of as great mutability as time hath mutation is in potentia another thing to the proportion of the changes of time as because a man who walks can stop and the flame of a candle go out in an instant therefore the consistency of a material subject as to our minds consideration is but moment-strong and we can affirm nothing of it in force of contradiction more durable then the unchangeableness or identity of time which is purely a thought or an abstraction Out of this it follows that if we put in spirituall substances a more then momentanean constancy we must also put the force of contradiction in them proportionable to that constancy or identity of it self to it self Now your self seeming to admit this constancy under the name of aeviternity in spirits for a future eternity it seems to me you should admit nothing in spirits that is not compossible together in the subject and by evident consequence that not to have an act and to have one in the same aeviternity is as impossible as not to have and to have in the same instant of time You will peradventure tell me this position ruins some common opinions in Divinity and my brittle Vindicator would tell me it moulder'd away his faith Sir if you be of the opinion that Theology is arriv'd to its non plus ultra I am not I think many now common and probable opinions will in after ages be demonstrated against and prove erroneous and therefore the pure authority of Divines who build upon pure reason hath no farther force with me then their reason And I think I have learned this lesson out of Saint Augustin as I am sure your self also have how ever in practice apparences may seduce you from the exercise of it as if you believe it consonant to Scriptures Fathers Councils c. without a legitimate examination of them which when you go about you find them to be easily eluded by the glosses of blasted Authors many of which kind of Authors nevertheless Saint Hierom in his Comments upon the Scriptures was used to cite that men of understanding might see in the variety of divers conceits what truths might be picked out even of blasted Authors as Aristotle out of the verities mingled among false opinions drew his own demonstrations The rest of these Chapters is but an explication indifferent to both sides in which as you admit in Purgatory a disposition to charity so me thinks you should to the change of affections by it And whereas you say that the soul is extra viam the common Tenet of Divines should admonish you that she is not in state to have new revelations and changes which are the propriety of Via Notes on the tenth Chapter WHich is for its Positions entirely true and holy but you seem to suppose as true some misinformations or misapprehensions concerning your Adversary as that he questions generall traditions and calls them novelties which how you can do who know Saint Austin testifies in his time as yet the question was not agitated and that each part might prove either true or false and that the Authour of the celebrated Dialogues expresly teaches they were unknown till his dayes and from thence till Saint Odilo's time very little esteemed or noysed How such an opinion can chuse but be a Novelty in respect of the Church of God I cannot understand or that six hundred years ago with a known beginning can enroll it into the practices or doctrins delivered by the Apostles passes my reach As for the universall sense of the Church I hope the Council of Florence's act will demonstrate the contrary as you may see in my answer to the Vindicator whither I beg leave to remit you The Text you cite out of Saint Austin is excellently true Quae universa tenet Ecclesia ab Apostolis praecepta bene creduntur quanquam scripta non reperiantur but with these cautions That the Church that is the community of Believers as such not as a multitude of men hold them as of faith not opine them only to be current truths else every common perswasion grounded on any probable Reason or Authority would become an unchangeable Article of Christian Religion and in this I think I have your consent if I mistake not the the 32. Chapter of your Systema which I formerly cited and desire my Reader to peruse the whole Chapter being excellently pertinent to this purpose As also Verons general Rule of Catholike faith which I hear is newly translated into English There you shall see how warily that experienced Controvertist proceeds in separating faith from opinions No doctrin says he begun since the Apostles though confirm'd by miracles and those miracles reported by Saints or approved by generall Councils or attested in the Bulls of canonization can ever be an Article of faith Nor is the practice says the same Auhor even of the universall Church a ground firm enough to build a point of Catholike faith upon because the object of faith is truth and the Church often guides her practices by probable opinions which upon occasion she may change And for Decrees of Councils the same Doctor maintains and cites Bellarmin for his opinion that unless the Council proceed conciliarly that is by due examination c. and define properly not barely affirm a thing by simple assertion and occasionally as it were en passant it does not oblige our belief and which is highest of all though the Council decree expresly and professedly a Doctrin debated yet unless it be defined as a truth to be believed with Catholike faith they are not properly heretiques that hold the contrary What you deliver that one mans satispassion may by way of impetration satisfie for another and profit him is very acceptable and none but they who mistake the words can dislike the sense for we see humiliations accompany solemn prayers both in the Law of Moses and Grace and nature it self teaches us it is a convenient habit for him that intreats mercy Notes on the eleventh Chapter WHere I see very little for me particularly to except against but that you term our Tenet an Innovation which name better becomes your own But this is an Indulgence to be granted to the conceit every one has of his own arguments For the opinion that the sensitive or corporeall part of man is capable of venial sin in it self and so of goodness I neither have nor will have any thing to do with it You say 't is taught by the most speculative Divines as Scotus's Scool and Cajetan c. I dare not meddle with such great men As for your Opiniators you speak of I cannot point you to a fairer example then the Vindicators Creed which he hath declared to be his faith in his Discourse against me To the touch you give about probable opinions the question is too great to engage in on so slight an occasion The place you quote out of Saint Austin seems not to concern the
to be excepted against Rather I congratulate among many other learned passages in this Chapter your truly Catholike explication of the Churches Tenet that while they are in Purgatory their sins remain and that their sins once perfectly taken away they are straight in Heaven which is in my mind the true sense of the Bull and Council Though I cannot approve what you attribute to Scotus that in Hell veniall sins after certain proportion of punishment cease to be which I think a misgrounded and exotick conceit Notes on the seventh Chapter IN your seventh Chapter you give Aristotles Reason for the unchangeableness of an abstracted soul a very true and good one but so dangerous if not perfectly understood that it hath precipitated divers Peripateticks into the suspicion if not the reality of being Atheists because a substance without an action is accounted among Philosophers frustraneous and superfluous and incongruous to nature to avoid which inconvenience I must note that this is one difference betwixt bodily spirituall substances that bodies are essentially instrumentall and therefore where they are the directly and primarily intended parts of nature they are frustraneous and idle if they have not motion but spirituall substances especially separated souls are certain beings which are the end of bodies and of all changes which end succeeds to changes as standing still and quiet doth to locall motion as being at home to the journey by which we come thither as health to curing and manhood to growth therefore souls are of themselves uncapable of motion as being now grown above materiality which is the possibility to change and motion and so by the negation of materiality in Peripatetick Philosophy is demonstrated the unchangeableness of souls And who ever supposes a change in spirits must suppose them also to have a potentiality to somewhat which is to be attained by motion as indeed those Divines do who put change in them This is Aristotles way throughout his Philosophy which those Peripateticks understood not who drew the mortality of the soul out of the deficiency of fancy in her I am glad in the mean while to meet an Adversary so learned as to penetrate the truth of Aristotles and S. Thomas his Tenet and so ingenuous as to attest those great Lights are on my side by which it appears I am not left singular in my opinion A favour the Vindicator would not aford me but made it injurious in me to pretend or assert I built on Saint Thomas his Principles It is now time to retire from this digression to the imputation you lay upon the Translator out of the Council of Trent where it forbids difficult points to be preached to the vulgar which you extend to the putting them into vulgar Languages not without some wrong to all such great wits who are as capable of high speculations as the Greeks and Romans were and yet know no other Tongues then their mothers and what Languages I pray you did those Greeks and Romans themselves use in their sublimest discourses but their mother Language In fine the practice of other Nations testifies that the Councils prohibition reacheth not so far if you think it did I wonder you prest it not home look in his Preface and you shall see this perform'd by him both to his and my justification of which yet you vouchsafe not to take the least notice But I would heartily intreat you to consider likewise those branches of the Decree which concerns your party and is a great deal more morall and important to vertue Incerta etiam vel quae specie falsi laborant evulgari ac tractari non permittant Uncertain devotions ought not to be divulged how much less violently pressed Were there but one clear sentence of a Father for the opinion of souls being freed before Judgement Were there any ground of it but unproveable revelations before the School Did there any ancient School man censure the contrary did it not pass in the Council of Florence for an indifferent opinion and the contrary not to be exacted Did not even at this day the gravest School men temper themselves from censure whatsoever their private opinion is I might think this command might less concern you But if none of this I have said can be confuted then lay your hand upon your heart and think what is to be done Remember in what language the scandalous delusive promises annext to certain prayers are printed and improvidently thrust as your Epistle calls it into Ladies hands look but a little about you and you may perhaps find motives enough to proceed very temperately in applying the Council of Trent against that worthy Person that translated the Book whose conclusion you dislike but confute not the Premises Your next opposition is about the day of Judgment which you say is not to be prayed for and your grounds are the dreadfulness of it and a place out of Saint Hilary And as for the dreadfulness I pray consider the words you cite Cum vix justus sit securus which if you please to mark say the just shall be secure that is out of all fear Consider also the triumph the book of Wisdom describes Then that the just stand up in great assurance c. And you your self know it is the sense of the whole Church that even in Purgatory they are all secure of their salvation As for Saint Hierom he was yet in the state of uncertainty and therefore no wonder if he had a deep apprehension of it being perpetually in thought of his sins But this was not the way which the spirit of God led Saint Martin Saint Ambrose and a late Saint who professed he rather desired to live in uncertainty of his salvation so to gain souls then to die immediately with security of going to heaven nor the mind of Saint Paul who desired to be dissolved and accounted death a gain so you see one Saints apprehensions are not to be the rule of the Church We have our Saviours warrant exhortation even to them who shall see the disorder of the heavens in way to judgment to lift up their heads with joy that their redemption is neer And Saint Paul calls the Saints those who love Christs coming And our only Master teaches us to say Thy Kingdom come Nevertheless I admit that the frightfulness of that great scene of the Universall conflagration may deterr spirits weak and not confident of their strength from desiring to be alive themselves at that day but not from desiring to come when God hath prepared elect Saints fit to encounter those terrors and to pray that such men may quickly be raised which is more regardfull in their way who think that even in aeviternity the addition of time is of eminent consequence Briefly in the day of Judgment there are two things considerable One the terrors and dangers in relation to which part none can conceive we ought to pray for it the other the great rewards and
especially should my Vindicator proceed close and pertinently like a serious man and an ingenious Schollar for so I should have more time to attend on the weightier matters And most of all if he would enlarge himself a little upon the same Question in his next Vindication for I shall be glad to be directed and assisted by any one But if any be so unexperienc'd as to imagin all that is deliver'd or decreed is absolutely of Faith let him satisfie the instances commonly urg'd by Divines of the Assumption of our Blessed Lady of the souls being the Form of our body and many other such truths universally assented to but not admitted into the Catalogue of Articles In fine if this last be your opinion you will find very few wise men of your mind if the former you are equally concern'd with me to separate Catholike from Theologicall Faith or any other Proposition of inferiour qualification The Conclusion THus have you my Opinion on your Result as full and particular as can be expected from a weak understanding subject to negligence and oversight yet to my power sincere and captive to the love of truth I hope you cannot be offended at my oppositions for I have that esteem of you that you are a lover of truth and not sway'd by passion or interest but only prejudiced by the force of custom and the reverence of School-opinions Censures though I think they belong to the duty of a Divine fit to shew his works to the Sun yet in this piece I have used none And though the unwary compliance of this age with Error makes me esteem'd censorious yet my heart told me I was oblig'd to do so when ever I engag'd my Pen into it and that I spared far more Opinions justly blameable then I censured because I deemed them not so pernicious as to force me to it The style I have not much regarded holding that both the matter and my age warn me not to be sollicitous of it but rather to speak quinque verba in meo sensu quam decem millia verborum in lingua In a word if I gain your Opinion of my sincerity let the Controversy it self speak for the truth and the reasons which are on both sides I must acknowledge my self ever obliged to you that you have shewn our Catholiques how to demean themselves with moderation towards one another in litigious disputes and with these thanks make way to your credulity that I am Your cordiall Friend and Servant THOMAS WHITE Postscript BEing inform'd that some few scrupulous and I fear unsatisfiable persons object against my Religion and Reason that it takes no notice of those words even before the Resumption of their bodies c. on which they chiefly ground I could not I confess at first but wonder at their prejudice which had so imprinted those words in their fancyes in Capitall that they could not see or know them in a lesser Character For I not onely took notice of them in my 34 and 35 pages and put them down at large as in the Bull cited by themselves but addrest my self purposely there to show them as impossible to favour their Cause as 't is that the Subject of a Proposition should be the Predicate which every smatterer knows to be in Logick the highest absurdity imaginable Besides in divers other places of my Book where any thing was attempted or urg'd from those words I offer'd my satisfaction to their difficulties with what success the Books must shew In the mean time I crave the favour upon occasion of their miscarriage in this that none would lend too easie credit to objections whispered in corners which are afraid to appear and justifie themselves in writing under their hands If any such be offer'd I shall both take it as a favour and acknowledge it my duty to satisfie them If not 't is so like the way of clamour and detraction that all persons meanly prudent will I hope neglect them and so shall I. INDEX AEviternal things not changable by Time p. 37.38 S. Ambrose's Testimony not prejudiciall p. 29.30 The opinion of Ante judiciary Delivery by occasioning the multitude of unworthy Priests harmfull to the Church p. 5.6 impairing solid Devotion p. 6.7 injuring civill Duties if follow'd p. 7. Fraudulently practis'd by many ibid. The Effects of it is true uncertain p. 9.10 The Church not chargeable with these Abuses p. 10. Censures allowable among Divines p. 67. S. Chrysostom's Testimony not prejudiciall p 31 32. Charity to be used in managing Opinions and why p. 12 13. Composition how found in Spirits p. 51 52. Delivery in the day of Judgment not singular in being universally held yet but an Opinion p. 12.16 18.19.26.61 not prejudic'd by Priviledg'd Altars and Indulgences rightly understood and sincerely practis'd p. 65 66. Delivery from Hell pray'd for in the offertory p. 34 35. Devotions not warrantable glanc't at p. 63 64 65. Identity of Time why necessary to Contradiction p. 57. Iudgment-day desirable p. 43 44 45. Language concerning Spirits how verifiable p 21 22 23 c. Penance how held by the Authour p. 38 39. Prayer when perfectest p. 50 51. Prayer for the dead manifoldly beneficiall p. 45. to p. 50. of equall efficacy in the deniers as the holders of Ante judiciary Delivery p 30 31. Priority of Nature not found in a pure Indivisible p. 38. Relief in Purgatory in the Authors Doctrin from p. 20 to p. 28. Reuelations even of great Saints how errable p. 69. Those of Gregory and Bede generally contradicted p. 32 33.72 This later unconsonant to Faith p. 70.71 That of the dead Skull examin'd p. 14 15 16.72 Sins remoining in Purgatory granted p. 39. Seuls separate why unchangeable in true Peripatetick Doctrin p. 40 41. This Incapacity of change the Result of their nature p 55 56. In what sence supernaturally deliverable before Iudgment p. 73 74. Tradition alone sufficient for Faith p. 35 36. Translating the Middle State not criminally scandalous p. 4 5. but judiciously pious p. 10. occasioned by others p. 11. Not this but the Adversaries carriage forbid by the Council of Trent p. 42 43. FINIS