A TREATISE OF THE CELIBACY OF THE CLERGY WHEREIN ITS Rise and Progress Are Historically Considered 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epiphan Haeres XLIII in init LONDON Printed by H. Clark for James Adamson at the Angel and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1688. THE PREFACE AMong the Errours and Corruptions of the Church of Rome there are such which have neither any foundation nor shew of Antiquity but are the meer Inventions of latter ignorant and barbarous Ages Others which obtained not indeed in the Ancient Church but arose from the degeneracy of some Belief or Corruptiin of some Practice received and used by the Ancient Christians Of the first sort are Transubstantiation Half-Communion Supremacy of the Pope Worship of Images and the like groundless Opinions and Practices which the Antient Church never thought of much less admitted Of the latter kind are Invocation of Saints which arose from an extraordinary Veneration paid to the Memory and Reliques of blessed Saints and Martyrs degenerating in latter Ages into downright Superstition and Impiety Purgatory advanced from a Belief generally received in the Ancient Church that the Souls of the departed are not admitted to the beatisical Vision before the Day of Judgment into a foolish Opinion of a Fictitious Place of Torment which might receive them in that interval of time And Infallibility of Councils raised from an external Submission of ancient Christians to their Decrees into an Obligation of yielding an internal Assent to their Definitions The Beginnings and Rise of the Errours of the sirst sort are unknown and uncertain as being founded in dark and ignorant Ages whose Actions are now no less obscure than were then their Notions But the latter sort admit a more clear and more certain Knowledge Their several Steps Progresses and Gradations may without much difficulty be traced out and exposed to the view of all Mankind as hath been often done by the Divines of the Reformed Churches But the most eminent Instance of the latter kind is the Imposition of Celibacy in the Church of Rome which arose from an immoderate affection and reverence of Virginity in the Ancient Universal Church and Example of many particular Churches Upon which account I may boldly affirm that the Imposition of Celibacy hath greater advantages to recommend and justifie it to the World than any other erroneous Practice or Opinion of the Church of Rome whatsoever Many others indeed proceeded from the Imitation and Advancement of some Ancient Doctrine or Practice But then that Practice degenerated into Abuse and that Doctrine was advanced into Errour Whereas the Imposition of Celibacy can plead not only the Countenance and Resemblance of Antient Times but produce the Examples and Authorities of Popes Councils and Doctors who anciently imposed Celibacy upon the Clergy and urged the Imposition of it with no less fervour than it is at this day continued in the Church of Rome However Celibacy be confirmed by these Great Authorities and recommended by this peculiar advantage of Undoubted Antiquity few Divines of our Church have handled this Controversie or endeavoured to shew the inclusiveness of those Authorities and weakness of this Antiquity Some few have produced Authorities of the Antient Writers in Favour of the contrary Practice or in treating of other Arguments have briefly touched of it and all have passed it over in a few Words as a Matter of less Moment At least none that I know of have handled this Controversie in a particular Treatise nor shewn the Beginnings Occasions Advances and Success of the Imposition of Celibacy in the several Ages of the Church This Enquiry hath been omitted not because Truth is wanting to our Side or the whole Stream of Antiquity runs contrary to us but because this is one of the less Momentous Controversies and our Clergy whose peculiar Glory it is to be less solicitous of their Interest even in things lawful and indifferent declined the Controversie least in pleading for the lawfulness of Marriage and they should be thought by a Censorious World to plead for their own Passions and Inclinations and perhaps Practice too To supply this Defect is the Design of this Treatise to vindicate the injured Cause of Marriage and shew that the Antient Esteem of Celibacy was neither Rational nor Universal that both Antient and Modern Imposition of it is unlawful and that the Antient use of it is no reasonable nor necessary President of the Modern Practice of it to shew the Occasions of that Esteem and Beginnings of this Imposition and carry the History of the Celibacy and Marriage of the Clergy through the several Ages of the Church This I have here undertaken and as I hope in some measure performed perhaps with so much the better Success because induced by no Prejudices nor pleading for any peculiar Interests For the Reader may be assured that the Author of this Treatise hath neither experienced the Pleasures of Marriage nor hath the Honour to be a Priest of the Church of England It may not be amiss because our Adversaries commonly object to us falsifying of Citations and borrowing them from one another a Crime which the Romish Priests of England are truly guilty of perhaps therein to be excused because the badness of their Cause requireth the former and their own Ignorance necessitates the latter 〈◊〉 farther to advertise the Reader that of all the Citations which he shall find in this Treatise no one is taken up at the second hand for the first 1300. years and after that time no more than three Writers cited upon the Faith of others viz. Alvarus Pelagius Panormitan and Polydor Virgil whose Writings I had not then by me nor had any opportunity to consult A TREATISE OF THE CELIBACY OF THE CLERGY WHEREIN Its Rise and Progress are Historically Considered VIrginity is a thing so plausible and if true so venerable so countenanced by Antiquity and admir'd by the Unthinking Multitude so highly subservient to the Secular Interest and outward Grandeur of the Clergy That among all the Artifices wherewith the Church of Rome upholds a sinking and decaying Cause it is no wonder if She more especially make use of this It might justly deserve our reverence and excite our Emulation if her Clergy made good their glorious Pretences of Virginity by a real and unspotted Chastity But since when we departed from the Church of Rome we resumed that ancient priviledge of Mankind of believing our Senses since Reason and Revelation assures us that so great a part of Mankind cannot and Experience demonstrates that it doth not enjoy a Perfection so extraordinary since an enforced Vertue and servile Piety is neither acceptable to God nor venerable to Men We slight their Virginity because impos'd and do not believe it because we do not see it The Plea indeed of Antiquity is not only specious but in some measure true In the Ancient Church they retained an infinite esteem and veneration for Virginity Many extolled it as the glory and
some made it even the business of Christianity it was an unusual abstinence from lawful and permitted Pleasures that procured them Admiration from the Heathen and Honour from their Fellow-Christians But then they really performed what they generously undertook Their Celibacy was no less chast than voluntary their Piety was fully adequate to their Zeal and both perhaps in some things greater than their Knowledge Yet should we even do violence to our Reason and force our Nature to imitate the Examples and receive the Doctrine of those great and holy Persons if either their Consent or their Practice had been universal But on the contrary the Imposition of it hath been condemned by the most Famous Councils and Greatest Writers never used in the Eastern Church not introduced in the Western till almost two hundred years after Christ enjoyned but in some few Provinces of that and even in those not universally practis'd and all this without doing injury to the sacred Bond of Marriage and ever leaving open a refuge for incontinent Persons Not so the Church of Rome which not only adviseth but imposeth Celibacy in many of the Clergy have dissolved Marriage in all descrieth it as Heresie defineth it to be worse than Fornication and to none allows a remedy for Incontinency To demonstate the Injustice of the Church of Rome herein and her departure from the Doctrine and Practice of the Ancient Church shall be the Subject of this present Treatise It is no small presumption of Errour when the Defenders of any Opinion agree not in the merits of the Cause they undertake In the Church of Rome there are Four Opinions about the Celibacy of the Clergy The first that it is of Divine Right Instituted and Commanded by God. So Jo. Major Clichtovaeus and Turrian teach that God hath forbidden Bishops Priests Deacons and Sub-deacons whom we shall hereafter comprehend under the general Name of the Clergy unless when we manifestly distinguish them to Marry or use their Wives already married The second is that of Bellarmine Valentia Vasquez Becanus Aquinas and the far greater part of the Roman Divines that it is not properly of Divine but of Apostolick Right as being instituted by the Apostles and ever since constantly and invariably practised by the Church that a Vow of Continence should be annexed to Holy Orders and consequently that Marriage thereby becomes unlawful to the Clergy without a Dispensation The third without any respect to Divine or Apostolical Institution and Practice of the Ancient Church whether they be here had or not thinks it sufficient that the Church hath Power to impose a Vow of Continence upon the Clergy and that such a Vow being once taken all use of Marriage is become unlawful and subsequent Contracts invalid This seems to be the Opinion of many of the Canonists and the Council of Trent which ventured to define no more than this that Clergy-men or Regulars after a solemn profession of Continence cannot Marry or if they do that their Marriage is unlawful Lastly the more moderate Divines maintain that it is neither of Divine nor Apostolical Right but deriveth all its Obligation from Ecclesiastical Institution which as well as the Vow annexed to it will cease to oblige as soon as the Church shall please although in the mean while she hath sufficient reason to continue her Institution Against these Opinions I shall prove these Four Propositions I. Celibacy of the Clergy was not instituted either by Christ or his Apostles II. It hath nothing excellent in it and bringeth no real advantage to the Church or to the Christian Religion III. The Imposition of it upon any Order of Men is unjust and contrary to the Law of God. IV. It was never universally imposed or practsed in the Ancient Church I. First then that Celibacy was not instituted either by Christ oâ—… his Apostles By Celibacy we mean a perpetual abstinence from the use of the Nuptial Bed in those already Married and not Contracting of Marriage in single Persons after taking of Holy Orders or making a Vow of Chastity That such Celibacy was not at all enjoyned by Christ nor by the Apostles as of Divine Right is sufficiently proved from the dissent of our Adversaries herein For it is the received Opinion of the Church of Rome that nothing can be a matter of Faith such as this would be if it had been commanded by Christ which is doubted and disputed of among the Doctors of the Church Now this is denied by the Maintainers of the Second and Fourth Opinions As for the Third that according to the usual artifice of the latter Popish Councils is so obscurely proposed that it neither directly favours nor opposeth it Besides neither Scripture or Tradition can be offered for this claim of Divine Institution The former is not so much as pretended to or if it be we shall examine it afterwards The latter cannot justly be since none but an universal Tradition of all past and present Ages is sufficient to convey down a matter of Faith whereas here the greatest part even of the present Church deny it But I will not insist upon disproving this as well because it is disowned by the greatest part of our Adversaries as because all the Arguments to be produced against the other Opinions will with much more force be valid against this I will only observe that if this Opinion be either false or uncertain the Infallibility of the Church of Rome is wholly overthrown since many Popes and Councils in the Eleventh Age determined the Celibacy of the Clergy to be of Divine Institution and the lawfulness of their Marriage to be downright Heresie Bellarmine therefore and with him the more Learned of the Church of Rome decline this Plea and assign to this Celibacy a bare Institution of the Apostles acting herein without any particular or express Commission from our Lord but by them prescribed and advised as meritorious itself and convenient to the Church punctually herein followed and obeyed by the Church in all Ages Whether the Church and more especially the Ancient did conform its discipline to this pretended Institution of the Apostles we shall enquire hereafter and by proving that it did not prove also that the Apostles made no such Institution Since the Primitive Church cannot be supposed to have immediately degenerated from the Instructions and Admonitions of her Founders and great Doctors But to pass by that I observe that whether the Apostles instituted Celibacy and ordained a Vow of Continency to be annexed to Holy Orders is a Question of Fact and consequently cannot be infallibly determined by the Church but must be by them clearly proved either from express Texts of Scripture or an universal and invariable Tradition That there is no such Tradition we shall â—…hew in some measure presently and more largely hereafter For Scripture we desire to know where those plain Admonitions of Celibacy to the Clergy are to be found For we
are in no ways obliged to prove the Negative Marriage being not forbidden to the Clergy by the Moral Law and therefore to be esteemed Lawful to them till a manifest Prohibition shall be produced Bellarmine indeed urgeth that Precept of the Apostie Tit. 1. 8. that a Bishop be sober and temperate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But not to say that Bellarmine herein forsakes his own Principle and maketh Ceiibacy to be of Divine Institution since St. Paul speaketh this not only as one that had obtained Mercy of the Lord to be Faithful but also as an Apostle of Jesus Christ These words serve not the purpose as designing neither Continence nor Chastity but Abstinence from Drunkenness and Coveteousness and are opposed the first to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the second to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the former Verse Or if we should with St. Chrysostom interpret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this place of an universal Temperance we must remember that such a Temperance is nothing else but a Moderation in the use of all lawful Pleasures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Clemens Alex. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He is universally Temperate not who abstaineth from all things but who moderately useth those things which he judgeth lawful Or Lastly if we should against all reason interpret 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chast and Continent Yet the Fathers unanimously teach that these Vertues are not incompatible with the moderate use of Marriage as we shall prove hereafter In the mean while let it be observed that St. Paul reason'd before Faelix 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Righteousness and Temperance and yet cannot be supposed to have forbidden him the embraces of his Wife As for Bellarmine's other Text 2 Tim. 2. 4. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life It is sufficient these words are addressed not only to Clergymen but to all Christians Whether a Married state doth necessarily entangle Persons in the Affairs of this Life more then Celibacy shall be enquired hereafter We come now to that great Store-house of the Assertors of Celibacy the VII Chap. of the 1 Epist. to the Corinthians And here a few Observations might have prevented many Mistakes as first That the Apostle was so far from imposing Virginity upon any Order of Men that he seemeth to have foreseen the danger of such Mistakes and therefore to have inserted these Cautions of them But I speak this by permission and not of command Ye are bought with a price be not ye the servants of men And this I speak for your own profit not that I may cast a snare upon you Secondly To those who are already Married he adviseth not a total but a temporary Abstinence Defraud not one the other except it be with consent for a time that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer and come together again that Sataâ—… tempt you not for your incontinency Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called Art thou bound unto a wife seek not to be loosed Thirdly That of those who are already Unmarried he adviseth Virginity to them only who have the Gift of Continence Nevertheless he that standeth stedfast in his own heart having no necessity but hath power over his own will and hath so decreed in his heart that he will keep his virgin he doth well I say therefore to the unmarried and widows it is good for them if they abide even as I. But if they cannot contain let them marry for it is better to marry than to burn Fourthly That this advice of Virginity was given not for the attainment of any greater merit but meerly for reasons of Convenience and the urgent Necessities of those times I suppose therefore that this is good for the present distress Such shall have trouble in the flesh but I spare you But this I say brethren the time is short But I would have you without carefulness Fifthly That this Advice was directed not only to the Clergy but to all Christians in general The Apostle no where restrains his discourse to the former but all along addresseth himself to the whole multitude of Believers If any one of these Observations be true as they are all most certainly then no advantage can be drawn out of this Chapter for the cause of Celibacy now in Controversie But our Adversaries are not only destitute of Reason and Revelation in favour of this Opinion but we have also many strong Arguments against it For to pass by the greatest of all the Silence of Scripture and the contrary Practice of Antiquity the first manifested already the latter to be proved hereafter Many of the Greatest Divines of the Roman Church do expresly confess that the Celibacy of the Clergy is neither of Divine nor Apostolical Institution This all those Popes Councils and Doctors hereafter to be produced who allow the Marriage of Priests in the Greek Church to be lawful must have held unless they be supposed to have betrayed the Doctrine and Tradition of the Church All those Divines likewise who have admitted or allowed a total abrogation of the Laws of Celibacy could not believe it to have a Divine or Apostolical Original However I shall produce some few who expreslly denied it As first the Canon Law which may be looked upon as the sence of the whole Church of Rome for some Ages So then Gratian The Marriage of Priests is Forbidden neither by Legal nor Evangelical nor Apostolical Authority and yet is wholly Forbidden by the Ecclesiastical Law. And The Church after the Apostolical Institutions hath added some counsels of Perfection as that of the Continence of Ministers Joannes a Ludegna in a Speech made in the Council of Trent and Printed among the Acts of that Council determineth and largely proveth that the Celibacy of the Clergy is neither of Divine Right nor in any sence commanded by the Apostles but only advised by them And that if there was no Laws of the Church or Monastick Vows Priests or Monks might lawfully Marry Besides if the Opinion of those Divines be true who maintain that Christ superadded no Evangelical Counsels to the Moral Law Celibacy can be neither of Divine nor Apostolical Institution unless we suppose that the Apostles immediately adulterated that most pure and simple Religion which they had received from their Master And indeed this seemeth highly rational most consonant to the Honour of God and adapted to the Nature of Man. That Religion was most beâ—…itting the Wisdom of the Deity to prescribe for the last and most perfect Rule of Mankind which was most pure and simple And this seems to have been the great End of Christ's coming into the World to free us from the bondage of the Ceremonial Law and estate us in that perfect liberty if not of Will yet at least as to the objects of Choice in which we were at
the Clergy the use of Marriage appeareth from the Decretal of Pope Stephen cited by Gratian in these words The Tradition of the Eastern Churches is different from that of the holy Church of Rome For in them Priests Deacons and Subdeacons are joyned in Marriage Matrimonio copulantur i. e. enjoy the use of Marriage as Mendoza hath learnedly proved the meaning of those words to be But in this or the Western Churches none of the Clergy from a Subdeacon to a Bishop hath liberty to use Marriage Here the Pope expresly confesseth the use of Marriage by the Clergy to have been always the Tradition and Practice of the Eastern Church And if so it must have been also sometimes of the Western For being never practised in the East it could not be of Apostolical institution and therefore must have been introduced in the West by some subsequent Decree of the Church This was the state of Celibacy in the Christian Church for the first thousand years No-where imposed in the better and purer Ages of Christianity introduced into the Roman Patriarchate by a rash Pope commanded by many Provincial Councils of the West but in no place universally observed the imposition of it always disused and at last condemned in the Eastern Church and the practice of it in these latter Ages become obsolete in the West It will not now be amiss to look back a little and make some Observations upon the Authors and advance of Celibacy whereby we may the better judge how far the Authority and Example of those times ought herein to influence and direct the practice of the present Age. First then the Celibacy of the Clergy was hitherto esteemed by all a matter of meer Discipline first introduced for reasons of Decency Convenience and supposed Edification which have not only long since ceased but Celibacy is now become a Snare to the Clergy and a Scandal to the whole Church So that the obligation of the Laws of Celibacy even in those particular Churches where it was antiently introduced and commanded have long since ceased The pretence of Divine or Apostolical Institution was not heard of till the days of Hildebrand and is but faintly maintained in these times That the antient Imposers of Celibacy never thought of this pretence is evident because they never made that plea. This we before observed particularly of the Decrees of Siricius and Innocent and may be affirmed of all Popes and Councils which favoured or commanded Celibacy in those times Not to say that some Councils as the Quinisext II. of Toledo and others expresly acknowledge the permission of Marriage to the Clergy to be of Apostolical Institution II. The Example of the antient Church in this case is not only not conclusive but even of no authority it neither necessitates nor recommends Celibacy to the present Church For all the deference which we ow to the Authority and Example of these times proceeds from a probable supposition that the antient Church had greater and better opportunities of knowing the mind of Christ the intentions of the Apostles and the exigences of the Church than the present Age can pretend to as being more removed from the Fountains head and animated with a less vigorous and impartial zeal for the knowledge of Truth and increase of Piety But when this supposition becomes not only improbable but is evidently false when we are assured the practice of the antient Church was occasioned and introduced by prejudices and mistakes false notions of Piety and gross errours about the nature of things imitation would not only be not laudable but even foolish and perhaps unlawful lest the continuance of such a practice should uphold the errours which first produced it At least when these mistakes are discovered these prejudices removed the authority of this example will vanish with them That this was the case of Celibacy in the antient Church we have all along observed and proved and need not here repeat our Arguments III. If we should allow the usage of the antient Church â—…o be in all cases a Rule and Pattern to the present Age yet will Celibacy receive no advantage from it The Marriage of the Clergy may put in a larger and much better Plea of antiquity as being able to produce the practice of the Universal Church in the four first Ages of Christianity of the whole Eastern and many parts of the Western Church to this day and alledge the Suffrage of two General Councils the first and fourth which confirmed and allowed it Whereas the imposition of Celibacy was unknown to the first and better Ages not universally practised in the latter rejected by one and condemned by another General Council and never confirmed by other than Provincial Synods whose Acts may be annulled and Decrees abolished by the single authority of any particular Church And certainly if what most of our Adversaries pretend the tradition and practice of the present Universal Church be the only certain method of knowing the Opinion and Doctrine of all precedent Ages the lawfulness and convenience of the Clergies Marriage must have been the belief of the antient Church since all the Eastern Churches the greatest part of the Universal Church not to speak of the Reformed Churches in the West do at this day permit the use of Marriage to the Clergy and maintain the impositioâ—… of Celibacy to be unlawful Which also is no small prejudice to the cause of the Church of Rome if there be any truth or solidity in that grand Argument of our Adversaries that in the case of two dissenting Churches when the one openly condemneth the practice of the other and receiveth not the same severe Sentence from her Adversary Truth and Justice must necessarily ly on that side For however the Greek Church hath always condemned as impious and unjust the imposition of Celibacy in the Latin Church the Latines never dared to return the same Sentence upon the permission of Marriage to the Clergy in the Greek Church Rather the practice of the Eastern Church hath been allowed and ratified by the publick Authority of the Church of Rome For to omit the great Later an Council under Pope Innocent the Third wherein our Adversaries confess that permission of Marriage was continued to the Greek Priests thus Pope Nicolas the First answered to the Inquiry of the Bulgarians You ask whether you ought to maintain and honour a Priest having a Wife or to remove him from you To which we answer That although they be very blameable you ought not to cast them off And Bellarmine acknowledgeth that although the Roman Church approves not herein the practice of the Greek Church and judgeth it to be an abuse yet she permits it to the Greeks so that if they had no other errours a Peace might easily be accorded between the two Churches IV. The practice of the ancient Church in the imposition of Celibacy was various and divers and consequently neither Celibacy it self
more continent And in another place resolving Oceanus his Question Whether Carterius a Spanish Bishop who had married one Wife before and a second after Baptism had not thereby violated the Apostle's Injunction of a Bishop's being the Husband of one Wife He pronounceth That he had not Lastly The contrary Opinion is built upon a false Foundation For not to say that it was first set on foot by Tertullian after he was become a Montanist and from him received by the Latin Fathers it relyeth wholly upon these Two false Suppositions First That according to any other sence the Precept of the Apostle would have been unnecessary the Roman Laws never allowing Polygamy Secondly That the Apostle maketh use of the same Phrase when he commands a Widdow to be chosen the wife of one husband 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 although no Laws or civilized Nations ever permitted Women to have two Husbands at the same time But both these Reasons vanish when opposed to our Third Interpretation For Divorce was permitted by the Roman as well as Jewish Laws for many other causes besides that of Adultery which alone was allowed by Christ So that whosoever had put away his Wife for any other cause and married another might truly be said to have two Wives and any Woman who had married again after such an unlawful Divorce had truly two Husbands Having thus refuted the pretence of Divine or Apostolical Institution I proceed to the Second Proposition That the Celibacy of the Clergy hath nothing excellent in itself and produceth no real Advantage either to the Church or the Christian Religion beyond Marriage And here I am not ignorant what Panegyricks and Encomiums of Virginity have been composed by many of the Antients and almost all the Writers of the Barbarous Ages This was a large field for them wherein to display their Rhetorick a subject so specious in itself and glorious in its Title that 't is no wonder it hath been the Theme of so many luxuriant Wits many of which have little less than Deify'd it and equall'd its Merits to the collection of all other Christian Vertues I shall not here undertake nor is it necessary to make an harangue upon the Praises of Marriage much less to depress the Excellencies of the Virgin state it will suffice to shew the weakness and invalidity of the contrary Arguments and thereby reduce both Marriage and Virginity to that Equilibrium wherein Nature first placed them and our Saviour left them First then I observe That this extraordinary affection and reverence of Virginity was first started and introduced by a Heretick Tertullian who deceived by the Enthusiasms of Montanus endeavoured to resine the Christian Religion and advance it into a System of Angelick Perfection He led the way to the Writers of the Latin Church who receiving this prejudice from him propagated it in some measure among the Greeks although it never was by them embraced with that zeal and pursued with that fervour which always accompanied it in the Western Church Secondly it may be observed That this extravagant veneration of Virginity prevailed proportionably to the decay of Learning and encrease of Ignorance in all Ages The Reputation of Celibacy was ever then highest when Knowledge was at its lowest ebb Particularly in the Tenth and Eleventh Ages the most scandalous and barbarous periods of Time that ever the Church waded through when Learning seemed banished out of the whole World then Celibacy triumphed every where and was look'd upon as the Consummation of all Vertues Marriage of the Clergy decried and abolished and more Monasteries founded than in all the Ages either before or since Thirdly This Opinion was first produced and ever after advanced and maintained by a gross Mistake that there is somewhat of impurity or sinfulness in the use of Marriage and that Chastity cannot be retained in a Married state That the Admirers of Celibacy among the Antients were guilty of this Mistake we shall have hereafter occasion to observe and although the more Learned Writers of the Church of Rome are ashamed of such a Proposition yet do they constantly fall back and recurr to it when they assign the Reasons of imposing Celibacy upon the Clergy So Bellarmine after he had before disowned it when his purpose requires it doubts not to say It cannot be denied that some impurity and pollution intervenes in the act of Marriage not what is a sin but what ariseth from sin If by this Pollution and Impurity he means a Natural one we grant it but then that affects not the Soul nor depreciates the worth of Marriage if a Moral one that will indeed be truly and properly a Sin but this he dares not say Besides his Distinction of a Sin and a Consequence of a Sin is wholly vain For if in all Use of Marriage the effect of a Sin interveneth then cannot Marriage be used without some precedent sin A Proposition so false and erroneous that the Use of Marriage was intended for our first Parents in the state of Innocence and would have been practis'd to this very day had they never fallen Nay farther whether fallen or not fallen it was their Duty to make use of Marriage for the Propagation of Mankind and even for some Ages after the Creation it was so far from being meritorious that it was Unlawful to continue Virgins But if by the antecedent sin which produceth this Pollution in the Act of Marriage Bellarmine means only the Original depravity of our Nature if it be a Necessary effect of this depravity then God cannot in Justice and will not in Mercy impute it to us if it be not a Necessary effect of it then Marriage may be used without it and his Proposition will fall to the ground However because this ever was and is still the great Engine of the Patrons of Virginity wherewith they gained Applause in the World and blinded the eyes of unwary People it will not be amiss to clear this matter a little further and demonstrate that a true and proper Chastity and Continence may be observed in Marriage which will also overthrow most of the Authorities produced out of the Writings of the more moderate and disinteressed Fathers as insinuating no more than an Advice of Chastity in the Use of Marriage If this Proposition seemeth either harsh or like a Paradox it is only because we are unacquainted with it and our judgment anticipated by false notions of Chastity which consists as well in a moderate and well regulated Use of Matrimonial Acts as in a total Abstinence from them nay the former will always be a Vertue the latter sometimes a Sin as in the Infancy of the Creation and if one married Person totally abstaineth without the consent of the other and in most cases but a thing indifferent and then only a Vertue when it administers occasion and opportunity to a greater good than is the Propagation of Mankind and vertuous Education of Children for
the Clergy of the Church of Rome Now at this time in the Church of Ephesus some young Widdows had imprudently been chosen into the number of Deaconesses who either not being able or not willing to contain had some of them Married and others as the Apostle seems to imply had given Scandal by their loose carriage The Apostle therefore ratifies the Marriages of those who were already Married and giveth free leave to the rest to Marry But for the future commands that none be admitted into that Order under Threescore years old at which age there is no danger of Incontinency Now that the Apostle treateth here of these Deaconesses or Widdows who had promised to the Church to observe Continence appeareth as well from the Context as from the common Interpretation of the Fathers many of whom Bellarmine reckons up and embraceth their Opinion After the Apostle succeed the Fathers St. Clemens Alex. the great Defender of Marriage and most Learned of all the Writers of the Three first Centuries Second Marriage after a Promise of Continence is unlawful not in the Contract but in the breach of Promise St. Cyprian speaking of Virgins that had professed Chastity But if they will not or cannot persevere it is better they should Marry than fall into Incontinency by their faults Epiphanius although otherwise a great Bigot of Virginity speaking of those who after a Solemn Vow of Continence and undertaking a Monastick Life find themselves tempted with Lusts gives them this advice It is better to commit one sin by violating the Vow than many by indulging a wandring Lust it is best for him who cannot perform his undertaking openly to Marry a Wife according to the Law. St. Basil blaming some Virgins who after they had solemnly devoted themselves to God and vowed perpetual Chastity behaved themselves unseemly saith It were much better for them being married to a Husband to receive from him directions of life and recompence the benefits of his government by assisting him in the care of the Family and educating a succession of hopeful Children and so preserve her Chastity although it were only to avoid the Jealousie of her Husband There is extant among St. Chrysostom's Works two Eloquent and Passionate Treatises written by him whilst young to his Friend Theodorus afterwards the Great and Learned Bishop of Mopsuestia who in his youth having entred into a Monastick Life had in the twentieth year of his age quitted it for the love of Hermione a fair Virgin whom he resolved to Marry Here Chrysostome employeth all the strength of his Rhetorick to exaggerate the heinousness of his Sin committed in violating his Vow made to God yet no where adventures to declare that his Marriage would be invalid gives it the name of Marriage and not of Adultery and although he equals the Sin of it to that Crime and by a Metaphor calls it Adultery yet he plainly distinguisheth it from formal Adultery more especially in these words Marriage you will say is lawful so say I Marriage is honourable saith the Apostle and the bed undefiled but fortnicators and adulerers God will judge But it is not permitted to you to celebrate the Rites or rather use the lawfulness of Marriage For when one is joyned to a heavenly Spouse to part with him for a Wife and joyn himself to her this is Adultery although you should ten thousand times call it Marriage and by so much worse than Adultery by how much God is greater than Men. Wonder not if Marriage is condemned equally with Adultery when God is despised Here the Crime indeed is sufficiently aggravavated but placed wholly as may be observed not in the use of his intended Marriage but in violating his first Faith pledged to Christ in his Vow of Continence Calls his intended Contract Marriage grants that when Married Hermione will be his Wife And in the close of his Passage plainly distinguisheth his Crime from Adultery Wherefore the Latine Translation in Fronto Ducaeus his Edition renders it thus Wonder not if such a Marriage is compared to Adultery The same Father in another place saying That some Monks in his time quitting their Profession Contracted Marriage passeth the same Censure on them always proceeding upon this ground That they who make a Vow of Chastity do thereby as it were joyn themselves in Marriage to Christ and therefore by a subsequent Marriage become as it were guilty of Adultery Upon which account also many other Fathers in their Rhetorical Flights give to these Marriages the Title of Adultery But if we come to close and strict Reasoning St. Augustine will tell us for them That as this Marriage with Christ is not True but only Spiritual so neither is this Adultery True and Real but only Spiritual and Mystical This Father professedly handles this Question refutes all the contrary Objections and having said that Such Persons are condemned not because they afterwards Contracted a Marriage but because they violated their former Promise of Chastity Determines in these words No small an evil ariseth from this inconsiderate Opinion of the invalidity of Marriage of holy Virgins which quit their Profession For hereby Wives are separated frrom their Husbands as if they were Adulteresses not Wives and they who would by separating of them reduce them to Continence make their Husbands become true Adulterers if while these are alive they marry other Wives Wherefore Gratian contracteth the sence of St. Augustine's Argument and truly represents it thus Some affirm those who Marry after a Vow to be Adulterers but I say they grievously sin who Separate such Persons I might produce many other places of St. Augustine to the same purpose especially where spâ—…aking of Professed Virgins which although Incontinent adventured not to Marry partly for Shame and partly for fear of Punishment He giveth his Opinion thus These who long to Marry and yet do not Marry because they cannot do it unpunished it is better they should Marry than Burn that is than be scorched with the secret flames of Lust who repent their Profession and are grieved at their Promise St. Hierome writing to a Consecrated Virgin who leaving her Mother lived with an unmarried Clergyman and was suspected to maintain an unlawful familiarity with him giveth her this advice either to return to her Mother or Marry her Lover Why are you afraid to return to her If you be still a Virgin why need you fear a close Consinement If Debauched why do you not publickly Marry That will be the next refuge after Shipwrack to extenuate at least your Crime by this Remedy A Passage so much the more Memorable because of this Couple the one was a Clergyman the other a Nun and yet St. Hirome not only alloweth but adviseth their Marriage The Council of Ancyra in the Year 314. Decreed that Those who having vowed Virginity falsifyed their Promise should be placed in the rank of Bigamists But none
wherewith the Antients were induced to make this Constitution are not only now ceased but are even become opposite For first we see that by this Decree Chastity and Continence is so far from being promoted in the Clergy that thereby a door is rather opened to all kind of Lust and Villany and Coveteousness in the Clergy so far from being restrained by it that it seems hence to have received no small encrease II. To Confute our Adversaries pretence of Antiquity and establish my Design it is sufficient to produce the Authority of some Fathers who thought the Imposition of Celibacy unlawful or inconvenient to the Church to alledge the Testimony of some Historians assuring us that Marriage was in their Time used indifferently by the Clergy and propose the Examples of some Married Clergy Althogh some Fathers and Writers were of a contrary Opinion or the greater part of the Clergy perhaps practised Celibacy For this will undeniably prove that both Marriage and Celibacy were left indifferent to all that neither was a Point of Faith an Institution of Christ or his Apostles or a matter of Universal Practice Whereas our Adversaries pretending herein to an uninterrupted Tradition and constant Practice of the whole Church in all Ages must to that end produce a perfect consent of all Doctors Historians and Writers and an universal Practice of all Times If any one Writer occur not condemned or any one Example not censured by the Church the Plea of Tradition must fall Some indeed of the Roman Church as Erasmus and Cassander pretended not to so Universal a Tradition and Practice but then they were so far from Defending the present Constitutions of the Church of Rome by the Authority of the Antients that they were open Enemies to the Imposinion of Celibacy However the Dissent of ancient Doctors and Councils and the diverse Practices of private Clergymen will manifestly demonstrate that Celibacy was neither universally imposed nor practised in the Ancient Church as it is at this day in the Church of Rome but that as well as Marriage left indifferent both to Clergy and Laity if not in some particular Provinces yet at least in the Universal Church III. The numbers of the Married Clergy in the Ancient Church ought not to be estimated only from the accounts of them which we find in Ecclesiastical History of Monuments of Antiquity For the Relation of Wives or Children add neither Ornament nor Use to History nor have any part in it unless upon extraordinary occasions which rarely happen It concerns not Posterity to know whether Aristotle or Plato were Married since neither Marriage nor Celibacy will inhaunce their Vertue or diminish their Worth. And if mention of Wives be rarely found in Civil much less will it in Ecclesiastical History For Women sometimes bear a share in Civil Matters but in publick Acts of Religion and Affairs of the Church it is even unlawful for them to intermeddle So that if but a few Examples of Marriage in the Clergy of the Ancient Church can be produced we may thence reasonably conclude that the Married Clergy were then very numerous IV. The Reader may observe that almost all those places which we shall produce out of the Ancient Doctors for the lawfulness of Marriage in the Clergy and against the Imposition of it are taken either from their dogmatical Treatises which were written deliberately and in a sedate temper of Mind or from their Harangues of Virginity where the very force of Truth extorted from them those Confessions Whereas the Testimonies made use of by our Adversaries for the Necessity or Convenience of Celibacy in the Clergy are for the most part drawn either from these Encomiastick Discourses of Virginity where they employed all the force of their Eloquence to magnisie the Merits of that State and recommend it to the World or from their Polemick Writings against the Adversaries of Celibacy wherein they were more intent to Destroy Errour than Establish Truth And no wonder if in both these Occasions corrupted with Prejudice or transported with Passion they bent the Bow to much and receded from that Exactness of Truth which is seated in the middle way To these Observations I may add the Confession of many Great Men in the Church of Rome who allow Celibacy neither to have been imposed nor universally practised in the Antient Church To pass by then Cassander Erasmus and the more moderate Divines of that Church I will produce only Gratian and Mendosa the last of which acknowledgeth that Marriage was always allowed to the Clergy and every where thought indifferent till forbidden by the Council of Illiberis in the Fourth Age the first goeth further in these words From this Authority an Epistle of Pope Pelagius in the Sixth Age it appeareth that the Clergy of the aforementioned Order Priests Deacons and Sub-deacons might then lawfully use Marriage And in the time of the Council of Ancyra in the Fourth Age the Continence of the Ministers of the Altar was not yet introduced Although perhaps by this last Passage only Deacons and Subdeacons are understood However in another place he speaks more generally When therefore we read that the Sons of the Clergy are promoted to be Popes or Bishops they are not to be thought to have been born of Fornication but of lawful Marriage which was every where permitted to the Clergy before the prohibition and is to this day permitted to them in the Eastern Church Having premised these few preliminary Observations I proceed to Matter of Fact and begin with the Apostles than whom none better knew the intention of their Master or the convenience of the Church and were the best Pattern of the Clergy for all future Ages St. Basil seems to have believed that all the Apostles were married where speaking of the excellency of of Marriage he brings in the Example of Peter and the rest of the Apostles The Interpolater of Ignatius his Epistles who lived in the beginning of the Sixth Age in like manner produceth the Examples of Peter Paul and the other Apostles or as the Latin Translator antienter than Ado Viennensis who flourished in the year 875. renders it the rest of the Apostles The Author of the Commentary upon the Epistles of St. Paul in St. Ambrose's Works who was Hilary a Deacon of Rome excepts St. Paul and St. John and affirms all the rest to have been married That St. Peter was married we are assured by the Authority of the Holy Scripture That he had a Daughter by her the antient Book of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Travels writ before the times of Origen manifest to whom the latter Legendary Writers give the name of Petronilla St. Peter is kniwn to have had a Wife and the begitting of Children hindred him not from obtaining precedency among the Apostles saith the abovementioned Hilary in his Questions upon both Testaments falsly ascribed to St. Austin For that he was
from married Priests but much farther in the time of Hildebrand and once again advanced into the formal Heresie of the Eustathians From the Montanists the Catholicks received their dislike of second Marriages one of the most palpable Errours of Antiquity since what the Apostle expresly alloweth and in some Cases adviseth most of the Ancients decry as scandalous and inconvenient oft-times as a tolerable Evil and sometimes even as a grievous sin Tertullian hath written whole Books against it Athenagoras calls it a decent Adultery Origen maintains that a Digamist however otherwise a person of good conversation and adorned with all other Vertues not to belong to the Church I might add many other Fathers and Councils who imposed a tedious Penance upon Digamists but the thing is sufficiently notorious This prejudice against Digamy was first taken up in the end of the Second Age. Before that time second Marriage was thought indifferent and wholly innocent Hermes in â—…he First Age had determined the lawfulness of it and Clemens Alexandrinus in the next pleads largely for it From the Gnosticks the Catholicks received an erroneous Opinion of some Impurity and Sinfulness or at least Imperfection in the use of Marriage They scrupled not to use the Authority of Books forged by those Hereticks in prejudice of Marriage such as the Gospel of the Egyptians the Acts of Paul and Tecla and the like and in some measure adopted their Errours Thus Origen and one of the most early Favourers of Celibacy writeth thus of Marriage Although I will not positively pronounce yet I suppose these are some ordinary actions of Men which however they be free from sin are not worthy to be honoured with tbe presence of the Holy Gospel for instance lawful Marriage is not indeed sinful yet while conjugal Acts are performed the Holy Ghost will not be present although he seems to be a Prophet who performs them St. Hierom the great Patron of Celibacy in the next Age goeth farther and disputing against Jovinian doth in some places make Marriage not only sinful but even damnable If it be good saith he for a Man not to touch a Woman then it is evil to touch her For nothing is contrary to Good but Evil. While I perform the Duty of a Husband I do not the Duty of a Christian For the Apostle commandeth we should always pray If so we must never serve the ends of Marriage For as often as I do that I cannot pray I suppose that the end of Marriage is eternal Death The Earth indeed is filled by Marriage but Paradise by Virginity And as the Apostle permits not those who are already married to put away their Wives so he forbideth Virgins to marry Marriage is permitted only as a remedy of Lust it being more tolerable to be prostituted to one man than many Nor did this Errour expire with those Heresies from whence they rose About the year 600. when Augustin Archbishop of Canterbury desired of Pope Gregory some Instructions for his new Converts in England and Rules of Ecclesiastical Discipline he gave him this for one A Man after he hath laid with his own Wife ought not to enter into the Church till he hath washed himself with water nor must then immediately enter Whereas Clemens Alexandrinus praising the Simplicity of the Christian Religion instanceth in this very Ceremony which although used of old by the Jews he saith was no where practised in his time by the Christians Many other erroneons Opinions obtained in the antient Church which proceeded from no other cause but this I will observe but one more their Opinion of the lawfulness of Self-murder to prevent the loss of Virginity imagining somewhat of Sinfulness and Impurity was inseparably annexed even to the natural act of Generation So Eusebius bestows large Encomiums upon some Virgins and Matrons who had laid violent hands upon themselves to prevent the Lust of Heathens And Aldhelmus citeth a Sentence of some Father more antient than himself Self-murder is unlawful unless when Chastity is endangered which he consirms and illustrates with many Reasons and Examples Such weaknesses of the Antients had deserved indeed to be buried in Oblivion if they had not influenced their Practice and laid the Foundations of an Errour which continueth even to this day that Marriage is a state Unbefitting and Celibacy therefore Necessary to the Clergy An Opinion first taken up upon those Prejudices which we have just now mentioned and maintained upon the Authority of those who are led away with these Mistakes So that to take away the Plea of Antiquity from the Church of Rome in the case of Celibacy it were sufficient to shew that the Antients received and embraced it meerly for the sake of these Prejudices and Mistakes Which we have already done For these were the great and only Arguments of Celibacy for the first Thousand years while none were yet so foolish as to imagin it to be of Divine or Apostolical Institution The pre-conceived Opinions of the impurity of Marriage in all and great indecency of it in those who administred Holy things tended directly to introduce the Celibacy of the Clergy For these Reasons Origen and Eusebius who were the only Orthodox Writers before the Council of Nice who openly prefer the Celibacy of the Clergy to their Marriage desired it might be introduced For they rather faintly wished the thing than dogmatically used it and by their Wishes manifest that it was not yet introduced As for their unreasonable prejudice against Digamy that contributed no less to the cause of Celibacy than the other Mistakes For the unlawfulness of Digamy once supposed the force of the Apostles Precept of Marriage to all who could not contain became wholly enervate since a Man is no less subject to Incontinence after enjoyment of a Wife for some few years perhaps days than he was before he ever married Besides all the Patrons of Celibacy failed not to make use of this Argument That if Second Marriage be unlawful or indecent to the Laity even First Marriage will be so to the Clergy it being usual for them who disallowed Second Marriage in all to think First Marriage only a tolerable evil and permitted in some as Divorce was formerly to the Jews And then it was a natural order of Superstition first to forbid Second and then all Marriage to the Clergy Therefore we may observe that in the beginning of the Third Age Tertullian affirms Digamy to have been forbidden to the Clergy both by Apostolical Tradition aud the Discipline of the Church and to be generally discussed by them in his time as a scandalous Imperfection if not a Crime But we no where find Marriage forbidden to the Clergy till the time of the Apostolick Canons first published in the end of this or beginning of the next Age. These Mistakes and Prejudices and Reasons of Celibacy founded upon them were common to both
Fornication Thus have we brought down the History of the Imposition of Celibacy to its Final Period I mean the Universal Reception of it in the Western Church towards the end of the Fourteenth Age when the Marriage of the Clergy fell from a general into a total disuse and was thenceforth compelled to take refuge in the name and disgrace of Fornication What a deluge of Lusts and Impurities overflowed the Christian World when Celibacy became triumphant and Marriage was exploded may easily be imagined Such deplorable Scandals of the Church I should willingly pass under silence and not provoke the anger of our Adversaries by the rehearsal of so sad a truth if the nature of my design did not require me to say somewhat of it which yet I will propose with all modesty and brevity I will not here upbraid to our Adversaries the noted Tragedy of Pope Gregory's Fish-ponds although related by Haldericus more than 800 years since nor the more famous story of Pope Joan although attested by more than twenty eight Historians before the Reformation I will not object to them the Incredible Bestialities and Horrible Lusts of the Popes of the Tenth Age nor insist upon the Infamous Impurities of private Churchmen I will produce only a few General Testimonies of the Writers of latter times Alvarus Pelagius Bishop of Silva in Portugal in the beginning of the Fourteenth Age wisheth that the Glergy had never vowed Chastity especially the Clergy of Spain wherein the Sons of the Laity were not much more numerous than the Sons of the Clergy About the same time Durandus junior Bishop of Mimatum in France proposing means for the reformation of the Church adviseth among other things that it were ordered that Publick Stews might not be kept near great Churches nor in the Court of Rome next to the Palace of the Pope nor in other Places near the Houses of Bishops In the next Age Gerson affirms that either incontinent Priests must be tolerated or none can be had and therefore that it were more convenient for the Church that Concubines should be publickly permitted to the Clergy than that the Lâ—…ity should be forbidden to hear the Masses of incontinent Priests Glemangis relates that in many Diocesses the Priests giving a set and determinate price to their Bishops publickly and openly kept Concubines This scandal of selling Licenses of Concubinacy to the Clergy proceeded so far that in Germany the Bishops and their Officers not only granted those Licences for a certain sum of money to all who asked them but also forced those Clergy-men to take them who neither desired noâ—… intended to make use of them In Switzerland it was the custom in many Cantons in the times of Popery that whensoever they received a new Pastour they obliged him to take a Concubine that he might not attempt the chastity of Virgins and Matrons The same reason induced the Senate of Rome when Pius V. intended to put down the publick Stews to intercede and petition for the continuation of them as well to gratifie the Clergy who incited them as to prevent greater scandals justly fearing the honour of their Wives and Daughters if the Lust of the unmarried Clergy were diverted from the wonted channel To say no more the Adulteries Fornications Sodomies and Bestialities discovered in our Monasteries at their dissolution are an evident demonstration of this sad truth The Author of Onus Ecclesiâ—… who was John Suffragan Bishop of Saltzburg and writ just before the Reformation saith There were very few Gurates in Germany who did not wallow in the filth of Conoubinacy and that The Nunneries in his time were as publickly prostituted as the common Stews And lest we should imagin the Romish Clergy to have observed a greater Purity since the Reformation than before the Fornications and Incest of Paul III. the Soâ—…omies of Julius III. and incestuous Commerce of Innocent X. with his Brothers Wife Olimpia are yet fresh in the memory of all men of the latter of which Abbot Gualdi confesfeth that the Histories of former Ages cannot produce a scandal so enormous or an unlawful love so immoderate which made him for her sake to forfeit both the Reputation of his Person and the Honour of the Church I will produce but one Example more but that related by the Doctors of the Sorbon and consequently undeniable to our Adversaries In a Visitation made in the year 1619. by the Bishop of Serzane at the command of Pope Paul V. it was found that among the Ecclesiasticks of three large Provinces Stiria Carinthia and Carniola who had all been bred up under the severe Discipline of the Jesuits there were found only six Priests who kept not Concubines Nor did the imposition of Celibacy infect only the Morals of the Roman Clergy but also corrupted their judgment and by that means introduced far greater scandals into the Church when Concubinacy and other unnatural Lusts being become universal they employed their Wits to prevent their own shame by proving those Villanies not to be unlawful For to pass by an Encomium or Apology of Sodomy published by John Casa Archbishop of Beneventum and Legate of the Pope to omit the Complaint of Gualter Mapes That the Priests insinuated into silly women a fear of damnation if they denied their Embraces to them it cannot be denied that many latter Casuists of the Church of Rome have asserted That Fornication committed only for the sake of Health or evacuation of an extimulant Humour is not unlawful and that most of them teach that simple Fornication is no deadly sin I will alledge only one instance of these scandalous Maxims but that proceeding from the Head of the Romish Church and related by Wesselus of Groningen a learned and pious Divine of that Church Pope Sixtus IV. out of the fulness of Apostolick power gave a License to the whole Family of the Cardinal of St. Lucia to commit Sodomy in the three hotter months of the year with this clause Let it be done as it is desired The sense and scandal of so many Lusts Impurities and Bestialities daily committed by the unmarried Clergy induced many great and learned men of the Church of Rome to advise the abrogation of the Laws of Celibacy and permission of Marriage to the Clergy Panormitan giveth his opinion in these words It is enquired whether the present Church can enact that a Clergy-man may contract Marriage as the Greeks do I answer It may And I do not only believe that the Church hath a power of decreeing this but I also believe that this would be a wholsom Constitution for the good and salvation of Souls Pope Pius II. confessed That there were indeed former causes why Marriage should be taken from the Clergy but now much greater causes why it ought to be restored Polydor Vergil delivers his Judgment thus This I will affirm That this enforced Chastity
the future Service of God. Such Cases did often happen in the Beginning of Christianity and the Times of Persecution but in the calm and flourishing estate of the Church are more rarely to be found So that in all others Chastity in the notion of a total Abstinence is a thing wholly indifferent even although such Abstinence should be true and perfect But alas the far greater part of Mankind are not capable of such an Abstinence which consisteth not only in the preserving the Body from actual Pollution and unlawful Pleasures for that may be a matter of Necessity as well as Choice and is common to thousands who shall never see the Glories of Heaven but also in refraining the Mind from the desires and even the thoughts of Uncleanness and preventing the circles of an inward Fire Such a Man may truly be said to retain a pure and unspotted Virginity but then I doubt that at the same time he will be the Phoenix of his Age. And then after all if he want either Abilities or a Will to employ himself in Vertue and the Service of God to greater advantage than he could have done in a Married state his Celibacy will be devoid of all merit and become wholly indifferent On the other side the conservation of a true Chastity is both possible and easie in Marriage if it be not frequent that ariseth from the corruption of Mankind not any desicience or imperfection of Marriage Now that Chastity and Continence may be here found and practised the Apostle assureth us when he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Marriage is honourable in all men and the bed uudefiled or impolluted directly contrary to Bellarmine's Proposition The Apostle is herein followed by almost all the Fathers I shall producce some of them and first the Great Paphnutius who when in the Council of Nice the Celibacy of the Clergy was proposed under the pretence of advancing Chastity pronounced the embraces of a lawful Wife to be Chastity and was therein applauded by the whole Council So Clemens Alex. Just Men under the Old Law begat Children Marrying or using Marriage incontinently What may we not use Marriage continently and not go about to dissolve that which God hath joyned He also who marrieth for the sake of Procreation of Children ought to use continence so as not to lust even after his own Wife whom he ought to love begetting Children with an honest and chaste will. Lactantius As the Woman is bound by the Laws of Chastity to lust after no other Object so is the Husband bound by the same Law because God hath joyned the Husband to his Wife by the union of one Body St. Ambrose Virginity hath its rewards Widdowhood its merits there is also place for conjugal Chastity The Apostle commands a Bishop to be the Husband of one Wife not that he excludeth an unmarried Man for that is not the sence of his Precept but that by conjugal Chastity he may preserve the grace given him in Baptism If then Chastity is common both to Marriage and Celibacy the latter can have no intrinsick Excellence beyond the former Nor indeed do our more judicious Adversaries pretend to that Few are guilty of so foul an errour except some zealous and unlearned Monks The Excellence therefore of it is wholly accidental and consists only in affording greater advantages of Piety Knowledge and Beneficence than Marriage This therefore is next to be examined Let us then consider any one as a Man a Christian and a Priest. If in the first quality as a Member and Citizen of Mankind that estate will deserve the preheminence which is most communicative of good and beneficial to the whole Universe The benefits of Celibacy are indirect accidental and rare those of Marriage direct natural and frequent If as a Christian that state will be most eligible that more immediately procureth the grace and favour of God this Celibacy directly affords to none Marriage conferrs on all in the Opinion of the Church of Rome who make it a Sacrament If as a Priest that state is preferrable which giveth the greater and more diffusive Example to the Laity A Vertuous Celibacy will be indeed Exemplary to Virgin Laicks the smallest and most inconsiderable part of the Church But then a prudent and religious conduct of Marriage will serve as a Rule for other married Persons the far greater part of the Laick Church Thus far the Merits of both are at least equal If we recurr to the Authority of Examples we may begin at Paradice and the first state of Mankind Here we sind a married Couple even in the state of Innocence and the very first Blessing given by God unto Mankind to be this Be fruitful and multiply And as it can be no laudable Ambition to desire to exceed the Piety and Innocence of Paradice so neither can it be any great Perfection to defeat the first Blessing of the Creation If we descend hence until the Times of Moses we shall find all the Patriarchs both before and after the Flood to have pleased God and served their Generations at the same time All this while Celibacy hath no Example nor any one President If we look into the Mosaick Law Marriage was there expresly permitted and indirectly commanded to the Priest since none but their own Posterity could be admitted into that Order I am not ignorant that the Patrons of Celibacy urge mightily the Three days Abstinence from their Wives imposed upon the People in preparing themselves to receive the Law of God in Mount Sinai But this was enjoyned not only to the Priests but to all the People was a short and temporary not a total and perpetual Abstinence served only to typifie that inseparable Purity of Mind and Body which was to flourish in the Church of Christ and was a meer Rite and Ceremony unworthy of the dignity and simplicity of the Christian Religion Again if we consider the Saints and Prophets of the Old Testament St. Chrysostom will tell us that all the Prophets had Wives and FaFamilies as Esaias Ezekiel and the Great Moses and yet sufferd therby no diminution of their Vertue Or if we take our measures from the venerable Examples of Christ and his Apostles we may learn both from their Doctrine and Practice that the Perfection of a Christian state consists not in an idle and contemplative but in an active and benefactive state That most if not all the Apostles were Married we shall prove hereafter and if our Saviour chose a Single state wherein to pass his life on Earth Clemens Alex. shall answer for us That He had his proper Spouse the Church that He was no ordinary Man who should either want an help or be subject to the temptations of Incontinency that it was not necessary for him to continue his Species by Procreation who was himself God blessed for evermore And then if we cast our eyes upon the
Worship and Opinion of the Gentiles we shall find Celibacy in no great esteem among them and Marriage not only allowed to their Priest but even made necessary to some of them insomuch as the Pontifex Maximus among the Romans could continue no longer in his Office than his Wife liv'd St. Herom indeed and after him all the Champions of Celibacy alledge the Exmple of the Hierophantae of Athons But had that good Father in the heat of his Disputation considered the Character of those Priests he would not have ventured to produce their Example For if we may believe the Relations of Lucian and the more Ancient Christian Writers those Hierophantae of Greece practised in their secret Rites and Mysteries the most abominable Lusts and Villanies of the Pagan Superftition In speaking of this matter I will further observe that there was but one great Order of Priests among the Heathens which professed Virginity those of Cybele or Isis for as for the Vestal Virgins they were permitted to marry when their time of Service was expired and but one Sect of Philosophers that decried and contemned Marriage the Epicureans and of these the first were the most Infamous and Incontinent of all Priests the latter the most Debauched and Voluptuous of all Philosophers Lastly If we consult Reason for Scripture we have before examieed and Tradition we shall hereafter neither will that declare in favour of Celibacy That will only teach us that state is more Noble which most advanceth the Happiness of Life and gives the greatest assistance to the Perfection of our Nature For neither Marriage nor Celibacy have of themselves any intrinsick Merit at least not Celibacy as we before proved Neither of them doth immediately and directly illuminate the Understanding refine the Reason or purge the Will. Now the Happiness of Human Life and the Perfection of Nature consists in the tranquility and imperturbation of the Mind whereby it is sitted for the Contemplation of her Creator and the Exercise of all more noble and sublime Vertues This Tranquility next to Habits of Vice in the Soul is chiefly interrupted by immoderate and ungoverned Passions in the Body although even those Habits were produced at first by the intemperance of these Passions The greatest and most vehement of our Passions are those of Desire and among them the propensity to the continuation of our Species obtains thefirst place A a right Use of Marriage satisfies this propensity allays its violence secureth the Mind from all tempests on that side This Celibacy can do only in those who have the Gift of Continence who perhaps are not the thousandth part of Mankind if those be excepted to whom not God or Vertue but some defect of Nature hath given a reprieve from this Passion In the rest Celibacy especially when enforced will be only the occasion of perpetual or at least intermitting tempests which instead of a sweet Serenity will introduce into the Mind a turbulent Commotion dissorder all her Thoughts and deprive her of all Happiness Or if we should grant which is most false that Celibacy well governed is in all able to give the Mind the same tranquility and secure her from all perturbations arising from the passion of Desire yet still the Merits and Advantages of Marriage and Celibacy will be equal even in this Consideration There remains then only arguments of temporal convenience and outward decorum of the Church And here though it might suffice to observe that arguments of convenience are of no validity against a probability of unlawfulness much less against an express Divine Permission yet shall I briefly examine the Reasons of this kind produced by our Adversaries They may be reduced to three Heads A greater immunity from secular cares and worldly business and thereby a better opporunity to attend the Service of God and execute the Duties of their Office Secondly A certain indecency in the use of Marriage which renders it incompatible or at least inconvenient to the Sacerdotal Office Thirdly The better administration of the goods and revenues of the Church As for the First that might indeed with some colour have been pleaded in the infancy of the Gospel when many of the Clergy were designed as itinerant Preachers for the propagation of the Faith although it was then so far from being necessary that many of the Apostles did in their travels lead about with them if not their wives which is most probable yet at least women But now when the Faith is planted and the Clergy have particular limits assigned them wherein to execute their Office that reason ceaseth Another case may happen wherein this argument may take place in times of Persecution when 't is of great advantage and interest to the Church that her Clergy give examples of patience and constancy to their flock and is very probable that a man will embrace Martyrdom with a greater resolution and unconcernedness when freed from the solicitude of Wife and Children whose consideration and perhaps importunities might tempt him to Prevarication but then Celibacy is here also so far from being necessary that it will augment the Merits and the Glory of Martyrdom to break through those Obstacles and slight those Considerations However certain it is that in the Peaceable and Flourishing Times of the Church this Reason is of no Validity Hence appeareth with how little Reason our Adversaries urge that so much celebrated Text of St. Paul He that is Unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord how he may please the Lord. An admonition by the Apostle adapted to those times of Persecution as appears by the Preface of it But I would have you speaking to all Christians without Carefulness For otherwise Marriage does not necessarily involve more Carefulness or Disquiet than Celebacy If a greater Anxiety doth ordinarily attend it that proceeds not from the nature of Marriage but the abuse of Men. And therefore Clemen Alex. answers to the Ancient Hereticks urging this very Text against Marriage What then Cannot those who please their Wives in a lawful way give thanks to God May not a Married Man together with his Marriage care for the things that belong to the Lord Further these Texts do no more prove the Necessity or Convenience of Priests Celibacy than it doth of all other Christians Nor can it be here pretended that the Clergy are more peculiarly devoted to the Service of God and therefore more particularly obliged to this Duty For first That would suppose some Excellency in Celibacy which we have proved cannot be found and then the Priests under the Old Law were no less solemnly Dedicated to God who yet were not debarred Marriage Besides the Church of Rome excludes not those from holy Orders who have either Buried their Wives or vow a perpetual Abstinence from them although they may have many Children then alive As if an equal Solicitude and Anxiety were not required to provide for Children begotten before as after