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A20602 The second manifesto of Marcus Antonius de Dominis, Archbishop of Spalatio [sic] wherein for his better satisfaction, and the satisfaction of others, he publikely repenteth, and recanteth his former errors, and setteth downe the cause of his leauing England, and all Protestant countries, to returne vnto the Catholicke Romane Church: written by himselfe in Latine, and translated into English by M. G.K. De Dominis, Marco Antonio, 1560-1624.; G. K., fl. 1623. 1616 (1616) STC 7001; ESTC S109786 30,635 70

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from Apostolicall Tradition and succession from the most ancient Church which who so followeth cannot erre and he who contemneth and reiecteth such things is to be cast out as an haire-brained enemy of the Church Tertullian lib. de Baptismo setteth downe the vse of hallowed oyle August epist 119. numbereth also oyle amongst holy things The consecration of water for baptisme hath beene kept time out of minde in the Church for Cyprian lib. 1. epist vlt. maketh mention of the water and oyle of consecration and anoynting We haue in Optatus Miliuitanus That the holy Lib. 2. c●●e Par ent Temples if they were polluted by any meanes were wont to be hallowed againe with exorcismes and washing of the walls St. Basil deduceth from tradition Lib. de Spirita Sanct. ca. 27. the vsuall rite of annointing the baptized with oyle Antiquity teacheth that the signe of the crosse was wont to be vsed in the hallowings and consecrations of all things Iustin quest 118. Nazianzen Orat 1. against Iulian and in the Orat. at the Funerall of his Father Chrysost 55. in Matheum August tract 118. in Ioan. and serm 3. of the Annunciation and serm de tempore 181. cap. 3. Areopagita and others There are perhaps amongst vs some Rytes not so ancient in which we vse hallowed and consecrated things but seeing the Primatiue Church instructed by the Apostles feared no danger of secret Idolatry when she vsed consecrated oyle and the like why should we now feare who attribute no more vnto these consecrated things then the old Antiquity did vnto theirs Therefore to runne into schisme for these things is great impiety These rites are good seeing most of them are instituted by the Apostles and others sprung forth from the deuotion of Catholicke Churches and all are in no part contrary to faith but rather consonant vnto faith There was in old time diuersity of rytes and ceremonies in diuers Churches and yet they did not therefore depart from a mutuall Communion For as Sozominus saith They esteemed it to be friuolous and that worthily that they who agree together in the principall heads or points of Religion should be seperated one from another for the difference of a Ceremony Therefore the seperation of the English by which they haue deuided themselues from the true Catholicke Church and broken out into a manifest schisme is friuolous rash and impious And to communicate with them in diuine matters is to consent vnto their most wicked and pestiferous schisme 24 I will not here for feare of being too long dispute of the supposed new articles whereupon they ground their complaints and endeuour to excuse their schisme But will reserue this matter to be handled in another place Now I aske them this question Whither they thinke that those which they call new articles be contrary to faith or no if they should be contrary to faith then they should be heresies and should make vs heretickes worthily to be auoyded and to be seperated from the Communion of the catholicke Church But I haue proued already that there is no heresie in the Catholicke Roman Church and the Kings Maiestie of great Britaine and many learned men in that kingdome haue confessed that the Church of Rome doth not faile or erre in fundamentall points of faith and I haue already proued before that there is no true article which is not fundamentall and to be firmely beleeued therefore it maintaineth no articles which are contrary to the Catholicke faith and since they be not contrary to the true faith but containe the true faith they cannot minister a iust cause to begin a schisme But Protestants say the Church of Rome doth seperate and deuide vs from her because we respect those articles But I am sorry and lament that they had made a most foule and grosse schisme before any thing was spoken of concerning these articles which they call new Therefore it is great folly in them to alleage these new articles as a cloake for their schisme for the effect cannot goe before his cause I defend that they haue made a schisme without cause and by this I knew that they were manifest schismatickes and therefore haue departed from them And those same articles which Protestants affirme to be new may be euidently demonstrated out of Scriptures Traditions and Fathers to be true and the contrary articles which they set downe may be conuinced out of them to containe manifest heresies If the sence of the first Authors be retained for some milder Protestants now of late in matters of Controuersie as I haue heard doe vse fauourable explications not much dissonant from Catholicke doctrine by which they seeme to tend to a pious Reconciliation Who without a pernitious errour or rather plaine heresie can put all his saluation in faith only and exclude the necessitie of good workes and absolutely denie our merits and affirme that grace once had cannot be lost and that the iust cannot sinne They who hold with tooth and nayle that these and the like are articles of faith and that the contrary are heresies doe without question erre in matters of faith and declare themselues to be hereticks and by consequence are worthily numbred amongst hereticks by Catholicks in their definitions Therefore not any heresie of the Church of Rome or her manifest or secret Idolatry could giue an occasion vnto the Protestants schisme Neither can they obiect schisme vnto the Roman Church for she made not the schisme but they made it and she endured it for from her Luther and Caluin and the rest seperated themselues first and not she from them When they obstinatly reiected the Iudgement of the Church then they made a schisme Then they deuided the Coate of Christ then they errected one Altar against another then they forsooke the true Church 25 Besides the causes before rehearsed and examined they also pretended for their schisme a necessitie of Reformation in the Church But I could neuer yet see any reformation amongst them but to say the truth I obserued many deformations for the care of conscience is vtterly neglected and cast away amongst them some few accepted the rest haue no scruple of conscience to commit adultery violent extertion treacherie against their neighbours cosenage vsury as people who haue impiously abollished auricular confession fastings penance and such like holy exercises And suppose that they had found amongst vs any thing to be reprehended either in our manners or in our actions or in our gouernment that should not be imputed to the defects of the Church but vnto particular men whose actions are not allowed but reproued by Catholicks neither ought they to haue raised a filthy schisme for those smaller matters when the foundation of faith remained firme stable and vnshaden in the Church of Rome And suppose that we had builded vpon it Wood stubble or Hay as it is said in 1. Cor. 3. 12. Yet we should not be excluded from saluation But the Protestants haue left the
be that Babtlon spoken of in the Apocalips for it is the opinon of many Catholicke Interpreters that in the persecution of Antichrist the Ethnick Idolaters and the Enemies of the Christian name shall perhaps subdue it and of such that prophesie not yet fulfilled may be fitly verified yet in such sort as the faith of the Catholicke Church may continue safe and found Whereby now you see that my applying it to Christian Rome is but a meere calumniation for I know that Christian Rome is not Babylon neither can it be so called without great iniurie and God forbid that by this Prohesie we should vnderstand the same Romane Church which is the Mother and the head of all either to haue beene or hereafter to become Babylon for those things which are spoken of the Citie are not to be transferred vnto the Church I denied that there is a Church at Rome but I did not proue it therefore that negation must be layed vp amongst my euill speeches reproaches and heresies and conuincing my selfe within my selfe being ouercome by reason euen in the same Treatises I constantly affirmed that the Romane Church with her adherents was the only Church of Christ and now I doe most earnestly professe and affirme it I said it made a Schisme when I had not yet exact consideration what a Schisme was and in this I erred grosly this being a manifest falsehood and the proofe which I brought in confirmation is of no force For he who is lawfully appointed head of a Body and calleth and publisheth himselfe for head of the same body doth not seperate himselfe from the body neither casteth away the body from him but ioyneth himselfe vnto the body which hath no coherence with a Schisme yet I will handle this matter more at large in the correction of that worke Now I proceede to declare how it is euident to me that the English Sectaries and much more all the other Sectaries of our age are truly and properly Schismaticks because they haue seperated themselues without any lawfull cause from the true Church of Christ which is the Catholick Romane Church and her adherents 10 There can be onely two causes of a lawfull separation why one or more Churches of Christ and yet not commit Schisme should abandon one or more other Churches from their communion The one is heresie and the other is Schisme it selfe This is well knowne vnto all the faithfull that the hereticall Churches which are incorrigible are to be auoyded by Catholickes and that with such they ought not to haue any Ecclesiasticall communion I enquired often times of the English why they seperated themselues frō the church of Rome her adherents whither for any heresie And truly not none of them could either by words or writing shew me that the Romane Catholicks either of our time or in the time of our auncestors in their generall publi ke profession were at any time stayned with any heresie The Kings Maiestie himselfe of great Eritanie granted to me publickly and plainely and so did the wiser sort of their Ministers of all sorts and not a fewe of their learned men that the Church of Rome did not erre in fundamentall poynts of Faith wherefore the Church of Rome is not hereticall if we will take but that which they graunt Perhaps they will say the Church of Rome doth not erre in fundamentall poynts of faith which thing I also seemed to teach especially in the causes of my departing and in the Sermon I preached at London yet they erre and are fallen into heresie in other articles of faith which be not fundamentall But first I know not what article it may be of true faith which is not fundamentall for neither could I vnderstand nor they explicate vnto me how there may be such a distinction made or admitted that some be fundamentall and some not I haue alwayes thought that all and the sole articles which are truly articles of faith were fundamentall yet I errred when I excluded many true articles from the fundamentall which being true were also fundamentall articles and without heresie could not be denied although they be not of those principall articles of the Trinity incarnation necessity of grace Baptisme in the name of the Trinity c. such as are the Sacraments iustification necessity of workes merrits indulgences and the rest which I haue before rehearsed as already limitted in the Church because those things relye no lesse vpon the reuelation of God then the former and for that cause appertaine no lesse vnto faith then those For he that thinketh God to be a deceiuer in any one article whatsoeuer it be must of necessity also acknowledge him to be a deceiuer in all the rest Then I enquired often times of them who dealt seriously in the businesse to shew some article of faith in which the Church of Rome thought taught erroniously They vse to bring the article of Transubstantion of the bread into the body of Christ frō which they gather as they think some heresies viz. That Christ hath not a true body but a phantasticall if that in the least crum of the bread we put that whole body so that a body should not be a body Item that Christ is not in heauen if he be vpō the Altar on earth which is contrary to the article of the ascension of our Lord. Itē that Christ is not borne of the virgin Mary if that we do make him of bread In these men it is most true that which St. Hierome saith vpon the Epistle vnto Titus cap. 3. There is no Schisme that doth not inuent some heresie vnto it selfe that it may seeme to haue departed frō the Church vpon a iust cause But transubstantiation which the Catholicks professe is very far distant frō those heresies for all the properties of a body in thēselues are safe although they be put in a crum of bread but the same proprieties in order vnto the place which is externall to the body be seperable from it by the diuine omnipotencie which our Schoolmen explicate sufficiently But what heresie can they find in vs if we all doe constantly confesse that we beleeue as an article of faith that Christ had hath a true body with all his naturall proprieties in himself which we beleeue confesse may be kept by the same omnipotencie euen whē the body is brought into the least externall place neither can any impugne this Theologically and humane Philosophy neither can nor ought to measure the diuine power Let naturall Philosophy iudge what may be done by nature but let her reuerence and not iudge those things that be aboue nature Neither doth it follow that the body of Christ is not in heauen if it be vpon the Altar we all confesse that we beleeue by a diuine faith that Christ ascended into heauen and there sitteth continually at the right hand of the Father But yet we say that by dinine power one and the same body may
foundation they haue forsaken the foundation it selfe and the gold and siluer and pretious stones which they vainely brag of and vaunt to be theirs are more base then the filth and mire in the streets vnlesse they be built vpon the true foundation which is Christ There is one foundation not two foundations one Church not two one Christ not two If Christ be our foundation which they cannot deny then he is not theirs They haue made another Church deuided and seperated from ours and that cannot be the Church for that the Church is one and not two He that will be a member of that Church must needs be without the true Church of Christ 26 I confesse that the English Protestants deceiued me before that I had exactly considered the nature of a schisme for when I obiected schisme vnto them some answered that it was not their fault that they did not communicate with the Church of Rome they were ready to be in vnion but the Pope would not receiue them into his communion but reiected them with an anathema This excuse seemed to me for a time to be iust and reasonable but after I begun out of this ground in my priuate arguments and publike Sermons to vrge an vnion which vpon their words seemed to me somewhat easily to be concluded and so thrust my finger further into the wound then I perceiued that in England they did not vse the English confession or authorised articles for a rule of their faith which as they affirmed were very modest But the Confession of Caluin and many grosse errours of Luther And this I perceiued more euidently when I looked into the counterfeit Sinod of the Protestants at Dort in which the puritanicall articles of Caluine by consent of the English Agents were confirmed with the good liking of the English sect And if the English confession which is deuided into certaine articles doth not include in them those puritanicall articles of Dort why did they giue their consent and voyces vnto the Caluinian excesses in the name of the English sect Moreouer how can they which professe themselues mortall Enemyes to the Church of Rome be thought to desire an vnion with the Church of Rome and that the defect of agreement is not on their parts How can they cast the causes of schisme vpon the curses of Rome and Councell of Trident when before the said curses they had deuided themselues by schisme from the Catholicke Church and by such a schisme as in some respect was farre worse and more foule then was the schisme which was first raised by Luther and increased by Caluine For that England at the beginning abstained from the opinions of Luther and Caluine neither did they charge the Church of Rome either with heresie or Idolatry which the Lutherans and Caluinists made the pretext of their schisme and yet neuerthelesse without any apparent cause long after they yealded vnto the common schisme of these hereticks And now at this time the Englishmen for the most part doe not onely commend and defend the deuision and seperation made but striue by all force to maintaine it for they flye backe from vnion cast away charity and doe all they can to hinder peace and brotherly Loue in such sort as that many of them say they will sooner and more willingly enter into allyance or league with the Turks then with the Papists Call you this a minde ready to agree or to make an attonement is it likely to be true that the fault is not theirs why they doe not communicate with the Romane Church No it cannot possibly be that the vnion whereof I had some hope should take effect except they doe first detest all heresies and heretickes and beleeue aright with the Catholicke Roman Church and be conioyned vnto it in perfect Charitie 27 Henry the 8. made little difference but with the Pope onely whose primacie he denied with an hereticall spirit and moued with some distempered humours violently tooke vnto himselfe onely the Ecclesiasticall supremacie and carried himselfe more modegatly in other things which belonged vnto the faith and diuine seruice and ceremonies of the Catholicke Religion Vnder Edward his sonne a childe and much more vnder Elizabeth they departed not onely from the Pope the Vicar of Christ and supreame Pastor of the whole Christian slocke but also the diuine seruice and worship of God was taken away from the Catholicks by maine force and iniury and forbidden by the publique secular lawes What was there any lawfull Synode first called were the obiections against the Catholicks examined and discussed were their answers heard were they conuicted of any errour or impiety in Religion was the iudgement giuen by any competent Iudge No such matter Doth not the same violence the same iniury the same impietie continue for what labour and paines doe they who haue the chiefe charge of their Religion in England such as it is daily take least that the diuine anncient pious and prescript seruice should be restored vnto Catholicks And are not they then in the fault that the Schisme is not taken away They vrge Reformation yet Reformation although it be iust and necessary if it be done with Schisme is a most foule hatefull deformation That is reformed which continuch the same in substance Therefore the Catholicke Religion and her substantiall exercises ought to haue remained in England and if any thing therein had been to be reformed it should haue beene put vnder a lawfull reformation seruatis seru●●ndes without taking away necessaries And they should not haue brought in another Religion and suppressed the former or thrust it into a corner thereby to make two contrary and repugnant Religions so as the first is not reformed but as much as in them lyeth lestroyed and a new forged Moreouer there cannot be two Religions of Christ but one onely which is ours as I haue shewed because there is but one Church one foundation and one Christ 28. Therefore when amongst other euils I saw my selfe enuironed on euery side with an inuetterate Schisme and that there was no hope of vnion an Altar being erected against an Altar and disioyned from the charity of the Church I neither ought nor could stay with them any longer with a safe conscience Wherefore the remorse of conscience compelled me to returne vnto the Catholicke Church My Agar hearing the voyce of the Angell reprouing her and saying Returne vnto thy Mistris and humble thy selfe vnder Gen. 16. 9 her hand was forced of necessity to returne vnto the most holy Church her Mistris Moreouer my slight could bring me nothing but shame and destruction God commaunded me to be humble vnder the hand of my Mistris and in this thing especially it behooued me to follow God I wish to God that they vnto whom I foolishly fled would acknowledge their most miserable spirituall estate not onely for their heresies but also for their lamentable Schisme from which as I haue shewed them they cannot be