he is seated in Constantinople that is also in Rome For Constantinople is known to have been called New Rome was so named by CONSTANTINE himselfe the Founder had in Church and Common-wealth in both States 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 every way equalled priviledges with the elder Rome Senators and one of the yearely Consuls The adjacent country was then called Romania and is so corruptly termed by the Turks at this day Rumilio or Rum-ili that is the Roman Country It was the Emperiall Citie then when MAOMET that false Prophet and Antichrist arose as well as Rome indeed rather then Rome since the time that CONSTANTINE to the great advantage of barbarous nations enemies unto the Roman State translated the state of the Empire thither And lastly this great and Emperiall CITY bearing rule over the Kings of the earth is likewise as well as ROME seated upon seven hills at or neere unto the Sea indeed in a Foreland or Landstreight where two Seas meet the only Seat in the world for an Emperiall See For which cause it is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by NICETAS The City with seven tops Vrbs septicollis by PAULUS DIACONUS so acknowledged by IANUS DOUZA a Gentleman of the Netherlands in his Iournall and by M. RICHARD KNOLLS in his Turkish History with others Now upon these premised considerations of the Marks of that Antichrist so fitting the Turkish State and Tyranny every way it may seeme probable that MAOMET the false Prophet and the Turkish State as the Beast may at least be assumed into association with the Pope and Papacy in making up that Antichrist and Antichristian Kingdome or State opposite unto the State and Kingdome of CHRIST and Christians which respectu finis may be accounted one in opposition against GOD and CHRIST though the meanes of effecting it be many different and diverse Turcisme one way may oppose CHRIST as it doth vi apertâ by fiery force and Ropery bee ad oppositum another way fraude and insidijs as it is In which respect as DANIEL may well tell us of one horn so S. IOHN remembreth a Beast with two Hornes MAOMET in the East the POPE in the West both Hornes pushing fiercely against the Saints yet so also that it may be probable which ZANCHIUS hath Miscellan lib. III. and LAMBERT also upon the Apocalypse that beside these two after these both it is not unlikely out of both these impious opposite States one notorious singular mischievous Antichrist may arise towards the finall consummation of the world who in fradulent colluding malicious craftinesse in impious execrable and transcendent wickednesse through hereticall impostures and lying miracles shall goe beyond all other that ever lived in the world and bee fitted with all signes and markes of Antichrist unto the full so as no exception can bee taken against any in any one point Surely if the Generall of the Iesuites Order should once come to be Pope sit in PETERS chaire as they call it I would vehemently suspect him to bee the party designed for out of what nest that accursed bird should rather come abroad than out of that Seraphicall Society I cannot ghesse and but ghesse For in resolution I say with that IEWELL of England in pag. CCCXCIII I will not say the POPE is ANTICHRIST GOD will reveale him in his time and he shall be knowne yet is it probable hee may be of that rank I will not say the TURKE is Antichrist though it bee probable that Antichrist may come from thence the Turkes power being increased and inlarged by the Popes policy as the same B. IEWELL hath observed it well that it may not seem strange two opposite in State may conspire in opposing Piety For all these and whatsoever is beside these in this particular denoted being all prophecies and predictions of things to come obscurely and mystically delivered are but opinions and conjectures not intended not to be received as finall resolutions For my part I desire not to contest with any man about them nor would I willingly have mens mindes or the peace of the Church disquieted with them It is an evill disease in the world among Divines in things of indifferency they cannot endure dissentients He is not my friend I will hold no correspondency with him that will not per omniae and in omnibus bee of my minde There is a Rule of faith we acknowledge it commend it and have recourse unto it Things that are straight and direct and according to that Rule confessedly need not application are not commonly brought to be applied to that Rule but things of different or doubtfull standing these need application and are applied confessedly by the perpetuall practice and tradition of the Catholick Church in consent of Fathers Wee apply things doubtfull unto Scripture our Norma and exact and absolute Rule of faith and manners We consent and agree it is Antichristian to dissent from to reject that Rule and him an Antichrist that doth so or proposeth any thing as Credendum against that Rule The Pope doth this Let him then be an Antichrist in S. IOHN'S acceptance There are many Antichrists But whether hee bee THAT Antichrist or not I dare not presume to determine without speciall warrant in such a case If you have any speciall illumination or assurance by divine revelation or rather strong perswasion through affection much good may it do you keepe it to YOUR selves presse it not on others that in such cases desire sapere ad sobrietatem rather than resolve without good warrant CHAP. VI. Touching IUSTIFICATION The state of a meere naturall man who to please GOD must become a new creature That newnes cannot be wrought without a reall change of a sinner in his qualities In what sense it may be said that there is an Accesse of justification both by daily receiving remission of new sins and by increase of grace in joyning vertuous and good deeds unto Faith INFORMERS TOuching Iustification thus hee writeth A sinner is then iustified when hee is made iust that is translated from the state of nature to the state of grace as COLOS. I. XIII which Act is motion as they speak betwixt two terms and consisteth in forgivenesse of sinnes primarily and grace infused secondarily CHAP. XVIII pag. CXLII MOUNTAGU AND this all this in generall in particular is our Informers Popery Strange Popery Of what religion are you M. Informers YATES and WARD For in Christian Religion a man is and may be considered two waies as I also have considered him according unto a twofold state The state of nature to which hee was formed and the state of grace to which he is reformed as hee was in ADAM depraved and lost as hee is in CHRIST IESUS sought out found and healed of his maladies In his Being Subsisting and Constitution every man is first a naturall man in that state standing hee pleaseth not GOD. He can doe nothing saith CALVIN that can please him or be accepted of him His
required by the Roman Writers to make it rewardable as far as they are positive no Protestant disalloweth of To those conditions may others be added INFORMERS THese are his words This is your owne doctrine in the Romane Schooles and so farre the Protestants for these conditions do go along with you MOUNTAGU THis doctrine And what doctrine is this that there is merit of condignity that it is so farre forth due unto good works as that through and for the worke it selfe wrought and performed we may deserve and challenge upon desert or else GOD should wrong us grace goodnesse heaven happinesse at GOD'S hands 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I never said it never thought it doe detest it from my heart That doctrine which is to be found in the specified place is touching the quality not the validity concerning the condition not the imputation or account of a good worke which conditions specified and remembred by me are 1. That it be morally good not simply evill 2. Freely wrought and not out of compulsion 3. By man yet in this life not after death 4. In the state of grace and not by any naturall man without GOD. Of these conditions which doe not exclude other what Protestants doe not allow I adde and may adde many more Faith is necessarily required in the person before that any thing hee doth can please GOD. For whatsoever is not of faith is sinne These Informers it seemeth are otherwise minded for they traduce and calumniate me for a Papist who require as necessary these conditions unto a good worke which were never to my knowledge denied untill now And these are the conditions concerning which only I write So far the Protestants go along with you Concerning which consent in these particulars I confesse I thought it was reall and I think so still I never could finde I never did imagine I doe not beleeve any Protestant living setting your selves aside so ignorant peevish or prophane as to deny those conditions specified Now it being as I conceived agreed upon on all sides concerning the necessity of them I did make this conclusion unto the GAGGER If your texts doe contradict this either expressely or obliquely look you unto it it concerneth you as much as us And why might I not make it when they oppose a Position in the Protestants hands in which themselves are as deeply interessed as Protestants are But the men proceed to a specification of my consent more particularly CHAP. XIII GOD surely rewardeth good works according to his promise of his free bounty and grace INFORMERS ANd in that very page his words are If this be your Merit wee contradict it not And this is the Merit you plead for MOUNTAGU ANd so it is For all the Gagger's Texts of Scripture plead for that Merit I speak of and no other And that Merit is no more but this Verily there is a REWARD for the righteous doubtlesse there is a GOD that judgeth the earth A point of Popery put into my mouth by the Prophet DAVID and that totidem verbis And so King DAVID is become a Papist as well as I. For my words upon which that inference is made are REWARD in heaven no man denyeth REVVARD appointed for our good workes all doe confesse If this be your MERIT we contradict it not Doe you Dare you doe it that there is no REWARD for the righteous Cast the lye then into the Psalmists throate Psal XIX XI In keeping of them GOD'S Commandements there is GREAT REVVARD and unto him that said GOD REVVARDETH everie man according to his worke not onely according to the Qualitie of the worke that he that soweth of the flesh shall of the flesh reape Corruption and he that soweth in the spirit shall of the spirit reape glory and honour and immortality but according to the degree and proportion of his worke He that soweth sparingly shall reape sparingly and he that soweth liberally shall reape liberally Not of works or for works but according unto works rather For there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Alia est merces liberalitatis gratiae aliud virtutis stipendium aliae laboris remuneratio saith S. AMBR. specially in the intercourse betwixt GOD and man where Non debendo sed promittendo DEUS se fecit debitorem S. AUGUST And from this no Protestant I know dissenteth I am sure a speciall man in your bookes though I hold him of another spirit and Sect than you better by farre precisely setteth downe the same in his Comment upon the Epistle to the Galathians See then Reader the sincere and honest dealing of these misdeeming Informers that accuse me of Popery for positive Scripture by a trick of concealement in saying GOD REWARDETH GOOD WORKES CHAP. XIV The Church of England holdeth no such absolute certainty of salvation in just persons as they have of other objects of Faith expressely and directly revealed by GOD INFORMERS TOuching the Doctrine of the certainty of salvation having cited BELLARMINE'S opinion he hath these words This BELLARMINE assigneth and this is enough Faction may transport a man to wrangle for more but when once they ioine issue the difference will not be much CHAP. XXII pag. 186. MOUNTAGU ET quid haec ad IPHICLI Boves what hath this to doe with merit of good workes whereto by the Informers it is consigned Neither in my opinion nor yet in BELLARMINE'S judgement doth Certaintie or Incertainty of salvation depend so necessarily upon Merit or Demerit of good workes If a man continue constant in the course of good workes he is sure and certaine of salvation in BELLARMINE'S judgement and in my opinion also though differently Causally in his as procured by them Consequently in mine as following of them But whether hee that doth good workes be certaine of Salvation that is shall continue to the end faithfull constant in doing good workes and so obtaine Salvation the promise of GOD behighted unto those that doe good is another Question of a different and disparate Nature But to leave these Extravagancies and come to the point unto assurance of which they speake It being by the Gagger fastned unto our Church ignorantly or maliciously verie absurdly as almost everie particular in that Pamphlet is That everie one ought infallibly to assure himselfe of his Salvation and to hold that he is of the number of the Elect and predestinate unto eternall life I tooke him short for such his conclusion so generall that everie one ought singuli generum so the words intend to assure himselfe whereas that assurance upon which the poore fellow grounded his imputation resting upon the infallible purpose and decree of GOD'S predestination of the Elect was by the So perswaded in the Church of England for the Church of England it selfe was not of that opinion restrained unto some only and not enlarged unto all as the man hath it Every one ought Secondly that concerning even those some the Church
acts thereof The memorable Saying of SCOTUS The power of the Will in things divine CHAP. XI The fourth and last point of ARMINIANISME touching the Synod of DORT The Synod of Dort not our Rule Private opinions no Rule The Informers imputations nothing at all THE SECOND PART touching POPERY CHAP. I. THe Author uncharitably traduced His profession for the doctrine discipline received and commanded in the Church of England Conformable Puritans Furious zeale The Church of Rome not a sound yet a true Church Private opinions disclaimed The Church of England asserted to her owne publick and proper Tenents The cause of all these Imputations CHAP. II. The Church Representative and Points Fundamentall what they are All that Papists say is not Poperie Particular Churches have and may erre The Catholick Vniversall Church hath not cannot erre Of Generall Councels The Author farre from the Iesuites fancy The XXI Article of the Church of England explaned CHAP. III. Strange accusations Antiquity reverenced not deified Fathers accused of some error by Iesuites The occasion of their enlarged speeches concerning Free-will The Author acquitted of Popery CHAP. IV. Private and publick doctrine differenced In what sense the Church is said to be alwaies visible The Author acquitted from Popery againe by others learned Divines Of the Church of Rome CHAP. V. Touching ANTICHRIST The Pope and Prelacie of Rome Antichristian That he is Magnus ille Antichristus is neither determined by the publick doctrine of the Church nor proved by any good argument of private men Difference among Divines who The Man of sinne should bee The markes of the great Antichrist fit the Turkish Tyrannie every way as well as the Papacy The peace of the Church not to bee disquieted through variety of opinions No finall resolution to be yet had in this point CHAP. VI. Touching IUSTIFICATION The state of a meere naturall man who to please GOD must become a new creature That newnes cannot bee wrought without a reall change of a sinner in his qualities In what sence it may be said that there is an Accesse of Iustification both by daily receiving remission of new sins and by increase of grace injoyning vertuous and good deeds unto faith CHAP. VII A change made in a justified man The Author agreeth in part with the Councell of Trent and therefore maintaineth Popery no necessarie illation The doctrine of the Church of England and of other reformed Churches in this point of Iustification CHAP. VIII Strange Popery GOD onely and properly justifieth CHAP. IX Holinesse of life added unto Iustification and Remission of sinnes GOD justifieth originally and Faith instrumentally CHAP. X. An Accesse declaratory made to the act of Iustification by the works of a lively faith S. PAUL and S. IAMES reconciled The old Prophets and ancient Fathers made new Papists by the Informers CHAP. XI The doctrine of MERIT ex condigno rejected as false and presumptuous Difference between the old and the new signification of Mereri CHAP. XII The quality and conditions of a good work required by the Roman Writers to make it rewardable as farre as they are positive no Protestant disalloweth of To those conditions may others be added CHAP. XIII GOD surely rewardeth good works according to his promise of his free bountie and grace CHAP. XIV The Church of England holdeth no such absolute certainty of salvation in just persons as they have of other objects of Faith expressly and directly revealed by GOD. CHAP. XV. Touching Evangelicall Counsailes Evangelicall Counsailes admitted according to the doctrine of the old Fathers and many learned Divines of our Church Popish doctrine concerning workes of Supererogation rejected CHAP. XVI S. GREG. NAZIANZ defended from the touch of uncircumcised lips CHAP. XVII The exposition of the saying of our SAVIOUR If thou wilt be perfect c. S. CHRYSOST S. AUG S. HIER S. AMBR. make it no imperious precept If it be the Informers are the least observers of it and sinne against their owne consciences CHAP. XVIII Touching LIMBUS PATRUM The dreames of Papists about Limbus Patrum related and rejected The state of mens soules after death The place proportioned to their state The soules of the blessed Fathers before CHRIST'S ascension in heavenly Palaces yet not in the third and highest heavens nor in that fulnesse of ioy which they have now and more of which they shall have heerafter The opinion of old and new Writers Our Canons not to be transgressed The doctrine and faith of the Church of England concerning the Article of CHRIST'S descent into Hell The disadvantage wee are at with our Adversaries Every Novellers Fancie printed and thrust upon us for the generall Tenet of our Church The plain and easie Articles of our CREED disturbed and obscured by the wild dreames of little lesse than blasphemous men by new Models of Divinity by Dry-fatts of severall Catechismes The Beleefe of Antiquity The Author and It far from POPERY CHAP. XIX The seventh point of Popery touching IMAGES The Historicall use of Images maketh nothing for the adoring of them Popish extravagancies CHAP. XX. S. GREG. doctrine concerning Images far from Popery CHAP. XXI No religious honour or worship to bee given unto Images They may affect the mindes of religious men by representing unto them the actions of CHRIST and his Saints In which regard all reverence simply cannot be abstracted from them CHAP. XXII Popish doctrine and practice both about adoration of Images rejected CHAP. XXIII The Church of England condemneth not the historicall use of Images The Booke of Homilies containes a general godly doctrine yet is it not in every point the publick dogmaticall resolved doctrine of the Church The Homily that seemeth to condemne all making of Images is to be understood with a restriction of making them to an unlawfull end Many passages therein were fitted to the present times and to the conditions of the people that then were The finall resolution of this controversie CHAP. XXIV Touching signing with the Signe of the CROSSE To signe with the signe of the Crosse out of Baptisme or upon the breast c. no more superstition than to signe in Baptisme or upon the forehead The practice of the ancient Church The reasons that moved them that might move us to use often signing They lived with Pagans and wee with Puritans both deriders of the signe of CHRIST'S Crosse CHAP. XXV The practice of the primitive Church approved Unadvised Informers Novellers rejected CHAP. XXVI The testimony of S. ATHANASIUS vilified by the Informers The testimonies of other Fathers concerning the efficacie and power of the signe of the Crosse CHAP. XXVII Popery is not the signing with but the adoring of the Crosse Strange effects which GOD hath wrought of old adhibito signo CRUCIS and may doe still by vertue of CHRISTS Death and Passion which that Signe doth represent CHAP. XXVIII The Informers presumption against the current of Antiquity CHAP. XXIX Touching the SACRAMENT of the ALTAR The Informers drawn low
this Information Upon the Endictment I pleade Not guilty of both Accusations of Arminianisme and Popery and call therein for tryall for it by God and my Countrey the Scriptures as the Rule of Faith the Church interpreting and applying that Rule from time to time against all Novellers and signanter unto this English Church against Forreyners Dare any of the Brethren joine issue with mee upon this Absque hoc They dare not But to close with them first in Generall then in Particular for Arminianisme at large Arminianism in the several parts I disavow the name and Title of ARMINIAN I am no more Arminian than they Gomarians not so much in all probabilitie They delight it seemeth to bee called after mens names for anon they sticke not to call themselves CALVINISTS which Title though more honorable than Gomarian or Arminian I am not so fond of or doating upon but I can be content to leave it unto those that affect it and hold it reputation to bee so instiled I am not nor would be accounted willingly ARMINIAN CALVINIST or LUTHERAN names of Division but a CHRISTIAN For my Faith was never taught by the doctrine of men I was not baptized into the Beliefe or assumed by grace into the Family of any of these or of the Pope I will not pin my Beliefe unto any mans sleeve carry he his head never so high not unto S. AUGUSTINE or any ancient Father nedum unto men of lower ranke A CHRISTIAN I am and so glory to be only denominated of CHRIST IESUS my Lord and Master by whom I never was as yet so wronged that I could relinquish willingly that royall Title and exchange it for any of his meniall servants And further yet I doe professe that I see no reason why any member of the Church of England a Church every way so transcendent unto that of Leyden and Geneva should lowt so low as to denominate himselfe of any the most eminent amongst them But as those two Townes and States next unto God have stood by supportance of the Crowne of England for esse and benè esse in Temporalibus so likewise if CHRIST IESUS must needs be divided both One and Other even the most eminent in one and other ought to take name rather and denomination of Us or some of Ours than wee be nicknamed ARMINIANS or CALVINISTS of some of them Indignor I avow for my owne part to doe it and will not doe my mother that wrong to admit it nedum to seeke it Againe for ARMINIANISME I must and doe protest before God and his Angels idque in verbo Sacerdotis the time is yet to come that I ever read word in ARMINIUS The course of my studies was never addressed to moderne Epitomizers but from my first entrance to the studie of Divinity I balked the ordinarie and accustomed by paths of BASTINGIUS'S Catechisme FENNERS Divinitie BUCANUS Common places TRELCATIUS POLANUS and such like and betooke my selfe to Scripture the Rule of Faith interpreted by Antiquitie the best Expositor of Faith and applyer of that Rule holding it a point of discretion to draw water as neer as I could to the Well-head and to spare labour in vaine in running farther off to Cisternes and Lakes I went to enquire when doubt was of the dayes of old as God himselfe directed me and hitherto I have not repented me of it I have not found anie Canon Order Act Direction in the Church of England against it for it I have found many I never held it wisedome to tyre my selfe with haling and tugging up against the streame when with ease enough I might and with better discretion should secundo flumine navigare We know the further the current is the more muddy troubled and at length brackish the water is CALLIMACHUS said well Assyrius magnam Euphrates vim volvit aquarum At multâ illuvie foedaque it turbidus ulvâ If ARMINIUS in Tenents agreeth unto Scripture plaine and expresse if he hath agreeing unto his opinions the practice tradition and consent of the ancient Church I embrace his opinions let his person or private ends if hee had any alone I nor have nor will have confarreation therewith If CALVIN so farre in account and estimation before ARMINIUS dissenteth from Antiquity and the universall ancient Church I follow him not No private man or peculiar spirit ever did or ever shall tyrannize upon my Beliefe I yeeld only unto God and the Church Nor doe I wrong CALVIN or any other in this more than they have wronged the ANCIENT FATHERS So much in generall for ARMINIANISME now to particulars imputed by the Informers CHAP. II. Of S. PETER'S FALL INFORMERS TOuching the Doctrine of Finall Perseverance these are his words As S. PETER was a private man Christ did pray for Him that though his Faith fell totally for a Time yet it might not fall eternally CHAP. 8. FOL 64. MOUNTAGU TOuching the doctrine of Finall Perseverance I took not upon me to Touch it much lesse to Determine it all I doe not there mention it or meddle with it I grant these words remembred by the Informers are found in my Booke in the quoted place of fol. and chapt and mo words than these to make up a perfect period which they have dismembred to their owne behoofe My words indeed are these Your Masters and my addresse is unto the Gagger touching his Romish Teachers onely consider S. PETER two wayes even in this Prayer made for him by our SAVIOUR as a Private man as a Publicke person or as they love to speake as Head of the Church As a private person CHRIST did pray for him that though his Faith fell totally for a time yet it might not fall eternally and for ever as IUDAS failed and fell and hee was heard in that he prayed for These are my words in publick Record But can you say they are mine in due consideration that is ex animi sententiâ delivered For all have reference by as good Logick as ever PETER RAMUS taught you in Cambridge unto those words Your Masters c. and so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Artists speake must all and every passage be conceived Not any man but Partiaries would have taken them spoken Dogmaticè in course of determined resolution but Diegetice by way of Narration onely reporting the proposals of some Romane Disputers not my determination for and in the point But let them bee mine absolutely every way Yet secondly any ingenuous Reader might conceive that they are not Assertive thus His Faith did fall but only Suppositive Though his Faith did fall In effect thus To put the case that S. PETER fell away totally for a Time from GOD and CHRIST in denying CHRIST yet hee fell not finally and for ever for he recovered footing and fastnesse againe and held it out constantly unto the last Why this admitted an Error should bee reputed an Error of mine I cannot see For though it be Published it is not Delivered
onely supposed related and no more It may bee a custome amongst the Informers and others of that Tribe to dictate to their Popular Auditories out of their Pulpits tanquam de tripode though it be quicquid in buccam and the same to be received upon their bare words as divine Oracles whereupon they need not make any suppositions put no cases to bee demurred on seeing they are ubique and in omnibus peremptory resolved and conclusive But with us it is not so we are not so happy to have our bare words passe we must prove what wee speake and well is it if so and then we finde credence They and the Iesuites are rare men to leade mens Faith and Beleefe so in a string In this passage against me it being ad oppositum and they like enough to bee demanded Proofes for what they say all their accusations of Arminianisme and of Popery though they bee false and slanderous yet are they Magisteriall You cannot finde so much as any one proofe annexed unto any of the imputed Errors or brought in to manifest Ideò this or that is an Error Their Stile runneth These are his words or Thus he writeth c. supposing all men will at least should take it upon their words That what hee so writeth is an Error Such Illuminates are our Classicall Brethren May they be intreated a little to descend from this their Chaire of Infallibility and yeeld somewhat according unto reason by producing that Rule against which touching Finall Perseverance the words produced if so be they are mine every way to all intents and purposes doe offend and for which they may justly bee stiled Errors The Rule produced upon tryall and application M. MOUNTAGU must eyther stand or fall Till then he appealeth to all indifferent censures for suspension of their judgements concerning Errors thus by him Delivered and Published by Authority In the Interim to come somewhat neerer unto the Error heer informed against Doth ARMINIUS maintaine touching finall Perseverance you must tell mee my good Informers for I have not read him that sometime the Called and Elect of God the Chosen ones and Iustified by Faith such as S. PETER was though they doe fall totally for a Time shall yet recover necessarily againe and not fall away finally or for ever If this be Arminianisme and so his conclusion then therein He holdeth with ARMINIUS But I have bin assured that ARMINIUS did hold as the Lutherans in Germany doe not only Intercision for a Time but also Abscission and Abjection too for ever That a man Called and Iustified freely through the grace of GOD in CHRIST might fall away again from Grace Totally finally and become a cast-away as IUDAS was for ever For S. PETER upon admission of this Passage as your selves have related it in your calumniatory Information by M. MOUNTAGU'S conclusion did not could not fall finally for CHRIST prayed for him that he might not fall and CHRIST was ever heard in that hee prayed for So that out of your owne mouthes M. MOUNTAGU is acquitted of Arminianisme for if He say any thing to the point it is that S. PETER could not fall finally from Faith nor lose it for ever irrecoverably For say you These are his words Though S. PETER fell totally he fell not eternally that is hee recovered and persevered unto the end and so touching finall Perseverance at least He teacheth in your own confession no otherwise than your selves do Thus Pure malice and indiscreet zeale make men many times lose their witts they know not where I adde if M. MOUNTAGU be an Arminian you are rather Papists for I demand In denying and forswearing CHRIST did S. PETER fall or did he not fall If abnegation and abjuration and execration will inforce a fall he did Now if he fell he needs must fall totally or finally for Cedo tertium a man falleth not who is not off or down from the Place Grace Multi dantur ad gratiam recessus hee that falleth to day may rise againe to morrow hold out unto the end receive the reward of Righteousnesse in finall Perseverance bee crowned with glory and immortalitie I say no more than you have subscribed if you look unto it After we have received the HOLY GHOST wee may DEPART FROM GRACE given and FALL into Sinne and by the grace of GOD wee may arise againe and amend our lives Artic. XVI Nec beatum dixeris quenquam ante mortem quamdiu enim vivimus in certamine sumus quamdiu sumus in certamine nulla est certa victoria was Catholick Doctrine of old But heer also as in the former passage these Informers mistake me for their owne advantage for I speak but only representatively according to the opinion and Tenent of the Roman Schooles I appeale unto their Honesty at least wise Knowledge are not my wordes laid downe directly thus For in YOUR opinion Iustifying faith may diminish and may be abolished and lost Now Iustification being in an instant c. If in their opinion it may be lost namely faith which justifieth then Iustification which is an Effect of faith may also bee lost and may bee recovered after such losse For things transitory are in a like habitude unto being and not being may cease to be and be againe After such losse of Faith and Love transitory in their opinion they againe may revert and finde a being but yet still in their opinion So all heer Delivered Errors or not Errors so or so is still in their opinion not the iudgement specified of M. MOUNTAGU My goodly Brethren this is no faire play to fasten that on me as my Assertion which precisely I relate from anothers mouth which I remember not but as the Doctrine of the Church of Rome and upon that their Doctrine by Them maintained by Him related doe inferre against a Papist a plaine Non sequitur from his owne Tenents unto an inconsequent Argument by Them inferred and opposed against the true and Catholick doctrine of the Church of England touching Iustification by Faith alone CHAP. IV. Of FALLING FROM GRACE The Tenet of Antiquity therein The doctrine of the Church of England in the 16th Article the Conference at Hampton Court the Book of Homilies and the publick Liturgie INFORMERS ANd againe Some hold that Faith may be lost totally and finally which is indeed the Assertion of Antiquity The Learnedst in the Church of ENGLAND assent unto Antiquitie in that Tenet which the Protestants in GERMANIE maintaine at this day having assented unto the Church of ROME MOUNTAGU A Ntiquum obtinent These men are still the same Calumniators and runne still along with all one indirect dealing Their Information in direct tearms standeth thus To make report and no more but to make report of Arminianisme if yet it be Arminianisme which is reported is in point of opinion to bee an ARMINIAN in point of Arianisme with these men to be an ARIAN for M. MOUNTAGU in this case hath done no
certus qui de hac re justo latentique judicio non omnes instruit sed neminem fallit PROSP. Resp 7. ad Cap. GALLORUM Ex REGENERATIS in CHRISTO IESU quosdam RELICTA FIDE pijs moribus APOSTATARE A DEO impiam vitant in suâ AVERSIONE finire multis quod dolendum est probatur exemplis But the greatest question will be concerning the Learnedst in the Church of England said to consent unto Antiquity in this case of falling away from grace Where first I will not deny but that Many in the Church of England reputed learned are of that opinion that Faith had cannot be lost But if it shall appeare that the contrary Tenet is the PUBLICK DOCTRINE of the CHURCH of England then I have not wronged private men in making this comparison between them and Those whom themselves will acknowledge to be their Superiours both in learning and authority Now to give them all due satisfaction which may thinke themselves wronged by my comparative speech I argue as followeth They were the learnedst in the Church of England that drew composed and agreed the ARTICLES in 52. and 62. that ratified them in 71. that confirmed them againe in 604. that justified and maintained them against the Puritans at Hampton Court that have read and subscribed them at their Induction unto Benefices and Consecration unto Bishopricks that penned the Homilies read in Churches But all these have and all such doe assent unto Antiquity in this Tenent and subscribe it truely or in hypocrisie Therefore I may justly avouch it The learnedst in the Church of England assent therein to Antiquitie The Major I suppose no man will question The Informers themselves are peradventure within that Pale The Minor I make good particularly and will prove it accordingly obsignatis tabulis In the forenamed XVI ARTICLE we reade and subscribe this After that we have received the HOLY GHOST wee may DEPART AWAY FROM GRACE and FALL into Sinne and by the Grace of GOD we may rise againe and amend our lives Now let me ask the question Have you subscribed this Article or have you not If you be Beneficed men you have read it and subscribed it professed your assent and consent thereto before GOD and his CHURCH or else by Act of Parliament you have forfeited your spirituall promotions and are deprived IPSO FACTO within two moneths If so then have you subscribed that Arminianisme which you impute as an Error unto me Haply you will be of his minde one of your Tribe who when he was told what hee had subscribed for poore ignorant man he understood it not protested he would teare his subscription if he could come by it and so would have lost his Benefice which few of you will doe if it be a Good one for conscience sake marry for a Poore one you will not stick Haply you will quarrell the Sense of the ARTICLES but then you must remember that the plaine words sound to the meaning for which I have produced them and that untill the CHURCH it selfe expound otherwise it is as free for me to take it according to the letter as for you to devise a figure The ARTICLE insisteth upon men Iustified speaketh of them after Grace received plainly avoucheth They may fall away depart from that state which once they had they may by Gods Grace rise againe and become new men Possible but not Certaine or Necessary But the meaning by you assigned cannot be good being allied unto the stocke you are for by your Tribe the true meaning of the ARTICLE and the Doctrine there Delivered and Published by Authority eyther originall or derived primary or secondary was upon this very point challenged as unsound because against the current of their Institutions And had Arminianisme then been a nickname the challenge without doubt had fastned there but challenged it was in this Sense as Vnsound at the Conference of Hampton Court by those that were Petitioners against the Doctrine and Discipline established in the Church of England And being so challenged before His sacred Majesty was then and there Defended maintained avowed averred for True ancient justifiable good and Catholick by the greatest Bishops and learnedst Divines then living in this Church against that absolute irrespective necessitating and fatall Decree of your new Predestination stiled by you The Doctrine of YOUR DIVINES commonly called CALVINISTS as indeed it is YOURS being never heard of in the world but of late but stiled then and there by the Lord Bishop of London Dr. BANCROFT in publick audience with much vehemencie without any check dislike distaste dissent for we reade of none a desperate doctrine of Predestination At what time also that Reverend Prelate and most accomplished Divine whose memorie shall ever be pretious with all good and learned men the late Bishop of Norwich then Deane of PAULS Dr. OVERALL upon some touch by occasion of mentioning the ARTICLES of LAMBETH did relate unto his most SACRED MAIESTIE those concertations which himselfe had sometimes had in Cambridge with some Doctors there about this very point of Falling from Grace and that it was his Tenet and had beene That a justified man might FALL AWAY FROM GRACE and so ipso facto incur GODS wrath and was IN STATE OF VVRATH and DAMNATION untill he did recover againe and was renued after his fall At which time that Doctrine of the Church of England then quarrelled now stiled Arminianisme accused of Noveltie slandred as pernicious by these Informers and their Brethren was resolved of and avowed for True Catholick ancient and Orthodox by that Royall Reverend Honourable and learned SYNOD The Booke is extant published by warrant and re-published by command this present yeer of the Proceedings at that Conference which will averre all that I say for truth against you heer See the Book And for explication of that Authorized and Subscribed doctrine there is an Homilie in the Booke of Homilies first composed and published in King EDWARD'S time approved and justified in Parliament in Queene ELIZABETH'S daies and Authorized againe of late to be read in Churches entituled OF FALLING AWAY FROM GOD. Which very TITLE is sufficient warrant for the Doctrine or Error in this point imputed to M. MOUNTAGU But that which is Delivered in the Homily will justifie Him unto the full for the Homily doth throughly and wholly insist upon the Affirmation That FAITH once had may againe be LOST Out of the first part of that Homily you may take this my good Informers for your edification Whereas GOD hath shewed unto all them that TRULY do BELEEVE his Gospell his face of mercy in CHRIST IESUS which doth so enlighten their hearts that they be TRANSFORMED into his Image be made PARTAKERS of the heavenly light and of his HOLY SPIRIT be fashioned unto him in all goodnes requisite unto the CHILDE of GOD So if they doe afterward NEGLECT the same if they bee unthankfull unto him if they order not their
you may strongly sent that which is but weak Now who can help this Touching this point I beeleeve because Iusee the experience such as your selves can not relish nor savour any thing but only GOD'S secrets For you and men of your Company are never at quiet with GOD'S Arcana Imperij can never let his eternall Predestination alone The most ordinarie Theame of your as I am given to understand and their popular Preachings is touching that comfortable Doctrine of Election and Reprobation M. MOUNTAGU rubbed somewhat upon this sore thus That Men in Curiosity have presumed farre upon and waded deepe into the hidden secrets of the Almighty And you amongst others being galled as guilty have winched at it and hence it is that He seemeth so strongly to SAVOR of Arminianisme who would not have you meddle beyond your Modell but keepe and containe your selves within the bounds of Christian sobriety and moderation and savor of S. PAUL'S counsell Sapere ad sobrietatem He savoreth of Arminianisme but how ARMINIUS savoureth we shall smell it if we can and find it at leasure For having but named Him you fall hote upon Lutheranisme and of M. MOUNTAGU'S consent with Them as if Arminianisme Lutheranisme were two words of one signification or in this point Lutherans and Arminians were divided or as if in your heate you rambled up and downe and could not well resolve what to fasten on Will you have the Imputation runne thus The XXI chap. savoreth strongly of Arminianisme and He declareth himselfe therein to consent with the Lutherans two severall acts upon different objects Or shall it be that He savoreth so of Arminianisme because he declareth himselfe to consent with the Lutherans If Lutheranisme and Arminianisme be distinct heer is an Error committed by these Informers against Error that I am not presented upon point of Lutheranisme in the Title as well as upon point of Arminianisme If not different but the same Lutherans were in being and in name when ARMINIUS was not hatched nor in the shell And if it be an Error of ARMINIUS which was the Positive Doctrine of Lutherans and LUTHER before ARMINIUS was born why is ARMINIUS entituled unto that which is none of his but M. LUTHER'S Why is M. MOUNTAGU accused of Arminianisme said to savor of Arminianisme rather than of Lutheranisme both in this being one and the same thing There lyeth heer a padd in the straw I can ghesse at the cause a tricke of your Brotherly charity Because LUTHER'S opinions were not Dangerous but ARMINIUS errors are Dangerous For we are told in their Insinuations that THIS Arminianisme hath infested and had brought into great perill the STATES of the Vnited Provinces if the KINGS MAIESTY by his gracious care and providence had not helped to quench the fire Scilicet as of old the Pagan Idolaters accused Christianity of all those calamities which befell mankinde Postquam esse in mundo Christiana gens cepit as ARNOBIUS speaketh Blessed bee the PEACE-MAKER amongst men the Generation of that faithfull One shall be ever blessed And blessed be that MAN of PEACE in ISRAEL for ever The reward of the righteous rest upon his Royall Person and Posterity and the faithfull promise of that GRAND-PEACEMAKER betwixt Heaven and Earth be sevenfold returned into his bosome whose Princely care and providence is not confined within the surroundry of the foure Seas but enlarged ultra unto his neighbours those Vnited Provinces primarily and before all But for this particular Sirs Informers can you speake upon knowledge for I must confesse my ignorance and small intelligence in matters of this kinde both for action and speculation that there was no other Snake lurking in covert nothing else but the simple difference about these School-points of Predestination Freewill Finall Perseverance which had so almost indangered the state of those Vnited Provinces Did no craftie Interloper are you sure of that put in his Stocke among those brawling Bankers Did no wiser men or man worke upon perhaps exasperated mindes or exasperate minds to worke upon as it hath hapned elsewhere in points of controverted Divinitie called into question or maintained on foote that Religion may serve for a stalking horse to catch fooles and be pretended to serve turnes Surely those very points being Scholasticall speculations meerly and as farre from State-businesses as Theorie is from Practice are not of themselves aptae natae to breed dangers Those so dangerous opinions in the Netherlands have beene as freely quarrelled and as fiercely pursued in the Vpperlands of as long time without all danger but of Tongue-tryall And why should they be so dangerous heer Those Classicall projects Consistoriall practices Conventuall designes and Propheticall speculations of the Zealous Brethren in this Land doe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 aime at Anarchy popular confusion Dangerous indeed to Prince and people State Civill and Ecclesiasticall may well come under this Information as being active in Front and not onely upon the Reare Why informe you not against the Fomenters of them Would you not take it ill if your selves were traduced as Dangerous indeed who do more than upon the Bye incline unto them But I am loth to touch heer or to meddle beyond my slipper The State is not the Subject of my Profession I pray for the prosperitie of Prince and Polity but let their courses alone to whom they concerne I excuse not ARMINIUS or Arminians in any misdemeanor onely let not Innocency in different Opinions bee calumniously traduced without cause M. MOUNTAGU in his owne particular is knowne hee giveth GOD the praise therefore to better than your selves or any of your Sect be they who they will bee to foment neyther Faction in State whereof he is incapable nor Schisme in Church whereto he is not inclinable having all his Studies addressed and Prayers directed to one end to make up if it were possible the rents in the Garment of CHRIST IESUS the breaches and ruines in the CHURCH for which cause it is apparant They cannot endure Him Quibus quietamoveri magna merces and live well fare full and fatt by Fishing in troubled waters There is One GOD One Faith One Hope One Baptisme not dividing but composing Christ in his Members and Profession Comparisons are odious yet sometime necessary Gall and Vineger are corrosive but must sometime bee used There is never a Saint-seeming and Bible-bearing hypocriticall Puritan in the Packe a better Patriot everie way than the man that hath Delivered such dangerous Errors Your goodly glozings and time-serving colludings with the State are but like Water-men upon the Thames looking one way rowing another way Your Holy cause you see will not succeed by opposition therefore you come up and seeme to cloze with the Church of England in her Discipline to use the Crosse and weare the Clothes but for her Doctrine you wave it preach against it teach contrary to that which you have subscribed that so through FORRAINE DOCTRINE being infused secretly
and instilled cunningly and pretended craftily to bee the Churches at length you may winde-in with FORRAINE DISCIPLINE also and so fill Christendome with Popes in every Parish for the Church and with popular Democraties and Democraticall Anarchies in the State God divide you first in IACOB and scatter you in ISRAEL In this present Passage who or what directed you writing in and beeing of the Church of England unto this Division of OUR DIVINES commonly called CALVINISTS and Lutherans as membra dividentia and ad oppositum YOUR Divines forsooth Of what Livery are you or those YOUR Divines Separatists from others Singular a Part a Faction a Division or else why YOUR Divines Are not You and YOURS Divines of the Church of England If not what make You meddling nestling roosting heer Hy you hence to the Brethren of AMSTERDAM where YOUR Divines are if there be any such For there they say all religions may be met with if a man have lost his Religion there he may finde it there are all Divines the Divels and all If yea what make you with that Title of OUR Divines why divide you non dividenda Mine and Thine Yours and Ours are not for Vnity are not or should not bee heard or once named in the Church of England The Divines heer are or should be all of them Divines who hold or should hold and maintaine the Doctrine established and commanded to bee taught in the Church of England which was never taught nor directed by the precepts or wills or fancies or factions or forgeries of men and is not to be stiled Lutheran or Calvinian but by such onely as mean to set up ALTAR against ALTAR and to foment a Schisme in the Church Such be YOUR Divines it seemeth who are cut out into Division Into their Secret let not my soule enter I am none I professe of that Fraternity no Calvinist no Lutheran but a Christian This I Declare not that which you calumniate that I adhere first unto them consent unto them All of them and Only to them infallibly who have been in their severall times 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 taught of GOD and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 enspired by GOD secondly unto those that are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their true Successors and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their Lieutenants and so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 observers of the Rules and Traditions enjoyned of old according to deduction from that Prime Rule interpreting the HOLY SCRIPTURES the Rule of faith in places controverted and obscure which is ever in points of lower alloy not according to the fancy and most-what presumption of some one man delighting commonly to oppose and thwart the streame of Antiquity but according to the sense and meaning of those Times that drew water neerer unto the Well head that is to the APOSTLES and their Successors immediately As for consent with Lutherans I doe no where declare it Shew me the place where I preferre them commend them once name them to this purpose You never were so privy unto any thought of mine that you could speake what I thought of them concerning whom I wish that they were men of more allayed spirits and calmer temper than they are or doe shew themselves in opposition And yet why may I not in some things as well as soone as lawfully consent unto them as unto YOUR DIVINES the commonly called CALVINISTS IOHN CALVIN came after in time and was but a Secondary unto MARTIN LUTHER entring in upon his Labours and Reversions and why should he challenge any priviledge of preferment above MARTIN LUTHER that I may not as well and lawfully declare my self for the one as for the other In this Church and Kingdome doth any Rule Canon Law or Authority tie or command me to reverence the one above the other to follow the one rather than the other I may why not consent with the Lutherans rigid or mollified in some things against the Calvinists and in some other differenced opinions with the YOUR Calvinists against them why not who tyed mee more to the one than the other or to eyther more than to BELLARMINE in some things against them both Truth hath latitude and extension No man that I know of hath infallibilitie from errors assigned unto him ex asse Truth is truth whosoever speaketh it and S. AUGUSTINE did embrace it from TYCHONIUS a Donatist in one particular rather than the Tendries of Catholick Authors What if I went thus far or did so much declare my selfe to favour the Lutherans against YOUR Divines Have I therein broken any Statute transgressed any Canon offended against Law opposed Order neglected any Authority If I have Declare against mee let mee answer for it If none of these take notice of YOUR Divines what are private mens opinions unto me who may bee as free in my opinions as they are in theirs But I doe not as you informe Declare any such thing for to Declare importeth a publicke Act an assent upon acknowledgement Doe I in this CHAPT professe correspondency in the point controverted with Lutherans Doe I any where with them or others beside the Church of England the absolutest representation of Antiquitie this day extant What that Church beleeveth I beleeve what it teacheth I teach what it rejecteth I reject what it doth not tender I am not tyed unto I was bred a member of the Church of England brought up a member of the Church of England therein by the meanes and Ministery of that Church I received that Earnest of my salvation when by Baptisme I was inserted into CHRIST In the Union and Communion of that Church I have lived not Divided with Papist nor Separated with Puritan Through the assistance of the grace of GOD'S Spirit which is never wanting unto any that seeke Him I hope to live and dye in the Faith and Confession of that Church than which I know none nor can any be named in all points more conformable unto purest Antiquitie in the best times which I trust to make good against any and all those Brethren in evill Papists and Puritans whosoever who looking and running two severall waies doe like SAMPSON'S foxes joine together in the taile If there bee in any writing preaching saying or thought of mine any thing Delivered or Published against the Discipline or Doctrine of THIS Church I am sory for it I revoke it recant it disclaime it Vultu laeditur pietas if I have done so in any thing unto my Mother in all humilitie I crave pardon and will undergoe Penance But the presumptions of servants are not the Lords directions Every one that prateth readeth lectureth preacheth or professeth must not look to have his Theses Lectiones Harangues or discourses taken as the Dictates or doctrines of our Church Our Mother hath sufficiently made knowne her minde in her publicke promulgated authorized ARTICLES and COMMUNION BOOK with those other to which we have all subscribed that are publickly interessed in the Priesthood and Function of this
Church of England whose Discipline in that and in other DUTCH Synods is held unlawfull What Ends men had in that Synod I knowe not nor am curious to enquire how things were carried I as little understand or care Whether any or all subscribed absolutely or with protestation I cannot tell Let them looke unto it and answer for it whom it doth concerne This I am sure IOHN DEODATE Minister and Professor in the Church of Geneva and imployed unto that Synod of Dort from his Countrey being lately with me at Eaton professed there unto me his owne opinion in some points contrary to the conclusions of Dort as also the dissension of their Church at Geneva from the PRIVATE opinions as he called them of CALVIN and BEZA And I am as sure that the Church of England never so concluded nor determined it in her Doctrime I am sure it hath been opposed in the Church of England otherwise taught and professed in the Schooles when I was an Auditor there It hath been prohibited to be enjoyned and tendred or maintained as the Authenticall Doctrine of our Church by supreme Authority with sharp reproofe unto those that went about to have it tendred then when those Conclusions or Assertions of Lambeth as they are called in the Conference at Hampton Court were upon sending downe to the Universitie of Cambridge likely enough to have beene there applauded by some through the opinion of the great worth and learning that they had of the then Professor a thorough man everie way upon YOUR Side and an earnest Promoter of the novell opinions against other learned Divines part dead and yet part alive Since which time at the Conference of Hampton Court before HIS MAIESTY by Doctour BANCROFT the then Lord Bishop of London it was stiled against the Articles of Lambeth then urged by the Puritans a Desperate doctrine as I take it to be without reproof or taxation of any And can wee conceive this should have been acted spoken or tolerated against a Doctrine approved by the Church of England Besides in all probability the publick Doctrine of the Church of England is not very likely to have beene or to be upon the Party of a Faction that hath so long had a Schisme on foot against it to bring in Genevanisme into Church and State wholly totally were it possible at least so partially that sensim sine sensu it might creep upon us not as once 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by opposing the DISCIPLINE ex adverso but by complying with That formerly oppugned cum infortunio to winde in with the DOCTRINE point per point that men being so seasoned and infected with the ONE may at length more readily willingly and sooner incline unto the OTHER It being so in the nature of man that opinion settled for the excellent worth temper desert and conveniency of any one invention or proposall of some one man men may be disposed unto him in any or all other things though of another nature Considering then your Side your Comportments your Ends it is not in reason probable that you should have the Doctrine of the Church on YOUR Side against Mr. MOUNTAGU your affection to the Church setting reason of profite and interest aside being such as it is well knowne to be Say I it is not probable I say it is directly otherwise For the Church holdeth and teacheth punctually and that in the Opinion and with the dislike of the Learnedst of Your Side that Faith true justifying Faith once had may be lost and recovered againe that a man endued with GOD'S holy Spirit and enlightned with the Heavenly light may LOSE that HOLY SPIRIT have that Light put out become like unto SAUL and IUDAS may be brought into so vile a condition that hee shall be thought meet for no other purpose than to be condemned into Hell Now to your own understanding my good Brethren can the Church of England be thought to patronize YOUR Predestination and so farre to crosse and thwart YOUR Perseverance It is your own GOD hath appointed them to Grace Glorie GOD according to purpose hath called and justified them therefore it is certain that they must and shall be saved infallibly But if the Once justified by a lively Faith may in the opinion of our Church lose that justification they are not saved by an absolute necessitie IRRESPECTIVE without relation unto their Repentance For whatsoever thing may be otherwise than it is is not necessarily to continue one way and ever the same DAVID and PETER falling as they did unlesse they had repented as also they did should have perished eternally which because they repented they did not Certissimè liberantur qui liberantur No man taketh CHRIST'S sheep out of his hand none of GOD'S Elect doe perish for ever which although it be true it is so true upon supposition of the meanes Faith Repentance and finall Persevering in obedience without which they are none of GOD'S Elect nor belonging to CHRIST these being the appointed instrumentall causes of all their salvation as the proper immediate cause of the wicked's destruction is their impenitencie infidelity and disobeying GOD which the very Synod of Dort denieth not that define the wrath of GOD to remaine on them that Beleeve not That life eternall is for them that Beleeve which calleth them Praeteritos or non Electos that perish a Title that cannot accrue unto those that as the Doctrine of YOUR Divines was at least were made by GOD to perish everlastingly Quod ante Gehennam mali pereunt non est DIVINI operis sed HUMANI Quòd autem in Gehenna perituri sunt hoc facit DEI aequitas cui placere nulla potest Peccantis impunitas with FULGENTIUS so I conclude CHAP. VIII Touching Free-will the III. point of Arminianisme INFORMERS HE calles the Question of Freewil betwixt us and the Papists in this point a Question of obscurity MOUNTAGU I CALL it so indeed and in my poor understanding and small capacitie I ever took it to be a Question at least as it is intangled of perplexed obscurity You my good Brethren as it seemeth esteeme it not so Queis meliore luto finxit praecordia Titan. You can easily foord over all the depths therof and cleerly còmprehend all the darkest mirksomnesse therin Admiror stupeo why are you enraged against me if I cannot attaine the measure of your transcendentnesse but confesse my disability and imperfection But cleere or obscure light or darknesse in the point of Free-will in my Opinion what is it to Arminianisme in your information Was ARMINIUS also in the same opinion that the Question of Free-will was obscure Surely so and yet what meaned those dangers you talk of for opposition seeing men are not peremptory but upon resolution and resolution groweth not but upon perswasion which is ever upon evidence to the understanding If not so then wherein doth N. MOUNTAGU Arminianise But esto as you will every way What Error is in it
at least what danger consequent unto Error I should thinke it a preservative against danger rather inasmuch as the difficulty and obscurity pretended will in all probabilitie keep men off from meddling in it above their Modell and so from any consequent trouble or danger if any such can be about it I have not heard ARMINIUS taxed for any such assertion which if he had held he had beene in the right The Question of Freewill so canvassed and discoursed of up and downe is indeed a point and so ever hath beene held of very great obscurity fitting rather Schooles than popular eares or auditories If it bee not an obscure Question what then meane those many and manifold intricated and distracted divisions amongst men touching Freewill the nature state condition of it since ADAM'S fall the power efficacy and extent thereof in naturall morall civill divine indifferent good bad determined indetermined acts the concurrence and cooperation thereof with grace the constitution and connexion thereof with necessity prescience providence predestination the decrees purposes and will of GOD Protestants and Papists together by the eares Papists at odds amongst themselves and Protestants with Protestants upon no better tearms To my capacity that is obscure which is so much intangled with contradictory disputations upon all hands and so much perplexed with oppositions BELLARMINE a man no disparagement to your worth of as strong a braine and piercing apprehension as eyther of you M. WARD and M. YATES or any new upstart Master in Israel of the pack confesseth that the Concurrence of Grace and Free-will is Res omnino difficilis fortassè in hâc vitâ incomprehensibilis which saying of his our Bishop MORTON I hope nor Papist nor Arminian disliketh not and remembreth withall out of BENIUS this De modo quo liberum arbitrium vel movetur vel movet ad exercitium boni clamant alij rem non posse in hâc vitâ percipi sed omnem ingenij humani captum superare OCHAM SA CAIETANUS ALII This is strange Arminianisme is it not CHAP. IX Controversies unnecessarily multiplied the AUTHOR no Favourer of them Questions of obscurity and speculation not fit for Pulpits popular eares Freewill made no such controversie among moderate men either of the Pontifician or Protestant side as people are borne in hand withall INFORMERS BUt M. MOUNTAGU saith It might better have beene omitted and overpassed in silence especially the differences hanging as they doe upon such niceties and the controverted particulars being of no great moment upon due examination CHAP. XVI pag. CVII MOUNTAGU I Must and do confesse I am of that mind and thinke so still that the idle fellow the Gagger had done much better had merited more at GOD and mens hands to speake in his owne language and deserved better of the Church and have done better service to GOD Almighty as also might the major part by much of his Side if they would bee more sparing in multiplying controversies and disputes and so in disquieting the peace of the Church in points of that nature which doe not so concerne the state of mans soule or his walking in the waies of GOD'S commandement or knowing of Him the onely true GOD and whom he hath sent IESUS CHRIST Now was ARMINIUS also of that opinion If he were not how am I or can I bee an ARMINIAN for this If he were of this opinion then hath hee been deeply wronged by you and others that make him an Incendiary a Bontifeu a Flabellum of faction and sedition so much undeservedly in both Church and State that charge him so deeply as you have done with troubling the Netherlands and endangering that State by moving Disputes about Prescience Perseverance Predestination universall Grace Free-will and losse of Faith And surely M. MOUNTAGU deserved a more moderate and lesse empassioned censure than to bee informed against for moving of sedition which toucheth deep and will beare I trowe an ACTION of the Case who hath evermore detested that humour of Innovators that take the disquieting of things established a sufficient hire to set them on work who for feare of offending that way concealed both his owne opinion often and sometime the doctrine of the Church which haply he should not have done Is hee therefore seditious because he refused to dispute discourse or talke de omni Ente to contest for every thing ut pro aris focis to make a Case of faith or conscience of every speculation or because hee professeth his dislike of multiplying controversies in those kindes which increase rather discord and troubles in Church and in State than serve to edification It is strange that for wishing advising and in his owne particular using and ensuing that moderation thereby not to engarboile the Church and disturb the course of piety he should so by you and yours be blamed accused and traduced for a PAPIST and an ARMINIAN calumniated almost in every Ordinary by your means for a dangerous driver at Popery and Sedition being with one breath in the selfe-same points blamed for being so temperate for saying no more for not mooving favouring fomenting unnecessary quarrels and disunions in questions of speculation and of obscurity advising rather to reserve them for and referre them to the Schools though your honest simplicity or PURE charity thought it fit to conceale this his moderate wish or advice rather than to thunder and lighten in your Pulpits with them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by buzzing them into popular eares and capacities incapacious of them unable to comprehend them O vertiginem may I not well say that men should have such whirle-gigs in their brains and be so farre at variance with their owne wits as to imply contradiction in adjecto to charge M. MOUNTAGU because he had delivered such and such errors in Doctrine and yet to accuse him because he misliketh the delivering of such errors For in such and so great variety of errors or opinions touching free-will it may be that not one of them all is true but that more than one of them should be true it cannot be as CICERO spake in another case If OF the defenders of Free-will some beleeved not the necessity of grace which doctrine the IESUITES condemne of PELAGIANISME some denied that GOD can absolutely determine the will and are confuted by the most part some disliked that GOD should bee said by his exciting grace to work physically in man and are gaine-said by BENIUS as therein Adversaries unto Fathers and Councels some hold that GOD doth not morally determine the will and are excepted against by SUAREZ some gave to mans will in the Act of conversion an equality with yea a preeminence before grace and are therefore contradicted by others as repugnant unto Scriptures and to Fathers and finally some laboured to satisfie all doubts concerning the concurrence of grace and will and yet confesse they cannot assoile them as is confessed in these many words by the
proper acts thereof To will though drawne to performe many acts in course of life as willingly it could wish them to be otherwise Those in that Councell were Men as well as Pontificians learned men they were at least the major part and spake as well like men as for a factious party in the Church In that place they speak of Free-will in enlarged tearms and not in reference unto actions of grace of piety of repentance or regeneration and godlinesse toward GOD. Now it is I take it a ruled case with all reasonable men that in ADAM and through his Fall non amisimus naturam sed gratiam Indowments of grace above nature or additaments unto nature wee lost in ADAM Nature and naturall indowments were impaired and not extinct and abolished in his Fall Nec qui à Spiritu DEI igitur ideò se putet LIBERUM NON HABERE ARBITRIUM quod ne tunc quidem perdidit saith PROSPER quando Diabolo voluntate suâ se dedit à quo IUDICIUM VOLUNTATIS DEPRAVATUM EST NON ABLATUM Quod ergo NON INTERFECTUM EST per vulnerantem NON TOLLITUR per medentem vulnus sanatur non natura removetur In which sense and regard I inferred then and there a second decision of that Councell Liberum arbitrium non quidem EXTINCTUM esse sed viribus ATTENUATUM The which I might have enlarged and commented upon by the XVI Canon of the Synod of Dort in the IIII. Decision de conversionis modo where the Conveners will in these words proove either themselves Arminians or you Ignorántees or malicious Calumniators will they not Sicuti verò per lapsum homo non desiit esse homo intellectu voluntate praeditus nec peccatum quod universum genus humanum pervasit naturam generis humani sustulit sed depravavit spiritualiter occidit It a etiam haec divina regenerationis gratia non agit in hominibus tanquam TRUNCIS stipitibus nec VOLUNTATEM EIUS QUE PROPRIETATES TOLLIT aut INVITAM VIOLENTER COGIT No otherwise than so saith M. MOUNTAGU peradventure not so much as so but you say He concludeth this his Chapter thus Our Conclusion and yours is all one wee cannot wee doe not deny freedome of will in man whoso doth so is no CATHOLICKE I adde no nor PROTESTANT For I did not conceive that any Protestant till you professed your selves so senselesse would have denied that Conclusion There is FREE-WILL We eat we drinke we sleep wee wake wee walk we rest wee runne wee talk wee hold our peace we consent assent disagree freely wittingly willingly without any constraint out of the naturall power of our Free-will And yet further for your sakes I adde It were well done and worth the while as SCOTUS said well to cudgell him well and thriftily that should deny FREE-WILL so long untill hee did confesse it to be in our power to goe on to cease or hold our hands And if he should commence an action of battery to put in this Barre It was not I that beat him it was FATALL NECESSITY and I was thereby compelled to doe it I had not any FREE-WILL to resist it was not in my power to doe or not to doe otherwise But concerning Freewill the power possibility and activity of the will in the things of GOD towards GOD in the state of grace I have set downe my Errors as you call them in two propositions tendred unto mee and unto you also of the Church of England First that Man in state of naturall corruption cannot turne nor prepare himselfe unto GOD by or through his owne naturall and humane power and strength Secondly that Prevented by grace and by grace assisted hee putteth to his hand to procure augmentation of that grace as also continuance unto the end in that grace No man commeth unto GOD but he is drawne being drawne hee runneth or walketh as his assistance is and his owne agility and disposition unto the end No man beareth fruit in CHRIST IESUS the Vine unlesse that by the Husbandman hee bee engraffed To engraffe is opus Hortulani ALONE When as the branch is engraffed that it may prosper and beare fruit the root must supply the slip sucke and retaine sap supplied from the root This is enough no more need bee curiously insisted on or disputed of The Church of England doth no way contradict this it is the precise doctrine of our Church ARTIC X. The condition of man after the Fall of ADAM it such that he cannot turne nor prepare himselfe by his owne naturall strength and good works to faith and calling upon GOD. Wherefore we have no power to doe good works pleasant and acceptable unto GOD without the grace of GOD by CHRIST preventing us that we may have a good will and working with us when we have it Man is heer in this passage by the Church considered two waies as in Nature depraved as in Nature againe by Grace restored In Nature depraved Freewill is totally denied unto man for any workes of righteousnesse acceptable or pleasing unto GOD before conversion or for works of actuall concurrency in the very act of first converting but not for workes of Nature or Morality of which works only the Proposition was to be understood Si per morale opus virtutes intelligas Philosophicas non neganius posse hominem sine speciali gratiâ multa fortiter temperanter juste agere saith D. WHITAKER And that saying of DAMASCEN is denyed of no man that hath his braines in his head 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Man being a creature endued with reason doth rather leà de nature than is led by nature and upon appetite or desire may shake off if he please and acquit himself of that desire or close in with it and give consent unto it In state of Grace repayring and restoring Nature Free-will is not denyed man but how Not as in or unto naturall objects hic mota movet It worketh with us we with it together with Grace when wee have once that good will wrought in us And surely if wee have it working at all it is not titulus sine re nor is it inane nihil as some it seemeth thought which the Councell of TRENT condemneth very justly This is not my singular fancy as your opinions most-what are private imaginations of opiniative men ignorant of others wedded to their owne conceits OPERATUR ille COOPERAMUR nos NON enim AUFERT sed ADIUVAT bone voluntatis arbitrium saith S. AUGUSTINE Quaest XV. super Deuteron And againe Quaest L. In spirit ualibus conflictibus sperandum est et petendum est adjutorium DEI. Non ut NOS NIHIL OPEREMUR sed ut ADIUTI COOPEREMUR And again Retract I. XXIII Vtrumque Credere velle DEI est NOSTRÛM utrumque est DEI DEI est quiae praeparat voluntatem NOSTRÛM est quia non fit nisi volentibus nobis and Epist CVII Quomodo dicuntur
it were true which is most false wherewith I am charged by these honest men yet I might answer and what if I doe Who bound the Church of England or Me a Priest and a Member of the Church of England unto defence of all the Decrees or Determinations of that Synod Hath Prince or Parliament or Convocation Edict Statute or Canon I knowe none I have heard of none nor ever shall I hope And till I heare of such quod 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I answer Let them that are interessed plead for themselves For my part I nor have nor ever will subscribe that Synode absolutely and in all points for in some it condemneth upon the Bye even the discipline of the Church of England but so farre forth onely as their Determinations shall bee found and made conformable unto the doctrine of OUR Church nor I think will the Ferventest amongst you subscribe it in every point For sure I am YOUR Divines as you call them have disavowed sometimes some things resolved of in that Synod as for instance Cooperation of Free-will and Grace Reprobation negative rather than positive But as I said the Synod of Dort is not MY Rule and your Magisteriall Conclusions are NO Rule I hope all not violently precise will say Ampliandum upon your bare imputations who bring nothing to prove me an ARMINIAN but your 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hee saith thus and thus and we say this is ARMINIANISME Absque hoc And thus much for Arminianisme THE SECOND PART TOUCHING POINTS OF POPERY IN GENERALL CHAP. I. The Author uncharitably traduced His profession for the doctrine and discipline received and commanded in the Church of England Conformable Puritans Furious zeale The Church of Rome not a sound yet a true Church Private opinions disclaimed The Church of England asserted to her owne publick and proper Tenents The cause of all these Imputations NOw come they to POPERY in a larger extent A strange imputation in my opinion considering the subject upon which they work which may argue in them with any indifferent Reader an uncharitable unchristian fiery Puritanicall zeale malice and indiscretion too For did I prevaricate was it a compact between Me and the Papists to collude If I favoured them would I so have handled them as few have beside me in so exasperating a stile Sure A Kingdome I know divided cannot stand But the truth is As with the IESUITE he is an Heretick that is not furioso more a Roman Catholick so with the PURITAN he is a Papist that will not run a-madding with them It is not the first time for this very cause I have been talked of esteemed of traduced as a Papist which I can the better brooke because they have meted this measure to the Church of England it self as sympathizing with Papists in her Liturgy Discipline and Doctrine too It were to be wished that such transported spirits were taught to be more submisse and sparing in their talk I call GOD and all his holy Angels to witnesse I nor am nor have beene nor intend to be heerafter eyther Papist or ROMISH Catholick a Papist of State or of Religion but a Priest a member a follower of the Church and Doctrine of the Church of ENGLAND The Originall grounds of Popery are to my understanding against Reason have not their warrant from revealed Truth stand not with the purer practice of prime Antiquity I have been born and bred and brought up in the Confession of the Church of England I have learned loved admired and proposed unto my selfe to follow indeclinably not onely the Discipline of the Church of England whereunto the Puritans and Schismaticks themselves at least the wiser and subtiller sort of them come off roundly now for ends best known amongst themselves remaining quod erant quoad doctrinam tantum non in EPISCOPATU Puritani but the whole and entire Doctrine of that Church proposed in Synods confirmed by Law commanded and established by Act of PARLIAMENT This totall both Doctrine and Discipline I willingly and thoroughly embrace In profession thereof 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have lived and will die and will maintaine it by GOD'S grace to bee Antient Catholick Orthodox and Apostolicall I say it againe a never was or will be a Papist no not in heart though many be arrant Puritans in heart that onely for preferment do conforme hold with the Hare and runne with the Hound who so they might vivere and valere would as willingly have up the Presbyterian Anarchie as would THO. CARTWRIGHT were he living though many once Puritans turne often Papists And no marvell for fleeting is commonly from one extreme unto another Men of moving violent Quick-silver Gun-powder spirits can never rely upon middling courses but dum furor in cursu est runne on headlong into extremes And so I may avow I will not bee a Papist in haste because I never was a Puritan in earnest or in jest having found it true in my small observation that our Revolters unto Popery were Puritans avowed or addicted first And yet it must bee granted All powder doth not take fire alike nor are all Puritan Spirits of one disposition With some of them more braine-sick than the rest all my Booke against the Gagger is quickly branded with Popery or scurrility With others more discreet I doe but walk upon the brinks of Popery wherein is some allaying of that former fervency for upon their better advice I am but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at the next dore unto it What they thinke or speake I cannot hinder nor doe I greatly care I professe my selfe none of those furious ones in point of difference now-a-dayes whose profession and resolution is That the farther in any thing from communion with the Church of Rome the neerer unto GOD and Truth that we ought to have no commerce society or accordance with Papists in things divine nor almost humane upon pain of eternall damnation but must bid defiance irreconcileable unto them for ever I am absolutely perswaded and shall bee till I see cause to the contrary that the Church of Rome is a true though not a sound Church of CHRIST as well since as before the Councell of Trent a part of the Catholick though not the Catholick Church which wee doe professe to beleeve in our Creed a Church in which among many tares there remaineth some wheat In Essentials and Fundamentals they agree holding one Faith in one Lord into whom they are inserted through one Baptisme Ecclesia Papalis saith FRANCISCUS IUNIUS neither Papist nor Arminian quâ id habet in se quod ad definitionem Ecclesiae pertinet est Ecclesia And I verily am perswaded that I ought not to goe farther from the Church of Rome in these her worst daies than she hath gone away from her selfe in her best dayes I hold it to bee furious zeale without discretion issuing out of ignorance or malice or both in them who proceed so farre in their extravagant
assertions as to professe that Turks and Turcisme is to be preferred before and rather embraced than Papists and Popery with whom the Puritan-Papist the IESUITE is quit For they teach the like concerning Turkes and Heretickes as they call us But the truth is haec non est illa HELENA these opinions are not the things which offend them so much or moved them to impute these calumnies unto M. MOUNTAGU there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For whereas the PURITANS were wont to bee shrowded under the covert of the CHURCH of ENGLAND and to vent publish and tender their many idle dreames fancies and furies unto the world under pretext of the doctrine of OUR CHURCH and our Opposites of the Romish Side did accordingly charge OUR CHURCH with them M. MOUNTAGU out of just indignation against that open wrong and injury done unto his Mother and as he doth assuredly hope to the good service of HIS MAIESTY and the CHURCH hath disbanded them from their shelter taken them off from colluding under the CHURCHES protection and sent them to their owne home to shrowd there if they could and to answer for themselves to make good their own cause by and of themselves and likewise hath asserted the CHURCH unto her owne true Tenents naturall and proper unto that doctrine which is publickly determined and authorized in her authentick Records to the high displeasure no doubt and distaste of such a porent overweening faction as they are Hinc mihi sola mali labes This is the ground of all the POPERY and ARMINIANISME with which I am aspersed The particulars whereof in the one I have wiped away aheady the other will as easily off too I take them in order as they were proposed in the copie that came unto my hands in which they are digested without any good method or due order as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of angry and idle braines POINTS OF POPERY IN PARTICVLAR CHAP. II. The Church Representative and Points Fundamentall what they are All that Papists say is not Popery Particular Churches have and may erre The Catholick universall Church hath not cannot erre Of Generall Councels The Author farre from the Iesuits fancy The XXI Article of the Church of England explaned INFORMERS HE saith that the Church Representative true and lawfull never yet erred in Fundamentals and therefore that hee seeth no cause but to avouch The Church Representative cannot ERRE pag. XLV MOUNTAGU IN this Accusation are two Propositions distinct though connexed and dependent First The Church Representative true and lawfull did never erre in Fundamentals Secondly The Church Representative so true and lawfull cannot erre in Fundamentals Now whether Proposition of these two is Poperie or are both these Propositions jointly or severally taken Popery To explicate the tearms and draw up to anatomize your confusednes The Church Representative is a GENERALL COUNCELL not titularly so as the Conventicle of Trent but plenarily true generall and lawfull Points Fundamentall bee such as are immediate unto faith for instance the ARTICLES of our CREED which only be those Tenents and Points of faith that have indeed and so must have Universality Antiquity Consent Knowledge No man can be saved that beleeveth them not no man can be saved that knoweth them not which must bee understood de viâ ordinariâ except that GOD himselfe have disposed otherwise who may dispense with his owne Ordinances as he will as in case of Infants Naturals frantick persons which through invincible disability are extra Censure Ordinariorum Otherwise the knowledge and beleeving of them is absolutely necessary and required necessitate medij unto salvation To say they are Fundamentals to propose them for Fundamentals that are thus required and must bee knowne and acknowledged upon so great and dangerous an exigence is no Popery as I conceive no not in your opinion The Papists rather are ad oppositum For they enlarge their Tenour make their dignity and degree too common abusing that honour peculiarly due to them by promiscuously communicating it unto other points of inferiour rank and reckoning especially those XII new ARTICLES of the Tridentine CREED Thus upon explication of the tearms we come unto the assertion It is belike Popery to say that in them in these Fundamentall Points A true and lawfull generall Councell never erred de facto because forsooth Papists say that a generall Councell cannot erre If this were right and regular yet first Bate me an ace For all is not Popery that Papists say but what they say as Papists as a Faction divided as in particular by themselves that haply is Popery All is not Heresie that Hereticks hold nor is all Puritanisme that PURITANS beleeve or maintaine They hold many things right with the Church of England but what they hold as PURITANS that is as a schismaticall Party divided from and opposed against the doctrine or discipline or both of the Church of England that wee may be bold to call so Semblably wee are to judge of Papists and so what is said of Papists is not presently and indistinctly Popery but may be said in terminis by Protestants and they be never a whit the more any Papists for so saying Againe to say that this Proposition A true and lawfull Generall Councell never did Erre is Popery cannot sinke into my understanding For I demand Quo warranto hath any Classis or Consistory of Lay-elders or others concluded it so It may be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a misreport an error in Storie which goeth no farther than unto the thing done or not done Historicall mistakings mis-relatings who made them Poperie though I professe I neyther know nor acknowledge any mis-report or error in point of Story in so saying Let any Puritan living shew me where when in what any Generall Councell according to true acception or Church representative hath so erred in the resolution and decisions of that Councell for in the debating of doubts questions propositions the case is otherwise and not the same I conceive and acknowledge but foure Councels of this kinde that of Nice of Constantinople of Ephesus of Chalcedon Shew me in what Fundamentall point of Faith any of these Generall Councells have erred But it is Popery peradventure to say It never was therefore in all probability it cannot be If so then inconsequences and Non sequiturs in Logick are in your opinion to be ranged under Points of Popery and so by this your assignement Popery will extend it selfe very farre indeed farther than ever any POPE or Papist did pretend or claime And if you will grant the POPE this so universall and transcendent jurisdiction yet M. MOUNTAGU'S Popery cometh not up so high as unto generality illimited It cannot bee at all it insisteth but upon some points onely and that not by or with a generall vouchee neither but thus only I see no cause Now there may be cause though I see it not It may be though I
think and speake and write otherwise or you eyther yet both of us may bee deceived But somewhat there was which these men intended and would have said if so bee they could have hit upon it It is a Conclusion of the Romane Schooles The Church cannot Erre which Proposition I may both affirme and deny as it is proposed The Church CANNOT Erre The Church CAN Erre For first it i◠ambiguous subiectivè What the Church is which cannot Erre The word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and must be distinguished And secondly we may consider it obiectivè In what things the Church cannot Erre and Quousque that Not erring doth reach forth Extensivè To this purpose I differenced Churches two wayes into Topicall or Particular Churches into Catholick or Vniversall I divided also the objects of erring or not erring two wayes into Fundamentalls or superstructives For Particular locall Churches such as Corinth Ephesus Smyrna Thyatyra Laodicea c. it is in Confesso on both sides that They may Erre for it is evident that they have Erred both in inferiour and in higher points of Faith And so have Erred oftentimes that through their Erring in Fundamentalls in that sort they have ceased to be Churches any more The Catholick or universall Church I considered two wayes conceiving it to be Diffusive or Representative and that diffusion to runne out two wayes into Vniversality of ALL both Time and Place or into Vniversality of Time alone The first is so ample that it fetcheth in the APOSTLES and all and so includeth within the Verge that part of the Catholick Church which is now regnant in heaven and free from all Error as partaking of that blisse which leadeth infallibly holdeth inseparably in all Truth In this sense and acceptation the proposition is not quarrelled The Church so hath not cannot Erre The second divided part stinted from so large an extent is yet enlarged respectively to all members to every member in particular of the Catholick Church living any where at any one time so that the whole aggregation of all Christian professors make and compose this Church And as yet I thinke the Informers doe not quarrell us for Popery Their whole stitch is against the Church Representative in a Generall Councell In which though I should resolve simply and punctually thus A Generall Councell cannot Erre yet could I not be counted a Papist For the Tenent of the Papists if you my Informers know it not in their Schooles is this A Generall Councell can no way Erre in the Decisions finall thereof which is allowed by the POPE By which they necessarily inferre as also they stick not to expresse that unlesse the POPE give ratification any Generall Councell whatsoever may erre in any point of Faith of what nature soever And therefore such is their Doctrine since the IESUITES have domineered in their Schooles all the validity and assurance of not Erring which a Generall Councell hath or can have either in fide or moribus is onely from that impossibility of Erring which the POPE hath as Haeres ex asse unto S. PETER to whom our SAVIOUR behighted that impossiblity alone So that pretend the IESUITES as long as they will that fair and specious shew and title of the CHURCH never so much have they nothing in their mouthes but The CHURCH the CHURCH the POPE is that Church and their conclusion heer is not for the Church but for HIM Now doth Mr. MOUNTAGU come up unto nay looketh he toward this Catholick Roman fancy and infallible madnes Nothing lesse Hee directly pitcheth upon the Church Representative in a generall Councell WITHOUT the Pope I meane without the Pope as Head or exceeding the bounds and limits of a Patriarchicall Bishop I go not unto all things discussed or determinable in a Councell but rest upon that which is Fundamentall Nor doe I resolve it as certum de fide or tender it unto others to be beleeved I say no more but I see no cause why I may not so resolve and that also but upon suppositions if the Councell be truely GENERALL indeed and of SUCH none yet ever erred that ever I yet read or observed in Points Fundamentall And therefore I saw and see no cause but a man may say Such a Councell shall never erre in Fundamentals But concerning Fundamentals if your stitch bee against them I answer with B. MORTON in his Appeale THE beleefe of some Articles is so absolutely necessary for the constitution of a true Church as a reasonable soule is for the essentiall being of a man In such as these are shew me an error Dr. REYNOLDS himself though maintaining the contrary was not able in his VI. Conclusions out of all his reading and yet therein was his excellency to afford us so much as a peece of an example in Antiquity for a Generall Councell erring in FUNDAMENTALS and I am perswaded no man living can instance it Of such onely doe I speak and in such onely do I conceive infallibility and so as I conceive it the promise of OUR SAVIOUR may and doth hold HEE shall leade you into ALL TRUTH as also that other to the same purpose Where two or three are gathered together in my Name I AM THERE in the MIDDEST of them The Church of England may seem to have been of a contrary minde in her determinations and to have taught and prescribed to be so taught that such Generall Councels true and lawfull not onely may erre for possibilitie but also have erred in reality For Artic. XXI we reade thus GENERALL Councels may not be gathered together without the commandement and will of Princes And when they be gathered together for as much as they bee an Assembly of men whereof all be not governed with the Spirit and word of GOD they MAYERRE and sometime HAVE ERRED even in things appertaining unto GOD. Which decision of the Article is not home to this purpose First the Article avoucheth that GENERALL Councels have erred which cannot be understood of my limitation Fundamentals because there is no such Extat of any Generall Councell true and lawfull Secondly things appertaining unto GOD are not all Fundamentals but points of Piety GOD'S Service and Religion which admit a very large interpretation For many things appertaine unto GOD that are not of necessity unto salvation both in practice and speculation In these haply Generall Councels have erred in those other none can erre The Councell of Nice determined the controversie of Easter it was not Fundamentall I put the case that in it they erred It was a thing appertaining unto GOD in his service this may come under the sense and censure of the Article but this toucheth not my opinion concerning only Fundamentals Thirdly the Article speaketh at large concerning Generall Councels both for debating and deciding I onely spake of the determination wherein it may be possible they nor can nor shall erre that may and have erred in the discussing In that very Councell of
mission and commission You cannot produce any time out of any Records or Memorials extant or remembred in which and by which it may appeare that these things were otherwise The Churches of the East Asia Greece and Africa were a long time visible eminent and glorious The Churches of the West have held it out longer Since there first was a Church in England France Spaine and Rome there hath not ceased to bee a Church there And if in any of these places or all these places the Church should cease or not bee visible yet would it be still visible otherwhere though not ever alike nor to like purpose Againe I do call those Some mens doctrines in this point Private Opinions and so well may I doe in respect of the disinvalidity and disproportion of them being private mens opinions and no publick proposals or resolutions of the Church I call them not so in regard of paucity of proposers for they may bee many a strong potent prevailing partie that thus opine and runne a course to themselves in their owne Tenents against or beside publick enacted and authorized doctrine And yet even private opinions also are against you That worthy Divine my deare friend while he lived D. RI. FIELD lib. 111. pag. XIX saith It cannot bee but they are the true Church must by profession of the truth make themselves knowne in such sort that by their profession and practice they may be discerned from other men But without all question that Church must needs be visible the members whereof doe make open and publick profession of their Faith in such sort that by their practice and profession they may be knowne and distinguished from other men And therefore that learned man rightly resolveth That BELLARMINE laboureth in vaine to prove that there is and alwayes hath beene a VISIBLE Church and that not consisting of some few scattered Christians without order or Ministry or use of Sacraments for all this we do grant and most willingly yeeld unto howsoever perhaps SOME FEW have been of ANOTHER OPINION Marke my good Informers D. FIELDS Popery to the purpose and with all D. HUMFREYES another Papist SECRET abodes are no Christian Convocations because this communion of Saints is an OPEN testification of Christianity and D. WILLET no Papist I hope unlesse your selves be saith that The ONLY absence of word and Sacraments doe make a nullity in a Church therefore an existence in a Church is made by their presence But how can you or any man possibly conceive that the Word should be preached and Sacraments administred in a Church Invisible The L. Bishop of LICHFIELD hath as much Popery in this point as M. MOUNTAGU hath In his Appeale thus he writeth Now Protestants and Romanists doe concarre in words and almost in sence So that the difference is not so much in the position as in the application of the Invisibility of the Church And before him long since that IEWELL of his time hath uttered these expresse words The generall or outward Church of GOD is VISIBLE and may be seene in his Defence against HARDING And this Doctrine is sufficiently and to this purpose explaned by that right worthy and learned Deane Dr. WHITE in his just Defence of his deceased Brother against the cavills of a Iesuite And he that hath read moe Papists than ever you have heard of concludeth thus Whereunto our learned adversaries for the greater part agree Great Ignorance then it must be or malice or faction or all that by the Information of these poore Divines M. MOUNTAGU is promoted for a Papist for saying that with moderate men on both sides this Controversie might cease or for calling the opinion of the INVISIBILITY of the Church a private opinion But as I said so I see it fareth still now adayes as with the Iesuite and Iesuited Papist such as be by farre the major part of that side every man is an Heretick a Lutheren a Calvinist I know not what that is not a desperate Papist to goe unto the Divell with them though it be upon a second pouder-plot so also with our Puritans very Sibs unto those Fathers of the Society every Moderate man is bedaubed with these goodly habiliments of ARMINIANISME POPERY and what not unlesse hee will be frantick with them for their Holy Cause Yet well fare BELLARMINE a man of a better spirit than some of the Paternitie who ingenuously confesseth concerning this particular Notandum est multos ex nostris tempus terere dum probant ABSOLUTE Ecclesiam non posse deficere nam CALVINUS caeteri Haeretici id concedunt And that learned Deane of CARLILE of late against FISHER saith the same It is but lost labour to spend time in proving against us that there is alway in the world a true Church for we have ever acknowledged it and have ever been Papists in opinion for so doing or else these good Fellowes are and ever will bee I know what I could have produced many moe to purpose and amongst them diverse whom they will not cast off for Papists as M. PERKINS M. CLAPHAM D. SPARKS c. I will yet adde a little more Poperie to the former and so leave my friends and Informers to chew the Cud upon it as they do after Lectures The Church of Rome hath ever beene visible The Church of Rome is and ever was a true Church since it was a Church Therefore the true Church hath been visible I say Remember it lest you mistake my saying or maliciously mistake it a True Church ratione essentiae and Being of a Church not a Sound Church every way in their Doctrine CHAP. V. Touching ANTICHRIST The Pope and Prelacy of Rome Antichristian That hee is Magnus ille Antichristus is neyther determined by the publick doctrine of the Church nor proved by any good argument of private men Difference among Divines who The Man of sinne should be The markes of the great Antichrist fit the Turkish Tyrannie every way aswell as the Papacie The peace of the Church not to bee disquieted through varietie of Opinions No finall Resolution to bee yet had in this point INFORMERS COncerning ANTICHRIST thus hee writeth I professe ingenuously I am not of opinion that the Bishop of ROME personally is THAT ANTICHRIST nor yet that the Bishops of ROME successively are THAT ANTICHRIST Chap. X. pag. 74. MOUNTAGU WHat if I am not of that opinion what if ingenuously I professe so much that I am not of that opinion as indeed I am not I was occasioned to shew my opinion in the point by the Gagger who charged our Church in generall with the private Fancy and opinion of some men that the Pope of Rome was that very Antichrist mentioned and foretold in the Scripture I must needs avow it or disclaime it That I could not doe without wronging the Church and my selfe therefore I thought it an honest mans part ingenuously to professe what I thought Sure it
would be more pleasing unto GOD and commendable with men if your selves and such Halfers in opinions omnium horarum homines for your private ends would openly avow what covertly you conceale and publickly professe that in which animitùs being rotten at the Core you are dissentients indeed from the Church of England than to be and call your selves at least Conformitants for fashion sake in some few and indifferent points of Ceremony and to be opposites in Truth both from them and most points of Doctrine of the Church of England For the point in question what if I for my part professe so much you may for your part professe the contrary if you please so be it you trouble not the Church with it nor would pin my Faith unto your opinion One thing I promise you for my part I will not lightly talke of my opinion in Pulpits will you say as much for your opinion I thinke not I know nay For your opinions must bee all THE LORDS HOLY TRUTH I am not anie way offended with you for your opinion that The Pope is Antichrist yet much rather might I because you presume to determine so peremptorily of future Contingents which being ever uncertaine quoad nos those things cannot but rashly be defined or absolutely taught as true the event whereof may hap afterwards to prove otherwise Why should you be angry with mee in such points of no assurance because I doe not subscribe unto you I am not tyed unto you more than you to me Who concluded it but your selves to be flat Popery not to Beleeve or Preach that the Pope is that Antichrist or to professe the contrary that he is not that Antichrist Who can finde it to be the doctrine of the Church of England What Synod resolved it Convocation assented to it What Parliament Law Proclamation or Edict did ever command it to be professed or have imposed penaltie upon repugnants or non-consentients unto it Some Protestant Divines at home and abroad I grant have thought so wrote so disputed so in good zeale no doubt against that insolent and insufferable and outrageous Tyrannie and Pride of the Bishops of Rome and their infinite enormities in the Church and out of that affection have been too violently forward out of conjectures and probabilities to pronounce The POPE is that MAN OF SINNE and SONNE OF PERDITION The Synod of GAPP in France made it a point of their Beleefe and concluded it peremptorily to be so And let them and you beleeve it so if you will Their inducements doe not convince or perswade me I never yet saw proofe or argument brought that was perswasive much lesse that was demonstrative in the case I never yet met with argument or reason to the point but at least to my owne satisfaction I was able to answer it If you can give better I am like to yeeld Till then there being no conviction nor compulsion in foro externo or interiori I would gladly know why it should not be as lawfull for mee to opine The Pope is NOT that Antichrist as for others to write to preach to publish to tender unto Proceeders this Proposition The Pope Is Antichrist They thinke one way I am of another minde and so are infinite others with me Why may not I sedatè and tranquillè as well deliver my Negative as M. GABRIEL POWELL publish and print as if the Church of England were of his minde out of violent and transported passion no doubt thus I am as well assured and as throughly perswaded that the POPE is THAT ANTICHRIST as I am resolved IESUS CHRIST was the Sonne of GOD or to that purpose for I have not now the booke by mee Surely this man made it an Article of his faith so will not I. And yet I will not deny but the Pope is an Antichrist I doe not deny it I doe beleeve it These honest Informers should not so have dealt with mee as by a knack of concealement to have done me so palpable a wrong as if my meaning were the Pope was no Antichrist at all So I might have walked not onely upon the Brinks but have come much within the Verge of flat Popery and not injuriously as now have been slandered for and stiled a Papist For that imputation might more than grate upon an universall approoving of the totall doctrine of the Church of Rome in as much as there were of old are now and alway will bee many Antichrists and hee that any way opposeth CHRIST in his Kingdom his Word his Church is an Antichrist which as ingenuously as the former I professe the Pope and the Church of Rome doth And therefore when out of my private opinion onely for which I will not trouble the peace of the Church I denied that the Pope was THAT Antichrist then yet and there I added withall AN Antichrist notwithstanding I hold him or them carrying themselves in the Church as they doe Which Passage and Proposition had bin sufficient with men not partially addicted unto a Side and maliciously bent to calumniate an Opposite as it is too manifest my Informers bee to have discharged mee from guilt or tincture of Popery For will or can any Papist living say that the Bishop of Rome now is an Antichrist But so have I said and written and professed so if these honest Informers had been pleased to have reported it so But it stood not with their prime purpose of calumniating directly it gave check unto their detraction in chief and so they passed it slightly over But as concerning the maine the question on foot Whether the Pope of Rome or the Popes of Rome either are or may be accounted or is THAT Antichrist or Antichrists my irresolution grew as I have remembred from the much insufficiency of their proofes that tender it stoutly strongly affectiouately and tantum non as a point of faith Not any one of their arguments is not all their arguments together are convincing Secondly because it is in Scripture every where tendred as a Prophecy and therefore a Mystery sealed up obscure not manifested nor to bee understood but by evident and plaine event without divine revelation How then these are the very words of Bishop MORTON in excuse of the Fathers concerning their erring in this verie case of ANTICHRIST can ignorance of those things which cannot possibly be understood before the time of their accomplishment in the last daies be held prejudiciall unto the wisedome of the Fathers of former times I may adde thereunto Or the cautelousnes of suspenders and not forward concluders in these times And yet farther because Protestants are divided in the question For all doe not determine or resolve that the Pope is THAT Antichrist remembred in the Scripture and yet none of them have hitherto at any time beene stiled or reputed Papists no not by Puritanicall Opposites The Scriptures as is apparent doe in this question propose us two persons AN Antichrist one with many THE
of Salvation In the second Homily there I have read thus Iustification is not the office of man but the office of GOD. and againe Iustification is the office of GOD onely and is not a thing which we render unto him but which we receive of him not which we give to him but which we take of him by his free mercy and by the onely merits of his most deerly beloved Sonne our Lord our only Redeemer Saviour and Iustifier IESUS CHRIST And yet it is Popery in M. MOUNTAGU to have said and written Properly to speake GOD only justifieth who alone imputeth not but pardoneth sinne En quo vaecordia caecos For yet moreover is it not your owne Beleefe and Profession for which if he should say otherwise M. MOUNTAGU should be cryed downe Papist that Iustification consisteth in Remission of sinnes or not imputing of them unto the man justified Ne posthac dubites saith CALVIN Instit III. XI XXII and you subscribe it quo modo nos DEUS justificet cum audis Reconciliare illum nos sibi non imputando delicta and againe Nos justificationem simpliciter interpretamur acceptationem illam quâ nos DOMINUS in gratiam receptos pro justis habet Eamque in Peccatorum remissione ac justitiae CHRISTI imputatione positam esse dicimus Sect. 2. to whom per omnia agreeth M. PERKINS in mo places than ten defining Iustification to be an Act of GOD absolving c. And yet with you M. MOUNTAGU is a Papist for affirming GOD only justifieth properly when your selves confesse that Iustification at least properly consisteth in Remission of sinnes and that none can forgive sinnes properly but GOD. How this should hang together I professe my ignorance I cannot tell For eyther Iustification in your opinions must not consist in forgivenesse of sinnes or else others beside GOD must have power of imputing or of not imputing sinnes And heere it is worth the while to observe how these detracters doe crosse their owne shinnes It will not be long before that M. MOUNTAGU with them be accounted a Papist for saying A Priest GOD'S Minister in GOD'S place can forgive sinnes and heer he is a Papist for saying GOD only justifieth properly when themselves will have Iustification to bee meerly forgivenesse of Sinnes and yet hold that none doth or can forgive Sinnes but GOD. May I not say well ô vertiginem In sober and not in madde Puritanicall sadnesse dare you say that some other beside GOD some creature over and above GOD can forgive Sinnes This is contrary to the doctrine of the Church of England in that Homily which you remember indeed but can produce no testimonie thence Because all men bee sinners saith that Homily and offenders against GOD and breakers of his Lawes and Commandements therefore can no man by his owne acts workes or else deedes seeme they never so good be justified and made righteous before GOD but everie man of necessity is constrained to seek for another righteousnesse or justification But where shall he find it where is it to bee had It is expressed according unto truth To be received at GOD'S hand It is GOD then that justifieth in this opinion of the Homily And againe in the second Homily of that argument as is already remembred Iustification is the office of GOD only it is not the office of man Credimus SPIRITUM SANCTUM in cordibus nostris habitantem voram nobis fidem impertiri ut hujus tanti mysterij cognitionem adipiscamur saith the Belgick Confession which is the POPERY of M. MOUNTAGU as pleaseth these Great Masters in Israel Lyars against their owne knowledge in saying it contradicteth the Doctrine of the English Church Or if this be not the thing they meane what is it That GOD imputeth not sinnes unto the justified or that Iustification is not in pardoning and not imputing sinnes whereas the Papists doe clamour against us for maintayning that Iustification to be received at GODS hands is forgivenes of sins and trespasses in such things as hee hath beene offended in I confesse I am a Papist if this be Popery or else that which followeth after Remission of sins against which they informe in the next place CHAP. IX Holinesse of life added unto Iustification and Remission of sins GOD justifieth originally and Faith instrumentally INFORMERS AGaine WHO only can and doth translate from death unto life reneweth a right spirit and createth a new hart within us MOUNTAGU WHo can doe this but only GOD most high It is a work of Omnipotencie to create they say it is a greater work to recreate Where sinne is pardoned by GOD and a man is become regenerate borne anew and in state of Grace with GOD there GOD by his HOLY SPIRIT worketh inward renovation Where sinne is graciously and freely pardoned there holy life and conversation doth est soones ensue This is the divinitie that I have learned in our Protestant Schooles touching this point And to my understanding it is observed and tendred by DAVID in Psal L. X. Hide thy face from my sinnes and put away all mine iniquities which is Remission of sinnes Then followeth to make up a complete worke Create in mee a clean heart O LORD and renew a right spirit within mee which to me seemeth an Infusion of Grace And S. PAUL doth everie where after vocation unto and acceptation of us with GOD urge walking according unto vocation in newnesse and in holinesse of life But because GOD was moved thereunto by a true and a lively faith in him and his mercies in CHRIST Faith is by mee said to iustifie instrumentally That GOD justifieth causally hath beene suspected of Popery and challenged therefore Now that Faith justifieth instrumentally cannot avoide the same imputation And yet the maine exception of all Papists against the doctrine of our Church is that we hold a man is iustified by Faith which must be originally or instrumentally THAT wee exclude with the forenamed Homilies That we be iustified by Faith in CHRIST only is not That this our owne act to beleeve in CHRIST or this our faith in CHRIST which is within us doth iustifie us for that were to account our selves to be iustified by some act or vertue within our selves For saith S. PAUL Rom. VIII XXXIII It is GOD that iustifieth THIS we embrace as also in the same Homily Faith doth directly send us to CHRIST for remission of our sins And by Faith given unto us of GOD wee embrace the Promise of GOD'S mercie and of Remission of sinnes which accordeth with the traduced passage of M. MOUNTAGU because GOD was drawne unto it by our Faith which laying hold upon his mercy in CHRIST obtayneth this freedome and newnesse and renewing from Him Faith is therefore said to justifie that is instrumentally or applicatorily And so I am content to passe for a Papist with the CHURCH of England CHAP. X. An Accesse declaratory made to the act of Iustification by the works of a lively Faith S.
publish it according to the CANONS prescribed unto Ministers in such cases knowing it to be the resolved doctrine of Antiquity as I do I am not excusable if I transgresse the CANONS What your ignorance may pleade for you I cannot tell I leave it to them that must look unto it where you live if you offend as you are like enough to do if it come in your way But on the other side there are Texts of Scripture that seem at least to say and have been ever taken of Writers old and new to say that the soules of the Fathers that died before CHRIST were not there whereas now they be as S. IOHN 111. 13. No man hath ascended into Heaven IOHN XIV 3. I goe to prepare a place for you PSAL. XXIV 6. Lift up your heads O you gates and be you lift up you everlasting doors and the King of glory shall come in Which Text of that Psalme all Antiquity from IUSTINE MARTYR downeward doe expound of Heaven opened at the Ascension of our SAVIOUR according unto that which we daily professe in our English LITURGIE out of and with Saint AMBROSE When thou hadst overcome the sharpnes of death thou didst OPEN the Kingdome of HEAVEN to all Beleevers So Heb. IX 8. 12. The WAY unto the HOLIEST OF ALL was NOT YET MANIFEST while as the FIRST Tabernacle was standing and Heb. X. 20. Heb. XI 39 40 UPON these grounds and others that I now remember not it hath been the common received opinion of all the FATHERS Greek and Latin that the soules of the Righteous before CHRIST were not in the highest and most glorious Heavens locally which is also the opinion of BULLINGER PETER MARTYR HYPERIUS and others BUCER and MUSCULUS directly write that the Thief was the first who with CHRIST entred into Paradise Upon M. CALVIN it is imposed by many though injuriously that he thought no righteous soule did doth or can goe into Heaven before the generall resurrection but indeed he declineth the question of the place and for the state against the Popish LIMBUS averreth that in respect of genericall happinesse they before CHRIST enjoyed the same that they doe now but for accidentall beatitude and degrees of happinesse he putteth a difference and resolveth that even now they are in profectu untill the day of Doome untill which time they expect in atrijs the consummation of their beatitude CHRISTUS Sanctuarium Coeli ingressus ad consummationem usque saeculorum solus populi eminùs in atrio residentis vota ad DEUM defert Instit 111. 20. 10. If a man should presse his words as they will beare the soules of the Righteous and those now that dye in the LORD nedum of the Fathers before CHRIST are not yet in Heaven but I doe it not This is all he favoureth the opinion of all Antiquity that the soules of the FATHERS before CHRIST were not in COELO SUMMO ET GLORIOSO and yet I hope CALVIN did not maintaine Limbus Patrum ALL this groweth for crossing your newly invented Puritanicall conceit and direct depravation of an Article of our Creed the descent of our Saviour into Hell and in answer unto the Gagger in this point have I in this particular angred the generation of your fellow-brethren The Popish Gagger objected unto the Church of England this TENET that IESUS CHRIST descended not into Hell Unto whom the substance of my Answer was With what face or what forehead can he say that we teach so that in our Creed repeat it openly and ever in the Church professe it in plaine and expresse words that propose it in Baptisme interrogatorily unto God-fathers and God-mothers to be answered unto avowed and publickly beleeved that teach it in our Catechisme unto children that subscribe it in our Articles thus THAT as CHRIST died for us and was BURIED so ALSO it is to bee beleeved that HEWENT DOWNE INTO HELL Artic. 111 that have publickly defended it against Puritanicall opposition and lastly that with us more more really and to purpose doe beleeve it than the Church of ROME doth and those that accuse us of sacrilege for violating an Article of our CREED For they professe that CHRIST onely descended into the uppermost Region of Hell LIMBUS PATRUM really into the other parts and continents virtually onely or effectually in the power of his GOD-HEAD and his Passion Non descendit ad INFEROS reproborum ac in perpetuum damnatorum saith their grand Dictator THOMAS AQUINAS quoniam ex co nulla est redemptio igitur ad eum locum descendit qui vel sinus ABRAHAE vel communiter LIMBUS PATRUM appellatur But the truth is we are at some disadvantage with our Romish Adversaries For as every one through the greedinesse of gaine may write and print almost what hee will especially if it savor of the Lemannian Lake so every private fancy every wilfull opinion ignorant assertion and some blasphemous dotages cast forth by any man that is or hath been of our Confession or is any way divided in Communion from the Church of Rome and us both is by many men and most an end by our Adversaries cast upon the generall Tenent of all Protestants and more specially upon the Church of England though that Church in the generall and approved Doctrine thereof doe detest it more than the Church of Rome doth In this very point the manifold dreames of new refined spirits are made ours their little lesse than blasphemies made ours the tergiversations qualifications disturbing of senses from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 anima Shéol Hádes Inferi Infernus and what not made ours the toies trash fables of Pagans Poets Philosophers Magicians and who not of what not brought in to trouble and disturb our belief by some that faine would bee and yet are loth to be Puritans made ours The much urging of this Article not to be found in ancient Creeds not to have been taught or beleeved of the Eastern Churches not of that of Constantinople I know not what else tending to make men first waver in their faith then to doubt of their faith and at length flatly to deny their faith if in this why not in other Articles that eyther are or may bee so serupulized all made ours laid unto our charge by our adversary and made the publick Doctrine of OUR Church So the blasphemy of CHRISTOPHER CARLILE that made this Article an Error and a Fable pag. XXVIII 77 against D. SMITH is made ours That horrible blasphemy that CHRIST indured the very torments of Hell and went down to suffer there as BANISTER and AEPINUS taught is made ours That CHRIST did being yet alive suffer in his humane soule INFERNI TREMENDA TORMENTA not onely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Greek Liturgies discrectly call them but even desperation and the second death as it is in HUMES Rejoinder unto D. HILL in DEERINGS Catechisme in your new fangled Modell of Divinity M. YATES was it not