glory of God and the merits of Christ And therefore the conclusion must needs follow being built vpon an vnmooueable foundation that that Religion which maintaineth such doctrines is not the truth of Christ but the seduction of Antichrist MOTIVE V. That Religion deserueth to be suspected which refuseth to be tryed by the Scriptures as the perfect and alone rule of faith and will bee iudged and tryed by none but it selfe But such is the Religion of the Church of Rome Ergo. THe first proposition in this Argument though it be most true and cannot without any shew of reason be contradicted yet that it may be without all doubt and exception it shall not be amisse to strengthen the same by sound and euident proofes deriued both out of Gods word and consent of ancient Fathers The Proposition consists of two parts first that it cannot be the true Religion which will not abide the alone tryall of the Scriptures Secondly that it will bee iudged and tryed by none but it selfe let vs consider of both these seuerally 2. And concerning the first if the Scripture be the fountaine of all true religion the foundation and basis of our faith the Canon and rule of all the doctrines of faith and the touch-stone to trye truth from falshood then to refuse to be iudged and tryed by the Scriptures alone is plainely to discouer that there is something in it which issued not from that fountain which is not built vpon that foundation which is so oblique and crooked that it dares not to be applyed to that rule and which is counterfeit and dares not abide the touchstone Now that the Scripture is such as I haue said let the Holy Ghost speaking in the Scripture beare witnesse Search the Scripture saith our Sauiour for in them you thinke to haue eternall life and they be they which testifie of me therefore the Scripture is the fountaine of all true religion for what is the Religion of Christians but the right knowledge of Christ Iesus This caused Saint Paul to say I desire to know nothing but Christ Iesus and him crucified Againe the Scriptures are able to make vs wise vnto saluation through faith in Christ Iesus and are profitable to teach to improue to correct and to instruct in righteousnesse that the man of God may be absolute and perfect to euery good worke Therefore the Scripture is the onely fountaine of true Religion for what is true Religion but spirituall wisedome and holy perfection the one in contemplation the other in action the one in knowledge the other in practice for these two ioyned together do make a man truly religious but the Scriptures afford both as it is cleare in that saying of S. Paul and may be confirmed by another like speech of Salomon who affirmeth that the commandements of God will make a man to vnderstand righteousnesse and iudgement and equity and euery good path Righteousnesse and iudgement pertaine to knowledge equity and euery good path belong to practice And for this cause Origen compareth the Scriptures to Iacobs Well from whence not onely Iacob and his sonnes that is the learned and the skilfull but his sheepe and cattell that is the simple and ignorant doe drinke that is deriue vnto themselues the waters of life and saluation and therefore where the knowledge of the Scriptures flourished not as among all the Heathen both Romanes Grecians and Barbarians before their conuersion there no true Religion shewed it selfe but their Religion was all false and deuillish for in stead of the true God they worshipped dumb creatures and mortall men yea deuils themselues as Lactantius sheweth All which proceeded from hence that they had not the word of God for their guide which is the onely fountaine and well-spring of true Religion 3. Againe as it is the fountaine from whence so it is the foundation vpon which our faith relieth whether wee take faith for the act of beleeuing or for the matter and obiect of our beliefe Ye are built saith S. Paul vpon the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles Christ Iesus himselfe being the chiefe corner stone By the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles is meant the Propheticall and Apostolicall doctrine as all Expositours that I haue read yea their owne Aquinas and Caietane with one consent auouch and to bee built vpon this foundation is to haue our faith to relye and depend vpon it onely as a house relyeth onely vpon the foundation and without a foundation cannot stand that therefore is no doctrine of faith that is vpholden by any other foundation neither hath that any good foundation which is not built vpon the Propheticall and Apostolicall doctrine they build vpon sand that build vpon humane traditions euery stormy puffe of winde will shake the house of that faith but they which heare the word of Christ and keepe it build vpon a rocke against which neither the raine flouds nor windes no not the gates of hell are able to preuaile because they are grounded vpon the rocke which rocke indeede is Christ to speake properly as not onely S. Peter confesseth 1. Pet. 2. 7. but euen Christ himselfe that is this rocke Math. 16. 18. when hee saith Vpon this rocke will I build my Church that is vpon this truth that Christ is the Sonne of God yet the word of Christ may also be called the rocke because it is as firme and durable as Christ himselfe And that wee may know that Gods word onely is the foundation of faith S. Paul telleth vs plainely that faith is by hearing and hearing by the word of God If any of them say as they doe that the word of God is not onely that which is written in Scripture but that which is vnwritten deliuered by tradition let them shew as good reasons to proue their traditions to be the word of God as we doe to proue the Scripture and we will beleeue them but since they cannot let them beare with vs if we vnderstand the Apostles words as spoken onely touching the written word and the rather because we haue for the warrantize of our interpretation both S. Paul himselfe in the same Chapter verse 8. when he saith This is the word offaith which we preach Where hee sheweth what is that word which is the ground of our faith namely the word preached And S. Peter who hauing magnified the word of God with this commendation that it endureth for euer presently expoundeth himselfe of what word hee spake saying And this is that word which is preached amongst you That is the word of the Gospell which was not in part but wholy and fully as preached by mouth so committed to writing And thus S. Basil also interprets it for he saith Quicquid est vltra scripturas Whatsoeuer is out of the Scriptures diuinely inspired because it is not of faith is sinne for faith is by hearing and hearing by
at large discoursed in the former Chapter touching the chiefe Iudge of controuersies for when as they disable the Scripture from that office and exalt the Church that is the Pope as I haue shewed into the highest throne of iudgement what doe they else but debase the Scripture in subiecting it to the Popes wil and making it a vassall to wayt vpon his pleasure and giuing a greater certainty and infallibility to the determinations of his mouth speaking out of his chayre then vnto the infallible and certaine light of truth shining in the Scriptures This is open wrong to the Scriptures and not onely to it but also to the Spirit of God the Author and Enditer thereof for they which set vp the Pope as an all-sufficient and most competent Iudge and pull downe the Scripture as non-sufficient and incompetent as the Romanists doe doe they not aduance the one and disgrace the other as on the contrary we which ascribe all conâ—petencie of right and sufficiencie of power to the Scripture and denie the same to the Pope doe we not disgrace him and aduance it This is the difference in this poynt betwixt them and vs and their Religion and ours and that men may see how little estimation they haue of the Scripture compared with their Pope though the Pope be a man vtterly vnlettered ignorant euen of the grounds of Grammar much more of the grounds of Diuinitie as some of them were though he be a childe of tenne yeeres of age as Bennet the ninth or a mad Lad not past eighteene yeeres old as Iohn the twelfth though he be an Atheist as was Leo the tenth or a Coniurer as Iulius the third Lastly though hee were a man destayned with all manner of filthy and lewd conuersation as a number of them were yet his iudgement must bee heard and preferred because forsooth quatenus Papa as he is Pope he cannot erre though quatenus homo as he is a man hee be an Heretike or an Atheist or a wicked wretch or because Papa est doctor vtriusque legis authoritate non scientia The Pope is Doctour of both lawes in authority and not in knowledge And thus by their Religion the holy and sacred Scripture must giue place and bow the knee to an vnholy sacrilegious and ignorant Pope oftentimes and acknowledge him as Iudge and submit it selfe to his sentence and censure 8. The second doctrine of theirs whereby they disgrace and wrong the Scripture is that touching the insufficiency and imperfection thereof for they are not ashamed to say that the Scripture is imperfect and vnsufficient of it selfe and that in it are not contained all things needfull to saluation but that a great part yea the greatest part of true Religion is grounded vpon tradition without the which the Church of GOD could not bee sufficiently instructed either in faith or manners this is their goodly doctrine whereas we on the other side hold and maintaine that the Canonicall Scripture containeth in it sufficiently plainely and abundantly all doctrines necessary to be knowne for the attainment of saluation whether they be positions of faith or directions for godlinesse and that thereis no neede of any vnwritten traditions for the suppliance of any want or defect which is found therein And herein we haue not onely all the ancient Fathers of the primitiue and purer times of the Church our Abbetters as Iraeneus Origen Athanasius Basil Chrysostome Cyril Tertullian Cyprian Augustine Hierome as you may see in the places quoted in the Margent but also the testimony of the Holy Ghost in the Scriptures plainely and directly affirming the same 9. That this imputation of imperfection and insufficiency is layd by them vpon the Scripture let vs heare themselues acting their owne parts and first Bellarmine the Ringleader He in his fourth Booke De verbo Dei and fourth Chapter sets downe this position that the Scriptures without traditions are not simply necessary nor sufficient and throughout that whole Chapter doth nothing else but labour to prooue the same by many arguments and reasons as if hee were not content barely to affirme so high a blasphemy but euen as the Poet sayth Cum ratione insanire To be madde with reason and so are all his reasons there vsed in very deed mad reasons which my purpose is not to spend time in confuting that being sufficiently performed by our great and learned Champions of the truth which as yet remaine vnanswered onely it is inough for my intent to discouer to all men his notable blasphemy against the holy Scriptures which not onely in that place but in many other euidently and impudently sheweth it selfe 10. Next vnto him comes in another great Iesuite Gregorie de Valentia and he playeth his part and sayth That the most fittest way of deliuering the doctrine of faith to the Church was this not that all should bee committed to writing but that some things should be deliuered viua voce that is by tradition But Cardinall Hosius more plainly and boldly affirmeth That the greatest part of the Gospell is come to vs by tradition and that very title of it is committed to writing Yea it is reported of him that he should say Melius actum fuisse cum Ecclesia si nullum extaret scriptum Euangelium That it had beene better for the Church if there were no written Gospell extant O blasphemy and yet wisely spoken if so be by the Church hee meaneth the Church of Rome as without doubt hee doth But let vs heare another of the same stampe Eckius I meane that peremptory Bragadochio he steps forth and shoots his bolt in a moment The Lutherans are dolts sayth hee which will haue nothing beleeued but that which is expresse Scripture or can be prooued out of Scripture for all things are not deliuered manifestly in the Scriptures but very many are left to the determination of the Church Coster another Stage-player of theirs comes in and diuides the word into three parts to wit That which God himselfe writ as the tables of the Law that which he commanded others to write as the Olde and the New Testament and that which he neither writ himselfe nor rehearsed to others but left it to themselues as traditions the decrees of Popes and Councils And then he concludeth blasphemously that many things of faith are wanting in the two former neither would Christ haue his Church depend vpon them but this latter is the best scripture the Iudge of controuersies the Expositor of the Bible and that whereupon we must wholly depend His words are these Omnia fidei mysteria ccaeeraque credita scitu necessaria â—n corde Ecclesiae sunt clarissimè exarata in membranis tamen tam noui quam veteris Testaments multa defiderantur that is All the mysteries of faith and other things necessary to bee beleeued and known are most clearely engrauen in the heart of the Church but in the leaues of the Olde and
New Testament many things are wanting What can be more plaine Yet Lindanus is more plaine for he calleth Traditionem non scriptam c. The vnwritten tradition that Homericall moly which preserueth the Christian faith against the inchantments of Heretikes and the true touch-stone of true false doctrine and the Aâ—acian buckler to be opposed to all Heretikes and in conclusion the very foundation of faith To this fellow adioyne Melchior Canus as a coÌ„panion in blasphemy who saith That many things belong to Christian faith which are contained in the Scripture neither openly nor obscurely To conclude all in one summe without any further repetition of priuate mens opinions wherein much time might be spent the voyce of their whole Church represented in the Councill of Trent is this That traditions are to bee receaued pari pietate with the same reuerence and affection wherwith wee receiue the Scripture it selfe Thus wee haue a view of the doctrine of the Church of Rome touching the insufficiency of the holy Scripture both in part and whole Out of all which these two impious conclusions doe necessarily arise First that traditions vnwritten are equall if not superiour in dignity and authority to the written word of God and secondly that without the helpe of them it is not able to bring vs either to a sauing faith in this life or to the end of our faith in the life to come then both which what could be spoken more iniurious either to the Word it self or to the Maiestie of that Spirit from whom it proceeded And that their blasphemy might be known â—o all men Bellarmine more like a Iulian then a Christian doth not onely affirme the Scripture to be vnsufficient and imperfect but also not simply necessary and to that end he maketh a good round discourse and bringeth in long Leaden arguments which indeed are not worth the answering for they are meere sophisticall collusions as any one of meane iudgement may easily discerne Neuerthelesse by this we may see what an honourable opinion and affection these fellowes beare towards the Scripture when as they dare to affirme that they are not simply necessary but may bee wanting and remoued without any great hurt to the Church of God 12. The third iniurious doctrine whereby open disgrace is offered to the holy Scripture is concerning the authority thereof compared with the Church for this they teach and hold That the authority of the Scripture doth depend vpon the Church and not the Church vpon the Scripture And so by consequent that the Scripture is inferiour to the Church and not the Church to the Scripture whereas we on the contrary affirme and defend that the Church wholly dependeth both for authoritie and existency vpon the Scripture and so is euery way inferiour to the Scripture and not the Scripture vpon the Church 13. This blasphemie of theirs may more euidently be discerned if we obserue what they vnderstand by the Church to wit not the Primitiue Church which was in the time and immediately after the Apostles but the succeeding and present Church and that not the whole Catholicke Church which is dispersed ouer the world but the Church of Rome which holdeth vpon the Pope as the Vicar of Christ and in this Church not the whole body but the Pastours and Prelates assembled in a Councill yea and lastly not the Councill neither but the Pope who is totus in toto all in all and in whome all the members meete and resolue themselues as lines in the center as is before declared This is their Church and to this Church of theirs they subiect the Scriptures euen the word of God to the Pope of Rome that is God himselfe to a mortall sinnefull man For as Nilâ—â— the Archbishop of Thessalonica saith To accuse the Scripture is to accuse God so to debase the Scripture is to debase God 14. That wee may see this to be true and that wee lay no false imputation to their charge heare them speake in their owne words and let Bellarmine leade the Ring If we take away saith he the authoritie of the present Church and of the Councill of Trent then the whole Christian faith may bee called in question for the truth of all ancient Councils and of all poynts of faith depend vpon the authority of the present Church of Rome Marke he saith not vpon the authority of the Scripture but of the present church of Rome where he doth manifestly preferre the authority of the Church before the Scripture not onely of the Church but of the Church of Rome as if there were no Church but that and not the Church of Rome as it was in the purer and primer times but the present Church corrupted and depraued with infinite errours Againe in another place he concludeth That the Scriptures doe depend vpon the Church and not the Church on the Scriptures which position he confesseth in the same place to haue beene in other places maintained by him And yet elsewhere he disclaimeth this opinion as none of theirs and calleth it a blasphemy that it is his I haue shewed already though he be ashamed of it as he may well be and therefore exore suo by his owne iudgement he and all the rest are guilty of most grosse and intolerable blasphemie But that you may see that it is the generall receiued doctrine of them all for the most part heare others as well as him vttering their spleene against the Scriptures Siluester Prierias saith that Indulgences are warranted vnto vs not by the authority of the Scripture but by the authority of the Church and Pope of Rome which is greater And againe That the Scripture draweth it strength and authority from the Church and Bishop of Rome Eckius saith that the Scripture was not authentical but by the authority of the Church and putteth this proposition among hereticall assertions The authority of the Scripture is greater then the Church Pighius also affirmeth the same that all the authoritie of Scriptures doth necessarily depend vpon the authority of the Church and calleth all that hold the contrary in scorne Scriptuarij that is Scripture-men or such as maintaine the Scripture Cardinall Hosius goeth further and commendeth a blasphemous speech of one Hermannus as a godly saying That the Scriptures are of no more force then Aesops Fables without the testimonie of the Church and addeth presently of his owne that vnlesse the Churches authority did commend vnto vs the Canonicall Scripture it should bee of little account with vs. The like is deliuered by Coclaeus by Canus Stapleton Andradius Canisius and generally all other of that side that handle that question 15. Onely to palliate the matter they bring in a distinction to wit that this dependance of the Scriptures authority vpon the Church is quoad nos in respect of vs not quâ—adse in respect of it selfe and declaratiuè for declaration sake
Popish superstition doe say that it is an ordinarie matter A wonderful superstitiō that is nourished by Images so apparent that it cannot be denied Now if this were a scandall taken and not giuen they might in some sort bee excused but it is eūidently not onely occasioned but caused by reason that both the doctrine is inuolued with so many intricate questions and distinctions that it is impossible for an ignorant person to discerne thereof and also because the Image it selfe as the Prophet Habacuck telleth vs is a teacher of lyes For which cause as Polidore Virgil reporteth the Fathers of all vices condemned the worship of Images for feare of Idolatrie the most execrable vice of all The second offence is to the vnconuerted Iewes who are most zealous in this point of the Law against Images insomuch as Iosephus reports of them they did hate the verie Images of men in their Heathenish Trophees as being forbidden them by God Now it is well concluded by a iudicious obseruer of the Westerne Religions and without doubt is a most true obseruation that there is no one thing in outward respects that doth ingender in the Iewes such a detestation of Christian Religion and keepe them from being conuerted as the worship of Images in the Church of Rome for they and that by good reason may thus dispute If this Religion of Christians were of God then they would not oppose themselues to the expresse Commaundement of God in worshipping Images which he hath so plainly forbidden but they oppose themselues to Gods Commandement and worship Images therefore their Religion cannot bee of God Hence it is as the former learned Relator doth report that at Rome though all the Iewes in the Citie are constrained once a yeere to come to a Christian Church and there heare a Sermon for their pretended conuersion yet when as a Fryer before the beginning of his Sermon holdeth vp a Crucifix and prayeth vnto it in their open sight they are more alienated from the Christian faith by this odious spectacle then all the reasons and arguments that he can vse are able to perswade them to the same Behold two dangerous and fearefull scandals which arise from this doctrine one to their owne weake ones of which our Sauiour saith that it were better for a man that a milstone were hanged about his necke and that hee were throwne into the Sea then that hee should offend one of them the other to the obstinate Iewes whose conuersion shall be so beneficiall to the whole world as that Saint Paul calleth it life from the dead Now our Religion is farre from giuing any such offence to one or other either in this or any other point thereof if it bee not vtterly misconstrued and misconceiued 24. Againe in their worship of Relickes there is no securitie at all both in feare of Idolatrie which may bee well committed to them if they bee true in giuing them a higher measure of adoration then they themselues allow of which is easio to bee done by the ignorant multitude and also in feare of worshipping false relickes in stead of true whereof there is no small number in the Church of Rome as hath bin alreadie declared and lasty in feare of neglecting the true members of Christ by a too sumptuous prodigalitie towards the bones of I cannot tel what dead men or other creatures as is most vsuall in their Church and that in great excesse in which respects it is without question a more safe course that all such Relickes were buried vnder the earth with due honour of Christian sepulture then that they should thus indanger both godly pietie Christian charitie And this is the conclusion of their Cassander who sayth that it is more safe rather honourably to burie those corruptible relickes and to draw the World to the worship of their spirituall relickes which neither time can corrupt nor fraud counterfeit 25. Againe they hold and teach that traditions are to bee honoured with equall affection and deuotion as is due vnto the olde and new Testament and that there are many things belonging to the doctrine and faith of Christianitie which are neyther expressely nor obscurely contained in the Scriptures And therefore by their owne confession they build many doctrines of their Religion vpon tradition onely without Scripture and acknowledge that without tradition many of them would reele and totter The Protestants hold the contrarie and constantly affirme that the Scripture is an all-sufficient directorie and a most absolute and perfect rule for faith and manners and therefore that wee ought not to relye our faith vpon any thing but Scripture alone Now let vs consider and examine whether of these two doctrines are more safe for a man to repose his soule vpon And that our doctrine is so may appeare first by the nature of the question it selfe which is controuerted betwixt them and vs for the question is not whether the Scripture bee the Word of God or no therein wee shake hands as an vndoubted truth but whether traditions bee the Word of God or no the affirmatiue they hold wee the negatiue and that by great and strong grounds which our aduersaries themselues cannot deny but that they carrie great shew of reason and probabilitie Now whether is the safer course to relye our faith vpon those principles that are vnquestionably Gods Word or vpon those that are controuerted disputed and called in question Any man that goeth about to buy a purchase will sooner venture vpon such a title which was neuer called in question nor can indeed bee doubted of then vpon a broken disputable and vndecided title he will looke twice vpon his pennie before he part with it in such a case lest caueat emptor proue him to bee of little discretion and teach him to repent when it is too late This is the case of euerie Christian wee are to buy the truth and not to sell it as Salomon counselleth Now who will not that hath any graine of wisedome in his heart rather lay out his monie that is his soule and conscience which as Augustine calleth it is numisma Dei Godscoyne because his Image is imprinted therein for the purchase of that truth which is without all exception in the holy Scriptures then for that which is said to be in traditions but mixed with many doubts and ambiguities It is a rule in Law that abundans cautela non nocet a man cannot be too warie in making sure his title to any thing whatsoeuer How much more then should it preuaile in cases of conscience where the damage is not of house and land but of our soules which to euery man ought to be more precious then the whole world Here is an euident direction for our choice if we eyther loue the truth or our own soules which must liue by it 26. Secondly it may appeare by the perpetuall certaintie of the holy Scripture and variable
they deuide the word of God into verbum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 written and vnwritten their vnwritten word is nothing but orall Traditions deliuered as they say by Christ himselfe to his Apostles alone and not to his common Disciples because it contayned the high mysteries of the Kingdome of God and by them conuayed to their successours Bishops and Elders of the Church Secondly they affirme also with them that these orall Traditions are of equall authority and necessity with the word written yea that the word written is of no authority at all quoadnos in respect of vs except it bee authorized by the tradition of the Church And thirdly they teach that the word written is imperfect vnlesse the vnwritten Cabala bee added vnto it and that not one alone but both together make a perfect rule both for faith and manners Doe they not now Iudaize in all these points Yes the Romish Apologers to proue their doctrine of traditions fetch an argument from the Iewes Cabala as may bee seene in a late tractate falsly called the Catholike Apologie which is so much the more strange because their own Sixtus Senensis professeth that the Iewish Thalmud is fraught with innumerable blasphemies against God and his Christ our Sauiour and impieties against the law of Moses besides other infinite fopperies Is not this then a good patterne for them to imitate and is it not a sound argument that is deduced from such premises Surely their traditions which they build all their superstition vpon thus symbolizing with the Iewish Cabala can be of no better credit then it is and what credit that hath not onely their Senensis before bâ—t Galatinus another stout champion of theirs acknowledgeth when he saith that it is mere madnesse to approue all their vnwritten traditions which they bragge to haue beene deliuered in mount Sinai and from thence orderly to haue descended to posterity Now that which he speaketh of the Iewes Cabala may as truly be affirmed of the Romish traditions let them therefore goe arme in arme together since they will needes haue it so â—â— ioynt enemies to Christian Religion 18. Againe the Iewes ascribe so much credit and faith to their Cachamim or illumined Doctors that whatsoeuer they teach be it right or wrong they must not enquire into the truth thereof but receiue it as an article of their Creed and build their faith and saluation thereupon Thus writeth one of their owne Rabbines to wit Rabbi Isaac that died in Portugall Anno 1493. Wee are bound saith he to giue no lesse credit to euery Rabbine in their sermons and mysticall or allegoricall explications then vnto the Law of Moses it selfe and if there be found in their words any thing hyperbolicall or contrary to nature and sence we must ascribe the fault thereof to our owne defectiue vnderstanding and not vnto their words And the same is the doctrine of their Thalmud Their speeches saith it are the speeches of the liuing God neither doth one word of theirs fall to the ground in vaine and therefore we are bound to beleeue all things whatsoeuer are written of them or in their name for it is the truth neither must any man laugh at them neither in his countenance nor in his heart for whosoeuer shall doe so shall not escape punishment and his punishment they say shall be this that he shall be tormented in hell in boyling excrements And in another Booke the Iewes are commanded to say Amen not onely to their Prayers but also to all their Sermons and alleÌ„goricall expositions Yea if two Rabbines contend and contradict each other yet they are bound to beleeue both of them because the words both of the one and the other are the words of the liuing God though they vnderstand not each other And in a word so great is their madnesse that they are not ashamed to say That the words of their Rabbines are more to be regarded then the words of Moses law and that if they teach that the right hand is the left and the left the right yet they are bound to beleeue them 19. And is not the Church of Rome paralell to them in this case I will not condemne them but let their owne words be their Iudges Thus write the Rhemists in their Annotations vpon Acts 17. 11. The hearers must not try and iudge whether their Teachers doctrine be true or no neither may they reiect that which they find not in Scripture The same is the tenent of Cardinall Hosius Andradius and all other of that stampe Bellarmine affirmeth that the people must beleeue what soeuer their Passors teach except they broach somenew doctrine which hath not beene heard of in the Church before and if they do so yet they must not Iudge of them but referre them to the definitiue sentence of the Pope to the which they must yeeld full consent without further examination Yea he impudently concludeth in another place That if their ordinary Pastor teach falshood another that is not their Pastor teach the contrary truth yet the people ought to follow their Pastor erring rather then the other telling the truth And another blasphemous Cardinall giueth a reason thereof Because saith he if a man did not beleeue that Christ is very God and man and the Pope thought the same hee should not be condeÌ„ned For saith a third Cardinal the iudgement of the Pope is the iudgement of God and his sentence the sentence of God As if the Iudgement and sentence of God could bee erronious which the first Cardinall supposeth concerning the Pope or as if the Popes sentence being erronious could be the sentence of God as the second affirmeth Obserue their blasphemous absurdities Siluester Prierias concludeth this poynt when hee sayth That whosoeuer resteth not on the doctrine of the Romane Church and Bishop of Rome as the infallible rule of God is an Heretike And the Canonists sticke not to say that the Pope is subiect to no law but that his iudgement is in stead of law and that his actions are not to bee enquired into neither may a man say vnto him though hee lead thousand soules into hell with him Sir why doe you thus and that it is not better then sacriledge to call in question the Popes fact or to iudge of his actions Thus an insallibility of iudgement and an impossibility of erring is ascribed vnto the Bishop of Rome so that whatsoeuer hee propoundeth bee it right or wrong must bee receiued vpon paine of damnation Neither is it ascribed onely vnto him the worlds high Priest but also to their Councills and inferiour Pastors animated by his spirit whose doctrine is to be heard and not examined as they teach And therefore it is esteemed a great sin amongst them for a man to make question of any doctrine brought vnto them by any Romish Iesuite Fryer or Priest
confesse afterward that it is indeed a rule but not a total and entire rule but a partiall and imperfect one If it bee any waies a rule then it was giuen by God and written by the men of God to that end to be the rule And so Bellarmines goodly reasons hang together like a sicke mans dreame the one part wherof ouerthroweth the other 18. But to answere in particular to them seuerally To the first I say that it is not farre from blasphemy to affirme that there is any thing in holy Scripture that is vnnecessary for though all things are not of equall necessity and profit yet there is nothing in the whole Booke of God from the beginning of Gen. to the end of the Reuel but may haue most profitable and necessary vse in the Church of God if not for the essentiall forme of faith yet for the adorning and beautifying of it and this may truely bee verified euen of those things which he excepteth against to wit the Histories of the Olde and New Testament and the salutations in the Epistles of the Apostles out of all which how many excellent doctrines may be deriued both for the confirmation of faith and edification of manners And therefore as in mans body God by nature hath not disposed all parts to be alike necessary but some haue no other vse but ornament and comelinesse so hath Almighty God mingled the parts of holy Scripture in that manner that some are as it were bones and sinews to our faith some flesh and bloud and some againe but exteriour beautie and fashion yet as in nature nothing is made in vaine so much lesse in Scripture is there any thing to be accounted superfluous and redundant nay in this diuine body there are no excrements that may be cast out and separated as it fareth in our earthly carkases but all is entire sound and perfect as the Prophet Dauid teacheth Psal 19. 7. when hee saith that the Law of God is perfect conuerting the soule and our Sauiour Math. 5. 18. when he auoucheth that till heauen and earth perish one iote or title of the Law shall not c. 19. To his second reason I answere three things first that it is entirely false that the Scripture doth not contayne all things necessarily required to the Essence of faith for if the Scripture be perfect and giueth wisedome to the simple if nothing may bee added to it nor taken from it if to teach any thing besides the Scripture deserueth the fearefull Anathema if it be able to make the man of God perfect to euery good worke if in them onely wee may finde eternall life if the Church of God be built vpon the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles and lastly if our faith and hope doe arise from the Scriptures then there is nothing necessary to saluation but is fully and plenarily contained in them but the first is true as appeareth by all those testimonies before alledged and therefore the latter must by necessary consequence be true also 20. Secondly I answere that Bellarmine by that assertion crosseth the whole streame of the Fathers for most of them affirme the flat contrary Tertullian saith that when we once beleeue the Gospell Hoc prius credimus non esse quod vltra credere debemus This we beleeue first that there is nothing besides which we ought to beleeue Iraeneus saith that the Apostles committed to writing the Gospell which they preached Fundamentum columnam fidei nostrae futurum To be the foundation and pillar of our faith Basil saith Quicquid extra diuinam scripturam est cum ex fide non sit peccatum est Whatsoeuer is beside the holy Scripture because it is not of faith is sinne Cyrill saith that all those things were written in holy Scripture which the Writers thought sufficient Tam ad mores quà m ad dogmata As well touching conuersation as doctrine Augustine saith that those things were chosen out to be written Quae saluti credentium sufficere videbantur Which seemed sufficient for the saluation of them that beleeue And againe he saith in another place Whether concerning Christ or concerning the Church of Christ or concerning any thing that pertaineth to our faith or life we will not say if we but if an Angell from heauen shall preach vnto you but what ye haue receiued in the Scriptures of the Law and the Gospell let him be accursed Chrysostome saith Si quis eorum If any of them who are said to haue the holy Ghost doe speake any thing of him selfe and not out of the Gospell beleeue it not Ierome speaking of an opinion touching the death of Zacharias the father of Iohn Baptist saith Hoc quia ex Scripturis non habet authoritatem This because it hath not authority out of the Scriptures is as easily contemned as approued I supersede for breuity sake the residue of the Fathers who with full consent conspire in the same opinion yea not onely the Fathers but many also of their owne most learned Authors as Thomas Aquinas Antoninus Durandus Peresius Clingius and diuers others by all which we may see how little reckoning Bellarmine maketh of the ancient Fathers where they make for him hee magnifieth and exalteth them to the skies but when they are opposite to him he reiecteth them as drosse and the like account he maketh of his owne Doctors 21. Lastly I answere that of those things which he affirmeth not to be contayned in holy Scripture and yet to be of necessity of beliefe some of them are farre from either necessity or profit as that of the meanes whereby women vnder the Law were purged from originall sinne and how the Gentiles were partakers of the couenant hauing not the Sacrament and that Easter is to be celebrated vpon the Lords day If these things be of that necessity of beliefe which hee maketh them how many thousand then haue sinned greatly in being ignorant thereof for at this day not the hundreth part of Christians euer heard these things once named and yet by this ignorance they neither offended God nor hindered their owne saluation And what shall we thinke of Iraeneus and other godly Bishops in the East that held that Easter was not to bee celebrated euer vpon the Lords day Againe the other things nominated by him as that the books of the sacred Bible are the Canonicall Scripture and the word of the liuing God that the children of beleeuing parents are to be baptized that Christ descended into hell may easily be proued out of Scripture either by expresse testimonie or by necessarie consequence and deduction which is all one for Perinde sunt â—a quae ex Scripturis colliguntur atqueâ—a quae scribuntur c. saith Nazianzene 22. Thirdly being driuen by the power of truth to acknowledge the Scripture to be a rule he commeth in with a leaden distinction to wit that is not a totall but
a partiall rule and that the word of God written and not written by this last meaning traditions is the totall and perfect rule To this I answere in a word that by this distinction he plainely ouerturneth that which before hee had confessed for if it bee the rule of faith then it must needes be totall and perfect if it be not totall and perfect then is it not the rule for a rule must be proportioned to the thing whereunto it is applied If then our faith be either longer and larger then the Scripture then cannot the Scripture bee any wayes called the rule thereof Besides as Theophilact saith Regula et amussis neque appositionem habet neque ablationem A rule doth neither admit addition nor diminution and that is the definition of a rule according to Varinus Regula est mensura quae non fallit quaeque nullam vel additionem vel detractionem admittit A rule is saith hee a measure which deceiueth not and which admitteth no addition nor detraction Therefore if it be the rule of faith either it is perfect and absolute or none at all if it standeth in neede of traditions to supply it want then why doth hee call it the rule and why doe all the Fathers giue it the same name and why hath it that inscription in the forehead the Canonicall Scripture Lastly if God would giue vs a rule for our faith and life in the Scripture then by the same reason hee would make that a perfect rule for shall any imperfect thing proceede from the authour of all perfection When an imperfect creature is borne wanting either limmes or forme we ascribe it to a defect and errour in the particular nature from whence the creature is deriued or to the indisposition of the instrumentall causes not to the generall nature which tendeth alwaies vnto perfection How much more then ought this Iesuite be afraid to ascribe an imperfect creature to the all-perfect Creatour especially seeing it is the worke of his owne hands without the intermingling of all second causes and proceedeth immediately from his owne spirit the Prophets and Apostles being but as Baruch to Ieremie writers and engrossers of that which the spirit did dictate vnto them And therefore I may boldly and firmely conclude that as the vncreated word of God begotten of the Father before all time is perfect God and can neither receiue augmentation nor diminution so the word of God pronounced first by the mouth of the Prophets and Apostles and after by them committed to writing which is called the Scripture is absolute and perfect and can neither be encreased nor diminished to make it more or lesse perfect and so is the onely true sound and sacred Rule whereby both our Faith and life is to be directed towards the Kingdome of Heauen 23. And thus I hope the first proposition remaineth sound and firme notwithstanding all that can be sayd to the contrary Now I come to the confirmation of the assumption or second proposition which is that the Religion of the Church of Rome refuseth to be tryed and iudged by the Scriptures alone and will be tried and iudged by none but it selfe which if it be euicted then the conclusion must necessarily follow that therefore it is not onely to be suspected but vtterly reiected and abhorred 24. That this is so though it hath already in the precedent discourse beene sufficiently demonstrated yet that the matter may appeare more plaine and their impudency may be more notorious let vs search deeper into this wound and discouer the filthinesse thereof from the very bottome and first that they renounce the Scripture from being their Iudge and then in the second place that they admit of no other Iudge but themselues 25. Concerning the first let vs heare Bellarmine the Achilles of Rome speake foremost hee affirmeth in expresse words that the Scripture is not the rule of faith or if it be that it is a partiall and imperfect rule and vtterly insufficient of it selfe without the helpe of Ecclesiasticall traditions This assertion is well-neere the whole matter subiect of his third and fourth Bookes De verbo Dei which he laboureth to strengthen by all meanes possible Yea in the third Chapter of his third Booke he saith peremptorily that the Pope with a Councill is the Iudge of the true sense of the Scripture all controuersies Now in setting vp the Pope or a Councill into the supreme throne of Iudgement he must needes pull downe the Scripture the Spirit of God speaking therein from that throne and despoyle it of that authority But what need I draw this consequence from his words seeing throughout that whole Chapter he doth almost nothing else but striue to proue that the Scripture is not the Iudge doth reproue the Protestāts for saying that all the iudgements of the Fathers and all the decrees of Councils ought to be examined ad amussim Scripturarum according to the rule of the Scriptures Next vnto Bellarmine commeth in Gregory de Valentia and hee most boldly auoucheth that the Scripture is not a sufficient Iudge or rule of all controuersies of faith and that the Scripture alone defineth nothing at all no not obscurely of the chiefe questions of faith and where it doth speake it speaketh so obscurely that it doth not resolue but rather increase the doubt Cardinall Hosius is no whit lesse audacious when he affirmeth that the Scripture in it selfe is not the true and expresse word of God which we ought to obey vnlesse it bee expounded according to the sense and consent of the Catholike that is in his opinion the Romane Church The Iesuites Salmeron Turrian and Coster doe not onely barely affirme as much but also confirme it by reason The Scripture is dumbe saith Salmeron but the deciding voyce of a Iudge must be quicke The Scripture is a dead letter saith Turrian and a thing without life saith Coster but a Iudge must be liuing who may correct such as erre therfore that Scripture cannot be the Iudge It is as it were a Nose of wax saith Melchior Canus flexible into euery sense and as it were a Delphian Sword fit for all purposes saith Turrian therefore cannot be the Iudge And therefore two other Iesuites to wit Tanner and Gretzer impudently conclude that no heresie can be sufficiently refuted by Scripture alone and that by no meanes it may be graunted that either the holy Scripture or the Holy Ghost speaking by the Scripture should be the supreme and generall Iudge of Controuersies and hee addes his reason because the Scripture cannot dicere sententiam giue sentence on one side as a Iudge should doe Nay one Vitus Miletus as Pelargus reporteth is not ashamed to say that wee read that an Asse spoke in the Scripture but that the Scripture it selfe euer spoke we neuer read And thus this fellow makes the Scripture it selfe to be more mute then Balaams
Asse and the holy Spirit lesse able to make that speake then an Angell was to make an Asse to speake Then which what could be brayed out more like the beast he speaketh of 26. But some may say All these are but priuate mens opinions we heare not all this while the determination of the Church Let vs harken therefore to the voyce of the Church touching this poynt that is as they hold of the Councill or rather Conuenticle of Romish Bishops assembled together at Trent which they call the Church representatiue The second Canon of the second decree in thy fourth Session of that Councill doth thus determine Let no man trusting to his owne wisedome dare to interpret the Scripture after his owne priuate sense or contrary to that sense which our holy Mother the Church holdeth or contrary to the vnanimous consent of the Fathers The former part of this Canon is good and sound for Saint Peter saith that no Scripture is of priuate interpretation and therefore they which wrest the Scriptures to their owne senses contrary to the intent and scope of them are guilty of a grieuous sinne before God and doe it to their owne destruction for Optimus scripturae lector est qui dictorum intellectum non attulerit sed retulerit exscriptura saith Hil. that is He is the best reader of the Scripture which doth not bring a sense to the Scripture but draweth it out of the Scripture Besides the middle and end of the Canon is not to bee misliked if they haue a fauourable interpretation for the iudgement of the Fathers is greatly to be regarded and the authority of the Church is to be held in especiall reuerence but for all this latet anguis in herba vnder these faire pretences of words is couched a snake of foule errour for first they tye the gift of interpretation of Scripture and of decision of controuersies to the Chaire of Peter seated at Rome and possessed by the Pope Peters successour as they call him or to the Chaire of Bishops assembled together in a Councill as in Noahs Arke whereas Saint Paul saith plainely speaking of the gift of interpretation These things workethone and the same Spirit distributing to euery man seuerally as he will And in another place that the spirituall man discerneth all things and therefore the Scriptures Now by the spirituall man the Apostle meaneth the man regenerate and sanctified by the Spirit as it appeareth by that he opposeth him to the naturall man in the verse going before and so the gift of discerning and interpreting is not proper to the Chaire of Bishops 27. Secondly this Canon doth not onely giue vnto the Church thus conceiued of them the onely gift of interpretation but also a Praetorian and vnexaminable authority in interpreting so that all which they deliuer out of their Chaires must bee receiued peremptorily without examining the grounds and reasons for which they are mooued to be of that iudgement which Tyrannicall vsurpation is both contrary to the expresse precepts and principles of holy Scripture and also to the doctrine and practice of all the ancient Fathers for the scripture bids to try all things to hold that which is good And Paul refused not to haue his doctrine examined of the men of Berâ—a by the Scripture the same Apost directeth vs how to behaue our selues at the time of prophecying namely that two or three Prophets speake the other iudge All which places are flatopposite to that peremptory obtruding of interpretations vpon the Church which the Canon speaketh of so are all the Fathers in generall for in prescribing certaine rules to all men both of vnderstanding and interpreting the Scriptures they plainely shew that there is not this absolute authority nor infallibility in any to obtrude what interpretation soeuer without contradiction or examination 28. Lastly the Canon in giuing this indefinite power of interpretation and determination of doubts to the Church without any relation had to the Scripture doth vtterly iustle out the Scripture from being the Iudge And so Andradius the interpretour of this Councill doth expound the intendment thereof when he saith that the iudgement of the Church is Principium vltra quod non sit fas in inquisitione progredi Aprinciple beyond the which it is not lawfull to proceede in inquisition By which he giueth to vnderstand that our faith must relye wholly and solely vpon the iudgement of the Church that is the Pope and his Prelates without enquirie at all into the word of God whether that which they propound be consonant to the truth or no. As Erasmus in a certaine disputation against the Papists confesseth that their opinion hath not sure certain testimonies of Scripture but that the contrary opinion may be better more clerely strongly proued out of Gods word notwithstanding saith he if the Church bid I will beleeue it for I will captiuate my vnderstanding to the obedience of the Church And this indeed is the Babylonian seruitude of the church of Rome wherby they fetter the souls of their followers to perpetual slauery and lead theÌ„ blindfold vnder the veile of an implicite faith vnto perdition for this is the first ground they lay in the hearts of all their generation that they must not examine the doctrine of the Church but take it at their hands as good coyne though it be neuer so counterfeit doctrina in Concilijs definit a custodieÌ„da est non examinanda saith Bellarmine that doctrine which is defined in a Council is to be kept not examined and ordinarius pastor Ecclesiae audiendus est non iudicandus saith Stapleton an ordinary Pastor of the Church is to be heard not iudged thus we see that the Scripture is thrust cleane out of dores from hauing any right or title in the decision of questions of faith not onely by priuate men but euen by their Church it selfe 29. Now here two things are to be obserued of vs for the plainer enucleation and clearing of this poynt first that in making the Scripture Iudge we doe not exclude the Church nor any member of the Church from the office of iudging and discerning onely we place them in their due order and ranke for this is it we intend that the Scripture is the highest and most absolute Iudge from the sentence whereof there is no appeale to be made to any higher Court and that the iudgement determination of the Church or of any member therof is subordinate vnto that and to be ruled and guided by that and where it is agreeable vnto that there to be receiued where it swarueth from that to be reiected For as in the ciuill estate the Iudges deputed to that office haue no absolute authority in themselues but are subiect vnto the lawe and the Ministers thereof and therefore must not speake what they list but what the law directeth so in the state Ecclesiasticall they
for to restraine a common good to a particular vse is an open wrong to the good it selfe which the more common it is the better it is and the lesse common the lesse good for bonum est sui diffusiuum good inclineth naturally to spreade it selfe and therfore the restriction thereof is violence and force offered to the nature of it and truth cannot abide to bee imprisoned but loueth liberty This is true in all naturall good and true things but much more in this supernaturall good and truth which as Origenâ— well noteth was not written for a few as Platoes Bookes were but for the people and multitude yea for the veriest Ideots and women and children as the Fathers affirme 20. And yet these presumptuous Romanists forbid the reading of the Scripture among the people one of them affirming That it was the deuils inuention to permit the people to reade the Bible Another That he knew certaine men to be possessed of the deuill because being but Husband-men they were able to discourse of the Scriptures All teaching that it is the ground of Heresie and that Lay men are no better then Hogs and Dogs and therefore these precious pearles not to be committed vnto them and that the Scripture to a Lay man is as a sword in a mad mans or a knife in a Childes hand Thus they practise to imprison the Scriptures within the Priests cells or Monkes cloysters which were giuen by God to be the light of the world and yet which is to be noted in Queene Maries bloudy and blinde daies such as could dispend a certaine summe of mony by the yeare might reade the Bible without any speciall dispensation as if heresie builded her nest rather in the brest of the poore man then of the rich or as if the rich were lesse carnall then the poore and thus these saucy fellowes handle the sacred Scripture at their pleasure being rightly to be branded with the name of Heretikes whom Epiphanius generally calleth Lucifugae because they cannot abide the light of the Scriptures but fly from them as Owles and Bats from the light 21. Another practice of theirs is against the sense of the Scripture as the two former were against the letter that neither the body nor the soule thereof might be left vnuiolated and this is in respect of the learned to bar them vp from controuling their errours as the other were in respect of the simple to keepe them from once looking into them Their policy in this is to interdict all senses and expositions of the Scripture saue such as agree with the Church of Rome and are allowed by the Pope of Rome this is the interdiction of the Councill of â—rent and is grounded vpon a false interpretation of that article of our faith I beleeue the Catholike Church for as Stapleton saith The literall sense of that article is that thou beleeuest whatsoeuer the Catholike Church holdeth and teacheth And Cardinall Hosius If any man haue the interpretation of the Church of Rome though he know not whether and how it agreeth with the words of the scripture notwithstanding he hath Ipsissimum verbum Dei Now by the Catholike Church they meane the Romane Church or rather the Romane Bishop as I haue shewed for as Siluester sayth The power of the Catholike Church remaineth onely in him And as Stapleton The foundation of our Religion is of necessity placed vpon the authority of this mans teaching and therfore one â—aith that the Pope may change â—he Gospell and giue to it according to place and time another sense Yea a blasphemous Cardiâ—all is bâ—ld to say That if a man did not beleeue that Christ is very God and Man and the Pâ—pe thought the same he should not be condemned This is a tricke pâ—ssing all other whereby they not onely make sure worke with the Scripture that it neuer doe them hurt but also fashion the sacred and diuine sense thereof vnto their fond and foolish fancies and make it speake not what the Holy Ghost intendeth but what they imagine Nay they are so impudent as to say That the Scripture is fitted to the time and variably vnderstood the sense thereof being one while this and another while that according as it pleaseth the Church to change her iudgement Can there be a greater disgrace to the Scripture then this is 22. Adde to these yet another deuice which is far worse then all the rest that is a grosse and palpable wringing and wresting out of the holy Scripture a sense contrary to the true intendment of the place fitting it strangely to their own purpose This is a practice of theirs so coÌ„mon as that their Books swarme with nothing so much as such fond and foolish interpretations and so ridiculous withall that it would make euen Heraclitus himselfe to laugh if he were aliue I wil here report some few of these strange wrested Expositions that the Reader may haue a taste of them and so iudge of the whole caske 23. And to beginne at the beginning of the Bible Genes 1. 16. It is written God created two great Lights the greater to rule the day and the lesser to rule the night that is saith Innocentius the third one of their owne Popes And also Molina the Iesuite God ordained in the Firmament of the Catholike Church two dignities to wit the Pontificiall dignitie and the Regall But that to gouerne the day that is the Spiritualty and is the greater and this to rule the night that is the Carnalty and is the lesser so that how great difference is betwixt the Sunne and the Moone so great is there betwixt the Bishop of Rome and a King that is according to the Glosse vpon the same place seuen and fiftie times So in the 3. of Genesis whereas the words of the Text are plaine Hee shall breake thy head or tread vpon thy head which is the first and principall promise of the Messiah they contrary both to the Hebrew and Septuagint translate and expound it Ipsa She shall applying vnto the Virgin Mary that which properly belongeth vnto Christ euen the worke of our Redemption And this interpretation and translation of that place is approued by the Councill of Trent in approuing the vulgar Latine Bible for authenticall and by Bellarmine also who calleth it a great mysterie that in the Hebrew a verbe of the Masculine gender is ioyned with a Nowne of the foeminine to signifie that a woman should breake the serpents head but not by her selfe but by her sonne and is also so translated by our Doway Translatours in English 24. So againe that place in the Psalme Psal 91. 13. Thou shalt walke vpon the Aspe and the Cockatrice and shalt tread vpon the Lion and the Dragon Pope Alexander the third interpreted it of himselfe and the Emperour applying the promise made to Christ principally and in him to all the Elect vnto himselfe as Pope and
brought into the world sayth Saint Augustine by originall sinne ignorance and difficulty from which two other fountaines of euils doe arise to wit error griefe For ignorance bringeth forth error and difficulty griefe And our Countrey-man Stapleton telleth vs plainely that Zelus sine scientia est vehemens cursus in deui◠in quo quantò curris velociùs tantò a via aberras longiùs peccas absurdiùs Zeale without knowledge is a violent course in a wrong way wherein the swifter wee runne the further woe wander and sinne the groslier Thus they themselues write and therefore I wonder how the same men should dare to allow that which in their own consciences they condemne or nourish that in the people which they confesse to bee a sinne a wound and disease of the soule and the way to perdition I know not how they will distinguish and shift off that saying of Saint Paul Blessed is he that condemneth not himselfe in that which hee alloweth vnlesse it bee either by saying that they condemne not ignorance in all but onely in the Lay people as if Lay people had not souls to saue aswel as Priests Or that they allow of it not simply in regard of it selfe but in respect to a further good to wit the increase of deuotion as if euill were to be done that good might come thereof which Saint Paul giueth a God forbid vnto and sayth that their damnation is iust that are of that minde I leaue therefore this first proposition confirmed by Scripture reason Fathers and their owne Doctours and come to the second wherein out of their owne grounds they shall bee conuinced of this grosse impiety 6. That the Romish Religion doth nourish and maintaine most grosse and barbarous ignorance amongst the people and take from them the key of knowledge First their owne confessions Secondly their doctrines And thirdly the fruits and effects of both in the whole rabble of their multitude Priests and people shall euince For their confession The Rhemists doe plainely confesse that knowledge in things wee pray for is not required of Christians but that ignorance is to bee preferred before it and that ability to professe the particulars of our faith is not necessary no when possibly we are to dye in the defence of the same faith How contrary is this to that which Saint Peter teacheth that eueryman be ready to giue an answere of the hope that is in him Hosius saith that to know nothing is to know all things and ignorance of most things is best of all How contrary to that which our Sauiour teacheth This is eternall life to know thee and whom thou hast sent Iesus Christ The same Hosius with Stephylus and others commends the Colliers faith to be the onely faith whereby euery vnlearned man may trye the spirits resist the Deuill iudge of the right sense of Scriptures and discerne true doctrine from false c. And what was the Colliers faith Mary being at the point of death and tempted of the Deuill answered I beleeue and dye in the faith of Christs Church Being againe demanded what the faith of Christs Church was answered that faith that I hold And thus hee beleeued as the Church beleeued and the Church as he and yet he neither knew what the Church nor himselfe beleeued This is a braue faith and worthy to bee canonized to all posterity for conquering the Deuill But what if the Deuill departed from the Collier not because hee was scarred with his bugbare faith but because he perceiued him safe enough intangled in his snare and so needed not to tempt him any more being already sure enough his owne Where was his faith then Sure I am it is farre vnlike to that faith which the Scripture speaketh of which is often called by the name of knowledge and not of ignorance as Esay 53. 11. Iohn 17. 3. 7. Againe another affirmeth plainely to wit Linwood their Lawyer that for simpler people it is sufficient to beleeue the articles of the faith implicuè that is confusedly and infoldedly and not distinctly and plainely as a bottome of yarne folded together which lieth in a small compasse and not raueled out at the length that it may bee seene and discerned in euery part And their Angelicall Doctour Aquinas compareth Gods children to asses and their teachers to oxen because it is said in the first Chapter of Iob that the oxen did plow and the asses fed by them that it is sufficient for them in matters of faith to adhere vnto their superiours And in the same place hee concludeth that a man is bound to know no more explicitely but the Aritcles of the faith As for all other doctrines of Religion conteined in Scripture it is enough to beleeue them implicitely And againe in another place hee sayth that knowledge doth occasionally hinder deuotion and therfore that simple men and women that are voyd of knowledge are for the most part most inclined to deuotion But I confesse he speaketh this of such knowledge as is not sanct fied but puffeth vp how be it hee should then haue ascribed the impediment of deuotion vnto the pride that accompanieth knowledge and not to knowledge Hence grew that notorious celebrated prouerbe of the Romish Synagogue that Ignorance is the mother of deuotion And it goeth for currant amongst them all as yet vncontrolled But how opposite is the very sound thereof to that which holy Scripture teacheth that ignorance is the mother of errour and of folly Prou. 7. 7. and of destruction Hos 2. 6. Thus wee haue their open confession and what should follow but their open condemnation 8. But peraduenture the Iury requireth fuller euidence let them list therefore to their doctrines diuers whereof either directly maintaine ignorance or at least by necessary consequence driue thereunto and they are such as are not the particular opinions of priuate men but the approoued doctrines of their Church so that a man cannot bee an entyre Romanist but he must needes subscribe vnto them and subscribing vnto them must also needs confesse that that monstrous ignorance which is in the Church of Rome doth issue out of their corrupt fountaine To come therefore vnto them 9. The first doctrine that breedeth and nourisheth ignorance amongst them is their locking vp the Scripture in an vnknowne tongue that the common people being ignorant of the learned tongues may not be able to read them much lesse to vnderstand them to their comfort which that is so hath beene partly declared already and may further bee demonstrated for Bellarmine affirmeth that it is not necessary for the Scripture to be translated into our Mother tongue And Azorius another Iesuite going a step further saith that it is not expedient for the sacred volumes to be translated into Mother tongues because thereby the vnitie of the faithfull should be detrimented and diuers causes of errors and heresies would spring vp
actour therein This is so grosse that it needs no refutation and it sheweth plainely the point I ayme at that there is no colour for their Masse in the new Testament seeing they are constrained to fetch it out of the old especially by so ridiculous and strange a deduction 61. Secondly if wee consult with the primitiue and pure antiquity wee shall neuer finde any iust testimony for the Romish propitiatory sacrifice for the expiating and purging away of sinnes for albeit the Fathers doe often call this Sacrament a sacrifice yet their meaning is not that it is a true proper and reall sacrifice but onely either a commemoration and representation of the sacrifice of Christ finished on the Crosse or an application and obsignation of the same to the faithfull receiuers which to bee their intendment may be gathered first from their owne testimonies which are so cleare and direct that I shall not need saue to referre the Reader to the places quoted in the margent And secondly by Lumbard their prime Schooleman and profest Epitomizer of the Fathers especially of Saint Augustine who sayth expresly that that which is offered and consecrated by the Priest is called a sacrifice and oblation because it is a commemoration and representation of the true sacrifice made vpon the altar of the Crosse And thirdly by their constant ascription to the sole sacrifice of Christ the onely power of propitiation and satisfaction for sinnes which if it be true then when they call the Masse A propitiatory sacrifice they must of necessity vnderstand not a reall sacrifice but onely a representation and application of that onely true sacrifice on the Crosse besides which there is no other externall and corporall sacrifice in the new Testament as Lactantius plainely witnesseth when hee sayth that those things which are wrought by the fingers or done without a man are not true sacrifices 62. Lastly if it bee granted that many of the ancients did speake of a proper and true sacrifice yet the theatricall pageant of the Romish Masse cannot bee vnderstood by them both because in the ancient description of the rites and orders of the Church found in Iustine Martyr Dionysius Chrysostome Augustine and others no such histrionicall representation in ceremonies gestures words and acts is to be seene and also because the Romish Doctours themselues confesse that the rites and ceremonies therein vsed were not in the Apostles times but crept in by little and little and were patcht together at diuers times and by diuers persons as their fancies led them now the sinewes of the Masse consisteth in these and therefore these beeing confessed nouelties how is it likely that the thing it selfe should be of a different nature 63. The fire of Romish Purgatory is a bird of the same feather it was neither kindled in the Scriptures neither is it found in ancient Councils or in the writers of the Primitiue Church nor yet in those that next succeeded the age therof I vnderstand here Romish Purgatory to wit such as is taught maintained in the Church of Rome at this day as an article of faith and is thus described A fire of hell adioyning to the place of the damned wherein the soules of the faithfull departing in the guilt of veniall sinnes or for the more full satisfaction of mortall sinnes already remitted are tormented which is nothing differing from the punishment of the damned in respect of the extremity of the paine but onely in respect of continuance of time the confession of this Purgatory sayth Bellarmine is a part of the Catholike faith and it is decreed by the Council of Trent to the same purpose 64. Concerning this Purgatory if wee consult with the places of the scripture alledged by them for the maintenance thereof wee shall find them either friuolously or falsly produced for either they are allegories which can affoord no strong conclusion in reasoning or they are vtterly of another sense except they bee wrung and stretched beyond their â—ether which to bee true may appeare First because none of them directly say that there is a Purgatory secondly the consequence extracted from theÌ„ is of so ambiguous an Interpretation that if one interpreter conceiue them that way two are of a contrary iudgment thirdly because they crosse one another in the Interpretation of them as for example Bellarmine obiects Mat. 5. 25. which Iansenius interprets cleane in another sense so Mat. 5. 22. produced by Bellarmine is confuted by Suarez and Maldonate so 1. Cor. 3. 2. is not vnderstood of Purgatory by Pererius and so of all the rest now how can an article of faith bee built out of these texts when neither the words themselues doe plainly affirme it nor by necessary consequence either in the opinion of Fathers or ioynt iudgement of their owne Doctours it can bee deduced from them and thus there is no fewell for this fire to bee found in Scripture diuine 65. Touching Councils it is to be noted first that the ancientest Councill which is alledged for the proofe hereof is the third Councill of Carthage which was about the yeere 398. Secondly the most of them speake not of Purgatory but of prayer for the dead which might bee done and was done without any conceit of Purgatory for they prayed for them of whose present possession of Heauen they doubted not as hath beene shewed before Thirdly that the first Councils alledged to mention Purgatory and decree it for a doctrine of faith were the Laterane vnder Innocent the third the Floreâ—tine vnder Eugenius the fourth and the Tridentine vnder Pius the fourth in the yeere 1563. and this sheweth directly and from their own confession that it is an article of no great antiquity 66. Lastly concerning the Fathers it cannot bee denyed but that many of them speake of a purging fire but it is to be obserued in them that they most of them intended not the Romish Purgatory but the fire of the day of Doome as the testimonies of Basill Ambrose Hilary Origen Lactantius and Ierome all alledged by Bellarmine doe euince if wee will either examine them by the contexts of the places themselues or giue credit to their owne Doctors so expounding them or to Bellarmine himselfe who in diuers places crosseth himselfe and yeeldeth asmuch as wee auouch Besides it is to bee obserued that many of the Fathers supposed that the Saints departed did neither receiue reward nor punishment till the last day but were kept in certaine hidden receptacles till that time and therefore they could not dreame of Purgatory which is an intermediall punishment ending at the day of iudgement Of this opinion were Irenaeus Iustine Martyr Tertullian Origen Lactantius Clements many others of the greatest ancients Againe it is to bee obserued that Augustine whom they challenge for the greatest patrone of this fire yet defineth nothing determinately of it but speaketh doubtingly and problematically and if he affirme it in
they done it to gaine any thing thereby in disputation but onely to keepe the common people from infection whereas they spare none neither Fathers nor Councels nor moderne Writers and that not so much lest the common sort should bee infected as that the learned might be depriued of those weapons wherewith they might fight against them and wound their cause Seeing the case now so stands that hee which can muster vp together the greatest armie of Authours to fight vnder his colours is thought to haue the best cause their dealing then with vs is like that of the Philistims against the Israelites who despoyled them of all weapons and instruments of warre that they might dominiere ouer them with greater securitie but ours is not so towards them And therefore both in this and all the former respects it is a miserable vntruth and a desperate cuasion to say that wee are more guiltie of this crime then they are 107. Lastly whereas in his first answere hee pleadeth the lawfulnesse of the fact let vs heare his reasons to moue thereunto and in the interim remember that in prouing it to bee lawfull hee confesseth it to bee done But why is it lawfull Mary first because the Church being supreme Iudge on earth of all Controuersies touching faith and Religion hath authoritie to condemne Heretikes And therefore also the workes of Heretikes and if this then much more to correct and purge their Bookes if by that meanes shee can make them profitable for her vse and beneficiall to her children To which I answere two things First that it is not the Church that doth this but the sacred Inquisitors to wit certaine Cardinals and Lawyers deputed to that office who for the most part are so farre from being the Church that they are often no sound members thereof Iâ— it be said that they haue their authoritie from the Pope who is vertually the whole Church why doe they then speake so darkly and say the Church hath this authoritie when as they might in plaine termes say that the Pope hath it but that hereby they should display the feeblenesse of their cause and the fillinesse of this reason for thus it would stand Why is it lawful for Books to be purged because the Pope thinkes it lawful And must not he needs think so when the Authors crosse his triple crowne and speake against his state and dignitie Adde hereunto that it is a fallacie in reasoning when that is taken for granted which is in question For we deny their Synagogue to be the true Church and much more the Pope to bee the supreme Iudge and therefore till those things be proued the reason is of no effect 108. Secondly most of those things which are purged by them are so farre from being heresies or errours that they are the most of them sound doctrines of faith grounded vpon the authoritie of Gods sacred truth for they blot out many things in both olde and new Authours that they themselues dare not accuse to bee hereticall as that place in Saint Cyril before mentioned touching the power of faith which is no more in direct termes then that which is said in the Scripture Act. 15. 15. that faith purifieth the heart and that in the Basil Index of Chrysostome The Church is not built vpon a man but vpon faith and those propositions which are commanded by the Dutch Index to be wiped out of the Table of Robert Stephens Bible to wit that sinnes are remitted by beleeuing in Christ that he which beleeueth in Christ shall not die for euer that faith purifieth the heart that Christ is our righteousnes that no man is iust before God and that repentance is the gift of God with a number of like nature These they purge out of Stephens Index which notwithstanding are directly and in as many words recorded in the Booke of God and so it may iustly be thought that they are so farre from clenfing Bookes from the drosse and dregs of errour that they rather purge out the pure gold and cleare wine of truth and leaue nothing but dregs and drosse behind 109. His second reason is because nothing is more dangerous to infect true Christian hearts then bad Bookes Therefore it is not onely lawfull but needfull and behoouefull to the Church of God that such Bookes should bee purged and burned too if it bee so thought meete by the Church to the end that the sinceritie of one true faith and Religion might be preserued I answere all this is true which he saith but are they heresies which they purge no they are sound and orthodox opinions for the most part as hath beene proued in the answere to the former reason And doe they it to keepe Christian men from infection no their chiefe end and drift is to depriue their aduersaries of all authorities that make against them that so they might triumph in the antiquitie of their Religion and noueltie of ours which is one of their principall arguments which they vse though with euill successe for defence of their cause dealing herein as Holofernes did with the Israelites at the siege of Bethulia breaking the Conduits cutting the pipes and slopping the passages which might bring vs prouision of good and wholsome waters out of the cisternes of olde and new Writers this is their purpose and no other whatsoeuer they pretend for if they meant any good to Gods people for preuenting of infection they would haue purged their lying Legends of infinite fables their Canon Law of horrible blasphemies and their Schoolemen of many strange opinions Yea they would haue condemned the Bookes of Machiauel and of that Cardinall that wrote in commendation of the vnnaturall sinne of Sodomie and a number such like filthy and deuillish Writings which are printed and reprinted among them without controulement And againe is it vnitie in the true faith and religion that they seeke no it is conspiracie in falshood and consent in errour and not vnitie in the truth till the Romish Religion bee proued to bee the true Religion which can neuer be this reason is of no force to iustifie their proceedings Lastly is it Christian policy no it is deuilish subtletie and craftie forgerie for the case so stands betwixt them and vs as in a tryall of land betwixt partie and partie wherein hee that bringeth best euidence and witnesse carrieth the cause now if one partie either suborne false witnesses or corrupt true or forge euidences to his purpose or falsifie those that are extant all men will count him as a forger and his cause desperate and iudge him worthie the Pillorie so betwixt vs the question is who hath the right faith and the best title to the Church Our euidences are first and principally Gods Word then the writings and records of godly men in all ages now then they that shall purge pare raze blurr falsify or corrupt any of these must needs bee thought to bee subtle and craftie companions and not honest
vncertaintie of vnwritten traditions for the Scripture was euer the same since it was Scripture and so shall continue to the end of the World no man daring to alter or change it to adde thereto or detract ought therfrom for feare of the curse denounced against such presumption But Traditions are and haue beene euer most variable and vnconstant some that haue beene held for Apostolical traditions being vtterly abrogated and abolished as threefold immersion or thrice dipping in baptisme for signification of the Trinitie giuing the Eucharist to infants which was vsed 600. yeeres in the Church standing in publike Prayers at Easter and Pentecost and such like and some altered and changed as deferring Baptisme vntill the feasts of Easter and Pentecost into baptizing vpon any occasion fasting vpon Wednesdayes and Saturdayes into Wednesdayes and Fridayes and so many ancient constitutions dispensed withall by the pretended Apostolicall authoritie of the Church of Rome as is confessed by them And that this is an vncontroulable truth that one famous example of the contention betwixt the East and West Churches touching the obseruation of Easter doth euince for the one side pretended a tradition from Saint Iohn and Saint Philip the other from Saint Peter and Saint Paul Now if some traditions bee thus vncertaine subiect to change abrogating dispensing and abolishing all must needs bee of the same nature and if all bee of that nature then there can be no securitie in conscience to suspend our faith vpon them the safest way therefore is to relye vpon Scripture alone the fulnesse whereof Tertullian adored and of the authoritie whereof whatsoeuer was destitute Ierome iudged to bee nothing but vaine babbling and besides the which whosoeuer teacheth any doctrine of faith Saint Augustine pronounceth anathema against him 27. Thirdly and lastly by the infallible truth which shineth in the Scriptures as the Sunne in the firmament wherein no errour euer was found no spots or blemishes as in the Moone of traditions no deceit nor misleading vnlesse in sence peruerted as by Heretikes to their owne destruction but many traditions haue beene as erronious and deceitfull in themselues so the causes of much errour in the Church witnesse Papius who as Eusebius testifieth broched many exorbitant doctrines vnder pretence of tradition from the Apostles and drew manie Ecclesiasticall Doctours moued by his antiquitie for he was Disciple to Iohn into the errour of the Chiliasts and all the ancient Heretikes almost who flying from the Scriptures did shelter themselues vnder the pretext eyther of philosophicall principles fained gospels or forged traditions and hereof many ancient traditions themselues giue pregnant euidence as those alleadged by Clemens Alexandrinus to wit Iustification by philosophie Repentance after death Preaching the Gospell to the wicked in hell which the Romanists themselues condemne or that of Cyprian touching anointing to bee vsed in Baptisme and mixing wine with water which Saint Augustine relected as erronious or that of Iraeneus who saith that it was a tradition that Christ suffered at fiftie yeeres of age which is disallowed by all sound authoritie and conuinced of errour by the Scripture it selfe Of this kind a number more might bee produced if need required but these are enough to inferre the conclusion that traditions are not of that infallible truth as the holy Scripture is but rather subiect to errour and falshood and therefore it can bee no part of Christian wisedome to repose our faith vpon them for it is to build vpon a sandie foundation which will deceiue the building in time of need 28. Auricular confession hath as little securitie in the practice of it as any of the former doctrines for first it implieth inpossibilitie of performance by requiring a perfect enumeration of all particular sinnes both secret and open and that vpon danger of damnation the absolution being frustrate if this condition bee not obserued Now because no man is able to performe this therefore no mans conscience can be assured of the remission of his sinnes by that sacramentall medicine whereas on the contrarie hee that confesseth his knowne sinnes to God and forsaketh them with a generall detestation of all other vnknowne though many escape his remembrance yet by Gods promise is sure to find mercie which is the doctrine of the Protestants This is possible and easie to be done The other impossible and improbable and that many learned of their side haue ingeniously confessed as Cassander Rhenanus with diuers others And albeit the Fathers of the Trent Councell in shew seemed to qualifie the matter with this limitation that other sinnes which do not come into the mind of the partie confessing diligently thinking vpon them are vnderstood as generally included in his confession yet the Iesuite Suarez confesseth that the Priest cannot remit any one sinne except the penitent confesse all that hee ought to confesse and Maldonate another Iesuite that because the Priest can remit no sinnes but such as he heareth confessed therefore hee that must remit all must heare all And it is plaine that whatsoeuer the Councell spake yet it meant no otherwise by the reason which they giue for necessitie of confession which is that the penitent may bee iudged whether he hath sinned or no and if hee haue in what kind and degree to the end that proportionable penance may be ioyned to his offence and therefore it is required that not onely the act of sinne but all the circumstances bee discouered Who what to what end how by what helpes where when which are the seuen circūstances attending vpon euery actiō Now how can the Priest iudge of the nature qualitie quantitie of the sin except he know it with all the circumstances if he know it not how can he enioyne a competent satisfaction And if no satisfaction be enioyned then no remission eyther of the sinne or at least releasement from the temporall punishment thereof can bee obtained What a snare are mens consciences brought into by this intricate doctrine How much freer and securer a course is it to confesse necessarily to God alone voluntarily to the Pastor in cases of distresse of conscience and want of instruction and penally to the Church in publike for satisfaction not of God but of men for some publike offence committed This is the doctrine of Protestants which as it is free from impossibilitie so it is full of safetie 29. Secondly their doctrine leaueth the conscience in doubt whether the sinne bee truly pardoned or no by the absolution of the Priest for the Priest being a man is vnable to search into the heart of a sinner and so consequently may erre in the vse of the key for if the Confessor bee an Hypocrite though he make a true relation of all his sinnes with all their circumstances and be therefore absolued by the Priest yet it is certaine that such an one is not absolued in Heauen but stands lyable to Gods
so that their ignorance be simple and vnaffected may bee saued And hereupon they conclude that it is safer to bee of that Church wherein by our owne confession a man may be saued then of that to which they denie all hope of saluation but it is a conclusion made by confusion For who seeth not that that is more likely to be the true Church which is animated with charitie then that which is void of charitie and that it is safer to harbour vnder her wings that is charitably affected euen towards her enemies then vnder her that is so miscarried with enuie that she committeth all to the pit of Hell that are not of her fellowship and profession especially seeing Saint Paul chargeth the Thessalonians that If any man obey not the Gospell they should note him with a letter and haue no companie with him that hee may bee ashamed yet they should not accout him as an enemie but admonish him as a brother If then it be safer to thinke charitably of those that are without then vtterly to condemne them all then it must be also safer to bee a member of our Church then of theirs And to make the matter more cleare Saint Augustine is flat of our mind to thinke more Christianlike of Heretikes as they repute vs then they doe for writing against the Donatists thus he sayth They that defend their false doctrine without obstinate boldnesse especially if they be not such as haue beene authors of those errours but either receiued them from their Parents or were seduced by others and doe carefully seeke the truth being readie to be reformed assoone as they shall see their errours such men are not to be esteemed as Heretikes Thus writeth Saint Augustine whereby hee condemneth the practice of the Church of Rome and iustifieth ours as more agreeable to the rule of charitie and thus that reason whereby the Iesuites seduce many ignorant persons falleth to the ground and maketh more against them then for them 43. Thirdly if the Churches authoritie bee aboue the authoritie of the Scriptures then are men to bee preferred before God and that which is subiect to errour before that which can neither erre nor deceiue for the Church consists of men but the Scripture is immediately from God and the Church may erre though not in fundamentall points but the Scripture cannot erre no not in the least titte the truth of this allegation is grounded vpon those reasons First because euery particular Church may erre as is confessed and therefore the whole Chuchin generall may erre also for such as is the nature of the parts is the nature also of the whole Secondly Councels which are their Church representatiue haue erred as is notoriously knowne to all and confessed by Saint Augustine who sayth that the decrees of prouinciall Councels are subiect to reprehension Yea former generall Councels may be corrected by them that follow as the Councell of Arimine by the Councell of Constantinople the second of Ephesus by the Councell of Chalcedon the Councell of Carthage by the first of Nice and the second of Nice by the Councell of Franckeford Thirdly the Pope that is the Head of the Church hath erred this is also confessed therefore the bodie can claime no better priuiledge but sayth the same Augustine There is no doubt of the truth of any thing which is contained in the Scripture Therefore who can doubt to place the resolution of their faith as the safest course on the Scripture rather then on the Church especially seeing no particular writer of the holy Scripture can be taxed with the least errour but many particular parts of the Church whether we respect the imagined head which is vertually the whole Church in their estimation or the chiefe members in grosse as the Councels or the deuided ioynts as particular Congregations may iustly be challenged as tainted with diuers errours in doctrines of faith 44. Lastly the Church of Rome may be the whore of Babylon and so the See of Antichrist if not necessarily as wee auouch yet coniecturally as no man can denie because spirituall Babylon is said to bee a Citie situate vpon seuen hils and not onely so but that raigned ouer the Kings of the earth both which notes directly agree to the Citie of Rome but the Church of Protestants cannot by any likelihood bee that whore seeing neither of those markes doe in any respect belong vnto it Is it not safer then to rest our selues in her bosome which by al probabilitie is an honest Matrone then in her armes which is a suspected harlot If Caesar would haue his wife to bee without suspition then euerie Christian had need to looke to his faith whereunto he is as it were married by the Spirit of God wherby he is married vnto Christ that it be not onely sincere but also free from all suspition or likelihood of errour 45. Thus we see in these few maine points of the Romish Religion compared with our contrarie assertions that it is a farre safer course to bee a Protestant then a Papist let all indifferent persons iudge and discerne betwixt vs and I pray God direct them by his Spirit to choose the truth 46. There is one thing yet remaining whereby this may further appeare and so and end of this whole discourse and that is that there is no one point of doctrine wherein they differ from vs but is contradicted by some of their owne learned Writers shaking hands with vs and crossing their owne Pew-fellowes whence from ariseth not onely another strong argument of greater securitie in our Religion then in theirs which hath the suffrages of the greatest enemies to vphold it but also of vnresistable truth which worketh so vpon the consciences of the aduersaries thereof that it forceth them will they nill they to acknowledge it now and then as the Deuill himselfe was constrained to confesse Christ Iesus to be the Sonne of God I might write a whole Volume of this point alone but I will propound here onely some few instances and so shut vp this Treatise 47. Protestants teach that a man is iustified by faith alone whereby the righteousnesse of Christ is imputed vnto him and not by the inherent or adherent righteousnesse of his owne workes the same is confessed by Thomas Aquinas who sayth that no man is iustified with God by his workes but by the habit of faith infused and againe that there is in the workes of the Law no hope of iustification but by faith onely and by Pighius who holdeth that there is in vs no inherent righteousnesse whereby wee may bee iustified but that our iustification is by Christs righteousnesse imputed vnto vs and by the Diuines of Collen who affirme That the righteousnesse of Christ imputed vnto vs and apprehended by faith is the principall cause of our iustification and by Cassander who approueth of our doctrine of iustification by faith alone and imputed
against their Emperours and that this was not for want of strength as Bellarmine would haue it he sayth that euen then they did not attempt any such thing when in number and strength they might make their party good but in this extolled their Religion aboue all other by defending this most holy doctrine That all men ought to obey the Magistrates The notable and learned Treatises of Barclay a French man Blackwell Warberton c. our Countrey-men all profest Romanists doe peremptorily and plainely by many reasons confute the same Touching his spirituall iurisdiction though there bee fewe of them that gain-say that yet Gregory the great one of their owne Popes may stand in stead of many who by many letters both to the Emperour and Bishop of Constantinople sheweth that no man ought to be an vniuersall Bishop ouer therest calling that name in detestation vaine proud prophane blasphemous mischieuous Antichristian against the commandements of God and decrees of Councils and peremptorily sayth that he is a follower of Sathan and a fore-runner of Antichrist that assumeth it to himselfe 59. And that the Pope is not the supreme Iudge in the Church nor of infallible iudgement but the Scripture only many of them are of opinion aswell as we Aquinas saith that the doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles is the rule of our vnderstanding Antoninus saith that God hath spoken but once and that in the holy Scripture and that so plentifully to meet with all temptations and all cases that may fall out Gerson saith that the Scripture is the rule of our faith which being well vnderstood no authority of men is to be admitted against it Gonradus Clingius saith that the Scripture is the infallible rule of truth yea the measure and Iudge of the truth Peresius saith that the authority of no Saint is of infallible truth for that honour is due only to the Scripture Yea Bellarmine their Ring-leader confesseth the Scripture to be the most certaine and most safe rule of faith Franciscus Victoria saith that the Pope in dispensing against the Decrees Councels and former Popes may erre and grieuously sinne Alphonsus de Castro diueth deeper and saith that euery man yea the Pope and that as he is Pope and Pastor of the Church may be deceiued Bozius pierceth yet deeper and saith that the Pope may be an Heretike yea write teach and preach heresie And lastly Almayne saith that the power of not erring in the faith is not alway in the Pope Are not all these now Protestants in this point But for fuller satisfaction in this point I referre the Reader to the reuerent and iudicious Deane of Winchester Doctor Morton with others who haue largely and learnedly discouered this matter in their writings 60. The like might bee shewne in all other points these few instances therefore shall suffice for this time to perswade that it is farre more safe to subscribe to the Religion of Protestants then of Romanists seeing we hold nothing which many of their owne ranke and order doe not maintayne aswell as we and what I pray you could mooue them thus to doe being sworne subiects to the Church of Rome but the euidence of truth which shined so cleerely to their consciences that they neither could nor durst gaine-say the same Conclusion NOw then gentle Reader these things being thus cleerly proued viz First that the Religion of the Church of Rome giueth open libertie to sinne Secondly that it maintayneth by the grounds therof things forbidden by all lawes Diuine Naturall and Humane Thirdly that it imitateth the Iewes in those things wherein they are enemies to Christ Fourthly that it derogateth from the glorie of Gods mercy and efficacy of the merits of Christ in the worke of our redemption Fiftly that it refuseth to bee tryed by the Scriptures and will be iudged and tryed by none but it selfe Sixtly that it is at defiance and profest enmitie with the sacred Scriptures Seuenthly that it maintayneth grosse and palpable Idolatrie Eightly that it is contrary to it selfe by manifest contradictions Ninthly that it is apparently opposite to the Gospell of Iesus Christ Tenthly that it nourisheth grosse and barbarous ignorance amongst the people Eleuenthly that it was neuer knowne nor heard of in the Apostles time nor in the primitiue Church Twelfthly that it vpholdeth it selfe by vnlawfull vniust and vngodly meanes and lastly that it is dangerous and vnsafe both in respect of Gods glorie mans conscience and Christian charitie I say all these things being thus cleerely demonstrated what remayneth but that wee abhorre the same as the Religion of the great Whore and her Paramour Antichrist who with their cup of fornications and vaine pretext of Peters authoritie haue besotted heretofore all Nations of the earth and cleaue to the sinceritie of the Gospell taught and professed in the Church of Protestants which is free from all these imputations for it neither giueth libertie to sinne nor maintayneth any thing that is vnlawfull nor imitateth the Iewes ascribeth all the worke of our redemption to Gods mercy and Christs merits onely desireth to bee tryed and examined by the Scriptures reuerenceth the fulnesse and perfection thereof abhorreth all shew of Idolatrie is not at enmity and opposition but keepeth a sweet harmony with it selfe doth not crosse the Gospell not so much as in shew condemneth and laboureth against ignorance is agreeable to the doctrine of the Apostles and primitiue Church maintayneth it selfe by no vnlawfull meanes and lastly hath great safetie and securitie in the profession thereof Good Christians must bee like good Gold-smiths who will not take a piece of gold of any mans word but will trie it by the touch-stone and weigh it in the ballance The Truth is like gold it behoueth all therefore to trie it and weigh it before they entertayne it into their soules lest they receiue in stead of pure mettall that which is counterfeit and light trie therefore these two Religions which of them hath the truth and without partialitie or affection retayne the good and reiect the counterfeit remember that the truth of Christians as Saint Augustine saith is more beautifull incomparably then Helene of the Grecians and that it alone as Saint Ambrose saith freeth alone saueth alone washeth and therefore though it be hid in a deepe pit as the Philosopher said yet it is diligently to be digged for of all them that desire the saluation of their soules In a word let not the darke mists of error and superstition blinde thine eyes but open them wide to the beholding of the bright light of truth that shineth round about thee and know that if the Gospell be hid it is hid to them that perish in whom the god of this world hath dazeled their mindes that they should not see the light of the glorious Gospell of Iesus Christ I desire no more credit at thy hands then the euidence of these reasons produced do require and therefore if they be true then
it is Romish is not the true Catholique Religion of CHRIST but the seduction of Antichrist THE PREAMBLE THat which Ireneus an ancient and godly Father of the Church speaketh of all Heretickes that all the Helleborus in the world is not sufficient to purge them that they may vomit out their follie may truely be spoken of the Church of Rome and her adherents that it is a difficult matter if not almost impossible to reclaime her from her errors and to heale her wounds All the balme of Gilead will not do it nor all the spirituall phisicke that can be ministred for there are two sinnes which of all other are most hard to bee relinquished Whoredome and Drunkennesse the one because it is so familiar and naturall to the flesh the other because it breedeth by custome such an vnquenchable thirst in the stomacke as must euer anon be watered with both which spirituall diseases the Church of ROME is infected She is the Whore of Babylon with whome the Kings of the Earth haue committed fornication and who hath made drunke with the Wine of her fornications all the Inhabitants of the Earth In regard of the first Ieremie prophecied of her that though paines be taken to heale her yet shee could not be healed And in regard of the second Saint Paul prophecied that GOD would send them strong delusion that they should beleeue lies that all they might bee damned that receiued not the loue of the truth Notwithstanding though the hope bee as little of the reclaiming of most of them as of turning an Eunuch into a man or making a blacke Moore white yet I haue propounded in this discourse a strong potion compounded of ingredients which if they bee not past cure may purge and cleanse them of their disease and reduce them to the sanity of Christian Religion Which if their queasie stomackes shall eyther refuse to take or hauing taken shall vomit vp againe and not suffer them to worke vpon their consciences yet this benefit will arise that God shall be glorified the truth manifested and all that loue the truth confirmed and they also themselues that are so drowned in error that they will rather pull in others ouer head and eares vnto them and so drowne together then be drawne out of the myre by any helpe shall be conuinced in their consciences of their most grosse apostacie With this confidence towards Gods glorie and the good of his Church though with little hope of recouering them from their obdurate blindnesse I enter into my intended taske desiring the Lord to giue a blessing to these poore labours which I consecrate to my Lord and Master Iesus Christ whom I serue and the Church his Spouse of which I professe my selfe to bee one of the meanest members MOTIVE I. That Religion which in many points giueth libertie to sinne is not the truth but such is the Religion of the Church of ROME ergo c. THe first proposition is an vndoubted truth and needs no confirmation especially seeing S. Iames describeth true Religion by these attributes pure and vndefiled And S. Paul calleth it the mysterie of godlinesse and the doctrine according to godlinesse And herein consisteth an essentiall difference betwixt the true Religion and all false ones so that it must needs follow that that Religion which is essentially the cause and occasion of sinne and openeth a wide window to vngodlinesse cannot be the truth of God but must needs fetch it beginning from the deuill who is the author of all euill The Gospell indeede may by accident be the occasion of euill as S. Paul saith The law is the occasion of sinne for it stirs vp contention and strife and discouers the corruptions of Mans heart and by opposing against them as a damme against a streame makes them to swell and boyle and burst forth beyond the bounds howbeit here the cause is not in the Gospell or Lawe but in the corruption of mans heart which the more it is stirred the more it rageth and striueth to shew it selfe But neuer yet was the doctrine of godlinesse the cause of wickednesse nor the pure and vndefiled Religion of Christ Iesus an essentiall procurer and prouoker vnto sinne 3. This therefore being thus manifest all the question and difficultie remaineth in the second proposition to wit that the Religion of the Romish Church is such as openeth a gappe vnto sinne and giueth notorious libertie and scope to vngodlinesse and that not by way of accident or occasion but necessarily as the cause to the effect Qua data necessariò soquitur effectus as the Logicians speake and therefore being an â—npure and defiled Religion and the mysterie of iniquitie not the mysterie of godlinesse it cannot be that true Religion which Christ our Sauiour brought with him from heauen and left here vpon earth blamelesse and vnspotted like himselfe to be the way to lead vs vnto heauen where hee is 4. That the Romish Religion is a polluted and defiled Religion tending to libertie and loosenesse Let the indifferent Reader iudge by these few instances deriued out of the verie bowels of their Church and being articles of their faith and grounds of their Religion And first to beginne with their doctrine of dispensations whereby they teach that the Pope hath power to dispense with the word of God and with euery commandement of the Law and not onely with the Law but with the Gospell and Epistles of Paul to what horrible loosenesse and lewdnesse of life doth it tend for to omit that it containeth in it open blasphemie by their owne rule which is that In praecepto superioris non debet dispensare inferior the inferiour may not dispense with the precept of the superiour by which the Pope dispensing with Gods lawe is not oneâ—y equalled but exalted aboue God what sinne is there bee it neuer so hainous which there is not libertie giuen to commit by this licencious doctrine 5. Incest But Pope Martin the first gaue a dispensation to one to marrie his owne sister and not his wiues sister only as some of the Romish crue would dawbe ouer this filthie wall because it is in Antoninus Cum quadam eius germana for Siluester Prieriâ— Bartholomeus Fumus and Angelus de Clauafio speake more plainely Cumsua germana that is with his owne naturall sister Another Pope dispensed with Henry the eight to marrie his sister in law and with Philip of Spaine to marrie his owne Niece and Clement the 7. licenced Petrus Aluaradus the Spaniard to marrie two sisters at once and no maruaile seeing it is the very doctrine of the Romish Church that the Pope can dispense in all the degrees of Consanguinitie and Affinitie saue onely with the Father and his daughter and with the Mother and her Son Sodometrie But Pope Sixtus the fourth licensed the Cardinall of Saint Lucie and his familie to vse freely that sinne not to bee named in the
An officious lye and a lye in sport are but veniall sinnes saith Molanus the same Authour affirmeth that if any man steale some little thing suppose an halfe peny as Bellarmine giueth instance whereby no notable hurt is caused this is to bee esteemed no mortall sinne Againe rash iudgement though consent bee added thereto is regularly but a veniall sinne so also is the painting of the face saith Molanus Cardinall Caietane reckoneth vp a number such like as for example Partiality in iudgement and acception of person if it be not pernitious Flattery when we praise one for veniall euils and it be without any manifest hurt Ambition that is an inordinate desire of honour if it be not for euill deeds or immoderate Arnogancie whereby a man attributeth that to himselfe which is farre aboue him if it be without preiudice of his neighbour Craft if it bee not ioyned with damage Couetousnesse as it is opposed to liberality that is an inordinate desire of money and greedy keeping of it being gotten because it is not against but besides charity Contempt of our neighbour and Superiour in small trifles To contend in words against a known truth if the opposite falshood be not pernitious To rayle vpon our neighbour to his face if it proceede from passion or bee but a light reproach Curiositie if it bee naked without some other euill ioyned with it To mocke and scorne our neighbour if in a small matter Drunkennesse if it be not full and compleat to wit if a man drinke till the house seeme to goe round and yet is not depriued of reason yea if it bee of purpose and with full intention For a childe not to reuerence his Parents so that it be free from notorious iniurie and contempt To deceiue if in a small mater Gluttony is then onely mortall when a man makes the delight in eating the last end Hypocrisie to wit thus farre forth if a man faine himselfe to be good in some thing when hee is not or better then he is Filthy speech is most vsuall but veniall To disdaine a mans neighbour is commonly but a veniall sinne To iudge rashly of our neighbour is either veniall or mortall according to the greatnes of the thing where of we giue iudgement Idlenesse if it haue no other mischiefe to accompany it These and a number such like are reckoned vp by that Author to which I might adde many more out of other Romish writers but these may suffice for our purpose to demonstrate what liberty this doctrine giues to loosnesse For hence men may be bold to sweare to curse to raile to back-bite to steale to be drunke to be idle c. cloke all vnder this vaile They are but veniall sinnes Yea and because the common people are not able to vnderstand their nice distinctions of against and beside charitie surreption and irruption great and small dammage c. therefore often grosse and great sinnes creepe in vnder the name of venials if this be not a doctrine of liberty what is 40. The sixt and last doctrine tending to loosnesse the last I meane of those which I intend to propound in this Discourse for there are many more that tend to the same end is their doctrine of implicite and infolded faith where by they teach that if a man know some necessary poynts of Religion as the doctrine of the God-head of the Trinitie of Christs incarnation and Passion c. it is needlesse to busie himselfe about the rest by a particular or distinct knowledge but it sufficeth to giue assent to the Church and to beleeue as the Pastors beleeue This implicite faith is the mother of ignorance and this ignorance say they is the mother of deuotion but what kind of deuotion I pray you such as the mother is such is the daughter a blinde mother and a blinde daughter such a deuotion and zeale which the Iewes had when they crucified Christ or as Saint Paul had when he persecuted the Church of Christ or which the Gentiles had when they thought they did God good seruice by putting to death the primitiue Christians Like Poliphemus when his eye was bored out by Vlisses dashed himselfe against euery rocke so doe these blinde Romanists the eye of knowledge being bored out by this pernitious doctrine dash themselues against the rocke of Heresie in matter of faith and impietie in manners for all errour in doctrine ariseth from ignorance of the Scriptures You erre not knowing the Scripture and the power of God saith our Sauiour and erring in manners proceedeth from the same fountaine for if the hyding of Gods word in the heart is a preseruatiue against sinne as the Prophet Dauid auoucheth then the ignorance of Gods word must needs be the cause of many errours and enormities in life To this agreeth the opinion of Chrysostome Scripturarum ignoratio haereses peperit haec vitam corruptam inuexit haec sursum ac deorsum omniamiscuit The ignorance of Scripture hath bred heresies brought in corruption of life and turned all things vpside downe And also of Saint Hierome who sayth plainely Ama scientiaÌ„ Scripturarum carnis vitia non amabis Loue the knowledge of the Scriptures and thoushalt not loue the vices of the flesh Whereby hee giueth vs to vnderstand that where there is no loue of knowledge there must needs be the loue of vice the reason is manifest because the Scripture is a most exquisite rule and exact squire to try all our actions by as Chrysostome calleth it and a straight and inflexible rule as Gregory Nissen termeth it Now if this rule squire and ballance be hid from vs how can we square our actions aright how can wee giue them their iust poyse and weight As the Carpenter that hath lost his rule and line cannot but erre grosly in his worke So the Christian that is depriued of this knowledge of Gods word must needs runne into infinite foule and grosse enormities 41. From this fountaine conioyned with those which went before springeth the monstrous corruption of manners in all places whâ—â— Popery raigneth especially in Italie and Rome vnder the Popes nose They obiect to vs the great and horrible disorder and corruption which is among Protestants but we on the other side as we stand not to iustifie our selues in this kind but rather be waile the prophanenesse of all estates in these dayes euen vnder the Gospell so we dare boldly say that in the time of Popery heretofore and in places where it now swayeth their impiety and prophanenesse doth as farre exceed ours as a great mountaine doth a little molehill Of all Countries in the world Italie is the Popes owne peculiar and yet that is the very siacke of the world for sinne witnesse Aencas Siluius who liued almost two hundred yeares since who sayth
practice Their principles are these As long as the Prince continueth excommunicate the Subiect is freed from the oath of subiection this is the Position of a Cardinall whose authority was so great in the Church of Rome that whatsoeuer he wrote was allowed as sound and authenticall without examination or supervizing To him I adde a Bishop whose writings after supervision and examination were approued as Catholique doctrine and to containe in them nothing contrary to the receiued faith of the Romane Church his Position is this Assoone as a Christian King becomes hereticall forthwith people are freed from their subiection The condition in the first Position is if the King be excommunicate in the second if he be hereticall which though different in termes yet in substance are all one for euery heretique is excommunicate quatenus apertè haereticus in that he is an open heretique if not by name yet in deed and by right and so Subiects may lawfully deny him obedience saith another Iesuite and what is an hereticke in their diuinity I pray you Marry Whosoeuer maintaineth any doctrine expresly condemned by the Church of Rome hee is to be accounted say they an obstinate hereticke To these adde the sentence of another Cardinall euen our owne Countriman Al in his Apology for Stanlies treason who ioyneth both these two conditions together as two twinnes By reason saith he of Queene Elizabeths excommunication and heresie it was not onely lawfull for any of her Subiects but euen they were bound in conscience to depriue her of any strength which lay in their power to doe and to deliuer her Armies Townes or fortresses into her enemies hands she no more being the right owner of them But all this while we haue not the pillar of Popery Bellarmine it may be he is of another mind heare therefore his resolution Non licet Christianis tolerare c. It is not lawfull for Christians to tolerate a King that is an infidell or an heretike if he endeuour to draw his Subiects to his heresie or infidelity This is braue Bellarmines resolution of this case Neither doth he barely set it downe but laboureth to proue it by many arguments throughout that whole Chapter indeed he pinneth it all vpon the Popes sleeue he must pronounce the King to be an heretike and they like sheepe must auoyde him as a wolfe he must forbid them to obey and they must forthwith fall to rebellion that whole seuenth Chapter is worth the reading if any desire to know the full and compleat doctrine of the Romish Church concerning the poynt of rebellion and treason against Princes And that this was the doctrine not of some few among them but of all in generall Let a Fryer of their owne testifie about three hundred yeares since Sigebert mencioning the Popes proceeding against Henry the Emperor thus writeth Be it spoken with the leaue of all good men this nouelty that I say not heresie had not as yet sprung vp in the world that Gods Priests should teach the people that they owe no subiection to euill Princes and though they haue sworne allegeance to them yet they owe them no fidelity neither shall hee be accounted periur'd which thinketh against the King yea hee that obeyeth him shall be counted for excommunicate and he that doth against him shall be absolued from the guilt of iniustice and periurie Here we may behold the doctrine of that age and withall that by this Fryers iudgement concurring with vs it is not onely nouelty but a point of heresie to dissolue the bond of allegeāce which Subiects owe vnto their Princes vpon any pretence whatsoeuer 3. But all these are but the opinions of priuate men and not the decrees of the Church heare therefore what the Church speaketh by the pretended head thereof the Pope who as they affirme cannot erre whilest he sits in the chaire of Peter to determine matters of faith Gregory the seuenth alias Hildobrand thus determineth We by Apostolicall authority doe absolue all from their oaths which they haue giuen to persons excommunicate And another Pope of later time in his Bull against Queene Elizabeth thus We absolue all Subiects from their faith they haue plight with Elizabeth their Queen A third Pope Paulus Tertius did excommunicate Henry the Eight King of England and commanded his nobles to beare armes against him and to make vp the full squadron of Popes when as the Vniuersite of Salamanca determined that all Catholiques which did not forsake the defence of the English and follow the traytor One all in Ireland did sinne mortally and could not obtaine euerlasting life except they should desist Pope Xistus giueth this censure of their determination Those Diuines saith he haue done the parts of good Lawyers Confessours and Doctours Many more testimonies to this effect might be accumulated but these are sufficient because wee shall haue occasion to speake hereof more at large hereafter to all that are not either bewitched with the enchantments of the whore of Babylon or blinded with preiudice to shew how both in their principles and their practice they maintaine treason and rebellion against Princes contrary to the lawes of God of nature and of man 4. A doctrine Cousin german vnto this of the same kind though not of the same degree is that their Position touching the dissoluing of all bonds of naturall and ciuill society wherby they resolue that no communion or fellowship is to bee held with heretiques that is with Protestants by whatsoeuer bond of nature or ciuility they be obliged therevnto and therefore the Father is bound to dis-inherite and cast off his Sonne the Sonne to deny and disobey his Father the wife is forbidden to render due beneuolence to her husband the seruant is commanded to disobey his Master the debter to deny payment to his Creditor the Countriman to deny his owne Country the kinsman to disclaime his kindred if any of these be heretiques that is be Protestants What a religion is this that not only choaketh the breath of humane society but euen stifleth the life of nature it selfe Hee that desireth to see these things proued let them reade Doctor Mortons first Booke of Romish positions and practices of rebellion and also his reply vnto the moderate answere where he shall find them largely and foundly discouered and confirmed 5. Againe by their doctrine of equiuocation they teach and maintaine open and notorious lying and periury such as the very heathen of stricter life and simpler iudgement abhor'd their doctrine is this A man saith Tollet is not alwaies bound to answere according to the meaning of the asker but may sometimes vse equiuocation and deceiue the hearer this is lawfull saith he whē the Iudge requireth an oth against iustice or when he is not a competent Iudge as another speaketh as for example if the Iudge demand Hast thou done this he may answere I haue not though he
a small neither shalt thou haue in thy house diuers measures a great and a small but thou shalt haue a right and a iust weight a perfect and a iust measure Let no man oppresse or defraude his brother in any matter How contradictory these plaine precepts and enunciatiue propositions of Gods word are vnto the positions of the Cardinall no man can but discerne that is not bewitched with the soâ—cerie of Iezabel either therefore let him shew out of holy writ some exception from these generall rules or let him acknowledge his Doctrine and Religion to be the vpholder of most grosse and palpable theft 22. If any man say that these be the opinions of priuate men and not the doctrine of the Church I answere that this is a most friuolous conceit for none of their bookes are admitted to the presse before they be examined by certaine Censurers deputed to that purpose by the Church and if any thing dislike them or seeme to sauour of heresie as they call the trueth presently it is either gelded out or corrected at their pleasures And that which goeth for currant hath his allowance subnexed That it containeth in it nothing contrary to the Catholike faith of the Church of Rome These positions then of these Iesuites standing thus approued by the common consent of their Censurers and priuiledged to be both printed and read of all men as containing nothing contrary to wholesome doctrine cannot be thought to be the vnaduised opinions of priuatemen but euen the doctrine and religion of their Church 23. Lastly that I may conclude this second argument they maintaine also the prophanation of the Sabboth which the Lord hath enioyned to be sanctified with so great and vrgent a precept Remember that thou keepe holy the Sabboth day Adding â— mâ—menâ—o before and fencing it with so many reasons after that it might not seeme a light matter but a coÌ„mandement of great consequence yet these impudent preuaricators make it a matter of no moment yea giue liberty to the open breach and transgression of it For thus writeth Cardinall Tollet Homo tenetur c. A man saith he is bound vpon paine of a mortall sinne to sanctifie the Sabboth but is not bound vnder the same paine to sanctifie it well As if forsooth it could be sanctified at all if it be not well sanctified or as if the prophanation of the Sabboth were the sanctifying of it for not to sanctifie it well is nothing else but to prophane it howbeit if this were all the iniurie hee doth to Gods Sabboth it might be borne withall but the bold Cardinall taketh vpon him to breake in pieces the barres thereof and to expose it being the Lords day and therefore fit to bee employed onely in the Lords worke to most vile and base offices for thus hee writeth in the same booke Licet iter facere c. It is lawfull to take a iourney on the feast day with this caueat that diuine seruice be first heard It is lawfull to hunt and doe such like things It is lawfull for Iudges especially rurall to giue iudgement on the feast day it is no sinne for a Barber to exercise his trade on the feast day for commodity if he had no leasure to doe it at another time they are excused also which sell flesh kill beasts and sell necessary victuals on holy dayes And if the occasion of a great gayne would otherwise bee lost as in fishing for Herring and Tunnes which come not but vpon certaine dayes it is lawfull to fish on the holy day In publique solemnities it is lawfull to prepare the wayes and to build for spectacles This is the doctrine of that renowned Cardinall whose writings are so approued of the Church of Rome that whatsoeuer hee speaketh is held for trueth But here it may be answered that he nameth not the Sabboth but the festiuall or holy day to which I answere First that the title of that Chapter is de Sabbathâ— and therefore if he meaneth not that hee swarueth from his purpose Secondly that the expresse words and drift of the whole Chapter demonstrates that vnder the name of the festiuall or holy day he includeth also the Sabboth And thirdly how could he giue instructions touching the cases of the Sabboth if he intended not the Sabboth seeing all his rules runne vnder this generall terme on the festiuall or holy day This therfore is but a mist to blinde mens eyes that they might not see their impietie 24. Can this Religion thinke you be of God which in thus many points crosseth and trampleth vnder foote the law of God Doth not the head of that congregation euidently shew himselfe to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that outlaw which S. Paul speaketh of 2. Thess 2. that is such an one as opposeth himselfe to the law of God Doe not the necke and shoulder which are supporters of that head I meane the Cardinals and Bishops shew themselues to be of the same nature and disposition with it and the whole body which is quickned by the life of his doctrine to be meerely Antichristian He that seeth not this is blinde and cannot discerne a farre off hee that seeth it and confesseth it not is carelesse of his owne saluation Let vs leaue them therefore either to bee conuerted which God graunt for Christ his sake or to bee confounded if they continue in their errours MOTIVE III. That Religion which imitateth the Iewes in those things wherin they are enemies to Christ cannot bee the truth but such is the Religion of the Church of Rome Ergo. THe malice of the Iewes towards Christ our Sauiour and his Church from the beginning vnto this day is so notorious that the whole world is witnesse thereof Saint Paul witnesseth of them that they killed the Lord Iesus and their owne Prophets and persecuted the Apostles and were contrary to all men and forbad them to preach vnto the Gentiles that they might be saued to fulfill their sinnes alwaies and that the wrath of God was come vpon them to the vttermost And as it was at that time so euer since they haue not any whit remitted but increased in their rancour for still they crucifie vnto themselues the Lord of Life though not in his person which is at the right hand of God yet in his meÌ„bers whoÌ„ they persecute vnto death asmuch as in them lyeth and in his Gospel which they still pursue with a deadly hatred Yea so great is their malice that many times they haue taken Christian children vpon their preparation day to the Passouer and nailed them vpon the Crosse loaded them with reproaches and scornes in disgrace of Christ and miserably tormented them to death as was done by the Iewes of Inmester a Towne scituate betwixt Chalchis and Antiochia as witnesseth Socrates in his Ecclesiasticall History and in Germany at Fretulium as also in England at Lincolne and Norwich as our Chronicles testifie Yea it
in this poynt Now here a double taske lyeth vpon mee first to proue this to bee their doctrine and secondly to shew how this doctrine tendeth to the empeachment of Gods glorie 4. That this is the doctrine of the Church of Rome let the Councill of Trent which they call their Church representatiue and which being approued by the Pope cannot erre as they affirme be Iudge Thus it decreeth and bindeth the decree with a curse Si quis dixerit c. that is If any man shall say that mans free-wil being mooued and stirred by God doth nothing cooperate by assenting to God moouing and calling it whereby it may dispose and prepare it selfe to the obtaining of the grace of iustification and that it cannot dissent if it will but like a thing without life is not at all actiue but meerely passiue Anathema sit Let him be accursed This Riddle of the Councill of Trent for so most of the decrees thereof are rather to bee termed then Canons of faith is thus expounded by Andradius interpretation who was present at the same Councill and knew the meaning of those holy Fathers to wit that there is in euery man by nature a power and ability Ad inchoandas perficiendas spirituales actiones that is To beginne and to effect spirituall actions but that power and ability is so fettered with the chaines of sinne that vnlesse grace come and helpe to set it free it can doe nothing as a man weighed downe with yron shooes though he hath power in himselfe to go yet cannot except his yron shooes be put off or as a bird caught in a snare hath power to flie yet cannot except the snare be broken c. By these two similitudes he illustrateth the sentence and meaning of the Councill whereby it euidently appeareth that this is the plaine doctrine of the Church of Rome that of the regeneration and conuersion of a sinner the spirit of God is not the sole cause but that with the spirit Mans free-will doth concurre and so both together make the ioynt efficient cause 5. The later Romanists and especially the Iesuites to passe ouer the grosse positions of the former Schoolemen do more plainely deliuer the meaning of their Church concerning this poynt Let vs heare Bellarmine speake Cooperamur Deo c. We cooperate with God saith he not onely as our Aduersaries would haue after iustification but euen in very iustification it selfe and in the beginning of faith And after he peremptorily concludeth Non nisi cooperantibus nobis Deus salutem nostrum operaturâ— that is God doth not worke our saluation without our owne helpe cooperating with him We are beholding to Bellar. for setting down plainly our opinion For this we hold that after the first grace wherin we are meerely passiue we then begin to will and worke our owne saluation but yet not of our selues as from our selues but onely of his grace wherewith as we are preuented to beginne so we must continually be accompanied that wee may perseuere for if God withdrraw his grace neuer so little we are â—ure to sinke as Peter did in the water which is the very opinion of Saint Augustine for in his Enchiridion ad Laurentium thus hee saith Deus nolentempraenenit vt velit volentem sequitur ne frustravelit that is God preuenteth a man being vnwilling that he may will and followeth him being willing lest he should will in vaine And of Saint Hierome who thus speaketh Non sufficit mihi quod semel donauit nisi semper donauerit peto vt accipiam cum accepero rursus peto that is It is not sufficient for me that he hath giuen me grace once vnlesse he doe alwaies giue I pray that I may receiue and when I haue receiued I pray againe And againe of Saint Augustine Hominis non libera sed Dei gratia liberata voluntas that is Mans will is not free but freed by the grace of God And in another place Eatenus libera quantenus liberata that is It is so farre-forth free as it is freed and no further 6. But to proceed Coster another Iesuite is a little more plaine and grosse Liberum arbitrium c. Free-will saith he doth prepare it selfe to iustification by the ayde of God not yet inhabiting but onely moouing and helping not onely suffering but also working and doing And againe in the same place Man being fallen into the darke pit of sinne that he may be drawne out againe doth not onely receiue and suffer but coworketh with the grace of God and prepareth himselfe by beleeuing trusting and vndertaking the duties of piety vntill arising vp to the Sonne of Righteousnes he be replenished with the diuine light of grace as Ieremie being baled out of the dungeon helped those which pulled him out by putting the cloutes and cordes vnder his arme-holes Salmeron another Iesuite is yet more palpable Liberum arbitrium non partem c. Free will saith hee doth not worke one part and the grace of God another but to euery action is extended aswell free-will as grace But Ecchius surpasseth all the rest for plainenesse for thus he writeth The beginning of our saluation we haue from Gods mercy but to yeeld to Gods wholesome inspiration is in our power c. Thus with an impudent forehead they marry together Gods grace and mans will in the act of Regeneration betwixt which a diuorce was made by the fall of Adam and so remaineth irreconciled till we be engrafted into the second Adam by faith 7. Hence it is that the Councill of Trent is bold to affirme that when equall grace is offered vnto two that one is conuerted and the other remaineth in his infidelity the cause is in their wills in that one entertaineth the other reiecteth the grace that is offered And to hold this saith Molynâ— another Iesuite is a matter of faith And this is the doctrine of Thomas their great Clerke It is in the power of our free-will saith he to hinder or not to hinder the receiuing of diuine grace And another more fully and foully thus dareth to speake If it be demanded why this man is conuerted and that man is not the helpe of God being giuen alike to both the reason is to be assigned to free-will namely because the one would bee conuerted and the other would not And this also Bellarmine himselfe acknowledgeth Gods motion saith he leaueth man altogether free to be conuerted or not to be Lastly they doe not onely hold that we haue a power in our wills to moue towards our owne conuersion and freely to will or nill the accepting of Gods grace offered but also to perseuere to the end after grace receiued This the Iesuite Molyna doth in expresse words set downe when hee saith That the perseuerance of men in good dependeth vpon their owne free cooperation and the dayly particular diuine helpe And this is the
dead and therefore lesse glory ascendeth vnto God by their doctrine then by ours But what doe I say lesse when indeed to giue any part of the Creators glory to the creature is vtterly to take all from the Creator for hee will haue all or none as Tertullian notably obserueth when he saith That true faith requireth this in defending the true God that whatsoeuer is his we make it onely his for so shall it bee accounted his if it bee accounted onely his by which rule the faith of the Romane Church cannot bee the true faith 12. And againe according to the second ground if to giue all the glory to God and none to our selues sauour of humility but to deuide stakes betwixt God and our selues hath a taste of pride then it must needs follow that God is more honoured by the one then by the other because by humility God is honoured and by pride dishonoured and therefore the Apostle saith that hee resisteth the proud and giueth grace to the humble for what cause but because the proud man seeketh his owne glory whereas the humble deuesteth himselfe of all and layeth it downe at the foote of God the proud man reioyceth in himselfe but the humble reioyceth in the Lord alone according as it is written Let him that reioyceth reioyce in the Lord. Now the Romanists that magnifie free-will haue iust cause their doctrine being presupposed to be true to reioyce in themselues which is an argument of pride for whereas our Sauiour saith Without me ye can doe nothing they may say Yes something for wee can either admit or reiect thy grace by our owne power and whereas the Apostle saith Who hath separated thee what hast thou which thou hast not receiued they may say I haue separated my selfe in doing that which I was able and so made my selfe fit for grace and this power I haue not receiued from Gods speciall fauour but from my owne free will All which kinde of speeches as they are full of pride and fleshly vanity so they are stuffed with impiety and blasphemie and manifestly tend to the dispoyling of the diuine Maiestie of that glory which is onely due vnto him And therefore I conclude with two notable sayings one of S. Augustines and another of Cassander a learned Reconciliater of late time Tutiores viuimus saith the Father si totum Deo damus c. that is We liue more safely if we attribute all wholy to God and not commit our selues partly to God and partly to our selues And this is the part of a godly minded man saith the Reconciliater to attribute nothing to themselues but all to Gods grace whence it followeth that how much so euer a man giueth to grace yet in so doing hee departeth not from pietie though hee detract something from nature and freewill but when any thing is taken from Gods grace and giuen to nature which belongeth to grace that cannot be without eminent danger So that by the confession both of this learned Romanist and also of that reuerend Father our doctrine in the poynt of free-will is both more agreeable to piety and respectiue to Gods glory then theirs is and therefore in reason to be preferred before it 13. The next doctrine whereby the glorie of God is darkened and the dignitie of Christs merites blemished is their doctrine of IustificatioÌ„ which I ioyne next vnto Free-wil because their sophistry cunning in this great maine pillar of Religion cannot well be discerned they so palliate the matter with faire glosses goodly words except their opinion touching the power of Free-will be first apprehended And here before I enter into the bowels of this poynt it is to be obserued that most of them vaunt and bragge that they doe much more magnifie Christs merites by their doctrine of Iustification then we doe which how true it is the discourse following I hope shall so manifest that euery indifferent man shall be able to say truely of them as Saint Augustine said of the Donatists These are the words of men extolling the glory of man vnder the name of Christ to the abasing of the glory of Christ himselfe 14. The doctrine therfore of our Church touching the iustification of a sinner is in effect thus much That a sinner is iustified that is accepted into the fauour and loue of God not by any thing in himselfe or from himselfe but by the perfect and vnspotted righteousnes of Christ Iesus imputed vnto him by the meere mercy of God through the couenant of grace and apprehended on his behalfe by the hand of faith The reason whereof is because that which must satisfie Gods iustice and reconcile a sinner vnto him must haue these two properties first it must be of infinite weight and value to counterpoyse with the rigour of Gods iustice and secondly it must be of sufficient ability to performefull and perfect obedience to the law of God so that a perfect satisfaction bee made both in respect of the obedience which the law requireth and also of the punishment that it inflicteth Now no righteousnesse of man is thus qualified but is both imperfect and vnsufficient no not the righteousnes of Angels themselues being though excellent yet â—â—finite Creatures sauing the righteousnes of Christ Iesus onely who is both God and Man and therefore his righteousnes onely and none other is that whereby a sinner must be iustified before God 15. From this it appeareth that when we say that a man is iustified by faith our meaning is not that faith is the cause of our iustification but onely the instrument and hand to apprehend that righteousnes of Christ whereby we are iustified when we say faith alone iust fieth we meane that it alone is the instrument of our iustification because it alone layeth hold vpon the righteousnes of Christ and applyeth it to our selues not that it is euer alone but alwaies accompanyed with charity and patience and zeale and temperance and other fruites of the spirit for we hold that the true iustifying faith is euer mâ—â—re grauida bonoruÌ„ operuÌ„ as one of their own fauourites affirmeth that is full of good workes and euer anon ready to bring them forth as occasion serueth Neither doe we deny as some of them falsly slander vs though many of their chiefest Writers gaine-say their fellowes and affoord vs that fauour to speake the truth of vs but that euery one that is iustified must also be truely sanctified and that saluation is not obtained by iustification alone but by sanctification also yet wee make sanctification and good workes not to be the causes but the effects nor the roote but the fruit nor the anticedents but the necessary consequents and attendants of our Iustification And as Bellarmine truely distinguisheth to be necessary Necessitate praesentiae non efficientiae by a necessity of presence not of efficacie as if they wrought our saluation In a word
that are inferiour Iudges are but the Ministers of the law of God and must not vary from the rule thereof in any respect And for this cause as the Iewes were commanded to obey the sentence and determination of the Priest in all controuersies so the Priest was commanded to giue iudgement according to the law and no otherwise and albeit the Hebrew glosse vpon that Text teacheth that if the Priest say that the right hand is the left or the left is the right his sentence is to be holden which is the plaine doctrine of the Church of Rome Iudaizing in this as in many other things yet Lyra writing vpon that Text saith that the glosse is manifestly false because the sentence of no man of what authority soeuer is to be holden if it be contrary to the law of God so we admit the Church to be Iudge and euery priuate Christian also in his place but we ascribe the chiefe power and authority of Iudging to the Scripture alone The next place we allow vnto the Church and the lowest vnto the particular members thereof These last to be directed by the Church but yet so farre as it bringeth it authority out of the Scriptures and it to be limited by the bounds of the Scripture also and if it iudge against the euidence thereof not to bee heard nor beleeued This is our opinion that wee may not be mistaken but our aduersaries aduance their Church vnto the highest place and make the Scripture an inferiour vassall and seruant vnto it as I haue declared 30. Secondly note thereason that moueth them thus to disclaime from the iudgement of the Scripture it is because they know full well that the maynest and chiefest poynts of their Religion wherein they dissent from vs haue no ground nor foundation in the Scripture but would vanish like a morning aust if the light of Gods word should but shine vpon them as for instance their doctrines of worshipping Images of tasting dayes of prayer for the dead of Purgatorie of shrift of pardons of the communion in one kinde of single life and of the priuate Masse and such like all which poynts and many other their owne Writers contesse cannot be sufficiently proued out of the Scripture And therefore Andradius doth fully and ingenuously acknowledge that many poynts of their Religion would reele and stagger if they were not supported by tradition and Bellarmine himselfe saith that it may be doubted whether the great poynt of transubstantiation may be sufficiently enforced out of the words of the Text Hoc est corpus meum So that wee see now the reason why they will not be tried by the Scriptures euen this because if the Scripture bee Iudge Popery must needes goe to wracke This is ther fore a cunning and witty policie or rather a grosse and palpable subtilty of theirs whereby though they dazle the sight of the simple and ignorant yet they cannot bleare the eyes of the vnderstanding and wise from discerning into their fraud 31. Hauing thus proued that they reiect the Scripture now I come to shew that they allow of no other Iudges but themselues for the proofe whereof there needes no long discourse seeing it is sufficiently apparent by that which hath already beene deliuered that they appeale from the sentence of the Scripture vnto the iudgement of the Church and tye vnto the girdle thereof the onely key of interpretation Now by the Church they intend first the Romish Synagogue that is all that whole bony which dependeth vpon the Pope for their head and receiue as it were life and nourishment by his influence for as Bristo saith the Romane Church is the Catholike Church and as the Rhemists the Catholike and the Roman faith is all one Secondly by the Church they meane more particularly a congregation of Romish Bishops and Prelates assembled together in a Councill which they call the Church representatiue And thirdly and principally they intend by the Church the Pope who is the head of the Church and contayneth in him virtually all the power and authority of the Church The Church in the first sense is not to be this Iudge say they nor yet in the second which notwithstanding is but an vpstart opinion and but of the first head for in the Councils of Constance and Basil it was decreed that the Pope should obey the Councill and be ordered by it in all things pertayning to faith and the reformation of the 〈…〉 and many learned Romanists haue been of the same opinion as Bellarmine confesseth but now neither may the Councill be Iudge therefore take the Church in the third sense for the Pope and then you haue the man that is the Church virtuall and must be all in all euen the only Iudge and Vmpier in all controuersies The center in which all the lines that is opinions of Fathers Councils and Diuines must concurre and meete The Epitome and abridgement of the whole Church in whom alone remayneth the whole power of the Catholike Church And thus from the Scripture they call vs to the Church from the Church to the Councils and from them to the Pope and there they pitch their line as in the highest poynt of resolution 32. That they thus vnderstand by the Church the Pope and that all iudgement is deuolued vnto him alone heare them speake in their owne persons Bellarmine saith that the Pope without a Councill may define matters of faith because being the vniuersall Pastor and Teacher of the Church he cannot erre teaching out of the chaire and that he is absolutely aboue the Councill and that he may as he is the chiefe Prince of the Church retract the iudgement of the Councill and not follow the greater part And therefore when hee affirmeth in another place that the Pope with a Councill is the Iudge of the true sense of the Scripture he foysteth in the word Councill for a flourish but indeede hee meaneth the Pope alone for if the Pope be aboue all Councils and may establish or disanull their decrees at his pleasure then is not hee with a Councill but without a Councill the chiefe Iudge 33. Gregory of Valence is more plaine By the Church saith he we meane her head that is to say the Romane Bishop in whom resideth the full authority of the Church the Iesuite Coster after he hath discarded the Scripture from being Iudge because it is Res sine anima sensu in varias pugnantesque sent entias distracta A thing without life and sense distracted into diuers and contrary opinions saith that Penes Ecclesiā Cathelicā est indicium veritatis The iudgement of the truth is belonging to the Catholike Church but because the whole Church cannot meete together in one place without great inconueniences Therefore God hath appoynted and nominated one man to wit the Pope to whom he hath so tyed his presence and spirituall grace that in question◠of
call the Scripture a dumbe Iudge some a dead Letter and without a Soule others dead Inke others a Nose of Waxe to be wreathed this way or that way others say that it is no better then Aesops Fables without the authority of the Church all of them ioyne in this that it is not simply necessary that it was written not to rule our faith but to be ruled by it and that Christ neuer commanded his Apostles to write any Scripture and that it is subiect and inferiour to the Church all these and many other bitter and blasphemous speeches they belch out against the Scripture whereby they plainely bewray their cankred hatred against the Scripture and all because they finde it contrary to their humour and an enemie to their Religion 33. Thus the Minor proposition in this demonstration is I hope sufficiently prooued to wit that the Religion of the Church of Rome doth professedly disgrace the holy Scripture as both by their doctrine their practice and their blasphemous speeches against it doth manifestly appeare and so the conclusion is of necessary and vndeniable consequence that therefore it deserueth to be suspected and reiected of all those that professe themselues to be friends to the Scripture and hope from it either consolation in this life or saluation in the life to come MOTIVE VII That Religion is to be abhorred which maintaineth commandeth and practiseth grosse and palpable Idolatry but so doth the Religion of the Church of Rome Ergo c. WHen I consider the fearefull Idolatry of the Church of Rome which for that cause is called The Whore of Babylon and The Mother of fornications Reuel 17. 1. 2. I cannot choose but wonder that any should be so bewitched with the sorceries of this Iezabel or made drunke with the wine of her fornication that they should take her marke vpon their forheads and right hands and ioyne with her in her abominations and not rather come out of her with all speed as they are admonished by the Angell lest they bee partakers in her sinnes and haue a share also with her in her plagues but then againe remembring that which S. Paul faith that the comming of Antichrist should be in all deceiueablenesse of vnrighteousnesse and that God should send vpon them strong delusion to beleeue lies I turne my wondering at their sottishnesse into the admiration at Gods Iustice and Truth the one in punishing their contempt of his Gospell with such a giddinesse of spirit and the other in making good his owne word after such an euident and manifest manner that there by it most clearely appeareth that the Pope of Rome is that Man of sinne and Sonne of perdition there spoken of euen that Antichrist which exalteth himselfe aboue all that is called God and sitteth in the Temple of God as if he were God As this appeareth in many grosse errors which they hold so in none more then in the horrible idolatry practised and preached defended in this Antichristian Church of which I may truely say as Plutarch said of the heathen that they mingle heauen with earth because they made Gods of men men of Gods So these whilst they giue diuine worship to earthly creatures as the crosse pictures of Christ and to the Saints in heauen or attribute earthly affections to heauenly creatures make a plaine mixture of heauen and earth spoyling the Creatour of his honour due vnto his Dietie and adorning the creature therewith and ascribing that vnto men which is onely proper vnto God That the Church of Rome is guilty of this impiety I hope by Gods grace so to proue in this Motiue that no Iesuite though neuer so subtill shall bee able with any shew of sound reason to hisse against 2. The first proposition in this Argument though it be of so euident a truth that it needeth no further demonstration yet because S. Paul saith that an Idoll is nothing in the world and thereupon some may peraduenture conclude that Idolatrie is a matter of nothing and a small and triuiall sinne I will therefore very briefly shew the greatnesse and haynousnesse of this sinne and how odious and abominable it is in the sight of God As touching therefore that phrase of Saint Paul An Idoll is nothing it is not to bee vnderstood either in respect of matter for euery Idoll hath a materiall being and subsisting as the matter of the Calfe which the Israelites made in the Wildernesse was gold and of the brazen serpent which was abused also as an Idoll was brasse and of those Idols which the Prophet Esay declameth so against were wood nor yet in respect of forme as Bellarmine and Caietane would haue it As though the Apostle should meane thus that an Idoll though it hath matter yet it hath no forme that is to say is the representation of such a thing as hath no being in nature for many of the Idols of the Gentiles were of such things as truly were but the Apostles meaning is as Tertullian obserues and many other both of ancient and late Writers that an Idoll is nothing in respect of that which it is intended to bee that is that it is no God nor hath any part of the Diuinitie in it which deserueth to bee worshipped or that it is nothing in regard of efficacie and power that is as the Psalmist speaketh is not able to doe either good or bad to hurt or to helpe to saue or to kill and this interpretation is authorized by S. Augustine and S. Chrysostome the one saying thus There are Idols indeede but they can doe nothing neither are they Gods the other thus Sunt Idola sed ad salutem nihil sunt There are Idols but they auaile nothing to the attaynement of saluation and it is also approued by many other Expositors both ancient and moderne Protestants and Papists and is most agreeable to the whole current of the Text. This then that S. Paul saith That an Idoll is nothing is both so farre from extenuating the sinne of Idolatrie that it aggrauateth the same and also so farre from clearing the Church of Rome from the guilt of that crime that it rather layeth a greater stayne thereof vpon it 3. As for the greatnesse of the sinne it may appeare by three considerations first of the precept for there is no one commandement of the Law so frequent in the whole Scripture and so strictly vrged and mounded and fenced about with so many reasons as that is against Idolatrie as we may see in the Decalogue Secondly in respect of the punishment denounced against and inflicted vpon the committers thereof to wit not onely eternall death from the iustice of God which is the wages of all sinne vnrepented of but also temporall death from the iustice of man as being vnworthy to breathe this common ayre or to tread vpon the earth that thus sinne against the Maiestie of God and that
creature For as Augustine well obserueth Wee beleeue the Apostle we doe not beleeue in the Apostle and we beleeue the Church and not in the Church and therefore in the Apostles Creed where we say I beleeue in God wee doe not say I beleeue in the Catholicke Church but I beleeue the Catholicke Church whereby is plainely insinuated that none but God is to be beleeued in because to beleeue in a thing is to put our trust and confidence in that thing As for that place in the Epistle to Philemon it maketh nothing for this purpose for there the word Faith is referred to the Lord Iesus and Loue to the Saints neither ought Saint Hieromes authority more preiudicate vs in this interpretation then it doth them in many such like whom they reiect as they do the rest of the Fathers at their pleasures especially seeing no man else besides himselfe is of that minde at least wise if he vnderstand by faith to beleeue in the Saints and not to beleeue them onely the one whereof is proper to the Creator the other to the creatures 62. To the last I answere that Prayer is properly one of the sacrifices of the New Testament for here the sacrifices are not corporall but spirituall as may bee prooued in generall by that which our Sauiour saith Iohn 4. God will be worshipped in Spirit and truth And in particular by comparing Mal. 1. 11. with 1. Tim. 2. 8. for whereas Malachie prophecying of the Kingdome of Christ had said that Incense and a cleane offering should be offered to God in euery place Paul sheweth what is meant hereby when he commandeth to lift vp pure hands vnto God in euery place But suppose that it were improperly called a sacrifice yet it looseth not the knot for all kinde of sacrifices both proper and improper corporall and spirituall are due onely vnto God for to whome belongeth a Temple and Altar to him belongeth a sacrifice saith Saint Augustine but no Temple or Altar proper or improper is to be built or set vp to any but to God and therfore no sacrifice is to be offered but to him 63. Lastly touching the authority of the Fathers which are alleaged so frequently by Bellarmine to prooue the Inuocation of Saints and from which Cassander would draw this conclusion That it was not credible that those holy men would admit any doctrine or custome which they supposed to bee contrary to the Euangelicall and Apostolicall doctrine or detract any thing from the glory of God or the merit of Christ when as they vnderwent so heauie conflicts for Christs sake Here not to keepe the Reader in suspense referring a fuller satisfaction to this argument to a more fit place foure things are to bee noted first that for the space of two hundred yeares after Christ the Intercession and Inuocation of Saints were doctrines vnknowne vnto the Church and therefore they alledge no Father within that compasse saue Dionisius Areopagita Cap. 7. Eccles Hierarch which booke as diuers other that goe vnder that name Illyricus hath proued to bee counterfeit by impregnable reasons And Iraeneus Lib. 5. contra Haeres who saith that the Virgine Mary was made the Aduocate of the Virgine Eue by which hee could not meane that Eue did pray vnto Mary here on earth seeing Mary was not then borne when Eue liued nor that the Virgine Mary did pray for Eue whilst shee liued because then shee her selfe was not both which must needes be if by this testimony the Inuocation of Saints should be proued 64. Secondly those Fathers that liued in the next two hundred yeares speake of this matter very variously and doubtfully as if it were a doctrine which they knew not what to say to were not fully resolued in Thirdly of those Fathers which he alleageth though in some places they seeme to allow that custome which was then brought into the Church yet in other places they disallow the same Yea and they are disapprooued also of others that liued in the same age Thus true Athanasius condemneth Inuocation of Saints Orat. 2. 3. contra Arianos and false Athanasius alloweth it Sermon in Euangel de Sanctissima Deipara Basil approueth it but Nazianzene doubteth of it and Epiphanius that liued also about that time vtterly condemneth iâ— Chrysostome in some places seemeth to allow of it in others he speaketh against it and so doth Augustine and the rest as you may see at large prooued by Chemnitius in his examine of the Councill of Trent And that which is not to be forgotten they alleage many false and counterfeit Bookes vnder the name of the Fathers as Dionysius Areopagita Ecclesiast Hierar Athanas Serm. de Sanctissima Deipara Chrysost hom ad pop 66. and many others of the like impression as the same Chemnitius hath learnedly and vnanswerably prooued 65. Lastly those Fathers which doe defend this Inuocation yet do not defend it as it is now practised in the Church of Rome for first the Fathers if they did allow of this Inuocation yet it was in their priuate deuotions not in the publike Leiturgie of the Church for it cannot bee prooued that in any of the ancient Leiturgies this Inuocation was vsed vntill Gregorie the firsts time for as for that which was called Chrysostomes Masse all know it is a bastard brat and not a true Child of that good Father but in the Church of Rome it is practised in their publicke seruice and so is come from a matter of priuate deuotion to a generall practice of Religion Secondly the Fathers though they may seeme to haue prayed sometimes vnto the Saints out of the heate of their deuotion yet it was but now and then and as it were by the way whereas their ordinary prayers and deuotions were directed vnto God but in the Church of Rome the Saints are more prayed vnto then God he hath the least and they the greatest share in their deuotion witnesse the Letanie of the blessed Virgin Marie and the Marie Psalter and their Common practice Thirdly the Fathers albeit they directed their prayers sometimes to the Saints yet they reposed most confidence in their prayers to God and in the mediation of Christ as appeareth by that which Chrysostome saith Ad Deum non ostiarâ—o c. We need no Porter nor Mediator nor Minister to bring vs to God say but Miserere mei Deus c. And in another place hee saith that when wee pray our selues to God wee obtaine more then when others pray for vs. But the superstitious Romanists thinke to speede better when they pray to the Saints then when vnto God And therefore they are not ashamed to say that we must appeale from the Court of Gods iustice to the Court of his Mothers mercy Fourthly the Fathers did not so much as dreame of any merits of supererogation which should be in the Saints and by them should be communicated vntovs but all the interest
vrge Command him though Redeemer that â—e be By right of Motherhood which is giuen to thee 71. And this the Rosarie of the Virgine Mary doth more euidently manifest for Dominicke who was the first inuentor of it ordayned that fiftie Ane Maries should be recited and at euery tenth one Pater noster which together make a Rosarie and for this purpose the same Dominicke framed fiue and fiftie Stones or Beades and hung them together on a string betwixt euery ten little ones one great one and called them Patriloquia as it were prayers to the Father which he might more properly haue called Matriloquia prayers to the Mother for here are ten Aues to each Pater noster And this was the originall of praying vpon Beads Now out of these Rosaries sprung there Mary Psalters for three Rosaries to wit an hundred and fifty Aue Maries and fifteene Pater nosters make one Mary Psalter because forsooth the Psalter of Dauid consists of so many Psalmes and to the fraternitie of this Psalter and the sayers thereof were giuen by diuers Popes as Sixtus the fourth and Innocent the eighth threescore thousand yeeres of indulgence and plenary remission both from the punishment and fault one in the time of life and one in the houre of death Is not heere I pray you the worship of the Virgine Mary exalted aboue the worship of Christ who can doubt of it seeing the proportion is ten to one fifty to fiue an hundred to ten an hundred and fifty to fifteene And no maruell if it bee thus in their prayers seeing it is as euill or worse in their deeds for whereas wee haue one Church or religious house dedicated to Christ we shall finde ten dedicated to Mary the Mother of Christ and so the Mother is aduanced aboue the Sonne and yet she but a woman of flesh and bloud saued by her Sonne and blessed by that faith which shee had in him and hee the Sonne of God as well as the Sonne of Man the Sauiour and Redeemer of mankinde 72. But the most horrible Idolatrie and blasphemy of all the rest is to be found in another Mary Psalter of theirs compiled as they say by Bonauenture and authorised in the Church of Rome wherein they apply all the whole Psalter of Dauid to the Virgine Mary and wheresoeuer they finde the name Dominus Lord they put in Domina Lady as for example in the third Psalme for Lord how are my foes increast they say Lady how are my foes increast and in the sixt Psalme for O Lord correct mee not in thy wrath they say O Lady correct me not in thy wrath And in the 31. Psalme for Blessed are they O Lord whose sinnes are forgiuen they say Blessed are they whose hearts loue thee O Virgine Mary for their sinnes shall be forgiuen them by thee and so cleane through the Psalter If any desire to see the gulfe and dunghill of Superstition and Idolatrie practised in the Church of Rome vnder the Inuocation of Saints let him but read this one Psalter which alone if there were no other argument is sufficient to conuince their whole Church of open and notorious Idolatrie and that Cassander himselfe confesseth in the place aboue quoted 73. Thus they exalt the Virgine Mary aboue Christ and equall her with God yea which is horrible to speake and fearefull to be recorded they place her aboue God himselfe for they teach that a man may appeale to the Virgine Mary not onely from a Tyrant and from the Diuell but euen from God himselfe This writeth Bernardine de Busto about 120. yeeres since and his booke was authorised by Pope Alexander the sixt and yet remaines so farre from all disallowance that it is approoued by Posseuine as a learned and godly booke Out of which it must needes follow which I tremble to vtter that by their doctrine the Virgine Mary is greater then God because euery appeale is from the lesser to the greater 74. But no maruell if they preferre Mary to Christ that is the Mother before the Sonne seeing they doe as much to two Fryers Francis and Dominicke He that would see how Francis is matched and exalted aboue Christ let him read the booke of his Conformities and hee will bee astonished at their madnesse Also of Dominicke they write most strange things and such as Christ neuer did the like as for example Christ raysed but three dead saith Antoninus but Dominicke raysed three at Rome and forty that were drowned in a Riuer neere to Tholosse Christ being made immortall after his resurrection entred twice into the house the dores being shut but Dominicke being a mortall man entred into a Church in the night the dores being shut that he might not waken the brethren Christ had all power committed vnto him in heauen and earth and Dominicke did partake the same power with him for the Angels serued him the Elements obeyed him the Diuels trembled at him Christ was the Lord absolutely and by authority but Dominicke principally and by possession Christ was laid at his birth in a Manger and wrapped in clouts to keepe him from cold but Dominicke being an infant would often get out of his bed and as if hee abhorred all delights of the flesh lye vpon the bare ground Christ neuer prayed but hee was heard if he would except in the Garden when hee prayed that the Cup might passe away from him where praying according to his sensuall part would not be heard according to reason but Dominicke neuer desired any thing of God but it was graunted vnto him Christ being borne a Starre appeared in the East which directed the Wise-men to him and foreshewed that he should be the light of the world but Dominicke being borne and ready to bee baptized his Godmother saw a Starre in his forehead foretelling a new light of the world Lastly Christ loued vs and washed away our sinnes by his bloud so did Dominicke for hee whipt himselfe thrice euery day with an Iron chayne and drew bloud each time out of his sides once for his owne sinnes which were very small the second for those that were in Purgatory and the third for those that liue in the world Is not Dominicke heere in some things equalled and in others preferred before our blessed Sauiour Iesus Christ 75. And thus to passe ouer all their false and counterfeit Saints which eyther neuer were in rerum natura or were not such as they make them as Christopher George Catherine and such like For it is a true saying of Augustine or of some other Multorum corpora honorantur in terris quorum animae torquentur in inferno The bodies of many are honoured on earth whose soules are tormented in hell And to omit that the Pope may erre in the canonizing of Saints it being grounded vpon false miracles as Caietane acknowledgeth and others though Bellarmine be of another minde and laboureth to prooue the contrary but God wot with
man should say that a man may bee iustified by his owne works wrought by the power of nature without the diuine helpe by Christ Iesus and Bellarmine seemeth to affirme as much in this place Yet Andradius that famous Interpreter of that forenamed Councill one of the most learned men of his age and that knew well the mysteries of that Councill doth tell vs that by diuine helpe the Councill vnderstood not the grace of regeneration and speciall worke of Gods sanctifying Spirit but heroicall motions stirred vp in the vnregenerate and vnbeleeuers and that by this speciall helpe they might doe works void of all fault and meritorious of saluation And Bellarmine confesseth in other places that they are good suogenere that is morally and Salmeron the Iesuite that they dispose and prepare a man for iustification and the same Councill of Trent in the seuenth Canon following doth curse them that shall say they are sinnes or that they deserue the hatred of God Now if these kinde of works be good in their kinde and preparatiues to iustification and not sinnes nor deseruing the hatred of God but such as whereby the Heathen were saued then it is a probable falsehood in Bellarmine when he saith by their doctrine that these works doe not iustifie nor helpe any thing to the iustification of a sinner 10. Secondly it is false also which he affirmeth concerning the second kinde of works to wit of preparation that though they proceede from faith and grace yet they doe not iustifie for Bellarmine in another place doth not stick to say that this faith iustifieth by way of merite and deserueth forgiuenes of sinnes after a certaine manner and here in this place that these works proceeding from faith doe merite after their manner and obtaine remission of sinnes which if it be true then it must needes be false which he sayd before That they make not our works to concurre with the merits of Christ for the remission of sinnes which is the point of opposition and that which also he affirmeth here That these works doe not iustifie seeing remission of sinnes is of the verie essence of iustification for none haue their sinnes forgiuen but they are iustified and none are iustified but they haue their sinnes forgiuen they concurre in one if they bee not one and the same And therefore if these works merite remission of sinnes they must needs also merite iustification And thus Bellarmines distinction doth no waies free their doctrine from opposition to the doctrine of the Gospell 11. The Gospell teacheth that hee which repenteth and heareth the promise ought to beleeue it and bee perswaded that not only other mens sins but euen his owne are pardoned for Christs sake and that he doth please God and is accepted of God and in this faith ought to come vnto God by prayer But the Church of Rome teacheth that a man must alwaies doubt of the remission of his sins and neuer be assured thereof which doubting as Chytraeus truely speaketh is plainely repugnant to the nature of faith and a meere heathenish doctrine 12. Bellarmine answereth here not by a distinction but by a negation denying flatly that the Scripture teacheth any such doctrine that a man may be assured of the remission of his sinnes and his reconciliation with God and this hee seemeth to prooue by two arguments one because it is contrary to other plaine and manifest places of Scripture another because all Gods promises almost haue a condition annexed vnto them which no man can iustly know whether hee hath fulfilled or no. 13. It is good for Bellarmine here to vse a plaine negation for their doctrine is so manifest that it will admit no distinction the Councill of Trent hath put that out of all question and distinction For it teacheth in expresse words that no man ought to perswade and assure himselfe of the remission of his sinnes and of his iustification no though he be truly iustified and his sinnes be truely and really pardoned This doctrine is so euident that Bellarmine could neither distinguish as his custome is nor yet deny it and therefore hee freely confesseth it and yet Gropper condemned it as an impious doctrine and Catharinus at the Councill of Trent defended the contrary that the childe of God by the certainty of faith knoweth himselfe to be in the state of grace And so did also Dominicus a Sotâ— and diuers others of their owne stampe But there is great cause why the Church of Rome should maintaine this doctrine of doubting very peremptorily for as Chemnitius well obserueth all the Market of Romish superstitious wares is built vpon this foundation for when as the conscience being taught to doubt of solution doth seeke for some true and sound comfort and not finding the same in faith through the merits of Christ then it flyeth to it owne works and heapeth vp together a bundle of superstitious obseruations by which it hopeth to obtaine fauour at Gods hands hence arise voluntary vowes Pilgrimages Inuocations of Saints works of Supererogation priuate Masses sale of Pardons and a number such like trash and when as yet they could not finde any sound comfort in any of these at last was Purgatory found out and redemption of the soules of the dead out of that place of torment by the suffrages and prayers of the liuing Now the Romanists fearing lest these profitable and gainefull wares whereby an infinite tribute is brought into their coffers should be bereft them haue barred out of their Church this doctrine of certainty of saluation by faith of which if mens consciences bee once perswaded they will neuer repose any more confidence in those superstitious trumperies 14. But we with Luther may boldly say that so odious and impious is this doctrine that if there were no other error in the Romane Church but this we had iust cause of separation from them and with Chytraeus that it is repugnant to the nature of faith and a meere heathenish doctrine For it doth not onely nourish mens infirmities who are too much proâ—e to doubting but euen encourage them thereunto and teach that we ought to doubt But that we may come to the point is not this indeede the doctrine of the Gospell that wee should not doubt of our saluation why then doth our Sauiour command all to repent and beleeue the Gospell By which he plainely teacheth where true repentance goeth before there beleefe in the Gospell that is assurance of forgiuenesse of sinnes by the bloud of Christ doth follow and that wee ought euery one to be thus assured seeing this is a precept Euangelicall which doth not onely giue charge of doing the thing commanded as the Law doth but also inspireth grace and power to effect it as Saint Augustine well informeth vs when he saith The Law was giuen that grace might bee sought and grace was giuen that the Law might bee fulfilled Why doeth Saint Paul say
Prophet Esay saying Behold I will lay in Sion a stone a sure foundation which is a playne and manifest Prophecie of Christ and not of Peter as the Apostle Peter himselfe expoundeth it where by the way we may note the feareful outrage of these Romish Rabbies against the truth of God and the God of truth whilst to the end they may aduance their Popes dignity by Peter they wrest and peruert the Scriptures and apply the Prophecies belonging to the Sonne of God to his seruant Peter and so make Peter himselfe nay the holy Ghost a Lyar. It were not credible that such blasphemous thoughts and words should nestle in the heart and issue out of the mouth of any but that the Apostle Saint Paul hath fore-told vs that in the time of Antichrist because men would not receiue the loue of the truth that they might be saued therefore God would send them strong delusions that they should beleeue lyes c. But to the point If Christs person be the onely true foundation of the Church in whom all the building being coupled together groweth vnto an holy Temple in the Lord and that not the persons but the doctrine and faith of the Apostles are those secundary foundations which the Scripture speaketh of as hath beene proued out of the Fathers then the opposition is vndefeasible namely that there is but one person the foundation of our Church which is our Lord and Sauiour the Sonne of God Christ Iesus and yet that Peters person should be the foundation of the Church also together with Christ 45. Thirdly I answere that both in truth and also in proprietie of speech there can bee but one foundation of one building those stones that are layd next to the foundation are not properly a secundary foundation but the beginning of the building vpon the foundation and for that cause when Peter and the rest of the Apostles are called twelue foundations it cannot bee vnderstood that they were any wayes properly foundations of the Church either first or second but that our Sauiour who is the substance and subiect of their doctrine is the onely true and singular foundation of the Church and that there is none other besides him for if when it is said that we are built vpō the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles is meant the doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles as must needes bee because the Prophets are coupled together with the Apostles which liued not in the Christian Church and therefore could not be personall foundations of it and Christ crucified is the substance of their doctrine then it must needes follow that the Apostles meaning is nothing else but that we are built vpon Christ whom the Prophets and the Apostles preached and beleeued in And thus S. Hilary vnderstood it and Saint Ambrose and Anselmus who giuing the foundation of the Church to Peter expoundeth it sometimes of his faith in Christ and sometimes of Christ himselfe in whom he beleeued And thus doe also Salmeron the Iesuite and Cardinall Caietane in their commentaries vpon that place and Peter Lumbard together with the glosse vpon the place interpret And so this distinction of a primary and secundary foundation hath no foundation in the word of God 46. The Gospell teacheth that no Apostle or Bishop or other Minister of the Gospell is superiour to another of the same ranke or hath greater power and authority then another in respect of their ministerie but that all Ministers in their seuerall degrees haue equall power of preaching the Gospell administring the Sacraments binding and loosing But the Bishop of Rome challengeth to himselfe a supreme power ouer all other Bishops and ouer the whole Church and braggeth that he hath by right a title to both the swords both spirituall and temporall and that both iurisdictions doe originally pertaine to him and from him are conueyed to others c. 47. Bellarmine heere first confesseth and secondly distinguisheth hee confesseth that the Bishop of Rome hath a supreme power ouer all other Bishops and the whole Church and denyeth that eyther those places here quoted or any other doe prooue the contrary 48. To which I answere first that whereas out of Luke 22. 26. and 1. Cor. 3. 4. he extracteth a disparity and an inequality I answere that no man denyeth it and therefore he fighteth with his owne shadow hee should prooue not a bare superiority which wee confesse but a superiority in the same degree as of one Bishop to another and that in power not in execution wherein standeth the point of opposition 49. Secondly whereas he saith that though the power of remitting and retayning finnes and binding and loosing was communicated to all the Apostles yet Peter was ordayned chiefe Pastor ouer them all because our Sauiour Christ sayd vnto him alone Feede my sheepe and To thee will I giue the Keyes of the Kingdome of heauen I answere that in this hee crosseth both himselfe the Fathers and the truth himselfe for elsewhere hee confesseth that the keyes both of Order and Iurisdiction were giuen to all the Apostles indifferently and therefore it must needes follow that Tibi dabo claues was not spoken singularly to Peter but generally to them all for if Christ gaue the keyes to them all as he confesseth then without doubt he promised them to them all or else his word and his deede should not accord together And againe hee acknowledgeth that all the Apostles had both power and commission to feede the sheepe of Christ when Mat. 28. he bade them all Goe teach and baptize and they all did put that commission in execution therefore it must needes follow that no singular power was giuen to Peter when as Christ said vnto him Feede my sheepe vnlesse we will say that the rest had not the same commission 50. The Fathers for Saint Cyprian saith plainely that all the Apostles were the same with Peter indued with equall fellowship both of honour and power and that a primary was giuen vnto Peter that the Church might appeare to be one Saint Hilary is of the same minde You O holy and blessed men saith he for the merit of your faith haue receiued the keyes of the kingdome of heauen and obtained a right to binde and loose in Heauen and earth Saint Augustine saith that if when Christ said To thee will I giue the keyes of the kingdome of Heauen he spake onely to Peter then the Church hath not the power of the keyes but if the Church hath it then Peter receiuing the keyes represented the Church And lastly Leo one of their owne Popes confesseth asmuch when hee affirmeth that the strength of this power of the keyes passed vnto all the Apostles and the constitution of this decree vnto all the Princes of the Church 51. Lastly the truth for when the Apostles stroue for superiority Christ who is truth it selfe and would not haue concealed so necessary a trueth if
Dominick the other of Saint Paul were written these words On Pauls By this man you may come to Christ On Dominicks But by this man you may doe it easilier because Pauls doctrine led but to faith and the obseruation of the Commandements but Dominicks taught the obseruation of Councils which is the easier way All this and asmuch more might be produced to this purpose But I conclude the point with the censure and confession of their owne Cassander who out of the writings of William Bishop of Miniatum concludeth with him that as if officious lyes should bee added to the holy Scriptures there would remaine no authority nor weight in them So no errour nor falshood should be tolerated in Images and Pictures in the Church seeing that an errour not resisted is receiued for a trueth And in the same place the same Cassander doth bewaile the abuse of Images in the Church of Rome affirming that superstition was too much pampered thereby that Christians were nothing behind the Heathō in the extreme vanity of framing adorning and worshipping of Images Thus farre Cassander out of which we may perceiue the chiefe lessons that are learned out of these Lay bookes to wit ignorance superstition and Idolatry And therefore no maruaile if all these vices raigne in the midst of their Church as plentifully as amongst the Heathen themselues 19. Fourthly they deliuer for sound doctrine that whereas Saint Iohn sayth that they which haue the anointing of the holy Ghost know all things Hee meaneth not that euery one should haue all knowledge in himselfe personally but that euery one that is of that happy society to which Christ promised and gaue the holy Ghost is partaker of all other mens graces and gifts in the same holy Spirit to saluation And thus whereas Saint Iohn meaneth that euery true Christian both by the outward preaching of the word and by the inward vnction of the Spirit hath a distinct knowledge of all things necessary to saluation They say that it is sufficient if he be partaker of another mans knowledge though he be empty voyde himselfe Then which what can be a greater nourisher of ignorance and quencher of knowledge For if I may bee saued by anothers mans knowledge and faith And if it bee not required that I should know al things necessary to saluation in my owne person but may haue a share of another mans knowledge what need I greatly seeke for knowledge my selfe And why may I not repose the hope of my saluation vpon other men And heereby wee may obserue their grosse absurdity In the case of iustification they teach that wee are not made righteous by the righteousnesse of Christ imputed vnto vs though hee bee the head of the body of the Church and the Spirit that animateth it proceedeth from him and yet heere they say that a man may be made wise and knowing by the knowledge of other their fellow members in the same body abiding in the vnity of Christs Church What is this but to aduance the members aboue the head or at least to forget themselues not caring what they say so that they maintaine the cause they haue in hand 20. I but Saint Augustine sayth If thou loue vnity for thee also hath he whosoeuer hath any thing in it it is thine which I haue it is mine which thou hast And againe in another place hee sayth When Peter wrought miracles he wrought them for me because I am in that body in which Peter wrought them In which body though the eye seeth and not the eare and the eare heareth and not the eye yet the eye heareth in the eare and the eare seeth in the eye c. Therefore all the grace and knowledge that is in any other of Gods Saints either liuing or dead is ours by participation And so that which was sufficient in them for their saluation is also enough for vs for ours though wee haue little or none of our owne Thus reason our Rhemists in the place before quoted But I answere first with our reuerend learned countrey-man Doctor Fulk that Saint Augustine vnderstandeth that place of Saint Iohn of an actuall and personall knowledge inspired by the holy Ghost concurring with the outward ministery of the Church and not of any generall knowledge infused into the Church to bee transfused and dispersed among the members by an imputatiue participation Secondly if a man may know by another mans knowledge why may not a man bee righteous by anothers righteousnesse And if the knowledge of our fellow members may bee imputed to vs that wee thereby may bee saide to know why may not the iustice of our head bee so imputed vnto vs that thereby wee may bee made iust These things are so paralell that the one being granted the other needs must follow Thirdly and lastly that communion which is betwixt the members of a body either naturall or mysticall is not an actuall translation of gifts from one to another but either a participation in the fruit of those gifts or a generating of the like in others by doctrine example exhortation prayers and such like meanes And so wee may truely say that euery one that is in the body of Christ reapeth fruit and benefit by all the graces and gifts that euer haue or shall belong to any member thereof though not for merit yet for comfort instruction edification and increase of grace And againe as one candle lighteth another and one steele sharpeneth and whetteth another So wisedome and grace is deriued from one to another either by naturall commerce of speech or patterne of example Thus much did Saint Augustine intend and no more and therefore it neuer came into his minde to thinke as these idle braines would make him that the knowledge which resided in the Saints of God is actually in all Gods Children or that they are partakers of their gifts and graces to their saluation For he that will be saued must beleeue for himselfe and know for himselfe and liue godly for himselfe If hee doe all these things by a proxy hee must also goe to Heauen by a proxy and not by himselfe This doctrine therefore is a manifest breeder and maintainer of such grosse ignorance as both Saint Augustine and all other holy men haue alwayes condemned for a sinne 21. A fift doctrine from whence ignorance springeth and ariseth is their prohibiting of Lay men to dispute touching matters of faith and that vnder paine of excommunication This Nauarre propoundeth as the doctrine of their Church neither is it contradicted by any other Aquinas goeth further and sayth that it is vnlawfull to dispute of matters of faith in the presence of those that are ignorant and simple And Bellarmine taketh away from the people all power of iudging of their Pastours doctrine saying that they must beleeue whatsoeuer they teach except they broach some new doctrin which hath not beene heard of in the Church before And if they
euery man As the multitude of the Nineuites knew not their right hand from their left so this rabble know not the right hand of Religion from the left As for the maine points of the Catechisme how can they know them whereas they are ignorant of the grounds thereof For the Lords Prayer the ten Commandements and the Creede they rumble vp in the Latine tongue not vnderstanding one word what they speake They say Pater noster and Credo in Deum and yet they know not what Pater meaneth nor what Credo signifieth Yea for the most part they so mistearme the words thereof that their language is more like to the babling of Infants or rather the prattling of Parrats then the speech of men Neither is this ignorance onely to be found among the basest of the people which haue no teaching and education but euen amongst the better sort of them that are well borne and brought vp and after so strange and strong a fashion that by no meanes can they be withdrawne from this inueterate and continued custome of their Ancestors Hence springeth all that grosse superstition which is vsed of them as creeping to the Crosse falling downe before Images adoring and beautifying them with new-fashioned garments running a Pilgrimage to this Saint and that setting vp Tapers before their shrines wearing about their necks the beginning of the Gospell of Saint Iohn as a preseruatiue against the Diuell and the herbe Veruine being crossed and blessed against blasts the white Pater noster and the little Creede with an infinite number of such like superstitious vanities whereof there is neyther head nor foote Would any that are not plunged ouer head and eares in ignorance put any affiance in such trumperie and yet herein is all the Religion of the vulgar who repose euen the hope of their saluation in these things and thinke it a greater sinne to neglect or omit one of these Ceremonies then to breake any of the Commandements of God 28. Now let any man iudge whether this can be the true Religion which nourisheth this barbarous and monstrous ignorance and superstition amongst the people and whether that can be a good tree which bringeth forth such bitter and sowre fruits This is the conclusion which groweth out of the premises by necessary consequence The XI MOTIVE That Religion which was neuer knowne nor heard of in the Apostles time nor in the Primitiue Church cannot be the truth but such is the Romish Religion in most points thereof therefore that cannot be the truth 1. THe Romanists triumph in no one thing so much as in the antiquitie of their Church and Religion and therefore they cast euermore into our teeth that our Religion is but vp-start and our Church of yesterday euen since Luthers time being neuer extant in the world before But herein they play but the Sophisters for if they speake of true antiquitie we will ioyne issue with them in this point and doubt not but to prooue that theirs is the vp-start Church and their Religion the new Religion in those points wherein they differ from vs and that our faith and Religion was taught and professed by Christ himselfe and his Apostles and exercised and maintained in the pure and primitiue Age of the Church For the cleere manifestation of which point it is first to be obserued that there is a double antiquitie one primary another secundary Primary is that which was from the beginning though discontinued and interrupted by the corruption of times Secundary is that which indeede is aged and gray-headed but yet reacheth not to the spring head Thus our Sauiour Christ controlleth the law of Diuorce Mat. 19. 8. though it was aged and of long continuance euen two thousand yeeres old yet Nonsic fuit ab initio It was not so from the beginning where we see that Diuorce was old and full of yeeres and yet farre from true antiquitie for true antiquitie is that which is deriued ab initio from the beginning In regard of this it is truely said of Tertullian Verum quod primum falsum quod posterius That which is first is alwaies true and that which commeth later is false but in respect of the other it is also as truely spoken of Saint Augustine Estmos diabolicus vt per antiquitatis traducem commendetur fallacia It is a diuellish custome that error should be commended by the descent of antiquitie Secondly it is to be obserued that no antiquitie be it neuer so ancient and hoare-headed is to be reuerenced or regarded if it bee not grounded vpon the truth of the Scriptures and that which seemeth nouelty if it bring Scripture for it warrant is truely ancient and hath true certaine and vnresistable authoritie the reason is giuen by Aquinaâ— Because the Law of God proceedeth from the will of God and therefore may not be altered by custome proceeding from the will of man whence it is that no custome ought to preuaile against the Law of God To which purpose is that of Tertullian Heresies are to bee conuinced not so much by noueltis as by verity whatsoeuer sauours against the truth that shall bee heresie yea though neuer so ancient And of Cyprian If onely Christ is to bee heard wee ought not to regard what any before vs hath thought fit to bee done but what Christ who is before all hath first done for we must not follow the custome of man but the truth of God and in another place Custome without truth is nothing but antiquitie of error Vpon this ground also Clemens Alexandrinus in an Oration to the Gentiles who pretended antiquitie for their errors as the Romanists now doe saying that they and their Fathers before them were borne and bred in that Religion and therefore will not now giue it ouer saith Let vs flye custome as a rocke or the threates of Charybdis or the fabulous Syrenes for it choaketh a man it turneth from the truth it leadeth from life it is a snare a hellish gulfe an euill fanne c. And Saint Augustine Truth being knowne custome is not to be followed for our Sauiour did not say I am custome but I am truth Now vpon these grounds wee offer to ioyne issue with them First that they haue no true and primitiue antiquitie for their Religion and secondly though some of their opinions be of long continuance yet being not warrantable by Scriptures they ought not to preiudice by a conceit of nouelty that primitiue and Apostolicall truth which by corrupt time hath beene interrupted And this I hope to discourse so plainely in this Argument following that no indifferent reader that seemeth not forestalled with preiudice shall depart vnsatisfied 2. Concerning the first proposition I take it to bee of an vndeniable truth for without all question all truth was taught by the Apostles to the Primitiue Church and no part thereof was left vnreuealed for so Saint Paul saith in plaine tearmes to
some one place he leaueth it in suspense in others and vtterly denyeth it in a third as for example in his Enchiriden he speaketh thus waueringly Such a thing is not incredible to bee after this life but whether it be or no it may be doubted and in a sermon hee seemeth vtterly to deny it when hee sayth There are two places and there is not a third we are ignorant of a third yea we finde in the Scripture that there is none such Againe it is to bee obserued that those Fathers which doe patronize this Purgatory yet propound it not as an article of faith but as a free opinion to bee receiued or contradicted as men thought good or saw reason and these also were none of the most ancient For Bellarmine climmeth no higher for it then to Athanasius Basill and Gregory Nazianzene for as for Dyonisius all knew him to bee a counterfeit but those liued after the age of the Primitiue Church as for those Fathers which liued in those purer times there is not a sillable found in them for the defence thereof Lastly it is not to bee forgotten that their owne Roffensis doth auerre that whoseeuer shall read the Greeke Fathers shall finde none or very rare mention of Purgatory and that all the Latine Fathers did not at the first apprehend it and that it was not a long time vniuersally beleeued in the Church but came in by little and little These things laide together doe demonstratiuely shew that Romish Purgatory was not an article of faith in the Primitiue Church but a late deuice brought in by a vaine feare and false and lying apparitions and maintained euer after by the smell of gaine and profit which â—accreweth thereby to the Popes purse and for the maintenance of his pompe and pride which otherwise would soone fall to the ground 67. Lastly to tye vp for breuities sake many points in one bundle prayer for the dead as it is vsed in the Church of Rome hath no ground of antiquity For though it cannot be denyed but that it hath beene an ancient custome in the Church and frequently vsed by the ancient Farthers yet their manner of praying was not of that nature as it is now in the Romish Synagogue For first the Ancients prayed for those whom they were perswaded to bee already in blisse as hath beene formerly declared but the Romanists say that such prayers are auaileable onely for soules tormented in the fire of Purgatory and that wee may not pray either for the blessed or the damned Secondly many of the Ancients suppose that all soules were reserued in a certaine secret place from the presence of God which they called Abrahams bosome Paradise the port of security the outward court of Heauen c. And therefore could not pray for their deliuerance from Purgatory as the Romanists doe Thirdly when the Ancients did pray for the Saints departed they did it as Bellarmine confesseth not in regard of any misery wherein their soules were but for the glorifying of their bodies in the day of the generall resurrection but the Romish prayers are onely for those that are in paines that they might bee deliuered Lastly the Ancients speake of the matter doubtfully as Saint Augustine with a peraduenture and as of a laudable custome receiued in the Church but not as a doctrine of absolute necessity but the Romanists obtrude it as an article of faith and call them Heretikes that deny the same and therefore though in generall prayer for the dead bee ancient yet Romish prayer is an Innouation declining from antiquity both in the obiect and subiect manner and end 68. So auricular confession is of like nature with the former For we confesse that confession was ancient but Auricular Romish confession is but a late vpstart both in respect of the absolute necessity of it which was brought in by Pope Innocent the third beeing before accounted but onely profitable and not necessary as in the Councill of Cabilon secondly in respect of the priuatenesse for Maldonate a Iesuite confesseth that for a long time in the Primitine Church there was none but publike confession thirdly in respect of the exact enumeration of all finnes with the circumstances which implyeth an impossibility for their owne Rhenanus confesseth that this is a deuterosis or late inuention of the Schoolemen neither indeed can a patterne bee giuen of it in all antiquity And lastly in respect of the merite which by the Church of Rome iâ— ascribed to the very act done thereof of which there is not the least mention in any of the Ancients In a word what need wee seeke further seeing wee haue the free confession of their Glosse vpon Gratian who affirmeth that this auriculaer confession is more truely saide to haue beene ordained by a tradition of the Church then by any authority either of the old or new Testament 69. So the exact number of seuen Sacraments which is an article of the Trentish Creede fortifyed with the greatest curse against all that shall say that there are either more or fewer is indirectly confessed to bee a nouelty by the Iesuite Suarez for hee sayth that the Council of Florence did but insinuate this truth and the Councill of Trent did expressely define it by which it is euident that it was but an insinuation in the Councill of Florence and no article of faith till the Councill of Trent and therefore an Innouation And directly by Cassander who sayth that vntill the dayes of Peter Lumbard wee shall scarce finde any author who set downe a certaine and definite number of Sacraments and to put the matter out of doubt it is confessed that this truth as they call it is not found in the Scripture but founded vpon Ecclesiasticall tradition And although Bellarmine laboureth to prooue out of Scripture them seuen none els to be properly Sacraments yet it is with as euill successe as Tyrabosco the Patriarke of Venice did extract the iust number of seuen from the miracle of fiue loaues and two fishes For first his owne Pew-fellowes disclaime some one some another of them as Durand doth Matrimony to bee properly a Sacrament because it hath not the vertue of conferring grace and Bonauenture extreame vnction to bee instituted by Christ and Aleusis and Holâ—ot did the like touching confirmation and also because his proofes are so friuolous oftentimes that a recitation of them is a sufficient refutation as for example to prooue that there is a promise of sauing grace in the conferring of orders he alledgeth 1. Tim. 4. 14. and 2. Tim. 1. 6. where Timothy is charged and admonished not to neglect but to stir vp the grace that was in him which was giuen to him by prophecy with the imposition of hands of the Eldership Here indeed is grace giuen to Timothy at his ordination but first it could not bee sauing grace because hee was before that conuerted and beleeued
somewhat longer let the Reader beare with mee for so the nature and nouelty of the matter requireth Their next practice then to defend their Church and Religion is by grosse and palpable lying and falshood yea so grosse and palpable that any ciuill honest man would blush to be reputed the author of such fables which they obtrude vpon silly people as verities necessary to bee beleeued and which they like simple creatures giue faith vnto asmuch as vnto the Gospell it selfe and neither is the one or the other any maruaile seeing Saint Paul prophesied long agoe that on the one side Antichrist his comming should be according to the efficacy of Sathan in all power in lying signes and wonders and on the other that God would send vpon them that receiued not the loue of the truth strong delusion that they should beleeue lyes so that by this prophecy one of the chiefest props of Antichrists kingdome must bee lyes and therefore the Church of Rome making no conscience thereof sheweth it selfe to be no better then the Synagogue of Antichrist If they say that they doe it to a good end namely to maintaine the truth I answere with Iob Nunquid Deus indiget mendacio vestro vt pro illo loquamini dolos Doth GOD stand in need of your lye that you should speake deceitfully for his cause no he will surely reprooue you for it and with Saint Augustine Cum humilitatis causa mentiris si non eras peccator antequam mentireris mentiendo efficieris quod euitaras that is If thou tellest a lye for humility sake or for the truths sake if thou were not a sinner before by lying thou art made that which thou didst auoid what can bee more pithily spoken for the reproofe of these men who by falshood pretend to establish the truth and by lying to vphold their Religion and if neither the Scripture nor this holy Father are regarded by them then let them heare the censure of the Heathen Cicero who concludeth that in virum bonum non cadit mentiri emolumenti sui causa It falleth not to a good man to lye no not for his owne profite sake what are they then in his account who make a common practice to lye for their aduantage But lest I should bee thought to accuse them falsely and in reproouing their lying to fall into the same vice my selfe let vs take a short view of some of their notorious vntâ—uths which are sparsed in their bookes And heere to omit their lying Reuelations lying priuiledges false Canons forged donations counterfeit de lying martyrologies all which are stuffed with notorious falsities and that by the confession of their owne Doctours I will insist onely vpon their lying miracles wherein they vaunt themselues as a marke of their Church and wherewith they labour to vphold most of their erronious opinions 11. And first touching their miraculous transubstantiatioÌ„ and adoration of the Sacrament not finding in Scripture sufficient proofe for it it is strange to see how many monstrous miracles they haue deuised for to win credit thereunto Bozius a man of great fame amongst them telleth vs these three tales first that Anthony of Padua caused his horse to kneele downe and worship the holy hoast by which strange sight a stout Heretike was conuerted to the true faith And secondly Saint Francis had a Cade Lambe which vsed to goe to Masse and would duely kneele downe at the eleuation and adore And thirdly that a certaine deuout woman to cure her Bees of the murren and to make them fruitfull put a consecrated hoast into the Hiue which when after a time shee tooke vp shee not onely found a miraculous increase but saw also a strange wonder the Bees had built a Chappell in the Hiue with an Altar and windowes and doores and a steeple with Bells and had laid the hoast vpon the Altar and with a heauenly noyse flew about it and sung at their Canonicall houres and kept watch by night as Monkes vse to doe in their Cloisters Who would not beleeue now but that the hoast is to be adored if hee be not more senslesse then a horse or a Bee or a Cade Lambe But if this be true why are Mice so prophane that they dare rend it with their teeth And why doth not the Popes Hackney kneele downe and doe reuerence vnto it when hee carrieth it on his backe accompanied with muletters and horse-keepers and Courtisans and Cookes with sumpter-horses and all the baggage of the Court as oft as his Holinesse is to trauell abroad when hee himselfe followeth mouÌ„ted vpon a goodly white palfrey accoÌ„panied with Cardinals Primates Bishops Potentats Is more honor to be giuen to Christs Vicar then to Christ himselfe Or was Anthonies horse more religious then all the Popes horses yea then the Pope himselfe and all his traine And if the hoast bee so soueraigne a preseruatiue for Bees why doe any good housewiues suffer their Bees to perish seeing they may haue the hoast for God amercy or at least wise for a very small price In the booke of the conformities of Saint Francis wee finde this miracle On a time Fryer Francis saying Masse found a Spider in the Chalice which hee would not for reuerence to the Sacrament cast out but drunke it vp with the blood afterward rubbing his thigh and scratching where it itched the Spider came whole out of his thigh without any harme to either O strange miracle and yet not so strange as this that Christs bloud in the Chalice should poyson Pope Victor except Francis a Fryer were more holy then Victor a Pope or the blood in one Chalice were of greater force then in the other but peraduenture the Priest in the one had no intention to turne the wine into blood as the Priest in the other had and then wee know there can be no conuersion but no maruaile if this be true seeing in the festiual of Corpus Christi day we read as great a wonder as this to wit of a Priest that hauing lost the hoast in a wood as hee came to housell a woman that was sicke and hauing whipt himselfe for his negligence went backe to seeke his Lord God and at last spying a pillar of fire that reached from the earth to heauen ran thereunto and found Gods body at the foot of that pillar and all the beasts of the forrest about it kneeling on their foure knees and adoring it with great deuotion ex ept one blacke horse which kneeled but on one knee and that blacke horse sayth the story was a fiend of hell who had turned himselfe into that shape that men might steale him and bee hanged as many had beene This as it was reported to bee done not far from Exbridge in Deuon-shire so it was as solemnely read in the Church and as verily beleeued as any miracle that euer Christ wrought who can doubt now but that the bread in the
Murdach then lately Bishop of Yorke and discharge her of her childe without paine and take it from her so that it was neuer seene more very likely for a priuy or a fishpond might meet with it by the way as it had done a number more in former later times A thousand such lies as these shall you find in their Legends and martyrologies and other bookes insomuch that Espensaens a learned Bishop of their owne doth freely confesse that no stable is so full of doung as the Legends are full of fables yea that very fictions are contained in their portesses and Canus another learned writer that the Pagan Histriographers did more truely write the liues of Emperours then the Christians did the liues of Saints and that in the golden Legend there are monsters for miracles rather then true miracles and that hee which wrote this booke was a man of a brasen face and a leaden heart 23. Thus it is euident by the confession of many learned of their owne side that these bee lying tales coyned as holy deceits as some of them terme them but more truely as deuilish deuices not to maintaine the truth but errour for how can that bee the truth which standeth in need of lying to maintaine it Caietane a Cardinall and a great learned diuine sayth that the credit of the Romish miracles dependeth vpon the report of men who may deceiue others and bee deceiued themselues and Antoninus the Archbishop of Florence calleth the visions of Bernard and Briget touching the conception of the Virgin Mary fantastick visions and mens dreams why should wee then beleeue them to bee true when as they themselues beleeue them not 24. If they obiect and say why may not these miracles be as true as those which are reported by many of the ancient Fathers and seeing famous miracles haue beene in all ages of the Church why should these last ages bee suspected for falsity more then the former I answere first that those Fathers themselues which were reporters of such miracles yet did repose no such confidence in them as to build their faith vpon them as the Romanists doe for Saint Augustine sayth Quisquis adhuc c. Whosoeuer yet seeketh aften wonders that hee may beleeue is himselfe a great wonder who when the world beleeueth doth not beleeue and in another place Contra istos mirabilirios c. Against these miracle-mongers my God hath made mee wary saying there shall arise in the last dayes false Prophets working signes and wonders that they might lead into errour if it were possible the very Elect. And Chrysostome or whosoeuer els was the author of those learned homilies on Mathew proueth that the true Church of Christ cannot bee discerned or knowen by signes or other meane but onely by the Scripture and that the working of miracles is more found among false Christians then true Tertullian sayth plainly that the Heretikes did raise the dead cure maladies foretell things to come the same is affirmed by Chrysostome Ierome Eutheâ—ius Theophilact as witnesseth Maldonate the Iesuite by which it appeareth that the Fathers thought miracles were not to bee regarded except they were wrought for the confirmation of the truth and that a miracle was to bee examined by the doctrine not the doctrine by a miracle and therefore that they are not any proper and true markes of the Church as the Romanists make them nay that they are rather markes of Antichrist and his Church as both our Sauiour and Saint Paul plainely auouch so that by this their great bragge of miracles they giue vs this strong aduantage against them that their Pope is Antichrist and their Church Antichristian which otherwise wee should want 25. And secondly I answere that they themselues reiect diuerse miracles of the fathers as fantastick visions and mens dreames so doth Antoninus call the vision of Bernard and Briget in the question of the Virgin Maries conception and Canus taxeth Gregory and Bede with this that they missed the marke now and then who wrote miracles talked of and beleeued among the vulgar that is which they receiued by heare-say and not by any eye-witnesse or sound proofe now why should wee be restrained from that liberty towards the rest which they take towards Gregory and Bede especially seeing many of their miracles are such as no reasonable man would euer beleeue and deserue rather the splene then the braine as for example Saint Ierome reporteth this to bee one of Saint Anthonies miracles how Anthonie trauailing in the wildernesse to seeke out Paul the Hermite met with a Centaure halfe a man and halfe a horse who spoke to him and shewed him the way and by and by when the Centaure was gone meeteth him another Monster like a Satyre with a hook nose and hornes on his head the lower part of his body like a goat offering him a branch of palme whom Anthony asking who he was he answered I am a mort all creature an inhabitant of the wildernes such an one as the Gentiles deluded with error called a Satyre and I am come as an Embassadour from my flocke to beseech yon to pray to God for vs whom wee know to bee come for the saluation of the world whose sound is gone through the earth if this bee true that there are such monsters or if they bee that they beleeue in Christ and so may bee saued let vs beleue then all that euer the Poets haue written of Ixion Polyphemus Pan Silenus other such like moÌ„sters Gregory Nissen writeth touching Thammaturgus that the Virgin Mary and Saint Iohn camedown from heaueÌ„ to him taught him his creed which is as likely to bee true as that which the Poets write of Apollo that taght Aesculâ—pius the rules of Physick or the Rabbines of the Angell Sanbasser that was Adams Schoolmaster 26. Saint Bernard in the life of Malachias if at least that booke bee Saint Bernards telleth vs of Malchus the teacher of Malachias how hee restored hearing to one that was deafe and how the patient confessed that when the holy man put his fingers into both his eares hee felt as it were two pigges issuing out of them Againe hee reporteth that a certaine Prior of the Regular Friers seing Malachie the Bishop to haue many seruants but few horses gaue vnto him the horse that hee rode on which beeing a restie iade and setting hard at the first the Bishop found him so but ere hee had ridden farre by a wonderfull change hee prooued a very excellent and precious palfrey ambling most sweetly the like tale wee reade in the Dialogues ascribed to Gregory of a horse which a Noble-man lent to Pope Iohn which beeing a very gentle sober nagge when as afterward the noble mans wife should bee set vpon him hee pust and pranced and stampt most strongly disdaining that a woman should sit vpon his backe which had carried the
high Priest of the world much like to King Alexanders Bucephalus which being bare would carry any groome quietly but when his trappings and furniture was on then hee would endure none but Alexander The writer of the life of Saint Bernard relateth a pretty wonder done by that holy man at the dedication of a Church when as the place was so filled with multitude of flies that the people could not enter into it without great annoyance Saint Bernard vsing no other meanes to destroy them said onely I excommunicate them and presently the next morning they were all found dead on the floore Doth this sauour of Saint Bernards holinesse or can any man bee so madde as to thinke that so holy a man would denounce excommunication ordained to separate from the Congregation open and sinfull men against poore silly flies sure hee hath no more wit then a flye that will beleeue this so that notwithstanding the ancient miracles recorded by the Fathers yet the Legendary Romish miracles are not freed from grosse and notorious falshood 27. Another practice of theirs to win credit to their Religion and disgrace to ours is slaundering and calumniating both our Religion and the professours thereof and that so grossely and falsely that their owne consciences could not chuse but say secretly vnto their tongues thou lyest when they were writing them in their bookes but they deale like theeues who to cleare themselues from suspition of robbery raise vp hue and cry against true men or like harlots that lay the imputation of dishonestie vpon sober matrones to the end that they themselues might bee thought chast and honest so beeing full of sores and blemishes themselues they seeke to couer their owne shame by discouering ours Which if it were in truth though their enuy was neuer the lesse yet their sinne was not so great but beeing notorious and outragious lyes they plainely show that they care not what they belch foorth so they staine vs with the filth thereof and that they haue learned that Maâ—chauillian rule audacter calumniari to slander boldly because though the wound bee healed yet a scarre remaineth 28. Their slanders are darted either against our persons or the gouernment of our Church or our doctrines let vs take a short view of all these and first for their personall slanders they slander all of vs in generall with the ignominious titles of solifidians nullifidians nudifidians Infidels worse then Turkes c. yea and say that wee haue no faith no Religion no Christ no God and what not that either malice can deuise or enuy and rage vtter These slanderous reproches are set abroach by rayling Parsons in his booke of the three conuersions and almost in all other of his discourses and by Mathew Kellison who was of a sudden start vp from spigget to the Pulpit a buttery diuine and by Wright another of the same stampe and by Reynolds and Bellarmine and Beran and Coster and all the brood of ranke mouthed Iesuites who as if they were all bitten with one madde dog raue alike against our Religion and the professours thereof but God bee praised with euill successe for their calumnies are so transparent that he that doth but meanly vnderstand the grounds of our Religion cannot but turne the lie vpon their heads 29. But let vs heare their reasons why we are all Infidels mary they propound two principall ones and those very strong as they thinke first they say that all learned Protestants are Infidels because they build their faith vpon their owne priuate exposition of Scripture and secondly that ignorant Protestants are Infidels because they rely their faith vpon their Ministers credit To the first I answere two things first that wee doe not interpret the Scripture by our own priuate iudgements but by the Scripture it selfe for some places are so plaine those principally that contain the grounds of Religion that they need no exposition as Saint Augustine witnesseth saying that quaedam in Scripturis c. There be some things in the Scripture so manifest that they require rather a hearer then an expounder and what those things are the same father declareth in another place where he sayth that in those things which are plainely set downe in Scripture are found all those points which containe faith and manners and those things which are obscure and hard in Scripture we do not expound by any forraine or priuate interpretation but by conferring them with other more plaine and perspicuous places and so except they say that the Scripture it selfe is of a priuate interpretation they cannot condemne vs of that crime Now that this is the best way of interpreting let the same Augustine informe vs who sayth That there is nothing contained in hard places of Scripture which is not to be found most plainely vttered in others and Chrysostome who affirmeth that the Scripture expoundeth it selfe and suffereth not the Reader to erre and Basill who telleth vs that those things which be doubtfull or seeme to be couertly spoken in some places of holy Scripture are expounded by other plaine places Of the same minde are the rest of the Fathers and so wee expound the Scripture no otherwise then all the ancient Fathers vsed to doe and then indeed it ought to be 30. I but wee follow not the iudgement of the Church say they which hath the onely key of interpretation committed vnto it if they meane by the Church the fathers we may iustify our selues by condemning them of the same fault they deale with them as the Iewes dealt with their wiues if they please their humors they hold vnto them but if they crosse or thwart them they sue out a bill of diuorce against them and put them away nothing is more common then this in all their writings and therefore it needs no instances to prooue it if they meane the Councils why by their owne teaching no Councill is of sufficient authority except it bee confirmed by the Pope nor any decree or interpretation to bee entertained without his approbation Therefore they must needs meane the Pope alone and if they doe so then we confesse that wee haue iust causes not to tye our faith to his girdle nor our vnderstanding to his braine seeing many of that ranke haue beene open Heretikes some notorious Atheists all men and therefore subiect to errour yea seeing the body of their Church is an Apostate harlot and the surmised head on earth that man of sinne the great Antichrist spoken of in the Scriptures If to vary from him then and his Babylon in our exposition of Scripture bee priuate interpretation wee confesse our selues guilty but in all other respects cleare and innocent 31. Secondly grant that wee doe in some points follow on our owne priuate exposition yet wee are not therefore Infidels for then most of the Fathers should bee infidels aswell as wee for there are few of them which haue not sometimes priuately vea and falsely
expounded the Scriptures as their owne Doctors confesse Canus saying that they spake with a humane spirit and erred sometimes in things which afterward haue appeared to appertaine to the faith and Posseuine that there are some things in the Fathers wherein vnwitingly they dissented from the Church either therefore they must tax them with infidelity aswell as vs or cleare vs aswell as them if al the force of the argument hang vpon this pin that therefore wee are Infidels because we priuatly expound the Scriptures 32. To the second viz. that all vnlearned Protestants are Infidels because they rely their faith vpon the credit of the translatours I answere three things first that they doe not rely their faith vpon the credit and fidelity of any translatour but partly vpon the iudgement and authority of the Church which receiueth such translations and alloweth them and is able to iudge of them and partly and principally vpon the word translated which containeth such holy and heauenly doctrine as none that readeth or heareth it can chuse but acknowledge the Maiestie of Gods Spirit speaking in it 33. Secondly if our people are therefore Infidels because they cannot examine the translations by the Hebrew and Greeke and doe therefore rely their faith vpon the translatours credit then Augustine was an infidell who knew neither of these languages but was as it is written of him monoglossos and then many godly Doctours and Fathers of the Church were Infidels who for the most part were all ignorant of the Hebrew tongue and some of them of the Greeke also and lastly then all the godly Christians in the purer times who both read and heard the Scriptures translated into their mother tongues were infidels for they all relyed their faith vpon the word translated but not for the translators sake who might erre in translating many places but for the sound holy and heauenly doctrine therein contayned 34. Thirdly if this maketh men infidels to relye their faith vpon man then the ignorant Romanists must needs be all infidels whose implicite Colliarlike faith is grounded onely vpon the Church that is not onely vpon the Pope who is in power the whole Church but also vpon euery ordinary Pastor be he Iesuite or Priest or Frier or any other whom they are according to their diuinity bound in conscience to beleeue whatsoeuer they teach as hath been shewed now this is to rely their faith vpon the fidelity and credit of man and therfore the blame of infidelity falleth vpon them more iustly then vpon vs and thus this accusation of theirs that we haue no faith no religion no God no Christ but are plain Infidels is a most notorious and open slander 35. Thus generally they slander our religion and the professors thereof but not content therewith they set vpon particular persons and those that are most eminent in our Church either in authority of place or excellency of learning that like Captaines march in the head of the ranks For to omit their horrible raylings against Kings Princes Magistrates Nobles and men of high place that any wayes opposed themselues to the Romish Monarchie whose glorious vertues were so resplendent that the mist of their slanders cannot darken the lustre thereof Lord how they raue and rage against the ashes of Luther Oecolampadius Zwinglius Caluin Beza and other worthie champions of our Church O◠Luther they write that he was an Apostate Friar that through enuy pride and ambition fell from them because the office of publishing Indulgences was taken from the Monks of his order and translated vnto the preaching Friers and that he had conference with the Diuell about the priuate Masse and was taught by him that it was vnlawfull and that in a disputation at 〈…〉 psia he vttered these blasphemous speeches This cause was neither begun for God nor shall be ended for God and that his life was incestuous and he himselfe a notable wine-bibber and his death infamous and fearefull he going to bed merry and drunke and being found the next morning dead his body being black and his tongue hanging forth as if he had been strangled and that after his death his body so stanke that they could not endure to carry it to his graue but threw it in a ditch and that the Deulls departed from many that were possessed and came to his sunerall These and many other strange fictions they haue set vpon the stage for the disgracing of the life death and memory of that blessed instrument of God 36. For Caluin they report that he was branded on the back by the Magistrate for his Sodomiticall and brutish lust and that he dyed in despaire calling vpon the Diuell swearing cursing and blaspheming most miserably being possessed with the lousie disease and wormes so increasing in an impostume or most stinking vicer about his priuy members that none of the standers by could any longer indure his stinke The like slander they lay vpon the life of Beza who they say in his youth was an effeminate wanton luxurious Poet and deserued as much shame for his filthy life as Caluin had done Zwinglius was slaine say they by Gods iust iudgement in the warre against the Catholicks Oecolampadius dyed suddenly in the night and Carolastadius was murthered by the Deuill 37. Further they tell how Luther went about in vaine to restore to life one Mesenus that was drowned by whispering and murmuring in his eare and how he would haue cast out the Deuill out of a certaine mayd but was in danger to be slayne by him and how Caluin compacted with one Bruleus to fayne himselfe to be dead that to shew the lawfulnesse of his extraordinary calling he might miraculously rayse him to life againe and that he prooued dead indeed and deceiued his expectation and made him a knowne impostor Thus they belch forth their venome against these good men that through their sides they might wound the Gospell and truth which they professed but with what likelyhood of truth I pray you marke and iudge and because matters of fact can be prooued by no other euidence but by witnesse except God miraculously discouer them to the world and witnesses also must be impartiall and without exception or else their testimonie is of no moment let vs therefore compare those that speake for them with these that are against them and try whether deserue most credit 38. Sleidan writeth of Luther that his death was most sweet and comfortable full of heauenly prayers and godly exhortations at which were present the Earle of Mansfield and other Noblemen Iustus Ionas the Schoolemaister of his children Michael Caeleus Iohannes Aurifaber and many more who testified the same to be true and Erasmus reporteth of his life that it was approoued with great consent of all men and that the integritie of his manners was such that his very enemies could finde nothing in him that they might calumniate which
assertion that God can not make those things that bee done to be vndone doth not destroy but build vp the omnipotency of God seing as Bellarmine himselfe acknowledgeth Facere contradictoria non est efficere sed deficere to doe things contradictorie is not to effect and doe but to faile and vndoe and therefore an argument of impotency rather then of omnipotency and for that cause Pererius another Iesuite auoucheth the same doctrine with vs in these words God is said to be omnipotent not onely because he can do whatsoeuer is contained in the world but also because nothing is impossible vnto him except that which to be done implieth contradiction what an impudent flander then is this to say that wee deny Gods omnipotency by affirming that hee cannot make that to bee vndone which is done especially seeing wee say further with Tertullian and Saint Augustine that therefore God cannot do it because he will not do it he cannot therefore deny himselfe not make that to be vndone which is done because hee will not and he will not because it would rather be an argument of weakenes then a power in him so to doe 76. Againe they challenge Caluine of denying the immortality of the soule And why thinke you Because they would make him to say that the soules of the iust are kept in certaine secret receptacles till the day of Iudgement and doe not till then inioy the presence of God Another palpable slander for first Caluine doth not say so secondly if hee did yet it doth not follow thereupon that hee denyeth the immortality of the soule for the first let Caluine first speake for himselfe and then let his aduersaries also speak for him Touching the place where the soules of the iust remaine after death he affirmeth plainely in diuers places that they liue with God and enioy the happy felicity of his kingdome though their perfect happinesse is deferred till the second comming of Christ when their bodies and soules shal be re-united and made partakers of the same blessednes This he testifieth not in one or two but in many places how therefore can they lay to his charge that opinion touching secret receptacles where soules are reserued till the day of the resurrection 77. Mary sayth Bellarmine in two respects first because he maketh Christ alone to haue entred into the Sanctuary of heauen and there to present the prayers of the people resting in the vtter court to God secondly because he sayth that the Saints departed are ioyned together with vs by faith therefore sayth Bellarmine He must needs deny that they see God seeing where faith is there is not sight But his conclusion in both is false though the premises be true for as the Atrium or vtter Court of the Temple to which Caluine alludeth was a part of the Temple so by proportion the vtter Court of Heauen is a part of Heauen witnesse their owne Ribera expounding that place of Exodus whereunto Caluine alludeth and therefore Caluine if hee did say so doth not banish the iust soules out of Heauen but onely placeth Christ our high Priest betwixt God and them But what if hee speake onely of the Saints liuing and not departed and meane by the vtter Court not any part of Heauen but the Church militant heere on earth If this be true what shamelesse slaunderers are these fellowes to wring a sense out of Caluine whereof there is no show in the words let the place be consulted and viewed and their malice and impudency will appeare most notorious 78. Againe that faith which hee speaketh of in the second place is nothing else but their stedfast beliefe and expectation of the resurrection of their bodies which liueth in the faithfull soules separated from this mortality vntill the full accomplishment of their happinesse aswell as in the Saints militant neither can I conceiue any absurdity in this that the Saints departed should haue faith in this respect seeing they must needs haue hope which two Theologicall vertues are so perplexed together that one cannot bee without the other and therefore Clemens Alexandrinus calleth hope the blood of faith and Saint Paul sayth 1. Cor. 13. that faith and hope shall cease together when charity shall suruiue and remaine If then the Saints departed hope for the resurrection of their bodies why may they not bee said also to beleeue it and yet for all that be in heauen too 79. Neither is the other place obiected out of Caluine by Bellarmine any whit repugnant to this doctrine for though he sayth that it is a foolish and rash part to dispute curiously what the place is that the Saints possesse in Heauen and whether they inioy the full ioyes of heauen or no yet in the very same place hee affirmeth that they are in the presence of Christ in Paradise and that they onely expect the fruition of that promised glory which their bodies also shal be possessors of at the comming of Christ 80. Thus we haue heard Caluine speake for himselfe Let vs now heare his enemies speaking for him in this case then which there cannot be a stronger argument of his innocency and in this two may stand for all Bellarmine is the first hee directly confesseth that Caluine placed the soules of the Saints in heauen euen before the comming of Christ and to him subscribeth Fenardentius another Iesuite who affirmeth that this was Caluines opinion that the faithfull when they should depart out of this world doe behold God neere vnto them and as it were set before their eyes And thus Caluine is quit from this enditement by the witnesse of his profest aduersaries 81. Secondly let it be granted which neuerthelesse can no wayes be prooued that Caluine held this opinion touching the residence of soules in some secret place yet it doth not follow that therefore he denyed the immortality of the soule For then Origen Iustine Martyr Tertullian Irenaeus Lactantius Victorinus Chrysostome Theodoret Theophilact Ambrose Bernard and diuers others of the ancient godly Fathers should be enwrapped within the same errour who all held that opinion touching soules departed and yet were as farre from gain-saying or once imagining any opposition to the soules immortality as these backbiting Shemiâ—s are from charity and truth 82. Another lowde and lewde slander of theirs against our Religion is that it maintaineth and warranteth rebellion and disobedience against lawfull Princes Which if they could prooue wee would confesse that our Religion was naught seeing Gods word commandeth euery soule to be subiect to the higher powers but yet not worse then theirs which is without all contradiction guilty of this crime which they impute vnto vs as hath beene prooued but let vs heare their proofes they are of two sorts first from the doctrines of some of our learned writers and secondly from the practice of our professors In the first kind they obiect Caluine Beza Luther Knox Buchanan
this to rely vpon for his saluation then the other Thomas Aquinas seeing this ascribeth an infinitie to humane satisfactions in respect that they are informed by grace but therein hee crosseth both all his fellowes and their doctrine it selfe for if they be infinite then they must needes answere aswell for the eternall punishment as for the temporall which they denie 13. Thirdly they themselues cannot agree about their satisfactions as whether they bee by precept and commandements or only by counsell and perfection and not commanded whether the vertue of satisfying bee in the outward or inward act or in both whether they serue to take away the temporall punishment onely or the gilt of the sinnes or the punishment of hell excepting the eternitie whether they be so necessarie that there can bee no absolution without them or that a sinner may be absolued by his contrition and confession without penal satisfaction and lastly whether the least satisfaction be sufficient for the greatest temporall punishment or that a due proportion is to be obserued All these intricate questions are exagitated in this doctrine some holding one thing some another without any iust and sure resolution what a dangerous thing is it then to relye vpon these vncertainties which they themselues are not able to bring into grounded principles how much safer is it to repose our selues wholly vpon that blessed satisfaction of our Lord and Sauiour Iesus Christ in which neyther Romanist nor Protestant could euer find any ambiguitie or doubt but that it is of absolute necessitie for mans saluation of infinite efficacie to appease the wrath of God and of proportionable dignitie to the iustice of God 14. Lastly after they haue with one hand stretched the worthinesse of their satisfactions to the highest straine yet they pull them downe againe with the other and make them of no force for let the satisfaction bee what it will yet the Popes pardon can dissolue the bonds thereof for it is a ruled case in their Religion that all satisfactorie punishment may bee released by a pardon and this pardon may bee obtained by saying not onely ouer certaine prayers visiting certaine Churches worshipping certaine relickes and kneeling to certaine pictures c. but also by disbursing certaine monie out of their purses that may come to the Popes purse and coffers Behold now the greatest danger of this doctrine thy satisfaction is released and made no satisfaction and it is released by him of whom thou maist iustly doubt whether hee hath authoritie so to doe and whether he may erre in doing it hee doth it de facto not examining whether thou bee truly penitent or no but whether thou hast payd thy penitentiall tax or no and that which is worst of all hee so granteth it that it is alwayes reuocable at his secret pleasure so that satisfaction is made no satisfaction by the Popes pardon the Popes pardon is made no pardon because it is bought with monie thy monie perish with thee that thinkest this gift of the holy Ghost can bee obtained with monie and the mony is cast away because the Pope may both erre in his pardoning and also reuoke his pardon when he list without giuing any notice of the cause vnto the partie what securitie can a Christian conscience find in these vnsure principles How much safer a course is it to rely vpon Christs satisfaction onely which is a true satisfaction indeed not disanulled by any act eyther of God or man not pardoned but performed not purchased by monie but by faith which is more precious then gold and lastly not reuocable by any power in heauen or in earth but standing firme as an euerlasting foundation for the saluation of the elect 15. Touching Antichrist whether side doth more incline to take part with his Apostacie and is in most danger to bee inthralled to his dominion let any indifferent man iudge for wheras it is granted by all both Romanists and Protestants yea and Fathers also that Antichrist should bee a Monarch clayming an vniuersall iurisdiction throughout the whole World and should also challenge to himselfe an infallibilitie of iudgement Protestants abhorring all such manner of subiection and renouncing all such power in any creature cannot possibly fall into the Antichristian gulfe But Papists professing the Pope to be the sole Monarch of the Church and his iudgement to bee of infallible truth in the defining of matters of faith must needs bee in more danger to bee in Antichrists Kingdome we cannot be slaues to Antichrist because we admit no gouernment like vnto his in the Church nor any such peremptorie power of not erring in the gouernment But they professing a gouernment and a power in that gouernment so agreeable to the state of Antichrist may suspect themselues to bee fallen into that Apostacie as they are indeed ouer head and eares Our religion then is more secure in this respect whereas theirs by their owne principles hath some affinitie and correspondence therewith and Antichrist himselfe may be in their Church but cannot by any probable coniecture be in ours 16 Againe for the Article of Inuocation of Saints the Romanists that hold the affirmatiue are in many respects subiect to many more and greater dangers then the Protestants which hold the negatiue for first if their doctrine bee not true they manifestly detract from the glorie of the Creatour and giue the same vnto his creatures Whereas if our doctrine bee false wee onely detract from the glorie of the creatures and giue it vnto the Creatour Now by how much it is a greater sinne to doe iniurie to the Creatour then to the creature by so much the more dangerous is their doctrine then ours and as it is safer to ascribe that glory to God which is due to man then to man that that is due to God so is there more safetie in our doctrine then in theirs 17. Secondly in respect of charitie if they erre in this opinion then doe they turne the holy Saints of God into abominable Idols and so offer that wrong vnto them which they being iealous of Gods glorie of all things most detest as the examples of Paul and Barnabas and of Peter and the Angell declare but if wee erre wee onely being iealous that Gods glorie may not be communicated to any other depriue them of a little worship which wee thinke belongeth vnto God and in the meane while esteeme them as blessed Saints and honour them by praysing God for them imitating their godly examples and keeping an honourable remembrance of them in our Churches Now in charity whether is a greater wrong to the Saints to turne them into Idols that is into deuils or for zeale of Gods glorie to take from them a little of their due honour 18. Thirdly in respect of conscience if they doe sinne in this it is the horrible and fearefull sinne of Idolatrie which being spirituall adulterie causeth a diuorce
the child before it bee baptized is in some sort partaker of the Sacrament of Baptisme euen by the faith of the Church which hath vowed him thereunto And Bonauenture as hee is reported by Cassander sayth that infants are disposed vnto Baptisme not according to any act of their owne but according to the act of other because the mercie of God imputeth to them as their owne will the will of another Insants therefore stand still in as good case in euery respect as men of yeares if not in better both being vnbaptized and the one dedicated to God by their owne desire the other by the purpose desire of the Church and therefore either these may bee saued aswell as they or else God is not so mercifull to them as to these which is no lesse then impietie to thinke and blasphemie to pronounce 38. Another wicked consequence that followeth vpon this doctrine is that it maketh God the Father the Sonne and the holy Ghost euen that blessed Trinitie that is the fountaine of all truth and goodnesse to be lyars and teachers of vntruth For God the Father sayth to Abraham I will bee thy God and the God of thy seed And that this is not to bee vnderstood of the seed of Abraham according to the flesh onely to wit the Iewes but much more of his seed according to the Spirit which are faithfull Christians may appeare both by that which is in the verie same place where it is called an euerlasting couenant and by Saint Pauls testimonie who affirmeth that the blessing of Abraham was to come on the Gentiles through Christ Iesus aswell as on the Iewes God the Sonne sayth Suffer little children to come vnto me for of such is the Kingdome of Heauen plainly affirming that the Kingdome of Heauen is pertaining to little children and not barred vp against any as our Romanists teach it is against such little ones as dye without baptisme Our Sauiour saith without exception that the Kingdome of Heauen belongeth vnto them they as it were to make him a lyar bring in an exception and say that except they bee baptized not Heauen but Lymbus belongeth vnto them And the holy Ghost by the mouth of Saint Paul sayth That the children of beleeuing Parents are holy the reason is because the root is holy and therefore the branch must needs be holy and if children may be holy before they be baptized then by the same rule they may goe to Heauen before they be baptized for as no man without holinesse can see God so with holinesse none can be banished out of the sight of God And thus this doctrine giueth the lye to euery person of the blessed Trinitie 39. If they say that it is our Sauiours doctrine that except a man be borne againe of water and the holy Ghost hee cannot enter into the Kingdome of Heauen and therefore all those generall promises are to bee restrained by this exception if they bee baptized I answere out of Bellarmine that God is not tyed to his Sacraments but can saue them by his especiall grace as also witnesse diuers others of their learned Doctours And therefore whereas our Sauiour saith Except a man be borne againe c. it must needs be vnderstood by another exception to wit of cases of necessitie where Baptisme cannot be obtained and is not contemned for not the want but the contempt of Baptisme is damnable 40. The third and last inconuenience that ariseth from this doctrine is that it is the mother of diuers strange paradoxes and grosse absurdities as not onely of Lay mens Baptisme yea of Pagans and that in scorne but also of changing the true element into lee or broth or puddle water and that which is most strange of baptizing the childe in the mothers wombe before it bee borne or ripping vp the mothers belly in case the child be in danger of death c. some of all which absurdities are held by them all and all by some Is it not then more safe to hold that opinion which is more respectiue to Gods glorie agreeable to Christian charitie and free from all these dangerous consequences 41. To conclude omitting many other of their doctrines which might easily bee shewne to stand in the same case of dangerous tenure and hath in part alreadie beene manifested as their doctrine of set fasts implicite faith veniall sins dispensations with others more I propound for the last instance that doctrine of doctrines the verie groundcell of their ruinous Religion touching the veritie authoritie and singularitie of their Church which they vaunt and bragge to be the onely true Catholike Church of Christ and to haue a preeminence ouer the Scriptures and without the which to be no possibilitie of saluation that there is no safetie in these positions many reasons will euince as first if it should bee true that out of the bounds of that Church none could bee saued then those famous Churches of Asia which were in Pope Victors time that opposed themselues against the predominance of the Church of Rome were all damned wherein flourished many holy Martyrs that gaue vp their liues for the testimonie of Iesus Then Saint Cyprian and all the Bishops of Carthage to the number of fourescore that in a Councell at Carthage set themselues against Pope Stephen and his Councell were damned and Saint Cyprian must bee no longer a Martyr but a Schismaticke and then S. Augustine with the whole Church of Africa and troupes of Martyrs and Confessors should not bee crowned with blisse but tormented in hell for they reiected the yoke of the Bishop of Romes authoritie and would not admit that any should make appeales from them to Rome This horrible and vncharitable inconuenience doth arise from that dismall doctrine The Church of Rome is the onely Catholike Church and out of it there is no hope of saluation now that these holy and heauenly Martyrs and Confessors of Iesus Christ were out of it appeareth by their most receiued definitions of a Catholike and a Schismaticke A Catholike faith Bellarmine is he that is subiect to the one Pastor the Pope whereby hee makâ—th the essentiall forme of a Catholike to be his vnion and coniunction with his head the Pope and a Schismatike sayth Tollet is hee that doth separate himselfe from the head of the Church and the Vicar of Christ I assume but Cyprian Augustine and those other famous Bishops did not acknowledge any subiection to the Pope but separated themselues from his dominion therefore they were by their doctrine no Catholickes but Schismatickes and consequently out of the Church and so out of saluation a damnable conclusion 42. Secondly they peremptorily auouch that none of vs being not members of their Church can bee saued we on the contrarie charitably beleeue that many of them that are ignorantly members of their Church if they hold the foundation of Iesus Christ and depend vpon his merits not their owne
Protestants condemne the worship of Images taught and practised in the Church of Rome but they are not alone therein but haue many Romanists for their abetters and companions Cassander concludeth out of Saint Augustine that there were no Images in all the Churches of his Diocesse And Polydore Virgil writeth that by the testimonie of Ierome it appeareth how in a manner all the ancient Fathers condemned the worship of Images for feare of Idolatrie thus speaketh he in his vncorrupted editions but in his later editions his tongue is tyed by the Belgicke Index others as Holcot Durand Alphonsus flatly affirme that no worship at all is due to an Image neither is it lawfull to worship it diuers Councels also decreed the same as the ancient Councell of Eliberis propounded this onely remedie against Idolatrie that no Images should bee painted in Churches but this Councell was not Romish for Poperie was then scarce in the Embrio therefore of later time a mere Romish Councell to wit that of Franckford consisting of many Romish Bishops and the Popes owne Legates condemned all worship of Images and a later yet to wit the Councell of Mentz held in the yeere 1549. decreed that the Image it selfe was not to bee worshipped but that by the Image of Christ men should bee stirred vp to adore Christ which is contrarie to the new professed doctrine of the Church of Rome 54. Many Romanists as well as Protestants reiect the intercession and inuocation of Saints as an Article not found eyther in the olde or new Testament In the olde Testament sayth Salmeron The Patriarchs vsed not to be inuocated both because they were not in perfect estate of blessednesse and also because there had beene then a danger of Idolatrie to offer that honour vnto them And for the new Testament the same Iesuite confesseth that this article is not expressed because the Iewes would haue thought it an hard matter to inuocate Saints departed and the Gentiles would haue taken occasion to haue thought that the worship of new Gods had beene prescribed vnto them Of the same opinion was Ecchius who peremptorily affirmeth that the inuocation of Saints departed is not commanded in the holy Scripture And Faber Stapulensis thus writeth I would to God that the forme of beleeuing might bee fetcht from the Primitiue Church which consecrated so many Martyrs to Christ and had no scope but Christ nor imployed any worship to any saue to the one Trinity alone 55. That a Christian may bee certaine of his owne standing in present grace and of his future saluation is the doctrine of Protestants denyed by the Church of Rome and yet approued by many of her deare children as for example Euery one that beleeueth seeth that he doth beleeue sayth Dominicus Bannes A Christian man by the infallible certaintie of faith which cannot bee deceiued certainly knoweth himselfe to haue a supernaturall faith sayth Medina Some spirituall men may be so certaine that they are in grace that this their assurance shall be free from all feare and staggering sayth Vega reported by Gregory de Valentia And touching assurance of eternall life the same Medina sayth that hee would haue euery beleeuer certainly to hope that he shall obtaine eternall life And of the same opinion are al the rest of them saue that they will haue this certainty to be of hope and not of faith and so the difference is in words and not in the thing for they make it to be without doubting or wauering firme and assured aswell as we 56. That concupiscence is a finne in the regenerate is affirmed by Protestants contrary to the receiued doctrine of the Church of Rome yet many Romanists themselues shake hands with the Protestants in this point as Ribera a Iesuite who writing vpon the twelfth of the Hebrewes sayth that by sinne hanging fast vpon is meant the concupiscence of the flesh against the holy Spirit which the Apostle vseth often to call by the name of sinne and Tanner another Iesuite acknowledgeing that concupiscence in the regenerate is called sinne by the Scripture sayth that it is a great wickednesse to traduce as blasphemous the manner of speech true in it selfe and imitating the Scriptures yea and Stapleton calleth it a certaine iniquitie and obliquity not onely against the dominion of the mind but also against the Law of God Now Bellarmine telleth vs that whatsoeuer is contrarie to the Law of God is mortall sinne Cassander playeth the Protestant in direct termes in this point for he sayth that if we respect sinne as an iniquitie or disease which must be resisted by the spirit lest it burst forth into vnlawfull acts concupiscence is not vnfitly called sinne but if we respect it as an offence to God and guiltinesse to which punishment and damnation is answering it is not thus sinne in the regenerate 57. Touching marriage of Priests which the Church of Rome condemneth as execrable filthie and abominable we allow as holy and lawfull we haue their owne Doctours on our side and against their owne mother Gratian sayth that marriage of Priests is not prohibited eyther by legall or Euangelicall or yet Apostolicall authoritie but by Ecclesiasticall onely Espenseus sayth that for many hundred yeeres after the Apostles time by reason of the want of others Priests were married Caietane affirmeth that if wee stand onely to the tradition of Christ and his Apostles it cannot appeare by any authoritie or reason that holy order can be any hinderance to marriage eyther as it is an order or as it is holy Pius the second one of their owne Popes affirmeth that it is better for a Priest to marry then to burne though hee haue vowed the contrary and that there be many reasons to forbid Priests marriage but more to allow it Panormitane Cassander Erasmus doe all agree that in regard of the monstrous and filthy effects that follow a vowed single life it were better both for Gods glory and the auoyding of scandall in the Church that libertie of marrying were granted to all men And Espenseus and Agrippa doe grieue and blush to behold rather Concubines and Stewes to bee permitted to their Clergy then lawfull wiues 58. The Popes Primacie or rather Supremacie in all affaires and ouer all persons challenging the iurisdiction of both swords and authoritie of supreme Iudicatures in cases of controuersie and interpretation of Scripture with an infallibilitie of Iudgement is the verie foundation of Poperie yet the same is razed not onely by Protestants but by many of their owne ranke that are both by name and profession Papists Concerning his temporall Iurisdiction so stiffely maintained by Bellarmine and the Iesuits our Wisbich Priests affirme that this power was neuer giuen vnto Peter Espensâ—us condemneth it in direct tearmes Tolosanus confesseth that for two hundred yeeres after Christ it was neuer read that Christians attempted any thing
faith he doth neuer erre Gretzer saith that the generall lawfull and ordinarie Iudge of controuersies is the Bishop of Rome whether hee define any thing alone or with a Generall Councill this Iudge is always infallible Staplet on saith that the foundation of our Religion is placed of necessitie vpon the authority of this manâ— teaching in whom wee heare God himselfe speaking And another of them saith Si toâ—us mundus sententiaret contra Papam If the whole world should determine against the Pope yet we must stand to his sentence To conclude the Canon Law saith that it were heresie to thinke that our Lord God the Pope might not decree as hee doth yea that his rescripts and decretall Epistles are not Canonicall Scripture 34. Thus we see the Pope is that which they meane by the Church and he is the onely compendious Iudge and therefore when they talke of the Church it is but a vayne vaunt for when all comes to all they entend nothing by the Church but their Lord God the Pope as the Canonists call him who is ens secundae intentionis compofitum ex Deo homine Abeing of the second intention compounded of God and man and quasi Deus in terris c. as it were a God vpon earth greater then man and lesse then God hauing the fulnesse of power Now by this that hath beene said the truth of my second proposition doth euidently appeare to wit that the Romanists will allow no other Iudges in matter of controuersie but themselues alone and so giue iust cause to all that are not blinded with errour at least to suspect their Religion if not vtterly to abandon it which is the conclusion necessarily following vpon these premises 35. Which that it is of most necessarie consequence appeareth by this because it is against all reason that the same should be both the party and the Iudge yea in equity is it fit that we should stand to his iudgement whom we accuse to be a falsifier of the Scripture and euen Antichrist himselfe or that that Church should bee our Church which wee affirme and proue to be an Apostate and an harlot seeing that a Iudge should be indifferent and vnpartiall and not a party as the Church and Pope of Rome is in all cases of controuersie depending betwixt them and vs as for example in the controuersie of the Church the question being which is the true Church The Iudge to determine thereof we say is the Scripture they cry The Church meaning their owne Church as I haue shewed Doe they not by their doctrine aduance themselues into the tribunall seate and make their Church the Iudge whether it bee the Church or no so in the question touching the Popes Supremacy who shall be Iudge whether this supreme power be in the Pope or no Mary the Pope himselfe for they admit no other Iudge Sure he must needes gaine the cause when hee is thus his owne Iudge If this bee not a plaine tergâ—ueâ—sâ—tion I know not what is if this doth not bewray the weakenesse of their cause let any indifferent man consider and giue sentence 36. For as on ourside in the question of the Kings Supremacie whether euery King in his owne dominion bee the supreme Gouernour of the Church vnder Christ or no if wee should in this case admit no Iudge but the King himselfe Or in the question of our Church whether wee be the true Church of Christ or no if wee should refuse all other triall saue that which ariseth from the iudgement of our owne Church and the Bishops and Prelates thereof would not all men laugh at our folly and thinke our cause weake and desperate So may all men thinke of the Romish Religion that it be wrayeth manifest folly in the maintayners and apparent weakenesse in the grounds thereof in that it will not bee iudged but by itselfe especially seeing it is the property of selfe-loue whereof no man liuing is freed to make men blinde in their owne causes and partiall on their owne sides To conclude therefore as the Lion in Esope that challenged to himselfe the whole prey that was caught and would not stand to the equall partition of his fellow-hunters proued himselfe thereby to be a tyrant and his title naught so the Pope of Rome and his Proctours in refusing to be iudged by any saue themselues and by that right clayming a title to the truth discouereth both his tyrannie ouer the Church of God and the holy Scriptures and the badnesse of his weake cause seeing truth like a chaste matrone though it be slandered yet is so bold and powerfull that it feareth not to bee tried by those that are the greatest enemies thereof Spectatum admissirisum teneatis amici MOTIVE VI. That Religion doth iustly deserue to bee suspected which doth purposely disgrace the sacred Scriptures But such is the Religion of the Church of Rome Ergo c. OVr Aduersaries may fitly be likened to churlish and angrie Mastifes whose property it is to rend with their teeth those that are vnarmed and not able to resist but if they meet with an armed man that can keepe them off and entertaine them with sharpe blowes then they wreak all their teene vpon the cudgell or weapon wherewith they are annoyed so they seeing themselues well banged and beaten by our men at Armes I meane our Champions that defend the quarrell of our Church with the staffe of the Scripture and their hairy scalpes wounded with the stones fetcht out of Dauids scrip fall a snarling and biting the staffe and the stones which haue beene the instruments of their sorrow whereas if they finde any without a staffe in his hand or a stone in his sling that is vnfurnished with Scripture to fight with them ouer him they domineere take him captiue and leade him to their denne for a prey This their malice against the sacred Scripture which is the only engine of their destruction I hope by Gods fauourable assistance so to discouer in this Chapter that they themselues shall euer bee reputed as blasphemers of the truth and their religion as odious and abominable to all posterity 2. The Maior or first proposition in this demonstration though it bee of an vndoubted truth yet for the greater illustratio thereof two poynts are to be considered first what this Scripture is which is opposed against and secondly what they are to be esteemed which oppose themselues vnto the Scripture The Scripture contained in the Olde and new Testament is in a word the holy and sacred word of the eternall God which to haue said of it is an ascription of the greatest dignitie vnto it as can bee deuised for if it bee the holy and sacred word of the eternall God then must it needs be perfect excellent pure vpright cleane permanent wife sweet and what else may be spoken for the setting forth of the excellency of a thing all which attributes are giuen
and ignorance must needs ouerflow the world as wofull experience hath taught to bee true in those places where the Romish Religion preuaileth 16. Thirdly they teach that Images and Pictures are Lay mens Bookes wherein they must read and with the which they must content themselues without searching at all into the Booke of God This doctrine taught Gulielmus Peraldus three hundred yeeres since saue that hee ioyned the Scripture and Images together for thus he writeth As the Scriptures be the Bookes of the Clergie so Images and the Scripture are the Bookes of Lay men where hee equalleth a dumbe and dead Picture to the speaking and liuely Scriptures the worke of man to the Word of God But Loelius Zechius a learned and famous Diuine of latter time goeth further and saith that Images are the onely Bookes for them that bee vnlearned to draw them to faith and knowledge and imitation of diuine matters Yea another Fryer that liueth in Paris at this day or at least was aliue very lately goeth yet a degree further and affirmeth that Lay men may more easily learne diuine mysteries by contemplation of Images then out of the Booke of God and all these are as they stile them most Catholike and holy Bookes But what should I search further into these petty Disciples whereas the grand Doctor himselfe hath this proposition in expresse words Meliùs interdum docet pictura quà m scriptura A Picture doth better instruct sometimes then the Scripture 16. This is their Doctrine Now what fruits doth it bring foorth Surely the best fruit is ignorance a worse then that error and the worst of all superstition and and idolatry for howsoeuer we deny not that there may be an historicall and ciuill vse of Pictures either to put vs in minde of our absent friends or to represent some obseruable history and notable deede done or to stirre vs vp to the imitation of the vertues of Godly men and women yet we constantly affirme that to make them the Bookes of Lay men either to be instructed by them alone without the Booke of God or to finde better and more perfect instruction in them then in it is to inwrap the people in a cloude of foggie and mistie ignorance and to hood-winke their eyes that they should not see the bright shining light of truth for where is all sound sauing knowledge to bee found but in the holy Scripture whither doth our Sauiour Christ send his Disciples but vnto them he doth not say vnto them Gaze vpon Pictures for they be they that testifie of me and In them yee shall finde eternall life but Search the Scriptures for c. And the Prophet Dauid that it is the Law of God that giueth wisedome vnto the simple and that conuerteth the soule and giueth light vnto the eyes and not the Pictures of Abraham Isaac and Iacob or of any of the Prophets And therefore though a man may be instructed by a Picture touching a thing done yet most certaine it is that more excellent and more perfect instruction is gotten by the Scripture for let an vnskilfull man returne neuer so often to the beholding of his Picture it will alwaies represent the same thing vnto him and if any scruple or doubt remaine in his minde it can answere nothing for the explication thereof whereas in holy Scripture that which is obscure in one place is explained in another and that which in one Chapter we cannot conceiue in the next following it may be is so cleerely set downe that a childe may discerne it without erring so that as a man may discouer his meaning by signes and becks yet it is not so effectuall as if he vtter it by word of mouth so Pictures may teach but yet Scripture teacheth more fully and effectually And therefore to tye the people to these dumbe Bookes and discharge them from searching into the Booke of God is to depriue them of the chiefest meanes of knowledge and so to foster them in ignorance 17. But yet this is not all For besides that it occasioneth ignorance an Image also is a teacher of lyes as the Prophet Habakuk calleth it and a mother and a nurse of superstition and Idolatry For first how many Pictures are there in their Churches of Monsters and miracles that neuer were As of Saint George killing the Dragon Saint Christopher carrying Christ vpon his shoulder ouer the Ford. Saint Catherine tormented vpon the wheele and disputing with the Philosopher Saint Dunstane holding the Diuell by the nose or lip with a paire of Pincers Saint Denis carrying his owne head in his hands being strooke off Saint Dominick burning the Deuils fingers with a Candle which hee made him to hold will he nill hee And an infinite number such like which either neuer were extant in the world or were not such neither euer did worke such feates as are represented by their Pictures Two Pictures I cannot passe ouer in silence which I haue seen and obserued with my owne eyes the one at the Church of Ramsey in Huntington-shire neere adioyning vnto that quondam a famous and rich Abbay In this Church in the lowest window in the right I le is a picture of a paire of Ballance in one skole whereof is the Deuill and in the other a woman and the woman is more sinfull then the Deuill ouerweighing him euen to the ground Behold a Lay mans book whereat wise men may wonder fooles may laugh and women may bee inraged and euery one may read the folly and prophanenes of those times Sure I am heere is little instruction for the soules health The other is in the Cloister window of the cathedrall Church of Peterborough where is painted out at large the history of Christs passion In one place whereof our Sauiour Christ sitteth with his twelue Apostles eating his last Passeouer which because it was vpon the Thursday night before Easter commonly called Maundey Thursday therefore they picture before him in a dish not a Lambe as the truth was but because it was Lent O miserable blindnesse three pickerels so that now the Paschall Lambe is turned into a Paschall pickerell and all forsooth to nourish in the people the superstition of the Lent fast For if they should see Christ eating flesh in Lent what an incouragement would this be thought they for the people to doe the like 18. And thus Images may wel be called Laymens bookes But what bookes you see euen such as teach lyes and superstition no sound and true instruction I could heere relate how that Saint Dunstane put life by a trunke forsooth into the Image of the Virgin Mary and made her speake against the marriage of Priests when that controuersie could no otherwise bee decided And how the Image of the Crucifixe vsed to speake to Saint Francis to the end to giue authority to the order of his fraternity and that vpon two Images in a Church at Venice the one of Saint
vsed by Christ himselfe or his Apostles and therefore must of necessity be grosse and palpable Innouations 29. From the Eucharist let vs looke backe to the ceremonies of Baptisme and first to their baptizing of Bels and of Gallies and Ships secondly exorcisme and exufflation thirdly anointing with oyle and crossing and fourthly salting and spittling lastly threefold Immersion or dipping the Infant all which are palpable nouelties so confessed by the Romanists themselues neither can they euer shew that these ceremonies were either commanded by Christ or practised by Iohn Baptist or the Apostles and though some of them as the crosse and anointing are of great antiquity and were then and may bee still lawfully vsed as things indifferent yet in their Church where such an opinion of necessity is laid vpon them that Baptisme is not effectuall without them they are meere Innouations no wayes warranted by any antiquity 30. Lastly I propound as their feasting so their fasting dayes together with the manner of fasting vsed amongst them as first the Lent fast of fourty dayes which their Iesuite Azorius confesseth not to bee of diuine ordinance and the variablenesse of the vse thereof doth prooue no lesse some Churches continuing the same full sixe weeks as the Illyrians Lybians Egypt and Palestina some seuen weekes as they of Constantinople with the nations adioyning some but three weekes and those dispersed within the six or seuen as occasion serued some againe three weekes immediatly going before Easter and lastly some two onely as the followers of Montanus all this is recorded by Sozomene in his History by which it is euidently euinced that this fast was no Apostolicall institution nor yet any childe of true antiquity for if it had there could not haue beene any such variety in the obseruation thereof 31. Secondly their fast of 4. times coÌ„monly called Ember weekes was first deuised by Pope Calixtus as would witnes Polidore Virgill if he were not gelded by these strange bookpurgers but though he be silent yet their own Platina telleth asmuch Thirdly their tying of fasts to certaine set dayes as the fourth and sixt day of the weeke was not allowed in Saint Augustines time for hee thus writeth against Vrbicus that stroue for the Saturdayes fast I read in deed that wee are commanded to fast but which ought to bee the dayes of our fasting I finde not prescribed in the Euangelicall or Apostolicall writings nor in his scholler Primasius his age for thus sayth he There is no Law set down concerning fasting but as euery man can or will nor in Socrates time who liued about the yeere 440. for hee plainly testifieth that the rites and obseruations of fasting were by the Apostles left to euery mans free liberty and choyce 32. Lastly their manner of fasting which is twice to refresh their bodies on the fasting day at noone by a small dinner and at night by a short supper Bellarmine himselfe confesseth to bee contrary to the ancient custome which was to eate but one meale on the fast day and that a supper and doth also giue diuers reasoÌ„s of this mutatioÌ„ As first that thogh it bee tolerated in their Church yet it is not commanded Secondly that those customes which are not grounded vpon Gods word may by ecclesiasticall Lawes bee varyed according to the diuersity of time place thirdly that when the ancients broke off their fast at the ninth houre they vsed to dyne at the sixt that is noone and therefore when as many doe ordinarily dyne at the third houre they may by like proportion breake off their fast at the sixt these be Bellarmines reasons to maintaine this Innouation whereby we may both behold what silly props hee hath to vphold his rotten cause and also that by his owne confession this is a meere nouelty and therefore he concludes that notwithstanding these forenamed reasons yet they doe better who after the ancient custome eate nothing till the ninth houre and in Lent till the euening And thus wee see how in the principall ceremonies of their Church they haue degenerate from the vsage and custome of all pure antiquity 33. Thus much of the outward face of their Church Now let vs examine a little their doctrines wherein they differ from vs which are the sinewes and nerues thereof here I might referre the Reader ouer vnto our learned and godly Country-man Doctour White lately deceased who in his high-way to the true Church obiecteth eight points wherein the moderne Church of Rome hath varyed from that which formerly was maintained notwithstanding I will also a little touch vpon the same strings adding somewhat more both in points and proofes then is there deliuered that the Reader may haue also heere some satisfaction concerning these matters 34. First therefore it is an article of the Romish faith that the Virgin Mary whom wee honour as a blessed woman and the mother of our Lord was conceiued and borne without the staine of originall sinne This doctrine was decreed 〈◊〉 an article of faith in the Councill of Basill in the yeere 1431. and afterwards was approoued by the Councill of Trent and by Pope Sixtus the fourth yea and all that take any degree in the profession of diuinity in the vniuersity of Paris first sweare that they will defend this prerogatiue of the Virgin Mary Now that this is a nouelty appeareth first because it was not receiued as an article of faith before the Councill of Basill Secondly because the Fathers generally either vtterly denie it to bee a truth or at least doubt of it Saint Chrysostome sâ—â—tly denyeth it Saint Bernard calleth it in plaine termes a nouelty Caietane reckoneth fifteene fathers to haue beene of a contrary opinion others two hundreth others three hundreth as witnesseth Salmeron the Iesuite and lastly Canus peremptorily affirmeth that all the Fathers contradicted it And it is to be noted that whereas Bellarmine produceth twelue Fathers for the proofe thereof not one of them doe directly affirme it except one or two Thirdly because the Elder Schoolemen with one consent disapprooued it as Dominicus Bannes Turrecremata Thomas Aquinas Bonauenture and others in so much that in this point they are driuen to this grosse shift That yonger diuines are more apprehensiue of truths then were the more ancient Doctours Bellarmine I confesse in this point accuseth vs of slendering their doctrine because hee sayth it was neuer held in their Church as an article of saith as wee say it is but by his leaue if it was the decree of one Councill though not confirmed by the Pope as he saith the Councill of Basill was not and was allowed by another Councill confirmed by the Pope to wit the Councill of Trent as an holy opinion and agreeable to the Catholike faith and approued by diuers Popes as hee confesseth and defended generally in their Church not onely by doctrine but by a solemne obseruation of a festiuall day in memoriall
thereof then surely it cannot bee lesse then an article of their faith or if that terme mislike him a generall Romish opinion which is enough for our purpose 35. Againe it is another article of the Romish faith that diuine seruice should bee in the Latin tongue this to be contrary to all antiquity I haue already declared a little before and therefore I thinke it not needfull here to repeate it onely this is to bee marked that till the Pope of Rome began to shew himselfe to be Antichrist that man of sinne the mystery of whose name is the number 666. which according to Irenaeus coniecture is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Till then I say this Latine seruice was not publikely receiued but euer since as if the Pope would discouer himselfe to bee that enemy pointed at by that Prophecy hee will haue all the prayers of the Church to bee Latin and hath fixed an Anathema vpon euery one that shall dare to affirme the contrary 36. Againe it is another doctrine of the Romish Religion that the Lay people may not read the Scriptures nor keepe them in their mother tongue which to bee contrary to the ancient custome of the Church three reasons demonstrate First their own confession for Azorius the Iesuite confesseth that the Scriptures in the Primitiue Church were to be published throughout all nations and therefore were made common by the three most common and famous languages and againe Wee confesse sayth he that in Ierome and Chrysostomes times the Lay people were exercised in reading the Scriptures because they were written in those languages which they vnderstood And Ledesima another Iesuite that the Bible was translated into the Latine tongue presently after the Apostles times and that to this end that all might vnderstand the Scriptures And Espensaeus sayth that it is manifest by the Apostles doctrine Col. 3. 16. and by the practice of the Church that the publike vse of reading the Scriptures was then permitted to the people And further that the Iewes instructed their children at fiue yeeres of age in the Scriptures and therefore that Christians might bee ashamed to be carelesse therein and this hee sayth was not onely his complaint but the complaint of the ancient Fathers And lastly Cornelius Agrippa affirmeth that it was a decree in the Nicene Councill that no Christian should be without a Bible Thus we haue a quadron of their owne Doctors acknowledging this to bee a nouelty 37. Secondly the generall consent of the Fathers demonstrate the same for the Councill of Nice as it is alledged before out of Agrippa decreed that no Christian should be without a Bible and Saint Augustine alloweth the vse of the Scriptures to all when hee sayth that they are not so hard but that euery one by his study and diligence may attaine to so much knowledge in them as shall further him in his saluation and Chrysostome in many places exhorteth all both men and women learned and ignorant yea very tradesmen to get Bibles and to read them for though they vnderstand not what they read yet they gaine to themselues some sanctity by the reading of them And Ierome perswadeth not onely men but women to fly to the mountaines of the Scriptures saying that though there be none to teach them yet their indeuour shall bee accepted of God and in another place hee sayth that Plato wrote not to the people but to a few for scarse three vnderstand his workes but Christ our Lord wrote by his Apostles not to a few but to the whole people Origen compareth the Scripture to Iacobs Well wherein drinke not onely Iacob and his children that is the learned but the sheepe and oxen that is the rude and simple Nazianzene affirmeth that Christians ought to read the Scriptures or if through ignorance they cannot then they must giue eare to others Many other testimonies I could alledge but these are I thinke sufficient to shew that in the age when these holy men liued this doctrine was neuer hatcht nor heard of and therefore must needs bee an addle egge of a later layer 38. Thirdly lastly the manifold translations of the Bibles into sundry languages proueth the same for to what end were they translated if they might not bee read This Saint Augustine affirmeth when hee sayth that the holy Scripture proceeding from one tongue beeing through the diuers tongues of interpreters farre and wide dispersed abroad became knowne to the Gentiles to their saluation And Theodoret as plainely The Hebrew bookes were translated into all languages which are at this day vsed in the world Chrysostome is confessed to haue translated some parts of the Scriptures into the Armenian tongue and Vlphias into the Gothicke Charles the fift caused them to be translated into the French tongue and Charles the great into the Germane Alfred king of this Island the Psalter into the English tongue and at this day the Moscouites Armenians Egyptians Ethiopians haue their publike prayers and Scripture in their vulgar and knowne tongues Now these ancient translations doe euidently proue this Romish doctrine to bee an Innouation 39. Againe it is another doctrine in the Romish faith that Priests and Ministers of the Gospell ought not to marry and that marriage is an inseparable impediment to holy orders some of them most grosly affirming that the vow of single life is so essentiall to Priesthood euen by the Law of God as that it is no more lawfull for any person to permit the Clergy to marry then to license a man to steale But they which speake more remissely say that though it bee a positiue Law yet it is Apostolicall and therefore ought to bee obserued in the Church inuiolably and the reason is giuen by Bellarmine Because great purity and sanctity is required in the office of sacrificing but in the act of marriage there is mixed a certain impurity and pollution which though it be not sinne yet it proceedeth from sinne and maketh a man carnall and so vnfit for diuine offices 40. This is their doctrine which to haue no ground in true antiquity first their own confessions beare witnesse and secondly the light of history For their confessions one of them sayth that marriage of Priests is not prohibited either by Legall Euangelicall or yet Apostolicall authority but by Ecclesiasticall onely another that many hundreth yeeres after the Apostles by reason of want of others Priests were marryed another that if wee exclude the Church Lawes and stand onely to that which wee haue from Christ it cannot bee prooued by any reason or authority that speaking absolutely a Priest sinneth in marrying or that holy order is an hinderance to marriage either as it is an order or as it is holy others that in the most ancient times of the Church and after the Apostles deaths Priests had their wiues And lastly their owne glosse and marginall obseruation
grace not deluding their soules with a fond expectation of other mens deuotions Sure it is that the opinion of purgatorie and prayer for the dead must of necessitie nourish a presumption of veniall sinnes at the least which our doctrine adiudgeth to hell without repentance aswell as any other and because few are able to distinguish betwixt mortall and veniall sinnes but iudge them veniall which are to Gods iudgement mortall as their Iesuite Coster confesseth when hee sayth that that may seeme a light offence vnto man which is haynous in Gods sight therefore it must needs also bee in danger to breed a secret presumption of mortall sinnes also And so whilest they haue a blind conceit of the suburbes which is Purgatorie they cast themselues into the Citie it selfe which is hell 34. Lastly this may be demonstrated to the conscience of any not preiudiced with a blind zeale to the Romish Church by this reason for that neyther Purgatorie nor Prayer for the dead can directly be proued out of Scripture as hath bin proued before concerning Purgatory and is apparent concerning prayer for the dead there being neither precept nor promise nor direct example in the whole volume of Gods Booke for the same as is confessed by their owne Bredenbachius and besides hauing no sound foundation in the consent of ancient Fathers as hath beene also prooued but being founded vpon vaine apparitions and strange reuelations of soules departed which many of the Fathers were of opinion could not bee as testifieth Maldonate one of their owne Iesuites for feare lest vnder that colour we should be drawne to superstitions and others thought that Deuils did faine themselues to be the soules of dead men as witnesseth Pererius another Iesuite yea and some of their owne Doctours haue beene perswaded that all apparitions about Churches are eyther demoniacall or phantasticall whereas on the contrarie our doctrine of two places is direct in Scripture and was neuer denied by any authoritie either of olde or new Diuines I meane possitiuely that there is a Heauen and a Hell wherefore this wee may safely beleeue and repose our soules vpon but to entertaine the beliefe of the former is as dangerous to the conscience as doubtfull to the vnderstanding seeing hee that doubtingly vndertaketh any action is condemned as a sinner because hee doth it not in faith Faiths obiect being Gods Word alone and not the vncertaine coniectures of humane opinions much lesse the vaine apparitions of dead ghosts 35. Againe their doctrine of the absolute necessitie of baptisme excluding thereby infants from Heauen and confining them to a Prison in the brimme of Hell there to indure the euerlasting punishment of losse is a dangerous doctrine both in respect of pietie towards God and charitie towards our neighbour and certaintie to a mans conscience and consequently our doctrine that holdeth the contrarie is more safe in all those respects For touching pietie it is a great imbasing to Gods mercie and a detracting from the glorie of his grace to thinke that Almightie God should in iustice cast away the infinite myriades of vnbaptized infants or that his sauing grace is so tyed to the outward Sacrament that he cannot or at the least will not saue any without it the first of these is confessed by many of the learned Romanists themselues to be à Dei misericordia alienum not agreeable to the mercie of God which exceedeth not onely the deserts but euen the hopes of men The second is confirmed by a due comparing of the olde couenant of the Law with the new couenant of the Gospell for if it be true that children dying vnder the Law vncircumcised were saued by the faith of their Parents as Saint Bernard thinketh yea and is also agreeable to the tenure of the Scripture for many children dyed in the Wildernesse without the Sacrament of Circumcision it being omitted for those fortie yeeres by Gods own allowance and Dauid hearing of the death of his childe before hee had receiued the outward character of Circumcision as may be gathered out of the Text. did solace himselfe with this confidence that the childe was saued Then it must needs follow if the same priuiledge be not granted to the children of Christian Parents that the couenant of the Gospell is not so large as the couenant of the Law nor Gods mercie so bountifull to Christians as to Iewes nor the merits of Christ so effectuall after his comming in the flesh as they were before by all which the glorie of the Gospell and grace of Christ is much defaced and the vnbounded Ocean of Gods mercie limited and stinted 36. Touching charitie is it not an vncharitable conceit to despaire of the saluation of poore infants dying without Baptisme and that both towards the infants themselues who though they are borne in originall sinne yet are innocent from actuall transgressions and towards the Parents who being themselues within the couenant hereby are depriued of that chiefe comfort of the couenant which is that God is not onely their God but the God of their seed and towardes the Church that hereby is robbed of a great part of her children and made vnable to present young infants to her Husband Christ Iesus Children are little beholding to them for this doctrine Parents lesse and the Church the mother of the faithfull least of all And indeed so farre is it from charitie that it is full of damnable crueltie 37. Lastly touching the perilous consequences that follow vpon this doctrine I need name but these three to wit first that it maketh God more mercifull to men of yeeres then vnto tender infants for they teach that men of yeeres as Valentinian the Emperour may be saued by the Baptisme of the Spirit or by the Baptisme of bloud which is Martyrdome though they want the Baptisme of water but infants albeit they may haue the Spirit of sanctification euen in the wombe as Iohn Baptist had and may be Martyrs according to their opinion as the children that Herod caused to be slaine yet if they want the Sacrament of water they adiudge them peremptorily to be banished from Gods presence for euer Now then children and men being in the same predicament either the one must be admitted to Gods fauour aswell as the other or it must needs follow that God is partial and more fauourable to the one then the other If they say that men though they haue not the act of Baptisme yet they haue votum a desire vnto it which being intercepted by some sodaine accident is supplied by inward grace I answere with Bellarmine that as another mans sinne was the cause of the damnation of infants so other mens faith sufficeth them vnto baptisme Why should then the desire of one man be of more efficacie to his saluation then the desire and purpose of the Church for the saluation of infants To this purpose their owne learned Schooleman sayth that