Infallibility in the Pope and that in matters of Fact. This is the Dispute so hotly debated of late years between them and the Jansenists For the Pope having condemned five Propositions in a Posthumous Book of Jansenius entituled Augustinus Forms were drawn up to be subscribed under pain of Excommunication though the Propositions could no where be found in that Book But as the Flatterers of the Court of Rome first raised the Pope above a General Council to secure him against the Reformation in Capite Membris which the other Bishops have so often required so the Jesuites have extended his Infallibility yet farther even to matters of Fact and so whatever he determins must be right in all cases It was upon these grounds that Subscription was to be made to the five Propositions by the Seculars and by the Regulars of both Sexes and was enforced not onely by the Pope but by the Gallican Church Notwithstanding certain Divines and the Nuns of the Port Royal resused to make the Subscription enjoyned not that they made any scruple of the Doctrine it self which they were required to acknowledge but because the contrary to it was no where to be found in the Book condemned but the Pope they said had been imposed upon by those who pretended to have taken the Propositions out of that Book Hereupon arose a Controversie concerning the Infallibility of the Church and of the Pope the Jesuites maintaining that the Pope cannot be mistaken in a matter of Fact and that therefore the Propositions are in that Book whatever ordinary Readers may think of it his Holiness has determined so and he cannot be mistaken For they f Les Imaginaires les Visionnaires la Traitè de la foy humaine Octavo à Cologne 1683. p. 81 86 88. make no scruple to assert that the Pope is as infallible in matters of Fact as our Saviour himself that he saw with the eyes of the Church as they phrase it and discovered those Propositions by the illumination of the Holy Ghost This is but what the Jesuites maintained in that famous Thesis of Decemb. 12. MDCLXI in the College of Clermont as a Catholick Truth repugnant to the Greek Heresie concerning the Primacy of the Pope viz. That Jesus Christ hath given to all Popes whenever they shall speak è Cathedra the same infallibility himself had both in matters of Right and of Fact. The Nuns of the Port Royal and all others that refused to sign the Formulary wherein the five Propositions of Jansenius are condemned were used with great severity and the Archbishop of Paris would not be dissuaded from imposing the Subscription But however the Church of France might stand affected towards the Pope at that time and in that affair yet the opinion against the Pope's Infallibility is so generally maintained in that Church that it is almost peculiar to it and is termed g New Heresie of the Jesuites p. 79. by the Jesuites Sententia Parisiensis A.D. MDCLXXXII the French Clergy in a Synod held at Paris determined that a General Council is above the Pope according to the Decrees of the fourth and fifth Sessions of the Council of Constance Against this Determination Emanuel à Schelstrate the present Vatican Library-keeper wrote a Book printed at Antwerp An. Dom. MDCLXXXIII wherein he endeavours to shew from ancient Manuscripts that those Decrees of the Council of Constance which have passed so long upon the World for authentick and were so often approved and confirmed in the Council of Basil are notwithstanding false and he sticks not to affirm that they were partly falsified by the Council of Basil and partly obtruded upon the Council of Constance against the consent of a great number in it and in the absence of others and so have been imposed upon the Church ever since in so many Editions and by so many Licences and Approbations particularly by the Bull of Paul the Fifth before the Roman Edition of the Councils and had the good luck never to be discovered by any before himself when he now sets himself to oppose the Determination of the French Clergy 2. But M. Schelstrate is not the onely man that opposed the Gallican Church in this Controversie For George Szelepechemy Archbishop of Gran and Primate of Hungary put forth his Synodical Letter containing a Censure of the four Propositions in which h Vide Not as in Censur Hungaricam 4. proposition Cleri Gallicani apud Edmun Richer Vindicias Doctrin major Schol. Paris is this assertion Ad solam sedem Apostolicam divino immutabili privilegio spectat de controversiis Fidei judicare It onely belongs to the Apostolick See by a Divine immutable Privilege to judge of Controversies in the Faith. And he with his Bishops were so zealous in the defence of that Doctrine that they profess in the conclusion they would spend the last drop of their Bloud rather than depart in the least from it This Proposition Jan. 30. MDCLXXXIII the Parliament of Paris delivered to M. Edmund Pirot Syndick of the Faculty to be examined which when the Faculty had received from him on the first of February they chose certain of their body to study and consider the Point and then after due deliberation to give their Judgment upon it This they did March the first and asterwards for three months together in their several Assemblies which were no less than fourty five in number the Question was propounded to be disputed upon and when they had by this means throughly debated and concluded the Controversie they declared That the Proposition as it excludes Bishops and General Councils from that Authority which they have immediately from Christ in judging in matters of Faith is rash erroneous contrary to the practice of the Church and to the Word of God as well as to the constant Doctrine of the Faculty This answer the Faculty of the Sorbon gave to the question May the eighteenth and then reviewing it the day following confirmed it moreover from the several Censures which had been formerly passed by their Body in this and former Ages upon such Tenets Thus that Reverend and Learned Society i Censura sacrae Facultatis Theolog. Paris ad dandum Senatui responsum data in propositionem de qua ille quaesierat quid ipsa sentiret Parisiis 1683. made the most deliberate and solemn determination that could be possibly made in any case But the controversie would not end here for another Authour under the name of Eugenius Lombardus took the Propositions into Examination MDCLXXXV and in contradiction to them asserts that the Pope has Authority to depose Kings that he is above a General Council that he is Infallible when he determines è Cathedra that he can dispense with Oaths and Vows made to God Almighty And the same year M. Maimbourg answered M. Schclstrate but Schelstrate replyed the year following and so the dispute is still depending unless we can suppose the desence of
HISTORICAL EXAMINATION OF THE AUTHORITY OF General Councils SHEWING The false dealing that hath been used in the publishing of them AND The difference amongst the Papists themselves about their Number LONDON Printed for Henry Mortlock at the Phoenix in St. Paul's Church-yard and at the White-Hart in Westminster-Hall MDCLXXXVIII THE PREFACE THE chief Controversies between the Church of England and the Church of Rome have of late been managed to the best advantage on both sides The more judicious seem to be satisfy'd and others to be tired out with a close and eager debate of above two years continuance all seem to be settled now and fixed in their Principles and every one sees or thinks he sees on which side the Truth lies I am confident all has been said for Popery that can be said though I am not so well assured that much more might not have been said against it which has been spared out of a regard to our common Christianity and to Religion in general besides the respect due to a great and gratious Prince of that Communion But our Adversaries have not been wanting to their own Cause in this opportunity nor in the least favourable to ours At first they would seem to be satisfied if they could be truly represented and rightly understood but those colours were soon wiped off and something must be done to blacken us when they could not appear so lovely as they desired Laborious attempts therefore have been made against the chief Points of the Reformation against our Office of the Eucharist against our Church-Government and Ordination and all this by a Person who has been so little convinced by these Books that while he had them by him he liv'd in our Communion for many years however now they come to operate upon him but if they have no speedier effect upon others than they have had upon him they seem to be designed for the Conversion of the next Age and indeed they hitherto have had but little success upon this But I leave him to God and to his own Conscience though the world may justly expect an Account from him to shew that any thing has been ever said to give us a worse Representation of Popery than such a Practice may doe 'T is certain nothing has been left unattempted which might blemish the Church of England in its Doctrine or in its Discipline And to give the Work its last and heroick Turn and shame Men into a sense of Religion and into a true Notion of the Catholick Church Beasts have been made to dispute in the Magnificence of Verse above the ordinary capacities of Men and if this fails to work upon a sullen and obstinate Age nothing can ever doe it Herein the Authour follows the wisedom of the Ancients who were wont to instill their Doctrines by Fables and Allusions but as his manner is he has mightily improv'd this way beyond whatever the Ancients knew For their Beasts were wont to speak as you would imagin Beasts to do if they had the use of speech but his Beasts are all Heroes and exceed most Men that ever I met with Æsop and Phaedrus were content with Beasts as they found them onely they made them prate after a brutish kind of Fashion Horace's Brutes too were as unheroical Brutes as any of Æsop's and Virgil himself could not advance his Beasts one pitch above their nature no his Monarch of the Bees did not that I can understand make one heroical Buz. But our Poet to the confusion of Mankind has made Brutes speak such rare things as no Man ever spoke nor perhaps can understand Yet after all that has been said in Verse or in Prose against us or in behalf of the Church of Rome I am not convinced but that she is the same Church of Rome still which she was an hundred years ago nay she would not be thought otherwise that were as much as her Infallibility is worth There is not the least concern of ours to discover the Church of Rome to be worse than she is now represented to be but we should be glad if we were mistaken and could find her so much altered for the better It were inexcusable in us to dislike or not to acknowledge any thing of a Reformation which was carried on here by degrees and we pray God to prosper any Beginnings of it in other Countries but if the Church of France must be put upon us for the whole Roman-Catholick Church and the Sentiments of some particular Men for the Doctrines of that Church if we must be persuaded that all the varieties and diversities of Opinions in the Church of Rome have ever been infallibly the same and that Italy will subscribe to what France shall dictate or that even all or the greatest part of the Clergy of France will agree to the Bishop of Meaux's softnings and refinings these are strange things and will not readily be admitted France has indeed all the Learning of the Roman Communion confined in a manner within it self and seems to set up for an Empire of Arts and Religion as well as of Arms and that must needs pass for Catholick Doctrine that has so much Learning and so many Legions to defend it The Jesuits have a known distinction between the Popery of France and the Popery of Rome as F. Cotton confessed in the Point of Allegiance and they are of late much concerned for the Interest of the French Church and for the Pope's infallibility even in matters of Fact at the same time so that if at any time by the Power of France they can get a Pope of their Society by virtue of a very convenient Doctrine that the Pope may chuse his own Successour they have at once an infallible and a perpetual Pope and then the Jesuits Morals may be Gospel though the present Pope has term'd them scandalous but that may be scandalous at one time which is not so at another Suarez asserts that the Pope may change the manner of Election now in use apud Carleton Curs Theologic Tom. Poster Disputat 22. Sect. 6. 'T is certain that Popery is carried on in all its heights even in France it self and the Gallican Privileges betrayed by that very sort of Men who would now be thought the chief defenders of them The Authour of a Book entituled The Pernicious Consequences of the new Heresie of the Jesuits against the King and the State published Febr. 1. MDCLXII being an Advocate of Parliament complains that the opinion of the Pope's infallibility had got ground in France and that there was great likelihood of its spreading daily it being the general opinion of the Jesuits who are a vast Body diffused throughout all parts of the world and have the Education of Youth wherever they come Duvall endeavoured to introduce this Doctrine into the Sorbon but attempted it warily saying that neither the one nor the other side of the Question is de fide But though he was all his
Labbé had caused a Draught of the Work to be printed and I am apt to think that through this Authour's Complaint the Council of Basil had more right done it than otherwise at would have had But the Treatises prefix't in the Apparatus are such as quite overthrow the Gallican Privileges and the Doctrines peculiar to that Church For Cardinal Jacobatius de Conciliis sets himself purposely to prove the Superiority of the Pope to a Council and answers all Objections against it lib. 10. p. 519. in Appar Concil Labbé and in plain terms denies the Authority of the Decrees of Constance and making use of those known Evasions that these Decrees were to take place onely in the times of Schism between two contending Popes or in case of Heresie or that it was no general Constitution but limited to the present exigency of Affairs in short he denies that any Constitution of a Council can bind the Pope because he has no Superiour but God and so in all points he palpably contradicts the Doctrine of the French Church p. 536. Paulus Fabulottus de Potestate Papae supra Concilium proves his Tenets by all manner of Arguments from Scripture from Reason from History from Fathers and from Councils and in his fifth Chap. where he shews the Pope's Superiority from Councils be shews particularly that the French ought not to except against the Authority of the last Council of the Lateran because they acknowledge its Authority in enjoying the Privileges granted them in the Bull of Leo the Tenth which confirmed it and it is unreasonable says he that they should allow it when it makes for their advantage and reject it in other matters Fabulott ib. p. 69 70. He pretends to shew that Martin the Fifth did by his Bull retract the Decrees of the Fourth and Fifth Sessions of Constance made says he in Schism by appointing the Question to be put to all suspected of Heresie An credant Romanum Pontificem in Dei Ecclesia supremam habere Potestatem Whether they believe that the Pope has supreme Power ' in the Church of God And so turns the Council of Constance upon the French ib. In a word he concludes that whoever persists obstinately in the contrary Opinion against so many Councils for he produces no fewer than six whereof that of Constance is the second must needs be an Heretick He particularly answers the Objections brought from the Council of Constance in the usual manner as for the Council of Basil he says all Catholicks confess it was not a lawfull Council when it defined Councils to be above the Pope At last he concludes with admiration that any one should to the destruction of his Soul be so perverse as to call in question so certain a Truth established on so strong Arguments and so great Authorities Caranza maintains the Popes Infallibility and says it was never doubted of 'till the Councils of Constance and Basil Controver 3. p. 112. in Appar Labbei He spends his fourth Controversie in shewing against these two Councils that Pope's are against General Councils Petrus de Monte in his Monarchia runs as high as any of the rest and to make a Pope a complete Monarch exempts the Clergy from the Obedience and their Possessions from the Dominions of temporal Princes in Apparat. p. 155. But Jacobatius if it be possible goes beyond this For he maintains the Deposing Power and affirms that the Pope alone may depose Emperours and Kings and whomsoever he pleases and particularly the King of France and this without the advice and concurrence of his Cardinals he makes no doubt of his deposing Power the onely Question is whether he can doe it alone without his Cardinals and he determines in the Affirmative ibid. pag. 329. so little regard is to be had to that which is esteemed the Doctrine of the French Church and which some would have us think is the Roman-Catholick Doctrine and the Doctrine against the Pope's Infallibility the Sententie Parisiensium as it is called in contempt is every where decryed even in Paris it self The Jesuits at Cologne laid down this Rule In Censura Coloniensi fol. 132. If any Man examin the Doctrine of the Pope by the Rule of God's Word and seeing that it is different chance to contradict it let him be rooted out with Fire and Sword Walsh Irish Remonstr Treat 4. p. 61. And both the Clergy and People of the Roman Communion in Ireland generally hold the Pope's Infallibility being influenced by the Jesuits as they are in most places Insomuch that in MDCLXVI they refused to sign the three last of the six Propositions which the Sorbon in MDCLXIII had presented to the most Christian King and to apply them as they did the first three to his Majesty of Great Britain and His Subjects though they contain nothing but an Assertion of the King's Prerogatives and a Denial of the Pope's Infallibility Irish Remon Treat 3. p. 23. and Treat 4. p. 58. This we are told by One who is an Advocate for Popish Loyalty and it is confessed by Another who made it the Business of his Life to write against the Deposing Doctrine that this is the Doctrine most generally received amongst those of that Communion Neque quenquam movere debet ut aliàs observavi in Apol. num 4.49 utì citatur in margine quod opinio haec quae Summo Pontifici hanc potestatem tribuit communio sit quà m opposita plurésque Doctores eam sequantur c. Widrington Discuss Discussionis Praef. So little security have we that Popery is the same thing in France that it is at Rome and in other Popish Countries or that the Bishop of Meaux's Exposition is good Popery even in Paris it self But that which is the Doctrine generally taught we are often told by the Guide is equivalent to the Definitions of a General Council inasmuch as no Council can be known to be general nor consequently to teach true Doctrine but by the Reception it meets with from the Church and so the Misrepresenters will be found to be those that soften and palliate Popery contrary to the sense of the most of that Communion I am sure Cardinal Poole and his Synod at Lambeth MDLVI were for Popery as it is at Rome they did not content themselves to fetch it from France For they receive the Bulla Coenae equalling its Authority even to the Decrees of General Councils and Apostolical Traditions and they profess to own the full extent of Power attributed to the Pope by the Council of Florence Decret 2. and they quote it in the usual form Quemadmodum etiam in gestis OEcumenicorum Conciliorum in Sacris Canonibus continetur not Quemadmodum c. as we are now taught to reade it according to the true Translation vid. Walsh Lett. to the Bishop of Lincoln p. 274. if such a nicety will make any material difference and this was done by Cardinal Poole by virtue of his Legantine Power in a
in an Exception to reserve the Liberties of the Gallican Church entire And in the e Id. p. 348. Low Countries when Margaret Dutchess of Parma then Governess there required the Magistrates of every Province to make search whether any thing in the Decrees of the Council of Trent were contrary to the Rights of his Catholick Majesty or to the ancient customs of their Countrey they animadverted upon several Chapters particularly upon C. 5. Sess 24. which the French likewise particularly except against and they said it was an Innovation and the King might insist upon his Ancient Right 3. I think nothing can be a greater Evidence that this Council was not General than the opposition of National Churches in behalf of their particular Privileges in points of Reformation for a General Council may undoubtedly prescribe to particular Churches in matters of Discipline as the first General Councils did and oblige them to a compliance for the peace and benefit of the whole and the Council must be judge what is most conducing to that end To deny this Authority to a General Council is plainly to lay its Authority quite aside and to receive onely as much of it as particular Churches shall think fit for it were an extravagant thing to demand absolute obedience and submission in matters of Faith when points of Discipline are insisted upon against the express Decrees of the Council a Council may err in Doctrine but if it have any Authority this must extend at least to points of Discipline which are in themselves indifferent and may be altered as it shall seem most conducing to the good of the whole Church * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euseb de Vita Constantini lib. 3. cap. 20. Constantine after the Council of Nice not onely determined the Controversie against Arius but the time of keeping of Easter and other things of Order and Discipline to which all Churches submitted whatever eager Debates they had had amongst themselves before The erecting the Churches of Constantinople and Jerusalem into Patriarchates and the settling of Church-Government was performed in the four first General Councils yet nothing was objected against the Authority of Councils in such Affairs nor did the Churches placed under the Patriarchates of Jerusalem and Constantinople insist upon their particular Privileges onely the Church of Rome was unwilling to have Constantinople equalled to her self and therefore made a troublesome but fruitless opposition in the Council of Chalcedon 4. But if at this day the Church of France be so jealous of her Privileges in matters of Discipline we have much more reason to be carefull of the Privileges of our common Christianity in matters of Faith if she insist that her Bishops have Authority to decide the Causae Majores i. e. all Debates arising whether in matters of Faith or Discipline according to the Decrees of General Councils how can it be denied us to defend the Ancient Faith according to General Councils truly such if they reject the Decrees of Reformation how shall we subscribe Pope Pius's Creed nay how shall they subscribe it not by virtue of any obligation from this Church but because they otherwise think the Articles of it True and for the contrary reason we cannot subscribe them because we think them false so that the Authority of the Council of Trent is really laid aside on both hands and the merits of the cause must be the onely thing in Debate For to say that a General Council properly speaking cannot abridge a particular Church of her Privileges is to say that a particular Church is above a General Council or at least exempt from its Jurisdiction This is well enough understood at Rome where Gerbais's Book in defence of the Gallican Privileges is condemned § XVIII I have done now with their Councils and have shewn how far Papists themselves have been from thinking them infallible or from acknowledging most of them to be General whatever credit they may have gained by the ignorance and superstition of latter Ages when every Assembly of Bishops greater than ordinary was esteemed a General Council and every General Council voted it self infallible For 't is certain that in the most ignorant Ages they first fansied themselves infallible and then took the liberty to say and doe what they thought fit and so imposed many superstitious conceits and gainfull Projects on the world for infallible Truths It now remains onely to consider whether we can meet with any better satisfaction from the consent of the present Roman Church and to enquire whether there be any expedient to reconcile these differences concerning the Authority of their several Councils But here we are so far at a loss that we find them in nothing more disagreeing than in the very Fundamental Point upon which all the Authority of Councils depends and so disagreeing in this they must be at an eternal disagreement concerning the Councils themselves For some making the Pope above a General Council others a General Council above the Pope and a third sort making them co-ordinate those that place infallibility in the Pope alone have little reason to regard a Council and those that place it in a Council alone do upon occasion as little respect the Pope or judge of General Councils by Bellarmin's Rule and seek no farther than for the Pope's confirmation but those that think it is in neither separately can acquiesce in the Determinations neither of Pope nor Council unless they both concur unanimously in their Determinations and whoever make the Church diffusive to be the Judge of what Councils are General and what are not so are still at a wider difference from all the rest § XIX Our English Papists seem generally to be of the last Opinion placing the Authority of the Church in the Agreement of the Pope with a General Council but making the Authority of General Councils to depend upon the Reception of the Church diffusive hereby placing the Authority Executively onely in General Councils confirmed by the Pope but fundamentally and radically in the Church upon whose Approbation all depends but by Church they understand onely the governing part of it and such as would have had a right to vote if they had been assembled in Council This is the Doctrine advanced in the Book so much valued by our English Papists The Guide in Controversies and because this way has most Artifice and Amusement in it they are willing to put the issue here though most of their Priests must needs have great Prejudices against it from a foreign Education For the French are of the second opinion and the Pope with all his Adherents of the first How well the Guide's Hypothesis has been accepted abroad I am not able to say but it will be best guessed at by the contest that has been about the two other opinions whether the Parties seem inclinable to admit of the Guide as a Reconciler § XX. The Jesuites are for no less than a Personal
upon the Epist to Titus to the Centum Gravamina to an entire Collection of Discourses to this purpose called Fasciculus rerum expetendarum fugiendarum or to the History of the Council of Trent or to the Concilium Delectorum Cardinalium to get rid of this Argument which is so plausibly urged by the Guide and runs through all his Discourses for if men will so apparently transgress all the measures of Right and Wrong we have no reason to confide much in them about what is True and False when it is so much for their Interest to uphold the opinion of Infallibility which implies Industry and Abilities as well as Integrity * Loci Theologici lib. 5. cap. 5. Melchior Canus asserts that Councils as well as Popes may err unless they take care to use all due means in examining the Doctrines defined That Councils have sometimes acted by Interest and Design is confessed on both hands the onely Question is what and how many these Councils have been He says indeed that as for himself he will never admit that any Pope or Council has not used all necessary diligence in determining Questions of Faith But what matter is it what he will admit unless he will answer his own Arguments if he will admit the Premisses and deny the Conclusion what is that to us others of his Communion will own that Popes have erred è Cathedra and he owns that Honorius and other Popes have erred in matters of Faith now 't is but carrying the Argument one step farther subsunt omninò causae eaedem and General Councils may err in their Definitions as well as Popes His words which are very remarkable are these So that we are not to look upon those as the Judgments of the Apostolick See which are made in private malitiously or inconsiderately by the Pope alone or by some few of his Party but those which appear to have been first well examined and by the advice of several wise Men Now we have the very same Reasons to say the like of Councils if there be the same cause for it for we ought not to think that the Pope onely should be mistaken when he is asleep and should speak the truth when he is awake and that the Fathers of a Council alone should go on right sleeping or waking and that they should discern difficulties with their Eyes shut or in the dark It is an usual thing believe me for all the Judges of the Church when they publish their Decrees to be driven on by a certain rashness and suddenness of Judgment as by a wind so that they effect nothing which may be looked upon as solid grave or certain Clemangis is yet sharper Vpon whom shall my Spirit rest Disputat super mater Conc. General in Fasciculo rerum expet fugiend pag. 200. E. but upon the humble man and him who trembles at my Word But if as our Lord bears witness it onely rests upon those then according to the temper of this Age there are in all probability but few such in our Councils There are usually in every Assembly great numbers of carnal or worldly Men ambitious and contentious Men swelling with that humane knowledge which puffs up see therefore the necessity of believing that the Holy Spirit has always the upper-hand in Councils when the minds of the Consulters always resist and put a bar to any thing which might produce sounder and more saving effects especially since the Decrees of Councils proceed for the most part from the major part of the concurring Votes This I speak not positively but by way of Inquiry c. But says Bellarmin it is a sufficient evidence that a Council has not erred if the Pope has confirmed it and his Confirmation is the Criterion of a truly General Council or rather of Infallibility for Councils whether general or particular in Bellarmin's d De Concil Auctoritate lib. 2. cap. 5. account cannot err if the Pope has once confirmed them But first Popes have confirmed Councils which are not acknowledged to be General as we have seen of the Councils of Constance and Basil nay Liberius confirmed the Council of Sirmium which was Heretical Secondly This involves us yet in farther Difficulties for these Men who hold that without the Pope's Confirmation no Councils can be legitimate or of sufficient Authority to propose Articles of Faith are brought to this Vid. Francisc Long. Coriol Praelud ad Conc. Carleton cursus Theolog. Tom. poster Disp 22. §. 3. that they assert it to be De Fide that the present Pope whoever he be is Christ's true Vicar and Successour to Saint Peter which is the general opinion of the Jesuits But how this could be De Fide when there were so many Antipopes for about seventy years together or how any Council can be known to be General upon these Grounds is impossible to understand since if there should be any defect in his Baptism either as to the Form or the Intention of the Priest or if any thing should be amiss in his Election or Consecration he is by a constitution of Nicholas the Second by a Bull of Pius the Fourth and by a plain and necessary Consequence from their own avowed Principles not a Pope but an Invader and is to be anathematized and withstood by all Christian People The French King would not acknowledge Clement the Seventh for Pope till the Cardinals who chose him had sworn that they proceeded canonically which yet would not satisfie the University of Paris and the French Clergy And Bellarmin e De Conciliis lib. 1. cap. 8. confesses that it is doubtfull whether the first Council of Pisa MCCCCIX which deposed Gregory the Twelfth and Benedict the Thirteenth and elected Alexander the Fifth were approved or not but if it had been certainly rejected Alexander the Sixth would certainly have styled himself not Alexander the Sixth but the Fifth And it is besides says he almost the common opinion that Alexander the Fifth and John who succeeded him were true Popes However of the Three Pretenders to the Popedom these were most generally owned for such So that if a man can extend his Faith in such an intricate business to all the circumstances requisite to the making a Pope duly qualified for the confirmation of a Council he can have no reason to make the least scruple of whatever the Council delivers and so may as well take the Councils word and never stay for the Popes confirmation However the Infallibility of Councils resolves itself into the Infallibility of Confessours at last and every private man believes as much and no more of Councils than his Confessour thinks fit to acquaint him with and since the Jesuits have every where almost that office the Councils are generally received as they have put them forth and understood as they explain them and will be so received and understood though these I have mentioned or a thousand more objections lye against