Work of the Efformation of the sacred Life and Nature of God in Mens Souls it would not be in any wise suitable and agreeable with his Design to make them only externally righteous and holy without an inward change of Mind and Disposition and therefore expresly informs all his Followers and Disciples That except their Righteousness exceed the Righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees they shall in no case enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Which is as much as to say that he hath set the attainments of rational Souls at a higher Pitch than ever was or could be warranted by the Doctrines and Practice of the Scribes and Pharisees and now requires not only an abstinence from the outward and gross Acts of Sin but a hearty and sincere Purgation of the Soul from all Vice and the Reduction of all its Powers and Faculties into an Universal Complyance to God's holy Will By which likewise that false and carnal Liberty which some would assume to themselves is wholly destroyed and we are taught that Religion gives no allowance or toleration to any the least evil that without Holiness no Man shall ever see the Lord and that the Promise of seeing God is only made to the Pure in Heart Nor can we understand less by this Holiness and Purity of Heart than such a vital Frame and Temper of Spirit as does not only exclude all gross Defilements and Pollutions of the Flesh but likewise all secret Mixtures and Combinations of Hypocrifie and all those other more spiritual Sins whose Acts have no such intimate Conjunction and Commerce with the Body Nay so far is the Gospel of the Son of God from countenancing or giving any Dispensation to Sin that it strictly commands us to abstain from all appearance of Evil. For he came into the World to cleanse our Minds from all irregular and disorderly Lusts and Passions and to redeem us from all Iniquity that is not only from this or that particular Vice but from all manner of Evil to the end he might purifie unto himself a Peculiar People zealous of good works as we read Tit. 2.14 Sin and Evil is not a meer fantastick Being an aiery Notion or sound of Words but a real Nature and state of Defilement and Pollution and while the Soul is under its Dominion it is then said in Scripture to be clothed in filthy Garments But the true Clothing of the Soul is Righteousness and Holiness Zech. 3.3 4. and this is compared by the Spirit of God to fine Linen Rev. 19.8 clean and white 4. Lastly the Flower and Summity of that Divine Nature which our Lord and Saviour came to beget in Mankind being an Universal Love and Charity it is certain he does not only teach it by his Commands and Example but he condemns the contrary state and temper of Mind as directly opposite to the Excellency and Perfections of the Nature of God There is no one thing that ever our Saviour so earnestly press'd upon his Disciples as Love It is his new and his old and last Command that we love one another and he proposes his own Example for our Imitation Love one another as I have loved you Now How is that Surely Joh. 13.34 with a Love stronger than the Bands of Death which made him give his Life a Ransom for the World And this alone he tells us shall be the Badge and Cognizance by which his followers shall be known By this shall all Men know that ye are my Disciples if if ye have love one to another v. 35. For indeed there is nothing makes us more God-like nor is there any thing that so fully expresses the Nature of the Supreme Being as Love God is Love says St. John Love is the First-born of Heaven and the joy of Angels and holy Souls whose pure minds never shine with so great a splendor and glory as when they are irradiated with the powerful Influence of so sacred a Being Behold the grand Exemplar of Charity the Son of God himself made a Man and consider him in all his abasements his solitudes and sufferings from the first moment of his Birth to his dying on the Cross and we shall find very powerful and strong Emanations of dear Compassion and Benignity to the World He was so far from grieving or paining or injuring any that he went about every day doing them good freeing them from their miseries and easing them of their sorrows He never did the least hurt or harm to any Man living but rebuked the indiscreet Zeal of his Disciples who would have burned the Samaritans with Fire from Heaven for denying to their Lord an Hospitable entertainment adding that he came not to destroy but to save the lives of Men. This is the Grand Law of the whole Creation that consolidates and holds together all the parts of Heaven and Earth and makes them conspire in a sweet and universal Harmony and Consent and permeating and touching humane souls by a vital Energy impregnates and fills them with a sacred life which life is no steril and inactive Principle but diffuses it self in acts of dear kindness and benignity to all capable subjects and especially to Man a Creature most dear to God himself for whom every one that throughly partakes of this spirit of love will be ready to offer up even his own life according as the Beloved Apostle speaks Hereby perceive we the love of God 1 Joh. 3.16 because he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the Brethren 5. Having seen the Grand Ends and Purposes of God in the Gospel of Christ Jesus I shall now manifest how perfectly all these are frustrated and destroyed by those Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome which are either established by Papal Laws and Statutes or countenanced approved and maintained with great vigour and industry by the Members of that Church by which it will likewise appear that the old Polytheism and Idolatry of the Heathens is really revived established and practised there though in another and newer Garb and Dress In the first place then I have declared that the great End and Design of God in the Evangelical Dispensation was to form his own blessed Nature in the hearts of men to consummate his Holy Image and to regenerate them by his own Spirit And would you think that any Company or Society of men that profess to be the Servants of Christ Jesus to advance his Crown and Dignity and to seek the Amplification and Enlargement of his Kingdom should yet be so treacherous as to undermine this Grand Purpose and maintain such Doctrines as do directly evacuate and destroy and are clearly repugnant to the Mind and Will of God in the Gospel Behold then such as are taught and allowed by the most eminent and leading men in the Romish Church I shall instance only in these three which are so notorious and so diametrically opposite to the very
end and intent of God in the Gospel as if by those the Devil had plotted the utter extirpation and subversion of that blessed Nature which ought of right to have the Soveraign Rule and Dominion over all Intellectual Beings 1. The Doctrine of the Direction of the Intention 2. The Doctrine of Probability 3. That of Sacerdotal Absolution upon Confession at the hour of Death The first of these viz. the Direction of the Intention serves to so many excellent purposes for the propagation of all manner of Vice and the bringing into act all the secret machinations and contrivances of evil with the safety and security of Conscience that at first sight it looks like a Devilish Engine fram'd on purpose for the destruction of the true and living Nature of God in mens souls For if this Doctrine be true and if it be not let them look to it that teach and uphold it there is no Vice so heynous no Sin so great but a man may salva Conscientia with a good and honest Conscience commit it if he have but the wit to direct his Intention aright Ex. gr If a certain company of men here plotted to kill the King and some of them be apprehended and brought before a Civil Magistrate who has Power to take the business into Examination the rest that remain yet undiscovered may lawfully kill both the Magistrate and the Witnesses that informed against their Associates always provided they direct their Intention aright for that secures the Action from being Criminal that is they must not kill them upon pure Revenge for that is forbidden by the Law of God but may dispatch them to preserve their Reputation or to free a whole Order and Society of men from an indelible disgrace that is likely to be cast upon them and now the sin is vanished and the Conscience clean and white as in the day of Innocence But in such an affair as this or something else of like nature care must be taken that the Action be managed with the greatest secresie for though the inner man be secure yet the outer is not and though the Fathers Conscience be entire and sound yet his Neck may be broken by the force of a Humane Law that takes no notice of this Admirable Invention of the Direction of the Intention In like manner this superpolitick device shall sanctifie and hallow Fornication Adultery Theft or whatever other enormous wickedness a sensual person thinks fit to run into by which all endeavours and hopes of attaining to a new Birth unto Righteousness are utterly stifled and cut off and the new Creature in the Scripture shall be no more than an empty sound For surely that Person can give but a poor sign of the Renovation of his Mind and the change of his Soul by the Spirit of Holiness and Righteousness that can allow himself in any of those forementioned gross sins let his Intention be what it will And though perhaps it may be said that this is no Doctrine of the Romish Church yet it is a Doctrine which is taught and practis'd by the greatest Casuists and most flourishing Order that that Church abounds withal Nay it is a thing that seems to pervade and run through the whole Body of their Religion forasmuch as no Sacrament can be valid and efficacious if the Priests intention be either wanting or otherwise imployed And since this is so I see no reason why this Engine should not be turned and made to do execution upon themselves For supposing this to be true it evidently follows that no man can be assured that amongst those many Millions which make up the Romish Hierarchy there is so much as one true Priest and consequently no man can have any certainty that ever any Sacrament is rightly and duly administred for this depends upon the mans being a true Priest and that no man can know and be sure of unless he first be certain that he was rightly and duly baptized nor can he have any assurance of this unless he be likewise certain that he was baptized with due Intention that is that the Minister of his Baptism was not a secret Jew or Moor or Atheist but a Christian in heart as well as Profession otherwise believing the Sacrament to be nothing in giving it he could intend to give nothing and that he neither out of negligence nor malice omitted his Intention But suppose the man be a true Priest yet when he consecrates the Sacrament I am not sure he will do it with Intention for there is a story of a Priest that was burnt in France for compacting with the Devil to give no Sacraments with Intention 2. The Doctrine of Probability is likewise a neat and excellent Device to set forward the Trade of Sin and Wickedness For thus Emanuel Sa A man may do what he conceives lawful according to a probable Opinion though the contrary be more safe And agreeable to this is the Assertion of the Jesuit Knot in Mr. Chillingworth That for the avoiding of sin we are not always bound to take the safest way but may follow the Opinion of any probable Doctors Which impious Doctrine is loaded with so many mischievous and fatal consequences as render that new Birth unto Righteousness without which our Saviour says no man shall enter into Heaven perfectly useless and unnecessary For 1. From hence it will follow that a man may resolve not to use his utmost care and endeavour to avoid sin without any hazard or danger of his damnation And if this Doctrine be once throughly reduced to practice in the lives of men a deluge and flood of wickedness will as certainly break in and overflow the World as the waters once drowned it when God broke up the Store-houses of Heaven and Earth For this casts a fatal damp upon all endeavours after Holiness and Righteousness and mens Zeal and Contention for a better state of life cools like the air by intervening showres and all those Motives and Exhortations which are used in the Gospel to excite and stir up our drowsie souls to a watchful and diligent prosecution of the War against sin are rebated and made ineffectual and the Fire of Hell is no more to be valued than a painted flame Mr. Chillingworth discoursing upon this Doctrine of probability says Chap. 7. He knew a young Scholar in Doway Licens'd by a great Casuist to swear a thing as upon his certain knowledge whereof he had yet no knowledge but only a great presumption because forsooth it was the opinion of one Doctor he might do so Cardinal Bellarmine teaches That want of Power to maintain a Rebellion was the only Reason that the Primitive Christians did not rebel against the Persecuting Emperours To whom agrees Aquinas when he says Ecclesiam tolerasse ut fideles obedirent Juliano Apostatae quia sui novitate nondum habebant vires compescendi Principes terrenos i. e. That the Church suffered the faithful to obey Julian the
Apostate because by their late rise they had not sufficient strength to repress Earthly Princes Here are two Probable Doctors and the conclusion from thence is that when ever they find themselves to have a Party strong enough they may having the Opinion of such Probable Doctors on their side attempt the Murder of their natural Prince and introduce their Religion though with the Blood of thousands of innocent Persons And this they may do although themselves should think it unlawful because Bellarmine and Aquinas Men of approved Virtue and Learning among them have determined for the lawfulness of it 2. From hence it will follow that a Man may forsake the more safe and infallible Direction of Gods Word and the clear Evidence of Reason and Conscience and take up with the Opinion of some one Man who perhaps speaks unadvisedly and carelesly or it may be out of design and set purpose to deceive and by this means all the severe Duties of Religion shall be evacuated and the Precepts of the Gospel made to comply with the Vices and corrupt Inclinations of Men and all as it pleases our Probable Doctor which certainly is the most unreasonable and unrighteous Usurpation upon the understandings of Mankind that ever was as if the generality of Men were made only to be imposed upon Nay by this means the best and wholsomest Laws in the Christian World shall be rescinded if there be but a Probable Doctor to dispute their Obligation These horrid and impious Consequences will yet appear more plain and evident by those Instances First we are commanded in the holy Scriptures to love the Lord our God with all our heart with all our soul and with all our strength and the truth and sincerity of our love is evidenced by avoiding of Sin and by keeping his Commandments But now if a Man may forsake the plain and easie direction of God in the sacred Writings and rest in the Opinion of a Probable Doctor he need not much trouble his Head about the love of God See the Mystery of Jesuitism Hurtado de Mendoza as he is cited by Father Escobar says A Man is bound but once every year to have an actual affection for God Coninck supposes we are bound to it once in three or four years Henriquez once in five years But Filiutius thinks a Man is not obliged every five years And if we do not think our selves fairly dealt withal yet Father Syrmond will make a full amends and he assures us we need not love God at all For we are not so much commanded says he to love God as not to hate him Secondly we are injoined a speedy and sincere Repentance in the holy Scriptures to turn from our Sins and Impieties unto God while 't is called to day that is to make use of the present time which is only ours But if throwing the Scripture aside we may without danger follow the Guidance of any Probable Doctor then a Man is bound to repent only three times a year at Christmas Easter and Whitsontide for so Scotus says But if you are unwilling to undergo this burdensome and afflictive Duty so often you need perform it but once a year and for this you have the Authority of Scotus and Medina And if you think this too much hear what Reginaldus says The time when a Man is bound to repent is at the Article of imminent Death for the mean while there is no Precept commanding that a Sinner should not persevere in enmity against God there is no Negative Precept forbidding such a Perseverance How directly repugnant those Doctrines are to that Grand Positive end of the Gospel the Replantation of the sacred Image and Nature of God in the Souls of Men every pious Christian who earnestly desires the Recovery of the World from the Bondage and slavery of Sin cannot but see and that those Champions which the Dark Kingdom set out to defend and maintain the Pagan Worship which quickly vanished and disappeared in all places where Christianity shone in its Native lustre and brightness were not half so successful in their Attempts nor such dangerous Enemies of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus as those Popish Agents who by speaking Lyes in Hypocrisie do really Debauch and Paganize the World again and make Men two-fold more the Children of Hell than if they had been perfect Strangers to the very name of a Christian 3. Another Doctrine which undermines the Grand Purpose of God Almighty in regenerating and renewing the World by the Gospel is that of Sacerdotal Absolution upon Confession at the hour of death For thus the Doctors of the Church of Rome teach That though a man live and die without the practice of Christian Virtues and with the habits of many damnable sins unmortified yet if he in the last moment of his life have any sorrow for his sins Vid. Chilligw Ch. 7. and joyn Confession with it he shall certainly be saved Which is a Doctrine that instead of reforming and bettering the World which certainly was intended by the manifestation of the Gospel opens a door to all imaginable licentiousness and wickedness Our blessed Saviour assures us that except a man be born again he shall not enter into Heaven Now certain it is that Divine Generations as well as Natural are not instantaneous but require time for their full maturity and perfection and as sure is it that an Act of Attrition accompanied with Sacerdotal Absolution can never work a change or Renovation of the mind and consequently it must be as horrid a Cheat as ever was put upon the poor deluded Sons of Adam to perswade them that this is enough for their Salvation though otherwise they die without the practice of Christian Virtues and with the habits of many damnable sins unmortified For to speak the plain truth this kind of Absolution looks more like a Charm or Spell used by superstitious people to fright away evil spirits than any thing of sober truth having neither Reason nor Scripture to countenance or abett it And though men may deceive and befool one another yet those unhappy people whose sad Fate it is to be sent out of the world with no better hopes of Salvation than what an Act of Attrition with Priestly Absolution is able to give them will find the Scene of Affairs quite altered there and those grim Officers of the Infernal Kingdom will infallibly challenge and seize their own notwithstanding the fairest dismission by all the arts and devices of a treacherous Ghostly Father Consider all you that have any care for your Eternal Interest and Salvation how grosly you are abused by these Holy Impostors and Factors for the Devils Kingdom Can the Absolution of your Priest work a real change in your Dispositions and Natures or can those few words effect a Mortification of your vicious habits and withal superinduce the contrary Virtues Will this Charm procure a safe passage through the Guards of the invisible Regions
these ways a Man may escape Amongst the rest of the Indulgences conferr'd upon the Con-fraternity of the Rosary this is one That every time they recite the whole Rosary for the departed they gain the delivery of a Soul out of Purgatory And though Charity grow cold and there be little to be done for Love yet Money that answers all things will open the Gates of Purgatory and deliver whoever the Donor pleases De Miss l. 3. c. 10. for some Monks have taught as the learned Mornay relates that the Souls which are in Purgatory do leap at the sound of the Money when it is cast into the Bason for them so comfortable a thing is Gold The poor Sinner indeed is in the worst condition who has few Friends and less Money and truly for ought I can see such a one living obscurely may dye without much regard or concern and being quickly forgotten may ly the whole time in Purgatory which is not ten years say Dominicus Soto and Thomas Zerula But for those who are of Ability to purchase Masses and Sacrifices by leaving round sums of Money at their Death they need not fear the staying so much as a day in Purgatory So that it need not be said How hard but how easie is it for a Rich Man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven And is not this excellent Doctrine and very well fitted for the encouragement of a wicked Life Skin for Skin and all that a Man hath will he give for his Life and he were a very Foor that would not part with some of his Estate to be freed from the punishment of his sins and be made happy for ever But alas our Ministers cannot give us such excellent encouragements as these nor can they with safe Consciences tell us that Money will open the Gates of Paradise but they tell us in sober sadness that if we live bad Lives we shall certainly and unavoidably be miserable They have no ways of freeing Men from Hell and Damnation but only by perswading them in their Life time to be truly penitent and sincere nor will they promise and secure any that their sins are pardoned upon any other terms than that godly sorrow that works repentance never to be repented of 2. But if this Provision be too narrow and scanty for a Course of Debauchery and Licentiousness his Holiness like a most kind and indulgent Father will give his Children no cause of complaint but as well out of a prudent regard to his own Coffers as an earnest desire to give his Sons as ample a liberty to follow all the extravagant and enormous motions of Flesh and Blood as Heart can wish he grants many Indulgences and Dispensations for sin and wickedness And though we squeamish and faint-hearted Protestants who check at every Sin may think strange that Christ's Vicar as he calls himself should act so contrary to the Interest of his Supreme Lord yet the Plenitude of the Pope's Power will warrant this and much more For his Power as Du Ranchin who was no Protestant speaks hath neither Banks nor Bottom and his Jurisdiction extends over all the World even as low as Hell and Purgatory and as high as Heaven taking hold of great and small Review of the Council of Trent l. 2. c. 10. Clerks and Laicks things sacred and prophane And afterwards he gives divers Instances of the fulness of the Pope's Power out of their own Authors viz. That the Pope is a God upon Earth that God and he have one and the same Consistory that he can go against all Councils and Statutes that he can make wrong to be right To whom no Man may say Why do you so Whose Power may not be disputed without incurring the Crime of Sacriledge forasmuch as he is the Cause of Causes and the just Cause and for that it it is to be presumed that whatsoever pleases him is just and reasonable Now he that hath but Faith enough to believe those vast Prorogatives of his Holiness need never question the Validity of his Indulgences and Dispensations for Sin And that we may not think this unlimited Power to be only the fawning of his Parasites and Court-flatterers Clement the VI. in his Bull of altering the Jubilee gives us a Specimen of it where among other things he ordains That if a Man be going to Rome upon Devotion in the year of Jubilee and happen to dye by the way he shall be totally acquitted and absolved of all his sins And he afterwards adds Howsoever we command the Angels of Paradise that they convey his Soul into the glory of Paradise being totally absolved from the pains of Purgatory Well spoken brave Head of this Church we will trust thee for finding out an easie way to Heaven at any time In Rome there are so many Churches Altars and Crosses that have such an inexhaustible stock of Indulgences granted to them by several Popes that a Man cannot miss a full Remission and Pardon of all his sins And that we may not think our holy Father the Pope has forgotten his Children in England or any other place far distant from Rome he has provided Pardon and Salvation for these at as easie a Rate as can be desired By Grant from Pope John the XX. every bowing of the Head at the naming of Jesus gets twenty years pardon And to grace the Ceremony the more Sir Edwin Sands says Europae spec he has heard sundry of their famous Divines teach in the Pulpit That Christ himself on the Cross bowed his Head on the right side to reverence his own Name that was written over it Again The saying of the Beads over with a Medal or other Trinket of the Pope 's Benediction appendant gets a Plenary Indulgence and delivers what Soul out of Purgatory one pleases And now one would imagine that his Holiness had given ample satisfaction to all his dearly beloved Children but because some are apt to be querulous and complaining out of his abundant Charity he has been pleased to rate and set a Price upon most Sins that they may know before they act any Villany what an Absolution will cost The Book is called Taxa Cancellariae Apostolice The Tax of the Apostolical Chancery and was set forth by Pope Leo the X. Of which Book in the first place hear Du Ranchin's censure Review of the Council of Trent l. 2. c. 4. who speaking of the dishonest Arts and Tricks the Popes use to get Money refers those that desire further Information to a Book Intituled Taxa Cancellaria Apostolica Printed at Paris 1520. And yet says he this is nothing in Comparison of the Penitentiary Tax printed with the same Book where every Sin every Crime how heynous soever hath his Price set so that to have a License and Impunity for sinning there needs no more than to be rich to have a Pasport to Paradise both for himself and his misdeeds But that which might make Rome blush
if there were any shame in her Brow these Pardons and Indulgences are denyed to the Poor and Indigent who are not of Means sufficient to raise these Criminal and Incestuous Impositions So that we live not in those days when it was harder for a Rich Man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven than for a Camel to go through the Eye of a Needle for now the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to them and not to those beggarly Creatures that have nothing but a Staff and a Wallet Take likewise the Complaint of Claudius Espencaus a famous Doctor of Sorbon cited by the same Author Comment in Ep. ad Tit. There is a Book publickly set to every Mans view says he which sells as well now as ever Intituled Taxa Cancellariae Apostolicae which is prostitute and set out for gain like a common whore whence more naughtiness is learned than from all the Summists and Summaries of all Vices There is License granted for many of them and Absolution for all but only to such as will buy them I forbear the names For as one says they are very fearful even the sound of them It is strange that in these times in this Sohism that Index and Inventory of so many unclean and abominable Villanies so Infamous that I am confident there is not a more scandalous Book in all Germany Switzerland or any other place which hath separated from the Church of Rome was not suppressed Yea it is so far from being suppressed by the Treasurers of the Church of Rome that the Licenses and Impunities for those so many and such horrible Crimes are renewed and for the most part confirmed by the Faculties of the Legats which come from thence into these Quarters with Power to restore to their former Estate all things that were utterly lost and so to legitimate all Bastards Whoresons and such as were begot by any unlawful Conjunction to allow People Marriage with such as they had formerly committed Adultery with to absolve such as were perjured Simoniacal Falsifiers Robbers Usurers Schismaticks Hereticks recanting yea and even to admit them to Orders Honours Dignities and all sorts of Benefices to dispense with casual not wilful Murderers howbeit the fore-cited Tax doth not except wilful Parricides Killers of Father Mother Brother Sister Children or Wife Sorcerers Enchanters Concubine-keepers Adulterers Incestuous with Parents or Kindred Sodomites Sinners against Nature abusers of themselves with Beasts c. O that Rome would from henceforth have some shame and cease to set out such a shameless Catalogue of all manner of wickedness This Passage is warily commanded to be blotted out in their Spanish Expurgatory Index Dr. Peter de Moulin saith That this Book was Reprinted at Paris by Tossanus Dionysius in S. James 's Street De Monar Temp. Pont. Rom. at the wooden Cross the King's Priviledge and the Pope's Bull being annexed to it And the Lord Morney speaking of these Books faith They are no less commonly used among the Pope's Brokers than Calendars with Husbandmen Mystr Iniq. or the Book of Customs and Entries among Merchants This Sink of wickedness which I have here discovered cannot but be extremely offensive to the tender senses of every true Christian therefore I shall hasten as fast as I can from it only citing a Passage out of Dr. Ranchin with a pleasant Story relating to it Review of the Council of Trent l. 5. c. 1. It is ordinary saith he with the Popes to grant a plenary Pardon of all Sins with this Expression Be they never so he ynous not only at the great Jubilee but also in particular Bulls And he instances in that of Pope Sixtus the V. An. 1588. granted to the Catholicks of France But that says he which is yet more to be condemned in them is that the Popes de not only give remission of sins already committed but also of such as are to be committed which is a means to obligex all the hast Rascals in the World unto him and to give them occasion to redouble their Crimes and Misdemeanours to rob with four hands to kill Father and Mother to set upon their Lords and Masters to violate the Authority of their Princes and usurp their Dominions For provided they can make their Party stronger and that they be devout towards the H. See there will be no want of an Indulgence yea even without that always provided they pay their Rent The story is this In the time of Pope Leo the Tenth Tetzelius a Fryar was sent into Germany with a great number of Pardoris to advance Money for his Holiness This Factor highly commended his Wares where ever he came and affirmed that he could pardon all sins both past and to come whereupon a German Gentleman bought such a one of him and afterwards rob'd the Pardoner Tetzelius was highly offended and threatned him with Bell Book and Candie But the Gentleman answered That he had bought his Pardon for it declaring that was the Sin he determined to commit when he made that Purchase To which the poor Fryar knew not what to reply 10. The last great end and purpose of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus was as I have shown to diffuse and propagate an Universal Love and Charity but how far removed from this excellent temper and spirit the Romish Church is their practice is a sufficient witness For he that shall consider how they brand us of the Reformation with the odious name of Hereticks and how impiously diligent they have been to exadicate and extirpate the Reformed Religion out of the world persecuting it in all places where their Power extends with all imaginable cruelty and withal remembers that as the often-cited Author tells us it is a Maxim of the Jesuits That if any manexamine the Doctrine of the Pope by the Rule of Gods Word Du Rauchin Review l. 5. c. 7. and seeing that it is different chance to contradict it let him be rooted out with Fire and Sword He I say that deeply reflects upon these things will find that Instruments of Cruelty are in their Habitations and that their tender mercies are like those of the wicked Our blessed Saviour once rebuked the indiscreet zeal of his Disciples when they would have called for Fire from Heaven to consume the ungrateful Samaritans and tells them that he came not to destroy mend liver but to save them But the Romish Church as if she had owned no other Lord but him who was a Murderer from the beginning thinks it not enough to call for Fire from Heaven but searches Earth and Hell too to destroy harmless and innocent persons The good Shepherd said the meek Lamb of God lays down his life for his sheep But the proud and bloody Bishop of Rome with his Idolatrous Clergy are so far from this Divine Spirit that they drive them to the Shambles and out their throats without any remorse witness those many barbarous Massacres and Butcheries of men for no other