DIFFERENCES IN MATTERS OF RELIGION BEtweene the Easterne and Westerne Churches Wherein the Romane Church may see her selfe charged with as many Errours as shee falsly layeth to the charge of other Churches in Europe Gathered by Irenaeus Rodoginus Ioan. 15.17 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 LONDON Printed by AVGVSTINE MATHEVVES for Iohn Budge and are to be sold at the signe of the Windmill in Britaines Burse 1625. TO THE RIGHT HOnourable and most magnanimous Patterne of inuincible courage my singular good Lord and Patron George Earle of Engie Lord Gordon and Badenocht Sonne to the thrise-Noble and Puissant L. George Marquesse of Huntley Earle of Engie L. Gordon and Badenocht Sheriffe principall of Aberden and Invirnesse L. of Oboyne and Strathaune Baron of Achindowne Melgon and Gartly c. all increase of honour in this life and eternall happinesse in the life to come TO lay aside right Honourable all the officious complements vsed by most men now adaies to make way for the purchasing of the fauour of high and eminent Personages What your Lordship is to me J my selfe know best neither will J expose it to the view of Buyers it being vnvendible yea vnestimable J offer to your Lordships favourable Patronage this little Treatise of lamentable Dissentions neuer for ought I know heeretofore collected into one Packet and as yet rather a Rapsodie then a Methodicall Relation of Differences Your Lordship loueth Vnion This emboldeneth me Your Lordsh hateth Schisme for which I heartily thanke God beseeching him vpon the very bended knees of my soule that you and all such eminent in Learning Wisedome and Pietie may by all meanes possible endeauour to helpe to pull downe these ill-composed walls of Schisme and to reare vp the beautifull and long-desired wall of Peace God preserue your Honour increase your Wealth and restore you fully to your former Health Your Lordships daily Orator in all duetie and good affection most humble Irenaeus Rodoginus To his most louing Master I. R. the Contriuer of this Worke. HEre Schismes and rents and breaches manifold With weeping eyes which now I doe behold Thou hast layd out before the view of men With thine exact and Peace-desiring Pen. Well dost thou wish for which I wish thee well Yet wishing doth not fiery darts repell But Oh that Kings and Potentates their best Would doe and so yeeld to thy sweet request Then should Peace shine and Gordian knots now fast Dissolued bee and into Lethe cast Misonices Renatus THE PREFACE TO THE READER CHristian Catholicke Reader whosoeuer thou art hauing taken some paines in collecting these differences I recommend vnto thee the vsing perusing of them Come with a minde voide of preiudice and behold the schisms of the Church the lamentable and pitifull ruine of Christian people vnlesse men by speedy repentance and earnest deuotion to God the Authour of peace and concord preuent these sure imminent perils and dangers The coate of Christ is rent his garment is torne in peeces the world is distracted and distempered with the raging waues of opinion Some Church-men either in ambitious and extrauagant thoughts are become furious giuing out idle fancies for sound and solid nourishment Iere. 14.14 the Prophet calleth them false visions and the deceite of their owne heart or else as it is euer in schisme are misled yea rather muzled by preiudice so that there is no sauce be it neuer so sweete which can taste well to their pre-ocupied pallats but only that which relisheth the venemous gall of bitternes whereby they may worke the bane and vtter ouerthrow of them which are of a contrary mind the first sort of these men are led to foster Schisme against conscience to maintaine themselues in Dignities Wealth Peace and Promotion Of which is a number of the learned'st and most polliticke Christian Prelates Cardinalls Doctors and Preachers in the Romish Church The second is hurled forward without any respect only blowne vp with foolish zeale lacking knowledge so that there is not a moule-hill this day in Religion betweene the one side and the other which to them seemeth not to bee an high mountaine They can see nothing but through perspectiues making things a far distant seem to be very neere Or rather they behold the controuersies of Religion as they doe the Moone in the Horizon which seemeth to bee a great deale bigger though more distant thē the Zenith then when shee hath iournied a good way in her course And that because of the transparant and watrish bodies of the Clowdes interiacent which diuide the rayes of their sight and let them not behold that luminous body in rei veritate as it is but so farre as they can till the impediments be remoued The first sort though their power and meanes be greater yet their action is lesse nor yet is it so rigorous in playing a part in this dolefull Tragedie of Church and State deuision seeing preferment breedeth emulation from without and arrogancie as a domesticke and indiuiduall Achates which let neuer the giddy multitude so doat and admire their actions as that they can lead by their carriage this wild and vntam'd Colt to be the Organ of vpholding Schisme and idle opinions The other sort despising as it were dignities misregarding money leauing Father and Mother Wife and Children yea all things so they say for Christ and his Gospell well take themselues either to a speculatiue and retyred life and so they shunne the thunderbolts of enuie and hatred or else they choose an actiue kind of life to preach the Word in pulpits to teach it in Schooles or to giue priuate informations in doctrine and manners by conference disputations reasonings by writing to those who are farre distant from them and by leauing monuments of their diligence and industry to future ages for eternizing their name and pofession Both these sorts bring admiration admiration enquirie enquirie notice of the reasōs of their doings notice breedeth liking of their persons and profession especially whē the dunghill of foolish and idolatrous opinions is lustred guilded with the glistring colours of Rhetoricke which in the eares of Ignorance soundeth as sweete as the harmonicall concords of the sweetest-breasted Quiristers Liking of the profession is that which maketh men now a daies runne to all these heady courses to murder massacre poore Christians to ruinate Cities dispeople Kingdomes kill Princes inuent Gunpowder Treasons yea what not And doe the inuentors of these mischiefes deuisers of diuersitie with the vpholders thereof come first vpon the Stage to act the Prologue of these turbulent Tragedies No surely They lie securely all the night long in their beds in the day time they meditate quietly in their closets how to vphold these pretty tricks when as the poore Christian world is trauelling thorow moore and marrish casting ditches and Trenches to defend or offend And finally the common-wealth is the instrumētall cause led by the circlings of these vpper powers in zeale and ignorance to rippe
a saying to be registred in the hearts printed vpon the fore-heads of turbulent and furious spirits now adayes who cannot indure but with gnashing of teeth that any Church or Countrey baptize with crossing after haue Organs or Altars Curats or Prebenders vse Cap or Surplise because they haue them not or rather will not haue them at all or else because they are in vse in the Popish Church a fine reason indeed I wonder that these men can indure preaching in a Church built by a Papist or ringing of Bells this being a custome vsed by the Papists or giuing of thankes after meat seeing the Papist doth the like And as those men loathe euery Ceremonie which the Romane Church hath so doth the Romish Church detest the Greeke Church and shee no lesse the Romish so that this question being propounded to Chomatianus by a Greeke Whether it was lawfull for a Greeke to enter into a Latin Church and worship there being desired he answered negatiuely Tom. 1. Iuris Graecorum Balsamon saith That all the ceremonies of the Latin church differing from the ceremonies of the holy Catholike Church he meaneth the Greeke Church are to be reiected and no societie to be kept with the Latines Ibidem Cabasila propounded a question to Iohn Bishop Citrius if the Greeks which were buried in the Latine Churches and had Hymnes sung at their Funeralls could be subiect to censure Yea after the Councell of Florence the rage of the Grecians was so great against those that were at the Councell and accorded to some Articles for the purchasing of ayd against the Turke who at that time tooke the neuer enough lamented citie of Constantinople that when they came home though subiect to the vncertaine and faithlesse mercy of the barbarous conquerour they excommunicated all those who accorded to the Articles and when their soules had taken their good night in parting from the body they cast them like dogs into ditches and denied them most barbarously the benefit of Christian buriall The Latine Church not being willing to be inferiour to her sister in these prankes doth serue the Protestants after the like manner for if any of the reformed Church die amongst them his soule is determinately sent packing to Hell by the Popes * For euery Holy Thursday he curseth all Protestants cursing his body it must either lie vnburied at all or else it must be carried to some place where Protestants vse to interre their dead O my soule what shalt thou think How must thou meditate vpon the barbarous and beastly crueltie against the dead bodies of them who liued to the eyes of all vnblameable perchance and died in the faith of the Lord Iesus holding him onely their Redeemer Sauiour and Mediatour baptized in the Name of the Father Sonne and Holy Ghost giuing testimonies of their comfort and gladnesse in the houre of their death shewing by their cheerfulnesse the Prognostications and infallible tokens of their entrance and fore-smelling of endlesse glory Such mens bones doe the Papists debarre from resting in that Portion of our Grand-mother Tellus where the former Saints bodies which now in part triumph in delight rest waiting for a glorious resurrection a perfect beatitude with a full and plenary indulgence acquittance from sin and her reward death for death is the wages and stipend of sinne Is not this a tyrannie going far beyond that of Nero surpassing that of Decius and an hundred times more execrable than that of Heliogabalus These men can suffer him whom they haue seene with their eyes die in a kennell stabbing and stabbed in a drunken humour or him who all his life time hath played the throat-cutting Ruffian or the leacherous whoremonger and who at last hath dyed in the Poxe without so much as poenitendi animus yea him whom they haue heard with their eares awake Stix Lethe and Acheron with hideous and fearfull bannings abuse with thunderbolts and cannon-shot volies of abominable oathes the great and glorious Name of the euerliuing God such men I say they can indure to be intombed incoffined with them and to haue their portion in their ground and to lie among them with abundance of peace whereas they would striue to ransacke Heauen and Earth yea Acheronta mouerent they would euen trouble Hell it selfe if they did know that any Protestants ashes did rest there O Lord how long wilt thou delay and suffer this vnheard of crueltie To returne to my purpose The reason of all these things is either the want of charitie or of prudent discretion of things necessary from things indifferent This age is pestered yea it is consumed with these fire-brands in matters indefinable Many good Christian people haue vsed direct and indirect meanes to cure this sore to quench these faggots with their Writings full of prudence and pietie but behold their reward both the parties haue persecuted them with calumnies calling them Neutralls neither hic nor haec Nullifidians Vbiquitaries yea the ordinary censure goeth so far as without soule and conscience now to call them Atheists Or else both the parties hate them in such a measure that they thrust them from their Communions This maketh the Speakers in this businesse to bee few but Writers almost none I remember that conferring with a learned man concerning this subiect I asked him why he did not write his iudgement in these controuersies His answer was Cui vsui reip Christianae et cui bono mihi telling me that it could not helpe the generall cause one whit but doe much hurt to the doer I know many such on both sides who lament the Schisme and yet cannot helpe it Oh that the Roman Church sometimes the beautifullest amongst women that fairest and most glistering Church amongst all her Sisters millitant vpon Earth would acknowledge her selfe to be a Sister and not a Mistris There was a time when she gaue her helping hand as at the famous Councells of Nice Ephesus Constantinople and Chalcedon and did not rule with a dictatory power There was a time when in an harmonicall concord she was moued with the rest of her planeticall and wandring Sisters in this vaile of sorrow and triall by the reuolution of her first mouer and did shine amongst them all like Phoebus in his Spheare imparting out of her deuotion and charytie that portion of light which her Redeemer had made her Hand-maide of euen then when Arrianisme had ouer-runne all the Orient and Affrick when Ierome cried out of it Ingemuit mundus se Arrianum esse factum but now the fogge of her smoakie vapours obscureth the declining rayes of Religion and Charity which in the latter ages are so fast rushing to their Sun-set yea to their lamentable and darkesome midnight Alas who shall furnish my eyes with floods of waters who shall make my head a liuing spring that from henceforth I may water my Couch with sorrowfull teares Let mee mourne with the Turtle and chatter with the Crow for the losse
and without repentance and therefore damnable I remember that once conferring with a Cousin of mine a prudent and learned Gentleman compleat in all endowments of body and mind his want of charitie onely being excepted he said Woe is mee that you should be in Hell when I am in Heauen seeing you are an Heretike Protestant he meant I answered Well Sir you are too rash in iudging I am as sure said hee of your damnation if you die a Protestant as that Christ is in heauen at the right hand of the Father I answered You that are Papists are very sure of our damnation I wonder greatly that your are neuer sure of your owne saluation But thus much I tell you I will not sit vpon Gods Tribunall to giue out the Sentence of condemnation against you yet since you lacke charitie towards me your Christian Brother and giue out the sentence of condemnation against me so peremptorily taking Gods part vpon you I thinke you will be damned except you repent you of your speech And take not my Iudgement for rash since I iudge the Tree by the Fruit and you by your Charitie which is the principall and cardinall Vertue of the law Deuout Preachers fill your Sermons from the Store-house of Scripture informe in faith from Saint Paul to the Romanes and from the first and second of Iames reforme manners from Ieremie Ezechiell Hosea and Ioel denounce iudgements from Zacharia Amos Ionas Michaiah teach your selues from Titus and Timothie This is all your taske and to liue well and goe before the people like the fierie Pillar in the night and the Cloud in the day to guide them and to preserue them from Schisme and Heresie Doe not spend your time in inventing Rhethoricke to admiration critticke Methods for emulation vnprofitable Questions breeding Controuersies Feed not the itching eares of the humerous people with Nouelties needlesse questions and vnhandsomely borrowed Similies In touching and taxing your Aduersaries in Pulpits which would to God you did more seldome doe not so much endeauour to make them odious to your people as to make your hearers commiserate their estate for whom Christ died and to mooue your Auditorie to pray for their conversion and not for their confusion Our prayer to God should be to suspend his Iudgements and to helpe vs with grace as he pleaseth to giue it for measure and when hee pleaseth to giue it for time Prayer should bee Optatiue desiring and wishing with feare and humilitie no wayes Imperatiue enioyning substance and circumstance to God that he would inflict such punishment at such time and in such place vpon such and such persons Popish curses and Excōmunications the Sword which vntie the Gordian knot of the Church the Hammer which broake the wall in the mids the noyse which must not be heard at the rebuilding of the Temple I abhorre with my soule since the peremptory and rash Excommunications the drawing of the Sword of God vpon euery idle occasion scandalously and many times in derision of God and his Church the cutting off men from the Communion for little causes for no causes yea for vertuous actions and reproouing of sinnes offensiue to God and opprobrious to man haue occasioned bred brought to light nourished and yet still foster the rent of the Church Lord giue vs affections to loue peace hearts to bewaile the Schisme and then will we hope for Vnion Which O Lord in thy due time performe to thy glory the honour of thy Sonne and the comfort of those who shall perseuere in thy grace to the end Amen Thine in the Lord I. R. THE DIFFERENCES BETWEENE THE Easterne and Westerne CHVRCHES THe causes of this lamētable Schisme which diuided the affections of Christians and brought vpon them the yoake of Turkish seruitude as I can gather them from Petrus Stewartius Leodius a man by discent of the Scottish blood for Religion a Romish Catholicke remarkable for his dignity Vice-Chauncelour and professor of Diuinitie in Ingolstade famous for the Iesuites renowned Schoole there neither adding nor diminishing from his words as they are set downe in his notes vpon Caleca who being a Greeke wrote against the Orientall Churches in defence of the Ceremonies of the Occidentall Churches you shall haue faithfully translated as here followeth Petrus Stewartius in Calecam Pag. 407. editione Ingolstadiensi 1608. Ex varijs Graecorum monumentis WE think that the causes or rather the excuses of the Schisme are foure 1. First the deuision of the Empire for albeit the Emperours who did raigne at Constantinople after Constantines departure from the Citie of Rome a He toucheth the forged donation of Constantine which I would wish no man to beleeue since it is refuted inuincibly by the learned of this Age. Reynolds with Hart. History of Magdenburge and the Booke intituled Constantines defence because they had by a donation bestowed it all as wee spake before vpon the Church had not right it Italy yet not withstanding sometimes they ruled b This indeed is not probable that they had no right at all in Rome and yet should rule euery where Iudge indifferent Reader euery where But when a barbarous Nation had rushed c Infra pro in videtur poni into Italy euen to Rome and the d Loe. 3. Pope had required the aide of Leo Emperour then at Constantinople who negligently refused aide to the Church the Pope was forced to recall e Anno Dom. 800. Charles-maine from the French Territories and make him Emperour in Italy and defender of the Church For this Pope Leo was a man much giuen to voluptuousnesse as we read and therefore too too remisse in his gouernement of the Empire whence it came to passe that in his time the Sarazens tooke Syria the Turks Capadocia and so the Roman Empire was diuided 2. The second cause of the deuision was because they were not called to the Counsell f Vltra montanum seu Lugdunense lib. Greg. x. beyond the hills when the word filioque and from the sonne was added 3. The third occasion was which they themselues sometimes in familiar conference did shew vnto vs the too great and extraordinary exaction of the Popes Legats for when they brought yearely the Chrisme from the Apostolicke Sea to Constantinople they would not depart from thence vnlesse they had eighty pound weight of gold besides other gifts bestowed vpon them I will be silent of the pompe and pride whereof they spake which the Legats shew there 4. The fourth and chiefest cause vpon the Clergies part was the deposition of their Patriarch Photius f Et in the Latine multiplied soundeth harshly the excommunicating of him with other Prelats and some Abbots Paulo infra These things were written in Constantinople by the preaching Friers for the edifying of the people and for the profiting of soules in the yeare of our Lord 1252. to the praise and glory of the Father Sonne and Holy Ghost Amen The Articles controuerted