men and deducing according to the never failing rules of Logick consequent deductions from them if this be it which you mean by discourse it is very meet reasonable necessary that men as in all their actions so especially in that of greatest importance the choice of their way to happinesse should be left unto it and he that followes this in all his opinions and actions and does not only seeme to doe so followes alwaies God whereas he that followeth a Company of men may oftimes follow a company of beasts And in saying this I say no more then S. Iohn to all Christians in these words Dearly beloved believe not every spirit but try the spirits whether they be of God or no and the rule he gives them to make this tryall by is to consider whether they confesse Iesus to be the Christ that is the Guide of their Faith and Lord of their actions no◠whether they acknowledge the Pope to be his Vicar I say no more then S. Paul in exhorting all Christians to try all things and to hold fast that which is good then S. Peter in cōmanding all Christians to be ready to give a reason of the hope that is in them then our Saviour himselfe in forewarning all his followers that if they blindly followed blind guides both leaders and followers should fall into the ditch and again in saying even to the people Yea why of your selves iudge ye not what is right And though by passion or precipitation or preiudice by want of reason or not using that they have men may be and are oftentimes led into error and mischiefe yet that they cannot be misguided by discourse truly so called such as I have described you your selfe have given them security For what is discourse but drawing conclusions out of premises by good consequence Now the principles which we have setled to wit the Scriptures are on all sides agreed to be infallibly true And you have told us in the fourth chap. of this Pamphlet that from truth no man can by good consequence inferre falshood Therefore by discourse no man can possibly be led to error but if he erre in his conclusions he must of necessity either erre in his principles which here cannot have place or commit some error in his discourse that is indeed not discourse but seeme to doe so 13 You say thirdly with sufficient confidence that if the true Church may erre in defining what Scriptures be Canonicall or in delivering the sense thereof then we must follow either the privat Spirit or else naturall wit and iudgement and by them examine what Scriptures containe true or false doctrine and in that respect ought to be received or reiected All which is apparently untrue neither can any proofe of it be pretended For though the present Church may possibly erre in her judgement touching this matter yet have we other directions in it besides the privat spirit and the examination of the contents which latter way may conclude the negative very strongly to wit that such or such a book cannot come from God because it containes irreconcileable contradictions but the affirmative it cannot conclude because the contents of a book may be all true and yet the book not written by divine inspiration other direction therefore I say we have besides either of these three that is the testimony of the Primitive Christians 14 You say Fourthly with convenient boldnesse That this infallible Authority of your Church being denied no man can be assur'd that any parcell of Scripture was written by Divine inspiration Which is an untruth for which no proofe is pretended and besides void of modesty and full of impiety The first because the experience of innumerable Christians is against it who are sufficiently assur'd that the Scripture is divinely inspir'd and yet deny the infallible authority of your Church or any other The second because if◠I cannot have ground to be assur'd of the divine authority of Scripture unlesse I first believe your Church infallible then 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 unlesse I first beleeve 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 infus'd faith and true religion if he doe but understand him selfe Which is to say agreeable to what you had said before and what out of the abundance of your hearts you speak very often That all Christians besides you are open Fooles or conceal'd Atheists All this you say with notable confidence as the manner of Sophisters is to place their confidence of prevailing in their confident manner of speaking but then for the evidence you promised to maintaine this confidence that is quite vanished and become invisible 16 Had I a mind to recriminate now and to charge Papists as you doe Protestants that they lead men to Socinianisme I could certainly make a much fairer shew of evidence then you have done For I would not tell you you deny the infallibility of the Church of England ergo you lead to Socinianisme which yet is altogether as good an Argument as this Protestants deny the infallibility of the Roman Church ergo they induce Socinianisme Nor would I resume my former Argument and urge you that by holding the Popes infallibility you submit your selfe to that capitall and Mother Heresy by advantage whereof he may lead you at ease to believe vertue vice and vice vertue to believe Antichristianity Christianisme and Christianity Antichristian he may lead you to Socinianisme to Turcisme nay to the Divell himselfe if he have a mind to it But I would shew you that divers waies the Doctors of your Church doe the principall and proper work of the Socinians for the 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 Cardinall 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 Tanerus in Colloquio Ratesbon And also by Vega Possevin Wiekus 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 Cardinall Perron in his 3. Book 2. Chap. of his Reply to K. Iames Who is it that informs us that Origen who never was questioned for any error in this matter in or
servants and instruments alwaies prest and in readinesse to advance your designes and disabled wholly with mindes so qualified to prejudice or impeach them it is safe for you to put a crown on their head and a reed in their hands and to bow before them cry Haile King of the Iewes to pretend a great deale of esteem and respect reverence to them as here you doe But to little purpose is verball reverence without entire submission and syncere obedience and as our Saviour said of some so the Scripture could it speak I believe would say to you Why call ye mee Lord Lord and doe not that which I command you Cast away the vaine and arrogant pretence of Infallibility which makes your errors incurable Leave picturing God and worshipping him by pictures Teach not for Doctrine the Commandments of men Debarre not the Laity of the Testament of Christs blood Let your publique Prayers and Psalmes and Hymmes be in such language as is for the edification of the Assistants Take not from the Clergy that liberty of Marriage which Christ hath left them Doe not impose upon men that Humility of worshipping Angels which S. Paul condemnes Teach no more proper sacrifices of Christ but one Acknowledge them that dye in Christ to be blessed and to rest from their labours Acknowledge the Sacrament after consecration to be Bread and Wine as well as Christs body and blood Acknowledge the gift of continency without Marriage not to be given to all Let not the weapons of your warfare be carnall such as are Massacres Treasons Persecutions and in a word all meanes either violent or fraudulent These and other things which the Scripture commands you doe and then we shall willingly give you such Testimony as you deserve but till you doe so to talk of estimation respect and reverence to the Scripture is nothing else but talk 2 For neither is that true which you pretend That we possesse the Scripture from you or take it upon the integrity of your Custody but upon Vniversall Tradition of which you are but a little part Neither if it were true that Protestants acknowledged The integrity of it to have been guarded by your alone Custody were this any argument of your reverence towards them For first you might preserve them entire not for want of Will but of Power to corrupt them as it is a hard thing to poyson the Sea And then having prevailed so farre with men as either not to look at all into them or but only through such spectacles as you should please to make for them and to see nothing in them though as cleere as the sunne if it any way made against you you might keep them entire without any thought or care to conforme your doctrine to them or reforme it by them which were indeed to reverence the Scriptures but out of a perswasion that you could qualify them well enough with your glosses and interpretations and make them sufficiently conformable to your present Doctrine at least in their judgement who were preposses'd with this perswasion that your Church was to judge of the sense of Scripture not to be judged by it 3. For whereas you say No cause imaginable could avert your will from giving the function of supreme and sole Iudge to holy writ but that the thing is impossible and that by this meanes controversies are encreased and not ended you mean perhaps That you can or will imagine no other cause but these But sure there is little Reason you should measure other mens imaginations by your own who perhaps may be so clouded and vail'd with prejudice that you cannot or will not see that which is most manifest For what indifferent and unprejudicate man may not easily conceive another cause which I doe not say does but certainly may pervert your wills and avert your understandings from submitting your religion and Church to a tryall by Scripture I mean the great and apparent and unavoidable danger which by this meanes you would fall into of loosing the Opinion which men have of your Infallibility and consequently your power and authority over mens consciences and all that depends upon it so that though Diana of the Ephesians be cryed up yet it may be feared that with a great many among you though I censure or judge no man the other cause which wrought upon Demetrius and the Craftsmen may have with you also the more effectuall though more secret influence and that is that by this craft we have our living by this craft I mean of keeping your Proselytes from an indifferent tryall of your Religion by Scripture and making them yeeld up and captivate their judgement unto yours Yet had you only said de facto that no other cause did avert your own will from this but only these which you pretend out of Charity I should have believed you But seeing you speak not of your selfe but of all of your side whose hearts you cannot know and professe not only That there is no other cause but that No other is imaginable I could not let this passe without a censure As for the impossibility of Scriptures being the sole judge of Controversies that is the sole rule for man to Iudge them by for we mean nothing else you only affirme it without proofe as if the thing were evident of it selfe And therefore I conceiving the contrary to be more evident might well-content my selfe to deny it without refutation Yet I cannot but desire you to tell me If Scripture cannot be the Iudge of any Controversy how shall that touching the Church and the notes of it be determined And if it be the sole judge of this one why may it not of others Why not of All Those only excepted wherein the Scripture it selfe is the subject of the Question which cannot be determined but by naturall reason the only principle beside Scripture which is common to Christians 4 Then for the Imputation of increasing contentions and not ending them Scripture is innocent of it as also this opinion That controversies are to be decided by Scripture For if men did really and sincerely submit their judgements to Scripture and that only and would require no more of any man but to doe so it were impossible but that all controversies touching things necessary and very profitable should be ended and if others were continued or increased it were no matter 5 In the next wordes we have direct Boyes-play a thing given with one hand and taken away with the other an acknowledgement made in one line and retracted in the next We acknowledge say you Scripture to be a perfect rule for as much as a writing can be a Rule only wee deny that it excludes unwritten tradition A siâ— you should have said we acknowledge it to be as perfect a rule as a writing can be only we deny it to be as perfect a rule as a writing may be Either therefore you must revoke your acknowledgement or retract your
salvation and yet I cannot hope to be saved in that Church or who can conjoyn in one brain not crack't these assertions After due examination I judge the Roman errors not to be in themselues fundamentall or damnable and yet I judge that according to true reason it is damnable to hold them I say according to true reason For if you grant your conscience to be erroneous in judging that you cannot be saved in the Roman Church by reason of her errours there is no other remedy but that you must rectifie your erring conscience by your other judgement that her errours are not fundamentall nor damnable And this is no more Charity then you daily afford to such other Protestants as you term Brethren whom you cannot deny to be in some errors unlesse you will hold That of contradictory propositions both may be true and yet you doe not judge it damnable to liue in their Communion because you hold their errors not to be fundamentall You ought to know that according to the Doctrine of all Divines there is great difference between a speculatiue perswasion and a practicall dictamen of conscience and therefore although they had in speculation conceived the visible Church to erre in some doctrines of themselves not damnable yet with that speculatiue judgement they might and ought to haue entertained this practicall dictamen that for points not substantiall to faith they neither were bound nor lawfully could break the bond of Charity by breaking unity in Gods Church You say that hay and stubble and such unprofitable stuffe as are corruptions in points not fundamentall laid on the roofe destroyes not the house whilst the main pillars are standing on the foundation And you would think him a mad man who to be rid of such stuffe would set his house on fire that so he might walk in the light as you teach that Luther was obliged to forsake the house of God for an unnecessary light not without a combustion formidable to the whole Christiā world rather then beare with some errours which did not destroy the foundation of faith And as fo◠others who entred in at the breach first made by Luther they might and ought to haue guided their consciences by that most reasonable rule of Vincentius Lyrinensis delivered in these words Indeed it is a matter of great moment and both most profitable to be learned and necessary to be remembred and which we ought again and again to illustrate and inculcate with weighty heapes of examples that almost all Catholiques may know that they ought to receiue the Doctors with the Church and not forsake the faith of the Church with the Doctors And much lesse should they forsake the faith of the Church to follow Luther Calvin and such other Novelists Moreover though your first Reformers had conceived their own opinions to be true yet they might and ought to haue doubted whether they were certain because your selfe affirm that infallibility was not promised to any particular Persons or Churches And since in cases of uncertainties we are not to leave our Superiour nor cast off his obedience or publiquely oppose his decrees your Reformers might easily haue found a safe way to satisfie their zealous conscience without a publique breach especially if with this their uncertainty we call to mind the peaceable possession and prescription which by the confession of your own Brethren the Church and Pope of Rome did for many ages enjoy I wish you would examine the works of your Brethren by the words your selfe sets down to free S. Cyprian from Schisme every syllable of which words convinceth Luther and his Copartners to be guilty of that crime and sheweth in what manner they might with great ease and quietnesse haue rectified their consciences about the pretended errours of the Church S. Cyprian say you was a peaceable and modest man dissented from others in his iudgement but without any breach of Charity condemned no man much lesse any Church for the contrary opinion He believed his own opinion to be true but believed not that it was necessary and therefore did not proceed rashly and peremptorily to censure others but left them to their liberty Did your Reformers imitate this manner of proceeding Did they censure no man much lesse any Church S. Cyprian believed his own Opinion to be true but believed not that it was necessary and THEREFORE did not proceed rashly and peremptorily to censure others You belieue the points wherein Luther differs from us not to be fundamentall or necessary and why doe you not thence infer the like THEREFORE he should not haue proceeded to censure others In a word since their disagreement from us concerned only points which were not fundamentall they should haue believed that they might haue been deceived as well as the whole visible Church which you say may erre in such points and therefore their doctrines being not certainly true and certainly not necessary they could not giue sufficient cause to depart from the Communion of the Church 42 In other places you write so much as may serve us to proue that Luther and his followers ought to haue deposed and rectified their consciences As for example when you say When the Church hath declared her selfe in any matter of opinion or of Rites her declaration obliges all her children to peace and externall obedience Nor is it fit or lawfull for any private man to oppose his judgement to the publique as Luther and his fellows did He may offer his opinion to be considered of so he doe it with evidence or great probability of Scripture or reason and very modestly still containing himself within the dutifull respect which he oweth but if he will factiously advance his own conceits his own conceits yet grounded upon evidence of Scripture despise the Church so far as to cut of her Cōmunion he may be justly branded condemned for a Schismatique yea an Heretique also in some degree in foro exteriori though his opinion were true much more if it be false Could any man even for a Fee haue spoken more home to condemn your Predecessors of Schisme or Heresy Could they haue stronger Motives to oppose the doctrine of the Church and leave her Communion then evidence of Scripture And yet according to your own words they should haue answered rectified their conscience by your doctrine that though their opinion were true and grounded upon evidence of Scripture or reason yet it was not lawfull for any private man to oppose his iudgement to the publique which obligeth all Christians to peace externall obedience and if they cast off the Communion of the Church for maintaining their own Conceits they may be branded for Schismatiques and Heretiques in some degree in foro exteriori that is all other Christians ought so to esteem of them and why then are we accounted uncharitable for judging so of you and they also are obliged to behaue themselves
thereof Now your Church notwithstanding all this enervates and in a manner dissolves and abrogates many of these precepts teaching men that they are not lawes for all Christians but Counsells of perfection and matters of Supererrogation that a man shall doe well if he doe observe them but he shall not sinne if he observe them not That they are for them who ayme at high places in heaven who aspire with the two sonnes of Zebede to the right hand or to the left hand of Christ But if a man will be content barely to goe to heaven and to be a doore keeper in the house of God especially if he will be content to tast of Purgatory in the way he may obtaine it at any easier purchase Therefore the Religion of your Church is not so holy nor so good as the doctrine of Christ delivered in Scripture and therefore not so likely to come from the Fountaine of holinesse goodnesse 72 Lastly if I follow your Church for my Guide I shall doe all one as if I should follow a Company of blind men in a judgement of colours or in the choice of a way For every unconsidering man is blind in that which he does not consider Now what is your Church but a Company of unconsidering men who comfort themselves because they are a great company together but all of them either out of idlenesse refuse the trouble of a severe tryall of their Religion as if heaven were not worth it or out of superstition fear the event of such a tryall that they may be scrupled and staggered and disquieted by it and therefore for the most part doe it not at all Or if they doe it they doe it negligently and hypocritically and perfunctorily rather for the satisfaction of others then themselves but certainly without indifference without liberty of judgement without a resolution to doubt of it if upon examination the grounds of it prove uncertain or to leave it if they prove apparently false My own experience assures me that in this imputation I doe you no injury but it is very apparent to all men from your ranking doubting of any part of your Doctrine among mortall sinnes For from hence it followes that seeing every man must resolve that he will never commit mortall sinne that he must never examine the grounds of it at all for fear he should be mov'd to doubt or if he doe he must resolve that no motives be they never so strong shall move him to doubt but that with his will and resolution he will uphold himselfe in a firme belief of your Religon though his reason and his understanding faile him And seeing this is the condition of all those whom you esteem good Catholiques who can deny but you are a Company of men unwilling and afraid to understand least you should doe good That have eyes to see and will not see that have have not the love of truth which is only to be known by an indifferent tryall therefore deserve to be given over to strong delusions men that love darknesse more then light in a word that you are the blind leading the blind and what prudence there can be in following such Guides our Saviour hath taught us in saying If the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the ditch 73 There remaines unspoken to in this Section some places out of S. Austin and some sayings of Luther wherein he confesses that in the Papacy are many good things But the former I have already considered and return'd the argument grounded on them As for Luthers speeches I told you not long since that we follow no privat men and regard not much what he saies either against the Church of Rome or for it but what he proves He was a man of a vehement Spirit and very often what he took in hand he did not doe it but over doe it He that will justify all his speeches especially such as he wrote in heat of opposition I believe will have work enough Yet in these sentences though he overreach in the particulars yet what he saies in generall we confesse true and confesse with him that in the Papacy are many good things which have come from them to us but withall we say there are many bad neither doe wee think our selves bound in prudence either to reject the good with the bad or to retain the bad with the good but rather conceive it a high point of wisdome to separate between the pretious and the vile to sever the good from the bad and to put the good in vessels to be kept and to cast the bad away to try all things and to hold that which is good 74 Ad § 32. Your next and last argument against the faith of Protestants is because wanting Certainty and Prudence it must also want the fourth condition Supernaturality For that being a humane perswasion it is not in the essence of it supernaturall and being imprudent and rash it cannot proceed from Divine motion and so is not supernaturall in respect of the cause from which it proceedeth Ans. This litle discourse stands wholly upon what went before and therefore must fall together with it I have proved the Faith of Protestants as certain and as prudent as the faith of Papists and therefore if these be certain grounds of supernaturality our faith may have it as well as yours I would here furthermore be inform'd how you can assure us that your faith is not your perswasion or opinion for you make them all one that your Churches doctrine is true Or if you grant it your perswasion why is it not the perswasion of men and in respect of the subject of it an humane perswasion I desire also to know what sense there is in pretending that your perswasion is not in regard of the object only and cause of it but in nature or essence of it supernaturall Lastly whereas you say that being imprudent it cannot come from divine motion certainly by this reason all they that believe your own Religion and cannot give a wise and sufficient reason for it as millions amongst you cannot must be condemn'd to have no supernaturall faith or if not then without question nothing can hinder but that the imprudent faith of Protestants may proceed from divine motion as well as the imprudent faith of Papists 75 And thus having weighed your whole discourse and found it altogether lighter then vanity why should I not invert your conclusion and say Seeing you have not proved that whosoever erres against any one point of Faith looseth all divine Faith nor that any error whatsoever concerning that which by the Parties litigant may be esteem'd a matter of faith is a grievous sinne it followes not at all that when two men hold different doctrines concerning Religion that but one can be saved Not that I deny but that the sentence of S. Chrysost. with which you conclude this Chapt. may in a good sense be true for oftimes by
Of which ranke are those only which constitute and make up the Covenant between God and Man in Christ and then such as are necessary to be beleived not in themselues but only by accident because they were written Of which rank are many matters of History of Prophecy of mystery of Policy of Oeconomie such like which are evidently not intrinsecall to the Covenant Now to sever exactly punctually these Verities one trom the other what is necessary in it selfe antecedently to the writing from what is but only profitable in it selfe and necessary only because written is a businesse of extreame great difficultie and extreame little necessitie For first he that will goe about to distinguish especially in the Story of our Saviour what was written because it was profitable from what was written because necessary shall find an intricate peece of businesse of it almost impossible that he should be certaine he hath done it when he hath done it And then it is apparently unnecessary to goe about it seeing he that beleiues all certainly belieues all that is necessary And he that doth not beleiue all I meane all the undoubted parts of the undoubted Books of Scripture can hardly belieue any neither haue we reason to beleiue he doth so So that that Protestants giue you not a Catalogue of Fundamentalls it is not from Tergiversation as you suspect who for want of Charitie to them alwaies suspect the worst but from Wisdome and Necessity For they may very easily erre in doing it because though all which is necessary be plaine in Scripture yet all which is plaine is not therefore written because it was necessary For what greater necessity was there that I should know S. Paul left his Cloak at Troas then those Worlds of Miracles which our Saviour did which were never written And when they had done it it had been to no purpose There being as matters now stand as great necessitie of believing those truths of Scripture which are not Fundamentall as those that are You see then what reason we haue to decline this hard labour which you a rigid Taske-master haue here put upon us Yet insteed of giving you a Catalogue of Fundamentalls with which I dare say you are resolu'd before it come never to be satisfied I will say that to you which if you please may doe you as much service and this it is That it is sufficient for any mans salvation that he belieue the Scripture That he endeavour to beleiue it in the true sense of it as farre as concernes his dutie And that he conforme his life unto it either by Obedience or Repentance Hee that does so and all Protestants according to the Dictamen of their Religion should doe so may be secure that he cannot erre fundamentally And they that doe so cannot differ in Fundamentals So that notwithstanding their differences your presumption the same Heaven may receiue them All. 28 To the twentieth Your tenth last request is to know distinctly what is the doctrine of the Protestant English Church in these points and what my private opinion Which shall be satisfied when the Church of England hath expressed her selfe in them or when you haue told us what is the doctrine of your Church in the Question of Predetermination or the Immaculate Conception 29 To the 21 22. These answers I hope in the judgement of indifferent men are satisfactory to your Questions though not to you For I haue either answer'd them or given you a reason why I haue not Neither for ought I can see haue I flitted from things considered in their owne nature to accidentall or rare Circumstances But told you my opinion plainely what I thought of your Errours in themselues and what as they were qualified or malignified with good or bad circumstances Though I must tell you truly that I see no reason the Question being of the damnablenesse of Errour why you should esteeme ignorance incapacitie want of meanes to be instructed accidentall and rare Circumstances As if knowledge capacitie having meanes of Instruction concerning the truth of your Religion or ours were not as rare unusuall in the adverse part of either as Ignorance Incapacitie and want of meanes of instruction Especially how erroneous Conscience can be a rare thing in those that erre or how unerring Conscience is not much more rare I am not able to apprehend So that to consider men of different Religions the subject of this Contoversie in their owne nature and without circumstances must be to consider them neither as ignorant nor as knowing neither as having nor as wanting meanes of Instruction neither as with Capacity nor without it neither with erroneous nor yet with unerring conscience And then what judgement can you pronounce of them all the goodnesse and badnesse of an Action depending on the Circumstances Ought not a Iudge being to giue sentence of an Action to consider all the Circumstances of it or is it possible he should judge rightly that does not so Neither is it to purpose That Circumstances being various cannot be well comprehended under any generall rule For though under any generall rule they cannot yet under many generall rules they may be comprehended The Question here is you say whether men of different Religions may be saved Now the subject of this Question is an ambiguous terme and may be determined and invested with diverse and contrary Circumstances and accordingly contrary judgements are to be given of it And who then can be offended with D. Potter for distinguishing before he defines the want whereof is the cheife thing that makes defining dangerous Who can finde fault with him for saying If through want of meanes of instruction incapacitie invincible or probable ignorance a man dye in errour he may be saved But if he be negligent in seeking Truth unwilling to find it either doth see it and will not or might see it and will not that his case is dangerous without repentance desperate This is all that D. Potter saies neither rashly damning all that are of a different opinion from him not securing any that are in matter of Religion sinfully that is willingly erroneous The Author of this Reply I will abide by it saies the very same thing neither can I see what adversary he hath in the maine Question but his owne shaddow and yet I know not out of what frowardnesse findes fault with D. Potter for affirming that which himselfe affirmes and to cloude the matter whereas the Question is whether men by ignorance dying in errour may be saved would haue them considered neither as erring nor ignorant And when the question is whether The errors of Papists bee damnable to which we answer That to them that doe or might knowe them to be errours they are damnable to them that doe not they are not He tels us that this is to change the state of the Question whereas indeed it is to state the Question and free it
ignorant of the falshood of it or dyed with contrition And then considering that you cannot know whether or no all things considered they were convinc'd sufficiently of the truth of your Religion and the falshood of their own you are oblig'd by Charity to judge the best and hope they are not Considering again that notwithstanding their Errors they may dye with contrition that it is no way improbable that they doe so the contrary you cannot be certain of You are bound in Charity to judge and hope they doe so Considering thirdly and lastly that if they dye not with Contrition yet it is very probable they may dye with Attritiō that this pretence of yours that Contrition will serve without actuall Confession but Attrition will not is but a nicety or phancy or rather to give it the true name a Device of your own to serve ends and purposes God having no where declared himselfe but that wheresoever he will accept of that repentance which you are pleased to call Contrition he will accept of that which you call Attrition For though he like best the bright flaming holocaust of Love yet he rejects not he quenches not the smoaking flaxe of that repentance if it be true and effectuall which proceeds from hope and fear These things I say considered unlesse you will have the Charity of your doctrine rise up in judgement against your uncharitable practise you must not only not be peremptory in damning Protestants but you must hope well of their Salvation and out of this hope you must doe for them as well as others those as you conceive Charitable offices of Praying giving Almes and offering Sacrifice which usually you doe for those of whose Salvation you are well and charitably perswaded for I believe you will never conceive so well of Protestants as to assure your selves they goe directly to heaven These things whē you doe I shall believe you think as charitably as you speak But untill then as he said in the Comedy Quid verba audiam cum facta videam so may I say to you Quid verba audiam cum facta non videam To what purpose should you give us charitable words which presently you retract again by denying us your charitable actions And as these things you must doe if you will stand to and make good this pretended Charity so must I tell you again and again that one thing you must not doe I mean you must not affright poore people out of their Religion with telling them that by the confession of both sides your way is safe but in your judgement ours undoubtedly damnable Seeing neither you deny Salvation to Protestants dying with repentance nor we promise it to you if ye dye without it For to deal plainly with you I know no Protestant that hath any other hope of your salvation but upon these grounds that unaffected ignorance may excuse you or true repentance obtain pardon for you neither doe the heavy censures which Protestants you say passe upon your errors any way hinder but they may hope as well of you upon repentance as I doe For the fierce doctrine which God knowes who teaches that Christ for many ages before Luther had no visible Church upon earth will be mild enough if you conceive them to mean as perhaps they doe by no visible Church none pure and free from corruptions which in your judgement is all one with no Church But the truth is the corruption of the Church and the destruction of it is not all one For if a particular man or Church may as you confesse they may hold some particular Errors and yet be a member of the Church universall why may not the Church hold some universall Error and yet be still the Church especially seeing you say it is nothing but opposing the doctrine of the Church that makes an error damnable and it is impossible that the Church should oppose the Church I mean that the present Church should oppose it selfe And then for the English Protestants though they censure your Errors deeply yet by your favour with their deepest censures it may well consist that invincible ignorance may excuse you from damnation for them For you your selfe confesse that ignorance may excuse Errors even in Fundamentall Articles of faith so that a man so erring shall not offend at all in such his ignorance or error they are your own words p. 19. And againe which their heaviest censures it may well consist that your Errors though in themselves damnable yet may prove not damning to you if you dye with true repentance for all your sinnes known and unknown 5 Thus much Charity therefore if you stand to what you have said is interchangeably granted by each Side to the other that Neither Religion is so fatally destructive but that by ignorance or repentance salvation may be had on both Sides though with a difference that keeps Papists still on the more uncharitable side For whereas we conceive a lower degree of repentance that which they call Attrition if it be true and effectuall and convert the heart of the penitent will serve in them They pretend even this Author which is most charitable towards us that without Contrition there is no hope for us But though Protestants may not obtain this purchase at so easy a rare as Papists yet even Papists being Iudges they may obtain it and though there is no entrance for them but at the only doore of Contrition yet they may enter Heaven is not inaccessible to them Their errors are no such impenetrable Istmus's between them and Salvation but that Contrition may make a way through them All their Schisme and Heresy is no such fatall poison but that if a man ioyne with it the Antidote of a generall repentance he may dye in it and live for ever Thus much then being acknowledged I appeal to any indifferent reader whether C. M. be not by his Hyperaspist forsaken in the plain field and the point in question granted to D. Potter viz. That Protestancy even without a particular repentance is not destructive of Salvation so that all the Controversy remaining now is not simply whether Protestancy unrepented destroies salvation as it was at first proposed but Whether Protestancy in it selfe that is abstracting from ignorance and contrition destroies Salvation So that as a foolish fellow who gave a Knight the Lye desiring withall leave of him to set his Knighthood aside was answered by him that he would not suffer any thing to be set aside that belonged unto him So might we justly take it amisse that conceiving as you doe ignorance and repentance such necessary things for us you are not more willing to consider us with them then without them For my part such is my charity to you that considering what great necessity You have as much as any Christian society in the World that these sanctuaries of Ignorance and Repentance should alwaies stand open I can very hardly perswade my selfe
know it to be so because the Church saies so which is Infallible If I aske what meane You by your Church You can tell me nothing but the company of Christians which adhere to the Pope I demaund then lastly Why should I beleive this company to be the infallible Propounder of Divine Revelation And then you tell me that there are many Motives to induce a man to this beleife But are these Motives lastly infallible No say you but very credible Well let them passe for such because now we have not leasure to examine them Yet me thinks seeing the Motives to believe the Churches infallibility are only very credible it should also be but as credible that your Church is Infallible and as credible and no more perhaps somewhat lesse that her proposals particularly Transubstantiation are Divine Revelations And me thinks You should require only a Morall and modest assent to them and not a Divine as you call it and infallible Faith But then of these Motives to the Churches Infallibility I hope you will give us leave to consider and judge whether they be indeed Motives and sufficient or whether they be not Motives at all or not sufficient or whether these Motives or inducements to your Church be not impeached and opposed with Compulsives and enforcements from it or lastly whether these Motives which You use be not indeed only Motives to Christianity and not to Popery giue me leave for distinction sake to call your Religion so If we may not judge of these things how can my judgment be moved with that which comes not within its cognizance If I may then at least I am to be a Iudge of all these Controversies 1. Whether every one of these Motives be indeed a Motive to any Church 2. If to some whether to Yours 3. If to Yours whether sufficient or insufficient 4. Whether other Societies haue not as many and as great Motives to draw me to them 5. Whether I haue not greater reason to beleive you doe erre then that you cannot And now Sir I pray let me trouble You with a few more Questions Am I a sufficient Iudge of these Controversies or no If of these why shall I stay here why not of others Why not of all Nay doth not the true examining of these few containe and lay upon me the examination of all What other Motives to your Church have you but your Notes of it Bellarmine gives some 14. or 15. And one of these fifteene containes in it the examination of all controversies and not only so but of all uncontroverted Doctrines For how shall I or can I know the Church of Romes conformity with the Ancient Church unlesse I know first what the Ancient Church hid hold and then what the Church of Rome doth hold and lastly whether they be conformable or if in my judgment they seeme not conformable I am then to think the Church of Rome not to be the Church for want of the Note which she pretends is proper and perpetuall to it So that for ought I can see Iudges we are and must be of all sides every one for himselfe and God for us all 155 Ad § 26. I answere This assertion that Scripture alone is Iudge of all Controversies in Faith if it be taken properly is neither a Fundamentall nor Vnfundamentall point of Faith nor no point of Faith at all but a plaine falshood It is not a Iudge of Controversies but a Rule to Iudge them by and that not an absolutly perfect Rule but as perfect as a written Rule can be which must alwayes need something else which is either evidently true or evidently credible to give attestation to it and that in this case is Vniversall Tradition So that Vniversall Tradition is the Rule to judge all Controversies by But then because nothing besides Scripture comes to us with as full a streame of Tradition as Scripture Scripture alone and no unwritten Doctrine nor no Infallibility of any Church having attestation from Tradition truely Vniversall for this reason we conceive as the Apostles persons while they were liuing were the only Iudges of controversies so their Writings now they are dead are the only Rule for us to judge them by There being nothing unwritten which can goe in upon halfe so faire cards for the title of Apostolike Tradition as these things which by the confession of both Sides are not so I mean the doctrine of the Millenaries and of the necessity of the Eucharist for Infants 156 Yet when we say the Scripture is the only Rule to judge all Controversies by me thinks you should easily conceiue that wee would be understood of all those that are possible to be judg'd by Scripture and of those that arise among such as believe the Scripture For if I had a controversie with an Atheist whether there were a God or no I would not say that the Scripture were a Rule to judge this by seeing that doubting whether there be a God or no he must needs doubt whether the Scripture be the word of God or if hee does not hee grants the Question and is not the man we speak of So likewise if I had a controversie about the Truth of Christ with a lew it would be vainly done of me should I presse him which the Authority of the new Testament which he believes not untill out of some principles common to us both I had persuaded him that it is the Word of God The New Testament therefore while he remaines a Iew would not be a fit Rule to decide this Controversie In as much as that which is doubted of it selfe is not fit to determine other doubts So likewise if there were any that believed Christian Religion and yet believed not the Bible to be the Word of God though they believed the matter of it to be true which is no impossible supposition for I may believe a book of S. Austines to containe nothing but the Truth of God yet not to haue been inspired by God himselfe against such men therefore there were no disputing out of the Bible because nothing in question can be a proof to it selfe When therefore we say the Scripture is a sufficient meanes to determine all controversies we say not this either to Atheists Iewes Turks or such Christians if there be any such as believe not Scripture to be the word of God But among such men only as are already agreed upon this That the Scripture is the Word of God we say all controversies that arise about Faith are either not at all decidable consequently not necessary to be believed one way or other or they may be determined by Scripture In a Word That all things necessary to be believed are evidently contain'd in Scripture and what is not there evidently contained cannot be necessary to be believed And our reason hereof is convincing because nothing can challenge our beliefe but what hath descended to us from Christ by Originall and Vniversall
Tradition Now nothing but Scripture hath thus descended to us Therefore nothing but Scripture can challenge our beliefe Now then to come up closer to you and to answer to your Question not as you put it but as you should haue put it I say That this position Scripture alone is the rule whereby they which belieue it to be Gods Word are to judge all Controversies in Faith is no fundameÌ„tall point Though not for your Reasons For your first and strongest reason you see is plainly voided and cut off by my stating of the Question as I haue done and supposing in it that the parties at variance are agreed about this That the Scripture is the word of God and consequently that this is none of their Controversies To your second That Controversies cannot be ended without some living Authority We haue said already that necessary Controversies may be are decided And if they be not ended this is not through defect of the Rule but through the default of Men. And for these that cannot thus be ended it is not necessary they should be ended For if God did require the ending of them he would have provided some certain meanes for the ending of them And to your Third I say that your pretence of using these meanes is but hypocriticall for you use them with prejudice and with a setled resolution not to believe any thing which these meanes happily may suggest into you if it any way crosse your pre-conceav'd persuasion of your Churches infallibility You give not your selves liberty of judgement in the use of them nor suffer your selves to bee led by them to the Truth to which they would lead you would you but be as willing to believe this consequence Our Church doth oppose Scripture therefore it doth erre therefore it is not Infallible as you are resolute to believe this The Church is infallible therefore it doth not erre and therefore it doth not oppose Scripture though it seem to doe so never so plainly 157 You pray but it is not that God would bring you to the true Religion but that he would confirm you in your own You conferre places but it is that you may confirm or colour over with plausible disguises your erroneous doctrine not that you may judge of them forsake them if there be reason for it You consult the Originalls but you regard them not when they make against your Doctrine or Translation 158 You adde not only the Authority but the Infallibility not of Gods Church but of the Roman a very corrupt and degenerous part of it whereof D. Potter never confessed that it cannot erre damnably And which being a company made up of particular men can afford you no help but the industry learning and wit of private men and that these helps may not help you out of your errour tell you that you must make use of none of all these to discover any errour in the Church but only to maintaine her impossibility or erring And lastly D. Potter assures himselfe that your Doctrine and practises are damnable enough in themselves Only he hopes and spes est rei incertae nomen he hopes I say that the Truths which you retain especially the necessity of repentance and faith in Christ will bee as an antidote to you against the errours which you maintain and that your superstructions may burne yet they amongst you Qui sequun tur Absalonem in simplicitate cor dis may be saved yet so as by fire Yet his thinking so is no reason for you or me to think so unlesse you suppose him infallible and if you doe why doe you write against him 159 Notwithstanding though not for these reasons yet for others I conceive this Doctrine not Fundamentall Because if a man should believe Christian Religion wholly and entirely and live according to it such a man though he should not know or not believe the Scripture to be a Rule of Faith no nor to be the word of God my opinion is he may be saved and my reason is because he performes the entire condition of the new Covenant which is that we believe the matter of the Gospell and not that it is contained in these or these Bookes So that the Bookes of Scripture are not so much the objects of our faith as the instruments of conveying it to our understanding and not so much of the being of the Christian Doctrine as requisite to the well being of it Irenaeus tels us as M. K. acknowledgeth of some barbarous Nations that believed the Doctrine of Christ and yet believed not the Scripture to be the word of God for they never heard of it and Faith comes by hearing But these barbarous people might be saved therefore men might be saved without believing the Scripture to be the word of God much more without believing it to be a Rule and a perfect Rule of Faith Neither doubt I but if the bookes of Scripture had been proposed to them by the other parts of the Church where they had been before received and had been doubted of or even rejected by those barbarous nations but still by the bare beliefe and practise of Christianity they might be saved God requiring of us under pain of damnation only to believe the verities therein contained and not the divine Authority of the bookes wherein they are contained Not but that it were now very strange and unreasonable if a man should belieue the matter of these bookes and not the Authority of the bookes and therefore if a man should professe the not believing of these I should have reason to fear he did not believe that But there is not alwaies an equall necessity for the belief of those things for the belief whereof there is an equall reason We have I believe as great reason to believe there was such a man as Henry the eight K. of England as that Iesus Christ suffered under Pontius Pilaâ—â— yet this is necessary to be believed and that is not so So that if any man should doubt of or disbelieve that it were most unreasonably done of of him yet it were no mortall sinne nor no sinne 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 performe the whole will of the dead should fully satisfy 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 discourse whether it be rationall and concluding or no I submit to better judgement But sure I am that the corollary which you draw from this position that this point is not Fundamentaâ— is very inconsequent that is that we are uncertain of the truth
saying I answer that this is an inconsiderate speech and unworthy so great a Father But let us conclude with S. Augustine that the Church cannot approue any errour against faith or good manners The Church saith he being Placed between much chaffe and cockle doth tollerate many things but yet she doth not approue nor dissemble nor doe those things which are against faith or good life 17 And as I haue proved that Protestants according to their grounds cannot yeeld infallibls assent to the Church in any one point so by the same reason I prove that they cannot rely upon Scripture it selfe in any one point of faith Not in points of lesser moment or not fundamentall because in such points the Catholique Church according to D. Potter and much more any Protestant may erre and thinke it is contained in Scripture when it is not Not in points fundamentall because they must first know what points be fundamentall before they can bee assured that they cannot erre in understanding the Scripture and consequently independantly of Scripture they must foreknow all fundamentall points of faith and therefore they doe not indeed rely upon Scripture either for fundamentall or not fundamentall points 18 Besides I mainly urge D. Potter and other Protestants that they tell us of certain points which they call fundamentall and we cannot wrest from them a list in particular of such points without which no man can tell whether or no he erre in points fundamentall and be capable of salvation And which is most lamentable insteed of giving us such a Catalogue they fall to wrangle among themselves about the making of it 19 Calvin holds the Popes Primacy Invocation of Saints Free will and such like to bee fundamentall errours overthrowing the Gospell Others are not of his minde as Melancthou who saith in the opinion of himselfe and other his Brethren That the Monarchy of the Bishop of Rome is of use or profit to this end that Consent of Doctrine may be retained An agreement therefore may easily be established in this Article of the Popes Primacy if other Articles could be agreed upon If the Popes Primacy be a meanes that consent of Doctrine may be retained first submit to it and other articles will be easily agreed upon Luther also saith of the Popes Primacy it may be borne withall And why then O Luther did you not beare with it And how can you and your followers be excused from damnable Schisme who chose rather to devide Gods Church then to beare with that which you confesse may be borne withall But let us goe forward That the doctrine of freewill Prayer for the dead worshipping of Images Woâ—ship and Invocation of Saints Reall presence Transubstantiation Receaving under one kinde Satisfaction and Ment of works and the Masse be not fundamentall Errours is taught respective by divers Protestants carefully alleaged in the Protestants Apologie c. as namely by Perkins Cartwright Frith Fulle Spark Goade Luther Reynolds Whitaker Tindall Franci Iohnson with others Contrary to these is the Confession of the Christian faith so called by Protestants which I mentioned heretofore wherein we are damned unto unquenchable fire for the doctrine of Masse Prayer to Saints and for the dead Freewill Presence at Idol-service Mans merit with such like Iustification by faith alone is by some Protestants affirmed to be the soule of the Church The only principall origen of Salvation of all other points of doctrine the chiefest and weightiest Which yet as we haue seen is contrary to other Protestants who teach that meâ— of good works is not a fundamentall Errour yea divers Protestants defend merit of good works as may bee seen in Breereley One would think that the Kings Supremacy for which some blessed men lost their lives was once among Protestants held for a Capitall point but now D. Andrewes late of Winchester in his book against Bellarmime tells us that it is sufficient to reckon it among true Doctrines And Woâ—ton denies that Protestants hold the Kings Supremacy to be an essentiall point of faith O freedome of the new Gospell Hold with Catholiques the Pope or with Protestants the King or with Puritanes neither Pope nor King to be Head of the Church all is one you may be saved Some as Castalio and the whole Sect of the Academicall Protestants hold that doctrines about the Supper Baptisme the state and office of Christ how he is one with his Father the Trinity Predestination and divers other such questions are not necessary to Salvation And that you may observe how ungrounded and partiall their Assertions be Perkins teacheth that the Reall presence of our Saviours Body in the Sacrament as it is believed by Catholiques is a fundamentall errour and yet affirmeth the Consubstantiation of Lutherans not to be such notwithstanding that divers chiefe Lutherans to their Consubstantiation joyne the prodigious Heresie of Vbiquitation D. Vsher in his Sermon of the Vnity of the Catholique faith grants Salvation to the Aethiopians who yet with Christian Baptisme joyne Circumcision D. Potter cites the doctrine of some whom he termeth men of great learning and judgement that all who professe to loue and honour IES VS CHRIST are in the visible Christian Church and by Catholiques to be reputed Brethren One of these men of great learning and judgement is Thomas Morton by D. Potter cited in his Margent whose love and honour to Iesus-Christ you may perceive by his saying that the Churches of Arians who denied our Saviour Christ to be God are to be accounted the Church of God bâ—cause they doe hold the foundation of the Gospell which is Faith in Iesus-Christ the Sonne of God and Saviour of the world And which is more it seemeth by these charitable men that for being a member of the Church it is not necessary to believe one only God For D. Potter among the arguments to proue Hookers and Mortons opinion brings this The people of the ten Tribes after their defection notwithstanding their grosse corruptions Idolatry remained still a true Church We may also as it seemeth by these mens reasoning deny the Resurrection and yet be members of the true Chruch For a learned man saith D. Potter in behalfe of Hookers and Mortons opinion was anciently made a Bishop of the Catholique Church though he did professedly doubt of the last Resurreâ—tion of our bodies Deere Saviour What times doe we behold If one may be a member of the true Church and yet deny the Trinity of the Persons the Godhead of our Saviour the necessity of Baptisme if we may use Circumcision and with the worship of God joyne Idolatry wherein doe we differ from Turks and Iews or rather are we not worse then eyther of them If they who deny our Saviours divinity might be accounted the Church of God how will they deny that favour to those ancient Heretiques who denied our Saviours true humanity and so
Paul and applied by him to our Saviour He hath put all things under his feet mentions no exception yet S. Paul tels us not only that it is true or certain but it is manifest that He is excepted which did put all things under him 84 But your interpretation is better then D. Potters because it is literall I answer His is Literall as well as yours and you are mistaken if you think a restrained sense may not be a literall sense for to Restrained Literall is not opposed but unlimited or absolute and to Literall is not oppos'd Restrained but Figuratiue 85 Whereas you say D. Potters Brethren reiecting his limitation restrain the mentioned Texts to the Apostles implying hereby a contrariety between them and him I answer So does D. Potter restrain all of them which he speaks of in the pages by you quoted to the Apostles in the direct and primary sense of the words Though he tels you there the words in a more restrained sense are true being understood of the Church Vniversall 86 As for your pretence That to finde the meaning of those places you conferre divers Texts you consult Originals you examin Translations and use all the meanes by Protestants appointed I haue told you before that all this is vain and hypocriticall if as your manner your doctrine is you giue not your selfe liberty of judgement in the use of these meanes if you make not your selves Iudges of but only Advocats for the doctrine of your Church refusing to see what these meanes shew you if it any way make against the doctrine of your Church though it be as cleare as the light at noone Remoue prejudice Even the ballance and hold it even make it indifferent to you which way you goe to heaven so you goe the true which Religion be true so you be of it then use the meanes and pray for Gods assistance and as sure as God is true you shall be lead into all necessary Truth 87 Whereas you say you neither doe nor haue any possible meanes to agree as long as you are left to your selues The first is very true That while you differ you doe not agree But for the second That you haue no possible means of agreement as long as you are left to your selues i. e. to your own reasons and judgement this sure is very false neither doe you offer any proofe of it unlesse you intended this that you doe not agree for a proof that you cannot which sure is no good consequence not halfe so good as this which I oppose against it D. Potter and I by the use of these meanes by you mentioned doe agree concerning the sense of these places therefore there is a possible meanes of agreement and therefore you also if you would use the same meanes with the same minds might agree so farre as it is necessary and it is not necessary that you should agree further Or if there bee no possible meanes to agree about the sense of these Texts whilst wee are left to our selves then sure it is impossible that we should agree in your sense of them which was That the Church is universally infallible For if it were possible for us to agree in this sense of them then it were possible for us to agree And why then said you of the selfe same Texts but in the page next before These words seem cleerly enough to proue that the Church is Vniversally infallible A strange forgetfulnesse that the same man almost in the same breath should say of the same words They seem cleerly enough to proue such a conclusion true yet that three indifferent men all presum'd to be lovers of Truth and industrious searchers of it should haue no possible meanes while they follow their own reason to agree in the Truth of this Conclusion 88 Whereas you say that it were great impiety to imagine that God the lover of Soules hath left no certaine infallible meanes to decide both this and all other differences arising about the interpretation of Scripture or upon any other occasion I desire you to take heed you commit not an impiety in making more impieties then Gods Commandements make Certainly God is no way oblig'd either by his promise or his Loue to giue us all things that we may imagine would be convenient for us as formerly I haue proved at large It is sufficient that he denies us nothing necessary to Salvation Deus non deficit in necessariis nec redundat in superfluis So D. Stapleton But that the ending of all Controversies or having a certain meanes of ending them is necessary to Salvation that you haue often said and suppos'd but never proved though it be the main pillar of your whole discourse So little care you take how slight your Foundations are so your building make a faire shew And as little care how you commit those faults your selfe which you condemne in others For you here charge them with great impiety who imagine that God the lover of Soules hath left no infallible meanes to determine all differences arising about the interpretation of Scripture or upon any other occasion And yet afterwards being demanded by D. Potter why the Questions between the Iesuits Dominicans remain undetermined You returne him this crosse interrogatory Who hath assured you that the point wherein these learned men differ is a revealed Truth or capable of definition or is not rather by plain Scripture indeterminable or by any Rule of faith So then when you say it were great impiety to imagine that God hath not left infallible meanes to decide all differences I may answer It seemes you doe not believe your selfe For in this controversie which is of as high consequence as any can be you seem to be doubtfull whether there be any meanes to determin it On the other side when you aske D. Potter who assured him that there it any meanes to determine this Controversie I answer for him that you have in calling it a great impiety to imagine that there is not some infallible meanes to decide this and all other differences arising about the Interpretation of Scripture or upon any other occasion For what trick you can devise to shew that this difference between the Dominicans and Iesuits which includes a difference about the sense of many Texts of Scripture many other matters of moment was not included under this and all other differences I cannot imagine Yet if you can finde out any thus much at least we shall gain by it that generall speeches are not alwaies to be understood generally but sometimes with exceptions and limitations 89 But if there be any infallible meanes to decide all differences I beseech you name them You say it is to consult and heare Gods Visible Church with submissive acknowledgment of her Infallibility But suppose the difference be as here it is whether your Church be infalliâ—le what shall decide that If you would say as you should dot Scripture and
be particularly known I mean known to be divine Revelations and distinctly to be believed And of this latter sort of speculative divine Verities D. Potter affirmed that the Apostles Creed was a sufficient summary yet he affirmed it not as his own opinion but as the doctrine of the ancient Fathers and your own Doctors And besides he affirmed it not as absolutely certain but very probable 5 In brief all that he saies is this It is very probable that according to the judgement of the Roman Doctors and the Ancient Fathers the Apostles Creed is to be esteemed a sufficient summary of all those doctrines which being meerely Credenda and not Agenda all men are ordinarily under pain of Damnation bound particularly to believe 6 Now this assertion you say is neither pertinent to the question in hand nor in it selfe true Your Reasons to prove it impertinent put into forme and divested of impertinencies are these 1. Because the question was not what points were necessary to be explicitly believed but what points were necessary not to be disbelieved after sufficient proposall And therefore to give a Catalogue of points necessary to be explicitly believed is impertinent 7 Secondly because errours may be damnable though the contrary truths be not of themselves fundamentall as that Pontius Pilate was our Saviours Iudge is not in it selfe a Fundamentall truth â—et to believe the contrary were a damnable errour And therefore to give a Catalogue of Truths in themselves fundamentall is no pertinent satisfaction to this demand what errors are damnable 8 Thirdly because if the Church be not Vniversally infallible wee cannot ground any certainty upon the Creed which we must receive upon the Credit of the Church and if the Church be Vniversally infallible it is damnable to oppose her declaration in any thing though not contained in the Creed 9 Fourthly Because not to believe the Articles of the Creed in the true sense is damnable therefore it is frivolous to say the Creed containes all Fundamentalls without specifying in what sense the Articles of it are Fundamentall 10 Fiftly because the Apostles Creed as D. Potter himselfe confesses was not a sufficient Catalogue till it was explained by the first Councell nor then untill it was declared in the second c. by occasion of emergent Heresies Therefore now also as new Heresies may arise it will need particular explanation and so is not yet nor ever will be a compleat Catalogue of Fundamentalls 11 Now to the first of these objections I say Frist that your distinction between points necessary to be believed and necessary not to be disbelieved is more subtill then sound a distinction without a difference There being no point necessary to be believed which is not necessary not to be disbelieved Nor no point to any man at any time in any circumstances necessary not to be disbelieved but it is to the same man at the same time in the same circumstances necessary to be believed Yet that which I believe you would have said I acknowledge true that many points which are not necessary to be believed absolutely are yet necessary to be believed upon a supposition that they are known to be revealed by God that is become then necessary to be believed when they are known to be Divine Revelations But then I must needs say you doe very strangely in saying that the question was what points might lawfully be disbelieved after sufficient Proposition that they are divine Revelations You affirme that none may and so does D. Potter and with him all Protestants and all Christians And how then is this the question Who ever said or thought that of Divine Revelations known to be so some might safely and lawfully be rejected and disbelieved under pretence that they are not Fundamentall Which of us ever taught that it was not damnable either to deny or so much as doubt of the Truth of any thing whereof we either know or believe that God hath revealed it What Protestant ever taught that it was not damnable either to give God the lye or to call his Veracity into question Yet you say The demand of Charity mistaken was it was most reasonable that a list of FundameÌ„talls should be given the denyall whereof destroies Salvation whereas the deniall of other points may stand with Salvation although both kinds be equally proposed as revealed by God 12 Let the Reader peruse Charity Mistaken he shall find that this qualification although both kinds of points be equally proposed as revealed by God is your addition and no part of the demand And if it had it had been most unreasonable seeing he and you know well enough that though we doe not presently without examination fall down and worship all your Churches proposals as divine Revelations yet we make no such distinction of known divine Revelations as if some only of them were necessary to be believed and the rest might safely be rejected So that to demand a particular minute Catalogue of all points that may not be disbelieved after sufficient Proposition is indeed to demaund a Catalogue of all points that are or may be in as much as none may be disbelieved after sufficient Proposition that it is a divine Revelation At least it is to desire us First to transcribe into this catalogue every Text of the whole Bible Secondly to set down distinctly those innumerous millions of negative and positive consequences which may be evidently deduced from it For these we say God hath revealed And indeed you are not ashamed in plain tearmes to require this of us For having first told us that the demand was what points were necessary not to be disbelieved after sufficient proposition that they are Divine Truths you come to say Certainly the Creed containes not all these And this you prove by asking how many Truths are thero in holy Scripture not contained in the Creed which we are not bound 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 So that in requiring a particular Catalogue of all points not to be disbelieved after sufficient Proposall you require us to set you down all points contained in Scripture or evidently deducible from it And yet this you are pleas'd to call a reasonable nay a most reasonable Demand whereas having ingaged your selfe to give a Catalogue of your Fundamentalls you conceive your ingagement very well satisfyed by saying all is Fundamentall which the Church proposes without going about to give us an endlesse Inventory of her Proposalls And therefore from us in stead of a perfect particular of Divine Revelations of all sorts of which with a lesse hyperbole then S. Iohn useth we might say If they were to be written the world would not hold the books that must be written me thinkes you should accept of this generall All Divine Revelations are true and to be believed 13 The very truth is
left them is and hath been the only fountaine of all the Schismes of the Church and that which makes them continue the common incendiary of Christendome and that which as I said before teares into pieces not the coat but the bowels and members of Christ Ridente Turcâ nec dolente Iudae◠Take away these Wals of separation and all will quickly be one Take away this Persecuting Burning Cursing Damning of men for not subscribing to the words of men as the words of God Require of Christians only to believe Christ and to call no man master but him only Let those leave claiming Infallibility that have no title to it and let them that in their words disclaime it disclaime it likewise in their actions In a word take away tyranny which is the Divels instrument to support errours and superstitions and impieties in the severall parts of the world which could not otherwise long withstand the power of Truth I say take away tyranny and restore Christians to their just and full liberty of captivating their understanding to Scripture only and as Rivers when they have a free passage runne all to the Ocean so it may well be hoped by Gods blessing that Vniversall Liberty thus moderated may quickly reduce Christendome to Truth and Vnitie These thoughts of peace I am perswaded may come from the God of peace and to his blessing I commend them and proceed 18 Your fift and last obiection stands upon a false and dangerous supposition That new Heresies may arise For an Heresie being in it selfe nothing else but a Doctrine Repugnant to some Article of the Christian Faith to say that new Heresies may arise is to say that new Articles of Faith may arise and so some great ones among you stick not to professe in plaine tearmes who yet at the same time are not ashamed to pretend that your whole Doctrine is Catholique and Apostolique So Salmeron Non omnibus omnia dedit Deus ut quaelibetaetas suis gaudeat veritatibus quas prior aetas ignoravit God hath not given all things to All So that every age hath its proper verities which the former age was ignorant of Disp. 57. In Ep. ad Rom And againe in the Margent Habet Vnumquodque saeculum peculiares revelationes divinas Every age hath its peculiar Divine Revelations Where that he speaks of such Revelations as are or may by the Church be made matters of Faith no man can doubt that reads him an example whereof he gives us a little before in these words Vnius Augustini doctrina Assumptionis B. Deiparae cultum in Ecclesiam introduxit The Doctrine of Augustine only hath brought in to the Church the Worship of the Assumption of the Mother of God c. Others againe mince and palliate the matter with this pretence that your Church undertakes not to coyne new Articles of faith but only to declare those that want sufficient declaration But if sufficient declaration be necessary to make any doctrine an Article of Faith then this doctrine which before wanted it was not before an Article of faith and your Church by giving it the Essentiall forme and last complement of an Article of faith makes it though not a Truth yet certainly an Article of faith But I would faine know whether Christ and his Apostles knew this Doctrine which you pretend hath the matter but wants the forme of an Article of faith that is sufficient declaration whether they knew it to be a necessary Article of the faith or no! If they knew it not to be so then either they taught what they knew not which were very strange or else they taught it not and if not I would gladly be informed seeing you pretend to no new Revelations from whom you learn't it If they knew it then either they conceal'd or declar'd it To say they conceal'd any necessary part of the Gospell is to charge them with farre greater sacriledge then what was punished in Ananias and Saphira It is to charge these glorious Stewards and dispensers of the Mysteries of Christ with want of the great vertue requisite in a Steward which is Fidelity It is to charge them with presumption for denouncing Anathema's even to Angels in case they should teach any other doctrine then what they had received from thē which sure could not merit an Anathema if they left any necessary part of the Gospell untaught It is in a word in plaine tearmes to give them the lye seeing they professe plainly and frequently that they taught Christians the whole doctrine of Christ. If they did know and declare it then was it a full and formall Article of faith and the contrary a full and formall Heresie without any need of further declaration and then their Successours either continued the declaration of it or discontinued If they did the latter how are they such faithfull depositaries of Apostolique Doctrine as you pretend Or what assurance can you give us that they might not bring in new and false Articles as well as suffer the old and true ones to be lost If they did continue the declaration of it and deliver it to their Successours and they to theirs and so on perpetually then continued it still a full and formall Article of faith and the repugnant doctrine a full and formall Heresie without and before the definition or declaration of a Councell So that Councells as they cannot make that a truth or falshood which before was not so so neither can they make or declare that to be an Article of Faith or an Heresie which before was not so The supposition therefore on which this argument stands being false and runious whatsoever is built upon it must together with it fall to the ground This explication therefore and restriction of this doctrine whereof you make your advantage was to my understanding unnecessary The Fathers of the Church in after times might have just cause to declare their judgmēt touching the sense of some generall Articles of the Creed but to oblige others to receave their declarations under paine of damnation what warrant they had I know not He that can shew either that the Church of all Ages was to have this Authority or that it continued in the Church for some Ages and then expired He that can shew either of these things let him for my part I cannot Yet I willingly confesse the judgment of a Councell though not infallible is yet so farre directive and obliging that without apparent reason to the contrary it may be sinne to reject it at least not to afford it an outward submission for publique peace-sake 19 Ad § 7. 8. 9. Were I not peradventure more fearefull then I need to be of the imputation of tergiversation I might very easily rid my hands of the remainder of this Chapter For in the Question there discussed you grant for ought I see as much as D. Potter desires and D. Potter grants as much as you desire and therefore that I should
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 whether â—oever they lead me Now I say they haue led me into this perswasion because they haue given me great reason to belieue it and none to the contrary The reason they haue given me to belieue it is because it is apparent and confest they did propose to themselues in composing it some good end or ends As that Christians might haue a forme by which for matter of faith they might professe themselues Catholiques So Putean out of Th. Aquinas That the faithfull might know what the Christian people is to believe explicitely 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 Cardinall Richlieu Now for all these and for any other good intent I say it will be plainly uneffectuall unlesse it contain at least all points of simple beliefe which are in ordinary course necessary to be explicitely known by all men So that if it be fault in me to belieue this it must be my fault to belieue the Apostles wise and good men which I cannot doe if I belieue not this And therefore what Richardus de sancto Victore sayes of God himselfe 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 errour which I belieue 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 haue 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 doe I know any opinion I hold against the Church of Rome but I haue more evident grounds then this whereupon to build it For let but these Truths bee granted That the authority of the Scripture is independent on your Church dependent only in respect of us upon universall 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 bee 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 all who began or continue the separation from the externall Communion of the Roman Church are guilty of the proper and formall sinne of Schisme THE Searcher of all Hearts is witnesse with how unwilling minds we Catholiques are drawen to fasten the denomination of Schismatiques or Heretiques on them for whose soules if they imployed their best blood they judge that it could not be better spent If we rejoyce that they are contistated at such titles our joy riseth not from their trouble or griefe but as that of the Apostles did from the fountaine of Charity because they are contâ—â—stated to repentance that so after unpartiall examination they finding themselves to be what we say may by Gods holy grace begin to dislike what themselves are For our part we must remember that our obligation is to keep within the meane betwixt uncharitable bitternesse and pernicious flattery not yeelding 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 seeme to speak according to the wholesome advise of S. Gregory Nazianzen in these divine words We doe not affect peace with preiudice of the true doctrine that so we may get a name of being gentle and mild and yet we seek to conserue peace fighting in a lawfull manner and containing our selves within our compasse and the rule of Spirit And of these things my iudgment is and for my part I prescribe the same law to all that deale with soules and treat of true doctrine that neither they exasperate meâ—s minds by harshnesse nor make them haughty or insolent by submission but that in the cause of faith they behave themselves prudently and advisedly and doe not in either of these things exceed the meane With whom aÌ„greeth S. Leo saying It behoveth us in such causes to be most carefull that without noise of contentions both Charity be conserved and Truth maintained 2. For better Methode we will handle these points in order First we will set downe the nature and essence or as I may call it the Quality of Schisme In the second place the greatnesse and grievousnesse or so to tearme it the Quantity thereof For the Nature or Quality will tell us who may without injury be iudged Schismatiques and by the greatnesse or quantity such as finde themselves guilty thereof will remaine acquainted with the true state of their soule and and whether they may conceive any hope of salvation or no. And because Schisme will be found to be a division from the Church which could not happen unlesse there were alwaies 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 beene such a Visible Congregation of Faithfull People Fourthly we will demonstrate that Luther Calvin and the rest did separate themselves from the Communion of that alwaies visible Church of Christ and therefore were guilty of Schisme And fifthly we will make it evident that the visible true Church of 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 division are Schismatiques by reason of their separation from the Church of Rome 3 For the first point touching the Nature or Quality of Schisme As the naturall perfection of man consists in his being the Image of God his Creator by the powers of his soule so his supernaturall perfection is placed in fimilitude with God as his last End and Felicity and by having the said spirituall faculties his Vnderstanding and Will linked to him His Vnderstanding is united to God by Faith his Will by Charity The former relies upon his infallible Truth The latter carrieth us to his infinite Goodnesse Faith hath a deadly opposite Heresie Contrary to the Vnion or Vnity of Charity is Separation and Division Charity is twofold As it respects God his Opposite Vice is Hatred against God as it uniteth us to our Neighbour his contrary is Seperation or division of affections and will from our Neighbour Our Neighbour may be considered either as one private person
malice If these mens conceits were true the Church might come to be wholly divided by wicked Schismes and yet after some space of time none could be accused of Schisme nor be obliged to returne to the visible Church of Christ and so there should remaine no One true visible Church Let therefore these men who pretend to honour reverence and believe the Doctrine and practise of the visible Church and to condemne their forefathers who forsooke her and say they would not have done so if they had lived in the daies of their Fathers and yet follow their example in remaining divided from her Communion consider how truly these words of our Saviour fall upon them Woe be to you because you build the Prophets sepulchers and garnish the monuments of just men and say If we had been in our Fathers daies we had not been their fellowes in the blood of the Prophets Therefore you are a testimony to your own selves that you are the sonnes of them that killed the Prophets and fill up the measure of your Fathers 46 And thus having demonstrated that Luther his Associates and all that continue in the Schisme by them begun are guilty of Schisme by departing from the visible true Church of Christ it remaineth that we examine what in particular was that Visible true Church from which they departed that so they may know to what Church in particular they ought to returne and then we shall have performed what was proposed to be handled in the fift Point 47 That the Roman Church I speak not for the present of the particular Diocesse of Rome but of all visible Churches dispersed throughout the whole world agreeing in Faith with the Chaire of Peter whether that Sea were supposed to be in the City of Rome or in any other place That I say the Church of Rome in this sense was the visible Catholique Church out of which Luther departed is proved by your own confession who assigne for notes of the Church the true Preaching of Gods word and due administration of Sacraments both which for the substance you cannot deny to the Roman Church since you confesse that she wanted nothing fundamentall or necessary to salvation and for that very cause you think to cleare your selfe from Schisme whose property as you say is to cut off from the Body of Christ and the hope of Salvation the Church from which it separates Now that Luther and his fellowes were born and baptized in the Roman Church and that she was the Church out of which they departed is notoriously known and therefore you cannot cut her off from the Body of Christ and hope of Salvation unlesse you will acknowledge your selfe to deserve the just imputation of Schisme Neither can you deny her to be truly Catholique by reason of pretended corruptions not fundamentall For your selfe avouch and endeavour to prove that the true Catholique Church may erre in such points Moreover I hope you will not so much as goe about to prove that when Luther rose there was any other true visible Church disagreeing from the Roman and agreeing with Protestants in their particular doctrines and you cannot deny but that England in those daies agreed with Rome and other Nations with England And therefore either Christ had no visible Church upon Earth or else you must grant that it was the Church of Rome A truth so manifest that those Protestants who affirme the Roman Church to have lost the nature and being of a true Church doe by inevitable consequence grant that for divers ages Christ had no visible Church on earth from which error because D. Potter disclaimeth he must of necessity maintaine that the Roman Church is free from fundamentall and damnable error and that she is not cut off from the Body of Christ and the Hope of Salvation And if saith he any Zelots amongst us haue proceeded to heavier censures their zeale may be excused but their Charity and wisdome cannot be justified 48 And to touch particulars which perhaps some may object No man is ignorant that the Grecians even the Schismaticall Grecians doe in most points agree with Roman Catholiques and disagree from the Protestant Reformation They teach Transubstantiation which point D. Potter also confesseth Invocation of Saints and Angels veneration of Reliques and Images Auricular Confession enjoyned Satisfaction Confirmation with Chrisme Extream unction All the seaven Sacraments Prayer Sacrifice Almes for the dead Monachisme That Priests may not marry after their Ordination In which points that the Grecians agree with the Roman Church appeareth by a Treatise published by the Protestant Divines of Wittemberg intituled Acta Theologorum Wittembergensium Iâ—remiae Patriarchae Constantinop de Augustana confessione c. Wittembergae anno 1584. by the Protestant Crispinus and by Sir Edwin Sands in the Relation of the State of Religion of the West And I wonder with what colour of truth to say no worse D. Potter could affirme that the Doctrines debated between the Protestants and Rome are only the partiall and particular fancies of the Roman Church unlesse happily the opinion of Transubstantiation may be excepted wherein the latter Grecians seem to agree with the Romanists Beside the Protestant Authors already cited Petrus Arcudiâ—s a Grecian and a learned Catholique Writer hath published a large Volume the Argument and Title whereof is Of the agreement of the Roman and Greek Church in the seven Sacraments As for the Heresy of the Grecians that the Holy Ghost proceeds not from the Some I suppose that Protestants dissvow them in that error as we doe 49 D. Potter will not I think so much wrong his reputation as to tell us that the Waldenses Wiccliffe Husse or the like were Protestants because in some things they disagreed from Catholiques For he well knowes that the example of such men is subject to these manifest exceptions They were not of all Ages not in all Countries But confined to certain places and were interrupted in Time against the notion and nature of the word Catholique They had no Ecclesiasticall Hierarchy nor Succession of Bishops Priests and Pastors They differed among themselues and from Protestants also They agreed in divers things with us against Protestants They held doctrines manifestly absurd and damnable heresies 50 The Waldenses began not before the year 1218 so farre were they from Vniversality of all Ages For their doctrine first they denied all Iudgements which extended to the drawing of bloud and the Sabbath for which cause they were called In-sabbatists Secondly they taught that Lay men and women might consecrate the Sacrament and preach no doubt but by this meanes to make their Master Waldo a meere lay man capable of such functions Thirdly that Clergy men ought to have no possessions or proprieties Fourthly that there should be no division of Parishes nor Churches for a walled Church they reputed as a barne Fiftly that men ought not to take an oath in any case Sixtly
yee offend against God by troubling his Church without iust and necessary cause Be it that there are some reasons inducing you to think hardly of our Lawes Are those Reasons demonstrative are they necessary or but meer probabilities only An argument necessary and demonstratiue is such as being proposed to any man and understood the minde cannot choose but inwardly assent Any one such reason dischargeth I grant the conscience and setteth it at ful liberty For the publique approbation given by the body of this whole Church unto those things which are established doth make it but probable that they are good And therefore unto a necessary proofe that they are not good it must giue place This plain declaration of his judgement in this matter this expresse limitation of his former resolution hee makes in the very same Section which affords your former quotation and therefore what Apology can bee made for you and your store-house M. Brerely for dissembling of it I cannot possibly imagine 111 D. Potter p. 131. saies That the 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 passe against the first Reformers seeing they also opposed the commands of the Church imposed on them for silencing all disputes and setling Peace and Vnity in government But this collection is deceitfull 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 doe 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 Luthers person but none against his cause which alone I have undertaken to justify therefore I passe 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 done especially of them whom Bellarmin beleeves in such a long train to have gone to the Divell 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 esteeme it not unpardonable in the great and Heroicall spirit of Luther if being opposed and perpetually baited with a world of Furies hee 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 Gospell Vnlesse you desire to heare of your killing of Kings Massacring of Peoples Blowing up of Parliaments and have a minde to be ask't whether it bee probable that that should bee Gods cause which needs to bee maintained by such Divellish meanes 112 Ad § 44. 45. In the two next Particles which are all of this Chapter that remain unspoken to you spend a great deale of reading wit reason against some men who pretending to honour believe the Doctrine 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 judgement cannot be defended For if they believe the Doctrine of your Church then must they believe this doctrine that they are to returne to your Communion And therefore if they doe 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 doctrine which is opposite in Diameter unto the doctrine of Protestants and therefore in a worke which you professe 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 Schisme BECAVSE Vice is best knowne 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 farre as belongs to our present purpose we shall passe on with ease to the definition of Heresie and so be able to discerne who be Heretiques And this I intend to doe not by entring into such particular Questions as are controverted between Catholiques and Protestants but only by applying some generall grounds either already proved or else yeelded to on all sides 2 Almighty God having ordained Man to a supernaturall End of Beatitude by supernaturall meanes it was requisite that his Vnderstanding should be enabled to apprehend that End and meanes by a supernaturall knowledge And because if such a knowledge were no more then probable it could not be able sufficiently to overbeare our Will and encounter with human probabilities being backed with the strength of flesh and blood It was further necessary that this supernaturall knowledge should be most certaine and infallible and that Faith should beleeue nothing more certainly then that it self is a most certain Beliefe and so be able to beat downe all gâ—y probabilities of humane Opinion And because the aforesaid Means and end of Beatificall Vision do farre exceed the reach of naturall wit the certainty of faith could not alwaies be joyned with such evidence of reason as is wont to be found in the Principles or Conclusions of humane naturall Sciences that so all flesh might not glory in the arme of flesh but that he who glories should glory in our Lord Moreover it was expedient that our belief or assent to divine truths should not only be unknowne or inevident by any humane discourse but that absolutely also it should be obscure in it self and ordinarily speaking be void even of supernaturall evidence that so we might have occasion to actuate and testifie the obedience which we owe to our God noâ— only by submitting our Will to this Will and Commands but by subjecting also our Vnderstanding to this Wisdome and Words captivating as the Apostle speaks the same Vnderstanding to the Obedience of Faith Which occasion had been wanting if Almighty God had made â—â—â—ere 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 abstaine from believing by suspending our Iudgments or exercising no act one
such Authorities as these and think you 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 tribunall of the Fathers nay not of the Fathers whose sentences are here alleaged Let us consider them in order and I doubt not to make it appear that farre the greater part of them nay all of them that are any way considerable fall short of your purpose 23 S. Hierome you say writing to Pope Damasus saith I am in the Communion of the Chaire 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 againe that he saies only that he was then in Communion with the Chaire of Peter Nott hat he alwayes would or of necessity must be so for his resolution to the contrary is too evident out of that which he saith elswhere which shall be produced hereafter He saies that the Church at that present was built upon that Rock but not that only Nor that alwayes Nay his judgment as shall appeare is expresse to the contrary And so likewise the rest of his expressions if we meane to reconcile Hierome with Hierome must bee 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 doctrine which he there intreats of For otherwise had he conceiu'd it necessary for him and all men to conform their judgments in matters of faith to the judgment of the Bishop Church of Rome how came it to passe that he chose rather to believe the Epistle to the Hebrewes Canonicall upō the Authority of the Easterne Church then to reject it from the Canon upon the Authority of the Roman How comes it to passe 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 feare you will loose your Fort by maintaining your Out-works and by avoyding this runne into a greater danger of being forc'd to confesse the present Roman Church opposite herein to the Ancient How was it possible that he should ever beleeue that Liberius Bishop of Rome either was or could haue been wrought over by the sollicitation of Fortunatianus Bishop of Aquileia 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 thirteen hundred years almost after the thing is said to be done and speaking for themselves in their own Cause rather then the dis-interessed time-fellowes or immediate Successors of Liberius himselfe 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 Angell I suppose he could not have said so with any coherence to his own beleif and therefore conceive it undeniable that what he said then to Damasus he said it though perhaps he streyned 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 latter could not then but agree with the former But that this Rule was perpetuall and that no man could ever agree with the Catholique Bishops but he must agree with the Roman Church this he saies 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 affirmes nor imports that separation from the Roman Church is a certain marke of Heresy For the Rights of Communion whatsoever it signifies might be said to flow from it if that Church were by Ecclesiasticall Law the head of all other Churches But unlesse it were made so by divine Authority and that absolutely Separation from it could not be a marke of Heresy 25 For S. Cyprian all the world knowes that he resolutely opposed a Decree of the Roman Bishop and all that adhered to him in the point of Re. baptizing 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 were therefore deprived of the Churches Communion which excōmunication could not but involve S. Cyprian who defended the same opinion as resolutely as Firmilianus though Cardinall Perron magisterially and without all colour of proofe affirme the contrary and Cyprian in particular so farre cast off as for it to be pronounc'd by Stephen a false Christ. 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 cōmanded by him not only to deny them the Churches peace Communion but even lodging and entertainment manifestly declaring that they reckoned them among those whom S. Iohn forbids to receive to house or to say God speed to them All these terrors notwithstanding S. Cyprian holdes still his former opinion though out of respect to the Churches peace he judged no man nor cut off any man from the right of Communion for thinking otherwise then he held yet he conceived Stephen his adherents to hold a pernitious error And S. Austin though disputing with the Donatists he useth some Tergiversatiō in the point yet confesseth elsewhere that it is not found that Cyprian did ever change his opinion And so farre was he from conceiving any necessity of doing so in submitting to the judgement of the Bishop and Church of Rome that he plainly professeth that
of a more powerfull principality there is a necessity that all the Churches that is all the faithfull round about should resort in which the Apostolique Tradition hath been alwaies observed by those who were round about If any man say I have been too bold a Critick in substituting observata instead of conseruata I desire him to know that the conjecture is not mine and therefore as I expect no praise for it so I hope I shall be farre from censure But I would intreat him to consider whether it be not likely that the same greek word signifying observo and conservo the Translater of Irenaeus who could hardly speak Latine might not easily mistake and translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conservata est instead of observata est Or whether it be not likely that those men which ancienly wrote Books and understood them nor might not easily commit such an error Or whether the sense of the place can be salved any other way if it can in Gods name let it if not I hope he is not to be condemned who with such a little alteration hath made that sense which he found non sense 30 But whether you will have it Observata or Conservata the new sumpsimus or the old mumpsimus possibly it may be something to Irenaus but to us or our cause it is no way materiall For if the rest be rightly translated neither will Conservata afford you any argument against us nor Observata helpe us to any evasion For though at the first hearing the glorious attributes here given and that justly to the Church of Rome the confounding Heretiques with her tradition and saying it is necessary for all Churches to resort to her may sound like Arguments for you yet hee that is attentive I hope will easily discover that it might be good and rationall in Irenaeus having to doe with Heretiques who somewhat like those who would be the only Catholiques declining a tryall by Scripture as not contayning the Truth of Christ perfectly and not fit to decide Controversies without recourse to Tradition I say he will easily perceive that it might be rationall in Iraeneus to urge them with any Tradition of more credit then their own especially a Tradition consonant to Scripture and even contain'd in it and yet that it may be irrationall in you to urge us who doe not decline Scripture but appeale to it as a perfect rule of faith with a Tradition which we pretend is many wayes repugnant to Scripture and repugnant to a Tradition far more generall then it self which gives Testimony to Scripture and lastly repugnant to it self as giving attestation both to Scripture and to Doctrines plainly contrary to Scripture Secondly that the Authority of the Roman Church was then a far greater Argument of the Truth of her Tradition when it was Vnited with all other Apostolique Churches then now when it is divided from them according to that of Tertullian Had the Churches erred they would have varied but that which is the same in all cannot be errour but Tradition and therefore though Irenaeus his Argument may be very probable yet yours may be worth nothing Thirdly that foureteen hundred yeares may have made a great deale of alteration in the Roman Church as Rivers though neere the fountain they may retaine their native and unmixt syncerity yet in long progresse cannot but take in much mixture that came not from the fountain And therefore the Roman Tradition though then pure may now be corrupt and impure and so this Argument being one of those things which are the worse for wearing might in Irenaeus his time be strong and vigorous and after declining and decaying may long since have fallen to nothing Especially considering that Irenaeus plaies the Historian only and not the Prophet and saies only that the Apostolique Tradition had been alwayes there as in other Apostolique Churches conserved or observed choose you whether but that it should be alwayes so he saies not neither had he any warrant He knew well enough that there was foretold a great falling away of the Churches of Christ to Anti-christ that the Roman Church in particular was forewarned that she also nay the whole Church of the Gentiles might fall if they look not to their standing and therefore to secure her that she should stand for ever he had no reason nor Authority Fourthly that it appeares manifestly out of this book of Irenaeus quoted by you that the doctrine of the Chiliasts was in his judgment Apostolique Tradition as also it was esteemed for ought appeares to the contrary by all the Doctors and Saints and Martyrs of or about his time for all that speak of it or whose judgments in the point are any way recorded are for it and Iustine Martyr professeth that all good and Orthodoxe Christians of his time beleeved it and those that did not he reckons amongst Heretiques Now I demand was this Tradition one of those that was conserved and observed in the Church of Rome or was it not If not had Irenaeus known so much he must have retracted this commendation of that Church If it was then the Tradition of the present Church of Rome contradicts the Ancient and accounts it Hereticall and then sure it can be no certain note of Heresie to depart from them who have departed from themselves and prove themselves subject unto Errour by holding contradictions Fiftly and lastly that out of the Story of the Church it is as manifest as the light at noone that though Irenaeus did esteem the Roman Tradition a great Argument of the doctrine which he there delivers and defends against the Heretiques of his time viz that there was one God yet he was very far from thinking that Church was and ever should be a safe keeper and an infallible witnesse of Tradition in generall Inasmuch as in his own life his action proclaim'd the contrary For when Victor Bishop of Rome obtruded the Roman Tradition touching the time of Easter upon the Asian Bishops under the pain of Excommunication and damnation Irenaeus and all the other Western Bishops though agreeing with him in his observation yet sharply reprehended him for excommunicating the Asian Bishops for their disagreeing plainly shewing that they esteemed that not a necessary doctrine and a sufficient ground of excommunication which the Bishop of Rome and his adherents did so account of For otherwise how could they have reprehended him for excommunicating them had they conceived the cause of his excommunication just and sufficient And besides evidently declaring that they esteemed not separation from the Roman Church a certain mark of Heresie seeing they esteemed not them Heretiques though separated and cut off from the Roman Church Cardinall Perron to avoyd the stroak of this conuincing argument raiseth a cloud of eloquent words which because you borrow them of him in your Second part I will here insert and with short censures dispell and let his Idolaters see that Truth is
direct contradictions viz. that conformity to the Roman Church was necessary in all points and not necessary in this or else so horribly impious as believing this doctrine of the Roman Church true and her power to receive Appeales derived from divine Authority notwithstanding to oppose and condemne it and to Anathematize all those Africans of what condition soever that should appeale unto it I say of what condition soever For it is evident that they concluded in their determination Bishops as well as the inferior Clergy and Laity And Cardinall Perrons pretence of the contrary is a shamelesse falshood repugnant to the plaine words of the Remonstrance of the African Bishops to Celestine Bishop of Rome 34 Your allegation of Tertullian is a manifest conviction of your want of syncerity For you produce with great ostentation what he saies of the Church of Rome but you and your fellowes alwaies conceale and dissemble that immediatly before these words he attributes as much for point of direction to any other Apostolique Church and that as he sends them to Rome who lived neare Italy so those neare Achaia hee sends to Corinth those about Macedonia to Philippi and Thessalonica those of Asia to Ephesus His words are Goe to now thou that wilt better imploy thy curiosity in the businesse of thy salvation run over the Apostolicall Churches wherein the Chaires of the Apostles are yet sate upon in their places wherein their Authentique Epistles are recited sounding out the voyce and representing the face of of every one Is Achaia neere thee there thou hast Corinth If thou art not farre from Macedonia thou hast Philippi thou hast Thessalonica If thou canst goe into Asia there thou hast Ephesus If thou be adjacent to Italy thou hast Rome whose Authority is neere at hand to us in Africk A happy Church into which the Apostles powred forth all their Doctrine together with their blood c. Now I pray Sir tell me if you can for blushing why this place might not have been urg'd by a Corinthian or Philippian or Thessalonian or an Ephesian to shew that in the judgment of Tertullian separation from any of their Churches is a certain mark of Heresie as iustly and rationally as you alleadge it to vindicate this priviledge to the Roman Church only Certainly if you will stand to Tertullians judgment you must either grant the authority of the Roman Church though at that time a good Topicall Argument and perhaps a better then any the Heretiques had especially in conjunction with other Apostolique Churches yet I say you must grant it perforce but a fallible Guide as well as that of Ephesus and Thessalonica and Philippi and Corinth or you must maintain the Authority of every one of these infallible as well as the Roman For though he make a Panegyrick of the Roman Church in particular and of the rest only in generall yet as I have said for point of direction he makes them all equall and therefore makes them choose you whether either all fallible or all infallible Now you will and must acknowledge that he never intended to attribute infallibility to the Churches of Ephesus or Corinth or if he did that as experience shewes he erred in doing so and what can hinder but then we may say also that he never intended to attribute infallibility to the Roman Church or if he did that he erred in doing so 35 From the saying of S. Basil certainly nothing can be gathered but only that the Bishop of Rome may discerne betweene that which is counterfeit and that which is lawfull and pure and without any diminution may preach the faith of our Ancestours Which certainly he might doe if ambition and covetousnesse did not hinder him or else I should never condemne him for doing otherwise But is there no difference betweene may and must Beleeve hee may doe so and he cannot but doe so Or doth it follow because he may doe so therefore he alwayes shall or will doe so In my opinion rather the contrary should follow For he that saith you may doe thus implies according to the ordinary sense of words that if he will he may doe otherwise You certainly may if you please leave abusing the world with such Sophistry as this but whether you will or no of that I have no assurance 36 Your next Witnesse I would willingly have examined but it seemes you are unwilling he should be found otherwise you would have givē us your direction where we might have him Of that Maximianus who succeeded Nestorius I can find no such thing in the Councels Neither can I beleeve that any Patriarch of Constantinople twelve hundred yeares agoe was so base a parasite of the Sea of Rome 37 Your last Witnesse Iohn of Constantinople I confesse speaks home and advanceth the Roman sea even to heaven But I feare it is that his owne may goe up with it which hee there professes to bee all one sea with the sea of Rome and therefore his Testimony as speaking in his own case is not much to be regarded But besides I have litle reason to be confident that this Epistle is not a forgery for certainly Binius hath obtruded upon us many a hundred such This though written by a Graecian is not extant in Greek but in Latine only Lastly it comes out of a suspicious place an old book of the Vatican Library which Library the world knowes to have been the Mint of very many impostures 38 Ad § 20. 21. 22. 23. The summe of your discourse in the 4. next Sections if it be pertinent to the Question in agitation must be this Want of succession of Bishops and Pastours holding alwayes the same doctrine and of the formes of ordaining Bishops and Priests which are in use in the Roman Church is a certain mark of Heresie But Protestants want all these things Therefore they are Heretiques To which I Answer That nothing but want of truth and holding errour can make or prove any man or Church hereticall For if he be a true Aristotelian or Platonist or Pyrrhoniā or Epicurean who holds the doctrine of Aristotle or Plato or Pirrho or Epicurus although he cannot assigne any that held it before him for many Ages together why should I not be made a true and orthodox Christian by beleeving all the doctrine of Christ though I cannot derive my descent from a perpetuall Successiō that beleev'd it before me By this reason you should say as well that no man can be a good Bishop or Pastour or King or Magistrate or Father that succeeds a bad one For if I may conforme my will and actions to the Commandements of God why may I not embrace his doctrine with my understanding although my predecessour doe not so You have aboue in this Chapter defin'd Faith a free Infallible obscure supernaturall assent to divine Truths because they are revealed by God sufficiently propounded This definition is very phantasticall but for the present I
true faith defined by the Apostle but an invention of your own 51 And having thus cryed quittance with you I must intreat you to devise for truly I cannot some answer to this argument which will not serve in proportion to your own For I hope you will not pretend that I have done you injurie in setling your faith upon principles which you disclaim And if you alleage this disparity That you are more certain of your principles then we of ours and yet you doe not pretend that your principles are so evident as we doe that ours are what is this to say but that you are more confident then we but confesse you have lesse reason for it For the evidence of the thing assented to be it more or lesse is the reason and cause of the assent in the understanding But then besides I am to tell you that you are here as every where extremely if not affectedly mistaken in the Doctrine of Protestants who though they acknowledge that the things which they beleeve are in themselves as certain as any demonstrable or sensible verities yet pretend not that their certainty of adherence is most perfect and absolute but such as may be perfected and increas'd as long as they walke by faith and not by sight And consonant hereunto is their doctrine touching the evidence of the objects whereunto they adhere For you abuse the world them if you pretend that they hold the first of your two principles That these particular Books are the word of God for so I think you mean either to be in it self evidently certain or of it self and being devested of the motives of credibility evidently credible For they are not so fond as to be ignorant nor so vain as to pretend that all men doe assent to it which they would if it were evidently certain nor so ridiculous as to imagine that if an Indian that never heard of Christ or Scripture should by chance find a Bible in his own Language and were able to read it that upon the reading it hee would certainly without a miracle beleeve it to bee the word of God which he could not chuse if it were evidently credible What then doe they affirm of it Certainly no more then this that whatsoever man that is not of a perverse mind shall weigh with serious and mature deliberation those great moments of reason which may incline him to beleeve the Divine authority of Scripture and compare them with the light objections that in prudence can be made against it he shall not chuse but find sufficient nay abundant inducements to yeeld unto it firme faith and syncere obedience Let that learned man Hugo Grotius speake for all the Rest in his Booke of the truth of Christian Religion which Book whosoever attentively peruses shall find that a man may have great reason to be a Christian without dependance upon your Church for any part of it and that your Religion is no foundation but rather a scandall and an objection against Christianity He then in the last Chapter of his second book hath these excellent words If any be not satisfied with these arguments above-said but desires more forcible reasons for confirmation of the excellency of Christian Religion let such know that as there are variety of things which be true so are there divers waies of proving or manifesting the truth Thus is there one way in Mathematicks another in Physicks a third in Ethicks and lastly another kind when a matter of fact is in question wherein verily we must rest content with such testimonies as are free from all suspition of untruth otherwise down goes all the frame and use of history and a great part of the art of Physick together with all dutifulnesse that ought to be between parents and children for matters of practice can no way else be known but by such testimonies Now it is the pleasure of Almighty God that those things which he would have us to beleeve so that the very beleef thereof may be imputed to us for obedience should not so evidently appear as those things which are apprehended by sense and plaine demonstration but only be so farre forth revealed as may beget faith and a perswasion thereof in the hearts and minds of such as are not obstinate That so the Gospell may be as a touchstone for triall of mens judgments whether they be sound or unsound For seeing these arguments whereof we have spoken have induced so many honest godly and wise men to approve of this Religion it is thereby plain enough that the fault of other mens infidelity is not for want of sufficient testimony but because they would not have that to be had and embraced for truth which is contrary to their wilfull desires it being a hard matter for them to relinquish their honours and set at naught other commodities which thing they know they ought to doe if they admit of Christs doctrine and obey what he hath commanded And this is the rather to be noted of them for that many other historicall narrations are approved by them to be true which notwithstanding are only manifest by authority and not by any such strong proofs and perswasions or tokens as doe declare the history of Christ to be true which are evident partly by the confession of those Iewes that are yet alive and partly in those companies and congregations of Christians which are any where to be found whereof doubtlesse there was some cause Lastly seeing the long duration or continuance of Christian Religion and the large extent thereof can be ascribed to no humane power therefore the same must be attributed to miracles or if any deny that it came to passe through a miraculous manner this very getting so great strength and power without a miracle may be thought to surpasse any miracle 52 And now you see I hope that Protestants neither doe nor need to pretend to any such evidence in the doctrine they beleeve as cannot well consist both with the essence and the obedience of faith Let us come now to the last nullity which you impute to the faith of Protestants and that it is want of Prudence Touching which point as I have already demonstrated that wisdome is not essentiall to faith but that a man may truly beleeve truth though upon insufficient motives So I doubt not but I shall make good that if prudence were necessary to faith we have better title to it then you and that if a wiser then Solomon were here he should have better reason to beleeve the Religion of Protestants then Papists the Bible rather then the Councell of Trent But let us hear what you can say 53 Ad § 31. You demand then first of all What wisdome was it to forsake a Church confessedly very ancient and besides which there could be demonstrated no other Visible Church of Christ upon earth I answer Against God and truth there lyes no presoription and therefore certainly it might be great
part therefore of this Doctrine is manifestly untrue The other not only false but impious for therein you plainly give us to understand that in your judgement a resolution to avoid sinne to the uttermost of our power is no necessary meanes of Salvation nay that a man may resolve not to doe so without any danger of damnation Therein you teach us that we are to doe more for the love of our selves and our own happinesse then for the love of God and in so doing contradict our Saviour who expresly commands us to love the Lord our God withall our heart withall our soule and withall our strength and hath taught us that the loue of God consists in avoiding sinne and keeping his commandements Therein you directly crosse S. Pauls doctrine who though he were a very probable Doctor and had delivered his judgement for the lawfulnesse of eating meats offered to Idols yet he assures us that he which should make scruple of doing so and forbear upon his scruple should not sinne but only be aweak brother whereas he who should doe it with a doubtfull conscience though the action were by S. Paul warranted lawfull yet should sinne and be condemn'd for so doing You pretend indeed to be rigid defenders and stout champions for the necessity of good workes but the truth is you speak lies in hypocrisy and when the matter is well examin'd will appear to make your selves and your own functions necessary but obedience to God unnecessary Which will appear to any man who considers what strict necessity the Scripture imposes upon all men of effectuall mortification of the habits of all vices and effectuall conversion to newnesse of life and universall obedience and withall remembers that an act of Attrition which you say with Priestly absolution is sufficient to salvation is not mortification which being a work of difficulty and time cannot be perform'd in an instant But for the present it appears sufficiently out of this impious assertion which makes it absolutely necessary for men either in Act if it be possible or if not in Desire to be Baptiz'd and Absolv'd by you and that with Intention and in the mean time warrants them that for avoding of sinne they may safely follow the uncertain guidance of a vain man who you cannot deny may either be deceiv'd himselfe or out of malice deceive them neglect the certain direction of God himselfe and their own consciences What wicked use is made of this Doctrine your own long experience can better informe you then it is possible for me to doe yet my own litle conversation with you affords one memorable example to this purpose For upon this ground I knew a young Scholar in Doway licenc'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 that he might doe so And upon the same ground whensoever you shall come to have a prevailing party in this Kingdome and power sufficient to restore your Religion you may doe it by deposing or killing the King by blowing up of Parliaments and by rooting out all others of a different faith from you Nay this you may doe though in your own opinion it be unlawfull because Bellarmine a man with you of approved vertue learning and judgement hath declared his opinion for the lawfulnesse of it in saying that want of power to maintaine a rebellion was the only reason that the Primitive Christians did not rebell against the persecuting Emperors By the same rule seeing the Priests and Scribes and Pharisees men of greatest repute among the Iewes for vertue learning and wisdome held it a lawfull and a pious work to persecute Christ and his Apostles it was lawfull for the people to follow their leaders for herein according to your Doctrine they proceeded prudently and according to the conduct of opinion maturely weighed and approved by men as it seem'd to them of vertue learning and wisdome nay by such as sate in Moses chaire and of whom it was said whatsoever they bid you observe that observe and doe which universall you pretend is to be understood universally and without any restriction or limitation And as lawfull was it for the Pagans to persecute the Primitive Christians because Truian Pliny men of great vertue and wisdome were of this opinion Lastly that most impious detestable Doctrine which by a foule calumny you impute to me who abhorre and detest it that men may be saved in any Religion followes from this ground unavoidably For certainly Religion is one of those things which is necessary only because it is commanded for if none were commanded under pain of damnation how could it be damnable to be of any Neither can it be damnable to be of a false Religion unlesse it be a sin to be so For neither are men saved by good luck but only by obedience neither are they damned for their ill fortune but for sin and disobedience Death is the wages of nothing but sin and S. Iames sure intended to deliver the adequate cause of sin and death in those words Lust when it hath conceived bringeth forth sin and sin when it is finished bringeth forth death Seeing therefore in such things according to your doctrine it is sufficient for avoiding of sin that we proceed prudently by the conduct of some probable opinion maturely weighed approv'd by men of learning vertue and wisdome and seeing neither Iews want their Gamaliels nor Pagans their Antoninus'es nor any sect of Christians such professors and maintainers of their severall sects as are esteem'd by the people which know no better and that very reasonably men of vertue learning and wisdome it followes evidently that the embracing their religion proceeds upon such reason as may warrant their action to bee prudent and this is sufficient for avoiding of sin and therefore certainly for avoiding damnation for that in humane affaires and discourse evidence and certainty cannot be alwaies expected I haue stood the longer upon the refutation of this doctrine not only because it is impious and because bad use is made of it and worse may be but only because the contrary position That men are bound for avoiding sin alwaies to take the safest way is a faire and sure foundation for a cleer confutation of the main conclusion which in this Chapter you labour in vain to prove and a certain proof that in regard of the precept of charity towards ones selfe and of obedience to God Papists unlesse ignorance excuse them are in state of sin as long as they remain in subjection to the Roman Church 9 For if the safer way for avoiding sin be also the safer way for avoiding damnation then certainly whether the way of Protestants must be more secure and the Roman way more dangerous take but into your consideration these ensuing controversies Whether it be lawfull to worship
Pag. 255. t Pag. 167. u Pag. 27. w Pag. 150. x Pag. 151. y Pag. 241. z Pag. 211. 213 214. a Pag. 234. b Pag. 234. c Pag. 221 d Acts 20. 2â— e Pag. 244 f Pag. 225 223. g Pag. 223 h Pag. 223 i Pag. 237. k In his defence page 330. l Lib. de Heres in 69. m Aug. ep â—8 a This perswasion is no singularity of mine but the doctrine which I have learn't from Divines of great learning and judgement Let the Reader be pleased to peruse the seaventh booke of Acontius de Stratag Satanae And Zanchius his last Oration delivered by him after the composing of the discord between him and Amerbachius and he shall confesse as much a A. or part 1â— 5. b Cont. 2. â— 10. n. 10. c Moral quaest Tr. 22. c. 2. n. 34. d Iâ— 2. 2. qu. 2. Art 3. Dub. Vit. e Instruction du Chrestien Lecon premiere f Ch. 3. Consid. ◠§. 5. p. 119. g 2. 2. dis 1. â— 2. p. 4. in sin Lib. 3. c. â— a Orat. 32. b Epist. 8 1. Point The nature of Schisme c 2. 2. q. 39. art in corp ad 3. d Lib. 1. deâ—id Symb. cap. 10. e Quest. Evangel ex Mat. q. 11. f Vbi supra h Heres 68. i Lib. 1. cont Parmen 2. Point The grievousnesse of Schisme l Supra art 2. ad 3. m Hom. 11. in ep ad Epk. o Lib. cent Parmen p Lib. de vera Relig. cap. 6. q Cont. Donatist l. 1. cap. 8. r Ibid. lib. 2. cap. 6. s De serm Dom. in monte c. 5. t Epist. 204. u Cont. advers Leg. Prophet l 2. cap. 17. w De gest cum Emerit x De side ad Pet. y Pag. 42. z Cont. Parm. lib. 2. cap. 62. a Cont. haeres lib. 4. cap. 62. b Apud Euseb Hist. Eccles lib. 6. 3. Point Perpetuall visibility of the Church c Apolog. part 4. cap. 4. divis 2 And in his defence printed Ann. 1571. Pag. 426. d In his exposition upon the Creed Pag. 400. e Proâ—os 37. Pag. 68. f Ibid. in cap. 1â— Pag. 161. col 3. g Ibid. in cap. 11. Pag. 145. h Ibid. Pag. 191. i Fol. 110. 123. k Answere to a counterfeit Catholique Pag. 16. l In praefat operuÌ„ suorum m In suo Acacatholico volum a. 15. cap. 9. p. 479â— n Ep. 141. o Pag. 154. p Mat. 16. 18. q Pag. â—6 r Pag 83. s In Psal. 30. Coâ— 2. t Epist. 48. u S. Aug. de fide Symbolo c. 1. w In Psal. 101. x De ovib cap. 1. y De Bapt. cont Donat. z Lib. 3. cont Parm. 4. Point Lutheâ— and all that follow him are Schismatiques a Pag. 68. b Georgiâ—â— Milius in Augustan Confess art 7. de Eccles. Pag. 137. c Benedict Mâ—rgenstern tract de Eccles Pag. 145. d Conrad Schlusselb in Theolog. Calvinist lib. â— fol. 130 e Ep. 141. f In praefat operum suorum g Lib. 2. cont Epist. Gaudent c. 7. h Pag. 76. i Pag. 126. k Pag. 151. l Pag. 155. m Epist. 76 ad Mag. n Numb 8 s Pag. 7â— t 1. Cor. 5. 10. u Ep. 162. w Mat. 33. z Ep. 116. a Pag. 75. b Pag 151. c Pag. 155 d Pag. 221. e Pag. 151. f Ep. cont Parmen lib 2 2 cap. 11. g Pag. 15â— h Pag. 75. i Pag. 76. k Pag. â—0 l Pag. 75. m Pag. 79. n Pag. 75. o Casu non voluntate in has turbas incidi Deum ipsum testor p Act. mon. pag. 404. q Sleidan lib. 16. sol 232. r Sleid. lib. 13. fol. 177. s Luth. in colloq mensal t Act. mon. pag. 404. u Cowp in his Chronicle w Tract 2. cap. 2 Sect. 11. subd 2. x Pag. 81. 82 y Pag. 154. z Pag. 75. a Lib. 1. Cont Parm. b Tract 1. Sect. 3. subd 10. c Ep. 55. d Lib. 2 Cont Parm. e Ep. 48. f De Bapt. lib. 5. c 1. g Pag. 20. h Pag. 81. i Pag. 155. k Advers haeres c. 27. l Pag. 124. m Pag. 105. n In his preface to his Bookes of Ecclesiasticall policy Sect. 6. p. 28. o Pag. 131 p Tom. 2. Germ. Ien. fol. 9. tom 2. Witt. of anno 1562. de abrog Miss privat fol. 244. q Tom. 5. Anâ—ot brevis r Colloq mensal fol. 158. s Praefat. in tom German Ien. t De formula â—issae u In parva Conâ—ess w In orat Germ. 12. de Luth. Vid. Tan. tom 2. disput 1. q. 2 dub 4. n. 108. x Lib. 2. cont Cresc c. 7. y Ep. 164. z Vpon these words ad Tit. 3. Hâ—ereticum hominem c. a Mat. 18. b Luk. 10. 16. c Lib. 1. cont Parm. d Hom. 11. in epist. ad Eph. e Rom. 1. 3â— f Mat 23. v. 29. c. 5. Point Luther and the rest departed from the Roman Church g Pag. 76. h Ibid. i Pag. 225. k De statu Eccles. Pag. 253. l Pag. 225. m Act. Mon. Pag. 628. n Ibid. o Tract â— cap 2. sect subd 3. p In serm dâ— Assump Mariâ— q In epist. ad Bohemos r De utreque specie Sacram s In Cent. epist Theol. Pag. 225. t Numb 49. u Pag 7â— w Coâ—t Parm. liv 2. c. 3. Eusch. hist. l. 5 c. 24. Perron Replic 3. l. 2. c. See c. 1. §. 3. Casaubon iâ— Ep. ad Card. Perron Pag. 151. 155. a S. Cyprian Ep. 63. In these words Sâ—quis de antecessoribus nostris vel â—gnoranteivel simpliciter non hoc observavit tenuit quod nos Dominus facere exemplo Magisterio suo docuit potest simplicitati ejus de indulgentia Domini venia concedi nobis verò non potest ignosci qui nunc à Domino admoniti instructi sumus b Wilfriduâ— to Abbat Colman alleaging that he followed the example of his predecessors famous for holinesse and famous for miracles in these words De Patre vestrâ— Columba sequacibus eius quorum sanctitatem vos â—mitari regulam ac praecepta caelestibus signis confirmata sequi perhibetis possum respondere Quia multis in judicio dicentibus Domino quòd in nomine eius prophetaverint daemonia ejecerint virtutes multas fecerint responsurus sit Dominus quia nunquam eos noverit Sed absit ut de patribas vestris hoc dicam quia iustius multo est de incognitis bonum credere quam malum Vnde illos Dei famulos Deo dilectos esse non nego qui simplicitate rusticâ sed intentione piâ Deum dilexerunt Neque illis multum obesse Paschae talem reor observantiam quandiù â—ullus advenerat qui eiâ— instituti perfectioris deoreta quae sequerentur ostenderet Quos uti credo fi qui tunc ad eos Cathòlicus calculator adveniret sic eius moâ—ita fuisse secuturos quomodoea quae noverant ac didicerunt Dei mandata probantuâ— fuisse secuti Tu autem socij â—ui si audita