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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27015	The safe religion, or, Three disputations for the reformed catholike religion against popery proving that popery is against the Holy Scriptures, the unity of the catholike church, the consent of the antient doctors, the plainest reason, and common judgment of sense it self / by Richard Baxter.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1657 (1657)	Wing B1381; ESTC R16189	289,769	704

10. Mans will is the Ruler of it self under God and it s fully free from that necessity which is contrary to its natural essential Liberty 11 It is a willful servant onely 12. The matter of their works is oft good but because their end and manner is alwayes wrong therefore they sin in all for bonum est ex causis integris 13. The will is free and not free in several sences 1. It is not free from Gods Government 2. Nor from its natural inclination to good in general and therefore cannot will evil as evil For these were but slavery 3. Nor is it free from the moral force of a darke and erring judgment 4. Nor from temptations 5. Nor from its own vicious disposition till grace free it But it s free 1. From any natural determination to evil or to unknown good in particular 2. And free from coaction or violence 3. And from a physical efficient immediate exterior Determiner in ordinary natural or sinful actions 4. And its free from sinful habites in that measure as it is sanctified 14. No question but the will is potentia activa naturalis or hath such an active power which is imployed in spirituals when it is inclined by a habit thereto but till then will not act spiritually not because the natural faculty is absent but because the inclination without which it will not act is absent 15. No doubt but under the common grace of Christ an unregenerate man may do that which he shall be more disposed to conversion by then also he would have been as our practical Divines all teach and we are fain daily to preach it to our people or else we shall make but ill work with them 16. Many by congruous merit do mean no more then the foresaid aptitude comparative to others 17. This also some Protestants hold But no wicked man ever did his best 18. There is a common grace whose efficacy is laid on the will as Adams was And a special which shall infallibly bow and change the will 19. A self-contradiction to deserve pardon 20. Some sin is but consequentially against love and other sin directly but all is against Gods Laws 21. Who ever denyeth that sin may be done away without Christs blood doth know little of sin or Christ 22. Mortal sin 1. As to merit is all sin 2. As to signification symptomatically it is all sin inconsistent with regeneration 3. Effectually it is all that eventually kills which is in several degrees and sorts 26. O unmerciful men that will dig so many pits then to entrap poor souls in mortal sin 27 28. Many of the ancients also were of this mind of which see my Treat against infidelity Part. 3. 2. Of this see the writings between Dr. Hammond and Mr. Jeanes many Schoolmen say otherwise 6 7. Saints on earth must intercede under Christ for others especially Pastors whose office it is And we may pray them to pray for us But not the Saints departed 10. All Pastors of the Church do hold their office in a subordination to Christs Prophetical Office And many a Prophet there hath been under Christ But none that hath the Office of being the universal infallible Teacher of the Church as the Pope would be 11. All Christians are Priests to God to offer up spiritual sacrifice metaphorically so called And Pastors offer up Christ Representatively Commemoratively and Sacramentally but not really The name Priest is not worth contending about 15. No doubt but Christ merited the glorifying of his own humane nature But that was but consequential to his meriting for us 16. Some of them prosess that by merit they mean but Rewardableness by promise which we maintain 1. It s no Covenant of works in Pauls sence or as Moses Law was But humane Actions are its condition And as all the Ancients use to call it the new Law so it s justly seeing Christ is the King of the Church and it hath the nature of a Law But the promise is the chief part and the moral precepts prescribe no other obedience then they did before in nature But Positives are added 3. In this they have some new friends among our selves 4. So say some Anabaptists 5. I would we could see this in the fruits and proof But de opere operato they are not themselves agreed of the sence 7. His real intention is necessary to make it a lawful administration as to himself but not to others but his seeming intention and their own seeming intention is necessary to the external being of the Sacrament that it be no nullity And the receivers real intention is necessary to the effects and well being of it to himself 8. It is not the name of a Sacrament that we contend about but the nature and definition 9. They know not what to make of this Character themselves many Schoolmen make it to be but a Relation And we confess that Baptism Ordination c. do fix us in a Relation to God 10. They that think it their duty to serve God by such inventions will easily be drawn to think too well of their invented works 1. By nature all are Satans captives which exorcism will not deliver us from 2. This error in case of Necessity some ancients and Councils held 3. Some of them except those that have the to●um baptismi none can be saved without the thing signified in Baptism but they may without the sign 4. There is a ground work laid for the pardon of future sins but no actual pardon of them 6. If the Pope were the head of the Church we must needs be baptized into him 7. How comes it then to appear in all as 〈◊〉 as they come to age 8. What goes with i● in m●st before they come to age 9. In many things they agree and in many they differ more then all confess Of which see Zanchy oft and fully 10. So the Antients thought and I think it the safest way 11 12. There 's no end of humane inventions when once men depart from the Scripture sufficiency and give way to their own self conceitedness and arrogancy 38. This the antient Church used and I should not refuse it either way 1. The word Sacrament is not fit matter for much contention 2. There is some difference in the terminus a quo and ad quem as the Law differeth but not such as to make one a Sacrament and the other none Publike profession of Repentance for open scandalous sins is a needful duty sinfully neglected by us as it is brought to a Sacrament and ceremony with them 3. This is a certain truth but that freewill is enabled and moved by Gods grace 4. Many of them by merit mean but that ex pacto it is the qualification of these to whom God hath promised Salvation 5 6 7 c. In flying from their invented way of Confession we have lamentably wronged the souls of men by disusing so much as Christ hath made our duty and

therefore ●●ey shall have life supposing it to be a true faith ●●at worketh by love The Jews that heard Peters●●rmon ●●rmon Act. 2. were converted and added to the ●hurch even thre● thousand souls and put into a state of Justification by Believing that Sermon 〈◊〉 37 38 41 46 47. But the Protestants believe ● that Peter preached in that Sermon there●● they also are of the Church and justified And least the Accusing Devil or Papists sh●● trouble the peace of any of his people Christ 〈◊〉 protested it with his own mouth Joh. 5.24 Ve●●ly Verily I say unto you He that heareth my word 〈◊〉 believed on him that sent me hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation but is passed fr●● death to life Me thinks this should make any ●●liever tremble at the thoughts of condemning tho● that Christ hath protested shall not be conde●ned Christ hath promised that all those that receive ● words and in whom his words abide shall be beloved of the Father and have everlasting life and ● heard in what they aske Joh. 14.23 15.7 Doub●less that which Christ himself preached was the t● Gospel and so far sufficient that whoever believe● it shall be saved Otherwise Christ could not ●a● converted any soul so far as to have brought the● into a state of Salvation by his Doctrine and the● Peter and the rest of the Apostles were not tr●● Christians by the belief of the Doctrine of Christ 〈◊〉 if the Doctrine which Christ preached be sufficie●● to make true Christians and Church-members o● those that receive it then the Protestants are such For they believe every word that the Evangelists record of the Doctrine of Christ And if the Papi●● say that there is more of his Doctrine necessary t● salvation which the Evangelists did not record i● Scripture 1. We call for their proof of it and 2. W●●●●ow that the Evangelists did purposely write th● ●●ur Gospels or Histories of Christ of purpose to ac●uaint the world with his Nature Birth Life doctrine ●eath and Resurrection c. Luke professeth that he ●rote his Gospel upon perfect understanding of all ●●ings from the very first which conteyneth a Decla●●tion of those things which are most surely believed ●mong us even as they were delivered by them that ●●om the beginning were eye Witnesses and Ministers ●f the Word Luk. 1.1 2 3 4. And he tells us Act. ● 1 2. that he wrote his Gospel of all things that ●esus began both to do and teach untill the day in ●hich he was taken up It would therefore have ●een an exceeding blemish to the Evangelists that ●rote of set purpose both the History of Christs ●ife and Doctrine if they had left out any part of it ●hat was of necessity to salvation Protestants there●ore that believe all the Gospel do believe so much ●s may bring them safely to salvation If Christ him●elf be not a sufficient Teacher nor the Gospel it self a ●ufficient Doctrine of Life Then whither shall we go to seek it Then Peter himself was not the Rock ●or a true Christian by Christs Teaching And then ●he Pope could not derive that from Peter which he ●ad not But Peter himself thought and taught o●herwise He saith Lord whether shall we go we know that thou hast the words of Eternal Life For my part I will take Peters counsel and go to Christ for the words of Eternal Life which are purposely recorded by four Evangelists in the Gospel Let who will go to the Pope for another Gospel to supply the supposed defects of this for I will not In Act. 22. 26. and other places Paul preacheth so much of the Gospel as might have made true Believers and all that the Protestants receive The Church of Rome when Paul wrote his Epistle to them were a true Church Rom. 1.7 and all the Doctrine that Paul writeth to them we do believe Paul telleth the Elders of Ephesus Act. 20.27 that he had not shunned to declare to them the whole councel of God and this is summed up in Repentance toward God and Faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ vers 21. And whatsoever Paul hath written to these Ephesians or any other Churches or persons we believe But what should we talk any more with such an arrogant unreasonable sort of men that dare maintaine that the belief of all the Holy Scripture is not large enough to salvation Atheists and Infidels say of the Scripture that it is too big to be all true And Papists say that it is not big enough to bring a man to heaven that believeth and obeyeth it Shall the Holy Ghost endite a Volume as big as the Bible and when he hath done shall any pretending to be Christians perswade the world that he that believeth all this shall be damned if he believe not the closet Traditions which the Romane Bishop pretendeth to be the keeper of Nay see the strange contradictions of this giddy fiction They lock up this Scripture it self from the common people in an unknown tongue They damne the translating of it as the root of all Heresies and burn men to ashes for using the Bible when they cannot keep it unknown any longer they translate it themselves as far as they can to their own advantage and put it forth with their perverting Annotations and yet when they have all done they condemne any that read it without a special licence from their Ordinary which in England and France they sometime grant to avoid suspicions but in Spaine Italy c. too few if any at all And when they have written voluminously to prove that the Scriptures are not necessary to the people for salvation and that Ignorance is the mother of devotion they come back again and dispute against the Protestants that the whole Scripture is not sufficient to salvation and he that believes but the Scriptures is not in a safe way to salvation It seems then that the Popes Canons are more necessary then the Scripture For a man may be saved without the knowledge of Scripture but not without the knowledge of the Canons of the Pope Yes that he may too if some of them mistake not if they will but implicitely believe that the Church of Rome is the Catholike Church and that the Pope is the infallible soveraign of the Christian world and believe some Articles of the Creed upon his credit he may be saved without either Scripture or Canons so he be but ready to believe and obey whatever shall be offered to him by the Pope for the time to come Moreover Christ and his Apostles do frequently promise Remission and salvation to all that truely Repent that love God in Christ that mortifie the flesh c. but all this do the Protestants and their Religion teacheth them to do it Paul concludeth that There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus that walk not after the flesh but after the spirit Rom. 8.11 But the Protestants are in

Catholick Church If any depart from Scripcures as to the sence in points absolutely necessary they cease to be of our Religion If any depart from it in lesser things they may yet be of the same Religion with us but so far we disown them if we know it Popery hath no sure test or means to prevent mutation But we have in that we fix on the Immutable Rock If Anabaptists Separatists or any erroneous persons live among us so far as they hold those errors so far they are none of us And if any err whom we dare not reject we yet reject their errors and take them for no part of our Religion And if this Argument hold it will much more condemne the Romanists who have more diversity of opinions and wayes among them then the Protestants as may in due place be shewed Obj. 6. That is not the true Religion nor a safe way to Heaven which men can have no Infallible certainty of But the Protestant Religion is such For they all profess their Church to be fallible Answ We must distinguish between a man that May be deceived and a man that Is deceived And between Infallibility in the Object and in the Subject or Intellect And between Infallibility in the absolutely necessary points and in some Inferior smaller matters And so I Ans 1. The Rule of our Religion viz. the word of God is Infallible yea the onely Infallible Rule of Religion and therefore we have an Infallible and the onely Infallible Religion 2. The weakness of the Recipient must be differenced from the Religion which hath no such weakness There is still the certainty and Infallibility of the Object when the believer through his own weakness may be uncertain 3. No man is Falsus actually deceived while he believes that doctrine of our Religion that is the holy Scripture And this we are certain of 4. No Christian in sensu composito nor no Church is fallible or can err in the Fundamentals or points absolutely necessary For if he do so he ceaseth to be a Christian and that to be a Church 5. In sensu diviso he that was a common believer may Apostatize from the faith and so may a particular Church and therefore is fallible but is not as is said Deceived till it turn from the Infallible truth 6. The best man or Church on earth doth know but in part and therefore erreth in part and therfore is fallible in part or in lower things So that it is not the least proof of the fallibility of Scripture or the Reformed Religion that men may Apostatize from it or that they may stagger in Believing an Infallible Truth or that we are fallible in lesser things All true Believers are actually Infalliblly perswaded of the Truth of Gods Word and particularly of all things absolutely necessary Obj. 7. That Religion is not true nor a safe way to heaven which wanteth many Articles of faith But the Protestant Religion wanteth many Articles of faith Therefore Answ 1. We must distinguish of our Religion as it is in the Professed Rule and as it is Impressed in the mindes of men In the former respect we say that our Religion wanteth no Article of faith for Gods perfect Word is our Religion But in the minds of men Religion is more or less imperfect according to the strength or weakness of mens faith 2. We must distinguish between true Articles of Faith and false ones made by the Church of Rome We are without the latter but want them not but we expect that they who call them Articles of faith do prove them so Obj. 8. Your Religion is unsafe by your own Testimony You condemne one another the Lutheran condemneth the Calvinist as Blasphemous impious and damnable the Calvinists condemne the Lutherans the Anabaptists both and every sect is condemned by others Therefore Ans 1. The Churches confessions pass no such condemnation nor any moderate sober men 2. If two children fall out call one another Bastard they are never the more Bastards for that nor will the father therefore call them so else what will become of your Jesuites and Dominicans Obj. 9. The very name of Lutherans Calvinists Protestants do plainly express a Sect or party different from the Name Catholike which denoteth the true Church which only holds the true Religion And the very name Reformed is novel and no proper title of the Catholike Church but onely a cloak for your Schisme which discloseth the novelty of your Church and way Answ 1. And of how much better signification think you is the name Papist or Romanist You call your selves Catholikes and we call our selves Catholikes You scornfully call us Lutherans and Calvinists which are names that we disclaime and then argue from your own imposed names Would you have us do so by you And as for the names of Protestants and Reformed we use them not to express the Essential nature of our Religion but the Accidental Removal of your Corruptions So that though Scripture or Antiquity talke not of A Protestant or Reformed Religion by name yet it commendeth to us that same Religion which we now call Protestant 〈◊〉 Reformed but then it could not so be called because you had not then hatched your corruptions and deformities which are presupposed to our Reformation The man that fell among thieves when his wounds were healed was a Cured man whereas before he was not a cured man because not a wounded man And yet he was the same man as before and the Theeves ●hat wounded him would have made but a foolish ●lea if they would have dispossessed him of his In●eritance on pretence that he is not the same man and have proved him not the same because he hath ●ot the same name it being not a Cured man that owned that inheritance before Obj. 10. Where the Catholike Church is there the Catholike Religion is and no where else But the Catholike Church is not with you but with us For you found us in Possession of the name and thing and then departed from us as Hereticks in former ages did from the Church Therefore it is not you but we that have the true Catholike Religion which is the onely safe way to salvation Answ 1. The Church must be known to be true and Catholike by the Religion which it owneth and not the Religion by the Church You begin at the wrong end As if I would prove such a thing to be a Vertue because it is in such a man as I esteem when I should rather prove him to be honest and Virtuous because that which is first proved honesty Vertue dwelleth in him 2. Did we not find the Greek Ethiopian and other Churches in possession of the name of the Catholike Church as well as you Yet you would dispossess them 3. We found you in Possession of All in your own account and all is yours if your selves must be Judges But in the account of the Greek Abassine and other Churches

headed by the Pope as the universal Bishop having a universal jurisdiction over the rest or an infallible Judgement in determining of controversies in matters of faith It is none of the least of our Reasons why we dare not be of the Romish faction or opinions called by them their Church and their Religion because it is so new and we dare not venture our souls upon new wayes nor dare we believe that Christ hath two sorts of Churches essentially different since his Resurrection one sort before the Popes universal headship and the other since nor dare we once imagine that Christ had no true Church on earth till Pope Boniface would needs be the universal Bishop or till Rome was advanced to the dignity and titles which it doth now usurpe I desire no better issue then this of our difference Let any Papists living bring out their cause to the tryal of antiquity and let them that are of the most Ancient Church and Religion carry the cause If we prove not theirs new and ours the most ancient or if they prove theirs more Ancient then ours as since Christs Resurrection then we are contented to be of their Church and way Arg. 6. If the Papists be the greatest Schismaticks upon earth most desperately rending the Church and separating themselves from the maine body of the visible Church then Popery is not a safe way to salvation But the Papists are the greatest Schismaticks on earth most desperately rending the Church and separating themselves from the main body thereof Therefore Popery is no safe way to salvation The consequences of the Major will be confessed by themselves It is only the Minor therefore that is to be proved which is too easily done being a matter of fact First The Papists do actually rend themselves from the greatest part of Christs Church on earth condemning all others to everlasting fire 2. They do lay the grounds of a continual schisme in making a new center of the unity of the Church of these two in order 1. He that shall consider of all the Christians in the world at this day who subject not themselves to the Pope of Rome and may truly be reputed to be of the Catholike Church will see that the Papists are but a small part of the Church But especially if we consider them as they were not many ages ago much more numerous then now they be The Grecians the Syrians called Melchites the Moscovites and Russians the Georgians all of the Greek Religion besides the multitude of the same Religion dispersed throughout the Turkes dominions also the Abassins Egyptians Armenians Jacobites who are neer of a mind and differ from the Papists and submit not to their authority Besides all the Reformed Churches in Germany Sweden Denmark Hungary Transylvania Brittain Ireland France Belgia Helvetia and other parts with those in the Indies I say consider of all these Christians together and it will appear that the Papists are but a few to them or not neer so many as they But if you further consider of the state of the Christian world not many ages ago when the Turkes had not yet subdued the Eastern parts and when the Abassian Empire was much more large and Nubia and other Countries had not revolted it will appear that we may well say that it was but a small part of Christians comparatively that did acknowledge the universall headship and jurisdiction of the Pope or submit themselves to him besides many other points of Religion in which they differ from him I know that the Papists say that these are all either Hereticks or Schismaticks and so no part of the Catholike Church But the accusation of Schisme is the meer voice of Schisme and for Heresie its true that all men and Churches have their errors which yet deserve not the name of Heresie The Jacobites and the rest that are neer them are afraid of acknowledging two Natures in Christ lest it lead them to make two persons with the Nestorians but yet they are not plaine Eutichites and both they and the Nestorians acknowledge Christ to be perfect God and perfect man only the Nestorians do amiss have these two natures two persons and that the Euticheans in flying too far from them are afraid to call them two Natures though they confess the Godhead and Manhood to be really distinct yet they say that both are as it were conjoyned or coupled into one Nature so that wise impartial men think that the Eutichites or at least these Christians that are so called amiss by the Papists do but misuse the term Nature for the term Person and so deny two Persons onely in sence and two Natures only in name and that by the same misuse of the terms the Nestorians do affirm two Natures onely in sence and two Persons in words onely Of this I desire the Reader to consider What Luther hath said de Conciliis This I must needs say that if I did not exercise the same charity in judging of the Romanists as I do in this excuse of the Jacobites and other Christians that are not of their Communion I should be forced to censure the former much deeper then the latter and if by all their errors I must hold the rest to be Hereticks or Schismaticks I must by the same measure judge the Romanists to be doubly Heretical as I certainly know them to be most notoriously Schismatical For though I know that they are not so barbarous and unlearned as most of these forementioned Christians and also that they are free from many of their mistakes yet withall they have many more in stead of them which the other are free from And for the Protestants they are Hereticks only on this supposition that the Pope be Judge By this time then it partly appeareth how great a part of the Church of Christ the Papists do differ from But yet this is not all nay the smaller part For if you will but consider the state of the Church of Christ for the first three hundred yea five or six hundred years you will find that the Papists do differ from them all even from the whole Church For then the Popes universal Episcopacy and jurisdiction was not known in the world as is said before All these doth the Romane party now separate themseves from All these they do pronounce to be no true Churches or true Christians but Hereticks and Schismaticks All these do they condemn to the pit of Hell They have now concluded that onely those are of the true Church that acknowledge the Mastership or universal Headship of the Pope and the Mistrisship of the particular Romane Church which none of all those forementioned did They now conclude that none can be saved but who are of this new-framed Church of theirs Now I do appeal to any reasonable impartial man alive whether there be any more notorious Schismaticks on earth then these men that dare unchurch the far greatest part of Christs Church on earth at