Caelorum obtineret sed Dominum Deum suum qui illud duplici jure obtinuit patris haereditate passionis merito altero contentum esse alterum sibi donare ex cujus dono illud sibi merito vindicet hacque fiducia fretus minime confundatur neque enim oleum misericordiae nisi in vase fiducia poni hanc homines fiducium esse à se deficientis innitentis Domino suo alioqui propriis meritis fidere non fidei esse sed perfidiae peccata remitti per Dei indulgentiam ideoque credere nos debere peccata deleri non posse nisi ab eo cuisoli peccavimus in quem peccatum non cadit per quem solum nobis peccata condonantur Words worthy of a lasting memory which they will not fail of where they are recorded Casting himself saith that excellent Historian with his whole soul upon God he thus reasoned That for his part he was on the account of any merits of his own unworthy to obtain the Kingdom nf Heaven but his Lord and God who hath a double right unto it one by inheritance of his Father the other by the merit of his own passion contented himself with the one granted the other unto him by whose grant he rightly or deservedly laid claim thereunto and resting in this faith or confidence he was not confounded for the oyl of mercy is not powred but into the vessel of faith this is the faith or confidence of a man fainting or despairing in himself and resting on his Lord and otherwise to trust to our own merits is not an act of faith but of infidelity or perfidiousness that sins are forgiven by the mercy of God and that therefore we ought to believe that sins cannot be blotted out or forgiven but by him against whom we have sinned who sinneth not and by whom alone our sins are pardoned This S r is the faith of Protestants in reference unto the merit of works which that Wise and Mighty Emperour after all his Military actings against them found the only safe Anchor for his soul in extremis his only relief against crying out with Hadrian Animula vagula blandula Hospes comesque corporis Quae nunc abibis in loca Pallidula frigida nudula Nec ut soles dabis jocos The only
man will swallow amongst them that which is destitute of all Probability but what is included in the evidence given unto it by Divine Revelation which is not yet pleaded unto him It may be then you will work Miracles to confirm your Assertions Let us see them For although very many things are requisite to manifest any works of wonder that may be wrought in the world to be reall Miracles and good Caution be required to judge unto what end Miracles are wrought yet if we may have any tolerable evidence of your working Miracles in Confirmation of this Assertion that you are the true and only Church of God with the other Inferences depending thereon which we are in the Consideration of you will find us very easie to be treated withall But herein also you fail You have then no way to deal with such a man as we first supposed but as you do with us and produce Testimonies of Scripture to prove and confirm the Authority of your Church and then you will quickly find where you are and what snares you have cast your selves into Will not a man who hears you proving the Authority of your Church by the Scripture ask you And whence hath this Scripture its Authority yea that is supposed to be the thing in Question which denying unto it an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you yet produce to confirm the Authority of that by whose Authority alone its self is evidenced to have any Authority at all Rest in the Authority of God manifesting its self in the Scripture witnessed unto by the Catholick Tradition of all Ages you will not But you will prove the Scripture to be the Word of God by the Testimony of your Church and you will prove your Châ—â—â—h to be enabled sufficiently to testifie the Scriptures to be of God by the Testimonies of the Scripture Would you knew where to begin and where to end But you are indeed in a Circle which hath neither beginning nor ending I know not when we shall be enabled to say Inventus Chrysippe tui finitor acervi Now do you think it reasonable that we should leave our stable and immoveable firm foundations to run round with you in this endless Circle untill through giddiness we fall into Unbelief or Atheism This is that which I told you before you must either acknowledge our Principle in this matter to be firm and certain or open a door to Atheism and the Contempt of Christian Religion seeing you are not able to substitute and thing in the room thereof that is able to bear the weight that must be laid upon it if we believe For how should you do so shall man be like unto God or equall unto him The Testimony we rest in is Divine fortified from all Objections by the strongest humane Testimony possible namely Catholick Tradition That which you would supply us with is meerly Humane and no more And 4. your Importunity in opposing this Principle is so much the more marvellous unto us because therein you openly oppose your selves to express Testimonies of Scripture and the full Suffrage of the Ancient Church I wish you would a little weigh what is affirmed 2 Pet. 1. 19 20. Psal. 119. 152. Joh. 5. 34 35 36 39. 1 Thess. 2. 13. Act. 17. 11. 1 Joh. 5. 6 10. 1 Joh. 2. 20. Heb. 11. 1 Tim. 1. 15. Act. 26. 22. And will you take with you the consent of the Ancients Clemens Alexand. Strom. 7. speaks fully to our purpose as he doth also lib. 4. where he plainly affirms that the Church proved the Scripture by its selfâ— and other things as the Unity of the Deity by the Scripture But his own words in the former place are worth the recital 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the beginning of Faith or Principle of what we teach we have the Lord who in sundry manners and by divers parts by the Prophets Gospel and holy Apostles leads us to knowledge And if any one suppose that a Principle stands in need of another to prove it he destroys the nature of a Principle or it is no longer preserved a Principle This is that we say The Scripture the Old and New Testament is the Principle of our Faith This is proved by its self to be of the Lord who is its Author and if we cause it to depend on any thing else it is no longer the Principle of our Faith and Profession And a little after where he hath shewed that a Principle ought not to be disputed nor to be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of any debate he addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is meet then that receiving by Faith the most absolute Principle without other demonstration and taking demonstrations of the Principle from the Principle its self that we be instructed by the voice of the Lord unto the knowledge of the Truth That is we believe the Scripture for its own sake and the Testimony that God gives unto it in it and by it and do prove every thing else by it and so are confirmed in the faith or knowledge of the Truth So he further explains himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For we do not simply or absolutely attend or give heed unto men determining or defining against whom it is equall that we may define or declare our judgements So it is whilest the Authority of man or men any Society of men in the world is pleaded the Authority of others may be as good reason be objected against it as whilest you plead your Church and its definitions others may on as good grounds oppose theirs unto you therein And therefore Clemens proceeds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For if it be not sufficient meerly to declare or assert that which appears to be truth but also to make that Credible or fit to be believed which is spoken we seek not after the Testimony that is given by men but we confirm that which is proposed or enquired about with the voice of the Lord which is more full than any demonstration or rather is its self the only demonstration according to the knowledge whereof they that have tasted of the Scriptures are believers Into the voice the Word of God alone the Church then resolved their Faith this only they built upon acknowledging all humane Testimony to be too weak and infirm to be made a foundation for it And this voice of God in the Scripture evidencing its self so to be is the only Demonstration of Faith which they rested in whereupon a little after he addes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so wee having perfect Demonstrations out of the Scriptures are by Faith demonstratively assured or perswaded of the Truth of the things proposed This was the Profession of the Church of old this the resolution of their faith This is that which Protestants in this Case adhere unto They proved the Scripture to be from God as he elswhere speaks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as
satisfaction the things which they do believe and let men be esteemed to beleive and to have attained degrees in the faith according as they are taught of God with an allowance for every ones measure of means light grace gifts which are not things in our own Power and we shall be nearer unto quietness than most men imagine When Christians had any unity is the world the Bible alone was thought to contain their Religion and every one endeavoured to learn the mind of God out of it both by their own endeavours and as they were instructed therein by their guides neither did they pursue this work with any other end but only that they might be strengthened in their faith and hope and learn to serve God and obey him that so they might come to the blessed enjoyment of him Nor will there ever I fear be again any Unity among them untill things are reduced to the same state and condition But among all the vanities that the minds of men are exercised with in this world there is none to be compared unto that of their hoping and endeavouring to bring all Persons that profess the Religion of Jesus Christ to acquiesce in the same opinions about all particulars which are any way determined to belong thereunto especially considering how endlesly they are multiplied and branched into instances such for ought appears the first Churches took little or no notice of nay neither knew nor understood any thing of them in the sense and termes wherin they are now proposed as a tessera of Communion among Christians In a word leave Christian Religion unto its primitive Liberty wherein it was beleived to be revealed of God and that Revelation of it to be contained in the Scripture which men searched and studied to become themselves and to teach others to be wise in the knowledg of God and living unto him and the most of the Contests that are in the world will quickly vanish and disappear But whilest every one hath a Confession a Way a Church and its Authority which must be imposed on all others or else he cryes to his nearest relations Lupis agnis quanta sortito obtigit Tecum mihi discordia est We may look for peace Moderation and Vnity when we are here no more and not sooner So that III. If those Theologicall Determinations that make up at this day amongst some men the greatest part of those Assertions Positions or Propositions which are called Articles of Faith or Truth which are not delivered in the words that the Spirit of God teacheth but in termes of Art and in Answer unto Rules and Notions which the world might happily without any great disadvantage been unacquainted withall unto this day had not Aristotle found them out or stumbled on them might be eliminated from the City of God and Communion of Christians and left for men to exercise their wits about who have nothing else to do and the Doctrine of Truth which is according unto Godliness left unto that Noble Heavenly Spirituall generous amplitude wherein it was delivered in the Scripture and beleived in the first Churches innumerable Causes of strife and Contentions would be taken away but ferri video meà gaudia ventis small hopes have I to see any such impression and consent to besall the minds of concerned men and yet I must confess I have not one jot more of the reuniting the Disciples of Christ in love and concord But most men that profess any thing of Divinity have learned it as an Art or humane Science out of the road compass and track where of they know nothing of the mind of God nay many scarce know the things in themselves and as they are to be believed which they are passing skilfull in as they are expressed in their arbitrary termes of Art which none almost understand but themselves And is it likely that such men who are not a few in the world will let go their skill and knowledge and with them their repntation and advantage and to sacrifice them all to the peace and agreement that we are seeking after Some learn their Divinity out of the late and Modern Schools both in the Reformed and Papall Church in both which a Science is proposed under that name consisting in a farrago of Credible Propositions asserted in termes suited unto that Philosophy that is variously predominant in them What a kind of Theology this hath praduced in the Papacy Agricola Erasmus Vives Jansenius with innumerable other Learned men of your own have sufficiently declared And that it hath any better success in the Reformed Churches many things which I shall not now instance in give me cause to doubt Some boast themselves to learn their Divinity from the Fathers and say they depart not from their sense and idiome of expression in what they beleive and profess But we find by experience that what for want of wisedom and judgement in themselves what for such reasons taken from the writings which they make their Oracles which I shall not insist upon much of the Divinity of some of these men consists in that which to avoid provocation I shall not express Whilest men are thus preing aged it will be very hard to prevail with them to think that the greatest part of their Divinity is such that Christian Religion either as to the matter or at least as to that mode wherein alone they have imbibed it is little or not at all concerned in nor will it be easie to perswade them that it is a Mystery layed up in the Scripture and all true Divinity a Wisedom in the Knowledg of that Mystery and skill to live unto God accordingly without which as I said before we shall have no Peace or agreement in this world Nobis curiositate opus non est post Jesum Christum nec inquisitione post Evangelium sayes Tertullian Curiosity after the Doctrine of Christ and Philosophicall inquisitions in Religion after the Gospel belongs not unto us As we are IV. It were well if Christians would but seriously consider what and how many things they are wherein their present Apprehensions of the mind and will of God do center and agree I mean as to the substance of them their nature and importance and how far they will lead men in the wayes of pleasing God and coming to the enjoyment of him Were not an endeavour to this purpose impeded by many mens importunate cryes of all or none as good nothing at all as not every thing and that in this or that way mode or fashion it might not a litlle conduce to the Peaâ—e of Christendom And I must acknowledg unto you that I think it is prejudice Carnall interest love of Power and present enjoyments with other Secular Advantages joyned with Pride Self-will and contempt of others that keep the professours of Christianity from conspiring to improve this Consideration But God help us we are all for Partyes and our own exact being in the right and therein
the last part and express no more but the Pope is a good man and seeks nothing but our good and therein aim at a double advantage unto your self First That you may with some colour of Truth though really without it deny the Assertion to be yours when as the latter part of it which upon the matter is that which gives the sence and determines the meaning of the whole is expresly contended for by you and that frequently and at large Secondly That you may vent an empty Cavill against that expression seeks nothing but our good whereas had you added the next words and never did us harm every one would have perceived in what sense the former were spoken and so have prevented the frivolous exception Your words are This also I nowhere aver for I never saw him nor have any such acquaintance with him as to know whither he be a good man or no though in charity I do not use to judge hardly of any body much less could say that he whom I know to have a general sollicitude for all Churches seeks nothing but our good Sir if I had pondered my words in Fiat Lux no better then you heed yours in your Animadversions upon it they might even go together both of them to lay up Pepper and Spices or some yet more vile employment For what you have said of the Pope I desire the Reader to consult your Paragraph so entitled and if he find not that you have said ten times more in the commendation of him then I intimated in the words layed down for your Principle I am content to be esteemed to have done you wrong You have indeed not only set him out as a good man but have made him much more then a man and have ascribed that unto him which is not lawful to be ascribed unto any man whatever Some of your Expressions I have again reminded you of and many others of the same nature might be instanced in and what you can say more of him then you have done unless you would exalt him above all that is called God and worshipped unless you should set him in the Temple of God and shew him that he is God I know not Let the Reader if he please consult your expressions where you have placed them I shall stain Paper with them no more And you do but trifle with us when you tell us that you know not the Pope nor have any such acquaintance with him as to know whether he be a good men or no As though your personal acquaintance with this or that Pope belonged at all to our question Although I must needs say that it seems very strange unto me that you should hang the weight of Religion and the salvation of your own soul upon one of whom you know not so much as whither he be a good man or no. For my part I am perswaded there is no such hardship in Christian Religion as that we should be bound to believe that all the safety of our Faith and Salvation depends on a man and he such an one as concerning whâ—m we know not whither he be a good man or no. The Apostle layes the foundation of our hope in better ground Heb. 1. 1 2 3. And yet what ever opinion you may have of your present Pope you are forced to be at this indifferency about his honesty because you are not able to deny but that very many of his Predecessors on whose shoulders the weight of all your Religion lay no less then you suppose it doth on his who now swayes the Papal Scepter were very brutes so far from being good men as that they may be reckoned amongst the worst in the world Protestants as I said are perswaded that their faith is laid up in better hands With the latter part of my words as by you set down you play sophistically that you might say something to them as to my knowledge I never observed any man so hard put to it to say somewhat were it right or wrong which seems to be the utmost of your design You feign the sense of my words to be that the Pope doth no other thing in the world but seek our good and confute me by saying that he hath a general sollicitude for all Churches But Sir I said nor be doth nothing but seek our good but only he seâ—ks nothing but our good and never did us harm And you may quickly see how causelesly you tall into a contemplation of your accuracy in your Fiâ—t and 〈…〉 loosness of my expressions in the 〈…〉 For although I acknowledge that 〈…〉 heen written in greater haste then 〈◊〉 judgements of learned men might well 〈◊〉 as is also this return unto your Epistle 〈…〉 of them proportioned rather unto the merit of your Discourse then that of the Cause in agitation between us yet I cannot see that you or any 〈◊〉 else hath any just cause to except against this expression of my intention which yet is the only one that in that kind falls under your censure For whereas I say that the Pope seeks nothing but our good and that he never did us harm would any man living but your self understand these words any otherwise but with reference unto them of whom I spake that is as to us he seeks nothing but our good whatever he doth in the world besides And is it not a wild interpretation that you make of my words whilest you suppose me to intimate that absolutely the Pope doth nothing in the world or hath no other business at all that he concerns himself in but only the seeking of our good in particular If you cannot allow the books that you read the common Civility of interpreting things indefinitely expressed in them with the limitations that the subject matter whereof they treat requires you had better employ your time in any thing then study as being not able to understand many lines in any Author you shall read Nor are such expressions to be avoided in our common discourse If a man talking of your Fiat should say that you do nothing but seek the good of your Countreymen would you interpret his words as though he denyed that you say Mass and hear Confessions or to intimate that you do nothing but write Fiats and you know with whom lies both jus norma loquendi The tenth and last Principle is That the Devotion of Catholicks far transcends that of Protestants so you now express it what you mention being but one part of three that the Animadversions speak unto Hereunto you reply But Sir I never made in Fiat Lux any Comparisons between your Devotions nor can I say how much the one is or how little the other but you are the maddest Commentator that I have ever seen you first make the Text and then Animadversions upon it Pray Sir have a little patience and learn from this instance not to be too confident upon your memory for the future I shall
what you had to say that in the Animadversions after the discovery of the falsity of the Assertions that it arose from I suffered your supposition to pass and shewed you the weakness of your Inference upon it And the reason of my so doing was this that because though the Papists brought not the Gopel first into England yet I do not judge it impossible but that they may be the means of communicating it unto some other place or People and I would be loth to grant that they who receive it from them must either alwayes embrace their Popery or renounce the Gospel I confess a great intanglement would be put on the thoughts and minds of such Persons by the Principle of the Infallibility of them that sent your Teachers whereinto it may be also they would labour to resolve your belief But yet if withal you shall communicate unto them the Gospel its self as the great Repository of the Mysteries of that Religion wherein your instruct them there is a sufficient foundation laid for their reception of Christianity and the rejection of your Popery For when once the Gospel hath evidenced its self unto their consciences that it is from God as it will do if it be received unto any benefit or advantage at all they will or may easily discern that those who brought it unto them were themselves in many things deceived in their apprehensions of the mind of God therein revealed especially as to your pretence of the Infallibility of any man or men any further then his conceptions agree with what is revealed in that Gospel which they have received and now for its own sake believe to be from God And once to imagine that when the Scripture is received by faith and hath brought the soul into subjection to the Authority of God exerting it self in it and by it that it will not warrant them in the rejection of any respect unto men whatever is to err not knowing the Scripture nor the Power of God In this condition of things men will bless God for any means which he was pleased to use in the communicating the Gospel unto them and if those who were employed in that work shall persist in obtruding upon their faith and worship things that are not revealed they will quickly discover such a contradiction in their Principles as that it is utterly impossible that they should rationally assent unto and embrace them all but either they must renounce the Gospel which they have brought them or reject those other Principles which they would impose upon them that are contrary thereunto And whither of those they will do upon a supposition that the Gospel hath now obtained that Authority over their consciences and minds which it claims in and over all that receive it it is no hard matter to determine Men then who have themselves mixed the Doctrine of the Gospel with many abominable errors of their own may in the Providence of God be made instrumental to convey the Gospel unto others At the first tender of it they may for the Truths sake which they are convinced of receive also the errors that are tendered unto them as being as yet not able to discern the chaff from the wheat But when once the Gospel is rooted in their minds and they begin to have their senses exercised therein to discern between good and evil and their faith of the Truth they receive is resolved into the Authority of God himself the Author of the Gospel they have their warrant for the rejection of the Errors which they had before imbibed according as they shall be discovered unto them For though they may first consider the Gospel on the proposition of them that first bring them the tidings of it as the Samaritans came to our Saviour upon the information of the woman yet when they come to experience themselves its power efficacy they believe it for its own sake as those did also in our Lord Jesus Christ upon his own account when this is done they will be enabled to distinguish as the Prophet speaks between a dream and a prophecy between chaff and wheat between error and Truth And thus if we should grant that the first News of Christianity was brought into England by Papists yet it doth not at all follow that if we reject Popery we must also reject the Gospel or esteem it a Romance For if we should have received Popery we should have received it only upon the credit and Authority of them that brought it but the Truth of Christianity we should have received on the Authority of the Gospel which was brought unto us So that our entertainment of Popery and Christianity standing not on the same bottom or foot of account we might well reject the one and retain the other But this consideration as to us is needless they were not Papists which brought Christianity first into this Land Wherefore well knowing that the whole strength of their reasoning depends on the supposition that they were so you proceed to confirm it in your manner that is by saying it over again But we will hear you speaking your own words We had not our Christianity immediately from the East nor from Joseph of Arimatheâ— we Englishmen had not For as he delivered his Christianity unto some Britans when our Land was not called England but Albion or Brittany and the inhabitants were not Englishmen but Britans or Kimbrians so likewise did that Christianity and the whole news of it quite vanish being suddenly overwhelmed by the entient deluge of Paganism nor did it ever come from them to us nay the Brittans themselves had so forgot and lost it that they also needed a second Conversion which they received from Pove Eleutherius And that was the only news of Christianity which prequiled and lasted even amongst the very Britans which seems to me a great seeret of Divine Providence in planting and governing his Church as if he would have nothing to stand firm and lasting but what was immediately fixed by and seated upon that Rock for all other conversions have variety and the very seats of the other Apostles failed that all might the better cement in the unity of one head Nay the Tables which God wrote with his own hand were broken but the other written by Moses remained that we might learn to give a due respect unto him whom God hath set over us as our Head and Ruler under him and none exalt himself against him I know you will laugh at this my Observation but I cannot but tell you what I think Where I speak then of the news of Christianity first brought to this Land I mean not that which was first brought upon the earth or soyle of this Land and spoken to any body then dwelling here but which was delivered to the forefathers of the now present Inhabitants who were Saxons or English men And I say that we the now present Inhabitants of England off spring of the Saxons
needs no other inducement to reject his Person for he hath done it already in the rejection of his Law but yet it may not be granted though it belong not unto our present discourse that every one that rejects any part of the Law of Christ must therefore be in a propensity to reject Christ himself provided that he do it only because he doth not believe it to be any part of his Law For whilest a man abides firm and constant in his faith in Christ and love unto him with a resolution to submit himself to his whole Word Law and Institutions his misapprehensions of this or that particular in them is no impeachment of his faith or Love Of the same importance is that which you add namely Did not the Jews by pretence of their love to the immortal God whom their forefathers served reject the whole Gospel at once and why may not we possibly by piece meale You do only cavil at the expression I used of doing the thing mentioned for the love of Christ but I used it not alone as knowing how casie a thing it was to pretend it and how unwarrantable a ground of any actings in Religion such a pretence would prove whereâ—ore I added unto it his Commission that is his Word And so I desire to know of you whither the Jews out of love to God and by the direrection of his word did reject the Gospel or no. This you must assert if you intend by this instance to oppose my assertion Besides indeed the Jews did scarce pretend to reject the Gospel out of love to God but to their old Church-State and Traditions on which very account your selves at this day reject many important truths of it But it is one thing vainly to pretend the Love of God another so to love him indeed as to keep his Commandments and in â—o doing to cleave unto the Truth and to reject that which is contrary thereunto You add as the issue of these enquiries Let us leave cavils grant my supposition which you cannot deny then speak to my Consequence which I deem most strong and good to inter a Conclusion which neither you nor I can grant Answ. I wish you had thought before of leaving Cavils that we might have been eased of the consideration of the foregoing Queries which are nothing else and those very trivial Your supposition which is that Papists first brought the Gospel into England you say I cannot deny but Sir I do deny it and challenge you or any man in the world to make it good or to give any colour of Truth unto it Then your Consequence you say you deem strong and good I doubt not but you do so so did Suffenus of his Poems but another was not of the same mind who says of him Qui modo scurra Aut si quid hâ—c re tritius or hoc re tritius videbatur Idem inficeto est inficetior rure Simul poeâ—ata attigit neque idem unquam Aeque est beatus ac poema cum scribit Tam gaudâ—t in se temque se ipse miratur You may for ought I know have a good faculty at some other things but you very unhappily please your self in drawing of Consequences which for the most part are very infirm and naught as in particular I have abundantly manifested that to be which you now speak of But you conclude I tell you plainly and without tergiversation before God and all his holy Angels what I should think if I descended unto any Conclusion in this affair And it is this Either the Papist who holds at this day all these Articles of faith which were delivered at the first Conversion of this land by St. Austin is unjustly become odieus amongst us or else my honest Parsons threw of your Cassocks and resign your benefices and 〈…〉 into the hands of your neighbours whose they were 〈…〉 My Consequence is irrefragable And I 〈◊〉 you plâ—iâ—ly that I greatly pitty you for your di courte and that on many accounts First That in the same breath wherein you so solemnly protest before God and his holy Angels you should so openly prevaricate as to intimate that you descend unto no conclusions in this affair wherein notwithstanding your pretences you really dogmatize and that with as much confidence as it is possible I think for any man to do And 2. That you cast before God and his holy Angels the light froth of your scoffing expressions my honest Parsons c. a sign with what conscience you are converâ—ant in these things And 3. That undertaking to write and declare your mind in things of the nature and importance that these are of you should have no more judgement in them or about them then so solemnly to entitle such a trifling Sophism by the name of irrefragable Consequence As also 4. That in the Solemnity of your Protestation you for got to express your mind in sober sense for aiming to make a disjunctive conclusion you make the parts of it not at all disparate but coincident as to your intention the one of them bring the direct consequent of the other 5. That you so much make naked your desires after Benefices and gleab lands as though they were the great matter in contest amongst us which reflects no small shame and stain on Christian Religion and all the Professors of it 6. Your Irrefragable Consequence is a most pittiful piece of Sophistâ—y built upon I know not how many false suppositions as 1. That Papists are become odious unto us where as we only reject your Popery love your Persons and approve of your Christianity 2. That Papists brought us the first tidings of the Gospel which hath been sufficiently before disproved 3. That Papists hold all things in Religion that they did and as they did who first brought us the news of Christianity which we have also manifested to be otherwise in the signal instance of the opinion of Pope Gregory about your Papal Power and titles 4. That we have no occasion of exception against Papists but only their holding the things that those did who first preached the Gospel here when that is no cause at all of our exceptions but their multitude of pretended Articles of faith and idolatrous superstitious practises in worship superadded by them since that time are the things they stand charged withall Now your Consequent being built on all these suppositions fit to hold a principal place in Lucians vera historia must needs be irrefragable What you add farther on this subject is but a repetition in other words of what you had said before with an application of your false and groundless supposition unto our present differences but yet least you should flatter your self or your Disciples deceive themselves with thoughts that there is any thing of weight or moment in it shall also be considered You adde then that if any part much more if any parts great substantial parts of Religion brought into the Land with
the first news of Christianity be once rejected as they are now amongst us as Romish or Romanical and that rejection or Reformation be permitted then may other parts and all parts if the gap be not stopped be looked upon at length as points of no better a condition I have given you sundry instances already undeniably evincing that some opinions of them who first bring the news of Christian Religion unto any may be afterwards rejected without the least impeachment of the Truth of the whole or of our faith therein Yea men may be necessitated so to reject them to keep entire the Truth of the whole But the rejection supposed is of mens opinions that bring Christian Religion and not of any parts of Christian Religion it self For the mistakes of any men whatever whither in Speculation or Practice about Religion are no parts of Religion much less substantial parts of it Such was the Opinion of the necessity of the observation of Mosaical Rites taught with a suitable practice by many believers of the Circumcision who first preached the Gospel in sundry places in the world And such were the Rites and Opinions brought into England by Austin that are rejected by Protestants if any such there were which as yet you have not made to appear There is no such affinity between Truth and Errour however any men may endeavour to blend them together but that others may separate between them and â—eject the one without any prejudice unto the other male sartâ— gratia nequaquam coit Yea the Truth and Light of the Gospel is of that nature as that if it be once sincerely received in the mind and embraced it will work out all those false notions which by any means together with it may be instilled As rectum is index sui obliqui Whilest then we know and are perswaded that in any Systeme of Religion which is proposed unto us it is only error which we reject having an infallible Rule for the guidance of our judgement therein there is no danger of weakning our assent unto the Truth which we retain Truth and falshood can never stand upon the same bottom nor have the same evidence though they may be proposed at the same time unto us and by the same Persons So that there is no difficulty in apprehending how the one may be received and the other rejected Nor may it be granted though their concernment lye not therein at all that if a man reject or disbelieve any point of Truth that is delivered unto him in an entire Systeme of Truths that he is thereby made enclinable to reject the rest also or disenabled to give a firm assent unto them unless he reject or disbelieve it upon a notion that is common to them all For instance He that rejects any Truth revealed in the Scripture on this ground that the Scripture is not an infallible Revelation of Divine and supernatural Truth cannot but in the persuit of that apprehension of his reject also all other Truths there in revealed at least so far as they are knowable only by that Revelation But he that shall disbelieve any Truth revealed in the Scripture because it is not manifest unto him to be so revealed and is in a readiness to receive it when it shall be so manifest upon the Authority of the Author of the wholâ—â— is not in the least danger to be induced by that disbelief to question any thing of that which he is convinced so to be revealed But as I said your Concernment lyes not therein who are not able to prove thâ—â— Protestants have rejected any one part much less substantial part of Religion and your conclusion upon a supposition of the rejection of errours and practises of the contrary to the Gospel or principles of Religion is very infirm The ground of all your Sophistry lyes in this that men who receive Christian Religion are bound to resolve their saith into the Authority of them that preach it first unto them whereupon it being impossible for them to question any thing they teach without an impeachment of their absolute Infallibility and so far the Authority which they are to rest upon they have no firm foundation left for their assent unto the things which as yet they do not question and consequently in process of time may easily be induced so to do But this presumption is perfectly destructive to all the certainty of Christian Religion For whereas it proposeth the subject matter of it to be believed with divine faith and supernatural it leaves no formal reason or cause of any such faith no foundation for it to be parts of it Such was the Opinion of the necessity of the observation of Mosaical Rites taught with a suitable practice by many believers of the Circumcision who first preached the Gospel in sundry places in the world And such were the Rites and Opinions brought into England by Austin that are rejected by Protestants if any such there were which as yet you have not made to appear There is no such affinity between Truth and Errour however any men may endeavour to blend them together but that others may separate between them and reject the one without any prejudice unto the other male sarta gratia nequaquam coit Yea the Truth and Light of the Gospel is of that nature as that if it be once sincerely received in the mind and embraced it will work out all those false notions which by any means together with it may be instilled As rectum is index sui obliqui Whilest then we know and are perswaded that in any Systeme of Religion which is proposed unto us it is only error which we reject having an infallible Rule for the guidance of our judgement therein there is no danger of weakning our assent unto the Truth which we retain Truth and falshood can never stand upon the same bottom nor have the same evidence though they may be proposed at the same time unto us and by the same Persons So that there is no difficulty in apprehending how the one may be received and the other rejected Nor may it be granted though their concernment lye not therein at all that if a man reject or disbelieve any point of Truth that is delivered unto him in an entire Systeme of Truths that he is thereby made enclinable to reject the rest also or disenabled to give a firm assent unto them unless he reject or disbelieve it upon a notion that is common to them all For instance He that rejects any Truth revealed in the Scripture on this ground that the Scripture is not an infallible Revelation of Divine and supernatural Truth cannot but in the persuit of that apprehension of his reject also all other Truths therein revealed at least so far as they are knowable only by that Revelation But he that shall disbelieve any Truth revealed in the Scripture because it is not manifest unto him to be so revealed and is in a
readiness to receive it when it shall be so manifest upon the Authority of the Author of the whole is not in the least danger to be induced by that disbelief to question any thing of that which he is convinced so to be revealed But as I said your Concernment lyes not therein who are not able to prove that Protestants have rejected any one part much less substantial part of Religion and your conclusion upon a supposition of the rejection of errours and practises or the contrary to the Gospel or principles of Religion is very infirm The ground of all your Sophistry lyes in this that men who receive Christian Religion are bound to resolve their faith unto the Authority of them that preach it first unto them whereupon it being impossible for them to question any thing they teach without an impeachment of their absolute Infallibility and so far the Authority which they are to rest upon they have no firm foundation left for their assent unto the things which as yet they do not question and consequently in process of time may easily be induced so to do But this presumption is perfectly destructive to all the certainty of Christian Religion For whereas it proposeth the subject matter of it to be believed with divine faith and supernatural it leaves no formal reason or cause of any such faith no foundation for it to be built upon or Principle to be resolved into For how can Divine faith arise out of humane Authority For acts being specificated by their objects such as is the Authority on which a man believes such is his faith humane if that be humane divine if it be divine But resolving as we ought all our faith into the Authority of God revealing things to be believed and knowing that Revelation to be entirely contained in the Scriptures by which we are to examine and try whatever is by any man or men proposed unto us as an object of our faith they proposing it only upon this consideration that it is a part of that which is revealed by God in the Scripture for us to believe without which they have no ground nor warrant to propose any thing at all unto us in that kind we may reject any of their proposals which we find and discern not to be so revealed or not to be agreeable to what is so revealed without the least weakning of our assent unto what is revealed indeed or making way for any man so to do For whilest the formal reason of faith remains absolutely unimpeached different apprehensions about particular things to be believed have no efficacy to weaken faith its self as we shall farther see in the examination of your ensuing Discourse The same way and means that lopt off some branches will do the like to others and root too but the errours and mistakes of men are not branches growing from the root of the Gospel A Vilification of that Church wherein they find themselves who have a mind to prevaricate upon pretence of Scripture and power of interpreting it light spirit or reason adjoyned with a personal obstinacy that will not submit will do it roundly and to effect This first brought off the Protestants from the Roman Catholick Church this lately separated the Presbyterians from the English Protestant Church the Independent from the Presbyterian and the Quakers from the other Independent And this left good maintains nothing of Christian Religion but the moral part which indeed and truth is but honest Paganism This speech is worthy of all serious Consideration That which this Discourse seems to amount unto is that if a man question or reject any thing that is taught by the Church whereof he is a member there remains no way for him to come unto any certainty in the remaining parts of Religion but that he may on as good grounds question and reject all things as any As you phrase the matter by mens vilifying a Church which a mind to prevaricate upon pretence of Scripture c. though there is no consequence in what you say yet no man can be so mad as to plead in justification of such a proceeding For it is not much to be doubted but that he who layeth such a foundation and makes such a beginning of a separation from any Church will make a progress suitable thereunto But if you will speak unto your own purpose and so as they may have any concernment in what you say with whom you deal you must otherwise frame your hypothesis Suppose a man to be a member of any Church or to find himself in any Church state with others and that he doth at any time by the light and direction of the Scripture discover any thing or things to be taught or practised in that Church whereof he is so a member which he cannot assent unto unless he will contradict the Revelation that God hath made of himself his mind and will in that compleat Rule of all that Religion and worship which are pleasing unto him and therefore doth suspend his assent thereunto and therein dissent from the determination of that Church then you are to assert for the promotion of your design that all the Consequents will follow which you expatiate upon But this supposition fixes immoveably upon the penalty of forfeiting their interest in all saving truth all Christians whatever Greeks Abissines Armenians Protestants in the Churches wherein they find themselves and so makes â—â—ustrate all their attempts for their reconciliation to the Church of Rome For do you think they will attend unto you when you perswade them to a relinquishment of the Communion of that Church wherein they find themselves to joyn with you when the first thing you tell them is that if they do so they are undone and that for ever And yet this is the summ of all that you can plead with them if there be any sense in the Argument you make use of against our relinquishment of the opinions and practises of the Church of Rome because we or our forefathers were at any time members thereof or lived in its communion But you would have this the special Priviledge of your Church alone Any other Church a man may leave yea all other Churches besides he may relinquish the principles wherein he hath been instructed yea it is his duty to renounce their Communion only your Church of Rome is wholly sacred a man that hath once been a member of it must be so for ever and he that questions any thing taught therein may on the same grounds question all the Articles of faith in the Christian Religion And who gave you leave to suppose the only thing in Question between us and to use it as a medium to educe your Conclusion from is it your business to take care bullatis ut tibi nugis Pagina turgescat dare pondus idonea fumo We know the condition of your Roman Church to be no other then that of other Churches if it be not worse
And again The light of thy Countenance is signed or lifted up upon us Psal. 4. Si hoc non sit testimoniorum satis ego nescio quid sit satis he must be very refractory and deserve a world of Anathematismes that is not convinced by all these testimonies that Images ought to be worshiped But quod non dant proceres dabit Histrio if the Scripture will not do it Miracles shall Of these we have an endless number heaped up by the good fathers to prove their Doctrine and justifie their practice The worst is that Tharasius almost spoiles the market by acknowledging that the images in their dayes would work none of the miracles they talked of so that they had them all upon hearesay Act. 4. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But if any should say Why do our images work no miracles to them we answer because as the Apostles saith Signes are for unbelievers not for them that believe And yet the misadventure of it is that the most of the Miracles which they report and build their faith upon were wrought as by so amongst their chiefest believers And what were the Miracles themselves they boasted of such a heap of trash such a fardle of lyes as the like were scarce ever heaped together unless it were in the Golden Legend Hadrian insists on the leprosie and cure of Constantine as loud a lye as any in the Talmud or Alcoran Theodorus of Myra tells us of a Deacon that dreamed he saw one in his sleep whom he took to be St. Nicholas Ac. 4. Another tells us a tale of one that strock a nail in the forehead of an image and was troubled with a pain in his head untill it was pulled out Another dreamed that the blessed Virgin brought Cosma and Damiana to him and commanded them to cure him of his distemper One mans daughter anothers wife is helped by those images And they all consent in the story of the image of Christ made without hands or humane help by God alone 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he sent to Abgarus King of the Edessenes as bellowing a lye as any in the heard So true was it that the Council of Franckeford affirmed of this Idolatrous Conventicle that they endeavoured to confirm their superstition by feigned wonders and old-wives tales Sir This is the Doctrine this the Confirmation of it which we are directed unto and enjoyned to embrace by your Tridentine decree This is that yea and more also as you will hear by and by that you are bound to maintain and make good if you intend to say any thing to the purpose about figures or Images For you must not think by your sleight florishes to blind the eyes of men in these dayes as you have done formerly Own your Doctrine and practice or renounce it This Tergiversation is shameful and you will yet find your self farther pressed with the doctrine of Chiefest pallars of your Church and the publick practice of it For though this superstitious Conventicle at Nice departed from the faith of the antient Church and was quickly reproved and convinced of folly by persons of more learning sobriety and modesty then themselves in the very age wherein they lived yet it rose not up unto the half of the Abominations in the filth and guilt whereof your Church hath since rolled it self And yet because I presume you are well pleased with these Nicenians who gave so great a list to the setting up of your Idols I shall give you a brief account both what was the judgement and practice of them that went before them in this matter as also of some that followed after them with joynt consent detesting your folly and superstition You tell us somewhere in your Fiat that the Primitive Christians had the picture or half portraiture of Christ upon their Altars I suppose you did not invent it your self I wish you had told us of the Legend that suggested it unto you For you seem in point of story to be conversant in such learned Authors as few can trace you in If you please to have a little patience I shall mind you of some that give us another account of things in those dayes 1. Some there are of the first Christians who give us an account of the whole worship of God with the manner and form of it which was observed in their Assemblies in their dayes So doth Justin Martyr in his Apologies Tertullian in his Origen against Celsus with some others Now in none of these is there any one word concerning Images their use or their worship in the service of God although they descend to describe very minute particulars and circumstances of their way and proceeding 2. Some there are who give an account of the persecutious of several Churches with the out-rages of the Pagans against their Assemblies the Scriptures all the ordinances and worship as do those golden fragments of the first and best Antiquity the Epistles of the Churches of Vienna and Lions to the parishes of Asia of the Church of Smyrna about the Martyrdome of Polycarpus preserved and recorded by Eusebius and yet make no mention of any figures pictures or Images of Christ the Blessed Virgin or his Apostles or of any rage of their adversaries against them or of any spite done unto them which they would not have omitted had there been any such in use amongst them 3. There are besides these some unquestionable remnants of the conceptions that the Wisest and soberest of the heathen had concerning the Christians and their worship as in the Epistle of Pliny about their Assemblies and the rescript of Trajan as also in Lucian Philopatris in none of which is any intimation of the Nicene Images or their Adoration It may be you will undervalue this consideration because built upon testimony negatively when it doth not follow that because such and such mentioned them not therefore they were not then in use or being But Sir an Argument taken from the absolute silence of all approved Authors concerning any thing of importance supposed to be or happen in their dayes and who would have had just occasion to make mention of it had any such thing then been in rerum naturâ is as great an evidence and of as full a certainty as the monuments of times are capable of Is it possible for any rational man to conceive that if there had been such an use and veneration of Images in the primitive Churches as is now in the Roman or that the reception and veneration of them was made the tessara of Church Communion as it is by the Nicene Conventicle that all the first Writers of Christianity treating expresly and purposely of the Assemblies of the Christians and the worship of God in them with the manner and circumstances thereof would have been utterly silent of them or that those who set down and committed to record all the particularities of the Pagans rage in scattering their