made capable of this their obligation But we are not now enquiring what the obligation to believe the main points of faith is nor whether tradition be a self-evident rule but how there should be a new obligation to believe something self-evidently connected with the former points is beyond my capacity to understand And they must be vulgar understandings indeed that can rationally and connaturally be made capable of such an obligation For if it be self-evidently connected with the main points no one can believe the one without believing the other for nothing is self-evident but what a man assents to at the first apprehension of it and if he doth so how comes there a new obligation to believe it Is it possible to believe that any thing consists of parts and not believe that that whole is greater than any of those parts for this is a thing self-evidently connected with the nature of the whole But these are self-evident riddles as the former were unintelligible demonstrations And yet though these be rare Theories the application of them to the case of the Roman Church exceeds all the rest Whence saith he the Government of our Church is still justified to be sweet and according to right nature and yet forcible and efficacious Although I admire many things in Mr. S's Book yet I cannot say I do any thing more than this passage that because men are obliged to believe no implied points but such as are self-evidently connected with the main ones therefore the Government of the Roman Church is sweet and according to right nature c. Alas then how much have we been mistaken all this while that have charged her with imposing hard and unsufferable conditions of communion with her No she is so gentle and sweet that she requires nothing but the main points on the account of a self-evident rule and implied points by reason of self-evident connexion with the former I see Mr. S. if he will make good his word is the only person who is ever like to reconcile me with the Church of Rome For I assure you I never desire any better terms of communion with a Church than to have no main points of faith required from me to assent to but what are built on a self-evident rule nor any implied points but such as are self-evidently connected with the former And no work can be more easie than to convince me upon these grounds for all endeavors of proof are taken away by the things being said to be self-evident For the very offer of proof that they are so self-evidently proves they are not so For what ever is proved by somthing beside it self can never be said without a contradiction to be self-evident But not to tye up Mr. S. from his excellent faculty of proving if Mr. S. will prove to me that any of the points in difference between us as Transubstantiation Purgatory Supremacy of the Roman Church c. have any self-evident connexion with any main point of faith in the Apostles Creed I solemnly promise him to retract all I have writ against that Church so far shall I be from needing a new obligation to believe them But if these be so remote from self-evidence that they are plainly repugnant to sense and reason witness that self-evident doctrine of Transubstantiation what then must we think of Mr. S. Surely the least is that since his being a Roman Catholick his mind is strangely inlightned so far that those things are self-evident to him which are contradictions to the rest of the world But withal M. S. acquaints us with another mysterie which is how these points descended by a kind of tradition and yet confesses they were never thought of or reflected on by the generality till the Church took occasion to explain them Such a silent tradition doth very sutably follow the former self-evident connexion For he that can believe Transubstantiation ro be self-evident no wonder if he believes that to have been delivered by a constant Tradition which was never heard of from the Apostles times to these Now Mr. S. is pleased to return to me and draws up a fresh charge against me which is that I act like a Politician and would conquer them by first dividing them and making odious comparisons between two parties of Divines But to shew us how little they differ he distinguishes them as faithful and as private discoursers in the former notion he saith they all hold the same divinely constituted Church-Government and the same self-evident rule of faith but as private discoursers he acknowledges they differ in the explication of their belief I meddle not here with the Government of their Church which I have elsewhere proved to be far enough from being divinely constituted but with the rule of faith and the question is whether the infallibility of oral tradition be that self-evident rule which that Church proceeds on Yes saith Mt. S. they are all as faithful agreed in it but as discourses they differ about it Which in short is that all in the Church of Rome who are not of his opinion know not what they say and that they oppose that which they do really believe Which in plain English is that they are egregious dissemblers and prevaricators in Religion that they do intolerably flatter the Pope and present Church with loud declamations for their infallibility but they do really believe no such thing but resolve all into oral tradition But is not this an excellent agreement among them when Mr. White and his party not only disown the common doctrine of the infallibility of Pope and Councils but dispute against it as pernicious and destructive to Christian faith on the other side the far greater part of Romanists say there can be no certainty of faith unless there be an infallible divine testimony in the present Church and this lodged in Pope and Councils that those who endeavour to overthrow this are dangerous seditious heretical persons Accordingly their Books are censured at Rome their opinions disputed against and their persons condemned And yet all this while we must believe that these stick together like two smooth Marbles as faithful though they are knocked one against another as discoursers and that they perfectly agree in the same self-evident rule of faith when all their quarrels and contentions are about it and those managed with so great heat that heresie is charged of one side and Arch-heresie and undermining Religion on the other Doth he think we never heard of Mr. White 's Sonus Succinae nor of that Chapter in it where he saith that the doctrine of Pope and Councils infallibility tends to overthrow the certainty of Christian faith and that the propagating such a doctrine is a greater crime than burning Temples ravishing the sacred Virgins on the Altars trampling on the body of Christ or the sending the Turk or Antichrist into Christian Countreys Or doth he think we can believe that the Pope and Cardinals the Jesuites
but this if a Pope and Council should define a new thing and declare they ground themselves on new lights as did their first reformers in England but I shall find he saith no such fopperies in faith-definitions made by the Catholick Church Is this the man who made choice of reason for his weapon could there be a greater calumny cast on our Church than to say her reformers grounded themselves on new lights when our great charge against the Church of Rome is for introducing Novelties and receding from pure and primitive antiquity Whether the charge be true or no yet sure it follows they did not declare they ground themselves on new lights but expresly the contrary Well but Pope and Councils neither define new things nor ground themselves on them but what means the man of reason that they make no new definitions surely not for then what did they meet for and what mean their decrees but he intends that they deliver no new doctrine but how must that be tried or hath Mr. S. gained the opinion of infallibility both from Pope and Councils that we must believe his bare word but we not only say but prove that even their last Council hath defined many things which never were delivered by Christ or his Apostles And it is to no purpose whether they say they ground themselves on new lights or pretend to an infallible assistance for it comes all to the same at last For if the assistance be infallible what matter is it whether the doctrine hath been revealed or no for on this supposition it is impossible that Pope and Council should miscarry Therefore if any Church be guilty of fopperies in faith-definitions it must be that which you miscall the Catholick but is more truly known by the name of the Roman Church There is yet one piece of Mr. S's sagacity to be taken notice of as to this particular which is that I am at an end of my argument because I say the opinion of the Pope and Councils infallibility is the common doctrin maintained in which I confound the Church with the schools or some private opinaters and then carp at those mens tenets And this is the force of all that Paragraph He tells me I want not wit to know that no sober Catholick holds humane deductions the rule of their faith schoolmen definers of it nor the schools the Tribunal whence to propose it authoritatively and obligingly to the generality of the faithful Neither doth Mr. S. want the wit to know that our present enquiry is concerning the sense of their present Church about the rule of faith Since then Mr. S. must confess it necessary to faith to know what the certain rule of it is let me enquire further whether any particular person can know certainly what it is unless he knows what the Church owns for her rule of faith and whether that may be owned as the Churches judgement which is stifly opposed by the most interessed persons in the Roman Church and the most zealous contenders for it Especially when the Pope who is said to be Head of the Church condemns the doctrine asserted and that only by a small number of such who are as much opposed by themselves as by any of us Is it then possible to know the Churches judgement or not if not 't is to no purpose to search for a rule of faith if it be which way can we come to know it either by most voices or the sense of the Governours of the Church either of the ways I dare put it to a fair tryal whether oral tradition or the infallibility of Pope and Councils be the Doctrine most owned in the Church of Rome But Mr. S. still tells us these are only private opinators and schoolmen who assert the contrary doctrine to his But wiill not they much more say on the other side that this way of oral trodition is a novel fancy of some few half-Catholicks in England and tends to subvert the Roman Church But is the present Pope with Mr. S. a private opinator or was the last a meer schoolman I am sure what ever Mr. S. thinks of him he thought not so of himself when he said he was no Divine in the controversie of Jansenius Doth the Court of Rome signifie no more with Mr. S. than a company of scholastick Pedants that know not what the sense of the Church is concerning the rule of faith I meddle not with the Schools but with the authority of the present Church and him whom Mr. S. owns for the head of it and is it consistent with his headship to condemn that doctrine which contains in it the only certain rule of faith Mr. S. may then see they were no such impertinent Topicks which I insisted on and as stout as Mr. S. seems to be I an apt to believe he would not look on the censure of the Inquisition as an impertinent Topick But at last Mr. S. offers at something whereby he would satisfie me of the sense of the Church as to this particular and therefore asks whether I never heard of such a thing as the Council of Trent I must ingenuously confess I have and seen more a great deal of it than I am satisfied with But what of that there he tells me I may find a clear solution of my doubt by the constant procedure of that most grave Synod in its definitions That is I hope to find that oral tradition was acknowledged there as the only self-evident rule of faith If I do this I confess my self satisfied in this enquiry But how much to the contrary is there very obvious in the proceedings of it For in the 4 th Session the Decree is That Scripture and tradition should be embraced with equal piety and reverence and the reason is because the doctrine of faith is contain'd partly in Scripture partly in tradition but what arts must Mr. S. use to infer from hence that oral tradition in contradistinction to Scripture was looked on as the only rule of faith I cannot but say that the ruling men of that Council were men wise enough in their generation and they were too wise wholly to exclude Scripture but because they knew that of it self could not serve their purposes they therefore help it out with tradition and make both together the compleat rule of faith Where I pray in all the proceedings of that Council doth Mr. S. find them define any thing on the account of oral tradition instead of which we find continual bandyings about the sense of Scripture and Fathers which might have been all spared if they had been so wise as to consider they could not but know the sense of the present Church nor that of the precedent and so up to the time of Christ. But they were either so ignorant as not to light on this happy invention or so wise and knowing as to despise it It is true they would not have their doctrines looked
on as novelties therefore they speak much of tradition and the ancient faith but that was not by what their Parents taught them but what the Fathers of the Church delivered in their writings for by these they judged of traditions and not the oral way And therefore I see little reason to believe that this was either the sense of the Council of Trent or is the sense of any number of Roman Catholicks much less of the whole Church none excepted as Mr. S. in his confident way expresses it And if he will as he saith disavow the maintaining any point or affecting any way which is not assented to by all I hope to see Mr. S. retract this opinion and either fall in with the Court of Rome or return as reason leads him into the bosom of the Church of England But there seems to be somewhat more in what follows viz. that though schoolmen question the personal infallibility of the Pope or of the Roman Clergy nay of a General Council yet all affirm the infallibility of tradition or the living voice of the Church essential and this he saith is held by all held firmly and that it is absolutely infallible To this therefore I answer either Mr. S. means that none do affirm that the universal tradition of the Church essential can err or that the Church of Rome being the Church essential cannot err in her tradition But which way soever he takes it I shall easily shew how far it is from proving that he designs it for For if he take it in the first sense viz. that all the faithful in all ages could not concur in an error then he may as well prove Protestants of his mind as Papists for this is the foundation on which we believe the particular Books of Scripture If this therefore proves any thing it proves more then he intends viz. that while we thus oppose each other we do perfectly agree together and truly so we do as much as they do among themselves But if Mr. S's meaning be that all of their Religion own the Roman Church to be the Church essential and on that account that it cannot err setting aside the absurdity of the opinion it self I say from hence it doth not follow that they make oral tradition the rule of faith because it is most evident that the ground why they say their Church cannot err is not on Mr. S's principles but on the supposition of an infallible assistance which preserves that Church from error So that this falls far short of proving that they are all agreed in this rule of faith which is a thing so far from probability that he might by the same argument prove that Scripture is owned by them all to be the rule of faith For I hope it is held by all and held firmly that the living voice of God in Scripture as delivered to us is infallible and if so then there is as much ground for this as the other But if we enquire what it is men make a rule of faith we must know not only that they believe tradition infallible but on what account they do so For if tradition be believed infallible barely on the account of a promise of infallibility to the present Church then the resolution of faith is not into the tradition but into that infallible assistance and consequently the rule of faith is not what bare tradition delivers but what that Church which cannot err in judging tradition doth propose to us It is not therefore their being agreed in general that tradition is infallible doth make thâ—m agree in the same rule of faith but they must agree in the ground of that infallibility viz. that it depends on this that no age could conspire to deceive the next But all persons who understand any thing of the Roman Church know very well that the general reason why tradition is believed infallible is because they first believe the Church to be infallible whereas Mr. S. goes the contrary way and makes the infallibility of the the Church to depend on the infallibility of tradition And therefore for all that I can see we must still oppose private Opinators in this controversie the Church of Rome not having declared her self at all on Mr. S's behalf but the contrary and the generality believing on the account of the present Churches infallibility And it is strange Mr. S. should find no difference between mens resolving faith into common sense and into the immediate assistance of the Holy Ghost If this then be the first principle of controversie as Mr. S. pretends we see how unlikely they are to agree about other matters who are so much divided about the principle of resolving them And if this be the ground of faith then most Romanists build on a wrong Foundation But if the infallibility of oral tradition be the foundation on which that formidable structure is erecting which he speaks of wo then to the Court of Rome for that is known to build on quite a different foundation And if this as he saith rises apace and has advanced many stories in a small time it only lets us know how fast their divisions grow and that they are building so fast one against another that their Church will not stand between them By this discourse Mr. S. pretends to answer all those If 's which follow which are these In case the Church may determine things de fide which were not before whether the present Church doth then believe as the precedent did or no if it did how comes any thing to be de fide which was not before if it did not what assurance can I have that every age of the Church believes just as the precedent did and no otherwise when I see they profess the contrary And if a thing may be de fide in one age which was not in a foregoing then a Church may deliver that as a matter of faith at one time which was never accounted so before by which means the present Church may oblige me to believe that as a matter of faith which never was so in Christs or the Apostles times and so the infallibility on the account of tradition is destroyed To all which Mr. S. gives a very easie answer viz. that they do not hold any disparate or unimplied points of faith but such as are involved and implied in the main point This is no more easily said then understood for if these be implied in the former how can there come a new obligation to believe them For to take his own instance will any man in his senses say that he that believes homo est animal rationale doth not believe homo est animal and this he makes choice of as an example how one point of faith may be involved in another so as to receive a distinct obligation to believe it I grant that homo est animal is involved in the other but he that shall say that after he hath assented
in reason he ought to have done before he had forsaken us I shall declare it more particularly in these following Proposiâ—ions § 2. 1. That the Doctrine of Christian Religion was by Christ delivered to the Apostles and by them first preached to the World and afterwards by them committed to Writing which Writings or Books have been transmitted from one age to another down to us So far I take to be granted by our present Adversaries That the Christian Doctrine was by Christ delivered to the Apostles and by them publish'd to the World is part of their own Hypothesis That this Doctrine was afterwards by the Apostles committed to writing he also grants Corol. 29. 'T is certain the Apostles taught the same Doctrine they writ and if so it must be as certain that they writ the same Doctrine which they taught I know it is the general Tenet of the Papists that the Scriptures do not contain the entire body of Christian Doctrine but that besides the Doctrines contained in Scripture there are also others brought down to us by oral or unwritten Tradition But Mr. S. who supposeth the whole Doctrine of Christian Religion to be certainly conveyed down to us solely by oral Tradition doth not any where that I remember deny that all the same Doctrine is contained in the Scriptures only he denies the Scriptures to be a means sufficient to convey this Doctrine to us with certainty so that we can by them be infallibly assured what is Christ's Doctrine and what not Nay he seems in that passage I last cited to grant this in saying that the Apostles did both teach and write the same Doctrine I am sure Mr. White whom he follows very closely throughout his whole Book does not deny this in his Apology for Tradition where he saith that it is not the Catholick position that all its Doctrines are not contained in the Scriptures And that those Writings or Books which we call the Holy Scriptures have been transmitted down to us is unquestionable matter of fact and granted universally by the Papists as to all those Books which are owned by Protestants for Canonical § 3. Secondly That the way of Writing is a sufficient means to convey a Doctrine to the knowledg of those who live in times very remote from the age of its first delivery According to his Hypothesis there is no possible way of conveying a Doctrine with certainty and security besides that of oral Tradition the falshood of which will sufficiently appear when I shall have shewn that the true properties of a Rule of Faith do agree to the Scriptures and not to oral Tradition In the mean time I shall only offer this to his consideration that whatever can be orally delivered in plain and intelligible words may be written in the same words and that a Writing or Book which is publick and in every ones hand may be conveyed down with at least as much certainty and security and with as little danger of alteration as an oral Tradition And if so I understand not what can render it impossible for a Book to convey down a Doctrine to the knowledg of after-ages Besides if he had looked well about him he could not but have apprehended some little inconvenience in making that an essential part of his Hypothesis which is contradicted by plain and constant experience For that any kind of Doctrine may be sufficiently conveyed by Books to the knowledg of after-ages provided those Books be but written intelligibly and preserved from change and corruption in the conveyance both which I shall be so bold as to suppose possible is as little doubted by the generality of mankind as that there are Books And surely we Christians cannot think it impossible to convey a Doctrine to posterity by Books when we consider that God himself pitched upon this way for conveyance of the Doctrine of the Jewish Religion to after-ages because it is not likely that so wise an Agent should pitch upon a means whereby it was impossible he should attain his end § 4. Thirdly That the Books of Scripture are sufficiently plain as to all things necessary to be believed and practised He that denies this ought in reason to instance in some necessary point of Faith or matter of Practice which is not in some place of Scripture or other plainly delivered For it is not a sufficient objection to say that the greatest wits among the Protestants differ about the sense of those Texts wherein the generality of them suppose the Divinity of Christ to be plainly and clearly expressed Because if nothing were to be accounted sufficiently plain but what it is impossible a great wit should be able to wrest to any other sense not only the Scriptures but all other Books and which is worst of all to him that makes this objection all oral Tradition would fall into uncertainty Doth the Traditionary Church pretend that the Doctrine of Christ's Divinity is conveyed down to her by oral Tradition more plainly than it is expressed in Scripture I would fain know what plainer words she ever used to express this point of Faith by than what the Scripture useth which expresly calls him God the true God God over all blessed for evermore If it be said that those who deny the Divinity of Christ have been able to evade these and all other Texts of Scripture but they could never elude the definitions of the Church in that matter it is easily answered that the same Arts would equally have eluded both but there was no reason why they should trouble themselves so much about the latter for why should they be solicitous to wrest the definitions of Councils and conform them to their own opinion who had no regard to the Churches Authority If those great Wits as he calls them had believed the sayings of Scripture to be of no greater authority than the definitions of Councils they would have answered texts of Scripture as they have done the definitions of Councils not by endeavouring to interpret them to another sense but by downright denying their Authority So that it seems that oral Tradition is liable to the same inconvenience with the written as to this particular § 5. And of this I shall give him a plain instance in two great Wits of their Church the present Pope and Mr. White the one the Head of the Traditionary Church as Mr. S. calls it the other the great Master of the Traditionary Doctrine These two great Wits notwithstanding the plainness of oral Tradition and the impossibility of being ignorant of it or mistaking it have yet been so unhappy as to differ about several points of Faith insomuch that Mr. White is unkindly censured for it at Rome and perhaps here in England the Pope speeds no better however the difference continues still so wide that Mr. White hath thought fit to disobey the summons of his chief Pastor and like a prudent man rather to write against him here out
proof of this I appeal to that Decree of the Council of Trent in which they declare That because the Christian Faith and Discipline are contained in written Books and unwritten Traditions c. therefore they do receive and honour the Books of Scripture and also Traditions pari pietatis affectu ac reverentiâ with equal pious affection and reverence which I understand not how those do who set aside the Scripture and make Tradition the sole Rule of their Faith And consonantly to this Decree the general Doctrine of the Romish Church is that Scripture and Tradition make up the Rule of Faith So the Roman Catechism set forth by order of the Council of Trent says that the sum of the Doctrine delivered to the Faithful is contained in the Word of God which is distributed into Scripture and Tradition Bellarmine speaks to the same purpose That the Scripture is a Rule of Faith not an entire but partial one The entire Rule is the Word of God which is divided into two partial Rules Scripture and Tradition According to this the adequate Rule of Faith is the Word of God which is contained partly in Scripture and partly in the Tradition of the Church And that Scripture is look't upon by them as the principal Rule and primary foundation of their Faith and Tradition as only supplying the defects of Scripture as to some Doctrines and Rites not contained in Scripture must be evident to any one that hath been conversant in the chief of their controversial Divines Bellarmine where he gives the marks of a Divine Tradition speaks to this purpose That that which they call a Divine Tradition is such a Doctrine or Rite as is not found in Scripture but embraced by the whole Church and for that reason believed to have descended from the Apostles And he tells us further That the Apostles committed all to Writing which was commonly and publickly Preached and that all things are in Scripture which men are bound to know and believe explicitely But then he says that there were other things which the Apostles did not commonly and publickly teach and these they did not commit to Writing but delivered them only by word of mouth to the Prelates and Priests and perfect men of the Church And these are the Apostolical Traditions he speaks of Cardinal Perron says That the Scripture is the foundation of the Christian Doctrine either mediately or immediately And that the Authority of unwritten Tradition is founded in general on these sentences of the Apostle Hold the Traditions c. Again The things which thou hast heard of me among many Witnesses commit to faithful men c. And that the Authority of the Church to preserve and especially to declare these is founded in this Proposition viz. That the Church is the pillar and ground of Truth So that according to him the primary Rule of Faith is the Scripture in which the Authority of Tradition is founded Mr. Knott says expresly We acknowledg the H. Scripture to be a most perfect Rule for as much as a Writing can be a Rule we only deny that it excludes either Divine Tradition though it be unwritten or an external Judg to keep to propose to interpret it c. So that according to him Scripture is a perfect Rule only it does not exclude unwritten Tradition c. By which that he does not understand as Mr. S. does a concurrent Oral Tradition of all the same Doctrines which are contained in Scripture but other Doctrines not therein contained is plain from what he says elsewhere We do not distinguish Tradition from the written Word because Tradition is not written by any or in any Book or Writing but because it is not written in the Srripture or Bible Bellarmine also says the same And as for the interpreting of Scripture he tells us that this is not the office of a Rule but of a Judg. There is says he a great and plain distinction between a Judg and a Rule For as in a Kingdom the Judg hath his Rule to follow which are the received Laws and Customs which are not fit or able to declare and be Judges to themselves but that Office must belong to a living Judg So the Holy Scripture is and may be a Rule but cannot be a Judg. Here he makes the Scripture as much a Rule for matters of Faith as the Laws of the Land are for Civil matters And in his Reply to Mr. Chillingworth he hath a Chapter of above 150 Pages the Title whereof is Scripture is not the only Rule of Faith which had he with Mr. S. believed Oral Tradition to be the sole Rule of Faith had been as absurd as it would be to write a Book to prove that Turks are not the only Christians in the World Mr. Cressy likewise not very consistently to himself lays down this Conclusion The entire Rule of faith is contained not only in Scripture but likewise in unwritten Tradition § 2. Now all this is as contrary as can be to Mr. Rushworth's new Rule of Faith Therefore Mr. White says They speak ill who teach that some things are known in the Church from Scripture some by Tradition And Dr. Holden in opposition to those who make Scripture any part of the Rule of Faith advances one of the most wild and uncharitable Positions that ever I yet met withall viz. That if one should believe all the Articles of the Catholick Faith c. for this reason because he thought they were all expresly revealed in Scripture or implicitely contained so as they might be deduced from thence and would not have believed them had he not judged that they might be evinced from Scripture yet this man could be no true Catholick Because as he tells us afterwards we must receive the Christian Doctrine as coming to us by Tradition for only by this means excluding the Scriptures Christ hath appointed revealed Truths to be received and communicated In the mean time Cardinal Perron unless he altered his mind is in a sad case who believed the Authority of Tradition it self for this reason because it was founded in Scripture § 3. And this fundamental difference about the Rule of Faith between the generality of their Divines and Mr S's small party is fully acknowledged by the Traditionists themselves Dr. Holden says That their Divines who resolve Faith according to the common Opinion do inevitably fall into that shameful Circle of proving the Divine Authority of the Scripture by the Church and the Infallibility of the Church back again by the Scripture because they dare not build their Faith upon the natural evidence and certainty of Tradition So that Dr. Holden's way of resolving Faith is different from the common Opinion of their Divines which he says does not differ from the Opinion of those who resolve their Faith into the private Spirit and this according to Mr. White
liberty from greater imployments how ready I am to give him all reasonable satisfaction And in the first place I return him thanks for the weapon he hath made choice of viz. that of reason there being no other I desire to make use of in managing this debate between us And I hope he will find as much civility towards him throughout this discourse as he expresses towards me in the entrance to his if that may be accounted any real civility which is intended meerly out of design with the greater advantage to disparage the cause I have undertaken and yet see no reason to repent of If in his cursory view of two Chapters of my Book he had as he saith quite lost me he had no cause to be troubled for it if he had found far more excellent persons such as Dr. Hammond and the Disswader and Dr. Pierce instead of me But to be sure he intends not this in honour to any of us but by way of a common reproach to us all as though we did not talk out of nature or things but words and imagination I could heartily have wished Mr. S. would have cropt so much of the victory due to anothers learning and industry as to have shewed me one proposition in those discourses which a rational understanding that would be true to it self could not settle or rely on But if such insinuations as these must pass for answers I must needs say I judg M. S. equally happy in confuting our grounds and in demonstrating his own in both which his greatest strength lies in the self-evidence of his bare affirmations But it seems he is willing to resign the glory of this Victory to the judicious Author of Labyrinthus Cantuariensis or to some others for him and when they have once obtained it I shall not envy them the honour of it And I suppose those persons whoever they are may be able by this time to tell Mr. S. it is an easier matter to talk of Victories than to get them But if they do no more in the whole than Mr. S. hath done for his share they will triumph no-where but where they conquer viz. in their own fancies and imaginations Therefore leaving them to their silent conquests and as yet unheard-of Victories we come to Mr. S. who so liberally proclaims his own in the point of oral tradition Which in a phrase scarce heard of in our language before is the Post he tells us he hath taken upon him to explicate further and defend What the explicating a Post means I as little understand as I do the force of his demonstrations but this and many other such uncouth forms of speech up and down in his Book which make his style so smooth and easie are I suppose intended for embellishments of our tongue and as helps to sure-speaking as his whole Book is designed for sure-footing But letting him enjoy the pleasure and felicity of his own expressions I come to consider the matter in debate between us And his first controversie with me is for opposing the infallibility of oral tradition to doctrinal infallibility in Pope and Councils A controversie fitter to be debated among themselves than between him and me For is any thing more notorious than that infallibility is by the far greatest part of Romanists attributed to the present Church in teaching and delivering matters of faith not by virtue of any oral tradition but the immediate assistance of the Holy Ghost and that this is made by them the only ground of divine faith For which Mr. S. may if he please consult his judicious Author of Labyrinthus Cantuariensis or any other of their present Writers except Mr. White and himself He need not therefore have been to seek for the meaning of this doctrinal infallibility as opposed to traditionary if he had not either been ignorant of the opinion of their own Writers or notoriously dissembled it For this infallibility is not attributed to the Rulers of the Church meerly as Doctors or Scholars but as the representative Church whose office it is to deliver all matters of faith by way of an infallible testimony to every age and thereby to afford a sufficient foundation for divine faith But Mr. S. attributes no such infallibility to the representative Church as teaching the rest but derives their infallibility from such grounds as are common to all parts of the essential Church Wherein he apparently opposes himself to the whole current of their own Authors who resolve all faith into the immediate assistance of the Holy Ghost without which they assert there could be no infallibility at all in tradition or any thing else and therefore these opinions are as opposite to each other as may be For such an infallibility is not attributed by them to the Teachers of the Church meerly on some signal occasions as Mr. S. seems to suppose when they are to explain new matters of saith but it is made by them to be as necessary as believing it self because thereby the only sure foundation of faith is laid and therefore it is very evident they make it proper to the Church in all ages Or else in some age of the Church men were destitute of suciffient grounds of faith For they by no means think it a sufficient foundation for faith that one age of the Church could not conspire to deceive another for this they will tell him at most is but a humane faith but that Christ by his promise hath assured the Church that there shall never be wanting in it the infallible assistance of his Holy Spirit whereby they shall infallibly teach and deliver all matters of saith And if this be not their opinion let them speak to the contrary which if they do I am sure they must retract their most elaborate discourses about the resolution of faith written by the greatest Artists among them Let Mr. S. then judg who it is that stumbles at the Threshold but of this difference among them more afterwards By this it appears it was not on any mistake that I remained unsatisfied in the Question I asked Whether am I bound to believe what the present Church delivers to be infallible To which Mr. S. answers I understand him not My reply shall be only that of a great Lawyers in a like case I cannot help that I am sure my words are intelligible enough for I take infallible there as he takes it himself for infallibly true although I deny not the word to be improperly used in reference to things and that for the reason given by him because fallibility infallibility belong to the knowing power or the persons that have it and not to the object But we are often put to the use of that word in a sense we acknowledg improper meerly in compliance with our Adversaries who otherwise are apt to charge us with having only uncertainties and probabilities for our faith if we do not use the term infallible as applied to
what he saith to a Syllogistical form it comes to this Where there is no possibility of error there is an absolute obligation to faith but there is no possibility of error in the tradition of any age of the Church ergo in every age there is an absolute obligation to believe the tradition of the present Church The minor he thus proves If no age of the Church can be ignorant of what the precedent taught or conspire to deceive the next then there is no possibility of error coming into the tradition of the Church in any age but the antecedent is true and therefore the consequent Now who sees not that the force of all this lies not in proving the minor proposition or that no age could conspire to deceive another but the consequence viz. that no error can come into a Church but by a general mistake in one whole age or the general imposture of it which we utterly deny and have shewed him already the falseness of it from his own concessions And I might more largely shew it from those Doctrines or opinions which they themselves acknowledg to have come into their Church without any such general mistake or imposture as the doctrines of Papal infallibility and the common belief of Purgatory The very same way that Mr. White and Mr. S. will shew us how these came in we will shew him how many others came in as erroneous and scandalous as those are For whether they account these matters of faith or no it is certain many among them do and that the far greatest number who assert and believe them to be the doctrine of their Church too If therefore these might come in without one age mistaking or deceiving the next why might not all those come in the same way which we charge upon them as the errors of their Church And in the same manner that corrupt doctrines come in may corrupt practises too since these as he saith spring from the other He might therefore have saved himself the trouble of finding out how an acute Wit or great Scholar would discover the weakness of this way For without pretending to be either of these I have found out another way of attaquing it than Mr. S. looked for viz. from his own principles and concessions shewing how errors might come into a Church without a total deception or conspiracy in any one age Which if it be true he cannot bind me to believe what ever he tells me the present Church delivers unless he can prove that this never came into the Church as a speculation or private opinion and from thence by degrees hath come to be accounted a point of faith Therefore his way of proof is now quite altered and he cannot say we are bound to believe whatever the present Church delivers for that which he calls the present Church may have admitted speculations and private opinions into doctrines of faith but he must first prove such doctrines delivered by Christ or his Apostles and that from his time down to our age they have been received by the whole Church for matters of faith and when he hath done this as to any of the points in controversie between us I will promise him to be his Proselyte But he ought still to remember that he is not to prove it impossible for one whole age to conspire to deceive the next but that supposing that it is impossible for any errors to come into the tradition of the Church Let us now see what Mr. S. objects against those words I then used against the demonstrating this way It is hard to conceive what reason should inforce it but such as proves the impossibility of the contrary and they have understandings of another mould from others who can conceive it impossible men should not think themselves obliged to believe and do all just as their predecessors And whatever Mr. S. says to the contrary I cannot yet see but that therein I argued from the very nature and constitution of the thing For that which I looked for was a demonstration which I supposed could not be unless the impossibility of the contrary were demonstrated But if it be possible for Men Christians nay Romanists to believe on other accounts than tradition of the precedent age I pray what demonstration can there be that men must think themselves obliged to believe and do all just as their predecessors did Surely if Mr. S's fancy had not been very extravagant he could never have thought here of mens being obliged to cut their Beards or wear such Garters and Hat-bands as their forefathers did For do I not mention believing first and then doing by which it were easie to apprehend that I meant matters of faith and such practices as flow from them Neither was there any such crafty and sophistical dealing as he charges me with for I am content his doctrine be taken in his own terms and I have now given a larger and fuller account why I am far from being convinced by the way he hath used for resolving faith Passing by therefore his challenge which I accept of as long as he holds to the weapon of reason and civility I come to consider his last enquiry why I should come to doubt of such an obligation in posterity to believe their ancestors in matters of faith and he judiciously resolves it into a strange distortion of human nature but such as it seems is the proper effect of the Protestants temper which is saith he to chuse every one his faith by his private judgement or wit working upon disputable words Which as far as we own it is not to believe what we see no ground for and if this be such a distortion of human nature I envy not Mr. S's uprightness and perfection If he means that we build our faith on our private judgments in opposition to Scripture or the universal tradition of the Church in all ages let him prove it evidently in one particular and I engage for my self and all true Protestants we will renounce the belief of it If he hath any thing further to object against the grounds of our Religion he knows where to attaque me let him undertake the whole or else acknowledg it a most unreasonable thing thus to charge falsities upon us and then say we have nothing else to say for our selves We pretend not to chuse our faith but heartily embrace whatever appears to have been delivered by Christ or his Apostles but we know the Church of Rome too well to believe all which she would impose upon us and are loth to have her chuse our Religion for us since we know she hath chosen so ill for her self But if Mr. S. will not believe me in saying thus what reason have I to believe him in saying otherwise Such general charges then signifie nothing but every one must judg according to the reason on both sides I now come to the last part of my task which
can write plainly and intelligibly and that this Book which he hath endited is so written and doth not depend upon Tradition for its sense and interpretation then the most scurrilous language is not bad enough for the Scriptures then what are those Sacred Writings but Ink variously figured in a Book unsensed Characters waxen natur'd words not yet sensed nor having any certain Interpreter but fit to be plaid upon diversly by quirks of wit that is apt to blunder and confound but to clear little or nothing These with many other disgraceful terms he very liberally bestows upon Divine Oracles the consideration whereof did it not minister too much horrour would afford some comfort for by this kind of rude usage so familiar with him towards his Adversaries one may reasonably conjecture that he doth not reckon the Scriptures among his Friends § 9. And whereas he saith That the Scriptures have preserv'd many particular passages which because their source or first attestation was not universal nor their nature much practical might possibly bave been lost in their conveyance down by Tradition this is impossible according to his Hypothesis For if neither the Scriptures letter nor the certain sense of it as to the main body of Christian Doctrine could have been secured without Oral Tradition that is if we could not have known that those passages which contain the main points of Christs Doctrine either had been written by men divinely inspired or what the sense of them was but from the consonancy and agreement of those passages with the Doctrine which was orally preached by the Apostles how can we be certain either of the letter or sense of other particular passages which must necessarily want this confirmation from Oral Tradition because their first attestation was not universal nor their nature much practical Nay his discourse plainly implies that we can have no security at all either of the letter or sense of any other parts of Scripture but only those which are coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine as is evident from these words Tradition established the Church is provided of a certain and infallible Rule to preserve a copy of the Scriptures Letter truly significative of Christs sense as far as it is coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine preached at first because sense writ in mens hearts by Tradition can easily guide them to correct the alteration of the outward letter This I perceive plainly is the thing they would be at they would correct the outward letter of Scripture by sense written in their hearts and then instead of leaving out the second Commandement they would change it into a precept of giving due worship to Images according to the Council of Trent and a thousand other alterations they must make in the Bible to make it truly significative of the sense of their Church But surely the outward letter of other passages of Scripture which were not intended to signifie points of Faith is equally liable to alterations and yet the Church is not by Tradition provided of any way to correct these alterations when they happen because Tradition doth as this Corollary implies only furnish the Church with a certain and infallible Rule of preserving a copy of the Scriptures letter so far as it is coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine § 10. Again he tells us Tradition established the Church is provided of a certain infallible Rule to interpret Scripture letter by so as to arrive certainly at Christs sense as far as the letter concerns the body of Christian Doctrine preached at first or points requisite to Salvation So that whatever he may attribute to Scripture for fashions sake and to avoid Calumny with the Vulgar as he says very ingenuously in his explication of the 15 th Corollary nevertheless 't is plain that according to his own Hypothesis he cannot but look upon it as perfectly useless and pernicious That 't is altogether useless according to his Hypothesis is plain for the main body of Christian Doctrine is securely conveyed to us without it and it can give no kind of confirmation to it because it receives all at its confirmation from it only the Church is ever and anon put to a great deal of trouble to correct the alteration of the outward letter by tradition and sense written in their hearts And as for all other parts of Scriptue which are not coincident with the main body of Christian Doctrine we can have no certainty either that the outward Letter is true nor if we could can we possibly arrive at any certain sense of them And that it is intolerably pernicious according to his Hypothesis is plain because * every silly and upstart Heresie fathers it self upon it and when men leave Tradition as he supposeth all Hereticks do the Scripture is the most dangerous engine that could have been invented being to such Persons only * waxen natured words not sensed nor having any certain Interpreter but fit to be play'd upon diversly by quirks of wit that is apt to blunder and confound but to clear little or nothing And indeed if his Hypothesis were true the Scriptures might well deserve all the contemptuous language which he useth against them and Mr. White 's comparison of them with Lilly's Almanack would not only be pardonable but proper and unless he added it out of prudence and for the Peoples sake whom he may think too superstitiously conceited of those Books he might have spared that cold excuse which he makes for using this similitude that it was agreeable rather to the impertinency of the Objection than the dignity of the Subject Certain it is if these men are true to their own Principles that notwithstanding the high reverence and esteem pretended to be born by them and their Church to the Scriptures they must heartily despise them and wish them out of the way and even look upon it as a great oversight of the Divine Providence to trouble his Church with a Book which if their Discourse be of any consequence can stand Catholicks in no stead at all and is so dangerous and mischievous a weapon in the hands of Hereticks SECT III. § 1. HAving thus taken a view of his opinion and considered how much he attributes to Oral Tradition and how little to the Scriptures before I assail this Hypothesis I shall lay down the Protestant Rule of Faith not that so much is necessary for the answering of his Book but that he may have no colour of objection that I proceed altogether in the destructive way and overthrow his Principle as he calls it without substituting another in its room The opinion then of the Protestants concerning the Rule of faith is this in general That those Books which we call the Holy Scriptures are the means whereby the Christian Doctrine hath been brought down to us And that he may now clearly understand this together with the grounds of it which
either wholly or for the far greatest part of them take upan humour against propagating Mankind And yet both History and the experience of the present Age assures us that a great part of Asia and of Africk where the most flourishing Churches in the World once were are fallen off from Christianity and become either Mahometans or Heathens In Africk almost all those vast Regions which Christianity had gained from Heathenism Mahometanism hath regained from Christianity All the North-part of Afrique lying along the Mediterranean where Christianity flourish't once as much as ever it did at Rome is at this time utterly void of Christians excepting a few Towns in the hands of the European Princes And not to mention all particular places the large Region of Nubia which had as is thought from the Apostles time professed the Christian Faith hath within these 150 years for want of Ministers as Alvarez tells us quitted Christianity and is partly revolted to Heathenism partly fallen off to Mahometanism So that it seems that notwithstanding the Arguments of hope and fear the very Teachers of Tradition may fail in a largely extended Church As for Asia in the Easterly parts of it there is not now one Christian to four of what there were 500 years ago and in the more Southerly parts of it where Christianity had taken deepest root the Christians are far inferiour in number to the Idolaters and Mahometans and do daily decrease What thinks Mr. S. of all this Have those Christian Nations which are turn'd Mahometans and Pagans failed in their Faith or not If they have I expect from him clear Instances of more that have failed in propagating their kind § 7. But besides those who have totally Apostatized from Christianity hath not the whole Greek Church with the Jacobites and Nestorians and all those other Sects which agree with and depend upon these and which taken together are manifoldly greater than the Roman Church I say have not all these renounced Tradition for several Ages And here in Europe hath not a great part of Poland Hungary both Germany's France and Switzerland Have not the Kingdoms of great Brittain Denmark Sweden and a considerable part of Ireland in Mr. S's opinion deserted Tradition If I should once see a whole Nation fail because no body would marry and contribute to the propagation of Mankind and should find this sullen humour to prevail in several Nations and to overspread vast Parts of the World I should then in good earnest think it possible for Mankind to fail unless I could shew it impossible for other Nations to do that which I see some to have done who were every whit as unlikely to have done it So that whatever cause he assigns of Heresie as Pride Ambition Lust or any other vice or interest if these can take place in whole Nations and make them renounce Tradition then where 's the efficacy of the causes to preserve Faith indeficiently entire in any For the Demonstration holds as strongly for all Christians as for any § 8. Secondly From these grounds it would follow that no Christian can live wickedly because the end of Faith being a good life the arguments of hope and fear must in all Reason be as powerful and efficacious causes of a good life as of a true belief And that his Demonstration proves the one as much as the other will be evident from his own reasoning for he argues in this manner Good is the proper object of the will good propos'd makes the will to desire that good and consequently the known means to obtain it Now infinite goods and harms sufficiently proposed are of their own nature incomparably more powerful causes to carry the will than temporal ones Since then when two causes are counterpoised the lesser when it comes to execution is no cause as to the substance of that effect it follows that there is no cause to move the wills of a World of Believers to be willing to do that which they judge would lose themselves and their Posterity infinite goods and bring them infinite harms c. in case a sufficient Proposal or Application be not wanting which he tells us is not wanting because Christianity urged to execution gives its followers a new life and a new nature than which a nearer Application cannot be imagined Doth not this Argument extend to the lives of Christians as well as their Belief So that he may as well infer from these grounds that it is impossible that those who profess Christianity should live contrary to it as that they should fail to deliver down the Doctrine of Christ because whatever can be an inducement and temptation to any man to contradict this Doctrine by his practice may equally prevail upon him to falsifie it For why should men make any more scruple of damning themselves and their Posterity by teaching them false Doctrines than by living wicked Lives which are equally pernicious with Heretical Doctrines not only upon account of the bad influence which such examples of Fathers and Teachers are like to have upon their Scholars but likewise as they are one of the strongest arguments in the World to perswade them that their Teachers do not themselves believe that Religion which they teach for if they did they would live according to it Why should any man think that those arguments of hope and fear which will not prevail upon the generality of Christians to make them live holy Lives should be so necessarily efficacious to make them so much concerned for the preserving of a right Belief Nay we have great reason to believe that such persons will endeavour as much as may be to bend and accommodate their Belief to their Lives And this is the true source of those Innovations in Faith for which we challenge the Church of Rome which any man may easily discern who will but consider how all their new Doctrines are fitted to a secular Interest and the gratifying of that inordinate appetite after riches and dominion which reigns in the Court of Rome and in the upper part of the Clergy of that Church SECT IV. § 1. SEcondly The main grounds of his Demonstration are apparently false For First This Demonstration supposeth that the generality of Christian Parents in all Ages perfectly understood the Doctrine of Christ and did not mistake any part of it that they remembred it perfectly and that they were faithful and diligent to instruct their Children in it which is as contrary to experience as that the generality of Christians are knowing and honest It supposeth likewise that this Doctrine and every substantial part of it was received and remembred by the generality of Children as it was taught and was understood perfectly by them without the least material mistake So he tells us That the substance of Faith comes clad in such plain matters of Fact that the most stupid man living cannot possibly be ignorant of it But whether this be
Moral and Intellectual part else how are they Arguments And if man according to his Moral part be as he says defectible how can the indefectibility of Tradition be founded in those Arguments which work upon man only according to his Moral part I have purposely all along both for the Readers ease and mine own neglected to take notice of several of his inconsistencies but these are such clear and transparent Contradictions that I could do no less than make an example of them SECT V. § 1. THirdly This Demonstration is confuted by clear and undeniable Instances to the contrary I will mention but two First The Tradition of the one true God which was the easiest to be preserved of any Doctrine in the World being short and plain planted in every mans Nature and perfectly suited to the reason of Mankind And yet this Tradition not having past through many hands by reason of the long Age of man was so defaced and corrupted that the World did lapse into Polytheism and Idolatry Now a man that were so hardy as to demonstrate against matter of Fact might by a stronger Demonstration than Mr. S's prove that though it be certain this Tradition hath failed yet it was impossible it should fail as Zeno demonstrated the impossibility of motion against Diogenes walking before his eyes For the Doctrine of the one true God was setled in the heart of Noah and firmly believed by him to be the way to happiness and the contradicting or deserting of this to be the way to misery And this Doctrine was by him so taught to his Children who were encouraged by these Motives to adhere to this Doctrine and to propagate it to their Children and were deterred by them from relinquishing it And this was in all Ages the perswasion of the faithful Now the Hopes of Happiness and the Fears of Misery strongly applied are the causes of actual will Besides the thing was feasible or within their power that is what they were bred to was knowable by them and that much more easily than any other Doctrine whatsoever being short and plain and natural This put it follows as certainly that a great number in each Age would continue to hold themselves and teach their Children as themselves had been taught that is would follow and stick to this Tradition of the one true God as it doth that a cause put actually causing produceth its effect Actually I say for since the cause is put and the Patient disposed it follows inevitably that the cause is put still actually causing This demonstration which concludes an apparent falshood hath the whole strength of Mr. S's and several advantages beyond it For the Doctrine conveyed by this Tradition is the most important being the first Principle of all Religion the danger of corrupting it as great the facility of preserving it much greater than of the Christian Doctrine for the causes before mentioned And yet after all it signifies nothing against certain experience and unquestionable matter of Fact only it sufficiently shews the vanity of Mr. S's pretended Demonstration built upon the same or weaker Grounds § 2. Secondly The other Instance shall be in the Greek Church who received the Christian Doctrine as entire from the Apostles and had as great an obligation to propagate it truly to Posterity and the same fears and hopes strongly applied to be the actual causes of will in a word all the same Arguments and Causes to preserve and continue Tradition on foot which the Roman Church had And yet to the utter confusion of Mr. S's Demonstration Tradition hath failed among them For as Speculators they deny the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son and as Testifiers they disown any such Doctrine to have been delivered to them by the precedent Age or to any other Age of their Church by the Apostles as the Doctrine of Christ. § 3. To this Instance of the Greek Church because Mr. White hath offered something by way of answer I shall here consider it He tells us That the plea of the Greek Church is Non-Tradition alledging only this That their Fathers do not deliver the Doctrine of the procession of the Holy Ghost not that they say the contrary which clearly demonstrates there are no opposite Traditions between them and us But this was not the thing Mr. White was concerned to do to demonstrate there were no opposite Traditions between the Greeks and the Latines but to secure his main Demonstration of the impossibility of Traditions failing against this Instance For that the Greeks have no such Tradition as this That the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Son is as good an evidence of the failure of Tradition as if they had a positive Tradition That he proceeds only from the Father especially if we consider that they charge the Latin Church with Innovation in this matter and say that the addition of that Clause of the Procession from the Son also is a corruption of the ancient Faith and a Devilish Invention Why then does Mr. White go about to baffle so material an Objection and I fear his own Conscience likewise by a pitiful Evasion instead of a solid Answer What though there be no opposite Traditions between the Greek and Latin Church yet if their Faith be opposite Will it not from hence follow that Tradition hath failed in one of them I wonder that Mr. White who hath so very well confuted the Infallibility of Popes and Councils and thereby undermined the very Foundations of that Religion should not by the same light of Reason discover the fondness of his own Opinion concerning the Infallibility of Oral Tradition which hath more and greater absurdities in it than that which he confutes And to shew Mr. White the absurdity of it I will apply his Demonstration of the Infallibility of Christian Tradition in general to the Greek Church in particular by which every one will see that it does as strongly prove the impossibility of Traditions failing in the Greek Church as in the Roman-Catholick as they are pleased to call it His Demonstration is this Christ commanded his Apostles to preach to all the World and lest any one should doubt of the effect he sent his Spirit into them to bring to their remembrance what he had taught them which Spirit did not only give them a power to do what he enclined them to but did cause them actually to do it I cannot but take notice by the way of the ill consequence of this which is that men may doubt whether those who are to teach the Doctrine of Christ will remember it and teach it to others unless they have that extraordinary and efficacious assistance of the Holy Ghost which the Apostles had if this be true his Demonstration is at an end for he cannot plead that this assistance hath been continued ever since the Apostles He proceeds The Apostles preached this Doctrine the Nations understood it lived according to it and valued
Church and skipt into the Opinions of human Sects not of human Election as Mr. S. blindly following Mr. Wh. does most absurdly translate it but he that hath returned from his Errors and hearkned to the SCRIPTVRES and conformed his life to the Truth is as it were advanced from a Man to a God At the same rate he goes on for several Pages together taking the Scriptures for an indemonstrable Principle from which all Divine Doctrines are to be demonstrated and for the Criterion whereby they are to be tried and charges the Hereticks in such words as we cannot find fitter for our Adversaries As says he naughty Boys shut out their School-master so these drive the Prophecies out of the Church suspecting that they will chide and admonish them and they patch together abundance of falshoods and fictions that they may seem RATIONALLY not to admit the Scriptures Again speaking of these Hereticks affronting the Scriptures he tells us they oppose the Divine Tradition with human Doctrines by other Traditions delivered from hand to hand that they may establish a Sect or Heresie Again he says they adulterate the Truth and steal the Rule of Faith c. but for ORAL Frauds they shall have WRITTEN Punishments But enough of this whosoever desires to see more of it let him read on where these men to their shame have directed us and see whether any Protestant can speak more fully and plainly in this Controversy The whole trust of the Papists is upon the equivocal sense of the word Tradition Which word is commonly used by the Fathers to signify to us the Scriptures or Divine Tradition as Clement here calls it but the Papists understand it of their unwritten Tradition and to this they apply all those passages in the Fathers where Tradition is honourably mentioned So Mr. S. deals with us in the Testimonies I have already examined And there is nothing of argument in those few which remain but from the ambiguity of this Word which I need not shew of every one of them in particular for whosoever shall read them with this Key will find that they are of no force to conclude what he drives at § 5. As for his Citations out of the Council of Trent by which he would prove it to be the perswasion of their present Church that Tradition is the sole Rule of Faith I have already shewn that that Council hath declared otherwise and is otherwise understood by the chief of their own Writers And therefore he did prudently to conceal in an c. those choaking words in which the Council declares itself to receive and honour with equal pious affection and reverence the Books of Scripture and unwritten Traditions And after a great deal of shuffling what a pitiful Account is it that he at last gives of that Council's putting Scripture constantly before Tradition because Scripture being interpreted by Tradition is of the same Authority as if an Apostle or Evangelist were present and therefore no wonder they honour Scripture-Testimony so as to put it before Tradition which is to say that because Scripture is subordinate to Tradition and to be regulated by it therefore it deserves to be put before it Besides if Scripture and Tradition be but several wayes of conveying the Evangelical and Apostolical Doctrine why should he imagine an Evangelist or Apostle to be more present by the Scripture than by oral Tradition Especially if it be considered that he supposes Scripture to be an uncertain and Tradition an infallible way of conveying this Doctrine SECT II. § 1. ALL that now remains is to confirm the precedent Discourse by Testimonies of the most eminent Persons of the Church in several Ages in which I shall not need to be large being so happily prevented by that full Account which is given of the sense of the Ancients in this matter in the Answer to Labyrinthus Cantuariensis which Mr. S. may if he pleases consult for his further Conviction § 2 I begin with the Historical Account which Eusebius gives of committing the Gospel to writing which is to this purpose viz That the Romans were not content with the Doctrine Preached unless it were also committed to writing and therefore did earnestly beg of Mark Peter's Companion that he would leave them a Monument in writing of that Doctrine which had been deliver'd to them by word of mouth And this was the occasion of the writing of St. Mark 's Gospel And when Peter did understand that this Work was publish'd being suggested by the Divine Revelation of the Holy Spirit it is said he was very much pleased with the ready and earnest desire of those Persons and that by his Authority he confirmed this Writing to the end that it might be every where read in the Church As for St. Matthew and St. John he tells us That of all the Disciples they two only have left monuments in Writing of whom it is also reported that they betook themselves to write being drawn thereto by necessity Matthew after he had preached the Word of God to the Jews and was resolved to go to other Nations wrote his Gospel in the Language of his Countrey and thus by the diligence and pains of Writing did abundantly supply the the want of his presence to those whom he left And when Mark and Luke had published their Gospel it is reported that John who had always used to preach the Word without writing it being at length wrought upon by the same reason did betake himself to write From this account it is clear that the Apostles thought it necessary for the preservation and secure conveyance of the Christian Doctrine that it should be put into Writing and that they judged this a better way to supply the want of their presence than oral Tradition Therefore the same Author tells us That the Disciples who immediately succeeded the Apostles as they travelled to preach the Gospel to those who had not yet heard the Word of Faith did with great care also deliver to them the Writings of the Holy Evangelists Again That Ignatius as he travelled towards Rome where he was to suffer exhorted the Churches of every City to hold fast the Tradition of the Apostles which as also by Writing he testified for greater security he held necessary to be copied in Writing § 4. That the Hereticks of Old made the same pretence which the Papists make now of oral Tradition in opposition to Scripture the same Eusebius tells us and withal that Books are a sufficient confutation of this pretence Those says he who were of the Heresie of Artemon said that all their Fore-fathers and the Apostles themselves had received and taught the same things which they also did and had preserved the true Teaching unto the time of Victor Bishop of Rome whose Successor Zephyrinus corrupted it And this saith he would have great probability were it not first of all contradicted by the Scripture and next if there
Religion to their posterity Whereas in truth we find in the early ages of the Christian Church several differences about matters of faith and these differences continued to posterity but all parties still pleading that their doctrine came from the Apostles it fell out unhappily for Mr. S. that those were commonly most grosly deceived who pretended the most to oral tradition from the Apostles still we find the grand debate was what came from the Apostles and what not whereas had tradition been so infallible a way of conveying how could this ever have come into debate among them What did not they know what their Parents taught them It seems they did not or their Parents were no more agreed than themselves for their differences could never be ended this way Afterwards came in for many ages such a succession of ignorance and barbarism that Christian Religion was little minded either by Parents or Children as it ought to have been instead of that some fopperies and superstitions were hugely in request and the men who fomented these things were cried up as great Saints and workers of miracles So that the miracles of S. Francis and S. Dominick were as much if not more carefully conveyed from Parents to Children in that age than those of Christ and his Apostles and on this account posterity must be equally bound to believe them and have their persons in equal veneration If men at last were grown wiser it was because they did not believe Mr. S's principles that they ought to receive what was delivered by their Parents but they began to search and enquire into the writings of former ages and to examine the opinions and practices of the present with those of the primitive Church and by this means there came a restauration of Learning and Religion together But though matters of fact be plain and evident in this case yet M. S. will prove it impossible there should any errors come into the Christian Church and his main argument is this because no age of the Church could conspire against her knowledg to deceive that age immediately following in matter of fact evident in a manner to the whole world But before I come more particularly to shew the weakness of this argument by manifesting how errors might come into the Church without such a conspiracy as this is I shall propound some Queries to him 1. What age of the Church he will instance in wherein all persons who were not cast out of the Church had the same apprehensions concerning all points of faith i. e. that none among them did believe more things delivered by Christ or the Apostles than others did I am sure he can neither instance in the age of the Apostles themselves nor in those immediately succeeding them unless Mr. S. the better to defend his hypothesis will question all written records because they consist of dead letters and unsenc't characters and wordish testimonies Never considering that while he utters this he writes himself unless he imagins there is more of life sense and certainty in his Books than in the Scriptures or any other writing whatsoever 2. Where there were different apprehensions in one age of the Church whether there must not be different traditions in the next For as he looks on all Parents as bound to teach their Children so on Children as bound to believe what their Parents teach them On which supposition different traditions in the succeeding age must needs follow different apprehensions in the precedent 3. Whether persons agreeing in the substance of doctrines may not differ in their apprehensions of the necessity of them As for instance all may agree in the article of Christs descent into Hell but yet may differ in the explication of it and in the apprehension of the necessity of it in order to salvation So that we must not only in tradition about matters of faith enquire what was delivered but under what notion it was delivered whether as an allowable opinion or a necessary point of faith But if several persons nay multitudes in the Church may have different notions as to the necessity of the same points by what means shall we discern what was delivered as an opinion in the Church and what as an article of faith But Mr. S. throughout his discourse takes it for granted that there is the same necessity of believing and delivering all things which concern the Christian doctrine and still supposes the same sacredness concern necessity in delivering all the points in controversie between the Romanists and Us as there was in those main articles of faith which they and we are agreed in Which is so extravagant a supposition that it is hard to conceive it should ever enter into the head of a person pretending to reason but as extravagant as it is it is that without which his whole fabrick falls to the ground For suppose we should grant him that the infinite concerns which depend on the belief of the Christian doctrine should be of so prevalent nature with the world that it is impossible to conceive any one age should neglect the knowing them or conspire to deceive the next age about them yet what is all this to the matters in difference between us Will Mr. S. prove the same sacredness necessity concern and miraculously attestedness as he phrases it in the Invocation of Saints Purgatory Transubstantiation Supremacy c. as in the believing the death and resurrection of the Son of God If he doth not prove this he doth nothing for his arguments may hold for doctrines judged universally necessary but for no other Therefore Mr. S. hath a new task which he thought not of which is to manifest that these could not be looked on as opinions but were embraced as necessary articles of faith For unless he proves them such he can neither prove any obligation in Parents to teach them their Children nor in Children to believe what their Parents taught but only to hold them in the same degree which they did themselves When Mr. S. will undertake to prove that the whole Church from the time of Christ did agree in the points in difference between us as necessary articles of faith I may more easily believe that no age could be ignorant of them or offer to deceive the next about them But when Mr. S. reflects on his frequent concession that there are private opinions in the Church distinct from matters of faith he must remember before he can bring home his grounds to the case between their Church and ours that he must prove none of the things in debate were ever entertained as private opinions and that it is impossible for that which was a private opinion in one age to become a matter of faith in the next But because this distinction of his ruins his whole demonstration I shall first propound it in his own terms and then shew how from thence it follows that errors may come into the Church and be
entertained as matters of faith His words are It being evident that we have but two ways of ordinary knowledg by acts of our soul or operations on our body that is by reason and experience the former of which belongs to Speculators or Doctors the second to Deliverers of what was received or Testifiers And this distinction he frequently admits not only in the present age of the Church but in any for the same reason will hold in all From hence I propose several Queries further to Mr. S. 1. If every one in the Church looked on himself as bound to believe just as the precedent age did whence came any to have particular opinions of their own For either the Church had delivered her sense in that case or not if not then tradition is no certain conveyer of the doctrine of Christ if she had then those who vented private speculations were Hereticks in so doing because they opposed that doctrine which the Church received from Christ and his Apostles If Mr. S. replies that private speculations are in such cases where there is no matter of faith at all he can never be able to help himself by that distinction in the case of his own Church for I demand whether is it a matter of faith that men ought to believe oral tradition infallible If not how can men ground their faith upon it If it be then either some are meer speculators in matters of faith or all who believe on the account of the Popes infallibility are Hereticks for so doing 2. If there were speculators in former ages as well as this whether did those men believe their own speculations or no If not then the Fathers were great Impostors who vented those speculations in the Church which they did not believe themselves And it is plain Mr. S. speaks of such opinions which the asserters of do firmly believe to be true And if they did then they look on themselves as bound to believe something which was not founded on the tradition of the Church and consequently did not own oral tradition as the rule of faith So that as many speculators as we find in the Churh so many testifiers we have against the infallibility of oral tradition 3. Whether those persons who did themselves believe those opinions to be true did not think themselves obliged to tell others they ought to believe them and consequently to deliver these as matters of faith to their children Let Mr. S. shew me any inconsequence in this but that it unavoidably follows upon his principles that they were bound to teach their Children what themselves received as the doctrine of Christ and that the obligation is in all respects equal as if they had believed these things on the account of oral tradition 4. If Children be obliged to believe what their Parents teach them for matters of faith then upon Mr. S's own concessions is not posterity bound to believe something which originally came not from Christ or his Apostles For it appears in this case that the first rise was from a private opinion of some Doctors of the Church but they believing these opinions themselves think themselves obliged to propagate them to others and by reason of their learning and authority these opinions may by degrees gain a general acceptance in the ruling part of the Church and all who believe them true think they ought to teach them their Children and Children they are to believe what their Parents teach them Thus from Mr. S's own principles things that never were delivered by Christ or his Apostles may come to be received as matters of faith in the present Church Thus the intelligent Reader needs no bodies help but Mr. S. to let him understand how Invocation of Saints Purgatory Transubstantiation c. though never delivered either by Christ or his Apostles may yet now be looked on as articles of faith and yet no age of the Church conspire to deceive another Either then Mr. S. must say there never were any private opinators or speculators in the Church as distinct from testifiers and then he unavoidably contradicts himself or he must deny that posterity is bound to believe what their fore-fathers delivered them as matters of faith which destroys the force of his whole demonstration Perhaps he will answer that Children are not bound to believe what barely their Parents or any other number of persons might deliver as matters of faith but what the whole Church of every age delivers This though the only thing to be said in the case yet is most unreasonable because it runs men upon inextricable difficulties in the way of their resolving faith For suppose any Children taught by their Parents what they are to believe Mr. S. must say they are not bound to believe them presently but to enquire whether they agree with the whole Church of that age first before they can be obliged to assent Which being an impossible task either for Children or men of age to find out in the way of oral tradition this way of resolving faith doth but offer a fairer pretence for infidelity For we see how impossible it is for Mr. S. to make it appear that their Church is agreed about the rule of faith for by his own confession the far greater number as speculators oppose the way asserted by him how much more difficult then must it needs be to find out what the sense of the whole essential Church is in all matters which Parents may teach their Children for doctrines of faith So that if Children are not bound to believe what their Parents teach them till they know they teach nothing but what the whole Church teaches it is the most compendious way to teach them they are not bound to believe at all But if this distinction be admitted as Mr. S. makes much use of it then it appears how errors may come into the Church at first under the notion of speculations and by degrees to be delivered as points of faith by which means those things may be received in the Church for such which were never delivered by Christ or his Apostles and yet no age conspire to deceive the next which was the thing to be shewed This is one way of shewing how errors may come into the Church without one ages conspiring to deceive the next but besides this there are several others I might insist upon but I shall mention only two more 1. Misinterpreting the sence of Scripture 2. Supposing it in the power of some part of the Church to oblige the whole in matters of faith For the first we are to consider that no imaginable account can be given either of the writing or universal reception of the Books of the New Testament if they were not designed for the preservation of the doctrine of Christ. And although it should be granted possible for the main and fundamental articles of Christian faith such as the Apostles Creed gives a summary account of to have been preserved by
the help of tradition yet unless we be extreamly ungratful we cannot but acknowledg that God hath infinitely better provided for us in not leaving the grounds of our Religion to the meer breath of the people or the care of Mothers instructing their Children but hath given us the certain records of all the doctrines and motives of faith preserved inviolably from the first ages of the Church And when the Church saw with what care God had provided for the means of faith oral tradition was little minded thence the memory of those other things not recorded in Scripture is wholly lost all the care was imployed in searching preserving and delivering these sacred Books to posterity To these the primitive Church still appeals these they plead for against all adversaries defending their authority explaining their sense vindicating them from all corruptions Tradition they rely not on any further than as a testimony of the truth of these records or to clear the sense of them from the perverse interpretation of those Hereticks who pretended another kind of tradition than what was in Scripture And when these were silenced all the disputes that arose in the Church concerning matters of faith was about the sense of these Books as is evident by the proceedings in the case of Arius and Pelagius Wherein tradition was only used as a means to clear the sense of the Scriptures but not at all as that which the faith of all was to be resolved into But when any thing was pleaded from tradition for which there was no ground in Scripture it was rejected with the same ease it was offered and such persons were plainly told this was not the Churches way if they had plain Scripture with the concurrent sense of Antiquity they might produce it and rely upon it So that the whole use of tradition in the primitive Church besides attesting the Books was to shew the unreasonableness of imposing senses on Scripture against the universal sense of the Church from the Apostles times But as long as men were men it was not avoidable but they must fall into different apprehensions of the meaning of the Scripture according to their different judgments prejudices learning and education And since they had all this apprehension that the Scripture contained all doctrines of faith thence as men judged of the sense of it they differed in their apprehension concerning matters of faith And thence errors and mistakes might easily come into the Church without one age conspiring to deceive the next Nay if it be possible for men to rely on tradition without Scripture this may easily be done for by that means they make a new rule of faith not known to the primitive Church and consequently that very assertion is an error in which the former age did not conspire to deceive the next And if these things be possible M. S's demonstration fails him for hereby a reasonable account is given how errors may come into a Church without one age conspiring to deceive another Again let me enquire of Mr. S. whether men may not believe it in the power of the ruling part of the Church to oblige the whole to an assent to the definitions of it To speak plainer is it not possible for men to believe the Pope and Council infallible in their decrees And I hope the Jesuits as little as Mr. S. loves them or they him may be a sufficient evidence of more than the bare possibility of this If they may believe this doth it not necessarily follow that they are bound to believe whatever they declare to be matter of faith Supposing then that Transubstantiation Supremacy Invocation of Saints were but pâ—ivate opinions before but are now defined by Pope and Council these men cannot but look on themselves as much obliged to believe them as if they had been delivered as matters of faith in every age since the Apostles times Is it now repugnant to common sense that this opinion should be believed or entertained in the Church if not why may not this opinion be generally received if it be so doth it not unavoidably follow that the faith of men must alter according to the Churches definitions And thus private opinions may be believed as articles of faith and corrupt practices be established as laudable pieces of devotion and yet no one age of the Church conspire to deceive another Thus I hope Mr. S. may see how far it is from being a self-evident principle that no error can come into the Church unless one age conspire to deceive the next in a matter of fact evident in a manner to the whole world Which is so wild an apprehension that I believe the Jesuits cannot entertain themselves without smiles to see their domestick adversaries expose themselves to contempt with so much confidence Thus I come to the reason I gave why there is no reason to believe that this is the present sense of the Roman Church My words are For I see the Roman Church asserts that things may be de fide in one age which were not in another at least Popes and Councils challenge this and this is the common doctrine maintained there and others are looked on as no members of their Church who assert the contrary but as persons at least meritoriously if not actually excommunicate Where then shall I satisfie my self what the sense of your Church is as to this particular Must I believe a very few persons whom the rest disown as heretical and seditious or ought I not rather to take the judgment of the greatest and most approved persons of that Church And these disown any such doctrine but assert that the Church may determine things de fide which were not before In answer to this Mr. S. begs leave to distinguish the words de fide which may either mean Christian faith or points of faith taught by Christ and then he grants 't is non-sense to say they can be in one age and not in another Or de fide may mean obligatory to be believed In this latter sense none I think saith he denies things may be de fide in one age and not in another in the former sense none holds it Upon which very triumphantly he concludes What 's now become of your difficulty I believe you are in some wonderment and think I elude it rather then answer it I shall endeavour to unperplex you I must confess it a fault of humane nature to admire things which men understand not on which account I cannot free my self from some temptation to that he calls wonderment but I am presently cured of it when I endeavour to reduce his distinction to reason For instead of explaining his terms he should have shewed how any thing can be obligatory to be believed in any age of the Church which was no point of faith taught by Christ which notwithstanding his endeavour to unperplex me is a thing as yet I apprehend not because I understand no obligation
and all the Papists of forreign Countreys do as faithful agree with Mr. White in this It seems not so by the proceedings in the Court of Rome against him in which as appears by the censure of the Inquisition against him dated 17. November 1661. his doctrine is condemned not only as false seditious and scandalous but as heretical and erroneous in faith And if it were not for this very doctrine he was there censured why doth Mr. White set himself purposely to defend it in his Tabulae suffragiales If these then do agree as faithful who cannot but envy the excellent harmony of the Roman Church in which men condemn each other for hereticks and yet all believe the same things still Well Sir I am in hopes upon the same grounds Mr. S. will yield us the same charity too and tell us that we agree with him as faithful only we differ a little from him as discoursers for I assure you there is as great reason the only difference is we give them not such ill words as they do each other For let Mr. S. shew us wherein we differ more from him about the Rule of Faith than they do among themselves For Mr. White when he hath said that all kind of heresie doth arise from hence that men make the holy Scripture or a private spirit the rule of faith he presently adds it is all one if one make Councils or Pope any other way than as witnesses to be the authors of faith For saith he this is to subject the whole Church to that slavery to receive any errour for an article of faith which they shall define or propose modo illegitimo i. e. any other way then as witnesses of tradition Either then we differ from Mr. S. only as discoursers or he and his Brethren differ from each other more then as such And so any one would think who reads the oppositions and arguments against each other on this subject particularly Mr. Whites Tabulae suffragiales But let Mr. White say what he will Mr. S. tells me I am not aware how little they differ even as Divines The more shame for them to have such furious heats and oppositions where there is so little difference But as little as they differ Mr. White thinks it safer to talk of their unity in England than to try whether they be of his mind at Rome by going thither to clear himself for he justly fears he should find them differ from him some other way than as bare discoursers Yet let us hear Mr. S's reason for saith he though some speculators attribute to the Church a power of defining things not held before yet few will say she hath new revelations or new articles of faith But we know the temper of these men better than to rely on what they barely say For they say what they think is most for their purpose and one of Mr. White 's adversaries if himself may be credited plainly told him if the doctrine of the Popes infallibility were not true yet it ought to be defended because it was for the interest of the Church of Rome for which he is sufficiently rebuked by him It is one thing then what they say and another what necessarily follows from the Doctrine which they assert But for plain dealing commend me to the Canonists who say expresly the Church by which they mean the Pope may make new articles of faith and this is the sense of the rest though they are loth to speak out Else Mr. White was much too blame in spending so much time in proving the contrary But what man of common sense can imagine that these men can mean otherwise who assert such an infallibility in Pope and Councils as to oblige men under pain of eternal damnation to believe those things which they were not obliged to before such a definition And what can this be else but to make new articles of faith For an article of faith supposes a necessary obligation to believe it now if some doctrine may become thus obligatory by virtue of the Churches definition which was not so before that becomes thereby an article of faith which it was not before But these subtil men have not yet learnt to distinguish a new doctrine from a new article of faith they do not indeed pretend that their doctrine is new because they deny any such thing as new revelation in the Church but yet they must needs say if they understand themselves that old implicit doctrines may become new articles of faith by vertue of the Churches definition So little are they relieved by that silly distinction of explicit and implicit delivery of them which Mr. S. for a great novelty accquaints us with For what is only implicitly delivered is no article of faith at all for that can be no article of faith which men are not bound to believe now there are none will say that men are bound to believe under pain of damnation if they do not the things which are only implicitly delivered but this they say with great confidence of all things defined by the Church And let now any intelligent person judg whether those who assert such things do not differ wide enough from those who resolve all into oral tradition and make the obligation to faith wholly dependent upon the constant tradition of any doctrine from age to age ever since the Apostles times But Mr. S. is yet further displeased with me for saying that Pope and Councils challenge a power to make things de fide in one age which were not in another For 1. he sayes I speak it in common and prove it not 2. He adds That take them right this is both perfectly innocent and unavoidably necessary to a Church And is it not strange he should expect any particular proofs of so innocent and necessary a thing to the being of a Church But he will tell me it is in his own sense of de fide which I have already shewn to signifie nothing to his purpose Let him therefore speak out whether he doth believe any such thing as inherent infallibility in the definitions of Pope and Councils if not I am sure at Rome they will never believe that Mr. S. agrees with them as faithful if he doth whether doth not such an infallible definition bind men by vertue of it to the belief of what is then defined if it doth then things may become as much de fide by it as if they were delivered dy Christ or his Apostles For thereby is supposed an equal obligation to faith because there is a proposition equally infallible But will he say the Pope doth not challenge this Why then is the contrary doctrine censured and condemned at Rome Why is the other so eagerly contended for by the most zealous sons of that Church and that not as a school-school-opinion but as the only certain foundation of faith Mr. S. is yet pleased to inform me further that nothing will avail me
is to shew that this way is repugnant to common sense and experience and that the Church of Rome hath apparently altered from what was the belief of former ages To which purpose my words are It is to no purpose to prove impossibility of motion when I see men move no more is it to prove that no age of the Church could vary from the preceding when we can evidently prove that they have done it And therefore this argument is intended only to catch easie minds that care not for a search into the history of the several ages of the Church but had rather sit down with a superficial subtilty than spend time in further enquiries But two things M. S. tells me are required ere I can see that their faith varies from the former first to see what their Church holds now and then to see what the former Church held before and he kindly tells me if he sees any thing I see neither well It seems I want Mr. S's spectacles of oral tradition to see with but as yet I have no cause to complain of the want of them but I see much better without them than with them He tells me I cannot see what their present Church holds and therefore I cannot assure any what was held before because if I renounce tradition I take away all means of knowing The reason why I cannot candidly see as he phrases it what their Church holds now is because I cannot distinguish between faith and its explication some Schoolmen and the Church By which it seems it is impossible for me to know what their Church holds concerning Invocation of Saints Worship of Images Communion in one kind for those are the points I there mention wherein it is evident that the Church of Rome hath receded from the doctrine and practise of the primitive Church Or are these only the opinions and practises of some Schoolmen among them and not the doctrine and practise of their Church But that we might come to some fuller state of these controversies I wish M. S. would settle some sure way whereby we might know distinctly what are the doctrines and practices of their Church If the Council of Trent and Roman Catechism be said to be the rule of doctrine I desire no other so that those may be interpreted by practices universally allowed among them As when that Council only defined that due honour be given to Saints the general practice of that Church may tell us what they mean by that due honour and if that be not fair I know not what is But I see all the shift Mr. S. hath is when he is pinched to say these are the opinions of Schoolmen and private speculators and not the doctrine of their Church And if such shifts as these are must serve the turn I should wonder if ever he be to seek for an answer But the shortest answer of all would be that none but those of their Church can know what she holds and therefore it is to no purpose for Protestants to write against her or it may be that none but Mr S. and one or two more can tell for many among them say those are the doctrines of their Church which they deny to be So that except Mr. White and Mr. S. and some very few demonstrators more all the rest are School-men private Opinators and not to be relied on But I cannot see what their Church held formerly neither No wonder at all of that for if I cannot see an object so near me as the present Church how can it be expected I should see one so much further off as the doctrine of former ages And his reason is so strong as may well perswade me out of one at least of my five senses For saith he if I question tradition I question whether there be any doctrine delivered and so any Fathers And is not this argued like a Demonstrator First he supposes there never was any way used in the world but oral tradition and then strongly infers if I deny that I can know nothing But I can yet hardly perswade my self that the Fathers only sate in Chimney-corners teaching their Children by word of mouth and charging them to be sure to do so to theirs but as they loved preserving the doctrine of faith they should have a great care never to write down a word of it But why I wonder should Mr. S. think that if I do not allow of oral tradition I must needs question whether there were any Fathers I had thought I might have known there had been Fathers by their Children I mean the Books they left behind them But if all Mr. S. pleads for be only this that no Books can be certainly conveyed without tradition he dispute's without an adversary but as I never opposed this so I am sure it doth him little service It is then from the Books of the Fathers that I find what the sense of the Church of their age was and from thence I have shewed how vastly different the opinions and practices of the Roman Church are from those of the primitive Although then I may not think my self obliged to believe all that the present Church delivers for matter of faith yet I hope I may find what the opinions and practice of the former Church were by the records that are left of it And the reason why I cannot think any one obliged to believe what every age of the Church delivers is because I think no man obliged to believe contradictions and I see the opinions and practices of several ages apparently contrary to each other Well but I call this way a superficial subtilty and so I think it still so little have Mr. S's demonstations wrought upon me But saith he is that which is wholly built on the nature of things superficial No but that which pretends to be so built may And of that nature I have shewed this way to be and not the former But that I may not think him superficial as well as his way he puts a profound Question to me What do I think Controversie is and that he may the better let me know what it is he answers himself I deal plainly with you saith he you may take it to be an art of talking and I think you do so though you will not profess it but I take it to be a noble science But to let him see that I will deal as plainly with him as he doth with me I will profess it that I not only think Controversie as usually managed but some mens way of demonstrating Mr. S. may easily know whom I mean to be a meer art of talking and nothing else But he takes it to be a noble science yes doubtless if Mr. S. manage it and he be the judg of it himself His meaning I suppose is by his following words that he goes upon certain principles and we do not We have already seen how certain his principles have