as good be of none at all Nor to trouble you Fourthly with this that a great part of your Doctrine especially in the points contested makes apparently for the temporal ends of the Teachers of it which yet I fear is a great scandal to many Beaux Esprits among you Only I should desire you to consider attentively when you conclude so often from the Differences of Protestants that they have no certainty of any part of their Religion no not of those points wherein they agree Whether you do not that which so Magisterially you direct me not to do that is proceed a destructive way and object arguments against your Adversaries which tend to the overthrow of all Religion And whether as you argue thus Protestants differ in many things therefore they have no certainty of any thing So an Atheist or a Sceptique may not conclude as well Christians and the Professors of all Religions differ in many things therefore they have no certainty in any thing Again I should desire you to tell me ingenuously Whether it be not too probable that your portentous Doctrine of Transubstantiation joyned with your fore-mentioned perswasion of No Papists no Christians hath brought a great many others as well as himself to Averroes his resolution Quandoquidem Christiani adorant quod comedunt sit anima mea cum Philosophis Whether your requiring men upon only probable and prudential Motives to yield a most certain assent unto things in humane reason impossible and telling them as you do too often that they were as good not believe at all as believe with any lower degree of faith be not a likely way to make considering men scorn your Religion and consequently all if they know no other as requiring things contradictory and impossible to be performed Lastly Whether your pretence that there is no good ground to believe Scripture but your Churches infallibility joyned with your pretending no ground for this but some texts of Scripture be not a fair way to make them that understand themselves believe neither Church nor Scripture 9. Your calumnies against Protestants in generall are set down in these words Chap. 2. § 2. The very doctrine of Protestants if it be followed closely and with coherence to it self must of necessity induce Socinianism This I say confidently and evidently prove by instancing in one error which may well be tearmed the Capital and mother-Heresie from which all other must follow at ease I mean their heresie in affirming That the perpetual visible Church of Christ descended by a never interrupted succession from our Saviour to this day is not infallible in all that it proposeth to be believed as revealed truths For if the infallibility of such a publique Authority be once impeached what remains but that every man is given over to his own wit and discourse And talk not here of Holy Scripture For if the true Church may erre in defining what Scriptures be Canonicall or in delivering the sense and meaning thereof we are still devolved either upon the private spirit a foolery now exploded out of England which finally leaving every man to his own conceits ends in Socinianism or else upon natural wit and judgement for examining and determining What Scriptures contain true or false doctrine and in that respect ought to be received or rejected And indeed take away the authority of God's Church no man can be assured that any one Book or parcel of Scripture was written by divine inspiration or that all the contents are infallibly true which are the direct errors of Socinians If it were but for this reason alone no man who regards the eternal salvation of his soul would live or dye in Protestancy from which so vast absurdities as these of the Socinians must inevitably follow And it ought to be an unspeakable comfort to all us Catholiques while we consider that none can deny the infallible authority of our Church but joyntly he must be left to his own wit and wayes and must abandon all infused faith and true Religion if he do but understand himself aright In all which discourse the only true word you speak is This I say confidently As for proving evidently that I believe you reserved for some other opportunity for the present I am sure you have been very sparing of it 10. You say indeed confidently enough that The deny all of the Churches infallibility is the Mother-Heresie from which all other must follow at ease Which is so far from being a necessary truth as you make it that it is indeed a manifest falshood Neither is it possible for the wit of man by any good or so much as probable consequence from the denyal of the Churches Infallibility to deduce any one of the ancient Heresies or any one error of the Socinians which are the Heresies here entreated of For who would not laugh at him that should argue thus Neither the Church of Rome nor any other Church is infallible Ergo The doctrine of Arrius Pelagius Eutyches Nestorius Photinus Manichaeus was true Doctrine On the other side it may be truly said and justified by very good and effectual reason that he that affirms with you the Pope's infallibility puts himself into his hands and power to be led by him at his ease and pleasure into all Heresie and even to Hell it self and cannot with reason say so long as he is constant to his grounds Domine cur ita facis but must believe white to be black and black to be white vertue to be vice and vice to be vertue nay which is a horrible but a most certain truth Christ to be Antichrist and Antichrist to be Christ if it be possible for the Pope to say so Which I say and will maintain howsoever you daub and disguise it is indeed to make men Apostate from Christ to his pretended Vicar but real Enemy For that name and no better if we may speak truth without offence I presume He deserves who under pretence of interpreting the Law of Christ which Authority without any word of express warrant he hath taken upon himself doth in many parts evacuate and dissolve it So dethroning Christ from his dominion over mens consciences and instead of Christ setting up Himself Inasmuch as he that requires that his interpretations of any Law should be obeyed as true and genuine seem they to mens understandings never so dissonant and discordant from it as the Bishop of Rome does requires indeed that his interpretations should be the Lawes and he that is firmly prepared in minde to believe and receive all such interpretations without judging of them and though to his private judgement they seem unreasonable is indeed congruously disposed to hold Adultery a venial sin and Fornication no sin whensoever the Pope and his Adherents shall so declare And whatsoever he may plead yet either wittingly or ignorantly he makes the Law and the Law-maker both stales and obeyes only the Interpreter As if I should pretend that I should
the Jewish Church endued with an absolutely infallible direction in case of moment as all Points belonging to divine Faith are Now the Church of Christ our Lord was before the Scriptures of the New Testament which were not written instantly nor all at one time but successively upon several occasions and some after the decease of most of the Apostles and after they were written they were not presently known to all Churches and of some there was doubt in the Church for some Ages after our Saviour Shall we then say that according as the Church by little and little received holy Scripture she was by the like degrees devested of her possessed Infallibility and power to decide Controversies in Religion That sometime Churches had one Judge of Controversies and others another That with moneths or years as new Canonical Scripture grew to be published the Church altered her whole Rule of Faith or Judge of Controversies After the Apostles time and after the writing of Scriptures Heresies would be sure to rise requiring in God's Church for their discovery and condemnation Infallibility either to write new Canonical Scripture as was done in the Apostles time by occasion of emergent Heresies or Infallibility to interpret Scriptures already written or without Scripture by divine unwritten Traditions and assistance of the holy Ghost to determine all Controversies as Tertullian saith The soul is h De test aniâ— cap. 5. before the letter and speech before Books and sense before style Certainly such addition of Scripture with derogation or substraction from the former power and infallibility of the Church would have brought to the world division in matters of faith and the Church had rather lost than gained by holy Scripture which ought to be farr from our tongues and thoughts it being manifest that for decision of Controversies Infallibility setled in a living Judge is incomparably more useful and fit than if it were conceived as inherent in some inanimate writing Is there such repugnance betwixt Infallibility of the Church and Existence of Scripture that the production of the one must be the destruction of the other Must the Church wax dry by giving to her Children the milk of sacred Writ No No. Her Infallibility was and is derived from an inexhausted Fountain If Protestants will have the Scripture alone for their Judge let them first produce some Scripture affirming that by the entring thereof Infallibility went out of the Church D. Potter may remember what himself teacheth That the Church is still endued with Infallibility in Points Fundamental and consequently that Infallibility in the Church doth well agree with the truth the sanctity yea with the sufficiency of Scripture for all matters necessary to Salvation I would therefore gladly know out of what Text he imagineth that the Church by the coming of Scripture was deprived of Infallibility in some Points and not in others He affirmeth that the Jewish Synagogue retained infallibility in herself notwithstanding the writing of the Old Testament and will he so unworthily and unjustly deprive the Church of Christ of Infallibility by reason of the New Testament Especially if we consider that in the Old Testament Laws Ceremonies Rites Punishments Judgements Sacraments Sacrifices c. were more particularly and minutely delivered to the Jews than in the New Testament is done our Saviour leaving the determination or declaration of particulars to his Spouse the Church which therefore stands in need of Infallibility more than the Jewish Synagogue D. Potter i Pag. 24. against this argument drawn from the power and infallibility of the Synagogue objects That we might as well inserr that Christians must have one Soveraign Prince over all because the Jews had one chief Judge But the disparity is very clear The Synagogue was a type and figure of the Church of Christ not so their civil Government of Christian Common-wealths or Kingdoms The Church succeeded to the Synagogue but not Christian Princes to Jewish Magistrates And the Church is compared to a house or k Heb. 13. family to an l Cant. 2. Army to a m 1 Cor. 10. Ephes 4. body to a n Mat. 12. kingdom c. all which require one Master one General one head one Magistrate one spiritual King as our blessed Saviour with fict Unum ovile o Joan. c. 10. joyned Unus Pastor One Sheepsold One Pastour But all distinct Kingdoms or Common-wealths are not one Army Family c. And finally it is necessary to Salvation that all have recourse to one Church but for temporal weale there is no need that all submit or depend upon one temporal Prince Kingdom or Common-wealth and therefore our Saviour hath left to his whole Church as being One one Law one Scripture the same Sacraments c. Whereas Kingdoms have their several Laws different governments diversity of Powers Magistracy c. And so this objection returneth upon D. Potter For as in the One Community of the Jews there was one Power and Judge to end debates and resolve difficulties so in the Church of Christ which is One there must be some one Authority to decide all Controversies in Religion 24. This Discourse is excellently proved by ancient S. Irenaeus p Lib. 5. c. 4. in these words What if the Apostles had not lest Scriptures ought we not to have followed the order of Tradition which they delivered to those to whom they committed the Churches to which order many Nations yield assent who believe in Christ having Salvation written in their hearts by the Spirit of God without letters or lake and diligent keeping ancient Tradition It is easie to receive the truth from God's Church seeing the Apostles have most fully deposited in her as in a rich store-house all things belonging to truth For what if there should arise any contention of some small question ought we not to have recourse to the most ancient Churches and from them to receive what is certain and clear concerning the present question 25. Besides all this the doctrine of Protestants is destructive of it self For either they have certain and infallible means not to err in interpreting Scripture or they have not If not then the Scripâ—ure to them cannot be a sufficient ground for infallible Faith nor a meet Judge of Controversies If they have certain infallible means and so cannot err in their interpretations of Scriptures then they are able with infallibility to hear examine and determine all Controversies of Faith and so they may be and are Judges of Controversies although they use the Scripture as a Rule And thus against their own doctrin they constitute another Judge of Controversies besides Scripture alone 26. Lastly I ask D. Potter Whether â—his Assertion Scripture alone is Judge of all Controversies in Faith be a fundamental Point of Faith or no He must be well advised before he say that it is a Fundamental Point For he will have against him as many Protestants as teach that by Scripture alone it
his malice had caused And besides it were to say that Infants dying without Baptism might be saved God supplying the want of Baptism which to them is unavoidable But beyond all this it were to put into my mouth a full and satisfying Answer to your Argument which I am now returning so that in answering my Objection you should answer your own For then I should tell you that it were altogether as abhorrent from the goodness of God and as repugnant to it to suffer an ignorant Lay-man's soul to perish meerly for being misled by an undiscernable false Translation which yet was commended to him by the Church which being of necessity to credit some in this matter he had reason to relie upon either above all other or as much as any other as it is to damn a penitent sinner for a secret defect in that desired Absolution which his Ghostly Father perhaps was an Atheist and could not give him or was a villain and would not This answer therefore which alone would serve to comfort your penitent in his perplexities and to assure him that he cannot fail of Salvation if he will not for fear of inconvenience you must forbear And seeing you must I hope you will come down from the Pulpit and preach no more against others for making mens Salvation depend upon fallible and uncertain grounds lest by judging others you make your selves and your own Church inexcusable who are strongly guilty of this fault above all the men and Churches of the World whereof I have already given you two very pregnant demonstrations drawn from your presumptuous tying God and Salvation to your Sacraments And the efficacy of them to your Priest's Qualifications and Intentions 69. Your making the Salvation of Infants depend on Baptism a Casual thing and in the power of man to conferre or not conferre would yield me a Third of the same nature And your suspending the same on the Baptizer's Intention a Fourth And lastly your making the Real presence of Christ in the Eucharist depend upon the casualties of the Consecrator's true Priesthood and Intention and yet commanding men to believe it for certain that he is present and to adore the Sacrament which according to your Doctrine for ought they can possibly know may be nothing else but a piece of Bread so exposing them to the danger of Idolatry and consequently of damnation doth offer me a Fifth demonstration of the same Conclusion if I thought fit to insist upon them But I have no mind to draw any more out of this Fountain neither do I think it charity to cloy the Reader with uniformity when the Subject affords variety 70. Sixthly therefore I return it thus The faith of Papists relies alone upon their Churche's infallibility That there is any Church infallible and that Theirs is it they pretend not to believe but only upon prudential Motives Dependance upon prudential Motives they confess to be obnoxious to a possibility of erring What then remaineth but Truth Faith Salvation and All must in them relie upon a fallible and uncertain ground 71. Seventhly The Faith of Papists relies upon the Church alone The Doctrine of the Church is delivered to most of them by their Parish-Priest or Ghostly Father or at least by a company of Priests who for the most part sure are men and not Angels in whom nothing is more certain than a most certain possibility to err What then remaineth but that Truth Faith Salvation and All must in them relie upon a fallible and uncertain ground 72. Eighthly thus It is apparent and undeniable that many Thousands there are who believe your Religion upon no better grounds than a man may have for the belief almost of any Religion As some believe it because their Forefathers did so and they were good People Some because they were Christened and brought up in it Some because many Learned and Religious men are of it Some because it is the Religion of their Countrey where all other Religions are persecuted and proscribed Some because Protestants cannot shew a perpetual succession of Professors of all their Doctrines Some because the service of your Church is more stately and pompous and magnificent Some because they find comfort in it Some because your Religion is farther spread and hath more Professors of it than the Religion of Protestants Some because your Priests compass Sea and Land to gain Proselytes to it Lastly an infinite number by chance and they know not why but only because they are sure they are in the right This which I say is a most certain experimented truth and if you will deal ingenuously you will not deny it And without question he that builds his faith upon our English Translation goes upon a more prudent ground than any of these can with reason be pretended to be What then can you alledge but that with you father than with us Truth and Faith and Salvation and All relie upon fallible and uncertain grounds 73. Ninthly Your Rhemish and Doway Translations are delivered to your Proselytes such I mean that are dispenced with for the reading of them for the direction of their Faith and Lives And the same may be said of your Translations of the Bible into other National languages in respect of those that are licenced to read them This I presume you will confess And moreover that these Translations came not by inspiration but were the productions of humane Industry and that not Angels but men were the Authors of them Men I say meer men subject to the same passions and to the same possibility of erring with our Translators And then how does it not unavoidably follow that in them which depend upon these Translations for their direction Faith and Truth and Salvation and All relies upon fallible and uncertain grounds 74. Tenthly and lastly to lay the ax to the root of the tree the Helena which you so fight for your vulgar Translation though some of you believe or pretend to believe it to be in every part and particle of it the pure and uncorupted Word of God yet others among you and those as good and zealous Catholiques as you are not so confident hereof 75. First for all those who have made Translations of the whole Bible or any part of it different many times in sense from the Vulgar as Lyranus Cajetan Pagnine Arias Erasmus Valla Steuchus and others it is apparent and even palpable that they never dreamt of any absolute perfection and authentical infallibility of the Vulgar Translation For if they had Why did they in many places reject it and differ from it 76. Vega was present at the Councel of Trent when that Decree was made which made the Vulgar Edition then not extant any where in the world authentical and not to be rejected upon any pretence whatsoever At the forming this Decree Vega I say was present understood the mind of the Councel as well as any man and professes that he was instructed in it
in the Church all truth yet he says not neither can we infer from what he says That the Church should always infallibly keep this depositum entire without the loss of any truth and sincere without the mixture of any falshood 149. Ad § 25. But you proceed and tell us That beside all this the Doctrine of Protestants is destructive of it self For either they have certains and infallible means not to err in interpreting or not If not Scripture to them cannot be a sufficient ground for infallible faith If they have and so cannot err in interpreting Scripture then they are able with infallibility to hear and determine all Controversies of Faith and so they may be and are Judges of Controversies although they use the Scripture as a Rule And thus against their own doctrine they constitute another Judge of Controversies beside Scripture alone And may not we with as much reason substitute Church and Papists instead of Scripture and Protestants and say unto you Besides all this the doctrin of Papists is destructive of it self For either they have certain and infallible means not to err in the choice of the Church and interpreting her Decrees or they have not If not then the Church to them cannot be a sufficient but meerly a phantastical ground for infallible faith nor a meet Judge of Controversies For unless I be infallibly sure that the Church is infallible How can I be upon her Authority infallibly sure that any thing she says is Infallible If they have certain infallible means and so cannot err in the choice of their Church and in interpreting her Decrees then they are able with Infallibility to hear examine and determine all Controversies of Faith although they pretend to make the Church their Guide And thus against their own Doctrine they constitute another Judge of Controversies besides the Church alone Nay every one makes himself a chuser of his own Religion and of his own sense of the Churches Decree which very thing in Protestants they so highly condemn and so in judging others condemn themselves 150. Neither in saying thus have I only cried quittance with you but that you may see how much you are in my debt I will shew unto you that for your Sophism against our way I have given you a Demonstration against yours First I say your Argument against us is a transparent fallacy The first Part of it lies thus Protestants have no means to interpret without Errour obscure and ambiguous places of Scripture therefore plain places of Scripture cannot be to them a sufficient ground of Faith But though we pretend not to certain means of not erring in interpreting all Scripture particularly such places as are obscure and ambiguous yet this me-thinks should be no impediment but that we may have certain means of not erring in and about the sense of those places which are so plain and clear that they need no Interpreters and in such we say our Faith is contained If you ask me How I can be sure that I know the true meaning of these places I ask you again Can you be sure that you understand what I or any man else says They that heard our Saviour and the Apostles preach could they have sufficient assurance that they understood at any time what they would have them do If not to what end did they hear them If they could Why may we not be as well assured that we understand sufficiently what we conceive plain in their writings 151. Again I pray tell us whether you do certainly know the sense of these Scriptures with which you pretend you are led to the knowledge of your Church If you do not How know you that there is any Church Infallible and that these are the notes of it and that this is the Church that hath these notes If you do then give us leave to have the same means and the same abilities to know other plain places which you have to know these For if all Scripture be obscure how come you to know the sense of these places If some places of it be plain Why should we stay here 152. And now to come to the other part of your Dilemma in saying If they have certain means and so cannot err methinks you forget your self very much and seem to make no difference between having certain means to do a thing and the actual doing of it As if you should conclude because all men have certain means of Salvation therefore all men certainly must be saved and cannot do otherwise as if Whosoever had a horse must presently get up and ride Whosoever had means to find out a way could not neglect those means and so mistake it God be thanked that we have sufficient means to be certain enough of the truth of our Faith But the priviledge of not being in possibility of erring that we challenge not because we have as little reason as you to do so and you have none at all If you ask seeing we may possibly err How can we be assured we do not I ask you again seeing your eye-sight may deceive you How can you be sure you see the Sun when you do see it Perhaps you may be in a dream and perhaps you and all the men in the World have been so when they thought they were awake and then only awake when they thought they dreamt But this I am sure of as sure as that God is good that he will require no impossibilities of us not an Infallible nor a certainly-unerring belief unless he hath given us certain means to avoid error and if we use those which we have will never require of us that we use that which we have not 153. Now from this mistaken ground That it is all one to have means of avoiding error and to be in no danger nor possibility of error You infer upon us an absurd Conclusion That we make our selves able to determine Controversies of Faith with Infallibility and Judges of Controversies For the latter part of this Inference we acknowledge and embrace it We do make our selves Judges of Controversies that is we do make use of our own understanding in the choice of our Religion But this if it be a crime is common to us with you as I have proved above and the difference is not that we are chusers and you not chusers but that we as we conceive chuse wisely but you being willfully blind chuse to follow those that are so too not remembring what our Saviour hath told you When the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the ditch But then again I must tell you You have done ill to confound together Judges and Infallible Judges unless you will say either that we have no Judges in our Courts of Civil Judicature or that they are all Infallible 154. Thus have we cast off your Dilemma and broken both the horns of it But now my retortion lies heavy upon you and will not be turned off For
manners but the approbation of them doth yield sufficient cause to leave the Church I reply with S. Augustine that the Church doth as the pretended Reformers ought to have done tolerate or bear with scandals and corruptions but neither doth nor can approve them The Church saith he being placed (z) Pag. 75. betwixt much chaffe and cockle doth bear with many things but doch not approve nor dissemble nor act those things which are against Faith and good life But because to approve corruption in manners as lawful were an error against Faith it belongs to corruption in Doctrin which was the second part of my demand 19. Now then that corruptions in Doctrin I still speak upon the untrue supposition of our Adversaries could not afford any sufficient cause or colourable necessity to depart from that Visible Church which was extant when Luther rose I demonstrate out of D. Potter's own confession that the Catholique Church neither hath nor can err in Points Fundamental as we shewed out of his own express words which he also of set purpose delivereth in divers other places and all they are obliged to maintain the same who teach that Christ had alwayes a visible Church upon earth because any one Fundamental error overthrows the being of a true Church Now as Schoolmen speak it is implicatio in terminis a contradiction so plain that one word destroyeth the other as if one should say A living dead man to affirm that the Church doth not err in Points necessary to Salvation or damnably and yet that it is damnable to remain in her Communion because she teacheth errors which are confessed not to be damnable For if the error be not damnable nor against any Fundamental Article of Faith the belief thereof cannot be damnable But D. Potter teacheth that the Catholique Church cannot and that the Roman Church hath not erred against any Fundamental Article of Faith Therefore it cannot be damnable to remain in her Communion and so the pretended corruptions in her doctrins could not induce any obligation to depart from her Communion nor could excuse them from Schism who upon pretence of necessity in Point of Conscience forsook her And D. Potter will never be able to salve a manifest contradiction in these his words To depart from the Church a of Rome in some Doctrins and practises there might be necessary cause though she wanted nothing necessary to Salvation For if notwithstanding these Doctrins and practises she wanted nothing necessary to Salvation how could it be necessary to Salvation to forsake her And therefore we must still conclude that to forsake her was properly an act of Schism 20. From the self-same ground of the infallibility of the Church in all Fundamental Points I argue after this manner The visible Church cannot be forsaken without damnation upon pretence that it is damnable to remain in her Communion by reason of corruption in Doctrin as long as for the truth of her Faith and belief she performeth the duty which she oweth to God and her Neighbour As long as she performeth what our Saviour exacts at her hands as long as she doth as much as lies in her power to do But even according to D. Potters Assertions the Church performeth all these things as long she erreth not in Points Fundamental although she were supposed to err in other Points not Fundamental Therefore the Communion of the visible Church cannot be forsaken without damnation upon pretence that it is damnable to remain in her Communion by reason of corruption in Doctrin The Major or first Proposition of it self is evident The Minor or second Proposition doth necessarily follow out of D. Potter's own Doctrin above-rehearsed that the promises of our Lord made to his Church for his assistance are to be (b) Pag. 131. extended only to Points of Faith or Fundamental Let me note here by the way that by his or he seems to exclude from Faith all Points which are not Fundamental and so we may deny innumerable Texts of Scripture That It is (c) Pag. 155. comfort enough for the Church that the Lord in mercy will secure her from all capital dangers c. but she may not hope to triumph over all sin and error till she be in heaven For it is evident that the Church for as much as concerns the truth of her Doctrins and belief ows no more duty to God and her Neighbour neither doth our Saviour exact more at her hands nor is it in her power to do more than God doth assist her to do which assistance is promised only for Points Fundamental and consequently as long as she teacheth no Fundamental error her Communion cannot without damnation be forsaken And we may fitly apply against D. Potter a Concionatory declamation which he makes against us where he saith May the Church of after-Ages make the narrow way to heaven (d) Pag. 221. narrower than our Saviour lest it c since he himself obligeth men under pain of damnation to forsake the Church by reason of errors against which our Saviour thought it needless to promise his assistance and for which he neither denyeth his grace in this life or glory in the next Will D. Potter oblige the Church to do more then she may even hope for or to perform on earth that which is proper to heaven alone 21. And as from your own Doctrin concerning the infallibility of the Church in Fundamental Points we have proved that it was a grievous sin to forsake her so do we take a strong argument from the fallibility of any who dare pretend to reform the Church which any man in his wits will believe to be indued with at least as much infallibility as private men can challenge and D. Potter expresly affirmeth that Christs promises of his assistance are not intended (e) Pag. 151. to any particular persons or Churches and therefore to leave the Church by reason of errors was at best hand but to flit from one erring company to another without any new hope of triumphing over errors and without necessity or utility to forsake that Communion of which S. Augustine saith There is (f) Ep. cont Parmen lib. 2. c. 1â— no just necessity to divide Unity Which will appear to be much more evident if we consider that though the Church had maintained some false Doctrins yet to leave her Communion to remedy the old were but to add a new increase of errors arising from the innumerable disagreements of Sectaries which must needs bring with it a mighty mass of fallehoods because the truth is but one and indivisible And this reason is yet stronger if we still remember that even according to D. Potter the visible Church hath a blessing not to err in Points Fundamental in which any private Reformer may fail and therefore they could not pretend any necessity to forsake that Church out of whose Communion they were exposed to danger of falling into many more and even into
should please your selves with being more than any one Sect of Christians it would presently be replied that it is uncertain whether now you are so but most certain that the time has been when you have not been so Then when the (a) Hier. Cont. Luciferianâ—s whole world wondred that it was become Arrian then when Athanasius oppos'd the world and the world Athanasius then when (b) In Thâ—od Hist l. 16. c. 2. your Liberius having the contemptible paucity of his adherents objected to him as a note of error answered for himself There was a time when there were but three opposed the decree of the King and yet those three were in the right and the rest in the wrong then when the Professors of error surpassed the number of the Professors of truth in proportion as the sands of the Sea do the Stars of the Heaven As (c) In ep 43 ad Vincentium S. Austin acknowledgeth then when (d) Commen torii lib. 1. c. 4. Vincentius confesseth that the poyson of the Arrians had contaminated not now some certain portion but almost the whole World then when the author of Nazianzen's life testifies That (e) In â—â—ta Nazianz. the Heresie of Arrius 〈◊〉 possessed in a manner the whole extent of the world and when Nazianzen found cause to cry out (f) In Ores Arian pro seipso Where are they who reproach us with our poverty who define the Church by the multitude and despise the little flock They have the People but we the Faith And lastly when Athanasius was so overborn with Sholes and Floods of Arrians that he was enforc'd to write a Treatise on purpose (g) To. 2. against those who judge of the truth only by plurality of adherents So that if you had prov'd want of Universality even thus restrained to be an infallible note of heresie there would have been no remedie but you must have confessed that the time was when you were heretiques And besides I see not how you would have avoided this great inconvenience of laying grounds and storing up arguments for Antichrist against he comes by which he may prove his Company the true Church For it is evident out of Scripture and confessed by you that though his time be not long his dominion shall be very large and that the true Church shall be then the woman driven into the wilderness 43 Ad § 25. 26. The remainder of this Chapter if I would deal strictly with you I might let pass as impertinent to the question now disputed For whereas your argument promises that this whole Chapter shall be imployed in proving Luther and the Protestants guilty of Heresie here you desert this question and strike out into another accusation of them that their faith even of the truth they hold is not indeed true faith But put case it were not does it follow that the having of this faith makes them Heretiques or that they are therefore Heretiques because they have this faith Aristotle believed there were Intelligences which moved the Sphears he believed this with an humane perswasion and not with a certain obscure prudent supernatural faith and will you make Aristotle an Heretique because he believed so You believe there was such a man as Julius Caesar that there is such a City as Constantinople and your belief hereof has not these qualifications which you require to divine faith And will you be content that this shall pass for a sufficient proof that you are an Heretique Heresie you have defin'd above to be a voluntary error but he that believes truth though his belief be not qualified according to your mind yet sure in believing truth he believes no error and from hence according to ordinary Logick me-thinks it should follow that such a man for doing so cannot be guilty of Heresie 44 But you will say though he be not guilty of Heresie for believing these truths yet if his faith be not saving to what purpose will it be Truly very little to the purpose of Salvation as little as it is to your proving Protestants guilty of Heresie But out of our wonted indulgence let us pardon this fault also and do you the favour to hear what you can say to beget this faith in us that indeed we have no faith or at least not such a faith without which it is impossible to please God Your discourse upon this point you have I know not upon what policy dis-joynted and given us the grounds of it in the beginning of the Chapter and the superstructure here in the end Them I have already examined and for a great part of them proved them vain and deceitful I have shewed by many certain arguments that though the subject matter of our faith be in it self most certain yet that absolute certainly of adherence is not required to the essence of faith no nor to make it acceptable with God but that to both these effects it is sufficient if it be firm enough to produce Obedience and Charity I have shewed besides that Prudence is rather commendable in faith than intrinsecal and essential to it So that whatsoever is here said to prove the faith of Protestants no faith for want of certainty or for want of prudence is already answered before it is objected for the foundation being destroyed the building cannot stand Yet for the fuller refutation of all pretences I will here make good that to prove our faith destitute of these qualifications you have produc'd but vain Sophisms and for the most part such arguments as return most violently upon your selves Thus then you say 45 First that their belief wanteth certainty I prove because they denying the universal Infallibility of the Church can have no certain ground to know what objects are revealed or testified by God But if there be no other ground of certainty but your Churches infallibility upon what certain ground do you know that your Church is infallible Upon what certain ground do you know all those things which must be known before you can know that your Church is infallible As that there is a God that God hath promised his assistance to your Church in all her Decrees that the Scripture wherein this promise is extant is the word of God that those texts of Scripture which you alledge for your infallibility are incorrupted that that which you pretend is the true fense of them When you have produc'd certain grounds for all these things I doubt not but it will appear that we also may have grounds certain enough to believe our whole Religion which is nothing else but the Bible without dependance on the Churches infallibility Suppose you should meet with a man that for the present believes neither Church nor Scripture nor God but is ready and willing to believe them all if you can shew some sufficient grounds to build his faith upon will you tell such a man There are no certain grounds by which he may be converted
or there are If you say the first you make all Religion an uncertain thing If the second then either you must ridiculously perswade that your Church is infallible because it is infallible or else that there are other certain grounds besides your Churches infallibility 46. But you proced and tell us that Holy Scripture is in it self most true and infallible but without the direction and declaration of the Church we can neither have certain means to know what Scripture is Canonical nor what Translations be faithful nor what is the true meaning of Scripture Answ But all these things must be known before we can know the direction of your Church to be infallible for no other proof of it can be pretended but only some Texts of Canonical Scripture truly interpreted Therefore either you are mistaken in thinking there is no other means to know these things but your Churches infallible direction or we are excluded from all means of knowing her direction to be infallible 47 But Protestants though as you suppose they are perswaded their own opinions are true and that they have used such means as are wont to be prescribed for understanding the Scripture as Prayer conferring of Texts c. yet by their disagreement shew that some of them are deceived Now they hold all the Articles of their faith upon this only ground of Scripture interpreted by these rules and therefore it is clear that the ground of their faith is infallible in no point at all The first of these suppositions must needs be true but the second is apparently false I mean that every Protestant is perswaded that he hath used those means which are prescribed for understanding of Scripture But that which you collect from these suppositions is clearly inconsequent and by as good Logick you might conclude that Logick and Geometry stand upon no certain grounds that the rules of the one and the principles of the other do sometimes fail because the disagreement of Logicians and Geometricians shew that some of them are deceived Might not a Jew conclude as well against all Christians that they have no certain ground whereon to rely in their understanding of Scripture because their disagreements shew that some are deceived because some deduce from it the infallibility of a Church and others no such matter So likewise a Turk might use the same argument against both Jews and Christians and an Atheist against all Religions and a Sceptick against all Reason Might not one say Mens disagreement in Religion shews that there is no certainty in any and the other that experience of their contradictions teacheth that the rules of reason do sometimes fail Do not you see and feel how void of reason and how full of impiety your sophistry is And how transported with zeal against Protestants you urge arguments against them which if they could not be answered would overthrow not only your owne but all Religion But God be thanked the answer is easie and obvious For let men but remember not to impute the faults of men but only to men and then it will easily appear that there may be sufficient certainty in Reason in Religion in the rules of interpreting Scripture though men through their faults take not care to make use of them and so run into divers errors and dissentions 48. But Protestants cannot determine what points be fundamental and therefore must remain uncertain whether or no they be not in some fundamental error Answ By like reason since you acknowledg that every error in points defin'd and declared by your Church destroies the substance of faith and yet cannot determine what points be defined it followeth that you must remain uncertain whether or no you be not in some fundamental error and so want the substance of faith without which there can be no hope of salvation Now that you are uncertain what points are defined appears from your own words c. 4. § 3. of your second Part where say you No less impertinent is your discourse concerning the difficulty to know what is Heresie For we grant that it is not alwaies easy to determine in particular occasions whether this or that Doctrin be such because it may be doubtful whether it be against any Scripture or divine Tradition or definition of the Church Neither were it difficult to extort from you this confession by naming divers Points which some of you say are defin'd others the contrary And others hang in suspense and know not what to determin But this I have done elsewhere as also I have shewed plainly enough that though we cannot perhaps say in particular Thus much and no more is fundamental yet believing all the Bible we are certain enough that we believe all that is fundamental As he that in a Receit takes twenty ingredients whereof ten only are necessary though he know not which those ten are yet taking the whole twenty he is sure enough that he has taken all that are necessary 49. Ad § 29. But that he who erreth against any one revealed truth loseth all Divine Faith is a very true doctrin delivered by Catholique Divines you mean your own with so general a consent that the contrary is wont to be censur'd as temerarious Now certainly some Protestants must do so because they hold contradictions which cannot all be true Therefore some of them at least have no divine faith Answ I pass by your weakness in urging Protestants with the authority of your Divines which yet in you might very deservedly be censur'd For when D. Potter to shew the many actual dissentions between the Romish Doctors notwithstanding their braggs of potential Unity referres to Pappus who has collected out of Bellar. their contradictions and set them down in his own words to the number of 237. and to Flacius de Sectis Controversiis Religionis Papisticae you making the very same use of M. Breerely against Protestants yet jeer and scorn D. Potter as if he offer'd you for a proof the bare authority of Pappus and Flacius and tell him which is all the Answer you vouchsafe him It is pretty that he brings Pappus and Flacius flat Heretiques to prove your many contradictions As if he had proved this with the bare authoritie the bare judgement of these men which sure he does not but with the formall words of Bellarmine faithfully collected by Pappus And why then might not we say to you Is it not prettie that you bring Breerely as flat an Heretique as Pappus or Flacius to prove the contradictions of Protestants Yet had he been so vain as to press you with the meer authority of Protestant Divines in any point me-thinks for your own sake you should have pardon'd him who here and in many other places urge us with the judgement of your Divines as with weighty arguments Yet if the authority of your Divines were even Canonical certainly nothing could be concluded from it in this matter there being not one of them who delivers for
first because the experience of innumerable Christians is against it who are sufficiently assured that the Scripture is divinely inspired and yet deny the infallible authority of your Church or any other The second because if I have not ground to be assured of the Divine authority of Scripture unless I first believe your Church infallible than I can have no ground at all to believe it because there is no ground nor can any be pretended why I should believe your Church infallible unless I first believe the Scripture Divine 15. Fiftly and lastly You say with confidence in abundance that none can deny the infallible authority of your Church but he must abandon all infused faith and true religion if he do but understand himself Which is to say agreeable to what you had said before and what out of the abundance of your heart you speak very often That all Christians besides you are open Fools or concealed Atheists All this you say with notable confidence as the maner of Sophisters is to place their confidence of prevailing in their confident maner of speaking but then for the evidence you promised to maintain this confidence that is quite vanished and become invisible 16. Had I a minde to recriminate now and to charge Papists as you do Protestants that they lead men to Socinianism I could certainly make a much fairer shew of evidence than you have done For I would not tell you You deny the infallibility of the Church of England ergo you lead to Socinianism which yet is altogether as good an Argument as this Protestants deny the infallibility of the Roman-Church ergo they induce Socinianism Nor would I resume my former Argument and urge you that by holding the Popes infallibility you submit your self to that Capital and Mother-Heresie by advantage whereof he may lead you at ease to believe vertue vice and vice vertue to believe Antichristianity Christianism and Christianity Antichristian he may lead you to Socinianism to Turcism nay to be Devill himself if he have a minde to it But I would shew you that divers wayes the Doctors of your Church do the principal and proper work of the Socinians for them undermining the Doctrine of the Trinity by denying it to be supported by those pillars of the Faith which alone are fit and able to support it I mean Scripture and the Consent of the ancient Doctors 17. For Scripture your men deny very plainly and frequently that this Doctrine can be proved by it See if you please this plainly taught and urged very earnestly by Cardinal Hosius De Author Sac. Scrip. l. 3. p. 53. By Gordonius Huntlaeus Contr. Tom. 1. Controv. 1. De verbo Dei C. 19. by Gretserus and Tannerus in Colloquio Ratisbon And also by Vega Possevin Wick us and Others 18. And then for the Consent of the Ancients That that also delivers it not by whom are we taught but by Papists only Who is it that makes known to all the world that Eusebius that great searcher and devourer of the Christian Libraries was an Arrian Is it not your great Achilles Cardinal Perron in his 3. Book 2. Chap. of his Reply to K. James Who is it that informs us that Origen who never was questioned for any error in this matter in or neer his time denied the Divinity of the Son and the Holy Ghost Is it not the same great Cardinal in his Book of the Eucharist against M. du Plessis l. 2. c. 7 Who is it that pretends that Irenaeus hath said those things which he that should now hold would be esteemed an Arrian Is it not the same Perron in his Reply to K. James in the fifth Chapter of his fourth Observation And doth he not in the same place peach Tertullian also and in a manner give him away to the Arrians And pronounce generally of the Fathers before the Councel of Nice That the Arrians would gladly be tried by them And are not your fellow-Jesuits also even the prime men of your Order prevaricators in this point as well as others Doth not your Friend M. Fisher or M. Floyd in his book of the Nine Questions proposed to him by K. James speak dangerously to the same purpose in his discourse of the resolution of Faith towards the end Giving us to understand That the new Reformed Arrians bring very many testimonies of the Ancient Fathers to prove that in this Point they did contradict themselves and were contrary one to another which places whosoever shall read will clearly see that to common people they are unanswerable yea that common people are not capable of the answers that learned men yield unto such obscure passages And hath not your great Antiquary Petavius in his Notes upon Epiphanius in Haer. 69. been very liberal to the Adversaries of the Doctrine of the Trinity and in a manner given them for Patrons and Advocates first Justin Martyr and then almost all the Fathers before the Councel of Nice whose speeches he says touching this point cum Orthodoxae fidei regula minimè consentiunt Hereunto I might add that the Dominicans and Jesuits between them in another matter of great importance viz. God's Presciâ—â—ce of future contingents give the Socinians the premises out of which their conclusion doth unavoidably follow For the Dominicans maintain on the one Side that God can foresee nothing but what he decrees The Jesuits on the other Side that he doth not decree all things And from hence the Socinians conclude as it is obvious for them to do that he doth not foresee all things Lastly I might adjoyn this that you agree with one consent and settle for a rule unquestionable that no part of Religion can be repugnant to reason whereunto you in particulr subscribe unawares in saying From truth no man can by good consequence inferr Falshood which is to say in effect that Reason can never lead any man to Error And after you have done so you proclaim to all the world as you in this Pamphlet do very frequently that if men follow their Reason and discourse they will if they understand themselves be lead to Socinianism And thus you see with what probable matter I might furnish out and justifie my accusation if I should charge you with leading men to Socinianism Yet I do not conceive that I have ground enough for this odious imputation And much less should you have charged Protestants with it whom you confess to abhorre and detest it and who fight against it not with the broken reeds and out of the paper-fortresses of an imaginary Infallibility which were only to make sport for their Adversaries but with the sword of the Spirit the Word of God Of which we may say most truly what David said of Goliah's Sword offered by Abimelech Non est sicut iste There is none comparable to it 19. Thus Protestants in general I hope are sufficiently vindicated from your calumny I proceed now to do the same service for the Divines of England
prohibited All which confirmeth your Majesties grave and learned Censure in your thinking the Geneva translation to be warst of all and that in the Marginal notes annexed to the Geneva translation some are very partial untrue seditious c. Lastly concerning the English translation the Puritans say Our translation of the Psalms comprized in our Book of Common-Prayer doth in addition substraction and alteration differ from the truth of the Hebrew in two hundred places at the least In so much as they do therefore profess to rest doubtful whether a man with a safe conscience may subscribe thereunto And M. Carlile saith of the English translators that they have depraved the sense obscured the truth and deceived the Ignorant that in many places they do detort the Scriptures from the right sense And that they shew themselves to love darkness more than light falshood more than truth And the Ministers of Lincoln-Diocess give their publique testimony terming the English Translation A Translation that taketh away from the Text that addeth to the Text and that sometime to the changing or obscuring of the meaning of the holy Ghost Not without cause therefore did your Majesty affirm that you could never see a Bible well Translated into English Thus farr the Author of the Protestants Apologie c. And I cannot forbear to mention in particular that famous corruption of Luther who in the Text where it is said Rom. 3. v. 28. We account a man to be justified by faith without the works of the Law in favour of Justification by faith alone translateth justified by faith ALONE As likewise the falsification of Zuinglius is no less notorious who in the Gospels of S. Matthew Marke and Luke and in S. Paul in place of This is my Body this is my Bloud translates This signifies my Body this signifies my Bloud And here let Protestants consider duely of these Points Salvation cannot be hoped for without true Faith Faith according to them relies upon Scripture alone Scripture must be delivered to most of them by the Translations Translations depend on the skill and honesty of men in whom nothing is more certain than a most certain possibility to err and no greater evidence of truth than that it is evident some of them embrace falshood by reason of their contrary Translations What then remaineth but that Truth Faith Salvation and All must in them rely upon a fallible and uncertain ground How many poor souls are lamentably seduced while from preaching Ministers they admire a multitude of Texts of divine Scripture but are indeed the false Translations and corruptions of erring men Let them therefore if they will be assured of true Scriptures flye to the alwayes visible Catholique Church against which the gates of hell can never so farr prevail as that she shall be permitted to deceive the Christian world with false Scriptures And Luther himself by unfortunate experience was at length forced to confess thus much saying If the Å¿ Li. cont Zuing. de verit corp Christ in Eucha world last longer it will be again necessary to receive the Decrees of Councels and to have recourse to them by reason of divers interpretations of Scripture which now raign On the contrary side the Translation approved by the Roman-Church is commended even by our Adversaries and D. Covell in particular saith that it was used in the Church one thousand t In his answer unto M. Joha Burges pag. 94. three hundred years ago and doubteth not to prefer u Ibid. that Translation before othâ—rs In so much that whereas the English-Translations be many and among themselves disagreeing he concludeth that of all those the approved Translation authorized by the Church of England is that which cometh nearest to the vulgar and is commonly called the Bishops Bible So that the truth of that Translation which we use must be the rule to judge of the goodness of their Bibles and therefore they are obliged to maintain our Translation if it were but for their own sake 17. But doth indeed the source of their manifold uncertainties stop here No The chiefest difficulty remains concerning the true meaning of Scripture for attaining whereof if Protestants had any certainty they could not disagree so hugely as they do Hence Mr. Hooker saith We are w In his Preface to his Books of Eccl. Politie Sect. 6.26 right sure of this that Nature Scripture and Experience have all taught the woâ—ld to seek for the ending of contentions by submitting it self unto some judicial and definiâ—ive sentence whereunto neither part that contendeth may under any pretence refuse to stand Doctor Fields words are remarkable to this purpose Seeing saith he the Controversies x In his Treatise of the Church in his Epistle dedicatory to the L. Archbishop of Religion in our timâ—s are grown in number so many and in nature to intricate that few have time and leisure fewer strength of understanding to examine them what remaineth for men desirous of satisfaction in things of such consequence but diligently to search out which among all the societies in the world is that blessed company of holy ones that houshold of Faith that Spouse of Christ and Church of the living God which is the Pillar and Ground of Truth that so they may imbrace her Communion follow her Directions and rest in her Judgement 18. And now that the true Interpretation of Scripture ought to be received from the Church it is also proved by what we have already demonstrated that she it is who must declare what Books be true Scripture wherein if she be assisted by the holy Ghost Why should we not believe her to be infallibly directed concerning the true meaning of them Let Protestants therefore either bring some proof out of Scripture that the Church is guided by the holy Ghost in discerning true Scripture and not in delivering the true sense thereof Or else give us leave to apply against them the argument which S. Augustine opposed to the Manicheans in these words I would not y Con. Ep. Fund cap. 5. believe the Gospel unless the Authority of the Church did move me Them therefore whom I obeyed saying Believe the Gospel why should I not obey saying to me Do not believe Manicheus Luther Calvin c. Choose what thou pleasest If thou shalt say Believe the Catholiques They warn me not to give any credit to you If therefore I believe them I cannot believe thee If thou say Do not believe the Catholiques thou shalt not do well in forcing me to the faith of Manicheus because by the Preaching of Catholiques I believed the Gospel it self If thou say You did well to believe them Catholiques commending the Gospel buâ— you did not well to believe them discommending Manicheus Dost thou think me so very foolish that without any reason at all I should believe what thou wilt and not believe what thou wilt not And do not Protestants perfectly resemble these men to whom
between these two We receive the Books of the New Testament as they are commonly received and we receive those that are commonly received because they are so To say this were indeed to make being commonly received a Rule or reason to know the Canon by But to say the former doth no more make it a Rule then you should make the Church of England the Rule of your receiving them if you should say as you may The Books of the New Testament we receive for Canonical as they are received by the Church of England 45. You demand Upon what infallible ground we agree with Luther against you in some and with you against Luther in others And I also demand Upon what infallible ground you hold your Canon and agree neither with us nor Luther For sure your differing from us both is of it selfe no more apparently reasonable than our agreeing with you in part and in part with Luther If you say Your Churches infallibility is your ground I demand again some infallible ground both for the Churches infallibility and for this that Yours is the Church and shall never cease multiplying demands upon demands until you settle me upon a Rock I mean give such an Answer whose Truth is so evident that it needs no further evidence If you say This is Universal Tradition I reply your Churches infallibility is not built upon it and that the Canon of Scripture as we receive it is For we do not profess our selves so absolutely and undoubtedly certain neither do we urge others to be so of those Books which have been doubted as of those that never have 46. The Conclusion of your Tenth § is That the Divinity of a writing cannot be known from it self alone but by some extrinsecal Authority Which you need not prove for no wise man denies it But then this Authority is that of Universal Tradition not of Your Church For to me it is altogether as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Gospel of S. Matthew is the Word of God as that all which your Church sayes is true That Believers of the Scripture by considering the Divine matter the excellent precepts the glorious promises contained in it may be confirmed in their faith of the Scriptures Divine Authority and that among other inducements and enforcements hereunto internal arguments have their place and force certainly no man of understanding can deny For my part I professe if the Doctrine of the Scripture were not as good and as fit to come from the Fountain of goodness as the Miracles by which it was confirmed were great I should want one main Pillar of my faith and for want of it I fear should be much stagger'd in it Now this and nothing else did the Doctor mean in saying The Believer sees by that glorious Beam of Divine light which shines in Scripture and by many internal Arguments that the Scripture is of Divine Authority By this saith he he sees it that is he is moved to and strengthened in his beliefe of it and by this partly not wholly by this not alone but with the concurrence of other Arguments He that will quarrel with him for saying so must finde fault with the Master of the Sentences and all his Schollers for they all say the same The rest of this Paragragh I am as willing it should be true as you are to have it and so let it passe as a discourse wherein we are wholly unconcerned You might have met with an Answerer that would not have suffered you to have said so much Truth together but to me it is sufficient that it is nothing to the purpose 48. In the next Division out of your liberality you will suppose that Scripture like to a corporal light is by it self alone able to determine and move our understanding to assent yet notwithstanding this supposal Faith still you say must go before Scripture because as the light is visible only to those that have eyes so the Scripture only to those that have the Eye of Faith But to my understanding if Scripture do move and determine our Understanding to assent then the Scripture and its moving must be before this assent as the cause must be before its own effect now this very assent is nothing else but Faith and Faith nothing else than the Understanding's assent And therefore upon this supposal Faith doth and must originally proceed from Scripture as the effect from its proper cause and the influence and efficacy of Scripture is to be presupposed before the assent of Faith unto which it moves and determines and consequently if this supposition of yours were true there should need no other means precedent to Scripture to beget Faith Scripture it self being able as here you suppose to determine and move the Understanding to assent that is to believe them and the Verities contained in them Neither is this to say that the eyes with which we see are made by the light by which we see For you are mistaken much if you conceive that in this comparison Faith answers to the Eye But if you will not pervert it the Analogie must stand thus Scripture must answer to light The eye of the soul that is the Understanding or the faculty of assenting to the Bodily eye And lastly assenting or believing to the act of Seeing As therefore the light determining the Eye to see though it presupposeth the Eye which it determines as every Action doth the object on which it is imployed yet it self is presuppos'd and antecedent to the act of seeing as the cause is alwaies to its effect So if you will suppose that Scripture like light moves the Understanding to assent the Understanding that is the eye and object on which it workes must be before this influence upon it But the Assent that is the beliefe whereto the Scripture moves and the Underis moved which answers to the act of seeing must come after For if it did assent already To what purpose should the Scripture do that which was done before Nay indeed How were it possible it should be so any more than a Father can beget a Son that he hath already Or an Architect built a house that is built already Or than this very world can be made again before it be unmade Transubstantion indeed is fruitful of such Monsters But they that have not sworn themselves to the defence of Error will easily perceive that jam factum facere and factum infectum facere are equally impossible But I digress 49. The close of this Paragraph is a fit cover for such a dish There you tell us That if there must be some other means precedent to Scripture to beget faith this can be no other than the Church By the Church we know you doe and must understand the Roman Church so that in effect you say no man can have faith but he must be moved to it by your Churches Authority And that is to say that the King and all other Protestants
of Irenaeus alledged here by you is utterly and plainly impertinent Or whether by this discourse you mean as I think you do not your Discourse but your Conclusion which you discourse on that is that Your Church is the Infallible Judge in Controversies For neither hath Irenaeus one syllable to this purpose neither can it be deduced out of what he says with any colour of consequence For first in saying What if the Apostles had not left Scripture ought we not to have followed the order of Tradition And in saying That to this order many Nations yield assent who believe in Christ having Salvation written in their hearts by the Spirit of GOD without Letters or Ink and diligently keeping ancient Tradition Doth he not plainly shew that the Tradition he speaks of is nothing else but the very same that is written nothing but to believe in Christ To which whether Scripture alone to them that believe it be not a sufficient guide I leave it to you to judge And are not his words just as if a man should say If God had not given us the light of the Sun we must have made use of Candles and Torches If we had no eyes we must have felt out our way If we had no legs we must have used crutches And doth not this in effect import that while we have the Sun we need no Candles While we have our eyes we need not feel out our way While we enjoy our legs we need not crutches And by like reason Irenaeus in saying If we had no Scripture we must have followed Tradition and they that have none do well to do so Doth he not plainly import that to them that have Scripture and believe it Tradition is unnecessary Which could not be if the Scripture did not contain evidently the whole Tradition Which whether Irenaeus believed or no these words of his may inform you Non enim per alios c. we have received the disposition of our Salvation from no others but from them by whom the Gospel came unto us Which Gospel truly the Apostles first preached and afterwards by the will of God delivered in writing to us to be the Pillar and Foundation of our Faith Upon which place Bellarmine's two Observations and his acknowledgment ensuing upon them are very considerable and as I conceive as home to my purpose as I would wish them His first Notandum is That in the Christian Doctrin some things are simply necessary for the Salvation of all men as the knowledge of the Articles of the Apostle's Creed and besides the knowledge of the ten Commandments and some of the Sacraments Other things are not so necessary but that a man may be saved without the explicit knowledge and belief and profession of them His second Note is That those things which were simply necessary the Apostles were wont to preach to all men But of other things not all to all but some things to all to wit those things which were profitable for all other things only to Prelates and Priests These things premised he acknowledgeth That all those things were written by the Apostles which are necessary for all and which they were wont openly to preach to all But that other things were not all written And therefore when Irenaeus says that the Apostles wrote what they preached in the World it is true saith he and not against Traditions because they preached not to the People all things but only those things which were necessary or profitable for them 145. So that at the most you can infer from hence but only a suppositive necessity of having an infallible Guide and that grounded upon a false supposition in case we had no Scripture but an absolute necessity hereof and to them who have and believe the Scripture which is your Assumption cannot with any colour from hence be concluded but rather the contrary 146. Neither because as He says it was then easie to receive the Truth from God's Church then in the Age next after the Apostles Then when all the Ancient and Apostolique Churches were at an agreement about the Fundamentals of Faith Will it therefore follow that now 1600 years after when the ancient Churches are divided almost into as many Religions as they are Churches every one being the Church to it self and Heretical to all other that it is as easie but extreamly difficult or rather impossible to find the Church first independently of the true Doctrin and then to find the truth by the Church 147. As for the last clause of the sentence it will not any whit advantage but rather prejudice your Assertion Neither wil I seek to avoid the pressure of it by saying that he speaks of small Questions and therefore not of Questions touching things necessary to Salvation which can hardly be called small Questions But I will favour you so far as to suppose that saying this of small Questions it is probable he would have said it much more of the Great but I will answer that which is most certain and evident and which I am confident you your self were you as impudent as I believe you modest would not deny That the Ancient Apostolique Churches are not now as they were in Irenaeus his time then they were all at Unity about matters of Faith which Unity was a good assurance that what they so agreed in came from some one common Fountain and that no other than of Apostolique Preaching And this is the very ground of Tertullian's so often mistaken Prescription against Heretiques Variâsse debuerat Errer Ecclesiarum quod autem apud multos unum est non est erratum sed traditum If the Churches had erred they could not but have varied but that which is one among so many came not by Error but Tradition But now the case is altered and the mischief is that these ancient Churches are divided among themselves and if we have recourse to them one of them will say This is the way to heaven another that So that now in place of receiving from them certain and clear truths we must expect nothing but certain and clear contradictions 148. Neither will the Apostle's depositing with the Church all things belonging to truth be any proof that the Church shall certainly keep this depositum entire and sincere without adding to it or taking from it for this whole depositum was committed to every particular Church nay to every particular man which the Apostles converted And yet no man I think will say that there was any certainty that it should be kept whole and inviolate by every man and every Church It is apparent out of Scripture it was committed to Timothy and by him consigned to other faithful men and yet S. Paul thought it not superfluous earnestly to exhort him to the careful keeping of it which exhortation you must grant had been vain and superfluous if the not keeping of it had been impossible And therefore though Irenaeus says The Apostles fully deposited
Church concerning it which without any ambiguity the holy Scripture doth demonstrate to us Among many other Points in the aforesaid words we are to observe that according to this holy Father when we prove some Points not particularly contained in Scripture by the authority of the Church even in that case we ought not to be said to believe such Points without Scripture because Scripture it self recommends the Church and therefore relying on her we relie on Scripture without danger of being deceived by the obscurity of any question defined by the Church And elsewhere he saith Seeing this is (z) De Unit. Eccles c. 19. written in no Scripture we must believe the testimony of the Church which Christ declareth to speak the truth But it seems D. Potter is of opinion that this Doctrin about not-rebaptizing such as were baptized by Heretiques is no necessary Point of Faith nor the contrary an Heresie wherein he contradicteth S. Augustine from whom we have now heard that what the Church teacheth is truly said to be taught by Scripture and consequently to deny this particular Point delivered by the Church is to oppose Scripture it self Yet it he will needs hold that this Point is not Fundamental we must conclude out of S. Augustine as we did concerning the baptizing of Children that the infallibility of the Church reacheth to Points not-Fundamental The same Father in another place concerning this very question of the validity of Baptism conferred by Heretiques saith The (a) De Bapt. cont Donat. l. 5. c. 23. Apostles indeed have prescribed nothing of this but this Custom ought to be believed to be originally taken from their Tradition as there are many things that the universal Church observeth which are therefore with good reason believed to have been commanded by the Apostles although they be not written No less clear is S. Chrysostom for the infallibility of the Traditions of the Church For treating these words 2 Thes 2. Stand and hold the Traditions which you have learned whether by speech or by Epistle he saith Hence it is (b) Hom. 4. manifest that they delivered not all things by letter but many things also without writing and these also are worthy of belief Let us therefore account the Tradition of the Church so be worthy of belief It is a Tradition Seek no more Which words are so plainly against Protestants that Whitaker is as plain with S. Chrysostom saying I answer (c) De Sacra Script p. 678. that this is an inconsiderate speech and unworthy so great a Father But let us conclude with S. Augustine that the Church cannot approve any Error against Faith or good manners The Church saith he being (d) Ep. 119. placed between much chaff and cockle doth tolerate many things but yet she doth not approve nor dissemble nor do those things which are against Faith or good life 17. And as I have proved that Protestants according to their grounds cannot yield infallible assent to the Church in any one Point so by the same reason I prove that they cannot relie upon Scripture it self in any one Point of Faith Not in Points of lesser moment or not Fundamental because in such Points the Catholique Church according to D. Potter and much more any Protestant may err and think it is contained in Scripture when it is not Not in Points Fundamental because they must first know what Points be Fundamental before they can be assured that they cannot err in understanding the Scripture and consequently independently of Scripture they must foreknow all Fundamental Points of Faith and therefore they do not indeed relie upon Scripture either for Fundamental or not Fundamental Points 18. Besides I mainly urge D. Potter and other Protestants that they tell us of certain Points which they call Fundamental and we cannot wrest from them a list in particular of such Points without which no man can tell whether or no he err in Points Fundamental and be capable of Salvation And which is most lamentable instead of giving us such a Catalogue they fall to wrangle among themselves about the making of it 19. Calvin holds the (e) Instit l. 4. cap. 2. Pope's Primacy Invocation of Saints Freewill and such like to be Fundamental Errors overthrowing the Gospel Others are not of his mind as Melancthon who saith in (f) Cent. Ep. Theol. Ep. 74. the opinion of himself and other his Brethren That the Monarchy of the Bishop of Rome is of use or profit to this end that consent of Doctrin may be retained An agreement therefore may easily be established in this Article of the Pope's Primacy if ether Articles could be agreed upon If the Pope's Primacy be a means that consent of Doctrin may be retained first submit to it and other articles will be easily agreed upon Luther also saith of the Pope's Primacy it may be born (g) In Assertionib art 36. withall And why then O Luther did you not bear with it And how can you and your followers be excused from damnable Schism who chose rather to divide God's Church then to bear with that which you confess may be born withall But let us go forward That the Doctrin of Freewill Prayer for the dead worshipping of Images Worship and Invocation of Saints Real presence Transubstantiation Receiving under one kind Satisfaction and Merit of works and the Mass be not fundamental Errors is taught respectivè by divers Protestants carefully alledged in the Protestants (h) Tract 1. c. 2. Sect. 14. after F. Apology c. as namely by Perkins Cartwright Frith Fulke Sparke Goad Luther Reynolds Whitaker Tindal Francis Johnson with others Contrary to these is the Confession of the Christian Faith so called by Protestants which I mentioned (i) Cap. 1. v. 4. heretofore wherein we are damned unto unquenchable fire for the Doctrin of Mass Prayer to Saints and for the dead Freewill Presence at Idol-service Mans merit with such like Justification by Faith alone is by some Protestants affirmed to be the soul of the (k) Chalk in the Tower disputation the 4. dayes conference Church The only Principal origin of (l) Fox Act. Mon. p. 402. Salvation of all other Points of (m) The Confession of Bohemia in the Harmony of Confessions p. 253. Doctrin the chiefest and weightiest Which yet as we have seen is contrary to other Protestants who teach that merit of good works is not a Fundamental Error yea divers Protestants defend merit of good works as may be seen in (n) Tract 3. Sect. 7. under m. n. 15. Breereley One would think that the King's Supremacy for which some blessed men lost their lives was once amongst Protestants held for a Capital Point but now D. Andrews late of Winchester in his Book against Bellarmine tells us that it is sufficient to reckon it among true Doctrins And Wotton denies that Protestants (o) In his answer to a Popish pamphlet p 68. hold the King's
Lay-men but in one kind That Pictures may be worshipped That Saints are to be invocated and so in the rest and then your differences about the Popes Supremacy Transubstantiation and all the rest will speedily be ended If you say the advice is good in this but not in other cases I must request you not to expect alwaies to be believed upon your word but to shew us some reason why any one thing namely the Churches Infallibility is fit to prove it self and any other thing by name the Popes Supremacy or Transubstantiation is not as fit Or if for shame you will at length confess that the Churches infallibility is not fit to decide this difference Whether the Church be infallible then you must confess it is not fit to decide all Unless you will say it may be fit to decide all and yet not fit to decide this or pretend that this is not comprehended under all Besides if you grant that your Churches Infallibility cannot possibly be well grounded upon or decided by it self then having professed before that there is no possible means besides this for us to agree hereupon I hope you will give me leave to conclude that it is impossible upon good ground for us to agree that the Roman Church is infallible For certainly light it self is not more clear than the evidence of this Syllogism If there be no other means to make men agree upon your Churches Infallibility but only this and this be no means then it is simply impossible for men upon good grounds to agree that your Church is infallible But there is as you have granted no other possible means to make men agree hereupon but only a submissive ackdowledgment of her Infallibility And this is apparently no means Therefore it is simply impossible for men upon good grounds to agree that your Church is infallible 90. Lastly to the place of S. Austin wherein we are advis'd to follow the way of Catholique Discipline which from Christ himself by the Apostles hath come down even to us and from us shall descend to all posterity I answer That the way which S. Austin spake of and the way which you commend being divers wayes and in many things clean contrary we cannot possibly follow them both and therefore for you to apply the same words to them is a vain equivocation Shew us any way and do not say but prove it to have come from Christ and his Apostles down to us and we are ready to follow it Neither do we expect demonstration hereof but such reasons as may make this more probable than the contrary But if you bring in things into your now Catholique Discipline which Christians in S. Austins time held abominable as the picturing of God and which you must and some of you do confess to have come into the Church seven hundred yeers after Christ if you will bring in things as you have done the halfe Communion with a non obstante notwithstanding Christs Institution and the practice of the Primitive Church were to the contrary If you will do such things as these and yet would have us believe that your whole Religion came from Christ and his Apostles this we conceive a request too unreasonable for modest men to make or for wise men to grant CHAP. IV. To say that the Creed contains all Points necessarily to be believed is neither pertinent to the Quâ—stion in hand nor in it self true I SAY neither pertinent nor true Not pertinent Because our Question is nor What Points are necessary to be explicitely believed but what Points may be lawfully disbelieved or rejected after sufficient Proposition that they are divine Truths You say the Creed contains all Points necessary to be believed Be it so But doth it likewise contain all Points not to be disbelieved Certainly it doth not For how many Truths are there in holy Scripture not contained in the Creed which we are not obliged distinctly and particularly to know and believe but are bound under pain of damnation not to reject as soon as we come to know that they are found in holy Scripture And we having already shewed that whatsoever is proposed by God's Church as a Point of Faith is infallibly a truth revealed by God it followeth that whosoever denyeth any such Point opposeth God's sacred testimony whether that Point be contained in the Creed or no. In vain then was your care imployed to prove that all Points of Faith necessary to be explicitely believed are contained in the Creed Neither was that the Catalogue which Charity Mistaken demanded His demand was and it was most reasonable that you would once give us a List of all Fundamentals the denyal whereof destroyes Salvation whereas the denyal of other Points not Fundamental may stand with Salvation although both these kinds of Points be equally proposed as revealed by God For if they be not equally proposed the difference will arise from diversity of the Proposal and not of the Matter fendamental or not fundamental This Catalogue only can shew how farre Protestants may disagree without breach of Unity in Faith and upon this may other matters depend according to the ground of Protestants But you will never adventure to publish such a Catalogue I say more You can not assigne any one Point so great oâ— fundamental that the denyal thereof will make a man an Heretique if it be not sufficiently propounded as a divine Truth Nor can you assigne any one Point so small that it can without heresie be rejected if once it be sufficiently represented as revealed by God 2. Nay this your instance in the Creed is not only impertinent but directly against you For all Points in the Creed are not of their own nature Fundamental as I shewed (a) Cap. 3. n. 3. before And yet it is damnable to deny any one Point contained in the Creed So that it is cleer that to make an error damnable it is not necessary that the matter be of it self fundamental 3. Moreover you cannot ground any certainty upon the Creed it self unless first you presuppose that the Authority of the Church is universally infallible and consequently that it is damnable to oppose her Declarations whether they concerne matters great or small contained or not contained in the Creed This is clear Because we must receive the Creed it self upon the credit of the Church without which we could not know that there was any such thing as that which We call the Apostles Creed and yet the Arguments whereby you endeavour to prove that the Creed contains all Fundamental Points are grounded upon supposition that the Creed was made either by the Apostles themselves or by the (b) Pag. 216. Church of their times from them which thing we could not certainly know if the succeeding and still continued Church may err in her Traditions neither can we be assured whether all Fundamental Articles which you say were out of the Scriptures summed and contracted into the Apostles
external communion was corrupted and needed Reformation 53. That a pretence of Reformation will acquit no man from Schism we grant very willingly and therefore say that it concernes every man who separates from any Churches communion even as much as his Salvation is worth to look most carefully to it that the cause of his separation be just and necessary For unless it be necessary it can very hardly be sufficient But whether a true Reformation of our selves from errors superstition and impieties will not justifie our separation in these things our separation I say from them who will not reform themselves and as much as in them lies hinder others from doing so This is the point you should have spoken to but have not As for the sentences of the Fathers to which you refer us for the determination of this Question I suppose by what I have said above the Reader understands by alleadging them you have gain'd little credit to your cause or person And that if they were competent Judges of this controversie their sentence is against you much rather than for you 54. Lastly whereas you desire D. Potter to remember his own words There neither was nor can be any just cause to depart from the Church of Christ no more than from Christ himself and pretend that you have shewed that Luther did so The Doctor remembers his words very well and hath no reason to be ashamed of them Only he desires you to remember that hereafter you do not confound as hitherto you have done Departing from the Church i.e. ceasing to be a member of it with departing from the Churches external communion and then he is perswaded it will appear to you that against Luther and his followers you have said many things but shewed nothing 55. But the Church Universal remaining the Church Universal according to D. Potter may fall into error And from hence it cleerly followes that it is impossible to leave the external communion of the Church so corrupted and retain external communion with the Catholique Church Ans The reason of this consequence which you say is so cleer truly I cannot possibly discern But the conclusion inferr'd me-thinks is evident of it self and therefore without proof I grant it I mean that it is impossible to leave the external communion of the Catholique Church corrupted and to retain external communion with the Catholique Church But what use you can make of it I do not understand Unless you will pretend that to say a man may forsake the Churches corruptions and not the Church is all one as to say he may forsake the Churches external communion and not forsake it If you mean so sure you mistake the meaning of Protestants when they say They forsook not the Church but her corruptions For in saying so they neither affirm nor deny that they forsook the external communion of the Church nor speak at all of it But they mean only that they ceased not to be still members of the Church though they ceased to believe and practise some things which the whole Church formerly did believe and practise And as for the external Communion of the Visible Church we have without scruple formerly granted that Protestants did forsake it that is renounce the practice of some observances in which the whole Visible Church before them did communicate But this we say they did without Schism because they had cause to do so and no man can have cause to be a Schismatique 56. But your Argument you conceive will be more convincing if we consider that when Luther appeared there were not two distinct Visible true Churches one Pure the other Corrupted but one Church only Ans The ground say Histories are silent of any such matter I answer there is no necessity that you or I should have read all Histories that may be extant of this matters nor that all should be extant that were written much less extant uncorrupted especially considering your Church which had lately all the power in her hands hath been so pernitiously industrious in corrupting the monuments of Antiquity that made against her nor that all Records should remain which were written nor that all should be recorded which was done Neither secondly to suppose a Visible Church before Luther which did not err is it to contradict this ground of D. Potters that the Church may err Unless you will have us believe that May be and Must be is all one and that all which may be true is true which rule if it were true then sure all men would be honest because all men may be so and you would not make so bad Arguments unless you will pretend you cannot make better Nor thirdly is it to contradict these words The Church may not hope to triumph over all error till she be in Heaven For to triumph over error is to be secure from it to be out of danger of it not to be obnoxious to it Now a Church may be free from error and yet not secure from it and consequently in this Protestants that Luther reformed the whole Church perhaps though I know not who they be that say so by a frequent Synecdoche they may mean by the whole the greatest and most illustrious part of it the lustre whereof did much obscure the other though it were not wholly invisible Besides if their brag be evacuated as you call it let it be so I see no harm will come of it Lastly whereas you say that supposing a visible pure Church Luther must be a Schismatick who separated from all visible Churches I tell you if you will suppose a visible Church extant before and when Luther arose conformable to him in all points of doctrin necessary and profitable then Luther separated not from this Church but adjoyned himself to it Not indeed in place which was not necessary not in external communion which was impossible but by the Union of faith and charity Upon these grounds I say that the ground of this Argument is no way made certain yet because it is not manifestly false I am content to let it pass And for ought I see it is very safe for me to do so for you build nothing upon it which I may not fairly grant For what do you rupted Luther forsaking the external communion of the corrupted Câ—urch could not but forsake the external communion of the Catholique Church Well let this also be granted what will come of it What that Luther must be a Schismatique By no means For not every separation but only a causless separation from the communion of the Church we maintain to be Schismatical Hereunto may be added that though the whole Church were corrupted yet properly speaking it is not true that Luther and his Followers forsook the whole corrupted Church or the external communion of it But only that he forsook that Part of it which was corrupted and still would be so and forsook not but only reformed another Part which Part they themselves
of the Apostles the (h) Lib. 28. cont Faust cap. 2. Church hath brought down to our days by a never-interrupted course of times and by undoubted succession of connection Now that the Reformation begun by Luther was interrupted for divers ages before him is manifest our of History and by his endeavouring a Reformation which must presuppose Abuses He cannot therefore pretend a continued Succession of that Doctrin which he sought to revive and reduce to the knowledge and practise of men And they ought not to prove that they have a Succession of doctrin because they agreee with the doctrin of the Apostles but contrarily we must infer that they agree not with the Apostles because they cannot pretend a never-interrupted succession of doctrin from the times of the Apostles till Luther And here it is not amiss to note that although the Waldeases Wickliff c. had agreed with Protestants in all points of doctrin yet they could not brag of Succession from them because their doctrin hath not been free from interruption which necessarily crosseth Succession 25 And as want of Succession of Persons and Doctrin cannot stand with that Universality of Time which is inseparable from the Catholique Church so likewise the disagreeing Sects which are dispersed throughout divers Countries and Nations cannot help towards that Universality of Place wherewith the true Church must be endued but rather such local multiplication doth more and more lay open their division and want of succession in Doctrin For the excellent Observation of S. Augustine doth punctually agree with all modern Heretiques wherein this holy Father having cited these words our of the Prophet Ezechiel (i) Cap. 24. My flocks are dispersed upon the whole face of the Earth he adds this remarkable sentence Not all Heretiques (k) Lib. de Pastorib c. 8. are spread over the face of the Earth and yet there are Heretiques spread over the whole face of the Earth some here some there yet they are wanting in no place they know not one another One Sect for example in Africa another Heresie in the East another in Egypt another in Mesopotania In divers places there are divers one Mother pride hath begot them all as our own Mother the Catholique Church hath brought forth all saithful people dispersed throughout the whole world No wonder then if Pride breed Dissention and Charity Union And in another place applying to Heretiques those words of the Canticles If thou know not (l) Cant. 1. thy self go forth and follow after the steps of the flocks and seed the kids he saith If thou know not thy self go (m) Ep. 48. thou forth I do not cast thee out but go thou out that it may be said of thee They went from us but they were not of us Go thou out in the steps of the flocks not in my steps but in the steps of the flocks nor of one flock but of divers and wandring flocks And feed thy Kids not as Peter to whom is said Feed thy sheep but seed thy kids in the Tabernacle of the Pastors not in the Tabernacle of the Pastor where there is one flock and one Pastor In which words this holy Father doth set down the Marks of Heresie to wit going out from the Church and Want of Unity among themselves which proceed from not acknowledging one supreme Visible Pastor and Head under Christ And so it being Proved that Protestants havâ—â— neither succession of Persons nor Doctrin nor Universality of Time or Place cannot avoid the just note of Heresie 26 Hitherto we have brought arguments to prove that Luther and all Protestants are guilty of Heresie against the Negative Precept of saith which obligeth 〈◊〉 under pain of damnation not to imbrace any one errour contrary to any Truth sufficiently propounded as testified or revealed by Almighty God Which were enough to make good that among Persons who disagree in any one Point of Faith one part only can be saved Yet we will now prove that whosoever erreth in any one point doth also break the Affirmative Precept of Faith whereby we are obliged positively to believe some revealed truth with an infallible and supernatural Faith which is necessary to salvation even necessitate sinis or medii as Divines speak that is so necessary that not any after he is come to the use of Reason was or can be saved without it according to the words of the Apostle Without saith (n) Heb. 11.6 it is impossible to please God 27 In the beginning of this Chapter I shewed that to Christian Catholique faith are required Certainty Obscurity Prudence and Supernaturality All which Conditions we will prove to be wanting in the belief of Protestants even in those points which are true in themselves and to which they yield assent as happeneth in all those particulars wherein they agree with us from whence it will follow that they wanting true Divine saith want means absolutely necessary to salvation The faith of Protestants wanteth Certainty 28 And first that their belief wanteth Certainty I prove because they denying the Universal infallibility of the Church can have no certain ground to know what Objects are revealed or testified by God Holy Scripture is in it self most true and infallible but without the direction and declaration of the Church we can neither have certain means to know what Scâ—ipture is Canonical nor what Translations be faithful nor what is the true meaning of Scripture Every Protestant as I suppose is perswaded that his own opinions be true and that he hath used such means as are wont to be prescribed for understanding the Scripture as Prayer Conferring of divers Texts c. and yet their disagreements shew that some of them are deceived And therefore it is clear that they have no one certain ground whereon to relie for understanding of Scripture And seeing they hold all the Articles of Faith even concerning fundamental points upon the self same ground of Scripture interpreted not by the Churches Authority according to some other Rules which as experience of their contradictions teach do sometimes fail it is clear that the ground of their faith is infallible in no point at all And albeit sometime it chance to hit on the truth yet it is likewise apt to lead them to error As all Arch-heretiques believing some truths and withall divers errors upon the same ground and motive have indeed no true divine infallible faith but only a fallible humane opinion and perswasion For if the ground upon which they rely were certain it could never produce any errour 29 Another cause of uncertainty in the faith of Protestants must rise from their distinction of points fundamental and not fundamental For since they acknowledge that every error in fundamental points destroyeth the substance of faith and yet cannot determine what points be fundamental it followeth that they must remain uncertain whether or no they be not in some fundamental error and so want the substance of faith
was to all Christians at that time to set up any Pictures in a Church to worship them as your new fashion is bruited abroad to be done in the Churches of the Catholique Church But what answer doth S. Austin and Optatus make to this Accusation Do they confess and maintain it Do they say as you would now It is true we do set Pictures upon our Altar and that not only for ornament or memory but for worship also but we do well to do so and this ought not to trouble you or affright you from our Communion What other answer your Church could now make to such an objection is very hard to imagine And therefore were your Doctrin the same with the Doctrin of the Fathers in this point they must have answered so likewise But they to the contrary not only deny the crime but abhorr and detest it To little purpose therefore do you hunt after these poor shadows of resemblances between us and the Donatists unless you could shew an exact resemblance between the present Church of Rome and the ancient which seeing by this and many other particulars it is demonstrated to be impossible that Church which was then a Virgin may be now a Harlot and that which was detraction in the Donatists may be in Protestants a just accusation 17 As ill success have you in comparing D. Potter with Tyconius whom as S. Austin finds fault with for continuing in the Donatists separation having forsaken the ground of it the Doctrin of the Churches perishing so you condemn the Doctor for continuing in their communion who hold as you say the very same Heresie But if this were indeed the Doctrin of the Donatists how is it that you say presently after that the Protestants who hold the Church of Christ perished were worse than Donatists who said that the Church remained at least in Africa These things me-thinks hang not well together But to let this pass The truth is this difference for which you would fain raise such a horrible dissention between D. Potter and his Brethren if it be well considered is only in words and the manner of expression They affirming only that the Church perished from its integrity and fell into many corruptions which he denies not And the Doctor denying only that it fell from its essence and became no Church at all which they affirm not 18 These therefore are but velitations and you would seem to make but small account of them But the main point you say is that since Luther 's Reformed Church was not in being for divers Centuries before Luther and yet was in the Apostles time they must of necessity affirm heretically with the Donatists that the true unspotted Church of Christ perished and that she which remained on earth was O Blasphemy an Harlot By which words it seems you are resolute perpetually to confound True and Unspotted and to put no difference between a corrupted Church and none at all But what is this but to make no difference between a diseased and a dead man Nay what is it but to contradict your selves who cannot deny but that sins are as great stains and spots and deformities in the sight of God as errours and confess your Church to be a congregation of men whereof every particular not one excepted and consequently the generality which is nothing but a collection of them is polluted and defiled with sin You proceed 19 But say you The same heresie follows out of D. Potter and other Protestants that the Church may err in points not fundamental because we have shewed that every error against any revealed truth is Heresie and Damnable whether the matter be great or small And how can the Church more truly be said to perish than when she is permitted to maintain damnable Heresie Besides we will hereafter prove that by every act of Heresie all divine faith is lost and to maintain a true Church without any faith is to fancy a living man without life Answ What you have said before hath been answered before and what you shall say hereafter shall be confuted hereafter But if it be such a certain ground that every error against any one revealed truth is a damnable Heresie then I hope I shall have your leave to subsume That the Dominicans in your account must hold a damnable heresie who hold an error against the immaculate Conception which you must needs esteem a revealed truth or otherwise why are you so urgent and importunate to have it defined seeing your rule is Nothing may be defined unless it be first revealed But without your leave I will make bold to conclude that if either that or the contrary assertion be a revealed truth you or they chuse you whether must without contradiction hold a damnable Heresie if this ground be true that every contradiction of a revealed Truth is such And now I dare say for fear of inconvenience you will begin to temper the crudeness of your former assertion and tell us that neither of you are Heretiques because the Truth against which you err though revealed is not sufficiently propounded And so say I Neither is your doctrin which Protestants contradict sufficiently propounded For though it be plain enough that your Church proposeth it yet still me-thinks it is as plain that your Churches proposition is not sufficient and I desire you would not say but prove the contrary Lastly to your Question How can the Church more truly be said to perish than when she is permitted to maintain a damnable Heresie I Answer she may be more truly said to perish when she is not only permitted to do so but de facto doth maintain a damnable Heresie Again she may be more truly said to perish when she falls into an Heresie which is not only damnable in it self and ex natura rei as you speak but such an Heresie the belief of whose contrary Truth is necessary not only necessitate praecepti but medii and therefore the Heresie so absolutely and indispensably destructive of salvation that no ignorance can excuse it nor any general repentance without a dereliction of it can beg a pardon for it Such an heresie if the Church should fall into it might be more truly said to perish then if it fell only into some heresie of its own nature damnable For in that state all the members of it without exception all without mercy must needs perish for ever In this although those that might see the truth and would not cannot upon any good ground hope for salvation yet without question it might send many souls to heaven who would gladly have embrac'd the truth but that they wanted means to discover it Thirdly and lastly she may yet more truly be said to perish when she Apostates from â—hrist absolutely or rejects even those Truths out of which her Heresies may be reformed as if she should directly deny Jesus to be the Christ or the Scripture to be the Word of God Towards which
God or grounded upon Scripture but only by the Church and therefore alterable at the Churches pleasure i This is falsely translated Convenire ad Romanam Ecclesiam every body knows signifies no more but to resort or come to the Roman Church which then there was a necessity that men should do because that the affairs of the Empire were transacted in that place But yet Irenaeus sayes not so of every Church simply which had not been true but only of the Adjacent Churches for so he expounds himself in saying To this Church it is necessary that every Church that is all the faithful round about should resort With much more reason therefore we return the Argument thus Had Irenaeus thought that all Churches must of necessity agree with the Roman how could he and all other Bishops have then pronounc'd that to be no matter of Faith no sufficient ground of Excommunication which Victor his adherents thought to be so And how then could they have reprehended Victor so much for the ill use of his power as Cardinal Perron confesses they did seeing if that was true which is pretended in this also as well as other things it was necessary for them to agree with the Church of Rome Some there are that say but more wittily than truly that all Cardinal Bellarmines works are so consonant to themselves as if he had written them in two hours Had Cardinal Perron wrote his Book in two hours sure he would not have done that here in the middle of the Book which he condemns in the beginning of it For here he urgeth a Consequence drawn from the mistaken words of Irenaeus against his lively and actual practice which Proceeding there he justly condemns of evident injustice His words are * In his Letter to Casaubon towards the end For who knows not that it is too great an injustice to alleage consequences from passages and even those ill interpreted and misunderstood and in whose Illation there is always some Paralogism hid against the express words and the lively and actual practise of the same Fathers from whom they are collected and that it may be good to take the Fathers for Adversaries and to accuse them for want of sense or memory but not to take them for Judges and to submit themselves to the observation of what they have believ'd and practised k This is nothing to the purpose he might choose these examples not as of greater force and authority in themselves but as fitter to be imployed against Victor as domestique examples are fitter and more effectual than forrain and for his omitting to press him with his own example and others to what purpose had it been to use them seeing their Letters sent to Victor from all parts wherein they reprehend his presumption shewed him sufficiently that their example was against him But besides he that reads Irenaeus his Letter shall see that in the matter of the Lent-Fast and the great variety about the celebration of it which he parallels with this of Easter he presseth Victor with the example of himself and others not Bishops of Rome Both they saith he speaking of other Bishops notwithstanding this difference retained peace among themselves and we also among our selves retain it inferring from his example that Victor also ought to do so l If the Pope's proceeding was just then the Churches of Asia were indeed and in the sight of God excommunicate and out of the state of Salvation which Irenaeus and all the other ancient Bishops never thought And if they were so why do you account them Saints and Martyrs But the truth is that these Councels did no way shew the Pope's proceedings just but rather the contrary For though they setled an uniformity in this matter yet they setled it as a matter formerly indifferent and not as a matrer of faith or necessity as it is evident out of * In ep ad Episcopos in Africa Where he clearly shews that this question was not a question was not a question of faith by saying The Council of Nice was celebrated by occasion of the Arrian Heresie and the difference about Easter In so much as they in Syria and Cilicia and Mesopotamia did differ herein from us and kept this Feast on the same day with the Jews But thanks be to God an agreement was made as concerning the Faith so also concerning this holy Feast Athanasius and consequently they rather declare Victor's proceeding unjust who excommunicated so many Churches for differing from him in an indifferent matter m It seems then Polycrates might be a Saint and a Martyr and yet think the commands of the Roman Church enjoyned upon pain of damnation contrary to the commandements of God Besides S. Peter himself the head of the Church the Vicar of Christ as you pretend made this very answer to the high Priest yet I hope you will not say he was his inferior and obliged to obey him Lastly who sees not that when the Pope commands us any thing unjust as to communicate Lay-men in one kind to use the Latin Service c. we may very fitly say to him It is better to obey God than men and yet never think of any authority he hath over us n Between requesting and summoning me-thinks there should be some difference and Polycrates says no more but he was requested by the Church of Rome to call them and did so Here then as very often the Cardinal is fain to help the dice with a false translation and his pretence being false every one must see that that which he pretends to be insinuated by it is clearly inconsequent o Polycrates was deceived if he believed it to be against Gods Commandement and the Pope deceived as much in thinking it to be Gods commandement for it was neither one nor the other but an indifferent matter wherein God had not interposed his Authority Neither did the Councel of Nice embrace the Censure of Victor by acknowledging his Excommunication to be just and well grounded for which the Cardinal neither doth pretend nor can produce any proof any way comparable to the fore-alledged words of Athanasius testifying the contrary though perventure having setled the observation and reduced it to an uniformity they might excommunicate those who afterward should trouble the Churches peace for an indifferent matter And thus much for Irenaeus 31 I come now to S. Austin and to the first place out of him where he seems to say that the Succession in the Sea of Peter was the Rock which our Saviour meant when he said Upon this Rock c. I answer first we have no reason to be confident of the truth hereof because S. Austin himself was not but retracts it as uncertain and leaves to the Reader whether he will think that or another more probable Retr l. 1. c. 26. Secondly What he says of the Succession in the Roman Church in this place he says it elsewhere of all the Successions in all other
another age Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended but there are few or none to be found No Tradition but only of Scripture can derive it self from the Fountain but may be plainly prov'd either to have been brought in in such an age after Christ or that in such an age it was not in In a word there is no sufficient certainty but of Scripture only for any considering man to build upon This therefore and this only I have reason to believe This I will profess according to this I will live and for this if there be occasion I will not only willingly but even gladly lose my life though I should be sorry that Christians should take it from me Propose me any thing out of this Book and require whether I believe or no and seem it never so incomprehensible to human reason I will subscribe it with hand and heart as knowing no Demonstration can bee stronger than this God hath said so therefore it is true In other things I will take no mans Liberty of judgement from him neither shall any man take mine from me I will think no man the worse man nor the worse Christian I will love no man the less for differing in opinion from me And what measure I mete to others I expect from them again I am fully assured that God does not and therefore that men ought not to require any more of any man than this To believe the Scripture to be God's word to endeavour to find the true sense of it and to live according to it 57. This is the Religion which I have chosen after a long deliberation and I am verily perswaded that I have chosen wisely much more wisely than if I had guided my self according to your Churches authority For the Scripture being all true I am secur'd by believing nothing else that I shall believe no falshood as matter of faith And if I mistake the sense of Scripture and so fall into error yet am I secure from any danger thereby if but your grounds be true because endeavouring to finde the true sense of Scripture I cannot but hold my error without pertinacy and be ready to forsake it when a more true and a more probable sense shall appear unto me And then all necessary truth being as I have prov'd plainly set down in Scripture I am certain by believing Scripture to believe all necessary Truth And he that does so if his life be answerable to his faith how is it possible he should said of Salvation 58. Besides whatsoever may be pretended to gain to your Church the credit of a Guide all that and much more may be said for the Scripture Hath your Church been ancient The Scripture is more ancient Is your Church a means to keep men at unity So is the Scripture to keep those that believe it and will obey it in unity of belief in matters necessary or very profitable and in unity of Charity in points unnecessary Is your Church universal for time or place Certainly the Scripture is more universal For all the Christians in the world those I mean that in truth deserve this name do now and alwayes have believed the Scripture to be the word of God so much of it at least as contains all things necessary whereas only you say that you only are the Church of God and all Christians besides you deny it 59. Thirdly following the Scripture I follow that whereby you prove your Churches infallibility whereof were it not for Scripture what pretence could you have or what notion could we have and by so doing tacitely confess that your selves are surer of the truth of the Scripture than of your Churches authority For we must be surer of the proof than of the thing proved otherwise it is no proof 60 Fourthly following the Scripture I follow that which must be true if your Church be true for your Church gives attestation to it Whereas if I follow your Church I must follow that which though Scripture be true may be false nay which if Scripture be true must be false because the Scripture testifies against it 61. Fifthly to follow the Scripture I have God's express warrant and command and no colour of any prohibition But to believe your Church infallible I have no command at all much less an express command Nay I have reason to fear that I am prohibited to do so in these words Call no man Master on earth They fell by infidelity Thou standest by faith Be not high minded but fear The spirit of truth the world cannot receive 62. Following your Church I must hold many things not only above reason but against it if any thing be against it whereas following the Scripture I shall believe many mysteries but no impossibilities many things above reason but nothing against it many things which had they not been reveal'd reason could never have discover'd but nothing which by true reason may be confuted many things which reason cannot comprehend how they can be but nothing which reason can comprehend that it cannot be Nay I shall believe nothing which reason will not convince that I ought to believe it For reason will convince any man unless he be of a perverse mind that the Scripture is the word of God And then no reason can be greater than this God sayes so therefore it is true 63. Following your Church I must hold many things which to any mans judgement that will give himself the liberty of judgement will seem much more plainly contradicted by Scripture than the infalliblity of your Church appears to be confirm'd by it and consequently must be so foolish as to believe your Church exempted from error upon less evidence rather than subject to the common condition of mankind upon greater evidence Now if I take the Scripture only for my Guide I shall not need to do any thing so unreasonable 64. If I will follow your Church I must believe impossibilities and that with an absolute certainty upon motives which are confess'd to be but only Prudential and probable That is with a weak foundation I must firmly support a heavy a monstrous heavy building Now following the Scripture I shall have no necessity to undergoe any such difficulties 65. Following your Church I must be servant of Christ and a subject of the King but only ad placitum Papae I must be prepar'd in mind to renounce my allegiance to the King when the Pope shall declare him an Heretique and command me not to obey him and I must be prepar'd in mind to esteem Vertue Vice and Vice Vertue if the Pope shall so determine Indeed you say it is impossible he should do the later but that you know is a great question neither is it fit my obedience to God and the King should depend upon a questionable foundation And howsoever you must grant that if by an impossible supposition the Pope's commands should be contrary to the law of Christ that they of your Religion
Patron as to the great Defendor of it which style Your Majesty hath ever so exactly made good both in securing it from all dangers and in vindicating it by the well ordering and rectifying this Church from all the foul aspersions both of Domestick and Foraign enemies of which they can have no ground but their own want of Judgement or want of Charity But it is an argument of a despairing and lost cause to support it self with these impetuous out-cries and clamours the faint refuges of those that want better arguments like that Stoick in Lucian that cryed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O damned villain when he could say nothing else Neither is it credible the wiser sort of them should believe this their own horrid assertion That a God of goodness should damn to eternal torments those that love him and love truth for errors which they fall into through humane frailty But this they must say otherwise their only great argument from their damning us and our not being so peremtory in damning them because we hope unaffected Ignorance may excuse them would be lost and therefore they are engaged to act on this Tragical part only to fright the simple and ignorant as we do little children by telling them that bites which we would not have them meddle with And truely that herein they do but act a part and know themselves to do so and deal with us here as they do with the King of Spain at Rome whom they accurse and Excommunicate for fashion sake on Maundy-Thursday for detaining part of St. Peters Patrimony and absolve him without satisfaction on Good-Friday methinks their faltring and inconstancy herein makes it very apparent For though for the most part they speak nothing but thunder and lightning to us and damn us all without mercy or exception yet sometimes to serve other purposes they can be content to speak to us in a milder strain and tell us as my Adversary does more than once That they allow Protestants as much Charity as Protestants allow them Neither is this the only contradiction which I have discovered in this uncharitable Work but have shewed that by forgetting himself and retracting most of the principal grounds he builds upon he hath saved me the labour of a Confutation which yet I have not in any place found any such labour or difficulty but that it was undertakable by a man of very mean that is of my abilities And the reason is because it is Truth I plead for which is so strong an argument for it self that it needs only light to discover it whereas it concernes Falshood and Error to use disguises and shadowings and all the fetches of Art and Sophistry and therefore it stands in need of abler men to give that a colour at least which hath no real body to subsist by If my endeavours in this kind may contribute any thing to this discovery and the making plain that Truth which my Charity perswades me the most part of them disaffect only because it hath not been well represented to them I have the fruit of my labour and my wish who desire to live to no other end than to do service to Gods Church and Your most Sacred Majesty in the quality of Your MAJESTIES Most faithful Subject and most humble and devoted Servant William Chillingworth The CONTENTS of the Chapters with the Answers thereunto THe Author of Charity Maintained his Preface to the Reader Page 1. The Answer to the Preface Page 5. The FIRST PART CHAP. I. THe State of the Question with a summary of the Reasons for which men of different Religions one side only can be saved Page 23. The Answer to the First Chapter Shewing that the Adversary grants the Former Question and proposeth a New One And that there is no reason why among men of different Opinions and Communions one Side only can be saved Page 25 CHAP. II. What is that means whereby the revealed Truths of God are conveyed to our understanding and which must determine Controversies in Faith and Religion Page 37 The Answer to the Second Chapter Concerning the means whereby the revealed Truths of God are conveyed to our Understanding and which must determine Controversies in Faith and Religion Page 45 CHAP. III. That the distinction of Points Fundamental and not Fundamental is neither pertinent nor true in our present Controversie And that the Catholique visible Church cannot err in either kind of the said Point Page 107 The Answer to the Third Chapter Wherein is maintained That the distinction of Points Fundamental and not Fundamental is in this present Controversie good and pertinent And that the Catholique Church may err in the latter kind of the said Points Page 115 CHAP. IV. To say that the Creed contains all Points necessary to be believed is neither pertinent to the Question in hand nor in it self true Page 165 The Answer to the Fourth Chapter Wherein is shewed that the Creed contains all necessary Points of meer belief Page 172 CHAP. V. That Luther Calvin their Associates and all who began or continue the Separation from the external Communion of the Roman Church are guilty of the proper and formal sin of Schism Page 210 The Answer to the Fifth Chapter The separation of Protestants from the Roman Church being upon just and necessary causes is not any way guilty of Schism Page 227 CHAP. VI. That Luther and the rest of the Protestants have added Heresie unto Schism Page 279 The Answer unto the Sixth Chapter That Protestants are not Heretiques Page 289 CHAP. VII In regard of the Precept of Charity towards ones self Protestants are in a state of Sin as long as they remain separate from the Roman-Church Page 341 The Answer to the Seventh Chapter That Protestants are not bound by the Charity which they owe to themselves to re-unite themselves to the Roman-Church Page 345 The Conclusion Page 365 THE PREFACE To the AUTHOR of CHARITY MAINTAINED WITH An Answer to his Pamphlet entituled A Direction to N. N. SIR UPon the first news of the publication of your Book I used all diligence with speed to procure it and came with such a mind to the reading of it as S. Austin before he was a setled Catholique brought to his conference with Faustus the Manichee For as he thought that if any thing more than ordinary might be said in defence of the Manichean Doctrine Faustus was the man from whom it was to be expected So my perswasion concerning you was Si Pergama dextrâ Defendi possunt certè hac defensa videbo For I conceived that among the Champions of the Roman Church the English in reason must be the best or equall to the best as being by most expert Masters trained up purposely for this war and perpetually practised in it Among the English I saw the Jesuites would yield the first place to none and men so wise in their generation as the Jesuits were if they had any Achilles among them I presumed
would make choice of him for this service And besides I had good assurance that in the framing of this building though you were the only Architect yet you wanted not the assistance of many diligent hands to bring you in choise materials towards it nor of many careful and watchful eyes to correct the errors of your Work if any should chance to escape you Great reason therefore had I to expect great matters from you and that your Book should have in it the Spirit and Elixir of all that can be said in defence of your Church and Doctrine and to assure my self that if my resolution not to believe it were not built upon the rock of evident grounds and reasons but only upon some sandy and deceitful appearances now the wind and storm and floods were coming which would undoubtedly overthrow it 2. Neither truly were you more willing to effect such an alteration in me then I was to have it effected For my desire is to go the right way to eternal happiness But whether this way lie on the right hand or the left or straight forwards whether it be by following a living Guide or by seeking my direction in a Book or by hearkning to the secret whisper of some private Spirit to me it is indifferent And he that is otherwise affected and hath not a travellers indifference which Epictetus requires in all that would find the truth but much desires in respect of his ease or pleasure or profit or advancement or satisfaction of friends or any humane consideration that one way should be true rather than another it is odds but he will take his desire that it should be so for an assurance that it is so But I for my part unless I deceive my self was and still am so affected as I have made profession not willing I confess to take any thing upon trust and to believe it without asking my self why no nor able to command my self were I never so willing to follow like a sheep every Shepherd that should take upon him to guide me or every flock that should chance to go before me but most apt and most willing to be led by reason to any way or from it and alwaies submitting all other reasons to this one God hath said so therefore it is true Nor yet was I so unreasonable as to expect Mathematical demonstrations from you in matters plainly incapable of them such as are to be believed and if we speak properly cannot be known such therefore I expected not For as he is an unreasonable Master who requires a stronger assent to his conclusions then his arguments deserve so I conceive him a froward and undisciplin'd Scholar who desires stronger arguments for a conclusion than the Matter will bear But had you represented to my understanding such reasons of your Doctrine as being weighed in an eaven ballance held by an eaven hand with those on the other side would have turned the scale and have made your Religion more credible than the contrary certainly I should have despised the shame of one more alteration and with both mine arms and all my heart most readily have embraced it Such was my expectation from you and such my preparation which I brought with me to the reading of your Book 3. Would you know now what the event was what effect was wrought in me by the perusal and consideration of it To deal truly and ingenuously with you I fell somewhat in my good opinion both of your sufficiency and sincerity but was exceedingly confirmed in my ill opinion of the Cause maintained by you I found every where snares that might entrap and colours that might deceive the simple but nothing that might perswade and very little that might move an understanding man and one that can discern between Discourse and Sophistry In short I was verily perswaded that I plainly saw and could make it appear to all dis-passionate and unprejudicate Judges that a vein of sophistry and calumny did run clean thorow it from the beginning to the end And letting some Friends understand so much I suffered my self to be perswaded by them that it would not be either unproper for me nor unacceptable to God nor peradventure altogether unserviceable to his Church nor justly offensive to you if you indeed were a lover of Truth and not a maintainer of a Faction if setting aside the Second Part which was in a manner wholly employed in particular disputes repetitions and references and in wranglings with D. Potter about the sense of some supernumerary quotations and whereon the main question no way depends I would make a fair and ingenuous answer to the First wherein the substance of the present Controversie is confessedly contained and which if it were clearly answered no man would desire any other answer to the Second This therefore I undertook with a full resolution to be an adversary to your Errors but a Friend and Servant to your Person and so much the more a friend to your person by how much the severer and more rigid adversary I was to your errors 4. In this Work my conscience bears me witness that I have according to your advice proceeded always with this consideration that I am to give a most strict account of every line and word that passeth under my pen and therefore have been precisely careful for the matter of my Book to defend truth only and only by Truth And then scrupulously fearful of scandalizing you or any man with the manner of handling it From this Rule sure I am I have not willingly swerved in either part of it and that I might not do it ignorantly I have not only my self examined mine own Work perhaps with more severity than I have done yours as conceiving it a base and unchristian thing to go about to satisfie others with what I my self am not fully satisfied but have also made it pass the fiery tryal of the exact censures of many understanding Judges alwayes heartily wishing that you your Self had been of the Quorum But they who did undergo this burthen as they wanted not sufficiency to discover any heterodox Doctrine so I am sure they have been very careful to let nothing slip dissonant from truth or from the authorized Doctrine of the Church of England and therefore whatsoever causeless or groundless jealousie any man may entertain concerning my Person yet my Book I presume in reason and common equity should be free from them wherein I hope that little or nothing hath escaped so many eyes which being weighed in the balance of the Sanctuary will be found too light And in this hope I am much confirmed by your strange carriage of your self in this whole business For though by some crooked and sinister arts you have got my Answer into your hands now a year since and upwards as I have been assured by some that profess to know it and those of your own party though you could not want every day fair opportunities of
Writer Michael de Montaigne was surely of a far different minde for he will hardly allow any Physitian competent but only for such diseases as himself had passed through And a far greater than Montaigne even he that said Tu conversus confirma fratres gives us sufficiently to understand that they which have themselves been in such a state as to need conversion are not thereby made incapable of but rather engaged and obliged unto and qualified for this charitable function 42. Neither am I guilty of that strange and preposterous zeal as you esteem it which you impute to me for having been so long careless in removing this scandal against Protestants and answering my own Motives and yet now shewing such fervor in writing against others For neither are they other Motives but the very same for the most part with those which abused me against which this Book which I now publish is in a maner wholly imployed And besides though you Jesuits take upon you to have such large and universal intelligence of all State-affairs and matters of importance yet I hope such a contemptible matter as an Answer of mine to a little piece of paper may very probably have been written and escaped your Observation The truth is I made an Answer to them three years since and better which perhaps might have been published but for two reasons One because the Motives were never publique until you made them so The other because I was loath to proclaim to all the world so much weakness as I shewed in suffering my self to be abused by such silly Sophisms All which proceed upon mistakes and false suppositions which unadvisedly I took for granted as when I have set down the Motives in order by subsequent Answers to them I shall quickly demonstrate and so make an end 43. The Motives then were these 1. Because perpetuall visible profession which could never be wanting to the Religion of Christ nor any part of it is apparently wanting to Protestant Religion so far as concerns the points in contestation 2. Because Luther and his Followers separating from the Church of Rome separated also from all Churches pure or impure true or false then being in the World upon which ground I conclude that either Gods promises did fail of performance if there were then no Church in the world which held all things necessary and nothing repugnant to Salvation or else that Luther and his Sectaries separating from all Churches then in the World and so from the true if there were any true were damnable Schismaticks 3. Because if any credit may be given to as creditable Records as any are extant the Doctrine of Catholiques hath been frequently confirmed and the opposite Doctrine of Protestants confounded with supernatural and divine Miracles 4. Because many points of Protestant doctrine are the damned opinions of Heretiques condemned by the Primitive Church 5. Because the Prophecies of the old Testament touching the conversion of Kings and Nations to the true Religion of Christ have been accomplished in and by the Catholique Roman Religion and the Professors of it and not by Protestant Religion and the Professors of it 6. Because the doctrine of the Church of Rome is conformable and the Doctrine of Protestants contrary to the Doctrine of the Fathers of the Primitive Church even by the confession of Protestants themselves I mean those Fathers who lived within the compasse of the first 600. years to whom Protestants themselves do very frequently and very confidently appeal 7. Because the first pretended Reformers had neither extraordinary Commission from God nor ordinary Mission from the Church to Preach Protestant Doctrine 8. Because Luther to preach against the Masse which contains the most material points now in Controversie was perswaded by reasons suggested to him by the Devil himself disputing with him So himself professeth in his Bock de Missa Privata That all men might take heed of following him who professeth himself to follow the Devill 9. Because the Protestant cause is now and hath been from the beginning maintained with grosse falsifications and Calumnies whereof their prime Controvâ—rsie-Writers are notoriously and in high degree guilty 10. Because by denying all humane authority either of Pope or Councels or Church to determine Controversies of Faith they have abolished all possible means of suppressing Heresie or restoring Unity to the Church These are the Motives now my Answers to them follow briefly and in order 44. To the first God hath neither decreed nor foretold that his true Doctrine should de facto be alwayes visibly professed without any mixture of falshood To the second God hath neither decreed not foretold that there shall be always a visible company of men free from all error in it self damnable Neither is it always of necessity Schismatical to separate from the external communion of a Church though wanting nothing necessary For if this Church supposed to want nothing necessary require me to profess against my conscience that I believe some errour though never so small and innocent which I do not believe and will not allow me her Communion but upon this condition In this case the Church for requiring this condition is Schismatical and not I for separating from the Church To the third If any credit may be given to Records far more creditable than these the Doctrine of Protestants that is the Bible hath been confirmed and the Doctrine of Papists which is in many points plainly opposite to it confounded with supernatural and divine Miracles which for number and glory outshine Popish pretended Miracles as much as the Sun doth an Ignis fatuus those I mean which were wrought by our Saviour Christ and his Apostles Now this Book by the confession of all sides confirmed by innumerous Miracles foretels me plainly that in after-ages great signs and wonders shall be wrought in confirmation of false doctrin and that I am not to believe any doctrin which seems to my understanding repugnant to the first though an Angel from Heaven should teach it which were certainly as great a Miracle as any that was ever wrought in attestation of any part of the doctrine of the Church of Rome But that true doctrine should in all ages have the testimony of Miracles that I am no where taught So that I have more reason to suspect and be afraid of pretended Miracles as signs of false doctrine than much to regard them as certain Arguments of the Truth Besides setting aside the Bible and the Tradition of it there is as good story for Miracles wrought by those who lived and dyed in opposition to the Doctrine of the Roman Church as by S. Cyprian Colmannus Columbanus Aidanus and others as there is for those that are pretended to be wrought by the members of that Church Lastly it seems to me no strange thing that God in his Justice should permit some true Miracles to be wrought to delude them who have forged so many as apparently the Professors of
abandon him as he was bold to alter that Canon of Scripture which he found received in God's Church 9. What Books of Scripture the Protestants of England hold for Canonical is not easie to affirm In their sixth Article they say In the name of the holy Scripture we do understand those Canonical Books of the Old and New Testament of whose Authority was never any doubt in the Church What mean they by these words That by the Churches consent they are assured what Scriptures be Canonical This were to make the Church Judge and not Scriptures alone Do they only understand the agreement of the Church to be a probable inducement Probability is no sufficient ground for an infallible assent of Faith By this rule of whose Authority was NEVER any doubt in the Church the whole book of Esther must quit the Canon because some in the Church have excluded it from the Canon as (o) Apud Euseb l. 4. hist c. 26 Melito Asianus (p) In Synop. Athanasius and (q) In carm de genuinis Scrip. Gregory Nazianzen And Luther if Protestants will be content that he be in the Church saith The Jews (r) Li. de serv arb con Eras tom 2. Wit sol 471. place the book of Esther in the Canon which yet if I might be Judge doth rather deserve to be put out of the Canon And of Ecclesiastes he saith This (Å¿) In lat serm conviviali us Franc. in 8. imp Anno 1571. book is not full there are in it many abrupt things he wants boots and spurs that is he hath no perfect sentence he rides upon a tong reed like me when I was in the Monastery And much more is to be read in him who (t) In Ger. colloq Lutheri ab Aurifabro ed. Fran. tit de lib. vet nov Test fol. 379. saith further that the said book was not written by Solomon but by Syrach in the time of the Macchabees and that it is like to the Talmud the Jews Bible out of many books heaped into one work perhaps out of the Library of King Prolomaeus And further he saith that (u) Ib. tit edit Patriar Proph. sol 282. he doth not believe all to have been done as there is set down And he teacheth the (w) Tit. de li. Vet. Nov. Test book of Job to be as it were an argument for a Fable or Comedy to set before us an example of Patience And he (x) Fol. 380. delivers this general censure of the Prophets Books The Sermons of no Prophet were written whole and perfect but their Disciples and Auditors snatched now one sentence and then another and so put them all into one book and by this means the Bible was conserved If this were so the books of the Prophets being not written by themselves but promiscuously and casually by their Disciples will soon be called in question Are not these errors of Luther fundamental and yet if Protestants deny the Infallibility of the Church upon what certain ground can they disprove these Lutherian and Luciferian blasphemies O godly Reformer of the Roman Church But to return to our English Canon of Scripture In the New Testament by the above-mentioned rule of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church divers Books of the New Testament must be dis-canonized to wit all those of which some Ancients have doubted and those which divers Lutherans have of late denied It is worth the observation how the before-mentioned sixth Article doth specifie by name all the Books of the Old Testament which they hold for Canonical but those of the New Testament as they are commonly received we do receive and account them Canonical The Mysterie is easily to be unfolded If they had descended to particulars they must have contradicted some of their chiefest Brethren As they are commonly received c. I ask By whom By the Church of Rome Then by the same reason they must receive divers Books of the Old Testament which they reject By Lutherans Then with Lutherans they may deny some Books of the New Testament If it be the greater or less number of Voices that must cry up or down the Canon of Scripture our Roman Canon will prevail and among Protestants the Certainty of their Faith must be reduced to an Uncertain Controversie of Fact Whether the number of those who reject or of those others who receive such and such Scriptures be greater Their Faith must alter according to years and days When Luther first appeared he and his Disciples were the greater number of that new Church and so this claim Of being commonly received stood for them till Zuinglius or Calvin grew to some equal or greater number than that of the Lutherans and then this rule of Commonly received will canonize their Canon against the Lutherans I would gladly know why in the former part of their Article they say both of the Old and New Testament In the name of the holy Scripture we do understand those Canonical Books of the Old and New Testament of whose Authority was never any doubt in the Church And in the latter part speaking again of the New Testament they give a far different rule saying All the Books of the New Testament as they are commonly received we do receive and account them Canonical This I say is a rule much different from the former of whose Authority was NEVER any doubt in the Church For some Books might be said to be Commonly received although they were sometime doubted of by some If to be Commonly received pass for a good rule to know the Canon of the New Testament why not of the Old Above all we desire to know Upon what infallible ground in some Books they agree with us against Luther and divers principal Lutherans and in others jump with Luther against us But seeing they disagree among themselves it is evident that they have no certain rule to know the Canon of Scripture in assigning whereof some of them must of necessity err because of contradictory Propositions both cannot be true 10. Moreover the letters syllables words phrase or matter contained in holy Scripture have no necessary or natural connection with divine Revelation or Inspiration and therefore by seeing reading or understanding them we cannot inferr that they proceeed from God or be confirmed by divine Authority as because Creatures involve a necessary relation connection and dependance on their Creator Philosophers may by the light of natural reason demonstrate the existence of one prime cause of all things In Holy Writ there are innumerable truths not surpassing the sphear of humane wit which are or may be delivered by Pagan Writers in the self same words and phrase as they are in Scripture And as for some truths peculiar to Christians for example the mysterie of the blessed Trinity c. The only setting them down in Writing is not enough to be assured that such a Writing is the undoubted Word of God otherwise
35. You proceed And whereas the Protestants of England in the 6. Art have these words In the name of the Holy Scripture we do understand those Books of whose Authority was never any doubt in the Church you demand What they mean by them Whether that by the Churches consent they are assured what Scriptures be Canonical I answer for them Yes they are so And whereas you inferre from hence This is to make the Church Judge I have told you already That of this Controversie we make the Church the Judge but not the present Church much less the present Roman Church but the consent and testimony of the Ancient and Primitive Church Which though it be but an highly probable inducement and no demonstrative enforcement yet me-thinks you should not deny but may be a sufficient ground of Faith Whose Faith even of the Foundation of all your Faith your Churches Authority is built lastly and wholly upon Prudential Motives 36. But by this Rule the whole Book of Esther must quit the Canon because it was excluded by some in the Church by Melito Athanasius and Gregory Nazianzen Then for ought I know he that should think he had reason to exclude it now might be still in the Church as well as Melito Athanasius Nazianzen were And while you thus inveigh against Luther and charge him with Luciferian heresies for doing that which you in this very place confess that Saints in Heaven before him have done are you not partial and a Judge of evil thoughts 37. Luther's censures of Ecclesiastes Job and the Prophets though you make such tragedies with them I see none of them but is capable of a tolerable construction and far from having in them any fundamental Heresie He that condemns him for saying the Book of Ecclesiastes is not full That it hath many abrupt things condemns him for ought I can see for speaking truth And the rest of the censure is but a bold and blunt expression of the same thing The Book of Job may be a true History and yet as many true stories are and have been and Argument of a Fable to set before us an example of Patience And though the Books of the Prophets were not written by themselves but by their Disciples yet it does not follow that they were written casually Though I hope you will not damn all for Hereticks that say Some Books of Scripture were written casually Neither is there any reason they should the sooner be called in question for being written by their Disciples seeing being so written they had attestation from themselves Was the Prophesie of Jeremy the less Canonical for being written by Baruch Or because S. Peter the Master dictated the Gospel and S. Mark the Scholler writ it is it the more likely to be called in Question 38. But leaving Luther you return to our English Canon of Scripture And tell us That in the New Testament by the above-mentioned Rule of whose Authority was never doubt in the Church divers Books must be dis-canonized Not so For I may believe even those questioned Books to have been written by the Apostles and to be Canonical but I cannot in reason believe this of them so undoubtedly as of those Books which were never questioned At least I have no warrant to damn any man that shall doubt of them or deny them now having the example of Saints in Heaven either to justifie or excuse such their doubting or denial 39. You observe in the next place That our sixth Article specifying by name all the Books of the Old Testament shuffles over those of the New with this generality All the Books of the New Testament as they are commonly received we do receive and account them Canonical And in this you fancy to your self a mysterie of iniquity But if this be all the shuffling that the Church of England is guilty of I believe the Church as well as the King may give for her Motto Honi soit qui mal y pense For all the Bibles which since the composing of the Articles have been used and allowed by the Church of England do testifie and even proclaim to the World that by Commonly-received they meant received by the Church of Rome and other Churches before the Reformation I pray take the pains to look in them and there you shall find the Books which the Church of England counts Apocryphal marked out and severed from the rest with this Title in the beginning The Books called Apocrypha and with this close or seal in the end The end of the Apocrypha And having told you by name and in particular what Books only she esteems Apocryphal I hope you will not put her to the trouble of telling you that the rest are in her judgment Canonical 40. But if by Commonly-received She meant by the Church of Rome then by the same reason must she receive divers Books of the Old Testament which she rejects 41. Certainly a very good consequence The Church of England receives the Books of the New Testament which the Church of Rome receives Therefore she must receive the Books of the Old Testament which she receives As if you should say If you will do as we in one thing you must in all things If you will pray to God with us ye must pray to Saints with us If you hold with us when we have reason on our Side you must do so when we have no reason 42. The Discourse following is but a vain Declamation No man thinks that this Controversie is to be tried by Most Voices but by the Judgement and Testimony of the Ancient Fathers and Churches 43. But with what Coherence can we say in the former part of the Article That by Scripture we mean those Books that were never doubted of and in the latter say We receive all the Books of the New Testament as they are commonly received whereas of them many were doubted I answer When they say of whose Authority there was never any doubt in the Church They mean not those only of whose Authority there was simply no doubt at all by any man in the Church But such as were not at any time doubted of by the whole Church or by all Churches but had attestation though not universal yet at least sufficient to make considering men receive them for Canonical In which number they may well reckon those Epistles which were sometimes doubted of by some yet whose number and authority was not so great as to prevail against the contrary suffrages 44. But if to be commonly received passe for a good Rule to know the Canon of the New Testament by why not of the Old You conclude many times very well but still when you do so it is out of Principles which no man grant for who ever told you that to be commonly received is a good Rule to know the Canon of the New Testament by Have you been trained up in Schools of subtilty and cannot you see a great difference
Church which we pretend may deviate from the Ancient but such a Tradition which involves an â—â—ndence of Fact and from hand to hand from age to age bringing us up to the times and persons of the Apostles and our Saviour himself cometh to be confirmed by all those Miracles and other Arguments whereby they convinced their doctrine to be true Thus you Now prove the Canon of Scripture which you receive by such Tradition and we will allow it Prove your whole doctrine or the infallibility of your Church by such a Tradition and we will yield to you in all things Take the alleaged places of S. Athanasius and S. Austin in this sense which is your own and they will not press us any thing at all We will say with Athanasius That only four Gospels are to be received because the Canons of the Holy and Catholique Church understand of all Ages since the perfection of the Canon have so determined 54. We will subscribe to S. Austin and say That we also would not believe the Gospel unless the Authority of the Catholique Church did move us meaning by the Church the Church of all Ages and that succession of Christians which takes in Christ himself and his Apostels Neither would Zwinglius have needed to cry out upon this saying had he conceived as you now do that by the Catholique Church the Church of all Ages since Christ was to be understood As for the Councel of Carthage it may speak not of such Books only as were certainly Canonical and for the regulating of Faith but also of those which were only profitable and lawful to be read in the Church Which in England is a very slender Argument that the book is Canonical where every body knows that Apocryphal books are read as well as Canonical But howsoever if you understand by Fathers not only their immediate Fathers and Predecessors in the Gospel but the succession of them from the Apostles they are right in the Thesis that whatsoever is received from these Fathers as Canonical is to be so esteemed Though in the application of it to this or that particular book they may haply erre and think that book received as Canoniel which was only received as profitable to be read and think that Book received alwaies and by all which was rejected by some and doubted of by many 55. But we cannot be certain in what language the Scriptures remain uncorrupted Not so certain I grant as of that which we can demonstrate But certain enough morally certain as certain as the nature of the thing will bear So certain we may be and God requires no more We may be as certain as S. Austin was who in his second book of Baptism against the Donatists c. 3. plainly implies the Scripture might possibly be corrupted He means sure in matters of little moment such as concern not the Covenant between God and Man But thus he saith The same S. Austin in his 48. Epist cleerly intimates (a) Neque enim sic poturt integrit as atque notitia literarum quamlibet illust is Episcopi castodiri quemadmodum Scritura Canonica tet linguarum literis ordine successione celebrationis Ecclesiasticae custoditur contra quam non desuerunt tamâ—n qui sub nominibus Aposiolorum multa consiagerent Frustra quidem quia illa sic commendata sic celebrata sic nota est Verum quid possit adversus literas non Canonica authoritate sundatas etiam hinc demonstrabit impiae conatus audaciae quòd adversus cos quae tanta notitiae mole firmatae sunt sese erigere non praetermisit Aug. ep 48. ad Vincent cont Donat. Rogat That in his judgement the only preservative of the Scriptures integrity was the translating it into so many Languages and the general and perpetual use and reading of it in the Church for want whereof the works of particular Doctors were more exposed to danger in this kind but the Canonical Scripture being by this means guarded with universal care and diligence was not obnoxious to such attempts And this assurance of the Scriptures incorruption is common to us with him we therefore are as certain hereof as S. Austin was and that I hope was certain enough Yet if this does not satisfie you I say farther We are as certain hereof as your own Pope Sixtus Quintus was He in his Preface to his Bible tells us (b) In hac germani textus peâ—vestigatione satis perspicue inter omnes constat nullum argumenum esse certius ac sirmius quà m antiquorum probatorum codicum Latinorum fidem c. sie Sâ—xtus in Praef. That in the pervestigation of the true and genuine Text it was perspicuously manifest to all men that there was no Argument more firm and certain to be relied upon than the Faith of Ancient Books Now this ground we have to build upon as well as he had and therefore our certainty is as great and stands upon as certain ground as his did 56. This is not all I have to say in this matter For I will add moreover that we are as certain in what Language the Scripture is uncorrupted as any man in your Church was until Clement the eighth set forth your own approved Edition of your Vulgar Translation For you do not nor cannot without extream impudence deny that until then there was great variety of Copes currant in divers parts of your Church and those very frequent in various lections all which Copies might possibly be false in some things but more than one sort of them could not possibly be true in all things Neither were it less impudence to pretend that any man in your Church could until Clement's time have any certainty what that one true Copie and Reading was if there were one perfectly true Some indeed that had got Sixtus his Bible might after the Edition of that very likely think themselves cock-sure of a perfect true uncorrupted Translation without being beholding to Clement but how foully they were abused and deceived that thought so the Edition of Clemens differing from that of Sixtus in a great multitude of places doth sufficiently demonstrate 57. This certainty therefore in what language the Scripture remains uncorrupted is it necessary to have it or is it not If it be not I hope we may do well enough without it If it be necessary What became of your Church for 1500 years together All which time you must confess she had no such certainty no one man being able truly and upon good ground to say This or that Copy of the Bible is pure and perfect and uncorrupted in all things And now at this present though some of you are grown to a higher degree of Presumption in this Point yet are you as far as ever from any true real and rational assurance of the absolute purity of your Authentique Translation which I suppose my self to have proved unanswerably in divers places 58. In the sixteenth Division It is objected to
she delivers for that reason because she delivers it And if you meant only Protestants will have men to believe some Books to be Scripture which the Roman Church delivers for such may not we then ask as you do Do not Papists perfectly resemble these men which will have men believe the Church of England delivering Scripture but not to believe her condemning the Church of Rome 101. And whereas you say S. Austin may seem to have spoken Prophetically against Protestants when he said Why should I not most diligently enquire what Christ commanded of them before all others by whose Authority I was moved to believe that Christ commanded any good thing I answer Until you can shew that Protestants believe that Christ commanded any good thing that is That they believe the Truth of Christian Religion upon the Authority of the Church of Rome this place must be wholly impertinent to your purpose which is to make Protestants believe your Church to be the infallible Expounder of Scriptures and Judg of Controversies Nay rather is it not directly against your purpose For why may not a Member of the Church of England who received his Baptism Education and Faith from the Ministery of this Church say just so to you as S. Austin here to the Manichees Why should I not most diligently enquire what Christ commanded of them the Church of England before all others by whose Authority I was moved to believe that Christ commanded any good thing Can you F. or K. or whosoever you are better declare to me what he said whom I would not have thought to have been or to be if the belief thereof had been recommended by you to me This therefore that Christ Jesus did those Miracles and taught that Doctrine which is contained evidently in the undoubted Books of the New Testament I believed by Fame strengthened with Celebrity and Consent even of those which in other things are at infinite variance one with another and lastly by Antiquity which gives an universal and a constant attestation to them But every one may see that you so few in comparison of all those upon whose consent we ground our belief of Scripture so turbulent that you damn all to the fire and to Hell that any way differ from you that you profess it is lawful for you to use violence and power whensoever you can have it for the planting of your own Doctrine and the extirpation of the contrary Lastly so new in many of your Doctrines as in the lawfulness and expedience of debarring the Laity the Sacramental Cup the lawfulness and expedience of your Latine Service Transubstantiation Indulgences Purgatory the Pope's Infallibility his Authority over Kings c. So new I say in comparison of the undoubted Books of Scripture which evidently containeth or rather is our Religion and the sole and adequate object of our faith I say every one may see that you so few so turbulent so new can produce nothing deserving Authority with wise and considerate men What madness is this Believe then the consent of Christians which are now and have been ever since Christ in the World that we ought to believe Christ but learn of us what Christ said which contradict and damn all other parts of Christendom Why I beseech you Surely if they were not at all and could not teach me any thing I would more easily perswade my self that I were not to believe in Christ than that I should learn any thing concerning him from any other than them by whom I believed him at least than that I should learn what his Religion was from you who have wronged so exceedingly his Miracles and his Doctrine by forging so evidently so many false Miracles for the Confirmation of your new Doctrine which might give us just occasion had we no other assurance of them but your Authority to suspect the true ones Who with forging so many false Stories and fals◠Authors have taken a fair way to make the faith of all Stories questionable if we had no other ground for our Belief of them but your Authority who have brought in Doctrines plainly and directly contrary to that which you confess to be the Word of Christ and which for the most part make either for the honour or profit of the Teachers of them which if there were no difference between the Christian and the Roman Church would be very apt to make suspicious men believe that Christian Religion was a humane invention taught by some cunning Impostors only to make themselves rich and powerful who make a profession of corrupting all sorts of Authors a ready course to make it justly questionable whether any remain uncorrupted For if you take this Authority upon you upon the six Ages last past how shall we know that the Church of that time did not usurp the same Authority upon the Authors of the six last Ages before them and so upwards until we come to Christ himself Whose questioned Doctrines none of them came from the Fountain of Apostolike Tradition but have insinuated themselves into the Streams by little and little some in one age and some in another some more anciently some more lately and some yet are Embrio's yet hatching and in the shell as the Pope's infallibility the blessed Virgin 's immaculate Conception the Pope's power over the Temporalties of Kings the Doctrine of Predetermination c. all which yet are or in time may be imposed upon Christians under the Title of Original and Apostolike Tradition and that with that necessity that they are told they were as good believe nothing at all as not believe these things to have come from the Apostles which they know to have been brought in but yesterday which whether it be not a ready and likely way to make men conclude thus with themselves I am told that I were as good believe nothing at all as believe some points which the Church teacheth me and not others and some things which she teacheth to be Ancient and Certain I plainly see to be New and False therefore I will believe nothing at all Whether I say the foresaid grounds be not a ready and likely way to make men conclude thus and whether this Conclusion be not too often made in Italy and Spain and France and in England too I leave it to the judgement of those that have wisdom and experience Seeing therefore the Roman Church is so far from being a sufficient Foundation for our Belief in Christ that it is in sundry regards a dangerous temptation against it why should I not much rather conclude Seeing we receive not the knowledg of Christ and Scriptures from the Church of Rom◠neither from her must we take his Doctrine or the Intepretation of Scripture 102. Ad § 19. In this number this Argument is contained The Judg of Controversies ought to be intelligible to learned and unlearned The Scripture is not so and the Church is so Therefore the Church is the Judge and not
they might be saved God requiting of us under pain of damnation only to believe the verities therein contained and not the divine Authority of the Books wherein they are contained Not but that it were now very strange and unreasonable if a man should believe the matter of these Books and not the Authority of the Books and therefore if a man should profess the not-believing of these I should have reason to fear he did not believe that But there is not always an equal necessity for the belief of those things for the belief whereof there is an equal reason We have I believe as great reason to believe there was such a man as Henry the eighth King of England as that Jesus Christ suffered under Pontius Pilate yet this is necessary to be believed and that is not so So that if any man should doubt of or dâ—sbelieve that it were most unreasonably done of him yet it were no mortal sin nor no sin at all God having no where commanded men under pain of damnation to believe all which reason induceth them to believe Therefore as an Executor that should perform the whole will of the dead should fully satisfie the Law though he did not believe that Parchment to be his written Will which indeed is so So I believe that he who believes all the particular Doctrines which integrate Christianity and lives according to them should be saved though he neither believed nor knew that the Gospels were written by the Evangelists or the Epistles by the Apostles 160. This disourse whether it be rational and concluding or no I submit to better judgment but sure I am that the Corollary which you draw from this Position that this Point is not Fundamental is very inconsequent that is that we are uncertain of the truth of it because we say The whole Church much more particular Churches and private men may err in points not Fundamental A pretty sophism depending upon this Principle that whosoever possibly may err he cannot be certain that he doth not err And upon this ground what shall hinder me from concluding that seeing you also hold that neither particular Churches nor private men are infallible even in Fundamentals that even the Fundamentals of Christianity remain to you uncertain A Judge may possibly err in judgment can he therefore never have assurance that he hath judged right A Traveller may possibly mistake his way must I therefore be doubtful whether I am in the right way from my Hall to my Chamber Or can our London-Carrier have no certainty in the middle of the day when he is sober and in his wits that he is in the way to London These you see are right worthy consequences and yet they are as like your own as an egg to an egg or milk to milk 161. And for the self same reason you say we are not certain that the Church is not Judge of Controversies But now this self same appears to be no reason and therefore for all this we may be certain enough that the Church is no Judge of Controversies The ground of this sophism is very like the former viz. that we can be certain of the falshood of no propositions but these only which are damnable errors But I pray good Sir give me your opinion of these The Snow is black the Fire is cold that M. Knot is Arch-Bishop of Toledo that the whole is not greater than a part of the whole that twice two make not four In your opinion good Sir are these damnable Heresies Or because they are not so have we no certainty of the falshood of them I beseech you Sir to consider seriously with what strange captions you have gone about to delude your King and your Country and if you be convinced they are so give glory to God and let the world know it by your deserting that Religion which stands upon such deceitful foundations 162. Besides you say among publique Conclusions defended in Oxford the year 1633. to the Questions Whether the Church have Authority to determine Controversies of Fâ—ith And to interpret holy Scripture The Answer to both is â—ffirmative But what now if I should tell you that in the year 1632. among publique Conclusions defended in Doway one was That God predeterminates men to all their actions good bad and indifferent Will you think your self obliged to be of this opinion If you will say so If not do as you would be done by Again me-thinks so subtil a man as you are should easily apprehend a wide difference between Authority to do a thing and an Absolute The former the Doctor together with the Article of the Church of England attributeth to the Church nay to particular Churches and I subscribe to his opinion that is an Authority of determining Controversies of Faith according to plain and evident Scripture and Universal Tradition and Infallibility while they proceed according to this Rule As if there should arise an Heretique that should call in question Christ's Passion and Resurrection the Church had Authority to decide this Controversie and infallible direction how to do it and to excommunicate this man if he should persist in error I hope you will not deny but that the Judges have Authority to determine Criminal and Civil Controversies and yet I hope you will not say that they are absolutely infallible in their determination Infallible while they proceed according to Law and if they do so but not infallibly certain that they shall ever do so But that the Church should be infallibly assisted by God's Spirit to decide rightly all emergent Controversies even such as might be held diversly of divers men Salva compage fidei and that we might be absolutely certain that the Church should never fail to decree the truth whether she used means or no whether she proceed according to her Rule or not or lastly that we might be absolutely certain that she would never fail to proceed according to her Rule this the Defender of these Conclusions said not and therefore said no more to your purpose than you have all this while that is just nothing 163. Ad § 27. To the place of S. Austin alledged in this Paragraph I Answer First that in many things you will not be tried by S. Augustin's judgement nor submit to his Authority not concerning Appeals to Rome not concerning Transubstantiation not touching the use and worshipping of Images not concerning the State of Saint's souls before the day of Judgment not touching the Virgin Marie's freedom from actual and original sin not touching the necessity of the Eucharist for Infants not touching the damning Infants to hell that die without Baptism not touching the knowledge of Saints departed not touching Purgatory not touching the fallibility of Councels even general Councels not touching perfection and perspicuity of Scripture in matters necessary to Salvation not touching Auricular Confession not touching the half-Communion not touching prayers in an unknown tongue In these things I say you
will not stand to S. Austin's judgment and therefore can with no reason or equity require us to do so in this matter 2. To S. Augustine in heat of disputation against the Donatists and ransacking all places for Arguments against them we oppose S. Austin out of this heat delivering the Doctrine of Christianity calmly and moderately where he says In iis quae apretè posita sunt in sacris Scripturis omnia ea reperiuntur quae continent fidem moresque vivendi 3. We say he speaks not of the Roman but the Catholike Church of far greater extent and therefore of far greater credit and authority than the Roman Church 4. He speaks of a point not expressed but yet not contradicted by Scripture whereas the errors we charge you with are contradicted by Scripture 5. He says not that Christ hath recommended the Church to us for an infallible definer of all emergent Controversies but for a credible witness of ancient Tradition Whosoever therefore refuseth to follow the practice of the Church understand of all places and ages though he be thought to resist our Saviour what is that to us who cast off no practices of the Church but such as are evidently post-nate to the time of the Apostles and plainly contrary to the practice of former and purer times Lastly it is evident and even to Impudence it self undeniable that upon this ground of believing all things taught by the present Church as taught by Christ Error was held for example the necessity of the Eucharist for Infants and that in S. Austin's time and that by S. Austin himself and therefore without controversie this is no certain ground for truth which may support falshood as well as truth 164. To the Argument wherewith you conclude I answer That though the Visible Church shall always without fail propose so much of God's Revelation as is sufficient to bring men to Heaven for otherwise it will not be the visible Church yet it may sometimes add to this revelation things superfluous nay hurtful nay in themselves damnable though not unpardonable and sometimes take from it things very expedient and profitable and therefore it is possible without sin to resist in some things the Visible Church of Christ But you press us farther and demand What visible Church was extant when Luther began whether it were the Roman or Protestant Church As if it must of necessity either be Protestant or Roman or Roman of necessity if it were not Protestant Yet this is the most usual fallacy of all your Disputers by some specious Arguments to perswade weak men that the Church of Protestants cannot be the true Church and thence to inferr that without doubt it must be the Roman But why may not the Roman be content to be a part of it and the Grecian another And if one must be the whole why not the Greek Church as well as the Roman there being not one Note of your Church which agrees not to her as well as to your own unless it be that she is poor and oppressed by the Turk and you are in glory and splendor 165. Neither is it so easie to be determined as you pretend That Luther and other Protestants opposed the whole visible Church in matters of Faith neither is it so evident that the Visible Church may not fall into such a state wherein she may be justly opposed And lastly for calling the distinction of points into Fundamental and not Fundamental an Evasion I believe you will find it easier to call it so than to prove it so But that shall be the issue of the Controversie in the next Chapter CHAP. III. That the distinction of Points Fundamental and not Fundamental is neither pertinent nor true in our present Controversie And that the Catholique Visible Church cannot err in either kind of the said Points THis distinction is abused by Protestants to many purposes of theirs and therefore if it be either untrue or impertinent as they understand and apply it the whole edifice built thereon must be ruinous and false For if you object their bitter and continued discords in matters of Faith without any means of agreement they instantly tell you as Charity Mistaken plainly shews that they differ only in Points not Fundamental If you convince them even by their own Confessions that the Ancient Fathers taught divers Points held by the Roman Church against Protestants they reply that those Fathers may nevertheless be saved because those errors were not Fundamental If you will them to remember that Christ must alwayes have a Visible Church on earth with administration of Sacraments and succession of Pastors and that when Luther appeared there was no Church distinct from the Roman whose Communion and Doctrine Luther then forsook and for that cause must be guilty of Schism and Heresie they have an Answer such as it is that the Catholique Church cannot perish yet may err in Points not Fundamental and therefore Luther and other Protestants were obliged to forsake her for such errors under pain of Damnation as if sorsooth it were Damnable to hold an error not Fundamental nor Damnable If you wonder how they can teach that both Catholiques and Protestants may be saved in their several Professions they salve this contradiction by saying that we both agree in all Fundamental Points of Faith which is enough for salvation And yet which is prodigiously strange they could never be induced to give a Catalogue what Points in particular be Fundamental but only by some general description or by referring us to the Apostles Creed without determining what Points therein be Fundamental or not Fundamental for the matter and in what sense they be or be not such And yet concerning the meaning of divers Points contained or reduced to the Creed they differ both from us and among themselves And indeed it being impossible for them to exhibit any such Catalogue the said distinction of Points although it were pertinent and true cannot serve them to any purpose but still they must remain uncertain whether or not they disagree from one another from the ancient Fathers and from the Catholique Church in Points Fundamental which is to say they have no certainty whether they enjoy the substance of Christian Faith without which they cannot hope to be saved But of this more hereafter 2. And to the end that what shall be said concerning this distinction may be better understood we are to observe that there be two precepts which concern the vertue of Faith or our obligation to believe divine Truths The one is by Divines called Affirmative whereby we are obliged to have a positive explicit belief of some chief Articles of Christian Faith The other is temed Negative which strictly binds us not to disbelieve that is not to believe the contrary of any one Point sufficiently represented to our understandings as revealed or spoken by Almighty God The said Affirmative Precept according to the nature of such commands injoyns some Act to
brought for the universal infallibility of the Apostles or Scriptures So he may and so he must lest otherwise he receive this answer of his own from himself How many Truths lie unrevealed in the infinite Treasury of God's wisdom wherewith the Church is not acquainted And therefore to verifie such general sayings they must be understood of Truths absolutely necessary to Salvation Are not these fearful consequences And yet D. Potter will never be able to avoid them till he come to acknowledge the infallibility of the Church in all Points by her proposed as divine Truths and thus it is universally true that she is lead into all Truth in regard that our Saviour never permits her to define or teach any falshood 14. All that with any colour may be replyed to this Argument is That if once we call any one Book or parcel of Scripture in question although for the matter it contain no Fundamental error yet it is of great importance and Fundamental by reason of the consequence because if once we doubt of one Book received for Canonical the whole Canon is made doubtful and uncertain and therefore the infallibility of Scripture must be universal and not confined within compass of Points Fundamental 15. I answer For the thing it self it is very true that if I doubt of any one parcel of Scripture received for such I may doubt of all and thence by the same parity I infer that if we did doubt of the Churches infallibility in some Points we could nor believe her in any one and consequently not in propounding Canonical Books or any other Points Fundamental or not Fundamental which thing being most absurd and withal most impious we must take away the ground thereof and believe that she cannot err in any Point great or small and so this reply doth much more strengthen what we intend to prove Yet I add that Protestants cannot make use of this reply with any good coherence to this their distinction and some other Doctrines which they defend For if D. Potter can tell what Points in particular be Fundamental as in his 7. Sect. he pretendeth then he might be sure that whensoever he meets with such Points in Scripture in them it is infallibly true although it may err in others and not only true but clear because Protestants teach that in matters necessary to Salvation the Scripture is so clear that all such necessary Truths are either manifestly contained therein or may be clearly deduced from it Which Doctrines being put together to wit That Scriptures cannot err in Points Fundamental that they clearly contain all such Points and that they can tell what Points in particular be such I mean Fundamental it is manifest that it is sufficient for Salvation that Scripture be infallible only in Points Fundamental For supposing these Doctrines of theirs to be true they may be sure to find in Scripture all Points necessary to Salvation although it were fallible in other Points of less moment Neither will they be able to avoid this impiety against holy Scripture till they renounce their other Doctrines and in particular till they believe that Christ's promises to his Church are not limited to Points Fundamental 16 Besides from the fallibility of Christ's Catholique Church in some Points it followeth that no true Protestant learned or unlearned doth or can with assurance believe the universal Church in any one Point of Doctrine Not in Points of lesser moment which they call not-Fundamental because they believe that in such Points she may err Not in Fundamental because they must know what Points be Fundamental before they go to learn of her lest otherwise they be rather deluded than instructed in regard that her certain and infallible direction extends only to Points Fundamental Now if before they address themselves to the Church they must know what Points are Fundamental they learn not of her but will be as sit to teach as to be taught by her How then are all Christians so often so seriously upon so dreadful menaces by Fathers Scriptures and our blessed Saviour himself counselled and commanded to seek to hear to obey the Church S. Austin was of a very disterent mind from Protestants If saith he the (s) Epist 118. Church through the whole world practise any of these things to dispute whether that ought to be so done is a most insolent madness And in another place he saith That which (t) Lib. 4. de Bapt. cap. 24. the whole Church holds and is not ordained by Councels but hath always been kept is most rightly believed to be delivered by Apostolical Authority The sâ—me holy Father teacheth that the custom of baptizing children cannot be proved by Scripture alone and yet that it is to be believed as derived from the Apostles The custom of our Mother the (u) Lib. 10. de Geaâ—si ad liter cap. 23. Church saith he in baptizing Infants is in no wise to be contemned nor to be accounted superfluous nor is it at all to be believed unless it were an Apostolical Tradition And elsewhere Christ (w) Serm. 14. de verbis Apost cap. 18. is of profit to Children baptized Is he therefore of profit to persons not believing But God forbid that I should say Infants do not believe I have already said he believes in another who sinned in another It is said he believes and it is of force and he is reckoned among the faithful that are baptized This the authority of our Mother the Church hath against this strength against this invincible wall whosoever rusheth shall be crushed in pieces To this argument the Protestants in the Conference at Ratisbon gave this round Answer Nos ab Augustino (x) See protocol Monach. edit 2. p 367. hac in parte liberè dissentimus In this we plainly disagree from Augustin Now if this Doctrine of baptizing Infants be not Fundamental in D. Potter's sense then according to S. Augustine the infallibility of the Church extends to Points not Fundamental But if on the other side it be a Fundamental Point then according to the same holy Doctor we must relie on the authority of the Church for some Fundamental Point not contained in Scripture but delivered by Tradition The like argument I frame out of the same Father about the not re-baptizing of those who were baptized by Heretiques whereof he excellently to our present purpose speaketh in this manner We follow (y) Lib. 1. cont Crescon cap. 32. 34. indeed in this matter even the most certain authority of Canonical Scriptures But how consider his words Although verily there be brought no example for this Point out of the Canonical Scriptures yet even in this Point the truth of the same Scriptures is held by us while we do that which the authority of Scriptures doth recommend that so because the holy Scripture cannot deceive us whosoever is afraid to be deceived by the obscurity of this question must have recourse to the same
Saviour speaketh clearly The Gates of Hell (e) Mat. 16. shall not prevail against her And I will ask my (f) Joan. 14. Father and he will give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever The Spirit of Truth And But when he the Spirit of (g) Joan. 16. Truth cometh he shall teach you all Truth The Apostle saith that the Church is the Pillar and ground of (h) 1 Tim. c. 3. Truth And He gave some Apostles and some Prophets and othersome Evangelists and othersome Pastors and Doctors to the consummation of the Saints unto the work of the Ministry unto the edifying of the Body of Christ until we meet all into the unity of Faith and knowledge of the Son of God into a perfect man into the measure of the age of the fulness of Christ that now we be not children wavering and carried about with every wind of Doctrin in the wickedness of men in craftiness to the circumvention (i) Ephes 4. of Error All which words seem clearly enough to prove that the Church is universally infallible without which unity of Faith could not be conserved against every wind of Doctrin And yet D Potter (k) Pag. 151 153. limits these promises and priviledges to Fundamental Points in which he grants the Church cannot err I urge the words of Scripture which are universal and do not mention any such restraint I alledge that most reasonable and Received Rule that Scripture is to be understood literally as it soundeth unless some manifest absurdity force us to the contrary But all will not serve to accord our different interpretation In the mean time divers of D. Potter's Brethren step in and reject his limitation as over-large and somewhat tasting of Papistry And therefore they restrain the mentioned Texts either to the Infallibility which the Apostles and other sacred Writers had in penning of Scripture or else to the invisible Church of the Elect and to them not absolutely but with a double restriction that they shall not fall damnably and finally and other men have as much right as these to interpose their opinion and interpretation Behold we are three at debate about the selfesame words of Scripture We confer divers places and Texts We consult the Originals We examine Translations We endeavour to pray heartily We profess to speak sincerely To seek nothing but Truth and Salvation of our own souls and that of our Neighbours and finally we use all those means which by Protestants themselves are prescribed for finding out the true meaning of Scripture Nevertheless we neither do or have any possible means to agree as long as we are left to our selves and when we should chance to be agreed the doubt would still remain whether the thing it self be a Fundamental Point or no And yet it were great impiety to imagine that God the lover of Souls hath left no certain infallible means to decide both this and all other differences arising about the interpretation of Scripture or upon any other occasion Our remedy therefore in these contentions must be to consult and hear Gods Visible Church with submissive acknowledgment of her Power and Infallibility in whatsoever the proposeth as a revealed Truth according to that divine advice of St. Augustine in these words If at length (l) De util cred cap. 8. thou seem to be sufficiently tossed and hast a desire to put an end to thy pains follow the way of the Catholique Discipline which from Christ himself by the Apostles hath come down even to us and from us shall descend to all posterity And though I conceive that the distinction of Points Fundamental and not Fundamental hath now been sufficiently confuted yet that no shadow of difficulty may remain I will particularly refel a common saying of Protestants that it is sufficient for Salvation to believe the Apostles Creed which they hold to be a Summary of all Fundamental Points of Faith The ANSWER to the THIRD CHAPTER Wherein it is maintained That the distinction of Points Fundamental and not Fundamental is in this present Controversie good and pertinent And that the Catholique Church may err in the latter kind of the said Points 1 THis Distinction is imployed by Protestants to many purposes and therefore if it be pertinent and good as they understand and apply it the whole edifice built thereon must be either firme and stable or if it be not it cannot be for any default in this Distinction 2. If you object to them discords in matter of Faith without any means of agreement They will answer you that they want not good and solid means of agreement in matters necessary to Salvation viz. Their beliefe of all those things which are plainly and undoubtedly delivered in Scripture which who so believes must of necessity believe all things necessary to Salvation and their mutual suffering one another to abound in their several sense in matters not plainly and undoubtedly there delivered And for their agreement in all Controversies of Religion either they have means to agree about them or not If you say they have why did you before deny it If they have not means why do you find fault with them for not agreeing 3. You will say that their fault is that by remaining Protestants they exclude themselves from the means of agreement which you have and which by submission to your Church they might have also But if you have means of agreement the more shame for you that you stil disagree For who I pray is more inexcusably guilty for the omission of any duty they that either have no means to do it or else know of none they have which puts them in the same case if as they had none or they which professe to have an easie and expedite means to do it and yet still leave it undone If you had been blind saith our Saviour to the Pharisees you had had no sin but now you say you see therefore your sin remaineth 4. If you say you do agree in matters of Faith I say this is ridiculous for you define matters of Faith to be those wherein you agree So that to say you agree in matters of Faith is to say you agree in those things wherein you do agree And do not Protestants do so likewise Do not they agree in those things wherein they do agree 5. But you are all agreed that only those things wherein you do agree are matters of Faith And Protestants if they were wise would do so too Sure I am they have reason enough to do so seeing all of them agree with explicite Faith in all those things which are plainly and undoubtedly delivered in Scripture that is in all which God hath plainly revealed and with an implicite Faith in that sense of the whole Scripture which God intended whatsoever was Secondly That which you pretend is false for else why do some of you hold it against faith to take or allow the Oath of
Allegiance others as learned and honest as they that it is against Faith and unlawful to refuse it and allow the refusing of it Why do some of you hold that it is de Fide that the Pope is Head of the Church by divine Law others the contrary Some hold it de Fide that the blessed Virgin was free from Actual sin others that it is not so Some that the Popes Indirect power over Princes in Temporalties is de Fide Others the contrary Some that it is Universal Tradition and conséquently de Fide that the Virgin Mary was conceived in original sin Others the contrary 6. But what shall we say now if you be not agreed touching your pretended means of Agreement how then can you pretend to Unity either Actual or Potential more than Protestants may Some of you say the Pope alone without a Councel may determine all Controversies But others deny it Some that a general Councel without a Pope may do so Others deny this Some Both in conjunction are infallible determiners Others again deny this Lastly some among you hold the Acceptation of the Decrees of Councels by the Universal Church to be the only way to decide Controversies which others deny by denying the Church to be Infallible And indeed what way of ending Controversies can this be when either part may pretend that they are part of the Church and they receive not the Decree therefore the whole Church hath not received it 7. Again Means of agreeing differences are either rational and well-grounded and of Gods appointment or voluntary and taken up at the pleasure of men Means of the former nature we say you have as little as we For where hath God appointed that the Pope or a Councel or a Councel confirmed by the Pope or that Society of Christians which adhere to him shall be the Infallible Judge of Controversies I desire you to shew any one of these Assertions plainly set down in Scripture as in all reason a thing of this nature should be or at least delivered with a full consent of Fathers or at least taught in plain tearms by any one Father for four hundred yeers after Christ And if you cannot do this as I am sure you cannot and yet will still be obtruding your selves upon us for our Judges Who will not cry out perîsse frontem de rebus 8. But then for means of the other kind such as yours are we have great abundance of them For besides all the ways which you have devised which we may make use of when we please we have a great many more which you yet have never thought of for which we have as good colour out of Scripture as you have for yours For first we could if we would try it by Lots whose Doctrine is true and whose false And you know it is written (a) Pro. 16 33 The Lot is cast into the lap but the whole disposition of it is from the Lord. 2. We could referre them to the King and you know it is written (b) Pro. 16.10 A Divine sentence is in the lips of the King his mouth transgresseth not in judgement (c) Prov. 21 1. The Heart of the King is in the hand of the Lord. We could referre the matter to any Assembly of Christians assemled in the Name of Christ seeing it is written (d) Mat. 18.20 Where two or three are gathered together in my Name there am I in the midst of them We may refer it to any Priest because it is written (e) Mal. 2.7 The Priests lips shall preserve knowledge (f) Mat. 25.2 The Scribes and Pharises sit in Moses chair c. To any Preacher of the Gospel to any Pastor or Doctor for to every one of them Christ hath promised (g) Mat. 28.20 He will be with them alwaies even to the end of the world and of every one of them it is said (h) Luk. 10.16 He that heareth you heareth me c. To any Bishop or Prelate for it is written (i) Heb. 13.17 Obey your Prelates and again (k) Eph. 4.11 He hath given Pastors and Doctors c lest we should be carryed about with every wind of Doctrin To any particular Church of Christians seeing it is a particular Church which is called (l) 1 Tim. 3.15 The house of God the Pillar and Ground of Truth and seeing of any particular Church it is written (m) Mat. 18.17 He that heareth not the Church let him be unto thee as a Heathen or Publican We might refer it to any man that prayes for Gods Spirit for it is written (n) Mat. 7.8 Every one that asketh receiveth and again (o) Jam. 1.5 If any man want wisdom let him ask of God who giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not Lastly we might refer it to the Jews for without all doubt of them it is written (p) Isa 59.21 My Spirit that is in thee c. All these means of agreement whereof not any one but hath as much probability from Scripture as that which you obtrude upon us offer themselves upon a sudden to me haply many more might be thought on if we had time but these are enough to shew that would we make use of voluntary and devised means to determine differences we had them in great abundance And if you say These would fail us and contradict themselves So as we pretend have yours There have been Popes against Popes Councels against Councels Councels confirmed by Popes against Councels confirmed by Popes Lastly the Church of some Ages against the Church of other Ages 9. Lastly whereas you find fault That Protestants upbraided with their discords answer that they differ only in Points not Fundamental I desire you tell me Whether they do so or do not so If they do so I hope you will not find fault with the Answer If you say they do not so but in Points Fundamental also then they are not members of the same Church one with another no more than with you And therefore why should you object to any of them their differences from each other any more than to your selves their more and greater differences from you 10. But they are convinced sometimes even by their own confessions that the Ancient Fathers taught divers Points of Popery and then they reply those Fathers may neverthelesse be saved because those errors were not Fundamentall And may not you also be convinced by the confessions of your own men that the Fathers taught divers Points held by Protestants against the Church of Rome and divers against Protestants and the Church of Rome Do not your Purging Indexes clip the tongues and seal up the lips of a great many for such confessions And is not the above-cited confession of your Doway Divines plain and full to the same purpose And do not you also as freely as we charge the Fathers with errors and yet say they were saved Now what else do we understand
they judge aright and that they proceed according to the Evidence that is given when they condemn a Thief or a murderer to the Gallows A Traveller is not always certain of his way but often mistaken and doth it therefore follow that he can have no assurance that Charing-cross is his right way from the Temple to White-Hall The ground of your Error here is your not distinguishing between Actual Certainty and Absolute Infallibility Geometricians are not infallible in their own Science yet they are very certain of those things which they see demonstrated And Carpenters are not Infallible yet certain of the straightness of those things which agree with their Rule and Square So though the Church be not infallibly certain that in all her Definitions whereof some are about disputable and ambiguous matters she shall proceed according to her Rule yet being certain of the Infallibility of her Rule and that in this or that thing she doth manifestly proceed according to it she may be certain of the Truth of some particular Decrees and yet not certain that she shall never decree but what is true 27. Ad § 12. But if the Church may err in points not fundamental she may err in proposing Scripture and so we cannot be assured whether she have not been deceived already The Church may err in her Proposition or custody of the Canon of Scripture if you understand by the Church any present Church of one denomination for example the Roman the Greek or so Yet have we sufficient certainty of Scripture not from the bare testimony of any present Church but from Universal Tradition of which the testimony of any present Church is but a little part So that here you fall into the Fallacy à dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter For in effect this is the sense of your Argument Unless the Church be infallible we can have no certainty of Scripture from the Authority of the Church Therefore unless the Church be infallible we can have no certainty hereof at all As if a man should say If the Vintage of France miscarry we can have no Wine from France Therefore if that Vintage miscarry we can have no Wine at all And for the incorruption of Scripture I know no other rational assurance we can have of it than such as we have of the incorruption of other ancient Books that is the consent of ancient Copies such I mean for the kind though it be far greater for the degree of it And if the Spirit of God give any man any other Assurance hereof this is not rational and discursive but supernatural and infused And Assurance it may be to himself but no Argument to another As for the infallibility of the Church it is so far from being a proof of Scriptures Incorruption that no proof can be pretended for it but incorrupted places of Scripture which yet are as subject to corruption as any other and more likely to have been corrupted if it had been possible than any other and made to speak as they do for the advantage of those men whose ambition it hath been a long time to bring all under their Authority Now then if any man should prove the Scriptures uncorrupted because the Church says so which is infallible I would demand again touching this very thing That there is an Infallible Church seeing it is not of it self evident how shall I be assured of it And what can he answer but that the Scripture says so in these and these places Hereupon I would ask him how shall I be assured that the Scriptures are incorrupted in these places seeing it is possible and not altogether improbable that these men which desire to be thought Infallible when they had the government of all things in their own hands may have altered them for their purpose If to this he answer again that the Church is infallible and therefore cannot do so I hope it would be apparent that he runs round in a circle and proves the Scriptures incorruption by the Churches infallibility and the Churches infallibility by the Scriptures incorruption and that is in effect the Churches infallibility by the Churches infallibility and the Scriptures incorruption by the Scriptures incorruption 28. Now for your Observation that some Books which were not always known to be Canonical have been afterwards received for such But never any Book or Syllable defined for Canonical was afterwards questioned or rejected for Apocryphal I demand touching the first sort Whether they were commended to the Church by the Apostles as Canonical or not If not seeing the whole Faith was preached by the Apostles to the Church and seeing after the Apostles the Church pretends to no new Revelations How can it be an Article of Faith to believe them Canonical And how can you pretend that your Church which makes this an Article of Faith is so assisted as not to propose any thing as a Divine Truth which is not revealed by God If they were How then is the Church an infallible keeper of the Canon of Scripture which hath suffered some Books of Canonical Scripture to be lost and others to lose for a long time their being Canonical at least the necessity of being so esteemed and afterwards as it were by the law of Postliminium hath restored their Authority and Canonicalness unto them If this was delivered by the Apostles to the Church the point was sufficiently discussed and therefore your Churche's omission to teach it for some Ages as an Article of Faith nay degrading it from the number of Articles of Faith and putting it among disputable problems was surely not very laudable If it were not revealed by God to the Apostles and by the Apostles to the Church then can it be no Revelation and therefore her presumption in proposing it as such is inexcusable 19. And then for the other part of it that never any Book or Syllable defined for Canonical was afterwards questioned or rejected for Apocryphal Certainly it is a bold Asseveration but extremely false For I demand The Book of Ecclesiasticus and Wisdom the Epistle of St. James and to the Hebrews were they by the Apostles approved for Canonical or no If not With what face dare you approve them and yet pretend that all your doctrin is Apostolical Especially seeing it is evident that this point is not deducible by rational discourse from any other defined by them If they were approved by them this I hope was a sufficient definition and therefore you were best rub your forehead hard and say that these Books were never questioned But if you do so then I shall be bold to ask you what Books you meant in saying before Some Books which were not always known to be Canonical have been afterwards received Then for the Book of Macchabees I hope you will say it was defined for Canonical before S. Gregorie's time and yet he lib. 19. Moral c. 13. citing a testimony out of it prefaceth to it
that she must For seeing the Church is a Society of men whereof every one according to the Doctrin of the Romish Church hath freewill in believing it follows that the whole Aggregate hath freewill in believing And if any man say that at least it is morally impossible that of so many whereof all may believe aright not any should do so I answer It is true if they did all give themselves any liberty of judgment But if all as the case is here captivate their understandings to one of them all are as likely to err as that one And he more likely to err than any other because he may err and thinks he cannot and because he conceives the Spirit absolutely promised to that succession of Bishops of which many have been notoriously and confessedly wicked men Men of the World whereas this Spirit is the Spirit of Truth whom the world cannot receive because he seeth him not neither knoweth him Besides let us suppose that neither in this nor in any other place God had promised any more unto them but to lead them into all Truth necessary for their own and other mens salvatition Doth it therefore follow that they were de facto led no farther God indeed is obliged by his Veracity to do all that he hath promised but is there any thing that binds him to do no more May not he be better than his word but you will quarrel at him May not his Bounty exceed his Promise And may not we have certainty enough that oft-times it doth so God at first did not promise to Solomon in his vision at Gibeon any more than what he askt which was wisdom to govern his people and that he gave him But yet I hope you will not deny that we have certainty enough that he gave him something which neither God had promised nor he had asked If you do you contradict God himself For Behold saith God because thou hast asked this thing I have done according to thy word Lo I have given thee a Wise and an Understanding heart so that there was none like thee before thee neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee And I have also given thee that which thou hast not asked both riches and honour so that there shall not be any among the Kings like unto thee in all thy days God for ought appears never obliged himself by promise to shew S. Paul those Unspeakable mysteries which in the third Heaven he shewed unto him and yet I hope we have certainty enough that he did so God promises to those that seek his Kingdom and the righteousness thereof that all things necessary shall be added unto them and in rigour by his promise he is obliged to do no more and if he give them necessaries he hath discharged his obligation Shall we therefore be so injurious to his bounty towards us as to say it is determined by the narrow bounds of meer Necessity So though God had obliged himself by promise to give his Apostles infallibility only in things necessary to salvation nevertheless it is utterly inconsequent that he gave them no more than by the rigour of his promise he was engaged to do or that we can have no assurance of any farther assistance that he gave them especially when he himself both by his word and by his works hath assured us that he did assist them farther You see by this time that your chain of fearful consequences as you call them is turned to a rope of sand and may easily be avoided without any flying to your imaginary infallibility of the Church in all her proposals 35. Ad § 14. 15 Doubting of a Book received for Canonical may signifie either doubting whether it be Canonical or supposing it to be Canonical whether it be True If the former sense were yours I must then again distinguish of the term Received For it may signifie either received by some particular Church or by the present Church Universal or the Church of all Ages If you meant the word in either of the former senses that which you say is not true A man may justly and reasonably doubt of some Texts or some Book received by some particular Church or by the Universal Church of this present time whether it be Canonical or no and yet have just reason to believe and no reason to doubt but that other Books are Canonical As Eusebius perhaps had reason to doubt of the Epistle of S. James the Church Rome in Hieromes time of the Epistle to the Hebrews And yet they did not doubt of all the Books of the Canon nor had reason to do so If by Received you mean Received by the Church of all Ages I grant he that doubts of any one such Book hath as much reason to doubt of all But yet here again I tell you that it is possible a man may doubt of one such Book and yet not of all because it is possible men may do not according to reason If you meant your words in the latter sense then I confess he that believes such a Book to be Canonical i. e. the word of God and yet to make an impossible Supposition believes it 〈◊〉 not to be true if he will do according to reason must doubt of all the rest and believe none For there being no greater reason to believe any thing true than because God hath said it nor no other reason to believe the Scripture to be true but only because it is Gods word he that doubts of the Truth of any thing said by God hath as much reason to believe nothing that he sayes and therefore if he will do according to reason neither must nor can believe any thing he sayes And upon this ground you conclude rightly that the infallibility of true Scripture must be Universal and not confined to Points Fundamental 36. And this Reason why we should not refuse to believe any part of Scripture upon pretence that the matter of it is not Fundamental you confess to be convincing But the same reason you say is as convincing for the Universal infallibility of the Church For say you unless She be infallible in all things we cannot believe her in any one But by this reason your Proselytes knowing you are not infallible in all things must not nor cannot believe you in any thing Nay you your self must not believe your self in any thing because you know that you are not infallible in all things Indeed if you had said We could not rationally believe her for her own sake and upon her own word and authority in any thing I should willingly grant the consequence For an authority subject to errour can be no firm or stable foundation of my belief in any thing and if it were in any thing then this authority being one and the same in all proposals I should have the same reason to believe all that I have to believe one and therefore must either do unreasonably in believing any
demonstrated that such a man adheres to you with a fiducial and certain assent in nothing To make this clear because at the first hearing it may seem strange give me leave good Sir to suppose you the man and to propose to you a few questions and to give for you such answers to them as upon this ground you must of necessity give were you present with me First supposing you hold your Church infallible in Fundamentals obnoxious to errour in other things and that you know not what Points are Fundamental I demand C. Why do you believe the Doctrin of Transubstantiation K. Because the Church hath taught it which is infallible C. What Infallible in all things or only in Fundamentals K. In Fundamentals only C. Then in other pointsshe may erre K. She may C. And do you know what Points are Fundamental what not K. No and therefore I believe her in all things lest I should disbelieve her in Fundamentals C. How know you then whether this be a Fundamental Point or no K. I know not C. It may be then for ought you know an unfundamental Point K. Yes it may be so C. And in these you said the Church may err K. Yes I did so C. Then possibly it may erre in this K. It may do so C. Then what certainty have you that it does not erre in it K. None at all but upon this supposition that this is a Fundamental C. And this supposition you are uncertain of K. Yes I told you so before C. And therefore you can have no certainty of that which depends upon this uncertainty saving only a suppositive certainty if it be a Fundamental truth which is in plain English to say you are certain it is true if it be both true and necessary Verily Sir if you have no better Faith than this you are no Catholique K. Good words I pray I am so and God willing will be so C. You mean in outward profession and practise but in belief you are not no more than a Protestant is a Catholique For every Protestant yeelds such a kinde of assent to all the proposals of the Church for surely they believe them true if they be Fundamental truths And therefore you must either believe the Church Infallible in all her proposals be they foundations or be they superstructions or you must believe all Fundamental which she proposes or else you are no Catholique K. But I have been taught that seeing I believed the Church infallible in points necessary in wisdom I was to believe her in every thing C. That was a pretty plausible inducement to bring you hither but now you are here you must go farther and believe her infallible in all things or else you were as good go back again which will be a great disparagement to you and draw upon you both the bitter and implacable hatred of our Part and even with your own the imputation of rashness and levity You see I hope by this time that though a man did believe your Church infallible in Fundamentals yet he hath no reason to do you the curtesie of believing all her Proposals nay if he be ignorant what these Fundamentals are he hath no certain ground to believe her upon her Authority in any thing And whereas you say it can be no imprudence to erre with the Church I say it may be very great imprudence if the question be Whether we should erre with the present Church or hold true with God Almighty 58. But we are under pain of damnation to believe and obey hâ—â— in greater things and therefore cannot in wisdom suspect her credit in mâ—â—â—â—rs of less moment Answ I have told you already that this is falsly to suppose that we grant that in some certain points some certain Church is infallibly assisted and under pain of damnation to be obeyed whereas all that we say is this that in some place or other some Church there shall be which shall retain all necessary Truths Yet if your supposition were true I would not grant your Conclusion but with this Exception unless the matter were past suspition and apparently certain that in these things I cannot believe God â—nd believe the Church For then I hope you will grant that be the thing of never so little moment were it for instance but that S. Paul left his cloak at Troas yet I were not to gratifie the Church so far as for her sake to disbelieve what God himself hath revealed 59 Whereas you say Since we are undoubtedly obliged to believe her in Fundamentals and cannot know precisely what those Fundamentals be we cannot without hazard of our souls leave her in any Point I answer First that this argument proceeds upon the same false ground with the former And then that I have told you formerly that you feare where no fear is And though we know not precisely just how much is Fundamental yet we know that the Scripture containes all Fundamentals and more too and therefore that in believing that we believe all Fundamentals and more too And consequently in departing from you can be in no danger of departing from that which may prove a Fundamental Truth For we are wel assured that certain Errors can never prove Fundamental Truths 60. Whereas you adde That that visible Church which cannot err in Fundamentals propounds all her definitions without distinction to be believed under Anathema's Answ Again you beg the question supposing untruly that there is any that visible Church I mean any Visible Church of one Denomination which cannot erre in Points Fundamental Secondly proposing definitions to be believed under Anathema's is no good Argument that the Propounders conceive themselves infallible but only that they conceive the Doctrin they condemn is evidently damnable A pâ—ain proof hereof is this that particular Councils nay particular Men have been very liberal of their Anathema's which yet were never conceived infallible either by others or themselves If any man should now deny Christ to be the Saviour of the world or deny the Resurrection I should make no great scruple of Anathematizing his doctrin and yet am very far from dreaming of infallibility 61. And for the Visible Churches holding it a Point necessary to Salvation that we believe she cannot erre I know no such tenet unless by the Church you mean the Roman Church which you have as much reason to do as that petty King in Africk hath to think himself King of all the world And therefore your telling us If she speak true what danger is it not to believe her and if false that it is not dangerous to believe her is somewhat like your Pope's setting your Lawyers to dispute whether Constantine's Donation were valid or no whereas the matter of fact was the far greater question whether there were any such Donation or rather when without question there was none such That you may not seem to delude us in like maner make it appear that the visible Church doth hold so
Testimonies have I taken as mine heritage for ever And lastly in the Ep. to Philemon He therefore departed from thee for a time that thou shouldst receive him for ever 75. And thus I presume I have shewed sufficiently that this for ever hinders not but that the promise may be appropriated to the Apostles as by many other circumstances I have evinced it must be But what now if the place produced by you as a main pillar of your Churches Infallibility prove upon trial an engine to batter and overthrow it at least which is all one to my purpose to take away all possibility of our assurance of it This will seem strange news to you at first hearing and not far from a prodigy And I confess as you here in this place and generally all your Writers of Controversie by whom this Text is urged order the matter it is very much disabled to do any service against you in this question For with a bold sacriledge and horrible impiety somewhat like Procrustes his cruelty you perpetually cut off the head and foot the beginning and end of it and presenting to your Confidents who usually read no more of the Bible than is alledged by you only these words I will ask my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the Spirit of Truth conceal in the mean time the words before and the words after that so the promise of God's Spirit may seem to be absolute whereas it is indeed most clearly and expresly conditional being doth in the words before restrained to those only that love GOD and keep his Commandments and in the words after flatly denied to all whom the Scriptures stile by the name of the World that is as the very Antithesis gives us plainly to understand to all wicked and wordly men Behold the place entire as it is set down in your own Bible If ye love me keep my Commandments and I will ask my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the Spirit of the Truth whom the world cannot receive Now from the place thus restored and vindicated from your mutilation thus I argue against your pretence We can have no certainty of the Infallibility of your Church but upon this supposition that your Popes are infallible in confirming the Decrees of General Councels we can have no certainty hereof but upon this supposition that the Spirit of Truth is promised to them for their direction in this work And of this again we can have no certainty but upon supposal that they perform the condition whereunto the promise of the Spirit of Truth is expresly limited viz. That they love God and keep his Commandments And of this finally not knowing the Popes heart we can have no certainty at all therefore from the first to the last we can have no certainty at all of your Churches Infallibility This is my first Argument Another follows which will charge you as home as the former If many of the Roman See were such men as could not receive the Spirit of Truth even men of the World that is Wordly Wicked Carnal Diabolical men then the Spirit of Truth is not here promised but flatly denied them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees of Councels which these Popes confirm nor of the Churches Infallibility which is guided by these Decrees But many of the Roman See even by the confession of the most zealous Defenders of it were such men Therefore the Spirit of Truth is not here promised but denied them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees which they confirm nor of the Churches Infallibility which guides her self by these Decrees 76. You may take as much time as you think fit to answer these Arguments In the mean while I proceed to the consideration of the next Text alledged for this purpose by you out of S. Paul 1 Ep. to Timothy where he saith as you say The Church is the Pillar and Ground of Truth But the truth is you are somewhat too bold with S. Paul For he says not in formal terms what you make him say The Church is the Pillar and Ground of Truth neither is it certain that he means so for it is neither impossible nor improbable that these words the pillar and ground of truth may have reference not to the Church but to Timothy the sense of the place that thou maist know how to behave thy self as a Pillar and Ground of the Truth in the Church of God which is house of the living God which exposition offers no violence at all to the words but only supposes an Ellipsis of the Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek very ordinary Neither wants it some likelihood that S. Paul comparing the Church to a house should here exhort Timothy to carry himself as a Pillar in that house should do according as he had given other principal men in the Church the name of Pillars rather then having called the Church a House to call it presently a Pillar which may seem somewhat heterogeneous Yet if you will needs have S. Paul refer this not to Timothy but to the Church I will not contend about it any farther then to say Possibly it may be otherwise But then secondly I am to put you in mind that the Church which S. Paul here speaks of was that in which Timothy conversed and that was a Particular Church and not the Roman and such you will not have to be Universally Infallible 77. Thirdly if we grant you out of courtesie for nothing can enforce us to it that he both speaks of the Universal Church and says this of it then I am to remember you that many Attributes in Scripture are not notes of performance but of duty and reach us not what the Thing or Person is of necessity but what it should be Ye are the Salt of the Earth said our Saviour to his Disciples not that this quality was inseparable from their Persons but because it was their Office to be so For if they must have been so of necessity and could not have been otherwise in vain had he put in them fear of that which follows If the Salt hath lost his savour wherewith shall it be salted it is thenceforth good for nothing but to be cast forth and to be trodden under foot So the Church may be by duty the pillar and ground that is the Teacher of Truth of all Truth not only necessary but profitable to Salvation and yet she may neglect and violate this duty and be in fact the teacher of some Error 78. Fourthly and lastly if we deal most liberally with you and grant that the Apostle here speaks of the Catholike Church calls it the Pillar and Ground of Truth and that not only because it should but because it always shall and will be so yet after all this you have
dead in any sense And yet D. Potter doth not deny but that Aerius was esteemed an Heretique for denying (r) Pag. 35. all sort of Commemoration for the dead Nothing of the Churches Visibility or Invisibility Fallibility or Infallibility nor of other Points controverted betwixt Protestants themselves and between Protestants and Catholiques which to D. Potter seem so hainous corruptions that they cannot without damnation joyn with us in profession thereof There is no mention of the Cessation of the Old Law which yet is a very main Point of Faith And many other might be also added 15. But what need we labour to specifie particulars There are as many important Points of Faith not expressed in the Creed as since the worlds beginning now and for all future times there have been are and may be innumerable gross damnable Heresies whose contrary truths are not contained in the Creed For every Fundamental Error must have a contrary Fundamental Truth because of two contradictory Propositions in the same degree if the one is false the other must be true As for example if it be a damnable error to deny the blessed Trinity or the Godhead of our Saviour the belief of them must be a Truth necessary to Salvation or rather if we will speak properly the Error is damnable because the opposite Truth is necessary as death is frightful because life is sweet and according to Philosophy the Privation is measured by the Forme to which it is repugnant If therefore the Creed contain in particular all fundamental Points of Faith it must explicitely or by cleer consequence comprehend all Truths opposite to innumerable Heresies of all Ages past present and to come which no man in his wits will affirm it to do 16 And here I cannot omit to signifie how you (Å¿) Pag. 255. applaud the saying of D. Usher That in those Propositions which without all controversie are universally received in the whole Christian world so much Truth is contained as being joyned with holy Obedience may be sufficient to bring a man to everlasting Salvation neither have we cause to doubt but that as many as walk according to this Rule neither overthrowing that which they have builded by superinducing any damnable heresies thereupon nor otherwise vitiating their holy faith with a lewd and wicked conversation peace shall be upon them and upon the Israel of God Now D. Potter knows that the Mystery of the B. Trinity is not universally received in the whole Christian world as appears by very many Heretiques in Polony Hungary and Transilvania and therefore according to this Rule of D. Usher approved by D. Potter the denyal of the B. Trinity shall not exclude Salvation 17. Let me note by the way that you might easily have espied a foul contradiction in the said words of D. Usher by you recited and so much applauded For he supposeth that a man agrees with other Churches in belief which joyned with holy Obedience may bring him to everlasting Salvation and yet that he may superinduce damnable heresies For how can he superinduce damnable heresies who is supposed to believe all Truths necessary to Salvation Can there be any damnable heresie unless it contradict some necessary Truth which cannot happen in one who is supposed to believe all necessary Truths Besides if one believing all Fundamental Articles in the Creed may superinduce damnable haeresies it followeth that the Fundamental Truths contrary to those damnable heresies are not contained in the Creed 18. According to this Model of D. Potters foundation consisting in the agreement of scarceone Point of Faith what a strange Church would he make of men concurring in some one or few Articles of belief who yet for the rest should be holding conceits plainly contradictory so patching up a Religion of men who agree only in the Article That Christ is our Saviour but for the rest are like to the parts of a Chimaera having the head of a man the neck of horse the shoulder of an Oxe the foot of a Lion c. I wrong them not herein For in good Philosophie there is greater repugnancy between assent and dissent affirmation and negation est est non non especially when all these contradictories pretend to relie upon one and the self same Motive the infallible Truth of Almighty God than between the integral parts as head neck c. of a man horse lion c. And thus Protestants are far more bold to disagree even in matters of Faith than Catholique Divines in questions meerly Philosophical or not determined by the Church And while thus they stand only upon fundamental Articles they do by their own confession destroy the Church which is the house of God For the foundation alone of a house is not a house nor can they in such an imaginary Church any more expect Salvation than the foundation alone of a house is fit to afford a man habitation 19. Moreover it is most evident that Protestants by this Chaos rather than Church do give unavoidable occasion of desperation to poor souls Let some one who is desirous to save his soul repair to D. Potter who maintains these grounds to know upon whom he may relie in a matter of so great consequence I suppose the Doctors answer will be Upon the truely Catholique Church She cannot erre damnably What understand you by the Catholique Church cannot general Councels which are the Church representative err Yes they may weakly or (t) Pag. 167. wilfully misapply or misunderstand or neglect Scripture and so err damnably To whom then shall I go for my particular instruction I cannot conferr with the united body of the whole Church about my particular difficulties as your self affirmes that the Catholique Church cannot be told (u) Pag. 27. of private injuries Must I then consult with every particular person of the Catholique Church So it seems by what you write in these woâ—ds The whole (w) Pag. 150. Militant Church that is all the members of it cannot possibly err either in the whole Faith or any necessary Article of it You say M. Doctor I cannot for my instruction accquaint the universal Church with my particular scruples You say the prelates of God's Church meeting in a lawful general Council may err damnably It remains then that for my necessary instruction I must repair to every particular member of the universal Church spred over the face of the earth and yet you teach that the Promises (x) Pag. 151. which our Lord hath made unto his Church for his assistance are intended not to any particular persons or Churches but only to the Church Catholique with which as I said it is impossible for me to conferr Alas O most uncomfortable ghostly Father you drive me to desperation How shall I confer with every Christian soul man and woman by sea and by land close prisoner or at liberty c. Yet upon supposal of this miraculous Pilgrimage for Faith before I have the faith of
which doth propose and indeed believe them hath for matter of Faith the essence of a true Church that which doth not hath not Now to this Question though not to yours D. Potter's Assertion if it be true is apparently very pertinent And though not a full and total satisfaction to it yet very effectual and of great moment towards it For the main Question being What Points are necessary to Salvation and Points necessary to Salvation being of two sorts some of simple belief some of Practice and Obedience he that gives you a sufficient summary of the first sort of necessary Points hath brought you half way towards your journies end And therefore that which he doth is no more to be slighted as vain and impertinent than an Architect's work is to be thought impertinent towards the making of a house because he doth it not all himself Sure I am if his Assertion be true as I believe it is a Corollary may presently be deduced from it which if it were embraced cannot in all reason but do infinite service both to the Truth of Christ and the peace of Christendom For seeing falshood and errour could not long stand against the power of Truth were they not supported by Tyranny and worldly advantages he that could assert Christians to that liberty which Christ and his Apostles left them must needs do Truth a most Heroical service And seeing the overvaluing of the differences among Christians is one of the greatest maintainers of the Schisms of Christendom he that could demonstrate that only those Points of Belief are simply necessary to Salvation wherein Christians generally agree should he not lay a very fair and firm foundation of the peace of Christendom Now the Corollary which I conceive would produce these good effects and which flows naturally from D. Potter's Assertion is this That what Man or Church soever believes the Creed and all the evident consequences of it sincerely and heartily cannot possibly if also he believe the Scripture be in any Error of simple belief which is offensive to God nor therefore deserve for any such Error to be deprived of his life or to be cut off from the Churches Communion and the hope of Salvation And the production of this again would be this which highly concerns the Church of Rome to think of That whatsoever Man or Church doth for any error of simple belief deprive any man so qualified as above either of his temporal life or livelihood or liberty or of the Churches Communion and hope of Salvation is for the first unjust cruel and tyrannous Schismatical presumptuous and uncharitable for the second 13. Neither yet is this as you pretend to take away the necessity of believing those verities of Scripture which are not contained in the Creed when once we come to know that they are written in Scripture but rather to lay a necessity upon men of believing all things written in Scripture when once they know them to be there written For he that believes not all known Divine Revelations to be true How doth he believe in God Unless you will say that the same man at the same time may not believe God and yet believe in him The greater difficulty is How it will not take away the necessity of believing Scripture to be the Word of God But that it will not neither For though the Creed be granted a sufficient Summary of Articles of meer Faith yet no man pretends that it contains the Rules of obedience but for them all men are referred to Scripture Besides he that pretends to believe in God obligeth himself to believe it necessary to obey that which Reason assures him to be the Will of God Now Reason will assure him that believes the Creed that it is the Will of God he should believe the Scripture even the very same Reason which moves him to believe the Creed Universal and never-failing Tradition having given this testimony both to Creed and Scripture that they both by the works of God were sealed and testified to be the words of God And thus much be spoken in Answer to your first Argument the length whereof will be the more excusable if I oblige my self to say but little to the Rest 14. I come then to your second And in Answer to it deny flatly as a thing destructive of it self that any Error can be damnable unless it be repugnant immediatly or mediatly directly or indirectly of it self or by accident to some Truth for the matter of it Fundamental And to your example of Pontius Pilat's being Judge of Christ I say the denial of it in him that knows it to be revealed by God is manifestly destructive of this Fundamental Truth that All Divine Revelations are true Neither will you find any error so much as by accident damnable but the rejecting of it will be necessarily laid upon us by areal belief of all Fundamentals and simply necessary Truths And I desire you would reconcile with this that which you have said § 15. Every Fundamental Error must have a contrary Fundamental Truth because of two Contradictory Propositions in the same degree the one is false the other must be true c. 15. To the Third I answer That the certainty I have of the Creed that it was from the Apostles and contains the Principles of Faith I ground it not upon Scripture and yet not upon the Infallibility of any present much less of your Church but upon the Authority of the Ancient Church and written Tradition which as D. Potter hath proved gave this constant testimony unto it Besides I tell you it is guilty of the same fault which D. Potter's Assertion is here accused of having perhaps some colour toward the proving it false but none at all to shew it impertinent 16. To the Fourth I answer plainly thus that you find fault with D. Potter for his Vertues you are offended with him for not usurping the Authority which he had not in a word for not playing the Pope Certainly if Protestants be faulty in this matter it 's for doing it too much and not too little This presumptuous imposing of the senses of men upon the words of God the special senses of men upon the general words of God and laying them upon mens consciences together under the equal penalty of death and damnation this Vain conceit that we can speak of the things of God better than in the words of God This Deifying our own Interpretations and Tyrannous inforcing them upon others This restraining of the word of God from that latitude and generality and the understandings of men from that liberty wherein Christ and the Apostles left them (a) This peâ—â—sâ—asion is no singularity of mine but the doctrin which 〈◊〉 have learned â—â—om Divinâ—s of gâ—eâ—t learning and judgment Let the 〈◊〉 Reader be pleased to peruse the seventh book of Acont de Strat. Satanae And Zanch. his last Oration delivered by him after the composing of the discord
necessary parts of it omitted had been to speak impertinently and rather to confirm than confute their error It is plain therefore that he must mean as I pretend that all the necessary Doctrine of the Gospel which was preached by S. Peter was written by S. Mark Now you will not deny I presume that S. Peter preached all therefore you must not deny that S. Mark wrote all 42. Our next inquiry let it be touching S. John's intent in writing his Gospel whether it were to deliver so much truth as being believed and obeyed would certainly bring men to eternal life or only part of it and to leave part unwritten A great man there is but much less than the Apostle who saith that writing last he purposed to supply the defects of the other Evangelists that had wrote before him which if it were true would sufficiently justifie what I have undertaken that at least all the four Evangelists have in them all the necessary parts of the Gospel of Christ Neither will I deny but S. John's secondary intent might be to supply the defects of the former three Gospels in some things very profitable But he that pretends that any necessary Doctrine is in S. John which is in none of the other Evangelists hath not so well considered them as he should do before he pronounce sentence of so weighty a matter And for his prime intent in writing his Gospel what that was certainly no Father in the world understood it better than himself Therefore let us hear him speak Many other signs saith he also did Jesus in the sight of his Disciples which are not written in this Book But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and that believing you may have life in his Name By these are written may be understood either these things are written or these signs are written Take it which way you will this conclusion will certainly follow That either all that which S. John wrote in his Gospel or less then all and therefore all much more was sufficient to make them believe that which being believed with lively faith would certainly bring them to eternal life 43. This which hath been spoken I hope is enough to justifie my undertaking to the full that it is very probable that every one of the four Evangelists hath in his Book the whole substance all the necessary parts of the Gospel of Christ But for S. Luke that he hath written such a perfect Gospel in my judgment it ought to be with them that believe him no manner of question Consider first the introduction to his Gospel where he declares what he intends to write in these words For as much as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed amongst us even as they delivered unto us which from the beginning were eye-witnesses and Ministers of the Word it seemed good to me also having had perfect understanding of things from the first to write to thee in order most excellent Theophilus that thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed Add to this place the entrance to his History of the Acts of the Apostles The former Treatise have I made O Theophilus of all that Jesus began both to do and teach until the day in which he was taken up Weigh well these two places and then answer me freely and ingenuously to these demands 1. Whether S. Luke doth not undertake the very same thing which he says many had taken in hand 2. Whether this were not to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed amongst Christians 3. Whether the whole Gospel of Christ and every necessary Doctrine of it were not surely believed among Christians 4. Whether they which were Eye-witnesses and Ministers of the Word from the beginning delivered not the whole Gospel of Christ 5. Whether he doth not undertake to write in order these things whereof he had perfect understanding from the first 6. Whether he had not perfect understanding of the whole Gospel of Christ 7. Whether he doth not undertake to write to Theophilus of all those things wherein he had been instructed 8. And whether he had not been instructed in all the necessary parts of the Gospel of Christ 9 Whether in the other Text All things which Jesus began to do and teach must not at least imply all the Principal and necessary things 10. Whether this be not the very interpretation of your Rhemish Doctors in their Annotation upon this place 11. Whether all these Articles of the Christian Faith without the belief whereof no man can be saved be not the Princicipal and most necessary things which Jesus taught 12. And lastly Whether many things which S. Luke hath wrote in his Gospel be not less principal and less necessary than all and every one of these When you have well considered these proposals I believe you will be very apt to think if S. Luke be of credit with you That all things necessary to salvation are certainly contained in his writings alone And from hence you will not chuse but conclude that seeing all the Christians in the world agree in the belief of what S. Luke hath written and not only so but in all other Books of Canonical Scripture which were never doubted of in and by the Church the Learned Arch-Bishop had very just and certain ground to say That in these Propositions which without Controversie are universally received in the whole Christian world so much truth is contained as being joyned with holy obedience may be sufficient to bring a man to everlasting Salvation and that we have no cause to doubt but that as many as walk according to this rule neither overthrowing that which they have builded by superinducing any damnable Heresie thereupon nor otherwise vitiating their holy Faith with a lewd and wicked conversation peace shall be upon them and upon the Israel of God 44. Against this you object two things The one that by this Rule Seeing the Doctrin of the Trinity is not received universally among Christians the denial of it shall not exclude Salvation The other that the Bishop contradicts himself in supposing a man may believe all necessary Truths and yet superinduce some damnable Heresies 45. To the first I answer what I conceive he would whose words I here justifie that he hath declared plainly in this very place that he meant not an absolute but a limited Universality and speaks not of propositions universally believed by all Professions of Christianity that are but only by all those several Professions of Christianity that have any large spread in any part of the world By which words be excludes from the universality here spoken of the deniers of the Doctrin of the Trinity as being but a handful of men in respect of all nay in respect of any of these Professions which maintain it
be between those that are good Christians and those that are not so But instead thereof had delivered this one Proposition which would have been certainly effectual for all the aforesaid good intents and purposes The Roman Church shall be for ever infallible in all things which she proposes as matters of Faith 84. Whereas you say If we will believe we have all in the Creed when we have not all it is not the Apostles fault but our own I tell you plainly if it be a fault I know not whose it should be but theirs For sure it can be no fault in me to follow such Guides whithersoever they lead me Now I say they have led me into this perswasion because they have given me great reason to believe it and none to the contrary The reason they have given me to believe it is because it is apparent and confest they did propose to themselves in composing it some good end or ends As that Christians might have a form by which for matter of Faith they might profess themselves Catholiques So Putean out of Tho. Aquinas That the faithful might know what the Christian people is to believe explicitly So Vincent Filiucius That being separated into divers parts of the World they might preach the same thing And that that might serve as a mark to distinguish true Christians from Infidels So Card Riclieu Now for all these for any other good intent I say it will be plainly uneffectual unless it contain at least all Points of simple Belief which are in ordinary course necessary to be explicitly known by all men So that if it be a fault in me to believe this it must be my fault to believe the Apostles wise and good men which I cannot do if I believe not this And therefore what Richardus de sancto Victore says of God himself I make no scruple at all to apply to the Apostles and to say Si error est quod credo à vobis deceptus sum If it be an error which I believe it is you and my reverend esteem of you and your actions that hath led me into it For as for your suspition That we are led into this perswasion out of a hope that we may the better maintain by it some opinions of our own It is plainly uncharitable I know no opinion I have which I would not as willingly forsake as keep if I could see sufficient reason to enduce me to believe that it is the will of God I should forsake it Neither do I know any opinion I hold against the Church of Rome but I have more evident grounds then this whereupon to build it For let but these Truths be granted That the authority of the Scripture is independent on your Church and dependent only in respect of us upon universal Tradition That Scripture is the only Rule of Faith That all things necessary to Salvation are plainly delivered in Scripture Let I say these most certain and Divine Truths be laid for Foundations and let our superstructions be consequent and coherent to them and I am confident Peace would be restored and Truth maintained against you though the Apostles Creed were not in the World CHAP. V. That Luther Calvin their Associates and all who began or continue the Separation from the external Communion of the Roman Church are guilty of the proper and formal sin of Schism THE Searcher of all Hearts is witness with how unwilling minds we Catholiques are drawn to fasten the denomination of Schismatiques or Heretiques on them for whose souls if they employed their best blood they judge that it could not be better spent If we rejoyce that they are contristated at such titles our joy riseth not from their trouble or grief but as that of the Apostles did from the fountain of Charity because they are contristated to repentance that so after unpartial examination they finding themselves to be what we say may by God's holy grace begin to dislike what themselves are For our part we must remember that our obligation is to keep within the mean betwixt uncharitable bitterness and pernitious flattery not yielding to worldly respects nor offending Christian Modesty but uttering the substance of truth in so Charitable manner that not so much we as Truth and Charity may seem to speak according to the wholesome advice of S. Gregory Nazianzen in these divine words We do not affect peace with (a) Orat. 32. prejudice of the true doctrine that so we may get a name of being geatle and mild and yet we seek to conserve peace fighting in a lawful manner and containing our selves within our compass and the rule of Spirit And of these things my judgment is and for my part I prescribe the same law to all that deal with souls and treat of true Doctrine that neither they exasperate mens minds by harshness nor make them haughty or insolent by submission but that in the cause of Faith they behave themselves prudently and advisedly and do not in either of these things exceed the mean With whom agreeth S. Leo saying it behoveth us in such causes to be (b) Epist 8. most careful that without noise of contentions both Charity be conserved and Truth maintained 2. For better method we will handle these Points in order First we will set down the nature and essence or as I may call it the Quality of Schism In the second place the greatness and grievousness or so to term it the Quantity thereof For the Nature or Quality will tell us who may without injury be judged Schismatiques and by the greatness or quantity such as find themselves guilty thereof will remain acquainted with the true state of their soul and whether they may conceive any hope of Salvation or no. And because Schism will be found to be a division from the Church which could not happen unless there were always a visible Church we will Thirdly prove or rather take it as a Point to be granted by all Christians that in all Ages There hath been such a Visible Congregation of Faithful People Fourthly we will demonstrate that Luther Galvin and the rest did separate themselves from the Communion of that always visible Church of Christ and therefore were guilty of Schism And fifthly we will make it evident that the visible true Church or Christ out of which Luther and his followers departed was no other but the Roman Church and consequently that both they and all others who persist in the same divisions are Schismatiques by reason of their separation from the Church of Rome 1. Point The nature of Schism 3. For the first Point touching the Nature or Quality of Schism As the natural perfection of man consists in his being the Image of God his Creator by the powers of his soul so his supernatural perfection is placed in similitude with God as his last End and Felicity and by having the said spiritual faculties his Understanding and Will is linked to him
time from whence did Donatus Luther appear From what earth did he spring From what sea is he come From what heaven did he drop And in another place How can they vaunt (z) Lib. 3. cont Parm. to have any Church if â—he have ceased ever since those times And all Divines by defining Schism to be a division from the true Church suppose that there must be a known Church from which it is possible for men to depart But enough of this in these few words 4. Point Luther and all that follow him are Schismatiques 12. Let us now come to the fourth and chiefest Point which was to examine whether Luther Calvin and the rest did not depart from the external Communion of Christ's Visible Church and by that separation became guilty of Schism And that they are properly Schismatiques clearly followeth from the grounds which we have laid concerning the nature of Schism which consists in leaving the external Communion of the Visible Church of Christ our Lord and it is clear by evidence of fact that Luther and his followers forsook the Communion of that Ancient Church For they did not so much as pretend to joyn with any Congregation which had a being before their time for they would needs conceive that no Visible Company was free from errors in Doctrin and corruption in practice And therefore they opposed the Doctrin they withdrew their obedience from the Prelates they left participation in Sacraments they changed the Liturgy of publique Service of whatsoever Church then extant And these things they pretended to do out of a perswasion that they were bound forsooth in conscience so to do unless they would participate with errors corruptions and superstitions We dare not saith D. Potter communicate (a) Pag. 68. with Rome either in her publique Liturgy which is manifestly polluted with gross superstition c. or in those corrupt and ungrounded opinions which she hath added to the Faith of Catholiques But now let D. Potter tell me with what visible Church extant before Luther he would have adventured to communicate in her publique Liturgy and Doctrin since he durst not communicate with Rome He will not be able to assign any even with any little colour of common sense If then they departed from all visible Communities professing Christ it followeth that they also left the Communion of the true visible Church which soever it was whether that of Rome or any other of which Point I do not for the present dispute Yea this the Lutherans do not only acknowledge but prove and brag of If saith a learned Lutheran there had been right (b) Georgius Milius in Aug. Confess art 7. de Eccles Pag. 137 Believers which went before Luther in his office there had then been no need of a Lutheran Reformation Another affirmeth it to be ridiculous to think that in the time (c) Bened. Morgenstern tract de Eccles Pag. 145. before Luther any had the purity of Doctrin and that Luther should receive it from them and not they from Luther Another speaketh roundly and saith It is impudency to say that many learned men (d) Conrad Schlusselb in Theol. Calvin lib. 2. fol. 130. in Germany before Luther did hold the Doctrin of the Gospel And I add That far greater impudency it were to affirm that Germany did not agree with the test of Europe and other Christian Catholique Nations and consequently that it is the greatest impudency do deny that he departed from the Communion of the visible Catholique Church spread over the whole world We have heard Calvin saying of Protestants in general We were even forced (e) Epist 141. to make a separation from the whole world And Luther of himself in particular In the beginning (f) In praefat operum suorum I was alone Ergo say I by your good leave you were at least a Schismatique divided from the Ancient Church and a member of no new Church For no sole man can constitute a Church and though he could yet such a Church could not be that glorious Company of whose number greatness and amplitude so much hath been spoken both in the old Testament and in the New 13. D. Potter endeavours to avoid this evident Argument by divers evasions but by the confutation thereof I will with God's holy assistance take occasion even out of his own Answers and grounds to bring unanswerable reasons to convince them of Schism 14. His chief Answer is That they have not left the Church but her corruption 15. I reply This answer may be given either by those furious people who teach that those abuses and corruptions in the Church were so enormous that they could not stand with the nature or being of a true Church of Christ Or else by those other more calm Protestants who affirm that those errors did not destroy the being but only deform the beauty of the Church Against both these sorts of men I may fitly use that unanswerable Dilemma which S. Augustine brings against the Donatists in these concluding words Tell me whether the (g) Lib. 2. cont Epist Gaudent cap. 7. Church at that time when you say she entertained those who were guilty of all crimes by the contagion of those sinful persons perished or perished not Answer Whether the Church perished or perished not Make choice of what you think If then she perished What Church brought forth Donatus we may say Luther But if she could not perish because so many were incorporated into her without Baptism that is without a second baptism or rebaptization and I may say without Luther's Reformation answer me I pray you what madness did more the Sect of Donatus to separate themselves from her upon pretence to avoid the communion of bad meaâ— I beseech the Reader to ponder every one of S. Augustine's words and to consider whether any thing could have been spoken more directly against Luther and his followers of what sort soever 16. And now to answer more in particular I say to those who teach that the visible Church of Christ perished for many Ages that I can easily afford them the courtesie to free them from meer Schism but all men touched with any spark of zeal to vindicate the wisdom and goodness of our Saviour from blasphemous injury cannot chuse but believe and proclaim them to be superlative Arch-heretiques Nevertheless if they will needs have the honour of Singularity and desire to be both formal Heretiques and properly Schismatiques I will tell them that while they dream of an invisible Church of men which agreed with them in Faith they will upon due reflection find themselves to be Schismatiques from those corporeal Angels or invisible men because they held external Communion with the visible Church of those times the outward Communion of which visible Church these modern hot-spurs forsaking were thereby divided from the outward Communion of their hidden Brethren and so are Separatists from the external Communion of them
with whom they agree in Faith which is Schism in the most formal and proper signification thereof Moreover according to D. Potter those boisterous Creatures are properly Schismatiques For the reason why he thinks himself and such as he is to be cleared from Schism notwithstanding their division from the Roman Church is because according to his Divinity the property of (h) Pag. 76. Schism is witness the Donatists and Luciferians to cut off from the Body of Christ and the hope of Salvation the Church from which it separates But those Protestants of whom we now spake cut off from the Body of Christ and the hope of Salvation the Church from which they separated themselves and they do it directly as the Donatists in whom you exemplifie did by affirming that the true Church had perished and therefore they cannot be cleared from Schism if you may be their Judge Consider I pray you how many prime Protestants both domestical and forraign you have at one blow struck off from hope of Salvation and condemned to the lowest pit for the grievous sin of Schism And withall it imports you to consider that you also involve your self and other moderate Protestants in the self-same crime and punishment while you communicate with those who according to your own principles are properly and formally Schismatiques For if you held your self obliged under pain of damnation to forsake the Communion of the Roman Church by reason of her Errors and Corruptions which yet you confess were not Fundamental shall it not be much more damnable for you to live in Communion and Confraternity with those who defend an error of the failing of the Church which in the Donatists you confess (i) Pag. 126. to have been properly heretical against the Article of our Creed I believe the Church And I desire the Reader here to apply an authority of S. Cyprian Epist 76. which he shall find alledged in the next number And this may suffice for confutation of the aforesaid Answer as it might have relation to the rigid Calvinists 17. For Confutation of those Protestants who hold that the Church of Christ had always a being and cannot err in Points Fundamental and yet teach that she may err in matters of less moment wherein if they forsake her they would be accounted not to leave the Church but only her corruptions I must say that they change the state of our present Question not distinguishing between internal Faith and external Communion not between Schism and Heresie This I demonstrate out of D. Potter himself who in express words teacheth that the promises which our Lord hath made (k) Pag. 151. unto his Church for his assistance are intended not to any particular Persons or Churches but only to the Church Catholique and they are to be extended not to every parcel or particularity of truth but only to Points of Faith or Fundamental And afterwards speaking of the Universal Church he saith It is comfort (l) Pag. 155. enough for the Church that the Lord in mercy will secure her from all capital dangers and conserve her on earth against all enemies but she may not hope to triumph over all sin and error till she be in heaven Out of which words I observe that according to D. Potter the self-same Church which is the Universal Church remaining the Universal true Church of Christ may fall into errors and corruptions from whence it clearly followeth that it is impossible to leave the External communion of the Church so corrupted and retain external communion with the Catholique Church since the Church Catholique and the Church so corrupted is the self-same one Church or company of men And the contrary imagination talks in a dream as if the errors and infections of the Catholique Church were not inherent in her but were separate from her like to Accidents without any Subject or rather indeed as if they were not Accidents but Hypostases or Persons subsisting by themselves for men cannot be said to live in or out of the Communion of any dead creature but with persons endued with life and reason and much less can men be said to live in the Communion of Accidents as errors and corruptions are and therefore it is an absurd thing to affirm that Protestants divided themselves from the corruptions of the Church but not from the Church her self seeing the corruptions of the Church were inherent in the Church All this is made more clear if we consider that when Luther appeared there were not two distinct visible true Catholique Churches holding contrary Doctrines and divided in external Communion one of the which two Churches did triumph over all error and corruption in Doctrine and practice but the other was stained with both For to faign this diversity of two Churches cannot stand with record of histories which are silent of any such matter It is against D. Potter's own grounds that the Church may err in Points not Fundamental which were not true if you will imagine a certain visible Catholique Church free from error even in Points not Fundamental It contradicteth the words in which he said the Church may not hope to triumph over all error till she be in heaven It evacuateth the brag of Protestants that Luther reformed the whole Church and lastly It maketh Luther a Schismatique for leaving the Communion of all visible Churches seeing upon this supposition there was a visible Church of Christ free from all corruption which therefore could not be forsaken without just imputation of Schism We must therefore truly affirm that since there was but one visible Church of Christ which was truly Catholique and yet was according to Protestants stained with corruption when Luther left the external Communion of that corrupted Church he could not remain in the Communion of the Catholique Church no more than it is possible to keep company with D. Christopher Potter and not keep company with the Provost of Queens Colledge in Oxford if D. Potter and the Provost be one and the self-same man For so one should be and not be with him at the same time This very Argument drawn from the Unity of God's Church S. Cyprian urgeth to convince that Novatianus was cut ost from the Church in these words The Church is (m) Epist 76. ad Mag. One which being One cannot be both within and without If she be with Novatianus she was not with Cornelius But if she were with Cornelius who succeeded Fabianus by lawful ordination Novatiâ—nus is not in the Church I purposely here speak only of external Communion with the Catholique Church For in this Point there is great difference between internal acts of our understanding and will and of external deeds Our Understanding and Will are faculties as Philsophers speak abstractive and able to distinguish and as it were to part things though in themselves they be really conjoyned But real external deeds do take things in gross as they find them not separating things which in
damnable errors Remember I pray you what your self affirms pag. 69. where speaking of our Church and yours you say All the difference is from the weeds which remain there and here are taken away Yet neither here perfectly nor every where alike Behold a fair confession of corruptions still remaining in your Church which you can only excuse by saying they are not Fundamental as likewise those in the Roman Church are confessed to be not Fundamental What man of judgment will be a Protestant since that Church is confessedly a corrupt one 22. I still proceed to impugn you expresly upon your own grounds You say That it is comfort enough for the Church that the Lord in mercy will secure her from all capital dangers but she may not hope to triumph over all sin and error till she be in heaven Now if it be comfort enough to be secured from all capital dangers which can arise only from error in Fundamental Points why were not your first Reformers content with enough but would needs dismember the Church out of a pernicious greediness of more than enough For this enough which according to you is attained by not erring in Points Fundamental was enjoyed before Luther's reformation unless you will now against your self affirm that long before Luther there was no Church free from error in Fundamental Points Moreover if as you say no Church may hope to triumph over all error till she be in heaven You must either grant that errors not Fundamental cannot yield sufficient cause to forsake the Church or else you must affirm that all Community may and ought to be forsaken and so there will be no end of Schisms or rather indeed there can be no such thing as Schism because according to you all communities are subject to errors not Fundamental for which if they may be lawfully forsaken it followeth clearly that it is not Schism to forsake them Lastly since it is not lawful to leave the Communion of the Church for abuses in life and manners because such miseries cannot be avoided in this world of temptation and since according to your Assertion no Church may hope to triumph over all sin and error You must grant that as she ought not to be left by reason of sin so neither by reason of errors not Fundamental because both sin and error are according to you impossible to be avoided till she be in heaven 23. Furthermore I ask Whether it be the Quantity and Number or Quality and Greatness of doctrinal errors that may yield sufficient cause to relinquish the Churches Communion I prove that neither Not the Quality which is supposed to be beneath the degree of Points Fundamental or necessary to Salvation Not the Quantity or Number for the foundation is strong enough to support all such unnecessary additions as you tearm them And if they once weighed so heavy as to overthrow the foundation they should grow to Fundamental errors into which your self teach the Church cannot fall Hay and stubble say you and such (g) Pag. 155. unprofitable stuffe laid on the roof destroys not the house whilest the main pillars are standing on the foundation And tell us I pray you the precise number of errors which cannot be tolerated I know you cannot do it and therefore being uncertain whether or no you have cause to leave the Church you are certainly obliged not to forsake her Our blessed Saviour hath declared his will that we forgive a private offender seventy seven times that is without limitation of quantity of time or quality of trespasses and why then dare you alledge his command that you must not pardon his Church for errors acknowledged to be not Fundamental What excuse can you feign to your selves who for Points not necessary to Salvation have been occasions causes and Authors of so many mischiefs as could not but unavoidably accompany so huge a breach in Kingdoms in Common-wealths in private persons in publique Magistrates in body in soul in goods in life in Church in the State by Schisms by rebellions by war by famin by plague by bloud-shed by all sorts of imaginable calamities upon the whole face of the earth wherein as in a map of Desolation the heaviness of your crime appears under which the world doth pant 24. To say for your excuse that you left not the Church but her errors doth not extenuate but aggravate your sin For by this device you sow seeds of endless Schisms and put into the mouth of aâ— Separatists a ready Answer how to avoid the note of Schism from your Protestant Church of England or from any other Church whatsoever They will I say answer as you do prompt that your Church may be forsaken if she fall into errors though they be not Fundamental and further that no Church must hope to be free from such errors which two grounds being once laid it will not be hard to infer the consequence that she may be forsaken 25. From some other words of D. Potter I likewise prove that for Errors not Fundamental the Church ought not to be forsaken There neither was saith he nor can be (h) Pag. 75. any just cause to depart from the Church of Christ no more than from Christ himself To depart from a particular Church and namely from the Church of Rome in some Doctrins and practises there might be just and necessary cause though the Church of Rome wanted nothing necessary to Salvation Mark his Doctrin that there can be no just cause to depart from the Church of Christ and yet he teacheth that the Church of Christ may err in Points not Fundamental Therefore say I we cannot forsake the Roman Church for Points not Fundamental for then we might also forsake the Church of Christ which your self deny and I pray you consider whether you do not plainly contradict your self while in the words above recited you say there can be no just cause to forsake the Catholique Church and yet that there may be necessary cause to depart from the Church of Rome since you grant that the Church of Christ may err in Points not Fundamental and that the Roman Church hath erred only in such Points as by and by we shall see more in particular And thus much be said to disprove their chiesest Answer that they left not the Church but her corruptions 26. Another evasion D. Potter bringeth to avoid the imputation of Schism and it is because they still acknowledg the Church of Rome to be a Member of the body of Christ and not cut off from the hope of Salvation And this saith he clears us from the (i) Pag. 76. imputation of Schism whose property it is to cut off from the Body of Christ and the hope of Salvation the Church from which it separates 27. This is an Answer which perhaps you may get some one to approve if first you can put him out of his wits For what prodigious Doctrins are these Those Protestants who believe
of Schism it is certainly consequent that all who persist in this Division must be so likewise Which is not so certain as you pretend For they which alter without necessary cause the present government of any State Civil or Ecclesiastical do commit a great fault whereof notwithstanding they may be innocent who continue this alteration and to the utmost of their power oppose a change though to the former State when continuance of time hath once setled the present Thus have I known some of your own Church condemn the Low-countrey men who first revolted from the King of Spain of the sin of Rebellion yet absolve them from it who now being of your Religion there are yet faithful maintainers of the common liberty against the pretences of the King of Spain 5. Fourthly That all those which a Christian is to esteem neighbours do concur to make one company which is the Church Which is false for a Christian is to esteem those his neighbours who are not members of the true Church 6. Fifthly That all the Members of the Visible Church are by charity united into one Mystical body Which is manifestly untrue for many of them have no Charity 7. Sixthly That the Catholique Church signifies one company of faithful people which is repugnant to your own grounds For you require not true Faith but only the Profession of it to make men members of the visible Church 8. Seventhly That every Heretique is a Schismatique Which you must acknowledge false in those who though they deny or doubt of some Point professed by your Church and so are Heretiques yet continue still in the Communion of the Church 9. Eighthly That all the Members of the Catholique Church must of necessity be united in external Communion Which though it were much to be desired it were so yet certainly cannot be perpetually true For a man unjustly excommmunicated is not in the Churches Communion yet he is still a Member of the Church and divers time it hath happened as in the case of Chrysostom and Epiphanius that particular men and particular Churches have upon an overvalued difference either renounced Communion mutually or one of them separated from the other and yet both have continued Members of the Catholique Church These things are in those seven Sections either said or supposed by you untruly without all shew or pretence of proof The rest is impertinent common place wherein Protestants and the cause in hand are absolutely unconcern'd And therefore I pass to the eighth Section 10. Ad § 8. Wherein you obtrude upon us a double Fallacy One in supposing and taking for granted that whatsoever is affirmed by three Fathers must be true whereas your selves make no scruple of condemning many things of falshood which yet are maintained by more than thrice three Fathers Another in pretending their words to be spoken absolutely which by them are limited and restrained to some particular cases For whereas you say S. Austin c. 62. l. 2. cont Parm. inferrs out of the former premises That there is no necessity to divide Unity to let pass your want of diligence in quoting the 62. Chapter of that Book which hath but 23. in it to pass by also that these words which are indeed in the 11. Chapter are not inferred out of any such premises as you pretend this I say is evident that he says not absolutely that there never is or can be any necessity to divide Unity which only were for your purpose but only in such a special case as he there sets down That is When good men tolerate bad men which can do them no spiritual hurt to the intent they may not be separated from these who are spiritually good Then saith he there is no necessity to divide Unity Which very words do clearly give us to understand that it may fall out as it doth in our case that we cannot keep Unity with bad men without spiritual hurt i.e. without partaking with them in their impieties and that then there is a necessity to divide Unity from them I mean to break off conjunction with them in their impieties Which that it was S. Austin's mind it is most evident out of the 21. c. of the same Book where to Parmenian demanding How can a man remain pure being joyned with those that are corrupted he answers Very true this is not possible if he be joyned with them that is if he commit any evil with them or favour them which do commit it But if he do neither of these he is not joyned with them And presently after These two things retained will keep such men pure and uncorrupted that is neither doing ill nor approving it And therefore seeing you impose upon all men of your Communion a necessity of doing or at least approving many things unlawful certainly there lies upon us an unavoidable necessity of dividing Unity either with you or with God and whether of these is rather to be done be ye Judges 11. Irenaeus also says not simply which only would do you service there cannot possibly be any so important Reformation as to justifie a separation from them who will not reform But only they cannot make any corruption so great as is the pernitiousness of a Schism Now They here is a relative and hath an antecedent expressed in Irenaeus which if you had been pleased to take notice of you would easily have seen that what Iraeneus says falls heavy upon the Church of Rome but toucheth Protestants nothing at all For the men he speaks of are such as Propter modicas quaslibet causas for trifling or small causes divide the body of Christ such as speak of peace and make war such as strain at gnats and swallow Camels And these saith he can make no reformation of any such importance as to countervail the danger of a division Now seeing the causes of our separation from the Church of Rome are as we pretend and are ready to justifie because we will not be partakers with her in Superstition Idolatry Impiety and most cruel Tyranny both upon the bodies and souls of men Who can say that the causes of our separation may be justly esteemed Modicae quaelibet causae On the other side seeing the Bishop of Rome who was contemporary to Irenaeus did as much as in him lay cut off from the Churches unity many great Churches for not conforming to him in an indifferent matter upon a difference Non de Catholico dogmate sed de Ritu vel Ritus potiùs tempore Not about any Catholique doctrine but only a Ceremony or rather about the time of observing it so Petavius values it which was just all one as if the Church of France should excommunicate those of their own Religion in England for not keeping Christmas upon the same day with them And seeing he was reprehended sharply and bitterly for it by most of the Bishops of the world as Eusebius testifies Euseb hist l. 5. c. 24. Perron Replic 3.
his judgment in this matter this express limitation of his former resolution he makes in the very same Section which affords your former quotation and therefore what Apology can be made for you and your Store-house M. Brerely for dissembling of it I cannot possibly imagine 111. D. Potter p. 131. sayes That errors of the Donatists and Novatians were not in themselves Heresies nor could be made so by the Churches determination But that the Churches intention was only to silence disputes and to settle peace and unity in her government which because they factiously opposed they were justly esteemed Schismatiques From hence you conclude that the same condemnation must pass against the first Reformers seeing they also opposed the commands of the Church imposed on them for silencing all Disputes and setling Peace and Unity in Government But this Collection is deceitful and the reason is Because though the first Reformers as well as the Donatists and Novatians opposed herein the Commands of the Visible Church that is of a great part of it yet the Reformers had reason nay necessity to do so the Church being then corrupted with damnable errors which was not true of the Church when it was opposed by the Novatians and Donatists And therefore though they and the Reformers did the same action yet doing it upon different grounds it might in these merit applause and in them condemnation 112 Ad § 43. The next § hath in it some objections against Luther's person and none against his cause which alone I have undertaken to justifie and therefore I pass it over Yet this I promise that when you or any of your side shall publish a good defence of all that your Popes have said and done especially of them whom Bellarmine believes in such a long train to have gone to the Divel then you shall receive an ample Apology for all the actions and words of Luther In the mean time I hope all reasonable and equitable judges will esteem it not unpardonable in the great and Heroical spirit of Luther if being opposed and perpetually baited with a world of Furies he were transported sometimes and made somewhat furious As for you I desire you to be quiet and to demand no more whether God be wont to send such Furies to preach the Gospel Unless you desire to hear of your killing of Kings Massacring of Peoples Blowing up of Parliaments and have a mind to be askt Whether it be probable that that should be Gods cause which needs to be maintained by such Divellish means 113 Ad § 44 45. In the two next Particles which are all of this Chapter that remain unspoken to you spend a great deal of reading and wit and reason against some men who pretending to honour and believe the Doctrin and practice of the visible Church you mean your own and condemning their Forefathers who forsook her say they would not have done so yet remain divided from her Communion Which men in my judgment cannot be defended For if they believe the Doctrin of your Church then must they believe this doctrin that they are to return to your Communion And therefore if they do not so it cannot be avoided but they must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so I leave them only I am to remember you that these men cannot pretend to be Protestants because they pretend to believe your Doctrin which is opposite in Diameter unto the doctrin of Protestants and therefore in a Work which you profess to have written meerly against Protestants all this might have been spared CHAP. VI. That Luther and the rest of Protestants have added Heresie unto Schism BEcause Vice is best known by the contrary Vertue we cannot well determine what Heresie is nor who be Heretiques but by the opposite vertue of Faith whose Nature being once understood as far as belongs to our present purpose we shall pass on with ease to the definition of heresie and so be able to discern who be Heretiques And this I intend to do not by entring into such particular Questions as are controverted between Catholiques and Protestants but only by applying some general grounds either already proved or else yielded to on all sides 2 Almighty God having ordained Man to a supernatural End of Beatitude by supernatural means it was requisite that his understanding should be enabled to apprehend that End and Means by a supernatural knowledge And because if such a knowledge were no more than probable it could not be able sufficiently to overbear our will and encounter with human probabilities being backed with the strength of flesh and blood It was further necessary that this supernatural knowledge should be most certain and infallible and that Faith should believe nothing more certainly than that it self is a most certain Belief and so be able to bear down all gay probabilities of humane Opinion And because the aforesaid means and end of Beatifical Vâ—sion do fat exceed the reach of natural wit the certainty of faith could not always be joyned with such evidence of reason as is wont to be found in the Principles or Conclusions of humane natural Sciences that so all flesh might not glory in the arm of flesh but he who glories should glory (a) 2 Cor. 1â— in our Lord. Moreover it was expedient that our belief or assent to divine truths should not only be unknown or inevident by any humane discourse but that absolutely also it should be obscure in it self and ordinarily speaking be void even of supernatural evidence that so we might have occasion to actuate and testifie the obedience which we ow to our God not only by submitting our will to his Will and Commands but by subjecting also our Understanding to his Wisdom and words captivating as the Apostle speaks the same Understanding (b) 2 Cor. 10.5 to the Obedience of Faith Which occasion had been wanting if Almighty God had made clear to us the truths which now are certainly but not evidently presented to our minds For where truth doth manifestly open it self not obedience but necessity commands our assent For this reason Divines teach that the Objects of faith being not evident to humane reason it is in mans power not only to abstain from believing by suspending our Judgments or exercising no act one way or other but also to disbelieve that is to believe the contrary of that which faith proposeth as the example of innumerable Arch-heretiques can bear witness This obscurity of faith we learn from holy Scripture according to those words of the Apostle Faith is the (c) Heb. 11. substance of things to be hoped for the argument of things not appearing And We see by a glass (d) 1 Cor. 13. in a dark manner but then face to face And accordingly S. Peter faith Which you do well attending unto as to (e) 2 Pet. 1.19 a Candle shining in a dark place 3 Faith being then obscure whereby it differeth from natural Sciences and yet being
most certain and infallible wherein it surpasseth humane Opinion it must relie upon some motive and ground which may be able to give it certainly and yet not release it from Obscurity For if this motive ground or formal Object of Faith were any thing evidently presented to our understanding and if also we did evidently know that it had a necessary connection with the Articles which we believe our assent to such Articles could not be obscure but evident which as we said is against the nature of our faith If likewise the motive and ground of our faith were obscurely propounded to us but were not in it self infallible it would leave our assent in obscurity but could not endue it with certainty We must therefore for the ground of our faith find out a motive obscure to us but most certain in it self that the act of faith may remain both obscure and certain Such a motive as this can be no other but the divine authority of Almighty God revealing or speaking those truths which our faith believes For it is manifest that God's infallible testimony may transfâ—â—â— Certainty to our faith and yet not draw it out of obscurity because no humane discourse or demonstration can evince that God revealeth any supernatural truth since God hath been no less perfect than he is although hâ—â—â—â— never revealed any of those objects which we now believe 4 Nevertheless because Almighty God out of his infinite wisdom and sweetness doth conour with his Creatures in such sort as may befit the temper and exigence of their natures and because Man is a Creature endued with reason God doth not exact of his Will or Understanding any other then as the Apostle faith rationabile (f) Rom. 12.1 obsequium an Obedience sweetned with good reason which could not so appear if our Understanding were summoned to believe with certainty things no way represented as infallible and certain And therefore Almighty God obliging us under pain of eternal camnation to believe with greatest certainty divers verities not known by the light of natural reason cannot fail to furnish our Understanding with such inducements motives and arguments as may sufficiently perswade any mind which is not partial or passionate that the objects which we believe proceed from an Authority so Wise that it cannot be deceived so Good that it cannot deceive according to the words of David Thy Testimonies are made (g) Psal 92. credible exceedingly These inducements are by Divines called argumenta credibilitatis arguments of credibility which though they cannot make us evidently see what we believe yet they evidently convince that in one wisdom and prudence the objects of faith deserve credit and ought to be accepted as things revealed by God For without such reasons and inducements our judgment of faith could not be conceived prudent holy Scripture telling us that be who soon (h) Eccles 19. â— believes is light of heart By these arguments and inducements our Understanding is both satisfied with evidence of credibility and the objects of faith retain their obsenrity because it is a different thing to be evidently credible and evidently true as those who were present at the Miracles wrought by our blessed Saviour and his Apostles did not evidently see their doctrin to be true for then it had not been Faith but Science and all had been necessitated to believe which we see fell out otherwise but they were evidently convinced that the things confirmed by such Miracles were most credible and worthy to be imbraced as truth revealed by God 5 These evident arguments of Credibility are in great abundance found in the Visible Church of Christ perpetually existing on earth For that there hath been a company of men professing such and such doctrines we have from our next Predecessors and these from theirs upward till we come to the Apostles and our Blessed Saviour which gradation is known by evidence of sense by reading books or hearing what one man delivers to another And it is evident that there was neither cause nor possibility that men so distant in place so different in temper so repugnant in private ends did or could agree to tell one and the self same thing if it had been but a fiction invented by themselves as ancient Tertullian well saith How is it likely that so many (i) Praescript c. 28. and so great Churches should err in one saith Among many events there is not one issue the error of the Churches must needs have varied But that which among many is sound to be One is not mistaken but delivered Dare then any body say that they erred who delivered it With this never-interrupted existence of the Church are joyned the many and great miracles wrought by mâ—n of that Congregation or Church the sanctity of the persons the renowned victories over so many persecutions both of all sorts of men and of the infernal spirits and lastly the perpetual existence of so holy a Church being brought up to the Apostles themselves she comes to partake of the same assurance of truth which They by so many powerful ways did communicate to their Doctrin to the Church of their times together with the divine Certainty which they received from our blessed Saviour himself revealing to Mankind what he heard from his Father and so we conclude with Tertullian We receive it from the Churches the Churches (k) Praese c. 21. 37. from the Apostles the Apostles from Christ Christ from his Father And if we once interrupt this line of succession most certainly made known by means of holy Tradition we cannot conjoyn the present Church and doctrin with the Church and doctrin of the Apostles buâ— must invent some new means and arguments sufficient of themselves to find out and prove a true Church and faith independently of the preaching and writing of the Apostles neither of which can be known but by Tradition as is truly observed by Tertullian saying I will prescribe that (l) Praesc c. 22. there is no means to prove what the Apostles preached but by the same Church which they sounded 6 Thus then we are to proceed By evidence of manifest and incorrupt Tradition I know that there hath always been a never interrupted Succession of men from the Apostles time believing professing and practising such and such doctrines By evident arguments of credibility as Miracles Sanctity Unity c. and by all those ways whereby the Apostles and our Blessed Saviour himself confirmed their doctrin we are assured that what the said never-interrupted Church proposeth doth deserve to be accepted and acknowledged as a divine truth By evidence of Sense we see that the same Church proposeth such and such doctrins as divine truths that is as revealed and testified by Almighty God By this divine Testimony we are infallibly assured of what we believe and so the last period ground motive and formal object of our Faith is the infallible testimony of that supreme Verity which
no wonder that no one can be excused from deadly and damnable sin for if voluntary Blasphemy and Perjury which are opposed only to the infused Moral Vertue of Religion can never be excused from mortal sin much less can Heresie be excused which opposeth the Theological Vertue of Faith 11 If any object that Schism may seem to be a greater sin than Heresie because the Vertue of Charity to which Schism is opposite is greater than Faith according to the Apostle saying Now there remain (o) 1 Cor. 13.13 Faith Hope Charity but the greater of these is Charity S. Thomas answers in these words Charity hath two Objects one principal to wit the Divine (p) 2.2 q. 39. ar 2. in corp ad 3. Goodness and another secondary namely the good of our Neighbour But Schism and other sins which are committed against our Neighbour are opposite to Charity in respect of this secondary good which is less than the object of Faith which is God as he is the Prime Verity on which Faith doth relie and therefore these sins are less than Infidelity He takes Infidelity after a general manner as it comprehends Heresie and other vices against Faith 12 Having therefore sufficiently declared wherein Heresie consists Let us come to prove that which we proposed in this Chapter Where I desire it be still remembred That the visible Catholique Church cannot err damnably as D. Potter confesseth And that when Luther appeared there was no other visible true Church of Christ disagreeing from the Roman as we have demonstrated in the next precedent Chapter 13 Now that Luther and his followers cannot be excused from formal Heresie I prove by these reasons To oppose any truth propounded by the visible true Church as revealed by God is formal Heresie as we have shewed out of the desinition of Heresie But Luther Calvin and the rest did oppose divers truths propounded by the visible Church as revealed by God yea they did therefore oppose her because she propounded as divine revealed truths things which they judged either to be false or humane inventions Therefore they committed formal Heresie 14 Moreover every Errour against any doctrin revealed by God is a damnable Heresie whether the matter in it self be great or small as I proved before and therefore either the Protestants or the Roman Church must be guilty of formal Heresie because one of them must err against the word and testimony of God but you grant perforce that the Roman Church doth not err damnably and I add that she cannot err damnably because she is the truly Catholique Church which you confess cannot err damnably Therefore Protestants must be guilty of formal Heresie 15 Besides we have shewed that the visible Church is Judge of Controversies and therefore must be infallible in all her Proposals which being once supposed it manifestly followeth that to oppose what she delivereth as revealed by God is not so much to oppose her as God himself and therefore cannot be excused from grievous Heresie 16 Again if Luther were an Heretique for those points wherein he disagreed from the Roman Church All they who agree with him in those very points must likewise be Heretiques Now that Luther was a formal Heretique I demonstrate in this manner To say that God's visible true Church is not universal but confined to one only place or corner of the world is according to your own express words (q) Pag. 126. properly Heresie against that Article of the Creed wherein we profess to believe the holy Catholique Church And you brand Donatus with heresie because he limited the universal Church to Africa But it is manifest and acknowledged by Luther himself and other chief Protestants that Luther's Reformation when it first began and much more for divers ages before was not Universal nor spread over the world but was confined to that compass of ground which did contain Luther's body Therefore his Reformation cannot be excused from formal Heresie If S. Augustine in those times said to the Donatists There are innumerable testimonies (r) Epist 50. of holy Scripture in which it appeareth that the Church of Christ is not only in Africa as these men with most impudent vanity do rave but that she is spread over the whole earth much more may it be said It appeareth by innumerable testimonies of holy Scripture that the Church of Christ cannot be confined to the City of Wittemberg or to the place where Luther's feet stood but must be spread over the whole world It is therefore most impudent vanity and dotage to limit her to Luthers Reformation In another place also this holy Father writes no less effectually against Luther than against the Donatists For having out of those words In thy seed all Nations shall be blessed proved that God's Church must be universal he saith Why (Å¿) De Unit. Eccles cap. 6. do you superadd by saying that Christ remains heir in no part of the earth except where he may have Donatus for his Coheir Give me this Universal Church if it be among you shew your selves to all Nations which we already shew to be blessed in this Seed Give us this Church or else laying aside all fury receive her from us But it is evident that Luther could not When he said At the beginning I was alone give us an universal Church Therefore happy had he been if he had then and his followers would now receive her from us And therefore we must conclude with the same holy Father saying in another place of the universal Church She hath this (t) Cont. lit Petil. lib. 1. cap. 104. most certain mark that she cannot be hidden She is then known to all Nations The Sect of Donatus is unknown to many Nations therefore that cannot be she The Sect of Luther at least when he began and much more before his beginning was unknown to many Nations therefore that cannot be she 17 And that it may yet further appear how perfectly Luther agreed with the Donatists It is to be noted that they never taught that the Catholique Church ought not to extend it self further than that part of Africa where their faction raigned but only that in fact it was so confined because all the rest of the Church was prophaned by communicating with Caecilianus whom they falsly affirmed to have been ordained Bishop by those who were Traditors or givers up of the Bible to the Persecutors to be burned yea at that very time they had some of their Sect residing in Rome and sent thither one Victor a Bishop under colour to take care of the Brethren in that City but indeed as Baronius (u) Anno 321. nu 2. Spond observeth that the world might account them Catholiques by communicating with the Bishop of Rome to communicate with whom was ever taken by the Ancient Fathers as an assured sign of being a true Catholique They had also as S. Augustin witnesseth a pretended (w) De Uâ—i Eccles c
on our Saviour's promise to S. Peter from which a general rule and ground ought to be taken for all Ages because Heaven and Earth shall (w) Mat. 24.35 pass but the word of our Lord shall remain for ever So that I here conclude that seeing it is manifest that Luther and his followers divided themselves from the Sea of Rome they bear the inseparable Mark of Heresie 20. And though my meaning be not to treat the point of Ordination or Succession in the Protestants Church because the Fathers alleadged in the last reason assign Succession as one mark of the true Church I must not omit to say that according to the grounds of Protestants themselves they can neither pretend personal Succession of Bishops nor Succession of Doctrin For whereas Succession of Bishops signifies a never-interrupted line of Persons endued with an indelible Quality which Divines call a Character which cannot be taken away by deposition degradation or other means whatsoever and endued also with Jurisdiction and Authority to teach to preach to govern the Church by laws precepts censures c. Protestants cannot pretend Succession in either of these For besides that there was never Protestant Bishop before Luther and that there can be no continuance of Succession where there was no beginning to succeed they commonly acknowledge no Character and consequently must affirm that when their pretended Bishops or Priests are deprived of Jurisdiction or degraded they remain meer lay persons as before their Ordination fulfilling what Tertullian objects as a mark of Heresie To day a Priest to morrow (x) Praescr cap. 41. a Lay-man For if here be no immoveable Character their power of Order must consist only in Jurisdiction and authority or in a kind of moral deputation to some function which therefore may be taken away by the same power by which it was given Neither can they pretend Succession in Authority or Jurisdiction For all the Authority or Jurisdiction which they had was conferred by the Church of Rome that is by the Pope Because the whole Church collectively doth not meet to ordain Bishops or Priests or to give them Authority But according to their own doctrin they believe that the Pope neither hath or ought to have any Jurisdiction Power Superiority Preheminence or Authority Ecclesiastical or Spiritual within this Realm which they swear even when they are ordained Bishops Priests and Deacons How then can the Pope give Jurisdiction where they swear he neither hath or OUGHT to have any Or if yet he had how could they without Schism withdraw themselves from his obedience Besides the Roman Church never gave them Authority to oppose Her by whom it was given But grant their first Bishops had such Authority from the Church of Rome after the decease of those men Who gave Authority to their pretended Successours The Primate of England But from whom had he such Authority And after his decease who shall conferr Authority upon his Successors The Temporal Magistrate King Henry neither a Catholique nor a Protestant King Edward a Child Queen Elizabeth a Woman An Infant of one hours Age is true King in case of his Predecessor's decâ—ase But shall your Church lie fallow till that Infant-King and green Head of the Church come to years of discretion Do your Bishops your Hierarchy your Succession your Sacraments your being or not being Heretiques for want of Succession depend on this new-found Supremacy-doctrin brought in by such a man meerly upon base occasions and for shameful ends impugned by Calvin and his followers derided by the Christian world and even by chief Protestants as D. Andrews Wotton c. not held for any necessary point of Faith And from whom I pray you had Bishops their Authority when there were no Christian Kings Must the Greek Patriarchs receive spiritual Jurisdiction from the Great Turk Did the Pope by the Baptism of Princes lose the spiritual Power he formerly had of conferring spiritual Jurisdiction upon Bishops Hath the Temporal Magistrate authority to preach to assoil from sins to inflict Excommunications and other Censures Why hath he not power to excommunicate as well as to dispense in Irregularity as our late Soveraign Lord King James either dispensed with the late Archbishop of Canterbury or else gave commission to some Bishops to do it And since they were subject to their Primate and not he to them it is clear that they had no power to dispense with him but that power must proceed from the Prince as Superiour to them all and head of the Protestants Church in England If he have no such authority how can he give to others what himself hath not Your Ordination or Consecration of Bishops and Priests imprinting no Character can only consist in giving a Power Authority Jurisdiction or as I said before some kind of Depuration to exercise Episcopal or Priestly functions If then the Temporal Magistrate conferrs this power c. he can nay he cannot chuse but Ordain and Consecrate Bishops and Priests as often as he conferrs Authority or Jurisdiction and your Bishops assoon as they are designed and confirmed by the King must ipso facto be Ordained and Consecrated by him without intervention of Bishops or Matter and Form of Ordination Which absurdities you will be more unwilling to grant than well able to avoid if you will be true to your own doctrins The Pope from whom originally you must beg your Succession of Bishops never received nor will nor can acknowledge to receive any Spiritual Jurisdiction from any Temporal Prince and therefore if Jurisdiction must be derived from Princes he hath none at all and yet either you must acknowledge that he hath true Spiritual Jurisdiction or that your selves can receive none from him 21. Moreover this new Reformation or Reformed Church of Protestants will by them be pretended to be Catholique or Universal and not confined to England alone as the Sect of the Donatists was to Africa and therefore it must comprehend all the Reformed Churches in Germany Holland Scotland France c. In which number they of Germany Holland and France are not governed by Bishops nor regard any personal succession unless of such fat-beneficed Bishops as Nicholas Amsfordius who was consecrated by Luther though Luther himself was never Bishop as witnesseth (y) In Millenario sexto Pag. 187. Dresserus And though Scotland hath of late admitted some Bishops I much doubt whether they hold them to be necessary or of divine Institution and so their enforced admitting of them doth not so much furnish that Kingdom with personal succession of Bishops as it doth convince them to want succession of doctrin since in this their neglect of Bishops they disagree both from the milder Protestants of England and the true Catholique Church And by this want of a continued personal Succession of Bishops they retain the note of Schism and Heresie So that the Church of Protestants must either not be universal as being confined to England Or
And indeed how can she be Judge of them if she cannot decide them And how can she decide them if it be a question Whether she be judge of them That which is question'd it self cannot with any sense be pretended to be fit to decide other questions and much less this question Whether it have Authority to judge and decide all questions 2. If she were Judge it would not follow that she were infallible for we have many Judges in our Courts of Judicature yet none infallible Nay you cannot with any modesty deny that every man in the world ought to judge for himself what Religion is truest and yet you will not say that every man is infallible 3. If the Church were supposed infallible yet it would not follow at all much less manifestly that to oppose her Declaration is to oppose God unless you suppose also that as she is infallible so by her opposers she is known or believed to be so Lastly If all this were true as it is all most false yet were it to little purpose seeing you have omitted to prove that the Visible Church is the Roman 14 Ad § 16. Instead of a fourth Argument this is presented to us That if Luther were an Heretique then they that agreed with him must be so And that Luther was a formal Heretique you endeavour to prove by this most formal Syllogism To say the Visible Church is not Universal is properly an Heresie But Luther 's Reformation was not Universal Therefore it cannot be excused from formal Heresie Whereunto I Answer first to the first part that it is no way impossible that Luther had he been the inventor and first broacher of a false Doctrin as he was not might have been a formal Heretique and yet that those who follow him may be only so materially and improperly and indeed no Heretiques Your own men out of St. Austin distinguish between Haeretici Haereticorum sequaces And you your self though you pronounce the leaders among the Arrians formal Heretiques yet confess that Salvian was at least doubtful whether those Arrians who in simplicity followed their Teachers might not be excused by ignorance And about this suspension of his you also seem suspended for you neither approve nor condemn it Secondly to the second part I say that had you not presumed upon our ignorance in Logick as well as Metaphysicks and School-Divinity you would never have obtruded upon us this rope of sand for a formal Syllogism It is even Consen-German to this To deny the Resurrection is properly an Heresie But Luther's Reformation was not Universal Therefore it cannot be excused from formal Heresie Or to this To say the Visible Church is not Universal is properly an Heresie But the preaching of the Gospel at the beginning was not Universal Therefore it cannot be excused from formal Heresie For as he whose Reformation is but particular may yet not deny the Resurrection so many he also not deny the Churches Universality And as the Apostles who preached the Gospel in the beginning did believe the Church Universal though their preaching at the beginning was not so So Luther also might and did believe the Church Universal though his Reformation were but particular I say he did believe it Universal even in your own sense that is Universal de jure though not de facto And as for Universality in fact he believed the Church much more Universal than his Reformation For he did conceive as appears by your own Allegations out of him that not only the Part reformed was the true Church but also that they were Part of it who needed Reformation Neither did he ever pretend to make a new Church but to reform the old one Thirdly and lastly to the first proposition of this unsyllogistical syllogism I answer That to say the true Church is not always de facto universal is so far from being an Heresie that it is a certain truth known to all those that know the world and what Religions possess far the greater part of it Donatus therefore was not to blame for saying that the Church might possibly be confin'd to Africk but for saying without ground that then it was so And S. Augustin as he was in the right in thinking that the Church was then extended farther than Africk so was he in the wrong if he thought that of necessity it alwayes must be so but most palpably mistaken in conceiving that it was then spread over the whole earth and known to all nations which if passion did not trouble you and make you forget how lately almost half the world was discovered and in what estate it was then found you would very easily see and confess 15 Ad § 17. In the next Section you pretend that you have no desire to prosecute the similitude of Protestants with the Donatists and yet you do it with as much spight and malice as could well be devised but in vain For Lucilla might do ill in promoting the Sect of the Donatists and yet the mother and the daughter whom you glance at might do well in ministring influence as you phrase it to Protestants in England Unless you will conclude because one woman did one thing ill therefore no woman can do any thing well or because it was ill done to promote one Sect therefore it must be ill done to maintain any 16 The Donatists might do ill in calling the Chair of Rome the Chair of Pestilence and the Roman Church an Harlot and yet the state of the Church being altered Protestants might do well to do so and therefore though S. Austin might perhaps have reason to persecute the Donatists for detracting from the Church and calling her harlot when she was not so yet you may have none to threaten D. Potter that you would persecute him as the Application of this place intimates you would if it were in your power plainly shewing that you are a curst Cow though your horns be short seeing the Roman Church is not now what it was in S. Austin's time And hereof the conclusion of your own book affords us a very pregnant testimony where you tell us out of Saint Austin that one grand impediment which among many kept the seduced followers of the faction of Donatus from the Churches Communion was a calumny raised against the Catholiques That they did set some strange thing upon their Altar To how many saith S. Austin did the reports of ill tongues shut up the way to enter who said that we put I know not what upon the Altar Out of detestation of the calumny and just indignation against it he would not so much as name the impiety wherewith they were charged and therefore by a Rhetorical figure calls it I know not what But compare with him Optatus writing of the same matter and you shall plainly perceive that this I know not what pretended to be set upon the Altar was indeed a Picture which the Donatists knowing how detestable a thing it
evident and therefore according to your doctrin no formal Heresie The third saies indeed that of the Professors of Christianity some shall arise that shall teach Heresie But not one of them all that says or intimates that whosoever separates from the Visible Church in what state soever is certainly an heretique Heretiques I confess do always do so But they that do so are are not always Heretiques for perhaps the state of the Church may make it necessary for them to do so as Rebels always disobey the command of their King yet they which disobey a King's command which perhaps may be unjust are not presently Rebels 21 Your Allegations out of Vincentius Prosper and Cyprian are liable to these exceptions 1. That they are the sayings of men not assisted by the Spirit of God and whose Authority your selves will not submit to in all things 2. That the first and last are meerly impertinent neither of them affirming or intimating that separation from the present Visible Church is a mark of Heresie and the former speaking plainly of separation from Universality Consent and Antiquity which if you will presume without proof that we did and you did not you beg the Question For you know we pretend that we separated only from that present Church which had separated from the doctrin of the Ancient and because she had done so and so far forth as she had done so no farther And lastly the latter part of Prospers words cannot be generally true according to your own grounds For you say a man may be divided from the Church upon meer Schism without any mixture of Heresie And a man may be justly excommunicated for many other sufficient causes besides Heresie Lastly a man may be divided by an unjust excommunication and be hoth before and after a very good Catholique and therefore you cannot maintain it Universally true That he who is divided from the Church is an Heretique and Antichrist 22. In the 19. § we have the Authority of eight Fathers urg'd to prove That the separation from the Church of Rome as it is the See of S. Peter I conceive you mean as it is that particular Church is the mark of Heresie Which kind of argument I might well refuse to answer unless you would first promise me that whensoever I should produce as plain sentences of as great a number of Fathers as ancient for any doctrin whatsoever that you will subscribe to it though it fall out to be contrary to the doctrin of the Roman Church For I conceive nothing in the world more unequal or unreasonable then that you should press us with such Authorities as these and think your selves at liberty from them and that you should account them Fathers when they are for you and Children when they are against you Yet I would not you should interpret this as if I had not great assurance that it is not possible for you ever to gain this cause at the tribunal of the Fathers nay not of the Fathers whose sentences are here alleadged Let us consider them in order and I doubt not to make it appear that far the greater part of them nay al of them that are any way considerable fal short of your purpose 23. S. Hierome you say writing to Pope Damasus saith I am in the Communion of the Chair of Peter c. But then I pray consider he saith it to Pope Damasus and this will much weaken the Authority with them who know how great over-truths men usually write to one another in Letters Consider again that he says only that he was then in Communion with the Chair of Peter Not that he alwayes would or of necessity must be so for his resolution to the contrary is too evident out of that which he saith elsewhere which shall be produced hereafter He says that the Church at that present was built upon that Rock but Not that only Nor that alwayes Nay his judgment as shall appear is express to the contrary And so likewise the rest of his expressions if we mean to reconcile Hierome with Hierome must be conceived as intended by him of that Bishop and Sea of Rome at that present time and in the present State and in respect of that doctrin which he there intreats of For otherwise had he conceiv'd it necessary for him and all men to conform their judgment in matters of faith to the judgment of the Bishop and Church of Rome how came it to pass that he chose rather to believe the Epistle to the Hebrews Canonical upon the authority of the Eastern Church than to reject it from the Canon upon the authority of the Roman How comes it to pass that he dissented from the Authority of that Church touching the Canon of the Old Testament For if you say that the Church then consented with S. Hierome I fear you will lose your Fort by maintaining your Out-works and by avoiding this run into a greater danger of being forc'd to confess the present Roman Church opposite herein to the Ancient How was it possible that he should ever believe that Liberius Bishop of Rome either was or could have been brought over by the sollicitation of Fortunatianus Bishop of Aquileia Hierom. de scrip Eccl. tit Fortunatianus and brought after two years banishment to subscribe Heresie Which Act of Liberius though some fondly question being so vain as to expect we should rather believe them that lived but yesterday 1300 years almost after the thing is said to be done and speaking for themselves in their own Cause rather than the dis-interessed time-fellows or immediate-Successors of Liberius himself yet I hope they will not proceed to such a degree of immodesty as once to question Whether S. Hierome thought so And if this cannot be denyed I demand then If he had lived in Liberius his time could he or would he have written so to Liberius as he does to Damasus Would he have said to him I am in the Communion of the Chair of Peter I know that the Church is built upon this Rock Whosoever gathereth not with thee scattereth Would he then have said the Roman faith and the Catholique were the same or that the Roman faith received no delusions no not from an Angel I suppose he could not have said so with any coherence to his own belief and therefore conceive it undeniable that what he said then to Damasus he said it though perhaps he streined too high only of Damasus and never conceiv'd that his words would have been extended to all his Predecessors and all his Successors 24. The same Answer I make to the first place of S. Ambrose viz. That no more can be certainly concluded from it but that the Catholique Bishops and the Roman Church were then at unity so that whosoever agreed with the later could not then but agree with the former But that this Rule was perpetual and that no man could ever agree with the Catholique Bishops but he must
agree with the Roman Church this he sayes not nor gives you any ground to conclude from him Athanasius when he was excommunicated by Liberius agreed very ill with the Roman Church and yet you will not gainsay but he agreed well enough with the Catholique Bishops The second I am uncertain what the sense of it is and what truth is in it but most certain that it makes nothing to your present purpose For it neither affirms nor imports that separation from the Roman Church is a certain mark of Heresie For the Rights of Communion whatsoever it signifies might be said to flow from it if that Church were by Ecclesiastical Law the head of all other Churches But unless it were made so by divine Authority and that absolutely Separation from it could not be a mark of Heresie 25. For S. Cyprian all the world knows that he (b) It is confâ—ssed by Baronius Anno 238. N. 41. By Bellar. l 4. de R Pont. c. 7. Sect. Tertia ratio resolutely opposed a Decree of the Roman Bishop and all that adhered to him in the point of Rebaptizing which that Church at that time delivered as a necessary Tradition So necessary that by the Bishop of Rome Firmilianus and other Bishops of Cappadocia Cilicia and Galatia and generally all who persisted in the contrary opinion (c) Confessed by Baronius An 258. N. 14. 15. By Card. Perron Repl. l. 1. c. 25. were therefore deprived of the Churches Communion which Excommunication could not but involve S. Cyprian who defended the same opinion as resolutely as Firmilianus though Cardinal Perron magisterially and without all colour of proof affirm the contrary and Cyprian in particular so far cast off as for it to be pronounc'd by Stephen A false Christ (d) â—bid Again so necessary that the Bishops which were sent by Cyprian from Africk to Rome were not admitted to the Communion of ordinary conference But all men who were subject to the Bishop of Romes Authority were commanded by him not only to deny them the Churches peace and Communion but even lodging and entertainment manifestly declaring that they reckoned them among those whom S. John forbids to receive to house or to say God speed to them All these terrors notwithstanding S. Cyprian holds still his former opinion And though our of respect to the Churches peace (d) Vide Conc. Carth. apud sur To 1. he judged no man nor cut off any man from the right of Communion for thinking otherwise then he held yet he conceived Stephen and his adherents (e) Bell l. 2. de Con. c 5. Aug. ep 48. l. 1. de Bap. c. 18. to hold a pernitious error And S. Austin though disputing with the Donatists he useth some Tergiversation in the point yet confesseth elsewhere that it is not found that Cyprian did ever change his opinion And so farr was he from conceiving any necessity of doing so by submitting to the judgment of the Bishop and Church of Rome that he plainly professeth that no other Bishop but our Lord Jesus only had power to judg with authority of his judgement and as plainly intimates that Stephen for usurping such a power and making himself a judg over Bishops was little better than a Tyrant and as heavily almost he censures him and peremptorily opposes him as obstinate in error in that very place where he delivers that famous saying How can he have God for his Father who hath not the Church for his Moâ—her little doubting it seems but a man might have the Church for his Mother who stood in opposition to the Church of Rome and being farr from thinking what you fondly obtrude upon him that to be united to the Roman Church and to the Church was all one and that separation from S. Peter's Chair was a mark I mean a certain mark either of Schism or Heresie If after all this you will catch at a phrase or a complement of S. Cyprians and with that hope to perswade Protestants who know this story as well as their own name that S. Cyprian did believe that falshood could not have access to the Roman Church and that opposition to it was the brand of an Heretique may we not well expect that you will the next time you write vouch Luther and Calvin also for Abettors of this Phansie and make us poor men believe not only as you say that we have no Metaphysicks but that we have no sense And when you have done so it will be no great difficulty for you to assure us that we read no such thing in Bellarmine Bell. l. 2. de Con. c. 5. Sect. 1. Canâ—sius in Initio Gatech e Spt. die 14. as that Cyprian was always accounted in the number of Catholicks nor in Canisius that he was a most excellent Doctor and a glorious Martyr nor in your Calender that he is a Saint and a Martyr but that all these are deceptions of our sight and that you ever esteemed him a very Schismatique and an Heretique as having on him the Mark of the Beast opposition to the Chair of Peter Nay that he what ever he pretended knew believed himself to be so in as much as he knew as you pretend and esteemed this opposition to be the Mark of Heresie and knew himself to stand and stand out in such an opposition 26. But we need not seek so farr for matter to refute the vanity of this pretence Let the reader but peruse this very Epistle out of which this sentence is alleaged and he shall need no farther satisfaction against it For he shall find first that you have helped the dice a little with a false or at least with a very bold and streined Translation for S. Cyprian saith not to whom falsehood cannot have access by which many of your favourable Readers I doubt understood that Cyprian had exempted that Church from a possibility of error but to whom perfidiousness cannot have access meaning by perfidiousness in the abstract according to a common figure of speech those perfidious Schismatiques whom he there complains of and of these by a Rhetorical insinuation he says that with such good Christians as the Romans were it was not possible they should find favourable entertainment Not that he conceived it any way impossible they should do so for the very writing this Epistle and many passages in it plainly shew the contrary but because he was confident or at least would seem to be confident they never would and so by his good opinion and confidence in the Romans lay an obligation upon them to do as he presum'd they would do as also in the end of his Epistle he says even of the people of the Church of Rome that being defended by the providence of their Bishop nay by their own Vigilance sufficiently guarded they could not be taken nor deceived with the poysons of Heretiques Not that indeed he thought either this or the former any way impossible For to what
purpose but for prevention hereof did he write this long and accurate and vehement Epistle to Cornelius which sure had been most vainly done to prevent that which he knew or believed impossible Or how can this consist with his taking notice in the beginning of it That Cornelius was somewhat moved and wrought upon by the attempts of his Adversaries with his reprehending him for being so and with his vehement exhorting him to courage and constancy or with his request to him in the conclusion of his Epistle that it should be read publiquely to the whole Clergy and Laity of Rome to the intent that if any contagion of their poysoned speech and pestiferous semination had crept in amongst them it might be wholly taken away from the ears and the hearts of the Brethren and that the entire and syncere charity of good men might be purged from all dross of heretical detraction Or lastly with his vehement perswasions to them to decline for the time to come and resolutely avoid their word and conference because their speech crept as a canker as the Apostle saith because evil communication would corrupt good manners because wicked men carry perdition in their mouths and hide fire in their lips All which had been but vain and ridiculous pageantry had he verily believed the Romans such inaccessable Forts such immoveable Rocks as the former sentences would seem to import if we will expound them rigidly and strictly according to the exigence of the words and not allow him who was a professed Master of the Art to have used here a little Rhetorique and to say That could not be whereof he had no absolute certainty but that it might be but only had or would seem to have a great confidence that it never would be Ut fides habita fidem obligaret that he professing to be confident of the Romans might lay an obligation upon them to do as he promis'd himself they would do For as for joyning the principal Church and the Chair of Peter how that will serve for your present purpose of proving separation from the Roman Church a mark of Heresie I suppose it is hard to understand Nor indeed how it will advantage you in any other design against us who do not altogether deny but that the Church of Rome might be called the Chair of Peter in regard he is said to have preached the Gospel there and the Principal Church because the City was the Principal and Imperial City which Prerogative of the City if we believe the Fathers of the Council of Chalcedon was the ground and occasion why the Fathers of former time I pray observe conferred upon this Church this Prerogative above other Churches 27. And as farr am I from understanding how you can collect from the other sentence that to communicate with the Church and Pope of Rome and to communicate with the Catholique Church is alwayes for that is your Assumpt one and the same thing Saint Cyprian speaks not of the Church of Rome at all but of the Bishop only who when he doth communicate with the Catholique Church as Cornelius at that time did then whosoever communicates with him cannot but communicate with the Catholique Church and then by accident one might truly say such a one communicates with you that is with the Catholique Church and that to communicate with him is to communicate with the Catholique Church As if Titius and Sempronius be together he that is in company with Titius cannot but be at that time in company with Sempronius As if a General be marching to some place with an Army he that then is with the General must at that time be with the Army And a man may say without absurdity Such a time I was with the General that is with the Army and that to be with the General is to be with the Army Or as if a mans hand be joyned to his body the finger which is joyned to the hand is joyned to the body and a man may say truly of it This finger is joyned to the hand that is to the body and to be joyned to the hand is to be joyned to the body because all these things are by accident true And yet I hope you would not deny but the finger might possibly be joyned to the hand and yet not to the body the hand being cut off from the body and a man might another time be with his General and not with his Army he being absent from the Army And therefore by like reason your collection is sophistical being in effect but this to communicate with such a Bishop of Rome who did communicate with the Catholique Church was to communicate with the Catholique Church therefore absolutely and alwayes it must be true that To communicate with him is by consequent to communicate with the Catholique Church and to be divided from his Communion is to be an Heretique 28. In urging the place of Irenaeus you have shewed much more ingenuity than many of your Fellows For whereas they usually begin at Declaring the Tradition of the c and conceal what goes before you have set it down though not so compleatly as you should have done yet sufficiently to shew that what authority in the matter he attributed to the Roman Church in particular the same for the kind though parhaps not in the same degree he attributed to all other Apostolique Churches Either therefore you must say that he conceived the Testimony of other Apostolique Churches divine and infallible which certainly he did not neither do you pretend he did and if he had the confessed Errors and Heresies which after they fell into would demonstrate plainly that he had erred or else that he conceived the testimony of the Roman Church only humane and credible though perhaps more credible than any one Church beside as one man's Testimony is more credible than anothers but certainly much more credible which was enough for his purpose than that secret Tradition to which those Heretiques pretended against whom he wrote over-bearing them with an argument of their own kind farr stronger than their own Now if Irenaeus thought the Testimony of the Roman Church in this point only humane and fallible then surely he could never think either adhering to it a certain mark of a Catholique or separation from it a certain mark of an Heretique 29. Again whereas your great Achilles Cardinal Perron in French as also his Noble Translatress misled by him in English knowing that mens resorting to Rome would do his cause little service hath made bold with the Latine tongue as he does very often with the Greek and rendred Ad hanc Ecclesiam necesse est omnem convenire Ecclesiam To this Church it is necessary that every Church should agree you have Translated it as it should be to this Church it is necessary that all Churches resort wherein you have shewed more sincerity and have had more regard to make the Author speak sense For if he
new Observations the first that the Pope having threatned the Bishops of Asia to excommunicate them Polycrates the Bishop of Ephesus and Metropolitan of Asia despised the Popes threats as it appears by the answer of the same Polycrates to Pope Victor Euseb hist Eccl. l. 5. c. 24. Hieron in Hieron in script Eccl. in Polyer which is inserted in the writings of Eusebius and of Saint JEROM and which JEROM seemeth to approve when he saith he reports it to shew the spirit and authority of the man And the second that when the Pope pronounced anciently his Excommunications he did no other thing but separate himself from the Communion of those that he excommunicated and did not thereby separate them from the universal communion of the Church To the first then we say that so farr is this Epistle of Polycrates from abating and diminishing the Popes authority that contrariwise it greatly magnifies and exalts it For although Polycrates blinded with the love of the custom of his Nation which he believed to be grounded upon the Word of God who had assigned the fourteenth of the Moneth of March for the observation of the Pasche and upon the example of S. JOHN'S tradition maintains it obstinately Nevertheless this that he answers speaking in his own Name Exod. 12. Hieronym ubi supra and in the name of the Council of the Bishops of Asia to whom he presided I fear not those that threeaten us for my Elders have said It is better to obey God than man Doth it not shew that had it not been that be believed the Pope's threat was against the express Word of God there had been cause to fear it and he had been obliged to obey him for m who knows not that this answer It is better to obey God than men is not to be made but to those whom we were obliged to obey if their commundements were not contrary to the commandements of God And that he adds that he had called the Bishops of Asia Euseb Hist Eccl l. 5. c. 23. to a National Council being n summoned to it by the Pope doth it not insinuate that the other Councils whereof Eusebius speaks that were holden about this matter through all the Provinces of the Earth and particularly that of Palestina Bâ—da in frag de Aequinociio veâ—â—aâ— which if you believe the act that Beda said came to his hands Theophilus Archbishop of Cesarea had called by the auctority of Victor were holden at the instance of the Pope and consequently that the Pope was the first mover of the Universal Church And that the Councils of Nicea of Constantinople of Ephesus embraced the Censure of Victor and excommunicated those that observed the custom of Polycrates that was deceived in believing that the Popes commandement was against Gods commandement And that S. JEROM himself celebrates the Paschal Homilies of Theophilus Patriarch of Alexandria which followed the Order of Nicea concerning the Pasche doth it not justifie that when S. JEROM saith That he reports the Epistle of Polycrates to shew the spirit and authority of the man he intends by authority not authority of right but of fact that is to say the credit that Polycrates had amongst the Asians and other Quarto decimans These are the Cardinal's words the most material and considerable passages whereof to save the trouble of repetition I have noted with letters of reference whereunto my answers noted respectively with the same letters follow now in order a If Eusebius were an Arrian author it is nothing to the purpose what he writes there is no Arrianism nor any thing towards it Never any error was imputed to the Arrians for denying the Authority or the infallibility of the Bishop or Church of Rome Besides what Eusebius says he says out of Irenaeus Neither doth or can the Cardinal deny the story to be true and therefore he goes about by indirect Arts to foil it and cast a blurr upon it Lastly whensoever Eusebius says any thing which the Cardinal thinks for the advantage of his side he cites him and then he is no Arrian or at least he would not take that for an answer to the arguments he draws out of him b That Ruffinus was enemy to the Roman Church is said but not proved neither can it be c Eusebius says the same also of caeteri omnes Episcopi all the other Bishops That they advised Victor to keep those things that belonged to peace and unity and that they sharply reprehended Victor for having done otherwise d This is said but no offer made of any proof of it The Cardinal thinks we must take every thing upon his word They to whom the Tradition was delivered Polycrates and the Asian Bishops knew no such matter nay professed the contrary And who is more likely to know the Truth they which lived within two ages of the fountain of it or the Cardinal who lived sixteen ages after it e How can it make against those that object it seeing it is evident from Irenaeus his Reprehension that he thought Victor and the Roman Church no infallible nor sufficient Judge of what was necessary to be believed and done what not what was universal Tradition what not what was a sufficient ground of Excommunication and what not and consequently that there was no such necessity as is pretended that all other Churches should in matters of faith conform themselves to the Church of Rome f This is to suppose that Excommunication is an Act or Argument or sign of Power and Authority in the party excommunicating over the party excommunicated whereas it is undeniably evident out of the Church-Story that it was often used by Equals upon Equals and by Inferiours upon Superiours if the Equals or Inferiours thought their Equals or Superiours did any thing which deserved it g And what is this but to confess that they thought that a small cause of Excommunication and unsufficient which Victor and his adherents thought great and sufficient And consequently that Victor and his Part declared that to be a matter of faith and of necessity which they thought not so And where was then their conformity h True you have so expounded it but not proved nor offered any proof of your exception This also we must take upon your Authority Irenaeus speaks not one Word of any other power to which he compares or before which he preferrs the power of the Roman-Church And it is evident out of the Council of Chalcedon * Cant. 28. That all the Principality which it had was given it not by God but by the Church in regard it was seated in the Imperial City Whereupon when afterwards Constantinople was the Imperial City they decreed that that Church should have equal Priviledges and dignity and preheminence with the Church of Rome All the Fathers agreed in this Decree saving only the Legats of the Bishop of Rome shewing plainly that they never thought of any Supremacy given the Bishops of Rome by
Apostolique Churches Thirdly that as in this place he urgeth the Donatists with separation from the Roman Church an Argument of their Errour So elsewhere he presseth them with their Separation from other Apostolique Churches nay more from these than from that because in Rome the Donatists had a Bishop though not a perpetual Succession of them but in other Apostolique Churches they wanted both These scatter'd men saith he of the Donatists Epist 165. read in the holy books the Churches to which the Apostles wrote and have no Bishop in them But what is more perverse and mad than to the Lectors reading these Epistles to say Peace with you and to separate from the peace of these Churches to which these Epistles were written So Optatus having done you as it might seem great service in upbraiding the Donatists as Schismatiques because they had not Communion with the Church of Rome overthrows and undoes it all again and as it were with a spunge wipes out all that he hath said for you by adding after that they were Schismatiques because They had not the fellowship of Communion with the seven Churches of Asia to which S. John writes whereof he pronounces confidently though I know not upon what ground Extraseptem Ecclesias quicquid foris est alienum est Now I pray tell me do you esteem the Authority of these Fathers a sufficient assurance that separation from these other Apostolique Churches was a certain mark of Heresie or not If so then your Church hath been for many Ages heretical If not How is their authority a greater Argument for the Roman than for the other Churches If you say they conceived separation from these Churches a note of Schism only when they were united to the Roman so also they might conceive of the Roman only when it was united to them If you say they urg'd this only as a probable and not as a certain Argument so also they might do that In a word whatsoever answer you can devise to shew that these Fathers made not separation from these other Churches a mark of Heresie apply that to your own Argument and it will be satisfied 32 The other place is evidently impertinent to the present question nor is there it in any thing but this That Caecilian might contemn the multitude of his adversaries because those that were united with him were more and of more account than those that were against him Had he preferr'd the Roman Church alone before Caecilian's enemies this had been little but something but when other Countries from which the Gospel came first into Africa are joyned in this Patent with the Church of Rome how she can build any singular priviledge upon it I am yet to learn Neither do I see what can be concluded from it but that in the Roman Church was the Principality of an (a) You do ill to translate it the Principality of the Sea Apostolique as if there were but one whereas Saint Austin presently after speaks of Apostolical Churches in the plural number and makes the Bishops of them joynt-Commissioners for the judging of Ecclesiastical causes Apostolique Sea which no man doubts or that the Roman Church was not the Mother Church because the Gospel came first into Africa not from her but from other Churches 33. Thus you see his words make very little or indeed nothing for you But now his Action which according to Cardinal Perron's rule is much more to be regarded than his words as not being so obnoxious to misinterpretation I mean his famous opposition of three Bishops of Rome in Succession touching the great question of Appeals wherein he and the rest of the African Bishops proceeded so far in the first or second Milevitan Councel as to (b) The words of the Decree which also Bellarm l. 1. de Matrim c. 17. assures us to be perform'd by S. Austin are these Si qui Africani ab Episcopis provocandum putaverint non nisi ad Africana provocent Concilia vel ad Primates provinciarum suarum Ad transmarina autem qui putaverit apellandum à nullo intra Africam in Communionem suscipiatur This decree is by Gratian most impudently corrupted For whereas the Fathers of that Councel intended it particularly against the Church of Rome he tels us they forbad Appeals to All excepting only the Church of Rome decree any African Excommunicate that should appeal to any man out of Africk and therein continued resolute unto death I say this famous Action of his makes clearly and evidently and infinitely against you For had Boniface and the rest of the African Bishops a great part whereof were Saints and Martyrs believed as an Article of faith that Union and Conformity with the doctrin of the Roman Church in all things which she held necessary was a certain note of a good Catholique and by God's Command necessary to Salvation how was it possible they should have opposed it in this Unless you will say they were all so foolish as to believe at once direct contradictions viz. that conformity to the Roman Church was necessary in all points and not necessary in this or so horribly impious as believing this doctrin of the Roman Church true and her power to receive Appeals derived from divine Authority notwithstanding to oppose and condemn it and to Anathematize all those Africans of what condition soever that should appeal unto it I say of what condition soever For it is evident that they concluded in their determination Bishops as well as the inferiour Clergy and Laity And Cardinal Pâ—rron's pretence of the contrary is a shameless falshood repugnant to the plain words of the (c) The words are these Praefato debito salutationis officio impendiò deprecamur ut deinceps ad aures vestras hinc venientes non saciliùs admittat is nec à nobis excommunicatos ultra in Communionem velitis recipere quia hoc etiam Niceno Concilio de finitum facile advertet venerabilitastus Nam si de inferioribus Clericis vel Laicis videtur id praecaveri quanto magis hoc de Episcopis voluit observari Remonstrance of the African Bishops to Celestine Bishop of Rome 34 Your allegation of Tertullian is a manifest conviction of your want of sincerity For you produce with great ostentation what he saies of the Church of Rome but you and your fellows always conceal and dissemble that immediatly before these words he artributes as much for point of direction to any other Apostolique Church and that as he sends them to Rome who lived neer Italy so those neer Achaia he sends to Corinth those about Macedonia to Philippi and Thessalonica those of Asia to Ephesus His words are Go to now thou that wilt better imploy thy curiosity in the business of thy salvation run over the Apostolical Churches wherein the Chairs of the Apostles are yet sate upon in their places wherein the Authentique Epistles are recited sounding out the voice and representing the face of
a man may perswade himself he doth believe what he doth not believe then may you think you believe the Church of Rome and yet not believe it But if no man can err concerning what he believes then you must give me leave to assure my self that I do believe and consequently that any man may believe the foresaid truths upon the foresaid motives without any dependance upon any succession that hath believed it always And as from your definition of Faith so from your definition of Heresie this phancy may be refuted For questionless no man can be an Heretique but he that holds an Heresie and an Heresie you say is a Voluntary error therefore no man can be necessitated to be an Heretique whether he will or no by want of such a thing that is not in his power to have But that there should have been a perpetual Succession of Believers in all points Orthodox is not a thing which is in our own power therefore our being or not being Heretiques depends not on it Besides What is more certain than that he may make a straight line who hath a Rule to make it by though never man in the world had made any before and why then may not he that believes the Scripture to be the word of God and the Rule of faith regulate his faith by it and consequently believe aright without much regarding what other men will do or have done It is true indeed there is a necessity that if God will have his word believed he by his Providence must take order that either by succession of men or by some other means natural or supernatural it be preserv'd and delivered and sufficiently notified to be his word but that this should be done by a Succession of men that holds no error against it certainly there is no more necessity than that it should be done by a Succession of men that commit no sin against it For if men may preserve the Records of a Law and yet transgress it certainly they may also preserve directions for their faith and yet not follow them I doubt not but Lawyers at the Bar do find by frequent experience that many men preserve and produce evidences which being examined of times make against themselves This they do ignorantly it being in their power to suppress or perhaps to alter them And why then should any man conceive it strange that an erroncous and corrupted Church should preserve and deliver the Scriptures uncorrupted when indeed for many reasons which I have formerly alledged it was impossible for them to corrupt them Seeing therefore this is all the necessity that is pretended of a perpetual Succession of men otthodox in all points certainly there is no necessity at all of any such neither can the want of it prove any man or any Church Heretical 39 When therefore you have produced some proof of this which was your Major in your former Syllogism That want of Succession is a certain mark of Heresie you shall then receive a full answer to your Minor We shall then consider whether your indelibe Character be any reality or whether it be a creature of your own making a fancy of your own imagination And if it be a thing and not only a word whether our Bishops and Priests have it not as well as yours and whether some mens perswasion that there is no such thing can hinder them from having it or prove that they have it not if there be any such thing Any more than a mans perswasion that he has not taken Physick or Poyson will make him not to have taken it if he has or hinder the operation of it And whether Tertullian in the place quoted by you speak of a Priest made a Layman by just deposition or degradation and not by a voluntary desertion of his Order And whether in the same place he set not some mark upon Heretiques that will agree to your Church Whether all the Authority of our Bishops in England before the Reformation was conferr'd on them by the Pope And if it were whether it were the Pope's right or an usurpation If it were his right Whether by Divine Law or Ecclesiastical And if by Ecclesiastical only Whether he might possibly so abuse his power as to deserve to lose it Whether de facto he had done so Whether supposing he had deserved to lose it those that deprived him of it had power to make it from him Or if not Whether they had power to suspend him from the use of it until good caution were put in and good assurance given that if he had it again he would not abuse it as he had formerly done Whether in case they had done unlawfully that took his power from him it may not things being now setled and the present Government established be as unlawful to go about to restore it Whether it be not a Fallacy to conclude Because we believe the Pope hath no power in England now when the King and State and Church hath deprived him upon just grounds of it therefore we cannot believe that he had any before his deprivation Whether without Schism a man may not withdraw obedience from an usurp'd Authority commanding unlawful things Whether the Roman Church might not give authority to Bishops and Priests to oppose her errors as well as a King gives Authority to a Judge to judge against him if his cause be bad as well as Trajan gave his sword to his Praefect with this Commission that If he governed well he should use it for him if ill against him Whether the Roman Church gave not Authority to her Bishops and Priests to preach against her corruptions in manners And if so Why not against her errors in doctrin if she had any Whether she gave them not authority to preach the whole Gospel of Christ and consequently against her doctrin if it should contradict any part of the Gospel of Christ Whether it be not acknowledged lawful in the Church of Rome for any Lay-man or woman that has ability to perswade others by word or by writing from errour and unto truth And why this liberty may not be practised against their Religion if it be false as well as for it if it be true Whether any man need any other commission or vocation than that of a Christian to do a work of charity And whether it be not one of the greatest works of charity if it be done after a peaceable manner and without any unnecessary disturbance of order to perswade men out a false unto a true way of eternal happiness Especially the Apostle having assur'd us that he whosoever he is who converteth a sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death and shall hide a multitude of sins Whether the first Reformed Bishops died all at once so that there were not enough to ordain Others in the places that were vacant Whether the Bishops of England may not consecrate a Metropolitan of England as
false Church may preserve the Scripture trure as now the old Testament is preserved by the Jewes either not being arriv'd to that height of impiety as to attempt the corruption of it or not able to effect it or not perceiving or not regarding the opposition of it to her corruptions And so we might receive from you lawful Ordination and true Scriptures though you were a false Church and receiving the Scriptures from you though not from you alone I hope you cannot hinder us neither need we aske your leave to believe and obey them And this though you be a false Church is enough to make us a true one As for a Succession of men that held with us in all points of Doctrin it is a thing we need not and you have as little as we So that if we acknowledge that your Church before Luther was a true Church it is not for any ends for any dependance that we have upon you but because we conceive that in a charitable construction you may pass for a true Church Such a Church and no better as you do somtimes acknowledge Protestants to be that is a Company of men wherein some ignorant souls may be saved So that in this ballancing of Religion against Religion and Church against Church it seems you have nothing of weight and moment to put into your scale nothing but smoak and wind vain shadows and phantastical pretences Yet if Protestants on the other side had nothing to put in their Scale but those negative commendations which you are pleas'd to afford them nothing but No unity nor means to procure it no farther extent when Luther arose than Luthers body no Universality of time or place no Visibility or being except only in your Church no Succession of persons or doctrin no leader but Luther in a quarel begun upon no ground but passion no Church no Ordination no Scriptures but such as they receiv'd from you if all this were true and this were all that could be pleaded for Protestants possibly with an allowance of three grains of partiality your Scale might seem to turne But then if it may appear that part of these objections are falsely made against them the rest vainly that whatsoever of truth is in these imputations is impertinent to this trial and whatsoever is pertinent is untrue and besides that plenty of good matter may be alleadged for Protestants which is here dissembled Then I hope our cause may be good notwithstanding these pretences 55. I say then that want of Universality of time and place The invisibility or not existence of the professors of Protestant Doctrin before Luther Luther's being alone when he first opposed your Church Our having our Church Ordination Scriptures personal and yet not doctrinal Succession from you are vain and impertinent allegations against the truth of our Doctrin and Church That the entire truth of Christ without any mixture of error should be professed or believed in all places at any time or in any place at all times is not a thing evident in reason neither have we any Revelation for it And therefore in relying so confidently on it you build your house upon the sand And what obligation we had either to be so peevish as to take nothing of yours or so foolish as to take all I do not understand For whereas you say that this is to be choosers and therefore Heretiques I tell you that though all Heretiques are choosers yet all choosers are not Heretiques otherwise they also which choose your Religion must be Heretiques As for our wanting Unity and Means of proving it Luther 's opposing your Church upon meere passion Our following private men rather than the Catholique Church the first and last are meere untruths for we want not Unity nor Means to procure it in things necessary Plain places of Scripture and such as need no interpreter are our means to obtain it Neither do we follow any private men but only the Scripture the word of God as our rule and reason which is also the gift of God given to direct us in all our actions in the use of this rule And then for Luther's opposing your Church upon meere passion it is a thing I will not deny because I know not his heart and for the same reason you should not have affirmed it Sure I am whether he opposed your Church upon reason or no he had reason enough to oppose it And therefore if he did it upon passion we will follow him only in his action and not in his passion in his opposition not in the manner of it and then I presume you will have no reason to condemne us unless you will say that a good action cannot be done with reason because some body before us hath done it upon passion You see then how imprudent you have been in the choice of your arguments to prove Protestants unwise in the choice of their Religion 56. It remains now that I should shew that many reasons of moment may be alleaged for the justification of Protestants which are dissembled by you and not put into the ballance Know then Sir that when I say The Religion of Protestants is in prudence to be preferr'd before yours as on the one side I do not understand by your Religion the doctrin of Bellarmin or Baronius or any other private man amongst you nor the Doctrin of the Sorbon or of the Jesuits or of the Dominicans or of any other particular Company among you but that wherein you all agree or profess to agree the Doctrin of the Councel of Trent so accordingly on the other side by the Religion of Protestants I do not understand the Doctrin of Luther or Calvin or Melancthon nor the confession of Augusta or Geneva nor the Catechism of Heidelberg nor the Articles of the Church of England no nor the Harmony of Protestant Confessions but that wherein they all agree and which they all subscribe with a greater Harmony as a perfect rule of their faith and actions that is The BIBLE The BIBLE I say The BIBLE only is the Religion of Protestants Whatsoever else they believe besides It and the plain irrefragable indubitable consequences of of it well may they hold it as a matter of Opinion but as matter of Faith and Religion neither can they with coherence to their own grounds believe it themselves nor require the belief of it of others without most high and most Schismatical presumption I for my part after a long and as I verily believe and hope impartial search of the true way to eternal hapiness do profess plainly that I cannot find any rest for the sole of my foot but upon this Rock only I see plainly and with mine own eyes that there are Popes against Popes Councels against Councels some Fathers against others the same Fathers against themselves a Consent of Fathers of one age against a Consent of Fathers of another age the Church of one age against the Church of
that generally speaking in things necessary only because they are commanded it is sufficient for avoiding sin that we proceed prudently and by the conduct of some probable opinion maturely weighed and approved by men of vertue learning and wisdome Neither are we alwayes obliged to follow the most strict and severe or secure part as long as the doctrin which we embrace proceeds upon such reasons as may warrant it to be truly probable and prudent though the contrary part want not also probable grounds For in humane affairs and discourse evidence and certainty cannot be alwayes expected But when we treat not precisely of avoiding sin but moreover of procuring some thing without which I cannot saved I am obliged by the Law and Order of Charity to procure as great certainty as morally I am able and am not to follow every probable opinion or dictamen but tutiorem partem the safer part because if my probability prove false I shall not probably but certainly come short of Salvation Nay in such case I shall incurre a new sin against the Vertue of Charity towards my self which obligeth every one not to expose his soul to the hazard of eternal perdition when it is in his power with the assistance of Gods grace to make the matter sure From this very ground it is that although some Divines be of opinion that it is not a sin to use some Matter or Form of Sacraments only probable if we respect precisely the reverence or respect which is due to Sacraments as they belong to the Moral infused Vertue of Religion yet when they are such Sacraments as the invalidity thereof may endanger the salvation of souls all do with one consent agree that it is a grievous offence to use a doubtful or only probable Matter or Form when it is in our power to procure certainty If therefore it may appear that though it were not certain that Protestancy unrepented destroyes Salvation as we have proved to be very certain yet at least that it is probable and withal that there is a way more safe it will follow out of the grounds already laid that they are obliged by the law of Charity to embrace that safe way 5. Now that Protestants have reason at least to doubt in what case they stand is deduced from what we have said and proved about the universal infallibility of the Church and of her being Judge of Controversies to whom all Christians ought to submit their Judgement as even some Protestants grant and whom to oppose in any one of her definitions is a grievous sin As also from what we have said of the Unity Universality and Visibility of the Church and of Succession of Persons and Doctrin Of the conditions of Divine Faith Certainty Obscurity Prudence and Supernaturality which are wanting in the faith of Protestants Of the frivolous distinction of points fundamental and not fundamental the confutation whereof proveth that Heretiques disagreeing among themselves in any least point cannot have the same faith nor be of the same Church Of Schism of Heresie of the Persons who first revolted from Rome and of their Motives of the Nature of Faith which is destroyed by any least error and it is certain that some of them must be in error and want the substance of true faith and since all pretend the like certainty it is cleer that none of them have any certainty at all but that they want true faith which is a means most absolutely necessary to Salvation Moreover as I said heretofore since it is granted that every Error in fundamentall points is damnable and that they cannot tell in particular what points be fundamental it followes that none of them knowes whether he or his Brethren do not erre damnably it being certain that amongst so many disagreeing Persons some must erre Upon the same ground of not being able to assigne what points be fundamental I say they cannot be sure whether the difference among them be fundamental or no and consequently whether they agree in the substance of faith and hope of Salvation I omit to adde that you want the Sacrament of Penance instituted for remission of sins or at least you must confess that you hold it not necessary and yet your own Bretheren for example the Century-Writers do (g) Cent. 3 cap. 6. Col. 127. acknowledge that in times of Cyprian and Tertullian Private Confession even of Thoughts was used and that it was then commanded and thought necessary The like I say concerning your Ordination which at least is very doubtful and consequently all that depends thereon 6. On the other side that the Roman Church is the safer way to Heaven not to repeat what hath been already said upon divers occasions I will again put you in mind that unless the Roman Church was the true Church there was no visible true Church upon earth A thing so manifest that Protestants themselves confess that more than one thousand yeers the Roman Church possessed the whole world as we have shewed heretofore out of their own (h) Chap. 5. Num. 9. words from whence it followes that unless Ours be the true Church you cannot pretend to any perpetual visible Church of your Own but Ours doth not depend on yours before which it was And here I wish you to consider with fear and trembling how all Roman Catholiques not one excepted that is those very men whom you must hold not to erre damnably in their belief unless you will destroy your own Church and salvation do with unanimous consent believe and profess that Protestancy unrepented destroyes Salvation and then tell me as you will answer at the last day Whether it be not more safe to live and die in that Church which even your selves are forced to acknowledg not to be cut off from hope of Salvation which are your own words than to live in a Church which the said confessedly true Church doth firmly believe and constantly profess not to be capable of Salvation And therefore I conclude that by the most strict obligation of Charity towards your own soul you are bound to place it in safety by returning to that Church from which your Progenitors Schismatically departed lest too late you find that saying of the holy Ghost verified in your selves He that loves (i) Eccl. 3.27 the danger shall perish therein 7. Against this last argumant of the greater security of the Roman Church drawn from your own confession you bring an Objection which in the end will be found to make for us against your self It is taken from the words of the Donatists speaking to Catholiques in this manner Your selves confess (k) Pag. 112. our Baptism Sacraments and Faith here you put an Explication of your own and say for the most parts as if any small error in faith did not destroy all Faith to be good and available We deny yours to be so and say There is no Church no salvation amongst you Therefore it is safest for
forcible from the Donatists against the Catholiques than from Papists against Protestants in regard Protestants grant Papists no more hope of salvation than Papists grant Protestants whereas the Donatists excluded absolutely all but their own Part from hope of Salvation so farre as to acount them no Christians that were not of it the Catholiques mean while accounting them Brethren and freeing those among them from the imputation of Heresie who being in error quaerebant cautâ sollicitudine veritatem corrigi parati cùm invenerint 23. Whereas you say That the Argument for the certainty of their Baptism because it was confessed good by Catholiques whereas the Baptism of Catholiques was not confessed by them to be good is not so good as yours touching the certainty of your salvation grounded on the confession of Protestants because we confess there is no damnable error in the Doctrin or practice of the Roman Church I Ans No we confess no such matter and though you say so a hundred times no repetition will make it true We profess plainly that many damnable errors plainly repugnant to the precepts of Christ both Ceremonial and Moral more plainly than this of Rebaptization and therefore more damnable are believed and professed by you And therefore seeing this is the only disparity you can devise and this is vanished it remains that as good an Answer as the Catholiques made touching the certainty of their Baptism as good may we make and with much more evidence of Reason touching the security and certainty of our Salvation 24. By the way I desire to be inform'd seeing you affirm that Rebaptizing those whom Hereticks had baptized was a sacriledge and a profession of a damnable Heresie When it began to be so If from the beginning it were so then was Cyprian a sacrilegious professor of a damnable heresie and yet a Saint and a Martyr If it were not so then did your Church excommunicate Firmilian and others and separate from them without sufficient ground of Excommunication or Separation which is Schismatical You see what difficulties you run into on both sides choose whether you will but certainly both can hardly be avoided 25. Whereas again in this § you obtrude upon us That we cannot but confess that your Doctrin contains no damnable error and that yours is so certainly a true Church that unless yours be true we cannot pretend any I answer there is in this neither truth nor modesty to outface us that we cannot but confess what indeed we cannot but deny For my part if I were upon the rack I perswade my self I should not confess the one nor the other 26 Whereas again presently you add that D. Potter grants we should be guilty of Schism if we did cut off your Church from the body of Christ the hope of Salvation I have shewed above that he grants no such matter He saies indeed that our not doing so frees us from the imputation of Schism and from hence you sophistically inferre that he must grant If we did so we were Schismatiques and then make your Reader believe that this is D. Potter's confession it being indeed your own collection For as every one that is not a Papist is not a Jesuit and yet not every one that is a Papist is a Jesuit As whosoever comes not into England comes not to London and yet many may come into England and not come to London As whosoever is not a man is not a King and yet many are men that are not Kings So likewise it may be certain that whosoever does not so is free from Schism and yet they that do so if there be sufficient cause may be not guilty of it 27. Whereas you pretend to wonder that the Doctor did not answer the argument of the Donatists which he saies is all one with yours but referres you to Saint Austine there to read it as if every one carried with him a Librarie or were able to examine the places in Saint Austine I answer The parity of the Arguments was that which the Doctor was to declare whereto it was impertinent what the answer was But sufficient it was to shew that the Donatists argument which you would never grant good was yet as good as yours and therefore yours could not be good Now to this purpose as the concealing the answer was no way advantageous so to produce it was not necessary and therefore he did you more service then he was bound to in referring you to St. Austin for an answer to it Whereas you say he had reason to conceal it because it makes directly against himself I say it is so farre from doing so that it will serve in proportion to the argument as fitly as if it had been made for it for as Saint Austin saies that Catholiques approve the Doctrin of Donatists but abhorre their Heresie of Re-baptization so we say that we approve those fundamental and simple necessary Truths which you retain by which some good souls among you may be saved but abhorre your many Superstitions and Heresies And as he saies that as Gold is good yet ought not to be sought for among a company of Theeves and Baptism good but not to be sought for in the Conventicles of Donatists so say we that the Truths you retain are good and as we hope sufficient to bring good ignorant souls among you to salvation yet are not to be sought for in the Conventicles of Papists who hold with them a mixture of many vanities and many impieties For as for our freeing you from damnable Heresy and yeelding you Salvation which stone here again you stumble at neither he nor any other Protestant is guilty of it and therefore you must confess that this very answer will serve Protestants against this charm of Papists as well as Saint Austin against the Donatists and that indeed it was not Doctor Potter but You that without a Sarcasm had reason to conceal it 28. The last piece of D. Potter's book which you are pleased to take notice of in this first Part of yours is an argument he makes in your behalfe p. 79. of his book where he makes you speak thus If Protestants believe the Religion of Papists to be a safe way to heaven why do they not follow it This argument you like not because many things may be good and yet not necessary to be embraced by every body and therefore scoffe at it and call it an argument of his own a wife argument a wise demand and then aske of him what he thinks of it being fram'd thus Our Religion is safe even by your confession and therefore you ought to grant that aâ— may embrace it And yet farther thus Among different Religions one only can be safe But yours by our own confession is safe whereas you hold that in ours there is no hope of salvation thâ—refore we ought to embrace yours Ans I have advised with him and am to tell you from him that he thinks reasonable
necessary which the latter according to their own grounds have no obligation to do nay cannot do so upon any firm and sure and infallible foundation THE CONCLVSION AND thus by God's assistance and the advantage of a good cause I am at length through a passage rather tyring than difficult arriv'd at the end of my undertaken Voyage and have as I suppose made appear to all dis-interessed and unprejudicate Readers what in the beginning I undertook that a vein of Sophistry and Calumny runs clean through this first part of your Book wherein though I never thought of the directions you have been pleas'd to give me in your Pamphlet entituled A direction to N. N. yet upon consideration of my Answer I find that I have proceeded as if I had had it alwayes before my eyes and steer'd my course by it as by a card and compass For first I have not proceeded by a meer destructive way as you call it nor objected such difficulties against your Religion as upon examination tend to the overthrow of all Religion but have shewed that the truth of Christianity is cleerly independent upon the truth of Popery and that on the other side the arguments you urge and the courses you take for the maintenance of your Religion do manifestly tend if they be closely and consequently followed to the destruction of all Religion and lead men by the hand to Atheism and Impiety whereof I have given you ocular demonstrations in divers places of my book but especially in my answer to your Direction to N. N. Neither can I discover any repugnance between any one part of my answer and any other though I have used many more judicious and more searching eyes than mine own to make if it were possible such a discovery and therefore am in good hope that though the musick I have made be but dull and flat and even downright plain-song even your curious and critical ears shall discover no discord in it but on the other side I have charg'd you frequently and very justly with manifest contradiction and retractation of your own assertions and not seldom of the main grounds you build upon and the principal conclusions which you endeavour to maintain which I conceive my self to have made apparent even to the eye c. 2. § 5. c. 3. § 88. c. 4. § 14. and 24. c. 5. § 93. c. 6. § 6 7 12 17. c. 7. § 29. and in many other parts of my Answer And though I did never pretend to defend D. Potter absolutely and in all things but only so farre as he defends Truth neither did D. Potter desire me nor any law of God or man oblige me to defend him any farther yet I do not find that I have cause to differ from him in any matter of moment particularly not concerning the infallibility of God's Church which I grant with him to be infallible in fundamentals because if it should erre in fundamentals it were not the Church Nor concerning the supernaturality of Faith which I know and believe as well as you to be the gift of God and that flesh and bloud reveal'd it not unto us but our Father which is in heaven But now if it were demanded What defence you can make for deserting Charity Mistaken in the main Question disputed between him and Dr. Potter Whether Protestancy without a particular repentance and dereliction of it destroy Salvation whereof I have convinc'd you I believe your answer would be much like that which Ulysses makes in the Metamorphosis for his running away from his friend Nestor that is none at all For Opposing the Articles of the Church of England the Approbation I presume cleers my Book from this imputation And whereas you give me a Caution that my grounds destroy not the belief of diverse Doctrins which all good Christians believe yea and of all verities that cannot be prov'd by natural reason I profess sincerely that I do not know nor believe that any ground laid by me in my whole Book is any way inconsistent with any one such Doctrin or with any verity revealed in the Word of God though never so improbable or incomprehensible to Natural Reason and if I thought there were I would deal with it as those primitive Converts dealt with their curious Books in the Acts of the Apostles For the Epistle of St. James and those other Books which were anciently controverted and are now received by the Church of England as Canonical I am so far from relying upon any Principles which must to my apprehension bring with them the denial of the authority of them that I my self believe them all to be Canonical For the overthrowing the Infallibility of all Scripture my Book is so innocent of it that the Infallibility of Scripture is the chiefest of all my grounds And lastly for Arguments tending to prove an impossibility of all Divine Supernatural Infallible Faith and Religion I assure my self that if you were ten times more a Spider than you are you could suck no such poyson from them My heart I am sure is innocent of any such intention and the Searcher of all hearts knows that I had no other end in writing this Book but to confirm to the uttermost of my ability the truth of the Divine and Infallible Religion of our dearest Lord and Saviour Christ Jesus which I am ready to seal and confirm not with my Arguments only but my Bloud Now these are the Directions which you have been pleas'd to give me whether out of a fear that I might otherwise deviate from them or out of a desire to make others think so But howsoever I have not to my understanding swarved from them in any thing which puts me in good hope that my Answer to this first Part of your Book will give even to you your self indifferent good satisfaction I have also provided though this were more than I undertook a just and punctual examination and refutation of your second Part But if you will give your consent I am resolv'd to suppress it and that for divers sufficient and reasonable considerations First because the discussion of the Controversies intreated of in the first Part if we shall think fit to proceed in it as I for my part shall so long as I have truth to reply will I conceive be sufficient employment for us though we cast off the burden of those many lesser disputes which remain behind in the Second And perhaps we may do God and his Church more service by exactly discussing and fully clearing the truth in these few â—â—an by handling many after a sleight and perfunctory manner Secondly because the addition of the Second Part whether for your purpose or mine is clearly unnecessary there being no understanding man Papist or Protestant but will confess that for as much as concerns the main question now in agitation about the saveableness of Protestants if the first part of your Book be answered there needs no reply to the Second
I say our Saviour took to perform an admirable miracle even upon the man himself and that he brought about by as unlikely a course only with inviting himself to his house By which unexpected affability and courtesie of our Saviour this so notorious and famous Publican and sinner was so surpriz'd with joy and comfort that presently he gives over all thought and consideration of his trade as a thing of no moment and being to receive Christ into his house and knowing how ill agreeing companions Christ and Mammon would prove in the same lodging he resolves to sweep it and make it clean for the entertaining of him he empties it of that dross and dung wherewith before it was defiled half of his estate goes away at a clap upon the poor and the remainder in all likelihood is in great danger to be consum'd by that noble and generous offer which he makes in the words of my Text Whomsoever I have defrauded by forged cavillation I restore c. 4. In which words I shall observe unto you these two General Parts Division First a Discovery and it may be confession of his beloved bosome sin the sin of his trade in these words If I have defrauded any man or whomsoever I have defrauded Secondly Satisfaction tendered in the words following I restore unto him four fold In the former General we may take notice of two particulars 1. Zacchaeus his willingness and readiness of his own accord to discover and confess his sin when he said Whomsoever I have defrauded And 2. the nature and heinousness of the crime discovered which is called a defrauding by forged cavillation or as some Translations read with false accusation In the second General likewise which is the satisfaction tendered by Zacchaeus there offer themselves two particulars more namely 1. So much of the satisfaction as was necessary to be performed by virtue of an indispensable Precept and that is Restitution in these words I restore unto him 2. That which was voluntary and extraordinary namely the measure and excess of this Restitution which he professeth should be four fold Of these two parts therefore with their several particulars in the same order as they have been proposed briefly and with all the plainness and perspicuity I can imagine And 1. Of the former General and therein of the first Particular namely Zacchaeus his readiness to confess his Sin in these words If I c. 5. I said even now only General I. It may be this was a confession of his crime but now I will be more resolute Partic. 1. and tell you peremptorily this was a confession for without all question Zacchaeus as the case stood now with him was in no humour of Justifying himself he had no mind to boast his integrity in his office Or if he had he might be sure that common fame if that were all yet that alone might be a sufficient argument at least too great a presumption against him to confute him But to put it out of question Our Saviour himself by applying the 10. verse of this Chapter to him acknowledgeth him for a sinful undone man one that had so far lost himself in the wandring mazes of this wicked world that unless Christ himself had taken the pains to search and enquire after him and having found him by the power and might of his Grace to rescue and recover him from the errour of his ways by restoring him his eyes whereby he might take notice towards what a dangerous precipice he was hastening there had been no possibility but at last he must have needs fallen headlong into the gulf of destruction 6. Now it being I suppose evident that Zacchaeus was guilty and that in a high degree and openly and scandalously guilty of the crime here discover'd there is no doubt to be made but that he who was so willing to unlock and disperse his ill gotten treasures would not begin to divert his covetousness upon his sins he would not hoard them up but would place his glory even in his shame and whereas he had been the servant and slave of sins he would wear his shackles and fetters as signs of the glorious victory which through Christ he had won and emblemes of that blessed change which he found in himself being rescued from the basest slavery that possibly can be imagined into the glorious liberty of the Sons of God 7. But it may be you will say Suppose Zacchaeus did freely and voluntarily confess his sin to Christ who had authority to forgive him his sins though he had never discovered them what collection shall be made from hence Zacchaeus might be as bold as he would with himself but as for us his example shall be no rule to us we thank God this is Popery in these daies and since we have freed our selves from this burden we will not be brought into bondage to any man we will confess our sins I warrant you only to God who is only able to forgive us them as for the Minister it may be we will sometimes be beholding to him to speak some comfortable words now and then to us when we are troubled in conscience and we have not been taught to go any further 8. I confess I find no great inclination in my self especially being in the Pulpit to undertake a controversie even where it may seem to offer it self much less to press and strein a Text for it for I desire to have no adversaries in my Preaching but only the Devil and Sin Only having now mentioned Confession and considering how much the Doctrine of our holy Mother the Church hath been traduc'd not only by the malice and detraction of our professed enemies of the Church of Rome but also by the suspicious ignorance and partiality of her own children who out of a liking of the zeal or rather fury of some former Protestant Writers have laid this for a ground of stating Controversies of our Religion That that is to be acknowledged for the Doctrine of these Reformed Churches which is most opposite and contradicting to the Church of Rome So that as the case goes now Controversies of Religion are turn'd into private quarrels and it is not so much the Truth that is sought after as the salving and curing the reputation of particular men 9. These things therefore considered truly for my part I dare not take upon me so much to gratifie the Papists as to think my self oblig'd to maintain many incommodious speeches of some of our Divines in this point Hoc Ithacus velit magno mercentur Atridae They will never be unfurnish'd of matter to write Books to the worlds end if this shall be the method of stating Controversies Oh what an impregnable cause should we have against the Church of Rome if we our selves did not help to weaken and betray it by mixing therewith the interests and conceits of particular men 10. Give me therefore leave I pray you to give you
justification by faith without the works of the Law were never read in the Church but when the 13. Chapter of the 1. Epistle to the Corinth concerning the absolute necessity of Charity should be to prevent misprision read together with them 33. Whereas you say that some Protestants do expresly affirm the former point to be the soul of the Church c. and therefore they must want the Theological vertue of Hope and that none can have true hope while they hope to be saved in their communion I answ They have great reason to believe the Doctrin of justification by faith only a point of great weight and importance if it be rightly understood that is they have reason to esteem it a principal and necessary duty of a Christian to place his hope of justification and salvation not in the perfection of his own righteousness which if it be imperfect will not justifie but only in the mercies of God through Christs satisfaction and yet notwithstanding this nay the rather for this may preserve themselves in the right temper of good Christians which is a happy mixture and sweet composition of confidence and fear If this Doctrin be otherwise expounded than I have here expounded I will not undertake the justification of it only I will say that which I may do truly that I never knew any Protestant such a soli-sidian but that he did believe these divine truths That he must make his calling certain by good works That he must work out his salvation with Fear and Trembling and that while he does not so he can have no well grounded hope of Salvation I say I never met with any who did not believe these divine Truths and that with a more firm and a more unshaken assent than he does that himself is predestinate and that he is justified by believing himself justified I never met with any such who if he saw there were a necessity to do either would not rather forgoe his belief of these Doctrins than the former these which he sees disputed and contradicted and opposed with a great multitude of very potent Arguments than those which being the express words of Scripture whosoever should call into question could not with any modesty pretend to the title of Christian And therefore there is no reason but we may believe that their full assurance of the former Doctrin doth very well qualifie their perswasion of the later and that the former as also the lives of may of them do sufficiently testifie are more effectual to temper their hope and to keep it at a stay of a filial and modest assurance of Gods favour built upon the conscience of his love and fear than the later can be to swell and puffe them up into vain confidence and ungrounded presumption This reason joyn'd with our experience of the honest and religious conversation of many men of this opinion is a sufficient ground for Charity to hope well of their Hope and to assure our selves that it cannot be offensive but rather most acceptable to God if notwithstanding this diversity of opinion we embrace each other with the strict embraces of love and communion To you and your Church we leave it to separate Christians from the Church and to proscribe them from heaven upon trivial and trifling causes As for our selves we conceive a charitable judgement of our Bretheren and their errors though untrue much more pleasing to God than a true judgement if it be uncharitable and therefore shall alwayes choose if we do err to err on the milder and more merciful part and rather to retain those in our Communion which deserve to be ejected than eject those that deserve to be retain'd 34. Lastly whereas you say that seeing Protestants differ about the point of Justification you must needs inferre that they want Unity in faith and consequently all faith and then that they cannot agree what points are fundamentall I answer to the first of these inferences that as well might you inferre it upon Victor Bishop of Rome and Polycrates upon Stephen Bishop of Rome and Saint Cyprian in asmuch as it is undeniably evident that what one of those esteemed necessary to salvation the other esteemed not so But points of Doctrin as all other things are as they are and not as they are esteemed neither can a necessary point be made unnecessary by being so accounted nor an unnecessary point be made necessary by being overvalued But as the ancient Philosophers whose different opinions about the Soule of man you may read in Aristotle de anima and Cicero's Tusculan Questions notwithstanding their divers opinions touching the nature of the soule yet all of them had soules and soules of the same nature Or as those Physitians who dispute whether the Brain or Heart be the principall part of a man yet all of them have brains and have hearts and herein agree sufficiently So likewise though some Protestants esteem that Doctrine the soule of the Church which others do not so highly value yet this hinders not but that which is indeed the soule of the Church may be in both sorts of them And though one account that a necessary truth which others account neither necessary nor perhaps true yet this notwithstanding in those truths which are truly and really necessary they may all agree For no Argument can be more sophistical than this They differ in some points which they esteem necessary Therefore they differ in some that indeed and in truth are so 35. Now as concerning the other Inference That they cannot agree what points are fundamental I have said and prov'd formerly that there is no such necessity as you imagine or pretend that men should certainly know what is and what is not fundamental They that believe all things plainly delivered in Scripture believe all things fundamental and are at sufficient Unity in matters of Faith though they cannot precisely and exactly distinguish between what is fundamental and what is profitable nay though by error they mistake some vain or perhaps some hurtful opinions for necessary and fundamental Truths C 3. Sect. 54. alibi Besides I have shewed above that as Protestants do not agree for you over-reach in saying they cannot touching what points are fundamental so neither do you agree what points are defin'd and so to be accounted and what are not nay nor concerning the subject in which God hath placed this pretended Authority of defining some of you setling it in the Pope himself though alone without a Councel Others in a Councel though divided from the Pope Others only in the conjunction of Councel and Pope Others not in this neither but in the acceptation of the present Church Universal Lastly others not attributing it to this neither but only to the perpetual Succession of the Church of all ages of which divided Company it is very evident and undeniable that every former may be and are obliged to hold many things defin'd and therefore